Much as I enjoy college (well, I am actually pretty ready to be done.  I mean, I have been here for 4 years and am going to be stuck here for another one...I technically am a senior so aren't I allowed to have senioritis, too?  But that is a whole different blog post...) 

Anyway

I do enjoy college, but my biggest problem is living in my crappy university apartment (ah...could I be an interior design major?).  Well, it's not so bad, but there are some necessities I do miss.  Like a kitchen table.  It is super annoying to make a nice meal (or even a not-so-nice meal) and have to eat it at the ugly I-am-trying-to-look-like-wood veneer coffee table, or else at the kitchen peninsula with tedious stools that have no backs, so it completely wrecks any attempt at posture by forcing one to eat hunched over their food.  

It would also be nice to be able to actually DO something to an apartment.  Like paint it whatever color I want, or get furniture that I actually like.  A big problem with this is the transient state I am always in, being that I have not stayed in one place for more than 9 months (although factor in that winter break is for an entire month in the middle of that) in the past 4 years.  Buying too much furniture or things like that just amount to more stuff that needs to be hauled in and out every year during move in/out, and storage, of course, is always a problem during the summer months.  Not to mention that I have little drive to even attempt to decorate a place that I am going to be in for so little time.  Not only is it for a mere 9ish months, but when I am at school I tend to not spend time at my apartment because I am so busy working in the design building or involved with other extra-curricular things.  

My impermanent housing situation is only going to compound itself in the next year, since during the summer I will be on an internship somewhere (Minnesota?  Wisconsin?) and then will be in Rome for the fall semester, end up at home over winter break, before winding up back here in the spring to finish classes and graduate before heading to Madison (I think).  Don't get me wrong, I am looking forward to these things.  It would just be nice to have a place to call home that actually felt like a home.  Mom's and dad's house doesn't quite cut it anymore...and anyplace I am when I am not there is still just too brief to make it feel like mine...and I really do miss having a kitchen table.

ESP

I am pretty sure that Tyson and I can read each other's minds...

you know your shopping trip has been successful when you have saved more than you have spent...

Chipotle: $12 Free (with a gift card)

One cashmere-blend scarf: $98 $25

One pair of khakis for my boy: $48 $9

One sweater: $39.50 $15

Another sweater: $59.50 $47

One soft sweater for my boy: 29.50 $12.50

Hand soap: $10 $3

One track jacket for my boy: $50  $40

Dinner (including one delicious pomegranate margarita): $49.53

One full day of bonding with my boy: priceless 

Above: my favorite deal of the day, which actually turned out to be $25 when I brought it up to the register

i now get to put some letters after my name...

I PASSED!!!

Peace,

Shannon Jay, LEED AP

Monday + snow + 1st day of school = ...

When it is only 10 o' clock in the morning, and it feels like it is about noon, (*sigh*, it's STILL not noon!), you know you are in for a long day...

Dear Mr./Ms. Computer Lab In-Charge Person,

Don't update the ENTIRE computer lab over break unless you do it right.  It is very frustrating to come back over break and not have my flash drive recognized/tell me that I am not authorized to access my OWN stinking flash drive/not allow me to do anything with my flash drive if I can get it open (i.e. not make new folders or put any new files on the drive).  Using a flash drive seems like a pretty basic function of computers and any issues with it should be resolved before you have hundreds of students coming back to your building.

Thanks,

ShayJay

And I found out that my option studio class, for which we are building a cabin in South Sioux City, Nebraska, also meets on Fridays, not just on Mondays and Wednesdays like I originally thought.  I have not had class on Fridays for the past year and a half...call me spoiled, but this sucks.  No less because it is a 4 hour (yes, hour) class from 1:10-5:20.  Yuck.  This makes things additionally complicated because I plan on doing interviews on Fridays for my internship, and missing a 4-hour studio class does not sound like a very good plan.  However, we are also told that since as interior design students we have Fridays "free", that any absenses in our interior design classes because of job interviews are not excused, which also excludes the other 4 weekdays.  *sigh*  This is probably not the semester to finally have class on Fridays.  I am excited for the class otherwise though, although it would have been nice to know exactly when it met before the very first day of classes...

cars

What I am going to miss about my Jeep:

• heated seats
• built-in thermometer
• programmable buttons for things (like the garage door)
• my 10-cd changer
• 4-wheel drive (no fear even on snowy roads)
• automatically adjusting drivers seat with programmable settings for 2 people
• the button i push that tells me how many more miles before i run out of gas
• the big back storage area

What I am excited for in my "new" Cutlass:

• 85,000 miles (as opposed to almost 160,000)
• way better gas mileage
• i still have a sunroof
• i probably look more in proportion to the vehicle i drive
• it is very, very clean
• the stuff i haul around will be hidden in the trunk, not blocking my view through the back window
• the speakers all work
• it does not beep every time i start it and say "please perform service" even though nothing is wrong

What I still miss about my Jimmy (my first car):

• the bright blue color
• it was a beast and could handle anything

oh the irony

If only the USGBC knew how much paper I was using (wasting) to help study for their LEED exam...

blah

While flipping through my most recent issue of Architectural Digest (which persists in coming to my house in Minnesota...for some reason I get about half of my mail at my apartment in Iowa and half of it in Minnesota...) I noticed that most of the projects featured were rather...bland.  Now don't get me wrong, there wasn't really anything wrong with any of the projects individually.  I actually truly liked the majority of them, and they featured interesting furniture selections or other nice components.  Taken as a whole, however, the magazine was pretty blah.  I flipped through it once, but when I was thinking about it later realized that I could not really recall anything specific from any individual project.  Upon looking through it again, I realized that if I had not known any better, I would have throught all of the images were from the same project.  Every design (except one, which featured different shades of blue interspersed throughout the residence...but otherwise was no different) was in the same neutral color palette.  

Basically I just found it interesting that in such a luxurious and highly respected publication, they would not feature more diversity.  I mean, do you know what kind of work it takes to get featured in their pages?  I don't mean to make them sound completely awful, though.  This is the first time I can remember (in about a year and a half of receiving the magazine monthly) feeling so disappointed in an issue.  I'll have to pay close attention in the future and see how I feel about what is being featured.

Some good did come from this disappointment, though.  I remember last year looking at the senior interior design students gallery show that displayed their range of work from being in the interior program.  Each student had a fill-in-the-blank profile next to their work, and one of the things each of them had to answer was their "design philosophy".  I have been thinking about that off-and-on ever since then, because while I have had a somewhat vague idea in my head about what my personal design philosophy is, I have not been able to nail it down.  Now, however, I know exactly what will go in that blank:

"Create every project to have its own personality, like something nobody has ever seen before."