Wahooo! I saved! Wednesday September 20, 2006

I just hate it when I am supposed to go to a “mandatory” lecture and it really has nothing to do with me. That is what happened today; I went to a lecture on the Department of Science and Technology, and it was pretty much useless unless you were a freshman. That is how I spent my first hour on campus. I timed the walk from my house to campus and it is 20min. This is not too bad, but it will probably take longer when it is really cold, rainy, and windy. The whole day, I was just running around from campus to my house then back to campus then into town centre, back to various locations on campus, and finally at 5:30pm I came home. All this hustle and bustle was well worth it because I saved about $900. This was possible, because when I finally got internet access today I found out that some of my other loans had gone through and I did not have to pay some of the admin fees and received a $600 discount. J I guess in the long run it does not seem like much, but every penny counts. Also, with all my outings today I tried to set up a bank account; what a hassle! One bank will give me a card to withdrawal money from the ATM with no minimum deposit, but not a debit card. If I want to get a debit card, I need to initially deposit $10,000. What student has this just laying around? Now the other bank, I get a debit card, but I have to pay $100 for a 12 month account. I will probably pay the $100 because, I don’t like dealing only in cash.

Tonight for dinner I had this canned pasta dinner…there is a reason why it only cost a $1.20. I should have known, but I’m cheap. I had dinner with two other girls at the house, but I feel bad, because one girl wants everyone to eat together. I really want to tell her she is out of her mind, but she is so naive. She also wants to pull money together so that we all share some food stuff, but I will not participate in this. I have lived with people before, and sharing food just causes problems.

Last week I did laundry and it was interesting to say the least. For laundry soap you have two choices: biological and non-biological. I don’t know why you would choose something that is less environmentally friendly; they both cost the same price? First of all the washer is very very small. I put a few things in and picked the cycle labeled “fast colors”. No clue what “fast colors” really means; but I know that it does not mean that the cycle is fast. I went to my room after I started the washer and an hour later went down to switch over the laundry to the dryer…it wasn’t done! Ninety minutes later, the wash cycle was still not done. Finally, two hours later, washing was complete. The dryer was fine, but I do not think dryer sheets are very popular here. This is evidenced by the fact that 40 dryer sheets cost $4. I think my clothes will be just fine without the use of a dryer sheet.

I live in an all girl house, and sometimes the toilet seat is up in the bathroom??? Well, it is not that boys are visiting, but it has to do with the French girl. After she goes to the bathroom, she fills up a water bottle, lifts the seat, and pours it in the toilet. Now I only know this because I can hear her slam the seat up against the lid and pour the water down the toilet. I don’t know much, if anything, about French culture; but this is quite bizarre.

Something strange, is that one of the people in my program is actually a doctor! I have no clue why he is back in school; but I tried to ask him, I just didn’t understand through his thick accent.

Lastly, yesterday I did not write, because I went with my friends to Southport. Josh is a bobby there and he had to go into work so a few of us were going to walk around the city. This sounds great, but actually it was BORING. When Josh told me he had to go into work, he made it sound like was going to be for about an hour. What he really meant was that he had to work from 6pm – 11pm. So four of us spent 5 hours walking around and really seeing nothing! I’ll have to get more details next time.



Pictures of Southport


the ocean ??? /not the best lighting for the church