Babies and Bullets

Hello again,

I know I’ve been gone for a while, but yes as Eli says I have been on spring break and relaxing. Well as relaxing as life can ever be.

First things first, I’ve been accepted to the University of Eau Claire! I know Elizabeth will get a little mad that I didn’t tell her directly, but here it is. I’m going to Eau Claire next year. I find that it is good timing since three of my history professors are leaving at the end of the semester and that is just three too many.

Anyway my vacation wasn’t as relaxing as I wanted it to be for two reasons, the first is that my cousin had her twins… three months early. They are beautiful twin boys, but at this time they will be at the Children’s Hospital in the Twin Cities until June. The twins were respectably 1 lb 6oz and 2lb’s each and the smaller of the two has an air pocket in his lung that is worrying. Her is a picture of one of them. There isn’t that many since their parents are more worried about survival than good picture taking, for obvious reasons.

This is a picture of the larger twin, along with the heading picture and the follow picture is of the smaller of the two.

However, my vacation wasn’t spent completely worrying over two very cute babies. I had homework to do and an Elizabeth to catch up with. My homework was not appreciated. I had to write a ten page paper on six films centered around the Cold War and the Vietnam War. There was a diverse collection containing, Dr. Strangelove, The Green Berets, Apocalypse Now, Rambo II, Platoon, and Red Dawn. I personally had the most trouble watching Apocalypse Now, since in incorporated more of war, which I cannot stand to watch. I almost got sick.

I did have a good vacation despite the horror that I saw in the movie and I’m glad to be back.

Anyway you have to love Dr. Strangelove and it’s satire on Atomic Weapon’s use and the dangers of war.

Changing Weather

I know. Anne knows. We haven’t posted for a couple weeks. Anne was on spring break for the past couple Tuesdays, and I’ve been super busy. Journalism takes a lot out of a girl.

But now it is spring break for me and I am happier than a bird with a french fry.

But it is ridiculously warm out. And even though I love it, it gets me worried. It’s March. And two weeks ago I was photographing this:

Pretty, Pretty icicles.

And now it was 80 degrees out today. And I believe it is going to thunderstorm tonight.

I don’t want to complain, because I’m sick of winter (and I love night thunderstorms), but it’s not going to be good when the trees start to bud and then it freezes.

It does make a nice day for walking and window browsing in downtown Eau Claire with your bestest friend, though. And taking nice, bright photos, to get a head-start on my photo club exhibit piece.

A little bird that makes me think of spring.

A Happy Girl With a Camera

This has been a up and down week for me.

Monday went as well as it’s been going for the past few weeks. And ‘well’ is not the word to describe it. Horrible. Tear-inducing. Any synonym for that. But, the week gets better, usually. And life goes on.

My mom’s dog Joy. A Jack Russel Terrier who is very photogenic.

This has been an interesting week. Monday’s Human Sexual Biology class had me becoming a hypochondriac as we had a lecture on the BRCA gene. Tuesday I got through a test in World History and a test in my Art History class. I’m pretty confident about those two tests. Wednesday Snowpocalypse  2012 hit western Wisconsin. I had doubted that it would really snow, because the formula for calculated the real amount of snow forecast-ed (as opposed to the fake amount of snow that the weatherman tells us) is to take the lower end of the forecast-ed number, divide it in half and subtract one. It was projected at first to be 4-8 inches of snow. So 4/2=2-1=1. No big deal. But then the number changed, and it was actually (sort of) right.

Slow shutter speed on the bridge facing The Hill. Notice The Hill is capitalized. Because it is that infamous.

What I’m saying is Wednesday was really bad. Living out in the country on a dead-end road usually means that we get plowed out last. Well, it also means that the power will go out. And out it went. I first noticed that the power was probably out when I woke up at 8: 20 and saw that my alarm hadn’t gone off. It took me a second to connect my blank screened clock with a power outage, but my sleepy brain got it. I then slept to 11:00. I got up and panicked because I couldn’t brush my teeth properly without water. Luckily the power came on just as I entered the bathroom. And then I went to class.

A shot of a script I’m starting. A friend and I want to do a silent movie and I’ve been working on some ideas.

Thursday was my exciting day. I went to classes, had an hour break before my time in the photo studio. The previous Saturday I had went to Best Buy and caved and bought a camera. Frankly, it was about time.

They were out of stock, so they told me to come in Thursday. And of course I went in.

And my new camera made my week.

The above photos are taken with my new camera.

Eau Claire

This is my university.

The view from the 7th floor of the humanities building. In the distance you can see a lovely bridge that is the worst to walk over during the winter,.

I’ll admit, when I first started here I thought I had made the wrong choice. It turns out that it wasn’t that way, I may just have been drug down by past events that made me want to get away from Eau Claire. Just this past summer I was still considering transferring to the University of Wisconsin-Madison once my junior year rolled around.

But then fall rolled around, and the first two weeks I thought to myself “this is going to be a long, stressful semester.” and in some ways it was stressful, but it flew by. And that kind of makes me sad, because as stressful as it was, it was by far the best semester I had.

This is the administration building--the oldest building on campus, built in 1916. By far my favorite builing.

And hopefully they just keep getting better.

This semester I got a job working  for the school paper as their staff photographer (work meaning unpaid), I’m taking more journalism classes and hoping that I don’t get nervous writing so many stories this semester, I’m joining organizations (photo and Society of Professional Journalists), and taking a studio photography class.

This is the view from the bridge (I've always wondered if it had a name). It's beautiful, but a cold place to walk.

I’m never going to be home.

But I don’t think I’ll mind, because it’s a great place to be.