Bless my lucky little stars.

Besides several somewhat minor irritating annoyances (dying car, shin splints, lack of funds, AP starting, etc) life has been pretty decent (despite the fact that AVH is missing from it).

Got myself out on a sailboat for.the.first.time.since.being.home. Glorious. Like all things American the process was much more organized than anything ever was in ZA. Big K (the club caretaker) sent me out on a JY15 with a talkative gal, my "instructor", who proceeded to dump at least three novels full of information and terms on me. I sat there staring at her as she maneuvered the boat around the lake until she finally looked at me and said, "did you get all of that?" I just kinda laughed, telling her that I ride horses and it's basically the same thing. (ok, ok yes I told her that but I followed it with: you can tell me all the technical stuff but until I feel what it's supposed to feel like I won't ever really know.) Then we broke the boat and she freaked out. If she only knew the things we did in ZA. Henceforth, my new observation is that Americans are up-tight.

Had DM's kids over for one night and it was great because the sisters were together again. We spent the afternoon gallivanting around town, trying to find fairy doors, and eating ice cream before dinner (shhh!). Rented a movie after dinner, the only restriction being that it couldn't be a cartoon. Gave my bed up to them for the evening, found myself pleased to be on the second floor so I could hear the rain on the roof. Then spent the next morning in our pajamas lying on my bed talking about (little) girly things.

This morning Felicita and I had a 'coming to Jesus' ...meaning we both had fun. (imagine that!) I was so pleased with my ride, as was DM, that we attempted to start scheming a way to convince The Boss into letting me take her horse to The Working Student Position of a Lifetime after I graduate. But, in reality, that will probably never happen. So I'll just dream on.

Received my first real mail from the RSA and flopped onto my bed with delight to read it. Then I concluded that the joys of receiving non-bill-related postage are underrated.

It's actually cold enough that I can drink Rooibos without sweating my face off. My mum suggests that I should just not drink tea when it's 85F and 100% humidity but I tell her that 1) I'm addicted and 2) it makes me think of ZA and that makes me happy. (oh and 3) it's good for you).

Today the AP did one of the best things it could do for me this semester: change the professor of my required pre-req class (yeah, that's right, to the major I'm almost finished with) to my most favorite professor. The enormity of this change is larger than I could ever convey. Oh bless my little 8:30am course, I now have reason to get out of bed to make it on time!

To top it off, last week the academic advisor not-so-much-of-doom not only approved my Politics course from The Adventure of a Lifetime, she also gave me a concentration release form. I said, what's that? She said the end is near. I smiled. That's kinda frightening.

So with that, what should I do when I'm not in Academic Prison anymore?
(that's the question of the year, I'm now accepting bids.)