unreal.

seriously... only one more final!
most of my friends are already done, so there has been some premature celebrating. ha. :]

on thursday, i found out that i won a prize for my poster. three of us won $200, and i was shocked and grateful to be one of the winners. the best prizes are the unexpected ones, huh?

that day, we had a lab lunch at genghis grill. i was a little nervous because i suggested we eat there, so i worried that people might not love it and would wonder what in the world i was thinking by suggesting we eat there. BUT they loved it. i'm fairly certain that i heard everyone say at some point that they wanted to go back... or so-and-so would love this place, i need to bring her here. :]

plus i rode out with dr. tittiger, and we had a nice talk on the way about grad school, traveling, james. yeah. we covered lots of ground. haha. he was encouraging about a trip to korea, and it was just interesting and nice to hear his input on things.

on friday morning, i had my evolution final bright and early at 7:30am. i'm fairly certain that i did well enough to keep my A in that class. woot!

then it was a mad rush to turn in my thesis to the honors program. it turned into a big ordeal. grr.
my honors advisor told me that all i had to do was submit a bound copy of my thesis and all would be fine. well... when i turned in my $7 kinkos bound copy, the lady asked me where my signature page was... umm... excuse me? wth is a signature page? then... she asked my where the other two copies were... umm? you're kidding me right? then... she flips through it and says "is this normal copy paper!?" seriously. all my (worthless) honors advisor told me was ONE BOUND COPY. nothing about a signature page. nothing about *three* copies. and certainly nothing about archival paper. [honestly, in 200 years no one is going to want to read my thesis.] i explained to them that in biochem, we don't have any sort of signature page. we don't even submit bound copies, let alone bound copies on archival paper. WE EMAIL IT. i subtly told them to get with the times, and i think they got the hint. :]
still. i had to come up with three archivally bound copies. so so so thankful to sharon in my lab for helping me find some cool watermarked unr archival paper and teaching me how to use the special binding machine in the department office. she was a true lifesaver.

the weekend was full of studying for the biochem final. so weird to think that it was the *last* time that all of us will study together. kinda sad really. the final was rough. i feel like i disappointed dr. welch by not doing as well as i should have. sigh.

but we did arrange a gift for him since he is retiring... we got a nice picture frame for the group photo from our CABNR dinner and most of us signed it. he genuinely seemed to appreciate it. :] i signed it dr. amy griffith "the one who is going to travel" because he and i had a long talk on friday about traveling. he said now is the time to take a year off and live because i'll never have the chance again. so when i turned in my final, he said "there she is... the traveler." ha.

immediately after the final we went to the wall [a bar across the street from campus] for lunch. everyone except me had a few shots/beers. yikes. then that evening, we had a bbq at mike's house. i was so tired. i wish i would have been a little more into the evening, but i just wasn't quite feeling it.

anyway. i was having trouble sleeping, so i thought it would be a good time to update. my blogging has been sparse lately, and i kind of regret that. i will get my photos uploaded one of these days though!

oh and today i picked up my organic spec exam 4 and i am sitting at a 90% average going into the final. it's so weird that you can go from feeling like you're going to fail [hopeless] to feeling like you can get an A [hopeful]. as i was walking with james after i picked it up, i said "i guess this is my lesson for the last semester of college... don't give up!" [too bad i didn't learn that one a little earlier... it could have helped in a couple other classes. haha.]

ok. better get some rest so i can do well on my final. it so doesn't feel like i am about to be done. the semester definitely feels done, but not school. so unreal still.