domo arigato mr. roboto

yumi and me standing in front of the Golden Pavilion

yumi and me in a rickshaw
yumi and me standing at the top of roppongi hills in front of tokyo tower

mount fuji from the bullet train
yumi and me with some harajuku girls
yumi, yumi's friend yuh yuh, yuh yuh's roommate chris, and myself at monkey park with a monkey!

holy cow. christmas, new years....japan! christmas was great. as most people can tell, i love christmas and i love being around my family. christmas eve was great, trivial pursuit was quick (although each year i start to answer more and more questions), video games were played, and family that wasn't physically there was in my thoughts (in michele's case she was in my computer!). christmas day was filled with more family and friends, good food, a dog (don't worry, not mine), a christmas story, and relaxation. my time of relaxation wasn't very long though. two days later i was off. 13 hours on a plane all the way to tokyo, japan to visit my roommate yumi. 10 days of awesomeness. it was so great. i got to see shrines and temples, walk through the imperial palace (which only happens 2 days out of the year) get to know yumi's family, learn some of the language (alright, not that much. geez japanese is hard), meet yumi's friends, site see around tokyo, experience the night life, and eat great food. omg it was really an amazing trip. new years is very big in japan. we had a great night filled with yumi's friends, a jazz bar, and lots of dancing. then i was able to go to the Meiji Jingu shrine which is a shrine for the new year. i just got back yesterday so i'm still jet lagged, but it was definitely worth it. japan was amazing and sooooo much fun. these are some pics to prove it!

home again home again

finally home! and glad to be here. i've already seen a lot of people and done some fun things. it's great to be home. 5 finals really fried my brain and so now i'm very excited to relax at home. the countdown begins for christmas eve and my trip to japan. Can't wait for either! in the busy holiday season, make sure to take a little time to yourself and just relax. 

last night a bunch of girls and i had our secret santa exchange. there were about 14 girls in totals. it was a lot of fun. it definitely got me in the christmas spirit. i love christmas and last night we had a lot of fun. i got a manicure as a present so i'm sure i'll be able to put that to good use. we all hung out and watched elf for a little bit. it was also a good break from studying for finals. everyone was dressed very festive, as were we; it was all a lot of fun. an early happy holidays to everyone!

3 days till home!!!

also, just wanted to say that aunt susan and her family are in my thoughts for this holiday season. 

give me some of your tots!

tonight is called eggsam which really means EGGSam. so there is breakfast in our dining hall that is supposed to be a study break. it actually already started. it's starts at 10 and goes until 12 midnight. it's pretty cool actually. a nice study break where basically the entire school is and the best part is that our professors and staff are the ones cooking for us. even the president of the college will be cooking for us. can't wait for the tator tots!

SNOOD

so my mom might not really like this post but oh well. hehe love you mom. anyways, i've gotten really into this game called snood. it's sooo awesome. there are like little figures that make faces and you need to get three of them in a row. it's so cool. i play all the time. i just recently got into a different version of the game which is so good. i got all of my roommates into it and we all play all the time. finals are coming up so hopefully i don't spend too much time playing snood. but for those of you who are looking for a good new game, i would definitely check out snood.

let it snow!

we had out first night of snow last night. the campus looks so pretty.....but i'm ready for it to go away now.

this is kind of hard

man college is kind of hard. even though i've only been back from break three days i feel like i've had an enormous amounts of work to do. well anyways, break was awesome. i loved being home. it was definitely relaxing and i got to see a lot of people. the food was great and thanksgiving was very nice. it was great to see my cousin daniel and i can only hope for the best for him. the ride back was awful. it took me 5 hours to get back instead of only three. the weather was gross and rainy and i was all by myself. then my internet stopped working, meaning something is now wrong with my computer. awesome. then i had a big group project to work on that included two late nights spent in the library with my group. today we presented and i think it went well so that's really good. finally the stress has all been relieved and i don't have much to think about until finals start a week from this thursday. and then home again for a whole month. yeah college is kind of stressful. i'm trying to make the best of it though and now i'm going to enjoy some nice relaxing days before finals.