The Stars That Usher Evening Rose

William left today. Cathy came and picked him up around 5:30pm. But before they left we went to eat at the Mellow Mushroom in downtown Asheville. Since most of the parking there is along the streets I had to parallel park for the first time since I took my drivers test to get my license five years ago. Surprisingly I did it perfectly even Cathy was surprised. Took us a while to find that parking place though we had to drive around the block about three times before it opened up. We also drove around the downtown area a little before and after eating and Cathy said "Yeah you can definitely tell this is a college town", course I already knew that and have said that many times. I asked her what tipped her off and she said that half the people are hippies or hippie wantabees even the older people. I thought that was pretty funny, but it is true. Anyway after eating we left and came back to the dorm were William grabbed his stuff and they headed out the door and hit the road around 7pm or so. Due in part to basically no notice of him coming up here and really lack of ideas for things he could do around here we pretty much did nothing other than going out to eat a few times and he played the PS2 a lot especially when I was in class. It was nice having him around though even if we didn't do much. But, now the wait begins for Michael and Matt to get up here on Friday.

This past weekend as I said I would I went to Cathy's. We stopped by blockbuster and rented Final Cut. It was a decent movie. I can see why a lot of people would not like it though, because it is not what you would call action packed. But it has an intriguing storyline and it is one of those movies that make you think in order to fully follow it and even so still left me wondering what just happened after it was over. And I like movies that leave you slightly dumbfounded at the end. While there I got a call from Matt saying that he and Michael may not being able to come up this weekend because his work suddenly through a mandatory training session on him this Friday. Luckily though he has been able to reschedule the training and so they are still coming. On Sunday before I left we all went over to my other sister's (Jeralyn) place and had a Easter dinner. Unfortunately since I had to leave for school and because Cathy misjudged time we were not able to stay very long.

Also while there at Cathy's before leaving for Jeralyn's I mentioned to William that come next Fall he would be able to come visit and stay with me here at my school. Next thing I knew he had a plan in action to try to come up here this week since he has Spring Break this week. Since no one was at the school Sunday evening he was not able to come up with me when I did. But today they talked to them at the school had everything set up and now he is up here with me until Wednesday afternoon when his mom will pick him back up. Then Friday afternoon Matt and Michael arrive. When Cathy and the kids got up here today we left and went to go get something to eat. Knowing that Cathy has been dying to try that Jimmy Buffet owned restaurant called "Cheeseburger In Paradise" that is here in Asheville we decided to go there. I had the "The Shaken Bacon, Burger" (I think it was called) which has bacon, lettuce, tomato, onion (though I got it without onion), mayonnaise, and cheddar cheese. I was really surprised to find how good they actually are. Even their fries were extremely good. Matt, Michael and I also plan to go up there Friday for dinner to get something to eat.

Now I sit at work typing this as William sits in here and watches TV waiting for me to get off work. Not sure what exactly he and I are going to do while he is here since he doesn't have much money but I am sure we will figure out something.

Tomorrow morning I will leave to go to Cathy's place. She has been asking me to come since it is Easter weekend. Supposedly she and Jeralyn have some Easter dinner (or lunch in our case since I have to leave Sunday) thing planned on Sunday. We do not have classes tomorrow so that is why I will be able to leave in the morning. This will probably be the last time that I head over to Charlotte for a weekend for the rest of the school year. Michael and Matt come up next weekend and after that I have two big projects, one of which is a group project, that I have to work on and both are due at the end of April.

As for that December 23, 2012 date the only other thing I have found is that they(the Mayans) actually did not pick that month/date/year it is just that the date they picked on their own calendar when translated to our current calendar comes out to be December 23, 2012. Though I am still curious as to why they believe it will end then and if it is actually the end they predict or just the beginning of the end.

Spring sucks. Only thing that I like about Spring are the storms. Being the weather nerd that I am anything that has lightning catches my attention. Hell anything besides sunny days catch my attention but especially storms. Kind of weird considering I used to be scared to death of storms as a kid. Maybe that is why I am so fascinated by them today. But other than that I can think of no positives of Spring. It means that warm and hot weather is on the way and I hate hot weather. Also means allergy season and already this early into Spring my allergies are starting to act up and not much sucks more than not being able to breath and having an occasional sore throat. Winter needs to come back and unfortunately it will be a while before it does.

My Humanities lecture today was about the tribes in Central America. While the professor was talking about the Mayans he mentioned that they predicted the end of the world would be December 23, 2012. This raised a lot of questions in my mind. As in where did they get the date from? While spending a few seconds looking it up supposedly the 23 came from the letter "W" the 23rd letter in the alphabet. But why the letter "W" and why the year 2012? Knowing the Mayans were very good astronomers then do they think we are going to be killed off by a large meteor like the dinosaurs were or in some other way related to astronomy? These were all questions that came to mind plus some when he mentioned the date. I plan to look more up on this to try and answer some of these questions because I would like to know where the date came from. I also could not help but notice the closeness of the date to Christmas. I know that Christmas has nothing to do with the date since obviously the Mayans did not have Christmas, But I still found it interesting. I am sure as that date gets closer and closer we will start hearing more and more about it. Hell now its just over 7 and 1/2 years away. Not all that long when you really think about it. Here is to hoping they are wrong, which they probably are but as long as that date is in the future then who the fuck knows. Anything is possible, course it is all absurd anyway. :P

Winter keeps hanging on. All day Wednesday it rained and then overnight that night it changed over to snow dumping about 2 inches of snow on us by morning. This in turn cancelled classes on Thursday. Which sucked and kicked ass all at the same time. It kicked ass for obvious reason in that I got to sleep in, didn't have to go to class, and didn't have to take a test that was scheduled for that day. But it also sucked because we had next Thursday and Friday as snow make-up days off which ment a four day weekend. But, thanks to the snow and class being cancelled on Thursday we now have classes next Thursday. Luckily though we still get that Friday off so it is not all lost.

Tonight I watched the movie Phantoms which is based off of a Dean Koontz book by the same name. The movie overall was decent I guess. Had some fairly well known actors and actresses in it such as, Peter O'Toole, Ben Affleck, Rose McGowen, and Liev Schrieber. The movie is about a town called Snowfield, CO. where everyone has seemed to have been killed and the main characters set out to try and figure out what is going on and how to stop it. The movie is loosely based on fact, in that it brings up the fact that there have been real cases where entire towns or civilizations have completely vanished. The movie started out fairly poorly though as they seemed to try to hard to scare you and because of that it was very predictable. But as the movie went on it progressively got better and become increasingly more interesting as the storyline began to build and of course the ending gives you that small little twist that leaves you hanging. Anyway I have a headache so I am going to go slam my head into a brick wall now.

I did something today that I have never done before. That is I withdrew from a class. I withdrew from my Clac. II class because I have basically no chance of passing it. I would have to ace everything including the final from here on out to pass the class and that is pretty unlikely. I still plan to attend class though just not for a grade. Reason being is that I will be able to see the rest of the material throughout the rest of the semester and get a head start when I take the class next time. Plus right now I either have an A or extremely close to an A in my other classes so I potentially could have a 4.0 GPA at the end of the semester without the Calc. II class. I have never had a 4.0 GPA for a semester before in my life and actually only gotten over a 3.0 GPA twice before. So hopefully I will be able to pull it off because that would be awesome.

I finished reading "Blindness " by Jose Saramago. That book is pretty fucked up in a way that it shows what is wrong with people in this word today. It shows our weaknesses and what people are willing to do when put in certain positions or conditions. While reading the book you realize that for the most part he is exactly right. One thing that is pretty cool about the book as that Saramago does not give any of the characters names. Instead he idenifies them by other things such as there is the doctor, the doctors wife, the thief, the boy with the squint, the girl with dark glasses and so on, but never names. So finishing that book I went to Barnes and Noble today and bought a new book. This time going back to Dean Koontz and his book named "Whispers".

I have returned to Asheville. I arrived back in town around 6:30pm yesterday. The last few days at Cathy's were nothing overly interesting. Jacqueline came down with strep throat on Saturday so she was pretty much bed ridden for the last two days that I was there. Hopefully I wont catch it as that is the last thing I need. Though Saturday I did get a lot done. That morning I got $100 out of the bank and within 24 hours spent $87 of it. First William and I went to get hair cuts, which was $14 for me. Then William and I went to go pick out a new cell phone for me since I probably am going to go back to Cingular soon. Then we went and got lunch which was about $25 for the two of us. Then left from there to get my car washed which cast me $24. That night we somewhat watched the movie "Eight Man Out" but though most of it William and I made fun of the movie by giving characters different goofy names and so on. Sunday when I left I put $24 in the gas tank which is the final of that $87.

Today has been and up and down day so far. I got my Calc. Test back that we took back before Spring Break that I thought I had passed only to find out that I failed it. But my ATMS 241 class this afternoon was cancelled so that made up for some of it. Now I sit at work, being bored. Ready for Spring Break to come back which unfortunately is impossible.

On another boring note to most is that my favorite driver Mark Martin who won two weeks ago just won the Bush Race at Las Vegas for his 47th career Busch Series victory extending his own record. I feel like I am forgetting to post about something, oh well if I remember I can always post it later.

Spring break so far for the most part has been fairly boring, well partly because there really isn't anyone here half the time so all there really is to do is watch tv and play video games. Though there still have been a few interesting moments.

First of which was on Tuesday. Cathy was home because her computer at work had the hard drive crash so she had to get a new one. So she was sitting at the computer and got up and moved over to the Reese (their guinna pig) and started saying "Oh my God" over and over again. At first I thought that something bad had happened to guinna pig, like maybe it had gotten hurt or something. After asking "what?" for about the fourth time she finally says "Oh my God, she is having babies." Not sure if I was to believe her or not I walked up to the cage and lo and behold there were these three little baby guinna pigs in there with her. Which seeing that explained how she had gotten so big because we were just thinking that she had gotten really fat but she was actually pregnant. They named them, Cocoa, Peanut, and Butter the ingredients in Reeses Peanut butter cups. Talking to the vet they said you can not hold the babies for two weeks because the mother might reject them if we do and that they have to stay with the mother four weeks and then they can give them away. Depending on the sexes of the babies they might keep one. They only will keep another girl because they do not want more babies. So if there is atleast one girl then they will keep that one and Jeralyn will get one and then the other will probably go the pet store since they have offered to take some if needed.

Also I finally got my car inspected today. The last inspection expired at the end of January so I needed it. But it wasn't without hassle. We originally went yesterday but I had lost my registration for the plate so we went to the NCDMV to get another print out of it. But they told us that they could not give it to us because I owed a property tax on it. That was the first I had heard of owing any property tax. I called my dad to see if he had heard anything about it and he told me that he hadn't. So I figured that I would call the county when we got back to the house to figure out what the cost was and pay it. But before we even made it home Jeralyn called telling me that she was already talking to them and asked me what my plate number was. So I gave her that info and she did all the work for me and even paid the tax for me which she took off the money she owes my dad. So that made me able to go down there today and get my print out and get the car inspected. Now I only need to get it washed. And get my haircut.

Not sure If I mentioned it already or not but William now has braces. On top of that he chose pink braces. Not sure why he just said he felt like it. He also has this crank thing at the top of his mouth that he has to take one turn on a day for 16 days straight. That is for the widening of his jaw. It is funny hearing him talk because now he slurs a lot of his words. Though he still is far from figuring out how to eat with them as it takes him much longer to eat than it does anyone else.

Casey, their dog, has been a real pain in the ass. She keeps chewing everything and peeing on the floor. Also like Clancy if she gets out she takes off running and you have to chase after her. Like this evening she got out and William and I had to chase her down. I literally made a diving tackle to catch the dog but only got her by one leg and so when I brought my arm around to wrap her up I accidentally punched her in the face. But we got her. Also any open door whether its the bathroom door or the pantry door she is right there and has to go inside. We have accidentally closed her in the Pantry about three times this week. Even opening the refig and she tries to climb in. Plus when the guinna pig babies were being born she had to be right there and know what was going on. So we would just pick her up and she would just watch. Never seen a dog so enthralled by something like that.

Other than a few stops at the grocery store and other errands that is pretty much my Spring break in a nutshell. Very exciting I know. Tomorrow night we do plan to go see the movie "Robots" as it does come out tomorrow. That's it for now I guess, I will post again on Sunday when I get back to school, unless something insane thing happens before then that bares earlier posting.

One more class to go, plus tutoring, before I am out of here for Spring Break. I will probably post atleast once while there and of course when I get back to school, to let you all know what is going on. I am going to my sisters in Charlotte since I don't feel like making that 9 hour drive to Orlando by myself, and there are not exactly a lot of people from Florida that go here that I could possibly carpool with. As a matter of fact I only know one other person from Florida who goes here and she is from Tampa. But luckily for me I have family who are much closer.

I have had two bloody noses that I know of in my life. Both of which were this morning. I woke up about 7am this morning and set up for a second and my nose started running at first I didn't know it was blood until I put my hand up there and came back with blood on it. After a few minutes it stopped but I noticed I had gotten some blood on the sheets. Just my luck. So I laid back down and went back to sleep. Then my alarm went off a couple hours later and again I sat up and again my nose started running and again it turned out to be blood. So after a few minutes I got that one stopped to. I am not sure what caused them. I just found it unusual since I never have bloody noses and then have two in one morning. On another note I have finished my two test, one of which I almost positive I aced and the other one I am not sure about but I think I passed it.

It never ceases to amaze me how each year goes by faster and faster. I mean it literally still seems like it was last night that it was new years and now it is March. If at 22 years old the years are moving this fast I do not even want to think about how fast they are going to go 40+ years from now.

Snow and Cold. That pretty much sums what the weather here since Sunday night. Overnight Sunday we got 2 inches of snow here which cancelled school on Monday. Today we have had classes but earlier today we wondered if we were even going to make it though the day. Around 10:20am or so it started snowing again and quickly picked up in intensity to basically whiteout conditions that lasted about 30+ minutes. In that time it dumped about a half inch of snow on the ground. But by the time my 11am class started the snow had stopped and then the sun came out melting all but the snow that was in shad. Since then we have had off and on snow showers, like the one currently as I type this, but none of these have been anywhere near as heavy as the one this morning and have not really stuck to the ground. On top of this snow it has been extremely cold. Like today we never even saw 30 degrees. The temps have been in the mid to upper 20s all day with windchills in the teens. I am dreading tomorrow morning because windchills are supposed to be below zero.

I have two test at the end of this week that I have not even started studying for. They are both big ones. One of which counts for 25% of my final grade. I keep getting side tracked by other things that I find more interesting. With spring break on the horizon I seem to be turning lazy this week. Hopefully tomorrow I will be able to get some stuff done.

I talked to my mom tonight and asked her about Clancy since I had not really heard anything for a while about him. She said he is doing ok. That his back legs seem to be getting stronger as he no longer falls into his poop when he takes a dump. She said taking him out of the cage has seemed to be the right thing to do as he has seemed to be doing much better outside of it than he was doing in it. Also she mentioned that her sister/my aunt and her husband/my uncle are coming up to look at a house in the same neighborhood this weekend. Supposedly the house is selling cheap. So we shall see what happens with that. I must admit it would be extremely weird this summer if I do stay in Orlando to have my Aunt and Uncle in the same neighborhood along with my great aunt who has already moved there.