November 27th, 2011

So today is a day I won't soon forget that's for sure! Today was the day that I was initiated into the Delta Eta Iota sorority, but my day was memorable for very different and somewhat terrifying reasons. Throughout the morning and early afternoon, we were getting reports of the awful wind in Calgary and here in Lethbridge. Windows in office buildings in downtown Calgary were being blown in, they even shut down the downtown core at one point. Semi trucks were being blown over like they were made of paper, siding and roofs were being ripped off; it was truly terrifying. The wind here wasn't as bad. Only a little bit stronger than normal but there were tops of trees blowing about.

Later on, while Meagan and I were getting ready for our initiation, my friend Alicia walked in and said there was a funny colored cloud outside. So I'm not particularly concerned, more nervous about my initiation than anything but then we find out there's a wildfire just west of Lethbridge. Meagan and I then get a text from Jade, the President of the sorority telling us to get out of the city and go to her house in Coalhurst, so we jumped into the car and went straight to Coalhurst. We had to stop at Safeway on the west side before going because we were running out of gas. It took three of us to push open the car door so Meagan could get out an fill up. And everything was orange and hazy. It looked like something out of a natural disaster movie where everything is grossly exaggerated.

While we were driving to Coalhurst, we could see the fire from the highway. It was one of the scariest moments of my life, the wind was also so strong we almost blew off the road! I had never heard an Alberta warning before, its scarier than being beside the fire! It starts with a super annoying, obnoxious and anxiety-inducing buzzard then an automated woman's voice announces whatever's going on. I wasn't really scared until I heard that. Once we were at Jade's, she was running around trying to make sure everyone got here safe, then we spent a good hour watching the news, trying to get information about what was going on but the news was more concerned about elderly women in Quebec. At one point we got reports that the University had been evacuated, but my friend on DE4 texted me and told me that that was untrue. Jade was ready to grab sleeping bags from the garage for us and have us spend the night there. At about 8 p.m. we all got really hungry and since we hadn't started initiations yet we carpooled over to Coyotes, a gas station restaurant in Coalhurst. It was really nice to go out to supper as a sorority. Apparently that's going to be a new tradition. After we had supper it was about time to start initiations (which I can't really tell you anything about), after initiations, (which ended at 11 p.m.) it was time to go home. The threat for Lethbridge had passed and Jade was comfortable with letting us leave. Meagan, Kelsey and I went and picked up Meagan's friend Brandon before we came back to UHall, he was on the west side so it wasn't too far out of the way. All of Rez now smells like smoke, and I have a massive headache from it but we're all okay, everyone's home safe, ready for classes in the morning.

November 19th 2011

First of all, happy belated birthday to my sister Ashley, I don't think you got my text so now you can't say I didn't say it! You'll get your present at Christmas as well.

So for the past few mornings, Tiersa Reid (one of my best friends on the floor) and I have been going swimming to get some exercise. I love swimming! I find it so much nicer and less painful to swim laps for an hour than go to the gym. During weekdays we go at 7:30 - 8:30 and, depending on what time our classes start, we might do some gym exercises before hand. Today though we slept in for an hour and went at 8:30 instead. We went to the gym for an hour then swam for 45 minutes. I have been feeling so good the past few days. Plus I've been sleeping better! After the gym, we went grocery shopping with some others on our floor (Keltey, Haileigh and Kurt). Thank goodness because Sunday's are the hardest to get food here. Tim's isn't open and CJ's has a stupid buffet on, it's $15 a meal and the foods always cold and rubbery. Its kinda funny actually, most of the kids on my floor have made "emergency calls" home to ask for food! Kurt actually gets a care package every week! Boy I feel sorry for his parents who have to pay postage on all that.

Then it was time to get ready for the Cabaret. It's the last one of the semester and it was the formal Christmas Cab. I had bought a blue dress a few weeks back from a thrift store and it was really pretty. I had a ton of fun with everyone! Tickets were $30 but that included buses there and back, supper, prizes and the dance. The food was alright but the dance was fun. It was nice to see everyone dressed up in their best.

After the cab, Alicia, Veronica, Kurt, Nicki and I hung out in the common room watching Toy Story and Stardust. Kurtis spilt a whole box of Kraft dinner on the floor. Pretty much everyone but Veronica and I were drunk. It was very entertaining!

November 11th - 14th 2011

So this weekend wasn't as boring as I thought it would be. Everyone except like 5 of us went home for the long-weekend but we managed to have fun anyways.

It started off easy. Alicia and I got up early to watch the Remembrance Day Ceremonies in Ottawa, Edmonton and Lethbridge. We wen't to the one in Lethbridge but it was at noon so we actually caught 3 ceremonies in one day! It wasn't the nicest outside but in Lethbridge, wind is nothing. While waiting for the bus back to the University, Alicia and I went to the Bargain store and bought some Christmas decorations for our rooms. That night, Kurt, Alicia, Casey and I went to the Void (kinda like a game room for rezzors) and played a few games of pool and watched "The Pagemaster" and "Ella Enchanted". At 1 a.m. the R.A. on duty came and closed the void so we had to go back to the common room where I showed Kurt Labyrinth for the first time! We now have a new convert Shannon! At 3 a.m. we decided to go to bed.
Saturday, I decided to start decorating my room and my door.

Alicia and I spent hours cutting out paper snowflakes. My room looks really cool now, including some plastic Christmas balls suspended from my roof. 

Sunday was left to studying and we got a surprising amount done. But Alicia wanted to go out and take photo's before the snowstorm was to hit Monday so I put on my formal dress that I bought and we went out and took artistic photo's. I'll put some up on my blog once she's finished editing them.

Monday was back to classes as usual. My Psychology midterm was today and I got 80% on it! All this week there's a poster sale going on in the Atrium and you can get posters as big as the wall for $20. I bought a few for really cheap and I'm super excited about them!

This one was called solitude

Van Gogh's "Peach Blossoms"

This one is "Apple Blossoms"

I also got a few more as Christmas presents so I won't show them here.

Now I'm back to studying for my Geography midterm tomorrow and my Economics midterm on Thursday. 

November 9th, 2011

So life's been extremely hectic lately with 6 midterms in the next two weeks! Plus this morning was pretty eventful. I awoke at 6 am to a faint but obnoxious, high-pitched beeping. I thought I was going crazy for a minute or two. I knew it couldn't be the buildings fire alarm because I have one in my room and it wasn't going off. Then I heard people walking up and down the hallway and I peeked out. Turns out, the fire alarm in one of the rooms on the far end of the girls hall was going off for no reason. Security was called and, when they couldn't figure out how to turn it off, ripped it out of the wall! I was so happy when it turned off. I had been up until 3 a.m. previous to that studying for the two midterms I had today. They went pretty well. French was easy and I'm expecting a fairly high mark on that. Religious Studies however I'm not so sure. The test was on Hinduism and its the first test we've had with our new teacher. Our last teacher specialized in Western Religions and we've now completed them. Hopefully all went well though, fingers-crossed! Considering how much studying I've been doing, I figured I earned a night off tonight so I went to the gym for a few hours with Kurt and Tiersa, watched a movie with some other people on the floor. Then Kevin came home and we rehearsed our set for open mic night. At 11 p.m. it's quiet hours in Rez  (Kurt had joined us by this point) so we went up to one of the music practice rooms that Kevin has a key to and jammed out, rehearsed some Christmas Carols, until 12:15 when Kevin made us come home because he needed sleep. My next midterm starts on Saturday so I'll knuckle down after classes tomorrow!

October 28-31, 2011

Hi everyone!

Sorry I haven't blogged in a while, mid-terms are horrible and I've been really busy.

Over the past few weeks I've gradually been doing more and more with the sorority such as going to Sister Sundays, going out for drinks and handing out flyers for the various volunteer activities we've been doing. I'm really glad I joined the sorority.

This weekend was Halloween and I had a ton of fun! There was a Halloween Cabaret in the Zoo, and it was ok. Nothing super exciting unfortunately but I still had a blast that night. My costume was a "Victorian Masquarade" theme that I thought I did pretty well. 

Here's Alicia and I dressed in our masks. We hung out and dance at the Cab for a bit then came home and had a floor party of our own before the majority of people went out to Studio 54.

Saturday night, Chelsea, Tiersa and I went to a showing of the movie Rocky Horror Picture Show and if you want to watch it, let me warn you it’s not for the feint hearted. During the movie there’s a whole bunch of actions, activities and things you’re supposed to yell out at certain parts. It was so cool! I can’t even describe it to you, I’m sorry. I didn’t get home until midnight though after stopping at McDonalds for a late night supper.

Sunday I had another Sister Sunday with Delta Eta Iota. We did pizza making and T-Shirt making. I’m happy about that because it means I’ll have my own Delta Eta Iota shirt with the logo on it to wear around so I can actually prove I’m in a sorority! The pizzas were fantastic! We used pita breads, covered them in pizza sauce and various other toppings of our choosing then baked them until the cheese was melted, yum they were tasty! I love hanging out with the sisters, they’re all just so cool. And it really helps to know others who are in the same major that you are, they give you little tidbits and tricks for succeeding in that field.

Monday night (Halloween) was the Sororities “Trick or Eat” event where we went around door to door collecting non-perishable food items to donate to the Salvation Army. Kaylee and I collected two full garbage bags of canned goods and macaroni from only 30 houses! I was so impressed with the people in Lethbridge, there were only a few houses who said they had nothing to spare, some houses even gave us several Safeway bags full of stuff! It really makes you feel like your making a difference when doing stuff like that. Plus, I got to see a bunch of cute little kids in costumes, some pretty inventive too, like a little girl who was a dice. There was also a little boy, maybe 4 years old, dressed as Mickey Mouse while his mother walked him around, she was dressed as Minnie Mouse and the dog she had with them was Pluto!

After the Trick or Eat, there was another Rez Wars event, Halloween Decorating Contest! Our floor was dressed to the nine’s! Plus everyone on the floor dressed up and participate, which was nice to see as a lot of people stay hidden in their rooms most of the time. We had Zombies and “Giant rats” banging on doors when people walked by. We even had original music playing, created by Steph on our floor. We came in 3^rd unfortunately, but we beat DE3 which is our biggest competition! 

All in all, this Halloween has been a ton of fun!

I’ll try and write again soon, but I really can’t make any promises as Mid-terms are here again, boo!