Whatever I Feel Like I Wanna Do, Gosh!

Sorry I've been such a bad little blogger lately. It's mostly because I've actually been exploring. It's also partially because of this:

Yep. I redo this baby at least every other day.
You should see it now. It's color coded and beautiful.

BUT on the I've-Actually-Been-Leaving-My-Room front, here's a short rundown of what I've been doing for the last week or so:

- I started my job. So far, so good. It's pretty straightforward and easy. It might get boring, but I'm happy to be working from home... at least I can play good music!

- I met the 2nd year students in my program. There are 8 of them (there are 3 of us), and they all seem really great. Two of them already have jobs, which they're using for their student teaching. Myself and the other two first years kinda see that as living the dream.

- I've been bonding with the people in my program, whom we'll refer to as Miss M and Mister M, no relation. We went out to dinner on Tuesday night, and I really think we got to know each other quite well. We haven't aired all of our baggage or anything yet, but we really do love each other already. It's nice that all of us jumped in and felt the same way: We're going to be a close-knit group. Let's skip the awkward phase and just be best friends.

- I've been taking pictures with my iPhone. Not of people though. Still working on that part.

This is the courtyard between my dorm and my school building.
Seriously, sometimes I feel like I go to Hogwarts. And this isn't even the pretty part.

- I went out with Roomie S's college friends, which was super fun. I got to explore Midtown East, which is a totally new area for me. Sure, there's some touristy stuff around there that I've seen, but the NYC bar scene is a whole new world for me.

- I watched the Gator game at one of the local Gotham Gators bars with my good friend and fellow Gator-transplant Jungle K. It was much more low-key than the Atlanta Gator bar I went to with my sister. But it was nice to see an old friend, make some new ones, and be served by a funny bartender. Overall, a good experience.

- I also got to explore Greenwich Village a little, since the Gator bar was downtown. Not too much to report except that I'm growing less afraid of it. And Washington Square Park is the best place in the world for people watching.

Today it was also a wonderful place for clear blue sky watching

Nothing too crazy, but it's been a good week. Too much time spent in bars for my liking, but I guess that's the standard "get to know the people around you" place for 20somethings. Oh well, at least we're getting pretty good at finding cheap drinks!

Hooray for School! Part II

Why yes, I am only taking four classes and still taking two full posts to write about them. Thanks for asking. Here's the rest of them!

Language Development & Habituation: The Foundations
My first linguistics class! I'm still unsure how I feel about this one, other than that I'm excited to learn more about the subject. We don't focus on ASL linguistics or teaching language to any special populations, but the class is a foundation for those classes which we will take later. We also share this class with the Deaf Ed program.

Cognition & Learning
I'm taking this psychology class online. Unlike UF's online courses, there is no taped lecture for me to watch or optional class for me to attend. It's basically a distance learning course, so most of the people in my class don't even live in NYC. What on earth do you do in a class that doesn't have a lecture? You read. A lot. You read textbooks, articles, and lecture notes. It seems ridiculous to pay the amount I pay in tuition to just read a book and not actually have someone lecturing, which is why the other people in my program have chosen to take the in-person option for this class, which meets on Monday nights.

So why on earth have I chosen to pay full tuition to read lecture notes instead of just taking the class like a normal human being? First, some background info: TC's classes started on a Wednesday, so no Monday or Tuesday classes. These missed dates are made up for during Thanksgiving, when Wed/Thurs/Fri classes are all canceled. HOWEVER, the second week of classes was Labor Day, so STILL no Monday classes. That's right, Monday classes will not meet for the first time until the third week of school. So how is TC making up for this? Fall semester ends on Monday, Dec 20th. Since I have yet to meet a single person with Friday classes, classes for most other people end on Thursday, Dec 16th. That's a whole four days earlier, folks.

Yep. That's my reason. It is not a good one. But traditionally, the weekend before Christmas is very important to my family. We lost my cousin to Hodgkin's Lymphoma on December 19th, 2005. Since then, we have spent the days surrounding Dec 19th celebrating his life and legacy, which is the love that our family shares. I don't know about you, but I don't want to spend the five year anniversary of his passing writing a final paper. Online class it is.

What Are You Doing New Year's, New Year's Eve?

Shana Tova, y'all!

Today is Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish new year. I love Rosh Hashanah, not just because apples and honey are delicious, but also because it gives me a chance to make New Year's resolutions in the middle of the year. I know, I know, that's not a Jewish tradition. It's a me tradition. Besides, they also conveniently work out to be school year resolutions, which is usually much needed. Plus with the way my life has been going lately, promises I make to myself in January just may not be relevant in September.

I used to make my New Year's Resolutions really action-based. Lose five pounds. Sleep better. Keep up with your online classes. A few years ago, I switched to making them more attitude-based, and I think that's really helped me so far. Sure, it makes it really difficult to measure. But I kind of like that. I hate looking back and thinking I'm off track. Now, they tend to be half and half.

So here they are, my Rosh Hashanah/School Year's/NYC Resolutions:
1. Appreciate the city in which you live.
2. Appreciate the opportunity you have been given.
3. Appreciate the people with whom you surround yourself.
4. Don't get overwhelmed by your reading.
5. Keep in touch with your many long-distance loved ones.
6. Reach out to the people in NYC when you need them (and even when you don't).
7. Update your blog as close to daily as possible.
8. Remember why you're here. You were meant for this.
9. Create (and maintain) an allergy-prevention routine.
10. Get to know your suitemates. They seem pretty fabulous.
11. Immerse yourself in the NYC Deaf community.
12. Find productive ways to de-stress. Fit them in even when it's difficult.
13. Do your physical therapy. You deserve not to be in pain.
14. Drink more water.
15. Eat as healthfully as possible.
16. Don't stress out when you're not eating healthfully.
17. Watch your budget. Adjust when needed. Don't go crazy.
18. Always remember what (and who) is important.
19. Survive New York winter.
20. Embrace change.
21. Don't be afraid. You can do anything. You deserve to do anything.
22. Be the best damn Maid of Honor in the world.
23. Find a way to fit painting back into your life.
24. Don't be so hard on yourself.
25. Love as much and as well as you can.
26. Put positivity in. Get positivity back.

Anyone else setting goals for the new year? It's never too late :)

Hooray for School! Part I

There are a few reasons I haven't talked about my classes yet. First, I had yet to have all of my classes. Well, we're a week in, so that one is taken care of.

Second, I wasn't sure how personal I wanted this blog to be. It was originally just going to be about New York City in general, no thoughts or anecdotes about my education at all. Recently I've decided that I'd rather use it to keep up with everyone that's far away than try to be Carrie Bradshaw and create a publishable character (a girl can dream). I don't want to feel like I can't say something on here because it doesn't fit with the "theme" of my blog. So basically, screw it, I'm going to write about school. I didn't move to New York to be a writer. I moved to New York to be a student, and eventually a teacher. School is my life. My life is school.

SO without further ado, thoughts after my first week of classes:

Designing Curriculum & Instruction
The first thing I learned in this class is that my professor is a Gator, so that was pretty awesome. Apart from that, this class freekin terrifies me. There's an unwritten prerequisite (Principles of Teaching & Learning), which is also on my program's course of study. Unfortunately, that class wasn't offered this semester, so we plunged head first into this class. Almost everyone else in the class is a second year student and/or has teaching experience. I'm bound and determined to do my damnedest in this class, but that 200-page curriculum project at the end of the semester is pretty daunting. Luckily the other people in my program are all in my section, so we should be able to form a group and create an actual ASL curriculum, which will basically be the coolest thing in the world, assuming we decode the language of our crazy textbooks and actually figure out how this curriculum design stuff works.

Intellectual History of the Deaf
This class is listed on my course of study as "Psychosocial Aspects of the Deaf and Hard of Hearing, Part I." Needless to say, I was overjoyed when I showed up and SURPRISE it's a history class. If you haven't noticed already, I'm a total history geek. I really liked learning Deaf culture in sign language classes because I enjoyed the historical aspect of it. On our first day, we learned about references to deaf people in the Torah and Talmud, so I was basically overjoyed. Let's just combine everything I love learning about into one class. I actually liked doing the reading for this class today. I'm sure my fellow teaching assistants down in the Swamp can understand how excited I was to read about Clerc, Gallaudet, Stoeke, Public Law 94-142 and the IDEA (bonus points if you all just did the signs for those things/heard Tuccelli in your head while reading this).

We're combined with the Deaf Education students for this class, and not everyone understands ASL. My program coordinator, who is Deaf, teaches the class entirely in sign, so we have a pair of voice interpreters. They are amazingly talented interpreters, and it was cool for me to actually see a pair working together, taking turns and feeding each other things that the one currently voicing might have missed. The professor's fingerspelling is INSANELY fast, and it's usually crazy words like "epistemes," so the fact that they were catching everything is pretty darn cool.

However, as my friend Gator B over at The Boston Buzz pointed out, hearing a voice interpreter say something when you're trying to focus on the signs that you've already seen and could probably comprehend is REALLY DIFFICULT. For me, it's easy to fall back into depending on my ears to receive the information instead of my eyes, which is really bad since it's my receptive signing skills that need the most work. Unlike Gator B's ASL class, the voice interpreter will NOT be going away since some people in the Deaf Ed program here don't know a single sign. I'm seriously considering ear plugs for tomorrow's class.

Lots of words and no pictures? Sounds like a two-part post to me.

The British Are Coming (Today's Fun Fact)

Tonight's Fun Fact about NYC comes courtesy of one of the lovely people in my program. Lady M's friend is a tour guide for Columbia's main campus and shared this little nugget of information with her earlier this week:

All Columbia University undergraduate students are required to take a physical education course, but they are also required to pass a swimming test. There are several theories about how this started (and why it still exists), but my favorite has something to do with the possibility of a British invasion.

No not THAT British Invasion!
(Source: BlogCritics.com)

I mean an ACTUAL British attack on the United States, as in the revolutionary war. You see, Columbia administrators way back in the day needed an escape plan for their students in the event that the Red Coats took over the city.

I know, crazy hacked road sign in Texas, it's a scary thought
(Source - KCBD and Arbroath)

They wanted to ensure that should the British intrude on their hollowed halls, all of their Ivy League men could swim across the Hudson. That's right. Swim. Across. The Hudson. To New Jersey. One major was (and still is) exempt, however: engineers. Why? Because they could build a boat.

Pretty solid, as long as the Others don't destroy it before you reach Joisey.
(Source - Lost Hatch)

So is it true? Who cares. It's great fun.

Let's Go Explore: Riverside Park

My To Do list for this week is pretty epic, but I'm refusing to let it get to me. As soon as possible, I need to switch cell phone plans, figure out where the heck my Apple iWork rebate ended up, AND find two long lost packages that made delivery attempts on Saturday before my mailroom opened. What's that, a cell phone company, technical support/customer service AND the US Postal Service? Maybe I'll go the DMV this week too, just for fun.

So this morning, after a failed trip to the post office to find my long lost textbooks, I decided I needed some kind of release. It's nice outside today, warmer than it has been, but not nearly as hot as it was last week. I decided to walk down to Riverside Park and see the Hudson, up close and personal.

Riverside Park stretches four miles along the Hudson River, from 72nd St to 158th St. It was designed by Frederick Law Olmstead (of Central Park fame) in the late 1800s. I am constantly amazed at the park system in this city. The way the walkways accommodate the naturally hilly landscape just astounds me. Although I only saw a small portion of Riverside Park today, I look forward to getting to know one of my closest parks a little better over the next coming weeks.

And of course, I never go anywhere without my iPhone, so here are some shots of the park this morning!

Pretty trees on one of the walking paths

Trees along the soccer field, with the river in the background

Hello Hudson! And a soccer game going on

A lovely shaded pathway
Not pictured: a ton of people and puppies out playing today

Guys... Where Are We?

Living near Columbia, it's really easy to forget you actually live in one of the biggest, busiest cities in the world. I know that's kind of silly. It's clearly Manhattan. I look outside my window and see big buildings and yellow taxis. I walk five blocks in either direction and I hit a subway stop. But I'm serious - it's easy to sink into college mode and forget to enjoy the wonders of the city.

Yesterday was the first time I left my neighborhood in a week. Sure, I've been wandering around roughly a 20-block radius, but until yesterday, I hadn't gotten on the subway and gone anywhere for a looong time, which is why I haven't been blogging lately. Nothing to say, and nothing to show. And let me tell you, I had cabin fever. But I've had so much work to do and so many errands to run and so many people to catch up with. But yesterday, I simply refused.

I woke up early, finished my five page paper (welcome to the first week of grad school), ran a few errands, and hopped on the subway to the Upper West Side. After a few glasses of wine on Jungle M's rooftop, we followed a friend a few blocks away to a tiny Thai restaurant for late night spring rolls and drunken noodles. Then we went our separate ways - the boys to their nearby Fordham Law dorms, and Jungle M and I back to her studio apartment to watch 30 Rock and PTFO. And right before I fell asleep on an air mattress on the floor of one of my oldest friends, I thought, "this right here, is New York City."

Sure, you can drink beer at a friends house anywhere you live. But can you do it on a rooftop overlooking Central Park?

Not our view exactly but pretty close

Source - Oyster Travel Guides

So I decided last night that starting today, I will do something to make me appreciate the beautiful city in which I live every single day. And if you know the right Twitter accounts to follow, you know that there are a million things going on in this city every single day. And so many of them are free! Now, obviously there are going to be days where I can't just take in a Broadway show. But even if the only thing I have time to do is walk down to The Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine, or grab an apple turnover at the Hungarian Pastry Shop, or just sit on the quad of Columbia's campus and take in the magnificent, ancient buildings, that's okay.

So what's up first? Tonight, Jungle M and I are taking in one of the Metropolitan Opera's free outdoor screenings. Because why not?