Danny and Melanie: October 2008

Holy smokes I haven't posted in a long time! It's crazy how time can just slip away so easily. I am currently halfway through my craziest, hardest, busiest, and most hectic semester in college so far. And somehow, with a lot of unseen help, I am getting along just fine! I have been taking 15 credits of math and science classes, 20 hours of work a week and driving to Salt Lake 2 days a week for physical therapy. I did end up dropping my 8:30 class this last week though because I have just been in way over my head. So I am down to 12 credits which is the least amount of credits I have taken, and yet I have about double the work load in those classes than I have ever had before. Funny how that works. So let me tell you what my week generally consists of.... Monday, Wednesday, and Friday I have Biology from 9:30-10:20, Chemistry from 10:30-11:20, and Statistics from 11:30-12:20. Then I always rush home so I can be on time to work from 1-4. Mondays when I get home from work I have a couple hours that I can either study or run errands or whatever needs to be done. Then I go to FHE at 7, One Tree Hill is at 8 and of course I can't miss that. So then I have from 9 on to do more homework or whatever. Tuesday I work from 7-4. I work at a place called EK Ekcessories. It is basically line work. We put together lanyards, dog collars, dog leashes, and pretty much a whole lot of random stuff that I don't even know what it is used for. We are at stations and we switch every hour. It is not too bad the days that I only work 3 hours. But an 8 hour day is a bit much for me! So I think Tuesdays are my least favorite days because of it. Well as soon as work is over I head straight to Salt Lake to my physical therapy. My knee finally got better, in fact I just barely got back from a 30 minute run and there is no pain at all so that is great. He is now focusing on my neck. I have been getting a lot of headaches and my neck is so stiff that I can't really turn my head to the right to see behind me, I have to turn my whole body. At first I was feeling really discouraged because for the first 4 weeks or so of him working on my neck I didn't see any improvement. However, just this last Thursday when my session got over I was able to turn my head as far as I could before the accident. It was amazing. My neck has stiffened up again since then, but for like 2 days I could turn my head with no pain. So that was really encouraging for me. But anyways, I go to physical therapy at 6 every Tuesday and Thursday and it usually lasts about an hour or so. Well then I always have to go to my house and eat and fill up my car. I usually don't get back to Logan til 1o or later. So basically I can't get anything done on those days. Occasionally I will just go straight to the library to study, but it closes at 12 so I don't really have that much time. Well Wednedays I have class and work from 9:30-4:00 again and then I have 3 hours to get stuff done before I have my human dissection class. O man is that an interesting class. A lot of you may be thinking that it sounds disgusting, but it really is a neat class. We prepare the cadavers for the human anatomy class in the spring. Here at USU we have one of the nicest cadaver labs around. We have a total of 7 cadavers that were purchased from the U. The cadaver that I have been working on all semester is named Deloris, she was a 74 year old clerk that died from an abdominal carcinoma. Me and my partners were assigned to dissect out the female pelvis. But along with that we also have removed and dissected her kidneys, liver, lungs, and heart. It is just amazing how much you can learn. And you know at first I was really worried if I was going to be able to do it, I didn't really like dissecting pigs and worms and stuff all that much. But it is not as bad as you would expect. And mostly it is just so interesting! Well that class goes from 7-10 every Wednesday. So once again I will maybe study for a bit after before I have to get to bed. Well Thursdays are my lab days. I have a 3 hour biology lab from 8:30-11:20, and then a chemistry recitation from 11:30-12:20. Then work from 1-4, Salt Lake and PT until late. Fridays I juat have school and work til 4, and then I usually just try to relax or something for a little bit because I finally don't have something I have to be doing every second like most days. I will usually hang out with my friends Brody and Lauren or with my roommates on Friday and Saturday nights. Then on Sunday I have church from 9-12. They called me as the Relief Society secretary this year so most Sundays I have a plethora of meetings to attend throughout the day. And then that night we have ward prayer at 8:30. So ya, that is pretty much how my weeks go. Not all that surprising that I haven't really had time to blog recently. I had 2 hard tests this last week that I had to really cram for because I just can't find enough time to study for them these days. Amazingly I was able to do a lot better on them than I expected but still not as well as I would have liked. But I have had to decide that I will just do my best with things and that it is going to have to be good enough. I need to stop stressing so much. Last Sunday I was so stressed out I just had a melt down... which is part of the reason I ended up dropping my class. So ya, life has been crazy but you know it is just fine! Nothing I can't handle. I am just so happy to have my tests done this week, I feel so much better. And hopefully now I will be able to keep up in my classes better. Well the Relief Society has to speak tomorrow in sacrament meeting so I should probably stop procrastinating writing my talk and get to it. It's on repentance and forgiveness, pretty broad subject... Wish me luck!

These are pictures of my 5 roommates, unfortunately I have individual pictures of all of them though!

This is Michelle and a kid she was dating at the time. We were at a Richfield High football game over Labor Day weekend.

This is my roommate Lysa. I always take my makeup off at night and my roommates just think it is so funny how I look as I do it so we had to take some pictures!

This is Kieley. She is a real sweetheart!

This is Ashley, she is the roommate I actually share a room with!

Now these are just some pictures from my semester so far!
This is me and my friends Brittan and Michelle at a hockey game!