We lost one of our cockatiels today. =(

Poor Pete had been looking really bad for the past few months, so his passing really didn’t come as a huge surprise. He was older when we got him in the first place nearly 10 years ago, arriving in a battered, rusty old cage.

Fly high, Pete. You were a good bird.

On the college front, I’m barely a week into PSY101 and it’s already killing me. My books still haven’t shown up… in fact, one was put in the mail JUST today. >_> Which makes actually studying even more difficult. I’ve ended up having to look up each item on the chapter outline on Google just so I can tell what everyone is talking about. Fortunately, my instructor is really understanding and has been giving me notes to read. I had to write a short paper that was due yesterday, which I didn’t get done on time. In another “fortunately”, the program for the online classroom crashed on the server side, which pushed back the due date to midnight tonight.

Now, I have to write a paper about what I’ve learned so far. XD Umm… in a nutshell? Freud either had to be one unbelievably sick puppy or he had to be smoking something. Jung is easier to follow, I feel sorry for Parlov’s dogs, and I never knew so many pages could be dedicated to the examination of the origins and symtoms of stress.

And, last but not least: In psychology classes, the textbooks are your only map. And Jasson is horrifically lost!!!

*shifty eyes* The information I’m about to tell you is confidential and should be considered highly classified. Be forwarned that should this information fall into enemy hands, it could mean the deaths of thousands of covert ops.

The criminal entity known only as “Echo” has taken an unknown designer’s mouse hostage for reasons not yet determined. This vile terrorist has only stated that her demands must be met within the appointed hour and an unknown object known as “the fuzzy blue ball” be returned to her. Should we fail to meet this rapidly approaching deadline, she has threatened extreme bodily harm in the form of many kitty scratches and toothy nibbles.

Be advised that an elite team of negotiators has been dispatched to work with the hostage taker to see if a compromise can be reached. In the meantime, police search teams are canvasing the area to hunt for this desired object should the negotiators be unsucessful.

The designer only had this to say: “Damned cat, gimme back my friggin’ mouse!”

This post has been brought to you by Stress! It gets you every time!

Well, I bought my psychology book earlier today. I found it for $17 on Amazon.com and it normally retails for $107. =) So I’m happy. After my luck there, I think I’m going back onto Amazon tomorrow and see if I can’t find the rest of my books for this semester that cheap. I just keep hoping my college and the government work together as well as they have so far and get my loans ready, because otherwise this is going to be ugly once File management comes in a few weeks. Jodi has promised to see what she can do to find me an older copy of access that might just work on the computer, so I’m keeping my fingers crossed.

I’ve worked my cost of a new computer down to about $670 - which includes tax and S&H, since I’ll be going with a Dell. Then I budgeted in $70 so I can purchase Microsoft Office from an OEM place I know, and then an extra $200 a semester for Fall, Winter, and Spring for the rest of the software.

Living in this community has lit a fire under my ass. Don’t get me wrong, I [think] I like kids… but the little monsters here have been pushing it and school hasn’t been out more than a couple weeks here. And to think, once upon a time I used to be a staunch opponent for Summer School. Yeah, sure. The two youngest neighbor kids spent last Friday, Saturday, and Sunday almost constantly screaming. @_@ Imagine being woken up a 7:30am by a little girl screaming right outside your bedroom window. (And for no good reason other than she wanted the PINK chalk.)

What other randomness can I toss into the goodie bag? To ease stress I’ve started doing push-ups, crunches, lifting the few weights I still own, etc. When I don’t feel like a walking cramp, I can already tell a little difference.

Samurai Champloo! ^_^ And damn: I always heard FLCL was weird, but - err - damn! What’s more, I think Sally likes it. LOL Thanks, I’ll stick to Dragonball, Samurai Champloo, and One Piece. That weirdness I can handle.

What else?

Yeah… Tomorrow’s the court date and lets just say I’m a wreak and leave it at that. Going to be lots of praying going on in this house.

I’m trying very hard not to think about court on the 21st.

According to our landlords, since we’ve given them money for the back rent, they aren’t going to go for eviction… BUT, they’re still going to court and will “get a judgement.” At which point… supposedly, we’ll have 56 days to make payments with nothing more than a blemish on our already banged up credit reports. I say all this is “supposedly” because they told us before that they weren’t going to evict us and then we get served.

Doesn’t make sense to me one iota, but thinking is — obviously — for losers. I keep praying for something good to happen. It sounds incredibly selfish in a way, given our track record; but we’re all still on the verge of panic. I guess I’ll just going to stop talking about this for now.

In news that will allow me to maintain my sanity, I have to say that this is so freaking cool! *whine* Mommy, I wanna win the lottery so I can have kewl toys too! =]P

I passed my first course with 100%, Thank Heaven. My next classes start on the 23rd, so I’m pretty much playing lazy until then. Waiting to hear back from the college on the status of my aid. I had to fill out this weird form and send it back, so now the status they list online is that they’re processing the changes to my financial aid. Blah. I think I’m going to give them a call before the storms hit this afternoon and see what’s up.