NYE

Bringing in the New Year with good friends and a cute dress. Hopefully my night will be indicative of my 2016. Good talks, good people, good food. 2015 was tough and 2016 will be tough as well but I'm looking forward to the challenge and I know I have a good support group behind me. Cheers to 2016.

Exploring Fairmount Park

Strawberry Mansion

Friends

Woodford Mansion

Laurel Hill Cemetery

Harry Kalas' grave

Looking toward Kelly Drive and Hunting Park Ave

Just a few past and present Explorers taking on the mansions of Fairmount Park. After rushing to make it to Strawberry Mansion on time, after I yelled at everyone to be there punctually, we enjoyed a tour of the stately summer home and of Woodford right down the street. So much history in those houses. We walked were Ben Franklin and many others were before.

Joy

I'm pretty sure I promised 25 people that I'd hang out with them over break...but I'm only here three weeks so my next week or so is pretty packed. But today I was able to head to Ambler for a relaxing movie date with Meaghan, who's leaving for Chicago tomorrow. We saw Joy, a relatively true story of an entrepreneur who overcame her crazy family to find success as the creator of the self-wringing mop. Jennifer Lawrence is super feisty in it. I'm not a good critic because I think everything is alright but I enjoyed my afternoon with Meaghan.

Christmas 2015

Nothing like good ole family time on Christmas Eve and Day. We were able to see the entire family, which is pretty spectacular considering I haven't seen anyone since August. We saw little "Buddy-the-Elf" Cameron, who's absolutely adorable. I stuffed my face with food and cookies and it was awesome. Super thankful to eat good food and see good people.

The Wissahickon

Am I really home if we don't go for a run at Valley Green? So it was only natural that we went Christmas morning. But unfortunately, my shin's been hurting the last few weeks and to prevent living in a boot for 2.5 months, I've haven't run in 2 weeks. So while my family got to frolic through the trails and in the woods, I had to settle for walk--which was pleasant and refreshing. I always want to slow things down at Valley Green and take a walk but I'm always running about. So I enjoyed the slower pace of this Christmas morning, grateful that I was able to even walk pain-free.

Spotlight

Besides my trip to University City yesterday, I really haven't been out of the house or seen anyone besides by family. So when our schedules finally matched, I met Dan up in Doylestown to see Spotlight at the County Theater (their version of Ambler). I took the bus so I wandered around Gap and the bookstore. We met (while it was pouring) before the movie at Nonna's--Dan got a cappuccino and I got caramel ice cream. So it's a good and a bad thing we saw Spotlight today. Good in the sense that I can recommend it but luckily you can't see it before Christmas. Bad because it was so heavy--very intense account of the disgusting clergy scandal in Boston. I felt sick--and very weird about my attendance in church on Friday. We'll see how that goes. And then Dan drove me home and we both vented and caught up and it was good.

A Very Philly Welcome

After sleeping 13 hours, I was ready to go. Jimmy and I took the train to 30th Street so we could go to the La Salle-Miami game at the Palestra. On our way, we stopped at Cira Green, a new rooftop park at 30th and Chestnut. The weather was a little overcast but the views were still stunning. The park will be especially cool during the spring and summer. And we probably should have just stayed at the park instead of going to the dismal game. It was La Salle's worse loss in their entire history. Welcome back Katie? I didn't expect anything else from my beloved La Salle team. I have one more game while I'm back for them to turn it around. Here's hoping.

What I'm Listening To: "Alone on Christmas Day"

Take a listen to Phoenix covering the Beach Boys' "Alone on Christmas Day." Hopefully you're not alone on Christmas. I was alone on Thanksgiving and it wasn't nice at all. So reach out to those who may be alone--it really means a lot to be remembered.

Arizona Basketball

One of the things I was most excited for when coming to Arizona was going to basketball games. I've been going to La Salle basketball games since I was essentially born. And I'd like to say I'm a college basketball fan. I didn't get to see La Salle's run to the tournament and Arizona has been  a top 25 team for many years now. So I went to the game against NAU tonight. I honestly can't describe how different games at Arizona are from games at La Salle. 

First, the arena is probably 3-4 times larger than Tom Gola and it was mostly packed, even on this penultimate day of finals. And the player introductions were showy and the student section was on their feet the whole time. To say the least, it was an event. But I do miss the games at La Salle and the Palestra. But I'll be back soon and hopefully I can sneak my way as a student!

What I'm Listening To: "Roses"

Just another song I've heard off of my friend Chuy's Spotify playlist. I think almost all the new songs I've heard and that have been stuck in my friend came off his playlist since I've been here in Arizona. The beat is so good. I just want to dance when I listen to it. And like all my other "What I'm Listening To" posts, this too is on repeat until I find my next obsession.

My View The Last Two Weeks

Finals week for graduate school is much much different from undergrad. I spent most of the last two weeks at my cubicle in the department. This was my view. I've survived off candy and tea. By Wednesday afternoon. my first semester will officially be over. And what a long and tough semester it was. And the spring will be even harder and more stressful. But I'll hit the grind and it'll all work out.

What I'm Listening To: More Adele

There's no such thing as too much Adele. I think 50% of my conversations with my friend Lindsey revolve around Adele. "Why did Adele cross the road? To say hello from the other side." But in all seriousness, if you haven't listened to any of her new album, you have to. It's so good, as in Adele fashion. Also, I just saw this (I did not come up with it) but Philadelphia = Phil-Adele-phia. Isn't that so good? I tell people I'm from Philadelphia all the time so I'm going to start using this all the time. I also say "hello" to people in the sing-song way "hello, how are you?" just like Adele does, but clearly not as well.

Running Angry and Fast

So I went to bed late last night because my head was just filled with thoughts. And I woke up early today to run because I needed to clear my head before locking myself in the department all day to study. I was in a bad mood and very angry so I just kept pounding my run. All 8 miles up Sentinel Peak/A Mountain and back. Essentially a mile and half up. And I threw down the hammer. My last two miles were both under 7:00. The average is only 7:27 because of my 9:00 mile up the mountain. But I need to be angry more often so I can run faster. 

Making Mac-and-Cheese

So I've been getting tired of eating peanut butter sandwiches for lunch and who-knows-what for dinner (usually a mash up of some meat and veggies). I decided to be adventurous and try cooking something from a recipe (gasp!). Honestly, recipes scare me. I'm not good at following them. I think it also comes from me not knowing cooking very well. For a while, I thought brown sugar and white sugar were the same, just different colors. I've used olive oil for baking because I didn't have vegetable oil. Those are just some examples of my ignorance. Don't get Kristen or Cody started on my blueberry quinoa incident. Anyway, I found a recipe for mac-and-cheese that looked relatively straight forward (and that didn't require flour because I didn't have that) and it turned out...okay. The sauce has a weird consistency to it but otherwise it's any old mac-and-cheese. I titled it "BLT Mac," although it's actually spinach and not lettuce. For the future, though, I think I'll stick to getting my mac-and-cheese out, especially at The Fix in Tucson.

Fixed Points

So finals are upon us already. My first one is tomorrow and it's already bad--I'm having dreams and/or nightmares about sets and other mathematical concepts that I even don't know.

But I stumbled upon something interesting the other day when I was studying fixed points. Imagine the United States. Now imagine a US map spread out on some American's kitchen table. There'll be a point on the map that exactly matches the real life location. Isn't that super cool?? And that's the idea of a fixed point (sort of, anyway).