Tag: journal

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Being back in Tampa is great. Even though it’s so weird not being able to see most of my friends on a daily basis now. I love eating my mom’s food again and being able to lounge around at home. So wonderful after always being stressed in classes, just to relax and be with my family, not a care in the world…

Saw Spiderman 3 tonight with Chris and Dream – was definitely a fun movie, although it was all over the place. Three villains, crazy plot..but I liked it for the popcorn flick it was.

I sort of want to write a poem or something, but I currently lack the inspiration. Ah well, maybe another night.

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SCHOOL’S OUT!!

Finally, my last exam of my last class is over. Math stats exam was at 7:30 this morning – I feel absolutely wiped out right now. I’m not even going to say how late I was up last night studying. Before the exam, I got two large cups of coffee and went in and dominated. I think. We’ll see in a few days, but either the test was easier than I thought it would be or I just remembered more than I thought I would. But for the grace of God…

I was so happy when the exam was over…no more school for the summer! I was singing and praising God…here’s the song I was singing:

Ah Lord God, Thou hast made the heavens
And the earth by Thy great power
Ah Lord God, Thou hast made the heavens
And the earth by Thine outstretched arm.

Nothing is too difficult for Thee
Nothing is too difficult for Thee
Great and mighty God
Great in counsel and mighty in deed

Nothing, nothing, absolutely nothing
Nothing is too difficult for Thee

So glad all my classes are done…as I’m sure all of my readers can tell. I think my grades turned out ok – I will update when I’ve found out my final grades for the whole semester(Oh, I did find out one grade – I aced my last Operations Research test!) Now, I will crash and get a little much-needed sleep. After the exam, I stopped by work and I was starting to get dizzy from lack of food and sleep. I went to breakfast afterwards, so I have food. Now I just need sleep.

Leaving Gainesville tomorrow!! Bittersweet..

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It was pleasantly cold today. And by cold, I mean 60 degrees. But that temperature for an April day in Florida is pretty rare…I’ll take it, that’s for sure! So nice walking to class in the crisp fall-like air.

I woke up around 6:30 to go to my accounting lab. Wow, that class seems like such a high school class. One, because it’s actually easy. And two, because it starts at 7:25 in the morning. A few people were definitely sleeping in there today.

I’m going home to Tampa today for Easter weekend – even though I have a lot of homework/studying to do, I’m still looking forward to spending time with the family! Now, time to walk to Stats class. Hope everyone has a great weekend!

NATIONAL CHAMPS…AGAIN!!

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Wow, another unbelievably amazing championship run by the FLORIDA GATORS!!! Is it great to be a Florida Gator, or what? I’ve been here two years, and we’ve won a basketball championship, a football championship and ANOTHER basketball championship. April 2nd was a glorious day!

Unfortunately, I had to go to classes for most of the day, but around 5:30, me and April went to stand(or sit, rather) in line at the ODome. I’ve never seen a championship game in there before, so I figured I had to try it out…eventually Carolina, Xuan, and Said showed up and we all went inside at 7:30. We got awesome free T-shirts(“Billy-ball: The Gator Nation of Domination”) and got so hyped up in the couple hours before the game. Dream and Laura eventually joined us after their late classes.

It was such an unbelievable loud and excited environment inside the ODome – all of us felt so confident the Gators would win. And once the game started…well, I got a little nervous as we got behind, but then Corey Brewer started sinking the threes. Chris Leak talked during the halftime show and that was awesome. But even more awesome was watching the rest of the game. Even though most of our big men were in foul trouble, we still dominated on Ohio State and WON, 84-75. What a game!!! We all counted down the last few seconds and then the ODome erupted!! Hugs, high-fives, big smiles…NCAA Basketball National Champions, 07.

All of us ran out onto University Avenue then, for a celebration that has become relatively frequent these last couple years. The Gator chants, the upraised arms, the V for Victory. The masses of students all wanting to celebrate our Florida Gator basketball team. And what a team it’s been. #42 Al Horford. #13 Joakim Noah. #12 Lee Humphrey. #2 Corey Brewer. #11 Taurean Green. What a magnificent five.

And despite all this championship glory, I must again be reminded that true glory does not come from winning sports titles, but all glory is God’s. How good it is to remember that.

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It is an absolutely gorgeous day outside! Sunny, bright blue skies with a few clouds hovering far above. I had a group meeting for Intro to ISE earlier this morning and then ran into Sweeney in the Plaza of the Americas…good times. Now I’m off to class(in less than ten minutes).

Oh, forgot one minor thing.

GO GATORS!! NCAA Championship game tonight!!

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So, it’s spring break. I just realized I haven’t written anything substantial in a long time. Right now, I’m at home in Tampa, chilling in my room while Rob plays Madden ’02 on his Gameboy. He just got here today and tomorrow we’re going down to Sarasota to finish off our spring break before going to Gainesville. But I’m starting this off all backwards. Let’s go back a little ways…

This semester’s been pretty good so far – even though I have a lot of work, I like most of my classes. Intro to ISE. Financial Accounting. Operations Research. Statistics 1. AutoCAD. The hardest one is probably Statistics, but at least I’m doing ok gradewise so far. Anyway, this is all boring stuff that probably none of you want to hear, so I’ll just skip to spring break.

I actually haven’t done much so far this past week – I came here last Friday and have basically been relaxing at home. Which is SO NICE. Great home-cooked meals and being with the family. I had a lot of Operations research homework as well as financial accounting homework, which was annoying, but I’ve gotten most of it done. Monday night was Sara Wilkin’s b-day, so me and Dream and Amanda went out and celebrated with dinner at Estela’s, this great Mexican place. I do so love Mexican food…

Wednesday, a bunch of us hit up the beach at Fort Desoto – I probably should put some pictures here, but I’m getting a little tired; maybe in the next few days I’ll post a picture update. Anyways, the beach was awesome. Even though the water was cold, we got some good sand-castle building in. And of course, you can’t go wrong with grilled hot dogs, mmm…

Today, I’ve been doing more homework until Rob got in from Tally. We then went to Wal-Mart and Target to restock my college snack supply and I applied at Target to work over the summer. For dinner tonight, my dad made chicken parmisan and it was amazing! Dream and Chris came over too and afterwards we watched United 93(great movie…so moving) and then the Gators game(first round of the NCAA tourney). We beat Jackson State 112-69. Not bad at all.

I guess I should probably get going to bed soon since we’re gonna get up early tomorrow to go to the park to play basketball, but I’ll leave you all with a short poem:

Mid-morning
Harsh as glass against the skin
Dull as unfound pearls half-buried
Reaping fruits not quite ripe
Reaching for the diamond light

Waves rippling strongly onwards
Trees bowing before the clouds
Water cascading down upon the shore
Traveling through the wilds evermore

Sun peeks over the azure horizon
Rising crystal vapor gleams
New morning parades its lace
a blushed glance, unveiled face.

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I don’t know why I’m posting this, but Dream wants me to, so why not? 😉 This is a bit of a fluff poem, but I like it. Hope all of you do, too. 🙂 What do you do when you like a girl and you don’t know if it is right to pursue her, hm? That is the question of the hour. Anyway, onto the poem.


Sun shining through clear prism of blue
Leaves descending on an airy balustrade
Lavender petals frame a perfect picture
Hands touching each other in love.

Hearts melt like chocolate in the sun
Tender glances lead to soft words which
Flow like a brook through the summer woods
In such love eyes meet and purely sparkle

Sun pouring through porous cotton
Trees bend gently down to emerald field
Rose petals float and caress the air
Hands held gently as a medal of love.

Love entranced eyes gaze with pure light
He looks at her with her hair softly dancing
She looks at him with his eyes strongly piercing
And they love.

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So, almost the end of the week – FINALLY! The only thing I have left to worry about is my statistics exam at 12:50. I think I’m ready for it – but still a little nervous. We’ll have to see how that goes…

I had my 7:25 accounting discussion today – it’s so weird going to class that early in the morning. It feels like high school all over again. And it was SO cold this morning. Had to be in the 30’s, which I haven’t felt for a while. It was weird because as I was walking to my class, I had a cup of coffee – the inside of my hand was nice and toasty while the outside of my hand was freezing. Very odd sensation, let me tell you. But, for some reason, I don’t mind the early class TOO much. Just the waking up at 6-something. That’s not fun. Oh, and in class, while we were going over stuff I sort of already knew, I wrote a haiku. I’ve never really written them before, but I did. And it’s pretty lame, but hey, all haikus are. Here it is:

Accounting is a
very bad place to be at
an early hour.

Actually, I wrote it a little differently in my notebook, but it didn’t follow the form(ok, I don’t write them all the time), so I modified it a touch, so it actually is a haiku(5,7,5 instead of the 5,5,7 I had). Oh, and hour is two syllables. I so decree it.

Anyways..since you probably didn’t want to see my haiku anyway, I’ll change the subject. I’m sort of hungry, so I should probably eat breakfast soon. But I’ll talk about the Career Showcase instead. That was on Wednesday and was much fun. I was really worried, but I don’t know, I found it very..exhilarating, to be there and talk to the recruiters from different companies. I don’t know if I’ll get an internship, but at least I met a bunch of different company people and passed out my resume a lot. After it, I was exhausted though. I wish I’d gone last semester, but at least I went this time. I’ll definitely have to go next fall to get an internship for NEXT summer.

Ok, I’m not sure of what else to write, even though I know lots has happened, so I’ll just call it an entry and go have breakfast. Hope everyone has an awesome day!!

James HoganLeave a comment

I’ve really been slacking with updates lately. So I figured I should at least write something, no matter how short it turns out to be..

Anyway, I’m back at UF now!! Last Saturday, moved back on campus. I’m really glad I’m still living on campus since I don’t have a car, but it’s also kind of weird since a lot of people are living off-campus now. Thankfully Dream and Andrew and other people still live on campus, so I’m not totally alone. And it’s awesome living with Rob in Graham Hall. We named our room “The Bunker” since we live on the ground floor…seriously, the view out of our window is a cement wall. Still, the room is really nice, especially now that I’m unpacked and posters are on the wall.

On Sunday, went back to Creekside for the first time in a while…so fun seeing everyone again!! Monday I went down to Criser Hall and picked up work permit and then went into Weil(Engineering Hall) to meet my employer(who’s Andrew’s uncle). My job is pretty sweet because I work with the ISE department, in which I’m majoring. So I get experience in the department, get to network, AND get paid. Only minimum wage for now, doing office work, etc, but I’m happy with it.

Monday night, went to a party at Sweeney’s place – their apartment was awesomely decorated. You could definitely tell it was a girl’s place! It was great seeing more people that I hadn’t seen for all summer, like Javier and Sonia and Julie.. Tuesday morning, woke up EARLY to go tubing with Rob, Liz, Steven, Katie and Katie’s roommate Lindsey. The water was cold and the sun was hot and we had an awesome time floating lazily down the river, talking and then eating sweet picnic food afterwards.

Wednesday, had classes for the first time. Most of my classes seem pretty hard, but I’ll just have to deal. My Matrices class has a teacher that can barely speak English and my Statics class is physics-based, so I know that class will be no fun. Engineering Economy is the only class that seems kind of fun. Today had my programming class, which looks deathly hard, but at the same time, kind of fun. Will be interesting to see how that goes.

Then tonight, went out to dinner at this Vietnamese place with the gang – last night Craig and Dustin were in town. And now I’m just finishing writing this while “High School Musical” is playing on the TV…

Hope you all enjoyed the update – have a great night!