Well this is it! It is now technically Wednesday of exam week for the S109 semester. I am still awake because I have been spending the past couple hours going through old papers from the semester and beginning to set things up for next semester. I fortunately do not have anything to study this week because I have no scheduled exams so this is my way of preparing to finish the term papers that i have to write. this paper work though has been on my mind for weeks and as i've always said, i need organizaion in order to truly finish anything off. so now that i'm physically and mentally prepared i can focuse on doing my best job with finishing the term papers. tonight was the exam jam, so it was able to set me off in that great mood. i spent time with some good friends just relaxing and having fun. I was able to eat some free food which was served by the teachers, get a free AMAZING back massage, attend a session of 'blessing of the brains' from campus ministry in which you could join in meditation through prayer, and also we were given the opportunity to pie some of the RAs in the face. that was definitely amusing! oh and how can i forget the kareoke. i was able to witness some very interesting performances from some of my friends as they attempted to ...i believe sing... is the word several popular songs from the ages. it was definitely a fun night. and come saturday i will be able to travel home, again through the megabus, for just less than a month. i am hoping to work A LOT at home with my lovely ladies at Hallmark and to build closer relationships with my family! i've realized a lot this year how much i really would like to bond with my family more. i don't want to be cheesey, as some might think. but really, i do love my family. of course we fight and bicker and tease each other and oh my gosh do we get on each others nerves sometimes. but i love them. hey, family is the one thing that will always be there anyway! so whether i like them or not. i'm stuck. but i'm glad i'm stuck with this family. a big irish family in the southside of chicago is one of the greatest things ever known. i'm glad i'm a part of such a community!

 oh and i want an ipod and the twilight series for christmas ;)

 Merry Christmas and Happy New Year everyone! It's been a great semester!!!

Hey Guys!

The end of the semester is here! Just one more week of exams and I’m home free. And man, lookin back, it FLEW! I can’t believe its December already and I have to take my exams. And wrestling season is already down to the last two and a half months! But the fact that this semester has gone so quick is a good thing, because as I sit here typing this taking a break from my studying, I am having very little trouble recalling information about philosophers and events that I learned about at the beginning of the semester. Believe it or not, something actually stuck in my head!

I’ll take this time to tell you all about how the end of the semester works. The first and most important thing: I get paid for various things that I’ve done for the school this semester. Second thing: exams. Sometimes they suck, sometimes they aren’t too bad. This semester for me isn’t too bad, except for the fact that I have two exams and a final paper all due within 19 hours of each other. Other than that, my exam schedule is cake.

For those of you who don’t know, the week of finals is different from the rest of the year. Classes don’t meet at their regular times and only once for each class. For example my Monday Wednesday Friday class that usually meets at 10 to 10:50 will now meet Tuesday at 8:30 to 10:30 to take the exam. At 10:31 a.m. on Tuesday, I’m done with American History! (Nothing personal Dr. Lynch. I like ya, but that’s just one more step closer to my degree!) And then at the end of the week, we are done with school till the second week of January or so. I realllllllly need this month off!

Well I gotta get back to studying!

See ya!

>Eric M.

well its coming down to it! there is less than two weeks left of this semester and i'm ready for it to be finalized! i don't know how i managed it but i have not had one test all semester and I have no schedulded exam to take. I have one final project, 2 final papers, and 2 more concerts, and then i'm done! my last event for campus minisitry was last night. I also had my first concert for college chorale last night. our final concert is tonight in the mater dei chapel at 7:30. we had our concert for mount singers on the wednesday before thanksgiving break and our final show will be next friday after the semester is over when we perform at the festival of lights. my final project is for my flameworking class and oh my goodness i am ready to finish it! i'll have a picture of it on here SOON! My final papers are for Ethics and Religion and they are both on their way to be done! I've got these next two weeks to focus on preparing myself for next semester: i can set time away for work, homework, exercise, sleep if need be, and clubs/organizations. I'm ready to start the next semester. I'm ready to take on new challenges. I'm ready to learn new material. I'm ready to further my education. I'm ready!

This winter break is going to be awesome! when i was home for thanksgiving break i was able to go in to my work at Hallmark from the summer and tell my manager about my availability for the winter break and she told me my name is still in the system! i'm happy! I need that job!

 only two more weeks left - I'm making it work!!!!

So Thanksgiving break went by in the blink of an eye. Before I knew, I was sleeping in my bed at the dorms and I was preparing for the torturous Monday that I just encountered. 

But my break wasn’t all that bad, but I’m certain I’ve had better. I went home Tuesday night after my ASL class and slept at home that night. Then Wednesday morning at 6:30 AM, my mom and I made the 4 ½ hour drive to Pigeon Forge, TN, to meet up with some of her friends to hang out for a bit. We shopped, went out, and just had some good general girl fun (say that ten times fast lol). They ended up going home on Wednesday night but Mom and I spent the night in Tennessee. Then on Thursday morning, Thanksgiving, we went up through Gatlinburg, surprised there were people out and shops were open, but we went up into the mountains to Cade’s Cove and drove around on the path up there observing the natural scenery. It took three hours to drive the 25 miles up the mountains, the 11 mile trail, and the 25 miles back into Gatlinburg. It was excruciatingly slow but my mom and I had fun in the car making fun of all the other holiday drivers. ;) We ended up leaving for home at 2:30 PM and got to my aunt’s house at 7 PM. We were tired, I was hungry, and I was exhausted from driving in the car for almost 8 hours (Cade’s Cove trip + the drive home). The Thanksgiving meal at my aunt’s was good and we had fun hanging out and just being goofy. For example, my uncle had my two younger cousins, Lexie who is 8 and Jake who is 4, put on a circus and do acrobatic tricks for us in the middle of the living room. Of course, my other cousin, Sean who is 1, wanted to join in and he tried doing his own flips, unsuccessfully might I add.  

Friday was Black Friday and my mom and I went out again and shopped till my feet just about fell off my legs. It was fun though and I got some gifts for people crossed off my list so it was productive to say the least. Then on Saturday my brother and I spent 4 hours raking leaves for my mom (she’s showing up a lot in this isn’t she? Wow… lol). Of course, on Sunday we were looking out into the expansive backyard and my mom said, “Wow… it looks…” and I said, “Desolate.” And she said, “No. I was gonna say pristine.” Lol But later she did say it looked a bit desolate so ha! She agreed with me! Lol I like the leaves on the ground, just as much as I like snow on the ground. I just don’t like to clean either of them up, but again, who does? J 

Sunday I spent the day watching the Bengals lose again, but what else is new? I also watched the Steelers-Patriots game so that was fun. I like both teams so I didn’t care who’d win (I’ll prolly get flack for that later but oh well). Then I came back to school for school this week and the exams are next week so… 

Only four more full school days left and four exam days and then break! I’m going on vacation with three of my girl friends from Friday, Dec. 12^th-Sunday, Dec. 14^th, so I am really looking forward to that! But it’s getting down to the wire and I am stressed beyond belief but I really don’t have that much to do. I just need to calm down and breathe and I’ll be fine. That is some good advice for everyone though. J Until next time, breathe evenly and deep and all will be fine… J Now, if I can just remember that for myself… ;)

Hey, what’s up everybody!

Life has pretty much returned to normal here in the tri-state area since the “hurricane” hit.  I’m pretty sure everyone has their power back now, although I did hear that some people just got it back TODAY, a week and two days after the storm! That would be terrible! There still is some visible damage to some of the houses around town. My prayers are still with those people.

On a different note, college is truckin on and most people are just taking or getting grades back from their first exams of the semester. Let me use this time to offer up some advice to potential college students, and this doesn’t just apply to Mount St. Joseph’s students:   

           DON’T

                             FREAK

                                          OUT!

A lot of students usually flip out when they are preparing for their first exams. There hasn’t been a lot of time to get to know your professors and identify their teaching style, let alone their assessment style.  True every class is different in the way exams are administered and the types of tests given, but usually students overanalyze the information being tested.  The most important thing to do is ask the professor how the test will be made up. If that doesn’t help, first off, just breathe and then start with studying the broad topics of the information being tested (this especially helps if you fall behind in your readings).  Then if you still have the motivation and time to study, focus on the more in-depth concepts being assessed. 

Just remember that you can only do as much as you can do. That makes a lot of sense, right? But it’s true! If you try to push yourself too hard, you will get stressed and forget half the stuff you studied, and that is just pointless.  So when taking your first exams, relax, take breaks when studying (and often: this keeps you focused), and just do as much as you can.  And worst case scenario, if you do terrible on the exam, you have the rest of the semester to work hard and bring up the grade, because you’ll know what to expect on the next exam!

Life’s too short to stress out over an exam!

>Eric M.

Hey everyone!

Well, this is it! The last blog before school is out.  This year went so quick.  In fact, after this week, I’m going to be half way done with my college career.  That’s pretty weird to think about.  I don’t feel like that’s the case at all.  These first two years flew by!

Anyway, I thought I’d talk about the exams, since they seem to be on everyone’s minds this time of year.  Myself, I’m not too worried or stressed. I’m usually a good test taker and a few tests don’t hold a candle to the papers and projects I’ve had to complete these past few weeks. 

The way the exams work is pretty simple. You can search “exam schedule” on inside.msj.edu to find our schedule.  The schedule is listed by the time of day the course usually meets.  Then, it lists what day the respective exam will take place and what time. For example, my Age of Ideology class meets on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 10:00.  The exam takes place on Thursday at about 1:15 till 3:05.  After that, I’m done with the course (which is a pretty tough course, just for future reference).

You will also find that some classes don’t meet for the exam.  One of my classes has an optional exam, only if you need the extra points to boost your grade. I have an A in the class, so I don’t really need the points, so I opted out of taking the exam.  Out of 5 classes, I only have to meet for 3 exams, and they are all on different days.  This laid back scheduling helps ease any stress students feel when faced with the exams and definitely helps me feel more comfortable with them. 

So when faced with the final exams, just relax, use the free time created through the exam schedule to study as much as you can, and just take the tests. There isn’t much more you can do, so relax, do your best, then go enjoy your summer! A lot of people get over-stressed, but there really is no reason to. By this point, you will have been working for 10 weeks for a good grade, one week isn’t going to kill ya.

If you’re in college, push through these last weeks, and if your in high school, enjoy the time you have left.  Then enjoy the summer time!

I’ll try to post up a few blogs over the course of the summer break, just to let you guys know what’s goin on.

See ya!

>Eric M.

You know when your mind is racing even when you’re going to bed.  That’s been me for the past two weeks.  As exams are approaching next week for most of MSJ’s students, the interior design students have some of their exams this week.  In our interior design classes, for our final projects we always have projects instead of tests.  To many that would sound very easy, but in reality I think it may be harder.  In interior design you are always modifying and finding better ways to space plan.  So you are always down to the wire because of constant modifications that you make.  The newest project that I am undertaking at the moment is my lamp.  For environmental technologies we have to build our own lamp.  On to less stressful news, the Department of Art and Design had their annual thesis opening this past Friday.  This is when students present their final projects to the public.  This is a big deal for all seniors because they get to show off all of their hard work and what they have learned over the past four years.  There are two thesis openings that are a week to two weeks apart from each other.  The first thesis opening has graphic design work mixed in with fine arts and art education.  And the second thesis has interior design work mixed in with fine arts and art education work.  Speaking of all the hard work these girls do I need to get back to my work.