I'll take a large latte with an extra shot, sugar free vanilla and whipped cream

I'm currently standing inside the Steaming Bean Coffee House downing my second Italian Soda of the day. The sugar rush is starting to kick in and Jason Mraz is playing a little louder than usual as I haven't seen a soul walk through the front door for the past forty-five minutes. Don't worry, all the dishes are washed and put away and the coffee is fresh and ready for the next customer that comes in. I do like working when it's busy because time flies by so much faster but slow days come in handy when I have a lot of homework to do. Since today is an unusually slow day and a majority of my homework is done I figured I'd take the free time to update this blog.

So far this semester has been going great. I'm really enjoying living off campus. It's nice to go home after work and have my own place to escape to when I don't feel like dealing with the rest of the world. It's also nice to be able to make dinner whenever I want and I really like only worrying about one other person's laundry being in the machine rather than an entire floor.

Classes are going really well. The other night we had a "Star Party" for our Astronomy lab. Rather than sit in a classroom and try to understand the sky based on charts and equations we went out there and explored. I'll admit I could have thought of at least fifteen other things I'd rather have been doing on a Thursday night from 8-10pm, but this lab was my favorite so far. Jimmy put names of stars and constellations on pieces of paper and had us split up into teams of two. We randomly picked one of each and preceded to find them in the sky. If I had to try to find a constellation a month ago I'd show you the Big Dipper, which as it turns out isn't an actual constellation, it's an asterism. Yet there we were, finding Hercules in the sky.

I'm also enjoying my Ethics class. It's really interesting to learn about different philosophies and religions and what they consider a virtuous life. Being raised a Catholic I am thrilled to learn about the history of the church from a historical standpoint rather than religious. I also like exploring different ideologies and the ways people think.

Aside from classes and work, I've been working on this year's campus reader The Translator. It's about a man who grew up in Darfur and all of the terrible things he witnessed there. He wrote the book hoping the rest of the world would read it and come to help these pour impoverished people. It can be difficult to read because it's a complete reality check as far as what has happened over there, but it really drives the point across. I recommend it to anyone who's interested in learning more about the geneocides that have been committed in Darfur.