The Ivory Tower

Hey y'all! Well I finally got around to putting pictures up of the place where I will be working like a mad man. As you can tell I am not a professional photographer by any stretch of the imagination.

This is where my department is. Pretty huh?

This is their version of Library Mall.

Typical pathway on campus. Huge magnolia trees all over. Someone told me that they have one of each tree found in Tennessee.

I can see this clock tower from my office window. Yeah that's right office.

This is their school of engineering. Very imposing.

Not gonna lie, I would prefer a Caribou.

There you have it folks, a little insight into my life here at school.

No Pictures But Funny Stories

So I have totally been procrastinating on taking the pictures but it's because I have been kinda busy with school stuff. Pretty much every day I have been walking to the psych building to work on old research projects and getting started on new ones. It's great to live within walking distance of the campus but I am finding there are some major downsides as well. Well actually there is only one downside. I never thought of myself as a sweaty person, sure I would sweat when working out but who doesn't? Well I have come to find out that humidity and myself do not get along. While everyone around me looks as cool as a cucumber, I look like someone dropped me into a pool. It has gotten so bad that I have to plan around how sweaty I will get. For example, I had to go into the lab today so that I could get some work done. Also while I was there, I had to meet with the academic coordinator to go over my schedule. I knew that I would be a dripping mess once I got to the building; the walk takes about 20 minutes. I left for the lab early enough so that I could sit in my air conditioned office and dry before heading down to my meeting. This is all fine and dandy now since I have an overabundance of time but once school starts? I foresee having half my wardrobe at school for mandatory costume changes.

I have learned all sorts of things since coming to Nashville. It really is a whole other world from what I am used to. People are surprisingly polite and any women over the age of 35 calls sweetie or hun. Another thing that I have learned; Scientology isn't just for the rich and famous. One day when I was walking to school, already fairly sweaty I might add, I was stopped by three people. They were all dressed in business clothes and looked like they were on campus for a meeting. The leader of the group asked me if I knew where the Student Life Center was because they were part of an education conference that was being held there. Now I haven't been on campus long but I have started to learn my way around. I told here that I did and that I would be walking past it on my way so I told them to follow me. The woman and I made awkward conversation while the other two followed in silence. She was asking me if I was a student and what I was studying. I told her that I was actually a grad student, puffing my chest out a little, and that I was in the clinical psych program. After I had said this, the other two started talking quietly to one another while the woman seemed to intentionally ignore them. She asked, "Oh like psychiatry?" I get this a lot, the confusion of psychology and psychiatry, so I told her no actually. As we were nearing the Student Center I asked what school they were with since they were going to an education conference. The woman said oh we are with the Church of Scientology on 8th, you should stop by, bring friends if you want. I kinda tripped over myself at that point and said oh, well, here is the center have a good day. I booked it as fast as I could. I didn't even know they allowed Scientology in the South.

How Long Has It Been?

The last time I even thought to write on here there was snow piled on the ground and I never thought I would be warm again. Now I am sitting in a coffee shop, in Nashville, afraid to go outside because if I do, I will be drenched in sweat within minutes. I don't know if it is because I have lived in colder climates for the past 5 years but I cannot get over how flipping hot it is outside. People walk down the street in jeans and it blows my mind, how are they not suffering from heat stroke? Supposedly it is pretty bad up in the Cities but I am gonna put my money on it being worse down here.

I moved into my apartment earlier this week and it is pretty nice. The floors squeaked a lot wherever I walked but it didn't bother me too much. Unfortunately the same can't be said for the guy who lives below me. This came to my attention last night while I was talking to my dad on the phone. When I talk on the phone I like to pace around the room rather than just sit in one place. I don't know why I do this, I just do. About midway through the conversation and mid-step, I hear a double bang which seemed to originate from below me. I stoped moving just to see if it would continue, which it didn't, so I started walking again. Then came a single bang, definitely not a coincidence. It was about 10:30 at night so I figured the person below me felt that I should be going to bed when he was. I cry bullshit.

This morning I went down to the office to report that my floor was really squeaky and that I think the guy below me was banging on the ceiling to tell me to stop moving around. The women at the office told me he had come in just earlier to report the same thing. For some reason I feel threatened by this guy. It isn't my fault that the floor is squeaking and I shouldn't be forced to only move around my apartment when it is convenient for him. Either way, they are sending some maintenance people up to my apartment today to fix all the floorboards. Hopefully they will do an adequate job the first time so that my downstairs "neighbor" won't be banging anymore.

Today I think I am going to walk around the campus and take pictures of it so that I can post them on here. I want to give y'all a better idea of what life is going to be like for me here. I won't take any pictures of my apartment just yet because I don't even have my furniture yet so it looks like a crack den.