Jun

05

Iowa City Summer

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I made the decision to spend my summer staying in Iowa City. The main deciding factor of my stay is my job. I love my job at the rock wall in the CRWC (Campus Recreation and Wellness Center) and when I was given the opportunity to stay on this summer I jumped at the opportunity. It also saved me a job hunt if I had returned home to the Chicago suburbs.

The only downfall I can see is that besides working, I really have nothing else to do. I couldn’t afford summer classes, so that wasn’t an option. So besides working, I really need to find something else to do…

Spending the summer away from home is a new experience all within itself. But another new experience is living on my own. Freshman year I was in the dorms, sophomore year I lived in my sorority house, so this is the first time I’m truly on my own in an apartment. It has definitely been a learning curve. Luckily I’m naturally an extremely neat and organized person, so that has made the transition easier. Cooking is another big one. I LOVE to cook, and finally I get the opportunity to instead of having my food made for me. So that’s a major perk.

Overall I’m loving working here this summer. I already absolutely love my job, I’m really getting to know my coworkers, and I’m trying lots of new things. I can’t wait to see what else this summer brings me!

Apr

15

Dear Weather,

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Dear Weather,

I’d really appreciate if you chose one season, and stuck to it. By choosing a season, I mean spring. Let it be spring! Your bipolar temperatures are really starting to get to me. Beautiful one day, and chilly the next. T-shirt one day, winter coat the next. Enough is enough!

Love, Andi.

But anyways…

I’m ready to do what I love most about Iowa City. I want to sit out on that beautiful Pentacrest lawn and just listen to the sounds of Iowa City and the University. It’s a comforting place to just sit and relax, hang out with friends, slack-line, throw a frisbee around, and just study! When Iowa City has nice weather, it has BEAUTIFUL weather. I feel shameful sitting inside on perfect 70 degree days. I gaze out my window and just long to sit in the grass and do nothing. No Ipod, no computer, no phone. Just simply lay there and enjoy the weather, people watch, cloud gaze, and to put it simply, enjoy being completely unproductive.

Iowa City is a beautiful place to be. I couldn’t imagine going to school anywhere else.

Mar

26

Busy Bee!

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This semester has not been anything less than HECTIC!

I feel like I never have a moment of down town! From class, to work, to my sorority, I just have too much going on! In one respect it can be a good thing. It forces me to be more scheduled and narrows my focus. But on the other hand, I can be a very introverted person, so I often crave the alone time. Today I even cancelled a doctor appointment just so I could have an hour or two of down time! I realize I just got back from spring break, but I did not have the typical, beach-side, relaxing vacation like many of my friends. Granted I’m not complaining, but my break was actually pretty stressful. So returning to school only brings back even more stress! I’m having a hard time keeping things together, so hopefully I can pull through and make it though the rest of the semester!

Feb

02

New On-Campus Job!

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For the past semester I’ve worked at the Hillcrest Marketplace for Student Housing & Dining. Don’t get me wrong, it was a good job with amazing co-workers and superiors, but it was time for a change.

Over winter break I was browsing Iowa’s website for available student jobs. Quite a few came up, but I was pretty uninterested. But then one opening caught my eye; Rock Wall Attendant at the CRWC. I’ve been climbing for over 5 years now and it’s something I absolutely love. The risks, the sense of accomplishment when you complete a tough route, and just the people who also enjoy that kind of atmosphere. So needless to say, I applied immediately! I was nervous waiting for the email which would tell me my fate, but only a couple of days later it appeared in my inbox. I held my breathe when I opened it. I didn’t get the job… but I did get an interview!! I was ecstatic!

The interview was the Monday before classes started, and 6 other people were also being interviewed for the position. I hadn’t climbed in a few months so I was also quite rusty. I also did not own my own harness, which everyone else had their own personal equipment. I was feeling quite intimidated and slightly embarrassed. All the other applicants also knew many of the pre-existing staff members. At that point I was feeling really let down. The first phase of the interview was a skill check, to see if we knew how to belay, knew the proper commands, and safety checks. I felt like I did average. I wasn’t outstanding, but then again I was pretty rusty. After that we had rotations around different stations to ‘teach’ the current employees certain skills. I like to think of myself as a good communicator so I thought I did a good job. One of the rotations was also a very brief interview, where I thought I answered the questions with ease.

Once the group interview was over we had a lunch break, and then had to come back for individual interviews. We (all the applicants) decided to all get lunch together just because we could! I thought it was great getting to know my possible future co-workers.

After that I headed back to the CRWC for my interview. I was super nervous, but I felt a little more confident than before. The interview was very brief. A max of probably 3-4 questions were asked, and then there was a brief pause. My heart skipped a beat, and before I let myself be disappointed I heard the words “Congrats, we’d love to have you as a new hire.” I was so happy! I wanted this job so badly and I couldn’t believe I got it, and as it turns out all 7 of us were hired!

All the older employees were so welcoming and helpful on my first shift. I mainly greet and sign people in and help them fill out the proper paperwork and waivers in order to climb. It’s a simple job, but I couldn’t be happier!

Rock Wall at the CRWC!

Rock Wall at the CRWC!

Jan

28

First Week Takedown.

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So this past week, or “syllabus week” as many like to call it, was the big wake up call for Iowa students after they got back from winter break. Many students have a rough time re-adjusting to things. No longer sleeping in, finding all your new classrooms, diving back into homework, purchasing books… basically the first week back is a choppy one.

For once, I had a very smooth week back. I had a really rough time home with several family members passing, so coming back to my life in Iowa was a relief. But being back still had its’ challenges. I had quite a rough first semester struggling with anxiety, high stress, depression, roommate problems, getting homework done, and overall time management. So returning for the spring semester I was absolutely determined to not repeat last semester.

I’m happy to report that after this first week I have confidence I’ll be able to overcome my fall semester slump. I feel like I’m on top of my game. I’ve been using my new agenda like a mad woman and it’s kept me unbelievably organized and helping infinitely with my time management. I’ve switched roommates and I couldn’t be happier in my new room and with my new roommate, so I will no longer feel stressed just coming home to my own room! I’ve also been right on top of my homework, completely, days in advance instead of waiting to do it the night or morning it’s due.

Overall just taking some of those simple steps has reduced my stress to an unheard of level for me. I feel much more organized and put together, and I don’t feel like a chicken running around with its head cut-off! Hopefully I can grab onto this momentum and hold on for dear life so it doesn’t get lost and fade away.

Jan

23

New Semester, New Me.

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I’ve finally arrived back in Iowa City after a very long, and hard break. My winter break was unfortunately not a great one. I had several relatives pass away and one most recently on the first day of classes. So to say the least, my semester has not kicked off on a high note.

Despite a rough start, I have high aspirations for the semester. I plan to really buckle down and do my best with my classes, I want to create stronger bonds with my sorority sisters and marching band friends, keep in touch better with my family back home, find an apartment to live in next year, and improve my overall health. I have quite the list going for me, but I plan to achieve every last item.

I wouldn’t consider these a “new year’s resolution”. I believe them to be a list of things to do that I can better my overall experience at Iowa and just my life in general. My motivation and determination are strong right now, so I hope I can keep that persistence as the semester rolls on.

Fingers crossed.

Dec

27

Winter Break: Much Needed!

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This semester was a very rough one for me. I had more than several health issues holding me back from being focused and ultimately took a hit on my grades. Student Health and many other location on and near campus became like a second home. It ate up a lot of my time and effort. So these next few weeks are much needed. It is going to be more of a time of recovery than a break. I’ll be using these next few weeks to focus on getting my health back to 100%.

I hoping next semester will be a turning point in my college career. Hopefully winter break will be enough time for me to turn my health around and get back on track. I made the hard decision of taking a lighter schedule in the spring to cut myself a little slack, because this semester was quite the rough one for me. But I’m motivated to get back on track so I’m keeping my fingers crossed that I’ll be able to pull myself back together by the time I need to head back to Iowa!

Dec

03

Long Time, No Blog.

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Well to say the least, it’s been a month and one day since my last post. My only excuse is simply being stressed to the max, socially, mentally, physically, and of course academically. These last two weeks are killer. I haven’t been this drained in a while. My goal is to bust it out for the rest of the semester and then head home for peace and quiet for five weeks. I’m in serious need of a break.

I’m taking a much lighter class load next semester so I have every intention of getting back on the blogging band wagon. But for now I’m hanging in there and counting down the days until winter break!

Nov

01

Reorganizing My Life.

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Time management is always something I’ve struggled with. I tend to never write things down, and then it will hit me the day before that I need to get something done. That in turn makes me rush around and get really flustered, and once I get really flustered I get really stressed. I bought a tiny planner at the beginning of the year, but it was so small that it usually just got smushed to the bottom of my backpack and forgotten about.

So in an effort to reorganize my life, I bought a brand new, BIGGER planner. Along with it I bought colored pens to organize it even further. I’ve had this system going for about a week now, and I’m happy to report it seems to be working! It no longer gets buried in my backpack and I’ve actually been looking at it and writing things down. This is especially helpful when it comes to tests! Although I’m still a very stressed student I feel like it has gone down considerably since getting my new agenda. Not to mention I spoiled myself and bought a really cute Vera Bradley agenda. So that also gives me incentive to use it because I love the look and the layout of it. I suggest to anyone who needs to get organized, buy a larger sized planner and use colored pens for different classes. It’s an easy way to get yourself organized.

What I use to get organized!

Oct

29

‘Just’ Northwestern

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This past weekend was the “unofficial” marching band away trip. We don’t officially go as the band, but we all come together and decided to travel to an away game without the responsibilities of waking up crazy early to rehearse. This year the elected game was Northwestern of “just” Northwestern (jNW) as we like to call it. We say “just” because we have an ongoing joke that they are no threat to us, so when we play them we say things like “calm down guys, it’s just Northwestern.” It’s a little silly but we love it nonetheless.

We left Friday afternoon to spend the night at my house back in Chicago! It was really convenient (and cheap!) because I only live about 45 minutes away from Evanston, where Northwestern University is located. We had a bonfire in my backyard and just hung out. Even though I was probably home for less than 12 hours it was still great to see my family and all my pets!

Then the next morning we woke up around 6 to drive to jNW and tailgate! Tailgating is something band members do once a year, and it’s on the unofficial away trip. Because other games we are getting up to rehearse and touch-up our show before the game! So it’s definitely a somewhat unique experience to band members. But we all decided to park in the same lot to tailgate together! I would say there were probably about 50 or more band members who made the trip, which is about one fourth of the entire band!

Even though we ended up losing it was still a great experience. We got to se the Wildcat marching band and talk with some of their band members and watched their pregame show. Big10 bands always support each other even if we are sworn rivals. They had a James Bond themed halftime show which sounded great, although they’re band is considerably smaller than ours! I loved my trip and I can’t wait to see where the band will end up next year for our away trip!

Me and my friend Martin during the game!