The end

Well everyone… this is it. And when I  say this is it I’m serious, this will be my last post so I decided to make it a good one (and good may translate into long just FYI).

So as you all know I’ve had an absolute blast at the University of Manitoba for the last 4 year of my life.  But now its time to actually take the degree I’ve earned and put it to good use! I’m actually doing so right now. But this will take a bit of explaining, so bear with me.

As of our graduation night, I was still looking around for a job that both interested me and was local enough I didn’t have to move. So while at the dinner, I was chit-chatting with a prof, and happened to mention I was still on the lookout.

Well about 2 weeks later, I was almost done exams and this professor (who is absolutely wonderful) contacts me to tell me that he thinks he knows of a job that would interest me, and that I should apply if I didn’t have a job anywhere else. So I applied to the Manitoba Pork Marketing Coop without having a full understanding of what the job actually was. Well after my interview I couldn’t believe my luck! It was the EXACT kind of job I was interested in!!  What I would do each day would be the perfect mixture of dealing with markets in the Agricultural world!

Well as you may be able to tell from all of my excitement about this…. I got the job! I’ve been at it for almost 2 weeks now, and boy is it sure awesome! It just goes to show how as long as you’re going to school for something that you enjoy doing, you’ll enjoy the job that comes out of it! And I have to send a MAJOR thank-you to the professor who set me up with this. Having such a close-knit faculty is probably my most favourite feature of the Faculty of Agriculture and Food Sciences.

WEDDING

So now that you know whats all happening in terms of employment, I think it’s time to update you on wedding status! Our social is TOMORROW! And I’m so pumped.. we got all of our prizes together already, and food is almost done, it’s pretty much a matter of getting the hall set up on Saturday which should be a piece of cake!

And I have to tell you about all of the prizes we are having, just because I’m super proud! We have 4 BBQs, a Wii, a gazebo, Cedar chairs, golf bags, shop vacs, etc. It will be AWESOME!!!!

GOOD-BYE

So that’s the big news out of my life right now. I’m going to take the time to say it’s been an absolute pleasure informing you all of what was going on in my life! I hope you found it either useful or entertaining (I’m not optimistic enough to hope for both).

Keep your stick on the ice!

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Final everything

So as the end of school comes closer and closer (freakishly close if you ask me) I’m realizing how everything we have to do is titled with “final”. It’s amazing; we have final papers, final exams, final meetings, final assignments, final presentations, etc. This week for me is especially full of final meetings. All of the councils, groups and clubs are meeting one last time, the best part is that a lot of these groups serve pizza! So if you remember my evaluations of different pizza’s from earlier in the year, its time for more of that awesome pizza hotline.

JOBS

As it goes, graduation also means it’s time to go get yourself a job! Well I decided it was time to start working on that. The wonderful thing is that I now have a very broad degree that can put me into many lines of work including financials (banks/credit units), sales (ag products), or agronomy.

FLOWERS

And of course I must give an update on wedding planning. This week its flower time! I’ll be heading to Altona to check out the flower shop there, and maybe look at some pictures to see what I like and what I don’t like. I already know that if it includes roses or daisies, it has my attention. I also think lilies are absolutely gorgeous (much to my mom’s dismay). I’m super excited.

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Paper writing time

As student’s, there is a fact you can pretty much count on, somewhere, sometime during your university career, you will be required to write a research paper involving a LOT of reading of articles and finding scholarly journals as references. I know this is going to make me sound like the strangest person in the world, but I actually enjoy writing these papers! When you’re typing something up for a future due date, you can spend as much (or as little….) time as you want refining your words and making them awesome! As a person who tends to speak before thinking this an excellent opportunity.

So for my policy class I’m writing a paper on food safety policies in Canada and the United States, and if anyone has some good research material to look over, be sure to let me know!
GRAD FAREWELL DINNER

And the grad farewell dinner I’ve been mentioning for the last while was an absolute blast on the weekend!  All you who are in school, keep trucking through cause the end sure is a great time! The Friday was really great because I got a little pampered with a manicure and pedicure. Then on Saturday, my parents, my future parents in law, my grandparents and aunt and uncle (because I have a cousin graduating with me as well) all came into the city for the banquet. Everything went super smooth! Our photographer even set up this little photo booth where we could take pictures all night with funny props and poses. So now we have some pretty unbelievable pictures to remember the night by!

THE SHINING

And last, I just HAVE to tell you about the movie I watched the other day. I’m sure you’ve heard of it, or at least seen a spoof of it in The Simpsons and Family Guy.  What a freaky movie! That “Redrum” writing sure had me confused. I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone, but I’m so glad I finally know what all of the fuss is about!

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Graduation is looming near

All of a sudden I looked at a calendar today, and I definitely got a little freaked out! The end of the year is coming up fast!!

As I’ve mentioned before, I’m graduating this year. The terrifying part is that I have no idea what I will be doing afterward. Another reason why it seems to be so close is because our Grad Farewell Dinner is normally held at the end of March.

I’m super excited about this dinner! Basically, the grads and family and friends have an evening for the valedictorian address, toasts to the grads, the faculty, etc., and we hear from someone who graduated with an Agriculture Degree and are successful in the ag industry. I’m actually the one who gets to plan this night, which makes it extra special to me.

So now, a week away, I’m pretty sure we have everything picked out. That is: the menu, the guest speaker, the toasters, the MC (that’ll be me), and even the colour of the napkins. And I still have no idea what I’ll be doing come May. Kinda scary……

BREATHING TIME

On a lighter note, this is that beautiful in between time where midterms are done, and finals are still a bit away. My advice to every one of you is to take full advantage of this time. I actually had my first weekend off a little while ago (well actually I had the weekend before that off but I got my wisdom teeth out then, so its not really a vacation, its more like a painful resting period). Anyway, my weekend off, the first thing I did was sit and do nothing! And after that, I went and checked out some flower shops for the wedding, and then I did a little bit more of nothing! It was excellent. So take full advantage of this time, because we all know finals will be coming up before we know it, and breathing time will become a luxury.

Till next time…

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Accounting is my life

As I’ve mentioned before, I’m currently working on my Agriculture and Food Sciences Degree. A part of that degree is taking an accounting course which I decided to take long distance over the summer. A thing you should know about me is that I seriously dislike the subject, and found motivation for studying to be virtually nonexistent. So……

Here we are in February, and I just finished it up! I finally wrote my final last week, and it feels as though I have had a ginormous weight lifted off of my shoulders, and life is great! I have learned a few things though.

1. Procrastinating something you dislike does in fact make it worse later on
2. Putting a lot of work into something and accomplishing it feels awesome
3. I now appreciate my fiancé (an accountant by trade) SO much more

Social Planning
So now I get to do some of the good stuff, and that includes social planning! For those of you who are interested, we are having our wedding social on May 8 in Oak Bluff, and it should be lots of fun. I’ve been spreading word around the faculty each day. In fact this weekend, Corey and the men in his family are curling in the Arborg Men’s Bonspiel and are hoping to win some awesome prizes!

Grad Planning
Another thing I get to do with my position on FASO is plan grad, and I’ve very excited that we’ve found our guest speaker! Johanne Ross, the executive director of Ag in the Classroom and a former Ag grad from our faculty will be gracing us with her words.

Hope all is well with all of you!

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Reading Week

Hey everyone! First of all, I am so sorry for the tardiness of this note. It seems life just kinda jumped up and got busy.
 
But enough complaining, it’s time for READING WEEK!!!

Now for some, reading week is the equivalent of spring break. A week to go on a trip, or sit and watch tv for hours straight. For me however, the name is very fitting because reading is what I am doing! It’s alright though, because I’d rather do it now while classes have come to a stop, than later when they’re back up and running. I think of this week as a “catching your breath” week.

So let me tell you here what I’ve actually all been up to!

CURLING

I started last weekend by heading to the town of Morris for a curling bonspiel! 19 other friends of mine and myself formed 5 teams in a mixed “funspiel”. We had a blast playing against each other all weekend, and hanging out in the evenings at a friends’ hot tub. 2 of the teams even managed to win 2nd and 3rd event!

VALENTINES

The bonspiel ended on Saturday night, and we all headed back to the city on Sunday. Sunday was of course the 14th, also known as Valentine’s Day to some! It was quite enjoyable as my fiancé and myself went to go see Percy Jackson and the Olympians (which is actually a really great movie if any of you are considering it).

BIRTHDAYS

So now as Monday rolled around, it was time to head back to Altona a celebrate both my brother Derek’s birthday (he turned 24 that day) and Corey (my fiancé’s) birthday- although his is actually only on February 26. Part of Derek’s birthday present was the movie “The Assassination of Jesse James” with Brad Pitt. (I just watched the movie today, and although its somewhat slow, I’d still give it 7/10).

INFO DAYS

And for those of you who doesn’t know what all goes on on campus while we’re all away, its Info Days! This is where high school students from all over come and check out what the University of Manitoba has to offer. I had the privilege of doing presentations for the Faculty of Agriculture and Food Sciences. It was actually kind of cool to because my cousin came to it!

HOMEWORK

So I’ve given you just a very brief recap of this last week, including all the main events. In between all these events though, I have NOT been sitting around, as I mentioned, I have been reading. For some reason, I have more homework this year than I’ve ever had during this time. So I’m filling in my extra time with assignments and studying…. Fun fun.

Anyway, I should probably get back to that because more midterms are on their way!\

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Curl curl and curl some more

So I just spent this weekend doing one thing and one thing only, watching curling! Ya I know what some of you are thinking…. Why would you subject yourself to that kind of boredom? Sitting and watching 6 games? Surely there is some homework or something you could be doing instead.. Well I’m not going to lie, about a year ago I would be saying the exact same thing! But this year is a little different, see my fiancé was on the ice. And 7 other people I knew quite well were also playing. It was a pretty awesome weekend, and I actually ENJOYED watching them. Go figure I know. But I thought of something else actually… see the aggies hold an event in March called “All night curling” where we curl late into the night… and now that I’ve been watching all these games, I’m sure I picked up a pointer or 2 somewhere!

BUGS

But on to school stuff. So I officially have my first midterm tomorrow, and it sure seems crazy! I mean, didn’t we JUST start the semester? How do we already have enough information to be tested on? But I guess that’s the way it goes. I guess I’ll look through my notes and see what there all is. If you’re wondering why I named the segment the way I did, it’s because I’ll be taking an entomology exam. So we get to look at all kinds of cool bugs, and find out what they do in life. It’s pretty awesome actually!

JOBS

Well as most of you know as well, I plan on graduating this April… (fingers crossed of course). So I thought it was about time for me to start looking for a job! This brings me to my interview I had last week. I walked in there, prepared as can be, only to find out they’re looking for someone to start next week! It was pretty funny as there is absolutely nothing you can do at that point. There had been a slight miscommunication somewhere as to what exactly they were looking for. Oh well though, guess I’ll keep looking.

Anyway, I hope midterm season starts a bit later for all of you than it did for me!

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Hoedown Week

The first week of January spells one thing and one thing only for us Aggies… HOEDOWN WEEK!

So basically we plan 2 events for each day.. an afternoon one and evening one. The afternoon ones range anywhere from going tobogganing to a chili lunch (where there’s a chili making competition) to “redneck Olympics” where each participant has to complete a crazy obstacle course.

And the evening events included Rumors comedy club (which I actually planned because it was our grad fundraiser) where one lucky girl won a 32” TV and a lucky guy won a Molsen beer fridge. Another night was spent doing Karaoke, and another was at Whiskey Dixx on Portage.

 Of course on Friday there was the giant Eat Yer Hat Social (and for those of you who don’t know- this is in my opinion the best social on campus).  And the last event of this week.. a day long pubcrawl! This is by far my most favorite event of the entire week, and the reason is because that is where I met my fiancé!!

AG DAYS

So this week there is some more aggie stuff going on, but this time it’s a little more on the employment side of things. Ag Days in Brandon is an annual convention for anyone in an agriculture related field. Everyone goes there and tours around to see what’s new in agriculture.

As a student ambassador, we were approached to host a University of Manitoba booth. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to attend, but I DO have several friends working at the table. If  you happen to be swinging by… go on and say hi!

Well that’s it for all right now… I got a couple of assignments to do, as well I have an optometrist appointment tomorrow so I should probably get a good night sleep and rest my eyes……

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Time for the new semester

I MADE IT!

Well exams are done!!! Well they’ve actually been done for quite awhile…  as I’m sure you’re all realizing. I sure hope everyone made it through, and had a chance to enjoy their holidays through and through! My last exam was the 22nd, and I was so happy when I walked out of there.

HOLIDAYS

My holidays were EXCELLENT as well. We split the time between mine and my fiance’s parents and grandparents places (which meant going to Fisher Branch, Stonewall, and Altona). But we got a chance to see everyone so that was really nice. Although to be completely honest, I think I’m STILL full from all of the food we ate. We had steak, ribs, more steak, and appetizers! So So delicious…. I think I could eat steak for a week and not get tired of it!

Was pretty crazy weather there for a little while too! I hope nobody got stuck somewhere, or got in any sort of accident. On Christmas day, Corey and I managed to get stuck in all of the snow just driving into a parking lot RIGHT outside of my grandparents place. I was a little embarrassing until they all came out and pushed us right out.

STARTING SCHOOL

So now that school has started again; it’s time for the fun of new classes! I’ve actually got a pretty eclectic combination of classes that I’m pretty excited about. As an agriculture student, I decided to take an entomology course to see how bugs affect agriculture. As well, I am taking an interesting elective in the faculty of music that includes going to see various classical concerts and reviewing them.  I’m so excited about this new set of courses! That’s the nice thing about elective, you can take courses that aren’t a part of your degree but are super interesting still.

HOEDOWN

In addition to classes, there are a lot of activities coming up this next week. From Jan. 11-16 the aggies are putting on their annual HOEDOWN week. This means at least 2 events a day, everything from tobogganing, to Rumors Comedy Club, to a Karaoke night! All events are open, and Tuesday night (Rumors night) is actually a fundraiser for our graduating class so for anyone who’s not busy……it’s sure to be a great time!

The wrap up for the week is on Friday night, it’s called Eat Yer Hat social. It’s right on campus, and should be EXCELLENT!!

Keep on keepin’ on…..

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McDonalds, exams and Christmas shopping

McDonalds

It’s amazing how when someone happens to mention something, it can get on your mind, stick, and not leave. For me its when someone mentions McDonalds. I’m sure you know what I’m talking about, that feeling when someone just says the words “double cheeseburger” your mouth starts watering and you feel this urge for French fries, a cold coke, and yes that delicious double cheeseburger! Well it happened the other day…. This wonderful yet inconvenient craving, only something happened that never had, it happened to me and 2 of my friends all at the same time. Someone just said the word, and the next thing you know we were on our way out the door on the way to the closest McDonalds (which is the one at the corner of Pembina and Bishop Grandin for those of you keeping tracks.. just SLIGHTLY shorter than the one by the Perimeter). Anyway the moral of the story is we got our McDonalds and were all very happy..

Exams
Second thing on my mind today is exams! Surprise surprise.. I’m sure you’re all thinking, seeing as how they start next week!!!! (I try not to overdo the exclamation marks, but for some things they are just necessary). So I finally got on top of things and checked my schedule so that I at least knew WHEN I had to write them.. and I actually got pretty lucky this year, I have 3 the first 3 days, then about a week off and 2 more, which is really nice cause I’ll have time in between to get some Christmas shopping done! Which brings me to my next point….

Christmas Shopping
So those of you who have already ventured into the malls have seen that already the stores are CRAZY busy. There are people everywhere! Luckily being a student, if you have a spare somewhere you can swing by during a time that isn’t peak hours.  If you’re not aware.. those hours that are not considered “peak” during this time would be between 10:00 am and 10:05am…..sooooooo have fun!

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