A Semester of Blessings

I've just finished my first semester of my senior year (one more left!) here at ULM. I've really come to love this school, well, at least most of it. Me and the library, we've become good friends. I spent most of my time, when I'm not in class or at work, there. When I'm not there, I would've been found on the third floor of Strauss Hall, where us Psychology majors live in the lab. Thanks to wonderful teachers/mentors and my great friends I've finally made it out of the semester alive with my sanity in tact.

I've found that, recently, all of my hard work and effort has really paid off nicely. Many blessings and opportunities have come my way. This semester, I worked on a memory experiment with my adviser. He came up with the idea, and I did all of the grunt work. I spent over 26 hours testing participants and gathering data, but our data was inconclusive. Even though it didn't work out great, I now have lots of experience collecting data and working with human subjects.

My work with my adviser soon got around to another professor of mine. He runs the Social Science Research Lab on campus (conveniently located on the 3rd floor of Strauss Hall, also). He sought me out to help him on some of the projects that they are working on. I'm currently working on two big projects.

The first, is a MacArthur Foundation grant for northeast Louisiana. We are working with the juvenile justice system and helping improve it. For an internship in the spring, I will be helping a graduate student with this project.

The second, and most exciting, is a project dealing with cancer patients in northeast Louisiana. I don't want to give away all of the details, but I'm the lead person on this project. If everything works out according to plan, then we may be able to help improve the quality of life of cancer patients in our area!

Lastly, I have done better (grade-wise) this semester than I have ever done in the past. I made the Dean's List! I was so excited when I found out; me and my dad did the 'party dance.'

While taking an inventory of the blessings that have come my way recently, I can't help but stop and thank my Heavenly Father for His hand in all of this. It has been the most memorable semester thus far, and I am so thankful for all that I have received.

If I don't post until after, I hope that those who read this will have a Merry Christmas!

What do you get when Santa goes down a chimney when a fire is lit?

A Crisp Cringle.

At the close of this Black Friday weekend, I want to touch base on the craziness that has gone on this weekend. I work in our local mall at a store that will go unnamed. This weekend began the official Christmas shopping season for us retail kids. It seems that every year stores open earlier and the customers get a little crazier. One of the stores in the mall was even open on Thanksgiving Day. That's crazy!

I worked crazy hours this week to prepare our store for Black Friday. (side note: I had a customer ask me, earlier in the week, what is Black Friday. I had to ask her if she was serious.) I arrived at my store at 2am on Friday and there were at least 75 people already in line waiting for the store to open at 3am. Customers rushed in after we opened our doors. The line soon snaked from the cash registers all the way to the back of the store and then up to the front door; a second line had to be formed to accommodate all of the customers.

By the time I left the store at noon, it looked as if a bomb went off in our store. A friend of mine told me about the mess Saturday morning before the store opened. They had to pick up all of the clothes that were on the floor and put them in a fitting room until they could be folded and put back on the sales floor. The pile was above her shoulders. When I left Saturday night at 1am, that room hadn't budged.

So, What is my point? Christmas just isn't Christmas anymore. On TV there's now a count down to the count down of Christmas. When did we let Christmas become like this? Does anyone remember what this season is really about? My goal this season is to remember why we have this time of year.

Kids Say the Darndest Things

We all know that kids are a hoot. They say the funniest things and are so completely honest. Here's a great thing I just heard about one of my step-sisters.

I was in the kitchen getting lunch today and I made a comment to my dad and step-mom, and I spelled a word rather than saying it. My step-mom replied, "God can spell." I looked at her and said, "What?" She explained that while visiting her daughters this weekend, her middle daughter remarked, after she heard someone spell a curse word, "God can spell." I found this so hilarious; I sat down and had the best laugh. I hear adults do that all of the time. We spell words we don't want kids to hear, but then they get old enough and can understand what we say. Sometimes I catch myself occasionally spelling a curse word when I feel the urge to say one but would feel bad for actually saying it. But as my step-sister would say, "God can spell."

First Blog

Okay. I don't have a title for my blog yet because I don't know where I'm going with this yet.

My name's Jessica, call me Jess. I'm a new Louisianian. I moved here Fall of 2008 year to attend the University of Louisiana Monroe. I'm a senior Psychology major. I'm hoping to break into graduate school in a year and become an Experimental Psychologist.

I love fall and winter weather. I'm talkative. I love music and movies. I'd rather read a good book than watch T.V. My favorite color is red, and I love owls.

Uh, I guess that's it!