easy days

blueberry chocolate chip oatmeal cookies

The university has no mandated holidays for graduate students.  It's the hardest thing to explain.  "Student" isn't quite the correct word anymore.  Which I guess also balances out the "awesomeness" of not having to pay tuition anymore.  (Except, damn those student fees I didn't know about.  This is my only motivation to use the gym.)

Despite feeling my mind and body disintegrate from boredom and under use, I am going to miss those lazy days.  Easy, simple days.  When I could slowly wake up by the light of the sun at 9 am and eat breakfast for three hours before going back to bed for a nap.

quinoa burger from Spotted Dog (also watermelon beer is pretty great)

Liking all my fellow grads so far, but I'm missing Nance Pants and Nikki who were around 80% of the time to keep my brain awake and functional...

rewards on National Doughnut day

...to eat food and drink blueberry beers all day long.

if you wanna be skinny, eat this

Chapel Hill means frequent trips to Caribou and grocery stores and TOPO.  Chapel Hill means suburbia, so driving in circles and taking walks through residential homes.

grossest looking product I've ever seen

Madison doesn't necessarily not mean any of that.  But since I live downtown and haven't explored much besides that and campus, Madison means lively younguns.  Madison means walking everywhere lets me pretend I'm a "city girl."

satisfying that occasional hot dog craving at Sup Dogs (where they also have the kinds of tater tots potato dreams are made of)

No more easy days with the same familiar faces.  But that's the risk of growing up and moving on, I guess.  We were advised to stop thinking like undergrads - that's the quickest way to make the transition into the confusing unknown that is grad school.  Everyone knows I'm dreading the concept of more school, but part of me can't believe I'll only have two years to do all the things I think I can/want to do.  Are we sure it's possible?
Here's to hoping I'll make it.

mid afternoon gelato martini at Sugarland - looks like everyone had the same idea