Hello all! I promise I'm still alive. Sheesh, it's been awhile. To be honest, I'd kinda forgotten about this...wooops. Anyways, so, I do have new news! Lets see...school! I hate school, but since I've discovered online classes, it's really not so bad. This Spring term I've been taking Women in Art History, and Personal Health.

Why I took Women in Art History? Well..I need another art credit, and PCC has decided to take away credit night classes (the only time I can go!!) in Dark Room Photography...sooooo art history it was! As for the women part...well...I couldn't get into any of the other online art history classes. Considering I'm completely lost, haven't read more than 20 pages in the book (it's pretty much the most boring writing I've EVER had to read!), I still have a passing grade in the class. Some of it is interesting, some of it makes no sense, and some of it is just a bit too feminist for me. But if I've learned anything, it's that I can make things up out of thin air...and the instructor still finds it acceptable.

Health, another required class. Pretty much all the same stuff I learned in high school health, including some of the assignments we did. I currently have a high B or an A.

The term is almost over!!! In fact, I'm pretty sure both of my finals are currently available =) This whole online class thing is my savior! While they don't offer all classes online, they do offer most. All of my assignments are posted 1 week before they are due, and everything is due on the same day of the week at the same time. Tests are multiple choice or essay questions, all done online, a lot like you'd take a quiz on the internet. You email your instructor with questions, have class discussions over emails....and you can do it ANY TIME from ANYWHERE. It's pretty awesome, totally worth the extra $20 a class.

On April 15th Charlie and I signed a month to month lease at a new apartment. Our lease for the apartment we've lived in for the past two years was up in March, and before then we'd pretty much decided it was time to move. Where we were living wasn't terrible, but it wasn't great either. If you know Portland at all, you know that you don't want to live ANYWHERE along 82nd ave. It's busy, noisy and run down. We'd been living in a two bedroom, the second bedroom had just become a giant storage space. We were off 82nd, it was noisy, police sirens all the time, the neighbors downstairs thumping around and slamming doors, the neighbor next door thinking he's the next Jay-Z..it had all just gotten to be so bad. So we decided to move into a one bedroom, something that was AT LEAST $75 cheaper a month, otherwise there was no point in moving. The thing is, unless you pay an arm and a leg, one bedroom apartments here in Portland are usually tiny or crappy. After searching for a month or two we finally found something we liked. It's a 1940's six-plex, single level, that is just 10 minutes from my work (10 minutes closer than before!) It's only 300 square feet smaller than our last place, which sounds like a lot, but really isn't. My kitchen doubled in size in fact, and everything else stayed about the same size. It has all wood floors (yay!) I'm so over carpet! I went from having a 8X4 galley style kitchen, to a 10x10 kitchen, with a back door, and I for the first time in my life have a kitchen table! I even have a little storage area that I can put (what's left of) the stuff we had in the second bedroom at the old place. I took a carload of stuff to goodwill, oh yes I did. We have a front and back door, and our landlord said we could pull out the ugly bushes that are on either side of our back porch, and on one side of our front porch, and plant whatever we would like. We're also allowed to paint our walls whatever colors, we can even paint murals! Not to mention it's $80 less a month. There's a park, literally right next door to our place. The apartments don't face the street, the end of the first apartment in the row is right next to the street, so we can sit on our front steps and watch little league games in the park next door =) And it's sooooooooo quiet! I swear I've only heard sirens twice in the last month, and it's so nice to look at my bedroom window and see trees, rather than billboards. It's funny, because my whole life I've always heard my neighborhood (SE 76th & Flavel) referred to as felony flats, but it's actually pretty nice, quiet, and safe enough that I see little kids out every single day. We really like it =)

Other than that, there's nothing else new. Charlie has been working at the restaurant his sister works at, but business has gone down there sadly. He has an interview at the Zoo tomorrow though! Gosh I love the zoo! I haven't been in years ha, hopefully he gets a job there, and we can get in free!!