I was supposed to go get my picture taken for the OPT application today and in the application package they had suggested a place in Upper Montclair. With all the bussed and trains I'm taking to to go there I had to leave an hour earlier than usual so that I could do this before work started. I get to the place and see these signs "Everything must go" and "Closing down sale". Awesome. I walk in and the guy doesn't even turn around. When he finally does he tells me they no longer take passport pictures. GREAT! Can you recommend me a place that do and take the official US passport pictures and not the old fashion ones...no. So my mug shots were not taken yet but T is taking me to a place that does tonight so it's all good. I have everything except the pictures and a check for $10000000000000 million thousands hundreds billions that they want for the card. I have a meeting with Aditi on Thursday morning and we will go through the application. It's very convenient that the person giving me a ride home 3 times a week is also the person in charge of the immigration things here at school!
Work permit application, check.
My boss is out today because her son is sick so I have been able to take care of some of my personal business. I have a little stats project I should be doing but sooooo do not feel like it so I will leave it. Instead I will work on my resume!
One of the great things about America is the fact that berries, fruits and vegetables are always in season. I just had a snack of blueberries and strawberries that T made for me yesterday. Our local Farmer's market has watermelon and cantaloupes all year round all though they are a little bit more expensive now during the winter time but not anywhere near as expensive as they are in Finland during winter!
Later!
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
Monday, February 16, 2009
Every day is a Valentine's Day
when you live with the one you love (According to T)! So our plans for V-day didn't exactly go as planned but we had fun regardless. More about that later.
On Friday I headed to the city to see Saara. It was the big day, the day my salmiakki storage was filled once again! And boy, did she do good! I have all kinds of salmiakki, T got her chocolate and Vanilla kossu so we are now good until we can go to Finland ourselves and get some more of that good stuff. But anyway...
I took the bus with T to the city, walked the 16 blocks to Saara's hotel and got there around 9:15am. We decided to leave the candy etc. to her hotel since we weren't sure how much walking we'd be doing and frankly it was a big ass bag so it was best that way. First we went to eat breakfast in a diner and yapped away. It has been awhile since we last saw each other so we had a quite a lot catching up to do. After breakfast Saara wanted to do a little shopping and other than the Mac computer she wanted to buy, we were able to find it all. When we were done shopping, we went to have dunking donuts (breakfast had included few cups of coffee). After that we met up with T for lunch near her office and I was glad to find out T and Saara got a long great! After lunch we decided to go have a drink in an Irish bar, at this point Saara had gotten texts from the other members of her Finnish delegation that they were bar hopping so we decided to do the same. I just couldn't find the bar I was looking for so we went to drop of Saara's shopping bags to her hotel (stopped by at Starbucks on the way), I used a lifeline and called a friend about the bar address, I took my salmiakki and booze bag with me and we went to O'Lunney's. 5 of Saara's friends met us there and T joined us after work. We had a great time, drinking cider and telling stories...Valtteri especially was full of great stories! One end of the table was all about poop stories while the other end was concentrating on academic stuff. Guess which end we were at?!? We decided that since it would be St. Patrick's day while we will be in Finland, we will stay in Tampere for that night, crash on Saara's couch and meet up with Salla and Valtteri as well. O'Connell's and Soho, watch out!
We really had a great time and it was awesome speaking Finnish again. Commenting in Finnish on facebook and speaking to my mom once a week isn't exactly enough of Finnish. I notice I forget words and sometimes how the grammar goes.
Like I said, we had plans for Valentine's day that did not materialize. T was supposed to have a brunch with her mom (while I stayed home being lazy and watching TV), come home after that and we would have made dinner and rent movies but then her sisters called and wanted to see us so the whole plan flew out the window. Instead we went to her moms, she made seafood linguine (one of my fave dishes that she makes), Carly came over to hang out with us and then we went to her dads, had dinner with them, watched Madagascar 2 with her sisters, played Rock Band and I played with their pet bunny who is 16 pounds/ 8kg (bigger than Sox!!!). We got home around 9:30 and watched an episode of Desperate Housewives we hadn't seen yet. It was a fun day and since we might be somewhere far away next year, we thought it would be a good idea to see everybody. And like I said, every day is a Valentine's day when you live with T! I don't need a calendar mark for that!
On Sunday we just chilled, only thing we did outside the house was go to Farmer's market to get the veggies and fruit for this week. Other than that we just basically read. I finished the 3rd book of the twilight series and T was towards the end of the 4th one. I think she should be done by now since she had the day off today and less than 100 pages left. I will have my nose in that book soon enough!
I didn't have a day off today so I'm at work right now. I have been doing some job searching, nothing serious just yet but just to see what's out there. I'm also thinking about attending my graduation ceremonies...I'll need to talk to T about that.
Have a great week everyone!
Later
P.S. Good luck Saara for tomorrow!
On Friday I headed to the city to see Saara. It was the big day, the day my salmiakki storage was filled once again! And boy, did she do good! I have all kinds of salmiakki, T got her chocolate and Vanilla kossu so we are now good until we can go to Finland ourselves and get some more of that good stuff. But anyway...
I took the bus with T to the city, walked the 16 blocks to Saara's hotel and got there around 9:15am. We decided to leave the candy etc. to her hotel since we weren't sure how much walking we'd be doing and frankly it was a big ass bag so it was best that way. First we went to eat breakfast in a diner and yapped away. It has been awhile since we last saw each other so we had a quite a lot catching up to do. After breakfast Saara wanted to do a little shopping and other than the Mac computer she wanted to buy, we were able to find it all. When we were done shopping, we went to have dunking donuts (breakfast had included few cups of coffee). After that we met up with T for lunch near her office and I was glad to find out T and Saara got a long great! After lunch we decided to go have a drink in an Irish bar, at this point Saara had gotten texts from the other members of her Finnish delegation that they were bar hopping so we decided to do the same. I just couldn't find the bar I was looking for so we went to drop of Saara's shopping bags to her hotel (stopped by at Starbucks on the way), I used a lifeline and called a friend about the bar address, I took my salmiakki and booze bag with me and we went to O'Lunney's. 5 of Saara's friends met us there and T joined us after work. We had a great time, drinking cider and telling stories...Valtteri especially was full of great stories! One end of the table was all about poop stories while the other end was concentrating on academic stuff. Guess which end we were at?!? We decided that since it would be St. Patrick's day while we will be in Finland, we will stay in Tampere for that night, crash on Saara's couch and meet up with Salla and Valtteri as well. O'Connell's and Soho, watch out!
We really had a great time and it was awesome speaking Finnish again. Commenting in Finnish on facebook and speaking to my mom once a week isn't exactly enough of Finnish. I notice I forget words and sometimes how the grammar goes.
Like I said, we had plans for Valentine's day that did not materialize. T was supposed to have a brunch with her mom (while I stayed home being lazy and watching TV), come home after that and we would have made dinner and rent movies but then her sisters called and wanted to see us so the whole plan flew out the window. Instead we went to her moms, she made seafood linguine (one of my fave dishes that she makes), Carly came over to hang out with us and then we went to her dads, had dinner with them, watched Madagascar 2 with her sisters, played Rock Band and I played with their pet bunny who is 16 pounds/ 8kg (bigger than Sox!!!). We got home around 9:30 and watched an episode of Desperate Housewives we hadn't seen yet. It was a fun day and since we might be somewhere far away next year, we thought it would be a good idea to see everybody. And like I said, every day is a Valentine's day when you live with T! I don't need a calendar mark for that!
On Sunday we just chilled, only thing we did outside the house was go to Farmer's market to get the veggies and fruit for this week. Other than that we just basically read. I finished the 3rd book of the twilight series and T was towards the end of the 4th one. I think she should be done by now since she had the day off today and less than 100 pages left. I will have my nose in that book soon enough!
I didn't have a day off today so I'm at work right now. I have been doing some job searching, nothing serious just yet but just to see what's out there. I'm also thinking about attending my graduation ceremonies...I'll need to talk to T about that.
Have a great week everyone!
Later
P.S. Good luck Saara for tomorrow!
Thursday, February 12, 2009
Woo Hoo!
Friday is almost here!!! Saara is almost in NYC and more importantly, my candy is almost here! Woo Hoo!
I had a meeting with my advisor yesterday. He signed 2 of my forms so now I should be good for graduation AND to apply for my work permit for next year. And just in time...He sent us an e-mail yesterday saying that he's gonna be on sabbatical for the rest of the semester and other professor is gonna be acting as the interim grad advisor. And the professor just happens to be the professor of my earlier Wednesday class and kinda slow, old and computer and technology challenged. So, the easy contacting and messaging that you do with the grad advisor is no longer possible but luckily I should be good now and no longer need signatures for forms...Phew!
I'm getting more and more excited about a possible move but there's still plenty to be done before that will even be possible, one of which is work so I better get to it! There will be no blogging tomorrow as I will spend time with Saara and Saturday is Valentine's day (and El Viiru's birthday, happy birthday in advance). I have a Valentine's day date with T so computer's are off that day. Valentine's day is one of the over hyped and overpriced days here so we are gonna stay home, cook dinner and rent a bunch of movies.
Happy Valentines Day everyone!
Hyvää Ystävänpäivää kaikille!
I had a meeting with my advisor yesterday. He signed 2 of my forms so now I should be good for graduation AND to apply for my work permit for next year. And just in time...He sent us an e-mail yesterday saying that he's gonna be on sabbatical for the rest of the semester and other professor is gonna be acting as the interim grad advisor. And the professor just happens to be the professor of my earlier Wednesday class and kinda slow, old and computer and technology challenged. So, the easy contacting and messaging that you do with the grad advisor is no longer possible but luckily I should be good now and no longer need signatures for forms...Phew!
I'm getting more and more excited about a possible move but there's still plenty to be done before that will even be possible, one of which is work so I better get to it! There will be no blogging tomorrow as I will spend time with Saara and Saturday is Valentine's day (and El Viiru's birthday, happy birthday in advance). I have a Valentine's day date with T so computer's are off that day. Valentine's day is one of the over hyped and overpriced days here so we are gonna stay home, cook dinner and rent a bunch of movies.
Happy Valentines Day everyone!
Hyvää Ystävänpäivää kaikille!
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
Mandatory day of classes
Yes, today is THE day when I actually have classes. And this time I even remembered to pack my notebook with me! I also have my backpack filled with snacks like grapes, carrots, gold fish, apple, banana and a cinnamon bun. And my coffee of course. I need to be constantly eating while my first class is in session because otherwise I would fall asleep. He is brilliant but not a good or motivating professor. I'm actually thinking about recording his classes so that on the mights when I can't fall asleep I can play his voice and BOOM! I'd be out cold. My second class is easier even though it starts at 8:15 and goes on till almost 11pm. He is brilliant, funny and makes his lectures interesting. I do snack on his class too just because I'm missing dinner. I'm usually hungry when I get home but it's too late to eat anything.
It's so gorgeous outside today. When T was driving me to work today (she's home sick) it was 64 F degrees or 17 C!And I need to spend the day inside. Figures. I wish I could be home with T and to make sure she's not secretly sunbathing when she's sick! Yes, you! This weather won't last for long though and it's supposed to be back to colder weather by Valentine's day. I'm ready for the spring. I hope the weather is on our side in March when we go to Finland and don't have to carry winter clothes with us. We might be spending St. Patrick's day in Tampere, we were talking about it yesterday...2 of my fave pubs are there! And they are Irish and British so it will be perfect! And good cider will be available...
I have a meeting with my advisor in 45 minutes...I better get prepared!
Later
It's so gorgeous outside today. When T was driving me to work today (she's home sick) it was 64 F degrees or 17 C!And I need to spend the day inside. Figures. I wish I could be home with T and to make sure she's not secretly sunbathing when she's sick! Yes, you! This weather won't last for long though and it's supposed to be back to colder weather by Valentine's day. I'm ready for the spring. I hope the weather is on our side in March when we go to Finland and don't have to carry winter clothes with us. We might be spending St. Patrick's day in Tampere, we were talking about it yesterday...2 of my fave pubs are there! And they are Irish and British so it will be perfect! And good cider will be available...
I have a meeting with my advisor in 45 minutes...I better get prepared!
Later
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
My honorary Finn
Last week we were watching the s6 3rd episode of the L word when T says: Did you see that? That's Marimekko, right? And she was right! There they were on Jenny's table, 4 black Unikko table cloths. Finland is slowly infiltrating America...First Gwyneth Paltrow tells people to buy Iittala glass wear and now the L word is advertising Marimekko. I have a feeling that wasn't paid advertisement though since unless you know it's Marimekko, you can't really see labels or anything and all the other product placements from this season have been way too obvious. But anyway, if you ever watch this episode...Jenny and Alice are having a meeting at Jenny's, they are sitting by the kitchen table. The table cloths are Finnish and I'm so proud of T for catching that!
we are kind of big time excited about possibly moving somewhere far away and starting anew. T said that my blog yesterday made it sound like she was more so than I was and I wanted to stay. That's not the case. I had thought about looking for jobs around this area because I thought this was where T wanted to be, close to her family and friends etc. but since she is open to a move and a change it kind of opens things up for me and my job hunt. Since so many things are uncertain in our lives right now, with me being able to stay here an all, we feel like this is a perfect opportunity to make something happen...and hopefully settle down somewhere where we can make a place for us. A home. It's not so much about the place as it is about the person you're with, at least for me. In a way it has been huge adjustment for me to settle in this car culture around here and it's something that both of us want to change. We want a small town feeling with the benefits of a city somewhere close by. We wanna be able to enjoy the outdoors, go bike around, walk to places and have time to enjoy things after work. Now the weeks are spent on every kind of work related activity, at least for T. I'm home at 5 every day when I don't have school but T gets home around 7 and then it's time to eat...not really a lot of time to go places. So that's something we want to change. More quality time together and improve the quality of life.
we are kind of big time excited about possibly moving somewhere far away and starting anew. T said that my blog yesterday made it sound like she was more so than I was and I wanted to stay. That's not the case. I had thought about looking for jobs around this area because I thought this was where T wanted to be, close to her family and friends etc. but since she is open to a move and a change it kind of opens things up for me and my job hunt. Since so many things are uncertain in our lives right now, with me being able to stay here an all, we feel like this is a perfect opportunity to make something happen...and hopefully settle down somewhere where we can make a place for us. A home. It's not so much about the place as it is about the person you're with, at least for me. In a way it has been huge adjustment for me to settle in this car culture around here and it's something that both of us want to change. We want a small town feeling with the benefits of a city somewhere close by. We wanna be able to enjoy the outdoors, go bike around, walk to places and have time to enjoy things after work. Now the weeks are spent on every kind of work related activity, at least for T. I'm home at 5 every day when I don't have school but T gets home around 7 and then it's time to eat...not really a lot of time to go places. So that's something we want to change. More quality time together and improve the quality of life.
Monday, February 9, 2009
The weekend
We had a very low key weekend. grocery shopping, cooking, TV, books, surfing etc. we also went to see a movie on Saturday "New in town" with Renee Zellweger and Harry Connick jr. I liked it, it was funny and cute and the accent was hilarious! If you've seen Fargo you know the one...Swedish/Norwegian/American...def. NOT Finnish! LOL! anyway...it had a scene where I just laughed hysterically for 5 minutes and couldn't stop. Elviira, Noora, you should be able to appreciate this...Renee's character moves to Minnesota and is greeted by her new secretary who tries to keep the conversation going but the silence gets too much so she asks "Have you found god?" And Renee goes " I didn't know he was missing!" and bursts laughing! LOL! It was so hysterical, my eyes were wet and I just couldn't stop laughing.. You gotta see it to fully appreciate it but since I don't like people pushing their god at me and I know Noora and Elviira feel the same, I thought you would get a kick out of that. If ever someone asks you that question, here's your answer. I doubt they would find it funny though...or that I could say it with a straight face but I can always try...
Next weeks are gonna be busy. I need to apply for my work permit. I need to write my resume. Start job hunting. Fight with Kela. Send my insurance material. Study for my comprehensive exam. Go to Finland. Show T around. Blah blah blah...the list goes on. We made a list of places where we would be willing to live, T has an itch to move and start a new and I don't care that much whether we stay in NJ or go somewhere else in the States. So once my resume is done and I start looking for jobs, NY, NJ area isn't the only part of the country I will look into. Who knows...We might end up in Hawaii...Colorado...Oregon...or somewhere else!
Stay tuned for the scenes for our next chapter...
Next weeks are gonna be busy. I need to apply for my work permit. I need to write my resume. Start job hunting. Fight with Kela. Send my insurance material. Study for my comprehensive exam. Go to Finland. Show T around. Blah blah blah...the list goes on. We made a list of places where we would be willing to live, T has an itch to move and start a new and I don't care that much whether we stay in NJ or go somewhere else in the States. So once my resume is done and I start looking for jobs, NY, NJ area isn't the only part of the country I will look into. Who knows...We might end up in Hawaii...Colorado...Oregon...or somewhere else!
Stay tuned for the scenes for our next chapter...
Thursday, February 5, 2009
A little bit of this...
my boss left for the day but there's still 45 minutes before my work day ends so this is a good time to blog a little. I had my monthly doctor's appointment on Monday, he says it looks good, we're making progress and blah blah blah. Time and physical therapy will hopefully make it better but my foot might never be 100% again. Awesome. I guess my plans for running a marathon can be thrown out the window...I guess I won't be representing Finland in the Olympics anytime soon...I guess I won' become the next hot foot model...but at least I can walk and the pain, for the most part is gone. Going down the stairs is still a little difficult and I need support from the railing and can't carry anything heavy in my lap but it's getting better. I have come up with my own kind of "running down the stairs" in our apartment so I'm moving around. At this point the Doc said he can't really give me any medication because it seems to be getting better by itself and as far as pain meds go, next up from what I've been given so far are the opiates, vicodin and other hard stuff. So yeah, I'm going to physical therapy twice a week for the foreseeable future and see where it takes me. I submitted my insurance claim to Finland for all of this, lets see if they are giving me any money back.
I saw that Kela, the good old Kela wants over a 1000 euros back from me for student aid from 2007...yeah NOT gonna happen! that agency is nothing but pain in the ass. What's the point of being a grown up and having been moved away from home for almost 10 years now and not being accountable to your mom if you need to explain every friggin penny to Kela???? Seriously! That amount should come to 0 once I show them all my earnings were for the months BEFORE I was a student. And now shouldn't they understand that BY THEMSELVES if I am a customer of their ABROAD OFFICE?!?!?!? how would I be getting paid from Finland if I'm studying in the USA???? That place seriously pisses me off. Love the few hundred you give me every month though! Thank you and please sent them again next month.
I'm reading the twilight book now, I'm about 90 pages short from completing it. I'm not sure whether I like the book better than the movie. I usually prefer to read the book before seeing the movie just so that other people's ideas aren't clouding my view but in this case, I keep going back to the movie thinking I really liked it the way it was. It is definitely one of the movies everyone needs to see and it can be seen many times and probably gets better over time and after many viewings.
We went to see Slumdog Millionaire last Saturday with our friends Shari and Lea in PA. It was AWESOME! So good. Other than seeing that it got nominated for like a 100 Oscar's, I didn't know anything about the plot. Words cannot describe how awesome the movie was. GO SEE THAT MOVIE!!!
Tonight T is going to a gala in the city with Shari and rub elbows with Maya Angelou and Sigourney Weaver. I'm gonna stay home, watch the crossover episode of Gray's anatomy and Private Practice and order Chinese! I didn't take anything out to defrost so I won't be cooking tonight.
My weekend starts in 22 minutes.
Later peeps!
I saw that Kela, the good old Kela wants over a 1000 euros back from me for student aid from 2007...yeah NOT gonna happen! that agency is nothing but pain in the ass. What's the point of being a grown up and having been moved away from home for almost 10 years now and not being accountable to your mom if you need to explain every friggin penny to Kela???? Seriously! That amount should come to 0 once I show them all my earnings were for the months BEFORE I was a student. And now shouldn't they understand that BY THEMSELVES if I am a customer of their ABROAD OFFICE?!?!?!? how would I be getting paid from Finland if I'm studying in the USA???? That place seriously pisses me off. Love the few hundred you give me every month though! Thank you and please sent them again next month.
I'm reading the twilight book now, I'm about 90 pages short from completing it. I'm not sure whether I like the book better than the movie. I usually prefer to read the book before seeing the movie just so that other people's ideas aren't clouding my view but in this case, I keep going back to the movie thinking I really liked it the way it was. It is definitely one of the movies everyone needs to see and it can be seen many times and probably gets better over time and after many viewings.
We went to see Slumdog Millionaire last Saturday with our friends Shari and Lea in PA. It was AWESOME! So good. Other than seeing that it got nominated for like a 100 Oscar's, I didn't know anything about the plot. Words cannot describe how awesome the movie was. GO SEE THAT MOVIE!!!
Tonight T is going to a gala in the city with Shari and rub elbows with Maya Angelou and Sigourney Weaver. I'm gonna stay home, watch the crossover episode of Gray's anatomy and Private Practice and order Chinese! I didn't take anything out to defrost so I won't be cooking tonight.
My weekend starts in 22 minutes.
Later peeps!
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