It's cold o.O

I could not resist!

Is it a bad thing that I've no idea how to do algebra? Whatever I did learn of it a couple years ago has completely slipped my mind! Hehe, lucky it appears that you don't need it in life anyway! :D

It's been a good sort of week. Wednesday, myself and two others were on the Scholarship Biology tutorial - there wasn't really that much to it. It was more of an introduction to it, showing us what we should have done at level 2 and what we'd definitely need to do this year to have a possible chance at understanding the exam. It turns out that I haven't done a couple of standards at L2 that I should've done, however this is easily fixed as the teacher showed us how to access the level 2 work through the level 3 program (Why don't they do this for chemistry as well?!?!)
     She also suggested a few extra resources we'd find helpful. Mastering Biology is the first, and I definitely won't be using it. It's an online course that you do, however it costs about $200 to pay for the access code into the course and the text book. Another idea was to subscribe to an American science magazine which has all the latest research etc each week. The other option was to access and read a "Campbell and Reece" BIOLOGY book.
I think there are about nine or 10 editions of this book and it just so happens that I have the fourth edition on hand! It doesn't matter what edition you have, because the backbone of the information is the same and the research is just a little older. I was stoked! I looked on Amazon, and the most recent version is worth just under $200 new - not surprising for a hardback textbook designed for university students - it's about 8cm thick....So going back about five years ago when I was intending on vet science as a career, we found this in a second hand book shop and bought it for just $30! It's been sitting on my bookcase collecting dust all these years and I've only read a small portion of it :) Mum went hunting on Trade Me and found more of these books, particularly an 8th edition hardback that had just one dollar on it o.O Mum had a bit of a bidding war and bought it for a massive $5! Wow, I don't think the owner of this book realises what they missed out on...but I certainly wasn't going to alert them to it! Hopefully it'll arrive in the mail this week and I can see the difference between the editions. They'll be great to take to uni next year too. I can't believe my luck.

Doing the scholarship shouldn't be too hard if I put my mind to it, getting an excellence in my last test certainly gave me a boost of enthusiasm. It just means I really should do all three externals, and three internals (six out of the seven available standards), just to learn the information I will need for schol. And also go back on last years standards I didn't do and at least read up on the material. Which just leaves the two text books as added resources.


Last Friday was good because I finally finished my first statistics assessment - something I've been putting off. Thursday and Friday, I put myself into gear and just got straight into it, writing out the report wasn't too hard and I kept getting more ideas to put into it as evidence...it's about five pages long lol. But there's lots of information in there, and I looked at the exemplars and a student got a merit with a one and a half page report with little information and no added extras. Fingers crossed my added extras do me well! That afternoon I went over to Sam's place to see her for a few hours, which was nice :)

Mum and I have been milking at our normal place since Saturday and we go through til Tuesday night. Then I'll go back on Thursday to help them put on mating stickers - something new for me. From now until mid July we're there every weekend, starting in June we're also going to be there every Wednesday and in July we've got about 8 days straight there. It also seems that we'll be needed to shift animals at their runoff in June.
     This is all because the owners go on their annual trip overseas for a month, so we'll be working with their daughter for all of June until she and her husband go on their holiday overseas when the owners come back. So I think Mum and I'll have to consider that place as our second home!
     Dad has started calling all of our clients to ask them about their winter spray plan, and when they'll want him to come in. It's actually quite funny listening to Dad on the phone like that - sort of like a telemarketer..."This is on special....This is best for this...I'm recommending for you a mixture of....And when do you want me there?" Although the difference is that he has English as a first language...

I've decided to do the forty hour famine early, starting Wednesday and ending Friday - rather than Fri-Sun as I'll be needed to work, so that means no internet for me after Wednesday night...gee, how am I to survive?! lol

My current issue I'm having at the moment is with my car - the battery is dying and I really really need to find a new one. My car is pretty specific when it comes to wanting parts, so it forms a lovely dent in my bank balance unfortunately. It's been pretty sluggish since about February, but only now as it gets colder it's starting to cause a problem, on Friday it took me four tries before it decided it'd let me go out, meaning Dad sent me on my way with his jumper leads for just in case and over the weekend he's been getting up at the crack of dawn with me to start my car. Surprisingly it is starting really well at 5 o'clock! The warrant is due mid June and I'm yet to find out whether windows are part of the inspection? The drivers door window motor has burnt out; another replacement part needed. But if I don't need it for the warrant then I just won't bother, so long as nobody accidentally opens that window...what goes down won't go up!! haha

Saturday afternoon our youth group had paintball. I can't believe I've lived here all these years and have never known a paintball existed here! Sadly, only 6 of us went, five teens and the leader, also only two girls, but it was still fun! It's a small section of trees with heaps of pellets and tractor tyres stacked up to hide behind. We played capture the flag three times and a free for all game at the end. Okay...so I'm kinda brutal when it comes to paintball! I was the only one who had never played before so they probably weren't expecting that I'd hold down the trigger and free fire! I was continuously hitting the other team and took just one hit to my pinky in the first game. It split the skin and drew blood and stung a bit for a second there. I appreciate the fact I've still got a finger, as I can imagine a real bullet blowing it off....
All three games of capture the flag my team won. The third game a small wheel barrow tyre was hoisted by a pulley into a big central tree, acting as a second "flag" to get. I made it my goal to get there and pull it down while the two guys in my team fought for the flag. Away it came...however I wasn't expecting the thud as it crashed onto my head...ouchies. haha
     Free for all wasn't too fun. The other girl and her brother had to leave beforehand, leaving just the four of us to go for it. Being alone without a friend in a free firing war wasn't the best thing and I found myself getting blasted within minutes. That lot hurt, as one of the guys got me about five times - on the side of my waist and just below my ribs, sending me spinning around to cop one in the back and then as I put my gun in the air to show I'd been hit I got one square in the knee cap and one on the side of my shin. It hurt like heck! Another bullet must've hit my helmet as it exploded and sent paint flying onto my mouth - that stuff tastes gross by the way....

My back is killing me now, a few bruises have come up but I think I must've lifted a bucket of milk wrong at work and now I'm suffering from it. Probably because I have been lifting milk buckets up and over the yard fence (OSH would have a field-day) and then I've been helping Dad lift his spray boom and such today and yesterday. I guess it all adds up, silly silly.... It's crazy to think that since March I've been lifting and carrying milk buckets everywhere at work, then this weekend when there are just nine calves yet to wean and not much milk to lift at all....pathetic don't you think?!


Quite honestly though, I'd like to know who invited Jack Frost to come back? I'm living in my dressing gown and slippers!