AhNa: grateful

the extroverted side of me

8:10 PMAlaina

grateful life truth

Fri...☮Jan.. 24☮2014 ღ Blog Randomized #1

2:45 AMAlaina

college grateful life

Sat.☮July 20☮2013 ღ OVER reacted!?

11:44 AMAlaina

It's that time of the year again!! OMG! What time of the year? The time to buy textbooks!! -The life of a college student- O GOD! I mean, you might be thinking it's just BUYING textbooks, why is she making such a fuss about it, right?? but no! It's going to be such a huge process for me, because it means that I have to spend a couple of hundreds when I am already broke COUGH**!! On top of that, I will also need to do lots of calculations and do lots of research to find the best deals possible, why shouldn't this be a BIG deal!! I especially hate those courses that have tons of readings and you have to buy like 10 novels for that one class! come on right? Why can't it be just like buy one freaking huge novel and be done with -.- If you are someone like me who are willing to do all kind of research to avoid spending a few hundreds less, I will give you some saving tips :)

Find out all the books that you'll need for the up-coming semester from your school, I look up mine from my school's bookstore website.
Write down the titles, ISBN's and prices (used ones if possible) for each book, I usually do this on Excel, but tables work just fine on Words.
Go on comparison websites to compare textbook (new and used ones) prices. The two that I found the most helpful are cheapesttextbooks, and bookfinder.
Definitely consider selling back textbooks that are not related to your fields of study, e.g. common requirement courses/ electives, you can also compare textbook buyback prices using the the links above.
If even used books are out of your budget, consider renting your books.

Disadvantages of renting textbooks:

-the deadline to send back your books could be before your finals

-if lost, you got to pay it

- can't keep them to study for exams after college, like for graduate school

After all, maybe I should just try to stress-fully enjoy this moment, because it's 'technically' another online shopping experience of mine; who doesn't like online shopping? You must be kidding me! Plus, there won't be any more of these kinds of stressful moments once I am out of college, so let me learn to complain less.

Continuing on the topic of college.....College education is an investment that I can't afford to hire an investor to look over, well, let's pray to god that I, myself can make some good investment decisions. I definitely want to pay off my debt asap when I get out of college. I hope college is WORTH it. T_T but then, I am wondering why there are so many people who are working different jobs that are not related to their college degree..

left me wondering....

ღAlaina

grateful life thoughts

Weds.☮July 10☮2013 ღ What's your thought on....

6:43 PMAlaina

I've been having this thought on life (yeah, like definitely not sure what sparked that thought?) ... I was trying so hard to try to put life in the simplest form that I can, then the idea of balloon came to mind...? oh really? balloon? Can you make any connection between life and balloon as of now? hmmm, no? not yet? well maybe not even after I explain my thought . oh silly.

So here's how the story goes.
I had this Creative Poetry course last semester, well, not the worst course I've picked, it was actually quite relaxing for me as I only had it once a week (that lazy side of me). Through out the course, we had to read lots of poems and I must admit that many of them made not much sense to me nor the other people in my class. The thing is, poetry is ...very perceptive to your own experiences., it's very individualized to the readers themselves (in a way that you interpret it with what you've personally experienced) , just like style? get it? A poem can be like a very condensed piece of puzzle that has soo many clues in it that even the most experienced detective might have a hard time solving. I've read some poems that made complete nonsense to me, they were just weird, out of no where, metaphors that I thought "what the heck!" That's when I concluded that poets are virtually stylists because they can put the most random ideas together and make their poems (outfits) unique, and thus making them very subjective to each reader and everyone has their own take on poems/fashion. I applause you, poets.

Now have you gotten some idea of where my 'life like a balloon' idea sorta came from? yeah, blame it on my course.

But how is life like a balloon? Let me try not to complicate my thought...
I think most of us have played with balloons before, no? When you buy a pack of balloons, they are not inflated, just laying there..like a newborn?. But then, when you start to blow air into it, it slowly yet surely gets bigger and bigger, and in no time, it gets big enough to fly in the air.. care free...until this one day, when it gets too high or gets stuck or just pops .. then it's over. BAM! there ya go, my take on LIFE.

until next post,

ღAlaina