Back to School: With Pictures!

I got back to my dorm yesterday and I'm the first out of all three roommates. Neither of my roommates are back yet, but I'm assuming that they'll be here by tonight (tomorrow's our first day of classes). Even though I couldn't wait to get back to the city, leaving home was somewhat bittersweet. Even though I'm not that close to any of immediate family members, I felt somewhat sad about leaving. Anyways, my parents were (and still are) out of the country while I was back home in suburbia with my older sister, so all I did was sleep, eat, and laze around. It actually came to the point where I started to get muscle aches due to muscle disuse atrophy. Even though I felt a tinge of sadness from leaving, I'm glad to be back in the city where trains and buses are relatively dependable, more diverse restaurants are close by, etc. There's just so much more to do in general. I came back with a notice on the kitchen sink noting that the kitchen sink is being fixed, that sucked.

The view from one of our windows. That's my James Dean portrait. Currently, I'm attempting to read two different books, Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy and The Heart is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers.

My desk with all the books I need for this semester. On the right side of the shelves is my DVD collection consisting of Breakfast at Tiffany's, La Vie en Rose, Roman Holiday, Sex and the City: Seasons 5 and 6 (Part 1 and 2), and many others. I also have a jar of condoms on the top shelf and the game Dirty Minds, which I got as a gift and have yet played.

This is our kitchen. My roommate eats a lot of cereal; those boxes of cereal on top of the fridge are all his. Even though we have a stove top and oven, for some reason I'm the only one who actually cooks.

My roommates and I share a bedroom. Can you guess which bed is mine?

Anyways, now that I'm back at my "second home" and school resumes tomorrow, I had to pick up my books. It's upsetting how expensive college textbooks are. It's even more upsetting when an author/publisher comes out with a new edition, therefore making the preceding edition worthless and a student would be unable to sell back their book. It's distressing because a student in general pays about $100-$200 in books per class on average (assuming that each class uses a textbook). When a student tries to sell their books at the end of the semester and discover that the publisher has come out with a new edition, therefore their $100-$200 book has no value at the bookstore, it's upsetting and unfair. Correcting one typo (i.e. misspelled word) in a textbook can be considered a new edition, which is totally absurd and unfair; publishers are taking advantage of students that are already thousands of dollars in debt!

I got my books this morning and the total cost was $640.46. I bought five of my books and rented six of them; I opted for used copies depending on availability. I allegedly saved $277.49 by renting more than half of my books. If I chose to buy all of my books, it would have cost me $917.95. Anyways, what can you do other than oblige?In any case, let's just hope that I put them to good use. The classes I bought the books for are as follows:

MWF: ITAL-101: Italian I, MATH-131: Applied Calculus 1, PSYC-349: Psychology of Maturity and Aging, PSYC-338: Psychology of Religion
TuTh: SOCL-245: Sociology of Religion, PSYC-306: Research Methods

This semester, I want to do as well as last semester, if not better. I'm also planning on being more active on campus (i.e. joining and participating in clubs) and find a job. I need to start saving up if I want to make my study abroad trip to Italy in two semesters a reality. I just hope I can juggle all this. I think I can. Wish me luck!