Travel

Travel
Travel

San Francisco

San Francisco
San Francisco

Laugh With Me

Laugh With Me
Laugh With Me

Currently // March

Here we go. Fresh off of a week in Austin (which I'll be recapping this week, get your stomachs ready to rumbleeeee!), I am back at school and ready to start my very last quarter of college. Exclamation point, exclamation point, exclamation point times a squillion.

While I'm in a corner trying desperately to process my emotions, here's a bit of verbiage to end this firecracker of a month (I mean, okay not really, but it was really really hot ... sorry East Coast) –

Watching :: SO. MUCH. I was getting the bang for my (roommate's) (mother's) Netflix buck this month. Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, FRIENDS, Broad City, I watched it all. One of my favorite Chinese soap operas was also on Netflix, so there went 9 hours of my life never to be seen again.

Eating :: non-stop. After an all-out eating spree in Austin, I promised myself a week of detoxing once I got home. Tacos and Taco Bells and margaritas and milkshakes later, I laugh in my own face.

Shopping :: for a bathing suit! About to become a total cliche and fall victim to one of those Triangl bikinis. Or, more practically, Target. 
Planning :: Our Europe itinerary. T-2.5 months!

Reading :: Well, I just today finished Yes, Please. Jazz hands and finger snaps! Up next: Provence, 1970. Also, this past week I was digging back into my GChat archives that go all the way back into 2006, when I was a wee middle schooler. Cringed the whole way through. Melodrama was the name of my game!

Enjoying :: days spent out in the sun watching my friends play softball, the feeling of being on an airplane and on the go again (um, and it was so incredible flying over Stanford!), hanging out with friends and basking in nostalgia and 'remember whens'.

Waiting :: to see if this last batch of classes will be a solid academic end to my undergraduate career. TBD.
Needing :: To detox. But not really wanting to. Plus – a job. See: trying to avoid unemployment in the coming months. (SOS.)

Feeling :: very, very, VERY bittersweet. Anything can trigger the tears at this point. Frat houses wrapped in twinkle lights, Senior Spring champagne popped, talk of beginning the packing process slow and steady, shopping for graduation dresses, imagining those last few days here at this paradise. Ball of emotions.

Wishing :: for the next two and a half months to be filled with the best memories of all.
13

Living In Silicon Valley: What's That Like?

What's that, you say? Wireless charging! SO. COOL. #thankyoustarbucks.

Skipping town this week has made me realize just how unique and special the area I have called home for the past four years can be. There's always been buzz about this 'Silicon Valley' place, this mystical land from which our iStuff and Facebook stalking and #nofilter's originate. I'm here today to give you a peek into this weird universe – although as a college student here, of course my perspective might be different from, say, that of a startup founder or CS professor or hip barista or sustainable living entrepreneur:

Firstly. The weather. It's perfect year-round – sunshine and smiles and cakes baked out of glitter and butterflies, straight up no exaggeration whatsoever. We're close to a hike in the redwoods or up a mountain if we so desire, or can also alternately beach it up in Half Moon Bay or Santa Cruz. If nature's not your gig, then there's always a day in San Francisco or San Jose, or small town charm in Sausalito. The possibilities are endless, as are our credit card statements every month because cost of living = soul sucking money vacuum.

Every single conversation includes a startup idea or two (hundred). In fact, every other person you know has interned at / founded / pitched a startup or five. The other half of the people you know are employees of tech giants like Facebook, Twitter, and Google, which FUN FACT all have spectacular and free cafeterias and snack stations and all things good and holy. Google also has bikes. Which people steal sometimes, and leave all over the place. Jealous.

"Going to the store" is another way of saying "ordering from Google Express." The celebrities on campus are not the MVP of a gold-medal winning Olympic team or a Disney Channel actress, but Steve Jobs's son and Bill Gates's daughter. When discussing the implications of technology addiction, we're referring not to social media and iPads, but to virtual / augmented reality and The Next Big Thing. You have a minimum of four food delivery services on your smartphone, which you rotate based on who delivers from Chipotle, who's offering a promotion, and who could bring you toothpaste from Target. The only cars that rival Ubers and Lyfts ... are Teslas. Teslas everywhere.
If you have a formal interview out at a bank or really, any company, on the East Coast or Midwest or Normal City, USA and need to borrow a suit or dress shoes? SOL, my dear. Totally out of luck, because the only "professional wear" people have here are startup T-shirts, Yik Yak socks, and um ... jeans. When it gets real fancy. 

Grabbing gelato in (exorbitantly expensive) downtown Palo Alto? You might just run into Her Royal Highness, Marissa Mayer. Date night at the movie theatre in Mountain View? Mark Zuckerberg will very likely sit two seats down. Think he goes for the extra pumps of butter? Now you'll know!

People live and breathe TED Talks. Friends are often featured in Forbes or Business Insider, which can be pretty jarring the first time it happens because hello, were you not acting like an idiot two nights ago when you wanted to parkour your way to get chicken tenders? Secret geniuses, everyone, but often lacking common sense. It's probably because people converse so much in CS code, the brain waves got a bit ... disrupted.

Oh, disruptors. That's one heck of a buzzword. As is: design thinking, angel investors, VCs, and social innovation. These words are thrown about like confetti, and you'll definitely pick up on it if you grab a Mint Mojito coffee at Philz or a Tiger Spice Chai at Coupa Cafe, where many, many $$$$ meetings take place. Coupa is so important to Silicon Valley culture that it makes a split second cameo in the movie, The Social Network. So, Justin Timberlake status!

Checking your inbox can be a tricky process, because more often than not, you'll receive a long e-mail about this, that, or whatever new app someone developed, and they're begging you to 1) check out the beta site, and 2) perhaps be a part of a focus group? Coupa provided!

Indeed, this place is anything but normal. It's exciting, buzzing with energy, the breeding ground of young innovators who believe in changing the world ... aaaand, a population about to get a whole lot more lazy because so. many. delivery. apps.

10

But What You Don't See On Instagram Is...

A quick confession: I actually have not yet finished Yes Please! I tried to race through the fifty or so pages I had left before my ride to the airport arrived, but my eyes were like, hey quit it baby girl how 'bout we shut down for a snooze instead?

Anywho. I love this book! I love Amy Poehler! Even more than I thought I did! Amy is honest and frank and hilarious and this book is chock full of good advice, lessons learned, amusing antics, and resonant tidbits. I found myself thinking "she gets it, she GETS it, she really REALLY gets it" more than once.

My absolute passage was this: "Once [Rachel] Dratch and I played Michael Jackson and Elizabeth Taylor, respectively, in a sketch where we sat in a tree twenty feet in the air. I looked out over Studio 8H and for the millionth time laughed at my crazy life. Tina and I used to look at each other before "Update" and also laugh at our crazy lives. We would whisper, "We fooled them!" Sometimes I would pat her knee. One time I ran into Mick Jagger, Tom Petty, and Eric Idle in the hallway and I was legitimately mad that they were in my way, but the gratitude never left me."

This. We fooled them. It's three little words that have summed up more than one experience in my life (albeit slightly different from Amy's cooler version). I scribbled it down in my journal and also snapped a photo lest I forgot about it, God forbid:
But hey! Speaking of "fooling people," you wanna know something else? Those pictures up there are 100% staged. What you aren't able to see on Instagram {I'm not even posting this on Instagram, so by Instagram I mean Instagram / Pinterest / Facebook / Twitter / Perpetually Caroline} {and I'm sharing in the spirit of saying yes please to authenticity and all} is ...

// I didn't even read the damn book casually swinging about on a hammock, swayed by a light breeze and alit in the glow of the sunset. No sir-reeeeeee. (I read it in bed. By the heater. Because it was 65 degrees.)

// The book kept on falling on my face. One-handed photography is a PROFESSIONAL SPORT, y'all.

// I had to shave for this. But on second thought, please don't zoom in.

// Guess what the rest of my outfit consisted of? If you guessed real stylin' workout shorts and a business casual sweater, you guessed right! Top notch #OOTD right here.

// These sandals? Had to dig them out from the back of the closet, dust bunnies attached. The sole was unglued and flap flap flappin', the leather was frayed, and a new one is sitting in my Target online shopping cart.

// It was FREEZING. See goosebumps. (But please don't.)

// This photo op was planned for days. Seriously. In my mind, it was to take place on our cute little balcony and I was going to make a fancy schmancy (wine) glass of iced water with cut up citrus, but well, the balcony was locked and I was too cold to get ice.

// Things that were cropped out: recycling bins, red solo cups strewn all over the yard, condiments on the picnic tables left over from lunch, and a photo bombing squirrel. I would have kept him in, but he was way too smug so I thought I'd show him who's boss. Sorry buddy.

// Reading did NOT go down. Obviously, because I was writing this post and waiting for my burger delivery.

// # of shots taken of this scene: 9.

// I fell out of the hammock tossing and turning, trying to find an angle that would include the Cali-fabulous palm tree.

// What I wasn't doing that I was supposed to be doing while doing this: packing, cleaning, laundry, vacuuming, etcera etcera etcera.

// I then proceeded to repeat the whole thing with my burger, as such:
FOOLING YOU ALL IS HARD, MAN.

BLOGGING IS HARD.
14

Finding Magic In The Mundane

Exactly a year ago, I was meandering the streets of Barcelona. It was a magical weekend of being tipsy off of gin & tonics and uncontrollable laughter {I might've walked into an elevator wall, oops}, and breathing in that gorgeous Catalan air made up of intermingling tapas and sangria and the romantic Spanish language. I was speechless upon seeing La Sagrada Familia and enthralled by Gaudi's masterpieces – some, a mere few steps around the corner from our hotel.

A week before that, we were fresh off of an adventurous St. Patrick's Day weekend in Dublin and seeing the expansive Cliffs of Moher after an exhausting seven-hour bus ride. Then, we drowned ourselves in afternoon tea and scones one final time in London before retreating back to Oxford for an infuriatingly stressful week of staying up way too late, scrambling to finish end-of-term essays, fueled by "intellectual vitality" and, really... the chips and cheese fried up in a food truck down the block that tasted so amazing only at 2 am.

Right after Barcelona, my best friend and I took a train on a whim to spend a quick 24 hours in Paris – we feasted on fondue in Montmartre, shared macarons and crepes, and had to take the red-carpetted stairs right from the Champs Elysee entrance straight to our hotel room.

Not long after that, I came home to Stanford for a very go, go, go quarter that began with surprising my roommate and culminated in road-tripping the Pacific Coast Highway down to LA and an internship that had me in New York City living in the East Village and working at 30 Rockefeller. As if all of that wasn't a dream already, my sister and I decided to pop on over to China for a week in September to see our family and "relax." Because thirteen hour flights are so relaxing.
2014 was absolutely extraordinary. And in so many ways, it was exactly that – extraordinary. It was the outlier of a year. And so far, in 2015, it's been a bit of a struggle coming to terms with that. When I'm watching my eighth FRIENDS episode in a row in the dead of night and Netflix is cruelly prompting me "Are you still watching?," it's hard not to let my mind wander back to "last year this time, I was...!!! Oh how the mighty have fallen!"

It's not that I'm not thrilled to be where I am now. I am. I could never not be thrilled to be here in sunny Stanford with my best friends in the passenger's seat. It's just ... different. It's finding happiness in the mundane day-to-day life. It's being content – more than content – in treating myself one too many times (to foot reflexology and new skirts and acai bowls and artisan ice cream and Chipotle bowl(s)(s)(s)) and in the unintentionally hilarious quips courtesy of my friends and in getting all comfy just to watch The Mindy Project.

I realized something as I was watching FRIENDS (a good thing too, or else it'd be wayyyyy too many hours of my life gone down the drain) – it is ten seasons' worth of peeks into mundanity. I mean, sure they go to London at one point and Las Vegas and the Bahamas, but 9/10s of the show is simply the six friends in an apartment or in a coffee shop, having a great time and laughing all the dang while. Sometimes the ordinary can be even more exceptional than the extraordinary, y'know?
10

7 Things I'd Rather Be Doing

A glimpse at the current trainwreck of an existence:
Aaaaaaaand, if I had some kind of a parallel universe shifter remote, or something of that nature, I'd instead be doing any of the following ...

1 // Planning 1) my Spring Break trip to Austin – I shared a Google Doc with my bestie / hostess Brina with a list three pages deep of every single eatery I want to step stomach in and labeled in bright red "I'm the guest, you can't say no" and 2) my summer extravaganza all across Europe. I've already started a Pinterest inspiration board for it because things like that are such a necessary contribution to this planet.

2 // Making a steaming bowl Cup O' Noodle because my body is craving sodium and MSG and all things terrible, the little nuisance.

3 // Finishing up Yes Please and giving in to the urge to begin writing my own autobiography with all two pages' (double-spaced) worth of material I'd have for it! It'd go something like this: middle school drama queen --> high school golden child (aka nerd) --> early onset grandmahood.

4 // To be completely honest? Curled up and catching up on shows. Confession: I swapped two hours of studying for watching Pretty Little Liars and then reading theories, which then led me down a rabbit hole of reading Serial theories as well, before I sheepishly went back to color-coding my notes. BUT. I still have Once Upon A Time, The Mindy Project, New Girl, Modern Family, and The Royals to obsess over, fret not my darlings.

5 // Online shopping, and curating the perfect spring / summer wardrobe. I'm thinking lots of pom pom shorts, bright sundresses, and slouchy shirts ... and judging by the number of packages, addressed to thirty different people, from Forever 21, Nordstrom, DSW, and Amazon piled up in my house's mail corner at the moment, I am far from alone on this one.

6 // Picking up every teeny tiny itty bitty piece of lint in my room, rolling them into dust balls, building stupid trash snowmen with them, and then belt out a rousing rendition of Let It Go as I dramatically throw them into the garbage can one at a time. Just kidding, I really wouldn't want to do this, but at this point, I'm desperate.

7 // Chris Pine. Oh wait, what?
12

Go Ahead, Laugh At My Expense.

–Sent from my iBrain as it burns and crashes on its way to the finals finish line.

Here's a story for you on this Hump Day: 

I had an epiphany yesterday.

It all started at around 7:30pm when Cassandra wanted to take her third nap of the day, and I thought – I can't enable her any longer! I can't do it! (Also, I was bored and wanted her to play with me.)

"Wanna go on a walk?!" I asked her, eyes full of hope and a sweet little sparkle.

"I'll go on a run with you..." she bantered back, knowing what a ridiculous notion it was.

"I'll go on a donut run with you." That was it. My final offer.

And then I brightened, "We can go on a Do-NOT run!!!!"

And in that moment, I swear the world made a little more sense.

---

Okay, okay, now I'm inspired. Screw an extra hour of studying. Screw that Pretty Little Liars episode waiting to be watched. I'm on a roll here. I have another story for you:

#tbt to that time I burned my nose by blowing out the jasmine-scented candle we so lovingly cradled home from Target. That time was yesterday. #wcw my unburnt nose.

---

Practically Shakespearean, right? Here's a final tale:

"Wanna to go to In-N-Out?" Cassandra offered one night several weeks ago.

"Yes. Buuuuuuuut, I might make a really bad decision." I said, feeling a little preemptively guilty. 

"Oh no, you're going to get a protein burger aren't you..."

There you go. In our world, a bad decision would not be multiple orders of fries or a greasy burger or even a sugar-laden milkshake. No. In our world, a bad decision comes in the form of two lettuce leaves.

---

That's all I have for today, folks. I'm going back to the books, with my head hung low and my tail drooped sadly behind me. My apologies if this entire post made zero sense – brain capacity is a HOT commodity currently.
6

I Didn't Mean To...

Anyone else currently in a MonDAZE?! As in, Dazed and Confused and Really Wishing It Was The Weekend Again? Samesies, especially because I know I'll be chanting "IhatemylifeIhatemylifeIhatemylife" under my breath this whole week until I emerge from hell after my last final on Friday morning. Okay anyway, what I really wanted to talk to you about today was –

Things I Didn't Mean To Happen, But Did Anyway.

Exhibit A:

I didn't mean to ... escape to San Francisco the weekend before finals, but my sister needed a catsitter and that's an offer I cannot refuse. Literally. Cannot. Or else my mom would probably yell at me. Also, it's been our credo to escape the weekend before finals. Logical? No. Regretted ever? No...t really only sometimes maybe ...

Exhibits B – Some Other Letter Later On In The Alphabet:

I didn't mean to ... submit such a large order on a retail site, but I'm currently on the lookout for cute outfits "for Europe" (my latest excuse for everything) because I'll totally have so much room in my luggage and everything.
I didn't mean to ... order so many oysters, but my roommate and I have been craving them for SO long. A couple of weeks ago, we were driving all around Palo Alto trying to find a restaurant open at 11pm serving the dang suckers, but alas ... we had to wait. Until now.

I didn't mean to ... also get beer and chowdah on top of that and get really, really stuffed, but happy hours, man. It'd be rude-o to behave otherwise at Bar Crudo!

I didn't mean to ... stop for ice cream even as I felt my stomach combusting, but – it's BiRite ice cream.
I didn't mean to ... watch all of Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt in all of two sittings. Beyonce!

I didn't mean to ... waste a good-outfit-good-hair day on a no makeup day, but two out of three is already one in a million.

I didn't mean to ... eat so many fistfuls of Sour Skittles. They're just so good when you overcome the tang! 
I didn't mean to ... drop another twenty bucks on a pedicure, but the window announced "Foot Massage" in flashing lights, and Massage is one letter away from Message, so I strongly believe it was a message from the universe for me to have my toes painted Barbie pink.

I didn't mean to ... favor stealing Biore nose strips from my sister's medicine cabinet and watching a few episodes of TV (see above) with wine in hand over going out to a bar. Trust me, my roommate and I literally walked to the bar, saw that contrary to popular belief there are people in a bar – people who socialize and flutter and laugh and are dressed nicely – and made a beeline back to the cats and Kimmy.

I didn't mean to ... catch a cold the week of finals, but the world is cruel unless I'm eating oysters and ice cream and getting my toes painted Barbie pink, and so the split second I took a break from all of that, wham bam the sniffles are here ma'am.
I didn't mean to ... take a nap immediately after downing a mocha from The Mill, but the living's tough, ya know what I mean?

I didn't mean to ... almost fall asleep writing this post, but HELLO NYQUIL BYE BLOG WORLD!

Happiest of Mondays to you, my friends!
13

Remember To Remember This

Here we are in the throes of Finals Week, and frankly, it sucks.

You should've seen me last night. Google Drive froze for about thirty minutes while I was frantically trying to crank out a research paper (on Yik Yak! "Academia" *slaps knee laughs in glee*) while also trying to remember the epidemiology of personality disorders. I was about to rip. my. hair. out. and / or throw my laptop against the wall. But I stopped because I happened to be on a slide describing a certain anger management issue, and I re-evaluated and walked away slowly ... in search of sugar as an alternative coping mechanism.

My nap this afternoon, so luxuriously enjoyed, was longer than the total amount of sleep I got last night. College is a funny thing, ain't it? I mean, you're essentially living in an alternate universe of sorts where your main job is to listen to experts teach you everything they know, make Taco Bell runs so as not to waste a fast metabolism, and forget to shower or do laundry during stressful weeks even though they're highlighted in bright neon.
I know my days here in this paradise where I can go to class in the very clothes I went to sleep in are numbered. Where we've essentially skipped winter AND spring and gone straight ahead to summer – lemme just tell ya, a typical afternoon here currently involves absorbing Vitamin D by the pool. I've been sweating in shorts this week, it's been that glorious. I'm going to miss having delicious meals prepared and ready for me at 12pm and 6pm sharp. I'm going to miss how "decorating" is simply taping 4x6's in a haphazard fashion on the wall, living within a yelling distance from all of my closest friends, sitting around the lunch table listening to the smartest people I know calculating the country's GDP if X, Y, or Z happens, and running into my entire social circle simply by making a pitstop at Starbucks. (And also, living one minute away from Starbucks.) It's an invigorating place, college.

I'm writing this out for posterity's sake because it's likely my last real finals week (nothing but Senior Spring for me next quarter). As much as the lack of sleep and the growing laundry pile and the tricky multiple choice questions are truly, truly destroying my soul at the moment ... I wouldn't trade this for the world right now.

So here's a quick little message to my future self:

Hey you, remember when you thought the biggest problems of your life were a couple of twee tests? Who were you even trying to kid, amirite o wise one? No, no. You were merely having the tiiiiiiiiime of your life (no I never felt this way beforeeeeeeee).
3

Choices I Have Made In The Past Two Days

Before every night out on the town, my friend Lauren likes to playfully remind everyone to "make bad choices!" But she says it in such an innocent, honey sweet way that most people take it as a firm warning – girl, you better watch yoself OR ELSE. It works the opposite way on the off chance she decides to throw out a "make good choices!" Intuitive, I know!

If my life in the past couple of days has been any indication, I need Lauren shouting "MAKE BAD CHOICES I REPEAT MAKE BAD CHOICES" to me with a megaphone from the rooftops, because while yes there have been a couple of good decisions, there have also been a few more that are a wee bit questionable.

So, dear bloggy friends, help me evaluate these so-called questionable ones? Tell me if I was justified, or if I should put myself in time out?
QUESTIONABLE CHOICE #1 :: Making a split second decision to wrangle a couple of friends and drive to Chick-fil-A, which happens to be 30 minutes away. On the one hand, holy heck that is some good chikin and I love me some dip & squeeze ketchup, but on the other hand, that's a whole lotta effort for something that's not exactly ... well ... nutritious or free ... at all.

QUESTIONABLE CHOICE #2 :: Um, so I spent $10 on pens. But they're colorful Sharpie pens, and also some cheap BIC ones too, and I promise I won't lose them for at least three weeks!!! Also, I was at Target and you can't leave the premises without buying something you don't need, so like yeah.

GOOD CHOICE #1 :: OK, throwing myself a bone here. I put my foot down and demanded some of my favorite friends to come over for dinner last night because I haven't gotten to spend good old-fashioned quality time with them recently. Patting myself on the back for that one.
QUESTIONABLE CHOICE #3 :: Target is a breeding ground for disaster, and that's my disclaimer for this one. I was waiting for my friends to finish checking out, and decided that I'd get myself a hazelnut latte to fuel my night of essay-writing. We get home, I take one sip, and then receive a text from Hanna: who's down to go get Philz?! Philz is a million times stronger, promises a fun outing with a car full of friends, and PHOMO though okay?! I'm a disgrace, I know, I know. So here I am with two coffees for a paper that seriously doesn't want to be written.

GOOD CHOICE #2 :: BOOKED MY TICKETS FOR A SUMMER IN EUROPE. WITH MY BEST FRIEND. The UK & France & Italy & Croatia & Bosnia and Herzegovina & Greece & cool layovers in Canada and Germany &&&&&&& I have decided that this negates all of the previously mentioned questionable choices because I'm so excited and happy that I officially don't care about anything else!
HONORABLE MENTION :: Shaving off an hour of my studying time to write this blog post even though I'll be a hot mess tomorrow when I'm biting my nails down to a bloody stump in anxiety because I can't possibly study for a midterm and finish an essay and start studying for finals at the same time.
13

A CaptionThis! Contest ... Against Myself

Caroline #1 :: A really! really! fun! get together with some really! really! hungry! friends!

Caroline #2 :: We just really like Mexican food okay don't judge. And by Mexican food I really mean chips and all the dip. And by food I mean bottomless margaritas.
Caroline #1 :: Driving to the cutest little shabby shack of a froyo gem called Yumi Yogurt with Lindsey and Lauren for dinner, aka a craving-satisfying birthday cake flavor + layers and layers of real cookie dough.

Caroline #2 :: THEY SARAN WRAP IT & YOU GET TO CRACK IT OPEN HALFWAY. Never mind that it tastes like UNICORNS, but it's even more fun than popping bubble wrap!!!!!!
Caroline #1 :: Friends!

Caroline #2 :: Kind souls who crashed my solo The Prince & Me and Bridget Jones's Diary binge (I'm a sucker for accents, sue me for breathing) and dragged me downstairs for some face-to-face socializing. Thank you kindly. #andnowbacktomrdarcy
Caroline #1 :: So maybe not the healthiest Friday night there ever was. But all for good reason – celebrating the greatest daddy there ever was!

Caroline #2 :: Fathers have birthdays so daughters can fill up on grease and sugar, that's just a universally accepted truth. Also, this is the first time I've ever had wontons in chili oil, which probably has my azn ancestors rolling in their graves, but dammit that was one delicious plate of food and I refuse to apologize for my actions.
Caroline #1 :: Thanks papa for letting me hang out with you all weekend and buying me food.

Caroline #2 :: *brb drooling*
Caroline #1 :: Well I'm slightly concerned about the food to non-food ratio in this post, but let's disregard that for a moment and talk about how amazing this delicious bowl of ramen was. And all in great company, of course! Can't ask for better lunch buddies than my dad (is he sick of me yet?!) and my ABILSMTG (almost brother-in-law, seven months to go)!

Caroline #2 :: I asked for my ramen spicy, ate half the bowl pretty proud of the fact that my mouth wasn't on fire yet, and then realized the spicy paste was still sitting patiently on the spoon next to the bowl. I've never claimed to be the smartest egg in the carton ramen, that's for sure.
Caroline 1 :: I may not have gone to school for engineering, but I'm not awful at building my own cocktail it turns out. In your face, engineering / product design majors, I'm not useless!! Aaaaaand putting this on my resume.

Caroline 2 :: It's five o'clock somewhere here. It was five o'clock HERE. On the dot.

So it turns out one Caroline was sassier than the other, one might have better survival instincts in society, and both are forever eating everything in sight.

We're at that point in the quarter when term papers and midterms and finals (yes BOTH) are turning our brain capacity to a number resembling the temperature in, like, northern Minnesota at the moment, so this was the best I could do today. Hope your Monday outlook is looking a lot brighter than mine!
7

Recalibrating Your Inner Compass

You guys, I am living a cliche over here. Senior year has gone from "Falalalala, this campus is my kingdom, I can nap all day if I want to, I can wear only the lounge portion of my closet if that's what I feel like doing, I can go to bed at 9pm and grouch at the frats because I'm old" to "FML FML FML IS ANYONE STILL HIRING?! NEED JOB HELP" to grimacing and resisting the urge to burst into tears whenever someone asks "how is everything, really?" to glaring intensely at the Facebook statuses that are all, "I'm so humbled Harvard Medical School is my next step" or "Starting out at 200K over at Palantir!!!" 

K.

O. K. A. Y.

In shambles is the current state of mind for every college senior not going into consulting, finance, or engineering. And for those going into grad school, because rolling admissions ain't no joke yo. We're on the verge of #SOBBING or a mental breakdown or an anxiety attack at all times. That is, if we haven't just completely given up and permanently sewn ourselves into our beds and under a thick blanket. Ticking time bombs, all of us.
My freshman year RA, Annika, is visiting for a couple of days. She arrived this afternoon, gave me a long, sturdy hug, and sat herself down at my desk, ready for an hour or two's worth of catching-up.

Maybe there's just something about spilling all of your worries and concerns and absurd thoughts to someone who listened to you ranting about the very same things four whole years ago that puts you at ease. It could be because you see that they were in a similar position all those years ago, and have ended up A-OK after all. It could be because you realize how scared and unsure you were all those years ago, and realize that you ended up A-OK after all.
After dinner, a lot of people from my freshman dorm stopped by to say hello to Annika. I've maintained over and over again that my freshman dorm was the most transformative and special thing I've ever been a part of. But with time and with distance, it was inevitable that we've all grown apart somewhat. Some of us are closer than we are with others; some of us see each other on a more consistent basis.

I see these people, and it's like no time has changed.

I see these people, and it's like a marked reminder that we've made it this far, we've made it and we're in a good place, and we're all so, so lucky to be where we are today.

I see these people, and I have this profound sense of my inner compass being recalibrated. I feel my perspective coming to again: I know that there are incredible opportunities ahead and meaningful lessons to be learned and wonderful memories to be made.
So, how is everything right now?

Well.

It could be better right now. But for the most part, everything's okay. Everything will be okay, I'm sure of it. I've put my faith in the moments that recalibrate my inner compass, I've decided to seek these moments, and I know they'll guide me towards the right direction in no time at all.
PS. HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO MY DAD!! I love you to the moon and back, and even more than that!
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