tleach0608

Hello strangers, I have returned!  Yes, I know, it's rather anti-climactic, but I decided today that I will get back to everything that brought some joy to my life, and part of that is sharing my photography with a community of like-minded enthusiasts.  

In the past couple of years I've managed to do a lot and I won't go into all of it, but I'll touch on the highlights--I've graduated from Kent State just this past May and officially have a degree is Zoology!  Now I can start my endless search for a job where I can care for animals in some way (and get paid for it haha), which will be a long search, I think.  I've spent the past 2 1/2 years volunteering at a place called the Medina Raptor Center where I help to care for educational and rehabilitated raptors, as well as work with and train many of our ed birds (such as falcons, hawks, owls, etc).   I'm actually living my dream by being there and love what I do every single day.  

Those are the big ones that really matter--and in the meantime I'll probably be flooding my gallery with photos of our ed birds so that everyone can appreciate them as much as I do!

I know, I know, I haven't posted a journal in a while and I haven't really uploaded much in a couple months.  I always think it's funny that I "work" less hours now that I'm in school full time (even with homework added in), and yet I have less time!  

But hopefully all of you will forgive me as my dedication is paying off--I still have a 3.9 GPA with a full year under my belt, am partly angry at myself for being cocky at the beginning of my math course because I can only get an A- in the course IF I get a perfect on my math final.  Am proud of myself for getting a perfect on my Chem final to pull a miraculous A after a bad exam.  And am extremely proud of myself for winning the 2012 Kathleen Wolf Award for my performance with math last semester.  I am so honored to have been chosen over all the other nominees and so grateful to the professor who nominated me--evidently he never nominates anyone and wrote that he felt I had what it takes to be a math major.  What an incredible compliment!

So yeah.  Math final is today, I'm going to try as hard as I can to get a 100% on it and I'm going to miss having Dr. Dhaher as a teacher--he was a fantastic teacher, great humor and personality and really cared about us as student and our success.  I feel bad because so many students slammed him on Rate My Professor.com and even a little in class--but really, how can you say he's a bad teacher if he explains things in a way that's easy to understand, is always willing to go back and re-cover topics that we weren't clear on and provided a review before each and every exam over everything on it, with no surprises?  I just don't get how people can say bad things about him, given all that.  It sort of makes me mad about those spoiled kids that put absolutely nothing and no effort into classes and then get pissed and blame it on the teacher.  All you punks out there--fuck off.  

Whew, I'm a little fired up about that, aren't I? LOL

In photography news, I have nine weddings booked this year and am meeting with another bride next week for a wedding next year.  My first wedding of the year is in one month and I'm getting hyped and excited, and with finals behind me starting this afternoon, I am planning many many trips out to the MetroParks and Cuyahoga Valley National Park, starting with Brecksville to see the eagle nest and its little eaglet!  That's tomorrow morning.    At the end of the month is my trip out to Finger Lakes for a lot of waterfall photos, which I am so excited!!

Emma is--well she is being a rebelling little thing.  She fortunately doesn't test us quite as much as she did a few months ago, but she tries flexing her dominance every so often.  Of course, right now as I type this, she's laying on the floor by me, sleeping like a baby.  It's starting to get warm out and we're already having to run the AC because she has such a heavy coat.  Next time we get a dog, we're getting one that isn't acclimated to mountains, eh?  I have quite a few photos of her that I need to get processed and shared and I promise they will be coming up.  

This summer my plans:

*Visit lots of parks for lots of hikes and photos
*Visit zoos on the crappy, rainy days
*Learn French so I can try testing out of taking classes for it at university
*Weddings!!  Six so far this summer
*Enjoy being unemployed for as long as I can swing it so that I can focus on university
*OH!  And Diablo III.  Let's not forget that this will be playable in 11 days!

So what's up with you?

I tell you what...the past ten years of my life was spent planning out times to take vacations, and even being on break there was such a sense of anxiety of being away from the office and knowing crap was happening that would bog me down when I returned.  Vacations were never care-free because there was always that stress in the back of my mind.  

I'm on spring break right now and the complete sense of relaxation and lack of stress is just amazing.  There are no emergencies or blow-ups that will need my attention when I return, all I have is classes to go back to.  I woke up today at my normal 7 a.m. and went out to Beaver Marsh and enjoyed a chill, foggy morning and then came back, got Emma and took her for a walk along the Towpath because it was a sunny beautiful day.  Now I'm relaxing on the floor of the house, it's blessedly quiet because she's wiped out and sleeping, and I'm just looking forward to a full week off to just hike around the parks, take photos and enjoy what is going to be an amazingly fantastic week.