WHERE ARE YOUR COMMAS, YOUNG LADY?!

From my professor --
Sorry about your experience in the newsroom, though better you discover this here rather than in your first job. Don’t suppose it would help any to say that a different editor, a different paper may produce a different experience.

Hope you find some outlet for your writing in your career.

Keep an eye on your punctuation. Noticed two or three missing commas in compound or cmp/complex sentences.

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He is so helpful, that man.

Moving on - I can't believe I didn't think of this sooner. I received an email the other day from a very frantic boy in my editing class. He works the Sunday night shift on the sports desk and this interferred with - OHMYLORD - the Super Bowl. I emailed him back, quite quickly, and said that even though I had been counting down the days until the big event (wait, that's football right?), I thought I might be able to help him out. In conclusion, I am now working the night of the Super Bowl (I'll probably see more of it on the TV in the newsroom than I would at home since I don't watch television), and the very grateful boy is taking my birthday shift. I GET TO GO HOME!! Yippee.

The snow and ice are still with us here in the frigid wasteland that is Missouri. It gets warm during the day so the snow and ice start to melt, but the temperatures drop at night, refreezing the precipitation on the ground. Our house sits at the bottom of a hill, and a row of four parking spots sits next to the house. To get to my car, I either need to cut through the "grass" or ascend the hill via the road. The grass is covered in five inches of ice, so that's not too conducive to walking. I take the hill. I avoid the blatant ice, but a thin layer of glassy pavement always eludes me. I giggle the entire trek up to my car and try not to slip and crack my ribcage. Going down isn't as dangerous, I decided, because I would rather fall on my butt than on my face.

I went to the dermatologist after I got back from Europe. She took a long look at my face and said, "Hmmmm." She then proceeded to ask me some totally legitimate questions, like, 'Do you regularly wash your face with dirt and oil?" and "Are you sure you're not a pubescent 13-year-old boy in disguise?" She diagnosed me with some exotic disease called 'Your Face Hates You', which she assured me wasn't contagious. Right now I'm using some really innovative topical creams, the goal of which being to peel off the top five layers of skin on my face and start over. I'm at a good place in my life right now, really.

In other news, I just tilted my head up to take a drink of water and missed my mouth, dousing my face, tank top and pajama pants with a torrent of water. I'm so graceful.

I bought a study guide at the bookstore today called "Word Smart for the GRE". Katie's been freaking out about it for the past two weeks, so I figured it was high time I started stressing, too. Or at least pretending to stress. It has a bunch of really random, unpronouncable words that are likely candidates for the vocab portion of the test. I love me some big words, so this book is going to become my new best friend. I'll try to throw some GRE words into future blog posts.

My brother is coming to visit this weekend! I should clarify, however, that he isn't necessarily coming to see me; he's just using me for my residence. I loved how before it was always, "Why did you choose THERE?" Now that his best friend Pat goes here, Scott has conceded that it's "kind of cool" and has given Mizzou his stamp of coolness approval. This is my fifth semester in Columbia, so it's nice to see that he's come around before I have. Just kidding. Maybe I can somehow squeeze some bonding time out of this weekend.