Nap & Fun > Work

Napping and having fun aren't ACTUALLY priorities of mine over my schoolwork, but if anyone were to have played fly on the wall watching me today, they sure would have thought so.

After spending all of yesterday having fun, today was (supposed to be) a day of predominantly work. I have done my work by now, but I can't say it was the first thing I did, like I had planned. I woke up at around 9:30 AM to go to breakfast with two friends that I've made while here on campus. We went to some place serving crepes on Amsterdam Avenue about a minute away from campus, and I got a crepe which looked better suited for dessert than breakfast; but, then again, I'm not really complaining. I returned to my room at around 10:45, with a little over an hour to use for working before I was to go out again. I ended up taking a nap.

At 12 PM, I met with Aurea, Adrianne, Morvarid, Tomi, a few other kids and two RAs for a trip to the Museum of Natural History. We took the 1 down from 116th Street to 72nd Street and walked east a few blocks over to the western border of Central Park, which we walked alongside but would not visit until later in the day. We arrived at the Museum of Natural History at 79th Street and entered, paying $14.50 with our Columbia ID rather than the usual $19.00. The Museum of Natural History was amazing; I viewed everything from the fossils of dinosaurs to the Easter Island Moai. A museum is something that is viewed, not explained, so any attempt at trying to explain it would do it justice. For that reason, I'll let some of the pictures doing the explaining for this blog. I can say, though, that the there are tons and tons of information to discover at the museum, and that this was a fantastic experience for me. I was able to learn about the possible reasons dinosaurs went extinct, how dinosaurs evolved into the creatures roaming our planet today, how we human beings evolved from apes, and how Native American tribes of different areas adapted to their setting, among other things.

We did not leave the museum until about 3:30 PM, and while we could have eaten any time in the museum, we much preferred buying a hot dog at a hotdog stand somewhere and eating in Central Park. We left the museum and proceeded to do exactly that, finding a nice shady area (an unlimited number to choose from) and sitting down together to eat our food. After eating, we took a long, winding walk through the western side of Central Park, passing over lakes, and under the thick canopy of trees. We only covered a small area of the park, but Central Park is a beautiful place. We reached areas in the park where you could forget you were in New York City; there were buildings in the distance but otherwise no signs that there were millions of people around you. Like I said about the museum, though, Central Park is something that can be viewed and walked through, not explained or described in words. I had a fantastic time, though, and we came out of the park on 72nd Street, where we got the C south for one station to Columbus Circle, and the 1 up to Columbia from there.

As soon as I got back to the dorm, I changed clothes to go out the gym to play some basketball with my roommate. We have been talking about beating eachother all week, and while we did play today, we did not settle things because I did not win and I am supposed to win. We were in the gym for about an hour, and I got back to my room at about 6:30 PM, where I would get to work finally. I took a nap instead.
I woke up at around 8:15 PM, and after showering, got together some things so that I could go downstairs and do laundry. The laundry room, which can also be used as a sauna if you ever need one while on campus, had fewer washers than it did people needing to use them. I'd be ok with this if I were simply dealing with unfortunate circumstances, but there were 3 washing machines jammed with quarters, one with some other error, and (this is the one that pissed me off the most) wet, washed clothes left unattended in washers that other people need to use. I was ok with waiting a little while, but there were 3 or 4 washers that were filled with clean clothes the entire time I was waiting. AT one point, there were 5 washers full of unattended washers. If 4 of the washers are broken, 5 of them are being hogged by people who haven't thought that maybe other people need to use the washers, and there are only 16 washers, I get a little frustrated. Instead of working or eating (or napping), I was sitting in a sauna waiting my spot in line for people who had simply left their clothes unattended.  I considered putting up a sign that if people leave their clothes unattended for more than an hour in washers/dryers that need to be used, that I would donate their clothes to Goodwill, but I was too lazy to make a sign. Also, that might be a bit too provocative. And it also really wasn't that big of a deal; I just complain sometimes.
Anyway, I started the washer at about 9:30 PM, with far less than enough time for the washer and dryer to do their complete cycles; however, I was able to take my clothes out right before curfew.
Then I cam up to my room to find that my suitemates had ordered Chinese food. The rest of the day was simple things like eating, blogging, and homework.