Going to Town...Downtown!

Today is a post full of selfies! What can I say? :) I love taking selfies.

Anyway, I took a quick day trip to downtown Santa Barbara today. When I woke up, it was really wet and rainy, so I made sure to wear my rain jacket...

(You can sort of see how wet the ground was!)

Fortunately, the world dried up quickly and then the sun came out. I didn't need my rain jacket at all!

Anyway, I took the bus to the transit center. I had five things I wanted to do today. I needed to get my medications - one prescription and one over the counter, a birthday card, some hand sanitizer, groceries, and lunch. I had a budget of forty dollars...I spent around $64. Whoops... it was fun though :)

(The sky was clearing up!)

At CVS, I picked up my medication and two birthday cards, because I couldn't choose which one I liked more. :) Then, at Bath and Body Works, I picked up six hand sanitizers (three for me and three for a friend) and two hand lotions (one for me, and one for the same friend). At Ralphs, I got three bottles of sparkling water, a box of tea bags, two instant soup pouches, and some other little snacks,

(Lunch was a roasted chicken and walnut pesto sandwich and
chicken orzo soup from Pickle & Swiss!)

I got lunch at a little sandwich shop called Pickle & Swiss. It was a little overpriced to be honest, but definitely a treat so it's okay :)

(Me and my purchases!)

Though I did spend quite a bit today, it was nice to just get out. Now, all I need to do is to get through finals, and then I'll be okay. :)

Also - this is the last post of my Blog Everyday Challenge. I'm not sure what I'll do from this point on, but probably not daily posts. It was a little rough, but I did it and I'm proud.

Breathtaking.

I was heading to dinner with a friend after a long long day of being sick and studying, with emphasis on the last two syllables of the latter ;)

We walked outside and were greeted with this breathtaking view.

(3/4/2017 - View from Ortega Dining Commons)

There are so many things I love about my school, and this is one of them. I'm so grateful I go to UC Santa Barbara. If I didn't, I would have never met the people I've met, or be the person I am today.

Best Friend

I'm honestly just so grateful for this girl. <3

Night Time Musings

I didn't really have the energy to blog tonight, but I said I was going to, so here we are! Because I don't really have a topic today, I'm just going to treat this post like a giant brain dump.

- I'm sort of in a bit of a weird mood. I'm definitely not at my happiest, but I've also been worse off. I'm not sure why I'm in so much of a funk right now.

- I'm also a bit sick which sucks. And I have this horrible cough, and no energy, and so on.

- This month, I took on the Rock Your Handwriting challenge as well as my other responsibilities. Honestly, it isn't much of any work at all, but it's just another thing I'm trying to remember with my day.

- I wonder if I'll ever get my chem degree, and if I do, in how many years? Can I really do this college thing? It definitely seems hard.

Well, I'm going to sign off for the night... I still have quite a bit of work to do.

Good night!

-C

What's in my Pen Case? Pt. 2

Yesterday, I posted the part one of my two-part What's in my Pen Case series, so here's part two!

On the back of the panel that has my eight most frequently used pens, there are three mesh pockets. The stuff I keep in here is pretty straightforward.  In the top pocket, I have two little pads of staples brand sticky notes, one blue and one lime green. In the next, I keep two erasers, a black and a white.

(How I arrange things in these pockets!)

(The things I keep in those three pockets!)

The last pocket has a pad of yellow sticky notes and a pack of pencil lead, or rather, like fifteen consolidated packages in one container. I use the sticky notes to leave notes for people, write mini to-do lists, and of course, to take notes. Having three colors is really incredibly convenient, and these three pads fit perfectly in my pen case right now.

This isn't my favorite part of the pen case, however. The mesh isn't stretchy and I worry that I'll rip it apart. The erasers and lead don't stay in the pockets very well either...

(When you flip over the page of pens!)

And finally, in the bottom half of my pen case, I keep...well, pretty much everything else. :) I have a small white Rhodia grid pad (N. 12) which is useful for testing pens, leaving notes I want to keep, bigger to-do lists, and drawing on. Below it, I have a Tombow hybrid correction tape. Its grey tip can be pulled out in order to protect the white-out, but I find that I don't need to do that as it isn't messy at all. Neither of these items is secured to the pen case.

Underneath the Rhodia pad and the correction tape, I have quite a myriad of supplies... I just like being prepared. :) I have a mini stapler, a MUJI "stick type portable scissors," two rulers, three more mechanical pencils, two standard pens, and two fountain pens! Wow. I've posted pictures below. :)

I keep a metal ruler and a plastic ruler, as I've found that the metal one is (obviously) more durable, but the plastic one is a) see-through, b) a protractor, and c) required for my physics lab. But I wholly prefer my metal ruler - it's so nice and thin and sturdy.

      

The stapler I debated about, as I didn't think it would be useful, but I've used it a lot more than I thought I would! The scissors are there so I can snip off bits of thread from clothes or my backpack, or cut paper, or what not... essentially, I'm keeping my scissors in here to act like scissors. :) I also keep three other mechanical pencils back here. The green and the red/gold one are the same, except for color. (I put gold foil in the top of the red one to get that color.) I keep these three pencils back here in case my carpel tunnel is really bad - the wider barrels are much easier for me to hold and the grips are so comfortable!

There's also a 0.28 tip pen back here, which I use only to make notecards for linear algebra. My professor allows us to have a notecard, front and back, for midterms and exams, and with a very slim pen, I can fit more information on the card! :) The two fountain pens are just for funsies - if I have the time to let the ink dry, I'll use these pens. I absolutely adore the heaviness of the Jinhao 250. For such an inexpensive pen, it looks quite pricey and writes nicely. This pen has a fine nib (which I specified in the picture with an F). And of course, the Muji gel pen is my only pen in my entire pen case that isn't a color I could use for regular school work. It's nice to have a pen that has a little more pizzazz... and it helps me ensure that my pen case isn't just old and boring. ;)

(Pens I keep in the back...
Sorry for the off-center photograph!)

I just wanted to make sure I posted a photo of my five mechanical pencils (and my correction tape too, I suppose!) All of these pencils, with the exception of the Pilot Opt, were purchased in Taiwan. The Opt was a gift from a couple of good friends of mine.

(From top: Pilot Delful, Pilot Opt, and three Pilot Dr. Grip CLs, and a
Tombow mono hybrid style correction tape)

Alright, that's all I have for today's blog post! See you on Thursday!

What's in my Pen Case? Pt. 1

Hi there! :) As you may know, I'm currently majoring in chemistry at UC Santa Barbara. I'm also a little bit of a stationary collector... so I carry around a pen case with me. :) I thought I'd blog about it today - it's one of my favorite things I use.

This is a rather lengthy post, so I've split it up into two, so here is Part 2. :) In this post, we'll just be going through the top half of the pen case.

Before I begin, however, I'd like to post a disclaimer: I mostly use black and dark blue pens, as well as pencil. My pen case strongly reflects that. I have another pencil case I use that holds colorful pens, which I might blog about another day this week or just in the future. This is just the one I use for my work every single day.

Anyway, that's enough talking, so let's begin!

I use the LIHIT LAB pen case pictured below. (I've heard this pen case be called the "Teffa" pen case as well). I chose this specific one because I've heard a ton of good reviews about it, and even though I researched it (a bit, anyway), I was still surprised by how large it was. After using it for just over a month, however, I've gotten used to it, though it still is a bit unwieldy to use on the small desks we get in classes and such.

I don't keep anything in the outside pockets of my pen case, unless I have a midterm or a final, in which case I keep my ID in the smaller pocket. An index card will fit in the bigger pocket, but obviously, because it isn't very protected, I don't keep index cards in that pocket. As of right now, both pockets are empty.

When you open the pen case, on the first two "pages" of the pen case, I keep my white 0.5 Pilot Opt mechanical pencil, as well as my black and pink Pilot Delful 0.5 mechanical pencil. 

(What you see when you open my pen case!)

The Pilot Opt was a Christmas gift from two of my friends, and I love how sleek it looks. It has a spring clip that allows me to clip the pencil to papers, my mini legal pad folio, my bullet journal...really anything. And the Pilot Delful clicks like a pen, so that the piece that feeds the pencil lead doesn't always need to be exposed. It's my favorite pencil for travelling or keeping outside my pen case, as the tip stays protected. These two pencils are relatively slim (compared to the others I keep in my pen case) so they stay up at the front.

(Zebra Mildliners!)

And I also have my pastel set of Zebra Mildliners. I recently got these (as well as the yellow and blue sets) and I'm already in love with them! I'm going to save them for their own little blog post... :)

Anyway, on the next page of the pen case, I keep the eight pens I use the most - there are six black ones and two dark blue. 

I'm going to start off with the two pens on the bottom. I purchased the sharpie pen because I currently have carpel tunnel, and the sharpie pen is essentially a fineliner - it requires absolutely no pressure. It's not my favorite, as when the ink runs out, I'll have to toss the entire pen body and that's just a huge waste of plastic, but for now, it's nice to have. The Pilot Precise V5 definitely isn't my favorite pen. I use it for lab, as it requires a bit of pressure (which makes my carbon copies come out darker), but due to its needle-like tip bending under pressure, it isn't very durable. Once the ink runs out, I will most likely not repurchase it. 

But now, from the top! I like my dark blue Pilot G2 pens because of the color - it's something that's a little more interesting to look at. The G2 is a reliably good pen to use so I use it often - I keep two of those in my pen case and will often take notes with them. With the Uniball Signos, there really is no reason for me to have four of those except for varying tip sizes. I use the 0.38 tip (gold "ultra micro") for writing my cheat sheets for Chem, the 0.5 (gold "micro") for notes and letters, and the 0.7 (just the normal silver 207) for really everything else. The 207s are waterproof, unlike the G2 pens, and don't bleed when they get wet! The 0.7 signo is my go-to daily writer; in fact, I keep a third one clipped to my bullet journal. Although I love my dark blue G2 pens, sometimes, you just need the standard black pen.

(My most-used pens!)

Anyway, I'm going to stop here for tonight, as it is getting late. Happy Tuesday, and see you tomorrow!

-C

Wow, it's been a while.

Well...it's been quite a bit of time. It's already "next year," so to speak. I haven't touched the post button here since last summer, and since then, I've gone through 1.75 quarters.

But well, I'm going to challenge myself to post once a day for the next week. The blog posts may be really short, or maybe more in depth? I'm picking up on some new hobbies, got some cool new stationary, started a bullet journal...

A lot of stuff has happened and I want to remember most of it. What better way is there to do it than to blog about it?

Alright, that's all I'm going to blog about today Hopefully, tomorrow's post will be a bit more interesting!

-C