65° and rain, winter's here

Well this is awkward. After returning home last week and deciding I would appreciate the Santa Barbara weather more, it got cold.  Yes, it is the last week of October, and it's finally cold after entering the 60's. No blue sky, no sun, and waving palm trees. I think since I moved to Santa Barbara my comfort zone for temperature now ranges from 75°-85°. So in other words I finally wore pants for the first time since I've moved here. Here's a picture as proof that the impossible finally happened.

It even managed to rain in Santa Barbara. Not really, but it did rain in my apartment! Yes, raining in my apartment. First of all, I currently live at Beach City. I like it a lot: good social life, lots of events, cheap, and the staff are super helpful. However, as I was going to bed last night I couldn't help but notice a sound. Specifically the sound of water coming out of our light sockets in the hallway and bathroom. Yes at 1:00 am exactly, twas' quite the situation to deal with after waking from a good sleep. After initially putting buckets under the pouring waterfalls, I then realized I'd spend the entire night setting alarms every other hour to empty the buckets. I quickly found the power box and cut the water making the leaks drip to a stop. And with my luck of course, Beach City's office would be closed Sundays so I can't get help unless I hire my own plumber. Beach City has workers for that so I can manage with no water for a night. Life without water hasn't been too bad, after showering at a neighbors, hopefully I can sort this out and move on. Definitely expect a post at the end of the semester with a personalized review of Beach City, my apartment vendors. Here's a quick recap after my visit to Niagara falls: 




I'm not going to lie that after the water incident last night I'm going into this week a little stressed. I've got a group project due, math exam, a meeting with my counselor to plan out my classes, a blogging and a social media worker meeting, a meeting with the Economics club President, not to mention it's also Halloween Tuesday, so I'm going to a concert that night. 



You can bet I'll keep you updated on how it all pans out so stay tuned! 
And lets hope I can get these leaks fixed, go Vaqueros!

Home Sweet Home

After a busy week filled with homework, exams, projects, surfing, and work: why not go back home and sleep in your real bed, right? My thoughts exactly. I am one of the unfortunate ones who hasn't brought a car to college so shoutout to Katie for the ride, twas' appreciated so I could see my beautiful hometown.

Los Gatos (my hometown)

Now lets get down to business. I currently live in Santa Barbara, last week it was 85 degrees Fahrenheit and because of this weather I tend to wear flip-flops (I have an awesome flip-flop tan I'm quite proud of), I wear shorts and t-shirts along with the occasional tank top. So after leaving paradise, I was quite disappointed the Bay Area welcomed me home to rain and stepping in a big puddle when I got out of the car after a 5 hour car ride. Gross. Point is after a few months at SBCC its seemed I've become accustomed to the weather and forgot the rest of the world has seasons. This leading me to the realization I take the weather here along with many others for granted and don't appreciate it enough... expect some pretty campus pictures this week to prove my point.


However!!

1.) While I was home with the influence of my nurse Mother I got my flu shot! Getting the flu shot is very important especially as a college student because you don't want to miss any class, so you don't end up behind on work. However, this was especially a big deal for me since I didn't get the flu shot last year because I have a fear of needles and ended up being sick for like 3 months straight, no joke. For those of you who didn't know me pre-blog you wouldn't know this, but if you know me you know I hate 3 things: needles, seeing blood, and snakes. So for all the doubters here's a picture as evidence that I overcome my fear of needles and got the shot, now I'm all good and ready to tackle the rest of the school year (10/10 recommend you get the shot)

Didn't get a spider-man band aid:/

2.) In addition to improving my odds of good health I had a very healthy Nutella crepe with my middle school math teacher, Mr. Cal. After planning my trip home, I immediately messaged Mr. Cal asking if he wanted to meet for some food. He's one of the teachers who teaches you more than just math. It's hard to find a teacher who really cares about their students and gets involved with the school to better understand student lives. For that reason ever since 7th grade I've been staying in touch with Mr. Cal and seeing whats'up. He's definitely been one of my favorite teachers throughout my schooling and always manages to share some of his wisdom with me making me more than happy to meet up with him and chow down at a local cafe.

Mr.Cal and I post destroying some Sweet Peas crepes

3.) Lastly, I clocked in on that host grind to get my money up. The restaurant I worked at in high school doesn't have many hosts, so whenever I return home, I plan on picking up some hours and making some money. So I did exactly that. 3 shifts later, 2 hours of overtime, and 1 free dinner, I'm quite a happy employee. I must admit it's really cool that the restaurant allows me to work when I return home, so shoutout to Willow Street  if any of you find yourselves hungry in the South Bay.

Willow Streets chicken tequila fettuccine
with chocolate milk and chocolate cake... 

Some words of wisdom I think worth mentioning while on the topic: The more you do something the better you get. This is an idea I completely believe in and have found successful not only in the workplace but on the soccer field and academically as well. At Willow Street when they first hired me, I hated the job and considered quitting after 3 weeks (don't tell them that), but stuck with it in hopes to be able to save for my senior trip to Waikiki, but that's beside the point. After hating the job because I wasn't good at it, I stuck with it and picked up more shifts and got better every time I worked. Through practice, repetition, mistakes, and most importantly learning from my mistakes I quickly found myself to be the strongest host and simultaneously started to enjoy working.

Some motivation for the week: If you want to be good at something, do it.
Also how can you hate your job when you get this after a
8 hour shift:

I'm feeling pretty good after this weekend as it served as a great vacation allowing me to recharge my batteries and connect with my roots. I hope everyone's getting ready for the week and remember if you want something: go get it, simple as that.
Vaquero up baby! Stay tuned I've got some exciting blogs coming up!

John

Shredin'

Ladies and gentlemen, the time has finally come... I finally have a surfboard! Yes, after living 5 minutes from the Pacific Ocean it has taken me almost 2 months to finally get a board down here. A very deserved shoutout to my Dad for coming down and giving me one of his boards, love you dude. 

I've always surfed because back home in Los Gatos, I'm only a short half an hour drive from Santa Cruz (huge surf town). So I've always surfed but have never taken it too seriously. My Dad however, being from rainy England is obsessed with the scenic California Coast and catching waves on his days off from work. From this, my Dad has always been very enthusiastic to take me out to surf but I never been too interested since he's in his 50's and somehow manages to kick my butt time after time when we're out in the water. Whatever though, give me a year in Santa Barbara and I'll be cutting circles around him in my sleep. So I asked him to bring a board down and he did (homie) and now I've finally got something to do on weekends (besides homework) ;)

Left me and Evan right

Usually, when I'm back home and go out in Santa Cruz, I use a longboard, because thats what I had and didn't think much of it. Longboards are fun to use, easy to learn on, and aren't too much work. Now this is the interesting part: being the cocky athlete I am, I told my Dad to bring a shortboard because I wanted try something new and though it'd be fun. Easier said than done. Shortboards are a whole new game compared to longboards. So the board itself is a custom made board from an artist named Troy Freeman made for my dad and the board itself is a 6'9" which isn't too short, but in terms of what I'm use to: it's tiny. 

My first time out: I ate it to say the least. I’ve never duck dived (to dive under an oncoming wave) before, so to be honest I got flattened by some barreling waves more than I would have liked, but that's all part of the game and makes you learn real quick. I managed to get 2 or 3 rides which didn’t last too long but I’ll take it for my first time on a short board. The primary difference between a shortboard and longboard is a shortboard is harder (in almost every aspect). I wasn’t expecting such a challenge but it’s nothing I can’t handle and improve on. So after getting trampled by a few waves I decided I wouldn't take any more beatings. That night when I returned home I watched a youtube tutorial on how to duck dive, went in the apartment pool with my board, and practiced till I could do 5 duck dives in a row. 15 minutes later: I am now the best duck diver in the game. Catch me at your local beach shredding the swell... of course is easier said than done. I plan on going out 2-3 times a week and hopefully I can get pretty good over time and kick my Dads butt when I return home over break. 

The other thing about surfing is I so wish I had a picture of the sunset when I was out there. Truly incredible. There’s nothing like looking up at pink clouds while catching the days last sets with the sun on you; absolutely perfect. So a little surprise for this weekends blog, but I’m going home and will be sure to grab my GoPro so I have a water proof camera out there to take pictures to share with you guys and maybe some wipeout videos too if the impossible occurs ;) 

Like I said the goal moving forward is to get in the water 2 or 3 times a week to consistently improve and get better. Something I really believe in is the more you do something the better you get so thats something I’ll be trying to emulate in coming weeks, stay tuned…

First Time At UCLA

Being one of my potential transfer schools I was more than excited to finally see the UCLA's campus for the first time. After a combination of public transport systems between busses and train rides I finally arrived in Westwood to see their beautiful campus. I linked up with one of my high school best friends who's a student in the art program and also invited me to his frats event that night, Lambda Chai Alpha.

Here are my impressions after my first visit to the school. For starters, the food: The cafeteria is bomb. Here at SBCC our cafeteria is no doubt stellar, but UCLA is in a league of their own. I was truly impressed with the food, leading me to stuff myself, like the hungry college student I am. Also a bonus for campus food is the In-N-Out down the street.

More impressive however, was the beauty of the campus. Despite not having a beach bordering the campus the school makes up for this with a combination of new modern buildings along with the old fashioned red brick halls. For being in LA the school also has a lot of nature including big lawns and even pine trees giving the school a nice combination of nature and modernness.

I really liked the campus and had a great time while I was there as it's always great to see old friends. All in all a pretty successful trip south to further strengthen my desire to transfer.

Back to the books for now.
Stay tuned!

How To Live With Roommates Pt.1

Living with roommates can be difficult and it's inevitable you'll encounter some disagreements throughout the year. Between dirty dishes and consistently leaving things out of place, there'll eventually be some tension between your differences. However, there are ways to prevent said tension by setting rules each resident must obey. Commandments of the house if you will. Below is a copy of my apartments personal commandments :

All the commandments contribute to a cleaner living space but commandment #9 is the most influential commandment motivating my roommates to follow the other rules. When someone doesn't obey a rule, they are forced to donate a dollar to a jar. Eventually, once the jar fills we spend the money towards something our apartment needs for the week such as paper towels, food, or a new X-BOX ONE video game. Having a small reasonable consequence for disobeying the rules is what motivates my roommates to clean up because we're all already broke enough as it is.

If you're having any disputes with your roommates I encourage you to communicate to them rather than holding it in or letting it slip. A tip to minimize assigning blame to a specific person is to use "I" statements rather than "you" statements. For example instead of saying "Jason, YOU left YOUR used scrambled eggs pan out and YOU left the milk out again, can YOU put things away?" try phrasing it as "Hey Jason, sometimes I feel frustrated when I wake up in the morning and need to cook breakfast before class and have to clean a dirty pan and use warm milk, maybe we can work on putting things back where they belong together". By using "I" statements rather than "you" helps take away the blame and focuses on the problem and why it's a problem. By using "I" statements your roommates won't feel targeted or feel like they're being nagged to do something.