Today has been an amazing day and I am extremely happy. Not only did I win a Strawberry Fields Forever paint brush on Neopets for getting into the Valentine’s Day issue of The Neopian Times, but I brought Charles to Chess Club this afternoon and he was the star of the show. Everybody absolutely loved his wittiness and accepted him into the club with open arms. I feel like an extremely good person for what I have been able to give Charles; because of me, he is able to communicate with others and has been able to break through the language barrier that has held him back for so long (4 months since he arrived in America). I am more than glad to help. Living up to Clarke Kent, aka Superman. =)

Tomorrow I will be attending the local Chinese New Year festival…I’ll be sure to upload photos and blog about the event! On Sunday, my boyfriend and I will be having either lunch or dinner at Basil’s and a lovely present exchange afterwards. Needless to say, I am quite excited.

I would like to share with you some of the quotes, sayings, poems, and short phrases that I have picked up over the last two years. I keep a small, college-ruled notebook (Duke Merchandise, in fact) that my sister gave me and it has provided me with a great way to collect all the lovely words that I have picked up and made up since 2008. I want to name my little Duke notebook something other than, well, “My Little Duke Notebook.” If you have any suggestions (I’m open to any and every possible idea!), feel free to let me know through a comment or two!

I hope these excerpts brighten your day! Have a nice laugh, a good cry, a smile dancing upon your lips.

My Favorite: “Our greatest fear is not that we are inadequate, but that we are powerful beyond measure.” –Nelson Mandela

“For heights and depths no words can reach, music is the soul’s own speech.” –Author Unknown

“Courage is not without the absence of fear.” –Ambrose Redmoon

“You can’t have all the talents in the world, so just do what do you best.”
“I believe that writing is like a series of road trips. You know your destinations, but it is up to you on how you’re going to get there in the end.”
“Silver is the better gray.”
“In order to survive NaNoWriMo, all you need is a little help of Pandora music, granola bars, and the will to win.”
–Me

Clarke: How could a son murder his own father?
Chloe: Absence of love. Some say that’s the definition of evil. –Smallville

“What one neuron tells another is simply how much it is excited.” –Francis Crick

“I am becoming still more independent of my parents, young as I am, I face life with more courage than ever, my feeling for justice is immovable and true. I know what I want, I have a goal, an opinion, I have a religion and love. Let me be myself and then I am satisfied. I know that I’m a woman, a woman with inward strength and plenty of courage.” –Anne Frank: Diary of a Young Girl, 1947

“I am still learning.” –Michaelangelo, age 85, 1560

“The heart has reasons which reason does not know.” –Pablo Picasso

“We can’t erase the past, and we sure can’t change the future, but sometimes life gives us the opportunity to make things right.” –Author Unknown

“Early to bed, early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise.” –Benjamin Franklin

“I love to sleep. Don’t you? Isn’t it great? It really is the best of both worlds. You get to be alive and unconscious.” –Comedian Rita Rudner

“My future starts when I wake up every morning…everyday I find something creative to do with my life.” –Miles Davis

“Time is of the essence.” –Author Unknown

Kevin: Love is patient, love is kind. Love means slowly losing your mind.” –27 Dresses

“The first step to better times is to imagine them.” –Chinese fortune cookie

Floccinaucinihilipilification-the act of estimating something as worthless

“If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain and bitter, for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.” –Max Ehrmann, “Desiderata”

“Your eyes are the brightest of all the colors,
I don’t wanna ever have another.
You’ll always be my Thunder.” –Thunder, Boys Like Girls

“A bad day’s work is better than no day’s work at all.” –Phillip Pullman

“Today’s tangents will become tomorrow’s arcs, and unforeseen connections will tie up your loose ends in a way that will make you want to slap your head and holler at your accidental brillance.” –NaNoWriMo pep talk

“Come live with me and be my Love,
And we will all the pleasures prove
That hills and valleys, dale and field,
And all the craggy mountains yield.
There will we sit upon the rocks
And see the shepherds feed their flocks,
By shallow rivers, to whose falls
Melodious birds sing madrigals.
There will I make thee beds of roses
And a thousand fragrant posies,
A cap of flowers, and a kirtle
Embroider’d all with leaves of myrtle.
A gown made of the finest wool
Which from our pretty lambs we pull,
Fair linèd slippers for the cold,
With buckles of the purest gold.
A belt of straw and ivy buds
With coral clasps and amber studs:
And if these pleasures may thee move,
Come live with me and be my Love.
Thy silver dishes for thy meat
As precious as the gods do eat,
Shall on an ivory table be
Prepared each day for thee and me.
The shepherd swains shall dance and sing
For thy delight each May-morning:
If these delights thy mind may move,
Then live with me and be my Love.”
–The Passionate Shepherd to His Love, Christopher Marlowe

“Perhaps there could be no joy on this planet [Earth] without an equal weight of pain to balance it out on some unknown scale.”
“It’s not the face, but the expressions on it. It’s not the voice, but what you say. It’s not how you look in that body, but the things you do with it. YOU are beautiful.”
–The Host by Stephanie Meyer

“Live in the moment.” –Author Unknown

“…the rest is still unwritten.” –Natasha Beddingfield

“In the midst of winter, I found within me an invincible summer.” –Albert Camus

“Being a kid is hard work.” –My cousin

“The smell of morning is so refreshing. It feels like you’re ready to conquer the day and do anything!” –Vanessa Hudgens, Self Magazine

“Never let the fear of striking out keep you from playing the game.” –Cinderella Story

“When I was born, I was so surprised that I couldn’t talk for a year and a half!” –Gracie Allen

“Only those who will risk going too far can possibly find out how far one can go.” –T.S. Eliot

“Kind words are short and easy to speak, but their echoes are truly endless.” –Mother Theresa

“The roundest kinght at King Arthur’s round table was Sir Cumference.” –Anonymous

“Perserverance is failing 19 times and succeeding the 20th.” –Julie Andrews

“You must do the thing you think you cannot do.” –Eleanor Roosevelt

“Why is ‘abbreviation’ such a long word?” –Anonymous

“I’m a believer in paths. I think we are each walking a path set out for us, and whether or not we follow it like we should is up to us. But there is a path in which footsteps trod, paths that intertwine with others when we interact, paths that take us where we need to be.” –A Livejournal Friend

“Better to write for yourself and have no public, than to write for the public and have no self.” –Cyril Connolly

“I could see him thinking, his eyebrows pulled together like caterpillars sharing a kiss. A happy caterpillar couple.” –TeenInk prose, January 2010

“There is a gift in giving.” –A friend

“Success is the sum of small efforts, repeated day in and day out.’ –Robert Collier

“With every ending comes a new beginning.” –Proverb

~TRA