End of classes. For various reasons mostly slept through the last Thermo on Thursday, but paid enough attention to catch at the end when the teacher said that the big long derivation had ended up with the same equation he'd derived a different way on Tuesday, so that didn't matter.

Last night we had a baking party. Catherine had thought up the idea of handing out Christmas cookies, with the main purpose of meeting the boys next door that she thinks are hot. All us roommates were there, and then Catherine and Karen invited a guy from their tai chi class name Ben, who turned out to be a guy I recognized from my PChem class. He brought "homemade" egg nog and offered it to anyone. I said sure! and took a sip - my gosh, it was the worst thing ever. Holy crap. Then I asked (which I should have done first, I realize) if it was alcoholic egg nog and that explained the horrible, horrible taste. Since so far I've tasted wine, champagne, beer, and I think that was rum in the egg nog, and absolutely hated all of them, that means I won't drink much after I turn 21. I like chocolate better.

Went to the health center on Thursday to get more steroid cream for my latex allergy rash in case I run out over Christmas (I touched rubber band by accident last week which prompted a new outbreak) - it's much easier to get a prescription here than at the HMO at home. The doctor I saw, the same one I've been seeing for my allergy since last spring, asked my what year I am. I said third year. Then she replied, "Oh, because you look twelve."

I know looking 60% of my age will be an asset when I'm past 30, but right now, I'd really rather look old enough to belong here.

Bowl game stuff is working out better than I'd thought. Including that the band will get to get into Disney World and another park for free! I'd wanted to go to Disney World while I lived on this side of the country, and the price of a plane flight to Orlando (this time out-of-staters are responsible for their own airfare to the bowl game) is far cheaper than that of driving to Orlando from Atlanta, staying in a hotel, tickets to the parks, and the cost of food, all of which I would have to pay if I convinced my roommates to go. With the band, except for plane fare, everything is covered. Everything. Hotel, bus rides everywhere, the two parks, food, and a free t-shirt too! When I talked to the director he expressed regret that they couldn't give as much away to the band as normal because the bowl doesn't pay much, but I think what they're giving us is totally awesome.

I set the oven on fire yesterday. I wanted to make my toffee candy before the baking party to reduce the load on the oven, but Karen had already used my big baking pan with sides on the baklava, so I used a flat cookie sheet. The recipe just said "lay crackers on cookie sheet," not mandating sides, so I thought it would be okay, reasoning that once it went in the oven it would solidify.

I forgot that it bubbles up a lot before it solidifies, and the butter/sugar mixture and some saltines fell onto the heating element in the oven - and lit on fire. Catherine had the idea of squirting it with water from a sports bottle, which did put out the fire, but only after it sent a big flame up the entire height of the oven.

After the flames were out and I was scraping charred remains from the bottom of the oven and Catherine was fanning the smoke out the window with a blanket there was a knock on the door and lo and behold, it was the CA. It wasn't about the smoke, luckily, (he didn't even say anything about the smoke), it was to deliver the finals packs my parents had ordered.

And surprisingly, I was able to salvage a lot of the candy.