A New Semester

UNC students have now been back at school for a week and a half and to me, it feels like much longer. As you know my last semester was challenging, not necessarily becuase of my course load, since I only had 13 hours, but becuase I had such a hard time adjusting to college life. However, this semester is so much better. I have more hours, 17.5 (I'll explain the 0.5 later) but I know how to handle it now. I know that, esp. for history classes, the teachers give you way more reading than is humanly possible to accomlish and to be able to have a life at te same time. I learned that the hard way. I learned that you have to do what you can to get by and sometimes that means not doing all of the reading, but definitely doing all of the assignments. Mabye it's becuase this semester has barely started, but I'm actually enjoying myself here!

Of course the first week of classes you barely have any homework and this time I took advantage of it my going to the gym to work out. I went with one of my friends who is sort of like a personal trainer on the side. So she told me what exercises to do. I eneded up only working out for 45 minutes with her becuase I became so exhausted. I was sore by the time we were done stretching! Yeah! Seriously! So anyways a couple days later, once I wasn't as sore, I decided to go back. I walked up the stairs of the Ram's gym and saw a sign which read something like this: "Make sure you clean all equipment before and after use, due to an outbreak of the flu virus! You don't want to miss any of your exams!" After reading it I remembered back in December when it seemed like everyone was getting the flu and I was proud of myself for not contracting the illness. So I went on my way to work out...this time without my beastly friend!

A couple days later I was walking down to my dorm with my roommate after having spent the day trying to "study" in my sister's dorm--we ended up talking for 3 hours instead. I sat down at my desk and began to pull out all of my books to actually get some work done. The longer I sat the more hot I began to feel and the more achy my body became. Soon enough I asked my roommate to check my head to see if it felt warm. I was pretty sure I was coming down with something like a fever. Sure enough I was warm, but I became hotter and hotter. My eyeballs even ached. As it turns out, I ended up being sick. Wheather it was actually the flu or not, I will never know because I didn't have a thermometer. But it was awfully hot in that room for the next few days and I had the most horrible time trying to sleep.

The moral of this story: If you read a sign that gives you advise on how to not get an illness, pay attention to it! Especially when it's in a germy gym.