One might wonder what an industrious, workaholic student does when she has several weeks with absolutely no commitment, quite a bit of studying exhaustion, and an empty house.

Well, let me tell you…

I have worked in the garden, or rather, the front yard, which I have turned into a garden in several places:

Note the pretty, unfinished path. That is a hose, not a snake, though I saw one at the Botanical Garden the other day.

My herb garden. Basil on the left, and some cilantro and "Thai Basil" (don't ask, my stepfather asked me to plant it). Ah, more pretty red path.

The vegetable garden. Those boxes were built by my grandmother's husband last spring for my mother.The area to the back, behind the boxes, was totally filled with plants - quite a jungle - and had to be cleaned out. It took me about two days to get that area neat enough for planting.

Peppers and more tomatoes in the front-most box, cantaloupes on those little hills behind (A insisted on them) and berries up against the fence.

Garden beans, with their little poles all set up. These I grew from seeds. I am quite proud of their progress; I wasn't so sure about the whole seed business and had little faith it would work. The cantaloupes were from seeds also.

So, several huge piles of vegetation put by the curb, quite a bit of sweat, and some increased muscle mass later, the yard is looking good.

However, I only did that about half of the days so far, maybe less. Other times I have..

Made appointments to see old teachers:

"P^2" is a nickname for one of my teachers from high school.

Printed out all of the pictures from the Spring Break San Francisco trip at CVS, and even bought a little book to put all 120 of them in:

Any of my fellow nerds, note the 1,3,5-trimethylbenzene on the top right!

Organized my file box…

Well..."organized" meaning I put all the stuff I had stashed on the top in appopriate files or spaces in the box.

Spent a rather lot of money getting various pieces of art and posters framed at Hobby Lobby; also got a matte and frame for this postcard from the Villa Borghese; it turned out pretty nice:

They just don't make 'em like they used to, hmm?

Oh, and I began to re-read Sense and Sensibility (note: not on the reading list. Hehe…)

Gotta love the sisters Dashwood.

Aaaand I made a CD with all of the OChem lecture recordings from this semester for Charles…I will drop it off at the lab at TCU where he works later (he’s always there).

Good times.

PS: To estivate is to “pass the summer in an inactive or resting state.”