DEADLINES ARE THE DEATH OF ME.

We are approaching the end of this semester, and so much is happening. I am currently working on a 8 page paper due this evening and following that I to study for a test and have a 10 page paper all for Tuesday, keep in mind that is only 2 out of 4 classes. Deadlines just crept up on me and I am sure I am not the only one. This semester flew by so quickly, I can not get over it. With only a few more weeks left, it is crucial to do your best.

It is hard to balance social life, school life, and a part time job. Sometimes I feel like I can not find a will to keep going. But I repeat a “I can and I will” mantra to myself every once in awhile and I push through it. When that doesn’t work I look up inspirational people or places, this motivates me and instills that hard work can pay off in the long run.

Dead lines really are the death of me. They keep me up all night and suck all the energy and brain power out of me. BUT we have made it to the home stretch everyone, just a few more weeks and we will have successfully made it to Winter break. Speaking of winter break it is like a month long! Anyways, I hope that my struggle story and how I persevere was in the slight bit inspirational, humorous, or even entertaining. See you all next week!

GOOD LUCK.

Rian x

Hello Fall

Even though fall officially began in late September, it seems like we are just now starting to see some colder weather. Living in Santa Barbara for the vast majority of my life I know that the “fall” months are usually some of the hottest of the year, sometime even the winter months. I’ve spent some Christmases at the beach in shorts and flip-flops, which I am definitely not complaining about. Who else gets to say they can go to class in shorts and t-shirts and go to the beach after in November?

You have to admit, we are pretty spoiled living in Santa Barbara/Goleta. Even if you moved here at the beginning of the semester, you just start to expect that the weather is always going to be a comfortable 73° and anything below 65° is like an Alaskan winter. As soon as I check my iPhone weather app and see that it is going to be 68° or below, I bust out my boots, sweaters, and long sleeves. Which is quite unnecessary, but I freeze at those temperatures.

I can definitely appreciate the cooler weather, especially because a week ago it was 100°. We love the warm weather, but once it gets over 85° we also don’t know how to act. Like many people, the last few months of the year, are some of my favorite times, but I don’t get to necessarily enjoy all aspects of fall and winter. However, the cooler weather definitely puts me in the fall/winter spirit. So far, I have indulged in making cookies and drinking some hot chocolate. Hopefully, we get to experience some more of this seasonal weather! And if not, I don’t mind going to class in shorts and flip flops!

Rian x

Not Feeling 100%

Hi everyone! I have been feeling under the weather and have spent the past week in a ball in my bed, well at least that’s what I wanted to do. This week was another hectic school week with a stressful presentation and more midterms.. STILL. I powered through the week and tried my absolute best considering the fact that I just wanted to sleep all day. However, this weekend was my dad's birthday so I knew I had to get better quickly!

Per usual, I was in LA this last weekend. My dad grew up in Los Angeles and because the Dodgers are in the WORLD SERIES, we thought it would be fitting to go down there and watch the game in his hometown. But before the game, we decided to go take some picture of the beautiful sunset.

First, we went to a reflecting pool. The perfect view of all the skyscrapers in Downtown LA. Next, we went up to the U.S. Bank Tower. Home to the glass slide. A glass slide that goes outside of a 70 story tower. CRAZY. Recommend checking it out. This was our second time going, but we just wanted access to the 360° view of Los Angeles. Personally, this is the best view in the entire world. The mountains, the beach, and for us the sunset. I can’t use enough words to describe how awesome and beautiful the sunset was. An extra bonus was the wings painted onto the glass by an artist Colette Miller. You’ve definitely seen pictures of these wings on instagram, and if you haven't you must be living under a rock. Then, we went to a restaurant to watch the the Dodgers win game 4 in the World Series and eat an appetizer or two. Finally, we went to walk around Hollywood. Because whats a trip to LA without walking down the Hollywood Walk of Fame?

I really enjoyed this weekend, even though I still wasn't feeling 100%. I look forward to talk to you guys in a few days, look out for another blog soon!

Rian x

How to Destress as a College Student

College is stressful, to say the least. Constant tests, quizzes, projects, essays, presentations,  and on top of all that nightly homework. It can get very overwhelming, especially if you are a full time student like myself. Because I know the struggle of always being stressed, I put together a few tips and ideas to destress yourself!

1. BREATH.

I know this sounds silly but often times we forget to just take a minute and breathe. With all the assignments clouding my headspace, I make sure to take some time and focus on just breathing. I have this app on my phone named Calm. It’s a really awesome tool to use if you’re especially stressed out. There’s a bunch of free activities to do, but my favorite is the breathing bubble. It gives you different noise cues, so you know when to breathe in, hold, and breath out. There is no timer, so you are able to focus on how long you need to practice breathing for. TIP: Close your eyes while doing this exercise it really blocks out any distractions so you can solely focus on breathing.

2. TAKE A WALK.

When I do my homework at home, I sit at my desk for hours trying to finish it all. I stare into my laptop and textbooks for hours searching for answers and trying to understand new topics, but sometimes I just get so overwhelmed I want to give up. I have come to the conclusion that it is because I am sitting in the same little corner for hours. So I get up and take a walk outside. Even if its around the block or down the street, something about fresh air and new surroundings makes me feel so much better. TIP: Try and be observant and listen carefully while you are on this walk. Focus on things like birds chirping, the wind rustling the trees, or even the sound of cars passing by. This will get your mind off of homework for a few minutes.

3. GO TO THE BEACH

Waves crashing is one of the most therapeutic sounds, ever. Lucky for us we live only a hop, skip, and a step away from it! Walking on the beach is one of my favorite things to do. I think this one is pretty self explanatory, but just taking a stroll or sitting on a towel at the beach is really helpful when I am feeling stressed out. TIP: Check what time the sun sets in the evening. Sunsets are really awesome, so if you can try and watch the sunset over the water at least once a week!

4. DO SOMETHING YOU LOVE.

It can be easy to neglect your wants, especially when you’re so focused on all the school stuff. I always make sure to do something I like to do every once in awhile. A few examples are making new playlists to listen to, watching a bunch of youtube videos, painting my nails, or even spending a little extra on my favorite meals.

I hope this brought you some inspiration to find ways to destress yourself. Mental health is SO important!

Take care of yourself,

Rian x

DACA Advocacy Week at California Community Colleges

Hi everyone, this week I have some cool stuff for you to get involved in!

Some background information: I am in a club on campus named Sigma Chi Eta. Which is SBCC’s honor society of the National Communication Association. We put on a few events throughout the year, and this fall we decided to kick off the year by doing a small event this week and next week. We sat down and discussed different topics, and ultimately chose to do something to spread awareness and give support to all our DACA students who attend SBCC and just all DACA students in general.

After planning this event, we learned that this week is DACA Advocacy Week at all California City Colleges. We were excited and even more eager to set up our tables and start making a difference. After researching and learning more about what we can do we decided the best thing was to print out postcards, which would be sent to congress men and women. We also thought it would be really awesome if students could post sticky notes on a whiteboard with encouraging and supportive notes.

We are hosting this event on West Campus (in front of the library) TODAY (Wednesday, October 18th) and next Thursday (October 26th) from 11 a.m. to about 2 p.m. This is a great opportunity if you don’t know much about DACA, go to the tables you can learn more about it from different students. If you do know what DACA is/what is happening to DACA and you want to take action but don't necessarily know what to do, this is a great small step in the right direction. This issue is a lot bigger than one of us, so let’s all come together and make a bigger difference together.

Hope to see you there,

Rian x

My Day at the Harbor Festival

Hi everyone! I am back with more exciting weekend activities. This past Saturday my family and I went down to the Harbor and Seafood Festival. The Harbor Festival is an event that showcases the "Bounty of the Santa Barbara Channel." Not my words, the banners words. Basically this event aims to showcase that the harbor is an actual working harbor. Over a 100 fisherman land about 10 million pounds of seafood every year. Impressive. Besides all these fun facts, the Harbor Festival takes place at the actual harbor and there they showcase a bunch of vendors, informational booths, and fresh seafood!

At one booth they had fresh sea urchins, which are those spiky purple creatures. They were cracking  them open and scooping all the orange insides out of them for people to eat. Personally, it did not look appetizing in the slightest, but people were lining up to get their hands on one.

At another one of the booths, we grabbed some Aebelskivers. WHICH ARE SO GOOD. Pretty much they are pancake puffs, but they are topped with a raspberry jam and power sugar. I believe they are a Danish dessert, these particular ones were from a bakery/restaurant in Solvang. If you ever get a chance to go to Solvang you must get these!

We then walked around a bit and looked at all the vendors and shopped around. There was tons of people, I mean tons. So after we saw everything and ran into family friends, we decided to get something to eat. My mom and I don't eat sea food, so none of the booths and fresh seafood looked appetizing to us. So we went to the Breakwater Restaurant where I had some awesome chicken tenders and french fries.

As small as Santa Barbara is, they host/have some awesome little events. Always check out the newspapers and even ads on TV for more info about little events in Santa Barbara. I will definitely try and give you guys a heads up about upcoming events on and off of SBCC campus.

Talk to you guys soon

Rian x

My Weekend In LA: iPath Field Trip

Hi everyone, IM BACK. My classes and life got the best of me. But not to worry I am back, and will have weekly blogs up. Tomorrow I will also be posting another blog that I have been working on, because of the lack of blogs for the past couple weeks.

This weekend I went to Los Angeles to tour colleges with a program at SBCC, iPath. iPath is a program that is to help students with the transfer process. There are academic counselors just for iPath students, they host FREE field trips plus your food and hotel is even included, and in your iPath classrooms you get tutors for your specific class. To be in iPath you just have to be enrolled in their list of classes with a specific teacher, visit their page to check what classes are being offered next semester. They are a great resource!

On to the good stuff: my trip. We got to visit UCLA, LMU, and Pepperdine. We left early Saturday morning and headed to UCLA. It was open house, so there was about 8,000 people visiting and touring. IT WAS CRAZY! There was an opening ceremony where the band played and they taught us the famous 8-clap. Then for the rest of the day we were able to galavant and visit different informational meetings and tour the campus. We got to all the beautiful buildings, including the famous Royce Hall. After we went on a bus tour of LA, passing Beverly Hills, Bel Air, and even getting to see the Hollywood sign. We went to our hotel, with an amazing view, and got to have some "free time." A group of other students went to get some dinner and got to adventure the Westwood Village. After a long day and scorching 98° heat we all headed to bed for an early morning, so we could head to Loyola Marymount University (LMU).

At LMU we got an informational meeting about the school and an tour of the beautiful campus. I have already visited this campus, as it is my #1 choice for schools. Unfortunately I was not able to stay for long because my parents were picking me up from campus because we had to go to a Ram's game. Which we ended up losing, but that's okay because we got to hang out in LA before we headed home. This weekend was awesome!

Again, I definitely think you should check out iPath and all they have to offer. I'll talk to you guys tomorrow! Rian x

HOW TO GUIDE: MIDTERMS

It is almost that time of the year my friends: Midterm Season. Along with weekly quizzes in my math class and other sporadic quizzes and tests, I have already have two midterms so far. Midterms in only the fifth week of school is not something I had really prepared myself for. Welcome to college. However, both midterms seemed to go over pretty smoothly and I walked out of them pretty confidently. The reason for that is I made new study habits for myself. So, today I thought I would share some easy tricks to get that grade you want.

Study Tip #1: DEDICATED QUIET SPACE.

When I study, do homework, or do anything where I need to focus I make sure I have a quiet place to go. Since I live with my parents, it can be hard to do that since everyone has their own agenda. My mom will be in the kitchen cooking so I can’t be there, both my parents will be in the living room watching t.v. so I can’t be in there, and until recently I didn’t have a dedicated spot in my room to do work besides my bed or the floor, which usually ends up with me taking a nap. Now that I have a desk and a little corner dedicated to my school work, I am not distracted and can just close the door knowing I won’t have anyone bother me. Like I said my new setup is brand new, but before I had to find other places to go. One night I found myself at a Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf and other days I would spend my breaks in the library getting as much work done as I could. PRO TIP: GO DOWN TO THE SECOND LEVEL OF THE LIBRARY. It’s really quiet down there, and the perfect place to really focus and zone into your studying. I just learned about the second level about a few weeks ago.

Study Tip #2: NO LOUD MUSIC.

When I’m in places like the library and coffee shops it can still be sort of loud so I make sure to wear earplugs, use noise canceling headphones, or play classical musical music instead of playing my normal playlist. I find myself jamming out to my regular playlist and get no work done, especially when it’s not something I want to study for. I know some people say they do well while listening to their favorite songs, but personally I find it nearly impossible to get anything done. So, if you have trouble really focusing because of loud noises and you listen to your favorite playlists while studying,

try and switch it up a bit. PRO TIP: SPOTIFY HAD DEDICATED PLAYLISTS FOR STUDYING AND FOCUSING, CHECK THEM OUT. Not only do I find new songs I like, but they are really helpful for tuning everything else and being productive. Also, Premium Spotify is only $4.99 a month and now it includes Hulu. No Ad’s plus free Hulu, that sounds like a deal to me.

Study Tip #3: FIND A FRIEND.

I know it can be intimidating to talk to new people in your classes, but in the long run it is so helpful. In all of my classes I make sure to introduce myself to at least one person. That way we can exchange contact info and if I need help or miss a day I have someone I can rely on to help me or fill me in on what I missed. I am constantly receiving and sending messages from people in my class about homework questions and more recently questions about quizzes/tests/midterms. You can even plan a study session, because working together is always better than working alone.

I hoped these tips gave you some good ideas about how to prepare to study! They really worked out for me so I hope they work for you. If you guys want more let me know in the comments and subscribe to my blog page to get notified when I post!

Rian x

I LOVE LA.

Hi everyone, long time no talk. It is already the fourth week of the semester, can you believe it? Time really does fly.

Over this past weekend I went to Los Angeles with my parents. We have season tickets for the LA Rams, so we had planned to go to LA on Sunday for the football game. But, Saturday morning my parents and I decided that we also wanted to go to a Dodger game that evening. So, we made an entire weekend of it in LA.

Large Storm Clouds over Mountains. 

Saturday after we booked a hotel and bought our tickets for the game, we started our venture around 1 p.m. Luckily, our car has bluetooth so the time passed by pretty quickly. I know a lot of people don’t like the traffic in LA, but personally I never really mind it. Especially because the destination is always worth it. Anyways, we arrived at Dodger Stadium, found our seats, and grabbed some nachos. The view at the stadium is so beautiful: large bright lights and a clear view of the mountains. On Saturday, there were huge clouds that were creeping up and over those mountains, which made for an even more beautiful sunset. When it got dark, those clouds became storm clouds. As we were watching the game, out the corner of our eyes we could see flashes of light. There was lighting over the mountains, and it was SO COOL. I was quickly distracted by the lightening that I stopped watching the game. Which we did in fact lose. After the game, we stopped by my favorite stop in LA, Cielito Lindo at the Placita Olvera, to grab some taquitos. Which wraps up day one.

Kurt Werner's Signature (Far Right)

Sunday we woke up early to head over to the Los Angeles Coliseum, where the Rams play. We like to go in early and head over the the tunnel where all the players come out. I’m usually pretty good about squeezing myself in between people to get signatures from athletes. It just so happened that they were honoring Ram Hall of Famers, and Kurt Werner was there greeting fans and taking selfies with them. I however did not get a selfie with him, but I did get his signature on my dad’s hat. Yea, my dad owes me one.

It was so hot at the game, especially because the Coliseum does not get much shade until the evening. It was nearly unbearable, but the Rams kicked the Colts butts pretty badly (46-9) which made it all worth it.

Despite the Dodgers losing and it being nearly 100°, it was a great weekend in Los Angeles. It’s really awesome that we can go to places like LA and do so much in just a short weekend because we live so closely to it. If you’re not crazy about the hustle and bustle of LA but still like to go sometimes, remember that you get to come home to a place like Santa Barbara.

My Mom and I taking selfies during the game. 

My Name is Rian, not Rain.

Hi everyone, & welcome to my first blog post! I am so excited to be starting this new adventure and getting to share it with you all!

First off, let's address the title of this blog. It is a very rare experience for my name to actually be pronounced correctly. Which is funny because it's actually a very common name, with some uncommon spelling. My name is Rian, pronounced like Ryan. One little letter really throws people off. I was so used to my name being mispronounced, that I eventually accepted it and wouldn't correct people anymore. But, when the time came to make a 6 word memoir about myself, for my English 110 class in high school, it only seemed fitting to base it off of the mispronunciation of my name. Because, it really is the story of my life. Thus, my mantra began which also became my senior quote.  

Besides the pronunciation of my name there is more to know about me. I am 18, I grew up and went to school here in Santa Barbara, I have my own Youtube channel (username ‘Rian Noel’ make sure to check it out) and now I’m currently enrolled as a Communication major. Hopefully, I will be able to transfer within two years to a 4 year college.

My Youtube Channel

But so far I am enjoying SBCC a lot so far. I have 3 classes on campus, which are only on Tuesdays and Thursdays and one online class (I don’t know how I got so lucky). I’m taking Math 117, Comm. 101, Comm 121, and Film Studies 101. WISH ME LUCK. The further I get into the school year I will definitely update you guys on how everything is going!

Goodbye Summer Sunsets :(

Even though I am bummed about the summer coming to an end, especially not being able to watch the summer sunsets every evening, I am very excited to begin a new chapter in my life. I was very nervous first starting a week ago, not sure if I was going to make new friends or be able to handle what college throws at me. But, I know SBCC has a lot to offer me, and I know eventually I will find my place by joining clubs and getting involved. I can’t wait to see all the exciting and interesting things that will come my way during my first semester! I can’t wait to share all my experiences with you guys!

Rian x