One negative thing about the Loyola dining halls is that two of them, Simpson and Damen, close at only 8 P.M.! Luckily, DeNobili is there to save the day! (Well, rather the night!) It is often that students (like me) become hungry after 8, after all of the dining halls have closed. For times like these, the DeNobili dining hall stays open every Sunday-Thursday until 11 P.M.! In this post, I will be discussing the perks of DeNobili late night dining.
DeNobili late night dining is open every Sunday-Thursday night on normal weekdays throughout the semester. The hours run 8 P.M. to 11 P.M., which is much later than the regular operating hours of the Simpson and Damen dining halls. Many students enjoy attending late night dining because they often get hungry after 8 P.M. and do not wish to spend money. One perk of late night dining is that your regular meal plan can be used, so no extra expense is needed!
In addition to the hours, DeNobili late night dining also offers food not often found during hours of regular operation, or of those found in other dining halls. The main example of this is the chicken nuggets! DeNobili late night dining offers delicious chicken nuggets, only found at DeNobili, only found at late night. These chicken nuggets are widely popular amongst the student population here at Loyola, and many students only go to late night specifically for the chicken nuggets! I have been there a few times, and I do have to say, the nuggets are delicious!
In addition to the chicken nuggets, the regular service of various fried foods such as French fries, burgers, hotdogs and grilled cheeses are offered as well. The pizza bar is also still open for service during late night dining. Here, students can create their own personal pizza and have it baked to perfection within minutes! Cereal is also an option as well, for a light snack.
All in all, DeNobili late night dining has something to offer for everyone. With their weekday late hours, no one will have to go hungry after the dining halls close! They can enjoy delicious and specialized food choices for no extra charge with their regular meal plans. All of this combined, and DeNobili is the place to be for late night cravings!
Over the summer, I plan to do many things which include taking some summer courses at Loyola and attending Old Town School of Folk Music (located in Lincoln Square). Here, I will be taking a couple of courses and learning the cello. Why? This is for fun! No credit will be carried over towards my graduating credits. That doesn’t matter and I do not mind. I love music; learning about music and being able to play an instrument is leisure for me. As I have written in my other blog posts, music is one of the most central aspects of my life. As a child, I learned to play the guitar and piano.
Now, after I see that many other people can play or want to play those instruments, I think that I am not that unique anymore! Many people that I know of do not know how to play the cello, but appreciate the sounds it makes. I agree with them too; it has a deep, modest, and sincere sound! For me, learning this instrument will be challenging for some reasons (but none that I can’t overcome!). For example, the left hand plays the neck region. My biggest concern is that I am a leftie. My left hand finger coordination isn’t that strong compared to my right hand.
Anyways, I am excited to go to the music school over the summer. I know I will have fun and enjoy myself!
Happy Tuesday everyone! So I feel like I always say this, but the papers are piling on because the end of the semester is getting too close for comfort. It is getting quite real over here because I officially have to pick up my cap and gown tomorrow for graduation! I am graduating and have no idea what I really want to do with my life and it is freaking me out. So in order to calm myself down a bit, I thought I would let you guys in on some of my stress reliving tips. These tips can be for any sort of stress, it is not just school related! I know I posted one a while back about stress relieving tips, but those were solely for school and these are more general!
Take a step back! – Often we feel so overwhelmed that we feel like we have to keep going 24/7 at a 100 and ten percent, but you have to keep in mind that you are only stressing yourself out further. Take a step back, even for a few minutes, and breathe. Going into things with a clear head gives you a renewed source of energy and commitment to whatever you are doing!
Put it in perspective! – Freaking out about getting that A versus an A-? We have all been there, but here is a little secret, close your eyes and imagine yourself ten years from now, even ten days, does that grade matter? Probably not. I highly doubt a future boss will look at your grade and deny you because you did not get that A. Put in the right amount of effort, do your best, and feel good about that! You are only human, although some of us hope for the brain of Iron Man, we don’t have it. Just do your best and don’t stress!
Sleep on it! – This is not to say procrastinate, but everything looks better in the morning. Tomorrow is a new day with no mistakes in it, so do not carry the baggage of yesterday into today. Go in with a clear mind and clean slate and tackle whatever you have to tackle!
Find something that Relates to you! – Get into some activity that helps you get rid of stress. For me, baking, writing (non-school related of course!), and playing the piano are my stress relievers. Find yours! Don’t be afraid to find something that is tailored to you. There are a ton of options out there that people may tell you to do like yoga, breathing exercises, stress balls, ect, but you have to find what works for you.
Talk it out! – Do not bottle the stress up! If you need to talk to someone, talk to someone. Whenever I tell a friend about a bad day and get some words of encouragement it is the best dose of stress relieving medicine out there. Don’t look for sympathy, but don’t be afraid to reach out to someone when you just need to vent. It is like a win-win situation, because then they can do the same and you both can blow off some steam!
Like I said, these stress tips can apply to anything, not just school. It is good to be able to manage stress though because let’s face it, life is no picnic, but keep your chin up! You are going to be just fine!
This past weekend was the first one in quite a while that I’ve had free time to explore Rome. My friends and I have had the opportunity to experience cities all over Europe, but hardly anytime to explore the city we’ve been calling home. And these new explorations had me falling in love with Rome all over again. Now our last month and half will be dedicated to Roman explorations–we started off well this week by visiting 2 popular mercatos (markets) of Rome.
Without any classes on Friday, a friend and I made use of our morning and visited the Mercato Trionfale. This indoor market feels almost like a shopping mall due to its size–as it is the largest market in Rome, but the stalls filled with an array of produce, meats, cheeses, baked goods, spices, and various odds and ends tell you otherwise. Our visit was mostly just to browse, but we ended up buying a few things. My favorite purchase was the box of fresh strawberries I bought for 1 Euro and 50 cents. Although the bombas (filled doughnuts, one cream and one chocolate) I had made for tough competition.
We browsed in mostly the bakery and produce aisles, but the market had plenty of butcheries as well as a seafood section. We also stumbled across a party supply store, pet store, a few clothing stores, and a flower shop. Needless to say, nearly anything you need could be found at the Mercato Trionfale–I think it’d be a great spot to grab a picnic before you continue wandering around the Eternal City.
On a whim Saturday afternoon we visited our 2nd mercato of the weekend in Campo de Fiori. This traditional outdoor market is open daily and is one I will likely be making another visit too. I found the atmosphere in this market to be much more “Roman” or at least more along the lines of what I would imagine a Roman market to consist of. The vendors’ tents filled the piazza with a wide range of goods including Italian leather, kitchen utensils, produce, flowers, and piles of pasta. This market has the potential to supply me with several souvenirs to bring home to friends and family.
These mercatos sold many of the same items, but both offer a very different atmosphere. I may prefer Campo’s mercato to Trionfale’s, but those bombas may bring me back to Trionfale anyway.
In some of my earlier blog posts, I mentioned that I love to do origami. To me, it is a beautiful art form that anyone can do; it does not need much skill! From one piece of paper, you can make paper animals, planes, shapes, and more. Whenever I am free and have a piece of scratch paper in my hand, you will always see me folding away! The benefits of knowing how to do origami include never becoming bored, being called creative, getting attention from everyone, especially the girls. In my senior year of high school, I even asked my friend to prom by making her a bouquet of origami flowers!
When I was younger, I favored making birthday cards over buying cards from the store. My cards were elaborate. When I mean elaborate, I mean creative and time-consuming. Some cards took me up to two hours to create. My cards aren’t the usual pop-up ones that you may be thinking about. My cards required x-acto knives, fine pens, special glue, and more. Yes, I know some people may think I am a little crazy but in the end, I think I create art unlike any other. That alone is more special than a $3.99 greeting card.
I did not take pictures of the cards, but here is an example of one I did do:
BONUS…… Here’s some toilet paper art that I did for a project in AP English. Please do not ask how long it took for me to do 12 rolls…. 🙂
This past weekend, I had a friend from home come visit me in Chicago! She has been here before, but has not done many touristy things. So, that Saturday that she was here, I made sure we did as many touristy things as we could! In this post, I will be talking about how fun it is to be a tourist in your own city every once in a while!
The first thing we did after the St. Patrick’s Day parade (which was the same day) was get lunch and eat it along the lake! One of the most beautiful things about Chicago is being right next to Lake Michigan. We went to Chick-Fil-A for a chicken sandwich (there are none in Michigan where we come from, so this was a touristy thing!) and we found a wonderful sunny spot on the other side of Lakeshore Drive to sit and eat as we watched people bike by. It was so relaxing and calming! After lunch, we decided to walk along the lake until we hit Navy Pier. We walked around the inside of the pier and explored all of the cool shops inside! We walked all the way to the end of the pier, where we went outside right by the Grand Ballroom. The end of the pier is absolutely beautiful. On each side, there is a wonderful view of the lake and the cityscape. We made sure to take pictures! My friend also told me here that she has never been on the Navy Pier Ferris Wheel! So naturally, that is where we headed next! I was terrified though, as I hate heights! But once we were on board and heading up, the view was just enough to make me forget my fear. The city and lake looked amazing from the top of the wheel! I’m definitely glad I forced myself to go on!
Once we were done with Navy Pier, we decided to take an architectural boat tour on the Chicago River (which was still green!) The tour left from Navy Pier, and traveled down both branches of the river and lasted 75 minutes. Our tour guide was really excited about the architecture, and his excitement led to our excitement, and it was great to learn about the buildings of our great city! We learned about the original shores of the lake, old warehouses, new modern architectural marvels, different architects, the old and new post offices, the Merchandise Mart, and the Sears Tower (Willis Tower) among much more! I learned many new things about this great city that I have never known, and it was a wonderful tour!
The next thing we did was go shopping! My friend was really looking forward to the shopping that Chicago has to offer, so I made sure to take her all along the Magnificent Mile-Michigan Avenue! We also stopped by the Water Tower Place, which always has wonderful shopping. After shopping, it was beginning to get dark. We ended our night with a classic Chicago dinner-deep dish pizza from Gino’s East and a delicious cupcake from the Sprinkles Cupcake ATM!
My friend truly had a wonderful stay in our beautiful city, and I had tons of fun being a tourist again! Sometimes, it is good to get out of your daily routine and to take a look at the fun around you! Chicago is a wonderful place to do this. Although I’ve been here for the past seven months, I forgot how much fun the tourist aspect of the city could be and I really loved touring with my friend! So, get out there and do something you haven’t done in ages, like riding the Navy Pier Ferris Wheel! You won’t regret it!
Hi everyone! So with the weather get nicer, I wanted to share some of my favorite outdoor spots on campus which are perfect for just lounging around and getting some school work done. The grass is not green yet, but soon with the weather warming up, rain, and plenty of sunshine, the grass will be a wonderfully lush and green!
Madonna Della Strada courtyard area – Located facing the lake with a half circle to sit around. Get place to catch the lake’s breeze and just to relax. Bonus: This is an amazing spot for pictures on campus!
IC – Located right in front of the IC and facing the lake, this space is a continuation of the half circle in front of Madonna Della Strada. It can get quite windy here, but lots of students just sit on the edge and chat here. I have even seen some lay on the ledge and take naps! Only for the brave of course 😉
The Quad – SO MUCH ROOM FOR ACTIVITIES! I love this spot. There are trees to sit under and also an open area for sports. This space is so large that students can do homework, play sports, take a nap, or just sit and chat without running into each other’s space. People often bring their dogs here to run around as well. Who doesn’t like dogs?!?!
Space in between Madonna Della Strada and Coffee Hall – This is a smaller space which often does not receive much student traffic and that is why it is perfect. This is my favorite space. Facing the lake, it is a small hill that slopes slightly downwards. Since it is more of a quiet spot, there is always peace and quiet for homework. The lake just makes everything calmer and makes struggling through Organic Chemistry homework much easier!
(I apologize for the brownness of these photos, but I promise that these spaces are so lovely when the green grass grows in and there are flowers!)
After enjoying Paris and London stop #3 on our spring break journey was County Mayo, Ireland.
My Uncle Eugene put us in the care of his sisters for the weekend, which couldn’t have been more perfect. Deirdre picked us up from the airport then drove us over to Westport, a really lovely little town with some cute shops and of course friendly Irishfolk. She pointed us in the direction of a good Irish restaurant before she went back to work. Jordan and I both had some of the best vegetable soup and brown bread ever before wandering around town. Pretty much as soon as we landed we noticed how much kinder the Irish people we met were than any other place we’d been thus far. We had some pretty long conversations about our travels with a few shopkeepers and even ended up meeting someone from Chicago. The world can be a pretty small place sometimes. Sharon, my uncle’s youngest sister, met us at 4:30 for a little adventure to the coast.
Westport actually runs right into the bay, so our drive on the way to the beach was beautiful. The beach we stopped at is right at the base of Croagh Patrick, a mountain with a church on top that is often visited by pilgrims. You can’t make up something as picturesque as this scene. We only stuck our fingers in the Atlantic and walked up a little hill to the 1st statue of St. Patrick–even with the sun shining it wasn’t an ideal sun-bathing or mountain climbing kind of day.
That morning Sharon drove us all the way out to Galway so that we could get on a tour bus that would take us to the Cliffs of Moher. We made a few stops along the way, including the Ailwee Caves and some other cliffs that weren’t swamped with tourists. We couldn’t have had better weather that afternoon, the sun was shining and the wind was calm. Jordan and I took a seat right on the edge and took it all in. The pictures I took can in no way do the views justice. We spent quite awhile walking around the edge just in awe of these magnificent Cliffs.
Jordan and the Cliffs of Moher.
Getting out of bed on Saturday morning was pretty painful because I wanted nothing more than to have that bed shipped right over to Rome, but our tour guide Deirdre had to keep us on schedule! We spent the morning visiting family and shortly after 1 we boarded the train to Dublin.
The 3 hour trainride to Dublin passed quickly and when we arrived we took one train to another that brought us out to Killbarack where our AirBnB was for the weekend. We ended up at a pub in Howth that evening, where we enjoyed another round of pub food and some Gaellic football.
We spent all of Sunday exploring as much of Dublin as we could in a day. Our first stop was a visit to the beautiful campus of Trinity College, followed by hot chocolate, and a tour of Dublin Castle. Our next stop was St. Patrick’s Cathedral, which is similar to the gothic style of Notre Dame. We spent the rest of our afternoon in museums. We enjoyed our last round of pub food–which we certainly had our fill of over break, but one last shepard’s pie didn’t hurt.
St. Patrick’s Cathedral.
Monday morning we flew out of Dublin at 6 AM, which brought our spring break to a bitter sweet end. This was by far my favorite trip of the semester, but travelling for 10 days straight kind of wears you out, so my bunk bed back at the JFRC wasn’t an unwelcome sight afterall.
The one thing we all want to avoid the most, but something that none of us can dodge completely, is getting sick in college. When you’re sleeping a few feet away from a roommate, sharing restrooms with an entire hallway, and living among three hundred other co-residents, germs are bound to spread like wildfire. Dr. James M. Steckelberg of the Mayo Clinic warns that “Flu viruses travel through the air in droplets when someone with the infection coughs, sneezes or talks. You can inhale the droplets directly, or you can pick up the germs from an object and then transfer them to your eyes, nose or mouth.”
Whether suffering from a cold, the flu, or food poisoning, being under the weather is definitely no fun. College students are generally more prone to getting sick when midterms or finals roll around, because we are sleeping less and are not watching what we eat. Here are 4 ways to avoid getting sick in the first place and 4 things to do when you find yourself red-nosed and hugging a box of tissue.
4 Ways to Avoid Getting Sick:
Wash your hands whenever possible and use hand sanitizer.
Get into the habit of washing your hands properly, and not just rinsing them, especially before meals. This is the Number One Rule for staying healthy. According to the Centers for Disease Control, human influenza viruses generally can survive on surfaces between 2 and 8 hours, so a classic soap-and-water routine remains the best method for getting rid of the germs we students frequently pick up by touching shared surfaces, including doors, sinks and elevator buttons. In addition to warding off contagions in public spaces, hand washing is a simple yet effective means of self-defense when someone who lives in close quarters to you gets sick.
Sleep whenever you can, as much as you can.
A weakened immune system has been scientifically linked with sleep deprivation, so students who stay up all night studying will render their bodies less capable of combating infectious disease. Even obsessive hand-washers can’t completely escape exposure. When an infected person coughs, sneezes or even talks, flu viruses travel through the air in droplets, which can be inhaled directly, so it’s never a bad idea to call it an early night, or at least squeeze in a 20-minute power nap, if you haven’t been getting enough rest lately.
Don’t share.
Sharing may be caring, but not when it comes to germs. Do not share eating utensils, food, or beverages with friends during flu season. Most of us know to avoid sharing food or drinks between friends when either one is sick or showing signs of coming down with something. It is easy to misjudge, however, when someone is on the verge of getting cold, or appears to have recovered. According to the CDC, flu symptoms may not develop for up to 4 days after a person becomes infected, and the flu is most likely to be passed to someone else from 1 day before symptoms start, up to 7 days after symptoms develop. Sharing risks passing the flu to someone you care about, before you even know you have it and after you think you’ve gotten over it.
Eat right and stay hydrated with H2O.
Cold and flu viruses last from three to 14 days (www.healthline.com). Potentially, that could translate into two weeks of misery, so it’s worth reiterating that nutritional food boosts the immune system and arms our bodies against those micro-predators that are lurking around campus, while, eating junk food weakens our internal gladiators in times when we most need them to fight against an invisible enemy. On average, we should be drinking 64 ounces of water a day, which is equivalent to eight cups, or almost three water bottles, of water. Though coffee, soda, or juice may taste better than plain water, they promote, rather than alleviate, dehydration.
4 Things to Do If You Get Sick:
Call the Wellness Center.
Although the Loyola Wellness Center does not take walk-ins, call them and talk to a nurse who will ask you to describe your symptoms and advise you accordingly on what to do. You don’t want to overlook something that may be more serious than it appears.
Be prepared.
Keep a first aid kit or a box full of the basics that you could need if you do get sick. Having to trek over to CVS with a fever does not make for a fun off-campus excursion. Preparing vitamin supplements and some over-the-counter medicine ahead of time makes everything a little more bearable when you’re feeling under the weather.
Sleep
Sleep as much as you can, all day long if necessary, so as to allow your immune system to function at optimal efficiency and replenish “good soldiers” as quickly as possible.
Email your professors to let them know you need, or expect, to miss class.
Try not to be the student who goes to class sick and spreads the germs to everyone, including the professor. Instead, email your professors as soon as possible and ask them to excuse your absence. This is especially helpful if you are missing an important class or have a project due, because the teacher might kindly give you a mini-extension on an assignment.
I wanted to take a few hundred words to tell you about an experience you should get involved in–Loyola Weekend. It is something I attended last year as a senior in high school (although juniors are welcome as well, I believe) and something that I enjoyed a lot. It’s a really good way to figure out if Loyola is the right school for you, which is a step in the right direction to figuring out where you’d like to go next year as the year comes to a close.
What Loyola Weekend is, is a two day event where you are encouraged to explore Loyola, see the campus, and talk to the current students. Find out what it’s all about, find out where you would fit in, or even find out what major and minor choice is right for you. (Although in my experience, you’ll mess around with your major and minor so much that you’ll just start to tell your family and friends that you’re undecided.) Come and meet current students and hear their stories, ask them your questions, and discover your new favorite things about Loyola, whether it be Madonna, Halas, or Mundelien’s many hidden treasures.
I am a little hazy on the details, but I do believe that you may also see the freshman dorms and go inside some of the buildings. There will be walk around tours and plenty of people to help you find your way, so come out and see Loyola!
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