To be honest, I have no idea who I’ll be smooching during the first second of 2010, and frankly I find the hype surrounding the whole thing kind of strange. And annoying. NYE is so awesome in so many ways; the kiss shouldn’t make or break your night! So, if you’re like me and you have no idea where your lips will be come 12:00 AM on January 1 (or if you know for a fact they’ll be firmly attached to a glass of bubbly), pump yourself up with the equally amazing or even better aspects of our final night of 2009.

I don’t know about you, but this year I’m in serious money-saving mode. As much as I’d love to go buy my biffies matching pairs of Alexander McQueen’s 10-inch Alien Heels, college girls don’t have tons of moolah to buy the most fabulous gifts out there.

I’m just going to throw this out there:

I haven’t had a boyfriend on Valentine’s Day since I was fifteen. It was chock-full of adolescent cliches– roses, pearl earrings, homemade cards…all those things that happen on TV and in movies happened to my tiny, naive, unappreciative sophomore self. I’ve had other boyfriends, but they always seem to ironically end or begin almost perfectly in order to stay out of sync with Valentine’s Day. Super.

You mean being showered with love …

I’m going to level with you, here—I go to Stanford. It’s not snowing out here. I get pretty cold at night and in the morning, but that’s because I’m from SoCal, which makes me a big baby in the weather department, I know that.

So although it’s relatively warm here during the winter, there are definitely some changes that occur with the change of the “seasons,” and, as with everything in life, they come with their pros and cons:

Pros:…

I’m going to be honest: I’m not dying for Thanksgiving break like the rest of my freshman companions. Everyone around me seems to miss home, miss their parents, and miss their beds so much that they can’t wait to get on a plane.

It seems like everyone’s FB status is something about “ONE MORE WEEK!”– even people who are totally thriving and happy college freshmen.

I, however, am completely happy at school. I love my life here and my friends …

The first time I ate in my college dining hall was the first time I realized that putting on that Freshman 15 wasn’t due to just drinking more alcohol. How on earth can I avoid the temptation of returning to the dessert bar…three times?

Never in my life had tons of food been readily available to me and all paid for. The moment I saw the glimmer of that giant soft serve machine was the moment I knew I was …

I’ve always considered myself to be pretty savvy about food and diet… but since there are SO many psychological layers to eating; food, body image, etc., it’s easy for us to abandon our rational brain and wholeheartedly believe things about our bodies that may not be true. Even the savviest of us all may be tempted to believe weight-loss fabrications, which is why I investigated some of the things people have told me (which I believed!) by speaking with a …