At the beach..

I am sitting in the hotel lobby with a bunch of work-a-holics sucking up the internet. I look like I'm doing important things but I'm definitely not.. BUT I can drink coffee with the best of 'em. I know that I am electronically dependent. I have everything that I need for survival. 1.) Laptop. 2.) Blistex. The original plan was just to check my email but then I read Julie’s blog and got caught up uploading this so that I can listen to it when I get deathly bored tonight. I think it is a Professor’s last lecture about following your childhood dreams and living your life optimistically and I know that I will love this so much and probably cry like a big ole’ baby just like she did. That will be the second time this week I have cried like that and I am embarrassed to admit that but sometimes life’s situations are owed that type of emotional release. I’m totally okay with that.

Sooo.. yesterday I fell in love with my iPhone. Deep, ultimate, desperate, unconditional, cannot live without you, fuck up my entire life, never leave me, forever and ever LOVE. This happened when I was sitting on the beach and I received an email and I was able to respond RIGHT THERE. And even take a picture and send it. Then I was informed of the quality. If my phone and I were a Disney movie that would have been the moment where it put the glass slipper on my little foot. It was beautiful. Then my brother threw sand at me and I hid the phone in the cushiony, safe part of my bag and left it with my mom to stand guard over. It’s that special.

I took these pictures with it..


This is me on the pier


And my brother and Kelsey.


And Kelsey eating sand because we don't feed her. Kidding.

Laaaaazy

Everyone keeps encouraging me to be a lazy bum now that summer school is out and I have stopped resisting and embraced the laziness. Thursday was a brutal exam day and that deserved celebration so Friday night I had a sushi feast at Mt. Fuji. Mt. Fuji is my favorite sushi restaurant and this is the first time I went when it wasn’t half price so I didn’t have to wait forever. I am getting really good with chop sticks, but I give up on the slippery pieces and just use my fingers. It was so beautiful I didn't want to eat it.. but that only lasted about 5 seconds.

Then Saturday was uneventful but Sunday completely made up for it. I have been working all week trying to get my hands on an iphone. It was necessary for me to obtain this phone before going to the beach with my family. I was starting to get very worried about the possibility of spending days with them without any form of auditory escape. I’m not a proud AT&T customer but since that’s the only way I could have the iphone, I’m sticking with them. My relationship with them is like an unhappy marriage with 3 kids in middle school. I complain about them a lot, but I’m not leaving. And the Customer Services Reps in the stores talked so much shit to me over the past couple of days. They told me I wouldn’t find the phone any where and that just made me crazier about getting one. So here is what I have to say to them..



We waited in line for only an hour and a half, and when we left the apple store there was about 100 people waiting outside. I was probably 10th in line so I'm glad we got there early.

Then Jamie and I went to the pool but it was cloudy and cold..



And we're still dorks and hold our noses when jumping in.

It's been a while..

Going to summer school is like drinking water from a fire hose. I hope I never ever ever have to do this EVER again. That’s why I haven’t updated in a while. That and there’s not much exciting going on.

So it’s July 5th which means that yesterday was July 4th, which made me remember the best July 4th ever on a sailboat in Coronado Bay. I was probably 16 and the fireworks over the bay were so pretty. Six years later July 4th was spent eating Chinese food and trying to watch Pulp Fiction (for my Film class) while listening to huge thunderstorms outside. So today a lot of people are without power, including my workplace, so they sent us home. Now I’m STILL trying to watch Pulp Fiction but I don’t like it.

So since there’s not much going on, here’s some random pictures I took this weekend..

On a walk through downtown Thursday night..















And at the pool yesterday with my neice..





And then I found this brave, lifeless mouse in the filter so I was ready to go..

Stooopid

Friday night Tabbatha and I tried to go see SATC. It’s been all the hype around here so we got tickets early and everything. I spent most of Friday afternoon being stupid excited about it. When we got to the theatre there was a looong line. So naturally, we assumed that’s where we needed to be. We stood there watching all the girls in the theatre and the outfits they were wearing. It was crazy! I would say at least 60% of the population was dressed in clubbin girl clothes. And at least 40% of them looked nasty. They looked so crazy that people were laughing out loud at them. I wish I had my camera. But the joke turned out to be on us because we were standing in line for the 10:45 show and our tickets were for 10:15. So we are going this evening. Hopefully.

The weather is quite nice these days so I am starting to take long walks/jogs. It is going to be so good for me. I need to exercise more and I know it will help me relieve this frustration that my relatives cause me. And I need to start drinking more water. But this morning I retreated to my special little corner in Panera and drank an unhealthy amount of coffee. But it was so good. And quiet!

Soo much fun

I used to think that hiring a Nanny was just ridiculous. I understood day time care, so that you could go to work and get your day time business done, but I just did not understand the need for a live-in Nanny. But now I get it. You totally need a Nanny just so you can do the laundry, or heat up a Lean Pocket, or pee.

This weekend my mom was supposed to be keeping my niece. That was all fine and dandy. Then Friday afternoon my grandmother was in a car accident (she’s okay, broken leg), so my mom had to spend the evening at the hospital with her. That left ME watching the baby all evening. (Sidenote: Earlier in the day I went to the grocery store to pick up some things for the weekend and I saw “Vienna sausages” on the list. I immediately called my mom and gave her a huge speech about how we can’t feed Kelsey this nasty, processed dog food, and how I don’t want to have to take everyone on the Maury Povich show when she’s just 4 years old and 125 lbs for an intervention.) So I picked her up and she started screaming to the top of her lungs in my car. I was thinking hard hard hard. “How do I stop this?” “If I were 14 months old what would I want?” “What the hell is wrong with this kid?” “Chicken nuggets!” So, I definitely put my foot in my mouth with the whole obesity speech and fed her McDonalds on the way home. Then she kept me up all night, until I called my mom at 3am crying (not really, but I might as well had been). So mom got home at 3:30 and I slept 3 hours before having to work all day at the dealership.

Saturday night my friend Jackie told us a story that almost made me die and I will probably share it with random people for the rest of my life. She stole some girl’s hamburger meat and gave it to a friend to take home to her grandmother to make Jackie a meatloaf. Apparently, the grandmother makes really great meatloaf. The fact that this meat was transported is just hilarious to me. So the Gma made the meatloaf, but the friend did not return the meatloaf to Jackie, instead she gave it to one of their guy friends to give to her. Well, Jackie couldn’t get in touch with the guy friend and she just knew “his hungry tale” ate the meatloaf and she wanted the meatloaf, in its entirety, returned to her ASAP. There were so many more fabulous details to this story. I spent the first 3 minutes of her telling it to me, thinking “Did she just say she stole someone’s meat?” I talked to her Sunday and she was eating the meatloaf. Phew. I’m glad, because I think she may have hurt the guy that had it.

Sooo busy

I'm so busy but life is good.. :-)

And, my laptop charger exploded white liquid everywhere. Now I have to buy a new one. AGAIN.

So I'm writing this from the library at school. The squirrels are more rabid than I remember. They are making weird chirping noises and darting out of strange places. I think I may have even heard one of them growl at me. Yesterday was the first day of summer classes and as I crossed across Franklin St. into campus, I passed Tyler Hansbrough. I guess if you have to go to summer school at least there are big basketball players to look at!

It's all good in the hood

I woke up at 7am this morning and I'm going to sleep before midnight tonight. Is this true? Could it be? Am I actually, for once, on a normal schedule? This is a miracle. I have somewhat maintained this quasi normal schedule for weeks now. I can't believe it! I used to sleep at weird hours during the day and stay up all night, but this new schedule is good for my health! It helps my skin and even allows me to get things accomplished. Like this morning when I spent 3 hours cleaning the entire house before going to work at 1pm. And I even found my camera cord so now I can transfer pictures to my laptop. So here are pictures from Duke Gardens last week..





Kelsey has since had a haircut. Her first!

Happy Birthday, Jamie!

In the words of Jessica Simpson... "Well, 23 is old! It's almost 25 which is almost mid-twenties."

I want to make it worth the fight

The other evening I saw a movie called The Bucket List at the lovely $1.50 theatre in Raleigh that always smells like Fritos. Even after the fire and renovation it still stinks, but it’s so cheap that one pretends to not notice the aroma. This movie was about two older men who found out they had cancer and only had 6 months to a year to live. They set off to enjoy the last few months of their lives by doing all the things on their “Bucket List,” a list of all the things they wanted to do before they died. So I was inspired to make my own:

1. Go skydiving
2. Internationally: visit London, Paris, Rome, Spain, Ghana, Pakistan, Australia, Japan, New Zealand, China, The Fiji Islands, Egypt, Dubai, Toronoto
3. Nationally: visit Las Vegas, NYC, Alaska, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Hawaii, Niagra Falls, Disney World
4. Go deep sea fishing
5. Buy a real designer purse
6. Tell someone the story of my life, all details included
7. Be a member of Oprah’s audience
8. Ride a camel
9. Go parasailing
10. Write a book (or short story) about my life
11. Go white water rafting
12. Inspire someone
13. Get into really great physical shape
14. Learn to scuba dive
15. Live in a different state, or possibly a different country
16. Be debt free
17. Graduate from college
18. Obtain a Master’s Degree
19. Go on a road trip with no destination
20. Volunteer in a developing country
21. Volunteer for something amazing here in the US
22. Get married on a beautiful beach
23. Learn to sew
24. Eat sushi in Japan
25. Adopt a child
26. Selflessly help someone in need
27. Love, truly.
28. Take a leap of faith
29. Be comfortable in my skin, and proud of who I am.

Weekend Fun

This Saturday evening rolled around and I was sitting in my bedroom staring at my closet thinking about arranging my shirts in order by color until the late night news when I could get my daily Texas polygamous wives interview update. I love that shit. And I was going to eat some disgusting 33 cent Ramen Noodles for dinner. I even had the water boiling when I said to myself, I said, “Self, this is inappropriate behavior for a Saturday evening!”

So what did I do? I contacted Jamie and we contacted Tabbatha and together we went to Sunset Grille. Well, Jamie and I actually arrived before Tabbatha and had a classic moment. One of those moments where you realize that some things never change. I realized that we were sitting there in the car staring at the bar/restaurant, thinking about going in, but waiting for Tabbatha to lead the way because we are both challenged when it comes to social situations… especially ones where a lot of people stare at you. But I’m trying so that’s great! Anyway, it was a simple evening, but a wonderful one nonetheless. At one point I laughed until I cried so I always think that’s noteworthy. The subject that caused this laughter is not so noteworthy.

And I especially love going to the restroom to find a drunken ghetto girl clad in leopard print tights (that I'm sure were meant to be worn under something, not as pants) and hot pink stilleto pumps proclaiming that she is about to pee in the sink.

Craaaazy

There is nothing exciting to report. I did get a haircut finally. Now it’s short. I didn’t expect for it to be so short. But it’s a good thing, I think. The ends were so unhealthy and discolored but now it’s short and brown and okay. I’m so used to having long, straight hair but I need to get with the times. I feel like now I would dedicate more time than ever before to actually styling my hair. I can’t get over how I want bangs but I know I’m not that cute with bangs. Bangs are so cute if done right! No bangs for me, though. I feel like shorter hair makes me need more makeup. Is that crazy? I don’t want to look boring and homely.

I love it when you go to the hair dresser and they tell you all about your hair. Like today. Did you know that I have very thick hair? The hair strands themselves are not thick, they are “fine,” but there are so many of them which make my hair thick. And since my hair is fine it becomes tangled very easily. And I need to start using a heat protector since I blow-dry my hair every day. But for the most part, it’s nice. Thank you, Sir.

I paid too much to have my hair cut at Salon Blu in Brier Creek. I needed to have it done today because of my crazy schedule. The guy who cut my hair used to work at The Body Shop and I loved that he described Satsuma as “it’s like one of those push-pops being shoved up your nose” and the old formula mango body butter as a “grease pit”.

Happy Birthday!

Yesterday was Kelsey's first birthday! She is a lover of sweet potato Gerber baby food, stealer of all of my kisses, palm tree pony tail wearer, laptop keyboard banger, babbler supreme, sharer of her chocolate cake, and the adorable baby niece of mine!