This College Town

Is anybody out there?

2011-03-02T18:44:00.004-06:00

So. You may have noticed that this poor blog has been over here collecting dust. It's not because I've stopped blogging, promise. It's because I haven't made an effort to post about real life. I started blogging about wedding planning instead, since that was what was going on in my world. I figured no one here would be interested in that, since the majority of the people who (used to) read were not also planning a wedding.

Anyway, when I realized this blog was still here, I knew that this was not really the kind of blog I wanted to be writing. I want to write about things that are interesting to a broader audience, and writing about my wedding and blog-sharing with other brides-to-be was a good way to get my feet wet. Now that wedding planning is sort of winding down (or amping up?), it was time to start considering a new "real life" blog. I'm not exactly sure what shape it will take, yet, but if you've followed me for any length of time, you know it'll be awesome. ;)

Anyway, I figured I'd share my other blogs here now. If you'd like to keep reading, update your Google Reader or blogroll or whatever you use to read blogs. I'll love you forever.

Peonies and Potted Plants (Wedding Planning)

Everyday Adventures (New Blog)

Holstee Manifesto

2010-11-09T22:00:00.001-06:00

I'm taking this to heart...

...and considering changing some things.

Oh, hello there.

2010-08-25T21:16:00.003-05:00

Hi ya'll. *Sheepish smile* I'm sorry I haven't been around a whole lot. I started this blog because I wanted to share my adventures and misadventures, but I haven't been doing a very good job. I haven't been doing a good job at having adventures either. So here are some things that are going on:

• This week our church is hosting an organization called Family Promise, where we provide dinner and hang out with some local homeless families that shuttle from church to church. Last time we did this it was a lot of fun, since one of the little girls' birthday was that night, so we had a little party with cake and ice cream for her.

• I've been going to the gym fairly consistently! Meg started a Facebook "support" group for the Couch to 5K running program, and so far I'm sticking with it! Woohoo, go me!

• Matt and I have started "Souper Salad Tuesdays." Yum.

• We went to Schlitterbahn last weekend. It was uhmazing. So glad we got to go! I don't think I'd been there since Pam, Anna and I went for our senior (in high school!) trip, where Anna kept pinching dudes' butts.

• We also went to see the Astros' AAA baseball team, the Round Rock Express play the Oklahoma Redhawks (Rangers' AAA team). The Express aren't very good, but the Redhawks are awesome, and it was a fun game.

• I started a blog specifically for wedding planning, since I didn't want to clutter this one up with all that stuff since that's not really what ya'll started reading my blog for. If you're interested in the new one, let me know and I'll send you the link. I'm hoping to apply to blog for Weddingbee in the next month or so! I will defo keep ya'll updated if/when that happens. :)

Ya'll, I don't feel like I do a whole lot these days, but somehow I wind up totally exhausted. I think hoarding my vacation time is probably bad for me, but if I want to take a couple weeks off next year then it's a necessary evil. I'm slightly overwhelmed a lot of the time, but I hide it well by either throwing myself into projects or shutting down completely. I never did learn about balance. :)

So now I'm heading home so I can play with my kitty-boo for a little bit, and then we're going to try this new experiment called HAHA YOU'RE LOCKED IN THE OTHER BEDROOM, where I lock her up at night in a room that is not mine. My parents have always done this with our cats, locking them in the laundry room at night so they know when it's bedtime and they go to sleep and everything is happy. Well, whenever I'm at work, she sleeps. And when I'm not at work, I'm likely sleeping. Elliott takes it upon herself to get attention. By biting me. A lot. While I'm sleeping. I get so frustrated with her for doing this, and I rarely get a good night's sleep because of it, and I think it will be better if I can teach her that night time is sleeping time. I anticipate her howling her head off for a few nights, but through two closed doors, I will gladly take that over nicked arms.

Tea and Me

2010-06-27T23:05:00.005-05:00

I'm reading this book called Three Cups of Tea. Julie, you would really like the premise of this book: "With the first cup of tea, you are a stranger. With the second ... a friend. With the third cup of tea, you are family."

It's about an American mountain climber who stumbled into this remote Pakistani village and learned that they had no school, and children would sit outside and attempt to learn on their own in the dirt. He decided he was going to build them a school, and within a few years, had schools built all over Pakistan. There are many discussions over tea - and it's how he knew he was safe or not safe with various tribes he met.

I'm reminded of my dream to change the world; I have no real plan to do so, just a desire to do SOMETHING, to save SOMEONE, do some good SOMEHOW. I've done absolutely nothing to change the world. I'd like to think that God has a use for me, and it's bigger than I can imagine. But what in the world can I do in a career field in which a former boss once told me that everyone in this industry is basically a whore? (To consumerism, not an actual whore.)

I still want to change the world.

----------

A few things I alluded to before but never got the chance to elaborate on...

Matt and I found a church we love, and joined. I'm glad this is something we get to do together.

We joined the church's summer softball team, Scared Hitless. We've lost every game so far, by A LOT of points, but it's a lot of fun. We've made some good friends. People bring their puppies (er, mainly big dogs, but they're alllllll puppiessssss!) and bring us water and Rice Krispies.

----------

Other Stuff:

I miss vegetables.

Knight and Day was pretty good and entertaining, but Tom Cruise has Crazy Eyes. Poor Katie Holmes.

A year in retrospect.

2010-06-06T15:06:00.005-05:00

I know I've been a bad little blogger, and I have several things I will post about in the very near future. But for now, I only have one thing I'd like to talk about.

I have a goal in life.

This is a big big deal to me, because life has been on the fritz, and I've been panicking and anxious a lot in the past few days. I've needed reminders that I can't do everything on my own, and that maybe I need to be taking advantage of extra opportunities that I've ignored in the past.

It's incredibly difficult for me to admit this, but ... I've been living in this college town, and I'm not very happy.

The last few years were full of high-reaching goals - pass this class or that class, get experience in my field, graduate college, graduate with a high GPA, move to be with Matt, get a job within my field of study - and I did well. Not meaning to brag. I thrived because I had stuff I wanted, and they were mine. And I did them on my own.

With the exception of my "be done with therapy" goal, I've yet to complete anything since I moved. All of the goals I've set for myself since then have not been manageable, most notably: pay off a good chunk of my student loans before I get married. You already know, I'm in a massive amount of debt from my out-of-state college. And I've always considered it to be MY debt, and I HATED the fact that getting married meant forcing MY "problem" onto someone else to deal with. Even if that someone else wanted to be burdened with it. Because he knows I CAN do it alone, but that I'm miserable trying.

So I've set a goal. It probably won't help much toward aforementioned debt, but it's something I can control and something I can do.

I'm going to start freelancing. I'm going to get five clients by the end of 2010.

This is not me begging for business. I know most of the people who read this have no use for a graphic designer. But I don't have a great way of getting the word out, so if you know anyone who needs any paper goods (brochures, ads, party invitations, wedding invitations, campus flyers, T-shirt designs, maps, ANYTHING), think of me. And if any of you do need anything, I'd be happy to do it for free just for the experience and samples.

Exhausted.

2010-05-13T20:56:00.004-05:00

Work this week has been all-consuming, and I don't think I'm doing a very good job of taking care of myself in the meantime.

The beginning of the week, we were having our sales meetings company-wide, which meant I didn't get much work done outside that. I have several projects to complete by the end of the month, and I'm feeling stressy, but not under enough pressure yet to do my best under-the-wire work.

With our Monday meeting starting in the late afternoon, we got to have a "happy hour" with some yummy wine, and a (free!) dinner afterward. After that, I just wanted to go home and chill, but I let some people guilt me into going out and ended up staying out way later than I wanted to. It was a good time, we chilled out at a bar and had a good time, but by the time I came back and went to sleep, it was later than I wanted or needed.

I woke up in the middle of the night last night not feeling well. Hmmm, I wonder why that is? MAYYYYYBE it's because ... I haven't been getting enough sleep, I haven't been eating healthy (fruit snacks, cereal bars and dessert does not = great energy and confidence), I don't feel like I'm keeping on top of the things I want to do both in work and especially outside of work. I haven't been going to the gym consistently, which isn't good for my stress levels or well-being.

Most of all, I hate to admit that one of my professors may have been right: life is like a never-ending Thursday. I hate that. I would say I'm pretty happy with life, but I wish I had a little more passion for the everyday.

In other news ...
• Elliott was diagnosed with kitty acne (!!), and I think she might be allergic to the shampoo they gave me, because her chin looks wayyyy worse now. I'm trying to give it time to let it heal before I try a new astringent the vet gave me, but she keeps scratching her chin bloody. My poor baby! My cat at my parents' house, Tugger, had acne before, and my mom said she just used CLEARASIL and it healed him up! Haha, if worse comes to worse, I'm totally trying that.
• My sister is coming to see me this weekend! We're going to try on bridesmaids dresses, and I'm taking her out for sushi, since no one else in my family will let her!
• I may have some good church news in the next few weeks ...

I'm RAGE-Y

2010-04-27T17:15:00.002-05:00

Before you go any further, READ THIS ARTICLE.

Oklahoma, I am ASHAMED of your government. I am HORRIFIED at the lengths you will go to constrain the beliefs of others.

I don't care whether you approve of abortion or not. It is unconstitutional, discriminatory, illegal and horrific to PERMIT doctors to lie to women about their pregnancies in order to force their beliefs on others. Not only permit, PROTECT them.

It doesn't matter whether the child has birth defects, or is perfectly healthy. Doctors have no right to try to control a woman's rights by giving her false information. Women deserve to be educated on any potential defects so they can be prepared to live with those defects if they choose to continue their pregnancy, and if they choose not to ... well, it's none of the doctors' damn business. The doctors aren't the ones who have to live with the life-changing consequences one way or another.

Another thing that makes me horribly angry is what other provisions this could allow in the future. If a doctor is allowed to lie about the baby's state in order to prevent it from being aborted, are they allowed to lie if the mother's life is in danger because of the baby? Why should a doctor get to decide whether my life is more or less important than my (hypothetical, totally not real, don't be freaking out, people) baby's?

Where is the AMA in all this? This provision surely goes against doctors' Hippocratic oaths. If a doctor is okay with lying to his or her patients, I sure as hell don't want to ever go to that doctor.

Social-ism

2010-04-06T19:29:00.004-05:00

That's about me being social, not actual socialism. :) No fights on this blog!
So what have I been up to the past week or so? Well ... I've been quite social! (Heh... okay so maybe I'm not as funny as I think.)

• Picked up my beautiful shoes! I was going to post a picture of them, but I haven't taken one yet. Soon, young weedhoppahs. (Psh, I don't know why I say that, my dad always did when we were kids.) I also picked up my veil from the shop, but no pictures of that will be posted. :)
• Two weekends ago, went home for a wedding for one of Matt's friends from high school, and got to spend some time with both our families.
• This past Wednesday we went to a bar called Tap, since they were doing a piano bar night. I was feeling kind of anxious, so we didn't stay that long, but we met up with some of Matt's friends and had Long Island Iced Tea, and the piano night was pretty cool. Piano Dude took requests on drink napkins, but wouldn't play the songs unless they were accompanied by an insult. He played a lot of famous TV themes (So no one told you life was gonna be this way...) and country songs, and it was pretty cool.
• Friday we went to the Revolution Bar in downtown to see a percussion group that Stephanie recommended to Matt (hi Steph!), but I don't remember the name of the group. They were really neat though, I enjoyed the music a lot. There was this funny hippie dude that must have been a roadie, and might have been high, because he danced freakily by himself for the whole night, and was wearing capris and moccasins ...
• Easter Sunday! I hadn't had plans for Easter, so I sent around a Facebook message asking if anyone in my book club wanted to do a potluck dinner, but no one responded. I got a call from one of them, though, who was making an entire Easter dinner for just her and her husband, so she invited us over. We went to church and then headed over there, and it was soooo nice and relaxing, having lunch/dinner with friends, playing cards, drinking beer. Wuuuuuuunderful!

Anyway, spent all day thinking it was Wednesday, so now I have more time than I thought to get stuff done, so I'm off to put a dent in my list!

... Are ya'll tired of hearing me talk about shoes?

Note to Self

2010-03-20T22:57:00.002-05:00

Must remember:
Spending a fortune on the wedding will not make the marriage any better. It won't make us happier in the long run, it won't provide a better future, and it won't make us love each other any more.
The only thing that matters about this day is that we walk away married. The food, the flowers, all that is just details in the big scheme of things. Your wedding is no more or less because of the details.

Today was a rough day in this department. But I am staying positive, trying not to let myself stress out, and bringing myself back to this.

In good news, we booked a venue yesterday! My mom was in town for the weekend, and we got quite a lot of stuff done! Also, I ordered some SHOES! I will put pics up when I get them in, because they look a little different online than they will when I get them.

I'm sorry if I talk too much about wedding stuff.

Also, today I saw The Bounty Hunter, and I thought it was cute and funny. I heart Jennifer Aniston.

Precious vacation time

2010-03-16T17:32:00.003-05:00

Had a great extended weekend! Matt and I had planned to go camping, but those plans were botched when everybody else had the same idea. Instead, we planned a mini Texas road trip for Sunday and Monday. But first ...

• My grandparents came into town on Saturday to take us out to a congratulatory lunch at Cafe Eccell, which is quickly becoming one of my new faves.
• Jackie came over Saturday night and we talked wedding goodies! I am so glad I know someone else who is wedding planning at the same time as me, because it makes me feel more sane knowing I'm not the only one worried about little details.

Then ~~bright and early~~ Sunday morning we were on our way! We planned to stop by Matt's parents' house in Austin, so we stopped at a national park along the way to go hiking and play frisbee. Then onward! Had a relaxing evening hanging out with his parents and playing Trivial Pursuit. Next morning, up early for real so we could make it to the Spoetzl Brewery in Shiner for some Bier! If you haven't been, it's a pretty fun tour, and the beer is really good. We also bought some pint glasses and Shiner coasters so we can drink classy at home! Along the way we checked out some historic landmarks and a few of the Painted Churches of Texas. Up to Brenham to go to the Blue Bell Creamery for some ice cream, but since it's spring break, everyone else had the same idea, and their tours were full for the day, so we bought some ice cream and sat outside to eat before heading back home.

Tonight I'm going to get sushi with some book club people ... I've never had anything but California rolls, so I'm a little scared, but hopefully it will be okay!

Noooooooooooo!

2010-03-12T17:25:00.003-06:00

Today I got an e-mail saying my pretties are not in stock, and they're sorry but they won't be able to send me my shoes!!!!! I would say this is the worst thing ever, but somehow in the last 24 hours I got my nose bashed by a washing machine and a bruised eye from a doorknob, so there you go.

Shoe Lust

2010-03-11T00:11:00.002-06:00

Tonight was the premiere of cycle 14 of America's Next Top Model, but SOMEONE didn't get to see it because the TV CHANNEL WAS PLAYING A STUPID BASKETBALL GAME INSTEAD. Matt told me it was the national championship for college ball. The Sooners were playing. I should have cared, but I was TOO FREAKING MAD about missing ANTM. I had a long day at work, and I just wanted to see Tyra get up to some seriously ridiculous shenanigans.

Instead, I looked at shoes online. Matt and I went to go get nachos at Freebirds. We watched a few episodes of The Big Bang Theory, which it turns out is a really cute show, and quite funny too. Oh, and I bought some shoes online when I found them for $50 cheaper than on zappos. Wanna see?! Of course you do.

Cute, eh?

I also found these ... and tried to justify buying them for about 30 seconds ... but let's just say they cost more than my wedding dress and veil combined.

Oh, D&G, you're such a tease.

Someday when I become incredibly rich ... oh who am I kidding, I don't think I'll ever be able to justify dropping that kind of money.

Overall a salvaged evening, I'd say! So whatcha think about the shoes?! :)

"You're totally bonkers. But don't worry. All the best people are."

2010-03-07T12:39:00.004-06:00

After an awesome day of bargain hunting at craft stores all day yesterday (SCORES GALORE!), Jackie invited me to go see Alice in Wonderland with her and her fiancé's roommate/cousin (I think?) last night. I got there a little late, so I ended up sitting by myself in the second row. I hadn't really planned on seeing it; I hadn't seen any previews and I'm not totally in love with the original Alice (it's kinda trippy). But I really liked it! Good graphics, good casting, and it was funny. I approve. Heart Helena Bonham Carter and Anne Hathaway, though I reaaaaaally thing they should have dyed her eyebrows blonde too. Even the 3D effects didn't bother me, except for when things were flying at the screen. Not a big fan of that usage of 3D.

WINNER!

2010-02-28T09:42:00.003-06:00

My future sister-in-law Steph nominated me for a "beautiful blogger" award! Yay! Thank you for thinking of me (and for reading!).

If you’ve been nominated, here are the rules:
1. Thank the person who nominated you and link to their blog.
2. Copy/Paste the award to your blog.
3. Tell us 7 interesting facts about yourself.
4. Nominate 7 bloggers you love and link to their blog.

Seven interesting things about myself:
1) I gave up meat for Lent, and am a little outraged by how few vegetarian items there are at any given restaurant.
2) I named my cat, Elliott, after a character on Scrubs. Scrubs is the only medical show I will watch, because it has nothing to do with actual medicine.
3) My grandma and I are both in book clubs, and we like to share books.
4) My to-do iPhone app is my lifesaver, because it means I spend less time writing lists and more time doing the things on it.
5) I miss cooking. Over the summer I cooked a lot, and I have a lot of things I want to try. Let me cook for you!!!
6) I have been living in College Station for almost a year. I didn't realize that until a couple weeks ago. HOW did time go so fast?!
7) I love coupons.

Here are my “beautiful blogger” nominees (and yes, I know some of them might be considered "cheating" since they won't repost ... but oh well!):
1) From Okie to L.A. Rookie chronicles the life and times of my wonderful friend Lola, who moved out to Los Angeles after college to pursue screenwriting. Oh, and bee-tee-dubs, she writes about the celebrities she sees a lot! :)
2) Sarah has been writing Plenty of Paper for ages, but she writes with such a witty style that I am very jealous of! :) She used to live in C-Stat too, so it's fun to try to make her guess what places I'm writing about!
3) I'm very proud of my friend Meg for writing Heald Family Fitness Camp, as fitness and health can be intensely personal topics, and it is brave of her to post everything she does!
4) Caitlyn writes My Ever-Wandering Heart, and I find her writing to be a huge blessing. She reminds me of all the great things God teaches us when we're not paying attention, and all the things we are blessed with that we don't thank Him for enough.
5) I don't remember when I stumbled upon Cheap Healthy Good, but let me tell you, this is my style of cooking! Not to mention all the great, sometimes unusual recipes, but the writing is fun and the once-a-week newslinks are always fun to read (there are some weeeeeird things on the interwebs, ya'll)!
6) By far one of my favorites EVER, Go Fug Yourself is the brainchild of two snarky celebrity fashion bloggers. Not only are they hilarious and dead-on, but they created a March activity for the ladies ... Fug Madness! (You'll hear more about this later, I'm sure.)
7) Of all the blogs I subscribed to while looking for inspiration, Weddingbee has been the most useful and fun by far. With tons of "Miss" and "Mrs." bloggers, it's wedding planning the way I like it: with great deals, lots of how-tos and honesty!

With the exception of my "cheat" blogs, everyone else has to...
1. Thank the person who nominated you and link to their blog.
2. Copy/Paste the award to your blog.
3. Tell us 7 interesting facts about yourself.
4. Nominate 7 bloggers you love and link to their blog.

Coming Back to Bite Me

2010-02-22T19:21:00.004-06:00

Remember last June when I took my car to be inspected, it failed, and I said "Screw that, I'll just deal with it if I ever get pulled over"?

Today I got pulled over; a cop finally noticed that my sticker should have been renewed eight months ago. Might I add that my car has undergone a little more trauma since last June ... the driver's window fell down and when I took it to get fixed, they charged me $120 and put the glass on the wrong side of the weather stripping, so it doesn't go up and down the way it's supposed to. ANYWAY. The cop starts walking toward my car, and I have to roll down the driver's side back window to ask him if I can open my door since my window doesn't work. He asked why I didn't get it inspected, and I told him the truth - that it would have cost more than I was willing to spend on my car! And he wrote me a big fat ticket. Boo.

It would be sad if it weren't so funny.

Mini-Series

2010-02-21T10:03:00.003-06:00

(1)
Seems like my sister is always in town when I have exciting stories, right? That's because when I'm by myself, I do things like research, or go grocery shopping on a Saturday night.
R is in town because today there is a big bridal fair, that we will be going to in a little while with my also-recently-engaged friend Jackie. We intend to win lots of free stuff and try lots of free cake, and generally just die at the ridiculous price tags of everything we see.
Anyway, whenever R is in town, she wants to go do stuff, which is good because it keeps me from being a total bore. I already had some stuff planned, so I hauled her along, but I don't think she had a very good time going to book club with me (despite the free cake and Diet Coke). She wanted to go to a martini bar in the bar district, Northgate (the C-Stat version of Campus Corner). Wanting to beat the bar traffic, we went around 9. Turns out, it didn't open 'til 10, so we went over to Jackie's to hang out for an hour, then went back. And it was dead.
Since we had free rein of the bartender, since no one else was around, I ordered a dirty martini, since I'd always wanted to try one. Note to everyone: don't order dirty martinis. Even if you love olives. I do. It was gross. Martini #2! Cherry! Much better! By then, more people had shown up, and started dancing, and people started making out with each other, and R said she was going to fall asleep, so we left and planned to come back next time at a later time (and to take a nap so we can stay up later ... 'cause we're old and lame).

(2)
Matt and I went back to my parents' house for the weekend to do taxes and get our engagement pics taken by my lovely and wonderful former roomie!! (Is there a better way to say former roomie? It doesn't really flow well, and ex-roomie sounds mean.) I can't wait to see how the pictures turned out. We hit up a bunch of places around our hometown: the lake, our high school, a park by the high school, Town Square. It was so much fun! Plus, it was the weekend right after Slake had gotten over a foot of snow, so everything was snowy and icy and beautiful. Take that, everyone else in Texas!!!
After that, I ditched Matt at home (sorry, honey! ^__^) and took my mom, aunt, sister and Julie to go dress shopping. And found the dress. And ordered it. And bought a veil, which I hadn't originally intended, because I'm not really a veil-type of person. But Julie convinced me, and she was right: the dress looks more complete with it. And it's beyoooooooteeeefullllll!!!

(3)
I found out the Harlem Globetrotters were coming to College Station at the beginning of February. Matt and I started watching The Amazing Race last season after Matt found out two of the Globetrotters were competing. He was really excited about it, so I got tickets to go see them. Now, I didn't know that the Globetrotters weren't an NBA team. And I didn't know that there is very little basketball actually played during Globetrotter games. But that didn't really matter (in fact, it was probably more interesting for me since it wasn't real basketball!). It was so much fun! It was corny and funny, and Matt loved it, and there were a lot of really neat basketball tricks.

(4)
I invited some people from my book club over for a Super Bowl party - the first time I've had a bunch of my own friends come over for a party. I am sociable again! There were cupcakes with Super Bowl rings on them! And pizzaaaaaa. After the game, a couple of the girls stuck around to watch Keeping Up With the Kardashians reruns, and just hung out. Yay! I miss hanging out.

(5)
Matt has been meeting with a Realtor, and we have been looking at townhouses. Well, we found one that we love, put in an offer, and it was accepted! Pending inspections, loan attaining, etc., we gots ourselves a house! It's cute. :)

(6)
The other day, I got really mad about the lack of recycling facilities in College Station, and the fact that the recycling facility in the city next door doesn't allow most of the stuff I want to recycle. I mentioned to a co-worker in a rage that I miss Oklahoma. Then he made fun of me for missing Oklahoma, saying "No one in the history of the world has EVER missed Oklahoma!"
Maybe he's right, but I do miss Oklahoma.

BLING! and some other goings-on

2010-01-26T20:51:00.009-06:00

Sorry for my lack of posting the last couple weeks. I've been a little ... okay extremely distracted. Distracted to the point where I pretty much get nothing done, ever.

Why am I so distracted? Well, I'm glad you asked!

I'm engaged!!! Matt proposed a few weeks ago!

So instead of my usual rational thinking, every thought in my brain has been replaced with WEDDINGS! weddings! WEDDINGS! weddings! I've become a woman possessed.

Now, I never dreamed about my wedding as a kid. I only went to one wedding in my entire childhood. I went to several in college, and despite knowing that my own would come someday, I never gave it much thought, at least not in terms of what I wanted. (Plus, I don't like planning things I can't make happen right away. I like to get things DONE.)

Now I'm getting to think about all that stuff, and I'm PSYCHED! I have no idea what I want for my wedding, but thinking about it is fun. :)

ANYWAY, in non-marriage related news ...

My sister came into town this past weekend to celebrate her 21st! We went to dinner at Cheddars, and they didn't have enough seating for all our party, so they asked if they could seat us at booths opposite each other, which my sister said was cool. So it ended up being me 'n Matt at one booth ... and everyone else at the other. We had been demoted to chaperons. Awww. But the chicken fried steak was deeeelish. I always forget how much I love that place until I go again. We also went to a bar called Harry's that I'd never been to, since R decided she wanted to go dancing. Welllll ... it was different kinds of dancing than she had expected, and Matt and I were the only ones there of all her friends who knew how to two-step. But the live band was pretty good, we had a good time, and I tried to teach her how to country dance sixth-grade style.

Anyway, I'm off the computer. I've had a headache all day, probably not helped by me staring at a screen all day. Peace out yo!

Some steps in the right direction

2010-01-03T23:44:00.004-06:00

I don't believe in New Year's Resolutions. By calling your goals resolutions, you're practically dooming them to fail. We always talked in marketing classes about needs. You don't NEED a new Mercedes - you don't even need a car - you need a way to get from A to B. You don't need a steak dinner - you need something to satisfy your hunger.

Here are my needs:
• Friends
• A way to de-stress
• Something to do

Here are ways I am/will be meeting my needs:
• Today I signed up to be a member of the gym that's across the street from my apartment. As I don't work out much, being a member of a gym doesn't serve much purposed except ... they offer classes. I am much more likely to go if I have a class I am going to every week. (Plus, they have a hip hop class, which was a big draw.) They offer pilates, which will help me relax. It will give me something to do. It will give me a new outlet for meeting people. BAM - three in one. I have a meeting with a personal trainer this week to figure out what I need to be doing as far as working out on my own, plus to figure out how machines work because I avoided using them for most of college just because I didn't know how to use them properly/to my advantage, plus I didn't want to look stupid for not being strong enough to use the machines at their lowest weight. Sorry for the run-on sentence, but it's late so I'm not going back to fix it.

Other goings-on:
• Had a wonderful Christmas break. Took some time off work, and got to spend a lot of time with my family, a few days with Matt's family, some fun road tripping and finished an audiobook. Very relaxing and lazy, but now I'm ready to get back into a routine.
• Got an iPhone for Christmas, which I am now addicted to. It does EVERYTHING, including auto-correct spelling and punctuation! That was one thing that always bothered me about my old phone, the difficulty in punctuating things properly. LOVE.
• I love the show "How I Met Your Mother," as you may know. My mom and I went shopping one day when I was home, and I am THRILLED to announce that I am now the owner of a dress that Lily wore one episode. This brings my total of Lily-clothes to two. I just spent like 20 minutes looking for a picture of it, but can't find one. Sad.
• It's way past my bed time, so peace out yo.

Party trifecta!

2009-12-19T08:07:00.007-06:00

I've been thinking in movie/TV quotes more than usual this week. If you can guess what TV show that's from, I'll buy you a cookie.

It's barely 8 a.m. on a Saturday - my only day to sleep in! - and I'm awake because SOME DUMB CAT (ELLIOTT) won't stop jumping on things and making noises. Ugh.

I feel really crummy this morning, most likely due to the massive amount of sugar I consumed yesterday. We had our office Christmas party, and we had catered in delishhhhh food, and there was candy scattered all over all the tables and ... well I need to learn a little self-control. After work I got all dressed up for Matt's friend's rehearsal dinner, and they were trying to pawn off all their dessert food afterwards, and somehow I ended up with an entire pie. I was like, great, what am I going to do with this? I can't let myself eat a whole pie! I tried to give it away to one of my neighbors, who was outside smoking when I got home, and he took half of it, but was all, "I can't take your whole pie from you!" and I'm like, "PLEASE, I don't need to keep a pie in my house." I don't keep sugary stuff at home, because if it's there I'll eat it. I do enough of that at work every day. Plus this guy has kids, kids love pie. Well, at least now I only have half a pie to worry about, and someone suggested freezing it, so maybe I'll do that.

The rehearsal dinner was in this really cute art gallery that was full of Aggie-related pictures. There were a lot of pictures of the various Reveilles and a lot of football pictures - even pictures of Aggies playing football with Longhorns - so I asked Matt where were the pictures of the Aggies playing the Sooners, and he said that since OU wasn't in their fight song, we weren't special. I beg to differ, sir, I beg to differ. There was also a train caboose outside, and it was just a cute place overall.

I hope my stories are at least somewhat interesting, ya'll. I try to take mundane things and make them sound cooler than they actually are (without exaggerating) because really I'm not that exciting in my day-to-day life. So I hope my pointless Allie stories are amusing, if nothing else. Have any suggestions about things for me to write about? I will totally do it. :)

Last weekend was the biannual Percussion Studio show, which was awesome. The theme was YouTube videos, and there were a lot of creative things done for it. Then, mid-week after all the college kiddies were done with finals, Percussion Studio did their annual boxer gift exchange (everyone brings boxers and Yankee Swap ensues). Ended up with some South Park boxers that are really soft, so now I have some new PJ pants? Somehow, awesomely, I have become an honorary PS member, along with another friend, Jackie, whose boyfriend is also in Studio. We end up at all their events and we're just awesome that way. ANYWAY. That party was followed by another party for being done with finals, and I went for an hour or two, but since it was a Wednesday night and I am an old woman who has to work, I left like, five hours (!!) before everyone else.

Today is the wedding (Matt's a groomsman, hopefully I can remember how to get to the church...), tomorrow my book club is doing a White Elephant gift swap and hors d'ouevres. Things are crazy! Hope your weekend is awesome too.

It's beginning to look a lot like ... COLD!

2009-12-06T17:15:00.006-06:00

After weeks and weeks of warm when everywhere else has been frigid, it finally got cold here in C-Stat. It's MISERABLE! It didn't just get cold, it got cold and rainy. Yuck.
So I'm not going to lie, the reason I haven't posted anything lately is because I've fallen into a bit of a slump. I go to work, I come home, and I either park on the couch and watch whatever's on TV or I putz around the house and/or cook something while watching whatever's on TV. I wouldn't say I am particularly happy with this arrangement - but the past few weeks have been busy enough to keep me from being too miserable about it. But now that I have nowhere to be until Christmas ... I am lonely sitting around doing nothing all the time.

I'll do a quick rundown for anyone who's interested. What have I been up to lately?
• A few weeks ago, Matt and I took a road trip up to Oklahoma. Alyson and Nash and Lola were all coming into town too, so we got together and went out for drinks, and a watch party at Meg's for the OU/A&M football game, and another party with some other friends that are still in town. It was so much fun, and I miss them all so much!
• The week after that, I went on my first business trip! LAS VEGAS! I'd never been before, and I was only there for about three days, but it was FABULOUS! I wish I'd had more time to explore, but we had to work all day in our trade show booth. I need to plan another trip to go back, because I didn't get to see very many of the hotels! (I was staying in Circus Circus, and we only got to see Wynn, Bellagio, Caesar's Palace and Paris. Wynn was ridiculous - there was a Ferrari dealer inside the hotel!) Needless to say, very glad I had the opportunity to go.
• The NEXT week (see where this is going?) was Thanksgiving, and Matt and I headed to visit my grandparents, where we were having Thanksgiving with my family, and his parents were coming up to meet my family. After Thanksgiving "dinner," we headed down to Austin to see his family and also go to his cousin's wedding.

After all that ... this was all I wanted to do. (And I just took this cute pic of my kitty.)

Anyway, back to the main point - I'm finally back home for a while. Hooray! My sister came in to see me this weekend. (She is lonely too, now that she is living back at home and is in a long-distance relationship.) It gave me an excuse to find things to do, and I compiled a list of things to do now so that I don't sit around my house all the time. We went Christmas shopping (and regular shopping!) and had a good time. We went to go see the wind tunnel that Matt's been working on for the past, oh forever, which was pretty sweet (and now I know what Matt does for a living!). Hehe. Aaaaand now my house is a disaster, with dishes piled everywhere and trashes overflowing, and is generally gross, and it is NOT cool. But I am looking forward to this week now.

Meow?

2009-11-07T07:40:00.004-06:00

I've been here for five months now, and somehow I've managed to go all that time without having a cat. I've ALWAYS had cats! But after Mr. Darcy had to be put down (he lived with Julie and me in Oklahoma, had feline leukemia and wasn't in the best condition), I don't think I was ready to get another cat. But for some reason I haven't been the happiest the last month or so, and Matt and I decided it was a good time to get a cat, since it would be company for me and, well, kittehs make me happy. :)

Meet Elliott:

Some girls a few streets over found her outside their front door, and they were looking for a home for her. When we tried to get her in the car to take her home, she decided to make a run for it and ran zig-zags across the parking lot to try to avoid going anywhere, but was ultimately trapped when one of the girls put out a container of fish that she just couldn't resist. We captured her, put her in a box and got her into the car before she could do anything, but once in the car she managed to escape again. I managed to get her back in the box to get her into my apartment, but if we ever take her anywhere again, I will have to get her a proper carrying unit.

We spent two days trying to come up with suitable names, Matt's getting ridiculous and mine getting literary, until we decided on something we both liked: Scrubs, the TV show. And Elliott's name.

I think she's happy here, so far. I am happy she's here.

Another funny story: I was on the webcam talking to my family. We all have Macs, so we can use iChat to have four-way conferences, so all four of us were on the camera, and my mom had her cat, Tugger, my sister had "Audrey-boo" (her cat), and I had as-yet-un-named Elliott. My dad sat there and thought, and said, "Maybe I should get a cat. Or a boa constrictor."

He's not much of a cat person. He still says the only reason we got Tugger was because he'd had too many chocolate chip cookies and wasn't feeling right-minded. In 1996.

I did not chop down that cherry tree.

2009-10-24T21:10:00.002-05:00

Not going to lie ... it's a little lonely here. I really miss having friends around.

I've always refused to be "That Girl." I do not need a man to make me happy - I can be happy on my own, and I choose to have that man around because I want him, not because I need him. I love getting to see him whenever I want to. But it is driving me CRAZY that he is the only person I ever hang out with. I am unintentionally That Girl. I need some girlfriends here. In a major way.

I'm going to die alone.

Blogging has been on my to-do list for a couple days, so I guess I should get on that.

2009-10-21T18:27:00.007-05:00

After all, I know you all find my words RIVETING. But YOU know how much I like crossing things off lists, so let's get to it.

Last week, I tried a lot of local food. I won't get into it, because food is not that interesting if you don't know what I'm talking about. (Sarah: Pho John's and Los Cucos. Both MMMMMMM.) Let's just say that local Mexican gives El Fenix a run for its money, and NOBODY puts El Fenix in a corner.

I need to do dishes in a bad way. Also, I know my newspaper amigos will be sad, but I changed my newspaper subscription today so that I will only get it on Sundays (for the coupons!) instead of every day. I don't have time to read it every day, so it piles up and looks like this ... and I'm tired of my living room looking like this. Note the cute new shoes, which I bought while my sister was in town.

WHICH LEADS TO MY NEXT TOPIC ... this past weekend, my sister came into town. I love my sister, and I'm glad we don't live in the same house anymore, because we get along fantastically now that we don't. We got to catch up (on both life and the fourth season of How I Met Your Mother, since she hadn't seen any of it yet). Saturday, Matt took us to an airshow in Bryan that he'd heard about, so we went out to this Air Force runway thing where they had all this little two- and four-person airplanes set up, and they had pilots doing formations in the sky. It was pretty cool, and Matt was pretty much in heaven. Afterwards, we went to get barbecue at C&J's, and the OU/texas game was on, at the point where OU was actually winning. I was wearing my OU shirt, and Rachel was wearing my OU sweatshirt, and there were a bunch of guys there who were doing a little smack talk, and I was slightly confused, because I thought all Aggies hated Texas all the time. Apparently when it's Texas vs. other states though, Texas wins? I am still getting the hang of this. It's weird here.

After a nap and Freebirds nachos (Rachel always insists on going to Freebirds every single time she comes to town), we went to play minigolf and arcade games, and we attempted to play Dance Dance Revolution like we'd never stopped five years ago. Two songs in and we were failing and out of breath, but it was way fun.

On Sunday she went to hang out with one of her friends from middle school who is in college here, so I went shopping for a couple of things. When all of my friends graduated college the semester before me, they gave me a ton of shelving, minor furniture and cleaning supplies, all of which I have put to good use, because I'm into free stuff. Well, I acquired this little metal rack that I had been using as a pantry, until I came home with groceries last week and realized I couldn't fit everything on it anymore. So I bought these awesome shelves, and now I have tons of space to store my foodstuffs. (Sorry about the picture being sideways, it uploaded wrong and I'm too lazy to fix it.) I also complain daily about how cold my office is at work, so I went to buy a space heater to keep under my desk. I unpacked it and put it with my stuff to take to work, and ... it's defective. I'm taking it back tomorrow. Fail.

That's all I have, and I'm sure ya'll were all bored out of your minds about six paragraphs ago, so I'll go. *Checks off to-do list*

It's hilarious that A&M's main goal is hating Texas, even when they're not playing Texas.

2009-10-10T09:34:00.005-05:00

Sophomore year of college, I was in a long-distance relationship with a crazy Aggie who went to every football game and every Midnight Yell. When the OU/A&M game rolled around, I planned to go to Kyle Field to see the game with him, and we went to my first Midnight Yell. I had no idea what was going on, knew none of the yells, and I'm pretty sure I thought said boyfriend was insane.

Last night we went to my second Midnight Yell, the first since I've moved here. Matt hadn't been to one in awhile, since it's less convenient now that he doesn't live on campus. We thought we weren't going to be able to get good parking, since we left later than we wanted to (we were watching Dracula, the one where Keanu Reeves pretends he can act. Weird movie). But we got to park right next to the field, luckily, because it was cold outside. (Cold for Texas, that is.) We sat next to a guy who was wearing A&M pajamas and who asked why I didn't know any of the yells even though I was wearing an A&M sweatshirt (not mine ... not giving in yet). "We" sang about hating Texas. We swayed back and forth in a metaphorical "sawing 'em off" (I had just assumed that they liked swaying dramatically while singing, but now I figured out they were supposed to be a giant human saw). "We" yelled "Whoop" a lot. We listened to Yell Leaders make fun of Mike Gundy (okay, I'll whoop for that!). Matt forgot one of the yells, so I teased him and said that even I knew it (no I didn't), and then it just turned out to be them saying "Rah!" a whole bunch of times, so I probably could've figured that one out had I remembered any of the hand gestures. I can get behind them wanting to beat the hell out of OK State, because as a Sooner fan I'm supposed to hate them too.

And then when it was all over, the lights went out and I got my kiss. :)

A Rant

2009-10-06T19:48:00.004-05:00

One thing that I dislike about working in an office is that there isn't much opportunity to get up and move around, so I find myself sitting all day, then I come home and I sit some more, and right now my legs are practically withering away from disuse.

I've been a chronic worrier all my life. I've been given worry dolls, I've prayed, I've talked to therapists ... and while all have helped to an extent, today I got so irritated at myself. I realized that my constant anxiety is WORTHLESS. It is a COLOSSAL waste of my time. And I know this realization probably won't make anything change, but I don't WANT to worry anymore. It doesn't give me the control that I think it does. So why do I do it? This is a hypothetical question ... but I know in some circumstances, I've been worrying about the same things for so long that I just don't know how to NOT worry.

OK, I'm done being frustrated. Other goings-on ...
• My aunt came to C.S. for work last week, and she stayed with me for a couple days. I don't know a whole lot of things to do here, so I guess it's good that she stays busy working. Anyway, she got assigned to come down here again, so I'll get to see her this week too, and then my sister got jealous (even though she lives 15 minutes from my aunt), and decided that she wanted to come visit (on a completely different week...) and that makes no sense to me, but I am always happy to see family. :)
• We are working on creating a Sunday tradition. There is this local BBQ place, C & J's, that is very close to Matt's apartment, but he had never been there before I moved here. Since then, we've gone a few times after church, and now Matt always wants to go get barbecue. I told Rachel about it, because she likes barbecue too, and now when she comes to visit I have to take her, plus Freebirds, because she always demands that we go to Freebirds.
• After several weeks of attending a particular church here, I think we've decided that it isn't for us, and we will continue looking.
• I was supposed to meet some people from book club at a Chinese restaurant tonight, but after about 15 minutes no one had shown up, so I just left. I was a little hesitant about the restaurant once I got there anyway; it smelled delicious, but was kind of dingy, and there was a sad fish tank with half the tank's dirty water evaporated. Does not inspire confidence.

That's all I can think of for now, and I want to get some ice cream, so peace out homies.

Sandwiches! Sandwiches!

2009-10-01T19:14:00.004-05:00

Matt and I went to a new sandwich shop, Sub Culture. I think it's a super awesome name for a sandwich shop. However, on the way back home Matt mispronounced it "Cub Soldier" so now that's what I'm calling it. :) I'm such a nice person.

This week has gone by really fast. I've been staying pretty busy at work, but I like being busy. I've gotten to do a bunch of sweet designs for drive-through windows for some potential clients.

Book club has been growing pretty rapidly, so they decided to start doing "dinner club" as well, so now smaller groups go out for food once a week. This week we went to Wings N More, and it was uh-MAZING.

I'm working on finishing a book I've been reading the entire summer. I'm supposed to start the next book for book club, but I am frustrated that I'm not finished with this other one I've been working on for so long.

My aunt is coming over now, so I'll post more later.

No disclaimer on this one. If you don't like it, that's too bad.

2009-09-27T18:29:00.004-05:00

Every once in awhile, I get really inspired. Mainly because I'll hear a story about someone doing some kind of awesome outreach, or really affecting change for God in an amazing way. I begin to wonder, why don't I do things that have a profound impact on people? I've always hidden behind a guise of wanting everyone to like me, and that people don't like talking religion because no two people can ever agree, and not wanting to shove things down people's throats that they don't want to hear ... but what about the people who DO want to hear? What have I ever done for them? What opportunities have I missed because I didn't want to offend anyone?
Cru always used to do a big campus outreach once a semester. I usually skipped that day, a) because I didn't always agree with the way they were doing it, and b) because I don't know how to talk to perfect strangers about God. I've been through the training and know the right things to say, of course, but sometimes what people need isn't all of the "right" answers. Knowing God doesn't magically solve everything that's wrong in your life, and I don't want to pretend that it does. And maybe that's why I've had such problems trying to teach others when I feel like my life is such a bad example.
I'm not going to lie, I am not a role model for a good Christian life. I can count on ... probably two fingers ... the number of times I've cracked my Bible since I moved here almost four months ago (excluding going to church). I am happy with the choices I've made, but I definitely don't feel like a lot of them are God-driven. I am a little surprised that God has allowed me the opportunities He has when I've been so unfaithful. I've been too self-reliant. I have been too impatient for results to relax and let God be in control.

I'm looking for a church. I think I found one I like, but it's not just a matter of me liking it. I'm discovering that what I need is a place to go where it doesn't matter who else is there, or what anyone else is doing, and I forget for a moment that anything else exists. It's just me and God here now. I felt good today.

It's very frustrating to be a good communicator and still feel like I'm not communicating well enough.

Here's a bigger thought: Is it really loving everyone if I say nothing about a greater love that changes people?

My Family Portrait (or "A picture's worth 1000 words ... but will 1000 words paint you a good enough picture?")

2009-09-21T22:58:00.006-05:00

I went home to visit my family this weekend, and it was very much needed. I hadn't been home since probably June, and they've only come to visit me once since then. My sister and I went to lunch and went shopping, because she loves spending money and I love learning how to be fashionable and then refusing the advice because it's too expensive to be fabulous. I did take a little bit of what she told me, though, and walked away with a cute purse and a few rings. I also got to cook fajitas with my dad and hang out with my mom and aunt.

My sister recently moved back home, and with her came her annoying kitten, Audrey. Now, my parents have had our cat, Tugger, for 13 years, and he is very set in his ways. He likes to lay around on my dad's chair, "make muffins" on my mom's lap, and growl at everyone. Audrey likes chasing Tugger's tail, rolling on her back in front of him, and hissing at everyone that isn't my sister. Tugger hates Audrey, but Audrey LOVES Tugger. I spent the whole weekend trying to make Tugger feel loved, because now that there's a New Cat on the Block, everyone seems to have forgotten about him, and he very much resents that, even though he doesn't like anyone as a general rule.

I bought The Office season 5 last week, watched it all in a matter of days, and then left it with my sister, and now I want it back. I am also wondering why How I Met Your Mother is not out on DVD yet, but I have plenty of other things to watch in the meantime. TV this season is pretty much legendary so far.

I guess it's time for me to go to bed now, so I can function at work tomorrow.

A Post Before Sleeping

2009-09-15T22:08:00.003-05:00

I think THIS commercial is so clever.

As I've posted before, I am in the process of learning how to cook. I haven't quite gotten the hang out what things actually go together, so I blindly follow recipes in the hope that whoever wrote them knows better than I do. This is sometimes, but not always, true. As most of my cooking is highly experimental, I am very lucky to have a boyfriend who is always willing to partake in free (for him) food, no matter what the results. I am always a little bummed when things don't work out and I waste time and money, but mainly I just like that recipes require me to buy and try stuff that I otherwise wouldn't.

I finished up my scrapbooking and am now looking for another project. I was all excited when Matt actually asked to look at the finished results. No one is ever interested in my scrapbooks! It makes me very happy to share ... because otherwise what would be the point of documenting everything?

"Apple Orchard Banana Cat Dance 8-6-6-3!"

2009-09-12T12:21:00.003-05:00

Finally, I have a project. For the past week or so, I've had all my paper, stickers and ribbons spools spread across my living room rug in an attempt to get caught up on the 11 months of scrapbooking I've neglected. I'm having so much fun. :) I know no one else cares about this project, but I am looking forward to the day when my future children are in high school and I can make them look

Not much has been going on here. I'm sorry I don't have anything new to report about living here. I learned some new streets the other day. That's not interesting.

I'll have something interesting to post next time.

The land of the free and the home of the SOONERS

2009-09-05T10:43:00.002-05:00

I've never been much of a football fan, but I have been full of pride the past few days for my Sooners. It could be simply because I'm not surrounded by it anymore, and I miss the excitement behind it. It could be because I miss Oklahoma and want to feel close to something familiar. Or it could just be that I don't want to be an Aggie fan so I have to place my allegiance elsewhere or get automatically lumped in with everyone else in this town.

I don't have anything against the Aggies either, except that I am not one. So tonight, I will probably be doing laundry at my boyfriend's house, because he has a washer and dryer and I do not, and I will make him put the OU/BYU game on, because even if I don't watch it the whole time, I want to keep up.

I've managed to carve out a little bit of a social life here. As I've posted before, I joined a book club, and over the course of the past few weeks, we've slowly started hanging out more in between meetings, for game nights and the like. I really enjoy hanging out with these people.

I should sort my laundry and try to get a few things checked off my to-do list. It is ever-expanding and I never seem to do anything done.

This killin' time is killin' me.

2009-08-31T07:20:00.002-05:00

I've always been a pretty driven individual. Never one to sit still for long, I like to be busy and be working toward something. I spent a lot of time in high school and college planning for the future. But, now that the future is here, I'm having a bit of a hard time dealing with it.

I've completed all my big goals. I don't have anything to work towards right now, so I am having a difficult time deriving pleasure from the everyday stuff because I don't have a reason to do anything.

For all of you who are not in college anymore (or who are but have dreams beyond college), what are your goals?

Blaine enjoys oil changes, highway driving and long walks on the beach.

2009-08-18T12:58:00.005-05:00

Some of you may remember that when I was a wee college freshman, I accidentally rear-ended a truck with its tailgate down while I was going like, five miles per hour. The wreck caused some hood trauma and a cracked headlight casing, but Blaine was released from the mechanic's in stable condition. After finding out how much it would cost to get the hood and headlight back to their previous conditions, I decided to screw that, because I had/have no money. Four years later, he remains in his poor, dented-in state. Now he is almost 10 years old, with almost 125k miles, and replacing anything seems pointless if it doesn't directly cause problems with the car. The headlight still works fine with the cracked casing.

Last June, I was in College Station visiting Matt and I needed to get my car inspected, since I still was registered in Texas. They passed me with no problem, but not before they screwed something up: a something that cost me $150 to fix. They didn't fix it properly, because now Blaine squeaks when it's cold or rainy. I decided NOT to go back there to get this year's inspection, because I don't want them to screw my car up again. So I went somewhere else.

This Somewhere Else had a pierced lip and the gall to tell me he wouldn't pass my car until I replace the cracked casing! I am not standing for it! I still have no money, and there's no need to replace the casing when the light itself works fine. My father is a big proponent of not getting inspections done until you get pulled over by the cops, and I think I might take a leaf out of that book from here on out.

You're just jealous that OU wins football games.

2009-08-14T20:53:00.007-05:00

I've been lounging around tonight, just reading and chillaxing, when I decided to go to the post office. I wrote a letter to my roommate, who is in China doing mission work until December, several days ago and had yet to post it. It's really hot outside, even though it's dark, so I rolled my windows down so I could wiggle my fingers in the wind. I didn't have my music on loud, and I was minding my own business, but as I pull away from the post office, a black windows-down-music-blaring SUV honks at me and yells "HATER!" I assume this was in reference to my OU decal, which I REFUSE to remove, because OU is awesome and I am PROUD to have gone there even though I'm stuck living in Aggieland now.

Other goings on: I'm officially getting sick of watching Friends, mainly because Matt has been watching episodes back to back for basically the entire summer. So the other night, I BEGGED to go out somewhere and DO something fun, so Matt took me to this family entertainment center that had glow-in-the-dark mini golf ... and it was cowboy-themed! It was arranged in themed rooms, so there were the cowboys on the range, cowboys in a saloon, sheriffs holding cowboys in jail ... it was very cute, and I actually held my own pretty well. They also had a semi-decent arcade, and I challenge all of you to ski-ball if you ever come into town.

The next night I guess Matt was still tired of Friends so we went to go see The Ugly Truth. It was really good! Lots of man candy and a funny storyline, and both of us really liked it. It definitely had awkward stupid-guy moments, but overall made up for it with Heigl hilarity. She really is quite awesome in this movie.

My family is coming into town tomorrow, so I'm cleaning during the commercial breaks of Chelsea Lately. So I will try to focus my attention elsewhere. Hope all of ya'll have a wonderful weekend!

Everything I want to put here only makes sense if you can hear my voice inflection.

2009-08-05T20:30:00.004-05:00

I've always described my dream job as a job where I get to sit and play in Photoshop (or really any program in Creative Suite) all day. But as much as I dreamed of that, I definitely was not expecting to find that in my first job out of college. But oh my gosh, I love my job! I've spent entire days playing in Photoshop/InDesign/Illustrator and helping my counterpart make decisions regarding playing in Photoshop/InDesign/Illustrator. PLUS, I've gotten to do a little bit of copywriting, too. PLUS I have my own office!

In other news, I am officially an old person. I go to sleep at 10:30 p.m. and wake up at 7 a.m. without an alarm clock.

Chicken Pork Sunday

2009-08-02T20:33:00.003-05:00

This weekend has gone by WAY too fast. But, for all of my complaints of not getting to hang out with people enough and not knowing very many people, I definitely made up for it this weekend.
• Thursday night I went to Ozona with a friend from my internship for my birthday and got a yummy drink.
• Friday was the last day of my internship, so we went out to lunch at this fancy place that was REALLY good but for some reason I've forgotten the name of. Then Matt and I went on a double date to Abuelo's with one of his engineering friends and his girlfriend, and played board games for awhile.
• Saturday got the oil in my car changed and went shopping for awhile for some cute things to wear to work (somewhat unsuccessfully ... see Grievances, below). Then bought birthday cupcakes (just plain frosting with sprinkles, no Harry Potter ones this year) and had people over to play poker. Made me miss Oklahoma a little, when we used to have penny poker nights and Huck would win every time.
• Today I ran errands, did a little more shopping and cooked dinner in my Crock Pot, but it's been a pretty lazy day. Attempted to go to church this evening, but it turns out the church we tried to go to only has the evening service when students are in town.

Grievances:
• I know people will hate me for saying this, but hey, if you don't want to read my blog then don't. I love shopping, but I hate that it is so hard to find cute, professional clothing for people who are smaller than "women's" size. Fine, maybe I am not a woman! Maybe I am still a little girl. But I can't be the only little-girl-sized person in the working world.
• All but one of the cute shirts I bought are sweaters, so even though they are cute and new, I can't wear them because summer in Texas is miserable. Why is it so hard to find summery, cute, professional clothing?
• I'm not even sure I need to have cute, professional clothing for my job. I am going to be very sad if I don't need to, because I have waited all this time to be able to do so!

Anyway, I start my new job tomorrow!!! I am excited and nervous. I hope it is fun.

That is all. Matt is watching the Rangers game on TV, so I am going to go watch Canada's Next Top Model while I can. :)

My honor student can beat up your honor student.

2009-07-29T21:52:00.003-05:00

In the two months I've been here, I have seen quite a few bumper stickers that read the following:

HOWDY
DAMN IT!

And oooh, this totally plays into my geeky punctuation fetish. I presume that it is intended to be read, "Howdy, damn it!" as in, "You say 'Howdy' or else." However, because there is no punctuation indicating it as such, I prefer to think of all the Aggies' bumpers declaring, "Howdy! ... (damn it)," as in "I can't stop saying freaking 'Howdy!' and it's driving me insane."

I can't remember the Mary Poppins cleaning-up song. Otherwise I'd put the lyrics here.

2009-07-29T20:56:00.006-05:00

I know no one really cares about this, but I find it very ironic that when you pay money to buy the kind of sunscreen that's supposed to NOT clog your pores, you break out more than you would if you had just bought regular ol' Coppertone. We went to Inks Lake this past weekend, which was way fun, but my skin is now freaking out.

Been trying out lots of local restaurants, mainly in the two-block radius around where I work, which happens to be about 20 minutes from where I live. A girl I work with and I go to lunch about once a week, and I love that there are no chains within walking distance (except Subway). We went to a cute little Italian place, Square One Bistro last week, which was YUM (I am having a minor love affair with all things Italian), and today we went to get Mexican at Papa Perez. I am rather picky about my Mexican food, and have yet to find anything that can beat out El Fenix, but they had very good tacos. Tomorrow is my birthday, and we are going to go out and get drinks after I help Matt move. Unfortunately she's moving to Pennsylvania in a couple of weeks, which is awesome for her, but I am sad she'll be leaving.

I've been trying to clean my apartment, which has become a lot more work since Roachgate, because I had to rewash almost every dish in my kitchen (I didn't bother with stuff in the top shelves of my cabinet. I might end up going back and doing that later out of paranoia, but I am assuming bug spray around the floor won't mess up stuff that high up?). Also, wood floors are a lot more difficult to clean than I thought they would be. They make it look so easy in the commercials when dust is the only things your Swiffer needs to pick up.

Need to do some more stuff before it gets too late and I get lazy. I really need to go grocery shopping, but I think that might have to wait until another day.

Everything is bigger in Texas.

2009-07-28T08:45:00.000-05:00

Thanks to the suckitude that is my life, I am sitting around waiting for 9 a.m. so I can go hurl wrath at my apartment managers until they send an exterminator over.

There were ROACHES here last night. !!!!!!! BIG roaches, like two inches long. I've never seen anything so scary in my life that wasn't in a movie.

I lived in the same (very messy) apartment for three years, and never saw hide nor exoskeleton of roaches. But now I keep a decently clean home and I get the Night of the Living Giant Freaking Bugs.

I ran to the store to get Raid while Matt tore apart my kitchen looking for places they could be coming from, and my entire kitchen is full of poison now, but I am FREAKED OUT people. All I wanted to do was empty the dishwasher! I did not ask for this!

Harry Potter and the Employed Bookworm

2009-07-16T21:38:00.004-05:00

The biggest news for this week: I finally got a job! I'm very excited. I'll get to do some graphic design and writing, on top of some other duties, which is really all I wanted. So I can't wait to start that.

Other goings on: Went to go see Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince with some people. I was slightly disappointed that I didn't get to dress up and go to the midnight premiere like I have for every other premiere since I started attending them, but we went the next day and I LOVED IT. The sixth book was definitely not one of my favorites -- in truth, I found it somewhat anticlimactic -- but I think the movie is one of my favorite in the franchise. I was struck by how much better the actors had gotten since the previous movies, and no one was ridiculously overdramatic, as was one of my complaints of the previous movies. I need to rewatch them all, because I can't seem to remember most of what happened in movies 2-6. I've seen the first one so many times (mainly as Wizard People) that I remember pretty much everything about it.

Also went to this month's meeting of the book club, where we discussed this really awesome, demented book, The Hunger Games. It was very Brave New World meets Lord of the Flies meets And Then There Were None. If you're into demented, futuristic books, you'll love it. I'm very much enjoying this group of people. Then, today I went grocery shopping and ran into one of the ladies, and I felt bad because I didn't know what to say to her.

Other events of the weekend: Went to visit my grandparents and see their new house, went shopping at IKEA and then to dinner with Matt's parents (WHY have I never been in an IKEA before?! I love IKEA!), and had the first power outage during a major thunderstorm. I would say that I really hope my car isn't hail damaged, but a couple dings doesn't make much difference to the overall appearance of my poor banged-up Blaine.

Most people either live to eat or eat to live. I live to write about what I'm eating.

2009-07-12T19:57:00.005-05:00

In my intro to sociology class in college, we spent a great deal of time talking about what some book called "McDonaldization." Basically, it's that chain restaurants create some magic formula for their food so that no matter where in the world you visit, their restaurant/fast food chain's meals will always taste the same. A big part of this class was spent discussing the "Iron Cagers," "Rubber Cagers" and "Velvet Cagers." The velvet cagers were the ones who loved this about restaurants, and stick to major chains because they like what is familiar. The iron cagers are the ones who always try to break free of the chains, primarily visiting local restaurants only. The rubber cagers were kind of in between, liking a little bit of both. This class bored me to tears, so I'm sorry I had to explain it.

My family has always been iron cagers. They like trying out every local place when we travel somewhere new, and my dad gets restless with eating the same foods all the time. One of my biggest goals since moving here (far aside from finding a job) has been finding local restaurants. I would consider myself more of a rubber cager. But along with being sick of fast food and enjoyment of cooking for myself came a desire to try a lot of local food places.

Today I wanted to try Firehouse Subs, a place that I thought was local, but my mother informed me a little while ago that there's one off the highway up by her house, so that's kind of a bummer. BUT, it was AWESOME. They have amazing subs, and Matt and I decided that it was way better than Jimmy John's, and we couldn't decide if it was better than Quizno's. The only problem was that the sandwiches were HUGE, and I couldn't finish mine even though I ordered the smallest size. The interior was really cute too, with Dalmation-spotted tabletops and fireman-themed everything.

My current adventure has been looking for a church down here. What makes this interesting is that I'm pretty flexible about church-going; I went to a Presbyterian kindergarten, but soon after that we stopped attending church altogether. In high school my now-former-roommate Julie started dragging me to her Methodist church, and I continued going to a Methodist church through college because that's what I was used to. I don't really consider myself to be of any particular denomination though; I prefer to label myself a Christian and leave it at that, because sometimes the labels cause too many problems among different groups. So we've been trying out a lot of different places. So far we've found the Church that Feels Like School and the Rock Concert Church, both of which we've nixed. I don't know what I'm looking for, but I haven't found it yet. But the search has been fun. I think I'll just know when the place is right.

By the way, now because of this town, I keep trying to capitalize the word "college," even when used to informally describe the university which I attended. Thanks for that.

Lessons Learned

2009-07-09T23:28:00.003-05:00

You get what you pay for.
Today I bought a vacuum cleaner. Matt and I had dinner party tonight (went well, by the way), and the apartment kind of badly needed a good cleaning, even though it wasn't really obvious (hooray beige carpet!). I went to Target to look, figuring a decently cheap (but not crappy) vacuum would be around $50. I found one for $39.99 and got really excited, so I bought it and used the extra money I WOULD have spent on the vacuum to buy a cute pair of green flats. ^_^
So I get the vacuum home, and it is CRAP. I should have spent the extra $10-$30 for a less crappy one. I don't like it at all, and it definitely requires quite a bit of assembly. I assumed vacuums were meant to be idiot-proof, but Matt told me that when they price them that cheap, they remove the idiot-proof features.
Spend the extra money. You get what you pay for.

Sometimes it's a good thing to own two bottle openers that sing "Boomer Sooner."
Somehow in college Julie and I acquired one of these singing contraptions. It was funny at first, then was annoying to no end. Then, soon after graduating, I acquired a second one. Since I had just moved to College Station, I wanted to cling to anything OU I could, so I kept both. I hadn't really used either of them since moving (I'm not really a big beer drinker), but since we had people over tonight, they got put to use. It was good to hear "Boomer Sooner," believe it or not. I really miss OU.
Also, there is nothing better than irritating die-hard Aggies. :) Luckily I retrieved my bottle opener from the garbage before anything happened to it.

Big Girls Cry a Lot ... When They Have No Money

2009-07-06T00:23:00.004-05:00

Pictures posted on Facebook! Booyah. My apartment is clean. I love it.

I have yet to have a noise problem since I've moved into my new apartment. I'm very thankful for this, especially after spending close to a year listening to Next-Door-Neighbor-to-the-Left (in Oklahoma) blast "Big Girls Don't Cry" and "Gives You Hell" 24 hours a day. Tonight though, I seriously thought someone had finally moved into the apartment next door to mine, because I can hear someone coughing rather loudly. I hope he is okay (it sounds like a guy). I met my downstairs neighbor the other day, and he is a sweet older man. But I don't think the floors are that thin either.

Today has been an all-time low since I moved. I have just kind of skated through the last few months, hoping that any financial woes would work themselves out, because they always have before. But with new internship, I decided to re-budget. And oh gosh, I am going to be flat broke in a couple months. This is scary, even though I've been on the verge of flat-broke for four years, and have yet to miss a meal or turn in rent late. I'm having a much more difficult go of finding a full-time job than I expected. It's not reassuring when people tell me I picked the wrong town to move to. I get reminded of that a lot. Today it was while at the dentist.

Anyway, things have been crazy. I've yet to spend a weekend in C-Stat yet. This past weekend, Matt and I went up to Dallas to visit family - parts of both of ours, actually. I got to visit my family, and on Friday night we went to a Rangers game with his sister and her boyfriend. Then, because Matt won a radio contest and got tickets to Saturday night's Ranger game too, we went to that one as well. Ballpark hot dogs are delicious, but all food there is ridiculously overpriced. Both games had really cool fireworks displays too. I've been asking for years why there are not fireworks in different shapes, but they actually had some smiley-face fireworks and star-shaped fireworks too. Also, I got a back to my cell phone. It's silver and doesn't match the pink of the rest of the phone, but at least the battery's not hanging out the back now.

Last night, we went to some friends' for chicken wings and Mario Kart. That was pretty awesome. I rock at the Wii, and managed to come in at respectable places (not behind all the computer characters!). Thanks for the practice, Julie! This week I'm hosting a dinner party/get together with some of Matt's Percussion Studio friends. I'm making beer brats in my Crock Pot, and the rest is potluck. I'm excited about it. I haven't had anyone besides my sister over to see my place yet.

But luckily, FINALLY, I'll actually get to hang around this weekend. I am ready to RELAX.

Unlimited Nights and Weekends

2009-07-01T19:19:00.006-05:00

Believe it or not, I'm FINALLY cleaning so I can take pictures of my apartment! It's been a month since I've moved here, and it's about time I took those ... . But it's taking a little longer to clean than I'd like, especially because the study isn't organized entirely. I will have pictures soon, I promise!

Tonight has been pretty basic. Worked a half day so I could look for jobs in the afternoon, but unfortunately didn't get very much accomplished ... some of the places I was looking are no longer in those locations and/or are not the same company I thought they would be. But, will persevere. In the meantime, at least I'm going broke more slowly than I would if I didn't have anything going on. Then tonight I made barbecue chicken in the Crock Pot, which was pretty good. I wish I'd had better veggies to go with it, but I didn't do a very good job of grocery shopping last night (I had one of those hand baskets, and by the time I put milk and juice in it [and pinched the crap out of my arm with the basket handles], I tried to get out of HEB as soon as possible).

My adventure for the week was last night, when I started cleaning. I was about to take out the garbage, and I grabbed my phone off the kitchen table to put in my pocket. It didn't actually get to my pocket ... I dropped it, and it broke into a few pieces, and then all the pieces bounced under the oven. I spent a few minutes freaking out, thinking about all the people I could call to get help ... except that my phone was under the oven! So I rummaged around the closet and discovered that I have a broom (!) and attached packing tape to the end and managed to get the main part of the phone out. I couldn't find the back piece, because I do not have a flashlight and there is a lot of crap under the oven (pills? a golf ball?!), so I have been walking around like a loser with half a phone. I would just go get another, but I don't want to pay for a new phone when my contract expires in a few months, but luckily my entire family at one point had the same phone I do, and my dad keeps all the pieces, so I can get a new back to my phone no problem, as soon as I can get home next.

Watching So You Think You Can Dance, and I want to keep cleaning/organizing during the commercial breaks, so TTFN.

Hi, I'm Allie and I'm a bibliophile.

2009-06-26T13:15:00.005-05:00

Yesterday was pretty fabulous. After work, I went to get dinner with some of Matt's friends' girlfriends. We went to this cute little Asian restaurant, Rosie's Pho, a couple blocks away. It was pretty good food, and better company. Fortune cookie: "The best things in life aren't things." :) Unfortunately I had to dash out after dinner, because last night was the first meeting of a book club I found. We were reading In Defense of Food by Michael Pollan, which I recommend, even though it was a little tough to get through. It's all about how our "Western diet" focuses too much on trying to be healthy through supplements and particular nutrients instead of focusing on eating whole food, and how the "Western diseases" (diabetes, heart disease, obesity) would be less of a problem if people would choose less processed food and stop making food decisions based on health claims.

Anyway, we went to Caffe Capri for the meeting (which had AMAZING cheesecake in ridiculously large slices). I think I am really going to enjoy going to these meetings. Mostly women who are in grad school or have just finished school, most of them engaged or married, and most of them pretty new to town. I'm very glad for this, because everyone seems very open to meeting new people, and it's not such a college-y environment. Don't get me wrong, I love the college environment, but I was seriously worried when I moved here that I wouldn't find anyone to hang out with that wasn't still in school. I'm really looking forward to getting to know them. Plus, one of them lives in my apartment complex, so maybe she will have the answer as to what to do with the curtain problem?!

There is a fly in my apartment that is driving me crazy. I finally did dishes, too. I made brownies the other day, and they were only okay, but they managed to dirty almost every dish I own, and I didn't get around to doing them yesterday. Major gross. But SHOCKER: I think I might actually love cooking! But, I am not particularly good at figuring out what goes well together sans recipe. So I am looking for a way to quickly use up a lot of cilantro, red onion and snow peas before they go bad. (Not necessarily in the same dish, but whatever.) Any ideas?

At least I'm in the right industry.

2009-06-23T19:36:00.003-05:00

I hate Windows with every fiber of my being.

I started an internship on Monday. It's with a software development company, but I get to do a lot of editing, so that's really cool.

I am starting to lose hope with trying to get curtains up. I've punched holes in various places around the window, and still haven't managed to find a spot where the hooks/nails/whatever will go in more than half an inch. It's a wall, people! I even tapped on the wall to find a hollow spot! I don't know what to try next, but I really don't want to put more holes in the wall.

That's all for now.

America's Next Broke Homemaker

2009-06-19T00:01:00.008-05:00

GREAT day yesterday. Okay day today. We're going to do this by topic today.

Money. Already broke my no-more-spending rule, but it was for a good reason! Yesterday I FINALLY found a "manly" bedspread (this was a requirement; Matt wanted it to be manly, I wanted it to be pretty, so we compromised on getting a pretty set in semi-manly colors), and it is BEAUTIFUL! Sage green and brown. When I ever get around to taking pictures of my apartment, I will post them for all to see. I wanted to wait until my curtains were up, but I am STILL having issues with that one (see topic: Lowe's).

Party. Last night we went to a party with some of Matt's friends, and it was a fantastic time. We basically hung out outside all night, and it was really nice; I can't remember the last time I just sat outside. Despite the many bug bites I discovered this morning, it was much needed social time. Matt's friends are really cool, and their girlfriends are cool, so I am looking forward to getting to know them better. (See topic: This Evening)

Lowe's. In an attempt to finally get curtains hung today, I took a little trip to Lowe's. This was much more complicated than it sounds. Apparently Google maps doesn't know that one of the streets here splits into two different streets, and so I went on a 10-15 minute run-around trying to find a street that didn't exist on the wrong fork. When I finally found Lowe's, they didn't have screws short enough to fit into the wall (for some reason I can't drill more than half an inch into the wall, and the screws that came with the curtain rod are too long). The college guy running that aisle told me I should buy a hacksaw and get one of the thicker screws and just make it shorter myself, but I have no idea what I would do with a hacksaw once I got one. Plus I'm not spending money, remember?

This Evening. Overall, today has not been the best. But it had its good moments, the first being that I went to Layne's for the first time for some chicken (here, it is in heavy competition with Raising Cane's, but to be honest, they are pretty much exactly the same). Matt's friend Matt works there, and invited me to come tonight for some free chicken with the purchase of a drink (Allie likes free food). It was slow, so we got to sit and talk for a little while, then I came home to watch So You Think You Can Dance and other quality TV (see topic: Modeling Shows). After a little while, I decided to go to the McDonald's across the street to get a Redbox DVD, since Matt went to see the Rangers play and that means I can watch bad chick flicks. I opted for Bride Wars, which NONE of you wanted to see with me and it was REALLY CUTE AND YOU MISSED OUT!!! :) I am thinking this Redbox thing is a good idea, since there are quite a few movies that I wanted to see over the past semester, but never got a chance to (THANKS, CAPSTONE).

Modeling Shows. Tyra Banks may be freakin' crazy on America's Next Top Model, but damn does she know how to turn out fierce models. While flipping channels, I came across She's Got The Look, a modeling show for women over 35. I think this is a great idea; you know, embrace aging, all women are beautiful, etc. However, in watching the photo shoots and casting calls, I am struck by how unprofessional everything is in comparison to ANTM (despite SGTL also featuring supermodels, though not ones I've ever heard of). The judges absolutely raved over this one woman's photo, even though her face was totally dead. I wonder how the other modeling shows are, because other than that crap Most Smartest Model, I haven't watched any of them. But even through the madness, I will still have mad love for ANTM. I can't stop my curiosity about what will come out of Tyra's mouth (and imagination) next.

In Response. Pam, try going to a secondhand furniture store. Not like Goodwill, but a place that only sells furniture. In Oklahoma, Alyson and Lola bought a couch for a semester from a secondhand store, and it was decently nice. Amy, I am glad I am not the only one with a padded dining room table. My mom had one too, but my family is kind of weird about furniture. My dad spent a year in California, and he slept on a blow-up mattress and only had furniture he found in the garbage outside his apartment complex.

Headline: Allie single-handedly saves newspaper business through subscription

2009-06-15T16:34:00.006-05:00

I am trying to think of an Office-esque ridiculously long subhead to go with that spectacular (and totally realistic) headline. But seriously, I did purchase a subscription to the local newspaper today when I went to get groceries at HEB. A woman outside the door was selling subscriptions, and I figured that, since I'm new to the area and will now be a not-college-student resident of this town, I might as well get to know what's going on in it. Plus, the woman promised me a $30 HEB gift card (and it turns out it costs a lot to cook things for yourself and a 22-year-old male when he comes over for dinner). I accepted, immediately spent my $30, and now cannot be blamed for the demise of the industry. Plus, I was flipping through the paper this afternoon, and I am very pleased with the way my $11 went, because it looks like a very good paper.

I feel like I've spent a lot of money since moving. (This may be relative, since I spent the last four years clinging tightly to every penny that came my way.) I am cheap, but I keep having to buy things, some of which end up being a waste. For example, today I bought Hercules Hooks. I bought them to hang my curtains, because supposedly the wall is too shallow to hold the screws that came with the curtains. I didn't think about how the Hercules Hooks work prior to buying them (the wall can't be that shallow), so now I have Hercules Hooks and nothing to use them on. Goodbye $15. If anyone would like to buy them from me, I would be more than happy to pass them off to someone who might use them. PLUS I'll throw in the laser light level thing that came with them ABSOLUTELY FREE!!!

I also finally bought a kitchen table. No chairs, just the table. One day at a time. It's one of those little folding tables that's padded on top to make it look a little fancier, and I think I will use some of the leftover cloth from reupholstering my chair as a tablecloth to hide the metal. My mom has promised to lend me some folding chairs to go with it (until I decide to buy the Real Thing), but she doesn't know when she's coming to visit. At least the table is light enough that I can always move it to in front of the couch, because it turns out balancing plates on your lap on the couch and trying to cut things is a good way to slop food everywhere.

After all this buying, I decided that I am NOT going to spend any more money. So I went to get the mail, and got an invoice from a magazine I subscribed to last month, demanding I pay them.

Other things of note: I love coupons, but need to remember to use them. Target has wine bottles with really cute labels.

Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs

2009-06-14T23:46:00.005-05:00

I've been COOKING since I moved! When I was living in OK, Alyson told me she never ate TV dinners, and always cooked instead. I thrived (survived?) on TV dinners, because I was/am lazy and don't particularly enjoy cooking. But, one of my goals in moving here is to learn to cook things, and hopefully learn to enjoy cooking as well. So far my biggest success has been sweet 'n spicy meatballs in my Crock Pot.

Went to the movies with Matt yesterday to see Up. I love Pixar. It was adorable, and such a good story. Plus, I had never seen an animated movie in 3D before, so that was a pretty cool experience. There are a lot of 3D movies coming out.

Even though Texas and Oklahoma are not that far from each other, the weather is WORLDS different. It has been hot and muggy the last couple days. I've been used to a drier kind of heat, so I'm trying to do the whole "embrace your hair's natural texture" thing, and doing the wave. Waves don't go very well with bangs.

I'm really missing my girls. Excluding Matt, I have one friend here from high school, and we got dinner the other night. But I miss having people around all the time. In Norman, our house was kind of the hub of hanging out, so we always had people around. I am not a clingy person by nature, and so I am irritating myself by being so attached-at-the-hip to Matt, but I hate being lonely.

I have been reading a lot though. That's been a plus. I love reading, and I'm glad to have the opportunity. Especially since I tend to start two to three books at the same time, and then it takes me forever to get through them.

Also, am planning to start a part-time internship in a week or so, where I'll get to do a little bit of copywriting!

Tomorrow I am buying Hercules Hooks and hanging up my curtains. Fo' real.

Being a professional student had its perks.

2009-06-10T08:07:00.003-05:00

I find it incredibly difficult to make myself wake up in the morning when I don't have school or work to go to. Granted, I'm up at 8 right now, but I was totally lame and went to sleep at 11 last night. My brain is still a little foggy, but I really am trying to start getting up at a decent time. I think for the most part I'm still in college mode.

I finished up the last of my decorating purchases yesterday when I remembered that I don't have a job yet, and should probably make sure I have one before my savings dwindles. Reupholstered my desk chair again, and it looks much better this time. Also punched about four more holes in the walls with a drill for my curtains, only to find out the wall isn't deep enough to take the screws that came with them, so I will have to find a solution to that later.

I'm starting to feel an itch, and I really want to go out and meet people, but I am not sure where to start. I miss hanging out with my girls. Figured out how to set up my printer yesterday, so I printed a picture of all of us from one of our midnight excursions on campus, as well as a cute pic of all the guys from Alyson's wedding. I wouldn't say I'm lonely — Matt's around, and he is very good company — but I need me some girl friends. Luckily, Lauren is still living here, so I am having dinner with her this week.

Still haven't figured out why my e-mail won't send outgoing mail through the Mac Mail program. Think will call the company and tell them I have Outlook (even though I don't) because I called tech support yesterday and they told me they don't know how to fix Macs, only PCs with Outlook. If it turns out I am the only person in this town with a Mac, I might shrivel up and die.

Women are not meant to use tools. This is why we keep men around.

2009-06-08T22:47:00.005-05:00

I really don't get the point of those plastic "anchors" you're supposed to put in the wall before you put in screws before hanging things up. Is plastic really that strong, that it is necessary on top of METAL to keep something as simple as a (very lightweight) piece of fabric from falling off the wall?

It sucks that my boyfriend has a broken leg, and does not have the full range of motion that he usually does, but he was so good today when I freaked out about aforementioned anchors when I tried hammering one into the wall and it shattered. Turns out I didn't have the right tools to install my living room curtains, so he promised to get them tomorrow. Just goes to show, Dad may buy a toolkit for his high school grad, but Daughter won't necessarily figure out that an electric screwdriver is not a drill. In the meantime, Matt hung up some shelves for over my TV (which I bought mainly to disguise the ugly thermostat that hangs RIGHT. IN. THE. MIDDLE. OF. THE. LIVING. ROOM. WALL.) and I am very happy with the way they look. I am very much looking forward to taking pictures of everything decorated nice.

Never got a chance to hit up Hobby Lobby, but Sis and I did go to the mall (note to self: don't wear platform heels when going to an unfamiliar mall) to see what was there (and where I will be shopping this week when I run out of other things to do), and we bought curtains, miscellaneous decorative items, and the best floor rug in the world. We also had lunch with Matt's parents while they were in town for the day, and nachos for dinner. Yes, I know I dislike cheese, but Freebirds nachos do not count, because while there was definitely cheese on them, there was SOOO much other stuff that I couldn't even taste it over the guacamole, pork and refried beans. Yummm.

Learning my way around a little better. Matt drew me a map, which has been extremely helpful. Also, my sister is really good at reading maps. I am not.

Usage + What's Going On

2009-06-08T09:09:00.004-05:00

This blog was originally created for a journalism class. I really liked the title of the site, so I didn't want to have to create a new one. So if you are not from OU, please excuse all the journalism stuff already on here. I hate to get rid of things, so everything is staying as-is, at least for the time being.

I'm living in College Station now. My boyfriend, Matt, is going to grad school here starting in the fall, and after a four-year, long-distance relationship, it's wonderful to actually get to see him when I want to. I commented to him the other day, "People who date in the same town have it so easy. It's weird that so few relationships work out even when living in the same city." Long-distance sure puts everything else into perspective.

It took me long enough to get Internet set up; I've been here a week or so and had nothing to distract me, so miraculously I'm already done unpacking and setting things up (although I have yet to figure out how to set up the wireless Internet thing). I pretty much love my new place, and so far I like the town well enough. I keep referring to it as "Oklahoma" on accident, though, as in, "No I don't have [item] with me, I left it in Oklahoma." It will just take a little while to get readjusted.

My sister came to town last night. She is going to help me decorate my place a little today, when she wakes up. Last night was a bit of an adventure, and I learned that McDonald's is the only fast food in this town that has a drive-through that is open at 1 a.m. (Whataburger usually is too, but it was closed for renovations. Sad face.) We drove all over town trying to find some food, before settling on just getting chips and salsa at the 24-hour grocery store not 20 steps from my apartment.

What else ... learned how to play shuffleboard with some of Matt's friends at a bar called Fitzwilly's on Thursday. That was pretty fun, and my team won, even though I'd never played it before and the other team had more members. Then Friday we went back to Dallas to see my cousin graduate high school, and got to hang out with my family. Otherwise I've just been trying to turn this place into a nice place to live and hang out, and I think I've done a pretty decent job (mainly because my sister likes my apartment, and she is not a very complimentary person overall).

So this is my new life. Let the adventure begin!

Twinprov

2009-05-12T19:00:00.003-05:00

When a promotional rep from Paramount Pictures invited funnymen Buck and Clint Vrazel to a pre-screening of Star Trek, not even the Vrazels knew the event would create such a stir for their comedic brainchild, Twinprov.

Before the screening began, the Vrazels were speaking to a women who worked for The Oklahoman. Upon finding out they were comedians, she asked the brothers to do an impromptu rap about Star Trek. They improvised, and she liked the beat-boxed rap. Later, they were invited to perform the rap in front of 400 people at the next screening.

Buck and Clint are both members of Oklahoma City's Red Dirt Improv, and former players in the University of Oklahoma's Obviously Unrehearsed Improv! troupe. They have been playing improv together for nine years. Clint had been thinking about how life was changing — he was looking to move to a bigger city — and he knew that before he went, he wanted to do a two-man show with his twin brother. Twinprov was formed, and the Vrazels do stand-up, improv, write funny songs and just tell stories about their lives.

"We didn't do any research for the Star Trek rap," Clint said. "There are just magic moments, and they stick with us."

The Oklahoman wants Twinprov to do similar things for all the "geeky" movies coming out over the summer, Clint said, because "it's easy to connect to people." Look for improv hits for Harry Potter, The Terminator, G.I. Joe and more over the next few months.

Watch the Star Trek rap:

CLICK HERE to visit Twinprov's Web site and upcoming show schedule.

Othello's Open Mic Night

2009-05-05T11:56:00.002-05:00

Open Mic Night takes place Tuesday evenings at Othello's on Campus Corner. Comics begin performing around 10:30 p.m. No cover charge or drink minimum.

Life09

2009-04-14T10:40:00.002-05:00

Life09

2009-03-12T23:16:00.006-05:00

The IAO Gallery in Oklahoma City is hosting Life09, a one-night art show to help raise funds for the Maisha Arts and Cultural Camp in Kenya. There will be a silent auction for works produced by local artists, as well as Kenyan musicians. The goal is to raise money through social activism rather than asking people for money.

Attendees can not only help provide backpacks and art kits for campers through donations, but can also get involved in the art show personally through a community art piece.

The Maisha Orphanage was founded in 2006 by Beatrice Williamson, a native Kenyan. Her mother taught kids in Kenya and had an 8-year-old girl in her class. The girl stopped showing up for class when her parents both died of HIV, so she was taking care of her siblings and living with their uncle, who was also HIV-positive. Williamson's mother offered her home as a place where the kids could receive food and have a safe place to do their homework. As time went on, the kids brought more and more children with them, until she had 80-some-odd children outside her home every day.

Multidisciplinary studies senior Kendall Brown got involved with the Maisha Orphanage project randomly — through Facebook. "It's a total mark of our generation — I went across the sea because of Facebook," she said of her trip to Africa. When the village was affected by heavy violence, Brown talked to Williamson about creating a camp for the children, and ultimately founded the Maisha Arts and Cultural Camp. "I thought I wanted to be a photographer. Turns out, I want to be an art therapist," Brown said. She said she has always been passionate about the arts, especially in education and "how it helps kids deal with pain and tragedy that they otherwise wouldn't be able to handle."

Life09 will take place from 6:30 to 10:30 p.m. on Thursday, April 2 at the IAO Gallery. The gallery is located at 811 N. Broadway in Oklahoma City. Pre-register at www.NightofArtandMusic.com; as space will be limited, there will be a guest list at the door. The event is free, but the suggested donation is $10 at the door.

Red Dirt Improv

2009-03-12T11:46:00.007-05:00

The Vista closed; Bingo now offered at Coach's Brewhouse

2009-02-15T16:16:00.006-06:00

Coach's Brewhouse is now offering free games of bingo every Tuesday evening, starting Feb. 17.

Anyone age 18 or older can come win free money. There will be six $25 winners and two $50 winners, plus a jackpot game worth $500. For the jackpot game, only seven numbers will be called, and if no one wins, Coach's will up the ante $50 each subsequent week.

Previously, bingo was offered on Tuesday nights at Vista Sports Grill down the street from Coach's. On Friday, Feb. 6, the "Vista building" was closed down due to structural issues, according to the Vista's Web site. The restaurant and all offices within the building are closed for the time being while the building's structural problems are remedied. There is no set date for the building's reopening at this time.

Coach's will be offering bingo "just like the Vista used to, because the Vista shut down — unfortunately — with the building in disrepair," said Coach's manager Tom Houser. "It was a wildly successful night, and we could offer that for the people who enjoyed the Vista's bingo night."

Coach's Brewhouse is located at 110 W. Main St. Games will start at 10 p.m. and will be played every 20 minutes until about 12:45 a.m. Coach's also offers live music on Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights. For those that are 21 and up, Coach's offers $1.75 pints or $7 jugs for their handcrafted ales, and $9 buckets of domestic bottles.

Othello's Open-Mic Night

2009-02-05T20:32:00.004-06:00

Open-mic night is back at Othello's after taking a few days off from comedy for the bad weather.

Students can come watch comedians perform, or even get the chance to perform themselves. Ten to 12 comedians usually perform in a night, and they each get 10 minutes of stage time, so there is great variety.

Othello's has been hosting open-mic night for two years. About eight comics, including OU graduate student James Nghiem, had previously been performing at the Loony Bin Comedy Club of Tulsa. They had gotten tired of the time restrictions imposed on them there, and wanted more time on stage. So, they found a new venue and pioneered an open-mic opportunity for everyone to get involved.

"I like that you have as much freedom as you want [at Othello's]," Nghiem said. "You can develop your own material, and the crowd is on my side. ... It's its own identity, its own culture, its own environment. It's a restaurant, it's a free-for-all."

Anyone is welcome to come and try their hand at comedy. Open-mic night begins at 9:30 p.m. every Tuesday night. If you would like to be a performer, show up at about 9 p.m. to sign up. Othello's is located on Campus Corner at 434 Buchanan St. There is no charge to get in.