Making a Holiday Splash

So today was Easter! Praise Him!

In honor of this amazing day, I went to church, iced my cake, took a nap, and spent all evening with family. It was such a great holiday that I didn’t mind the pollen or having to run to Wal-Mart (patewie!). I also broke lent by gnoshing on some sweets. A few Dove chocolate pieces, a donut, some peeps and some cake!

Not at the same time.

I am not a pig. I did eat a delicious ham, though.

The Sparkling Raspberry Champagne Cake was awesome! I used raspberry sparkeltini that’s really inexpensive (around 6.50) and really delicious. I also used some strawberry flavoring and real raspberries. It was a light and scrumptious desert. I also liked that the frosting I made for it was nice and fruity and the splash of champagne made it super airy.

Anyway, since I spent so much time resting, I figured I’d give myself a break from my Chuck blog (which I’ll have finished before tomorrow’s episode) and just revel in the very good day.

Enjoy your blessings and take some time to rest.

I also watched the awesome movie Splash, and guess what I found:

You’re Welcome

G’night everybody.

Not So Sweet

In case you don’t remember or didn’t know or whatever, I gave up sweets for Lent. I’m not Catholic, but my dad’s side of the family is and it’s one practice we’ve kept. It’s generally a rewarding experience and I feel great for doing it.

Must. Not. Nom. The. Screen.

But it’s only been eleven days and I’m about to go crazy for a cookie. There are four boxes of Girl Scout cookies sitting in the cupboard and it’s making me loco.

Why are cravings so hard to deal with? It doesn’t help either that, in general, I’ve decided to try and eat more healthy. I realized that while my parents were in New Orleans (by the way, that wallaby I thought they saw, was actually a young kangaroo, which is just as crazy) and I pretty much pigged out on Chinese food and pizza that it so effects my weight and I need to loose a few. While loosing weight is a goal, the more important one is to just get healthier. It should be easy, because I’m young and I can still make better changes easier, but… I’d kill for a Reese’s right now. *sigh*

At least I worked out 3 times this week! Not like that’s even close to being enough. :-\

Ugh.

...

This is so taxing

Happy Presidents Day, y’all!

(Not pictured: Georgey's cake and brand new mattress)

Traditionally, the way to celebrate this particular holiday, is by purchasing a mattress. I, myself, have never observed this ritual, but I’m not a staunch Presidentialist. Because it’s an “official” holiday (quotes because, while I may consider National Donut Day completely and totally official, the United States Government does not recognize it as such… party poopers), banks, post offices and other business are closed for the day. Many of you bums folks may have celebrated this President’s Day by taking advantage of the fact that your work office was closed for the day. I am not jealous. Jerks.

But lucky for me, it wasn’t busy, so the day was mostly calm and quiet. So groovy. Well, as groovy as things can be when you’re still at work. After that, things got super awesome: pedicure!! Mom and I were supposed to go yesterday, but the place we had a gift certificate for was closed on Sunday, despite the fact that the hours on the storefront clearly listed Sundays as being open. But whatever, my toes are a lovely french tip pedicure and I feel relaxed and calm. Seriously, if you’ve never had a pedicure, there’s nothing better. It’s a foot bath/massage! Glorious.

After that… I did taxes! With help from my parents. And Tommy. And Heineken. But still, accomplished none the less. And after looking over my state and federal income taxes the fam and I had a sneaky suspicion that my taxes from last year may have been done incorrectly. And bam, they totally were, so we filled out an amendment for last year’s taxes and hopefully I’ll get all the money that’s due sometime soon. And double plus good? The feds do direct deposit. Small point of contention is the fact that the NC revenue folks are already saying that they’re running behind on refunds, so hopefully the feds will move quickly.

…

HA! Who am I kidding? Red tape =/= fast moving. Oh government, you obnoxiously cumbersome rascal, you.

Anyway, I think I’ve decided to forever eschew the idea of buying a mattress in honor of Presidents day.  From now on, on this most sacred holiday, I’ll get a pedicure and do my taxes. This way, when I get stressed out over the weird wording of the state income tax form (because, let’s be honest, the 1o40EZ is a piece of cake), I can look down at my freshly polished and massaged tootsies and smile.

The forefathers would have wanted it that way.

President Lincoln Agrees with Presidential Pedicures... FOR AMERICA!

Monetary Investment

In a lot of ways, I’m totally weird. I’m sure this is a total surprise.

*crickets*

Thought so. Anyway, I’m so weird (HOW WEIRD ARE YOU?) that I was eligible for a scholarship in high school because I wrote an essay about how weird I am. True story. Well, as an adult I’ve tried to temper my weird quirks so that I could be less, well, quirky and more responsible. For example, now I’m  trying to commit to my resolutions and work on changing things, but putting just a little monetary investment into it. Some examples…

My lunch box!

I bought mine at Staples, but I've seen red ones at Walmart. But I sooo love these polka dots.

I really wanted to commit to making my lunches and as weird as it may seem, buying this adorable lunch box by BYO has really helped me to pack my lunch almost all the time. There has only been about two times that I haven’t packed my lunch for a meal, which is helping me save so much money.

My new running shoes!

Mine aren't exactly like these, but because my pair were on sale, they don't offer them online any more.

I’ve been trying to work out more, because, well, I need to, but my old shoes were starting to wear a bit more. I knew I was in the market for a new pair, but it wasn’t totally urgent. However, when Kohl’s was having a huge clearance I knew it was my time to upgrade and it has made a big difference. These shoes are much more comfortable and I’m more committed to getting to the gym and working out. For 20 bucks, they are totally worth it and are making a huge impact.

Some new wardrobe pieces…

My lovely new purple coat from ModCloth.com

My favorite new cardigan from Gap

They say you should dress to reflect the where you wanna be in life and I’m trying to pick out some pieces that will help me in my career as I continue to grow. Hopefully. We’ll see.

Anyway, these little purchases are really helping me to grow up and stay committed to the changes I want to make. It’s kind of nice.

Also, rewarding yourself with a latte every now and then helps, too.

Vernacular

Once again I’m tired after a long day and psyching myself up about something super exciting. Which I don’t wanna jump the gun with by sharing about it yet, but rest assured, I’ll share when the time is right.

Something I stumbled across today, via ModCloth’s blog, was a totally neato site that made my word-loving heart swell with joy. It’s a site called SaveTheWords.org and it’s trying to promote the use of words that are not so popular any more.

You can pick your own word of many!

In light of recent articles discussing how kids are doing poorly in English and school because of terrible spelling and vocabulary brought on by a crippling T9 dependency, I love this initiative. It’s from Oxford, so obviously it’s advertising and not just jargon philanthropy.

But hey! If there’s anything I love it’s a good marketing campaign, especially one so clearly aimed at logophile like moi.

Obviously, you’re just dying to know what words I adopted. Drum roll pleeeeeeeeeeeeeease!

Vacivity & Foppotee

They even send you a nifty little adoption certificate. Eeee!

Adorably enough, the site’s motif includes those little squiggle lines you see when a word is misspelled. These rarely used words have gone so far out of use that they receive the little red squiggles, so it’s a nice little tie in to an iconic image.

And now to leave you with my two words in two sentences.

Louie had made himself the out to be quite the foppotee in cooking class after he tried to boil a liquid in a covered pot. Had he checked the vacivity of the pot before turning on the burner, he would have gotten hot water and would not have ended up with a charred part.

Ok, kiddies, time to hit the hay! Let me know if you figured out the definitions of the words just by reading the sentences and without looking it up.

Snow Way

There is a lot of grumbling about there being some snow/ice/wintery mix/crap sometime Friday night and maybe all day Saturday. They’re calling for obscene amounts of precipitation and around these parts that is never a good thing. Sadly for our area, rarely do we ever get 3 inches of nicely perfect snow. No, what we usually get is ice/rain/snow that turns into gray slush all over the land. It’s not that pretty. Last winter we had a few pretty days of snow, but that was such a rare occurrence I’d be shocked if it happened again.

Regardless of what ends up falling, my state does not handle it well. In fact I think the RTP might handle massive spontaneous wildfires better than it handles snow/ice. The January of my senior year of high school we had some snow which ended up being maybe about half an inch of ice in some places, which wouldn’t have been too bad had people not freaked out. Children had to stay overnights in schools, people were abandoning their cars on major roads because traffic was at a standstill, some people were stuck in traffic for about 5 hours on a route that normally would have taken about 45 minutes. This, of course, made national news and basically everyone in America made fun of us because we just couldn’t get our acts together. Yep, definitely a proud moment.

That having been said, lemme give a few tips for those of you who have a tendency to lose your mind if you see wet, cold stuff falling from the sky.

DO NOT GO OUTSIDE AND DRIVE IF YOU DO NOT NEED TO.

I don’t care if you have 4-wheel drive or not, stay inside. People tend to zoom around ON ICE like their cars can handle it, but it doesn’t matter what kind of car you have, if there’s ice it can be dangerous. If you need to drive, drive prudently. Be careful of wind, black ice and other nastiness.

Ok, that’s about it. Be safe, Carolinians! And please don’t embarrass me on national news any more, mmk?

Shaken

Truth be told, I’m not feeling too well tonight. I thought about talking for a bit about the Conan/Leno thing, but that was yesterday before the earthquake in Haiti.

I’m not gonna say much, because… Well, I’d just be adding noise. There are families grieving and a town left in ruin. I’m definitely praying for all those affected, as I know people all over the world are doing. But just as a side note, check out the Red Cross’s site or other places online and see about what, if anything you can do… Also, tonight my mom had on a political pundit show on briefly and they were talking about the cost of our country’s involvement. Listen, I know things like this can get political and I know our country’s deeply in-debt, but let’s just focus on sending positive support, ok? Thanks.

Anyway, here’s a picture that speaks more than I ever could…

If you’d like to see more here’s a link that has some pretty powerful photos. As a word to the wise, some of the pictures are graphic.

Pray, y’all.

An Open Letter

Hey there,

You know who you are. *sigh* I regret that I’ve had to take to this medium to communicate, but I feel like I have no other way to reach you.

Every time I see you we share an awkward glance and I stumble a bit. Your presence certainly trips me up. The moments we conveniently run-in to each other seem a little more than a coincidence. It’s like the fates have conspired or the planets have aligned. There must be a divine reason for the seemingly never-ending amount of encounters we seem to share. Divine or devilishly inconvenient.

I’ve tried not heading to that room at the times I know you’ll be there, but you always seem to match my clock. It’s a strange predicament I’m in, because where the mere thought of you used to unnerve me, I find that I’ve come to accept you. Although, if I’m being completely honest, I don’t think I’ll ever be truly comfortable with you.

And so, person who brushes her teeth in the public restrooms, I guess I have to resign to the fact that you will always freaking be there.

Sincerely (learning to get over stage fright),
K

Oh Nine Sums it Up

Even if you don’t listen to my blathering on about generational divides and the changing courses of the blahblahblahs, get off my lawn, kind of stuff. I’d recommend you watching this video. After that, we can discuss.

The original is here, but WordPress doesn’t embed vimeo videos… Which makes me wonder if I should tumblr…. Anyway.

This video is great, because it really shows how much smaller the generational divide is becoming. They don’t recognize the sound of dial-up! I watched You’ve Got Mail the other day and it starts with the sounds of dial up and I thought about how these kids would have no idea what the heck that noise was… Or probably why AOL would be so popular. Hm. Anyway, I hope this gives you something to discuss.

Till tomorrow, kidlets!

Twenty Ten Resolves

New Year. New attitude. New resolves. I don’t just wanna make resolutions I wanna make some life changes. It’s a new decade, kids, let’s kick out the jam, turn the page and all that nonsense . Which means you may notice a few blog posts missing. No point in looking back on what I didn’t do. It’s time to plan for what I will do.

Let’s start over. Get this thing set right. With a list. Bam.

1. Blog everyday for the next 100 days. If I plan on being on vacay or away from a computer or some such apocalyptic nonsense, I’ll post via the publish later option. Meaning, I’ll plan them out. It’s not cheating. It’s planning ahead.
2. Pack my lunch at least three times in a work week. I know this is a random decision, but I bought a new lunch bag and I want to leave work early to beat traffic. How is this done? Lunch packing! Applesauce and juice box optional. Also, moneys are saved.
3. Work out 45 minutes twice a week. Obviously, I should be doing more than twice a week, but I’m trying to set goals I know I can achieve right now. This is something totally doable.
4. Read one book a month. When I was a receptionist, I was averaging about 5 books a month, so this should be easy to do.  Book reviews/synopsis to be posted here.
5. Do a writing challenge at least once a week, with four weeks in a month, post at least two of them a month. Y’all don’t need to read all of my brain farts, but I should let you see how I’m challenging myself. Writing challenges count as a blog post.

These goals are pretty easily accomplished. With goals it’s best to set something that’s time sensitive and quantifiable/measurable. These goals meet that, yo. They’re small but simple… I have a few other goals I’m considering testing out. But we’ll see how this goes. They have to do with dating, jobs and living arrangements. Stuff currently too embarrassing to share with digital strangers such as yourselves. But don’t worry, you’ll share in my silliness soon enough.

Oh. In other new year news, I’m a part of Second Cinema now. So, lookout world!

Sweet. So, one post down, 99 more to go. Promise.