Sara

Blog Moved To...

2008-07-14T16:27:00.002-05:00

http://jeremysara.blogspot.com

It's for both of us. But still mainly about me, of course.

Yay

2008-05-09T02:27:00.003-05:00

I have designed and purchased business cards. They're very simple but designed well. Perfect when looking for a design or art job. Now the job hunt begins. I have a very long list of design firms and architecture firms and home builders to send my resume too. As well as some vets, who get a different resume because at one point I was going to be a veterinarian so I've taken all the relevant classes to assist a vet. I've even stuck my hand into a cow's stomach. Smelly. I'm currently still working at the magazine because although graduates are supposed to be terminated from their jobs on May 9th, my boss argued to keep me through the summer so I have three months for my job search.

My husband takes the DAT on June 16. Applies to dental school on June 1. We've picked 15. And yes to all my Ablog friends, Richmond is one of those 15. The Virginias, North Carolina, Boston, New York, Arizona, Dallas, Minnesota, California, Pennsylvania...we're applying everywhere. I'm personally rooting for Dallas because that's where we'd like to settle eventually. They give preference to residents of Texas and Utah! What a happy coincidence. But I'd be very happy with NYU, too, because I love New York City.

In fact, we just got back from NYC. My parents took us for my graduation present. The Metropolitan Museum was amazing and the Museum of Modern Art was my own personal heaven. I bought a print of Picasso's Les Demoiselles d'Avignon and we're putting it in our bathroom to shock people who tend to be shocked by art because really, if any art is going to shock someone who tends to be shocked by art it's Picasso's group of distorted prostitutes. Or, of course, Francis Bacon's Painting, 1946" but even I feel that is a bit much for my bathroom. It has tons of meaning and it's a very deep painting but it's also somewhat disturbing. Plus, they didn't sell that print. I also bought a Jackson Pollock print, of course, because I love him. And Andy Warhol's Campbell's soup can for the kitchen. Because it just makes sense. Sadly, they didn't sell any Franz Marc prints. I will have to buy those on the internet.

We also saw Wicked while we were there. It was fantastic. But we had the understudy Elphaba and she wasn't as good as the Elphaba we'd seen in Denver with the touring company. She just kind of spoke the high notes, almost like she couldn't reach them so she didn't try. But then she'd hit a fantastic high note and you'd think, "Well, why didn't you do that when it was REALLY important during Defying Gravity?" But still, fantastic. It's coming to Utah next summer. I check daily to see if tickets are on sale yet.

Well, that's pretty much caught everyone up so I'm off to bed. I have Friday's off with my husband because I go to work insanely early to get Friday's off so while it's not strictly necessary that I go to bed, I'm getting tired seeing as it is 2 a.m. and I've been up since 5:45 a.m.

Oh, and I didn't fail statistics. It's the most failed class at BYU. Leaving it until my last semester wasn't my best idea ever but it worked out. Studying for the final had me in hysterics because I just turned dumb for one day there and couldn't figure anything out, but the actual test went incredibly well.

12 More Days

2008-03-31T15:30:00.003-05:00

Twelve more days of class and I will be officially done with college (minus the walking and the cap and gown).

I should really start sending out my resume and putting together my design portfolio. I have my eyes on a few architects here that I think would be fantastic to work for, including a couple of national companies that might have an office in the city we end up in for dental school, which could mean I could just transfer when we moved and I wouldn't have to worry about searching for a job again. I have until August when I have to give up my job (sad) because I will no longer have a "student" status.

Also looking for illustration jobs. I work for a magazine right now, so maybe something will open up this summer and I'll just move on upstairs. Doubtful because I believe we tend to hire out for illustration, but you never know. Maybe that's just because they haven't had any illustrators apply.

I'm also taking that preveterinary preceptorship class in the Spring. It runs a rescu shelter so I'll learn all I need to know to be a vet tech which would also be a perfect job for me because animals are involved. Either way, I've taken all the interior design classes here at BYU and I've taken the animal nutrition classes and whatnot here as well. And I've just always been good at drawing and painting. So I have options. No need to freak out.

Get me out of here

2008-02-20T17:18:00.005-06:00

I've been trying to find a job in either art or design because I graduate in April and it'd be nice to know my options. Utah has zero opportunities. There is a staggering lack of art museums around here. The only design job I found is for Bassett Furniture. I don't want to be a salesman. I don't do well with sales. I want to work for an actual interior design firm where I actually design, not sell existing furniture and just help people arrange it. Graphic design jobs are everywhere, interior design is nowhere. We need to move to Dallas. Or New York City or somewhere equally job-equipped. Or I need to open my own business, but there's no point here because we're moving to some unknown state in a year and a half. My mom is gathering up a list of all the architecture firms she used to work with while she was working here. Hopefully there will be a design job somewhere in there.

It's Jeremy's birthday tomorrow. He'll be 25. He's getting golf clubs (fairway woods, not a whole set of clubs because that's crazy expensive and he already has a set), a bowling ball, and an iPod nano. I got a bowling ball too because there's no point in getting one for one of us and having the other use a ball that doesn't fit their hands. Hopefully I'll like bowling more with my own ball and my own shoes (I can't wear bowling shoes from the alley--gross). We joined the Tucano's birthday club for both of us, so we each get a free meal for our birthdays. That was fun. But Jeremy is saving The Spaghetti Factory for his birthday night dinner because their free birthday dessert is out-of-this-world better than the ones they charge for. It's amazing.

Apple is coming out with a new shuffle in 2gb. I have a green, pink and silver one already (one for the gym, one for rock and one for pop music). I caught a glimpse of new colors, but now I can't find it anywhere on the internet. There was a fantastic plum colored one that I feel a need to purchase. I'm hoping they actually do come in that color. If so, that'll be my "favorite songs" shuffle.

Anthropologie Item of the Day

My Sephora Addiction, Shopping Snobbery and Greece

2008-02-08T14:36:00.000-06:00

As we walk into Sephora:
Salesperson: "Can I help you find anything?"
Jeremy (to me): "This is a makeup store. Like any girl would walk in here and say, 'Oh no! I'm lost!'"

That quote came to mind because I'm almost out of makeup so that means I need to make both a trip to Sephora.com (we don't have one in Utah, it's a shame, it really is a fantastic place) and Macy's because I happened to run out of pretty much everything at once. All I have left is my Chanel mascara and my makeup brushes. Sometimes I wish that I was one of those "drugstore girls," but then I look at the complexions of most "drugstore girls" and realize why I'm a makeup snob. I have highly sensitive skin--even wind freaks my entire body out--so I have to use Clarins, Lancome and Givenchy. Givenchy is my favorite, but when I can get by with a bottle of Clarins foundation for $30 less than a bottle of Givenchy foundation and everything turns out alright in the end, I'll do it. I won't give up my Givenchy powder, though. Thank goodness I have a husband who is just fine with my anti-cheap attitude.

I am also a clothes snob. Anthropologie is one of the only places I really shop. Because of this I actually buy stuff much less frequently than I would if I had another favorite store. But it's really a money pit. My mom jokingly calls it "Philanthropy" because all of our money goes there. We share this store as a favorite store which makes for fantastic over-the-phone shopping dates--her in Minneapolis and me in Salt Lake. We went there for her birthday. She got a cookbook and some salt and pepper shakers, I contemplated a shirt but realized that I needed nice, non-plastic cereal bowls more and ended up getting those. I'm happy with that purchase because the bowls really do make me happy, especially filled with frozen strawberries for a snack. Yum.

These are reasons why I'm glad I got lucky enough to marry a man who wants to be an orthodontist.

My brother-in-law Colby just got his LDS mission call to Athens, Greece. I'm very excited for him, especially since that is the one place in the world that I want to go most (my major emphasis here at BYU is Greek art and history--which it is very difficult to do anything with after graduation, which is why I've decided to be a vet tech--more on that later). So yay for Colby. I told him that Jeremy and I would be happy to come pick him up when he's done. I was planning on taking Jeremy somewhere for his graduation present (my parents are taking us to NYC for mine in April/May) and we were thinking Paris because hey, I can speak the language and it'd be a really great time, but maybe we'll switch it to Athens. I'd rather go there even though I can't speak the language.

Addition:

I was looking at shoes today at Anthropologie and ran across these:

All currently out of my price range, but I'm lusting.

I really am not that fantastic at blogging...

2008-02-01T14:55:00.001-06:00

I don't do it often enough. I should fix that.

I went back to my old hangout, the Achenblog, today. Fantastic place. Realized I just missed J.A. being here, on my campus. I should really visit D.C. sometime and go to a BPH with everyone. I was actually offered D.C. for my graduation trip from my parents but I chose NYC because I've been to D.C. I've also been to NYC but with a choir group and boy was that a fiasco. Our tour guide was useless. He took us to FAO Schwartz. Now, it is a fantastic toy store. But we were all seniors in high school and I guarantee that each of the girls there was looking wistfully down Fifth Avenue wondering why we ran past all those magnificent shopping experiences to come to a toy store. So I chose NYC so that we could do it right. My parents took me to D.C. and we did that right, now it's New York's turn. I'm currently wrestling with the idea of putting out $450 for Wicked tickets on Broadway. They have some left. Orchestra seating. It's very tempting, but I've seen Wicked already and it's cheaper in Chicago and we can easily hop on the train to Chicago from my parent's house this summer during our visit.

I've taken every Tuesday off this year. It's as if I get through Monday and think, "Okay, time for a break." I only have one class and I don't have to work on Tuesdays. I think this trend will continue.

I got an A on my thesis. I didn't even look at my other grades. (Later I did, but the first time I checked them I just saw that and thought, "Whew, I can graduate.") It was a relief. And then I forgot to go and pick it up for future proof that yes, my future children's mother got an A on her thesis. They'll just have to take my word for it.

Done

2007-12-26T01:07:00.001-06:00

My thesis is done. I have turned it in. I have presented it. My finals are done. The semester is over. Whew.

Relaxation for two and a half weeks. Yes, short break, but at least we get out for summer early.

Christmas was fantastic. I got a diamond ring (it was on sale, I played the "I want that" wife card) and clothes and Anthropologie goodies. I got Jeremy a bunch of clothes that he's wanted and a camelback for when he goes golfing. Don't want a dehydrated husband.

Now for sleep. In the hustle and bustle I've managed to become slightly sick. Bad cough and general ickiness. Time for sleeping.

Birthday!

2007-11-02T00:19:00.000-05:00

I have another French oral exam on Monday. Crap. Hives are guaranteed because, I'm not gonna lie, I have not paid much attention to the last two chapters.

I also realized this week that I have a paper on the Justinian and Theodora mosaics in the church of San Vitale in Ravenna, Italy due on Tuesday. 12 pages. Haven't started.

And Tuesday is my birthday, so I have to be done by Monday because I don't go to school on my birthday.

And my thesis in its final completed form is due next Friday.

After next week the rest of the semester should be breezy. But why oh why did this hectic week have to fall on my BIRTHDAY WEEK?! Doesn't fate know that my birthday is a full one to two week celebration which should not be marred by countless papers and tests (oh, yes, Mesoamerican test next Thursday, too)? Where's the justice? I should be able to kick back and relax, enjoy my multiple cakes from multiple sources who also realize just how important my birthday is and do some recreational reading rather than non-recreational writing and reading.

Can you tell I'm burned out? April and that cap and gown really can't come fast enough.

My Thesis is Almost Done

2007-10-15T00:11:00.001-05:00

The first draft, anyway. I spent 6 hours just typing typing typing today. My right palm muscle feels bruised. Think what you want, but I think that's some pretty intense typing. I've never worn out my palms typing before.

My husband got a new computer game so I was free to concentrate solely on the thesis without feeling like I should be talking to him more. Because of the 6 hours and intense focus I finally have a clear direction. For the past month and a half I've been writing the practicums for the thesis class and none of them have given me any direction because, really, what does Freud know about Aztecs and their cosmology? There are certain aspects of Aztec and Mayan life that Freud could apply to (like the genital bloodletting to re-birth the gods--ouch) but that's still not as mentally twisted as Freud tends to be. Most of the time I was able to manipulate the topics so that I could write a somewhat coherent short paper, but a couple of them just completely threw me for a loop. Feminism and the Aztec culture in general? Sure, in a round-about way. Feminism and the Aztec Calendar Stone in particular? Not really. The binary opposition was the easiest paper, but I'm getting sidetracked. None of them helped me with the direction of my thesis, which was their intended purpose and that is why the thesis class was changed last year to include practicums into the curriculum. (I personally think that was a mistake because modern day theories often do not lend themselves to ancient or non-western art for the most part--there are exceptions, but for the most part, no.) But after reading reading reading books and articles and journals and microfilms of codices I finally have direction just in the nick of time. I'm very relieved. I can have this first draft done by Thursday so I have time to get feedback from my adviser before the theses are even due for peer review.

It's all about the purpose of the stone. It was for sacrifices to the sun. So my paper is all about the reason for the sacrifices, how they were done, and the iconography on the stone reinforcing the use and meaning of the stone. To be honest, the more I read the more morbid I think it is, but I see how it was absolutely necessary to their religion so I'm completely fine with the turn that my thesis has taken. It's incredibly interesting to me and I'm not even worried about the symposium when I'll have to present the paper (not yet, at least...). I just need to get down the pronunciations (hey, I spelled it in English! I'm constantly spelling that word in French lately). Huitzilopochtli, Nanahuatzin, Coyolxauhqui and Centohuitznahua are not words common to my vocabulary but are also words that I really would like to avoid tripping over during the presentation. I'd like to appear that I know this topic backwards and forwards.

Unneeded French Stress

2007-10-08T15:52:00.000-05:00

I did a fantastic job! She said my speed on my reading passage was perfect and that I had the vocab ("mon vol" - my flight) down wonderfully! And I didn't even get hives!

Now for my written Mesoamerican test at 4 this afternoon. I'm not as worried about that one. If there is a civilization I know . . . well, it's Greek. But Mesoamerican probably ties.

Oh, and this morning we locked both sets of keys in the car while the car was running.

I was dropping Jeremy off for class so I got out of my side, locked my door and closed it. He got out of his door, apparently locked it, but left it open for me. Well, we were on a hill so the door closed. That was good for a laugh.

French Stress and My Husband, the Fashion Maven

2007-10-08T00:45:00.001-05:00

I cried tonight. Because of French. That's a new low. But I have my Mesoamerican art midterm tomorrow and really, the deities are very confusing. Lots of X's in the names. Hard to remember the difference between One Hunahpu, Seven Hunahpu and just plain ol' Hunahpu. Of course, I remember (One and Seven are brothers and One is plain ol' Hunahpu's father, and Xbalanque is his twin brother and they were born from his [One Hunahpu's] spit that impregnated Lady Blood after his [One Hunahpu's] head was cut off in the underworld (Xibalba) and was planted and a tree grew that apparently still had spit in it...and could talk. But still. Stressful. And tomorrow I have a French oral exam. So I cried because I don't like to look like an idiot and there was a good chance that I would. But then I got myself together and wrote out all the possible conversation topics that could come up and came up with canned phrases that can be used for any subtopics within those topics, and some of the phrases even transcend topics. So if I know those, I'm good. And I figure if I stick in something like, "Il faut pour mon bonheur" (It is necessary for my happiness) after I say something like, "Mon mari faire la vaiselle and ranger la salle de bains" (My husband does the dishes and cleans up the bathroom) I can get a laugh out of her and voila! Time killed.

Speaking of my husband, he's incredibly great with fashion. I mean, before he met me he was pretty good with it, but now he's amazing. I needed a new jacket. I have a great coat, but not one single fall jacket to my name. So we embarked upon a trip to the mall and after several stores with no luck (well, there was luck in Banana Republic where we found a kelly green wool jacket that was the stuff dreams are made of and I was trying to justify the $218 for a jacket until I finally decided that'd be stupid when there was probably one somewhere else for under $100) we ended up in the Gap. Not only did he beeline to the best men's coat in the place (because he has jackets, but no coats) but he also beelined to the best fudge colored mid-thigh length jacket with big buttons for moi (see, utilizing my French). It's the best jacket ever. It goes great with my blue eyes and newly red hair. Then he found me a very Audrey Hepburn-esque sweater jacket. He's still hard to convince when it comes to things that aren't "classic" looking, but he's got the classic fashion down. I never have to worry what he'll come up with for Christmas. It's always from Anthropologie and it's always fantastic. He feels really proud when he finds something that I adore. He was in fine form this weekend. Of course there are also the times when I find something I adore and he thinks I'm being sarcastic...

Midterms, Masters and a PhD?

2007-10-05T23:40:00.000-05:00

I have two big midterms next week, a French oral exam (shoot me) and I have to have made headway on my as-yet-unstarted thesis because I have to meet with my adviser sometime next week. I'll probably put it off until the next Tuesday during his office hours so that it gives me the weekend to bang it out so that for the rest of the semester I can just revise, have it looked at, revise, have it looked at, etc . . . until it's due and I have to present it. Ugh. Present it. In front of people. Oddly, I'm much more panicked about the idea of French oral exams than I am about presenting my thesis at a symposium. If anyone is in town on December 7th and looking for something to do and is feeling a distinct lack of Aztec art in their lives, feel free to come to my thesis presentation. It's on the Aztec Calendar Stone.

Today during my thesis class we were talking about post-structuralism, structuralism, hermeneutics (I'd never heard of it before this either), deconstruction and Foucault. I love that class. It's so much more fun than any other class I've taken during my college career. We just sit around in a conference room and discuss. I was in charge of the structuralism/post-structuralism discussion. The Master's program was also brought up. For a few minutes I was very intrigued. And then I remembered that I'm very burnt out. The last thing I want to do is graduate in April and start my Masters in April, too. On top of that, I really do not want to learn another language right now. French is enough for me. I will get my Master's (and if we end up in New York or something, Sotheby's Graduate program here I come -- it's the best one I've run across so far. Plus, it's Sotheby's. What I wouldn't give to say, "I studied art and art history at Sotheby's in New York City." That's the best sentence that could ever come out of my mouth.) but I won't be getting it at BYU. BYU has one of the most comprehensive art history Master's programs in the nation, but I'm not going on to get my PhD so if I get my Master's at whatever college we end up for Jeremy's dental school (say, University of Minnesota--I love their art history program) it is not like I'll be getting a second rate education, nor will I feel less prepared for my PhD because like I said, I don't plan on getting a PhD. At least right now. Though the PhD holds quite a bit of allure. The dissertation to get the PhD, however, not quite as much allure. Though if I really think about it, I would really like a PhD. Even if my plan is just to be a stay-at-home mom who paints and sells her paintings on eBay and such. It'd be nice to have.

On the lighter side of things, we re-did our apartment. Changed the office and the bedroom colors so the bedroom is now blues rather than reds and browns--it's much more relaxing. Plus, I love my paintings above the bed.

Updates in the Life of Sara

2007-09-27T23:52:00.000-05:00

Bullet form updates because there's much too much to catch up on for full length sentences.

Currently writing my thesis. It's on the Aztec Sun Stone. I'll be glad when I'm done with it and have finally presented it in December.
I hate my French class more and more with each passing day because (and I'll own up to this) I am awful with languages. I'm not ashamed of that fact. I'm very okay with that fact.
I have been painting a lot more lately. I'm not so intimidated by my paint brush anymore. I'm also not intimidated by my pencils anymore. It's fantastic.
I'm a senior in college. Finally. I'm very over school. I've always been the brainy chick. I'm quite done with that. I'm content to be the stay-at-home artsy chick who likes to decorate and paint and who occasionally breeds her corgis.
I have a torn right bicep muscle and currently can't lift anything heavier than a fork. Not exaggerating. Pop cans cause excruciating pain.
The aforementioned torn bicep muscle has put a damper on my recently acquired nightly racquetball hobby. I'm going out of my mind without it.
I feel very inadequate lately. School-wise. I've been pulling great grades. I even pulled an A on my French test (no one was more surprised than me, let me tell you). But I'm still feeling inadequate. It might be because I'm surrounded by people who are all hyped about school right now because they're not seniors still having to take care of their French requirement for the art history major. It might be because I don't care and these gung-ho girls surrounding me make me feel inadequate because I just don't have that level of enthusiasm lately and I feel like I should. It also might be because I am an idiot for feeling inadequate merely because I'm quite ready to graduate and I realize that I'm an idiot for feeling inadequate for that.
My step-sister is getting married in a month and she is making the bridesmaids get dresses from David's Bridal. I thought that brides these days had realized that actual "bridesmaid dresses" are generally hideous and can never be used again. I allowed her to get a dress from Banana Republic or Anthropologie for my wedding. This is how she repays me. With taffeta. Shiny blue taffeta. David's Bridal is an abomination of a store.
Jeremy had to get a root canal on a tooth that hadn't been filled correctly years ago so is now dead--$969. That was really fun. Love handing over the debit card for that.
If I don't start doing better on my diet I'll throw myself off a cliff. My doctor put me on a medication for my nerve pain (which WASN'T nerve pain) that caused a 25 lb weight gain in....drum roll please...1.5 months. Yes. One and one half months. Unnatural! And completely awful. Come to find out that the pain I've had all my life is because of a magnesium deficiency and all I needed to do was go to the health foods store and buy some Dolomite (which is a fancy name for Calcium and Magnesium in one little pill). $3.69. I was paying $60 a month for the Lyrica. $3.69 for 6 months of Dolomite and the best part is, I can finally lose the weight instead of battling intensely to keep it from continuing to go up on that stupid medication. (Why don't doctors get the whole "vitamins and minerals" thing? Tons of tests and they never thought, "Hey, let's check her magnesium levels.") So that's my current pre-occupation. Getting back to where I was pre-Lyrica. It's slow, but I'm getting there. I feel pray to the Symphony chocolate bar this week. And hot chocolate because it's unseasonably cold here.
The feeling of inadequacy I mentioned earlier may also be because of this weight.
I purchased a new Macbook for the writing of my thesis. It's a lifesaver and I love it. I currently can't lift it very easily though because of my injured arm. I can lift it with my left hand but it's awkward because I'm just not used to that.
Someone offered to buy my paintings the other day. I'm very excited about that. I plan on opening an eBay store now that I know that hey, people like what I do. So we'll see how the eBay store thing goes.

And that is about it for now. I plan on writing with more frequency from now on.

Art and Fear: Fears about Yourself

2007-08-24T00:00:00.000-05:00

Today at work I stumbled across a book on our bookshelves here in the studio titled Art and Fear: Observations on the Perils (and Rewards) of Artmaking. It explores the way that art is created, the reasons it often fails to be created and the difficulties that a lot of artists face, causing them to give up on their art along the way. I thought it would be an interesting read, and since I had nothing else to do at the moment, I picked it up. I read the entire book today. It was fantastic and it applied to myself in sections.

At one point the book explored the connection between art and fear. Fears about yourself and fears about others. The "Fears About Yourself" section (with this highly suitable quote at the beginning: "We have met the enemy and he is use. - Pogo") states that fears about artmaking fall into two categories: fears about yourself and fears about your reception by others. Fears about yourself often prevent you from creating your best work, while fears of reception from others prevent you from doing your own work. The part that stuck out to me the most in this section, however, was the section titled "Pretending."

The fear that you're only pretending to do art is the (readily predictable) consequence of doubting your own artistic credentials. After all, you know better than anyone else the accidental nature of much that appears in your art, not to mention all those elements you know originated with others (and even some you never even intended by which the audience has read into your work). From there it's only a short hop to feeling like you're just going through the motions of being an artist. It's easy to imagine that real artists know what they're doing, and that they--unlike you--are entitled to feel good about themselves and their art. Fear that you are not a real artist causes you to undervalue your work.

The chasm widens even further when your work isn't going well, when happy accidents aren't happening or hunches aren't paying off. If you buy into the premise that are can be made only be people who are extra-ordinary, such down periods only serve to confirm that you aren't.

This is my problem. Every time I sit down in front of my canvas surrounded by my brushes and paint, I think, "What if I'm awful? What if I have no ideas? What if I'm just trying to be an artist and failing miserably and everyone around me only says I have talent because they care about me? What if I don't actually have any talent and I'm just playing at painting and drawing?" Once I start painting I get over these initial questions because really, they don't matter. It's just me and the canvas and my head and I can do whatever comes to mind because whatever I put down on that canvas will be my art. My version of art. The book goes on to make a good point about this very thought process:

But while you may feel you're just pretending that you're an artist, there's no way to pretend you're making art. Go ahead, try writing a story while pretending your writing a story. Not possible. Your work may not be what curators want to exhibit or publishers want to publish, but those are different issues entirely.

In other words, if you're making art, you are an artist in your own right. Whether or not you will eventually get your dreamed of one-man exhibit and sell your painting or whether or not your book is picked up by a publishing house isn't the relevant issue in this matter. If you are making art, you're an artist.

This fear of pretending goes hand in hand with the next question that I often ask myself. How much talent, if any, do I actually have for art?

Talent, in common parlance, is "what comes easily." So sooner or later, inevitably, you reach a point where the work doesn't come easily and--Aha!, it's just as you feared! Wrong. By definition, whatever you have is exactly what you need to produce your best work. There is probably no clearer waste of psychic energy than worrying about how much talent you have—and probably no worry more common. This is true even among artists of considerable accomplishment.

Even at best talent remains a constant, and those who rely upon that gift alone, without developing further, peak quickly and soon fade to obscurity . . . Artists get better by sharpening their skills or by acquiring new ones; they get better by learning to work, and by learning from their work.

Talent may get someone off the starting blocks faster, but without a sense of direction or a goal to strive for, it won't count for much. The world is filled with people who were given great natural gifts, sometimes conspicuously flashy gifts, yet never produce anything. And when that happens, the world soon ceases to care whether they are talented.

Looking back, I think I must have some talent. I was able to pick up that pencil and draw a very good picture for someone who had never drawn before. The first time I created a painting, it made sense. My colors turned out exactly how I wanted them to and the finished product pretty well matched what I had in my head when I started the painting. So really, I was able to get off the starting blocks pretty fast. I really do think that my greatest talent lies in my colorist abilities. I know exactly how to mix cornflower blue paint. I can look at a color and say, "That purple has been mixed with yellow and white has been added to turn it into a tone."

So I know I have some artistic talent, even if it doesn't go beyond colors. But like I've already said. I was able to get off the starting blocks quickly. It didn't require much thought. I never learned how to draw or paint, I just did it. So my ever-present worry of "Do I actually have any talent at all?" is really baseless. What I should be asking myself is, "Do I actually have any direction at all? Do I know what I want to paint and where I want to go with it?" Most of the time, yes. Sometimes, no. Those are the times that I really do hope for happy accidents. Most of the time the "happy accidents" fates smile on me. Sometimes they don't. And that's when I question myself. But I really do need to learn that I don't need to question my talent. It's there. It's my direction that I need to question. It's my drive that I need to keep up. If I keep going, talent with aid me. But if I give up, talent won't do me any good.

I also need to recognize that talent doesn't equal perfection, and perfection doesn't equal good art.

If you think good work is somehow synonymous with perfect work, you are headed for big trouble. Art is human; error is human; ergo, art is error. Inevitably, your work will be flawed. Why? Because you're a human being, and only human beings, warts and all, make art.

Ansel Adams, never one to mistake precision for perfection, often recalled the old adage that "the perfect is the enemy of the good," his point being that if he waited for everything in the scene to be exactly right, he'd probably never make a photograph. Adams was right: to require perfection is to invite paralysis.

I've never really expected perfection from my artwork, but I expect pretty close. I suppose I should start going for precision like Ansel Adams does. Do what you're doing as precisely and as well as you can and what you produce will be your best work at that time with what you had available to you. If I clung to the idea of perfection I would never advance in my artmaking. I would cling to what I know very well and what I know I can do perfectly. I'd never take artistic risks, I'd never discover new techniques or ideas. Requiring perfection really would invite paralysis. Requiring perfection would eventually lead you to quit because you'd stop working to avoid making (inevitable) mistakes.

This section of the book also addresses how expectations can also lead an artist to stop working. If expectations always exceed execution and an artist allows him- or herself to become overly bothered by differences between the expectations of the finished product and the actual finished product, this can lead to discouragement and eventually lead to quitting.

Given a small kernel of reality and any measure of optimism, nebulous expectations whisper to you that the work will soar, that it will become easy, that it will make itself. And now and then the sky opens and the work does make itself . . . Unfortunately, expectations based on illusion lead almost always to disillusionment.

I try not to have expectations. To be truthful, I rarely have any expectations at all when I am painting. Occasionally I will paint from expectations. More often, I just paint. When I'm drawing, however, I have expectations. High expectations. I suffer from the aforementioned expectations based on illusion. More often than not I reconcile any imperfections in the drawing with the overall appeal of the drawing and the overall quality of it. Sometimes, however, a drawing is relegated to a drawer, never to be seen again because I can't reconcile the imperfections with the rest of the drawing and I can't seem to fix them, either. To put it bluntly, I disown the drawing. I try not to think that I ever created that drawing.

This is a bad idea. If I am going to learn from my imperfections and learn not to have overly high expectations I need to own that drawing. I need to look at it and say, "I created this. I'm not exactly proud of it, it needs some work and these are the parts that need some work." By doing this I recognize my artistic shortcomings and I am able to advance my skills in those areas because I've brought them to my attention rather than burying them inside a dark drawer.

Shoot. Me.

2006-06-29T15:47:00.000-05:00

So I work in photography for BYU Magazine and law school publications and the university websites and stuff. I edit through the photos and put the good ones onto iView so that anyone in our network--specifically the designers--can see them, choose one, and let me know which one(s) they want in high-res form for their respective projects.

When I started working here in January the department had decided to try out Aperture, a new photo software for Mac computers, instead of using the typical combination of Photoshop and Bridge. My workflow went something like this:

Import the photos into Aperture from the digital card -- Watch it for an hour because importing into Aperture takes ridiculous amounts of time and slows down the computer so you cannot be productive in the meantime -- Edit through them -- Export them back out of Aperture onto one of the regular hard drives -- Watch it for another hour -- Convert the photos to low-res in Photoshop ridiculously fast -- put into iView. All together about 3 hours depending on the amount of pictures.

I finally convinced them that the workflow was a little on the insane side--Aperture added about three steps, adding up to between two and three hours of my day that could be spent doing more productive things than importing then exporting. So we went back to Bridge and Photoshop and my workflow went something like this:

Import the photos onto the hard drive from the digital card -- Edit through them -- Convert to low-res in Photoshop --Put into iView. All told, about 30 to 45 minutes, depending on the amount of pictures.

So I spent over a week exporting photos out of Aperture onto our regular hard drive to be used in Bridge.

Today, my boss--my exaperating boss--says, "I'm liking Aperture more and more. It has that magnifying glass." What? A magnifying glass? That's why you like Aperture?! I just looked at him. I didn't want to have to explain that it is much easier for him to pull the whole lot of photos over into Photoshop (takes roughly five seconds - select all, drag, it automatically opens with a little screen that you can scroll through and it does all the things that Aperture does) than it is for me to import and export continuously for no good reason other than his liking of the shift+ accent grave function that provides you with a magnifying glass.

It would take over 2 weeks to import everything back into Aperture. And then the ridiculously long workflow begins again.

Like I said, Shoot. Me.

Wedding Photos

2006-06-29T11:18:00.000-05:00

Wedding photo albums - online! I love the internet. I posted them to my facebook site for all my friends to see, then found out that I can share them with anyone--not just my high school and college friends that are members--just by giving this link.

http://byu.facebook.com/photos.php?id=17814918&l=3f1ad

Bridal Pictures

2006-05-24T18:08:00.000-05:00

So I had a session with my photographer--just me, her, my grandmother to help me carry my train, and my dress. Here are a few of the results. Unfortunately it was way too sunny that day for my blue eyes and I'm squinty in all of them. I photoshopped them (Jeremy got me Photoshop at home! Now I don't have to come into work to use it!) a bit to make my eyes look less squinty. I don't know that it worked.

This is turning into a photo blog as of late. I apologize. I will write again sometime soon. Probably after the honeymoon.

This last one was for Jeremy. He likes to golf. It said "Guest Services" on the side, but I photoshopped that out while still keeping the reflection. I am finally refining my photoshopping skills.

Engagement photos w/ Addendum

2006-04-12T00:32:00.001-05:00

I'm very proud of them so I'm going to have to post a few. In the second one I have some of the greatest hair I've ever had. I'm glad we got a photo of it.

This is our favorite

This is the magnificent hair. It just falls right. Click on it. Make it bigger. Prepare to oooo and ahhh.

Wishing my bangs weren't parted. Oh well.

I'm laughing instead of kissing him. Smooth.

And I'm laughing again. I kissed him "poorly" the first time (I puckered my lips--it just looked ridiculous), so I couldn't help but laugh the second time. And please excuse my George Washington profile.

I just like this one.

I'm done bragging about us now.

I had three 12-page papers due in the last 2 days. That was fun. Especially my Islamic Art paper. I'm just not interested by desert castles, which, unfortunately, I chose to write on. What was I thinking? They're like Steinbeck for me.

Finals are next week. That's all I want to say on that subject. That's all I want to think about on that subject.

I go for my dress fitting on Friday. I have a feeling it won't need alterations. The sample I tried on was the same size I need and it fit pretty much perfectly. A little long, but I remedied that with the shoes I purchased. I'm hoping I can bring it home on Friday. My grandparents are going with me.

Invitations go out in the next week or two. In all seriousness, if any Achenbloggers would like one, e-mail me at saramelander@gmail.com. I consider you all my friends. I ordered extras in case I forgot anyone or made a lot of new friends in the next month and a half.

I had my bridal shower last Saturday. Apparently about 27 were invited (I have yet to get my invitation--it got lost. Lucky I was told about it.) and about 40 showed up. How does that happen? Not that I'm complaining. An entire turkey was cooked for the luncheon so it wasn't like we were short on turkey sandwiches. And I got a haul. Everything from a trash can to a fold down ironing board to a sandwich maker to a decorative plate holder for the wall to lingerie. It was a lot of fun, too. I think there should be more bridal showers. I'm having another one in July when I go home to MN for the second reception. My best friend and my mother are collaborating.

I think that's about all for now.

Addendum:

Aroc reminded me about my neurological thing I've been going through. I had some nerve conduction tests that went fine and came back normal. So I had to have a spinal tap for the last test. That didn't go well. The tap didn't hurt, but it hurt afterward. And 48 hours later when I got up stiffly and took a shower, I got the spinal tap headache. My back hadn't healed while I was down. By that night I was almost crying like a baby and not ashamed to admit it because I've never had a headache like that (to hear Jeremy tell the story, though, he's never seen me so brave--I may be exaggerating about the crying) and so Jeremy took me to the ER where I got the blood patch. Had I known what the blood patch felt like I would have just stuck with the headache for a few days. That fluid would have stopped leaking on its own at some point. But no, I got the blood patch and wanted to die. The spinal tap came back looking pretty good and my vitamin levels are normal because I take vitamins. So they diagnosed me with an oversensitive nervous system and put me on a mild anti-depressant that isn't actually for depression, but for nerve pain. For the first time in 10 years I haven't feel pain or tingling for a whole two weeks. My feet also aren't nearly as claustrophobic. And I can keep my feet under the covers at night without them hurting. It's a great life.

The Life of Sara

2006-03-09T10:01:00.000-06:00

I'm not even going to apologize for not posting for over a month. I'd rather not even acknowledge it and just go on from here.

Lots of stuff has been going on. Good and bad. I'll bullet it for efficiency.

- Wedding planning is almost done. We've got the flowers, the cakes, the food, the music, the photographers, the decorator (I won centerpieces at a bridal show from the very decorator I was going to use), the dress (Third one I tried on)...I'm surprised at how easy it was. I've always loved organizing though, so it makes sense that I'd enjoy every minute of it. Our colors are citrus colors (white, orange, yellow, green and pink grapefruit). I have a bouquet of 2 dozen roses in those colors. Bridesmaids carry bouquets of green carnations. Jeremy has an orange rose. It works well. The wedding cake is lemon with white buttercream frosting, three square tiers with pink grapefruit ribbon around the base of each tier and decorated with mini citrus fruits. The groom's cake is spice with a sports car skidding across the top (we have a sports car--Mustang SVT Cobra convertible and it's Jeremy's baby) with chocolate bands around the base of each tier. It's two tier and round. Centerpieces are floral (all sorts of flowers in our colors) with limes cut up in the vases to add depth. Linens are yellow and white. My uncle Preston has an army band that travels all over the world to play and we got him for the music. We're having a dessert buffet. And last but definitely not least, my dress to the right (it's a Chanel--that excites me). You can click to enlarge and see details. It has great details. The back can be seen here. It has a gorgeous train. It's shown in champagne, but I got white. I'm traditional. Second choice was a Balenciaga, but I loved the details on the Chanel more overall. The front of the Balenciaga isn't as fun. It's also not as "me" as the one I chose. I went in planning to buy a flouncy ballgown type that I liked complete with tulle. I'd been admiring this Chanel from afar but I wasn't going to try it on because I knew I'd like it and it was out of my budget since I was buying my dress myself. But I gave in. I tried it on. I had to buy it. I have no buyer's remorse, either. I'm perfectly content and happy with my decision.

- Second item. Jeremy's parents are horrible. Because I'm quiet they think Jeremy shouldn't marry me and he will pretty much be disowned (just like their first daughter--she was disowned after she got married because her husband isn't exactly like their family either) when we get married. They just don't want to let go because they have made their children their lives. They don't even date. Without their kids around, I don't see their marriage holding up. Luckily they have 4 kids to go still. They've put us through hell. Jeremy is actually hoping they disown him so he won't feel obligated to go over there anymore. So now I NEVER go over and that makes them mad (Even though they've judged me to be unfit for them and they don't want me over there. Apparently I should keep trying to be who they want me to be and keep coming over for the criticism.) but neither of us want me to go over there. So at least it's a mutual decision. Even his younger brother has been sending me e-mails telling me that this is all my fault and I'm tearing the family apart. Dude. This all started just because they got mad because I was quiet and started chewing me out for it. This isn't my fault. This isn't Jeremy's fault. His dad is narcissistic to the hilt and has never been wrong. Never. And if you think differently, he'll flat out tell you that you're wrong and that you'll go to hell for thinking that way. I'm not exaggerating. He regularly tells his children that they're on their way to hell because they don't think they way he does and they should because he has it all right. And he's always telling his wife she's a bad mother. Hmmm....Someone needs to buy him a mirror. Or beat him up, I'd be satisfied with either.

- I have some sort of unknown neurological problem. I can be standing around or walking or sitting (so really it happens randomly) and suddenly all my limbs will feel like they've fallen asleep and start tingling for hours. (15 hours for my left arm is the record--that got annoying. That's when I finally went to the doctor.) And then after that stops I'm so tired that it's painful. MS was suspected because it runs in my family and I have all the symptoms (but MS mimics tons of other diseases so I haven't been that worried) but after a 2 hour (and absolutely terrifying) MRI last week it came back clear, so that's been ruled out. They're starting to think my nerves just aren't connected very well. I don't see that anything could be done about that, but at least we'll know what it is if that is the case. I have to have nerve conduction tests next week. Fun. I love needles.

- My mom was in town last week to do all the flower shopping and wedding dress shopping. She's hilarious. We had fun. And Jeremy loves her, so that's a plus. No contention anywhere in my family. I like the lack of contention.

- One of my best friends has a band called Ashbury. He's the lead singer. He's one of the smartest people I've ever met--we have funny conversations about Oedipus (trust me, it is possible). Anyway, he gets to open for Bon Jovi in Las Vegas. I had absolutely nothing to do with it obviously, but I feel it is my duty as a friend to tout him and Ashbury.

- I had a three hour midterm in Islamic Art and Architecture on Monday. I hate midterms. And they never seem to end. They're staggered. I have at least one test every week for the rest of the semester. I'm sufficiently tired of testing and writing papers.

- Everything is falling into our laps. For free (except the LoveSac). We have two couches (one that is ugly and will be put in the spare bedroom because it has a hide-a-bed and one that isn't ugly and will go in the living room). A dining set. Four vacuums. Four. I was worried that we would have a hard time getting one. I don't think we'll take all four of them--maybe 2. Two microwaves (in case one breaks, I guess). Bookshelves. A big screen TV with an entertainment center stand, so we have three TVs now. We got ourselves a LoveSac SuperSac for $100 cheaper than we had originally planned and we even got a better cover than planned. Sheets. Comforters. Quilts. KitchenAid. Coffee table. And this is before any showers or wedding gifts. I already have pots and pans and a new dish set with glasses and flatware. We have got to be the best equipped college couple around. I love people.

I should update

2006-01-27T14:17:00.000-06:00

Here's what has been going on:

- We found a wedding photographer. Finally. We love their pictures and the two ladies that do the photography (they can Photoshop their butts off, too, so we can get some cool effects in our pictures) so it should make for a fun and comfortable atmosphere. Plus, we get our negatives so we don't have to print the pictures through them. They also do custom invitations at a fraction of the price of other custom invitation places.

- My new job is great. I'm a photographer's assistant for a publications and graphics department here on campus. We also do freelance work. It's laid back and really fun. I'm working on a Mac computer though. I'm not a fan of Macs. But my monitors make my fiance jealous. I have two monitors--23" and 30". He almost drooled over them the first time he saw them. Another plus is that I have keys to the building. I can work whatever hours I want, as long as I don't go over 20. And I can use the dark room whenever I want so that I can continue developing pictures even though my dark room is still in Minnesota.

- We found an amazing apartment where they pay everything, so there are no surprise gas or electric bills. I'm going to move in and then once we're married Jeremy will move in. This means that after living in my apartment for a total of 3 weeks I'm already putting the contract up for sale. Not that I mind. Most of my roommates are pretty cool, but one gets really anal about Jeremy coming to pick me up for school and work every morning at 7:45 a.m. The apartment rules apparently are that men can't be in our apartment before 9 a.m. (I hear you mentally saying, "What the hell?"), so the fact that he's even knocking on our door before 9 a.m. pisses her off. Nevermind that he knocks and we leave. He shouldn't even be knocking at that time in her opinion.

- The post on Achenblog today and all the talk about dads reminded me that I should see what mine was up to. My dad is in jail. Again. I occasionally google his name along with "utah jail." I haven't done that for about a year so I thought I'd check it out today. It has never failed to let me know that yes, he is in jail yet again. He's such a winner.

- Wedding dress shopping is not always fun. I haven't yet tried on that dress I posted a picture of. I'm waiting until my mom flies into town to go with me. Right now I'm just narrowing the bridal shops down. One lady at a bridal shop basically treated me as though I was worthless because I have a short torso and will need the shoulders tucked. Her solution was to buy the dress 1 or 2 sizes too big so that only the sides have to be taken in, but then the waist line is down below my hips so the shoulders would still have to be tucked--I'm still trying to figure out her logic. All the other bridal shops had consultants that looked at me and said something like, "Well, you're petite all over" or something along those lines. I prefer those shops rather than the ones that want me to end up paying more for a huge dress that would need more alterations.

- We have our wedding cake and our groom cake nailed down. And we went to a bridal show where I won 8 free centerpieces from the company that I was planning on hiring to decorate for our reception. Talk about lucky. We'd only been there for about 10 minutes when they announced over the speaker system that I'd won.

- My schedule has gone through numerous changes. I've only kept one of my original classes--Northern Mesoamerican Art. The other five changed, most more than once. I'm taking Islamic Art and Architecture. I thought it would be boring but it's my favorite class. Islamic culture is very interesting.

- I have NO get up and go today. Ugh. Jeremy was asking this morning if I was okay. I'm fine, I just have no drive today. At all.

That's about it. My lack of drive is showing in this post. I don't really feel like having any sort of closing remarks, either. So I'm just gonna post this now.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

2005-12-28T08:24:00.000-06:00

I refuse to say "Happy Holidays" and further the ridiculous trend of down playing the religious overtones of the Christmas season. I trust anyone reading this of another religious persuasion to take it on good faith that I'm not attacking them by extending holiday greetings in their direction in a fashion they're not used to.

I will probably be taking a blogging vacation for awhile (from here and from the coveted and dearly loved Achenblog). I've had very little to say lately, anyway. I'm in a quiet stage. The fiance is currently preparing to drive 23 hours to get to me so he can take me back to school and move me into my new apartment in a week and a half--he'll be here tomorrow. Finally. So my next post will probably be from my new place.

I received an iPod for Christmas--the original one. 20 MB (GB? I don't know.), white, color screen with a photo library. I haven't used it yet. Jeremy needs to fix my computer before I really get crackin' with the iPod. It has a virus or there are too many "services running in the background" or some such computer nonsense. All I know is it takes 85 hours just to turn on. Forget about opening an application. I'm really only marrying him for his car (drool) and his computer skills. My mother also decided that she needed to help outfit my kitchen. So we got a set of dishes, glasses, silverware, a can opener, cooking utensils, a frying pan and a pan/pot that I don't know how to classify. It actually makes me want to cook. His parents bought us a KitchenAid and a power drill. He was excited--it's manly. More manly than a KitchenAid. I'm more excited about the KitchenAid. Oh, and I got a little stuffed dog named "Hobo" and the new INXS CD because you have to have some new music to put on the iPod.

I didn't think I wanted an iPod. I thought they were overrated. I felt that I didn't need all that technological mumbojumbo. My skipping CD player would suit me just fine. But when I held that shiny new iPod in my hands I realized that I had been full of crap. It's just so pretty. The hours and hours (and hours and days) of music it will hold renders me speechless.

I'll be back in a couple of weeks once school starts and I'm moved into my new apartment and I have something to say. Hopefully I'll have good news on the job front because as of 4:30 this afternoon I am officially unemployed. My last day at the gym was Christmas Eve and today is my last day at the City. Unemployment is a scary barrel to be looking down.

I fell hard

2005-12-13T13:30:00.000-06:00

I'm wearing new shoes today. They're significantly higher than I'm used to but surprisingly easy to walk in and very comfortable. I had just finished paying a stack of bills that I had to take back to a co-worker's desk for her to process and scan into the system. She's back by the coffee machine so I put some hot chocolate powder into my mug thinking I would kill two birds with one stone and stop for hot chocolate while back there. That was a bad idea. Right as I got to her desk I became aware that I was falling. I don't know how it happened. I've replayed it in my mind, I just remember falling slowly and, it seems, pretty gracefully. [Sidenote: I've always been a graceful faller. In fact, most of the time I don't end up completing the fall. I use my leg muscles to stop myself mid-fall. Or I'll change the fall into an exercise move. Whenever I step into a puddle and slide forward, when most people would fall I turn it into a walking lunge. I'm laughing like a fool as I walk away from my near-accident, but at least I'm not hurt (and I can do one less lunge at the gym that night). I look like an idiot either way, though. No one deliberately does walking lunges through campus on a rainy day.] So I completed the fall this time, but I bounced right back up (well, into a squat where I stayed for a few seconds laughing my head off while another co-worker said, "Are you okay?"). I assured her that I was [Only to find out later I have a rug burn the size of my entire knee (on my knee, that's how I'm getting my measurement)] and we both started laughing at the hot chocolate powder all over the floor. I realized I would have to call the custodian and explain to him that I am an idiot. Then one of the managers walked out, saw us laughing and saw the hot cocoa everywhere and I said, "I fell over." He joined in the laughter as he walked away. As did the finance manager. As did another co-worker in finance. And the custodian. And the other secretaries. I am the office clown today. I'm okay with that though because I'm having a hard time stopping my own laughter.

This reminds me of the time I fell down at the bottom of the stairs at the gym simply because I wasn't paying attention and was taken by surprise at the lack of another stair.

Also of the time that I fell flat on my ass a few days after meeting my fiancé because, once again, I was wearing tall shoes and trying to maneuver around objects in a room. That was the only time he hasn't caught me--he was in the next room. He has a pretty good track record when it comes to keeping me on my feet.

Also of all the times that I've done those walking lunge falls on rainy days while stupidly wearing flip flops through campus.

Or the time I sat back too far on a backless bench and fell backward off the bench. I actually got hurt that time, though. Chipped a bone in my elbow.

Also of the time that I fell 4 feet off a landing when I was startled by my phone ringing.

On the whole I am reminded of what a klutz I am.

I just heard that tonight we're supposed to have the biggest snow of the season. I hate snow. Speaking of snow, this reminds me of my dogs. (Did you follow that train of thought? 'Speaking of snow, here's my dogs!')

Luckily Kati has a new sweater. And weirdly, she was actually excited to have us put it on. She must be a perpetually cold dachshund.

CD of the Day: Mercy Me - The Christmas Sessions
Quote of the Day: "My religion is very simple. My religion is kindness." - The Dalai Lama

The Onion Horoscope

2005-12-02T12:02:00.000-06:00

"Scorpio (Oct. 24 to Nov. 21): Despite there being over 50 words for snow in Inuktitut, you will fail time after time to score cocaine while visiting the Yukon next week."

Well, damn.

Other funny ones:

"Virgo (Aug. 23 to Sept. 22): You will be forever labeled 'quixotic' after mistaking a field of windmills for the solution to the world's energy crisis."

"Libra (Sept. 23 to Oct. 23): Sure, they may be laughing at you now, but pretty soon they will have to stop in order to catch their breath."

"Aquarius (Jan. 20 to Feb. 18): The stars say birdwatchers from all over the world will congregate outside your home sometime next week to observe more than five distinct species of vultures."

and last but not least

"Pisces (Feb. 19 to Mar.20): You'll be forced to learn another lesson the hard way this week, but it's college-level differential calculus for engineers, and that's the way everyone learns."

Something I learned this week:
Honeymoon planning sucks. Yup. You'd think it'd be easier than the wedding. But it's not. It's easier for me to find a reception center, find dresses I like, find bands or DJs, find cakes I like, find invitations and make guest lists, choose a color scheme--all easier than picking a honeymoon destination. You know what else is crazy? The honeymoon costs as much as the wedding unless you want to stay in a Motel 6 in your hometown. I keep saying, "Jeremy, honey, I want you to take charge of the honeymoon. I'll take care of the wedding if you'll take care of the honeymoon." But even as I say that I realize it's unrealistic. This whole thing needs to be a joint effort, even if honeymoon planning pisses me off.

Also, apple cider when you're not feeling well--not a good idea. Just makes you feel worse.

New pictures

2005-11-29T13:11:00.000-06:00

Yeah, we're adorable together.
21st birthday with Anne and Nicole.

Coolest family ever. Kinda hard to see us. Just take my word for it.

I think someone said something funny and I'm laughing. My mom might have told us to say "whiskey" instead of "cheese."

Extreme close-up. I love that leather jacket. I'm a fan of the man in it, too.

My "blow a long distance photo kiss to Jeremy" sequence:

"Too close," "What am I looking at?" and "That'll do."

I'm not very talkative today so I will just leave it at that. Have a great Tuesday!

Obligatory Mediocre Thanksgiving Entry

2005-11-28T09:03:00.000-06:00

Seeing as it was my last Thanksgiving at home my parents, dogs and I stayed home and had a quiet Thanksgiving with the food the way we liked it. Last year my parents went to a friend's house for Thanksgiving where they had a potluck type of system. The person told to bring some stuffing brought cold wild rice with grapes in it. Good and healthy, but not Thanksgiving fodder. Thanksgiving is meant to be fattening. It's a day dedicated to starch and meat. It's the day you forget about the diet. (Except where pie is concerned. Pie is gross. But I probably ate enough pumpkin chocolate chip cookies to equal half a pie.)

After dinner we went to see our traditional Thanksgiving movie. We saw The Ice Harvest this year. It was supposed to be funny. We all found it pretty depressing. There were a few chuckle moments, but overall it was a pretty depressing movie full of drinking, strip joints, unhappy families and murders. Should have seen Chicken Little.

Leaf People

2005-11-22T14:09:00.000-06:00

This is how boring work is today. We're getting complaints about people because their leaves aren't being picked up by the leaf truck. I call these people leaf people. That gave me a mental image of a person made of leaves in my head and here's where that led:

And then:

Have y'all heard that song? "Let my peoplllleee go!"

What's everyone doing for Thanksgiving? We're having a quiet Thanksgiving at home, going to the traditional Thanksgiving Day movie and probably playing a game of trivial pursuit. I can't wait for the mashed potatoes. I love mashed potatoes. I could live on them and them alone. I'd be unhealthy but I'd be satisfied.

Here's your "What the...?" picture of the day:

The 24-Hour Meme (?)

2005-11-16T13:45:00.000-06:00

I still don't get the "meme" title, but I guess it's a fad thing and I'm gonna have to live with it. I stole this from yellojkt's blog. Karen also used this in her blog. This may become a phenomenon.

6:00 a.m. - The time that I would like to get up in the morning because the idea of being a morning person appeals to me. I can't do it though.

7:00 a.m. - The time that I actually get up. Also the latest that I have ever stayed up before going to bed.

8:00 a.m. - This is when I arrive at work, make my hot chocolate, and act like I'm busy when really I'm being a slug for an hour.

9:00 a.m. - I'm not really useful to the world until this time. This is when I really start working.

10:00 a.m. - By 10:00 I'm back to slug mode and I have a morning Coca-Cola, but it never does anything for me.

11:00 a.m. - This will be the time of my wedding ceremony on June 1st. The reception will be in the evening around 7:00 p.m. There will be a luncheon with family members inbetween the two.

12:00 p.m. - I've been known to crawl under my desk for a quick nap during my lunch break if I'm tired. It's a rare thing, but since I fit under there quite well and no one can see me . . .

1:00 p.m. - This is the hour that I was born on November 6, 1984. 1:08 to be exact. My mother was in labor for only two hours, so she couldn't have any pain medication, but she had an easier birth than the lady down the hall who received the medicine. Or maybe she's just really tough.

2:00 p.m. - As of late this is about the time I get fed up with working and I take a break to look up stuff like wedding dresses, flowers (orange family--orange, apricot, coral), etc . . .

3:00 p.m. - At about this time I start to run out of work, so I grab the stack of bills that has piled up throughout the day and I pay them. I always leave them until the end of the day so that I don't have to walk back to finance as often throughout the day. It's both time efficient and easier on my high heeled feet.

4:00 p.m. - This is when we all start cleaning up and closing up and finishing up so we can close at 4:30 and go home.

5:00 p.m. - The time of my almost nightly workout. I work Thursday nights starting at this time until close at the gym, so I don't work out on Thursdays. I could get up early on Thursdays and work out but, like I mentioned earlier, I'm not a morning person.

6:00 p.m. - Either I'm still working out or I'm pacing around my house because I don't know what to do with myself. There's never anything going on at 6:00 p.m. Even TV is worthless at that time. And I'm never in the mood to read at 6:00.

7:00 p.m. - Gilmore Girls every Tuesday night on The WB.

8:00 p.m. - I'm usually talking to Jeremy by now.

9:00 p.m. - Check my e-mails and other messages while still talking to Jeremy. Look at me multi-task!

10:00 p.m. - This is the time that I get home from work on Thursday nights.

11:00 p.m. - Usually taking a bath or a shower at this point so that I can wake up that much later the next morning. My hair does itself over night so I only have to brush it in the morning. Unless I want it curly, then I have to spend time on it in the morning and I have to get up 15 minutes earlier at 6:45 a.m.

12:00 a.m. - Hopefully I'm asleep by now, otherwise I'm worthless at work the next day.

1:00 a.m. - Has anyone noticed how horribly unfunny the late late show hosts are? I watched Carson Daly the other night and just stared at the screen like, "Oh. My. Word. You. Suck." Even his audience wasn't laughing, so he was trying to crack jokes about the lack of laugher. That's when I would just say, "You're not laughing...okay, why don't we cancel the show?" And I'd leave before I embarassed myself further.

2:00 a.m. - My first toilet papering excursion took place at this time. I was at Angie's birthday party when I was about 11 or 12. I can't remember her last name. We didn't get caught.

3:00 a.m. - This is about the time that I would wrap up working while out at college. I had a job that I did at home (I was a "data entry specialist") whenever I had time. I just had to get 10-20 hours in a week. I shot for 20 hours a week. Had to pay the rent. I'd play during the day, work during the night, and then skip classes in the morning. After two years of college I still haven't learned to go to class (for the most part--I always go to my major classes). But I do well without going so I guess it doesn't really matter.

4:00 a.m. - First semester sophomore year in college my friends and I had a prank war with a guys' apartment down the hall. At 4:00 a.m. one morning we cinderblocked them into their apartment. It took 20 cinderblocks and two rolls of duct tape. Then we left a note for each one of them (6 guys in the apartment), some candy and a CD with a song for each guy. Then we made them breakfast after they crawled out their windows the next morning. They never topped us.

5:00 a.m. - This is the time that I wake up and wake everyone else up on Christmas morning every year.

In closing, this dress is screaming my name:

Getting Married - UPDATED

2005-11-14T08:42:00.001-06:00

I'm getting married. More to come later.

This calls for an emoticon - :)

Update:

Sara and Jeremy. I know I've been kind of quiet about him and everything, but I've decided to stop being quiet about the whole Sara/Jeremy thing because we're engaged and it's much much much more fun to be vocal about the whole thing and who cares if I share details of my personal life as long as I'm okay with sharing the details? We're getting married June 1st.

Not the best picture, I'd been crying a tiny bit because I had to leave him again for 7 weeks. Won't see him until January. Right now I'm wearing one of his rings with Scotch tape around the base to keep it upright on my finger. We went ring shopping a couple of days ago so that he could see which styles attracted me most. Now he's going to buy it in a couple of weeks and surprise me with his pick when I get back. I can't wait to see him again.

Birthday Wishes to Me

2005-11-05T13:29:00.000-06:00

This week/weekend is all about me. If you're in my vicinity, that is.

-Feel free to send birthday wishes my way as I will be 21 tomorrow. Also feel free to ask for my work address should you want to send flowers or other presents on Monday. Delivery men have always been good at getting there by noon so you can rest assured the gifts will be received before I leave town. Those of you in Utah can just wait to shower me with (much deserved) presents while I'm there. (I'm not usually this conceited. This side of my personality only rears its attractive but demanding head for the first week of November every year.)

-I won't be getting the "loser" stamp at the bar tonight at midnight when I go with my friends. They will though. They're still 20.

-I read Fahrenheit 451 again today while here at work. That's how slow the gym is on Saturdays. I can read an entire short novel by 1 p.m. Made me think yet again how fantastically (word of the day--I'm using it whenever possible) sad my life would be without books. If there were no books I wouldn't be able to read books like Fahrenheit 451 and imagine what it would be like without books. Now I'm reading the sixth Harry Potter yet again. I'm a bit of a nerd. I'm okay with that though.

-I leave for Utah on Tuesday morning where I will spend time with friends and family and celebrate my birthday and my grandparents' 50th anniversary for an entire week. I also need to find a new apartment/condo/house while I'm out there. That means I have to pay a deposit on whatever dwelling I decide on (house is appealing at the moment, condo is also appealing--they're both the same price so we'll see which will be more convenient). I hate paying money. For anything.

-Speaking of hating to pay money, I took an hour off of work yesterday around 2 p.m. because I just couldn't stand being there anymore. I was going to buy myself something frivolous for my birthday. I got to the mall and there was nothing that I could bring myself to buy. Some really great stuff at Express, but I'm not willing to spend that much money on myself unless it is November 6th, the actual day of my birthday. So I used my "free panty" (such an embarrassing word) card that I got in the mail from Victoria's Secret and got a pair of completely un-frivolous underwear (un-frivolous because everyone needs underwear). At least I didn't come out bagless on my shopping trip. And the major birthday shopping trip to Minneapolis is tomorrow anyway. I'll find something then.

CD of the Day: Imogen Heap - Speak for Yourself

No quotes or Random Sara Facts today. I don't feel like it.

Dang it

2005-11-04T09:43:00.000-06:00

I feel like crap. I've felt horrible all week. I have the worst ear ache (I'm sure someone has had a worse ear ache, but right now I don't care because mine hurts and that's what matters at the moment) and a sore throat and food--eww. Food is gross. I also feel like an unusually heavy insect is sitting on my nose. (I say unusually heavy insect because the pressure has not yet reached a really horrible level.) And dude, I am the size of a hippopotamus today. What is up with me? Sinus problems aren't supposed to make you fat. I'm confused.

Today is a very bad day. I feel like crap and while I look exactly the same as usual I feel 10x bigger. I just want to go home and take a nap and then go to the gym and work out in a sweatshirt to lose these 5 buckets of water that I SWEAR I acquired overnight. (Working out while feeling sick is not a good thing, I know.) I'm blue today. Not literally blue. Down in the dumps blue. I always feel blue when I'm coming down with a head cold/sinus grossness thing. That's why I'm picking myself apart and I feel like my chin gained five pounds last night (I swear I have five chins today). Just last night I was working at the gym and while doing laundry I saw myself in a mirror and thought, "Dang, I'm pretty." But today my skin is stupid looking and I've expanded.

And these pants attract every spec of dust on earth. Pretty soon I'm gonna look like that Pig Pen kid on Charlie Brown and I'll have dust clouds following me everywhere I go because there won't be room for them all to mingle on my pants, so they'll take turns hanging out on my pants or swirling in a cloud of dust around me. They're black so they show everything. Stupid cling pants.

And the ends of my hair are dry. And I think my fingers have shrunk in length and increased in width. I look like I have hobbit hands. At least they're not hairy. I need a pedicure. I need to be pampered. I need a bubble bath. And my Evian is warm because I didn't put it in the fridge and usually warm Evian water is okay. Not warm, but room temperature. I'm fine with that. But this is a day old liter of water that I opened yesterday and warm day old Evian is not my friend. I need to put it in the fridge.

I need a vacation. But I don't go on vacation until next Tuesday. And some sinus medicine, but sinus medicine is illegal in Minnesota because meth addicts use it. I have to sign my life away to the pharmacist in order to get some. I say let the meth addicts have the medicine to make meth. It's their own fault. Why save people from their own idiocy, especially when they enjoy it? As it stands now all I have is some Excedrin, some warm Evian, some apple cider and some nail polish. None of that is going to stop the gross monsters that are rampaging through my head today.

Me

2005-11-03T14:52:00.001-06:00

I am bored and out of interesting things to say at the moment. So I'm going to make Sara lists.

I am a [perfectionist.] I am worried about sharing my writing. I am -addicted- to Coca-Cola. I am terrified of bicycles. I am excited by new school or office supplies. I am a ~huge~ flirt. I am a doodler. I am a compulsive "changer" of everything from clothes to web sites. I am against self-inflicted and avoidable idiocy. I am disgusted by the writing and acting on 7th Heaven. I am not tolerant of poor treatment of others or myself. I am in *love* with anyone who can spell and use punctuation. I am a compulsive "tidy-upper." I am a horrible cook. I am not all that happy with the [appearance of my knees.] I am incredibly happy with the [appearance of my face.] I hate the phone unless you're named --Josh, Jeremy, Brandon, Brian, Nicole, Kat, Jennie, Randi or Trent--. I am terrified of airplanes. I am a fan of Ginger Altoids. I am big into flashy cocktail rings. I am a Phoenix Suns fan. I am scared of playing the piano for people. I am extremely picky about my [ranch] salad dressing. I am part vegetarian. ~~I am tiring of my best friend's behavior~~, which saddens me. I am allergic to something in (milk) and I am often disappointed by (soymilk). I am a huge fan of red lipstick.

I think I'm chubby sometimes, but I still think I'm gorgeous. I think I look like walking death in light pink. [Barnes and Noble] is my favorite place to hang out. I drink hot chocolate every morning. I want to work at the Vatican museums. I like to lose myself in *art*. I keep a real paper journal, but it has to be pretty otherwise I lose my interest in writing in it. I hate lotion and the way it (feels on my hands). I ~play the guitar~. I hate buzzing sounds. Hostility makes me ^panic. I think ~~politics~~ are --dumb--. I love to kiss in the rain. I love to play games in the rain. I love to be in the rain. I wish I could wear more hat styles. At 21 I still love playgrounds--swingsets--slides--rolling down hills. Christmas has the best smells. I love the smell of snow. I hate The Daves Matthews Band. I love [sending and receiving] letters. ~For the most part~, I prefer *acoustic*.

Fresh papaya juice makes me want to heave. I want to learn how to make P.F. Chang's lettuce wraps. I want to see [Italy], Germany, New Zealand, Scotland, {England}, France, Sydney, Tokyo and ~go back to Brasil~. I would live on fruit and broccoli if I could afford it. I want to make out with Keifer Sutherland _(shhh). I want to **pay more attention**. I want to have smaller hips so the "perfect fit" is easier to find. I want to be [seen] as a good person. I want to [BE] a good person. I want to find a cure for Multiple Sclerosis. I want to live in Harry Potter's world for >just one day.< I want to raise my children to be {amazing individuals}. I want to try out a daring (but not scary) haircolor. I want to feel less conspicuous in red lipstick. I believe that people are [generally] good. I want to be memorable.

More to come

2005-11-01T10:31:00.000-06:00

I'll write later or tomorrow. Right now I feel horrible and I have an earache, so I'm getting as much filing done as possible before going home at lunch time. I can't be sick for my birthday or my trip to Utah for my grandparent's 50th anniversary, so I'm going to sleep this thing off today. I'd better be better by around 7 p.m. tonight or I'm going to feel severely put out.

It's horrible that I feel I have to justify my absence from this place for a day. Now I know how Joel feels. For all the non-Achenblog regulars, this will explain: The Tail That Wags the Blog.

CD of the Day: Cities 97.1 Sampler #15 [#17 is coming out on Nov. 8th. They usually sell out all over Minnesota in a day or so. A guy I work with lines up outside Target at around 5 a.m. to get his. (And yes, there is a line. It's not just one guy hanging outside of Target in the middle of the night. Though that would be funny.) Then he burns it for us. The Cities 97 Sampler CDs are generally live acoustic performances that artists have done for Cities 97 in their Studio C.]
Quote of the Day: "To conquer fear is the beginning of wisdom." - Bertrand Russell
Random Sara Fact: When I was younger I was friends with all the boys because girls sucked. So I played a lot of sports. Football, home run derby, street hockey (I was the best street hockey goalie this side of State Street), basketball, soccer, all that stuff. One time I was the receiver while playing football. I went for it, I caught it, I was running toward the end zone. No one was in my way. I was gonna score a touchdown. Then I fumbled, I dropped the ball, I tripped over it. I didn't fall though. I just stumbled and stood in place while I assessed the agonizing pain in my ankle. Justin and Cameron (my two best friends back then) were dumbfounded--not at the fact that I was in pain, but at the fact that I had fumbled the football right before the endzone and that I was just standing there. I officially sucked in their eyes for a few minutes. Turns out I broke my growth plate in my ankle. What a pathetic sports injury story. [Other broken bones: My wrist while ice skating, my elbow when I fell backwards off a bench (also pathetic), the tailbone on the trampoline, my collarbone on the trampoline, and my foot in an embarrassing accident I will never divulge.]

I don't do mornings

2005-10-31T09:19:00.000-06:00

I have to sign up for classes for Winter semester on Wednesday. I can start signing up at 6:00 a.m. mountain time. So...7:00 a.m. central. That means I have to get up 30 minutes earlier than normal so I can be ready for work by 7:00 a.m. so I can register at that time. And you know what I'm going to get stuck with? The 8:00 a.m. Italian class. I know it. There are only 12 spots left in the 9:00 a.m. class, but there's 22 in the 8:00 a.m. I can do 9:00 a.m. every day. But 8:00 a.m.? I don't do 8:00 a.m. when I'm at college. But I am going to have to. Unless I want to take the accelerated class at 4:00 p.m. every day, but 1) I don't like to have afternoon classes--I like being done by noon (doesn't jive well with my "no early classes" mentality) and 2) I don't remember enough of high school French to consider myself "exposed" to a romance language. My major requires French, Italian or German. Four semesters of it. I have four semesters left (unless I do spring/summer terms, and I probably will to shorten this whole thing up). I have no choice but to take whatever class I can get.

I hate mornings. For awhile I thought it would be cool to be a morning person. A girl that I like to call "Alternate Universe Sara x 5" took hold of me and made me think it would be a great idea to get up at 5:00 a.m. every day and go work out, get the exercise out of the way so that I could do whatever I wanted with my evenings. That lasted one day. And then for two weeks I would reset my alarm for 7:00 a.m. when it went off at 5:00 a.m. Finally Alternate Universe Sara x 5 left and I no longer had to set my alarm for 5:00 a.m. Working out in the evening is so much better.

The extra "Fall back" hour this weekend didn't do me any good. I never get that "I get an extra hour of sleep" feel-good, fuzzy feeling that other people get. Maybe I am an Arizonan (Arizonian?) at heart, seeing as I don't get the whole daylight savings time fuss.

Drastically switching topics: With my lunch I had a Valencia italian soda from Barnes and Noble. It tasted like a cross between liquified Fruit Loops and liquified Flintstone's vitamins. It was horrid.

I saved this as a draft and now I'm coming back to it. I've figured out my schedule. Classes overlap by a few minutes here and there, but there's nothing I can do about that. They shouldn't put all the art history classes during the same times. I have to take Art History Method, Northern Mesoamerican Art, Southern Baroque Art, Comparative Media Systems, Biology 100 (I've put it off long enough, I guess) and German 101. I can't fit Italian into my schedule with the other classes I have to take. This doesn't please me. German won't do me much good when I get to Rome. (Since writing this morning, my schedule has changed again. Romanesque/Gothic Art and Architecture, Art History Method, Studio Techniques for Art Restoration, German, Media Law, Biology.)

And every class is in the afternoon or evening. Stupid tiny art history department. All the classes only offer one section and are all in the afternoon or evening. That means I have to find a morning job and I'll have to get up early every day and I don't even benefit from it by knowing some Italian at the end of it all.

Happy Halloween!

_{(Courtesy of Jeremy again.)}

CD of the Day: Nada Surf - The Weight is a Gift
Book of the Week: The Mouse and His Child - Russell Hoban
Quote of the Day: "Just walk beside me and be my friend." "More like, 'Get behind me you idiot. You'll probably lead us the wrong way.'" - Me, in response to that cheesy poem
Random Sara Fact: When I went to McDonald's in Brazil by myself it was a fiasco. I just wanted a little hamburger and figured that if it was spelled the same way on the menu, the pronunciations would probably be somewhat close. (Go ahead, say it, "Ignorant American.") So I asked for a hamburger. They stared at me. I pointed toward "hamburger" on the menu but they obviously couldn't tell what I was pointing to. They brought the kitchen staff out. They couldn't understand me. They brought the manager out. He couldn't understand me. Meanwhile there is a line queuing up behind me, so I finally just pointed to the picture of the McChicken sandwich on the counter. Two days later I went back with my step-dad where he and the staff had a conversation in Portuguese about me, laughing their heads off. It's "ahmburger." The "h" is silent.

I am so naked today

2005-10-27T08:22:00.000-05:00

I have no watch. I never wore a watch until last year on November 6. Apparently 20 is the "watch birthday" in my family. (I have no idea what the 21st birthday is.) That's when Mike (step-dad) buys you a watch and sends it to you for your birthday. I picked this beauty at the right. Mike was a little skeptical about the Bulova choice as he's always been a Seiko man, but Seiko watches are too masculine for my taste (I'm referring to the women's watches). This one is semi-thin, covered in crystals and looks great on me. I've always had problems with watches because I'm short, so naturally I have short arms. I think that watches tend to cut my hands away from my arms in a weird looking way. But not this watch. This watch is the watch that dreams are made of.

Usually when wearing my watch I don't pay attention to it. It's just nice to have it there. I check it when I need to. Now that I'm not wearing my watch I am compulsively checking my wrist. Every five minutes or so. I can't say for sure because I'm not wearing a watch. "What about the clock on your computer, Sara?" you ask. Well, that's about 45 minutes too fast and if I try to change it I am told that I "do not have the proper privilege level to change the System Time." I guess the incompetent IT department finally found something they could understand and control. The clock.

My mother just recently realized that I would be turning 21. While watching Gilmore Girls on Tuesday night, to be precise. Around 7:30 p.m. On the show, because Rory is me and I am Rory, it was her 21st birthday. All of the sudden my mom said, "You're turning 21." "Yes, I am." "No, Sara. You're. Turning. 21." "Yes." "You're not my kid anymore. You're like my counterpart now. You're like a colleague." "Ya know what's sad, new colleague-mom? That it takes watching Gilmore Girls for us to realize reality."

Maybe 21 is the "Congratulations! You're an orphan!" birthday. I have a mom for about another week, and then I will watch Gilmore Girls with a "colleague" every Tuesday.

Birthdays are a four week affair in my family. You celebrate for two weeks before and two weeks after the actual date of the birthday. This is why I got bling and a necklace yesterday. We are in the beginning stages of the birthday celebration. Next stage of the birthday celebration--unknown right now. But there will be dinners and dates and presents and a trip and shopping and lunches and parties. I think being an only child has something to do with the all-out birthday celebrations. Or maybe it is just that my mother, me, my friends...we all like an excuse to party or shop or eat fancy. There actually wasn't going to be a big all out celebration this year. I'm working a lot so I don't have much time for frivolities such as celebrating the aging process. But then my mother realized on Tuesday that I was turning 21. (It is now Saturday and I re-read this paragraph...I sound like one of those spoiled brats. But the four week birthday celebration isn't as elaborately expensive as some may think. My bling was $3.00. We just like an excuse to avoid mowing the lawn, so the birthdays in our family are a month long because mowing the lawn should never be done while celebrating.)

Now, to completely switch gears. I am so tired today. Exhausted, even. I wouldn't be surprised if I fell asleep sitting up and then face planted into my computer before waking up. I didn't sleep well. My dog was a complete bed hog last night. For a Dorkie (half weiner dog, half yorkie) she sure can take up a lot of space on a big bed. I'd try to move her but she'd just move back. And then I'd say, "Kati! Move somewhere else." She'd look at me with a look that said, "What? This is my bed. You're lucky I'm giving you a corner." And then she'd lick her paws. Hard. Violently. Shaking the bed. Making her tags jingle-jingle-jingle. Then Sasha started barking her head off at about 6 a.m. so that woke me up. I got up to see what was wrong. Nothing, of course. She just wanted someone to get up. So instead of going back to bed for an hour I just stayed up and spent extra extra extra time on my hair. It looks exactly as it does when I give myself 15 minutes to do it. I've got 6 hours of work under my belt today and only 8 more to go. I'm almost on the downhill slope towards bed.

Let's hope I don't fall down at the bottom of any more stairs at work tonight. It took a couple of days for that rug burn on my jaw to go away.

Happy Halloween!
_{(Courtesy of Jeremy. He sends these in e-mails to brighten my day.)}

CD of the Day: Marjorie Fair - Empty Room
Quote of the Day: "People are particularly stupid today. I can't talk to anymore of them."
Random Sara Fact: I get really excited over a new pack of highlighters. The variety pack with blue, pink, green, yellow and orange. A pack with all the same colors is just a disappointment.

|73-|- p33<35 (or, to us normal folk, Pet Peeves)

2005-10-26T09:52:00.000-05:00

Does this piss anyone else off:

"_|00 gt /\/\4d sk1llz"
"PHr3Ku3N7ly H4s|{3d K0o£St330nZ"
"1 4t3 j00r r4m3n n00d135"

Translated into normal human language these read:

"You got mad skills."
"Frequently asked questions."
"I ate your ramen noodles."

I read an article about this "Leetspeak" (derived from "elite") a while back and thought, "No kid is gonna take the time to learn that just so they can talk on the net to their friends." I was wrong. It is everywhere I look. Some of my friends are starting to use it. It starts slow. They say, "d00d" instead of "dude." Then all of the sudden they're typing, "1 4t3 j00r r4m3n n00d135" and you're saying, "What?"

One of my biggest pet peeves are people who graduated from high school and still can't spell. Actually, junior high. If you made it through junior high you should be able to spell. I hate it when people tell me that they "have to run some aarons." I picture them forcing boys named Aaron to run. "Fasion" is not how you spell "fashion." "Obsesstion" is also incorrect. "Fone" is not phone. "Plain" and "plane" are two completely different things. It isn't "apericot." This stupid leetspeak is just perpetuating this grammar/spelling problem. Leetspeak obviously isn't grammar and spelling intensive. They spell "the" as "teh" but change it to "73h."

There are also the lesser forms of internet lingo such as:

bk = back
dis = this
dno = don't know
ryt = write or right

Stop being lazy and write out the word(s). Other wise I will hate you and not feel bad about it. Ever.

And this:

"WuTz Up?"

It's not cute. It's annoying.

Another pet peeve: people who don't understand words. Such as grudgingly. "Grudgingly" does not mean I am holding a grudge against you. It means that a person is reluctant or unwilling to do something. Put down the comic book and read a dictionary. And "alliteration" is not another word for "onomatopoeia." They don't even have anything in common.

Another pet peeve: coughing. If there is a tickle in your throat, get a drink. Don't cough until you cry in my vicinity. I will offer to hit it out of you if I have to. Help yourself, people. Drink some water. (A whole entry may someday be devoted to the fools who can't seem to do anything for themselves and find satisfaction/redemption/happiness/whatever-you-want-to-call-it in the mere act of complaining.)

Another pet peeve: wet bathroom rugs. Before I get married a deal will have to be made that he just needs to do the yard work and wipe his feet dry before stepping on the bathroom rug and I will happily raise the children, clean the house and make dinner. There's very little that I find more disgusting than stepping on a wet bathroom rug when you're wearing socks.

Which brings me to my next pet peeve: socks. And shoes. And tight blankets. I enjoy freedom of movement, down to my toes.

Last pet peeve for today: idiots. This one is self-explanatory. To most. If you aren't quite sure what makes an idiot, you're probably one of them.

I bought some "bling" yesterday during lunch because I wasn't hungry and I didn't have any bling. It's kind of like the ring in the picture, only no obviously fake "diamonds" and a lighter shade of pink. It's fun to wear when I'm feeling playful. I also bought a 6' necklace. Yes, 6', not 6". I wrap it around my neck three times. I love it.

Also received three new sweaters in the mail. As a college student with only two sweaters and winter coming on I felt the need to stock up. Looking at them all in a line, I realize just how preppy I am.

I suppose everyone noticed the new "theme" to the blog when they got here. I got tired of the spunkiness that the dots and the green and the yellow implied. I never get tired of grey (unless it's in the sky), white and black so this motif is likely to stick around for a while. It's more calm. More me.

CD of the Day: Phantom Planet - The Guest
Quote of the Day: "Hope is the thing with feathers, that perches in the soul, and sings the tune without words, and never stops at all." - Emily Dickinson
Random Sara Fact: I hate the phone. But I spend a whole lot of time on it. There are certain people that I look forward to talking to (Brian and I have talked for about 13 hours in one day, Brandon and I could talk forever, Jeremy and I can talk forever, and I don't mind talking to Nicole or Jennie or a couple other girls) but for the most part, I avoid the phone if it's at all possible. If I've just gotten comfortable and the phone rings, I won't get up to get it. You'd think I'd stop applying for secretarial/receptionist jobs. But it beats cooking fries.

CDs and things

2005-10-24T09:56:00.000-05:00

Nothing of interest happened this weekend. I went shopping with the intent to do no real shopping. No purchasing, just browsing. No money spent. I guess I hadn't met myself.

I was pleased to make my acquaintance on Friday night at the mall where I bought a new scarf, a new shirt and the new Circa Survive CD in addition to free merchandise with a V.S. card. I now know myself and I am a shopper.

My CD collection expanded by 6 this weekend. My mother belongs to a music club, so she can get CDs for $2.99 quite frequently. She sends me surprise CDs all the time (from a list that I guess she keeps of CDs that I've mentioned). This weekend I received My Chemical Romance, Fall Out Boy, Kristin Chenoweth, and Michael Buble. And then I bought the new demo CD from The Warm. (They are my favorite English band, not yet worldwide famous but they'll get there and they seem to be gettin' around in England. I absolutely love these guys. I'm partial to Boyd, probably because I talk to him the most. Actually, I'm equally partial to all of them when I think about it.) So indulge me while I talk about all these new CDs.

Circa Survive - Juturna - At first it was hard to tell whether a man, a woman or a twelve-year-old boy was singing. Looking at the picture of the band I saw that it was a man that looks like a twelve-year-old boy. First few songs are enjoyable, but then they all start to sound the same. I don't know why this band was on that "Bands to Know in 2005/2006" list. It's okay, I don't regret the purchase, but not my favorite. Well, I do kind of regret it. I should have gotten Armor for Sleep or Receiving End of Sirens or something, but even if I had opted for one of the other CDs I would probably have bought this one at some point. My computer is too slow to download music, so I buy first, regret later.

My Chemical Romance - Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge - Love it. I am a rock-ish girl at heart, though, so I always knew that I'd like this band. I also like the concept of each song being part of a story. It was all connected and I loved it. I thought they were one of the few redeeming performances at this year's beyond lame and almost aggravating MTV VMA awards. Diddy or Puff or P or whatever his name is now (Am I the only one that thinks "Diddy" sounds like a sissy name? He should really just go by Sean.) is less interesting than beige paint. He's about as funny as a lightly salted rice cake. Green Day, My Chemical Romance and Kelly Clarkson (though less than stellar and often off-tune) were the only performances that didn't make me want to sit in the corner in the fetal position and eat my hair. MTV pisses me off. Focus on the music, not the rap theatrics please.

Fall Out Boy - From Under the Cork Tree - I was skeptical. When I saw them in the pre-show for the VMAs I couldn't understand a word they said. (I thought they were singing about a pickle, turns out it was "We're going down, down in an earlier round/Sugar we're going down swinging/I'll be your number one with a bullet/A loaded god complex, cock it and pull it." I'm not sure where I thought they were saying "pickle.") I've been hearing about what a great band Fall Out Boy is for quite some time now, but when I saw them perform I was less than impressed. They sounded like any other punk band. New Found Glory with a you-can't-understand-what-I'm-saying twist. But I was willing to give them the benefit of the doubt because their melody was extremely catchy. So, after a couple of listens, I can officially say that I am cool with Fall Out Boy. They probably won't be around for very long, but while they're around I'll enjoy them. And they have song titles like Our Lawyer Made Us Change The Name of This Song so we Wouldn't get Sued and I Slept with a Member of Fall Out Boy and All I Got was This Stupid Song Written About Me.

Michael Buble - It's Time - Mainly old Frank, Dean, and Sammy type music. I had a problem with this guy for quite some time because he's basically just another cliche. "I can sing well, my voice is smooth, so hey, I may as well do what's alread been done by people like me." He has a good voice. I just wish he would use it to do some new music, some of his own music. But the CD is still enjoyable. Great to study to. They play it at the Barnes and Noble that I frequent and I've always liked it, even if he does sound like Harry Connick, Jr. who sounds like Frank Sinatra, though neither can really measure up to the Frank, whom I love.

Kristin Chenoweth - Let Yourself Go - Also older music. None of her own. She played Galinda/Glinda in Wicked: The Musical and I love her voice, so I thought, "Hey, why not?" It's good, but once again, not the best. I wish she'd do her own music. This CD has songs such as Let Yourself Go, My Funny Valentine, and How Long Has This Been Going On? It's an old fashioned sort of CD with a full orchestra accompaniment. If you ever find yourself in a big band mood, this is definitely a good CD for your collection.

The Warm - Haven't yet heard the CD because I just ordered it from Southampton on Saturday night, but seeing as I like the burned CD Boyd sent and this one probably has many of the same songs on it, I'm sure I'll like it. I've heard one of the songs that I think is on it (Back to Me) and it has become one of my new favorite songs. I love it. Nick has such a unique voice (and when you see him holding a guitar...woah). The melodies are great. The lyrics are great. The beat is great. These guys are just really talented. Obviously they are destined for greatness. I strongly urge y'all to check them out. Click the link above for their official site. To hear their music, go here, to their MySpace site. (I sound like a suck-up, but I really really think they deserve a chance to get out there, so I'm hyping them as much as possible. I do the same for Ashbury, my friend Brian's band. But Ashbury will be saved for a later entry because this one is long enough.)

CD of the Day: All of the above
Book of the Week: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince - J.K. Rowling - I'm reading it yet again, I love it.
Quote of the Day: "Whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa. Lois, this isn't my Batman glass." - Peter Griffen, Family Guy
Random Sara Fact: When I was younger no one liked me because I was really shy. I was very unattractive and chubby and I didn't know how to dress or do my hair. I had short boy-ish hair that I didn't know what to do with. So I desperately (read: stupidly) got my mom to mail away for some of that shampoo that is supposed to make your hair grow faster. My mom and I couldn't get it out of my hair for about a week or so. So all I accomplished was looking like a greasy dirtball for a week. We laugh about it now.

There's no particular point to this post

2005-10-21T12:45:00.000-05:00

- I frequent the bar and grill downstairs for lunch because it is convenient and doesn't involve walking outside in the cold to my car. Every time I go down there is a guy from my high school juggling bowling pins (or bowling pin shaped objects) in the atrium of the mall, most likely because of the high ceiling height. He drops the pins every time someone walks by. I've watched him from a distance because I don't want to throw off his rhythm as an audience seems to do. I hear that he's trying to get into the "juggling circuit" here in town. He wants to put on shows. But he really can't juggle all that well, and I don't know that there is a juggling circuit in town; we're pretty small. Anyway, he was gone today.

- I think the first snow of the season is coming within the next week or two. The air smells and feels different. When the first snow hits I usually get a cup of hot chocolate and a donut from the local donut shop, but the owner skipped town in the middle of the night recently along with the owner of the donut shop in the next town over, so there are no more donut shops nearby. Subway took over. I'm going to have to fork over a few more dollars for a hot chocolate and danish at the bakery and sandwich shop.

- Minnesota is the least technologically advanced state in the union. It's going to take 5 to 6 weeks to get my new license in the mail. It took 5 minutes to apply, but will take 5 to 6 weeks to get it. In Utah they take the picture and tell you to wait a minute, then hand you your new license. Turning 21 in Minnesota is aggravating. They say to go no more than 3 weeks before your 21st birthday to renew. So I went two weeks in advance. I'll be 21 for an entire month before my license arrives. Hopefully they were giving me a worst case scenario and it will be here in a couple of weeks.

- I've decided that I don't like bbq sauce.

- I fell down at the bottom of the stairs last night at work. I wasn't paying attention while walking down them so I reached the bottom before I realized it. Thinking there should be another stair I took a "stair step" (more exaggerated than a regular step), my foot reached the floor before I thought it would because of the lack of a stair, took myself by surprise and tumbled down in a heap, rolled a couple of times, skinned my knee through my jeans, skinned the palms of my hands and got a rug burn on my jaw. I laughed so hard. I just stayed on the floor and laughed. Thankfully I work alone at the gym and there was only one person working out upstairs so no one saw it. I don't think I would have been that embarrassed had someone seen it, though. I've told too many people the story to have truly been embarrassed by it. I told my mother, I told Brian, I told Jeremy, Jeremy told his family, and now I'm telling all of you. I'm still laughing.

CD of the Day: The Spill Canvas - One Fell Swoop
Book of the Week: Fahrenheit 451 - Ray Bradbury
Quote of the Day: "The person who seeks all their applause from outside has their happiness in another's keeping." - Anonymous
Random Sara Fact: I am a neat freak. I hang my clothes in my closet according to color, my books on my bookshelves according to author (but not in alphabetical order, just grouped together), and when living on my own I never leave my room until my bed is made and my clothes are all put away.

The Demeaning Light Switch Hunt

2005-10-14T09:01:00.000-05:00

Last night was my first solo night at the gym. I trained in on Monday night and everything seemed pretty straight forward. But when we closed up for the night there was a stray towel that Ashlee had to throw in the washer (If you leave ONE hand towel out, Tami, the morning person apparently "rips you a new one." She sounds pleasant, doesn't she? But my boss said he was thinking he needed to let her go because she has a bad attitude so hopefully I never even have to meet this Tami woman.) so she told me to go ahead and she'd turn off the last few lights.

Big mistake.

When I went in yesterday and my boss said, "Any last questions?" I said no because I truly didn't have any. No one thinks to ask, "Where's the reception area light switch?"

Big mistake.

I get off at 9:30. That's when the gym closes. So I go through and I turn off all the lights, all the stereos, all the fans, lock up the windows, throw all the towels in the washer. Everything is going well. Then I come back to grab my purse and go. But I can't find the reception area light switch. I looked everywhere. I flipped every switch in sight and still no lights went out. I called Ashlee. She didn't answer. I called Lance. He didn't answer. I didn't call my boss because he goes to bed at about 8:00 p.m. Twenty-five minutes later (I clocked out so that it wouldn't charge them overtime, I'm not about to charge them for my stupidity) I'm still looking. So I had to call the doctor that lives upstairs and ask where the switch was.

Behind the copier. At hip level. Behind the desk. Who on earth would think to look there? And why would you put a copier in front of it? The copier is pretty close to being flush with the wall, so I had to wriggle my hand back there and brush the light off with my fingertips. Horrible place for a light switch! Or a copier! Take your pick. So I switched it off and breathed a sigh of relief. Then I realized that the light over the stairs wasn't going off! And there WERE no more switches! I checked behind the drink cases, behind the nutrition cases, under the desk, down the stairs, in the studios, everywhere! No more switches. I finally had to decide that it was one of the battery operated lights (there are a couple more throughout the gym) that doesn't turn off and I left.

Then I woke up at 6:45 a.m. this morning and my first thought was, "I didn't count the cash drawer! Damnit!" It's not a big deal, it takes about 10 seconds to count because we make about $50 a day from tanning, nutrition and drinks and the only thing we do is count the money and put it in an envelope in a drawer but you know what this means?

I'm on Tami's bad side.

CD of the Day: David Gray - Life in Slow Motion
Quote of the Day: "I love to shop after a bad relationship . . . I buy a new outfit and it makes me feel better. It just does. Sometimes if I see a really great outfit, I'll break up with someone on purpose." - Rita Rudner
Random Sara Fact: I'm usually not this stupid.

Photos?

2005-10-12T11:41:00.000-05:00

I'm thinking of starting a separate photo blog. Or maybe I'll just start a separate photo journal, on paper, in a book. Or maybe I'll do both. I was just sitting around last night and I thought, "It would be kind of fun to document myself and my life one photo at a time and explain the significance of that photo to my day or week." It's a nice idea, but I don't know how well I would follow through. Inevitably I would forget to take pictures. And when I go back to college I won't have a digital camera or my dark room. It would cost a lot of money to get photos developed on a regular basis. I need to look into getting a cheap digital camera. Christmas is coming . . .

Maybe it is just starting the entire thing that is holding me back. I have grand ideas, but I frequently run out of time to do them. I'm gonna do this, though. It wouldn't even take that much work. And I need to get back into my photography. I've been neglecting my favorite hobbies because I don't have time. I need to make time. When I'm out of digital camera access and my dark room is 1300 miles away then I'll figure out something new to do.

CD of the Day: Tristan Prettyman - Twentythree
Quote of the Day: "It is not so much our friends' help that helps us, as the confidence of their help." - Epicurus
Random Sara Fact: I hate pie. Any kind of pie. I can't stand pie crust and I can't stand pie filling. I love cheesecake, but that's in a different category in my opinion. And I don't eat pork, lamb, or veal. I think those animals are too cute to eat.

Fun with Google

2005-10-10T08:35:00.000-05:00

I was searching around the other day when I finally got tired of taking quizzes (boy, does that get old fast) for more stuff to do. My boss was MIA on Friday so I sat around, drank my Evian, and searched for things to do. (The various Quidditch games on harrypotter.com are fun, as is finding the secret clues to unlock "secret" material on jkrowling.com. If you like words, the word games on yahoo.com such as BookWorm or WordRacer really rock my world and hopefully yours as well.)

Moving on to my "Fun with Google" title, I found Montage-a-Google and Guess-the-Google. At the Montage-a-Google, you enter a keyword and it searches for up to 20 images that best fit that keyword and montages them, like so:

Cool, huh? Yeah, I thought so. You can screen grab it (hit the "print screen" button on the keyboard) and copy and paste it into paint or a similar program to print it out or save for later use. I'm going to do a bunch of related ones based on some central theme and somehow incorporate my own photography into it and make a collage. I'm feeling like making new things for my walls but I don't want to do anything really big right now. By big I mean "large amounts of work." I'm not referring to size because this collage thing could end up being pretty large by the time I'm done. Or I might do two medium sized ones. We'll see.

The second one, Guess-the-Google, is similar. But it gives you an image like that one above and then you have to guess the keyword! I suck at it. You get 10 tries of 20 seconds each game (you can guess as many words as possible during that time), and I have yet to even come close after playing 3 times (that's 30 tries, 600 seconds, I'm pathetic). Hint: It never seems to be anything obvious. One had a bunch of water pictures, so naturally I guessed "water." Completely wrong. (Amendment: Today I'm really good at the game. I don't know what happened.)

Speaking of my photography (mentioned earlier), I'm going to put it on eBay. My friend, a completely amateur black and white photographer, took a picture he thought was cool so he put it on eBay expecting to get maybe $30. $800! He got $800 for an 8x10 black and white picture of a person on a street. Then he put a 16x20 picture of a flower on there and got $695! He started taking pictures 6 months ago. I've been working in a dark room since I was 16. I'd never thought to do anything with my photos except give them away, hang them up myself, or enter them in the yearly City calendar competition. I now have a goal to open up an eBay store with my photos, framed and probably matted, in various sizes. It's so cheap to do the photography, so even $30-40 a picture would be a nice profit. I could even do photo sets. I could take three similar pictures, frame them the same way, make them either all the same size or complementary sizes and sell them in sets. People love black and white photo sets. And people will apparently pay out the nose for originals just on the off chance that someday they may be worth something. I've got to get a piece of that action.

CD of the Day: Jump Little Children - Can't remember the CD title, but the song "Cathedrals" is a favorite of mine
Book of the Week: The Eyes of the Dragon - Stephen King (A good read no matter how often I read it--it's my favorite King novel.)
Quote of the Day: "Don't worry about the world coming to an end today. It's already tomorrow in Australia." - Charles Schultz, Peanuts Creator
Random Sara Fact: I'm still a sucker for Saturday morning cartoons and Cheerios, sans sugar. I personally like Cartoon Network's "Boom" channel with shows like The Smurfs and The Snorks and all those old-school cartoons.

The Ikea Crowd (cue scary music)

2005-10-07T14:37:00.000-05:00

I am a walking Pantene commercial today and I love it! I washed my hair last night and apparently I slept on it VERY well (quite the talent if I do say so myself--when you can "sleep style" there's really no stoppin' ya in any endeavor undertaken). I got up, looked at it, realized it didn't even need brushing and so I did my makeup. Today is a good day. Any day that you don't have to deal with your hair and you have new makeup, a new dress and new heels to wear is automatically a good day.

Let's talk about Ikea. Has anyone ever been there? Those who have, do you agree that it is hell in a warehouse? It encourages a herd mentality. You have to follow the arrows on the floor through the showroom, usually while being jostled and having your progress hampered by idiotic mothers who thought it smart to take their 2-year-old toddler with them and people who have been so lazy for years that they are now so overweight that they use electric carts to get around because they are wider than they are tall. If they would walk so many problems would be solved. They would lose weight, the electric cart wouldn't get wedged in the showroom causing a human cattle traffic jam, and I wouldn't have a panic attack because of all the screaming toddlers and the lazy people. (I say this in a somewhat harsh manner because they can walk, they aren't disabled. Were they disabled I wouldn't have a problem with the electric carts. My grandfather has Multiple Sclerosis. I am happy to go with him wherever he wants to go in his electric cart or I am happy to push him in his wheelchair. But these people are obviously not disabled. There is a lady in my church like this. She's not disabled, she's generally healthy except she is wider than she is tall. So she has a defeatist attitude and a "woe is me" conversation style because of it, but she won't do anything about it. So she bought an electric cart. I have little patience for things like that.)

When I get trapped in an Ikea Crowd I begin to talk faster and faster and higher and higher. I become twitchy. I get nervous. I develop a want/need to yell "Fire!" just to clear everyone out. But I fight it and I follow the herd through the showroom. Occassionally I get the urge to say, "Mooooo" but I also fight that in case someone around me may misconstrue my true meaning and think that I am insulting them when in reality it is I who suddenly feels like a cow. All I needed was a new bookshelf. I have bags of books sitting on my floor looking for a shelf-like home. I took half a day off of work so that I could go to Ikea on a Thursday afternoon and purchase a cheap $20 (but still okay looking) bookshelf in black (not the birch that is shown). I made it through the showroom. Relatively uncrowded. My progress toward the shelving was not slowed in any way, shape or form. I got there, I wrote the aisle and bin number down, and I hightailed it to the self-service furniture area. I found my bookshelf, loaded it onto a cart and then realized something crucial: my car wasn't big enough.

I put the bookshelf back and vowed to come back on Saturday when I will bypass the showroom and head straight to the self-service furniture area to avoid the Ikea Crowd (capitalized because it is an entity--a scary, sanity-threatening entity). After putting the bookshelf back I stopped by the Swedish market and bought some Cloudberry jam and left.

CD of the Day: Augustana - Stars & Boulevards
Quote of the Day: "Common sense is seeing things as they are; and doing things as they out to be." - Harriet Beecher Stowe
Random Sara Fact: I have claustrophobic feet, so I wear flip flops pretty much all year long. This dictates that I wash my feet thoroughly and keep my feed pedicured to keep my feet pretty despite all the sandal wearing. I am okay with Converse or Converse-like sneakers because they are lightweight and the fabric of the shoe isn't thick. Jeremy (my Jeremy, not our AchenJeremy that comments here) gave me a good excuse to use so that people would stop looking at me like I was crazy: the nerve endings in my feet are especially sensitive, so when they are enclosed it sends extra messages about enclosure to my brain and causes a claustrophobic feeling. It sounds kind of smart, so I'm going to use it. In closing, judging solely from my hatred of the Ikea Crowd and my claustrophobic feet, you can probably tell that I like my space.

I'm giving in . . .

2005-10-07T13:43:00.000-05:00

. . . to my quiz-taking side. Work is dead today. I haven't even seen my boss today, I don't know if he's here. So here we go. I got this idea from yellowjkt's blog.

Raw evil score: 28.89%

Congratulations! You are Gabrielle Solis, the
ex-model with everything she's ever wanted: a
rich husband, a big house and John, the
17-year-old gardener.

Which Desperate Housewife are you?
brought to you by Quizilla
It's better than Edie at least. Though it doesn't fit the the "You're not really evil" results above.

I am 12% Idiot.

I am not annoying at all. In fact most people come to me for advice. Of course they annoy the hell out of me. But what can I do? I am smarter than most people.

Take the
Idiot Test
@ FualiDotCom

Ha! Yup.

Nihilist Bear

Which Dysfunctional Care Bear Are You?
brought to you by Quizilla
I tend to like fluffy kitties, so I don't know how accurate this is. Adult cats I'm not a fan of, though.

You're a Passionate Kisser

For you, kissing is about all about following your urges
If someone's hot, you'll go in for the kiss - end of story
You can keep any relationship hot with your steamy kisses
A total spark plug - your kisses are bound to get you in trouble

What Kind of Kisser Are You?

You Are Somewhat Machiavellian

You're not going to mow over everyone to get ahead...
But you're also powerful enough to make things happen for yourself.
You understand how the world works, even when it's an ugly place.
You just don't get ugly yourself - unless you have to!

How Machiavellian Are You?

Your Blog Should Be Orange

Your writing has a star quality - it's charming, bold, and flamboyant.
You write what's on your mind, without fear of embarrassment later.
You are one of the most honest bloggers around, and people appreciate your daring persona.

What Color Should Your Blog or Journal Be?

Hmm...but it's not...it's mostly green...

Legumes can be horrifying

2005-10-05T13:27:00.000-05:00

I have very little to say today, so I'll leave you with this. I hate circus peanuts.

CD of the Day: Aerosmith - Greatest Hits
Quote of the Day: "Peter: Oh my god, Brian, there's a message in my Alphabits. It says, 'Oooooo.'
Brian: Peter, those are Cheerios." - Family Guy
Random Sara Fact: I am absolutely terrified of bicycles.

Let's talk about the "Retro Lunch"

2005-10-04T12:37:00.000-05:00

Do only retro/flashback/legend-loving people go to lunch? Is there some reason that all radio stations have "Retro Lunches," "Flashback Fridays," and "Lunch Legends?" No decent music is to be found from noon to 1 p.m. in my town. There is a lot of Milli Vanilli, Johnny Cash, and Prince. That "Party Like it's 1999" song should have been retired in 1998. Who wants to flashback party? Who wants to abandon the parties of today to party like it's 1999? It's like leg warmers. Does anyone really miss them? No! Just like no one misses Milli Vanilli! There should be a station designated for the flashback music. You can only hear K.D. Lang's one hit song so many times.

Five minutes ago I got a second job at my gym. It's only 8 hours a week (8 to 5 on Saturdays) to start, but it's only to supplement income and the gym owner said that there will most likely be more opportunity for evening shifts once I get started. I've never worked on Saturdays before. It shouldn't be so bad, though. The gym is a tiny local gym so whenever I go in the desk people are just sitting around reading or talking. This will give me a chance to catch up on my reading. I've wanted to work at this gym as a second source of income for quite some time now, so my break has finally come! It helps that I'm friendly with the gym owner, too. Not that kind of friendly. Just friendly. I'm excited about the job because I know that I'll enjoy it, but I have mixed feelings because I like my free Saturdays. Not that I ever do much, but it's just nice to have a free day. Now if I want to go shopping up in the Twin Cities at Anthropologie or something, I have to take time off of work (during the normal work week, working only one day a week at the gym means I most likely won't ever take time off of that).

Speaking of Anthropologie, I must have this dress. It is quite possibly my dream dress. I am a slave to Anthropologie fashion. The dresses, the fabrics, the details, the colors, the fit, the cuts, the embellishments! The perfumes, the bedding, the dishes, the flowers, the lamps, the table cloths, even the shower curtains. The shoes, oh my gosh the shoes. That dress with those shoes. Unfortunately the shoes cost 2.6 times more than the dress. I will never own those shoes. But a girl can dream.

CD of the Day: The Receiving End of Sirens - Between the Heart and the Synapse
Quote of the Day: "The beginning is the chiefest part of any work." - Plato
Random Sara Fact: My biggest pet peeves are 1) people who cough and do nothing to stop it and 2) people who graduated from high school and still can't spell or make use of punctuation.

Tags: Music, Entertainment, Fashion, Work, Random Thoughts

Donkeys Not More Dangerous than Planes

2005-10-03T09:24:00.000-05:00

I always get those hokey e-mails about loving your neighbor and if you don't send this on in 5 minutes and wish something good for your neighbor you both will be kicked to death by a donkey in 6 minutes. Today I also got an e-mail with a subject of "You think you know everything..." And I thought, 'Well, yes, but I'll read on anyway.' It had little useless tidbits like:

"No piece of paper can be folded in half more than seven times."

I can attest to this. I have tried it. It doesn't matter how big the paper is, either. After seven your paper folding days are over.

"Apples, not caffeine, are more efficient at waking you up in the morning."

Well, luckily someone brought in apples this morning and put them out for whoever wanted some. So I put it to the test. I slept roughly 4 hours and 27 minutes last night give or take a few seconds so I'm a little sleepy this morning. I haven't yet had my morning Coca-Cola. I can now also attest that the apple did wake me up more than the Coke usually does. This makes sense. Apples provide healthier and more natural energy and common sense dictates that it will have better benefits than Coke will. (Sidenote: The Grapple people lie. The apples don't taste like grapes. They taste like bitter apples.)

"Walt Disney was afraid of mice."

Who cares? I didn't bother to verify. Here's the one that caused me to do some serious research though:

"Donkeys kill more people annually than plane crashes."

Really? Hmmm...I have yet to come across a rampaging murderous donkey, but maybe I'm just one of the lucky ones. I found this:

Yes, but is this donkey-to-airplane comparison true? No one could possibly say, because while data about airplane crashes is readily available, we have yet to find so much as a single source for donkey-induced death statistics. (This fanciful comparison certainly vexes donkey lovers though, as evidenced by the vehement denial of it in the FAQ on the American Donkey and Mule Society's web site.)

Well, if it can't be proved, is it at least plausible?

We might be willing to believe that more people are injured (i.e., kicked, bitten, trampled, or thrown) in donkey-related accidents than in airline-related accidents. Or, given a worldwide growth of air travel and a declining use of donkeys, we might be willing to believe that the rate of donkey-related accidents exceeds the rate of airline-related accidents. We might even be willing to believe that there are as many donkey-related fatalities (such as people getting hit by cars while leading or riding donkeys) as airline fatalities. But the claim that donkeys directly kill (by kicking) more people every year than airplane crashes do is a bit much to swallow without something to back it up. (The number of airline-related fatalities varies from year to year, but a figure of 1,200 deaths per year is a reasonable average.)

There you have it. This just proves that you shouldn't base your intelligence too heavily on the "Think You Know Everything?" e-mails. But I can see why some people would be completely freaked out by donkeys. Their scheming ways are obvious.

CD of the Day: The Warm
Book of the Week: Caesar: A Biography by Christian Meier
Quote of the day: "Let him who would enjoy a good future waste none of his present." - Roger Babson
Random Sara Fact: I eat my M&Ms in twos, in complimentary colors. Blue/Orange, Red/Green, and Yellow/Brown because they don't make purple in the regular batch.

Jim would probably stomp on my candy heart...

2005-09-29T09:26:00.000-05:00

Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West by Gregory Maguire has been one of my favorite books for quite some time now. It blows The Wizard of Oz out of the water in my opinion. Day before yesterday I finally received my call from Barnes and Noble letting me know that my copy of Son of a Witch has arrived and is waiting for me. The long-awaited sequel to Wicked; the story of Liir, Elphaba's son. I. Cannot. Wait. (Even though I forgot to pick it up for the last two days, today is the day I will remember and I. Cannot. Wait.) Lunch time will be book pick-up time.Tonight at the gym I will sacrifice my stair-stepping time and use a stationary bike so that I can read easily.

Why, you may ask, did I feel the need to reserve a copy? This book isn't Harry Potter, it most likely won't be in short supply. Very few will be rushing to my medium-town Barnes and Noble to snatch up the new Maguire book. My mother hit it on the nose when I reserved a copy of Christopher Paolini's Eldest. It was a piece of paper to fill out that led to a book at the end. When I walked into Barnes and Noble to pick up Eldest there was a big display table of them, untouched. But mine was behind the counter. I have a feeling today will be the same. And I will proudly walk past the large, untouched display of books to get mine behind the counter because I am proud to follow all trails, paper or otherwise, that lead to books.

The musical also titled Wicked is also something that I need to see. I have the CD and I'm absolutely in love with the music. They're in Chicago right now (at least last time I checked). Six hours from me and still I can't seem to get there. There's a train I could take from Minneapolis to Chicago, and still I can't seem to get there. I'll probably end up seeing it in New York before Chicago. I always seem to do things the hard way.

Although I wouldn't mind seeing New York again. Last time I was there I was with my high school choir and we were whisked down Fifth Avenue at the speed of light by some fool tour guide in a flag-inspired windsuit with a matching umbrella in bright daylight so that we, a group of high school seniors, could get to FAO Schwartz in time to keep our schedule going. H&M, Nine West, Coach, Saks! We ran past them so that we could get to the toy store on time!

FAO Schwartz is right next to the Trump Tower which brings me to my next topic. (What a segue. Sidenote: I've been spelling segue "segway" for most of my life . . . I am ashamed.) I ran across The Apprentice: Martha Stewart last night. Does anyone else find Matchstick Corporation to be highly annoying? And the most aggravating of them all has to be Jim. He was constantly complaining that Dawn was a "road block" to the group, but Jim is the road block! He won't let anyone else speak or voice their ideas and he even talks over Martha. The scene with him and Bethenny talking to Chuck on the phone--I wanted to kick Jim. He was trying to grab the phone out of her hands and he wouldn't let Chuck even tell them his idea. Granted they lost, so maybe Chuck's idea of a cheap and one variety flower shop was a bad idea, but it's just common courtesy, especially in the business world, to allow others to speak. You can be cutthroat and not be a complete jackass. I can see why Chuck had to go, but I still wish the show didn't have to be plagued by Jim anymore.

Now everyone go make a candy heart:

It's a statement and a closing all at once. I am genius.

CD of the Day: Jason Mraz - Mr. A to Z
Books of the Week: Same as yesterday plus Son of a Witch
Quote of the day: "The human race has one really effective weapon, and that is laughter." - Mark Twain

Dorfus Frickenbutt

2005-09-28T10:35:00.000-05:00

That is my new name. At times it makes sense. Should you get bored, feel free to find out your new name here. I got this in an e-mail from my aunt this morning, figured I'd share it with my good blogging friends and posted it to my "code-experimentation" site instead of searching for it on the net somewhere. So ignore the stuff on the bottom, those are experiments to see if they work before I post them to that MySpace site that I have. Most aren't even on there yet.

Speaking of e-mail, I also got this with "Swimming Idiot" in the subject line:

Last night my mother and I were working on that song we have to sing and came up with some seriously funny guitar humor. I can't remember it, otherwise I'd share it. It had to do with my capo and rubber and glue...I think...

Official NBA seasons starts soon. My Phoenix Suns will be playing Dallas on November 1 and it will be on TNT. I have missed them.

I'm thinking of hitting up a 'Boodle Porching Hour sometime. Not the next one, but another one sometime. I just realized I have a free plane ticket waiting for me to use. It goes no where that I would ever need to go, but it does go to Washington, D.C. and New York City--both places that I love, but only D.C. has people that I know. So we'll see.

Today I am wearing strappy sandal-like heels and a coat. That Sesame Street song "One of These Things is Not Like the Other" is going through my head. It's hard to find comfortable closed-toe heels, though.

CD of the day: Waking Ashland - Composure
Books of the week: Eldest (Christopher Paolini) and Phantom of the Opera (because it's in my purse)
Quote of the day: "To be interested in the changing seasons is . . . a happier state of mind than to be hopelessly in love with spring." - George Santayana

Rest and Relaxation

2005-09-27T10:25:00.000-05:00

Or not. I'm at home today. I took the day off with the intention of vacationing at home. But I look around and see the kitchen needs to be cleaned and the lawn needs to be mowed and going to the gym this afternoon instead of this evening would be productive. It will still be relaxing, though. I can listen to music while I mow and I can dance with the mop while I clean the kitchen and stair stepping is good for the soul. Maybe I can throw in some reading somewhere. Or, be mindless and have a Gilmore Girls marathon. Either way, I will be scarce today. I will catch up on Joel and everyone tomorrow.

Singing and Such

2005-09-26T23:45:00.000-05:00

At work the other day we had the monthly Traffic and Safety meeting (Woohoo! I hear you all cry) and there is a lady from my church that is a member of the committee. No one likes her. She's mean, a bonafide moocher and is constantly feeling sorry for herself. But she comes up to me and says, "You're doing something in the talent show." Not a question, but a statement. "What?" I asked. "We need you in the church talent show. You and your mother. Both." So, I guess I'm going to be in the church talent show. And I guess I'm supposed to play the guitar and sing. Or play the piano and sing. Or both. No one is signing up to be in the show so why not just make it the church Sara show? I've been told to do something solo and to do something with my mother. So we're going to figure out a cool guitar duet for Mercy of the Fallen (Dar Williams) and some nice harmonies and play/sing that. And then I haven't figured out what I'll do. Maybe I'll juggle . . . or I'll just stick with music. I'll probably play some Ani Difranco song (on the guitar, not the piano, though the two songs I'm thinking about would work on the piano . . . I'll have to consider that) that doesn't have obscenities in it (that leaves me with either Falling is Like This or You Had Time, but those two are my favorites so I'm cool with that) and sing. That sentence was highly parentheses-pock-marked, sorry. I'm liking the piano/sing idea.

I sat down and played the piano tonight. I realized that I'm slacking and my skills have somewhat deteriorated. After I was done I remember muttering something about needing to jump off a bridge made of pianos (couldn't find a link for "bridge made of pianos," can you believe that?) because I didn't deserve to play anymore. Then I decided it would be more practical to just start practicing daily again. More practical mainly because where am I going to find a bridge made of pianos?

I hate singing in front of people. If people knew that they wouldn't ask me to.

To lighten the mood....

2005-09-26T15:21:00.000-05:00

Make a Mr. Picasso Head! Mine is here.

Oh, for the love of...

2005-09-26T14:25:00.000-05:00

Warning: This is a rant. I am at my wits end with being nice but I'm still doing the nice thing and ignoring the mean man’s comments. So I need a place to rant for a minute. Or two.

I broke up with my boyfriend (ex-boyfriend, technically) about a year ago. He’s not taking it like a 26-year-old man should. He was mean; I wasn’t going to stick around. And now he's back and being a level of mean I didn’t realize existed. I think he’s trying to get a reaction out of me. He likes to fight, but I refuse to fight with him over this. There’s nothing to fight about.

Background: He started out as the dream boyfriend. Sent gorgeous bouquets of flowers to work, made me a Build-a-Bear teddy bear and put a recording of our song inside the bear, called just to say he missed me and loved me. But still there were warning signs that he wasn’t as great as he seemed. When he sent flowers he’d say, “So were all the ladies at work jealous? Did they tell you how lucky you are?” When he gave me the bear he said, “So what did your friends say? Are they jealous?” And the frequency of his calls reached a stifling level. He’d call to see where I was, what I was doing. I gave him the benefit of the doubt throughout all of this and just answered his questions because I just chalked it up to excitement over the relationship, but I did ask him to tone it down with the phone calls. I was running out of things to say to him, and it was getting ridiculous. So he did stop calling 10 times a day, I will give him that much credit.

But then all of the sudden his dark side emerged. He told me he hoped I realized I’d never find better than him. He put me down every chance he had. (“The bacon is kind of burnt, can’t you even try?” “That’s another thing I don’t like about you, you listen to rock music on Sundays.” “That’s another thing I don’t like about you, you drink coffee.” What, did he have a list he kept updated?) And he’d comment on other women around us. Example: He’d comment on another women’s chest and then look at me with a sigh and an expression that said, ‘I guess you’ll do…’

That was the last straw. I broke up with him. “Out of the blue,” according to him. He had no idea where I was coming from. I told him that I was better than that, I deserved better than that and I wouldn’t put up with that kind of behavior or treatment from anyone. I put up with it for two weeks, which was long enough. He told me that I should have told him he was hurting my feelings because relationships don’t work without communication. I pointed out to him that I had told him and had already asked him to stop. He said, “Once. Once is never enough.” I said, “Once is always enough when you’re hurting someone.” So he said I needed to develop a tougher skin so that I could be a stronger person and not be hurt by insults. I said that developing a tough skin in this situation would only make me a weaker person because only a weak person would allow themselves to be treated the way he was treating me.

I had decided before breaking up with him that I was going to take the high road out of the relationship. I didn’t want to say anything that I was going to regret or feel the need to apologize for in the future. So that’s what I’ve done. I have not raised my voice, I have not called him names and I haven’t even uttered an obscenity in his direction throughout the last month. He has called me names. About five days after I broke up with him he decided it would be a really good (and mature, might I add) idea to contact me at work to call me names. Names that I won’t repeat. I simply said, “No decent man would use that language with a woman” and I asked him not to contact me again. He kept trying. Finally I missed one of his calls before I could stop it from going to voicemail and he left me a voicemail. Surprisingly, he apologized. He said that after he thought about it, he realized that he hadn’t treated me like someone he loved or even liked and that I had done everything right and been everything that he was looking for. So I sent him a message to say all was forgiven. Because it was, all was forgiven. I’m not going to hold on to a stupid grudge, it takes too much energy.

But then the next day he was back to his nasty self, reminding me in text messages that there was no way I could find better than him and called me another name. I could have come back and said something equally rude such as, “I’ve had better and dumped them.” I definitely have had better, but I still didn’t want to say anything that I would regret. So I said nothing. I ignored it. I gathered my thoughts together and called him later to try and get him to leave me alone once and for all, got his voicemail because his phone was off, and told him, once more, that he needed to leave me alone because I wasn’t willing to take the insults anymore, and that I thought he needed to think about the way he treated women and try to treat them more decently and I asked him not to contact me again. I told him I wouldn’t be reading any text messages or e-mails he sent, and I wouldn’t be taking his calls or listening to his voicemails so that was no point in wasting the energy trying to contact me.

He kept trying. I kept deleting voicemails and text messages without listening or looking at them, and eventually had to call my phone carrier to have the text messages blocked. Throughout all of this I still haven’t even raised my voice. This weekend, though, he got through my defenses. He has a website where he decided to post a very bitter diatribe about me. Apparently I am ugly, I am dumb, I am a liar, I am dirty names, I am everything that he hates. I’m not taking any of it to heart, though, because I happen to believe that I’m pretty darn gorgeous most days and I have people that will back that up, I am smart (His screen name is SerinityNow. That alone should have been a warning sign for me. And when I used the word “grudgingly” in a conversation with him he got offended and said, “You think I’m holding a grudge against you?”), I never once lied to him, I’m not what he called me, and if I’m everything that he hates, that’s his problem, not mine. But he has no reasoning for these things. I asked him when we broke up what I could have done to deserve that treatment and he had no answers. And in his apology he said that I had done nothing wrong, that I had done everything he could have wanted me to do as his girlfriend. And in this attack on his site he still doesn’t have any reasons. It’s just random slander with no apparent cause. And still I’m not saying anything. This is why I am here, ranting. Lucky for him, he didn’t use my last name on that site. I wouldn’t hesitate to call my lawyer and have him write a cease and desist if he had used my name. I did keep a copy of the website though. And almost everything else. Just in case.

/end rant. I feel much better.

When bored...

2005-09-23T13:44:00.000-05:00

This is fun to do. You can insert any text you want and it randomly searches Google for images relating to that text to create a background.

Rita

2005-09-23T10:49:00.000-05:00

Rita is heading straight toward my hometown in Texas. Although I haven't been there in years, this is bothering me. Most of our friends are still down there. The library that my mom took me to when I was young, the Burger King where I made random friends, the grocery store where I would always get a plum instead of a candy bar, the Popeye's chicken where my mom always accidentally ordered us both happy meals, all of those places are likely going to suffer damage. Beaumont, Port Arthur and Galveston are definitely not going to be as enjoyable to visit if directly hit. I used to play on those beaches in Galveston and wade way out into the gulf. You can walk out almost a mile in some places and the waters will never go above your waist. The last time I was there for a hurricane was mid-eighties if I remember correctly. My grandparents lost their roof, but that was really the extent of the damage for almost all homes. Now it's unlikely that our old house with the big green door will fair quite as well.

(I realized this was disjointed. So I'm going to warn that I am now using that green door statement as a segue into memories. I don't want to deal with making it flow.)

Banana spiders (scary, huge, banana-looking things) would spin webs across that door at night. My grandfather would keep a bebe gun (I have no idea if I spelled that right...) handy so he could shoot them. Then he would pull out his pocket knife and cut the web down. I don't miss those.

One time when my grandfather was out of town leaving my mother, my grandmother and me home a family of possums decided to hang out in our backyard. We'd never seen possums and had no idea what they were. We were relatively new to Texas. We didn't leave the house until the possums left the yard two days later. Looking back, that was a little ridiculous. Possums aren't exactly intimidating and we could have gone out the front door, avoiding them altogether. Unless, of course, a banana spider had webbed us in.