rain, rain, go away

first of all, what the heck kind of name for a hurricane is Gustav?

really. 

gustav?

why couldn’t they go with something more fitting? like DESTRUCTOR. or maybe, BRINGER OF AWFULNESS.

you know, something with a little more bite to it. 

gustav sounds too nice. 

I wish I could say, “whatever dude. I live in Illinois. hurricanes don’t affect me. and how bad could they be? I mean rain? really. for crying out loud, this one is named Gustav.”

but i can’t. because my Aunt Gail, Uncle Randy and my two cousins Michelle and Elizabeth live in New Orleans. 

and so does my friend Lyndon. 

and they all have to pick up and leave town to avoid the stupid hurricane casually making its way to the golf cost. 

where the JUST HAD a hurricane three years ago. 

and from what i understand, they haven’t quite gotten everything back to normal from that. 

my family currently is driving up here to Illinois to stay with my grandma for awhile. photo albums, important documents and pets in tow. 

and im pretty scared for them. 

as for Lyndon, i’m not sure where’s he headed, but I’m scared for him too. 

so I’m going to go ahead and pray that Gustav takes a turn for the ocean and miraculously misses their town.

if you want, you can pray too.

and then maybe, this will all end up being a bunch of people overreacting. 

maybe.

frick

well that was a good move. crap.

candidate x better step up his game.

we’ll go ahead and call this a regularly appearing feature: random thoughts 2

So since I’ve been so, so bad at blogging lately, I’ve decided that a good way to post in the middle of the week is to do a list of random thoughts. without further adu (is that how you spell adu?) here is my second installment of random thoughts. (read first installment here.)

· I signed up for political text message updates from MSNBC, and they are seriously sending me 10 a day during the convention. I’m pretty sure my co-workers think I’m popular because my phone keeps lighting up, but really I’m just a nerd who’s finding out things like ‘Confirmed – Bill Clinton will not attend Barack Obama’s speech Thursday evening’ and ‘Anti -war protesters at Pepsi center-War vets w/bullhorns demand to give letter to BO. One police helicopter is circling. The air space is close otherwise.’

· I really, really don’t want to move this weekend. and when I do move, I may not have a bed for like a week. I’m too scared to ask my new roommate if I can sleep on her couch.

· Why can’t anyone invent a good sports bra? Either it goes over your head and provides awkward support that hinders your ability to breath, or it connects in that back and offers no support what so ever. someone at NASA should get on this.

· I’m actually liking my job, although I have this constant fear that I’m going to screw something up and ruin the world.

· My aunt sent me this video and you need to go watch it right this second. I tried to embed imbed put it in this post, but I couldn’t figure out how. don’t be lazy. click the link and watch it right now.

· I spent my last $3.20 at mcdonald’s yesterday. I totally bought three items off the dollar menu and then I felt guilty for spending my last $3.20 at McDonalds.

· Who do you think the next president will be?

· today I stood in line for 1 hour and 12 minutes just to get a free burrito at the new chipotle in crystal lake. what? I like free food, and remember. I just spent my last $3.20 at mcdonalds so it was either that or peanut butter and jelly at home.

· ok. seriously folks. i really don’t want to move AGAIN this weekend.

· how long do you think i can get by wearing flip-flops? late october at least, right?

· today was the first time someone asked me how old I was since my birthday. I confidently replied “25? yes. twenty. five.”

· my mom just got a black berry and now she reads my blog on it, so I feel like i should blog more. (hi mom!).

· if i ever get married, im totally eloping.

· seriously. hold me to this.

· I’m really glad God invented spell check.

wanted: spacious bed, connected to pick-up truck.

I’m moving again this weekend.

turns out i like to spend as much money as I possibly can on gas.

bascially, im wondering if anyone knows of ANYone who has a pick-up truck.

cause i have this couch.

and i love it.

and i really, really, really, really, really want to move it.  

so give me a shout out if you’re: free saturday, can hook me up with a pick up truck, and you want to see woodstock and naperville all in one day.

just sayin.

I want to write April a love song.* (seriously. we’re not lesbians)

ok. so i love, love, love, love, love, love, love sara bareilles.

seriously. i love her.

i just feel this CONNECTION with the woman. i mean, she doesn’t want to just write someone a love song because they tell her to. she wants to do it when she actually LOVES them.

sigh.

i’ve listened to her cd approx. 342 times and every song is AMAZING!

there’s ‘gravity,’ which is about a bad break up. there’s ‘vegas’ which is about following your dreams and getting tatoos. and there’s ‘fairytale’ which is about a guy at the liquor story. oh and of course, there’s the ever popular ‘love song’ (the video to which is linked above).

so, when my best friend surprised me with tickets to see her, i kind of teared up. 

ok. the concert was ACTUALLY marron five and counting crows (ya, i have no idea who the counting crows are either) but so what if sara bareilles was only the opening act? and was apparently so minor that she wasn’t even listed on the ticket stub? im going to go ahead and continue to refer to it as the ”sara bareilles,” concert anyway.

let me go ahead and paint a scene for you guys:

the concert started at 7 p.m. in milwaukee, and we HAD to be there on time, seeing as how the WHOLE goal was to see the opening act.

the only problem was, april had to work till 5 p.m.

leaving us exactly 2 hours to drive 1 hour and 45 min., park and find our seats.

after a tumultuous drive into the cheese state, we found our way to the marcus performing arts center with time to spare.

except the concert was ACTUALLY at the Marcus amphitheater (seriously, why do people in milwaukee love this marcus guy SO much that they named TWO venues after him.? who is he?) so we had to haul a$$ to the right stage.

then we went to park, and the guy was all ‘oh, THAT stage is about a mile from here, but for $10 you can walk.’ He assured us it would be WAY more expensive to park closer. (later analysis of the situation showed that this was not true. at all.) we were under time pressure, so we threw our money at the man and started RUNNING to the concert.

the only problem was my pants were too big (what, being vegan helped me drop a few pounds ok.) i wasn’t exactly wearing a belt. or sexy underwear (i like to be comfortable. ok? gawd).  so the whole time my purple “granny panties” were totally showing (there was NO time to be worrying about stupid things like pulling up my pants. we had to get to the CONCERT!)

april says people were doing double takes because it was so bad and my underwear were showing THAT much. but im going to go ahead and hope the 432 people we passed on that mile run to the concert thought it was just a layed tank top showing though.

any-way.

we made it to our seating section just as sara bareilles started her first song (“bottle it up,” for those keeping track).

and then.

april realized she lost her ticket. (i TOLD her to wait to fiddle with her stupid camera)

i started freaking out a bit.

also, for the visual, go ahead and remember that april and i had seriously just run a mile. and it was very hot outside. 

we were sweating.  glowing.

a lot.

thankfully, the nice usher realized there was no way april could have gotten all the way to our seating section (past three other check points) if she hadn’t actually had a ticket, so he let her in.

we ran down to our seats.

and realized we had an AMAZING VIEW

sigh.

we had made it.

and sara bareilles was awesome.

and maroon 5 was also awesome. (i want to start stalking their lead singer).

and we didn’t stay for the counting crows. 

but im thinking it was a pretty awesome birthday, and that it’s a sign that 25 is going to be a good year.

unrelatedly, i want to know where the guy in front of us got his cell phone, because his pictures were SERIOUSLY way clearer than the ones april took with her $300 digital camera 

 *yes, i DO know that the title of this blog post is corny. but i don’t really care. ha.

reflections on a birthday

The following is an imaginary conversation, but you can feel free to mimic it whenever necessary:

Person A: Hey there, do you read “The only certainty is bad grammar?”

Person B: Of COURSE! That blog is so funny. AND, did you know the girl who writes it is 25?

Person A: Wow, 25? Really. That’s so cool.

Person A and B: Smile.

That’s right folks. I turned 25 yesterday.

supposedly my car insurance rates will go down soon as a result. YAY. (yes, i KNOW my recent car accident might interfere with that. why do you always have to crush my dreams. gawd.)

also, i can now say with absolute certainty that im “in my MID-twenties. exactly” before it was unclear whether i was in my early twenties or my mid-twenties. 24’s a tricky age. but don’t worry because 25 is CLEARLY MID-twenties.

First of all. THANK YOU to all the people who sent me a text message, or wrote on my facebook wall, or commented on my myspace page yesterday with the ever clever phrase ‘happy birthday’.

even you sarah kaplan (who I haven’t actually talked to since I was 13) way to remember my big day.

second of all, im going to go ahead and post a picture of me and my mom on my ACTUAL birthday, for those of you concerned that my appearance has changed dramatically since I turned 25.

 

from left to right. my mom, me. do i look older?

i think i look pretty much the same. i mean YES, i would argue that i see a couple wrinkles, but other than that, i look pretty young. (and my mom doesn’t look to bad either, if i do say so myself.)

 

third of all, thank you to the 14 waiters who sang happy birthday to me yesterday at the olive garden (and to my mom for taking me to the BEST restaurant on EARTH for my bday). seriously, the singing didn’t embarrass me at all. oh and I CANNOT forget to thank the waitress who carded me for my wine. way to make me feel young.

 

there it is folks, my 9,132nd day on earth.

 

fun times. fun times.

 

in conclusion: im thinking my 25th year is shaping up to be pretty good.

 

Person A: what about the sara bareilles concert you talked about on twitter? aren’t you going to blog about that?

 

me: yes, silly. but it was SO amazing that it gets its VERY OWN post. stay tuned.

 

sorry i’ve been away

so i can’t talk long, because im kinda, technically at work. monitoring the police scanner (like a crazy person) ….

I HAVE A D DAVID…. IM IN PURSUIT OF A SUSPECT …. NEGATIVE … WE HAVE A 911 CALL. A FOOTBALL PLAYER APPARENTLY HAD A BACK INJURY. IS BREATHING. AND CONSCIOUS. … WE HAVE A 10/10. TEN TEENAGERS BEATING UP ONE TEENAGER, APPARENTLY THEY HAVE A GOLF CLUB.

yes. that is EXACTLY what just came over the scanner.

true story.

anywho, just wanted to say hi. and that im sorry I haven’t blogged since saturday.

and also to tell you that i totally reached for the face wash on the bathroom counter this morning mid-shower and wiped out, somehow landing on my elbow.

ya. i feel in the shower.

and let me just say that tile is NOT a forgiving surface.

and since you mentioned it, don’t you think the material used in the shower SHOULD be a forgiving substance? I mean, it’s not a like a slippery shower is SAFE walking ground.

im just sayin. you’d think somebody would have invented a softer tub material by now.

also, have you ever hit that one centimeter on your elbow that vibrates into your whole body and then leaves you unable to rest your arm on anything for a day?

ya. me too.

i’ll blog more soon.

promise. ish.