Only Me

"Smoking is similar to hitting yourself on the head with a hammer because when you stop, you feel..."

Thu, 22 Mar 2012 20:52:31 -0400

“Smoking is similar to hitting yourself on the head with a hammer because when you stop, you feel better.”

Gotta love pinterest!!!

Thu, 22 Mar 2012 17:26:37 -0400

Gotta love pinterest!!!

Lol this should be my next goal

Sat, 17 Mar 2012 14:59:14 -0400

Lol this should be my next goal

My favorite ski resort

Fri, 16 Mar 2012 21:25:48 -0400

My favorite ski resort

Loveland!

Fri, 16 Mar 2012 21:23:01 -0400

This past week I went skiing at a resort called Loveland in Colorado. All I have to say is OMG it’s so awesome. And after my past skiing experiences, that’s saying something!!! (Read my past skiing posts to understand why) This place made me love to ski. Like seriously if I lived near some slopes, I’d be out there every day. I met some awesome people there this past week too. Hope I can go back some day.

So I just wanted to send a shout out through Tumblr to anyone else who LOVES Loveland!!

And to anyone who was there this past week (Mar 13-15, 2012), I was the chick with the bunny hat! ;)….. (yeah you probably saw me wipe out a couple times in the Basin)

I Pulled a Pepa

Fri, 16 Mar 2012 21:01:24 -0400

In this world, there are many people who are extremely trusting. They believe whatever you tell them- no questions asked. I am the complete opposite. I usually EXPECT sarcasm when you may be perfectly serious (unless I really know you, of course). This trait, although useful at times, can also cause some awkward moments in life.

[Although this is a short story, I found it random and funny, which is what I try to shoot for in all my blogs]

I was sitting across the table from a friend of mine the other day and I noticed his family wasn’t around. So I asked him where they were. When he told me that his dad was in Philadelphia, I responded:

“Pennsylvania or Mississippi?”

“Pennsylvania,” he replied. For whatever reason, I thought he was being sarcastic.

“Don’t get smart with me!” I retorted, angry that he had randomly decided to get an attitude with me. A very confused and fearful look came across his face.

“Pennsylvania….I…didn’t even know there was a Philadelphia, Mississippi….” he cautiously responded.

Random story, no? This, ladies and gentlemen of Tumblr, is what I call “pulling a Pepa”. And it is moments like this that make it clear there is only one Pepa Grace.

Auto Correct Strikes Again

Fri, 02 Mar 2012 15:30:25 -0500

This is a true story.

On my local news channel this morning, they reported a school going on lock down for several hours after receiving reports via text that a gunman was on his or her way. Long story short, the iPhone auto correct feature changed the last name of a person to “gunman”.

All I have to say is wow.

"Do you know any good Presbyterian churches around here? I left my directory at..."

Fri, 02 Mar 2012 15:23:30 -0500

““Do you know any good Presbyterian churches around here? I left my directory at home.”
“Actually I thought we could all go to church together tomorrow.”
“….To a catholic church?”
“Yeah! It’ll be like a safari. Maybe on the way we’ll see a wild herd of Lutherans!””

- Everybody Loves Raymond. A conversation between Amy’s parents (the MacDoogles) and Frank and Marie Barone concerning Easter.

ridiculouslyhilarious: love the cheshire cat.

Fri, 02 Mar 2012 15:03:34 -0500

ridiculouslyhilarious:

love the cheshire cat.

Photo

Fri, 02 Mar 2012 14:51:10 -0500

Photo

Fri, 02 Mar 2012 14:49:35 -0500

Worst Luck

Fri, 02 Mar 2012 14:44:46 -0500

Probably about three weeks ago, I had one of the worst days of my life.

It really started the night before. I was dog and house sitting for my pastor and his wife. They are the proud owners of a giant black schnauzer by the name of Lola. Now don’t get me wrong, she is one of the sweetest dogs you’ll ever meet. But I did not know that she was not supposed to drink any water after 9:00 at night. Especially, I found out, if you let her sleep with you. I was staying in their guest room and felt bad about locking her up and night, so I let all one hundred pounds of her up in the bed with me. First of all, that is a lot of dog. I own a toy poodle and there is quite a big difference in size.

Lola immediately climbed on top of me. She was so heavy I was worried she was going to crush in my rib cage. She also was a heavy breather and I knew there was going to be know sleeping that night because of how noisy her panting was. She also was restless and kept swatting my face with her paw. I got fed up with that after awhile and shoved her off of me. It took about every ounce of strength I had to do so. Once she was situated again, I drifted off into sleep. I had just made it into that state where you’re mostly asleep but still alert enough to be somewhat of your surroundings when I felt something warm and wet seeping onto me. Yes, Lola had wet the bed.

“Gross!!!!” I hollered. I jumped up and flipped the lights on and went about ripping the sheets off. I threw them in the washing machine and then put Lola in the room she normally sleeps in. Because I was trying to let the mattress air out, I was forced to sleep on the couch. I have a bad back anyway, so I woke up very sore the next morning.

I’m sure some of you think that’s the end of the story, right? Wrong. My day was only beginning. I went through the routine of getting ready for work and for awhile my day went all right. Then, when I got off for lunch, I asked a friend of mine who was visiting from out of town if she wanted to eat lunch with me and then ride with me to my chiropractor. She agreed and we set off.

After I got done at the chiropractor’s office, we drove through Starbucks. I personally didn’t get anything but she got something similar to a strawberry smoothie. I put my iPod on shuffle and we started making our way back home, jamming out to Queen’s “Somebody to Love” along the way. Everything was going good. Then the car in front of me stopped to turn left.

I literally blinked and then WHAM! My head was flung back against the seat. My friend’s was also as her strawberry concoction splattered all over the interior of my car. Someone had slammed into the back of us. Traffic had been going slow and so I suppose the other driver didn’t see us stop. Thankfully however, the other person in front of me had safely turned before the accident so I didn’t slam into them as a result of the force with which we were hit.

Wrecks are bad enough but this was particularly terrible for me because I had only owned my car a week. I had sold my 2000 Ford Ranger named Rufus for a black Nissan 2002 GLE Maxima whom I endearingly named Madge. It was really the first car I had ever bought because Rufus had belonged to my dad before he was given to me. So you can imagine my horror to Madge being wrecked first thing. I pulled over immediately, which ironically was the beer store on the county line. The other driver climbed out and was bawling her eyes out. Part of me wanted to cry too, except I knew someone needed to be calm in this situation. No one was hurt; her airbag didn’t even deploy. But again, I had only owned the car a week. I called 911 and was trying to describe to the operator where I was. She didn’t recognize the street names but as soon as I told her about the beer store, she knew exactly where we were. Because we were on the county line, I was transferred to both counties’ sheriffs departments because the operator wasn’t sure which department should respond to the accident.

Finally a deputy made his way out to where we were. At the same time the other driver’s father and sister made their way onto the scene. Coincidentally, the girl’s father knew the deputy (that’s what you get for living in a small town) and I knew right then that the girl would not be getting a ticket. Thankfully however, she did have insurance, so I wasn’t going to have to worry about paying for any of the damage. It wasn’t as bad as it could have been, in fact it turned out to be an easy fix. The car was driveable but the fender was hanging off so I had to watch in horror as the deputy tore it off in order to keep it from dragging the ground. The exhaust pipe had also been twisted to the side and a pin under the wheel was messed up. After the sheriff was done drawing up a report, we all went on our merry way. I had been instructed to go to the other girl’s insurance agency so that we could get the ball rolling on having the damage repaired. She was a member of State Farm, and I jokingly tried the trick on the commercial: “Like a good neighbor, state farm is there…with a time machine” but alas it did not work. Lol. What I did not know, however, is that State Farm actually has two locations in my little town. And they were on opposite ends of town too. I drove to the only one I knew about and was told that they had no such person in their system but to try the other office. So I had to then waste more gas to drive all the way across town to the other office.

When I finally got back to the house I was sitting for, I thought my bad luck was over for the day. But karma seemed to think my misfortunes were funny and so when I went to dig something out of the freezer, I accidentally knocked a plastic tub full of frozen celery out on the concrete (their freezer is in their garage). The container broke and bits of celery went every where. It was an insignificant occurrence, I know, but after the day I had had, it was the last straw. I hollered, which I’m sure freaked Lola out, and left to go home for supper.

Talk about your bad day.

The Theater Beckons

Sun, 05 Feb 2012 16:24:59 -0500

I live in what can only be classified as Small Town, USA. It’s one of those places where everyone knows everyone and you can’t marry anyone within a forty mile radius lest you discover you’re long lost cousins.
In my beloved little town, the community has, over the years, tried repeatedly to put together plays in effort to give everyone some form of entertainment, lest the town die of boredom.
In the fourth grade, I participated in such a play (“Ponder Heart” by Eudora Welty) and l loved every second, despite only having two lines and forgetting to go on stage for one of them.
So the other day, my sister comes in from tennis practice and tells me about a community play that at the time she wanted to try out for. But she had decided she did not have time to commit to such a play between tennis practice, school, and doing the exercise program “Insanity”. But other than working and teaching myself the violin, I have loads of free time. Too much. Because of this, she thought it would be a great idea for me to try out.
“The play is Romeo and Harriet,” she told me (yes, Harriet. It’s a parody) “Who knows, maybe you’ll get Harriet and the guy playing Romeo will be your real life Romeo!” Being the hopeless romantic that I am, I was FOOLISHLY sold hook, line, and sinker. Plus, I had always liked acting in school plays when I was in high school.
My sister told me about the play at 1:00 on a Saturday. The audition was that day at 2. When I made up my mind that I was going to do it, I had to run jump in the shower and then throw some clothes on. I had my sister blow dry my hair while I did my makeup. Then I jumped in the car and sped down town to the community theater.
The town community theater is a little hole in the wall that the chamber of commerce decided to open up about five years ago. It was opened because the community got tired fighting with the school for time to use the much nicer and spacious theater in town. The paint on the building was chipping and the only indication on the outside that it was a theater at all was a hastily hung sign that was white with purple lettering.
I parked the car and ran inside, barely taking time to note the shoddily built ticket booth. The main auditorium was slightly nicer as far as seating goes, but the actual stage was a joke.
“Are you here to try out?!” a woman asked me as I burst into the room. I nodded.
“Well grab you a script, an audition form, and those lyrics and have a seat.” I froze at the word lyrics. The play was a musical. Seeing as my singing voice sounds about like a dying, bloody moose in the snow, I DO NOT do musicals. Period. I found out later that my sister had known it was a musical but had not told me since she knew I would chicken out.
The thought briefly crossed my mind to just leave right then. I wish I had. But for whatever reason I decided to stick around.
My little sister had also told me the play was only open to people sixteen and up, so I was expecting to be surrounded by people my age, like in their early twenties or late teens. But for some reason every person there was no older than sixteen, some even younger than that. The oldest person auditioning was the wife of the preacher at First Baptist Church.
The next thing I noticed was some blonde haired dude and another obnoxious chick acting like they were Sharpay and Ryan off Disney’s high school musical. By acting like them I mean doing the whole “Mah Mah!” thing and singing “Bop to the Top” to warm up. The boy even had a letterman jacket that read “actor” on it. I tried to repress a shudder. It was clear most of the people auditioning had had vocal training and acting lessons. I didn’t even know those were available where I live.
I took a seat and immediately looked at the lyrics I had been given. It was the ever popular “Don’t Go Breaking My Heart.” I breathed a sigh of relief. At least I knew the song. The nightmare was only beginning, however.
First the director made us all get on stage and hold hands. It was an odd number of people, so I found myself holding the wrist of another girl while someone else held her hand. That was awkward enough. Then we had to all “unknot” ourselves out of the circle to form a line. Even more awkward.
After all that business was over, the entire group was required to sing the song together. That wasn’t too terrible. Then it was time for the individual auditions that had to be done in front of everyone. Since only two boys had showed for the auditions, I found myself paired with another girl.
“Do you want to sing the guy or girl part?” she asked. I quickly took the girl part.
I know what all you optimists are thinking right now. We have a Sharpay and Ryan so I’m about to blow everyone away by being Gabriella, right? Wrong. That only happens for Disney. It was pretty awful. On a scale of 1-10, it was probably a 4.5. What made it even worse was I went after a girl who had done an awesome job.
Thankfully after the singing was done, we could move onto the script. That I could handle. I had a blast acting out the parts.
It was a couple weeks before I heard any word from the director. I had been expecting a text message so I had not checked my email. When I did finally check my email, however, I discovered a cast list in my inbox. I had been cast as a dude. I’m not a big fan of gender-free casting, so I was pretty appalled. Thankfully, fate dealt me a sweet hand: practices interfered with some other stuff going on in my life.
All that humiliation for nothing. But rest assured, my faithful readers. I will come up with some form of payback for that devious trick my sister pulled ;)

librar-y: Easter 1913, New York. Fifth Avenue looking north.

Sun, 05 Feb 2012 15:01:28 -0500

librar-y:

Easter 1913, New York. Fifth Avenue looking north.

Is this really what we’re letting our kids play with now?...

Sun, 05 Feb 2012 14:53:35 -0500

Is this really what we’re letting our kids play with now? Seriously.

Can't Win for Losing

Tue, 31 Jan 2012 19:53:43 -0500

Over the last two years, I have went through some of the worst cell phone experiences of my life.
I had owned one of the first Blackberry curves that came out before AT&T realized how much money they could make off requiring data plans for all smart phones.
Because I had had the phone in my possession before the tyrant that is AT&T instilled this rule, I was not required to purchase a media package. But my Blackberry, which I loved like a puppy, was used. A friend had given it to me and it was clear it had seen better days. The track ball popped out all the time and occasionally the phone would freeze up. Then one day I was in the girls’ dorm bathroom, sitting on the counter chatting to some other girls. I absent-mindedly set my phone down as I talked. A good ten minutes later I looked down and I had placed my phone in a sink full of water. Needless to say, it was ruined and I had to resort back to my old LG flip phone.
But fate seemed to think I was destined for a blackberry and so another friend wound up giving me one that was the exact same model as the last when she used her upgrade. Because of this AT&T still did not charge me for a media package.
This phone I loved as much as the first. The track ball on it popped out frequently also, so I went to the local AT&T store to replace it. I was expecting ten dollars tops. But if I remember correctly, it cost me a whopping $30 to replace. I guess they charged for the “labor” of putting it in. But this was not the worst to come.
I was driving one day and my phone was in my lap. I was in a rush and so when I got out of my truck, I forgot it was there. My precious phone hit the pavement with a thud. Although cosmetically it appeared ok, the phone would not turn on. I thought it was gone forever.
So I sadly went back to the AT&T store and bought a Pantech Link. At first I loved it because the keyboard was similar to a blackberry and it was super slim. But I receive tweets from twitter via text and I quickly discovered the message memory on the phone was a joke. I missed my Blackberry desperately.
For some reason one day I decided to try my Blackberry again. And MIRACULOUSLY it came on. Imagine the joy you would have if someone handed you a million dollars and that is how I felt in that instant.
For awhile the phone worked like a charm. Being the text maniac that I am, this phone was the jelly to my peanut butter. But I am a firm believer that AT&T somehow messes with phones so that you are forced to purchase a smart phone. Suddenly, my precious phone suddenly became Satan.
First, the change was subtle. But overtime it became out of control. When I would press the delete button, it would type “jk”. When I pressed “q”, about six other letters appeared. For awhile I found ways to outsmart it but soon it became so bad I couldn’t take it anymore.
My upgrade was not until May 2012 (I had wasted my other one on that pantech). Most of my friends by now had iPhones and all raved about them. I knew a 4s would be coming out soon but at this point I could not wait. I was soon going to learn a valuable lesson about eBay because of this.
The cheapest iPhone I found at the time on eBay was a 3G with an otterbox defender and the original box. This “fabulous” package could be yours for the low price of $200. Which was terrible considering you could get one at AT&T for $50 if you had an upgrade. And when I say 3G, no I don’t mean a 3GS. I was about to learn not to casually place bids on eBay, considering if you win you have entered into a binding agreement.
I clicked “place bid” and then texted my friend asking if she thought it was a good deal.
“No it is not a good deal!!!” she replied in all caps. “You better pray someone else bids on that thing!” But with the release of the 4s only months away, I didn’t have a chance.
I watched in horror as the bid slowly drew to a close. After about two hours passed, the bidding drew to a close and I was now the proud owner of an iPhone 3G. I hastily emailed the seller who probably had a good laugh at my mishap. But he kindly said he would ask the second highest bidder. Apparently the second highest bidder had changed their mind because I was informed that the other bidders weren’t interested. So with that, I was shipped the slowest iPhone on earth.
It seems my bad luck has not quite run out though because I recently bought a car and am also paying for chiropractic visits so I am ditching the iPhone and the monthly media package for my old pantech again. I might as well could’ve kept the $200 and all the money I’ve spent on the data plan.

bookfessions: Source: anoriginalname

Fri, 20 Jan 2012 14:03:06 -0500

bookfessions:

Source: anoriginalname

Alien Head

Sun, 15 Jan 2012 09:17:17 -0500

When I was a little girl, the mother of some friends of mine used to fix all our hair using a technique she called “alien head”. Alien head involves wetting your hair and twisting it up in little knobs and sleeping on it over night. When you took it down the next morning, you had beautiful curls and all you had to do was spritz them with hairspray.
I decided I would try this technique on my own several years later because I remembered having gotten tons of compliments on my hair as a child. So, after I got a shower one night, I went about the task of twisting my hair in the little knobs. My first mistake occurred when I misjudged how large to make the knobs. In order for them to work on my hair, they needed to be a little bigger. Not huge, but not tiny. I didn’t think of this, however. I went to bed after the task was done and quickly fell asleep.
The next morning, I jumped out of bead and started jerking knobs out of my hair. The outcome was scary. My hair was like that of a poodle. A million kinky curls going all different directions. For someone whose hair is naturally straight, this was quite a shock to see. When I had been a child, the knobs had created beautiful, flowing tresses. But this style looked something more akin to being zapped by a taser on it’s highest setting.
You as a reader should also know that I was going somewhere that morning and had waited until the last minute to take them out. I had no time to whip out a straightener so I quickly grabbed some bobby-pins and tried to make my do look somewhat presentable. The outcome was better, but not great.
Thankfully, by the end of the day, most of the kinkiness had fallen out and I had a style that looked more like beach waves instead of making people think I had been zapped by lightning…. Or in this case, abducted by aliens…..

The Violin, part 3

Sat, 14 Jan 2012 22:18:11 -0500

For an aspiring violinist with no teacher, I was making ok progress. But it wasnt very long before I hit yet another bump in the road.
I had been watching videos a woman was posting on YouTube for instruction. She was obviously an instructor for small children, for instead of teaching about eighth and sixteenth notes, we learned phrases such as “huckleberry pancake” and “wish I had a motorcycle”. I had been in band all through high school (I played the marimba and was pit, aka front ensemble, captain senior year) and quickly became bored with this. I should have known, however, that you have to start out with the basics before you can play the tarantella.
I had learned some of the fingerings, so I began trying to pick out “Ode to Joy” by ear. I was able to get the first seven notes, although it was pretty screechy. But my main struggle in playing the violin has been playing anything on the A string. And I still had not memorized all of the fingerings and so when it came time to play a high D, I found it impossible to do.
Frustrated, I returned to my YouTube videos. But without a teacher, I had no one to stand there and correct me when I did wrong and give me pointers. My YouTube mentor began trying to teach a concept which she called “Lizards”. At this point I was like “This is stupid.”
Before I had ever started playing, I had come up with a rule that when I got frustrated, I would quit playing for the day. So I did just that. I then decided to download the piano sheet music to “100 Years” by Five for Fighting. But my nook tablet refused to cooperate. Angry at my music qualms, I went and cut on my new guilty pleasure, Merlin, only to be haunted by the musical scores in the show that frequently featured violins.
Since this was just yesterday, I can’t post anything else about my musical struggles. But check periodically for violin Part 4 and so on.

"She and Amy had had many lively skirmishes in the course of their lives, for both had quick tempers..."

Sat, 14 Jan 2012 20:55:00 -0500

“She and Amy had had many lively skirmishes in the course of their lives, for both had quick tempers and were apt to be violent when fairly aroused. Amy teased Jo, and Jo irritated Amy, and semioccasional explosions occurred, of which both were much ashamed afterwards. Although the oldest, Jo had the least self control and had hard times trying to curb the fiery spirit which was continually getting her into trouble…..”

- Little Women. Reminds me of me and my little sister growing up, lol.