I love Me Some 90's

None of this ipad business, this is the good stuff...

http://www.chacha.com/topic/christmas-list/gallery/1628/a-90s-kid-s-christmas-list

Between my siblings and me, I think we owned most of this stuff, from pogs and tamagotchis down to the red jeep.  We were even lucky enough to have N64.

Sweden

 My amazing trip to Sweden with my amazing friend, Kate, and staying with an amazing Swedish family, was the perfect way to end my study abroad.


I have been missing study abroad since the moment I landed in America.


True, America is great, and I am glad I live here, but still.


One plus to being home- I can sit at home being as antisocial as I want, whenever I want.


On the other side, I miss my friends.  I miss my friends in Utah, and I miss my friends from London.


At least arianna is coming on sunday and my siblings are coming after that!



Malou let us borrow her numerous fur coats.  How have I survived all my life without one of these?

Stockholm was decked out for Christmas.  It was perfect.

This amazing family took us bowling our first night there, 

and let us join in on some holiday baking.

McY D's

I never thought the day would come when I'd go to McDonald's on a regular basis to meet my nutritional needs.  But here it is.  I've gone more times than I can count this study abroad.   I can't help it.  It's cheap.  It's delicious.  It tastes like America.  Most importantly, it is satisfying. I go there not because I am hungry, but seems to be the only meal these days that leaves me feeling satisfied.  Does my body really just need a good 99 pence cheeseburger in its system?  Maybe.  All I know is that those golden arches bring me happiness.

Luckily, I only have 2 more weeks in London (which is sad) but it means not much time left to gain huge amounts of weight.  So... I may not do anything to kick this McDonald's habit.

One random tid bit conclusion I have come to:  I don't like the crust on my sandwiches.  I love cheeseburgers because they don't have a crust.

I also want to give a shout out to BK for a delicious chicken sandwich I had today.  I judged you too soon.

Gelato

Out of all the things I loved about Rome, the food I think wins.  I guess this isn't too surprising, good food holds an important place in my life.  But nonetheless, I am now a thin crust pizza fan.  I am also, like many others before me, a Gelato Convert.  


Don't get me wrong, I will always be a loyal UDF and Graeter's customer.  But I mean come on, how do you compete with real gelato?


We got gelato at least twice a day, sometimes three times.   The best place we found was Giolitti.  I find it hard to believe you could beat my combination:  Strawberry, Chocolate, and Hazelnut.  I don't even usually pick fruity flavors, but this strawberry tasted like you were eating strawberries.  I don't know how else to describe it.  The cream on top makes it.

I asked for a medium, I promise.  The first time I went in I got a small in a cup.  This was to be my last gelato in Rome so I had to go all out.  The guy at the counter, who had served me the day before, had told me a cone was better when I got a cup.  So I went with the chocolate dipped cone the second time around.  He was right.  It was better.

Bonjour from Paris!

This city is beautiful, dirty, romantic, cold, rainy, rude, and polite, all at the same time.

I think this thing is more impressive looking up at it than from the top.  But it is pretty impressive either way!  It definitely exceeded my expectations!

 Notre Dame- It was cool to see the rain coming out of their mouths!

 Sacre Coeur- beautiful sunset over the city.

 Versailles- Um, this day was amazing.  Versailles is ridiculous.  My favorite thing in Paris was riding the bikes at Versailles surrounded by the fall leaves.  It felt like a dream.  It was perfect!

I love Paris.  I love the paninis and crepes I ate everyday in Paris.  I love these girls who ate paninis and crepes with me in Paris everyday.

Life the way it's meant to be lived.

Hm. I knew I couldn't keep the frequent blogging up for long. Oh well.

The last few weeks have been great, as expected.

I loved the trip to scotland and northern england! Both

places were beautiful. I have never enjoyed hiking so much. With all the moving from hostel to hostel, it felt like camping. None of us seemed to bring enough clothes, so after the first 3 days we were all wearing dirty clothes that still smelled like the first hostel. But it was great. I kind of like getting to just go grunge because that is your only

option. Kind of like when I rocked the off-the-plane look my first few days in london. It's like most days you have the responsibility to actually "get ready" because you can, so it felt freeing to not feel that pressure.

One of my happiest moments from the trip was driving through the english countryside after visiting Chatsworth

(also known as pemberley) while watching Pride and Prejudice on the bus. It was pure bliss.

As fun as that trip was, it was nice to get back home to the London centre. Every day here is a new adventure, but not stressful. We have classes in the morning then usually the rest of the day to explore. Sometimes homework is thrown in there. Sometimes.

We've gone paddle boating,

seen "Wicked",

been to Cambridge (and went punting on the river!)

visited more museums,

toured St. Paul's cathedral (the stairs from Harry Potter!),

zumba,

Hung out with Taylor Lautner at the abduction premiere,

walked through Kew Gardens,

had some church activities,

seen "Much Ado About Nothing" at the Globe theatre,

toured Buckingham Palace (and seen Kate's dress!),

and have had delicious mexican food (where we were also brought 6 glasses of tequila, even after explaining that we don't drink,

and a free dessert platter for Fran's birthday (which is in october, but close enough...) even though we had already downed one. When we ordered the first platter, we asked the waiter if it would be enough for all of us and he replied, "I hope so." Well it wasn't.

It took us 3 minutes to eat the first platter, and 3 minutes to sing happy birthday and eat the second one. It was a great night.

I've become even more obsessed with food than I was before. This isn't good. Something is going to need to change. I don't really know how to explain it, because it isn't like the food here is really better than America. I think that is the problem. It is harder to find good food that doesn't cost too much, so we have become obsessed with finding it. Sadly McDonalds has become something close to a staple in our diets.

I need to exercise more. I wish zumba wasn't so expensive.

Arianna is getting bangs tomorrow. We are pumped for her.

View from St. Paul's cathedral

Settling In

This past week or so has been a lot of settling in, even moments of missing America, but it has been great. I mean how could life not be great when you are living and learning in London with a great group of people? I was going to say great group of girls, but my two directors, John and Peter, are great as well.

Our assignments have been walking around London and going to museums, with a little bit of sketching and writing thrown in there. I am sure the balance will switch more to the sketching and writing sooner or later, but for now I am enjoying the way it is.

We shop on Oxford Street (mainly at Primark, we're already needing a break from that store).

We take the tube.

We ride the bus.

We walk.

We go to Portabello Market.

We tour the Tour of London
We see Musicals (Legally Blonde!)

We visit the Victoria and Albert Museum, the National Gallery, the British Museum, and the Tate Museum of Modern Art.

We eat the same thing for breakfast and lunch everyday, with a mystery meal for dinner.

We go out at night, laugh, get yelled at, and fulfill our role as loud americans most of the time.

What I am most amazed about is how much I have enjoyed the museums. My whole life before this I'd do just about anything before I spend hours in a museum. I am shocked a the speed and extent that this has changed.

My first day here, I got to the centre, dropped off my bags, changed my shirt, then headed out with Peter to go to the Victoria and Albert museum. We walked through Hyde Park to get there, so it was fun having my own personal little tour, even if I was only half awake. He dropped me off at the museum and told me to meet back in the front at 3:30, the other girls should be there then too. So after getting myself a chocolate croissant at the cafe, I wandered. And I loved it. True, I couldn't let myself sit for too long or else I'd fall asleep, but that wasn't the museum's fault. I love walking through a museum by myself, getting to spend as much or as little time on something as I want.

The National Gallery was next on the list. We had to pick a painting to sit in front of for 30 minutes then write a paper on it. I chose "Dido Rebuilding Carthage," probably because I kind

of knew what it was actually about, but also because I thought it was beautiful. So many of the paintings I found myself wanting to sit in front of. The biggest realization I had here was how much better these paintings are in real life. I had seen some in my humanities class before on a powerpoint, but real life is a different ball game.

The Tate was fantastic. This is again coming from someone who thinks most modern art is ridiculous because it looks like a child could do it. But, this is where my great professors come in. Peter walked through one of the exhibits with us, and I experienced something with modern art I still can't explain. All I know is, there is more to it than I thought. I actually really like some of it. One thing I still struggle with though is who decides what is art? It bothers me that someone with a big name could paint a line on a page and put it in a museum, and that is fine, I can come to see how it could be art. The problem is what if I drew a line on a piece of paper? Would they put it in a museum? No. I'm sure i'll come to terms with this eventually.

We went to the British Museum yesterday. The highlights were the Rosetta Stone and a private viewing of sketches from a ton of famous artists. Incredible, like early sketches of Adam in the Sistine Chapel, and Van Gogh and Rembrandt and other people . What amazed me the most about them is the time and patience they would take, and how different a sketch looks from 4 inches away vs. 4 feet away. When you get up close you realize they really are just a bunch of lines. It is so cool.

I am trying to tame the shopping impulse, I am trying to just take it one item at a time and so far I think I am doing alright (considering there have been some essentials that I just have to get, and that list isn't quite finished. I'm still holding out for the right slippers).

The girls here are great. I feel lucky to be here the same time as them! We even celebrated Arianna's 21st birthday! It was a party. Life is good.

London Town

Getting to London is no fun. Being in London is fabulous.

Here is the story of my journey to London. I will try to just tell it as factually as possible without letting my feelings of bitter resentment get in the way.

I am packing in a rush to leave for the airport, when we realize my suitcase is completely falling apart, so I spend the ride to the airport in the back seat switching all my stuff to a different suitcase. I got rather car sick in the process.

We get to the airport in record time. One of my bags is only 36 lbs (leaving plenty of room to shop, of course). I grab a cinnabon, then sit at the gate. We are supposed to be boarding, but instead we get the announcement that the captain is missing. "We are pretty sure he is in the airport. He may be in the air, but we think he is in the airport." Ok, no big deal, it is 3:15 and my flight in detroit is not until 6:55.

The captain shows up and we board the plane. Then, we deboard. Mechanical difficulties of some sort. Luckily, there is an identical plane just one gate over. So, we board that plane. This process took about an hour, I don't know why. As it turned out, the plane was identical to the former in all aspects, including the mechanical difficulties. The minutes tick by, while every 5 minutes the crew is telling us they will let us know what is happening in about 5 minutes. At this point, everybody was on the phone about their missed connections. It is now about 5:45. I am on the phone with my dear friend, Arianna, who had bought me McDonalds and was asking the lady at the gate what the chances were of me making the flight. The woman told her there were several people on my flight who were trying to catch the flight to London so they could wait until 7, which was when my flight was supposed to get in.

My mother is on the phone, first telling me to get off the flight because she didn't think I was going to make it. Then, she says it doesn't look like there is another flight to London for the next 2 days, from Cincinnati or Detroit. So my only hope is staying on the plane and trying to catch the flight.

I did nothing but pray and wrinkle my empty cup up in my hands over and over again during the flight. We don't arrive in Detroit until 7:20. Arianna doesn't pick up her phone, the flight had already taken off. It turns out, it left at 6:48.

I have never missed a flight before in my life (despite a few recent close calls). So, I follow everyone else and get in line at the service desk to find a new connection. I talk to the first person, who says my best option is staying in a hotel in Detroit that night and catching a flight to Amsterdam the next night, then London after that. I then talk to someone on the help phones who says the same thing.

My parents are making calls and getting no further than I am

. The line dies down, so I get back in line to talk to a different person to see if I can fly home to Cincinnati that night instead. That seemed better than 24 hours in a Detroit hotel room. I continued to have a very incoherent conversation with the woman, who gave me the flight to Cincinnati, but wouldn't tell me if I could get back to Detroit for the flight to Amsterdam, and told me I had to talk to people on the phones. I told my mom what she had said, and she told me to stay on the phone go talk to her again. So, I approach the desk, and here is the gist of the conversation ( I believe her name was Deborah Anne):

DA- "What?"

Me-"Hi, if I go back to Cincinnati, what are my options of getting to London from there?"

DA-"Well is there a direct flight from Cincinnati to London?"

Me-"I'm not sure, if there is I think it is full."

DA- looking stuff up... "Oh, there is a flight that leaves Cincinnati tomorrow night and gets into London the next morning, connecting in Boston."

Me-"That sounds great!"

DA- says nothing, is doing stuff on her computer...

My mother on the phone-"So are you on the flight?"

Me-"I'm not sure, I think so"

DA-"Oh, I booked you on the flight. When I said it was an option, I booked you."

Me-"Oh, great, thank you."

DA-"Why didn't you just book that flight in the first place?"

Me-"Because I was trying to get there by tomorrow morning."

DA-"You just can't do that with these European flights."

Me- In state of confusion.

a few minutes later...

DA-"You are in London for a month?"

Me-"Three months"

DA-"What are you going to do without your mommy there to solve all your problems?"

Me- Jaw dropped and speechless.

At this point I don't even remember the rest of the conversation. All I could think about was staying polite, and escaping this woman as fast as possibly with my tickets.

The plane back to Cincinnati was delayed, because, as the captain explained, they had been delayed all day...

I get home, and leave the next day for Boston. I make it to London without a hitch that time. When I talk to the guy in the customs line, he asks me the basic questions, then asks me how much money I have with me. Then he asks me how much I have for the 3 months I am there. I tell him about what is in my checking account, and he sneers and says,"Do you know how expensive this country is?" I assure him that I will be ok, I have already paid for my lodging and food. He then asks, "Who supports you?" "My parents." He sneers again and mumbles, "Figures." "I worked over the summer and made money." He doesn't respond and hands me back my passport. A lady on my flight walks away next to me and says, "Wow, it sounded like you got the third degree!"

I know.

I talk to a friendly irish lady I sat near on the plane while I wait for my bags that I know won't be there. Then I report it to the delta desk, and they inform me my bags are on a flight to Amsterdam at the moment and will be getting in around 2 that afternoon. They will deliver them later that day.

Great, at least this way I don't have to haul them to the centre.

I make it to the centre in a daze at this point. It is wednesday afternoon. I don't see my bags until late thursday night. At least I filled out a form that gave me a voucher for my checked baggage fee, so I won't have to pay that on my way home.

Now I have my bags, and am living in London. Life is good. The girls here are great, the directors are so nice, and this city is fabulous. Our assignments are things like, go to a park and watch something there for half an hour. Write about it and sketch it. You have the rest of the day to explore the city. Ok, I can do that.

My only complaint at the moment would be the food in the center. The cook is a very nice woman who likes to experiment. This was dinner tonight...

It is a good thing we can have gelato and chocolate croissants basically anywhere else we go :)

Life Lesson:

I have seen the whole experience as a good life experience, and I learned that while being nice and polite to people won't necessarily get you what you want, but it will make you feel better about the way you acted. Also, the lady did get nicer by the end of our conversation. I can only image what could have happened if I had snapped back at her. For some reason, I found my self wanting to be even nicer to all the people I came in contact with at the airport afterwards. That is still a phenomenon I do not understand.

I am sure my next post will have a much better ratio between the positive and negative vibes. I am sorry for this one.

Oh Boys

What my little brother and his 15-year-old friends left as a tip for their waitress at California Pizza Kitchen... Watch out ladies, they are smooth....

Yes, the note does say "Your beutiful" with a heart.

They may not be the best spellers or grammatically correct, but they are charming.

What I Never Thought I'd Learn in School

I found something interesting while studying human development today. While reading in the chapter about socioemotional development in early adulthood, I came across this useful piece of information...

"Women tend to rate as most important such traits as considerateness, honesty, dependability, kindness, understanding, and earning prospects; men prefer good looks, cooking skills, and frugality."

So many conversations had at BYU are running through my mind right now...

Thoughts?

Finally- a title.

So I have had this in mind for a title for a while now, i've just been too lazy to actually change it. I was reading Eat Pray Love (a good book that I haven't actually gotten around to finishing yet) and I came across this phrase. The author says how it is ancient greek for the singular balance of the good and the beautiful. I thought it was cool. Shouldn't that be what we are striving for? Plus, it is a little shout out to my Greek ancestry. Holla.

It isn't anything terribly inspirational or creative, but it'll do. Just like the rest of my blog.

mmmmm

Elizabeth Daun, it is all your fault. This started when I read your blog post a while back where you mentioned oreos. So one night, we are all starving and grab some snacks before a movie. I get oreos.

Since that night, I have eaten 3-4 oreos every night at almost exactly midnight.

Why is it that milk by itself is decent, oreos by themselves are honestly only mediocre, but milk and oreos together? Delicious chocolaty goodness. This is not a healthy habit.

Don't worry mom, my roommates and I are determined to start up jillian michaels any day now.

Catch Up

I am terrible at blogging! Things happen, I tell myself I'll blog about them, then other things happen, I get busy, then all of a sudden there are tons of things to blog about and it seems too overwhelming to do.

Well, I have now been living at liberty square and going to school for a few weeks now. I am pretty much really liking it. All of my classes are actually interesting. I sort of read my text books for fun sometimes. I still can't decide if I want to be a nurse.

Liberty square... very social. It helps that I already knew about half the girls in my ward from last year, and half the guys in my ward know either my cousin or Taylor Jensen. So another thanks to the Jensen family for allowing me to have more friends. I thought being in a ward with a bunch of RMs would be weird, and that they would seem really old... but they don't. Not really at all.

I love my roommates. They are all great.

I love hot dog fridays.

I hate parking.

I'm nervous for the Reds when it comes to playoff time.

I miss my Holladay in Holy Land friends, I always will, but I am making new friends.

I have yet to really cook for myself. It just never seems worth it, and its hard to find meals for just one person. I like cooking for multiple people better, but that doesn't happen very often. I also like people cooking for me.........

I am STILL in the process of getting back into the swing of studying. I honestly am not even taking that hard a course load right now and i'm still barely keeping up with it. I need better self-discipline.

I realize I need to take more pictures. All I have are ones of my really great apartment, my new toms, and some really terrible pictures from a group of studs' intramural football game. I don't think anyone really wants to see those.

I think it is supposed to rain tomorrow. I am so excited. It doesn't rain enough here.

Favorites

Some of my new favorite things:

-Hatch's hot chocolate

-Zumba

-Anne of Green Gables

Some of my old favorites:

-Normandy Cafe

-My Holladay friends

-Great Harvest Bread

The Finale

This is probably my last post before heading to utah on tuesday. Here is what my life has been the past week...

Friday night- watched Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights.

Saturday- Read Jane Eyre

Monday- Hung out with friends (we watched the bachelor pad, don't judge.)

Tuesday- Went to the reds v. cardinals game. It was so depressing. My feelings towards the reds right now are like a parent who's child just flunked out of college. You love them, but think what the heck are you doing with your life, why are you screwing up this opportunity?? Although, seeing the brawl was worth it. Although I'm mad only cueto got suspended. What about the cardinals players that were pinning him to the wall? anyways... I hate the cardinals.

Wednesday- Started watching a terrible version of Jane Eyre. It was like someone just filmed a play. So, I switched to little women. (did you know that christian bale, guy who plays batman, also plays laurie in this movie???)

Thursday- Volunteered at the hospital for the last time, then watched the first half of a much better version of Jane Eyre.

Friday- My last day of work (more on that to follow) then ATP with hughbert, where we ended up getting together with the Jensens, dauns, and perrymans. It was a lot of fun. I then went home and finished watching Jane Eyre. (It was almost 4 hours long, which is why I did it in 2 parts). It was excellent, I liked it almost as much as the book.

So, this week was a very relaxing way to spend my last full week at home. It may have been more full of Jane Eyre than of my actual friends (whom I will miss) but I was okay not having a very active social life for a bit. It happens. And I still thoroughly enjoyed myself this week.

(as far as Jane Eyre goes, I love this story. Definitely on all-time favorites list. There is still another version of the movie from the library I plan on watching...)

Back to the last day of work... It was a lot more sad than I thought it would be. I knew it would be bitter sweet, and it is not like I'll really miss what I did everyday, but I loved working in an office, and working down town, and the people I worked with. This is how great they are... When I got to work, I was talking to some people and my boss came by and gave me a hug. She then led me to the back where they had filled an entire cubicle full of delicious breakfast food. They also all signed a card and gave me a present, which was a great american financial resources thermos. If any of you know me, you'll know that a who cubicle full of delicious breakfast food was so nice, it almost brought me to tears. And I absolutely love hot chocolate, so the thermos was perfect (you should have seen how happy I was when I found hot chocolate makings in the break room). When I first started unwrapping it ( it was a rectangular box) I said I hoped it was a new stapler. They thought I was kidding, but it would have been nice to use a fancy new stapler on my last day of work...

We took some pictures with my phone, and they kept wanting me to sit in a chair and have them all stand around me. And again, if any of you know me, you can guess that sitting in a chair with everyone else standing around me is about the last thing I wanted to do. So they finally gave up on that idea.

I also got to have LOD (lunch on dad) with Keith and Andrew at Nadas. It was delicious, as LOD usually is. Then, I went back to work, where everyone was telling me to leave early because it was my last day. Well, everyone else in the office leaves early on fridays anyway because they do summer hours. So by 2, the place was practically empty. I did very little work that afternoon, and when I say very little, I mean hardly any. Instead I talked to my fellow intern, Michael (there are only 2 of us on the whole floor). We made kettle corn, hoping for some good office drama as there sometimes is. He was nice enough to stay until 4:15 with me, even though he does summer hours too. We wanted to pull a prank, but all we ended up doing was switch my chair with Jeff's. So Jeff, if you ever read this, yes. It was me who switched your chair. I fully admit it. By 4:15 we gave up completely on attempting to work, and walked across fountain square to Graeters. On our way there I realized I forgot to turn in my badge, and ended up needing to run up the down escalator, which is so much harder than I thought it would be!) I got a scoop of blackraspberry chip. Delicious. (when I went through and highlighted certain words, that was supposed to represent the course of my day. It just so happens that that is all the times I ate. I didn't realize this until looking back at it...)

I now want to give a little shout out to all those who made my work experience more enjoyable. First, to my boss, Garri- You were a good boss. I loved our conversations, and I am flattered you told your daughter to be like me.

To Rhonda (Rhondeesia)- You are hilarious. Your stories and insights on life crack me up. My favorite was when you said your son looked like a tootsie roll.

To the other women in the department... Sonya, you are so much fun and easy to talk to. Kay, you are the happiest person I know and I love you. Laura, Lisa, Kellie, Terry, Linda, John, Deb, and everyone else, you are all awesome.

I now need to make a special note to Janet Furlong, who passed away a week ago today. I didn't talk much to Janet, but I felt a special connection with her because she put her contracts in groups of 15, which is the same number I sort them into, and she alternates what side of the paper she puts the paper clips on, which is what I do, so that one side doesn't get lop sided in the pile. She was only 48, and it was a big blow for my department. Some of these women had worked with her for 10, 15, 20 years. She is definitely missed.

That certainly put a damper to the week on monday, but that was also the day we got Instant Messaging in the office. This was supposed to help productivity, so that you knew when people were available, etc. But, it had the opposite effect. We can just say my productivity went down. There is no good in saying by how much.

Back to shout outs... To one-ear-mark, (I would not call him this except I don't think he even knows my name so there is no chance he'll be reading this. To answer questions, this is a man who got one ear cut off in a bar fight by a broken bottle), and to Julie, for providing entertainment in the office. I have to give Jeff the award to providing me the most entertainment though. Whether it was by talking to me or to other people. Thanks for giving me a place to kill time before the reds game. You are a good guy. On the same note of entertainment, I have to thank Michael. You made my last week or so much much more enjoyable. My favorite part of it all was probably telling stories through all the fabulous smiley faces on the Instant messaging system. I had a lot of fun with you, and I hope you love spain! (side note to michael- I don't think you'll be able to get away with making up spanish translations like you did with the popcorn bag. Even I could do that...) Oh, I can't forget Mary, who passed by at the end of the day saying, "Goodnight, I love you, God bless you. my child," to all of the people in our row of cubicles. It was fair enough for her to call us all her child, because we had 4 of the youngest people in the office all sitting in a row, with her at the end. And she is probably one of the oldest there. So it worked.

In general, everyone in the office was very nice, friendly, and funny. It made me love working there.

The biggest shout outs go to the Jensen family. To Nan, for being great. To Taylor, for coming back from a mission and living in liberty square, because we are pretty much under your father's orders to hang out, and that gives me a reason to stay in contact with this family while I am at college. To Andrew, for being a fabulous lunch buddy. And for letting me sit in the front seat on my last day... And most of all, to Keith, for providing me with surprisingly fun car rides. You've certainly entered the realms of my favorite adults to talk to. I spent more time talking to you throughout the course of the week than anyone else, and I am so glad. I have absolutely loved our conversations and getting to know you.

I did not anticipate this post being this long. And if you have read all of this, what are you thinking? You need to find something better to do with your time.

fun facts for friends

I just wanted to let my friends (who have blogs I listed as blogs I follow, besides, you'll be the only ones reading this anyway) know that a friend of mine named holly, who I think is totally awesome, said that after looking at my blog she proceeded to look at all of my friends' blogs. She told me I have the coolest friends, and I said I know, right? It did make me realize that my life is probably the most boring out of any of yours, but I am perfectly okay with that. I can live vicariously through all of you.

On a completely unrelated note, one reason I am thrilled to leave the beautiful state of ohio is to escape bugs. They are noisy, gross, annoying, and painful. At the moment, I am covered in bug bites while listening to the sound of cicadas outside my window. Lovely.

Cookies

Let me start off by saying that while this is my first blog about food, specifically oatmeal chocolate chip cookies, I am sure it will not be my last. I only want to express my wondering as to why it is that after having a cookie, there is nothing you want more than a cold glass of milk? This happens every time without fail...

My Blog.

I have finally gotten around to doing what i've been wanting to do all summer. I made a blog. I can now record all the moments I have been narrating in my head all summer as if I had a blog.

At the moment, my life consists of getting up early, going to work, having lunch on fountain square, back to work, reading Jane Eyre, and various nightly activities (nothing overly exciting, just exciting enough). Every once in a while, I make cookies too. I like trying new recipes, so if anyone has any good ones, give me a holla. Ones with chocolate chips are preferred but not necessary.

I work with a bunch of 45 year old women who make me smile and laugh every day. I also deal with a lot of forms. Forms that I fill out, stamp, and copy. I spend a lot of good quality time with the copier. We bond often, especially when I am tending it when it is sick. This is probably good practice for nursing. After copying the forms, I look up addresses and stuff the addressed envelopes with the now completed forms. Not to brag, but I have gotten very good at this process.

I only have 1 more week of work before going back to school. Bitter sweet. I will actually miss work, there are some pretty great people there. But I am excited to get back to Utah, specifically p-town. I especially miss my utah friends!!! Ok, back to watching so you think you can dance and possibly a 2 and a half hour version of wuthering heights, and reading more of Jane. Yes, this is my friday night. Love it.