Saturday, March 27, 2010

Pictures in No Particular Order

My mom is back from her trip and so here are the promised pictures, and one from my walk around the house. It's very spring-like (despite the snow on the ground).

New haircut (this isn't a particularly good view of the actual hair, but you get the idea).



Smokey was not happy when I came at her with the camera. But the camera, and my fingers, are still intact.


I bought my first orchid a few days ago. Goal one: don't kill it.



The painting I described a while ago is done and hanging in our dining room.



And the spring-like picture.

Wednesday, March 24, 2010

50

I just have to say that the last post was my fiftieth post.

I am sort of shocked that it has been that many. I'm glad I've stuck with it. I've enjoyed it. I hope you have too.

The Days in No Particular Order

Last night I had all these amazing ideas coming through my head. They weren't just random ideas, either. They were fully formed, well thought-out ideas that were ready to be spell-checked and posted. However, seeing as it was ten at night and I was trying to sleep (sort of), the ideas continued floating around in my head until I fell asleep, at which point they promptly disappeared. Completely.

So here goes nothing, with no ideas, creative or otherwise, anywhere near my brain.

I'm on spring break. There are no capitalized letters on that for me. Last Friday there would have been. My tutor had just cancelled, giving me an extra day off, and I was pumped to play in the snow and watch Friends and not have to do anything all week. Nothing isn't all it's cracked up to be.

I am more tired and feel worse than I have in quite a while. I'm bored. I can't figure out the NCAA men's basketball schedule. And all my ideas have abandoned me to leave me sitting at the computer, typing random, complaining thoughts.

Last night was fun when I looked out the window before going to bed and was greeted by a sea of white. The news had been saying all night that the mountains were supposed to get two feet of snow, but I usually ignore those reports because we hardly get anything here. This, however, was certainly not nothing.

I am looking forward to going outside and making a snow angel and throwing a few snowballs and just reveling in the beauty of the world.

I'm in one of those moods where I listen to the same song over and over and over. At least it's a song that I like.

I am cruising through my Health course, and I just finished the fourth (out of five) exams. The only problem is the computer still says they haven't recieved any of the exams I've sent in. I am trying hard not to freak out and to give it more time, which was working okay until I realized I hadn't copied any of the tests, so if they are lost in the mail, they are really and truly lost.

(Just thought of a perfect Friends line to insert there, but I won't. I tend to find it annoying when people constantly quote their favorite TV shows. But you should know, I am laughing on the other side of your computer screen.)

I did the laundry. I ate breakfast. I watched New Moon. Eh, what can I say. I'm on Team This-Isn't-That-Great-A-Movie-Or-Book-So-Get-Over-It-(Yet-I-Still-Watch-The-Movies-And-Read-The-Books). I listen to the clock tick. I emptied the dishwasher. I researched colleges. I couldn't figure out spell-check.

Life.
We'll see where it takes me.
And where I take myself.

Friday, March 19, 2010

How Are You?


It's a funny phrase. It is one most people hear several times a day. Very rarely does it seem that people actually mean it and want to hear how you are really doing.

It can be a greeting to which you are not obliged to answer. It can be a question that people want a short, happy answer to. It can be a question that people ask with good intentions, but end up not caring about your answer. And then there are the few people who ask it as a genuine question, and listen to your answer to the end.

Then there is the trouble of how to answer, if at all. As noted in a travel guide, when used as a greeting in the United States, it is acceptable to not answer but to continue on with your life or jump directly into the conversation. It is also acceptable to answer with a quick, one word answer and then ask the same question of your companion.

If you feel that a person is asking in a genuine way, you can answer. You can answer with an abrigded version of your life, perhaps with the more unpleasant features left out. Or you can sit down and have a real conversation with the asker.

Being sick, I hear this question often, to the point of ad nauseum. Normally I answer with a small smile and an "okay". Some people (like neighbors) seem to accept this and move on, feeling that their duty to be friendly and concerned has been fulfilled. I don't begrudge them this small, everyday courtsey (or what they may consider a courtsey). I am sure I have been guilty of doing the same thing.

Some people seem more converned and give me a questioning look. I may go into more detail about how I'm doing, but I still leave out the gory details. I have found that no matter how caring a person may be, the vast majority of people just do not want to hear about the bad stuff.

If I do open up, it tends to be a really good conversation-ender. People may feel awkward around me, or not know what to say. They may not have wanted to know all this in the first place, merely because they are not interested, or because they don't want to hear about more pain besides their own. (Becuase everyone, after all, has their own pain.)

I have concluded that it is easier, and nicer, to keep my answers short and relatively upbeat. I do not lie, but I do not tell the whole truth, either.

The strange thing is, after coming to this conclusion, I still ask the question of many people I run into. It is a social custom, above everything else, more than a true desire to know about another person's life. I like to think, however, that I am more receptive to an honest response than I used to be, if that is what people want to give.

For myself, it is also easier to not answer this questin fully. It makes me think about my life and the amount of pain (physical and otherwise) that I carry around. I only give the full answer to people I trust completely, and the rest of the time, I hope that they understand. I don't like to dwell.

So there is a balance to strike: between asking too much and not caring about the answer and not asking at all because you don't want to hear or don't want to burden the other person.

Whatever the balance, I encourage you to ask this question only when you care about the truthful answer you may receive.

Thursday, March 11, 2010

A Bit of This and That

Yesterday was a long, full day.

1) I got my hair cut. Short. Shorter than I've ever had it. I like it a lot, but it's going to take some getting used to. It barely fits in a ponytail, but the pigtails are awesome! Unfortunately, I can't post a picture because my mom took the camera with her. (See #2) To give you an idea, it isn't this short:


and it isn't this long:


2) My mom left for her trip. She is going to visit relatives and be a tourist in France and Spain. She will be gone for 10 days. It is just me, my dad, and Smokey. So far, we've been just fine.

3) I did other regular stuff, like my tutor came and I went to physical therapy. A long day, but good.

4) Today I was tired as expected, but I managed to sit down and crank out homework. I recieved my textbook and everything for my Health coure. I am doing it through a correspondence school. It should be interesting; they don't give the clearest instructions so I am hoping I will figure it out and get it right. I don't think it will be too hard. I just need a half credit and the chapters are really super short.

5) One of my fish died a few weeks ago and another one is still looking sick. Both went downhill after I cleaned the tank. Moral of the story: never, ever clean.

6) I finished a painting in art class (on Tuesday). Again, no pictures because the camera is taking a vacation. I will do my best to describe it, and hopefully, by the end, you will still want to see pictures. It is an abstract sort of thing. I got the idea from going through architecture magazines upside-down. (Artists are strange, aren't they? And the scary thing is, I might be becoming part of that group.) It is blue and green and some brown. And it's weird. Some days I love it and some days, well, some days it just looks like a bunch of random shapes that have nothing to do with each other. But really, that's what most paintings are.

7) I have recently discovered Rob Thomas and his music. I am now listening to his music quite a lot. It might be more along the lines of obsessively listening.

8) The computer was recently infected with something (I didn't do it) and so was reformatted and reconfigured and all sorts of things. So we now have the computer back, but all the files got all messed around and put in strange places and lost. Well, pretty much the only thing that was lost was my music. And it was partly my fault for not backing it up. (Does anyone know how to get music from an ipod to the computer? Don't ask me how I got the music on the ipod in the first place, because I don't know.) I was lazy and stupid and the CDs were only backing up 20 songs at a time! So I'm going through my music trying to find it and find out what can't be found. Wish me luck.

Tuesday, March 9, 2010

I'll Stay in the Dark Ages

Tonight we had pizza. Ordered-in pizza. Ordered on the internet. I had read all about how amazing and futuristic it is. So there I was, super excited. I was prepared with a song, even. (Later I discovered that there is no song by Rob Thomas called Future World. Even more disappointment. There's only so much disappointment a girl can take regarding her futuristic pizza in one night.)

I was humming away as we went to the website. Well, the first sign of trouble should have been the computer wasn't loading the site. It is always a bad sign when your computer disagrees with your decisions. We finally figured out where to go (they make it waaaaay too complicated) and the computer had apparently forgiven us for our bad decision making.

Then we get to chosing toppings. Besides being very confusing there were very few choices. Less than over the phone. At least it seemed that way. Maybe writing them all out like that made them seem small and insignificant. But still, when you have more choices about the kind of sauce you want than toppings, something's gotta be off.

We prevailed. We placed our order. Or so we thought. Then there was a page of info about delivery. (How many times do they want you to say they are going to deliver to a HOUSE?) And then payment info. And then confirmation. And then confirmation of the confirmation. And confirmation of the confirmation of the confirmation. (I may be exaggerating a little bit here, getting a little carried away with typing confirmation. It's a fun word to type, in my defence. Confirmation.)

The computer had mostly forgiven us for our bad, bad decision making by then, or maybe it realized we were already aware of our bad decision making. The page loaded. And that was it. (No progress tracker or anything. Clearly, we chose the wrong company.)

Half an hour our pizza arrived. Very good pizza. That I will, from now on, be ordering over the phone. Becuase I would prefer to stay in the Dark Ages, thank you very much. No more futuristic pizza for me.

Saturday, March 6, 2010

On Personal Significance

Looking through the labels I am reminded of the Best of 2009 blog challenge that I never finished. I had good intentions, believe you me, I just, well, you know...life....happened.

Part of it was that many of the topics didn't apply to me and I didn't really know what else to write about.

Another part was the fact that to stick with it, I would have had to blog every day for a month. That's 31 days. I wanted to, but it was intimidating and I just....didn't.

And then there's also the little voice that I try so hard to keep duct taped shut that asks if I really have anything that interesting to say. Are my opinions really worthy of being published on the world-wide-web for anyone to see? Even if they are, does anyone want to read them?

They are, after all, the mostly random, sometimes incomprehensible thoughts floating through my head. I read other blogs and constantly compare myself to them. I'm not that funny. I don't form strong opinions about anything. I will never be nationally published and recognized.

Yet here I am, writing down my personal thoughts and worries of my personal significance to the world. Somehow I want to or need to. I like having the possibility that anyone, at anytime could read what I have to say. Maybe they might even find it interesting. Or thought provoking.

But for now I will settle with writing when I can, what I can, where I can. It probably won't be as often as I would like, as funny as I would hope, and it will almost certainly be from the safety and comfort of my house.