Fotography Friday #2

This weeks theme is "Cats"! We have plenty of them around here, so I have plenty of photos of them! These are a few of my most recent photos of some of our cats...

This is our most recent addition, Toby... I wish I could pretty much drop into any position and sleep as comfortably as he seems to...

Mia, one of our ragdolls... she's not an outdoor cat, but she likes to think she is. We spoil her rotten because when she begs enough we bring her out and set her in this chair. She loves her chair. She sits here for hours without moving, merely content to be outside.

This isn't actually our cat... It's big brother's cat Cali. She's my niece though, so she counts as family. This was on one of the occasions where we tried to being her to our house to play with our cats. She hid in my room the whole afternoon. That's my bedskirt lol

House of Horrors

I knew a girl sophomore year of college who was the epitome of gross roommate. She lived in the room next door to mine and was in my degree program. Every morning I would knock on her door and get her for class because if not, she’d sleep right through. Occasionally, I would have to sneak into her room and drag her out of bed. Those were the worst days, because going in their room was the worst start to a day you could possibly imagine.

Let me try to explain this by way of example… She and her roommate both came to school with a full 16-piece set of dishes (keep this in mind). They cooked meals every day for just the two of them, and never cleaned their dishes until they ran out of clean ones to use. Imagine, two girls and 32 dishes, piled on their dorm room floor beside the sink. Dirty dishes would sit there for ages! There was an afternoon where I passed their door and there was a note from roomie 1 to roomie 2 that read, “I found the source of the smell! It was a pan of mac & cheese buried under a pile of dishes!”

Understand now? That room smelled to righteous! I was amazed it took them the majority of the school year to decide the room smelled. For the rest of us, it only took a few days to notice. I'm a clean freak and a bit of a germophobe, so entering their room was an awful experience for me.

I'm sure you're wondering why I bother sharing this story with you... I promise I possess a point! My older brother just found out his housemate is moving at the end of August. I was thrilled! this guy is completely disgusting! The other day, I went over to big brother's house to hang out. We decided to do dinner and a movie, and went into the kitchen to determine what we wanted to make. After deciding on the meal, we discovered there weren't any pots or pans available because they were all piled in the sink. Big brother opened the dishwasher to see if there were any in there (which there were), and we were accosted by a nasty stench because roomie doesn't rinse his dishes at all before shoving them in the dishwasher. I'm sure that practice works when the dishwasher is run frequently, but in the case of 2 guys who only eat 2 of 3 meals there each day, the dishwasher isn't run very often.

After giving up and cleaning roomie's dishes (I can tolerate doing dishes for a meal I participated in, but I'm not his mom or his fiancee, and therefore I was rather peeved) I made some dinner for myself. In the meantime, big brother decided to take out the trash. Apparently, his roomie had dumped something liquid in the trash and it leaked through a hole in the bag all over the bottom of the trash can. Big brother had to take it outside and hose it out.

People who don't clean up after themselves drive me crazy, but what's worse is people who misuse other people's things. Roomie is a paying renter in my brother's house, but he is still a guest in the sense that he doesn't own the place or any of the furniture in it. This, however, doesn't seem to phase him as he progressively destroys the furniture big brother bought just a year ago! For example, he leaves drinks and food on the tables in the living room (which leaves circles in the wood and such). Who does that to other people's stuff?! I used to come over and sleep on the couch, but now I have to clean the couch before I sleep on it because there's so many crumbs and crud on it. Big brother tries to keep the place clean, but he's losing the battle. His roomie has never lifted a finger to clean, even though big brother has told him to do so. Instead, roomie makes his fiancee, who doesn't live in the house, come over after work and clean for him. I would throw the ring in his face.

Wordless Wednesday #13

I got an award!

I've been given the Kreativ Blogger Award! AustenFan over at Reality Bites. . . Fiction Does It Better! tagged me with it! Thanks!!!

For this award, I'm supposed to list seven of my favorite things and seven other blogs. So let me think...

1. Going to Grandma's... Her house is a comforting reminder of simpler times. We eat muffins on the front porch and read the paper. And I love asking her questions about her life. Grandparents have the COOLEST stories!

2. Books for sure! They're like a disease. Big Brother and I went to Barnes & Noble the other day to have a coffee and I decided to wander the store (bad plan). I'm in the middle of two books at the moment, and am seriously backlogged on books I have to read. So what did I do? I bought three more books!

3. Cats. They're the best cuddle buddies out there!

4. Fuzzy socks take up an entire drawer in my dresser. They're unnecessary, but soft and warm!

5. I watch movies all the time. I average at least 1 or 2 per day.

6. Pepsi is the nectar of the gods.

7. I always have pair of polarized sunglasses on, be they on my face or on my head, day or night.

I'm going to be lazy about listing 7 blogs. My blog list is at the bottom of the blog. If you're on that list, you get the award!

The Nosy Neighbor

The other day I was watching a movie with my mom and a UPS truck drove into the court. I didn't think anything of it (who really cares what drives through?) but mom was apparently curious. Rather than simply ask me what pulled into the court, she reaches under her TV cabinet and whips out (get this!) a pair of binoculars! Really?!?! I mean, can you really be any more of the embodiment of nosy neighbor??? I'm at a loss for words... I'm somewhere between amusement and shock at the fact that she actually intended to watch the goings-on in the court with her binoculars...

$$$

Well... it's that time of the year again! I've registered for my classes (Organic chem and biology! Ack!) and football preseason kicks off in 2 weeks. I'm both excited and bummed. I need about 30 hours in a day to achieve all that I want to, but since that will never happen, I'm stuck with never finishing my to-do list. I know it will only get worse once school and work start. Worse yet, I was looking over textbooks, and it looks like it'll run at least $400... no more scholarship to help me out! Boo!

You want to know what the worst part about the textbooks is? This community college where I'm going my pre-reqs is determined to use the latest textbooks. The difference between the 14th edition and the 15th could be something as miniscule as fixing a few typos. But instead of having us buy the previous edition, they require the latest edition, which runs about $150 more! I usually do all my book buying on Amazon.com, but none of our textbooks are even available on there yet! I'll have to buy them through the school bookstore, which completely jacks up the price! It's such a rip off!

I had all this money saved up, between birthdays and Christmases for the past few years, and graduation. I had my UK trip all planned out so all I was waiting on was big brother to pull together the money. Of course, then he spent everything he had on a stupid new hobby... we won't go there (sore subject). I should have seen that as the beginning of the end... My money is disappearing. Between paying costs for certification and my license, as well as buying needed supplies for work and school books, my bank account is dying. It is a severely depressing prospect. I'll have income from work, and it will buoy my account. I'll make about $13,000 for working from August to June.

Many of my plans have been altered due to the money issue. I would love to own a Mini, but it will have to wait. I would love to move out (Big brother will have an open room in his house soon). Unfortunately school will eat all of my money. Fortunately, I've got my new plan laid out! The military has a grad school scholarship for medical professions. All expenses paid (tuition, room/board/books/etc) plus a nice little $1500-ish monthly allowance. The only stipulation is that when you get out of school, you give whatever branch paid for your school at least 3 years of service! I could live at big brother's with the allowance, have school paid for, and have job security after I graduate! I figure I'll try for the Air Force scholarship first, since they tend to have the nicest facilities. I'm not sure if I'll be given any say in the matter, but I plan to lobby like a champ to be stationed at one of the hospitals in Germany. Three years in Europe! Mom would have a fit (She gets worked up just hearing about the scholarship), but I would be able to visit all sorts of places I want to see while I'm over there!

I like my plan... Mom doesn't know I'm seriously considering the military scholarship. Last time I brought it up, she cried for days because she got worked up thinking about the prospect of me being shipped overseas after graduating. She thinks I'd hate being so far from my family (I, however, think that she thinks very highly of herself).

On a brighter note, I was poking around my accounts and guess what?! My AdSense has earned me $6!!! Woo! That's like finding money on the ground, because you don't have to do anything to earn it!

The Host by Stephanie Meyer

I've never been big on sci-fi books but I've occasionally gotten into a few sci-fi movies/shows... I love me some Stargate SG-1 (Daniel Jackson= hot archaeologist... GREAT combo)! A friend was determined that I give this book a chance, so I decided to have a go. This one had two things working against it- (1) I don't do aliens and (2) If you've read my Twilight series reviews, you know how I feel about Stephanie Meyer's writing skill... However I was willing to hope that perhaps she was just bad at writing the Twilight series.

This book, for those who don't know, is essentially about an alien invasion. These aliens, called "souls", come to Earth and fuse themselves to the spines of humans. They then inhabit the human, obtaining all of its memories and essentially taking over the host's life. The human consciousness is suppressed until it essentially disappears. The souls then live out the lifespan of their host and then transfer to another. They do this on a number of planets, not just Earth. The book focuses on a soul named "Wanderer" who is put into the body of a young woman. Typically the transition is easy and the human is immediately suppressed. Instead, this one remains as a very annoying voice in the head of Wanderer and makes life very hard. Along with acquiring memories, a soul also acquires the human's feelings, so it wasn't long before Wanderer wanted to see "her" family as badly as her human host. From there it's just a long line of mishaps and troubles with people wanting to kill her.

There were a few things I enjoyed about the book. It was certainly a different story than my norm, and I'm always happy to try something new. The relationships were more tolerable than those written by Meyer in the Twilight Series. They were more "normal" if you will, in terms of not being over-the-top, mental case levels of attachment. I will admit, by the end of the book, I felt bad for the dilemma the Wanderer suffered from, wanting to remain on Earth with people she had become attached to, but knowing she was an unwelcome guest in a body that wasn't her own. It's one of the only Stephanie Meyer characters I've ever felt for, aside from Jacob Black. There were a few turns of events in the book which kept it interesting, and added some unique perspective (typically with the body-snatcher scenarios you only ever get the crazed aliens who only want to dominate the planet where-as with Wanderer you experience other emotions regarding the whole scenario).

Like the Twilight series, Stephanie Meyers has an unnatural talent for being long-winded. She takes four pages to say what I could write in a paragraph. She becomes overwhelmingly focused on details to the point where you're mentally begging her to move along! She is also painfully repetitive, reiterating facts every three or four chapters that really don't need to be repeated. For example, the "soul" abhors violence. Rather than say it once and hope the reader has the mental capacity to remember, she feels the need to remind us at every unfortunate turn of events that the soul refuses to defend herself because it would be violent. And then you're stuck reading multiple pages of her arguing with the voice in her head about it as though the argument will actually result in any change in personality.

The story lacks originality in my opinion... parasitic aliens who take over the human race. From Invasion of the Body Snatchers to Animorphs, the story line has been played out. I've heard some people say they couldn't put it down, but I'd have to say there was no easier task for me to perform. I was hoping to read the book quickly and return it to the loaner, but it ended up taking me about four weeks to push myself through. As I reached the third week and had only finished half the book, I had to force myself to sit down and read the rest before I saw the friend again.

The book had a very slow start, and the story took too many chapters to develop. Once the story was finally on a roll, it didn't stop. I mean, it would NEVER END. You sit there thinking, "I'm only 2/3 of the way through the book... how much more can she possibly drag this out?!" No one can beat a dead horse like Meyer can!

In the end, I'd have to say the read wasn't worth my time. Stephanie Meyer lacks writing skill above that of many high school kids, and I find it very difficult to enjoy her books. Something about her writing style reminds me of when students have to write term papers and they add in random adjectives and repeat themselves a dozen times in an effort to make their papers longer.

Fotography Friday #1

Alright... adding something new to the lineup! As many of you know, not only am I an avid reader, but I also love photography. I'm not stellar at it, but sometimes I manage to surprise even myself! That said, I am introducing a new weekly post I shall call "Fotography Friday"! And yes, I do know how to spell photography. Each Friday, I'll have a theme and I'll show you some of my favorite photos pertaining to said theme. I'll also give a bit of explanation, because as they say, "A picture is worth a thousand words" and you may gain an insight or two about me!

So, without further ado, I shall declare this Fotography Friday theme to be "Big Brother", since it's his birthday week!

This is from the day I got the camera. This is when he finally realized I was sitting there snapping photos. Big brother is the family freak... no one else has blue eyes or fair skin like his.

This is big brother with his friend (the one he's been in love with since 7th grade) when we were on a bike ride to the park...

Big brother, zoning out while we were standing at the park... not realizing I'm snapping photos of him.

Wordless Wednesday #12

Yeah, I know! **Poll**

I know what you're thinking... I've changed the layout, YET AGAIN. I took a lot of critiques into account, and made modifications! Think of my numerous layout changes as dating (since we all know I completely lack that in the literal sense)... I've just been trying to find the right one to marry! I feel good about this one though! Read on, because there's a poll!

Here are some mods I've made:

This will load significantly faster because there are significantly less pictures supporting the layout.

There are less ads. People said it made the page look too commercial.

There's less pink. People said it was a bit too much.

Please let me know what you think! Give me ideas of what to add/delete. Should I drop the label list? I think so... It's really long... Just let me know! I'd appreciate all opinions!



On a completely unrelated note- My blog has just recently passed it's half-birthday and I've achieved 100 followers! I honestly find it hard to believe that there are that many people out there who find my life that interesting... I had a reader tell me that reading my blog makes them feel better about their life... I'm not sure whether that was a compliment, or if that means my life sucks that bad. Either way, I'll just keep pluggin' along... Thanks all for reading!

Out of Stock

You know how you inherit certain things from your parents? Well, I've managed to inherit a curse from my mom. Without fail, if we ever start to like something, it disappears off the market. This pertains to every item imaginable! Be it food items, personal care items, etc.

Worse yet, it also manages to get me with my favorite TV programs. Mind you, I don't watch TV. I can't actually tell you the last time I turned on a TV and watched a full program. For one reason, I'm far too impatient to deal with commercials. For another, my schedule isn't conducive to programming. All the shows I have ever truly enjoyed either air too early in the day while I'm in class/at work or too late at night when I need to be sleeping. I couldn't ever watch "prime time" shows because unfortunately 7:00-ish is also game time for most sports. For this reason, I just never bother with TV.


The only way I ever see TV shows is via Netflix (which, by the way, I'm ridiculously addicted to). It was via Netflix that I have seen every episode of CSI ever produced, as well as Rome, Robin Hood, and Gilmore Girls. Of those shows, what do you notice? Perhaps that three of the four are no longer airing? I'll give Gilmore Girls credit where credit is due... that show ran for ages and it was time for it to go. Unfortunately, I didn't really get into the show until the last season was going, so by the time I got through all of the previous seasons, the show was over. I'll blame myself for that and not the curse. I have a bad habit of living under a rock and jumping onto bandwagons like popular entertainment really late in the game.


Rome, however, only lasted 2 seasons. It wasn't a particularly amazing show by any standard (My biggest pet peeve with HBO is that it seems to think that a show is only entertaining if you see people having sex at least twice per episode) but the story line aside from that little issue was pretty awesome! I loved it! Sadly, as I said, it didn't last. BBC's Robin Hood is a show I really got into last year. I own the first two seasons (I loved it so much on Netflix that I went out and bought them). Season 3 hasn't aired on BBC America, but I came across the episodes online and have been keeping up with season 3 that way. Again, it wasn't meant to last... I knew how the 3rd season would have to end, merely based on the fact that certain actors had declared it their last season before the season even started. Fans were hoping the show would continue on without said characters, but BBC made the announcement about a week ago that they were scrapping the idea for a 4th season and leaving it how it ended in the 3rd. Sad, right? It figures...


This always happens! Every time I really get into something, it ends or disappears! Mom has it worse than I do... on a weekly basis she'll look in stores for something or on TV or some such situation and realize whatever it was she was looking for is gone for good. I hope it's not a sign of things to come for me as I get older. Perhaps this curse won't run as strong in me... or perhaps it strikes more frequently with age. Maybe I'll try to rock emo style and just start hating everything...

Deliciousity in a pan!

**Editorial note: A few people have contacted me to tell me they can't leave comments... I have since fixed the problem. Please email me if you still have trouble!**

I've decided to do a slightly different write up than the norm today! I'm not a creative cook... I usually stick with the easy stuff like soup and sandwiches. However, there are a few foods that I'll bust out the extra effort for. This is one of my personal favorites- Hot Chicken Casserole! Casseroles are pretty awesome in my opinion. I will admit this is kind of gnarly looking... a friend once told me she refused to even try it because it looked like someone puked on the plate. Load of rubbish in my opinion. Either way, be brave and at least try it!

**NOTE** I got this recipe from my mom's recipe stash. Mom likes to cook as though she's feeding a regiment... Feel free to half this recipe. It'll still be enough to feed a family of 4. Also, if you're on a diet, don't bother with this. This will destroy your calorie count for a week. You've been warned!

Ingredients:
(8) Pieces of diced chicken breast
(6) Hard boiled eggs(4) Cups of celery, finely cut
(1) Cup of cream of chicken soup
(2) 8 oz. cans of water chestnuts
(2) 4 oz. cans of sliced mushrooms
(2) Cups of mayonnaise
(2) Cups of sour cream
(1) Cup of slivered/sliced almonds (found in the baking section)
(4) Tablespoons of lemon juice
(4) Tablespoons of minced onion
(2) Teaspoons of salt
(1/2) Teaspoon of pepper
(1) Bag of shredder Mozzarella cheese

Here's a few ingredient shots. I just slice up the celery relatively thin. Mom sticks on the chicken to boil while I prep everything else. For those who don't know, the chicken is done when you cut it in half and it's white all the way through.





Mix all of the ingredients except the cheese into a big bowl. This first one is all the ingredients prior to adding chicken:


Shred up the chicken and add it to the bowl:


Here's a close up of it all mixed up. Gross looking, yes? Delicious though! I have a bad habit of munching on it at this point before shoving it in the oven. Yum!


Smear it into a pan and cook for 25-30 minutes at 350 degrees.


Take the pan out and cover with a layer of mozzarella cheese. You may want to mix it up a bit in the pan before adding the cheese, to make sure it's all cooked evenly. Stick it back in until the cheese is all melted and starts to brown around the edges.


We usually cook up a batch of jasmine rice to put the hot chicken casserole on. This stuff is incredibly filling, so a little bit goes a long way. It's so delish though!



Let me know if you try it and what you think. My younger brother hates it, but dad and big brother get excited whenever I make it. There seem to be mixed feelings for it, so don't worry about offending!

Can I ask a favor?

One of my students, Sam, has entered a design contest from Roxy to design a bathing suit. She aspires to be a designer, so she's pretty determined to get some votes. Unfortunately, her social network doesn't extend very far, so I wanted to help her out a bit. If you could just follow the link, and vote for her design, I would really appreciate it! Just click here to go to the voting page. Thanks!

Also, I know I've pretty much tapped out my social network, but if you haven't, please just click the vote button for my photo! I'm currently in 193rd place and the contest ends Aug 12th. I would love for my photo to win! It would get me $1000 to put towards grad school. Please vote!

My Favorite Photo (I've Ever Taken) Brickfish

Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince Review!

Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince is BY FAR the best movie yet!!!

As with all the Potter movies, there's always the concern about how much damage they'll do to the story line, but they did a fantastic job! There was a perfect balance of funny with serious, which kept the movie from being too ridiculous or depressing. The audience spent a lot of the movie laughing at the antics of Harry and Ron (Ron on love potion and Harry on Felix Felicis were hilarious!). Dumbledore even has his funny moments in this film! The serious and scary parts were also remarkably well done. At one point, you could visibly see the entire theatre jump when something scary happened. I know it's corny to say, but I laughed, I cried... It was just an AWESOME movie!

I've heard some people say the end was a tad abrupt, but in my opinion, so was the book. They left out some things, but as with all the movies, they were rather unimportant to the overall plot of the series. I liked the opening, and how it helped to bring in the events of the previous film. I think of all the films since the first, this is the first one I've felt the director did proper justice to the book. For example, it bothered me immensely that Alfonso Cuarón allowed them to wear muggle clothes the entire movie (where in the books you lose house points for such an offense). There were a few minor plot modifications, but nothing that harmed the story line, which was great!

All of the actors did a brilliant job, and I'm really looking forward to the quality of the final film. My dad said they'd better get a move on... it's one thing to see the young characters growing up, but the older characters are getting on in their years too. It was best seen in Maggie Smith, who was looking a bit worn... then again, she's been battling breast cancer, so the fact that she's going strong is incredible. It was hard enough changing Dumbledore actors (I just can't adjust to Michael Gambon... his version of Dumbledore is too abrasive and loud for me), I couldn't imagine changing Prof. McGonagall at the end! Half Blood Prince can definitely go down as my favorite of all the movies so far (A feat that hasn't been achieved since the first movie came out). Go see it!!!

Wordless Wednesday #11

They found something!

Surgery went well! It was definitely an interesting experience, but it was well worth it. We got there way early (one never knows if there will be tunnel traffic or not) and had to drop off a urine sample at the lab. Then they stuck me in my room. I watched the Tour de France for a long time, all the while starving to death. I hadn't eaten since 8:00 the night before, I was supposed to be in surgery at 10:15 and at 11:15 they finally came for me.

We started in the recovery room where the anesthesiologists did a nerve block in my hip. I had two, one front and one back. Then they wheeled me into the operating room and asked if I could manage to slide myself onto the operating table. This was supposed to be a difficult task, because of my dead leg from the nerve block. However, instead I crab-walked onto the table with no trouble. Their faces were hilarious. It was then that I realized my leg should be unusable by that point. So we sat around for a few while they occasionally poked me and asked if I could feel it. Finally it did kick in and they could get started.

I had been told I would be given a knock-out gas that would put me to sleep, but only barely. Supposedly, they would be able to ask me questions and I would be able to respond with one word answers and pass back out. I would be unaware of everything going on but not be out to the point where they'd have to shove tubes down my throat. They started by putting a cannula in my nose with the gas and after a few minutes asking me how I felt/was I tired? My response?

"I feel fine. Not really tired yet."

This wasn't adequate for their one word answer plan. They switched my nose cannula out for a mask and told me to breathe deep. I will say I was kind of out, since I was in a bit of a daydream land and didn't really pay attention to what the surgeon was doing. Unfortunately, I was never as out as they would have liked. Throughout the surgery, I kept giving sentences worth of responses.

At one point I heard the surgeon say, "Are you sure you gave her enough?"

And the nurse at my head, "Yes! I've given her three batches!"

So essentially they gave me enough to knock out a horse and I was still going strong! I was a tad ashamed of this fact... surgeons can usually tell when someone is a drug user because they have a high resistance to sedatives, whereas non-users will usually go out like a light. I swear on all that is holy I've never done a street drug in my life! But for some bizarre reason, my body wasn't giving up yesterday. The surgeon was able to show me pictures before we even left the operating room because I was wide awake as soon as they pulled off the mask. When they rolled me back into recovery, they didn't even bother taking me in. They just set me inside the door while they dropped off papers and took me straight to my room.

In my room, the nurse asked me if I was hungry but I just said I needed to pee. By that point I was on my 3rd bag of saline, so I was SUPER hydrated! The nurse was excited because that would knock out one of the criteria for me to go home. I had to:

1. Go to the bathroom without a problem
2. Eat without nausea
3. Be there for at least 30 minutes
4. Have my pain under control

I went to the restroom, I slammed down my lunch, and my knee felt fine. I was stoked I could get out so quick. Unfortunately I ended up being there for 2 hours because they were so back logged they couldn't get to me. But I made it home alright, and chilled on the couch. I had dead leg until about 8 PM. I slept fine last night and I've spent all day today on the couch downstairs. I'm feeling pretty good though!

So I'm sure you're thinking, "Whoop-dee-doo!" You probably want to know what they found, right? Well, it turns out my meniscus is in great shape, as is my articular cartilage. No, instead my infrapatellar fat pad had slipped into the joint space.


So the doc shaved it down and cleaned it out, and I should be good as new! It would explain all my meniscus tear symptoms, since something was getting caught in the joint space. I can walk without crutches as soon as I feel up to it, so I've been hobbling around a bit today. I'm feeling pretty good, and haven't really needed heavy pain killers. More later... right now I'm tired :o)

Going under the knife!

Just so everyone knows, I'm having surgery done on my knee tomorrow. Because of this, I may or may not be posting for a day or two... It really depends on the amount of pain I'm in and whether or not I'm high on percocet. Of course, I could just post while I'm high on percocet, but that may be a bizarre experience for everyone. More than likely though, I'll just be biting through the pain with no meds because pain meds don't agree with me.

The doctors actually have no idea what is wrong with my knee, aside from the fact that I'm pretty much always in pain. So, I was told there are a few possible outcomes:

1. The find nothing (This in my book is worst case scenario because that means there's no way to fix the pain)

2. They find a tear in my meniscus that the MRI didn't catch (This would be best case scenario because I'd be up and walking within the week)

3. They find chips in my articular cartilage and have to drill micro-fractures into the end of my bone to stimulate the bone regeneration process and fill in the chips (This is good and bad... good because they have found the issue and can fix it, bad because that would mean 6 weeks non-weight bearing and I'd be out at football practice on crutches come August)

I'm really hoping they find something. All signs point to meniscus tear, although nothing showed on the MRI. My knee clicks all the time, and if I'm standing/walking for long periods of time the pain becomes excruciating. I walked around San Antonio with a limp the whole time. If they find nothing, I may just ask them to amputate.

Wordless Wednesday #10

Predatoress Giveaway

I know I have a lot of True Blood fans on here, so I have a treat for you! Kimberly over at She Scribes is doing a giveaway for a new book called Predatoress! Predatoress is about an 18 year old Hungarian girl named Emma Gabor, who is your typical college freshman. Suddenly, she is attacked and turned into a vampire (descended from the infamous Vlad Dracula!). Critics say it'll be stiff competition for Twilight and Sookie Stackhouse. Interested?

The giveaway winner will receive a Predatoress Gift Set ($60 value) which includes the book and a bottle of ruby red Zinfandel that says "Blood" on the label with the vampires mouth. The bottle says it contains a California Burgundy, Bols Cocoa Liquor and hot Hungarian Paprika!



Sounds cool, huh? You have to be 21 to enter, and there are a number of ways to enter. You can read more about the Predatoress story and giveaway rules here!

Want to know more about Predatoress? Check out the official website here!

6 Unimportant Things That Make Me Happy Meme

Many thanks to Julia over at A Piece of My Mind for tagging me with this meme! For this, I have to list 6 things, which although unimportant, make me happy. Then I have to pass it on to 6 more people. SO... let me think...

Romantic movies. I have watched Pride and Prejudice a ridiculous number of times. There have been days where I have watched it, redirected to the menu, and watched it again. Mom hates those days. I've done it about a million and one times with North & South (The BBC film, not the Civil War one). It's a total waste of time, but I just feel content afterwards.

Music. I pop in my earbuds and listen to my film scores and I'm the happiest person on Earth. Very few of the songs on my iPod have lyrics... maybe about 5. The only album I enjoy listening to with lyrics is Wicked, which I do love listening to. Something about film scores just makes me happy. You can find a song for any mood. Just find a movie that matches your mood, and play from there! Great stuff!

Hanging out with my brother. Yesterday we sat on the couch for over an hour staring into space trying to think of something to do. I was perfectly content. He's my best friend.

Thunderstorms. They soothe me. I love the ones at night, when I can lay in bed and listen to the storm and watch the lightning flash.

A clean room. I hate clutter in my bedroom. I can't think straight or even sleep well if my room is a mess. I love when my room is neat and clean. An uncluttered room leads to an uncluttered mind!

Guys will totally not be able to understand this, but the women will... I love climbing into bed right after shaving my legs. I know, the guys are thinking, "Umm...?!" It feels awesome! Super soft! I love it! I have a super soft blanket on my bed, and it just feels great.

Ok, that's 6! So... who shall I tag? I'm only going to tag 4 because I think they'd be the only 4 who would do this lol. Feel free to pass it along without being tagged though! I need to update the list of blogs I follow. Some haven't been updated in months. Time to find new reading material!

Lindsey at A Kindred Spirit's Thoughts
TommyGirl at Backroom Treasures
Dori at From a Yellow House In England
Sara at The Breathing Post

A Night at the Movies

My brother and I met up with our parents this evening to go catch Ice Age 3: Dawn of the Dinosaurs... it was possibly the worst moviegoing experience of my life! I can sum up the movie in one word: Tired. They should have stopped with the first Ice Age movie. The second was tolerable. This third one was "cute" but had very little laugh-worthy material and just seemed... predictable. Don't waste your money on a movie ticket. And as if seeing a dud of a movie isn't bad enough...

Before every movie, it does a little thing with sound effects (phones ringing, babies crying, etc) and says, "don't spoil the movie by adding your own soundtrack." So why would a woman bring her two kids, who I would estimate were under 1, and maybe 2 years old? Neither was old enough to appreciate the movie! The baby cried the WHOLE movie, and the older one ran around and shouted and talked the whole time. How did the mom respond? She did NOTHING. The only time she reacted to her kids' behavior is when the older one drifted to far and she yelled (YELLED! In a movie!!!) at him to "Get back here!" REALLY?!?! Has the woman never been to a movie??? Does she not understand the basic movie-going etiquette???

I figured it was relatively common sense, but apparently not! I mean, my first thought would have been, "They're too young. We'll watch a video at home." Unfortunately, her brain obviously bypassed this thought process. As a backup, my brain probably would have thrown out, "Hey, the kid is being obnoxious. Take him outside of the theatre and take care of it so other people can watch the movie." But again, no such luck. She just sat there. The whole theatre was shushing her and muttering about how obnoxious they were. If you need to get out of the house, get a babysitter!

Lindsay needs a vacation from vacation.

Someone once told me "The best way to ensure something will get done is to write it down." My To-Do List has grown beyond my control. It has permeated my routine. I've been reading the same book for two and a half weeks! That's not normal! So, I thought, if writing is down wasn't enough, perhaps if I share my list with you, it'll compel me to finish! I mean, it's one thing for my brain to call me a failure, but another thing entirely if everyone on the world wide web were to think so.

My biggest mistake? Starting hobbies and heading off to school. I've been collecting stuff for 4 years and now that I'm done, I'm trying to clean up. Ahhh!!!!

On a complete side note before beginning this, the cat seems determined to eat my Pre-Op instructions. Very weird... Oh, and I'm in 246th place in the photo contest! I ran out of networks to ask to vote... so I think it'll die there, but I had a good run!

So here's my list. Some of it will sound completely bizarre, and I will try to explain as much as I can. As I manage to finish some of these tasks, I'll share my triumph with all of you!

1. Remove nail polish. This is harder than it seems. The polish is clear but turns hot pink when I go in the sun. I had thought I got it all and went out yesterday only to discover I hadn't. Very uncool.

2. Make arrows. For those who don't know, I own a British Longbow and it uses wooden arrows. Wooden arrows are very expensive (6 for $40) and it's cheaper to make your own. I bought all the supplies months ago, but haven't found the will to do it (I'm completely winging it. There's very little lit. on how to make them, even on the internet. Bad hobby idea.).

3. Edit photos. I'm now backed up from graduation, through my visit to the mountains, to convention in San Antonio. Photo editing is monotonous and my internet hasn't been working so uploading has been a nightmare.

4. Re-read Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. It's been a long while and the movie is about to release. Crud! I just remembered...

5. Buy tickets to midnight release. Hopefully it isn't sold out. I keep forgetting. I'm that geek who always goes in full costume. Oh yeah! But then...

6. Find costume. My gut tells me it's in the attic. I need to find that.

7. Make scrapbook. I keep everything from everything I do. Bad habit. I keep telling myself I'll do something with it. So I got it in my head to make a scrapbook of all my travels. It'll definitely help me clear some space. Unfortunately it's such a mammoth project that I'm having trouble getting motivated even though I have all the supplies. I just need to put it together.

8. Fix blog. I've decided to modify the welcome and do away with the featured content scroller. I'll make that bar much smaller and move everything up. I'll get to it.

9. Clean fish tank. Not a difficult task, just tedious.

10. Finish book. Can't start HP6 until I finish this book. I'm already in the middle of three (Somehow this keeps happening!) and I need to knock one out.

I think that's all... I'll add/remove as I go. My goal is to have at least 5 done by the end of the weekend. busy weekend ahead!