Good morning, Baltimore

Hello, sorry I haven't posted in a while but as you may have guessed things have been a little bit crazy.

My last day at A&F was July 16th. I just had my exit interview that day which was impersonal (I sat in front of a computer and filled out a survey) and caused me to go a little bit nuts in my opinions (I had intended to be reserved and polite)...I

literally typed the sentence "I believe [so and so] personifies everything that is wrong with this company." I hoped they liked that one.

That evening I had a goodbye bar night at a restaurant downtown called The Little Palace because I am a Princess, clearly. There were many handsome men there. My friend Michelle from my running group was nice enough to come, and she spent the first five minutes commenting on how everyone at A&F was attractive (everyone at my party, at least)

...I guess I hadn't really noticed. We'll see how it compares to UA.

It was really nice and really fun, even though it was bittersweet. The shitty part of the night was that I got my first speeding ticket driving home :-( Believe me, I deserved it, if not for that night then for the past 10 years when I have willfully and gleefully driven recklessly and ticket-free, but it just pissed me off that it was the first time that I got pulled over ever and he gave me the ticket. UNCOOL, OFFICER DOUCHEBAG. That meant that I had to go to court this past Monday to contest the points being applied to my ticket (I didn't contest that I was guilty and deserved to pay the fee, but I contested that I should get points). Lucky for me, they reduced my speed by 21 mph to get me within 5 mph of the speed limit (yeah, I said I deserved it) and gave me no points on my license. Phew. And yes, if you're wondering, I've stopped speeding. Quite as much.

So then the next day I went skydiving with John! I'd always wanted to go, and one day a "Groupon" landed in our e-mail inboxes for 50% off skydiving, so John called and said he wanted to go and we bought the Groupons! So then I knew I had to go within the next year...but we never really planned when we'd go. Once I found out I was leaving Columbus on the 26th, I knew I had to jump out of a plane prior...so we booked our appointments and drove 2 hours away to Middletown, Ohio. We waited quite a while once we arrived and got more and more excited...and then it was our turn and we got all geared up and went up in the air! And what goes up must come down....

I know Lizzy has done it, I don't know if any of the rest of you have...I know Annie hasn't...anyway if you haven't and you're open to it, I HIGHLY recommend that you do it someday. It was an awesome experience, unlike anything else I've ever done in my life. When you're in freefall it really just feels like you're standing outside on a windy day, and then when your chute is opened, it's just like floating down towards the Earth on an amusement park ride or something. Totally awesome. Plus, being strapped to a big burly dude isn't so bad!

After skydiving I spent the next week trying to forget what it was like to work at A&F, reading Grisham novels by the pool, meeting up with people to say bye one last time (I think John was the hardest. We both cried. He said "Why is everyone leaving me?" like the dad from My Big Fat Greek Wedding) and having panic attacks regarding the move.

Eventually moving day came. The packers arrived promptly at 7 am on Monday and were all done with my apartment by 12:30. My mom and I finished up in the apartment, got some lunch, packed the cars, and were on the road to B'more by 4. I arrived here around 11:30 that night and moved into my temporary housing (see Facebook for pictures, they're too boring to repost here). My mom chose to drive south to McLean instead so that we didn't have to unpack her car that night, and she met me back in B'more the next day.

So, drawing from an e-mail I sent Lizzy earlier this week:

I am living in Fells Point. (please see map for your reference). I have put the little walking guy exactly where I am living - I'm right at the end of the pier. Over down by Boston Street is the area called Canton. It has the Safeway and the local library so I have been there a couple of times. Then down by Light Street on the left side of the map, that's Federal Hill. We went there for lunch today. I am going to work in Locust Point (bottom right) Do you see in the bottom of the red circle where those streets kind of form an "H"? That's where Under Armour is. If I want, I can take a free "Water taxi" from fells point directly across the harbor over to where Under Armour is! It's pretty cool. Otherwise I have to drive all the way around the harbor which would take like 20-30 minutes. I think so far I like Fells Point the most -- young people live in Fells Point, Canton, and Federal Hill, so I'll look at all of them, but I like Fells Point so far. Lots of shops and places to eat. Lots of places to walk, too.

SO. That is life right now. I start work on Monday. I'm pretty nervous. I would like you all to come visit as soon as possible. Please. Thanks.

ALSO - Smolls (and anyone else, if they happen to have information that falls into the following categories) -- where are your favorite restaurants in B'more? Where should I be checking out? Would any of your friends here be willing to share some of the same information with me and not think I'm a creep? xoxoxo

my own personal version of fail blog

this what i saw in the A&F parking lot this morning.
what?

I am feeling a little dramatic

so I am listening to The House That Built Me by Miranda Lambert on repeat as I prepare for my move back to the East Coast. See lyrics here.

YOU MUST LOVE THIS.

owls being cute


love.

thanks to el senor soper.

fml

This is what has happened so far today.

I was supposed to be arriving in guatemala in about an hour. Our flight from columbus to houston was delayed an hour. We then took off and got rerouted to memphis where we got more fuel. We missed our connection in houston by 15 minutes.

So then we arrive in houston and one of the designers I'm traveling with says she thinks she has broken her foot. Since we now have 7 hours until our flight, we get a cab to the hospitalN but since our cabbie doesn't know where the hospital is, he decides to take us to an office complex instead. 50 bucks later, we make it to the emergency room where I am currently blogging on my work blackberry from the waiting room.

Less than awesome.

What if...

I recreationally wore an eye patch in order to isolate each eye one at a time and make each eye individually stronger?

It would be this one:

Note to self

Must stop screaming obscenities at fellow drivers/pedestrians while driving. You drive a convertible now. They can most likely hear you.

Oops.

Dry shampoo = new favorite thing

I read about Umberto Dry Clean dry shampoo in Real Simple recently and decided to get it. I used to wash my hair at least 6 times/week (I work out 6 times/week) but then I realized that it was really weakening my hair...so I bought this "Dry shampoo" at Target ($8.99) and I have been using it for the past week or so, and I really like it!

I used to put baby powder in my hair when it was getting a little oily at the roots but I never really felt like that worked all that well. This stuff really works - it adds texture and volume, it absorbs excess oil, and it leaves my hair looking really good. My hair isn't as shiny once the dry shampoo is in, but it doesn't look dirty. Granted, it's basically just spraying powder into your hair, but once you rough your hair up a bit and get the powdery look to go away, it's a great result. Just thought I'd pass along the discovery.

Heh.

how awesome is this?

instructions to make it here. You basically just tack a feather boa to a shirt and then make the feet out of dishwashing gloves! GAHHHHHHHHHH PLEASE make one of your nieces/nephews wear this in October!! Or really, at any point before the age of 5!

T-shirt Quilts?

Has anyone out there ever had a t-shirt quilt made or made a t-shirt quilt themself? I'm looking for something along these lines but I don't know if there is one service that people have used that is more reputable than another...I don't want to send away all my t-shirts and have them come back all mangled and not looking good :-( Ideally I would just do it myself but I'm pretty sure I'd mess that up too and it would take roughly 324 years for me to complete, at which point a t-shirt quilt would be of little use to me. I just have so many UVA/XO/life t-shirts in my closet and they have sentimental value so I don't want to get rid of them, but I don't want to keep them around either because I don't wear them...so I thought a t-shirt quilt would be a good idea...thoughts?

This morning...

I was driving to work and I pulled up behind a truck that had a bunch of new cars on it (you know what I mean? Like when they're driving to the car dealership?) and I found myself wondering, are those cars autobots or decepticons?

Yep.

Is Olivia Newton-John a XO?

Is it just me or is she carrying red & yellow balloons and a white carnation?

Quotes from what I'm currently reading

It'll probably be a little bit before I review this book (Olive Kitteridge) on the book review blog, but I wanted to share these quotes that I've particularly enjoyed so far (I forgot to record page numbers, but they'd be different in every edition anyway):

"'I'll stay with you.' And so they sat. The lamp from the side table threw a dim and serious light throughout the silent room. She took a deep, quiet breath and thought how she did not envy those young girls in the ice cream shop. Behind the bored eyes of the waitresses handing out sundaes there loomed, she knew, great earnestness, great desires, and great disappointments; such confusion lay ahead for them, and (more wearisome) anger; oh, before they were through, they would blame and blame and blame, and then get tired, too,"

"Sometimes, like now, Olive had a sense of just how desperately hard every person in the world was working to get what they needed. For most, it was a sense of safety in the sea of terror that life increasingly became. People thought love would do it, and maybe it did. But even if, thinking of the smoking Ann, it took three different kids with three different fathers, it was never enough, was it?"

"As she stepped out of the school that night, into the wintry air, walking with the talking Henry to their car in the far parking lot, she had the sensation that she had been seen. And she had not even known she'd felt invisible."

Random? Check.

A couple of thoughts:

1. Do you remember when you were little and you thought to yourself, I can't wait to be a grownup so that I can stay up as late as I want and I can eat entire rolls of raw cookie dough and I can...I don't know, do other dumb shit your parents said you couldn't do when you were little? And now you're "grown up" and eating an entire roll of cookie dough makes you sick and you like to be in bed at 10 pm so that you don't feel like crap the next morning? We all know that I may or may not have children, but if I do, I may just let them do all that stupid stuff when they're little and their young bodies can handle the insanity. What do you think? Don't let me babysit your children.
2. Not sure if it's only sold seasonally, but the Apple Spice Bread Mix from Trader Joe's is pretty good. Really easy to make.
3. I liked last Sunday way more than this Sunday. Why? Because it was followed by Sunday part deux, also known as Memorial Day. Sigh.

You probably don't care, BUT...

the book blog has been updated recently - now i'm only behind by 4 books!! :-)

Don't provoke me.

You know those yellow signs that people hang in their car windows that say "Baby on Board"?

Really, it just makes me want to tailgate them.

Someday I'm going to get a sign made that looks just like that sign but says "Babies are the WORST."

...except I'm pretty sure that would lead to my car getting keyed, and since my car IS my baby...hmmm...maybe I need to think this one through more.

I know it's Tuesday, but I think I'm still having a case of the Mondays, which I think is valid considering that yesterday was a holiday.

Really awesome quotes about running

I found this blog today - check it out for really awesome motivational quotes (most specifically related to running).

This was my favorite:
“Every morning in Africa, an antelope wakes up. It knows it must outrun the fastest lion, or it will be killed. Every morning in Africa, a lion wakes up. It knows it must run faster than the slowest antelope, or it will starve. It doesn’t matter whether you’re the lion or an antelope – when the sun comes up, you’d better be running.” – African Proverb

I think I'm the lion.

Lyrics I'm liking lately

Just wanted to share with you:
(from "Forever" by Drake, Kanye, Eminem, etc...)

"last name Ever, first name Greatest,
Like a sprained ankle, boy I ain't nothin' to play with"

"life is such a roller coaster, then it drops
but what should I scream for? this is my theme park"

"he's wondering if he should spit this slow,
fuck no, go for broke"

and i know people think it's weird that i listen to so much hip-hop/rap, but i just love the lyrics. i think rappers are better lyricists than other types of musicians (except maybe John Mayer) - I feel like people in other genres of music rely too much on their melodies and don't worry about what their music is actually saying. and i find the messages/themes in rap to be much more motivational than those in other types of music. honestly, a lot of the time, i really don't want to hear about other people being in love. it just makes me want to punch someone or vomit.

yep, happy monday!

So that we can never race "In Memory of" again.

If you don't like it when I get all soap-boxy and emotional and passionate about things, this probably isn't going to be the post for you. Feel free to check back another time.

So after I did the Columbus half marathon on May 1st (and felt like ass) I said I was going to stop racing for a while.

Then I didn't.

I found out the Race for the Cure was on May 15th downtown and I had to do it. I just think it's such an important race, such an important cause - and I knew it would be a great race to experience.

My friend Katie's mother Mary passed away from breast cancer in September of 2001. I ran in memory of her, and when I wrote her name on the paper that I pinned to the back of my shirt, I just felt so...shattered by the whole thing. I don't know anything about cancer research...but I have hope that we're going to see a cure in our lifetime.

I know I've mentioned this before, but my mom had ovarian cancer when I was in high school, and my aunt had breast cancer. They both survived (thank God) - but it means that the chances of me getting either breast or ovarian cancer (or both, really) are greater than those of the average woman. And that scares the hell out of me. But being downtown yesterday with 50,000 other people rallying to support research to find the cure for breast cancer - there was just so much hope and so much joy and spirit there.

Right before they started the race, two trolleys full of survivors drove through the group of participants who had lined up and waved out the windows at everyone. I cried. I kept thinking to myself yesterday, did I want to get up at 6:30 and drive downtown to run 3.1 miles? No. But do I want to wake up in 20 years and have breast cancer without a cure? Hell no. I'm blessed to have the opportunity to be able to do things like that now - I have to do them. There's no other choice.

The race started and everyone took off - there were bands every half mile and it was just such a celebration of survivors more than anything else, and celebration of the hope that we're going to find a cure. One of the bands was a drum line - a bunch of kids from a local high school - and they were so badass. Then - in the last 1/2 mile of the race - two straight city blocks were lined with big tough dudes and their motorcycles, revving the engines. It was. So. Cool. I high fived five of the guys.

I've done four races in the last 3 months and - even counting the two half marathons - this was the most emotional and inspiring. It just left me wanting to go attack life.

As for what attacking life entails, I'm not quite sure yet. But stay tuned. I'm sure it'll be entertaining.

This is way less important than the general message of the race and the experience of the race itself, but I was also proud because I broke 30 minutes for my 5k time - which I know isn't a big deal for some people, but it was for me! I finished in 29:49 according to my sports watch. Official times yet to be posted.

Passionate diatribe over.

In general "Whatever, I do what I want" news:
I'm getting back into riding horses. I used to ride when I was little - a lot. Like, for years. I leased a horse for one summer and was basically a barn rat (when I wasn't being a pool rat). Always there. Hanging out with my horse. I probably didn't smell very good that summer. Anyway a few weeks ago I decided that I missed riding and I looked into local barns to see if I could start taking lessons again - really all I want is access to a horse. So I went for my first lesson back yesterday and it was really fun - it was a gorgeous day (thanks, Ohio for the top-down weather the past couple of days) and I rode a thoroughbred named Oliver. He had a bit of attitude - wasn't really all that into trotting and would stop to walk whenever he damn well pleased, but let's be real, I have a bit of attitude and like to do whatever I want too, so we got along well. We just did a bit of walking and trotting around the outdoor ring and I got my posting rhythm back. Next time, getting back into cantering...and maybe at some point I'll get back into jumping again. All I really want is access to the horse and the barn and a trail - I want to take a horse out once a week or so and just chill the eff out, get away from everything. So. That was cool. I'll take a picture of Oliver next week to show you (or you can see him here).

And I saw the Batmobile driving around Columbus twice yesterday. No joke. I was out in New Albany picking my friend Heather up to go downtown to dinner (we were looking for men. We failed.) and the freaking Batmobile drove by me at a stoplight. My phone was connected to the stereo so I couldn't whip it out and take a picture for evidence. Heather just laughed when I told her that I had seen the Batmobile outside her apartment, but THEN we were sitting at dinner downtown and IT DROVE BY AGAIN. I started screaming and pointing and waving my hands. After she finished having a heart attack Heather turned around and saw it outside. And I was validated. As to why the Batmobile is driving around Columbus...no idea (I just googled Columbus Batmobile and came up with nothing good). This is the version it looked like:


And I'm out.

I am such a proud mama

I was watching Modern Family the other night (as all awesome people do) and lo and behold, what was Haley wearing, but ONE OF MY SKIRTS! She was wearing our awesome printed underlayer denim skirt from Hollister! I was so proud!

I mean, granted, she was wearing it in an episode where she got sloppy drunk, but whatever. See below!!So much pride!

I know I complain about my job (a lot) but it is really satisfying when you see something that you worked really hard on looking cute on someone!