Quiz

Q: What do you do when your house is a wreck, your air conditioner is
broken, and you have a ridiculous amount of work due this week?

A: Buy a cute new (and very reasonably priced!) coat. Obviously.

Falling Apart

This has been a really tough semester and I've been pretty consistently overwhelmed with school and work (paid and unpaid) related responsibilities. So it is natural that my house would have a major plumbing problem in the brief time between midterms and gearing up for the end of the semester. And now my air conditioner has frozen. The restoration people are coming back today to completely rip out the kitchen floor. I have put in numerous requests for the house elves to come fix everything but that hasn't worked so far. I keep telling myself that it could be worse. Everything is replaceable and insurance should cover it all. And I don't have shingles.

Back By Popular Demand

Oh, hi! Did I once have a blog?

Blogging was really easy when I didn't have much going on. It was easy to write up lists or tell stories when every day was the same. I went to work, sat at my desk, and went home. Days were more or less the same and I had all kinds of energy for being creative with writing and doing projects around the house.

It's much harder now. Each day is different and I don't have the luxury of taking half an hour in the middle of the day to write up something witty. This has also been one of the most incredible years of my life, in so many ways. It's much harder to share those details. I'm going to try, though. I'm going to try to have fun with this and share the funny, silly things. Like the actual shotgun wedding my sister witnessed last weekend.

So what have I been up to? Let's review:
School - fantastic. I'm loving this semester of classes and am gradually narrowing in on a dissertation topic.
Boyfriend - what can I really say? He's one of the reasons this year has been so amazing.
House - love it. I was apprehensive about moving from my beloved Carrboro, but I love my new(ish) place.
Projects - sadly lacking. I made a skirt back in the spring, but I haven't done much since then.
Cooking - I got a grill in May and I've been using it all the time. Bobby Flay has a fantastic grill cookbook and his dill-orzo shrimp has been a staple.
Music - Going to see Andrew Bird tomorrow night! This will be the third time I've seen him and he belongs in that rare category of musicians I love to see live.

Let's try for weekly posts - we'll see how it goes.

So Much The Same, And So Much Better

Yesterday I took the trip down I-85 to see my second favorite Wildcat team. The popularity of the basketball program has exploded since I last attended a game, and although I'd heard about the difference I didn't really understand until I saw it myself. The town bar was crowded before the sold out game, and it seemed like there were more people there in Davidson gear than there were in the student section at games five years ago. The bar was packed after the game, too. The wait for a table was nearly an hour and it took quite a while to get a drink. It was the kind of crowd you would expect to see on a homecoming weekend, not an average January weekend where the 'Cats played a so-so conference opponent.

Although the atmosphere was so different there were some things that were exactly the same. The cheerleaders nearly dropped someone, and their routines hadn't changed much. There were still seven year-olds racing to put on an oversized uniform and make a layup during a media timeout. The buses from The Pines were still parked outside promptly after the game to take home the senior citizens in their Davidson sweaters and knitted vests.

It's good to know that although the crowd was larger, the bleachers had backs, and press row was fuller, it was still Davidson.

Women and Wine!

I posted a while back about a group of women that got together to hang out and drink once a month around a theme. By my calculations, 75% of the women in that group got pregnant over the last year. People got busy with babies and the group fell apart.

Tonight I hosted the first revival group of Women and Wine. I don't think there were any of the original women in attendance (maybe Amanda?) It was the first time I had really had people over since I moved and it went so well (in terms of people). I think everyone met someone new and we all got along wonderfully.

Since there was usually a theme, I had planned on researching quality boxed wine - I searched The Splendid Table recommendations and put my list together. It wasn't until I got to the wine store that I realized that the quality box wines are sold in units equivalent to 4 bottles. There was no way I was buying two whites and two reds for a total of 16 bottles. I ended up buying a red box and a white box - with some red and white bottles. I probably have the equivalent of 8 bottles left, along with hummus, crackers, popcorn, chocolate, and cookies. Excellent benefit to hosting! We haven't decided on a host for next month but I'm already excited to get together with everyone again.

Christmas - Southern Style

My sister and I spent a lot of time in Florida before Christmas this year so our family was looking for things to do besides preparing for the next party or drinking all the red wine on the east coast. My parents had some free tickets to the Daytona Experience nearby so we went over to check it out. None of us are really Nascar fans, but it was still pretty fun. It was nearly deserted, so there were no crowds or lines for anything. One of the stops on the freezing cold tour was the Victory Lane area where you could get your picture taken as race winners. We hammed it up and whooped and hollered in our victory celebration - I would post the picture but I look like I'm in some pretty serious pain from the exertion of holding my arms up in victory. Also, there's a rumor that none of us had showered that day. (Hey, we were all on vacation...) We found out that my dad would never make it as a racecar driver while my sister and I would likely put ourselves and others in great mortal danger as soon as the engines started.

For our second redneck excursion we headed to the flea market. We have a Christmas tradition of doing a $5 gift exchange where we draw names and head to the nearest mall. To make it more interesting, we hit the flea market this year. I was a little worried about our ability to find gifts, seeing as how about three-quarters of the booths were closed, but there was no cause for concern. We all split up and headed in different directions. I found a huge portion of a warehouse set up with folding tables and cardboard boxes labeled from $1 up to $5. I'm pretty sure most of the merchandise fell off the back of a truck or was recalled for safety reasons and resold to flea market dealers. We all got funny, somewhat terrible gifts for each other and had fun exchanging them and explaining the reasoning behind our purchases once we got home.

We headed up to Kentucky after Christmas, making a stop in Georgia where my sister and I got schooled in Wii golf by our three year old cousin. Fortunately for us, we were able to prevail in bowling. This morning we celebrated my second consecutive birthday at the breakfast area of the Holiday Inn in my hometown. The afternoon may or may not have been spent reading a certain preteen vampire novel aloud to my sister as we drove back to Tennessee. All in all, an excellent holiday.

Round-up!

Reading - What is the What - Dave Eggers. There's not a whole lot to say about this besides how incredible it is and how you should rush out and get it even if you can't stand Dave Eggers and how it will make you cry and get really angry and still not be able to put it down and then finally be exhausted have to put it down for a month but then not be able to pick it back up because you know it will first break your heart some more and then end and you won't be be able to read it any more so you keep putting off finishing the book. So, really, not a whole lot to say about it.

Watching - I know it is full of, as someone put it, "overly contrived eccentricity", but I am loving Pushing Daisies this season. I could take it or leave it last season but it just keeps getting better, which makes its cancellation even more sad. I totally want Olive's nun outfit. Also, I am completely in love with Dogtown on the National Geographic channel. Our shelter directors have spent their vacations working out at Best Friends and they say it is just as wonderful as it looks. I generally end up crying at the end of every episode. The injured dog is now healthy! The crazy dog is now under control! The vet solved the medical mystery and the dog can now live a happy life!

Drying - apples by the bag-full. I made some of the famous Clayton family dried apple stack cake for a party last week and I am preparing to make another one in Florida so I have been processing apples for a good week now. I've only sliced a finger open twice with the mandolin so I figure I'm doing pretty good.

Loving - the Christmas tree lot at a local Methodist church. I've bought my tree there for five(!) years now and I could not love these people more. There are always old men out in the cold ready to haul trees, operate chainsaws, and secure my tree in the trunk of my car. They are really just the kindest people and would make me inclined to go to church if I weren't already of the church-going sort.