private?

Since I am now officially searching for jobs, I am considering making my blog private. I know private blogs aren't as fun because you can't be as snoopy, and I don't think they show up in Reader. But I did a google search of my name and the first thing to show up was this silly blog, despite my settings being set to "unsearchable". So what I want to know is 1) what do you think about private blogs and 2) if I went private would you really give me your email address so you could still check in on me? Feel free to answer number 1 on the comment section, but for number two I have designed a spiffy poll in order to let you answer honestly.

See poll to the right ----------------------->

gracias.

aint no party like a liz lemon party

Today was a total Liz Lemon day. For those who don't watch 30rock, Liz Lemon is this character that does really sloppy things- food in her hair, fly down, unwashed clothes, stuff like that.

Before I go into details, let me try and excuse Liz Lemonness. Wednesday night I only slept three hours, and last night I went to bed at 2am, only to wake up at five  with one of the worst headaches I have ever had. On top of it I had horrible neck tension and mucus stuck in my throat and nose (I am fighting a cold). It took me an hour to fall back asleep and that was only after Dan held me and rubbed my shoulders while I whimpered. 

Needless to say, it was really tough to get up this morning- I awoke at 8:47, and had to be to work by 9. So I threw on some comfy clothes (my wide leg pants and a baggy cardigan-not the most flattering combination) wrapped a nice scarf around my neck and pulled my unwashed hair back in a headband.

I felt ok about how I looked until I met Dan for lunch- He said that when he saw me his first thought was, "ooooh goodness." I had two bags sloppily hanging on my shoulders and I was walking toward him with a big box of kleenex under my arm. On top of that the headband I chose to put in my hair happened to be my tattered Bikram Yoga headband. And apparently my cute scarf wasn't helping, it was just drawing the eye upward, to the greasy hair and icky headband. Oh yeah, and to make it worse, my right shoe had a hole in the instep, and to make it even worse you could see my big toe, and to make it EVEN WORSE this big toe has a callus (I am not kidding- pathetic I know!)

After I realized my appearance, I made Dan follow me into the coed "people's bathroom" so he could fix me up. Unfortunately though my short hair doesn't fit into a ponytail, and I didn't have any bobby pins. So we improvised and I pinned my hair with a paperclip.

I felt a little better about myself, until I recalled the episode of 30rock where Liz Lemon wears a Chip Clip in her hair. I realized I couldn't fight it, it was just bound to be one of those days. 

Although, I should say someone did say to me, "your hair looks fabulous!" whhhaaa? Oh well, I'll take the compliment. 

congraduations

This past week dan-dan  had a nice little vacay-cay in Utah- his sister Rachel graduated from BYU (wooooo!!). I was super jealous because he got to see and play with some of my favorite people, not to mention my Gilman-Sistahs whom I miss. 

Doesn't everyone look so nice...

conGRADuations Rachie!!!

and for some reason I can't get over this photo-I am pretty sure its the smiles and hand gestures.

Speaking of Graduation, I need to give a shout out to Boodle who has officially graduated from CSU (wooooo!) He finished a while ago, but had an online class that needed to be completed. I am really proud of him for finishing because online classes can be really tough- I would know, I still haven't finished the Statistics class I started in the Summer of 2004 (and I never will). 

conGRADuations!

note: this is photoshopped

five senses

I am copying Angela, who seems to have been inspired by this person, and adopting the "five senses friday." Except, I am going to make it my own, and do "five senses whenever-i-want-day." I think it's a great way to quickly document your present state. So without further ado,

touching:

 crinkly trace paper.

smelling:

 sadly, nothing. my nose is stuffy.

seeing:

 too many computer rays: work on my computer until 3 am, wake up at 8 am to work on computer at work, stare at a projector in class, come home work on my computer until 3 am, repeat.

hearing:

 jonathan safran foer's "everything is illuminated". i love books on tape.

tasting:

freshly popped organic popcorn, seasoned with olive oil, fresh ground pepper, smoked paprika, and sea salt.

bringing it back

Remember how Tiffany necklaces were all the rage in 2000, at least they were in my high school. Well, I was totally into that trend and not only did I have the necklace, I had the matching bracelet, and key ring. Well, after not wearing this jewelry for almost eight years, I have decided I am bring back the trend.

Is 10 years long enough for a fashion cycle?

Who says the Easter Bunny is for babies?

In my family, the Easter Bunny would hide our baskets. So we would wake up Easter morning and search all around the house for the goodies. Later in the day, my parents and grandparents would hide eggs, including the coveted Golden Egg that would fetch a $1 reward (note: I always found the Golden Egg because it was always hidden in the lemon tree).

Well, the Easter Bunny didn't forget about us this year, he hid little baskets and presents for us- just like the old days! Although Dan had to do all the searching since Easter Bunny told me where everything was hidden (*wink wink*)

Dan searching high and low in his Sunday Best

A kindle light for me, and a book for Dan!

For our after church brunch, we dined on Tofu Scramble. We figured that was the closest thing to eggs that us vegans could eat.

I also decorated our house with tulips and placed a hydrangea near our door (let's hope a tenant doesn't kick it to pieces).

I hope you all had a wonderful Easter, and didn't forget what this holiday is really about.

earth day part deux.

One last insignificant thought about Earth Day. The only memory I have about E.D. from my childhood is this:

One day my mom came home with three giant bulletin boards. She had bought one for each of us kids to hang in our room. I was soooo excited. Yes, a bulletin board excited me. You see, when I was little I used to like to play "teacher," I would line up all my stuffed animals and 'teach' them. So a bulletin board was a terrific toy (I also used to play 'librarian' and 'real estate agent' but that's a different story.) Anyway, back to E.D., Earth Day happened to be the nearest holiday at the time I acquired said bulletin board, so I decided I would decorate it (you know how teachers decorate bulletin boards for different holidays).

Well, I cut out a bunch of blue and green construction paper to make the Earth, then I cut out letters to say "Happy Earth Day" and I glued them on the bulletin board. That's right GLUED. I had a permanent Earth Day bulletin board! A few months later I finally decided to try and take all the paper down, but it would only come off in chunks, so raggedy strips of green and blue paper were left on the bulletin board. It remained this way until I left for college.

Earth Day

I hope everyone had a nice Earth Day, did you do anything particularly earthy? I just did homework, though I did use my special "woody natural" pencils. I actually highly doubt that they were made from FSC wood, but the name makes them sound somewhat sustainable, so I will count that as a good deed.

Actually, I think every day should be treated like earth day. Every day you should appreciate the flowers, and clouds, and trees, even the rain. And everyday you should try your best to be good stewards of the Earth.

Columbia River Gorge (2009)

Japan (2009)

Now is a good time to give a shout out to the number one way you can reduce your carbon footprint- Vegetarianism! That's right, go meatless-save the planet. Don't believe it, google 'vegetarianism, global warming' or something like that and you will find myriad articles. Including one called "Vegetarian is the new Prius"- I like that title. If you can't hack being vegetarian, at least try to reduce your consumption.

Not only will the Earth thank you, these little guys will too.

15 minutes of fame

I'm famous! An article was written about me and the research I do here at school. 

But I am only a little bit famous because the article is on the UO website and not some national publication. So maybe it's not 15 minutes of fame, but more like 20 seconds.

'international jet set'

Some things you may not know about me:
1) my freshman and sophomore year of high school, I used to walk around with a SKA patch on my backpack...like this

2) During that same period, I took a pair of jeans, cut them into peddle pushers and sewed a checkered ribbon along the hem.

3) my first ever email address was: SkaSurfGal.

Basically, I was really into Ska music, and frankly still am. Wellll, this little rude girl is about to have her dreams come true.  She will be seeing The Specials LIVE. 

in.....

LONDON!

Today is my sister's birthday!! And to show I don't pick favorites, I have also made some birthday cards for mi hermana. Again, I will explain so you aren't lost on the inside jokes. 

#1 One Christmas, I found Fred in a vintage shop. Fred is a mink stole complete with a head, and 6 pairs of feet. That's right, six pairs of feet, which means it actually took more than one animal to make this accessory. I felt really bad for Fred and I decided I would give him to Nicole for Christmas, partly as a joke, partly to give Fred a better home. Well Christmas came, and she opened the box aaaannnd needless to say, there was a lot of laughing and terror, and she didn't want him.  

 title: "Poor Fred"

If anyone wants to know what happened to Fred, I released him and here he is now (i wish).

 #2 While staying with Nicole in Brooklyn one summer, I had brought along this Grateful Dead Record that Dan had gotten me for my birthday. It was on the floor in her room, and while we were getting ready for dinner she stepped on it and broke the frame it was in.  I freaked out and yelled at her, then she yelled at me, and we got into this huuuge ridiculous fight! She ended up eating dinner in, and I skipped dinner and just walked around Brooklyn by myself. The whole thing was so stupid and hilarious now.

title: american beauty

 #3 While in Florence, on top of the Duomo, this middle-aged woman, traveling by herself, asked if Nicole and I would take her picture. We readily agreed, but right before we took the shot, her face got serious, she turned to the side and looked into the horizon. Afterward she just said, "I only take profile shots." For some reason we found that really hilarious, and so on our trip to the Newport mansions some years later, we only took profile shots.

title: profile

#4: My favorite. So one thing I remember about Rome is that gypsies follow you everywhere and ask for cash. They repeatedly say "bless you, bless you, bless you" while they hold out their hands. Well this one gypsy followed us everywhere and wouldn't leave Nicole alone. When Nicole finally yelled at her, she said this, " Bhless you, Bhless you, AH VAFFANCULO!!!" which is f*** you in Italian (but it doesn't count as swearing on my blog since its another language). Wellllllll, the next day Nicole woke up with a giant puffy face, SHE WAS CURSED!

title: bhlessssss you

 #5 a collage of photos

Happy Birthday Seestir!!

On a less negative note, I found these images of Dan on a former blog post, and giggled. They were all taken on the same day. 

 It's no wonder he spent part of his childhood modeling for Klutz

negative nancy

What is wrong with me today? I am usually such a positive person, or at least I try keep my negative thoughts nicely bottled up, but today I complained on two online locations.

The first was yelp, complaining about a really poor dining experience.

Then immediately after I went on Facebook and complained about things people say that annoy me.

Tomorrow I will try to be less negative. 

april fools

Anyone else catch Google's April Fools joke. Google "Helvetica" and the entire web page turns to "Comic Sans" ewwww! It probably made a lot of typography snobs out their anxious, and non-design people probably just found it cute.  I had to take a screen shot.

my new favorite website

http://clientsfromhell.net/

My professor showed us this website, and after I got home I spent an hour reading through all the posts. It's basically a website where people can submit ridiculous client demands that they've gotten. It's mostly targeted toward graphic designers, but some posts are pretty universal. It's hilarious. Some good ones include:

...and some of my favorites:

bluhhh

If I could express my day through song, it would be:
"Just one of them days" by Monica
" Get me away from here, I'm dying" by Belle and Sebastian
or
"I want the world to stop" by Belle and Sebastian...
catch my drift? It's been a bad day.

It's actually been a bad couple of days, but today was the apogee (you like that word?) Basically what's wrong with me is that I am sleep deprived, and I feel like i have hit a wall with my studio project. This is a really bad combination because I think, "aaahh, I just want to sleep." but then I say, "noo you can't, your project sucks, fix it!" Then I pout to Dan and he says nice things, so I feel a little better, but then the cycle repeats.

Well this afternoon, after feeling badly about myself, I decided I was going to treat myself to a mate before I went to my 4 o'clock class. Even though I am avoiding sugar, I decided I needed a little indulgence. So I walk across the street to the pizza place that sells bottled mate, I put it in my bag (like I have done many times before), and head to class. Wellllll........

I open my bag and find a huge pool of "mate" at the bottom of my bag. Except it doesn't smell like mate, it smells like beer. So I rush out of the room, remove all my favorite pens and try to soak up the beer-mate. 

favorite markers

favorite pen ever

I figured what happened is some kid who worked there thought it would be funny to fill an empty mate bottle with beer, but the carbonation and the fact that the lid wasn't sealed made it explode.

Well, after that, I noticed that my phone was in the same pocket as my pens, and it was drenched! The screen had gone dark, and a little light was blinking purple. I took the phone pieces apart, and beer-mate spilled out of the battery pack.


So all through class, I am sitting and stewing over my phone, and beer bag, and beer-mate, that I completely lose track of the lecture.  On top of that, I am sitting with beer-mate in my bottle, and I am paranoid that the teacher will see it and think I am trying to sneak some alchy in to class.

Long story short, I go back to the pizza place to speak my mind to the owner, and she says that while she won't pay for a new phone, she will give me 100$ toward a new one. Somewhat placated I agree, but my phone without a 2-year renewal is $399 and I won't be renewing my contract since we are leaving the country.

Well we get to TMobile, and luckily I was able to find a mini version of my android for 125$ (the only smart phone cheaper than 299$).  Sold!

It's tiny and my fat fingers have a hard time with the smooshed touch screen, but it could definitely be worse! So my 'really bad day' ended up just being a 'kind of bad day', I'll take it....though I am not any less frustrated with my project. 

seattle

We took a little trip up to Seattle this weekend, so I could look at some housing projects. Even though it was a short trip we really made the most of it. Highlights include: meeting Dan's grandpa for the first time, staying next door to the Seattle Public Library, raw restaurants, olympic sculpture park, and listening to 'History of Love' on the drive.

...and for your viewing pleasure- model shots:

...and if those photos didn't excite you enough, here's a video of Dan trying out the "turn and pose" technique

farewell america tour

To kick off our move to London, we will be touring historic cities of the USA. It will be a sort of, "Wow, we fought so hard for our independence!...K bye, we're going back to the Queen." I kid, we are going because we have Southwest passes to use and we figured a free round trip flight should be used to go as far  as possible.

We are hoping we can see some of our friends who are scattered in this part of the country...will any of you be around July 22nd-Aug 3? Also, to any of you readers residing in the highlighted states above, do you have any suggestions for sites, food, and lodging?

It's going to to be a marvelous summer, I can already tell.

p.s. I realized that I didn't really know if DC was in Virginia or Maryland, so I just highlighted them both.