9.28.2005

*yawn*
It's nearly 3:freaking-o'clock in the morning and I can't get back to sleep. Thought I'd post.

i caved
Being just about the last person to jump on the bandwagon, I joined Facebook this week. Dude, how addictive! Friendster was fun while it lasted, but it really was geared more for New Yorkers than Midwesterners; there weren't many people from my high school. Now it's like a mini, cyber MHS reunion!

yeah, i expected more from this post, too
I was hoping some enlightening insight would come to me at this hour of the night, something I've been harboring in the recesses of my brain and which only surfaces when I'm groggy and my mind is pliable, an insight which I could pass on to you, Oh Faithful Reader. Rather, I just stare at Jack the Mac's screen, trying to will someone - anyone - to IM or email me to relieve my boredom. Oh, what has the world come to if I am writing about nothing? And yet you have read this far and wasted another perfectly good five minutes.

Apparently I'm a bit fatalistic at 3 a.m.

9.26.2005

attention, macphiles
I'm looking for anyone who's using the newest Mac OS X.4. Email me please. I need to see if anyone else is having trouble loading a webpage. Thanks!

Sorry this was such a boring post.

9.19.2005

again! again! again again again!
Do you remember that free-throw cheer from the basketball cheerleaders? I've been tagged again, this time by both Sarah and Megan. I hope this doesn't mean I have to fill out the survey twice.

10 Years Ago I Was...
...abusing my privilege as an eighth grade front office assistant by using the class period to wander the MMS halls, delivering massive notes to my BFF Amanda and coming up with every excuse possible to pass by the 6th hour classroom of my crush. I was on the newspaper staff and took very seriously my job of recording events for the Papoose Press. (The Papooses will go down as one of the worst mascots ever, though far eclipsed by my dad's high school mascot: the Lambkins; there's no battle cry so inspiring as, "BAAAAAH!") I was also mortified periodically by random classmates coming up to me in the halls saying, "You won't believe what your mom talked about in SexEd today..."

5 Years Ago I Was...
...staying up until 2 a.m. and dragging myself to 8 a.m. Philosophy discussion with the rest of the FIG; sleeping in the third floor FARC lounge by the window unit (or in random people's dorm rooms: Tuttle, P@t Hea|y, etc.) because I suffered in my A/C-less dorm room; enjoying the chance to eat scrambled eggs, pancakes with chocolate chips and Belgian waffles for breakfast everyday; crushing on the sexy blond guitar player who lived down the hall from me; practicing for the big Homecoming skit dance routines with AX; pomping, pomping, pomping; trying to figure out if emphasis on "being saved" was a sign of a cult, like my dad had warned me, or just a catch phrase used by Crusade.

1 Year Ago I Was...
...still trying to figure out if I'd made the right decision; swimming in the pool on the weekends; looking for ways to get involved with Phoenix life.

Yesterday I Was...
...trying to solve the world's problems with the rest of the Sunday School class; sitting on a raft in the pool; baptizing Yolanda with her first car wash; eating dinner at Betsey's.

5 Snacks I Enjoy:
• Cereal, specifically Paul Neuman's blueberry cereal
• Mozzarella cheese sticks/Muenster cheese slices
• Plastic (chocolate) donuts from the vending machine
• Popcorn
• Chocolate suckers from See's candy

5 Songs I Know All the Words to:
• Yeah, by Usher
• Moon River, by Henry Mancini
• Tune Out, by The Format
• Nothing Better, by The Postal Service
• Miss Independent, Kelly Clarkson

5 Things I Would Do With $100 Million:
• Find a charity that I can really get involved with and give them half
• Buy my parents a stress-free house
• Move out and head out for a year on the road
• Invest
• Set aside enough to get me started wherever I want to set up shop when I'm finished traveling

5 Places I Would Run Away To:
• The West End, London
• The Artisan, Columbia
• A mountain in the summertime, Colorado
• Nice, France
• Whatever the special is on Go-Today.com

5 Things I Would Never Wear:
• Tappered jeans
• Blue mascara
• A Louis Vuitton purse
• Skin-tight pants
• Mini skirt

5 Favorite TV Shows:
• Desperate Housewives
• Arrested Development
• Cheers
• The Cosby Show
• Friends

5 Bad Habits:
• Messing with my nails
• Not putting away the clean clothes
• Yawning when it's inappropriate
• Visiting blogs too often
• Forgetting where I put important things, like my Visa bill

5 Biggest Joys:
• Standing on top of a mountain
• The smell of an old book
• Rich hot chocolate and croissants for breakfast
• Looking back through pictures like these, these, these, these, these and these
• Comments

5 Favorite Toys:
• Yolanda
• iPod
• The Widgets on the new Mac OS X.4.2
• Digital camera
• The raft that lets me float half in the water, half on top of the water

5 Fictional Characters I Wish Were Alive and In My Life:
• Albus Dumbledore
• Phoebe (from Friends)
• Peter Pan
• Nancy Drew
• Jesse (from Before Sunrise)

And Now I Tag
Margaret
Leisha
Maureen
Ann (If she still blogs...)
J-Dub

9.13.2005

do you understand the words that are coming outta my mouth?
Intense coverage of Katrina has brought to light the various ways of prounouncing New Orleans. I give you a few I've heard:

Nu Or-lins
N'Aw-lins
Nu Or-leens
N'Or-lins
Nu Or-ley-ans

And then there's the way Cokie Roberts pronounces it, which I can't even begin to emmulate in type.

I'm wondering how Snoop Dogg* would pronounce it. N'Orlizzle? And how about Fiddy? N'Errlins?

*Or Snoop Dubb, for that matter.

9.07.2005



Thanks, Meg!




Seven Things I Plan to Do Before I Die*
• Live in a small French village and eat croissants for breakfast every day
• Skydive
• Build a treehouse
• Spend time (not just visit briefly) on every continent except Antarctica (I'll just wave at the shoreline from a boat and then head quickly back to the tip of South America)
• Give birth/adopt a child
• Build a library (as in: a room with shelf after shelf of books, not a building)
• Take at least one picture worthy of being enlarged, framed and hung on my wall.




Seven Things I Can Do
• Make fantastic quacamole
• Hike to the top of Camelback (It's no fourteener, but it does require the use of all four limbs to make it to the top.)
• A double pirouette
• Save for retirement
• Make a great mix CD and accompanying liner notes
• Have a genuinely fun time with a coloring book and some crayons
• Listen




Seven Things I Can't Do
• Whistle
• Support the death penalty
• Sing on key (not that that keeps me from belting out tunes in the car)
• Remember to water the violets
• Find a pair of jeans that fit the way they're supposed to fit
• Stand people who smoke while standing right next to the No Smoking sign
• Have a social life in Phoenix




Seven Things That Attract Me To Men
• Sense of humor/wit
• Intelligence
• Having convictions, and being open to learning about the convictions of others
• Gorgeous eyes
• Strong jawline
• Inability to be satisfied with the status quo
• Good conversation




Seven Things I Say the Most (Recently)
• Dude...
• I'll be home after the gym.
• Thank you for calling [employer name here].
• That bastard computer thief!
• Woah
• I heard a story on NPR the other day that said...
• Coffee refill, please.




Seven Celebrities I Dream About
[or: 1) I Once Found Dreamy, 2) Still Find Dreamy or 3) Who Have Appeared in My Dreams]
1.
• Jonathan Taylor Thomas (The Teen Bop magazines were stashed in a box in my closet for years)
• Joey McIntyre

2.
• Jason Bateman
• Adrian Brody

3.
• Brad Pitt (We totally made out on New Year's Eve of freshman year in college. Funny thing is, I've never really liked the guy.)
• Fergie from the Black-Eyed Peas
Kate, who was performing with Fergie in my dream

You're it!
Sarah
Pat
Andy

*I was tempted to write "Two chicks at the same time." Name that movie reference!

9.06.2005

please, somebody tag me
I'd tag myself, but that's just uncouth. So I'll settle for blatant begging instead. I'm not above displaying my desperation to be like the cool kids. So, you, you, you or you, I'm wide open.

9.05.2005

laborious
It occurs to me that the people who most deserve and most need Labor Day are the people taking our food orders and ringing up our sales purchases on this day.

10 things you never knew about erica, v.4
1. I own an engraved pica pole.
2. iPod-type ear bug headphones hurt - HURT! - my ears.
3. When I was 3 years old and traveling through Rocky Mountain National Park with my parents, I picked up some shiny black rocks when we stopped at a rest stop. An hour later in the car, the shiny black rocks had melted and were giving off the pungent odor of elk droppings. This story gets recounted by my parents every time we drive through the park.
4. I can wiggle my ears.
5. I cannot stand the smell of baby powder-scented anything.
6. I used to get really bad bloody noses, associated with sinus infections, and had my nose cauterized three times in second and third grade.
7. The first thing I read when I get a new issue of a magazine is the letter from the editor. I like that it makes me feel like I know what's going on behind the scenes at the magazine. Exception: SI. I read Rick Reilly first, and that's usually all I read.
8. I have an irrational fear of wasps. They just look so sinister, how could I not cower in fear?
9. Despite having once been a certified lifeguard for a summer, I have never figured out how to float on my back. It seems my bum likes to sink.
10. I admit it: until only a few months ago, I thought Audrey Hepburn and Katharine Hepburn were sisters.

9.02.2005

smells like a good day
They found Rose. She's safe; she's home. All is good in California. My computer is just a computer. The important information is recoverable. I'll get a brand new computer/monitor/external hard drive; and I have the luxury of having enough time to load all my programs and info before the deadlines start hitting.

It's the start of the Labor Day weekend, and I have plans. Tomorrow holds a day of floating down the Salt River in an inner tube with visiting cousins Devin and Kelsey, beer in hand, sun on shouders. It smells like a good weekend.

9.01.2005



my cousin is missing
Rose is actually my dad's cousin's son's wife, but in our family, everyone is called cousin. In the picture above, Rose is to my right, and Peter (her husband) is next to her. The two of them and some work friends went hiking in the Sequoia National Forest in California yesterday and she has disappeared.

My sister was in a car accident yesterday (she's ok), my work computer was stolen, and Rose went missing. What's wrong with Wednesday? Prayers, please.