The One Hundredth

For reals, you guys.

So I was all kinds of clichéd this morning. Today is the first time in 6 years that I've taken a sick day from anything: work, school, what have you. I'll have you know that it was very much warranted. Here are the overused phrases that described me at 7:00 this morning:

"She stood up and the room started spinning."
-I did and it did.

"She broke out in a cold sweat."
-This is the first time I've ever actually experienced this phenomenon. Not fun.

"All the blood drained from her face." or "She went as white as a sheet."
-It was creepy. My lips were as white as snow...paper...a ghost! (yay Friends)

"She heard the blood rushing in her ears."
-Yuh-huh.

So anyway, I was inexplicably dizzy and nauseous for the majority of the day. But only when I wasn't lying down, so there's that. There's nothing like feeling like you're going to pass out at any minute to make you wish you didn't live alone.

Tuesday Tunes: Guster - Keep It Together.
This is the album I was waiting and waiting for Amazon to deliver. I'm loving it.

Top Five Items From My Saturday

Or seven. Whatever. It's my blog.

1. Haircut. The first one I've had in almost a year. It's much better.

2. Camera. I had to buy a new one to replace the one that got dunked in the creek. See how I spun that to make it sound like it was just the camera that fell in, instead of me AND the camera AND my sister's camera? Mad skills.

3. Portrait. I'm almost finished. Woo!

4. Bowling. I went with the people from my small group at church. Fun! I got the lowest score. And broke a nail. But I got a strike on the last frame, so that made up for it...a little.

5. Amazon! I finally FINALLY got my stuff one month to the day after I placed the original order. Apparently Amazon does know how to run a business and they were quick to fix the mistake once I called them about it. Shop at Amazon.

6. Subway. Lunch. Mmmmmm.

7. Shoes. People at church noticed a couple weeks ago that I have lots of different shoes. So now every time they see me, they all check out my shoes. Yesterday at worship team practice I was wearing a green shirt and green and white sneakers and it was duly commented on that, yet again, my shoes matched my shirt. About half an hour later, a late arriver made a comment about the matchy matchy shoes and one of the older ladies replied "I know it! And I noticed when we were sitting down that they are slip ons!" And everyone said "really?" And I sort of slid my foot out of one of them and said "yeah." And eleven people went "oooOOOOoooo!" in unison. I laughed for about a minute and a half.

Tuesday Tunes

This Week's Feature: Cloud Cult

Now before you start envisioning Nike's and matching purple shrouds, let me set your mind at ease: as far as I can tell this is just a funky little band of funky little environmentally conscious hippie-types who make some pretty freakin sweet, funky little songs. I stumbled across them about a year and a half ago and they make some catchy tunes for sure.

This one's my favorite.

Living On The Outside Of Your Skin
Cloud Cult

Come and speak to me, my friend.
Forget the words that you think you were saying.
Cause your thoughts seem to be thinking otherwise.
Cause your feelings seem to be feeling otherwise.

Take your broken pieces and use them for protection.
Take your strong pieces and use them for living on the outside of your skin.

Living on the outside...

You've got to suck it up, even though they spit you out.
Take it in, Take it in.
Living on the outside of your skin.

Side note: Amazon has apparently come through with flying colors. I will know for sure by Friday.

Odds And Ends

Or, The Day Before Kristen Gives Amazon.com The Old What For

Draw it, Kristen: I spent the weekend working on a portrait. It's going to be a wedding gift for my cousin and her husband-to-be. True blue procrastinator that I am, I've been putting off working on it for about two and a half months now. It has to be done by next weekend so I have time to get it all matted and framed up before I head out the following Wednesday for Iowa. But now I'm all motivated to work on it an whatnot. It works for me.

Sing it, Kristen: I've been singing with the worship band at my church for six weeks or so now. No solos or anything, mind you. (I've always said that I'm like Hillary Duff: (what the crap, I know. You'll see.) I can carry a tune, but no one in their right mind would ever give me a recording contract unless I were teeny and blond). So anyway, I just sing along and do a little bit o' that alto harmony that I love so much. I've really missed singing with a small group - that was one of my favorite things about kinship in 'Gusta. So, at church we've been working on a new song here and there for a few weeks and gave it a shot today. Go here and listen to A Better Way if you wanna hear the original.

Bring it, Kristen: In the past five or six years, I've bought untold numbers of books, movies, and CDs at nicely discounted prices from Amazon.com. Well, about a month ago I placed a larger-than-normal order - I was buying three presents plus a Guster CD and a NOVA documentary about Mt. Everest (because I'm just. that. cool.) for myself. About two weeks ago I started wondering where my order was. I checked the site only to see that they claimed it had been delivered on March 1st. It hadn't. I've made phone calls to both delivery carriers with no help from either of them. Tomorrow, we'll see if Amazon customer service will be helpful or if they will be minus one very good customer.

Hi-yah.

I Fell In The Creek

Or, The Day I Hung My Pants Out The Car Window

My HTD came to visit me this past weekend. We spent lots of mirthful time together. Talked. Saw movies (Music & Lyrics (meh) and Breach (meh-plus)). Ate food. Bargain shopped ($40 pants for $8, yos - it's ok to be impressed). Watched Friends. Road tripped. 'Twas good times, for sure.

The most eventful day was the road tripping day, hands down. Way back when, my family lived in Flagstaff, AZ. We were there for three years and moved back to Nebraska the summer I turned 9. We went back to visit the next summer and I hadn't been back since. So Haley and I thought it would be fun to make a day trip up there - sort of rediscover our past.

Back in our Flag-livin' days, our family used to take little afternoon trips to Oak Creek Canyon after church on Sundays. We'd bring a picnic lunch, drive to this one spot along the creek, and hop on the rocks and play in the water all afternoon. So the sis and I decided to do that on our way up to Flag. We drove through the canyon on the way up (which is a beautiful drive, by the way) and stopped to have lunch at our little spot. It looked just as beautiful as I remembered (which is pretty impressive after 14 years). We ate lunch and decided to take some pictures before we headed up to Flagstaff for the late afternoon/evening.

At one point, Haley handed me her digital camera and made her way upstream so I could take a picture of her. I noticed a perfect rock-hopping path across the creek and, with both our digital cameras in hand, made my way across. I hadn't hopped on more than two rocks when my fatal error took place. Over the past 14 years, I had forgotten that not all rocks are as stable as they appear in the swiftly moving current. That third rock was a bitch and dumped me, digital cameras and all, into the chilly snow-melt creek. I landed on--what else?--rocks. Painful. Mildly embarrassing. My first thought was Are you freaking kidding me? My second thought was Wow, Pat's gonna love this story. Then, Dangit, I didn't bring any extra clothes along. Then Oh crap, the cameras!

Needless to say, the cameras were a little worse for wear. Haley's finally started working normally again (thank goodness), but mine is still on the fritz. The main dilemma, though, was the clothes. I was soaked. Several events unfolded that I'm not going to go into here...I'll suffice it to say that I ended up wedging myself into a spare pair of Haley's jeans (thank God for sisters and denim with a little give to it) and hanging my pants out my back window for the remainder of the drive to Flagstaff. By the time we'd made it there and drove around a bit, they were dry enough (at least from about the knees up) to swap with Haley's too small, too short spare jeans. Just goes to show that even day trips can bring about some pretty big adventures. Gotta love the travelling.

We ended up having a really great time in Flagstaff. We saw the houses we used to live in (the one still has the playhouse that our dad built for us out back), the school we used to go to, the Lumberjack statue that used to scare the bejesus out of Haley. Overall, it was a pretty great day.

Life Lesson #739: Bring spare pants.

A Play In One Act

Or, Why Finding Missing CDs Is Not Always A Good Thing

The Time: One hour ago

The People: Kristen and her HTD

The Setting: Talking on the phone. Haley sitting in her apartment, eating popcorn and watching TV. Kristen sitting in her apartment, ripping long-lost CDs to her computer and flipping through a case full of old CDs.

There is a lull in the conversation.

Haley queries, randomly:
"Why is there a fly in my apartment?"

Kristen answers, bemusedly:
"Why do I have a Creed CD?"

Aaaaaand scene.

The Land Of Race Car Ya-Yas

Caketastic, yos.

So I had to go to Scottsdale this past Saturday to get a bridesmaid dress altered. After spending 30 minutes being poked and pinned and talked to in rapid Español by the seamstress (my four years of high school Spanish failed me miserably) and leaving my dress in her capable hands, I decided to drive around a bit. I've been to Scottsdale several times but have never really spent any time there. It's well-known as the snooty, upscale suburb of Phoenix - the witty, witty locals have dubbed it "Snotsdale."

At any rate, it seems to be packed full of wealthy, retirement-age individuals and more than one white-haired gentleman going through some sort of midlife crisis. In the ten or fifteen minutes I spent driving around, I counted no less than six different convertible sports cars being driven (tops down, of course) by leathery, tanned, polo-shirt-wearing, older men. Their images just screamed "I try so hard to be cool, how could I be anything but?" They revved their engines at stoplights. They peeled from red light to red light, a la the car race home between Ben Stiller and Robert De Niro on Meet the Parents. You could almost see them surreptitiously checking their reflections in the rear view mirrors, eyes hidden behind expensive-looking sunglasses.

ANYway. I've been at a loss for things to write about lately. Oh well.

PS - Maybe this is only funny because I draw brains for a living. Prefrontal boretex indeed.