The one about the really long day

Ever have one of those days you feel like goes on for days? Like when a football game is for 11 a.m.—you start tailgating at 9orwhatevertimeyouwakeup, go to the game (or skip it) and then rally until the early hours of the morn? Boom. Had one of those marathon days last Saturday. Lawd have mercy, I never thought so much could happen in a 24-hour time period.

Just dancin'. Woo! I am an athlete!

Friday night (into Saturday morning, duh): After a 5-car caravan from Oxford to Bush (Bush is my town—in JNONO [Just North Of New Orleans] pronounced Ja-no-no-- that's made up) my friends and I went out in my town and had a dang blast. Tam, my sweet mommy, was our DD in her ex-minivan and she chauffeured us from our pregame location (where I had the world’s best etouffee that I can’t stop thinking about) to our bar of choice and back home. Side note: Mere and I found some (oldish) men to “sponsor” us to get into the bar. Finding sponsors when I go out is my newest hobby. Calling someone a sponsor makes them feel like they are doing charity work when they donate a couple dollars to the FUNd. See what I did there? Regardless, this local bar was so fun. And now I’m addicted to local bars and the spicy bands that play at them. Didn’t I just mention spicy bands in a previous blahg entry? I feel like I did. Could be a problem.

Whatever. Next day was Saturday: Woke up at the butt crack of dawn to drive to the city (the city= NOLA) for the run. We were  draggin’, but perky. Without going into too much detail for the legal 

reasons and since my blahg is public… (Yay for strangers who read my blahg! You rock! Especially you, kind stranger who religiously reads it in Germany.) …

At least it has some character?

I got in a wreck.

Womp, womp, womp. FAQs:

Was it your fault?

Merh. Yes. Duh. I always hit stuff. Not normally moving vehicles, but rather: garbage cans, curbs, animals, my parent's cars etc. I was trying to make a right hand turn into a parking lot that snuck up on me. I was in the left lane (which means there was a right lane next to me) and when my fellow drivers in the car said “Turn! Turn! Turn!” (not blaming the wreck on them, because it was DEF my fault, but you know how it is with a car full of peeps) I obvi turned. And heaven forbid I LOOK and see if a car was coming. Gah. I’m still depressed over it. I feel irresponsible and I am so paranoid on the road now. It’s probably good for me.

Did you get a ticket?

HELLO? I broke like 12 laws. Of course I got a ticket. Same day as I bought my plane ticket. And my court date is the day I leave for England. (Did I mention I’m going to England?! I’m going to England for 5 months.) Help me. I’m poor.

Was anyone hurt?

No. But I did hit a cop. Like the car I hit in the wreck, yeah, it was being driven by a real life police woman. I have great luck. Good thing she was in her Hyundai and not her Orleans parish cop car. I probably would have had heart failure.

Adam thought this picture was a good idea.
It's funny. But my face looks deformed.

And that’s that. Then we ran the race. We STARTED the race an hour later than all the other participants (sorry frands) but still had fun. It was like running through a colorful ghost town. Unique experience.

My parents treated us to lunch and then I drove to Baton Rouge (in my ghetto car whose passenger door no longer opens and doesn’t have a side view mirror) to see my carazay folks there. No kidding. They’re cray. Baton Rouge just does it so differently than Oxford and it’s always a good time. We played Guess Who which I kicked booty at while drinking Crush and Pinnacle (Luke was so impressed I guessed exactly the beverage, down to the brand name, that he made me.) Brent and I added a nice twist when we played a few rounds of “no questions about physical appearance” i.e. “Does your person have blue eyes? Brown hair? etc.” but rather, questions like, “Is your person Jewish? Does your person own a bottle of hairspray? Does your person have a desk job? Is your person a pedophile?” One day Brent’s going to hire me to be his Dental Hygienist. Cool, huh? Right, Brent? Also, thanks for sponsoring me at Bogie's.

Then we went out. Saw my best frands. Went to the bathroom with Cydney. Why girls always go to the bathroom in pairs, I’ll never understand. But I do it. It’s like Noah’s ark. My phone was brilliantly in my back pocket and it wasn’t until I was done doing my thang that we both looked down and saw my phone chillin’ in the pot. We about died laughing, but instead of having good reflexes and grabbing it out, we managed to snap a pic first on Cyd’s phone. Then she reached her hand in and grabbed my phone out and saved the day. And it was nothing short of a miracle:

IT WORKED! Then I announced to everyone I saw for the rest of the night that my phone survived several minutes in a bar toilet in its $20 case. HEYO.

We stayed out super late (because bars stay open later than midnight-- mind boggling), ate pizza rolls, slept 3 people in a full size bed, and sweated. Then the day ended. And when I woke up the next day, my car was still wrecked.

But I’m thankful for my phone still working, for safety, and for my friends, and my family, and cops, and for The Walking Dead, which I’ve watched 3 seasons of in 5 days.

The camping one

I haven’t blahgged in over a week and I didn’t even get any complaints. Does no one care that the blahg is bahk? No one?!? Maybe I should just stop blahgging. Y’all know I’m blahmotionally insecure and need constant reassurance.

Whatever. I’ll blahg for myself. Hmph.

Last weekend, my sweet frands and I decided to drop everything (we don’t have much to drop) and go camping. From the outside, we probably look like naturey folks. We do do (do do… ha ha… name that show) lots of naturey things, but despite that: WE’RE NOT. Chase was in charge of checking the weather. He’s got a really great GPA, and although he’s no boy scout, I thought we could count on him to keep us dry for the 24 hours we were planning to be gone.

This is how pretty and happy I look when I'm hiking.

We rented a couple of the world’s smallest tents and the world’s smallest sleeping bags and trekked (drove) out to Tishomingo State Park-- Allegedly the most beautiful place in Mississippi (arguable, but beautiful.)

We briefly went hiking for long enough to appease the hikers while still keeping me (not a hiker) in a mediocre mood before sunset. We chose our camping site unanimously on the “primitive road,” set up camp (lit’rally) and started dinner. Which required us making a fire. Which hardly happened. Erika was in charge of that. While there were flames (a flame, rather), it was weak. WEAK, WEAK. Valiant effort.

But can I just say how dang delicious dinner was? I was in charge of that. **flips hair** We made hobo packs. For those of you who aren’t Annie Oakleyesque like myself, hobo packs are aluminum foil with foods of your choice thrown in and seasoned and put over the fire embers to cook. I sliced up a butt ton of onions, mushrooms, squash, chicken, broccoli, carrots etc. and set it up buffet style and we went to dang town. Except not. We were in the middle of no where. Man, it was yummy.

And then right after dinner we had to quickly pack up because our weather man with the good GPA didn’t predict the weather via the app on his phone too well and suddenly the world’s worst thunderstorm was approaching and we had to take cover in our protective tents. So we went to sleep. By like, 8:30. Judge us. I don’t even care. It was scary as all get out and we are BRAVE PEOPLE. See video. Turn up the volume to hear the rain.

Oh, and the wood we used to make for our campfire? We stole it from the church camp staying at the fancy cabins. It was an accident. Kind of. We would have died without that wood. It’s fine. Isn’t it? GOD MADE WOOD FOR ALL PEOPLE, OKAY? Yeah, see? Sometimes stealing is justifiable. 

Here's my hobo pack before I attacked it and after I attacked it.

Here's how to fit 3 men into a 2 men (really 1 man) tent. 

This was taken in the morning when I thought Chase looked
 really pretty and I just wanted to document the moment. 

Did I mention it was freezing? It was FREEZING. 

The now-can-you-hEAR-me one.

If you don’t feel like reading all this, scroll down a few paragraphs. The summary and important parts of all this bologna (which you SHOULD want to read) is in bold.

Two weekends ago I went to this retreat I’ve wanted to go to for 3 years. It always falls on the same weekend, which happens to be Fall Visit Day (a special event put on by the Admissions and Enrollment Services office) every year, which I’ve been required to be at every year until this year. (I can already tell this is going to be a long story. I’m being breathy. Sorry.) Well, when I arrived at the retreat Friday night, I naturally forgot to throw my sleeping bag on a bed and got stuck sleeping on a mattress on the floor. 15 humans… 14 beds… Gabe on floor. Did I mention I also forgot my pillow? Oh yeah, I forgot my pillow.

It was actually comfortable as heck. Don’t feel sorry for me yet. (You’ll know when to.)

Here’s the climax: Saturday morning I woke up and I couldn’t hear out of my left ear. Dun dun dun dun. I say this loosely, of course. I could hear. I just couldn’t hear EVERYTHING. There were some noises that were muffled, some silent, and it felt like there was something stuck in there. So I do what any insane hypochondriac would do and assume a roach, or a small colony of ants, or a baby mouse crawled in my ear while I was asleep and was now nesting in my wax. (ß That’s kinda graphic. Sorr.)

Fast forward to Monday morning. I went to the health center on campus (BOOOOOO) and the doc told me there was nothing wrong with me. Basically, that I’m making shi up.

Really? REALLY? You think I formulated a lie of deafness just to come hang out with you and vomiting humans in the campus health center? No sir. That didn’t happen.

I kind of wish this were a little
more graphic for the effect. Weak. 

Now fast forward through over a week of me griping about not being able to hear and having to take naps and medicine because I can’t concentrate because of everything being muffled and the constant ringing and blah blah blah to today at 1:45, which was the first availability the real ear doc had. I even skipped food lab for this appointment. And Lord knows that’s a sacrifice. I transform into a chef on Wednesdays at 1:00 normally. But when I realized my doctor is young and smart and hot and spicy, I suddenly didn’t care so much about not learning to season and cut different types of meat.

After the doc ran lots of hearing tests and looked inside my ear, and I looked/ drooled at him, turns out:

I have permanent freaking hearing loss.

Here, read about it here. Enlighten yourself: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ménière's_disease

The real question here is: Is that chin cellulite?
Lord help me if it is. Just chillin' getting ear drum 'roids. 

Basically, he said sometimes this just happens to people. GOOD, INNOCENT PEOPLE LIKE ME. I have moderate loss of hearing in my left ear and I’ll receive 3 treatments of ear drum steroid injections (lit’rally a long needle into my ear drum) over the next two weeks, the first of which happened today and it hurt like **insert profanity** and sounded like a finger snap by your ear underwater (I always snap at myself underwater?). But my ear drum is gonna be like so ripped on roids so it’s worth it, right? ;) #springbreak13yall. There is a constant ringing in my ear that kind of sounds like wind, which he said will never go away, but after a year or so, I’ll become used to it. (A year is a long-ass time to hear one single sound, jtlyk. I’m already going crazy after 2 weeks of it. Especially when I’m trying to go to sleep or study or meditate which I never do.) It’s apparently just my brain compensating for my lack of being able to hear low-pitched noises. What am I? 90 years old?

Anyway. See ya, hearing! Hola American Sign Language! (ß dramatic.)

I know there are worse things. I get that. And I am very blessed. But it doesn’t take away from the fact that I’m not going to miss not having to say “WHAT?” every time someone with a deep voice speaks to me on my left. So if you think about it, say a yittle prayer for me? God will be able to hear if you have a deep voice even if I can’t.

I'm practically a doctor. I made this chart that I copied from memory of my hearing test results for you to see. I think it's pretty freaking artsy, myself. 

So now I’m crying and laying in bed and sulking and eating string cheese and blahgging and charging my phone. If you want to cheer me up, I’d love a bowl of clear soup and some fried rice from Toyo (formerly Nagoya… sad), a California roll, and a brownie sundae without the ice cream (which I understand just makes it just a brownie) from Bop’s.

Happy HOLLARween, y’all!

The one with some of my thoughts and tips on Halloween

Drum roll for the pumpkin results paleaaaaseee…

Shout out to ma sista sista Mad for making me this little picture stitchure.

Winner is:

1 (Globe): +++++++

2 (Haunted House): +++++++++++++

3 (Mississippi): ++

4 (Owl/Pikachu): +++++

5 (Ghosts): ++++++

6 (Lyceum):+

Congrats. New kid, you did me proud. Really. I just would have been really bitter had the globe or Mississippi won. Why? Because Mississippi only worked on his for .5 seconds and Globe was my stiffest crafty competitor AND went out and bought special tools. Granted, I wasn’t the greatest competitor, regardless. My owl was UG (for being an owl), but it did get more votes than the Lyceum (ha… ha) the first vote of which was my sweet mommy’s.

Just when you think all hope is lost, your mom tells you you’re special. Thanks, ma.

And thanks to everyone who voted. That was fun. Awful for my self esteem, but fun nonetheless. Maybe we’ll do it again. Or maybe not. Or maybe once I find something else I’m “good at” I’ll have a competition involving that. Good?

On a different Halloween note, we watched Children of the Corn last night. Have you seen that movie? Okay, don’t. It’s weird as X. (Replace X with whatever profanity you want. My grandparents read my blahg.) Seriously. I wanted to be scared and I WASN’T. Not even a little. But was I weirded the heck out? Yes. 500%. First scene is just old-people-drinking-coffee’s heads getting cut off by creepy children—one of which is a ginger—and I normally really like gingers and I DEFINITELY like old people and coffee. Bottom line is: don’t. watch.

Even my own DEAR friends are
 succumbing to the sexy press. (pressure.)

Lastly, I thought I’d share my thoughts on sexy Halloween creature costumes even though most people seem to be set on their ways on this topic.

(Similarly to how all of my Facebook friends are suddenly extreme Democrats or extreme Republicans with EXTREME opinions and political knowledge….)

Anyway, WHY IS THAT A THING? If you want to be sexy, can’t you just BE sexy?? Why do you have to wait until Halloween to turn yourself into a kitten or a mouse or a dishwasher or a waitress and then put SEXY before your description? I don’t know about you, but I’m sexy by nature. I don’t need October 31 to make it offish. Nor do I need to tell you I’m sexy. If you’re sexy, you’re sexy. I don’t walk around saying, “Hi. I’m sexy Gabrielle.” So, I feel you don’t need to walk around on Halloween saying, “Hi. I’m sexy Batman.”

People will know if you’re sexy. Believe me. But if you need some inspiration from the many sexy faces of me through the years, here's for you:

Sexy Antoine Dodson. 'Cause they rapin' erbody out here.

Sexy fairies. Circa 2005.

Sexy sailor with a booger. Circa 2006.

Sexy grandma. Hey grandma! 

Sexy Augustus Gloop. Personal fave.

Sexy 4th grade nuns. (I'm the particularly sexy one on the back row, far left, second from the end. Don't I glow?)

And then I rewore the sexy nun costume circa 2007. It was that sexy.

The pumpkin carving one

This is me luring you into my blahg. Muahaha.

A few days ago, one of my friends told me he didn’t want to do the pumpkin carving contest that I had so carefully planned because he didn’t want to lose. LAME. This just made me GRRR because I knew I could beat him and (duh) wanted to beat him. He said, “Gah, I guess if it were a math or spelling competition, I’d want you to participate because I know I’d beat you. **flips hair**” So he agreed to partake in my extreme carving competition. Thing is, though, I knew I could kick his ass in a spelling bee, even though everyone put their money on him (just when you think your friends think you’re smart…). So, in addition to the carving last night, we had our first annual Shelley Cove spelling bee.

I lost in the dang preliminaries to some word-- "toboggan." And then I misspelled “hygiene” during my redeeming round. “I” before “E,” silly me. Can you befreakinglieve that? Ironic and annoying.

And on top of that, his pumpkin is better than mine. Or I think so at least. And so does everyone else. Ugh. Then we were under a tornado warning (WARNING, not watch… whatever the heck the difference is,) I freaked the freak out and pushed Morgan, and then I chipped my front tooth on an Abita Strawberry bottle and now it's sharp on the inside (wanna make out?) Bottom line: If I’m not good at what I’m good at (carving and spelling,) THEN WHAT AM I GOOD AT? I’ll be working on figuring that out. Stay tuned.

I shouldn’t say anymore (nor should I post a really cute pic of me and my sweet pump) about the contest because I don’t want to give anything away and thus influence your votes (because obviously you’d want to vote for mine.) Here are the pumpkin pics. Text, fb message, or comment with your vote—winner gets a special prize (aka bragging rights.)

(Number 1)

(Number 2)

(Number 3)

(Number 4)

(Number 5)

(Number 6-- not sure why I don't have an unlit pic...)

(...Number 7...)

This is such a bitter blahg. I should have had the best pumpkin. And I should have spelled Hygiene correctly.

The one when the BLAHG CAME BAHK!

I feel like I completely forgot how to do this. Similar(ly?) to how I forgot how to run (see last blahg post in which I describe the half marathon I ran… HA.) If I could run a mile right now, it’d be a miracle. My friend says that’s all in my head—but really, I think that’s all in HIS head. I can’t run a mile.

Again, to refresh your memory, I don’t plan on ever covering anything of substance in this online journal. If you want to read it, I appreciate it and then we’ll have something to talk about next time I run into you. If you don’t, I’ll never know. But just know, that I’ll simply cover the random musings of my mundane life—lightheartedly, of course. Because that’s how my brain works. I stopped blahgging for the past 6 months because:

A. I thought I had nothing to write about (ß Sometimes I think dumb things…)

B. Once I thought that for about a month, I thought I had lost all hope of my fan base returning, so I just continued drowning in my unblahgged sorrows for the next 5 months.)

But now I’m back. And I’m here to say that being a senior rocks. For me, at least. I love my classes. (Side note: I declared Dietetics and Nutrition as a double major.) We cook, and eat, and chat, and “study” and eat, and gahhhh IT’S AWESOME, especially when we eat.

Additionally, it’s almost Halloween (which I skipped last year on accident) and I am really excited becaussseeeee we are having a PUMPKIN CARVING CONTEST! I can’t even begin to say how serious I am about it, either. I bought a knife, printed my pattern, read tips online, and consulted with an expert carver (hi Sam) to make sure my pumpkin wins. Don’t worry. You’ll get to see them all. The contest is Wednesday and you’ll all have a chance to vote… unless of course all of my competitors withdraw (ß I couldn’t think of this word, so after an awkward and vague description, Ross helped me and then asked for a shoutout.) themselves. Then I guess I’d automatically win. Which would be totally fine.

Things I love right now: My new Keds, wearing my hair naturally, Orbit gum (the dark blue kind… that’s nothing new,) our 3^rd ex-roommate’s fancy bathtub that is now a spare bathtub, Honey Boo Boo, Switched at Birth (sometimes I start speaking in sign language, thanks to the deaf co-star, Daphne, who has taught me 8 words,) vacuuming, taking naps, going to food prep lab, having my phone battery last all day long, and going out (because I have time and I wear whatever I want.)

That’s all, for now, in brief summary. I promise my next post will be less spastic. Just kidding. I'm not promising that. Stay tuned for the pumpkin pics on Thursday! 

I wanted to include some visual aids for you to sleep on, but my neighbors just got home. And since I'm borrowing : / their internet and they just got online, it's going super slow. So I can't. Remind me to do that later. These are the only (really random) ones that loaded. First world pains.

This is me and the Pepsi commercial girl. Remember her? We look alike! Cool! I have a Doppleganger!
If no bells are ringing, or if you didn't exist in the 90's, here you go:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3C1I-IrOgyg&feature=related 

And here's my new Mississippi Driver's License (or "Driver License," rather...) I cried a little. A lot. Whatever. Happy to be Mississippian nonetheless, just sad to part with my swamp. You know.

Thank you all for reading. Really.

XOXO,

Gossip Girl (I've been watching that, too.)

The Half Marathon WON

Didn’t know that I’d live to see the moment I’d be typing out this blahg post. But here I am, unable to move from the dent I’ve made in this couch due to soreness in my butt (OUCH), thighs, calves, feet, shoulders, and abs (invisi-abs, I call them) able to say:

I RAN A HALF MARATHON!

It wasn’t an easy journey. Let’s begin with that. But— SO worth it. If the training I’ve been doing since October didn’t stink enough, you wouldn’t believe the series of unfortunate events within the 24 hours leading up to the race.

We survived: injuries, tornados, a hail storm, Meredith’s car breaking down, Steven getting locked out of his car and other unmentionables.

Despite it all, we persevered! Hoorah!

Dad giving me a motivational fist bump

The race began at 7 a.m. yesterday (Sunday). Opening my eyes at 5:30 a.m. was all but pleasant, especially after having nightmares about half marathon disasters and lying in bed dreading the sound of the blow horn, people cheering for/watching me, wearing tight pants, being cold, being sore, thirsty, hungry, tired, etc. ALL NIGHT LONG-- Lit’rally. ;)

The weather was BEAUTIFUL. I hate breathing in cold Oxygen.

I crossed the start line at about 7:20 a.m. as I was in the 12^th corral to cross the start line. There were 25 corrals and about 25,000 people running the race. I stationed myself next to the oldest and fattest lady I could find and a loon who was running all 13.1 miles BAREFOOT… both of whom eventually ended up passing me. My morale = ^.

Weirdo with no shoes.

(Note to self: Huge crowds of skinny people with awesome muscles, lots of gear, doing odd stretches at the crack of dawn is mildly… errr, extremely… intimidating.)

I finished the first mile in 8 minutes and 40 seconds! I was so proud of myself. And it flew by. It was great. It was downhill from there (not lit’rally, unfortunately.) I ran the next two miles as well before taking a walking break and drankin’ some H2O. My average pace decreased very gradually with every mile, except for the miles in which I passed the fam cheering for me. They’re so dang cool.

At the 5K (3 mile) mark, I was still on top of the world. (I never thought I’d say that, either.)

By mile 6, I squirted a GU in my mouth (chocolate flavor—so delicious) for a quick pick-me-up. The energy boost may be all in my head, but I’ll take whatever works.

At mile 8, there was a sweet guy offering all the runners doughnuts and beer. Very thoughtful of him; and very tempting for me. I graciously refused.

Thought I was dying by mile 12. No kidding.

I passed mom and Madeline around then, and Madeline told me two things:
1. You’re going slow. 2. You don’t look tired. (I liked #2.)

The last half-mile was the worst. I couldn’t see the finish line, but I could see what I THOUGHT was the finish line. Hi false hope. My run was pretty much a walk with mild pep by this point.

CROSSING THE FINISH LINE!
Told y'all my arms flail around
uncontrollably. I never said I had a good form.

Crossing the finish line, I felt/looked like a zombie. But I was the HAPPIEST ZOMBIE IN THE WORLD.

Had I not been planning on celebrating post-marathon, I’m not sure that I’d have been able to finish. Each runner got two free beers at the finish line (#TNOLAM = Total NOLA Move) and after a 3 hour nap, we ate dinner and had a lovely, classy evening out.

I feel like I’ve left so much out—which I have. But I don’t want to be boring. And I am sleepy. Zzzz. It was such a great weekend. These pictures may make you jealous, but I will share them anyway. After all, I’m not forcing you to read this!

(But I am super thankful that you are.) 

Gettin' it before the race. Got my pump up jamz on.

Partyin', partyin', YEAH!

The catch-up one

Is anyone out there?

Hi again. I apologize for falling off the face of the earth for two months. So many completely thrilling things have happened to me since my last blahg post. That’s a lie. Nothing has happened. That’s also a lie. Some things have happened I guess.

Most importantly, I turned 21 on Christmas eve. On that day, I also threw up approximately 10 times. Hey, stomach bug! Most people spend their 21^st birthday throwing up alcohol. I spent it throwing up… not alcohol.

We also caught a rat in our house in Oxford. So that I don’t get sued and stuff, I’ll refrain from posting the video I took of the suffering fella. By the way, “rat” = 3 inch baby mouse.

And lastly, I’ve still been RUNNING! You may recall from a few posts back, that I announced to the world that I’ll be running a half marathon on March 4. Well, March 4^th is SUNDAY! It’s fine if you’re shocked that I’ve stuck with it. But I couldn’t bail. A few things to clarify that you’re probably wondering about:

(Meredith gets annoyed when I tweet about running. I hate to be that girl. But I’m allowed to blahg about it because this is my blahg. It’s where I write about myself and you non-forcefully read about myself. Neat!)

A. I’m still slow. BUT I’ve improved so much! When I started, I could run for only one minute at a time with a one and a half minute break in between runs. Now, I run about 7 of the 13 miles! I get that that’s technically not “running” a half marathon if I’m walking 6 of the miles. But hey, hatas gonna hate. You’re sitting right now. I’m probably running. Nah, probably not.

Look at my tennis shoes. WAH!

B. I still think I’m crazy for signing up for this gig. Every run I go on requires pretty much a day’s worth of mental preparation and a few hours worth of procrastinative “getting-ready” time—because it’s so miz.

C. My tennis shoes rock. They’re super electric. Boogie woogie woogie woogie.

D. Out of 17,000 people running the race, I have come to terms with the fact that I may come in last place.

E. I CAN’T WAIT TO BE DONE!

If you feel like coming to New Orleans for the occasion, consider this your invitation. I ask, however, that you: 1) Don’t cheer for me. I don’t like being watched. 2) Find a place to stay.

Hey Turcotte. Just thought I'd give you a loving shout-out. For the rest of you: Megan Turcotte was my roommate this summer. HAY ROOMMATE. She's the hippest human EV and she's weird. 

And now, a few pictures I found on my phone for your viewing pleasure. 

Cute dad won a Drew Brees autographed helmet!

Our little pet that we caught. 

Wil's means of motivating me to go run. 

My friend, Melissa (and her sister, Amy)
in Disney world circa 1999. $100 to whoever
 can name the character they are with. Awwwk.

BEFORE I straightened Madeline's mane. 

AFTER I straightened Madeline's mane.

Toothless at the Open House.