Thoughts. Experiences. Dreams.

My 'hood.

noreply@blogger.com (Jess) — Thu, 21 Apr 2011 05:21:00 +0000

I recently moved back to the neighborhood I grew up in until I was about ten. My parents still own the house and have been renting it out, apparently to people who didn't know how to take care of a home...and I am now renting it from them. So we completely gutted the house and there is still some work to be done but it is definitely shaping up.

But this post is about my 'hood.

I love it. It's so...gangsta. People who have been here totally make fun of it and I don't know if the reason I love it so much is because I grew up here or what but it just makes me happy. I love seeing everyone sitting on their front porches and lawns watching the cars and people go by. I love hearing the train in the distance. I love the sound of the ice cream man coming down the street and kiddos and their mommas running up to it in their pajamas. I love that I can hear just about everyone who is outside on this street through my window. I love the conversations I get to eavesdrop on. I love the hardcore arguments I hear and giggle at as I do homework in my room. I love hearing the music bumping in so many cars that pass by. I love how the asphalt is completely falling apart. I love that the kids play in the street and flee every time they see a car. I love that in this part of town people actually acknowledge their neighbors and say hello. Most of all, I love all the memories I have here and all of the memories that are yet to come!

...I don't love the million bajillion trillion mosquito eaters outside that nosedive me everyday and sneak into the house. Or the Chihuahua yapping/barking.

Update. I even did pictures!

noreply@blogger.com (Jess) — Wed, 26 Jan 2011 07:18:00 +0000

I'm just going to do a quick update bloggy because I feel like my page here has been a little neglected and I can't think of anything fun and interesting at the moment. I know some of you check this fairly often but do not see me too much so hopefully its appreciated and not a giant bore. :)

My house is allllllllllmost done! I know I've kinda been saying that for awhile now, but it seriously is! I cannot wait to move in and have my own place, and eat there and sleep there and get organized and stop living out of my filthy car!

Speaking of my filthy car, I hit a cow with it last month. I think I'll be taking it in to get fixed this week. I have a broken door handle and missing a mirror. The cow is fine as far as I know and I refuse to believe anything else. Even though I get made fun of for it a lot, I do agree that it is pretty funny that this is my second time. :)

I'm currently reading The Help. I'm staring at it right now trying to decide if I want to go back to reading and leave this hanging or finish my post. I definitely recommend it, awesome book! Next up is Water for Elephants.

Doctors are trying to figure out what's going on with my mom, she has no energy and feels terrible most days. Its awful watching her like that when she is normally the happiest go luckiest, incredibliest woman ever! They seem to think it is not her lungs, not her heart, and now they are looking into acid reflux. Bummed it takes so much time to figure it out, but soon enough I suppose!

I started school again last week. Hoping this semester is better than the last when my motivation completely up and left me hanging. I could technically graduate this semester but I kinda want to keep going (I know, totally weird) and I don't want to get denied due to budget cuts if I want to return later. So I'll just do it now. :)

Started snowboarding again! Its been five years since I broke my clavicle and I'm finally back in the game. I went twice last weekend with some pretty awesome people and had a great time so I'm going to continue and I WILL get better!

I turned 25 on the 3rd. It wasn't quite as bad as I had expected. I mean, I know I'm still very young and 25 isn't that big of a deal but... 25?!

Here are a few pictures of recent happenings:

My trip to Seattle/Mill Creek to visit Clarissa in November.

Co-worker Katelyn on our way home from a fun wine tasting trip!

Doghouse then Roe for Ceaenna and Rose's birthday.

Poor cow. :/

Christmas party with the bff's at the Horn Household! I love all the happiness in this picture!

The girls that went to play pool after dinner on my birthday, this slacker didn't take any pictures at dinner.

My new snowboarding friends...some not so new. :)

Life Changes

noreply@blogger.com (Jess) — Tue, 26 Oct 2010 04:19:00 +0000

My last post said that I had other changes going on in my life sooo here goes...

When you are young and growing up you always hear how crazy life is and how crazy it will continue to be. This is no different for Jess and myself, we are sitting in my room pondering what we want to tell the world. We have been through so much in the last five years. From meeting while working at Chuck E. Cheese to getting engaged in July of 2009. As a couple we have had amazing times and we have also faced our difficult times, but one thing is that we have learned to love each other for who we have grown to be as people. We each have our own ideas and thoughts about the things we want to tell the world but the main thing we want to tell the people involved in our lives, in one way or another, is that we have decided to go our separate ways. What this means is that we are no longer getting married, we are no longer engaged, and we are no longer dating.

We have to say this has been a crazy journey and it has been even crazier over the last two months. Obviously there are going to be tons of questions and we would like to let you in on a few of those answers but honestly, if it’s not on the list we probably don’t really want to talk to you about it. :) So if you could respectfully grant our wishes not to have gloomy faces and sorries and anything cheesy sayings like “well there is someone for everyone” or “you guys were perfect together.” (FYI: Jess will flip out on you if she gets any comments that say “:(” <--- from the mouth and hand of Jess) We all know you love us and are sorry so there is no need to express it.

Why?

We know there is no need to explain anything to anyone so we won’t, just understand that we see marriage as a huge commitment we are not ready for and we have both changed from the people we were five years ago.

How are we doing?

We are doing as well as anyone could be doing. We are still as good of friends as good friends could be in this situation. We don’t hate each other which is weird because, I, (Stephen) personally think it would be easier if Jess did something so I could hate her. Just kidding, kinda. :)

The reason we have decided to do it this way is because we thought it would be good for us to talk a little more about this as the dust has settled. It really is a healing thing for us. So if you have anything you’d like to say to us you could message us, but we aren’t obligated to respond so try not to take offense if we don’t.

Welp...see ya later.

Have I lost all five of my faithful readers?

noreply@blogger.com (Jess) — Sun, 24 Oct 2010 05:12:00 +0000

Oh my word, the last time I wrote on here was May 15th! And I said my new years resolution was to have 52 posts, HAH! We'll see about that.

So a lot of changes have been going on in my life lately. Some I'll let you in on now, the others I'll keep you posted on. Get it, "posted" 'cause its a blog. ;) Lame.

I finally got a job! At a bank. So far so good. :) And that's all on that...there are enough creepers that come in, I don't want any unknown internet creepers. Unless you want to open a new account, then I would gladly use you.

My grandpa was diagnosed with Multiple Myeloma which is a bone marrow cancer. He has to go through chemotherapy for the next 3 months and hopefully that will do the trick for a long time. At his age it is too risky to do any bone marrow transplants so hopefully the chemo does the trick! Prayers are welcome!

And lastly, I'm going to be renting my parent's rental house soon. This is the house I grew up in until I was 10 or 11 and it has a lot of memories loaded inside. But know what else is loaded inside right now? FILTH. We knew that the house was going to be bad after the previous renters who had been there for a number of years left, we just weren't expecting it to be quite as terrible as it was. We wound up gutting out the house including all of the floors, doors, cabinets, wall paper, and cottage cheese ceiling. So basically I'm going to have some pretty sweet before and after pictures but sadly I don't have the best before pictures...but that's how it's supposed to be, right?!

Yeah, that's contact paper on there...and yes, that is a very, very disgusting toilet with a cigarette butt in it.

FABRIC!

noreply@blogger.com (Jess) — Sat, 15 May 2010 22:25:00 +0000

Stephen called me a hoarder the other day, of course I got super offended since I pride myself in throwing stuff away. But I swear it is only with furniture and fabrics...I'm obsessed, just like my momma. With that, we need people to come and buy all of our fabrics and maybe some furniture!

My mom is downsizing and moving her upholstery shop to her house and there is NO CHANCE of bringing everything home and I know some of you lovely ladies love fabrics too so come out preferably before Friday 5/21 but no later than 5/28. Most of it is upholstery fabric but there are other ones that would be good for quilting and such, there are also trims, a couple sofa's, and a bunch of chairs that need some TLC.

Also, anyone who has an old school TV want this? $25?

The shop is located one block east of Clovis and north of Shields at

5764 E. Fountain Way #105

Fresno, CA 93727

Open Mon-Fri 7:00am-3:30pm

Phone: (559)294-1038 Or you can call me, email me at jessrouns@gmail.com if you don't already have my number. :)

Lunch Time!

noreply@blogger.com (Jess) — Wed, 14 Apr 2010 19:35:00 +0000

I'm starving. Two clients happened to know each other and now they are having the time of their lives catching up and I can't leave until they do. I love you The Seatery. :)

Also, today is April 14th and I can't find an important paper to finish my taxes. I wonder how that's going to pan out? I love living out of boxes too. :)

Welp, I just felt like taking a little visit to my blog. Have a great day!

DADGUMIT (whatever that means)

noreply@blogger.com (Jess) — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 06:55:00 +0000

Sometimes, when I don't fit in, I just want the easy way out and to just disappear. That doesn't always work out, in fact, it rarely does. I usually have to learn to deal, suck it up, and try to love.

I can be painfully shy and if I'm intimidated, it shows. BIG TIME. I usually know within about two minutes if I will be okay with a person by how overwhelmed I feel at that point. And yes, I have met people who I literally have to walk away from because my body begins to panic after about 30 seconds. These, my friends, are the kinds of situations (and people) where I really just don't fit in.

The not so funny thing about this is that those particular people are the ones who don't get it...at all. Like, at all, at all. I think this offends them, and know what the crazy thing is about that? I feel bad! I realize that I sound bitter, probably because I am and I realize that if I'm bitter I probably shouldn't be writing this for the internets to see. But, I am. I feel honest right now, maybe I'll regret it and delete it in a couple days, maybe not.

K, I'm gonna leave you hanging. Meanwhile, go read my last post and maybe you'll have more understanding.

Night, I love you my readers...most of you. I kid. ...pretty much. :)

A Little Understanding Please!

noreply@blogger.com (Jess) — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 08:21:00 +0000

Ever wonder why I'm kind of a oddball? I'm in a Personality Psychology class right now and stumbled across this article. If your an introvert, you'll probably laugh at how much you agree with the guy who wrote this article and if your an extrovert, I realize this article is pretty long and is just some journalist's opinion but I urge you to read it, you might learn something! Let me know what you think, I'm excited to read the comments on this!

Caring for Your Introvert - Magazine - The Atlantic

Black Bird

noreply@blogger.com (Jess) — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 09:10:00 +0000

When I was in high school I would drive on Highway 168 through Academy all the time which got to be a pretty boring drive, but there was about a month span of time where it seemed like every time I drove through I would see these huge clouds of black birds. It was so incredible that I was always pulling over to watch them for a bit before driving again. I always have the memory of these birds popping up, wishing to see them again sometime. Yesterday I was driving past the farming portion of Fresno State and found a much smaller cloud of them and it warmed my heart for the whole day. :)

Here are a couple youtube videos I found so you can enjoy them too!

I would really really love it if these birds would follow me to the Grand Canyon some day as I sit on one of the ledges watching them put on their show for me.

Haiti

noreply@blogger.com (Jess) — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 09:05:00 +0000

I can't stop thinking about Haiti. My heart aches for them. I've been following two people who are currently in Haiti on twitter and I'm obsessed with what they have to say, living vicariously through them. (FYI they are jonathanolinger and lindsaybranham if you are in with the twitter crowd). I want to go so bad to help in any way that I can. I was laying in bed thinking about my trip to New Orleans the other night. We went during the summer of '06, ten months after Katrina had hit, it has been the most incredible trip of my life. I have yet to experience something more life changing than that trip, to see the unshakable faith these people had after losing everything they had was amazing. While our group was gutting out a man's home he told us "It's okay, it's just stuff. You don't see a U-Haul following a hearse." Seriously? Can that get anymore eye opening? Incredible, right?

These are a few photo's from our experience..

This boat's home was 50 miles away from here.

Before.

After.

I want to help.

Thanks for Reading

noreply@blogger.com (Jess) — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 08:31:00 +0000

After reading a recent post on my lovely friend Katy's site, she encouraged me to write a new post at least every week...on average. I was just thinking the other day about how I wished that more of my personal friends who have blogs posted the latest and greatest more often. I just want to see what and how they are doing and what they are thinking about. Basically, I just want to hear from them somehow. That's when I stop myself and think "wait, I think the last time I wrote anything was in October, why should I expect them to do it when I don't?" I know that some of you read this weird stuff that runs through my mind, so whoever you are, thank you and this year in blog is dedicated to you.

I have a terrible habit of writing a post and never actually posting it because I'm sure that nobody actually cares about what I just wrote so my goal is to not only post more frequently but also to not care about what you care about...kind of. :)

This is an excellent example of a post that wouldn't have made the cut before my goal came into effect!

Who needs brains?

noreply@blogger.com (Jess) — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 08:05:00 +0000

I wound up getting an excused medical withdrawal from all of my classes last semester due to Viral Meningitis trying to kill me in September, which in turn made me completely and utterly spoiled. I have - no joke - been getting anywhere from 9 to 11 hours of sleep per night on average during the last few months and I have fallen madly in love with it. So much that I'm honestly a little worried about school starting back up in a week and a half. I've gotten so used to just working part time. But school and work? Going back to only sleeping 4 to 7 hours per night? What the what?!

Also, if you know me you probably know that I don't handle knowing anything about the human body well at all. Not only does my whole body start shaking and sweating like a mad man, but my imagination completely takes over leaving not even a smidgen of space for logic. Once I can relate with one tiny thing, I'm sure that there is something wrong with me and it takes some serious convincing to lead me back to healthy thinking.

With that, I'm also nervous to go back to my classes. After crying myself to sleep every night, knowing that I was for sure going to die due to spontaneous combustion of the head. And after numerous doctor's visits, an MRI, Lumbar Puncture, some encouraging and some not so encouraging words later, I am utterly terrified of not only the insides of the body as a whole, but also the brain. I'm majoring in psychology. How am I going to finish this without puking in class? Sick.

So, sleep deprivation and fear of the brain...here we come!

Thanks.

noreply@blogger.com (Jess) — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 04:12:00 +0000

I'm weak and an emotional wreck. Do I have every right to be? Nope, I'm pretty blessed. Is it difficult to keep reminding myself of that? Yes, I'm selfish.

I'll go ahead and thank God for putting up with my ridiculous prayers, also Stephen, my family, and close friends for putting up with me being so annoying, giving me pep talks, and shouting out some more sane prayers than mine.

There are a lot of things I want to change, I'm not sure where to start.

I Have Swine Flu

noreply@blogger.com (Jess) — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 22:16:00 +0000

Not really again, I just like fooling you, cause I hear it works. As you may know from my last post, I'm real sick. I'm told that I have some weird, mysterious viral infection but it hurts, bad. I've gone through tons of sicknesses and I'm actually really tough but I have never, ever felt anything like this and it really sounds so simple and easy to get through, just a headache and some nausea, no problem. Now, I also understand that my imagination is too big for my own good but when I'm at my worst, my thoughts look something like this:

"Oh geez, I seriously do have swine flu. What if it just takes a turn for the worst? What if I have to go to the emergency room tonight? I hate the emergency room. Plus, I would need a place to lay down because there is no way I would be able to sit up for hours. This isn't going to work out, I'm going to die. I really could die, like tonight, because I probably have a brain tumor. What happens then? Surgery to take it out? Do I have cancer? Oh no. I need Stephen to google some stuff cause if I do I'll pass out. No, I can't, he'll remind me how ridiculous I'm being, because I am. But people really do get brain tumors. I probably do too. I just won't say anything. It'll all go away if I just ignore it, right? I can't do this anymore, I'm losing my mind."

No joke, that's literally what has gone through my mind every night this last week. I can't believe I'm admitting to this. But my point is, I have WAY too much time on my hands right now.

But maybe all this extra time is a good thing. If you look two posts back it's basically me talking about how much I don't like wedding planning. Well, as of a few days ago, I'm on a roll! Calling and emailing people who have barns, posting questions and looking for networking on forums. Finding tons and tons of new wedding websites and blogs, which by the way, is flooding my google reader. Even though I can't see anything that's getting accomplished, I at least feel like I'm doing something and moving forward in is crazy process.

By the way, I feel like a lot of people don't know about google reader and you should. Basically you just enter all of your favorite blogs and websites in and it just lets you know when they have been updated and have new posts and stuff. I love it. :)

Sulking

noreply@blogger.com (Jess) — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 20:07:00 +0000

I get so restless when I can't do anything...or eat anything. I got this bad headache yesterday and took ibuprofen on an empty stomach right before a huge dinner with the fam. Turns out that was a really bad idea, I started to feel super sick and couldn't eat anything and I was really looking forward to Santa Fe Basque. So I just came home and slept my life away hoping all would be better in the morning so I could have a perfect three day weekend.

Nope. I woke up bright and early and headed to Stephen's office to meet him and others to take his youth group to the Poverello House (which I really enjoy). Got there, decided it was a terrible idea, went home, and threw up. I know, I know, I could have left that out. Whatever. Now, I still have an awful deadache and feel sick to my stomach only when I sit up or stand up. So, I'm refusing to get up for longer than a couple minutes at a time and I freaking hate it so I'm complaining to you, five readers of my blog.

AND to top it off, I can't figure out what I did with A Beautiful Boy yesterday, the book I'm obsessed with right now.

Oh and I realize that I accidentally spelled headache wrong but I looked at it and decided it fit better the way I spelled it.

Thanks for listening...reading. I need a hug. I was sooo looking forward to this weekend.

We Eloped!

noreply@blogger.com (Jess) — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 20:14:00 +0000

Okay, okay, I kid. But really, sometimes I go through these little spurts when I honestly think I would rather do that. Maybe I'll be the first bride-to-be to admit it but I don't like wedding planning so far. I teared up a bit yesterday thinking about it...I just want a location, so simple right? Nope, apparently not when you just want an old barn that isn't a "real" wedding location. Or maybe I don't like it because I have no idea how 10 grand is considered a "low budget wedding." Or maybe I don't like it because I am not looking forward to people saying things to me for cutting our guest list by about 70%. Also, when I'm sitting here wondering how I'm going to come up with textbooks for this semester, I also get caught up wondering how we're going to come up with our unrealistically low budget.

I just want to marry Stephen. That's all.

Then, my wheels start turning again and I think about all the fun things about weddings and obviously I want it to be amazing. Like how I want the seats to be straw bales and drink out of cute little mason jars and all kinds of vintage and rustic looking cotton prints and linens in yellows, beige's, and oranges. And a barn dance. And to just have fun with my closest friends and family.

I feel like I'm playing tug-o-war with myself. I'm done being a Negative Nancy, I'm glad I saved to good stuff for last. Phew!

Home for Sale!

noreply@blogger.com (Jess) — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 09:14:00 +0000

I have this AWFUL love/hate relationship with the house I live in. Like, really bad. Not even a little healthy. It's been for sale for about a year, which isn't all that bad since we're sure it will be at least another year until it sales thanks to the outrageous price. But tomorrow is the second showing in a week and part of me is saying, "no worries, its not like its going to sale or anything." and the other part is "oh no, where am I going to live if it sales?!"

So, in honor of these showings and open houses, I've compiled a list of reasons why you, (future viewer of home) should not buy this house.

1. It looks amazing from the outside front...not so much in the back. Or inside.
2. The only place in the house that has shaggy carpet is the bathroom. And by bathroom, I do mean the bathroom. Gross. Everyone knows carpet of any kind should NOT be allowed in the bathroom.
3. There are WAY too many wolf spiders. BIG ones.
4. There have been cockroaches lately. BIG ONES.
5. There are black widows outside. BIG ONES.
6. I constantly go to make a meal just to find weevils in the food. ...SMALL ONES.
7. Train.
8. Graffiti nearby.
9. Racing cars.
10. Creepy. In more ways than one.
11. Hardpan dirt. I mean, who wants that, right? Makes gardening no fun.
12. Awkward layout.
13. Helicopters looking for bad guys. I just remembered this one because I can hear one now.
14. There is no Trader Joes for miles away.
15. ...Or anything else for that matter.

See. You don't want it.

Fine. I guess I'll try to be a little more upbeat...here's a list of good things.

1. Sanger is about 10 minutes away if your into that.
2. There's a gas station about a mile away.
3. I'm literally drawing a blank. ;)

K, seeya. I'll post a picture of how cute it is after I move out someday.

I hope nobody that shouldn't read this does. :)

Engaged! :)

noreply@blogger.com (Jess) — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 02:45:00 +0000

As some of you out in the internets have heard, Stephen and I are engaged! It actually happened around noon on Saturday July 11th but we wanted some time to keep it top secret so we could tell some of our VIP's in person. I thought I would let all you guys know by telling the story in my blog since I know the questions will be coming sooner or later.

We'll do it in two parts... Stephen's story leading up to the actually asking and then my part.

Stephen:
So I actually wanted to propose around the 4th of July in San Diego but that didn't work out and what made it even worse was that everyday in San Diego Jess was like, "Today was the PERFECT day!" and it made me want to make it even more perfect.

I didn't ask because it would have killed me to do it without asking her parents. I had been trying to get a hold of her parents but I couldn't track them down. I drove to their house, actually drove past their house the first time because I was so nervous to stop but then pulled back around, but they were either asleep or not home so i just had to go home. The very next day Jess, myself and my mom were leaving to San Diego and I thought I'd give it one more try. I drove up to Jess' parent's house and NO ONE! I waited in the drive way for about a half hour but the time came that I had to leave to pick up Jessica and my mom to leave for SD.

Well after returning from SD I was trying to figure out the best time to get a hold of her parents. Thursday night, July 9th, We went to NewCov's college group and Loren, NewCov's college Pastor, and I had talked a little on how I could get away to drive up to Jessica's parents house to talk to them. The best idea we could come up with was that Loren's wife needed help with some boxes ASAP! That is when I drove off to see her parents. At her parents things went well, I got approval.

I had planned to ask her the next day, Friday, but things were going horribly wrong. Her mom had to go out of town to work, and she had to pick up her dad, then her parent took her out to eat and it was getting later and later and finally I had to say, it wasnt going to happen.

So we talked and I said hey lets go jogging the next morning and to make it a fun jog we will get geocaches along the way. She wasn't really up for the whole idea of running, she was more interested in napping lol. I finally did get her to go even though she wasn't too thrilled. I had planted a fake geocache the week before and programed it into our GPS. This is where Jess' side of the story comes in...

Stephen thought it would be a great idea if we went out for a jog in Woodward Park on Saturday morning...I didn't think it was quite as good of an idea as he did. Some of you may have even read my "tweet" or facebook status stating, "Who the heck does this Stephen guy think he is?! Hungry, jogging, and hot are not meant to go together." I was a little bitter but he somehow lured me in by saying we could take little stops by geocaching in different areas and taking the dogs. (*Side Note* Geocaching is like a worldwide treasure hunt where each "cache" is marked by coordinates that are entered into a GPS.)

As we followed the GPS, we got to this hill and Stephen had told me it was within 10 feet away and that they said this one was "tricky" I started looking in the crevices of the tree and turned around to find Stephen holding up a perfectly cut clump of grass. Underneath was a container he took out and said "there is some kind of story behind this one, oh, here's a letter, read it." As I took it out of the envelope and began skimming it I got very excited and said "Awww someone proposed here!" Then started reading it outload. As I was reading I started thinking to myself, "Wow, these people are a lot like us...I wish we could meet them, I bet we would get along great!" When I finished I looked up to see Stephen on his knee, holding a cute little black box with me beautiful ring. Then I cried a bunch. The End. :)

PS: Jessica didnt say anything for the first 30 seconds, I(stephen) was kind of nervous at that point in time!

P.P.S. Any questions about a wedding are unknown to us too...other than it being next summer or fall. :)

(click to enlarge)

Time for a puppy?

noreply@blogger.com (Jess) — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 06:12:00 +0000

My dad's friend from work took in a stray dog with 10 puppies, ready to be taken the end of next week...and basically...I really want one.

The big mistake was going with my family to see the puppies.

Here, Katy is sporting the little cutie I want:

Brett and Katy's: (Arizona)

And my mom's:

So bring the opinions on! Should I get her? I mean, this isn't just some 6 month commitment...Ah this is so hard! :)

AND If I DID get her...any name ideas? So far I really like Petunia and Olive...

Making Dumb Justifications ;)

noreply@blogger.com (Jess) — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 21:49:00 +0000

I did something dumb yesterday. Not that I don't do something dumb everyday, but yesterday was especially funny. To me anyway, hopefully to you too. :)

On Tuesdays and Thursdays I have three classes back to back in the same building, my friend Andrea is in my second class and she was running late so she texted me to ask if I would save her a spot by the outlet for her computer. No bigs, I can do that.

I get into class, walk straight to the back corner where we sat last time and just waited...and thought.

[I'm just going to do as my blogging friend Dominique did recently and write down my whole thought process. (Yes, that was a little plug telling you to check her blog out after you read mine.)]

"I like these people, they're really nice, I wonder why they haven't been sitting in this area before. Oh, she has Shapiro, that sucks, he is really good though. Oh. huh, I didn't know she was in my class, I definitely recognize her from somewhere. Man it's almost two, I think Andrea should be here by now...and this professor is never late. Maybe my clock is just wrong, there are a lot of empty seat right now and there's usually like three people sitting on the ground in this class."

After about ten to fifteen minutes had passed, this male professor walked in.

"Weird. I don't think I remember her saying we had a guest speaker or anything..."

That's when I did a little gasp, eyes got huge and jumped up. Ooops! Wrong class...I go to this room next, you know, the one right next door that looks exactly the same inside. I exited out the back door so I had to go around the building to go back to the front where the entrance to both rooms are and I had one more problem. Standing right between rooms 107 and 108...crap. Which one did I just come out of? Luckily I walked in the right one but Andrea and I were the ones sitting on the cold floor next to the cold door. :)

Hope you guys enjoyed the justifications for all of my clues!

25

noreply@blogger.com (Jess) — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 01:55:00 +0000

1. Most meat and dairy products totally disgust me, but I won't turn veggie mostly because of how inconvenient it could be.
2. I can't understand why some people think its cute or creative to use a K instead of a C. (Kar Kare, Kalifornia Krew) Lame.
3. I love to cook, I think its how I show love to people.
4. Baking is a different story...I think baking is for people who can't cook. Boooring. ;)
5. I HATE it when smokers are inconsiderate.
6. I like being fit and firm, it feels fantastic!
7. I've broken my left collar bone 4 times, two of the times a cat just jumped out and tripped me.
8. I started training for a marathon almost two years ago but injured both of my knees. Since then I haven't been able to run longer than 1 1/2 mi at a time and it frustrates me every time.
9. I'm terrified of childbirth.
10. I've had this weird blackout/almost passing out sensation in every health related class I've ever taken...I just can't handle it.
11. I've spent an obscene amount of time in an upholstery shop, I can't help but to look at every detail on every piece of furniture now...including mistakes.
12. I want to be an academic counsellor.
13. I'm addicted to Burt's Bees.
14. I've been on CompUSA's hold for quite sometime. My computer broke again.
15. Some guy ran a red light and totaled my last car last summer, I used the money to buy a new car of the same model.
16. I was a model in high school...that was my big secret. I sometime miss it because it was actually a lot of fun.
17. I have lots of secrets in me.
18. I LOVE a good adventure, especially if it involves travelling.
19. I grew up with a waterbed and I LOVED it.
20. Thanks to my cat my waterbed flooded my room once, it was a disaster...and my parents put the cat down.
21. I took karate in 6th grade, until I broke my arm...got my white belt. :)
22. I'm a terrible swimmer.
23. I prefer sports like ultimate frisbee, bowling and foosball. :) (If foosball counts)
24. I spent a fantastic weekend at Sugar Pine with some fantastic kids.
25. I spent entirely too long trying to think of 25 things about me.

Philosophy of Life

noreply@blogger.com (Jess) — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 02:26:00 +0000

I was just looking around my room to see if I could find a stray binder for school this semester and I just found an old research essay I did on Mother Teresa. She put together her philosophy of life in the 70's and I enjoyed it so I thought I would share with anyone who reads my posts. :)

Life is an opportunity, avail it.

Life is a beauty, admire it.

Life is bliss, taste it.

Life is a dream, realize it.

Life is a challenge, meet it.

Life is a duty, complete it.

Life is a game, play it.

Life is costly, care for it.

Life is a wealth, keep it.

Life is love, enjoy it.

Life is mystery, know it.

Life is a promise, fulfill it.

Life is sorrow, overcome it.

Life is a song, sing it.

Life is a struggle, accept it.

Life is a tragedy, brace it.

Life is an adventure, dare it.

Life is life, save it!

Life is luck, make it.

Life is too precious, do not destroy it.

Expect the Unexpected

noreply@blogger.com (Jess) — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 09:39:00 +0000

Last month Stephen and I drove to LA to take his dad and step mom to the airport so we had a nice chatty time on the drive back, which is weird because we normally have such boring car rides since we can both be knocked out instantly by the passenger seat. Mostly we were just talking about the unexpected. I LOVE the unexpected, like seriously thrive off of it love it, I get all giddy and can't stop smiling. Stephen doesn't speak quite as much as me ;) so after trying to pry it out of him, I still can't put my finger on his feelings towards the unexpected but I could definitely tell that he doesn't like it as much as me.

Your probably wondering what I'm talking about when I say "unexpected." One of my recent favorites happened around Thanksgiving. Stephen wanted to take his youth group to the Poverello House to serve dinner one night, they told him to get there at 5:00, we were running a bit late and got there at 5:20. Dinner was over and they had no use for us. We had two SUVs and a car load of kids with nothing to do. I found it hilarious, Stephen on the other hand was hating life. It was pretty unexpected.

Or you know those people you really just don't want to run into but you always do? Sure, it might be kind of awkward and weird when it happens but I pretty much always laugh about it right after.

OR even those events that are awful when it happens that takes some time to laugh about it. Those are the best! I was telling some people about the time I saw my parents getting the mail at the end of our road in the mountains while I was on my way home and I started waving at them and wound up driving my car into a ditch. I was crying laughing just talking about it.

So the weird part is that I'm such a planner it drives him up the wall when I ask him little planning questions because he's more spontaneous and wants things to take its course and carry on. So...shouldn't he be more up for those little quirky unexpected events? Maybe I just understand God's humor better than him. :) haha

big fat great

noreply@blogger.com (Jess) — Sat, 27 Dec 2008 10:10:00 +0000

So...turns out I don't blog very much when I'm in school. I think of it sometimes. I just never get around to doing it I guess. For example, I really wanted to write about those political signs and bumper stickers ("Kerry '04" really? you know its '08 right?) and how much I despise them regardless of what side I'm going for. But I didn't do it. All this lack of writing makes me feel a little rusty, like whatever I write there is no way its going to make sense.

So you know when you have something really important and you think to yourself "I need to put this really important something in a really important spot so I don't lose it." Well, I do that all the time and then lose it by not remembering where that really important spot was, basically until its useless again. But this time seems to be the worst.

My computer broke a little over a month ago, I can still use it but its a little tricky...it doesn't like to turn on so much anymore. Now, a week before a little over a month ago last year was when I bought the computer...meaning the manufacturer's warranty went up the week before it broke. But good news! I bought the 3 year warranty through Comp USA! ...oh wait, that's the store that announced they were closing down two weeks after I bought the computer. NICE. Well, now I guess I just need the receipt and then send it off to Texas or some other weird place to get it fixed. So I just decided to call with my receipt info and send it in after the semester was over...hmm receipt info huh? Yeah I have NO IDEA where the important place for that important receipt is and its driving me crazy. I spent the entire day tearing my room, car, and desk apart and I got nothing, hoping it wasn't in the glove box of my last car which is probably a small cube by now. So basically my plan is to wake up in the morning with it sitting on top of my desk. :)

Wow, I bet this post was boring. If I were you, I wouldn't have made it this far.

Your eyes tell me the whole story.

noreply@blogger.com (Jess) — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 06:55:00 +0000

My eyes are extremely sensitive to light. It's awful. I probably should wear sunglasses more than I do but I have this thing where I pretty much only wear them in my car.

Why?

Mostly because I can't stand having conversations with someone who is wearing them. I mean, no offense to everyone who does, I still love you...but it just seems rude to me. How fair is that? You can see my eyes but I can't see yours? No thanks.

I noticed in a drive thru the other day (I know, weird right?) that I took my sunglasses off to talk to the machine. haha