Goodbye April, Hello MOVING

I posted once in April?  One lousy quote?  To channel Charlie Brown, Good Grief!  I can explain.  We are moving.  To Ithaca.  On Wednesday.  In one tiny car.  But first we're going to DC for a few days to break up the long drive.  Then to New Jersey to visit grandparents and sisters in New York.  I have been a tiny bit preoccupied with packing boxes and standing in my kitchen thinking Will I need this in the next 12 month?  Will I care if I do not have this hand blender for a year?  Why do I have so many mismatched knives?  Why are blankets so chubby?  Will it be cold in New York?  What clothes will I need between now and then?  etc. etc. etc.  I think it's easier on your brain to just move completely.  Everything in a box.  Period.

I am proud to report that we have packed up several 'medium' moving boxes and shipped them on ahead.  Well, we packed them and my kind, lovely mother-in-law took them to the UPS store because we were in  Las Vegas.  Yes, a week before we move across several states, all of which get more snow than Florida, we went to Las Vegas.  Don't you love a husband with such ambition?  He planned the whole trip and all I really had to do was show up, but I was feeling stressed.  Me?  Stressed?  Unbelievable!   Unfortunately this included an overwhelming feeling of nausea on an airplane, which had nothing to do with turbulence or anything plane-related.  At times, I am a nutcase, I tell you.  Side note:  Long story, but I did get a free massage at the hotel spa, which did a fairly good job at relieving my stress.  I think I'll need another one tomorrow.

So anyway, now that we're back in eastern time and the humidity has gone from 10% to 90% (just look at my hair to believe that one!), we're back in moving mode.  I am really trying to be a glass half full person during all of this, which I like to think I am on a daily basis.  We do have a lot of clothing still in the closet that needs to be packed, but we also have a big fat suitcase packed up.  And several boxes in transit.  And a few other boxes in the dining room ready to be loaded into the car in a few days.  

Bottom line, if I've ignored a facebook message, e-mail, or even worse, a phone call, I apologize.  When we're settled, or beginning to be settled, in graduate housing two weeks from today, I should be back to normal.  That is, I will be better able to communicate with all this newfangled twenty-first century technology.  Thank God I don't have a Twitter account.  Until then, please take a number and I will be with you as soon as possible.

Also- birthday messages are allowed during this time.  Between the moving and packing and such, I also am supposed to turn 27 next Saturday.  As I will be a vagabond with no address for two weeks, this should be an interesting year for birthday cards, don't you think?

What is a friend?

Michael: How many friends do you have?
Me: [pause and look puzzled]  On facebook?  I don't know.
Michael:  A lot?  Because you just collect them, like shells on the beach.
Me:  Some people have more than 1,000
Michael: I don't even know that many people.

Things I Love

• A super clean house
• Open windows
• The smell of mowed grass
• Ice cream (eating and going to get)
• A really good book you can't put down (this is a rare find for me)
• Dark chocolate covered pretzels
• Pedicures and painted nails in general
• The ability to finish a long run
• Sunday paper crossword puzzles
• Baking and eating chocolate chip cookies
• E-mails from my sister (ahem)
• A perfectly set, coordinated dining table, complete with tablecloth, placemats, real napkins, etc.
• Bailey's Irish Cream (with or without coffee mixed in)

Seriously, Starbucks?

I found out on Ellen yesterday that Starbucks is testing out a new drink size: the Trenta.  Really.  Twenty ounces of coffee at a time isn't enough?  You need 30?!  That is nearly 4 cups of coffee in a cup.  More like a pitcher, really.  I have never even ordered a Venti, and likely shall not be ordering the new super-sized option.  Aside from making you extremely jittery, don't you think 30 ounces is bound to get cold before you finish it?  Especially in those lame paper cups.

Ode to Crayola

This will not be the first time I've referenced the great crayon makers on this blog.  Awhile ago I discovered an online quiz celebrating Crayola's 50th birthday.  Ever since I was a small fry, I have been fascinated by the Crayola 64 box.  Not only was there a sharpener in the back (!), but there were so many colors that could be arranged light to dark, dark to light, or if you were feeling exceptionally artsy, primaries in one compartment, pastels in another, metallics over here, etc. etc. etc.  So many opportunities for color-coding and imposing order on the great rainbow of a box.  I tried to keep like colors together... in other words, pinks and reds away from the blues and greens.  And if you took out three crayons at once, you better put them back in their original places and not rotate them throughout the box.  Perhaps a little OCD?

And the markers were even worse, as the smelly Mr. Sketch markers had a photo on the front showing the 'proper' order the rainbow of colors should be stored in their styrofoam* tray.  (The tray appears to be cardboard now, in case you wondered) You can ask my sister... I would not allow anyone to replace my markers in their tray unless they corresponded to their spot on the box.

In high school and college I had a different color binder for each class, with a matching highlighter to mark the textbooks and to easily recognize important dates on a calendar.  Biology test on Monday?  It'll be written in green.  English paper due Thursday?  That's the yellow one.  I continue this craziness on my post-student wall calendar, but have graduated to rainbow sharpie markers in lieu of highlighting.

What can I say?  I enjoy both order and color-coding.  My sister, forever the AP Chem student, often reminds me that I am abnormal: "Nature is not color-coded or organized.  It's entropy; nature tends from order to disorder.  It's natural to be messy."  But I never enjoyed or excelled in Chemistry.  If I can color-code something, I will.  Markers, crayons, binders, social events, or my closet.

Yes, these are all ribbed (mostly Gap) tank tops arranged by color on a shelf.  What can I say?  Call me if you ever need help organizing.

*Do you guys remember when it was OK to use styrofoam?  Marker trays were made out of it, Big-Mac boxes, Dixie cups.  And call me crazy, but when I'm drinking a hot beverage, I would much prefer a styrofoam vessel to a paper one with a 'sleeve' around the middle to keep my hands from burning.  It doesn't work, folks.  The drink gets cold and I burn my fingers.  One of the few things from the 1980s for which I am nostalgic.  Styrofoam, CareBears, Fraggles..... I smell another blog entry

Momsie was here!

My mother was here all week and boy were we busy!  In addition to two comprehensive theme park tours that included nearly every ride and no lines at all (YAY), Mom also finally 'met' Alice from Alice in Wonderland, which made her day.  The rest of us, of course, realize that Alice is actually a young woman wearing a blonde wig and a blue dress, but don't tell her that...  Mom and I also did some damage at the outlet mall here in Orlando, the highlight of the trip being Mom's trendy designer dress that cost less than most pairs of shoes.  It's super cute, too.  The week ended on a high note; the three of us saw Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland in IMAX 3D before dropping Mom at the airport.  Sadly, the weather was less than cooperative-- but still better than anything you could hope for in Ohio.  It's been cold and windy all week, creating bad hair days and cold hands.  It's a good thing fun times and merriment trump blustery days.

A Lesson in Canadian Culinary Creations

What with all the Olympic coverage in the news, in the past 24 hours I have seen two references to poutine.  It got me wondering...what the heck is poutine?  I went to wikipedia to find out.

Now is a good time to admit that if I come upon a word I do not know while reading a book, I keep reading.  I can often figure it out in context, and can't be bothered to stop reading the book.  This explains my sub-par SAT verbal score in high school.  If I encounter it twice, I find out what it means.  Hence my poutine research.

Poutine, which originated in Quebec, is a essentially a diner-type snack consisting of French fries, fresh cheese curd, and brown gravy.  Now, I enjoy cottage cheese more than your average Joe, but I am grossed out by the idea of this snack.  French fries?  Good.  Cottage cheese?  Good.  Brown gravy?  Eh, maybe on pot roast.  But combining them all?!  Who thought that would be a good idea?  It looks kind of gross to me.  I suppose it's just a variation of our own cheese fries with shredded cheddar, bacon bits, sour cream, etc.  and yet I have no desire to taste this creation.