So I went to a Halloween party last night and have spent most of today just being lazy and hanging around my apartment.
Had a ton of fun - I was there from about 11 to 3 or so. I wish that I'd brought a jacket, though! It was cold last night! Inside it was really hot though, because there were so many people dancing.
I went as Dorothy. (And that's my friend Anel - she was a spider.)
(and that's Becca, who went as Ellen Page in that new movie of hers... with the roller derby. Can't remember what it's called, though! )
At some point last night someone shouted "McKenzie picture!!" and all of the pledges ran outside and took a group photo. It was random and fun! (Although a few Actives did sneak in...)
Some of my favorite costumes were:
A David Letterman intern
The Swine Flu
Rorschach (from Watchmen.)
And Tommy and Chuckie from the Rugrats!
Now... bring on the real Halloween! Tonight there is a NaNoWriMo "Midnight Write" party!
It's like almost one in the morning and I'm starving. So... rice is on the stove. Super delicious!
Look what I made today!
A second, much-needed bookshelf to put more stuff on. Thing is... I need more book ends now! (What a good birthday present idea!)
Also, I finally got my mirror on the wall. (which, now I see it, is vaguely crooked.)
And... I have installed some excellent boy repellent into my car...
I'm picking up my favorite baby, Emma, from daycare twice a week now. I missed Emma so much! She's gotten bigger already. She eats like a beast (I don't know where she puts it all!) and she can sit up and balance herself pretty well already.
Oh, and she can clap. It is so adorable!
Tonight, I got all dressed up and went to see the musical Spring Awakening with my friends Karynna and Katlin. Let me say first, whuh!, and wow! It was so good! The musical is based off of a German play, and most of the characters are German schoolkids in their teenage years, who are all discovering their various sexual urges and the social taboo of them acting on it.
But contrasting the "conservative" times and messages being passed onto the children (or, well, messages not being passed onto the children) all of the songs (written by Duncan Sheik, who I am a huge fan of) are rock-themed, and it works perfectly. If it rolls through your area, go see it. But, um, don't bring your kids. (Unless you're comfortable with them watching the main characters have sex on stage. Twice. It's your call!)
Right, well, rice is ready. I'm going to shovel some food into me and then hit the sack.
Many of you are under the impression that I am a writer (to some degree) and in November I'm going to take that to a whole new level. Blog, let me introduce you to NaNoWriMo: National Novel Writing Month.
If it seems like it's a scary, scary prospect... well it is.
The idea, for those of you who are unfamiliar with the (massive, huge, completely mind-numbingly scary) project is that you (yes, you!) will write a 50,000 word novel in 30 days. For those who are mathematically inclined (not me!) that is around 1667 words a day (about 6 pages.) 50,000 words becomes in the end (or so I've been told) somewhere between 175-200 pages... and I will be honest and say that I am simultaneously terrified and completely delighted to be participating this year. However, something that I am struggling with is the idea that quantity is more important than quality. We shall see how that goes...
Also, no editing allowed. "Editing and such other weak pursuits are for December", according to the NaNo book No Plot, No Problem.
I've been planning my novel (in a not-outliney kind of way) ever since my friend Karynna reminded me to sign up in early October. So far, all I have is the title and a basic character sketch of my main character. I know that it is going to be a contemporary novel of the vampire persuasion (Why yes, I am going there) and that it will take place on the UT campus (which, at the moment is my entire world right now, so it kind of fits.)
So what is the brilliant title of my brilliant novel? I Bleed Orange.
It kind of started off as a joke... and then became "Well, huh. I could totally write that! Wait, that might actually be a lot of fun!" I've decided my main character's names will be Jonathan Pierce and Cassie Thompson. Jonathan will be the vampire... and hilarity will ensue. (However, no "Robert Sparkleson" for my vampires! Sorry, Twilighters!)
I have a little circle of friends who are also (completely crazy/have a death wish/utter dorknerds like me) doing NaNo, and I know that we plan on having little "word wars" (like "who can write the most words in 30 minutes") and writing sessions throughout November and so far they all have plots that are far more developed than mine... but I'm not too worried. I know my plot will come to me as I write.
I confess, my dear readers, that I do need something from you. I need you to be my "Guilt Monkeys". I need you to constantly (or, well, if you remember to) hound me and ask me how my brilliant and hilarious soon-to-be-bestselling novel is coming, and do all but sit on my shoulders and remind me that I have a word count to hit every day and I have to do it!
(Or you could come over and do my laundry for me. A busy student/writer/person-who-takes-naps doesn't have time for tasks such as laundry... No? Well fine.)
So, is anyone else doing it? Are you up for the challenge? Please, let me know if you're doing it too so we can be writing buddies!
Today is the beginning of the week-long blood drive going on at the UT campus. Every year APO sponsors it, and every year hundreds of people volunteer to give blood.
It's APO's biggest fall event and it happens to be an excellent way to get practically all of your required hours! (Of the 35, I have 10 so far, and will be working 20 hours, and get credit for 22 because Friday counts for time and a half!)
So if you can, come out and donate blood!
I worked at two different buses today and got two tshirts for it! (You get a tshirt after donating, by the way!)
Give blood, save 3 lives. They told me they were going for a "soccer shirt" kind of look. Works for me!
This one I think is hilarious, but I had to be told what it meant! ("Get 'giraffe' down here and give blood," Say it aloud - that might help!)
This was the fun bus I worked at most of the day off of Guadalupe St. Fun colors! (They're the ones that give you the giraffe shirt.) We kept Buddy B. Drop around with us all day and took turns in the suit.
Buddy is a drop of blood. Which is kind of creepy when you think about it, but he's clearly a happy blood drop.
I figured that if I was telling all of these people to donate, it would be pretty hypocritical of me to not do it myself, so after my shift was over I climbed into the bus and gave blood! My first time to ever do so.
They apparently had a hard time finding a vein (they're deep in there?) and then they had time drawing the blood out of me (It was really slow - my body reluctant to give it up?) and now it's kind of sore and I'm sure there will be a bruise there tomorrow.
Go Donate!
(If you want to, call me or send me a text message and ask me where I'll be if you want to donate at 'my' bus!)
So recently I've been doing a lot of thinking about my blog.
I'll be honest, I don't like to put bad or sad things on my blog - I don't want to worry you guys. But recently, I have been feeling like only writing about things like fun times and school are lies by omission, do you know what I mean?
I don't want my blog to be a big lie by omission.
Dad asked me the other day why I blog... and I honestly don't know why. It started off as "well, everyone seems to have one". It turned into "Well, I might as well continue, since I've been doing it for a while." And then it turned into a status-report of my life to my family and friends.
And I have been wondering if that is a good enough reason TO blog at all? Couldn't I just call you all, or send you emails?
Because isn't a blog a place to share your thoughts and life with other people? That is what it is to me, and that is what I feel like it started out as. I find that as time went on, with the readers came caution. I want to do my best to include all of the good times - and the bad - in my blog from now on.
I love you all and I count myself so blessed that I have so many people who love me enough to read these every time they arrive in your inbox.
So I have two email addresses using gmail (One is personal, the other is for all of the school emails that I receive!) and I was getting sick of logging out of one to post for this blog... so I just added another me to the blog.
So now this blog has two authors: Me, and well, Me. What do you think, should I name the second one Einafets? lol!
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So, if you are in or around Austin the week of October 12-16, you should totally come donate blood on the UT campus! APO is hosting a gigantic blood drive and I'll be volunteering for around 20 hours throughout the week. So come on out!
There are four locations around the campus, one on Guadalupe, Speedway, Dean Keaton, and 25th street. If you want to know which one I'll be at, just call or email me!
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This evening, my friends Karynna, Katlin and I went out to dinner... and we all showed up wearing blue shirts of the exact same shade! The waitress asked if we had planned it (the answer being: no.)
I went to the UT/UTEP game last weekend. It. Was. HOT. I took Brandlyn with me and we only lasted until half time. We then went to Kerbey Lane and drank about a gallon of water each. UT steamrolled all over them... Final score was something like 63-7.
Part 2: An Ankle
My ankle is still sprained, but since Thursday it hasn't really slowed me down (except going down stairs, which was pretty painful until yesterday.) I still can't bend it without it hurting (in a dull way) but I no longer have to do this awkward hop thing down the stairs.
It still looks a little swollen though.
Part 3: Aspen
I'm house sitting for the next two weeks. It's a little weird (I've never house-sat before) but it's not hard. I have to take care of a dog, Aspen, who is a little annoying, but sweet all the same.
She doesn't respond to voice commands very well, like my dogs, which makes yelling at her pretty fruitless. And really frustrating.
Part 4: ACL
I've got a pretty lopsided set of photography from ACL this year, as I went Friday, Saturday, and skipped out on Sunday altogether. Friday was perfect weather, Saturday was miserable, and Sunday it hasn't really rained (that I've noticed) but the mud created from the constant rain yesterday apparently made it stink and impossible to walk. Yuck! So look on mom's blog for any pictures of Sunday, if she took them.
There's Mom and Mike. And Katie, who will hate me for this picture. (This is her "I haven't quite realized that you're taking my picture" face)
And Mom's friend Kelly came again this year. Nemo was our "Flag". I thought it was funny that we had to "Find Nemo" every time. Haha. At night, we stuck a light in him so he glowed!
The first act I saw was John Legend. He was great! I like this picture of him a lot. He had a pretty Baby Grand up on the stage and I was jealous. ;)
I next went to see Andrew Bird, who was a lot of fun to hear!
I also got a video of his first 8 minutes (for my friend Danny, who really wanted to come this year, but couldn't!)
The sunset was pretty that night, and so were the moon and cityscape!
Saturday, I saw Flogging Molly (great), the Zac Brown Band, and the Scabs. Because it rained through Flogging Molly and the Scabs, I only got pictures of Zac Brown Band. They were great! I loved their cover of Devil Went Down to Georgia.
That's all for now! Grades for exams should be posted in the next few days... I hope I did well.
So I know you're wondering how I did on my Mythology test and while of course I don't have a letter grade yet, I did feel ridiculously confident during most of the test. And I only left 6 questions blank, but I know that I got at least one of the bonus questions right ("who played Eliza in the movie My Fair Lady - Audrey Hepburn.) But I felt smart during the rest of the test and was able to identify everything else really easily. Here's hoping for an A!
So on my way to my politics class today, I tripped and fell in a really embarrassing way (where you land on the side of your foot and your ankle tries to go down and your food turns inward? Owie.) and initially I felt like I was okay and during the day I could walk on it fine... but, well, it feels a lot less okay now.
(This could be like a game of "Spot the difference"!)
(Like my burnt orange nail polish? I do! Santa put it in my stocking last year.)
So... sprained ankle. I have wraps and stuff, and so I'll take good care of it. And I've taken an advil so hopefully the swelling will go down. It's just a mild sprain, though, so hopefully it shouldn't interfere with ACL weekend!
Right, so I'm going to go snuggle with a book and an ice pack. Goodnight, all!
P.S. Think of me on Friday from 1-2pm and send me intelligent thoughts about representative, direct, and social democracy (as well as communism, please!) I need a good grade in politics!
P.P.S. Happy October! (This month, my Harry Potter calendar features Snape.)
(and that's Becca, who went as Ellen Page in that new movie of hers... with the roller derby. Can't remember what it's called, though! )
