Well, it's not quite my birthday yet, but I must say, it's already shaping up to be a faaabulous one. Here it is, only Friday and already I've been having a great weekend and hopefully it will only get better from here. I've already gotten my license plates (for my purple car!), and even though that's not a real present, it was nice of the DMV to think of me.

And I got "The Ultimate Book of Cocktails"... as if I don't have enough incentives to drink, now I have a big shiny color book chock-full of glossy photos of pretty drinks and instructions on how to make them! Thanks Amanda! She also gave me THE hula hoop, as promised for months... so now we can have our Goldfine freak show... she on her unicycle, me with my hula hoop. That's how I get all the boys, with my swingin' gyratin' hips.

Anne gave me two Sam's Club size boxes of Cat in the Hat fruit snacks which I absolutely LOVE. And she promised to take me to see Hairspray in the Twin Cities sometime, how fun is that! I like delayed birthday presents.

And I also got a huge beautiful bouquet of irises, which are my favorite flowers in the whole world. Chelsea and her mom picked them out for me, along with a really big vase with a pretty white ribbon. The flowers and the vase now reside in the middle of our kitchen table and they are lovely.

Anyway, I'm supposed to tell the Goldberg joke to Chelsea now. Gotta go.

P.S. That's a total of 37 states, or 74% of the United States!

Darren (Darin? Darrin? Daren? Daryn? Yeah, no idea), Amanda's love-slave is almost here and I really should go to the library right about now, but it's so warm in here and so miserably bloody cold out. I'd really rather not go outside, thank you ever so much.

Holy crapola! This is neat.



create your own visited states map
or write about it on the open travel guide

It is my goal to visit all 50 and someday I will accomplish this, oh yes, I will. Even the deep South.

I'm really supposed to be doing other stuff so I gots to go.

Random thoughts from my day.

Well, thank the Lawd, we were not trapped by the multitude of snow today and were allowed to go to school!

Holy crap, that snow drift is above my head!

Jack Lemmon is my hero. Mostly because of this line from the Apartment: "That's the way it crumbles, cookie-wise." Tee-hee.

Please, please tell me that we all at least have some general idea of who the Mayans were. I mean, you don't need to know, necessarily, that they came up with the concept of zero, had a complex and rather accurate calendar, and constructed ginormous pyramids that still exist... no need to know all that.

Have sneaking suspicion that am something of a culinary genius... thanks to Campbell's broccoli and cheese soup.

For some reason, this is the funniest thing I've seen all day. I feel like I'm drunk. Hey, so does Rachel!

I know they don't exist any more and all, but I kinda wish I could be an Inca.

I should probably de-burify my poor car sometime soon, before it becomes a car-cicle.

snow day

For the first time in three years, UMD has called a snow day. Now, those of you who attend UMD may be saying, "Wait a minute... they cancelled school one day last year," but we all know that was crap. Closing school at 4 p.m. on a Friday afternoon? That soooo does not count. And, since the closing three years ago was due to the power going out, UMD didn't really have much of a choice. "Hmm, should we make these kids suffer through class in unheated classrooms on a day that's barely above 0?"

So Father Winter dumped a whole bunch of snow on Duluth today. According to the Star Tribune , we received 19 inches of snow over the past day or so! Holy frozen tundra Batman!

Anyway, I'm really really excited about the snow day. My whole life, I felt cheated because I attended a school district with a superintendent who would not close school despite the most horrible dangerous weather. I would wrap myself in layers of winter wear and make the trek to school while other kids in the metro area got to stay home and watch tv and go sledding and drink hot chocolate and NOT have to go to school. Every now and then, school would be cancelled, and though this was a cause for celebration, it wasn't nearly often enough as the other school districts. So, yay for snow days!

The best part of this snow day so far was getting back into my warm bed after Rachel told me that school was closed. Cassi and I are going to go out in a little bit and run around like fools in the snow. Hopefully we won't get buried. Think warm thoughts!

NBC thought they were being all generous tonight, giving America a whole hour of Friends... but really it's a whole hour of re-runs, those stingy media bastards. Of course, I watched one of the re-runs anyway thus negating any sort of pseudo-outrage I was feeling at the lack of a new episode of Friends. They're damn sneaky, those media types but I'm obviously not watching the second re-run, so I fooled them.

Anyway, did I mention that I met Kyan Douglas from Queer Eye? 'Cause I wasn't sure that I did. Just checking.

I'm also not sure if I mentioned that I got my very own automobile. I wish I could put a picture of my car on here, because it's pretty, but I can't. It's a 95 Pontiac Grand Am and it's a fetching shade of purple. The first thing that every girl/woman/female person asks about it (and this is true of really pretty much any car) is "What color is it?" As a girl/woman/female person myself, I'm always proud to reply, "Purple!"

At any rate, I really like my car. The worst thing about it so far is having to move it twice daily to avoid getting tickets. This hideous weather makes it all the worse. Anne's theory about Minnesota hating its inhabitants and trying to get rid of them using the weather seems more and more realistic every day. Minnesota does not love us; it does not want us here. Every time the wind howls, it is saying, "Good God, why haven't you people left yet? You must be insane."

My first (and second and third) day of the new semester have been just dandy. I only have one class on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and two on Wednesday. Friday will bring three classes my way and then Mondays will be long, with class from 9-12 and then a night class, and then I will be working some Mondays from 1-4, when my new job starts eventually. But yeah, that's my story of the new semester. Oh, except Pfauza (Professor Pfau, to be precise) said that I will be a "rock star" in Analysis of Public Discourse, which is good news for me. After Rhetorical Criticism of Conspiracy Discourse, I would hope that I'd be a rock star in Analysis.

Anyway, it's time for the NEW episode of Will and Grace. It better be good, to make up for the saddening lack of new Friends tonight. Stay warm kids and much love.

After a whole month spent at my parent's house with only one incidence of blogging, I'm finally back. Back for the blog enjoyment of my loyal fans, if I really have any of those. My parent's internet, for whatever ridiculous reason, wasn't working, and computer genius though I am, I couldn't get it to work. And I wasn't motivated enough to hie myself over to the library to blog, obviously. Yeah yeah, what lame excuses but it's just gonna have to do.

You would think I would have plenty to say after being gone for a month, but I am strangely at a loss. I think I'm just in a daze from coming back and starting class again, plus having a Kelly missing from the apartment and an Amanda added and a Chelsea missing down the hall. I keep feeling like there are things that I am forgetting... forgetting to do? But I think it's just people that are missing causing this nagging feeling. It's all very strange.

When I look back on my break, it seems like it flew by filled with a whole lot o' nothingness but I know it was fun and relaxing. Here are some highlights:

-Spending Christmas in Colorado, seeing crazy amounts of my extended family there
-Drinking and playing cards and Trivial Pursuit with the fam
-Getting my very own car!
-Having a relaxing New Year's
-Going to James and Robbie's dessert and wine party, where I crushed Robbie's foot with my high heels and kicked ass at Trivial Pursuit, apparently
-Going to the dentist... haha, actually that sucked
-Seeing the Wizard of Oz with Chelsea and Anne and a bunch of silly little kids
-Getting my very own car!
-Ice skating halfway across Lake Minnetonka with Anne and Eric
-Spending more time with my parents than I have for a while, which was nice... especially since they bought me my own car!
-And last, but not least....
Meeting Kyan Douglas! The grooming guru from Queer Eye! I met him and talked to him and got his autograph and he wrote "I love Aurora" on her Queer Eye calendar and he called me sweetie! Okay, so I know that I probably sound like a ginormous dork but I just can't contain myself. Queer Eye for the Straight Guy ranks right up there as one of my favorite shows of all time, and getting to meet one of the actors from the show... how crazy and exciting is that! My brush with celebrity.. and oh man, he is one gorgeous person. Almost unrealistically good looking. It was really the best day of my break. If you want to hear the story in full detail, check out Aurora's version, 'cause we shared the whole experience and she gives it in full shining detail in a way only Aurora can....

Anyway, I think I'm going to have to make the catching-up blog a whole series of shorter blogs otherwise this would take far too long. Plus, I just don't have the patience to sit down and write it all at once and I'm doubting anyone really has the patience to read it all at once. And, wow, okay, I'm really sorry for not blogging, people. I didn't realize how ornery y'all got when I didn't. Lord.

Hope everyone is happy and safe. Lots o' love.

sneak attack

So, I'm at the Ridgedale branch of the Hennepin County Public Library, monopolizing on of their many fine computers so I gotta make it quick. Let me just say, I did not expect to go pretty much the whole winter break without blogging but that seems to be the way it worked out. Believe me, I'm as disappointed as my "fans." I had visions of, nay, not sugarplums dancing in my head for Christmas... but visions of blogging all my fantastic holiday (and otherwise) stories, but it just wasn't in the cards. Who am I kidding? I have very few fabulous stories to tell about my break. I've done, well, pretty much nothing and it has been great. I've gotten, on average, 10 hours of sleep per night and I feel like I deserve it after my hard work.

But at any rate, I am going to run. There's a librarian standing in the aisle of books behind me and I feel like she's shooting daggers at my backside for writing a blog on a library computer! Gasp! What few stories I have (and an explanation for the lack of blogging) will have to wait until later. And, a certain red-headed blogger will have to tell me a story when we all return to Duluth... I'm talking to you Amanda, in case there was any question. Stay warm and safe and lots o' love!

P.S. Aurora, I can't wait til Saturday and KYAN!