dangit - i've already eaten my oatmeal this morning

i wish i had known about this before i ate my oatmeal today. i could have stopped at mcd's for my favorite creation ever! thank you herb peterson.

things that annoy me #1

looking over to see two people smoking in their car with the windows rolled up and then seeing the two kids sitting in their car seats in the back.

i'm not anti-smoking, but pro-child health.

10 inches shorter in 24 hours

so yesterday, i was driving home from lunch with my friends and somewhere between north richland hills and bedford i decided that TODAY would be the day i chopped my hair off. i've been trying to hold out until the end of school for a couple of reasons. 1 - i figured a full out salon day would be a fun way to spend the dreaded 30th birthday. 2 - when i cut bangs earlier this school year, mis estudiantes flipped out . . . so i was kind of hoping to avoid the whole "they're staring at me" oddness. but, the sunshine yesterday infected my brain and convinced me that the chopping off of the hair had to happen NOW.

as soon as i got home i measured by pony tail again to make sure i had the 8 inches needed to donate to pantene's beautiful lengths program - i had 12! way more than enough. so this morning, i headed over to my favorite area in fort worth: camp bowie and found myself as the first appointment at shampoo. like many other things in my life, i can't commit to a regular hair salon. i've always wanted to try this place out and figured a new funky 'do was totally worth it. within two minutes of walking in, i was minus 10 inches of hair and then ally was off. i LOVE my new hair. (i'd post a picture here, but i'm not quite use to the idea of having my picture floating around in cyberspace.)

i will definitely be going back to shampoo for future hair cuts and colorings. i'd already pretty much decided that when ally figured out a way to fix the GREAT BANGS DEBACLE OF 2007-2008, but they sealed the deal when i tried to leave her a tip (great new cut AND no more sticky uppy bangs? well-earned tip, i'd say) and they told me, 'yeah, we don't accept tips here.' WHAT? how cool is that? (not that i mind leaving tips, but i always am so unsure of what to leave, so i end up leaving too much, which makes my hair cut crazy expensive.) they said, 'just tell your friends to visit us.' soooooo, that's what i'm doing: if you are in fort worth and need a salon, go to shampoo!

top 5 lessons learned from a weekend trip to kcmo

1 - i'm not a very good flyer anymore. on my flight too kc, i had a serious case of motion sickness. on my way back, all i could do was think about getting off of the plane. it's weird. i never use to be bothered by planes, but the last few times i've flown, it's been torturous. hopefully, this - like my positive feelings toward having bangs - will pass.

2 - the world would be a much better place if we all knew which of the following categories our friends/family/coworkers/adversaries/etc. fell into: phone person or not a phone person. i, as many of you could testify, am definitely a phone person. i LOVE talking to people on the phone and tend to panic if my cell is not within reach at all times during the day. apparently, there are people in the world who do not like to whittle away their days by chatting on the phone and apparently i am friends/related to quite a few of those people. so all those times i thought you people were irritated with me or bored with what i was saying, you really just wanted to get off the phone before it molded to your ear. hmm.

3 - i only seem to like young children if i am related to them or if they belong to my oldest and dearest friends. for example, i spent all weekend with my cousin's kiddos whom i heart with the biggest heart possible. within 10 minutes of them dropping me off at the airport, i was surrounded by strangers' kids roughly about the same age and i quickly became THAT lady at the airport who glares at the mom who should totally be doing a better job of shushing her child when she cries because her ears hurt or the woman who totally rolls her eyes in judgment at the mother who let her two children sit by themselves on the plane while she and her hubby snuggled in another row totally ignoring the kid who was banging his toy cars together incessantly while i was trying to read a mary higgins clark book. HOW DARE HE BE - gasp - A CHILD. :) i'm NOT that lady normally, which is why i am amused at how limited my patience with these random children was.

4 - God leads you in the right direction. ever since i quit my job in kc two years ago, i've been bothered by the continuous question of "did i do the right thing?" not that i am not happy at the place where i've ended up, but i guess you always have those moments of self-doubt . . . especially when you have to leave students as amazing as those i left behind in kc and especially when your choice moves you away from family you completely cherished being near. so. questions beget answers, even if those answers are two years in coming. yesterday i spoke with a friend connected to my situation in kc and in hearing her experiences over the last year, i finally saw clearly that God did guide me in making the best decision.

5 - hanging out at joy's kitchen table is still one of my favorite things to do. ice cold dr peppers and yummy guacamole. what could be better?

spring break warm fuzzies

and here is my spring break wish for you . . .

may you find yourself at a random tropical locale participating in sudden group dances, calling out time-worn phrases like "party ovah here," and breaking into song after awkward pauses in conversation.

you know. just like justin and kelly . . .

so this might explain some things

today i was walking around our local big box store . . . you know, the one that was founded by a man named sam in bentonville, arkansas. anyway. a couple walked up to one of the sales people and asked where the dictionaries were. and this is where i learned that at the store where 138 million americans shop EACH WEEK dictionaries are not for sale! seriously. i didn't really believe the salesperson, so i even walked myself up to the 'book' section where nary a dictionary could be found. now, i know this might be quite a bit of english teacher snobbery on my part, but are dictionaries really just seasonal back-to-school fare?

and on a completely different note, can i tell you how excited i am that enchanted comes out on dvd next week? for some reason i ABSOLUTELY loved this movie. and while i'm glad that once won the oscar for best song, i have to admit i wouldn't have been upset if enchanted had snuck up and won for "that's how you know" for plain and simple cheese factor!

with an H - recycled blog #1

i wrote this a loooooooooong time ago in the vestiges of myspace. because i am bored/lazy/uninspired this afternoon, i've been reading some of my old ramblings. thought i'd share some of that pervious randomness here on the NEW blog . . .

____________________________

my gramma took me to buy my first tape on my ninth birthday. i am sure i had other 'tapes' that i shared with my sister and family - the eagles tape with "witchy woman" comes to mind - but the trip to the store with gramma betty when i turned 9 was my first perusal (is that a word?) into the world of pop music. starship had just come out with "sara" and it was in constant rotation on the amarillo radio station i listened to. i was so amazed that someone would write a song using my name, and well, was only NINE, so it was easy to turn a blind eye (or deaf ear) to such poetic references like "fire and ice" and "storms are brewin' in her eyes."

and then came the rest of my life.

for those of you who have never had a song entitled with just your name. . . . delilah-gloria-brandy-wendy-mandy-mickey-sharona . . . . let me tell you how much 'fun' you are missing. when introduced to you, random strangers will break out into the chorus bearing your name at church camp, band camp, hallway passing periods, college classes, football games, bars - and they do not sing quietly, or well. (and YES, i have experienced this in ALL of the above locations!) the best part of this is that these people who have the tendency to do this, also have a tendency to believe that they are THE most original people on the planet and that NO ONE has ever sung the song to you in such a way. my personal favorite, seeing as the song stealing my name is a power ballad circa 1986/1987, is when they turn all meatloaf on you and get theatrical. because then NO ONE - a.k.a. everyone - is paying attention to them.

AND, if you are LUCKY, the band/singer/boy-bander professing his/her undying dedication to you through this song bearing your name will take a traditional name that has been passed down for generations from ABRAHAM who got it from GOD who spelled it with an H and decide they think it looks more 'modern' without that H and zip, it's gone. THEN, you will get to spend the rest of your life qualifying your name's spelling and saying 'with an h' to the end of too many sentences than a person should have to in their relatively short life of nearly 30 years.

not that I've dealt with this much.

but, it was my first tape and the beginning of a slight obsession with the owning of music and books. so maybe it's not all bad.

and . . . i'm wearing socks

saturday. perfect afternoon. nearly 80. sunny. hangin' in the park with the pup and one of my favorite books. a little bit of a tan forming on my legs. totally rejoicing in the fact that yes, i live in texas.

monday. barely 48 hours later. it starts sleeting. and now, i am doing something i hate to do . . . wearing socks.

earlier, i think i had something else to write about. but now whatever that thought is has left my brain. oh! before the perfect saturday afternoon, i did try to go see the hillary clinton rally in fort worth. it wasn't very organized, which - and i know this might surprise some of you - is actually a very big annoyance of mine. why bother to gather people en masse without a way of communicating what you want them to do? . . . stand in this line, watch the long horns, nope i mean stand in that line, take your purse down that way, but don't take your purse that way, NO CAMERAS, etc.

so. i went for the experience and instead just got frustrated and ended up eating my favorite bbq turkey at risky's and finding my favorite wine (which is hard to buy outside of the vineyard) at lone star wines in the stockyards. so, i guess i created my own experience. i'm glad i went down there, though, because i definitely was reminded of why i love fort worth. sometimes i forget that.