wordless wednesday. funny edition.

boy: "my biggest fear is having, like, five final exams on the same day."
boy: "what's your biggest fear about school gracie?"
gracie: "that one day it'll all come to an end."

i saw this one at work during my lunch break. it made me smile.
i can totally relate to gracie. :]


p.s. i cannot believe it's october tomorrow!
but i'm excited. pumpkins + leaves + scarves. mmm. so lovely.
oh and it's time to decide on a halloween costume...

a small victory.

i just got my google reader below 700! i feel like that was a good accomplishment. haha. i've noticed that if there are only one or two unread posts, i tend to keep up with reading them... but once it gets too much higher than that [especially into the 20s or higher] i sort of give up. so i'm trying to slowly browse through most of them, and hopefully i'll start keeping up one day. :]

in other [less random] news, it was a good weekend.
i woke up early this morning because it was studio calico reveal. i decided not to go back to sleep, so instead james and i went to breakfast. it was sooo good. :]
and on saturday night, james and i went out for a little unofficial date to the chocolate bar. we even finished with fondue after our dinner. it was pretty much perfect.

i feel like i'm starting to get things more under control around here. i've been less overwhelmed for sure. maybe it's the changing season or something, but i'm just feeling a lot better in so many ways than i was a few weeks ago.
i'm also feeling the need to create something lately, but so far i haven't made time.
i'm hoping to maybe finish up a work-in-progress this week. i have a whole drona bin full of them, but there's one mini album in particular that should be easy to complete. i started knitting a hat for james a sometime ago too, but i haven't worked on it for a while now... maybe i need to find it.
there's just something about making stuff that's really good for me.
and it's been too long.

oh and a random funny thing... while i was at target today, i remembered that i've been meaning to buy a multi-vitamin to start taking. i tried this a few years ago, but never really stuck with it. i'm hoping for better follow through this time around. anyway. when i went to the vitamin aisle, i was finding all types of "women's" vitamins... some of them included boasts about weight control or cardio or joint relief in the titles.
i started to feel old.
and realized that there was no way i could buy a "women's" vitamin.
so i found my own little solution and threw the "teen advantage" vitamins into the cart. ha.

i actually did a little comparison of the ingredients, and i could see no huge differences, so i decided it was perfectly acceptable. and i think the little psychological game might help me stick with actually taking them. :]

i'm off to bed.
i hope you all enjoyed the weekend! i'm definitely sad that it's already over.

snapshots.

aug. 14th:

white coat ceremony for unsom. like i've mentioned before, i will have no shortage of medical experts to consult in my future. i even got to catch up with reece for a few minutes at the ceremony. james and i went to dinner with deepa's family afterward and had a great time. her parents are so funny, and her brother can talk and talk and talk. i happened to be sitting across from him. :]
here i am with katie:
and with deepa:

aug. 29th:
we went out to celebrate roxana's birthday with dinner at silver peak. a funny thing happened after dinner... howie asked our server if they had german chocolate cake shots. she said they did, so he said to bring one for all the girls. then he was like "well. amy, do you want one?" i was expecting an actual piece of cake in a little glass similar to what you can get for dessert at p.f. changs, so i said sure. i should have known better. haha. everyone was like "seriously!? you're going to have one!? that's so cool!" yeah. turns out it's an actual shot of some type of alcohol, which i found out when it arrived at the table. it did taste just like german chocolate cake upon biting into the lemon though. [i had to get a tutorial on how to take a shot. hilarious.] after silver peak, we wandered over to sapphire lounge, but we didn't stay there too long.
here's the group shot from dinner:
and here are the girls with the german chocolate cake shots:
deepa and i seem to have blocked everyone's faces. oops!

sept. 5th-12th:
victoria came to visit us. i should add that my sister, jamie, amanda, and paul were all here too. :] i think we were all very happy to have some family time. we made it down to the rib festival several times. my brother is a huge fan of ribs [as am i] so we made sure to get our fill. little miss victoria even enjoyed a few bites of meat off the bone:
she also enjoyed trying on my shoes:

and playing with her new baby play set:

she had so much fun feeding the baby in the highchair and pushing around the little stroller. the only problem was that occasionally she would try to sit in the mini stroller. :]
this was such a fun stage in her life to observe. it's really neat to see the connections she has made... for example, when she sees a car she says "bye bye!" and when she wants to find grandpa she wanders down the hall to his office where he's usually reading x-rays saying "bapah?" and when she would start going downstairs she would say "where's doggy?" because she expected to find helix down there. [he stayed at cameron's house part of the time she was here, but she did get to interact with him a few times. it went very well and was pretty adorable.] she can identify a few body parts and knows lots of animals and their sounds, which makes looking through books pretty fun. oh and she could say my name, including requesting for me to hold her... which pretty much melted my heart. my sister would be happy to know that she said "katie" each time we showed her a photo of katie after she and jamie had gone back to denver. like i said, it was a lot of fun to spend time with her right now. her little brain is like a sponge. :]
i'm just sad that i didn't take very many photos. ugh. story of my life.
my dad drove down a new car for my brother and amanda last week and today my brother called to tell my dad that when he picked victoria up from daycare today in the new car she said "where's bapah?" and he had to explain that grandpa wasn't there, but that the car is for them now.
ok. clearly i could go on forever about her. heee.

sept. 18th:
we went out to celebrate sarah's birthday. i've known her for a little while because she is good friends with james and dating one of the boys. she's a lot of fun, and i'm happy to be getting to know her better these days. anyway, her boyfriend nate told deepa and me that we could win some animals from the animal claw game at the wal. we didn't believe it was possible. i don't think i've ever seen someone actually win one of those animals. well. he proved us wrong by winning an animal to give to sarah, so then deepa and i became addicted. we won a blue monkey for helix and a teddy bear with a howie's favorite team logo on it. we were going to try to get another white monkey, but then nate told us that the machine at the breakaway is even easier to win an animal. so we went down there and oh. my. goodness. i definitely got addicted. but i won charlie the tuna, the blue m&m, and a clown in order to free up the animal i really wanted... keroppi! keroppi was my favorite sanrio character. when we used to make shopping trips to california when i was younger, i would stop into the sanrio store to pick a new little keroppi item. so fun. :] then once keroppi was out of the machine, i saw a stuffed little miss sunshine. i had to get it too. ha.
the clown didn't survive very long. sadly, the boys ripped him apart. but he became a nice decoration for the bar:

and we gave the m&m to the bouncer. haha.

ignore my overly excited smile and check out my winnings:

not bad, right?

and here's deepa with the monkey [which you could velcro around your neck. haha.] and the bear:

it was pretty hilarious. such a random and fun night. there is also a machine that you punch and it gives you a number based on how hard you can hit it... james and his friends usually get around 9000. they told me to try it and i got 2400 or so. ha. pathetic.

i ran into some fallon people at the wal, and i think they got a kick out of those animals. i talked to aaron schneider and jesse laca for a little bit and even jacob from elementary school remembered me. it's always interesting to run into people at the wal. i'm not entirely sure if they will remember seeing me. i had a very funny conversation with owen one night at the wal that i'm not sure he remembers. :]

well. i think that's about all i have for snapshots of the past month.

in other news, my anatomy practical went pretty well today. my ta let me look at the key when i turned in my answers. i know i missed one, but i seriously still think my answer is right! oh well. not much i can do. i had my first exam in lecture last week, and the same thing happened. i went to look at my test today [the professor doesn't give them back but you can view it in her office], and i explained why i chose the answer i did and why i didn't choose the answer she said was right. she even agreed that i was right and clearly knew what calcitonin does, but the answer i chose "wasn't what she was looking for". ugh! it's so frustrating when i can tell you all the information you want to know, but i just can't decode your wording, so i miss the question. i'm not a fan of multiple choice tests. [or the biology department, but i'll save the "biochem is better than bio" rant for another time. ha.]

i'm off to bed now.
it's going to be a long day tomorrow with an early start.

wordless wednesday.

i hate to go with another anatomy photo, but i have my practical this week.
so i've been doing nothing but reviewing the integumentary and skeletal systems today. good times.


p.s. the more interesting photos are in a half-composed post that i do solemnly swear to have up by the end of the week. :]
oh and did anyone watch the good wife? i randomly saw an advertisement for it earlier this week, so i decided to record it... you know since it has mr. big and all. the first episode was enjoyable. i just hope this isn't going to be another case of lipstick jungle/pushing daisies where i fall for a show, and then it gets cancelled. i also totally loved bored to death, but considering jonathan ames is in it... i pretty much made up my mind about being in love with the show before watching the first episode. ha. heroes was good too. i missed several episodes last year, but i watched the last couple with james last season, so i have a good idea of what is going on with the plot. it's interesting how they continue to add new characters and twists. but please let hiro be ok! haha.
i guess that's another sign of fall... tv starts invading my life again. maybe i should also solemnly swear to not start watching too many shows this fall. :]

i might have to buy his album just for this song.

you may or may not know that i'm a huge ratatat fan. like HUGE.
huge.
huge.
huge.
get it?

i have my very first iPod hooked up in my studio. it's one of the original ones. super old. i haven't updated the music in ages. mostly because i'm lazy and partly because i'm afraid it will stop working if i touch it. ha. i have a few newer iPods, but i kinda like the "vintage-ness" of that one, so i want to keep it working. anyway. i no longer listen to 70% of the music that is on that thing. i guess my tastes have evolved in the past 6 years. and some of the music has memories associated with it that i don't really like to recall. [ahem... dave. pretty much sums that up.] so when i'm in my studio, i listen to ratatat a lot because it's on that iPod, and it seriously never gets old. it's perfect for the background. it helps me get things done from organizing and cleaning to actually creating. [it's also great music to drive to if you like to get lost in your thoughts on long solo drives.]

i haven't been doing a good job at keeping up with new music lately, so i was elated to find this gem tonight.

i'm not entirely sure if i'm a kid cudi fan, but as i said in the title... i really like this song. probably because i've been starved of new music lately, so when you add in my favorite duet named ratatat on a track, you have a winner in my book. :]
i also really like some of the lyrics. i guess they strike a cord with me because i feel like i'm trying to figure out what path my life is going to take, and i've been kept awake plenty of nights worrying about it and trying to sort through my various dreams and visions for my future. i'm definitely trying to figure out my own way to pursue happiness. it's nice to remind myself that i will be fine.

i'm charging the camera battery as i write, so hopefully i can do the long overdue update post soon. in case i don't get that posted tonight or tomorrow, i just wanted to post something so that you know i'm still here. alive and well.
hope you are all enjoying the weekend!

[pretty much] wordless wednesday.

way too tired. still.
way too busy. still.
but also enjoying family time. :]

here are some blurry iphone photos from my walk with helix last wednesday...





i really will post a real post soon. i've just been spending very little time online lately. usually i just check my email right before i fall asleep these days. it's kind of nice to take a break, even if it's somewhat of a forced break and my google reader is approaching 1000 and i feel totally out of the loop with everything online. ha. i'm learning that it's really not that big of a deal to ignore my computer. but i still have photos from celebrating roxana's birthday two weekends ago and the rib cook off this past weekend. they are stuck on my camera for now. sometime soon i'll get them on here. :]

happy 09-09-09 today!

[not quite] wordless wednesday.

i guess i forgot to do this last week. things got a little busy between school and work and nannying. i guess i'm still pretty busy. life feels hectic right now.

here's a photo for today:
i have my first anatomy quiz this week. it's just over the directional terms, histology, and the integumentary system. we can take photos of the models to study, which is rather helpful. we can't take photos of the cadavers, but honestly i can't imagine even wanting to do that. [yes. i'm still not really even close to being ok with that element of the lab.]
so hopefully the quiz isn't too bad. i'm trying to brush the dust off the wrinkle in my brain that contains this information from when i took anatomy in high school. :]

i'll try to post again later this week, but for now i'm heading to bed. i'm exhausted.

:]

i love this photo of victoria. i kept looking at it over and over, and eventually i realized that i think i've seen a similar photo of myself when i was little. i asked my mom about it, and she said that it does indeed look a lot like me and she remembers a photo of me with a similar pose and facial expression. i'll have to see if i can find it.

next week, my sister and jamie are coming to town for a few days. then on the weekend, my brother and victoria will arrive to stay for a week. i am so excited to have some good family time. i only wish i could find my d80 camera to get some nice shots since we'll all be together. it doesn't happen that often anymore.

i started my anatomy class this week, and i also started working in the environmental chem lab again. so far so good for both of those. i'm hoping that eventually my anxiety and panic about the cadavers in anatomy lab will subside, but i'm not counting on it. luckily, roxana was able to sign up for the class. anatomy usually fills up fast and becomes impossible to add. luckily someone dropped it, and it happened to be in my lab section! i'm so thankful to have the support of a friend in lab.

this weekend i get to clean out my old car and start driving the new one. i suppose it's about time, since it's been sitting in the garage for a few months. i've just been sort of putting it off. i definitely don't have the hang of driving a manual yet, so i need to get some serious practice this weekend. otherwise, i'll pretty much be stuck at home next week and my schedule is crazy between helping with the boys, going to class, and working in the lab. wish me luck on quickly mastering the clutch.

james and i might attempt dinner and a movie tonight, so i'm off to get ready!
i hope you all had a great week. :]