Some more mindless nonsense.

Have I mentioned how happy I am since school let out? It's like I'm a whole different person. A person without stress. it's kind of strange, but kind of not, because I have the kind of memory that holds onto things like rice in an hour glass and now it's mostly already been shifted into an unused corner of my mind. Sure, it's all still there, but you have to take the effort to tip it upside down to get it back to where it started after it's seeped away. So basically if I take the effort to remember all that's happened, say by looking at some of my last posts, I'm surprised by just how bad it was, because all of the bitterness and displeasure has since evaporated from the now. It's sort of a blessing when it comes to the bad things, and sort of obnoxious when it comes to many of the good things in my life. Hence the caving in and buying of the camera that allows me to enjoy and reflect upon my surroundings and look back at the good times. One day I'll take the time to take a class and actually become good at taking these pictures, but for now I'll put it off with all of the other things my mind lets go.

Here is a picture of me letting go on my hammock. Thank you Kristen, for this amazing gift. And thank you Stratford, for building a house with railing conducive to me whiling away my time.


I've spent the last two days putting together several bookcases. As in 3. I now have 4, so I'm moving up in the world. And of course with that I've partially cleaned my room yet again, yet have become tired doing so, and will put off the remainder for another day. Here is my dad with his beard thing he insists on growing until his doctor lets him ride his Harley again in august. Claire quite enjoyed pulling on the hairs.





Chuck E. Cheese was exhausting, as I spent the whole time being dragged around by children, specifically my twin 5 year old nieces, and one was always dragging me in the opposite direction while I was trying to watch the other stationary twin that had no intention of moving, as they were at that moment on some sort of fun making apparatus. I learned the heartache of telling children that they didn't have enough tickets to get the prizes they wanted, and it broke my heart several times and made me hate
the establishment, especially when I found out that the points are equal to cents. I wish I would have known that earlier, and I just would have bought them anything they pointed to and let them believe it was their tickets and skills at achieving the tickets that produced such rewards. They were awfully excited every time they won tickets. Man I love how excited they get and how I get to watch it and get excited with them for free. Anyway, after I found out the point system, I bought the remaining nieces and nephew blow up swords. Traffic in the area was horrid. Less people should be hired, and more cones utilized in their stead. Ridiculously confusing.


Afterwards I went up to Herriman with two of my sisters to watch Churtis and the twins play in an inflatable water slide. Like it has a pump like one of those bounce houses constantly keeping it inflated, and when removed it just deflates. Kind of nice. And later was a picnic in the park with friends followed by a movie.









Here are some pictures of Claire with a blanket. She is so cute to watch with it. And I absolutely adore how happy she always is. It's fetching awesome, and she's like that even when Curtis is smothering her with his brotherly love.


It really is amazing that they get along so well. They both adore each other, which I think is providential since they're both adopted.













Today I skipped my church again. I mean, I went to church, just not my church. I've passed the stage of anonymity in my ward, and I don't so much like it. Devin has the same thing going on in his ward, only his is later, so I went with him, which happens when I sleep through my ward. Is it bad that I don't like people knowing who I am and being nice to me solely out of Christian charity? I mean, I like them and that they have it, but it's kind of awkward when you've been practically inactive for the last year, and people occasionally saying hello and calling you by name is all the effort exerted towards you, with no realization that you're not around on a regular basis and that you're not as strong spiritually as you'd like. So I'd rather they didn't have it towards me. They really are nice people, but I've made an effort on not a few occasions to sit to and talk to people, and still I'm just kind of there. Leaving me wanting to go back to not knowing anyone and not feeling so awkward about having been there so long and still not knowing anyone well. I'd rather just be there for the religion part, and not the socializing. That said I either need to find a new ward with at least one friend, or find a new ward with no friends and get in and out as soon as possible, so I can focus on feeling the spirit and not feeling the awkwardness instead of the spirit I should be feeling. Man that all sounds more pathetic put down in writing. I swear it's not that big of a deal and I'm not sweating it when I'm not openly analyzing it, but it's become a lot like distance running lately, and I do hate feeling uncomfortable more than pretty much anything out there--which leads to developing my excellent avoidance skills. The next post I swear I'll do something useful and post some Germany pics.

I discovered a bruise on my leg today, which is weird because I've been too inactive lately to warrant a bruise on my leg.

So I changed my blog layout, and it's kind of throwing me off. I think I need more things on the sidebar, so that will be my next project.

Today I found and lost the bike of my dreams. Or at least a semblance of the bike. All they had in was the fixie version, and I refuse to pay that much money to have a fixed gear in this mountainous state, but I paid for the geared up version and apparently they're all currently stuck in Italy:( Stupid Italy, like they need all those bikes. So I plan on waiting around for a few weeks because it's THAT perfect, but man I'd love to be riding on it right now. Sumie was nice enough to come with me because she clearly knows what to look for as she's more knowledgeable in the area of bikes, and we looked around all sorts of bike shops today, and ended up finding it where we least expect to find any acceptable bikes. It was next to the B&D burger where we met Devin for lunch. So basically I can't join the bike gang they've started until I get the bike. Conditions of the bike gang are that we have to wear a reflective leg band. Check. Then we have to be willing to take on all the little teen bike gangs that are all over Salt Lake, with their stylish, yet impractical due to all of the hills in SL, fixies and matching tattoos (thus one can see reason number 2 why buying a fixie would be unacceptable). Check check. Unless we actually have to take anyone on. I'm not suitable for anything more than a sarcastic comment here and there.


Imagine this bike with a rack on the back and plastic rim guards on the tires to prevent mud or water from being thrown onto your back. Then imagine it 20 times prettier and lighter and magnificent in person.


I also dragged my little sis out to ikea yesterday and bought a bookcase, finally, so now I'll be more inclined to clean my room with yet one more place to put things. I still need another, both wider and less tall, but this will be a nice start for now. I was having a hard time looking for and finding really tall (though not so much that it wouldn't be able to be transported in my little Toyota Corolla), not all that wide (given the small area I've shoved it into), cheap, and not ridiculously heavy considering I had
to carry it up the many winding stairs to my house, by myself mind you. So now my room is just as messy as ever, but with one more thing in it. A very large, though now put together, thing. I'll get on it though. Maybe that should be on my agenda...in a few days. Unfortunately tomorrow is booked. I get to go to Chuck E. Cheeses in the day time (yay!) and eat pizza in the park in the night time. Man that's a lot of pizza I just realized. It's my nieces birthday, so I'm super excited to see all my adorable nieces and nephews, especially since I broke down and bought a new camera. In my defense, it was off KSL.com, so it wasn't all that expensive, and it was brand new unopened. Plus it's an exact copy of my old camera (see previous post entry for picture), so I can pretend it did make it's way home from Germany, if I stretch my imagination enough and also forget about all the pictures on the memory card that was in that camera that didn't actually make it back. Stupid, stupid Melissa. The park thing is a double date with two friends. It's always nice to date as a favor to a friend, let me tell you. I think I'll become a nun, once I figure out how to cultivate chocolate from cocoa beans. But at least I'm getting out. Saturday is semi full, complete with tea time at one. Man do I miss clotted cream and scones, the best part about living in England. The worst part about living in England? All the weight one gains from eating clotted cream on a daily basis, not to mention the heart attacks that will later ensue.



And lastly, I finally saw Prince Caspian today. It was pretty good, though the song at the end was unexpected and, I felt, out of place.

I wish I made more money.

So, it's been a long time and I've actually really missed writing on here. I think it subtly may have been affecting my mood, not being able to write what I'm thinking. Anyway, without my camera (which I've come to the conclusion will be staying in Germany if it hasn't yet made it back yet) it's just not quite the same. This makes 2 cameras I've lost out of stupidity (the first being the one I drove away with on the top of my car). I miss the pictures on the memory cards more than the cameras. I intended to write on here as soon as I had all my pictures, but since that won't be happening I'll have to make do with those I have. Thank goodness I had the forsight to download all of them onto Kristen's computer up until the point I left my camera in Lupe's car. Only I'm not really in the mood to post those now, so there you go.

RIP lost camera, I'll miss you

For the first time since summer's actually began it's actually gorgeous weather outside on my off week of work. It's rained every week I've had off till now. It really is amazing how much the weather can affect one's mood. I'm in a slight funk as of recent, and hopefully I'll pull myself out of it. Crazy to feel so alone in life when you have so much to live for. I'm thinking tomorrow will be my low key day where I can hopefully find bookshelves for my room, look at some bikes (?), clean my room again, read, and maybe draw some and throw some (on my pottery wheel). Hopefully I will feel the motivation to get things done. Maybe I will break down and buy myself another camera.

Today was a day filled with briefly looking into bikes (I'm in the market and I fell in love with one that has a similar design to the one in the picture), helping with my parent's business by flaming acrylic mounts in the garage, babysitting youngsters, and a birthday dinner for Dave at the Cheesecake Factory following my Mario Party on the Wii. I then proceeded to eat my feelings at home (via that pistachio cheesecake), so I'm currently feeling pretty okay. My nephew was pretty funny today, which most 4 year olds are, telling me stories about a "Jeff" who lives in America, Utah, and eats chocolate covered pink ants he gets at the ant store for every meal, and about Caxon and Baxon finding fluffy and skinny cows to make blankets out of, but not here on Earth because then we would have no cows. And apparently there are some people here on Earth who sometimes DO eat cows. I couldn't make myself tell him that we were some of those people. During the whole babysitting experience we watched Monster House, then played "Throw the Turkey," where you know, we threw and caught a turkey, and throughout all of this I learned that my 9 month old niece can be endlessly entertained if she somehow comes across a simple blanket, which she will then roll around in giggling for hours. Up until this point I thought that she was hard to take care of because she does not stay still for one second, and is curious about everything...though to be fair she is the happiest baby I've ever seen.