Back in

I'm back in it here at home in Portland. Back to work, back to my garden, back to cleaning the house, back to a sweet boy and unkempt crushes, back to roomies, and cooler weather.

Today, I made a salad from herbs in my garden plus lettuces from my farmshare, I went for a run with my regular running buddy and didn't sweat out all of the fluids in my body. Yesterday, I drank tea with a sweet fellow and walked amongst the eternal springtime of Portland. There are flowers everywhere.

While I was away my garden exploded. My tomato plant doubled in size and my squash isn't too far behind all of that. It is nice to remember how sweet the summer is. Bouquets have been picked and made in houses all over Portland from the sweet bounty of early summer. The next few months is going to be wondrous.

Of course, I miss the east. But finally, the winter here is paying off it's dues.

Pretty Boy Sundays

I'm almost too tired to write tonight. Already, I've opened the computer three times to update you all on life over here but have closed it again too exhausted to think.... All I can think is sleep. Instead of think I typed sleep a minute ago. Side note: Pretty boy sunday is my favorite new phrase.

This is my 12th day in with one day out of work and I get to go back tomorrow night before my next day off. Well, maybe it'll be slow and I'll get called of. One can hope. Plus, only 5 days of work left until I'm homeward bound.

The Saturday to Sunday connection is especially difficult. Saturday being a day I wake early to run after working until 12 or 12:30 the night before. Then spending all day getting life done, in the best possible fashion, before heading in to work again (yesterday from 4:30pm-12:30am).

I bike home after that business and get up again before 7 in the morning on Sunday (leaving me with a grand total of about 5.5 hours of sleep).

The thing that makes it more traditional and far more difficult is that I lost my cell phone... So, that's been fun.

I'm not complaining.

Working so much has finally put me in the groove of the job. I'm getting quick, efficient. My plates are getting prettier. Things are alright. I've gone on dates with a couple of awesome people one of which I also work with(making work all that much better). I'm totally enchanted by the friends and new characters in my life and I'm making that money before I come home. My only complaint is allergies. These things suck.

Allrighty. I'm out. It's a reasonable hour to pass out, finally. . .

Getting back attchya from Chicago

Allright, here's to posting to you all from Chicago again.
Every time that I'm here, I'm pretty sure you get a post from me. You can thank Amtrak's ridiculously long layovers for that. Still I'm thankful to get off the train and find a comfortable place to relieve myself as well as to update you on my life as of late.

Here it is. Last week Delaware and a couple of walks through springtime

Jack in the Pulpit. bitter and peppery unless cooked I believe.

This past weekend New York, NY and the visiting of some very intense museums.

pretty sure I take this picture everytime I'm in the American Museum of Natural History. You can't deny that it's Tight. Giant squid fighting whale (Whatup?!).

Even though, everything in the Financial district of Chicago (which is at least where I assume I am) is closed on Sundays except for some random tea shop, the area is still convincingly city-like and for that impressive. 

I'd love to come to the real city (not just the tall business buildings part) some day with a real Chicago friend. Shout out Natalie who will someday lead me around the streets of Chicago. Also, shout outs to my Mom and Dad who hooked it up in NY from getting us a hotel to stay in with their mysterious hotel points and finding tickets to my first Broadway show, to helping me carry my huge load of stuff to the train station on Saturday. You guys are awesome. 

Snowski

It snowed on the east coast today. For us here in Chesterfield, it was just under an hour of wet, huge snowflakes. But, it was very beautiful to watch. I know, I am a self proclaimed hater of snow. But look at it. It really is beautiful in small bursts. This video is of Mamaw watching the snow fall.

Home. Sweet, sweet home.

I'm at home or I'm at a home of sorts. I'm at my grandmom's, Mamaw's, home.

I'm home but she's away in the hospital. I should be getting things set up for her to come home but thanks to my treacherous west coast inner clock I am just waking up.

Thought I should let you all know, the trip went basically well. Things are starting to happen here this morning. So, I've got to go.

A better update from this home, later.

Quittin' Time

I'm leaving my job. It's hard to say how long I've wanted to leave this job. It's been a long love-hate relationship with the ol' Slappy Cakes. From an underemployed start as a weekend hostess to the rush of summer work as a server back to sometimes hosting and then over to infrequent serving shifts in the winter, Slappy Cakes (or Slappy Jacks as my dad likes to accidentally call it) has been a crazy ride of strange work scheduling.

Most of the love I have for the place is because my coworkers are awesome. I will miss them so much. However, much of the hate come from the fact that Slappy Cakes is owned by a couple of people I would  kindly characterize as horrible people. Inconsistent and bad owners at best.

Despite or because of this, I am leaving after a year and a quarter of semi consistent employment. What did I learn? I don't know for sure. maybe that I don't want to be in food service any more or maybe that I want to work for owners that care about their workers.

Also, I've got more important places to be right now than working at a silly, over-hyped, kids restaurant. I hope everyone else that works there gets out soon too. That place can turn into a black hole of despair in the wintertime and I don't want anyone else to suffer through it for much longer.

All the best.

Things, Things, Things: We live in a material world

Well, since I've returned to Portland I've pretty much worn at least one thing a day that I brought back from the east coast. Here are a few of the treasures that I picked up back home

Earrings that I stole from Mom. They were broken so I replaced that top bit. That's why they're mismatched.

A blouse that I bought at Rumors, a Richmond Boutique.

Another pair of stolen earrings

A book that my friend made. It honestly didn't photograph very well but is awesome.

Tonight, I have a date with a boy that I met at the restore. Well, nothing is set in stone, but I think there will be a date tonight and I'm planning on rocking some of my east coast fashions.

Shout outs to Mom for hooking me up with all those sweet earrings, to Rumors for being such a positive and steady Richmond force over the past few years, to Terrance Edwards who designs sweet products which you can find at here, and to the Habitat for Humanity Restore for bringing people together.

East Coast Smeast Coast.

Some pictures for your viewing pleasure.

When I was packing up my green backpack and suitcase I realized that I owned a lot of green

In Delaware before we left for Virginia we tried to learn how to use the Camera's timer.

This was our best attempt.

A sink in my friends crazy old Richmond house

Another Bathroom's sink in the same house. A house full of crazy sinks

A flourless chocolate cake that my older sister made for my dad's birthday

Almond cheesecake covered in delicious fruit for the same birthday.

This is by no means all of the photos that I took but I thought I would give you a quick taste of how I spent some of my time while I was on the east coast. The report might be a little skewed towards sinks and cakes but I see nothing wrong with that.

IPad

Trimmed up

Our yard just got its version of a haircut and I can tell it feels kind of naked. The way that you feel naked after you cut off all of your long hair and you go to wash it when you shower and it's all gone. This is how my yard feels. It feels like all of its beautiful hair is gone. And when I say beautiful hair, I mean blackberries.

The landlord came over today and "cleaned up" our yard which, to me, means that he cut down all of the beautiful and productive rose and blackberry bushes. Our yard looks stunted and a little bit pathetic. But, it'll grow into itself. I'm just going to miss having those blackberries to great me every day when I get home from work. I'm going to miss them a lot.

It's ok. The good news is: I got off of work early today. Also, I bought my ticket back to the east coast. The running joke right now is I'm just going to move back since I have yet to purchase my flight back to the West Coast. Don't get yourself too excited. I'm not actually moving back east. I'm trying to establish some in state residency for myself here so when I figure out what's good I can go to school for it. But, I am looking forward to seeing you lovelies and to eating at some delicious Richmond restaurants (shout out Black Sheep and Kuba Kuba with maybe a little love to Strawberry Street Cafe and some 8 and a half pizza).

I hope you all are having a lovely weekend.

Where to even begin?!

This weekend passed by in a whirlwind of excitement!

I went from visit's with friends from Philly and the DE family, into wedding prep and then, even better, the wedding! It was beautiful and I'm both excited and a little jealous about the adventures that Jon-Mike and Jackie are embarking upon with their lives.

The wedding itself was filled with; moving prayers and speeches; beautiful dresses, flowers and setups; an open bar, dance floor and delicious cookies (plus, of course, wedding cake with gelato!) and plenty of aunts, uncles, brothers, sisters and family of all sorts.

The husband to be and our wonderful uncle Eddy.

Jon-Mike and Jackie dancing

After the wedding I had more quality family time as I rode down to Richmond, VA with my Uncle Roger and Aunt Sarah and beautiful grandmother. We watched VCU move into the final four by winning against Kansas and then I went to visit friends from school.

The week has been radiation treatments in the afternoon and family and friends all around that. Mamaw and I have gotten in some walks and I have many a plan to see some great people. Looking forward to continuing with my visit for the rest of the week.

Burning ball of excitement.

Like a small sun.

A very small but hot and excited sun.

That's how I feel right now.

I am on fire with excitement.

There are so many things to look forward to.

Landing in Philly and getting lunch with my friend Matt, going home and seeing my Mom Dad and brothers, getting to see my sisters and get ready for Jon-Mike & Jackie's wedding, Wedding!, Mamaw!, Uncles from all over, Mom's birthday, Riding in a car, Richmond VA, Friends, Family, Friends, and back to the west coast.

I am currently waiting in the airport and writing this blog. I have started to send out my Facebook feelers and text alerts. I can not wait for the east coast and me to be one again.

Hope you all are sleeping soundly as I type.

Tax Return

I'm getting my tax return shortly. Well, I just got my VA tax return in the mail and am waiting on my federal.

Since I first found out how much I was getting back for my tax return I started planning what I was going to do with my money. Was I going to save half of it and use the other half to buy new clothes and a new pillow? Perhaps I was going to buy a dresser, and some hangers. Maybe I was about to splurge on a membership to a rock climbing gym. All of those were ideas that I had batted around a bit. I might even want to replenish my greatly diminished earing supply with some of that tax money.

But then I realized my tax money is already pledged. I'm going on vacation to CO this year and that's where my tax return is going. It's pretty nice because it costs almost exactly the amount I'm getting back to fly to and from Colorado but I can't use any of the money for anything else. Is it too greedy to wish I was getting another $400 back from the government? Maybe but that doesn't stop me from dreaming. Oh a membership at a climbing gym... what a dream.

Still, I'm pretty psyched for some good travel and fun family time. That will be really nice. I'm actually looking forward to some of that later this month for Jon-Mike & Jackie's wedding. Yay! travels! I've been pretty homesick for the past few days and it'll be really nice to see those of you on the east coast and the east coast itself later on.

Hope you all have some fun plans in your near future. That's all for now.

East Coast! East Coast!

Today I did a big thing and applied for food stamps. It's possible that I won't qualify but I also just spent a bunch of money on air fare to get back to the east coast- so I probably will- and that brings me to the fun stuff!

I'm coming back east! I'll be flying into the Philly area on March 23rd 2011 and staying in DE for my brother's wedding on the 26th. Then! I will head on down to good ol' Richmond, VA to stay from the 27th to April 1st (Which just happens to be the birthday of a very sweet lady I'll be kickin' it with)

So, if you'd like to see me during this time get on top of things because this is a limited time offer.

Hope you're all having a great day. Thanks for reading.