.GIRLS.

we all know by this point that i LOVE HBO’s show girls.  yes i can see the comparisons to sex in the city and i do see how perhaps it is just a updated version.  but i was in high school during sex and the city’s hay day.  my mother, who had a birthday yesterday!, controlled a majority of what i saw on tv (why i never watched dawsons creek).

regardless, GIRLS and lena dunham speak to me.

remember that lovely woman who gave birth to me, the one who did not allow me to watch dawsons creek b.c joey and dawson slept in the same bed, well she is now worried that i like GIRLS.

here is what i woke up to this morning:

my response:

this might rival the time my grandmother asked me if/when i was going to produce grandchildren and i grabbed the turkey baster and said as soon as i can get some sperm…

my family must be soooo proud.  and im seriously about the mood stablizers.  everyone should be on them.  they make you more happy open loving and free

.endings.

today is the official last day of summer, for me at least.

tomorrow i have to report back to school full time, and while the students don’t show up until the 27, gone are the days of laying in bed until 9:30…

with the start of the school year come many endings and new beginnings. i almost feel like this is the start of the new year more so then january.  and since i did not have my shit in a pile back in january (heck i did not have it all within a 10 mile radius) i am taking to now to start my new year resolutions!

while i will not be sharing my resolutions with you, i will tell you their theme.  i am on a quest to be more open and loving and free.

very bohemian of me. 

truthfully, while watching girls on HOB i realized that i saw way to much of myself in uptight marni and self absorbed hannah.  that is not who i want to be.  i want to be free like jess, i want to shed my uptight layer and become less judgmental of everyone, INCLUDING myself.

ie this moment:  (credit)

so along with the usuals of be more organized, make my bed, don’t snap at people, i am adding be less judgmental and more open loving and free.

to help me on this journey i am reading (at the suggestions of B) When Things Fall Apart by Pema Chödrön.  it is a very far cry from most of the literature i read and the first self helpy book i have been able to read more then a page of.  perhaps because this time it was i who decided to go on this journey.  for the first time it was not at another’s suggestion, or under anothers forceful hand.  regardless it talks a lot about balancing the good and bad in life and how you can not know the beauty of the good without knowing and acknolowing the pain of the bad.

exactly the message i need to start my new year.

i am also going to get my charka’s balanced.

because why not?

.we’ve.all.been.there.

i read a lot of blogs.

most don’t touch me.  most provide entertainment or a glimpse into a different life, or a link to quality things.

this one made me cry: i accidentally saw a picture of you

who has not been there?  i mean its totally one of the many reasons i have quit facebook in the past/defriended all mutual friends.

I think joy is so brave for writing things and putting it out there.  we all feel like this, weather its an ex or a friend you’ve lost touch with.  that pang of nostalgia, not negative, not positive just honest and raw.  i love how she was able to put all those feelings down in words.  for more on joy you can follower her on twitter, and make one ALL of her recipes, you won’t regret it.

.internet.

today i crawled out from the rock i have been living under for the past 12 months and did some serious internet perusing.

i also sat at my desk for the first time EVER…

during college, my first job, and grad school i was constantly on the internet looking for new blogs, products and things to be interesting in.  then last year happened.  i finally had something that was all consuming and challenging and everything else in my life fell by the wayside.  yes i still read blogs, but i did not look for new ones.  i read the huffington post articles that caught my eye on twitter but i rarlely linked to new articles.

then SUMMER came.  basically the opposite of my new favorite show (well third behind girls and new girl) game of throns tag line “winter is coming”

summer has provided me with NOTHING to do.  this is more nothing than i am usually accustomed to because that nothing is me procrastinating on this things i have to do.  I LEGITIMATELY have nothing to do but blog, watch the Olympics, shop, and drink.

whatever your only 27 once!

do you have any idea how much CRAP is out there on the internet.  seriously i have having a severe FOMO attack (so much worse then a shame attack) over all the things i have been missing out on.  today i lost my self for 2 hours looking at shiz on the world wide web.

like a coke fein searing for her next fix i greatly cobbled up every link from every article bouncing from huffington to twitter to you tube to buzzfeed and back again.  seriously did you know there could be SO MANY INTERESTING articles about nothing?!?!

i was on such a high from all my interesting finds i thought i would venture on to facebook and see if i could conquer the beast.  its been over a year since i really spend more then half a minute on the website and i thought well perhaps i could go back.  since reactivating my account back in march i have spent probably all of 10 minutes on the website all from the safety of my iphone.

well lets just say that the facebook train has left me high and dry.  i’m about as clued in to it as my grandma.  i went on to actually delete some people who keep coming up in my news feed, you know when im really board and twitter isn’t doing it for me and i check it on my phone.  i thought i had defriended them LONG ago (i love nothing more then defriending people) and i guess you cannot do that on the iphone app?

regardless i could not even figure out how to find them let alone defriend them when i signed on today.  so then i spent a good bit of time goggling how to defriend and if there is a service out that that i could pay to go through and clean up my facebook life.  and i came across this little article.  heck yes!  i hope these people know i have moved on with my awesome life and they are no longer apart of it.  no press release?  there should be!

and seriously that moment when you want to re-friend?  does that happen?  if it does you need to check yourself.

other exciting things i found on the internet:

• mckayla is NOT impressed
• sorta knew about this
• some comments are funny
• webmd

 

.FOMO.

the Fear Of Missing Out.

do you suffer?  I DO

perhaps its the fact that i live in BFE virginia and all my besties live scattered about the country, perhaps its the fact that all but two of my besties got married/engaged in the past year, or the fact that my roomie B has countless invitations to go EVERYWHERE while i sit alone at home.  whatever the reason i am a chronic suffer of FOMO.

i recently had a massive cry fest over living in this god forsaken town.  i miss chicago.  i miss charlotte.  i miss oxford.  i miss being able to walk aimlessly down a crowded street and do whatever i please running into people i know.  not drive to some shopping mall and fight crowds.  UGH SUBURBIA.

i miss everyone being in the same place in life and having the same goal.  i guess its a natural response to feeling left behind and alone.

no i was not left behind.  i chose to move.  i chose to go somewhere by myself.  i elected to start a new life, a new path and to do it all on my own.  while this should be empowering it really only adds to the internal conflict i feel.  because yes, i am unhappy but no one but me put me in this position.

the strange thing is, the more people i talk too, the more i see that i am not alone in my feelings, something  i cannot find comfort in.  it makes the feeling worse.

Emma Gray, of huffington post, talks about the things she has learned in her first 25 years.  i love this list.  most of them i am still learning.  what i like most is that her lessons contradict,  the way most lessons in life do. #2 address FOMO while #3 suggests saying no to invitations.  #17 being single is awesome yet #19 its ok to want a relationship.  she address many of the feelings us post-college 20-somthigns have.  and she even eludes to HBO’s GIRLS in #21, because sometimes the story is all we have left at the end of the day!

in a response/follow up Margaret Wheeler Johnson write about what she knows as she turns 30.  she makes references to the velveteen rabbit, a scaring childhood book that caused as much damage to my physche as bambi did.

but her message is clear.  no matter how fake we feel our lives are and how we are waiting to wake up one day and feel “real” we already are.  and being real hurts. this is real life, no matter how awesome, shitty, or bland it may be, and its the only one we got.

.aparently.im.26?

i quite frequently have no idea how old i am.  i was born in october 1985 so i have yet to have my 2012 birthday.  making my exact age 26 and 10 months.  I recently told someone i was 24 and followed it up by making a remark about how 2010 is going.  clearly i have no idea what is going on in the real world.

i live my life in lala AMH land.

along with having absolutely no idea how old i am or what year it is; i look like i am about to embark on my junior year of high school so i can pull off any age between 18 and 24.  over 25 and people ask questions.  yes at 26 i still get CARDED EVERY time i order a drink (even though i drink at the same 3 spots religiously). perhaps its my indecision that causes me to get carded as i have moved on from my go to vodka gimlet (i was getting a bit too hammered) and have been better able to stomach beer so my options are wide open.

regardless of my youthful looks and lack of beauty routine need to change as a inch closer to 27.  we can blame my poor beauty routine on growing up a swimmer and having such bad acne that make up hurt my face but truthfully that was like 9 years ago… someones got to grow up.

and i have been TRYING!  i recently got my first set of highlights.  BLOND.

finished product:and again with the no makeup…

but now that we got the hair situation under control we (me and myself) are about to get this makeup situation under control.

so i have been following PIPMEGAN lead and watching lots of youtube videos on how to use my new sultra and how to do my makeup.  most of the bittys on youtube doing these tutorials seem to have been rejects from Real World and Teen mom; however, they know what is up on the make up/hair front.  perhaps that’s what they were doing while i was studying finance and getting my M.S.ed.

regardless hopefully this new me will bring me in to my 28th year a little more adult!

 

.handbag.lust.

you may not know this but i have been a large phoebe philo fan ever since she was first at chloe, and i was 12 years old.

did you belive that?

you should have.

not that i own any chloe, or can fit in the the famed high wasted jeans i so dream of wearing.  i mean perhaps some people think $595 is a bit much for jeans.  but this is happiness people.  there is no price for happiness.

i know about all of this from one of my favorite beach reads:

i think plum sykes is amazing and i devour everything she writes in vogue.  but i digress.  back to phoebe philo and my love for her.

she is no longer at chloe but at celine.  and she is hawking the most amazing bag i have laid my eyes on; the luggage mini.

while i am not crazy about this color combo the shape and the details are pushing me over the edge.

i love this nice nude but would like a little contrast with the detailing: the £1,550.00 price tag is not deterring me from lusting over this bag.  clearly my chosen career as a public school teacher allows me such luxuries so the only thing holding me back from owning this bag is the fact i live in rural bfe Virginia and there is not a Celine boutique in the near vicinity.

so i am going to drowned my sorrows in the coach willis.  i first spoke about my need for this bag here and since i chose to sell my soul to the devil this summer, aka teacher summer school and tutor kids, i have EARNED this bag.  (in my mind i really earned the luggage mini, but apparently the economy undervalues me and my work…)

i am torn between the mahogany or the brittish tan.  mahogany

brittish tan

i am also a little peeved that again, because, i live in BFE virginia i have to order the bag on-line and wait for it to come to me.  unless i go with the brittish tan then i can go pick it up in arlington tomorrow…

decisions, decisions…

.summer.

summer officially started for me today.  and what am i doing?  taking a LAST minute flight to chicago to see some of my most favorite people.  esp this hot ass mess:

why?

well because i am 26, have absolutely no commitments and am BORED out of my effing mind here in suburban dc.

and summer school does not start until next Thursday.

so why not hop a last minute flight outa here?

 

.birch.box.

you may have seen my BFF amc rave about birch box over on i like it. i love it

i first joined (got off the waiting list) in April and got my first box in May.  I was happy but not over the moon.  then came JUNE and i opened this:

seriously

a

FULL SIZE stila bronzer.

totally worth the $20 i have thus far invested in birch box.  i was a bit confused when the card that came with my box outlined different products but i would not trade anything i got.  i love love love my tili bag and will be saving all my products (besides the bronzer which i have worn everyday since i opened my box) for Colorado.

birch box is like everything i love about life combined into one:

 1. its mail!

2. its cheap

3. it pays for itself

4. its always a surprise!

you want it to?  its just a click away!

.where.i’ve.been.

hanging out with this guy:

and obviously cleaning up that sicko pit of a room.  we were in the middle of redoing my closet so everything had been pulled out and put on the bed/floor/desk.

some of you may know my nick name: hurricane.  this was coined by WJKs husband because every time (eery time) i visit i am a whirlwind of fun and entertainment.  my drunken patters also closely follow those of a category 5.  strong wind, waterworks, strange calm, strong wind, disaster.

well i have met my match in my new roommate.  and i am finally getting the post college experience that every young adult hopes for.

plus the pool is now open and while i did have a horrible run in with skin cancer earlier this year the world is ending in December so what the hell why not.  i could also quote YOLO but that is just my favorite restaurant in Ft. Lauderdale.

regardless i have been TRES busy living a life so full of splashes of happy that is perhaps a happy flood brought to you by hurricane AMH and her roomie B.