Chicken Without A Head

Here I am, writing during lunch...again.  Actually, this post will be unbelievably brief since August has been such a crazy month for me. I've moved apartments (wooo), travelled to Toronto, Ontario, Canada for a 4-day Conference (wooo), and now I am travelling to Savannah, Georgia, USA for a 4-day Bachelorette Party (wooo).  The moving process has been delayed--I still do not have internet or cable tv (U-Verse let down).  Full-time work has been embarassing, although for some reason they extended my position through the end of the Fall Semester (wooo).  And, to top it all off, student locker sales are happening this week and guess who's in charge of those--ME! Needless to say, I'm exhausted and have no time to myself let alone to blog.

Give me some time, maybe until the end of the month, to get back on my feet and back to blogging.

Until whenever I have time...

#CANTWAITTOMOVE

#CANTWAITTOMOVE is a frequent text I frequently send to and receive from my new roommate, Molly.  Molly and I have been friends for two years and I successfully talked her and her labrador retriever, Prince, to move in with me this coming year.  I had a great run with Jen, my roommate for the past two years, but she is getting married in two weeks!

Since I have never lived alone and am prone to hallucinations talking to myself if I'm alone too long, I am so glad to be moving in with Molly!  AND PRINCE!  Prince is a sweet, 7 (or maybe he's 8) year-old chocolate labrador.  He reminds me of my childhood puppster, Samson.  I am so excited to get to live with a dog, since I have been talking about getting a labrador of my own for a good 7 months (Bradley if he's yellow; Brody if he's black).  I hope Molly doesn't mind that I plan on taking him at the end of the year I'll be pretending Prince is also mine for the next year... :)

I currently live in a great part of Saint Louis, MO--the Central West End.  There are always tons of people sprawled outside after work and on the weekends. There are great restaurants. It is overall a great atmosphere.  It was a GREAT neighborhood for a new law student and someone new to St. Louis.

The downside to the CWE is that it attracts a young crowd--the SLU undergrads, to be exact.  As a 24yr old, being surrounded by children the "younger crowd" makes me feel like a grandma. At the END OF THIS WEEK I'll be moving to Clayton, MO.  Clayton is sometimes referred to as Yuppieville and is home to young families and young professionals.  It is less undergrad and more "Big Girl Life."  Since Molls and I spend most of our time out in Clayton (at the Target, Mall, and suburban grocery stores [read: NO MORE GHETTO SCHNUCKS]).   Not to mention my new apartment is an upgrade.  Currently, I live in a 2bdrm/2ba with wall to wall carpeting.  I do have the luxury of a walk-in closet and the master bedroom/bathroom combo, but it is just...outdated.  Take a look at my new apartment.  It is old-world meets new-world.  [Please note: Because I am blonde forgetful, there are no pictures (yet) of the kitchen.]

Entryway
(front door on the right)

Dining Room! 

Living Room
(look at the recessed ceiling)

Washer/Dryer

Molly's Room

My Room
(Bed will probs go here)

Wouldn't be my room if it didn't have COLOOOOR!

Closet

Bathroom

I am hoping to move a little bit throughout the week and be fully in by Saturday!  Speaking of a little bit, I need to go throw some things in Ferg to take out to 901 Hanley!  Eee!!!

I'll write more soon...I've been wanting to write a post about WEDDING SEASON, but I have a feeling that will be quite a long post and I haven't had much time lately with the excitement of my new place! :)

Enjoy your Sunday!

Talaynas & Tennis for the Win

I'm expecting a call from a talent agent any minute.  Actually, I'm not, but someone else might be.  Saturday night some friends and I went to a karaoke bar.  Although I wasn't able to bring down the house with my life-changing "Free Fallin'" rendition, my friend, Katie, did have the ingenious idea of giving some of the evening's "talent" a bogus business card along with some clutch line about how she really thinks they could make a great track, and they should call her.  

She had a point--these morons were singing to us like we were JLo, Randy, Steven Tyler, and Simon.  Some of them were great, but some of the songs were...not so great! CABARET?! Are you kidding me?  [Off the record, I totally sang along with the chick and loved it, but I was a party of one at that table.]  There were the crowd favorites--Styx, Elton John, etc.   Regardless of the talent, a night at Double D's (yes, that's the name of the bar) is always so much fun.  And it wouldn't be a night out unless I ended up at Talaynas. This former strip club is set up with a karaoke machine someone bought from ToysRUs in 1999 (which are awesome, by the way, and made my Christmas Wish List EVERY YEAR. Still have beef with Santa over that one...), floor-to-ceiling-wall-to-wall glass mirrors, a raised, wooden dance floor, and disco balls. EVERYWHERE.  It's the greatest place on Earth (yeah, Disney, you heard me).   Y'all are in for a treat because I found a picture (thanks to Google because none of my pictures from Talaynas are ever blog-appropro):  

The night was a total success.  I forgot that I could be fun in a social setting! Many times I have pulled a Brett Favre. "Yes, I am never going out again."  "The next day just isn't worth it." "I'm stepping away from the game to spend more time by myself with my family."  "My health is my number one concern." [Okay so those last two were "Urban Meyers," but whatever.  Go Gators!] And time and time again I send my friends through this emotional roller coaster that is entirely unnecessary.  I may declare my retirement from the social scene for three weeks or two months, but I'll be back.  Inevitably.  And the next morning as I'm racing to McDonDons for a two cheeseburger meal and a six piece chicken nugget and a Diet Coke, I'll declare again, "That was the last time." I'll bring my social circle back in to the will-she-won't-she game I know they don't play.  I have to say though, this time, it was definitely worth the Diet Coke.

Oh! And by the way, I'm ALSO expecting a call from Nole's camp any minute.  I just know he's heard about the Blonde Sensation out in St. Louis and will be asking me to be his hitting partner.  (Nole--pronounced "no-lay"--is Novak Djokovic's nickname.  He happens to be my favorite tennis player.  I have a hard time admitting that since I have loved Rafa since the very beginning of his career, but the day I discovered Novak has my exact birthday, I traded camps.  Now, don't you DARE call me a bandwagoner, because I found this out about 3 years ago when Nole was NOT World Number 1.)  Anyway, they're going to call; I just know it.  Why?

Because I am one. scrappy. player.  I have the grace of Scuttle.  That's right.  This guy: 

Disney's The Little Mermaid's Most Affable Character

I am exactly him.  I run all over the court with my huge wingspan with no direction and yell at myself, commenting on everything I don't do.  I am absolutely, 100% Scuttle.  My goal is to have the grace of a swan. Be Kate Middleton of the court.  Agility, power, grace...but, instead, I'm a crazed albatross.  I guess it's a white bird, so I'm almost there, yes?

I know that this will be an uphill battle, and that I should be saying "yay for me" since the balls are going over the net and mostly in, but I don't like to be Scrappy Doo. I want to be Daphne, dangit!  Oh well.  I need to run to the ball more instead of relying on my wingspan.  I think with better footwork I could be Kate of the Court.  But really Sharapova or Clijsters or Ivanovic because I'm not too sure Kate has any game, and, if I'm going to start hitting with Nole, I need to be just a "titch" better than I currently am.  Just a smidgeon. Nothing one more week of play can't fix especially since J & I have our first "friendly" on the books.  I loved when my mom would call her matches with friends a "friendly." I'm not quite sure how this works because I am so competitive.  With my friends, family, complete strangers, heck, even myself.  

When playing soccer, I was the defender who would take out the forward and make it look like an accident.  Honestly, most of the time I really was just going after the ball and the chick got in the way, but either way, she had. to. go.  She was definitely faster than me, and I knew that if she got past me and the ball got through the keeper, it'd be my fault, and I'm not having that on my chest.  So, instead of "when it doubt kick it out," my motto was "when in doubt, take her out." Fair.  I'm not afraid of getting kicked or hit [although MAN! When you do get kicked or hit it really knocks the wind out of you]. But, as long as the forward was also on the ground writhing, I knew I had done my job. 

To my credit and despite my less than sportsman-like conduct, [sorry, sportswomanship is not a word in my vocabulary] I never once had an enemy.  Be a you-know-what, but smile and apologize.  I mean, am I sorry I leveled girls into the ground? No Maybe if they limped off the field kinda.  But the point was the ball was nowhere near the goal, and the forward was stopped.

So anyway, I have no idea how I'm going to play this "friendly" because, if I had it my way, J & I would win 6-0, 6-0, the trainers would have to be called for the other side more than once, and after shaking hands, we'd sling our sweatbands into the crowd and go out for celebratory drinks.  CLEARLY I won't be "having it my way" since I'm pretty sure there won't be cabana boys trainers court-side and I don't play with sweatbands. 

Unfortunately, I see this playing out a little differently...

"Ow"

Why in the world am I plagued by the word "Ow?"  

Growing up, my mother used to get frustrated with me as I would come clambering down the hallway into the kitchen and inevitably bang my shoulder on the opened shutter doors that separated our hallway from our kitchen (these doors sounded like the crack of lightening + a shaken jug filled with pennies when I barreled into them).  I always said, "Ow," on impact--not OW! or $#*@ OW!.  Just a plain little, "Ow."  After years of doing this, Mom said: "Kristen, the walls haven't moved in seven years (or however long it was that we had lived in that house)." She wasn't mad, but surely she thought I would grow out of it.  I never did.  When I am home in September, I know that I will slam into those doors and send shock waves throughout our house.  (Ow.)

This tendency to say "Ow" only spread...When my brother--good ol' Matthew--would hold a basketball and do some sort of black magic move (i.e. he made it look like he was going to throw it at me, but then, somehow, it ended up in his hands again), I would say "Ow."  The same "Ow" as before.   The ball's wave of air did not even make contact with my body, and yet, "Ow."  

If you were to ask him about his favorite "Ow"-inducing scenario it would be something he coined "SHOE!"  Basically, he would open the door to my room, and usually find me lying on my bed doing some homework. He would lob one of his big, black school shoes at me while saying, "Shoe!" (You think I have big feet? Matty has size 14s.) He would throw it verrrrry slowly but high enough that gravity's pull would make it fall much faster.  Although I had all the time in the world to escape the "Shoe!" and very rarely got hit, I would still say Ow! I mean, COME ON, KEL!

Even my roommate noticed how often I say "Ow" very early on... Within our first three months of living together, she made an "Ow Board" (which was a Manila folder in which she was to tally how many times I said "Ow").  She claims it was too hard to keep current, and I believe her.  How many times am I going to bang the sweet spot on my wrist into my doorknob before I realize that IT IS STILL THERE???!!

And then again, today...

Backstory:

I have been at my summer internship (Read: BEST. JOB. EVER!) for five weeks.  Today, I fiiiinally figured out how to adjust my chair.  For the past five weeks, I have practically been molding my body to look like this:

Quazimodo ain't got nothin' on my hump!

I have to say, going all "beast mode" on my chair, really paid off because now I am in Chair Heaven.  Didn't think there was such a place? Well, let me show you the chair that made it all possible:

It's not the same but it's pretty darn close!

[By the way, what exactly is "beast mode"? I've interpreted it as something like Arnold Schwarzenegger saying "I want to pump you up." So, I hope that's right...] 

Getting to the Point 

(something else with which I also struggle)

In my fit of rage over my uncomfortable chair I began to tinker...  And tinkering led to a lot of Ow's.  So much so that my kind and caring cube neighbor commented on how many he had heard and was everything alright.  I really need to break free from "Ow" but I am just not sure how...

The fact of the matter is: I am clumsy. I am lazy. I think I'm 5'6" because most of my friends are in the 5'2"-5'8" range, and I'm not. But most of all, I am just careless with my appendages.  If I make it to senility with all of my limbs, it will be a miracle.  

Maybe I'll bring Lent to August and give up saying "Ow."  Just like during Lent where Ow is switched with swear words, for every "Ow" I'll donate $0.25 to the American Diabetes Association. I'll have Molly keep me honest... Hopefully August isn't any more expensive than it needs to be...I need to think this through before committing.  

I'll keep you posted! (Pun intended)

The (Academic) Year of Country Club Sports - Sport 1: Tennis

Judge me alllllll you want, but this year, my goal is to take over the Country Club sports (sidenote: yes, my "year" still runs by the academic calendar. In just 10 months I'll be forced to make New Years Resolutions in January. LAME). My roommate and best friend from undergrad the best 4 years of my life laughed, but I am totally serious.  So serious in fact that this morning I bought an adidas golf skort (thanks RueLaLa for a bangin' sale) and tonight I put OWS into action.  What is OWS you ask? Why, it's Operation Williams Sisters.  DUH!  My sorority big sister, Ensley, has a blog as well.  It's called Haughty by Nature and, let me tell you, she will CRACK. YOU. UP!  She recently dubbed OKM (Operation Kate Middleton) as a way of avoiding tempting junk food.  The premise is just think of how beautiful and thin (almost gaunt now, but we'll say OKM channels pre-wedding Kate) she is and then magically you find yourself putting down the popcorn and picking up a carrot (for those of you that know me, you realize how big a feat this is since I am addicted to popcorn).  So, thanks to Ens for giving me the idea for OWS.

OWS was born from a Groupon--$20 for 4 clinic lessons. Usually I can turn down Groupons but this one seemed just too perfect (Molly, I imagine this is how you feel every time you buy one!!)  It must have been right around the time of the French Open too because I was all hyped up on tennis. I grew up with a tennis playing mother, have watched every Major since I can remember, and have taken a few lessons in my time.  I roped my friend Julia into doing this with me since I was too chicken to do it alone (NEWSFLASH: Girls don't just go to the bathroom in pairs).   We decided that we want to be the Williams sisters, but not.  We're caucasian so the skin color is out.  We're blonde, so the hair color is out.  Although I'm on pace with the height (I'm 5'11" according to Dr. Lwin, who recognized very early on that if she ever told me I was 6' she'd lose me to a bribable doctor), Julia's height is more on par with the likes of Justine Henin. So the height is out.  Talent was the only thing left to align us with the Williams sisters...

We hoped in Ferg looking like the pros (Ferg is my adorable '07 Focus hatchback "Ferguson the Ford" named after Sarah Ferguson before she sold access to her ex-husband--which I think was a brilliant idea--that I plan on driving until I can give my teenager a 20yr old car).  We have state of the art equipment: running shoes and $30 racquets from Target (yet another Christmas gift for a slightly older version of my brother--18--Matthew is betting a thousand isn't he!). That's right--state. of. the. art.  As we waited for our lesson to start I scoped out the competition chatted up the other people hoping to be the next Rafa Nadal (yum) and [insert name here of a dominant female player].  The moving of my jaw must have really put my body out because I instantly started sweating, just standing still.  But, apparently, there was a heat advisory out.  Awesome.  I won't complain because Julia and I have a free lesson coming to us on Saturday indoors do to Mother Nature.  Julia and I thought we'd be turning the clinic into the comedy hour with our skills, but once the balls starting coming over the net, I think we were pleasantly surprised that we didn't [insert the tennis version of dance's phrase "having two left feet" here].

Once the lesson started everything was great! (Reality Check, KEL: You are in the "Beginners" class)  There was a great mix of people--some who have never touched a racquet and others like me (who seriously believe their 4 clinic lessons will bring them to the US Open Finals at Flushing Meadows and not as the spectator--as the player slinging soaked sweat bands into a screaming crowd).  Our instructor, Raj, picked up all our names in 2.2 seconds. At some point in the hour lesson, I asked him if he was a "leftist" because every time my fellow left-handed player, Carol, and I stepped up to hit balls he'd come up with some great life tennis lesson to share with all of us at the net.  At least there was another one in the group! Julia is a traitor because she plays sports right-handed but writes left-handed. Since I'm dreaming about my blue golf skort as I write this blog, how do I play golf? I bat right-handed, throw left-handed, play tennis left-handed...but golf?? I thiiiink I play golf right handed, but it's been so long...I should probably get that figured out before I take over the links...hold on.

[Ok. I took out my driver swung the club a few times (in my living room...safe) and then thought, "Oh that's great. I still have no idea which way is which." So then I Googled it.  Don't try because the answer doesn't exist on Google!  So then I used deductive reasoning--if Matthew (my brother with the awesome Christmas presents) could break three of my clubs that means he could play with them which leads me to the conclusion that I play golf right-handed.  <-- BLONDE MOMENT!]

Back to OWS...Julia and I really enjoyed our tennis lesson.  We had such a blast, and sweat a lot. Raj liked to challenge my wingspan so I spent most of the hour looking like Grandmother Willow blowing in the wind (see: Pocahontas).  But, spread eagles aside, it was a total blast!  I graced the competition my new friends with all of my comments---mostly fart sounds (when I mishit a ball) and G rated swear words like "ffffffffudge" and "shhhhhucks" (when I did that ball a favor and let it go past me). I'll get better with my vocals...I've still got to work on my grunt (see: Serena, Sharapova, et al).  So, I wasn't the worst in the bunch and if I could just get more balls in, then I'd be pretty good...in the Beginners Class.  As we left the clinic I spied a woman channeling her inner Ivanovic in the CUTEST tennis dress. I've been Google shopping for one since then...If I want to BE the part, don't I have to look the part?? (That's how I rationalized this skort anyway...)

Julia and I will be going to see how the "other half lives" and play indoor at our "bonus" lesson on Saturday...As of now, the "talent" prong of being the Williams sisters is still in the running...

I'll update you on OWS Saturday...GO GATORS!

Movin' on up to the West Side!

Okay, so it's not exactly The Jeffersons...but it's pretty darn close!  In just three short weeks I will leave the quaint Central West End neighborhood and move out to Yuppyville, also known as Clayton if you're the United States Post Office.   Although it's not to the East Side like The Jeffersons, I am definitely movin' on up!  For the first time in my apartment-life, I will have STAINLESS STEEL APPLIANCES, a gas stove, granite countertops, beautiful wood floors, a brand new washer and dryer, more than one window in my room, a dining room AND a living room, garage parking for Ferg (that's my '07 Focus hatchback. She's a beauty), and the best, most exciting thing of all, a BRAND. NEW. BATHTUB! That's right. No one's "tuchus" in it before mine.  Cannot wait!

[I feel like the little girl in Jessica's Daily Affirmations.  She goes on and on about all the things she loves. My new roommate, Molly, and I have made her affirmations appropro for our life..."I love my countertops. I love my dining room. I love my washer.  I love my sink...etc, etc."]  In case you haven't seen Jessica, here:

Since my roommate has to move out this weekend (see earlier post about her upcoming nuptials), I decided it'd be a good idea to follow her lead and pack up some of my things.  This turned into scanning my room, which has been declared a National Disaster Area since I started picking out my daily outfits, looking for things to give away. About the same time I started picking out my daily outfits, my mother began habitually asking my father for a bigger home because we had "no space."  Dad always quipped back with a witty remark about having "too much stuff" and so he would go terrorizing through the house making rash decisions about things that we didn't need.  I spent many a weekend going to St. Vincent DePaul with the most recent "stuff" that was going to keep my family in our home.  It really is an ingenious idea because we never moved!  So, whenever I feel like I don't have enough drawer space (which I really don't) or prepare for a big move, I, too, go terrorizing through my 900sq ft. cardboard box house deciding which "stuff" is next to go.

So this morning, after a visit with The Big Man Upstairs, I started looking for things that would be better at someone else's home.  I decided the following just had to go:

• 15 pairs of shoes (some circa 2005--how these made it past the last three rounds of "terrorizing" I have NO idea)
• a speaker system (I use this term lightly.  A 16yr old version of my brother gave them to me for Christmas when I was in college to hook up to my unreliable Dell laptop), 
• A lap desk (that I have not used since my family stopped taking road trips but for some reason it makes EVERY MOVE just in case I decide to do work in bed--which has yet to happen)
• A corner shelf (that was in my very first big-girl bedroom and is simply beautiful, but I just can't keep storing it in a closet from move to move; some seven year old princess will be obsessed with it)
• A side table (the one that you drape a tablecloth over it and you have a glass piece that goes on top)
• 2 bags of clothes (1 bag that I put together after the Christmas season but never took...Oops)
• A suitcase (without the handle. It broke, sue me.)
• AND my all time FAVORITE decorative sign: "I always wanted to be a procrastinator but I just never got around to it." (I am only parting with this GEM because it is red and my new room colors are a light mint green and a deep rose pink)

Some people get worried that I give things away without thinking, but what I didn't tell you about my Mom and Dad's "back and forth" about "bigger house" and "too much stuff" was that my mom benefitted from this whole ordeal.  All the shelves we cleaned off were filled again in three months.  It was like directions on a shampoo bottle: "Rinse and repeat."  So don't worry, those 15 pairs of shoes will now make way to 15 more pairs of MUCH newer shoes!

Although my apartment looks like something circa the Depression Era or that I'm facing foreclosure, I am very very VERY excited to be turning a new leaf in my St. Louis Adventure.  The suburbs will surely bring a more relaxed way of living, and I am SO. READY.

Here's to new beginnings....and new shoes!

Saaaturday! In the ... Library?

It's summer.  This should not be happening.  BUT, it is.  You see, I am in the library doing work.  Come August 22nd, I will resume this nightly occurrence with a whole lotta spite, but, today, it seems fun--almost like a vacation!  I packed a bag of snacks (see: sweet tarts, carrots, subway salad, and a now empty bag of ritz toasted chips) and headed to school this morning, well late morning--after a trip to the grocery store for said snacks. 


I needed to come to school because today my roommate is moving out.  She is getting married in a few weeks and needs to move all of her stuff before the big day so today happens to be that big day.  In an attempt to avoid helping not be in the way, I decided I'd finally get around to doing all that work for my second job that I promised to do one month ago.


Yes, I have two jobs.  But really four.  Two are paid (my internship with a corporation here in St. Louis and my part-time/ad hoc law firm job), one is volunteer (my executive board position for my law school's student government), and one into which I dump thousands of dollars into for "the time of my life"--being a bridesmaid.  In three weddings.  In 9 months.  I work 40hrs a week at job one (internship), very rarely at job two (firm), and probably 30hrs a week at jobs three and four combined. 


While three and four are "for good causes" I'm not stopping the AIDS epidemic in Africa nor am I fighting for the impoverished in, say, the Mississippi Delta [for you, Ensley].  Instead I am creating programming for the future lawyers of America and licking envelopes asking someone's friends to buy them "dirty or flirty" lingerie.  Yeah--my life has purpose.


But, I still find time to take a vacation---to the library.  Since being here, I have written numerous e-mails, picked centerpiece for Bride 1's shower, ordered a shower gift for Bride 2, and called to check in with Bride 3 so that she doesn't feel neglected.  I should start charging for my services.  


In the short three hours I have been here, I have also planned how to redecorate the student government office space in the library.  Jeffrey Lewis (and Zoila) would be so proud of me.  Here's hoping $$ actually does grow on trees.  I've written MORE e-mails, typed up documents laying out my plans for a student panel which will be aimed at easing the future lawyers of America into the comforts of unemployment.  Not one of these three hours has helped me generate ANY income.  Not a dime.  And just as I was starting to get to the billable hours, I decide to come on here and write to no one.  Smart cookie, I am.


I have realized that money does talk and ya know what? No one is paying me to type up this message, so ... sionara!

Gotta Start Somewhere...

Boy am I productive.  I created a blog on my lunchbreak.  Why? I haven't a clue. I am an opinionated person but I would definitely not make for good television because I'm boring, conservative, and have I said boring? I am like an old lady--I wait for the mailman (who should be dropping off my latest online shopping fix shortly--YAY), I watch useless TV (Although unlike my Grandma, I have never purchased anything from an infomercial...it is on my Bucket List, so I'll be sure to announce when something worthy comes along.  The Pajama Jean was a solid contender for about 2 weeks), and I'm in bed by 10pm.  SO, I can't promise any hilarious stories of debauchery (Thankfully, blogs got popular AFTER my college years).  But, I can promise that I'll at least write on here once a year because I put a reminder in my BlackBerry for next June--here's hoping I don't lose this BlackBerry between now and then or even that promise will most likely be a bust.


Happy Tuesday
(and as always, GO GATORS)