Steph's Last Birthday Gift Idea #5

Uh These Shoes

I wear an 8.5. Those look so comfortable AND they're Houndstooth!

Wins all around!

Steph's Last Birthday Gift Idea #4

I believe it's time for a new hairdryer. Mine's a smoker. I don't like that habit. I have to be picky here. I have curly hair and want a detachable diffuser. I like the ease of not doing anything to my hair while I'm getting ready. Especially with my schedule!

Steph's Last Birthday Party Gift Idea #3

A plastic, dishwasher safe water bottle and Brita filter. I like my water!


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I want the one with the bigger GBs

iPhone 4.

If you've upgraded your 3G, you'll understand.

Wish list

I rarely ask for things for my birthday. I don't like ski g for things. But seeing a this is the last birthday I'm celebrating, I'm starting a list of gift ideas. I figure, make this my most selfish birthday ever since I won't be celebrating after this October.

So here it goes; and come back regularly for more gift ideas as I think of them.

Steph's last birthday gift idea #1:
Nike tempo shorts, XL. Those are the most comfortable shorts created by mankind and I only have two pair. I love all colors and all pair with Alabama logos on them, or houndstooth if you can find that! Adidas makes a pair, too, and I'm open to trying their tempo shorts as well!

I also like the gym pants that come to your knees. Those are even more comfortable in my spin class. I will be picky. I like the tight kind, preferably black or gray. I don't like untangling lose garments from my bike on the road or in spin.

I hate shopping for clothes. It is number one on the "Top Ten Ways to Torture Me" list (I'm not posting that one as to avoid giving you any ideas). This means that when I say I want an article of clothing, I really want it!


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365 days later

It's hard to believe that a year has gone by.

It's flown!

This time last year, I was a nervous wreck, learning where all these new places were, meeting new people in a new world that I hadn't yet explored. I was getting dumped with tons of things to do and make happen. I was given goals and challenges for the first time in years! I was so scared I was in over my head.

Now it's starting all over again but this time I'm not afraid of being in over my head. I'm more balanced and I've learned new things. Can you say sopanification! I have new friends, my friends, I have achieved some of the goals I didn't think were possible. All in all, after the last several years of my life, going back to school has probably been the most self-rewarding thing I could have ever done for myself.

I'm not so much talking about the fun things that you can do in college rather than the self-gratification and self-esteem it gives me to know that I'm doing this. That I've overcome a lot to be able to tell myself that I CAN do this. So despite the mad amounts of partying that I now rarely get to do and the loads of memories I'm making, I'm learning something much more than just how to be a nurse.

The Gift

Me: Hey, Mum, guess what!

Mum: Hey, Stepper, what's up?

Me: I just saved a ton of money on my textbooks!

Mum: Really? How'd you do that?

Me: I didn't buy them from the University and rented two. I was supposed to pay nearly $600, saved over $300. I only spent $240 on the books I need this semester! I'm so excited!

Mum: That's great! Way to go! Guess what!

Me: Uhh.. what?

Mum: G got you something.

Me thinking: My stepdad bought me something?

Me: G bought me something?

Mum: Yeah! A taser!

Me: A taser? I'm confused.

Mum: Yeah! He got me one and thought it would be a good idea to get you one, too. Said he was worried about you walking around town by yourself!

Me: Mum, I don't know how to use a taser.

Mum: It's easy. Just point and touch. Skin, preferably.

Me: Uhhh.... Thanks! I can't wait to not have to use it! I can't wait to play with it!

So I pissed someone off

And I don't give a shit.

Why don't I give a shit? Because they aren't adult enough to tell me what I did. Usually when I have an issue, I take kindly to discussing like am adult, considering I am one, and I prefer to be surrounded by others who do. Therefore, I see the fact that the person who blocked me can't allow me the opportunity to know how I may offended them as less drama.

I'm too old for this shit and prefer A not be the middle man for when people have a problem with me. He doesn't need that drama, either. So especially of your beef is with me, leave him out of it and allow me to know what's up. If you still hate me afterwards then that's fair; I'll own up to my mistakes and ask forgiveness where I'm wrong or allow you your difference of opinion. Just leave A out of petty drama.


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Bama's Pluck and Grit has writ her name in Crimson Flame

21 days until Alabama football kicks off at Bryant Denny Stadium against San Jose State.

In case you haven't heard, I'm exceptionally excited about the 2010 Alabama football season.

www.rolltide.com for the new pre-game TRADITIONs video. If that doesn't get you pumped for the Crimson Tide then I might pretend I never knew you. OK, that last parts a stretch, but still, really?? Really? Not as excited as I am? You need to go to a game!

I am finding it mandatory to watch Alabama play Penn St. on September 11. I will watch Alabama make all of the Florida Gators cry.

And I will go to my very first Iron Bowl. I get goose bumps thinking about that one...

I love Alabama football!

Sob Story

I've just finished reading PS, I love you. I needed a whole box of Kleenex to finish that book. I've never had to put down a book because I was crying too much to continue reading it. What's wrong with me? I don't normally do that...

Then to make me cry more, a friend of mine posts a video of soldiers reuniting with their families. Like that wouldn't make me cry...

I think I have a permanent lump in my throat.

I do want to see PS, I love you now. I've finished the book, how different or how good is the movie? I hear good things about it. I'm on a roll, maybe I can find it online tonight... I've got a roll of toilet paper handy since I've been crying for the last two hours...

I don't know what book to read next. I feel like I might need a breather!

Reliving Quiet Me Time....**Sigh**

I've had the most relaxing, quiet afternoon at home. It's been so peaceful!

After what's seemed like days of going and going and going post vacation, I was very excited to take a leisurely afternoon to myself! I've been reading P.S. I Love You by Cecelia Ahern. It's a book I started at the beach and it got so hectic there with family fun that I wasn't able to read more. Once I got home, I had the move, I had work, I've had remotes, not to mention at some point I have to see A for some sanity, I haven't had much time to pick it back up! So this afternoon, following two blistering hot days in the sun watching mother's send off their children to college in U-Hauls and high-heels, I picked up my book again and haven't been able to put it down much!

This book is definitely climbing to one of my favorites of all times. I've never read a book that can make me laugh my arse off and then make me cry like a baby in one paragraph. I've never seen the movie; I've already put it on the top of my Netflix queue so when I finally mail that wretched movie I rented last time (The Goods, not good, very bad, so bad, I've considered it my civic duty to NOT mail it back!) I will get the movie in and laugh and cry like a baby all over again.

The rest of the roommates move in next Wednesday. I'm kind of nervous and I'm really not looking forward to it. Being in college again and wanting to be successful is exceptionally difficult when you have ten years on everyone. I'm praying that I get some A++, pencil-pushing, "partying is of the Devil" girls in here!!

The likelihood of that actually happening for me....not high

Letter of Disguist

I have to add to my little list of things that keep happening during my move. They keep calling me asking for keys I've already turned in.

Dear Apartment Manager,

This letter is in regards to the horrendous moving experience I have had at your complex. I was one of the few people who chose to stay in your shithole due to location and proximity to campus. I enjoy being able to peddle to class and save on parking. That benefit and your low rate (which I now know why is so low) are the only reasons I have for staying in your poorly run housing.

I will never participate in one of your transfers again. I will only sleep under the roof I pay you for. I have had the absolute WORST moving experience of my life and in reality, this wasn't even really a move!

I strongly suggest you make changes to your Chinese fire drill style of transferring occupants.

I have turned in my keys, I put them in an envelope, wrote down the apartment number, signed your little yellow form, and handed both to you, in your hands, in your office, after you tried to calm me down for the 5th time during this transfer.

I hope you're fired.

Sincerely,

Steph

Why I'll pay the movers extra next time

I'm pretty pooped but I have every right to be!

I have unpacked my room, straightened my room, freshened my room, and I am organized in my new room. I have cooked dinner, I have fed new roommate (the only one so far), grocery shopped (we split the bill, this will be awesome!), washed and dried a load of clothes, and I have even cleaned out all of my notebooks for the upcoming school semester.

I can rightfully say that I'm exhausted! All that is left for me to do is tear down my old plastic shelving unit (because I consolidated so well, I don't need it anymore! W00t!), hang my curtains, and find a home for my vacuum cleaner. I may have to reorganize the closet a bit.

I have so much more space in my new room. I might actually consider studying at home more now. Well... the rest of the new roommates move in the middle of this month. I wonder if they will have as much stress as I did getting moved in?

Everything that could have gone wrong went wrong, I'd say.

• My patio furniture was stolen WTF?? Really??
• My room wasn't ready for me to move in on the last day of "move-in" day.
• My room wasn't ready for me to move in until 2/3 pm on move-in...
• I was assigned the wrong room. They put me in the wrong room. Not the room I requested but the room they wanted me to have. No. No. No. No. It was basically my old room. It wasn't going to fly.
• They gave me the wrong keys. so after I got all of the above situated (with the exception of my patio furniture because I've yet to find it on some one's porch yet), I come home from work in 115 degree Alabama heat and can't get in. Not to mention, today corporate was in town, so I had to dress a little nicer for work. It was so awesome, I can't wait to do it again...

The lesson I have learned from this? No matter what happens, I'm not moving until I'm done with nursing school. If my new roommates are bitches, they'll move first. I've also learned to not leave anything on the porch, even if it is a rather large patio furniture set that is not inconspicuous at all to steal...

I'm so glad I can finally get comfortable... Now to try this new sleep aid and hopefully have sweet dreams tonight! I tried melatonin the last two nights and have not slept well. I'm overdue!

The Last Written Word of Sand

7/29/2010

I have decided to give up trying to blog on my iPhone. I love the mobility… when I actually have a decent signal.

 
 

My grandmother is trying to make me feel better about my 30 birthday next year. Age really is just a number in this family. They're 82 and don't act a bit of it! It still doesn't' make me feel any better about my age. She then tells me age doesn't mean anything but Obama is going to shoot all the old people with his healthcare plan. She means that facetiously of course.

 
 

This vacation has been so wonderful. I think I've done my vacationing properly, too. I can't seem to remember what day of the week it is. Unfortunately, it's Thursday. That means I have three full days left here and that is just not enough time for me! I want to stay here another week. Not that I don't miss my friends or the rest of my family. I just feel so relaxed here. Nothing to worry about, fuss over, fight to make happen. It's pleasant.

 
 

Today's plans: I'm a little pink from yesterday, SPF 50 is mandatory for my shoulders. Boo! I'm not letting a little burn stop me from trying to conquer my fear of ocean life in ankle deep waters. I'm going to make it to the sandbar. I've start a new book, PS I love you, and so far it's not been too bad. It's not Dexter. It's not gore and mystery so it's not really holding my attention just yet. Maybe it'll pick up in chapter 4 because the first three have me sluggishly flipping the pages. I hear it's a very good story, though. I've not seen the movie, either. Pool is definitely on the agenda. My aunt and uncle are on their way down today and my dad is moving into the condo below us. This trip has turned into the biggest family reunion. Siblings, nieces, nephews, in-laws, cousins, second cousins, aunt, uncle, grandparents, parents… I should have made T-shirts to sell this week. "The Anybody Related to Steph Reunion"

 
 

My dad just came up from trying to get the room below us settled. He rented it a few weeks ago. Apparently, no one's been in the condo all week and they won't let him go ahead and get situated. It seems rather petty but it pisses my dad off because the office has told him that people are in it. Drama drama drama. I hope he doesn't let that bother his trip that much, cause he's going to get in later and he's already at the beach.

 
 

Last night, we played guitar on the beach during sunset. A crowd came around us and we all shot the shit, drank a few beers, and sang different songs. It was fun. I haven't had an audience while I played guitar before so it made me a bit nervous. It was still fun. Afterwards, my dad and I were the only ones sitting on the lounges in the sand and we were watching the ocean.

 
 

"Dad," I said. "I think this is the first time we've shared a beer on the beach."

 
 

"Yup." he answered. "It's nice."

 
 

As if you couldn't have cued it better in a movie, fireworks started shooting off on the pier right in front of us. It wasn't amateur fireworks, either. A fireworks company had set up camp at the end of the pier and started a show that lasted twenty minutes. It was like the fourth of July on the 28th. They were huge fireworks. Some in the shapes of stars, some shaped like hearts. Large round explosions of blue and red in the shape of ribbons on a white ball of small lights. Huge golden streams of glitter exploded in succession and silver streams of fire framed the picture. It was so random it made it that much more special.

 
 

So after I sat on the beach and played music with my dad, we sat in the sand with a cold beer and watched fireworks. I'll always remember that.

Welcome back to stress

I had this idea at the beach. I would start using OneNote to write my blogs and then just upload all of them to Blogger when I got back home. I haven't done that yet. Today's my first day back at work and I got really tired of waiting for iPhone to catch up with my typing speed on my Blogger app. Damn new update... I ended up writing ONE entry and I'll post that later.

In the end, the vacation was awesome!

I got home to a disaster, though. My patio furniture was stolen, I moved my stuff from upstairs to downstairs without a place to live since I STILL didn't have a key with hours left before I HAD to be out of the old room... My apartment management is awful! They even put me in the wrong room! So after I got permission to move my stuff, I find out I'm supposed to be in a different room THEY ASSIGNED early, despite my request MONTHS ago for the room I wanted. That office management came scarily close to seeing me lose my temper. Thank God A was there to keep me calm.

The best part about coming back home so far is the welcoming hug I got from A when I got home. I love being held that tight. I missed him.

Now I must get back to work... Corporate day...

This is normal conversation

Me: "Dad, let me see the roof of your mouth."

Dad: "huh?"

M: Let me see the roof of your mouth!"

D: Do what, sis?

M: Let. Me. See. The roof. Of your. MOUTH.

D opens mouth. I didn't see what I was looking for.

M: Ok. Well where did I get this from?

I opened my mouth to show the rather weird growth on the roof of my mouth. You can see it when I laugh but it's not that noticeable.

D: I don't know, darlin', God must've gave it to ya.

Me: Oh.

D: Well do you like it?

Me: It doesn't bother me. It's just an overgrown palate. It's just different.

D: Well if you like it, I gave it to you. I you don't, your mother did.


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Panama City is BP free on the shore

It is so pretty down here! The water is so blue! The pier that was lost after one of the many hurricanes in 2005 is now back up, too.

I like to come out here early in the morning. Right now we're sitting on the porch and my dad is playing his guitar. It's one of the few quiet alone times we get because he's a Santa and young children ask for autographs everywhere down here.

The sand is clean, the lifeguards are legal and nice to look at (no worries, DrSxDP), and there aren't tar balls swimming in the ocean.

BP's biggest mess up ever is not completely forgotten, though. The US military has a pair patrolling the sands for oil. I thank our military for their service and feel bad for them in full fatigues and hats with only a Gatorade thermos on the back of their camo rhino! I'm sure they are glad the heat is the worse they have to suffer!

Today is sand day. I will have my toes in it... All day!!


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Vacation starts.......NOW!!

I am on my way to the beach. We're on the road about 30 minutes later than we wanted. My grandmother's knee isn't cooperating this morning.

It's always fun going on roadtrips with my grandparents. They have been married over 60 years and are so full of life. I hope when I'm 82 I have someone I can be this happy and in love with and still mobile enough to take trips the way they do. MeMe may have a bum knee today but they still have plenty of energy to share with the world!

We just passed the giant sinkhole on 65S. My grandparents hadn't seen anything like that. It was fun trying to explain to them how important dirt is to a highway.

I've had one cup of coffee this morning. I need more! I'm trying to not take my Dramamine... And I'm sitting in the back for now. I don't like being drugged while I drive, though. We're planning on stopping in Montgomery for some breakfast and Sike's and Kohn's then I'll drive from there.

This is the only time I think it would be fun to have 4square... But I still think it would be annoying.

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One Pooped Puppy!!

I am feeling a little too drained to write. But I want to write.

I thought I wanted a night to myself and now I'm bored. In my defense, it's been super hectic the last two days! Yesterday at work, I got stranded at a gas station for hours while Habeeb, the manager, kept telling me, "You are too small to drive that big van! Too small! Why do they have such small girl drive such big van!?"

Before Habeeb chided me for driving a huge Econoline, I was fighting with FAFSA about the loss of my grant... at this moment, I just realized that I did NOT get to call back today to find the form I need to fix that... GDMFPOSGD!

Then I got home much later than expected and had a pizza, beer, and packing party with future roommate and a co-worker. We got so much done! Thank God! Now all I need is the key to my new room and to move my clothes. It was very helpful having three sets of hands putting things I know I'm not going to need immediately in a box and moving them to the new apartment as I could. We had fun, too, or at least I did.

Now my "to-do" remaining pretty plastic. I knock a few items off, pack room up, go to Birmingham, wash clothes, and I'm only making room for more things to be added. Go to library, pack for beach, finish the weekend warrior list at work, sleep.

I've got so much going on in such a short period of time that burn out syndrome is really kicking in! I'm so ready for this vacation! More mentally than physically... especially after I had to step on that scale today... I'm so ready to have books, sun, and sand!! A whole week of zero responsibility: home, school, or work! -- OK, ONE responsibility that I didn't get to do today that must be done ASAP!

So after packing, working, moving, driving, waiting, pushing, organizing, recording, digging, fixing, bleeding, arguing, and I can't remember everything else because it's all blurring together, I'm sitting down and enjoying a beer.

I just may sleep tonight...

I'm taking Chuck Norris to the beach with me! Take that!

There is a storm. In the ocean. Headed for MY beach.

This isn't the news I had wanted to wake up to!

I will go to the beach next week anyway! DrSP wants to see me on TV in a mumu saying, "it sounded like a freight train," so I will make sure to pack that and rollers. Weather will not stop me from having a beach vacation.

The second storm all freaking year and it happens NOW? sheesh!

Actually, to be deliriously honest, that tropical depression #3 knows better than to trek it's way to my beach! It knows better than to waste it's energy forming a hurricane and threatening my condo! It knows I'll be there, and it's scared! Watch make haste and run away!!

Yes, I'm aware that's only slightly delusional...


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