Bangs!

There are a few things in this world that make me nervous (cats, the ocean, my first grade teacher, teenage girls, giant cows-particularly those that jump out at you when you’re on a peaceful bike-ride along the river, Jurassic Park …and the list goes on). However, I have found that sometimes my greatest joys have been in overcoming my nerves and, if not embracing them, at least confronting them. I live with a cat. I ride my bike when I’m home in Idaho despite the fact that a monstrous creature may suddenly pop out at me any second. I watched Jurassic Park for the first time in years the other day and although I almost peed my pants, I made it through the whole thing. As for my first grade teacher, she’ll always make me nervous…

Anyway, one of the things that tops my list of fear-producers are bangs. I don’t know why they make me so nervous. After all, my hair grows particularly fast, and if I hated them, they could be hidden for a few weeks while they turned into “side-swept bangs”, the safe alternative to going “all the way”. So, after trying all week to get Max to cut them (he didn’t think he qualified), I decided I would have to do it myself (I wasn’t about to pay $20.00 for someone to cut a straight line). So, for better or worse…bangs.

At least for the next few weeks…

Meow Meow, the Schizophrenic Feline

All little girls love kittens…and I was no exception. We once had a stray cat leave a surprise litter of 3 tiny kittens under our back porch when I was about 5 years old. I couldn’t have been happier about it. I played with them every day from sun-up to sun-down, cried my little heart out when the runt didn’t make it, and threw a fit when my mother made us give them away. But-a long time has passed since 5-year-old-Christie, and the place in my heart for felines has been filled with other things. Don’t get me wrong, I wish I liked them. Oh, how I wish I liked them! I just don’t. I can’t. I won’t!

My roommate, on the other hand, has successfully carried her child-like love for cats into adulthood. It has been somewhat of a running joke throughout college how much she loved them. We bought her stuffed mechanical cats for her birthday (which she so cordially named after me), sent her cat-singing you-tube videos to brighten her day, and even managed to obtain some AMAZING cat-covered tights to shield her legs from the Rexburg cold. But-apparently it wasn’t enough. One day…a couple months ago…it was no longer just a joke.

Her co-worker, who had a cat (or two) to spare, graciously gave Julie the thing that would quickly take my place as her favorite living, breathing mammal in the apartment. The morning I woke up to meowing at my bedroom door I knew life as I knew it was over. I tried so hard over the next few weeks to accept that there was a cat roaming around our little apartment 24 hours a day…but there are just some things I will never get used to. I will never get used to the subtle cat smell in the air. I will never get used to the fact that she poops in our closet. I will never get used to the fact that no-matter how hard I have tried to train her not to go in my room (and even when I swear my doors are shut), she ends up in my closet, trying on my shoes. I will never get used to being interrupted in everything I do, by someone that wants to play along.

I will never get used to her watching me pee…that’s just weird. I will never get used to the fact that she picks at our couch, carpet, and our adorable wicker chair, fraying the edges. And I will certainly never get used to her trying to sneak a drink out of my cup, every single time I turn my back.

I even have nightmares about her...like a couple nights ago when I dreamt that she was angry at me and came to ransack my whole bedroom and tore everything apart…woke up in a cold sweat after that one.

Last night though, I came to the realization that if I am forced to co-exist with a 4-legged creature, I better try to make the best of it. The one thing I find somewhat amusing about her is that she acts like no other cat I have ever come in contact with (not that there has been many…). But, even better, is the fact that we have diagnosed her with a mental illness. Not just ANY mental illness though…one of the greatest….Schizophrenia (possibly from the great big conk on the head she sustained about a week after being in Ju Ju’s care). Now, over the past 10 months that I have spent in the ER, I have come in contact with my fair share of Schizophrenics….and believe me…she exhibits all the characteristics. First of all, she acts inappropriately for her species (I swear she thinks she’s a dog the way she lays on her back and begs to have her belly rubbed)

Secondly, and most amusingly, is the way she spazzes out at absolutely nothing, and bolts straight into Julie’s room as if her life depended on it, hangs out for a second, and then comes back out like nothing ever happened (that’s her paranoia acting out…as it often does in Schizophrenics).
Lastly, she just LOOKS schizophrenic.

Ha ha, okay okay, so Julie helped out a little on this one, but regardless…

Despite my obvious, and often vocal dislike of Meow Meow (oh ya, her name is “meow-meow”), I put up with her and her crazy tactics because of the obvious (and quite sickening) love that Julie has for her.

So…welcome to apt 628, Meow Meow.

Just don’t pop my fragile, air-filled mattress or I will be the one spazzing out on your little feline tushy...

Alamo Metro Chorus

I mean to do a lot of things. I mean to run 4 miles every morning before work. I mean to wash my sheets once a month. I mean to drink 2 liters of water a day. I mean to finally get a Texas drivers license. I mean to buy a scentsy. I mean to learn the piano. I mean to go to Ireland. I mean to write my mother. I mean to keep a journal. I mean to wash the bird poop off my car. I mean to blog twice a week…and so on…but-I have finally started to do some of the things I’ve been meaning to do…first on the list; join a choir (and no, ward choir does not count).


I have been looking online for choirs to join, but with my crazy, ever-changing and evening-crashing work schedule, a choir that I could squeeze in was hard to come by. I have one day consecutively off a week…and although that day SHOULD be Sunday, it’s Thursday. After much searching of the world-wide web, I found a choir that just so happened to meet every Thursday. And it just so happened to be an all-women chorus. And it just so happened to be a barbershop chorus. AND, it just so happened to be full of women 3 times my age. I couldn’t have been more excited.

I have been going now for the past few weeks and I have loved every second of it. I love that I got hugs from several women the first week I was there, and more-so the second and third. I love that they try to set me up with their grandsons. I love that I am forced to sing so hard my voice is raw by the end of the three hours. I love that I have to practice. I love that there is an 85 year old in the choir who is a master ping-pong champ. I love that they all go out for margaritas afterward. I love that they do dancing warm-ups (that I still cannot figure out how to do). I love that they have a good news minute at the end of practice…just like relief society. I love that they joke about broken hips and doctors appointments. I love that it’s all acapella. But most of all, I love that I get to wear things like this when we perform…

Aged to perfection.

Sexy Chefs

 

Who said cooking had to be limited to cooking...?

Things women should never have to do.

Raising a family with nine girls put a lot of stress on my dad. Not only did he have to go on countless daddy-daughter dates, keep his mouth shut when we were PMSing (often at the same time), learn to step through the living room without demolishing our barbie house which had taken over, make flower head wreaths (out of weeds of course), compliment our new outfits or hair-do's, or, heaven forbid, participate in girl talk, BUT, he had to do all the things that women should never have to do. You know, things like un-clogging the toilet, changing the tires, killing the spiders, building the shelves, barbecuing the hamburgers...manly things. Unfortunately, although my dad is still a handy-man, he has become a lot less handy...especially since I moved 3,000 miles away. So, I get stuck with having to do stuff like this:

I need a husband.

i love food.

So...I was looking through my pictures the other day and noticed a startling thing...90% of them were either of me stuffing my face, or something that I was about to stuff my face with. I knew before coming down to Texas that I would be in one of the fattest states in the country, but that didn't stop me. In fact, it was a bit appealing. After all, I love food. I love making it, I love sharing it, I love going out for it, I love learning about it, I love experimenting with it, I just started trying to grow it, but most of all I love eating it....and eating it...and eating it. Here's a little sampler for you of what has filled my tummy just within the last couple months...and we are not even going to mention the food I ate in Mexico! (that will have to come later)...

Rudy's BBQ

my personal chef, and pre-tempura-ed veggies...SO good!

the cove; great atmosphere, great food, great company.

by far most amazing ribs ever...made, once again, by my personal chef.

strawberry ice-cream at the strawberry festival!

reason number three why I love Canada: wonderbras...I mean bars.

Moroccan Bites and Julie's amazing dessert/dinner.

Fresh veggie salad from the garden...with the gardener himself.

turkey legs at the rodeo!

funnel cake...with EVERYTHING on it.

spurs dog...no wiener of waterton...but we're a little to far south for that.

thanksgiving pumpkin pie.

apple feast at inks lake at sunset

Pineapple upside-down cake...an Alton Brown masterpiece.

Mount St. Dillon

Julie's gumbo!

Our favorite mobile taco restaurant. 

Green: most incredible vegetarian cuisine in San Antone.

river tree bistro

Welcome to San Antonio...

Hammocks

One of the first things I found out about Max when we started dating was that he slept in a hammock; not occasionally, not whenever he wanted to nap in the cool afternoon shade, but ALL the time. He had removed his bed from his bedroom and replaced it with a hammock where he would sleep that whole semester. Although I thought it was a bit on the insane side, ideas like these have always drawn me to him. I just never thought I would succumb to them…

It was two in the morning (once again, past my hour of reckoning), and we were deep in the heart of Mexico. Now, when I say deep, I mean deep. We had come upon El Tajin, the ancient ruins we were planning on exploring, but they didn’t open until the morning so we had some night to kill. Max decided it would be a brilliant idea to drive out into the middle of nowhere and set up the hammock for the night. So we drove…and drove….and drove...down countless winding roads through nothing but fields and forests until we came upon the perfect spot. In the middle of what turned out to be a cornfield (I realized in the morning), he tied up the hammock to some avocado trees and we spent the rest of the night in a hammock in the Mexican wilderness.

I was amazed that:
1. We weren’t eaten by Mexican wildcats. In fact, the only contact we had with any life at all was the next morning when a man drove his car all the way down to where we were, got out, barfed in the cornfield, and then got back in his car, turned around, and left. Hm…whatever.
2. It never got cold. We stayed warm with just Max’s amazing Mexican blanket purchased on a previous trip down..and a little cuddling of course.
3. We were not arrested and incarcerated in a Mexican prison. We had NO idea whose field we were in but were pretty sure if someone came to kick us out, we could just act like we didn’t speak Spanish. Well…Max would act, I would be sincerely clueless.
4. Hammocks are surprisingly comfortable.

Max, after a wonderful nights sleep.

The corn/whatever field we called home for the night.

The long windy road that took us there.