my week

I've been busy doing.... stuff. So I am going to steal JamFla's idea and just post about my week because I haven't been updating because I can't think of anything to post. We shall start with Monday.

Monday I went golfing with my sister and her husband. Well actually my sister just rode along in Robert's cart, but whatev. I forgot how much I LOVE to golf! I am not half bad either, which is surprising because I haven't actually played that much. I played 2 summers ago once or twice and last year I played once. I don't do too bad when there is someone that can give me pointers and tell me how I should be hitting the ball. I am even thinking about getting my own set of clubs! After golfing I went in to go to work. I got off an hour early which I was stoked about! I then went over to my sister's house and swam in their pool while drinking copious quantities of beer. 

On Tuesday I nursed my hangover and ate Paul Revere's lunch buffet and then fell asleep watching a movie that was horrible (in plot and acting) but actually had a few funny moments that made me laugh. So if you ever have a chance to watch Fired Up for free and have nothing better to do I would say you should watch it. But don't pay money for it and if you have something better to do than by all means do that instead. After my nap I played softball at 6 for our Coed league in Fort Madison. We won, of course. We are actually undefeated so far for the season. But after the game I decided I need to go to the batting cages before our next game because my hitting was AWFUL. After the game I went over to my sister's house and watched the DVR'ed version of the Bachelorette from Monday.

Wednesday I also had the day off of work. I got up in the morning, went to the gym for a couple hours and then mowed the grass at my house, which only takes about 35 minutes... but it was so humid and hot out!! My friend Nissa and I were going to go to the new Transformers movie but called the theatre and found out that they were sold out of all performances for the day, so instead we went to the bar where she works. I ended up losing 6 games of euchre in a row which was a pathetic display of my euchre abilities.

On Thursday I worked in the morning and then mowed the lawn of some people that asked me to while they were out of town, it took about 3 hours and it was HOT outside!! Plus I ran out of gas with literally one more row of grass to mow on the whole lawn and that sucked. After that I went home with all intentions of going to work out, but I was exhausted and sunburnt so I ended up falling asleep on the couch. I went with my sister up to Burlington to watch the guys from our coed softball team play some games for their men's softball league. They won both games so yay for them! Afterwards I went over to my friends house and won 2 games of euchre, trying to redeem myself from the night before! But I was so tired I had to go home early. 

Friday morning my mom, my sister, and I left early to go up to Iowa City and shop in Coralville. I ended up getting a pair of sweet sunglasses and a new swimsuit which I love! I got the top at Dillards and the bottoms from Old Navy. Then we took my mom to the doctor's so she could get this shot in her knee that is supposed to help it feel better. She has still been having major problems with it since her surgery 2 and a half years ago. Then when we got home yesterday around 5 I put my new swimsuit on, got in my sister's pool and proceeded to get plowed again. Swimming and drinking is way cooler than going to the bar!! I ended up going to bed before 1 a.m. and sleeping until 11 ish which was actually awesome because I felt fine all day today!

Today I woke up, went to workout and then showered and went to work. Now it is off to bed so that tomorrow morning I can get up bright and early and drive to Cedar Falls to pick up Alisha and some of my furniture I still need to bring back home. And I have to be back by 4 to go to work! It's going to be a long day!

thesis status: untouched

So yesterday was supposed to be my day off this week. My plan was to wake up reasonably early, get my run and workout in, then work on my thesis for at LEAST 3 solid hours of progress. Not exactly how my day turned out. I told Mary I would work for her in the morning while she went to her job interview. So I worked from 9 to noon for her. Immediately afterward I went to the gym for my workout. I stopped by my grandma's house briefly to drop off a shirt of mine that she is going to fix. I receive a text message asking if I could work for someone else. I said I don't want to work the whole shift, so I told her I could at least work from 4 to 7. Then my mom makes me mow before I go back in. So my day of productiveness was completely shot down because after mowing I only had time for a shower before work. Then I ended up working until 10 because the person did not show up at 7 as she was supposed to and then proceeded to ignore all of my calls and text messages.... so all in all yesterday sucked. I have to work tonight, tomorrow, Saturday and Sunday but I do have 3 days off next week which is unheard of!!! So hopefully nobody asks me to cover their shifts so that I can get some thesis writing and job hunting done!

gotta get out of this place

Fort Madison... home of the largest double swing-span bridge in the world... the home of the Iowa State Penitentiary... the bane of my existence. So I went to Des Moines this past weekend with my friend. I went along because I'm broke and it was pretty much a free ride, she was taking a continuing education class on Saturday and Sunday morning and the hotel was paid for so I agreed to go with her. The highlight of the trip was getting to see JamFla for lunch at Claxon's which had delicious food and a waitress that was completely overwhelmed... with all 3 of her tables. We felt bad for her. 

Anyway, I called Alisha on Sunday while I was waiting for Nissa's class to let out. I called to chat and more importantly to tell her Happy Birthday! I ended up talking to her for about an hour. She gave me a much needed kick in the pants during our conversation. I have since decided that I am going to continue to work at Hall's for now, finish my thesis, search for jobs in Boston, and move out there with Alisha when I have completed my thesis. This will give me a goal to get back on the thesis train since I have been majorly slacking since I've been home. I have also decided that even if I can't find a job directly relating to one of my degrees, then I will just get a job period and move out there. 

Alisha has so many good points when she points out all of the good reasons that I am in Fort Madison. The point is that there is about one good reason and that is the fact that my family lives here. But lets be honest, they aren't going anywhere and neither is FM and I can ALWAYS come back. Since I am 24 years old, single, without a serious job, or kids, or anything tying me down.... now is the time to move out of my comfort zone. So my plans for the next few months include saving as much money as possible for the move, and to get into gear and finish my thesis. And also to lose 20 more lbs before heading to Boston!!!

I missed May... oops.

So I guess since I missed the whole month of May that maybe it is time to update. I have moved back to Fort Madison although I am not completely done with school. I need to finish coding my data for my thesis and then write the results and discussion. Since I have come back to Fort Madison I am currently living at my mom's house. I have been home for almost a month and have probably slept at my mom's house a total of 8 times. I pretty much come to this town and am constantly doing things all the time and come home to shower and eat the occasional meal. I have worked on my thesis a total of 1 hour while I have been back, which I definitely need to change. I need to just get it done, even though I am not going to graduate until December anyway, I just want to have it done so I don't have to worry about it anymore. I have not applied for any "real" jobs yet because I'm not sure where I want to live. Right now I am working at the Ice Cream shop that I have worked at for 10 years. Although I make decent money, I am not getting full time hours and I need a job with that and health insurance to make me feel secure.

I have been living in a drunken state for the majority of the first half of the month that I came home. Life transitions make me have the urge to drink. Plus my friend and I started hanging with these guys from out of town that drink like fish. On a side note I will discuss places I have slept/passed out besides my mom's house: My sister's house - I haven't slept there as often as I used to because her newest dog makes my allergies flare up really bad. Nissa's house - I have slept there quite a few times, whether it be because she lives way out in the country and I get too tired to drive home after a late movie night, or one night I passed out on the living room floor because I have taken part in a wine chugging contest with her roommate (I won of course). The guys' apartment - there are two guys from out of town who are in FM for a year for work, needless to say Nissa and I have passed out there many a time. Nate and Travis' house - I do not drink and drive anymore which is why I sleep at so many random places, I slept here cause I had drank quite a bit so I just passed out on the couch. Ex's house - now this has happened on 2 occasions. I probably shouldn't have even gone back down this road, but its too late.... because I did. So now I am just going to try to make sure it doesn't happen in the future.

On a positive note I started training this week for The Bix (I would post a link to the website by my internet is janky.) Anyway, it is a 7 mile run in Davenport. I hope that I will be able to make it! I have been running about 1 to 1.5 miles for a few months now, but can never really get myself motivated to run further than that. For my training this week I am running 2 miles, next week it pushes me to 3 and 5 miles... I hope I can do it!

texts from last night

So I am in love with this new website that I found. It is called Texts From Last Night and it is amazing! I have often woken up and read texts in my inbox OR outbox that make no sense or are completely ridiculous. This website makes me feel completely normal about such texts. I've also (and this is sad) gotten good at deleting texts while I'm still drunk and don't remember to save myself the embarassment of having to remember what happened the previous night when I was wasted. This website was created a few months ago and you submit texts that you find from the night before. You just have to put your area code, so its anonymous but people know the general vicinity of where all the wastedness is happening. I think it is hilarious. I have gone through and read most of the older archives as well and some of them just crack me up! I hope you all get a kick out of this website as well. I was actually going to post one on the website that I received from JamFla that went something like this "Dear Dave Dragon, please do not fondle me when you come back to bed." but I couldn't remember exactly what the text was because I accidentally deleted it. :(

one step closer... to nowhere

So as of yesterday I am officially done with my interviews for my thesis. I am done collecting data! Now I just have to analyze it and write about it. I still have to finish transcribing the interviews but that shouldn’t take too long because I actually enjoy doing that a little bit. I then have to start coding the interviews and pulling out themes and topics that are discussed within the interviews. After that I will have to write, revise, and rewrite (probably 10 times) the Methods, Results, and Conclusion sections of my thesis. Then I defend it and I’m done! Now that I type it out it kind of seems like quite a lot to do still, but at least getting the interviews done allows me to cross one more thing of my “thesis to-do” list.

I am officially not going to graduate until August or maybe even December, but I will be done way before I get my actual diploma, so I need to start applying for jobs. As of now I am going to go back to Fort Madison at the beginning of May and work at Halls for the summer to make some money and start saving for a move somewhere else or a motorcycle (whichever tickles my fancy). But I also want to start applying for real jobs right away and hopefully get my foot in the door.

 

I have two main dilemmas. 1) I’m not exactly sure which types of jobs I should be applying for. However this dilemma is easily remedied by the fact that I’m going to just apply for anything I am qualified for because I just want to get a job (with any luck it will be one with health insurance!) Plus when I was talking about how I like transcribing, I think that I am going to try to work for a couple years and make money and all that, and then apply to an online program to be a Court Reporter. I really think I would like that job and they make pretty decent money and you can do the degree online in 2 years.

My second dilemma – Where should I live/look for jobs? I have realized in the past couple of years that I don’t think I am a big city girl like I once though. I really do like Fort Madison and the small town atmosphere. I like that I don’t have to plan an extra hour or two into travel time for simple tasks and errands like you have to do in places like Chicago. I also like the fact that my family is in Fort Madison. I am also not sure if I could move somewhere that I don’t know anyone. But the biggest problem with staying in FM is that I am not confident that I will find a guy there. This could be untrue, but I feel like I’ve met everyone there and I just don’t feel that anyone there is right for me. Hopefully I’m wrong! But I don’t want to settle for someone that is less than what I want or deserve just for the sake of staying in my comfort zone in FM. So I am perplexed. What should I do?

the right stuff

So I attended the New Kids on the Block concert in Moline, Illinois on April 2nd, 2009 which started at approximately 7:30 p.m! I did not write about this glorious event in my life until now because I knew that Dru and Jam were going to the same concert last night in Des Moines and I didn't want to spoil any part of the experience.

I distinctly remember the night when I was home in FM and my friend Nissa and I were out at the bar and she got excited and mentioned that NKOTB were going to be playing close to us and we should go. I immediately agreed with her! She ended up getting the tickets a couple weeks later. When I asked her how much the tickets were she said around $60. I remember thinking to myself that that was quite a bit of money, being as I don't have any form of income this semester and I used to be an avid rock concert goer and the average price of rock concert tickets is usually less than $35. She told me she could find someone else to go to the concert, but I sucked it up and forked over the $75 (there are always hidden surcharges and fees added to the price of the ticket).

So last Thursday we headed to Davenport at about 1:30 in the afternoon. We also went with two other girls, one is married to the brother of one of my friends and the other girl I had met once briefly but did not really remember that well. We decided to stop and eat at Hooter's before the concert. After that we still had time to kill so we went to the mall for about an hour. We then headed over the bridge to the concert. I was curious to see what the crowd was going to be like. It was just how I expected, 90% of the crowd was women, 9% were little girls, and 1% were gay guys. I think I saw about 10 straight guys at the whole concert.

The Jabbawokeez opened up for the New Kids. I thought this was a brilliant idea. They were highly entertaining but didn't drag on too long, and the tear down and set up time betweeen them and NKOTB was minimal because there were not instruments and what not to be moved and taken down.

When the lights went back down for New Kids I seriously felt like I was 9 years old again. I was so excited and giddy it was ridiculous! So here are my overall observations and critiques of the concert:

1. It was amazing! I had such a blast it was ridiculous!
2. I was so excited at how many of their old songs they played! I figured most of the music would be from the new album.
3. I loved how they did the original dance moves too!
4. Danny is ripped!
5. Jon didn't really seem like he wanted to be there.
6. Joey and Jordan still got it!
7. The concert only solidified my choice as a young girl.... I am STILL in love with Donnie! I remember when I was little that everyone was always in love with Jordan.. but I was then and still am a sucker for the bad boy of the group.

8. If I go to another concert I will pay the $700 to sit in the front row if it means I get to make out with Donnie like the girl at our concert did!!! So jealous!
9. I was going to get a Donnie button when the show ended but all they had left was Jordan, Jon, or Danny :(
10. All in all the concert was amazing and I had a blast. Before the concert I had had a rough week of drinking and a sore throat, so half way through the concert I literally couldn't talk at all!