hey... remember when i said i'd update more... oops!

there's been something on my mind to write about. basically how i've been feeling about a certain situation that happened before i moved out of kalamazoo. the reason i haven't updated this is because i've been wrestling with myself "should i, shouldn't i" and all that bullshit. i think that it will be cathartic and it will help me finally move on. this is not that post. but i have been meaning to update and i still will keep up with it. so... keep watching. also, there's an adorable cat picture up there for those of you who have been wondering where i've been. you're welcome. i'm also going to try to figure out how to add my twitter feed into this blog. anyway, that's what i came to say. enjoy the cat pic!

my wrist hurts...

Created by OnePlusYou

And there you have it. I'm really good a being caffeineated. Today after work I'm going to my first ever chiropractic appointment. I've been having problems with my right shoulder all week and my lower back has been hurting. Along with the jaw pain that it brough on by stress and the immense work out I got with softball this week, I'd say it's pretty deserved. I might try to get a massage next week as a birthday present to myself. What I really need is a very extended vacation. Like, for the rest of my life maybe? Although in certain ways, grad school will be like that. I'll be getting away from the things that are causing me the most pain. And heading straight for something that might cause me an equal amount of anguish. Awesome.

this makes too much sense.

Take this quiz at QuizGalaxy.com

technology and me

so i took this MASH quiz (you know, the quiz where you pick some dudes you want to marry and kids and cars and stuff and see who you end up with randomly?) and wanted to post it to my blog. the formatting was all off so i tried to fix it and then i ruined it. so i deleted it. but i will tell you what the game told me.

i will marry eric arnsman.
we will have one kid.
we will live in a mansion in australia.
we will drive a purple VW.
i will work as a truck driver and we will live happily ever after.

not a bad life, eh?

all hail the killer of plants!

There's a plant that sits behind me at work and it's dying. I like to think that it was dying before I worked here. Truthfully, it's probably my fault. Because it sits behind me, I never see it. I feel a little bit guilty that I don't take care of it, but mostly I'm waiting for it to die so I can find a replacement plant. At this point, I'm more interested to see if I can find an exact replica and replace it in the same pot without anyone finding out. I tried to complete Operation Plant Replacement while my boss was out of town, as she is the only one that mentions the state of the plant to me. Unfortunately, my local Meijer store didn't have these plants in stock then. This weekend is a holiday weekend so perhaps I can get one then.

I tried to save the plant before. It was wilting and getting brown around the edges and stems so I thought, "hey, I should water this sucker every day!" Did you know that plants can have too much water? And when they get too much water, they start turning brown at the bottom of the leaves? Combined with the lack of water for so long, the once green plant is green, then brown, then green, then brown again. I like to think of it as a zebra plant. The weird thing is that so far, NO ONE HAS REALLY NOTICED. I consider this a minor victory.

kangaroo dream

i know this probably isn't the most interesting of posts, but i had the strangest dream about a kangaroo last night. there was a kangaroo loose in downtown kalamazoo and the police were considering shooting it. eric and i found the kangaroo and tried to capture it so we could hide it. at first, the kangaroo was resisting and bounded away. eventually, we caught up with him by car where he hopped into the car and tried to bite me. somehow, i was able to calm him down and we all sat by the side of the road talking and laughing. i remember i was telling the kangaroo about a movie i saw and that i thought he would like. then the kangaroo wanted to play peek-a-boo so we did that for a while. for some reason, eric had a radio that was tuned into the police channel. we heard the police talking about how they had located the kangaroo on davis street and needed back up because it looked dangerous. i started screaming "we have to hide you!" and trying to push the kangaroo into the car. i saw the laser sights of one of the SWAT team members' rifle and told eric and the kangaroo to duck. i kept yelling "can't you just use a tranquilizer?!" and the SWAT team said that the kangaroo was too dangerous. i remember making eric and i both hug the kangaroo so they couldn't shoot it without shooting us. eventually, i think they killed the kangaroo or maybe i took it home. i can't remember the end of it. man, it was weird, though.

Way to go Michigan, way to go.

Yesterday it was raining a lot. Then, on my way to the gym, it started to look like snow. "Surely it's not snow," I said. "That would be ridiculous." Then it really starts to snow. Great. Awesome. My friend Christy and I are driving to Wayne State University tomorrow and hopefully it won't keep snowing. She's driving though, so it shouldn't be that bad.

About the gym: my legs are weaker than I thought. Everytime I have gone to the gym, I usually use the elliptical machine or the bike for at least 15 minutes. The leg exercises on the weight circuit have always been easier for me. So when I started this personal training stuff, I said I just wanted to work upper body. Then she asked me the other day if I wanted to add legs. I said, "sure," thinking it wouldn't be a problem. Whoa was I wrong! Those weights are H-E-A-V-Y. It didn't help that I had the foot strap on wrong. I'll have to keep doing the exercises a few times before it stops making my legs quiver. I felt like such a baby. Plus, I was wearing these ridiculously tight pants because I was sick of doing leg lifts and having my pants unravel to show everyone my white, white legs. Needless to say, I felt ridiculous. But there are other people there that wear more ridiculous things. So I'm ok.

bad girl... baaad girl

Today has been a good day. I had a freak out moment earlier in the work day because people kept coming up to me and saying "Here's this thing to do... I need it now." Normally, this would be fine but when there are three or four people asking this question it kind of makes me nervous.

I will post pictures later. I promise. My oldest cat, Merlin, has to go to the vet on Monday to get some tests done because he has been throwing up and I think he's lost a lot of weight. But he seems to be eating well and drinking. I'm really nervous about that. Especially because he will apparently become a "Senior cat" when he turns seven in August. Seven! I've had him for so long. I don't know what I'd do if something bad happened to him. Here's hoping it will go well.

oh, the things i can do!

This writing every day isn't working out like I had hoped. Mostly, I blame the sadness. And the sleeping. I should learn how to write while asleep. It would maximize my potential.

Over the weekend, I gave a waiter $3. Because he was complaining to the bartender about how another table, with a bill of $45, tipped him only four bucks. I felt bad and gave him the cash in my wallet. I was also drunk.

I should post pictures of cats and things. But I'm also thinking that my audience (this is you, boyfriend) sees enough of the cats that maybe I won't post that many pictures. But I think my blog looks boring so I'll add some kind of pictures.

I've been accepted to library science school but REALLY REALLY want to know about poetry school. Right now. This minute. My parents are going to Africa next week and I hope they don't get eaten by lions. Or African buffaloes.

weird habits i apparently have

Something I noticed last week about myself: when there's a pile of out-going mail here at the office, I have to arrange it by shape or it bugs the crap out of me. What I mean is that the biggest envelopes are on the bottom continuing until the smallest on top. I try to do this secretly and casually so no one thinks I'm going through their mail. Because the mail slot is right on my desk, I can't help but see it.

I also have a morning web-surfing routine that is really hard to get out of. I've tried. I always check my e-mail, LiveJournal, and Gaiaonline. In that order. If I have time, I'll check out Facebook. I've tried to change the order, or go to another site entirely and I can't do it. What a weird form of OCD.

The sizing thing also happens when I organize my books in a pile or papers or anything that are similar but different shapes. I can't help it. Piles get so awkward if you just mash things together.

wednesday bloody wednesday

I almost got into an accident on my way to work today because a stupid car decided it would be fun to spped up and try to merge in front of me instead of getting behind me. I was too busy playing with my iPod (whose battery is dead) to be as defensive as I usually am at this particular intersection, so I didn't hurry fast enough. So he got in. And I honked my horn and gave him the finger. I hate driving sometimes.

THE MAIL STILL HAS NOT BROUGHT ANY SCHOOL NEWS YET! I'm getting really, really, anxious about it. I just want to KNOW! Maybe I'm whining too much. There's also this stupid stuff going on with the Kalamazoo Film Society that is frustrating me a lot. I just wish they would leave us alone and not treat the Western Film Society like babies. I'm getting more and more disheartened with how the WFS is being treated in the community. I know it's out of my hands what happens next year but I still care.

I also added a link to Neil Gaiman's journal. He's talking about a new book of his that I must get. I'm trying not to buy too many books now. I really am getting rid of more this weekend so I shouldn't just replace the ones I get rid of. If I can whittle my collection down to fitting all in the one tall bookcase with some room left over, I'll be happy. Let's see how that goes.

anybody want my crap?

So I joined this website, freecycle.org, because you can create posts about things you have that you want to get rid of and people will hopefully respond and want to take your stuff. Holy cow, does this work. I was skeptical at first because I just thought "How many people will truly respond and take stuff?" The answer is "A lot." I packed up a box of books I no longer needed (read: I have too many and don't want to pack them all up and move them ever, ever again) and posted it on the site. Within a half an hour, someone responded and said that they wanted them. A couple of hours later, the books were gone. The same thing happened to a lamp, too. I'm waiting to see if someone will respond to the printer I left there but so far the woman hasn't written me back. The good news is, there are tons of others who want this printer. I should mention that I do not have the installation disk for the printer or a USB cord to hook the printer up. This doesn't seem to be a problem at all. How strange. I do have to resist responding to the messages people post on there about pets that need homes. Otherwise, I'd have five dogs and three more cats right now.

I listened to the newest "Learn German" podcast this morning. The guy talked about Guatemala! Apparently, he's taking a trip there and thought it would be a good idea to rattle off information about the country in German. It was... educational? Kind of interesting. It just reminded me of a text book I used in a class a while ago. I guess I learned something, though. And it's letting me hear German more often. That's good.

I was having problems with this iTrip thing for my iPod. I figured it out though. I found the manual as I was cleaning and read it for a minute. Apparently, you're only supposed to have the volume at a maximum of 70% on the iPod. I'd been turning it up all the way, so I wouldn't have to monkey around with the volume on my car stereo too much. Now that I've done the opposite, it works way better.

Later tonight, possibly tomorrow, I'll post pictures of funny things I found in thrift stores this weekend.

book hiding and pod listening.

Because I haven't had a chance to keep up with my German (read: I'm lazy and feel weird talking to myself) since I'm living in the US again, I recently subscribed to a few German podcasts. One of the is called "German Grammar Pod" which I mainly chose because of the cute name. It's taught by a British lady who speaks very, very deliberately. It's nice to have a refresher course in the grammar and I know it will help if I keep listening to it. Right now it's kind of boring. So is the second one I've listened to. That one goes through scenarios one might encounter in Germany. The episode I just listened to was "How to reserve a hotel room." The good thing about this is the host is German and sometimes slips into German speaking when he is explaining the situations. I think it's just nice to listen to German often. I haven't listened to the third one yet but it's from Deutsche Welle and is mostly news. I think (hope) I'll like that one better because I will have to listen really closely to understand what they say. My biggest problem right now is my ipod. It doesn't seem to want to stay charged for very long. I'll listen to it for about two hours and then the battery is low. Is this normal? I want to get a new one anyway, but can't exactly justify buying a new one until the summer. I want to get a new computer, too. We'll see what happens with grad schools before that becomes a real idea.

I joined this website today calle BookCrossing.com. Basically, you register your books and hide them around your town, country, whatever so that others may find them and read them. I figure it's a creative way of getting rid of the books I don't want anymore. I'll have to find a way to print off labels. And where to hide the books. Although that can be almost anywhere.

let's see how this goes, shall we?

This is a new... "project" I've decided to take on. I used to post stuff about my happenings while I studied abroad. It's been almost two years and I'm not in Germany anymore. I wanted a place to write often (daily might be asking too much right now) so this is it. I can't promise there will be great literature on here but I may post poems on occasion. Hopefully this will entertain someone.

paris (finally!!!)--sacre coeur, arc de triomphe, and the louvre

this is a picture of the train on the ride to paris. it was a four hour train ride and the way there we got to be in first class! that was pretty exciting for me. they even served us a lunch. the train was a french train company so it was slightly different than the german ones. if i had thought about it, we could have taken a much, much cheaper flight. but i thought the train would be easiest because shilo doesn't like being on planes. but we could have saved money. oh well. next time, i'll remember that.

this is a shot of this really pretty cloud i saw shortly after we arrived. we were on our way to see sacre coeur and i looked up and here was this cloud. so this is what the sky of paris looks like. more or less.

this is only a part of the million of steps we had to climb up on our way to the basilica. sacre coeur is the second highest point in paris, next to the eiffel tower. there were so many steps and it was so hot. by the time we got to the top all we wanted to do was sleep and drink massive amounts of water.

this is staci and shilo in front of sacre coeur. i tried to get them to take my picture a few times but neither one of them is very good at using my camera. so you'll see very little pictures of me, if any.

this is a better picture of the basilica. it's very beautiful.

this is the moulin rouge. it's pretty touristy. shilo was super disappointed when we got there. the original building looked nothing like this. it's kind of sad how touristy some parts of europe are. especially paris.

the next day we went to see the arc de triomphe (here) and the louvre. we tried to go shopping but we weren't having any luck. there were a couple times in paris where we wanted to do something but things were either closed or it just didn't work out. i'll have to go back again and visit the things i missed this time around.

this is the bottom half of the famous pyramid by i.m.pei in the louvre. here's a tip: if you want to go into the louvre, use the underground entrance. we didn't have to wait at all. and you can always go out the big glass pyramid way. it's pretty impressive either way you enter it, though.

you can only really take pictures of the sculptures in the louvre. there are some places where you can take pictures of paintings but only one or two places. these are some statues i thought were really nice. i can't remember what they were called or much about them but i have a book that probably says something about them. i don't know what this one was called but i found it pretty impressive.

not sure what this one is called either but i think the guy in the back is apollo. but i could be wrong. all of the sculptures were pretty impressive.

this one is called milo of crotona. i know this because it's in my book. he's being eaten by lions but in the real story, they were wolves that ate him. just so you know.

i found this one to be very impressive and interesting. i think bronze sculptures are really interesting, especially when they oxidize like this one. yup, i'm a dork.

this is part of the ceiling in the sculpture room. in case you didn't know, the louvre was a palace and became a public museum in 1793.

this is the famous venus de milo. they say that if her arms were still intact, they'd be able to tell who she was supposed to be because the arms are what shows the characteristics of the person.


these are two pictures of my favorite thing in the whole museum. it's called "the winged victory over samothrace" and it stood on a cliff so that everyone sailing into port would see it. it was so amazing. you had to walk up these steps to get to it and it took my breath away. staci's, too. it's just so huge and impressive.

this statue is called "psyche revived by a kiss from cupid." i think it's so beautiful.

and this is the outside pyramid. it's in the courtyard of the louvre. there are some cool fountains (one that is pictured here) around it and way, way too many pigeons. although i miss pigeons now, kind of.

anyway, i'll update more later. but later this week or something. i promise.

oh yeah....

i'm home in america now. i've been home for a while but i've been busy adjusting to america and working. i have to upload paris photos which i mean to do sometime this week. i hope no one thought i was dead. sorry if they did. i'm not dead.

BIRTHDAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

all right, last week i had a birthday. and i promise i'll only post a few pictures of fish. but there are way more to be seen when i get back. and a couple of small videos. but i'm sure you guys can wait.

SEEPFERDCHEN!!!!!!! they had a bunch of little seahorses. here's one of the best pictures i have of them.

here are some jellyfish. i wish the picture turned out better but they had a black light so you could see the jellyfish, that's why that one is glowing. but black light doesn't like to be photographed.

that little thing is a dogfish shark. there was this big pool where you could look over the tank at them. because there were so many people in the room, the sharks and rays kept poking their noses out of the water. i had my head a little over the edge to stare down into the water when one of the tiny sharks came halfway out of the water right in front of me. if i hadn't breathed and scared it away, it would have touched me. that would have been so cool.

and this is a sting ray. one of them almost touched me, too. it was really funny and weird to see them stick their noses and bodies out of the water. super funny.

and this is me on a dolphin. emily kept trying to make me wear this hat that we bought for her birthday but i kept taking it off. notice i'm not wearing it in this picture. in fact, i only have one picture where i'm wearing it. it was really ridiculous. i kind of regret getting it for emily... i didn't think she's make me wear it...

the we went swimming. this is a picture of the cheesecake that emily made and sheree brought to the swimming pool. for about a week before my birthday, emily kept talking about how she had this really great surprise thing for my birthday. and this is what it was! see, mom, you should make me one when i get back. and emily didn't think it was too hot outside to make a cheesecake. and we don't even have air conditioning here....

after swimming, we went to rheinkultur, which is the biggest free festival in germany. they have five stages set up and it goes all day long. there are tons of bands playing, too. the cool thing about this night was that one of my favorite bands, death cab for cutie, were playing. FOR FREE! it was pretty cool. but this picture just shows how many people were at the festival.

these are all the people i dragged along for my birthday: laura, martin, sheree, emily and katie. i tried to get them all smiling but someone thought it would be funny to make silly faces.... thanks.

this is a picture of death cab.

and this is another picture of death cab.

my birthday was really fun, as i said. i've been really busy with school finishing up and i haven't been going any cool places really. but in a ocuple of weeks i'll be in paris! and hopefully i can update this thing before then and also before i come home. which is really, really soon.

rhein boat cruise and the strokes in concert.

last wendesday we went on a boat cruise, arranged through the international club. it wasn't that exciting except we got one free drink and free weird sandwiches. i'm really excited for when i get back to america and can have normal sandwiches. not that i don't like these weird sandwiches, but i like american ones better sometimes.

this is a picture somewhere around königswinter.

this is definitely a picture of königswinter. you can see the castle ruins in the background. they look a lot smaller from down here. it's also a picture of part of the siebengebirge.

this is me, hanna, and sheree. hanna is from finland and is awesome. i want to go to finland now. she knows about five languages....

this is sheree, laura, and emily. laura is also from finland and is also awesome. like i said, finland must be a great place to live. and their language has *no* articles. not one "the" or "a". the only thing i've learned to say in finnish is "i am a bug". very useful.

last night i went to see the strokes, one of my favorite bands, in concert. it was SO AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!one this is actually a picture of the opening band, the eagles of death metal, who were ok but they're name is a lot better than they are. but the lead singer has got some really awesome moustache. you can't tell from here, but trust me, it's awesome.

ok, these are the strokes playing. i tried to pick the pictures that best showed that there were acutally people on stage. i couldn't get close enough to take better pictures due to the fact that the average height of the audience was eight feet, nine inches. ok, perhaps that's an exaggeration.

this is another picture of them. i was really excited to see them and to dance because i haven't danced in a while. i didn't mind so much being in the back because it gave me more room but i think there was a couple standing behind me that weren't amused by the dancing. oh well, they moved.

the lights at the concert were really cool, too. i should have taken a little video but my camera can't record sound so it would have been weird.

these last two pictures were probably the best that i took.

that's all for now. saturday is my birthday (sigh) so i'll have pictures from that soon. i definitely going to the aquarium and there's a free concert that day, too. neat.

BRUSSELS!!!!!!!!!!

last weekend i went to brussels. it's about a three hour train ride away and we left early in the morning. when we got to brussels, i took this as a good omen: batman!

this is the mannequin pis. the story of this statue is that a nobleman and his young son were walking around when his son got lost. the nobleman looked for his son but couldn't find him. a day, or a couple days later, he saw his son peeing on a street corner. he was so happy at the return of his son, he decided to put up a stautue in the exact position his son had been found in. now the people of brussels dress it up sometimes for special occasions.

this is a bunch of lavender bushels. brussels is known for lavender apparently.

this is a statue in the courtyard of the old city hall. we couldn't actually go in the city hall which was kind of a bummer.

this is the city hall.

this is a statue for all the martyrs. there are a bunch of names (i'm assiming of martyrs) listed on bronze panels below the statue but i couldn't figure out how to get down there to get a better look.

this is the crazy chair thing in the church of notre dame de finistère. it's completely made out of wood and is awesome.

this is the cathedral in brussels. because we went there sunday morning, we could go inside the church but couldn't walk around or take pictures because there was a service in progress.

this is the front of the palace in brussels. again, we couldn't go into the palace which was a real bummer but we did get to have a look around the old palace ruins under tha palace. the cool thing about going to see the ruins is that you have to enter this code to go through the door so we felt like we were spies or something. that was fun.

this is a really cool fountain. the top part spins around, probably due to water pressure.

so... brussels. not really that interesting of a town. we probably could have been there only for a day and seen all of this. but we did go to a really neat art museum on sunday. anyway, that's all for now.