Things

First thing: I hope you've been following some of the going ons with Armchair BEA. I have loved the interviews and all the fun posts. It's been pretty fabulous.

Second thing: I am currently in a car. Driving. To Washington. I am rather excited for my little mini-vacation. Sister B and I are going to our cousin's high school graduation. Plus, I really needed a weekend vacation. Right now. Memorial Day came at the PERFECT time. Seriously. This holiday will get me through the next month until the 4th of July. I'm ready for summer. SO ready.

Third thing: Friday Fill-Ins! YAY! I hope you enjoy these and I'll be back on the internets on Tuesday! Much love y'all! Peace!

1. Brownies -- the best food to take on a picnic.
2. Summer can't come soon enough for me right now.
3. I have a love/hate relationship with flip flops.
4. To love someone is to forget yourself.
5. This summer I want to take a really a long hike.
6. When I crave food, it's usually sweet or salty.
7. And as for the weekend, tonight I'm looking forward to arriving in Washington, tomorrow my plans include hangin' with the cousins and Sunday, I want to go to my first high school graduation since my own!!

Armchair BEA: INTERVIEW!!!

Welcome all y'all to my interview of Florinda from The 3 R's Blog. I was really excited to interview her and read the other interviews with Armchair BEA because I don't know many book bloggers and today's day of interviews gives me a chance to meet more people who love to read! So without further ado - here's Florinda!

1. What is the book that made you fall in love with reading?

I'm not sure I can remember the book, to be honest. I've been reading since I was four, and that was many, many years ago - I can't remember a time I didn't have a book with me once I learned how to read by myself, and I've always read one book right after the other. But I do remember some of the earliest books I loved and read and re-read: the Betsy-Tacy books by Maud Hart Lovelace, about girls growing up in small-town Minnesota in the early 20th century (the series follows them from elementary school through marriage and motherhood); the Melendy family stories by Elizabeth Enright; Eleanor Frances Lattimore's children's fiction set in both China and contemporary America; and, of course, Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House books.

2. I'll be honest - I'm more of a book blog stalker than writer, but I do read quite a bit. So,what do you enjoy most about combining reading with blogging?

I was never good at keeping a reading journal, but thanks to blogging, I finally have one! Knowing at the back of my mind that I'll be trying to capture my impressions of a book in a written record has helped me read more carefully and thoughtfully, and I'm glad that's happened. But what I really love is that I've found so many other avid readers in the book-blogging community - people who constantly point me toward new books to read, and who love to talk about the books we've read already!

3. I recently graduated from college and I didn't read much fiction during those 5 years of schooling. I remember feeling very daunted at jumping back into reading anything fun. So, what book are you most likely to recommend to someone who is looking to get back into the reading scene and has missed basically everything awesome?

I don't really have one "go-to" book recommendation - I try to base my suggestions on knowing something about the person and her interests. But having said that...in the situation you mention, Suzanne Collins' The Hunger Games series is not to be missed - and since the final book in the trilogy is due out in August, this is a great time to start on it!

4. You participate/host a lot of fun memes/daily topics. Which one is your favorite and why?

I don't really participate in as many memes as I used to, but I've used some of them as jumping-off points for my own features. My favorite participation meme is the Sunday Salon, which I finally joined last year. I like it mostly because it's so free-form it really isn't a proper meme, but it does give me a good framework for a weekly reading recap and some discussion of book/blog topics. My favorite self-developed feature is the Week-End Review, which I usually post on Fridays. That's my place to share the great links I come across in my blog reading - which I love to do - and it's also place for non-book-related discussion and general stuff that I might not be able to build a full post around.

5. What's your biggest guilty pleasure?

At this point in my life, I'm really working on not feeling guilty about my pleasures! But most of the ones I have aren't book-related. There's definitely some music on my iPod that I might skip past if I'm not alone, because I don't want to be judged on it - and since I know I judge other people on their (questionable, to me) musical tastes, I tend to expect the same! TV is a big source of my guilty pleasures too - for the last couple of years, my prime one has been Smallville on The CW - but since next year will be its last season, I guess I'll be looking for another one soon!

6. Are you a good boy or a bad boy kind of girl when it comes to books? And who is your favorite good/bad boy?

I can see the allure of the bad boy, but I'm past the point in my life where I have much patience with them any more, so I go for the good guys in fiction - and in real life, too. And I can't pick a favorite - I've met too many of them in all my years of reading!

and finally...

7. If you had the opportunity to go to BEA which author would you want to meet and why?

I probably wouldn't have had an answer to this question before I started working on my own Armchair BEA posts, since I really didn't even know who'd be there - but now that I've checked out the list, my #1 choice would be Jon Stewart, for reasons that have little to do with the fact that he and the Daily Show writers have a new book coming out! Since I get tongue-tied and stupid when I meet authors, it might be for the best if I didn't actually try to meet and talk with any of them, to be honest...but after reading her blog and three of her books, I'd like the chance to meet Beth Kephart.

Thanks so much for answering my questions Florinda! Be sure to stop by her blog to learn more about her and read her great reviews! Also - don't miss my interview over at Tales of a Capricious Reader and the other great interviews can be found at Armchair BEA Central!

Armchair BEA, Ten on Tuesday and a sad story

okay, let's start at the beginning shall we? Today kicks off the beginning of BEA in NY. My friend Angie over at Angieville is currently walking the halls and meeting awesome people. I couldn't attend BEA for realsies, so instead I'm participating in Armchair BEA. What is Armchair BEA you ask? Well, go HERE for a great little explanation. I have a few posts lined up for this event and I hope to attend the Twitter party for a little bit! Make sure to visit me tomorrow when I interview Florinda over at The 3 R's Blog. It's going to be a fun little event and I'm excited to be a participant this year.

Let's skip Ten on Tuesday for a minute - you'll find that meme below the sad story.

SAD STORY:
I burned my hand on my curling iron this morning. It hurts. It's not just a little burn, it's about the size of a nickel and it HURTS. I've run it under cold water, put aloe vera on it, put ice on it and it still hurts. sad right? I know.

Okay, so the sad story wasn't that long. don't sue me k?

Moving swiftly on...

TEN ON TUESDAY! by Chelsea at Roots and Rings

1. What is your favourite piece of furniture in your house?
hmmm. I am in love with my bed. I upgraded to a Queen size bed after graduation and I am in major love.

2. If it was raining so hard on a Saturday that you couldn’t leave your house, what would you spend the day doing?
Oh I could easily spend the whole day reading curled up in my blanket, but if that day was today I would probably spend it cleaning, cooking and getting things ready for my vacation this weekend.

3. What was your favourite candy as a child?
oh I LOVED going to the little burger joint up the street and purchasing penny candy. An assortment of sour patch kids, swedish fish (in just red and multi-colors!) and those watermelons and stuff. Oh yeah. so yummy.

4. Did you get an allowance? What was it based on? What did you do with it?
Nope. No allowance. I did have a paper route at age 10 and that's how I earned my money to pay for my pointe shoes.

5. Do you have a favourite Etsy store?
Not really, but my mom has one so I guess that's my favorite!!

6. Do you prefer time with family or time with friends?
I love time with both of them.

7. Looney Tunes, Tiny Toons, or Animaniacs?
Looney Tunes. That's the good stuff.

8. Best daytime talk show: Oprah, Ellen, The Doctors, Tyra (ha!), Dr. Oz, or Dr. Phil?
Since I work all day, I really don't watch daytime anything. However, when I've been home sick or on vacation, I love Ellen
.
9. Would you rather have the power of invisibility or the ability to fly?
Oh this one is hard. There are pros and cons to both, but I'd have to go with the ability to fly. That just sounds awesome.

10. Name 1 thing you love about being an adult.
I love that I get to choose my meal plans and what I do from day to day. No one tells me what to do.

WTF???

you guys, it is SNOWING!!! SNOWING! on May 24th, we have inches of snow. I'm not so happy about this. It is not fun, just COLD.

Also, I had a pretty crap Saturday. I was hoping to get 3-5 things done on my to-do list. NONE of them got done. Instead I spent 4+ hours at a studio hoping to get pictures done for my company and not one picture got taken. It was awful.  The story is a lot longer than that, but I don't feel like going into it.

Although, SwingKid and I went to the rec center Friday night for our date - which was so much fun and then we doubled friends of ours and went to OZZ and played pool for 2 hours. That was also a BLAST! :o)

Other than that, I'm just happy it's Monday. Odd, I know - but I am leaving Friday for Washington so I only have a 4-day work week. Happy day. I can't wait to have a little min-vacay.

one year ago
two years ago
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life is hard sometimes...

you know what? this week has been pretty rough on me. It has been an emotional roller coaster. All week I've been thinking about and listening to a song from Jekyll and Hyde for an audition for Annie Get Your Gun. I've been all sorts of excited about it AND THEN I realized that if I make this musical I won't be able to go to VA with Sister B when she's coming back from her study abroad. The musical runs through that entire time. So I'd have to go to VA a different time. Which shouldn't be a big deal, but unbeknowst to me, my mom wants to do a family photo.

So now...now, I'm just not sure. Plus, I had a mental breakdown last night over the whole shenanigan. Well that and something SwingKid said. Nothing bad per se, but combine that with the not so good week I've had, the crappy experience trying to find contacts that work (still working on this!) and the whole do I or don't I with the musical...his one little phrase threw me for a loop. So I cried. Because that's what I do when I've let too many things build up inside of me. I cry and can't express anything because it's not ONE thing that's making me cry. It's five hundred bazillion. Poor SwingKid, I think he's just starting to understand that.


Anyways.  Sorry to rant and go off on this long tangent that is vague and rather alarming - but I promise I'm doing okay. I just need a weekend of relaxation. Which I just might get once I figure out what to do about the audition tonight. :P

Let's move on shall we? It's Friday so that means we get to have some Friday Fill-Ins fun!!

1. SwingKid tickling me never fails to make me smile.
2. I'm looking forward to my little weekend getaway next weekend. WAHOO!
3. My coworker's Pandora is what I'm listening to right now.
4. Potato salad must have nothing in it! I hate potato salad. I'm not a fan AT ALL.
5. My breakfast of cinnamon was the best thing I ate today. (I've only eaten breakfast and while I plan on eating my other meals today,  I don't think I really have anything on the menu that is going to be AMAZING.)
6. Today was a long time coming. a long, long time coming.
7. And as for the weekend, tonight I'm looking forward to well...it depends on if I actually audition for this musical or not, tomorrow my plans include company pictures and a double date at OZZ! and Sunday, I want to try a new recipe!

one year ago