Sadie Lately

Let's get physical, physical.

2012-01-08T21:26:00.000-08:00

As I sit on our plush couch with no legs, admiring our near-fully furnished apartment and digesting the mass amount of fibrous food I just consumed, I observe my roommate Erin. At the moment, she's removing her shirt in a sweaty haze and scouring the kitchen for sustenance. For the hunt, she's donned in a sports bra and knee-length running pants that are pulled up to her belly button. "Excuse my fat rolls," she says.

Let us remember, Erin is a 5'11" stalk of celery; long, lean with a heap of hair on top.

After I avert my eyes, I attempt to rise from the world's lowest couch... But... I don't. My legs are too sore to stand up. After ~~living~~ being a sloth in Austin almost 2 months, I've only recently started working out again. And what have I done? I've conned Erin into buying a gym membership to be my workout buddy. And this Sunday marks the end of week 1. And with that, marks the end of the first week of Erin's Hell.

One time, I played college soccer. That brief stint taught me a little bit about how to work out. One other time, I discovered I had an immune deficiency. That precious blessing taught me a little bit about how to eat. With my vault of nutritional knowledge now open, I'm pulling a Mr. Miyagi and enlightening Erin about the dangers of eating Conversation Hearts for dinner, and how detrimental it can be to your liver if you replace water with Blackstone Merlot.

We're working on it.

Anyway, our athletic endeavors began last week and I was thrilled, THRILLED to have someone to be miserable alongside as I lay my cellulite to rest in cottage cheese hell. Though, on the inaugural session of Mission: Sexy Celebrity Body Double we discovered that Erin, immersed in her classic novel reading and adolescent poetic composing, was never introduced to the wide world of pushups. Or split jumps. Or shoulder presses. Or anything that sorority sisters everywhere can't bob up and down upon. So, I have taken it upon myself to nurture this newborn gym baby. We spent a lot of this week just learning how to do things. And considering I've begun growing a front-ass orb, I didn't mind the easing-into-things.

Now, earlier this week we put pushup-position rows into one of our circuit workouts. Unfamiliar with exactly how to do it, Erin asked I watch to make sure she was executing the exercise at peak athletic performance. Mind you, we had already done about 150 reps of other things so our muscles were already burning. But in the middle of her pushup-position row I see Erin slowly fall to the ground. On the way down to her death, I hear her desperately wheeze out the phrase, "My arm, Sadie... my arm won't hold up my body." And just like the waning moments in the renowned scene of Titanic when a weary Rose lets go of popsicle Jack, down Erin went.

Disclaimer: Erin is a champion. She's been pushing through these workouts with an intense amount of reluctance, but determination to accomplish. And that's admirable. Plus, the counselor who signed Erin up for her membership is spicy hot. Motivation City, population: Celery Stalk.

At the end of every workout, we limp out of the gym as if our brain isn't sending the message "bend" to our knees, all the while discussing how many ripped cut abs we're going to have and how many quarters we will bounce off each other's firm badonks. We are living the lives of real twentysomethings; we have 9-5 jobs, a church we frequent, an apartment that resembles a knockoff Anthropologie store, virtually no money, and a workout regime.

Now, someone to come over and slap this delicious chocolaty treat out of my hand before I eat it and it's 9 other friends.

I will no longer be smelling like a deep-fried onion: I'm employed!

2011-12-06T16:59:00.000-08:00

Hello, my name is Sadie. You might remember me from such careers as "Wild Bill's Burgers' Scene/Emo High School Waitress", "From Lifeguard to Headguard Then Demoted Back To Lifeguard" or "Lesbian UPS Truck Driver's Package Runner". I'd like to inform you today that as of November 28th, 2011, I have hung my part-time-job hat (knock on wood, touch a screw, hold your breath while driving through a graveyard, keep your freaking umbrella closed indoors and rub that lucky rabbit's foot raw).

I'm on day 8 as AW Media's Office Manager (plug), and while I would rather impale myself into a pit of letter openers than write invoices and manage payroll - I'm beyond thrilled (THRILLED) to have this job. Not only do I plan to kick the ass of all things administrative, but I plan to do it with the swiftness of a ninja so I can wiggle my way into the pages of the magazine. I want to contribute less to the filing cabinet, and more to the final product.

In light of my recent career-switch. I'd like to take this time and dedicate this blog post as a written memorial highlighting my soul-sucking, part-time past job life. Let the pitiful hilarity ensue.

The Early Age: Wild Bill was never really that wild.

I'm sure all of my high school friends can agree that Wild Bill was about as wild as a jar of pickles. But despite his resemblance to Bill Nye the Science Guy, the man knew burgers. My most fond memory of my working stint at Wild Bill's was getting the esteemed pleasure of serving one particular gluttonous contestant of the Monster Burger Challenge. First of all, the Monster Burger Challenge was a time-sensitive competition that summoned eaters to scarf down 3 1/3lb patties and 1 whole bun in 10 minutes or less. Second of all, disgusting. If you successfully achieved the goal (of which my dear friend Cameron Gregory puked and paled in comparison. 3 times.) you got your picture on the wall (sadly, Cameron never did). As I said, the walking seventh-sin came in and asked for the Monster Burger. With fries. I brought it out to him and we started the timer. After folding each patty into quarters and soaking the bun in his glass of water, Porky the Pig managed to finish the burger and fries in 2 minutes.

2 gargling, snorting, panting minutes.

He then wiped off his sweatstache and asked for a dessert menu.

The Demotion Age: I should have pooped in the pool while I had the chance.

Due to the longevity of my employment as a Wendy Peffercorn stand-in with the City of Hurst at the Central Aquatics Center (RIP Skin Cells: 2004-2010), I have concocted a list of favorite daily tasks/events/pastimes that seemed to never get old despite my ending salary being $9.97 and my age of resignation being 22. The list goes as follows:

Babies, toddlers, children, tweens, pre-teens and foreigners never understanding that every time they take a fat dump in the pool, we have to evacuate the water for 30 minutes, giving them a self-established timeout and us an opportunity to do even less work.
Having a tab at the concession stand and not paying it the entire summer.
Asking women of all shapes, shades and sizes to wear a City of Hurst t-shirt because we can see their saucer nipples through their sheer thong bikini.
That summer Cameron and I had a crush on each other. While not an impressive burger-eater, he always had those chiseled pecs and an endearing incapability to effectively serve a volleyball.
Playing an intense game of sand volleyball on rainy days. Also, watching Kathryn Wren do rain dances to the tune of "When The Thunder Rolls" by Garth Brooks while everyone else played volleyball.
Hating the Asian family of 42 that came in 30 minutes prior to closing time. Every single night.
Playing baseball, a sophisticated game of fencing, or jousting my arch nemesis with the Children's Pool measuring sticks.
My amazing, beautiful, Brazilian-like tan.
When patrons would clap after I heroically saved a drowning child or stereotyped adult.
The inservices when I was Guard of the Week.
The inservices when my best friend Whitley would rant about lifeguards less perfect than she.
The inservices when we would go down the slides naked.
Summers when my closest friends were my superiors.
The summer I was promoted.
The summer I was demoted.

And it all kind of went downhill from there.

The Lezbiazoic Age: What can brown do for you?
For a couple of Christmas breaks during college, I worked as a package runner for UPS. Actually, Cameron got me the job. Add "in the vocational know" to his list of qualities. Anyway, from 8am until 8pm I was running boxes (probability of the boxes being full of drugs: high) from a giant brown truck to various locations. Some of these locations included my friends' houses, some of these locations included the mall. You can imagine my 19-year-old dismay when I would catch eyes with people I knew who, unfortunately, noticed that it was indeed me sprinting through the mall, or hurdling up and down front walkways, donned in a dook-colored outfit made for a man who was shaped like a rhombus.

One Christmas, though, I had the spicy titillation of working with Gretchen Vandyke.*

*I can't remember her name, but I will work through my depression/early onset Alzheimer's and create a pseudonym for story's sake.

To sum up my lesbian UPS adventures, Gretch would often discuss her personal life with her mistress of 20 years prior. Seeking my womanly wisdom, she and I would go to lunch at any of these family-friendly locations:

Buffalo Wild Wings
Hooters
Chili's Too!

One particular afternoon, as we were delighting in our boneless wings, she received a "hella funny" text from one of her "dudes." Why I gave her my personal cell number I will forever wonder, but the message was instantly forwarded. A picture message! How fun. A picture message with sounds that reached the loudest decibel that could measure utter embarrassment immediately upon opening! How mortifying. It's a hazy memory, but I know the text said a variation of: "HEY EVERYONE, I LIKE GAY PORN. ALL THE TIME. EVERY DAY, Y'ALL!" And with the push of the down button, there lay a graphic picture of something to the Brokeback effect on my Nokia Brick's screen.

Gretch wound up tipping me 100 extra dollars after my seasonal schedule ended. I wound up blocking any more forwarded texts from her hella funny dudes.

The Dark Age: Outback and Outofmymind.

We all remember The Outback Chronicles, hmm? While I feel I was employed with that corporation for far too long, I will say I gained some sodium-laden weight, and some valuable insight from my relationship with waitressing. Such key knowledge includes:

Knowing just how disgusting restaurant kitchens are.
Understanding that butter is the main dish, and vegetables are the garnish.
Servers who spit in your food are real. And they are rampant.
If you order something that comes in multiples (fries, chips, vegetable medleys), you're likely missing 4 or 5 pieces from your plate before you even get your plate.
Ordering drinks that don't come straight from the fountain (excluding the bar), or ordering 2 drinks at once is a spit-worthy offense.
Does your plate look immaculately displayed? Your food was probably been poked and prodded by bare, unwashed fingers.
Realizing that there is at least 1000mg of sodium in everything you order.
If I ever catch you not tipping the appropriate amount, I will impale you into the aforementioned pit of letter openers.
And lastly, grasping that no matter how much you complain, you still don't matter. You're an amoeba in the restaurant world. And, again, spit-worthy.

But I digress.

Male Gynecologists: OBGY?

2011-09-21T12:52:00.000-07:00

Over the past few weeks, my daily conversations have been riddled with vagina. Why? I don't really know. But I do know that sometimes I feel like I'm in an episode of Sex & The City. And it's scary.

I'm 23 years old. And apparently at my age, I should have a vagyno picked out and put on speed dial. I have yet to divulge myself in the wide world of OBGYN, what with my abstaining from being wang banged and being prescribed birth control for whatever reason. So, that makes me out of the loop when my friends are swapping Gyno stories or sharing shaving secrets or gushing over whose uterus is the most normally shaped or, my personal favorite, whose Gynecologist is sexier.

And that brings me to my current ridiculous query, Male Gynecologists: The 8th Wonder of the World.

The Pyramid of Giza, The Sydney Opera House, Dr. Kenneth Furburger. What do these boggling works have in common? They all blow my mind. Now, I've pondered this. Really. I've spent many a minutes brooding, trying to understand why a man would want to go noodling around our great divide all day long. I just can't wrap my head around why someone, let alone someone of the male persuasion, would want to wake up, go to work and stare at a bushy bajingo day in and day out.

Women fanny nannies? Sure. We know what to expect. We know that beneath the Fruit of the Loom armor we will find God's sense of humor. We see it every day, and in the most unattractive and farthest-from-sexy way for one week a month.

And so, my bewilderment has led me to whip up a pros and cons list as an attempt to deem it acceptable for a man to be a doctor down south of the mouth. Observe:

Pros to being a medical Mr. Whiskerbiscuit:

You're gay, and are therefore visually unscathed by the daunting coslopus.
You are well-versed in the Chronicles of Vagarnia, and said knowledge could give you the upper hand in maintaining a strategically happy, healthy sex life.

Cons to being a medical Mr. Whiskerbiscuit:

You're gay, and are therefore visually scathed by the daunting coslopus.
You have to platonically poke, probe, feel around, lift, move, scrape, smell, slide, enter, exit and most importantly, look fixedly upon a flesh-toned venus fly trap for breakfast, lunch and dinner.

Cons > Pros. The defense rests.

Confessions of an ex-heifer part 2: Once you go fat, you never go back.

2011-09-11T14:19:00.000-07:00

Last night, as I was ~~eating~~ relishing the gluttonous glory of life in my Ghirardelli Almond Sea Salt Soiree dark chocolate bar, I began to think about my journey with food. If you'll recall, I've already delved the physical joys of being an ex-heifer, but being a bulbous baby doesn't only take a toll on your muffin top - it leaves a sticky-sweet fingerprint on your will power. That's why I, and all my once-a-whale sisters out there, can say that once you go fat, you never go back. There will always be something that tickles your binge button.

Observe:
Katie Miller (to Gerry Flynn): "Is your girlfriend still eating?"
Gerry Flynn (to Katie Miller): "Cheerios twice a day, then two pounds of sweets at any given moment in time."

You see, many of those who know me me know that I am a pretty healthy human being. My meals are for the most part green and/or organic, sometimes consisting of things people didn't even know came from the earth. And stop rolling your eyes, I don't eat like this for hipster or granola reasons. I eat like this because prefer the way my body feels after a hearty salad (so good), as opposed to the way my body feels after a 7 piece student special at Chicken Express (so good). Unfortunately, though, many of those who know me also know that I have a deep-seeded affinity for Chocolate.

Like, it's stupid.

As the 30 extra pounds of my youth began to slowly shed (heavy on the slowly)(pun!), I began to see my will power become enclosed in a chocolate vault.

When placed in front of me, the bag of Dove dark chocolate covered almonds becomes my prey. And I, the lioness hunting for ~~her family~~ ...myself, must ravish this 3-serving-large bag of pure bliss before anything might happen to it. Like a house fire. Or a tornado. Or my mother catching wind that I have chocolate goodies in the house. That woman is like a bloodhound for the sweet mixed scent of cocoa butter and semisweet chocolate.

While I do have my chunky childhood mostly to blame, it doesn't help that I believe this unhealthy adoration is genetic. I believe that my mother is the tippy top of the coocoo-for-cocoa family tree. And I absolutely believe that she passed on to me, along with the aforementioned baby weight of an extra baby, the inability to resist a nibble or 60 of anything of the chocolate descent. And it's going to be a slippery slope for the generations to come (sorry Gerry). Because on the one hand, I'm not interested in my children having type 2 diabetes at the ripe age of 7. But on the other, my milk-chocolatey heart would weep regularly if I robbed them of the wonderful, orgasmic, mouth-watering world of Dove chocolate products.

I've contemplated getting a grip on this "problem" since I no longer have obvious weight issues and I'm kind of a control freak, but... no. Besides, dark chocolate has heart-health benefits. So in my mind, the more dark chocolate I consume, the healthier my heart.

It's a win-win.

The Purgatory of Adulthood

2011-07-23T14:46:00.000-07:00

Full disclosure: I'm at my wit's end.

Upon my return from The Land Down Under, a.k.a The Land of Enchantment, a.k.a The Land of Perfect Weather, a.k.a The Land Where Katie Danced On A Stage In The Middle of a Night Club - I have deduced 3 things:

1) The Texas heat can kiss my recently-sculpted ass.
2) I underestimated just how much I missed Chipotle and Panera Bread.
3) I hate the transition.

That is to say, I hate the transition from college to adulthood. It's frustrating, indefinite, unreliable and belittling. I imagine that is what Purgatory would feel like; not too fiery hot, not too cloudy/golden/heavenly - but juuuuust annoying.

Going to Australia for 6 months was, by far, one of the best decisions of my life. The things I experienced, the memories I made, the lessons revealed to me by God - all things I would never want to give up. Not even for a lifetime supply of Chipotle burritos.

However, going into my adventure - I knew it had to end. Hoorah for realism. I knew I had to come home and catch up to everyone who had already landed jobs or internships or were handed down daddy's multi-billion dollar company.

So! Where does this bit of bitching and moaning leave me? Stuck between an 8oz sirloin and a treadmill. I'm [arguably] gainfully employed at Outback Steakhouse (yep, STILL) and 24 Hour Fitness. I'm working 2 part time jobs in order to catch me back up to speed financially. In doing this, I'm hoping to graduate from adulthood purgatory to adulthood heaven come November. Once that brisk month approaches, I'll hopefully be living on my own in Austin with a career, a roommate and a boyfriend right around the corner. Until then, I will endure the unstable income, the management staff who think I have rocks for brains, and the coworkers who will have liver transplants at 32.

But despite the first-world pain that I'm forced to survive, I'm excited for the after-purgatory-life. And really, really, really eager to get there. Don't tell anybody, though. I wouldn't be able to show my face in public if people knew I were thankful for any income at all, grateful for a surprisingly pleasant workplace, and glad I get to take home nightly a fist full of ridiculous stories about the clowns I work with.

In the mean time, everyone console Gerry. The next few months for him will be riddled with earfulls of stress-related vent sessions and financial complaints. Thank God for patient boyfriends.

Bye, I'm going to eat Chipotle.

I've got the Black Lung, Pop.

2011-05-10T03:43:00.000-07:00

I head back to the states on May 16th. That's in 6 days.

Shit is bananas.

A moment ago, I was watching fireworks at the Sydney Harbour Bridge to ring in the New Year. Now, I'm plotting ways to avoid American Airlines from slapping a fee on my checked bags and carry-on cardigans. Where did the time go?

In celebration of my departure from the land down under, Katie and I took one last trip up to Queensland. If I were a compulsive liar, I'd tell you that we went up there to assist with the flood relief and find a way to keep bananas from being $12 a kg. Unfortunately, I'm neither a liar nor a saint. Instead, we went up to Queensland to do nothing, sleep in, go to the beach, meet people, eat, drink and be merry. We're so selfish.

We got up to the Gold Coast/Surfer's Paradise late on the 27th, and it was raining. Then, we realized we missed the shuttle back to our hostel. Then, we walked around aimlessly in desperate search of our hostel. Then, we walked around aimlessly in a desperate search for for food that had a menu in English. Soon, though, it stopped raining, we found our hostel, dropped off our overpackedforaweek'stime bags and finally found food.

Dining at the elegant Hard Rock Cafe, we feasted on a decent cheeseburger and a fat glass of beer - our vacation had begun! We nestled into our tissue paper sheets and fluffed up our Legal Pad of a pillow and drifted asleep to the sweet sounds of beer bottles clanging and toilets flushing every 20 minutes.

The next day, it rained.

The day after that, it rained.

The day after that, it rained some more. But I demanded we suffer through the sand blasted wind chills for the sake of my bronzed skin.

On the way to the appropriately deserted beach, we met a guy in a kiosk. His hair looked as if it had been styled with Redbull & Vodka.

And so began the spiel.

"Look, you're American, I'm American. Let's cut a deal. What's your hostel charging for the club crawl? 30 bucks each? I've got a better deal. I'll give you a buy-one-get-one-free party pass - only $60 bucks."

"..."

"I'll give you 5 free drinks, free entry to all the bars in Queensland on Thursday night for Ladies Night, free food at the bars, hanging out with me all night (he winked just now), and free entry all night to the bars on Friday. That cool? Alright, I'll book you in. What are your names?"

"We don't have any money on us."

"Do you have credit cards?"

"Yeah, in our hostel."

"Alright cool, we'll just mark you down for Friday night for the Wicked Party Tour with me. I'll just need your money before I can give you all your sick passes."

"No, like, we don't have any money on us. As in, we can't give you any right now because it is not in our possession."

This little exchange went on for about 10 minutes too long. Eventually, out of pity and boredom we agreed to go on the club crawl with Wicked Party Tours and Winky McSellsmeshit. We figured if we were going to go out at all, we might as well get the best deal. Club entries in Surfer's Paradise are about 10 bucks at the door, and drinks cost about the same. So, 1 club entry and 2 drinks for 30 bucks? Grow up. Besides, Katie was sold on "free food."

Looking back, the night was hilarious. In the moment, the night was awkward, humid and smelled of drunk sweat. You know what I'm talking about.

The most awkward thing about the night was that the crawl started at 5pm. Everyone was lingering around each other, commenting on how hungry they were and how they weren't drunk enough to be drinking the weird radioactive energy drink they gave us. Except, however, except the people that wanted to take the term "crawl" literally - they were already exclaiming "WOO!" in various octaves and dancing to the sick dubstep beats in their heads.

The awkwardness subsided at about 10:30 and the night suddenly became fun. At that time, we were at a club with a lavish resort for a bathroom and everyone began to lose their inhibitions. Which means! Cracking jokes at people having dry sex on the dance floor, making new friends, being lumped in that pre-existing group of friends and reaping the benefits when someone says "this round's on me!"

We escaped the club just as the ripe stench of alcohol was seeping out of everyone's pores. On the way home, Katie honed in on a 24 hour pizza joint with $3 slices of margherita pizza. I think in another life she should have been a Bloodhound. That schnoz can find food from miles away.

And the consensus is: I still hate clubbing.

The next day, I was dying. My voice was completely gone and my nose might as well have been stuffed with corks. I think God was punishing me for going clubbing. Both for that I was being debaucherous, and because I wasn't helping rectify the banana crisis.

After our stint with the tiny town that's perpetually on Spring Break, we headed to the sunny, beautiful, quaint city of Cairns.

Cairns was a trip filled with much more nature-fueled activities, better food, a hostel that doubled as a luxury hotel and feeble attempts at keeping my illness from evolving into the Black Lung. Being on the Great Barrier Reef for 9 hours was warm, brilliant and absolutely unforgettable. However, I think the group of foreigners in front of me could not have been more grossed out at how much snot was running out of my nose and into my napkin.

What's important, though, is that I was getting a tan. Deathly ill on the inside, bronze and hot on the outside. My priorities are totally in line.

Katie was keen on being submerged in a rainforest. I, on the other hand, was keen on shriveling up and dying. Due to my failing as a self-propelled doctor, the rest of the trip for me was hard on my body. I'm convinced that I lost a lung at some point during our adventures. But I was in Cairns! I couldn't waste our days getting drunk on cough syrup and buying prepaid internet cards - I had to make it memorable. Sick or not.

And what's more memorable than biking 28 miles to a body of water? We rented bikes and rode up to this little spot called the Crystal Cascades. It was a pretty little spot with a slew of waterfalls, swimming holes and creeks. And aside from my developing pneumonia and getting a taste of what my wedding night will feel like (bike seats on long-distance rides are unforgiving), it was a beautiful day. Later that night we feasted on some overpriced Australian-native animals and onion rings. Immediately after, we went back to the hostel suite so I could be horizontal and go to bed at 9:30.

If you're wondering, Kangaroo tastes like an overcooked sirloin. And if you're also wondering, I'm a douche bag for eating a precious Kangaroo.

"So like, Sades Magades, why are you even in Australia?!?"

2011-04-18T07:06:00.000-07:00

Some of you have asked me repeatedly why I'm even here in this mystical land of sun, beer and boxing marsupials. And it occurred to me that the lot of you don't really know. So, I will take this time to escape having to have 45 different personal conversations and notify all of you simultaneously why I decided to travel across the world and play in Australia for 5 months.

Yay social media!

Nearly 2 years ago, my roommate Kathy Frances Miller (Allegedly, she hasn't read a single blog post I have written, so I feel zero sympathy for my blasphemous use of her middle name in a public forum. Take that, roomie.) and I conjured up the brilliant idea to fly out to Australia and live with my aunt and uncle after we graduated from ACU.

And that was about it for the brainstorming.

We got our Visas about a month after we applied for them, and that was a nailbiter. Turns out, Aussies don't want you in their country if you only have 2,000 dollars to your name. But I found a loophole. Anyway, after the long-anticipated approval we started saving that skrill. Meanwhile, God threw a wrench into my seamless plans and made me fall in love with Gerry. I then began to earnestly pray about why I was still on track to fly out here, and why God wanted me to.Why would I leave Gerry now? What am I going to be doing? In between banging my head against a wall whilst working at Outback and banging my head against an InDesign-slathered computer screen whilst trying to finish my degree, my brain was just busy all around.

I didn't really understand why I was here or what I was doing until well into my trip. And being away from my friends, family and boyfriend has been really hard. (Awwwwww! Shut up.) But! God prevails. And I'm now due to return home in less than a month with a clear mind, and a stronger heart.

Having just been deemed a college grad, you can get a little insecure about your sanity and your financial future. With that, I totally advise escaping reality and taking a would-be-semester-long vacation across the world. It really lets you figure out what you want to do. Not to mention that the change of pace and the break in monotony does wonders on your point of view.

Does anyone remember when I launched my very first website? It wasn't that long ago, nor was it very successful as more people pay attention to my Facebook than the actual site, but I already want a change. I already want to do more with it. And I already want to promise that I'll pay more attention to the new site. Perfectionism is a bitch, you know.

Anyway, I think we can all agree that I'm not the cooking-blog, make-your-own-headband kind of person. But when you're seeking your next move, and comparing yourself to other people you know who are kicking out admirable, quirky blogs and DIY websites, that aforementioned insecurity kind of eats at you. So there I was, praying and writing to God fervently, seeking answers to my vexing questions.

But silly me and my mildly unhealthy habit of comparing myself to others.

The idea for spiritual gifts, or God-given talents, or innate abilities, is that no two people share the exact same gift, talent or ability. You bring to the table something completely different - regardless of field similarities. And that's what I came to realize. My desire to do and be more was becoming less of my own and more of whoever I was stalking. And it's far too easy to fall into these days, what with everything being so accessible and constantly thrust your way. I then began to fully take advantage of the isolation that is my closet-shaped room in my uncle's house and focus on what my next move is going to be.

I had been blessed with a realization that has sparked huge things for my self-esteem, the evolution of Bee Creative Serivices and my potentially successful career. Unfortunately, you're not going to get to know what my big lightbulb moment is just yet. Though, stay tuned. It should be up and running by the summer. And if my oh-so-talented graphic designer is reading this, I do believe a deadline has just been set. Oopsie.

I'm beyond, BEYOND excited to unveil my new ideas with all of you. I think it's going to be a really great thing, and I know I'll be happy doing it. So long as all of you continue your trend of getting engaged and choosing to hire me to be your wedding photographer.

What tops the list of all of these pensive nights, powerful prayers and perfectly timed ideas is that I'll be able to start a new chapter of my life in Austin, Texas with Gerry sooner than later.

Being across the world has given me ample time to figure out a lot of things pertaining to my overall happiness and the happiness of those affiliated with me. It would appear that I lived a quintessential college life, in that I really "experienced" things and "found myself", so to speak. Hard and dark at times, but worth the light I'm feeling now.

If there's anything I can take home from my experience here in Aussieland, it would be to live simpler, love deeper and wear sunscreen.

Well I would walk 500 miles, then I would walk 500 more...

2011-04-08T21:37:00.000-07:00

Aussie slang defined (I found one!):

Arvo = afternoon. I received an email from an employer asking me if "Saturday arvo would work" and to let her "have a proper think". I'm living in a Dr. Seuss book.

Choosing to see New Zealand in exactly a week was a tricky commitment. On the one hand, we always had something to do. On the other hand, we always had something to do. By the end of the week I could fall asleep standing. I mean, I could probably fall asleep standing at any given moment, but you get the gist.

We got to our first hostel late on the 29th, feeling a little winded from our travels but really excited to start exploring. We managed to book a private hostel room with a double bed. Snuggle time with Katie! And that was the only bed that my body didn't reject completely, so that was a nice trend setter. Too bad none of the other hostels wanted to pick up on that trend...

After we settled, peed, and poked around the hostel for a while we remembered how ravenous we were. Luckily, we were staying at a hostel that was right off a happening strip of restaurants. What was doubly fantastic is that they were all mostly Asian restaurants. My taste buds were high-fiving each other.

But... whomp whomp: everything was closed.

Except a pizza joint at the end of the strip. Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaydamnit. At this point, if Italian food was banned from Australia I think I would leap and bound in utter happiness. I was raped with Italian food during our Melbourne trip since Katie's mother and her mother's best friend are from Kansas, and don't stray too far from foods they can't pronounce. What we lacked in edible diversity, we made up for in shenanigans and laughter. I forgave them.

Anyway, we found that stupid pizza place as it was nearing closing time. They grabbed us two pieces of pizza from a giant pan that was sitting out for God knows how long and popped them in the oven. Afterward, we decided that the most satisfying thing to do would be to wash our overpriced pizza squares down with some chain Asian food. This just resulted in my stomach being confused and my wallet being annoyed. Confused, annoyed and smelly - we stopped by a convenience store on the way home to buy some toiletries that we couldn't bring on the plane. You know: shampoo, conditioner, face scrub that we thought was body wash...

The next day was our only full day in Auckland, so we didn't want to waste any time. We got up at 9, snoozed 3 more times, waited for the receptionist, checked out of our luxury double bed and into our Nazi concentration community dorm room, then mozied on out the door and into the city for lunch after a yawn and a stretch.

And so begins our 9 hour walk/hike across the entire city. But first! I will excuse the fact that I have mozzarella dripping from my veins, and indulge in literally the best margherita pizza to ever hit my lips.

On a happy belly, we begin our walk. And immediately, we get lost. This might come to a surprise to all of you as Katie and I are capable, brilliant, ravishing young college graduates, I know. But in our defense, the "marked pathway" that guides us along this coast-to-coast walk was made for the ants that attend Zoolander's School for Kids Who Can't Read Good. Later than sooner, though, we made it to the base of Mt. Eden. Then we climbed it. Then we were slapped silly with amazement at God's earth, and the amazing things it does naturally. Volcanic craters? Tectonic plate-shifts to create regions and regions of hills and mountains? Geothermal parks?! Ridiculous.

We got lost on the way home. Shocker! But you can forget it if you thought my Chacos and I were walking back home. It was 7:30pm and the walk to where we got to was a 9 hour walk. Do the math. Instead, we opted for a 30 dollar taxi ride back to the hostel. Shut up, it was worth it. Covered in dirt, sweat and city sludge - all I wanted was a shower. We walked into our dorm and noticed that one of the top bunks of our set of bunk beds was being occupied by a young gentleman who had the musk of not showering and weed. German, high, and uninterested in getting to know us - we avoided the hug and howdies and immediately went to shower so we could eat. And I think I ate enough Thai to successfully cancel out my mozzarella veins.

When I said that our next place to sleep after our double bed ecstasy was a Nazi concentration community dorm room, I'd like to think I wasn't exaggerating. I'd also like to think that these new German roomies were related to our previous German roomies that we stayed with in Wollongong. We <3 the Gong! Around 3am I hear a rustling from our window, one of our roommates staggers/climbs in the window and makes his way to the bunk above me. Wreaking of booze and weed, he squeaks his way into comfort. About an hour later, I hear him dictating orders in German. Thoroughly freaked out and in complete discomfort on the tissue paper pillow I'm "sleeping" with, I lie awake. I think at this point, Hitler had ordered his troops into the ghetto. Or something. All I know is that I'm balls ass tired.

My eyes finally shut, only to be immediately reopened by the poke of Katie's finger in my shoulder. We needed to get up and walk to the city so we could catch our Naked Bus to Rotorua. In a haze, I gather my belongings and head to the front lobby so I can set my bags down to go brush my teeth. I peer at the clock. It's 5am. We don't have to be awake for another 2 hours.

You suck, Katie. You suck bad.

In her defense, daylight savings time in another country while your phone is set to the time of a different country can get a little trixie. But she's not excused. We arrived in Rotorua and were blasted with the horrible stench of sulfur. Among that, we were also greeted with a barf-worthy meal from a could-be-great hole in the wall cafe. So far, not so good. But! All was forgiven when we got to our hostel. Our lovely, chill, complete with hot-tub hostel that we were residing in for the next 5 days. And we had our own room. And we didn't sleep with tissue paper pillows. Success!

While in Rotorooter, we hiked, got lost, walked, smelled too much sulfur, got lost, sulfur, walked more, took hundreds of pictures, coddled my mozzarella veins, walked, saw an uncountable amount of colors, ate Thai, sulfur, walked through geothermal parks and ate an unforgettably delicious chocolate crepe. But my favorite part had to be the 4 hour 1,500 acre farm and lakeside horse trek we went on. Why? Because we went on a 4 hour 1,500 acre farm and lakeside horse trek. Then, we got free drinks.

New Zealand was like nothing I've ever seen. Both
literally, and figuratively. Geothermal parks are one of the coolest things on this planet. The fact that the deep earth is so unbearably hot that it creates fluorescent colors on the earth's surface is just amazing to me. So many colors! Though, I could do without the jank rotten egg smell of sulfur, but it comes with the territory.

Sort of like Gerry. He's hot, but his donk smells like rotten eggs, too.

RBT! Not to be confused with NRB...

2011-02-26T17:17:00.000-08:00

Aussie random fact (I'm done with the Aussie slang because I've stopped paying attention to the ridiculous things they say - instead I will delight your eyes with a fun Australian fact):

A trashman makes around 70k a year.

In other news, the most exciting thing happened to me yesterday! It was about 10pm and I'm driving home from work (I'll touch on that momentarily). And traffic flow in Sydney is non-existent. Stop. Go. Stop. Stop. Go. Go slowly. Stop. Slam on brakes. Rarely is ever just drive. Anyway, I'm at the part where I "go", then I quickly reach the part where I "slam on brakes." Cops are lining a main road that takes me home. Awesome.

I inch along and see that cars are being approached one police officer at a time. They're all holding this little instrument and sticking it in the driver's side window. A wave of utter excitement takes over my body.

It's an RBT! If you recall, an RBT is a Random Breath Test issued by police officers at any given moment of any given day to calculate your BAC. It's so vital to the upkeep of the Aussie society, that they've given the RBT its very own television show. I hope, hope, hope I'm on it. But I didn't see a camera. Unless it was in the breathalyzer. Anyway, I pulled up to the cop and frantically, but ecstatically, rolled my windows down. I was clutching my hands under my chin like a child does/I do when cake is around. He asked if I minded participating in an RBT to which I interrupted him by saying "NO WAY! I'M SO EXCITED!"

He stared at me and stuck the breathalyzer in my face. It wasn't like the ones in the states that you have to blow on, so I asked him what to do.

"Just count to 10."

"1! 2! 3! 4! 5!..."

I was rudely interrupted at 5 by a loud beep. He looked at me and said, "I only got to 5, ma'am..." Then I told him I was drunk. Then we had a laugh and a high five and I sped home.

Moving on.

Yes, I'm gainfully employed. No, they're not real jobs. I'm a nanny and a waitress. However, I'm very thankful to have a job at all, let alone 2. This was a sweet blessing as I was quickly running out of money. My mother thinks it's very odd that I'm a nanny. I half agree. I don't thrive to be in a business surrounded by little tiny baby children because they don't understand my sarcasm, but I do enjoy their company. I think they're funny. And they're great models. I took my camera to work today. Creepy? You be the judge. If anything, it's less creepy and more negligent. What the moms don't know, won't hurt them.

I primarily nanny for an ex-cop/personal trainer who is unbearably thorough in all she does. I had a background check done on me. Good thing I passed my RBT. Anyway, I nanny for her when she goes to work in the mornings, about 3 times a week. As a personal trainer, you work obscene hours of the day. I go into work at 5:30 in the morning to watch her 2 kids sleep while she teaches an old mum how to properly do high knees and butt kicks.

My days usually don't start until 10am, so making it to work on time is a miracle only God can perform. And hallelujah to the God most high, because it's 20 bucks an hour.

Mandi the PT birthed 2 children, Lorcan and Carrig. I'm convinced she found these names in one of the Harry Potter series, but she and her husband claim they're Irish. Top o' the mornin' to ya, your names are weird. But they're really cute boys. And they're oddly well behaved. It must be the ex-cop discipline. I'll probably start the Nanny Chronicles soon. They do and say some funny shit.

On Fridays, though, I assist another girl with the nanny responsibilities. We go to the beach and watch a bunch of tiny baby children for moms who are working out with Mandi. It's called Pram Fit. (Pop quiz! What's a "pram"? Bingo. It's a stroller.) It's actually a pretty clever thing. Moms dump their babes off with us in a room with a mat and some toys, and they go get their pump on. It's about 3ish hours every Friday morning. But I get to meet other babies that I want to steal. The main nugget I've got my thieving eye on is Ginger. I call her Ginger Baby. For hilarity's sake we'll say she's a redhead. But I think she has about 7 hairs right now. I took pictures of Ginger Baby all morning. Look at her! So sassy.

My other job sucks. And is boring. And isn't worth mentioning. But now I'm going to because I want to complain. I'm a waitress at Ablaze, a Tapas restaurant about 13 minutes from my house. Everything they do is inefficient, and the management staff is a joke. I think there was an American girl who worked there before me, because they all assume I've got the brain capacity of a cotton ball. Regardless, she set the bar way, way low. So now, I have to suffer through any conversation I have with them because they speak slowly and loudly and use words the toddlers at Pram Fit could even understand.

But there's this one guy, Cam. He's the bartender. He claims he's a musician and he wears black skinny jeans. And he asks me about America. I make sure to tell him all the things that would appeal to him: cheap booze, slutty girls, musical towns he must visit, etc. His eyes light up every time we talk. Which is a nice contrast from toddler town.

Why can't everyone treat me like a foreign goddess?

If you give a mouse a cookie, he won't eat it because he's smarter than to take a cookie from a mouse trap.

2011-02-13T01:27:00.000-08:00

Aussie slang defined:

Woop woop: A town in the boonies.
Ute = A pick up truck. That one's just silly.

Sidenotecompletelyunrelatedtothisblogpost: God blessed me with a number of job opportunities this week. And great ones! With great people. What a sweet, sweet guy. Ask and you shall receive, my friends.

Anyway, on top of my glorious career-shower, Katie and I got to exercise our hunting skills with a field mouse that had made a home in our naptastic purple lounge. And if he wasn't in the lounge, he was making his mousey way across the living room and behind the dish cabinet, perched along the baseboards. Though, he never ventured down the hall. He knew if he did his life span would have been significantly shorter if I found him in one of my shoes, or having a hump affair with Clyde (my moosebear) (#yesI'm22andstillsleepwithaplushanimaltocomfortme) in my bed.

I first discovered our little furry friend late one evening when I went to dawdle on the computer before bed. I turned on the light that led to the bathroom, but not the kitchen light. And all I saw was something furry, fast and fist-sized. Naturally, I assumed it was one of the giant ass poisonous spiders that we researched. I spent my computer time with my feet off the ground and all the lights on. When I told my uncle about it the next morning, he set out to find it. Moving the couches, tossing cushions about, he discovered the culprit. I was in my room Skyping with my soon-to-be-famous musical BFF Aaron Lagrone when I heard him find the bushy buddy (pardon the irate Australian profanity):

"It's a fuckin' mouse! A mouse! There's a bloody mouse in my lounge! You little shit!"

And so the saga began.

Operation Mouse House was a multi-teamed task, as the mouse was far too agile and sly to be captured by one. No, this mouse was a rodent professional. Hiding in nooks and crannies, darting the span of the living room when backs were turned, and strategically placed poops as to throw off our compass. Operation Mouse House was a "fortnight". It took two weeks to finally capture him. Australians love Shakespearean lingo.

The first week, my uncle bought 5-6 mouse traps and loaded them with a party tray of treats for the bushy brat. But he didn't bite. Then Katie took over. She asked for my help during the initial stages of her ambush, but... eh. It was much more interesting to watch. And well, who wants a rabies-ridden rodent scurrying atop their feet? Pass. This is what the kitchen looked like after Katie discovered Tuesday's location of Jerry Baseboards (given to him
by the ever-creative Katie Miller). She attempted to herd him into the bathroom in order to trap him in a more enclosed space. The mouse corral was flaw-full, but comical.

After she poked him a number of times with a wooden spoon, and blinded him a bit with the pink and purple flashlight - he darted out from underneath the cabinet, way too close to my feet, and back under the lounge. Corral fail.

Jerry: 2.
Humans: 0.

The next day, Katie resorted to her same tactics, sans the corral. And, on top of the wooden spoon my aunt has yet to find out that we were poking a mouse with, she found a branch of a palm tree. Which made to be a great poker, a would-be-great back scratcher, and a nice sweeping tool for when Jerry got out of line. The little anus made a number of trips back and forth from the purple lounge to the dish cabinet, defeating us all once again. We opted for a bigger army. With our Major General being the perma-annoying Puss Puss.

Jerry: 4.
Humans: 0.

I'm giving Jerry an extra point because the cat is already useless, so it starts with a demerit. But the cat proved to be even more useless when we tried to get him to trigger his innate predator instincts. The cat was staring at bugs and trying to run through screen doors. We even pushed his face into the area where Jerry was, but he would rather tend to his bug watching and ass being.

The funny thing about us even letting in Puss Puss was that he did absolutely nothing. Then the second we let him back out so he could go play catch with lint balls, the mouse would bolt to a new hiding ground. This... cat and mouse game... happened 4 times.

Jerry: 8:
Humans: 0.
Puss Puss: -985

It was time for a new attack plan. Uncle P readjusted his gardening gloves and went after the mouse himself. Linda wasn't exactly the best cheerleader as she was doing everything she possibly could to keep out of the mouse's sprinting range. Though, she was arbitrarily waving around a broom. Intimidation factor.

We decided that us catching the mouse with our hands was just a distant dream. So, we thought we'd trap him with Tupperware. Brilliant. Actually, it really did give us a boost of encouragement. When Jerry frantically scurried under the fridge on one of our numerous capture attempts, we lined the fridge with Tupperware as Katie tried her herding technique once more. She was brushing him to one side, so that he would run into the Tupperware. When the bait took the worm, we all got so excited that we screamed and forgot to hold down the plastics. He ran in between Katie's legs and back to the lounge.

Then shit got real.

When Jerry receded to his favorite hiding place (that we were fully aware of), we took the time to turn the living room into Fort Knox. We stripped the couches of their cushions and lined the living room with them, so he couldn't get to the dish cabinet anymore.

Jerry: 9
Humans: 1/2
Puss Puss: -1000

He infiltrated the Fort and made it back to the cabinet. But, our culprit is injured. He left a trail of blood on the way to the cabinet. How? Not from Puss Puss. Worthless cat. Either way, we take this time to get him back to the couch. One. Last. Time.

Fort Knox had been resized and re-enforced. Operation Mouse House is about to be finished. With my uncle still in his gloves, and the Tupperware in hand, we all were prepared to end this furball fiasco once and for all. Katie applied the sweeping mechanism and got Jerry to run out from under the lounge. Jerry tried to escape but alas! Blocked. He scurried back under the lounge and tried to wedge himself between the end table and the wall, but Katie NBA'd his ass and stuffed him. He ran out and toward the sliding glass doors where Uncle P was waiting and BAM! BAM! He trapped Jerry with the Tupperware.

Now, our hope is that the mass amounts of blood are just from his pre-existing wounds, and his lifeless position is because the Tupperware came down on his tail. Otherwise, Uncle P politely tossed Jerry's little mouse body over the fence. And Operation Mouse House was a long-winded success.

Jerry: 9
Humans: A proud 1 1/2.
Puss Puss: Who cares.

These are a few of my favorite things.

2011-02-08T03:31:00.000-08:00

Aussie slang defined:

Geed: Excited.
Dobber: A tattle tale.

As we hit the month mark of being in Aussieland, it's inevitable that I've procured a few "favorites". Let me not waste your time with fancy adjectives and descriptive stories; I'll just dive right it. But! Before I begin my blogpost of foreign wonders revealed, here a few words from my jealous boyfriend in a discussion about the land of Australia as a whole:

"...Blah blah blah, flouride, lamb, Vegemite , beer, I'm Australian, look at me mate! I'm so laid back I can barely stay awake." 

He's both eloquent and supportive. I can hear the bells...

Anyway:

Favorite number 1: You can wear the same clothes to the beach as you can to a funeral.

I love that everyone, despite occasion, profession or time of day, looks like they've just rolled off the beach. Visual: Your hair is disheveled, you're either bra-less (preferred) or you wear a swim suit underneath everything all the time, and you smell of sunny coconuts. I would like to specifically touch on the hair part: If you are someone who I have had contact with, or someone who has seen what I look like if/when I went to class, you'll know that I'm a huge fan of the on-top-of-your-head bun. And that's Australia's favorite hair-do. Because of that bun, I have yet to look like a tourist. It's convenient, it's a timeless style, and it's the only way my hair will stay up when it's not in a dyke braid twirling about as I run down the soccer field.

Favorite number B: Everything is abbreviated regardless of communicative medium.

As Katie and I are watching yet another episode of How I Met Your Mother, an always-hated commercial break came up. [For fear that I will start to sweat out of frustration, I'll avoid discussing how horrible Australian commercials are.] During this slew of commercials I heard the snippets of words: Eps, reggos, brekky, agro, ambo, cabbie, crim and lollie. Australians abbreviate everything. English lesson: typically abbreviations are used when writing, as to alleviate the spelling of lengthy words. Rarely do you pronounce the abbreviated words. Words like "etc." or "MGMT" or any of the states abbreviations. You don't say those words, you write them. Abbreviations are designed for efficiency. But in Australia, you get to make up your own abbrevs.I think this coincides with their I'm-on-the-beach-in-my-head dressing habits. If they look and speak like they're drunk on both booze and sunshine, it perpetuates the country's motto of their being "no worries, mate." And it's not like the States, where everyone is saying "totes jeal" or "BFF" or "so presh" like the lazy douchers we are - that crap is and better be a phase. Here, it's used in daily conversation and has been since the birth of this magical land. In case you haven't deciphered what these are, I'll tell you:

Eps = Episodes.
Reggos = Registrations.
Brekky = Breakfast.
Agro = Angry.
Ambo = Ambulance.
Cabbie = Taxi cab.
Crim = Criminal.
Lollie = Candy.
Reggos has been the most ridiculous one to date. And yet, I giggle every time.

Favorite number 3: I don't think they can even spell b-u-t-t-e-r.

They cook everything in olive oil. My aunt has a single tub of buttery spread, and it's made from plant seeds. It's not even real butter. I love how healthy Australia is. I haven't seen a single drive-thru upon being here. Which for parking's sake can be a pain in my ass, but after this trip I will no longer complain when Gerry deliberately parks 40 miles away from the entrance of wherever it is we're wanting to go. And the same handful of fast-food restaurants keep reappearing; KFC, McDonald's, Subway and this place called Hungry Jack's. HJ's (hehe) is just Burger King with a gayer name. Same menu, same logo, same cardboard patties. The food here gives Alaska a run for its money as far as purity and freshness goes. If this food were any more pure, even God wouldn't be able to eat it.

Favorite number B: The might not be able to spell b-u-t-t-e-r, but they can definitely spell T-h-a-i.

I don't know why I didn't make this number 1, but I love that there is a Thai restaurant on every single corner. Need a haircut? Sorry, this building is now a Thai restaurant. Petrol station? Nope. Pad Thai station. What? You're bleeding internally? Sorry, all doctors are across the street eating delicious Thai food. And they're all decorated the same, staffed with the same people in it. Literally, it might just be the same Asian family hopping restaurants. I'll never know. But I do know that they hire the youngest member of their family to paint and decorate the shops. Art decorations that are poorly hung, and don't pertain to Thailand whatsoever, crazy colors paired with more crazy colors slathered on the walls, and there's always a random lamp. And well, flies. But it's not about the ambiance, people. What matters most, is that they know how to cook my tofu. So far I've been let down once, but it was a white guy working the Hibachi in a Japanese restaurant. Wrong on all accounts.

And favorite number C: RBTs.

RBTs are Random Breath Tests. This little test is a swift kick of irony. Australians are world renowned for both their partying and their inappropriately chill attitudes. And yet, cops beat the streets with these little babies in hopes of arresting brah after brah. RBTs can be issued whenever, wherever and for whatever reason. Katie and I went for a job down a residential road, and saw a couple police cars pulling people over as they were passing. Each car was issued a Random Breath Test. It's was 11am. On a Tuesday. If the homeland adhered to this policy, the ears of Americans would be bleeding with cougars and their angry alcoholic ex-husbands who want their privacy where privacy is due. So they can drive drunk in peace! RBTs are so pertinent to a police officer's duty, that they've even made a reality show about it. No, it's not like COPS. A) Australia already airs COPS and B) RBTs deal a lot less with prostitution and cockroach infested houses.

Thus far, those are my favorites. I'm sure I'll find more as we continue our laid back, drunken journey. Until then, I can tell you that nowhere on my list of favorites will be a bullet for Vegemite. Or its sister product Cheesymite.

Barf.

Star Spangled Barbecue.

2011-01-25T04:24:00.000-08:00

I'm not going to enlighten you on any new Aussie slang because this post is about Amurrica! And because I don't have any to enlighten you about. Whatever.

We finally had our All-Amurrican BBQ and it was a success! First though, we had to try and grocery shop for American meals at an Australian supermarket. Katie and I went on the longest grocery shopping spree of my life. Turns out, Australians don't know what the hell black beans are. Together we spent about $200 bucks. Which, if you're keeping up with the financial Joneses you'll know our dollar is rapidly becoming toilet paper, so it was a lot of money to feed these mouths.

Anyway, I did without black beans for the time being and we packed up the car and headed home. I wish we had a camera to document our exasperation on the ride home. It looked like someone had kicked our dog, run away, came back for another swift kick, egged us, then ran away again. If I ever brave the supermarket again I'll be sure to avoid shopping from 3-6pm, also known as rush hour, also known as the time when everyone in New South Wales decides to shop for food. We got home, unloaded the car, and started putting things away. We had a shit ton of work to do, so we decided to start cooking the night before.

Much to my dismay, I realized I still didn't have any black beans. I needed these precious protein nuggets so I could attempt to make black bean burgers for myself since I'm still vegan. My uncle, the mob boss that he is, said he's "got a mate that can give us some black beans", so long as I give him an hour's time. Katie and I plotted what he was doing and who he was killing to get those beans for the hour he was gone.

But alas! He came back with black beans and clean hands.

Allrecipes.com told me I needed to soak my beans, so I did (later I will realize that the recipe called for canned black beans and this 9 hour Tour de Beans was a waste of time). After I dumped them in a pot of water, Katie started boiling some water to make hard-boiled eggs for the Deviled Eggs and for my potato salad. Which! I was simultaneously preparing by boiling my potatoes. My family has a huge, powerful professional oven. Probably because my uncle is a mob boss and had a "mate" who "set him up" with a legit fan-forced oven and open-flame stove. He totally killed someone on Iron Chef and stole their oven/stovetop combo.

I'm chopping all the things needed for my potato salad whilst whirring batter for the Amurrica cake and I'm beginning to feel like Martha Stewart pre-prison. The night goes on and as things are boiling/simmering/soaking, we watched The Road. Nothing like a little post-apocalyptic thriller to get you in the mood to celebrate America.

The next morning it was straight to the kitchen! Katie made the Deviled Eggs, the Bumble Bee Brownies (per Micah Merril-Johnson's delicious recipe), seasoned and molded the burger patties, made some onion dip with mass amounts of cream cheese that I tried and unfortunately liked, concocted a watermelon basket full of scrumptious fruit and made some homemade macaroni & cheese.

She was sweaty.

I continued to monitor my beans, finished the Amurrica cake, finished the potato salad, made pasta salad, made my kickass guacamole, made really good cookies with a retarded amount of butter, and finally made it to my black bean burger recipe.

I was even sweatier.

First attempt: fail. Why? Because you can't assume a blender is interchangeable with a food processor. And when you realize that, you can't just "add water" to your recipe to make it work in the blender. Instead, you send your mob boss uncle to acquire a food processor. And when he comes back with one, you pray for the family of the father he just slain because he "owed him". It's a criminal world, this Australia.

Anyway, the second time was a success. And lucky for me, I soaked way too many black beans, so I didn't lose much with the blender fiasco. I made the patties and put them in the oven to bake. People had already arrived so I went out and mingled with all of my family's friends. Most I had previously met from a gourmet barbecue we attended a couple weeks ago. Seriously, they had lamb, chicken kabobs, fried fancy cheese, chorizo sausages, and a slew of salads and breads. That was what sparked us having this barbecue. Because that food belonged in the same 5 star restaurant that the Iron Chef owned before my uncle "took care of him" and swiped his oven/stove. So, we decided to introduce how barbecue food should really taste.

Like refined sugar and saturated fat!

And turns out, just because I have a food processor accessible doesn't mean I can skip out on integral parts of my recipe out of sheer excitement. You know, like olive oil and the appropriate amount of rolled oats to hold it all together. My patties were drier than Gerry's Goldbond infused crotch. They crumbled when my uncle tried to barbecue them just for browning. But you know, they still tasted alright. With ample amounts of ground mustard and sliced avocado.

In other news, we wanted to deck the halls with boughs of red, white and blue - except we didn't find the time between preparing dishes. But we did dress appropriately, as did my uncle with his Dallas Cowboys t-shirt, jorts, flops and a red hat. And we even had guests who wanted to chime in on the fun. So much so, that he managed to find imported Budweiser. Classy.

Forgive his flag confusion, he was going for color combo.

Despite our sweaty trials, everyone ate way too much, drank way too much and attempted to speak in American accents all night. Which I found to be quite hilarious. They were marveling over the food as they ate each course. I told them it was the butter and cheese. Amurrica!

"I don't know about the Wollon, but I loved the Gong!"

2011-01-16T04:31:00.000-08:00

Aussie slang defined:

Gobbies = Blowj's.
Oy! Haiyagon', mate? = Hello, how are you doing, friend?
Far out! = Holy shit!
Buggar = Damn.

Katie and I took a little trip to this mystical land called Wollongong using the Tom Tom personality of Yoda. No, we weren't high or tripping on anything. It's a real city. Why were we going to this Dr. Seuss town? We went to celebrate a new friend's birthday. Creepy? Adventurous? You be the judge.

Immediately upon our arrival to the city we notice a huge water tower that says "We <3 the Gong!" in big, bold letters. (Later in the evening, I will have a conversation to one of the boys we visited, trying to explain to him that that phrase is riddled with sexual innuendos. He will look confused and ask me why. I will walk away.) I found out they sell t-shirts and mugs with said tagline. Don't think I'm not buying one.

After Yoda successfully guided is to the Gong, we made our way to the hostel we booked. Mind you, we passed it like 4 times because foliage and shrubbery were consuming what resembled a building, but we got there. And when we walked in the sweet aroma of pee infiltrated my nostrils. Pee and mold. We checked in and headed up to our room. With each and every step up the stairs I felt like we were walking up to Satan's quarters. It was so. Hot. If you know me at all you know that I sweat during an arctic blizzard.

So far the hostel is 0 for 2.

I'm on this responsibility leave, right. And it's been wonderfully slovenly. But did you know there are people who do this for a living? They just hop around and stay in hotels and earn money by babysitting or selling drugs or selling drugs to babysitters? They stay in hostels for years at a time. Satan's hostels that resemble the smell of your pee after you eat asparagus. It's a real dream come true.

Anyway, we were under the impression that we ordered a double bed in a single room because everything else was filled. When we opened up lucky door number 15, we were welcomed by 2 sets of bunk beds that belonged in Full House and the stagnant stares of 2 German girls. I think their names were Hefferweisen and Ursula. I don't really remember, I was sweating too much. After we tried to make small talk about Hitler and weed, we claimed out beds and went to grab something to eat. After we ate sub-par food and bought wallet-robbing cheap booze we headed back to the hostel to get ready for the party.

On the car ride home I was earnestly praying to God that he would send an ice storm through our room and that Veinerschnitzel and Vunderbrah would be gone. Alas! They are. But Satan's fiery wrath was still in full force. Douche bag. We start getting ready, play with our self-adhesive bras, have a pillow fight in our underwear and we hear the door begin to open. Za Germans are back? Nine! It's another German. But a boy one.

We exchange the "Your accent is beautiful, are you from Canada?" bullshit and learn that Sheizerben has been staying in the hostel for an obscene amount of time and is making friends with the other hostelians in the house, drinking and carrying along (refer to the dream come true I mentioned above). Hans and his boyfriends just live in the Gong, "go to school" and rent a room in a hostel, rotating roommates and inevitably STD's.

Anyway, off to the party we go.

Now look, us Americans love our pop culture. But Australians are like 13 year old girls who listen to their favorite songs loudly on repeat for 7 months. When we got to the party, that was located in a hotel lounge, it was like the entire night was a laser-lit musical ode to Rihanna, Enrique, JT and some suuuuper gay song about not being an angel and "loving when you do that stuff to me."

13 year olds. All of them.

The night raved on until the birthday boy was thrown out of Lounge de la Technopopmashups. Then everything got boring and sleepy, so we headed back to the hostel. We got back to find that Helda and Zelda were sleeping, so we quietly got changed in the dark and went to the back courtyard to see what the laughing and Rihanna musical ruckus was about. On our way down we found empty bottles of Jagermeister and a cute pathway of empty beer bottles that led us right to the backporch party. We saw Haggendazs and his friends merrily drinking into a stupor and met a ripped-cut Aussie who only eats chicken and vegetables. And was drinking something that had things floating in it.

He offered me some and I told him I don't drink my own vomit. I bid the party adieu and headed back up to Hades.

The next morning Katie and I went to breakfast along North Beach in the Gong. I felt like Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman when she wanted to shop in the fancy store. Except replace "shop at the fancy store" with "eat at a cute seaside cafe" and replace the prostitution for smelling like asparagus pee and looking like 3 day old make up.

Eat your heart out, Gerry.

Map of Tazzies everywhere!

2011-01-08T19:19:00.000-08:00

Aussie slang defined:

Muck around = screw around.
Baaaarrrrnt = a weird expression that 15-year-olds in Sydney say when calling someone out on something embarrassing.
Lad & lass = drug doing/sex having delinquent punk.

I've been in Aussie land for 10 days. While it's not a really long time, I'd like to say that I'm pretty acclimated to my surroundings. However, there are still a few ridiculous ass things that I still can't get over:

When people tell Katie and I that our accents are "beautiful. First of all, what? Second of all, I get the idea that just because our accent is "different" that it could be considered intriguing, but beautiful? Most American accents make people sound like they're stricken with some sort of nasal congestion problem. Either that or they have suffered some kind of brain trauma that has altered their ability to pronounce syllables and formulate proper sentences. Now, it might just be me... but it's not.
The cropped top/angleduptheass high-waisted jorts combination. Straight out of 1980. Everyone is wearing pieces of tank tops, or "singlets" as they would say, that hang slightly above the bellybutton, paired with the shortest, highest jorts ever made. I marvel at how girls' bajingas/map of Tazzies don't say hello to every passer-by. A modest example of my cousin and her friends is shown. I'll get her to model what her favorite outfit is soon. I like to keep my readers on the edge of their seats that way.
And lastly, the game of Cricket. What the hell is going on and why does your bat have angles on it.

Overall, my time here has set the bar REALLY high for the rest of my trip. Though, I could do without the sunburns, expensive drinks and the Vegemite.

A Tale of Two Toddlers.

2011-01-03T06:08:00.000-08:00

Newest Aussie slang defined:

Map of Tazzie = vagina.
Platt = braid.
Stuff it = forget it.

WTF mate?

My aunt and uncle are becoming increasingly more entertaining with each passing day. As I mentioned before, often times we find my aunt Linda being put in the position of lead babysitter for my uncle P[aul]. What with his whimsical attitude about things such as finances, money, alcohol and entertainment. Not to mention he's always yelling and always taking pictures of the most random and irrelevant moments that Linda is forced to regulate with her chill hand.

But I'm beginning to believe they're both toddlers.

Since we got here there has been an orange tabby cat meandering around their block. Nothing new. Cats are dirty sly shitwads. Anyway, any time this tabby cat comes around Linda instantly turns into a child. She crouches down and tries to hug the cat, all the while chanting "Ohh puss puss, come here puss puss, yeeeess puss puss."

Firstly, gross.

Secondly, why she loves the back-alley bastard is beyond me.

If, however, she so much as makes contact with the cat Paul grits his teeth, bangs on the nearest hard surface and sternly tells Linda, "NO." Repeating the fact that if she loves on the cat, it will return. Well, obviously that's what Linda wants so since we have been here I've seen Linda love on the tabby only when P is gone.

Today though, today was a new low.

I was standing in the kitchen fiddling with a computer and I hear the pitter patter of little padded feet come parading down the hall. I look to my left and see that tabby cat roaming around the house. I exclaim that the damn cat has made it inside! I'm with uncle P on this situation. Unless it's an adorable little playful clawless baby kitten, I'll punt it out of my path.

But by the time I turn to face my aunt that cat has already made it into her lap and under her stroking hands.

She demanded that I not tell Paul because she loved the little puss puss.

I shook my head.

I come from a land down under.

2010-12-31T22:40:00.000-08:00

Let's just clear this muddy water:

"G'day mate!" is a very real and very frequented phrase.
The toilets do, in fact, flush a different direction.
They really do eat kangaroos.
Women shaving is an option. And I'm opting out.
Putting things on a "barbie" is also real.

In fact, slang and abbreviations are what makes the Australian dialect. Let me introduce to you and define a few terms I've heard in the last few days:

To root = to have sex.
Daggy = natural/bohemian/down-to-earth style.
Zed = z.
Mossies = mosquitos.
On the tune = talking to someone.
Good onya = way to go.
Spit the dummy = pitch a fit.
Keen = to like something.
Nananap = a power nap.
Bathers/cossie = bathing suits.
Singlet = a tank top.
Poppa = a juice box.
Puss puss = cat.
Fair dinkum = are you serious?/a sweet situation.
Spewing = to be upset.
Heaps = lots.
Posi on the cue = place in line.

It's been a riot trying to decipher the slang that my family uses in their sentences. If context clues fail, I just blatantly ask what the hell they said. Most inquiries are followed by laughter. Pictured below is our room. Yep. It's an oversized closet with an escape route. It's quaint, but it works. I just need to find a place for all my American shit, so I can bring in my Australian shit.

So far Katie and I have been going non-stop since we got here not 4 days ago. Our flight here was "brilliant" as they would say; it was the fastest and smoothest 15 hour plane ride ever. Despite my being temporarily vegan, I managed to eat delicious bean salads and breads and jams on the plane, and gave my meals to the Aussie that was sitting with us. He was both pleasant and informative and snored like a train. And! The 21st century has done a wonderful job of providing entertainment for long-term travellers. We watched new release movies and played video games with each other on our own personal screens. But we still weren't allowed to have our phones on? I don't know.

Immediately upon arrival we went to the beach. My cousin looks like a fit little aborigine, so going to the beach with her was nothing short of an insecure trip. But it was still aesthetically pleasing. We walked from Bondi beach to Tamarama beach to Bronte beach. There, we had a snack at one of the seaside cafes where we remembered that Australia doesn't tip their waiters and waitresses. Instead, they get paid $20 dollars an hour. Bonus! Mainly because normal lunch plates are $18 bucks. F that. Fun fact: everyone in Australia gets a month off of work, regardless of your profession. And, if you don't feel like using your brain for your career - it doesn't matter. You can be a garbage man and still make about $90k.

Then the next day we went to Coogee beach. Where I successfully got a sunburn and saw about 4 sets of boobs. Tanning topless is a norm. And I will be participating.

We watched fireworks on the Harbour and it was melt-your-face kick ass. Everyone in Sydney is either extremely happy, drunk or both. So the company was nothing short of perfect. Plus, my uncle is the happiest person alive. So everything was "beauuuuutiful."

And today we went to the horse races. I didn't wear a goofy-ass hat, but I did make some bets. I won $3000 dollars!

Just kidding.

I lost $20.

But it was a fun experience. They had rent-a-straightener machines in the bathroom. And giant sharps containers in each stall. Evidently, shooting up while you're dropping logs is socially acceptable. Not to mention sanitary.

From what I can conclude from my first few days:

Australia > America.

Australia or bust.

2010-12-23T23:54:00.000-08:00

So, I'm taking a leave of responsibility.

If you didn't hear, or you haven't stalked me in a while, I'm going to Australia until May with one of my many roommates Kathy Frances Miller. And it's going to be a bitchin' time.

I plan on using my blog to keep you updated on all of the things you need to be jealous of that I will be doing/seeing/eating/swimming with. I don't feel like creating another blog just for this event. Besides, it's called "Sadie Latley" for a reason. And this trip, is lately.

I'm sorry for the absence as of late, but I've been busy graduating, moving, having a 1 year anniversary with my boo Gerry and gaining weight.

It's been a hoot.

But now! On to the next chapter, and on to a beach where the skin cancer rate is 1 in 2. Yay.

I have a lot of updates in my noggin, so be prepared for many of them as I will have an intense amount of down time while I'm down under. Oh, and pictures. So many pictures.

If you want a souvenir, ask Katie. She has more money than I do.

Compare and Contrast: Crack Cocaine and Law & Order: SVU.

2010-10-13T13:20:00.000-07:00

If Gerard Butler was stark naked, standing in my living room while Law & Order: SVU was on... I would probably ask him to come back in 6 hours. Why 6 hours? Because like Pringles, once you pop you can't stop. And there is never an episode of SVU that isn't part of a day-long marathon.

And why wouldn't I want to eventually see Gerard Butler naked?

As of late, my addiction to watching countless hours of SVU has gotten to be a little ridiculous. It started over the Christmas break when I was staying with my gracious sister and her musical husband. I chose not to work that Christmas break in order to respect my slovenly desires, so I occupied my time by watching SVU marathons, eating Chipotle and showering occasionally.

After a while, I started infecting my friends with my addiction. First, it was my sister's John-Mayer husband. It was official that I had hooked him when I was awoken from my nightly winter hibernation to the loud exclamation of "OHHHH SHIT!" I got up to see if anyone had been raped and coincidentally - someone had. Jeremy was watching SVU and got really excited at one of the many rape-related curve balls that is perpetually being thrown around on the show. After the marathon was over, he logged on to his PS3 and started Netflixing seasons of SVU.

Then, it was T-Money. On one probably beautiful afternoon, she came over one day to be with me and eat Chipotle. Episode after episode aired and before we knew it, it was 9pm and we had wasted an entire day learning about alibis checking out, rape kits, blunt-force trauma, the apparent sexual tension between Benson and Stabler and how Detective Stabler can't keep his fists out of people's faces.

And lately, I've gotten Court and Lynds addicted. I come home from class, plop on the couch, and immediately flip to my digital crack cocaine. We are now proud season pass owners of SVU. Which means when I get home from work tonight I'll probably have 25 more episodes recorded because there's a marathon going on RIGHT NOW.

The Outback Chronicles: Complain, party of everyone.

2010-09-28T11:28:00.000-07:00

A table for Complain, party of everyone, is now ready to be seated.

Despite the fact that this post might be slightly contradictory, I have to touch on the ever-present fact that I can't complete one shift at work without someone's panties getting in a twist about something completely irreverent and retarded. Not to say Outback Steakhouse is of grave importance, but for the love of all things Holy - shut up. Take off your tiara, and shut up.

The serving staff at the OB is beginning to resemble my 7th grade athletics locker room while everyone was getting ready for school, for a number of reasons:

Every conversation sounds like a herd of catty girls, seeking out their victim.
Every conversation is dripping with complaints and whines that it makes my ears bleed.
Every conversation makes me want to slaughter baby elephants.
Every conversation has the intelligence level of moss.
It smells like body odor, mass amounts of cheap perfume to masque said body odor, and onions.

Disclaimer: I can't say that my mouth has been completely void of bitches and moans, but I feel like mine are justified and erroneous, as they are the kind of complaints that while you're complaining other people interrupt you to cry about something they find to be more important. I complain about how horribly I'm sweating, how I'd rather wear a jacket made of a man's toenails than wait on a table full of cheap highschoolers, and how I should stop eating large spoonfuls of the garlic mashed potatoes... but don't.

But as I mentioned with the hostess stand chronicle, it seems that people make the time to complain about shit no one wants to hear. They start complaining the moment they step foot into the faux-Aussie dining establishment. This is what I hear: "Blah blah, my section sucks, my apron's dirty, I have to close?! Blah blah, I got soooo wastey faced last night I feel like shit why did Gabe schedule me? Ugh, blah blah, I'm fat, I don't want to work, my tables are assholes, why am I not getting tipped? Blah, Omg [insert name of innocent bystander at work who happened to be in the line-of-gossip] is such a flaming dick bag, blah blah BLAH."

Drama is so unbecoming, and I'm being encompassed by it nightly. I'm just shy of spreading nasty, sex-related rumors about everyone who bitches at work. It has the potential to backfire. I'll let you know how it goes.

Confessions of an ex-heifer.

2010-09-20T08:10:00.000-07:00

It has come to my attention that I closely resemble an M&M. On the outside is a hard, colorful outer shell. And on the inside - chocolate.

From ages birth until I was 18 I would venture to say I could have easily gotten a scholarship to Jenny Craig; as I was the perfect candidate. Rotund and full of imagination, I was your favorite fat kid. And oblivious at that. I was the token fatty with all of my friends. They were twigs, and I didn't seem to let it stop me from attempting to borrow their clothes. Not to mention, my sister was a star gymnast and cheerleader who went through boyfriends like I go through brain cells when I watch Jersey Shore. Needless to say, self-image issues began early.

Since I weighed 135lbs in 3rd grade, I had a lot of physical clout over a lot of people. Specifically, boys on the soccer field at recess. I planned my wardrobe accordingly, but sometimes I had to wear something warmer than my Sheryl Crow tee, jorts and my Nike sneaks. I remember specifically the pairs of jeans I would leave unbuttoned for school, because they were puncturing my stomach. So much so, that had I been pregnant, it would have been easy for me to have a self-handled abortion. Sweatshirts became a necessity for coverage.

When I was 18, my sister and I went to Starbucks and began chit chatting about our youth. She told me that one evening during family dinner, she noticed I was going in for thirds. It happens to be that my mother's spaghetti is that bad ass. Anyway, after dinner she burst into tears. She told me she was crying because she thought I would never lose the weight; that I would become obese. My mother reassured her that it was just baby fat, and that it would pass. To which my sister replied: "She's 14!"

My fupa didn't go away immediately. It took a little while. The summer before 10th grade I started working out a little harder for soccer and volleyball, so I slimmed down and voila! Got a boyfriend. In his defense, he's not a shallow ass bag, my new sexy teenage bod was all he knew. We just met. Anyway, during volleyball preseason I was moved to Varsity as a sophomore to give the bench some depth. And I wasn't about to be the salmon in this river, so I did what the other girls did as game-day rituals. Chick-fil-a before every game, peanut butter straight out of the tub before games when we had tournaments (you know, quick energy), and something after the game for muscle rebuilding. Keep in mind, I rode the bench for half of the season since the entire team was comprised of seniors. I put on a few pounds, and was dumped around Christmas time. We got back together, but I'm still convinced he started having second thoughts about the outer me, what with my helmet haircut and my perpetual Buddha belly.

You know, I'm proud of my bulbous youth. I was a statistic, and now I'm just a sloth. No longer being an athlete really takes a toll on your motivation to do anything but sit around. After my shoulder surgery it was hard to bounce back into my once-active lifestyle. Now I'm paying someone to make me work out. You'd think I would know how to work out after 18 years of doing so.

But I need to offset the amount of chocolate covered almonds I consume. So, money well spent.

I live every day longing to have been born 7 years earlier.

2010-09-01T14:29:00.000-07:00

If you don't know me, or if you haven't made this realization on your own, the 90s are the best 10 years that the world will ever know. If you disagree, then go drink bleach.

I grew up with 3 people who got to fully experience the essence of the 90s: my sister, who is often mistaken for a red-headed Cabbage Patch kid, my brother, whose Doppelganger would have easily been Zack Morris and my cousin Erin, who mourned over Kurt Cobain's death more than Courtney Love did. Those 3 got to live in the 90s. And I say "live" with the utmost intent. I got to be alive in the 90s, but I didn't get to live. I didn't get to experience my pre-teen years, tween years, teen years, and all other synonyms for adolescence in the 90s. They get to remember everything! They remember grunge, Nirvana, the sexual innuendos in Clueless that I didn't get until I was 17, Blimpie, The Cookie Monster when he was actually eating cookies instead of vegetables, the never-ending competition between MTV and VH1, and everything else that could possibly bring a human being joy.

And here I am. Being forced into the digital age, expected to erase my memory of disposable cameras and JNCO jeans.

But I refuse.

Thus, consider this long-overdue post a refresher of joy. A pedestal for awesome music, perfect humor and undeniably cool fashion. Consider this... an ode to the few wonderful things I remember from my brief childhood in the 90s:

Childhood memory #1: Adidas wind pants.

Adidas wind pants were my go-to pair of pants when I went to the skating rink. I liked the way they flowed and flapped behind me as I speed skated to the tunes of any Boyz II Men song, and "Everybody" by Backstreet Boys. The only reason I was cool was because I wore Adidas wind pants to Hurst Skate, which was just as appropriate as someone wearing flannel and a weed pendant necklace to a Third Eye Blind concert. There was another skating rink called Skatetown that was slightly less white trash and more for a popular crowd. But I never went to Skatetown. My mom didn't want to drive that far.

Childhood memory #2: Grand Champions.

Grand Champions, the most beautiful horses in the world! Palamino, Stallion, Thoroughbred, Spotted Appaloosa... Not only did I have about 47 different plastic Grand Champions, I had the game, reins, hygienal supplies, saddles, blankets, and a large suitcase to tote my prized collection. I made everyone shut up for the commercials, and spent a large sum of minutes in the toy aisle of any grocery store, staring at the beautiful, faux equines. My parents were smarter than to take me to Toys 'R Us, as I would have had a heart attack partially due to obesity and partially due to stress.

Childhood memory #3: After school specials.

The best shows on TV came on after school. And did I know every single opening jingle? Yes. Full House, Step by Step, Family Matters, Boy Meets World, Saved by the Bell, Doug, and Legends of the Hidden temple, to name a few. Everyday at 3:30 I would walk home from school, fix a large bowl of Kix and/or 2 turkey and mayonnaise sandwiches to consume during my primetime TV. It's a wonder I was overweight.

There are so many memories that I want to ramble on about, but will spare you the paragraphs. My only request is that someone find me the jean overalls I used to wear with a sports bra, and go rollerblading with me.

Where my dogs at?

2010-06-05T22:26:00.000-07:00

Chafing and perpetual camel toe aside, I've recently become a fan of stationary cycling at my gym. Amidst other workouts that I'm trying to have compensate for me being an ex-collegiate athlete, I've found that cycling is the best workout because I'm not really aware I'm working out until I try to get up for a drink of water and my legs stop working due to the longevity of my faux bike ride.

I was at the gym today, cycling my little chocolate-loving heart out, and a movie began playing on one of the tiny treadmill televisions directly in front of me. Alas, I began watching "I Am Legend."

After a few minutes of gawking at Will Smith's hot black bod, and growing increasingly more curious about what it would be like to live in a deserted world, I embark on the most awful and depressing scene of the movie:

When his precious dog, Sam, dies in his toned arms because a douche bag zombie-human's zombie-dog bit her in a vicious battle.

Then, it hit me. The saddest part of any movie pertaining to a dog, is if/when the dog dies. Examples include but are not limited to: Old Yellar, Homeward Bound, Lassie, My Dog Skip and Air Bud. Say the dog and its owner get into a street debacle with a gang. Shots fire and we see the owner is still standing strong while its puppy is left on the ground to bleed to its death.

Boom. Instant tears.

The audience could have cared less if the human survived the gang bang, so long as the doggy made it out of there alive. What did the dog ever do to you? Nothing. Nothing but need you, love you and serve as inexorable means of bouncy, furry happiness. I began to develop a theory as I was cycling deeper into my "random uphill" workout regime. I feel as though people feel more pain when dogs die in movies because they're the most loyal species to roam this planet. I would say "animals" instead of "dogs" but cats are selfish assholes.

Think about it, do mean things to your friends - you get shit listed for a while. Do mean things to your dogs - he shits in the yard and brings you your slippers at night. You could swap your dog's water bowl for a bowl full of vodka and he would still bite a burglar for you when the time came. Do that to your friend and you're getting sand in your bed.

The innate loyalty dogs possess is astounding. Which is why I think it's sad to see them die, even in movies. It's like they're the only good people left. Well, them and the guy from the Allstate Insurance commercials. Who has an uncanny resemblance to what the prodigy of Denzel Washington and Morgan Freeman would look like.

The Outback Chronicles: The Hostess Stand

2010-04-20T13:27:00.000-07:00

I had shoulder surgery on January 29, 2010. While the residuum was mentally euphoric, it was physically taxing. I quickly became:

1) A drug addict.
2) Constipated.
and 3) A worthless human being to society.

I somehow miraculously found it within me to keep up with my schoolwork, which gave me the upper hand when dealing with the number of absences in my classes later in the semester. But I needed money. And pronto. After applying at a slew of degrading and brainless jobs, I came across an old place of employment for one of my roommates: Outback Steakhouse.

I'm a fan of the restaurant industry. Not because of the shameless, dirty managers who get off on hiring 16-year-old blonds with an IQ of 5, and not because of the sexy, undeniably flattering outfits, but because I can manipulate innocent people into giving me free money.

How much cash I walk home with is dependent upon the intelligence level of my tables, how much twang I can incorporate in my dialogue, how much ass I can kiss and how many jokes I can crack without genuinely offending people. I'm just shy of lowering my moral standard to a point where I'd let people know that I'm a single mother who needs to make enough money for her infants as to avoid having to resort to stripping. We're all aware of the "Angel of Cloud 9"...

I'd make serious bank with the pity card.

Anyway, the Outback Chronicles are not to justify why I prefer serving food than folding clothes in order to have some kind of pre-career income. No, the Outback Chronicles are to inform the world of the slovenly servers, ridiculous banter, useless busboys and inexorable drama that occurs daily. Today, I would like to take the time to dispel the wonder that is: The Hostess Stand.

You see, because I had shoulder surgery, I was unable to do anything physical. Not to say lifting trays of hot food is a heart-racing workout, but I was incapable of doing anything pertaining to my shoulder. So, Outback management let me hostess until my shoulder was back to useful. Then I would be promoted to server.

As a hostess, you are expected to have both the IQ and the responsibility level of a 7-year-old. You keep your area clean, appear polite, and understand how to read and count. What they don't tell you in the job description, is that you're inadvertantly the Dr. Phil of the restaurant. Servers and busboys alike approach the hostess stand with this wistful look on their face that makes you wonder if someone put an "I CARE" sign on your forehead while you were dozing off.

Personal problems, shit-talking, life struggles, unwanted opinions, physical ailments... the list goes on. Once someone outside the hostesss realm leans against the stand, peers over to look at the floor chart and lets out that sigh of weariness... you know something of said characteristics is coming. At which point you can either look busy, or accidentally make eye contact. You decide your fate.

But really, you don't. Because if any employee has a spare 15 seconds, any and all of that ear-bleeding vernacular is fair game to besprinkle upon open ears. I've decided the best thing to do is nod. Any advice given will only prolong the hostess-stand confession, and give the impression that you're siding/supporting whatever and whoever approaches.

Sometimes I wish I were deaf. Maybe that will be my next table-serving scam. Everyone likes a deaf girl.

The Angel of Cloud 9.

2010-01-11T21:34:00.000-08:00

So, I have a story.

It was the Fall semester of my sophomore year at Abilene Christian University, and I was feeling ballsy. Moreover, I was employed at Spaghetti Warehouse. Time of my life. Anyway, after work one night this boy I worked with, Quinn, asked if I would like to ever hang out. Apprehensive to commit, knowing that I never actually wanted to hang out, I said sure. As we were exchanging digits, he mentioned something going on after I got off work. Something exciting, no doubt. This is Abilene, Texas.

I was counting my $21 dollars profit after a lively night at Spag House, when I received the text message that started it all. Quinn informed me that he and a couple of his friends were hanging out that night and I was cordially invited. Omg!

As I mentioned, I was a sophomore. As I failed to mention, Quinn was a Freshman. Shut up.

At ACU in the year 2008, if you were a Freshman - you had a weekend curfew, unless you "checked out" to someone's house. Now, the little brats don't have a curfew. But that's besides the point. Quinn and his freshman buddies picked me up in his friend, Mark's truck. Mark, Quinn and the guy whom I refer to as the "group douche" planned to buy beer at the gas station on Judge Ely notorious for selling to underage drinkers. This was before my drinking time, so I was indifferent to the plan. But you can bet your ass if cops questioned me, I was already thinking up an elaborate story to tell them. Something about how these boys I didn't even know just picked me up as I was taking a nightly stroll down Judge Ely and forced beer in my hand and blankets on my body and threw me in the backseat of their truck.

I'm sure you're anticipating me revealing that we wound up at a raging party, full of college cliches and MIPs... but we wound up trespassing on a lake shore that spilled into a lake that was unswimmable. It was freezing, so the Freshman cuties brought the beer and blankets to keep warm. I would venture to say they brought me along to keep warm as well. I'll take it as a compliment.

Either Quinn is a ridiculous lightweight or he had been drinking long before they picked me up because within 15 minutes of us arriving to the poison lake his pants were around his ankles and he was peeing everywhere. Group douche was too busy inviting other Freshman girls looking for scandal that the pee shower didn't really phase him. Moreover, Mark and I had a decent chat about various things that could have easily been covered on Facebook chat in the warmth of my dorm room, but it was pleasant enough.

It got too cold for me to play pranks on pee pee head, so I asked casually when everybody would be heading back. Freshman boys + booze = lame jokes at anything the token non-slut says. After they were through making fun of me for being cold and tired, and after Quinn emptied his tiny tank one last time, we left.

We dropped Quinn off at his Texas Chainsaw Massacre home in the back woods of Abilene. Shortly thereafter, I accidentally fell asleep on the way back because Mark got lost. Group douche would have driven but he was drunk, [poor Mark was merely a Freshman and "I'm a female". These boys were complete not only with lame ass jokes but misogynistic ones.

Every girl's dream. No wonder we got lost.

The truck stopped and I sat up anticipating to see the warm, welcoming outer penitentiary-esque shell of A.B Morris Hall... only to discover the warm, welcoming outer venereal disease-soaked shell of Cloud 9. The shittier Abilene strip club. And by "shittier" I mean both low-class and that there was shit plastered all over the walls. I even think I saw someone finger their name, number and endearing message out of one of the smearings. Anyway, my moral compass and I refused to walk into that place. GD and Mark pleaded with me, trying to convince me to go in with them by dishing out all the benefits of going like: BYOB and an entry fee of $10. Jackasses.

I caved. Only because I didn't want to be left out in the cold, in an almost stranger's truck, in the parking lot of a strip club, at 2 in the morning. We walked in, and I'm sure you can imagine what my virgin teenage eyes saw: scantily clad, overweight, too old and too young women gyrating and pulsating on a metal pole stricken with STDs centered on a 7x7 wooden stage, adorned with strategically placed mirrors.

After I paid my dues, and declined a job offer, I sat with my knees to my chin on a couch probably soaked in jizz and Natty Light, and stared at the ground. If ever I looked up to take a breath there were endless amounts of vagina attacking my line of sight. Mark and Douche looked awkward, paranoid and pleased. Awkward, because they are prepubescents chillaxin' in a janky strip club with a girl they just met, paranoid because I'm fairly certain an undercover cop was giving them the stink eye from across the room and pleased because they are prepubescents chillaxin' in a janky strip club with a girl they just met.

It was the longest hour of my life.

But, I think God was trying to tell me something. He sent me an Angel. She was a blond, seemingly petite 20 year old who dropped out of Cisco Junior College to strip full time. Angel was wearing a letter jacket, bra and thong with giant ass shoes. I gained valuable knowledge whilst talking with Angel. If I want to hide my money from the IRS, robbers, my parents, or my roommates all I have to do is buy some stripper shoes. They're hollow and completely useful. They have a movable slat that comes in the sole of the shoe that lets you put money inside of it. That way you don't have to keep it in your pants. Or lack thereof.

After declining yet another job offer, learning about the usability of 6 inch platforms and when strippers can touch a customer, where they can do it and how much it would cost, we left.

I got back to Morris and immediately took a shower. Afterwards, I put on my high heels, my bikini and popped in "Pretty Woman".

Mom, Dancing, and My Date With Hortence.

2009-10-23T12:44:00.000-07:00

I love my mother.

She always subtly finds ways to give me life lessons, after I've learned my lesson. Not really in an "I told you so" kind of way, but more in a "maybe next time you won't feel so stupid if you do this [insert better way of acting than I did]". They're endearing. Lately, and by "lately" I mean "since I got to college", she's been concerned for my love life. She usually finds a way to subtly, as usual, encourage me to go on dates, be dating, be loving, or even be lusting after someone of the male persuasion. See, Lorie Collins was a hippie back the day. Colorado cabins, the earth between her toes, love everyone, eat cans of Cambell's soup every day, never shower kind of hippie.

My recent encounter with her she took it upon herself to say, "Sadie, sometimes you just need to go dancing". Katie was with me and she took it literally. Then proceeded to laugh. Reason being, if I ever go "out" you can bet that I won't be the one on the dance floor. Rather, I'm playing pool. Or mingling. Or making frequent trips to the bathroom to pass the time until the song is over and my friends reconvene. So for my mother to advise that I "go dancing" is humorous to anyone who knows me.

But I took it metaphorically. So, it's my senior year. What do I have to lose? I decided to start dipping my toes in the wide world of "dancing". For those of you not catching my flow, I've taken it upon myself to go on any dates that are being thrown my way. Unless I feel immoral by going or like I'll be date raped by the end of the night. Forget it.

I'll just touch on one particular date that I felt like should be on MTV. Long story semi-short: this boy, we'll call him Hortence, found me on Facebook a bit ago. Hortence and I, one late evening, began chatting about some status update that he had that I was amused by. By the end of the conversation, Hortence suggested that we hang out and he gave me his digits. Remembering my mother, I accepted and reciprocated. Unfortunately for Hortence, midterms were the week he asked to hang out and we had games in Oklahoma. So the date would have to wait. Upon my return, I told him I'd meet up with him to play some pool after my night class. 10pm rolls around on that Tuesday and I find myself waiting in the parking lot for Hortence, I'm early (which is a first), but patient. I don't want to ask him if he's there yet, nor do I want to be "that girl" that waits at a bar for someone, so I just people watch. A few couples walk in, some creepy solos who are apparently drunk walk in, and then it happens... "He" walks in.

The physical examination goes as follows: black dress shoes, gray skinny jeans that are oddly loose around the ass-al region, black dress belt, powder blue striped button-down (no undershirt), and obviously straightened hair. No way was this the same guy that I saw on Facebook. I verified his cuteness with Katie and Erin and we agreed that he was worth the random blind date. But this was absolutely not the same person. "You've got to be joking...", I thought as I walked in the pool hall.

I opened the door and the look on his face was almost as if he was envisioning me as some angel walking through two doors that have flown open with a graceful force - tousling my hair as incandescence was beaming around my silhouette and doves were flying around behind me. Ridiculous. The first thing he says to me: "I don't know, they just handed me these... heh", referring to the rack of pool balls and two beers he just purchased. Immediately I noticed his nervous coughing tick thing.

Awkward conversation ensued and more nervous coughing ensued as we strolled over to the pool sticks. He grabbed a stick and began rolling it on the table as if he were finding the perfect stick for a big tournament he were about to enter. I just grabbed one and walked back to the table we chose.

Then it happened.

He pulls out a black satin glove as to better his pool playing game. I can't say that I hid what I was thinking very well. He disappeared to the bathroom and instructed me to break the rack. I opened my phone and texted Katie:

Me: "Hell no."
Katie: "Not cute or not cool?"
Me: "Both."
Katie: "ahahaha"

He came back and we played about 5 games of pool. He won. But who has a glove and sucks at pool? Then you're just a jackass. At least he beat me. His famous one-liner of the evening came from a conversation that we were having (nervous coughing didn't cease) about how he wound up in Abilene. He's from Pittsburgh.

Hortence: "My best friend is stationed at Dyess Air Force Base and told me I should come down and be on my own... so I did."
Me: "Did he fail to mention to you that this town was a dump?"
Hortence: "Hahaha, no he didn't tell me that. He didn't tell me that there were such pretty girls here, either. *wink*"

WINK. Oh my gosh. He winked.

After that he kept mentioning that he wanted to play the "slidey game". Which was his way of saying "shuffleboard". I told him I had homework and that I should go. It was 11:30pm and I'll never get that hour and a half back. I'm not even going to talk about the hug goodbye. Hands down the most awkward thing I've ever had to embrace. I was probably running to my car afterward, I can't remember. I do remember that I heard him cough a couple more times before he hopped into his 1989 red Nissan baby pick-up truck., though.

Moral of the story: dancing isn't for everyone. I'm sorry Mom, I tried. Kind of.

The Downfall to My Self Esteem.

2009-10-01T19:45:00.000-07:00

Currently watching: It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia.

So You Think You Can Dance, American Idol, America's Next Top Model, The Victoria's Secret Lingerie Show, The Olympics... What do all of these things have in common?

They all manifest people with a SUPREME amount of talent thus taking a detrimental toll on my self-confidence. But, like a Lifetime movie about rape or murder that I accidentally catch from the beginning, I just can't stop watching them. And consequently, I'm always eating Chicken Express or vast amounts of chocolate chip cookies while the show is on. Which definitely doesn't help anything.

The people featured in these shows/competitions all average to about 18 years old. If not 18, I'd guess around 20. Either way, both of those ages are younger than my current one. And what am I doing? Sitting on my couch. In Abilene, Texas. Gawking as these people twist and leap effortlessly through the air, singing the national anthem in 4 different octaves all the while displaying their ripped-cut abs that they've had since the ripe age of 4. It just makes me wonder what my life would be like if my parents and coaches had chosen to live vicariously through me. Practicing 40 hours a week on about 170 calories, falling behind in school, spending thousands of dollars, having my only friend be my dog... all for the love of my hobby...

I just wonder.

Whatever, I'm still jealous. These people are effing talented and keeping me delightfully entertained.

Kanye, How Could You Be So Heartless?

2009-09-13T22:10:00.000-07:00

The VMAs blew this year. And I wouldn't mind it if Kanye got a taste of Karma and crashed his probably pretentious car into a large pole breaking his ego and both of his knees to accompany his spineless lifestyle. I don't really like Taylor Swift all that much, but she didn't deserve that.

That being said, I'd like to talk about a topic that goes unsaid all too often: the initial moments upon meeting someone in person that you've met on the internet. Whether it's for romantic purposes or platonic purposes.

For instance, I lived in a schooling zone that put me at the junior high that split kids off after 9th grade. Some went to Trinity High School, some went to L.D Bell High School. By "some" I mean, 75% went to Trinity while me, like 3 of my friends and the awkward kids that I didn't know existed went to Bell. Needless to say, I needed to make some friends.

My friends Ashley and Katie were scandalously dating boys that went to Bedford Junior High (OMG!), so they knew a few people coming into 10th grade. They took it upon themselves to be good friends and introduce me to some of the Bedford Broncos also going to Bell. I met a couple people through Aimchat and got to know them through late night chats of revealing personal content like my hopes, dreams, how far I've gone with a boy and what my biggest turn on is. My dad usually woke up, stealthily opened my door and sternly whispered at me for being up late and chatting on the internet on a school night. But that's besides the point. Alas, the day was to come that I would attend a pool party hosted by the boys of BJH. Think of it as a PG version of the quintessential "back to school party".

Anyway, the most prevalent thing about this party was that I felt so immensely awkward not really knowing anyone and nervous that I would mistake a conversation that I had with BJHboy7666 for the conversation I had with iluvplayingfootball348. I remember boys approaching me and sheepishly asking me questions they already knew the answer to because, as the 21st century would have it, we revealed all of the initial get-to-know-you conversation topics via the internet. The whole night was just one awkward turtle after another. I felt like I had to be extra cool in person since they liked me so much online. It was a stressful time for a 15 year old girl entering high school. I had other things to worry about. Like my hair and counting calories.

Although, at the party I met Alex Seabaugh. We went on a date with like 4 other people and he was my first high school fling. Congratulations, Alex.

I can't imagine how it feels when people do this for real love. In movies they make it look so suave. That's bullshit. You know someone has nervous gas and is sweating uncontrollably because they don't have anything else to talk about since they've already touched bases on all of the "all about me" subject matter. It's just inevitable. I don't care how social you are. That first moment of meeting someone is always, always awkward.

It more or less goes like this: "Heyyyyy, I'm Sadie. But you already knew that... heh. You look nice tonight, a bit different from your profile picture. Man, I'm sorry. I'm awkward."

DISCLAIMER:

For those of you I met online and am still friends with today, thanks for working through that awkward time.

The Spirit Moved Right On Through.

2009-09-07T19:31:00.000-07:00

You know what I love about church other than the life and teachings of Jesus Christ my Lord and Savior? The people. The people are exceptionally wonderful to observe and chat with at church. For those of you who aren't aware, Sunday is my favorite day of the week. The weather is always awesome, the mood is always chill, the people are always nice and I'm always in the mood to read, write, be crafty and objective.

Although, I did have one bad Sunday involving, who I've come to decide, was the wicked stepmother of Lucifer himself. I don't wish to expound on it at the moment; I'm still grieving.

Anyway, on top of loving to people-watch at church, my favorite part of the service itself is the worship. And what do you get when you mix a worship service with church-loving people? An intense, balls to the wall, sing-your-guts-out, Jesus-lives jam session praising His name. I love it. I love when people close their eyes and act as if they're cruising in their Kia Spectra, solo, windows down, vocal chords up. It's even more awesome when I catch the eyes of those surrounding the would-be soloist, and their reaction to the personal junior high choir concert that is going on behind them. That whole scene is enthralling. Plus, I like that they're so comfortable with the church home that they release their inner diva/divo, worry-free.

Speaking of worry-free...

A couple of years ago, a friend of mine and I went to church together one fine Sunday morning. Late as usual, we hustled inside and settled in our seats just as the worship was starting. My friend excused herself to go to the bathroom. In the meantime, I was thoroughly enjoying the soulful and unruly song fest going on to my left. After two or three worship songs, I was beginning to question whether or not my friend was being evangelized to in the bathroom. Again. Just as I was about to get up and disrupt the potty preaching party, my friend returned. But she didn't look relieved at all. Instead, she was doing everything she could to muffle her uncontrollable giggle. In mid-seizure, she leaned over to tell me that in the middle of her routine pee, a woman came into the bathroom and, as God would have it, walked into the stall directly next to hers. Almost immediately, the woman began dropping a huge bomb. Apparently this was an epic release and my friend was nearly put in a comatose state due to her desire to never breathe. I believe she said, "It was rancid. Like, I thought my lungs were going to melt away on the inside from the sharp and fire-like burning sensation I got every time I was had to inhale." As they were washing their hands/fixing themselves, the woman began striking up conversation with my friend. Instead of the assumed "Hello" that people exchange in settings like this one, the woman came out of the stall saying, "Well! I guess the Spirit moved right on through me!" The conversation was absolutely opposite of her previous endeavor; so lighthearted, pleasant and dear to my friend, that we came to this conclusion:

It doesn't matter whether you're in the sanctuary singing your brains out or in the bathroom relieving your brains out, the sense of immense comfortability that the church brings is something worth looking out for and being a part of. I recommend that everyone let the Spirit move through them... however you feel it to be necessary. On that note, I also recommend that you do it through some sort of musical or lecturing means, you'll probably win the crowd over a little easier.

Consider my two cents donated.

And So It Begins.

2009-08-23T22:19:00.000-07:00

Writing an online blog has always been an odd and unfamiliar concept to me. Everything I've ever composed I've more or less had an unwritten:

SADIE'S JOURNAL!!

4 HER EYES ONLY!!

**KEEP OUT!!**

~...OR ELSE!!~

hypothetically plastered across the front cover with a painstakingly lame pink plastic lock and key attached . Always a closed book. Always personal. Insecurity flows within me if I ever share something from it to another human. Whether it was my 3 year old nephew while he watched Thomas the Tank Engine or my best friends who have to support me no matter what I do because that's what's in the contract. But, alas, here I am. Opening up to the world wide web, thinking that what I have to say and express myself about will be the least bit enticing. I suppose it's good I have an ounce of humility as I embark on this booming literary epidemic.

It'll be like Christmas for your eyes.