MeanGirls

My most favorite movie of allllllll times is Mean Girls.  There, I said it.  Every time I tell someone that, I feel like I get judged.   Ooooohhhh, I can almost smell the judgement wafting from my laptop screen.  Yes, it's smellable.  The judgement is just that intense.  I mean, plenty of people like Mean Girls, but what does it say about me that out of ever single movie in the entire world, every stunning setting and on-point casting, my favorite includes Lindsey Lohan, a bunch of dirty jokes, and, of course, some really evil teenage girls? Probably not very nice things.  But I can't stop, I love it and I always will, so in spite of all that I'm going to indulge myself and quote as many Mean Girls quotes as I possibly can, because I can.  EeeeEEEeeeeEEEEEEEeee, oh I am SO excited!  This is like one of my favorite things to do.  Ready  .... GO!

1. "Do you want to do something fun? Do you want to go to Taco Bell?" -Karen, when Regina is on an all-carb diet and does not want to go to Taco Bell.

2.  "Don't you know I'm on an all-carb diet? God, Karen, you're SO stupid!" - Regina, when Karen doesn't know she is on an all-carb diet, even though she should obviously keep herself informed about this stuff.

3. "I'm sorry, we only sell a size 1,3, and 5.  You could try Sears." -Snobby shop lady at 135 when  
 Regina can't fit into her spring fling dress. And for her information I got my homecoming dress at Sears and it was great.

4. "Whatever, I'm getting cheese fries."  -Regina when she would rather eat cheese fries than lose 3 pounds. Same.

5.  "These are the only pants that fit me right now." -Regina, when she wears sweatpants to school and can't sit with the plastics. 

6. "You can go shave your back now." -Regina, when Jason is being such a skeez.

7. "Your mom's chest hair!" -Janice, when asked what her wig is made of.

8.  "On Wednesdays, we wear pink." - Karen, when the Plastics are giving Cady the rundown of the pretty girl dress code.  If you know one Mean Girls quote, it's probably this one.

9.  "Get in, loser, we're going shopping." -Regina, when she pulls up in her convertible to take her friends shopping. 

10.  On October 3rd, he asked me what day it was. "It's October 3rd." -Cady, when she seduces Aaron Samuels by telling him the date.

11.  "Your hair looks sexy pushed back." -Cady, when Regina tells her to tell Aaron that his hair looks sexy pushed back because she is a jerk and knows Cady likes Aaron but Regina dates her anyway.

12.  "That was one time!" -Amber D'Alessio, on making out with a hot dog.

13.  "I WANT MY PINK SHIRT BACK! I WANT MY PINK SHIRT BACK!" -Damian, when he can't stop the car because it's past curfew but he still wants his pink shirt because Cady still has it. 

14.  "If you're from Africa, why are you white?" -Karen, when Cady says she's from Africa but is clearly white.

15.  "I can fit my whole fist in my mouth. Wanna see?" -Karen, when Cady asks her about her talents.

16.  "I can't go out - ahem - I'm sick." -Karen, when she's avoiding going out with Regina even though she is perfectly healthy.

17. "Boo you, whore."  -Regina, when Karen can't go out even though she is clearly not sick.

18.  "Stop trying to make fetch happen.  It is never going to happen!" -Regina, prematurely (and incorrectly) predicting the future impact of the word "fetch".

19.  "We should totally just stab Ceasar!" -Gretchen, when she has a nervous breakdown and tries to cope with it bu thinking of herself as Brutus and Regina as Ceasar.

20.  "You will get chlamydia and die." -Coach Carr, on having sex.

Ok, I could go on forever and ever and ever but it's late and I'm tired!

Did I miss one of your favorites?   Which one?

Swing!

I don't know about you, but I've always thought swing dancing was really, really cool.

  There's this one adorable couple at school who feels it necessary to show off at every school dance by swing dancing while the rest of us just kind of shuffle around in a circle with our arms around each other.   As a long-time shuffler, I have always been extremely jealous of this couple, to the point where, when I'm dancing with someone, most of my attention is focused over their shoulder to watch them instead of doing any conversing or dancing myself.  I promise it's not as creepy as it sounds.

It's totally as creepy as it sounds.  Anyway.

According to people who know about things like this, the next elevation of jealousy is envy, or the point at which you move past just wishing you had someone else's mad dancing skills to actually planning out how to get them for yourself.  My plan involves a tall, dreamy man swing dancing into my life and (literally) sweeping me off my feet and then marrying me.  We would be so good, and look as good as that couple I'd always envied, and it would be fantastic.  And we would have a child named Jeffery.  Basically, ever since I first witnessed swing dancing, I have always really, really wanted to learn.

And guess what? (Drumroll please) I learned how to swing dance yesterday!  That's pretty much the only part that matched my fantasy, considering my teacher was one of my little brother's friends.  Someday, maybe my little brother might have hot friends.  Yesterday was not that day.  But I LEARNED HOW TO SWING DANCE and can now check it off my bucket list! Some things I learned:

1. Flip flops are not suited for swing dancing; that's why people back then wore those cute oxfords and heels and stuff! My flip flops were sliding around on my feet and seriously threatening to trip me and twist my legs around and otherwise injure me severely.



2. You can swing dance to "normal" music.  Like, not just big band/50s stuff.  Not that I wouldn't have enjoyed that, but who knew?

3.  The boy is supposed to lead.  The girl doesn't have to be good at dancing AT ALL!  (Score!) That in itself is good for me.

4.  It makes you really dizzy.  There are a lot of spinning and twirling and other circle-y activities involved, so if you're prone to motion sickness - say no.

5.  SO FUN!

So, go swing dance.  Just GO!

Halfway

One of the best things about blogging is the ability to write about whatever my heart desires.  I can, and do, blog about what I ate, what I saw on the street, what I hit with my car.  There's no one paying me to do this, which has the side effect of me getting to sit down and ramble about whatever is taking up the majority of my brain space at the moment and also being poor.  That is so fun.  

Blogging gives me the freedom, for example, to write a post about what I am super excited about right now: midi rings! Also, it gives me a budget that challenges me to find cheap midi rings, which are way more fun than the regular expensive kind. 

I've had my eye on some some kind of midi ring since I discovered them on Pinterest during the winter and promised myself that I could buy one as soon as I started babysitting for the summer.  And guess what? I STARTED BABYSITTING IN THE SUMMER! Woohooo! 

And I kid you not, as soon as I had a spare moment after babysitting I was at the mall with the sole purpose of buying some great bling for my upper fingers.  

I started out at Francesca's, on of my favorite places to buy jewelry of all times and just the cutest place in the world.  Except someone else came and stole allllllmost all of their midi rings, except one that was a leetle bit pricey, so I left and hit up Claire's.  And BOY OH BOY there was a whole rack of midi rings right on the front counter near the cash register.  Except I couldn't buy just any ring, so I stood there for no less than 15 minutes, deliberating as the cashier tried to make things less awkward by acting busy.  Anyway, in the end I picked these guys: 

Because I liked how they looked on my hand.  You don't get to see that because I am not a hand model.

Also, there used to be four but one flew of my finger and disappeared forever.  Which was unfortunate but that's why I bought more than one and refused to pay a lot for them.

And ohhh, I am so excited! I love them, love them, love them! Go to Claire's, everyone!

What's you're favorite place to shop for jewelry? Are you into the midi ring trend?

S'moreos.

Guess what day it is?

It's FOOD DAY!

It's food day a lot around here.  I guess you could equate celebrating food day to celebrating a day of the week.  Not like a Monday, though, because that would just be silly.  The mood on food day is like that euphoric feeling you get on a Friday, because it's the kind of day that doesn't get any less exciting just because you already had one last week.

So, FOOD DAY!  More specifically cookie dough s'moreo day.

I know.  Let it sink in.

That's Oreo + s'more guts + cookie dough. Oh, it is so good.

They're pretty good looking, too.  Glamour shot.

It starts with the cookie dough.  The recipe is mostly from the back of a bag of flour, although I made a few modifications.

Cookie Dough
You'll need:
1 1/4 cups light brown sugar
1/2 cup butter
1/4 cup peanut butter
2 tablespoons milk
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1 egg
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 cup chocolate chips
3/4 cup crumbled Oreo

Combine dry ingredients, then add the rest!  You are now ready to make . . . 

Cookie Dough S'moreos
You'll need:
24 Oreo cookies
8 marshmallows
2 Hershey's chocolate bars

Start by dividing all your Oreos in half.  I twist mine, but ya know, whatever floats your boat.  Cut your marshmallows in thirds and break the Hershey bars into individual rectangles.  Place 24 Oreo halves on a baking sheet.  Top 12 of the halves with a teaspoon of cookie dough and the other 12 with marshmallow and chocolate.

 Bake both at 375 for 11 to 13 minutes.  After taking the s'moreos from the oven, let them cool for a minute before putting the halves together. 

Mmmmmm. Mm mmm mmmmm. 

They're really good hot and just slightly less good cold!  Happy Food Day!

Food

WIAW

It's time for (drumroll please ...) What I Ate Wednesday! The cool thing about this post is that I'm writing it on a Tuesday, so in basically predicting the future. I mean, I'll alter it before posting if I get something wrong, but I'll most likely be dead on and that's pretty cool. Also, I'm really nervous about this because it's a link up and as of right now I'm too technologically challenged to do link ups but ya know first time for everything so here we go!

Breakfast (AKA favorite meal of the day EVER!)
Eggs with spinach, onions, mushrooms, and turkey bacon.
I prepped 8 eggs worth of scrambled eggs yesterday so that I could eat them for breakfast all week and it was genius because they are really. Good. (I got this one right . . . plus I also had half a chocolate Pure Protein bar because HELLO morning chocolate!)

Lunch
Greens and tuna salad - spinach and lettuce with tuna salad (Chicken of the Sea + Dijon mustard + dill + chopped carrots) (I didn't have any of this because I overslept and only had time to grab a banana. So I had that and the apple and the brownie.  And then starved the whole afternoon.)
Apple
Healthy brownie

Actually, the brownie will probably be gone before lunch because that's how I roll in the morning during school. A girl's gotta have some sustenance! (Yeah, that brownie was history.)

Dinner
I honestly couldn't tell ya. Mom handles that (thanks ma!:) it's always super delicious and I can't
get it in my belly after sports practice fast enough.
(Oh my gosh you guys, it was pancakes with peanut butter and turkey bacon. And carrots.  Yummmmmmmmm.)

Dessert
More brownie, or maybe some dried fruit.
I managed to keep today's brownie intake to one ((for now)) but the dried fruit definitely happened.)

And there you have it.  It's Wednesday, and that's what I ate today.  And I didn't take pictures of any of it mostly because I forgot and a little bit because I just wanted to eat and not mess with picture taking. Maybe next week . . . gotta have goals!

Wings

Just so you know, I really wanted to name this post "Jeffery Gives Me Wings," but I'm trying this new thing where I use only one word to title my posts to be artsy or something.  Except don't expect that to last for long because it keeps me from doing things like naming this post , "Jeffery Gives Me Wings," which is kind of stupid because I really wanted to.

On the other hand, though, "Wings" kind of works because this post is about more than one kind of wing.  So I guess that makes the title also kind of punny, which is cool.

So, I had the most thrilling twenty minutes of my life today, but in order to fully understand the level of excitement that happened, we have to go back in time.

It's the year 2012, in the spring. Two freshman girls are walking along a gravel path, kicking up dust and chatting excitedly about what they're going to run, how fast they want to run it, how much they don't want to run it.  Suddenly, a flash of light knocks them right onto their butts.  Several moments later, when they have recovered their full vision, they are able to see the source of the light: Jeffery, sophomore.  Hurdler, distance runner, and an important component of sprint relays.  Basically, a champ.  Plus he's gorgeous, even at this early stage of male development.  And the two girls stalked him, using various internet entities and just by staring at him a lot at track meets, happily ever after until two years later, at another track meet, when the ice was broken by the best wingman ever to walk the earth. 

Today was the day that the wingman flew, guys.  And guess what? THE WINGMAN WAS ME!
YEAH IT WAS!

It was not easy.  After it was determined that 1) today would be our last chance to talk to Jeffery and 2) I needed introduce him to my friend Megan*, I spent a good three hours (not even kidding) building up my courage  assessing the situation,  trying to decide when was the best time to chat him up. So, I walked by his school's tent probably four unnecessary times and spent like an hour more in his presence than I needed to.  That's okay.  Part of my research was to get advice from anyone who would listen about how to be a wingman. I had several strategies prepared, depending on the situation.

1. "Haaaaaave you met Megan?"

2.  Drop something near (or on) him, and then he'd have to pick it up and give it to me and then that would transition smoothly into me talking up Megan, introducing the two, and their imminent marriage.

3.  "Hey, don't tell her I told you this, but my friend thinks you're attractive.  You should go talk to her!"

When the moment finally came . . . oh, gosh, was it exciting! He ran the race right before mine, so we were in the infield, near the start/finish line, at the exact same time! So obviously those crazy fate ladies in Hercules were basically knitting Megan and Jeffery's strings together, wherever they are.  I took advantage of them and walked up to him and was literally all,

"Excuse me, can I talk to you for a minute?"

And surprisingly, he didn't run away! So I just kept going.  I pointed out Megan, making sure to point out her long hair and general hotness, and told him that she admired his hurdling skills (I thought that sounded less superficial than saying she thought he was pretty) and that he should talk to her because she would really like that.

AND HE DID! After her race, Jeffery, senior, walked up to his stalker of two years and GAVE HER A HUG, and I have never seen anything more beautiful.

So after that, I was on this high.  I should seriously wingman more often, because I was so extremely proud of myself and basically couldn't contain it.  And then after that, I ran my 800 race and PRd and I honestly think I owe it to Jeffery, hence the saying and would-be title, "Jeffery Gives Me Wings."

Love,
Allie

Any good wingman-ing/matchmaking stories? Tips? Anything?

Over

I'll get right to the point.  There are two weeks of school left. Two weeks.  And I am so, so, so, so so so so so so so over it. I want summer so bad that I could cry.  In fact, I may possibly have shed a tear or two already.  I want to sleep in, to do whatever I want whenever I want all day long.  I want to lay in bed with the windows open and hear birds and sprinklers and - wait, I have to take a break to Pinterest summer things.  Ok, I'm back.  That was a bad idea, because now I might cry again. And I want to lay in a hammock and have bonfires and watch fireworks. Gosh, I can't stay away from that dang Pinterest page.  And go to concerts and eat ice cream and draw with chalk and wear a swimsuit all day. And be tan.

I'm crying.  Its not even PMS or anything,  I promise, I'm just getting really emotional about summer because its not here and I miss it so much.

Please, can summer please please please please happen tonight? I would cry some more from relief. I'm crying anyway.

I kind of apologize from that confusing glance into my consciousness. Thanks for hanging out.  Please bring me some summer.

Allie

Dates

There are all kinds of girls out there.  Country girls, relationship girls, girls' girls, Gilmore girls, #girlswithtatts, unfriendly black hotties, girls who eat their feelings, girls who don't eat anything, desperate wannabes, burnouts, sexually active band geeks, and the greatest people you have ever met. I'm not sure if boys subdivide themselves into all these categories or not . . . I'm going to go with not. For women, though, there are options. Pretty much any girl can find a niche in the plethora of adjectives describing just what kind of female she is, a niche that describes and defines her.

I, for instance, happen to be a dessert girl. I. Love. Dessert.  Like, when someone asks that thought provoking question like, "What can you not imagine living without?" my answer would have to be dessert.  I have tried to give it up. I have tried so hard.  Recently, though, I've decided to stop fighting nature and accept myself for who I am: a Dessert Girl.

Unfortunately, being a Dessert Girl is both a joy and burden.  A joy for obvious reasons.  A burden for because desserts are really bad at contributing to long-term health and stuff like that.  Also, they are really manipulative and make you think that if you just eat all the desserts you will feel just as great as when you eat alllll the fruits and vegetables.  Which is a dirty lie. Most of the time.

Enter: dates.  Not dates with boys, as if! Boys have cooties. Dates as in the really sweet shrively looking fruit things that make desserts fit into the long term plan of living a quality life that lasts past the age of 55.  I Pinterested it and made some date brownies, and then ate like four of them last night.  Which left only 3. Which meant I had to whip up another dessert FAST or else I would have an identity crisis.  Thus, the cinnamon raisin cookie bar was born. Ta da.

In a food processor, process together:

4 dates (0r 80 grams)
2 tsp vanilla
1/4 cup olive oil
2 Tbsp milk
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1 egg
1/2+1/3 cup ground almonds

When that's all smooth, stir in the raisins and cook everything in a greased loaf pan at 350 for 10-12 minutes. And then have 1 or 4 and feel no guilt because they're so healthy!

Happy eating!
Allie

I'm In Love

When I went to St. Louis over spring break, I was definitely not expecting to find love. In retrospect, I should have seen it coming all along. The location, the situation - it was the perfect set up for destiny to happen.



It all started at the Soulard Farmers Market in the Soulard (crazy, right?) area of St. Louis. It was just before lunch time, and I was getting a little hungry. We walked by stalls of fresh produce, crafts, homemade pasta and bread, flavored olive oil, fancy cheeses and exotic-sounding meat. (Oxtail? Chickens feet, anyone?) I have money burning a hole in my pocket and my stomach was loudly threatening to start digesting itself if I didnt do something to appease it soon. So, yeah, I guess you could say I was in a vulnerable position.



As we neared the last stalls of the market, I smelled bakery smells. As in,
my very favorite kind of smells. They were delicious and smelled like carbs and ohmygosh I had to get me to where they were coming from. Approximately 2.8 seconds later, I was standing in front of an abundant display of baked goods. After a short term flirtation with the cinnamon bread (which was never going to happen, because it was sitting on the counter giving itself to anyone who happened by- so promiscuous!) I saw them. The macarons. And I wanted one,which was weird to me because they were pretty trendy recently and I never like the popular one, because he's usually a jerk and just because his hair looks perfect and he's gorgeous doesn't mean that he's a good person! You're just going to get hurt, like in You Belond With Me by Taylor Swift without the happy ending. You just follow him on Instagram instead.



Wait, what are we even talking about here?



Back to the baked goods. Anyway, so I asked the vendor because he was the macaron expert here, and he recommended the salted caramel. So yeah, I bought that sucker right up and when the vendor asked if I was going to eat it right now I just kind of looked at him like ... Duh. I mean, I wasn't sure if it was going to work out but I thought I'd better just jump right in and get my heart broken now rather than later, if indeed that was to be.



The only picture I took of it was, regrettably, really ugly because I was shaking with excitement. Sorry.


 And angels sang and I told everyone I could about how happy I was with my macaron.



Like all loving relationships, separation has been really hard for me.
I intend to be reunited with my new favorite pastry as soon as I can get my hands on some kitchenware and gluttonous amounts of sugar. Until then, you can probably find me on the couch,
crying, watching chick flicks, and cheating with the ice cream.

Oatmeal Energy Bars (that were actually a success)

I've had fourish, (I think) if you're into keeping track of how much you eat and stuff. Personally, I think that once your consumed four of anything, be it oatmeal energy bars, Oreos, bowls of ice cream ... you should probably just let loose and stop keeping track, work through whatever feeling you're trying to eat your way out of, and try again tomorrow.

Really, though, I'm pretty sure I've just had four.

Four whats?  you ask.  Based on the title of this post and some subtle context clues (i.e. "be it Oatmeal Energy Bars") you may have guessed that we're talking oatmeal energy bars! Or, if you're like me, you probably figured it out right away and skipped to the recipe part because hello, FOOD!

You may have also deduced from the title that I'm not usually good at these. Virtually every time I've tried to make these in the past, something has gone wrong. They burned. They were under baked. The crumbled to pieces Shen I tried to get them out of the pan. I tried to add vegetable and they were just as gross as that sounds. This time was different. These bars stick together, taste great, fill you up (but not so much that it isn't possible to squeeze fourish of them in your food tank), and even appeal to the taste buds of my teenage brother, who usually turns up his nose at my healthy food baking attempts in favor of barbecue sauce, cheese, sour cream, and as much root beer and cream soda as he can get his hands on.

So if you want these to yourself (cough cough me), keep them a secret. Don't make them while other people are around. And above all, do NOT bring them on your family car trip. Just don't.

Oatmeal Energy Bars
-1 1/2 cups oats
-3/4 cup almond meal
- 1/4 cup vanilla protein powder
- 1/4 cup flax seed
- generous 1/2 cup mashed banana ( that's about half of your average banana)
- 1 egg
-1/2 cup nut butter
- 1/4 cup honey
- 1/4 cup mixed berries
- 1/4 cup nuts
- sprinkle of cinnamon

Basically, you can just throw all that in a bowl, mix it up, and throw it in the oven at 350 for 15-20 minutes. When they're cool, store them in the fridge in an airtight container  and they should keep for about a week! If they make it that long ...

Happy bar making!

Love,
Allie

Runninrunninandrunninrunningadnrunninrunninandrunninrunnin

You know that song, that song that starts and ends like, "Runnin', runnin' and runnin', runnin and runnin' runnin" for ever and ever? I'm not even sure what song it is.

Runnin' runnin'

Runnin' runnin'

still runnin' runnin'

...

I just Googled it, and apparently a bunch of other people have also Googled "Runnin runnin and runnin runnin song" because they didn't know either, so you can stop laughing at me now and saying how I live under a rock.  It's Let's Get It Started by the Black Eyed Peas, for those who were wondering.

We're talking about runnin' runnin' and runnin' runnin' and runnin' runnin' and runnin' runnin' today in honor of the first track meet of the season on Thursday (!!!) I found out today that I have to get to run at least one 800, which is two times around the track. When I say it like that, it sounds easy. Like, come on Allie, 2 is not a lot. 800, on the other hand, is a big number. 880, which is how far I'll be running in yards, is even bigger. So on Thursday I will run 880 yards, and it will be fun.

35 years ago ish, my dad ran his first 880, as a 5th grader. Want to know his PR for that season? 2:47. Want to know my time currently? 3:19.  That translates to about 32873 years in running world, and he was a 5th grader. As in a 10-year-old. Soooo, that lights a little bit of a fire under me, and I'm here to proclaim to the internet that newest life goal is to someday, somewhere, run a 2:46.

Well, now I have to do that because I just told everyone. Wish me luck!

*Luck, Allie*

Thanks guys.

Why We Love Baseball.

For those of you who enjoy baseball, baseball players, baseball pants, or a combination of all of the above, today is an exciting day. AKA Opening Day here in the States (look at me pretending people from other countries read my blog!)  Some people don't get why it's so exciting.  Maybe its because there are only about 10 minutes of action in the average baseball game. Yep, that's right, those guys get paid zillions to stand on the field for almost 3 hours. Maybe it's because there are games every day except sometimes Monday and Thursday, so it's not as big of a deal.  I don't know. I don't get it. Maybe they just want to be hipsters or something. 

Maybe I can sway them. 

Prepare to be swayed.

We love baseball because we get to go somewhere different to see a game, AKA the lovely metropolis of Detroit. Day in the big city. Whoop whoop

We especially love St. Louis baseball because St. Louis is actually pretty and sometimes you get to participate in record breaking temperatures like 105 degrees and the ballpark is legally obliged to give you free ice made from $4.00 water, which is a steal. Haha, baseball puns.

 

Sometimes you get to sit behind the dugout and see your favorite players and be like 10 FEET AWAY FROM THEM! (See that little white guy to the left of me? He's my fave. Max Scherzer. )

Added bonus: Shiny face pictures.

We love baseball because ballparks have creative names.  The home of the Cardinals, for example, is named after beer.  The home of the Tigers is named after a bank. Which totally has to do with baseball, you know.

We love baseball because after the night games they have fireworks and they are really, really good. Also, all of the lovely citizens of Detroit get a free fireworks show 2 or 3 nights a week, which is neat. 

 

 

The Perks of Being Sixteen

Some people look back on being 16 and remember a really, really great time of their lives, and I'm sure some don't.  I personally think it's fantastic, and maybe that's partially because I'm able to do things like staying up for 29 consecutive hours and then bouncing back enough (by means of a three-hour nap) to write a blog post about it.   Normally, the idea of doing something like that would make me cringe. And maybe cry (another perk of being a 16-year-old girl!) Not today! And I thought maybe you'd want to live vicariously through me, because who doesn't want to spend 1.125 days awake, eating junk and watching movies? I thought so. So now you get to know what I was up to, hourly, for all 29 hours.

6:30 am, Friday | Burying my head under the pillow, as my little sister told me that "Dad says you have to get up now."

7:30 am, Friday | Cleansing my face at school instead of in the comfort of my own bathroom as a result of aforementioned burying.

8:30 am - 2:30 pm, Friday | Learning, which is the part of being sixteen that you either don't miss or aren't looking forward to, so I'll spare you.

3:30 pm, Friday | Blowing hot air because running fast does that to you.  Track practice was 10 200s, and it was good and torture-y all at the same time.

4:30 pm, Friday | Selecting a prom dress for a male friend of mine who lost at What Are the Odds to try on. We chickened out and got Slurpees instead, which was a good choice.

5:30 pm, Friday | Chewing and chewing and chewing Cubby Bears for the first time, which are basically the harder, worse tasting children of Gummi Bears from the dollar store.

6:30 pm, Friday | Awarding said Cubby Bears for prizes at a youth night hosted at my high school.  Because I'm mean.

7:30 pm, Friday | Rolling across the floor, ninja style, while playing Sardines.  I never, ever win, but that does not stop me from acting like the offspring of the FBI and Jackie Chan to hunt down whatever unfortunate person has to hide first.

8:30 pm, Friday | Blending a chocolate peanut butter protein smoothie, which is one of life's greatest pleasures, before heading to partay stop numba 2, a church lock in.

9:30 pm, Friday | Singing along to Frozen. And being way too happy about it.

10:30 pm, Friday | Catching my second wind of about five that night after almost nodding of during our devotion.

11:30 pm, Friday | Swinging, outside. At night.  It's one of those bucket list things that you just have to do and can't really be described unless you just do it. Go ahead, no one's stopping you.

12:30 am, Saturday | Laughing way too hard at Awkward Family Photos, the game. The board includes the likes of this picture and about 40 of its closest friends, and that is fantastic.

1:30 am, Saturday |

2:30 am, Saturday | Screaming because game of Sardines number 2 was just too much for my fragile nerves, and every shadow was an axe murderer who decided he wanted to join in the fun.

3:30 am, Saturday | Drafting this blog post after being assaulted by Nerf missiles and having a cold pop can rubbed on my face by high school boys with too much sugar in their system.

It'll probably come out sometime this week. Stay tuned.

4:30 am, Saturday | Honing my skills as a future 2048 record holder. For those of you who haven't played it, 2048 is a super addictive game that is available on the app store for free.  It's just as dangerous as it sounds, and I like to think I kick butt at it even though I don't, which is part of its magical addictive qualities I guess.

See that tile that says 1024? That's a big deal. 

5:30 am, Saturday | Hypocritizing, which my dad claims is the one word version of "being hypocritical." Anyway, by this point we had changed places with the boys who inspired the nun post and were making noise and scrolling through memory lane on our phones and liking it a lot.

6:30 am, Saturday | Leaving the lock in two point five hours before everyone else to be hard core and go work out for 194734 hours.

7:30 am, Saturday | Preparing mentally to head to Oak Pointe's exercise class demo day, which was 3 hours of back to back to back to back 20-minute samples of classes. We weren't sure if we'd make it. (We did.)

8:30 am, Saturday | Spinning, which is not the same as twirling in a dress but is actually really fun! I now give major props to my mom for voluntarily spinning three times a week for what seems like my entire life.

9:30 am, Saturday | Piloxing, (pilates + boxing + dancing).  Where do they even come up with this stuff? Also, sweating. 

10:30 am, Saturday | Drumming on exercise balls with drum sticks. Which is apparently a work out these days, despite the way it brought me back to the days of whacking the heck out of my mom's pots and pans as a 5 year old. I got hit in the butt by the lady next to me. It is a dangerous sport.

11:30 am, Saturday | Drooling while sleeping in the car, (not even kidding) and probably looking really attractive. Maybe something like this.

Bingeing

I've recently come to realize that my life is basically a giant, long string of binges.

That's pretty depressing-sounding, isn't it? But that's basically how it works for me. When I find something I really like - whether it be a TV show, a food, a workout, a song, a book, a color - I go at it, hard, until that dead horse had not only been beaten, but its basically turned into a big dead horse pancake. Gross imagery #sorrynotsorry I don't have any solid reasoning for why my life is such a bingefest, although I do have a theory that I like to call Bingeing on A Bunch Of Different Things Is Basically a Creative Form of Everything in Moderation so Obviously I Have My LIfe Pretty Well Under Control.  I mean, if I spend 10 hours watching How I Met Your Mother (I'm still on season 1) one week and then don't watch TV at all for the rest of the next two weeks, is there really anything wrong with that?

This whole self-examination occurred as a result of John Green, who writes books that are almost as philosophical as the above paragraph and which also happened to be the subject of my latest binge. It started with a quote from A Fault in Our Stars, and before I knew it I had my hands on a virtual copy of it and had read myself halfway through the Superbowl. Which I heard was no big loss, but I wouldn't know that because I kept right on reading until I had gotten to the last page and my world was basically falling apart because of people I hadn't even met. And who don't actually exist.

And then before I knew it I was Sparknotesing it and then I was finding book numero two for the night AKA Looking For Alaska, which I proceeded to read until 3 AM, which resulted in me becoming emotionally involved with fictional characters for the second time in 12 hours. 

And I tell you, I haven't opened a book that wasn't required for school since November, and I do love reading. But that was definitely a binge. And it was awesome, and I don't play on changing my lifestyle any time soon!

Please excuse me while I start book numero three aka Paper Towns. 

I obviously hate you and don't value my sanity

I think I must be some kind of psychopath, because recently it seems like I've been really into self torture.  It's starting to become a big issue, because its spreading to the people around me. Like you. So if you want to save yourself, don't scroll any further. Especially if you, like me, live in Michigan, where snow's been falling non-stop since Halloween and most days, the temperature is zero or, if the weather really feels like being an over achiever, lower.

I mean, I don't hate Michigan. I love that we have four seasons (ahem even if winter is wayyyyy longer than all the other ones), but most of the time I'd rather be at the beach. More specifically, the ocean beach on Sullivan's Island, South Carolina, where we spent a week two summers ago. Things I miss ...

1. Being tan. Oh, how miss being tan. I know, I know, it was probably giving me skin cancer. But I spend so much time not being tan that it probably makes up for the one week out of the year that my skin spends actually exposed to actually exposed to sun!

 2. This

 3. My parents walking on the beach like supermodels. 

 4. This sunset every. night. 

 5. This beach being just 3 blocks away. 

 6. This being my back yard.

 7. The moon being pink. 

 8. The ocean. I've been to the ocean once . . . I fell in love. 

 

 9. Finding seashells. And constantly being happy. And warm. 

Yeah well it works, okay?

I literally haven't washed my hair with shampoo in over a week. No, I'm not turning into some kind of hippie, in spite of hard evidence to the contrary.

Back in 09, when I used to be cool.

Anyway, about that washing my hair thing . . . I don't.  Yep. For the last few days I've been doing that vinegar/baking soda thing that you've maybe heard about because it's a trend now. You heard about it here first, folks. 

In really, really simple terms, it works because baking soda and vinegar aren't as hard on your scalp as shampoo. When you use shampoo, it strips your hair of its natural oils - which is why it feels super-clean at first! - but that eventually causes your hair to work overtime to reproduce the oils, leaving you with - you guessed it - oily hair! That means that most of us have to wash our hair every single day, which causes it to break and just generally be less shiny and gorgeous. Sooooo . . . when you use baking soda and vinegar, it DOESN'T strip your hair of natural oils, so your hair DOESN'T get oily as fast. Rumor has it that after a few weeks of the system, you can go 2-3 days between each wash! 

So, how does it work, you ask? 1 part baking soda to 2-3 parts water. You have to experiment with the amount needed for your hair - I have short hair and use 1 tablespoon of baking soda and 2 tablespoons of water. Scrub that into your scalp really well (since its not as harsh as shampoo you really have to scrub!) and rinse it out. Next, rinse your hair with a cold vinegar rinse (thats 1 part vinegar to 3-4 parts water) and rinse that out with cold water. You don't have to use cold water, because I mean duh cold water in the winter. Nope. 

Oh, and make sure to put some lavender oil into your vinegar rinse or otherwise get some kind of good smelling spray in your hair, because you don't want to smell like vinegar.  Don't worry too much - one of those things should take care of it. 

Also, prepare to get called a hippie by your family members and for extreme jealousy of everyone who sees your hair, because this stuff works. 

I make good use of my time

Time management has never been an area of strength for me, which really stinks because the world is basically designed for the people who are. Why can't it be so that the people who always show up late, finish projects at the last minute, and do useless, fun things rather than productive, boring things get ahead in life? Because I would be great at that. And the way I see it, I'm going to either have to work against my natural tendencies for MY ENTIRE LIFE or learn to live with the consequences of what some might call "slacking." 

One prime example is my PSG white iPhone case.

It used to be white until Wednesday night, when I decided to decorate it instead of cracking into the pile of books in my backpack. I don't regret that at all. I'm actually kind of proud of it, which is why I wanted to show it to you.  The band sticker came from church camp because I'm hard core, and the prints are from magazines.  Spiderman came off my book cover. The heart is from a note from one of my friends, and the time stamp on the sticker used to be part of a movie ticket. All held together with wood glue and packing tape. It is a quality piece of work. 

Thanks for letting me brag on my very important little project. Go out there and make it a productive day. 

Things I Learn

Yesterday I learned about when life gives you lemons, eat chocolate ice cream. Because sometimes lemonade isn't enough. And, let's be honest, no one really likes lemon desserts.

Due to a dress code violation, I was sent home to change my clothes. I promise it's not as bad as it sounds. My dress was an inch too short and I WAS WEARING TIGHTS. Not that I'm bitter. No sir.

So I got home, let myself in, and changed into a skirt that was less revealing (of my tights. BY AN INCH!) and had just concluded that, yes, I should probably go back to school, when I remembered that we have Healthy Choice chocolate ice cream bars in the freezer. I mean they're healthy, right? And delicious. And no one else was home. So why shouldn't I be able to have one on my way back to school?

So I did, and my day got 1000000% better. The sun came out, the radio decided to play a song I actually liked. Good life choice. I guess the moral of the story is, always have your chocolate ice cream on hand, because you never know when your day will take a turn for the worse. Even if you're wearing tights.

Maybe if I did cool things

So, I was just stalking myself on blogger. (Yep, I'm that full of myself.) Oh really? You don't do that? You don't scroll through your old Instagrams simply for the satisfaction of how good you looked in that one dress, or press the "see more" button at the bottom of your Facebook page to relive 2009 just for the heck of it? No matter how painful it is to be reminded of your old hairstyle, lingo, relationship, whatever - WE ALL DO IT!! Yeah, that's what I thought.

To further justify how super-concieted or nostalgic or whatever it was I was being, stalking my own blog got me thinking about why do I not do this anymore?

And then I said to myself, Self, (that one's courtesy of my dad. No wonder I'm so funnay) it's because WHEN WAS THE LAST TIME YOU DID SOMETHING COOL AND ACTUALLY TOOK PICTURES OF IT OR EVEN REMEMBERED WHAT HAPPENED? Not that I was passed out drunk or anything, but lets be honest. Most of my recent pictures and ativities consist of things like this. AKA having fun and taking selfies, which is the beauty of being a teenager and owning my PSG white iPhone. We're expected to do things like taking cute selfies in selife study hall and then having them posted on Instagram against our will (see below) And then stalking ourselves later.

 

 Also, ignoring the less important things like an impending heat stroke, dehydration, and the fact that we have to pee. so. bad. at Cedar Point in order to capture our sweaty little faces.

 Taking selfies alone and pretending we were with Zac Efron.

Having the paparazzi take pictures of us while we have a dinosaur on our face.

 

 

And all of these got me thinking about how I never tkae pictures of cool stuff anymore, and seriosly you don't really want to see my face overandoverandovereverysingleday. It's okay, you can be honest. So I'll work on that, because I really do enjoy this part of my life and it means a lot to me. And I miss you.

 

Do you feel like we just broke up and I want you back?