Are you pickin' up what I'm puttin' down?

A Few Thoughts on my Pending Graduation

2007-05-09T15:25:00.000-05:00

That's right folks, in just a few short days I will be walking across a stage wearing a very unflattering gown and ridiculous square hat that is sure to ruin my perfectly coiffed hair while fighting a losing battle against a tassel which is surely only there to make all of these supposedly well-educated adults look like ignorant kittens as we playfully (or angrily) bat it out of our faces. And as this moment approaches, I must tackle many very important questions that face all college graduates:

1. Will I ever find a job?
2. How will I make enough money to eat?
3. Will I have to live in a portable ice shanty on Wisconsin Avenue?
4. If I can afford two portable ice shanties, set them up side-by-side and rent the other one out to another recent college graduate can I call it a duplex?
5. If I can call it a duplex, does that make me a landlord and mean that I have to draw up some sort of lease for my next door shanty neighbor?
6. If this does make me a landlord will Jenny and Mike show me all of the necessary tricks to being the greatest shanty manager/landlord that I can be?

Yes folks. These are all questions that recent college graduates must face. But while it's slightly frightening to be thrown out into the world on my own, it's time. While I'm not going to pretend like I am suddenly going to turn into some very serious adult who only worries about deadlines and the financial bottom line, I will say that it is high time for me to go out into the world and see what I can do. So to all of you who read this, I thank you for keeping me sane through these crazy college years. Lord knows without my friends I would constantly be in my over-stressed, somewhat unpleasant state that, thanks to all of you, only comes out every once in a while. Ending college is a bittersweet time, but it's time for me to grow up. Besides, we all know that I'll more than likely be back in school someday once I figure out what the hell to do with these three seemingly unrelated areas of study. And when that time comes about again, I hope all of you will still be around to make sure I maintain my sanity.

Did you hit me with a baseball bat while I was sleeping?

2007-03-01T23:35:00.000-06:00

I have had a less than stellar week. I spent the better part of 2 hours on Saturday sitting in a snow-filled ditch wrapped in a blanket while my car was nestled in what I like to call a large patch of glorified twigs. Now there is no need to worry. I am fine. Not so much as a broken fingernail and my car got away with only several scratches and a dent the size of a Swedish meatball (you should know by now that my analogies are never normal) and then had to pay some creepy man over $100 to tow my ass out. But I then made it the rest of the 1.5 hours home only to get hit on by a band of sleazy men at the gas station (baby girl do you know you're in the hood? did you know that you're in the hood and you're sexy? that is not a safe combination here... in the hood) and arrive back at the MC only to find some jackass with a VW Golf (one of the five that VW actually sold of that model) parked in my spot. He picked the wrong day to park in my spot and came out to a lovely parking ticket and big orange violation sticker. In my neighborhood I could have smashed his front window and no one would have looked twice (because I live in the hood you know, in case you weren't paying attention earlier).

As if that weren't enough, my body decided to entirely crap out this week (you know, the week where I had a two-day theology test, two quizzes, and a project to finish). I could deal with the headaches and the throwing up, but today was simply the last straw. I woke up and my body just hurt everywhere as if I had put myself through some kind of rigorous workout routine, and we all know that is clearly not the case. Which brings me to my opening question. Did any of you hit me with a baseball bat while I was sleeping? And then drag me outside and run me over with your car 5 times? And then take me skydiving without a parachute? Cause it certainly feels like you did so you might as well fess up now.

Isn't it neurotic? Don't you think? A little too neurotic.

2007-01-08T00:14:00.000-06:00

I'm not perfect.

Okay, I'll pause a moment as you regain your composure from that inevitable large shock-filled gasping breath you just took in.....

Alright, now that you've regained your composure I'll explain. I just finished "Devil in the Details" by Jennifer Traig (fantastic book) in which she humorously explains her life-long battle with OCD and her strive to be perfect. While I will not pretend that this book has suddenly led me believe I myself suffer from OCD or can even entertain the notion that I completely understand the outstanding nature of her compulsions or her battle with anorexia, I can see some of myself in her.

Here is something I have really never talked to anyone about. When I was younger I felt the need to do things that I didn't really understand. Why was it that I had to take exactly 10 sips, no more no less, from the bubbler? If I bumped my left side against something, why did I then also have to brush that item with my right side to "feel even?" To this day I always break numbers down in my head until they cannot be broken down anymore. I incessantly type out words in my head and at times feel compelled to walk at a certain stride, making sure not to step on any cracks. I like to blame my need to watch my feet when I walk on the fact that I just don't walk very well, but that's not necessarily the case. You may be saying well, maybe you're just a little neurotic. Maybe it's just a little quirk you have. And I agree. It doesn't interfere with my ability to do everyday tasks and I function reasonably well in everyday society. So what's the problem? What's the real kicker? I used to think, and sometimes still do at times, that if I don't do these things it would somehow cause disastrous things to happen. This was increasingly reinforced by the fact that when I did do them bad things didn't happen.

But sometimes I don't think about these things. Sometimes I break the ridiculous rules I have set for myself. And you know what? Nothing bad happens. Everything is okay. No one dies. My world does not come to a screeching halt. I can get by without breaking down the number "39" into "13" because both numbers are divisible by 3. Doing these things doesn't make me perfect. I'm perfectly imperfect. And that's okay.

p.s. As I was writing this post the song "Crazy" by Gnarls Barkley came on my i-tunes. Not very reassuring to hear someone constantly say "I think you're crazy" while trying to reaffirm your own sanity. Coincidence?

Burning Questions

2006-12-25T23:18:00.000-06:00

Now I know that during this Christmas season you may all be asking yourself "Has Courtney taken up knitting as a stress reliever since she received knitting items as a Christmas gift this year?"

The answer would be yes. And I am kind of taking to it. I just made a scarf. Lovely.

Merry Christmas to All.

p.s. Thanks to all who made Festivus a blast.

Who doesn't love a good snow day?

2006-12-01T18:46:00.000-06:00

All of this snow reminds me of all of the crazy/unsafe things we used to do as children in the snow. Like sledding. Always an unsafe choice. Someone was always getting hurt or stuck in a snow bank. Or if you were me you'd get to the bottom of the hill and have trouble getting back up to the top. Being "handicapable" is not always so advantageous. But I digress.

Because I went to a tiny perocial elementary school out in "the sticks", we did things like take a half day off of school to go on a school-wide sledding outing. We also did things like take entire days off to go rollerskating or hold our annual "LLS Olympics." I clearly learned a lot during elementary school. It's a wonder I can tie my own shoes.

But anyway, the annual sledding trip always seemed to end in tragedy. As if Adam running full-speed into an electric box wasn't enough to put the kibosh on this annual Lebanon tradition, I finally solidified the beginning of the end when I sledded off of a man-made “sledding jump” which knocked the wind out of me and gave the teachers a good concussion scare. It was pretty awesome.

Side note: One winter I decided making a snowman was too normal for me so I made a snowduck, complete with ducklings trailing behind. Best snow animal ever.

Speaking of sledding, the other day I saw facebook pictures of people sledding on recycling bins, lunch trays, and other assorted plastic items. While these items by themselves make for an amazing sledding adventure, the amazingness was only heightened by the fact that all of these itemse were clearly stolen. Jenny, Johnny, I feel like this could possibly be the winter version of urban kite flying. Maybe we could call it pilfered sledding or something. Who knows. We will work on the name at a later date.

Enjoy the snow everyone!!

Did you hear what I heard?

2006-11-29T22:52:00.000-06:00

Because this is a somewhat Christmas-related post, I thought I would start off with a Christmas-inspired title. Think "The Little Drummer Boy" written in past tense. But I digress.

Anyway, I was just informed that the 16-year-old girl who played Mary in that new movie "The Nativity Story" is pregnant. Out of wedlock. Oh the irony. I think I would claim immaculate conception. I mean, maybe she just got that into her role. Crazy. Oh Christmas.

some thoughts i had today

2006-11-21T14:42:00.000-06:00

disclaimer: the thought contained in the above thought bubble is much more entertaining than anything contained in the post to follow

things i thought today but didn't say out loud:

hey girl. yeah, you in the pink shirt. is that shirt new? i hope so cause you still have the price tag on it. however, you are walking much too briskly for me to catch up with you and i feel it innappropriate to yell something like this at you.

the library is supposed to be a quiet place to work. why in the hell are you doing very loud construction in the middle of the when you could wait 4 hours for everyone to be gone on break? what sort of construction device even makes a high-pitched squealing noise like that?

was that a bird that just ran into the window of the classroom?

who the hell smokes a cigar on their way to class?

the leaves are particularly crunchy as i walk through them today. delightful.

man i lead an exciting life.

Things that don't impress me

2006-11-20T00:04:00.000-06:00

Hey creepy man in bar, here are a few portions of your conduct that I find less than impressive:
1. Your "sweet moves"
2. The fact that your favorite movie is "What About Bob?"
3. That you invite us to go with you to another bar, only to find out that said bar is less than a hundred feet from this bar.
4. Your "wingman" who has decided to gaze at me in a creepy manner
5. Your general demeanor
6. Your relentless attempts to make some kind of "genuine connection with another human being" by following us out of the door
7. Your failure to understand the meaning of the words "Hey buddy, why don't you just move right along?"

Boat for Sale

2006-11-12T23:00:00.000-06:00

Jennifer and I were discussing personal ads this evening when I made a startling discovery. Have you every noticed that personal ads sound almost exactly the same as people searching for other things? I mean, think about it. Things like "Hansome Young Businessman seeks Tall, Leggy Professional Woman" could easily be replaced with "Handsome young businessman seeks 40 foot yacht on which to throw extravegant parties and engage in general debauchery." I have since become convinced that many who write personal ads only do so because they were already halfway there from that ad they wrote last week looking for someone to come wash their windows or to find that prized Mickey Mantle baseball card they have been seeking out for some time now. Now I ask all of you next time you read your local newspaper or search on Craigslist to imagine what all of these "man seeking woman" types had actually originally written that particular ad for. I think you'll see my point.

And to end this post I will give you an example of a personal ad from Craigslist under the "missed connections" area that does not necessarily fit the prototypical personal ad but made us laugh extremely hard nonetheless:

Yo girl in the white chevy cav with the hipster cut

And there are many more where that came from.

General public concensus on a hard-hitting issue

2006-10-23T23:04:00.000-05:00

When did calling someone a liar cease to be enough of an insult that people also felt the need to preceed it by calling them big and fat? Isn't that redundant anyway? I mean, really.

I heard a funny phrase today

2006-10-16T23:51:00.000-05:00

As the title indicates, I heard a funny phrase today. I was walking past these two men on my way home from class when I heard one man say to the other "Hey man, why you gotta be drinkin' on that haterade?" (rhymes with gatorade, for all of those not fluent in ebonics). It was one of the very few things that brought a smile to my face as I have had a particularly bad day. Please feel free to use this phrase as necessary when your triflin' friends are hatin'.

I know how you love your trinkets....

2006-10-11T16:18:00.000-05:00

I know it's not exactly a trinket, but I saw this in my friend's photo album and thought I needed to share it with the world.
Jenny, Kyle, this post is especially for you.
You know you want one....

The pressure is on

2006-10-06T23:54:00.000-05:00

Alright, alright, I give. You have all updated so I guess it is my turn. Lord knows I can not let you all go another day without my gems of wisdom cascading down upon you. Trouble is my life is not very exciting, so I have dug in the archives of my brain to come up with a few amusing things from my recent past that seem worthy enough to post for all to see, so here goes.

As many of you know, I spent the summer in Mexico and it was absolutely amazing and eye-opening. In fact it was so amazing and eye-opening that I shall now share some of the things I learned from my studies abroad.

1. I love Mexico.
2. It is perfectly acceptable for men to blatantly stare at you, whistle, and inappropriately comment on your physical appearance.
3. It is also perfectly acceptable for an old man to lift his shirt up over his beer gut and ask me to take a swim for him.
4. When men, particularly taxi drivers, are trying to chat you up by asking you where you're from, tell them you're from Canada because they will suddenly have nothing to say. No one knows a damn thing about Canada.
5. It is impossible to get a taxi between 3 and 4 pm.
6. When they say don't drink the water, they mean don't drink the water. Or eat food from stands on the street. Especially when the stray dogs that used to hang out by the stand mysteriously disappear. I'm serious.
7. If you get lime juice on your hands at the beach you will get second degree burns and end up at the crazy dermatologist's office who gives you a shot in your butt and then swears at you in English.
8. The sterotype that they like to shove as many people as possible in the bed of a truck is not a stereotype at all. It actually happens.
9. After a while phrases like "so I was passing the house with the cow tied to the tree on my way to the internet cafe" don't seem weird at all.
10. The house two doors down always had the distinct smell of marijuana coming from it which is only noteworthy because the only person who lived there was a little old lady.
11. Sometimes I fall down. Twice. In one day. Within a one hour period. In almost exactly the same spot.
12. Oxxo is the single greatest convenience store of all time.
13. Mexico is to old Volkswagen beetles what Boca Raton, Florida is to the elderly: the place where they come to die.
14. Mexican immigration officers will come on your coach bus and threaten to take all of you to jail for not having your visa with you, but only if they had a bigger truck.

My deepest apologies

2006-09-15T18:59:00.000-05:00

I must admit that I am a hypocrite. Every day I religiously check all of the blogs of those in our "special blogging circle" hoping and demanding that they have updated so I can entertain myself for at least a few minutes while simultaneously failing to update my own blog to give the rest of you temporary entertainment as I pour out endless gems of wisdom. And for this I am truly sorry. I can make up all kinds of lame excuses like I had homework to do or the phone rang or I was teaching the cat how to use the vacuum cleaner. But this is a lie. The mere fact that I have time to check all of your wonderful blogs every day and respond with detailed, deliberately orchestrated comments just proves that homework and stupid cat tricks can wait. What is more important is to let my friends, and the whole world if they so choose, know what is going on in my little world. So here is my sad attempt at apologizing for being a hypocrite. I hope you will accept it as I will make a much more valient attempt to keep the world updated with my endless gems of wisdom, or seemingly mindless babble, whichever you choose to call it. That is all. Thank you for reading.

"After losing 10 in a row, 1 game is a winning streak."

2006-09-04T22:58:00.000-05:00

Today I attended the Brewer's game armed with all the essentials: all the necessary fixins for "salad in a glass" (more commonly known as bloody marys), beer, burgers, front row seats at the club level, a premier parking pass (we could have only parked closer if we had actually parked on the field), a karaoke machine complete with microphone for "making important announcements", and the company of three of the greatest people you will ever know. Yes, this had the makings of a great day.

10:15 am: Brent, Jenny, Patrick, and myself depart for Miller Park

10:30 am: Discover that express parking is not so "express" when you have to drive all the way around to get in, but are delighted to discover that we get to park literally 100 feet from the entrance.

10:33 am: Jennifer, Brent, and myself begin drinking our daily servings of vegetables while Pat starts in on the PBR.

10:40 am: The grill gets fired up and the burgers are cookin'.

10:50 am: Brent discovers the karaoke machine has a microphone and all hell breaks loose.

11:00 am: We begin to discover that everyone else is parking on the other side of the parking lot. We decide to take it personally. Brent uses the microphone to ensure them that we "do not bite and would like them to be our friends."

11:15 am: We decide that having a microphone warrants us to claiming that we have our own radio show. Because of this AM 1590 WHUU "the WU" is born, complete with DJ Delightful, who you all may know more commonly as my brother.

11:30 am: Some brave people take the plunge and decide it just might be safe to park next to us. They discover it's not when we immediately offer them free bloody mary's.

11:35 am: Stan from the brave car next to us is hired on as the meteorologist for WHUU. Like any good weatherman, all of his predictions are false.

11:40 am: We realize that our radio show reaches a solid fifty people. We are happy with the numbers but hope for a broader listening base on our next Brewer's excursion

Like any good radio show, our radio show included special segments and whacky promotions. My personal favorite segment was "drunken voicemails from grandma". Pretty self-explanatory. Our whacky promotions included Brent offering Bloody Mary's and free air time on our radio show in exchange for goods and services.

Phrases like "I'll give you a bloody mary if you hit my sister with a wet pickle" and "15 minutes of airtime on our radio show if you give us your big umbrella" are born.

The rest of our tailgating time is spent sitting in the rain pretending we have our own radio show (the show had to be temporarily moved to underneath the table while consistently bothering all of the people walking past us with our amplified voices.

1 pm: We finally realize that it is time to venture into the game. Though we are only 100 feet from the entrance, we decide it is still necessary to take a "walkin' beer." Attempts to finish said walking beer before reaching the gates proves unsuccessful for most.

We finally enter the game, sit in our fabulous seats, and thoroughly enjoy ourselves as the Brewer's finally win a game. Details of the game itself can be accessed per personal request and if I feel like telling you.

The moral of this post you ask?

Any idiot can have a radio show if he's got a microphone and a ridiculous radio name.

I don't think you're ready for this jelly

2006-09-03T21:19:00.000-05:00

So today we decided it was necessary to download many ridiculous songs, most of them being of the female r&b genre. And in my quest for ridiculous songs I came upon what I would like to think is somewhat of a theme song for myself. If you know me and take a good look at the lyrics, I think you'll see what I mean.

Bootylicious - Destiny's Child

Kelly, can you handle this?
Michelle, can you handle this?
Beyonce, can you handle this?
I don't think they can handle this!

Better move, we've arrived
Lookin sexy, lookin fly
Baddest chick, chick inside
DJ, jam tonightSpotted me a tender thang
There you are, come on bab
yDon't you wanna dance with me
Can you handle, handle me

You gotta do much better if you gone dance with me tonight
You gotta work your jelly if you gone dance with me tonight
Read my lips carefullyif you like what you see
Move, groove, prove you can hang with me
By the looks I got you shook up and scared of me
Hook up your seatbelt, it's time for takeoff

I don't think you ready for this jelly
I don't think you ready for this jelly
I don't think you ready for this
Cause my body too bootylicious for ya babe

I don't think you ready for this jelly
I don't think you ready for this jelly
I don't think you ready for this=20
Cause my body too bootylicious for ya babe

Baby, can you handle this?
Baby, can you handle this?
Baby, can you handle this?
I don't think you can handle this!

I'm about to break you off
H-town goin hard
Lead my hips, slap my thighs
Swing my hair, square my eyes
Lookin hot, smellin good
Groovin like I'm from the hood
Look over my shoulder, I blow you a kiss
Can you handle, handle this

I don't think you ready for this jelly
I don't think you ready for this jelly
I don't think you ready for this
Cause my body too bootylicious for ya babe

I don't think you ready for this jelly
I don't think you ready for this jelly
I don't think you ready for this
Cause my body too bootylicious for ya babe

Move your body up and down (whoo!)
Make your booty touch the ground (whoo!
I can't help but wonder why (whoo!)
Is my vibe too vibealacious for you, babe

I shake my jelly at every chance
When I whip with my hips you slip into a trance
I'm hoping you can handle all this jelly that I have
Now let's cut a rug while we scat some jazz

[Scatting]

I don't think you ready for this jelly
I don't think you ready for this jelly
I don't think you ready for this
Cause my body too bootylicious for ya babe

a word everyone needs to know... and use more often

2006-09-02T23:37:00.000-05:00

Recently, my good friend Jennifer and I have been, how should I say, unlucky in love. We have come in contact with men who we have decided can be best described as "triflin'". Upon further thought, we realized that we don't exactly know what the word 'triflin' means, so I thought perhaps some investigation was in order to ensure that these men in fact are what we are claiming them to be. When looking up slang words there is simply no better place to go than urbandictionary.com. So here goes.

Trifling:
1. (adj.) Describing a situation, person, or event that is pathetic.
2. shady, not right

Yep. I think that sounds about right. Just thought everyone should know.