karma

my brother got a dog about four months ago, a little puppy named Karma. she's a yellow lab and super adorable, but SO full of energy. Super mischevious, for sure. Just now, she got a running start from my brothers bedroom and bolted across the house, only to throw herself onto the door to where the cats live and where the dog food is.

It definitely makes me appeciate my family dog, Mickey, who is very well trained, NEVER barks, is polite, and when he takes a treat, he doesn't chomp your hand off. He's more my kind of dog.

puppies!

working really hard...

being thankful

HOW IS IT ALMOST THANKSGIVING?

did we not just celebrate halloween?

Thanksgiving makes me think of how thankful I am for the people in my life.

And today, without a doubt, i can say that I could not be more thankful for the wonderful family, friends and boyfriend that I have in my life. :)

100 miles later

today i had a free day and some energy to burn, so I got in my car and started driving around aimlessly... I ended up taking practically every freeway in LA/OC. I started off by going to Long Beach and I drove through CSULB's campus, and then went through long beach, to san pedro, to venice beach, to santa monica, up santa monica blvd, and through LA and back home. It was rather amusing, some things you only see in LA.

LA was super smoggy and gross.

I don't get it either. Especially the Seagull part

Okay, seriously? This van is super sketch.

Does this disturb anyone else besides me? it's a giant shoe.

this reminds me of the song :)

because if nothing else will get you there, they have ice cream

when i was younger, i used to read all these books about homeless kids, foster kids, and kids wanting to run away and this is where they'd go.

if i was to stay in a hostel, this is where i'd want to stay

The batmobile!

end result: 100 miles, 3 gallons of gas, and some funny pictures

montana!

i took a very random, last minute trip to Bozeman, Montana last weekend. I've never been to Montana and it was a fun trip. It was very beautiful and there were some amazing landscapes. However, there isn't much to do without a car and some freedom, so there were moments of boredom. But certainly not with the weather... I got it all: rain, wind, snow, hail, lightning, thunder, sun. The fall colors came out in abundance, and for a few days I appreciated what it's like to really experience fall again. It's been awhile, and a first in terms of NORTH northern fall.

Grand Canyon from the airplane

wildflowers

My friend Jacquelyn from high school lives there, we went downtown on Saturday night to experience some Bozeman culture. there were lots of donned hunting gear.

view from the sister/aunt's house

view of bozeman looking north

cutest wierdest looking dog i've ever seen after tromping through mud. DOUG!

forest

this is the mill from the movie a River Runs Through It, which was directly across the street from the house I stayed at.

mountains on the way to the airport

tree sap

road to...?

caterpillar

hay bales

All in all, a good trip. Got to see some beautiful scenery, a new state, old friends, and a few new ones :)

steady as you go

my grandmother moves on friday. as in, four days from now my grandmother will not be living in her home that she's lived in for nearly 50 years. She's the original owner. My parents are both flying down tomorrow and staying until Saturday to help out. I wish they were coming down just to hang out and not to uproot my grandma and her life. there's going to be a messy driving intervention, which i am not looking forward to. She's trying to get her drivers licence back, which is no bueno. It's really strange to me that after friday she will no longer live there, and my friends and I are moving in. Part of me wants to totally redecorate and paint everything as quickly as possible to erase the weirdness that will remain once she is no longer there, and the other part of me wants to cling to the ugly painting and uncomfortable couch and not let anyone touch anything to preserve the lingering scents and memories. 

Today is my brothers 20th birthday. Happy birthday brother! I wish I could be in Auburn to help him celebrate it, but I will be seeing him in a few weeks when I go up there. I remember when he was born, the nurse walked us out to the car with a big wagon full of baby supplies and I got attached to the wagon. She (jokingly) asked which one I wanted, my brother or the wagon and after a short internal debate at three and a half years old, I wisely chose my brother. On the long drive home, it was ridiculously hot and I sat in the front seat and handed pillows to my mom in the back. I held him for the first time on the corner of our green couch, that now lives at Roni's mom's house, and my parents sat on the floor in front of me just in case. I used to climb onto the dresser by his crib and sing him songs before naptime, and when he got older we took long journeys around our driveway eating honeysuckles and berries to survive in a wagon very much like the one the nurse brought out when he was born. 



He's the one in front, with the blue shirt. Probably about five years old. 



I think he just graduated from the 8th grade and was about to enter high school. That's my dog. :)



my sophomore year of college.



Taken a few weeks ago. Not so little anymore.

"Bring on the evening hours," I cry "Bring on the evidence of my life"

colleen and i went to the house of blues last night to see Ingrid Michaelson and Greg Laswell and it might have been the best concert i have ever been to in my life and that's saying a lot.

not only is she a phenomenal songwriter and singer, she is quirky to a point where you just laugh and feel like you're sitting in a (giant) living room having a jam session. She was incredibly captivating. There were more than a few points in the concert where I got that overwhelming connected feeling that everyone is just caught up in a moment of standing still while everything else around is fast forwarding, and in that moment life becomes questionable and intense. at the end of the concert, everyone took out thier cell phones in a 1960's moment and waved them in the air as the lights went down to a dark soft blue and she sang an encore of "i cant help falling in love with you" and I think everyone got a little teary.

I got home around 11:30 or so and sat on the couch with a yellow notepad and a red pen and wrote. I wrote song after song and wished I could play my baby taylor better than the self taught sloppy fingering that i learned while sitting in my harry potter closet and on big white chairs on the porch of A-4, but to have those memories of watching students in the quad at 3am is more worth it than sitting in a cold music room all alone. I should have brought my notepad and guitar to work today so I could work on them more. Eventually I went to bed and continued to write and fell asleep with the light on, only to wake up when james walked in to see why i was awake at 6am.

Music always makes me question and think. We are here for a bigger purpose and i get caught up in my day to day life where everything has a place. But in the real world, nothing has a place and it's a big somewhat organized chaos, kind of like half the songs Ingrid sang last night. It was a reminder that I'm meant for bigger things. Much bigger things. It reminds me that I need more than just what is comfortable, what is given to me. i need to be caught up in a whirlwind to find my place.

And I think I like how the day sounds
Like how the day sounds through this new song


O wind won't you take me up to the sky
I can get a good look down at this life of mine
River won't you take me out and to the sea
I can get a good look back at the land that grounds me
-Greg Laswell

But as strong as I seem to think I am my distressing damsel,
She comes out at night when the moon's filled up and your eyes are
bright, then I think I simply aught to

Fall over, fall over, fall overboard, overboard.
Fall overboard just so you can catch me.
You can catch me.
-Ingrid Michaelson