Wednesday, June 30, 2004
Well, today, we're off. We're moving. So, it might be a couple more days before I can give a decent update.Posted by Rachel at 9:24 AM |
Tuesday, June 29, 2004
101 Things You Didn't Know You Wanted to Know About Me01. I can't whistle properly or roll my R's.
02. I'm not allergic to anything.
03. I've never broken, fractured, or sprained any part of my body.
04. I know how to crochet.
05. I can't see the pictures in those Magic Eye books.
06. I dislike all carbonated drinks - especially pop.
07. I absolutely hate the color "coral."
08. I find myself becoming more fond of the color orange.
09. I have a strange phobia of dingy basements and pipes (like these). I could never be a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle.
10. I feel bad whenever I kill any sort of insect/spider, so I try to avoid it whenever possible (except under certain conditions - ie., insect is in my bed or flying around my face. Or is a mosquito).
11. I love blank paper, be it lined, drawing, or printer paper.
12. I've never tried cigarettes, pot, or alcohol.
13. I've never tried sushi.
14. I have a tendency to procrastinate until the last minute and create unnecessary stress for myself.
15. I've kept a written journal on and off since second grade. I've kept one consistently since about sixth grade.
16. I haven't been on an airplane since I was three.
17. I taught myself how to do a cartwheel in my living room when I was nine.
18. I like playing floor hockey.
19. I don't know how to ice skate.
20. I've taken about five years of ballet classes in my lifetime.
21. I've never been outside of the continental U.S.
22. I used to watch the soap opera "Days of Our Lives" religiously during the summer.
23. I own Michael Jackson trading cards.
24. I despise circus peanuts.
25. I've never been skiing before.
26. I occasionally attempt large multiplication problems in my head for no real purpose at all.
27. I don't have the discipline to learn to play a musical instrument, even though I have the desire.
28. I've seriously contemplated trying to become a model.
29. I won first place in a karaoke contest with my friend Jenni back in middle school. We earned $15 each for our rendition of Shania Twain's "Man (I Feel Like a Woman)."
30. I tried out for cheerleading once as a freshman but didn't make the cut.
31. I'm not into girly things like lip gloss or fancy perfumes. I usually only wear makeup on my eyes.
32. I've never highlighted or dyed my hair.
33. (I'm secretly envious of punk rock girls....)
34. I've never been to a concert that wasn't outdoors.
35. I don't like reading poetry (though on rare occasions, I do write it).
36. I do know how to cook but usually hate doing it.
37. I collect postcards from all the places I travel to (outside of my home state, that is - though I have some from there too).
38. I weigh about 15 lbs. less than I should (according to the doctor).
39. I want to write a novel someday but suffer from chronic writer's block.
40. I've never been in a fist fight.
41. I find myself feeling inferior to people I don't know very well.
42. I'm not very good at holding grudges.
43. I have a tendency to be self-centered. Not necessarily selfish, just self-centered.
44. I've lived in Michigan my entire life.
45. I've never been in a car accident.
46. I still own all my Barbies from when I was younger.
47. I'm the only one I know who eats ketchup on fishsticks.
48. I know much more about pro wrestling than any normal teenage girl should.
49. I don't really believe in astrology, but I like to read my horoscope anyway to see how close (or far off) it is.
50. I don't like horror movies (though Kurtis did force me to watch Halloween. I made fun of Jamie Lee Curtis through most of it).
51. I prefer silver jewelry over gold.
52. I'm not actually residing at the address that's on my driver's license. I haven't been since I graduated.
53. I have a weakness for gel pens. Also markers, crayons, and colored pencils.
54. I used to try and analyze my dreams to see what they meant. I bought a book about it and everything.
55. I have a tendency to start or take on a project and then lose interest. Former projects include learning the keyboard, learning the drums, and learning handwriting analysis. I also have countless unfinished art projects.
56. I don't watch much TV. Maybe 2 hours a week, at most.
57. My favorite time of the day is dusk, particularly in the summer when the city lights start coming on.
58. I don't like tea - hot or iced.
59. I don't like coffee/cappacino either, except for iced cappacinos from Tim Horton's. Even then, only in moderation.
60. I used to be afraid of roller coasters that went upside down. I'd ride any roller coaster - no matter how tall - as long as it didn't have a loop.
61. I prefer the city over the country - though I do like to walk in the forest at times.
62. My artwork has occasionally earned me some extra money - the most I made on a single piece was $20 for an 8 x 10 drawing of a photograph for a friend.
63. I love the Bingo scratch-off lottery tickets. They're pretty much the only ones worth playing.
64. I'm a cat person (though I like dogs too).
65. I got a 4.0 on every single one of my high school report cards.
66. All of the (limited) knowledge I have about HTML I acquired on my own - except for a little help from Kurtis.
67. I love getting letters/e-mail (I mean real e-mail, not forwards or junk mail).
68. I'm not very good at keeping in touch with people who move away.
69. I generally prefer smooth peanut butter over crunchy.
70. Burger King food gives me a stomach ache.
71. I got to pet a stingray once at Six Flags/Sea World in Ohio. They're very smooth.
72. I sometimes forget how to spell the word "necessary." I have to say it in my head the way they taught us in elementary school.
73. I didn't have my driver's license until after I turned 18.
74. I once bought a pillow with the Backstreet Boys on it.
75. I eat pancakes with peanut butter on them.
76. I've been to Disney World but never Disney Land.
77. I love skeeball. And the clown feet game they have at carnivals and fairs.
78. I have an unfounded dislike for the brand Abercrombie & Fitch.
79. I love taking pictures.
80. I won a ring-designing contest through a local jeweler when I was in 3rd grade, and they made me a ring out of real gold based on my design. But it got lost when my mom moved. I sometimes see rings similar to it and wonder if it was inspired by my design. I guess I'll never know.
81. I don't particularly like pastel colors. I prefer bright, vibrant hues.
82. I'm not very adventurous when it comes to trying new foods.
83. I like to sing, but rarely do it in front of other people (I'm too self-conscious).
84. I've only had one surgery in my life, and it was outpatient surgery - I went home the same day.
85. I hated pulling my baby teeth as a kid - often I refused to do it. That's probably a large part of the reason I had to get braces.
86. I can't go underwater without plugging my nose (otherwise the water goes in - I haven't mastered the technique of keeping it out).
87. I don't like dark chocolate.
88. My mom got my ears pierced when I was 3 or 4. The holes are still there, but I rarely wear earrings.
89. I don't like mushrooms. Or onions, unless they're cooked into something and are well-concealed.
90. I don't eat a lot of red meat. I prefer chicken.
91. Sad movies don't make me cry - though there are a few that have made me come close.
92. I don't remember the time when my parents were together. They were divorced when I was three.
93. I give good massages (or so I've been told).
94. I don't have a definite favorite book, song, or movie. It all depends on my mood.
95. I'm terrible at making important decisions. I always worry that I'll regret my choice.
96. I've recently bought books that I loved when I was little - not necessarily to read them, but just to have them.
97. I love chocolate cake.
98. I hope to someday become fluent in French - I took two years of it in high school but have forgotten much of it.
99. I'm good at remembering short bits of information like names, places, times, numbers, phone numbers, etc.
100. I love getting flowers.
101. I once started a list of 101 things I want to do before I die. I only got to number 24.
Posted by Rachel at 4:11 AM |
Sunday, June 27, 2004
More site to visit again laterI feel sort of pathetic. Can you tell that I'm trying to get more of an online variety here?
Anyway.
Introducing: Celeste
Crap and Fish Sticks
Elizebeth
That's all I found and I'm bored now.
Posted by Rachel at 2:00 PM |
Saturday, June 26, 2004
Today has been one of those days that makes you want to play some slow, haunting music and curl up into a ball.The main thing I've been doing for the past few weeks is procrastinating. I really need to get out to SVSU and figure out financial aid if I'm going to live on campus (which I plan to, because right now I basically feel like I don't have a home - my driver's license says my dad's address, but staying there is like slowly suffocating. I'm staying at my mom's but once she moves, I won't have a room). I've been putting that off for two or three weeks now.
Heh, I've been spending too much time on the internet. It's like an addiction. It's the only place I have any human contact, really (aside from driving 20 miles out to STC), since we have no home phone and I'm usually here alone during the day.
I've been going to bed too late, sleeping in too late, and I've been failing miserably at time management. I've been putting off things I should be thinking about and dwelling on things I shouldn't. Trying to organize and figure out the scheme of my life & everything in it but making about as much progress as one would trying to walk up an ice-covered mountain in bowling shoes.
I haven't got much else to say. I guess I'm off to burn myself a slow CD.
Posted by Rachel at 12:44 AM |
I never did get the Sweet Tarts I was craving.
Posted by Rachel at 12:43 AM |
Thursday, June 24, 2004
My mom has a definate moving date now: July 1. I've actually decided to do some packing, which wasn't hard as most of my stuff was still in boxes from the last time she moved (my brother describes my mother's moving habits as those of Indians chasing buffalo across the plains...thank God she hasn't downgraded to a teepee).Today I decided to accomplish the task of taking my bed apart. I have a cheap brass day bed that I put together by hand back when we moved here ("put together" = "put some nuts and bolts in random places to hold the mattress up"). A couple of the bolts are missing at the bottom, so the bed is rather wobbly and sits crooked (I actually had it propped up with boxes so it would stay [mostly] upright).
As wobbly as the bed was though, it was not as easy to take apart as it was to put together. The cheap brass pieces along the back of the bed came apart (the parts that aren't supposed to) but some of the bolts were stuck. And of course, do you think I could find a decent wrench or a screwdriver anywhere? No. So I resorted to the fold-out knife in a pair of nail clippers I found to pry the bolts loose. But it worked.
I think once we get to the new house, I'll just throw my mattress on the floor somewhere. It's probably safer anyway.
On a brighter note though, I'll be glad to get to the new house. Because here, ants have suddenly started appearing frequently on the kitchen counters, and the sump pump broke so our basement is flooding (the landlord refuses to have it fixed). We suspect that the weird bugs and spiders we've been seeing around the house lately (like Spidey, maybe) used to live in the basement but have been flooded out of their homes.
Ah, the joys of renting.
Posted by Rachel at 12:30 AM |
Tuesday, June 22, 2004
Jumpin' on the bandwagonI have one more Gmail (Google's fantastical email service) invitation left. Who wants it?
Posted by Rachel at 4:07 AM |
Recently it came to my attention that there is a spider living in the corner above the bathtub where I shower every morning. I normally have no use for spiders, but this one was just a little wisp of a thing so I decided to let it stay where it was. No harm done.
I noticed about 3 days later that it had caught a couple of bugs in its web. That's all fine and dandy too; two less bugs roaming the house. Heh, I even took to referring to the spider as "Spidey" (my creativity amazes me sometimes).
Over the next couple days, Spidey grew a little. Not too much; just enough to be a bit more noticeable - he/she was still not big enough to make me nervous.
This morning I went in for my shower and noticed that Spidey had grown quite a bit since yesterday. In fact, in place of Spidey was this not-so-wispy, gigantuous spindly spider. This time, I was a bit nervous throughout my whole shower, especially when I noticed that my old Spidey had switched corners, and this was actually some foreign new spider.
I told my brother about it before I left the house today. When I got home tonight, I found that Mister Imposter Spider was gone, but Spidey is still there (I told him not to hurt her/him). I can't help but wonder, did my brother kill/take Mr. Imposter outside, or is he still here...somewhere...waiting for me...?
All's I know is, Spidey better not grow anymore, or his/her days are numbered. I don't like spiders.
Posted by Rachel at 3:42 AM |
Sunday, June 20, 2004
It's Father's Day and I forgot to call my dad. :(Now it's too late.
Posted by Rachel at 11:47 PM |
Hm. I got a 131 on this random IQ test. I guess that's good. I have to say though, I'm a bit disappointed because the last internet IQ test I took said I was a 160. I guess I'll just have to take comfort in the fact that internet tests probably aren't very accurate. Anyhoo, it says that I'm a:
"Visual Mathematician" [I don't like math, by the way. It's my weak area. Even someone as scholastically invincible as me has a weak area. In my case, it is math]. "This means you are gifted at spotting patterns — both in pictures and in numbers. These talents combined with your overall high intelligence make you good at understanding the big picture, which is why people trust your instincts and turn to you for direction — especially in the workplace."
Of course, then it goes on to tell me that I can get my 15-page personal report where I'll discover blah blah blah for 12 easy payments of $59.95 and if I give them all my friends' email addresses and my firstborn child they'll take $3 off, etc. etc.
Still, 131. That's not bad. I guess.
Posted by Rachel at 11:40 PM |
Sites to remember to check again later:
Beautiful Disaster
Singing Loudly
Xander
SoggyCereal{dot}com
This Afternoon in Drama
Rachel II
Posted by Rachel at 3:04 PM |
Thursday, June 17, 2004
So driving home from Kurtis's tonight was quite the task. It was about 12:30am and a bit foggy when I started my 20-mile drive; I soon realized that once I passed through the lights of the town, the fog was much harder to see through. So much so in some places that I slowed down to 30 and had my foot hovering over the brake, as I was unable to see more than 6 feet in front of my car (my main concern was deer - other animals cross the road too, sure, but deer do the most damage upon impact). I also experimented a few minutes of the drive switching back and forth between dims and brights - with the dim light, obviously not as much was lit up, but it went under the mass of fog and allowed me to see a bit of the road in front of me. The bright lights reflected the mass of fog but shone further out, so that I could see a larger area of fog and all the reflectors on the mailboxes. Cuz those mailboxes can be vicious.I eventually concluded that dims and 50mph were the best for said conditions.
Anyway, I finally arrived home safely to a dark house, complete with locked door and no porch light. My brother is used to being the last one home so he probably turned the lights off once he got in. Which does nothing to help me. I had my arms full of things I brought to Kurtis's but never took out of the car, not to mention a new box of Oreos, a cup of water, and a 2-litre of lemonade. So here I am, arms full, fumbling in the dark to get my key properly inserted into the keyhole. I'm proud to say that I succeeded in a very short period of time and didn't drop anything. But you know what would be the most useful thing in the world to me in times like these? One of those handy little flashlights that go on your keychain. That and maybe a good messenger bag to keep all the things in that I insist on carrying with me.
Posted by Rachel at 2:07 AM |
Wednesday, June 16, 2004
I just got a strange craving for Sweet Tarts. I love how they're sweet and sour at the same time...I wonder though, why did they name them "Sweet Tarts"?This question will forever haunt me. My eyes are burning though, so I must be off to bed.
Posted by Rachel at 12:50 AM |
Tuesday, June 15, 2004
My mother said that I like guys who look like they should be named Steve and drive El Caminos.I read some old archives today from a few different websites. From the 2000-2002 time span - the time before I knew the people whose archives I read. It's interesting to see how much they've changed, and how some of their interests have changed, how their writing style has changed...yet you can still see that it's the same person. It's strange to see that these people existed just fine before I came along, and would continue to exist just fine if I left. I guess that's kind of a strange way to look at it.
The above link and subject line is from my oldest existing livejournal. This site is pretty new so I had to dig a little deeper to find my old stuff. Funny, aside from my former Michael Jackson obsession and part of my circle of friends, I don't seem to have changed much.
It's depressing. I don't seem to be any closer to becoming the person I want to be. I'm not even sure if I know who I want to be.
Posted by Rachel at 7:04 PM |
You know, Reese's brand peanut butter doesn't taste any different than normal peanut butter. I expected it to at least be a little sweeter or something, but it's not.
And we have no milk. What good is a peanut butter sandwich without any milk to go with it?
I've been spending my time lately procrastinating while everone else works on packing. My mom is moving once again - this time to a 2-bedroom house in Chesaning - not taking into consideration the fact that there are 4 people moving in - her, my brother, my 3-year-old sister, and myself. One room is hers, obviously; the other will be my brother's and my little sis gets to sleep in the laundry room. Me? I'm a floater. I'll end up where ever turns out to be most convenient. I guess. It was originally planned that I would share a room with the mom, but her old boyfriend has been staying over more often than not lately. I guess that means couch, here I come.
I can't say that I care too much though. Not yet. I'll worry about it when the time comes. Or just live out of my car.
Posted by Rachel at 3:51 PM |
Yes, I did it again. I changed the template up some. Who knows how long this will last.
Posted by Rachel at 3:30 PM |
Friday, June 11, 2004
I need a new template. In fact, I think I've stopped posting very frequently because I don't much like looking at my website.Or I'm just too lazy to type out an entry.
I've been enjoying the new freedom of having my car (the same freedom that the majority of you have had for two years or more now) but next on my list is getting a job. I have a pretty decent amount of money saved up, but I keep being worried that it's going to go fast between paying insurance and paying for gas. I picked up a couple applications and I'm trying to decide whether to mark that I'm applying for part-time or full time.
Pros of part time: less time spent on the job (especially if I end up hating it); more time to be lazy.
Cons: smaller paycheck - less money for gas, insurance, and all the things I want to buy but can't afford.
Pros of full time: more money in the bank for my car, for college, etc. Plus my dad would probably be thrilled.
Cons: not having much time to do anything else this summer. Especially since it's summer. There's a lot I want to do.
I was going to bring my applications in today, but due to this dilemma (and the fact that we have no home phone, so I don't know what to put down for phone number) I think I'll postpone for a couple days.
I had my SVSU orientation last Monday. Despite being sort of a long day, everything went well. I got signed up for classes; I don't have any classes on Friday, and none of my classes start before noon. Plus I've got a 7pm to 10pm art class on Mondays and Wednesdays that I'm actually looking forward to.
Now if I can figure out how to pay for living on campus...
Posted by Rachel at 9:57 AM |
Tuesday, June 08, 2004
Ladies and gentlemen, allow me to introduce my new car.
I finally got insurance and registration all taken care of, and I drove it home today (after Kurtis and I went to Super Buffet for lunch).
Posted by Rachel at 4:43 PM |
Friday, June 04, 2004
I graduated!! Woooo! And I have a car now. I just gotta get insurance and plates.My last several days have consisted of...well...hm. Graduation practice was last week, as was the Honors convocation...last weekend I went with Kurtis to Jake's birthday party; Sunday we had a cookout that was not outside (so I guess it would just be a gathering, technically). Monday and Tuesday Jeffy and I spent all our time writing articles for a hypothetical paper for journalism. According to him though, our work paid off. He said he talked to Miss Stone and she said it was the best paper she ever read.
Cool.
Here's one of my articles:
Town Votes to Have Lemon Flavor Added to Water Supply
Residents of Metropolis, New York, will soon be tasting something a little different in their drinking water. In a poll held last Thursday, residents voted to add a slight hint of lemon added to the town's water supply.
As many as 98% of the eligible voting population took part in the poll and voted affirmatively 10 to one on the addition of lemon juice to their water. "It will add a nice bit of flavor, help spruce up the dull tastelessness of plain water," says one local resident. "Plus, lemon is a fruit. Fruits are good for you."
The proposition to add lemon juice to the town's water supply began almost six years ago when a group of local kids wanted to add Kool-Aid. Many residents were surprisingly enthusiastic about this idea until they discovered just how much of an effect paying for all that sugar would have on their tax bills. There was also the much -argued debate over which flavor to add: the town seemed to be split between grape and cherry. One of the residents finally got the idea to add something different instead: lemon.
"You know how some restaurants add a slice of lemon when you order a glass of water? Well, this idea is much the same. It will add a hint of flavor for those who don't like bland old water, but at the same time it won't be too strong for those who like their water tasteless."
Lemons will be imported from South America for only a slight additional fee on the residents' tax bills. Overseeing the automatic lemon squeezers will create additional jobs in the community though, which are expected to help the local economy.
