What a positively positive week!

Tunes:House M.D. (marathon!)

Well, it has been a HECK of a week. A good week, but still a heck of a week. Ha. In case you're interested, here's a quick recap. I'll add pictures to make it seem more interesting. :]

I managed to have 5 incident follow-up meetings on Sunday. Bang-em out! Monday, I finished my first portion of my Simulation University project. Which allowed me to feel absolutely relieved for the remainder of the week. I aced a quiz in Stats on Tuesday. Wednesday went by quickly- the class that I teach went well, my 1:1's were great, and our staff meeting was goofy and went by fast. I spent a few hours freezing my butt off up on the other side of campus talking with Collin- but it was ok. "Time well spent." Right on.
AND THEN MY LOANS CAME THROUGH! [and I felt a weight be lifted from my shoulders]
Thursday, I got coffee with the wonderful miss Kelly McKew, who lived in Shorts last year. My radio show went well- I was able to play some requests for the likes of Mel & Phil Walton. Then I spent all afternoon, gallavanting with Chris Evans whom I miss more than I like to admit. We went to the mall in Staunton, which is really more like a mini-mall. I got fantastic room fresheners there and now my room smells like Sweet Cinnamon Pumpkin. If you can, go to Bath & Body Works and snag yourself one of these:



ALSO, Chris and I watched the season premiere of The Office (which I have waited all summer for!!) annnd it was the best hour of television I've watched since last spring. Not that I've watched a lot, but it was great. JIM & PAM ARE ENGAGED! It's sad that a television couple makes me happy, but I can't deny that they do. haha.

Yesterday, I caught some "Tunes at Noon"- which is this new thing TDU is doing which is sort of awesome- with, again, Phil Walton. Then Hannah and I drove the hour and a half drive over the mountains to her house. Mmm. Eating food made by a Mom (not my Mum, but a Mom nonetheless), sleeping in a real bed and having no one to worry about was exactly what I needed. We then spent all day today in a positively liberal way, meandering around the 2008 Vegetarian Festival in Charlottesville.



Being in that environment, surrounded by those kinds of people, really made me want to go veg again...or at the very least, continue along the more creulty free path I've been on the last month or so (limited meat consumption, and limiting my meat to free range or local). I got to eat a lot of meat-free, dairy-free stuff this weekend. And! I discovered some new must-haves for myself, including the following...


[the best tofu I've ever eaten!]


[legitimately is better than cream cheese]


[GINGER iced tea. best ever]


[yes. this is a new must-have. I am so determined to get a Beagle after yesterday, it may legitimately play a role in what schools I apply at next year. well, yeah. maybe...the festival was also an adoption center for locally fostered, homeless pets. so bummed we couldn't help one]

In short, I am in such a happy place.
I'm going to go watch another few episodes of House, find some good recipes and tuck in early for the night. Much love!

update: albums snagged at an atique shop today!

Tunes:conan o'brien

I put off my homework further today by going thrifting with half of my staff. We went to Stump's Antiques (my favorite antique place in the valley) and I found tons of records to help me build my collection...and they were cheap, too!














[pretenders II]



hooray.
xo

Things I've been doing & Things I'm looking forward to...

Tunes:"riverside"// trent wagler & the steel wheels

The weather is so chilly these last few days, it is FANTASTIC. It's compelled me to plan for a weekend home in October so we can go apple picking and I can bring my brother to a movie or bowling and so I can soak in that crisp New England air. October 17th!
I'll actually be heading up to New England the day before (Thursday) and staying the night in Boston. Alli-- my RA from my freshman year at UNH, past co-worker & great friend-- lives there, and that night Ben Kweller (a musician I have loved since high school, yet who I've recently re-discovered) is playing a show at the Paradise and she and I are going to go!!



It's pretty ridiculous that I'm going to drive 10 hours to get there for 9pm to see BK, but it'll be so worth it. I haven't seen Alli in a year and a half, so this makes the weekend I'm going to have at home even better. I am extremely excited- Boston. Alli. Ben Kweller. HOME. Little Brother. Mum & Dad. Apple Picking. Long drives up north. White Mountains. Leaf peeping. Sweatshirts & sneakers. Red Sox! HOME.
I think you get the point, I'm stoked. Ha.

Speaking of live music, last night Hannah and I went to our favorite place in town-- The Little Grill Collective-- to see Trent Wagler & the Steel Wheels. They are this amazing americana/folk/bluegrass band whose home base is actually Harrisonburg, which is pretty cool. Collin & Collen joined us after dinner and we all danced in our seats (and eventually standing up) for a good 2 hours. I encourage anyone who has a stigma against americana music (banjos, mandolins, etc) to give Trent a listen. The talent of these musicians is incredible and Trent's voice is so great, I doubt many people could dislike them...



All week I have been trying to get work done on an enormous project I have due Monday. I have about half of it done, and I can not make myself work on it. I told myself to NOT let it wait until tomorrow...and I am trying so hard to be good and get it done, but my staff wants to hang out today, so I'm going to limit myself to hanging out until later today and then I'll come back and do work all night. Really.

In the meantime, I should get ready for staff hang out time.
Call me sometime! Miss you all!
xo

"Most happenings are beyond expression; they exist where a word has never intruded."

Tunes:kathy griffin

"You are so young, so much before all beginning, and I would like to beg you, dear Sir, as well as I can, to have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don't search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer."
-Ranier Maria Rilke (1875-1926)



Mati and I have been bouncing ideas back and forth today on the "answers" to the big "questions" and he sent this along to me. I found it so simply put, it really changed my perspective on all this. So thanks to Mati for that, and thanks to Ranier Maria Rilke for penning such insightful words in 1903.

late night

Tunes: "forever"// meego, walter


The last few days have been super unproductive for me. I get into this funk typically at the beginning of a year- I'm still trying to switch over from summer and no real things to get done-- academics-wise. I'll get on all of it eventually, I know. It's the transition teamed with my mounting anxiousness to be back in new england.

It feels like I must sound like a broken record. Or at least like a baby- still whining about missing home. I just find myself feeling lonely here a lot. Better than last year, but now that I'm back to living in my own apartment, supervising student staff, with Chris & Em being 15 minutes south and Alie being a full-time person at the lab, I just feel like I'm spenging a lot of time alone. Sometimes I like it, or rather I don't mind it at all. But when whole days go by where all I do is sit here, baking cookies or something to pass the time, I look back on the day at the end of it and wonder what if that was my last day? How sad that I spent it alone.
And today wasn't even that bad- Hannah came over to bake cookies with me. We watched "Stranger Than Fiction" which is probably what's fueling my mood at the moment. I love that movie so much, and ridiculously relate to Maggie Gyllenhaal's character as much as Will Farrell's. At one point during the movie, Hannah turned to me and said, "Leigh, lets not be Harold Cricks"...which was to say, lets not lead lonely, habitual, unhappy lives. Why would I ever want to? I hope I'm not setting myself up to.


I also should't let myself be so thoughtful while alone at this time at night. It doesn't help when Patrick is texting me, or when I read Josh Croteau's blog about his new place in Allston and how much he loves it. Or when I talk to my brother and how he's not doing anything all day...I want to go bring him bowling! And play frisbee!
Alas. I spent the day here, unproductive and unmotivated. At least I didn't spend all of it alone. Goodness. I am talking in circles.

On an unrelated note, the new Metallica song? Amaazinng.
And the band M83? I love them.



I need their album. It reminds me of every great movie from the 80's all at once. Which is such a great thing to be reminded of with the listen of just one song.
Oh, which reminds me. Radio show. This Thursday. Noon.

And the girls who live upstairs? ARE SO DAMN NOISY.
You'd swear they were doing jumping jax all night long.
Actually, I wonder if that's actually what they're doing.

The weather is weird, but telling of the fall that is on its way.
I'm trying to make it home a weekend in October. I realized once my loans come in, I will be rather "comfortable" in my finances (although it'll be a false comfort as I'll just be in more debt) so I should be able to finangle a trip home no problem. I realize after the year I had last year, that I need to take advantage of the 4 nights I am allotted off each month. So come October, I will be doing just that.

Goodnight!