I'm officially That Girl.

The one who dresses up her animals. This is Mia's Halloween costume - can't you just FEEL her excitement?!

Ben found a camera on the side of the street a few weeks ago and when no one responded to the sign we posted, we decided it was a gift from God and have been having fun with it ever since. It's amazing - quick like lightening! And it's a Cannon Elph, so I'm still loyal to my brand. Ben has claimed it since the Rebel is mine, but...we'll see who ends up taking more pictures with it. Here's what we took while playing with it tonight. Ben got tired of playing way before I did.

























Smoochable Dexter & Ladybug Mia




Bad-Mood Husband

High/Low

High: Finishing the first week of a two-week intensive that has made life slightly hellish. Making new friends in said class, including one with an adorable Southern accent that reminds me of how I used to think I was going to marry a cowboy some day.


Low: One more hard week ahead of hard topics like sex trafficking, child soldiers, and street kids.


High: Farring a lot better at football today - just a jammed finger. And witnessing, quite possibly, the funniest play ever. Long story short, it involved an illegal (but totally understandable) forward pass that had me rolling on the ground in giggles and thinking back to a junior high PE class in which I ran the wrong way while playing flag football. Hey - next time you have a bunch of hormonal preteens running straight at you, see what your instinct is. That's what I thought.

Low: As a whole, our team sucking air. We simply could not get our act together and now have a record of 1-1. Oh well - there's always next week.

High: Art Night. We didn't exactly see any art this go-around, but did enjoy digging through the library's book sale and listening to fantastic jazz. I'm not cool enough to be really into art, anyway, so the fact that the evening centered on two of my favorite things, books and music, made me want to skip. But the boots I had on were definitely not skip-friendly.

Low: Waiting for over an hour at a hot sushi place for dinner prior to Art Night. We ended up skipping out so we could catch some of the attractions of the evening and finally ate around 10:30 at Rubio's. Glamorous, no?


High: Playing darts in the back room of the jazz club.




Low: Realizing I'm equally as talented at using both my right and left hand when throwing darts, which is to say, not at all. Here's my favorite shot of the night:




High: Listening to George Strait's greatest hits while baking pumpkin bread and doing dishes today. There's just something about country music from the 80's that makes me smile.

Low: Listening to country music from the 80's also makes me long for a house with lots of land, animals, and books in a library equipped with a rolling ladder. And that's not going to happen for awhile. And sometimes I feel like I can't take one more minute of life in LA, but I need to be able to take a lot more minutes of this chaos.

High: Oktoberfest at the Miller's tonight. Good food, good spirits, apple bobbing, pumpkin carving, and taboo. Sometimes I really, really love this life in LA. I've got a feeling it has nothing to do with the city, and everything to do with the people who are in it.

I think I'm old.

And it has nothing to do with the recent birthday. I spent all last week falling asleep with an ice pack on my left quad. And I've been in bed all day today with a heating pad on my neck. I think I have whiplash. Or at least, I'm experiencing what I think whiplash would feel like.

I knew yesterday that today was going to be bad, since even coming home from the game I felt discomfort in carrying on a conversation with Nathan, whom was sitting to my right, requiring a turn of the head to provide proper eye contact and other friendly non-verbals. Then as the day wore on and I found myself making a side dish for the quarterly dinner with my advisor, I thought to myself, "This is not good." [The neck, not the dish, mind you.] At said quarterly dinner I experienced the normal slow and painful death of interacting with socially awkward individuals and listening to repeated stories, I thought to myself, "This night is worse than usual and I think I'm done." So, I made an early exit and got home in time to see the ending of a pretty intense game of darts amongst a fog of cigar smoke before I passed out on the couch out of sheer exhaustion. I woke an half an hour later so we could meet up with friends at Margarita Joe's or Rose or something and found that I should ALWAYS go to this Margarita mecca after game days because by the time we left, I was feeling no pain.

And then I woke up this morning.

Where's the love?

That's all I'm asking.


Football and sports in general are on my mind right now. Children at risk should be on my mind, since I need to write a paper for class on Monday. But I need to get pigskins and pendants out of my system before I can focus on trafficking and labor laws. And why is it in my system? A few reasons: today we had the first official flag football game (I may or may not have a concussion - another blog for another day), my television is locked in on college football all day today as it is every Saturday, and I just read Adam #2's blog.


From conversations I've had with other sports fans, I realize that the hatred Adam speaks of is not uncommon. But I just don't get it. How can one hate an entire TEAM? A team made up of people that change every year, people whom you've most likely never met. It just doesn't make sense to me. So I decided to use my best therapeutic skills and get to the root of all this madness. I know Ben's favorite team to hate is Notre Dame, but I wasn't sure why until I asked him 5 minutes ago. And after refusing to speak to me because he hates being blogged about, he finally opened up the floodgates and in a matter of seconds was spewing: because they "always get all the breaks and get to have a tv contract even when they're crap like now. They haven't won a single game yet! And they don't have to play in a conference, so their schedule is easier and..." He went on and on. And on. I stopped listening after awhile.


I guess I got an answer. But I'm still confused - why does all that matter? I think I have to really love a team in order to really hate another. That must be the secret. And even though I married into a family of Nebraska freaks, I'm still just a fair weather fan. So the fact that Notre Dame "gets all the breaks" really doesn't hurt my feelings. And I'm okay with that.

Good Manners

Wednesday night we went to Fuller's School of Psychology annual welcome back picnic and brought Mia along for the fun. There were a handful of kids running around the park and one little girl who looked to be about two years old took great interest in Mia. She was getting ready to pet her when her mom said, "Sweetie, you need to ask permission first." So, obediently, the little girl crouched down, hands on her knees, until she was nose to nose with Mia and sweetly said, "PLEASE!" Mia wagged her tail: Permission granted.

Home again, home again, hidly ho!

Ben and I got back on Monday after a whirlwind trip home. Maybe that phrase is redundant - it seems like all of our trips home are whirlwinds. We had a wonderful time, just the same, though. Ben met our new nieces for the first time and we both met some of our friends' babies, too. I'm telling you - people are having babies like it's their job back home! There were almost more kids than adults at my birthday party! After a long weekend of sloppy kisses, big bear hugs, baby talk, and spit up, Ben and I decided that we really love this Aunt and Uncle business. But the parent thing is a long way off. A REALLY long way.

It was bittersweet to be home. I think because it's not home anymore. Or at least, not the home we once had, which is to be expected. Life moves on without us there, as it should. I missed out on a party and a few other things happening here while we were in MO and I realized that we really have made a life out here in California. That's really weird to me, but I suppose that means we've succeeded so far in this whole "adult" thing. And it's not often that I feel that way. While we were in MO I had a few conversation with friends during which I thought, "Are we really talking about this? Is this really my life? Shouldn't we be giggling about boys or complaining about homework?" Sometimes being an adult is complicated. What am I saying? Being an adult is almost always complicated!


My birthday month has been one of the best so far. The party at Mike and tif's was fabulous and I was really touched by the turnout. It's a nice feeling - that of being loved and all. And I got to spend time with some of my most favorite people in the entire world: my family, Christy and her clan, Keri, and Kim. And I still have one more party to look forward to! Plus, Jake and Jason come into town tomorrow for a short visit. We've got a Damien Rice concert and Hotel Cafe lined up, but no Jimmy Kimmel because apparently Barry Manilow has a huge following and Friday's green room has been booked for ages. Who knew?!


Anyway, anticipation for things to come is so much fun! I feel incredibly blessed today as I start off my 26th year. Ben walked Mia this morning so I could sleep in, then woke me up with breakfast and coffee from one of my favorite coffee shops. It was so cute - he had it all spread out on the kitchen table, with lots of candy and gum surrounding it, along with the sweetest card. What a guy! My cup runneth over.

Grandpa Bill and Avyn.

Bocce ballers.

Jake and Ben - can't you just picture them in the same pose twenty years ago?

Just like Paris Hilton!

I had just sent out invitations last night for the birthday party I'm going to have in Missouri in a couple of weeks and was designing the invites for the party I'll have here in three weeks when it occurred to me, "I'm having birthday parties in two different time zones!" I think that means I'm cool. Or spoiled.

And while we're on the subject of birthdays, my first gift came in the mail today. So, according to the Blair rules, my birthday has officially started. Sweet! I've got a feeling this 26th year is going to be a good one.