I wanna see!

The Proposal

2011-06-07T15:48:00.000-07:00

I know many of you are waiting breathlessly for the video, but to tide you over, I have an overdue blog post to write. First off, the proposal was a complete surprise to me. With the exception of a wish and a fantasy, which I mostly kept to myself, I never guessed. To preface though, N loves to surprise me. When planning my graduation and birthday festivities for Memorial Day weekend, I didn't ask questions when N seemed to be planning much more thoroughly than is characteristic of him. I suppose I should start from the beginning though...

May 28th, 2011: A day that will live forever as possibly the most exciting day ever. First off, it was my 24th birthday. However, that sort of got lost under all the planning and excitement for my Masters convocation. The night before, my parents and N's parents had come to San Jose and on Saturday we were waiting for a car from Los Angeles containing my sister, E, friends O, JY and V. N was conveniently to be picked up from the airport by Bjet.

At 230, we traveled to school to attend my convocation ceremony. After this, we met a few more people at a fancy restaurant to eat dinner. We were escorted into a private room, in which we discovered very tasteful personal menus.

As people trickled in, including 3 of my wonderful roommates, 2 friends from undergrad, 3 extended family members and the crew from graduation, we all sat down to a wonderful dinner. After the salad and main course were whisked away, suddenly the door to our private room opened and in walked a giant lobster, lion, jedi and guy in a banana suit. The lobster was playing a wonderful rendition of Happy Birthday on the violin. Now, let me just say: Yes, I was surprised at this part, but some of it did make sense. It made sense to have a lobster because lobsters are one of my most loved creatures. It made sense that there might be a bunch of strange people in costumes because Fanime was happening that same day and basically everyone was dressed up anyway. And it made sense that the lobster was playing Happy Birthday because it did happen to be my birthday.Yes, it made sense that N had somehow found people strange enough and willing enough to crash my birthday dinner in such a way.

But now the lion had an ipad. It would be unusual for just any group of people to use ipads to communicate. As I watched, the lion began to make commands "Obey the kitteh!" and "don't panic" were quickly scrawled and presented. OK, now apparently we were to get involved. We were then ordered to "Follow Us"

So that we did. The entire group got up from the table and began to follow the costumed creatures through the restaurant and down the hallway. We were ushered into a bright room, complete with stage, small tables and chairs. I was instructed to sit on the chair furthest forward and isolated from the pack behind me.

Now strange things begin to occur to me. To my right are a group of people I do not recognize. There are about 10 of them and they are all wearing fake mustaches of some kind. They are cheering and look very happy to be there. Secondly, I notice that there are other people in the room. To my left is a women shrouded behind a hand towel and dark glasses. However, she has hair shockingly similar to my friend Jen. But Jen lives in Austin, which is far away from where I was then. And besides that, it just didn't make any sense.

Now on stage, N has changed out of his dinner wear and is wearing a bright yellow t-shirt. On the front, appropriately on his chest, is a heart. He is standing next to the guy in a banana suit who is holding an ipad. The ipad displays a count down, and is passed to N, who begins to wave it around dramatically.

I know that when that count down hits zero. SOMETHING is going to happen. But before the countdown even ends, I notice something even stranger. The lion has now shed his suit, revealing my friend John. John also lives in Austin, which, like I said, is very far away. But I can see very clearly that it really is him. I look closer at the red-haired woman, now positive it is Jen from before. My head has begun to spin a bit. How is it possible that these people are in this room with me at this moment?

Now more Austin friends are being revealed. I am shocked to find out that the people in the lobster, Jedi and banana suits are all familiar to me. Somehow, Austin has come to San Jose. Now on stage, the countdown is getting closer to zero. Suddenly half the "audience" behind me is on stage too! My sister and 4 friends from my dinner have miraculously changed, wearing shirts with my face, N's face or a post-it note reading "Guess What?" I cannot contain my confusion. The world has suddenly tricked me! What is going on?

Suddenly, everything was happening so fast, I couldn't process it. Thankfully, there were a few technical glitches along the way, which allowed to catch up a bit and come to several conclusions.

1. About 5 people in the room were from Austin. They were not supposed to be here, but yet they very much were.
2. About 5 people on stage had been eating dinner with me just moments before. Now they were in a dance formation wearing coordinating shirts.
3. Some of the shirts had MY face on them.
4. My father looked like he was trying not to cry.
5. There were A LOT of cameras in the room.
6. N and the people on stage were attempting to perform a very choreographed dance and media routine that involved 5 ipads, animation, and possibly juggling clubs and unicycles.
7. Everyone around me was shrieking with joy.
8. N looked delighted and nervous.

Eventually the stereo obeyed and I finally got to see the entire production. Somehow, I had 10 friends that were onstage performing a very rehearsed production. It had incredible animations, ipad fireworks, choreographed and times lyrics, amazing dance moves, frolicking, unicycling, juggling, cane spinning and so much love! At the climax of the song, N stands in front of me, holding an ipad above his head. On the ipad is an animation depicting cartoons of N and I floating in clouds, blooming flowers and pure joy. E, O, V and D frolic around him. As the music ends, the ipad presenters clear the way and N stands in front of me. He reaches into his pocket, searching for something small. He then kneels in front of me, pulls out a ring and asks me if I will marry him. I breathlessly say yes as he puts the ring on my finger. At this point I think I am looking at my mother. I have my mouth wide open for most of this.

Following, I am swept off my feet and into N's arms as he twirls me around and I begin to laugh and cry simultaneously. When he puts me down, I bumble around, hugging everyone in my path, most of whom are crying and laughing as well. After we take a picture with the mustache crew (of whom turn out to be the party previously occupying the room who wanted to watch), we go back to our table for dessert. Needless to say, I am unable to eat.

Our party then continues to Comedy Sports, where my friends and family encourage N and I to participate in the sketches. On my turn, I was barely able to comprehend the directions, yet did earn some points from my team. When the players ask for someone who has had an "interesting day", my family and friends immediately volunteer N. He is ushered on stage to do an interview about his day from morning to night. After being filled in, the CS players act out an impressively accurate and hilarious sketch of the proposal (the video can be found on facebook).

As it turns out, this epic production has been in the works since October. My family and friends have known about the proposal at various points along the way and many people have been trying really hard to lie well and not expose the secret. N and I have amazing people that love us!

In sum, I am now happily engaged to the love of my life and life has just gotten a little bit crazier. In the next few weeks, I will move away from San Jose, leaving my friends and family behind to join my fiance and friends in Austin where I will start my first internship as an occupational therapy student. Life is full of surprises, change, love and growth right now as I begin the next chapter of my life. See you then!

2nd Anniversary

2011-02-14T17:36:00.000-08:00

Today marks the day of N and my 2nd anniversary! In the past 2 years, I have a lot to reflect about our relationship. I am so proud that we have maintained such closeness regardless of our physical distance. Fortunately, I think that having a long distance relationship allows us to develop not only a greater appreciation of each other, but also better communication and stronger feelings. I couldn't be more lucky to have such a partner in my life. I cherish him, his surprises, his singing and his cuddles :)

Sometimes, I take myself by surprise when I realize how much I have. I feel I have grown so much as a person from this relationship and can only hope it will get better!

So Happy Valentines Day and Happy Second Anniversary to Us! Here's to a million more!

Happy Valentines Day 2011 (Appreciating the ones I love!)

2011-02-11T12:07:00.000-08:00

It’s Friday before Valentines Day and I am sitting here reading about and hearing of everyone’s wonderful plans to spend the day with their loved ones. Since I am in grad school, many of my loved ones will not be with me this year on Valentines, but I will take this time to appreciate them from afar.

My wonderfully smart sister

E, I am so proud to watch you grow into such a astonishing person. You have such determination, motivation and passion for your future and that in which you love. You take time to let the people you love know that you care for them. It is so amazing to see you embark on the journey of your own life. I cannot wait to watch your adventure unfold. I am so lucky to have you as my sister.

My nurturing, loving mother

M, You raised your children to be such wonderful, caring, compassionate and smart individuals! You teach your students to the best of your ability and give them so much of yourself and your compassion. I know that you strive to have a positive outlook on life and you have an uncanny ability to appreciate other people’s smallest accomplishments. I could not imagine what my life would have been without your support and encouragement.

My witty, life of the party father

P, You, like your father, have such a unique talent to bring amusement into any situation. You have taught me to be silly, funny and unique as a human being. You have instilled into me the appreciation of weirdness, yet also the importance of setting goals, doing the best you can and helping people that need it. You have such loving intentions to guide your children and your family. Without a doubt, you bring laughter into the lives of everyone around you.

My sweet and generous boyfriend

N, more than my boyfriend, you are my partner and my best friend. You make me feel valued and loved. You appreciate the good and the not so good parts of me. You will go to any lengths to cheer me up, should I be sad, or calm me down, should I be a bit too happy. You do not hesitate to share adventure with me. I cherish the relationship we have and cannot wait to see it bloom in the future. I love you more than words can express.

Happy Valentines Day to everyone in my life! I appreciate each person that brings something special into my life and helps mold the person I am today.

~Jessica

I love Public Art!

2011-01-18T12:53:00.000-08:00

This week I am in Miami, Florida visiting my dearly missed friend, Elise. She moved here a bit over a year and a half ago and is a high school language arts teacher. Nearing the end of my winter break, Miami is my last vacation stop before I return to school. My first night here, Elise and her boyfriend, Lester, drove me around Miami and upon driving, I just happened to see these beauties presiding over the city.

Now, my first thought was, "OH OH!! Huge, bright pink snails!! Love!!" Yes, it was love at first sight for these snails and me and a couple days later, I convinced Elise to drive me down in the daytime so we could get a photoshoot. After a bit of research, I came to find out that these darling giant snails are made of recycled plastic and are part of an art installation by a group entitled Cracking Art Group. Apparently, you can learn all about them at their website http://www.pinksnails.com/ .

Here are the rest of my photos. Enjoy!

Goin DSLR

2011-01-11T10:19:00.000-08:00

On Thanksgiving I was happily taking pictures with my Canon point and shoot camera. The next morning it completely disappeared. To this day no one has found it.

To say the least, I was devastated by the loss of my camera. Here I was cameraless at the start of my 6 week winter vacation. The time when I very much WANT to take A LOT of pictures. So I just sobbed a bit every day.

Then, a couple days before Christmas, I flew to Austin to meet up with Mr. Peterson for our Christmas trip to Minnesota. He had been taunting me for a few weeks already with his dutifully wrapped Christmas present for me: In a box a bit larger than a shoe box, wrapped in dark green paper and a small tag.

Well, I finally got to open the sucker and when I did, I was pleasantly surprised at its contents. Inside that box was my first and very own Nikon D3100. It is a newly released entry level Digital SLR camera. The significance of this gift is that it is an item that has been on the Eventual Wishlist in my head for many years now. This list contains other Eventual items such as my dream house, everything that goes in my dream house and... yeah, a DSLR. So, as soon as I charged the puppy, I took it for a spin. This blog chronicles my winter break so far in my favorite pictures.

Mind you that I hold nowhere near the amount of knowledge required to take full advantage of this little machine. But. It is me happily learning.

These pictures are among the first pictures ever taken with this camera.

Here we are journeying from Austin to Minneapolis

Christmas in Duluth with the Peterson family

Back to Austin

Photo shoot at the botanical gardens

First car buying experience

Random Favorites

More to come!
~Out.

The Joys of Technology

2010-11-07T13:27:00.001-08:00

More and more lately I have been feeling that it is the joys of technology that really enable me to be so efficient in my work. I really don't think that even 5 year ago students were calling up fellow students on skype, and simultaneously writing a paper on google docs, then saving it on dropbox to access online later at school and printing wirelessly to their printers. I doubt that even 5 years ago students could check their email on their smartphones any minute of the day, in fact, 5 years ago I often did not have good enough reception to call someone with my cell phone.

Even more than work, I pretty much have an online relationship. Even 5 years ago, that probably meant I met hm on a dating website and we chatted every day through instant message. Welcome to 2010 where I can facetime him on his cell phone from my laptop and we could go to the store together. I get to see him every day and say goodnight ton skypee every night. Often, I really am amazed at the tings we can do nowadays.

Pretty much everyone's life is synced with technology. Social encounters happen on facebook or via email. People's life soundtrack are carried around on their ipods and synced back up to their laptops when they get home. Digital cameras allow us to take infinite pictures of every event we attend and then snap all our friends can see them too through medias such as youtube, facebook, photobucket and all of these invaluable resources we have literally at our very fingertips!

Anyway, technology is a wonderful friend to all of us, even though it definitely does come with its own evils.

and that would be my thought for the day.

Yup, out!

Something I Belong To

2010-10-31T10:40:00.001-07:00

At the Occupational therapy Association of California conference in October with SJSU OT chair and Wonder Woman, Mrs. Dr. Heidi Pendleton

It has been long since my last post here. Perhaps it is because my student life has begun to overwhelm me with worries, newness, expectations but also satisfaction and wonder. Fortunately, I believe that in that time, I have come to a curious realization. Through the past few months of my second year in my Masters in Occupational Therapy program, I have become to identify as a member of the population of Occupational Therapists. This is a significant finding, as before in my life, I don't believe I have ever really identified with a group in such a way. Not only am I a member of a profession (profession!), I am a member of a group of people very much like me in personality and passion.

Last month I attended my fist ever occupational therapy conference. Unfortunately, (and in the future I will remember this) almost all of the sessions I attended were for students. It was nice to meet other students from different schools and programs, yet what really was exciting about being at that conference was that I was surrounded by TONS! of occupational therapists, professional people who live and breathe what I am training to do!

Part of my cohort at the OTAC conference

This feeling is expounding on the particular feeling I have gotten perhaps only once or twice in my recent past when I randomly come across a fellow occupational therapist. One such time was about a year and a half ago at an airport. There I was studying anatomy for my prerequisite into this program (how long ago that was!) and there sitting next to me was this curious woman. She happened to notice my open book of muscles and bones and asked me what I was ultimately studying. Upon sharing, I then found out that she, too was an occupational therapist. I still remember that moment, as it is rare and I hope it won't be the case in the future, but has since been so. Fancy meeting an OT at an airport!

Anyway, the point of this post is just simply for me to acknowledge this new point in my life, my maturity and my future career. I really think it is at this point, this identification as a member of something, that really has no going back. I am quite thrilled to have achieved this new motivation and that is really all I have to say for now. In the meantime, I will post some pictures!

In celebration of a constant livelihood at Beauty Palace

At the pumpkin patch, showing off our newly acquired Halloween tattoos

~Out!

Today is Crab Fest

2010-09-05T14:25:00.001-07:00

The Mustache

2010-08-22T11:49:00.000-07:00

I have recently pondered the fact that only male humans are able to grow facial hair. It seems that back in the day facial hair most likely was there to keep our faces warm. Well, at least to keep the men's faces warm. Apparently the women were protected by the infants they held to their faces to keep them warm, so no need for female mustaches I suppose.

Anyway, as the story goes Amanda and I were out shopping at Best Buy. Previously that day she had presented me with a wonderful clip-on mustache with malleable abilities. My high school friends had long ago decided that mustaches and mustache related gifts were perfect for me. This trend has sustained itself until present day. Regardless, as we were exiting Best Buy, we just so happened to come across a vending machine that included a variety of peel-off sticky facial hair arrangements. The possibilities included side burns, mustaches and beards. Mustaches. Oh my, this is an opportunity that cannot be surpassed, we thought to ourselves.

Now, I must explain to you the further significance of the discovery of mustache number 2 (aka bigote numero dos). You see, the original mustache of the weekend was a malleable, realistic mustache given to me by Amanda. I showed it to Mr. Peterson upon receipt and he did not like it. In fact, his dislike of said mustache was so strong, he grasped it by it's furry little self and flung it across the room. Apparently I am not supposed to have a mustache. This is an unfortunate part of the story as I quite liked my mustache. It was very expressive, kept my face warm and provided a wonderful disguise. Well, let's let you be the judge:

Here is a photograph of me and my mustache along with Mr. Peterson cringing away from me at the mere sight.

This dislike was completely unacceptable and exposure was the only option for a cure. Now you may see the significance of mustache number two. So Amanda and I had a plan. We waited for Mr. Peterson to arrive after work. We had pre-positioned the Best Buy mustache covertly UNDER the original mustache in order to provide extra mustache exposure. Mr. Peterson would be expected to remove the first mustache from my face only to reveal the second mustache underneath. Aha! What a plan!

In this photograph I model the second mustache. It is still in its plastic wrapping as we needed to preserve maximum stickiness for the exposure.

As the story continues, Mr. Peterson did return from work. He was welcomed by two giggling girls and a video camera. Armed with the excuse of changing the laundry, Amanda and I secretly applied both mustaches onto my face. We returned to the living room to show Mr. Peterson. As predicted, he promptly flung the first mustache across the room and was immediately surprised by the second one that appeared underneath. Despite his tiredness, he did very much appreciate the humor of it all and then flung the second mustache across the room after the first. Later that night, he retrieved them both and hid them in a secret location. One day I will find them and the plot will continue...

Until next time!
~Out!

Summer Summary

2010-07-27T08:43:00.000-07:00

Summer has been, to say the least, hectic. But that is not to say it has been uneventful. In order to catch you up from the last time I blogged, I will have to will my mind back 3 months to reflect on the past days of summer. So bare with me, and we shall get through all the adventures.

First, I will discuss the significance of the picture above us now. To start, I have to ability to become tan, but not generally the opportunity I was granted this summer. I currently work as a camp counselor for a day camp located at a lakeside spa and resort in the hills of lake travis. Most of the activities take place in doors but each day we spend at least an hour and a half outdoors at the pool and this is where I acquire my color. My tanness still often surprises me. It is as if my body has completely changed skin tones in a matter of weeks.

Life at camp: It's sort of a mixture of joys and stresses. I give you the example above: This 5-year old decided a couple weeks ago to propose to my co-worker. When asked why he wanted to marry her, he replied, "because she is my friend," when asked about the wedding, he replied that the couple was to get married, "tomorrow underground." The world is much stranger and simpler from a child's point of view. That is part of the job I enjoy. I enjoy seeing the tiny 4 year old declare he will, "have to live alone without a wife" when he discovers that his self-proclaimed girlfriend wants to kiss him. I enjoy the drawings of Obama and Spongebob so carefully etched in crayon. I enjoy stomping around the pools of goo and pouring it all over childrens' heads in the pouring rain. I enjoy being able to decide the answer to all sorts of ridiculous questions, such as "This stapler doesn't have staples in it. Can I pretend to staple my arm?"

On the flipside, being with children all day requires 110 percent of my daily energy. Sometimes just watching them is exhausting. Coincidentally, when I get home in the afternoon, I feel mostly dead.

BUT that is not to say that on the weekends we don't have fun!
In JUNE I had the distinct pleasure of attending the beautiful wedding of my dear friends Jonathan and Dione. Above is a snapshot of Eve, Emily and myself boogying on down to delightful dance tunes. I have not been to many weddings yet in my lifetime, but I can say for sure this one was the most fun. When one has such creative friends that challenge wedding guests to retrieve the LED light at the bottom of a 3-foot cylinder of blue water and a wedding cake shaped like a giant rubik's cube, one just must enjoy it.

And of course, it makes it all better when wedding guests jump in the hotel pool full clothed at the end and drive home sopping wet :)

Oh, right. There is that jumping out of a plane thing. In my opinion, it went pretty well. Once I was able to breathe better (after being force fed to much air in freefall due to my enormously open mouth), I quite enjoyed the sensation of floating high above the world. It made it a bit strange that there was an obnoxious lady strapped to my back, but hey, beggars can't be choosers, right? I definitely think I would do it again should I decide I had the luxury to spend large amounts of money of 5 minutes of thrill, but it was DEFINITELY worth it at least the one time.

Yes, also we got tattoos. Tattoos that delete themselves with time. They are the best kind of tattoos. These tattoos were acquired at a trip to Schlitterbahn water park, which happens to be the largest water park in the world. It also happens to have giant, multi-colored floating crocodiles. Crocodiles of which I want for my own and I am working on making this a reality.

Because I am living in Austin for the summer, I am sorely missing these wonderful people. We were able to enjoy each other's company briefly a couple weeks ago. To celebrate we decided to go gorge ourselves on some bbq, and gorge we did!
And, of course the reason we were visiting in the first place was to attend the wedding of Mr and Mrs. Joey and Amy Deavours! Hooray for weddings this summer. This JULY wedding took place in Santa Cruz and was beautifully done. I also got to see, and have Mr. Peterson meet, a few of my much-missed classmates (pictured above). Here is a picture of our group and the lovely bride and groom:

So, I know this was brief, but there will most likely be more to come. Right this moment I am sitting in a hotel room in Reno at the 63rd Annual International Juggling Association Festival. So more pictures and stories are to come! Until then, I hope everyone is having a pleasant summer!

~Oooout!

One Year

2010-05-07T21:39:00.000-07:00

I have come a long way.

One year ago today I was studying frantically to take my finals in anatomy and physiology. I had just graduated with my bachelors in psychology and was taking classes at a junior college to fulfill the prerequisites for grad school. I was taking an aerial class in ribbon and trying hard to memorize every bone, muscle, vein and artery in the body. I knew how the kidney worked, how the blood ran through the entire body and the pathology of muscle disease. I was excited and optimistic.

Today I am studying frantically to finish up my first year in grad school. I am writing what seems to be the umpteenth paper this semester. I have journal database combing down to the art. I know how to test if every sense in the body is intact and what to do when a child cannot swallow properly. I have watched dozens of documentaries, episodes of the office and various other weekly shows to keep me sane. I can rattle off the typical age of every developmental milestone imaginable. I am exhausted, yet amazed at myself.

What is the difference between the me a year ago and the me now? Well, I’ve gained wisdom. I have had hundreds more opportunities to make a fool of myself and reflect afterward, determined to do better next time. I have gained an appreciation of what it might mean to have an actual job, and begun to leave behind my old dream of being a life-long student. I have slowly, but surely, started to understand what exactly it’s going to mean to be an occupational therapist. I have just begun to get a taste of what I might actually do out there in the real world.

The past year has been a completely new experience and I look forward to what the next has to bring me. Hello summer, I’m just about ready for you :)

Spring 2010 Update

2010-04-12T17:21:00.000-07:00

Hello All!

I know I have not posted in FOR-EVER, but it is for good reason. Here is a quick update of my life the past month or so:

SPRING BREAK:

I went to visit Mr. Peterson in Austin. While I was on vacation, Nathan still had to work during the week, so Nate the Great and I did a bit of organization and construction. Here are two of our finished projects. (Nathan, of course helped while he was not at work)

Here are the 4 cabinets we put up in the hot tub room. The three of us worked until 4am to complete the task, not to mention has to install all the parts (Ikea!)

This project is my pride and joy as I LOVE the organization of this new and improved tool closet. It is even getting a light today!

Besides work we also rested and played.

Here we are at Gatti Land enjoying our pizza buffet

In line to purchase Nate an iPad on opening day.

And of course, we napped.

SCHOOL: I am almost done with my first year of grad school. I can barely believe it. Though it has been extremely grueling, I am proud to announce that I am well on my way to becoming an Occupational Therapist. Here are some of the things I've been doing:

Here I am learning neuromuscular developmental treatment for pediatrics

And here is a sneak peek at my group positioning device project.

Who knew Target could provide so many random things for us? Gardening kneeling boards for $1? I think so!!

Under the hood

The final masterpiece!

I LOVE MY SISTER!
Yes, I do! And she loves me too and sent me a care package. I got it today and was so surprised. I received fun and delicious things a-plenty. :)

Bright squishy octopus friends!

This is entirely upside down, but alas, still functions as a photo! Thin Mints out of season!! Sooo grateful!!

Welp, that's it for now.

Papers, midterms, finals, projects, presentations to come and then it's SUMMER!!

~Oooout!

Doin' it Grad School

2010-03-17T09:45:00.000-07:00

This semester: Not so fun. I think I already told you that, but here are some highlights.

Highlight #1: I got a 99.3% on my first Physical Disabilities midterm. I thought it was going to kick my butt, but (so many of those), I ended up kicking it!
Highlight #2: I also got an A in my first Pediatrics midterm. :)

Highlight #3: I get to watch my classmates feed my professor graham crackers as well as my classmates feed each other.
Highlight #4: We get to roll around on mats placed precariously on tables and rotate each other's spines.
Highlight #5: We get to use prostheses to cut cucumbers (pictures to come) P.S. It's kind of hard just to open those things!
Highlight #6: I have discovered that with increased workload comes increased motivation. I apparently have had untapped studying abilities my entire academic life and have never had to use them until now. I have effectively been studying for approximately 2.5 weeks straight and it won't end until Spring Break.
Highlight #7: Spring Break is in almost a week and I CANNOT WAIT!

~Out (and about)

Sprinklets of fun

2010-03-07T19:06:00.000-08:00

This past week has been extraordinary hectic, stressful and full of work. Since I returned from Austin this past weekend, there has been almost non-stop studying, writing and researching. Grad school this semester is less fun but you could say more interesting. I have started my level 1 fieldwork and run OT groups once a week at a local OT clinic. Wednesday, armed with a parachute, I will attempt to teach 6 and 7 year-old boys to socialize.

:)

Pictures of fun things are now necessary

1: Austin Jugglefest 2010

Here I am attempting to juggle and hoola AT THE SAME TIME!

One of our performers, Jim Mackenzie, attempts to blow up a balloon via pump through his nasal cavity and his mouth.

Nate and I on the rola bola magically hoola hooping a 6-foot hula hoop.

2. Holi Festivl 2010

Some classmates and I attended a Holi Festival this weekend. It is an Indian cultural event of forgiveness, diversity and togetherness. Bright colored powders are thrown in celebration, spread on faces and danced about in.

Some new friends

Babies getting messy!

Me by the afternoon. I look like I could be an avatar

3. My first-ever roller derby game!

Ever since I met my classmate, Caitlin and learned she played in Roller Derbies, I was determined to go to one of her games. Well, this weekend I achieved that goal and learned a lot!

Here are Caitlin, Diana and I in front of the rink.

More studying, shall be back sometime in the near future.

(You betaaaaaaaaaa!)
~Out

Why AppleCare?: My Story

2010-02-23T16:38:00.000-08:00

In December of 2004 I was excited beyond excited to get my very own laptop computer! I had dreamed since the age of 6 of its existence in my life (and at 6, laptops having not or just barely been invented, all I was thinking was this tiny, miniature version of my dad's big Macintosh)

I was a senior in high school and being in an Audio/Visual club, we practically cherished Apple products. We edited in iMovie on iMacs. The love was quite strong. I knew I wanted to get a laptop for college and I knew it just had to be a Mac.

I took all of the savings bonds my grandparents had given me over the years and cashed those puppies in. I purchased a brand new 13" iBook for $1200. I named him Nacho.

From first glance it was love. I referred to my iBook as if he were my best friend. I was reluctant to let anyone use it for any reason and I brought it to school every day. I was one of only a few lucky kids to have a laptop in high school and once my best friend bought hers a couple of months later, we would sit around with our iBooks side by side in class, gleefull of our priced possessions. Over the year, once we were all in our first year of college, 3 more of our close circle of friends purchased iBooks. The "new" ones came with 512mb of RAM and Tiger, the new operating system! I was jealous! I needed those new fast things on my laptop too, so I convinced my A/V teacher to give me Tiger and I bough 256mb extra RAM for Nacho. I was quite a happy camper.

Every once in a while I would have a problem with Nacho. The screen would go blank, he would freeze up, or something or that sort. I got very skilled at calling Apple, describing my problem and waiting for a brown box to arrive at my door. I would bid my goodbye, wrap Nacho up in the caring packaging (gleefully putting away the extra pre-cut packing tape strips the box came with) and waited for my Nacho to come back to me as good as new.

Not that most people would care, but I tried to keep an ongoing record of the maladies Nacho encountered over his 3 year lifespan:

August 11, 2005: Add spiral tubing/ Replace logic board

August 20, 2005: Purchase AppleCare (I guess my one year was almost up, so extended another 2, I don't believe you are allowed to purchase AppleCare after purchase like this anymore)

August 28, 2005: Add Spiral Tubing/ Replace Logic Board (Sound familiar yet?)

April 4, 2007: Replace Hardrive

July 18, 2007: Replace VRAM, Replace Hardrive, Replace flex-cable (familiar again?)

August 7, 2007: Replace VRAM (Oh dear...)

At this point I was getting worried, I was about to embark on a 3.5 month journey to study in England, Getting my iBook serviced in England may be a little bit harder. I called Apple about my problems. They said, Ah, yes, you are having problems. Why don't you send it to us again, we'll fix it. If it's still broken, call XXX person personally and we'll see what we can do.

Ok Apple. I go to England

2 days before my 3 15-20 page final essays were due, Nacho goes to sleep and doesn't wake up. This is a problem. Thankfully, 2 things save me:

1. I had backed up all my data on my external a couple days before

2. My friend Nathan was visiting me and he had brought his own laptop.

I was able to retrieve my drafts with his laptop, update them and turn them in on time (Lesson #1: Back up!!!)

Things go fuzzy here, but I think at some point in time, Nacho magically came back to life, but I was very concerned. I called the Apple guy that had told me he would help me out should Nacho fall ill once more. He didn't pick up. I left a message. This continued for a month.

Then in January, I sent Nacho in for service one more time.

January 8, 2008: Battery Replaced

I was actually fairly pleased with this one. I had been slave to a battery that lasted half an hour for the past 2 years. Now I could actually use my computer away from its power tether.

But I wasn't satisfied.

I called Apple again and this time escalated my case to a different manager. This manager listened to my woes for probably about 15 minutes. I remember I kept saying the same things over and over.

-I am a great fan of your products, you have served me well in the past

-I rely on this and only this computer for all of my school work

-The machine keeps constantly failing

-I have researched a weakness in the logic boards of this model

-I really can't afford to work on a laptop that needs to be serviced every couple months.

Then I heard what I wanted. Oh, I'm sorry, said the Apple representative. I'm going to set youup with a replacement.

YOU ARE?!?!

Yes, yes. And we also do not downgrade. Since the iBook 13" no longer exists, we're going to have to give you a 15" MacBook Pro. Would that be ok?

WOULD IT EVER!

At this point I am trying very, very hard to contain my glee. Once the deal was sealed I excitedly texted Nate at work. I was getting a machine twice the value, 3 times the speed nearly 3 years later FOR FREE!!

February 13, 2008: Nacho II is born.

sometime in March, I realize that my new MacBook Pro is not charging correctly. I take it to the Apple store to discover I had somehow swapped my power adapter with my friend's. Problem was, she was using 65w and I needed 85w. Insufficient. Apple replaced it for me free of charge.

March 13, 2009: Replacement of power adapter

But then, as with all machines, Nacho II fell ill. Upon running CPU-intensive programs, Nacho began to get very hot to the touch right under the CPU. The fan would start up, whirring away but I very well couldn't touch or carry my laptop without pain. I called Apple and got sent another box.

May 14, 2009: Replacement of fans, bezel, and a bunch of stuff

September 9, 2009: Replacement of microphone

January 17, 2010: call to Apple about heat problem, was told to go to Genius Bar

January 17, 2010: Cleaned out vent, Replacement of battery

February 4, 2010: Replacement of fans, Replacement of logic board

Oh dear, I began thinking at this point. This is all sounding way too familiar. I decided to do some extensive research on Apple's replacement policy and this is what I came up with. Upon the 4th repair on the same problem of a major part, the customer has the right to ask Apple for a replacement. It is up to the technician you asked to decide your fate. If the Apple representative feels you have a case, he will offer you a replacement. I believe this is just a rule of thumb, not an official policy.

Under this guise, I decided to send Nacho II in a few more times for repairs on the heat problem, as it continually persisted. I called Apple to ask for a box. Just to see, I told the Apple representative that it was my understanding that I can ask for a replacement upon the 4th repair. Yes, that is correct he said, let me get you to my manager. Oh, I think, don't hold your breathe. As soon as I get on the phone with the next guy, he looks through my file. "I see you have had 7 repairs on this machine" he says. Oh, I think, I suppose I have. "I see you have had consistent problems, even after continuous repairs" he says. Oh, I think, I suppose I have. "I think it's time we set you up with a replacement" he say. Oh, I think, well.... I suppose you should.

And that, my friends sums up some more lessons.

-Do your research

-Keep records

-Do the work to contact the company

- BUY APPLE CARE

I could not have done any of this if I wasn't covered under Apple Care. With both replacement units, I purchased a new warranty plan. It is WELL WORTH IT. I promise you.

I am now the proud new owner of a 15" unibody MacBook Pro. 5 full years later, I have only purchased my original machine, and 3 Apple Care protection plans, but I have now owned 3 separate machines. Apple stands by their customers and by their products. I wouldn't be a PC for anything in the world.

~Out

Sometimes....... I get distracted

2010-02-21T17:16:00.000-08:00

Here is a small sample of how my mind works.

I'm going to take a break and work on a project that involved an xacto knife
Where's the knife?
Uh oh. I need to find that so I don't stab myself.
I need to clean my desk to find it
I'm cleaning my desk, I should pick up the laundry off the floor
Wait, I have clean laundry that should be put away
Put away, I need to do my chores
Doing my chores
Thinking: I need to write a blog
Go in room, write blog
Now where is that xacto knife?

Happy Valentines Day/Anniversary!

2010-02-14T11:42:00.001-08:00

1 year ago today, Mr. Nathan Peterson asked me to be his girlfriend.

I agreed.

I couldn't be happier and look forward every day to the time we get to spend together.

He is my best friend and the sweetest boyfriend I could ever ask for.

For the happiest man in the whole restaurant.
~Out

Villa Paletti

2010-02-13T16:34:00.000-08:00

This Friday I made Minestrone soup in my long-since-borrowed crockpot. Oh hooray! It wasn't as good as I hoped it could be. Next time I will be sure to add more spices. Jonathan and Dione brought delicious home made bread. Italian herb! mmmmm That really didn't stick around for long and it will most definitely be invited back again.

After dinner, this occurred:

Why am I sitting on the floor, covering my face, with colorful, wooden things littering the ground? You may ask. Well, I suppose I ought to tell you.

Jonathan and Dione arrived this fine yesterday with a little box containing the most amazing German game. Apparently Germans are very good at coming up with games that involve nothing but, as dear Emily puts it, little bits of wood. This particular game is called Villa Paletti. I can just guess that the word 'paletti' means something along the lines of: Haphazard, unsteady, dangerous, misaligned, structurally unsound, wobbly... you get the point, or do you?

The box depicts some very confused or distressed citizens amongst the topsy-turvy attempts at some sort of structure. As you see in the foreground that man with the red beard looks simply agast at the set of instructions he holds in his lap. The other friends ponder the looks of the structure, perhaps discussing what exactly went awry.

Here we are in the first part of the game. It begins with all the vertical pieces holding up the largest horizontal piece. Each player, upon his or her turn, must extract his or her choice of assigned colored piece. If the extraction is successful, the player progressively places said piece apon the horizontal piece. It goes like this until a player is unable to extract a piece on the bottom-most layer for fear of topple (and is not subsequently challenged).

The game gets progressively tenser and tenser until, the inevitable happens. Here, as you can see by the picture I first displayed to you, I was the most unfortunate. Upon attempting to place my piece most carefully upon the highest horizontal layer, I toppled the entire configuration.

After playing once more, we progressed to Set.

Until next time...
~Out

On Change

2010-02-03T11:21:00.001-08:00

The past few years have been a product of educational, emotional and lifestyle change. Even so, sometimes I still feel exactly the same.

In August of 2007 I embarked on a journey to England, spending 3 and a half months there to study at a foreign university. I would know no one in a completely new place. This decision was probably the most therapeutic and life-changing choice I have ever made. Studying in England allowed me not only to explore myself in a completely fresh way, but also test my social skills, my study skills and examine who I was completely out of context of my previous life. In England I acquired some very close relationships with friends I still hold today. I developed study and focus skills I never knew possible.

In England certain habits arose. My closest friend, Brandy, and I developed a taste for chai tea and would meet in the hall kitchen several times a day to drink it. Staying up until 3am to talk with my friends and family back home became commonplace. Even when I had class the next morning. My sleeping habits were, to say the least, haphazard. I would fall asleep around 4 or 5 in the morning, wake up at 8 to attend an hour lecture, walk back to my dorm, sleep for 10 minutes, and off to lecture again. For fun I attended performances at our campus theater. Most of these were guest performers brought in by the university. At home I worked at a stagehand and usher for UCR’s performing arts department, but the productions I attended in England were very experimental and fresh. I have not since seen productions like these in the US.

Much of what I got out of England was a completely different look at who I was. I had countless night of self-exploration having conversations with Brandy, the only EAP member in my college (note: college=dorm in England). Having just come out of a relationship, which stifled every being of my body and soul, I needed to really vent.

That stifling relationship not only took me into my exploration in England but also brought me one of my deepest friendships. Virtually a couple weeks after the disastrous break up, I began hanging out with a distant friend at an event, funnily enough to get away from my ex. (We had traveled together to this event, a juggling festival in North Carolina, because we had planned it before the break up, awkward situation much?) This friend, Nathan, had been introduced to me a year or so before by my younger sister as “Vova’s awesome best friend”. She had hung out with the two boys two year before in Vegas. As a 13 year old at the time of her initial introduction, juggling and playing DDR simultaneously with a famous young juggler and his hip pal was all the rave. I remember hearing about it weeks after she cam home. Wanting to separate myself from my ex in North Carolina, I gravitated towards Nathan, one of the only familiar faces in the gym on the fist day of the festival. He was standing amongst a circle of friends, laptop on the ground at his feet. I walked over and greeted him, finding out that he was in the middle of an editing project; I immediately latched on to dove tailing interests. It turns out that Nathan finding it odd that I wanted to talk to him, facebooked me, finding I was no longer in my previous relationship, felt it safe to hang out. I spent the rest of the week hanging out with Nathan and his crew and departed at the end of the week. To my surprise, not long after my departure I received a text from Nathan, assuring me a good flight and that he would have one as well. This correspondence kind of took off for the rest of the summer.

Every night at 10 in California (midnight in Texas), I would call Nathan. Since these were still the days when reception was sketchy in my mountain home, I would hole myself up in the laundry room to talk to my new friend. Since Nathan lived in Austin, TX, he would not receive my call until midnight, but regardless, we talked every night for the rest of summer. This was a necessary and painful healing time for me. Having just ended the first romantic relationship of my life (one that lasted a year and a half), I was in no shape to bounce back. The past year and a half had been very bruising; I had not stood up for my interests, my beliefs, my values or myself to my ex and coincidentally had gotten knocked down a lot. He was narcissistic and strong willed and I was meek and conforming. It was a terrible match. Night after night Nathan listened and reflected on my thoughts and feelings. He was an extremely supportive friend and enlightening mentor.

When this summer of healing and budding friendship ended, I flew off to England.

After England, I came back to UCR to finish out my Junior Year. Having finally switched majors for the last time, I was taking upper division psychology classes and falling in love with the discipline. It is a minor regret of mine that I did not declare my major earlier as what I learned in my psych classes was not only very interesting to me, but extremely applicable in every day life, something that my previous major in film never really was. Near the cap of my units required to graduate, I very much needed to think about how I would spend my senior year and what venues I wanted to explore for my future. I eventually decided to stay in Riverside for the summer, work and attend summer school, allowing me to graduate in Winter instead of Spring.

Before the break-up with my ex, we had been attending meetings at the school’s swing dancing club. Decoding to declare it my own when I got back from England, I continued attending the meetings and found myself a new hobby. Swing dancing was hard! Always being clumsy with coordination, learning the basic steps to West-Coast swing dance was a challenge in itself, but once I mastered that I was able to unlock an entire new way to enjoy myself. I loved dancing so much I would drive the 45 minutes every Monday night to Riverside from my home in Lake Arrowhead during the summer to dance at Coffee Depot, only to return completely exhilarated.

Though I had a new group of friends from swing dancing, a new hobby and a new culture, I did have to begin thinking about more serious things. After talking with my father, I decided to explore Occupational Therapy as a possibility for grad school. I always knew that not attending grad school was not an option for me. Both my parents had post-secondary education, my father both a Master’s and PhD (in two different fields) and the recession had just begun, what better time that to be in school? The pre requisites for grad school included Anatomy and Human Physiology, both with labs. Needless to say, as a psychology major, I had not taken either. So Winter quarter of my senior year at UCR, I dropped to part-time status, taking 8 units instead of 12. I simultaneously enrolled myself in a local junior college, pulling string to take Anatomy and Physiology simultaneously. There is a reason why they are supposed to be taken separately, I realized later. The classes were designed for nursing students, the nursing program at SBVC (my junior college) one of the best in the country. The classes met roughly 6 hours a week including lab. I studied probably 12 hours a week per class just to keep up. From December to March, not only was I struggling to keep on top in A&P, I also had my 8 units at UCR to worry about.

Once my final quarter at UCR ended, it was time for me to start getting together my applications for grad school. By this point in time, I had decided that I wanted to pursue a Master’s degree in Occupational Therapy. Applications were due starting in October. I needed not only to complete A&P, but also up to 100 hours of volunteer work (the hours varied according to program). I began volunteering 3 to 4 days a week at Loma Linda University Medical Center and FROST developmental center in addition to my two classes at Valley. This was perhaps the time in my life I was forced to work the hardest. My professors at Valley required us to know material beyond what my father had learned at USC for his Masters back in the late 80s. Fortunately, during this time I refined my study skills and found good study partners and made pretty much all As in physio and mastered a B+ in Anatomy (I hated and was terrible at memorization).

Every single day from about November to April I checked my mailbox. After 3 letters of rejection, around April I received a letter of acceptance. This letter came from University of Washington in St. Louis, the number one school for OT (tied with USC) according to World News, but also a private school. In St. Louis. I was extremely not ready to know what to do. The school I wanted most, San Jose State, had not gotten back to me at all. I had been corresponding with the OT people at SJSU since the very beginning and was pressed between the decision of waiting for their decision and accepting the one of U of W. The biggest problem was that the St. Louis program would cost me over $60,000 a year and it was far away, while SJSU was in my state and tuition was (then) only $4K a year. After speaking with my knowledgeable father, I decided to contact SJSU about my other acceptance, hoping to glean an answer from them. In time I received an email stating that, unfortunately, my application for the OT program at SJSU had come too late. They had filled the class on rolling admission before my application was even considered. I was heart broken. Should I move to St. Louis, just to be in debt up my wazoo? Should I wait another year for SJSU? I didn’t know where to turn.

About a week later I received a phone call from Rochelle McLaughlin, the Master’s program coordinator at SJSU. She had met with the board and they had decided to admit me into the program that coming fall. WHAT DID SHE JUST SAY??????? Yes. I was in. And not only that, I was in as some sort of miraculous exception. I was completely elated. I jumped and screamed around my apartment for half an hour, Until I had called every important person and broken the news breathlessly and made myself hoarse. That was the most distinctly happy 30 minutes I have ever had in my life.

In February, amongst the throws of grad school applications, volunteer hours and A&P classes, my best friend, Nathan Peterson, had asked me to be his girlfriend. I couldn’t have been more ready. On Valentines Day 2009 I had a boyfriend! who I very much was in love with and who knew me in and out.

The summer before grad school, my dear friend Nate Culpepper (coincidentally one of Nathan Peterson’s best friends from Austin) flew to my assistance to drive me from Lake Arrowhead, CA to Austin, TX. Seriously, what a dedicated friend. Swiftly after attending my little sister’s high school graduation ceremony (and listening to her speech as VALEDICTORIAN (I’m so proud of her!!!!), Nate and I drove 21 hours straight through the night to Austin. When we arrived we were filthy and exhausted, but happy to be home.

Spending the entire summer with my boyfriend was necessary. Being long distance we had not really spent more than 2 weeks together (Side story: Nathan had flown across the world to spend my last week in England with me, one of the best times in my life) and the day-to-day routines of our relationship had yet to be steadily established. Summer in Austin was fantastic. After I finished my brutal, expensive and stressful summer online class in Neuroanatomy, we flew to North Carolina (yes, the same place and event where we had first shared our heart to hearts) to attend the International Juggling Association’s yearly festival. A couple weeks later, we flew to MN to visit Nathan’s family for 4^th of July. Summer was amazing.

In August, Nate Culpepper AGAIN drove with me back to Lake Arrowhead. We spent a single night at my childhood home, hopped in the car and drove another 8 hours the next morning to my new home in San Jose.

I didn’t really have much of a plan for where I wanted to live for grad school. I merely had a vague idea that I needed to have a place set up before I arrived with all my belongings. So about a month before I needed to be at school, I began searching for a single room to rent in my price range. I came across a few ads and responded, trying to promote myself as ideal roommate while disclosing enough to make it possible to be able to be myself and bring my friends and family over. On July 20^th, this happened:

Hi Jessica!

You sound like a lot of fun and I think we'd get along the best out of the other potential applicants! Unfortunately, we really need someone for a yearlong lease. Would that be possible?

Emily

On Jul 20, 2009, at 10:53 AM, sjsnetworkinginfo@gmail.com wrote:

Someone has replied to your post on SJSNetworking.com:

http://www.sjsnetworking.com/main/show/2461

Hi!

My name is Jessica. I am 22 years old and will be attending SJSU in the fall as a Masters in Occupational Therapy student. I love to cook, unicycle, juggle, read and paint. I am a very cooperative roommate and would love to live somewhere where I can get to know those I live with. I do not smoke, drink seldom and have no pets. I am fairly clean and organized and expect to help with shared space cleaning as well. My first priority is my schoolwork so I would like to live somewhere somewhat quiet and close to school and/ or Light rail. I would like to have guests over somewhat often, as I like to hold study groups and cooking nights. I am looking for a place to stay from mid August (15th) to mid May (when school ends). Please contact me with more information if you are interested in sharing with/ renting to me.

Thanks so much and I hope to hear from you soon! ☺

Jessica

Well, I thought to myself, I am the best of all the other applicants! I can most certainly work with that. After some more correspondence with my new friend, Emily, she provided me with a link for the house put up by the real estate agent previously trying to sell it. IT WAS STUNNING. Not only was this the house of my dreams, the rent was affordable, I would have my own room, and it was BLOCKS away from campus. Well, I just had to have it.

On August 14, my dad and uncle’s birthday, I drove up to Beauty Palace. Emily’s head poked out the window, and she came running downstairs to greet me. It has been fate ever since. My roommates are the most loving, fun, interesting, respectful, sweet, smart and creative people I have ever met. We get along seamlessly and they roll around on the ground with me. I could not have lucked out more. I finally have the relationship with my roommates that I always dreamed of, and I met them on craigslist! I suppose miracles DO happen.

At the end of August, I began my entry-level graduate program in Occupational Therapy. I met my 29 classmates and came to a realization. Certain kinds of people flock to certain kinds of professions. Occupational therapy is for creative and loving people who want to help people and do something about it. They want to love what they do and have fun with their jobs. They are flexible and kind of messy, open and kind. These are my kind of people!

Grad school has been for me an adventure. In undergrad, a handful of people always sat at the front, participated and loved what they did. Here, everyone is determined. They work hard and want to understand and apply what they learn. It is a flourishing learning environment. I learn things I will apply one day to my own practice. The classes are small and take place all in one building. My class of 30 has gotten to know each other well over the past 4 months; we have become good friends and spend time outside of class as well as in. I have developed a network of peers and friends.

I am so excited for the next two years. I am excited to learn as much as I can about my profession. I am eager to explore myself in my field, to take advantage of my resources. I am ecstatic to build a home with my roommates, and a life with my boyfriend. My relationships with my friends and family have changed and it will be an adventure to continue that growth as I mature and as time passes. My relationships are very important to me and I know they will change me for the better. I like change, always have, and very much look forward to what my future has to offer.

Doing Man Chores

2010-01-27T21:32:00.001-08:00

This winter break was a long one for me. I have never before experienced the 6 week Winter "intersession" that the semester system offers, but I must say, I love it under the circumstances. My boyfriend lives states away in Texas, and now my Family lives on the other end of the State. Because I had such a long break, I got to have family visit me, visit the Petersons, then just Mr. Nathan Peterson, then go back to my family, visit friends from home, then surprise Mr. Peterson with a second visit. Needless to say, I got a lot of visiting done.

After coming home to Southern California from Austin, I decided that I did not need 3 more weeks of sitting at my parents' house watching TV, so Nate-the-Great and I decided to surprise Mr. Nathan Peterson in order to get him back for all the surprising he has done to me (4 times currently). So on January 16th, I flew to Austin and just "happened" to run into Mr. Nathan Peterson at the local grocery store. He was very much NOT expecting this but quite appreciated it.

In Austin, I decided to be productive, and productivity just happened to be named "doing MAN CHORES". Now, let me tell you the current appeal man chores have for me. How cool is it to be able to shoot hopper guns filled with mud at the ceiling? stick your hand in the big hole the fan used to be in and feel around for wires? saw through nails? paint ceilings on stilts?

Well, you may be thinking, um, friend, there are also many drawbacks to man chores. Like breathing in loads of dust? Like scraping large amounts of popcorn ceiling with a small metal wedge? like vacuuming up mounds of filth from the carpet? like making the house completely filthy while you try to work on it?

Well, there are those things, but I choose not to remember them.

Here is a list of things Mr. Nathan Peterson, Nate the Great, and I accomplished in my last week of winter break.

1. Replace decades old bachelor "kitchen ware" with new stuff
2. Organize bachelor kitchen so that silverware now resides in a drawer instead of in the cupboard
3. Replace the terrible hunk vacuum with a DYSON!
4. Scrape off the evil popcorn ceiling in the bedroom
5. Texture said ceiling and paint it
6. Decide on bedroom paint colors and design
7. Replace faucet and sink

There is more to do, but that will be for Doing Man Chores Part 2 during spring break! So stay tuned.

Oh, pictures, you say?
Yes, there are those.

Scraping popcorn ceiling is sort of like trying to pry very dried, hard mud off a covered surface. Oh, wait. It is that, and it hurts us. And dirties us.

On the other hand, (or maybe on both hands), mixing up more mud to SHOOT at the ceiling once scraped free of popcorn is quite delightful.

In fact, it is so delightful, we want to stick our hands in it some more every chance we get!

Unfortunately, every tool that gets covered with gook must be hosed off with high pressured squirting water.

And also, when painting high places, we must get ourselves much high-er than normal. This involves walking around on slilts with a roller, while a very kind and patient friend replenshes your roller's paint supply every few strokes.

And when the day is done, plenty of cuddling is needed. I will miss this probably the most.

School updates soon to come.

~Out.

Years together and Years apart

2010-01-12T10:17:00.000-08:00

As of January 6th, 2010, my parents have been married for 31 years. We celebrated with a Costco chicken and a Red Velvet cake. My dad whined because my mom was making him kiss her too many times in front of the camera and my mom received a pineapple. Fun was had by all (me and the happy couple).

I would be proud to have a 31 year marriage where:

My husband is so enthusiastic about the cats he screams at them and I have to tell him to scream at the cats more quietly so I can remember what I have to do.
My wife loses pajama pants and finds them in the refrigerator.
My husband balances his newborn babies on one outstretched hand and continues to do it until they are toddlers
My wife encourages my children to pull netted vegetable bags over their heads and make faces
My husband buys a shotgun in case the neighbor comes by to harass me again and then teaches me how to shoot it
My wife buys me broccoli every week so I can eat it every day at work and scare my co-workers with my dragon broccoli breath
My husband picks me up from work and takes me home when I'm so tired I can't walk straight.
My wife stocks 10 cans of sweet rolls in the fridge because she knows I love them
My husband makes sure I don't fall to the ground when the kickback to the shotgun he bought almost knocks me down
We both call each other the same nick name and confuse everyone around us.
We are very strange and insist our childrens' friends get to know us.

There are tons more reasons why I would be proud to have many aspects of my parents' loving marriage in mine. Happy 31st anniversary Mommy and Poppy!

This past week, I visited my little sister AT COLLEGE! It's almost unbelievable how time flies. I'm 22 years old, completing my graduate degree and my sister is 18 years old and completing her bachelors degree. She is majoring in bioengineering and pre-med at UCLA (my parents' alma mater) and just began her second quarter as a freshman. When I got there we set off to do all the collegey things on campus. We also went to all her classes. It was super fun for me to actually go to class with no obligation to take notes or tests. We went to Stem Cell Class, Life Sciences Class, Statistics Class and Chemistry Class. The first night we went to a $2 showing of The Invention of Lying, which I enjoyed and then we went to the gym!

The next day we visited the student store and found tiny, pink, fuzzy valentine hedgehog friends. They were so cute and soft we just had to pick up an assortment of them and give them tiny hedgehog kisses!

Also, my loving sister delightfully covered me in all things UCLA and took pictures.

The little guy I am hugging is a dashboard friend with magnets in his butt, He dances around and costs $25. I did not purchase him.

The most UCLAey thing on campus is, of course, the Bruin Bear. He is a large metal statue and all the students sit around him and eat and socialize during the game. At times during the football season, they cover him in a wooden box to protect him from predators. I appreciate the security of the Bruin Bear.

Another very collegey thing to do is to eat in the dining halls. UCLA dining is famously very good, and indeed it was. They had more food courts than I could count, a Coffee Bean that accepts card swipes and multiple dining halls. The first night there, I had home made mac and cheese, green salad with blue cheese, mexican chicken plate, and fruit with whipped topping. Yum! Oh yeah, did I mention you can also use card swipes to get pizza and chicken wings to your room late at night?! Way more options than I had. After lunch the second day, the one available bathroom in the dining halls was closed, so Elyse and I went up to friend, Tina's dorm room to pee and on the way we discovered...

The master key ring idly hanging in a random door. I had a very strong urge to "borrow" them, but decided that would be not the best idea, so we just took this picture instead to record the moment.

My last day at UCLA, we toddled into Westwood to eat GIANT AND INEXPENSIVE ICE CREAM SANDWICHES!

This place is home to a line a block and a half long nearly every night and sells these huge ice cream sandwiches with your own 2 choices of cookie and 1 choice ice cream flavour for $1.50. What a deal! It also sells Hawaiian Shave Ice (Yes, Shave Ice, not ever Shaved) which has delicious ice cream at the bottom!

After ice cream, we headed over to the promenade to meet Mr. Vova. Whilst perusing, we came across this poster of a lady doing a very strage yoga pose. I deemed it the reverse praying mantis. Vova was so intrigued, he demanded we try it, and try it, we did.

I'm really not sure we did it justice though.

I had a super fun time hanging out at college with Elyse and really hope I can do it again. It seems it was just yesterday that Elyse came to visit me at college and we would ride unicycles around the dorms and climb the trees on campus. Aaaaah college!

When I got home, I set up the DDR pad Mr. Nathan Peterson had given my mom for Christmas. She has been wanting DDR for years now and was delighted at its arrival. Before we got to set it up though, the cats decided that they liked the DDR pad as well. Here they are gaurding it from being taken away.

More adventures to come!
~Out

Joe's Crab Shack

2010-01-06T11:49:00.000-08:00

Today I am sitting in front of the TV eating left overs. I slept in until 10:30 and I have no obligations except to socialize. Hooray vacation!

I just left Mr. Nathan Peterson's in Austin. Last week was super fun. Nate the Great moved in, the hot tub room was finished and we got to try out the hot tub. A lot!

In celebration for the New Year, I decided that I would give Mr. Nathan Peterson a 2010 chances to fulfill my wishes! Hooray! I decided to do the same for him, but perhaps he isn't as good at thinking up wishes for me :) Hehe.

Well, one of my "wishes" was to eat at Joe's Crab Shack, so Nate surprised me on my last night in Austin by taking us out to dinner there. Oh what fun! Eating crab consists of cracking open spikey outer skeletons with metal tools and plastic pokey things. Basically crab just flicked EVERYWHERE and it's a very good thing to wear giant bibs.

We also got to draw pictures with crayons while we waited for our crabs!

Here we are in our stylish crab eating bibs:

Group Shot!

I can't believe I ate the WHOLE THING!

I miss someone TONS AND TONS...

We love hot tubs

2010-01-03T10:21:00.000-08:00

Today is a day of the New Year. Now, I have been, for a time, dwelling over what exactly I am going to refer to this new year as: 20-10, 2010, 2'10, 0'10, 10? It is all very new and only time shall tell what exactly we will be calling this year. Also, when typing, I seem to find myself unable to stop with the pattern of 1s and 0s, so my years end up looking like 201010oopsdang try again 20101 that's better... and on and on.

This year in preparation for the New Year, Mr. Nathan Peterson decided to buy a hot tub. Only problem was there was no room in his home for such a large object. So he decided to build the hot tub its own room. The final product was supposed to be a surprise (for me at least) and it was to a point.

Here is the hot tub room from the outside. It is cleverly disguised as a garage.

In other news, pictures were taken (as always) and actually put up on facebook before they appeared here because I have been a major blog slacker. (probably in favor of cuddle time and hot tubbin') but I am back!

For New Years' Eve, we attended First Night in downtown Austin. First night is basically the place where everyone goes New Years' Eve and it consists of a parade, greasy food, and all sorts of interesting booths.

Here is a picture of Mr. Nathan Peterson and I perched on a tree branch. You can't really tell we are, but just believe me.

You can see the New Years' lights whizzing by in the background.

Here is a picture taken in front of this light show. Nate (the Great) did a clever silhouette job.

There was this super nifty public art piece which was basically a bunch of huge swings that lit up and played music in sync with each other over wireless Internet. It was one of the most amazing public art pieces I have seen.

Note the winter jackets. It was super cold outside, and poor Mr. Culpepper only had a sweatshirt.

Once it was too cold and windy for us to walk around much longer downtown, we went back to the house to get in the hot tub with some champagne and sparkling cider to wait for Midnight. We took a ton of pictures (which can be seen on Facebook) but here is a sample.

The next day, we woke up to greet year 2'10 and decided to get in the hot tub once more to test electronics in there.

Hooray! Work and Leisure all rolled into one.

Later that day, while waiting for Nate's new shed to be delivered, we did what we have been doing most of the week: play the New Super Mario Brothers for Wii!

Then, after the shed was installed and filled, we went bowling! Here is record of me apparently trying to maim the people in back of me with my bowling ball.

Nate, on the other hand, had a bit more success with his techniques and managed to bowl 3 strikes in a row! A Turkey! Gobble, gobble...

The next day, January 2nd, 2'10 we went to see ChickenDog

Here we are sitting in the audience playing with puppets:

On the way out of the show, Mr. Nathan Peterson decided to get in some piggy back time.

Hooray for mobile friends!

'Oliday Preview

2009-12-28T10:53:00.000-08:00

In the frenzy of 'oliday travel, visiting, shenanigans, meals, etc. I did not get very many chances to visit the cyber Internet world as of late. But I shall here provide a brief preview of festivities.

commence!

This 'oliday season we dig very deep tunnels in large amounts of very deep, cold snow

We enjoyed each other's company and made silly faces

We wore matching shirts with giraffes on them.

We practiced hissing like the Navi people do in the movie Avatar.

and posted it on Bridget's facebook wall

so she and Madelyn hissed back at us.

To find out more, stay tuned!

tessssssssst

I like that sloth

2009-12-19T11:28:00.001-08:00

Conversation redirected:

Bridget opens closet door to put something away. On the door hangs a small, stuffed sloth.

Jessica: I really like that sloth.
Bridget: What sloth?
Jessica: That one. I really like it.
Bridget: What sloth??
Jessica: It's very close to you
Bridget: Oh, that sloth. No, it's not a sloth. If anything, it's an elephant nose.
Jessica: What sloth? That is very clearly a sloth. Look at it hanging so sloth-like.
Bridget: What sloth?
Jessica: The one right here. It's hanging on the door.
Bridget (looks up): Oh, THAT sloth! I thought you were talking about the vacuum hose!

FIN.

After this conversation we made supreme egg nog pancakes. They were, to say the least, very supreme.

Suspicions and Surprises

2009-12-14T22:55:00.000-08:00

On Friday Emily and I got stuck in terrible terrible traffic. Coincidentally, Emily had to pick up her friend Anastasia from the airport. I told her no, problem, we could go on the way home. So here was Emily, telling me all about her friend, how she was coming home for the Holidays to visit her family. After we get the airport and realize that Anastasia's flight had been delayed, we parked and sat at the airport for a while. When we were parked I decided to call Mr. Nathan Peterson to follow up on a question I meant to ask him earlier.

The phone did not ring.

Now, this is not especially strange, unless you are me calling my boyfriend who only once in probably 2 and a half years EVER had his phone turned off when I was trying to call him. On that occasion, I had come home very irritated from traffic, traffic much like the traffic on Friday, to find that the friend I was supposed to hang out with was running quite late. On top of that, when she finally arrived at my apartment complex, she claimed she needed me to come get her, even though she had been there before. So here I am extra irritated trying to figure out where in the heck she parked. Finally I just gave up and headed back to my apartment. When I opened the door I was shocked to discover my friend Vova casually sitting in the living room. Across the room sat his girlfriend Lindsay. This was a bit puzzling because these friends lived in LA and I was no more expecting them then the next guy. Well, speaking of next guys, Vova informs me that there is someone else that came along. I went into my bedroom expecting Amanda (the friend I was supposed to hang out with in the first place) and from under the covers popped Mr. Nathan Peterson. This shocked me speechless and then I was covered in hugs and kisses which was very nice, but I was so surprised I just kept uttering, "What the heck? What the heck?!" I learned later that Nate had been scheming this surprise visit for some time and had rented a car from LAX to drive to Riverside, picking up Vova and Lindsay on the way.

Now, back to this past Friday. Knowing the information you now know, you must understand why getting no ring was entirely suspicious. And I also happened to be at the AIRPORT. Well, when I got no ring, I turned to Emily and told her the story I just told you. Then I succeeded to call his phone a couple more times just to make absolutely sure it had been turned off. It had. Now, I didn't want to get my hopes up. The odds were against me. There were plenty other reasons besides Nate flying to come surprise me for his phone being off. We decided to wait in the terminal and I went up to the arrivals board to see what time Anastasia's flight was supposed to come in. Now, the weird thing was there was no flight from LA or anywhere near it (Emily had told me Anastasia was currently living and working in Hollywood) but there was a flight from Austin, TX. To arrive very close to the time it was RIGHT THEN. Hmm, but before I had time to wonder too much Emily decided that we should ge look fr some candy. Glad for the distraction we started wandering around. I was at that point really wanting to suspect something, but then Emily received a call from Anastasia and I felt it was clear that she was who we would see walking out from the terminal.

Lo and behold that Emily's friend Anastasia looked exactly like Mr. Nathan Peterson! What? wait a second, that's impossible! So my suspicions were confirmed. My sneaky, lovable boyfriend had hopped on a plane to come see me after conspiring with my equally sneaky lovable roommates. They had apparently all been giggling about it right under my nose for the past week.

Unfortunately this weekend was the weekend proceeding 4 finals so most of my time Saturday was spent studying but I did get some good cuddle rewards on my breaks and we had some fun Friday and Saturday night. So in sum I love my boyfriend very much even though he has tamed me to always be suspicious of him sneaking up on me even if I think we are in separate states.

And now some photos:

After dancing around with Robbie at our Beauty Palace David Bowie Holiday Party in circles clad in snow attire, I was hot and tired and ready to go play in the rain!

James had brought his long board so Nate, James and I decided to go play on it in the rain in the middle of the street

Here I am racing down the street

James decided it would be a good idea to climb some trees. I watched.

A blurry picture of Nate and I attempting to long board at the same time right before my camera battery died:

How I spent most of my weekend and most of the week before: studying

At Christmas in the Park with our extra large portion of cotton candy

After we came home that night we decided to drink milk and juice in wine glasses to feel classy

Isaiah and Caitlin performing to the Cha Cha

Mr. Nathan Peterson doing the sliiide

and 2 finals down, 3 to go!
~Out

It's all first grade again

2009-12-10T15:20:00.000-08:00

Dear friends,

In the growing midst of finals week, I have, in fact, found more reasons NOT to study. Oh dear. One of my most recent hobbies is reading craft blogs. I am SOO INSPIRED. Now, this is not necessarily a good things because inspired to make things means not inspired to study. Not to get you wrong, I HAVE been studying. One needs some distractors. Right? Of course!

The point of today's blog is to reflect on a tiny story that occurred yesterday. It went a little something like this.

On this fine "Study Day" Robbie, Jessica and Bridget were hanging out in Jessica's room. They did things such as look at pictures of Jessica's cat (Squealing loudly, or at least Jessica was), looking at pictures of baby Jessica (squealing loudly, Robbie and Bridget were), and just ramdom assortment of things requiring more squealing. This day was particularly lax as the occupants of Beauty Palace has very much slept in. In fact, this portion of the story began around noon. Jessica was dressed in nothing but a bath towel, and Bridget in a bath robe. Robbie was dressed in pajamas. The point of Jessica and Bridget NOT being dressed at this point in time is a very integral part of the tale. You see, it all started when Jessica went to her wardrobe to pick out an outfit:

Jessica: Alright, what about something like this: One "El Conductor" Threadless t-shirt and a pair of jeans.
Bridget: No!
Jessica: *quizzically* what do you mean, "No!"
Bridget: You can't wear JEANS!
Jessica: Well, what am I supposed to wear?
Bridget: A Skirt
Jessica: OK, which skirt?
Bridget: That red one!
Jessica: (goes over to closet) That skirt?! That skirt is a swing dance skirt. With polka dots. Red and black polka dots. It doesn't even match "El Conductor"
Bridget: Wear it.
Jessica: This looks like something I would wear in first grade. Ok, fine. If you get to dress me, I get to dress you.
Bridget: Fair enough.

After Jessica kicked her friends out of her room so she could dress, she goes to find dear Bridget in Emily's room:

Jessica: Ok, I'm ready to pick your outfit.
Bridget: Well, that may be hard for you as my clothes are all over the floor.

(pause)

but you may pick me out an outfit from Emily's closet instead as her clothes are much better organized.
Jessica: OK
(Goes to closet, peruses. Begins to giggle madly) I've got it!
Bridget: Ok, show me.
(sees selection and also giggles loudly)

You will see below what all the giggling is about. Since we were already dressed like first graders we decided it was more than appropriate to have Robbie shoot some first day of school-esque photos. Here is the result: (Enjoy)

~Out for now. First final tomorrow.

2009-12-07T22:37:00.000-08:00

Jook!

2009-12-07T20:53:00.001-08:00

Today I re-discovered one of my childhood foods. My mother used to make us jook, a Chinese rice porridge. Here how:

Boil 9 cups water and/or broth and one cup white rice.
Stir occasionally until most of the water is absorbed (circa 1 hour)

Pour into a bowl and add a few drops soy sauce and one soft boiled egg. (Other options include assorted veggies, and meats)

Soft boiled egg:

Boil enough water to cover the egg(s) you plan to cook.
Gently lower 1 room temperature egg still in shell
Once boiling resumes, set a timer for 4 minutes
At the end of the 4 minutes, gently remove the egg, cool and peel.

Mr. Nathan Peterson and I made this together over Skype. Delightful date, dutiful meal.

Viola!

FRIDAY: On Friday a few OT ELMers assembled at Beauty Palace along with other good friends to eat dinner and make cookies. Two things occurred to make the night interesting:

1: Though we were making gingerbread cookies, we did not have access to holiday appropriate cookie cutters. What we did have were Halloween cookie cutters. So, we proceeded to make the best from what we had. Thus, Christmas Time Coffin and and Christmas-ey witches!

2: Traffic kept our friends from coming once dinner was ready so Amy, Joey and I did our very best to keep things warm. The pasta still managed to turn into a blob but it was fun trying to divy it up anyway.

Now is time for photos!

Ian and Fernando demonstrating how men make cookies

Custom cookies (volcano, Dr. Cara, zoloft, kitties)

Kim, Fernando and Amy

Joey, Nick, Caitlin and Kim

Kim about to devour our Evaluations professor, Dr. Cara

SUNDAY: We attended Eve's holiday choir performance. It was the loveliest. It was located in this tiny little church on campus. *The cutest!* They decorated the place with boughs and holly and when the performance was over we swiped those suckers to decorate all of Beauty Palace's interior.

Posing with our very own choir star

showing off our stolen goods

sharing mittens

Post concert, we went to this very nice little Mexican eatery and ate a Mexican declared "fondue" appetizer. It was basically quesodillas in disguise, only the insides were separate from the outsides and the fun part was putting them back together. (similar to Humpty Dumpty)

Battling the cheese insides.

Pleased with dinner feast

Pure Happiness

2009-12-06T11:31:00.000-08:00

Every person at different moments have their pick me ups. These days they would be for me...

#1: This guy:

#2: Kitties

#3: Babies

Something has got to get me through finals.

Chrismas on a budget

2009-12-04T14:22:00.000-08:00

This year I have less money to spend than ever before. This is due to my decision to spend the money I did have, as well as the money I borrowed and accepted from the State, on a graduate degree. Hopefully, once I get that degree I will get a job that just might allow me to splurge a bit on Christmas, but until then I'm getting creative!

So this year, dear friends, please expect gifts from the heart. Gifts that most definitely will involve me, a paint brush, some paint, and an artist's palette.

I now begin my finals countdown: T-5 finals!

When Poppy the Pop-Up popped off

2009-11-29T20:19:00.000-08:00

Happy Post Turkey, friends!

Since I will have almost zero relaxation time in the next 3 weeks, I'd better post about my holiday adventures before posting becomes a rarity.

So here goes Thanksgiving 2009

As the story goes, the family was on their way to Thanksgiving feast with the big silver van, (poppy the pop-top) towing Poppy (the pop-up trailer). Now, we have been well aware that it was a possibility for Poppy (the pop-up) to be a bit jealous of the new pop-up family member (Poppy the pop-top). Here we are driving along the freeway when all of the sudden we hear this terrible

terrible

Screeching sound. Screeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeech it went down the freeway.
Shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit we went down the freeway.

And so to avoid an incredibly brutal accident we pulled off the freeway. There we were in our Thanksgiving best, in the turn out lane to a main city street.

Our beloved pop-up trailer had had enough and had attempted to just jump off the trailer hitch. Thankfully the safety chains saved us, becoming quite mangled in the process

Since trailers were not covered on our AAA plan, we called a nice tow man to come get Poppy the Pop-up. He came in a windbreaker suit.

Since we could not tow our pop-up, we had the tow man drop it off at a local U-Haul lot. Why a U-Haul lot? I don't know. My father felt they would not mind discovering a new vehicle on their lot.

So we wrote them a nice note that said something along the lines of :

Hello, you don't know us but you will soon discover
we left you a present. Please try to fix it or call
us in the morning. Er-- Happy Thanksgiving?

And with that, we went to Thanksgiving. We did in fact receive a call in the morning from the U-Haul guys asking us kindly to remove our trailer from their lot.

ACTUAL THANKSGIVING:

We arrived at the Aunt and Uncle's house in the nick of time. Basically as soon as we walked in the door, everyone began scampering for food. We had been asked to prepare a "Kids Jell-O". Now, even though I am semi-offended that we were told to create a dish that involves mixing some powder and water and waiting, my mom and I decided to take it as a challenge. And challenge it turned out to be. You see, we decided to be clever and pour 3 different jello flavors into an assortment of silicon cake molds. The thing no one had informed us it that silicon cake molds are not even similar to jell-o molds. In fact, they pretty much wish you to fail if you wish to use them as such. So our Jell-o masterpiece came out looking like this:

It's sort of artistic in a very ugly way.

I forgot to also mention that in addition for our dreams to have creatively molded jell-o structured, we wanted them to be layered. The layering worked, the molding did not.

Here is my wonderful family post thanksgiving dinner consumption:

Notice my lovely father in the back, how he cocks his head and successfully blocks my mother's entire face. But she's still smiling.

After picture time, my cousins and I made paper fortune tellers. Oh, how I miss elementary school joys. I couldn't quite remember exaclty how the mechanics of playing went, so I made up my own questions and put the answers under the fold. My younger cousins had a good time telling me I was sadly mistaken. I still felt my fortune teller was of quality. Sample question: What is behind you? Sample Answer: 1 lobster.

Creativity: check

Mine is in the center of the picture, the one with the various faces.

Shortly after this picture was taken, I decided that Mr. Nathan Peterson should meet my extended family via Skype. They had never seen such a thing before and had lots of fun rotating themselves in front of the camera, dancing and yelling loudly. I'm not sure Nate actually remembered which was which, but he did get to view the insanity from afar. I really wish I had gotten a screen shot.

FRIDAY: After sleeping in Elyse's dorm room at UCLA, the family went to Cirque du soliel Kooza on the promenade.

I was pleased to discover that it actually takes place inside a giant circus tent.

I quite enjoyed the festivities, especially the part where people wearing very spindly stilts were launched off teeter boards, did several flips in the air and landed standing up.

On the way to dinner, we all had to fit inside the van accompanied by my father's very large surf board. Elyse decided to sit underneath it and traveled in a position something like this:

SATURDAY:I woke up in the morning to discover that over night the world had been covered in a soft blanket of white snow. This was entirely unexpected.

So I got out and logically let my cat explore.

She wanted to come back in.

SUNDAY: oh yes, now is the 9 hour drive back home. So interesting how you lose entire days when you live just far away from your family to drive to them for holidays. Along the tail end of the journey we decided to avoid the ongoing traffic we had been experiencing for the past 8 or so hours and go exploring in Gilmore. It was very pretty and much better than traffic.

Here is me and my other self at the beginning of the trip trying to amuse ourselves during traffic lulls:

For the next three weeks: CONSTANT STUDYING!!!!!!

Expect tiny updates

Starting now:

TUESDAY: Eeek Kineseology final.

To be continued...

Pre Turkey

2009-11-25T13:56:00.000-08:00

Whoah friends!

Today is the day before Turkey Day. Would that make it turkey day eve? I suppose it would! Last yesterday, which was actually yesterday's yesterday I drove home from San Jose with other self (AKA Jessica Williams). The 7.5 hour drive was possibly the most delightful 7.5 hour driving stretch I have had. Tis always good to catch up with good friends whom I rarely see. We arrived home 50 minutes behind schedule because we decided along the way that it would be a good idea to stop for McDonalds Chocolate Ice Cream Sundays!

Well, we did not realize that the people at Mc Donalds are very slow. Very slow indeed. I believe it took us half an hour in the drive in line with 3 cars ahead of us at 11:40pm to obtain our sundays. It was quite frustrating how inexplicably slow these people really were. My goodness...

When we finally did get our sundays they were as delicious as they promised to be and we consumed them and dripped them all over our shirts and pants because we are talented like that.

Blink blinkblinkblinkblink.... Hmm, I think it's going to go off any moment now. Blinkblinkblink. It's fun making faces for 20 seconds and no reason. aaah, here we go

The picture appears dark simply because it was dark outside.

I arrived home at 2:30am and woke up the next morning to promptly take pictures of my cat:

WEDNESDAY: Today is Turkey day eve and I am studying for my 3rd kinesiology midterm. Hooray.

I have been drawing lots of colorful diagrams because somehow it allows the information to flow into my little head and stick there much better. Also, it is amusing to draw little friends:

This guy is assisting knowledge about elbow and forearm joints. Notice the use of my elbow and forearm. Aaaaah, wonderful!

I really just love colorful pens:

Now I will prepare to get fat with Turkey day food. Let the preparation begin!

~Out now

Arr! Pirates of Pants Ants!

2009-11-22T14:48:00.001-08:00

Oh my, Friends! It's almost Turkey Day!! Tomorrow I will head to Lake Arrowhead with my other self to visit loved ones and eat a turkey. I feel really bad for the turkey so I try not to think too hard about how cute he probably was before he was shaved and broiled (dang, I just thought about it) To stop thinking about the sadness, I will recount some happy things.

SATURDAY: Beauty Palace heads out to the ballet. We are the classiest! We went to see the production of Pirates Penzance for Eve's birthday. I happened to be wearing heels of a very high height. I now understand why people think I am small. It was very fun to be up there so very high. The only problem was fast transportation. Well, any transportation for that matter. We had to rush from the parking garage to the ballet place so I was forced to attempt to propel myself at fast speeds in dangerous places. Like in a parking garage or across the street. It was a minorly difficult feat (or feet, haha!) and I have come to the conclusion that actually I don't very much like wearing shoes with little sticks attached to them for walking. I don't mind them standing or even better sitting. But walking, no, these shoes are NOT made for walking. Also, another reason why I do not appreciate wearing pokey sticks, is that it is easy to poke your friends. Which is all well and good when they deserve to be poked, but what happened to Bridget was not exactly warranted. I mean, she is mean to me, like she is being RIGHT NOW!! but I stomped on her little feet with my pokey little stick shoes last night and she probably did not deserve it.

That was A LOT of writing, so now I will just post a bunch of pictures to make up for it.

Here goes: (POSTING COMMENCE!)

packed in the back seat of Christine's car

Robbie peeking

Robbie: Guys!! We're at the ballet and I'm SOO EXCITED!

Come take a picture with us, Emily! Robbie: I'm still SOO EXCITED!

Robbie: I'm gunna come over here and share my excitement with Bridget!

Robbie: Aaaah, isn't it so tiring to be excited?

(Later that night) Robbie: I'll just take a nap

While Robbie was taking a nap, Bridget and I pretended to be silent lions:

Silent lions are silent so Robbie doesn't get woken up. Otherwise, they are loud.

SUNDAY: We went to a cafe to get coffee and "study" but no tables inside were large enough to accommodate all of us. So we went outside and our little heads froze.

I'd say it's time for hot chocolate.

~Out

on being slow

2009-11-20T15:30:00.000-08:00

my name is jessica and I am frequently very slow. I take forever to get ready when my dearest pal bridget only wants to go on adventures. Everyone is sad because of my actions

OK GOTTA GO!

~OUT

Spaghetti Tacos (and then some)

2009-11-20T15:05:00.000-08:00

WEDNESDAY NIGHT. DINNER

On the menu: Spaghetti Tacos (with meat sauce)
Chef: Bridget
Present: Jessica, Bridget, Eve, Robbie, Theresa

Step 1: Obtain taco shell:

Step 2: Daintily add spaghetti glob

Step 3: Sauce the sucker!

Step 4:

Step 5: Consume messily

My review of this dinner is mixed. I felt that tortillas and spaghetti were both very delicious, but didn't get along too well together. The spaghetti tries its hardest to escape from the shell and the sauce also enjoys running all over the face (see above). It is quite fun though to see your friends attempting to viciously shove the spaghetti taco monsters into their mouths.

Grade: B+ (due to messiness factor)

In other news on THURSDAY my OT class and I created this nice advice tree for children:

After we created this tree we went out for drinks. Our waiter convinced us to split 2 pitchers of margarita amongst the 6 of us and when I got home

well, when I got home I was not the only one who had or was consuming toxic, mind altering substances.

So chaos ensued

all over the floor of Beauty Palace. It was fantastic! And I managed to shoot a couple of pictures:

Joe Tran got more I think, and I need them!

More later!

~Out

lovers of loving love

2009-11-17T16:21:00.000-08:00

Hello Friends!

This weekend was a weekend of friends. Fortunately my school load lightened up a bit so I was able to enjoy the company of select friends.

Here is a recollection of some of the happenings:

SATURDAY: I went up to San Fransisco to accompany my dear friend Brandy to her law school final. I was a witness in the mock trial! I played a frail old lady who got madly karate chopped by a rabid police officer. I apparently did a good job because all the law students were very impressed with my performance at the end. Unfortunately we did not win; the jury was hung. But I had a fun time seething in the jury box as we watched the jury deliberate in front of us and some of them thought I had broken my own wrist! The nerve of them!

After the trial, I met Jenni on the BART and we rode to go meet Kaitlin at embarcadero to go ice skating. First, we snuck into the Hiatt to use the bathrooms and found this guy:

He had the softest beard and I just wanted to stand there stroking it all day long, but unfortunately we did not have time for that kind of luxury.

What we did do was wander around the fairy building tasting high class samples until it was time for our skating slot to begin. Now, I want to preface this next telling with some background. This is not my first time ice skating, nor have I not ice skated for very long. I have gone quite a few times through out my life time, but something about this time was off. My brain kept telling my foot to dig the tip of my skate into the ice. You are not supposed to do that because once you do, it throws your entire body off balance. To compensate I would next start skittering forward on my skates very fast in attempt to keep my weight and momentum over the skates. Then, because that was not working, I would try to lower my body weight closer to the ground and the next thing I knew, I was on the ground. I repeated this process, dear friends, about 5-7 times during the hour and a half we were on the ice. Really! I almost cannot believe it. It did help that every once and a while another non-child participant would fall and I would feel better being in a rink of my falling peers.

Fortunately, Kaitlin and Jenni saw my unsteadiness and sandwiched me between them to keep me safe. This was effective until I did the toe dig thing and almost took both of them down with me. That failed to faze them the least. Good friends last a life time. As long as you do not kill them on the ice rink.

Here are Jenni and Kaitlin demonstrating the ease by which they floated over those tiny little metal sticks attached to boots:

After some warm coffee, we all headed home. A good night indeed!

SUNDAY: This day I was planning to stay home and get school work done. But then I received a phone call from Olga offering a much more appealing activity. So away we went to an Ultimate Frisbee match!!! This was actually a delightful treat as Olga was specifically in town because of her ultimate frisbee match. The tournament was supposed to be on Saturday, which it was, and which I could not go, but there was also one on Sunday. So we drove to Santa Cruz to see Olga play.

I have never before seen an Ultimate game and I loved it! Here is Olga post-ankle roll being extreme as ever.

In order to help injury heal, Olga, James and I proceeded to throw some frizbee.

What a beautiful day for launching discs of plastic!

It is, as you may have noticed from the photos above, completely necessary to jump next to your friend throwing the frisbee as support.

After the game, Olga's UCLA team decided to scrimmage with UCSD. Now, this news was disheartening to Olga as she had a wrapped ankle, and thus could not play. We decided to instead go play at the beach. Which is precisely what we did.

There, at the beach, we discovered a giant, pitted avocado. Now such a discovery just called for a pit replacement. And replace we did with passion!

Here is me as pit.

Of course, one thing always leads to another and I moved into Olga's avocado

so we could properly cuddle.

But James and Olga did it a little bit better. As cute as two pits in an avocado!

Once we were leaving, we took some beach pictures. I thought we were both going to be standing in this picture, but I thought wrong.

What muscles!

MONDAY: I arrived home from class late due to a guest lecturer. When I got to the back door I discovered all my beloved roommates standing around in the kitchen. Bridget just happened to be standing against the glass door into the house. I could not resist but to swiftly press my body against the door and yell loudly, thus sending Bridget into a frightened recoil as she turned around slowly yelling "Oh! My! Goooood!" I laughed for quite a while. Then, I was presented with a wonderful little fellow from green festival. You may see him on my finger in the picture below.

Bridget and I decided on a whim that it would be deliciously appropriate to make chocolate cinnamon pancakes for dinner. Which, we did. With whipped cream and kiwi too!!!

Guys? What in the world would I do without you???

I recommend pancakes for dinner to everyone who reads this. Including those weirdos in that picture up there.

Love you all!

~Out.

Belly Button Art

2009-11-12T21:36:00.000-08:00

Today art was performed.

on my belly button!!!

This happenstance also occurred on the belly button of Emily. Or rather it is about to.

BANANA PHONE!!!!!!!

I know I've said this before, but life at Beauty Palace rocks. Here is a little sample of why I think so.

Time: 10:30pm
Place: Beauty Palace cuddle couch

I was about to go to bed and noticed I was missing my blanket. I went out to the cuddle couch to retrieve it as that it where I left it last. I discover Emily, Eve, Robbie and Bridget laying on the couch. Bridget was right in the middle, wrapped in my blanket. Here goes the rest

Me: Bridget, that is my blanket. May I have it? But first I will offer you a substitute blanket
Bridget: Yes, of course

[pause]

but I must tell you right now

[pause]

that I am not wearing any pants.

Me: Oh. Well.... wait what? Why do you have no pants?
Robbie and Emily: Teehee
Me: Why do they know you have no pants? And why did you take them off?
Bridget: Well, Emily took them.
Emily: I did not! Wait, that was a long time ago.
Me: I'm confused. {muttermutter} howcomenoonewilltellmewhyyouhavenopaaaaants
Robbie and Emily: Tehee

and I walked back into my room with my blanket and went to bed.

I love life.

~Out.

Secret Post

2009-11-12T20:28:00.000-08:00

My name is jessica and I am quite a poopyface. Though I have some redeeming qualities (such as my intense love for dessert) I am quite a failure at putting shoes on feet and being nice to Bridget.

Jessica "Lil' Player" OUT

How we ended up in Christmas Towne

2009-11-11T21:33:00.000-08:00

Dear Friends,

Sometimes adventures are inevitable. Things happen you just cannot control, but fortunately this is sometimes for a very good reason.

There we were, Eve, Bridget and I, driving home on Highway 17 from Santa Cruz and off to the right, straight ahead - was the road to Christmas Towne. We all knew we were going before it happened. We were supposed to keep going on the 17, but Bridget made the car face towards the on ramp to Christmas Towne. She began to scream before we even hit the ramp. She could have turned away, but some force did not let her.

"Bridget!! Why are you driving toward Christmas Towne?! This is not correct!"

Also notice the Christmasy attire all 3 of us happened to be wearing

So into Christmas Towne we rode. The lights were all on and strung. The trees were green and I'm sure Christmas carols must have been playing. The point is, dear friends, that on this fateful night Eve, Bridget and I ended up in Christmas Towne. And it was glorious.

In other news, I must share the delicious artichokes I grilled last night. Olga and James came over for dinner and we all had a nice evening over skype with Mista Nathan Peterson and my parents. Here are those artichokes:

Artichokes grilled in butter, shallots and garlic

Other things that happened tonight included going to Saturn Cafe in Santa Cruz for Emily's belated birthday. I enjoyed a fried egg (not a friend egg) sandwich and some french toast. The night included a Meer Kat moment.

Before dinner time, Jonathan and I decided now was a good time to smash open the glass christmas ornaments we filled with liquid acrylic this weekend. And so we did. With fury!

Hammer!

Smash!

Ooooh, look at my little head!

perfect (almost) little spheres.

After Jonathan, Emily and I sanded the little nubs off the tops of the spheres Jonathan contact juggled them and all was well at Beauty Palace

I leave you here with my friend, Robbie. Enjoy him greatly.

~Out

Little Liver Lumplings

2009-11-09T22:31:00.000-08:00

This afternoon I slept for nearly two hours and it felt SOOO GOOD. After 3 days of straight work, presenting today, turning in a research paper and getting two competency exams out of the way felt so remarkable. I know I still have more things to do before the semester ends but this was the bulk I had to get to before I could breathe a little bit again. After my nap I felt was a good time to make the persimmon cookies Elise made me three years ago that were so delicious. I have been wanting to make these for some time and we have had persimmons overly ripe for a couple of days now.

The first thing the recipe calls for is to remove skin and seeds from the persimmons and save the "pulp". I will share with you friends now that I don't particularly like eating persimmons in their normal state, but in cookie state, that is a different story. So extracting the pulp it is. These pictures explain how the task kind of went:

First, I took the whole persimmon and sort of just squeezed it. Immediately said "pulp" began oozing out of the body. I imagine this is somewhat similar to what it would be like to squeeze the***%$##% out of a human heart, but we can talk about that later.

Then, you extract the tough leafy part at the top I will refer to as the head. The rest of the persimmon by this point is extremely gooey and the skin basically just falls right off

So this is the part that was never explained in the recipe or any other experience in my life. The anatomy of a persimmon is quite strange. In the center they contain these bits that are not unlike a pistil in a flower, surrounded by big, black seeds, and here is the strange part: interspersed with the seeds are... well, you may look

livers?
little livers?
little liver lumplings?
what in the heck are these suckers.
They are round and shaped like a single lobe of liver. They are self-contained and contain goo. They do not surround the seeds as far as I can tell. They just contain goo.

So if someone can help me figure out this mystery, it would be much appreciated.

I will leave you now with the next best part:

sugar and fat!!!

what ARE those liver things?

(please)
(please, Bridget, tell me PLEASE!)

Procrastination Motivation

2009-11-07T21:08:00.000-08:00

Dear friends,

The message of this weekend is: sometimes not informing yourself of the mountains and mountains of work you must get done in 3 short days is a good thing.

First I will the share the list of things I need to complete before Monday

1 ten-page research paper
1 45-minute activity
1 15-minute power point presentation
1 activity hand out
1 activity protocol
Many activity preparation
1 fully prepared Jessica for dressing competency exam
1 fully prepared Jessica for dressing competency exam

Now, to put this all in perspective, I actually had not started on any of those things on that list until Friday afternoon. Since then I have pretty much kicked ass. 5/8 things on that list can be checked off with a 95% completion rate. That's some procrastination motivation for you! Ye-ah for experience writing research papers and good partners!

Now I will write about the things I did interspersed with said work.

first off: rice balls!

These delicious delicacies were introduced to me by my half-Asian other, Casey Lee. They were particularly fun to make because I got so fed up with having rice that was not sticky nor Asian, that I went out and purchased pretty much the stickiest rice one can purchase. And I cooked it in a rice pot and almost immediately after tried to get myself, Jonathan and Griffin to roll them into balls with our hands. Needless to say there was immediately exclamations of "ow!" "ooow! expletive!" and such things. Eventually after Jonathan decided on the secret shape (I think a cube was decided) then these delicious little creatures came to life, were given some seaweed pants and nice little seasoning hair. They were extremely adorable and here are friends Jonathan and Griffin showing the creations off.

Last night Jonathan informed me that he intended to acquire some liquid resin and pour it into glass Christmas ornaments to make contact juggling balls. Now, all the research essays in the world could not stop me from being in on the fun. So after spreading newspaper all over the floor, reading about complicated ratios and all the risks involved in breathing, touching or absorbing the chemicals, we began the adventure.

All materials and ingredients laid out

liquid enzyme is added to catalyze a reaction and begin hardening

dye is added

solution is mixed and poured

ornament is filled and set aside

After we managed to fill 3 ornaments we decided to have fun with the left over and attempt to suspend a penny in the liquid so we would have a fun-looking plastic gob with a penny inside once it dried. We decided to put the concoction in a plastic shot glass. We put the stuff to dry on a shelf in my room and when I went back to it several hours later this is what I found:

The resin had basically either melted or completely dissolved the plastic. It has since dissolved even further and I just left it that way because I don't know what else to do. I also breathed in so much plastic fumes after shutting my door, I had to move the stuff somewhere else to dry.

Pretty much, it's way cool to play with dangerous stuff.

The end for now!

~Out

Poetry

2009-11-05T21:05:00.001-08:00

Today in grad school I wrote two poems. The poems were about two of my favorite people in the world. I don't get to see either of them very often these days and I miss both of them all the time. I decided to write this blog for them and to share some more pictures.

One poem I wrote was for my sister. Elyse, you will always be the person I spy on most on facebook when I don't get to talk to you on the phone. I love laughing with you about pointless things and catching up as if time holds still the day we played in make believe worlds for weeks at a time. This part is for you.

Remember when we used to play that game?
We would run swinging at each other
and SMACK!
then hold on tight?
Then we would swing away and on the next beat
SMACK!
Hold on once more
I always knew no matter how long
I would come swinging back to you
Sometimes it's hard to hold on for long
But I'm still swinging
waiting for that
SMACK

The second poem is for my boyfriend. Nathan, even living all the way in Texas I get to see you every day and do things like watch The Office with my mom and vent to you about my days and watch you sing and dance to 80's music. You always know how to calm me down when I get upset and surprise the crap out of me when I least expect it. This is for you.

Most of the time
I visit you in a tiny window
But if I close my eyes
I can pretend you're right next to me
Which makes it all that much sweeter
When you are

Since that last picture also includes another of my favorite people in the world, I will write here and now a small poem for you, Olga.

Olga Olga Olga
I miss you like crazy
I want to make face cake

Goodnight friends.

A Very Austin Halloween

2009-11-02T17:01:00.000-08:00

This morning I woke up in Austin. At 9:30am I went to class in San Jose. I feel like I stepped in a time machine. I also feel like the time machine might have beat me up in the process. This weekend was HALLOWEEN WEEKEND 2009! (Yeah!) and I will recap it here for you friends.

THURSDAY: Today in Grad school I rode around in a wheelchair! This was a fun little assignment that required me to ride around campus in a wheelchair as if I did not have use of half of my body and by half of my body I mean one arm and one leg. So that means, my friends, I could not just push the wheelchair with my little arms. I had to push the wheelchair with one little arm and one little leg. This became most clear when I was required to "climb" a ramp up into the OT building and found myself promptly spinning around on the decline. I was definitely not going anywhere. Eventually I figured out that I had to go up backwards and push with my leg. Lesson learned.

Good Job, Man!

After that fiasco team OT decided to go out, and away we went downtown with our huge backpacks and various rolling devices.

This device demonstrated here by Diana

Here we are enjoying life downtown. Notice downtown behind us.

Oh yes, also cupcakes were eaten.

They were delicious AND adorable!

When I got home from downtown I discovered my roommates locked away. They were in full costume.

Well of course they were!

Because it was pumpkin carving time!
And one must do that activity in costume!
And dance prior to and after said activity!

Here we are cutting little holes in large squash vegetables and declaring our delight as we pulled out their guts with our bare hands and sometimes spoons

There is mine on the end. craftily designed by Miss Bridget Ore, my pumpkin displays a family of 6 little mere cats.

After pumpkin gut extraction I hurriedly packed and slept a little to FLY TO AUSTIN!!

FRIDAY: On this day in age I traveled to the land of Texans to visit Mista' Nathan Peterson. We of course had to immediately visit this very Texan store right outside of the airport. Here is a sample of items sold here:

Buck heads
Rain shoes for horses
Slippers that made noises (on purpose)
Big, sharp metal traps
lassos
A large contraption for feeding deer
whips
suspenders
The Most Awesome Swing in the World

Sooooo Texas

Here, you are allowed to be picky about your lassos (and there were more!)

SATURDAY: Well, first off it was absolutely crucial that we create an eagle head. I had miserably failed prior in the week to perform such a task. So we went around to a couple craft stores and badda-bing badda-bam began to make ourselves an eagle head.

Here is Nate in the backyard hot gluing the living daylights out of a little fur hat we decided to demolish

Here is Nate patiently affixing wire hangers to the inside of my shark suit. Best boyfriend ever.

It totally paid off.

Check it:

Nate does a good job of being Jerrod.

Even when I try and provoke him.

After our costumes were completed, we decided to put out some candy for the trick or treaters. We weren't going to be home so we decided to go for the old throw-some-candy-in-a-laundry-basket-with-a-sign trick.

deeeeeelicious!

Here is the sign I made:

Eagle and Shark love

Once we set our our bait, I mean candy, out on the porch we went to the juggler's halloween party and hung out for a while. Eventually we decided to explore the madness of 6th street. Nate basically pulled me through a thick stew of drunk people dressed up from bananas (there were at least 6 people dressed as bananas. why/. I cannot tell you why) to slutty law enforcement.

Before we left Nate decided to consume some quality street food so we went to a little booth and purchased this thing:

It was covered in secret "Diabolo Sauce" which promptly burned Nate's mouth so badly that he couldn't speak for moments afterward. So we went home to dab it off with napkins and sleep some.

SUNDAY: On Sunday we were obligated to go play some pranks with Nate's new Bluetooth Fart app. Basically it allows one iDevice to be a digital whoopee cushion while the other one controls it remotely. To try it out we went to Barnes and Noble and hid a phone in one of the main displays at the head of the escalator. Every time an innocent passer byer walked by the display we would so discretely play a very loud and obnoxious fart sound. We sat a few feet away pretending to read books and giggling madly with glee. At one point we kept playing the sounds close by to a worker stocking the shelves. After about 5 minutes of mass confusion, she located the iPhone and was probably wondering why every time it rang it sounded like someone passing gas creatively.

We also went to Costco and rode some horses

Sadly it turned out they weren't real

That evening we went to The Most Interesting Show in the World to see Mark Faje. It involved mostly circus arts combined with about 6 scantily dressed girls that "helped" the acts in various ways and danced around a lot. But it was pretty cool and we got free VIP passes

We got to sit, the suckers behind us were forced to STAND. (hah!)

Here is Nate on stage helping to knock a stick of wood out of a volunteer's mouth with juggling clubs. Mark Faje is meanwhile fitting himself snugly into that little suitcase over there.

I am probably forgetting things but I will post the rest of the pictures on Facebook. I better go do some studying.

Yikes.

Eagle vs. ...LiOn?

2009-10-28T20:28:00.000-07:00

Hello Friends,

Today I failed to turn an adorable lion head into an eagle head. I just could not hurt the little guy.

My very initial plan was to use his eyes and hot glue fuzz onto his head. I just couldn't do it!!!!!!!

So in the end I compromised and basically made the lion an eagle hat. I have yet to add beak and eagle eyes. I will probably do that with Nate on Friday when I get to Austin.

Hey, Robbie approves (and that's pretty much all that matters)

In other news. I have very successfully made my shark costume. Here are some preview pictures.

JAWS!!!!

Jaws on body

Enjoying the hood

OOOOh sharky!!!

Don't you just love the eyes? (they are googly!!)

Also, I just had to try on Eve's costume when I heard it was located IN THIS VERY HOUSE!!

Is that...

Yes, yes it is.

Pink, rainbow unicorn :)

Yes, lovin' life around here.

Playing catch up (and a little bocce)

2009-10-26T19:36:00.001-07:00

To begin with, Halloween is just around the corner. Fresh pumpkins are awaiting their carving on our front porch and Emily is in the living room sewing away. I, on the other hand, still have a lion head that looks very much like a lion head and not like the eagle head I am attempting to turn it into. Oops

Because it is not yet resembling an eagle, I can pretend I am a lion

In other news we have a new backyard mushroom. We love it very much.

Robbie knows it is very important to get down to its level before taking pictures with it.

FRIDAY: Beauty Palace attends the beautiful choir concert of our lovely Eve. It was, I must say, one of the best choir performances I have ever attended. Good job Eve! Most beautiful singing!

A group picture with the star and birthday girl of the night.

We came home to a birthday party for Eve. Everyone had a lot of fun singing karaoke at the top of our lungs. We were having so much fun the neighbors thought to tell the cops about it so they could come join us. Unfortunately they were unable to stay unless we paid them $5000 to come back. So no karaoke for the cops. But the rest of us had fun anyway

Eve is most hug-worthy

SATURDAY: Bridget and I decided to embark on a two-day bike ride up and down the Guadalupe River park trail. We didn't get very far Saturday but Sunday we went around 6-7 miles North. Here is a picturesque documentation of our trip

Almost immediately after we began, we spotted a little bird friend.

We rode along green fields and let our hair down.

Along the way we spotted a very crafty hobo dwelling

We decided we were glad we aren't hobos though. (High five!)

Upon resting, we decided to snap some pictures.

but we never seemed to be on the same page...

We consumed a light snack

And then ran across the field to touch these things

and it was so worth it.

Bridget sat on this little hill as well.

After our bike ride we listened to Celtic explode.
No, Celtic explosion. Right.

Mista' Dawg and company played us some real live Celtic explosion.

SUNDAY: This day everyone was only half awake on account of craziness that had occurred the day and night before. Never the less it was absolutely vital that we go to the pumpkin patch. And go we did. Good thing too because there were baby chicklets that needed to be cuddled!

It was delightful!

*Snuggle snuggle*

The fuzziness overcame me!

Then we came across this large and ugly pumpkin. It didn't mean to be so large and ugly so we took a picture with it to make it feel better.

Unfortunately, we could not contain ourselves.

Then we retired to the pumpkin patch (of tiny pumpkins) (No people)

Some pumpkins were chosen and scarecrows were sat by

Also, we stuck our heads through holes

It was all very tiring

Our pumpkins await their fates on the front porch.

MONDAY: Today, which is Monday, the ELM OT students took a very lousy midterm. So, to counteract the lousiness we went and played some BOCCE BALL!! Basically, Bocce Ball is like bowling. Except instead of pins, you hit the other teams' balls and aim for the silver snitch (or a small silver ball if you're not so cool to think it's a snitch)

Here is the Bocce crew (minus Kim who came later) before the game

Here is the infamous GREEN TEAM!

and the vengeful RED TEAM!

Let the pointing begin!

Our lovely cheerleaders

All these smiling faces and not one midterm frown!! We even recorded the night to watch when we graduate.

Thanks Kim for checking out the camera!

Wow. So that was probably the longest blog in blog history. Well, maybe not, but at least the one with the most pictures. Tonight I will sleep well I think. Next up: Halloween weekend in Austin, TX. I will work on costumes.

Out!

Dear Bridget

2009-10-25T15:32:00.000-07:00

I'm so sorry that I was mean to you on lasagna night.

Please oh please forgive me.

Love, Jessica

I am Waffles

2009-10-23T12:49:00.000-07:00

This blog was supposed to be written on

THURSDAY

but unfortunately blogspot would NOT let me do it, and thus it be written today.

Yesterday was yet another opportunity for a TODAY IN GRAD SCHOOL! opportunity.

Today in grad school I did several relay races. First we did a creativity relay race. Second we did a relay race that required the runner to hold a tennis ball between the knees and run that way. It was terribly hard and I ended up hopping back to the finish line. #3 We had to run with a partner with a balloon held between our heads, then we had to tie ourselves to a friend, then we had to blindfold one. Great fun was had by all and lots and LOTS of candy was given out.

Then we all made matching games. This was a very good opportunity to showcase the creativity of the class. Let me just give you one example:

See, the point of the game was to have 10 images paired with 10 descriptions or riddles. Then we were to swap with another team and play their game. It was quite a hit.

After class I rode home - like the wind - and was just about to sit down to dinner when...

BBRRRRRRRING!!!!! (actually it was more like bzzzzzz bzzzzzzzzz bzzzzzzzzzz) goes my phone. And there on the other end were the two Amys. The two Amy's informed me that the OT friends I left behind on my bike did NOT go home, but actually were still on campus. Would I like to go out for a drink? Well of course I would! So I shovel down delicious dinner and pedal pedal pedal on over to The Garage, a small German pubish thing to celebrate the birthday of Miss Diana.

Here is Diana eating her GIANT German birthday burger. (That's like a double alliteration)

These people were also there to celebrate:

Amy M. and Rene

Gaylene and Diana

Diana's Twin: Diana 2 and Fernando

Kim and Amy H.

Me and Amy M.'s twin: Amy M. 2

Fun was had by most everyone except perhaps poor Kim and Amy H. who ordered a bit too much greasy German food and felt compelled to eat vegetables.

TODAY Bridget and I went on a little adventure. We knew exactly where we were but the place we were looking for was lost for a very long time. After we found it an hour after we set out we just had to reward ourselves with a bit of dim sum.

DIM

SUM!!

Tonight is Evester's 21st birthday party and I have much to do before then, so I'm out --

Spider Bites: Not lovin' those AT ALL

2009-10-20T17:50:00.000-07:00

Today I was a scapula model.

and yesterday I dressed a little bit santa clause like

in my black boots

and my red silky fuzzy pants

and my fur vest

and I loved it!!!

I was so cozy and warm I wore my outfit to the library to study. Bridget, Emily and I went all the way up to the 8th floor. We gazed out into the distance at the tower Nate and I explored a couple months ago and then buckled down for some quality study time.

Around 4:30 we hear BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP and see FLASH FLASH FLASH FLASHY lights.
Fire Alarm!

and we're on the 8th floor. damn.

We begin to descend stairs for roughly 10.253 entire minutes until we finally get out and ride our bikes back in the rain. I never did figure out exactly why there was a fire alarm. If I discover the library burnt to the ground, I guess I will know then.

In other news I have somehow obtained 5 spider bites and a seemingly sperate allergic reaction. I took Benedryl today hoping it would help, which it did, in addition to knocking me out cold for an hour or so. Oh drug-induced bliss. Now the affects have worn off and I cannot afford another knock out. Perhaps chapter 22 from my mental health text book will be sooo interesting I will not notice as my body tortures me.

Many things to get done this week and next before I travel to Austin to dress up with Nate to be like these guys:

So with the wise words of my dear friend Halah, toodles!

Spontaneity! (Aka: Look! A Carnival!)

2009-10-18T18:19:00.000-07:00

Before I document adventures of today, I must mention fabulous lunches of the yesterday! Yesterday I finally got to see my very lovely friend, Jenni, and we had a most delicious luncheon at Panera. Yum!

Jenni is almost finished with her teaching credential and has been very busy indeed but I finally managed to snatch a morsel of her free time and see her for the first time since I moved here in August.

And now on to adventures of the today:

This morning Emily told us that she was off to have fun at a festival of joy and she was going to get to ride a ferris wheel. Of course I was very jelous and very much wanted to attend a carnival of some sort. But things like that just must wait, right?

Actually... on our way to juggling club we pull into the parking lot and lo and behold, look what was beheld

"Is that a carnival in the parking lot?", you say

"YES! YES IT IS!" I say. And so it was fate. First juggling, and then CARNIVAL!

Walking to the juggling spot, Bridget spotted a bridge and we just had to go over it apparently, which eventually led us to this tunnel. The tunnel had no mere cats inside it, so we needed to fix that problem.

Here is Bridget and I promptly fixing that

After juggling, carnival was explored. the first thing I noticed was that this was a very unique carnival. It offered such foods as:

"Pink carmel cheese popcorn!!!!!", you say

"YES, YES IT IS!" I say. For $2! What a deal! But we did not purchase the pink carmel cheese popcorn. we purchased something safe. Like half a carmel apple. In which we put together to form an entire carmel apple and promptly shared it like savages.

Next was ferris wheel time. Ferris wheel time cost $4. Bridget was at first terrified at such great heights moving swiftly over the carnival. I, on the other hand, was quite pleased.

Jonathan and Louis also rode the ferris wheel. They waved.

And stuck out their tongues, or at least one tongue

Nate and Shawn Dawg were at the bottom waiting for us once the ride ended. They had been released first.

Nate Dawg, Shawn Dawg, Jonathan and Louis

After carnival time we traveled to Jonathan and Dione's house to feed their very nice cat some chips.

And we also played a bit of Portal. Fun was had by all and I didn't run into the wall too much.

The end.

Boys (We love 'em)

2009-10-17T21:39:00.000-07:00

This week I starred in a Bridget Ore original comic strip. Would you like to see it?

That's me at the MacBook. This site sucks and won't let me put the comic here because it's so long, so just click on it to see the whole thing in your browser window.

Last night I poured glue on my hands, let it dry and peeled it off. It is delightful

Watching Stargate Universe with Mista' Nate now.

And out.

Wizard People

2009-10-17T00:33:00.000-07:00

Right now I am watching "Wizard People" with Jonathan, Dione, Louis and Eve. It is a soundtrack played along the Harry Potter 1 movie. And it is increasingly strange.

In other news, banana splits were made

and they were eaten. My stomach was so full afterward it hurt. I will have to learn to stop doing that.

I will go to sleep once this weird man stops narrating Harry Potter in a Charlie the Unicorn-esque voice.

Night All!

Today in Grad School!

2009-10-15T19:44:00.000-07:00

I made a realistic, life-size version of myself. The last time I did this activity, I was in kindergarten:

I will have to locate a photo of the actual life-size self-portrait but I will provide pictures of the one I did today:

I also taught my class to make homemade slime

Who knew grad school could be so fun?

Whip It ROCKED MY SOCKS, MY SHOES AND MY BIKE HELMET!!!

2009-10-14T23:57:00.000-07:00

Here's me trying to act like Ellen Page in my bicycle helmet

Eve, Bridget, Emily and I rode home on our bikes from the theater in the rain TOTALLY PUMPED. A+ from me!

That's all for now. Class class class and project presentation time tomorrow.

~I'm likin sum dim sum~

2009-10-14T17:32:00.001-07:00

Dear Friends,

Today I headed out early in order to acquire some dim sum. The thing I most wanted to obtain was delicious egg custard (or eggy custard if you're in my family). Observe the deliciousness:

But I also appreciate red bean sesame balls:

and sticky rice:

Now I am making myself hungry. To continue, I went early because I figure that was the time I could score the freshest and most abundant array of dim sum (Read: eggy custard) but was informed that eggy custard does not come out until 11am and it was indeed merely 9:30 am. Point: If I want eggy custard, please travel for dim sum after 11am.

In other news: Grad school is going FANTASTICLY. In addition to learning all I get to do to help people out as an occupational therapist, I also get to do kool kat things such as finger paint:

Note my artistic creativity

and teach an entire class how to make slime as if they were 4-6 year olds. That's only the befogging! (that word was supposed to be 'beginning' but it mysteriously has morphed. I'll leave it) Since school has begun, I have rolled around on a classroom floor with my peers, practiced putting on pants without the use of my legs, rolled around in wheel chairs, made play dough, been completely aghast at the craziness of one particular teacher as week after week she fails to tel us very important things such as material we are to be tested on and of course gone rock climbing.

Tonight I will join my fabulous roommates in a viewing of Whip It! and am EXCITED!

I think that is all for now, in the mean time I will leave you with this lobster baby

Peas and Love!
~Jessica

3 things I am lovin!

2009-10-13T19:35:00.000-07:00

Dear Friends,

I have decided that this blog will mainly consist of pictures and small blurbish captions. Point is I don't know how good I am at writing lengthy posts these days, but I am capable of...

capturing interesting moments in life

see?

This is Bridget. Bridget purchased a Ghostbusters jumpsuit and decided to wear it around the house ALL MONTH LONG. Point: Bridget has wonderful in-home fashion sense.

Digression Two:

Today was the first rainy day of the year. I wore my newly purchased RED rain jacket to school. I also carried an umbrella. Which inconveniently kept turning inside out or extremely right side up according to the wind pattern almost defeating the purpose of an umbrella. Point: To have a faulty umbrella and a rain jacket keeps one drier than with just the rain jacket and wetter than with said rain jacket and functional umbrella.

Conclusion 1 (Olga):

This blog is for you. Because you rock and also because I keep taking these pictures and having no where to conveniently share them. Point: I now surprisingly have a blog. Remind me to UPDATE IT!

Sincerely Yours,
Jessica