Disneyland...

HERE WE COME!!!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

St. Patrick's Day is funny, because as far as I know, no one really knows what it's about. At least there's something associated with Valentine's Day, even if no one knows what St. Valentine did. St. Paddy's day, though, just has this in your face emphasis on wearing green and drinking. So -- here's what St. Patrick's Day is all about!

-St. Patrick, who lived circa 384 - 461 AD, is a patron saint of Ireland. He was a Roman-English born Christian missionary. He was KIDNAPPED by some Irish folks and made a SLAVE for six years!! Then later he went back and taught them about Christianity.
-He is said to have banished all the snakes from Ireland!
-The "wearing of the green"comes from the tradition of wearing a shamrock as a sign of Irish nationalism. Back in the day, Saint Patrick used the shamrock to explain the Holy Trinity to pre-Christian Irish people. However, Saint Patrick's traditional color is blue.
-The longest running St. Patrick's Day celebration in the U.S. is held by Boston (go figure), since 1737. Chicago comes in at #8, having celebrated since 1843.

Gross!

I woke up with pink eye for the second time this quarter! Yuck! I feel like the germs are everywhere and there's no way for me to ever get rid of it all the way. I don't have the time or money to go to the doc and get medicine, so I'm going to see how it goes.

Mine looks quite inflamed.

A Dying Art

It makes me a little sad that the written word has such a different meaning than it did before computers and email etc etc. Generally, no one writes letters anymore, and there's no need for any person other than yourself to view your handwriting. As such, there is NO emphasis on penmanship. Of course, this is a talent that has been diminishing for quite awhile, but even looking back to my grandparents old lettes, there was certainly more attention paid to writing beautifully. I have never been able to write beautifully, but today I decided to start writing my class notes in cursive. It's pretty ugly and takes a long time, because I had trouble remembering how to make certain letters. But I think with practice it might look nice.

When I was a kid my sister got a calligraphy set for her birthday pretty much every year. I don't know why she always got them, but I liked to play with them. Unfortunately, I'd get so frustrated with my ugly Fs and Is and Ts (they were hard for some reason) that I would give up. I think that I probably have a better handle on my fine motor skills now, and I want to give the calligraphy set another try. Ebay, here I come!

Not Sexy

You know, I'm glad we don't live in a puritanical time when we can't show our ankles. But it's a little upsetting that for about the past 5 years, the possibility of seeing someone's butt when they're sitting down is considered ok, or even expected. How many girls' butt cracks I see in a day! It's astonishing, because the last thing to be counted as sexy is your pinched butt cheeks peeking out of your jeans. Where's the class, ladies?

I Hate Tinted Windows

Tinted windows make me incredibely uncomf, and I don't think I can even pinpoint why. It's not that I think that the people inside are up to no good (which they probably are!) but rather...when you're driving, your eyes should be on the road, and if I look into their car, I can't tell if their eyes are on the road or not. I know that's really dumb, but...

ALSO! I think it makes the car look mean.

I Hope You DAAAAAANCE

I hate that song, by the way. But anyways, I haven't taken ballet in over a year, which is a pretty long time for me, because I took classes pretty much year round from the age of 3 to 18, and then I generally took one class a year in college. Yesterday I was wearing some short shorts and I kind of checked out my legs and started doing some stretches and basic old dance steps for fun in my apartment. There's not much room though, and I couldn't do much and I started thinking about how much I want to take some more ballet classes. WELL! Today I shuffled my schedule around a bit for spring quarter, and I will be taking ballet two times a week and I am SOOOOO excited! The one sad thing is that one of my favorite parts of ballet for all those years was actually performing, and since college has started I haven't had any opportunities to perform. My freshman year I auditioned for a piece and we started rehearsing, but no one's schedules worked well enough to be able to rehearse enough. But, that being said, I still love just going into the great big studio and working really hard for an hour and a half and feeling really sweaty and tired afterwards and feeling like I've done something that I really love to do. So I'm looking forward to it.Also, I've always thought this, but I got to thinking that I would really love to teach ballet, just kind of a part time thing. I think this picture is hilarious because that's exactly what my ballet classes were like when I started. We had those same little rugs and our teacher wore a long skirt like that, and everyone had big bellies. I don't know how you get into teaching ballet? I guess it's something I can look into.

Rain, Rain

After about 2 weeks of really beautiful weather, sun, and warmth, rain has returned to Seattle. It's sapping my will to put on normal clothes, leaves the house, and go to school. Sometimes when it's been nice for awhile, the rain is a welcome break. I mean, it is Seattle. But this time, I'm pretty ready for spring and the rain is ruining it!


Luckily, the forecast predicts sun for the next three days.