We carved a pumpkin tonight. Well, I scooped out its guts and Brandon did most of the carving. But I like the way it turned out.

My co-worker brought in this really cool trail mix that she makes for Halloween every year. It's a mixture of peanuts and candy corn, and it's actually really good. It tastes like a Payday candy bar.

I've never eaten candy corn and enjoyed it before. I heard a comedian joke that every year after halloween, the candy makers go out to the dumpsters and pull out all of the old candy corn to use for the next year. However, this mix of dumpster candy corn and peanuts is great.

So after being nagged by five of my friends over the course of two weeks, I gave into peer pressure and joined Facebook. I resisted for a while, because I knew that on there, you're supposed to list your friends and your college and stuff, and I didn't want to get involved in a popularity contest. Plus, now that I'm in California and away from the small town environment, I think I'm way more laid back. I don't care if I trip and fall in front of the grocery store (which I did the other day, and looked quite the idiot) because I know most of the people I see on a daily basis, I'll never see again. Not so in a small town. If you trip in front of the grocery store, it's quite likely that not only will people from high school see it, but some of their relatives and their auntee twice removed will see it, and they'll talk about it for weeks.

So I've been enjoying the anonymity that Orange County provides. But when I think of my small hometown, or high school, I begin to get self-conscious, remembering the social castes and all the gossip that I hated and feared so much back then.

And so I avoided Facebook, because I did not want to know who was more successful than me, more popular than me, etc. And now that I've joined, I sort of regret it. You add a friend, you wait for them to approve you. And until they do, since I'm new to this, I have no friends listed on there. And yes, I do feel like a loser. Or perhaps like a female Frankenstein, roaming the earth in search of companionship, bellowing "FRIEND, FRIEND!"

I'm not sure how this is determined, but it's interesting:

My blog is worth $6,774.48.
How much is your blog worth?

It's Friday! Yay! So for lack of anything else to post, here's the Friday Five.

1. What do you like or dislike about autumn?
I love autumn. LOVE it. My birthday is in autumn, and it's just such a great time. The trees are changing colors, it's cool but not too cold.
What do I dislike about autumn? The fact that it avoids California.

2. Have you raked leaves into a pile just to jump in them?
Of course! It was mostly when I was younger, and my mom would spoil my fun by warning me that I could get red bugs or that a snake might have crawled into the leaves. Now that I think about it, she was probably just tired of pulling leaves off of my clothes before washing them.
Speaking of leaf piles, the ones that people leave on the street next to the curb always look so tempting to run over. However, someone once told me that people put bricks in the piles to discourage that, so I've always avoided it.

3. Have you ever carved a pumpkin and how did it turn out?
I have. I carved one two years ago, and it looked like something a possessed child might carve.

4. Have you ever eaten anything made from pumpkins other than pie?
I've eaten pumpkin seeds. And I'm not sure if the pumpkin spice latte has any real pumpkin in it, but it's yummy.

5. Where is a good spot to see the leaves change color where you live?
Well, sometimes the leaves turn brown when people forget to water them. I have a feeling that doesn't count.

I just remembered this, so excuse the fact that I have nothing to say that leads up to the story, only that I remembered it for some reason and it made me smile.

A few years ago I was talking to my friend Erick, whose dad owns a funeral home or two, or did a few years back. Since his father was in the business, Erick couldn't help but be around dead people a bit, and I was/am intrigued by death. No, I'm not morbid. I just find death fascinating. So there.

Anyway, I asked him if dead people ever sit up or make noises due to their muscles constricting or air escaping their lungs. He said yes, and also dead people also make the same motions that they repeated often during their life. For instance, a coal miner would make a motion as if he were hammering with a pick. I was amazed until he added, "Yeah one time I walked into the funeral home and there were these dead people jumping rope."

Yeah, so I'm gullible. But I do think it would be intriguing if our muscles continued in actions that we often performed. If that happened, I think I'd probably try to type. I wonder if carpal tunnel bothers dead people... Especially while they're trying to jump rope.

We're going to be visiting Alabama for Christmas. So if you want to hang out, we'll arrive on the 24th of December. I usually announce our visit rather early, so that people can prepare themselves to be in the presence of our sheer awesomeness, plus we normally buy our tickets in October. However, this year my dad was a bit more paranoid than usual that the prices of fuel would skyrocket, so we bought tickets in August. Some airlines didn't even offer prices for tickets that far in advance. But, buy them we did, and perhaps it was a good thing because Katrina came along not too long afterward. Buying the tickets in August probably saved my dad a stomach ulcer.

I was talking to some one the other day, and I said, "yeah, we (Brandon and I) love visiting home." She laughed and said, "we love visiting home?" Well, perhaps it's not his home, but he does enjoy it. Where else can you shoot things and eat Krystal burgers? Last visit we really emersed ourselves in the redneck culture that I had resisted for most of my life. We went to a fireball throw, ate Krystal burgers (okay, I never resisted Krystal's), went fishing in my dad's pond, and Brandon shot his first deer. We even listened to country music when we were driving to Florida and no other stations would come in. I was shocked when I realized I remembered a lot of the lyrics from when I was subjected to country music as a child.

Anyway, we're looking forward to the visit. Cold weather and all.

It's raining, and the high today is 67. Yay! It actually feels sort of like fall! I know it won't last, but I'm totally enjoying it for now.

My friend Eric once said that I always find the ugliest shoes possible. Maybe it's true, and I wondered if perhaps the new shoes that I got were just so ugly they're cute. But I love them. And I'm happy it's raining, even if I can't wear my new shoes because the suede would ruin.

According to this article, scientists have basically found a way to get stem cells without killing the embryo. It's funny, because just the other night in Biology we were talking about stem cell research, and my teacher made it very clear that he felt we were living in the dark ages due to our resistance to develope stem cell research. "They're just cells! It's not a baby. If it is, it's one ugly, undeveloped baby."

The following quote confused me a little, though: "The Coalition for the Advancement of Medical Research, which advocates federal funding of stem cell research, cautioned that despite the goal of avoiding ethical quandaries, the new approaches 'will not sit well with many who oppose embryonic stem cell research.'" If killing embryos is no longer an issue, why would people oppose it? Because of the whole "playing God" aspect? Feel free to comment your opinion.

Does Not Follow Directions Well

In 4th grade, I brought home my progress report to find a disturbing comment from my teacher. "Does not follow directions well." I was, of course, indignant, and commanded my mother (in a respectful, THIS IS INSANE YOU MUST TALK TO MY TEACHER BECAUSE I AM THE PERFECT STUDENT sort of manner) to schedule a conference about this blight on my ego. She humored me because she's great like that.

My teacher explained to her that when she gave me directions, I asked too many questions before carrying them out. For example, if she told me to sharpen my pencil, I would go get my pencil, pause, and say, "Does it need to be really sharp or just sharp enough to write? Which pencil sharpener do you want me to use, the electric or manual? Do you want me to sharpen the #2 pencil, or would you rather have me get a mechanical pencil?" I'm not sure why, but apparently this was driving my teacher crazy. So from then on, I tried to just do what she said, make some assumptions, and get it done. However, my first boss loved that I asked a bajillion questions before beginning a task, because she liked things to be done just so. See, 4th grade teacher? It only drives you crazy!

So for the past two weeks in my Bio lab, I've been in groups in which I was somehow elected the leader. This came to pass because when the time came to start our experiments, the other group members stared at me blankly and said "Now what are we doing?" My gosh, do they not know who I am? I don't follow directions well! I'm not a leader. I work hard, but do you know how long it took me to learn to cook simple recipes? But we made it through. We never finished our experiments first, but we never got chemical burns or killed anyone either. So it worked out.

Happy birthday to me! I'm 23 today. I remember when I was little, my plan was to marry at 23, after graduating college. I got the marriage and graduating college thing mixed up timewise, but otherwise, I'm on track. Hehe.

Diamonds are a Girl's Best Friend

Diamonds are forever. And apparently, now your dead granny's corpse can be around forever as well. But seriously, wouldn't it be a tad strange to not just wear your relative's ring that you inherited, but to actually wear them as jewelry? Plus, if you ever needed extra cash, you'd really feel guilty for pawning off your granny.

I don't know. In a way, the whole thing could be kind of sweet. Like keeping your loved one nearby all the time, without the corpse smell troubling you. It's kind of like wearing an urn. Just a pretty urn.

I'm sick. The Santa Ana winds have kicked up some sort of evil particles that send my allergies into full gear. School was interesting last night. I was so out of it from the allergy medicine that completing my Bio lab was a real struggle. How do they expect me to tie off the semi-permeable tubes when I'm having a hard enough time not projectile snotting all over my lab group? I bet you liked that mental image.

Anyway, when I got home I chatted on AIM with my brother-in-law Sean. We were talking about him hanging out with us some time this weekend, and I mentioned that he'd have to spend the night, because driving to Brea twice in one day is just no fun. And he was like, "Oh that's no problem, I drive now." I had to pause and take that in. He drives now. Wow. I knew the day would come. Brandon had the same reaction when I repeated the conversation to him. Times are changing. So watch out while you're on the road.

On Friday night, Brandon and I had just gotten our chips and salsa at the mexican restaurant of choice, when my cell phone rang. Seeing that it was my sister, I answered it. Straight to the point, she asked, "Are y'all alright?"
"As far as I know. Why?" She laughed and reported to an unknown group that we were fine.
"Oh, because of the fires. We heard about them on the news."
"Yeah, those are like, 60 miles away from us-" My mom beeped in. I thought about answering her call by shrieking "IT BURNS!!! HEEEELP" or something equally cruel and insensitive, but I decided to be nice. After all, I already moved 2,500 miles away from my mom. She doesn't need any more trouble.

It's sweet that they worry about me, it is. And I know exactly why they don't know that the fires are a good distance away. I figured it out when I was home last Christmas, and there were floods in southern California. The news didn't announce that there were floods in Orange and San Diego counties. The news didn't even say there were floods in southern California. It just said that there was heavy flooding in California. For crying out loud, Alabama newscasters. California isn't Rhode Island. It's huge, and it's safe to say that the whole state isn't suffering from a flood. Or fires. Unless it gets really bad. And in that case, feel free to give me a call, and I'll try not to be insensitive.