Mosaic Life

Monday again

Wow, it’s another Monday already. My weekend was fairly boring but productive. I wrote two papers for my last two summer classes. It was raining outside, so I really didn’t feel like I was missing out on anything outside the walls of our apartment. Oh, and by the way, I’m totally done with Hitchcock and Shakespeare! Woo! I mean, they’re nice and all, but I’m ready to move on to… Let’s see. World Lit, the classics to the Rennaissance and Media Writing. That should be entertaining.

Apparently the high today is in the upper seventies, which is insane. This is Hot-lanta, and it is August. I don’t care if it is raining, usually the temperatures do not go that low until, let’s see, October. So I’m all about this weather. It means that it’s cool enough to take a nap in my car during my lunch break, and I have missed those naps so much during the hot summer. I’m definitely the type of person that can’t function without a midday nap. Why doesn’t America have siesta time? That would be so awesome.

Woo, Spring Break

This week is my Spring Break. My intentions were to get ahead in my German and Broadcast Media classes, but you know how that sort of thing goes. Good intentions, blah blah.

I haven’t been completely lazy, though. I’ve been working to finish up a project that I’ve been working on since January. I can go into more detail about that next week, since it’s sort of a surprise for someone. At any rate, I consider it my magnum opus. I feel like Charlotte from Charlotte’s Web when I say that. You know, how she tells Wilbur that the egg pouch/eggs that she’s been creating are her magnum opus and then she dies? Well I don’t expect to die, but man, I had no idea what I was getting into when I started this here project. I’ll be super glad when I have a finished product.

So yeah, Spring Break. Not going to the beach to party. I never was into that sort of thing, anyhow. But I must say, I would really like to see an ocean soon. It’s been too long. I took it for granted when I was living in California and the ocean was always 30 minutes away. But hey, now I have tornadoes and humidity. Beat that, California.

I’m not old, but I sure can talk about the weather a lot

We had some crazy weather over the weekend, as I’m sure you’ve heard on the news by now. There was a tornado in downtown Atlanta that caused a lot of damage to the CNN building, the Georgia dome, nearby housing, and the surrounding area. It’s amazing that no one was killed, especially when you look at the aftermath.

It’s funny, because even though were were only a few miles away from where the tornado struck, all we experienced was about 10 minutes of strong storms. We were watching a movie with some friends and were completely oblivious to what went down. I mean, we’ve seen far worse thunderstorms than that. There was a really bad thunderstorm on the first night that we moved to Atlanta. You know, where lightning lights up the room so much that it feels like someone is playing with the lightswitch? And thunder sounds so close that you’re pretty sure it had to have taken out the neighbors? Yeah, that kind of storm. And ones like that made what we saw Friday night seem like nothing.

We were planning to go to Chattanooga for the weekend, but storms were in the forecast, and something about being really close to where a tornado struck makes you want to lay low.

Only problem is that I’ll blink and it will be Monday

Woo, it’s Friday. Know what that means? That I’ll get more sleep in the next two days. It also means that I have to prepare for a speech and an exam on Monday. Boo.

I ended up being able to visit my sister in Auburn last weekend, despite the “winter weather” warnings. It ended up snowing there, but not nearly as much as in Atlanta. When I got home on Sunday, there was still snow on the ground, though mostly it stuck to the grass and trees. Oh, and some neighborhood kids borrowed some snow off of my Honda and made a snowman, which remained in the same place (next to my car) until Wednesday. At that point it was more of a block of ice than snow. 

I had a great time visiting my sister. To some of my friends from highschool, it may seem strange how excited I am about becoming an aunt. See, my sister and I weren’t that close back then. We were more like acquaintances. She’d come home every now and then to get clothes. I spent most of my time with kids from the youth group at church or with my small group of close friends (i.e., fellow “non-conformists” who rebelled in a safe way that wouldn’t negatively affect their futures and considered themselves smarter than at least 75% of their peers. Yeah, lame, I know). People at school would express surprise when finding out that she and I were sisters (she was a senior when I was a freshmen). I remember the line of questioning. “You’re Brandi’s sister?” “Yes.” “Half sister?” “Nope.” “Step-sister?” “No, real sister.” “Oh. Wow, you guys are nothing alike.” “Right.”

But that changed when I moved to California. We talked on the phone more often and grew closer. We have a very similar sense of humor, and as the years passed since we’d been in high school, it seemed like we had more in common. And now she’s one of my closest friends. It’s what my mom wanted since she and my dad decided that Brandi should have a younger sibling. It just took, oh, say 20 years to happen.

Real quick

Things have gotten busy. It snowed Wednesday, and my lovely campus with its Harry Potter-esque buildings was covered in a thin blanket of white. It’s so mesmerizing to watch snowflakes fall. I know northerners are all like, woo, big deal, snow, but I get all excited about it and I’m not ashamed to admit it. Plus, some of you northerners with your snow have nasal accents. That’s right. I went there.

It’s supposed to snow again early Saturday morning, but I may go visit my sister (weather permitting) in Auburn for the weekend, where the 5 degree difference in temperature will result in yucky rain rather than pretty snow. My sister has now developed a cute little pregnant belly, which makes it seem all the more real that she’s going to be a mom soon. It’s exciting stuff!

Anyway, I got my hair did yesterday. It’s short, but my hair grows fast so it’s fine. I’m still trying to recover from a horrible haircut I got in July of last year. Did I not mention the bad haircut? It was bad, so bad. I went to supercuts (I know, I know, but I’m cheap and I was thinking, how could they mess it up? Oh, they found a way) and I believe the hair butcher thought I said “I want the front to look early nineties, and I want the back to look like a 12-year-old boy’s haircut from the nineties in the back.” After his assault on my hair, I tried to stop myself from hyperventilating. For months afterward I tugged on the back of my hair muttering, “grow, grow!” And now it’s finally gotten to a nearly-acceptable length. I will never go to a place that charges less than $35 for a haircut again. Lesson learned. Painfully learned.

Okay, this was a longer post than I intended. Gotta go. Have a good weekend.

Take that, electric company

According to the news, it was 18 degrees this morning with a windchill factor of 8 degrees. And yet, we have not used our heater yet this winter. Heat rises, and since we’re on the third floor and apparently have neighbors that don’t like their apartments’ temperatures to sink below 85, our apartment hasn’t been as cold as you’d think. Plus, we get a lot of sunlight. That’s not to say it doesn’t get cold.

It’s not so much because we’re cheap that we don’t use our heat. It’s more the principle of the matter. During the summer months we paid $160 a month to cool our apartment, and we figure that it will equal out if we save energy in the winter months. So, we pile on the clothes, use our little heater fan in the bedroom, and use more blankets. The cat has been forced to actually cuddle with us, as we provide him with heat and love. He’s not so much into the love part.

Burning California

Knowing that my husband and I had moved from SoCal, a coworker asked me if our friends and family were anywhere near the fires, so I figured I’d blog about it. As far as I know, Brandon’s relatives are all safe from the fires, though they are close to them. I know that my former workplace is pretty close to the fires as well, as documented by a former coworker, Crysti, on her website. Another former coworker and (partner in mocking others), The Dane, also blogged about the fires being rather close to his apartment. This hit close to home, or rather, our former home, what with it being less than a mile away from his.

When I lived in Southern California, I quickly learned of these crazy Santa Ana Winds that typically blew at sustained speeds of around 45 mph, and the way the winds, coupled with the dry heat, encouraged fires across the area. What’s sad is that the fires close to my friends/coworkers was started by arson, not natural causes or by mistake. I can’t imagine what people who have lost their homes are feeling right now, especially since homes in that area are incredibly expensive. The winds are supposed to die down a bit today, and hopefully that will give firefighters a chance to control the flames. We’ll see.

Recycle or else

So another warm winter has been predicted by our friendly weather predictors. I know many people disagree over whether global warming is caused by humans, sun activity, or God’s wrath, but let’s be practical here. If it is human-caused, I am going to get you people who don’t recycle and who drive Hummers. No seriously, you may enjoy your big giant gas guzzling luxuries, but me and my economy car are not amused. I hate hate hate warm weather. What’s the point of living in Atlanta if you don’t get a real winter? Well? I suffer through the torture that is the summer of Hot-lanta GA, and I expect to be repaid in full when winter comes.

If I don’t get to use my fireplace this winter, I’m totally going to join the tree huggers. And then won’t you feel guilty?

Of course it’s hot in hot-lanta

But seriously, this is just ridiculous. The high is in the upper nineties and the air is thick with humidity and utter discomfort. You can’t stay outside for more than five minutes without getting a sweat stache. And just try feeling remotely attractive with a sweat stache. My car heats up to about 300 degrees during the day, so when I get in I can’t even touch the steering wheel and God help me if I touch the metal on the seatbelt.

Whenever I talk to friends back in southern California during the winter, and they boast that it’s 75 degrees when it’s 40 degrees in Atlanta, I actually don’t envy them. I like cold weather because I like sweaters and hot chocolate and whatnot. But when they brag that it’s 75 degrees there when it’s a bajillion degrees here (or 100, but what’s the difference?), I struggle to remember exactly why we moved. Back in SoCal, we used our air conditioner about three times a year. You can’t survive here without air conditioning. You’d have a heat stroke, or in the least suffer from exhaustion since it’s impossible to sleep when it’s hot.

Our apartment heats up like crazy, and I’m not really sure what to do to conserve energy, because I refuse to allow the thermostat to go over 80. Our apartment is on the third floor, we have vaulted ceilings, and the sun shines pretty strongly on parts of our apartment. But we have trees blocking out some of the sun, and blinds and curtains, but it doesn’t seem to help. I’m hoping that we’ll be able to go without air conditioning or heating in the Fall months, which are usually pretty temperate, to make up for our soaring electric bill during the Summer.

Wow, this was a mundane post. Maybe next time I’ll talk about something interesting, like my cat. You guys like that, right?

Old Wives and Weather

My mom said that there is an old wives’ tale that there is always a cold front right before Easter. The old wives were right this year; the high tomorrow is 59, about 10 degrees below normal for this time of year.

I’m thinking that this is Mother Earth’s way of making amends for giving us 80+ degree temperatures before April. I guess I’ll accept the gesture.