"Do you want your animals?"

This blog is dedicated to animals, none of them normal. Lately animals have been very prominent, and then Liz, fellow animal non-enthusiast blogged about her beloved bug. Something has also happened to me and animals are slowly breaking through my stone heart.
#1a. Charlie the goldfish. I owe this one to Amber Moyes who asked me to babysit her goldfish, and never took him back. Little did I know that she had been attempting to kill him softly for years by filling his bowl with normal, chlorinated water, with no side affects. I cried all day at school in 3rd grade when I thought he died. Only to return home and be informed that he had been sleeping. Who knew fish slept? But soon enough I hated him because he would NEVER die. I think he was like 8 or so when he finally died. His body was transparent, no longer gold. Not even Cory the fish will break this record.
#2b. Mo. Officially Mo Fro Joe BoBo CoCo NoNo-that is a little look inside my elementary school brain. He lived through countless jail breaks, one of which ended when Brittany found the cat walking around with him in his mouth. But this was not the end for Mo. Nor was it the time I found him stuck in a paper towel roll. He died on Christmas of unknown causes. He was only 3.
#3c. Scamper. His lip would get stuck on his tooth so he looked like Elvis. Unknown liquid would drip from his face, snot? drool?, leaving behind a small puddle whereever he went. He would randomly run through the house at high speeds. He died, also on Christmas, at the age of like 18 or something. He was a rock star and my dad gave an amazing eulogy.
#4d. Binky. Enough said. More to come in his obituary which will hopefully not be for many years to come.

#5e. Who can forget the animal sacrifice of 2008. We found this in our yard one morning: Charred body of some sort of racoon-like animal tied to two rocks with rope. Here is a picture after the body was removed. I would give anything to know the story behind this.#6f. Foxy. Foxy has forever changed my perception of dogs. I'd like to thank Danny for the opportunity to walk dogs at his clinic. The perfect scenario, short 10 minute walks, give them back when you are done, no strings attached. Foxy was everything that I hate. Dog, small, rat-like. But we fell in love in the short 10 minutes we had together. Since I didn't think to check the name on his kennel he was called foxy, because he legit looks like a fox. Sadly I don't have access to pictures of the two of us.

#7g. And most recently. The other night JEB was up late and heard something banging several times on the closed kitty door. He assumed that someone had locked Binky out so he opened it up to let him in. Binky didn't enter and didn't respond when he was called...strange. So he opened the back door and what is standing by the cat door staring at him? A racoon. Ridiculous. Has he been here before? What would have happened if the cat door had been open? I now have images of this racoon lounging around our house while we're on vacation, watching t.v. and snacking on cheetos.

Emphasis on the SICK

I was at SJ's the other night when I was presented with a new tastey treat, the Pickle Sickle. Somehow they knew I would try it. As if this idea isn't disgusting enough, this particular Sickle had a dash of Jalapeno added. In this case, a picture is worth a thousand words. SAC saw how much I loved it and demanded to have some herself.
A quick Google search provides the background of this ridiculousness: Texas. Am I in any way surprised? No. http://www.bobspicklepop.com/

Every one has quirks, hers are just physical....and mental

I'd like to start out with, curse you Linx. She is the reason I haven't blogged about my birthday. I was waiting to get photographic evidence from her, but it looks like this will never happen. The written word with have to suffice. For those of you who forgot(Liz), I turned the oh so exciting age of 21 on June 3rd. We'll fast forward through the day where I had to work and get on with the festivities.
SJ, SAC, Linx, and I went out to dinner at our "secret" location, Grimaldi's in Old Town.
1. Our pizza was topped with ricotta cheese, meatballs, and sweet peppers. Weirdly amazing.
2. We people watched. A couple on a first date. Always enjoyable. Talking non-stop, overly "excited" about everything the other had to say. Generally a great specimen.
3. We were people watched. My cake had no candle so SJ found it only appropriate to create flames with her hand so I could still receive my birthday wish(it's going to be a crazy year). One lady in particular found us very strange.
4. Ridiculous conversation. Including the quote that is this blog title. Any guesses as to who SJ was talking about?
After dinner we found it only appropriate to let a psychic(we argued about the spelling of that word for a good 2 minutes) tell me what the rest of my life holds. Don't get too excited though, as we were in Scottsdale, we quickly realized that the woman lounging on her white couch was going to charge me more than my palm is worth. This led to the only other logical thing to do: Pimp cup. As much as I hate Walmart, it is often the only place open with exactly what I need. In this case, an extra-large beer mug. As we proceeded to check out, the very intelligent cashier asked to see my i.d. I was happy to show it to her. What was a buying? A mug and 2 liters of ginger ale, with cash. I'm not sure what tipped her off that the i.d. was necessary for this purchase, but I would like to thank her for giving me the opportunity to prove my age on the very eve of my birthday. The rest of the night was spent bedazzling mugs with rhinestones that were ripped off of my jazz costume, and mixing fake mojitos, or as SAC called it "fruit salad in a glass". Thank you ladies for a fantastic night.
Friday was my family celebration, along with appearances from SAC and SJ. To make this short and sweet. Grills(that's Gabe-language for girls) lunch, overpriced cupcakes at Sprinkles(it's all about the experience), Beauty and the Beast, a nap, barbecue, and swimming, which included the traditional intense game of HORSE. I'm probably forgetting something. A lot happened and it was a good time. One year older. I feel not a day over 15.

Oooooohhhh! We're halfway there!!!

Warning: The purpose of this blog is to complain. What you are about to read is a rant. Not only is my mom sick of hearing me whine, but she is out of town and her phone is off(ignoring me?) so here we are. First, I would like to remind everyone that I am a good student. I generally go to class and do my work. However, this internship class that I am in is currently the bane of my existence.
Let's begin from the beginning. I'm working at an interior design showroom in Scottsdale this summer, a pretty sweet deal. While I knew that associating this with school would ruin my life, I need the school credit; considering that I'm a senior and just decided to double major(another way to say I was 6 credits away from finishing one major when I changed my mind), I have no time to waste. So 3 credits over a 4-month time period is easy, right? FALSE. Since I have a scholarship, further proof that I was a good student, I have to be taking at least 6 credits to get the free money. Okay, so 6 Spring and 6 Summer. Again, FALSE. I can only get a max of 9 credits for the internship. Okay, so 6 Spring or 6 Summer. Again, FALSE. I am "required" by Roberta, the internship coordinator, to do the internship both Spring and Summer terms and therefore must be able to access Blackboard all 4 months, meaning I must be registered for class. The result: I am taking 7 credits. 6 Spring, using scholarship money, and 1 Summer, which I have to pay for just so I can get on Blackboard. Summary: I am taking an extra unnecessary 4 credits all to save $400. Worth it: Yes. I'm going to Australia.
The real issue here is the class itself. I can't handle it. Stupid, pointless, ridiculous, unnecessary, dumb, retarded, idiotic busy work, and I'm over it!!! I was over it since the first week. I won't even get into the details but basically we just have to write excessively about emotions, learning, growth, and work relationships. The result: I don't do anything. I hate it so much that I continue to forget to do anything and I don't care. Roberta takes this very seriously, good for her, but I cannot wait to be done with this. Also, let us take into account that it is summer, its an online class, and I'm working, so making this a priority is bound to be difficult, even if it interested me in the least.
Not to worry though. We are on the downward slope. After completing my homework tonight, a day early, I have officially completed 7 of 14 weeks of hell. HALFWAY THERE! This realization led me to a little youtubing of Bon Jovi's Livin' on a Prayer. Thank you D-Brown for teaching me that youtube can enhance any experience. The hair and leather fringe jackets in that video will not disappoint!

"Basically it's a bunch of hippies"

BAM
Recently I've been trying to pack in a lot of cultural/educational experiences. Why?
1a. I'm spending a lot of time with my parents
2b. I want to know stuff...stuff about life and the places I live
3c. I don't have access to rock band
4d. I'm starting my new life as a pseudo artist


Our journey starts at the Botanical Gardens. Like so many places, I've somehow never been here in my 21 years of existence in Arizona. This probably has something to do with the fact that for about 19 of those years I thought the desert was ugly. I would now like to retract that feeling along with the negative feelings I had towards mushrooms, shrimp, and crust. Anyways, Chihuly, a glass blowing genius, had an exhibit there for the past few months. Of course I hit it up the last weekend possible. I don't have much to say about this except for...awesome. "This boat is REAL"

Yesterday Mom and I took a little trip up to Arcosanti. Again, I have driven past this place on the way to Flagstaff maybe 100 times in my life and had no idea. Thank you History of Modern Architecture at BYU for bringing us together. Basically this Italian, Paolo Soleri, envisions cities using up a ridiculously small amount of space. Skyscrapers for housing and then everything else you would ever need packed in around it. No cars, he hates those, and everyone lives as a big happy family. Very eco-friendly, all sorts of ideas about farming, using greenhouses for energy, etc. We won't get into the boring details, but it is a cool idea. The problem being that the way this thing is being built is that people pay to do a workshop there and they build it. Upon asking Will what it was he said: "Basically a bunch of hippies that drew up plans for a city and get people to buy bells they make to pay for it." Couldn't have said it better(they make really cool bells). So in the past 38 years they have built 4, maybe 5, buildings. If you have a few million dollars hanging around, please help them out...this thing will never be completed.
This place is eerily similar to a city out of Star Wars. The best part was eating lunch with the hippies. So much long curly hair, birkenstocks, and lightweight cargo pants.