Ze List

I'm a dork, I know. I blame this one on Carisa and Kim, lol. Copy and paste and highlight the things you've done! Then when your finished add something you've done that wasn't on the list!

1. Started your own blog
2. Slept under the stars
3. Played in a band
4. Visited Hawaii
5. Watched a meteor shower
6. Given more than you can afford to charity
7. Been to Disneyland or Disney World
8.Climbed a mountain
9. Held a praying mantis
10. Sang a solo
11. Bungee jumped
12. Visited Paris
13. Watched a lightning storm at sea
14. Taught yourself an art from scratch
15. Adopted a child
16. Had food poisoning
17. Walked to the top of the Statue of Liberty
18.Grown your own vegetables
19. Seen the Mona Lisa in France
20. Slept on an overnight train
21.Had a pillow fight
22.hitch hiked
23. Taken a sick day when you’re not ill
24. Built a snow fort
25. Held a lamb
26. Gone skinny dipping
27. Run a 1/2 Marathon
28. Ridden in a gondola in Venice
29. Seen a total eclipse
30. Watched a sunrise or sunset
31.hit a home run.
32.been on a cruise
33. Seen Niagara Falls in person
34. Visited the birthplace of your ancestors
35. Seen an Amish community
36. Taught yourself a new language
37. Had enough money to be truly satisfied
38. Seen the Leaning Tower of Pisa in person
39. Gone rock climbing
40. Seen Michelangelo’s David
41. Visited Africa
42. Seen Old Faithful geyser erupt
43. Bought a stranger a meal at a restaurant
44.Sung karaoke
45. Walked on a beach by moonlight
46. Been transported in an ambulance
47. Had your portrait painted
48. Gone deep sea fishing
49. Seen the Sistine Chapel in person
50. Been to the top of the Eiffel Tower in Paris
51. Gone scuba diving or snorkeling
52. Kissed in the rain
53. Played in the mud
54. Gone to a drive-in theater
55. Been in a movie
56. Visited the Great Wall of China
57. Started a business
58. Taken a martial arts class
59. Visited Russia
60. Served at a soup kitchen
61. Sold Girl Scout Cookies
62. Gone whale watching
63. Got flowers for no reason
64. Donated blood, platelets or plasma
65. Gone sky diving
66. Visited a Nazi Concentration Camp
67.Bounced a check
68. Flown in a helicopter
69. Saved a favorite childhood toy
70. Visited the Lincoln Memorial
71. Eaten Caviar 72. Pieced a quilt
73. Stood in Times Square
74. Toured the Everglades
75. Been fired from a job
76. Seen the Changing of the Guards in London
77. Broken a bone.
78.Been on a speeding motorcycle
79. Seen the Grand Canyon in person
80. Published a book
81. Visited the Vatican
82.Bought a brand new car
83. Walked in Jerusalem
84. Had your picture in the newspaper
85. Read the entire Bible
86. Visited the White House
87. Killed and prepared an animal for eating
88. Had chickenpox
89. Saved someone’s life
90. Sat on a jury
91. Met someone famous
92. Joined a book club
93. Lost a loved one
94. Had a baby
95. Seen the Alamo in person
96. Swam in the Great Salt Lake
97. Been involved in a law suit
98. Owned a cell phone
99. Been stung by a bee
100. Made amends with someone who offended you
101. Flew in a small Cessna plane with just you and the pilot
102. Ran out of gas
103. Eaten fried okra
104. Swam in the Caribbean Sea
105. Peed in a swimming pool
106. Stayed in a beach house
107. Hosted an exchange student
108. Been a Secret Santa to a family
109. Worked on a political campaign
110. Coached a sports team
111. Baked bread from scratch
112. Driven from coast to coast
113. Paid off all of your debt
114. Roast marshmallows over a campfire.
115 Cut up a credit card
116. Drove a car through a flood
117. Been on t.v
118. Had braces
119. Been to the twin towers in NY.
120. Have played in both the Atlantic & Pacific Oceans
121. Been to ground zero
122. Bite my fingernails
123. Likes to scrapbook
124. Hates pie
125.Visited Mexico
126. Seen a Tornado in person
127. Have ever been lost at sea!
128. kisses a frog.
129. Gave birth to twins.
130. Received 2 moving violation tickets in 1 day.
131.Been Life Flighted.
132. swore
133. stranded in a motel for Christmas.
134. Been in 2 countries at once!
135. Adopted a pet from Humane Society
136. Did a triathlon
137. Never received a speeding ticket
138. Live with one kidney
139. Slept on the floor of a train station in Poland
140. eaten rocky mountain oysters
141. Volunteered at an orphanage in Chile
142. Stayed in a Bed and Breakfast
143. Stayed in a Hostel
144. Been chased by a bull.

Up In Smoke

I realize this is a bit past my time, but can I just say that Cheech and Chong are possibly the best stand up comedians in the world? Next to Jeff Dunham.

Waaaaay back in October Lance won tickets to their show here in town. The show wasn't until this last Saturday, the 24th of January (Happy birthday again Nomo!!) so we had a bit to wait for it, but man was it worth it! They are freakin hilarious! I didn't happen upon them through this experience, I've known of them since I was but a wee toddler. How? Dad exposed me to bits and pieces of their skits through their movies that were shown (after extensive editing) on TV. He thought they were pretty great and I suppose was only telling me about them to help me understand why he'd watch something like that with me in the room. I can't really relate to the kind of comedy they do, but I have to say it cracked me up. We were sitting in the center of the second row from the stage at the Convention Center. Both of them have aged quite a bit, but they both still look very much the same. Tommy Chong was by far my favorite part of the whole show. His wife tried her hand at some stand up, but her pretty couldn't cover the stink of her performance. There was a lot of talk about marijuana (surprise surprise) and some of it made me cringe a bit inside, but it was, over all, a good show. They did a skit as dogs. That was... priceless. It was to illustrate the differences between men and women. Women are cats; strong, independent, free thinkers, and we're pretty while we do it. Men are dogs. You'd have to see the skit to understand why it was so freaking funny. It was great though.

Can I just say, also, that people who are obnoxiously loud at those things shouldn't be allowed to stay? There was a lady at the end of the row we were sitting in who kept responding to Tommy Chong's rhetorical questions with loud "YES!" "HECK YES!" and other such exclamations. He kept looking at her when she'd do it like "man lady, shut up, I'm trying to talk here". I kinda wanted to throw my shoe at her.

If for nothing else, I think I'll keep Lance around cause he does take me to some pretty excellent shows. Yay!
That was a joke. I love the man to pieces.

New Year

Yay, made it through one more with my head still attatched. Go me go! I can't say I'm sorry to see the holiday's go though. I remember a time when I used to get excited about this time of year. Family, food, gifts, a lot of togetherness. Not this year though. A brief greeting among sisters was as close to "family time" as I got. As for all of this snow... I am so very much over it. I haven't had time to play in it therefore it must go. I am excited that school is back in session though. ITT plays by its own rules. While other area colleges and highschools are closing down they're over here sayin "Nope, sorry guys, you know the deal. You get here one way or the other. Hitch up your dogs if you must, class is gonna go." Yay for excellerated educations! For reals though, I am glad they're not shutting us down. Too much down time will delay me wanting to get back into the grove and it will be that much harder when the time does come. I need to keep the steam rolling, don't let the fire die! Oh, and for those who were curious, I didn't get to rub the grades in my dads face, I'm not even sure my mom heard what I had to say about it over the kids screaming, people talking over eachother and the TV being on. I forgot what it was like to have all of us together. For the last three weeks I've been at home alone with the dogs most of the time, if I'm not working or shoveling. It's a very lonely exsistance. Lance has been working for the street department of the city, making a lot of over time and out of grade pay for plowing the streets, which brings up another gripe. How ungreatful can people get? I mean, good grief! Lance comes home with stories of people flipping him off as he plows their roads, one guy pulled a gun on a grater operator, and people throw snowballs at them as they drive by as well. You guys complain that you can't get down your streets, but when they do finally get to your neighborhood you get angry at them for plowing you in. Do forgive, good citizens, let us all bow and kiss your feet, and while we're at it, we'll take all that snow in front and on top of your house for you and just, I dunno.... put it in your living room? Get over yourselves people, and count your blessings. Things could be SO much worse for you than having to dig your driveway out one more time.

Any way... I could possibly be in a bit of a bitter mood. I'm sorry. I do hope everyone had great holidays though. That's about all the cheer I can spread at the moment. Much love my people.

How far is too far?

I'm asking only because I have this neat little certificate thinger that the Dean at ITT gave to me. I made the Honors List this last quarter because of my grades. Not many of us made that, FYI. Knowing I passed my classes and knowing I got a great GPA is one thing, having physical proof that my teachers noticed, that the DEAN noticed... I want to frame that cute certificate in a pretty frame, admire it for a moment and then mash my dad's face in it. Not litterally. Well... kinda... but more like figuratively. I'd like to see him at our families Christmas get together, whenever that is, and have that certificate handy so I can pull it out and say "Oh boy! Whatever could this be? Honors?! ME?!" and then look pointedly at my dad and wait for that millisecond when his face drops in shocked disbelief and hopefully get a picture of it. Who was it who told me I couldn't pull off 'Sariah grades'? Who was it who sat in front of a complete stranger and asked me why I was even bothering with college? Who was it who has never really expected me to make anything of myself? Oh yeah, that'd be dad. I don't want to completely break him with this one yet though. My goal is to continue to stay on the Honors list and hopefully, by the end of my schooling, when I graduate and get that pretty little certificate that says I WIN, all of those good grades will have completely broken every misconception he ever had of me. He won't know what to think of me then, then he'll be FORCED to actually look at me and see me for who and what I am. He wont be able to brush me aside and tell me I'll never go anywhere because I'll have made it further than him by then. Because with that last super sweet certificate I have so many more doors open for me than he ever hoped to see open for him. He can't ignor me then.

That makes it sound like I'm doing this to get even with him or something like that, but that's not it at all. That's just a super awesome bonus for me. No, this schooling, all of this hard work, every penny I'm putting into this? This is for me. This is for every opporotunity I never got to take when I was younger cause I didn't focus on me. This is for every dream I abandoned to take care of what needed to be taken care of. This is for me and no one else. I want this and I'm going to get it, one way or another. I don't need him to believe in me, I never have. Would it have been nice? Yeah. Would it have helped? Probably. Do I absolutely need it? No, and I never will. My mom is proud of me, and really truely and honestly, that's all I ever wanted or needed.

Perhaps before I frame that certificate I'll let it sit on the fridge for a bit so I can look at it every morning and smile. This whole being proud of me thing? I'm kinda liking it. Go me go!

Ew, Cooties!

Mkay, so, going into my field of study I kind of figured that I would be a major minority and I was prepared for that. I don't think my teachers were though. I've got one teacher whom I had last quarter, she seems to handle me being the only girl in my class just fine. My math class has a few other girls, so that seems to go over well. Today was my networking class though. I don't think I could have stuck out like more of a sore thumb. I heard the giggles and felt the stares as I walked into the class before it had officially started, I took my seat two rows back from the front of the room and settled in quietly, I signed myself in when the attendance sheet came around and listened politely while the other boys introduced themselves and told the class what quarter they were in, why they were there and what they hoped to accomplish. When it came my turn, however, I think my teachers eyes bugged out a bit. He was at least polite enough to let me finish what I had to say before begging forgiveness for whatever future infraction he may commit as a result of "being a guy and saying guy things". The fact that I work in a warehouse with a bunch of vulgar men already barely phased the man. In his lecture he kept coming up short when he'd say "you guys got it? Oh! and gals? Sorry Maranda". It was cute at first, made me giggle, but after a while I got annoyed with it. He just kept going back to that one little fact. The other guys in the class seemed to make an extra effort to interject as many women jokes as they could into the teachers lecture, or at least hint at something like it. I can't say I was sad to leave that class room. The teacher is super nice otherwise, but that little thing is going to really grind my nerves if it keeps up. It's bad enough that I have to sit through five hours of class after being up at three in the morning for work, just let me be and do your thing please.

Last quarters results are in, by the way. I passed my math class with a B+ which put me at a 3.83 GPA, but I can recover this quarter. That number does not displease me though. I'm actually quite proud of myself. That's the highest GPA I've earned since... fifth grade? Something like that. And I worked my butt off for it. If I were a bit more proud of it I might have even printed it off and put it up on the fridge. Go Maranda! Woo!

Outside of school all is well I suppose. Work is work, but I have to say this; I miss living in the sticks. Oh how I miss it! Why? Why would I miss living where neighbors are few and far between, where cats run wild with the dogs, leash laws aren't enforced because there's no sidewalks to muddy, where snow can get up to your butt before the sun peeks over the mountains? Because those are the things I miss the most, especially the neighbor thing. Wednesday night/Thursday morning I almost had to call the cops. That does not please me. Why? Because at 2:30 in the morning I woke up. I didn't know why I woke up at first, but it soon became apparent. The lovely people who live in the upstairs apartment of our duplex decided that 2:30a.m. would be a SPLENDID time to have a big fat raging fight in which she ended up outside my bedroom window screaming, crying and yelling, he was inside slamming doors, stomping around and yelling back. My dogs were barking, their dog was barking, the next door neighbors dogs were barking, the dog across the street was barking, as were the dogs behind our duplex and the dogs down the side street. I was not happy. Not in the least. The only thing that stopped me calling the cops was the knowledge that if I did they would have made me stay and give a statement and tell them everything, and I can't exactly afford to be missing work because some people have no shame and no sense of decency. What in the world would make someone think it's OK to do something like that at 2:30 in the morning in a residential neighborhood? What would make someone think that was an OK thing to do ever? What good does yelling accomplish? How can that possibly fix anything? And the stomping and slamming of doors? Completely and utterly uncalled for. I wanted to open my window and yell at her to shut up and go to bed, but I was too tired and too upset.

Some peoples kids....

Aaaany way, happy holidays to all! I shall post more later. Ta!

Please Pass Go

Yargh!

All of this worry over math for nothing. That last test I had to make up, well... it didn't go so well, BUT! Fear not my people! I am pulling a strong 94% in that class still! And, to make it even better, our final is the biggest part of our grade. I have complete faith that my final project will go off without a hitch. Why? Because the super awesome computer nerdface genius (me!) has been overseeing it. The boys have helped gather the information, but they know their powers over Power Point are nothing compared to the awesome creativeness I wield within my mind and fingers. Rawr! My other classes are still going well too, all three of the finals for them are creeping up here fast. I'm not worried though, I've got this in the bag baby. My belt manager at work commented the other day that I seem much happier now that I'm back in school. Honestly, I would have to agree 100%. Having something to do with all this crap floating around in my noggen is super fun! Mom used to tell me that she didn't make stupid babies and I'd kinda roll my eyes at her and tell her my grades said different. I didn't apply myself though, not in all of my classes. The ones that came easier to me I did fine in, the others.... eh, I blew them off most of the time, didn't really see a point in them. All of the classes I take now I know I will be needing though and it's so much more fun for me to throw myself into them and push the limits I thought I had as far as my knowledge goes. It's exciting for me. I've always loved to learn, but I avoided the subjects I wasn't particularly good at. I can't avoid those any more though, and I think that's part of what makes it that much more fun for me. Having things come easy is nice, but when you really have to work at it and then you see how well you've finally mastered it.... it's a joy in it's own right, an achievement, something you can hold up and tell yourself every day "Look at this, you didn't think you could, but you did! Reach higher!" My only regret is that this realization came years after I left highschool. Oh well. I was more concerned about taking care of those around me then. I still worry about the people I love, but dang it! It's nice to worry about ME for a change, to be proud of ME, of who I am and who I'm becoming. I'm tooting my own horn here, I know, but again, this is something different for me, I'd just like to enjoy it for a moment.



Mkay, all better now. I have this devil cold that doesn't seem to want to go away. In an effort to thwart it's on-going rampage in my body I'm going to say farewell for now and curl up in a nice warm bed with my sweet hyper puppy. Yay for Abby!

Getting Cold

I think I need to put on some more weight, maybe that's all that saved me for so long there. Now it drops below 60 and I free my tooshie off! So not cool.

I know I should post more, I know I should call more, I know I should probably be doing a TON of stuff to keep my family in the loop that I'm not currently doing, and for that I appologize. I am trying though. This right here is an effort to better the lines of communication, as they stand, between myself and you lovelies who are out and about in the great wide world.

School has been going well, as you could guess from my last post. Math was a bit iffy there for a bit, we were getting into things I'd struggled with in highschool and was having trouble with again. It helps to have a super smart genius-like math nerd for a belt manager at work though. We sat down after work one day and went through my chapters together. I know I knew the material before, I had passed (barely) the same subjects in highschool, but I couldn't remember how. He was a bigger help than I think anyone could ever know. A fresh perspective and patience does WONDERS when trying to get something that comes easy to others through my thick stubborn head. We took a test on the material last week and I'm keeping my fingers crossed that everything goes well. And in all honesty, the kind of math I will be using primarily with my chosen career isn't nearly as difficult for me to understand as some of the other stuff like geometry *cries* I pitty the people who have to play with that all day. My other classes have never really been challenges for me, but they are the required gen-ed programs everyone is supposed to take upon entry to the college. This next semester should be much more interesting, for me any way. My new friends I made at school, Max and Clint, are both pretty bummed that I'm not going to have any classes with them any more. We will be at the school at the same time, have the same breaks and such, but because they're CAD students and I'm CEET, we have found our fork in the road. Max is still determined that we will all stay great friends no matter, which is super cool. He's a fun guy to be around and probably one of the reasons I really put an effort into my math class. He's a great motivator. We will have the same math class, but on different days this semester, so we've decided that study sessions before tests will be a MUST. I'll be taking a DC Current class though and I'm so excited! I've been taking computers apart for as long as I've cared to, even learned all the technical terms for the stuff I've been taking apart, but I've been careful about messing with the power for those thus far. This time around I get to manipulate it though. This is almost as dangerous and leaving me in a warehouse full of explosives with a ligher in my pocket. Sure, I'll be careful while I look around and see whats there, but heaven help us if you let me actually PLAY with any of it. This is the stuff that's going to get me into all of my projects I'll be doing for the next few years. All of the fun wires and electrical boards they gave me in my toolkit on my first day? I'll have more to do with them besides using them on my own stuff at home! I can't really begin to explain how excited I am. To be very honest, I was worried for a while there that because of the math involved in my chosen career I wouldn't maintain my drive to suceed. The exact opposite has been happening though! The math comes easier now that I have something I love to do to apply it to and teachers in and out of school who can explain the things that I don't understand, and the logical way computers work, inside and out, just kinda clicks for me. I never thought I'd be one of the lucky ones to find something like that, never in a million years. It's all so exciting for me! Lance has had to stop me more than once when I've been studying for tests in my computer classes and decided hands-on learning definately beat using the book all of the time and wanted to take my computer apart. They can only handle so much of that when they're used as often and for so much as I use my own. I have to hold myself back, most definately, but I see so much more potential in them now than I used to.

I feel like the biggest nerdface in the world right now. I completely just geeked out. What is this world coming to?

To work with my nerdface I suppose. Work... le blah.