Trying to See the Awesome in the Notsome

The reason I do my “This Week Was Awesome” thing is because it helps me see the awesome even when my week has been utter crap. It helps me think of that instead of dwelling on the shit.

However, this past week or so hasn’t been good, health-wise, for my family.

My great-grandmother is turning one hundred and freaking one years old on the 19th¹. She is old. She went into the hospital last week during the day, but was home by that night. The doctor told my aunt and uncle that she’s in the very beginning stages of congestive heart failure.

People can live for a while with congestive heart failure, but she’s 101 so what could be 10+ years for many people, probably won’t be for her. I’m hoping for a few more years, at least, but I’m trying to take advantage of the time I have with her. She’s my last living grandparent and a snarky one at that. I love that lady. When she was 98 she told me she wanted to slit George W. Bush’s throat. I nearly died laughing. It was beautiful. On Inaguration Day this year I called her and she was giggling she was so happy. She’s so adorable!

Then last night my dad had to go into the hospital because he faceplanted on some cement after tripping over a boulder in his friend’s backyard. After several hours, his head wouldn’t stop bleeding. It looks like someone shoved a baseball underneath his skin. This is disgusting. Thankfully, he didn’t have a concussion. A few stitches and they sent him on home. As a sidenote, apparently the first thing he said when he walked into the house was, “Now, I don’t want you to be worried, but…” before coming up the stairs² to show my mom his face.

Want to know the most worrying words in the English language? Those are them.

Also, my brother went to the doctor and found out he’s been walking on a fractured foot for over a year ever since a wrestling accident last year. *facepalm* And our family friend who lives with us had another seizure a couple days ago.

In other news, I have been having a lot of migraines and bad headaches lately. They always start behind the same eye and that’s making me nervous. I should really make a doctor appointment, though I’m going to wait until after my finals are over and done with this week.

Oh, yes, finals. I make things way too difficult for myself. If I’d just done stuff when it was assigned, I wouldn’t have to spend so much time worrying about the fact I wasn’t doing work. :P But I find it incredibly difficult to do schoolwork or anything, even, when I’m stressed out and distracted. Meh.

1. Funny story: Last year around July she was trying to make a doctor’s appointment over the phone and the receptionist could not understand when she gave her birthday as “12-19-08.” She just kept saying, “But…this is 08,” even when my grandma clarified she meant 1908 as in, SHE IS OLD. I lol’d in real life. ↩
2. We live in a split-level house with an entryway and then stairs leading either to the basement or to the living area floor. This means no matter what, we have to walk up an asston of stairs to get into the house. Fun for my brother–see above! ↩

This Week Was Awesome Because… (Vol. 1.3)

1. On Monday, the power went out so my mom, our family friend who lives with us, and I all ended up playing gin for hours with Disney villains playing cards. Sometimes it’s just simple things like the power going out that is needed to bring your family a little bit closer together.

2. On Wednesday I had a slice of pesto pizza from Hot Mama’s (just off Broadway in Seattle’s Capitol Hill) that actually made me stop walking and say, “Holy shit.” Delicious.

3. On Thursday night at 11PM, I ordered the world’s most annoying alarm clock. Despite using free shipping, it was delivered to my house on Friday around 4PM. 1) What the hell and 2) awesome!

4. On Friday night I saw one of my best friends’ faces for the first time in the month. Epic times were had!

5. Today I watched How I Met Your Mother for the first time…and promptly finished the first season today as well. And am currently watching the beginning of season two. Yeah, I’m addicted. NPH is amazing. :D

Why was YOUR week awesome?

When Creepers Attack

Yesterday my day was invaded by many, many creepers. Being the creeper magnet that I am, I should not be shocked by this and yet I always am.

Yesterday I went to the mall with my friend, Kari, to have conveyor belt sushi (at a restaurant next to the mall) and go to a movie. I’d never had sushi before and I loved it. :D I’m excited to go again!

After we left the sushi restaurant and actually entered the mall, we still had a couple hours to kill before our movie started so we headed for the Apple Store so I could check out the new 27″ iMac¹.

On our way, a crazy kiosk man comes at us from the side, shoves dixie cups containing a mysterious melon-colored liquid into our hands, and commands us to drink. He kept promising there wasn’t tequila in it².

And you know what we did?

WE DRANK IT. Our only excuse was that we were frightened of the crazy kiosk man who kept talking about tequila and how he bites his nails. He also demanded we come over to his kiosk (no idea which one it was!) and let him perform an unnamed “procedure” which would only take 50 seconds. At this point, I inch around and hide behind Kari. We decline his offer about 8 times and declare we have a movie to catch and then make a break for it.

The fact that the movie didn’t start for over two hours? Minor detail.

The first thing we both do, as soon as we reach our Apple Store refuge, is pull out our phones and tweet that shit so fast. You know you’re a little addicted when… </nerds>

We’ve decided that side of the mall is dead to us now. We can never return.

Then we saw Cirque du Freak which wasn’t as bad as I was expecting! Despite its flaws, I actually enjoyed it–it was funny. However, I have never seen a movie filled with so many damn creepers in it. And everybody just went along with the creepers, without mentioning the fact that they were clearly the creepiest creepers who ever creeped!

And on the way home, Kari and I were convinced the bus driver was going to kill us all. The PA system crackled and in a super-creepy and wheezy voice, informed us that the bus was past Tukwila Boulevard or something. Then he kept randomly stopping the bus on the side of the road for a few moments in random, completely dark areas and we kept having these “Oh my God, where the hell are we? Are we going to die?!!” moments every time it happened. I kept seeing a stereotypical horror movie play out in my head. The driver would slowly get up from his seat and turn to face the passengers. Perhaps a large scar would grace his face. And then we’d all effing die and that would be the beginning of the horror film. We’d be dead before the title even showed.

He also blew right past a group of teenage girls standing at the bus stop despite the fact that bus is the only bus that stops at that stop. It may have been the luckiest thing that ever happened to him because I’m surprised I made it out of there alive.

1. I’m trying to decide between a brand new 27″ iMac (the one with the 2.8GHz i7 processor) and a refurbished MacBook Pro (17″, antiglare, 3.06GHz Core 2 Duo) and wasn’t sure if a 27″ screen is too huge for the space I have. Another post is in the works about this. ↩
2. Klaus (aka Ambs) says: ………….. if someone’s like “THERE IS NO TEQUILA,” that means there is rum. ↩

Things I Have Done Instead of My Homework

If there’s one thing I completely pwn at, it is procrastination. I have it down, pat.

So far in the past 21 hours I’ve been awake I have managed to do these things instead of my homework:

1. Talk on the phone with one of my best friends for four hours. Yeah, really. She lives in Alaska right now, unfortunately, whereas I still live in Seattle, so we don’t get to talk as often as we’d like, but when we do? We talk forever. It’s pretty much ridiculous.
2. Squealed at the ridiculous amount of adorable at Cute Overload with aforementioned friend.
3. Read 85% of Down to the Bone by Mayra Lazarus Dole which I really, really like. Reading it makes me hungry! So much talk of Cuban food, so little time! If it wasn’t for the fact that my bus for school leaves in four hours and I haven’t finished my paper yet, I would be finishing it right now!
4. Watched Trembling Before G-d, a documentary about gay and lesbian orthodox Jews. Heartbreaking, but fantastic at the same time.
5. Written an infinite amount of lists about what I should be doing.
6. Began NaBloPoMo at my LiveJournal.
7. Wrote about 400 words for NaNoWriMo–though I intend on writing about 3,000-4,000 words today after the long-ass nap I plan on taking when I get home from classes. Add me as a writing buddy! I’m pumpkincarriage.
8. A million other things I probably didn’t need to do, but did anyway.
9. Wrote this post.

Yeah, seriously, I am the world’s biggest procrastinator. The other day I was procrastinating by reading articles on how to quit procrastinating. Of course, I mostly opened a billion articles in a billion tabs, then just scanned a few and closed the rest and went to do something more fun instead.

Considering the amount I procrastinate, it’s a wonder I actually manage to keep good grades.

How bad do you guys procrastinate? Or how do you avoid it?

This Week Was Awesome Because… (Vol. 1.1)

1. You know what I love? Making new friends. Also, rediscovering old friends. This week I rediscovered a lot of old friends and discovered many new ones. That’s pretty much one of the most awesome things that can happen to me.
2. I entered into the planning stages of a year-long YouTube video project with some of the aforementioned newly discovered and rediscovered friends, as well as a few very old, very close friends who are still just awesome.
3. I found out If You Give a Mouse a Cookie is playing at the Seattle Children’s Theatre until the end of November. The only way I could POSSIBLY be more excited for this is if instead of a mouse, the main character was a moose. And if instead of a cookie, they gave him a muffin.
4. I got two new nicknames. One of my new friends mentioned in #1, Jackie, has christened me with a new nickname: Hot Donna. As in, Hot Donna on That 70s Show. The nickname is spreading like wildfire, I tell you, wildfire. I give you all permission to call me Hot Donna as often as you’d like.
5. I’ve decided that every Friday I’m going to blog about why the past week has been awesome. Recalling the awesome things that have happened, even in an otherwise terrible week, will definitely improve my view on things.

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