Chatterbox

So, yesterday, I went to the dentist to pick up my brand-spankin’ new mouthguard since I grind my teeth like crazy every night and my old one warped to the point of being unwearable.

And I get fitted for my mouthguard, and it’s weird and different, but whatever, I’ll get used to it.

As I’m leaving, the Dental Tech hands me a little bag and tells me what it is, but I wasn’t paying attention. I put the little bag in my purse and forgot about it the rest of the day.

Well, when I open up the little bag, what do I see?

My teeth.

Seriously?? I have a mold of my teeth now, complete with a chipped front tooth (that’s just the impression…my tooth isn’t really chipped).

I mean, my first thought is use it as a Halloween decoration, but I’m wondering if I’m supposed to actually do something with this. Like…keep it until I’m old so I can get dentures made to look exactly like them?

I don’t really want to keep these around that long. I don’t think my house has room for plaster molds of my body parts.

So. Creepy.

What do I do with this?? What would you do with this??

Follow the Spiders

Okay. So.

EVERY MORNING I would run into a GIANT strand of spider web between the tomatoes and the peppers. It was like fishing line it was so strong and every morning as I went out to check on our tomatoes and peppers, I’d get a face-full of web. So I finally just accepted that the spider would keep rebuilding that one strand between the two garden boxes every day, and I learned to swipe at it before I walked between them.

And then last night, we let the dogs out and there was a HUGE web with a giant spider in the middle. We’re talking 2 feet across the main part of the web.

And a quarter-sized spider.

So I’m like…oh my god, this thing is going to kill me one of these days when I reach my hand into the peppers and it’s going to bite me and I’ll die and then what??

Mike got a broom, he gently swiped at the web to make sure he had control of where the spider went.

He put it on the ground.

WHAM. He smashed it with his foot.

I didn’t run into the web this morning.

“Everything Happens for a Reason”

Are you a believer of this? Many people are. I can’t tell you how often I’ve heard this over my own life: my mother is a big believer in this statement.

I don’t believe it. One bit. I completely understand why someone might say this to a friend or loved one during a tough time: they want you to feel hope, like you aren’t alone, that things will work out in your favor in the end, and many times they just don’t know what else to say. I get that. I always understand where the statement comes from, and usually it comes from a good place where the believer just wants you to feel better.

I still don’t buy it. In order to buy into it, I’d have to believe in a cosmic universe that I have no control over, that things will happen to me but it will be for some bigger purpose. Or, if you choose to believe, you’re on the side of a God who controls the intricacies and interactions in our lives, therefore has a path or larger plan for us.

Here’s what I believe: Life doesn’t always rule in my favor. Sometimes it does. Whether it does or it doesn’t, I am the one with the control on how I handle the situation and how I move forward with my life. There is no puppeteer hanging over me, deciding what will befall me and how I might emerge from the situation.

It is almost always true that we learn things from difficult and near-impossible situations, and the way that we as human beings are designed to overcome adversity is amazing. You could say that “X happened to you so you could learn Y lesson” but I personally believe in giving credit where credit is due: if someone learns a lesson or gets a better opportunity after an unusually hard time, it’s usually because that person worked for it, chose not to give up, and didn’t let themselves believe that a larger power would do everything for them. I respect that. Everyone should respect that & not pawn the credit off to the universe’s “reason.”

Again, I know that some people deeply believe in “Everything Happens for a Reason,” so I usually don’t make a deal of it when people say it to me. It irks me sometimes though, because I believe that our true characters show up at the times of greatest strife: whether or not I pull myself out of a difficult situation is on me, not on anyone or anything else.

Heavy topic for a random Tuesday? My wheels started turning when I read this Tweet by Tony Parsons, ReTweeted by Piers Morgan:

Nothing like a good Twitter prompt

Which side of this do you fall on? What do you believe & why?

Saturday Brain Dump

Since I was in bed moaning and groaning and whining about my wisdom teeth pain most of yesterday, I didn’t take the time to write a post. So…let’s give it a try today! I thought I’d give some quick updates.

1. Wisdom Teeth: The first two days were pretty awful. Yesterday, I was swollen like crazy and there was quite a bit of pain from just the pressure of being so swollen. Today, I am still swollen, but it’s not quite as bad. The pain has receded significantly from three of my four teeth holes (I have no idea what else to call them) but my bottom two are still the worst. Hopefully, today will see some significant improvement.

You can see my jaw is a bit more swollen on my left side (since the photo is a mirror image, it’s also the left on the photo). It was much worse yesterday, but I didn’t get a photo of it!

2. Weight Loss: Maybe this is the wrong time to post this because…lets face it, I’ve been eating nothing but liquids for the past few days, but I’ve lost more weight! More than in just the last two days, but my official weight loss is now up to 17 lbs. I think a lot of it has to do with the amount of soups I’ve been eating lately. It was never really intentional, but I’ve also been living largely on a vegetarian diet as-of-late, and that might have helped. Of course, I won’t become a vegetarian any time soon, but I don’t think that meat at every meal is always necessary.

3. New Computer: Last weekend, Mike and I went to Delaware and I picked up a new 15″ MacBook Pro! I still haven’t transferred a lot of the stuff from my old computer on it, but it’s beautiful and I loooove it. The screen is so much bigger & brighter than my old 13″ MacBook!

4. Pinterest: I thought Pinterest deserves a mention because I joined a couple of weeks ago and think it’s just about the best. thing. ever. I can bookmark anything I want through it, it’s SO easy to keep track of the things that I’m inspired by, and as a blogger, it’s an awesome way to keep track of sources. Plus, it’s just so darn pretty! Wanna follow my pins?

5. Spotify Music: My good friend TJ sent me an invite to Spotify this past week, which is also just as awesome as Pinterest. I have SUCH a hard time committing to buy an album on itunes or amazon or whatever, so listening to an album by almost any artist I want has been an awesome way to “try before I buy.” Since I’m just streaming the albums, it isn’t illegal like The Pirate Bay, Limewire, or Napster were. I also enjoy it more than Pandora because sometimes, I just want to listen to an album instead of a mix of artists.

A screenshot of the Spotify software, where I’m listening to Young the Giant’s album.

6. Tomatoes: Thank you for all of your tomato recommendations!! I was surprised by the amount of people who would eat so much caprese salad! Unfortunately, I had to preserve a lot of them before they started going bad, so while plenty of caprese salads have been eaten, I’ve also made some sauces, just roasted & frozen them, I made soup, and when I pick up cilantro at the farmer’s market tomorrow, I’ll certainly make some salsas. Great recommendations!

Okay, that’s all for now. I hope everyone has a happy weekend!

The End of an Era

I started reading Harry Potter at age 11. I was still at an age where I wanted so badly to believe that there really was a hidden world of witches and wizards. I pondered with my best friend for hours how it could be possible and how we might infiltrate such a world. We were baffled how two awesome people like us could be left out on this secret for so long.

I remember discovering Mugglenet.com and pouring over all of the theories and connections that people cleverer than I deduced from the books. Everyone was wondering how it would end, if Harry would die, and if Cho Chang was really Lord Voldemort trying to lure Harry to the dark side.

When they were casting for the films, I wished and wished and wished that they would cast me as someone. ANYONE. I would have taken Pansy Parkinson for all I cared.

I went to the midnight showings and the midnight book sales to be one of the first to witness The Boy Who Lived’s story. I screamed in frustration when Dolores Umbridge was so mean to Harry and when he felt so isolated, then sobbed when Harry experienced the loss of Sirius, then Dumbledore.

At 20 years old, I read Deathly Hallows while I was interning in LA. I finished in 12 hours and arrived a sweaty, unshowered, emotional mess to work (15 minutes late).

I’m a little over a month from my 25th birthday, and I have tickets to a 3:50 showing this afternoon. The midnight showing wasn’t an option this time around, as my husband needed sleep for work, but I secretly wanted to sneak out of the house to see it last night. I know that Harry Potter is not precious to my husband, and it might seem silly, but he is precious to me.

I grew up with these books and movies. I believe I was in the best age slot when these books surfaced in the United States–I desperately wanted to believe in magic and fairytales and happy endings, and Harry Potter provided the perfect escape into a wonderful world throughout my teenage years. As the movies are finally over, I feel like it truly is the end of an era-the end of that childhood innocence.

I am so happy that I grew up with such a wonderful and imaginative series of books that could transport me anywhere I wanted whenever my nose was buried in them; or of course, between book releases when I would daydream about what was next. Though the adventure is over for me, I am truly excited to experience this series through my own children’s eyes one day when they discover that magic as well.

Many Harry Potter fans my own age will consider themselves “dorks” or “nerds” for loving this series, but I reject that label because that isn’t what I am. I enjoyed a very human story about a boy against tremendous odds who overcame them with his courage, tremendous moral fiber, strength of heart and ability to love. How could anyone rooting for that boy be considered a nerd?

Are you a superfan of Harry? Did you grow up reading the books, or did you discover them at a later age?

Marriage Equality

I am extraordinarily happy today!!  New York has signed a bill which allows same-sex couples to enter into marriage.  Wow.  It gives me hope that someday, hopefully soon, opponents of gay marriage will be so few and far between that this right is granted to all citizens of the United States.

Source

I still love this so much

It is ridiculous, sad and embarrassing to realize how far behind we are when it comes to treating everyone as equals in this country.  It is also ludicrous to me that the biggest opponents of equal rights for all citizens are the people who claim that their religion is against a gay lifestyle.  It makes me so sad to think where this country would be if we didn’t reevaluate the religious doctrines which tell us that slaves are okay, that women are inferior to men and countless other silly beliefs that are no longer relevant to society today.

When we truly afford equal rights to all citizens, regardless of their sexual orientation, that will be another joyous day where common sense and the goodness of people will prevail.  I can’t wait for that day.

New York’s passage of this bill is a step forward, but there is still so much work to be done.  I wish that President Obama would weigh in here and demand equal rights to all in America, but for reasons I don’t understand, that hasn’t happened.

I hope that my children will be able to grow up in a society which allows them to marry whomever they wish.  It makes me ridiculously happy that the country we are moving to, Spain, legalized same-sex marriage back in 2005.  If Spain can do it, why not the United States?

Schadenfreude

I made this by request today for my friend Jess to make her smile and thought I’d post it here:

haha I had fun making it, anyway.

Have a good weekend!!