Mini Vacation

So this past weekend I drove out to see my best friend Casey. She lives in Phoenix. So I packed up my little honda and got on the road. I enjoy spending time driving. It's about a five and a half hour drive and I rocked out to some mixed cds I made, and looked around at the beautiful, dry scenery.

We have been friends for over ten years. We met while going to NAU. She works in marketing, and so when I got to town I was able to meet her in her office. I don't work in an office, and have never been in that kind of work environment. It was fun to see her in her element. Casey is really good at what she does and that company is lucky to have her.

After the office we went and got some yummy Thai food for dinner and visited her community garden plot. She has sun flowers, tomatoes, cucumbers, and some herbs. A man in her mom's neighborhood gave the community land (when he passed away) and requested that a garden be created. Each person pays a yearly fee for up keep and water. There is a food bank plot and a box for extra food that others have that would be given to the food bank. It's a really awesome program. Who doesn't love fresh fruits and veggies?!

Saturday we did some shopping and then watched My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding. That was part of plan for me to go out and see her in the first place. Casey had DVR-ed the six episodes and so we had a mini marathon. It was great.

Then we went to Bingo After Dark (BAD Bingo). It was soooo much fun. Eight Dollars got us 11 rounds of bingo and a lot of glow sticks. Half way through the sessions they stop and have a dance party. There had to be 500 people in the room. AND on the last game of bingo - I GOT A BINGO! I won 150$ It was awesome.

Sunday we enjoyed some samples at Costco and a trip to the pool. The high on Sunday was 111 - soooo hot!

Monday I packed up my bags and headed home. It was a great weekend!

Leaving on a Jet Plane

Don't Worry I know when I'll be back. Friday Night!

Today - well tonight really. I am going to Georgia to visit my dear friend Cuirstaun. She and I have been friends for over 15 years. She was a brides made in my wedding and really just an all around amazing person.

Here were are when she visited at Christmas time. You see Cuirstaun lives in Georgia now because she picked up her stuff and moved there almost two years ago in order to make her dream of getting her masters in public health happen. She will be graduating on May 7th. I won't be able to be there for her graduation but because I am on spring break - and we got a good tax return this year I am flying out to see her.

When she moved to GA we all joked that she would finally fall in love with a Strong Black Man. As you see from the picture below - she fell in love, but with a dorky white guy. We all adore Calvin and I hope that some day soon we will be toasting to their happy future.



I look forward to our late night trips to Walmart, picking peaches in the orchards, a day in Atlanta, and eating at Paula Dean's Restaurant.

The last time we went on an adventure to my friend Michele's wedding. We ended up having one wild adventure. From trying to find cheep parking and then subsequently being terrified by walking in a creepy parking structure - to being sung to by a homeless man. We are quiet the pair and I can't imagine what we will get up to.

Blond Ambition

So I have a fabulous new hair cut. And my wonderful hairdresser put some brown in so I feel like I look like a whole different person.

While I have been on school vacation, I saw a documentary on Locks for Love and got inspired. Here is my one problem. They don't take died hair.

I have been dying my hair for close to 15 years. And have recently come to the conclusion that I'm okay with having my natural hair color come back*. You see, I have always wanted to donate hair to Locks for Love - but have been a bit too vain in the hair department to give up the bottle. So I'm going to see how it goes. Is there a 12 step program for people who have this problem?

Hi My Name is Kelly Parsons and I am a hair-dye-aholic, the last time I used the bottle was January 3rd 2011.

My hair also grows very quickly so I would only have to be bothered with long hair for about a year or so. I would have to donate a minimum of 10 inches.

Another part of this decision is based on the fact that Clarol has changed their chemicals and it burned my scalp and has left scabs. It was kind of intense. I could hear it sizzling on my scalp. But I pushed on and thought - pain is beauty.

Or maybe it wasn't my scalp burning it was my brain cells dying. We may never know.

* I say this now - but when I grow it out and start finding gray hairs I may have a completely different mind set.

Grading Papers

I am in the middle of grading research papers. I'm down to 60. Which means I've graded around 100 over the last two (and a bit) weeks.

I really wish I could be doing a few crafts. But alas. I can not justify craftyness when there is so much to grade.

Today I was grading papers and this was a gem I came across that I thought I would share with all of you. I don't have the paper right in front of me so this is not word for word. But really the epic nature behind this still comes through in a paraphrase. The subject of the paper was Animal Rights.

"Society must take action against testing on animals. There are plenty of murderers and pedophiles in the prison system and those should be the people that companies test their products on - not animals."

It was one of those moments that made grading papers better.

I'm so close to Christmas break I can see the light at the end of the tunnel - but yet I just can't seem to see the end of the papers. Blurg.

So I'm Back

I feel like there are a lot of things to cover. I will not be able to post it all now, because I'm trying to get back to a normal sleep schedule. After all the first day of school is on Tuesday - first day with kids is Wednesday.

My brain is still trying to get a hold of this time situation. Because it still feels like I should be awake until about 3 am. But I made it to bed at 1 yesterday - that's two hours better from the night before.

The trip was wonderful. I gained 5lbs - but we'll say 2kg because it sounds like less. Why aren't we on the metric system. I mean really - what are we doing with this bologna about feet and pounds. It's a bit to complicated for me.

Here we are at LAX getting ready for our flight. It's hard to think that this was over a month ago. The flight took us 13 1/2 hours to get to New Zealand where we almost had to run to catch another 3 hour flight to Sydney. We got in at 9am Sydney time and had to wait almost an hour to get our bags. It may not have been an hour but it sure did feel like a long time. We got through customs and then we were out to meet the family. Tracey (mother in law) and Liam (brother in law) were there to pick us up. Liam is now taller than Bren. I couldn't believe it, neither could Bren really.



Here is a Koala that we saw at a wild life park we went to. He was loving himself sick with the eucalyptus leaves he was eating.









Here is Tas (sister in law) and Bren at the museum of natural history. This is a taxidermy kangaroo - Bren is pretending to snub it.








ps. I would like to post more pictures but it takes a long time on here and I'm not sure if there is a faster/better way to upload pictures. If you know of a way can you let me in on the secret.

A tree grows

How did I miss reading A Tree Grows in Brooklyn when I was in my teenage years.

My book club read it for our big summer read. Normally we go about 4 or 5 weeks in between books. But because people were going to be away for summer trips and none of us had work we chose to go for a longer gap as well as a longer book. We last read Angry Housewives Eating BonBons (a book about a book club - which we read for book club), and so we picked one of the books those women read as one of our books.

There are few books in my life that make me want to name children or pets after the characters - this book was one of them. I'm not crazy about naming a child Frances - but someday I will have a cat named Francie.

This was not a 'my life is now different because I read this book book' - It was a 'I could read this again after I finished the last page book' - the kind of book that makes you happy and sad, and as much as my friends tease me about being a fan of Oprah, I heard her say this once and it totally applies to this book.

"It's the kind of book that makes you think the characters are going on without you when you put the book down and go do something else"

Francie is the kind of girl who might just be the perfect character. She is witty and brave - sassy and loving. I adored every second of it. It reminded me a bit of Angela's Ashes. The idea of being so poor but still so alive and aware of the world.

I loved that she was always saying 'I wonder' - she was a lover of books and the page that describes her understanding words for the first time - and therefore was able to read - made me cry. It was so well put and really just what it feels like to read for the first time and really get it.

I love that I am here in Sydney while reading it. It always seems like there is time to read on vacation - that somehow doesn't really exist when I'm at home. I also love that it's cold here. It's nice to curl up with a cup of tea and a blanket and read.