Learning how to be gracious....

I've been thinking about writing for awhile, but every time I started to write an entry it just didn't feel right. I wanted to create an ode to all the things I'm thankful for, and when I started to think about it the list got longer and longer and each being so in depth they started to feel like they were deserving of their own entry, and that would take years to construct. So I've narrowed it down (slightly) and created a list with snippets of explanation -- none of which will even come close to explaining how grateful I am, but if any of them have to do with you, know that this year was incredible thanks to you. So here we go...

1. My mom - for her love post-its, treats for me, listening to me vent and being basically the best mom ever.
2. My brothers

Each is completely unique and incredibly giving. S for giving my my car and being patient and being a great friend when I need one. J for always talking me up, for making my laugh and helping inspire and build on my ideas. Both are so supportive and I could never thank them enough.
3. C

So giving and loving. Words couldn't even come close to expressing all you've done for me this year.
4. All of my incredible friends. I have SO many wonderful friends. My zero friend Mary, my "sister" Carolyn, my kindred spirit Div, my humor Darci, my Seattle savior Chirag, my reflecting wall
Amanda, my strength Rachel, my mentor Ashley, my heart Michelle, my confidante Adrienne, my cheerleader Carson, my inspiration Wacarra. Just to name a few. I am so, so lucky to have you all. And of course my hundreds of other amazingly wonderful friends that have helped shape the person I am today.
5. Family - My grandparents, my cousins, my aunts and uncles. All have given me so much it would take me 24 years to explain all you've done for me.
6. Susan - she makes me so happy, every single day.
7. My work - as much as I might complain, it's really a great place to work. I'm given great opportunity, respected and treated well. Plus, I work with great people.
8. Lounge music - the joy that Rufus Wainwright, Sinatra, Buble, Regina Spektor, Kate Nash bring me....they make me Merry Happy.
9. Having infinite paths ahead of me - whether it's school or my dreams of becoming a FN star, there is so much opportunity that is just waiting for me. Not everyone is lucky enough to have that.
10. Flowers - I've been given flowers so many times this year and every time they make me so happy!


Okay, I could go on forever, but I don't want to make your mind explode or bore you. So thank you all, for everything. Great year because of your kind, beautiful hearts!

A piece of Paris

C and I walked around the market today and slipped into a store down Virginia that I've never seen before. An adorable accessory store and I'm not sure how I ever missed it. Besides it being tremendously overpriced, it had some fantastically beautiful headbands. Which, of course, you know I love. Since they were $75 a pop, I figured I'd admire them and potentially make some myself. Here's kinda what they looked like..



Since I already have a black one, I figure I could use a red one and perhaps a pink one and another really beautifully ridiculous one. Ah, I love ridiculousness.

When we walked out of the store I stumbled across another store I had never seen before -- tucked away in a courtyard nook, so happily situated I forgot for a moment that I was in Seattle. All of a sudden, I found myself in Paris.




A Parisian soap store, so beautiful, I found myself trolling the aisles sniffing every candle and bar, soaking it all in. The attendant welcomed us, and offered us a mimosa in celebration of their 10 year anniversary.



We sipped on our mimosas, admired artwork and old 1925 watch gadget cuff links, and settled on a candled called "joy" which smells like Christmas and rendered exactly that feeling.

Needless to say, the store was quiet a find and make me well....

...so(ul) happy!


After we left we headed down to the market for a bit longer, and passed by vendors and admired their wares. We headed to Pink Door for a late lunch. Perfect pumpkin pasta, so amazing that I disregarded my better judgement and ate all of it without thinking about the calories. Meh.

We walked down 1st Avenue to The Big Picture to watch the new Bond film. I love Bond films, and while the action was definitely up to par, the plot was lacking and left me aching for the good ol' Pierce.

After the movie we headed back home, picked up a beautiful Audrey Hepburn poster and a coupled used CDS including one from Lynam (one of my favorite garage bands from back home) at Easy Street Records.

And then when I got home I instantly fell asleep for awhile and now...I can't sleep. I'm going to watch American Beauty and try to fall asleep for a early morning brunch with the girls.

Now and then..

A lot of pictures from the past have made their way into circulation in the past couple days, and at first it freaked me out...but then I thought about it. How cool is that people have pictures of me from the days of yesteryear? A girl that I was friends with growing up, but haven't talked to recently posted a picture of me on Facebook yesterday.



Again, freaked me out. I mean when the hell was this taken? What am I doing? Girl Scouts? No she wasn't in my GS troop...uhhh band? Oh God, there are people out there that have pictures of me in BAND. How embarrassing.


But, then there were really good pictures from old school times. My aunt passed along a picture today that made me feel a little nostalgic...either that or miss my family. Anyway, here it is:




So, anyone else out there have random pictures of me they'd like to pass along? I'd love to see them...with the exception of anything you have to share, Mom. I don't need to see those, and neither does anyone else.

Anyway, good night.

GMATTACK

...I'm trying to spend a bit more time studying for my GMAT that is rapidly approaching, but I have to admit, I'm finding it really hard. I need to learn to go somewhere where I don't have Internet connection, where I can't watch television and leave the iPhone behind and I need to do it soon. I'm having a really hard time with some of the math concepts, because well, I haven't really used math in the past 5 years. At least not the kind I need to know in order to pass this exam.

If you didn't take math courses in college(I took one, literally uno), the math section of the test is especially important to excel in, since it is the only way the school you're applying to can see if you measure up. As it stands right now, I don't quite measure up. And when I finally really accepted that fact last night, I nearly had a GMATtack-probably the worst kind of panic attack possible. Luckily, I had my friend come over to watch Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2 in order to calm my nerves and completely distract me from studying. Oh, yes, I'm a hero.

Anyway, if I don't kick it into gear soon, I promise you can take my GMAT books and beat me with them as long as you call an ambulance so I can get some fast stitches.

Thank you very much for your poll votes. It looks as though you proved my boyfriend wrong, which I thoroughly enjoy. Hmph.

Side note: A poll..

Okay, quick poll readers:



Do I look mad or focused? Please comment back your thoughts.

A fear from deep within..

As I was walking through Seattle's early morning fog/mist this morning on my way to work, on a day like any other, I saw it - something I find so disturbing that it makes my skin crawl just to think about it. To the normal person, you might think, "You're such a weirdo, what the heck is wrong with you?" But to me, seeing the bushy tail gray squirrel with it's big teethy fangs, running all over the tree in it's rabies-crazed behavior says one thing - "Beware."

It's true, I'm scared of squirrels..not in the same way you'd be scared of someone coming into your house in the middle of the night, or even walking through a dark alley allow, but it's the unpredictability of them that makes me feel a bit uncomfortable. It started a long time ago and it began with ferrets. I mean, I HATE ferrets and in my mind the two critters are closely aligned and simply up to no good.

Countless stories I've read on the Internet or experience first hand have validated my fear time and time again -- my friend was hospitalized from squirrel bites once, not that I have any sympathy because she was stupid enough to keep it as a pet, but whatever. My classes at UA were once canceled for 3 days because a squirrel gnawed through the power lines, causing a major outage. Up to no good, I tell you.

But seeing that squirrel on the way to work this morning got me thinking about irrational fears, and I realized I have A LOT of them. Some of them I wasted a tremendous amount of time worrying about them when I can't control them, and others are just something I need to get over.

* Fear of the economy (like I can do a damn thing about it, all I can do is hoard away my money and hope for the best).
* Fear of feet(used to be ridiculously bad a few years ago, but I'm pretty much over it)
* Fear of failing (the good news is that I'm the turnkey element to determining my success)
* Fear of not figuring out what I want to do in life (okay, does anyone really know? Please, tell me?)
* Fear of never seeing the world (...I can make this happen...eventually)
* Fear of never being near my family again (Again, I can make this happen, just take time)
* Fear of the unknown (Ah, yes. Completely irrational. Good, Jessica, good.)
* Fear of spiders (Okay, I'm not calling this one irrational. It's perfectly legit. And I'm convinced it's the way I'm going out. Spider bite, right to my heart.)
* Fear of not leaving a legacy (Okay, here's the good news...I have lots of great friends, who talk about me on occasion, so if I don't have one after a spider comes to kill me, at least I have people talking about me while I'm alive.
* Fear of lack of knowledge (I'm just afraid of being the dumb one, not knowing, needing to be the one in the know all the time, it's hard to keep up)
* Fear of missing America's Next Top Model (it's on tomorrow night and I have a PRSA meeting, God help me!)

As you can see, mostly irrational or something I just need to get the hell over. And I will, I hope, all in good time.

A new haircut

Writing my first entry via iPhone so let's get straight to it---I need a haircut bad. Now you're probably thinking "what are you talking about Jess your hair is the cutest EVER." While that might be true, I am not talking about my hair...I need a professional haircut. A little bit of time in the business etiquette salon would do me good.

It's not that I perceive myself as rude, or a bad professional... its just that I need to snip the edge off my "know-it-all" attitude that has recently grown because if I don't, it's going to get me into trouble.

It's hard after working somewhere for nearly two years (can you believe I've been here for almost two years?!) to not have that matter-of-fact attitude. But with more and more articles reigning in about job loss and the economy, it seems like professionalism (and if clients love you) is the only think that is keeping people employed. Now, I haven't seen job loss close to me, none of my friends have lost their job and while the Seattle economy certainly isn't booming, it's not getting the blow as hard as the rest of the country (at least it seems that way). But something tells me it's only a matter of time before the wave crashes on the Seattle shores and knocking people out along the way.

I'm want to become a better professional for myself, though. I want to tidy up because I'm worth improving, becoming a better me is worth every effort. I want to become a better professional because people expect it from me and more importantly, I expect it from me.

So give me a little bit of time to chop off some spilt ends, and I'll be coming out with a fresh new 'do.

oops! Veteran Day side note

Before I hop off to enjoy my Puffins, I wanted to thank all of you veterans for giving your time and lives to help protect us -- most importantly my wonderful brother, S. He was in the Navy for 8 years of active duty, and I believe (I need to call him to confirm) he went into the recruiter yesterday to sign up to be in the reserves. He is what you would call, my hero.

Of course, thank you as well to my wonderful Nonno who served in the military for years as well during the Korean War and Lord knows what else.

To my friend, T, who has already gone through one tour in Iraq and will soon go back for more.

To my friends N and M who guarded in a dangerous area in Djibouti while they served as Marines, thank you.

To my friend J, who has gone through two tours in Iraq -- thank you.

To the gentleman, W, I interviewed when he won $1 Million in the Lottery and is now serving his third tour in the guard in Iraq - thank you.

And to all other militia, thank you, thank you, thank you.

Happy Birthday C...and thank you Veterans, including my brother S

I've been awake for hours...while I had my alarm set earlier than normal this morning (around 5:30ish), my precious darling cat Susan decided at 5:23 am that she wanted to check and see if my eye lids tasted as good as she remembered -- I hope they did, because I was only slightly amused. It is hard to get mad, though, even at 5:23 am when you're greeted with the most adorable little face that looks like this


Now I might be a biased cat lover, but Susan Belle is freaking adorable, yes? Anyway, once I saw that face the frustration quickly subsided and I just closed my eyes and let her have her way with my eye lids. *sigh*

Today is C's birthday. Because he is incapable of waiting, he's already opened all of his presents and eaten some of his cake -- so we did a good portion of the celebrating last night. I got him a Pentax 1000 35mm camera, a flash for it, some film, a book on becoming the best photographer ever and a couple other little treats. Tonight we're going to La Carta de Oaxaca (http://www.lacartadeoaxaca.com/), which claims to be some of the best Mexican food in Seattle. Apparently the place is packed all the time, and don't even bother calling for a reservation because they don't answer their phone EVER. I'll let you know how it turns out.

Alright, we'll it's Puffin (http://www.worldpantry.com/cgi-bin/ncommerce3/ProductDisplay?prmenbr=587770&prrfnbr=892330&pcgrfnbr=881894) time! I suggest you go out and get your own box, and some raspberries too...and maybe some Splenda Mist (which is totally my new favorite thing and I got my sample bottle for free thanks to Hungry Girl...check this out and you might be able to snatch a bottle still:http://www.totallyfreestuff.com/index.asp?ID=18076). Basically the COOLEST thing ever.

Alright, I'm out.

Holding on to the weekend...

It amazes me every week how quickly weekends pass by, and I always wish they were longer, there was more of them, that I was less busy on weekends so I could sit on my death couch (yes, I still have that god forsaken thing) and watch hours and hours of mindless programming. Ah, yes, that's what I call being productive.

I am fortunate enough to seemingly (at least lately) always have really enjoyable weekends. Friday night C and I went to go watch our friend perform in Bat Boy at the Second Story theater in Redmond. She was incredible. The play, if you're familiar is a little over the top and based on the Weekly World News tabloid reports in the early 1990s. Although full of blood, violence, incest and interspecies sex....it was perfect. After the show we went with a few of the cast members to McMenamins.

Yesterday C and I walked around downtown and went to lunch with a couple of our friends at Pike Brewery. I got a new pair of jeans from Nordstrom Rack, and then we headed home to get ready for C's birthday dinner with his dad and step mom at Metropolitan Grill. We took a ridiculous limo that looked something like this



and had an inside cabin like this



down to the restaurant. Food was amazing. I had ahi tuna, calamari, the most outstanding halibut I've ever had and these garlic mashed potatoes that basically I would sacrifice my right eye for. Okay, no I take that back, I really wouldn't but they were very good.

Today some how managed to slip by quickly -- Sundays always do that. I build them up with the best intentions to clean, study, do research on graduate schools...and it never f'ing happens. I have to get it together or I'm never going back to school. But because I always end up so unproductive on Sundays I always wish the weekend was longer, if I had just one more day to get it done...I hold on so tight to them...dreading yet another manic Monday. Man, I'm already getting a super bad case of the Mondays.

Anyway, so holding on to the weekend today got me thinking...it's not the weekend I'm trying to hold on to, it's just a past life in general, a life where things make sense...I feel like I haven't had that in awhile. Okay, okay, not that my life isn't good because it is -- I have an amazing bf, great friends here, a completely insane and adorable cat, a good job where I'm respected...I don't know, it's just so hard to evolve. Hard to watch my friends evolve on complete opposite sides of the country, hard to not be near my family and evolve together...just hard. But after holding on to weekend after weekend, I finally decided today to let go. I'm missing so much life by spending time revisiting the past instead of living in my the present and planning for my future. Hopefully learning to let go is something I'll be able to hold on to.. I'll let you know next weekend.

The Times They Are A Changin'

So it might be 45 years since Bob Dylan wrote one of his most famous songs, but with Obama being our new president-elect and his campaign for "change", this song keeps coming to mind. I thought I'd put it to the test line by line to see if it holds any relevance today, or if I'm just trying to be deep. Or if I just love Bob Dylan, which I do. Alright, here we go.

Come gather 'round people - Yes, that works for today, people can still gather 'round. To make it more timely, our opposing political parties need to gather together.

Wherever you roam - People all over the nation, yes good.

And admit that the waters
Around you have grown - With global warming the ice caps are melting, making more water. Hah, okay, yes we have a rift in our nation.

And accept it that soon
You'll be drenched to the bone. - If you live in the Pacific Northwest you're always drenched to the bone, Bobby. But knowing you grew up in MN, you probably weren't referencing that.

If your time to you
Is worth savin' - We just had daylight savings time to do this very thing!
Then you better start swimmin'
Or you'll sink like a stone - Uhhh....
For the times they are a-changin'. - OBAMA!

Come writers and critics
Who prophesize with your pen - Political analysts? Journalists? Everyone interested in the election?
And keep your eyes wide
The chance won't come again - You can only cast your vote once, or something.
And don't speak too soon
For the wheel's still in spin - it kind of stopped spinning yesterday, although I guess my life is still spinning. To MBA or not to MBA?
And there's no tellin' who
That it's namin'. - It named Obama...and MBA? Or.....no MBA?...MBA? Dizzy...
For the loser now - MBA?...No...McCain?
Will be later to win - Palin?! God, no.
For the times they are a-changin'. - OBAMA!

Come senators, congressmen - McCain, Obama
Please heed the call - "Run for president!"
Don't stand in the doorway - French doors are becoming more popular on HGTV, maybe to solve this problem. It'd be hard for someone to block two doors...
Don't block up the hall - Thanks to WW, I lost enough weight to no block too many hallways..
For he that gets hurt
Will be he who has stalled - uhhh...stalling...please no one hit me. Oh wait, I got it! McCain postponing campaigning to "help with the economic crisis." Analysts are saying it's one of his biggest campaign mistakes. That and Palin.
There's a battle outside
And it is ragin'. - Raining a little bit outside...imagine that. Rain in Seattle? No f'ing way.
It'll soon shake your windows
And rattle your walls - Susan, my precious cat keeps running into the walls ans rattling them a bit. At least rattling my nerves.
For the times they are a-changin'. - OBAMA!

Come mothers and fathers
Throughout the land
And don't criticize
What you can't understand - Okay, I took this one four lines. Actually really relevant. Not that my mom is critical at all, she's lovely. But my mother and father are on the other side of the land, and my dad mentioned his varying political stance...
Your sons and your daughters
Are beyond your command - and my mom, while she is lovely, is a mom who is learning to mother an adult daughter. I think it's an ongoing learning curve, poor mom.
Your old road is
Rapidly agin'. - Uhhh...parts of my street could definitely stand to be repaved. And so could our economy.
Please get out of the new one
If you can't lend your hand - Hm.
For the times they are a-changin'. - OBAMA!

The line it is drawn
The curse it is cast - Maybe some witchy people casting spells on people on Halloween? Uh, nevermind.
The slow one now
Will later be fast - I'm getting tired....but tomorrow morning...I'll be so fast all you'll see is blur biznitches.
As the present now
Will later be past - ...that ellipses was written...in the past.
The order is
Rapidly fadin'. - I am too....
And the first one now
Will later be last - I'm pretty sure I lost my own challenge to be deep at this point...damn it. Maybe if I just get a fresh thought on it tomorrow...I'll come up with something so totally thought provoking it will BLOW YOUR MIND.
For the times they are a-changin'. - OBAMA!

Okay, good night. Sorry you had to endure that. Very, very, very sorry.