The Worst Fourth

I definitely wasn't expecting anything grand out of my Fourth of July this year.

Last year I worked all day, got a flat tire, set off a few fireworks with Alexa, packed for my upcoming drive to Florida/flight to Nicaragua, then set off fireworks in Luis's backyard with a bunch of his friends. We crashed early because we had to leave for Florida in the morning (I promise to explain my love for Nicaragua on a later post, because it will be a loooooong post)

This year, it was a little more.... exciting, for lack of a better word.

Once again, I worked, but only half the day. Then I headed on to Kennesaw to shower and get ready for a, hopefully, fun Fourth. I felt terribly sick and we had zero plans, but I demand to be fabulous anyways.

Then I went over to Luis's house, and guess what? I got another flat tire!!! I seriously hope that this isn't about to become some perversely tragic Fourth of July tradition for me, because I simply can't deal with that every year.

Lucky me, I was probably less than two miles away from Luis's when it gave out. So I just pretended to ignore the extremely bouncy drive to his parking lot. Finally, I got there and he stepped out to look at the car. Oh, did I mention that it was raining??? Last year too.

Check out this flat

How does that even happen??? I didn't hit anything or run over anything. I was just driving (at a safe speed too) and boom, all of a sudden the bumpy, uh-oh-I-think-I-have-a-flat driving started.

Anyways, the story gets better. Luis goes and tries to change the tire himself (because he's a man and for some stupid reason, men refuse to call professionals to fix things when needed, regardless of the pretty dime I pay my insurance company for unlimited roadside assistance) and he spends probably over an hour playing with the lug nuts and different tools.

Finally, Rodrigo and Jessica show up. Jessica and I leave the boys to their play mechanic games to work on an essay, and eventually, after another hour of playtime, they come back in defeat. Apparently, one of the lug nuts is 'stripped' (whatever that means) and normal tools can't get it out. So FINALLY, the boys let me call Geico to get this thing sorted out.

I explain to the insurance lady exactly what the issue with the bolt is and everything. The man she sends had no idea that the bolt was stripped before coming and he didn't have the tool for it. He leaves, being of no help other than to tell me to curse out my insurance lady (but she's so sweet I could never. Plus, call center people are only human! They make mistakes too!). I call Geico back and explain to the lady again everything that happened. This time she calls the companies around and asks about my specific problem. None of the companies do what I need. Great.

At this point my only option is to get a tow to a tire shop to fix my poor baby Lulu. The only problem? It's past 10 PM on a holiday. So I just get a reference number and leave it to deal with later. We finished the paper then went to Waffle House (because nothing is more patriotic in the South than Waffle House at midnight). It was too rainy to enjoy fireworks, so we settled for just listening to the loud bangs outside.

Yesterday morning I left for work with Luis's car. After work I come back and we tow the car to the tire shop, wait for a good 45 minutes in the lobby, and pay 9 bucks to find out that the bolt wasn't stripped at all, it was just differently shaped. Great.

So now I'm driving around on a spare until I have time to go to a used tire shop, because I have two more tires that look like they're about to give out too so I might as well replace them all.

Yay for car troubles, which I apparently have way too many of.

Just Another Crazy Busy Bee Weekend

What a week!

This past week... I don't even know where to start!

I guess I'll pick up where I left off.

So last Wednesday I wake early and go to class. I sit through a boring anthropology lecture. Then I get a text from my boss boss (like the Operator/Owner boss). He asked me to come in for a photo shoot release.

What? Photo shoot? All he had to say was that there were cameras involved and I would have been there in a jiffy. That's just the type of girl I am. I love pictures!

And I'm feeling pretty special too, because we both have iPhones, so I would have been able to see if he had sent the same text to multiple people in a group message, and it was a private. I felt so special! Although I'm sure he texted more than just me (I later found out 5 of us had the interview), but still, give me my two seconds of glory and ego-raising glee.

But unfortunately, I had class. As much as I love pictures, finals start this week and I could't afford to miss any classes from now on. So I told him the soonest I could get there would be at 12 45 (He texted me at 10 30), and he said okay! Excited again!

So I leave class (please don't ask me what we talked about in class, because all my notebook has written in it is a bunch of pictures of cameras!), and walk straight to my car (Lulu is looking pretty good, pictures eventually!) and drive straight to Chick-Fil-A.

All I have to say is that I'm pretty glad that I dressed up cute in the morning. I pulled this sexy professional look with black leggings, a long white shirt, a black blazer, and these adorable black heels. And of course, the bright red lips. I think my bright red lips can turn any outfit into classy and sexy.

Black leggings and adorable black heels

Long white shirt and black blazer, not mention the cute necklace ;D

Bright red lips :*

I walk in, looking for the cameras, and my Operator calls me over to a table and there's a lady sitting down with a pile of papers and her laptop. He introduces us, jokes around that I speak 7 languages (Um, it's 4, let's not give people high hopes of me. I hate to disappoint), and leaves the two of us together. We make small talk for a little bit. The kind of stuff everyone over 25 asks us under 20 kids. "Where do you go to school? What do you want to do? Blah blah blah" I am a professional at answering those questions, no joke. I have my answer down pat. And of course, the following, "Oh my goodness you're so smart, you're going to go far, etc etc" came, as always. I have a slightly inflated ego when it comes to these kinds of things.

Then, we get to the juicy bit. She finally asks me if I know what I'm doing there, and of course, I have no clue. He said photo shoot, but I don't see any cameras, so at this point I just feel like he knows how to get me to drive 20 minutes from Kennesaw.

Then she tell me the good news. She is a talent scout! Eek! She recruits people to do modeling, take pictures, and do videos! The excitement is overwhelming!

Of course, I'll be in my Chick-fil-A uniform and the pictures are for CFA marketing and instructional videos for all the newbies coming in to teach how to do stuff in the stores. But still! I'll be on camera and people will be taking pictures of me and I'll be on video and hundreds and thousands of little newbie CFA team members will get to see me on their videos! That's publicity right there my dears!

This is only the first step! Next, someone will realize how amazing I am at doing CFA informational videos, and they'll start hiring me for commercials and movies and runways and red carpets and so much more! My future life is flashing before my eyes and I am super excited! And it all started in junior high when I posed for Samoa's 40th anniversary for Girl Scouts. I can feel the tears coming. Michael Kors, here I come!

Not to mention that the pay is really nice too. Almost double of what I'm making now. But I'd do it for less. Just the experience of being a model, regardless for whom, is amazing. I am a beautiful budding talent, waiting to be discovered! Here I come Hollywood!

Then the rest of Wednesday was just a normal day. School and work. Yay.

Then Thursday was an adventure all on it's own.

I woke up super early to head downtown. As a political science major (Yay international relations!) I have to do an observation report almost every semester. That means waking up super early, going to court for several hours, writing down everything that goes down, then writing a ten page essay on it. Whoop-dee-do.

So Thursday morning I drove to downtown to go to immigration court. When I go to look for a parking spot, I realize that I left my credit card with Luis so he could fix Lulu. That is slightly problematic when I am stuck in downtown Atlanta with an almost empty tank and no money. So I look all over my purse and car and pull together $4 and a few cents to pay for parking.

Then I go to court, hold my tears in as I watch the judge be a jerk to a poor immigrant, and issue him to leave the country. Ouch. As a Latina, watching people get deported hurts. I switched court rooms at one point to see another judge too. The second judge was sort of nicer, at least to me. He realized that I wasn't there for a court date and started asking me questions, and he answered a lot of my questions too. I got a ton of notes from talking to him, even though he was obviously one of those self-righteous judge's who thinks America is for Americans, so screw the immigrants. I sure had a hard time not expressing my own feelings on the issue. To me, personally, he was pleasant enough though.

Finding my car was the next big issue. I walked up and down downtown for a good 15 minutes before I remembered where I parked. Then I had to sprint in the opposite direction because my parking meter was about to expire. I managed to get there 2 minutes after my time expired, but the cop was on the other side checking those cars, so I escaped without a ticket. I was fully prepared to cry my way out of a parking ticket though. My tears were on the ready!

Then I went to work, and that was that. At this point I forgot my laptop at work and only got it back Saturday night.

I did, however, go to a bar with Carlin after work Thursday night. That was super fun!

Blurryyy

We have a pair of friends, Haley and Alexis, who are in a band and often perform over at a bar close to my Chick-fil-A. Usually I'm too busy to go to any of their shows, but since that's so close to me, I always try to make those. I got there a little too late to watch them perform, but we had fun rocking to a rock band!

We're too cute!

We then hung out with a crowd who came out to see Haley and Alexis too. Afterwards we went to the only place open in the wee hours of the morning, the true Southern staple, Waffle House!

I ended up at home at 4am (which wasn't a very smart idea considering all the work I had to do on the following days). It was a crash and burn kinda night. I'm surprised I even took the time to remove my makeup!

The rest of the weekend was all work.

Chick-fil-A Ready!!

I worked 2 to close on Thursday, 11:30 am to close on Friday, and here's the real beauty of the weekend: open to close on Saturday! And that was on two nights straight of four hours of sleep. By 8pm Saturday night, I was ready to bite someone's head off. I opened drive thru and closed kitchen, which was actually a lot of fun for me. I have never worked screens before, so it was nice to do something different, and a great change of pace on such a long day.

Then Sunday I slept into 2 30 pm, which was amazing! Luis and I wore matching outfits

Yes, I know we're lame

And we went out for breakfast/dinner at Golden Corral! Then we went to Mass, which was really nice. And since we got out of Mass last night at 9 30, it's been non-stop homework, studying, and essay-writing.

Finals week is officially here, so life is about to get busyyyyyy!