Midterms

It's that time of year again!

The time when it's all cram, cram, cram for me and every other college student that wants to pass.

My life right now

I have four midterms today.

FOUR.

Four midterms. Back to back to back to back.

It's Constitutional Law and then Business Statistics and then Microeconomics and the International Political Economy. One at 8am, one at 9:30am, one at 11am, and the last one at 12:30am.

I'm pretty close to loony at this point.

So please forgive me.

And excuse me.

CRAM!

MIA

So I've been MIA for a couple of crazy weeks.

And by crazy, I mean insane. Like not a second to spare insane.

Since I got back from Florida I've gone out a few times with friends, gone to the doctor, threw the baby shower, worked a TON, got a new job, worked some more, learned a whole new work environment, did some marketing stuff with CFA, finally started closing as a shift leader, reconnected with an old friend, moved back into my dorm, hung out with my mom, went back to school shopping, hosted a Girl Scout reunion, started school up again, and started working out. So yes, I'm exhausted and that's my excuse for not updating.

So now that I'm back, expect to hear about all that's been happening, because these past two weeks have been insanely full of goodies!

Brunna's Book Club -- Beachcombers

This week's book is Beachcombers by Nancy Thayer.

This novel is quite the journey. The story follows four women: Abbie, Emma, Lily, and Marina. The four of them are all faced with struggles, and they each end up on Nantucket Island.

Abbie, Emma, and Lily are sisters and their father, Jim, lives on the island. Lily, the youngest, has stayed with him. However, Emma had gone of to Boston to work and live with her fiancee, and Abbie was in Europe as a nanny. Marina is already a middle-aged adult, but she spent her college summers on the island waitressing with her best friend.

This summer, different life events bring all four women together on the island. Emma loses her job in the fall of '09 and her fiancee breaks off their engagement, sending her back home in a pit of depression. This leads Lily to call Abbie back home, in hopes of making Emma feel better, and help out with their father's financial problems. Marina's husband asks for a divorce after 10+ years of marriage, sending Marina on a journey to get away from everything she currently knows, which causes her to rent the girls' old Playhouse from Jim.

The four women go on an awesome summer adventure as they all try to find themselves. The four women end up growing, falling in love, forging new friendships, and fulfilling dreams. It's definitely another chick novel, soul-searching and heart-wrenching. I thoroughly enjoyed it and 100% recommend it!!!

Let me know what you think of it!!

Brunna's Book Club -- Backseat Saints

Oh my goodness. This week's book had me all over the place crazy!

This week I am recommending Backseat Saints by Joshilyn Jackson.

This novel is about Rose Mae Lolley, or Ro Grandee as she's known after she's married. This girl has seen abuse all throughout her life. First she watched her father beat her mother. Then once her mother left, her father turned on her. After running away from her father, she was involved with a long line of bad men who just continued the abuse, only to find herself married to Thom Grandee, possibly the worst out of all of them.

It's a rough read, that's for sure. Just seeing what she, and so many other women in real life, go through is heart breaking. The reader gets to see the abuse from her eyes, feeling what Rose feels. There are nurses dying to call the cops on Thom, but Rose won't have it, Ro Grandee loves Thom too much. She stays married to him for five long and gruesome years, when one day, while driving her elderly neighbor to the airport, Rose runs into a gypsy who tells her her fortune. She is given the choice to choose between her life and Thom's. This opens her eyes to the fact that she has been hiding from herself all along; she will not survive if she stays married to Thom.

After failing to kill Thom herself, finding out her mother has left her a note behind, and becoming obsessed with a long lost love from high school, Rose is in for the adventure of her lifetime as she follows her gut and her saints throughout the country, looking for a safe haven from the abuse she has always known.

It's a really intriguing novel, and it gives the reader a rare insight on the mind of a battered woman. Rose's mind and the way she lives her life kept me on the edge the whole story through. At the end I also got to read the first chapter of another one of Jackson's novels, and I do believe that I will be reading more of her books.

Let me know what you think about this book! And I'm always open to new book recommendations!

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.

Tornado Warning

Yesterday was only kind of insane.

And by kind of insane, I mean absolutely out of this world crazy.

And I was at work when the apocalypse started. Talk about luck.

One minute the sky was bright and blue and beautiful. I stepped into the back to grab I don't know what, and when I come back up front, the end of the world had started. Winds at 70 miles an hour had the trees outside leaning horizontally and there was so much rain that I could barely see past an arm's length outside. Plus, the sky went from bright blue to pitch black.

Our dining room became packed. People piled on in complaining about not being able to keep their cars going in a straight line because of the wind. They walked in soaked from head to toe, looking like they had just left the pool, just from the short walk from their cars to the door. It was crazy.

We closed down the drive thru because the rain was pouring in straight through the window and our speaker box wasn't working. So of course, on the one day I wasn't working drive thru, the drive thru people get to go chill in the back. The other girl on front counter was closing that night, so she decided to get ahead in her cleaning projects for the day. I was holding down the fort by myself. And I was supposed to get off at 8. My life.

It wasn't just us either. Last night it was showing that 162,000 people in Georgia have no power, but 240,000 were powerless in Virginia and 91,000 in North Carolina. An article published at noon today is attributing the cause of death of at least four people to be due to the thunderstorms and tornadoes yesterday. Regardless, I'm thankful that we were luckier than those in Oklahoma, and my prayers go out not only to those affected by these most recent storms on the east coast, but all the people affected by storms this year, especially in Oklahoma.

I spent pretty much the entirety of the tornado running up and down grabbing people who didn't want to order water and little kids balloons to make them stop crying. I also made at least 50 ice creams and shakes. Plus the lights went out and the registers and machines were working on the generators. It was crazy. Finally the rain started dying down and the sky turned red. Not the kind of pretty reddish yellow color it is when the sun is setting/rising, but the kind of orange red color that movies show the atmospheres of other planets to be like. It was really eerie, especially at 9 at night.

The drive home was pretty scary. There were fallen leaves and branches all over the place, even on the highway. And none of the stoplights by my job or by the dorms were working. I almost went to Luis's house, but didn't want to make the almost 30 mile drive in that weather. On campus the bikes at the bike racks were all over the place, and there were even a few poles knocked down. The worst part of it all was that the lights had gone out and all entries into the dorms are card operated. Without electricity, the cards didn't work.

I had to circle the building looking for a door that was open, and eventually someone inside let me in. I eventually made it inside my room, which was pitch black. I was not a happy camper. My laptop was already dead from me spending the morning using it and my phone was already at 30%. I decided to just lie down in bed and read my Kindle until I fell asleep, and I planned with Luis to meet him at Ihop the next morning at 9.

There were still no lights at Kennesaw this morning, and apparently the whole KSU server is down so people taking summer classes can't log in to the online database and I couldn't pay my rent. Talk about tough luck.

Hopefully when I get home tonight the lights will be back on, because I have to be at work at 8 tomorrow morning and I'm going to need to charge my phone to wake up in time for that after closing tonight.

Sick Day

I'm being a sick puppy today ):

Last night I was hanging out with Luis, Carlin, and Pedro when I passed out.

Turns out I had forgotten to eat all day.

Good thing that it was at the end of the day yesterday so Luis spent the night with me taking care of me, but I still had to go to work today. I was supposed to work from 11 to close, but ended up coming in at 10 30.

Today was probably the worst work day I have ever had in my life. I was super light headed all day long, and slightly incoherent. I was slow on understanding what people were saying to me, and I wasn't even smiling brightly at my customers! I was just kind of hazy all day long.

I didn't eat anything last night after passing out, because I was pretty sure that I was going to throw up if I did, especially since I was already feeling woozy and my stomach was upset. I had a chicken biscuit and a half this morning. Then lunch was what turned me over. I had chicken strips, a parfait, and a cookie. I should have probably skipped the fried stuff, because my stomach really started hurting after that. I ended up throwing up two hours after eating and finally got sent home.

So now I'm lying down in bed, totally ready to turn in early.

Hopefully I'll be feeling better for work tomorrow!

It's Graduation Time

It's that time of year again.

Everyone is talking about graduations and going to graduation parties and crying because they're all going their separate ways after graduation.

It is also the one year mark for when my life got flipped around.

About a week before my birthday last year, my mom announced that she was moving to Florida. Of course, my brother and sister were going with her, but I had already paid the deposit on my dorm room in Kennesaw and was registered for my classes. I had a great job at Chick-fil-A and had just been asked to start my leadership journey to become a team leader. Not to mention that I also have Luis and all my friends here. Leaving Atlanta was definitely not in my plans.

The final decision ended up being that they would be moving and I would be staying. The incredible irony of this is the fact that I always said that I would be going as far as possible from Georgia when I graduated. I didn't want to stay here. I wanted to travel and go to school in another state and start my life over from scratch. I wanted to live that American college dream.

But no. I stayed, and my family left. At the time, it hurt. I couldn't even imagine living with my mom in Florida and me in Georgia. Mind you, that does not mean we had a great relationship. We have an amazing relationship now, and we had one before high school, but something happened in high school that just tore us apart and by my senior year, we couldn't hold a conversation for longer than 10 minutes without it turning into an argument. I was glad to be getting away, but I didn't want to be SO away either.

The announcement came right before my birthday, so I had a month to prepare myself. I planned with friends to stay at their places over the summer. I told people at church, so I would have them to rely on if all else failed. My mom would be leaving on the last day of May, and my dorm would not be available until August 14th. I had a summer of house-hopping ahead of me.

During that month, I had to learn how to drive. I had never seen the immediate need to learn how, and I personally hate cars and driving with a passion, so since I had my mom and Luis to drive me around, what did I need to know how to drive for? So I bought a super old and beat up 1998 Ford Explorer from my cousin for $900 and I started my struggle to learn. It's a good thing my first car was that super big metal box, because I crashed into so many poles and ran over more curbs than I can count.

My Explorer's name was Shelly, and I don't think I ever took a full shot of her. She was kind of ugly *cough really ugly cough* so she didn't get pictures. Here are her tires. One is from a particularly high curb, and the other from a tree.

And after she was completely totaled in September (that's a story for another time) I only kept the decal on the front of her, as a souvenir and reminder of how she saved my life.

I also got a second job working as a waitress at a Mexican restaurant down the street from Chick-fil-A. On the day of my graduation, May 25th, I drove my mom's car to get my liquor license so I could work at the restaurant.

This beauty sparked up a lovely conversation about how at 18 I can die for my country, and I can serve people alcohol, but I can't drink it myself. Not that I particularly care, but Facebook blew up on this one.

I then I drove to the DMV, and butchered my test. Fortunately, the guy giving me the exam passed me with a 70. A few tears were involved, but I got the license, which is what mattered.

From there, we went home. I put on my dress, cap, and gown, and we went off to graduation. I graduated with the Magnet Seal and with Honors. I also had cords for French Honor Society and one more that I can never remember what that last cord was for.

This is the only picture of me from graduation on Facebook, and I didn't even post it. I'm sure there are more pictures on my sister's laptop, but I never got to see them or get them for myself to post them. Because three days later, we were finishing up our packing and moving everything away. It was a good thing I had bought the Explorer, because it did all of our moving.

Here I am in the passenger seat, all cramped up next to boxes. We moved everything into a storage and my family only took clothes and necessities with them. My whole room and bathroom was fit into the back of the truck, with clothes in luggage, cosmetics and toiletries in laundry baskets, and everything else in boxes. I was also given an air mattress. So with everything in my back seat, I spent the summer living at Luis's and my god-daughter's, Alexa, mostly.

I got a third job halfway through summer and just worked everyday. I took a few short breaks from work: a one day vacation to be whisked away to Tybee Island by Luis, and two weeks in Nicaragua on a mission trip. The rest of the summer was working until school started.

This is one of those things that I look back on today and I can say both "Wow, it's already been a year?" and "Woah, it's only been one year?" because I feel like just yesterday I was sharing a room with my brother, getting yelled at for coming home past 11 after a date with Luis, and telling my mom to go buy me conditioner because I ran out again. And at the same time, it feels like that was a lifetime ago, and I have been living on my own for ever.

My life is so different now, and it has been through all kinds of twists and turns throughout the past year. And despite everything that has happened, I think I'm finally at a point where I am truly becoming happy with my life and the way I'm living it. I'm not quite there yet, and I still have no idea what I'm going to do for the rest of my life, but I'm figuring it out little by little.

No one said life was going to be easy. In fact, they told me that growing up was going to be very very hard. And they didn't lie, it has been. This past years has been the hardest year of my life, but if I could go back to April of last year when I decided that I was going to stay in Georgia, I would make the same decision once again. This is my life now.

19 Years And Counting...

First and foremost, I would like to start off this post by thanking God for blessing me with these 19 healthy years of life.

He has been so good to me, and has filled my life with goodness and blessings and joy, and I can't thank Him enough.

And keeping in line with the blessings, Thursday was really a day filled with joy.

I actually woke up in a really bad mood. Wednesday night I worked and I didn't get out until 11 30. I made it to my dorm just in time to ring in my birthday at home, at 11 57. Then I studied for my history final until around 3 (after doing the midnight birthday phone calls and answering FB messages). I finally woke up at 7, totally grumpy from lack of sleep. I drag myself over to my bathroom sink and BOOM!

BEYOND cute!!! My roommate is the best!! She wrote Happy Birthday in English, Portuguese (my language!) and German! (she lived in Germany for 10 years before coming to Georgia for college)

Look! It's Hello Kitty! Beyond adorable!!! She later drew on balloons, but I didn't snap a picture of that. It totally made my morning to wake up to that sight!

And she got me a present!

Three Victoria's Secret body mists, and a German chocolate called Kinder, that we discovered early on that we both love! She's just the greatest! I felt kind of bad, because the only thing I did for her birthday was buy her a jewelry case... Talk about being outdone!

Then I finished getting ready, and Carlin came over, along with a Starbucks gift card! Woot woot! She knows the way to my heart, that's for sure. I can now thoroughly enjoy Starbucks Happy Hour!!

Oh, and here's the outfit I bought for my birthday

With blazer

Without blazer

The blazer was already a part of my wardrobe, but the belt was purchased maybe 2 weeks before this, and so far had never been used. The dress though, so cute! When I came out of the dressing room on Tuesday, both Jessica and Karima agreed that the dress was a must have for me. I really like it. I can make it a business outfit with the blazer and some nice pumps, or I can wear it as a party dress, or even just a casual night out with friends outfit. So many endless opportunities, so much adorable-ness. And I wore the cute heels with the bow that I bought at Forever 21 on Tuesday as well. It was just a "be fabulous" kind of day!

We then studied and went to take our final, which wasn't too bad. We both closed the class with Bs even though we BOMBED the first exam (And by bombed I mean under 50%).

Finally, the final was over and off to Ihop we went! I didn't have breakfast, so Cinnabon french toast was the perfect way to start off my birthday. Oh, and the phone calls. Endless phone calls from my mom, brother, sister, aunts, grandma, et cetera et cetera, Not to mention a gajillion texts and e-mails and Facebook messages. I'm not going to lie, it does feel nice to have one day of being the center of everything.

Finally we came back to my dorm where my baby was waiting for me with surprises! He had a beautiful bouquet of flowers waiting for me, along with a big cupcake balloon (cupcakes are kind of an insider cutesie thing between us) surrounded by smaller balloons, and a gift bag!

Beautiful bouquet from him (:

The cute bag my lamp came inside, and his card 

My new (only) lamp (:

Balloons!

Cupcake balloon!!!

It was all so cute it's a wonder I didn't squeal!

He also brought me cards from my family (long story short, all my mail goes to his house).

I loved the cards! They were so cute and springlike, and I felt as if they all matched. If only it had been warm on birthday to celebrate the spring colors... My mom also sent me bonds... That won't be good for another 30 years. I'm sure that when I'm 49, I'll be so happy to have that saved up money to send my children to college. Or, to go on a really nice vacation!

Then off Luis and I went to the Georgia Aquarium! 

I love places like the aquarium and the zoo. Animals are fascinating to me. I really enjoyed going to the aquarium. We had the opportunity to touch sting rays and anemones and sea orchids and starfish. We saw beluga whales, whale sharks, penguins, and otters. We even sat in this huge room with a giant aquarium for a while and just relaxed, watching the fish swim around. So peaceful and lovely.

I also took a LOT of pictures. Pictures of me, pictures of Luis, pictures of fish and crabs and whales and frogs, pictures of everything.

And we are that couple. The icky, super lovey and affectionate, PDA, too cute couple. We make people jealous and wanna puke and awww and ewww and whatever else people have to say about us. But the point is, it's not a special date for us, if we don't take at least one oober cute picture (which usually involves kissing). So here it is

Cue awwing and/or ewwing

Aren't we so cute? He took me to Starbucks afterwards to pick up my free birthday drink (Yes, I am a rewards member!) and I got my first Starbucks venti ever! I tried the new Caramel Ribbon Crunch frappuccino! So yummy!!!

Our next stop... Buckhead! We went to this super nice, French restaurant, Bistro Niko. It was a beautiful place, and delicious! 

The bottle of water.

Our glasses were never less than half full. The waiter was at our table almost instantly after we took a drink. And the food was beautifully plated as well!

My shrimp meal!

He even had flowers delivered to our table!!

Aren't they beautiful?? They had a card attached to them as well. 

Dinner was wonderful and delicious. (not to mention fancy!) I had the shrimp over pasta, and he had a seafood pasta. It had shrimps, scallops, calamari, and more in there. He was slightly surprised to learn exactly what calamari is...

He tried feeding it to me, but I wouldn't touch that squid thing, much less allow it inside my body. He did end up eating it, after I was done taking pictures of it.

After we ordered our dessert, he got up to go to the restroom. Restroom my foot! He came back with this beauty

SO pretty!!! He brought me a little gift bag and when I pulled this out, I couldn't believe it. This necklace, WOW. Beautiful. AND it's real diamonds and white gold! I haven't taken in off since I put it on.

Our dessert finally came.

Three beautiful and delicious profiteroles! Now, the idea behind taking me to this French restaurant is rooted in the fact that I am a francophile. If it's French, I love it! French nails, french fries, french toast, french kiss... Just kidding! None of those are actually French, but since I was 8 years old, I have dreamed of going to France. I started teaching myself French in middle school, took French all throughout high school, listen to French music, read the French newspaper, am minoring in French, et cetera. I am French obsessed.

So of course, with my French obsession, I am always trying out new French bakeries, restaurants, diners, shops, boutiques, whatever. I love it. But, there's a curse that accompanies this immersion of all things French in my life. In French, the way to say Happy Birthday is Joyeux Anniversaire. They don't use bon. Bon is good. Like good food, good friends, good. Not happy. Happy is joyeux. It made me slightly sad, but more amused, that this French restaurant with such a lovely French ambiance and French food, would mess that up. Oh well, we can't have it all I suppose.

Then after dessert, the drama started. No day can be perfect I suppose, we always need a little bit of drama. I go to reach for my purse (I was actually using the Coach one Luis had gotten me for my birthday last year) so I can reapply my lipstick, now that dinner was over, and boom, no purse. Where is my purse? I go check the bathroom I went to at the restaurant to see if I hadn't left it there. Not there. I double check the table and floor again. Not there. We pay the tab, ask the hostess if anyone has turned a purse in. Nope. We go check the car, just in case I hadn't brought it with me. No purse. I call CNN Center to see if I left it at the Starbucks (the last time I definitely remember seeing my purse, when I loaded the gift card Carlin gave me onto my rewards card). Not there either. We go back inside the restaurant and check all the bathrooms, just in case. No purse.

Needless to say, I was freaking out. I lost my Coach purse with my Coach wallet inside. My ID, debit card, school debit card, school ID, dorm key card, cash, brand new Mac lipstick, and more, all gone. Of course I called Bank of America right away to cancel the card, which took FOREVER. And by forever I mean I had to call three different numbers, was transferred at least twice, and had to listen to that stupid automated voice way too much! It took almost 30 minutes to cancel the card, and then the people kept asking me stupid questions like my account number and the 16 digit number on the front of the card. Seriously? My card is LOST, just cancel the stupid thing!

I was so stressed out that I was a bit rude on the phone. I hate rude people, and I felt so bad afterwards because of it. It's not those poor people's fault I'm an idiot and lost my purse. At least the card got cancelled before anyone could use it. I left my contact information with the hostess and the manager in hopes of it being turned in.

I finally calmed down, and we went to Luis's house to say happy birthday to his sisters. Yes, their birthday is on the same day as mine! Isn't that cool? They're 10 year old twins, and totally adorable. I gave them their presents. Each one of them got a nail spa kit and a Hello Kitty eraser. Luis's mom gave me two undershirts (which will be normal shirts over the summer... promise!) and a pair of shorts. This was really interesting because Luis got mad at her for giving me shorts, saying they were too immodest. The conversation that went down after that was downright hilarious. (Just as a PS, they're not... I wouldn't have been able to wear them to high school, but they're long enough that my mom would approve, so we're good)

Finally, we left to head back to my dorm in Kennesaw. I took a quick nap in the car and woke up definitely not in Kennesaw. A few of our friends were there: Jessica (not the same one I went to the mall with), her boyfriend Rodrigo, and another friend, Pedro. We were at Rumba!

Unfortunately, we got there a little bit too early. Whatever though, we got free entrance because it was Thursday night, and the party picked up later on.

I did have a little rebel child moment though. I have never ever done anything slightly naughty before. Never smoked anything, drank, partied hard, skipped, cursed, ran away, sneaked out or anything like that. I figure that doing hookah once in 19 years is pretty good compared to most other college kids. I will probably never do it again either, I almost choked to death doing it on my birthday! So I got to do hookah for my first time, and they let me pick the flavor, strawberry! I didn't do it much though, I was much more amused by their smokes and puffs and whatnot.

This was my moment for the night. After we got this shotgun picture, I was done smoking. I'm pretty sure I could feel my lungs blackening and the lung cancer settling in. Plus, my family has a history of asthma, and I'm not into risky behaviors. It was fun to get to do it once though, I'm not gonna lie. We ended up partying until almost 3am, and then it was time to go home, because we were all exhausted.

Overall, it was a great day, and my best birthday yet. Hopefully I'll have many more, better ones to come.





P.S. Bistro Niko called me Saturday morning. My purse was turned in and EVERYTHING was still inside! God is good!

Finals V Birthday

It has begun.

The week of no sleep, no makeup, no life, and no cute clothes.

Why must this week fall on my birthday??? By tomorrow, I need to study for my anthropology final (probably the hardest one I'll take since this is the class I missed the most), make a Prezi presentation, watch the movie Lincoln, write a response to it, and write a ten page essay. Then on my birthday I'll have my history final (which is the reason the anthropology final is MAYBE the hardest, because this one will be super tough too) and a geography quiz.

Then I have to fully enjoy my birthday weekend, because apparently I am being kidnapped to somewhere that requires me to pack for the night and bring a bikini (my excitement on hearing this was almost uncontainable. Now to not eat anything until then so I can fit in my bikini and not look like an over-sized whale.)

Then Sunday I have Mass and Legacy! Which means it will be at the earliest 10pm Sunday night when I can resume my finals cramming. I have a US Congress final on Monday and my political relations final and my democracy and development in Latin America finals on Wednesday. I don't have to study much for US Congress because it's open note, but the other two are going to be extreme finals in which my final grade hangs in the balance. The struggle is real.

I'm going to have to break finals week norm, and stay pretty over these next two weeks! Today I'm going birthday shopping with two of my work buddies, Karima and Jessica. It's been postponed long enough, and I can't wait to go shopping!! Even though I spent almost all my money on Lulu, my mommy sent me some money so I have enough to spend, although not as much as I had allotted for myself beforehand. Either way, I have money and a mall and an upcoming birthday that I must look adorable for!!!

Then, I'm going out for dinner with Luis, because I have a Groupon for a steakhouse that expires on Wednesday, so it's my last chance to use it. We're probably going to come back to my dorm and watch Lincoln after that, so I'll get some quality time in and work done. Bonus points for multi-tasking!

Wednesday is the day of the anthropology final, democracy and development paper presentation, and US Congress essay/Lincoln review due date. Plus work afterwards. Yay.

Thursday will be the history final, lunch with Carlin, then kidnapping by Luis.

After my fun birthday weekend, my next big thing will be dinner with Estela and Emily to celebrate all three of our May birthdays! We have two more friends, Jessica and Daena, coming along to celebrate with us too, so I'm excited for that. It's been a while since I've seen some of them, and we haven't hung out as a group in forever. I'm also having lunch with a former work buddy whom I haven't seen in forever next week!

With all these fun plans in place, it's reallyyyyy hard to focus on school and finals and studying and writing essays. I've actually been really good about staying off other distractions like Pinterest and Polyvore (although Blogger obviously fell through the cracks on the "Stay away from distracting websites" part of my weekly plans)

Eh, I'll have all this fun this week, and get all my homework and studying done after lots of stressing. I know I'm not getting any sleep this upcoming week, but I know it'll be worth it!

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!