Day 2

One thing you need to know about my dad and I is that we love a leisurely breakfast and when we go on vacation we search out the best bfast spot in town. Today was no different. We consulted our bff Ram at the front desk and he told us to go to the Sedona Airport Restaurant. Not quite an appetizing name. I was a little skeptical but I had to trust my buddy Ram (he had in fact led me to the holy grail of burritos). We took a shuttle up to it and it was a teeeeeeny airport on top of a butte (yes, butte) for lil propeller planes. The restaurant was literally right beside the runway (freakin sweet). Another thing you need to know is that on vaca cofffee is free game, as opposed to in real life where my dad limits my intake so I won't have a heart attack. So needless to say, I was knocking back the coffee and perusing the menu until I saw....pumpkin bread french toast. I had to get it (let's be serious, I countdown the days until Einsteins has pumpkin bagels and pumpkin cream cheese). I ordered it and my dad ordered the eggs benedict (homeboy loves eggs benedict). Anywho I tried to pass the time by looking out the window and drinking more and more coffee (which made me very jittery and anxious for my french toast). FINALLY it arrived in all it's glory. I buttered it as fast as my lil hands could and took a big bite. Then I died. It was defreakinlicious. The best I've ever had and my stomach thanked me for making such a good choice.

After breakfast we went to Exposures International Art Gallery. Greg was in heaven (and we only scoped out the outside). It had tons of massive southwest-y sculptures (think buffalo, indians, eagles etc). These things were something else. I mean if an eagle is going to cost you $550,000 (I'm not exaggerating in the slightest) I guess it better be special. Once my dad stopped drooling, We went to another place called Tlaquepaque where we went in all sorts of neat little art galleries. Then we had to part ways with Ram (tears may or may not have been shed).

studly Indian at Exposures

Now we were headed to the GRAND CANYON. We essentially drove 2 hours going farther and farther into the middle of nowhere (a few random trailers scattered about). So finally we get to the park and I was famished (this is the only time I get cranky). Needless to say we had to get some food in me fast so we ate at this food court type deal at the Yavapai Lodge (cold taco pizza not worth writing about blah). Now I perked back up so we could go see the canyon finally! We check out a map and start walking towards what we think is the rim. WRONG. It was the path to some lodge. We walk back and regroup at our map and start walking again. This time we think we're on it! WRONG. We walked for a solid amount of time and then when we we were walking past where the employees lived and some sort of hut with chemicals we thought we must be going the wrong way. So we trek back to our map of lies and find the right route...FINALLY. Once we were on the right track, it was a real quick and easy walk to the rim. And all of the sudden....there it was....the Grand Canyon. It was pretty shocking. I wish I was a somewhat competent writer so I could properly use adjectives and give you a worthy description. But I'm not. Sorry. All I can tell you is that it feels like I got on the Magic School Bus and it took me to the inside of a postcard. We walked around the rim snappin pics for a while and then we checked into our room at the Yavapai Lodge.

Check out the California Condors

We had a much needed little siesta until it was time for dinner. On our way we saw a car pulled over on the side of the road and a lady was waving her arms frantically at us. I was fully prepared o jump out of our car and perform a minor surgery but she was just showing us the elk. There were probably a dozen elk total on both sides of the road eating their dinner. A few even crossed the street right in front of our car. Pretty exciting way to kick off the night.

We ate dinner at the restaurant at El Tovar. It's this ancient hotel that was the fanciest of fancy back in the day ( I mean it's still pretty fancy now). Anywho I knew I was going to be in for some good eats. Our waiter was this man in his 50's named Rick and boy was he a character. I don't know if he was in the CIA or if he went to professional waiter school but he sure acted like it.  He gave us our menus and said we wouldn't see him until we stood a menu up on the table (he demonstrated this in case there was some confusion). We could hardly wait til he left to start giggling. He referenced this and other secret signals throughout the night. I bout died. Anywho back to the food. whenever I'm out to eat nice places I enjoy getting exotic pork dishes (weird, I know). So tonight I got the pork chop with this gouda sauce and green chile cornbread stuffing. It was OMG delish. We spied another table getting their own individual silver pitchers of coffee, so of course we had to get on that. We gave Rick a signal and we said we wanted to split a piece of apple pie and have some coffee. He was adamant that we get the pie "a la mode" We said no thanks, and he said it's really good like that and we again said NO. IDK if Rick has been stuck out in the canyon for a while but there's apple pie a la mode everywhere and we've had it before obvi and tonight we just didn't want it. Well it gave us a good chuckle. Our individual pitchers of coffee came and oooooo was it good. The pie was scrumptious too (even without the ice cream Rick)

We went outside to check out the canyon at night. It's definitely my favorite when the sun is down and the moon is up. The inside of the canyon has this silvery glow and it looks so soft and tranquil. You can see every single star in the sky and ooo baby do they shine bright. It was really something else. We headed back to the room and realized we missed DWTS. We were bummed. All I wanted to see was Derek Hough (sexy, can I?) work it.

To sum it up...I'm pretty sure there's pumpkin break french toast on the menu in Heaven. The Grand Canyon scores a 100 on the epic scale. And I'm almost certain Rick was once a member of the CIA.

PS. God, Thank You

Day 1 in AZ

This is a long distance post coming to you all the way from Sedona, Arizona. Ya see, today my dad and I embarked on our semi epic adventure out West. Over the next 6 days we'll be spelunkering around the Grand Canyon ( and other place to see and be seen). But let me back up and tell you all thats happened so far.

We flew out of Charlotte, NC this morning. Now normally I would skip such a minor detail, BUT there was quite the character sitting in the row in front of me that you have to hear about. So before we took off, she was being obnoxiously chatty ( originally I was giving her the caffeine high benefit of the doubt, but no). Anywho I can hear everything she says and she's talking about where she can put her hermit crabs. Homegirl (who is in her 30's btw) has 3 hermit crabs with her on the plane!!! After a battle with the flight attendent she reluctantly puts them and their "hermit crab hotel" on the floor. Soon after she fell asleep (the rows around her were ecstatic at this development). We could all have some peace. Everything was fine and dandy until we landed. She goes to check on the crabs and she shouts that  one of them is in and I quote "critical condition" And the scene begins. She's holding the crab that needs to be ushered immediately to the ICU in her hand and legitimately starts breathing on it like she was giving it CPR or something. The whole time she's doing this, she's also shouting out hermit crab facts (they need 70% humidity etc). I felt so bad for the poor guy next to her because she kept shoving the sickly crab in his face. I do believe she's a nut.

Okay so we arrived safely (minus 1 hermit crab) in Phoenix and OMG is it different than Clemson (obvi). It's completely flat aside from the dune-ish mountains. The whole landscape is like one neutral color (even the houses look dusty). We got our rental car and started heading towards Sedona (like 2 hours away). We were ravenous so we pulled of on the Happy Valley exit. I' mean with a name like that, theres got to be some good eats right? Low and behold they had a Mellow Mushroom! Can you believe it? I couldn't...I was certain it was some mirage brought on by me being in the desert. But after one bite of that Mighty Meaty pizza, I knew it was legit. After our faces were sufficiently stuffed, we kept on truckin to Sedona. And OMG it is crazy beautiful. It definitely kicks Phoneix's bootay. As my dad was driving I was having to take pictures with both mine and his camera. I was snappin shots left and right out of the window. We stopped gawking long enough to check in at our hotel (with sick nasty views).

 We consulted with the guy working at the front desk (his name is Ram and he's my new best friend) about where we should eat. He suggested a place called Javelina Cantina. OOO baby did Ram steer us right. It was so warm and cozy inside (the perfect atmosphere for me to stuff my face with chips and homemade salsa). I ordered the chicken and vegetable burrito and it was BANGIN. Seriously, the best burrito I've ever had (suck it Moe's, Monterreys, and San Jose). My dad got the salmon tostada and he still hasn't stopped talking about it. We were definitely members of the CPC (clean plate club) tonight. After dinner we walked around and peeped in windows (of stores) hoping the sun would start to set. And of course it did because I mean obviously it's the sun and it's kind of predictable. But anywho the sunset was ahhhhhmazing. I'm really hoping my camera did it justice.

To sum up the day---Don't give hermit crabs CPR in public, it's weird. Javelina Cantina is da bomb and Sedona is beyond cool.

Now tomorrow we're headed to the Grand Canyon. I can't wait to see how a landscape can get more epic than the one I'm looking at right now. I'm pumped.


ps. earth, i love you

I'm in LOVE

Yes, that's right, I Healy Rose Fitzpatrick am in L-O-V-E. I'm in love with a little thing called Leadershape and it's people. It was beyond the 6 most meaningful days of my life. I could talk about it for days, but I'll try and spare you my ramblings as best I can and just give you some of the highlights.

Day 1
AHHH we found out our family clusters! We spent a ton of time with our family throughout the week reflecting and discussing. I will talk more about my AMAZING family later (they deserve they're own post).


Day 2- The Value of One, The Power of All
Today we got to do a little community service. Me being the nature loving girl that I am, was excited  to go to Greenworks and we may or may not have taken a few wrong turns trying to get there. It's an awesome non-profit focused on beautifying and cleaning up the Asheville community. Since it was kinda g-ross that day, we worked inside opening hundreds of little cigarette butt holders, pairing gloves, and making sweet bundles of trash bags. We beasted these tasks in like .2 seconds and were ready for some more, so we went on down the street to clean off a sidewalk. This is when things got exciting. As we were shoveling and raking our little hearts out, we heard a scream. We look and a car hit a girl on a bicycle. The poor girl is down on the ground and the car backs up and then goes screeching off. Who does that?? Luckily we were there and were able to call for help and bless her heart, she ended up being fine. But if you're in Asheville and you see a female with a dark complexion and no heart driving a black sentra, you best call the police.

Highlight number 2-tacooooooooos for lunch and churroooooooos for desert

We also took the DISC personality test and oooo baby we referred to our types all week. D was dodminance, I was influence, S was steadiness, and C was conscientiousness. Guess which one I was....I'm an I. I's are basically super enthusiastic and optimistic and they're very persuasive. Congratulations DISC test, you nailed me.


Day 3- Challenging What is, Looking to What Could Be
Today was the day we started creating our visions. We wrote down all of the things we care about, our passions, etc and what we want to create in the world.We shared all of this in our families and then used it to create a vision. My vision was that I want Clemson students to raise enough money to build a school in Pakistan through Greg Mortenson's (author of Three Cups of Tea) Central Asia Institute . And I want his book to be required summer reading and I want him to come and speak to Clemson students. And, and, and, and more exciting stuff. Everyone had super awesome visions and it was great to see all of the positivity.

After dinner that night we had the opportunity to get to know some Clemson leaders (the people that always send you emails). Since Student Affairs is my jam, I tried to talk to all of the people there that dealt with it. I soaked it all in and lemme tell you,  it was delicious. I'm starting to think I'm probably never going to leave college.

Day 4- Bringing Vision to Reality
Big things happened today....there was an earthquake! Okay so maybe it wasn't a real earthquake and it was just an earthquake scenario but we sure did treat it as if it were a matter of life or death. We had to rank our steps of survival individually and then come to a consensus as a group. Even though it took us a while, and we had some disagreements, we finally decided on our survival steps. We scored ourselves and guess what? We did awesome! My score by myself was a whopping 34 but with all of our noggins together, we got a primo score of 6. Oh heyyyy awesome teamwork! The whole point of this exercise was to discuss different group behaviors. You've got your Task-Oriented Behaviors (TOB's), Maintenance-Oriented Behaviors (MOB's), and you can't forget those dreaded SOB's- Self Oriented Behaviors. It was neat to see how different people took on these roles without even knowing that they were.  One thing about Leadershape is that I learned a new set of vocabulary that I can't let go and sometimes I get funny looks when I use it in the real world.

OMG I almost forgot to tell you about StarPower. Okay so all day rumors had been flying around saying that tonight we were going to do something that would make us cry. Um so obviously I was not exactly looking forward to this. I mean who likes crying? Anywho after the suspense could build no more, we went inside and awaited our fate. It turns out we were just playing a game...cough...I mean a simulation. So you got different colored chips and tried to trade up. I had no idea what was going on so I just traded to talk to people and cashed in asap. I did surprisingly well and was in the top tier. Well I won't harp on any more details but this was all an exercise of power and class. So we had a nice discussion with everyone and then again in our families.

Day 5

We talked all about some integrity today. It was stressed how important it is to lead with integrity. What you believe on the inside needs to match your actions on the outside.We also shared our core values with each other which was nice.

There was also a little skit show that night. Each family came up with a skit about stuff we did that week and omg was it funny. I was laughing my pants off. There was a spoken word/interpretive dance combo, a real world spin off, and even an Allan from the Hangover look-a-like. 

After the show we went off in our families to have a final heart-to-heart. We got to share how we felt about each other. So what if my family talked from 8pm to 2am? Who cares if I had to eat my feelings in pepperoni pizza? We love each other that much and I will never let them go. 

So after all of that love, there was no point in me going to sleep. Besides, I wanted to spend as much time with these people as I possibly could before having to head back to reality. So Taylor, Nate, and me committed to staying up all night. Of course we had story time and played scrabble with our own rules. As I recall in a state of delirium we actually started playing with the bugs that flew in and tried to make them our pets. Don't judge, we were tired. Anywho we decided to go on a walk at sunrise and we went spelunkering down by the lake. We tried skipping rocks but we weren't to good at it so we just threw rocks in the lake and made a symphony. It was beyond fantastic.

Day 6

Woo hoo! We had our graduation today! We were all dressed up and there was a ceremony and everything. It was so so nice. We held hands and someone read "There's Something in These Hills." Yep, there may have been a few tears in my eyes...that one gets me every time. Then we stuffed our faces with pizza on the bus and headed back to Clemson. I didn't want to get off that bus! I didn't want the experience to end. But I know it won't,  I'll even stalk these people down if  I have to. 

Final Thoughts

Leadershape was one of the most meaningful experiences of my life. Not only did I gain new leadership knowledge, but I learned so much about myself and others. Diversity is seriously one of my favorite things and it made me so happy how much of it there was at Leadershape. I cherish being able to listen to different people's views and thoughts on things. I was also able to reflect about what I really believe in and I was able to share that with a group of people who I knew would appreciate it even if they didn't feel the same way. After attending Leadershape, I feel like a brand spankin new person. Well actually I guess I feel just purely Healy. I was able to get rid of all the clutter that's built up and clouded my sense of self and now I'm exactly me. And it feels fantastic. I guess I went into the experience hoping I'd learn a little somethin somethin about leadership and make some new friends. Little did I know that at Leadershape, you don't make friends, you make family.

Short n' Sassy

Gone are the days where I step on my hair when I'm dancing...
Gone are the days where I can use my mane as a sweater...
and most exciting...
Gone are the days of going through bottles of shampoo like they're chicken nuggets.

I ACTUALLY DID IT. I got 12 inches of my luscious locks cut off today. The actual haircut wasn't that bad but everything leading up to it was pure torture. Last night at dinner my hair was the topic of conversation. I kept making ponytails and asking my mom whether she thought it was 10 inches or not (she has no concept of length measurement so it wasn't very helpful). I thought I better get the most out of my last hours with my hair. This involved me slapping my poor dad in the face with it on a regular basis and telling stories that required dramatic hair flips. I also may or may not have done some Glee style hair-ography. But alas it was time for me to go to sleep (and by sleep I mean toss and turn). You know how you hear about when amputees dream they still have their limb? Well I kept waking up after a crazy dream and wonder if after I got my haircut would I still dream with long hair. Dramatic I know. But anywhoo somehow I made it to the morning. I go to make some oatmeal and low and behold my mom found a picture in the paper of a little girl who donated her hair and put it right by my bowl. Talk about timing state newspaper!!! If this little girl could do it then surely I could too. So I took the longest shower of my life (which is obscenely long...I do love a hot shower) and dried my hair for the last time. I beebopped on down to the salon and met my friend Erin who looked like she might pass out any second. The time had come, I was actually going to chop a foot of my hair off. I hopped in the chair and Erin took some  "before" pics (they're at the end of this post) and golly was my hair long. Anywhoo Allison (the lovely hairdresser) put my hair into a ponytail that I would then mail in to Locks of Love. All of the sudden I hear her make the first cut and lemme tell you,  I've never heard such dramatic scissors in my life. Each snip was SOOO loud and it all happened in the slowest of slow motion. After the last agonizing snip was made, short hair sprung out at my shoulders and she handed me my longgggggg ponytail. I couldn't believe it was over. I guess had been expecting a choir of angels to start singing or at least some confetti to fall. Once I got over the anticlimactic grand finale, I was happy to just sit and have her shape up my new do. I figured I might as well go balls to the wall so I said "sure, why not?" to everything she suggested. It turned out fab. I got to relax as my bff Erin got her's done. I'm really proud of her for actually going through with it. She's had the same long hair basically our entire 12 year friendship. I was probably more worried about her than I was about my own hair. And ya know what? She loves her new hair! There was no shortage of warm fuzzies in Salon on Main today and it was delicious. I'm so so so so so happy that I can give my hair to a precious little child who needs it. Little do they know it but whoever get's my hair is going to have some pretty amazing memories that I've had with that hair on my head, on their head. And now that I think about it....my hair is going to be with that child as they make all sorts of great new memories of their own. So I guess my hair gets to live the life twice. Pretty neat.

before....extreme anxiety

told you it was obnoxiously long

pre- excruciating snip

chomp

short n' sassy

love.

TOO MUCH BOOTY IN THE PANTS

So this is my fifth day home and I think it's safe to say I have fully recovered from my sleep deprived week of finals. But now I need something to occupy my time(there are only so many Bravo marathons I can take) until I'm back in Clemson. What I really need to do is get my tush moving. I am noticing that I have a lil too much booty in the pants if ya know what I mean. I haven't really worked out (other than the occasional wii battle) since last summer. Maybe I should take note of what Fergie so eloquently says in her song Fergalicious..."My body stay vicious. I be up in the gym just workin on my fitness. He's my witness(Ooh wee)" But it seems a little silly for me to join a gym for the three weeks I'll be home--sorry Ferg. Luckily back in my youth (pre Clemmy) I used to be quite the master of home training and I have the As-Seen-On-TV gear to prove it. So it looks like I'm going to have to dust off the ol perfect push ups and get to work. I've already started working out with my favorite 57 year old trainer Gilad. You can hang out with him daily from 10-11 on Fit Tv. So if Regis and Kelly is a repeat you should check it out. Don't let the leotards and legwarmers fool you... he's pretty legit. My buns are forever burning afterwards. Another training tool I can't wait to take out of the closet is my INDO BOARD!!! It's this awesome balance board and it makes me believe that one day I'll just be able to hop on a surfboard and look like this. Like that'll ever happen but hey I can dream.
Well that's my plan...perfect pushups, indo board, and outdated fitness videos. Sounds fool proof right?....I'll let you know how it goes.

Oh and don't worry, as much as I love a fitness infomercial I'll never get a shake weight.

I've become one of those girls....

You know... the one's with obnoxiously long hair.

I hadn't really noticed how long my mane had gotten until recently when I realized that I no longer needed hair elastics because I could literally tie my hair in a knot on top of my head. Now that's TOO LONG. We all know the solution to this problem so why does it warrant a blog post?? I've decided I'm going to donate these red locks of mine to some precious lil ging who's lost theirs. This is kind of a big deal for a girl who got maybe an inch taken off last summer and thought she looked like she had a bob straight out of the 1920's (I can be slightly dramatic at times). I've thought about this decision a lot... obvi. With it being summer, there's no chance I'm going to get trapped in my car during a blizzard so I don't need to have the option of using my hair as a blanket. Also I'm going to be beeboppin all around Clemson as an orientation ambassador and I don't want to scare the incoming freshman with my sweaty, Cousin It hair. Now of course I'm going to miss this hair...especially when I need to tell a flirtatious story and it won't be there for me to flip. Oh I forgot to mention that one of my best friends, Erin, is going to donate her hair too! That is if she doesn't chicken out (which is a stronger possibility then you know). So I made the appointment and Thursday (yes THIS Thursday) is the big day! Until then, I plan on going to as many topless beaches as possible while I still have rib-length hair to offer some coverage.


One more thing.....
Please consider still being my friend even if I come out of this looking like a 4th grade tomboy who wears flannel shirts.

Richard Parker's Christening

To understand the magnitude of this epic adventure you must first hear how it all came about. Now despite what my perpetual milky white skin color says, I actually LOVE LOVE LOVE being outside. It's my absolute fave. You could probably start a small outdoor gear store (with a little Lilly thrown in of course)  out of my closet. For Christmas this year my dad decided to get me a kayak. Sweet gift right? If only I had ever been kayaking before. That's right, I live with the Saluda river in my backyard and have never been kayaking. I mean I go in the river all the time but it's usually in a canoe with a man who bends iron for a living doing the navigating/paddling. So I get this orange water vessel in December and have had to wait 4 months to use it. Talk about torture. But today was the day!!!

The day when all weather and water conditions were going to be perfect for me to try my luck at paddling up river. UM FALSE. We (and by we, obvi i mean my dad, I'm weak) throw our canoe and my precious kayak into the back of the truck and bebop on down the driveway to the boat ramp. Much to my horror, it was packed! WTF people aren't supposed to be around as I attempt to kayak for the first time. This is basically equivalent to p.e. in elementary school when we had to do pull ups as the entire class watched. Talk about traumatizing. I was beginning to have flashbacks to this terrible event in my childhood when we caught a glimpse of the water. Boy was it running high. Secretly I was hoping that there was no way my dad was going to let his lil baby out in that current and we would have to settle for coming back another day (when there were less people to watch me spaz). But no, good ol Greg (my dad) decided that I should at least paddle from one ramp to the other...essentially 30 feet tops. I knew there would be no arguing against this...He had spoken and this was going to happen whether I liked it or not. So I get in the kayak and dad pushes me out into the water. After my small panic attack subsided, I was able to paddle the 6 seconds needed to get me to the other ramp. I SURVIVED. Ecstatic to have completed the task at hand, I was ready to hop out and go on home for the glass of sweet tea one deserves after surviving a life threatening event. My dad had other ideas. He thought I was competent enough to venture out in the big water and paddle up stream. Not what I wanted to hear. Once again I had to look death by drowning in the eye and kick em in the balls. So my dad pushed me off into the water and I started frantically paddling. I soon got the hang of it and was really moving.As if me spazzing in a kayak isn't funny enough please keep in mind that as I'm out in the river paddling, my dad is running alongside me on the bank. It was just like when he taught me to ride a bike back when I was 5. He never left my side the whole time. What a keeper :)

 After I made it to my final destination, I did some spelunkering and turned around and let the current take me back home. Surprisingly enough I still had all of my fingers and toes when I got out of the water. SUCCESS! While I was paddling it became very apparent to me that this kayak of mine needed a name. After thinking long and hard (and polling my friends) After some good contenders Eduardo (Brooks), Maggie (Rach), Ty(christine), Caspian (Lily), Ivan (Jordan), and we can't forget El Tigre (none other than Tracey LeBlanc), I decided to name it....drumroll please....RICHARD PARKER. Richard Parker is this bengal tiger (who was stranded at sea in a boat with a lil boy) in one of my favorite books Life of Pi (read it if you haven't...so so so good). Well me and my Richard Parker survived our first trip in the river. I'm sure we'll have more adventures this summer worth telling your grandkids about.

Back in L-Town...now what?

A rival high school across the dam cleverly once said  "All dirt roads lead to Lexington." This may or may not be true...but I have lived on some dirt road or another the entirety of my existence... just sayin. After getting used to an epic life Where the Blue Ridge Yawns its Greatness in Clemson, I now have to be in Red-nexington. It's requires a lot of adjusting...obvi. Here are just some of the many obstacles I've been having to deal with

1. Both really old and really young people still exist on this planet. Seeing a bunch of toddlers or grandparents can be really shocking to a person who has spent the past nine months with those in a 5 year age range. I find my self saying "Awww" all of the time at random precious little old people just because I haven't seen their species in so long. I also need to work on remembering proper conversation topics to share with this new population. The rents don't quite understand youtube vids and tfln. I guess I'm going to have to start reading the newspaper.
2. I stick out like a sore thumb. Don't get me wrong, I'm all about some individuality (this is the girl who looked like she was ready to go to a shag instead of class everyday) but my Clemson-ness sticks out here. Everyone is not wearing orange or greek t-shirts and when I wear my sweet new ray bans I look like I have a surplus of cool points.
3. All of my needs are not met within a 5 mile radius. Clemson sure is convenient. All I ever need is within walking distance or at most a 6 minute drive (unless I need an Atami fix). Even though there is a Piggly Wiggly right by my house (yes we're very big on the pig here), my dining, clothing, and friend needs are far far away. Lucky for me if I do want to see a movie, I can go and hang out with my middle school friends outside of the glitzy Pastime Pavillion as we wait for our parents to pick us up.
4. There's no tigerstripe. They only accept real life money here and it's hurting my checkbook. Yes, that's right I said checkbook. I am the sole person under the age of 65 who doesn't have a debit card. That's part of the reason I love me some tigerstripe, it saves me the embarrassment of having to ask 'do y'all take checks?' And let's be real...tigerstripe is basically like free money and in L-town I don't have any free money. 
5. Solo dance parties aren't exactly acceptable. At clem clem in Barnett 3D3 spontaneous dance parties happened on the reg. Brooksy provided enough sick jamz and hot beatz to last until our fly moves ran out....so never. I can no longer have such parties because it would be weird for me to dance about in my room by myself not to mention the fact that my dj and dance partner extraordinaire doesn't live with me. 
6. I am now half of a pair of matching pajamas. Brooks and I would lounge around our room in our matching seasonal pjs all day everyday. Wearing ghost pjs in May is just plain awkward if the matching pair isn't seated next to you.