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.

The Blog Bug

As if Facebook and Twitter weren't enough, now I've been bitten by the blog bug too. I guess it all started when my lovely friend Rachael and I in a fit of procrastination started looking at random blogs of any people we knew. Of course we liked to read one's about wedding plans but we especially like to look at those of the sweet little families we know. Precious baby pictures never get old! Also I just recently got on a Pastor Perry Noble kick....seriously good stuff there check it out, but nothing can compare to The Pioneer Woman. My mom got me her cookbook for Christmas on a whim because it reminded her of me. Apparently mom does know best. Rach discovered The Pioneer Woman's blog this week and I've been obsessed ever since.I basically want to be her when I grow up. I can see so much of myself in her and it's not just because she has red hair and wears carmex all the time.On her blog she writes the love story of her and her husband ( she refers to him as Marlboro Man, cute right?) I don't want to give any of the juicy deets away because you have to read it for yourself but know that it's better than any movie (yes, even The Notebook...THAT GOOD). I was "working" in the Orientation office today and looked like a total nutcase sitting in an office all by myself smiling, giggling, and even tearing up as I read it. Now I'm not the only crazy one,  all of my friends have been glued to their computer screens waiting to find out what happens in the story of The Pioneer Woman and her Marlboro Man. Ree writes in a way that speaks to each of us. And as for my blog..... even though I'm not planning a wedding, have any cute baby pics, or an epic love story to tell, I'll try my very best to be entertaining nonetheless :)

Just to make sure you go and read it,  here's one of my favorite quotes from The Pioneer Woman thus far.

"He held my heart entirely in his hands, this cowboy of mine, and for the first time in my life, despite everything I’d ever believed about independence and feminism and emotional autonomy, I knew I’d be utterly incomplete without him."

Told ya it was good stuff! Now check it out!!! Confessions of a Pioneer Woman