Day 24: The Top Three....

Today’s challenge is to name my top three worst traits. Does that actually sound fun to anybody? Figuring out my three biggest flaws and putting them on display for the whole world isn’t really at the top of my list of great ways to spend an afternoon, but I suppose I’ll give it a shot. Don’t judge.

1.)    I overthink everything. And I do mean everything. Whether it’s a school paper, a fight with a friend, or whatever else, I am always thinking and re-thinking about it. I can talk myself into the worst possible scenario every time, which probably wouldn’t be such a bad thing if I could at least manage to talk myself back out of them. But I haven’t quite mastered that art yet, so right now, I just overthink. Apparently, this is my life's motto -->

2.)   I have a very difficult time trusting people. And also, I trust people too much. And even though those two statements probably seem mutually exclusive, or at the very least contradictory, they’re both very true. I am a pretty nice person…I’m never mean on purpose, I am not vindictive, I really try to treat people nicely all of the time (I fail at that, a lot, but I do try). So being devious, dishonest, or mean doesn’t really occur to me as something I could do, or something that someone else might do to me, which is how the whole “trusting too easily” thing happens. However, since I trust easily, as one might suspect would happen, I am often mistreated, which only serves to make me start to expect it. So I trust people, hoping that I’ll be proven right, but still expecting to be hurt, which is a weird kind of circle/non-circle in my head that shouldn’t make sense to anyone because it’s kind of crazy, but somehow makes sense to me. The problem is that sometimes, due to my overthinking and general distrust of most people, I think I bring some of the problems I experience on myself, because I tend to go looking for trouble where there is none.

3.)   I have been known, at times, to act like I’m perfect, and everyone else is wrong. It was recently brought to my attention that sometimes I act like a victim, which stung because a.) no one really likes to hear that about themselves, and b.) I think it’s actually true. Obviously, I don’t mean to do this, but the fact remains that I do have a tendency to think of myself as being always right, and anyone who disagrees with me or wrongs me is always wrong. Such is not actually the case, however. 

Sometimes I really need to just get my head out of my own behind and take a good long look in the mirror before I start pointing fingers at everybody else. I am not always wrong, but neither am I always right, and I really need to make sure I don’t come across to people like I think I am better or more right than they are. And I need to seriously examine my own behavior before I confront anyone else about theirs, so I don’t end up accusing someone of some terrible “crime” without realizing that I myself do the exact same thing.

What do you think are your biggest flaws? Leave me a link to your post in the comments!

Day 23: School's Out!

I was home-educated all the way up until college, and was blessed to receive a pretty excellent education. However, when I got to college, I quickly learned a lot of other things that I did not learn in “school”. And, subsequently, when I left college, the education-by-necessity continued. Ten years later, I’ve learned a lot of things, and even though I’m sure it would have been a lot easier had I had the knowledge ahead of time, I’m still grateful that I know it now.

-          Parallel parking really isn’t that hard. I know we all learned it in Driver’s Ed, but seriously, there is nothing like trying to get a car into a space that is maybe five inches longer than the car itself to teach you how to do it. Add in some packed snow in the streets, and, if you’re lucky, a speed bump smack dab in the middle of the only empty space within a six-block radius, and you’ll become a pro in no time flat. Promise.

-          It really is possible to survive comfortably on a steady diet of Chipotle and pasta with tomato juice. Not only possible, but delicious.

-          Watches are entirely unnecessary. Planners, on the other hand, are not. Get a good planner, and stick with it, otherwise your life will blow up in your face. (I've been using a basic planner I found at Barnes and Noble for the past few years, but I think next time I buy a planner, I'm going to buy an Erin Condren one, since I've read a lot of rave reviews!)

-          Showering every day, while always preferable, is definitely NOT required. Keep some wet wipes, deodorant, dry shampoo, and a hair tie and a headband with you, and you can handle anything. A little bit of perfume never hurts, either, so long as it’s not overpowering.

-          Box hair colors are really silly. Save up some money and get your hair done right at a salon if you really want it, or better yet, save all the money and just leave your hair the way it is. (I feel like in the interest of honesty, I should confess that even though I know this, I have still never gotten my hair colored in an actual salon, and always use box dyes. It’s terrible, I know.)

-          Being able to type fast is a really, really, really good thing. There’s never a time when being able to fly across a keyboard will be detrimental.

-          Knowing how to take good and efficient notes is an absolute MUST, whether you’re taking notes in a lecture or from a book. Find a method that makes sense to you, and use it. Always. Also, learn how to make efficient to-do lists, perhaps in the very necessary planner that was mentioned earlier.

-     Drink water like you’re getting paid to do it. You’ll never regret being really hydrated, but you will, at some point, regret not being hydrated. That point of regret might come after a night of heavy drinking, or it might come at 10:30 in the morning when your head hurts so bad that you want to stab yourself in the eye with a pencil. Either way, water is never a bad thing.

-          Eating at midnight really is okay if you’re hungry. Or sometimes even if you’re not. You may not have the world’s hottest body, but in the event that looking like a Victoria’s Secret model after the pictures have been airbrushed is not at the top of your list of things to do, then eat up.

What do you know? 

Day 22: Ranting and Raving..

Quick note: I decided I'm going to skip a few days in the blogging challenge. Partly because I'm already ridiculously behind and don't really have the time to catch up (okay, technically, that's a lie..I do have the time), but mostly because they're either similar to things I've already done, or because I just don't want to do them. So here are the three that I'm skipping:

Day 19, Sunday: Five of your favorite blogs and what you love about them - because I already did something exactly like this on Day 5, and I'm not particularly in the mood to do it again. 
Day 20, Monday: Get real. Share something you're struggling with right now - this one I'm skipping because I just shared a difficulty!! How many of my secrets do you people need to know?!
Day 21, Tuesday: A list of links to your favorite posts in your archives - and this one I'm skipping because I don't think I have enough posts to pick out my favorites. Maybe one day next year. 

...MOVING ON...

Today's challenge is to rant, about anything. I was thinking about doing only a singular rant, and then I realized that a lot of things annoy me, so I’m just going to rant about a bunch of annoying things(in no particular order). I’m embarrassingly excited about doing this.

-          People who don’t park straight. I mean seriously. You can’t take a second longer to make sure your car is straight in the space, and you’re not overflowing into the spaces around you? Sheesh.

-          People who talk loudly on their cell phones in libraries and book stores. I’m a bit more wiling to forgive it in a book store, since that is a retail location, but I’m not at all willing to do forgive that sort of nonsense in a library. I do understand that sometimes life happens and calls need to be made/taken but for crying out loud, keep your voice down.

-          When people refuse to take responsibility for their own behavior, or admit that they’re wrong. There is never shame in accepting responsibility. On the contrary, accepting responsibility for your behavior and admitting when you’ve made a mistake takes bravery and strength. I wish more people could see that.

-          When people refuse to accept another’s persons tastes/opinions as valid. So what if you hate romantic comedies or shopping or the color pink, or think more liberally than I do? Your different opinions are no less legitimate to me than my own, so why are mine so wrong to you?

-          Keeping Up With the Kardashians. Honestly, Kim and the whole family just need to show themselves to the door already, and be done. And while I applaud Kim’s ability to parley her sex tape into fame and fortune for her whole family, I’m really sick of them.

-          People who can’t manage to learn basic spelling and grammar, and are always spelling words incorrectly, or using the wrong one entirely. Some of the worst ones – your/you’re, their/they’re/there, pair/pear….and when people spell it “definately” instead of “definitely”.

What things make you crazy?

Confessional Friday: {Link-Up}

Today I am linking up with Leslie from A Blonde Ambition for Confessional Friday!

1.)    I confess that I am borderline terrified of passing semi-trucks on the road. I get scared they will run right over my car and kill me in some really painful awful way, since they’re huge and I’m not. When I was working for a law firm a few years ago, we worked on a case where a semi-truck had done exactly that – changed lanes over onto another vehicle. The top of the car got ripped off, and everybody in the car died. Yuck.

2.)   I confess that I don’t like to subscribe to the whole “food for fuel” notion. I mean, it’s a great idea in theory…being healthy, only eating the things your body needs, instead of stuffing it full of things it doesn’t… but the truth is, so many of the things that my body doesn’t need per se taste really good. So I eat them. And I love it.

3.)   I confess that I still read Cosmopolitan. There’s no real reason for this, other than that somehow, I have been subscribed to the magazine for almost seven years now, but have never once actually purchased a subscription. I’m not sure what that’s about, but either way, I still get it in my mailbox every month, so I figure I may as well read it. It’s really like getting the exact same magazine every month, just with a different celebrity on the cover, though, so that’s annoying.

4.)   I confess that I have gotten really lazy/terrible at putting things in my planner. I feel like right now, while I’m out of a job and everything, that my life is just very ho-hum, and there’s not really much differentiation between my days, so I don’t write stuff down. I should really start doing that again, and making myself do interesting things with my days, lest I succumb to couch-potato-ness.

5.)   I confess that I love driving long distances. I roll the windows town, turn the music up, throw my little foot up on the dashboard, and cruise. I like the feeling of the wind in my hair, I like singing at the top of my lungs, I like watching the road disappear beneath me. Going for a long drive is my favorite way to clear my head.

6.)   I confess that the Blog Every Day in May Challenge is a lot harder than I thought it was going to be. Not only is it tough for me to come up with posts for some of the prompts, but in the off chance you haven’t noticed, I’m somewhat terrible at consistent posting. Hopefully I’ll get better at it as we continue here, but I won’t hold my breath. I’ll probably be finishing up the challenge in June.

What are your confessions? 

Days 17 & 18: Read It. You Know You Wanna.

Why am I so bad at keeping up with this? Honestly, you'd think I'd be doing better, especially since one of my goals for May was to blog four times a week. Ha. Fail. 

Anyway, so I'm trying to catch up again, even though I'm a whopping week behind, so I'm combining two posts into one. Cheers. 

Day 17: A Favorite Photo 
This gem is of me and my littlest baby sister, taken at family Christmas 2012. She and I actually hosted Christmas in our apartment last year, which sounds a lot more intense than it was. Basically,one of my brothers and his wife stayed with us, and the whole gang helped out with cooking (although I made the pot roast...delicious, by the way). The hardest part of the whole gig was finding a place for everyone to sit, and keeping our mini Christmas tree upright on the coffee table. 

I love this picture because I look so happy, and because I was having so much fun that day! And also, I love the look on Jolynn's face. She is basically one of the cutest people in the world, and she makes any picture better just by being in it. :) 





Day 18: A Story From My Childhood

I swam competitively on a summer community swim team for my entire growing up life. It was great... I got a chance to get out of the house, make some new friends, spend time in the sun. Honestly, I loved it. And I was actually pretty good, too, at least until I hit puberty and all of a sudden didn't know how to handle my body in the water. It took a couple years to figure that out, but that's another story. 

Anyway, I always competed in five events at every swim meet - I swam butterfly in the medley relay and participated in the freestyle relay, and then swam freestyle, backstroke, and butterfly (my favorite) in the individual events. Sometimes I'd compete in the individual medley, too, but I am terrible at breast stroke, so I would always lose time on that stroke. Anyway, the point here is that by the end of the meet, after four other races, I was usually pretty tired. 

One time, we were competing against Richland Center, and the meet was really close. I was 13, and was swimming anchor in the freestyle relay. Our team had always had a pretty intense rivalry with the RC girls, so we really wanted to win. I was tired from my previous races, but was determined to still do everything I could to win the relay. 

By the time it was my turn, my team was about one body length behind the RC team. We were conveniently assigned to lanes next to each other, so I was able to keep an eye on my competition. I dove in, and gave it everything I had. By the turn, I had almost caught up with Megan (the really tall, really lean, really good anchor for the RC team), but was still just a little bit behind, and I was exhausted. After I finished the turn and started back the other way, I was breathing towards the spectator side of the pool, where all the parents were sitting, and where my coach was running along the side of the pool. Somehow I could hear everybody cheering for me, even through the noise and splashing. 

All of a sudden, I had a surge of energy. I started kicking harder, and I could feel the muscles in my arms working harder with each stroke. I caught up with Megan about halfway across the pool, and it was ON. 

The energy in the pool area was electric. I could hear people screaming and cheering, could feel the adrenaline coursing through my body. I stopped breathing... I just dug in, kicking and moving my arms as fast as I could. I watched Megan, and sensed that she was experiencing the same thing, was motivated by the same energy as I was. 

We both gave it everything we had, and Megan and I touched the wall at what looked to be exactly the same time. We both lingered in the pool for a minute, catching our breath and congratulating each other on a great race while the timers conferred. It seemed like the whole place was holding its breath. 

And then.... the timers determined that I had won the race by one one-hundredth of a second. My team, my coach, my parents went crazy, screaming and cheering and clapping. It was incredible.

There were other dramatic races in my years as a swimmer - some that I won, some that I lost. But that race has always stuck out in my mind as special. I don't know if its because of how close it was, because of the rivalry we had with the other team, or if it was something else. Either way, it's one of my favorite swimming memories.