Karma Karma

When I got into that car accident last week, as I said there were like 8 cars involved total. A young girl was in front of me, she walked back to my car and her and I went up to the cop and the trucker together. She was very nice and we chatted a bit while waiting. Her boss kept calling her while we were out there, telling her she needed to get to work and was really just being completely mean about the whole situation. After the SCDOT guy changed her tire she ended up leaving. Her car was definitely messed up but she was worried about losing her job and upsetting her boss. I felt bad that I didn't get her phone number, she said she had called her insurance agency and they knew about the accident and would help her get the truckers info though.

Well about 2 days later I went to the grocery store in the middle of the night and I run into that girl! Very weird because its nowhere near where the accident happened as it was on my 45 minute commute to work. Anyway I asked her if she got her car fixed and she said she did but she had to pay for it since she didn't have an incident report from the police. I got her phone number this time and told her I would text her the truckers insurance info and the claim number. I was happy that when I gave my statements I made sure to tell them about her just in case she tried to call in. She texted me the next day thanking me, they covered all of her costs! Felt good to know I was able to help her and it was so strange how we ran into each other so randomly!

But that's not all! I was out Monday night with some friends and I met a girl who worked where this girl worked. I told her about what happened and she already knew the story, she's friends with the girl from the accident! What a small world.

Today I get my car back from the body shop. I really hope that its fixed right, I'm going to run over to the dealership and have my mechanic take a quick look at it to make sure its all good. It'll be nice to have my car back, I like the rental and all but I'm pretty attached to my own car.

Last week I booked my trip to Japan! Leaving April 17th. I really can't wait. I've never been to a foreign county and I can't wait to see Brandon again. I am anxious about the long travel alone but I am sure I'll be fine. I'll bring lotsa DS games and my Zune along. Scribblenauts can keep me entertained for long periods of time, haha.

I also booked a trip to Myrtle Beach at the end of March for Nicole and I. We're going to a beer fest, she's getting a piercing in her ear like mine and we're going to go parasailing! This is the beginning of what is probably going to be another good year for travel! I am looking at booking a flight to Illinois next month so I can just get that out of the way. I haven't been home since 2008, looking forward to seeing my family again!

Going to sing Karoke tonight with a couple girls I met on Monday. Hope we have a good time!

How weird is it that my car was ruined by a driveshaft just days before LOST premiers. Charlie is my favorite character.

LOST

Where stuff happens and junk.

2010 is testing me.

Friday at work was very overwhelming and busy, I had a ton of things to do and right at the end of the day I made a mistake that, while fixable, was incredibly embarrassing. Wore out and wanting nothing more than to go home and relax with a cold drink I get home to my mom crying. My great grandmother wasn't doing well and she wanted to leave for Illinois Sunday to see her before she passed. Mom was planning on moving but not until next week. 15 minutes after hearing this news, great grandma passed away.

I did some shopping Saturday to get my mind off things. Sometimes its nice when you're feeling bad to buy something new that makes you feel pretty. I got some shirts and jeans. I went out Saturday night and had a good time, got a little carried away but I don't do that very often so I'm not going to beat myself up about it. Needless to say I slept pretty much all day Sunday.

Ready to start fresh and put the last few days behind me, I leave for work Monday morning. I was headed down I-26 near 378 in Lexington and the drive shaft came out from under an 18 wheeler. Seeing the 2 cars ahead of me hit the thing and go flying off the road with popped tires I thought I would be smart and straddle it. Only to find out it was taller than I thought, it ruined my car. After I pulled over I saw that this thing had caused a lot of issues for other drivers too. It took the police officer like 3 hours to get everyone's incident report filled out. He was so nice, he let me sit in his car while he filled out everything because my car wouldn't run and it was really cold outside. Finally, the tow truck got there and brought me to the body shop and enterprise picked me up with a cute, sporty little rental that I totally don’t mind driving for the next week or so. Luckily, the truckers insurance is covering everything and I will be well on my way by the end of the week (hopefully).

Yes it has been an eventful few days. I think I will be taking it easy for the next week or so.

Overdramatic Much?

 

---

From: Chris M.  

Sent: Thursday, January 28, 2010 11:24 AM
To: Stephanie
Subject:

 

Hi, we have talked briefly before my name is Chris, perhaps you remember me? Anyways I just thought I would drop you a line to see how you are doing and to point out that you are getting an F for lack of participation today. If it were possible to give a grade lower than an F I would do this.

 

If there was someway I could tell the world how much your conversational skills suck I would do that. If I could afford a commercial during the super bowl I would make that commercial about how absolutely pathetic you are with the talking to me today AND I would show it as many times as time would allow. Just sayin

 

Tl;dr its just a rant.

I've been tossing this around in my head awhile and mentioning it to a few people here and there who thinks its crazy that this even bothers me but I have to say it. I hate dual facebook profiles. You know where a boyfriend and girlfriend or a husband and wife make one profile for both people "bob and nancy smith" instead of one for bob and one for nancy. It bugs me for 2 reasons because when I see them I think either 1. one of these people does not have their own personal identity (surprise its usually the woman) or 2. one of these people is incredibly insecure and can't stand wondering who the other is talking to and such. And both of these things are my 2 biggest fears about being in a relationship.

Over the last few years I've worked really hard at finding my own identity again, separate from Adam and then separate from Tim. For some reason in both relationships I let them tell me what I should and shouldn't be interested in. Adam telling me not to be a teacher and make more money (clearly for his own benefit) and Tim talking down about virtually every idea I ever had. I found myself making choices based on how I thought they would react to them and that's what made me so unhappy. Its great to have common interests, in fact its better that way because you have more things to enjoy together. But sometimes a person is going to like things the other person doesn't like and it means you just need to support them and let them enjoy what makes them happy.

I don't have to go into much detail about the jealousy thing, most people have experienced it. I've been in one relationship my whole life where the person I was with was not at all jealous and it was fantastic. I am not a jealous person and its great when you are with someone who feels the same way.

I know its just facebook and the whole thing is kind of dumb anyway, but I really do think it says something negative about you and about your relationship when you can't establish your own profile with your own friends.

You know, some people say life is short and that you could get hit by a bus at any moment and that you have to live each day like it's your last. Bullshit. Life is long. You're probably not gonna get hit by a bus. And you're gonna have to live with the choices you make for the next fifty years. 

Pants on the ground

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r1l7f4Q6sTM

10 minutes later he's an internet sensation. Lookin like a fool with
your pants on the ground. Lol Sent from my BlackBerry Smartphone
provided by Alltel

One handed blog post

Apparently I threatened 2010 to kick butt so much that it kicked my butt for being cocky. I fell Saturday and broke my elbow! So here I type slowly pecking away with one hand. Needless to say this will be a short post.

Saturday night Nicole, Allison and I went out. First we had dinner at Julia's in Columbia (fantastic German food btw), then we went to the Vista. Neither of them seemed to be having any fun, the bars were crowded and it just wasn’t their scene. Nicole wanted to go to the Skyline. I don’t know, I cant decide if it’s the country music, line dancing, lack of culture, lack of decent beer or lack of decent crowd that I don’t like but I hate the Skyline. Not to mention it’s a smoking bar so you leave stinking every time. But alas, we went. Nicole found us a table in the farthest corner of the bar so I had to get up and find some poor unsuspecting man to talk into giving up his seats. That was easy enough, not sure his buddies were thrilled when they got back though. We got a good spot right next to the stage though. People watching was the best part of that night.

Brandon finally got his package. But not before the USPS and International Postmaster got a piece if my mind lol. I was stressed, his expensive helmet cam was in there! I'm happy he's got it now though, one less thing to stress over :)

also

It appears my birthday is also the same as Stephen Hawking. COOL!

I sent a package to Brandon in Japan 17 days ago. 12 if you take away the days that the mail didn't run. At any rate its been way too long and I'm worried about it. I emailed the USPS but they said since its going to an APO that its no longer in their jurisdiction. So I had to mail a letter to some agency in Virginia asking them to locate it. I have something else to send him but I'm afraid to now!!

Today is my birthday! I have no plans so far. I assume I'll be going out and finding the best happy birthday drink specials! Its my moms birthday too so I suppose I'll be going out with her. Mom bought me a haircut/color for my birthday. Its really cute, short with bangs and dark brown with some caramel colored highlights. Very pretty.

Last night my friend Waylon called me and helped me set up a training routine for the gym. Waylon is a personal trainer but he lives in Illinois so he's trying to help me over the phone. I have a list of exercises to do on particular days, how to do them and everything. He also talked to me about how we build muscle and how different types of workouts do different things for your body. I'm not going to type all of it out here but its really great to have someone to be able to ask questions and get ideas from. I take classes in the evenings, whatever is going on in the 6:45 timeslot after my workout is done. I like doing the BodyPump class at Golds but they moved the schedule around and last night in its time slot was BodyCombat. Something new for me but it looked fun, karate, kickboxing and taichi. That class was TOUGH omg!! Not only was is constant moving, jumping and running but there were a lot of moves you had to learn and then coordinate quickly. I worked HARD. I'm definitely going back but its probably going to take me a few classes to be able to follow the moves!! In 6 weeks I will report back to Waylon and he is going to adjust my routine so my muscles don't get used to what I'm doing. YAY for free personal trainer :P

Me: My birthday is 1-8-81 it’s a palindrome!
Vince: Oh neat, that explains your personality!
Me: Really? What's that mean?
Vince: I don't know I just made that up.

My birthday is Friday! Mom gave me a gift certificate to get my hair done. I haven't had it cut in months so I'm going today, super excited. Saturday we're going out to dinner with some friends. German food at Julia's, I love that place. I have no plans for my actual birthday yet but I'm sure it is going to be going out somewhere. We shall see.

Mom and I decided to go out Saturday night. We tried a new place since the regular place wasn't very busy. They had karaoke and a girl I used to work with was there so we stayed. Sitting at the bar chatting away I can feel the person behind me starting at me. Trying to ignore it I swear I can hear him breathing. So mom tells me "steph I think that guy behind you wants your attention". At this point I haven't even looked to see him because I'm kinda creeped out by the vibe I was getting from his piercing eyes.

"he's creepy isn't he?"
"yep"
"give him a dirty look so he'll quit"
My mom's incapable of giving dirty looks apparently so she says "stop staring at her". Apparently that meant, stop staring and talk to her. So creepy boy in his Guns n' Roses t-shirt moves to the seat right next to me. Yes, I could feel him staring and hear him breathing from 2 seats away and now I can smell him too. Essence of stale cigarette with a hint of parents basement is what I would guess he smelled like. So I turn my back to him and try to ignore the fact that he's now trying to join in our conversation. I was telling mom I really wanted to sing karaoke so creepy boy practically falls out of his chair running to find a song book. It was at that point that we decided to leave. He tried to get my phone number and I was really polite saying no but he acted like it was the biggest shock he'd ever heard, throwing his hands into the air and staring at me like I must be nuts.

Also, next time there's karaoke I am going to sing Lita Ford's Kiss me Deadly.

"You may not be her first, her last, or her only. She loved before she may love again. But if she loves you now, what else matters? She's not perfect - you aren't either, and the two of you may never be perfect together but if she can make you laugh, cause you to think twice, and admit to being human and making mistakes, hold onto her and give her the most you can. She may not be thinking about you every second of the day, but she will give you a part of her that she knows you can break - her heart. So don't hurt her, don't change her, don't analyze and don't expect more than she can give. Smile when she makes you happy, let her know when she makes you mad, and miss her when she's not there."

-Bob Marley

Shynnee.com

How cool is this? Brandon bought me Shynnee.com! I feel so cool and special :) It directs you to this blog. Now I feel like I should put more important awesome things here. Then again, everything I say is important and awesome :P

He also sent me a big box of cool Japanese things! Some of my favorite items: everything chocolate, a t-shirt that looks like I'm wearing a health kit from Left 4 Dead, Hibiscus flowers you put in a glass of champagne, energy drink that is in a packet that looks like donated blood, a stuffed tank puppy I can dress, dried fish and nuts, neat little brew your own coffee packs and an MRE that he's going to make me eat eventually. Ok that wasn't just some of my favorite things that was everything. I loved it all! Meltykisses are officially my favorite chocolates ever.

I got my brother the MW2 Combat Controller for his PS3. He's gonna be so happy. I see him look it up online everyday and we went to Best Buy and he showed it to me at least a dozen times. I found a "collectors edition" at GameStop, it comes in a special case. Not that it'll ever go into the case, kid plays 24/7! I let Shannon open her plush sushi and edamame keychain because she was having a bad day the other day and it put her in a good mood.

We're going to see Avatar for Christmas tomorrow! I'm stoked, everyone says the movie is great. They are actually playing a 3D version we're going to try and get into. Then moms making Christmas Dinner. I'm a little sad its not ham but she promised me ham for New Years. Have I mentioned before that I have an obsession with ham? The stuff is fantastic. Can't get enough!

The Gift

I went to a Christmas Party last night. At the party I was in charge of the games. We played a getting to know you game where I had everyone write down something about themselves nobody would know. Then we all had to guess who's who. It was fun. My other game was you take a pair of panty hose (everyone freaked when I started handing out panty hose by the way) and blow up balloons, first person who fills their hose all the way puts their "antlers" on wins. Everyone had fun with it.

We also did a Chinese gift exchange. Where everyone draws a number and when its your turn you can choose a gift or steal someone else's. Well I got to my turn and there were some so-so gifts out there so I decided to take my chances at the table. I picked this cute cloth bag with candy canes on it. Opened it up and there was some candles and candy and a book. YAY! I love books! The book was a bible..a camouflage bible.

I get that I live in the south and when it comes to things like this I am the minority, but here's the thing about holy roller that thought it'd be a good idea to give a gift like that. When we were playing the getting to know you game her secret about herself was : "I like to stay out dancing until early morning." When asked "oh, what kind of dancing do you like?" her reply? "Depends on which bar I'm at".

Reminds me of Jim Gaffigan "can we hurry this along, I've got some sinnin' to do".

2009 of awesomeness

2009 rocked for me. Looking back I can name one or 2 things that stood out and made each month awesome. I can only hope to keep the momentum through 2010. Here's some highlights from my 2009:

January-2 weeks spent in North Carolina for training for my awesome new job
February-2 more weeks in NC and a trip to Virginia beach to see my sister!
March-Trip to Myrtle Beach with Lindsy and Nicole for Lindsy's bday.
April-Lindsy and mom at my place all month, bonfire nights out in Batesburg
May-Trip to Hawaii to see Brandon!
June-Stayed at the Lake in an awesome cabin with friends.
July-4th of July pool party at my place and a fun trip to Savanna, GA!
August-Trip to Charlotte, saw a live band. Amazing dinner at my fav place, PF Changs. Trip to AL for work.
September-Cody moved in. hadn't seen my brother in a YEAR. Trip to VA to visit Lindsy and Jake
October-Charleston with Brandon, awesome comedy club! Halloween party, dressed as Marilyn Monroe
November-Evening at the State Fair, Thanksgiving full of yum and joined Golds Gym and the bowling team!
December-Visit from Lindsy, photo shoot with her and cody, christmas parties and CHRISTMAS!

I met tons of new people this year and tried out lots of new things. I learned a lot about myself and the things that I enjoy.

 I lived my life this year and it was amazing.

My brother, sister and myself went to get photos done last weekend. My sister Lindsy drove down from Virginia with her GIGANTIC dog Sampson. He's a German Shepherd. He also tortured Tank the whole time. Sampson just wanted to play and Tank just wanted to not have his head in Sam's mouth. Good times.

The photos turned out really good. We did some traditional smile and pose ones and then we got to do some silly ones too. One where we were fighting and one where my sister and I were kissing my brother and he was rolling his eyes. Totally cute. Its part of our Christmas gift to our dad. He's gonna love it. I posted them on Facebook and Myspace.

We tried to have dinner at my all time favorite place to eat Mikinos but they were closed for the holidays. Musta went on vacation. So we went to Copper River instead. I'd never eaten there, it was awesome! Not to mention the service was really great. Our waiter was an asian guy named Herman which I thought was kind of silly but it helped me remember his name. He was fun and gave great service, which is always important to me.

We wanted to go see the Christmas lights in Sumter at Swan Lake but it was late and that’s a long drive. I'm going sometime this week I think. I've seen photos on the website, it looks really pretty. I'm going to bring my camera and see if I can get some photos. I think if I just turn the flash off it'll turn out pretty cool. We shall see!!

I'm really excited about the Christmas gift I got Shan. She's obsessed with eating sushi and I found some plush Sushi on thinkgeek.com (yes like a stuffed sushi pillow thing) so I got her that along with an edamame keychain, the little pea pops up. Its adorable. I wasn't sure what to get Brandon so I just filled a box with random things that I thought he might like. I can't wait for my brother to get his, I got him Scribblenauts. I got my dad a bar set that looks like a chemistry set! Totally awesome. I'm in love with thinkgeek.com by the way. Its ok that I spilled my gifts here, none of those people read my blog ;)

 

Nonsense and rambling.

I really like that I can email my blogs in now. So I can just ramble and compile my blog throughout the day and send when I've run out of things to say. Enjoy!

I joined a bowling league for something to do on Monday nights. I'm a pretty horrible bowler but its just a fun league and you get a free bowling ball for joining. Last night they gave us coupons for Christmas so now I have a big book of bowling coupons. I decided to take my tellers sometime, they are pretty excited about that.

Tonight at the gym is shoulders. My 2 favorite things to work out are shoulders and back. I think because for the most part my shoulders and back always hurt, everyday. So I know when I build some muscle there they will likely start to feel better. Plus all the exercises I do for them get the muscles hot and stretched out so the pain goes away for awhile while I'm working out.

Man I can't believe the year is almost over! 2009 was definitely a big year for me, so many changes and so many awesome things happening for me. I think I'll make an end of year look back post, I need to make a list first. I already have a pretty exciting 2010, looking at flights to Japan today. Its like 6 months off and Brandon has our whole trip mapped out almost! My sister is turning 21 in March and we're planning a vacation for that.

Final note-It is my personal opinion that women should never wear camouflage. Ever.

The Jewelry

I moved recently to a bigger apartment. I've been living in a 500 sqft place so you can imagine that I don't actually own that many things. I don't collect anything so the stuff that I do own is either meaningful or useful or both. As I was moving I noticed that some of my jewelry was missing. These are items I don't wear because they are expensive and I don’t want to mess them up. I didn't stress about it because I thought maybe my mother had put it into her safe. When she got back I had her look inside just to make sure and it wasn't there.

I'm missing:
Diamond Earrings
Gold Garnet and Diamond Ring
Gold band with hearts shaped into the band
Gold and Pearl Necklace
Silver ring with blue, green and purple colored diamonds in it.
Heart shaped gold ring with diamond chips in it

I placed an ad on Craigslist and I have been looking at local pawn shops, I filed a police report and a claim with my renters insurance. Yea they will give me some cash, but man. I have so many cool expensive things in my apartment, why my family jewelry?? I'd trade everything I own to get that stuff back, its simply not replaceable. I am positive that it was workers coming into my apartment for various reasons. I have had one person stay the night in my apartment and I'm positive that person 1. wasn't alone in my bedroom and 2. wouldn't steal from me for any reason. I'm sick over this.

Mustachio!

Played some Left 4 Dead 2 the other night with Nick, Jon and AJ. We found a Whack-a-Mole type game in the Dark Carnival map. It was called Whack-a-Stache and instead of moles popping up it was pistachios with mustaches! When they popped out they yelled "Mustachio!". Very cute and I've been saying Mustachio! for days now. You get an achievement for beating the Whack-a-Stache game, which is basically the 4 of us shooting at the thing each time one popped out. Still loving that game.

Brandon got me Serious Sam:HD and I've been playing that today. Its a Doom style FPS game. I haven't tried Multiplayer yet but the Single Player is fun, I like the monsters and so far my favorite are these headless guys that come running at you screaming and they have bombs on their hands. If they get too close they explode on you. I just like how they yell AHHHHHHH!

Yesterday mom and I went shopping. I got most of my Christmas gifts online this year so besides the few things I needed to pick up for local people I mostly shopped for myself. Old Navy had a sweater sale, too bad when I got to the counter only 1 of the three I chose were actually on sale. I had already fallen in love with them so I got them anyway. After shopping we decided to grab a beer before going home so we stopped at Carolina Ale House. It was fun but as the bar area got more crowded we realized we were the only women in the place and that was attracting much unwanted attention and more drinks than we could handle, so we left and went to the comfort spot, McCareys.

Nicole had a purse party yesterday afternoon. I've never been to one before but it was neat. Very similar to Pampered Chef, PartyLite and all those other shop at home companies. They were selling purses, totes, and accessories. I got my sister a cute handbag and I bought myself a organizing tote. Its got lots of pockets and places to put things and the fabric is super cool. I'll probably use it for a gym bag or to put my sewing stuff in. Christmas time really makes the girl come out in me. haha.

Speaking of the gym, I haven't updated my okfinefinefine blog because its redundant. I'll probably end up mentioning everything I do here and since I joined bodybuilding.com to track my measurements theres no point to a separate blog. I'll delete it soon. I started going to classes at the gym now, Monday mornings is Boot Camp, Wednesdays BodyPump (favorite so far) and Saturday is BodyStep. Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday I do regular workouts and cardio still. Besides the fact that my entire body aches pretty much all the time I am starting to feel stronger already. My first 30 day measure date is the 11th, this coming Friday. I am confident I will see a difference.