I always forget I was in this:

a real "must-see!"

"He loves snails..."

WiLd GoOsE ChAsE

Today I didn't have to go to work because we had a snow day. I called my friend Steven to see what he was up to, and he was so happy to hear from me because his car had just broken down. He said, "Oh thank god you called me! My car just ran outta gas on West End! I'm standin' in front of SunTan City wearin' a bathrobe, and Stella's in the back seat!" (Stella is the overly-affectionate, half American Bulldog, half pitbull that belongs to his roommate. Very rambunctious dog--shouldn't be left alone, much less in a car, for lengthy periods).

I agreed to go pick him up, so I finally got there during the lunch rush hour, scooped him up, and after he revealed to me that he had left his wallet at home, I drove to the gas station, got him a gas can, filled it up with gas, and took it back to his car. He filled it up, and still it didn't start. Because of the awkward street parking spot he had, it wasn't an option to find someone with jumper cables, so I agreed to call AAA for him.

After waiting on AAA for two hours and crossing the street to eat at Qdoba while we waited, AAA finally arrived, checked the car, and said there was no problem with the battery. But still, the car wouldn't start, even after he did the fiddly tests with the battery machine.

Finally, he took a screwdriver and dinged around under the hood for awhile--literally banging on random parts of the engine and whatnot, until he told Steven to turn the ignition again, and magically the car started.

"Whatever you do, DO NOT TURN THE CAR OFF," the AAA man said to Steven. He had a messed up starter or something, the man suspected, and Steven should get it replaced immediately.

At that point, it was time to take Stella back home because she'd been in the car for 3 hours and Steven had taken my leftover nachos from me and fed them to her in the backseat, so he suspected she was going to vomit soon.

I thanked the man, bid Steven adieu, and made my way to my car. Approximately 2 minutes later, I received a phone call from Steven, who was giggling and said, "I've got somethin' to tell yew. It's so bad I almost don't wanna say it. You're just gonna die...."

I'm thinking, "Oh great. He turned the car off and now I'm gonna have to call AAA again to run back and fix it."

Nope.

Apparently, Steven just didn't have the car in park when he tried to start it the first time, which caused the initial problem. It wasn't until the AAA man told him the second time to start the car that Steven realized what had happened, but rather than cause himself any embarrassment, or let me/the AAA man know we'd wasted 3 hours for nothing, he just played along... until 3 pm...when he realized what he'd done...

That was a fun thing to do on my snow day...

New Years Resolutions

1) not waste entire days with naps//only take naps when absolutely vital

2) do not waste money/calories/time by eating numerous meals in between regularly scheduled meals (i.e. don't eat four pieces of pizza at 5 and then eat a full-course dinner at 7pm). This happens semi-regularly...

3) when large amounts of free time are presented, spend that time doing productive things like reading a book or an informative article as opposed to watching intellectually un-stimulating things online

4) lessen my procrastination aka don't put off realistic and necessary plans/responsibilities for until the last damn second.

5) Save money to move far far away, which means stretching small amounts of money like $20 across a week... I wasted some time yesterday watching videos about how to eat cheaply and some grocery shopping tricks... one lady suggested eating a lot of sardines and tuna... no thank you.

NY resolutions already failed

My plan was to be super productive on NYE and lay down the foundation for starting out on the right foot on New Year's Day... nothing particularly harrowing but still just a bunch of stuff that needed to be out of the way so that I could really get a head start on January 1st.

*signifies the consumption of a mini Reese's cup from the freezer

**signifies the consumption of a Reese's cup from the freezer that melted in my pocket first

***signifies the consumption of a piece of pizza

So I wake up on Friday at like 10am, and proceeded to stay in bed until 7pm watching 30 Rock...after like the 3rd episode, I remember saying to myself, "okay. you can lounge around today, only if you promise to really put your nose to the ol' grindstone tomorrow." * I'm really good at justifying all poor decisions I make. That's one of my many talents ;)

*, ***So I went to a friend's place to celebrate on Friday, and surprisingly enough, I actually behaved that evening and was able to wake up at 8:30am, arrived back at my house by 10am, puttered around the house and accomplished a handful of things like emptying the dishwasher, and rewarded myself with a little catnap around 11am.

That catnap turned into a 3 hour siesta, and when I woke up, I felt so tired and groggy that I decided to watch some more tv. *, ** I'm telling you the feeling of exhaustion flowing throughout my weakened body not only was a physical deterrent, but it crippled my psyche and had me convinced that I needed to buoy my spirits by watching 13 episodes of the 1980's cartoon, "Jem and the Holograms," based off of the Hasbro doll line...

**That was an excellent (poor) decision, because it was extremely fulfilling and productive to watch cartoons obviously (not). I truly blasted off into the Land of Gluttony where I lost consciousness because of a (probably) self-induced state of hypochondria and gorging... no bueno :/ **, *** (x4) Around 11pm, my body was so sore and tired from laying in bed for the past 48 hours, I felt like the only thing that would make me feel better would be to go to sleep.

So I set out to do that at 11pm, and by 2am I was ready. Somewhere along the way I fell into the trap of watching the British series, "Skins," which I find to be a much wittier and slightly more alternative and realistic version of "Gossip Girl."

I guess the point of telling you all of that is because my behavior the past 2 days directly contradicts my resolutions and pretty much dashed my hopes to hell of achieving them... Happy New Year.

Pizza total: 4 slices

Reese's total: 6, (2 were in liquid form)

it's a small world

Here's a good story for ya about what a small world it is.

This one time a few summers ago, I went to China on a school trip, and as I was walking on top of the Great Wall of China, surrounded by hundreds of people, I heard someone shout, "Erin Manning?!" I looked around and then saw this friend of mine named Kyle Riggs who was on the swim team with me for several years and who I went to high school with, but we went our separate ways after we graduated, and he stayed in Louisville where we grew up, and I went to Nashville, and we didn't speak for at least like 3 years. Then all of a sudden, there we are, meeting on the other side of the worrrlllddd...

Then after that I got interviewed for some weird British television show and they wanted me to stand up on the side of the wall to film it and I said "absolutely not, the wind will blow me over the side," which they thought was odd, but I didn't care.



Now we're friends and I visit him whenever I go home. He likes boys now, so we really have a gay old time together (no pun intended). Life's funny sometimes :)

morning routine

Every morning, I come to work where I am a receptionist at a law office, and have a pretty straight-forward routine.

I make the coffee for everyone, and after I pour myself a cup and add a little bit of milk, I inevitably get "You're So Vain" by Carly Simon stuck in my head because of the line in the last verse where she says, "I had some dreams, they were clouds in my coffee, clouds in my coffee..." I watch the milk swirl through my own cup of coffee...then I start thinkin about my dreamz...and all of my regrets in life...and as I mindlessly stir, I wistfully stare at the ripples and black fading into brown, liquid splendor until I'm shocked back into reality...

Next, I go to my desk and turn on my computer, and we use this data program called AS400 which reminds me of Windows DOS and is an all-around p.o.s. but the best thing about it is it makes these weird little electronic "beep boop beep beep beep" noises when it's booting up and the very first one is the exact same note and rhythmic spacing as Kelis' song, "Bossy," so then I have Bossy stuck in my head for a few minutes until I turn on Pandora and listen to something else and then the rest of my day isn't so routine-y. Thank gawd.