TOP TEN REASONS I'M LOOKING FORWARD TO BEING THE ONLY SINGLE PERSON IN MY FAMILY OF 9 DURING THE HOLIDAYS

Sometimes, it bothers me that I'm the only single member of the family when we all get together. At first.

Then we naturally settle down into some topic of conversation and suddenly the pregnant step-sister shares the details of her birthing plan and why it's better to go natural even if it means splitting your lady parts in half forever. And then the other step-people with babies are wiping up vom, snot and dirt and literally sticking their noses into a dirty diaper just to confirm that the feces does in fact exist. Then the horror stories of in-laws start to escalate including the story of a mother-in-law sending pajama jeans as an actual, genuine Christmas gift, and I find myself thinking ... "Okay. Exactly why does this bother me again?"

It's a slow day at work today, and I'm counting up all my vacation days, trying how to best divide them up between Thanksgiving & Christmas. Then, I actually starting thinking about Thanksgiving & Christmas. About the baby stickiness. And the arguing with the significant other over family members. And whose turn it is to do any and everything.

 And I think for the first time EVER .... I am excited to be the only single person in my family of 9 during the holidays this year. And here's why:

1. I don't have to pretend I like a present that is actually the worst thing I've ever seen.
2. And the money I save not buying something for a bro ... goes in my "Buy Whatever You Want, Amy, Because You Are So Awesome & Pretty" bucket.
3. Bring on the garlic-y and onion-y dishes for minty freshness is not a concern.
4. And for that matter, bring on that second piece of pound cake because, why the crap not?
5. And that fourth glass of wine.
6. I can go the whole holiday season without saving my legs ... and no one would ever know. And that is a beautiful thing.
7. In-Laws. Because I'm the worst at faking smiles and happiness.
8. Blasting "All I Want for Christmas is You" as loud and as long as I want without any groaning or judging
9. I get to be the one holding the dog in all the family photos. Always a pleasure.
10. What if I like wearing my grandma Christmas, snowflake panties and socks?

Thus far, I haven't met anyone worth giving up all the above. And until then, I'm going to bask in all its glory while drinking a fourth glass of wine in my snowflake panties and reindeer socks.

Plant a Seed, Plant a Flower, Plant a Rose

I’ve had a handful of TOP moments in my life –

Rolling Toomer’s Corner the night we won the National Championship

Receiving my acceptance letter from Auburn, and my acceptance phone call for grad school at Alabama

Meeting Celine Dion at Disney World

Watching the space rocket launch into the night at the Kennedy Space Center

Turning the corner on a street in Paris and seeing the Eiffel Tower

Those all pale in comparison to Monday night. 

Back in July, it was announced that Mumford & Sons AND Hanson were going to be in Birmingham on the same night. Talk about a hard decision to make. Mumford & Sons – such a great band with a lot of talent and awesome music. But after much consideration, it hit me that Hanson and I go way back … we have a history. I was making it way harder then it needed to be … when the answer should have been obvious all along.

My inner 8-year-old had a come apart. All my childhood fantasies came true, well sorta. I’m not exaggerating when I say that all those exact same disgusting feelings I felt when I listened and watched them years ago came rushing back.  I can honestly say it was the best $27 I’ve ever spent and resulted in one of the best nights of my life.  

I, like most 9-year-old girls in 1997, had a slight unhealthy obsession with those three blonde haired beautiful boys.  I asked for “Middle of Nowhere” for Christmas that year, and it was the first CD I would ever call mine. I had t-shirts, I had posters, I had magazines.  I cried to my mom about how much I loved them every chance I got. I dreamed of kissing both Taylor AND Zac (I liked them both equally; I had no real feelings toward Isaac … although I was standing RIGHT UNDERNEATH Isaac last night, and I will tell you … he’s turned into a very good looking Hanson bro. I’d be perfectly content to have the rest of his babies if he so insisted).

Hanson disappeared for a while after their debut album and that’s when Backstreet Boys and NSYNC came on the scene and I, again, like most 10-year olds in 1997, had a slight unhealthy obsession. I was one of the few who loved both bands equally and my Hanson obsession had kinda slipped away.

But when I saw that Hanson was coming to Workplay and that the tickets were insanely affordable, I did not hesitate to get mine. And I knew I would enjoy myself but good. gravy.  

It’s so weird to think that I loved them so much when I was little - and seeing them as a 24-year old woman was just as wonderful. They really are talented musicians and put on a real entertaining show. I don’t know which was more fun to watch – Taylor dancing and playing the piano at the same time … or Zac head banging while beating the crap out of those drums. I mean, yum.

They all rotated playing different instruments and each one took their turn singing a solo song. They only played a handful of their older songs, but they each took me back to my canary-yellow bedroom where I would BLAST Hanson out of my super 90’s boombox covered in Lisa Frank stickers.

So yeah.
Bucket list item scratch off.
Feels good. 

5 Worst FB Offenders. & Shark Week.

Facebook has been in our lives for nine years. 

Nine whole years.

Call me crazy, but I feel like that is PLENTY of time to catch onto what is okay, acceptable, cute, funny, not okay, unacceptable, not cute and not funny to post onto the pages of Facebook. 

But apparently not. 

The not okay, unacceptable, not cute and not funny posts are getting out of hand these days. And I'm fully aware that it's because I'm at the age now (almost 25. hollla) where alot of people are getting married and popping out tiny humans. Which is perfectly normal. It's the circle of life.  And believe it or not, I plan on doing it someday. And when that time comes ... when I realize that I've met my future husband or whenever I'm given a picture of the little individual growing inside my uterus or when I need someone to talk to about my insecurities ... I will NOT plaster it all over my Facebook page. It's just not right. 

No. 

Facebook is for pictures to show how awful Monday is.

It's for posting links to awesome lists on BuzzFeed like this one and pictures of super colorful drinks consumed during the happiest of hours.

It's for the countdown of how many days are left until Auburn Football starts back up and apparently it's the Animal Planet's secretive way to advertise that this week is in fact Shark Week (We get it. No more Shark Week statuses).

So, today, I've decided to contribute to society by furthering the effort to eliminate the not okay, unacceptable, not cute and not funny posts by defining the 5 worst Facebook offenders that need to sign off permanently. If you find that one (or MORE! surely you won't be guilty of two at a time) of the following descriptions pertains to you .... you need to get your life together. It is my belief that if you are guilty of one (or MORE!) of these, there must be something way worse wrong and happening at the deep core of your psyche. 

Get help today if you are -

The guy who never thought he'd get married and has to let the entire world know that he is betrothed and that she actually created the sun and the moon and the stars and also the very air we breathe: 

Potential Deeper Problem: Low self-esteem and a girlfriend (excuse me, fiance with the little mark above the e) who doesn't fulfill his needs to make him feel good enough. But that's okay. Because he found the love and belonging that he needs ... 32 times.

The desperately desperate cry for attention, vague e-mo status poster:

Potential Deeper Problem: A lack of friends and/or supportive family members to sit down and discuss your life struggles combined with too many episodes of Dr. Phil. And as a result, you turn around and make all 476 of your FB friends your support group. And guess what? TDK what to think either.

The housewife who has nothing else to do but she makes it seem like she does a lot during the day with her congested list of chores status posts: 

Potential Deeper Problem: This is a classic case of dull lifestyle syndrome. There should be way more to do than these three little things. If you are having fun with your life, there will be some mopping to do (to clean up the the mixers that splashed on the floor over the weekend), some toilet scrubbing to do (because your best friend couldn't handle all the mixers over the weekend), some carpet cleaning to do (don't you have a dog?!) and some window glass cleaning (because no one likes a dirty window).  Yeah, with all the other things you SHOULD be doing ... there would be no time to even think about making such a post as this. 

The knocked-up betch who thinks her unborn fetus is the cutest thing since ET:

Potential Deeper Problem: You are pregnant and therefore can't drink alcohol. So you can't post pictures of your happy hour cocktails. So instead you post pictures of your happy uterus environment. For those of you who do this, GET. OUT. 

The throw-me-a-barf-bag and crawl-out-of your-husband's-butt wife who needs an outlet for her nauseating feelings:

Potential Deeper Problem: The only thing I can POSSIBLY think of here is that your friends and family have been deaf and blind for six years and you still carry that hope that they will one day be healed and you want the first thing they see and hear to be that you feel better and completely loved by your absolute best friend and husband. Who you've known for almost six years. NOT EXACTLY SIX YEARS. Almost six years. 

Sorry if you found this harsh, but that just means you feel a little guilt bunny hopping around behind you. 

Looks like you need to turn back around and hop away from your FB behavior, friend. 

Smooches.

Memory Monday - it's not really a thing, but today it is

I was going through old pictures a few days ago and stumbled across a few that switched on a lightbulb to one of my greatest moments that should be shared with all –

Let’s just call today “Memory Monday”, that way it won’t be that random of a post:

One time, I crawled on top of the bed to wake up my then-boyfriend who was sound asleep and exhausted after a long night of coughing his lungs out due to his mono.

But once I got to his face to kiss him, I realized it wasn’t he.

It was his older brother …

who I had met the day before …

for maybe 5 minutes.

It was the first time in the history of men and women that a guy woke up terrified because there was a blonde girl in his bed.

Happy Monday, everyone!

Quarter-Life Crisis

For the past few weeks, I've been contemplating calling up ABC or NBC to share with them what happened to me the last time I was out and about in downtown Birmingham. I feel like it would make a great plot for an episode in a sitcom and that the world would be much entertained.

After enjoying an evening of stuffing my face with calorie-infested Mexican cuisine and one too many strawberry margaritas, my girlfriends and headed down to Lakeview to continue the evening's journey. The plan was to spend the rest of the night at Tin Roof ... however, it was like 9:30 and way too early for that. So, we decided to meet up at Rare Martini and hang out there until it got a little later.

On the way to the Martini, Janie and I drove past Tin Roof and saw a TON of people in there. It was packed; very abnormal for Tin Roof at that time of night. But in my mind, I saw it as our excuse to head over there early because everyone else was there and clearly it was socially acceptable.

We called the rest of the group and told them to just go ahead and meet us there. Janie and I parked and headed towards Tin Roof.

Well.

The closer we got, we noticed something was off. We passed a few older people walking in the opposite direction of us but just kinda shoved it off .... until we arrived.

I looked in the window, and thought I was hallucinating . Inside one of my favorite bars there were about 150+ senior citizens (60, 70 & 80 year olds) shuffling around chugging beer, hard liquor and house wines, complete with all their accessories: walking canes, electric wheelchairs, oxygen masks, the works. I looked like a sorority or fraternity house party gone way wrong.

All of a sudden, a combination of ultimate defeat and intense rage began to ripple within my person. I stormed (Janie would agree that "stormed" is a good verb here; I was quite upset) to the bouncer and the following conversation transpired:

Me: "Um. Xcuse. What in the world is going on here?!"

Bouncer Bro: "Yeahhhhh. They are from some retirement home around here, and they are celebrating one of their birthdays. But, don't worry.  They won't be here all night."

Me: "Well, when exactly are they leaving? Because there is NO WAY ON THIS PLANET I am walking in there with this situation. Nope."

Bouncer Bro (who at this point is both humored at my conflict and wanting to calm me down at the same time): "Look, look. Come here. Give me your hand. It's going to be okay."

He then proceeded to mark my hand, indicating that he was giving me a free cover.

Bouncer Bro: "Come back later, and you won't have to pay cover."

Janie, who was quite embarrassed by my behavior, also got her hand marked, thanked him and pushed me away from the scene. Hindsight, I probably shouldn't have been as upset because it wasn't the bouncer's fault ... but I want to tell myself he understood I was just mad at the situation.  Poor guy.

We walked back down to the Martini, warning everyone we ran into to not go to the Tin Roof (which was great because I consider that my community service for the year).

For a hot minute, I thought it was socially acceptable to hang with the seniors at Tin Roof at 9:30 on a Friday night. The experience is now referred to as "The Quarter-Life Crisis" - because it really truly was.

Six

Tomorrow marks my 6th month anniversary working at blr | further. Hard to believe, but it's true.

If you know me at all, you know how much I love my job and what all I had to go through to get here. I know I've said this a million times, but I believe deep down everything that happened at Strong happened so I would appreciate every aspect of the job I have now. If you don't know the story, feel free to message, e-mail, text, whatever. It's a fun one.

I'm a very lucky, very richly blessed girl in so many incredible ways but I'm probably most thankful that that I don't dread waking up in the mornings to head off to work anymore.  I know from first-hand experience how awful it is to not want to wake up and get out of bed because you are stuck in a job you that genuinely hate. If you hate your job, then you are probably not a very happy person.

But, that's no longer my situation, thank goodness! Sooooo, let's kick off the celebrating with a list, shall we? Who doesn't like a good list?

Six Reasons Why I Love My Job
(in no particular order)

1. I know that my superiors have confidence in me and my abilities.
2. I enjoy the personalities of my co-workers and think I can say I have developed friendships with them.
3. I feel confident in my assignments and finally am at a point where I feel like I have grasp of what I'm doing.
4. I love seeing the finished product of something I had a hand in helping complete, even if its just a small contribution.
5. My writing skills will never diminish. Ever. God bless those work orders!
6. It exposes me to all kinds of different companies and people around the country. If I were to ever get stranded in Jonesboro, Arkansas ... I'd know who to call!

Happy Fourth of July Week!

Breakfast

I normally eat Multi-Grain Cheerios for breakfast. Like, everyday.

But yesterday morning, I woke up and wanted something way more fattening and tasty than that.

So I dug around in our freezer and found a couple of frozen french toast sticks leftover. Perfect.

I put them in the microwave, pressed the start button and gathered my syrup and utensils.

When the buzzer when off on the microwave, I opened the door and had a moment.

They weren't french toast sticks.

They were fish sticks.

So there's that.