News!!

This past Saturday we had my dad's 50th birthday party. It was a lot of fun! Here's a couple pics from the day:

My sister, my dad, and me :)

Just me and dad :)
He got about 8 or 9 bottles of crown!
Definitely enough for another party! ;)

This is my Aunt Rose. She's the best.
But she lives in NC, so I don't get to see
her much :( 

So while we were drinking and eating and having a good time, Chris and I were talking to my cousins about this house they're fixing up. It's a 2-bedroom, 1-bath in Florissant and they said they'd rent it to us. We kind of laughed about it and let it go since we had never even considered living in Florissant. 

Well come Sunday we were driving back to Farmington and thinking, depending on what the house is like and how much they'd charge us for rent, it could be worth looking into at the very least. So we drove all the way back to Florissant just to go look at the house. And we loved it. The back yard is huge and has a nice patio. It has a one-car garage, a breezeway/mudroom type thing, and a good-sized basement. The only downside is that there's no dishwasher (but we generally eat off of paper plates most of the time anyway...) and there isn't a ton of storage in the bathroom. The closets are also a little small, but we figure with the basement and garage, that should give us plenty of extra storage for all the stuff we don't use on a regular basis. 

I called them on Tuesday to tell them that we officially want to rent it so it should be ready for us sometime in September. For those of you who are wondering, yes, this adds another half hour or so to my drive. Which will suck. But I have a couple options. 

I can always stay in Cape a couple nights if I really have to. And I'm hoping I'll be able to keep working from home at least one day a week. But I've also decided to start looking for jobs in St. Louis, even if they're just part time. I've got a few reasons for this. 

First, I'm already exhausted and I'm not even in school right now. So adding more time to my drive, plus classes is gonna make that worse. Second, because I'm doing so much driving, I'm spending a ton on gas and car maintenance. Yes, working for the university means I only pay 30% of my tuition, but it also means that I get almost none of the loan money I get approved for (I don't understand why this is but I guess they figure if most of my tuition is covered I don't need the extra money). So this semester--before we even decided to move to Florissant--I decided I wasn't going to take the tuition discount, because I get all of my loan money that way, which I need. So whether I continue working for the university or not, I'm not using that discount anymore, so I figured I might as well start looking in St. Louis. I'll just have to find a place that's willing to work around my class schedule. 

There's too much math involved to really get into the details. But basically if Chris and I are living and working in St. Louis and I'm only driving to school a couple days a week (instead of 5), we'll save a ton on gas and all that. 

And we get to switch our internet to AT&T! Unfortunately that means paying HughesNet's outrageous cancellation fees. But once that's done, we'll be paying about the same amount for cable and internet as what we're paying for internet alone now. So we'll be saving a lot of money as far as stuff like that goes once we move. 

We're super excited about the house and can't wait to move. The fact that we're so close to moving makes our current house seem that much more unbearable. 

Things will definitely suck for a while with all the driving and possible staying in Cape that I will have to do. But when we talked about it and whether we thought it was a good idea or not, we had to think long-term. I'll be starting my last semester of school this time next year. And we had plans of moving back to St. Louis after I finished school anyway regardless of where we were living at the time. Plus, my cousin said if we want to buy the house from him in a couple years, he'd sell it to us for pretty dang cheap. And we already know we like the city and the area and want to stay there, so if we end up loving the house too, why not buy it? So, thinking long-term, we just couldn't pass this up. 

Plus Copper is going to love that back yard! 

Amazon student

Forgot to mention! If you're a student and have a ".edu" email address, you can sign up for Amazon Student, which gives you all kinds of deals like free two-day shipping, plus you get a discount on Amazon Prime. Go to the link below to sign up!

http://www.amazon.com/gp/student/signup/info?ie=UTF8&refcust=PSTF2XI2VVGCCOT6QYRK556MLY&ref_type=generic

New PR!

For those of you who don't know, "PR" (in a mostly athletic sense) means "personal record". When I started reading a lot of running blogs and stuff a year or so ago, they were always talking about how they PR'd at a race they ran or something like that. I had no idea what that was or what it meant, so finally I googled it. So I'm saving you all the trouble :)

The PR I most want to talk about today though has nothing to do with running. My new PR occurred this morning when I made the perfect cup of coffee. That has literally never happened before. It was delicious, unlike the one I made yesterday. Gross and weak. 

And now on the the running achievements: 

My ankle is doing much better. I ran a full mile yesterday without stopping to walk. After that I alternated walking and running, mainly because I just couldn't breathe. But I did that for 4 miles in about an hour. Overall, I felt pretty good. My legs were pretty sore last night, so I'm taking a break today (plus it's raining), but I plan to run again tomorrow. 

The best part of my run was that for the first time in over a month, I got to run down by the river!

It's been too long :(

It was so pretty and was a really fantastic day for a run in general. The temp was between 75 and 80, there was a nice breeze, and it was kind of cloudy. 

For a while now, I've been using Runkeeper on my runs. It tracks my time, distance, calories burned, elevation climbs, etc. Pretty handy. According to Runkeeper, I've run almost 50 miles since May-ish (whenever I started using it). It's cool to be able to keep track of your all-time miles. And it also breaks it down by week and month so you can see your mileage breakdown that way as well. 

In addition to that, I also started using MyFitnessPal this week. Also a handy tool to keep track of what food you eat, calories consumed, etc. And you can connect it with Runkeeper so that your calories burned from your exercise gets added to your daily log in MyFitnessPal. Most people use it for weight-loss purposes. Although I would like to lose ten or fifteen pounds, I'm using it more just to keep track of what I'm eating and my calories in general so I'm more aware of how much I'm really eating. 

If you want to keep up with my progress on those two sites/apps, you can check out my profiles (which are sort of incomplete at the moment): 

Here's the link to my Runkeeper profile: http://runkeeper.com/user/RunChata/profile

And the link to MyFitnessPal profile: http://www.myfitnesspal.com/runchata

If you're already on those sites and want to "connect" or whatever, well I'm not sure how to do that if we're not already Facebook friends, but I do think I can invite people by email. So you could send me your email and do it that way. So if you're already on there, let me know! If not, sign up and then let me know! 

They also have apps for each so you can put them on your phone, tablet, etc. as well!

Crazy Weather Lately

No, seriously. This is what happened to the tree next to our house Saturday:

Struck by lightning. 

I was at home sick, so Copper and I were taking a nap when the lightning strike woke us up. I didn't know until the next morning what exactly had happened though. The power flickered a few times, the tv and internet went out several times. And then last night after a thunderstorm, the temperature dropped and I was actually cold when I took Copper outside. 

Speaking of Copper, not only is she already awesome at her regular high-fives, but now she's giving double!

Crazy eye. 

And the other day she stood on her hind legs for several seconds. She's almost as tall as me when she does that!

In other news, the bugs are almost gone I think!! I've only seen a few so far this week and most have been really small. I'm so thankful. Dealing with them has been a nightmare. 

Also, I finally finished American Psycho. It was pretty good, but it just sort of ended. There wasn't some big event or any real resolution. I think I'm going to watch the movie this weekend to see how it compares. 

In the meantime, I've started The Great Gatsby. I've read it before but it was back in high school and I feel the need to reread some of those books because I think I'll appreciate them more now than I did then and probably get more out of them. So, yay for finally being onto Book 6!

What I've Been Up To

Here's what I've been doing since June-ish:

Hanging out with my dog. She enjoys pestering
me and taking up the whole couch or bed. 

Copper got a new bed! She didn't like it at first, but now
she loves it :) 

We bought a dresser from Goodwill to turn into our new TV
stand for the living room. Chris did most of the work ;)

Annnd the finished product! Chris did a good job. He also
painted a bookshelf and an end table. Pretty sure if I had let
him, he would have painted the whole house. 

Sorry for those of you who don't like bugs. But
I've spent the last month or so trying to kill these
things. I went from being terrified to disgusted to
pissed. I put boric acid down every place I could
that the pets couldn't get to. I'm starting to notice a
slight difference. I'm praying they will be gone soon.

I ran down to the river a few times. With all the rain we'd had,
the flood walls had been shut for weeks. :( FINALLY they
opened them! And the river was still really, really high. 

Copper's close-up. Always in everybody's face. 

We tried to take this fool for a walk. She did
not behave herself. I have started taking her
on mini-walks and she's doing a little better. 

She also enjoys sleeping on MY side of the
bed. Rude. 

We take a lot of pictures of her. We have
nothing better to do. lol

She's so cute when she's asleep. And quiet. lol

:)

She's slowly learning how to catch things when
we throw stuff in the air for her. (You can see the
other table that Chris painted in the background.)

We went to Chicago! And did not eat at this
restaurant. Lol But I took a pic for my dad. 

On the left, you'll see the margarita I spilled
down the front of my white shirt. I wasn't even
drunk yet! Had to go buy a Margaritaville
t-shirt to wear instead :(

Random picture from our long walk all over
that damn city. 

Chris went to Dunkin Donuts on my birthday :)

This is what happens when you walk six-ish
miles in flip flops. Thankfully the swelling has
gone down and it doesn't hurt as much now. 

My margarita from Bubba Gump Shrimp. It
was watermelon and it was delicious. And so
was the food. I love that place so much. 

First baseball game I've ever seen on my birthday! The Cards
lost, but it was still so awesome to actually be able to go to
a game! 

Cards on the field. That guy in the bottom left corner was a jerk.
And he was a Cards fan. His friends--Cubs fans, I assume, and from
Chicago--were way nicer. 

The day after we got back, Chris had to work.
I sat at home with my foot propped up and slept.
He surprised me with HOSTESS DONUTS!
They were yummy! 

And, to be fair, here's a picture of Cocoa. She
doesn't get as much attention as Copper. Poor
thing. But she walks around like she owns
the place! 

There it is. There's quite a bit left out of the vacation part, but I didn't take too many pics. Here's some of what we did though:

Went to see Anberlin. Excellent show. We even liked the opening bands. 

After the concert we ate at a restaurant called Blue Line. I had the Bison Nachos and they were incredible. Chris had a Lamb burger which was also delicious. 

We did some shopping. We ate at a restaurant/brewery called Rock Bottom. We had the "beer sampler" as an appetizer and then we each had burgers. Let me tell you, these were the best burgers we've had in a very, very long time. They were cooked perfectly. 

Taste of Chicago started Wednesday. We planned to go, but found out it was outrageously priced. So we got pizza instead. We went to Gino's East. Waited forever for our pizza (there was only about 4 other people there). Once it came out though, it was delicious. Not sure it was worth waiting that long for, but it was good. 

We did some more shopping--got me some real shoes to wear instead of flip flops and then went to a Walgreens for an Ace wrap and Aleve. 

We went to Navy Pier a couple times. I wanted to go on a boat ride but we never got around to that. Maybe next time :)

Friday before we left, we went to see Monsters University. Such a cute movie! I loved it :) 

And that's about it. We slept in pretty much every day and that may have been the best part of vacation lol. 

Thanks for reading!

It's been a long time

A very long time. That summer class kinda took over my life and totally sucked. But I managed to get an A so it's all good.

Here's a few things that happened in the last month or so (I'll do another longer-ish post with pics and whatnot later):
Actually, not much happened in June that I can remember. So skip that.

Anyhoo. Chris and I went on a nice long vacation last week to Chicago. We ate a lot of delicious food (and spent way too much money on said food). Was saw Anberlin in concert (and a day or two later on the train...we weren't stalking them--I swear). We walked a ton and I hurt my ankle pretty badly doing God-knows-what. For a while I seriously thought it was broken. It's starting to feel better now though.

I turned 24 on Thursday. Also the Cardinals lost to the Cubs. But I still got to go to a game, so that was pretty cool.

Copper turned 8 months old on Thursday as well. We called to say happy birthday. :) She's still a pain.

The cat still hates her.

We have bugs. Which I eventually figured out were cockroaches. I've been so disgusted. But they are
slowly dying. PS did you know they cause allergies and asthma? So for people like me who have both, well we're screwed.

Work has been crazy busy.

My insurance company is still refusing to pay for my birth control. I will win this battle!

Sensodyne totally works. It just takes a while. My teeth feel perfectly fine now--little to no sensitivity. Pretty sure I've been using it for over a month now though.

Did I mention that 4-week summer class that totally took over my life? Yeah. I was not prepared for it at all. Turns out, the class was all about issues in education. You know who couldn't care less about education issues? Me. So I had a difficult time coming up with things to say in the forum and whatnot that didn't include mean things toward others. But like I said, I got an A in the class, so I'm happy. And happy it's over.

Like I said, I'll do another, longer post later with some nice pics and whatnot so be on the lookout for it!

First year of Grad School

So now that I've had a decent break from school (right before my summer class starts, haha), I thought I'd do a little reflection on my first year of grad school. 

In a lot of ways, it was what I had expected, but in some ways it wasn't. My first semester was far better than the second. I had an American Lit class and an editing class and enjoyed both of them. It got a little stressful at times, but I managed. And I got A's in both classes. I was proud of myself for accomplishing that in addition to the stress of moving back in October and adjusting to much, much longer days and a really long commute. It was exhausting. But I made it work. 

Second semester came around and I was a little nervous. I took poetry, which I was excited about, but I also had to take that dreaded research class and I had heard many, many terrible, horrible things about it. And it lived up to just about every one of them. It wasn't a particularly hard class, but it was extremely time consuming. Which meant for me that I spent all day Saturday and sometimes Sunday doing homework for just that class, plus occasionally making trips to the library during the week. 

That class was horrible and stressful and made me consider quitting a couple times. And, as it turns out (and as most people had warned), the class was pretty useless. Most of the people I heard that from were people doing a creative thesis. Which meant that the class was even more useless for me because the editing project I'm going to do is brand new so my teacher really didn't know what I should do or how to help me. That made it even more difficult for me to stay focused and put in all the effort I needed to in that class...why should I if it isn't helping me in any way? 

But, I did. I worked my butt off all semester--now not only did I have long days and a long commute, but my night classes were back to back (Wednesday/Thursday) which was even more exhausting, plus I had a puppy who really got a kick out of interrupting my homework time with all her shenanigans. 

In the end, I got A's in both classes. And I'm proud of myself. Toward the middle of last semester I had to really figure out what I'd be doing for my thesis. I went back and forth for a while between doing a creative thesis or doing the editing project, mainly because the editing project hadn't been approved yet, and I didn't want to get started on it only to find out I couldn't actually do it. 

Eventually it did get approved, so I decided to be the pioneer of the editing project. Seriously. I'm the only person currently in the program who is doing it. No pressure. So I have the book that I'll be editing. I've done a little research (which I had to do for that god awful class last semester--about the only thing that class was good for). Now I just need to actually start it. I'm having trouble motivating myself to do it though. After editing and stuff at work, it's hard to want to do all that work on my project later when I'm at home. 

Plus, my online class starts next week (I should probably figure that out for sure), and I'm working from home on Fridays. I'm guessing what I really need to do is just pick a specific time(s) each week to work on it. Part of me wants to wait until my class starts to see how much I'm going to need to do for that, but another part knows that if I do that, I'll just make more excuses not to get started on it. 

I have until Fall of next year to finish it though. And I know the longer I procrastinate, the worse it will be later and I'll have to become a hermit just to get it finished in time. Yikes. The good thing is that I'm not taking an actual class next summer. I'm taking my "thesis hours" so I get credit just for working on my thesis all summer. That should help a little. 

And I'd like to thank you all for taking time out of your days to read about all this nonsense. I do appreciate it! :) 

Copper loves her blankies :)