Isn’t she just darling? She matches absolutely nothing in my room but that’s no matter, I’ll just include her in all of my tea parties and she’ll fit right in.

My sister also brought me home a new ampersand trip from her beach trip last week! It is the one on top in the photo, isn’t it cute? I really just love ampersands.

Other things that are making me happy this week:
1. the freedom to sit around and drink icy cold drinks outside.
2. being on the computer on the front porch with an orange kitty at your feet and hummingbirds on the breeze.
3. The promise of real, good summer fun in the next month!
4. Kiwi fruit for breakfast and nutella for lunch!!

What is making you happy right now?

(image by Todd & Barbara)

I want to go and feel the real heat, none of this 80-one-day-55-the-next Oregon summer. I want to see the giant Saguaro cacti and trip over a prickly pear, be paranoid about meeting a rattlesnake or a scorpion, visit pueblos and get sunburnt. Drink a diet cola and feel the ice condensing around the glass in a place that gets less than a quarter the amount of rain I consider the ‘norm’.

But this post isn’t about that eventual trip, really. I’ve realized in that last few months that I really, really, really like cacti. And succulents. Succulents are really neat, shaped like twisty-orby-jointed-creatures, bent over and leaning against each other like drunken friends or something out of a Doctor Seuss book.

My family thinks I am crazy. (This is not different than any other day of the week, just a fact.) I keep looking at all the cacti in stores or in stranger’s yards and talking about how I want some. I want an aloe vera plant, I want a theolocactus and a Arthrocerus rondonianous and many, many, many, Sempervivums!

I recently bought a little pot of assorted cacti. I love it. I named it Horatio and smile whenever I see it around my house.

I like to think of Horatio as “a collective”.

I just figured out that my favourite part of Horatio is actually an aloe aristata, and that makes me very happy. I don’t know why. I just love little cacti.

This week, I almost turned into one of my beloved cacti.

It started out with attending a class with a professor that set me off in any way and I immediately started growing prickles. My roots expanded, absorbing all available water during the three-hour-class that I ‘endured’ and when I left, I was prickly and puffed up with my frustrations and loathing.

I tried to let go of my irritations and my anger, but every day I walked into that classroom a giant bloom grew out of the side of my face and I lashed out sarcastically at everyone around me, a little prickly pear of hatred.

It culminated on Thursday. I called my Mom after class (like I had the last three days) and we ended up getting into a completely unrelated argument. I realized then, that a four-credit class isn’t worth turning into a cactus.

So I dropped the class, and breathed a sigh of relief. I’d like to think that there was some romantic image associated with this, the cactus revealing the true desert flower or something romantic and disgusting and cliche, but really, nothing happened. I’m still pretty prickly about the entire subject, but my prickles are smaller and more like feathers than jagged edges, and I’m letting go of my frustrations.

But I still like cacti, even though I don’t want to be one. I hope that next time I can recognize the cactus symptoms a little bit sooner, though.

It was lovely. I’m from the Pacific Northwest, but I’d never visited Mt. Rainier before, and it was awesome to get away from the city and into the trees and snow and cold for a day.

L: iron oxide dyes a small streem blood-orange. R: The park used to have a hot spring and accompanying resort. The baths are still around, and just gorgeous.

I’m lucky this term because I’m getting spoiled with time off. After five weeks of working full time and experiencing bilateral wrist tendonitis for the first time, I’m finally getting some small sorts of vacations.

Yeah, I’m super cool.

This coming weekend I get to go to the coast with my whole family, and the promise of warm weather awaits. I’m sure the change from snow to freezing rain to warm sand will be a bit of a culture shock, but it IS the Pacific Ocean, it won’t be that warm!

Take some time this week to think about what defines you.

What makes you… you?

Not just the things you tell everyone. How do you tie your shoes? How do you wear your hair? How do you pay attention in class?

How does this seperate you from everyone as an individual?

Center yourself on this thought this week, and remember that unique, individual you is essential to this world.

I am… a fire tiger.
I am… a pokemon trainer.
I am… a college student.
I am… a lettering nerd.
I am… a college student who is putting herself through school.
I am… a girl who enjoys spending money.
I am… sometimes prim and proper.
I am… mostly goofy.
I am… an artist who draws dragons.
I am… in love.
I am… bad at paying attention in class.

Here’s another neat article about packing… but a bit more hardcore than mine!

Let’s try this again.

Today I went to the gym and ran a little over 1/2 of a mile, and shaved 10 seconds off of my stationary bike time. I hurt all over and am still a little shaky, but I feel fantastic. It is hard to replicate the way your body feels and the induced high you get after you work out.

Recently, Saturday Jane posted a great debate between her many selves about excersize and working out, and her own experiences with it. This has made me reflect on my thoughts working out and what keeps me going during my sessions, and I’ve figured out what it is:

The Shower Afterwards.

Seriously. It’s the best part. I love the burn, and getting past my goals, and if I hadn’t been completely exhausted by the final push in my biking to beat my previous time, I’d have danced across the gym, regardless of any stares that might induce.

But the best part is when you can relax your weary muscles in a steady stream of hot water, and slough off the sweat and dirt and grime and stress that comes along with exersize and life.

It is the best, and I look forward to it during ever minute of every step of every lap I run every day. It’s a nice motivation. Not to mention the proud feeling afterwards, knowing I actually followed through with my goals.

My current goal is to get to the point where I can do my cycling in 4 minutes and thirty seconds (as of today, I’m six minutes and thirty seconds), and run an entire mile without bursting into tears, like I would in elementary-school PE.

What are your goals?

The beginning of 2010 marks a strange anniversary for me. 2009 was the first year ever I used a planner.

Ever.

I am generally organized, but in a vague sort of way. I know where things are located in the piles of things in my room, and I organize once every six months and then promptly abandon all organizing plans as my life turns to chaos once again. I never used a planner for high school (even though it was “mandatory”), didn’t use one for the first three years of college (even though I probably should have), and certainly never ever really felt like using one.

But times change, I discovered Kath Kidston, and I got a job where the schedule changes every week.

My planner for 2009 is worn, and kind of falling apart. It is filled with memories, like this:

January 16th, 2009: Basket full of kitties.

May 20th, 2009: Blending in with couches.

September 24th, 2009: tried on a furry hat.

One of my final entries:

December 29, 2009. Sneak attack Snow!

I am all ready for my new 2010 calendar. I’ve even done SUPER organized things like written down my measurements in the back, and made a little colour chart of the prismacolour markers that I own so I don’t buy repeats. This organized thing is really awesome, and I’d like to pass it on.

The best part about using a planner is picking one out. Here are a few to peruse:

a. City Planner. $22.
b. 2010 Weekly Planner. $25.
c. Bird art calendar. $16.
d. 2010 Mini Plaid Planner. $8.

I bet you can get organized this year! Don’t you think you can?

I have drunk the required hot chocolate and enjoyed the traditional cookies and even been given a shot of some traditional scotch (that was very, very gross).

Tomorrow, I work, but we also plan to open stockings and eat ham and maybe even watch our family’s traditional Christmas movie, Young Frankenstein. (hey man, don’t judge, don’t judge.)

What are your holiday traditions?