that and this

A random selection of today's thoughts:

-Everytime I see someone on campus using the waist strap on their backpack, I can't help singing "we love the German tourist" in my head.

-I think I'm going to get some rollerblades.

-Who decided that leggings should replace pants? Really...I'd like to meet that person.

-My sister's only 7 (driving) hrs. away for the next week and a half, and I don't get to see her :(

-I am so ready for fall...crunchy leaves, apple cider, and cute jackets here I come!

-I really miss listening to alternative radio.

-My mom watched Glee yesterday because she missed me. How cute is that?

smiling next to Oprah and the queen

Honestly, if I had a billion dollars, the first person I would think of would be me. I would take a Jules Verne kind of trip, pay for the next lifetime of college, buy a jeep, and probably move to a nice house in the mountains of Arizona...or Europe. Of course, there would be family members and friends who would benefit from my fortune too. "What's that Stacie? You'd like another horse? Why not have two more?" "Mom, Dad, you need some fantastic landscaping for your new house and a new boat? I think this yacht's going to need a bigger lake." Really, it would be splendid.

But after that though, how fun would it be to just give it to people who really needed it? A trip to Haiti, another to Africa...heck, I probably wouldn't even need to leave Somerset. And not right away, but eventually I would adopt a bunch of awesome kids who didn't have hope before. It would be wonderful. Maybe even more than wonderful.

updates

This past weekend was Jessica's wedding. It was a "spiritual experience," and she was a "vision of loveliness," at least according to her new aunt. She was gorgeous, and everything was beautiful. I'm so happy for her and her new husband, Nate!

The wedding was on July 3rd, and I stayed to watch fireworks on the 4th with the two of them, her new brothers, and Kristi. The fireworks were pretty amazing. The weekend was kind of like taking a stroll down memory lane as we were in Gibraltar for a bit, and the fireworks were less than a mile down from what used to be the hospital that I was born at. I miss family.

Speaking of which, my sister's been visiting from Arizona since Saturday night/Sunday morning. I feel kind of bad because it's been too hot to do a lot of the things we wanted to. That seems funny since she's from one of the hottest places in the U.S., but her beautiful home is devoid of the wonderful stickiness that we get to experience throughout the summer here in Michigan. We did get to go to the zoo this week though. I've already talked about how much I love the zoo, so I won't go into it again, but we did have a lot of fun even in the 90 degree weather. After the zoo we did my next favorite thing and got Starbucks followed by going to the bookstore. Perfect day. Other than that, we've just kind of been bumming around. She leaves tomorrow, and I'm definitely not ready for her to go. I'll miss her.

So will the side of me that's been eating crap since she's been here. Usually I'm semi-health conscious, but my diet's been composed of mostly chocolate cake and M&M's while she's been here.

Which brings me to an update on my goals. I'm doing okay so far. I felt guilty after eating a giant burrito from Qdoba and half a bag of M&M's today, so I went for a pretty long bike ride. It was fun, and I felt great afterward :) The journal one's not going so well, but here I am blogging and it hasn't even been a month, so there's another one. The whole morning person thing is an ongoing struggle that sometimes I win, but mostly I don't. I'm still working on them though.

I'm going to go watch Return to Me with Stacie now. Goodnight.

"When I feel bad I like to treat myself. Clothes never look any good, food just makes me fatter. Shoes always fit. "

I've been thinking about my sister a lot lately. I miss her. Thinking about her has made me realize how much I've changed. This is kind of vaguely connected, so just try to stay with me. I've been thinking about how she thinks she's crazy because she has anxiety issues...our whole family has anxiety issues, but she's convinced that she's the only one who's not normal. And she wonders how I deal with it. Well, the plain and simple truth is that I don't hold it in...I let my craziness out all the time. You have to, otherwise, you implode. But here's how I've changed...I never used to let everything out. I used to keep everything bottled up and completely to myself. Now I have a blog. But the change occured before I made a blog. It happened sometime this summer. I always have to tell someone everything. I can't hold anything in. I'm not talking about secrets or gossiping, but if something's bothering me, or I'm worried about something, I annoy somebody else with it. And I still feel crazy, but it's out there, and it's not turning and growing inside me.

Another way that my sister has shown me how much I've changed deals with shoes. I don't buy nearly as many pairs of shoes as I used to. We would always go shopping on weekends when we lived like five minutes apart...and I would buy a new pair of shoes about once a month. Now that we live about six hours apart, shoes have simply lost their excitement. I miss shoes. She always made buying shoes fun and necessary...she always made me think I simply needed them. Now, I'm pretty sure I just need her.