sarah gets her third functional yet graphically challanged swimsuit. thanks speedo.

that's right folks, sarah is working at the beach again. instead of using the same swimsuit every year, thus saving us and them money, we have a new suit.

no, that's not the suit that i got. that's only the suit that i WISH that i got. instead, i get to wear this beauty:

except that mine is blue with green flowers. and that's not really that much of an improvement. the upside is, this year i got the right size so i won't feel like my shoulders are being squeezed downwards and always having to deal with wedgies without going down the speed slide.

my life has not changed much yet. a story in three parts.

I.

i'm still unemployed, but will be making a killing at our garage sale this weekend. and i'm not longer sleeping on the floor.

II.

saturday: art fairs in des moines. a few points: some art is bad. is it really art then? also, travel photography can easily suck. note: don't take pictures of boats in venice or the gargoyles of notre dame. totally overdone. role model for travel photography: kevin muggleton. not only does he have good photos, but he has a really funny last name.

III.

the cat that is as "ugly as sin". what words to come out of my mother's mouth. especially since she bought this thing for me!

i do find it somewhat frustrating that, after having sent in a cover letter and resume to indian hills (twice now, for different jobs), i have been sent in return an application to fill out.

digressions

last night my siblings and i saw the chronicles of riddick. it was fantastic, except for karl urban's hair. i especially loved the dame (that would be judi dench), but i think she's fabulous anyway. it reminds me of stratford, and standing room only and not being able to see the stage because i was behind a pole. anyway, i did like it. and what's better is when you get wonderful previews for movies like "alien vs. predator." another movie about aliens trying to take over earth? independence day anyone? oh, what about signs? speaking of signs, i want to see the new m. night shyamalan movie as well.

i've been looking into the culinary thing, a little bit. i'm still not sure how i feel about it. but can you imagine me walking around campus somewhere in one of those chef's outfits? the hat and the coat with some crazy pants and a scarf? it probably wouldn't be much of a difference--i'm generally a walking fashion disaster anyway. but it's something to consider, i suppose.

apollo

giving this dog a bath, well, it's not the most fun i've had.

cleaning the email

"deleting emails from alison is like killing a puppy or something."

-me

ordered list

1. my sister said i should go to culinary school. my dad caught wind, and now he's keen on the idea. because, you see, "chefs make a lot of money." uh...cause that's why i'd want to do something, of course.



2. i finished the second of phillip pullman's sally lockheart books yesterday. i don't like them nearly as much as his dark materials. i just have to think of them as practice for the good stuff, and i'm okay.



3. we watched pitch black yesterday. i can't wait to see the chronicles of riddick. not that i could anway.



4. today my mom participated in an art fair. nobody bought anything. but there were a lot of comments about how "creative" and "original" her stuff is. then why didn't they buy anything??

umbrella art

the excitement of my summer is best shown through pictures. here, i thought it would be hilarious to hang umbrellas on hooks by our deck as "art." it was actually kind of cool when the rain collected in them. you could say some thing about the function of umbrellas, and how i'm changing it, etc.

still no job.

new couch

the only reason i'm posting this is because i'm bored and because i can.

float on

first of all, i have this pressing need to make fun of the movie grant and i are currently watching. it's entitled "piñata: survival island" and the only reason it's still on is a) garrett wang of star trek: voyager is (or rather was, since his character was brutally murdered by a piñata) in it and b) grant wants to watch it for some strange reason. if you are ever channel surfing and happen upon it on amc, move on. it's basically a bunch of sorority and fraternity kids on an island hunting for underwear and getting killed by a giant, red-eyed piñata. it's got some pretty great music, though.

so anyway...i have this overwhelming need to tell everyone what my ideas are, even though i'm hesitant to do so because a) they aren't overly well formed yet and b) they depend on things that haven't happened yet and c) i've been known to have ideas for things and not follow through with them (it's the add thing, you know, thanks to the block plan).

basically, i was looking at the bunac website, and the only program i'm eligible for is new zealand. i wouldn't go for awhile, obviously, since i would need close to $6000 for plane tickets, fees, and paying back my parents and such, but i don't know, i don't have anything specific i'm in any hurry to do, and i've always wanted to go study abroad. which i didn't really do, but this would be doing something kinda like it. it's a thought, anyway.

now, back to my killer piñata. there are only three people left living, so it shouldn't be much longer.

modesty is a virtue to be strived for. or, don't be a jerk.

"Strive to be modest. It is much more becoming, believe me. People are always more impressed if they find out independently that you won the Nobel Prize than if you wear it around your neck on a ribbon."

that's some more bill bryson. i put this quote up because it is related to what i want to talk about.

people i want to throttle.

there's this guy i knew from youth group in high school who, unfortunately, shares the same birthday as me. (that's not relevant other than the unfortunate part.) i haven't seen him since high school, but he talked to my sister last night for a few minutes and all he did was talk about himself and how successful he is. the conversation started out about how he just got back from hiking in colorado, and had six rolls of film getting developed. then he talked about how he has a photography business on the side of his computer career (which i understand is a pretty good one) and he sells stock photos and does stuff like weddings. (but seriously, stock photos? that's not art, people!) then my sister says, "my sister is a photographer." "so is my sister...let's talk about me some more!" boo! but the part that makes me laugh was, he said something about how he's had the world's best photo teachers or something. how do you qualify who is the world's best? *sigh*

so anyway, i'm just irritated. stephanie said he probably just does it as a hobby and is aggrandizing himself and his abilities. still, the point is, he has vainglorious behavior (i've been using thesaurus.com) and i don't want to share my birthday with him. and i was so here first.

i <3 bill bryson

i just re-read i'm a stranger here myself, where the infamous "you can never go home again" quote is from. i had to write some of these down.

"Best of all, the weather stays at a generally congenial level, unlike Iowa, where I grew up and where the temperature and humidity climb steadily with every passing day of summer until by mid-August it is so hot and airless that even the flies lie down on their backs and just quietly gasp. It's the mugginess that gets you. Step outside in Iowa in August and within twenty seconds you will experience a condition that might be called perspiration incontinence. It gets so hot that you see department store mannequins with sweat circles under their arms."

"I grew up in Iowa, a thousand miles from the nearest ocean, so to me (and I believe to most other Iowans, though I haven't had a chance to check with all of them yet) the word ocean suggests alarming things like riptides and undertows. (I expect people in New York suffer similar terrors when you mention words like cornfields and county fair.)

"If Arthur's goal in life was to grow rather splendid facial hair and leave plenty of room in the history books for the achievements of other men, then his presidency can be ranked a sterling success."

this one isn't quite bill bryson, but it's from red green. and equally funny:

"this is something you need to attract girls."

"fluency in klingon!"

it's a wild friday night at my house

i think it's kinda funny that my mom suggested we watch trek uncut tonight.

book

i just love posting those pictures!

obsessively posting

i know i said i wouldn't post unless i had something interesting, but i lied. i feel like i should be obsessively posting on this thing, even though i haven't done anything new since last time.

that's a lie too.

i babysat for my mom's bible study this morning and made $20, but spent it all at target picking up my film and buying a 16oz. eddie bauer water bottle on sale for $4. it was difficult choosing a color (purple), but i was happy in knowing that i will probably also buy a bigger one later on. i then spent even more money at wal-mart picking up stuff that target doesn't have, like scrapbooking paper and a scrapbook. one of my projects is to get all of the photos from the last three years in books, starting with england. it'd be separate anyway, and it's the most photos for any one event.

i think my mom is upset with me for not actively looking for a job right now, but i feel as if the mono has decided that, since i'm no longer in school, it is entirely appropriate for it to kick my ass majorly. i've been sleeping more than 12 hours a day, and my sides hurt. that's what worries me the most since as of graduation i no longer have health insurance.

i keep looking and thinking i see the cat, but she's not there. she's a sneaky little thing, and i like taking pictures of her. i have some good ones, but since our internet is so slow, i can't upload them without getting super impatient. next project: get dad to get cable internet or something. oh, like that'll ever happen.

ps: it is bbq week on the food network and the bbq issue of bon appetit just arrived at my house. i really want some bbq.

wet hot american summer! on tv!

because someone (liz?) said something about it:

COMEDY CENTRAL AIRS WET HOT AMERICAN SUMMER

on June 7 @ 7:30 pm. Encore showings: Tuesday, June 8th at 3pm, Saturday, June 12th at 11pm and Sunday, June 13th at 8pm

Watch for clever TV editing and a NEW piece of music accompanying Coop's "bowlegged & bilingual" speech!

(untitled)

i keep trying to write posts, but i just end up deleting them. i don't really have anything exciting to say, mostly i've been cleaning and doing a lot of sleeping. trying to eliminate a lot of the clutter. i have a lot of projects to work on too, besides trying to find a job. but it's mostly trying to find a job. actually, first maybe i should work at the one that i said i would. stupid beach. i think the most exciting thing i've done was make chicken for my mom and i last night, and bake cookies this afternoon. the chicken took twice as long as it was supposed to, and the cookies look funny. (they taste all right though, which is what counts, i guess.)

if anything exciting happens, i'll be sure to let you know.