posting from the 'burg

Ebensburg, that is.
and so begins the next phase of life as a vagabond. i have food to eat, a gram who is willing to do my laundry, a room to sleep in (i took the one with the big bed but i hear im going to be kicked out over july4th when uncle michael comes) and a job for as long as pap can use me (and judging from the length of his to do list i could be here til christmas!)
the funny thing about having a home base is that i still have my car packed full of stuff! i pulled out a few duffel bags of clothes and my computer bag, and just left the rest in the car :) i havent opened my trunk in almost a month. ive been living out of two duffel bags worth of stuff. i am beginning to realize just how little you really need to live. i am SO blessed that i even have stuff to fill my little car cuz i dont really need nearly that much.
the good news about unpacking the car a litle is that i have also unearthed my camera cord! unfortunately though the process of uploading and posting my pictures is way more involved than i could have ever imagined and is taking FOR-EV-ER! but i promise there are pictures of all sorts of cool stuff and eventually they will make it to the internet.
as far as the giveaway goes, i have not had nearly the response that i had imagned i might - but the peeps seem to be the most in demand out of all my sweet prizes :) so here's what im thinking - ill keep the peeps around until an interested party shows up at grams or gram decides that we're going to head north to visit them when pap doesnt need me to work. sound like a plan nancyann?
ok so my poor lil compy vanilley (counterpart to milley) is working SO hard to handle all my pics, but is having a tough time finding space for them all... its not looking like pics are gonna happen at this very moment (or anytime in the next few hours at this rate) so i think im gonna go for a run.
please dont stop reading because of my pictoral dry spell... if anything, KEEP reading so you dont miss them when they get here!!!

the saga of the vagabond continues.

wanna hear a funny story? so i had a job all lined up for the summer. it was a really sweet deal that would be a good learning experience, a steady income, and was close to lots of people who love me. so i called them the other day to get some more details about where i would need to find a place to stay and where i'd be working and all that stuff that would be nice to know, and Tessa tells me that they filled the position with someone else so that means no job for me. isnt that just great news? i was ready to find a place to be. i was ready to start being my own grown up person. what im not ready to do is go back to the drawing board and start all over. ive been there, ive done that, and i have nothing to show for it not even a lousy tshirt. so much for having a plan. guess it just goes to show that i am not the final authority in plan making for my life. i'm confident that there is a plan... its out there somewhere and i can only guess that its better than the plans i had, it would just be really nice to know right about now. i used to know where i was going. i used to have a direction. now im just left with a carload of stuff and nowhere to unpack it.

in amongst all that stuff in my car i have found a few candidates for my giveaway to promote comments - i have three boxes of yellow marshmallow peeps, a mislabeled copy of the latest installment of the keychange series ("where's my ring by spring i did NOT find it" misleadingly labeled as "I FOUND IT greatest hits") and a free button from the Hoover Dam proudly proclaiming the wearer to be a "Dam Proud America." based on reader response and level of interest i will decide which prize will be given away, or if all three prizes will be given to three lucky winners, or if all three will be given to one lucky reader.

what i would like to find in my car is my camera cord.

i have a lot of pictures.

but unfortunately, i cant post any of them. first of all, my camera battery is dead. it can be charged, but my bigger issue is that i cant find my camera cord. so once my battery charges, i can take more pictures, but i cant post any of them yet until i dig through all the stuff in my car and find what i need. it could take a while. my car has been packed full for two weeks - i havent even opened my trunk yet im a little scared that if i open it it wont close again :)

so i guess its kind of obvious but i made it back from vegas in one piece, with only a henna tattoo as evidence of anything crazy i may or may not have done with my crazy vegas nights ;) i walked away from the slots with 150% return... i put a dollar in and won $2.50 im a high roller what can i say? if any of my investors are interested in collecting their share, i just have to advise you that the postage will cost more than the actual winnings

ive spent my time since i returned from the desert chillin on peoples pull out couches and in their spare rooms. im still trying to decide if i would suggest it to anyone else. its not a bad life as long as your ok with living out of a duffel bag with limited clothes options and never quite knowing where the little things that you only use every now and then are when you need them. ive been havin a good time hangin out with family and friends - i even got to celebrate my cousin's 21st with him and his friends :) good times with good people :)

so im not sure that anyone is really still reading this - my posting has slacked off since i dont have internet access 24/7 at school and without pictures i feel like my posts are full of the words that the pictures could usually fill and the words arent nearly as exciting... maybe ill have to have a giveaway to keep interests up until i find my camera cord. what exactly will i give away i'm not sure yet but i have a carload of stuff that might provide some interesting options... but until i come up with something unique, why not try to win a wii from this guys blog??

keep reading - i'll keep you updated :)

so this is vegas.

so im in vegas :) sitting in the library at UNLV using their internet because some very nice girl gave us her username and password :) we would be in the coffee shop that opens at 730 but the manager yelled at us and told us he didnt open til 8. i think he jus didnt like us. why are we up at such an ungodly hour in the morning you ask? oh maybe because our bodies are still on east coast time but in west coast time that means its time to wake up at 5am!!! i dont know when ill get to post again cuz internet costs money at our hotel :( but i promise to keep u all updated on my winnings lol :)

lets try this again.

ok so my last whiny post didnt get as many pity responses as i would have hoped. or even as many encouraging responses. i even left it up for you guys almost a full week. so i guess i have to take the hint that you want to hear happier things from me. so here goes. with plenty of bold words and !!exclamation points!! so you all know exactly how NOT whiny im being :)

1. i ended up with an A- in poli sci and im graduating Summa Cum Laude on Saturday!
2. i started packing and have downsized all my old books and notes from 5 boxes to 2!
3. i spent all day yesterday at Kennywood! it didnt rain at all and i might have even gotten a tan line!
4. i briefly wished that i was graduating with a large group of close friends, but after spending an hour and a half on a schoolbus with my graduating class, i realized exactly why that did not happen. who knew that you could make it take that long to get to Kennywood or make it feel even longer?
5. the Pens won game 7 last night! everyone around here is in a good mood.
6. tonight we're going to the Pirates game!
7. my family is coming tomorrow!!!!! i am so wicked excited about this. i havent seen them since january and i hear my brother has somehow managed to grow even taller! i did not think this was possible. in my head i can still take him in a wrestling match... but i'm not really so sure about that anymore.
8. if the sunshine decides to come out today, i think we are going skuzzy butt sliding at buttermilk falls!
9. i leave for Vegas, Baby! in a week! and the bridge is already on its way there!
10. and did i mention that oh my goodness im graduating from college on Saturday?!?!?!

why so serious?

so here i sit. done with all my undergraduate requirements. (yay!) all the hard stuff is behind me. i survived neikirk's poli sci class, and might have even pulled out a B, even after the final. then in the most impressive hour of my life i ate lunch, got back to my room, showered, shaved, and transformed from the grimey bum i had been all morning into a pretty and competant lady, and made it back down to campus to give a presentation with three minutes to spare. if i can handle that, im pretty sure i can do pretty much anything. i'm ready (in theory) to graduate next week and take on the real world.
this is a good place to be. this is how i always wanted college to be - all the fun and none of the work. so why am i having such a hard time enjoying it and being happy to be right where i am? instead, im worried about all kinds of things like where i'm gonna live and how i'm gonna get there after graduation and whether or not my still relatively new relationship can survive across 2,000 miles and how i'm ever going to find a job to finance all the crazy travelling i am going to be doing and how bad i really want to be at my friends weddings but i cant do that from wyoming cuz i have no money. why does it always come back to the money? i need a job to get money so i can start paying back my school loans but i need to have a home address and figure out where i want to live before i can get a job but i need money for gas to drive everywhere and im stuck once again in a big catch22.
i thought i was finally going to know where i was heading and all the uncertainty was going to go away. what im trying to remind myself of now is that its not all that bad. everything will work out exactly how God wants it to, and i just have to be patient. i didnt ask to learn patience, but apparently someone out there asked for me. they obviously know something i dont know. but i guess i'll just have to find out later and try to enjoy the ride :)

oh my word its may.

when did this happen? apparently three days ago but still... i missed it! wasnt it just april like a week ago? you would think that after 22 years of this whole changing months thing i would be a little better at it. and yet, this one just caught me off guard. maybe ill have better luck next month.