Tammy

so my big sis is here today. Sarah. we went training with the bloodhounds today, ate dinner and then went to the cemetary. it was cold. and windy. raining off and on--more sprinkling. altogether, not weather that makes you feel all warm and fuzzy inside. that was ok.

we walked across the cemetary, and started walking up and down rows of graves. the wind was cold. the sky grayish. and we kept walking. looking. and looking. we stopped, and called the office, who couldn't help us.

we kept searching, basically done. then on a whim, i walked back through the field, to a little field kind of hidden.

there it was. the grave of my best friend. Tammy A. Shaw. it doesn't seem real, to see the grave of your best friend.

part of me can't believe she's still gone. a lot of me can't. and finally visiting her grave opened up that pain again. but i'm so glad, so very glad we went. i miss her like crazy.

the weather looks and feels like i do inside...

suicide hurts.

off topic

real quick--i figured out how to blog from my phone, but occasionally it sends the following message:

"This picture message or video message was sent using Multimedia Messaging Service.

To play video messages sent to email, Apple� QuickTime� 6.5 or higher is required. Visit www.apple.com/quicktime/download to download the free player or upgrade your existing QuickTime Player. Note: During the download process when asked to choose an installation type (Minimum, Recommended or Custom), select Minimum for faster download."

if you see that, sorry, it's annoying. disregard it and it'll be deleted later on.

Valentine's day.

officially. valentine's day is lame. not because of all the cheesy hearts and flowers and cupids and love, but because it seems to have inbred our culture with an attitude of ungratefulness. i worked at the Flower Hut the past 2 days and was talking to the driver about delivering flowers and the best part of the flower business being the looks on the faces of a person as you deliver the flowers. that is, except on valentine's day. on valentine's day, out of all the orders we filled and sent out, only one person apparently was genuinely thankful. in fact, she was speechless. everyone else gave the flowers and delivery person the "oh, finally flowers arrived for me. it's about time. this is all? nothing better?" look.

people expect gifts and presents on valentine's day. if they don't have an "insignificant other" apparently that's a very valid and legit excuse to be a jerk on valentine's day.

 there is very little thanks on valentine's day. just expectations.

what have we come to?

yay craziness

i like craziness. 

i have a job!!! It's at a place called Marianna's Fundraisers and is like a different department of DelGrosso's Amusement Park, where I worked this summer.  {i promise, the place is better than the website.} i start thursday. aaaand it should be interesting. very interesting. still food service, which is always interesting, because there's all the food codes that you have to follow.


we have people coming over tonight and tomorrow. it promises to be...an experience. 


monday and tuesday I'm working at the flower shop i helped start in 06. the Flower Hut is a pretty cool place. especially when you do that arrive at-0800-hours-work-til-late-crash-at-a-friend's-house-for-a-few-hours-work-all-day-again-thing. hehe. i'm excited though. valentine's day is fun because there's always a ton of roses that i get to work with. and all these guys call, totally clueless about what they should get for their wife or girlfriend. so you get to ask them questions and basically choose what the girl in their life gets. it would be even better if i was a hopeless romantic...


wednesday we're doing ground work and laying trails for the Heaven Scent SAR team that i work with. yay!


thursday is first day of work. 


friday, saturday and sunday, a friend is coming up. saturday we're doing SAR training, going out to Fort Roberdeau, gonna go see a friend's gravesite and who knows what else.


oh, and I have to get in 52 hours of school somewhere in the middle... 

don't ask why i just posted this.


now that i just wrote this out, it doesn't seem as crazy as i thought it did, other than the social overload aspect of it. that will be interesting.

Values Voter Summit 2011

so.
VVS 2011 is over.
let's just say it was EPIC awesomeness.

day 1, i start student staffing and all of a sudden, there's Michele Bachmann.so automatically, we get out the phones and get pics.

day 2, Rick Santorum walks into the lobby.

day 3, i got to meet Ron Paul. that was randomly cool, because an Italian guy stopped me in the lobby and asked me what was going on. he wanted a "Obama's Last Day 1/20/13" bumper sticker, so i got him one and we stood in line together for like 90 min, discussing american & italian politics.

lessons learned:
1. if you have to fall flat on your face at the gala in front of the media, at least make sure you know one or two of them...
2. drinking lots of water is good.
3. taking cameras is a good idea.
4. good shoes are such a blessing.
5. bandaid's blister bandaids are some of the best inventions ever.
6. water is good.
7. always smile.
8. if the person looks like a creepy stalker, they very well might be one..........


{i totally wrote this out and managed to forget to publish it. can someone say "epic fail"!?}