Table for one

With some new found time on my hands I have actually been cooking my own meals lately. Not just reheating leftovers from restaurants, or nuking Lean Cuisines, but real life cooking. Yes, most nights I still just forage around my kitchen for food components that can be put together to comprise something resembling a meal, but that is because the reality is cooking for one is HARD.
Yes, it takes the same amount of energy, makes the same mess, uses the same amount of utensils and takes the same time as cooking for more than just myself, but what comes at the end of cooking for one? Eating alone. And that can take a lot of mental energy!
I have just slaved away cooking this fabulous meal, and I have no one to enjoy it with. No one to shower me with compliments over how delicious it is. No one to make me a back up dinner if it sucks. Just me. And sometimes, I have tons of leftovers.
Yes there are pros to being single. I dictate my own life. No one moves my keys, I get to decide what's for dinner, and I live in a very girly apartment. (There are pink pillows on the sofa and a picture of Pointe shoes on the wall). I can decide where I go and when I go and what goes on the grocery list.
But it's mostly lonely. And no one seems to talk about that. All you hear about is how empowering being single can be. But most of my friends are in relationships.

So this is my call to action, for all people who are married or in relationships, if you have single people in your life. Invite them out with you, call them up, don't forget about us. We're not all out living some fabulous unattached #nostrings life. Mostly we're trying to figure out what to do with our leftovers, or measuring out a single serving of pasta.

This is real life. Most people want to be with other people. Not all of us are lucky enough to be in romantic relationships, but shutting out those who haven't found 'the one' just because you have, isn't fair.

Don't feel sorry for me because I'm single, but acknowledge that I need to be around people, and sometimes I need to cook for someone other than just myself...

And this fajita pasta was really good!

So blow the candles out, my dear...

Today is my birthday, and I love my birthday!!

I have gone through a lot over the past year. Moving out of my apartment and back into my parents' house four days into my 25th year led to a rocky start, but 25 ended up being a great year! I met a lot of new people, and I made some terrific friends who have blessed me tremendously! Now I can only hope that 26 is just as (if not more) great.
As amazing as this past year has been, it's still a little hard for me to cope with that fact that I'm nowhere near where I thought I'd be in my life by the time I crossed the threshold from 'early to mid-twenties' to 'mid- to late twenties'. Although, my dad was 39 for several years...surely, I can hang on to 25 for a little while longer.

I want to keep having birthdays, but I don't want to get any older until something changes. I like the birthday crowns, and the birthday wishes, and the birthday blessings, and the birthday dinners...and I love the birthday bikes!

Okay, maybe 'birthday bikes' shouldn't have been plural. I just got the one. But it's pink and it has a little basket, so I think I'm good there!

I did have a great day: my friends surprised me last night with pie and ice cream, my kiddos sang to me today and my parents took me to my favorite Mexican restaurant for dinner! I just want to keep all the fun stuff, but stay away from the birthday blues!

I scream, you scream...

I love ice cream. I really really love it! One of the 'house rules' I had in my apartment was: if you want ice cream, you go get ice cream. (Some of the other rules included staying in jammies until at least 10 on Saturdays and never turning off the TV or changing the channel during a Law & Order: SVU marathon)

But...back to the ice cream thing. I really wanted ice cream tonight. I needed to work on church stuff, but I knew I wasn't going to get any real work done as long as I had ice cream on the brain. So I hopped in the car and drove myself to 31 Flavors. Let me tell you, 31 is a lot of flavors to have to chose from. I narrowed it down to two: cotton candy, and my 'usual' a flavor called icing on the cake. I couldn't choose. I 'eenie meenie miny moe-d', but ultimately, there was really only one right answer: both. Both was good. Both was the best decision I ever made without actually having to make a decision.

My life is exhilarating!

Stuff.

Most of us have too much of stuff. I have too much stuff. So much stuff that there is a storage unit full of my stuff.

Stuff from my apartment: Pots and pans, dishes, a microwave, a crockpot, furniture, lamps, silverware, shoes, pictures, blankets, odds and ends, gadgets and gizmos, whosits and whatsits...you name it!

I miss my stuff. I miss my knick-knacks, I miss my refrigerator magnets, I miss the chairs I fixed up, I miss my random assortment of framed pictures and allllllll the stuff from my Alice in Wonderland kitchen. And most of all I miss my mugs. Yes, I am quite attached to my mugs.

For some reason, it makes me a little sad when I open the cupboard to grab a coffee cup each morning and I only have 3 options. I've had the same 3 options for the last 7 months and I will continue to have the same 3 options until I can move out of my parents' house.

I am waiting very impatiently for the day I can unpack this box (and the two others just like it) and have multiple mug options. Until then I will have to settle for the 3 I have here.

A Place of One's Own

Once upon a time I had my own apartment. The rent was too high, the neighborhood wasn't great, and my air conditioner didn't work. On several occasions I had to re-light my heater pilot with a match when it went out, and once my toilet broke and it took two days before someone came to fix it. My kitchen had the ugliest brown lacquered cabinets, and I swear my upstairs neighbors had a pet elephant who enjoyed tap-dancing. The frat boy wannabes (who were in their mid-thirties) across the way played their awful music too loud, and if the kids weren't using my back-patio to play hide and seek on, they would always be screaming in the pool (which was right on the other side of my patio).

But, despite all of this...I had my own apartment. I had my own living room, and my own bedroom, and my own kitchen, and my own bathroom. I could decorate however I wanted, and watch whatever I wanted on TV.

I'm starting to really miss my old place...especially today when I'm being charged with the task of cleaning 'my' room.

A sampling of photos from my apartment in Simi

First off, it's really hard to keep your room clean when you have to figure out a way to keep all of your stuff in there...which is tough, since my room at my parents' house isn't that much bigger than my queen-sized bed that's in there. I have maybe a 12"-border around my bed, and mom won't let me hang anything on the walls (which are no longer the teal of my teen-hood, but a shade of gray that reminds me somewhat of a prison cell...apparently it's supposed to be 'classy' but it just feels depressing). How am I supposed to feel like this is my room if I'm not allowed to put any of myself into it? With none of my travel pictures, or even pictures of my friends the blank walls just make me sad. Plus, I am really starting to miss my stuff. Every time I visit the storage unit, I see all my chairs, and my lamps and my decor...and I just miss it.

Working less than 30 hours a week, along with the three semesters it will take (at least) to get all my ECE certification means it's going to be a long while before I'll be able to see the light at the end of the 'living with my parents' tunnel.

I feel like the only way I'm ever going to be able to move out is if I:

a) Inherit a house that is already paid off and has no property taxes attached to it

b) Win a bajillion dollars by playing the lottery, because a bajillion dollars should cover rent for a while

-or-

c) Get married

none of these are likely solutions...especially since I don't even play the lottery.

I guess I'm just destined to live the life of a twenty-five year old teenager...

Moving out and moving on...

I have neglected this blog as of late because something slightly devastating has happened and I needed to talk about with with family and friends before slapping it up on the internet.

It goes like this: I lost my job. This isn't the appropriate setting to give details, but I can say that it sucks.

A lot.

Loss of job (and the loss of income that comes with it) has forced me to move out of my apartment in the SoCal suburbs and back in with my parents in the Central Valley. As grueling as packing and unpacking was and is, the mental preparation for this move took more out of me than the physical. At 25, the idea of living with my parents (even though I've already been here for two weeks) still makes me mad and sad. I feel like I've lost my freedom (cue over-dramtic music).

While being back in my hometown hasn't been all bad (I enjoyed an impromptu picnic with a couple of old friends last weekend and a 'murder mystery dinner party' with some new friends this past weekend) it's just still very hard to wrap my mind around the fact that I don't have a job or money...and very little dignity. I just updated my resume, and I'm looking into taking some classes to increase my array of 'marketable skillz'. I've filled out half a dozen online job-applications (as well as the Myers-Briggs-esque questionnaires that accompany each one)...

I'm still not 100% what I want to 'be'. I can't see myself in a career that doesn't involve working with kids, as taxing as they are...I just love 'em

and all the little ants go marching...

I have a problem.
An ant problem.
And don't like it.
When I first discovered ants in my bathroom (random place for ants) I attacked them with a stream of hairspray. Mostly because its was 10:30 at night and that was the only thing I had at my disposal. Not only did it kill the ants, but it also sealed them to my floor a little bit and made my bathroom floor all sticky. So the next day I mopped my bathroom floor with bleach-water and the ants still didn't go away. So I bought ant traps, and now the ants are just mocking me. They are treating the trap like it's a little ant-sized Starbucks. They are just chilling out in and around it. They go in, they come out, they bring their friends...and it's driving me CRAZY!
Last night at dinner, a friend of mine inadvertently gave me a brilliant idea. She had mentioned seeing an anteater at the zoo...so I thought that maybe getting an anteater for my apartment would help me with my problem...but, ever the voice of reason, she reminded me having an anteater in my bathroom would just cause and bigger and stranger infestation. How would I then get rid of the anteaters? Is there such a thing as an anteater eater? And what is the difference between an anteater and an aardvark? Why is aardvark such a funny word?
Yes, an anteater would cause a much bigger conundrum then a bunch of little, tiny, ants.

I might invest in a can of Raid, though...

10...9...8...7...6...5...

4...3...2...1.
As glad as I am that I am starting this year with clean clothes, I hope I have something better to do next New Years' Eve than my laundry...
I hate making New Year's Resolutions because I never keep them. I should work out more, stress out less, blah blah blah…
I did make some last year because it was part of a party game. I didn't want to go too personal with my resolutions because who wants to resolve to be 'less single' in front of a roomful of people, especially a room that included my ex-boyfriend and his wife (who, btw resolved to have a baby in 2010…awk)
I have kept all the resolutions I made last year, I went to Disneyland (4 times, actually); I found an apartment; and I made it to 2011.
This year I need to make more friends, try not to be so much of a homebody, and have someone to kiss when I ring in 2012 (or at least not to spend next NYE alone, blogging in my sweat pants watching Carson Daly's schpiel on NBC)

Here's to hoping 2011 is less lonely than 2010...

Single people use blenders, right?

Yes, we do...but we don't get to register for them. Just because I'm not in the "marriage" stage in my life doesn't mean I don't need things for my apartment. There is no such thing as an apartment-warming registry. Bed, Bath & Beyond hasn't quite jumped on that bandwagon yet. Four months ago I moved into my first apartment and I'm still working on filling it. I did get some hand-me downs: silverware from my parents, a coffee table from my friend who moved and a sofa from an old lady at my church who apparently had cataracts. I have some left over stuff from dorm-living: stolen plates from the caf, a nice collection of dollar tree spatulas and other things we collected over the years. I had a decent collection of 'starter' items. Some good, solid basics. Mom stepped up and sprung for a toaster, and the 'rents pitched in the extra microwave they had sitting in the garage to help my kitchen come together. Trying to make this apartment 'home' involved hanging a few pictures, getting some curtains, and a couple of throw pillows to try to spruce up the hideous sofa, and the whole thing has come together quite nicely for what I've had to work with. It's nice and I get by.
Except I need a blender.
Granted, I can get a no-frills blender at Target for around 20 bucks, so it's not a HUGE deal...it's just...the principal...when you think of bridal registry, blender is the first thing you think of, right? It's like the stereotypical wedding gift. There is something about buying yourself a blender that just seems so...sad.
I realize that almost everything I just said set feminism back about 50 years...I may as well vacuum in pearls and pumps and enjoy unblended drinks from now on...

It's about time...

I haven't posted in over a week...I fail at blogging.
But in case anyone is actually reading this (Hi, Becca!!) I will write something.
On Wednesday nights I meet with my high school youth (Higher Ground) to have Bible study and fellowship. I really like meeting with my HG peeps on a weekly basis, because I get to check in with them and see how things are going, I enjoy hanging with my students. I feel bad for other youth directors, I bet their students aren't as awesome as mine. We start with a game, and then move into 'Highs and Lows' (when I was a camp counselor in a girls' cabin, we called it 'Rainbows and Spiders'-cute, right?)
I will share my (Roses/Thorns, Hills/Valleys, Something you likes/Something you dislikes)...I'll start with my low, that way it gets better at the end.
Low: My bike got stolen...my bike that I've had for SIX WEEKS got stolen. Bummer. BIG BUMMER. I really liked that bike, her name was Dorothy (I name things, don't worry about it) She was white with a black basket and a Relient K bumper sticker. I've never really been the victim of a crime before, so I feel very violated. I'm still in mourning.
High: I moved!! I finally have my own apartment, and it's kinda fun. I don't really have furniture yet, and I'm not completely unpacked...it may not be much, but it's mine!! I almost feel like a real grown-up. My sister came over the weekend, and she helped me unpack and I got to be a little hostess...I cooked for us and then we slumber partied it up on air mattresses in my living room!! Yay bonding!
I'm really excited to get furniture and start decorating so I can make it 'home'.