Is that rude?

I have discovered that I can be rude sometimes, without meaning to be. Let's be honest, my facial expressions usually betray exactly how i am feeling.  But my question is, does it qualify as rude if...?

If I avoid sales people at the mall. I usually go shopping with a purpose and I know what I am looking for. I appreciate sales people who will say hello and then let me browse and do my shopping instead of latching onto me like a pirahna. If I need your help, I will ask for it. The worst people are the salesman at the Kiosks in the mall. You know the one's that sell the magic lotion made from ingredients from the Dead Sea. I usually don't make eye contact and I try ignore them. They just won't take no for an answer. I've been sucked into that trap before. 

I have customers come through the drive up at the bank and sit and talk on their cell phones and don't even acknowledge my existence or say thank you. So I think it's okay for me to get obnoxious and talk as loud as I can as I tell them to have a nice day. Just to disrupt their conversation. Read more here about pet peeves and cell phones.  


I use my car horn more than I need to. I know the horn is there to prevent horrible accidents but sometimes I honk my horn if somebody just pulls out in front of me and cuts me off. I have  a right to let somebody know they almost hit me right?

Anyway, I am just saying I am not perfect but I am vowing to do better and become nicer.

Have a wonderful day everybody. Thanks for stopping by. 

Sunday Social 60

1. If you could only eat one thing for the rest of your life, what would it be?

The correct answer would be Cereal. I love all kinds and I could eat it for every meal. 

2. What's your guilty pleasure/comfort food?

Cheese Fries

Muddy Buddies or Sour Cream and Onion Pringles

3. What's the weirdest/craziest thing you've ever eaten?

Musabi which is a slice of grilled Spam on top of a block of rice, wrapped together with nori dried seaweed. It’s actually not so bad.

4. What foods do you avoid at all costs?

Sea Food. Okay let me clarify. I cannot eat Shrimp. The one and only time I tried it I gagged and spit it right back out. We like to call them cockroaches of the ocean. 

5. What meal reminds you of your childhood?

Ham Fried Rice. When we were young and my dad cooked dinner, he had two specialties.  Spaghetti or Ham Fried Rice. His ham fried rice was actually really good. He'd use fried chicken instead of ham, celery and other vegetables, and scrambled egg. 

6. Share one of your favorite recipes and the story behind it.

. 

I really like this recipe for chicken enchiladas. I don't have a cool story to go along with this, but my family seems to enjoy them. It’s fairly simple. It will make about 8 enchiladas.

The ingredients you need are:

9x13 pan

Tortillas

1 cup of sour cream

1 can (8 oz) of cream of chicken soup.

2 bell peppers

1 small jalepeno (you can use two if you want it more spicy)

2 cups of cheddar cheese

1 ½ -2 cups of chicken. The canned chicken is super easy and it’s the perfect amount. If you prefer you can cook and chop up chicken breast.

Slice up Peppers, chop chicken, and combine them with the sour cream and soup. You will only use about half of this mixture to fill the tortillas. For each tortilla, scoop ¼ cup of the mixture into the tortilla and then add a finger full of cheese. Roll the tortilla up and place it in the pan. When the pan is full spread the other half of the mixture on top of the rolled up tortillas and finish by sprinkling cheese over everything, according to your preference.  After that, bake at 350 for 30 minutes. Let me know if you try the recipe out or have any questions. 

Picks of the Week.

Out of Print Clothing. This website has fun t-shirts made from book covers. Check out the website.

William, Kate, and the Royal baby.  They are just the cutest couple and I am so happy for them. How adorable is she in that polka dot dress?

I forget how much I love this movie. The cast is great, the writing is quick, it all just works when put together. It’s one movie you can watch over and over. It holds up well. 

7 Little Words. This is a game similar to a crossword. In each puzzle, use the clues to help you click on the 20 tiles in the right order to unscramble the 7 hidden words. Remember, you can always ask for a hint. 

Tropical Starbursts. These are by far the best family of starbursts.  Mango melon, pina colada, strawberry-banana, and royal berry punch. How can you go wrong. 

Just found out this is a book. And yes I ordered it off Amazon. I won’t get around to reading it just yet, but I bet it’ll be a fun, quick read. 

Throwback Thursday-Childhood Memories of Your Parents

These are my parents, Ken and Mary Jo. I have a lot of fond memories with these two. My dad is very focused and a very hard worker, sometimes to a fault. He worked full time, took care of the house and the yard, coached our soccer teams when we were little, came to our violin recitals and so much more. He was basically superman. One of my favorite stories of my Dad might seem a little terrifying, but we can all laugh about it now. This story just illustrates that my dad has even more of a one track mind than most men do.

This is my dad and my soccer team. I have no idea why I am standing as far away from him as possible, by the other coach. 

So I was about 8 years old. It was during the summertime and my family and I had just finished dinner. My mom was gone to a Church meeting so she wasn’t home at the time. After dinner my brother and I wanted to go back and play outside. We wanted to finish working on a tree house we built in a vacant lot across the street. In our excitement we hurried out of the house through the front door.  I was the last one to leave and I reached my hand back to make sure the front door closed all of the way. Bad idea.  Our front door was green, huge, and heavy, and it swung shut by itself. As it swung shut my finger got caught in the crossfire.  The door sliced closed right through my finger. Of course I ran back inside screaming at the top of my lungs and crying. All the while I left a trail of blood in my wake as I went through the entryway and the living room. My dad saw what happened. My nail was gone and the tip of my finger was hanging by a thread of skin, clearly I needed stitches.

My dad wrapped up my finger the best he could but had to do one thing before we left for the hospital. He had to show my brother Jordan and my sister Erin how to scrub the blood out of the living room carpet, so it wouldn’t stain! We did finally make it to the hospital and my finger was sewed back on successfully. When we got back it was clear that Erin and Jordan had either not scrubbed the carpet correctly or that they hadn’t even tried to clean it at all. But what are you going to do?  I still like to tease my dad about that although it was very traumatic moment when it happened.

My childhood memories of my mom are all just examples of taking care of others.  She would lug us around to music lessons, come to our recitals and orchestra concerts, and help us with our homework. I remember one year my sister tore her ACL skiing, and my grandma had back surgery. They were both invalids recuperating at our house at the same time. My mom and Dad were, however, the best nurses ever. They would help my sister Adrienne get out of bed and get up on her crutches. My mom would make sure grandma would walk around the kitchen and stretch out her back muscles like the doctor told her too. My favorite memories of my mom are the notes I would get at girls camp during the summer and the cards I got on my birthday. They just made me feel so special. They are one of the few things that will make me tear up. 

If you want to read how about how my parents helped get through my traumatizing first violin recital. The post is here. 

If You Ask Me

I’ve been thinking lately that I need to be a more independent thinker. I’ve found myself being influenced way too much by what others think. I will let Amazon reviews weigh slightly on my decision when I order a book and I will let critics sway my choice of whether to see a movie or not. I’ve usually been the person that will go see a movie just so I can say I liked it and why. I just want to be able to form my own opinion. I know it’s almost impossible to block outside voices completely but I am making a goal to do my best. So today I thought I might share a few of my opinions with you .

Let’s start with some easy ones.

I prefer dogs over cats. Dogs seem to be more emotionally connected with their owners while cats always seemed a little stuck up. Dogs are happy to see you. They will go running with you and they just love to play.

Oversized Sunglasses-I am a fan. Some people say that wearing oversized sunglasses make you seem like you are imitating celebrities, I do not agree. I think they are cute and functional. They block out sun completely whereas little glasses might let sunlight blind you through your peripheral. And who wouldn't want to be more like Audrey Hepburn?

Next, the movie The Phantom of the Opera. It received a sorry 33% on rotten tomatoes. To quote the website “The music of the night has hit something of a sour note: Critics are calling the screen adaptation of Andrew Lloyd Webber's popular musical histrionic, boring, and lacking in both romance and danger.”  This might be but I actually really liked the movie.  I do love Gerard Butler and I was impressed with his singing for the most part. Emmy Rossum and Patrick Wilson are so talented. I have the movie soundtrack on my ipod and love listening to it.  While the movie isn’t perfect I think the costumes were gorgeous and the direction captured the grandness of the opera house and the story. Plus the changed ending is the perfect wrap up of the Phantom's story.                                             

The Catcher in the Rye. According to Wikipedia “The Catcher in the Rye is a 1951 novel by J. D. Salinger. Originally published for adults, it has since become popular with adolescent readers for its themes of teenage angst and alienation. It has been translated into almost all of the world's major languages. Around 250,000 copies are sold each year with total sales of more than 65 million books. The vel's protagonist and antihero, Holden Caulfield, has become an icon for teenage rebellion. The novel was included on Time's 2005 list of the 100 best English-language novels written since 1923, and it was named by Modern Library and its readers as one of the 100 best English-language novels of the 20th century.

I hated this book. I hardly ever say that about books in general but this is one of two books in my entire life that I felt was a waste of time. I read it and for the first 150 pages, I felt like nothing happened. Boy flees prep school. Boy takes girl on date. Boy revisits childhood home in Manhatten. Maybe I’m missing some deep message but I was not a fan. One Good reads review summarizes my thoughts perfectly.
"Sometimes truth isn't just stranger than fiction, it's also more interesting and better plotted. Salinger helped to pioneer a genre where fiction was deliberately less remarkable than reality. His protagonist says little, does little, and thinks little, and yet Salinger doesn't string Holden up as a satire of deluded self-obsessives, he is rather the epic archetype of the boring, yet self-important depressive. "

For more entertainment you can also read

Fashion I don't get

Favorite So You Think You can Dance Performances

My thoughts onRomeo and Juliet

Why I think I’mcynical

A Trip and a Party

Friday I got to go to the Tuacahn amphitheatre and see Mary Poppins. St. George is so pretty. Sure you are in the desert and its about 110 degrees but the red rocks make up for it. I wanted to take a picture with my mom but she conveniently volunteered to man the camera. 

The actual show was great and you couldn’t ask for a better venue. Not only was the stage right up against the red cliffs but the stage was so big they had real horses pulling carriages and cars driving across it.  There wasn’t a bad seat in the whole theatre. Mary Poppins even flew in  and made quite an entrance and there were fireworks near the end. How cool is that.

Sunday we celebrated Jordan’s birthday with this yummy carrot cake. The cream cheese frosting is to die for. It's the kind of frosting you want to lick from a bowl. 

I had to throw pictures in of these cute girls.

And there is no better way to spend a Sunday afternoon than playing my favorite game Clue. 

Olivia didn’t know what hit her. Apparently the murderer came as quite a shock. 

Sunday Social 59

1.  What was your favorite TV show as a kid?

2.  What is your current favorite TV show?

There are so many I have to name them. I love the Big Bang Theory, Psych, Once Upon a Time, The Mindy Project, Elementary, Nashville, Community, Switched at Birth, Glee, Chicago Fire, and Castle.

3.  Which reality show would you NEVER do?

I like showers, beds, and real food too much.

4.  Which reality show would you LOVE to do?

This is like a real life version of Clue, but one of the contestants is the murderer.

5.  What is the TV personality/character that you feel is most like you?

I honestly don't know. This is a really tough questions. if i had to choose it would be Monica from Friends.  I can be obsessive, uptight, very competitive, and sometimes unfiltered with my words ha ha.

6. Which TV character would you want to date?

 Matt Casey on Chicago Fire. Look at that face…and he’s a firefighter.

Degas and the Dancers

Today is my brother Jordan's birthday. So here's a shout out to my big brother.  Last year he had a pretty great day if I say so myself. You can read about it here. Jordan also shares a birthday with one of my favorite artists. 
Hilaire Germain Edgar Degas, was born July 19^th 1834 in Paris. Like many Impressionists, Degas liked to experiment with light, angles, and focus. But he differed from many Impressionists in that he did not paint outdoors or study the effects of light on landscapes. 

One of Degas' favorite subjects was the ballet dancer. He loved to paint the dancers practicing in rehearsals or backstage before a show. He wanted to capture their energy and grace, but also their hard work and effort. During his career he created more than a thousand pictures of dancers. I love these paintings because the colors are soft, they are delicate, and you can really feel the movement. 

Do you have a favorite artist?

Throwback Thursday-Moving Out

I was lucky when I finally moved out. It was about a year or so after I had started college. Four girls I knew from high school, including my neighbor Leslie, were actually all living together when fall semester started. One thing led to another and one of the girls, Emily, got engaged and needed to sell her contract, so I moved into the apartment in October.  It was a quick deal where my parents helped me move boxes, kitchen stuff, and bedding over to my apartment in one afternoon, told me good bye and left me to do my thing. 

So there was Leslie, Becca, Sarah, and I in the apartment, with two bedrooms and one bathroom. Sadly I was voted the most girly in the apartment because I was the only one who showered and washed my hair everyday but that’s an entirely different story.  Here are some pictures of what the apartments “supposedly” looked like. They were a bit ghetto. Moving out taught me how important it Is to clean up and keep your place tidy.  

The four of us were all friends with another apartment of guys named Richie, Corey, Drake, and Monte. The first night in my new apartment Sarah came home after being on a date with Corey and had to tell us all about how Corey had finally kissed her. It was all very exciting. Corey and Sara ended up getting married the next year and Becca finally gave Monte a chance. He liked her for so long but she would not give him the time of day. Monte tried so hard. Now they are married. And Leslie just got engaged to a kid who lived in the apartment complex at the same time.  

In summary, moving out was not traumatic for me. I lived close enough that I could go home on Sundays and I had a great experience with my first roommates. They were all so fun. Even though we only lived together for a year, we did become good friends. 

Becca took food from Leslie

Leslie and I 

Monte

Becca and Richie

Richie

Richie and Drake

Nap Time

Sarah and Corey's Wedding

Back together in April