normal obsessions

The royal baby (I’ll refer to him as Prince, because how cool is that?!) has arrived! I thoroughly understand the American obsession with the Royal family because we don’t have monarchies and thanks to Disney, every girl grew up wanting to be a princess. For Kate Middleton, that dream actually came true, giving the rest of us normal girls a sense that dreams really do come true. Besides, who better to admire than the people we fought so diligently to break away from? (Only kidding…)

So now the question remains: what is Prince’s name? People have been betting on it for 9 months now. Surprisingly I haven’t read much into it. I’m sure it will be a family name- and probably a very long one at that. Unlike us normal people, Prince will probably have about five names before they ever get to his last name. I didn’t know that monarchs even had a last name until I googled it about five minutes ago. I thought they just went by their first, middle, second middle, etc. names and ended it with something fun and royal like “the Duke of Cambridge”. Their last name however is obviously very English and very royal sounding…nothing as plain as Smith would do… which is why their last name is Mountbatten-Windsor. Good luck trying to teach Prince to write and pronounce that in kindergarten.

Not gonna lie, I was really crossing my fingers for a little princess, but I’m sure Prince will be just as dashing as his parents and just as fun as his Uncle Harry. Can I be his godmother? And I was also very glad that he arrived at a decent time of day so that I didn’t have to pull an all-nighter like I did in college to watch the Royal Wedding. (Ok, but seriously I probably wouldn’t have pulled an all-nighter to wait for the announcement of a baby that I will never meet. Watching the wedding was worth it but somehow waiting up just to hear a Royal crier make an announcement didn’t sound appeasing. Not to mention that in college, my body was trained to run on no sleep, but now that I have a job and a real-time schedule, I’m more of an in-bed-by-10-at-the-latest kind of gal.—But for the record I would, however break my schedule to watch another wedding of Royal or Kardashian magnitude on any given day. Yes, I’m that girl. Slightly obsessed.)

Is anyone else shocked at how quickly summer is passing by or am I just getting old? It’s almost August for crying out loud! I feel like say this every summer…but such is life. And what a difference in this summer and last. First of all rain, rain, rain. It rain an inch last week and is currently raining now. Not so bad since hardly any one down here irrigates and most crops are laid by at the moment. But the boys back home are singing a different story. Spence sent me a picture from the field last night after they got- wait for it…4 INCHES of rain the night before last. And guess what, they’re supposed to get more today. So instead of pumping water into the fields, they’re retracing all their previous steps and pumping water off. Fun fun. Compared to last summer which was one of the worst drought seasons ever with the some of the highest crop prices…God sure does have a sense of humor.

Another difference in last summer and this summer is my lack of tan-ness. Direct quote from my mother last weekend: “Wow, this is the palest I’ve ever seen you this time of year!” Thanks….I am becoming more cautious of sun damage after finding a few wrinkles on my face and my dad having skin samples sent off to be tested. So I catch rays when I can but am not exactly the sun goddess that I used to be. Instead, I now resort to sunless tanners- they stink, but they work. And to me, the cost of stench is much easier to pay than other potential costs.

Speaking of wrinkles, did you know that sleeping on your face (stomach and side sleepers) can cause wrinkles!? Engineers have built a pillow with a hole cut out so that only your ear, jaw, and hairline take the pressure, leaving your precious face unharmed from the ruthless wrinkle causing pillow while you snooze all night. While this may sound ridiculous, I have been overly aware of the way my cheeks smush into my pillow, creating an obsession of caution when I’m trying to sleep. The past few nights I have spent a good 3-5 minutes situating myself just so that my face feels as little smush as possible. “Prevention is key”…but somehow I still wake up looking like the Nightmare before Christmas every morning. Maybe I should just accept the fact that raisin skin is worth a good night’s sleep on a smushy, fluffy pillow (no matter how contradicting that sounds). Right…?

Last but not least, I would just like you to know that I fried my first ever batch of green tomatoes last night. And they were awesome. I also used my potato cutter to make my first batch (okay, actually the second because my first attempt was an utter fail) of homemade French fries. I’m becoming a decent gardener and cook while living down here- Mississippi makes me sustainable, and it feels so good. I posted a picture of the fried, unhealthy, goodness-es on my Instagram (another one of my obsessions) with the hasttag #BHGsummer in hopes of winning the weekly contest that Better Homes and Gardens is hosting all summer long. So far, they haven’t “liked” my photo…but it’s only Tuesday…there is still time. They’re probably just too busy gushing over Prince to notice me at the moment…

Stay hopeful my friends. Enjoy the summer and the rain. And remember that Jiminy Cricket was right when he said “dreams come true”.

Love always,

“And so with the sunshine and the great bursts of leaves growing on the trees, just as things grow in fast movies, I had that familiar conviction that life was beginning over again with the summer.”  – F. Scott Fitzgerald

sweet, sleepy dreams…

When I came home for Christmas break I never had any intentions of taking a break from this blog…however the negligence is obvious in fact that I only have one blog for the entire month of December as well as the comment made by Aunt Laurie last weekend: “Everytime I go to your blog it’s the same hair flipping one.” That said, it’s time to get back to business…

I could bore you with my endeavors over this seemingly endless break, or tell you all about my Christmas presents, but I would rather skip the junk talk. I don’t figure anyone really cares that much anyways. But I do have to give a shout out to a very reminiscent Christmas Eve dinner with the cousins at the “kids table”: we all laughed for about an hour over the goofy things we used to all do as kids. A few of the notable memories were the ridiculous games we used to make up and the extent of the holiday madness that fell upon Nan’s house with 12 grandchildren all under the age of 10. “Spence is the Monster”, “Around the House Tag”, “Lego Wars”, “Hide and Seek in the Basement”, “Yahtzee Pool”, and “Disappear” were among the favorite games we coined (aren’t the names so original!?). As for the holidays that we experienced growing up in my family, I cannot simply explain them in one sentence. Instead, let me paint a picture for you:

Christmas Eve night at Nans approximately 1998: KIDS EVERYWHERE. Presents stacked as tall as the giant Christmas tree in the tiny living room that was bursting at the seams with stressed out parents, hormonal teenagers, groups of little heathens in a panic over the excitement of the presents, and one set of overly active grandparents (Nan and Papa). The energy in the room was indescribably amped and the parents forced each child to sit in their “designated area” on the floor and wait patiently while the gifts were dispersed. There was always a little dispute when one  kid got to climb under the tree to get the presents in the very back…of course that was always the “favorite kid” which tended to cause a bit of hostility among the overly stimulated youngsters. Then all at once, the paper shredding began. Sparkly bows, pretty paper, and nametags were flying through the air while screams of joy and well-practiced “oohs” and “ahhs” rang throughout the room. Parents pretended to be excited about the noisy new toy that their child just opened, while figuring out to do with yet another tractor (or in my case, Barbie doll) that will obviously not fit into the already overflowing toy box. After all the toys were open we were all forced to be silent while Papa called “Santa’s secret phone line” and one by one we all took turns listening to Santa. Eventually we would all make our way home where Aunt Laurie would call with an update on Santa’s whereabouts according to the radar and we would all tuck into bed, secretly scheming ways to catch the fat man, until sleep overtook us and ruined the plan.

This was the typical Christmas for us for many years until we finally moved the holiday festivities to Aunt Sandy and Uncle Marks (at the time) new house. By this point, the heathens were all a little bit older, however no more mature- meaning that they now fought over who got the privilege of passing out presents. After opening the gifts, instead of calling Santa we played one of the most infamous original “cousin games”- Around the House Tag. It actually began as a game we played inside the house, which was absurd considering the number of people that filled the house, leading to multiple collisions and accidents. Needless to say, we were forced outside in the freezing cold, but everyone knows the resiliency of a kid is out of this world so the temperature was no threat to us. We would run as far and fast as we could for hours on end, eventually having to create very specific rules and guidelines because homemade games always present those tricky “gray areas” where no one really knows who is “it” anymore.

I know that was a little much to take in, but I thoroughly enjoyed our reminiscent moment and just wanted to share just one of the many crazy experiences that I had growing up as a child in an over populated family.

I will throw this out there one last time: sitting at home in Sikeston while everyone else has already returned to Stark really makes me sad. But in the end, I know that I only have one more semester at dear ole’ Murray, so I better get excited and soak it all up while I still can. (I promise I’ll eventually stop complaining about this….a surprise visit from Kelly last week helped get me excited for the return as we considered all the trouble we can get into our last semester in the MKY!)

Martin Luther King’s birthday is coming up so get excited….whoot whoot…

“Come, Thou Fount of every blessing, Tune my heart to sing Thy grace” and “When peace, like a river, attendeth my way, When sorrows like sea billows roll; Whatever my lot, Thou has taught me to say, It is well, it is well, with my soul.” Look them up…love them both.

Ok, now that I got all the BS out of the way, it is time for the list of the memorable moments of 2010:

1. SEC brought home the national championship
2. Alice in Wonderland, Twilight Eclipse, Inception, Toy Story 3, and Facebook finally gets a movie!
3. Antione Dodson- “Hide ya kids, hide ya wife”
4. All of Katie Perry’s songs and Jason’s new album
5. Rescuing the Chilean coal miners
6. H1N1 epidemic is declared over! (or at least back to normal)
7. The International Space Station surpasses the record for the longest human occupation in space
8. Lady Gaga’s outfits
9. CERN scientists actually trap antimatter…Angels and Demons flash back
10. BP oil spill
11. Earthquake in Hati
12. Bret Michaels and Hugh Hefner get engaged (not to eachother, of course)
13. Oprah’s last show…
14. WAYNE IS REALEASED FROM JAIL
15. Lynard Skynard came to the rodeo…yeah, I said it
16. Murray is a buzzer-shot away from the Sweet 16
17. State makes it to the Gator Bowl
18. Prince William popped the question…finally, a royal wedding in my lifetime!

I’m sure there were many more noteworthy events that I am overlooking, but I am drawing this blog to an end. Sleep is creeping its way into my body and is quickly taking over. I promise to write again soon!

Love always,

Addie

“You know that place between sleep and awake, the place where you can still remember dreaming? That’s where I’ll always love you, Peter Pan. That’s where I’ll be waiting.” -Tinkerbell

always dreaming…

Went to see the movie Inception last night. Let me just say, it took some analyzing and some thinking to get through that one, but I would love to sit down and have lunch with the writer of that movie. Absolutely incredible, and I’m definitely going to need to see it again to make sure that I put all the pieces together correctly.

Over all I had a very interesting night even after the movie was over. It rained, and for those of you from the Bootheel, you know that when it rains, it pours. Usually I’m out like a baby when the thunder rocks and rolls me to sleep, but last night was different. My brain definitely wasn’t ready to shut down and I’m not sure if it was due to the fact that I thought someone might infiltrate my dreams (doubtful, I don’t get persuaded that easily), or due to other things weighing on my mind, but either way I kept waking up about every hour. (Ok, so it could be to the fact that I was having to share my bed with an oversized dog because he is scared to death of storms.) Regardless of the culprit, I’m actually not that tired today, and the weather has cooled off thanks to the down pour so it’s a very nice day!

Through it all last night I couldn’t quit thinking about several quotes from the movie:

1. “Never recreate from your memory. Always imagine new places.” – we shouldn’t live in the past because trust me, it turns out bad. (People like Mal will haunt you and your every dream.)
2. “You mustn’t be afraid to dream a little bigger.” (as he pulls out a grenade launcher)- nuff said.
3. “You’re waiting for a train; a train that will take you far away. You know where you hope this train will take you, but you can’t be sure.”- sometimes we have to take chances…you can’t get something you’ve never had without first doing something you’ve never done.
4. “You keep telling yourself what you know. But what do you believe? What do you feel?”
5. “Dare you take a leap of faith? Or become an old man, filled with regret, waiting to die alone.”
6. “What’s the most resilient parasite? An Idea. A single idea from the human mind can build cities. An idea can transform the world and rewrite all the rules.” – I think this is very true. We have the power to do anything we want to. And ideas really are like parasites of the mind…once you get one, you can’t get rid of it. Idea’s that pop in your head continue to pop up until you do something to act on them. Crazy.

I love the depth and complexity of this movie. Mind boggling? Yes. But definitely worth the headache.

While I’m on the movie review, let me just say  that I appreciate the realism of Remember Me, but I personally was not a fan. I am a romanticist and I enjoy watching movies with a little “magic” in them. Though it’s not always practical, it’s an escape from the real world and reminds us for just a minute that miracles still happen and everything is possible. Gives me a chance to dream again. Not in this movie though. I wanted a good ending, this ending wasn’t magical, it was real. So for me, it wasn’t a “good” movie…it should have been listed under documentaries or something.

I just want to end this post by saying how regretful I am about Kendra Grey. I didn’t personally know her, but I know she will be missed by many. Always remember that the choices you make can influence other people’s lives forever. Even people that you didn’t even expect to touch. Think twice before acting.

Love always,

Addie

“You can’t live an undecided life.”