Stood-Up

Maybe you could help explain something for me.  I'm the type of girl who usually replies when people invite me to do something.  If I say yes, I usually stick to my plan.  {I say usually, because I try to avoid saying the words always or never, because then you will inevitably watch for the day I contradict myself by doing said thing I said I would never do and you will secretly judge me for it.} Even if something else that might seemingly be a better option comes along, I'm committed to my first plan.  Or if there is a completely legitimate reason why I cannot make it, I will try to let that person I had plans with know so that they are not wondering where I am.  Would they even wonder?  Is this just me?

I'm not talking about dates.  I'm talking about just making plans with friends.  The friends said that they were going to be there.  Then they are not there.  They are probably just running late.  They couldn't decide on what to wear.  Traffic.  Maybe there was a car accident.  Maybe they were in a car accident.

Where are you?


No answer.  Are they dead somewhere?  Laying in a hospital bed with no one to comfort them.  Do they see their phone ringing, but can't move their arms to pick it up and say I'm not coming because I can't move my arms?  What could cause them to not send a simple text message to say I can't make it.  Change of plans.  *enter lame excuse here*  Is it weird that I am at all concerned about them?  I don't lose sleep over it, because it's happened before and it will happen again.  Still if they were in my position, would they not care if I was M.I.A.?

Then to top it all off, you see your friend a week later and they say, "Oh yeah, I saw you're text message.  I was laughing.  You were looking for me, huh?"  I'm glad you thought it was funny.

It's just this flippant disregard that saddens me.  I don't think it's intentional, but I don't think they think. And honestly sometimes I just don't get it.  Maybe I care too much?  I need to get a life so I'm too self absorbed to care about what other people do?

No.  I'm happy the way I am and I'll never try not to change.

An Accent Of Sorts

Did you know I grew up in Wisconsin?  I did.  I spent my first 18 years of life there and I never knew there was such a thing as the Wisconsin accent.  I knew the big ones, Southern accent, Texan, New Yorker, Boston, Chicago, and California.  But in Wisconsin there was no accent.  I never heard anyone comment on the accent, probably because everyone sounded alike.  Who moves to Wisconsin?  Not too many.  You're pretty much born and raised there and don't ever leave.  Well, some do.  I did.  Still. it was like a thing that we would not speak of.  The accent.  

Then I moved to Arizona.  So many new people to meet.  I would introduce myself and then inevitably it would come up that I recently moved there.

Where are you from?

Wisconsin.

Oh, Wis-kaaawwnn-son. {enter extremely nasally drawn out "a" sound}

Umm, excuse me?

Cheese!

Cheese?  Yes, we do like cheese.  

I could just tell you were from Wis-kaawwnn-son, because of your accent.

What accent?


That's how it goes.  This was all new to me.  Being mocked for the way I said Wisconsin.  That is the way you are suppose to say it.  It's the only way to say it.  Wait, I have an accent.  It was all very confusing.

Every new person I met, it was the same thing.  They would repeat Wisconsin back to me in such an exaggerated way.  It got old fast and it still happens.  Without fail.

I say Wisconsin.

You say Wis-kaaawwnn-son.

And repeat.

Oh and there was that time when we were in London and met this British guy.  The subject of accents came up.  Of course, British accents.  Swoon.  Something was mentioned about how cute the British accent is.

Do you like our accents?

No. {Translation: They're dumb.}

To which I answer: You're dumb!  Rude.

Although, you can't really ever argue the British accent versus the American accent.  British accent will always win.  Then it will have a cup of tea and crumpets chuckling at our American accent while it drowns it's feelings in soda and ice cream.  Ooh, root beer float anyone.  Why can't we have a proper accent like the British do?

When visiting Wisconsin {Wis-kaawwnn-son.  Annoying, isn't it?}, I can hear the accents around me.  Only after being distanced from it for so long, only now can I hear it.  Even though, I don't feel extremely attached to people or things in Wisconsin anymore, going back there with the familiarity of how people talk is actually comforting.

I'll never move back there, but I am from there.  I have something that I will carry with me wherever I might go.  It's that accent that I didn't even know existed.  Yes, I'm from Wis-kaawwn-son.

Chills

You see what I mean?

An Open Letter to My VW Beetle

Dear VW Beetle,

Now that our time together has now come to an end, I thought it appropriate to write you a letter as one last goodbye.  You see, you are special to me.  Other vehicles would come and go, but you were the one constant for over a decade. 

We'll always have those memories.  When I learned how to drive, you were there.  You forced me to learn how to drive on a manual five speed and made my driver's test that much more nerve wracking.  I will forever know how to drive a manual because of you.  That makes me cool, only compared to those who cannot drive a manual.  Sorry I kind of loved you and hated you because of it, but I only hated you in traffic and on really steep hills.

We've been through the good times and the bad. 
Good: Road trips. Joy rides with friends. Getting me anywhere. Comfortable seats that know my rear better than anyone.  Sorry future owners.  Just kidding.  Good air conditioning, until a year ago which would go into the bad category.  Encouraging violence by watching kids run and hit someone playing slug bug, or is that bad?
Bad: Two terrible vanity plates, before we realized vanity plates are really lame.  It took us a few years.  Sorry for the embarrassment that brought you, and me.  That time a deer ran into us and smashed the windshield and the whole side in.  That time I ran over a huge landscaping block and all your innards were spewed out onto the road.  One cupholder.  Multiple cups. 

Now our time has come to an end.  I can't help but think how much has happened over the last ten years.  Old friends and new friends have come and gone.  Several moves-one across country.  Graduations.  New jobs.  Everything in between.  Life.  Time has flown by and stood still, if that's possible. 

It was time. To say goodbye.

Goodbye Portland!

Here are the last of our trip pictures.  I know you are happy about that.  Don't worry, I've got some more ranting coming your way with maybe a bit of nostalgia and a touch of sap {not from the tree, as in short for sappy}.  You would prefer pictures, huh?  I will pretend that my feelings aren't hurt, while I go eat some ice cream and cry in my room and have feelings of hurt.  Only not really.  

At The Mississippi Street Fair

I swear this trip was the trip of Brunch and Ice Cream, not put together.  We would have brunch, then eat a whole lot in between and end our evenings with Ice Cream.  My kind of trip.  

After brunching at Gravy where we had the biggest omelet stuffed with everything you could think to put in an omelet and smothered in, you guessed it, gravy, we walked along the Mississippi Street Fair.  Served to be a great place for people watching and observing how Portlanders do street fairs.  They do it well.  Within minutes of walking around, a girl came up to us asking to take our picture for her little street style blog, because as you know, we are "friends with style".  Her words, not mine.  =p  Then a few minutes later some middle aged man came up to us and said, "Okay, you girls. Picture."  And then walked away without telling us who he was or what he was going to use that picture for.  Pretty sure that is going up on some creepers wall.  Bleh!  Give us our picture back, Sir! 

The next day was hot for Portland and the local park was hopping.  They have a fountain where kids and big kids alike can get their feet wet.  

Oh and we had ice cream again.  What was I telling ya!  But check out that sky and those trees!  I miss you, Portland.  I really miss those pleasant chaps up there.  They're good people.  

What Ever Happened to Predictability??

I have more trip pictures.  I know you all just love looking at pictures of people that you don't know.  I know I do.  Here was our trip to San Francisco in a picture loaded post nutshell.

Day started off right w/ some Blue Bottle Lattes

Brunch at The Grove.  Aww brunch, my dear old friend! 

The painted ladies aka Full House house! 

Right after this picture we started singing the whole Full House theme song lead by my amazing friend Becky who remembered all the lyrics.  Hence my post title up there.  Come on, guys, who didn't love Full House!  Who knows the next line??  Rebecca, comment below!  

Palace of Fine Arts...

... where this happened!  That's right! 

Coit Tower

The Princess Diaries Fire House.  Always on the must see list.

Then for some reason we climbed this mountain!  Okay, it was more of a big hill.  It just felt like a mountain.  

After climbing the mountain, we thought we could take this on. 

Philz Coffee.  Best iced coffee EVER! I'm not kidding.  

And we ate a lot of good food and had a lot of ice cream too.  I don't have any pictures, because I was too busy devouring it to think about it.  Delicious!  Our friends were the best tour guides.  Thank you, Friends. for being our friends!

All the group shots here or the ones that actually look good were taken by our friend, The Photographer, Jonathan.  Check out his work here.

I'll Put Him In My Pocket

We were at Ulta the other day picking up some much needed drying lotion for those pesky things we like to call zits.  I get them.  My sister gets more of them (sorry, Syd). Everyone gets them.  Our friend in Portland was a wealth of information in the beauty department.  She told us about this David Badescu Drying Lotion for spot treatment.  I tried it last night on my third eye pimple, you know the one.  That stuff works.  The beauty guru also told us that Suave is now selling a dry shampoo.  Finally, I don't have to spend $15 bucks on a bottle just to have it break the next week.  True story.  Thank you, Suave, for being cheap and supporting my lazy habit of not doing my hair for days on end.

The point of all this isn't to share beauty products. As we were checking out, the girl behind the counter asked, "Would you like me to put him in a bag?"  Excuse me, did you say him?  Since when did drying lotion have a gender?  And if it does have a gender, then why him?  Why not her?  Would you like me to put her in a bag?  It's all very puzzling.  We didn't think to ask her these thought provoking questions.  I don't think we would have gotten a satisfactory answer.  Instead, we just laughed and put him in our pocket.

Now I'm all about personification, because that's all kinds of fun.  But I haven't really thought of them as having any specific gender, besides ships.  Those behemoths are girls, you know.  I've noticed most people name their car girl names or give them pet names.  With the exception of maybe a Mini Cooper which would be a guy with a proper British name like Harold, Charlie, or Horace.

If I started giving genders to things I think it would be a dangerous situation.  For example, if my dry lotion is a "him".  What if my cleanser was a "she".  When I washed my face, it'd be like they were making out on my face.  I'm not gonna think about it.

This post doesn't have any pictures.  You down with that?  She likes to mix it up.  She knows you'll understand.  See how I used "she" referring to my blog.  See how that was creepy.