Volunteer, Advocate, Trekker.

Oh, mother... a constant source of frustration and unequivocal support and faith at the same time. For weeks, I've been saying I'd take her to buy a new jacket - because the one she got was a hand-me-down from a family friend, and it just looks ridiculous to me -- it looks like it's got a little skirt attached to it :-( One of the many areas I wish I could improve mom - is fashion. She wears the strangest clothes. Oh if I could get her to watch and learn from "What Not to Wear"... a show she would fit right into! She has no problem with wearing clothes that look dirty, stained, grungy, or really old (some shirts she admits having since I was born.) For as long as I can remember, she almost never buys clothes. She takes David and my hand-me-downs (mainly shirts and belts), or random packages from distant relatives. But for the past few years, when I get the time and hit the frustration level - I take her out shopping, give her my critical opinions, and she usual...

WooHOO! So, the Census is not as over as I thought it was. Instead, I'm being retained for phase 2 which goes all of July -- 30+ hours a week. And with no summer classes, that's a lot of hours of me making money and not being able to spend it. Combined with the money mom owes me, and my balancing my accounts -- I've had enough lately to indulge and live life a little! So I treated myself to a new 5th gen Orange iPod nano, as well as a new camera! Yeah, I'm pretty much loving life. And what better way to inaugurate a new camera than to go explore some ABANDONED BUILDINGS :D Our abandoned building today is a former Mini-Golf/Put-put place in Hudson*, Ohio -- incredibly close to my Grandpa's house actually. ((* -- on the border of Hudson and Stow)) The first trip to Grandpa's of summer we often went here, me, Grandpa and Dave. It's only been closed a year or maybe 3 though, so I def declare it in the first stages of abandonment. In the following picture there...

I miss Sarah! :"( I'm so bored without her, even doing nothing is more fun when she's around. And lately I've been doing less than nothing - it's been class, work, sleep all week. I have done practically nothing fun all week and all I have to show for it is a little extra spending cash, which I can't spend! Cause I have to save up for a security deposit. Sigh. So grandpa passed away over a week ago. I don't think I'll go into funeral details, but it was very sweet and appropriate and I am glad we were able to honor his memory in the way he wanted at his funeral. And I am again incredibly thankful to the awesome super-fantastic friends that were able to make it. But now I think I'll share some family drama because it's just so darned entertaining. Firstly, Aunt Betty mentioned to us that we'd be taking a limo from the church the funeral was held at to the cemetery. The day of the funeral, she mentioned how her "car was so low on gas, she...

Grandpa died on Wednesday, May 12th at 8:00 pm at Akron General Hospital. I don't handle loss well, anyone who has known me for any length of time probably understands that. I've gone through a lot of loss, this is a boy who lost his best friend-role model-hero at age 8, his home, pets, and vast majority of his possessions at age 16 , and now the only male figure left in my life at 21. I keep thinking of 8 year old me on the morning I asked mom if dad had died, or days later when I was the center of attention at his funeral balling my eyes out and all the visitors couldn't help but wince at how agonizing it was that this little kid no longer had a father. These past few days I've been trying to find things to occupy myself so I don't have too much down time to think about all this, or worse write it in a blog -- and I've been pretty successful. I know my loving awesome super-fantastic girlfriend wishes she could be here to comfort me, but I would much rather he...

Well followers, it's been quite a stressful May I have to say. Grandpa is likely spending the last of his nights in the hospital, as his treatments aren't working and he isn't responding to medications - so his wishes are that he be taken off the breathing tubes. He was breathing with struggle on his own when I had to leave earlier to come to work (cause I couldn't get ahold of my boss.) I don't want to lose grandpa, but the Doctors seem to indicate that it's only a matter of time. Then there's the, by comparison, comically unimportant issues of working the Census and CAing and trying to figure out when each is. Add to that starting Monday I start classes. And thanks to enrolling in another class (3 credits) I don't risk losing a chunk of my CA paycheck to something, and I get a parking pass included in my tuition. (Parking was going to be an issue: taken care of.) Then Sarah goes off to China tomorrow morning, driving her to the airport in Cleveland. Is...

So last night I worked 2-4pm, and today I worked 4-8pm, and let me just say -- I HATE working day shifts. Without my labtop, there is nothing to do! I brought books, but I didn't read them, lol, never do :/ But yes, yesterday got to hang with Danielle and her friend Elise and her sister who came up to see Brit's play, then they came over and played DDR in the fifth floor social lounge, that was fun. Went to bed at like 4, then a random thunderstorm (that disapeared as randomly as it happened) woke me up at like 7, went back to sleep, broken phone woke me up at 9! Went back to sleep. Actually woke up at 10, went to the Circle K project-- Which was "Shop for Childrens Hospital". We had club funds raised up to buy things the Children's Hospital needs to give to children like toys and teething rings and so-and-such. Got 13 people, nice number, ended up going over to Montrose for Dollar Tree and Target. It was fun, and Kat complimented my executive decision making skil...

Woo! Break is almost here, with the exception of a Microeconomics final I'm severely dreading. So I thought I'd post the plans I'm considering for over break : 1.) Saturday, celebrate Chinese New Years with Grandpa and his Tai chi class. I try to go to this every year, grandpa's allowed to bring a guest and they all remember me from when I went and visited their class back when I was like 7! Though this time its during the day, and at a Thai restaurant, hrmm . 2.) Read Barack Obama's The Audacity of Hope which mom bought me for 2005 Christmas. It looks nice on my book shelf, but like many of those books, I really do mean to get around to reading them. 3.) Party with the gang, which seems to include returning to Akron a sure-heck-of-a-lot. 4.) This weekend, Christmas-up the house! After the Saturday night uber -cleaning (u.u; why can't my family clean on their own...) I'll put up all the Christmas decorations, and maybe even get the tree - or maybe go Sund...