Six Interesting Things...

Lisa tagged me to do this blog. However, as I am new(ish) or perhaps just not popular enough in the blogging world, I don't exactly have six people to tag...so I'll just fulfill my obligation to write down six interesting things about myself and leave it at that.

1. I'm an aspiring domestic goddess, but so far failing at it miserably. I read Domino magazine religiously. I regularly peruse the home offerings online at various website and compose fantasy wish lists. I daydream about elaborate dinner party menus, guest rooms and baths full of luxurious amenities, and entertaining in my fabulous, quirky, chic but comfortable home. I compose mental lists of in depth cleaning tasks to accomplish and convince myself that it will be truly enjoyable to accomplish them after work with a nice soundtrack and a glass of wine. Every now and then I make a little bit of headway...but too often I find myself doing what I'm doing tonight. I plant myself on my couch with my laptop or a magazine and try to ignore the many things I could and should be doing. I really hate to think of myself as a dirty person, but I'm realizing that in my own space I'm entirely too lazy. Hmm...New Year's resolution perhaps...

2. Next fall I'll be starting work on my third degree. Yikes! I have a Bachelor's Degree in English and a Juris Doctorate, both from Ole Miss. I've always sort of had Higher Education Administration on the brain, and even before getting my current job as a financial aid advisor I'd contemplated pursuing advanced degrees in the field. It seems a little like divine guidance then that employees of Ole Miss can take up to two classes a semester (one during business hours) free of charge. It also seems divine that with job experience in the field, a law degree can be substituted for a masters. Thus I will likely be starting my pursuit of a Ph.D. in Higher Education Administration next fall. My home may not look as impressive as I'd like, but my office wall sure will!

3. My boyfriend is six years younger than I am. Yeah. I'm not particularly over-enthused about sharing this one, but I know it is indeed an interesting fact about me. I'd always thought of myself as someone who required an older guy for things to work. Instead I'm discovering that I am significantly less emotionally mature than my 23 year old fella. He definitely arrived on the scene as something great when I least expected it...but also something entirely different than what I anticipated expecting. Hah.

4. I'm a collection of stereotypes. During the course of my life I've been a goody goody, a nerd, a jockette, a prep, a sorority girl, a hipster, and a professional. Do I necessarily feel that I've REALLY been these people? Not exactly. But I do know that I've participated willingly in things that have led others to think that I've been one or more of them. Church camps, honors colleges, basketball teams, the Greek system, indie music shows, and now webinars and seminars and staff meetings. You have to wonder if we all wind up as rag tag collections of all the things we've been and are...

5. I have a scarf addiction. If the weather and the situation in ANY way permit it, I'll find a way to incorporate a scarf into my outfit. It's gotten to the point where I literally just feel more natural while wearing one.

6. The above fact might make more sense when one considers how ridiculously cold natured I am. I spend the majority of the winter with cold feet and a cold nose. Meh.

Dear Santa...Part Two.

4. Little Birch Jewelry Stand. I currently have jewelry tangled in every available nook and cranny, so finding and carefully untangling that one particular necklace can sometimes turn into an extended exercise in patience. This stand would look artistic and graceful on a dresser or bathroom vanity even without jewelry, but I think it would be delightfully quirky, bohemian, and, gasp, FUNCTIONAL dripping with all of my necklaces and bracelets.

5. Bodum Chambord French Press. I gave my Mom one for Christmas last year, and while it doesn't come out for use on a weekly basis, it always feels a little luxurious when it does. French press coffee just tastes richer. Maybe it's just the fact that using one reminds me of dinners at Yocona...oh, and at last weekend's freezing Ole Miss/ULM game, we discovered that toting a French Press, an electric burner, and a tea kettle to the Grove makes a steaming hot cup of coffee and Bailey's a perfect and surprisingly easy game day drink.

6. Domino Magazine. I'm addicted. Pure and simple. More great home ideas and products than you can shake a stick at. Giving a magazine subscription seems like something of a dud gift at first, but getting something in the mail each month for a year that provides you with a few minutes of relaxed entertainment before bed is a truly great thing. And while you're on the Domino website, check out the super cool online Deco File tool.

More to come...

Dear Santa...Part One.

I've been thinking about Christmas gifts...about past gifts given that were raging successes, about the perfect thing for Mom, Dad, boyfriend, family, friends and beyond, and maaaaybe a little about a few things I'm drooling over for myself. I thought I'd share a mix of them...

1. WoodWick Candles. When you're stranded in a bland little musty apartment in the winter sans fireplace, these babies are perfect. The scents are nice, but the flat wooden wick that creates that familiar crackling, popping fireplace noise is genius. Dim the lights, grab a good book and a blanket, and let one of these create some perfect substitute cold-night-in ambience.

2. The University of Mississippi: A Pictorial History. I flipped through a few pages while on a coffee run at the campus bookstore the other day and was pretty pleased with what I saw. This new book is a hodge podge of photographs and other memorabilia from throughout the years, and would make the perfect coffee table volume for idle flipping/declaration of school spirit.

3. Victoria's Secret Flannel Pajamas. At six feet tall, I have a pretty darned hard time finding comfy pajama pants that will cover my ankles AND make me look cute. I have to admit that this pair from Victoria's Secret is my go-to, and this season the array of prints is thankfully a little more grown-up and chic. Plus, around the holidays you can usually get a matching pair of slippers tossed in for free.

To be continued...

Vive le procrastination...

Some things I should be doing on this Sunday evening:

1. Cleaning my kitchen.
2. Pouring half of the massive amount of leftover tamale soup into freezer bags to save for later.
3. Figuring out what in the heck is wrong with my car THIS time and praying it fixes itself.
4. Laundry laundry laundry.
5. Taking a shower.
6. Brushing Charlie.
7. Organizing bills and statements.
8. Dusting.

Instead I'm on my couch, drinking the last of the vino from the weekend and watching reruns of America's Next Top model. It just seems like a good way to wrap a weekend of freezing cold football.

a farewell to the one truly great thing about my new apartment...

So we've established that mid September is most definitely NOT the ideal time of year to be searching for a place to rent in Oxford, Mississippi. Given my limited budget and tight time frame, I felt lucky to find a place period, even if it was in an apartment complex I've always regarded as being thoroughly unremarkable. There was one little thing that cheered me up about the place...the fact that along the wall beside my front door were three wild and lovely abelia bushes, always alive with butterflies. To be fair, I didn't know exactly WHAT they were until I clarified it with my good friend Lisa over at Shower Fresh Garden. When Lisa saw these bushes however, she made her jealousy perfectly clear...and if Lisa is jealous of your plants, then you have some seriously great plants. She informed me that it was nice to see my abelias looking the way they're supposed to, as in the aforementioned wild and lovely. I'm fairly certain that she advised that the worst thing to do was to cut them back...so imagine my horror when I arrived home for lunch today to find my bushes hacked into sad, low squares, with more stick showing than leaf or flower.

OK, so I know that technically they aren't MY bushes, and that in all likelihood, I'll be moving on to a (hopefully) more fitting Oxford location in July. Still, I feel like my otherwise boring little place has lost the one thing that gave it instant character. And I'm definitely making a mental note to plant some abelia bushes at my next place...

your attention please...

I have a new job! Monday will be my first day as a financial aid advisor at Ole Miss. I'm beyond thrilled to be moving back to Oxford...funny how a town I'd only visited a couple of times before I turned 18 has so completely made itself my hometown. It's certainly not as if I haven't made frequent visits in the past two years, but there are still so many things I look forward to having nearby...burgers from Handy Andy, quiet time on the balcony at Square Books, Thacker Mountain Radio, lazy browsing at the Mustard Seed...

Now if I can just find a roof to cover mine and Charlie's heads...could there BE a worse time to be house/apartment hunting in a college town? I'm having a hell of a time. It doesn't help that I'm a lightish sleeper and don't do well with next door keggers on work nights. Yeah. My 18-year-old self would be staring at me with baffled disapproval right now.

10 things I can't live without...

I'm copying Lindsey's Lingerings a little here, and also creating a more cohesive list of something I've already started. Can't help it. Reading Lindsey's was so interesting...I really think asking someone a question like this gives you an amazingly thorough glimpse into the person they are. So here goes...

1. Smith's Rosebud Salve. I've already posted about my obsession with this stuff, so I won't go into it. See below if you're interested.

2. Fancy underthings. Even when there was no one around to see them, I literally couldn't stop myself from purchasing nice lingerie. Nothing ridiculously trashy or anything, just things a little nicer than your average cotton pair. The standard argument is that wearing nicer underthings makes you feel nicer in general, and I have to agree whole-heartedly. Even if I'm just in jeans and a tee shirt, I feel a little more fashionable, a little more adult, a little more TOGETHER if I know there's something matching and nice underneath. And now that there's a fella around, I think he probably appreciates my splurging on lingerie more than if I were splurging on face masks or something.

3. Concealer. (Preach it, Lindsey!) I definitely inherited my Dad's dark circles. Mine have been the bane of my existence for years now. Even when my skin is clear, I still have never been able to walk out of the door bare faced lest I scare small children. It's a pain. I constantly bounce from brand to brand, trying every formula and expense bracket imaginable. Looks like, based on recent things I've heard from friends, that next I'll be trying Vincent Longo and Bobbi Brown.

4. Coffee. If I don't have a cup in my hands within half an hour of waking up, my day goes nowhere good. But aside from the whole morning headache avoidance necessity cup, there really is just something so mentally and emotionally soothing about the perfect cup of coffee. I recently read that having a good cup of coffee can serve as a mood booster. I definitely find this to be the case. Before I left the job that was making me miserable (more on that later) one of the things that got me through the day was a latte delivery from my honey or the chance to slip away for half an hour to meet him at Rivertown (our favorite local coffee shop) for a cup. When I was studying for the bar exam a couple of years ago, I found that I was miraculously more focused, productive, and cheerful about the whole thing when I had a cup in one hand. And for years and years, one of my oldest friends and I have scheduled late morning "meetings" when we're both in town to catch up over a cup of coffee at one of our houses. I suppose I associate the drink with good friendships, support, etc.

5. Charlie the Indoor Pony. Speaking of emotional support...yes, I would definitely be lost without my crazy Airedale terrier/son. Charlie has supported me through law school, job searches, bad jobs, heartache, you name it. He always knows when I'm not doing so hot and comes straight over to rest his furry head in my lap. With Lindsey here yet again...having a pet is a mental health MUST. Not to mention, studies now prove that children who grow up in homes with furry pets are significantly less prone to developing allergies.

6. Fitted blazers and jackets. I miss them all summer long, and when fall and winter roll around, my go-to outfit always involves a blazer or jacket. They're just the perfect solution...they cover what needs to be covered while still creating a slim silhouette, they take casual jeans and a top to a slightly dressier level, and they make for a perfect layer to shed when necessary in overheated indoor climates. I have a black skinny wale corduroy blazer that I would seriously cry over if I misplaced it. Seriously.

7. My Mac products. Yes, I'm THAT girl. Addicted. I have an older iBook G4 that certainly isn't the newest snazziest model (far from it) but it still is a dependable part of my everyday life. I have an iPod mini in green that needs a new battery but that I still refuse to sell or dispose of, in spite of the fact that last Christmas I got an iPod classic, which now serves as the perfect portable road trip playlist, dance party soundtrack, and work out accessory (if I ever get back to working out, that is). And now I have a first generation iPhone that I got on the cheap from my (also Mac addict) father when he just haaaad to get the iPhone 3G. I'd convinced myself that I did NOT need one. Now I find that I use it constantly, and rarely just to chat. My most addictive features as of late? Tetris to play when I'm waiting somewhere without alternate entertainment, Shazaam (which, dangerously, can listen to a song you're hearing on the radio, tv, etc. and search it and give you the artist, song....AND link you to the iTunes page to purchase it...), Weatherbug to let me know precisely what the Grove will be like...

8. Nars Laguna Bronzer. I'm pale. Scary pale, and since I refuse to tan my face in the hopes that I'll look ten years younger than everyone who did in a few decades, I have to have something to match my face to the slight tan I develop on my arms and (sometimes) on my legs. This bronzer is perfectly portable, makes my skin glow, and gives me the perfect shot of natural color without looking like I've been baking in a tanning bed. I use it everyday, all year.

9. Sunglasses and/or scarves. If I don't have at least one of these on my body, I don't feel normal. Who knows why.

10. My faith. I'm not a regular church-goer, and I'm certainly not the strictest Christian you've ever met. But I deeply believe that God works in my life and pushes me gently in the direction I'm supposed to go. Without that belief, frankly nothing would make sense.