Home Sweet Home

You have to start somewhere, right? This is where I am starting. Everything is "in" the house, but it is obviously not arranged or organized or even remotely near the appropriate place. But this is where we are.

Welcome! The mat says it do I don't have to.

This is the door you just entered.  Come on upstairs!

 Yes, these ones. Come on.

This is the kitchen. It's the first thing you see when you get upstairs. Well, there's kind of a landing, but when I took pictures, there were boxes piled up there. So we're skipping that right now.

This door is usually closed, obviously, but I had to show you. I'm very proud of my pantry. Sprinkles mix, anyone?

 And if you turn to your left when you get upstairs, this is what you see.

 Turn more left. Dining room! My table is so ginormous, it has to be pushed up against the wall to walk. It shall be replaced with a pedestal table, someday.

Living room! I love it. It's so cozy. Well it will be, once not everything is on the floor.

Built ins. I balked against the idea at first because I'm not generally a fan, but I have kind of warmed up to them, and I have big plans for these babies.

 Looking at the built ins from the living room. The complex painted the wall. Aren't they sweet? It would be awesome if they would fix the light above my door, because it's kind of like Rape Hallway walking in there at night.

Peeking into the kitchen from the living room. That's the bathroom door. When your apartment is 873 square feet, your bathroom door is going to be uncomfortably close to the kitchen, no matter what.

Oh, my, sorry about this. This was my bedroom this morning. The clothes on my bed are part of the 30 for 30 Challenge. I like to combine projects. Why do one thing at a time when you can do two? One is boring.

And the dresser.

Don't mind my pink polka dot pajama pants.

 Hot mess next to my side of the bed.

 Mini hallway from my bedroom to the bathroom! Cute.

 Breaker box! Yep, in my bedroom. Lovely, no? It's hidden from sight if I keep that door open, but it's kinda weird. Not sure what to do with it. As my mom pointed out, at least I won't have to go very far if power goes out in the middle of the night. Silver lining!

 Haven. Closet.

Don't worry, I won't accompany you to the bathroom in real life.

Just showing you where I want to hang some hooks so the towels don't have to get thrown over the shower curtain.

 Thusly.

 Please wash your hands.

  You are also welcome to wash your face. Also, hi, camera!

 Poor linen closet, waiting for me to wash all the towels and sheets.

Oh, and I have two closets. This is the one I didn't show you. What do we think about the mirrored doors? I don't like them, though they are useful. I'm still debating the options with these.

I would show you the rest, but that's pretty much it. In the interest of full disclosure, it looks a little different now. I unpacked more, took out boxes, and moved some stuff in my bedroom. But you'll see that soon. All in good time, doves. All in good time.

Hopefully I won't make too much of an embarrassment of myself with this "blogging the decorating" thing. Be gentle with me, please.

Relocated and revived

I know, I've been in hiding. I had ALOT of crap to do, you guys, most of which is boring and you wouldn't care about, but one thing is very important, and that is - I MOVED!!! It's amazing what 8/10 of a mile will do for your spirits. See also, running water, no used condoms on the roof, and not living in a building with crackheads and meth addicts. When I woke up this morning, it wasn't to a feeling of dread and anxiety and wondering how fast I could get my booty out of the hell hole I live in. I woke up to a tree outside my window and wondering why I dreamed about a very needy ostrich.

This is very exciting news for you. Yes, you! See, now that I have a new apartment, I have a clean slate. A clean slate that needs some loving attention. And I am going to blog all that sweet, sweet, unadulterated loving attention right here, in this very blog. You'll get to watch as my apartment goes from a storage unit to a home. It already feels more cozy than my old place, just having my stuff piled up in it.

I'm going to post pictures of each room as it changes. Feel free to throw out ideas or suggestions! Because as much as I loved Domino and religiously read Apartment Therapy, I have no idea what I'm doing.

This isn't going to be some masterpiece of design or something. I don't have the thousands, or even hundreds, of dollars to throw into this place, and if I did, I would spend it all on an interior decorator because I sure don't have the time. It's my home, but it's still a temporary home. This is a pretty big year, and who knows where I'm going to be when my lease is up. This is going to be about a broke and stressed out law student trying to make something that's welcoming to come home to, a place that feels familiar and safe, without being over the top or "design-y." It's just a normal person's home. A normal person who is obsessed with horses and books and has too many animal-themed artwork prints. See? Totally normal.

Also, here is something exciting: I am going to unofficially participate in the 30 for 30 Challenge. What's that, you ask? Well, it's this idea http://kendieveryday.blogspot.com came up with. You pick out 30 pieces of clothing from your closet, and that is ALL you get to wear for 30 days. Generally, this is limited to workday and weekend wear. NB, that does not include work out wear, lounge wear, or what you change into when you come home. The idea is that you learn to live with what you have and learn to create new outfits out of what's in your closet. Also, no clothes shopping for those 30 days! I know! But I can do it. Plus, I need to. I think I have a shopping addiction, you guys. I'm going cold turkey. This will either rock, or suck. Hard. And once again, I'll be blogging it all right here. Yay for voyeurism!

Later, I will post the clothes I have selected for 30 for 30. And in the next several days, I will be taking and posting pictures of my little place as it develops. Right now, everything is in my apartment, and most of it is even already out of boxes, but it is nowhere near done or anything. I mean, really, you're never "done" decorating, but  it is not livable. Unless you're one of those hoarders, probably, because they seem quite content to live with stacks of boxes and accumulated crap around them. But I am not one of those people. So this needs to change, pronto. And I am in the perfect state of mind for it! Seriously, I feel like a great burden has been lifted off my shoulders, and I am ready to GO. I am ready to hang pictures, hang drapes, arrange, rearrange, measure, organize, purge, and restock. I feel so great, I even have a second wind for school. I am ready to read, edit, search, upload, and outline! 3L-itis isn't gonna get me!

But first, I have to go clean the old hell hole. I am now accepting bets on whether I'm getting my security deposit back.

I'm as astounded as you are.

I am not an easy person to live with.

Shocking, I know.

I like my house to be soothing and a place of retreat, but when I've been retreating for too many evenings in a row and haven't had time to put things away, or when I am in the process of packing and moving, the chaos and clutter makes me crabby and short-tempered.

I like quiet. When the television volume is loud, I get crabby and short-tempered.

I like it dark. When I lived at home, my mom was constantly following me around the house, turning on lights behind me so I could see, and marveling at home I navigated all but pitch-black rooms without a problem. When all the lights are on, it's too bright, and it makes me crabby and short-tempered.

I hate it when cupboard doors are left open. They need to always be closed, or I become crabby and short-tempered. And then I have to storm into the kitchen and slam them shut.

I am not good at explaining my reactions. I feel the things I feel and I will deal with those feelings by, generally speaking, sulking and pouting, and occasionally laying down on my bed and staring at the wall. I don't want to tell you why I'm mad/sad/melancholy/jealous/shy/frustrated (those are all emotions I will feel within any given 3-hour period). I may or may not want you to fix the problems. But I do not want you to ask me talk about it. Talking about it makes me crabby and short-tempered.

So it is a miracle to me that I have maintained a relationship for more than a year with someone I practically live with.

He eats whatever I put in front of him, even when he isn't hungry, and even when it's something root from the ground. He never judges me for eating both our shares of dessert. He buys me Diet Coke when he goes to the store. He loves my hair in all its various moods, and he likes it best when I am in a skirt suit for an interview or when I'm watching tv in pajama shorts and a grey tee shirt. He drives back to my house a hundred times for everything I forget when I leave, and he never calls me dumb. Every time I grab at my purse and announce another thing I left behind, he rolls his eyes at me and turns the car around. Sometimes he calls me "the living end."

Despite my repeated attempts to make him turn prematurely grey, or even to lose his temper once, he stays around. When I am incited with rage, he keeps to the corners, and he leaves when I demand it. He also sits next to me and holds my hand when I am scared. He always answers the phone when I call to tell him I'm sorry. He never hangs up on me, even when I enter full-blown Crazy Town. No matter what, he will always come back when I have shooed him away, and he knows that what I need is not to be alone, but to be with him, watching dumb movies and drinking wine. He lets me make up things to be angry about, and then he talks me down from the ledge I made.

He says his number one priority, all the time, is to make sure I am happy.

I'm not always happy, but that is because I am a terrible, evil person. I should be happy all the time, not because of all the things he does, but because he wants me to be happy so fervently and sincerely.

He's sitting right behind me, working on his AWR, making it the best he possibly can because it's something he cares about, and something he wants to be proud of. I hear him typing, and then I hear his chair move back as he reads over what he's written. He hasn't paid me any attention in hours, and I love him so much for it.

We both work extremely hard, and there's no end in sight. After school, we have to get jobs, and then we have to keep those jobs. We might get to go to sleep. Law school isn't easy, and I'm so fortunate to have someone like him both for the law school hours and the non-law school ones.

He makes me want to be a better person, so that he will be as fortunate as I am. Because I don't deserve it, and if anyone does, it's the guy behind me.

I hope he knows I love him more than anything.

We need to talk

I know, I know. It's not 100 degrees anymore! I should be thankful! I should thank the sun gods for restraining their anger and ceasing their attempts to melt the flesh off my bones! Don't get me wrong--I am more than happy to be able to go outside to walk the dog and not end it with dragging my sweaty corpse upstairs and then sitting in front of a fan to dry myself off.

But you know what? It is October. OCTOBER. And I read a lot of blogs, and I know that in other, less insane states, people are wearing sweaters and coats and boots. When I think "October," I think pumpkins and chill and SWEATERS AND COATS AND BOOTS. But in reality, I am still slogging through the day in cotton cropped pants and silk tops. NO THANK YOU.

So I'm leaving. Peace out, A to the Z! You suck. You torture and abuse me for five months, and then you torture and abuse me a little less and I'm supposed to kiss your feet. That is still abuse! Especially when I KNOW that other states are not such huge assholes to their residents. You're like a bad boyfriend and I am about to put it us on break, and then I am going to have a passionate (but cold) affair with someone who wants me to be happy - California. California embraces me AND my sweaters and boots. California doesn't take me for granted! It's not me, it's you, Arizona.

I have two more days to deal with your abusive ways, and then I will be OUTTA HERE! Haha!

Now I just have to figure out what tights I can wear with a black cocktail dress, because California is cold, you guys.

Oh, and happy one year to Boyfriend! I can't believe we haven't killed each other yet. It must be love!

The Change

You guys. I think it happened. I hit 26, and WHAMO. My body is doing terrible, vicious things to me. Why, body? I take care of you. I feed you things like brownies, but I also give you good veggies. I work you out with Jillian Michaels, and I give you days off when you seem to need it. You get Epsom salt baths, chiropractic sessions, and cuddles with Mulder. I don’t know what else you want from me, but you seem to be turning on me at an alarming rate. Stop it.

Ok, here’s the deal. I’ve been suspicious for a long time. A few months ago, I wore a boatneck vintage-inspired dress, and discovered that between the time I was wearing a bra to the time I looked at myself in the mirror fully dresses, I had sprouted the shoulders of a linebacker. Those had not been there before! I figured it was just the cut, and then I swore off boatneck sleeveless dresses. Then there are my feet. I sit for too long, I stand for too long, I wear heels, whatever, and they blow up like I eat nothing but salt.

But then. I put on a dress that I bought last year at H&M. When I bought this dress, I was eating very yucky food, because I was in Austria and they REALLY like pork and fried things. I was not feeling very good, if you know what I mean, because I’m more of a chicken breast and steamed zucchini girl, but they don’t have such things in Austria. But on a side note, maybe they did, because one night I ate something that was simply labeled “vegetables.” They were breaded and fried, and I had no idea which species of vegetable they were, or even if they were vegetables, because sometimes the German language likes to take a word you know and then have it mean something completely different. I think they’re just being really passive aggressive in their bitterness over World War II, to be  honest with you. But I digress. My point is that when I tried on this dress, it fit! It was a holy miracle, because dresses are usually too big for me in some way. Not this one! It fit perfectly. I even wore it a couple months later, back in January or so, and no problems. I loved this dress.

So when Boyfriend and I were going to go out for Phoenix Restaurant Week, I pulled out my pretty, fitting H&M dress, ironed the baby up, and put her on. But… what was this? I had to suck in my gut and hunch over awkwardly to get the buttons over my ribcage to close. I was perplexed. I had been eating Lean Cuisines and salads, cutting out fat, and watching my sugar intake. According to my most recent doctor’s visit, I had not gained an ounce in the last year. If anything, I was gaining muscles with all the strength training I was doing with Jillian Michaels, but I was not gaining mass. It was more of an over all tone kind of thing.

These are the things I explained to the dress as I struggled to get it buttoned. The dress, she did not care.

Once those buttons made it through the button holes, they made it very obviously how much they were straining. I straightened up and marched out of the bathroom. The dress was not going to win. She was not going back in the closet. I refused to believe I had outgrown this dress for whatever bizarre reason that did not seem to be affecting the way anything else fit. There was no way my RIBS had gained weight. Nope. Get it together, dress, we’re going out.

So then I ate. And in the car home, I had to unbelt and unbutton myself because I momentarily thought the dress would rebel and start suffocating me. Don’t tell anyone. Boyfriend rolled his eyes at me, but what was I supposed to do? Cease breathing because this dress clearly had a vendetta against me for forcing it out of the house?

That was a couple weeks ago. Now, keep in mind, I have been wearing dresses and skirts this summer because it has been a temperature that is successfully approximating the temperature which I imagine hell maintains. So the jeans have been hanging out in the drawer, waiting for some index under “melting skin.” This past weekend, I knew I would be sitting in my house and by now I was just sick of all my other clothes, so I pulled out my Sevens and ARE YOU KIDDING ME. I had to tug and tug and tug to get them over my hips. I was aghast. I immediately grabbed several other pairs from the Jeans Drawer and tried them on. Each one was noticeably difficult to get over my hips. Here’s the thing and I’m gonna be open here. I know every square inch of my butt. That sounds weird, but my lower body has been a point of contention to my self esteem, and I have spent an accumulated number of hours staring at, poking, and pinching my butt and thighs. I do squats, lunges, and leg raises nearly every day. See, I know there’s a point where your body has started going downhill, and when a lady needs to put more effort into the workout to get the same results. In fear of this time, I have been adding to my workout, doing different workouts, and eating more carefully.

I know for a fact that my butt has not increased an inch, and that my ribs are still very visible under my skin. So why is this happening? I’ll tell you.

See, when a lady reaches a certain point in life, her body decides that she needs to be preparing to have a baby. It happens when she gets her period, obviously. (I’m not gonna mince words here, guys. There’s no “Aunt Flo.” We bleed from our vagina for several days. Get used to it.) But THEN, in her mid-twenties, apparently, her body decides more changes are in store. Her ribs expand, her shoulders broaden, and her hips widen. AND IT SUCKS. This had always been a vicious rumor in my world. It was what older women said to me when they noted how bitty I was. “I was that skinny once,” they say, “but you try having four kids and see what it does to you.” I was not going to have four kids, or any number of kids, so this seemed misdirected. But here’s the dirty truth – you don’t even need to get knocked up and push a watermelon out your coocha. It happens anyway! Your body just starts acting like it’s pregnant! We are not pregnant, body! And if you keep acting like this, it makes me distrust you and then I decide we’re never going to be pregnant because this is obviously the crap you’re going to pull. What’s next? Is my uterus going to stop sloughing that crap off and start hoarding it for a phantom fetus? Am I going to turn into a rabid nester and start swooning when I walk by a Baby Gap? Am I going to get random pregnancy blindness? (It’s true! Look it up!)

I haven’t been getting much sleep for a whole bunch of reasons, which I’m sure I’ll document here once they’re dealt with, but honestly, as I toss and turn and worry and grimace, my last thought before I fall asleep is always, “Body, whyyyyyyyyyyy?”

Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to get to football tryouts. I hear the Cardinals need some help, and I might as well put my quarterback shoulders to use for someone.

Welcome to the NIGHTMARE

Oh, GOD. Ok, fine, I’ll update.

I promise, I had all kinds of great ideas for this next post. And by “all kinds of great ideas” I mean “one.” I was going to talk about the VMAs, which I didn’t even mean to watch, but it just sort of happened. I was going to praise Lady Gaga’s sartorial choices, except for the meat dress, which I don’t think she thought out very well, and then I was going to complain about Taylor Swift, Justin Beiber, and all the rappers I didn’t know. Obviously, it was going to be epic.

But then I had this thing called a “wake up call.” You know, where you have a good idea to talk to someone, and then that person basically tells you that the last two years of your life have been pointless and your grades don’t matter, and that what you should have been doing is socializing and volunteering to play with puppies, and pretty much everything else you would have RATHER have been doing than studying, but you didn’t because you thought that getting good grades and being on Law Review were what would get you a job, and now you have to spend every free moment “putting yourself in front of law firms” and networking and stuff, and also your resume, which you thought was pretty sweet for a 26 year old, is actually NOTHING and WHY HAVEN’T YOU BEEN DOING ANYTHING WITH YOUR LIFE and YOU BETTER START MAKING PEOPLE TALK TO YOU AND THEN PRETEND TO ASK FOR THEIR ADVICE SO THAT SOMEDAY THEY WILL REMEMBER YOUR NAME AND MAYBE TELL SOMEONE ABOUT YOU SO THAT SOMEONE MIGHT HIRE YOU AND YOU WON’Y HAVE TO WORK AT COSTCO UNTIL YOU’RE 62. YOU DON’T EVEN VOLUNTEER. ARE YOU SELFISH OR SOMETHING? HAVE FUN WORKING AT COSTCO. I mean, the career counselor didn’t scream like that, but that is how my brain is remembering the conversation.

I guess what is really disappointing is that I thought the most terrifying year of my life was my first year of law school. NO. It’s actually the year before you graduate. Because really, there is not much you can do about your GPA now, you still have to keep showing up at class, you still have to put in the time in Law Review, but NOW you get to wake up in cold sweats in the middle of the night hyperventilating because you dreamed you were decorating a sheet cake at Basha’s and you had WRINKLES. Oh, and also, the lights in your hallway at the apartment you still live in are out.

My wake-up call was really more of a "Wake up, your nightmare is about to become a reality if you don't get it in gear, because you don't know anyone and you have been wasting your time worrying about dumb stuff like grades." I have been spending every free minute since then working to rectify this, and that does not leave much time for blogging.

So this whole post is just to tell you that I haven’t forgotten about you. Hi! I miss you! But also to let you know that my crazy boyfriend who mentioned that I should apparently be updating this thing 2 times a week is going to be disappointed because THAT WILL NOT BE HAPPENING. (Also, why? I do not understand what the magical 2 posts a week thing will accomplish. Oh, and p.s., I had another blog topic in mind, and that was going to be about how much this blog would suck for you if I had to write two posts a week. That makes two epic posts I was going to write but didn't because if I stop planning my "networking" for a minute, I start hyperventilating.) So, bear with me! I promise to stick with this thing. Someday, I’ll be chronicling my career at Costco on it, probably.

Oh, let’s be real. I would never work at Costco. I’m more of an AJ’s girl.

Summer days, slippin' away

Ah, Labor Day. Nice to see you again. Everyone always says you’re a fake holiday (okay, I say you’re a fake holiday), but apparently, in my research to confirm you are, in fact, a fake holiday, I learned you’re actually an important holiday! You’re like Memorial Day for the people who fight the middle class war. Labor Day, you are the celebration of all the social and economic achievements of American workers, according to the Department of Labor, and I thank you for that, especially because it means that, in honor of my factory worker ancestors, I didn’t have to go to Pre-Trial Practice today. Thanks!

Still, though. Labor Day isn’t just a fake holiday (sorry, Labor Day, but I’m never gonna take you seriously). It’s also the time of year when you guys have to stop wearing your white shoes, until Memorial Day (there that parallel is again! Exciting!), if you’re from the South and think of yourself as a Southern Lady With Manners. Martha Stewart says Labor Day is the last chance for a summer cookout. And for a lot of people, Labor Day is the official “goodbye, hot, disgusting heat, I’m gonna go dig out my cardigans.”

These people do not live in Arizona, and these people did not have my summer, or, as I like to call it, Three Months of OHBABYJESUSWHYDIDANYONENOTSLAPMEWHENIANNOUNCEDMYSUMMERPLANS. 

That’s because while other people take vacations, or go to horse shows, or do something like, I don’t know, HAVE FUN over the summer, I decided to take one week “off” before my three summer classes, write a 30 page paper (with footnotes!), and then study for and take the MPRE. And then that left exactly one week before fall classes started.

But that’s not all I did! I know, it sounds like too much awesomeness, but just like the rest of the planet, I had my fair share of “even worse.” Between the continued economic sucking, the failure of a certain political class to deal with the problem, a huge, gross oil spill that ruined a lot of livelihoods of both people and pelicans, earthquakes, war, famine, flood, and Katy Perry, there was a whole bunch of teeth-gnashing and breast-beating. Also, last week, just catching the tail end of “summertime,” there was a condom in the stairs of my apartment building. A used condom. Excuse me while I go barf.

So summer sucked, but it wasn’t all bad! Here’s my summer breakdown.

I turned 26! I think that is still mid-20s, but it is the age I will be when I graduate law school. I have waited to be this age for a long time. I’m very excited about this year.

On my birthday, I got a dog. His name was Neo, and he was a corgi. I wanted a corgi, and his name was Neo, so obviously, this had to happen. But Neo bit me and everyone I love, and so I had to take the dog back. That was sad. But it made me realize that you can’t force good things to happen to you. When I got Mulder, I had been living on my own for over a month, and for a girl who a) LOVES animals and b) has had a dog/pet every single second of my life, that was a long, long month. Mulder picked me (actually he picked Boyfriend, but he likes me a lot and goes with me when I have to pee, so I think it worked out). And now he’s my Nugget and I love him a stupid amount! And the next dog will pick me, too. Also, I blocked Petfinder.com from my internet browser.

I did four weeks of Boot Camp, which started at 5:30am. Crazy! But I drove my butt over to the park and did those jump squats and skaters and bicycles until they told me I could stop, and it felt good! I learned how many more hours are in a day when you don’t push the snnoze button. I also learned how much I love naps. The discipline made me work out much more consistently, and I hate the days that I don’t do something active.

In conjunction with Boot Camp, I also discovered Jillian Michaels’ DVDs, and got my mom hooked on them, too. Jillian Michaels is like my workout twin. If I were a personal trainer, I would be just like her. In fact, when my mom and I work out together, one of my favorite things to do is yell at my mom to jump higher or farther or faster or whatever. “If you don’t challenge yourself, you’ll never know what you can do!” I yell. Or, “Do you want to be skinny? Do your mountain climbers!” Then my mom gives me a nasty look and I get scared. But if my client wasn’t my mom, I would be just like Jillian!

I saw “Inception,” or as Boyfriend calls it, “Invection.” “Inception” was good, but apparently you either hate it or love it. The important thing, though, is that Tommy from “Third Rock from the Sun” grew up to be quite delicious.

Boyfriend and I got all caught up on “Mad Men.” He had never seen it, but I had seen a few episodes from the first two seasons and almost all of the third season, and then, when I stopped watching new episodes because I was getting all caught up with Boyfriend so we could start watching the new episodes, I was reading spoilers, because I really needed to know. But now I am all caught up and we can spend Sunday nights yelling at Don as he spirals into full on alcoholism, falling in love with Roger, and drinking whisky (Boyfriend) and gin and tonics (me). I also introduced Boyfriend to and finished “Pushing Daisies,” which only had two seasons but really needed a lot more than that. It’s one of the most charming shows that has ever been on television. You can’t help but grin like an idiot the whole time, even though it’s about a guy who is a pie maker, but has the ability where he touches things and brings them back to life in order to find out who murdered them so he can solve their murder/collect reward money, but if he touches them again, they’re dead forever, and so when he touches his childhood sweetheart to find out who murdered her, he decides not to touch her again so she can stay alive, and they fall in love, but they can never touch. So it’s a little morbid, but Kristen Chenoweth is in it! And a golden retriever named Digby. And pie! This inspired me, and I baked my first non-pumpkin pie pies this summer: a cherry pie for my dad’s birthday, and a strawberry pie for Boyfriend/series finale of “Pushing Daisies.” I learned I bake great pies, and I can’t wait to incorporate them into my menu more frequently.

Can you get better than that?

Yes, you can. With corgi flop. Watch this. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=glii-kazad8 I discovered this over the summer.

Finally, I got glasses! This means I am even closer to becoming the 80-year-old woman we all know I am in my heart. They’re not even those pharmacy readers. They’re honest-to-goodness, I-have-a-prescription, my-left-eye-is-farsighted, hope-my-lenses-fit-these-Coach-frames glasses. And yay for no more headaches! As my dad pointed out, maybe I won’t be such a bitch after reading for a long time! I think it’s working out so far. I am quite fond of cleaning my glasses all the time with the little soft cloth in my glasses case. I feel like when I want to look more studious, I can remove my glasses and gently rub the hem of my shirt on the lens, then put them back on my face. Tah-dah! Exponentially smarter looking.

That about sums up summer. A lot of sucking, but also some good stuff.

One of the worst things about summer in Phoenix, aside from the oppressive, horrible heat that makes me cry that the sun is melting my skin off my body, is how long it lasts. In other areas, more “seasonal” areas of the country, now is the time to dust off your boots and dig out your sweaters and jeans. Here, we still have about a month and a half of oppressive heat that feels like death to look forward to. Mentally, emotionally, and physically, I am ready for tights and knee high boots with dresses. I want to pick out my outfit and not worry that wearing a belt is going to feel like my midsection is bursting into flames. I really, really, really want to wear that Calvin Klein sweater dress again.

So I guess here, for as sucky as summer has been, it’s kind of like our summer has extended itself a little while longer for some redemption. Hopefully, by the time I can open my patio door without feeling like I am walking into ground zero of a nuclear blast, the good things will outnumber the bad things. I definitely think more pie will help.