"I write, therefore I am."

This song makes me think of my sister. And how amazing she is. And reminds me how much I value her. And I smile. While I'm compiling things, and drafting, and crafting, please take a moment to revisit Part 1 - that way we remember where we came from. And then we only go up from there. :) Her story will be up soon. Thanks for your patience.

Hey! Look! It's not even February yet and I'm getting to the Tops of 2010! Go me! I'm doing so much better than 2010 . You already read the Best of 2010 , right? If not, go there first, silly. There's no confusion this year about my play counts, but they are significantly lower than 2009. I dunno if that's because all I listen to is Pandora now, or what. But way lower. The #1 of 2010 is just over half of the plays #25 had in 2009. LOL So let's get to business, shall we? WOW, it's quite the SHAKE-UP! Only THREE songs returning this year from last. All the rest have been ousted from the list. Some have returned from 2008 though! 25. Dirty Little Secret by The All-American Rejects (86), a newcomer! Yay! I don't know that I actually love this song... it's just that it's the first on my playlists, so if I just hit play this one comes on. So maybe it's here by default? 22. Fighting by Yellowcard (87), I don't think I owned these until the ver...

If you've spent ANY time with me at all, you probably know how I felt about 2009 . So I was eager to embrace 2010. And embrace I did. What a fun year! It went too quickly! But there were definitely good things. So let's revisit them, shall we? Best Trip of 2010 : Do you even have to ask? CEDAR POINT , hands all the way down (unless you're going over the top of the hill on a coaster while reading this). (Sorry for the blue line. My photo stitcher was acting up and it would have taken forever to get right. So deal with a blue line). Best Restaurant of 2010: Going to have to go with the restaurant where they know my name, they know who I want to be my server, and they have the Best. Bread. Ever. Good ol' Faustina. I prolly ate here like 100 times this year. Doesn't hurt that it's only half a block from my new digs. Yessir. If you ever want to go, I'm ALWAYS game. Just text me. Best Article of 2010: Hey! Look! I started reading articles! Prolly the best one (or...

Clay Coleman's Revenge! (Book 5 in the Escape from Lost Island series) - Grade: B. Do I think these books are excellently written? No. Would I recommend these books to other people? Probably not. But they were part of my childhood and I enjoyed revisiting them. Are they engaging? Yes. So *shrug* Clay Coleman's Escape! (Book 6 in the Escape from Lost Island series) - Grade: B. I think I'm all out of juice on these six books. They're a decent read, but I can think of much better things to spend your time on. 'Nuff said. James Redfield's The Celestine Prophecy - Grade: A. This book definitely gets my vote for your reading list. This book is a fascinating exploration of human consciousness and spirituality outside the definitions of institutionalized religion (I am in no way saying that institutionalized religion is a bad thing). A great read, very interesting principles contained within, with real-life applications. Suzanne Collins' Mockingjay (third book...

Dark Water - Grade: B-. Another scary one! This one's also bee on my list for years. Finally got around to seeing it. I figured out the whole story in like 3 minutes. So not so good writing. Also, most of the "scary" parts were just thrown in. For that reason. Not to aide the story or anything like that. They were ridiculous. Inception (x2) - Grade: A++. Unbelievable. That sums up this movie experience. I went back and saw it again the very next day. It was JUST that good. When's the last time I saw such an original storyline? Such a thought-provoking plot? Such all-around phenomenal acting? I can't even tell you, that's when. This movie was MIND-BLOWING amazing. I can't say anything else other than, IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN IT YET, DO SO NOW. Toy Story 3 - Grade: A. The original Toy Story came at the perfect age for me, and I loved it. Toy Story 2 was eh. But this one was just beautiful. I totally cried. When the movie was done, I wanted to fly to Flo...

2010 can't be complete without Halloween! One of the very first events hosted at my new house (pictures will come someday - as will actual gatherings... but first I need to buy a couch. And a vaccuum, before I unveil such things - sorry), was the Pumpkin Carving Party! One didn't seem like enough for me, so I decided to do two this year. Jessie and some others came over, but not everyone carved. Oh well, I make up for them. Pumpkin #1 Werewolf (in honor of my friends and their undying love of the game): And Pumpkin #2 Kids Trick-O-Treating: They looked awesome and we had so much fun carving them! The first weekend in November I was crazy enough to go camping with friends, which ended up being a lot of fun, albeit a little cold. For Thanksgiving this year, I hosted my own dinner instead of going somewhere else. I slated it as a dinner for those who had nowhere to go. 12 people came and we ate, and laughed, and had so much fun. My boss was kind enough to let us have it in the lar...

Summer arrived. I couldn't do anything near what I achieved with the Summer of Sun: 2009 , since I work full-time+, but we still managed to get in plenty of playing. In June, I took Turtle to the Best. Place. On. Earth. Period. CEDAR POINT . Those who have been, know. And those who have not, have not lived. Turtle always talked about the amazing coasters at Disney and 6 flags and such, and I scoffed. Because there are NOT coasters like the coasters at the Point. And now she knows this is true. We spent a whirlwind 3 days at the Point, with travel days before and after. It. was. epic. We stayed at a super quaint place like 5 miles from the park. The first night we were there, before going to the park, we were sitting out in the hammock just talking (and trying to flip each other over, which I succeeded in, but I fell out too and hurt my knee, so fail), and as the sun was going down, Turtle started FREAKING out. Which, naturally, freaked me out as well. I tried to get her to vocalize...

Well, 2010 is over. Anybody else feel like that one went faster than the Enterprise at Warp 10? Because blink. Blink. Blink. Done?! Since I just barely talked finished talking about 2009, I think it's time for an overdue recap. Which may or may not be worse than a baby that refuses to be born... >.> So 2010. I started the year as a hopeless addict . I worked. And worked. And worked. Which is not entirely a bad thing. Sure helps the finance department to not call me complaining everyday. The days bled away. Occasionally I did something fun. Like laser tag or werewolves . I did my best to maintain my social life, but really it was pretty quiet. In March, we did go to the Festival of Colors which was SO FUN. Chalk Everywhere! The celebration was great. We stayed for both crazy sessions of chalk throwing. At the countdown the first time I remember that the whole world went BLACK. I couldn't see ANYTHING. Like really. It was kind of scary. I had a blip thought of post-apocalyp...