I Like...INSANELY talented dancers. And B-Boys. And Yellow Shoes.

I meant to post this last week, but Lil C's dance troupe "The League of Extraordinary Dancers" (completely cheesy name? Yes) performed on the SYTYCD results show last night, and I have watched it approximately 6 times since then. Prepare to be amazed:

Find it, Feel it, Do it.

For your viewing pleasure:

It's so good to know that extremely inappropriately high cut leotards are necessary for "facial workouts."



Find that Boogie Body! Okayyy, boom chicka BOOM!

Happy Friday.

Ahh, the dancing

I haven't been posting about TBSOFT aka The Best Show of All Time aka SYTYCD aka So You Think You Can Dance because let's face it, when the show takes place during the third semester of grad school, there just isn't time to write all-important, earth-shattering recaps that EVERYONE reads. Um. But anyway, I have been feeling pretty good about the season so far, but now it's the top 10 and I am starting to get attached to a few of the dancers.

For Top 2, I'm predicting it's Ellenore and Jakob, and here's why:

Overall I think Jakob is my favorite...he reminds me a lot of Travis and even Danny in some ways because he flies and he is just. darn. amazing.

I am also a big fan of Katherine, and Legacy has really grown on me in the last few weeks. I don't think Russell will win, but he is fun to watch, and his solo last night was CRAZY.

Dang. Krump it yo.

I'm not a big fan of Mollee aka High School Musical Miley Cyrus My Little Pony 1990s Flashback girl who dances in denim leggings with crimped hair...and I think Ryan aka look at my large muscles and leather pants and cheeseball solo moves dude is on his way out.

There have been some great routines this year - nothing earth shattering, but enough to still make me wish I could dance. For now, I'll have to stick to interpretive dancing in front of my Christmas tree. Oh well.

7 Days of Thanksgiving - Day 7

This is probably a cop out because I have been baking and snacking and baking pretty much all day, so food is on my mind...but I am so thankful for it. I know I forget how HUGE it is to be able to talk about food as a given, as a "hobby" that I can indulge in whenever I want. I definitely forget what a privilege it is to be able to pull out my cookbook, mull over different recipes, imagine what kind of pie to make, and know that I can afford the ingredients.

I've never known [what I imagine is] the gut-wrenching feeling of wondering not what or where I'll be eating, but IF. It's so simple...but I think so much of the time it's the simple things - automatic for us but a luxury for so many - that we forget to breathe a prayer of thanks for every day. So in that sense, I am incredibly thankful that I can not only eat a delicious meal with family tomorrow, but that I can eat. At all.

I'm also thankful for food because of what it does to people. It doesn't matter how bad of a day it's been or what kind of baggage you bring - it all gets left at the door when people gather around a meal. At Convergence, it has become a regular event to have a community meal for people in the neighborhood. Each person brings a dish - doesn't matter what it is or how much - but each person brings something, and we gather around it and enjoy.

See, people bond over food. A man from an art gallery can sit next to a single mom from the streets and they can talk about how GOOD that green bean casserole is, or how decadent that piece of chocolate cake tastes. At our house church, we gather around food once a week, and some life-changing, encouraging, and completely frivolous (but AWESOME) conversations take place over those meals. Conversations take place and entire communities are formed on Twitter about food between complete strangers. You can learn so much about entire cultures based on the kind of food they eat and how they eat it. I don't know about you, but eating a good meal automatically puts me in a better mood (that might mean I should be in counseling, but whatever). The thing about food is this: no matter who you are, everyone likes food, and everyone needs it. Simple as that. It's amazing.

Happy Thanksgiving.

7 Days of Thanksgiving...Day 6

I am SO thankful for all of these people:

Extended family, friends, in-laws, they are all amazing! Even if they make weird faces, can't dance in a very coordinated fashion, and wear man short shorts. They are literally all over the world and I don't get to see them nearly as often as I'd like, but they are still my besties. I am also VERY thankful for things such as Gchat, iChat, and email that let me stay up to date with what's going in their crazy and amazing lives. Thank you for being so wonderful!

7 Days of Thanksgiving - Day 5

This is kind of related to yesterday's post, but I'm not cheating! Over the last three years, I have become acutely aware of how important it is to be a part of a community...To surround yourself, whereever you are and however you do it, with a group of people who care about something bigger than themselves, who are committed to caring about you and "keeping it real," as it were.

Despite what we tell ourselves and what the flashy billboards screaming "rugged individualism" tell us, we are not meant to go through life alone. We're not meant to struggle, make decisions, celebrate, or love in isolation. We can tell ourselves we're okay on our own all we want, but that doesn't change the fact that we need each other to give a hug, lend a hand, call us out, or help others together.

I honestly believe that being a part of the Convergence community has changed the direction of my life, and it has had a profound impact on the direction of my life with Scott as the Girgishmelsons (you have to have the "h" in there to make it sound right). It definitely played a big part in my decision to pursue a career in social work, and it has been so amazing to see how real, authentic, and powerfully changing life with God and life with others can be. Yesterday, I spent the morning helping set up for "ReThread," the free clothing store we do several times a year for the kids in the neighborhood. Families come in, are greeted with a smile and maybe a hug, and they get paired up with a "co-shopper" who takes them around to find the sizes they need and helps them try on clothes just like they would in a real "store." Yesterday, we gave out over 160 coats (I had to leave shortly after the store opened, but it was awesome nonetheless) to kids who would have otherwise been cold this winter. But as always, it is one of the most amazing feelings to look around and see this group of people who love each other dearly extending that love just as authentically to others.

The point of this isn't to say how awesome Convergence is or how "selfless" or "giving" these people are; it's simply me saying how thankful I am to be part of such a real community in the midst of a lot of "fake." They've seen me happy, sad, vulnerable, excited, inspired, scared, and everything in between...and I know they'll be there through everything else. Yesterday I had a scary thought: "What if we hadn't met them? What if we had just gone through the last 3 years alone?" What if we hadn't met them? I wouldn't have a lot of the passion for justice and true life with God that I have now, and I definitely wouldn't have laughed as much. I've probably gotten weirder, too. I don't know what our lives would look like, but I know for sure it wouldn't be this. And that's DEFINITELY a good thing.

7 Days of Thanksgiving - Day 4

Unfortunately, I don't have many embarrassing photos of these people to share with you, but that is only because I do not have my camera with me every minute I am with them...trust me, they are very weird. This group of people have made our life here in Oklahoma SO incredible. They have been with us on the med school roller coaster since before the first test block, and they are amazing. They bring us food when we are too stressed out to cook, make us roll on the floor laughing with their randomness, give us awesome role models for that FAR OFF day when we become parents, send us weird and inappropriate videos, call us out when we need some tough love, hold us when we cry, laugh for an hour about weird plastic evil rats, care about other people and show love to those who don't get it enough, bring us desserts every day for 4 days before board exams, live out their faith every day in an incredibly authentic way, let us kidnap their children and take them to Chuck E. Cheese, and basically walk through life with us hand in hand. Oh and also, they are all AMAZING COOKS. That is really why we are friends with them. They even listen to Scott's random rants and don't run away when he shows them disgusting pictures of operations and human organs and such. That is love.

Seriously, I am so very thankful for our amazing church community, especially our house church (small group). They are some of the best friends we've ever had, and they are literally like members of our family. We would do anything for them, and they have been there with us during the great times and the unexpectedly heartbreaking times in the last three years. We all know I was less than thrilled about moving to Oklahoma, but I truly believe that these people are the reason we ended up here. They have literally changed our lives, and I don't know what Scott and I would do without them!

7 Days of Thanksgiving - Day 3

They sing "Yellow Submarine" without fail when we go on road trips. They yell at each other when the other one drifts into another lane while driving in the dark. They cheer for us when we do something great, cry with us when the world is ending, come to visit when we're sick, send us care packages, and embarrass us in public. The occasional dinner out or shopping trip is great, too. Just kidding.

Yup, I am thankful for my parents! They are both amazing, generous, kind, giving, motivated, weird, thoughtful people, and I can only hope and pray that I will be as wonderful as they are when Scott and I have kids. I couldn't have asked for better role models growing up, and we are incredibly blessed to have them. Even if my mom still makes her dog "talk." And even if my dad still orders at the drive thru in weird voices or in opera form. AND even if they insist on taking us to Medieval Times when we are in our 20s. Totally normal. They are awesome.

I heart them.

7 Days of Thanksgiving - Day 2

I am SOOO thankful for my brother, Tim. Even though we are 5 years apart, we are really close, and I love hanging out with him. I think that we both regress about 15 years when we get together, and we are definitely a TAD on the weird side. Tim is hilarious, very hip and trendy, has excellent taste in music, has an incredibly kind heart, and is very popular with the ladies. He has a sweet haircut right now just like Kanye West, and he is really one of the greatest people ever. He's very laid back and good-natured, but he knows what he believes and sticks to it, and he is always willing to help out someone who needs it.

AND.

He posts things on my Facebook wall like this:

Thanks Tim.

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7 Days of Thanksgiving - Day 1

Thanksgiving really snuck up on me - we have been super busy, and for some reason it just doesn't FEEL like it's almost holiday time. That probably has something to do with the fact that it's way warmer than usual for this time of year, but whateverrr Oklahoma!

So I've seen this on a few other blogs and we did this last week in our small group, so I thought I'd follow suit by posting every day about what I'm thankful for. There are definitely more than 7 things I'm thankful for, but you get the picture.

Sooo, I'll start with my lovely bff/husband/shopping partner/expert chef/bringer of hot chocolate, Scott! The last 2.5 years have been so wonderful, and he always finds a way to make things fun, cheer me up when I'm down, or do something totally weird or crazy to make me laugh. I know he is my biggest fan, and he is so supportive even when I am freaking out unnecessarily and being dramatic. He also understands the importance of boots, and he is always willing to give me his opinion on crucial things like which pants to wear with which sweater (even if sometimes his opinion is wrong). He is obsessed with musical theater and buys every song from Glee on iTunes as soon as it comes out. Then, he listens to it at full volume in the study, in the kitchen, and in the car, even if it is putting us at risk for deafness. Then, he puts songs like "Take a Bow" (yes, the Glee version of a Rihanna song) on repeat and listens to them 12 times in a row. SO THANKFUL.

Just kidding ;) For serious, he is amazing! I know plenty of married med students who let their spouses do everything and don't get very involved in anything aside from studying, and Scott is pretty much the opposite of that. Even when he is working 18 hour days at the hospital on his surgery rotation, he makes time to help me with things and go on date nights, even when he is pretty much a zombie. He is passionate about so many things, and he doesn't let that little med school thing get in the way of staying as involved as he can in things that he cares about - he really goes over and beyond what is required of him, and he is an amazing husband, friend, brother, and son. I couldn't be more thankful for him!

YAY SCOTT.

Haha.

Another One

Bah! I seriously can't stop playing this song. Love.

Song Obsession of the Week - 90s Edition

For some reason this week, I've been going through my collection of awesome 90s music, jamming out to junior high/high school favorites like "Meet Virginia" and "Head Over Feet," and wait for it...Sister Hazel. I always do this with them - I forget about them and don't listen for like 2 years, and then one day I say SISTER HAZEL IS AWESOME, and then I listen to them non stop for 3 weeks. "Champagne High," "Killing Me," "All for You," they're all great. They played at Trinity's New Student Orientation concert my junior year, and they were AMAZING. Included in this concert: an awesome, acoustic, piano-ified version of "Best I'll Ever Be." Enjoy!

The Life of an MSIII on Surgery Rotation

My dear smelson started his surgery rotation last week. For him, this means leaving the house at 4 on most days, eating rarely, studying his booty off when he is home, walking around like a zombie, and going to bed at 9. For me, it means waking up at 4 and [hopefully] falling back asleep for a few hours, baking, having conversations with a zombie, and basically forgoing my husband on most nights and weekends. It's not that bad, just hectic...but I will say it has put a damper on our social life!

What happens on Halloween when your husband is on surgery: you find two graduation robes, striped scarves, plastic glasses, and call yourselves Harry Potter and Hermione:

It also means skipping invitations to Thunder games, missing out on outings, and going out for a friend's birthday but leaving at 8:30 to be in for the night.

HOWEVER, there is a HUGE plus to this surgery business: ANTM, Project Runway, SYTYCD, and Supernanny all go uncontested on the TV! Yessss.

Such is life for the next 8 weeks, and it's just another phase of this whole process that will be over before we know it. Forget seasons of life - seasons of med school is more like it. But just like anything else, we make the most of the time we do have and learn what we can, and it's all worth it in the end. In the meantime, I will embrace my control of the DVR, have some awesome girl time, and bake...and it will be awesome.

(But it wouldn't hurt to send a few subliminal messages that whisper "don't choose general surgery, don't choose general surgerrrryyyyyyy" to my hubs. Kthanks.)

I Like...PUMPKIN CUPCAKES!!!!!!

Ahh, cupcakes. A friend of mine made these and I stalked her until she gave me the recipe. I've made them approximately 3 (maybe 4?) times in the last 3 weeks, and received many comments such as "Oh man, these are better than (insert name of cute cupcakes and coffee shop here)," or "GIVE ME THE RECIPE NOW," or "Quit social work and bake," or "MMMhhmmahhhrghaekla." I'm not bragging, just saying this recipe is good. If you make them, you'll get these comments as well. Bonus: it lets you use cake mix!

1 box supermoist yellow cake mix - I used the Pillsbury Moist Supreme or whatever the name is because it has a cup of pudding in the mix!
1 cup canned pumpkin puree - go stock up on this because apparently we are in the midst of the Great Pumpkin Shortage of 2009, no lie.
1 tsp. pumpkin pie spice
3/4 cup buttermilk
1/3 cup vegetable oil
4 large eggsMake as directed on box (omitting the water).

Whipped Cream Cheese Frosting
This is the recipe my friend gave me, and I kind of worked off of it based on how much icing I needed because this made WAY too much. Literally, it got me through 2.5 batches of cupcakes.
1 quart heavy whipping cream
8 ounces cream cheese - I ended up using a little more than this so stood up a little better
2 cups confectioner's sugar2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
Beat with electric mixer until stiff peaks form.

Voila!

A few cupcakes for a friend's birthday:

The enormous bowl of icing (AFTER I iced 12 cupcakes):

What some people look like when they taste the cupcakes:

Enjoy!

I Like...Midterms. Oh, wait.

October was an absolutely CA-razy month for school. I really think that professors get together and have a little meeting with tea and crumpets and their little devil horns and say to each other, "Hum, how many papers and tests and presentation can we give ALL IN ONE WEEK?" And they do that for 4 consecutive weeks, rendering their poor innocent students exhausted, stressed out, and increasingly vulnerable to baking.

Huh? Is that just me?

Despite the craziness of school, we also had a bajillion other things going on, making for month full of fun but insanity as well. Sooo, here is a recap of October 2009, pictsha style:

First, we celebrated some birthdays with delicious cheesecake!

Then, we went to Dallas for a wedding. But then I forgot my camera, so I'll just tell you that there were Mardi Gras boas, light up dolphin necklaces, and neon sunglasses. I got one picture from my phone:

Next, we went to Chicago to see my B-A-yooteeful cousin get married:

We also enjoyed some delicious Chicago hot dogs with the fam:

Then, our wonderful Jen came to visit!!! She got to stop in OKC for a few days before her residency interview in Tulsa. She is amazing and it was so great to see her after 2 years! We baked. A lot:

First, we made a chocolate chip pie, Emeril style. It was a delicious pie, but it lied and told us it was done when it really wasn't. I hate deceptive baked goods.

Then, Jen taught me how to make blue cheese souffles! Apparently, souffles are not nearly as tricky as I've always heard. Nice and puffy:

It so fun to see Jen!

Then, we celebrated more birthdays!

Finally, I discovered that I love to bake cupcakes, unleashing a scary addiction that shows no signs of dissipating anytime soon. So beware, friends, cupcakes are coming! So far, my favorites have been red velvet (from Martha Stewart's Cupcake book, my new favorite book EVERRR), and pumpkin. I made both of these for the OU-Texas game:

Get it? School colors. Woo.

Soo, that has been my life for the past month (aside from stupid papers and such). I feel like I ran a marathon. Yay November.

Also - Happy Friday

So after we baked pumpkin cupcakes yesterday (after I got home from the lovely ER), Hannah and I had a dance/singing party to this song:



Also, please see the real video (couldn't be embedded), complete with awesome angsty stares, chin beards, and theatrical hand movements.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AgH-jWCny9U

Don't judge me.

What If Oklahomans Knew How to Drive?

There is something you should know about Oklahoma. This place is like the tornado capital of the world, and when I am cowering in my closet, any self-respecting Okie is running outside to "feel the wind," as Scott would say. They are hard core.

However.

When a little rain decides to come to town, people FREAK OUT. AHHHH WHAT IS THIS RUNNING DOWN MY WINDSHIELD I MUST PULL INTO THE LEFT LANE AND GO 45 MILES AN HOUR ON INTERSTATE 35 AND BRAKE EVERY 1.8 SECONDS OR ELSE I WILL DIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEE!! I really think that's what they're all thinking. But that's besides the point.

So yesterday, I was driving myself down to Norman at roughly 8:00am for class. It was raining - not pouring, just raining - and people were freaking out, as usual. So I had the freaker outers on one side of me, and the crazies who are oblivious to anything who still think it's okay to go 85 miles an hour when it has been raining for a while, and the roads are quite slick. Somewhere in the middle, people - not 90-year-old slow, but not speed racer fast. It's possible, I promise.

I am dutifully merging into the middle lane where the left lane ends, but the crazies are racing down to the verrrry LAST possible second so they can get to the front of the line, because THAT will make them get to their destination wayyy more quickly. So the freaker outer in front of me is braking frantically, but not letting the crazies in, because that would just be wussy. But no, the crazy will not let them get the best of him after his dangerous and a-hole-like maneuvers to the front of the line, so he just decides to go. Ehh, they'll stop, ehh, I have room, ehh, who cares. EHHHH WE ALL SLAM ON OUR BRAKES AND BIG TRUCK BEHIND ASHLEY SLAMS INTO HER.

So there I am, on the side of the road, strangely calm but staring at the back of poor Rocky the Rav4 while the very nice man (Roy, by the way) who hit me is assuring me that he is a good person and takes responsibility for his actions and will call me with his insurance info as soon as he gets home.

All is ok - I have a pretty sore back/head/wrist, but paranoid husband made me go visit his ER doctor boss to get it all checked out (which, by the way, I learned it is a very bad move to tell the person who hit you that your husband has an ER doctor friend, woops). So I'm good.

But it made me think - what if Roy hadn't been so nice? What if he had just lost his job and didn't have insurance anymore? What if I was actually injured but didn't happen to know someone who could get me into the ER in 5 minutes instead of 8 hours? What if the accident was more severe and one of us got hurt? If he didn't have that piece of paper, I'd be in a hospital, desperately thinking about how on Earth I was going to pay the $50,000 medical bill. I know, I just got rear-ended, blah blah blah, but it made me think for a second about all the What Ifs, and how thankful I am that things played out the way they did. Because for a lot of people, they don't, and this incident that is an inconvenience to me would change someone else's life.

But hey, I got a great friend out of it - Roy calls me approximately 5 times per day. Yay Roy!

Song Obsession of the Week

1) So You Think You Can Dance is BAAAAAAAAAACK!!!!! Here's hoping to a more exciting season this time around.

2) SYTYCD always provides me with amazing music. Case in point:



Ahh John Legend, you are grand.

An Ode to the Neighbors of 42nd Street

I live on 42nd Street
It is so very nice
We love our little house
And all the fun there is in Crown Heights.

We love to take walks at night
Or hang out at the Sip
Get some frozen yogurt, you ask?
It's oh so very hip.

But while we love our place a lot
I must go ahead and say
There are some weirdos on this block
And they get weirder every day.

There's Tony on the right
Who likes to rev his cars
He likes to kidnap our friends
And make them drive him to bars
(and stop for a whiskey coke at La Baguette and make them take him to pick up his whale steak).

There are the dudes down the way
Who like to party hard
They have a statue of a lion
And have parties with their bed in the yard.

There's Katharine and Thad on the left
They are our very good friends
We like to play Mario Kart a lot
And if you're playing Katharine, you're effed

Then there are the new ones
I don't even know their names
But they are bonafide crazytown
This isn't even a game

They like to sit on their porch
And they literally sit all day
Sometimes yelling, sometimes crying
Other times hitting people in the face

Sometimes they knock off a gas line
And they say it was because they were sweeping
But they are probably building a meth lab
And it will explode while we are sleeping

They pound on Katharine's wall all night
Screaming EFF YOU, EFF YOU, EFF YOU
They have large pitbulls who run around
And do not discriminate where they poo.

These lovely friends are leaving us
Tomorrow, or so they say
If they don't, their landlord will call the cops
And in jail for a while they will stay.

I love you, 42nd Street
Don't doubt it, I really do
But when will you stop throwing the crazy?
Hopefully very, very soon.

The End.

P.S. I know I should be the next poet laureate, you don't have to tell me.
P.P.S. IF YOU KNOW ANYONE WHO IS NOT A FELON AND IS LOOKING FOR A CUTE DUPLEX IN AN AWESOME NEIGHBORHOOD (seriously, it's great. super cute with sushi neko, VZD's, the wedge, etc very close), PLEEEEEASE SEND THEM OUR WAYYYY!

I Like...COOKIES

What happens when Ashley has a lot of reading to do, a husband who is on call, and a free Saturday morning? Ashley bakes! (Ashley is not sure why she is blogging in the third person, but it reminds her of a high school basketball coach slash teacher who used to go entire classes speaking in the third person and it was awesome).

So a SUPER classmate of mine decided to be incredibly kind and bring cookies to our afternoon class on Wednesday...and they were amazing. I don't have her exact recipe, but I found a very similar one on the Holy Grail of cooking, aka AllRecipes.com, and they turned out very yummy. They are called Dishpan Cookies, but I don't really get that. For serious though, these cookies have like 13094 delicious things in them, so every bite is like a SURPRISE! Whatcha gonna get?!?! I don't know!!!

(Have I had a lot of coffee and sugar and cookie dough this morning, you ask? NOOOO!!!!!!)

Whatever, here's the recipe:

(The recipe on the website says it makes 72 cookies...I like cookies but I don't need 72 of them, so I cut the recipe in half).

1 cup margarine (but I used butter because margarine is weird)
1 cup white sugar
1 cup brown sugar
2 eggs
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
2 cups cornflakes cereal
3/4 cup rolled oats
1 cup flaked coconut
1 1/2 cups chocolate chips

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. In a large bowl, cream together the margarine, brown sugar, and white sugar until smooth. Beat in the eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition. Sift together the flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt; stir into the creamed mixture until just blended. Then mix in the corn flakes cereal, rolled oats, coconut, and chocolate chips. Drop by heaping spoonfuls onto ungreased cookie sheets.
3. Bake for 8 to 10 minutes in the preheated oven, or until edges are lightly browned. Cool on wire racks..

YUM!