I Like...New Blog Formats and "Following" on Blogger

Sooo, I decided to mix up the blog-ness to make things a little more interesting. I thought this would be a fun new way to make myself blog more often, even if it's in the form of short, random posts.

In other news, I have recently discovered the "following" feature of blogger, and I have become an official follower of all of my friends' blogs, or at least the ones I am aware of. It's lovely and helpful because it updates me whenever one of you has posted something new, so I don't fall totally behind. It'd be sweet if I had more than two followers to make me feel more popular, but in all seriousness, I'm curious to actually know who all reads this. To my knowledge, there are only a few (aka Jen, Nava, Hannah, Mary, and Kathy), but I bet there are a few more who found the link on my Facebook profile or something. Come on, everyone stalks at least a litttttle bit, so I am just challenging you to do it out in the open. Show your faces, all you lurkers! Just kidding, I know about the awkwardness of Facebook and being caught up on the status updates and such of people you may not keep in touch with in person...but I'd love to know who you are, even if you've never commented or anything, so take the plunge and click the follow button! :)

Yay for blogging and the awkwardness of the Internet.

Yikes.

In a survey by Oxygen Media, 25% more women in the 18-34 age range stated that they would rather win America's Next Top Model than a Nobel Peace Prize Granted, people who watch Oxygen religiously are probably not 100% representative of the general female, non-crazy population (not that watching Oxygen is inherently bad, ahem), but this is still quite disturbing on multiple levels...ESPECIALLY if you have ever watched that show (which I do) and understand that it involves cat fights, ankle-breaking shoes, and Tyra Banks wearing scary costumes and making strange noises more often than not. But when I put it like that, I might take enormous wigs and animal noises from Tyra over world peace, too.



Oh, wait...

You can read the whole story here: http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/showtracker/2009/03/americas-next-4.html.

Song Obsession of the Week

Erin McCarley - "Love, Save the Empty." I like that someone is sending this message in music, finally...I've been meaning to post about this movie, maybe later.

If bows are right, then baby I don't want to be.

Turning 25 wasn't so bad, but there's nothing like spending two days a week on a college campus to make a girl feel O.L.D. These 18-year-olds prance around in panda-bear-printed galoshes and gym shorts (when it's not raining), uber-trendy True Religion ensembles, and football jerseys that have been custom tailored into super cute summer dresses, and I find myself thinking like a 76-year-old granny...What's with kids these days and their new-fangled fashion trend nonsense, anyway?!? I probably looked that young and silly as a freshman too, although I will proudly say I NEVER allowed myself to cave in to the UGGs-and-miniskirt-when-it's-95-degrees abomination. Apparently 3 years out of college transports you to a weird place between the college world and adult world in which I thought I was still in my "just out of college" days, but now I'm questioning the fashion proceedings of today's youth like a crotchety old lady. I'm in my mid-twenties. Yikes.

But the point of all of this is to talk about the bows. What. is. with. BOWS? Not cheerleader-style ribbon bows in ponytails. Bows like you'd buy to plaster on the head of an infant to demonstrate to all curious passers-by that, yes, this child is in fact a girl. Or the kind you'd get for a two year old to put on top of her cute little top-knot half ponytail thing. These girls get out of bed in the morning, slap on their verging-on-obscenely-short gym shorts, use their Chis and curling irons to their hearts' content, and then proceed to put BABY BOWS on the side of their head. Just sitting there, sticking out, clipped to their head. SUPER CUTE! I get that this is in some way related to the Gossip Girl ginormous flower headband idea, which I will admit can be pulled off in certain contexts, but this takes it to a whole new level of weird. You see cute, young college girl on the bottom, then get to the head and it's like a toddler. Sorry, it's just strange. Someone please explain to me - at 25, have I become THAT removed from the young people??? Or is it just a random strange trend? While not obsessed with trendiness, I like to think of myself as a somewhat-fashionable, semi-up-to-date person when it comes to trends. My monthly Glamour has not informed me that bows are the next big thing, so I don't feel too badly about this. 

I just don't get the bows. So I will resign myself to feeling old, and I will continue to proudly strut myself in my scarves. Thank you.

It's World Water Day

"Water is Basic" - an organization started by my old church in Dallas:



What it might look like if we had to do the same:


The things we take for granted...

Shameless Plug

My current music obsession: Blake and Kate.

Blake Mankin is a good friend of my little brother's from high school, and he and his girlfriend, Kate, are extremely talented. They just released their EP on iTunes, and I think everyone needs to hear it. Their lyrics are deeper than you'd expect from college students, and I love their folk/acoustic sound. The EP was number 1 in the iTunes folk section for a few weeks, so others obviously think they are awesome as well! Oh, bonus - cover art was done by little brother's very bff, Jonathan.

You should check them out at http://www.myspace.com/blakeandkate. Particular faves: Answer, and Fashion Compassion.

The Big 2-5

I turned 25 on Saturday, and it doesn't feel very different. This year I was super lucky that my birthday fell on a Saturday, leading to a 3 night birthday extravaganza that included sushi with the in-laws and brother, Cheesecake factory and Cranium/Wii with the usual crew, and an awesome lazy Saturday full of pancakes, Mario Kart, delicious Indian food, and a movie at home with Scotty. It was a fantastic weekend, I feel so blessed to have such awesome friends and family! It has been a while since I took a few days away from school and just enjoyed the people I love without worrying about papers/tests/procrastination, so that was the best birthday present I could ask for...with Mario Kart coming in a close second, of course.

25 doesn't feel very different...but it sounds different. I can no longer make a case for being in my early twenties, and 25 sounds more established than 24 did, for some reason. I feel like I should have more under my belt than just more years in higher education. Ha. I'm not getting promoted through the ranks of some high-flying corporation, I don't have a kid (thank goodness, for now), we don't have all kinds of free time or cash to travel the world without a second thought, and Oklahoma is probably the MOST exciting place I've ever lived. Ha. It's absurd, but sometimes I look at the carefree little undergrads when I'm on campus and feel. so. old.

Seriously, sometimes it feels like Scott and I are literally giving up our "twenties" for school, but then I stop feeling sorry for myself and focus on the fact that we have a fantastic life and fantastic friends, and we still have most [wait - half] of our twenties to enjoy, despite that pesky thing called med/grad school that interferes with our social lives every once and a while. And hey, bring on 30, because that will mean we are official people who are DONE with school! I'm not really sure where I'm going with this, but all this to say that I'm pretty ambivalent about 25. But for now, I'm going to work on enjoying the present and stop waiting for the future when "real life" starts.

Despite the ambivalence, here are my birthday-year resolutions. 25 is going to be the year that I get fit, by golly. Yesterday, Hannah and I went to our first Zumba class, which was awesome, freaky, and SUPER awkward, all at the same time. I shook, I shimmied (or tried to), and yelled out ZUMBA whenever the crazy instructor man told me to...and I had an amazing time! Apparently I am a terrible salsa dancer, but it was super fun and I can't wait to go back. I have decided that this is the year that I stop making excuses and find ways that work for me to get healthier and have fun while doing it. So, here we go, it's in writing...25 is the year that I get fit, worry less, and probably play more Mario Kart!