Do you ever feel like your life is a movie- but someone else is writing the script?

The Arm-Hair Complex

That's right! Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls I would like to introduce to you the new standard of social acceptability regarding armhair! Can you believe that that sentence is actually allowed to exist? I can, because I spend all day in high school.
So, here's how it goes: Girls are not allowed to have arm hair. If they do, they are either a) gross, b) uncool, or c) the type of girl who attends the Girls' for Green convention and doesn't ever wear a bra.
You get the picture.
Now I would like to present you with the root of the problem (haha, "root"): I have armhair. Not just any armhair. Gorilla hair. Picture gorilla arms with light brown hair on them and you get the picture.
And it is most definitely not a pretty picture, I might add.
So, I am faced with a dilemma that most societally oppressed people have faced at one point or another: to shave, or not to shave? That is the question.

New Layout!

Isn't it the cutest? Every time I go online now I have to stop here and just look...

Thanks to The cutest Blog on the Block! Y'all should check it out...

Friends: The Word That Epitomizes Why I Hate Being a Teenager

My sixteenth birthday party was this weekend.
I think you can judge by the title of this post exactly how it went.

Crazy Pants

I love the way the phrase "crazy pants" implies that only the pants are crazy. Not the person in them. It's like I can take off my crazy pants and become some semblance of normal. Only when I choose to put them back on do they work their magic.

You can just ignore this. I had this thought, frustratingly enough, on the way downstairs from the notebook full of crap I'd just written down. I didn't feel like going back up, so I wrote it down in the first place I could think of.

Enjoy your Sunday.

Ho Hum

So, I'm writing this more for the sake of posting than for actually having something to post. It really does take a lot of work to come up with a post that I think will be entertaining, and then to get in just the right mood to make it good. (Insert definition of good here.) So, I'm just posting what's on my mind and deciding not to care if anyone cares or not.

I think there's a post on here somewhere about how summer never lives up to the hype. I still agree with that post. For me, summer is a) wondering if any of your friends even care if you still exist, b) wondering if your friends still exist to wonder if you still exist, and, c) whether or not they're ever going to call you and ask if you would like to confirm both of your mutual existence by doing something together. So, it's either that, or doing nothing all day but reading/cleaning. And spending all your time with the nagging realization that all of the "wasted" time you spend reading/cleaning could be spent writing the essay that you know will end up being written at the last possible moment regardless of the three months you've had to suck it up and gitterdun.

Did you know that it's impossible to get anything done with perpetually chocolate milk-strawberry-goldfish-wanting kids interrupting you every minute- and- a- half and singing the Veggie Tales theme song in the background? You probably did.

I saw the Avett Brothers again last night. They were 10 times better than the first show, minus the meeting them part. I get such a feeling of... nostalgia, I guess (oddly enough) when I think about them. What right do a couple of guys from North Carolina have to go poking around in my head and messing with all my thoughts? What right do they have to be the origin of those thoughts? I hate that. I love that.

Did you know that my fourth-year hike for Girl's Camp is on Monday? Despite my notorious (or is it?) hatred for hiking, I'm actually excited. I get to spend a week in the wilderness with one of the coolest people I know as my tent partner! I actually have friends in my stake! Do I sound pathetic or what? (Please don't answer that.)

Did you know that I made the Color Guard? Did you know that I've missed every 4-hour practice they've had so far? And that, thanks to beloved Girl's Camp, I'm missing a week of the band camp that was supposed to help me get back on track? It's enough to make a person want to quit. But I'm tired of being a quitter. It gets old after a while.

I should be writing my talk for church tomorrow. I really have been completely un-inspired for it so far.

You know what? I'm sorry, you guys. You shouldn't have to put up with more than 4 paragraphs of useless monologuing. I expect more from myself than mindlessly babbling about trivial crap.

Oh, gosh, I just had the sad realization that that's a great description for this entire blog: "myself mindlessly babbling about trivial crap."

Now I'm depressed.

But don't hate me because now it seems like I'm putting myself down just to get you to tell me that my blog isn't annoying or trivial. I'm not digging for compliments here.

Now i sound like someone who regularly engages in compliment-digging.

What kind of a sick person writes about doing/does that?

Is said sick person actually just doing that right now?

I need to stop writing before I hurt myself.

Love always/as long as I'm still sane [but even then I guess I'd still love all of you (pshaw. All 3 of you) Oh crap I'm doing it again.]

Remind me never to write again unless I have a solid idea,

Alyssa

Finding My Passion: Step 1

Well, a couple days into summer vacation I have come to a conclusion: summer vacation sucks. It's been 3 days and I'm already bored out of my mind. As many people are driven to do when they have virtually nothing else to do, I was doing some soul-searching. I realize that this is a dangerous activity to engage in, but I feel that I have no other choice. It was either I googled "How to find your passion," or, "How to make cheese." For the sake of my family's health and the rest of our milk supply, I went with the first option. Plus, I didn't want to have to build my own cheese press.
Anyways, I clicked on an article that came up in my web search and started the first of the several steps listed: Think of what you're good at and start a list of potential candidates for your passion.
Here's what I wrote:

What Am I Good At?
editing
helping people
listening
self-analysis
writing
cooking/baking
shoving stuff in drawers
being "interested"
teaching
eating
spelling
picking zits
web-surfing (not really)
making people feel comfortable
being informal
making up excuses
reading
being shy/awkward
brushing my teeth
being a good student
being a good citizen
not caring if it's perfect (most of the time)
making a room look "lived-in"
buying t-shirts
self-sacrificing (for the most part)
just "screwing it"
coloring
not laughing at people who talk to themselves
talking to myself
arguing with myself
British accent
Jersey accent
Southern accent
thinking of things I'm good at
handwriting
doodling
creative thinking
hating math
wanting to improve myself
nicknames
singing
remembering lyrics
making inside jokes
impulse-buying
cutting olives
imagining
doing crunches
making lists
hating Elen
feeling bad for hating Elen
strongly disliking Elen
setting goals (not necessarily accomplishing them)
being selfish
hating myself
liking myself
doing my eyeshadow
wasting time
being needy
being independent
picking my battles (most of the time)
asking stupid questions
annoying my mother
making Christian angry

If you made it to the end of this list without skimming, I sincerely congratulate you.
Tune in next time for Step 2: What excites you?
As always, thanks for reading/caring!

What Do You Think?

So, we're back to this again y'all. I'm tired of my hair and lately I have had the urge to just chop it all the heck off. So, I came up with 2 looks that I love, and I wanted to get everyone's opinion, if you'd be so kind.


Look 1:



I was thinking a sort of combination of these two would be cute, but I also think just the first is adorable. Thoughts?


Look 2:



I love the style of the first picture and would prefer the length of the second picture. This look is cute and it involves new bangs from the ones I have now, whereas the other one has pretty much the same bangs.

So, anyways, that's what trivial crap has been on my mind lately. Please let me know what you guys think!

Staring, a.k.a. Creeping

Now, I'm going to tune in to my inner yoga instructor and paint a picture for you. First, I need y'all to close yours eyes, and breathe deeply. In.... Out.... In.... Out....
Okay, picture this:
You are walking through Costco on a Saturday at around 1:00 in the afternoon. Every pants-in-the-family-wearing mom is there with her puppy-dog-eyed husband (and when I say puppy dog, I really mean basset hound), every Grandma is moving as slow as humanly possible down the middle of the aisle, making it completely impossible to pass her (they're tricksy little hobbitses, those grandmas), and every dyed-blond, 40-something, has-been cheerleader is there with her A-game in tow. Now imagine your thoughts upon walking into this mad house. They might be something along these lines:
"Okay, not an ideal day at Costco, but nothing I can't handle." In which case, good for you.
"I guess I can't expect anything less from Costco at one o'clock on a Saturday."
"Mmmm, pizza...."
"Holy crap! What the heck would possess this many people to show up here at once?!"
Or, if you're smart, "I'm getting the heck out of this mad house, my shopping can wait 'till Monday."
However, if you're me, you're thoughts would be something along the lines of, "Why in the name of Mary Todd Lincoln are all these people staring at me?"
That's right, the good ol' woman-I've-just-met-at-Costco stare-down. One of many things in the world guaranteed to make your skin crawl and your palms sweat.
I just don't get the Costco stare-down. What's the point, people? Not that we all can't appreciate some woman we've never met staring expressionlessly at us for more than the socially acceptable one and a half seconds. Believe me, I appreciate it all right; appreciate how unnerving and weird it is. Because, according to my rule book, if you're going to stare at someone for longer than one and a half seconds, then you have to smile at them. That way, they just smile back and think "Oh, what a nice person," instead of when you don't smile, you just look away quickly. Then all they're saying is "Okaaaay...?" But when you stare at them expressionlessly for longer than is socially acceptable, they're thinking, "What is that lady's problem?"
So, people, alls I'm sayin' is, when you're at Costco at one o'clock on a Saturday afternoon, just don't stare at people so much. It's creeping me out.

A vs. An (It's Not That Hard)

Okay, people. It's time to tackle an issue here that, frankly, we shouldn't have to tackle AT ALL. But, we do, because, apparently (Whooooo, COMMA HAPPY :)) 9th grade honors English students don't know when to use the article 'a' and when to use 'an'. Sigh... I would rant endlessly about this, but let's just save you and me the trouble/boredom (not that ranting is boring (for me) but it does take up time and it's not all that entertaining for y'all) OKAY. Phew. Find your chi, Alyssa. Find your chi. Okay. Let's do this thang.
Imagine that you are writing a paper. You suddenly find yourself confronted with an unsolvable problem: is it a eight or an eight? It's time to stop and ask yourself: WHY THE HECK DO I NOT KNOW THIS? IS THIS NOT 3RD GRADE MATERIAL? Then, give yourself a really, really, humongous, ginormoogantic pat on the FACE (you thought I was gonna say back? Ha, you wish suckahs).
The rules for 'a' and 'an' are simple. Now, listen closely, y'all. If the word that comes after the article you're puzzling over begins with a VOWEL, you use 'an'. If the word that comes after the article begins with a CONSONANT, you use 'a'. Let's look at some examples:
I would like to eat an apple for lunch.
I would like to eat a sandwich for lunch.
Got it? We'll see... Now you try:
1. You forgot to put (a/an) eight after the one.
2. My brother is (a/an) jerk.
3. If you don't get this by now, you are (a/an) mentally challenged person, so please join Mental Alyssa in the Corner of Shame.
4. I prefer meat seasoned with (a/an) herb. OOOOOO, tricksy, tricksy. But you know the answer, I know you do. Just go with your gut; that always works for me.

SO, in conclusion, if I ever see the improper usage of a/an again, I will write the web address of this post on a bajillion itty bitty pieces of paper, roll them into the shape of bullets, and shoot myself with them. I will do that in the hopes that, in honor of my memory, someone will start a charity foundation entirely committed to educating the world in the "complicated" art of proper article usage. And, also, that when they find my body, they will have a bajillion tiny web addresses to hand out to the world in support of this noble cause.


'Nuff said.