Bit of Ivory

So I just spent the last 2 hours cleaning my room so Pam doesn’t realize what a slob I am when she arrives a week from today (YAY!!). I even steam-cleaned my carpet *gasp!* but I haven’t dusted everything yet. All my books are on my shelves, though. Except for the 10 or so that are still upstairs in my cubby.

So what else have I been doing for the last week? Being sick, mostly. It actually started on Thursday night, but I wasn’t about to miss out on Pirates, so I worked through it. Unfortunately, it didn’t go away. So what are my symptoms? I can just sense all of your curiosity. Well, basically, it’s all in my head. I’ve been feeling dizzy and lightheaded, with periodic headaches. Standing up has been an adventure, and walking even more so. I’ve gradually been getting better, so that I can accomplish things, but for about the first 5 days I couldn’t do much else but lay on the couch all day. I made it out of the house on Wednesday to see Pirates again, but was pretty much done for the rest of the day (except for a short trip to Barnes and Noble where I scared my sister by my inability to drive straight), managed to go shopping on Thursday and watch a movie with my sister and grandma (she hadn’t seen Narnia yet), and yesterday I washed my car, including steam-cleaning the upholstery, and did a bit more shopping (I was looking for new shirts). I between all of this getting-stuff-done I’ve spent a goodly portion on the couch.

I’ve actually started writing my paper for Lumos. Go me!

PIRATES.

AWESOME.

MUST. SEE. AGAIN.

DUDE.

. . .

Just. . . DUDE.

Heh. So I guess, after a whirlwind of posting while on vacation, being back home means being back to my usual non-updating habits. Ah, well.

There is a reason for that, though. I’ve been trying to cram in as much work as possible, to help pay for all the fun I’m having this summer. I did pretty well, considering, but it was a crunch there at the end of the month to raise the number of monthly hours. Will do better in July.

In any case, since today’s a holiday (Happy 4th of July, Americans!!!), I’m taking the day off of working. So there.

So, let’s see. What do I need to write about? Ah, yes. The rest of my Cali trip. Well, Nicole and I went to Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat on Thursday night, and it was very enjoyable. Although I must say that in some ways, I prefer the local productions we get up in Utah. But I was still thoroughly entertained. After the play, we drove around looking for somewhere with good desserts that was still open, and ended up at Mimi’s Cafe, where Nicole wanted the bananas foster mud pie but couldn’t get it because they were out, so had the bread pudding instead, while I contented myself with the chocolate chip pecan pie. Mmmm. We got home late and pretty much went straight to bed.

I tried to get up early the next morning to go shopping with Nicole at Kohl’s before she had to go to work, but failed miserably. I did wake up in time for her to show me what she’d bought on supa-supa clearance, though, including some cute clothes for my soon-to-be-niece. When Nicole left for work I got up and got dressed, and ended up watching Labryinth with Rosie to pass the time. I also gathered up my scattered belongings and re-packed my suitcase (luckily everything still fit, although it was a bit tighter than when I’d brought it). We went to Del Taco and picked up some lunch, then went back to City of Hope to eat with Nicole, since I was leaving before she’d get off work. After lunch we stopped by the Japanese garden again and fed the fish some more, then it was time to say goodbye to Nicole. *sniff* She might drive up to Vegas on Lumos weekend, though, so I’ll be able to see her at the end of July, and if she doesn’t manage to do that, she’ll be back the second week of August. Still, I hate to think that she’s a thousand miles away.

After lunch we stopped by Trader Joe’s so I could buy some ginger-root candy for the flight back. It was cheap! Then we stopped by the house and picked up my luggage, and went off to do a bit of last-minute shopping. I needed to get another bit of something for my sister, who’s birthday was the day after I got back. We ended up at Kohl’s, and I got several pairs of earrings at a nice discount (one for Lisa and 3 for me). We then stopped to get gas, and I attempted to buy some ginger ale, but the convenience stores failed me there, and we ended up at Albertson’s instead. I bought a four-pack of some ginger ale, then went to 7-11 and bought a cup of ice to pour it into. I only used two bottles, and left the other two for Taylor and Nicole. I think they enjoyed them. We also got a Slurpee for Rosie. In an effort to avoid traffic, Taylor dropped me off at the airport a couple of hours before my flight left, and I drank ginger ale, played Solitaire on my laptop, and read to pass the time until they called my flight.

The flight back was actually more bumpy than the flight there, and though I felt a little queasy, I was actually much less sick than before. I just listened to Keane (the old album and the new) the whole way, and focused on a spot at the front of the cabin where I couldn’t read anything. And I didn’t throw up, and after I got off the plane, I felt perfectly normal. So ginger works. I shall file that little bit of knowledge away for future reference. It took a while to get my bags– the Salt Lake airport is large and busy, completely different from the Ontario airport, which was the deadest I’ve ever seen– but I managed to find my dad eventually. We stopped at Wendy’s on the way home, because I’d been scared to eat before getting on the plane, and when I got home the whole family was there to eat ice cream cake to celebrate my SiL’s birthday. Good homecoming.

Someday I’ll post the pics I took.

So, since the Cali trip, I went to P.F. Chang’s with my family for my sisters’ birthday, saw Superman Returns twice (once on Friday, once last night, and it is SO GOOD), taught Sunday School two weeks in a row to make up for my co-teacher having to take over what should have been one of my weeks while I was in Cali, went shopping with Lisa to buy stuff for a Captain Jack Sparrow costume she’s hoping to finish in time to wear for the opening, met up with SQ people in Provo for dinner, and pretty much worked the rest of the time.

Oh, and I bought some yarn to make me a bag like the one I made for Nicole, except instead of lime green and light purple, mine’s going to be yellow and dark purple. I shall take pics when I’m done with it. But I have to finish the sweater I’m making for my neice-to-be Anna first, especially since my SiL has high blood pressure, and she might end up getting induced early because of toxemia. So I could be an aunt as early as next week! Whee! And in other baby news, my sister had her ultrasound yesterday. It’s one baby instead of two (they thought she might be having twins, because she was measuring pretty big), and while the sex has been identified, they don’t want to know, so the pictures are stapled together. Everything’s perfectly healthy with the baby, though, and the current due date is November 16. Yay! I love babies!

In fannish news, I bought a replica of Elizabeth’s pirate medallion necklace, and I’ve got me my tickets for a midnight showing of Pirates, so I’m all set.

Well, the internet was working hunky-dory for an hour or so when I woke up this morning, and I’d just caught up on everything I’d missed and decided to take a shower before settling down for some good, hard, work, and I came back and– bang, internet no worky. So instead of making money and doing something productive (I’m going to have to go on a grading SPREE next week), I’ll type up an account of my last few days. The title of this post is, of course, referring to the Keane concert I attended last night. But I’ll get to that in a minute. First, there’s Tuesday and yesterday morning to consider.

I have no idea what the weather was like bright and early on Tuesday morning, because I slept until eleven AM. I finally dragged myself out of bed and got me into the shower, and subsequently spent the entire day on the couch, as I related in my previous post. When Nicole got home, we had an approximation of Pad Thai made by Taylor (and it was very good, I might add), and then induldged in lazing around on the couch and going on a calling spree. You see, Nicole and Taylor had procured 5 tickets for the Keane concert, because Taylor’s cousins were going to come with them. The first four they bought through Ticketmaster at the face value, but they had to get mine through a ticket broker for about twice what it sold for originally (a bit more than that with shipping and fees). But now the cousins couldn’t come, so they had two tickets to a sold-out show on their hands. They called people– even people who are still in Salt Lake, who might be able to come down on short notice– and I tried to think of people to call, and even tried to get in touch with Kate, who I knew liked Keane and was considerably closer than Salt Lake, although still pretty far away, since she’s in the San Fransisco area. But no one wanted or was able to come on such short notice, so they finally decided to attempt to sell the tickets on eBay. The internet still wasn’t working, of course, so that’s when we headed to the coffee shop. I uploaded my posts of yesterday and checked e-mail, etc., while they tried calling a few more people, but no dice. So they put one of the tickets on eBay (they couldn’t find my extra ticket right away, so in case they couldn’t find it they wanted to make sure I could use one of the others), and we went to Cold Stone for some ice cream. Which was yummy. And that, in a nutshell, was Tuesday.

I woke up relatively early on Wednesday morning, managed to get internet access for a few hours before it went down (hmm, I’m beginning to notice a pattern here. . .), and ended up playing a few rounds of Super Monkey Ball party games with Rosie while Taylor tried to find my Keane ticket– apparently someone wanted to buy the one Nicole had put on eBay, and would buy the second one if it was available, so Taylor consequently searched. He did manage to find it, and the other two tickets were paid for and picked up from Nicole at her work. They were able to recoup the extra money they’d paid for my ticket and even have a little towards their own, so it was a good deal. After the ticket was found, Taylor, Rosie and I went to the Royal Panda for some Chinese for lunch, then came back to the house to arrange babysitting for Rosie. At about 4:30 we dropped Rosie off at Taylor’s parents house, and then went to Nicole’s work to pick her up. We stopped at Wal-Mart and Best Buy to get the new Keane album, had dinner at Tops, a burger joint that was very good, and then headed down to Hollywood for the concert, which was at the Henry Fonda Theatre. Hollywood Boulevard is a lot trashier than you’d think. Once you get past the El Capitan (which I definitely still want to try to go to, dad) and Graumann’s Chinese Theater, it’s mostly lingerie shops. Anyway, we paid to park at a lot across the street from the theatre, and got in line to enter. The tickets said the doors opened at 8:00, and we arrived about 7:30, so we were prepared for a bit of a wait. It wasn’t too bad, though, and there were some people from the Coca-Cola company giving away free cans of the new Tab Energy drink (which I think is so funny, but whatever), which tasted good on the first couple of sips– kind of watermelon-y– but then got progressively worse as you drank. It did pass the time, however, and after some security screenings, they let us into the theatre.

The Henry Fonda has been set up specifically for concerts of this type, so the main floor had no seats. If you wanted to sit, you could do so in the balcony, but we decided that being 10 feet away from the band (we were about 6 or so rows of standing-people back) was worth the sacrifice of standing. Well, the doors had indeed opened at 8:00, but we had to endure 45 minutes of loud not-particularly-to-my-taste music before we even got to the opening act, which was a guy called Kid Beyond from San Fransisco. He was a one-man-band, with lots of vocal percussion and looping and stuff like that, which I must admit was pretty cool, but his musical style– very hip-hop and heavy– was not at all to my, or most of the audience’s, taste. After 45 minutes of loud vocal percussion, he finally finished up. We eagerly watched the roadies setting up for Keane, but they didn’t appear on stage until 10. My feet were hurting pretty bad by then, I’d been sweating for at least 45 minutes, and my ears were already ringing (note to self: next concert, bring ear plugs), and I and the rest of the crowd were impatient to actually hear the band we’d been waiting for.

But when they finally took the stage– I forgot about how much my feet hurt. Now, this was my first concert (I know, I’m incredibly sheltered) unless you count choral/orchestral concerts, LDS musicians, and seeing the Beach Boys at the Stadium of Fire 4th of July celebration, so I don’t have much to compare to, but– Keane gives a great concert. I’ve always listened to live-in-concert recordings of groups that I generally like, and I’m usually very disappointed. They’re not half as good as they were on the album. Keane, though, lives up to the album. Mark of an excellent band, I guess, because they actually sounded just as good live in person as they did on their albums. It’s kind of fun to see a band consisting of a lead singer, a drummer, and a pianist– not a guitar in sight. They sang a mix of songs from their new album– most of which I liked very much, but as I’ve only heard them a few times I can’t judge whether any of them will become favorites or not– and familiar songs from their last album. When they sang “Bend and Break” and “Everybody’s Changing” and “Can’t Stop Now” and “We Might as Well be Strangers” and “Somewhere Only We Know” and “This is the Last Time” and “Bedshaped,” everyone sang along, which was great fun. For a couple of the most popular songs– “Everybody’s Changing” and “Bend and Break ” and “Somewhere Only We Know,” at least, there may have been others that I can’t remember– Tom, the lead singer, stopped singing for part of the chorus and just let the audience take over. I’m not sure if I can describe the energy that was there– only people who have gone to really good concerts can relate, I expect– but the venue was a relatively intimate one– only 800 people– and we were as loud and supportive as 800 people can be. The band members loved having us sing along, and they were sweating just as hard as we were by the end. Everyone had a marvelous time. They finished their set at a little after 11, but we stomped and cheered and chanted “Keane! Keane! Keane!” until they came back on and sang three more numbers.

I know I don’t have much to go by, but that was a spectacular concert, and any subsequent concerts will have to be very good indeed to supplant it from my Favorite Concert Ever position. I will definitely pay to see Keane in concert again. Worth the plane ticket, worth the sweat and the aching feet, worth it all. Amazing.

Oh, and the band members are all pretty cute. Especially the drummer, Richard.

Today, Taylor took Nicole into work and went to pick up Rosie from her grandparent’s, and hasn’t yet returned, so I assume he’s stayed over there to make use of their actually-working wireless network. Tonight I get to borrow Nicole’s car and attempt to navigate the extremely confusing California highway system to pick Nicole up from work, when we’ll probably grab dinner before heading back to Hollywood to see Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. I’m flying home tomorrow night.

It’s been a great vacation.

I’ve been having a fantastic trip so far, but today I’m pretty much exhausted, and plan on doing nothing more than sitting on Nicole’s couch all day with my laptop, catching up on LJ and the latest happenings surrounding Charlotte Lennox–which I’m sure will take me the greater part of a couple of hours–and doing a bit of work for WGU and maybe on my thesis, if I have the energy for it. Which I don’t think I will. It’s going to take enough energy to write up this entry.

Anyway, after I made my last post, Taylor and Rosie went to a church activity for Father’s Day, and Nicole and I went out to dinner at a yummy Mexican restaurant called Acapulco. When we all got back, we piled into the car and drove to Ventura. It was a pretty uneventful drive, and we arrived safe and sound, with Rosie half asleep, at about 10 at night. The beachouse was very nice– it’s actually a beach condo, but it’s right across the street from the Port Hueneme beach. There were two bedrooms– one with a king-sized bed, and another with two twin beds– two bathrooms, a kitchen, dining room, large living room, and a balcony looking over the ocean. Not that we could see it, really, since it was dark and a bit foggy. I did manage to glimpse the waves crashing on the beach in the light of a large lamp on the pier, but not much else could be seen. So we made sure there were wireless connections we could steal bandwidth from use, and went to sleep.

Next morning we slept in a bit– well, I did, the others were up pretty early, not surprising with an active 5-year-old– and went to Burger King for some breakfast. After a quick stop at the grocery store for some food, we went back to the condo and got ready to go to the beach. It’s been a long time since I’ve been able to play in the ocean– since I was eight years old, actually– so I quite enjoyed myself. The water was too cold to do much serious swimming, and I’d left my contacts in so I didn’t get too crazy even with letting the waves break over me, but I had a lovely time. After spending half and hour to 45 minutes in the water, I retreated to my beach towel and dried off a bit, and got a little sun. Before we left, Rosie’s parents buried her in the sand. I got pictures, which I’ll probably be uploading later today, after I get some work done. Anyway, we left the beach around noon, went back to the condo and showered and generally got ready, then went out for lunch. Unfortunately, the sushi restaurant Nicole and Taylor wanted to take me to wasn’t open for lunch, but luckily we got a very good substitute by driving to Ventura proper and eating at Eric Ericson’s, a great seafood restaurant that sits right on Ventura pier. I had a charbroiled halibut sandwich with avocado, bacon, lettuce, tomato, and onion, and boy was it good. I also sneaked some of Rosie’s fried shrimp, and it was excellent as well.

After lunch we drove up to Ojai, a small town nestled in the Calfornia foothills, to see my old high school friend Nathan McEuen perform. I really liked his music–it’s kinda folky, reminiscent of some of the 60’s music that I like– and bought one of his CDs. It was great to see him again– I don’t think we’ve met since graduation. We wandered around the Ojai Lavender Festival, which was where he was performing, and I bought a lovely hand-made straw hat to keep the sun off my face and the top of my head, which had already gotten a bit burned at the beach. Other than Nathan’s CD and maybe Keane’s new CD, it’ll be my only souvenier from this trip, I think. Unless I can find some great deals on earrings. I don’t feel too bad about spending a bit more than I usually would have, because it is hand-made and very high quality, actually fits unlike ones I tried on at big box stores, and can be used for the Cedar City/Vegas trip that’s coming in July. Besides, it looks very cute on me, which is unusual for hats. Maybe it’s the new haircut.

After the concert, we drove back down to Ventura, stopping at Starbucks for a refreshing Bananas and Creme Frappucino, which was delicious, although I think I’ll take Nicole’s advice and have them add caramel next time. Mmm, caramel. Anyway, after our Starbucks run (at which no coffee was consumed, I add for the benefit of other horrified Mormons on my flist– the creme Frappacinos are more like smoothies, and don’t have any coffee in them), we got back to the beach house, looked around on the internet for a while, and Taylor broke out the grill and whipped us up some steaks that he’d bought at the market earlier. Taylor’s uncle, his wife, and their two little boys (I think I’m getting the family relationships right here) came down and joined us for dinner, and then, although the night was foggy, we went down to the beach for another stroll and a bit of wading. The kids all got totally soaked, and an enjoyable time was had by all. After the beach, we stayed up pretty late talking until Jason and Melissa had to leave, then we all headed to bed.
Sunday dawned nice and bright except for all the mist, and we all got up and got ready for church. Taylor and Nicole used the LDS Meetinghouse Locator to find a ward we could attend for Sacrament Meeting, but when we got to the building it turned out that the info was a bit out of date. It seems they’ve just finished a new building in Oxnard, and all the English-speaking wards had moved there. It took a while for us to find the new building, and so we missed taking the sacrament when we did get there, but the rest of the meeting was very nice. Rosie went up with the primary kids to sing Father’s Day songs to her dad, and the ward choir sang, and the high council speaker talked about relying on the Spirit, and was a very good speaker. We didn’t stick around for Sunday School or Relief Society, but went back to the beachouse instead. After one last walk on the beach (I didn’t even change out of my clothes, just held my skirt up while the waves came in), we packed up, cleaned up the condo, and headed for home.

Rather than taking the freeway back to La Verne, however, we took the Pacific Coast Highway so I could look at the ocean. It was a lovely drive, although traffic around Malibu was horrific. After we got through Malibu we stopped to see the Los Angeles Temple, which is currently closed to undergo seismic upgrades and renovations, but was nice to look at all the same. We went into the visitors’ center and saw some of the exhibits, one of which was South American hand-carved depictions of events in the Bible and Book of Mormon. Very interesting. Having eaten nothing since breakfast, we gave in to our hunger, broke the sabbath, and stopped at the California Pizza Kitchen in Santa Monica for dinner. The Wild Mushroom and BBQ Chicken pizzas were very good indeed, and I was full up when we got back into the car to finish our drive back to La Verne. After a quick stop-off at Nicole and Taylor’s to drop off our stuff and get a card for Taylor’s step father, we went over to Nicole’s in-laws to have a little Father’s Day celebration. We didn’t stay long– just long enough to enjoy some root beer floats– and we came back to the house quite exhausted. Rosie went to bed almost immediately, and Nicole and I entertained ourselves by looking over old notes that people had written to her in junior high and high school, including some from yours truly. I surfed the internet, trying to catch up on all that I missed, while she looked through her files and pulled out the funniest letters for my inspection. I’m in awe of her pack-rat skills, as I didn’t save a single note from anyone at that time. They were sure fun to look through, though. Eventually we got too tired to continue, and as Nicole had to go to work in the morning and I was heading to Disneyland with Rosie and Taylor, we needed to get some sleep. I took up my position on the quite comfortable couch in the family room, read the first few chapter of Northanger Abbey (which was the first book I laid hands on when searching for something to read), and went to sleep.
After seeing Nicole off to work, I got up, obeying the insistent pressure that was Rosie, excited to go to Disneyland. Once all was ready, sunscreen was applied, mini-backpacks were packed, and hair was done, we got in the car to pick up Nicole and Taylor’s friend Kevin, who works at Disneyland and was going to sign us in for the day. Once we arrived, we parked in the new parking structure (Disneyland sure has changed from when I went last at age 11), rode the tram to Downtown Disney, and waited in line to buy tickets. Taylor and Nicole had decided to buy annual passports for themselves and Rosie, and Kevin was there to give them his employee discount. After we got those bought, we went to the entrance, where Kevin signed the three of us in for free! Thank you, Kevin! We went straight off to Fantasyland for Rosie’s sake. Kevin works in the entertainment division, and he knows all the characters, so Rosie was in high heaven. She said “hi” to Belle as we walked past, had a conversation with the Evil Queen from Snow White (clinging tightly to Kevin’s leg as she did so), got advice and a hug from Merlin (he advised us on what ride to go on first, and after considering the different variables such as popularity, scariness, and enjoyability, recommended Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride), got a wave and a hello from Princess Aurora and a hug from Gepetto, and got to sit on Ariel’s fin-lap, while Ariel made her an undercover mermaid and gave her a scale from her tail. Rosie held the scale tight in her hand, made a wish and dropped it into the water in front of Ariel’s statue, and tried to be a brave girl with her mermaid powers when we wanted to go on rides that scared her. Before Kevin left for work, he walked us over to where the cast members come in and out, and Rosie got to wave to Snow White, got a hug from Alice, a wave from Tweedledee and Tweedledum, some conversation with the Mad Hatter, a friendly wave and hello from Peter Pan and Wendy, and a handshake and a blown kiss from Captain Hook. She also got to interact with Push, the talking garbage can, who thanked Rosie for giving him a water bottle to eat, and asked for a hug.

And all of this was in the first hour we were in the park.

After Kevin left for wrok we got down to the serious business of riding rides, and waited in line for Space Mountain. Rosie has been on this ride before, but she was nervous. She never let go of Taylor’s and my hands if she could help it, and although we kept reassuring her that nothing was going to hurt her and that it would be fun, she was still pretty scared. In fact, while Taylor and I had a wonderful time (Space Mountain is always as good as I remember it), Rosie screamed basically the whole way, and sobbed while we walked out of the ride. We stopped for pizza before attempting any more rides, and gave her a chance to calm down, which she eventually did.

The idea was that we would head over to Frontierland and get FastPasses for Indiana Jones, but when we got there, they weren’t distributing them any more. We looked at the line for Splash Mountain, were informed that the wait was at about 2 hours, and decided to forgo it. Pirates of the Carribbean is still closed for renovations, so I couldn’t go on that (*sob*), although we did get to see the bleachers and giant screen they’re already setting up on Tom Sawyer’s island for the World Premiere of Pirates II. So instead we headed over to the Great Thunder Mountain Railroad, which Rosie remembered going on and liking, so she didn’t balk. A Rosie who’s looking forward to a ride is a much different Rosie than one who is scared to death of said ride, as she was much less clingy and quiet and much more inclined to attempt climbing rocks. She was a bit scared during the parts of the ride when we were in the mountain, but overall she had fun. We wandered back over to Fantasyland, because I wanted to ride the Matterhorn, but Rosie nearly threw a tantrum (which is very unlike her), so Taylor took her on Alice in Wonderland while I rode alone. It was very fun, but I decided that Rosie would have been freaked, so it’s probably a good thing she didn’t go. We met back up after that and went on Small World to conciliate Rosie (and it was worth it to see her reactions, as she loved it), then headed over to Tomorrowland, got FastPasses for Buzz Lightyear, and stood in line for Star Tours, which I hadn’t been able to ride on my last visit to Disneyland at age 11. Rosie was scared at first, but really enjoyed it when we actually got on the ride, and I had a great time. We came out and decided the 35 min. wait for Buzz Lightyear wasn’t so bad after all, so we went on it. I did terrible at the shooting-the-targets thing. My strategy was bad, I decided. Anyway, we e-mailed ourselves the pictures of us on the ride (I’ll post that later, too), and as Nicole was planning on joining us after she got off work, we left the park to meet her.

First, though, we walked through Downtown Disney to the Disney Hotel, and stopped in at Goofy’s Kitchen, where Kevin was working. At Goofy’s kitchen, the characters are there to interact with the diners, and Kevin wanted Rosie to get the chance to meet a few more of them. He managed to bring Princess Aurora out, and Rosie got a nice long time with her. They took pictures together of Rosie holding Tinkerbell in her hand, and looking at Tinkerbell in the air. Rosie also got a big hug from Pluto, who tried to lick her. After Aurora left, Kevin gave Rosie a Mickey Mouse cupcake, and we went back to the parking structure to meet Nicole and drop off uneeded bags. We had dinner at Tortilla Jo’s in Downtown Disney, then went back to the park.

We were going to hit California Adventure, but it turned out it closed at nine, so we missed it. Instead Nicole, Taylor, and Rosie went to the Main Street Bank to get their pictures taken for thier annual passes while I browsed the souvenier shops, then we all went down to Tomorrowland again. Rosie, Nicole, and I rode Buzz Lightyear with our FastPasses (I did slightly better this time, though not spectacular), and when we came out, the fireworks had already begun, so we joined Taylor and watched the end of them. I still wanted to go on Indiana Jones–it hadn’t even opened when I came last– so although I was pretty darn tired by that time, Taylor took Rosie on some more rides while Nicole and I headed off to Frontierland. The wait wasn’t too bad, so we joined the throng and rode Indiana Jones. It was way fun. We got out and discovered that Taylor and Rosie had just ridden Winnie the Pooh, and that Rosie was willing to try Splash Mountain, so we made plans to meet them. When we got there, however, Taylor and Rosie hadn’t yet appeared, so Nicole and I went on Winnie the Pooh (which is so cute!). When we got off, we found that Taylor had met up with Kevin, who had just gotten off work. We looked at the line for Splash Mountain, only to discover that the ride and broken down and they weren’t sure when it would reopen, so we decided it wasn’t worth it. I’d gone on Splash Mountain twice at Disney World in 2003, after all, and the rest could come back anytime they wanted. Kevin badly wanted to go on the Haunted Mansion, so we talked Rosie into it and went. I and the rest of the adults liked it a lot, and while Kevin tried to distract Rosie from the scariness by pointing out the fun things, like at the ball and dinner party there’s a set of plates that looks like Mickey Mouse, and one of the ladies dancing at the ball has Belle’s ball gown, Rosie was still pretty scared. She recovered quickly enough, though, and as it was almost midnight, we decided to call it a night. After another tram ride back to the cars, Rosie and I went with Nicole while Taylor took Kevin home. Unfortunately, the road were were supposed to take was blocked, and Nicole got us a bit lost on the way home, but we made it eventually, and pretty much fell into bed as soon as we possibly could.

And all of those rides were taken without a hint of motion sickness pills, and I felt much better all day than I have at an amusement park for ages. I did make sure to follow my limits (the teacups were right out, as were Dumbo, the Astro Gliders, and anything else that involved circles), but even the rides that made me queasy at Disney World didn’t do much to me here. I think the Dramamine is a thing of the past.

So today we plan on taking it easy. I slept until 11, and my feet and body ache every time I get up, so I don’t plan on doing much. I took a shower, but my contacts are still in their case and I haven’t bothered donig my hair. The internet connection I’ve been hacking is down right now, and Taylor and Rosie went to his parent’s to escape the heat for a while (their house doesn’t have central air), so I used the time to type up this account. I’ll have to post it when the internet comes back. Or maybe Taylor can convince his stepfather’s son, who lives in an apartment in the garage out back, to give us the security key for his wireless network, which Taylor’s offered to pay half for and which always seems to be up and running. In any case, since I can’t do any WGU work without the internet, I guess I’ll do some reading for my thesis.

Which isn’t a bad day to spend an afternoon, considering that the book is about LotR.

LATER:
Okay, the internet never came back up, so we went to a local coffee shop with a wireless hotspot. So now I’m posting. Hah.

I’m sitting in Nicole’s family room, hacking wireless access from someone in the neighborhood, and trying to get over my usual flying-ooginess. I didn’t take any motion sickness pills today (I can just hear Cyndi gasping in horror), because I’ve noticed that they seem to make me sick to my stomach, which kind of defeats the purpose, doesn’t it? Unfortunately, I also didn’t take the precaution of not eating anything while still in flight. I therefore threw up when we began to land. Blast. But it wasn’t too bad, and no one was sitting next to me, so noone else had to renact Cyndi’s trying-not-to-be-disgusted-while-still-seeming-sympathetic act (which, I must say, she did quite well). Anyway, the flight was pretty short (yay!) and uneventful (other than the landing troubles), and Nicole’s husband and daughter came along pretty quickly after I’d picked up my bags. We stopped at McDonalds for some breakfast (in the hopes that my stomach would settle, and it did seem to help), and we’re hopefully going to go meet Nicole for lunch at In&Out Burger, which I’ve always wanted to try. Tonight we’re going to drive to Taylor’s family’s beach house in Ventura, and spend the weekend there. So exciting!

In the meantime, I’m going to try and get some work done.

Dude. 26. That’s ancient! I’ve been able to drive for TEN YEARS. That’s CRAZY. So old. And I went from being 5² to being double unlucky (13 x 2=26), which can’t be a good thing. Looking forward to next year, when I’ll be cubed (3³=27), which won’t happen again until I’m 64. And 26 means I no longer qualify for my dad’s medical insurance, so I need to try to get it through BYU. Dran.

And I blame almost that entire last paragraph on my brother, who started finding special mathematical properties for ages back when he turned 22 (divisible by 11!), and has been doing it ever since.

Thanks for the birthday wishes, everyone. It’s so much fun to come online and see how many people remember me. It makes me feel guilty for being such a GBP slacker the last little while. Must do better at that.

I did well for my birthday. Got money from my parents to go towards my digital camera (yay!), $5 from my maternal grandparents (they’re so cute), a coconut lime verbena wallflower air freshener from Laura and Ben (yummy!), a $15 gift certificate to the Black Sheep Wool Company from Ben and Amanda (new yarn! Whoot!), and a new copy of Pride and Prejudice (the little mini hardback from Barnes and Noble, which I love and have wanted forever but haven’t been able to justify buying, seeing as I have twelve copies of that book already :P) and a cute bookmark from Lisa. Today I got a card from Nicole containing “good for one ticket to Keane, June 21″ and some adorable pics of her, her husband, and her daughter. And on Friday, I got a package from Pam, Rachel, and Susan containing (YAY!!) a Jane Austen Action Figure! I feel so loved. My grandparents, aunt, and assorted siblings came over yesterday for a spaghetti dinner with homemade breadsticks and Backer’s chocolate cake with raspberry filling. Mmmm.

As for my haircut– it is very cute, but I haven’t liked any of the pictures taken of it so far (save for, ironically, my new driver’s license photo), so you’ll have to wait till I’m satisfied. I need to get one soon, though, because I’d like to send one in to Lumos for the yearbook they’re putting together.

You may have noticed that Bit of Ivory looks a bit. . . different. That’s because I switched my blogging software from Movable Type to WordPress. I was getting sick of the comment spam, the trackback spam, the simple unwieldyness of MT. I looked around, especially at other blogs, and I really liked what I saw at Austen Blog, and discovered they were using WordPress. So I convinced my brother to install it for me. Everything has moved over relatively easily– it took my exported posts from MT and imported them very nicely, including comments, and I was able to transfer my image file over quickly. I also found a 3-column theme from Kaushal Sheth called Abstrakt3 which I think I can customize pretty easily.

I’m especially excited to be able to add an image gallery, a portfolio, and other areas to change this site from a simple blog to a real personal website.
So look for even more changes coming up pretty soon, and I hope you like the new Bit of Ivory!

Today, I bought my ticket to go to LA for a week! A couple of weeks ago, my friend Nicole called to tell me that Keane was going to be performing in Hollywood on June 21, and would I like to go? And I said absolutely, if you can get me a ticket. Well, she didn’t manage to get a ticket the first time around, but she found one with only a 100% markup (but since they started at $24, it wasn’t too bad) and got it for me. At first I was just going to fly down the day before and come back the day after (it’d cost me just as much to drive, with gas being so expensive these days), but then I got a text message that if I come the weekend before the concert, we could have his family’s beach house in Ventura all to ourselves. Teeeeempting. THEN, she called me this morning, and said that she found half-price tickets to Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat staring Patrick Cassidy for the day after the Keane concert, and would I like to come to that? So what turned into a 3-day quick run has turned into a week-long California vacation, filled with fun! We’re also going to a concert by an old junior-high-and-high-school friend of ours, Nathan McEuen, who’s making a bit of a splash in the music business. The fun never ends!

I got on Priceline and managed to name my own price for a non-stop Delta flight to Ontario International, which is only about 15 min. from their house, for $215 including taxes and fees. Not bad. I’m leaving in the morning on June 16 and coming back in the evening on June 23. I plan to bring my laptop and work during the day on my thesis and for WGU, since Nicole will still be working. I might also check out English programs at UCLA and UC Irvine while I’m out there– not that I have a chance of getting into either of their doctoral programs.

Anyway, California, here I come!

I did get my hair cut today. It’s cute, I think. I’ll post pics tomorrow.

I got a new digital camera!

It’s a Nikon Coolpix P2, and it’s awesome! I’m selling my old digital camera to my sister (it’s still a perfectly adequate camera, just not quite what I need right now), and using the money I’ll get for my birthday to make up the difference. I suppose I should have waited until, you know, it was actually my birthday, but it was on sale this weekend, so I decided not to wait.

It’s small and cute and has a metal body and is really easy to use and has WIFI capability!!!

Here’s one of the first pics I’ve taken with it, transferred to my laptop wirelessly! So cool. Anyway, the quality isn’t superb because it’s a snapshot of my TV screen, but I needed to get a record of the haircut I want to get, since I have an appointment with my stylist on Wednesday.

Kathryn Knudsen, as she appeared on What Not to Wear after Carmindy and Nick got done with her.

Won’t I look adorable? I don’t want it to be quite that messy-looking; she’s an artist and it suits her, but I need a slightly more polished look. Still, it’s the general idea. I hope Ashlee can reproduce it.