life isn't suffocating, air isn't overrated.

i officially suck at keeping this updated. i was good at it for a while, but now i'm horrible. whatevs. i bet no one reads this but me, anyway.

work is going great. i've been getting nothing but praise from dorene, my trainer. and i was told that she doesn't hand out undeserved compliments, so that makes me feel really good. she forgot that i've only been with her for technically a little over two weeks ... she thought i was at about the six week mark. she told me that i'm at the six-week level ... that it's crazy how quickly i'm picking things up. that made me feel really good. :] she's the nicest woman ever, and she's pretty much my mother-figure at work. i had a horrible migraine yesterday and went home halfway through my shift. she called me last night and left me a voicemail because she was concerned ... "hey pumpkin, i just wanted to see how you were doing and i hope you're feeling better..." she's amazing. :]

madre is kicking ass on the paint circuit. she's way ahead of where she was last year, which means that she's probably going to get a shitload of awards at the end of the year. i'm so proud of her. :] she somehow talked john into letting her buy a new horse trailer, and she's getting a GORGEOUS three-horse logan with eleven foot living quarters. the hotel fees were just getting rediculous - if she hadn't been able to stay in her friend's motorhome at the last show, her hotel room would have cost her $1500.00. fricking insane. so now she'll be able to stay in the horse trailer.

i'm moving to puyallup sooner than i had thought. the lease on my current apartment isn't up until november, but i'm so sick of the commute - because of traffic, it took me almost an hour and a half to get home on friday. screw that. i found some awesome apartments that are literally three minutes from work. it's a gated community, and each apartment has it's own garage, which is awesome. i found a two bedroom, one bath apartment that's available on september 25th and if someone doesn't claim it in the next couple days, i'm going to take it. i don't really need a two bedroom place, but when it's 150 square feet bigger than the one bedroom and is only $60 more ... i can't pass that up. it's expensive - about $1000 a month - but that's okay. it's virtually crime-free (thank god i have the ability to look that up at work) and has a really good reputation in the community. so i'm just going to live in puyallup and still pay the last two month's rent on my place in olympia. ahhhhh, i'm so excited! i can't wait to live by myself, so close to work. :]

alright, i've got to get going. food is calling my name. and so is burn cream ... i tried to straighten my ear this morning instead of my hair. i clamped down on my ear, and have a giant blister. it hurts like a bitch, and it's really gross looking. yuck. anyways, paaayce.

by the way, here's what my hair ended up looking like when i chopped even more off:

i effing love it. :]

i suck at the honor roll.

this is my pathetic attempt at the "honor roll" ... which would be honor society's dance to their song "see u in the dark".

i'm pretty much as horrible at choreographed dancing as joe jonas is in camp rock ...

... which is really, really bad.

and every care you used to have just seems to float away.

i used to think that my long hair was who i am. that it made me. that it was the only good part about me.

now, all of a sudden, i don't give a shit.

i wanted a change. because change is good. right?

hair before:



and hair after:



this past week, i got the idea to chop all of my hair off and donate it to locks of love. i've had long hair for most of my life. except for one brief moment following graduation, and even then it was past my shoulders. so i've never really had short hair.

i'm not completely happy with the results, though. i like the shortness, just not the crappy job that the stylist at gene juarez did on it. the underneath layer is blunt and choppy, and just doesn't look very good.

but then i was messing around with it and tied only the longest layer in a ponytail and got this:



and i really actually like it. so i think in the next couple of days, i'm going to have my normal stylist cut it a little shorter into a modern bob.

hopefully she doesn't screw it up too. :/

i don't wanna fall asleep because i don't know if i'll get up.

so much for writing almost everyday. it's been nearly a week since my last post, and that was only a few pictures from texas.

but right now it's 1:37 in the morning, and i'm really not tired. i slept all afternoon because i had a headache so bad that it was making me nauceous. so right now i'm pretty much wide awake.

i started my new job this week, and it's going well. it's been pretty slow ... i haven't really even begun my training. wednesday, my first day, i had to take an online course on anatomy and psysiology and then the assistant manager gave me 89 addresses in puyallup and i had to find them all on a map. then on thursday and friday, i had to take the map with me and physically go find all 89 addresses and write down what landmark was at each. they were mainly schools and apartment complexes ... places where 911 calls frequently come from, i'm assuming. so for two days, i basically got paid $20 an hour to drive around the city. i'm glad i was able to do that, because i kind of actually know my way around now.

this week, i'm attending an emergency medical dispatcher (emd) class in kent, which is why i had to take the A&P course. so i'll be in class tuesday through friday, 8:30am to 5:00pm. since the commute would be about an hour each way because of traffic, the city offered to put me in a hotel for three nights. so that's pretty awesome. they're paying for all of my food, too. then on the 13th, i have to attend an "emotional survival" class - basically i'll learn how to deal with stressed out callers and how to not get too involved and too wrapped up in it.

i'm still not 100% sure what my schedule will be while i'm in training, but i'm pretty sure it's going to be 2:00am to 10:00am. which kind of stinks. but that's the one downfall to this career - you have to be ready to work any shift on any day. after my training is complete in several months, i could be working any schedule. but i have a feeling it's going to be graveyard.

yesterday christa and i went to the county fair to watch the championship day events. i hadn't been there more than twenty minutes before i was scooped up and asked to help out. so for most of the day, i was stuck in the arena doing ring steward duty ... telling the kids where to line up and telling the announcer what gaits to tell the kids to do over the PA system. it wasn't bad until it started getting hot, and now i have a funky sunburn on my neck and throat. haha.

then that night, i rode rides with the leavitts - drew, danae, katelyn, colton, benj and tyson - and richard and jennifer. i had a blast, although my stomach wasn't very happy with me when i went on the starship 3000 or whatever it's called. the spinny one. it's amazing how as a kid, i could go on every single ride and none of them would phase me - the starship ride used to be my favorite ride of all time and i would BEG my dad to let me go on it time after time after time. now, i can't do spinny rides. i get sick to my stomach. i can still do the upside-down rides, but if there's any kind of drop, it messes with my stomach. so after the starship experience, i let my stomach settle and bumper-car'd it up for a while. then i went back to the other rides. i deemed benj my official ride partner, and he rode the zipper with me like three times in a row.

i think the most fun we had last night was when we went on the giant slide. they had just lubricated it, and holy crap ... we freaking flew. i raced drew down it one time, though, and on the last little hump part, i went airborne. i came down really hard on the raised part in between each groove, and now my back and ass are pretty sore. but it was worth it. we also went on the kiddy coaster - the dragon one. man, that was funny. we got some pretty weird looks from people ... there were more adults on it than kids. but it was fun ... we had our arms up the whole time and were laughing like crazy. overall, the night was a blast. i love that family to death - they're more like my own family than just family friends.

alright, i think it's time to try and go to sleep. i have to clean my room tomorrow and do laundry. plus i have to go shopping and get clothes for class this week, plus i have to pack.