Working for the Weekend

It's funny. 

As I (Erika) get older, I find that more and more I really am working for the weekend. It's the thought of those 2 days off that really help me get through the week. 

This weekend I was planning on going home to get my warmer clothes, my TV, some other stuff, and see my family. I was looking forward to it, and at 5:00 on Friday, I left the admissions office to get my stuff together and head out. Yess. 

Nooo. 

I gathered some of my stuff and headed out to my car (which, by the way, was parked by Ogle Villages because the parking lot by my village is always full. Grr). I got to my car, and lo and behold: a flat tire. 

Are. 

You. 

Serious.

Oh well. I know how to change a tire. When I got my car, my dad got me all kinds of good tools to change my tires with and taught me how to do it. I'll be like Pam! :)

I get my stuff out. Take the hub cap off, and jack up the car. 

Then I thought that I should call my mom and tell her that I was going to be a little later than originally anticipated. So I did, and she put me on the phone with my stepdad. He reminded me that I'm supposed to put the parking brake on and loosen the nuts before I jack up the car. Oops. Good thing I talked to them. :) 

So I go through all the motions: parking brake, loosen the nuts, jack it up, take the nuts off, take the tire off, get the other tire out. 

And at this point I was feeling pretty good about myself. I can change my own tire with no, well... only a liiiitle help! Yesss. 

Nooo. 

I got the other tire out and lifted it up to put it on. But!! It. Doesn't. Fit!! 

AAARrrrrggghhh. 

Apparently when I was in South Carolina, my stepmom and sister took my car in to get new tires. Very nice of them. But, the guy gave them the wrong size for the spare. What a scam artist. 

I was SO ticked. I was going to be so proud of myself for changing my own tire and driving home like normal. But now... it's still sitting in the Ogle Village lot with the flat back on it, and it will be sitting there for quite a while until I can get the old one fixed or a new one. 

Luckily, I have the best roommate ever and the best parents ever. Kate took me to her house for Friday night (Smart People = best movie ever... er... something) and then my mom came and got me on Saturday morning. 

My mom made me homemade chicken noodle soup cause I'm sick, and Timmy gave me a great way to get out of classes - tell my profs that I busted my brain. Why I didn't think of that before, I have no idea. Maybe my brain is already busted. 

So, despite the less than happy start of my weekend, it turned into a pretty good one. 

Also. One more thing: I was surprised at how few people asked me if I needed help. 

I mean, I didn't need it... and the 3 people who asked, I said, "No, thank you." 

But still... where is the chivalry? 

Ok. Peace out. 

PS - I found this picture of my dog Daisy as a puppy: 

Isn't she soo cute?!

Kiss the Girl

A. I'd like to say 2 things first.

#1 - Erika and I wrote blogs on the same day. Again. After reading mine, make sure you keep scrolling down and read hers. Or else.
#2 - A boy kissed me.

B. I'd also like to say that my life is fantastic still. I dyed my hair and I love it.

If it weren't for my ugly costume, I'd probably get hit on all the time because it looks so good.

Just kidding.

But seriously.

C. I started my new class. It's about creativity and innovation. It's pretty sweet and I feel like if anyone knows anything about those two topics, it's Disney, so I'm really glad I'm taking it from them.

But that's neither interesting nor fun for you to read about, so I'll talk about people in my class.
#1 - There was this guy (Phillip) and he's from Ghana. In the middle of my prof talking, he stands up and starts taking pictures of people like it's no big.
#2 - Later in the class, Phillip and a friend of his from Ghana kind of circle around me and tell me they'll give me money. As I look at them with a completely blank stare, they tell me it's so I can buy the textbook for them. They can't buy it online because they don't have credit cards. Makes sense. So rather than getting hustled, I made some new friends. And then they documented it...

#3 - Then there's this boy Chris. He's from Puerto Rico. I met him on the bus ride home one day and it turns out we have class together. Being he lives in the same apartment complex as I do, I offered him a ride home from class because I drove and no one wants to wait 40 minutes for the bus to come when they can get a ride home from a girl with greatly colored hair. We went to Wal-Mart to get groceries and when I dropped him off in front of his apartment, he turned to me and kissed me on the cheek.

Whoa.

I didn't really know what to do. So I just kind of sat there. And then he got out of the car and went home. (Don't worry, Mrs. Miller. My mom knows and is semi-ok with it)

D. I went to Magic Kingdom today. By myself :( It was sad, but it was kind of a recon mission. People keep asking me about rides and they keep asking me for dinner recommendations and being I haven't ridden any rides or eaten in the park in about 5 years, I figured I should scope it out. So I did. But I was by myself. I kind of felt like a creeper...you know...walking around a park where there are tons of little kids...all by myself. At least it's not like I went to go see Wall-E in the theater by myself, eh Eric?

However, I got these great pics:


So, that's my life right now.

Chris, you better have read this by the next time I hear from Eric.

And as for the rest of you, i hope you are having fantastic lives and that you don't forget to read the blog that Erika wrote today. It's brilliant.

Love,
Jessica

P.S. Do any of you actually pronounce the "W" when you say the word "sword"? I don't, but it seems like everyone here in Florida does. So let me know, because it fascinates me.

Let's Get Married

"Meet me at the altar in your white dress.
We ain't gettin' no younger, we might as well do this."

That's basically what Matt said to Erin this weekend! Ok, not really like that at all, but the result is the same: ERIN AND MATT ARE ENGAGED!!

In other news, Kate and I (Erika) went to the roommate games. And it sucked. Cause we didn't get to play. Seriously, we were like 1 out of 2 rooms who didn't get to play (the other room was Heidi and Caitlynn).

So we decided that we should so something really cool to make up for it. Unfortunately, that's hard to do when Jessica's not here to help us come up with things to do and people to do them with. We sat in the middle of the road for a while wondering what we should do. Pathetic, I know.

Then we figured that we should go to our friends' house. So we did. We went to visit Josh, Ben, Steffan, Mike, Dan, and all the other people who live in that house. It was great fun. They have On-Demand cable that teaches you how to dance. It doesn't get much better than that. I now know how to do the heel-toe, the wop, and... well, Kate and I sat out on the booty pop lesson. Heh.

Then the next day we went back to their house again for a bonfire. That was great fun as well. Fires are great, even if there isn't a band to throw in them. ;)
And we met a nice girl named Betsy.

And then, on Sunday we went back to their house to watch the football game. I was definitely conflicted cause I'm a Lions fan (YAAAY for Millen getting fired, btw), but they suck and it's hard to watch a game and root for them cause then you just get depressed. And on top of that, they were playing the 49er's which is the team Andrea's brother plays for. So it was pretty sweet watching somebody that I've met play in the NFL.

In short that was our weekend. Really the only reason I wrote this blog was to tell everyone that Erin and Matt are engaged! Woo! Annnd.... this is what her ring looks like:

Very simple, very pretty - good job, Matt.

Ok. Peace out.

Blitzkrieg Bop

So. Arbor Games = The best ever.

Some people would claim the opposite. But don't believe them. They're liars.

Our theme this year was the Punk Movement. Which, at first I wasn't so sure about cause I don't know anything about punk. Or so I thought. When I started looking at some of the punk songs on iTunes, I recognized a lot of them. And then when I heard some of the other themes ("The best thing since sliced bread," "SAU Baseball," "The Founding of SAU") I realized just how cool ours was. It was so much fun dressing up as punks.


For those of you who don't know, that girl who's not me, Kate or Erin is our new roommate Karis. She was really good at doing mohawks! That came in very handy on Wednesday, that's for sure.

Kate got so many compliments she is considering changing her whole look to punk forever.

For our skit, we did a fake punk concert to the Ramones Blitzkrieg Bop. Before you think you haven't heard the song before, you have. It's the one that goes: Ay, Oh, Let's go!



It was great. James even gave himself a real mohawk. There's dedication for ya. It was spectacular.

Kate and I ended up rocking out the rest of Arbor Games too.
Kate participated in all of the games except for the first one cause we were off changing.
I participated in all of them except the first one and the bat spin. No face plants for me this year.

We even got sucked into doing the tug-o-war. That's the first time I have ever done that.



And I never knew how exhausting it was! Man. I was tired afterwards. Although, that maaay have something to do with the fact that I could NOT stop screaming. I really tried cause I know it was probably wasting a lot of energy. But I just couldn't stop. You all know me and my weird sounds. They will never stop.

Also. Here's a video of Kate doing the bat spin. Spectacular.




Also. If you would like to see all the marvelous pictures that I didn't post, go here:

http://www.new.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2020634&l=0ca11&id=178200466

Ok. Peace out.

PS - don't forget to read Jessica's blog that she wrote today/yesterday (not sure which) too!!
She has some aaawwwesome news and pictures!! :D

When You Wish Upon A Star

I have huge, gigantic, tremendously colossal news.

But I'm not gonna tell you until the end of the blog.

And for all of you who scroll down just to read the end first, you are losers.

First things first...it's what you all have been wishing for...a not so great picture of me in my uniform:
It is neither a good picture nor is it an attractive one. Look closely to see the chickens on my skirt...Blech.

So. On to my news.

I met someone.

Someone great.

And no. It is not my gay NASA friend.

I met...

Johnny Depp as Captain Jack Sparrow.


In the flesh. And totally 100% for real and verified.

Starting in September, Magic Kingdom hosts a series of Not-So-Scary Halloween parties and apparently, they have a contract with Johnny that he will make appearances as Captain Jack in 3 of them. None of the guests know about him - if they ask to take pictures with him, he has to decline it - but he just looks like a guy who spent a couple hundred dollars to look like real thing.

And this is how my interaction went with him:

Jessica: "Hey, Captain Jack!"
Johnny Depp: " 'Ello mate!

That was pretty much the extent of it. I did a double take when I saw him and was only like 97% sure it was him (I could only imagine, right?) but when I talked to my manager about it, she told me that it was definitely him.

I know. Even I'm pretty much jealous of my own life right now.

This even tops meeting Caspian. Who could have guessed that life would be so great??

Sorry for making you all jealous (but not really...)
- Jessica

If it makes you hate me any less, I still haven't met the people I really want to meet.

And that would be the Jonas Brothers ;)

Strange Things

Ok, guys. First things first.

I have to give a shout out to my fantastic cousin Chantelle and my ex-coworker, Eric...so...holla!

Now. On with the blog.

Lots and lots of things have happened to me since I blogged last. You really have to expect the unexpected when you work for Disney.

Let me first bring up my greatest disappointment.

Johnny Depp was in Magic Kingdom at the same time as me, but no one told me until the day after. I was in the presence of greatness, and no one thought I would care. Think again, guys. And, I heard he was waiting for Lizzi in this pose...

Interesting, no? Too bad no one told her about it either. She missed it.

I also got to go to a Halloween party. We have them 2x a week here in the Magic Kingdom. It's actually pretty awesome. People go all out with their costumes. And being that I'm super fun, I was in charge of coming up with ways to interact with the guests, so I had limbo contests and sword fights with these Mickey Mouse plastic light up swords. In fact, I was so good at sword fighting, that Dopey the Dwarf saw me and challenged me to a duel. I won and he ran away. It was fabulous.

I'm not even kidding. That actually happened. 100% truth.

The day after, I got to go INSIDE Cinderella's castle and get a tour of her guest suite. It was AWESOME! There's a waterfall in the bathroom.

It was equisite. I want to live there forever.

I also got "robbed." We were having a tremendously bad storm (courtesy of Hurricane whatever. I can't keep them straight.) and I was selling this lady like 8 ponchos. This other lady came up and just grabbed them and ran.

Seriously? You're gonna steal ponchos from Disney World? Ok. You're cool.

Lucky for me, I didn't get fired.

And now, for the best part of my blog.

Two days ago, I was out at a cart (and it felt like 100,000 degrees out, but in reality, it was only like 100 degrees...) selling water bottle fans. I would spray unsuspecting guests, and they would either be thrilled, or get kind of mad about it...most people were thrilled, thankfully.

Anyway.

Here's how one of my encounters went:

Man: "Douse me girl, douse me!"
Jessica: "OK."
M: "That was great! What kind of deal can you give me on that fan?"
J: "I can sell it to you for $17!"
M: "That's not a deal! That's how much it costs!"
J: "I can fill it up with ice?"
M: "Alright, girl! You SOLD me!!"

Then, he moves his head in a zig zag motion and says:
M: "Guuuurl! If I wasn't gay, I'd snap you RIGHT up!!"

He saw me later in the day and told me if he wasn't gay, he'd kidnap me. He also asked where I was from, and I said Michigian, and he said he was from Ohio. Then he says, "I work for NASA!" and then does the Heisman move and runs out the store. What a great guy.


For those of you wondering, the man in the picture is not the same man. I just wanted you to get a mental picture. My gay friend was skinny, white, wore glasses, and was almost 50 years old.

I know. Excellent.

So, that's pretty much my life.

On top of all that wonderfulness, I'm watching Air Bud right now.

Yes. It's true.

Peace out,
Jessica

Oh. P.S.

I had to clean the apartment today because we get room inspections (LAME!!!). It took like an hour and a half, but as I'm cleaning the bathroom with bleach, I spray down the mirrors to clean them, smell something funny, and then realize that I'm using bleach and ammonia at the same time. Oops. At least I had the sense to close the bathroom door and use the fan to ventilate it and get out.

At least if I had died, they would have found me rotting away as the inspected my room.

And probably would have then fined me.

Some Kind of Wonderful

Today, my wildest dreams came true.

I stepped into Disney World.

And then I stepped into Narnia.

And met Prince Caspian.

He was quite dashing. I'd date him. He was the best part of my day.

I then got to see the rest of Disney's Hollywood Studios (formerly, Disney's MGM). I saw the stone table that Aslan was killed on and stood in the room where the White Witch tried to seduce Caspian and Peter to bring her back to life in Prince Caspian. It was brilliant.

I also had the pleasure of seeing a kid run into a wall. He thought he was taking a short cut through a curtain, but it turns out the curtain was hiding a wall. I'm still laughing about it. Out loud. And it was like 6 hours ago.

Finally, I had met Kim Possible and had dinner at Pizza Planet. It was a fantastic day. Although Ron wasn't very cute. Pity.


But what's worse was the character attendant who took our picture with Ron and Kim was trying to get fresh with me. He pinched my nose and played with my sunglasses. I really wanted to punch him in the face.

However, being that I'm so good at reacting, all I did was grimace at him. I'm awesome.

So, that's pretty much it.

I know this is going to sound corny, but the only thing that would have made this day better is if I could have shared it with all of you. Corny, but true.

Still love and miss you,
Jessica

Oh. P.S. Paul and Andrew.

In the Great Movie Ride, they added clips from Rambo. I laughed and everyone thought I was nuts.

Hot Fun In The Summertime

So, after Washington DC was Virginia Beach.

I love the beach. This was the view from our balcony.

I also love my Birthday, which was spent ON THE BEACH! Yessss. Spectacular. Awesome way to spend my golden birthday. 21 on the 21st. Yessss again.

There are many things that one can do when at the beach. But really... "I just want[ed] to lay on the beach and eat hot dogs. That's all I've ever wanted." - Kevin Malone, accountant at Dunder Mifflin. That's really all I wanted too. And my birthday wish came true!! :D

Needless to say, it was a great birthday. Although, this is the first year EVER that I was not able to blow out all my candles in one blow. Gosh, I'm getting so old.

Other notable things took place while we were in VA Beach too.

The cool thing to do there is to rent these bike-things. We got a 6-person bike, since there are 6 people in the family it worked out great. Or so we thought. It was a very difficult thing to move and maneuver. And it was hot. And I was already sunburned. But it was a nice way to see the coastline of VA Beach. And we got Dairy Queen. Dairy Queen makes everything ok. But the moral of the story is: don't always follow the crowd cause they don't always know what they are doing.

Virginia Beach kind of prides itself on being family friendly and not a spring break party town. Naturally there are still those types of people. But don't worry. The people of Virginia Beach have taken that into account as well.

That's enough to scare anybody into obedience.

Finally, the last really notable thing that happened in Virginia Beach was a ride on a boat called the Rudee Rocket. It's a yellow speedboat that takes you speeding out into the ocean to a spot where there are tons of dolphins and then you come speeding back. It was... an experience. They warned us prior to getting onto the boat that the ocean was in "red flag" conditions due to the high winds, and that because of this, we would all get very very wet. I kind of thought they were exaggerating and telling us just in case that happened. But no. They surely weren't. We got soaked! It was fun, though. At least that part was. When we stopped to look at the dolphins, it was cool - there were tons of dolphins, but the up, down; up, down; up, down; up, down motions started to get to people. I came very very close to throwing up and poor little Timmy actually did. Other than that, though, it was a great experience and I'd totally do it again. :)

And for the record, it's cool being at school.
But I miss Jessica.

Ok. Peace out.

America the Beautiful

Hello all! :)

It's been a while since I (Erika) update, but that's cause I was on VACATION, and super busy at school...

We (and by "we" I mean my family and I) went to Gettysburg, Washington DC, and Virginia Beach. It was spectacular.

First I'll tell ya'll about Gettysburg and DC. Gettysburg was kind of just a pit stop on the way to Washington DC, so we didn't see all the great sights that there are to see. Regardless, when we got to Gettysburg, we drove around for far too long a time looking for the visitor's center. When we finally found it, we went in and saw a movie about the battle and Civil War in general, and then went to a museum for a while.

Then the real fun and games began. We bought a car tour-cd-thing. It let us go at our own pace and get a feel for the HUGE battlefield. I had no idea how big this place was...
All in all - it was cool.

Then we were off to DC. We stayed in a "quirky" little place called the Hotel Harrington. It was right downtown, so that was really cool - we were only a couple blocks away from the White House. 

The problem was.... it was kind of a pit. 

It kind of reminded me of a hostel that we stay in when we go to Chicago for school trips. So, actually - I was quite used to it. My family, on the other hand was not. 

But, despite the less than satisfactory living conditions, we had a great time in DC. We did your typical tourist-y type stuff. We got tickets for the Tourmobile:

Oops, that's not it. ;)

There we go. This bad boy took us to see all the sights. They would drop us off, we'd get out, and then catch the next bus. It was nice, cause it cut down on the walking. And based on how much we walked anyways, if we didn't have the bus, I DEFinitely would have died. 

Some notable things that happened while in DC: 

1. My mom talked in her sleep. We all know how funny people talking in their sleep is. :) First she said, "Get out of here!!" and then she started screaming... but the funny thing was that she sounded like she was a ghost. And Timmy sat up and said "What are you doing??" Haha. It was hilarious. 

2. We saw this on the way to Arlington National Cemetery: 

I wish you all could see this thing better. It was hilariously creepy. A man's head on a fish.... yikes.

3. All the monuments and stuff, they were all great. I saw the WW2 Memorial for the first time, and it's really cool. I also saw the National Cathedral for the first time... and it was sweeet!

4. There was a hullabaloo at the White House, and we thought maybe we would see somebody famous (like the Jonas Brothers, for example), but unfortunately, no. All we saw were cops, police tape, and news crews. And no. I still don't know what was going on. All we know was that you couldn't get anywhere near the White House and people who had tours scheduled weren't allowed to go on them. 

Okie dokes. That's all for now. Sorry I've neglected for so long. 

And the next post will be all about VA Beach. yay!!

I'll Be Missing You

Ok. I have some terrible, terrible news.

Poor Christopher Robin got kicked out of the Winnie the Pooh clan.

What's more, he's been replaced by a girl. Darby. Seriously?

I know. It's devastating. We don't even sell his merchandise in our stores.

Life no longer makes sense.

In other news.

I think that Disney World is the only place in the world where you can buy pantyhose from a vending machine.

Also, Jamar's birthday was yesterday. Yay!

And the Jonas brothers even wished him a happy birthday. Double yay!

That's pretty much it.

Love and miss you all!
Jessica