Fall Trends: an overview

Fall is here, and with it the new trends and looks that inspire a legion of women to look silly. I have worked hard to find the cutest trend inspired items of the season. First, let's sift through the trend sand to see what's out there.

1. Biker trendy (according to one mag I read, more aptly titled the look "the L word")

• This look is complete with tons of leather, chains, zippers, harsh lines, gloves, and overall black zeal. Not so me.

2. Geometry lesson

• Crazy shoulder shapes, triangle bodice sillouettes, and lots of hard angles. Reminds me of Blade Runner. That's a good/bad thing.

3. Neon lights

• The colors of the seasons previous have been bold and unique, but the switch is to the brightest, most fab colors possible. Be prepared to be blinded by the top designers. So... Can't lie. Love this.

4. Animal print

• Nothing new. Honestly a little bored with the animal print but I can't say it isn't fun.

5. Gray

• Again, kind of a normal thing in the fall these past few years. But paired with one neon item (or a few) and that'll shake things up a bit. Also, have to admit I like the gray eye look.

Anyway, so now the fun part. My favorite items for the fall season, complete with pictures.

1. Christian Louboutin Suede Over The Knee Boot in Purple at your local Saks Fifth Avenue. If you have a mere 2k to blow on a pair of boots, I salute you (as well as laugh because that's pretty ridiculous,) Oh Christian. Why must you taunt us.

I think my favorite outerwear designer is Sunner. I particularly love the Sunner Navy Wool-Cashmere "Calgary" Ruffle Short Coat on Bluefly. It's austere, yet feminine. Good mix of power.

Fabric Necklaces - The new fad?

The most recent neckwear trend is the string look. Why; I couldn't possibly tell. I don't particularly grasp the beauty of the 'neck lush' fabric necklace or the purpose. It's a ripped up scarf. Does anyone actually like these things?

I do admit, the one on the right is fairly cute, direct from necklush.com. They call this one the necklushie and it's only $22 dollars. I can't help but think of bungie chord though, and why you'd want a piece of jump rope around your neck, I can't imagine.

I think they have latched on to this fad and made the most of it in comparison to the companies I have seen that produce these thread necklaces, but is this a sustainable business plan? I certainly don't think so. I guess that's biased based on my dislike for the product in general but it just looks like a machinated scarf to me.

Maybe my tastes aren't eclectic or eccentric enough to take interest in a product like this. If I just had to have one, I think I would try to make one instead of just going out and buying it. Anyone interested in going that route can simply find some cute color yarn such as this kind at yarn.com and create something unique and fun by themselves. Fun fashion craft project, perhaps?

On another note, I received a surprise gift in the mail last week. I figure since it's also a necklace I can throw it out there and brag a little on my boyfriend at the same time. He saw my blog post apparently and ordered the Swarovski Golden Shadow Briolette necklace under the radar. I almost even sabotaged him by ordering it last weekend when I freaked out over it being sold out, and having emailed briguysgirls, the necklace was put back up for sale. I must mention, this etsy retailer has great customer service!!! Ray proceeded to ruin my glee at the necklace being up again and kept telling me that buying the necklace was probably not a good idea and that I was supposed to be saving money.

I thought nothing of this, as I have a problem (i.e. wanting to buy a lot of cute things I see), and was bummed out for the rest of the day over it. (How fickle, I know.) A few days ago, I received my mystery gift in complete shock and created a bit of a tizzy at work, enlisting co-workers to help me figure out why I just received the necklace I had wanted so bad. Ray done good!

Gone Boutique Fishing: Cute Finds

Today showing signs of a true addiction to etsy dumpster diving. To the right, I have a piece from an artist that shows the type of abstract painting that I really enjoy. It reminds me of a multicolored hibiscus/azalea flower mix. Nataera designs and develops dozens of this form of abstract art on etsy and her personal site. I believe my favorite part about the pieces I've seen is how warm and vivid they are. They are still not too abstract to prevent a relation with something in real life, thus leaving the imagination ample space to roam and decipher.

I also began to search for particular locations for the first time today. I had to, of course, search my hometown Birmingham, AL before doing anything else. I happened to run across the cutest little baby outfits at bakd's boutique; I've seen some of these designs in the Nomad Supply, at least I am fairly sure that they were the same label.

I also ran across some very minimalistic jewelry designed by a local designer named sundreams. My favorite piece is the Rebirth earrings, and at $7, it's hard to go wrong.

Two of my favorite pieces came from randomly searching locales away from my own. Of course the first location I searched after Birmingham was Ireland. I decided to give the entire country a shot at pleasing my tastes so I could happily show my Irish boyfriend my treasure trove of celtic goodies.

My favorite item was the Eau de Nil Triple Drop Earrings. I don't really have a reason to love them as much as I do, but given they are only $15 (or better yet, 10 euros) and absolutely adorable, I have the perfect reason to bug said Irish boyfriend into sharing some Celtic charm with the southern girl writing this post. Ooh la la. The designer's name is PearlyQueenJewelry and her designs are listed on etsy at very affordable prices.



The next designer that I found, on a completely unrelated search under the Paris locale, is Lunedhiver. Her pieces are all extremely delicate, simple, and tasteful, but with details that embody the inspiration that she writes below each piece. My favorite piece is the Josephine earrings - Gray Agate and Copper and the earrings are so feminine and unique that I just love them. The price is a little high at $26, but well worth it if the quality is as good as seems.



Today I've officially decided that this blog should be solely for fashion, beauty, and art (maybe pop culture as I expand). I have been puzzled over what focus I should have in this blog because I also want to write about several other things and wasn't sure how to mix everything together. For that reason, I am not going to. I am going to focus only on the nicer things in life, and give this blog a purpose of being a getaway for my busy life.

Boutique of the Week: White Owl

Detroit has slowly been destroyed by the de-emphasis on American ingenuity and credence in the automotive industry. Okay so all things aside, that's the big 4's fault (mostly) for not acknowledging changing needs of the American auto owner and the residents of the city have been punished for being a part of the crock. It was good while it lasted.

The so-called "ruins of Detroit" pictures are examples of how far the previously 4th largest city in America has fallen. One of my favorite examples is the Michigan Theater, because it's previous glory is completely long lost in the new parking deck form. The deterioration and lost opulence is apparent in the quick side by side comparison. (Thanks slate.com for this great example.)

I picked White Owl this week because it is a perfect example of someone that is using pieces that, in my mind at least, commemorate the fallen city of Detroit. The energy of that glamor and sophistication is offset by the tinged metals and use of chain. All are very vintage, all strikingly simple and unique.

Also interesting, the most fabulous necklace sold out before I saved the image for this blog. We will have to do with a few other products that I fancy.

1st we have the Vivienne Pearl multichain necklace. It sells for $38 on etsy.

I really like the Mixed Metallic Chunky multichain earrings. These are also on etsy for $18.

I really like the lace that is used, and although I wouldn't personally wear the lace necklaces, I find these earrings adorable. They are called the Xandra lace earrings (vintage green bead) and retail on etsy for $22.

After doing a little history diving, I managed to find my favorite necklace in the pile even though it's sold out. It's called the Lillian multichain and if I remember correctly it cost under $40.

My dream ModCloth outfit ... Today.

Today I formulated the cutest ModCloth outfit ever.

Beginning with the the Empress Hotel Dress (here), I then decided some tights would be appropriate and chose the Satine Tights (here). As the delirium from impending cuteness developed, I questioned what else i could add to create my look.

From the ModLife blog, I found the most adorable jacket I have seen. It makes me think of the Coldplay's Violet Hill (or general image anyway these days). Which in turn is very powerful, seductive, and creative. Okay so this is the pretty posh princess cutesy version of the dingy battalion leader, but it's still beyond adorable and makes me think of... Daisies.

The Battalion Jacket in Ivory can be found here.

Finally, I picked the Toulouse Lau-Wedges to complete the look. With a mixture of grey and gold, all pieces of the outfit come together superbly (Or at least I think so.) This shoe can be found here.

Okay... I cheated. The last piece is actually from a completely different site (Etsy) and I just love it and think it matches the whole ensemble quite well. The designer is Briguysgirls and I love how detailed and ornately simple a special few of her pieces are. The necklace is called the Swarovski Golden Shadow Briolette on 14k Gold Filled Chain, Double Layered Necklace. The daintiness of the piece is what draws me to it.

Overall, I am very pleased with this look from ModCloth. Now if only I could afford to buy it right now. Such is my luck!

April... To July? Oops

I have obviously not posted here in too long. I could say that things have been absolutely, inanely crazy, but that would be slightly cliche and obvious. So I'll say this: I've spent my time as of late working about twice as much as ever and still taking classes through the summer. Definitely haven't had much of a break and I am presently so excited that I only have two weeks left until I have a whole two week break from school. I'm going to have to make the most of that two weeks because after that I am back in school for more hours than I've ever taken at once.

Here's to hoping they can find a new Adoption Specialist so I can, with clear conscience, relax the hours some when the semester starts.

Life has been eye-opening lately to areas that I could use improvement, and I feel as if I have been abusing several resources. A few concerned people may never forgive me for taking so long to return books that were borrowed early in the summer. Gosh, did I really completely forget about the outline? What is wrong with me!

I think about this question and realize that nothing is wrong with me at all. My brain is just tired. That's okay too.

So how do I make it through these last few weeks and keep getting by in these two excessively crazy and abusive classes? I don't know yet. I'm working on it. That's all for now, back to the 3-4 page paper I have to write by tomorrow and that nagging sensation that tells me I have completely ignored everything else that was important to do this weekend.

Still a five year old and very content.

Sometimes I wonder how the short term and long term converge and morph and become the future, present, and past and leave me in a substantially subjective area known as now. Who am I? What do I want to become? There are so many pressing challenges that seek to overthrow the ambivalent stance in this time frame and so many more that slowly condense my world into a pool of dehydrated rose petals. Soft, bumpy, and vividly in memory of what could be but is not. Now, if only to introduce the water into this pool to give them life. Then though, the problem becomes not about what to put into the pool, but how much, and in what increments?

And so begins finals week, with a underlying current of confusion and a good level of stress. So much to do, so much that's undone, and so much will be done and completed tonight. Ray's not particularly helping the situation lately. It's all good.

So I've been trying to focus most of today with little progress done but a lot of mental work/time attributed to this worthwhile focus. Too many diversions are involved in the disconnection between what I'm doing and what I should be doing. At least last night I was able to catch up on the year round bible reading. Keep running into the "I don't have time today" situation and putting it off for a few days and then catching up. It's amazing how calming and focusing it is.

To explain the five year old statement in the title, I still have this feeling that I'm mentally far below my age deep down and don't understand reality well enough. There are these random states of excitement and shock that show discomposure and make me seem that I am not completely there. I love the idea of being ready for any news but I'm still extremely green to so much. The passion to learn and experience so that I am not so at odds with the world is my focus, but the stories of the CEO's/leaders with clear, concise focus are bringing out the jealousy.

Anyway back to the marketing plan. This semester has been fabulous and informational just extremely busy which is why I've not even posted since March. Apologies to all that stumble around here.

Mid-Terms, Motivation, and Exaggeration

What's this grand feeling of inadequacy? I can read for hours and never see the difference between my writing ability and someone elses, then I can read one article and feel as if I have no right writing at all. I love how there are so many writing styles and how unique certain writers become by making their own of it. There's something vaguely mysterious about the process of putting thoughts down; so much must have shaped the individual to allow them to see the world from all sorts of different angles and rely on their history to model the use of the words that they use. Language intricacies are so interesting, albeit complex I'm sure. Maybe one day I'll be interested enough to make time to study it, but for now I'd prefer just musing about the matter.

This week was amazing, miserable, and wonderful all at the same time. Now the deadlines loom over my head, somewhat reachable but just far away that they seem convoluted by the very fog that gave me this splotchy tan at the beach. Recap:

Saturday -
Ate at Red Pearl with my sister and a friend. It was pretty delicious, but in the end I think I preferred the chicken noodles to the beef pot (will note for future reference.) We got tons of snacks, from taro strips to an Indonesian candy bar. More than half of it was inedible due to holes in the bag. Big disappointment, especially when the taro had to be thrown away. Ben and Jerry's made up for it though. I forget what I had, but it was really good and had coconut in it. We stumbled around in different stores but didn't have enough time before the movie to wander aimlessly. My sister bought us both popcorn and drinks (Tally: 15 bucks) and the tickets (14 bucks.... Movies are less important to the theater than popcorn and drinks? Wild concept.) The Watchmen was an awesome movie; I really enjoyed Rorschach throughout the movie. He was pretty cool. Otherwise the movie was like extremely graphic, so much so that I thought it should not have had R rating anymore. Can't complain though, it was thought provoking, intriguing, and beautifully done.

Sunday -
Went to the Rec center with my family because I wanted them to experience the coolness. Attempted rock climbing and only my little sister agreed to do it. The boys stood back away from us and made fun of most attempts. Played racquetball for a while, or rather taught my siblings to play racquetball, and enjoyed it a lot. I need to play more; It's mildly addictive. Played basketball, which has never been my forte, but it was a lot of fun. I surprisingly hit a lot of baskets as soon as my little brother stopped trying to hog the ball and be the superstar of our half court game. I still missed enough that I could remember my lack of proficiency, and will leave that game to random bursts of curiosity or interest. Then went to the ping pong tables and practiced. My siblings need to get out more so they can compete in these odd little outings.

Monday -
Worked all day and got to follow Jodie around some. Also learned that there was a possibility that I could fall into a similar role as her in the near future if I work hard enough. Very exciting stuff, given it would be my first serious real job that had nothing to do with interning or clerking or something silly. The heightened responsibility is exciting. It would be a stable position too, which is even more cool.

Tuesday -
Same as Monday, except there was strawberry cupcakes gratis my awesome boss, and it was also the other Amy's birthday. We all went to lunch at Salsaritas, which is one of my favorite random restaurants right now, and had a good old time. Pretty awesome! My boss was superiorly sweet and made me strawberry cupcakes. (Very delicious ones at that.) Then I went bowling for the first time in about officially 14 years or so and had a great little party thing and had a big "oh no they're booked" moment and had to resend people to the right destination. I had a really great time even though only a bare minimum amount of people were able to attend because everyone was out of town. Merritt had his chance to make everyone look really badly and did so with enough grace that no one really minded the slaughter. Nothing was lacking besides food, because I couldn't bring myself to eat in front of everyone else when no one else had eaten dinner. I ended up being fairly hypoglycemic by the end of the night due to this but still managed to beat my sister in air hockey.

Wednesday - Overall, sucky day. It was depressing. Ray wasn't on, no special typical birthday treatment, and I even managed being responsible for purchasing my birthday cake and cooking dinner (which I didn't even want). I was definitely feeling a bit diva haha. Funny way to start off 21.

Thursday - Tres adore. My birthday wish was to be at the beach, and to the beach we did go. We ended up waking around 5:15, got ready, and were gone by 5:30. I managed to catch up with the around the year bible reading thing and was proud of myself for doing so (even though I keep managing to get behind and lost in the shuffle of life.) After a slight side track to the Panama City mall for dumb bells (don't ask), we made our way onto the gloriously perfect beach. About 30 minutes into my mini-vacation, fog began drifting in and totally obscured the sun and things relatively close to the beach. Not my picture perfect idea of the beach, but still had an awesome time and even managed to burn myself in several places. On the way home, we stopped in Dothan for food at Santa Fe restaurant. I'd never been there before but I was assured that it was good. Happily, I found out that it was. I had a steak and salad and sweet potato, all cooked quite well. It wasn't anything fancy or seriously memorable, but I definitely haven't had a sweet potato that was that good in a long time. (The practical bucket of butter and brown sugar that came with it probably helped this along splendidly.) It was very remniscient of Logan's steak house, complete with cowboy decor, and peanuts on the floor. I think I definitely prefer Santa Fe, even though the constant country music was relatively annoying.

Friday - My good friend Chandra met me after work to take me to lunch in honor of my birthday. I was given the opportunity to try Indian food for the first time, which I must say, was amazing. I will hopefully get the opportunity to go to Silver Coin very often in the future, but at the price, I will have to settle for on occasion. For now, Red Pearl still trumps all, because I've always loved Chinese food and this is relatively authentic compared to the Americanized version, and way better than. I'll always have a soft spot for Egg Drop soup, but those chicken fried noodles were to die for. I'm sure there are plentiful amounts of other things on the menu that I would just love. Surin's moving down on my 'cool' list because I feel like I'm missing out on real thai food when I eat there. A lot of the food just seems to be thrown together and lacking substance. I suppose that could be why I started to just eat Maki when I was there and avoided the entre's all together. Ah I'm rambling about food, I will do this further in a latter post, back to Friday. After lunch, we ended up perusing some stores, even got a little dolled up. We were going to go to Sephora for a makeover but they were totally booked. Instead, I told her about the Bare Escentials store, and ended up going there. She ended up looking like a full blown movie star or something after they were done with her. I bet she'll forget about it again like last time and not wear anything for a while until I get her set up with yet another one. All in all, a very fun day, complete with a happy birthday present to myself in the form of some very heely, super cute shoes.

Saturday and Sunday - Given the whole responsibility thing, I managed to study and research most of these days. Nothing happened that was terribly exciting. After the awesome week I had, I couldn't imagine wanting to do anything at all though. It was all cloudy and dreadful and uninteresting outside anyway.

Snow (Hey Oh)

It's really amazing what one badly timed snow storm can do to plans. Today may be completely different now due to the musings of the parentals on the safety of going anywhere in particular. I just hope I will still be able to see the show.

I can't particularly blame snow for any deviation in my day. I haven't seen so much snow in years, if not over a decade. It's been falling at a decent clip all morning, and at one point I thought it was dying out in warmth, but then it started to fall faster. I don't know what it is that makes snow so much more magical than rain. It is, after all, the same thing but colder. I like watching rain, but snow just seems mesmerizing as if I were looking out my window and my house sat in a snow globe. I suppose that's due to it being so rare and that makes it special because I never see it. I've been to snow covered places several times, with inches, if not a foot, of snow covering most things up north. I've never been able to see the creation of that snow though, just minimal flurries except during the '93 blizzard, of which I was probably too young to care to stay in one place long enough to really watch. I just did a little research on it, and the storm struck one day after my birthday. Now it's less than 2 weeks away. I guess March is the month of snow to Alabama?

It feels surreal. All in all, it's been a pretty awesome week, even though there's been slight kinks in pretty much everything I've tried to do. I suppose that's just how life goes. I do know on any wise that I need to find out what I'm doing during the summer besides take classes. I want to work full time... The new HR manager for the office will be working with us in a few weeks and there is no telling what he'll want changed or what he wants to stay. I am only on an internship, which technically they don't have to keep me after May.... It would be pretty lame to have to find a new company when I like this one as much as I do. I don't know where else I would want to work. I suppose everything works out for the best, but I still want to move out and all of that and there is no way that I could do so working part time or at least on so few hours. I probably shouldn't work full time and try to go to school anyway, especially taking so many hours in class. This semester I kinda wish I would have taken at least another class because even though I'm taking 18 hours, the majority of the classes are easy. It hasn't been terribly time consuming even though most classes require stuff for every class. I can't scrummage up a ton of interest in a lot of the projects, just the general attention to detail I put into pretty much anything I do.

I really don't feel like working on anything right now, even though I probably should go ahead and get a head start on next week or at least go through the practice GMAT I took last weekend. That's definitely going to take some attention to get it to turn out like I'd like it to but I think I should be able to progress. I'm kinda pulled in all directions. Do I look for companies that I may want to work for; do I look at grad schools; do I dedicate time to the delightfully dreaded GMAT; do I take classes this summer; do I shadow as many people as possible in various jobs I'm interested in (Tomorrow meeting with my mentor with hope to shadow him over Spring Break which just happens to be my birthday week!). I just don't know what to focus on. Right now, I'm trying to focus on everything, and it's slightly overloading my brain.

For now, dedication to relaxation and snow. Later will be everything else.

Sounds kinda like Willie Nelson

There is something uniquely charming about Anthony Bourdain's "No Reservations." What would be a better employment than being allowed to travel the world, write, be sarcastic, and entertain myself through culturally themed hobbies and activities? I think that would be absolutely marvelous.

Life has been pretty simple lately. I should recant when using such words given everything going on. I think being able to try so many new things has given me a new perspective to life. The more I can experience the more at ease I tend to be. I think that has to do with the longing to be prepared and know. I guess I was taught to be ready for any situation, and I know I'm not.

I'm really thankful for being given the chance to work where I do. Shared iTunes playlists are only a mere drop in the bucket of perks for being here, but from these and some very cool members of staff (one being an ex-magazine music writer) I have found some pretty groovy tunes.

One of my favorite new bands is White Lies. Every time I start to listen, I find myself totally immersed in the music, sinking deeper in the rhythm and beat into some delicate flavor of music that I find quite enchanting. Okay... So some of the songs are mildly cliche and typical. There's definitely mixtures of a lot of different groups already on the market, but it's a lot of what I already like that's out there mixed together in some grand blender that knows to disgard what I don't particularly enjoy. It makes me want to dance.

"Let's grow old together, and die at the same time. "

I love Santogold. I'm going to go ahead and get that out there. I haven't found a group that I liked this much over all in... Well, a long time. "I'm a lady" is one of my favorites out of the whole cd. I can't come up with any one song that I didn't like on the cd though, which is a very rare or absolutely non-existent predicament to find myself in. (Yes, it did beat the ever famous "Viva La Vida or Death and All His Friends" but only due to the emphasis on whole cd versus one song. I still love the title song. The video... Not tons. I thought Apple did a better job.)

"I pay for what's called eccentricity and my wish to evolve."

Those are probably my two absolute favorites from everything. I do love Elbow, Spinerette, Roisin Murphy, Yael Naim, Feist, Manu Chao (of course!!!), but I haven't gotten the chance to listen to all these guys enough to decide how much. Feist and Yael Naim is too slow to really get into now and I don't have Elbow or Spinerette's cd's. Roisin Murphy seems like the music lacks depth but again I have not decided overall. I've been much too busy listening to my other new loves.

Something that I did not think that would happen is the redeveloped interest in The Raconteurs. Since seeing their show at Bonnaroo on the site I have decided I need to see them live. The album's not thriller by itself, but that set was amazing, and now I must go to Bonnaroo some day.

I must! (The lyrics to Consoler's of the Lonely follows this thought too well. "I'm bored to tears yeahhhhhhh.")

It would be fun.

Shove your hope where it don't shine.

I probably should not be writing right now, as I've just had a fairly emotionally disturbing conversation with someone fairly close and may sound cynical and bitter at some point in my little ruse tonight, however, I will take that chance. A lot has been going on lately, and there's even more than ever to do this weekend. I sit here tired... I don't know if this is more physical or mental at present, although both are probably stemming from emotional instability.

I'm cutting myself off from something very dear to me. I've done it before, but I've never been able to do it for very long because how attached I am. I don't want my return to stem from loneliness or anything other than I must go back because of true love.

Life for me is too easy. I don't have to deal with all of the drama going on with so many other people because in a way I'm locked where I am to avoid disrespecting my family's wishes. The last few weeks have been a bit traumatizing in general because most of my school plans were changed completely. Now I also have no real way to study abroad. (That may be a good thing if my resolve holds.) I verge on anger every time I think about how all of the plans have been changed. It's really frustrating me... And that is odd. Maybe I'm just normally really good at channeling that elsewhere. I don't know.

The simplicity has its charm, and then there's always the parts that sting. I've been invited to who knows how many things lately that I could not go to if I wanted to. In the case of a few invites, I really would have wanted to be involved. Some of the invites would be a matter of deciding if they were too secular or not. I am not interested in drinking, and I don't judge people for doing so on occasion, but I don't know if I could be hanging out somewhere with that going on. For instance, I want to go dancing, but do I want a bunch of drunk people around me doing who knows what? Not so much... I do need to work on finding more friends that relate more to me spiritually. It's hard for me to break through the facade of a lot of 'religious' people, but I long to be close to people that have similar beliefs. I don't think I deserve that though right now. I still long for something to belong to that I can accept and take for face value. The hodge podge group of people I know are so random and different, but a lot of them are a lot more 'worldly' than I am, probably because I've never been around them in those situations where I'd feel uncomfortable. There's a lot of things I have to think about on this end. Friends show who you are. Acquaintances are another matter. However, in getting closer to the people just living for pleasure and stuff, I don't know what I'm losing or missing from these relationships between me and God.

For now, rest. Tomorrow, education will be the focus.

Ugh.

Teacher... Here's Johnny!

We took a personality test in Business Honors last week and went through our results. I was oddly nervous about what I would be this time in the Myers Briggs personality test, because I kept getting different results when I was in different moods. I knew what I am basically, and I didn't want to be known as any of the other personalities that I had gotten when I was out of the ordinary moods, very focused, or very flighty and subdued.

Here is my psychological type and some description about what it means:

E (Extroversion) - oriented to the outer world, focusing on people and things, active, using trial and error with confidence, and scanning the environment for stimulation.

N (Intuitive Perception) - Perceiving with memory and associations, seeing patterns and meanings, seeing possibilities, projecting possibilities for the future, imagining; 'reading between the lines', looking for the big picture, having hunches; 'ideas out of no where', and letting the mind tell the eyes.

F (Feeling Judgment) - Applying personal priorities, weighing human values and motives, my own and others, appreciating, valuing warmth in relationships, and prizing harmony; trusting.

J (Judging) - Using thinking or feeling judgment outwardly, deciding and planning, organizing and scheduling, controlling and regulating, goal oriented, wanting closure, even when data are incomplete.

All together, these letters comprise ENFJ, and we were given brief descriptions about what all of the letters together meant.

ENFJ = Imaginative harmonizers, workers with people; expressive, orderly, opinionated, conscientious; curious about new ideas or possibilities. Having extroverted feeling as their strongest mental process, they are at their best when responsible for winning people's cooperation with caring insight into their needs. They value:
-Having a wide circle of relationships
- Having a positive, enthusiastic viewpoint of life
- Seeing subtleties in people and interactions
- Understanding others' needs and concerns
- An active, energizing social life
- Seeing possibilities in people
- Thorough follow-through on important projects
- Working on several projects at once
- Caring and imaginative problem solving
- Maintaining relationships to make things work
- Shaping organizations to better serve members
-Sociability and responsiveness
- Structured learning in a humane setting
- Caring, compassionate, and tactfulness
- Appreciation as the natural means of encouraging improvements

All in all, I feel this description is an extremely good fit for me. It touches on random aspects of who I am so vividly that I was pretty shocked at the level of specificity.

There was also a smaller description as follows: Leads by facilitating, helping others plan and cooperate to meet goals, influences by clarifying processes by which goals can be met, and focus is on encouraging others in building consensus.

How awesome! I did disagree with the coaching needs for this profile though which are as follows: Not getting down to business (... Definitely not me.), Taking criticism personally (Only time I care about this is when it's someone I really look up to and the phrasing is done in a very negative way.), becoming bossy or over zealous (I have felt this way before but I would never speak out in a manner that could be construed in this way.), and trying too hard for win-win, harmony (Been there, learned not to do it by now. Oddly enough, managing people on this site I used to be pretty dedicated to fixed all desire to make everyone happy. I am totally not falling for that one again.)

I have to write a paper about all of this stuff relating to my personality. I really don't feel like talking about myself in that way, but this post was to aid my logic and hopefully it has made the process seem more interesting. I think it has. I still wish the title to the personality type was something like... Commander of Everything, instead of Teacher. There seriously was one of the personality types listed as Mastermind. How colorful teacher is compared to that? Come on people? Make it fun and exciting to be a part of my fun and exciting personality type! I'll have to email the official Myers Briggs crew.

Yet the dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from the masters' table.

A few days ago, one of my friends brought up something that happened between her and her boyfriend. She grew jealous because her boyfriend was looking at other women in this movie they were watching and making snide comments about enjoying it just to mess with her. One of my male friends was sitting there, and remarked that he didn't understand why women were jealous about guys looking at other women. I only listened at the time, but I've thought about it since. I know it would bother me if my boyfriend was staring at women in a sexual way. The reason is pretty simple. "I am my beloved's , and his desire is toward me." (Song of Solomon 7:10) When a person really loves someone else, they want to be wholly connected to each other, and both long for the other to want them.

"Set me as a seal upon thine heart, as a seal upon thine arm: for love is strong as death; jealousy as cruel as the grave" (SOS 8:6) In a marriage, the two must respect each others quirks and oddities, but they also must respect the other person enough to avoid giving any reason for jealousy. I want to be wholly entwined with my love, not merely on the outside of the relationship. My man has to be my best friend. The two becoming one is excruciatingly important to me. I would want him to be the other half of me. I don't understand stuff like bachelor's parties and bachelorette parties. I wouldn't want to see anybody else. My mind would totally be focused on the one person that really mattered. I'm like that now. I was pretty much invited to a bachelorette party, and there was mention of a stripper. I was like... I hope you aren't expecting me to come. I don't know what part of me is so devoted or where that came from, but the other stuff just doesn't even interest me at all. My focus is all on him.

I don't even know how dangerous that is to be wholly engrossed with someone like this. I guess that's why I relate to Bella's situation and why it was so addictive. Pretty silly I suppose.

Je ne t'aime plus

So... Manu Chao is awesome.

That was my public service announcement for today, which has gone pretty awesomely so far, even if I'm sitting here waiting for tutees to show up while being really bored.

1sts: I learned why Dad never let us get driven around by a bunch of random dudes in high school. Poor loaner car.

I ate at Maki Fresh. It was pretty good but not exceptional. The crunch maki was nice... I feel bad for never using wasabi on my sushi... Guilt. Sushi makes me feel guilty. That's really retarded. The sauce that came with it though was delicious, and a tad spicy. Seems just right.

I tried Edamame though... I didn't know you were supposed to pull the beans out. After eating one whole and deciding it tasted like a pile of strings from string beans, which of course I hate, Nick let me in on the secret. Don't eat the whole thing... Just the seeds inside. Brilliant, I know. Maybe I should ask people before I do things, expecting my actions to make sense or be logical seems to be a problem. Maybe that's some social knack that I never picked up... What more important reasons for etiquette classes are there? Too bad I can't find any available except for the business ones that only explain that we aren't supposed to apply lipstick at the dinner table and what not to wear with striped socks. I've gathered that beforehand; the girls at Kickoff did seem pretty cool for breaking the lipstick rule. General disinterested improprieties of common social behavior are pretty hot I think. I don't think, however, that includes spilling water on myself, or having my cheeks puffed out with water while waiting for the elevator, and someone just so happens to be in said elevator really counts as hot social disinterest. I'll have to work on that.

This week has been really fun, but pretty complex. My schedule will end up relaxing a bit, but right now is when everybody wants to be tutored and everyone wants homework and readings and so on. I was told today by Kristi that I would be able to do more hours than the 10 that she thought would be fine before. This is great news, except for the fact that I tried to fill in the empty holes here at Trio. And at present, I have about 10 random people looking for help and some of them are in classes I have absolutely no memory of. I guess relearning stats 1 will be beneficial... Happy 21 hours of classes to me. I suspect this is vaguely ironic because I do turn 21 in March... I at least won't be taking any tests for my students. Sigh of relief right there. I hate how I memorize things and they just slowly dissipate into no where. I especially abhor my memory when it comes to names and faces... I tried repeating these girls names that I met last Sunday in my head and trying to match them to their names, and the only name I remember is the first one that told me. I guess I'll have to keep working on that.

I wonder what I would have been like if I would have gone to public school..

Abrupt train of thought, I know.

I am reading "5 Minds for the Future" by Howard Gardner and was noting how different I am as a person than the person he described in school that suffered from an un-disciplined mind. He makes a claim that people are forced to spend so much time learning useless facts rather than structure and mental discipline and a rigorous desire to solve problems. I grew up avoiding facts. They were there, through hundreds of pages of books that lay around me. That couldn't interest me less. Now I fall into the realm of having a lack of trivial information to produce decent conversations, but structure and detail to my arguments that come from years of doing whatever I could to get through school without learning dead dates.

I learned adaption. Now that I've been in college for a while, I'm finally learning how to study in a way that I get the information. I've realized that I really love to learn, I just hate to learn too quickly and with lots of multiple-choice exams. Guh. I'm one of those people that don't get the base information until I delve deeper, and so much information fascinates me and continues pulling me away from the 'importants' that will be on the test. I suppose that is why adaptation is so important, to keep my train of thought connected to reality. I don't even really like school. I like the socialization, and I like the success of doing it well. I just don't have to be in there to be enjoying myself. I could be self-taught now that I do have this determination. Obviously I'm staying with the system though.

There's something of a fire burning inside my ribs; it determines that I will continue forcing myself to keep my eyes on the prize. Somehow I've gotten this venom flowing freely through my veins, telling me that I should pay attention to all these schedules and deadlines and dates but it's all over my head at times. I want to challenge myself, devote myself to things pertaining to the good and majestic and wonderful things in this world and make God the center of attention while juggling everything else.

Who do I trust? Who do I want to be? I guess it depends on my mood. This mood test in Honors this week is going to be hilarious. I'll probably end up in some cold, dejected mood and turn out to be introverted and cynical when that's not me at all. I read Shackleton's Way for that class lately and found a quote that is so totally me I should post it here.

"I love the fight and when things [are] easy, I hate it." - Ernest Shackleton

Shackleton was a leader and understood loneliness of choosing to make things a lot easier for other people to reach a goal. I admire him for a lot of what he'd done and imagine that this book will have to be in my personal collection because how strongly it teaches independence and the way to successfully rely on those around you. He has a lot of really great quotes throughout the book, and several parts of the book is solely devoted to what he said or what others said about him. He's no hero of mine though. I don't know what he lived for. Thrill? Excitement? I can't be that person. I don't have to chase danger to enjoy myself in what I do. God will always be a huge part of my life, even though conviction points out that I don't always know what's best for me even though I'm supposed to be listening to him.

I do know that I want to continue to learn, stay close to God, find and garnish closer friends with similar interests, strive to be my best. I guess I should write a mission as if I were a business of some sort to proclaim my intentions and put it on my resume and everything. Let's see...

My mission/objective: To serve God wholly through serving others, while dedicating myself to knowledge and wisdom, striving to be the best in everything I do, and discerning carefully what path I should take to greet the future, prepared for the new tasks life brings.

"Apply thine heart unto instruction, and thine ears to the words of knowledge." - Proverbs 23:12

La belle dam sans merci

Twilight? If someone had mentioned this book to me before, I would have just stared at them and possibly rolled my eyes and questioned their taste. Silly hype, right?

I've finished the 4 books that are out now, gratis Christy's kindness, and Eclipse has left me pretty bewildered. The second book was my favorite, I could relate eerily, but now that I've read Eclipse, out of order to the other books, the relation has grown more vivid. Do I see myself as Bella? No. The situation surrounding her is close to home. (Yes, I have fallen in love with a vampire and have a werewolf as a best friend... Right...)

Anyway, at one point in my life, I had an Edward, and a Jacob figure, competing for my interest. When Edward was gone a few years back I felt completely shell-shocked, alone, and confused. I didn't know what was going on at all. I just knew that I needed someone around, someone that I could be closer too. Suddenly, a month after thinking how badly I needed someone I could be completely open with, that person fell from the sky and left a crater somewhere in the subcutaneous layer. My love for Edward was unflinching, but painful enough that I realized I needed some form of intervention because I had absolutely no physical contact with people in general. There was like this circle around me, and my personal space wasn't broken because I wasn't comfortable around people still. Jacob was vibrant, witty, personable, and friendly. He was goofy in a way that I couldn't begin to imagine in someone I knew in person. I was used to the solitude but loathed it, and he made things better through his presence. He supplied hugs galore, rampant excitement, and really made me trust him too quickly probably. While I was still hurting over my Edward, he tried to get me interested in him, I guess. Like Jacob, he was unpredictable, outgoing yet bashful, boyish, and very warm. At first, I thought he was crazy. He seemed so wild and reckless that I wondered where he even came from. His personality may be recreated by stuffing a meteor in a balloon full of helium. He loved me, even though I have the opportunity to doubt a lot of things now, and in my own way, I loved him back. Not as a lover, but as a best friend that I could really mix my feelings into instead of be all quiet and shy and demure like normal. I was confused, and I let him manipulate me in some ways, but I ended up doing the right thing. Unlike Bella, I have a backbone and would prefer sacrificing my own feelings or happiness to protect someone else. His relentless pressure about a relationship was not something that I wanted to deal with, as I still wholeheartedly loved Edward and did not want to be without him. Jacob began to call me callous because I emotionally checked out after our interchangeable warning matches, but the shock of his final abrupt conversation cutoff left me hurt, and in a way, forlorn. I remember complaining to my random friends coldly about how he had told me that I was a bad friend because I treated him like all of my other friends and was growing distant. He couldn't manipulate me if he was distant so it worked out quite nicely.

I, like Bella, still felt the negative impact of avoiding and probably hurting Jacob by the end of book 2-3. I could read his emotions, see the impact of our mutual agreement to avoid each other but he was still there for me and I feel so badly when I hurt other people. I did blame myself as Bella does, although she goes a little wild with those feelings. I'd like to believe my own were more reasonable. Then again, my Edward is thousands of miles away with no way to bridge the gap unless I somehow find a way or move out and so on. Maybe Bella wasn't that crazy to sacrifice herself for 5 years on a whim, or hope of something working out as I'd like. Maybe Bella was realistic enough to do something else with herself. Then again, Edward wouldn't leave her waiting unless it was for her own good. I suppose there's no reason being depressed over uncontrollables. I'd still wish him to be part of my life and I would kill for a chance to fall asleep in Edward's arms as Bella can so often. As Bella realized, there is one person that is the most important though. As I read these books, I found myself grinning over the random correlations between the books and my life.

The first book was still a sappy piece of typical teenager girl drama.... Disgruntled, I will have to leave the description at that. Books 2 and 3 had the power to make me think about how I do feel and have felt for so long, as a prisoner trying to keep it all together when nothing makes sense.

So to you, Jacob Black, I havae finally bid you an emotional farewell. Edward was always the most important person in my world. I was silly for trying to think around that due to my own momentary gratification or needs.

Bobble head syndrome

Waiting for my Entrepreneurship class is certainly going to be a challenge, given it's at 4:30 and I'm just doing random chores. Worse yet, I've realized today that dinner will be completely construed once I get into my night classes more. I haven't even had one yet, last week I got to skip out of Retail (with promised access to a video of the class once Mr. Gee gets around to it.) because of Kick off. This week will technically be the first I'll really have all 3 of them. I normally eat around 5, and so obviously I'll either have to decide to eat out before class or wait 2 1/2 more hours than normal to get home.... I don't want to screw up my metabolism either so I've just been balancing the options in my head. So far it seems that the best idea is to bring food with me to a certain extent, especially since I can't stand eating on campus that much. Still have to blow the $225, but being on campus all day for 3 days pretty much leaves me a lot of room to spend it. According to my calculations... I have about 5 bucks to spend every day there. Doesn't seem like much anyway with such ostentatious prices.

"Run neon tiger... don't let them tame you. You're far too pure and bold."

I don't know what I'm waiting for... School, work, all these random things I have going on doesn't seem like much at all. There's this internal yearning that makes me want to shoot farther; be more; know more. I have this feeling of puzzlement in the back of my head, attempting to push it's way out right behind my eyes of what I am, who I want to be, what I want to reach for and all that muddled up mess. I started to wonder if I am in the right field. Consultation is certainly close to my heart but would I prefer business or consumer? Would I rather tend to the problems of a company or group on whole, even a non-profit, or would I rather tend to the needs of the little guy? If I'd rather help the little guy than shouldn't I instead be double majoring in finance rather than marketing? What sort of information do I need financially for management consultation for that matter? And would I rather specialize in non-profits or technology firms or mix it up and be very broad? I know I would like to specialize so I suppose I should just keep adjusting to what becomes the new path. I think helping the little guy is more of a side desire, something that will stay with me for the rest of my life, and coaching on a managerial level is more proactive for career. I could always focus differently in graduate school if this turns out to be defective logic. For the present, I'd like to become more involved in coaching people one-on-one, and maybe mentoring at Trio if that is possible. At Kick off there was the mention of helping out the Shades Valley Y and maybe doing life coaching and that sort of thing for the people that go. My face lit up like a light bulb. How perfect? I guess I should start with Trio and keep trying to edge out and don't get blown out with all the stuff that will be going on this semester. I'll have to cut business honors in half just to get to my mentoring program and am going to have to get out of there as early as possible too.

Ahh... Busy busy. It was still cool seeing Patrick getting baptized yesterday. I had no idea he'd only recently been saved. God really is an awesome God. Next week I'll get to try out that service and see if I enjoy it more; I have a feeling that I definitely will. I hope so; it'll be a good experience to grow accustomed to. That's all for today.

Cheers.

So... there was today

Ah... First kick-off I have been able to attend with DAXKO and I have to say that I enjoyed it royally. There was so much to do and my team may not have won but it was a mixture of all these things that I've always wanted to do but never have. My team was awesome and was comprised of a mixture of over-competitive, unruly, crazy and fun people. Anne, Patrick, Brian, Jeremy, Jamie, Susan, and Ming all performed impressively; and I even surprised myself by not getting worn out as quickly as I expected to, given the lack of exercise. Exercise is definitely on my New Years resolution list, but not as the typical resolution. I'd decided for some time that it's something I want to retain in my life; I want to be active, whether biking, swimming, whatever it takes to be fit long-term.

Today made me think about the future in a way. So much research must be done to fulfill all of the goals I've set aside for this future ahead of me. Where do I want to live, or do, are very viable questions and are constantly changing, at least moving forward and spiralling out into specifics of interest. What do I really want though? I'd like to say that I know but there are so many different avenues that could be taken and my plans would change as I pass different possible roads. I feel like I'm on 2nd avenue south and my life can be taken so many different one-ways I couldn't imagine. Each one way that is taken to meet some aim or goal generally puts me on a road such as 20th street, chock full of many more main roads and one ways and places to stop. Where do I stop? Should I speed up? Slow down? Options, options, options.

For now, things seem right. Who knows once the semester starts though. I've signed up for so many things and am extremely excited to be involved around campus, even more so than last semester. I'd like to stick it with GFBC for a while too, even though there are other churches I'd prefer to be involved with that just happen to be too far away for now. I can never get stiffness, nor can I figure out when people react certain ways to me. I guess before I know why I don't particularly fit in there, I should see why my behavior is ignored, thwarted, or misconstrued. Perhaps, it's not something I can change in me once I know. What is though? All things concerning me are void of reason at times, so much so that it becomes apparent that God in no way controls man. Man is his, or her, own being, fully concerned with himself and following his own way and logic. The same goes for me and I also note that this perception is based on my own life and said logic. I just never really know how anybody sees me. I feel as if I am some person that's never really found herself in any one place, except for those little lovely moments that come and go, generally when solitude confines me in some coffee shop or store with half a dozen complete strangers. It is then when I feel wholly at ease.

Team building just makes me realize that I have no idea if I am coming on too strong, too weak, or just seem odd. To reach these goals I must find myself and my faults so that I at least have the option of fixing them. This whole Kick-off has inspired me to seek out those faults, even while things are crazy busy, and test myself further, make myself work harder, meet the need even more. Even if my findings hurt, they must be sought if I ever am to really improve myself.