The Tale of the Orange Water Bottle

I don't like the water bottles with the twisty caps.  They bug me.  I don't know why it's such a pain for me to twist and untwist that cap all day, but it is.  One year, when I was still in grad school, my mom gave me an orange plastic water bottle for Christmas.  It had a pop-up cap.  It was fabulous.

But there were some people who did not feel the same way about my water bottle.  They teased and taunted, saying that it looked like a baby bottle.  I didn't care.  My water bottle and I had some good times together and no one could take that away from me.

Then one fateful day I had left my water bottle in the refrigerator to keep it cold before school, and when my roommate opened the refrigerator door, it fell out onto the kitchen floor and broke.  He tried to replace it by giving me one of his old water bottles to use, but it just wasn't the same.

This isn't really about the water bottle.  It's about a part of me that I have lost and can't seem to replace.  A part of me that used to get me up and ready to face the day at 5:45 AM every morning.  A part of me that ate cereal in the backyard with Esteban the garden gnome.  That breathed in the warm morning air and felt good to be living another day.  That scored free chocolate chip muffins from the coffee shop.  That was excited about science and about the future.

Sometimes I miss my old life in Vegas so much I can't stand it.  I miss my friends who I never get to see anymore.  I miss my classes and research and field trips.  I know I can never go back to the way things were, but goshdarnit, there are times when I really wish I could.

Horse & I

If I had a horse...

he would be my buddy.

T or C: The Sequel

 

Just in case you didn't get enough the first time...

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Part 2: Next Time, I'm Going to GreatClips

Sometimes, I wonder what makes the fancy, expensive salons so special.  Are they really any better than the $10 haircut down the street?  Are the skills of their stylists that much more superior?

Last weekend, I went to solve this mystery for myself.  With my discount gift certificate in hand, I showed up for my second appointment at the spa.  This time, for a haircut, and... shocker... some color.

Ok, so I didn't dye my hair.  Well, not completely anyway.  For one thing, it's REALLY expensive.  The lady next to me was fixing her all-over highlights and that alone cost $85!  Plus I'm just not ready to take that step yet.  Maybe eventually, but not now.  But I did get some highlights.  Mainly because I've never done it before and wanted to try it, for fun. 

I wasn't really sure what color to get and the stylist told me most people get blonde.  I just thought... blonde?  no way.  That would look stupid.  I suggested red because I thought that would look good but she talked me out of it.  She told me she'd have to bleach my hair and then put the color in (this kind of makes me think she was just lazy and didn't want to spend the time on a discount coupon customer) and that it would be dry and also fade faster than other colors.  So I figured all right, whatever, but I still didn't want blonde.  So she suggested a caramel color instead.  This I could live with. 

I think it turned out pretty nice.  Matt really likes it as well, and in the end, it's really mainly for him to look at, so if he's happy I'm happy.

The haircut itself was ok.  It was definitely not my worst haircut, by a long shot.  But I do wish she would have gone a little shorter.  And as far as haircuts go, it really wasn't anything spectacular that the less expensive salons wouldn't do.  At the place I used to go to in Ann Arbor, the ladies/girls would always ask me what I thought.  This lady did not do that.  She just finished what she was doing and then ran off to mix up the color.  The only times she really talked to me was to tell me about this or that product she was using at the moment.

Is it just me, or does every trip to the hairstylist seem more like an infomercial than a haircut?  From the moment I sat down in the chair, I was inundated in product placement.  I truly believe that in addition to all their beauty courses, hairstylists/cosmetologists are also trained in the fine art of advertising and marketing. They know what they're doing.  It's really hard to turn someone down when they're the ones holding the scissors.

In the end, out of all the 50 million products she showed me, I ended up being suckered into one.  It's a shampoo called Be Curly.  Supposedly it makes curly hair seem less dry.  As she explained it to me, people with curly hair think it is more dry than it actually is because the oils and stuff have to spend a lot of time moving down the curls.  I guess this shampoo does something to fix that, so I figured I'd give it a try.  I'm not really sure I notice a difference but  when I told Matt about it, he said he thought my hair did actually look less dry.  So maybe it's working.

Not Sure

I have a post all written and pretty much ready to go except I need to put a picture in and I haven't been able to load it yet.  My family came into town last Friday and they were here until yesterday morning at 4:30 am, when I drove them to the airport.  After that I went to work, apparently because I am crazy.  It was kind of nice having no one around though.  Plus I got to leave at 1:30 yesterday.  Bonus!

I went for a hike with Matt down one of our favorite canyons in the Sandias.  We met some little kids (ok, they were probably like 18, but that's little kids to me I guess) and their dog and chatted with them for a while.  At this point I realized I was becoming very tired and hungry so we went home and ordered a pizza.

I have had a scratchy throat since around Tuesday evening and this morning I woke up feeling pretty bad.  Like I had no energy and was basically forcing myself to move around and get ready.  I think it's just allergies flaring up because of the random change in weather we are having here.

Later today, I am supposed to go back down to TorC to finish my para-arch training but I don't know if I have the energy for it.  Matt said to think about it and see how I feel this afternoon before I make up my mind.  Normally I'd be all for getting out of the office, but today I'm just not feeling it.

Part 1: The Ugly Truth

I'm going to let you in on a little secret.

I have gray hairs.

Yeah, it's a bummer.  But the real kicker?  I've had them since I was sixteen.  SIX.TEEN.  I remember because I first noticed them on a trip to my grandparents' house with my family.  I was the last one to get out of the minivan and was shutting the door when I caught a glimpse of myself in the window.  Two long gray strands were hanging down from the side of my head.  What the....????

I quickly yanked them out, and dismissed it as a fluke.

It wasn't.  They just kept multiplying and multiplying.  And I just kept pulling them out, but it was getting to a point when I could never get them all.  I know there's some saying that if you pull one out, two more will grow in.  Is that true?  I don't know.  I'm not a scientist (oh, wait, I AM, nevermind...but not that KIND of scientist) but I think it has something to do with using up pigment/color.  Mine is just running out sooner than expected.  Kind of like the time they ran out of roast beef at Arby's.  Observe...

Supply and Demand!  Apparently my hair does not understand economics.  But neither do I, so I guess I can't blame it.

Lucky for me (I guess), my hair is super thick and I have a lot of it, so it was easy enough to hide at first.  But it did eventually get to a point when people started to notice.  Crap-tastic.

Sometimes when we're just sitting around hanging out or whatever, Matt pulls them out for me.  After about 10, 12 or 15, he gets frustrated and stops.  Because there's a lot.

So, why don't I just dye it?  I bought a box when I lived in Vegas and then freaked out and let it sit under my bathroom sink until I moved out, then I threw it away.  I bought another one here that I think is still sitting under the sink, if I haven't thrown away already.  I think the main reason is that a lot of my hair is still brown, and it just seems like a waste of my natural color to put fake crap over it.  I just haven't been able to bring myself to do anything remotely close to changing my hair color.  In any way.  Ever.

But that might be about to change...

The Jerk Factor

 *UPDATE* I just went to the office to get a new card and the lady said I had to pay $5 to replace it.  What???  But since I didn't have exact change she just gave it to me for free.  Something seems odd about that, but... ummm, cool?

There are a lot of times when I do something that I know make people think I'm a jerk/don't like them/am just plain weird/etc.  But something in my silly little brain keeps freaking out and doing the same thing over and over again.

And then when I see someone else doing the same thing, I'm like WTF?  And then I remember I do the exact same darn thing all the time.

A while ago, my apartment switched the laundry room over from quarters to cards.  This sucks for a few reasons, including

1) The cards must be loaded with cash.  The cash machine is in the back room of the office, which can only be entered by the apartment staff.  The office is closed on Sundays.  So people like me who work all week and then space out about adding money to the card until doing their laundry on Sunday?  Kinda screwed.  I posted about a time that this happened before and my subsequent trip to the laundromat on my old blog.  For those who weren't reading it at the time, let me sum it up for you:  Mierda.

2) They recently raised the price from 75 cents to a dollar.  For no reason.  Just 'hey, guess what, we're raising the price.  Too bad for you!'

3) My laundry card is becoming demagnetized.  This happens to me all the time.  In college, I went through so many key cards to my dorm room for no other reason than they simply stopped working.  It was a huge pain in the ass to be standing at the damn door trying to get in for up to 20-30 minutes until one of my roommates showed up.  It's like I radiate a magnetic force or something.

This is what happened to me with the laundry machines this weekend.  And guess what, it's Sunday, so office =  no open.

I got all my laundry into the machines, put in the detergent, all that stuff, and then I put my card in to the card reader, which says: Error Error Error.  Over and over again.  Frustrating.  To make matters worse, two other people came in while I was doing this, so I just stood there looking like a dumbass putting the card in a million times trying to get it to work.  I knew they saw me.  I knew they probably realized it wasn't working, and I was getting frustrated.  But they just carried on without even acknowledging the fact that I even existed.

It's not that I necessarily wanted them to offer me their card or anything, but just saying something like... hey, your card isn't working?  that's a bummer.  Anything to make me feel less stupid about standing in front of the machine like a fool.  But they didn't say anything.  And I didn't either.

I do this all the time.  I see people that I could say hello to, have a conversation with, help out...and completely ignore them because I'd rather not deal with it.  These are the times when I really realize how the way I am affects me in a negative way.  Stupid little everyday things that most people wouldn't think twice about.  Things I try not to deal with because hiding and forgetting about it is a lot easier.  I really do wish things were different.  Maybe it's finally time to make a real change.  It's scary, though.

Elephant Butte and Other Cool Stuff

 Picture day!

This is Elephant Butte.

 

 

  

Not Elephant Butte, but still cool nonetheless. 

Petroglyphs are neato.

 

bunny

 

mountain lion

  

and buffalo.  oh wait.  not a petroglyph.

that is all.

Truth or Consequences

Nestled in the heart of New Mexico, is a little town called Truth or Consequences.  It used to be called Hot Springs, New Mexico, but a crappy old game show hosted by Bob Barker and one fateful April Fool's Day changed all that.  I'm not too clear on all the details and don't really feel like looking it up, but that's pretty much the gist of what happened.

What I really wanted to show you today is just a little glimpse into what this town is actually like.  Because, umm, yeah, it's great.

While I was there, I had the opportunity to visit the local museum.  It is run by a very nice, but very clueless old couple.  Also, the old man has crazy eyes, for sure.  The size of the museum is actually pretty impressive considering the size of the town itself.  It has something like nine rooms.  Some of the stuff was pretty cool, but as I moved through the museum, I started to notice little things.

 

First of all, the Judge N' Jury sign is super classy.  But what really caught my eye was the woman wearing the green dress in the back row, third in from the left.  The thing she is holding is a baby, if that makes the image any clearer for you.

 

I'm not exactly sure what is going on in this scene.  The little slip of paper at the bottom says "How the West was won."  I am assuming that the man standing in the middle of my ill-placed flash (I have had that camera since 2004 and still don't know how to turn the flash off) has just shot the man who is laying down, but that is the extent of my knowledge.

 

I saw this and immediately had to take a picture because the fire is Christmas tinsel.  How awesome is that?

 

ummmm..... beer!

 

This was actually pretty cool.  They had a whole wall devoted to fully intact pottery.  Don't come across that too often.

 

 The large number of arrowheads on display was also impressive.

 

I love this sign.  If you can't read it, it says "Unusual Items: The use of some of these items is not known.  The white round rock looks like a gas cap.  The black bowl has a false bottom.  The other looks like an orange juice squeezer."

 

The wild west, plastic figurine style.

Oh my gosh, this picture.  It's like the olden day pancake man.

 mannequins = creepy

And that's the museum.  Did you learn something new during your visit?  I sure did. 

More amazing TorC photos to come!

The Closest I'm Going to Get to a Love Song

I'm jumping back on the bandwagon.  The Spin Cycle topic this week is Valentine's Day.  Instead of talking about my relationship or my Valentine's Day plans and all that blah blah, I decided to express my feelings through song.

So... I'm going to sing for you!

Just kidding.  Because I'm pretty sure that would be classified as some sort of torture, and because this is pretty much the best song ever, I decided to leave it up to the experts.

 

(By the way, I am totally STOKED that the Chili Peppers are back at it again and curious to find out what this new guitarist is like.  He's no John Frusciante, but I hear he's pretty darn close)