so much to blog about!

Holy Guacamole, Batman!

Here is a list of events I need to blog about:
1. Vegas and the massive amounts of food I ate!
2. One month until I see ALEX!
3. His Mum and Step Dad are coming to NEBRASKA! Woop!
4. Packing - My worst nightmare.

OK, I'm gonna go for now.  Is it weird that I would write a blog about all the blogs I wanna write?

Sarah
x

Booking the Ticket

So..Alex and I are trying to coordinate purchasing tickets....this is a pain in the butt.
And I just realized...I MIGHT want to look at my visa endorsement on my Passport before I actually book my ticket!

I know now.

This is the first day of the rest of my life....
Well, Friday was.

I got an email from the UK Border Agency on Friday stating "Your UK Visa has been issued"....and that's ALL it said. I was confused! HAHA!  I had to read it twice to actually understand the information contained in it!  I thought to myself....6 months worth of information gathering, money saving, loan agreements, etc....and that's all I get in response!?  It's that simple??....At least the Border Agency could have said "Thanks for all of your hard work, we have reviewed your materials and you seem to be a great addition to our country. Welcome to the UK."....but no. I got a simple, 6 word email. HAHA!

I think I walked around Friday and Saturday with my head in the clouds. I worked all day at ASU on Friday, a double at Pita Jungle yesterday and didn't even have time to think about what's about to happen or how much I have to do. Today, I'm getting that feeling of "Holy shit. I have soooo much to do."
I have decided to start a video diary of this journey in my life. I have been journaling, blogging, facebooking, and taking pics....but it's time to step up my memory-capturing game....it's time for some videography!

So, Here you have it....Day 2 after knowing.

Today is when the countdown begins! Ninety days until school starts at the University of Leeds! I cannot wait to begin the next chapter of my life. xxx

Almost instantly I went from 'excited to see my dad' to...'Oh yeah, he's annoying as shit'...

the weirdest thing...

As I looked to my left at 'The Border Trilogy', a book which I have already once attempted to read, the pages seemed to be raising up and down, almost as if it was breathing. The dog-eared cover and tattered pages were rising and falling like the chest of a sleeping animal.  Perhaps my second attempt at this Cormac McCarthy compilation has summoned it back into being as its' words and characters breathe life into my own world.

Nonetheless, that was cool.

This is a test of my mobile blog. Test test test test.

neither here, nor there.

Ever get into those kinds of moods where nothing really excites you or pisses you off? yeah. that's me right now. neither here, nor there. i suppose that's better than being far off in la-la land, or being caught up in a bunch of BS that will do me no good.

i miss you grandpa.
I had a dream about him last night...i can't remember if he was sick or well. something tells me that he wasn't well. he's got such a cute laugh. =) what a fabulous man - served in the army, owned his own (innovative) business, married the best woman in the world and raised 4 incredible men. taught us all to work hard to get what we want. and now here he is...such an accomplished man with nothing but a victorious past, struggling to remember what he had for lunch. he's reverting back to a child and it's driving my grandma mad. she's only mad because she's sad. they've been together for 64 years (but have known each other since childhood) and she's always been the glue, but now she's the glue not by choice.  my grandparents have 4 boys, with 7 grandchildren, and 7 great-grandchildren.  What a family I have. I'm so lucky...

Sometimes all you have to do is write your feelings (or lack thereof) down and things will change. I went from feeling blah, to feeling loved, grateful, and beholden.

What or who makes you feel loved?  To whom are you beholden?

SAS

Here's a pic of my darling cousin Stef and my fabulously dapper Grandpa Stephens!

this is not a blog about work!

I just realized that I haven't crabbed about ASU one bit in these blogs! YAY for ME!...but too bad for my roomie...she's the one that gets all of that nonsense! waaa-waaa....

ok, so today was a good day (so far)...
slept in...ahhh....
did zumba at 10 with this Ruder...
got a kick ass dirty soy chai latte at "the coffee shop'...
then hiked all around the lost Dutchman state park...
Now I'm getting ready for work at Pita Jungle.  Cross your fingers that there's at least a hundy in it for me tonite!

oh!!!! and in other news....I'm going to Vegas! I'm going to Vegas! I'm going to Vegas!


hugs and shit.

sarah

whoa, life. please don't forget I love you, even though I don't say it all the time.

well, it's been about a week since i last blogged. and it feels like it! oh how Ive missed you, my quirky little therapeutic friend!
first and foremost...during the last third of a mile of the 18 miles that i biked today, and after i did ZUMBA for an hour, as well as 45 minutes of circuit training...i rode past a McDonald's.  All i could think at that moment was "KEEP GETTING FAT AMERICA". that's it. I wasn't worried about the oncoming traffic, the fact that my bike light burnt out, or that I was simply biking after dark in ghetto-ass mesa AZ....nope. all i could think about is how WE as a PEOPLE, are killing ourselves with obesity. there's a fracking McDonald's every 3/4 mile in mesa. I live within a one mile radius of at least 20 restaurants. are there any health food stores? no. shit. there's not even a freaking regular grocery store! mental.
anyway...speaking of my "high horse"...i got told that 'it must be nice up on it [my high horse]' this past weekend by some stupid-ass stranger. the truth is...I've worked hard to even fracking have the opportunity to barter with the universe to get a horse...i got lucky that it's high. point is...i do my research. i work hard. i never enter into a debate, conversation, chat, whatever...without facts and details. i don't. it's suicide otherwise. 
ok, done. i sound like an ass. haha.

what else....?
oh...i have been UNCONDITIONALLY accepted to the University of Leeds! Background check and Teachers council of England check has come through just fine. =)  I just need to wait for my Certificate for Acceptance of Studies (CAS) and my loan paperwork to come to me, then it's visa application time, bitches!!!
When my visa is accepted and I book my ticket to Leeds, we are having a freaking party, peeps! Omaha friends, let's fill Jake's one last time!  AZ friends...POOL PARTY! =)

workout status: well, I'm riding my bike to work everyday.  That's anywhere between 11-13 miles a day.  it's really not that much of a workout.  i swear. when the weather gets to be 110 degrees, then i will change my mind.  but for now, it's no big deal.  and otherwise....pita jungle keeps me busy, so I get 3-4 days a week to workout. if it were my choice, I would workout every day...wait....i can choose to workout every day...i just don't want to get out of bed before 7:30am or go to bed after 11:30pm!
but, yesterday, in the fabulously cool, rainy weather, the beautiful Lindsay Ruder and I ran about 4-5 miles and I rode my bike about 10 miles, oh and I taught dance - we did barre work.  Tonite I did the aforementioned workout (see paragraph two). and now I'm sitting on two bags of frozen veggies, cos my bum hurts! I did some crazy ballet barre work tonite, mixed in with the circuit training, as well as the splits on the wall.  my ass quickly realized that it hadn't been forced to do that in well over 330 days. but, I'll pull through. no pain, no gain! or as Demi Higgins from her 5th grade pointe class would say, "pain is weakness leaving the body".  thanks for that gem demi. =)

my fruit and yogurt dessert is hollering at me. i gotta go!

peace.

that's too bad.

A couple of things are really too bad right now...
1. how slow my computer is moving...
2. how much at ate at lunch....ready for it??....a handful of veggies, a small scoop of mac and cheese, a hand sized salad with 2 slices of cucumber and tuscan dressing, a 1/4 cup of broc soup, a veggie burger without a bun but with a slice of cheese, a pickle spear, an apple wheat muffin, a small bowl of trix, and....a rice crispie treat. WTF. im going to die early.
FAIL.

oh. yeah. uh-huh. great.

So, I forgot to mention that on Saturday of this past weekend, I ran 2 miles when I got up, went to Faith and Dave's house for an awesome breakfast, then went to the gym ran some more and did some ass+abs. (For those of you reading this...you probably don't care and are a bit annoyed that you are reading a blog about someone elses' agenda. well, not everything is about you! Ha!)

OK, here is the good stuff....the stuff that Monday mornings are made of....(usually)
I got my butt out of bed uber early today - had a meeting on another campus. OK, I was supposed to be up earlier, but whatever. I was out of bed making coffee at 6:15am - that's amazing for me.  I can barely get out of bed before 7:30 most mornings. I got ready and shot out the door at 6:44am, drove to campus, rode my bike to the shuttle stop at about 10,000 miles per hour, just to see it start to pull away at 7:00am exactly. Aren't those guys supposed to run a bit late?? The rest of the world is constantly late??!?!...anyway, I slapped on the side of bus and he stopped. Thank goodness. I needed to get to the Downtown campus by 7:30 and the next bus didn't leave until then! So, I loaded my bike into the luggage hold (cos I didn't have time to lock it up!), and climbed aboard. Sat right across the isle from one of my students. Great. I was a hot mess, out of breath, no makeup, shoes untied, etc.  "Hi Cornell! How are you? I'm not a morning person, as you can see."  Then the journey began. I got to DPC right on time...went looking for the signs to point me to where I needed to be...but the signs were missing. HAD THEY CANCELED WITHOUT NOTICE? I asked the info desk lady. She was nice...mystery solved. I was a week early. So, I went to the bathroom, put on my makeup, wandered around a bit, thought about going to get a coffee at some posh/trendy/hipster shop in downtown phoenix...then realized there was free coffee in the foyer! BOOYAH! my early morning debacle became worth it! Free coffee! Free bananas! Free apples! YAY! Not all is lost. I boarded the 8am shuttle and headed back, not feeling too sorry for myself. You'd think that a person would be pissed off that they got out of bed an hour early, rushed for no reason and wasted an hour and a half of their precious time. I'm actually OK....Well, I was OK....until I started writing this. FML.

what a weekend...

It's late sunday night, the air conditioner is running, I'm alone....and I stink.
yeah, that's right. I smell horrible.
I, first of all, had to be in SNOTsdale at 8am and a shower was not on my morning agenda - sleep was. Then I met Lindsay at Camelback for an adventure. it wasn't just your normal, run-of-the-mill camelback day. oh no. today topped off at about 96 degrees and we rocked up right in the thick of it, about 2:50pm. And our plan was (to me) gargantuan. We had it in our sights that we were gonna go up the cholla side, down the echo side, then jog the 3 miles back to our cars. now, I have actually been wanting to do this for a while. Ive seen loads of SDBs doing it (SDBs = Scottsdale douche bags, can be male or female), so I figured my slow, over-eating ass could do it. HA! I WAS RIGHT! BOOYAH! I was even carrying a full camelback - 2 liters of agua, a change of clothes, a change of shoes, etc...nothing quite like alex has to carry when he does is army bloke trainings ( I think it's like 100 lbs or some crap)...but it was enough for me to feel a difference. anyway, we did the whole thing, including time to and from our cars and an apple snack time at the top in 2:22. my feetsies are doing ok. thank jeebus I brought a change of shoes! I would have been in clip.
what else....?
Linds and I put together a meal plan for the week. as well as a workout schedule. with this week being my first week taking my own tables at pita jungle, I feel the need to stay active, eat well, and remain focused...focused on all the cashes I needs ta be makin! Kim and I watched a super ghetto movie last night and it's rubbing off on me. if someone asks you to watch the film "havoc" with them, tell them that you would rather wear those Chinese shoes that "shrink" your feet. yeah. it's that bad. but I wasted 2 hours of my life so ya'll don't have to. you're welcome.

back to the meal plan - it's not nothing, and it's not what I have recently been eating....it's balanced.
im not going to write it all out right now. but i will tell you that if I stick to it, I won't be hungry throughout the day and I won't buy random bags of honey mustard and onion pretzel bits. gah!! those things are so good. it's gotta be the MSG.

ok there was something else...oh yeah!! lindsay and I have made a fist-pump pact that we won't indulge in sweets unless we are together. and by sweets I mean, cookies, cake, pastries, cookies, brownies, cookies, blah blah blah...all the shit I want to shove into every hole in my body at this current juncture. there is an almond patty - from Holland, nonetheless - sitting on my counter as I type....and it's hissing at me. like an angry cat. like an old, crotchy cat who wants your attention but doesn't know how to calmly nab it.  im not going to give in. I will not pet you, delicious, brown, moist almond patty. perhaps you'll get lucky tomorrow.... but what I will enjoy is some cottage cheese and cranapple sauce. no sugar added. =)

tired.

peace.
sas

PS - im totes not taking a shower before bed. I will just wash my sheets soon. =)

Newness thrives.

Well, on Sunday I started my new part-time job at Pita Jungle in Mesa.  It's a really laid back environment and the people I have worked with so far are genuine and kind. Oh, and did I mention they are all potheads and hipsters? Haha.  I don't have a problem with their openness about smoking, but the first time they try to drag me into that lifestyle, it's over. =)  Anyway, I am still in "training", even though I kick major ass at serving. The first night I worked, I was doing all of it.  The girl I helped out made $130 and I got a free dinner... =( I guess it's better than nothing. I can't wait to be on my own and making fat tips. And believe me, I will make fat tips. I'm the most charismatic asshole when I want to be. =)  So, I'm working tonite (Friday) and tomorrow as a "trainee", then it's time to cut me loose! Seriously, I can't wait to walk home with my first hundy...cos it's going straight to my roomie! Haha! I owe her. But for serial, my goal is to save up $3,000 by June 6th, 2011 to go toward my Leeds Fund. If any of you reading this have extra cash they would like to donate to a good cause, please let me know. I am being real. Moving overseas is a choice that I have made, for me, yes. And I am doing everything in my power to save, save, save.  For example, I'm working 40 hours a week at ASU, 25 hours a week waiting tables, and I will soon be teaching 3 fitness classes a week....BUT, giving back/helping out not only gives the giver immense satisfaction, it puts those who struggle in a position of gratitude. And I feel that when I am gratuitous, I am a better person. If I am a better person, I am more kind to others, I treat my fellow man with more respect and I lead a better life. And in the process, put random smiles on peoples faces, therefore making this place more bearable.  So, if we all give a bit more, we will receive a bit more. ;) ;)
OK....
What else....
I feel it's necessary to let you all know that I am trying really hard to stop eating so much cake. and cookies. and chocolate. and brownies. and cornbread with honey. and ice cream. and....so, part of my random blog posts will be what I ate that day/week/whatever...and what I did for fizz (when I have time to crack some!).

Monday: worked 8am-9pm, laid on couch, ate a bunch of crap.
Tuesday: worked 8am-5pm, went to happy hour with Colleen, drank lots of water/soda water, ate loads of food at work, not at happy hour (I spent ZERO dollars there!).
Wednesday: worked 8am-6:15pm, taught dance, went to the GYM! yay! did 2 miles at 6.3 mph, did squat/calf combo on the leg press, did the ladder thingy on my hammies.  That's 8 reps at 70lbs, 7 at 60, etc.  did some circuit stuff - jj 1 min, 40 lunges, 30 weighted sit ups, 15 skull crushers, 15 triceps presses, 20 push ups, repeat the whole thing 2 more times, add in some floor jjs and lunge runs, and i did some more abs. Then finished with 10 mins on the stair climber at level 8. whatever that means....And I ate ok that day. had loads of good fruit, stuffed baby bella with spinach/tuna. had some sauteed gray squash.
Thursday: worked 8am - 8:30pm, ate homemade pasta and veggies, had oatmeal for breakfast, had nuts, grapes, one small chunk of Parmesan cheese, and a glass of vino for dinner. read a couple of chapters in 'blood meridian'. read it. it's great.
Friday: that's today! Im working 8-9ish...then i was thinking about making myself go on a short 2 mile jog. in mesa. in the dark. hmmm....

WOW. this is long. good luck reading these. haha. I couldn't do it.
hugs.
Sarah

oops

well, well, well....

i learned a valuable lesson today.  check definitions of words you're unsure of before presenting videos to the class that contain such unknown words....

my bad.

vision board party!

Thanks to one of the HED class members, I now have decided that a vision board party is defo needed at my house!  My roommate and I are going to plan one for our friends at the end of February.  My student leaders at West and Poly campus are going to use this idea as an in-hall evening program too!  We have done these in the past with the Success Coaching students, but in a 1-1 coaching session....I think the idea of doing them in a group forces you to articulate in many different ways what you want and the steps you're going to take to get it.  If you're alone, who's going to ask you "what's that mean?", "why did you put that on there?"....the group vision board party is such an amazing idea!
As individuals, this will help us take steps toward our goals consciously, and eventually sub-consciously - since we will place the board in an obvious place that will nab many glances everyday.
I'm reading "The Secret" and it speaks of vision boards and how they really do work to help students/parents/professionals/anyone reach their goals.  The part that I believe to only be slightly true is when the author states that you don't have to worry about HOW your goals will be reached, that that is the universes job.  Meh, I think that the universe gives us what we want if we really believe in it, see ourselves doing it, and give it our all...so by putting together a vision board, actively looking at it, thinking about having those things in our lives, we can achieve those things.  I don't think it's all up to the universe.  If you make a vision board, just leave it in your room, never think more about it, find it later, realize none of it happened, I'm not going to be surprised. I have met sooooo many people in this world who say one thing, then do another.  It's annoying.  For example: "Man I really want to get rid of this belly fat."...I say, don't have a latte and a chocolate doughnut for breakfast everyday then.  Or, "Yeah, I really want to be an anesthesiologist when I get done with school"...Ok, you probably don't want to skip your bio exams for the entire first half of the semester and you should probably think about going to chem"....Here's another good one..."We get so many bills! I'm never going to have the money to pay all of them on time."....And here's my thoughts on that...how much does a pack of cigs cost? what about that fancy dinner you had? or that new dress, how much was that? oh and the beer?....you see my point??

Basically, the vision board is a reminder of why you stay focused until you get what you want.
Your actions today, lead you to tomorrow.
Make each moment worth your time.

BYEEEEE!
Sarah

Who Am I?

Here is a compilation of me, in my current state.

 I like to eat. a lot.

 recently discovered that shooting an M4 is good for the soul.

 i LOVE to travel sedona is absolutely beautiful. and i had to show it to my boyfriend. and as you can tell, i also enjoy being goofy.

 im a pretty big fan of chilling out. :)  especially outside.

 ive been here twice in the last 4 months. love it there. and this is my new coat!

 my bestest fwend. i wuv him.

 im a ballet instructor and i still perform...even at my age!

 mountain biking in the mcdowells. i never imagined i would get so into this sport.

 my other bestest fwend. the babysitter of my emotions. i love her dearly.

traveling. again. i love what im not used to. and we dont have a lot of these beachy-things in nebraska. i also enjoy the beach because its never the same from one moon to the next. much like me.