http://heyasparky.blogspot.com/

I really really hope you’ll visit me in my new spot… I’m moving on to a new & better Sparky! All the old posts are there too, I promise. So as much as I love that a lot of you are still checking in here, I’d love it more if you were checking in THERE. Please & thank you & much love.

www.heyasparky.blogspot.com

Go check it out, there’s a post waiting for you! Now on with the flashback friday:

Would you believe me if I said this photo actually wasn’t Halloween?

Nope. This ridiculous (& inappropriate) pirate costume was for Homecoming 2005. *sigh* My sorority past rears its head once again. The theme was “story books” so our parade float was Peter Pan & you need pirates in Peter Pan. Except you don’t need that kind of pirate… not one that keeps talking about her “booty” anyway.  haha I thought I was so funny at the time but now it’s embarrassing. I guess you could say my pirate was… Arrrrrr-rated? (ha see what I did there? get it?)

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Head over to Christopher & Tia to link up with a Flashback of your own!

So on a trip to San Antonio to visit my brother stationed there, my mom picked up this necklace of a spur as a gift. To be honest, at first I really didn’t think it was my style… but it didn’t take long before I started wearing it when I’d watch games & became convinced it was a good-luck charm. It became priceless to me. (not to mention the spur spins!)

Then I lost it, can you believe it? When we went back to San An for my brother’s wedding we looked everywhere for a replacement with no luck, so my amazing mother gave me HER spur necklace that she bought on the same trip for a Christmas gift. It may be the best gift I ever got. And wouldn’t you know within a few weeks… I lost it. Gah! Heartbreak & a lot of beating myself up.

It stayed lost for months, through a move to a new apartment, until one particularly sad day when I thought I might lose my mind… I’m not kidding you, it was literally dangling from a shelf of my purse rack. Just hanging there, waiting to be found. I actually cried, it’s like it knew I needed a pick-me-up & to be brought a little luck.

 I’m sure you can guess the next part of the story: I lost it… again. Or as I’m starting to believe, it went into hiding. It seems the spur retreats when I’m not in need of it & reappears to brighten my life at just the right time. I have tickets to a pre-season game tonight… which is crazy in & of itself since Pittsburgh has no NBA team to be playing against. For some reason Spurs & Cavs are playing at Pitt (I don’t know why either…) & I’m going to see my boys play IN REAL LIFE!

 I laid out my Ginobili jersey days ahead of time & have been so pumped except for 1 factor… that damn spur necklace. I need to wear it & it’s been gone for months. I kid you not, this afternoon it appeared. Sitting next to my perfume in the bathroom where I know it wasn’t before. Look, I’m not saying my necklace has powers or that I’m superstitious or would believe this story if I was reading it… all I’m saying is I can’t explain the mystery of the spur necklace. I’m just glad it has really good timing!

The 12 year old inside of me has been waiting so long for the day when “Clueless” fashion would circle back around. And lately I’ve been seeing some interesting evidence…

Could it be? Are  the fashion-gods that kind? Please excuse me if you’ve been well aware of this for ages, it’s just that I don’t really follow trends anymore. That’s the nice thing about aiming for “classic”, it never changes… & I don’t remember the last time I was shopping not at a thrift store. But now I want to! I want to buy granny-looking boots to wear with my over-the-knee socks! Maybe I’ll even layer them over tights. (oh snap!) Happy day….

If you picked up a newspaper or glanced at your newsfeed this morning you probably already know there was no atomic bomb. But I do this all the time. The slightest things & I’m certain it’s the apocalypse. I know people running through worst-case-scenarios are pretty normal, but I have a feeling I’m on my own with this one. It’s not that I’m afraid of the end of the world, I’m just always pretty sure it’s happening in a “Here we go…” kind of way. I remember once waking up in the middle of the night to the sound of airplanes & a siren (most likely unrelated noises) & took serious consideration whether I should wake my roommate to let her know we were under attack. I finally decided she’d find out for herself & should get some sleep while she could.

Well, apocalyptic nightmares…. YOU’RE ON NOTICE.

Joining you on notice is some stranger from N.C. named Jessie who won’t stop texting me. He apparently has my brother’s old cellphone number, so when I was text-yelling at my brother about a computer problem I was actually harassing a stranger. When I finally caught on to what was happening I apologized & hoped it would all be behind me… but for some reason this person thinks we’re penpals & keeps texting me. This is not a Meg Ryan movie, it’s real life & completely inappropriate.

My fridge, the silver Kia, & laundry aggression have all been cleared up, but I’m going to keep you up there until someone else needs your spot. You just sit there & think about what you did.

Also a new addition to Dead to Me… a spot reserved for only unforgivable offenses… spiders. My apartment has more spiders than I can mentally handle. They’re all kinds of different spiders too which freaks me out more for some reason. I keep killing them & more just take their place. I really worry about that whole statistic where most people eat 8 spiders in their sleep during their lifetime. If I wake up with a stuffy nose or a tickle in my throat I immediately think it must be a spider & freak out until it turns out to be just a booger. So spiders, not that you were ever on my good side, but now you should know that you’ll never be anything but dead to me.

Amanda I’ve known for years & have loved her from the start. She was there when we were both new to our church, in Mexico during the best & simultaneously worst week ever, when I was horribly & pathetically heart-sick over some guy who didn’t even know I existed,we even applied for the Amazing Race together & I still think we’d be a unstoppable tag team. She’s one of the first people I look for when I enter a room. She’ll be in LA, something  she’s talked about doing since we first met & now it’s really happening! It’s a wonderful opportunity for her & I’ve provided her with a list of actors who, if she makes out with them, I’ll have to make out with HER just for the proximity to them.

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Tink I call my life-partner which must make it ok to tell her secrets I shouldn’t tell anyone else. (you know you tell your husband things you shouldn’t, it’s the same thing) When I needed to take up running to handle the stress of my home, she was right there. When I needed to chain-smoke cloves out of anxiety before seeing my ex for the first time in years, she supplied them. I haven’t known her as long as some of my other friends, but I feel like we’ve covered the entire range of human emotion together in the past year & 1/2… accomplishment, anxiety, heartbreak, depression, drunk, ecstatic, bored… & on & on & on.I probably spend more time with her than anyone else which I’m sure will leave a big Tink-shaped-hole in my life. But she’ll be back after her year with AmeriCorps hopefully.

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And I couldn’t send these ladies away without something to keep close to their hearts. So they each got a hanky (for sad tears this once, & happy tears from today on) & a key with their own special meaning. Amanda, Tink… I love you both more than I could possibly express.

Even my pup doesn’t want to get out of bed. Seriously. And there’s no consolation with the promise of the coming season the way there is when we suffer through spring rain. So I’m turning to my last resource…

Dear Grilled Cheesus, please bring back a late Indian Summer with warm, dry days. Pretty please. And if you can’t, then can I at least have these boots to get me through? Please & thank you.

Happy birthday, Daddy!

I believe that from time to time you just need a night when you can look in the mirror & think “damn I look good”. I believe it’s a woman’s right to be sexy… not to attract or impress anyone, just to give honor to that side of you. I believe that there is a time & a place for smokey eye makeup.  I believe that time is anytime, even if there’s nowhere special to go. I believe you don’t need a reason to feel good about looking good.

The other night I went out with friends for a celebration. The truth about how this started is that I hadn’t showered, didn’t WANT to shower, so instead I looked at my I’ve-seen-better-days hair & said “let’s go with this”. I added product to make even more of a bed-head mess, & then went on to charcoal eyeshadows. And it felt GOOD.

Then something strange happened. I felt awkward about uploading photos from that night… like I was embarrassed to post photos that say “Hey look at me, I’m hot”. I’m not conceited, Lord knows I’m way to self-conscious to cross that line, but I should be allowed to feel good about looking good. So I will.