FLYING TO SPAIN TOMORROW

So exccciiiiitttteeeddd yet also freeeaaakkkiinnnngggg oouuuutttttttttt. I have a lot of "Spain Bucket List" things I want to do, and one of them is to see/meet/stalk one of my favorite fashion bloggers: Madame de Rosa. <<<click huurrr>>> 

Her blog is in spanish and I meaaannn I love to read about moda in another idioma #spanglish

http://madamederosa.com/

Living as a fashion blogger in Madrid????? IT'S MY DREAM. Anyways. She is definitely one of my style *iconz*. Among meeting her, some of my other Spain bucket list activities include 1) Don't lose wallet, 2) Don't get stabbed, and 3) Buy mass amounts of Spanish jewelry and vino, you know just the usual traveling objectives.

SO EXCITED!!! ESTOY EMOCIONADO, FELIZ, Y EXTASIADO!

I can't NOT blog this.

Double negative in my title. Deal with it.

The DT came out with a "special edition" newspaper yesterday, FRIDAY, and I couldn't help but immediately think of the Someecard that looks remarkable similar to it. Like did the DT do it on purpose???? Both guys have mustaches?? Collared shirts??? Short hair??? It's almost eerie. I'm thinking they did do it on purpose. Those rascals.

DIY Hi-low Dress

$118, BCBG

Hi-low dresses have been the trend for a while now, and it has definitely caught on with the masses. AKA most of them are pretty expensive. But you don't have to give up going out to eat for a month to afford one.... make your own. I spent about 30 minutes in a second hand store today, picked up some maxi dresses, and did work with some fabric scissors when I got home. 

The dresses were all less than $10. 

You will not find a Hi-low dress online or in-store for 

less than $10. 

You just won't. 

If you need help/advice with vintage shopping Click Here. 

Step One
When you buy the dresses at a second hand store, focus on the fabric/pattern. If it's a timeless solid black, polka dot, or solid color, then it will most likely look like you bought it from a department store after you've re-made it. As opposed to if you buy a dated, or blatantly 80s pattern, then it will just look "vintage." Meh.

The basic black maxi dress. Perfect for DIY's.

Step Two
Try on the dress and use a washable pen to mark how short you're going to cut it. Take the dress off and cut one side at a time, trying to make the sides as even as possible. If you're crafty-mc-shmafty, then hem the edges. I probably won't. Let's just say I didn't make the highest grade in clothing construction. #ADMlife #droppedthatmajor

Ta Da!

Make a turban with the scraps of the dresses, like the middle pic.

There are two ways you can cut the dress. 

• By cutting straight up the side hems, and a straight line across  your legs, like this dress. 

• 

  $208, shopbop.com

• Or, by rounding out the cut to an angle so it looks like this one.

• 

  $195, shopbop.com

Don't forget to top off your hi-low dress with a flower crown!!!!!!

Move Like Jagger, but Smile Like Giada

HI ME AGAIN, BLOGGING AGAIN, MUST BE FINALS WEEK TEE HEE!

I've been watching a lot of food channel lately, and in accordance with that, have seen a lot of Giada's bicuspids (can you tell my mom is a hygienist) lately. My sister and I had an in-depth convo about our feelings towards Giada, on both her TV presence and food. And yes, her mouth. I mean, she is just happy! She smiles with every word.

"I hope bugs don't get stuck in my teeth in the fake wind blown photoshoot"

"NO Bobby Flay, MY teeth--I MEAN TEAM--will be the Next Food Network Star"

"And here is where I do a face pose for the camera right before I open the oven"

"Frowning on the inside because this photo shoot is almost over and I won't be photographed smiling until tomorrow."

"I LOVE SMILING. SMILING'S MY FAVORITE."

"Trying to distract from my big chompers by showing off my big honkers. NOT WORKING THOUGH."

Well I've been practicing my Giada face.

I mean, I think I've almost got it down. I just need to be making pasta while I do the Giada smile. We look like sisterz. On the real though, did i just say that?, I think G is beautiful and I would kill to have her smile, hair, body, or cooking skills, so I'm just a bitter blogger avoiding studying for finals.

DON'T LET ME RAIN ON YOUR PARADE, GIADA. I KNOW YOU WILL SMILE EITHER WAY THOUGH.

Smile so hard, muthaf*ckas wanna blog me*

*Jay-Z & Kanye lyric, for those of you over 30 reading this blog, and thank you by the way :>

Comfort Zones

Finals week: cleaned the house, re-decorated the coffee table, used lemon zest as an ingredient for the first time, and have tons of new "study" songs. Oh, and now I'm blogging. I guess I can get away with a little "free time" stuff because, basically, this has been the EASIEST end-of-the-semester I've ever had. Just 3 finals and 2 group projects (that are done already). I always do kind of a wrap up blog entry of sorts, just blah blah about how the semester went by fast, I don't want to be a senior, and I can't find a meme to describe the pains of being a college senior. Here is last semester's end-of-the-semester diddy.

Reading over last semester's entry makes me think about 2011. It was such a wonderful year for me. Best memories ever. I love college. Blah blah blah boring blog post blah blah, and then I started thinking about 2012. This year has been good too, but I have a feeling that 2012 is about getting out of my comfort zone. It's about growing up.

Along with other major life changes, I turned 21. I don't know why being 21 is an entire different entity in my mind than being 20, but to me it is. I put 21 up on a pedestal. Mental block about being 21, an adult, and mature. Not sure how I feel about it. I loved being a freshman in college because you can get away with ANYTHING and the only explanation you need is "Meerrr, I'm a freshman in college" and everyone gets it. "I'm 21, and a senior in college" leaves no room for frivolity. It's about getting your sh!!!!!t together and not saying "Moving back in with my parents" when people ask what the post-grad plans are. Being a freshman in college was a comfort zone. Even being 20 was a comfort zone. 21????? Uncomfortable.

I feel like 2012, for me, is about changing and growing up. I'm studying abroad this summer and I'm excited, nervous, and I know it's going to change my life. At least that's what past study-abroaders have told me. Flying across the world, before even getting to the destination, is a terrifying feat to me. I hate flying by myself. It is 8 levels of uncomfortable for me. But I'll be acquainted with 5 different airports when it's all said and done. I guess thats a plus? I'm not going abroad with any friends. Uncomfortable. Meeting all new people. Sometimes in Spanish. Definitely a new experience. Trying not to get pick-pocketed on the busy city streets. Uncomfortable. Living without a blow dryer for a month, UNCOMFORTABLE. lolz

I didn't have a job in my last semester of 2011, but I applied for a responsibility-laden position in 2012. I underwent an extremely rigorous interview process, and landed myself a paid internship. I became so comfortable not having to report to anyone, not having anywhere to be at any time, that the whole internship thing is a little intimidating. A job that isn't retail???? Nothing to do with clothes??? Uncomfortable.

I know I can handle all of these life changes, but it's weird looking back *cue sentimental music* and thinking about how fast things have changed this semester, and mostly out of the blue. Life gets uncomfortable, and fast. If I've learned anything, I've learned that. And to not sell your books back to Red & Black. Some of the rocks that I've been leaning on are gone, and it's uncomfortable, and forcing me to change. When I get all weird introspective/gushy and reflective, I like to recall certain lyrics from a song that my sister often blogs about. 

The more I know, the less I understand
All the things I thought I knew, I'm learning them again
I've been tryin' to get down to the Heart of the Matter




That is just good stuff right there. Bloody brilliant, as Harry Potter would say. There are more touching lyrics to that song, but I'm trying to keep the cheese factor at a level 2.

I once heard a quote that was something to the effect of "Do one uncomfortable thing every day." I don't know who said that, but it's been hitting home for me lately.  Except, more like every other week.

I think this weather is getting to me.

Dreary-ASS London weather + 
Roommate out of town +
Free time
 = Sappy blog post

A Week of Bizarre Events

It all started last Monday, when I was delivering The Odyssey to the Greek houses. Everything was normal, blah blah blah, then I realized I didn't have my phone. I just had it circa two minutes earlier, reading a text. Thinking I accidently left it on top of a stack of newspapers on a doorstep of a Greek house, I begrudgingly drove back and took the time to walk up the paths of the previous four houses I delivered papers to. Not there. I AM A PRODUCT OF GENERATION Y, PEOPLE. I DON'T DO WELL WHEN I'M NOT CONNECTED TO THE WORLD. I only have a certain amount of time to deliver all the papers before class starts every Monday, so I just told myself it was lost in my car somewhere and continued to deliver the papers. I was running out of time. Finally, I just stopped right there in front of the Chi O house and frantically tore apart my car for, oh, about 15 minutes, cursing just like my daddy would have in such a situation. hah. DIDN'T FIND IT. Then my car makes the beeping "I'm out of gas" sound. I refuse to ever run out of gas and be forced to carry one of those red gas holder things and fill my car like it's a jet ski. I hope to never hit that level of rock bottom. So I was forced to drive all the way to a gas station on Frankford, OUT OF MY WAY, MIND YOU. All this while without a phone. Probably haven't gone this long without my lucky charm since mid 8th grade, when I didn't have a cell phone quite yet.

After getting gas, it's clear I won't make it to class on time, HENCE WON'T MAKE IT TO ANY CLASSES FOR THE REMAINDER OF THE DAY.

This meme is sad but it holds true. 

I head back to Greek circle, don't worry I checked into Foursquare BEFORE I lost my phone, thank gaawwd lolz, and deliver the rest of the papers in a suicidal depression. After more or less throwing the papers at the FIJI house, I went back to the first four houses, where the scene of the accident took place. Retraced all of my steps, and finally FINALLY found my poor little iPhone, dressed in J Crew's finest leopard iPhone case, sad and alone in front of the Sigma Nu house, deserted in the middle of the street. I picked it up and was shocked and horrified at what I saw. Another crack. Only this time, the crack wasn't a crack, more like a bullet shot. It literally looks like my phone was shot. My phone looks like 50 cent.

I tried to take a pic of my iPhone with my iPhone. Didn't work. But it looks exactly like the picture above. It's black and has holes in it. I had planned on getting the crack fixed that week BUT THEN ANOTHER BIZARRE EVENT OCCURRED BEFORE I COULD BLINK.

The next Tuesday morning, I found myself in my usually Tuesday/Thursday routine, running late and riding my bike to Spanish, not yet fully awake. Riding along Memorial Circle, as per usual, I see a bike-cop waving me to come towards him. I acknowledge him, and realize he is probably trying to direct me to go a certain way because of the road construction. So I ride passed him and wave, smiling sort of. La la la, riding along, the psycho races up to me and yells "MAM STOP THE BIKE." Hmmm. So I stop and take a headphone out of one ear.

He says "Do you know what you just did?"
Ummmmm. No?
"I need to see your ID."
I don't bring my ID with me to class.
"Well. What's your name."
Augusta Neal.
"How do you spell Augusta?"
DID YOU TAKE 4TH GRADE GEOGRAPHY???? MY NAME ISN'T BRITNEY???? THERE IS ONLY ONE WAY TO SPELL AUGUSTA?????????? "A-u-g-u-s-t-a"
"Do you know what you did, Au-goose-tah?" (mexican)
No.
"Drove wrong side of the street, against traffic."
Where????
"If you were a car, where would you go??" (his words, verbatim.)
What????
He then gets on his walky talky thing and retrieves all my info and writes it down on a ticket. When he's off he says, "You're from New Mexico, you should know bike laws. It's a huge bike state."
REALLY???? DON'T YOU GO SASSING ME AT 9 AM THAT I'M NOT A GOOD NEW MEXICAN. YOU CAN'T SPELL "AUGUSTA." I didn't really have a valid argument, so I just stood there and was like hah okay.
AND THEN another bike-cop rides by and says, "Passing out tickets, Garcia! Nice!"
so many thoughts and actions played in my head at that exact moment. I just stood there.

Showed up late to my Spanish class. Professor said "Mas tarde, donde--" ... "I WAS JUST PULLED OVER BY A BIKE COP. A BIKE COP." he laughs. soooo funny. Spanish classes tend to grow attached to each other, so it was okay that I stormed in and cause a fuss. All of them care about my life. In my eyes.

All day the responses have been something to the effect of "Wait, the cop was on a bike? You were on a bike?".... "This never happens to people."........ "He didn't give you a warning???"

$75 dollars later. So rude.

A few more days went by, somewhat of a roller-coaster, 

but mainly a roller-coaster that was only going down. 

Then Saturday happened. Then the roller-coaster ran into the ground full speed. Lying in bed, about to commence a much needed nap after a day of study abroad orientation and community service hours (not of my own free will, sorry, I'm not that saint-like), my phone vibrates with a notification that I received a message on Facebook. I check it. It's from an unidentified male in military attire. Curious. It says something to the effect of oh hey i seen u were kewt n so id added ya.  The painful grammatically incorrect messages kept streaming in from this guy and I responded with short "haha ok"'s and "haha cool"'s for as long as I had stamina for (7 minutes) and then stopped talking to him. He asks for my number (I'm such a hot commodity, I know). In light of everything that week, I thought what the heck (A REGRETTABLE DECISION ON MY PART) and so we started texting. Then he wants to skype. UM NO???? I DON'T EVEN KNOW YOU. I told him my skype was broken. Like it's a machine or something? Lol???? He pretended to believe me. Then he called me like the bipolar psycho he is, which was red flag #354, and HELL if I was going to answer. I told him "why would I answer the call to someone I don't know" I was hungover and not in the mood to deal with creepers, even if they're a soldier risking their lives in Afghanistan. Then I felt bad, because he was a soldier risking his life in Afghanistan. So the 2nd time he called I answered. #supportourtroops (ANOTHER REGRETTABLE DECISION ON MY PART).

This guy wouldn't shut up. He just needed someone to talk to, AND I DID NOT REALIZE I HAD SIGNED MYSELF UP TO BE THE PERSON. He told me all about his problems with his Lubbock ex-girlfriend, whom he insisted I look up on Facebook, I have 6 mutual friends in common with her, weird, then told me all about his family by starting out with:

"My family is crazy."

"Haha, all families are crazy."

"No really, my sister hears voices and is in a mental institution."

UMMM WHAT DO YOU SAY TO THAT???? WHY AM I ON THE PHONE WITH YOU??????? He proceeds to tell me the story of her almost getting arrested and then everyone realized she was insane, and how his dad was poor as a child, and he is the youngest of like 4 kids, AKA A BUNCH OF CRAP I DON'T CARE ABOUT. I don't get it. The whole time I was half-way listening, I popped in with a few uhhuh's, oh's, interesting's, and wow's, with a flat dry voice. He gave me every gruesome detail about the dynamics of his ex-girlfriend, how she cheated on him, AND I DON'T BLAME HER, and how he paid her rent, bought her everything in the world, and she only gave him reeses for christmas, BLAH BLAH I WAS ON THE PHONE FOR 58 MINUTES. AKA I HELD THE PHONE TO MY EAR WHILE HE TALKED ABOUT HIMSELF FOR 58 MINUTES. I mainly spent my time on Twitter, tweeting about how outlandish the situation was. I was an unpaid, but mostly pissed off therapist. 

My twitter is in spanish, get on my level.

After I finished 2 episodes of Friends, I decided it's time to draw the line here. This phone call has got to come to a stop. So I tell him I have to get off the phone because I'm falling asleep. Which was absolutely true. He says something obscure, trying to keep talking, 'K REALLY GOTTA GO BYE!' and hung up. 

3 seconds later. Phone vibrates. "hey we nvr got to tlk bout u"

HEY GO PUT THAT THROUGH GOOGLE TRANSLATE FROM 'GHETTO' TO 'ENGLISH' SO I CAN UNDERSTAND YOU.

I didn't respond.

3 seconds later. 

"ill ask ?'s"

He proceeded to ask me questions, NOT ABOUT MY LIFE, but literally asked me "how mch do u weigh?"

REALLY??????? IS THIS HAPPENING??????? HOW MUCH DO I WEIGH????????????? I responded with "ha never ask someone that again" 

To which he responded with "as long as its less then 150"

FIRST OF ALL, INCORRECT USAGE OF 'THEN' SECOND OF ALL, YOU'RE SHALLOW, 3RD OF ALL, DIE.

Then he abruptly changed the subject of the questions, from shallow to obscene, and asked about things which shalln't be mentioned in a class amateur fashion blog. This is the point where I stopped texting back, and was with Friends at Fuzzy's, and have already conveyed to them the ridiculousness that was my afternoon. 

Then I got a text that will probably scar me for the rest of my existence: "ight hold on 1 sec imma send u something."

I read that text and said/gasped, "OH GOD. OH GOD. NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO." To which my friends responded with confused expressions Then another text followed it. What you think happened, happened. I threw my phone across the tacos to my friend and made him deal with the situation. In 2.5 seconds, all paraphernalia was deleted, and he was blocked from my Facebook. 

This story is so off the wall, that I realize you might not believe me. Allow me to provide the evidence.

Hi. Welcome to my life.

Then came Sunday night. To which you all know, Lubbock had Tornado warnings. KAMC tweeted me back, and favorited my tweets, soooooo it kind of made up for the rest of the bizarre week. 

I'm done.