Ugh, one of THOSE days...

Between stress, extreme PMS, and a regular ol' case of the Mondays, it has been quiiiiiite the day. I listened to everything my body wanted to do and some weird stuff happened.

List of Weird Things I Did Today:

1. Uncontrollably giggled through most of the morning 
2. Cried my eyes out for a couple different reasons and also no reason at all
3. Hated everyone and everything that spoke or moved in my vicinity
4. Had an epiphany during yoga class and then lost it and cried about it 
5. Ate EVERYTHING in my path-- granola bars, chicken breasts, chocolate, veggie burgers, mixed nuts, yogurt-- EVERYTHING
6. Made a trillion flash cards (with a trillion more to go) 
7. Took two dead-to-the-world naps that I didn't have time for
8. Alternately plummeting and skyrocketing self confidence, every hour on the hour

Grad school is sort of kicking my butt and my body/mind doesn't quite know how to handle it yet. Figuring it out. Not as fast as I'd like, but getting there. A skype date with ze boyfriend, a cup of tea, and some Alexi Murdoch have stabilized tonight and the prospect of tomorrow is lookin' better and better. 

Why Tomorrow Will Be Better Than Today:

1. Tuesday is not Monday, so that's a start.
2. I found Green Mountain coffee at the grocery store today (ON SALE, CAN I GET A HELL YEAH). The smell of home will probably simultaneously make me happy and sobby. The good kind of sobby.
3. The third year audiology students need a guinea pig to practice vestibular testing on and I'M IT. Vestibular testing checks for functionality of the inner ear systems that control balance, so I'll get dizzy and hopefully not throw up everywhere.
4. New Girl and the Mindy Project go up online. Commence solo giggle sesh.
5. I only have 2 classes on Tuesdays, so I can hopefully spend some time catching up with schoolwork. (bleh, but yay, i guess.)

Official Coloradoianer

Well, it's official. I've got my new Colorado plates, my driver's license, my car registration, a buncha other crap, etc. I'M A COLORADOIANER(???!). There were a trillion hoops to jump through to get all this stuff, but I did it, it's over, I'm done waiting in 80 hour lines at the DMV.

Not sure how I feel about going through such a racket to become a resident in a state I'm not sure I even like yet. It'll be good in the long run, because in-state tuition will be BALLINNNN', but... ehhhh. They make it hard to become a resident here. If I didn't have thousands of dollars in student loans on the line, I would say eff it all and go on being Vermonty with my Vermonty plates and Vermonty registration and sticking out like a sore thumb among all the Colorado and Kansas plates. I'm not sure whether the woman at the DMV took pity on me or what, but I got to keep my old plates, which I'm PSYCHED about. Gonna cherish those babies. Til death do us part.

Here are my new ones. My car's name is Suzi the Civic and has a distinct Christmas theme goin' on, brought on by the plates, which said "ELF." Didn't do that on purpose, it was just meant to be. I'm sad to be changing them and hope that Christmas will stick around, despite the lack of elves. (I'm sure it will, you can see a hint of the tinsel poking into the picture above). I was disappointed with the new ones until my dad coined the acronym QYC: "584-- QUIT YER COMPLAINING," which has become 1) my favorite thing to shout at whiners, and 2) my own personal motto about grad school. There's so much to complain about, but I should probably spend that time making flash cards instead...

So, there's that. I'm almost a resident. I just have to physically be here for 11 more months or something and that'll be that. Goodbye VT residency, it was so good to belong there. I miss it like y'all wouldn't belieeeeve.

Beanie Brigade does Riot Fest

Grad school, man. It's a hell of a ride. 

To be entirely cliche, "work hard, play hard" is a fairly accurate phrase to describe the life of a grad student. I could study every spare second of the day and still have unfinished textbook readings and more flash cards to write. Allotting time for things other than school is so, so important, even if it's guilt-inducing.  It's hard to let loose when there's an exam looming, but ya GOTTA. 

This past weekend, the Beanie Brigade/Heels on Wheels headed to Denver to check out Riot Fest. I did a bit of studying on Saturday, but for the most part, NOPE. Part of me was freaking about wasting time, but the other part was coaxing me to let it go and gift myself a worry-free weekend.

From L to R: Brenna, Christine, me. AKA, BEANIE BRIGADE

Another guy in our AuD program played in Riot Fest for a few years and still has the ins, so we were able to get on the guest list FO' FREE. Festival food and drinks are plenty expensive, but we managed to sneak in some well-hidden snacks (and *ahem* pocket shots maybe). All in all, $20 for parking and a few more bucks for when the snacks ran out-- a grand total of practically nothing to see a boatload of bands.

Eyebrows, Undercuts, and Otis

It's only Tuesday and it's already been a hella weird week. On Sunday afternoon, I received some pretty awful news of an old coworker's death. Not really gonna touch onto the suicide subject because I was hoping to keep things light n' happy here, but Monday was pretty darn rough. And then on a smaller upset-scale, my research proposal was shot down. It was a terrible, terrible morning.

Fortunately/unfortunately, everyone was having a terrible morning. For lots of different reasons. Christine, Brenna and I decided to have a girl's night. Cliche, but yo, it WORKS. Even though we all have unreal amounts of work/studying/stressing to do for grad school. When in doubt, eat candy, drink wine, sing along to Grease, draw on darker eyebrows, give drastic haircuts, and snapchat each other from across the sofa.

We took a make-up trip to Macy's, where the gayest man I've ever seen chose the perfect shade of brown for my eyebrows and then yelled at me for wiping it off with an alcohol-soaked tissue instead of a make-up wipe. Um, hello, beautiful and perfect make-up artist, how was I supposed to know alcohol doesn't go on your eyebrows?! I've never used an eyebrow pencil in my life, give me a break. Better yet, give me a discount. (...He didn't give me one).

It probably looks the same to everyone else, but I see a difference and that's all that matters. 

Today's been much, much better. I woke up at the crack of dawn to get a good workout in before classes, but ended up with an extra half hour. Instead of taking the time to leisurely get ready, I had a burst of inhuman motivation and rearranged all my bedroom furniture. There is nothing quite so satisfying as seeing your bed in a different corner of the room and knowing that you almost popped a vein getting it there. This wooden dorm furniture isn't kidding around. I would've broken toes if I had let it drop the two inches I was able to lift it above the ground.

Here's a big ol' dose of Otis to help you tackle the mid-week blues. Repeat as necessary.

Six kiwi for $1? Twenty fruit leathers for $1.50?! WHAT IS HAPPENING HERE

GUESS WHAT I FOUND. (Well, actually, someone told me about it, but THEN I WENT AND ACCIDENTALLY FOUND IT). (I feel like I've already used so many caps locks the actually thing that I found won't be as impressive as I'm making it out to be, so I'll make it bigger)

A DISCOUNT GROCERY STORE!

Y'all probably don't care, but I DO. That place is magic, lemme tell ya. It's a random mish mash of foods either beyond their expiration dates or with severely damaged packaging. It's like the land of misfit toys, except there's no Yukon Cornelius to lead you around and you have to pay for everything. That actually makes it sound bad.... 

Here's the story: I made a grocery list and headed out for the normal grocery store, King Soopers (the stupidest grocery store name I've ever heard of). I got lost, as is the usual for me in Greeley (I wonder when that will stop?), and instead ended up on 85 headed towards Denver, where I spotted Esh's Grocery. I decided to just shop there instead and that is when my whole life changed. 

I am being dramatic, but it's goddamn worthy of dramatics. I went in there and found absolutely nothing that was on my grocery list, but everything wonderful. I somehow narrowed down my "needs" to just this stuff and I spent less than $10. Fruit leathers, granola, quinoa, quinoa mac n/ cheese(!!!), fresh organic strawberries and tomatoes, and energy bars. 

I'll be buying meat and dairy products at normal grocery stores (probably), but for everything else, the discount place is where you'll find me. There were soooooOoOoOo many organic products and gluten free things everywhere. I'm going to be eating well and will never get bored, since the store content is always changing. There were some shelves with 50 cans of spicy refried beans and others with only 1 lone jar of jelly. It depends on what's goin' bad. 

I'M SO EXCITED.

Happily eating chocolate chips as I write this. Wheeeeee!

It's been a long, long journey getting to where I'm comfortable with the way my body looks and changes. Not gonna get too far into it, but a few years back I struggled with some disordered food and exercise behavior. I made a lot (a lot) of life changes (mostly good ones) in my last year at UVM and finally started finding my balance. I've pretty solidly found it now and I'm so glad the huge transition to Colorado didn't throw me out of whack.

A large epiphany moment in accepting myself came from watching the fitness progress of others on Instagram. Strictly fitspo, never thinspo. I follow a few people who have dream bodies, follow the strictest of diets, and always post beautiful pictures, but more importantly, I also follow people who use their accounts to document what really happens. And that's a whole different story.

The term that changed everything for me is "shape." Your body changes shape regularly. The way you look in the morning is not necessarily how you will look by the end of the day. You're different depending on what you eat, what your workout is, how stressful the day was, etc. Someone will post a "morning shape" photo and an "evening shape" photo and the two look night and day different (PUN INTENDED, LOLOL). And ya know what else?! You can be muscular and it's often times not noticeable unless you're flexing! It's deceptive! It's downright misleading! Let me repeat, NOT EVERYONE LOOKS LIKE THAT ALL THE TIME. I actually think it's worth repeating a few more times and maybe even worth shouting from a rooftop or two, but I'll spare you.

I took a gym selfie the other day because I started seeing a little bit of bicep definition and got way, way excited. Of course, it's only when I posture myself just so and flex the shit out of it, but HEY. I'll take it. This one was taken in the morning and you can bet your bottom dollar that I did not look quite the same that night after a pasta dinner and a couple whiskey sours. It's all about the ebb and flow. I wish it hadn't taken me so long to realize that.

And side note: just because I'm feelin' good about what's goin' on here, that does NOT mean I've given up all ma junk food. There are still heaps of chocolate chips in my oatmeal every damn day and the speed at which I can chunk-spelunk through a pint of B&J's is actually awe-inspiring.

I treated myself to a pair of fancy patterned compression workout shorts at the Nike outlet today because 1) most of my workout gear is thrifted and that's sort of gross and 2) they're pretty and 3) they were on sale (which is still out of my desired price range, but UGH) and 4) my quads looked AWESOME in the dressing room. New gym clothing shouldn't be this exciting, but it IS. Treat yo'self. Make leg day as fun as possible.