Peace Corps, Here I Come!

It's official. I received my Peace Corps Invitation this morning!

Country of Service: KAZAKHSTAN

Dates of Service: August 18, 2008 - November 7, 2010

I'm still taking it all in, and wading through the massive amounts of information that was Fed-Exed to me, but it's really happening. It's kind of crazy how much my world changed in a matter of hours. Before this morning it all felt very distant and intangible, but now it is suddenly very real. Holy cow! I'm leaving the country in less than 8 weeks!

Let the fun begin! Because you better believe I plan on making the most of these next two months...

Sasser Syndrome

I was explaining at a recent softball game that I suffer from "Sasser Syndrome". Everyone looked at me like I was crazy. I looked back at this group of Fantasy Baseball fanatics, especially Jason who knows practically every baseball trivia question in the book, and said, "You know, the catcher Mickey or Mackey Sasser, who couldn't throw the ball back to the pitcher?" They insisted I was making it up and no one had any idea who I was talking about (including Jason).

Unfortunately for me, my credibility had been recently questioned when I swore up and down that the 1989 World Series game was played in Oakland, not San Francisco (an honest mistake, I swear). So they all dismissed my allegation and moved on. Well... I hate being wrong (and rarely, RARELY am) so I just had to prove myself right!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mackey_Sasser

Yes, that's right. Mackey Sasser. :)

He's quite the looker, huh?

My SF Giants

So, they may not be the San Francisco Giants that I grew up cheering for. Oh how I miss those days with Matt Williams, Kevin Mitchell, Robby Thompson & Will Clark... BUT, they are still MY San Francisco Giants.

And maybe this isn't really their season, but they're still setting records and putting their names in the books. Find me another team this season that has accomplished both a TRIPLE PLAY




and STEALING HOME.



Or find me a team, period, that has accomplished both in a single season. And I am proud to be able to say that I witnessed one of these amazing feats. Yes, that's right. I took Ryan to the Giants game where Castillo, Durham and Bowker turned a fabulous triple play. How many people can say that they have seen a triple play live?

Nevermind the fact that the Giants lost that game in 13 innings (a very LONG 13 innings), you can forgive them that when you've just witnessed a triple play! :)

I'm trying to see as many Giants games as possible this season before I leave the country. So far I've got a record of 2-2 this season - I started thinking that I needed to stop going to games with Ryan because they were losing every game he attended. But the Giants did manage to pull off a fantastic win against the Tigers for Ryan's birthday on Monday, so I'm willing to reconsider. But I'm still wary...

My favorite Giants seats at AT&T park yet. Thanks Megan and Matt R.!

Bleachers! Can't beat the ambiance of screaming fans...

Triple play game! Go home San Diego.

We were surrounded by Detroit fans, but Bowker shut them up with his homerun. Happy Birthday Ryan!

Giants games with the family, just like old times. (Except this time Robby Thompson doesn't live down the street.) For those of you who don't know... Robby Thompson used to live on Oakview Drive in San Carlos (yup! MY street). On the day he moved, Ryan went down to his house and asked him to sign a ball. I was a wuss and too afraid to ask so I stayed home - still regret that decision.

So, if anyone feels like a Giants game this season... you know that I'm always up for it.

Guys and ?

I've decided that someone needs to take on the task of inventing a new word. Not just any word, I've got one in mind:

There's no acceptable female equivalent for "guy" in the English language.

I, personally, constantly use the term "girl" to refer to females my age or around my age, but really that's the equivalent to "boy".

I rarely use the word "woman" because it just sounds so stuffy and mature. It's not natural for me to say that I was talking to this "woman" the other day when she was in her twenties.

And I refuse to believe that "gal" is an adequate term unless you live in the South and square dance on a regular basis.

"Lady" just makes me think of Lady and the Tramp, or some women at an English tea party.

"Chick" is acceptable in certain circumstances, but isn't really a word that a female can use to refer to another female. That's a word that should exist primarily in the male vocabulary.

So, someone please invent a new word for me to use. Thank you.

The Happiness that Is/Was "The Fort"

I've got this friend. Her name is Stephanie. She's an actor.

Oh and yes, I've learned it's more PC to call her an actor than an actress. Darn feminism and equal rights interfering with the English language. We invent these words and we don't even use them, argh.

Anyways, back to the point.

She is currently performing in a show in San Francisco called Headspace (nice plug, I know). A group of us went to see the show and celebrate this budding actor friend recently. We show up only to find, what? That there's a fort! Um, yea!

The stage was a round stage and they had constructed various seating arrangements around it, one of which was a fort! So, of course we all fought over the fort and crammed as many of us as possible on it. You'd do it too, dont lie.

But what I've come to realize is that the fort is genius. I mean, truly genius. Because, while I am a fan of theater and enjoy a good show every season or so, this is definitely not the case for everyone. You know there are guys who have been dragged to plays by their girlfriends one too many times. So what do you do? You put a fort in the theater and suddenly the child in us all emerges and you're stoked to be watching this performance before you because you're camped out in a fort. Because really, who doesn't love a fort?

And even for those of us who do love a good show every once in a while, there's always something about the venue to complain about: no leg room, seats are squeaky, smells bad, etc. But lie down in a fort with pillows and try complaining about the venue...

Now, if you insist on being one of those people who swears they don't appreciate a good fort, you shouldn't be reading my blog because we shouldn't be friends. But, I suppose I'll let you stay (my readership isn't quite large enough to turn anyone away just yet).

Oh, and don't forget the best part: The top of the fort had a bucket that they could raise and lower for food and drinks. This is not a joke. Fort + Bucket = Elation.

I can't finish this post without confirming that actor friend Stephanie is indeed a rockstar, not to mention MY friend. :) Yes, Stephanie you heard it here first, I'm your friend not just Mike's.

Jason and Matt experiencing the happiness that is the fort.

Sure, there were couches too... but not quite the same as the fort.

And the happiness continues...

Ahh the fort... in all it's glory. Note the bucket.

Natural Born Tendencies

What's with this whole potty training thing? I haven't been able to escape the phenomenon lately. And, to be completely honest, I don't think it is something that Americans should talk about, not to mention draw attention to. I mean, who decided, "Hey! Let's remind people that they aren't born with the ability to not crap their pants?"

Think about it... someone actually has to train you how to recognize that you are going to poop and beyond that, to actually make your way to a potty to dispose of your own waste. If no one taught us, we'd just sit there, perfectly content filling our pants with our own poop. I think it is absolutely foul.

On television a couple of days ago there was a family who was working on potty training their sextuplets. First of all, women - take pride in the fact that we are way more on top of this whole poop in the potty thing. Boys are apparently much more resistant to the whole toilet issue. But, as a whole, we are all much less capable of being trained to poop in a toilet than to pee in it. I have this awful image of a three year old girl being held at arms length in the air, being rushed to the bathtub with her panties overflowing with poop.

I just have a really hard time imagining being that age and not being able to prevent something so horrid from happening. Or, worse, not thinking that it's horrid. It just brings me back to the realization that babies are gross. They emit foulness from every orifice. If you don't believe me, watch the following video:



Now don't get me wrong... I love kids, but gross.

Again, I was confronted with the potty training issue when I came across a news article featuring a woman who claims she can potty train any child in one day. One of her tricks - if the kid makes a mess, they are forced to clean it up themselves. Can you imagine? Oh Sally just pooped her pants again... Sally, you know what to do... Go get in that bathtub and clean yourself up. And clean up those dirty panties before you put them in the washing machine, you hear? I mean, it sounds absurd, but isn't there a little part of you that would absolutely love to hand the task off to the child? AND if they are forced to handle their own soiled clothing you think they are going to be a little more desperate to figure out the whole potty thing right? I'll consider it my "last resort" method...

I also want to add that I'm awesome. I talked to my mom about all of this and she said I was the easiest kid to potty train ever. Take that Ryan! I guess it kind of makes sense... I mean I'm so disgusted by the idea now that I was clearly also disgusted by it then. I was so ahead of my time. :)

HIV Negative-Positive

Ever wonder what it's like to live life in the "in-between"? Well, I've been doing it for a few weeks now, in a variety of different ways - the most disturbing of which is my HIV status.

I always thought that HIV was a hit or miss kind of thing? You know, either you have it or you don't... Well, apparently with the Peace Corps it's not that simple. Although I have officially tested "Negative" for HIV, my results have been rejected by the Peace Corps. I started wondering if maybe there was more to this HIV thing?

Since becoming HIV Negative-Positive my outlook on life has changed drastically. I received my rejection notice on May 28th and since then, life has not been the same. I got sunburned, my batting average dropped to 0.333 in Tuesday night's game, I decided to paint my toenails purple, the lovely people of Starbucks have learned my name and my order by heart. All very rare occurences in my life up until my diagnosis.

I visited my doctor on Tuesday, hoping she could provide some comfort. Although, as mentioned in a previous post, she's not exactly the most comforting of doctors. She just told me some depressing story about a patient of hers who gets tested regularly for HIV because he has a thing for prostitutes. He must also be suffering from HIV Negative-Positive, it's the only explanation. :)

My doctor gave me another lab report declaring me HIV Negative, so I can only hope that with evidence of my blood work the Peace Corps will reconsider their initial rejection and I can return to being a regular HIV Negative individual. I think the chances are good...

*On a side note, thanks to Lauren for giving me the idea for this much overdue blog post. Ideas and inspiration are always welcome as I am a regular victim of blogger's block.

Peace Corps Update

It seems like nearly every day I have someone else asking me if I know where I'm heading for my Peace Corps service, or when I'm leaving. Believe you me, when I know... every one of you will know. For now, to keep the questions at bay, here's the latest:

- I completed all of my medical examinations, got a whole bunch of lab reports and doctors' signatures. I sent my packet to the placement office in DC a little over three weeks ago. I have not heard from them since then, in fact, until this morning I didn't know if the packet had even made it to DC.

- This morning, I received an update declaring that they received my medical packet as of May 21, 2008.

So, now I wait for them to review my medical kits, hope that they don't need any more information from me (which would certainly mean giving more blood and getting more shots - not to mention more waiting). Once approved, they will then start looking for a place to send me. And then I receive my invitation in the mail. We're looking at about a month or two before I know where I'm heading.

The "good" news is that they send the invitation at least six weeks before your departure date. So, I can start planning my future a minimum of six weeks before I leave. Argh...

Outwit, Outlast, Outeat

I don't know how many of you have seen the movie Alive, but for those of you who haven't, here's the basic plot:

A Uraguayan Rugby team suffers a plane crash in the Andes Mountains in 1972. No search team is coming to rescue them, and they need to gain strength to find help for themselves. Unfortunately, they have no food left. The only solution: to eat the dead. (Based upon a true story.)

The movie forces people to ask themselves the question, What would you do in this situation? Would you eat the dead or not? On our way home from softball a couple of weeks ago, Matt and Justin took this idea a little further. Sure, it started innocently enough as Justin affirmed that he would want all of us to eat him if he died first. Matt concluded that he would indeed have no reservations about eating Justin - his former roommate of many years. I was a little less certain about eating Justin, and Lauren was just absolutely appalled that our drive home had taken such a terrible turn.

They theorized that if they found themselves in a similar situation, you know that everyone would just be hoping that the fat guy dies first - absolutely willing him to death in the hopes of food for all. But, wait, maybe we want the most muscular person to die first - more meat, less fat. After only a couple of short minutes, the question of whether or not to eat the dead was no longer the issue - these guys were beyond eating the dead. They were now eating AND mutilating the dead without hesitation.

I'm not sure who started it, but they began imagining all of the ways they could use the various bones and appendages of the person they had just devoured. At this point Lauren and I were begging them to stop, assuring them they had taken it far enough, we were turning up the radio to drown out their discussions about using the jaw bone as a saw, and adorning their bodies in the carcasses of their comrades - like the indians would do, they claimed. After enough complaining, the conversation finally took a turn...

Matt and Justin had now jumped to the following scenario: you are alone, with no friends left to eat. At what point do you decide to eat your own arm? I found myself trying not to laugh at this point. It's one thing to talk about eating another human being - a dead one, at that - but to begin eating your own body, while you are still alive (obviously) is beyond imaginable for me. But, Matt and Justin were very easily capable of imagining it. I don't know if the rest of you have thought this through, but here are Matt and Justin's pointers for anyone considering eating themselves:

1. Eat your left arm first (if you are right handed).
2. Next, after making certain that there are no berries left to scrounge or any method of saving yourself by foot, move on to the legs.
3. Make sure you leave the other arm, otherwise you will be unable to cut up the rest of your body.
4. Take it slow, pace yourself.
5. To eat your second arm, is to admit defeat.

How any one person, not to mention two could begin to devise such a plan is beyond me. We all laughed as they imagined the rescuers finally showing up to save you, and finding the savage survivor with nothing but a torso left.

In conclusion, should any of you find yourselves on vacation with Matt and Justin, you better hope you are not the fattest or the most muscular, you better not give up, and you better be willing to Outwit, Outlast, Outeat.

Got Milk?

7 Random Things About Me

I'm taking inspiration from Lailah. I guess I'm supposed to choose seven things about myself that most people wouldn't know. I'm resorting to this blog because I'm stuck. In life, I'm stuck - I still don't know where I'm headed or when (Peace Corps), and my blogs are starting to resemble this issue. I thought maybe this fun little post might un-stick me. (Please ignore the bizarre thoughts possibly conjured up of a Post-It just then. Just me? Nevermind.). So... 7 random things that I think most of you won't know about me.

I have a very small family.
My entire extended family (including the spouses and kids of my cousins) is only 22 people. AND all of my grandparents are still living. So, this number has not been reduced by deaths in the family - this is the whole thing. I have five cousins, three aunts, and two uncles. As a result, I find myself wanting more kids than the average person from my generation.

I jumped out of a plane.
This doesn't come up in daily conversations and as a result I guess not too many people know about it. In March of 2005, I had to leave my house to get some studying done in a quiet place. I went for a drive and parked. I saw a whole bunch of parachutes falling from the sky in front of me. I turned the car on and found a skydiving facility down the road. I convinced three friends to come with me and in April of 2005 we jumped. I loved it even though I look like a mentally handicapped individual in my video as we're getting ready to tumble out of the plane - long story.

I grew 7" during high school.
When I entered Sequoia High School I was 5'2". By the summer of my junior year I was 5'9". I had many painful months.

I'm ophidiophobic.
Big time. We're talking, I have to change the channel or cover my eyes when I see a snake on TV. I used to just think I was afraid of snakes like some girls are afraid of spiders (which don't really bother me), but then I had a professor who explained the difference between fear and phobia. He said, imagine there is a snake in a box in the corner of the room, if you are afraid of snakes, you wouldn't go near the box, if you have a phobia, you couldn't be in the same room as the box. I would not be in the same building as the box. Needless to say, I don't understand why anyone would want to see the movie Snakes on a Plane.

On the SATs my Math score was 260 points higher than my Verbal score.
This is only worth mentioning because I graduated from college with a Bachelor's degree in English. I was admitted to UC Davis as an Econ major, and took classes including Statistics and Calculus during my first year at Davis. It wasn't until I took an elective called Creative Writing: Fiction that I officially changed majors. This was after a series of other considered majors including Exercise Biology (I wanted to be a Pediatric Physical Therapist). I haven't taken a math class since that quarter, but there was a time when my math skills were much higher than my English skills, believe it or not.

I screen my calls.
This is true of just about every phone call I receive. I don't think there is a single person whose phone call I have not ignored at least once. It's not because I don't like everyone who calls me, but there are just some times when you don't feel like talking on the phone. And unfortunately I experience these moments more often than the average person. So, I'm sorry in advance because if I have not yet ignored your phone call, I will once during our friendship - it's basically inevitable.

I have to wet my toothbrush before I put toothpaste on it, and then wet it again with the toothpaste.
I know, this is so random but that's the point right? AND I got stuck on number 7. I couldn't think of anything. So, when I brush my teeth I guess I'm really paranoid about making sure the brushing is going to be sudsy so I have to make sure everything is wet. I used to be the same way about washing my hands, wet them, soap in them and then wet again. I've decided that's a waste of water now, but I can't quit the tooth brushing habit.

Now that I read this list over, I'm realizing that the few people who read this blog fairly regularly (my faithful readers as Lailah and I would call them) probably know almost all of these things about me. But for those of you who don't... now you know and surely feel exponentially more enlightened than you were before you stumbled across this post.

Accident-Prone?

As a kid, I was always covered in dirt and almost always had stains on my clothes. I was that kid that just wanted to get into everything and when my parents took me camping I was the first one to find some way to get dirty. There's a picture of me, at the age of three where it looks like I could have very well been eating dirt and then spreading it all over my body, I'm covered in layer of brown - the tannest I've ever been.

Again, at about the age of four, is my favorite home video of all time - a birthday party of mine at the gymnastics center. We basically rented out the place for an hour and just ran and ran and ran. We jumped into the giant foam pit and climbed in and out of big foam structures. It was basically a four-year-old's dream, just uninterrupted playing for an hour. Included in this deal was a gymnastics instructor - basically a babysitter who was paid to wear us out while our parents stood on the sidelines chatting.

Part of the fun were these big (3' x 3') foam blocks that were stacked on one side of the gym in a pyramid that stood probably 9' high. All of us kids would climb onto the pyramid and jump off of it onto a big pad in a fit of giggles. My adventuresome spirit came out and I got the brilliant idea to upstage my friends with a new dismount. I climbed onto the top of the pyramid, turned around so my back was facing the pad, lay down and slowly slid off the block backwards with my arms hanging on to the top of the block. As I got ready to drop, my arms caught the block and as I fell the block came tumbling after. First, I hit the pad, and then the giant block landed on top of me. My mom was videotaping the whole thing while talking to a friend of hers, and as the viewer watches me fall, you hear my mom simultaneously saying "whoop! there she goes..."

But here's the ridiculous part - I didn't get hurt. I'm sure I cried for a little bit out of shock, as four-year-olds do, but not a bruise or a scratch on my body. I share this story only to point out that I would often do the most ridiculous things, and I suffered no injuries.

Even with this adventuresome spirit of mine, I surprisingly never broke a bone (excluding a couple of untreated fingers during volleyball season) and I've never had stiches (although I probably should have that time my dad hit me in the head with a wrench - nice little scar from that one, thanks Pops!).

I've been playing sports since I was eight, and of course there have been the inevitable minor injuries - sprained an ankle once, a floor burn or two and a potentially broken finger from volleyball, a handful of raspberries from softball, but those were just part of the deal. I had friends that were tearing their ACL's, breaking bones, getting awesome casts in festive colors, but me - I got nothing.

What I have found is that while I escape the major injuries I'm constantly experiencing little accidents. Megan won't let me live down the time I parked in front of her house, jumped out of my car to run inside and somehow managed to trip on the curb, skid on the sidewalk and tear a hole in my jeans. I'm sure if I allowed them, my friends could recount many more of these types of stories.

Until recently, I've felt relatively accident free. In the past four or five years I don't feel as though I've done too many stupid things or fallen unexpectedly. Granted, there still haven't been any major injuries suffered, but for the lack of dangerous situations I've been placing myself in, I'm getting hurt a surprising amount. Just in the last few weeks... I looked down at my hand and saw that one of my fingers was bleeding after packing up camp on our recent camping trip. I smashed my thumb in my desk drawer scraping off a chunk of skin. I've got an inexplicit cut on my knuckle that's scabbing over, I ran into the corner of our couch the other night leaving a mighty bruise on my thigh. Not to mention the slice I took out of my finger with the serrated knife while chopping onions (see prior post)... and to top it all off, I got a terrifyingly fast softball to the shin while playing third base at our game on Tuesday night.

I'm afraid that it's all starting to catch up to me. All those injuries escaped during my childhood might be coming back to haunt me. If this is the case, you might as well stick me in a bubble because I'm pretty sure the worst is yet to come.

My New (Unwelcome) Houseguest

Friday night, as I was watching TV in my room (yes, I had very big plans Friday night) I started to hear scratching above my head. It took me a few minutes to figure out what was going on, but then I realized that something was scratching around in the attic.

About a year ago, we had a similar problem -- rats had managed to make their way into our attic. My dad solved the problem by littering the attic with rat poison and eventually we terminated those nasty vermin! Unfortunately, one of the terminated rats was found underneath my mom's car as she pulled out of the garage. Needless to say, she freaked! She tore out of the garage, closed the door, and called my dad at work to warn him that the dead rat better be gone by the time she got home from work that afternoon. He disposed of the carcass, but my mom has never quite gotten over that morning.

I managed to sleep Friday night with no more interuptions from our guest in the attic. But, I had made the mistake of going downstairs and telling my mom about the rat - having become, myself, a little spooked out by the thing. She had to load her car up Friday night for an early morning photo shoot on Saturday and couldn't stop picturing the rat underneath her car from the year before. I got in a little bit of trouble for (unintentionally) freaking her out.

If it hasn't been made clear by now, my dad was out of town this weekend - so our rat exterminator was not available. Saturday night, I crawled into bed and proceeded to be woken up about every 15 minutes from 2 am to 7 am by the guest upstairs. At one point I was convinced the rat was going to gnaw a hole through the ceiling and fall into my bed. This was enough to keep me from sleeping soundly the rest of the night, in addition to the loud noises above my head.

So, here's how my Saturday night went. Fifteen minutes of light sleep, then loud scratching wakes me up. I stumble to my feet on top of my bed and jump up and down slamming my palms against the ceiling. Then I collapse back on to the bed for fifteen more minutes of sleep before repeating myself. After about two hours of repeating this routine, I started thinking of alternatives - I made my way into my closet where I found an old volleyball of mine. I climbed back into bed with the volleyball in my arms and fell asleep. The next time my new friend woke me up, I grabbed the volleyball in both hands and threw it against the ceiling a few times, and then curled back up with it. It was one of the worst nights of sleep I've ever experienced.

I called my dad on his way home from Oregon, and warned him about the attic guest and that my mom was surely going to get on his case to terminate the thing as soon as he walked in the front door. So, he came home loaded with rat poison and climbed up into the attic. I still heard scratching last night, but it was much less powerful, so hopefully the poison is weakening this guest of mine already. I also forced my dad to assure me that there was absolutely no way the rat could gnaw his way through my ceiling.

Now, apparently I just have to wait until it drops onto my mom's car. :)

Dear Conditioner

Why on earth can you not manage to last half as long as your dear friend Shampoo? I mean, just look at Salt & Pepper, they've got it totally figured out. One salt shaker lasts equally as long as a pepper shaker (unless you are my dad, who feels the necessity to drown every item of food in gallons of pepper - but that's a rare case, not to mention disgusting). But you and Shampoo have some serious work to do. I shouldn't have to buy two bottles of you for every bottle of Shampoo that I buy.

I don't mind if you are bigger than Shampoo so that you last as long... but maybe you have a complex about being so much larger than Shampoo? Get over yourself, Conditioner, everyone loves you more anyways. It is you, Conditioner, that makes my hair silky smooth and shiny. Shampoo has got nothing on you - EXCEPT that Shampoo has the longevity factor that you can't seem to get a grasp on. You must understand that you are thicker and you don't make suds like Shampoo, therefore a dollop of you doesn't go nearly as far as Shampoo.

Who can buy Conditioner without feeling it necessary to buy your counterpart Shampoo? Not I. My shower is filled with half-empty bottles of Shampoo and one sole, rapidly depleting, bottle of Conditioner. You are a duo that should not be separated, but I am starting to think that I am simply going to have to start buying extra of you to make up for this problem. And this is not a solution that I appreciate.

So, Conditioner, I beg of you -- get your act together and banish this problem I have.

Love (for now),
Jamie

It Should Come With A Warning Label

The new Weepies album "Hideaway" should definitely come with a warning label. I'm a big fan of The Weepies and I bought their new album last weekend before our road trip to Santa Barbara. Unfortunately, it wasn't really that kind of road trip so we didn't listen to the album- instead we listened to a really awesome 6 hour mix I made. So, when I got back to the Bay on Sunday I was really anxious to start listening. I got in a few tracks on the way to Burlingame for dinner with Ryan and Lailah on Monday night, but come Tuesday I still hadn't heard most of the album.

So I plugged in the iPod as I jumped in my car to head to my softball game. I figured I could listen to the remaining tracks to and from the field (which is less than ten minutes from my front door). As I got ready to turn onto 101N I saw that traffic was stopped. So, feeling pretty awesome for knowing the backroads, I decided I'd take them through Redwood Shores to avoid the freeway and traffic. It was an absolute success until I got within 100 yards of the field.

I sat stopped at the last light before the field. I was hanging out in the right hand lane enjoying my Weepies. The light turned green and the trail of cars started chugging forward. Suddenly I realized I was on the on-ramp to the freeway two lanes to the right of where I needed to be. Because traffic on 101 was so heavy there was no way for me to get over two lanes in the 20 feet before we entered "no turning back" territory. So, I slowly inched on to the freeway. As I drove past the field I laughed at myself for being so ridiculous as I imagined my teammates watching me creeping by the field on the freeway.

I finally made it down to the next exit and turned around to get back on 101 heading the other direction (which had much less traffic at this time of day). I was cranking my Weepies again and enjoying life as I drove past the field one more time before my exit. I exited and headed left. It was just seconds too late that I realized the left hand lane doesn't take you East over the overpass, but instead takes you down to the next exit. Again, I had to take the backroads through Belmont this time, to get back to the overpass I had just driven under twice.

I finally made it to the field, had just enough time to lace up my cleats and then I was running to the batter's box.

I was that car on the road that just kept driving past its destination but couldn't actually manage to get there. Back and forth on 101 I drove, while my teammates sat at the field totally unaware that I was just on the other side of the fence passing by on the freeway.

Pretty much, I blame The Weepies.

Jamie Lynne Morris

That's my name. Take note. Not because I'm going to be famous one day or anything, but because I’m under the impression that it's a simple name. I have always thought that it was relatively hard to misspell or mispronounce. BUT, oh how wrong I was. So, I'm just asking that everyone take a nice little glance at how the letters combine and in what order.

I have to hand it to my parents; they did a pretty good job picking names for Ryan and me. Our names aren't unusual in any regard, but they aren't overused either, like many of the popular names of my generation. My only real complaint growing up was that it wasn't very easy to make a nickname out of Jamie. People have tried over the years, and a few have stuck, but for the most part, I'm just Jamie. And, at the age of 24, I'm quite happy with it. But in middle school, it was a different story.

At that age, there was this desire to find something unique about your name. There was one girl at our school that wanted to be unique so badly that she started spelling her name differently. She went from Jackie to Jakki. Her poor parents. My attempt was much less successful. Growing up, I had accumulated only two nicknames thus far, neither of which was exactly impressive – Jamerz and Jamie from Nebraska. So, I tried to get people to start calling me J.J. Just the thought of it makes me shudder. Fortunately, no one else saw the relation (noting the obvious - that there is no other “J” in my name) and it never caught. In fact, I don’t think a single person ever called me J.J. At the time, I was very disappointed.

I got over trying to force a nickname upon myself, and learned to just like being referred to as Jamie. But the glory days didn’t last long. When I entered high school (which was about 65% Latino) I encountered some new problems with my name. Teachers reading off the attendance sheet started hesitating and calling out the name “himay” (which might I add is actually spelled Jaime) AND is the name of a boy. There would be chuckling among my friends, but after a few classes at Sequoia High School, teachers caught on and the problem diminished. I thought I had heard the last of it, until that fateful afternoon in June of 2002.

The week before graduation all of us Seniors were handed name cards. We were supposed to fill out our name as we would like it read over the speaker system as we received our diploma. Beside each word, we were instructed to spell the name phonetically (so as to reduce mispronunciations on one of the most important days of your life). My friends and I laughed as we filled out these cards, because we all had pretty simple names to read, “Sarah Hogan”, “Adam Klein”, “Chelsea Lewis” etc. But nonetheless, I filled my card out like this:

Jamie (jay-me) Lynne (lin) Morris (more-iss)

So, I’m all dressed up in my graduation robe, sitting in the bleachers with my friends (alphabetically, I was close enough to exchange glances with Miskelly and Milanos). Our cue comes and my row stands and begins filing towards the podium. As I hand my name card (complete with pronunciation guide) to my guidance counselor and step up to the plate, I wait to hear this name that I have grown to love announced over the speaker system. Instead, this is what I, my parents, my friends, my family, and the families of all of my close friends heard, “Himay Lynne Morris”. Wide-eyed, I looked my counselor in the eye absolutely stunned. Ms. Dolores Sleeper looked back at this blonde, pale-skinned, 18-year-old, and stumbled out a quiet correction “Jamie” (which to this day no one remembers hearing besides myself).

Thanks to Dolores Sleeper I’d finally gotten myself that nickname I had so long ago desired. I can admit that the whole scenario is really quite entertaining now, when I visit with the families of those high school friends, they all laugh about Himay’s graduation. And the name started sticking. At some point in college, the story got out, and the nickname expanded on itself. I was now Himay Gonzales (with an accent of course) in certain circles, which is so ridiculous you just have to laugh, and to this day I still have one friend who calls me nothing other than Himay.

Now, here’s what you have to recognize. Himay, is the phonetic spelling of Jaime – the Hispanic version of my name. So, whenever someone spells my name Jaime, it strikes a little nerve and I have nightmares about that afternoon in July and those mornings when attendance was being read. While this was not included on my list of pet peeves, it should have been. With friends, I’ll usually forgive an initial misspelling or two, but I’m quick to correct after that point.

At food joints where the barista or whomever asks for your name, I’m always more entertained with the various ways that these professionals believe my name to be spelled. They’ve run the gamut – Jaymee being one of my favorite. A teammate on my softball team had a sister with the same name as me, but hers was spelled J-Me, on her birth certificate. I’ve taken up this method of spelling my name whenever I feel that the five letters are just too strenuous a task.

We won’t even get into my middle name. That’s almost always spelled without the “E”, which I can understand, and forgive considering how rarely it is used. My medical records at Kaiser still have me listed as Jamie Lynn because I’m too lazy to go through the process of showing up in person downtown to change the record. And as for Morris, it has only been in the last two or three years that I have started to take a liking to my name. As a kid I hated my last name because my signature always went to the dogs after the M-O. Two double cursive r’s… that’s just never attractive. The way I sign my name now, it looks like Jamie L. Mom’s.

So, here’s another window into the weird way that my mind works. I’m sure it sounds a little OCD, but if people started spelling my brother’s name Rian, I’m sure he’d have issue too. Well, OK maybe he’s a bad example. Point is, I’m sure every one of you has had at least one name issue in your day (except maybe my cousin Christopher Patrick Tate – that one’s pretty hard to screw up) but hey I thought my name was easy too… so who knows?

I have been known to respond to any of the following, if I have missed any feel free to correct me:

J.Mo
James
Paisley
Jame-Jame
Himay Gonzales
Himay
Jamie from Nebraska
Jamerz
Sister

But one last time, for the record, it’s Jamie Lynne Morris.

What's the greatest thing in the world?

This question came about the other day. I understand that it’s a pretty loaded question, and that in order to answer it, you really have to understand what kind of person you are and what things are ultimately the most important to you. I had a really hard time answering it. This probably boils down to the fact that I’m utterly indecisive. I’m really awful at picking favorites (with the exception of a few things) and I usually cheat and pick my Top 5.

So, I did what any schooled person would do… I decided to look at my friends’ answers. I started sending emails and asking friends simply “What’s the greatest thing in the world?” I figured everyone else would have an equally hard time answering this question and that I would feel better about my own inability to decide. What I found surprised me…

The very first person I asked gave me one of my favorite answers. I sent her a message that just stated the question, no lead-up, no explanation, just the question. She responded seconds later with Happiness. As simple as that. The more people that responded, the more intrigued I became with how their answers corresponded with their lives and their personalities.

Ask yourself the question, what’s the greatest thing in the world to me, and just pay attention to the kinds of answers that run through your mind. For me, it was all of these little pleasures (cheesecake, laughter, long showers, etc.). But when it came down to picking the big ideas, I got overwhelmed; it starts to feel so definitive.

I also found myself expecting certain answers from certain people. I knew my family would say something about God. I figured a couple of my love-struck friends would mention Love in one way or another. And at the same time, things I had known about certain people or their circumstance were affirmed through the less expected answers they gave me. My friend who is just finishing up law school, commented on the value of a good night’s sleep. :) Another chose “imagination” and was quick to explain that without imagination we are no different from any other species. A recent college grad mentioned how great “experiencing new things” is. Others simply jumped with the first thing that came to their mind, which was surprisingly usually a food item – pizza, chocolate and strawberries all making that list.

So here’s what some of my close friends and family deemed the greatest things in the world:

Happiness
Experiencing New Things
Real, Honest Laughter
Friends & Family
My Husband
Courage
A Good Night’s Sleep, When You’ve Worked Really Hard
The Thing You Want Most In a Moment That You Are Least Able To Obtain
Jesus
Babies
Love
Family
A Warm Sun-Filled Day
Imagination
Optimism
The Strawberries I Am Eating Right Now
Chocolate
Bicycles
Pizza

I should also note that I didn’t really want to publish this blog (which I typed up a little over a week ago), but I’ve been getting grief from all of the people who gave me answers, so this one serves to appease the masses. :)

My Tumultuous Relationship with Root Beer

Root Beer makes me vomit.

I don't like the taste of Root Beer. True.

I say that it makes me vomit to merely emphasize the fact that I don't like the taste of Root Beer. False.

It's not an exaggeration or a method to help me convince you of the severity of my dislike for Root Beer. It's a fact. When I drink Root Beer, I throw up. Granted, I haven't drank any Root Beer since the last time it made me vomit, but would you? I think not.

Let's revisit the scenario from the last time I drank Root Beer, shall we? I was 15 (so now you have to imagine me being at least 4 inches shorter). I was at Lake Shasta on a houseboating trip with my high school youth group. The sun was setting. We had all gathered around the basecamp for a night of singing gospel songs and playing games (pretty traditional evening routine). As my competitive spirit starts to swell, we are all split up into two teams.

The first activity I sit out (not by choice! but due to too many numbers, you can only compete in one activity). I watch as my fellow teammates line up beside the other team (LOSERS!) and the first person in line is handed a large brown paper bag. On the count of three the first person in each of the two lines reaches into the bag and pulls out an object. They are now required to consume the entirety of the contents in their hand before passing the bag on to the next person in line. I remember very little about what my teammates were forced to eat, except that there were multiple jars of baby food in that brown paper bag. I can't remember if my team won or not (Shocker, I know, but I wasn't participating so I was less invested).

Activity Number Two. I am up to the plate. A handful of members from each team are asked to stand along the edge of one side of the picnic table, facing the members from the opposing team. So here I stand, at the picnic table staring down the person facing me. Starting at one end of the table and working their way down, the youth group leaders begin placing an object in front of each person at the table. As I look down in front of me, what else do I see but a nice cold can of A&W Root Beer? Oh great.

Rules of the Game. Starting at the head of the picnic table, both teams begin chugging the can of Root Beer. When they have emptied the contents of their can, the next team member pops the soda can and starts chugging. First team to place the last empty soda can upside down on the picnic table wins.

And, I'm sweating. The only thing worse than this can of soda would be a jar of pickles. But, it's a competition. What can I do? At this point, I'm more concerned with winning than I am with my own tastes. So I lift my head and growl at the individual standing across from me. OK, I don't really growl, that would just be weird, but you get the idea.

3... 2... 1... GO!

And we're off! These Senior boys just demolish these cans of soda, and in what feels like less than 30 seconds we've finished at least three cans. We've got two people ahead of me, and before I know it the person standing to my left has the soda can at their mouth and they're chugging. I just can't let my team down! He/she (how could I possible remember) smashes their can upside down on the picnic table and my shaking fingers are popping the top to my can of A&W and raising it to my mouth. Ughhhh... Just that gnarly smell alone makes my stomach lurch. I've got Root Beer running down my cheeks, splashing on my shirt, sneaking in my nose, not to mention pouring down my throat. I have absolutely no idea how I finished that can of Root Beer, but all I remember is smashing the upside down can on the picnic table and running for the bushes.

I cannot tell you which team won. Hopefully mine, but as the game finished up I was a little preoccupied upchucking into the greenery. I'll spare you the details, but lets just say it came out with as much force as it went down with. And, if the vomiting wasn't enough, I had Root Beer all over my shirt, my face, my hands. I smelled like Root Beer for the remainder of the night, and fought off the upchuck reflex for quite some time. We won't even get into the whole inability to burp thing.

It was a less than pleasant experience, and I haven't sipped Root Beer since that awful evening.

Book Club

I decided that my fabulous book club needed a blog post. We started our book club back in October (around the same time that I attempted to start a book club with some old high school friends - which after three months of me being the only one who read the books, was disbanded). But this book club has been a godsend. There are 9 of us in the group, many of whom I didn't know before the club started, and now I find myself eagerly anticipating the monthly gatherings with each of these wonderful gals.


We've read some really great books, and some not so wonderful books (It's The End of the World As We Know It), drank some good wine and eaten some fabulous food. And, if I do say so myself, we've got a pretty good dynamic going on and just the right number of people in the club to get some great discussions going. There is always a dinner (or brunch) which everyone contributes to, resulting in far too much food each and every month, and then just a lot of catching up and story telling.

Last night was our 7th book club meeting, where we had read The Diving Bell and The Butterfly by Jean-Dominique Bauby. For anyone who doesn't know his story, he was the editor-in-chief of French Elle, when he suffered a massive stroke that left him the victim of Locked-In Syndrome. Pretty much, he was completely paralyzed except for the ability to blink his left eye. And that is how he wrote this book - by blinking his left eye!



Unfortunately we had our first injuries reported last night. I came over to Lauren's (our host for April) to help prep dinner and she assigned me to chopping duty. I assured her that I was a world class chopper. Moments later, I yelped and after much blood loss and a little dizziness, I was back to work with a band-aid on my index finger. Lauren ridiculed me to no end (I think dropping the chopped garlic all over the kitchen floor didn't help my situation), but I had the last laugh because when opening a can she sliced her thumb and also returned to work with a band-aid. :)



April's book club was also possibly the loudest book club in our history. We found that we have the tendency to raise the volume around the dinner table to an unhealthy level. But, we also took a little time to get to know each other with a nice juvenile game of two truths and a lie. Where this came from I have no idea - well it was from Steph, but that doesn't exactly explain why we all agreed to play it, that could have been the wine. But I think we'd all agree that it has been a blast getting to know these girls both in and out of book club over the past 7 months.


The best part - so most of these gals know each other through their fiances/husbands/brothers (a group of guys who know each other from high school and college), a group which includes Ryan. When these guys realized that they were all sitting around with nothing to do one night a month they decided to band together and form their own club. So they formed "The Barrio" - a club focused on finding the best burrito in the Bay Area. http://burritorater.blogspot.com/. While it pales in comparison to our book club, the entertainment value is quite high.

Love these girls, and love our monthly get-togethers. Thanks for all the laughs, can't wait to see what next month has in store...

Book Club Members:
Ashley, Becky, Cary, Lailah, Lauren, Megan, Robin, & Stephanie.

Birthday Celebrations Can Never Be Too Late

So, for my birthday this year two of my closest friends planned a little outing for us. It is actually becoming somewhat of a tradition with the three of us. Last year they surprised me and drove me over to Carmel for the day, where we picnicked on the beach and then went to a daffodil farm and picked 'til our hearts content. It was probably the greatest birthday ever.

Here we are at the daffodil farm in Carmel Valley last year (2007).

So this year, after some minor scheduling delays and health issues, the two of them decided to try and out-do last year's celebration and we drove up to Saratoga and went wine tasting. The weather could not have been more perfect, causing Sarah to force us to put Tracy's top down on the way there and on the way back, so the hair was a little bit of a tangled mess, but we had a great time.

They packed another picnic and we ate out on the property at one of the vineyards after our first wine tasting. Then we drove down the mountain to a second vineyard, complete with roaming peacock (which was certainly Tracy's favorite part of the day) and did some more wine tasting before heading home. I pretty much have the greatest friends EVER.

It was an absolutely fabulous day, and I certainly can't complain about getting to extend my birthday celebrations into the month of April. Who would? So cheers to fabulous friends and wonderful weather! Thank you for yet another outstanding birthday.

Sarah

Tracy

And if you can't tell from the pictures, I was stuck sitting in the back seat on the way to the vineyards. :)

Cruel and Unusual Punishment

I'm changing doctors.

I had my first medical appointment yesterday for my extensive Peace Corps Medical Evaluation. When my doctor heard that I was joining the Peace Corps she started by telling me about some married friends of hers who decided to go to Cambodia and the husband came back with a liver disease that was slowly killing him. After she told me horror story number one, she decided to continue with this fright fest and mention all of the additional immunizations I was going to need before I left and how much they were going to hurt. Um, excuse me? Aren't you supposed to be my doctor? Last I checked this wasn't exactly the favored method of speaking to your patients.

Then I handed her the stack of medical forms that I need to get filled out in the next couple of weeks. As she began browsing the immunizations and blood work that I needed done she kept smiling and laughing and looked me in the eyes and said "you going to cry", and as she scheduled each injection and blood draw she noted to herself and her now very uncomfortable patient "ouch! this going to hurt" and "ooo! so many needles..." When I told her that I'm not a crier and I that I was prepared for the process, she said, "OK, well when you come back next appointment, you tell me if you cried. I bet you do."

As if all of this wasn't bad enough, she kept checking back with me to make sure I still wanted to join the Peace Corps. She even asked me if I could really ride a bike, because in Asia you'll die if you can't ride a bike well. So, Dr. Leung is out, BUT the process yesterday didn't end there. After her examination I was shuttled to the Injection Clinic where more joyous events awaited me.

In the Injection Clinic I was told I would be getting three injections, and was handed a form for Polio, Tetanus and TB. Let me say now that I don't like needles. At my old doctor's office, the Injection Nurse would always laugh at me because I can't watch them stick the needles into me, so I would stare determinedly at the wall over the opposite shoulder, and then he would give me a Snoopy bandaid when it was all over. I can handle needles, as long as I don't look at the needle or what is going into or coming out of my body. So the two Injection Nurses yesterday (after giving me these pamphlets) walked out of the little shower curtain enclosed room and started preparing my entourage of drugs. I guess they thought this little shower curtain was a sound proof barrier because the older of the two nurses began asking the other if she could do all three shots, or if she would like to watch the other woman do them this time. Pretty much, the woman who was about to shove three needles into my body was a newbie. Great! And now I'm worried...

After Polio in my left shoulder and Tetanus in my right and the TB test in my right forearm, I still wasn't done for the day. The new nurse did alright, not too much pain at the time of the injection (although I suffered all night last night from aching shoulders). So from the Injection Clinic I walked over to the Lab for blood work and urinanalysis. I peed in a cup (which I had been holding since I got to the doctor's - knowing that this was an inevitable part of the day's proceedings) dropped it off in a box and was asked by the lady standing next to the box "do you need blood work".

At this point, let's be honest... I'm tempted to say no and run the hell out of there. But I've got the form in my hand and it would have just been avoiding the inevitable. So I let her sit me down in a chair, lay my left arm on a cushion, and watch as she pulls out vial after vial after vial. Five empty vials sat there in front of me on this little counter. Instinct set in, and before she even had the stretchy rubber thing tied around my bicep I was staring intently at the wall over my right shoulder.

I guess maybe this looked a little bizarre, because the nurse immediately asked me if I was OK. I reassured her that I was fine, I just can't watch. This exchange took place about four more times during the process, but she managed to steal five vials of blood from my left arm before I left the doctor's.

So, in less than two hours I had three injections, five vials of blood drawn, a cup full of pee and three Advil, not to mention the strong desire for a new doctor. And this was only Day One of the process... I go back in 2 days, and again next week.