a portrait

I began a new book on the airplane ride home from Chicago. It is James Joyce's A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. I've barely read any of it yet, but I must say, I LOVE HIS WRITING STYLE! So far, i've just been getting to know Stephen Dedalus. And I say it like that because I really do feel like I have been getting to know him. The way the book is written, I really feel like I can get inside his head. I know how he thinks and how he feels, not just what he thinks and feels. I love it! These are my favorite kind of books. I love the language James Joyce uses. He isn't trying to make his sentence structure or flow perfect or even make sense. In fact, for the first couple pages I was just really confused. But after I got through those, it all totally made sense. It's just a constant stream of thought. It reminded me of when I had to do journal entries in middle school everyday. Some days we would answer a question and other days we would just have to write whatever was on our mind for the full five minutes or whatever. It's a good book so far...I'll let you know what I think when I'm done.

Job #3

So I’ve blogged about my summer jobs before, but I have a new one! Since I’m done with my stint as an official nanny, I am starting a new job with the Town of Danville. I am a summer camp site leader or something like that. I’m not a counselor, but kind of like it. I do more of the organizational and logistical work rather than the grunt work. But, I work with the teen camps, formally known as the DesTEENation Camp! Haha…funny name. I am going to be a doing a lot of fun stuff with them this summer! We will go somewhere new every day, including places like the Great Mall, Great America, Aquarium of the Bay, Trapeze Arts, Oakland Zoo, Alcatraz, Pier 39 and other Bay Area sites! I’m really excited! I haven’t been to basically any of these places since I haven’t lived here long, so I’m really excited to get paid to do all of these fun things! When I’m not going to all these cool places, I’ll be working with other camps with littler kids and the summer of service camps. I’m really excited about this job! It’s going to be so much fun!

Friday the 13th!

On this glorious day in June, I had the strangest assignment ever. Today was the last day I was Alex Wick’s nanny. Sad day, but it’s been fun so I’m happy. This morning I drove to the Oakland airport and met Debbie and Alex. Then Alex and I got on a flight to Chicago! So exciting! We both slept for most of the flight with a little word search and Sudoku mixed in. There was a baby crying just about the entire flight and I wanted to die…it was so annoying! And the turbulence was a little ridiculous too. We arrived at Midway Airport right on time. We met Alex’s dad’s assistant and then he was off! Bye Alex!

I wandered around the airport for a couple hours. I bought stuff I didn’t really need. I bought a bag of popcorn to deliver to Lapondza at Ann Taylor. When I told her I was going to Chicago she told me I better not come back without a bag of popcorn from “Nuts on Clark.” I bought Bowfinger on DVD to watch on the flight home (just finished it and it was just as hilarious as ever). This is where the bad luck started…

My flight was an hour delayed. It was coming from Boston through a storm so it took longer than usual. I waited at the terminal and finally got on. When I got settled and we were in the air, my headphones broke. I’m really mad about it actually. They are really new! They still work, but the outside covering fell off. Ugh! Then, the woman next to me spilled her drink…on me and my stuff. My laptop case now has a coat of ginger ale and so do the jeans I was wearing…it’s kind of uncomfortable.

I’m usually not a superstitious person at all, but when the drink flew from the tray and onto me, I knew it had to be because it’s the 13^th. I guess I can’t complain too much though. I got paid to sit on an airplane all day! Happy Friday the 13^th!

Crepes de Paris

There are these really funny French guys who come to the Danville farmer’s market every Saturday morning. They make and sell crepes! And they are so good! They come from Brittany, a region in France and their crepes are strictly Brittany inspired. I’ve only tried one, which Melissa and I recreated at home the other night, but it was so good! It had bananas and chocolate with a little Chantilly on top. I think I will go every Saturday for the rest of the summer.

Water Balloons

I took Melissa to Blockbuster tonight and on the way home, the car in front of us was throwing water balloons out their window! We saw the first victim, a runner on the side of the road. Sad… but we sped up to see who they were, we didn’t know them. We were almost home and I had forgotten about the car completely, until I heard a splash directly to the left of me. HA! They missed! And then, SPLASH! Right on! They hit the passenger side! Melissa totally got wet too! I forgot that the back window was open…sorry about that Mel…

i've fallen part 2

bike crash

bump on the head :(

his arm is completely straight, i swear.

poor guy...

perks

i just finished the book i wrote about starting in my last blog. it is called, "the perks of being a wallflower." i really enjoyed it. it was a quick, fun read. it only took me two afternoons, which is the perfect kind of book for my attention span right now. it was about a boy getting through his freshman year of high school. it was kind of sad sometimes, and disturbing at other times, but overall had a really good message. it changed the way i think about a lot of things.

santa cruz

i went to santa cruz today! first time i've been to the beach in about 10 months! it was a pretty good day. solely for the fact the it was spent at the beach. i left danville at about 10 and picked my brother up in berkeley. we drove to santa cruz and ate lunch at the santa cruz diner. i had a cobb salad and taylor had some sort of sandwich on french toast. the best part of the restaurant was that they had trivial pursuit cards on the table. taylor is basically the smartest person i know. when we were finished, we drove to the beach. i made a few circle to find parking and then we walked to the boardwalk. we layed on the beach for five hours. it got really hot, and then it got really cold. we took a few breaks for bathroom and drinks, but overall got some really good tanning time in. i started a new book that you'll be reading about soon.
when it got too cold to stay at the beach, we packed up and drove to ucsc. we parked and walked around. they have a really pretty view of the bay. after we were bored of ucsc, we went to caffe pergalesi. taylor's friends' band from berkeley was playing there. we had some vegetarian dinner and then tempo no tempo's set started. they were pretty good. i left taylor in santa cruz and started the long journey home. it took me and hour and 30 minutes to get home. i am not used to a drive like that for the beach. i hope it was worth it...do i look tanner?

at the ball game

the angels played the a's this weekend! it's been so long since i've been to an angels game! it was nice to see them again. on friday night, my mother and father and i were on our way to oakland. taylor called us and said he was taking bart and would meet us there. we sat behind the first base line on row 26 and tried to cheer over the obnoxious a's fan sitting right behind me. the hot dogs were good and hot chocolate was especially good. there were a few angels fans to be found, which was a good thing.
the a's have a new rally movement. they call it "trumpet time." sound familiar? if not yet, it will. they played a movie clip on the jumbo-tron, and then the chompers, the elephant comes on the screen (i was half expecting a monkey). then the words, "if you make noise, he will come" come onto the screen. i just shook my head in awe. then the elephant is shown moving around on the screen and "trumpet time" flashes all around. the a's totally ripped of rally time! i couldn't believe it. but of course, it didn't work, because it was a copy and the angels won. go angels!

no more future blogging!

wow! i just tried posting a future blog, and the coolest thing happened! i set the time i wanted it to say it posted, and it told me it owuld automatically post it at that time! crazy! now, nobody will be confused anymore about why there is a blog that says i posted it on monday when it's only sunday. i think i'll 'past blog' this and see what happens...