Hey Stranger!

Oh my, it's been way too long. I apologize for my absence. May has been a whirlwind. Kind of. At any rate, I've been staying somewhat busy/ill, so I've been staying away - to keep my germs from spreading to you. No one wants to be too close to a girl with a gross cold (I've learned the last few weeks, as people maintained a good 10 foot distance from me when I saw them...).

And now that the world has slowed down a bit, I feel like I should sum up my life from these last few weeks. It's kind of late tonight, and I need to go to bed, so I'm afraid the best I can do is give you a short list of the goings-on here.

May 2012 - the Haps:

My Birthday! I'm 26 now, and it feels so good. And kind of old. But generally good.
DC-Iowa-Missori-Iowa-DC. I flew to Iowa with a Congressman, a Senator, and my brother's boss - who was seated right next to me. Serendipitous! Ben, I deserve a cut of the raise you're sure to get after my friendliness and restraint on the plane - I restrained myself from being a total embarrassment in front of your boss. It wasn't easy. I was bursting at the seams, trying to hold the music in my soul from coming out in full Musical format for everyone to enjoy with me. You. Owe. Me.
Celebration Trifecta in Missouri. We celebrated my birthday (ice cream cake! so good...), Mother's Day (love you, mom!), and a baby blessing (Zoey, you are a doll) in one fun-filled, party-packed weekend. We of course celebrated with kickball, ultimate frisbee, turtle hunting, turtle racing, and fireworks. Z&J sure know how to show us a good time.
Stupid cold lasts way too long. I can't seem to fly places without returning home sick these days. Glad it wasn't strep throat again this time, but I haven't been able to fully kick this blasted cold since getting back. I've been working with sexy voice for the 6 days (it's a blessing and a curse).
Memorial Day Weekend spent at the Outer Banks in North Carolina. Duck Beach take two happened this weekend. I saw Boy from last year at one point, and it was super awkward, so that was fun. But beyond that, most of this year's experiences were pretty different from last year, mostly because this year I knew a lot more people, so I was less awkward in the many large group settings of the weekend. I put sexy voice to use when I could, and generally relaxed all weekend. Activities included playing in the powerful ocean waves, running away from ugly crabs who dared to near my towel, dangling my legs in the pool, getting to know new boys (and making some new lady friends - a girl needs his girl friends), {not} sleeping, doing a jigsaw puzzle (of course), and burning my skin in the only way I can - in weird splotches on random spots of my face and body. Awesome.
Job Interviews. Since my boss is retiring at the end of the year, other offices with scheduling needs have been asking about my plans, so I've had a couple of interviews. I won't lie, I'm not quite ready to quit my office yet...I don't want to leave! But it's been good to remember what interviewing is like, so this has been good practice, getting back into the search.
Selling my soul and getting totally sucked into the Bachelorette.  Which is totally more justifiable than the Bachelor seasons, so I don't feel quite as ashamed about it. I was ironing tonight (ironing! me! It felt so weird, especially because I was ironing, and I liked it...I know, I'm scared too), and watching the show on Hulu, and I was totally into it. I can't to tune in next week and find out who gets kicked out next. I hope it's Kalon and/or Ryan - they're total weirdies.

And that is my life these lat 31 days in a nutshell (not literally). And now, I'm so exhausted and falling asleep sitting up typing this (literally). So I'm going to bed. I'll do my best to not leave my next post until the end of June for a recap of that month...but this was fun to go back and relive it all. May was so fun! There's a reason why it's my favorite month of the year. And yes, a lot of that is because of my birthday, but it's also because good, fun things just happen in May. Hopefully June can keep up this year.

Anything that I missed recapping? I'm certain I forgot something awesome, but obviously I can't think of anything, so lemme know if you can!

A Birthday Song For You, But Mainly For Me (and Other Song References)

On this, my birthday eve, I thought I'd share a song with you that you should listen to on my birthday day - a song that is a new annual tradition for me to listen to on my birthday. I found it sometime last year, and I've since been counting down the days (which has been a long time, I found it, like, last summer...) until I could legitimately play it.

Sadly, it's kind of obscure, so it's NOWHERE on the interwebs in its entirety. And I'm short on time (I'm leaving on a jet plane in 4 hours!!!), and lacking a collection of pictures of my last 26 years, so I can't turn the song into a jazzy life montage of all my fun times on this planet, and then figure out how to put the montage on youtube so I could then link to it on this, my blog, and then later deal with copyright issues like all youtube videos for songs do. Otherwise, I would totally go all self-absorbed and do that, yo.

But I can't - so the best I can do is give a long explanation (see above) about why I'm just putting down a link to a clip of the song:

http://wpte.tunegenie.com/music/bleu/happy-birthday/ (click on the clip for Kate. obviously)

Listen to the clip. Imagine how great the full song would be. And celebrate a day of joy that is my birthday. Because when it's my birthday, it's everyone's birthday!*


*I don't really know what that means, but it seemed like something a commercial would tell you. At any rate, I hope you enjoy my birthday as much as I'm planning to! if anything, because it's on a FRIDAY FRIDAY FRIDAY!!!

The Muddying of a Care Bear T-Shirt

So, I've shown you how to make a Care Bear t-shirt.

And now let me present to you how to muddy a Care Bear t-shirt.

(Disclaimer: the actual muddying process was not caught on camera - because we definitely did not bring a camera on the run. It wouldn't have survived...)

Before:

 Care Bear STAAAAAAAAARE!!!!!!!!!! (You'll just have to imagine the rainbow beams shooting out of our stomachs...the camera couldn't catch the light properly...and I'm not that proficient with PhotoShop)

I totally got peer-pressured into the little care bear ears/pigtails. But they turned out cute enough, and stayed in the whole race, so I can't complain too much about it. That said, I should never be a speaker during DARE week to help kids stay strong against peer pressure (do schools still use that program?!)...

 The Mighty Care SpiderBear...Friend Bear shoots spiderwebs of friendship to engulf her friends so they can never leave her - friends don't let friends get far!

And After:

Most of the mud comes right at the end - in the big mud pit you have to crawl through to get to the finish line. Turns out, muddy water is just as chilling as clean water, when it's kind of cold outside...brrrr.

Care Bears are tough. Don't be fooled - they're still bears...Grrrrr!

 And this is the cross-over show the Care Bears are in talks of doing - Care Bear Wrestlemania!

These guys were crazy. They had just finished running while we were getting ourselves put together. They stopped for a photo blitz near us, and people kept asking to take their picture, so they were there posing forever. So of course, we jumped on the bandwagon and asked for a picture with them. I couldn't decide if I thought they were hilarious, or if I wanted to throw up from their nasty speedos. The guy on the end by me was doing these deep, meditative breaths - because, you know, it's hard work holding up all the air in the sky.

Some Highlights:

Running into friends unexpectedly before and after the race

The WWE guys - total hams for the camera. And we fed their egos.

The string jungle that we had to get through Entrapment style (not really). At the end, Jillian was still in it and yelled to me, "Friend bear - help a friend out!" Thanks for keeping me true to my tummy symbol, J.

Our calls to keep us together - "Care Bears Unite!" Pretty sure that's not from the show or movies, but we liked it anyway

The sunshine that came out for 5 minutes after we finished - if that was all the sun we'd get, we got it at the perfect time

My silky smooth skin after the mud bath at the end

The lake we cleaned off in - not as cold as it probably was for the earlier racers!

Totally got dunked in the water by one of the aforementioned friends we ran into. NOT COOL. Very cold, in fact.

FIVE GUYS FOR LUNCH! Sooooooo good

Getting to use my care bear ribbon that I've carried with me for the last 8 years of my life, just knowing there would come a time when it could be a legit part of an outfit. It was tied around my ponytail, but when I got suckered into pigtails, I tied the ribbon around my wrist. After every obstacle, I raised my arm and the ribbon brought us together and running again.

This was definitely one of the more fun races I've run in my life. Slight burns, bruises, and cuts aside, I had a blast. Here's to repeating it next year! Though hopefully it will be a wee bit warmer then...