Not that swift. XO, Mer

Sunday, August 1, 2010

Katie

Katie is one of my very closest friends. We've been friends since we were very young. Katie's staying with me for awhile and we are having the best summer. Brunch in Eastern Market on Capitol Hill was one of our first outings.

Oh, I love you, Kate!

Christmas 2009

I spent Christmas with Spencer's family in St. George. It was a miracle I got there, actually. I flew out on the evening of Sunday December 20th - the same day I returned from Charlottesville. I got back at about noon, and my flight was at 6 pm. I think my flight was one of the first flights out of D.C. after the storm. Had I a flight earlier in the day, it for sure would've been cancelled and then I maybe would've never gotten out. People were stranded for days. It's amazing what a storm like that will do for air travel. All those people on the flights for a day and 1/2 were unable to leave.

I'm a horrible picture taker and take few pictures. I need to be better. These are my only pictures from that trip.

Crazy Kimball. He seriously is crazy. Spencer has made him crazy. He's the silliest boy I've ever met.

Darling Isabelle - who sometimes follows her brother's example and is very, very silly.

Love Spencer. Love his family. I couldn't ask for better and more amazing brothers.

Snowpocalypse Winter 2009 - 2010

Friday night of the first huge storm in December I decided I was going to try and beat the storm and make it to a wedding in Charlottesville. The girl getting married, Kathryn, is a daughter of another judge on the tax court. We've known their family since 1983 and Kathryn and I are the same age and have seen each other periodically throughout the years. I was going to be our family's representative (since my parents are abroad) at the wedding.

I started driving at around 9 pm that night. Hunter and I had both been at a standstill not knowing the best course of action. Finally we both decided (independently) we weren't going to sit around and let the storm get the best of us. We spoke on the phone just after 9 and realized we were both on the road. He was headed to Minnesota to spend the week and Christmas with Carter's family. Hunter was trying to beat the storm as he drove Northwest. I think I ended up driving right into the storm. It was not fun and definitely scary. I was white knuckled the whole way as I drove down there. I really should've turned around, but just after driving for an hour, I already felt I had infested too much and was going to push forward -- not a wise choice. I saw car after car that had either stopped or slid and then couldn't get going again. I know several people died on this road going south that night. They froze in their cars, I guess.

I somehow found and made it to the hotel in Charlottesville and pulled in at 2 am. I probably should've left my car just anywhere in the adjoining lots, but I was driving around trying to figure out where the hotel was and when I found it, I just pulled it around back and stopped. I ended up being pretty blocked in, but I probably would've been blocked in and unable to move no matter where I was parked in the area. Nobody came to plow for days. The most horrible part of this account is that I didn't even get to the wedding. Saturday morning I had no idea if the wedding was even happening. I didn't have contact phone numbers for anybody. I even sent a message to Kathryn on Facebook (we weren't even friends at this point) telling her I was here and asking if the wedding was happening. She couldn't believe I had come (I couldn't either) and let me know the wedding was happening at 5 pm instead of at 11 am and that the location had changed to the Boar's Head Inn in Charlottesville rather than the chapel on UVA campus, which is on this tiny street at the top of a hill. So I finally had the information I needed, I just didn't know how to get there. It just was an impossibility. Had I figured out what was going on, I maybe could've called a cab, but I heard the cab wait was 4 hours. The snow had stopped at this point (it had stopped at about 9 am that morning, I think), but digging my car out just wasn't going to happen. I was persuaded to call Kathryn's father too (like at 3 pm in the afternoon). Can you imagine calling the father of the bride right before his daughter's about to get married to ask if he knew of anyone who could give me a ride? There wasn't, which I knew. I just was letting him know I'd come. No one could make it -- only the closest family members were there.

It was a pretty horrible 48 hours -- I even cried and was mad I'd made such an effort to come. At the same time being stuck in a Holiday Inn with absolutely nothing to do and nowhere to go and no control over your life is kind of a freeing experience. I think many people felt the same way -- that it's amazing how the control we have over our lives is so easily taken away. I read, did some grading, did yoga, ate at the Applebee's next door, and bonded with others stranded with me. I ended up being able to dig out Sunday morning and headed back to D.C.

Here are pictures to document it all...

The craziest part of this past winter is that the December 19th storm was not the only massive one. We also had the even bigger (I think) one in February. School was cancelled for over a week.

Catching up on the last year (?) of my life.

When I started teaching September of last year, my life quickly became a whirlwind of trying to catch up on missing a couple weeks of school (I started a couple weeks into the school year), constantly trying to catch up on sleep and prevent complete exhaustion, and keeping up with my 1st and 2nd graders. It was a tough year, but one that I'm looking back on with fondness as I realize I probably learned a lot and I'll never have to do it again.

I'm confident that this next year will be much better. When I got the job offer in September of last year I was in NYC with my friend Loree. Somehow I never posted pictures of our get-together there. She's a good friend (and even put up with living with me for over a year), so I wanted to document our fun trip together. That weekend was really an amazing one -- I felt so blessed to have just gotten a job offer, to be in a great city, and to have such great friends.

These are pictures of our outing to Brooklyn. We saw Wicked that night, which was really, really wonderful. Thanks, Loree for such a fun trip!

Loree and Rachel

Looking at Manhattan from Brooklyn (I think)

Art?

Me and Ree on the Brooklyn Bridge

Ukraine and Russia

I put pictures in an album on Facebook. For those of you not on Facebook (I applaud you) take a look at a few of the pictures my mom just sent me.

It was a really great trip. Thanks to Hunter for being an amazing traveling companion. Especially since on the flight over I was completely miserable and sick and was up all night moaning and throwing my legs/body over him trying to get comfortable. Of course, he didn't even say a word.

Saturday, June 12, 2010

Nothing Tastes as Good as Skinny Feels

I'm trying to live by Kate Moss's motto. It's not working.

But seriously, I just love it when clothes feel loose. But making yourself continuously work out in order to avoid tight clothes is all you've got to do.

Some things to get excited about:

1. School's out for summer!

2. I leave for Europe in a week! SO excited for the cultural experience and also to see my parents.

3. I have a new camera and I love it!

4. Pasha ripped off his shirt on So You Think You Can Dance! They brought him back from a prior season and he is SO AWESOME!

5. Have been attending the most darling girls's bridal showers and am planning one for one of my best friends with one of my best friends.