The Beginning

I thought it was time for a real home- some place where blogging was not only expected but accepted .

So fall is finally here!

this is a view from my driveway in front of the house. The screen on the my digital camera is busted, and I really thought I was capturing just the yellow tree- but I guess I like the juxtaposition. The yellow tree bares persimmons. I hear they are an excellent fruit for baking pies or jams- but the thought of using fruit that grew naturally and not fruit that you purposely planted for harvest is really gross to me. A friend of Mike's (the fiancee) swears he saw a bus driver have a kid get out of the bus in front of my house and pick some persimmons and then get back on. I have a hard time believing a bus driver would do that, and I have hard time believing this friend of Mike's- however, I really don't know why he would make such a story up. But, anyway. The main point is that fall is finally here. and I love it.

I have been doing my best to be a good fall participant. I hold pretty high expectations every year, but somehow end up falling short. But, I think I am doing pretty good so far. I have made chili:


along with drinking lots of warm coffee (but really, I don't need fall to do this). I bought apple crystal lite yesterday- which granted is NOT apple cider- but it's a calorie free replacement. I also got apple cinnamon rice cakes which are realllly good. I swear fall is not just all about the food for me. I have gotten all of my sweaters and warm weather clothing out of their summer boxes, and I have decorated my entire house in my fall decor. This weekend I also plan on making a Halloween playlist, as well as a fall playlist.

Yesterday I listened to Blink182 while driving home from my parent's house. I realized that they sort of remind me of the fall mostly due to two occasions, both involving Jessica "Hot Pants" Baird. For the first, during our junior year of high school we were both doing the play Arsenic and Old Lace- I was in it and she was the stage manager. Jessica not only drove that year but she had her own car. I am four months older than Jess, but I really didn't start driving until the summer after junior year which was also when I got my first car- but regardless- because I did not have acceptable transportation Jessica drove me home everyday after play rehearsal. This was - of course- during the fall months. To thank Jessica for constantly taking me home, my mother wrote her a check for the gas money she had spent. Jessica used that money to buy the new Blink182 CD- the live one...we listened to it every day. A lot happened in my life junior year. But, thankfully the one thing I will think of first is being on stage and Blink182.

The second time was the fall of my first year at college. Jessica and I had both gone to the University of Memphis. For some reason, and I really can not remember why I ended up riding with Jessica when we went home for Thanksgiving. I don't know if there was something wrong with my car, or if I didn't have gas money to get home, or if it just made sense to us to car pool- whatever the reason Jessica drove us both. I was having a very difficult semester and I was feel very down that day, but I tried my best not to show it. But, for old time's sake Jess whipped out some Blink182- and I am pretty sure that it all we listened to for the entire 3 hour trip home.

There is still so much more I need to do before this fall leaves me. I have to make something pumpkin-y. I need to have several more pumpkin spice lattes from Starbucks. I need to go to a corn maze and haunted houses. I need to catch Halloween Town on the Disney channel. And I need to create a new tradition.

School is going really great. I have this professor- Dr. Ryan. This is the third semester that I have had him. He's tough- you'll have to do some work- a lot of it. But, I take him because he really knows his stuff. He gives 5 major grades in his class a quiz grade (he gives 22 quizzes in a semester and averages them for your final quiz grade), 2 essays, and 2 in-class essays. I have never gotten anything better than a B on one of his in-class essays and I have never gotten anything better than a C on the out of class essays. We took our first in-class a couple weeks ago. I was feeling ok about it going into the class.....you see he gives you a sheet with like 18 possible essay questions. You go home and write thesis statements to prepare for writing about them....then you come into class and he picks 4 of those and you write on 3 of them. But, when I got to class the 4 he chose were the 4 I felt the least confident about. I struggled writing them- in fact I was still writing the third one as class was wrapping up and I thought I wouldn't finish. So, when I was evaluating how I did afterward I thought- maybe I'll get another B. We finally got the tests back last Friday..............and I got my first A. I was ecstatic. I even put it on the fridge. I'm doing pretty dang good in every other class, too. I think this will be a productive semester.

My goal is to write here every day. I don't know if this will be successful....but I am willing to try.