A Good Week

      Well, these have been a good past few days. On Tuesday the painters came, and now my living room is a lovely light grey with white trim. Much more up to date than the bland cream color it had been since I was born. Then Tuesday evening me, GC, KK, MR, and DK (and my mama) went to the Ag Expo carnival, which was fun but SO SO hot. And the rides were a little less fun than last year. But the animals were adorable. I could have stayed and stared at the bunnies all day. They were just so darn cute. And GC made friends with this tiny little goat named Sprinkle. Also the snow cones were divine. I'm not ashamed to say that I taste tested from all three snow cone places, After the carnival I spent the night at GC's house with KK and we watched (for the second time) The Longest Ride to get prepared for the rodeo which we were going to the next night. That movie is surprisingly heartwarming for a Nicholas Sparks movie. I mean, the romance is as cheesy as you would expect, but Scott Eastwood is so so good looking that he makes up for it. The part that's actually really good and interesting is the flashback side story about the old man that the main girl is visiting at the hospital. His love story with his wife was honestly pretty sad, but that made it more realistic. It really addressed the fact that love by itself can't make all your dreams come true. Anyway, I don't want to spoil it for you, but I do recommend it. I'd say it's probably my second favorite Nicholas Sparks movie after A Walk to Remember. On Wednesday, we putted around on the golf cart, priced stuff for GC's yard sale, ate too much coffee cake, and then eventually went to the rodeo. I had a great time, and hopefully everyone else did too. The food was delicious, the cowboys were lovely, and bull riding is a sport that I can really get in to. It takes absolutely no sports knowledge at all besides knowing they have to stay on the bull, and it requires absolutely no attention span. If you can pay attention for 8 second spans of time, you can enjoy bull riding. After the rodeo, we had to sit in traffic to get out of the parking lot for literally like 45 minutes, which was terrible because we were all dead tired and just wanted to go home. But eventually we did get home, and then I woke up this morning and had possibly one of the most productive day I've had all summer. I steam cleaned the carpet in the living room (the room that was just painted) and since I had to let the carpet dry, I was barricaded in my bedroom for a few hours. At first, the part of me that I inherited from my mother was like "Oh I'll just take a nap or read or something" but then the part of me that I inherited from my father was like "But you could clean your room because it's super messy, and then you could paint the desk lamp you bought a few weeks ago. And while you're doing that, you might as well listen to some educational podcasts so all your senses are engaged!" So I ended up doing the latter. And when I was done all that, I still had time left over so I did end up reading some of my book too. Then I had to move the few pieces of furniture left in the living room and steam clean the parts under them that I hadn't been able to get to during the first round. So then I was barricaded in the other half of the house, so I ate some lunch (it was like 2 pm at this point. Sometimes in the summer I kind of forget that my body needs nourishment and bypass the whole eating food thing...) Then I worked on some projects on the computer and made a lot of progress on them. Then the carpet was dry enough to walk around in, so I used the unusually high amounts of adrenaline I somehow had to move a bunch of furniture back into the room and then my Mom came home and I went over to have dinner with my family that came in from Montana and Kansas. I just realized that I spent way more time explaining my living room adventures than anything else, so I apologize because that was probably boring. Then I headed to FZ's house where a bunch of us were getting together for a movie night as a goodbye gathering for Cassandra (I don't know why, but Cassandra is like the only person who never gets referred to by her initials on the blog). We watched Monsters University. I saw that movie in theaters but somehow I didnt' remember most of what happened, which was nice. It was a fitting movie since we're all heading off to college soon (way too soon). It was also nice to just hang out with a bunch of friends that I haven't seen in a while. Unfortunately my fellow bloggers couldn't be there, since AB is on a missions trip and SE is in Philly for Orientation (eek!) so their presence(s?) were missed. SR wasn't there either which probably made SG cry on the inside all evening. Anyway, then I departed and DS and I were walking to our cars talking about how it's weird not seeing everyone all the time and how we thought this summer was going to be filled with times hanging out with friends but actually, we've kind of just been at home doing nothing. I guess my mind keeps forgetting that this is it, so I've been treating this summer like any other. Which is maybe a good thing, but still. Anyway, I think everyone is feeling the imminence of college a little too much right now, so I send you all hugs and deep breaths. Hope you've been having a good week as well.

P.S. Good luck at college Cassandra!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I can't wait to hear all about it. I'm sure you'll do wonderful things and take lots of adorable artsy pictures. :) :) :) <3 <3 <3

-VaughnDL