i went downtown today to have lunch at the roaring fork with the three big-wigs from design reactor. it was a party of four: me, the ceo, the president, and the key strategist. someone in my head is singing that seasame street favorite "one of these things is not like the other one"

as i waited for the rest of my lunch bunch to arrive i had to hold back the giggles watching tens of hundreds of thirty-something men saying things like "business plan" and "hows the PL on that". they all walked by wearing their starched button down shirts and black pants with shiny belts. its just so out of my realm! its a big day at apple if someone actually has on a belt... and an even bigger day if the belt matches their shoes.

the meeting went really well and i formally handed over my signed offer letter. i am really excited about their plans for austin and i have a good feeling about this new venture.

i strolled back into work, slowly slipping into a food coma from the delicious lunch, and stopped cold when i saw a giant sign meant to encourage us to start out this new quarter strong. it said "pick up the pace!!" and was on a table of complimentary chips and salsa. so ask me again if i'm gonna miss this job....

i know i keep making empty promises that i'm going to stop making fun of the people i work with and how dorky they are, but in two weeks i'll be working solo and i'll have much less material to work from.

i came to work this morning and was greeted by flyers everywhere announcing the new "apple chess club". now i can respect someone's desire to play a nerdy game like chess, and when i'm 80 i am sure i will enjoy a rousing 'check mate', but at work?? what is going on here?

the newly formed club is going to meet on mondays at 7pm... after work....but in one of the work meeting rooms. um... yeah. the flyer also says its "byob" (bring your own board) and that "beginners to pro are welcome". what the heck does that mean? is there such a thing as a professional chess player??

nerds. i work with nerds.

i was so excited to find out this weekend that our wedding video is almost complete!! they have posted our "highlight video" online if you want to check it out: go here!

i have watched it probably 10 times and if i'm being totally honest- i started crying before it even started playing the first time : ) it just completely captures how HAPPY we were that day.

my fortune cookie last night read: A man does not know what he is capable of until he tries.

i gave my two weeks notice this morning at work. on my 28th birthday i will begin a new adventure at design reactor.

i will have to adjust to life without constant chatter of 100 other people in my hometown of cubeville. life without a rearview mirror on my computer to stay on top of things. being miromanaged to the point where i am told exactly how many phone calls i am required to make in a day. life without an access badge attached permanently to my hip.

i'm going to have to get used to life downtown in the hustle & bustle of austin, relying independently on myself for results and success. life at an agency surrounded by creative people doing really interesting work. answering to the president directly on how things are going and if i am going to hit my targets.

whew... gotta take a deep breath.

i should be ashamed of myself, but you HAVE to read this - click here

confessions of a 28 year-old newlywed sales girl:

- i fake cell phone calls when i don't want to talk to people in public. yes, even you.*
- i rudely honk at bad drivers and curse at them for doing things i did two miles back.
- i make excuses for my music choices when people get into my car and my stereo is blasting christian music.
- i look inside the kleenex after i blow my nose.
- i pretend to make fun of kevin when he wants to go to the macaroni grill but i secretly love their eggplant parmesan.
- in classes at the gym i secretly hope other people in the class are jealous of me.
- i was recently offered a job by a company that apparently has more faith in me than i have in myself. and thats a shame.
- i've never spent more than $50 on a pair of shoes in my life... and no one that matters cares.
- when julie told me the compliment her mom gave me after her rehearsal dinner, i prentended to laugh and shake it off, but i think about it often because it is one of the nicest compliments i've ever recieved
- i secretly registered for wedding gifts cheesy people would want to give and returned them all
- i don't pray enough. even though i always feel better, act better, love better when i pray more often.
- i wear pajamas so seldomly that i almost always forget to pack them on trips- even to my inlaws' house.

so what's your confession?

*today's post inspired by post secret

my weekend in pictures...

i spent exactly 3 1/2 hours cleaning out my closet yesterday. it was a frighteningly large endeavor but now, the fruits of my labor are a clean and organized closet of clothes i actually want to wear!

i got rid of roughly 1/4 of my clothes and am still a little heavy on the casual wear, but i saw the error of my ways when i counted 36 t-shirts in the stack. now we're down to a respectable 12. the good thing about cleaning out my closet when kevin is gone is that i can't use him as a distraction to avoid all of that work... and no one is around to see that i'm wearing my wedding veil while i'm doing it.

the hard things to get rid of are the sentimental clothes. i have held on to a pair of jeans since my senior year of high school. i wore them through college, kept them as my hopefull "skinny" jeans through the heavy years, and rejoiced when weight watchers got me back to the point where i could slip them on. i thought they were SO cool when i bought them. they are all torn up and patched and soft. i wore them with pride to a jackopeirce concert in college- i remember looking at myself in the mirror in collins room 403 thinking, "oh yeah these jeans are HOT." that was the night the lead singer gave katy a hug and we put their bumper sticker on my car and drove around for hours.

i've packed them up and moved them around austin with me and now i'm finally getting rid of them. its hard to let go of all of that!

saturday was the day of football at the burpo house. we are not really sports spectators - we lean more heavily on the participation side of things. it is rare that we would both sit down and actually watch more than one football game in a row (especially on a saturday with gorgeous cycling weather) but there were so many great games on! casey was so excited that tech AND baylor won that he had a little too much shiner and sacked out on the couch.

and yes, i am working on getting an actual digital camera and not subjecting you to crappy picture phone pics anymore!

i was driving down the drag yesterday looking for a place to park and i noticed something interesting. and, no, it wasnt the requisite 'homeless' twenty-somethings with dreadlocks selling trinkets made of some form of hemp with a cute little puppy tied to what is probably a hemp rope. they are always there.

i parked and started searching my car for loose change when i noticed that the street went:
metered parking spot, metered parking spot, metered parking spot, handicap spot.

am i the only jerk out there thinking, "hey! how come the handicap spot doesn't have a parking meter?"

oh... i guess i am. crap.

i love this picture of kevin and i enjoying ourselves at rusty and andrea miller's wedding.

what i did this weekend
by casey burpo

when momma told me i was going to get to go to dad's bike race with her i was soooo excited i almost wagged my tail off my butt, but when we got there it was so hot all i could do was pant and drink water.


i even tried to hide under a big suburban to get away from the sun, but it didn't help much...


so i just kept drinking more water. mom thought i looked like a giant gerbil, but i didn't care b/c that ozarka goodness was the only thing keeping me alive. it is HOT!


i was so tired by the time we got home i tried sleeping anywhere i could... but dad's face is not nearly as comfortable as it looks.


ahhhh, much better! snug as a bug in a rug


but now its monday again and i'm bored. but at least i'm not hot!

why i would prefer to live in texas rather than new jersey based entirely on reality television.

first of all i would like to point out that people on reality television from texas are attractive!

the first reality show celeb i was particularly happy to see hailing from our great state- shannon from the inaugural season of 'the bachelor'. was it just me, or was she not awesome!? she had a cute weimaraner and she wasn't taking no crap from nobody. she was a classy gal who wasn't sure about the whole premise of the show and was not sad to see alex go when he chose the easy girl from kansas instead. (shame on you kansas, i thought you had better morals than that)

this brings us to the amazing race. now some of you may remember that my sister and i tried out for this show, made it to the second round of interviews, were not chosen and subsequently no longer can bring ourselves to watch it- but for a season or two i was all over that show. blake and paige from season two were the runner-up arlington natives who were just to cute for their own good. i mean you have to be at least a little mean to win those shows.

kelly clarkson. need i say more? the girl is now the queen of the "angry but thoughtful white girls who sing the verse of the song and kinda scream the chorus" genre. plus she's one of what my husband refers to as "skinny big girls" and she's proud of it!

any fans of the apprentice out there? amy was the best- and represented for texas in a big way. she was the last woman standing on the apprentice's first season and the only remotely racy thing she did was make-out with one of her fellow contestants... and who can blame the girl for wanting a little tongue?

my pride of texans on reality tv did falter quite a bit with the release of "sheer dallas" on TLC. i choose to believe that the people on that show, while they may be representative of dallas, are not representative of texas. i also only saw one episode of the show... so i do not have enough knowledge to speak to the matter properly. i realize this show puts my entire theory into question, but i must press on.

now i would like to take a moment to explain why i chose new jersey as my example of a state i would not want to live in, based entirely on reality television. i will admit upfront that my choices of shows for this section is questionable at best as they are both on MTV. the first being "real life" and the second being "my super sweet sixteen".

last year an episode of real life aired called "i'm in a summer share" all about people who rent houses together on the jersey shore. this was my first real introduction to jersey 'style' (which i put in quotation marks because i do not believe it is actually style-ish).in case you missed this groundbreaking documentary on shore rats, let me catch you up. acrylic nails, big hair, horrible accents, guido beefy guys, etc. all i can say is, "ew."

on to the latest episode of sweet sixteen. this show is horrible and it mainly focuses on brats who are unappreciative and selfish... but man they can throw some great parties! that is, up until last week. this episode featured a girl named "cindy" who is from staten island and lives in jersey. not only was she the usual level of brat/selfish but her party was crap!

yes thats right, i'm basing my desire to not live in new jersey (or staten island for that matter) on a sixteen year old's birthday party. but seriously, you had to see the episode to understand. her party compared to the others on the show is like comparing brie to ez cheese. its just not even a suitable alternative. the horrible accents make the show a bit hard to watch, not to mention the stereotypical overprotective brothers who would apparently rather get tattoos and groom their facial hair than learn proper grammar.


exibit a: a picture from the show of the big brother and the guy who came dressed as "prince charming".


i'll wrap this up by saying, clearly i watch too much television (or at least too much MTV) but i hope you will agree with the following synopsis: people from texas are generally cute and they kick ass on reality tv and accents from new jersey are ick.

disclaimer: for the sake of my argument i would like to admit that i have chosen to disregard jessica and ashlee simpson from this essay and my reasons are two-fold.

1) jessica and nick made a pretty smart move by signing the contract for that show. who cared about them until 'newlyweds' anyway??
2) ashlee simpson is not from texas anymore...at least if its up to me. she is so LA its ridiculous.

anyone want to play 'where's waldo?'

things observed over the course of a weekend at austin city limits:

- sweat... a lot of it
- a man who had actually worked his nipples into the design of a full frontal tatoo
- the decemberists are awesome
- millions of particles of dust dancing to the music
- the temperature gauge actually reaching 108
- a girl in high heels. i swear.
- franz ferdinand makes everyone want to dance around
- a middle aged man with a huge pot belly picking up blunts of smoked joints and trying to light them
- a sorority chick wearing a skirt as a dress...and i know this for a fact because i own the same skirt
- 65,000 people all getting along and enjoying themselves
- only one lead singer from a band actually wipe his sweaty shaggy hair away from his face
- hundreds of people roaming around with bandanas/towels/tshirts over their mouths to avoid inhaling too much dust
- every single band making at least one comment about how hot it is
- the whole crowd laughing while jason mraz played an oasis song
- wearing no shirt versus wearing a shirt makes way more of a difference then i would expect - and now i'm even more jealous of boys with bare chests
- girls spending WAY more time and effort trying to impress boys than necessary. (any girl who would dress up in jeans, cowboy boots, heavy necklaces, makeup or anything of the sort in this type of heat should be considered insane and ill fit to date anyway)
- my husband acting as chauffer like the sweet boy he is
- being in the sun for 6+ hours a day wears me out more than it used to

one hundred and eight degrees in austin today. i was outside for six hours of that. whew!

too tired to type...full review of sunday's experience at acl soon to come!

yesterday at the festival was awesome. the heat gets to you at first, but the breeze keeps your sanity in tact. it was definitely not as hot as last year (thank goodness) but it looks like today might rival those temperatures.

in short:
- the frames were rockin
- death cab was good, but didn't draw me in like i expected
- the walkmen were great- very hip crowd
- firey furnaces i did not enjoy. they kinda yell a lot and i spent most of the concert trying to figure out if the lead singer was a boy or a girl
- jet was awesome. they were so into entertaining, by the end they were dripping with sweat
- bloc party kicks butt. their songs make me want to dance around

commentary on sunday's bands and the choice of attire for college and high school girls soon to come.

i thought i'd take a break from all of this ACL talk to bring you this lovely photo of president bush actually asking condoleezza rice if he could go to the bathroom at a UN summit meeting...just in case you need a good chuckle this friday afternoon.

today's joke brought to you by brenda miele:

brenda: knock knock
mollie: who's there?
brenda: banana
mollie: banana who?
brenda: knock knock
mollie: who's there?
brenda: banana
mollie: banana who??!!
brenda: knock knock
mollie: WHO'S THERE?!
brenda: orange
mollie: orange you glad you didnt say banana?

brenda: orange you glad you didn't sell your ACL ticket???!!!


heehee

its a twister!!

people in austin have gone completely crazy. we aren't even in the real path of hurricane rita and already i hear the grocery stores are sold out of water bottles and batteries. the latest forecast is acutally much more promising!

in middle school there was some form of natural disaster approaching. it was either a hurricane or blizzard or something - i can't remember. what i DO remember is my mom sending my dad to SAM's to stock up on "essentials" and after an hour he came back with the following:

- 5 pound bag of snack size snickers
- 1 carton of assorted Robitussin cough syrups
- 30 cans evaporated milk

so i guess you could say it runs in my family to plan poorly for events like this, but i have every intention of buying a raincoat before i camp out in the mud for 3 days at zilker park. i'll let you know how it goes!

rita and acl are totally in a fight.

i have proof of how much fun i had at my sister's bachelorette party on saturday... a big brown bruise on the front of my hip bone from going down the waterslide head first one too many times.

i was cleaning out my hotmail inbox the other day. (i hardly ever use my hotmail account anymore since it is 90% spam anyway.) i ran across this email i sent to my sister last november after a night out on the town and it had kevin and i both laughing.

From: Mollie Donovan
Sent: Saturday, November 13, 2004 1:07 AM
Subject: yo

its 1am and i just got to kevin's house. i had to pick him up for the night b/c he started making white russians for himself at home at 5:30. (did i tell you about his recent obsession with white russians?)

we went down to fox & hound to meet up with friends and there were all of these columbian guys there who thought kevin was so funny and kept buying him tequila shots. i made the mistake of leaving him with those guys for an hour. who knows how many shots he took...

then we went to halcyon (the coffee shop with the yummy espresso martinis) and hung out on the couches and met up with some other friends of ours. it was a pretty fun night. except of course i was the designated driver and had to finally tell the columbian guys - named juancho and anjelo- to stop buying kevin drinks.

oh my gosh, can i tell you what just happened? i am sitting here emailing you and i hear the microwave start up and shout, 'hey kevin what are you doing?' and then i hear casey eating something. kevin is drunk and has decided that since he's hungry and making himself a quesadilla, that casey must be hungry too and fed him for the third time today. and no, i'm not
kidding.



heehee. it just makes me wonder how many of those silly nights we forget about because there isnt a random email to remind you. i wish i was better at journaling. there is just so much to remember.

ridiculous

have you guys been reading this stuff? so you're telling me if i get an internship at the banana republic, i could put "oversaw sales for a banana republic" on my resume and bush might one day put me in charge of U.S. trade with honduras? sheesh. *rolls eyes, hangs head in shame*

i went home at lunch today and let casey into the backyard. we both laid down on the porch and baked in the sun. the concrete was warmer than the sun for once and it felt so wonderful. the sun behind my eyelids brightened and dimmed with the passing clouds and it seemed like my heartbeat was in perfect synch with the vibrating of the air conditioner.

i could have laid there until the concrete swallowed me whole.

i love austin. kevin and i always laugh about how many people gush about austin whenever we are in dallas and then proceed to complain about living there (helloooo? move!). i know people have all kinds of reasons for staying put wherever they are... jobs, kids, etc... but we sure wish more of our friends who loved austin wanted to live down here with us : )

i'm so proud of austin today. not only has austin given more cash donations to the red cross than any other city in texas (despite that we are a fraction the size of big cities like houston, dallas, san antonio)... but now the community has turned out so many material donations, the city officials are actually asking people to stop giving. check this out!

i thought it was interesting to read what newspapers around the world were reporting about the katrina disaster. here is the link:click here

this morning i made it to the gym for a half-ass effort on the elliptical machines. i still can't run. stupid stress fracture.

after i had my share of pseudo running and cnn hurricane coverage, i headed home. i pulled up to a red light sweaty, tired, and ready for a shower. to the left of me is a homeless man with the requisite cardboard sign.

i have an internal struggle every time am in this situation. if only i had a legitimate distraction...i'm not on the phone... i have no one in the car with me... i have nothing to focus my attention on to act like i don't see him... i am just sitting in my car thinking, 'crap.'

i know enough to not give him any money, so i scan my car for food. my ever-present luna bars are scattered around the car. i scrounge up two and roll down my window. i said, "are you hungry?" holding out the s'more flavored luna bars. he comes to the car and says he isn't hungry and asks what the bars are. i said, "they are chocolate granola bars." he reads the label, says "i don't think i like s'mores, but thanks anyway" and goes back to his post on the road median.

then he comes back toward the car - i'm thinking, maybe he changed his mind. nope. he offers me a pencil. he apparently has a stash of wooden #2 pencils that he uses to thank people...

i politely declined. it was really strange. i guess beggars can be choosers.

i never used to even consider gas prices when taking the familiar trip up i-35. i just did the math and my round trip gas to dallas this weekend is going to cost $80.

so when you take into account i am making five trips to dallas in the next two months, that's $400- IF prices stay where they are today. ouch.

i would like to take this time to welcome my anonymous friend from "morgan keegan & company" who checks this blog more than anyone. even more than my mom.

crazy times around the burpo household (how weird is that to say/write?!)

life has been pretty hectic lately and i have a feeling its still only the calm before the storm. i've been working on throwing the baddest bachelorette party ever for my sister.

well, maybe not the baddest party ever, but the baddest party considering the circumstances. the circumstances being that i'm throwing the party for mostly moms that will probably get pretty drunk off of one glass of champagne.

i'm looking forward to it even more than i thought i would. my sister is the kind of person that is constantly trying to make everyone in her life feel incredibly important. i think its high time everyone made sure she feels that important to them. i'm actually really intimidated by the thought of disappointing her... i sure hope i don't.

i got back from seattle last night and was welcomed by the smothering heat of texas. as soon as i stepped off of the plane my face had a grimace - its just so stinking hot here!!

seattle was fun! the weather was amazing, the city is really cool, and our meetings all went well. i learned my lesson yet again that i should never go out late with my field partners. they can put away some serious alcohol! i was very tired yesterday.

i am definitely looking forward to the weekend - the last relaxing weekend at home before my tour of duty begins. i will be out of town for various weddings and showers four out of the next five weekends. (and 4 out of 5 doctors agree that isnt good for your mental health)

let me preface this post by saying that i have not watched an episode of "saved by the bell" in at least three or four years. i swear.

i was out riding yesterday morning and i met up with some girls to ride the "dam loop" which is a 50-mile ride from downtown out to lake travis and back. it is a beautiful ride. the pain of the ride comes in the hills- one in particular called the "dam hill" that starts at the bottom of the dam and takes me about 10-15 minutes to ride in total.

so as i'm riding up hills like this, i tend to repeat a song chorus or bible verse in my head (and sometimes outloud when i'm not completely out of breath). i'll say the chorus or verse one time while sitting and then one time while standing and on and on until i reach the top of the hill.

as i'm approaching the dam hill yesterday - somehow the chorus to a song from saved by the bell jumped into my head. i rode up this hill singing to myself "put your mind to it, go for it. get down and break a sweat. rock and roll, you aint seen nuthin yet."

its from the episode where kelly, lisa, and jessie decide to create a girls' singing sensation called "hot sundae". (the same episode as the much quoted "i'm so excited! i'm so excited! i'm so.... scared!")

the whole time i was just thinking, "where did THAT come from???"

check it out. i'm 2legit.

i am about to go to an offsite with my team at work. we are leaving momentarily to head to "the main event" to have pizza, play laser tag, and miniature golf.

it all sounds tame and innocent enough, but i am so not in the mood. not only that but i am beginning to lose patience with one of my co-workers and i really might kill her. no really, i might.

so if i call you later today, answer the phone. it very well may be my one phone call from prison - so answer, ok?

luna
Originally uploaded by molliedonovan.

we finally got our team picture taken for the luna bar website - i'll post a link when the austin page goes live : )

now i just wish my foot would heal so i could get out there and run with the team!

ok, i dont want to harp on how poorly dressed people at work are, but i can't help myself. i am certainly thankful for our relaxed dress code around the office, but seriously some people take it a little far.

i just saw a girl in the hall wearing black running shoes (you know the kind that a waiter would wear) with white tube socks. she had on navy leggings and what appeared to be a "scrubs" top. it was printed and cut just like a pair of scrubs.

i swear.

it was a regular saturday morning - i met two gals for a planned 45 mile bike ride. we headed off into the great unknown with a map in my pocket and returned 5 hours later, battered, bleeding, and tired in a stranger's pickup truck.

we were so taken in by the scenery that at about mile 15 we missed our turn and went another 20 miles down a road through the hill country. katie got a flat. it started pouring down rain. the map i drew in ink got wet and bled until it was illegible. casey fell off her bike. we rode farther and farther away from our route.

finally we flagged down a pickup truck to find out where we were. the nice guy (ironically named kevin) let us know that we were indeed only a few short miles from johnson city - yes, thats right, johnson city!

the guy miraculously offered us a ride back to austin and threw our bikes in his truck bed. thank goodness for crew cabs! he was an arborist and he was actually working, so we learned how to properly unload a trailer full of brush, that chickens like to eat other injured chickens, and so much more! : )

thankfully we found a safe way home and had lots of laughs along the way, despite the series of unfortunate events. i just wont be planning any trips out to the hill country again any time soon.

i was making a salad yesterday (my usual lunch) and i pulled the bag of salad out of the fridge. i am lazy and therefore buy pre-packaged salads that come with a little bag of walnuts and cranberries inside to make my life a little bit easier. i opened the salad bag and when i poured it into the bowl - i realized they had accidentally included two of the goodie bags in my salad.

i actually exclaimed "woohoo!!" out loud and then realized i was really glad no one else was around to see that...

my dog has fleas.

no, this isnt the intro to a cheesy country song - its the facts. poor casey is a scratchaholic these days. i had to go buy a bunch of flea medicine and house fogger to get rid of the little bugs. i locked casey in the kitchen while the fogger settled into the rest of the house.

casey + the kitchen = a recipe for disaster.

he ate all of my bananas and opened my boxes of luna bars. kevin and i laughed and laughed imagining casey singing the chorus of gwen stephani's song b-a-n-a-n-a-s while wreaking his havoc.

there is a car dealership in town - champion something... i honestly have no idea what make of car they sell. all i know is, they have a radio commercial in which the jingle is :

who ya gonna call? call champion!

now, i am the first to admit that ghostbusters was a great movie... in 1984. yes, thats right, they are using the over-quoted tagline-slash-theme song from a twenty one year old movie to try and sell cars.

does this seem odd to anyone but me? who exactly is this targeted towards? granted, i remember the name of the dealership due to this ill fitting jingle - but i dont remember anything about their commericals other than the fact that they bug the crap out of me.

i just walked down the hall to the gym and it was the second time in two days that i have seen a girl wearing knee-high black leather boots... at work no less. i'm not even talking about semi-hip stiletto boots - these have both been circa 1998, with chunky heels and all.

could someone send these ladies a memo to let them know that: 1) its summer (in texas) and 2) those boots are ugly.

so the new look for the site is in honor of all of the green things i'm eating. i know its not very 'spicy' or 'hot ta-mollie', but its very representative of my life right now.

i would also like to say that men in suits are HOT. kevin and i went suit shopping for him last night and boy, the instant that jacket goes on, the HOT radar goes off...

kevin fell off the wagon and directly into the nearest taco cabana. sad but true.

me? i'm still trucking along with my new veggie friends...

yum

yum
Originally uploaded by molliedonovan.

my induction into vegan life began bright and early this morning with an 'ultimate meal' smoothie.

it ain't pretty, people. but honestly, even though the first couple of sips tasted like liquified broccoli... after a while it kinda started to taste o.k.

the vegan chronicles**

i headed off to the first meeting of the "beef up your inner vegan" challenge tonight. kevin came with me because he wanted to be supportive - and after hearing the overwhelming benefits - he decided to join me for the next six weeks. we are actually pretty excited about it - we went straight to whole foods and spent a ridiculous amount of money on food that will probably only last us two days.

its interesting what different peoples' reactions have been to hearing that i'm jumping on the vegan wagon - at least temporarily. people can be really defensive of their own way of eating without even realizing what they are defending. but i guess we can all be that way about some things...

in other news, i'm considering buying THIS shirt... as i'm sure it will get some laughs when i'm grumpy from my dairy withdrawl mood swings.

** disclaimer... this post written while enjoying the last wonderful drops of a ben & jerry's chunky monkey pint, effectively ridding my house of the last ounces of dairy. scary thought!! **

what a great weekend - i laughed so hard and had so much fun. it was just great.

we were at the lake with four other couples (when did my life suddenly become noah's ark at events?) and we just had a blast. its really interesting how quickly boys who don't know each other very well can become friends. why arent girls more like that? i so wish they were.

so here's to brittany and jay for having us out to their place! it was wonderful!

binge week...

i have been eating like crazy this week... i've had pizza...twice, nachos...twice, ice cream, and lots of queso. my six week experiment as a vegan starts on monday - i was having such a great time eating to my little heart's content!

then i saw THIS and really meat sounds like about the LAST thing i feel like eating right now.

i guess i can just think of that anytime i start craving dairy or meat... yeah. i think that will definitely do the trick.

well another week is flying by - we are headed to a college friend's lake house tomorrow after work to hang out with the baylor peeps. i'm really excited - its a fun group and i could definitely use a lazy weekend in the sun.

in other news, i got a soccer mom haircut. sad but true... i'll get used to it soon enough but for now i'm going to keep looking in the mirror thinking, 'who is that lady and does she drive a mini van?'

ever since i read "mere christianity", i've been trying to be more mindful of the negative side of pride - and how being prideful can take fun, healthy competition and turn it into something else. i'm trying not to compare myself to others to make me feel good or proud of my accomplishments. (but MAN is that a hard thing to do or what?!)

so in the interest of not putting others down to gauge my own success....

yesterday in the triathlon i kicked last year mollie's ASS!

i did - i trounced her by over 17 minutes. woooo hoooo!!

the race was amazing - apart from feeling awesome and really shocking myself with my finishing time of 2 hours, 38 minutes - i was just so inspired by my teammates. they were so excited and positive throughout the race and they were so proud of one another - it was like a competitive-free zone. i loved the way that felt!

tomorrow is the last day with my team in training team - our race starts at 7am. i have to say that since i joined 'tnt' three years ago, this is absolutely my favorite team i have gotten to work with. everyone is just amazing and it will be a bittersweet thing to finish the race.

wish us luck!

bren and i went to a patty griffin concert last night to celebrate her birthday.

there was a girl there in a blue silk shantung dress. i swear it was a bridesmaids dress... but i digress.

patty just rules. she is so cute and sexy and can sing her little tail off. she has so many good breakup songs. i hope her life hasnt been as sad as those songs make it out to be.

it was definitely an austin moment... standing outside at stubbs, slight smell of bar-b-que in the air, nice chill may breeze blowing through, listening to patty sing backed up by awesome guitars and a rocking accordian. it made me glad to live here.