Your Smile On Fire

May 2008 - Posts

• in which the jordyn is an idiot

  So I was sitting at the counter eating a grilled cheese and reading What Happens Here, and my dad was putting on his shoes and we had a conversation that went like this.

   

  Me: Where’re you going?

   

  Dad: I’m going to buy some new shoes and then I’m thinking I’ll try to find a pizza plane, and I should go out and do some jeps but I’m not feeling too motivated.

   

  Me: Ah. Well have fun with that.

   

  Pizza plane: (n) A type of radio controlled airplane that, yes, resembles a pizza.

   

  Jeps: (n) Um… how to describe this… um… airplane flight log stuff. Paperwork for pilots? Something like that. I swear I know what it is I’m just not all that good at describing it.

   

  *************************************************************************

   

  Also, dear friendlies, I need some help. I have been putting this off for a long time and now… well, now I’m kind of getting tired of avoiding it.

   

  You remember a while back when I gave up reading and writing for two weeks? Yeah. Well. During that time I decided that I needed something to do with the time I would normally spend doing that stuff and so I took up photography.

   

  It was fun. But seriously I don’t have the patience or the creativity to be a photographer.

   

  Still, I took some nice pictures. And then I took a pretty stupid one.

  

   

  You see? Do you see that? Do you see my stupidity?

   

  No?

   

  Okay well let me explain it. In order to take the picture I used this double-sided sticky stuff, that you’re supposed to use for scrapbooking, to get the CDs to stay on the guitar. Erm, duh, Idiot Alert. After many hours I managed to get the gunk off of one of the CDs (the newest and probably bestest one, Kate Voegele), but the others are still messed up.

   

  And so I am wondering, does anyone know a good and safe way to get sticky stuff of of CDs? Because these are four of my favorite CDs potentially ruined. (In case you’re wondering; Feist, KT Tunstall, Sara Bareilles, and Fountains of Wayne.)

   

  So, um, halp me? Puhleeeze? If you have any ideas at all? Would rubbing alcohol work or would it ruin them? Because I’m pretty sure nail polish remover would ruin them. That stuff is lethal. And what about getting them resurfaced? Would that be my best bet or would it even help?

   

  You see, friendlies? This is what happens when I quit writing - I end up being an idiot.

  Posted May 15 2008, 01:32 PM by jordynt with no comments

  Filed under: suggestions, Mr. Aviator Shades, confessions, writing

• my active imagination

  Omg you guys. You can find anything on the internets.

   

  Anything.

   

  Including that old tv show of which I have been trying to gather proof of for, like, ever. Flash Forward. It was on Disney Channel way back when? And I mean way back. Like before Lizzie McGuire or Jett Jackson (um, anyone remember that one?) back.

   

  And, guess what? It exists! ed. It existed.

   

  Honestly. Sometimes I think I invent these things in my mind and they never really existed at all, I just made them up. Some other things I may or may not have made up in my twisted up mind?

  • The Great Bamboozlement. It was a book and this family lived on a boat and they were river merchants? And the kids had to lie to the thieves who were trying to rob them or something? Omg it was great. I loved it and have been looking for it FOREVER. Now, thanks to the internets and Amazon in particular, I have found it here. But no cover, so I can’t be totally sure if it’s the right one.
  • This book about this brother and sister who went to live in this big old house by a lake with their aunt and uncle? And there was a creepy house by the lake also or something? And they made friends and had a wonderful summer out in the middle of nothingness? Yeah. No idea what it’s called so the internets isn’t of much help. BUT! If you ever read a book that sound similar to this, please leave the title in the comments. It was a childrens’/middle grade book. And oh how I loved it.
  • You know the book The Gadget? (The first ever book I made my dad read?) Well, I forgot about it for a while and somehow got this idea that it didn’t exist and I had just made up in my mind a story with two-headed frogs and killer dogs in it. But no. This book is alive and well.
  • This kids’ picture book that aimed to convince us all that fairies are real? I read it when I was little and thought it was weird. Or at least, you know, I think I read it. You guys, the aliens are maybe playing tricks on me again.
  • A book with little people and they eat acorns or have acorn hats or something, and the girl in it wanted adventure or something. (See? Do you see this crazy peek into The Jordyn’s head that you are getting?)

   

  That’s all the possibly-fiction stuff I can think of right now, but who else is wondering how this season of House (not to mention The Office!) will end?

   

  I know, I know. TV addict. It’s all part of the plan, as I cackle real evil-like. Mwaa-ha-ha-ha-ha!!

   

  In other news, both of my parents currently have reading assignments given to them by yours truly. Mom is supposed to be reading Sarah Dessen’s That Summer and Dad is supposed to read Nancy Werlin’s The Rules of Survival.

   

  And now I have to watch American Idol and hope that the Archulater is booted off.

   

  Hey. I can dream, can’t I?

  Posted May 14 2008, 08:59 PM by jordynt with no comments

  Filed under: lists, books, dorky pride

• overthinky

  Welcome to the second part of my 99 part series: 99 Things About The Jordyn.

   

  Thing Number Two:

   

  The Jordyn overthinks.

   

  The end, that is all, toodles, etc.

  Posted May 13 2008, 09:51 PM by jordynt with no comments

• i would like a shoe phone

  So this is the first post in a 99 part series (you know, like Stephen Colbert’s BetterKnowADistrict series?). And the series is called 99 Things About The Jordyn.

   

  Welcome.

   

  I know this is a huge undertaking. But thanks for pointing that out.

   

  Thing Number One:

   

  The Jordyn used to be obsessed with Get Smart. Um, the tv show, not the movie coming out starring that one guy whose name I have momentarily forgotten but I know he plays Michael on The Office.

   

  You know how Maureen Johnson (for all of you who read her blog) goes on and on about Abba all the time? Well I can be that way with Get Smart. The very fact that I have made this a 99 part series instead of the more popular 100 or even 101 is evidence of my love for Get Smart. (Which, yes, was way before my time. But whatever. TVLand used to play it all the time.)

   

  Here is a clip of the awesomeness. Behold! The shoe phone! (Am I the only one who wants one of those?)

   

  The show is very very awesome and also I am definitely going to see the movie when it comes out.

  Posted May 13 2008, 09:38 PM by jordynt with no comments

• family v. relatives

  Hey friendlies. You’re probably all like, What’s up? Do you realize you haven’t wrote in days? When usually we can’t get rid of your stupid yammering! Are you okay? Are you dead?

   

  Yammering: (v) See ‘yakking’, also ‘blabbering.’

   

  Well, no. I am not dead. I am fine. Just busy. Like for instance, there is the fact that I started working again. Yeah, I know, you’re shocked that I actually found a job after so many months of looking. Who knew retail and other low end jobs were so difficult to come by? And besides that, there was also yesterday.

   

  Which was, yanno, totally stressful. So stressful that I finally gave up on my art project and am sure I will not do so great on it. And for the record, it wasn’t stressful because of the art project. It was stressful because of the possibility that the dogs I am dog-sitting got into some Ibuprofen and then calling some vets and poison control and COMPLETELY FREAKING OUT. Apparently Ibuprofen is, like, the number one toxin for dogs. ABOVE CHOCOLATE! Seriously, all you dog owners out there - watch out. Do not, for example, leave a zippy bag of Ibuprofen in your purse if there is any chance at all of the dogs getting at it.

   

  Man, that was scary. But the dogs are fine. And I am fine. And their owners will be home soon.

   

  Okay. Well. Transition. (Also, I love how in blog posts you can just write the word transition and not worry about having an actual transition.)

   

  I was thinking today, when I was driving home, about the difference between family and relatives. I know that technically, if we’re talking about extended family v. relatives, they’re pretty much the same thing. But they don’t seem like they should be. According to The Jordyn Dictionary, they aren’t the same.

   

  Relatives are the people you’re related to. Your parents, siblings, parents’ siblings, grandparents, etc. Whoever you share a family tree with.

   

  Family is slightly different. Family is smaller. Family is the people within that group of relatives that you care about and who care about you (and not in the oh-yeah-they’re-family way you care about your distant aunt Sylvia. Also, does anyone have a distant aunt Sylvia? Because if so, what a coinkydink.)

   

  I don’t think that there’s a clear way to differentiate family from relatives though. It’s not that easy, but I know who I consider family and who I consider “just relatives.” For one thing, I know the family better. (The Family. Like we are part of the mafia or something.) I have funny anecdotes about The Family! I look forward to seeing The Family and wish I saw them more often! I call The Family! We keep in touch! We enjoy each other’s company! Most of the time!

   

  Basically I think that all you really have in common with your relatives is a branch of the family tree and maybe some genetic traits, but you have so much more in common with the ones you consider family. If you are older than someone you consider a family member, you probably have funny and embarrassing stories about them. Like maybe when they were little they refused to wear underwear or a shirt with their overalls. (Remember overalls? I used to wear them all the time. And I don’t even think I liked them, but my mom did and I think that was when they used to be “in” or whatever, because people would say, “Jordyn, I like your overalls,” and I would be thinking that I belonged on a farm somewhere. Nothing against farms, of course. It’s just that I wasn’t on a farm. I was in school.)

   

  Wow. I have certainly digressed and, as always, I’m not even sure if this post is understandable, but whatevs. Look forward to posts about The Family.

  Posted May 12 2008, 02:25 PM by jordynt with no comments

  Filed under: Lance Tankman, Mich, Rainbow Fairy, Reese's Pieces, Sad Loserville, Subway, Mother Dearest, musings, us four, grandma

• messages from the outer limits of our universe

  This was the phone I had before I bought the shiny new Env.

   

  

   

  Do you guys see it? Do you see the alien phone? Its outer-spacey blue color and diminutive size? Well! That is just a trick, just a slight of hand. Because, you see, THIS PHONE WAS MADE BY REAL ALIENS. FROM THE OUTER LIMITS OF OUR UNIVERSE!

   

  How do I know this? Because of the sound it makes when the battery runs out. It’s this wobbly, not-of-this-planet, we’re-totally-coming-for-you sound. And I swear the first time I heard it I was honestly questioning my sanity (I know, I know, how rare can that possibly be with me?) and wondering if THE ALIENS WERE ACTUALLY AND FOR REALLY CALLING ME TO THE MOTHERSHIP.

   

  You see, it happened like this. The Alien Phone was dying. I would be in the middle of sending a text or having a conversation or dialing a number and all the sudden it would just give up. Shut down. Kaput. It was really getting annoying. My phone, you see, was giving up on me. And keeping that in mind, I thought it would be no big deal to get a new one. I mean, I didn’t think The Alien Phone would go berserk.

   

  So I got the Shiny Envy.

   

  And I proceeded to leave my Alien Phone somewhere in my room, still turned on even though it was periodically shutting itself down. Basically I forgot about it for a while. I was putting music on my Shiny Envy, I think, and also texting with it. So when I heard this faint, wobbly, strange, we’re-coming-for-you sound, it kind of freaked me out. I was like, huh?

   

  I thought I might be going crazy. Nothing on planet earth made that sort of sound. NOTHING! So I thought, Jordyn, maybe you need to get some sleep. Maybe your imagination is going all sorts of crazy on you.

   

  But then I heard it again. And again. And oh dear heavens, I began to question my sanity. I checked the home phone, sitting on my desk. I turned my computer and stereo off and walked around in the direction of the sound. And I found nothing. So then I did a very sophisticated thing in that I DECIDED THERE MUST BE ALIENS OUTSIDE MY WINDOW. And I checked for them in a sort of ha ha, just kidding, I don’t really think there’s extraterrestrial beings out there sort of way. Which, of course, there wasn’t.

   

  BECAUSE THEY WERE CONTACTING ME THROUGH THE ALIEN PHONE. OBVIOUSLY.

   

  Of course, I felt really stupid once I figured this out, that The Alien Phone was low on batteries (and really honestly low on batteries, not just, I-feel-like-pooping-out-on-the-Jordyn low on batteries like normal) and that it was The Alien Phone calling me from space.

   

  Or, whatever, calling me to either turn it off or recharge it. Whichever. You know. It could have been the aliens. I wouldn’t put it past them, I mean they turn that guy’s dog into one of them so that the guy’s neighbor would shoot it and store it in his freezer.

   

  Oh, what? None of you ever listened to The Art Bell Show? LIARS!

  Posted May 09 2008, 10:35 PM by jordynt with 2 comment(s)

  Filed under: my past life, dorky pride

• feeling this way

  It is some sort of curse of mine that I always think I can explain things, that in my head the words always make perfect sense and the person on the other side of the conversation knows exactly what I’m saying when in real life all my words come out mangled and confusing.

   

  Writing isn’t the same thing. I mean, it’s great and I’m so glad that, at least with this form of communication, my meaning finds its way from me to the recipient. But it’s not as if you can write down the words in your head before you say them - even if you did, the other person would interrupt you or your tone wouldn’t be right and you’d be misinterpreted anyways. At least, that’s how I feel about myself.

   

  I feel as if I have to get permission to feel the way I feel - validation, almost. Like I should preface the “feeling” sentences with, “I know this is stupid, but…” Because it is. It always is. Emotions, mine at least, are always stupid. Or they’re not but I still think they are. Or I think other people will think they are.

   

  I’m not sure if I’m the only one that’s like this though. Because one time one of my friends was mad about something, but not really letting herself be mad, and she wrote me and email about it and when I wrote back I told her it was okay to be upset. “I’m giving you permission to be angry,” I told her.

   

  Which, oddly enough, is what I find myself looking for so much of the time. Someone saying that it’s okay to be jealous, angry, nostalgic, sad, whatever. Someone to let me know it’s okay to be mad when everyone else gets invited, to feel like I’m purposefully being left out. To tell me I can be jealous, can miss people, can be lonely.

   

  The thing is I should be like this. I shouldn’t need someone else’s “permission” to feel how I feel. But somehow I always think that my emotions are different from everyone else’s - like no one else in my shoes would be this petty, this upset, this jealous, this lonely, this happy, this ecstatic, this whatever. It’s like I feel the need to reign in my emotions, to not really feel them because other people might not feel the same as me.

   

  Is that stupid or what?

   

  Lucky for me, there are quotes about this sort of thing. And we all know how the Jordyn loves quotes. THEY ARE THE LIFEBLOOD OF CHAMPIONS!! (Please, someone know where this quotes is from. I hate being the only one who knows.) 

   

  Like this, from The Boyfriend List, My problem is I can think whatever I think but I still feel the way I feel. And this, from Tuesdays With Morrie, I thought about how often this was needed in everyday life. How we feel lonely, sometimes to the point of tears, but we don’t let those tears come because we are not supposed to cry. Or how we feel a surge of love for a partner but we don’t say anything because we’re frozen with the fear of what those words might do to the relationship.

   

  So this is my new goal, and sharing with the internets is kinda weird, but whatevs. From now on I am going to work on my emotions and not feeling like I need anyone else’s permission to feel them. I know! So touchy-feely, new agey! I am such the hippie.

  Posted May 08 2008, 11:31 PM by jordynt with no comments

  Filed under: quotes, life, musings, confessions

• i have awesome radio stories

  There’s a lizard outside my window, friendlies.

   

  In other news, have you ever wondered why when you put in a DVD of The Office (assuming, of course, you have DVDs of The Office) the theme song is so loud you have to scramble to turn the volume down no matter how low it already was, but then the actual show comes on and you have to turn the volume up as high as it will go just to hear what they’re saying? Yeah. That’s annoying.

   

  I’m counting how many books I have with the main character’s name in the title. Does anyone else do stuff like this? Probably not.

   

  The answer, in case you were wondering? Ten. Suite Scarlett, Saving Zoe, Serafina67, The Murder of Bindy Mackenzie, The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks, The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane, Harriet the Spy, The Alison Rules, and Hail Caesar. Jeez. I should have counted how many books have titles starting with the word the. Just because I call myself the Jordyn doesn’t make it okay for everything and everyone to do the same.

   

  You can tell I have nothing to write about, can’t you?

   

  Oh! Okay, so I just thought of something to tell you. Yesterday I was in the car, listening to the radio, going to the library. And anyways, some lady calls the radio station and the conversation between her and the DJ goes something like this;

   

  Lady: Am I late?

   

  Because this radio station is always giving stuff away. I think all of them are. Me and my cousins used to listen to The Impossible Question and try to answer it, which reminds me of a few more funny radio stories, but back to the one at hand. I’ll start over now because I’m sure you all forgot what the lady said by now. (Of course I’m assuming you’re all just like Dory.) Anyways;

   

  Lady: Am I late?

   

  DJ: For what?

   

  Lady: I don’t know. Just, you know, whatever.

   

  AND SHE SAYS THIS VERY LAID-BACK, LIKE SHE CALLS RADIO STATIONS ALL THE TIME JUST ASKING IF SHE’S LATE FOR SOMETHING. It was hilarious.

   

  And also it makes me want to tell more radio stories. Like this one. It was March 6th, 2007 and I know that for sure because I just looked up the old email I wrote Michelle about it. See, I write people random emails like this fairly often. And don’t even bother to ask how my mind works that I actually remembered that. I boggle even myself sometimes. Anyway, this morning radio show was asking people to call in and tell what their obsessions were. So blah, blah, blah, obsessed with reality shows, shopping, motorcycles, whatever. Then this guy calls in and the DJ asks him what his obsession is and he says this, WORD FOR WORD, “Well, I don’t know if I would call it an obsession, but I do know that before I started playing World of Warcraft I used to do other things.”

   

  Um, yes. I would call that an obsession. Worse, I would call it an addiction, but who am I to judge? Also, that was hilarious.

   

  Oh, and I do have one more radio story to tell but before that a little bragging. I got a 95 on my preschool observation!! Picture me doing a little happy dance (my happy dance, incidentally, involves me jumping up and down as if I think I am a kangaroo. It is very wonderful). No but seriously friendlies, this is awesome. It means maybe I will get an A in the class? One can only hope.

   

  And okay, on to the next radio story. I told you guys about how me and my cousins (and sister, of course) used to listen to a local radio station that had this thing called The Impossible Question. Usually the winner would win, like, a meal from Taco Bell or something, and Brad really wanted to win a taco. I’m not sure if it was about the winning or the taco (he’s a notorious cheap-o), but this is why we sometimes called in. (Well. He called in or Taylor called in. Not me. Maybe sometimes Mads would. Not me.) (Did I mention I never called in?) Back to the story. I forget what the question was this one time, but Bradis was talking to the radio guy and in the background Tay and Madisona were jumping around and being… well… loud. So after my cousin tells the DJ his answer their conversation goes something like this;

   

  DJ: Are you in a zoo or something?

   

  Bradisona: What? Oh, no, that’s just my sister and cousin.

   

  You guys. I am not kidding you. That is what was said. That really happened. Do I not have the bestest cousins (and sister, but from now on out lets just assume that 98% of the time when I say “cousins” I mean “cousins and sister”) ever?

   

  Yes. Yes I do.

   

  Also, Madisona will be 12 very shortly. Wow we are all getting really old. Before you know it we will be all married and what not and will bore our children to death with stories about how “when me and your aunts and uncle were little.”

   

  Oh crud, wait. Haha, they won’t be aunts and uncle! They will be second cousins! Oh well. We can just call them that anyways, right? Right? RIGHT?

  Posted May 08 2008, 04:36 PM by jordynt with 2 comment(s)

  Filed under: people, Lance Tankman, Rainbow Fairy, my future life, Reese's Pieces, my past life, blah-blah-blah, books, us four

• hates and loves

  So today, while I was looking around the kitchen and thinking of making either crepes or angel food cake (then finding out we had no flour), I realized that my opinions on things are always very definite. My opinions are RIGHT, dude. They are FACT. And they are never, ever iffy.

   

  Like, I never (or at least rarely) think things are ‘okay’ or ‘pretty good’. No, I have SOLID opinions. I hate something or I love it. I never just think it’s alright. The problem with this is that when I change my mind about something it is a big deal. My family says things like, “wait - I thought you hated this song,” and I have to be all, “well, I did… and now I don’t,” and they pretty much just think I’m crazy, most likely.

   

  My family thinks I’m crazy an awful lot. Of course, everyone in my family (immediate and extended) thinks that everyone else is crazy, all the time. And I am no exception to this. (In fact, when I was younger I think everyone probably thought I was the craziest one of all. Actually, this might still be true. No matter. I embrace the crazy that I am.)

   

  But anyway. What was I talking about? Oh yes. Things I HATE and things I LOVE.

   

  Things the Jordyn hates:

  1. Gossip Girl - the books and the show.

  2. Amy Winehouse, especially that Rehab song. Just go already and quit whining about it.

  3. People saying things about how wonderful it must be to be so young and so, so healthy. Pshhh.

  4. High School Musical.

  5. People with the I-know-everything-about-life-and-no-one-else-knows-anything complex. Especially when they are my age because come on, not even Einstein knew it all when he was a teenager.

  6. Scoffing at the fact that someone likes to read and/or write.

  7. Talk radio where everyone is just mostly arguing. See point number 5, because these people always think they’ve got it all figured out.

  8. The obsession with Miley Cyrus/Hannah Montana. SHE’S EVERYWHERE!!

  9. Doctor Zhivago, the movie. The only character I liked was his wife, whatever her name was. I felt bad for her though, having to put up with everyone else in the movie.

  10. Awkward dialogue on television. See number 4.

  11. When perfectly skinny girls feel the need to talk about dieting and “watching their weight.” (Honestly I could go all Freudian on this one and say this is a direct result of being overly-cautious to notdo that since so many people seemed to be convinced I was anorexic back in mid school and junior high. Which, yanno, Freud! wasn’t a total whack job, so maybe that’s true?) (I bet you’re wondering about the ! on Freud, huh? It’s a Friends reference, lol.)

  12. David Archuletta. If he wins I will be devastated. DEVASTATED, I TELL YOU! DEVASTATED!

   

  Things the Jordyn loves:

  1. The Hills, even if it is vapid, superficial, and most likely fake.

  2. The Paper. Am I the only one that thinks Amanda likes Alex? If you watch this show, please respond with your answer on this most important matter. But seriously, it’s like a Greek play or something. Amanda likes Alex! Alex is trying to steal the in-chief position from Amanda! Everyone hates Amanda anyway! (And also, Adam went to High School Musical on ice? Seriously? That’s really just embarrassing.)

  3. Books!

  4. Blogging, hence the obsessiveness.

  5. Friends who live 800 miles away yet are still sending me a graduation invitation. (Thanks, Ash!) (And, also, just my friends in general. Also, family.)

  6. Listening to wonderfullest music. Like Avril Lavigne, Taylor Swift, Kate Voegele, Fountains of Wayne, and anything hillbilly.

  7. My phone. It is orange! It is an env! It stores up to 100 notes! (A function which, trust me, I make great use of.)

  8. Cooking, which the Jordyn used to hate. But then she watched a week of Food Network while she was sick and - boom! - now she is a cooking fool! Just yesterday she made crepes with whipped cream that she whipped herself!

  9. Inside jokes.

  10. Quotes. Wonderful, wonderful quotes.

  11. Offbeat names. Kiley! Johnson (for a first name)! Jenner! Roo! Ashton! Kelso! Tally! I am all about names that are just a little different.

  12. David Cook. If he does not win I will likewise be devastated. See point 12 in the list of hates.

   

  So there you have it. Things I hate and things I love, and if you look at points 1, 4, 8, and 12 on the hates list as well as points 1, 2, and 12 on the loves list (as well as secret point 13, which was going to be House), you will see that my crusade to make you all believe I spend a zillion hours a day watching telly is still in effect. AND IT IS GOING WONDERFULLY!!

   

  (Oh and also, don’t forget - do you think Amanda has a crush on Alex? Answer! If you watch The Paper! Because otherwise you have no idea what I’m talking about!)

  Posted May 06 2008, 10:51 PM by jordynt with no comments

  Filed under: lists, Miss Pacman, dorky pride, confessions

• criminals in ski masks

  Mozella sounds a lot like Macy Gray. Just sayin.

   

  Hello friendlies! Today is one of those foggy days where it is foggy. And I swear I had stuff to write about before I actually sat down (this happens wayy too much), so since all my amusing thoughts have left me I’ll just tell you about the bank robbers.

   

  And then maybe something more later? I don’t know.

   

  Anyways. Bradis and Madis were down for a while and me and Mom and Madis had just gone to Sprouts. A store that is always very, very cold. I wonder if that is supposed to make it seem more healthful or something? I don’t know, but Sprouts is two things (1) healthy, and (2) cold. Also, (3) smells weird, which is probably just all the organicness of it. Also, the vitamins.

   

  Organicness: (adv) the act of being organic.

   

  So there we were, driving away from Sprouts headed toward home, and this car speeds past us going in the opposite direction. Okay, fine, nothing odd there.

   

  But the people in the car, this old-looking red convertible, WERE WEARING SKI MASKS. Black ones. Now I’m no scientist or anything, but we don’t exactly live in Antarctica and what reason can you think of for wearing a ski mask in summer unless you’re in Antarctica?

   

  That’s right. None.

   

  So I turn to Madis and say, “Did you see those guys?” (Note: I do not actually know they were guys. They could have been girls. Or one of them could have been at least. But whatever.)

   

  And Madis says something about how fast they were going. (Hint: Really really fast.)

   

  And I say, “Did you notice they were wearing ski masks? Ooh, I bet they just got done pulling a bank job!”

   

  Madis, of course, was very on board with this idea. My mom, however, basically called us crazy. Which, okay, we are. But not for that reason, please. Because in my mind, the equation is very simple and it goes like this SUPER SPEEDY OLD LOOKING CONVERTIBLE + PEOPLE WEARING SKI MASKS = BANK ROBBERS.

   

  Simple. I saw bank robbers, probably bank robbers fleeing the scene of the crime. My life is so exciting.

  Posted May 06 2008, 06:29 PM by jordynt with no comments

  Filed under: Reese's Pieces, my past life, Mother Dearest

• post email panic

  While I wasn’t really planning on writing a third post today, sometimes these things just happen. Plus, I am very obviously addicted to blogging.

   

  Or, uh, you know, writing in general. (It occurs to me that I use words like “um” and “uh” far more often in my writing than I should. There’s even an instance of it in my essay. In a book! Probably qualifies me as A WEIRD WRITER, which is probably one of the highest forms of WEIRD you can reach. Yay me!)

   

  Anyways, today I was thinking about something I refer to, at least in my own mind, as POST EMAIL PANIC.

   

  Post email panic is what happens when, after happily sending an email off to someone, you become convinced that IT HAS BEEN SENT TO THE WRONG RECIPIENT AND WILL DESTROY YOUR WORLD WHEN IT INEVITABLY FALLS INTO THE WRONG HANDS. This happens one of two ways.

   

  1. You send the email and the very second you hit the send button you are suddenly stricken with panic that you sent it to the wrong person. After all, you know so many people whose names begin with M so how could you have possibly sent it to the right one? (Seriously you guys, are you on a mission to make sure at least half the names in my contact list begin with the letter M?) So then you frantically click to your ’sent’ box and make sure it has been directed to the proper email address. Then you check it three more times just to be sure. After all, you can never be too certain! (Especially when it comes to things that you, at that point in time, HAVE ABSOLUTELY NO CONTROL OVER.)
  2. The whole sending of the email goes fine. It’s not until a couple days (or weeks, depending) that the anxiety sets in. Because OHMYGOSH THAT WAS A TOP SECRET VERY IMPORTANT EMAIL AND THERE IS STILL NO RESPONSE and of course you’ve talked to the intended recipient since then so wouldn’t they have brought it up? Except that they did. Which is why you’re totally freaking out and, after checking to be sure you actually sent it to the right M-name, you go to plan B. Which involves typing out a short and awkward email around the lines of, “Oh, uh, just checking to see if you got that last email I sent you? About the thing with the thing? Yeah? Okay, great, just, yanno, wondering. No biggie.” And then you wait impatiently for the ALL CLEAR email which means YES I GOT IT OF COURSE I GOT IT, WHO DID YOU THINK IT WENT TO ANYWAYS?

   

  Yanno: (v) A combination of “you” and “know”. Yanno, these dictionary entries are awesome.

   

  In any case, Post Email Panic happens to me a little too often. And the thing is, whenever I really think of what would happen if one of those emails went to the wrong person, the answer is 99.8% of the time… nothing. Maybe some mild embarrassment? I remember, after writing my Red essay and promptly sending it to Michelle (of course), being panicked that I sent it to my mom instead. I was like, Nooo, she can’t read that!! (And now, of course, it goes without saying that she has read it. Der.)

   

  Man. Life is hilarious.

   

  Der: The funny person’s duh. See also, doi. You don’t get a lot of der these days.

  Posted May 05 2008, 11:02 PM by jordynt with no comments

  Filed under: people, Mich, Mother Dearest, blah-blah-blah, life

• nifty gifty

  It happened like this:

   

  Apparently I got a box from Amazon in the mail. I say apparently because it showed up at our house and it had my name on it.

   

  Only I didn’t order anything from Amazon. I know this because when I am expecting a package I am neurotic about checking the mail and waiting impatiently for it and so on and so forth. But this time I wasn’t being neurotic or impatient or anything. In fact, you might say that when the Jordyn looked at the box she was like, Huh? Where did this come from? Does it contain a bomb that will detonate in my face? WHO IS OUT TO GET ME!?

   

  Then the Jordyn started thinking, This is not right. Maybe I did order something from Amazon. And then, Nah, that is impossible. So I began to open the box. And inside were those weird air-filled sacks Amazon sends sometimes in place of regular ole fashioned packing peanuts. You know what I mean.

   

  However, underneath the super-duper-Amazon-air-packaging was something flat that was green stripedy and resembled sheets. Honestly, I am not kidding you, I thought, Oh, gee, Mom ordered sheets for me. Because, yeah, that’s the sort of weird way my brain works.

   

  Turns out it wasn’t sheets though! It was gift wrap! And cue the Jordyn, still confused and also pretty stupid because SHE REALLY THOUGHT IT WAS GREEN SHEETS THERE FOR A SECOND. But anways, attached to this lovely green gift wrap was a nice little wonderful card from my mommy that was full of sentimental goodness and OMG THE JORDYN STILL DOESN’T KNOW WHAT IS INSIDE THE WRAPPING PAPER BECAUSE SHE IS OBVIOUSLY DUMB AS A ROCK AND SLOW AS A TURTLE (yes, I love similies although maybe those two were a bit much).

   

  And what was it?

   

  It was the amazing, the splendiforous, Oh, the Places You’ll Go! Woohoo!!

   

  Also, remind me to tell you guys about the time I saw bank robbers. It was thrilling!

  Posted May 05 2008, 03:59 PM by jordynt with 1 comment(s)

  Filed under: Mother Dearest, life

• this post has asterisky goodness

  Hello friendlies!!

   

  It is 5:25 in the am, according to my alarm clock. For some reason my body was refusing to sleep (as it so often does), so I figured, hey, it’s late enough, I’ll just get up and dink around until I have to get ready for school.

   

  Is dink a word?

   

  According to dictionary.com, it is a word - it just doesn’t have the definition I thought it had. In case you’re wondering, I am not using the word dink as a racial slur, a volleyball term, or slang for a two income, childless couple. Really I should write my own dictionary, wherein dink would have the following definition;

   

  Dink: (v) to do something of little importance and/or harm in order to pass the time. She figured she would just dink around until the morning came.

   

  See? The first entry in THE JORDYN DICTIONARY. Which, I’m sure we can all agree, should totally be a real thing.

   

  In other news, does anyone know how to do that line-splitty thing? Since I don’t, you’ll just have to pretend that all those asterisks below equate to a line-splitty thing.

   

  ********************************************************************************************

   

  Ah look! Asterisky goodness! ^^^

   

  Anyway, while I was failing at sleep (seriously, if Sleep 101 were a class my GPA would be taking a not-so-lovely dive) I was remembering, for some unknown reason, this thing my ELP class (Extended Learning Program, which basically meant the school thought we were smart enough to be in this “smart” class. I know, I know, I do a loverly job of explaining things, right?) did in third grade.

   

  After we finished our poetry unit there was this poetry reading thingamajig we did in the school library. We sat in a row of little chairs and they set the podium up and our parents came and we read stuff we’d wrote and blah-blah-blah. So anyways, everyone had a bunch of poems they wanted to read, and I had two. Because then, as now, I was nervous about reading anything I’d wrote in front of people. Actually I was (and am) nervous about people reading anything I’d wrote at all. I know, I know, so smart for an aspiring author, huh? But anyways, we would get up and read our stuff and our overly proud parents would take pictures of us.

   

  And somehow, in all that picture-taking, none were taken of me. Oh, not because my parents didn’t take pictures, because they did. I have them (the pictures, not my parents) sitting in my pencil box with all the other snapshots I’ve acquired over the years. There just aren’t any that were taken when I was reading. Now, I’m not sour about this or anything, I mean it was difficult enough for me to stand up there withoutthe added pressure of THIS MOMENT IS BEING RECORDED FOR ALL TIMES AND FOREVERNESS!!, but it just seems a little odd that I have pictures of Keegan reading and possibly even pictures of Olivia and Damian reading, but none of me.

   

  You can see me in the background though, looking very little and ascared.

   

  Ascared: (v) frightened or afraid, usually applied to a little person such as an eight-year-old child. I was ascared to read my poems aloud.

   

  -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

   

  Also, for anyone who is wondering, I have, in fact, started a wordpress blog. Which, uh, is basically identical to this blog. So yay for identicallyness!! (www.girljordyn.wordpress.com) But you can comment there if you like. Or you can ignore wordpress if you like. Or you can ignore me altogether if you like because really I just blog because I am full of bloggery goodness inside. (hahaha)

  Posted May 05 2008, 05:54 AM by jordynt with no comments

  Filed under: my past life, blah-blah-blah, life

• crusade

  Crusade! Crusade crusade crusade!

   

  That is the word I've been trying to remember for about a week now.

  Posted May 04 2008, 10:27 PM by jordynt with no comments

• the marriage age is going up? hm?

  So according to the statistics, marriage age is getting older and older. The average age to get married is now in your late twenties for both men and women.

   

  Which sort of makes me go, "huh?" Because I just don't see it.

   

  I know of at least three girls in my classes who are planning their weddings (and none of them is any older than 22), more people that are that young and already married. Sarah's friend (who's what? 20? 19?) got married a few months back and another girl I know (who is 19, I think) got married just last week. Plus I found out that a girl I was friends with in third grade and beyond, who's still a senior in high school, is engaged.

   

  So do I just deal with a very skewed-from-the-rest-of-society group of people? At first I thought that, but then I realized that all these people I'm talking about aren't at all in the same section of my life. A couple of them are of the same religion as me, others I know from school, and that last girl is someone I haven't seen since freshman year. So, uh, what's up? Is the marriage age going up for everyone except people within one degree of the Jordyn?

   

  And really, what is the right age to get married? This question has been the catalyst for many Jordyn-Mich, uh, debates over the years. Probably as time goes on it will become an ironic thing, lol, but our opinions vary so much that I feel like we need to have a mediator - someone to stand in the middle (figuratively speaking, of course), and tell us the correct answer.

   

  Which is, obviously, that there is no correct answer. Some people get married at eighteen and twenty-five years later are still perfectly married and say things like "JORDYN YOU REALLLY MUST START DRINKING COFFEE, FOR IT IS THE LIFEBLOOD OF CHAMPIONS!!" And then there are people who get married at that same age and five years later are all OMG WHAT DID I DOOO?? and boom, divorce. Same goes for people who get married at twenty-four or twenty-five or twenty-nine or thirty-two. And that just makes everything so much more confusing.

   

  So what was I talking about? Oh yeah. The marriage age going up for everyone except people I know? Or something like that?

   

  Also, I watched Chasing Zoey Friday night. Because I am obviously still thirteen years old, woo-hoo!!

  Posted May 04 2008, 04:14 PM by jordynt with 1 comment(s)

  Filed under: people, Mich, blah-blah-blah, life, musings