Werecows

To Granddaddy

2012-01-14T00:03:00.000-08:00

My favorite song right now is the hymn "In the Garden". I have the Brad Paisley version of it, and I can listen to it over and over again. But what is important is not that it is my favorite song, but why this is my favorite song. This song helped me so much after my Granddaddy passed away. I encourage you to look it up and listen to it while you read this, especially if you're unfamiliar with the lyrics to the song.

My love for this song is not upbeat, but it is uplifting. It doesn't make me exactly happy, but it does give me joy. I often cry when singing this song; it is bittersweet. In fact, it taught me what the "bittersweet" really means. For whatever reason, this song was used by the Lord to give me comfort.

My Granddaddy loved being outside. His home and his land were extremely important to him. His huge yard in SmallTown, AL was his Garden of Eden, in a sense. I heard "In the Garden" shortly after Granddaddy's funeral, and a very distinct mental image blossomed.

I imagine my Granddaddy, as he was when I was a little girl. He is not sick, frail, and weak like he was before dying. No, rather he is healthy and independent. He is back in his hometown, the place he loved. The place I love because of my grandparents. And he is sitting in his backyard, near some flowers. And that is where my Lord comes to meet him. I can't see the face of God; since I can't imagine that detail, He is more or less just Light. But He comes to my Granddaddy, in the garden, the backyard. He walks around my Granddaddy's yard with my Granddaddy, and He tells my Granddaddy that he is His own. And the joy they share as they tarry there... Well, my imagination only goes so far. I can't comprehend, due to the fact that I am alive.

That is how I imagine my Granddaddy meeting God, the very second he left his body. The very second the hospital ceased containing him. The very second that medicine, doctors, and machines no longer had any power over him. Of course, no one can absolutely know if anyone else is saved. You can only be sure of yourself. But from the way my Granddaddy tried to live his life and the way he openly claimed Jesus as his King, I am confident he is genuinely a Christian and his soul is in Heaven. This hymn allowed me to connect the passing of my Granddaddy's soul from Earth to God's Kingdom.

As I sit here writing this, I have never died. That is obvious. I do not know what it is like to meet God after death. I do not know what my Granddaddy experienced with death.The above scenario is my imagination, a symbolic creation to represent my belief in God and how He gathers His children to Heaven after their death. However, I do believe that God used it, or even perhaps gave it to me, to comfort me. I know that my Granddaddy came to the garden alone, but God met him there. I miss my Granddaddy; I love him so much. And that, mixed with the absolute, pure, complete joy that my Granddaddy felt when he met God in the garden, brings a bittersweet lump to my throat and bittersweet tears to my eyes.

Finals Make Me Wanna... Dance?

2011-12-04T00:57:00.000-08:00

Do I just love final exam week so much that I break into dance whenever I think about it? Of course not; don't be stupid. This is all about procrastination. I mean, obviously I'm procrastinating if I am writing this at 2:30 in the morning, right after doing a dance workout to keep me awake.

Finals begin on Monday morning. At 8:00 a.m., I shall be faced with the most terrifying exam I believe I will have ever had to take. Not fun. At all. So of course, I am nervous.

I spent quite a long time today in the library. I didn't get home until nearly midnight. How on earth is it possible that I still have so much to do to prepare for this test? And that's not even including my other exams this week. A girl has to cope, right? So it's always great to sneak in a little fun during the study time.

Tonight, I met a great group of classmates in the library. Sometimes it is just the little things that make a stressful situation seem less torturous. It was nice to take a few minutes here and there to quit talking about generalization and phonemic awareness, and to spend some time talking about boys and funny people we know. It was great laughing at the girl who was running laps on the first floor of the library. It was great to talk about our loved ones and, of course, our pets (because there has never, in the history of time, been a good conversation that doesn't at least mention a puppy or kitten). And then, after we all went home to try to sleep our last good sleep for a week, I decided a dance was exactly what I needed.

So I danced. And tomorrow, I'm gonna dance again. And then possibly the next day. And I'm going to have so much fun dancing, that I'm not going to stop (that is, unless finals actually render me so physically depleted that I cannot move). Peace out, homies.

Waiting is Sometimes Necessary

2011-11-26T19:34:00.000-08:00

So it has been a while since I've had anything to say on here. Quite a lot in my life has changed. I have grown accustomed to thinking that the things that have occurred and the things that I have realized have all impacted me negatively. And today I have realized that is just backwards thinking.

Perhaps the catalyst of my sad semester was the death of my Granddaddy. I really love my Granddaddy; always have and always will. He was always my encourager; he thought I could do anything I wanted to and do it perfectly. As I sit here writing this, so many memories are running through my head.

I remember him being so proud of me at my high school graduation that he cried. He always told me how he looked forward to my college graduation. He made it to the beginning of my senior year of college; I wish he could be here for the end. And I remember when my mother and I would sit in the living room and watch those silly wedding shows on the girly channels, and he would see what we were watching and tell me how he couldn't wait to see me walk down the aisle as a bride. He obviously didn't live long enough to see that, since I am currently as single as possible. I would give anything to have him there on that future day. I really love my Granddaddy.

Perhaps the most striking memory I have, and the one I cling to more than anything right now, is the memory of his last words to me. I came home one Friday near the beginning of this semester. That night, Granddaddy became very ill, and my Mama decided to take him to the hospital. He didn't realize at first that I had even come home; he didn't see me until I helped him into the car. I had to pick his feet up off the ground and put them into the car, because he was too weak to be able to pick them up and put them in himself. As sick as he was, he smiled when he saw me.

He said, "Well Carolyn, how is school going?"

"It's pretty tough right now," I replied.

"But you're tougher," he said. Adding in, "goodbye," and, "I love you," it was our last conversation ever.

The next time I was able to come home from school to see him was the next weekend. I visited him in the hospital, but he was not really able to talk. He tried, but I couldn't really understand what he was saying. He knew I was there, though. But that visit is not what I really choose to think about. I prefer to remember those words, "But you're tougher."

After Granddaddy died, I did not handle it very well. I really felt the loss; it was a huge hole. It still is. But then it seemed like everything else in my life started to fall apart. I realized things I wanted out of life regarding personal relationships and choices after graduation, but I could not have them. I had made decisions, and at the time I thought I had made them carefully, over the past couple of years that have prevented me from getting what I wanted. I realized I had been very wrong in my perceptions of things for so long, but by the time I fully understood things and desired to act, I could not. I have tried to stay a Godly woman, although I fail to always do right, just like every other sinner on this planet. And when I realized what I wanted, I thought that perhaps I had not done right according to God's plan. (Now let me just say that I do not know God's plan. I do not know if I did right or not. But I do know now that God can work with it; after all, He is God.)

But then, I turned to God in a new prayer. My prayer for a while was, "Lord, either give this to me or take away my hurt from not being able to have it. It doesn't matter which one; I just want to be happy."

I feel like that's a fairly common prayer for people to pray. It's easy to say those things when you regret decisions made in the past and desire a happier future. But it's a fallacy. It's pretty elementary, actually. I remember it being in Sunday School lessons from when I was a child. God's three answers to prayers are: yes, no, or wait. And I was reminded of that today, while I was in the student section at the Iron Bowl.

I can't exactly figure out what at the Iron Bowl reminded me of God's promises, or why I felt compelled to put it on the internet for folks to read. But either way, here it is. God told me today that He has a future for me. He just ain't telling me what it is yet. It may or may not be what I have wanted, or currently want. And He told me not to even worry about that anymore, because He's got something for me; I just have to be able to wait. I can still be sad about decisions I made, but I have got to be prudent in my sadness. I am here where I am and I can't change that.

Waiting is sometimes necessary. I have to wait right now to find out where to go next, what to do, and how I can be the best woman I can be. So what I need to do is look forward to my future; my meaningful future.

And that, my friends, makes me happy.

Who broke Carolyn Kate's arm??? Oh, Carolyn Kate did.

2011-05-20T17:33:00.000-07:00

When I was four years of age, I was a very active child. I loved to run; I loved to play. And no attire could prevent me from running or playing, even Sunday church clothes and an impending nap time. So, as I was running to my room after arriving home from church, I didn't think anything about it. I probably should have, though.

Multiple factors played into the breaking of the arm scenario which is about to unfold. First, I had removed my shoes. Second, I was wearing stockings, which provide little to no grip between my foot and the floor. Third, we don't have a carpeted house; the floor of my family's home is mostly tile, with some linoleum around our bedrooms. Finally, I was running. Those factors, when added together, can potentially be hazardous. And of course, I slipped in the hallway outside of my bedroom, landed smack on the ground, with my arm twisted and somehow underneath me.

Well, of course I did not handle that situation well. I have worked in a nursery and I have ample babysitting experience. I'm not much more aware of how children are capable of making bad situations much worse. Now, since I was only four, there are gaps in my memory from the time of the fall to my arrival at the hospital. I remember my parents trying to figure out what happened to their screaming child. I remember getting an ice cream treat, which I thought was grand. And I remember waiting in the emergency room.

Now, allow me at this point in time to explain that I was a pretty happy child. I was precious, of course. And like a lot of children, I would be happy and play even while injured. I don't get it now; if I broke my arm today I would whine and milk it for all it's worth. But apparently I was playing in the car on the way to the emergency room. This led to my mother scolding me, and trying to figure out if I really was hurt or if I was putting on an act. It was difficult to tell, because my arm did not have an obvious break in it and there was no blood, or gore, or other telling signs of a ghastly wound. But I was also very sensitive to scoldings, and I reacted very strongly to them. I hate to get in trouble. And as a child, I hated it even worse. And since I was a fairly good child (oh, how different than my little sister, ha ha ha), I did not require frequent punishment and therefore handled normal, very mild punishment as though it were the end of the world. This fussing in the car was no different.

So we arrived at the hospital, and after waiting what felt like a thousand years in the emergency room, it's finally my turn to be examined. As they're asking me routine questions, I say, at some point, that my mother was angry at me. Little did I know the consequences of those words. Remember, good child = rare punishment. Rare punishment = inability to cope with normal consequences. Scolding at play = consequences. Inability to cope with scolding and questions from nurses = trouble for mommy.

And to top it all off, my arm had been fractured near my elbow joint in such a way that if it had been maliciously twisted by a person, the same results could have been achieved as were achieved by the simple slipping and falling upon my arm.

Let me just say right now that my mother has never injured me in her life. I rarely had to be spanked, and even the few spankings I did receive were very mild. I guess the doctors did not know that, though. And so they began to question her.

"Mrs. Carolyn's Mom, did you twist Carolyn Kate's arm?" Well, this did not go over well, and my mom vehemently denied everything.

"If you twisted her arm, just tell us."

"I did not twist her arm!"

I am sure that I am glad that I did not witness that glorious scene. Anyway, in the end, my mother was cleared of the offense. They were able to figure out the real story from what I said, that I had broken my arm by slipping and falling, and my mommy continued to be able to not-hurt me. And, I got a hot pink cast out of the deal. I'm sure I looked adorable with it (of course), and I was able to use it as a paper weight in preschool (which I thought was fabulous, because no one else had a paper weight for their coloring sheets).

Summertime

2011-05-13T10:05:00.000-07:00

So, summertime has come again! And true to form, I have done very little this past week. Now I am back in Auburn for a few days to clean, and then I'm headed to Decatur for a day to attend a wedding. And I'm loving every minute of it because I realize that this summer, and maybe next summer, is my last summer to be a semi-adult. After that, I'm pretty much expected to be a real adult.

So today, as I was driving and listening to my radio, I was really happy. I was even happy when Ke$ha was on the radio (okay, so maybe I'm always happy when Ke$ha's mindless music is on the radio). I was even happy when Nickelback was on the radio (although I had to change the station to avoid vomiting all over my car). I was happy with the summertime flowers and green trees, and I was happy with my lot in life. I don't have any real problems compared to people who are dealing with serious tragedies at this time.

I can spend a lot of time feeling sorry for myself. I didn't get a 4.0 this semester, and I could go on and on about how crappy that is because in high school, 4.0 was easy to achieve. I'm worried about not getting into the graduate school of my choice. I gained some weight this year. I want a job, but they're hard to find. I don't have a grand talent like being able to sing, or paint, or play a musical instrument, or dance. I don't have a hobby, except for reading, if reading can be counted as a hobby. I can't even keep my room well organized. But none of these things should weigh me down, because I really do have it made.

And I am so happy to be spending my summer here in Alabama, unemployed or not. I can't wait for fireworks over the Coosa River and picnic with friends. I wanna go spend some days on Lake Martin or Lake Jordan. I wanna sit outside and watch my crazy cat chase after bugs and lizards, and try and get a tan (but that's unlikely). I wanna go to the beach and enjoy myself as a vacationer (a snowbird, as BoyfriendJordanFromBaldwinCounty might say, although I disagree).

I'm just very excited to be here.

The Worst Day of My Life

2011-04-21T14:20:00.000-07:00

In August of 2009, I had the worst day of my life. I don't remember the specific date, but that is only probably because it was so terrible and dramatic. Allow me to preface this story with a little background knowledge about why this day was so absolutely awful.

My family has generally only kept one pet at a time. This allows us to shower all of our love and adoration onto one lucky creature, and therefore allow it to live the most privileged life an outside pet can live. Girl, a black labrador retriever, was my first pet. She "ran away" to live with someone else when I was a little girl. When I was 7 years old, we were given a little gray tabby kitten, Tiger. Tiger was a mild mannered guy, very sweet with me and my sister. He was smart; he knew he had to be sweet to us because we fed him lots of food. He was not so sweet with the vets. He's the only cat I've ever heard of who had to get muzzled to go to the vet. He grew into a really, really, really fat cat. He weighed somewhere between 15 and 20 pounds, and he was predictably very lazy.

So on this August day, back in 2009, my family was spending one of the last weeks of summer together. We planned on taking a day trip to go out of town, but that morning we noticed that Tiger was breathing extremely heavily and very quickly. My mother measured his respiration rate, and it turned out to be like a million breaths per minute. Using our brilliant deductive skills, we figured out that something was wrong. But what? We had to take him to the vet. Mom gave me the task of getting some of our older towels to put in the cat carrier while she was outside making sure it was clean. This is when things started to get really, really dramatic.

I head to go outside to the carport, where my mother was waiting. As I shut the back door, I heard "RUN, CAROLYN! RUUUUUUUUUUUUNNNNNN!" I heard this awful, shrill, squeaky scream.

Little Sister, who was already outside, and I started running. Little Sister was holding our dying pet in her arms, and he was being bounced up and down while we gallop halfway up the driveway. I turned around, to figure out what I'm running from.

It's a bat. A BAT. In the middle of the day. And it had been trying to crawl into our home while I had opened the door to come outside. When I shut the door, I had closed it upon the bat's leg. That was when things started to happen in slow motion.

The screaming bat managed to wriggle itself free from the door. It started flying around in frantic circles and zigzags. I initially assumed it was only doing so because it was hurt. I'm sure getting its leg closed in a door did not feel very good. However, the bat saw me, or heard me, or smelled me, or something else equally scary, because it then started to fly at me. I began to run, because the bat was still flying very manically and was not actually zooming straight at my head at that particular moment. It was chasing me, though, and it chased me and Little Sister (still clinging to our freaked out, half-dead cat) all the way up our driveway, up the front sidewalk, and to the front porch.

Little Sister and I got inside the house, and shut the door. The bat kept flying around our house for half an hour or so, and even banged up against our windows.

Inside, we were all freaking out. Tiger was on the floor on his side, eyes wide and mouth open, gasping to avoid suffocation. Little Sister and I are practically in shock. Here's about what he looked like:

My mother was talking about all of us probably having rabies. The conversation went something like this: "blah blah blah Dead Cat blah blah Bat blah blah Rabies blah blah blah Was Anyone Bitten or Pooped On? blah blah blah Vet blah blah blah Can You Believe We Were Just Chased by a Bat???"

After around half an hour, we made our way outside again. We had to get Tiger to the vet, because unfortunately the jostling he received during our retreat was terrible for him. We packed him up and rushed him to the vet. He couldn't even meow by the time we got him there, and his nose was no longer pink. Essentially, we walked in, showed him to the vet, and suddenly the clinic from a small town veterinary clinic to an emergency surgery pet-saving wonderland. They were all like, "We need to get him into surgery, asap!" So they whisked him away. We got reports that went something like this, "We are having to slice open his belly; this is bad and he might die at any moment," and "He just died and we performed miracle kitty cat CPR on him and brought him back to life."

It was very dramatic.

Thankfully, Tiger did not die that day. He held on for a few weeks longer. If he had died that day, I think it would have been too much. I mean, really? I don't know if you can understand the fear of being chased by a potentially rabid, definitely angry, injured, manic bat in the middle of the day. I'm surprised I did not wet myself. That bat was bent on revenge. But then to have your only pet almost go to Kitty Cat Heaven on the same day? Dreadful.

The Almost Crisis

2011-03-27T19:52:00.000-07:00

I don't have a parking pass that allows me to park on campus during the day. I was running late and did not have time to wait on my school's transit system before class started this past Friday. So I parked across the street from campus on a one-way street right beside one of the local bars. I paid the meter for an hour and a half and walked the short distance to my classroom.

After class, I nonchalantly walked back to my car. It had been a wonderful day thus far, and I had little to worry about... until I approached the car.

There is was: little, covered in pollen... with a huge dent and yellow paint scraped all over the black paint on the left side. I just stopped in my tracks, visibly stunned. It was awful. Someone had scraped up the car and then left without so much as leaving a note! After regaining my composure (somewhat), I approached the vehicle. In my panic, I didn't remember what to do since the person who had hit the car had left the scene. I decided to just get in the car and cry and call my mommy, like any rational adult would do.

As I get to the driver's side, I reach down to open the door. That's when I realized that this door was missing it's handles. The handles on the doors of the vehicle were gone. As in, I could not find a way into the car. There was nothing for me to open the door with. After standing there for a good minute or so without coming to a rational conclusion of what to do, I start to cry a little bit. That's when I noticed that through the back window, there were books and bags that I don't own sitting in the back seat. I go look at the vehicle's tag. It's not my tag.

It's not my car. I looked around, and sure enough, my car was sitting a few cars down from this poor vehicle. I happily walked down to my beautiful car and there's not any (new) damage on it! I still feel really terrible for that person who owned that other car, though. It was really not funny at the time.

2011-03-25T09:41:00.000-07:00

I recently returned to my college town after enjoying a lovely, wonderful, fabulous Spring Break. I traveled with my boyfriend, Jordan, for a week to stay with his family, and it was great.

However, coming back to school was not so lovely, wonderful, and fabulous. Although I was very happy to learn that most of my assignments due this week were pushed to a later due date, two very awful things happened in one very awful day to solidify this week as a bad week.

Number One: The Roach.
I woke up Wednesday morning to get ready to go to campus. The previous day, I had left a few hand towels and an empty paper towel roll on my bathroom counter, and I didn't really think anything of it. Until I entered my bathroom and heard the scurrying sound of a bug under those paper towels/ paper towel roll. My body froze. I knew that it could be nothing other than a vile roach.

(Note: I don't live in a disgusting place. I've lived here for three years, and we never, ever get any other bugs than roaches, and they only come into our rooms when we spray the property. Also, my room is not disgusting. It's a little cluttered, but definitely not gross. I keep it clean, with a few books and shoes on the floor, and my regular girl beauty crap on the bathroom counter.)

Anyway, I knew I had to act. I snatched up the towels and it wasn't there. I thought it had crawled into the empty paper towel roll. Because I'm infinitely clever, I devised a plan to get rid of that beast without even touching it. I folded a mountain of toilet paper into two large-ish squares. I then carefully placed those squares on either open side of the empty roll, with the intention of quickly moving it over my toilet and shaking the roach violently out of the roll and into the potty. I would then flush it and never see that roach again.

When I snatched that empty paper towel roll up, it turns out that the cursed roach had just been under the paper towel roll. It just looked at me. I looked at it (and nearly vomited. Melodramatic? Yes. But I hate roaches with all my being). I knew I could not squish it on my counter top. So I decided to try to shoo it to the floor, which did not work, might I add. As soon as the roach left it's filthy spot, it somehow scurried away from me and somewhere BEHIND my counter. I haven't see it again... yet. I'm so scared. I know that the poor little thing was probably much more terrified than I was. But still... I really did not want to deal with it.

Anyway, after thoroughly cleaning my counter with a ton of cleaner, I finished readying myself for school and away I went.

Number Two: The Assignment
That evening, I was prepared to work on a homework assignment that was due on Thursday morning. I had downloaded the voice sample I needed the night before, but because it took approximately eighty billion years to download, I decided to hold off on actually doing the assignment ( on which I was prepared to spend around three hours working). So I get around to doing my assignment, until I realize that only two or so minutes of the eight minute sample had properly downloaded.

So I tried downloading it again. Well, I didn't actually get anything to work correctly until midnight. Meaning that I still had to do the actual assignment. Meaning, I wasn't going to bed before 4:00 am, and I had an 8:00 am class in the morning. Those stupid birds outside of the window started chirping while I was still awake.

I'm just thankful for Jordan, because without his help I would still be trying to download the voice sample.

2011-03-06T00:17:00.000-08:00

I was tagged by Lacy Marschalk a little while ago to continue the journey of this magnificent award:

I love winning prizes.

Here are the rules you MUST OBEY in order to make sure this award makes it around the world:
1: Link back to whoever it is that decided you were worthy.
2: Display the pretty picture from the creator, Jillsmo.
3: Display 5 statements, only one of which can be truth.
4: Link to 5 other bloggers, who MUST do this, too.
5: Link the post to "Memetastic Hop" so that Jillsmo will know where it has been. I have no idea who this person is.

Here are my statements. This will determine if I am or am not a good liar.
1: I was once locked outside of my home for an entire night because I had been out late and had forgotten my house keys. My parents didn't hear my knocking on the door or hear the doorbell ring, and I didn't want to freak them out by knocking on their window. So I just slept in the car until the next morning.
2: When I was a child, I wanted to be a robot. I would walk around the house talking in my robot voice and would pretend like I was malfunctioning when asked to do something I did not want to do.
3: One time, while on vacation with my family, we decided to just travel to the Atlantic Coast without making hotel reservations or anything. We arrived to the Georgia coast, and no rooms were available anywhere. But we were too tired to drive anymore, so we decided to go camping.
4: My boyfriend, Jordan, loves to dance. In true romantic spirit, he signed us up for ballroom dancing "lessons" as my Valentine's Day gift. When we got there, though, we realized that it was not a ballroom dancing class, but instead was a competition. Needless to say, we decided to forfeit.
5: My little sister managed to text her way into a ~$2,000.00 phone bill. Yeah, that was not a pleasant day to talk to my family on the phone.

Now that I have hopefully confused the mess out of you, I shall tag 5 other people to play this little game! I know you're super excited.
AllThingsWetumpka
Melinda
John Stuart
Clint
Rachel

I need to find some more people to follow or something. I'm pretty sure some of these people haven't done anything blog-wise for about a million years.

2011-03-04T20:45:00.000-08:00

I'm going to tell a little tale about my childhood... and how traumatic it was.

Do you remember how as a child it was so cool to talk about your parents' age? Yeah, so do I. And so when I was in Kindergarten I went home and asked my mother how old she was. And because she is a sweet mommy, she told me that she was 99 years of age.

So the next time when my peers began discussing the age of their parents, on the van ride to our after school care, I volunteered the information that my mother was 99. I thought I had won the prize - I had the oldest parent. I was so cool. And so happy.

But then this girl turned around and said something along the lines of, "your mom is going to die when she turns 100." I suppose that is how a young one's logic functions. 100 is the limit - there is nothing after 100.

So I took this new information presented to me as the absolute truth. I believed this with my entire being, and I was sad. I seriously thought my mother was going to die on her next birthday.

When I got home that evening, I threw myself onto my parents' bed and became hysterical. I was sobbing and inconsolable, and my mother was trying to figure out why. She finally figured out that I was sad because I thought she was going to die on her next birthday. Which was apparently hilarious to her. And my father.

It was finally explained to me that my mother wasn't 99 years old, and even if she had been she probably wouldn't have died on her 100th birthday. Didn't matter to me then; I was quite distraught.

Moral of this story: don't lie to your kids, unless you want something really funny to happen.

Pink Babies

2011-02-10T23:16:00.000-08:00

I realized the identity of Smelly Guy today. I was just sitting in class and he walked past me to his seat and his stench just hit me like a wall. And the grossest part is, he doesn't even sit directly beside me. He sits like three seats away from me. Gross. I feel bad about the poor people sitting beside him.

On a totally different note, I've decided to describe how awesomely literal I was as a small child. My practicality was showcased by my names for my dog, blanket, and stuffed animals.

I got my dog when I was one or two years old. She was a black labrador retriever, and I LOVED her. I played with her and played with her, and oh! the joy that was my dog. So what is a perfectly creative and intelligent little child to name her beloved dog? Girl. Yes, my dog's name was Girl. She was a girl, so no other name made more sense. Girl has since gone away to Puppy Dog Heaven, but she will always be remembered.

My childhood blanket was absolutely perfect. It was yellow and square, and not too big and not too little. It was perfect for holding at night when I went to sleep when I was a little girl. And, you know, um, well, maybe when I was like, uh, um, well eighteen years old, too. But anyways, what's a girl to call her beloved blanket? Yellow Blanket. Duh. It was a blanket, and it was yellow. It makes sense, okay.

So I think you might be catching onto the idea. Well, I'm about to throw you for a loop!

Not really.

I had three more stuffed animals that may or may not still reside in my room at my parents' house: Hard-face Pink Baby, Mushy-face Pink Baby, and Pink Bear. Guess what color they are! If you guessed pink, then you're a genius.

Hard-face Pink Baby and Mushy-face Pink Baby were once both the same. They had soft stuffed bodies and a soft stuffed head, but their faces were like a soft rubbery-plastic material. One day, my family went on vacation to somewhere. As we got out of our car at the hotel, I unknowingly dropped one of my pink babies onto the parking lot and walked off without it. That was one of the most traumatic nights of my young childhood. When I was a little girl I loved my pink babies more than I loved my life, I think.

Well, my parents were about sick of hearing me sob about my lost pink baby, so gave a last-ditch effort to rescue their precious baby's babydoll. They went to the front desk of the hotel, and that perfect lady at the desk told them she had found it the night before and took it home to her daughter or granddaughter (I can't remember which one, and at the time I did not care one bit. No one was gonna take my pink baby). Anyway, that blessed saint returned my doll to me the next day.

But the doll had been run over in the parking lot, and had tire treadmarks on her. And her face was mushy. Thus, the difference between Hard-face Pink Baby and Mushy-face Pink Baby. I secretly loved Mushy-face more than Hard-face, but I would have never told Hard-face that.

I also had Pink Bear, who may or may not have come to college with me my freshman year. But even though it may or may not have lived in my dorm room freshman year, it is important to remember that it was only freshman year. Just clarifying.

Smelly Guy

2011-02-09T18:41:00.000-08:00

In one of my classes there is a guy who stinks. I mean, he is smelly. And I can't figure out who it is, because the stench seems to hit me from all directions. It could be a girl, I suppose. But there's mostly guys who sit around me in this class, which is why I think it's a guy. So I wrote a poem especially for him:

Hey Smelly Guy, who sits next to me in class

Your total stench makes me need a gas mask

I understand that you smoke, and that's okay

But maybe you should cut back from 20,000 cigarettes a day

I'm not asking you to smell like delightful flowers

I just wish you would take showers

Because my nose is not but a few feet from your disgusting body

And trust me, no girl's gonna think you're a hottie

As long as you smell like rotten beans

Please, oh please, get clean

My speech anatomy test got moved to next Tuesday, which is a great! My week just got ten billion times better when I found that out! Since my paper and language acquisition became deleted off of my to-do list yesterday, I have slept approximately ten much-needed hours.And I did laundry. Bonus points to Carolyn for productivity!

2011-02-07T19:24:00.000-08:00

I had a fabulous weekend!

First of all, let me say that The King's Speech is a wonderful movie. I think that it is completely deserving of all the awards it has been nominated for. Also, I found it extra interesting because I do want to become a speech therapist (although I want to be a bit more, ugh, licensed than Logue). I cried in the movie, but that doesn't mean too much since I cry in almost every movie.

Now I have a billion things to do this week, since I enjoyed my weekend instead of working during it. I stayed up until 4:30 writing my paper last night, however... so I have been sort of productive!

Here's a pretty flower. Enjoy.

2011-02-04T18:50:00.000-08:00

When reviewing my former posts, I realized that I have used excessive punctuation. I always feel the need to use excessive punctuation when relating things on this blog. However, when I go back to review it I feel like it looks a little ridiculous.

As though I talk like this: "OH. MY. WORD. UR LIKE SOOOOO CRAZYYYYYYY!!!!!1!!!1!!! LIKE WHY WONT U TALK TO MEEEEEEEEEEEE??!?!?!??!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!!!!?!?!???!!???"

Which I don't (unless provoked).

Here is a pretty picture:

I HAVE RECENTLY EXPERIENCED A FEW PROBLEMS

2011-02-03T21:06:00.000-08:00

Let me just relate to you the problems I have experienced.

It all started last week on Tuesday. I was required to write a short paper for my Critical Theory of Literature class. So I write one on Plato and turn it in, because that is what I thought my syllabus told me to do. It turns out that I was quite wrong. My synopsis was supposed to be on Aristotle, which I realized much too late. And when I got my paper back, it was practically screaming at me, "CAROLYN, THIS IS EMBARRASSING! I AM ASHAMED TO BE YOUR PAPER!!"

However, my professor was very kind and allowed me to rewrite the paper and still get a grade on it, even though points would be deducted from its grade for being late. I probably would have rewritten it anyway and turned it in, even if it didn't count for a grade, because I don't want to look like the class idiot. It was only a page or so, and not worth very much of my grade.

Anyway, the point of the matter is that he allowed me to rewrite the dang synopsis and email it ASAP. So on Wednesday, I wake up and write this synopsis prior to going to class. However, I don't have time to proofread it, and I decide I will just do that later. So I go to school, I see some friends, I have some fun, and then later that night I start proofreading the paper and when I get ready to email it, MY COMPUTER DECIDES THAT WORKING PROPERLY IS STUPID.

After some tears and frustrations, I do get my paper turned in, and after like a week of not having a computer, it finally returns to me. I didn't know what to do with my spare time without my computer. What is a 20 year old to do?? Color? Play card games? Rescue hundreds of puppies and kittens from shelters, like I have the money for that??? I swear I am not an animal hoarder.

Anyway, those are not real problems. They were embarrassing and annoying, however.

On a happier note, my tests for this week are over. On a less happy note, I have two tests and a paper due next week.

Blah Blah Blah American Idol Blah

2011-01-20T14:22:00.000-08:00

So, I was watching American Idol last night. I don't usually watch much of American Idol, but like all Americans, I enjoy the episodes where silly people sing silly songs in a silly voice and then get get a silly ticket back home rather than one to silly Hollywood. As we all know, Simon has been replaced by Steven Tyler and Paula/Kara have been replaced by J. Lo. And Randy is still there, of course.

During one part of the episode, after they denied someone fame and fortune, J. Lo asks Randy how he found it possible to have done that job for the 10 or however many years he has been there. She was implying that it was a difficult job.

Now, I don't know about you, but I believe I would have no problem making a truckload of cash doing nothing other than sitting on my behind and listening to people sing. True, they sit there all day and listen to people and they're always out and about. But you guys, they probably make MILLIONS of dollars doing it!

J. Lo is known for being a diva, because she's pretty and fabulous, but c'mon. Seriously?? Their job(s) might be time-consuming and integrity-depleting, but it's not difficult.

Guess What I Did Today

2011-01-18T15:11:00.000-08:00

I am a student at a University. By "University", I mean a school for grown-ups, or for those who are nearly grown-ups. At this school for grown-ups, I am studying Communication Disorders. I have every intention of obtaining my master's degree in speech-language pathology and then obtaining a license to practice within the state of Alabama. This means I am involved in a professional program. Full of professionals. Grown-ups.

Classes for the Spring 2011 semster have just recently begun, and so we are still in the "howdy, what's up?" stage with classmates and professors. Due to this, the professor of my Speech Mechanism class asked us to write down and turn in some information so he could get to know the class better. We had to describe our hopes for future careers and what our minors/concentrations are, and also what our interests are. We were also required to describe one thing that is unique about us.

I had no problem deciding on answers for almost all of the categories above, since I am familiar with both my goals and myself (duh). However, I could NOT think of any reason that I am unique. I mean, there's gotta be something. However, since this was an 8 a.m. class, and I am a college student, I had trouble thinking of something.

Below is more or less what I included on my information sheet:

"Hometown: Wetumpka, AL
Minor: English
Career: I hope to obtain my master's degree and a license so that I can practice within the state of Alabama. I would prefer to work with children, either in schools or a private practice. I was inspired by my mother to become a speech-language pathologist, etc.
Interests: Literature, blahblahblah.
What Makes Me Unique: I hate seafood, including shrimp. I feel as though this makes me unique because everyone else seems to love shrimp."

WHAT WAS I THINKING?? As I stated before, this is a program for GROWN-UPS. "I hate seafood"???? I regretted it as soon as I wrote it.

Allow Me to Clarify

2011-01-10T14:50:00.000-08:00

I believe that the title of this blog needs to be clarified.

"Werecows" does not, in fact, mean that we are all cows. Instead, it refers to a variation of the traditional werewolf. I'm not sure what inspired my parents to invent the werecow, but I do know that it was a genius move when it came to Little Sister.

My family resides in rural Alabama, and our home is in the woods. Little Sister and I grew up hearing about wampus cats and other scary creatures who lived in the woods, so hearing about werecows really didn't seem that far-fetched to Little Sister. By this point I was old enough to question the legitimacy of werecows, but honestly, I can't remember if I believed my parents or not.

However, werecows roaming the forest in search of people to destroy seemed like a perfectly sensible thing to Little Sister. Sometimes, when she was in bed and my dad got home late from work, he would knock on her window and "MooOOooOOOOooooOOoooOooo". Isn't that funny? Maybe I'm the only one who thinks that's funny, but I doubt it.

I suppose that it was an ideal way of my parents had of insuring Little Sister didn't wander off into the woods. More than likely, however, they just thought it was funny. And thus, the title of this blog was born.

Awkward

2010-08-14T16:20:00.000-07:00

How does one go about starting a blog?

This is awkward. Awkward like when someone wants to hug you and you barely know them.