Juicing

I've been having a lot of fatigue lately. So this past Thursday I manned up and went to see a doctor. Not the Doctor, my friend, a real doc (sorry Doctor, you're not a doc yet). I do not like going to the doctor. Specialist type doctors like dermatologists, podiatrists, and other such practitioners I have no problem with. Sign me up for a routine physical check up and I run in the opposite direction. My mom had to coax me into agreeing to the appointment.

After getting asked a lot of questions about my diet and weekly activities, the doctor starts talking about juicing green stuff. Green stuff= cilantro, parsley, lettuce, spinach, etc. I guess we're going to try and get my system more alkaline and less acidic since the doc thinks my meds are running havoc with my system.
I was tired before I started taking amoxicillin. I was on DORYX when I started having the fatigue. I'd actually been taking the DORYX for 6-7 months when I started noticing my fatigue. Fatigue is not in the main listed side effects of amoxicillin or DORYX. Of course, I could be completely wrong, but I've only been taking amoxicillin for about a month. My face is looking tons better, so I don't want to go off the drug right now.

However, I have no problem with trying to add more nutrition to my diet. I also have no issue with taking probiotics and fish oil to try and help me feel better. Goodness knows I'd like to not be tired all the time.

I did not know that the juicing of the green stuff would taste so strongly of...well...green stuff. Today I made a concoction of lettuce, spinach, cilantro, a few carrots, and some lemon juice.
Next time I will remember to only add a LITTLE cilantro and not three freaking stalks of it! Other than the overwhelming taste of cilantro (I do like cilantro, I've just never eaten it by itself and so am unaccustomed to the flavor) the juice isn't that bad. Just something to get used to drinking.

Also fund out that when they take your blood at the doc's office, they tell you "This will only pinch for a second." They lie. It pinched the whole time the nurse took blood from my arm, and for a good few minutes afterwards. I have a high pain tolerance, but I appreciate when people tell me straight up how long it will hurt/pinch/whatever. I have a lovely bruise on my arm and hopefully when they test my blood everything will be a-ok and the juice will even out my energy and we'll be right as rain!

If you'll excuse me, I have to go gag down another quarter glass of green stuff.

Halfway Through Summer

It's been an eventful time of late...

Ren Faire is most amazing place in the world. Now onto the rest of my life.

I changed jobs. I'm not working in a shop anymore. I'm a barista now at Vero and just had my first day of practical training. I worked a lot on the register and made a lot of mistakes but my coworkers said that I was doing really well for my first day. We serve other things besides just coffee, so I'm learning how to serve gelato and make fried dough puffs. It was a slightly difficult first day and I felt like I failed a lot, but as someone (or many people) have said to me, "If you're not failing, you're not trying hard enough." I guess I'm trying really hard because that register hates me. I shall not let it conquer me! I shall prevail and win it's affection!

I'm still making a lot of reconsiderations about which direction to go in. Right now I'm still dancing, but I want to explore my writing, my passion for history, and my passion for general performance. I'll probably take a history and a creative writing class this fall as part of my college studies. Being in Ren Faire has made me take a step back and really look at the realistic aspect of some of my career ideas.

There's been a recent learning curve on "How do I react to certain things?" I recently found out that if I'm boxed in and "attacked" without a determinable exit- I'll turn into River Tam and possibly hurt somebody. That was a scary thing to realize. I think I scared myself more than anything. Now I get to learn how to deal with that and make sure that I take care of myself and the people around me so that I don't have another River Tam "Miranda" moment.  Oh well, we live, we learn, we grow, and we work through things.

God is challenging me on a lot of things. My health hasn't been the greatest. I've gotten a lot of fatigue and I'm going to be getting a general physical on Thursday to make sure that there isn't anything wrong. Hopefully it will just be an imbalance on my vitamins and I'll take some supplements and be A-ok. It's hard to be not at my best and I just have to trust that this is only a season. Change will come, hopefully for the better. Slowly I'm turning more and more over to Him and He's brought some great things into my life. I've also had a lot of mini-lessons that haven't been too fun, but God is going to carry me through it.

The Debate in my Head

Goes something like this:

I want to dance.
I want to work at a museum.
I want to be a writer. 
I want to be a Library Scientist.
Science? Are you out of your MIND? You HATE Science.
NO I don't, I just don't like how it was taught in high school.
Weren't you homeschooled?
Yes.....and your point is?

ARG!

The more I work with the people at BRF, the more I am learning, the hungrier I get to learn more. I want to study history! I want to learn about people and their lives and what was important to them! I want to work in a place where I can see history and possibly even touch it! Museums work that way right?

The more I write, the more I want to tell stories. I want to inspire people with my books! I'm a freaking Jo March in almost every way!

Dance has lately taken more of a back seat in my life. Not intentionally, but I have to think about what seriously perusing a career in dance means. It would mean performing, but it would also mean a lot of auditioning and rejection and training and possibly a very lonely life.
Then again I could be totally off my rocker. I could have a very friend filled life if I danced. It also means I might not be able to do Ren Faire every year.

Dance.
History.
Acting.
Writing.

Cycle and Repeat until my head spins and I start crying because I don't know what to do. Nothing I want to do pays, so I'm fine with that part of my life. I always knew that the things I wanted to do are not money-makers, but they are amazing jobs in their own ways.

Please, pray for me as I think about my choices. This could mean going in a very different direction than I've thought about all year. I've been discovering so many passions that I have and I'm trying to figure out if I will have to choose between them. Honestly, the biggest questions are about museum work/history , and dance vs other types of performance.

In other news, my life is really good right now. I'm having the best summer of my life. I've got some little bumps along the road but I'm working through them. I just really need God working in my life to give me direction and I need Him to show me the door he wants me to walk through.

Kaite.

Waking Up

I have encountered a new phenomenon that happens when I wake up.
I feel anxious. Like going to an audition sorta-kinda-not-really wanting to throw up anxious.
It happened every day when I woke up last week, and it happened through the weekend and it was here again today. Lovely. 

Last week I also consistently woke up with a Sea Shanty stuck in my head. Today I woke up with a "Dernnit it's only 6:30!!!!" and not being able to go back to sleep because of said stomach anxious feeling issues.
Yesterday at BRF (go see the post at Tales of Anne Drew), I also did not feel like eating ANYTHING. I would take a bite of something, be chewing it, and would feel absolutely sick. Then I would force myself to swallow and I'd be fine after a few seconds. My mother tells me that this is because of the heat. I think it sucks because I kind of need to eat to keep going through the BRF days.

But I will stop that rant and move onto what's been happening in the past week.
I got some hours at work! It's still not enough to keep me going all summer, and I have picked up some babysitting jobs, but I filled out 5 applications for various places and am praying that I get a job at one of these business establishments. Business Establishments....sounds so official, don't it?
Just to be clear- I love my job. I love the people I work with. I would be very happy if I could get a few more hours, but I don't think it's possible because I was told that the company cut back on the hours and I can't work weekends. I don't know, one of my fellow workers is leaving because she never got enough hours.

 Other than sorta working, I helped a lot around my house to pay of the gas money that I contribute as the carpool to BRF instigator. My family had a garage sale this weekend and I helped my mom sort out things, price things, and helped with the actual selling of things for a morning. It's nice to know that I won't actually have to pay for my gas from this weekend.
I also when to dance class after a two week break last Monday and it was great! I loved being back at it and I was on such a happy-high afterwards until I sat down on my train seat and was like "What did I just do?" Then I woke up sore and very happy on Tuesday. My other dance class starts this week on Thursday (I think). I'm hoping that it will be as good as the one that I took during the school year on Tuesday nights. 

I need to write more in my story. I have a problem because the part that I have to write is not the part that I want to be writing. Ergo I procrastinate. But the part that I need to be writing is very essential for certain character developments and relational standings. Still I am seriously procrastinating. This week I am aiming to get to a certain point in my writing.

Now it's almost the time that I thought I would wake up at. I think it's time to start getting the day going.

Dreams

I really do have the weirdest dreams.

It's rare that I dream about people that I know. It's even rarer that I have the same dream twice. Usually my dreams take on plots (that shift and change with the dreams). If people that I know show up, they don't always act like themselves. Places that I know like the back of my hand, suddenly are brand new. Most of the time my dream takes place somewhere I've never been but am totally familiar with.

Once I did actually have the same dream twice. When I was very little I had a dream where I was in this huge building (we'll call it a house, but I don't even know what type of building this would be). I wandered from room to room, and each room was pretty cool. I think one room had a dinosaur party with real dinosaurs, and one room was a gymnasium, etc.
Then I got to a room that was just a spinning swirl of blue and purple. There was a large black bulk in the room and I was really scared because I had no clue what that bulk was. I woke up and labeled the dream under "nightmares."
Years later, I was probably 11 or 12, I have the exact same dream. Same rooms, same everything (or enough of the same that I recognized when I woke up that it was that dream). Then I get to that blue swirling room.
The black hulk is replaced by a person! Guess who?
Floop. From spy kids. Random much? I woke up from that dream thinking "What the heck?" But that's not really a strange thing to have characters from books or TV or movies show up in my dreams.

My favorite dreams often have been about Robin Hood. I've had many Robin Hood dreams over the years spanning back to when I was pretty little. I blame the Ren Faire and Errol Flynn.
I also have had numerous dreams about and taking place in the Ren Faire. I've dreamed that I've lived there in a tree house before. I'm have sailing dreams, I've had flying dreams.

I've also had dreams where things in real life come to pass. Once, when I was sick I had a dream about a friend who was looking for me at the homeschool co-op I went to. They actually called me a short time later and asked where I was. Upon questioning (at a later time), I found out that they were wearing exactly what I had dreamed that they wore, and they had been looking for me in the exact places that I dreamed about.
This is just one example of a very rare occurrence. I do not usually dream about people and what they are doing in real life. The fact was that I knew that I hadn't told this friend that I was sick. I knew they would be looking for me, and based upon their dressing habits it wouldn't be too surprising that I actually got their clothing right in my dream.


The annoying thing is that when I dream about people that I know, they don't usually act like themselves in real life. So if they do act like themselves and do something....I don't know....NORMAL, I get mixed up and sometimes forget that the particular thing didn't happen in real life.
Last night I had a dream about being at the Ren Faire and talking to some people, and I found out that one of the veteran performers was going blind and wouldn't be able to perform for much longer. Now all of the people in my dream last night were real people. This does not usually happen. Second of all, the veteran performer is in very good health and I don't expect them to go blind any time soon. This is one of those "realistic" dreams that drive me bananas. I wake up feeling like the things that happened in my dream are facts, and then realize how absurd my dream was.

Funny how a dream about a person going blind is labeled and absurd dream, but a dream where I'm chased by death eaters in white robes through a banquet hall/office building until I'm trapped and can't rescue any of my friends is a "normal" dream.
By the way, that death eater dream was not labeled as a nightmare. My nightmares are extreme and vivid and I often have woken up and cried. Unless it's a bumble bee dream, then I wake up with a sore neck, paralyzed.
I haven't had a nightmare for a long time. I'm beyond thankful for that. There was a time where I hated sleeping because I had a nightmare every night. Horrible nightmares, think the worst nightmare you've ever had multiply it by five. I'd wake up around 3am and start sobbing until I calmed myself down and coaxed myself back to sleep for a few more hours.
Huh, that's probably why I was so keen on after lunch naps for a while.

All this to say, I woke up at 6am and couldn't fall back asleep so I decided to write a post about my weird dreams. Ask me to tell you about one of them sometime. They're actually pretty cool for the most part and I get a lot of story ideas from them.

BAPA- Day 1

Friday, I was terrified that I wouldn't be good enough. I was scared because I had no idea what the heck I was doing.
Here is an example of what was going through my head.

I feel sick. I can't wait to go to the potluck! GAHHHHH I"M GOING TO BE MEETING PEOPLE WHO I"VE WATCHED FOR YEARS!!!! Why am I doing this? I'm not talented like they are. They're amazing and I'm this little newbie who has NO IDEA what she's doing and can't improv to save my butt. This is going to be SO MUCH FUN!!!

If you have ever seen Tangled....watch the scene where she is freaking out about leaving her tower. That was really what was going on inside my head.

Thank goodness The Doctor came and went on a walk with me, I think I was driving my mom nuts.  I haven't been so nervous about anything since the audition for BRF.

So I get to the potluck and guess what- THESE PEOPLE ARE AMAZING!!!! Totally insane like me- only cooler! Seriously, these people are weird crazies. I can already tell that we're going to have the BEST times this summer.

Then this morning I drag my body out of bed at the unholy hour of 6am (ewwww). I leave my house at 7:45 so I can get to BAPA (Bristol Academy of the Performing Arts- it rhymes with Appa for you Airbender fans).
I get to BAPA at 8:30- WITH A STOP FOR COFFEE.....will someone tell me how I did that? It took me over an hour to get there on Friday, and less than an hour on Saturday. What does this say about the time I'm going to make driving up there tomorrow for rehearsal?

In short (cause you've got to jump over to Tales of Anne Drew to read about my BAPA day ((maniacal laugh)) today was SUPERCALIFRAGILISTICEXPIALIDOCIOUS!!!!

Now go read Anne's blog.

BNRC- Across the Universe

Book Nook Review Corner! 
Today's pick: Across the Universe
By: Beth Revis
3/5 Pens 

(Summary from Amazon) Fifty years before Godspeed's scheduled landing, Amy's cryo chamber is unplugged, and she is nearly killed.
Now, Amy is caught inside an enclosed world where nothing makes sense. Godspeed's passengers have forfeited all control to Eldest, a tyrannical and frightening leader, and Elder, his rebellious and brilliant teenage heir.
Amy desperately wants to trust Elder. But should she? All she knows is that she must race to unlock Godspeed's hidden secrets before whoever woke her tries to kill again.


To be honest, when I picked this book up, I couldn't help but hear the Beatles song (of the same title) playing in my head. Then I looked inside the cover, read the summary, and saw the quote from the a fore mentioned song. And after looking up the lyrics, the song works fairly well with the story. But back to why I like and don't like this book.

I liked the way it was written, you alternate between Amy's and Elder's perspectives. I've read a handful of books that take this approach and I think it can either show a lot of depth or totally wreck the book.

I'm a fan of a good dystopian novel. This had many elements that can make a fairly good one.
I'm also a fan of almost any retelling of Sleeping Beauty. Amy wakes up from a (almost) 300 year slumber, though not from a kiss. However, I like looking at this as a fairytale dystopian retelling that just happens to be in a Sci-Fi setting.
I was not very impressed with the Sci-Fi elements. Actually let me scrap that. I was impressed with the Sci-Fi elements because they were so "normal." Revis wrote them in so that you could understand how things worked and the "weird space stuff" was kept to a minimum. I mean, unless you're going to go all out Star Wars, Trekkie, or Firefly, sometimes I think subtle is the better way with Sci-Fi. There were no page-and-a-half descriptions of how things worked, simply because all of the technology was familiar in one way or another. Fingerprint scans, floppy disks (I know right?), simple medical terms without a lot of strange substances.
Everything was plausible, and that made it a little scary at times because I can see how that might work out in the future. Shudders.

The reason why the book only earned 3 out of 5 pens, is simply because I didn't like the characters. Eldest was a mediocre villain at best. Elder was a little too scattered for me to find any balance in his character- until the end when he seemed to get his act together (but only a little bit). Amy was good, but if the book had just been written from her perspective a LOT would have been left out.

My biggest peeve was that Revis totally threw in a character loop at the end that wasn't carried out well. If Eldest was a bit cheesy at times, this character was even cheesier with an extra helping of cheddar.

So every element was carried out well, and the characters (while a little wishy-washy at points) were well made. I think my biggest deal with this book was that it needed to be a touch more suspenseful, or a touch more romantic to make it work. It just didn't hold my interest for long. All in all, it's worth a read during a lazy summer day when you don't want to get too invested in something.