"a puppy is not a motorcycle"

adam2000 said this at work today. i spend too much time at work, and it's cuz i'm too honest. i tried to explain it to nolan, like this: if i check my myspace, i don't count it in my hours (we keep track of our own hours). same as when i take a lunch or answer my own emails, i subtract it from my hours. since it's my own time, and i don't feel guilty about wasting my boss' money, i do as i please, and next thing you know i've talked to my mom for a half hour and worked on derby stuff for an hour. bla. and i come home and work on derby stuff or my own business stuff, and then it's time to sleep and all the interaction i've had with people is at work or derby, and next thing you know i'm a boring person...

i'm feeling melancholy right now, it's pretty boring. i have all these important things to do, and i'm not really doing them. i'm having trouble staying focused. i'm listening to kzum, and the guy said it's a snow storm outside. what! i just got home, and there was no snow... but sure enough in these few hours the snow started falling, and now it's back to winter time. i knew i should have taken the bike today, but i'm afraid of the cold. one day it was like 10 degrees out, but it was the first day in a while with minimal ice on the ground, so i HAD to ride my bike to work. and when i got to work, i was so cold that i was nauseous for half the day. it sucked, and now i don't want to ride unless it's above freezing when i start out. because no matter what, it might be nice when you start out, but then by the time you get ready to go home it's dark and waaaay colder. and i'm scared to ride on solid ice, i already know i'll just wipe out. so i drive, and i hate driving. some of my friends ride all winter long, even when it's dark and waaaaay cold. i became too much of a bay area girl to do that anymore. wonder when i'll be a nebraska girl again, totally fine with the winter being as long as it is.
i'm getting closer and closer to buying a house, i can almost taste it! my goal is to have one in time to plant a garden. can't wait!!
here's the poster i made for the derby battle of the bands, nolan said it looks like porn.

get here faster summer!!

siiiiick

i am obsessively checking my temperature since i got a thermometer today, it's been hovering between 100 and 101.
no, i am not finished with this blog, i have just been occupied since the new year with frivolous pursuits.
i am soooo ready to get out of bed and not have a pounding headache, i've been stuck here for the last 2 days, it sucks.

happy 200th post!

and have a great 2008!
much love,
t




things to look forward to in daters, not haters for 2008 and posts 201&up:
all the derby photos i haven't shown anyone WILL be posted!
a "year in review" by me, when i cut the crap out of the one i've already made.
more exciting updates about my life, as they happen! or soon after.
more photos, more jokes, more tears.
stay tuned!!

a debate!

i love it. a long time ago, taka, molly and i went to see dave navaro at the independent. it was awesome(ly bad) . and it was so much fun. i took a short video of him playing, like 5 seconds, and posted it on you tube and it has sparked quite a debate in the comments section, check it out .

and by the way, this is the most viewed video on my youtube channel, with over 11,000 views. a pudding wrestling video comes in at second place with 7,000 views. the parakeet video trails at a distant third, with not quite 3,000 views.

yesterday at work, the boss was away all day long. strangely, he was not answering his emails, and we speculated on what he does at home all day. i got up out of my faux-ergonomic chair and demonstrated what i imagine he does on a day of hookey, "he smokes cigars in his boxer shorts, and walks around conducting a philadelphia brass cd."

a year ago i was shitting my pants on venice beach, (didn't i tell you that?) on my magical swedish christmas date with rickard and his friends. i had food poisoning OK!! we left the egg nog out all night and drank it the next afternoon, but i was the only one who got sick. i didn't want to tell anyone about it, and it suuucked. i left my swedish meatball a few days later when i moved back to ne, but he's still cute as ever and having a great christmas. merry christmas rickard!!
and merry christmas everyone, i hope you had as great of a christmas as i have- great family, good friends, good food, plenty of booze, cute boys, and of course great presents.

x-mas in frisko
to remind you that x-mas is about 2 1/2 weeks away. how did this happen?? since when did time pass without me giving it permission? i have about 2 1/2 presents so far, uh oh. the odds aren't with me on this one...

boz in morning.

boz crashes on the couch outside my room over here at lizzy and adam 2000's house. and then i wake him up in the morning with my cooking and coffee making, which he usually begs for. not because it's good, because he's hung over and anything is good. god bless these men, who love whatever you cook.

i went to art school for photography, and it was great. i met so many amazing photographers, in and out of school. and i try to keep up with what everyone is doing, and sometimes it's really inspiring, and sometimes it's depressing. it makes me wonder about what i'm doing now, i haven't taken a photo for myself for months. i have photo jobs, which is the best thing in the world and my goal to be able to support myself with my camera, but it's not the same. it makes me sad. winter is coming up, it's pretty much dark at 5pm, and it's going to get cold soon. and this would seem to be the worst possible time and place to make work, but i'm going to cross my fingers no. i've been working on a body of workfor the past year, night photos about trees and light and stars and etc, and i would like to keep working on it. no, i need to keep working on it. so here's to goals.
these photos were taken in menlo park about a year ago.

the derby programs are finally finished. not printed, cuz that's not my responsibility thank goodness. but they're laid out and lookin good, and now i can get some rest.
sometimes i lay in bed and think about all the things i have to do, and it sucks. i wonder why i didn't take the baby steps that make up the larger steps that get me closer to my goals, the baby steps that i set out to take for that day, and it makes me feel terrible. i like to make up different slogans to help me with things, motivation is a big one. staying cheerful is another. unless you're in my family, i probably don't talk to you when i'm cranky, and so you would have NO IDEA that i'm not my usual wonderful self ALL THE TIME! i know, it's hard to believe.
on monday at derby practice, i took a momentous hit when i was jamming. like, flying through the air sideways and then landing on the shoulders. but my fingers came first, and now my middle left finger is a monsterous purple sausage. i have to ice it all day and it's difficult to type.
tasha's b-day party was grrreat last weekend, at the after party at her house we danced and danced. i got to pull out all the sweet moves i practice by myself and even learned some new ones... conrad showed me how to salsa! well, he tried. i'd be trying so hard to do the steps, and then he'd be like, "NO! NO SAN FRAN!" i'm not sure what he means by that, i don't think my booty moves are a sf thing. he thinks tons of stuff i do or say that he's never heard about are san fran things. oh that connie. so no rump shakin' in salsa. or something... earlier when it was a bunch of derby girls dancing together, there was some nerd that no one knew trying to get in on the action. we just kept shutting him out, and he finally went over to conrad and said, like, dude to dude, "these o'rourkes girls, they dance like that but they don't put out. they're just a bunch of teases." !!! i know! what an idiot! but i forget that's the message guys get when there's booty dancing going on, they see it as a direct invitation to hump. i guess that's the point of booty dancing most of the time. but really sometimes you're just having fun.
my finger really hurts now, from all this typing.
these photos were taken with my holga on the awesome camping trip i went on with my mom last summer.

tari & mandy's halloween party

tons more HALLOWEEN PHOTOS here!

i just watched a video of a porcupine eating a banana, it was sooo cute. then i watched a video of a cat curled up in a toilet. i think it's ok for me to go to bed now.
the videos calmed me.

my favorite jeans are called stretch pants

a short review of the mall:

gateway is the only mall for me, don't give me no southpointe and i won't call it westfield or whatevs. i remember gateway when it was named gateway and had astroturf down the slanty parts. so i had to go to gateway earlier this week, and this is what i thought.

panic- yes, you're going to feel panic at the mall, cuz you get lost. it also bring back thoughts about shopping for christmas and buying things for people that you know they won't like and you're throwing your money away, but it's december 23rd and time to just buy some shit so you don't come up with a diary from claire's and a coupon that says, "good for one free lunch on me!". coupons are great.

tiredness- the mall tiredness is like casino tiredness, you want to go home but can't find your way out, and plus there could be the greatest thing you need if you just go into the next store. this is real tiredness that will stay with you for 24 hours, don't disregard it.

hot topic- it's a terrible store. i'd rather shop at jones & company nyc or whatever it's called. it's everything that is wrong with teenagers for all time, with a price tag. you want to be bad? you want a shirt that says, "i'm not crazy, don't listen to the voices in my top hat"? you want to be a rebel but still want to fit in with a bunch of future losers? step right up to hot topic.

the food court- it's a great place to eat. and while you're sitting by yourself eating a runza, you can pretend you're not an internet predator looking for some underage tail. even then, it's a great place to eat and relax.

harry and steve's- a shitty place to shop. if you plan on giving jobs to mongolian children, go to old navy where the clothes are at least good.

caca nails- it's actually CA (california) nails, but they put it in the window twice with no space between the two abbreviations, i can't help but think of it as caca. i've never had my nails done professionally, so i wouldn't know about caca nails.

there's a shitty art photography studio that has photos of a horse that looks like it has two heads, and aerial views of memorial stadium. and the candle store. and the store that has a wax butler out front. i don't know how i feel about these stores. like caca nails, i've never been a customer. ok, i guess i hate the art photography store.

so i'm walking around the mall, trying to decide how i should remember how to get out of the mall. go back to the food court and go towards aldo keeping jc penny on your right, or go to the proactive booth and make a beeline for caca nails... feeling the panic and tiredness, when i remember wet seal. lord i forgot! and charlotte russe! yess! as far as i'm concerned, these are the best places in the mall to shop. these are the stores i'm sure that destiny's child shops at, so therefore it's good enough for me. and guess what i found at wet seal? the same kind of jeans i bought in may, but they haven't got them in again until now. and i found the last pair in my size!! success! the denim is sooo stretchy, allowing previously unheard of amounts of tightness with amazing amounts of comfort. i think they're actually called leggings. awesome. so i got them.

in conclusion, the mall kind of sucks, but you can find some things there. you can eat, and sit around, and look at teenagers and see what the popular styles are so you can avoid them.

that's a wrap.

speaking of art photography, that anne geddes bee baby pic i have up really harshes my mellow. everytime i see it, i get a little angry.

happy birthday molly!

good luck hood rats and girls going to minneapolis! kick some butt!

when i was downtown today going to the bank and stuff for work, i saw two reporter ladies walking down the street with a camera and stuff. i thought the blonde one was kate ellington from 10/11 who did a spot about the mad maxines (video to come later) that i was in, and so i smiled at her but it wasn't her. it was some other blonde lady and her and her partner asked to interview me for the news. i said yes, and they told me i was to give my opinion about steve pederson getting dismissed from doing something with unl football and tom osborne getting that job. and i'm all confused because i don't know who this guy is or what happened to him or what his job was, but they want me to say something really bad, and keep on simplifying the situation so i could make a comment. finally i'm like, "i'm sorry, i don't know who scott peterson is, i don't really know about football." and they laugh and say, "ok, you could just give your opinion on TOM OSBORNE then." but i don't have an opinion on tom osborne, and i tell them they should do a story about roller derby. i apologize to them, but say i would give a really bad interview, and say goodbye.
when i got back to work, i told everyone the story, wishing i would have just pulled something out of the air to say about football and the husker legacy and lessons and all sorts of things, when nolan told me the dude's name is steve pederson and not scott peterson. ha. and way back when, i didn't know who scott peterson is either.

favorite saying of our derby announcer...

"that's gonna hurt tomorrow!"

lizzy's bruise.
you don't know the half of it buddy.

warning: this is a serious quote, taken verbatim from a blog i looked at just now. i repeat, this is a serious quote with no hint of sarcasm.

"We shared our tattoo ideas, and his was the Chinese character for love on his back. Darren and Bronwen are the some of the few people I can talk openly with about love. We’re such hopeless romantics."

and it's a dude writing it.

the last few days have been real crappy.
and then, the least of all worries, the girl at the coffee shop has no idea what the word "steeping" means in regards to tea. huh?
conrad loaned me a book last night, rain of gold, before we went to that funny little amigos on 27th and capital parkway. i've never been there before, there's only outside seating and a GIANT billboard directly above you that you never noticed before and now is larger than life. we ate cheeseburgers and fries, and vowed to never eat cheeseburgers and fries again. i read my book and went to bed, thinking "tomorrow will be better, a new day and all that." nope.

check out my awesome new handlebars, conrad set me up over the weekend with a little bit o'this and o'that, making it ride like a whole different bike!

in case you didn't know, i spend about 80% of my day posing and lounging on my bike.

another thank you to mr. miguel, my personal work is up too now. click here!