new jersey

so i've been home in new jersey for the past few days and well really nothing going on. i mean besides doctors visits.

i drove up to jersey on thursday, stopping thursday night in dc with my friend ellie to break up the 13 hour drive, since i wasn't sure how i'd feel with my knee. and it was great to see her and i drove through clarendon where i lived in dc and it made me miss living so close to dc and all the crazy and fun of the summer and made me miss many of my friends. and then the rest of the drive up to nj was fine. i've decided though i rather just do it in one 13 hour stretch than stop. i don't like driving for two days, i'd rather just go.

i will be in nj until at least the first week of january. and i'm already going insane. since i'm not working i have no money and can't really do anything. i am hoping to sub a few days while i'm home though.

and yes, i was correct. i did tear my ACL and i'll be having surgery on december 19th, but hopefully sooner. i asked if there were any cancellations to be moved up as i need to be in nj for at least 3 weeks post op, as i can't drive for 3ish weeks and need physical therapy every day for the first 2 weeks.

it doesn't help that the weather has been cold and dreary in jersey either.

happy thanksgiving!

history hotties

so as you know i am a huge history fan. and well i have gone on a spring break civil war road trip, a civil war weekend , making history friends in kansas, my laura ingalls wilder obsession, and a george washingon obsession among many other things.

and well i'm about to share my love of history hotties.

yes, history hotties. 

gw

stonewall jackson

one of my first history hotties was a young george washington. yes our founding father was once quite the hottie. this is gw at 19 back in his surveying days. and he could survey me anytime. i think i blame this on going to a school named after him and just a general george washington love. but he was quite a dashing young man.

so others that i think would have been quite the heartthrobs back in their day also include alexander hamilton, thomas jefferson and zachary taylor and a young stonewall jackson.

but my most recent historical hottie is our 19th president rutherford b. hayes. he is extremely gorgeous. look at his eyes. and he kinda fits my mold of what my type tends to be. yummmmy!

                                

                     rutherford b. hayes

and so in my love of historical hotties i have found the best website ever - my daguerreotype boyfriend and it makes me feel better that i'm not alone in my love of historical hotties. check it out and see for yourself some very fine 19th century gentlemen!

so yes, i am coming out to the internet on my love of historical hotties!

what is one of your random quirks that people think is kinda weird. believe me when people find out i think a young george washington was a hottie i get some weird looks!

greatest fear

so back in the summer of 2002 i was playing field hockey at our team summer camp and i collapsed when playing and i tore my ACL (anterior cruciate ligament) in my left knee. i was pretty devastated to say the least as i was going into my senior year of high school and was super excited for my senior season of field hockey, ski racing and just life in general with all the possibilities of senior year and my future. but after surgery i worked my ass off for physical therapy and was able to ski in my final meet my senior year. and i continued to get back into shape as i wanted to play field hockey in college but ended up rowing. i have a pretty awesome scar on my left knee and 9 years later i just wear a knee brace when i ski and sometimes hike. but my greatest fear has always been tearing my right acl. and well it looks like my greatest fear has come true. 

i was playing kickball monday night like i do on monday night. i joined a league and have spent the last few getting to know my teammates, laughing and having fun. so i was playing last night and running to third base when i collapsed as i reached third. i felt my knee give out and heard a pop! as soon as i hit the ground i knew it was my ACL. i remembered the pain and feeling from when i did it before and immediately iced it and hung out on the sidelines keeping it up cheering on my team. and while i kept hoping it wasn't my ACL - as soon as I tried walking and it wasn't stable i knew. so i went home and amy took me to the er and within an hour the doctor said i was correct and that i'd torn my ACL. i have a appointment tomorrow with a othro here in charleston to double check everything and it looks like i'll be back in new jersey for a few weeks as i'll most likely need surgery. so trying to figure everything out and deal with insurance and figure out plans and trying to find the silver lining in all of this. 

i'm now going to have matching scars on my knees, i rock crutches like no one else and i'll now have 2 knee braces and be even more bionic!... and well there must be a reason why this all is happening, and it will all make sense one day. 

back in 2002 right after my left acl surgery 

pitt & chs

fun with a coworkers sunglasses!

so i realized i never wrote about my pittsburgh trip last week! i had a great weekend working in pittsburgh at the conference. i was conference support, so i didn't have my own group of students but i was conference paparazzi and helped with whatever needed to be done and i was lucky to get to spend the weekend with a few of my favorite people. so really most of my weekend was spent laughing with my coworkers. and as i wrote about earlier this week it really gave me time to think about working in corporate leadership & development. so lots to think about and it was great to travel as i've really missed that. and i met a new awesome person who i was conference support with and we had a fun adventure sunday morning and also had one of our flights the same on the way home. and maria and i had fun hanging out in the charlotte airport while we waited for our flights home and we also saw catelynn & tyler from teen mom!  

so i didn't really get out to enjoy pitt except for the little adventure sunday morning, which i'm still waiting on the pictures of! but here are some pictures from the weekend. i love these conferences for the connections you make and meeting so many awesome people!

fun adventure!

gorgeous fall day in pittsburgh!

<3 the beach!

and this week was pretty crazy with work. i started in my new position and the next few weeks are going to be rough. with the store being a mess and the holiday season upon us i have a lot to do in the next few weeks! but i'm excited about it and man i'm getting a great upper body workout from constantly moving boxes and clothes! so today was my day off from retail job and after seeing my schedule for next week i decided not to sub today as i'm working sun-thursday next week and my last day off was october 29th so if i didn't take today off i'd be working until the 18th without a day off. so i had a lazy morning reading in bed and enjoying snuggling in my bed on such a chilly morning. and then this afternoon amy and i had an adventure to the beach! 

since we are 20 minutes from the beach we headed out to sullivans's island again to enjoy a walk on the beach and this time decided to head towards fort moultrie. so not only did i go to the beach i also got to see a historic revolutionary war/civil war fort on veterans day! i can't wait to go back and actually do the fort, not just walk by and hug it! so here are some fun pictures from our beach walk. and it was a but chilly today in charleston only getting about 60 today, but an absolutely gorgeous day for a beach walk! 

fort moultrie - the palmetto log fort here on sullivans island was super important in the revolutionary war

super excited to be at the fort and hugging history! i also frolicked to the fort to hug it. 

shadow fun at the beach!

gorgeous day!

sunset over the fort

so i had a wonderful day off! i'm headed out to a party tonight of a friend and i'm currently watching the unc-msu basketball game. to kick off the season and to honor veterans day they are playing on an aircraft carrier and it is pretty awesome! and tomorrow night i'm seeing darius rucker! such a great weekend!

what are your weekend plans?

oh and yay 11/11/11

horoscopes

so i happened to randomly check my horoscope today and wow it was ridiculously similar to things going on in my life. and it made me laugh. i've mentioned before my love of notes from the universe and how i am a to a t on my leo astrological sign but my horoscope today just really hit home.

You're excited about the prospects of your future, yet obvious obstacles still need to be handled before you can consider yourself successful. You could even feel waves of discouragement today if you focus on how much work there is still left to finish. It's helpful to take a few moments and think about your recent changes, carefully observing where your horizons have grown. However, don't waste precious energy looking back, for time marches on and you must live in the present.  

the first sentence soooo accurately describes how i am feeling right now about my life. i'm super excited about the possibility of the future and i'm really starting to think more about corporate training & development. i mean it is similar to what i've spent the last year doing well minus the corporate part, but i really do enjoy the leadership/teamwork part of what i did the last year. i took and loved two leadership classes in college, i would still be teaching but in a non-traditional setting and there are so many places something like this could take me. and with the second part - of work left to be finished. just thinking about everything i need to do in the next two weeks with work to get things where they need to be in the store and with the holidays almost here. the back of house is such a hot mess! but i'm learning and while everything right now is merchandise based but my assistant store manager is awesome and i know i'll learn a lot from her. a hard part for me is getting my mind around the fact i'm working in retail - but as i've come to realize in the last month there is so much that goes into it. specifics about product placement, marketing, sales, customer service, creating brand loyalty and then everything behind the scenes from corporate. 

so as i told myself the last 1.5 years - come september 2011 i'm looking for a non-teaching job, and well i found one, got a promotion within the first month and a lot of possibility for the future. 

so my horoscope was pretty spot on today. what do you think? do you ever get eerily accurate horoscopes? 

fall

so i forgot how pretty fall was with leaves changing colors and crisp cool weather and i'm in pittsburgh this weekend working a conference and BAM absolutely gorgeous! i only wish i had more time here this trip to play and explore more of pitt. i was here last march and had a great time! but after my leaves being only yellowish down in charleston seeing reds & yellows & oranges makes me so happy!

traveling

Hi from Pittsburgh!

A bit of a crazy day! Worked this morning 7am to noon, went home, packed (nothing like last minute), caught a taxi to the airport for my 4pm flight to Charlotte, hour layover, flight to Pittsburgh, bus to hotel and then dinner with a college friend!

I'm excited for the next few conference days and to work with some great people! And to remember the fun of working with 7-9th graders for 14 hours a day!

Took a fun picture of the t-rex at the pitt airport today! And went to 2 new airports - Charleston & pitt so always fun!

But I didn't have good flights - about halfway through my chs to charlotte flight my jaw and face began to hurt like crazy. Sharp pain that I've had once or twice flying but this was the worse annd it lead to a migrane so they were not fun flights!

But I'm excited to be traveling!

happy november

happy november!

first i can't believe how fast time is flying? the last week was pretty busy with work and life and the next week is going to be even crazier. though my life is usually quite interesting!

i do have some good news about the job front! it became official yesterday that i am now the "back of house supervisor" at retail job! so i'm now a supervisor of the stock room and will be in charge of making sure that the back is organized and all sizes are out on the sales floor. my manager has been happy with my work and was impressed with my background so he wants to give me more and thinks i might be a good candidate for a management position in the future. so this is exciting as it is more stability in the job front but still not full time/benefits. but it will be about 35 hours plus i'll still sub a little bit too. but it has me thinking about something completely different for a career path - one i never ever thought of and i really think i'd like to work in corporate in a leadership/training area as opposed to a store manager so who knows. but i'm excited about this!

sweet potato gnocci and soup!

good weekend - went to the farmers market downtown and had a fun day cooking with amy! we picked up fresh gnocchi and amy made butternut squash & apple soup plus red velvet cupcakes! annnnd we ate dinner at our dining room table! (pics coming soon) so that was super fun! and then we went out for a few drinks but i couldn't stay late because i had to be at work early and i was exhausted!

ladybug

i did end up dressing up for halloween and did go out for a bit monday night with amy & friends but again having to be at work at 7am does put a damper on going out. and then tonight i had a friend blind date! an old friend of mine from gs camp 10 years ago saw that i moved to charleston on fb. one of her friends juuust moved down here so she sent us an email and we went out for drinks tonight and YAY! we went to fish for happy hour and had some amazing dims sum and a great time talking about life & moving to charleston. so i can't wait to hang out with her again!


and this week is even crazier because i'm off to pittsburgh tomorrow afternoon until sunday night. i'm working a conference there this weekend for my old job and i'm excited to see some people and to just have a fun weekend working with some great students! annnnnd it will be so nice to get out of south carolina. i love it here but for the first time since i moved back from ireland (march 2009) i have spent more than a few weeks in one state. i haven't left south carolina since i drove down here august 23. i haven't gone more than 45 minutes from charleston.  i'm not used to being so in one place. and getting ready for this trip has reminded me of that.

how was your weekend? any fun plans this week?