Friday Nights

I always seem to be way too tired to do anything on Friday nights.

When I get home from my weekly Friday business meeting for my business class, all I want to do is lay on the sofa or take a nap. It's becoming a problem. I don't feel like a college student.

Let me just describe my day.

I came home from class, sat on the chair, got the energy up to go get ice cream and shop for about an hour. On the way home, Natalie and I decided to get a manicure because the place next to our house only costs $14 and has a student discount. We really wanted pedicures, but they were more money so we stuck with mani's.

Turns out, the lady asks if I want gel nail polish because it will last at least 3 weeks. I say, yeah that sounds great! She tells me that it's a little bit more, but I didn't think that it would be a big deal. After an hour and a half wait because the gel stuff takes an extra long time to dry, I get the bill for $30.

Apparently the gel junk is not really just a little bit more--it's flat out expensive!

Anyways, we leave the nail place and rush home to change for dinner. I didn't even want to go to dinner after spending that much money, but we had already made plans.

So I went to dinner and then came home and been here alone ever since!

Of course, I have found very entertaining things to do here on my Friday evening.

I'll give you a quick preview...

I've been playing this lovely business simulation game for my business class. We get a group of 5 people, all different executives for the firm, and we have to start a business selling computers and make a ton of decisions for starting it up from scratch. We get graded on how well we make decisions and how well our firm does in the market. We did the best in the class this quarter, probably because of dorks like me in my group on the website on Friday nights.

Next I started thinking about the job fair coming up. I keep getting emails that say to 'dress appropriately for the job fair' and I got to thinking, I don't exactly know what that means. So, I checked to see what google had to say. I kept checking more sites because I didn't really like what they had to say. 

1. Treat a job fair like it is an interview because it is your first interview. Dress like you're at an interview.

2. Women should wear a solid color, conservative skirt suit with a coordinated blouse. The skirt should be past your knees. Wear moderate heels, not too high and never show your toes. Limit your jewelry, and always wear hosiery, light or tan colored (I didn't know people still wore hosiery; welcome to the real world). Sparse make-up, and manicured nails (CHECK!!).

And so next, this is what I went to: 

I actually just happened to get an email saying that The Limited is having a suit event where all suits are 40% off. So, I thought, perfect time to browse! Suits are so expensive, so maybe if they are on sale, it will be affordable... And I soon found out, even on sale, they aren't a good deal or anything.

Ok, obviously if I were wearing these, they wouldn't be so stylish. I wouldn't have all of the accessories because the websites said no jewelry or weird colors or anything. (I really like the first one!) 

So, after all my suit-searching, I decided to research every firm coming to the job fair that was looking for candidates with my major or something similar. They were all from like Pennsylvania and Atlanta and Memphis. I found a select few from around here and Chattanooga that were interesting.

So I decided that I better get to work on an impeccable resume and impressing one-minute commercial of myself! 

(Sounds miserable to me.)

I ended the evening with a quick facebook check, a chat with a couple of my fellow dorky team members for my business group, and then a blog post. The roommates have returned from their adventures tonight, and I am in the same place they left me a few hours ago when they went out.

I feel like a got a good amount of stuff done, yet nothing at all in my world has changed since 9:00 besides my knowledge about job fairs. Thank goodness for Friday nights! Hope you all enjoy your weekend!

Fun Facebook newsFeed

See that up there?

Well let me repeat what it says. It says, Emily Beal is engaged to Ben Hyman.

This made me super excited tonight when I looked on my facebook and this was the first thing that popped up on my news feed! They are the most adorable couple ever, and I was elated to hear the news (and to be at her house when she came back from him proposing)!

Congratulations Emily! (Click on her name to see her blog.) I decided I was going to post a blog post for her because she hasn't yet. You need to get on that, Emily!

I'm just going to go ahead and throw this out there--something else that made me really excited was that I actually figured how to do a screenshot of facebook and put it on my blog. That's a big step for my un-computer savvy self!

It's Been 5 Years

Today marks 5 years since Natalie Sitton passed away.

Natalie was one of my friends who was killed in a car accident our junior year in high school. I'm not sure if September 21 will ever pass again without memories of the night that she died. It was horrible.

It's crazy to me how, 5 years later, my senior year in college, when I'm thinking about my career and such, that this day still affects me.

Although she wasn't one of my closest friends, I was utterly devastated, as was my entire class. She was a friend who I talked to at school and when I saw her at the mall (which seemed to be about once or twice a week), but we didn't hang out a ton out of school. It's amazing how much her life rocked my world as a high school junior.

Anyways, I think that that day--September 21, 2005-- was the first time that I truly realized how short life can be. "You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes" (James 4:14).  We're not guaranteed any amount of time on this earth. We better do things that truly matter now, because there is no telling how long we're going to have.

So, what truly matters? I would dare say, only the things that are bringing God glory, advancing the Kingdom, showing His love to all who are around me, growing deeper in my relationship with Him. Those things are the only things that are going to count if I look back on my life here on earth. What an awful feeling it would be to look back and wish that I'd done things differently!

Although I don't think about Natalie very much anymore, her life taught me a lesson that stuck with me. I don't always spend my time wisely. I don't always bring God glory. But, ever since that day, I think I have had a thought in the back of my mind that creeps up every now and then and reminds me, I'm just a mist. My time here is short--no matter if it is 17 years or 71 years--it's all short!

I was reminded of that lesson again today, and I thank the All Sufficient One, El Shaddai for that reminder. He has blessed me by reminding me of the things that matter.

I'm not sure that I could list off many good things that came from her death at age 17, but  I do know that it was good because our Sovereign God, El Elyon, allowed it to happen. I find comfort in remembering that El Elyon had complete control over that entire situation, and that His will was brought about through that.

I pray that I won't forget this lesson. Life is short, and more than that, it's important to do what is going to matter in eternity.

33 Weeks

I came to the realization that I only have 33 weeks left as a student.

That is, in 33 weeks, I'll be all on my own. For only 33 more weeks will it be okay for me not to have a job or a husband. After that, it's all over. I'll have to get one of the two. :)

As of now, I will be jobless, homeless, foodless, and directionless in just 232 days. This puts a whole new twist on how I think of my life. As I enjoyed my canned tuna for dinner, I began to think about the fact that I'm not always going to have money for things like food if I don't have a job.

I'm hoping that's not really how it will work. Maybe the parents will let me live with them or help me out with food. Hopefully they won't let me starve. But really and truly, hopefully I'll get a job!

I was looking at the Fall job fair participants today and was completely overwhelmed with qualifications and resumes... and on and on and on. How in the world am I going to ever get a job?

Being a Human Resources major doesn't help anything either, because we work on problems like: to hire 60 sales people, you'll need 1747 applicants to apply in order to narrow it down and get the candidate you want. That is, the company would need about 32 applicants in order to hire one person, and that's just a regular sales associate position. I'm not sure if I'm talking HR jargon or not, but what I'm saying is that it's pretty darn hard to get a good job.

At job fairs, recruiters talk to hundreds of students. They might offer 30 interviews, and then narrow those interviews down to five people, then down to one or two job offers.

My human resources major might actually be hurting me because I know way too much about recruiting. I'm already nervous about the job fair that is over a week away. Oh, we also study the unemplyoment statistics. Those are pretty darn high as well. I have a higher chance of being unemployed than being employed.

Things are looking pretty grim for my near future.

help! i only have 33 weeks!

(I chose this picture to bring memories of happy times)

Looking Forward to Fall!

We just have 3 more days until Fall 2010!

I have never said that Fall is my favorite time of the year because I hate that it means that Winter is on its way. But, winter signs aside, Fall is my favorite! (At least right now it is. Once it's March, Spring will be my favorite. Winter will never be my favorite, though.)

Anyways, I was just thinking about a few things that I'm looking forward to:

Chocolate chip pumpkin cookies
                  They are super easy, 3 ingredients, stir, and bake!
Apple Cider

Lots of kinds of really good apples

Bon fires

Cardigan sweaters

Falling leaves

Crisp air, crunchy leaves, clear skies

Pumpkin spice lattes

Fall decorations

And lastly, soup!

How to get rid of a burn scar

If you read my blog at all, you know that I am accident prone--never serious accidents, but just awkward, embarrassing accidents. Roller skating accidents, accidently-too-short hair cuts, almost airplane accidents, you know what I mean. You might be surprised to know that I don't have many scars from my accidents.

But, this summer, I was unloading my suitcase from the back of the bus and received a nice burn on my leg from the tailpipe. It didn't hurt too bad for too long, and I was fine, but I'm left with an ugly scar on my leg.

Backstory--I have always been proud of my scarless legs. Never playing a sport in my life and always being too scared to take big risks, I haven't had too many chances to get scars. I have one scar on my left knee from when I was 4 playing at my dad's hardware store and falling on a gravel hill. Daddy had told me not to go up the gravel hill and I trekked on up anyways. I fell half way up (I've never been the most coordinated person). By the time I got down the hill, the blood was on my sock and it was unbelievably traumatizing. (I had to put a band aid on it, which was my idea of a nightmare as a child because I was terrified of anything medical related.) Maybe that was the day that I started never breaking rules that involved my safety. I still have the scar to look back on and always remember breaking Daddy's rules.

I had a cyst removed in 7th grade, but I went to a plastic surgeon (and got put to sleep because I was chicken) so that I didn't have a scar. It's on my back, so I'm actually not sure if I have a scar from that, but I don't think I do.

So anyways, back to the story. In May I burnt my leg, but I had no idea that I was going to have this 2 inch dark scar spot on my leg from it, or else I would have tried to figure out how to get rid of it. Now, 4 months later, it still looks the way it did 2 weeks after it happened. Bummer!

Last Friday I was straightening my hair with a flat iron, and somehow it burnt my arm. I have no idea how it happened, but I sure did feel it! The flat iron touched the skin on my arm where it's super tender, the part that never gets tan and is really soft. Needless to say, it bubbled up really fast and stung for a while, but I left for dinner without treating it. (I should have learned about that after my bee sting that still hurts because I didn't treat it with ice or anything. The stinger finally came out last week, two weeks after I got stung.)

For the burn--someone told me to put ice on it, someone told me to put butter on it, someone told me cold water, and someone said whatever I do, do not put ice on it. I never really did anything because I never figured out what to do. I'm still wondering what to do for it. I read something that says vitamin E oil doesn't work and that it's just a myth. I read something about silicon strips, and something saying to rub it with olive oil.

So, who knows? The internet has way too many contradicting answers to: how to get rid of a burn scar.

No one ever comments on my blog, but I'm open for suggestions via comment, email, facebook, or in person! I'll share with you if I get any feedback. I can't have 2 scars in one summer when I have only had one in twenty-one years.

The burn didn't even really hurt bad, it just looks nasty. It's brown and in a nice L shape with bubbles. I'm hoping I don't sound like a diva. I think I probably do, but this is a life-long-lasting issue I'm talking about.

I'm happy to be blogging again, y'all. I had a minor leave of absence because of back to school business. I really want to blog more regularly now! I have high hopes, so we will see. The Vols lost yesterday, but not too bad. It's been a fun weekend, and I'm excited about a not-too-busy week!

Go Vols!

The Tennessee Florida game is tomorrow! 

Go Vols!!!