List #260: Things I Should Win an Oscar For

When I was in high school I dreamed of growing up and winning an Academy Award. I had grand ideas of my life somehow ending up in Los Angeles, wearing gorgeous designer dresses on red carpets, and giving the most perfect off-the-cuff winners speech. I would have held that gold statue high up in the air, showing off my sculpted arms, and have diamonds dripping from my ears and fingers.

Yeah. None that happened. The idea of living in Los Angeles actually sounds terrifying. I haven't acted in anything since I played the Mad Hatter in a sorority skit. And I actually really don't even like diamonds.

So since I have no chance of winning an actual Oscar, here's what I think the Academy should honor me for. You know, just in case they start giving out awards to ordinary people who blog from their couch in Pittsburgh.

I should at least be nominated for the following bests:

• Wearing of multiple tights when it's 0 degrees outside.
• Doing your own hair and make up in a house with one bathroom and one roaming and feisty toddler.
• Online shopper.
• Ability to get salt marks all over ones shoes and tights.
• Showering in the dark.
• Recommending books you haven't heard about yet.
• Not watching movies.
• Disliking James Patterson.
• Forgetting where you put your glasses.
• Forgetting where you put your keys.
• Forgetting where you left your phone.
• Playing games on your phone and then getting bored with them after two weeks.
• Thinking chipped ham really is the best lunch meat.
• Loving peppermint tea.
• Falling asleep with a heating pad.
• Having a crush on Captain America, the character.
• Being so very much like Leslie Knope.
• Daydreaming.
• Drinking water out of Tervis mugs.
• Snacking on sweet tarts.
• Taking an extraordinarily long time to knit a scarf for oneself.
• Watching every episode of Parks and Recreation at least 5 times at this point.

What about your awards, dear readers? Let me know what you'd likely win for! 

List #259: Where I Was While I Was Away

I know. It's been a long while since I last blogged. In the last year and a half so many things in my life have morphed and changed that often I don't quite know what to share and how to share it. It's why you haven't heard too much about my life, the Boyfriend, and the (now) Toddler. It's all a balancing game of how much is too much and what's appropriate and what I'm comfortable with. And sometimes, I really just don't know how I feel on any given day.

But I'm ready to get my blogging game back on track. I've been journaling a little since I've been gone and I've learned one thing about myself:  I am my better self when I'm writing my thoughts. And I think sometimes I'm even better when I'm sharing them.

So to start off, I'll catch you up on where I've been while I was away:

• Oakland
• Downtown
• My library
• Other libraries
• Sitting on the right side of a bus
• Sitting on the left side of a bus
• Walking through Schenley Park
• Carnegie Museum of Pittsburgh
• Phipps Conservatory
• Charleston, WV
• On the side of the highway in WV for 3 hours
• Sunset Beach, NC
• Eating Thanksgiving dinner on a beach
• Reading on a porch
• Watching television on the couch
• Sitting on the floor playing with a Toddler
• My family's house
• His family's house
• Extended families' houses
• Putting up and taking down Christmas lights
• Under lots of blankets
• Sitting in a movie theater
• Restaurants. Restaurants. Restaurants. 
• Laughing with friends at parties
• Target.
• Lowe's
• Giant Eagle
• In bed dreaming 
• In bed having nightmares
• Sitting in my new desk chair
• The Benedum Center 
• The Strip District
• The North Shore
• Casinos
• A wedding
• A bridal shower
• Not Pawnee, Indiana

So dear readers, where have you been lately?