back! (and fresher than ever)!

OOPS! Sorry, people who care about me and my life. I haven't had the time or energy to write recently, but now I'm making the time; channeling the energy. Within hours of posting my last entry, I looked out the front door to see my street torn up, with several men in hats driving trucks and staring into the ground. I guess there was a water emergency. We had water back by the end of the day. Rest assured, that smell of filth in the air isn't me.

Work has been consuming me, this week in particular. Tami's in Arizona until Sunday, and one of my co-workers has come down with a 72-hour my-boyfriend-is-visiting bug, and hasn't been able to work her shifts. As I've been left in charge, I get to fill the empty store time. So my next paycheck will be sizeable (sizeable for Movie Gallery, that is). Inventory is next week, which means an early day of coffee, doughnuts, and counting. Inventory day is also the first day of the carnival in the Ames parking lot.

Perhaps you weren't able to detect the excitement masked in that last sentence, but THERE'S A CARNIVAL COMING TO THE AMES PARKING LOT! Which, for those of you who haven't visited us in Jay (read: everyone but Michelle), means the carnival is across the street from our apartment. Thursday, Friday and Saturday, June 8-10. We are going to live at the carnival until it's gone. And, if anyone wants to overdose on fun with us any of those days, you're more than welcome to come up for a day, spend the night if you have to travel. We've got seven bags of bottles in the basement, and every penny we redeem is going to be spent on the carnival. No more, no less.

I had a dream milestone last night. For the first time, I acknowledged a dream while still dreaming. The plot, summed up, was that Elliot Yamin (of American Idol fame) fell in love with me. I apparently found a way to see the show, but it was filmed in what looked like a super-huge version of my high school gymnasium. Anyway, he was trying to hold me, and he wrote me letters, etc. Very nice. Then my sister was wheeled in several levels below us on a stretcher, and I cried (so Elliot comforted me, obviously!). Then Jeremy came in and asked what was going on. We fought, and I told him repeatedly that nothing had happened (because it never does...my brain thwarts it all), and that it was only a dream. How bizarre and self-realizing. Is that the right term? Though I was saying it, I wasn't fully aware of it until I woke up. I'm excessively impressed. Jeremy was, too.

Just realized something...if I had said "I was excessively impresed", I could've made the contraction I's. I's excessively impressed. Ha! Sounds terrible, but technically, there's nothing overtly wrong with it. Not that I plan to use it in conversation.