ABC's of Me

So as usual I'm late to the ABC party, but thought I would join in anyway.  Especially since I am procrastinating and really should be packing for Hawaii.  Even though I love to travel, I hate to pack.  I really hate to pack for "hot weather" vacations since you seem to need so much more clothes.  Why is that?  Anyway, without further adieu the ABC's of me!

A. Age: 33 - gasp!  When did that happen?  And I'm only 2 months away from 34.  Time to start dusting off the 34 Things list...

B. Bed size: Twin.  Long story and hopefully soon I will upgrade.

C. Chore you hate: So many chores to choose from.  I think anything to do with the bathroom I absolutely loathe.

D. Dogs: Eh, they are fine, much better than cats!  I love my parents' dog (Chloe, any dog pics on the blog are usually of her), and I don't mind my sister's dogs.  Or some of my friends' dogs.  But overall, I'm just not an animal person.

E. Essential start to your day: Breakfast of some sort.  I really can't skip breakfast.  And lately I've been trying to be good about taking my vitamins first thing.

F. Favorite color: It was blue for the longest time but then it became green.  I rebelled against pink when I was younger but now I have embraced pink.

G. Gold or silver: Silver

H. Height: 5’8” - I have finally accepted it.  I desperately wanted to be 5'9" but it just wasn't in the cards.

I. Instruments you play: I used to play flute once upon a time.

J. Job title: What do I want it to be?  Princess of the WORLD!  Ha, just kidding.  Tax Manager or something like that.  I feel uncomfortable with my title, but that's a post for another time.

K. Kids: Hmm, I would have answered this one definitely yes but as I am nearing 34 I'm starting to wonder if it is in the cards for me.  I have fantastic "nieces and nephews" and I've always thought about adopting.  So we'll see - you never know what God's plan is - although I'd really like to know!

L. Live: About 20 minutes from downtown Seattle

M. Mom’s name: Mum, Mummy, Mommy, Mom or Teresa

N. Nicknames: Em, Emmy, Yemmy - I don't really have a proper nickname.

O. Overnight hospital stays: Fourth grade for dehydration among other things

P. Pet peeve: Another one I can list several things but talking on your phone in the bathroom just gets me every time.  Or starting to write a check after the clerk gives you your total - I mean really?  Is the date changing or the store's name?  Or your name for that matter?

Q. Quote from a movie: From Anne of Green Gables:  "Twenty pounds of brown sugar" or "Anne Shirley, what in heck are you doing out here?  Fishing for lake trout."  From Pride & Prejudice: "Mr. Darcy!"  From The Rock: "Welcome to the Rock" or "How did you get out of your cell?"  From Indiana Jones: "If you are a Scottish Lord, I am Mickey Mouse!"  I like this game - I could go on and on! 

R. Right or left handed: Right.  And do I know my right from my left?  No.  I have to write in the air to figure out my right and make an L with my fingers to figure out my left.

S. Siblings:  1 Sister, 1 Brother (both younger)

T. Time you wake up:  I'd like to wake up at 6:15 on weekdays, but lately it has slipped to 6:30

U. Underwear: Hanes

V. Vegetables you dislike: Brussel Sprouts, Green Beans (I was never so happy when I figured out I was allergic to green beans)

W. What makes you run late:  I hate being late.  Traffic.  Random odds and ends that I think I have time for but I don't.

X. X-Rays you’ve had: Teeth, ankle, leg, knee

Y. Yummy food you make: I'm not a cook, although I can make a decent fajita/stir-fry concoction

Z. Zoo- favorite animal: Tigers, Bears & Elephants

Play along, if you'd like!

Mosaic

I saw this on Mandi's blog and it looked like fun!

a. Type your answer to each of the questions below into Flickr Search.

b. Using only the first page, pick an image.

c. Copy and paste each of the URLs for the images into fd’s mosaic maker.


And here are the questions:
1. What is your first name? Emily

2. What is your favorite food? Pad Thai

3. What high school did you go to? Hazen

4. What is your favorite color? Green

5. Who is your celebrity crush? Clive Owen

6. Favorite drink? Cappuccino

7. Dream vacation? Greece

8. Favorite dessert? Gelato!

9. What you want to be when you grow up? Happy

10. What do you love most in life? Possibilities

11. One Word to describe you. Determined

12. Your flickr name. This one didn't return anything so I used my name again.

Me & my blog

I saw this meme on Mandi's blog and thought it was interesting.

why did you start a blog?

I like to travel and the past several years I have been traveling a lot! After each trip I'd often send out several emails to different people telling them about my trip. Then I started writing up a narrative of my trip and emailing that out. Blogs had started to intrigue me and it seemed like a natural platform for my trip reports. It has continued to evolve from just travel narratives to more of what is going on in my life.

how did you come up with your blog name?

As my original intention was for this to be for my travel narratives, I wanted travel or journey or adventure (something that reflected travel) and lo and behold I settled on travel with emily.

do your friends and family know about your blog?

Yes. I have friends and family all over the country and this is an easy way for people to see what I'm up to as I am not always the best correspondent and I am not the biggest fan of the phone. I don't know what it is about the phone, but I would prefer to either email/text or talk to someone face to face. I am not a good phone person.

how do you write your posts?

I come up with all sorts of ideas for what I will write when I'm running or driving or traveling but then when I actually get to my computer (or to a pad & paper) to write it down, it never seems to come out the same. And then of course at some later point I do remember what it was I had wanted to say, in the way I had wanted to say it. Sometimes I go back and edit, but usually I let it go because it is never as clever or witty as I had first thought.

have you ever had a troll or had to delete unkind comments?

Just once have I had to delete comments from a troll.

do you check your stats? do you care how many people read your blog? if you do care, how do you increase traffic?

It hasn't really crossed my mind to check. It could be interesting though.

what kind of blogs/posts interest you?

I like glimpses into other people's lives. I like artistic posts. I love looking at other people's pictures, both of places I have been and places I haven't been. I am a very visual person.

what do you like and dislike about blogging?

I have always liked to write and this gives me a forum to write. It also can let me be creative, or at least try. Plus it is basically a record of my life.

The part I don't always like is the time involved. It can be a time-sucker!

A fun game of tag!

I saw this on Stacy's blog. I love these things so I thought I'd play along!

5 Things I was doing 10 years ago:
1. Uh, this is harder than I thought. Finishing up my junior year in college.
2. So if I remember right this would be the year we were having roommate drama. Long story short, we had a roommate who who was very needy and just made our living situation somewhat miserable.
3. Going to London for the first time to visit my freshman year roommate who was studying over there. Who knew that visit would start my love affair wth London?
4. Buying MY first car, a little red Mazda MX-6. My first vehicle was a Ford Escort which I shared with my sister and she drove it more than I did so I don't count that and my second was a 1978 Ford Truck which was really my dad's but he let me use it. So that's why I consider the little red car my first car.
5. Yeah, I have no idea, that was a long time ago.

5 Things I was doing 5 years ago:
1. Living in Houston
2. Trying to decide what to do - stay with Enron or find a new job.
3. That's about all I remember... I'm not sure why 5 years ago was harder than 10 years ago...

5 Things I did today:
1. Went to kickboxing
2. Went to Target
3. This is more something that happened - my poor car got a rock chip in the windshield. Seriously, what is going on with my car?!
4. Watched Duke beat Boston College
5. Did not go to Starbucks (more about this later in another post)

5 Products I can't live without:
1. Hm, not sure about this...
2. Lately, Crystal Light on the go packets
3. The little bottles of Purell hand sanitizer
4. My Coach purse
5. My ipod

5 Things I would do if I won a billion dollars:
1. Give to charity
2. Quit my job!!!!!! And then take a year to travel the whole world.
3. Buy a house (or two or three). One of them in Italy.
4. Buy my parents a house and my dad a car. Probably buy my brother a car as well.
5. Buy myself a car!! I can finally get my BMW!!!

5 Places I have lived:
1. Newcastle, WA
2. Bellingham, WA
3. Houston, TX
4. London, England
5. Newcastle, WA

5 Jobs I have had:
1. Babysitter
2. McDonalds crew person
3. Gift wrapper at a toy store during Christmas (they didn't want to train me to use the cash register so they had me wrap presents)
4. Office Manager for a tradeshow company
5. Tax Accountant

5 Things you may or may not know about me:
1. Since it is college basketball season and all, my favorite basketball team (and probably my favorite team of all) is Duke and one of the thing I would absolutely love to do is at least visit Cameron Indoor Stadium. How'd a Seattle girl end up a Duke fan? Well it all goes back to Quin Snyder (also from Seattle) who went to play for Duke. My dad loves watching local kids so we would watch Quin playing for Duke. It also helped Duke was on TV a lot! :)
2. I once won a writing contest in 6th grade and got to go to a writing camp.
3. Speaking of things I won - I actually won the award for Best Actress in high school. Yes, me, one of the shyest, quietest people around was an actress (at least in high school). There is something about not being me, but being a character, that I enjoy.
4. I love The Mummy and The Mummy Returns movies - yes I know they are silly but they always make me laugh!!
5. I finally passed the last section of the CPA exam on my 5th try. Yikes!!!
6. Oh, and I thought I'd add one more - I'm leaving for London on Wednesday (Feb. 13th) for a long weekend.

TAG - you're it!! Feel free to join in on the fun if you'd like!

Bangs

My director told me one of the comments she received on the presentation was "What is different about Emily? Something is different but I can't put my finger on it." My director responded with "It's the bangs." I got my hair cut about two weeks ago and wanted something a little different. It's not that different and with the end of the year coming up I figured if I didn't like it by the time I emerge from the year-end process they will be mostly grown out. Again, it's not that big of a deal but since most of you who read my blog don't see me on a day to day basis I thought I'd at least post a photo of my new 'do.

Bogota Blackberry

I've been on a quest this year to be nicer to myself - getting regular massages, treating myself to manicures, among other things. If you know me, you know I like to fade into the background, I don't like to stand out. So when I treat myself to a manicure I usually go for an understated color. I'm not sure what happened this time - maybe it's the fact I'm leaving for Italy tomorrow - but I chose a burgundy color (Bogota Blackberry). When she applied the first coat, I panicked a little and started doubting my choice. It was really bright!! But it turned out nice, if I do say so myself. It'll be fun (I think) while it lasts.

Found

I have been feeling lost in several different areas of my life. One area in particular would be that of exercise. Without anything to train for it has been easy to say "I don't feel like working out tonight" and going home after work, bypassing the gym. Of course, then I feel bad (usually) that I didn't work out and the cycle continues. Today I decided to take a couple of steps to re-focus at least this aspect of my life. I met my friend this morning for what used to be our Saturday morning constitutional. This was the first time we've met for a walk in several months. It was also 36 degrees outside! Brr!! Note to self: next time remember a hat to keep my ears warm. I also bought myself a new pair of tennis shoes. And the pièce de résistance, I signed up for the 12Ks of Christmas Run which, let's face it, will be more of a walk for me. I have about 7 weeks to train. I like the 12K distance (approximately 7.4 miles) and it is just long enough that you do need to do some training for it. The reason why I'm posting all this is to keep myself honest. By putting out the goal of doing this run, it will help motivate me!

What I Love about Fall

The glorious array of color on the trees

Orange, yellow, red, brown

Crunching through the fallen leaves

Waiting for the last few to fall

Leaving the window open a crack at night

Snuggling deeper under the covers to keep warm
Pumpkin Spice Lattes with a little nutmeg sprinkled on the foam

The roar of a crowd at a football game

I Don't Dance

I never really went through what I call the "12 year old girl" phase when I was 12 which is probably why I'm going through it now at 30. Case in point - last year Read Madrid came to Seattle to play DC United and I bought tickets as soon as possible to see not only David Beckham (whom I love!!) but also Ruud Van Nistelrooy (who is another favorite of mine). At the game I went and stood by the tunnel waiting for Real Madrid to walk out so I could be 20 feet from David Beckham and take lots of pictures. Of course the pictures ended up being of his back. Another case in point, the last two cds I got - Aly & AJ and Ashley Tisdale. And one more, not only have I watched High School Musical & High School Musical 2 (and own both soundtracks & the HSM DVD), but I am getting ready to watch HSM2 again - and this time the dance-a-long version. And I will be dancing along! :)

ETA: And this is why when I lent my HSM2 soundtrack to my boss for her daughter, her daughter asks "Do Emily's kids like HSM too?" I chose to laugh at this comment!