Oh, Toto.

Wow.
I mean, wow.

I found a magic lamp, rubbed it, and asked the resident genie to grant me my wish of change. What a thorough genie he's proven to be!

Just so you can rest your worried heads about my whereabouts, know this: I have a roof over my head. I live with a nice hairstylist named Jenn. After my first day of new employment I am still employed, so....that's good. I, with my argyle knee socks; and they, with their name badges and security clearance and orientations and 120,000+ employees and dizzying array of buildings and traffic and cafeterias and sunrise shifts; we'll learn to co-exist.

I'm a long way from home, in more than geographical terms.
Here's to making it through to Saturday/beach/breathing/reveling in this change I chose! Huzzah!

In 11 days...

...I'll be living here:



I may be living in my car, but near my car will be a beach!

This is my formal announcement that I'M LEAVING UTAH. By way of fielding questions before they come, here's the deal:

I'm taking a job with Northrop Grumman, starting Nov. 30. I'll be a "graphic artist."
I hope to live in Huntington Beach, CA.
I don't know how I'm getting there.
I don't have a place to live yet.
Yes, I am sad to leave. Yes, I am terribly excited. Yes, it's 70º there right now.
Come and visit. There's room in my car.

Hooray for change!

11/11

It's 11/11 so I'm making a wish. Lots of wishes, actually. Because I figure on 11/11 you have 24 hours/1,440 minutes worth of wishes and that warrants a wishlist.

1--I wish I could be tan without going tanning or getting cancer (or spending money)
2--I wish to go to Thailand in December, 2010
3--I wish I had a personal chef. Not because I don't like cooking, but because I don't have time. I never eat vegetables unless it's a salad from Wendy's.
4--I wish we could all wear really light-weight, unobstructive, minimal clothing every day. Not in an effort to be immodest...but just to be less encumbered by fabric.
5--I wish I had the guts to sing on Broadway. Oh, and the talent.
6--I wish I only needed 4 hours of sleep each night.
7--I wish that by the time I have a baby they'll have figured out some other way for it to happen so I don't have to experience pain or the bizareness of a freaking HUMAN coming out of me.
8--I wish Utah weren't so landlocked.
9--I wish Obama weren't so dang electable. Well played, Democrats, well played.
10--I wish hot chocolate gave me good breath.
11--I wish I could live on a beach but there would be mountains and trees and skiing and a lake for waterskiing and all of my family and friends lived there too and we would all home school our kids together (so you only have to teach them a little bit each day) and there wouldn't be a lot of pollution or lights so you could see the stars every night and it would snow just for the month of December and have an October and November just like the one we're currently having and we wouldn't have to eat unless we really wanted to and in my job I would actually help people but in a way that's enjoyable to me and everybody would join the church and...yeah. Ahem. That about covers it.

I discovered with Laura once that when I wish on a star or on an 11:11 it's formulated more like a prayer than a wish. So now I say "11:11, make a prayer!" And most of my wish/prayers are constructed something like that last one, with very specific information and lots of it. I've seen enough movies where you have to be careful what you wish for (ala "Big", "13 Going on 30") so I don't want to leave any room for misinterpretation of what I want. It's not like I'm asking for a lot, you know?

Flight of the Majestic Eagle

Since no Halloween is complete without multiple costumes, I present the following:



You may think I look frightened. Not so. This is my fierce eagle scream, which, when hoisted by my waist (thereby cutting off most of my oxygen), sounds more like...a strange eagle warble. I'm trying to get a hold of some video so you can get the full effect.

And just because it's a fun memory for me, here's a picture of how my flight started out:



And afterward, there was a request that I do a final skate. That's when the eagle scream really came to life. I'm a mighty bird of prey.





Thanks, Natty and Ryan, for the goods.

Pier 39, here we come!

Next year, please remind me of how much I hate being painted on Halloween. Seriously, remind me. I'll remember right up until about a week before and then suddenly I'll decide it will be really cool to paint myself some color, completely forgetting about how uncomfortable it is.

But we look pretty sweet, right?



And here's to the Halloween crew--5 years running!