[one] i dropped off darcy this morning to be boarded, and i miss him so much more than i thought i would. the apartment seems so empty and quiet. i didn't realize how much noise he makes even though he doesn't actually "speak." i bet the people under us are happy, though. i always feel bad when darcy thumps because i'm sure they hear it through their ceiling. his thumps are loud.

[two] i am currently in the middle of that feeling of doing something and then not really remembering why you thought it was a good idea and kind wishing that you didn't but you already did so you have no choice to see it though. like when you drag a joke out a little too long, and even you want to just stop it, but it's too late.

[three] future me looking back at my life via my blog may not realize that yesterday was a really good day. i think i should put the record straight. despite not getting landline, it was a very potter day, and it doesn't matter that harry potter technically ended years ago. it doesn't matter that i am now a supposed fully-fledged adult. the second new harry potter stuff appears, the fangirl in me flares up as big as ever. the rita skeeter article was like a breath of fresh air when i hadn't realized i was drowning. i missed those guys. (although technically the article took place two years before the epilogue so my desire to know what happens after the epilogue is still unsatiated. and if this article came out two years earlier then teddy kissing victoire shouldn't have been such a big deal because they would have been doing it for two years. see, this is what happens when i'm starved of information. i get too analytical and critical.) the wizarding world expansion also opened yesterday, and i am planning on visiting it this fall and i am so excited. this has kind of been the year of harry potter news with the theme park, the movie, the play (which i am also fantasy planning on going to see and really hoping that it turns into really planning), and new short stories.

[four] this is kind of going along with the previous point, but it's not hp related so it got its own number. yesterday marked the day that i finally finally finally got past that stupid level in candy crush. the number three-twenty-three will forever haunt me, but i learned a valuable lesson. if it has nothing to do with school, i do not give up easily. i work and try and work and try until i succeed. yay me. (if only i could apply that same perseverance to more productive things. oh well.)

[five] there are eight minutes left until i can eat so i am not going to reread this. if there are typos or non-flowy parts, i apologize. i'm not sorry enough though to edit. 

building and fixing till it's good as new

i started this blog post three different times, and i dunno if it's the fasting or what, but it kept coming out just incredibly sappy. and saccharine. and just... overkill times ten. so. suffice it to say that today was one of those days where you think, being me is actually pretty awesome. those days when you're really appreciative of the little weird things that make you you. and that is all i will say on that. moving on.

my in-laws have this house that they're renting out and i have so many ugly emotions tied up in it that i've started to hate it. (when i was in the midst of whatever i was in around my birthday, i would spend most of days doing small jobs around that house to fix it up between renters, things like caulking bathrooms and painting pantries and scrubbing floors. the feeling of completing a task successfully, no matter how small, was something i needed. it was partly therapeutic and partly toxic and i can still taste the desperation in the air when i'm in it.) anyway, the appliances all kind of decided to die and while i needed to call a repair guy for the washer and fridge, i was going to fix the garbage disposal myself. well, the original plan was for my dad to fix it, but then there was a couple of really intense, stress-filled weeks and then he left the country with the rest of my family. so it was left to me. and let me tell you, it did not look good. i went back to that house three days in a row (mainly because i kept forgetting things that i needed and would try to fix it for ten minutes before telling myself that if i only remembered the needle-nose pliers i would be able to do it and i'll just come back tomorrow) and it got to the point where people were telling me to just leave it to my husband or a repair guy and no that did not mean that i was weak and worthless it just meant that there were some things i could not do. 

but see, i refused to believe that. especially in that house. i had pushed all the stress and failure and negative feelings out of my mind into those rooms for months, and they were all just waiting for a chance to move back in. i could not fail. and so i didn't. and it felt awesome. (i was on the phone with my dad wen i fixed it and i'm pretty sure he thinks i'm crazy because of how excited i got.) and while fixing a garbage disposal is really not that big of a deal, shut up. it was symbolic. with maybe just a bit of some unhealthy obsession. 

and then i became incredibly arrogant because apparently my ego will swell at the slightest hint of an accomplishment and called my husband and said, "you're so lucky you married me. not only am i smart and pretty and creative, but i can also fix stuff. you hit the freaking jackpot." yeaaah, i'm obnoxious. 

and then i tried to play candy crush and failed again at that same level that i have been stuck on forever and my ego was returned to its natural size. i really need to pass this level, you guys. my self-worth has somehow become tied up in it. it's bad. i will be eighty-seven years old and still trying to beat it, refusing to give up. 

*Bob the Builder Theme Song

all i could think about

[one] so i've been stuck on this level in candy crush for months. this is not an exaggeration. i think i got to it in january or february. maaaybe early march. and i cannot for the life of me get past it. i think they should have an option available after you try a level a few hundred times (i usually go through all my lives around twice a day, which means i try the level ten times a day on average, which means i have tried way more than a few hundred times, which means i am pathetic.) that says, "you suck and we feel sorry for you. pay ninety-nine cents to move on." i would totally pay. anyway, this morning i was playing and doing awesomely. like, i really thought i was going to win. i still had twelve moves left and was close to clearing all the jelly and then my phone up and dies on me. out of nowhere. despite being fully charged. and of course when i turned him back on, candy crush just figured i had rage quit or something and counted it as another loss. ugh. way to ruin my life, jasper.

[two] i really like rainbow rowell. the author? i've read everything she's written multiple times despite just discovering her late last year. shortly after i discovered her, her newest book (due out this summer) became available for pre-order. which i obviously did. i have been waiting all year for this book. i really have been. for some reason, though, i have thought it comes out july first. and i planned my summer travels around that, as stupid as that sounds. well, okay, so i didn't really plan it around it but i did happily think for the past three months that the timing was so perfect because her book would come out on the first and i would leave on the third and is there a better way to spend your last days before leaving the country than lost in a book you have looked forward to all year? i think not. but i just found out yesterday that i am an idiot and the book doesn't come out until july eighth and i am so disappointed. it's obviously not the end of the world and my husband can easily just bring the book when he joins me later (because he is not leaving the country with me because he went and grew up and got a job and now has to worry about things like vacation days), but still. i won't properly be able to read it because i will be doing the visiting family thing and then i will come back and do more of the visiting family thing and taking a day to devour a book will probably not be appropriate. gah.

[three] sometimes i think about the way we actually are and the way that we are remembered and the gap between those two people and if it matters at all and which one is more important. (i once started a short story that kind of touched on this that i constantly think about and say i will finish, but three years later and most of it is still in my head. which i guess is better than forgetting about it completely, but still. get your act together, sarah.) anyway, what brought on this latest round of pondering things which probably don't matter much at all in any scheme of things, grand or ungrand, was lilacs. i love lilacs in the way that i love navy blue and the number seven, in a nostalgic eye-rolly phantom limb sort of way. they were my favorite for a long while (all three of those things) because they were my mom's favorites, and growing up i really had no personality. (it was also a case of crippling insecurity and self-doubt and liking things that were valid to like, and who was a better judge of worthiness than my mom, right? sometimes i want to go back to little me and just shake her.) anyway, lilacs are no longer my favorite (they are second, though. and i'm pretty sure it's because i really like them and not just because i used to like them. my favorite flower is sunflowers and daisies because they can both share the number one spot if i say they can), and every time i see them i think of my mom. but, as it turns out, lilacs are not my mom's favorite flower. oops. i found this out last year (possibly the year before) and yet in my head, even though i know they aren't, they are. because they are what i associated with my mom for so long. i don't think i'm making sense anymore, but you get what i'm saying, right? lilacs are not my mom's favorite flower, but i will always remember my mom loving lilacs the most: my mom vs how i remember my mom.

*Landing in London - 3 Doors Down

why do i keep counting?

since i'm pretty sure i haven't done one of these in a while, here's my life in numbers at the moment because i am sick and can't think straight enough to write a flowing post:

by the way, this post was written from the bottom up so if it doesn't quite make sense, that's why. i didn't realize there might be a problem with that until it was too late to stop.

10- half of the time i spent trying to think up something to write for number ten (this means i thought for twenty minutes). the few thoughts i have at the moment keep being drawn to the tv with every exclamation from my sister and "oww" from my sister's phone. (or, you know, her friend who's on speaker. either one.)

9- the number of times the word "please" was said in the last ten seconds. to get this to stop, i just agreed to play video games. i do not like video games. i have turned sucking at them into an art form, and i get way too frustrated. ash, this is all your fault. (so i played, reached a record level of suckage, ash gave out false shouts of encouragement (as if saying i'm "actually good" will make me suck less) and i lost every. single. time.)

8- the number of days it's been since i hurt my toe. my sister just said, loudly, "fat princess?!?!" and my train of thought has been derailed. her plus video games is really distracting. when we were little, she was often banned from playing video games because she would get too aggressive. now, there's no one to ban her. this has nothing to do with the number eight, but i really can't do much about that.

7- the number of things on my to-do list that i am currently ignoring to write this post and make fun of my sister as she sucks badly in modnation racer or whatever it's called with her friend. after weeks and weeks of stressing over it, she finally chose a username thingie and set up her online account for the ps3 network? as you can see, me and video games are not really the best of friends. but she's racing against her friend, and she sucks.

6- the number of books that are crowding my bed, not counting the two moleskine notebooks or the kobo (who, by the way, is named jj). i would move them, but there's really no space for them to go.

5- the number of months left until i am married.

4- about the number of weeks its been since "sleeping in" meant later than six:thirty. i have been watching way too much ben 10 and nineties reruns every morning.

3- the number of days until my homework is due. i have been talking about it/ridiculing the instructions for three weeks.

2- roughly the number of weeks left until my sister moves across the world. saddest part, she's taking her sons with her.

1- the number of classes left after this semester until i am officially a master of science.

*Why Do I Keep Counting? - The Killers

he's on the table and he's gone to code, and i do not think anyone knows what they're doing here

i was never a big fan of video games. from the atari my sister got for her 6th birthday or something to the xbox i tried at a friend's house. gameboys, psp's... they were never really my thing. sure, i play them. and yes, i have fun. but i was never one of those "natural" video gamers. i usually suck. and i get very frustrated with them and end up all tense and annoyed and ready to throw the whole thing out of the nearest window. but my cousin has a nintendo ds, and all that has changed. she has a grey's anatomy game which has become my latest addiction. you don't really do much in the game but play through episodes making choices that don't change the storyline, completing challenges like avoiding little red balls of anger, and performing parts of surgeries. not much to do, but highly highly addictive. on the addictiveness spectrum, it's somewhere between cigarettes and crack, and probably closer to the crack.

one thing i hate about the game: meredith. i don't mind her in the show and at times really like her, though she was never my favorite character. in the game, i despise her. she has a one track mind, and all her story lines revolve around her relationship with mcdreamy. the entire hospital is on lockdown because of a diptheria outbreak and what is she thinking about? how her date will be afftected by the lockdown. she is in the middle of a bypass heart surgery and asks to leave early so she will have time to get ready for said date. i mean, really?? what kind of doctor does that?? i don't care if there is a whole surgerical team doing the operation, you do not leave halfway through for a date, even in a game. she interrupts shepherd while he's prepping a patient or something to tell him that she's committed to their relationship, and while he's distracted, the patient has a seizure. i think what really annoys me is that although i control a lot of her choices, i really have no control over what happens. she's the same no matter what i do. now, i havent watched the show in a while. i missed the entire last season - night classes suck. but i dont remember meredith being that obsessed. yes, her relationship was always a big part of the plot, but i remember her being a good doctor, not a ditsy flake. if that's how her character has gotten lately, then i'm not sure i want to watch last season which is sitting on my desk.

oh, and i hate how george is such a girl.

*Jumper - Third Eye Blind