To appease the masses, I bring to you . . . an update.

Yes, I have been a very sucky blogger the past few months. Grad school + job = NO FREE TIME. Pity me, please?

OK, so last I spoke was when Nana passed away. I was in Georgia for about a week helping with funeral arrangements and the like, then I came back to North Carolina.

My kittens did great while I was gone (AJ watched them for me), and they also gained names! I named the one with more white on his face Oscar (for Oscar Peterson) and the other one is Miles (for Miles Davis). There will be more pictures to come, though they haven’t grown AT ALL since I got them (which, I shouldn’t say that too loud - they are precious and adorable, I like their size now, LOL). They love to cuddle with me and they are SO GOOD together - I can’t imagine ever seperating them. I feel bad because I am gone so much of the day, so I don’t get to spend nearly as much time with them as I want to, but since they have each other, I know that they’re doing just fine. They just really like to cuddle when I come home!

The next week was utter chaos because it was holiday at Starbucks, so crazy busy, and I also had one week to get ready for Christmas. AJ and I had a lovely Christmas on the 21st, and on the 22nd I had Christmas with his family. On the 23rd I drove to GA, had Christmas with MY family, and then drove back on the 26th.

On the . . . 29th? . . . I woke up at about 3:30AM with really intense pain in my lower right abdomen. I could barely stand up, and it made me throw up it hurt so bad. I was able to get to the computer, saw that the right side is the appendix side, and decided I didn’t want to risk it. I called AJ and woke him up and he got me to the ER. It turns out that I had a ruptured ovarian cyst, so the next week I was off my feet a bit and then taking it pretty easy. I feel much better now, but man that hurt!!!

Classes started back on January 4th, and it has been NONSTOP since then. At the moment my rotation is in the development office, and it’s very time intensive. My schedule most days is something like this:

Rotation: 8AM-9:30AM
Class: 10AM-2PM
Rotation: 2PM-4:30PM
Work: 5:45PM-11:45PM

Note that I get about 8 hours off . . . and those are the sleeping hours . . . try fitting homework and sanity time in there. I’m exhausted. Luckily, there are only about 4 more weeks of this rotation and then I switch to something a little more laid back, so if I can just hang in there.

I’m getting really tired of school. As I go through all my classes, I realize that I’m not really learning a ton. I don’t say this to be cocky, I just got a really great undergrad education, and my instincts are usually pretty good. If it weren’t for the darned three letters that I need to get a job (MFA), I probably would be just fine to have skipped all this. I just have to keep reminding myself that I’ve only got about a year and a half before my internship, and while that’s technically still school, it’s really a job too, and it will be in an office somewhere (or something . . .)

I have missed being able to be online. I feel like I’m losing a little bit of myself because of all the craziness. Summer will be a welcome time. How is everyone else doing (is anyone even reading my blog anymore)?

For me, Christmas starts when Santa goes across the screen at the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade. The holidays are officially here!

TiVo, in a rare moment unreliability, decided to delete the parade before I got a chance to watch it. Grrr . . .

So I started Christmas the day after Thanksgiving. Mama and I went and bought a very real(istic fake) tree for my apartment. My first Christmas tree! I brought up all my Christmas decorations from Florida the last time I was home, so I put out all my Nutcrackers and my nativity set, and then left the tree for another day (since I wasn’t feeling well).

Last night I got the tree all set up - AJ helped me by putting it together and helping me fluff out all the limbs (he’s pretty good at it, LOL)! I then sorted through all my ornaments. There was a bag that I set aside that would be great for a little girl (but are a little too young and pink for me), and the rest I put on the tree. Drumroll please . . .

This is my lovely decorated apartment !

My first Christmas tree!

And a little close up of some ornaments:

Some of the ornaments are newer, like the little Cavalier King Charles Spaniels that look just like Ella and Olive and the little Moravian star to remind me of Winston-Salem, NC (where I attended both undergraduate school at Wake Forest University and graduate school at North Carolina School of the Arts). Others are very old, like the pink sand dollar with a Nutcracker (this was given to me when I danced in the Nutcracker for the first time) and the blue and yellow angels (these hung on my mother’s Christmas tree when she was a girl)!

As I have mentioned, I have a Nutcracker collection, so here is a look at it:

Hmm, let’s get a little closer! Here are Steinbach wisemen . . .

And Steinbach Charles Dickens and William Shakespeare!

And a few more that I have on a bookcase near the kitchen (the short one on the left was my mother’s first nutcracker from before I was born - it’s the first in my collection)!

And my nativity set - I just got this last year and LOVE it!

The only thing I’m missing is an Advent wreath for my table, but that may have to wait until next year.

So, now I’m ready for Christmas for the first time in my adult apartment. Ahhh! I’m so excited!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I have ALWAYS been obsessed with the Nutcracker. When I was younger, I danced in the Nutcracker every year with my dance studio. When I learned to dance on pointe, my first performance in toe shoes was as an angel in the Nutcracker.

When we moved to Florida, my new studio didn’t put on a production of the Nutcracker, and this devastated me as I had fallen hopelessly in love at this point. I had to stay involved somehow, so I started a collection. Today my nutcracker collection is quite extensive, and I am so thrilled that I have my Christmas decorations in North Carolina now because I will be able to put some of them up in my apartment! No worries, I’ll post pictures when that happens

I was thrilled when my senior year in high school, the women’s chorus that I was the president of at my school was offered the opportunity to sing the vocals at the end of the first act. I was thrilled to be involved again with my favorite ballet and a now required part of my Christmas. It was fantastic to be able to participate in this show in a new way, and I still sing along when I hear the soundtrack!

And now, it’s all coming full circle. Today, here in graduate school, I am in my box office rotation. And every five minutes or so the phone rings and I sell a few Nutcracker tickets to children and their grandparents . . . does it sound cheesy for me to say this makes me feel all warm and fuzzy?

I love the Nutcracker . . .

OK, let’s try this again! I really do want to get back to blogging regularly, things just seem to be a little unorganized at the moment. However, as I am about to tell you, that will soon change.

First off, I’m transferring to a new store . . . today was my last shift at the Starbucks that was “my Starbucks” as a customer, and my first Starbucks home. Our new store is said to be opening on August 4th, but sometimes these things get pushed back a bit, so we’ll see if that actually winds up happening like it’s supposed to. It was sad today though - MANY regulars talked about how they will miss me, and there was a banner and a cake . . . it was really sweet. Oh, and I hit 6 months with the company on the 5th of August, so woo hoo!

OK, enough sadness, onto the AMAZING news! I have been accepted into grad school for next year! This whole things has come together very quickly. A former director of mine (I stage managed Marvin’s Room for him) got me in touch with his wife who is apparently very well connected in the theatre community in this region. I spoke with her on the phone, and she told me about this new program (just graduated their first class this year) that North Carolina School of the Arts is offering - it’s an MFA in Performing Arts Management. Not only is it right up my alley, but it’s right down the road (NCSA is in Winston-Salem). So I contacted the head of the program and went in for what I thought was an informal chat, but wound up being my first interview. We discussed the program (which is set up very similarly to the FSU program), and the possibility of me jumping into their class for this fall at the last minute. This was just over a month ago. Things were left very much up in the air, and then he had to leave town for a couple of weeks.

After much back and forth trying to arrange a time for me to meet with him and the other full time faculty member (who I had not met previously), we finally set a meeting for this past Wednesday. We sat down, talked, reviewed my application (which I had submitted while the head of the program was out of town). They told me that they couldn’t officially tell me if I was in, the admissions department had to do that, but they could tell me if they were recommending me for admission, and they said they would get back to me in the next few days to let me know if they were, in fact, recommending me.

I was quite shocked to check my email Wednesday night with an email saying that they were going to recommend me for admission! So, unless I fail the background check (like that will happen), I’m in! I am currently an unofficial member for the NCSA grad class of 2010! I will be here in Winston-Salem for the next two years, and then the third year of the program is spent in an internship . . . somewhere. They have some people that stay nearby, some people in NYC, some in Boston . . . it just depends.

So yes, I have a life plan, I am SUPER pumped about it, and I can’t wait to get started in September!

Aside from that, my family is doing well, AJ is great, my new apartment is slowly coming together (did I mention I moved 2 weeks ago? - living by myself for the first time EVER - eek!), and I’m loving my job with E. Webscapes. Yay!

Now if only I could convince my mom to let me get a kitten like I want . . .

Oh yeah, almost forgot about the kittens! About a month ago, I helped AJ remodel his condo (repainted EVERYTHING, ripped out the carpet and sanded down and refinished the hardwood floors, picked out all new furniture, the works)! While we were waiting outside for the Chinese delivery guy, a very tiny and very cute little kitten came up to us! We figured he was just a kitten that got loose (actually, at the time we thought he was a she), so we pet him, gave him some water, and then were going to go about our business. Well, the food came and we walked across the street to the park so we could sit at the picnic table to eat. And the kitten followed us! He played in the tree the whole time we ate, coming to us every once and a while for a bite of chicken, and then he followed us back across the street when we went back to AJ’s. At this point we realized he was a stray, so we took him in for the night. The next day we took him to the vet and found out that he was a very healthy 10 week old kitten that we decided to name Jazz.

He is such an awesome cat - so lovable, and playful! I have always always ALWAYS been a dog person, and never in a million years would I think of getting a cat. But Jazz absolutely won my heart over, and I will never feel that way about cats again. Here’s a picture of Jazz when we first got him (he’s grown a lot now) - he’s got really cool markings, including spots on his back:

Well, after about 3 weeks we decided Jazz needed a playmate. So we went to the Humane Society and got another little kitten. This one is even tinier, and we named him Ninja (well, AJ named him . . . I disapproved of that name because it doesn’t suit him, and we never call him that, we always call him “the little one” . . . so there). Here’s a picture of him giving me kisses (bad pic of me, but he’s so cute) - he is COMPLETELY black . . . no white at all:

Anyways, they’re technically AJ’s kittens, and they get to live with him, and I love them so much and they act like I’m their mommy, so I think they’re mine too. But I really would like one (or two) to have at my own place. So, must talk Mama and Daddy into this . . .

Oh yeah - Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows? AWESOME!!!!!