Summer's Signature Scent

Salesmen.

I hate salesmen with every fiber of my being.

Now, in a manner of speaking, I (as a barista) am a salesman.

Conveniently, I choose not to speak in that manner.

Just today, some dimwit walked into the coffee shop with no intention of buying coffee.  From the moment he walked in, I could tell he was extrovertly awkward as his eyes were a trifle too drowsy and his voice a trifle too loud (contrary to popular belief, those are the exact qualities of an awkward extrovert).  Immediately, I was expecting him to order some organic wheat-thins omega-fish-oil concoction, but instead I got this:

Why I love Romance Novels...and Starbucks

Alas,
   It has been far too long. The truth of the matter is, I have been so wrapped up in everything going on offline that I haven't made time to talk about anything of consequence online. So, after finally picking up a book I enjoy...Reg is smiling saying 'one of those books', and I've decided to tell you why I enjoy the wonderful world of the cheap romance section.
        Love is easy. Things happen, bad things and you know everything is going to work out for the hero and heroine.
         You know when something is coming. In life, surprises are just that...surprises. In a romance novel, the writers stick to the same plot line...there is trouble, it gets worked out, the couple is happy for a brief page or five and then larger trouble happens. It always will come, but it will also always be resolved and the couple will end up together.
        It's a wonderful escape from reality. I can get swept away in a romance faster than any other genre. I don't know if it's because I am a girl or because I am a hopeless romantic, but there you have it. I fall in love as the heroine does, have my heart broken as she breaks his heart, and rejoice when they are finally together.

 In closing, I also like Starbucks coffee....when at Starbucks, my frappuccino always is consistent...at school, the blended coffee (which is supposed to be like a frap) always clumps together whether it's -30 degrees F or 60 degrees F.

     Until next time,
                  Sayuri

BTW: Read Memoirs of A Geisha. You won't regret it....also, read Wuthering Heights...just don't tell Reg I said so :p

Summer's Fortune Cookie

“’Oh, I don’t know! But he shouldn’t be standing around all by himself.’ ‘Drop it,’ said Rearden.  While thinking dimly that he did not want to hurt their feelings, he could not prevent himself from adding, ‘You don’t know how hard I’ve tried to be left standing all by myself.’” ~ Atlas Shrugged

Well hello there, my little dustpans!

… no?

You know what I’ve noticed? It’s socially acceptable to say “epic fail” to someone else, but to say it to yourself is more than a little depressing.  I find this in itself depressing because there should always be a self-belittling phrase for any situation! Therefore, I’ve concocted one myself…

Here is the first post on my other blog

Before you reaction is "what other blog?" I want to preemptively say, "It's not you, it's me."

I had to. For class.

http://theycallmesusie.wordpress.com/

An oldy but goody from Reg's junk pile

Remember our favorite things lists from Summer and Honey?

I made one too! And I finally found it, at the bottom of my pile of crap to put on my bare apartment walls.

crap?--I call that art

Summer's Musical

"Cats scratch you for no reason, so they should understand if you wipe your nose off on them for no reason." - Michael Hartz

Hello everyone, and welcome to 2o12!

... plus 13 days.

It's a bit awkward to be blogging again for many reasons, one of which being that I still don't have enough of a life to pull me away from my computer...

Another reason is simply that, hey, it's been a while.

As my last post was over a month ago, I'm at a loss as to how I should begin this... So, I'll get through this the way I get through most of life: I'll copy someone else's idea.

Yes, today I'll follow Reg's example and talk about my new year's resolutions (now, officially, I never made any. However, as well as a world-champion idea copier, I'm also a first-class bullshit-er. So here it goes).

1. Cuss less

Now, I know I don't seem like the most blatant cusser in the world, but trust me. I have my moments. In lew of this (if that's even how you spell "lew"), I've constructed a few handy phrases to use in place of cuss words. For example, when I think "f*** my life" I'll instead sing "how could this happen to me?!?!?" from the song of the same title by the forever whiny Simple Plan (who misses whiny boybands? Anyone? ... Anyone besides Justin Bieber?). Similarly, in place of "f*** off" I'll sing (in my best Jack Black impersonation) "STEP OFF!!!"

... Apparently, this resolution involves my life turning into a giant musical.

No complaints.

2. Write More Music

What's the point of having a passion if you don't pursue it? Notice, there aren't any movies about the loser kid who dreams of being a basketball star, gets asked to play on the team, and says "Nahh... I'm not really feeling it." Or evil queens being told by their magic mirrors that they're in fact not the fairest of them all and replying with a "mehh, whatevs. Wanna watch some Gossip Girl?"

3. Get My Poop In Group

Besides being a clean way of saying "get my shit together" (and being my new favorite phrase), this basically describes the theme of this new year (for me, at least. You can leave your poop lying around for all I care). I've spent the last few years of my life being SO INCREDIBLY LAZY, I swear I turned into Snorlax at one point. It wasn't my most attractive look. So, this year, I'd like to clean myself up a bit. Stop treating my room like a junkyard, stop procrastinating for every single assignment, and start focusing a little more on reading and music. If there's anything I learned in 2011, it's that I'm far more capable of a successful life than I give myself credit. Therefore, I'm going to start putting that capability to use.

I suppose I could continue, but I'll stop boring you and move onto something more constructive (like YouTube!).

Thanks for reading! I hope all your resolutions are going splendidly and that your wildest dreams have already come true.

Or, I at least hope you're eating chocolate.

That's almost as nice.

Less than three,

~ Summer

zdrah-stvooy, duh svee-dah-nee-ye--maybe Reg should just give up before it's too late

Well…

                Ahem….

                                It’s, uh, been awhile. Hasn’t it?

I apologize for going so long without a post that this seems awkward. If I had attempted this sooner, I could’ve jumped right in with my usual ever-so-insightful exposition on life (that is sarcasm, dearies) but now it’s been that indeterminate amount of time it takes to get from reasonable hiatus to near-blog death (or at least blog coma.)

Honestly, this post is born of guilt.

My classes started for the semester, and my English class requires me to keep a blog—thus I decided if I had to post somewhere else on the web, it was unfair of me not to post here.

It’s a new year and all, so I might as well share my resolutions:

1.       DGAF as much as possible.

My OCD is getting quite bad at college. I have to actively remind myself that normal people don’t clean the microwave and stove obsessively after every use, and it is perfectly reasonable to leave the dishes in the sink and wash them once a day instead of the moment after every dirtied dish is empty of food.  

This also applies to my boy-crazy ways. It is not necessary to make eyes at every remotely attractive man who passes by on the way to class.  

2.       Save money and don’t tell anyone.

Mostly this is because my roommates always pay rent at the last possible moment and often short me a couple dollars (and by “a couple” I actually mean closer to a hundred.) Their rent is not my problem. So I am running my accounts down as low as possible, opening a secret savings account and telling everyone I’m broke as a joke.

3.       Learn Russian

Not like I learned Spanish in high school.  I need to apply myself every single day to learn a language—being able to say “party tomorrow”, “I want one more beer please” and “my lover is the son of Francisco” does not count as proficiency. (and no tumblr in class)

That’s all. I suppose I could now let you know what has happened lately:

I went back to California and my dad had given away my cat and had an appointment to take my dog to the humane society. His girlfriend had moved in (and no one thought to tell me). My childhood friend’s mother has been having marriage problems and now parties with my dad and his girlfriend, getting so wasted she often can’t drive home and sleeps in my bed. Her son and my childhood crush is over at my Dad’s house more often than I am (he’s now a condescending, mockingly sarcastic douche bag.) His sister posts vast amounts of red solo cup pictures on facebook. My grandma repeats herself more often than she did and I didn’t get to see Summer the entire week before I left.

But I made more money at work in three weeks than I made all semester in North Carolina. Summer and Honey and I had an awesome Denny’s hopping experience and party out in the boondocks. I baked 11 pies, two pans of brownies and three dozen cookies. I saw the beach, the ranch, my favorite little touristy beach town and went shopping in the local college town at night. I met a nice tattoo artist who fixed some of the lines on my bad decision from Charlotte. I visited with three of my closest friends, spent time with five of seven grandparents (some are step, that’s how that number works), took my dog on a couple last jeep rides, and had a conversation with my 2 and a half year old niece.

Finally, my dad cooked pancakes shaped like various animals—and he served them on my Lion King plate.

(I tried to make the good paragraph longer than the bad).

ДО СВИДА́НИЯ!

Reg.

p.s. I don’t even know what the letters are in that, so yah. I’ve got a lot to learn.

Alas...I miss Reg and Summer

Where art thou? I miss the funny posts that could make boring days fun :)  Come back! Come back!

WHY ARE ALL OF THE PEOPLE I KNOW GETTING PREGNANT?--An Apostrophe by Sayuri

Dear Biology,
           WHY is it that all of the people I know are getting pregnant? If it's something in the drinking water, remove it. If it's because guys are more attractive than they used to be, put bags over their heads or birth control in the girls' hands. SOMETHING....ANYTHING...I'm not sure most of these people know what is involved in raising a baby. Yes, we're almost 20, but trust me, raising a kid is hard work. We'll see how many are up to the challenge.
         Merry Christmas,
                               Sayuri

Summer's Balance

You know those moments when your life takes a turn and you find yourself in a surreal world that can't possibly be your own life?

It's been happening to me a lot lately.

Last night I was driving to town when, about halfway through, I started wondering "why does this feel so wrong? Am I even awake? Where am I? Do I know how to drive?"

Yeah. Not something you want to start wondering when it's pitch-black.

Also, I've been falling down a lot recently. Losing my balance. And the other day I dreamed that Hurley from Lost was explaining economics to me on the island.

A coincidence?

I think not!

Anyways, today I had another of those moments.

A couple weeks ago, I composed a quartet. Since I wrote it for a university audition, I decided to show it to my teacher. After playing through it with only us two violinists, things took a bit of a weird turn. My piece is going to visit some people... many people, in fact.

My teacher decided that she would call up our local composer and musical genius (who, might I add, was something of a hero to me when I was little) and have him help me with it. My piece will also visit a conductor of the youth symphony and a cello teacher, both of whom will be asked to play it with me and my teacher so we can hear the piece in its entirety. Violin I, violin II, viola and cello.

I cannot tell you how huge this is to me.

I've never shown anything I've written to anyone besides family. Only a choice few family members at that. I've never heard it played by anyone other than my computer. I've never known if I would ever hear it played by anyone other than my computer. Then today...

I got to hear the two violins. Live. Together. Outside my computer, outside my head.

It was wonderful.

I still can't really believe it, it's all too huge for my small mind to comprehend. I just thought I'd let you know, since I haven't written anything for a while... so yeah. Good times.

I don't want you to get the wrong idea about this piece... it's not amazing at all. It's really not all that good. It could be adequate, I'm not really sure. Hopefully, it's adequate for an audition. We'll see, I suppose.

Well, I'll try to update more often! I miss you, my lovelies!

Less than three,

~ Summer

p.s. What did the snowman say to the other snowman?

p.p.s. Smells like carrots!

p.p.p.s. When I first heard that joke, it took me about 10 seconds to understand it. I'm a bright one, alright...

Susie Homemaker, Reg, Mother...it's all the same to Reg

I never realized how eccentric I was until my new roommates moved in.

I guess I should back up a bit and explain; I live with Salamski, my ex-step brother, in a duplex. He was denied unemployment and still can’t find a job, so I pay his rent.

Rather, grandma secretly puts money in my bank account so I may pay his rent.

Well, he finally wised-up to this save-Salamski’s-man-card scheme of grandma's. Thus, he decided to rent out his half of the duplex and live on the couch instead of being bailed out by two women.

Luckily our new roommates happen to be mutual friends of ours, so we get along well. This may be in part due to the “talkin’ to” Salamski gave them on their first night, when I, predictably, was in my room writing a treatise on the political development of Canada (all this “evolution not revolution” nonsense pushed my 1000 word minimum to 10 pages.)

It went something like this:

Salamski: “…and this is Reg’s coffee cup. Do not touch her coffee cup…all the dishes should be done promptly and put away, except for the coffee cup, which stays on the counter to the left of the coffee pot… Make sure you unplug everything and keep lights off and stuff, Reg’s kinda freaks out about that…she’s probably asleep right now, she always goes to bed at 9:00 but stays up ‘till 10 doing whatever…and you have to be really really quiet. She does not like noise. Do not make noise after 9.”

So I’m the crazy bitch who keeps everything clean and goes to bed early. They’ve taken to calling me Susie Homemaker. Or Mother.

Your butterfly,
Reg

Summer's Blague

Well, here it is.

Thanksgiving Day is upon us.

For weeks, I've been dreading this day like it was Justin Bieber's Christmas album. Now that it's here, though, it's not quite as scary as I'd imagined...

Thanksgiving, that is.

Justin Bieber's Christmas album will never cease to terrify me.

After all, who am I to hate on a holiday devoted to being thankful? When you think about it, Thanksgiving is one of the most beautiful holidays we have.

I actually wonder if other countries have similar holidays... They should! I know Thanksgiving was originally about the pilgrims and all that rot, but these days it revolves around many universal values:

Football, family, and food.

AND giving thanks.

Therefore, on this day, I'm going to take a moment to acknowledge all the things I'm thankful for.

1. Family

Whether you love 'em or you hate 'em, they're a huge part of who you are. I, for one, love my family. I'd be lost without them.

2. Friends

In the last few years, my life has become crazier than Willy Wonka (seriously, that guy's on something). No matter how bad things seem to get, however, my friends always manage to pull me through... Honey, Regette, and Sayuri get a huge shout-out and internet hug!!!

3. Inspiration

Recently, I've been finding a lot of inspiration... I think it's important to find someone or something that inspires you to go farther and try harder. Therefore, I'd like to thank Tom Milsom, Dean Moriarty, Elton John, Mika, Rudolf Budginas, and (of course) Daniel (Jurassic Park guy) for being my inspiration in your own strange ways. In fact, it was while listening to Elton John's "Funeral For a Friend/Love Lies Bleeding" a couple months ago that I officially decided to become a composer.

4. Coffee

How awesome is coffee? Most of my greatest moments happened while I was under the influence of coffee. I absolutely love it. Without coffee, I have no identifiable personality. Just ask anyone who's been around me when I HAVEN'T had coffee... of course, that usually involves me pulling a Jack Sparrow asking "why is the coffee gone?!" and running around madly searching for that heavenly brew. That's usually followed by my poor defense of "I'm not addicted, I just NEED it!" Yeah... coffee's awesome.

5. Hardships

Oh, the hardships. No fun, right? Well, without even the most minor of hardships, I wouldn't be as strong as I am today. Sure, I'm still pretty weak... but a bit stronger! Wow, it sounds like I'm talking about coffee. I have issues... but what I'm saying is that I'm thankful for everything I've gone through, because it's made me who I am today. It's given me a different perspective on things... dare I say existentialism?

6. This Blog

Did you know that the French word for "joke" sounds exactly the same as "blog"? I'm just waiting for the day someone comments with "your blog is a blague!" Anyways... yes, I'm thankful for this blog. It's been a lovely way of keeping Say, Reg and I in contact! Keeps us up to date and whatnot... and while we may not be the most consistent posters, when we do post it brightens my day.

I love you both very, very much and I hope to see you very, very soon!

I hope your Thanksgivings are wonderful and pie-full.

Less than three,

~ Summer

p.s.
coffee=love.
love=oxygen.
therefore,
coffee=oxygen.

Summer's Idea

OH, the drama.

This Occupy Wall Street thing has gotten way out of hand. Somehow, a group of people with no specific purpose or plan has attracted other groups of people similarly without purpose or plan, and these groups have attracted the attention of basically everyone.

Wow.

Therefore, after seeing one too many Facebook political arguments as informed as those of the majority of the protesters, I thought I'd throw my two cents in.

Actually, it's more like one cent.

Make that a piece of eight.

Anyway, I'd like to bring up a few things that are slowly becoming my pet peeves about these protests.

Truths and a question: A post by Sayuri

I should be working on my Japanese homework. I should be answering some questions for Elementary Health & P.E., I should be studying for my math test since I failed the last one with a 53%. But, before that, I have some sad realities, some enlightening truths, and a question to share with you lovely people.

Facebook Friends

Today, I tackled a feat SO large, it took over 3 hours....I went through all of my facebook friends, typed out every single name in a three column list (during creative writing of course lol) and I picked off some of them and...

Reg does love “bubble” metaphors

I overuse bubble metaphors, it’s true—however, they are usually effective in getting my point across..

Firstly, there is my personal space “bubble.” Perhaps due to being an only child, I do not like my space encroached upon in any circumstance (the only exceptions being my three closest friends and my father.)

Secondly, there is the larger “bubble” I live in—the bubble of growing up for 18 years in the same homogeneous country town, award winning school system, and middle class family.

Today I expanded the second “bubble.” (The first is hopeless, but I do try.)

Today, in atonement for the two bags of black licorice I dipped in 98 percent cacoa ghiradelli dark chocolate I made late last night, I went for a walk. I went for a 3 hour walk around where I live, and I finally know how to get where I’m going.

I should really stop being so nervous and just get on with my sad, sad life in my tiny bubble.

Your butterfly,

Reg

Sad Realities --Sayuri--

So, here's the thing.

Sexual assault at all is wrong. Violent sexual assaults are inexcusable.

When alcohol is involved, both victim and perpetrator are victims.

Yet, alcohol doesn't excuse the crime.

But, I'm sad. Saddened by the fact someone, I don't know personally but know of and have heard about for sporting things, ruined his life. He can't return to school. Can't play the game he clearly loved. His whole life, this tag will follow him, and it saddens me that his future is ruined. His employment, future relationships, future educational opportunities are all jeopardized by the assault he committed. I am sad for him. I wish we could go back, and change what happened, both for victim and perpetrator. We can't. We must continue on, yet, it has opened my eyes to the possibility of feeling sorry for the person who creates victims. Batterers, rapists, sexual assault doers, all of these people make decisions that ruin their lives. I can't imagine living with that lingering over my every move.

I don't really know what else to say. Make wise choices. The decisions you make today, can decide your future. It's a scary reality that we all must acknowledge.

And everything follows logically--if only in Reg's dreams

I haven’t thought of much to write about lately, so I’ll take inspiration where I get.

I always feel a bit weird finding inspiration from other bloggers (though I feel weird all the time anyway, so why is now any different) but translating my thoughts into a coherent blog post trumped awkwardness in this situation.

So sorry, random internet person who seems awesome--I’m not picking on you. You just said something pretty and I stole a small part of it to think on.

( I was going to use a metaphor then –to chew on—but I wasn’t sure you’d want the thought back after I chewed it up and spit it out…sorry, extended metaphor)

Well, anyway: mollymawkattack said—

“Choice is a dangerous word.”

Choice is a dangerous word—but only because it inspires false hope. Choice gives us the hope that we can control the greater part of our lives, when in reality, our choices are mostly irrelevant. Our options are the defining factor in our lives.

(I’m going to give poor and perhaps illogical anecdotal evidence now and go off on some pretty gnarly tangents, so bear with me, if you will.)

Reg's sad excuse for a joke

Challenge Accepted




'




Challenge Complete


Love, Reg


p.s. I'm kidding--I know what Sayuri meant, and I'll write an apostrophe later

10:21 am... it's later... thus I give you my apostrophe:

A challenge for Reg & Summer :)

Write an apostrophe.

   XD

         ~Sayuri