variations on girlyman

so, my idea was to post a song from my current favorite band, girlyman. HOWEVER, when i youtubed "girlyman", this came up and made me laugh. so here you go. i'm sure i'll make you listen to girlyman in the near future anyway.

sorry, kids, but i hate these layouts

i promise to create something lovely and fun over christmas. maybe we can incorporate a family photo or two, but i just did not like that last one.

and yes, it is all about me.

see you soon!

i think this speaks for itself

To All UMaine Community Members:

It is anticipated a large snow event will take place at UMaine on Sunday night, the 16th of December, that will necessitate the constant plowing of parking lots beginning at midnight Sunday.


+++++++


i love this place. it's quite necessary to keep telling myself. a "large snow event" just has such a nice ring to it.

ER Visit

Another little not so fun tid-bit. Remember how my back had been hurting for so long? Most of it is attributed to some newly found endometrial cysts discovered a few weeks ago. This message is going to be short because I can't sit in the chair very long. To make a long story short, two weeks ago my back started hurting so badly that every day activities became hard. Getting out of bed, going to work, bending over, anything. The pain was horrible. It was a shooting pain from my lower back that would travel down my left leg below my knee. The other night, my hands and feet went numb while I was driving. That was interesting to say the least. Anyhow, it finally got so bad that I went to Sentara/Obici in Suffolk yesterday. I sat for a total of around 7 hours. They finally told me it was my Sciatic nerve. They prescribed me some Prednizone (or a form of it anyway), Vicodin (for the pain) and Ibeprofin. I'm feeling much better since the prednizone is getting into my system.

Note to self: Never let things get that bad ever again. Sciatic nerves are nothing to play around with. They hurt!

Hopefully I'll be back to my old self by Christmas! :) Love you all

<3,
Tina

baby's first art purchases!

automufflerqueen: show us what you got when you can, if you can;-)

oh mom...you are wise beyond your years. beth and i did set out to purchase either an odd tiger painting or an uncomfortable nude. though they were both there in spades, we were both swayed by art that we actually appreciated. she ended up with a large (quite large) jackson pollack-esque number. very cool. i was jealous.

this is what i ended up with - the pictures, of course, don't do them justice, but you get the idea.




8x10


12x16


24x20

and my own personal piece of artwork:

this picture was taken after my first attempt to free my car. this was about as far as i got this night. another night or so later i went out to find that it had snowed again and there was an even deeper cover on the entire car. the hood, as you can see, was the most difficult bit. i have since bought a new scraper that is so sharp that i'm afraid to use it and a shovel with an extendable handle. al-right...

the countdown begins

as you all might know... it's only three days until i come home from PA.

yes... that's right. i'm coming home on my birthday...

right again, it is my 21st birthday. yeehaw.

it has been 2 years since i got to celebrate a birthday at home and although i have to drive approximately 6 hours for it, i am overjoyed to be able to spend it at home.

i know what you're all thinking... 'this post sucks. there's no pictures! jess always puts pictures!'
i agree... it does suck... i'm sorry... but i have too much stuff to do, to stop and find pictures to put in here... i'd rather just get all my stuff done, then ramble on down to good ol' VA and have you look at me in person.

so that's my story... and i'm stickin' to it.
<3

if you get tired of my posts...

then you are just going to have to tell me. otherwise i'm going to keep posting pictures of the pretty pretty snow. at least until carla gives my annotated bibliography back and i get to work (for serious) on that project.

this is what i woke up to this morning:


classes that started before 10am were cancelled. all others were on schedule. my class starts at 11.


so...time to suit up!


and start walking...this is the cut-through that i took a picture of when i first starting walking to school. it's very woody in the last picture. this little trough was just wide enough to walk in and came up to my mid-calf. when i came home this afternoon, someone had actually widened it and flattened it down. very nice.


this is the parking lot that is usually full by 9am. it was plowed yesterday and maybe this morning? probably not though. (this, p.s., is the reason for the delay: so roads and parking lots could be plowed.)


me looking tough in the snow. picture courtesy of matt.


and my new favorite picture for everything.


hope you enjoyed the pics. i feel these are far superior to yesterday's attempts.

so much snow

so...the snow is here to stay in orono. i'm not sure how many inches we are talking about, but it's serious. classes were cancelled at noon for the rest of the day and it's only supposed to keep coming down. according to the weatherpersons, it will stop sometime tomorrow, after dumping 12 to 18 inches on our fair town. regretfully, i do not have any current pictures b/c it is dark now. these pictures were taken around 11:30am, so you can imagine that things have only gotten worse.

my car has gotten stuck in the snow only once.

i have fallen on the ice only once.

i have a feeling that i will keep track of these numbers. it could get interesting. i'm going to intersperse comments from my students, pat and classmates throughout.


this is what i woke up to. very early stages. i also woke up to these:

Unfortunately, I won't be in class today. My parents told me I could not go to school because of the weather. They said something about rather having a stupid living kid than an educated one that died in a car accident. Sorry. I will try to catch up later. Jason.

Dear Ms.Hedrick,
i hope that if you're driving to school this morning that it didn't scare you too much. I wanted to let you know that i'm a commuter student and unforunatley for the month of december i dont' have a car, and due to the snow i have no way of
getting to school. I'm assuming a lot of commuter students won' t make it up to Orono today. :( Please fill me in on anything i miss in class.
-Kristen


on campus, walking in at 8am.

complete email from pat burnes: It's also a good idea to keep a shovel in the trunk or back seat of your car. P


we couldn't find a ruler in any of our offices, so we used matt's einstein action figure. as you can see...the snow is chest level.

matt: "put your coat on, virginia. we're going outside."
me: "but you guys don't have coats on!"
matt: "yep. put your coat on. let's go."


i can't be bothered to rotate. brian is slightly taller than einstein. neither are altogether helpful in terms of scale. this was all still early at 11:30am.

in response to my question of how long winter in maine lasts -
one of my students: "one year it snowed on my birthday."
me: "oh yeah?"
student: "yeah. my birthday is in may."


matt in the snow.

me: "it certainly wasn't fun cleaning off the car this morning."
another student: "oh...just wait."


no rain, nor snow, nor dark of night will keep them from their smokes.

yet another student: "did you drive today?"
me: "yes, i did."
student: "how did that go?"
me: "very slowly."
student: "good."


this is how i found my car in the campus parking lot. i had been on campus for a little over three hours. needless to say, i had some work to do before i could leave. snow is so quiet. it's very strange.

the first thing i said as i arrived at laurie's for the stuculty meeting: "umm...so my car is stuck. but i think it's out of the road."
laurie, looking out the window: "oh yeah, you're fine."


this is the last picture that i took before i uploaded pictures. you might be able to see that accumulation, but it's much worse now anyway.

conversation as we were shoveling out my car -
laurie: "oh, i love the snow! but then again...i don't drive in it."
me: "well, i'm not going to do it again."

tomorrow i will walk. and i'm looking forward to my winter wonderland. i hope my shortcuts are manageable. might just be a disaster. i'll let you know.

This is soooo funny

I saw this particular web sight and I couldn't resist. It is absolutely hilarious.. The first set of "Elves" is Shavaris (Varis), Melissa (my best friend), Kiel and me.


http://www.elfyourself.com/?id=11449301286782


The second sight is Melissa's boyfriend, Ryan, Von (Kiel's roommate), Katie(my other best friend) and Kiel.

http://www.elfyourself.com/?id=114869

I love these sights. They are hilarious. They just make me laugh and I thought I would share.

Love everyone!!
<3 Tina

Thanks for all the pictures

I've been a bit scattered the last couple of weeks and have not been able to comment to all of the lovely and often entertaining :) pictures from the various posts. They were all great!! It was so nice to see you Manda and Jess - you both are as beautiful as ever and I cannot wait to see yall in person! About the raquetball idea, I'm scared...but willing to go along and possibly read a book while yall play (I can't promise I can watch it either). I'm glad we finally have a countdown now and there is a bright light at the end of the awayness tunnel (I know that's not a word). We must all get together and have some laughs. Until then...luv u guys and gals!!!!

first snow of the season

As you can see, PBU got their first snow of the season last night. It barely covered the ground, but it was enough to make me mad. I don't like snow when I have to do things or go places, but this isn't enough to keep me in. As a matter of fact, I have plans to go to the mall this afternoon and spend some money. Take that, Snow!! You can't break me! Not today!!! Muuuhhaaahahaaaaaaa!!!! (evil laugh, if you couldn't tell)


Just thought I'd share with ya'll. Love you guys.

Birthday Countdown: 9 days
Home Countdown: 10 days
Exams to go: 4
Papers to go: 2
Homework assignments left: 0

We're Ready!

Just waiting for the girls to come home! And look who's already here......SANTA!!

just a suggestion

so you know how we were trying to come up with fun activities for the winter break?

well...i vote for racquetball!

Whitley Thanksgiving

My thanksgiving was spent in Middletown, NY with Renae and the rest of the Whitley family. Thanksgiving preparations: Renae has this tradition of putting olives and pickles in the official olive and pickle tray. She pretty much freaked out when she thought someone had already done the job.
This is Dewey Mason Whitley IV (I think it's the fourth...). You might not be able to see it, but he is actually washing a deer liver in the kitchen sink... good times...
Renae and Katie, Dewey's fiance, getting ready to play some CARDS!!!! (I begged everyone to play cards with me EVERYDAY!!!)
Father Whitley and son Benjamin Whitley carving the ham. ("Wanna piece o' meat? Wanna piece o' ham?!")
Thanksgiving Dinner! (From L to R: Dewey, Katie, Ben, Aaron, Jules, Renae, Me, Father Whitley and Lillian. Not pictured: Mother Whitley)
Fat Woman and Fat Man, as they were so affectionately referred to.
Me and my coffee! FIERCE!!!
Me and the victorious hunter... all the boys went out hunting on Thanksgiving day and Ben got both of these. I was excited and also really grossed out. As you can see, I'm pretty attached to Ben... that's because I was about to vomit and wanted to block my view of the gaping hole of innards on both of these.
Cosmic Bowling at the Hoe Bowl. There were black lights... Things glowed. (My face is priceless.)
Ha! the Hoe Bowl. It was amazing.
I told Renae that I would get a 'livestock picture' before I left NY. She believed me when I made an evasive maneuver to pull off the side of the road when I saw this horse just chillin' in a field.
We like to pretend we are models... and the perfect place to do it is in a cemetery. :)
I ABSOLUTELY LOVE THIS PICTURE:
The gang at Matt's house (Clockwise from Top: Long-Hair-Jay, Matt Notaro, Kati Negro, Me, Jess O., and Ray-Nay)

My Thanksgiving was amazingly fun and extremely tiring. I miss all you guys, but since I couldn't be with you guys I was definitely in the next best place. I LOVE the Whitley family and always love going to visit. Some more highlights of the trip include: playing Nerts (card game) until 2am with Tab and Maegan, playing Sixes (another card game) with Renae and laughing our heads off to the point that her mom had to ask us if we had had anything to drink that night, adventures to Wurtsborough & O'Toole's, Renae yelling "TURN LEFT HERE" about 10 feet in front of the turn @ around 55mph, playing the Nap Game at Matt's (just a 'game' where you take a nap), going to visit Jess O. and having her dad tell us that we look like we need a beer, going to Jess O's house and then breaking out in some sort of rash because of Kryst's pug licking me, taking mystery pills from Yana to clear up said rash, and absolutely CrAzY fOg on Wednesday night.

Another highlight (but not so high...): I got pulled over today on the way to Matt's house. This was my first time being pulled over, EVER. And I was super nervous. And Renae had just told me what the speed limit was and I was going a lot faster, because up there there really aren't many speed limits or speed limit signs at least... So, I had just started slowing down and then the light turned on behind me... GREAT! So, I got out my license and registration and stuff (good thing I cleaned out my glove compartment or I wouldn't have been able to find it :) ).

Police Officer: Do you know why I'm stopping you?
Jess: No
Police Officer: Wanna take a guess?
Jess: Speeding?
Police Officer: You got it.
Jess: How much?
Police Officer: 53 in a 30mph zone.
Jess: (jaw drop and mental 'doh!') Stink. I'm not from anywhere around here.
Police Officer: I can see that. (Hands back paperwork.) Just slooooww down (emphasis was placed on the 'slow').
Jess: Ok, thank you.

Police officer proceeds to get back in his car and pull away, while I on the other hand am shocked and sitting motionless in the car. Renae then told me that her friends have been stopped there for going 31mph before (only 1mph above the limit) and have gotten tickets. Craziness. Needless to say, I was driving around 28mph the rest of the way to Matt's house. Yikes!

I Love Ya'll!!! I absolutely must go to bed now cuz I am CRAZY TIRED.

<3
P.S.- Mandi!!!! Sorry we got disconnected today when you called. I didn't get back to a little bit ago and didn't call you back. I'm sorry!!! I will hopefully get to talk to you tomorrow though! I love you!

thanksgiving in maine

matt getting ready to carve the turkey:

evan selecting some turkey morsels:

now the after eating shots, we were definitely too busy eating to take pictures. there was a lot of food. and we (there were 5 of us) ate most of it.
me and matt, lamenting our full conditions. some more than others:

sarah and erin, feeling full on the couch:

evan, who got hungry again very quickly, should probably become a professional eater and win competitions:

laurie ate elsewhere, so she self-moderated a little better:

matt was way too close to me to take my picture. i tried to communicate this, but instead just closed my eyes. because that will help.

dessert! the only thing that wasn't made from scratch was the raspberry cake in the front. we have some talented pie and cake makers in our midst up here:

after the sugar high, i think we got a little silly. me, laurie and erin decided it was couch time for the girls:

well...such was my thanksgiving in maine. the only thing you missed is a lot of football and a jay and silent bob movie later.

and now for something really different, i turned in my project for my composition class with pat on friday (yesterday) and she emailed me back last night (still friday) and called it 'amazing' and gave me an A on that and the class. yay! one class down, one to go. well, two if you can't my kids, fingers crossed on that one.

Thanksgiving

the Hedrick gang in the kitchen......... and in the sunroom......