A Little Catching Up

Well, my blogging life has become non-existent. No one tells you that a job working 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. will actually be much more time consuming than college. In class, you have plenty of time to catch up on reading all your favorite blogs and to prepare a blog post of your own. Even though I sit at computer screen (well, two screens actually) all day, I have real things to be doing. If I put this much effort into class work, my GPA would be above a 4.0...probably.

I've been sans-car for the last two weeks. My good ol' Ford Focus finally when kaput. In the middle of the Broadway turn lane. After some searching, my mom found me a nice little white Toyota Corolla. It's a 2001...BUT it has 40K miles on it and it was only $5000. That's a damn good deal and it only has to last me until I find a nice doctor husband to buy me a new one. Being without a car has been challenging. I am so grateful to Trever, who has taken me to and from work a little early each day. The situations, though not ideal, has it's advantages:

• It prevents me from spending money during lunch because I am forced to bring my own.
• It saves me on gas money, though I will gladly pitch in to pay Trever.
• It forces me to wake up earlier and be promptly on time.
• I get into work 30 minutes early each day and am able to build up hours so I can leave early on Friday afternoons. This is especially nice today, as I make my way to the lake at 2 p.m. -- woot!

Mom is meeting me at the Lake of the Ozarks this weekend and will be bringing along my sweet new wheels. She is so awesome to have found this car, communicated with the dealer and drive it to me. I may have a real job now, but the task of searching, finding and buying a new car is a daunting one, and I don't think I'm ready yet.

Since I have been such a poor blogger lately, I'll just give you a quick update as to what's been going on in my life. We'll start with Game of Thrones, not the TV show, but the book. It's the nerdiest looking thing, with a cheesy photo of Sean Bean (of the TV show and The Lord of the Rings) sitting in the intentionally uncomfortable throne of swords. It just has the "I also play W.O.W. until 4 a.m. every morning" look. Regardless...it is one of the best books I've ever read. Ever. It's so well written, in a style that's enchantingly and beautifully vintage. The characters, though numerous and difficult to keep track of, are interesting and the storyline is complex and exciting. Even when it's boring, it's exciting. It's over 600 pages long and I love every page of it.

50 Shades of Grey, on the other hand, sucks. I'd read about it and heard about it, so I figured I'd get on board. But the thing must have been written by a middle schooler...a really kinky middle schooler? I thought it was a joke at first. I thought the author was trying to create this young, immature character reflected by her writing style. That is not the case. So, I just gave up after the first chapter and skipped to the more interesting chapters, which is what everyone is so up in arms about. It was weird. The concept is strange and not entirely awful, but there is just no way I can stick around when the writing is so terrible. I heard on a radio talk show that women love it so much because the main character ends up changing this guy who is so controlling and emotionally unstable. Which is fine, women love what they love. But that doesn't mean they should have to read CRAP to find the kind of stories they love. Disappointment.

This is the banner I designed for the our intern orientation.

Work at the lovely JES Holdings, LLC has been going nicely. Tuesday and Wednesday were Intern Orientation. Though I have been here for a month I was still required to participate. There were 10 of us from either Missouri or Georgia, each interning in a different department: marketing, IT, property management, investment accounting, leasing, etc. It's a weird thing, to through together 10 people who are essentially strangers and force them to spend two days together. Don't get me wrong, they were all really cool people, but I can only talk about what I'm doing over Memorial Day weekend and what it's like to be joining the SEC so many times before I need the company of someone I know a little better. Tuesday was spent mostly in the conference room listening to various speakers explain different aspects of our company. Tuesday night we got to go out to Room 38 for dinner (on JES) and then to Quinton's for a little patio time, trivia and $2 Big Girls. The outing was a good time, and let's face it, the preferred way to get to know 10 strangers. We stumbled in Wednesday morning and worked on one of our properties to prepare a unit for leasing. We cleaned and painted the place and then got to buy decor accessories to dress it up a bit. The orientation ended in dinner with one of the executives in our stylish (sarcasm) and poorly-fitting Nike golf shirts (not sarcastic).

Anyway, I've been sitting at work for the last 40 minutes working on this post because I if I clock in early, I'll have to leave before Birthday Lunch or go over on my 40 hours. Baaaah. But it's about 8 a.m. now, so I'm headed off to do some property newsletters. I know, I know. THRILLING.

Let me know if you're going to be at the lake tonight, we're going to a foam party...should be fun. Have a great Memorial Day everyone!