a few thoughts from India...

yep. I'm tired. I've always been someone who need a good deal of sleep. Go ahead. Ask my mom. As a kid, I didn't care if my friends were over, if I was sleepy, I would go to sleep. :-) Since I'm still adjusting here, I'm not writing a whole lot yet. Here some thoughts...

We have air conditioning where we are staying. It's nice. Cause it is hot outside. I've had worst but the AC is a hugh blessing :-)

Indian drivers are incredible. I don't know how anyone can drive so offensively and yet so defensively at the same time. It always makes me a little nervous but they actually really good drivers. It's just different.

My sinuses cleared up just in time for the lovely scents of Mumbai. I'm glad to be able to breath - mostly.

Tonight we're going to visit the orphanage that I worked with 4 years ago on my first trip to India. I'm looking forward to seeing the kids again. I'm not sure if any of them will remember me because they have lots of different teams that come through and work with them. But i remember them!

well, hmm...

Ok, so i want to start blogging again. I'm back from Switzerland and i'm in Texas doing... well, nothing. I've been asking God 'what's next' and He seems to be telling me to rest and wait. In other words, take a chill pill :-D I don't want to waste all of time so I'm painting some, doing a little reading and, hopefully, working here and there. So, I don't have a whole lot to write about but since I have the time, i would like to blog a little.

This afternoon i had a post already to go and Photobucket was giving me some issues with resizing my photos. hmm. I could either have really massive photos that wouldn't show up entirely on my blog, OR i could little-itty-bitty thumbnail-size photos. What's the deal yo? Then I tried resizing to photos in iPhoto and that didn't seem to do the trick either. Is it just operator problems? hm. I'm hoping to have this sorted soon. Until then, please don't hold your breath...

points to ponder...

- Since i've gotten a bike, all of my favorite days have become my least favorite. Windy and rainy days are no fun on a bike. Grant it, i could walk, but i get there so much faster if i ride. Plus my feet really can't take walking for 20 minutes, standing up for 6 to 7 hours, then walking 20 minutes again. Yeah, i know, I'm getting old... :-)

- Why are some customers easy, or even fun, to serve while others are like cruel and unusual torture? Is it the attitude? "Just give me my coffee so i can have my caffeine fix." "Starbucks was really busy so i guess i'll bless you guys with my order." Is it the requests? "I know you already started making my drink order, but can i change that to a *half-caf* and use 1% instead of whole milk?" "Can i get a medium mocha in a large cup and don't make it too sweet?" I had a lady come in last week that ordered 2 drinks, one for herself and the other to take to someone. That *someone* had the moxie to ask that we make her latte *good* this time. Apparently, she had one of ours before that wasn't up to par. Hey, i may not be the best barista, but i always make my drinks as best as i know how! - of course, i didn't say that to her. It's a good thing that i only have a week left...

I'm in a love/hate relationship...

... with the wind.

As long as i can remember, i've loved bad weather. Go ahead, ask my mom. Rain, lightning, thunder, and wind! I love windy days; especially in the fall. The orange, red, and yellow leaves swirling though the air. Big gusts that almost blow your scarfs off... there's nothing better. :-) Unless....... you're riding a bike. Don't get me wrong, i generally love riding my bike. But try riding directly into a 30 mph gust of wind, uphill. yeah, uphill. Not fun. The last 2 days it's been awfully windy around here and i'm not enjoying it so much, bike-wise that is...

read my lips: n-o....

So, i live with a great family, The Harke's. (plus The Clark's) The Harke's has 3 awesome kids, Olivia (5), Silas (3), and Cora (almost 1). Tonight, I witnessed Cora's first 'argument' with her mom. Cora, as most kids, loves to get into everything! One of her favorites is the kids plastic plates and bowls. Ricci (her mom) doesn't mind her doing it but she does leave quite the mess. So tonight, after Cora tore through all the plastic ware and got bored, Ricci cleaned up. Then Cora made her way back and noticed that the floor looked too bare and decided to get the plates again. As she reach for the basket, Ricci said, "Cora! No!" Cora looked right up at Ricci, screeched, and started pulling out the plates. Once again, Ricci told Cora to stop and she (Cora) did the same thing: screeched and grabbed another plate. It was such a defiant little screech for a 1 year old. She can't even talk and she already knows how to say no.

No use in crying over spilt sugar... or is it?

Today I opened at work, which means waking up at 5:10am. Whatever. I got up, rode my bike to work, made some coffee, opened the store. No problem. Then about 10:30 one of customers mentioned that we were almost out of sugar as he handed me the sugar bowl. “Thanks” I replied as I got the sugar bag to refill the bowl. I emptied the last little bit into the bowl and made a mental note to remind my boss to get some more. Just then a customer walked in, one of our regulars. I got him his small house coffee and he went to go fix it up and he asked if we had any sugar. “Yes, I’ve got it back here” I said. As I went to hand the sugar bowl to him, I hit it on the corner of the counter and it spilt all over the cash register and counter top. Normally, I would have gotten angry with myself, and perhaps, say a cuss word. But I didn’t. All I wanted to do was cry. Since the customer was still standing there (feeling sorry for me, by the look on his face), I tried to recover and say something funny. But my mind was blank. All I wanted to do was cry. I didn’t; I had customers. For some reason it left me feeling extremely depressed and low, as though I could cry at the drop of a hat. It felt like I had let the whole world down and that I should just give up. It was weird. I had never quite felt like that before, let alone, over just spilling some lousy sugar. But, after about 30 minutes I was fine. I didn’t feel low, I actually felt kind of stupid for feeling that way in the first place. I mean, what happened? Would I have actually felt better if I had just cried?

Not the most uplifting blog, sorry. Don’t worry, I feel fine now.

Coffee snob?

Sn-offee
or
cob?....

so, for those of you who don’t know: I’m working part-time at a local coffee and tea café. It’s a nice place. We have really good coffee and like 100 different kinds of tea. We have a lot of faithful costumers that are really nice. And now we two locations. – I kind of sound like a commercial… anyhoo, today a guy and his daughter came in and his daughter had Dunkin’ Donuts. DUNKIN’ freakin’ DONUTS! Now, I think I have the right to be offended that they brought stuff from another coffee place into ‘my’ coffee place. But my first thought was, “how could they drink Dunkin’?” What?? Should I care that they bought Dunkin’ instead of coffee from us? People have different taste buds. Maybe they saw Dunkin’ first. Sometimes it’s easier to go to someplace familiar. Yeah, maybe they were from out-of-town. Maybe they have a tight budget (gas is like $4.40 a gallon). Our coffee is a little pricer than Dunkin’ but that’s because it’s really good coffee (and GREAT service). – there I go again… anyhoo, who am I to judge?

But just don’t bring other coffee into ‘my’ coffee place… it’s weird.

poetry?

Oddly enough, today was the first day for me to attempt poetry. You know, besides making up different lyrics to Roses are red, Violets are blue… I’ve never considered myself very good with words, my own words. But I’m currently reading The Fellowship of the Rings and I do believe Mr. Tolkien has inspired me…

the air is dead
the air is dense
it needs to rain
to ease my pain

the air is hot
the air is still
I need some relief
it is my belief

that I need the rain.

I hear the thunder
I see the clouds
the storm is coming
over the mountain lips its foaming

the wind is blowing
nature is stirring
the effects, I feel them not
for it is still hot
inside the house

and I need the rain.

now I am out
no longer in the house
the wind is still rushing
the thunder is not hushing

I feel the coolness
I feel the newness
the weather has changed inside and out
but just one thing I still care about
there is still no rain.

and I love the rain.

rainy days and… monday

It has been pouring for most of the day. And I’ve been out in it. I ran a few errands and a saw a movie with a friend. I’ve changed my pants twice today because they keep dragging in the rain. Oh well. What can I do? I already packed my galoshes. Actually, I’ve packed most everything. It’s hard though. Somebody is moving into my room after me, but I’m still here till Monday. So, I can’t pack all of my winter clothes yet. And I’m still using my bed. Anyhoo, I have to finish soon; did I mention I was leaving on Monday?!?

everyone knows it's windy...

today is my favorite kind of day!

it's cloudy

it's windy

it's rainy

we are getting the 'left overs' of hurricane Noel. it's gorgeous! i know. i'm weird. but i like bad weather. not to much rain that you can't walk without an umbrella. but so windy that if you do have an umbrella, you have to hold on for dear life. it's so perfectly cloudy that you just want to sleep-in forever. unfortunately, i couldn't. i had to get up and head downtown. but i got to be in this beautiful weather.

lone star..

I haven’t felt quite myself lately. I’ve been missing my friends, Amy, Heidi and Kathryn. I could be my goofy-old-self with them. it was easy. We were all goofy. We could watch zombie movies and laugh at them together. We could take goofy myspace pictures together. We could just hang out and have a good time. They all moved away at the beginning of the summer. Amy back to Ohio. Heidi and Kathryn to Washington (state). I knew that I would start really missing them about this time. You see, last year, all 3 of them were gone for the summer too. H & K were visiting family and Amy was working at a camp in MO. But everyone came back to New Haven by the fall. Well, this year they all left at the beginning of the summer and I knew that they weren’t coming back in the fall this time. But I knew that’s when I would REALLY start missing them. Well, I’ve notice that the last couple of weeks, I’ve felt a little off. With those girls, I would laugh to the point of crying, probably once a week! (which, by the way, is one of my favorite things to do!) I haven’t done that in a while. It’s been a while since I’ve watched a zombie movie; it’s not much fun by your self. Don’t get me wrong. I still have some good friends to hang out with. But it’s a little different now. My closest friend in New Haven is married. So it’s a different dynamic. I don’t go and buy a frozen pizza and ice cream and rent a cheesy zombie movie to spend the night with her. She’s allergic to dairy. Plus at the end of a work day, she may want to spend some time with her husband. Anyhoo, it’s just different. I guess I’m a little lonely and I’m definitely missing my good friends. I may see Amy by next month and I will be seeing Heidi and Kathryn in the early part of next year. I’m definitely looking forward to that.

p.s. as I went to bed last night, I was starting to feel a little better. Not so lonely.