No More Dr. Carpenstein

Hi everyone!  Bet you thought you'd never hear from me again.  Not to worry--things might have been a little crazy for a while there, but they're normalizing now.  And my life has changed a lot.  Remember how in my last post I said I was dating a guy?  Well, here he is!

Ah, U-Swirl, how I love you.

And here he is again!

 Yep, we got married!  Hooray!

Aren't we just so cute?

We got married on October 11th of last year, so the date was 10-11-12.  Handy, huh?  It's sure to be easy to remember!  

It's amazing what can happen in a year.  For example, almost exactly one year after my first date with Scott, we celebrated our 6 month wedding anniversary.  I find this very amusing.  Yes, to most people (at least the ones I work with), that's a bit quick.  But I have no regrets.  Being married is awesome!  You know, just in case you were wondering... Hopefully soon I'll tell you about some of the adventures we've had so far.  There have been quite a few--fishing for beans, trying new recipes, trying not to be eaten by alien potatoes (man, most of these revolve around food, don't they?  Weird...).  Anyways, we're happy and doing well.  And it's summer!  (Meaning no homework for the Mr.)  Hooray!  

More to come soon.  Ish. :)

GRE Scores and Dates (and not the fruit kind)

Hi people!  Yes, I'm a slacker, I know.  So, I took the GRE the first weekend in May (really, it's been that long already?) and got my results back...last week?  I think.  Yeah, I'm pretty sure it was a week ago today.  Anywho, I did surprisingly well, especially considering how I felt while taking the test.  {How am I supposed to know whether or not this one paragraph in a super long article is supporting a point from five paragraphs ago in 1 minute or less?}  So yay for that!  I definitely will not need to take it again, which is good.  However, my plans may be changing soon.  You see, I've started dating this boy.

He's kind of (really) awesome. 

I like him a lot. :)

Dating was really weird at first, I must admit (I'm hoping others will agree with me on this), but now that I've had some time to get used to the idea it's fun.  Who'd've thunk--dating is a fun thing!  I really only have a picture or two of him (and none of the two of us), so once I get some good ones I'll put them up.  Probably.  Mwahahaha.  Until then, if you need more details you can find me and ask.  (I don't really feel like putting all the gory details out there for the world to see.)

So, in a nutshell, things are good.

Carpenstein out.

GREat!

Guys--I just registered to take the GRE.  As in, graduate school.  Graduate school!  I will admit, a tiny part of me is freaking out right now, but the rest of me is almost excited (well, not for the test exactly, for the school part).  I am such a nerd...

Adventures in Paradise...Bakery

Earlier this week, someone needed to pick up lunch for a meeting we had going on in our office.  Usually another lady takes care of lunch stuff, but she was out sick.  (We missed her a lot.)  Therefore, I was the lucky one chosen to get the food.  We have a Paradise Bakery right around the corner from work, so it was not big deal.  Or at least, it wouldn't have been for a normal person.  Ha.

I walked in and found out that the menu we were basing the order off of was the catering menu, not the normal cafe menu.  Snafu #1.  Luckily, one of the workers (he looked like a manager) took pity on me, probably seeing the desperation in my eyes and the green Heliae shirt, and majorly helped me out.  He got the order all filled out and sent me over to pay.  I picked up a sandwich for myself (might as well...) and walked over to the cash register.  Snafu #2: my purse is huge, and I was now carrying a menu, a paper with our order on it, my sandwich and cookie, and trying to pay and get drink cups and all.  Again, the nice girl at the cash register took pity and was very helpful.  It was only then that I realized my biggest problem yet: the tea.

Two people wanted iced tea.  Now, my only experience with iced tea has been A) seeing other people drink it, and B) passing it by as an option at the soda fountain.  Snafu #3:  the soda fountain at Paradise Bakery does not have a tea option.  Instead, they have four huge metal canister-looking things with tea in them.  I literally sat and stared at them for a few minutes, totally at a loss.  

"Sure," I thought, "send the only girl who doesn't drink tea to get some for two of our VPs."  

I was about to call my boss and ask her what to do (she drinks iced tea all the time), but I realized that I left my phone sitting on my desk at work.  Great.  I finally just filled some cups with ice (going on a brain wave that iced tea is just normal tea, but with ice--brilliant, I know) and went for the plainest brew I could find and hoped it would work.  I also had a great conversation with someone else at the drink area.

Random Guy: So, you're not getting any of these? [motioning to the soda options]

Me: Nope, I'm not.  I'm getting iced tea, except I don't drink tea and have no idea what I'm doing.

Random Guy: Oh, OK....

Yeah, I pretty much just gave up on looking like a competent adult in any measure.  

In the end, I think everyone got what they wanted (at least I didn't hear any complaints) and I got a delicious Paradise Club sandwich to replace my PB&J.  Oh, and an opportunity to turn in my first ever expense report!  Get excited!

And who says office jobs are boring?

Trabajando

Sorry guys--I'm really not trying to be a horrible life-updating-blogger.  There's just not much to update about.  Work has been pretty demanding lately.  (Ick.)  I'm at an awkward phase where I don't know how selfish I want to be when it comes to working hours.  For example, do I want to leave at 5:00 (when our office "officially" closes), or stay until who knows when to get things done?  Today, I opted for the latter.  Turns out, who knows when was 7:00.  I don't even want to know how many purchase orders I did.  Well, maybe I do.  Tomorrow.

So...that's really about it.  I have a nice time on the weekends (although last weekend I did have to take some work home with me...).  I'm going on a ward campout this weekend.  That should be fun.  Oh, and I played in a Mesa High orchestra alumni concert last night.  Maybe I'll post on that at some point--it was certainly an adventure.

Until then, I am signing off.  Consider yourselves updated.  :)

Welcome to the Space Jam...

In honor of my lovely friend Rhonda's birthday, I will finally post about mine.  Haha.  

So, this year I turned 23.  How did that happen?!?!  I don't feel 23!  When I woke up, I found this outside my bedroom:

 Gotta love those siblings!  There were more hearts and a poster outside on the garage door (and on the steering wheel of the car I drove), but I didn't get a picture before the rain washed them away.  Whoops!

Sadly, I had to go to work.  I guess that made me feel like an actual adult--working on my birthday.  As far as work goes, it actually was a pretty nice day.  I had gone out to lunch the day before, so I didn't do anything fancy for that.  Around 3:00, my mother and sister-in-law showed up at work with a big box of brownies (the Pillsbury ones you get at Sam's Club--my weakness).  It was like the day at school I never got--you know how you always got awesome treats on other people's birthdays in elementary school?  Since mine was in the summer, I had never experienced that first hand.  (Not that I'm complaining--a summer birthday is awesome!)  Let's just say that my cubicle was suddenly very popular...Thanks Mom and Jaimee!

After work, we did the traditional Joe's BBQ/Krispy Kremes run, but family-style this time.  (This is possibly the first year my parents have come along for this--usually it's just me and a sibling or two.)  Want to know something horrible?  Krispy Kremes was out of hats!  I know, scandalous, right?  So, we didn't get to take our traditional eating-a-doughnut-with-the-beautiful-hat-on picture, like this one:

*sniff*

Next year, my friends.

Since my birthday was conveniently on a Friday, I just extended the celebrations over to Saturday.  I had to make up for the 8 or so hours at work, right?  Right.  We had some family time (a.k.a. seeing "Cowboys and Aliens"--not really my first choice...) and that night I had some people over to partake in another time-honored birthday tradition: the watching of a really stupid movie.  Don't ask me why, but this is one of my favorite birthday traditions.  I'm weird.  This year's winner was:

Picture courtesy of Amazon

 Oh yes.  It's stupid, and it has Michael Jordan in it.  (It was my Michael Jordan birthday--#23 and all.)  Perfect!  Again, I forgot to take pictures, so...just take my word on it.  People came.  

Like these ones!

And this one!

And we watched the movie.  And mocked it heartily.  Yep, that about sums it up.

Ooh, ooh, want to see one of the cool presents I got?  (And then I'll be done, I promise.  I forgot to take pictures of all of my other presents--I love them too, though, family and nearly family!)  

It's a holder for my crochet hooks!  And fancy new bamboo hooks!  And it's cute!  I am so excited!  (And such a nerd, I know.)

And so, that was my birthday.  Now I can post about new crochet projects!  Yay! 

"In a New York minute....oohweeooh...."

Last Tuesday, I woke up with a plan for my day that looked pretty much like every other Tuesday.

The Plan

7:00--Wake up, shower, eat breakfast

8:45--Leave for work

9:00--Arrive at work and get down to business

11:00--Stop working, eat lunch, switch into my awesome volunteer smock, and head off to the hospital

12:00--Arrive at the hospital and help people (while having fabulous conversations with my desk-mate, of course)

4:00--Leave the hospital for home

4:15-ish--Be home and...well, that's pretty much what the plan was (except for Jenny/Kailei night, of course).

As you probably suspect, my actual plan went nothing like that.  Instead:

The Reality

7:00--Alarm goes off

7:30--Actually get out of bed

8:38--Check my phone and see that an unknown number called me and left a message while I was in the shower.  Listen to the voicemail and find out that it's from a staffing agency saying they found my resume on ASU's Career Link and they think I would be great for a position they're trying to fill.  {OK, random, but not a bad random.}

8:42--Call back the message-leaver, get some info, and agree to meet for an interview later that afternoon.  {You know, no biggie.  It's not like I already have a job or anythi---wait a second...}

8:52--Try to eat breakfast while simultaneously getting references together, e-mailing my boss to tell him what's going on, e-mailing my supervisor at the hospital asking to leave early, updating my resume, and calling my dad saying "What am I supposed to be doing right now?"

10:00--Decide there's no way I'm making it in to work, call in, and continue preparing until it's time to leave for the hospital.

12:10--Arrive at the help desk and find out that my desk-mate's kids are sick, ergo she will not be coming in. Find out that it's just going to be me for the next 3 1/2 hours and my book is at home.  Start panicking...

Several prayers and about 1 1/2 hours later--Stop panicking.  Deal with today's taxi craziness and general everyday busyness that is the front desk.  Make a few really stupid comments (such as asking someone coming in looking for a patient what department the person in question worked in), but overall help people.

3:40--Leave the hospital, put gas in the car, drive to interview.

4:25--Arrive at interview (on time!), fill out paperwork, and have a really nice chat with my (now) good friend Matt.

6:00-ish--Arrive at home

Later--Call my boss to tell him what's going on {and that I'm really not trying to ditch him...}

After later--Decide I'm really sick of calling, e-mailing, and texting people.

OK, that last bit sounds really ungrateful.  This was an amazing opportunity that just fell into my lap--the position they're looking to fill is an administrative position at a biofuel engineering company (pretty much an excellent combination of my work experience--small as it is--and education).  Right now it's just temporary, but there's a possibility that it would become permanent.  After the first interview, my information was passed on to the actual company looking to hire and I had an interview with them this afternoon.  It went pretty well--the people were nice and I didn't say too many dumb things (hopefully...).  I'll definitely keep you all posted. :)

I Am an Adult

I'm currently in the start-up process to become a volunteer at Banner Desert hospital (down on Dobson and Southern).  I decided that I might as well do something worthwhile with all the glorious non-school time I have right now.  So, today was step #3 (I think...somewhere around there): the health screening.

Dun dun DUNNN!!!!

Really, it wasn't that bad, but they did do a TB skin test (where they shoot you up with TB particles...or something...let me go consult my disease textbook and I'll get back to you on that one) and take what seemed to me to be a large amount of blood.  Really, how much do you need to check for chicken pox antibodies?  Whatever.  The moral of the story is that I did it, did not pass out (I have a bad history with blood donation), and even went to a 2-hour orientation session afterward and drove myself home.

For some of you, this may seem like nothing special.  But to me, it was a big deal.  I actually feel like...an adult.

Haha, only took me 22-odd years.