Sweet niblets, I just realized three of my recent posts have ended with an emoticon smiley.

There, I’ve got them all out of my system. Shudder. I am not an emoticon girl. Contrary to apparent recent evidence, I am not a fan of sideways symbols making faces. While we’re on the subject, I also cannot stand the acronym LOL. Greg Giraldo has a great bit about the overuse of LOL and other ridiculous text shorthand, but YouTube isn’t being kind and showing me the clip I want. Full disclosure: Neil uses LOL in his texts, and it very very VERY much irked me in the beginnings of our relationship. I admittedly use “haha” far more than any one person should in the course of their average texts per day, but “haha” is a much more socially acceptable phrase to show you’re either joking or think something is mildly amusing during the course of electronic conversation. When D-Bag and I used to have Skype chat conversations instead of just walking the 10 yards to the other’s apartment in Germany, he was pretty boss at using appropriate animation to make or support a point or story he was telling. That’s because one, Darin is the shit; and two, Skype has some pretty great animations. He was also a fan of the eye-rolling emoticon during Facebook chats (we had a weird and lovely co-dependency which apparently required us to be in communication at all times) which was just so great because that’s actually a face that he uses often in real life.

…it seems my apology for excessive smiley faces has just turned into a soliloquy on how much I miss my German bestie, as so many things lately often do.

I’ve returned from Thanksgiving 1 of 3, a lovely weekend in Kansas City full of food, family, and that football game that I’m not going to talk about. I’m not sure what it is about Mondays, but they’ve become my most productive day of the week and when you’ll probably catch me in the best mood. Today not only did I feed someone’s parking meter that had expired, I took an impromptu trip to visit my former co-workers at the hospital. It was the first time I’d been back since leaving a month before studying in Germany– needless to say I was getting some very Twilight Zone-ish vibes considering I’d worked there nearly every day for two and a half years. It was surprisingly the same, though I’m not sure what I was expecting, which was both reassuring and kinda sad. Roomie Lauren and I just returned from dinner at Masala, a local vegetarian Indian restaurant. Yes, it was delicious and yes, I can see Indian being my new food kick for a couple weeks. On the docket for the rest of the night? Finding a job, naturally; perhaps I’ll bake 713 some autumnal treats, though that would require me leaving the couch. Today I’m thankful that my doctor talked me into getting the flu shot, and that my leg doesn’t actually need to be amputated, I just merely have a calcified hematoma (really, really bad bruise) from that terrible spill I took in DC a month ago. Seriously, it’s like I have a third knee. Lots of ice, ibuprofen, and massaging the calcium from my blood that’s collected on the area back into the ol’ veins is helping the pain, though. It’s pretty fantastic.

A big thank you goes up to Papa K for backing up all my files before I went to Germany. The other day Neil said something about murdering me to gain possession all of my things (he was kidding… I think) which reminded me I’d drawn up a will before going to Germany last year. Sure enough, I just found it buried in my very disorganized documents folder, so will now share it with you mostly in its entirety now (edited slightly for content and to protect those who probably don’t want their full names associated with me):

12/16/09—The Last Will and Testament of Brittney, one kick-ass cool kid
In the event of my untimely death, my belongings should be dispersed as follows:
1. My car goes to Melissa B. so she can drive her own ass to Ames
2. Admiral Jim Jack goes to Geoff W. And his electrical fans. And his silver trash can.
3. My PRSSA polo and Iowa Swimming & Diving t-shirt to Natalie
4. Neil gets my dead body so he can prop me up on the couch with a beer in my hand and talk to my cadaver—essentially nothing will have changed from our living friendship
5. My fake id goes to the highest bidder. It works everywhere but Brother’s and probably Fieldhouse
6. Everything else goes to Kayla.

Can we please not talk about how at the age of 20 I apparently still wanted to be remember as a “kick-ass cool kid”? I wonder where my parents ever got the idea that NPH and I only hang out to drink together. Clearly I was just far too immature, seven months out from the legal drinking age and all.

I have the tendency to find myself and my sarcasm far too amusing.

Golly gee, there’s a lot I could talk about. I won’t, however, because the purpose of this blog is to slightly entertain readers with sarcastic fluff and not bog you all down with my political views or the anger and sadness I feel about certain decisions made yesterday (some were not surprising, one I don’t care about, and some were a terrible blow to the progress made during the last election. I will instead post my Facebook status– which a record number of people “liked”– and then move on:

You’re showing your immaturity and why they voted against you in the bars anyway– it’s not suddenly prohibition, if Iowa City is “dead” now it must mean you aren’t much fun anyway. The fact so many people care about downtown more than judicial retention, gay marriage, backwards-thinking Branstad, or even the House becoming red again, is quite sad and pathetic, Hawkeyes.

On a brighter note, NPH finally took the GRE (graduate school entrance exam, for those of you not in the know) this morning and did really well! He just came in under the score he was aiming for– like, if he’d have only gotten two more questions right he would have been there– and it’s a huge weight lifted off the entire house. Tomorrow I head to Minneapolis for a PRSSA trip! So today I am thankful for this:

This is the scene before me. Graduate level exams are very mentally taxing.

As we spend the evening watching election returns on CNN, I figured I’ll start my November blog tradition of saying something I’m thankful for every day. While I’m quite thankful for the cherry Twizzler Nibs NPH just gifted me with, I’m going to try to not just list a food item for the next 20-odd days. To kick off things, I’ll stay on topic with today’s political theme and say I’m thankful for our president. I could say I’m thankful for free speech and the right to vote, but snoozefest alert. I can honestly say I’m not on the same level of appreciation Ricky Stanzi has for America– I think there’s a helluva lot wrong with our political systems, and if given a job in (and plane ticket to, and a better handle on the native tongue of) Germany I’d abandon everything here before you could say “Forget getting my degree.” But today I’m very thankful for Barack Obama, Barry O, the man I’ll stand behind even my father claims we “kids just voted for him because we thought having a black president would be cool.” He is cool. (That’s not why I voted for him– his opponent was definitely farther up that list than the color of his skin.) He’s also not perfect, but neither would you be in that position. Some people only respect the position, but I certainly also respect the man. Yes we can, yes we did, these next two years will be quite interesting.

This morning Roomie Rachael and I got up early to ROCK THE VOTE down at the ol’ rec center. We were voters number 8 & 9, and there was no shortage of little old ladies manning the ballot tables. The entire process took about seven minutes; it was the first time I’ve voted at an actual polling place. In 2008 I voted absentee, and I have memories of going to the polling place with my mom when Ben and I were little. This morning I was oddly excited to blacken those little bubbles (no, I won’t tell you how I voted… ok, YES to repeal the 21 ordinance, though I have a feeling it will stay in place, and YES to retaining our judges. I won’t get started on people who think those who are different than them don’t deserve the same rights– they don’t deserve my blog space.) We grossly overestimated the amount of time it would take, so set up camp in the journalism building to snarkily comment on the morning’s current events from around the world.

“I know I would be if I had to spend that much time with the Jonas brothers.” –Rachael, on the likelihood that Demi Levato entered rehab for being coked out of her mind.

Yesterday I had my final pre-registration meeting with my academic adviser for my LAST semester of college. I had the dilemma of choosing between one really hard class that would most likely be quite beneficial to my eventual career, or choosing a pretty cushy class since the likelihood of me being able to give a damn any more than I currently do is about -500%. The jury’s still out on which I’ll get into/ register for. I’m pretty excited to fill up my final 13 credit hours with superfluous electives– fitness walking, anyone?

Fergus is three months old today! And he’s getting huge. And by huge I mean long and kinda fat, but only fat in really weird places. And by that I mean he looks pregnant.

“BLOG, BLOG, BLOG, BLOG… please?” At least @nataliedubs loves me.

I’m pretty excited about this week for many reasons. Tomorrow is my chance to redeem my less than stellar midterm grade because we’re having another one. Afterward, there’s a BIG EVENT for another of my classes– the thing we’ve been working on all semester, the thing I’ll be quite glad is over. After that, not to jinx myself, it will be smooth sailing until my one final in December. I’ll have regular homework and stuff for both of my jobs, but the big projects will be done-zo.
This weekend I went back to where I interned for the summer and put in some mad hours at their annual Halloween event. I was surprised to come back and find Fergus had grown a lot in like 72 hours. He’s taking to running/bounding/careening from room to room since his legs have finally grown a bit. I have zero interest in Halloween this year, but it’s the last weekend I’ll be in Iowa City until… December? so will make the most of it. I’ll half-ass a costume last minute at best.
OH and I got a B+ in one of my classes that just ended. While normally I wouldn’t be psyched about this, it’s pretty high for the amount of effort I put into it which was next to nothing (it was for my major which was now a minor which I chose to finish out only because it was just an eight week course.)
There you go, Natalie– not exciting, but a post nonetheless. Time to do my readings for my test tomorrow… ha… nervous laughter.

Today was a busy, whirlwind day in DC– I’m now chillin’ in our hotel room with a beer and some homework. Tomorrow is the earliest morning, the day I will get a job, a very important networking day in the life of Brittney. This morning we didn’t participate in some optional sessions, and instead went to the National Zoo which was AWESOME since I’m newly obsessed with zoos. After about an hour of geeking out over their Halloween decorations, we took the Metro downtown and did some window shopping. THEN we went toward the White House, even though I’d been last night, and took some pictures for the director of our school. My feet were killing me and I wanted to go home, but then we noticed a large group of people on the White House lawn and heard a bunch of music coming from behind the gate. Now, the White House is not easy to even get remotely close to and is pretty hidden by trees (who knew? Not me until last night.) Some random guy overheard us and informed us that the grounds open twice a year for the White House Garden Tour. He pointed us in the direction of the free tickets, and after only three minutes of waiting and a security screening, we were walking up the driveway to the White House! Very cool. Everyone was far less impressed with the various trees and flowers, and instead were turning to their friends like, “Holy balls we’re on the White House lawn.” Post- 9/11, this was a very big deal. We got to see Sasha and Malia’s new playground as well as the kitchen garden planted last year. We managed to make it back to the conference for a session on internships, and are now getting pizza delivered because I am tired.
…Also I’m kind of very sad that I’m not running my first half marathon today. I realize that was obviously not my only opportunity to do so, but I’m still kinda bummin’.

World, meet Fergus Jackson. You can call him Fergs.

He's quite fond of grass...

...but he's also a big fan of me.

He's only 8 weeks old so sleeps a LOT.

He's also very well-tempered, a cuddler, and generally the cutest thing you've ever seen.

Perhaps I’ll fill you in on more later, but I’m going to go digest my first Pumpkin Pie Blizzard of the season (thanks, Lauren!)

On this day, one year ago, I wrote my first post about absolutely nothing. Happy one year blogiversary to my myself! There have been 154 posts in 365 days, not too shabby considering I took a few months off to blog elsewhere about my study abroad adventures. Am I doing anything to celebrate this glorious occasion? Well it’s four-meeting Friday (it’s exactly at it sounds– even though I don’t have class on Fridays, I consistently have to be more on my game than any other day of the week) and then later I’m going to get real domestic around 713 with some bacon mac ‘n cheese for NPH and deep cleaning sparked by Bryce’s amazing job on getting the upstairs bathroom to sparkle. One of my meetings this morning was about trip to DC in six days, and it got me really excited. I’m probably more excited, however, to go shopping tomorrow for super professional clothes to wear while I’m there. I suppose you could say I celebrated this morning with a FREE bagel at Bruegger’s (the ridiculously friendly register lady hooked me up with some coupons) and Roomie Lauren said something about a pumpkin pie shake at Hamburg Inn before the weekend’s over. Ahem.