Life in Denim and Flip Flops

Let me just preface this post with the fact that I'm crazy, but as someone recently told me.."as long as you own it, you're fine." So this is me owning my crazy. I dread shoveling snow. I don't enjoy walking through it to get to work. I avoid driving in it. This December we got 30+ inches. And then we spent the month of January with only 3 days above freezing. And boy has it been gloomy and dreary. I'm a bit fed up with it, so yesterday I posed the following on my facebook status: What # snowpacalypse are we on now this winter? Maybe we should start naming them like hurricanes so we can keep track better. *rolls eyes* I couldn't help but think that it couldn't hurt my attitude toward the weather to name the storm headed our way. You know the one threatening to dump more than a foot of snow. Besides didn't someone say the best way to defeat one's enemy is to know them? How can we know them until we name them? So with the help of...

Ahhh!! Autumn and I have purchased tickets (and good ones at that) to see "Next to Normal" in Des Moines in March. I'm so excited. I really don't have much more to say other than I'm gonna have the album on repeat for the next 6 weeks :) Yay!!

Bitch Magazine has just released a list of 100 YA books for the Feminist Reader. This is so me on so many levels. I love lists, YA books, and kick-ass female leads. Perusing the list I realize I haven't read as many as I might have thought. I'd like to think that I seek out these types of books, but apparently I've got a long way to go. The list is a PDF otherwise I'd copy/paste it here. So instead I'll point out the books I've read and the ones I've got on my to read list. (Books I own in italics. I tend not to buy/keep a lot of books. So owning them is kind of a big thing for me.) I was really impressed with the blend of fantasy and realistic fiction. I love fantasies, but with those I feel like the feminist ideas sometimes get watered out a little. It's easier to set up a female in a leadership or as a strong role when they have some sort of power. I like having female heroes like that, but sometimes I crave real-world girls dealing with real-world ...

I do some weird things in my library instruction. I do not think I would be incorrect in saying my information literacy sessions are slightly unorthodox. This semester is no different. One class this particularly true for is Introduction to Research Writing. In that class students see us 6 times during the semester. I'm in charge of (and teach 98% of) the first library day of the social science unit. We focus on introducing the geographic region and doable topics for social sciences, as well as the importance of a good research question. Each semester I create an activity for the students to do that engages them with the material in some way. This semester, thanks to Amy's great idea, and my wonderful friends, the students will be pairing topics with haiku written about it. I thought you all might enjoy seeing it. So without further adieu my prezi of haiku :) Mississippi River Watershed Haikus on Prezi EDIT: I realize now that this is sort of an incomplete look. This...

I was discussing a friend of mine with Natalie Standiford , a YA author on twitter, and she commented that it sounded like an "epic" friendship. I had never really thought of it that way, but once I had the thought, I couldn't really unthink it. Being the word geek I am, I looked epic up in the dictionary. I found the following definitions: epic. (n.d.). Dictionary.com Unabridged . Retrieved January 22, 2011,  from Dictionary.com website: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/epic Of unusually great size or majestic and impressively great? Yeah, I've been blessed with a few friendships that I would call epic. Growing up I had one of those idyllic sort of childhoods. I went to school with the same 19 kids for 9 years. I still can't go back to church with my parents without running into a grandparent of one of my former classmates. One would think that this would have led to one of those friendships you find in books and movies. The best friend you...

I know that I've blogged about my love of sports a lot in the past . But it's been a while and clearly it's time for one again. Oh, and it's timely, because I'll be spending tomorrow night at the UW-Indiana basketball game. (8 pm CT on ESPN/ESPN3) I love watching the game however I can, but there is just something about experiencing a game live. And there is nothing better than being part of the Badger student section, The Grateful Red . (For football they're Bucky's Bleacher Creatures.) The culture of the games and particularly the student section is special. The band is right in the student section and unlike some other arenas (MSU's Breslin Center...I'm talking to you) they don't pipe in music. The band provides it all. Sing-alongs and songs you damn well better know the dance moves to. In the student section (at least the lower 2 tiers) you stand the entire game. If you sit at all, it's during timeouts. And usually then you're danc...

Today my little sister turns 24. And boy do I feel old. But in a good way. A favorite author of mine once said that "I think today for a lot of people siblinghood is a relationship that occurs primarily in childhood, and then when you're adults you still talk but you mostly talk about your parents or your other siblings or familial matters of some kind...and you're stuck with the same image of your siblings that you had when you were little. [...] I think it's an increasingly rare pleasure to know your siblings as adults." ( John Green, Dec. 28: John's Last Brotherhood 2.0 Video ) I am incredibly lucky to be able to say I know my sister as an adult. And I love the adult that she's grown up to be. She's the bestest little sister a girl could have. So sorry I couldn't be there to celebrate with you today in person! Now I recognize that most of you might not agree that 24 and almost 27 make us adults, but to that I'd remind you the last time w...

Earlier this week someone I follow on Twitter asked if anyone felt like the music they listen to a lot becomes the soundtrack of their lives. Like if there are specific songs or albums that have very specific memories or feelings or events connected to that music. One or two things popped into my head, but the idea stuck with me this week. I realized that I have lots of examples of this. I am a creature of habit which certainly aids this endeavor. In college I always studied and wrote papers to the same like 5 albums. To this day, those songs bring me back to the library and my favorite study spot. But I've also got some memories that are less to do with repetition but more to do with the a situational thing. Songs, albums, or artists that bring me back to a certain place and time. Friend Is a Four-Letter Word--Cake -- This song always bring me back to a stretch of Hwy 30 between Mount Vernon and Cedar Rapids. Gretchen and I did a lot of escaping to CR to go shopping, watch a mov...

So twice this last week I've been asked for YA book recommendations for people who are new to YA. It got me thinking about what books I'd suggest in that situation. I happen to know one of them pretty well (or did when we were the right age for these books originally), but the other I'm not as sure what kinds of book she was looking for. So I thought, why not do a YA primer. I'm by no means a YA expert. Just a big fan of the genre. And if you've read this blog before.. (which I'm sure all what...6 of you?...have) you know I love to talk about books. So here's the list: Becky's YA Primer . Just pick the type of book you're looking for and scroll down to that category for my suggestions. I don't have descriptions for all the categories yet, but I'm working on it. You'll notice a few of my favorite authors on their quite a bit. Some books fit multiple categories, but I've only listed each once. If you ever want to come back to it, I...

If you don't live in the same YA-obsessed world I do, or if you've managed to not talk to me or read my Twitter in the past few weeks, you may not have heard of the book I'm going to talk about. I've got Kelly (a college friend of mine) over at Stacked to thank for turning me on to Siobhan Vivian . I happened to win a drawing for a copy of her latest book Not That Kind of Girl . I read it and loved it...of course. (Because I mean seriously, we all know I was that judgey Natalie that you find at the beginning of the book.) Then I moved on to her other books. A Little Friendly Advice was exactly what I was hoping it would be; an interesting look at what it means to be a friend and what happens when you've got a group of friends cobbled together over time. Somehow without knowing, I manage to save the best for last. Same Difference follows Emily, a budding artist, as she goes to an art day-camp in Philadelphia who finds herself but starts to lose everything she...

My sister made this blanket as a birthday/Christmas present for me. It's been a while in the making. She crocheted each square and pieced it all together in a gorgeous pattern. The squares are about 5-5 1/2 inches wide and the blanket is a 9x9 square blanket. I love it! Manda crochets super-tight so the blanket is heavy and so so warm. It has got to be one of my favorite presents ever!! I'm curled up under it right now watching Veronica Mars with Manda. :)

What a weird temperature day. The computer lab at work this week has been a sauna. We're talking like major notable difference between the rest of the library and this room. So much so that knowing I was going to be teaching 4 classes in there today I wore a short sleeve shirt to work and was still hot in there. So after about 4 hours in there, I got to come out to the reference desk. Now the desk is notoriously cold. My body kinda started freaking out at that point. I threw a cardigan and a scarf on to sit out there for two hours. By the time I bundled up for the walk home I think my body had given up trying to figure out what was up. Which is why at 7:30pm I crawled in bed under a bunch of blankets to warm up and cuddle up with a book. In addition to this, I'm also attempting to ignore what feels like the beginning of a sore throat and the fact that I've been sleeping so poorly. Nope. Not getting sick. I feel fine. Maybe a good warm night's sleep will fix this. Righ...

So I was having a hard time falling asleep last night. I decided at some point that maybe willing myself to sleep wasn't the most effective way to go about accomplishing this task. So I thought I'd distract myself with my creative writing. I was trying to figure out where to take either one of the two short stories I started this summer, but I couldn't figure it out. And I haven't been able to for a while. Instead last night I kept coming back to a story I wrote for a friend two years ago. I wrote Red-Sequined Dress as a gift for Emily, the Christmas/Hanukkah after I moved to Dubuque. (And yes, I laid out, printed, and "bound" it with red sequins myself!) The more I thought about the story, the more I realized it isn't done (plus there are lots of errors). I like the characters, ideas, and storyline. But it all needs more depth. And Kelly is right. I need goals and a direction. So here it is. I vow (promise? set as my goal?) to adapt this short 4,00...

New beginnings. It's that time again. A time to try something new or fresh. Or renew old vows. And so I shall. First to renew old vows. Last year I made it my goal to write in my blog 3 times a week, calling Sunday to Saturday a week. And boy did I use that to my advantage a few times. I made it way longer than I thought I would. All the way til October. I think it was good for me to have a routine. So I'm gonna do it again. It's going to be harder to get back in the routine after being so bad about blogging, but now is as good a time as any, right? Ok, next. I really liked the month-by-month challenges. This month I'm going to start with the no fast food or Panera deal. Not so official, but I'm gonna keep my eye on my caffeine too. Maybe if I keep it under control before the semester I might survive the first few weeks :) And last but not least I'm going to write. During the summer I was really good about working on my short stories. Or just writing. When...