Another great find on my computer

I just found a couple more thoughts from a few months ago. I liked them so much, that I decided to add them to this blog. I'm proud of myself for finally being able to just jump in and write a post without worrying about if I could have said it better. It's a certainty that someone out there is writing bits of literary genius and it's ok that is isn't me. I'm thankful that God has given me the courage to share my thoughts. It's nice to think that someone cares about what you have to say.

nobody's perfect
Neither are blogs...I can't seem to write blog posts because I want them to be perfect. It is hard for me to write anything and then hit "publish post" because I keep trying a better way to say it. I am certain that not every blog is full of profound thoughts, so why should this one be? I'm pretty sure that no one is scrolling the blog world to find the greatest wisdom of the world. What does this really mean? It means that I'm going to write and post blogs without wasting hours/days/weeks worrying about how I can say it better.

I agree, I'm not perfect
Not being perfect can be hard to accept sometimes. I tried for a very long time to make my life perfect. Surprisingly, it hasn't worked out. I continue to remind myself that mistakes are what makes life interesting.

It's Tax Time

It's that time of the year when you have to report your earnings to the government and then cry about how much money you don't get to keep. Even though, it's sad to see how much money you earned that you can't have, it's nice of the government to take it out little by little. I'd cry a lot more if I had to write a big check every year. Actually, I don't cry when I do the taxes, because I didn't have to do them. One bonus about being married is that you can file jointly and, really, it's only practical for one person to do taxes. I'm thankful that I'm not the person elected. Until the 2007 tax season rolled around, I always did my own taxes and I actually kind of liked it. The years 1996 through about 2005 were actually really enjoyable because I just wrote EXEMPT in the box and then waited for all of my sweet little pennies to come back to me.
Unfortunately when you have the fortune of a real salary, you also don't get all of your money back. I'd like to say though, that I feel lucky and grateful that I live in a country with a stable, working government that provides a lot of services for its citizens. I'm also happier that I get to hand over money to a government that I trust a lot more this year than I have in a long time.

I'm HUNGRY

Here's something I learned today. Don't read cookbooks at night after dinner, even if you're trying to plan your meals for the week. It will probably make you hungry. Then, when the 100 fast food commercials come on TV, you'll want to go to McDonalds.

Here's my thoughts on what else to learn from this, I'm thankful that food is easy to come by. We're not stuck spending our days hunting and gathering food anymore and I'm glad. I'm not sure that I'd be a good hunter and gathering sounds kind of boring.
Since today's world requires money and not skills to eat, I'm thankful that I have enough money to buy myself food whenever I want. I'm grateful that God has given me the ability and intelligence to earn enough money to live comfortably. However, if God decided that McDonalds commercials should be on less often, I'd back up that decision:)

Sometimes, I'm Pretty Funny

Do you ever read things that you wrote months ago and think, "I'm a comical genius"? I might not actually be a comical genius, but I think I can be pretty funny. Sometimes, I'm even funny and smart in the same paragraph. I'm totally amazed when I find these pieces of literary wit on my computer. So, I decided to paste some of these gems. Here are my thoughts on personal statements. Enjoy:) p.s. I'm not really counting this post towards fulfilling my NYR, it would be cheating I think since I already wrote this.

personal statements
have you ever written a personal statement? they are difficult. i always want to throw in bits of personality-like avoiding capitalization or mizpelling certan words-since you have to convey yourself to an audience in 600 words. Since I tend to air on the side of too informal or too formal, it is tough for me to figure out what to say. On top of that, I'm a perfectionist, so I will spend 3 days writing 600 words. This is also saddening b/c I already wrote this personal statement last year for the application that didn't get me in.Bottom line, I will encourage creativity in language if I ever serve on an admissions committee:)

Personal Statements and Rejection
I just finished reading my post about personal statements. I decided to write about how useless they really are. Apparently, my personal statement had no bearing on the decision whether or not to let me into dental school, since I got my rejection letter exactly one week ago today. Now-I am certain that my statement was probably the best one they read, so I guess that means that grades, DAT scores, or timing was more important. What exactly does this mean for me? I'm not sure, rejection is a hard pill to swallow, but I'm not really sure I even want to be a dentist. I more or less just want the opportunity to decide if I want to be a dentist at this point. When I received the news I was not getting an interview last year, I immediately felt resolve to reapply, quickly followed by devastation. I didn't feel that this year, just disappointment and hurt. Maybe that's ok, maybe I'm not supposed to work on teeth for a living.

I like my teeth

This is my friend Melynda checking my teeth, coincidentally, she's also my dentist. I made her cute assistant Deena take this picture. I'm thanful that Melynda is my dentist. I always liked going to the dentist, because I've always liked that really clean teeth feeling that you have after you visit the dentist. But, now it's actually fun. The only thing that I don't like is that I can't talk very much. It's really hard to have a conversation with someone with dental instruments in your mouth and saliva pooling next to your tongue.

She's a great dentist and she even gives me kid's toothbrushes, instead of adult ones. I try to always get a Little Mermaid one, but they were out of Disney Princess toothbrushes, so I had to get a Mrs. Incredible toothbrush. If you're in the KC area and you're looking for a dentist, I highly recommend her. This is her office's website http://www.drwidick.com/. You can even schedule appointments through the web-which I think is super cool.
Shout out to whoever decided to do that--Mr. Widick, I think!

Time to Post Again!

Well, here I am again, working so faithfully to fulfill my New Year's Resolution! Today, something amazing happened to me. I got an email from the editors of a journal asking me to submit the article that I presented at a conference to a journal. Now, this is a taste of what I've been waiting for in my career. I've been waiting to be an important, sought-after person for a long time and my day has finally come! Well, maybe I'm exaggerating the importance of me, but it does feel good to be recognized. I have no idea how they found about the article or why they contacted me, but I don't really care. I'm excited that someone wants to know what I know. I'm going to print out that email and frame it I think.

The best part about this story is not that they contacted me, but I realized today that being "an expert" isn't the pinnacle that I've made it out to be. I don't want to downplay my excitement about this opportunity, but I am elated that I finally recognize that success in my career is not the most important thing in life. I am really grateful to God for helping me to figure that out and also for the chance to get published:)

OK, time to revise my nyr

So, again, I've totally blown my resolution, so let's revise it a bit. I'm not going to write everyday, I'm going to write once or twice per week. However, in my defense I did try to post last week, but stupid errors foiled two of my posts. But, enough excuses...here's my real post.

I want to make a few comments about spider solitaire. WTF, I say to that game. Why is it so easy to win with one suit, but darn near impossible to win with 2 suits?

I've had an unnatural obsession with solitaire recently and I've experienced some flashforwards to my possible future and it was a sad, sad day in my life. So, I haven't played solitaire in 2 days. Congratulations to me, I'm proud of my willpower.