"Fall back!"

In a world where college students’ umbrellas turn inside out, and the streets are flooded with water and fallen leaves….

(insert dramatic music here)

If feel like we have been here before. Cold weather, lots of rain, very little hope of seeing a smidgen of sunlight. It’s back. Fall has returned.

I was peeking out from under my umbrella this morning and couldn’t help but think of several pumpkin flavored recipes. It sounds odd, but when the colors change, suddenly I crave seasonal spices and flavors. As a college student living off campus, I have to cook for myself, and therefore my culinary world is expanding faster than you can say “Sundried tomato pesto turkey Panini’s”!

I find that fall weather is the perfect time of year to be contemplative, really sift through the memories you have made. Go through all the imaginary files in your brain and thumb through all that you have learned and absorbed like a sponge.

As I sit at this familiar window at work, I ponder what I was doing on this day last year…. Was I just as cold and wet from walking the distance from campus to work? Was I happy? Upset? What was I working on? What was I thinking at the time? How did I define myself then? Surely I cannot be the same person now.

It’s strange to think how, in a year, you can change and develop so much. College is the place for expanding your horizons in countless ways: making friend, getting involved in different activities, actually learning how to dance, falling in love, getting your heart broken, making mistakes, and learning from said mistakes, re-defining yourself, making a foundation for yourself and for the big world to see. It’s quite a road to travel, but you certainly aren’t alone!

365 days and you are still here, reading my blog, seeing a different me than I was last year. Writing and conveying words to an entirely different reader than you were last year at this time.

Woah.

That’s pretty nifty, if I dare say so myself.

If you don’t believe me, just sit back and take a few moments to ponder how far you have come in life, and be sure to give yourself a big pat on the back for hanging in there through the “life is a bitch” times and shining your best at “yes! This is totally awesome!” moments.

I am mentally giving you all a high five.

Be sure to bundle up today if you live in a rainy and cold environment like myself, if you do not, I’m totally jealous. Let’s hit the beach.

Keep smiling!

~Piper

It's a new dawn....it's a new day....

It's a new life.

And I'm feeling....good.

Actually no, not good, things have been rather hectic and crazy around here. Not favorable in the least, but hopefully things will improve and the sun will come out and the freezing ice rain will leave us alone!

So...yeah...hi there. You probably don't remember me or recognize me for that matter, since I am covered in dust and dressed in the shadows of a forlorn corner of the mind. I was kindly reminded that I had not posted a blog in a while, and I realized exactly just how long it has been!

Not a whole lot has changed since my last post, a pity to those who were seeking mind-blowing excitement and earth-shattering stories of my day to day life. Nevertheless, I will tell you that the seasonal colors are absolutely gorgeous, rain is absolutely dreadful to walk though in high heels even with an umbrella, coffee is slowly but surely wearing off on me...I think I need to take a break, and last but not least MIDTERMS are over! We can all take a wee bit of a breather now that the planets are back in order and school is less stressful.

A little tid-bit that you might enjoy is my Halloween costume! This has been in the making for the past couple weeks now and AT LAST it is finished! I am dressing up at the eternally gorgeous Audrey Hepburn in her classic role of Holly Golightly in "Breakfast at Tiffany's", it shall be super fun to do and I cannot wait until I am in full Audrey mode! Watch out world, for one night and one night only, a crazy girl in college is about to take on the great role of a fabulous actress!

I hope you all have your costumes picked out or at least have a rough idea as to what you want to be. If not, e-mail me, I have a million awesome suggestions!

Now that I have assured you that I am not dead (yet), I promise I will get back to a regular blog posting schedule here soon. Perhaps updating on just tuesdays. We shall see how it goes. Until then, thank you for hanging in there! I shall see you in the next post!

Keep smiling.

~Piper

Ahh...ahhh...aaaaaaaacccchhhhoooooo!

Grab your hankies ladies and gents,

Cold season is here.

Yes, I have caught the dreaded plague that has been going around. No matter how much hand sanitizer I manage to use or how many vitamins I take...there is always a bug that manages to dodge right past me and get me horribly ill.

Today was where the evil seed blossomed into something big and terrifying. My head turned fuzzy and dizzy, my stomach was queasy, and my nose became runny. And what did I do? I still went to school.

So put that in your oven and cook it!

Ahem, yes, I am quite proud of myself. I actually contemplated riding the bus back to my apartment several times during the course of this day, but I still managed to suck it up and pull through the entire day without tossing my cookies. I should like to call it a personal victory.

A word to the wise, keep your tissues close, spray everyone you come into contact with Lysol, and drink as much orange juice as possible. Seriously!

Watch out for the plague. Nibble on some pumpkin spice muffins, take many naps, watch chick flicks, and curl up with a good book where the prince and the princess live happily ever after.

(Achoo!)

Love you all, stay healthy!

~Piper

Ahhhhh Cashmere….

It’s that time of year again dear readers,

Where Mother Nature decides that there is no longer any reason for the weather to have a coherent pattern of temperature increases and decreases. It is scattered and all over the place.

So, armed with a vast wardrobe and a thick skin, I ready myself for the days that are above 80 and the days that are below 65. Us college students are a resilient bunch.
Aside from that, I absolutely must tell you about the crazy things that have been going on in my life!

Are you ready for this?

Last night I decided to make fried chicken, but since I was without a fryer, I wanted to improvise....

I looked up recipes for pan fried chicken breasts that had a nice crunchy skin to them. I immediately entered into my own version of “Iron Chef America”/”Chopped” where I only had select ingredients and I had to improvise with what I had. I was missing most of the bizarre spices that were mentioned, so I combined some chili power, paprika, and salt, then I tossed in the flower and bread crumbs as well as garlic salt and pepper. I was golden! I had a basic foundation that I could work off of, the rest was completely of my own invention…ahem…I mean…I totally knew what I was doing. And let me tell you, this fried chicken was FANTASTIC.

So after that strange episode, I also had a bizarre dream last night....

(Keep in mind that this is a dream.)

I had a landscape class in a forlorn building that was incredibly hard to find on campus. So I was a tad late, but the teacher didn’t seem to mind. He was a middle aged fellow with red glasses, a short dark moustache and beard combo, and a sassy attitude! He gave us all a list of places/landscapes to find, assuring us that we had never seen them before. And sure enough, he was right.

They were all drop-dead-gorgeous scenes that looked to have been out of a National Geographic magazine. The catch though, was that each and every one of those places had a difficult task assigned to it. For instance, one place was a steep hill that we had to climb up, but with very thin strings to use as rope. And then another was a long tunnel that flooded with water every five minutes, so you had to sprint. By the end of the list, we all came back exhausted and tired and dirty, and the professor just looks us over and said, “Congratulations, you survived the first day. See you Wednesday for the next list.”

BAH!

Strange dream. Very strange.

I also wanted to inform you that I am super huggable today. I am wearing my cashmere sweater and I swear to God…it is the most glorious material on the planet. Mr. Darcy would totally have attracted Elizabeth Bennet much more quickly if he had been wearing cashmere.

Just saying.

Well, I hope you all are relishing in the fall weather and are readying yourselves for scarves, crunchy autumn leaves, sassy boots, as well as warm snuggles with loved ones.
Much love to you all!

~Piper

"You have bewitched me body and soul...."

Dearest and loveliest readers,

Have you ever had one of those days where you just want to crawl into bed, make a fort out of fluffy pillows, eat an atrocious amount of ice cream and watch Pride and Prejudice over and over again?

No? Really? Weird….

We should really get together sometime and do that because it is quite the experience and is really fun!

It just so happens that I feel exactly like that today and need a movie buddy. Would you be so kind as to join me?

Excellent!

Unfortunately I will not be anywhere near my bedroom until later today, and then I may just grab something delicious to munch on and snuggle with my college-worthy stuffed animals and build a pillow fort. Why? Because I can.

Indubitably.

Yes, I vote yes.

Even Castle votes yes, because he knows when I am right and agrees with me 110 percent. Ask him yourself, granted, all he will do is wiggle and flap his fins really fast (since he is no longer a chubby little fish). That’s his form of saying “YES PLEASE!”

Ugh. I have one more class to go to today and all I want to do is…well…look at the first sentence of this blog entry. I’m sure you can figure it out.

Then it is off to the apartment and getting some homework done as well as looking over my notes for this week. And mayhaps cooking something delicious for dinner, what that might be…who knows?

Maybe something with chicken, I still have a chicken breast in the freezer….

To the internet!

Whilst I skim for some handy recipes for this evening, I bid you all a good day and I hope that you are looking forward to this long weekend just as much as I am! Renaissance Festival here I come!

So, you know what you are doing tonight right? You are coming over to watch Pride & Prejudice with me, as well as several other Jane Austen movies that involve cute and fluffy romances as well as a sophisticated lexicon sported by epic British accents!

You know you want to.

Love you bunches

~Piper

What? She's Alive?!

Yes, yes I pride myself in feeling as awesome as Wonder Woman after the first week of classes, thank you very much....

(nerd)

Well here it is folks, the beginning to a new school year. A fresh slate. Full to the brim of Northface jackets, UGG boots, fake tans, and scandalously tight clothing accompanied by high heels you shudder to walk in.

Campus is alive and well, teaming with students from all over sporting as many fashions as there are blades of grass. I am proud to admit that I am not including myself in the popular phenomenon of “what is totally hip right now”. I’m that common, everyday person you don’t think twice about. Yet I think about you. Yeah…that sounded creepy.

But just as I state in this blog’s description, I notice the tiny details and see what other’s don’t usually see, thus the flashes of inspiration. And this year, ladies and gents, will be full of flashes of inspiration, I can feel it!

Updates on this year overall, the living situation this year goes splendidly. I enjoy living with my lady friends and cooking and baking while listening to old pop music such as Britney Spears, Backstreet Boys and NSYNC.

Last night I went to the grocery store with two of my roommates and bought some gorgeously ripe strawberries that gleamed like rubies.

I couldn’t resist.

I sliced those jewels up, put them into a bowl, sprinkled some sugar, and dove right in to pure bliss. I then cooked up a batch of macaroni and cheese and completely stuffed my face. As is the way it should be! I have also fallen madly in love with hummus. Is that odd? To fall madly in love with ground up chic peas seems a tad odd….but I was introduced to a certain brand of hummus recently and it was DIVINE. So I had to pick some up along with whole wheat pita bread and baby carrot sticks for dunking. So good my friends, so good….

Ahem.

As a side-note, I am proud to announce that Castle is doing better. His belly is a little less noticeable and seems to have gone down in terms of size. Hopefully it will continue to progress so that he returns to his normal self. So let us all cross our fingers, click our heels three times, spin around, make a wish, and hope that Castle is on the road to recovery and that his new diet will serve him well.

Other than that, he is a happy and wiggly fish that never ceases to make me smile when I enter my room. The moment he sees me, he becomes the epitome of excitement. Who knew that beta fish could have such wonderful personalities and be so awesome at cheering you up?

Enough of fish tales (get it? hehe) for now, let us continue this journey which I have been putting off for far too long….

My short story blog.

Yes, yes, I know I haven’t updated in a while….it is quite sad. Well, I intend to post a new story up there tonight, so keep an eye out for that here: http://short--flashes.blogspot.com/

As for right now, that is all I have to say really. I hope you are all doing splendidly and smiling often!

Love you bunches,

~Piper

The Belly of a Fish

...rather, the belly of my beta fish.

Rick Castle is my dorm fish, as you know from previous journal entries. And this morning I discovered he has grown a bit of a belly. Nothing too outrageous, but just a tad noticeable. He lives by himself, and is a HE no less, therefore he is not pregnant unless the store managers forgot to tell me something....

I have to preface this by saying that he is by far the cutest thing since sliced bread, especially when I get up in the morning and his fins flap extra quickly and he is wiggling all over the tank. So....with such a wonderful greeting to the day, I feel compelled to reward him for such behavior. I feed him just a tiny pinch of food. No biggie.

Well over the course of the summer, his tank was stationed in the kitchen. And because my family is going through some serious pet withdrawl, Castle was as close as they came to having a pet. So both my mother and my sister would feed him, and then I would feed him, unknowing of their already having fed him.

He has become a little piggy. Guess who is going on a diet pronto!

You can definitely hold me to this, because I am only feeding him ONCE a day from now on.

Castle, prepare yourself. You are about to trim down and become a slim swimming machine rather than a pudgy little fish.

For those of you who have fish, do not be sucked in by their cute little wiggling and extra speedy fin flapping and big shiny eyes! Take control and say no to the cuteness and deny them that extra pinch of food.

Hope you all are happy, healthy, wealthy, and wise!

I'll update on more college-ness in a future post. In the meantime, smile!

~Piper

A New Beginning

A fresh slate.

No one could ask for a better thing.

To begin on a completely new foot that is both curious, cautious, as well as rearin' to go. You don't know what lies ahead, but you sure as heck are ready to take a peak and see!

As I look out of my new window watching the sunset, I see that the fountain is still running and each and every drop is illuminated like a tiny facet. Each and every bedroom light in the surrounding apartments are on, showing that their inhabitants are also settling in to their new and temporary nest.

It's a nest away from home and I already feel strange and just a tad lonely despite my being surrounded by lovely roommates. I am ready. But there is always that hesitancy of having to spread your wings and count on a good wind to take you away from the nest, and keep you in the air rather than plummeting to the forest floor.

We all have to learn how to fly at some point in our lives, and sometimes, we need more than a nudge. We literally have to be pushed from the nest and rely on pure instinct. This method is not always encouraged, but the end result is definitely worth it!

To all you new "flyers", be glad that you left the nest even if it's for a short time. You were kicked out of it for a reason and you might as well not make that reason half-assed. Put all your energy into it and make sure you succeed.

I believe in you.

In fact, I am the one encouraging you to keep flying.

Fly until those little wings cannot keep up with you anymore, then take a rest, and then give it all you got again and again.

I'm with you all the way!

~Piper

All Aboard!

Ladies and Gentlemen,

The time has come for newly sharpened pencils (do people use those kinds of pencils anymore?) fresh notebooks, blank planners, and lots and lots of excitement to see all the people you have missed over the duration of the summer.

With the determination and strength of a lion, I am ready to leave the nest once again in order to gain a better education and prepare myself for the world. Needless to say, this will be a fun year filled with cooking, friends, outings, photo-shoots, dancing, and lots and lots of homework and study time.

Move-in day is the 19th so we are running around gathering things that I shall need for my room in the apartment. That also involves me rooting through my room trying to decide what nick nacks and clothes to bring....ALL of them of course! Am I right ladies?

So without much further ado, I am off to stuff my belongings into black trash bags that will make traveling much easier and more space efficient.

In the meantime, I hope you all are enjoying your last taste of freedom and are enjoying every last ray of sunshine this summer has to offer before school/work/life starts.

Keep smiling!

~Piper

Cha-Ching!

There is nothing quite like a day where you and your girlfriends go shopping.

Shopping, what a word. What a beautiful, glorious, amazing word.

Nothing in the world that can compare to that intense estrogen connection; which sparks urges to drool at shoes and purses and super cute fashion trends.

They will always be honest with you. Telling you that you “deserve” those new boots, or that you look “amazing” in that dress, or that that necklace is “definitely” your style.
Plus, school is on the horizon, so the need to buy some new articles of clothing was definitely a must.

I am very proud of the loot that I found yesterday, and now have sitting in my room, patiently waiting for me to sport them and look fantastic while doing so.

Those shopping sprees relieve huge amounts of stress and make you feel unstoppable. You feel as though the entire store is one big adventure, and in it are goodies just waiting to be discovered. Like your own personal treasure hunt. And at the end of the hunt, you feel as though you have conquered the world with that receipt showing just how much you actually saved.

Well played.

The best part of shopping is being able to touch everything, sift through every hanger and instantly decide whether or not it is something that would suit your taste. The process is instantaneous. You have to quickly make a choice between “OMG YES!”, “Absolutely not!”, or “…..maybe….let me try it on first….”.

It’s such a guilty pleasure.

Truly it is.

And us girls love every minute of it.

Though, it is interesting to think of all the different guilty pleasures we have. Some of us like to get manicures and pedicures. Some of us like to get our hair styled. Some of us like to have facials. Some of us just like to sit in bookstores for hours on end.

To me, shopping is like chocolate. It’s bad for you to indulge in all the time, but every once in a while, you just got to have it.

So yesterday could technically be considered my chocolate fix.

Yumm.

I hope you take some time and invest in your guilty pleasure. Believe me, it's worth it!

~Piper