"Now I'm free, free falling."

A few people have asked me lately how to pronounce "beanditch" and what the meaning is behind it, so I thought I'd take the opportunity and blog about it, killing two birds with one stone.

Firstly, it's pronounced like bean-ditch. Not be-and-itch, as a few people thought. (I'm looking at you, Sara and Whitney.)

Secondly, I'm being REALLY lazy right now, and don't feel like typing this story up, but I love you guys so I guess I will.

Picture it. Michigan. 2003... Some friends and I were on our way home from the mall, and decided to take the back roads for a while. 1) We just really liked doing this, and 2) we once caught a glimpse of really hot guy doing push-ups in his front yard, so we kept driving by trying to see him again. As we were driving, I asked what was growing in the field to the right of us, and when they answered "soy beans," I thought "Soy beans are totally edible! I need out! I need to try one!" Nevermind pesticides. I NEEDED to try a soy bean straight from the source! I was so excited that I took off on a dead run for the field. Apparently, some very tall weeds had recently been mowed down in front of the field, so what looked like flat land was actually weeds covering up a giant ditch. The second I reached the stupid thing, I dropped straight down, and of course my friends erupted in laughter.

Now, I'm all for making a fool of myself to garner a few laughs (just ask my family about my Beyonce - Single Ladies impressions) but this was ridiculous. I could have died broken a leg!  As I collected what was left of my pride and climbed my way out of the ditch, I realized that I had two huge grass stains on my favorite pair of pants. Talk about adding insult to injury.

My friends quickly decided that this little incident needed to live on in infamy, and decided to nickname me beanditch. I now use the name for everything on the internet, because I know it's always available. I got so sick of the Stacey8549303746 usernames. Beanditch is just so much easier.


30 DAY MUSIC CHALLENGE
Click here to see the entire list.

Day 21 – A song that you listen to when you’re happy:

I listen to a lot of songs when I'm happy. A lot of songs make me happy. I was listening to my mp3 player on random last night and came across a song that I had forgotten how happy it makes me. It was one of, if not the, big song off of the album, and I became kind of sick of it, so I would always skip over it when it came on. I'm kind of glad that happened, though, because I was able to have that small euphoric moment last night.





I thought I'd throw this one in for the heck of it. Go ahead and judge me. I don't care. I loved this song as an adolescent (nostalgia = happiness), I love it now, and I truly foresee myself always loving it. You should too.

"The waiting is the hardest part."

10 THINGS I LEARNED DURING BLACK FRIDAY

This year for Black Friday, instead of just doing some major shopping/butt-kicking, my sister and I camped out on the cold concrete floor of Walmart. Seven hours for a $198 dollar laptop. Seven. Oh do I hope it was worth it. (We can't have them until Christmas, naturally.) During my stay I learned a few things, so I thought I'd share. Enjoy!

1) I could NEVER survive in jail. Seven hours with nothing to do was torturous enough, particularly on my butt and hips. Several years with nothing to do would surely make my brain explode.
                                 

2) When spending large amounts of time with little to do, make sure you bring several things to keep you sufficiently occupied. Seven hours of your mp3 player on shuffle will. not. cut it.
3) People will fart ANYWHERE. Once is excusable, accidents happen. Eight to ten times is just ridiculous. Have a little compassion on the poor souls who are stuck within inches of you.
4) Don't have dreams, they will inevitably be crushed. My sister and I decided that we should design our own line of Black Friday t-shirts with funny sayings on them. Later we saw some women with shirts that read "Team Black Friday. Shop till you drop (or get trampled)." Funny, but heartbreaking. They had stolen our idea.
5) Little sisters aren't nearly as obnoxious when you are both facing the same hardships.
6) Gummy bears come in 3 pound bags. If necessary, that bag can be used as a pillow.

I doctored this photo, but a 3 lb bag of gummy bears was truly used as a pillow during the night.

7) A Slim Jim, some Gardetto's, a 5 Hour Energy Shot to drink, and Tums for desert is not an acceptable meal.
8) People are crazy. I mean, this is something that I've known for quite a while, but I don't think that I understood the severity of the craziness until last night.
9) Sixteen year old girls giggle. A lot. Very loudly, sometimes. It's embarrassing.
10) And lastly, my mom is awesome. She drove 25 minutes is the sleet and hurricane-like winds to drop my sister and me off at Walmart. She then proceeded to do some crazy person shopping, drive back home, do two loads of laundry, put dishes away, drive back to Walmart, do some more crazy person shopping, take my sisters and me out to breakfast, come home, go to bed for a bit, and then get up and go to work for 8.5 hours.

My mom's got it goin' on!


30 DAY MUSIC CHALLENGE
Click here to see the entire list.

Day 5 - A song that reminds you of someone:

My grandma passed away in February of 2009, while spending her last few days at an amazing hospice facility. They provided a basket of CDs for my grandma to listen to, but it ended up being where my family sought solace during the extremely hard time. Throughout her last 48 hours, we listened to an Alan Jackson CD that consisted of nothing but hymns. No one in my family is particularly fond of Country music, but it was basically the only bearable Christian selection in the "Basket O' CDs". The song that happened to be playing while she passed was I'll Fly Away. For several days after her death I heard that exact version of the song EVERYWHERE, and it will forever remind me of her.




This isn't the exact version (the other was much slower) but it's the closest I could find.