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Guess what? As of yesterday my age is now a palindrome, which only happens every 11 years or so. So that's pretty cool :) Also does it strike anybody as odd that the word "palindrome" is not, in fact, a palindrome? I feel like it would be cool if the names of things described the things themselves. Like an orange. It is a fruit that is orange. This is the closest anybody's gotten with palindrome:

And it just doesn't make any sense.

Anyways, Happy Sunday!

In which I provide a painstaking photographic documentation of repotting my cactus...because I'm bored and it's awesome

You know how some people have a green thumb? My mom is one of those people. She grew up on a farm and has pretty much always had some type of garden and loves to make things grow. Well unfortunately I did not inherit this particular attribute and my thumb tends to be a little more of a murky yellowish-brown color. I have a little bit of trouble keeping plants alive. Ever. So one day I said to myself, hey self, maybe you should try a cactus! They tend to be sturdy plants and if anything could withstand my horticultural ineptitude, it would be a cactus. So I bought this one and named it Lou, (as in Lou Ferrigno, as in the Hulk, because they are both green and they are both sometimes dangerous):

Ta da!

So Lou was pretty little when I bought it, but it's grown a couple inches since then, so I decided it needed a new home. I had planned on replanting it in the yard when it got a little bigger, but I decided to put it in a pot instead because I will be moving out soon and I want to take it with me. So here is what I did:

First, I bought a new pot. I found this one at Home Depot for 10 bucks and I love it. Especially since it's purple and if  you're going to put a cactus named Lou Ferrigno into a pot, it needs to be purple. (Because the Hulk has purple pants, get it? See what I did there?)  Granted it should probably be manlier, but whatever, it's awesome. 

Then I pulled the cactus out of it's old pot. Bye nasty old pot!!

For those of you concerned for my safety in regards to handling a pointy plant, worry not, I used protective equipment. 

Then i got my soil. Also found at Home Depot. Reportedly it is full of fabulous nutrients for Cacti of all kinds.

Mmmmmmm plant nutrients.

Then I popped the cactus in the pot and packed some soil around it. It was at this point that I realized that being barefoot outside was not really a good idea as I was being eaten alive by ants, so I ran inside.

Then I watered it.

Then I took pictures of it.

TA DA!!!!! The finished product. Just like pretty much everything else in my life, it's a little wonky but awesome and I love it.

And that, friends, is the true story of how my cactus came to find itself in a much more healthy-growth-accommodating living space.  Probably right about now you are wishing you had the last five minutes of your life back but personally I'm thinking that maybe I'll develop a green thumb after all :)

IS THIS REAL LIFE????

Okay you guys, this has probably been the craziest three months of my life and I'm not even exaggerating. Here's how it went down:

1. In the second week of may I graduated with my Bachelor's Degree in Nursing! I have wanted to be a nurse for as long as I can remember, and when I was in junior high (around age 13) I developed a full academic plan so I could be a nurse, and then I stuck to it and guess what? I'M A NURSE!

2. After I graduated and partied it up a little bit with friends and family I started studying for the biggest test of my whole life: the NCLEX (aka the nursing licensure exam). I took a week-long prep course and then studied for a month and ended up taking over 1,000 practice questions which pretty much drove me completely crazy. And then in June I took it and I kicked it's butt, and a few days later I had an actual bona-fide nursing license in my hands. That was probably one of the best feelings in the world knowing I had accomplished this goal that has been pretty much a lifetime in the making.

3. Once I had a license in hand it was time to get a job. After applying for about a bagillion jobs and being rejected for all of them, I went to a recruiting fair and ended up being interviewed for a Heart hospital. Let me just state here that working in a Cardiovascular ICU is pretty much my dream job so when I got the call a week later that I got a job in the Cardiovascular PCU (which is a step-down unit from the ICU so it will be the perfect starting point) I was over the moon. Especially since one of my best friends from nursing schools is orienting with me to work in the same system!! We were pretty excited on our first day :)

I feel so blessed and humbled by everything that has happened to bring me to where I am today. I am so excited for this opportunity to really learn how to be a nurse and take care of people in need. I feel like everything in my life has changed and more big changes are coming, and I can't wait!

Senioritis

So I'm going to graduate from college in 25 days!!!!! I'm not entirely sure where the last 4 years of my life went, but clearly they happened because my transcript tells me so. Some weeks when I have a paper to write or something I don't want to do I think school is taking forever, but then I look back and realize that the last few years went by so quickly and I don't feel that different from when I was a freshman just starting out. But on the other hand I feel like I'm a completely different person than I was back then. It's sort of a conundrum. But in any case, I have less than 4 weeks before there's going to be a BSN by my name and I won't have to do a homework assignment ever again unless I want to (aka unless I decide to go back to school...which is likely). Of course this doesn't really mean I'm free because I still have to spend every day from now until June studying for the NCLEX exam so I can get my license, and then I have to try to get a job, but it's nice to know that there's a light at the end of the tunnel, and one day soon I'm going to be an actual bona fide nurse, which is something I've known I was going to be since I was probably six years old. It's just crazy that it's actually happening, and thankfully so far I love it :) 

Day 6: Your views on mainstream music

Ummmmmm love it. Well sometimes. I like a lot of music regardless of it's "mainstream" status, but the fact is when a song is more mainstream you hear it on the radio more and then it gets stuck in your head forever and you learn all the words and then it's your new favorite song. Which I'm fine with, whatever.
But I also like not-mainstream stuff too, I don't even know what qualifies as mainstream, but I'm assuming it's stuff like T-swizzle and whatnot.
Anways, basically I like music. Right now my favorite things to listen to are Carrie Underwood and Death Cab for Cutie, so there you go.

Day 5: Things you want to say to an ex

Ummm I don't have an ex, so I don't really have anything to say to them, because they do not in fact exist. I suppose if I had an ex, it's likely that I wouldn't want to say anything to them at all :)
That is all.
But hey guess what?? I just finished my critical care rotation in nursing school!! Which means I just have one rotation left (aka 2 months) until I am done and I graduate!!!! :)

Day 4: Bullet your whole day

Well my days are all different but here's how my typical Tuesday goes:

• 5:00AM-Alarm goes off at which I whack it as hard as I can repeatedly until I hit the right button to turn it off.
• 5:15-Alarm goes off again, I repeat above step.
• 5:30-Alarm goes off again, I repeat above step but this time I roll out of bed and make a break for the shower as fast as I can because I'm late.
• 5:45-Eat breakfast whilst printing whatever notes or homework I need off the computer.
• 6:00-Make my awesome dad get up absurdly early to drop me off at the light rail.
• 6:20-Get on the light rail and spend 45 minutes people watching
• 7:30-Arrive at class and try to stay awake for four hours of lecture.
• 11:30-Eat lunch
• 12:00-Arrive at second class and try to stay awake for another 3 hours
• 3:00-Go home
• 4:00-Study, do homework
• 7:00 eat dinner, go do more homework
• 11:00-Collapse in exhaustion and get ready to do it again tomorrow.

And that, friends, is why I have no life, because the most exciting part of my day is the life-or-death battle I have with my alarm clock in the morning :) But at least this Tuesday I get to go to my best buddy Celery's BRIDAL SHOWER!! So that will be good. And then on Thursday and Friday I get to shake up my routine and go do 12 hour shifts at the hospital :)

Just for fun, these pins from Pinterest pretty much sum up my life:

See first 3 bullets above

I love scrubs. they are so comfy.

Sorry guys, I know I do this a lot.

hehe

:)

After I graduate I'm going to sleep for a week.

Every test EVER

But it's all good because you get to do awesome stuff like this: