in love

married

an artist

a friend

a sister

a daughter

a daughter-in-law

shy

an introvert

dorky

silly

cool

current

i t w a s n't m e

this was my sweet ride for the weekend, in all of it's duct taped glory. the way i understand it, somebody was driving on the freeway when the hatch of a military tank flew off into the road, crashing into the body kit and causing a variety of other damage to the car.

other things to note in this picture:

a) my vespa which stranded me on my first cruise to work last thursday, thanks to a large screw planted firmly in the side of the tire (since repaired...but i'm thinking i might need to get a new tire).

b) the car is actually in the garage.

yes. jeff and i have lived in our place for almost 7 months, and we can just now fit a car into the garage. thanks to the 3-day weekend, we were quite productive with building shelves and getting hooks and moving boxes.

so the big question is...how did i do with my second attempt at driving a manual transmission car? (note: the 1st time was when jesse tried teaching me years ago, ending with a breakdown on my part in a parking lot, having stalled out several times trying not to run over people i didn't particularly like in high school, anyway.)

well. not bad. yes, i stalled out, but i really drove better more times than not, having almost perfected the e-brake on a hill trick, and managing to park in our very narrow garage several times. the security guard at our complex was very amused watching me attempt to make it into the garage the first time...and the last time. but all the times in between weren't bad.

so here i am, on the verge of turning 27, and i can at least say i finally do know how to drive a stick shift car.

cami (5:50pm, 5.31.05)

s t a y o f f t h e r o a d

i've got a company car signed out for the upcoming 3-day weekend. my boss wrote hawaii under the "destination" field on the white board. i wish.

the time has come for me to really learn how to drive a manual transmission car, and at the company's expense. my boss says that if i can make it home, i should be in good shape. he has a lot more confidence in me than i do.

jeff is back, but since he was gone last weekend, i spent several fun days occupying my time with various friends.

abbey and i went to a day spa, where i was actually told that, other than being a little oily, my skin was in really good shape. what? i was shocked, but i guess the cash i've dropped on proactiv over the last year or so has really made a difference. after being pampered, we met up with another friend at the to-die-for indian food place.

sunday was spent at disneyland with abbey, leanne, travis, and bryan. it was a long, full day, but so much fun.

on the seemingly endless drive home, bryan made the comment that i seemed so much happier since changing jobs.

it's so true. and it's not really the work that has made me so much happier, but the environment.

am i a terrible female for being so relieved to be back in an all-male department?

well...no. there was only so much i could take of being harassed about my weight and my food consumption and my non-dieting lifestyle.

and in other news, if you type in the words "naked" and "roadtrip" into google without quotation marks around them, my website comes up as number 12. ha ha. i love referral logs.

cami (5:48pm, 5.25.05)

s p r i n g i s l o v e l y

we haven't had rain in a while, which has made me very happy. i can wear skirts and t-shirts and don't have to worry about covering up with sweaters.

my poor husband called me this morning from his roadtrip to check in on me. he saw my new site and was worried something was wrong.

nothing is wrong, i told him. i just miss you, is all.

we haven't seen each other much in the last week and a half, which is out of the ordinary for us.

we played a board game at a friend's during an easter celebration, that asked something along the lines of, "you are stranded on an island for the rest of your life. would you rather spend the rest of your life alone, or have to spend the rest of it with one person who didn't leave your side for even one second." i said i would rather have jeff even if when he was bothering me the most, than never again at all.

it makes me sad to think of being stranded on an island by myself for the rest of me life.

which brings me to my next thought... everything seems so much more dramatic in print. dramatic, exciting, exotic. all that.

the san diego reader has a columnist that goes and visits random parties around town and then writes reviews about them. crasher. they all sound so big and exciting.

it makes me wonder how many people are really at these parties. it makes me wonder if one of our parties would ever be cool enough to invite the crasher man over.

and so my point is anything in print leaves a lot to the imagination.

and nothing is wrong.

cami (11:46pm, 5.21.05)

i've been staring at this picture for about half an hour now, because for some reason, it is really freaking me out. and for some reason, looking at it is making me feel like i haven't looked at myself in a long time. and for some reason, it makes me want to cry.

and not cry because i'm sad or cry because i'm happy...

just cry.

and maybe it is just the one beer i drank with dinner while i ate an artichoke and watched starsky and hutch by myself in my messy home.

in a little less than 2 weeks, i will be 27 years old. twenty. seven. i'm oh-so-young and oh-so-old and oh-so-going-through-some-sort-of-quarter-life-crisis.

but i'm tired of my old website and i'm tired of hiding behind a password protected journal. so i'll bare it all out in the open again and hope that nobody from work googles me.

first names only, please.

i don't even know where i'm going with this...but i guess you're invited to see it when it happens.

in other news, i rode in a fixed up bmw around a racetrack a few times last week. part of a work-related trip, but i won't say where it is that i work. but i can say that i'm sure a lot of people in this world would be envious of where i've landed and i just hope it lasts a while.

but back to the ride in the fixed up bmw. somebody said it only takes one taste to be addicted, so does it make me a junkie? maybe. this coming from a girl who has driven at most 15 miles in a manual transmission car. but i can't stop thinking about those few minutes i spent being whipped around in my seat and the wobbly leg feeling after getting out to walk away.

and i've been doing some arts and crafts. made a few altoid tin purses and some cool magnets and jewelry. arts and crafts. while i was polishing off the can of wasabi peas at my desk today i began imagining how i could turn it into a purse, as well.

racecars and arts and crafts.

i'm such a weirdo.

well...duh.

cami (9:33pm, 5.20.05)