Thankful Day Thirty!

There are so may additional things to be thankful for that I didn't dedicate a day for here on my blog. I am thankful for all the good things in my life, but I am also thankful for the challenges that I have overcome or am currently facing. These challenges will help me become a stronger more independent person, and I appreciate that. It's hard to think of challenges and mistakes as opportunities to grow, but that is what I am doing today!

Thankful Day Twenty Nine

Am thankful that I got tickets to the civil war today! I'm not a sports fan, but I do enjoy watching games once in a while, and the Super Bowl and the Civil War are the two games I really enjoy watching every year. Go Beavers! 

Thankful Day Twenty Eight

Happy Thanksgiving! I thought I would save my most thankful post for thanksgiving. This year I am most thankful for Eric (I bet he thought I was going to forget about him all together). This year we celebrated 2+ years together, and I have become exceptionally thankful that I have him in my life.

Thankful Day Twenty Seven

Doctor Who! I just saw the 50th anniversary episode! Words can't describe how happy I am right now.

Thankful Day Twenty Six

Today I am thankful that I am a determined and resilient person. I feel like I am working so hard at life and at school but I keep getting feedback that indicates otherwise. This degree is taking so long, and I'm feeling very adrift and alone with the process. All I can do is keep bouncing back and continue plodding on, and eventually I'll get to the end. 

Thankful Day Twenty Five

Scientific calculator apps! Remember when you had to pay over $100 to get a scientific calculator!? *cough* me either.. I'm just saying. Well I've been making due with the calculator on my phone, which as been handy, but wasn't able to do some of the complex calculations that I needed recently. So I searched for scientific calculators and it turns out that there are a bunch of apps that I can download to my phone, to my chrome browser and to my desk top FOR FREE! *giddy*

Thankful Day Twenty Four

Today I am thankful for awesome new blogs. I recently found a new blog I really like
http://www.freckled-fox.com/

I have enjoyed going through her poses, especially her hair tutorials. I discovered her blog as I was trying to find some sort of inspiration to upgrade my look from "grad student" to some kind of "professional." I am really enjoying experimenting with some of the styles I have found on here.

I am a little obsessed with style blogs. It's not really obvious from my style most of the time, but I really enjoy skimming them when I need a break. I've been a fan of the idea of blogging from the fist time I heard about it years ago. I'm glad that it's become a "thing" that people do!

Thankful Day Twenty Three

My father, since I have already thanked everyone else in my immediate family, and I don't want him feeling left out. What girl doesn't idolize her father!? When I was very young I use to want to be just like my dad when I grew up (beard and all). Now I just appreciate him so much for being the man in my life when I was growing up and to helping me grow into the woman I am.

Here is a dad and daughter adventure we had together while building antenna frames in a creak during my work with the Coos Watershed. 

Thankful Day Twenty Two

My sister. Because what is better than having a sister like Katelynn? I can't really think of anything. It's like having a ready made best friend that you have known since her birth. I adore that woman.

Thankful Day Twenty One

My dog, Anna, I miss her.

Last year I was homeless a lot in Corvallis and Newport and she would come live in my truck with me and we had adventures together, but this year she is just hanging with my sister and her new doggy pal Cosmo.

Thankful Day Twenty

Today I am thankful for red wine. I am drinking some now as I was thinking about what I was thankful for today.. and I was inspired.

I am also thankful for white wine, cider, and many types of beer. 

Thankful Day Ninteen

Today I am thankful for E-bay. I get these obsessions to have nice clothes, but I can't afford them new. Fortunately, there are plenty of randoms strangers willing to sell me the stuff I want at a discount. I guess what I am really thankful for is randoms strangers, especially the random stranger that just sold me a pair of awesome knee-high boots.

Thankful Day Eighteen

Today I am thankful for my new dog-walking side business!! $20 an hour! :-) Just in time for Christmas.

Thankful Day Seventeen

Today I am thankful for Sundays. On the Sundays when I work I can park in the parking lot on campus and don't have to walk the 1.5 miles to my office. I am thankful for that today since the weather is not so great.

Thankful Day Sixteen

Today I am thankful for Duolingo - its a free app on my Google chrome browser, and its designed to help people learn languages. Its fun to play around on when I don't have anything else to do. One of these days I will learn a second language. Until I get there, I'm learning some Spanish and french words with the program.

Thankful Day Fifteen

I am thankful for free podcasts! I think it is so amazing how much free information you can easily acquire in the internet these days. Big props for my three most favorite! Give them a google if you want to learn tons of fascinating stuff.

Thankful Day Fourteen

Today I am thankful for Dixon - The free gym I have access to on campus. I'm working on getting fit! And it helps me stay sane.

Thankful Day Thirteen

I am thankful for the amount of healthy and vegetarian friendly food that they have available on campus.

Thankful Day Twelve

Today I am thankful for nature's bounty! Specifically, Chanterelle mushrooms, which we found in spades today while taking an impromptu drive through the woods to Elk Lake.

Thankful Day Eleven

I am thankful for yoga, for relaxing, and for learning how to calm my mind down (if only just for a second). Over this last year, yoga has been a force for good in my life, helping me get healthy, relax, and make it through school. 

Thankful Day Ten

Today (and pretty much every day) I am thankful for coffee! It makes going into the office on a Sunday much better than it would normally be. 

Thankful Day Nine

I'm thankful for running. I've spent a lot of time this past year running, I'm done a race almost every month for a whole year (it will be once a month if I make it to February), and I am off running a 10k race through wine country today (free wine at the end). That is a lot to be thankful for.

Thankful Day Eight

It might be stupid, but I just realized I'm very thankful for colored markers. They make editing my thesis seem more like a craft project than it really is. 

Thankful Day Seven

I am thankful for good books. I have a huge stack of them that I am working my way through. I appreciate all the great books I've got lost in. I look forward to many more.

Thankful Day Six

Toady I am thankful for coho salmon. With out coho I wouldn't have a career or a graduate school project. Thanks Coho!
I'm all like:

Not really...... but kinda yeah...

Thankful Day Five

Today is my brother's birthday,  and I am thankful for him.  I'm thankful I had a younger brother growing up,  and that he has turn into an awesome dude.  Today he is in the Army serving in Afghanistan.  I'm proud of him, and even though we don't get to talk a lot,  I miss him.  THANKS BEN!

Thankful Day Four

I am thankful for thick socks and waterproof shoes.

Thankful Day Three

Today I'm thankful for my best friend TJ. For listening to my crazy,  and making me feel like I'm awesome. 

Thankful Day Two

I'm thankful for my education,  for the opportunity to go to college, for graduate school. I'm thankful for the people I've met and everything I've learned along the way.

Thankful

Today I am thankful for my mom,  for bringing me into this world and raising me to be an independent, free thinking women. She was my first teacher,  and I could never repay that.

Truck Norris - A Love Story

Like all epic love stories it started with a name. 

What's in a name? that which we call a rose

By any other name would smell as sweet

So Truck Norris would, were he not Truck Norris call'd

The moment I set eyes on him I knew he was the one for me. He was beautiful and tough, he was everything I ever wanted in a truck.

For three years we were inseparable! He took me wherever I wanted to go! He hauled everything I needed hauling.

He took me camping! 

He met my friends and family! 

We raised house plants together. 

We even lived together for three moths when I was a nomad. 

But then, like all epic love stories, fate conspired to separate us. Our epic love was shattered by another's villainous wrongful left turn.

NO! 

NO! 

NONO!

I was alone in the world again. 

...

The bittersweet ending to this love story was Truck Norris's was reincarnation into his doppelganger Randolph. Pieces of Truck Norris will live on in Randolph,who will fulfill the epic adventures in fish field work started by Truck Norris and myself.    



Then our hansom hero rode off into the sunset. The fair maiden waving goodbye, knowing that a piece of her heart went with him. A piece that would never be filled by another.

A glooming peace this morning with it brings

The sun, for sorrow, will not show his head

Go hence, to have more talk of these sad things

Bend Ale Trail - The First Four Stops

Bend Oregon has a lot of breweries and the town has created a tourist road map or "Ale Trail" for anyone interested in exploring them. Eric and I have started the 10 stop beer adventure, but we have only completed four stops. Or rather, I should say I have only completed four of the stops. Eric has completed them all before, so this is his second go-round.

1. Our first stop was the "extra credit" stop in at Three Creeks Brewing in Sisters (a town about 25 minutes away from Bend). We also had lunch here, I got some pretty good fish tacos, and I can't remember what Eric had... but I remember it seemed tasty. [Edit - I am informed that it was chowder]

2. Our second stop was at Silver Moon Brewing for a quick pint.

3. The Deschutes Brewery Pub is a place I have spent a lot of time before, but it is always a good place to visit, and it was where we got drink number three!

  

4.Our fourth stop was the next day after we completed a 10 k race! A pint and some setting in the sun felt AMAZING at Good Life Brewing.


Stay tuned when the adventure continues!