the list

Hank's list of neuroses and neediness:

• He loves closets, if you don't want hair on EVERYTHING close the door.
• He knows how to worm his way in if you don't latch doors. 
• He will build a nest, well, several nests. 
• He will never run outside. It is scary.
• He will timidly poke his head outside and then run INSIDE because outside is scary.
• He will stay in his cat bed, but he will use it more if you put it on your bed. 
• He can only have a small container of wet cat food. IF you choose to purchase some, get the kind that is orange plastic (I don't know the brand) and a fish flavor. This is the only kind where he will eat the entire container. 
• He is not picky about dry food, but he prefers the cheap stuff to the organic, healthy stuff. 
• He is meticulous about cleaning and using his litterbox. He will "clean" the walls surrounding the areas as well.
• Use clumping litter in his Roll'n Clean Litter Box. <---favorite favorite--="" litterbox="">
• His cleaning tendencies spill over to the area around his food bowl. This is why he can't have too much wet food, he will clean and clean and clean and then dump it over. 
• As he "cleans" he will also drag anything he can find to cover the food clothes, papers, magazines, bags, anything. 
• He will try to clean/cover any of your food you leave out on the floor as well. 
• He doesn't eat people food.
• He will beg and prowl around your legs if you're cutting cucumbers. He LOVES cucumbers.
• He will let you know when his food or water is empty. He'll yowl at you and then lead you to his dish.
• If he throws up, he'll try to cover it up.
• He likes to be combed. He'll roll on to each side so you can get his sides with the furminator. He will preen after because he's beautiful.
• He wants to talk to you. Feel free to talk back. 
• When his eyes dilate, he's going to spaz out. This is your warning. 
• He'll let you trim his claws you just have to hold him and be the boss.
• He likes to have his picture taken. 
• Feel free to put his bumblebee hat on him. He has a love/hate relationship with the attention. 

This is the list I gave Dave before I handed Hank over to him. At least he's with family, so I'll get him back when I can. 

The first of many hard goodbyes. 

I've been told that my pictures are deceiving about how big he is, is this better to show his baby mountain lion size?


love you people.
amy

Hank & my birthday card

My mom makes her own cards. She can go a little cray-cray with the paper crafts sometimes, but it's her jam, so who am I to judge? I talked about some of her other craftiness a couple of years ago. 

I love his whiskers. I'm ridiculous. 

Owls! 

Where's my card? 

love you people. 

amy

I'm THIRTY: 30 x 30

I guess I haven't given you an update since May...and I am 30 now, so I've been asked by a couple of friends about how it went.

Welllllll, it's still going. (-: I mentioned this in the May update, but I've given myself permission to keep working on my list until my 31st birthday. I know, I know. This doesn't make it a THIRTY BY THIRTY, but it's my THIRTY BY THE END OF THIRTY.

Judge me if you want, but let's keep it real: I'm gonna do what I want.

Without further ado:

• Health and Fitness
• get acupuncture
• lose 25 pounds-5 pounds to go! 
• run a 5K
• run a 10K
• run the Indy-mini
• complete a fast 

I have been a complete slacker. I have barely been working out anything except my brain and there are days when that's not going so well...

• Financial
• invest money into a stock
• put $3000 in savings and keep it there for 6 months or longer [just noticed the typo in the original document, awesome.]
• purchase a car, make payments rounded up to the nearest 100 for 12 months-Car purchased Aug 2011, one year into a 3 year loan. (-:

Can we talk about school loans? living on them? FOR EVERYTHING? I'm scared. Hold me. 

• Academic
• apply and get accepted and attend a master's program, so I'm not going to a master's program. I AM going back to school! 
• learn more about the bible
• take a healing touch class

Yup, going back to school. Need to read the bible more. Get on looking for a healing touch class, my friend who has taken one took from a program that teaches a weekend in Indy, so I'm going to try to get in there! 

• Creative
• get paid to take pictures
• submit something to be published
• write 3 chapters for a book
• sell 10 items on Etsy

Can we keep it real? I just can't care about these things right now. True story, that's how I'm going to roll. 

• Service
• become a big sister
• get certified with children's disaster service
• purchase a heifer from Heifer, International

In knowing I was moving, it wasn't fair to a Little that I would leave her so quickly...that has been delayed for a bit until I get my life in some kind of order. Or maybe just slightly less chaos is a more attainable timeline. 

• Challenges
• flirt
• say "yes" to dates-
• go 4-months without purchasing a clothing item
• go a month without a cell phone

DONE. DONE. DONE. Boom. 

• Travel
• travel alone
• go to Canada-Will people flip if I travel to Canada alone? It's just across the border...
• go to Mexico

Why am I poor? Why?!? Why? WHYYYYY?!?!?! 

• FUN!
• grow hair out and donate it-so close! I'm hoping for a spring chop! Here's a recent picture with it straight. It's definitely not this red either! 
• wear make-up daily for a month-
• be in a community musical-BLARG. BLECH. BOO. Can we invent a place where days have 40 hours in them so I can get everything I want to do done? While we're at it will you send me a future LOML who is independently wealthy? pleaseandthankyou?
• find a cakewreck, submit it and have it show up on their website  

You know I started taking classes in August, right? And that I'm transitioning to Indianapolis? And that I forgot how to be a student? And that it's way harder now that I'm 30 and not 19 and I actually care about what I'm doing? [Is there a correlation there? age and caring and grades?]

Anyway, I mention the school thing becuase it's basically the priority in my life right now. That's why blogging will be sporadic [unless I'm avoiding work] and picture-taking will be minimal. Not that that's how I want it to be but if I could figure out how to get money from taking pictures and being crafty and drinking coffee and rambling about non-important non-life-altering things that would be totally rad. If it provided enough money for actual travel that would be even more rad.

I don't feel like that's my calling anyway, so...yeah. Just a happy fantasy to distract me from the real goal.

I'm in-progress for a lot of items and I don't want to totally give up on some of them. Hence my extended deadline to November 14, 2013. So before I turn 31, I will accomplish most of my list!

I will leave you with a picture of me from last year:

And this year:

I'M THIRTY! 

love you people.

amy

it starts with an "st" and rhymes with "fuddy"

Yeah, I'm avoiding it.

THE NERVOUS SYSTEM.

I don't want to talk about it.

I want to talk about my totally hip new highlighters. They're the Target brand from...uh, Target.

The last 2/3 of a pumpkin chai at the 'fly. It's totally...mmm, fly.

It does look kind of gross here, so you'll have to trust me...freals, TRUST ME.

Speaking of fly, these birds are in the PhotoBooth now and they follow your head around.

Hank spent some time posing for pictures this afternoon, I now present Hipster Cat:

MUDLOVE.

OK, time to get to business. 

First I shall skype with BeckyS. 

Then to business. 

And learning.

And those kinds of things. 

I guess. 

love you people.

amy