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    Wednesday, February 25, 2009
    Lent
    I've decided to participate in Lent this year. I haven't for a few years and felt like I had missed out so this year I'm jumping on board. I wasn't sure what to give up though - lots of things are going around, like giving up something computer/internet related, which in all honesty would make me crazy - facebook is the number one way of keeping in touch with people for me! I didn't want to do something like give up chocolate because in the past when I've done that then as soon as lent's over I go into a diabetic coma from gorging myself on sweets (okay I've never been in a coma but you know what I mean). So this year I'm doing 2 things, the first is giving up eating anything after 8 pm which is partly a health thing but also i find that is the time when I feel the most out of control with eating. The second is that I'm trying to stop swearing. Anyone who doesn't hear me speak every day might be surprised that this is somethign i have to give up, however unfortunately I swear like a sailor now...lol I hear it all day every day at work and it's embedded itself not only into my language but into my thinking. So I am really going to try and cut this out, although just today I've swore out loud 6 times so I'm not doing great. But I imagine it will take time :)
    posted by jamie @ 4:09 PM   5 comments
    Saturday, February 14, 2009
    25 Things
    So there's this thing going around facebook..where everyone writes 25 random facts about themselves and then posts it for their friends to see and do the same. I did it and thought I would stick it on my blog partly as a keepsake for myself to look back. So here are my random 25 things. They are very long but I actually put a lot of work and thought into them.

    1. I am an eventual-conformist, as opposed to a non-conformist or conformist. I hold out long enough that it’s ‘old news’ for the conformists, and it’s ‘giving in’ to the non-conformists. Hence, why I am doing the 25 things thing now.

    2. I love my family and talk to them all regularly. I realized my parents were cool when I was about 19 and my relationship with them has only grown since then. My brother and I talk over the net weekly if not daily, and I think he’s probably one of the coolest people in the world. He’s got mad skillzzz that I’m jealous of :). I am also extremely proud of him.

    3. Music is a tremendous part of my life. I always have a song in my head, always always always. I’ve played the piano since I was 10, guitar since I was 16 and have been singing since I was a wee little one. I’ve been able to record a few times, once professionally which I still hold as one of my favorite moments in life.

    4. My brother and I made my parents a CD for Christmas, it has 11 songs on and we made the music and did the vocals for all of them. We started it last April and worked on it all year, it was a HUGE project and turned out amazing. I was so used to keeping it a secret from my parents that I haven’t mentioned it to anyone, until now. I can’t believe I haven’t talked about it more! It’s awesome!

    5. Music inflicts extremely strong emotion in me. There have been many times where I’ll be walking somewhere listening to my ipod (or before that, my diskman…before that, my walkman) and a song will come on that brings me to tears and I have to just stop and soak it in. It’s not always the words that get me but there are moments musically where it just moves me in a way I can’t even describe. I’ve also spent many nights where I’m trying to fall asleep listening to music but I end up laying there for hours skipping to all my favorite songs. There is nothing like being completely relaxed, in pitch black and having one of these songs playing loudly in my ears. On the hand though, there are parts of songs that come on the radio or at work that I actually hate. Like, when they play I feel angry and almost sick. It’s crazy and Craig makes fun of me about this.

    6. I’ve been in 2 car accidents, the first when I was 17 and the second when I was 20. The first one was serious, causing the death of 2 people, the second only a fender bender. However, it was the second that put me in a deep fear of getting behind a wheel again. I didn’t drive for nearly 2 years afterward and though people knew I wasn’t driving, for the most part I kept it a secret of how intensely afraid I was of dying in a car accident. Driving to me now is normal again, but when it’s snowing out I can panic easily.

    7. When Craig is not home for dinner, I eat the same thing almost every night. I mix together black beans and corn, along with some taco seasoning and cheese and fry it in a tortilla. I have been doing this for years and I can’t believe I’m admitting that I still do it to all my old roommates that are probably like….you STILL do that????

    8. I’ve only ever had 2 boyfriends before I met Craig. One was for a month my sophomore year of high school, and the other was when I was 19-20ish. I knew I wanted to marry Craig the first day we ever hung out. I immediately imagined a life with him and knew I wanted that. We got engaged 9 months after that day, married one year after getting engaged, and have been married now for a little over 2.5 years and I so look forward to the rest of my life with him.

    9. I’ve moved around a lot. I was born in Davenport, Iowa, lived there till I was 5. Then I moved to Waunakee, Wisconsin and lived there till I was 11. Half way through 7th grade we moved to Tomahawk, Wisconsin where I lived till I was 17. The summer after graduating high school, my family moved to Granville Ohio and I went to Vancouver, BC, for a 5 month long program. I came back for the summer and lived with them, then moved to Vancouver till I was 24. Now I live in St. Catharines, Ontario, and I’m 25. That’s a lot of places.

    10. Because of my moving around a lot, I’ve been able to experience a lot of different places, houses and sub-cultures which is neat. However it has left me with a feeling that I don’t have a home base like others. For the most part, where my parents live is my home base now because they are there. But all the places I went to school are places where I will probably never return to except for a visit here and there, and sometimes I feel jealous of people who were born and lived in the same place their whole life. I have no idea what that would feel like.

    11. I made the choice to become a Christian when I was 14 and it has had a lasting effect on me ever since. Though there were obvious rough patches in my teen years and even adulthood, that one decision has always remained strong in my mind and I feel without a doubt that God is real. There is a clear distinction for me between my old way of thinking and feeling, verses after I made that decision, and even though I don’t always “feel” it, I know I am not alone. I am not one for religion and rules, but definitely believe you can have a personal relationship with the Creator.

    12. I wish I made friends more easily. I tend to react to first impressions and write off people whom I could probably become really good friends with. But when I become close with someone, it’s for life. I may not see them any more (from moving away) but still refer to them as one of my best friends and think about them regularly. I also need a group of friends around to hang out with, but without that one or two close close friends I feel lost and if we’re in a fight, I am miserable. I remember in high school when I was in a fight with one of my 2 best friends, life was absolute hell.

    13. I started a blog in 2005 and posted pretty much weekly until about 6 months ago. The blog is precious to me, it is full of pictures and moments from the past 3 years, and I wish I could keep up with it like I used to. I don’t know why I don’t anymore, I still think of things I want to post but just don’t get around to doing so. It’s www.chaosandorderblog.blog
    spot.com if you wanna check it out.

    14. I was never a huge gamer, but I always loved Nintendo, since that was what we grew up with. My brother and I even talked recently about how we loved some video games, but weren’t “gamers” because we didn’t play weird things like World of Warcraft. We really said this exact phrase (remember that conversation Jason?). But alas, I spoke too soon. Some friends at work talked me into to trying the demo of WoW and I was hooked instantly. I have been playing for about 3 months now and it is one of my favorite and most relaxing and exciting past times. I have a level 53 character, who is a Priest that can heal others. It’s an extremely social game and is SUCH a blast; I even got my brother into it a bit. He is a Cow that fights with a big ax lol……. All I can say is, don’t knock it till you try it.

    15. I love techy gadgets, which I get from my dad. I am always wanting something that will make the technology I have better, faster, or more convenient. I am fairly computer savvy and try to keep up with the newest things out there.

    16. My brother already used this one but I want to say it too cause it’s funny. My mom is so hilarious and gets obsessed with tv shows, movies and actors. She’s always had a favorite thing of that year, sometimes they stretch over a period of years or last a short while. The biggest in my memory was Lord of the Rings. She has several life-size cutouts of LOTR characters in the basement, multiple posters, action figures, and many different copies of the books and movies. It was a HUGE thing in our house for many years. Now, it is smallville. My mom loves smallville and everything superman, which is now the icon you see throughout their house. You can always tell what she’s into by the calendar for that year. The past couple have been smallville, before that, harry potter, LOTR and before that, maybe star trek. I can’t remember. I also grew up riding in our family van with the license plate, “WARP 11”.

    17. I have inherited my mom’s obsessive personality and pretty much do the exact same thing. Some of my obsessions, dating back to the 8th grade include: Whoopi Goldberg/Sister Act, Bette Midler (and all her movies but mostly Beaches), Mariska Hargitay/Law and Order:SVU, Harry Potter, ER, etc. Mariska has probably been my favorite of them all, I even have an autographed photo of her, that’s addressed to me and I still read fan sites about her. I have also caught a few of them by-proxy from my mom, such as LOTR and even Harry Potter, which I completely lost myself in for a few years and cried when the 7th book ended because I couldn’t imagine my life without new Harry Potter books coming out.

    18. I am long winded when I write.

    19. I volunteer at a program called Celebrate Recovery at my church every Friday night. It is an addictions recovery program based on the 12 steps of AA, but with the Higher Power being God, and basing the steps on biblical principles. It is really a neat program where lots of people have been able to recover from various things and then go on to help others.

    20. Having kids intrigues me but also frightens me. I can’t believe I could be responsible for another human being in such a real way. I look forward to that day, but in a “im glad it’s not yet” kind of way. Sometimes when I hold babies or see cute baby clothes at work, I want one. But that fades quickly.

    21. I’ve always been a borderline pyromaniac. Fire and melting intrigues me to no end. If a candle is near, I must play with the wax. If I’m at a campfire, I must be poking it with sticks and catching them on fire. This semi-obsession lead me to make one of the stupidest decisions of my life that my parents still bring up. When I was like 9 or something, we were camping with another family and the kids were sitting around a fire. My parents had bought this brand new big tent thing to go around the picnic tables and keep the food in, which was made out of this netting to keep bugs out. The coolest thing about it though was that when I took my stick that I had started on fire and poked it through its walls, the netting would instantly melt away into these big holes that kept getting bigger and bigger. It looked really neat and I was amazed at the effect the fire had on it. Needless to say my parents did not share my interest in my scientific discovery and I was made to stay back at the campsite while they took all the kids swimming. It was traumatic and I didn’t understand why.

    22. I dabble in artistic things without ever really committing to them. For example, photo editing, video editing, photography, scrapbooking, drawing, painting, etc. The only one I ever stuck to and practiced for the sake of improving was music.

    23. I want to help people in my career someday, but I don’t know who or how or what. I have changed my mind millions of times so now I sort of just take the attitude that whatever happens, happens.

    24. I feel awkward and tired of talking about myself so I am gonna stop at 24. I'm also going to tag as many or as little people as I want to. Take THAT, non-conformists!

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    posted by jamie @ 9:40 PM   0 comments

    About Me

    Name: jamie
    Home: St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada
    About Me: I am an American living in Ontario. I've just recently started going to school again for a BA in Human Services. I like mexican and indian food and watching tv way more than the average individual. I absolutely love talking to my parents on the phone and my brother is one of my best friends. I'm married to a great guy whose pretty much the exact opposite of me but he loves me and makes laugh and we have a lot of fun. I didn't always feel this way, but these days I'm feelin' pretty good. That's my life, welcome to chaos and order.
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