G+P=FUN

During this time of the year the thought in all high school students minds is ‘How can I possibly get to all of my friends graduation parties!?’. Well, unfortunately, If you are anything like me, then there is no possible way to squeeze them all in. However there is a process that is guaranteed to make you more successful than you otherwise would be.

The first choice you must make before planning out your daily route is picking a grad party buddy! You can have one or three or five but make sure your group isn’t too big because you want to make sure you have chances to talk to everyone at every party and aren’t confined to a group. Also decide who the designated driver will be for you weekend(s) so you don’t have to worry about transportation when your trying to get from party to party.

Once you have found your party buddies it is time to start getting prepared for your all you can eat journey. Collect the date and time for all of your friends parties. Weather it’s by facebook or by mail the most important thing is to make sure you have an invite for all the parties you are planning on attending.

After you have gathered all of the dates and times for parties it is time to start organizing. On an Excel document or in a table on word make columns for Name, Time, Date, and Address. Depending on how many days you are attending grad parties is how many separate tables you will need. Have one for each day and order the parties by time within each table.

Now that you have established all of the dates and times and days you have to find out how to get to each house. Although GPS’s are good it always takes time to plug in the address. Depending on how many parties you are attending this time might be very important to your schedule. I would suggest either map questing or making sure ahead of time you know where all of the streets of the parties are.

Now that you have your days all planned out you are ready to go! Just make sure that your getting to all of your good friends parties and if time goes past too quickly don’t be afraid to make necessary cuts. Remember people wont die just because you couldn’t make it to their party.
(407 words)

DEBORAH

My mother’s hairstyles can be classified into five main groups. There’s the Short hair, the Long hair, the Brunette style, the Blond look, and her SURPRISE category. Every month she gets a new style and she never ceases to surprise me.

My mothers dream hairstyle is long hair. Of course her idea of long hair is just around shoulder length so its not technically long! She loves the look of long hair but she insists that it doesn’t look good on her so she very rarely goes for this look. However she has tried this look a few times over the years but usually would cut it short right after she reached the length she wanted. I will never understand!

My mother’s next style is short. She almost always has short hair, but no worries she mixes it up. Most of the time her hair is about 2 inches long but sometimes she gets crazy and does 2 ½ inches! WOW your really mixing it up mom!

Whenever my mom gets a new hair cut people always comment on the color. Some times it blond, sometimes its brown, sometimes it has a tint of red, but mostly its brown. Lately my mothers go to color is brown. Don’t get me wrong, she always finds a way to spice the color up, but really? Brown? What a poopy color!

Back in the olden days when blonds really did have more fun, my mother always had bleach blond hair! Lately there has been less and less blond but she still trys to throw it in every once in a while. And of course she always finds ways to have fun!

The fifth category my mothers hair falls into is the surprise me category! Believe it or not but sometimes Deborah gets a little funky. Not only will she combine two of the categories, but sometimes she combines all four! Like one time she had her hair longish in the front and it got shorter in the back, it was brown with blond highlights! Getting fancy! Lately though her favorite hairstyle seems to combine three of the groups. Usually her hair is short, brown, with blond streaks. Currently all of her hair is brown except for her bangs, which are a beachy blond. Now that’s hip!

 Not only will Deborah combine the categories, but she also enjoys mixing up the texture of her hair. Sometimes it will lay flat but others she will have it all spiked up. Also sometimes in the back instead of laying it down ward she will sweep the hair to the side!

As forest Gump would say, Deborah’s hair is like a box of chocolate, you never know what your gonna get. 

(454 words)

The NERVE!

For the past year my sister has been planning her wedding. Although there have been many mishaps and accidents leading up to her big day the one that sticks out by far as the biggest pain in our asses are the bridesmaids my sister picked for her wedding party. These bridesmaids have been doing the compleate opposite of what is to be expected of them and I only hope I can learn from my sisters biggest mistake.

Operation Bridesmaid Dresses

A good Bridesmaid must wear whatever it is the bride picks out for her for the wedding. This means that there will be no wining and nagging to the bride or other bridesmaids about how much they dislike the dress. It is the brides big day, not yours! However, apparently my sister’s bridesmaids did not know of this rule, because they have been giving us every reason of why they don’t like the bridesmaids dresses my sister has picked out. There is no respect for the bride’s choices at all. When my sister said she wanted short dresses for her bridesmaids, the three girls instantly felt the need to tell her how much they hate their legs and how they refuse to wear a short dress in the wedding. Then after my sister was polite enough to pick out a completely different floor length dress for them to wear they decided they didn’t like that dress either because it showed their guts too much! This is how we landed on dress number 3. With the fabric stretching to the floor and rouching around the middle to hide oversized stomachs they are still complaining. This is NOT how a bridesmaid should act.

Operation Do What Your Told

A good Bridesmaid should do whatever they can to keep the brides life stress free up to the wedding. They should offer to help set up for showers, run out to pick up a forgotten item, and be kind and gentle when trying to say the hair style picked for the wedding makes the bride look like a moose. However, similarly to the bridesmaid dress fiasco the case of these three bridesmaids is completely different then what you would expect. The first thing one bridesmaid did after having her dress bought and altered, was threaten to quit the bridal party. She was upset because her little sister (whom my sister had met maybe 5 times over the years) was not being invited to the wedding. She then decided to call my sister and yell at her for not having proper “wedding etiquette”. I’m sorry, but seriously??? The next thing one of the other brides maids did was tell my sister she HAD to wear her hair half up and half down because she looked funny with her hair all done up. My sister has worn her hair up for every dance all through high school and every formal event prior. So you’re choosing now to tell her that her favorite kind of hairstyle makes her head look funny? These girls are just ridiculous.

(509 words)

The NERVE! part 2

Operation Bachelorette Party

The last thing a Bridesmaid must do is plan a Bachelorette party fit to the brides taste. They must ask her what she wants and make sure to carry out their plans in a semi secretive way as to not give away all the party surprises. If the party isn’t going to be fun for the Bride, then what’s the point? When meeting with my sister about the party they were told that she wanted a formal sophisticated bachelorette party. She wanted all of her cousins there and she wanted things for her younger sister (me) and the adults attending the party, to do before going bar hopping that night. Upon hearing this, the girls agreed, but after heading into party planning things got ugly. Because I am the maid of honor my sister gave me the party-planning crown. I decided to host a cocktail party at my house prior to dinner at Zins. Although they agreed to this they seem to think that the bar hopping that night will be used for getting completely smashed and raunchy! They also insist on disagreeing with all of the cocktail party choices my sister and me decided on and long story short, they are doing the complete opposite of what they should. What a shocker!

These bridesmaids have gone crazy and are doing nothing of what would be expected of them. My sister and I often wish we could go back and choose three different people to be her lovely bridesmaids. People who did all they could to help and who were always kind and polite to everyone. However this is not possible and the very people who are supposed to be her best friends are forcing my sister to tears. This is defiantly not how bridesmaids should act, and if I had it my way I would change the date and time of the wedding and get three new bridesmaids to fill their spots.

(326 words)

v.s. Surgery #2

At the end of my last appointment with Dr. Kalberg I was told to come in once I got my braces off to get my second surgery. I accepted that and went on my way. Then after I got may braces off we called to make an appointment and Dr. Kalberg had retired!!! My mother got so angry she went in and complained and he said he would come back to do my second surgery. They didn’t know for sure if I would need the surgery or not so they told me to come in so they could take a look. Turns out I did need it and they informed right then and there that I was getting my surgery right then! I was so scared I had no time to prepare myself!
After seeing them bring in a tray with three very big needles on it I think I went into panic. I started breathing very deeply and I was so nervous but I didn’t want to let it show because then I know it would have been so much worse. I was very sad I didn’t have my I-pod with me this time but nonetheless they had to do the surgery. The second they started bringing the needles to my mouth I griped my arms and stomach and literally began to shake. I am terrified of needles and not having the time to prepare myself made it that much harder to bear. Yet again after three shots I was ready to go.
Very similarly to the first surgery after I was numbed I don’t really remember anything. I do know that they cut a piece of skin from the top of my mouth and put it on my lower gums. Unlike the first time I didn’t have to get my tissue sliced and but I did still need stitches on my gums. Different than the first surgery was the way they stitched my gums. The first time they just stitched it on the front. This time however, they stitched the front and through the teeth to the back of my jaw. I can now feel the stitches on the back of my teeth unlike last time. Also different from the last time I didn’t get a band-aid for the roof of my mouth. Because I have a retainer it will act as a band-aid to prevent infection but like last time I will have to get my bottom band-aid changed after a week.
Very different from my first surgery this recovery has been a breeze. I went back to school right after they finished and I have been going ever since. I also am not in any pain at all. I can eat solid food as long as I don’t bite into it, I can fall asleep the second my head touches the pillow, and I have only had to ice my jaw once. Life is good. However unlike before the band-aid on my gums will not stay on. I had the first one on for 2 days before it came loose and had to be replaced. Then just two hours after it was replaced the replacement came loose! However unlike the first time I am not going to tell anyone of my replacement band-aid coming loose. I think my mom would kill me.
Over all I think my experience has been very good. I have a very good doctor and an extremely sweet nurse. I have pain meds that work like charm and help me sleep. Plus I have amazing friends backing me up 100% of the way. I could not have asked for a better experience, however I cannot wait for it all to be over. Once I have free range of my mouth I tell you I will be a very happy women.

(638 words)

Surgery #1 v.s.

A few months ago I went to the orthodontist and I was told I needed to go see peritonitis as soon as possible. The gums in the front of my jaw had been hurting and apparently this wasn’t a good thing. During my appointment I was told I had a receding gum line and that the sensitive parts of my teeth that were supposed to be covered up were not. Also they informed me that if I didn’t get surgery on my mouth it was very likely that the roots of my front bottom teeth would pop out of my gums and that would not be good thing.
Because of my busy schedule and the peritonitis offices busy work schedule it was very difficult for me to get an appointment for my surgery. My mom had been calling time after time to schedule a time but it never seemed to work. Finally completely out of the blue the peritonitis called and said they had an open slot the next morning at eight. My mother told me when I got home that night from showchoir practice and let me tell you I was very nervous!
When I went in for the surgery Dr. Kalberg was very calm and comforting but still I managed to cry my eyes out before they even touched my mouth. Before they started the surgery I decided I would listen to my I-pod and close my eyes for the entire procedure. I did not want to see what they were doing in my mouth. The first thing they did was numb my entire bottom lip and the right side of the roof of my mouth. It took three shots of Novocain and a lot of squinting of my eyes before my mouth was sufficiently numbed.
After I was numbed, to be completely honest I’m not entirely sure what happened. I know they sliced all of the connecting tissue between my lip and my gums. I know they cut a piece of skin off the top of my mouth and then they put it down on the tooth and used dissolvable stitches to hold it on. After everything was stitched up: roof of my mouth, gums, and the connecting tissue, they put on band-aids. I had one on my gums and one on the roof of my mouth. I had to keep each on for a week and when I went back they took off the one on the roof of my mouth but put a new band-aid on my gums.
The healing processes for my first surgery was quite monotonous. All I could do was lay on the couch miserably rolling around in pain. When I was sore we would use the blender to make ice, which molded perfectly to my face, when I was hungry I sipped smoothies from a spoon, when I was tired I tried, fruitlessly, to sleep. I felt horrendous for two weeks and people brought me balloons, coffee, roses, and pumpkin juice. I ate only liquids for two whole months. What a joy my first surgery was.
(515 words)