how embarrassing.

so. i saw stacey sitting there at the bus stop, and, after slightly scaring her, i sat with her.

we decided to talk in british accents, so for the entire time sitting at the bus stop, and the entire time on the bus, we were talking (rather loudly, i must admit) in british accents.

unfortunately, on the stop before ours, one of stacey's friends from MC got into the bus and greeted us enthusiastically. stacey and i sheepishly said hi and carried on the conversation in our regular, american accents. aaaaaaaaannnd everyone on the bus officially thinks that we're big dorks. gotta love it.

i shall leave this house with a distorted image of self

kate's mirror somehow makes me look a tiny bit skinnier than i am.

shockingly, i don't really have a problem with that.

i DO have a problem with mary's mirror in our room. it makes me look almost obese.

it is not good for me.

everything i try on makes me look bad, until i run over to kate's mirror for reassurance.
most of the other girls in our house refuse to even look in it.

this will have to change soon, before i develop an eating disorder.

go terps!

my first terps soccer game of the season: MD vs. duke.

my first terps soccer game of the season: MD vs. duke.
i got to sit next to yuko and tuffer!!

does that not look like the smoke monster from lost? about to devour those puny soccer players!



these controversial pictures taken by bryan:

the scarf of controversy.

the neck of controversy.

the beard of controversy.

pretty christy, whose photograph is serving to represent the "four on the couch" game that we played afterward at "john david AND SAM's party"

still no tv.

i don't think it's even been turned on.

when i was little....

i wanted plastic surgery to make my eyes like this.



i also named all of my dolls rachel.

ha.

quiet time fairy

stacey in the back room

~8am

ramen disaster

"YES! ramen!" i thought as i scarfed down the noodles. i had eaten most of them by the time i realized that there was a small dead bug in my soup.

i pensively placed him on the side of the bowl and began to wonder if he had, in fact, been inside the ramen package before i had even cooked it.

to my horror, as i forked another bunch of noodles, there were two small maggot-like baby moths, dead on my fork.

(those are wormy-moths on the side of my plate, not noodles)

(and there's the momma moth herself.)


needless to say, i think i won't eat ramen for a while.

9/18 : kate's birthday party

there is something entirely other-worldy about this picture.
it is just s o c l a s s i c .

take a look at danny's face. aah. so good.

def the funniest picture of the night.

click on it to make it bigger and then look at danny's face. i dare you.

hahaha. and i have no idea why but this picture of bryan totally made my day when i first saw it. so angelic. so ethereal. so.... bryan.

the skilled guitarist james entertained us after everyone left.

i love katers.

the funny thing about it is that there's really only one picture that was taken of KATE at her party. and it's only half of her face. oh well.

9/17? : mary's 6 month anniversary

jimmy wilson texted me in the morning to ask for our address....
and look what arrived, carried by a slightly creepy old man at 8:30 at night:

what a lucky girl....

they are so cute that it almost makes me sick. :)
just kidding, mary.

hey- and the roses are still alive, too.

9/15? : james learns an important lesson

never, in any circumstance, burp in front of stacey.

don't even SAY the word "burp" for that matter.

"prub" will have to do.

9/12 : a day in the life of...

... joel gravely: being stalked by us while sitting in a room, surrounded by candles. HA.

... stacey bosdosh: going running in PGizzle....

... equipped with ipod and mace.

9/11 (later) : the gathering + hangout afterwards

take two- a house tradition.

ah manny days!
we were re-taking the shot that lyd did of jd.

two of my favorite people in the world came to visit, too!

i won't see janice in a long time... (sniff, sniff).

9/11 : second family dinner

i was so excited to cook dinner for all the girls.
i went out, bought lots of groceries, and made the BEST taco salad.

and then no one showed up.
me and kate were sitting there, and mary and stace were MIA.

so i called up james and asked him if he wanted dinner.
he turned my mourning into dancing. haha. literally.

then he stayed to do homework before the gathering. ^

then britt k (my love) came over and we showed her the back room. stacey saw that there was a quite random chair there and declared that it was the courtship chair! she explained that that is where the man would have to sit if he was going to be presented in front of the comittee of approval before he could court one of us.

we wanted to take a picture, so james kindly stood in for the awkward and nervious courtier, while the girls looked on sceptically.

hahaha. nice one, james.
good thing you already passed the real test. :)

i've kinda decided that i'm going to adopt james. he came over for another family dinner yesterday. he's offish part of the fam.

oh happy day!

how i felt before skyping my parents and sister and nephew.

how i felt after skyping my parents and sister and nephew.

needless to say, it was wonderful to talk to them. they just went through all of granny's stuff today. apparently she willed everything to our dog, shumba. (joke.)

sigh. i miss them a lot, though.


p.s. i have a WHOLE bunch more pictures that i'm gonna put up as soon as kate's computer stays here for long enough!

last night.

when i was going to sleep, mary was doing homework, so the light was on, and john david, stacey, kate and lindsay were out in the living room making lots of noise. well, not lots. our walls are just thin.

so anyway, i lay there for a long time in a kind of limbo- not sleeping, not waking. and i had the strangest half dreams while i was there.

my favorite product of this that i actually dreamed that i was biting people's laughs. it was incredible. i mean, who thinks of that.

so anyway, favorite phrase of the day:

"if i could bite the air-borne laughs"

ahh. i love it.

i hate pedestrian crosswalks

i just hate them. they are, by far, the most awkward part of every day for me.


i hate the uncertainty of knowing whether a car will stop or not. the driver could be like me, and forget to look for pedestrians until it's too late.... so i always end up waiting way too long to cross.


i hate the weird "walking across the road" part, when the car just has to wait there watching you. the driver could be in a big hurry, and i just rudely disrupted his journey. i hate it when pedestrians walk as slow as they possibly can in front of my car. it seems so snobby.... so i always end up doing this extremely dorky jog/walk which is so unwieldy with my huge backpack and (sometimes) art portfolio bouncing around wildly.


i hate the question of whether or not i should actually acknowledge that the car exists by nodding or smiling or waving. the driver could be a stalker or an axe-murderer who would follow me home if i made eye contact.... so i always end up somewhere in between, with a half-committed smile, not establishing eye contact or maybe mouthing "thank you" into the air.


i also hate how, at the pedestrian crosswalks at lights, everyone ends up going over at the same time, and then we're stuck in a kind of angst-y "don't acknowledge that the other person exists even though you've been walking next to them for fifty yards" huddle.... so i always end up crossing the street to the sunny side of the road, and being all sweaty by the time i reach my class. gross.


so lame. so awkward.


if i had it my way, and these strange social rules of conduct didn't influence my actions as much, i would smile and wave at crosswalks, as i walked swiftly across, and i would say hi to the people stuck next to me waiting for the "walk" light to eliminate awkwardness.... that's probably expecting too much from myself, though. maybe i'll just stick to awkward.


oh, and p.s. i have soo many more pictures that i'll put up soon. kate has them on her computer, so... yeah. and i have a test tomorrow.

constance lumgair.

today would have been a perfect day.

i slept in, i ate kashi cereal, and i even wore my favorite color. i had salt water taffy with my brother while watching the office, and drove in his car with him and yuko singing coldplay and american pie at the top of our lungs. we ate sushi and sat in the sun. then i went on a bike ride with shumba. all of my favorite things were put into one day.

but there were lots of tears today, too.
the only reason that i did most of those lovely things was because i was very, very sad.

sad because i got a phone call at 11 o'clock and my father's somber voice informed me that my granny, his mom, had just died. she was surrounded by her family: my mom and dad were there, my sister and her baby, and even her best friend biddy had just arrived. she was 91.

the way that she left this world was so characteristic of the way that she seemed to dance through life: she did it quickly, gracefully, and with perfect timing.


my granny was one of my heroes. she was one of the most beautiful and vibrant people to ever live- of that i am convinced. her life was nothing short of extraordinary, her spirit was vibrant and vivacious, and each day of her life was embraced with pure enthusiasm.

she was passionate. she was stubborn. she was loving.


she did more exciting things in her life then i can ever hope to accomplish: she sailed around the world for years, was an extraordinary single mom, owned a factory, ran a community center, was a professional ballerina, owned and ran a dance studio, toured europe and the u.s. in a caravan, and ended each day with a glass of brandy.

"water? no i don't want water! i only drink water when it's mixed with brandy!"

this afternoon, nick and i thought it was only appropriate to tearfully sip a glass of the world's best beer in her honor.

"what!? you can't drink wine? oh, my dear, that is wretched! utterly wretched!"


she was overwhelmingly positive, even when things seemed impossible, and persevered through more trials than anyone else that i know. she was remarkable. she was delightful. she loved to laugh, and had the best sense of humor.

i loved the elegant way that granny spoke. very occasionally, she would say a word that, if uttered by someone else might have been unsavory or uncouth to me. maybe it was her rich south african accent, or perhaps her manner, but her words were never vulgar or course. just charming, somehow.

"butt? is that what you call it these days?... in MY day, we called it an ass!"
(that only really works if you say it in a british accent)

she loved Jesus, too. she was saved late in life, but that didn't stop her from praying with beautiful simplicity and enthusiasm, and from reading her little black bible every day.

(this was at the airport... the last time i saw my beloved granny)

the thing that makes me cry the most, though, is the thought of how she is now. she's no longer constrained by that squeaky wheelchair, and the lost neurological connections that crippled her are no longer of any consequence. i know that she didn't just walk into heaven. she was dancing. she was dancing a more beautiful, graceful and flawless dance than she had ever composed in her youth. she's probably still dancing. and she's dancing for her savior... the veil has been lifted. her faith is now sight.


i just wish i could see that dance.

i miss her already.

dear mommy and daddy-

i was using kate's computer, and so i edited all the pictures on there and was about to upload them when- ALAS!- she took her computer away with her to gaithersburg!

i will put them up soon, though, my beloved parents.

your adoring daughter,
rachel

and i quote

"lizzie... you are such a PANsy!!" (stacey (talking to me). we were pretending to be sorority girls)

((blip!)) "oh sorry. that was me." -kate, in reference to the beeping of gchat.

one word: "PRUB".

jen thompson: "here is a present from my mom.. to have..... and to hold."
rachel: "in that box, there is a man. a tiny little man."

"THE TENT OF MEETING" -label on the sign that kate wants me to put as a banner over our back room. yeaaaaaaah right.

"you can tell more about somebody by the rules that they break." (uuuh. what was the exact quote? it was so much deeper)-stacey bosdosh, thoughts on linguistics.

yoga lessons with kate and stace

chick-fil-a

on tuesday evening, we discovered that the chick-fil-a opening was actually a day before when we thought it was, so we scrambled around the house for warm clothes, and then jumped in the car, headed for virginia.

stace was #65. linds was #66. i was #67.

haha james.

the guys actually had caregroup. good job.

we won ponchos for winning the hula-hoop game. oh yeah.

ha. here sam demonstrates how most of us spent the night.



we did it!
i got my 52 (or however many) free chick-fil-a coupons at 6 am and made it to my 9 am art class still.

still no internet. still no tv.

hide and go seek in the dark, anyone?

kate was it.

kate is ripped.

we discovered this after her recent interaction with a certain "boxing bootcamp" class at the gym at umd.

needless to say, we all have a new respect for her.