Whitney Johnson

One of my friends tweeted this quote a few days ago, and it seemed really relevant to the last post of the semester. I cannot believe this semester is almost over. It has definitely been my toughest yet, but it has also been my fastest. After this semester, I only have one semester left at App. For several reasons, I decided not to apply to App for grad school, so that will really be it. In May, I am leaving Boone. It is a weird feeling that is becoming more real to me everyday. I will be a little sad when this time comes to leave my teammates, my friends, and the place I have been for the past three years. However, I know that what C. S. Lewis says is true, and I can't wait to see where next year takes me.

I am so excited to go home on Tuesday. I am sure I have said this before, but I just love being able to go home and see my family and my boyfriend. At home, he only lives twenty minutes away, which is much better than the usual three hours while we are at school. After my experiences this weekend with cooking, I am super behind on my homework. I was planning on finishing up most of my projects this weekend and being able to just hang out over break. It looks like that is not going to happen, but it will be okay. Hopefully I can motivate myself to finish my work, so I will have more time to spend with family.

I thought I should share one of the entertaining stories from our cooking experiences this weekend. At one point, we were using all of the burners on the stove to speed up the process. The smoke detector started going off, but at my old apartment last year, this happened all the time. I was manning the stove at that point, so I started yelling for people to fan, open windows, and open the door. I thought it was just because it was getting too warm in the apartment from all of the burners going at the same time. Wrong. My roommate said "Om, you know its on fire right?" No, I didn't. The fire was right behind a huge pot, where I couldn't see it. It was a small fire, but it was definitely a fire. I tried to blow it out. It would blow out and come right back. So, I started thinking about what to try next. (While one of my roommates screamed "Put water on it", someone screamed "no", and someone else screamed "take pictures.") I knew baking soda was good to put on a stove fire, but we didn't have any. I thought about using the fire extinguisher, but the fire was not that big, so I did not want to resort to that yet. Finally, we decided that flour was similar to baking soda, so we would throw that on it. It burned for a couple seconds after the flour was put on it, but then it went out. Success! Aside from having a smoke filled apartment for the night, everything was fine. It just gave us a good story to tell. Also, in case you were wondering, you should put a metal pot lid over small fires on the stove. I had never heard that before, and we couldn't think fast enough to figure that out. But Google knew what to do.

Every year, the softball team divides into four teams the month before Thanksgiving to compete to see who will have to cook the Thanksgiving meal for the team. This year, my team lost, so we had to cook the whole meal. Six of us had to cook dinner for thirty in our small apartment kitchen. This wasn't some easy dinner where we could buy pre-made things and microwave them. Our coach bought the groceries, and she would only buy things to make the food from scratch. It literally consumed my entire weekend. From making the grocery list to cleaning the turkey, making Thanksgiving dinner for thirty people is no joke. It ended up being mostly fun, and now we have some great stories to tell. And our teammates and coaches were really appreciative, so that made it worth it.

There wasn't much on TV tonight, so somehow the TV ended up on Extreme Cheapskates on TLC. On this episode, a cheap mom is helping to plan her daughter's wedding. She is definitely extreme. She is forcing her daughter to be married in a high school gym. The wedding dress came from the back room of a Pawn Shop where the owner said there were rats the size of cats running around. The groom's mom gives her disapproval for almost everything, but the mother of the bride does not care. They got married on a $1000 budget, and the mother had control every step of the way. I think it is ridiculous to spend $30,000 on a wedding, but I also think that the way this mom is treating her daughter is a little crazy. At least the couple has a good attitude about the whole thing, though. The groom said that he was not a fan of the way they were getting married, but he was very happy to be making the commitment to his wife.

I have determined that I am really a huge chicken. This probably stems from watching too many episodes of Criminal Minds, but I am not good at being home alone. After being gone all weekend, I came back to my apartment last night at about nine. I came in and tried to put my bags in my room, but my door was locked. This was strange, since I never lock my door. So, I was immediately convinced that a murderer was hiding in my room waiting for me. (I'm not really sure why they would lock me out, but that was my thought process.) I wasn't about to wait around to find out. I went to my car and locked myself inside. First, I called my boyfriend, who was three hours away in Durham, I was looking for some reassurance that it was really nothing. However, he is also a victim of too many episodes of Criminal Minds, so he freaked out a little too. Finally, I called my roommate and her boyfriend and asked them to come over. By that time, I had convinced myself that it was probably nothing, and I was being silly to call them, but it did make me feel better for them to come. We broke into my room and were ready to take on any robbers hiding out. However, of course it was nothing. My closet door was just open and it happened to push the lock in. When I closed the door, I was locked out. Mystery solved.

Over the past two years, my friend, Brittany, has taught me just what you can accomplish if you believe in yourself. She got her undergrad degree in three years. Then, she came to App and walked on to the softball team. She played while completing her master's degree, which seems impossible to me. She also tried out for the track team and threw javelin for the first time in her life after completing her softball eligibility. She even got to go to the conference tournament last year to throw the javelin. So, when Brittany mentioned that she wanted to try out for the USA handball team a few months ago, I never doubted her for a second. Last weekend, she drove to Auburn to try out for the team. She was one of two girls to make the team from that tryout, even though she had never played handball before. Now, she is moving to Alabama to train and compete with the USA handball team for about three years. If they qualify, she will be able to go to the Olympics. There is literally nothing she can't do, and I am honored to call her my friend.

While we were walking around Southpoint waiting for our table at Maggiano's, we went in a couple of stores we had never been to. We walked through West Elm, which is a store with home decorations. I wish I was creative enough to decorate my apartment or future house like that. Then, we went in Sur la Table, a kitchen store. We probably spent 45 minutes in the store just walking around looking at everything. I used to think kitchen stuff was so boring, but now I feel like I could look at it all day. It's amazing how many different things can go into just one room in your house.

On Friday, I actually got to have a date with my boyfriend. I don't remember the last time that happened. He goes to Duke, so we don't see each other that often, and usually, when we do see each other, we have something planned with other people. I got to Durham early on Friday though, so we decided to make use of the gift cards he had gotten for his birthday to Maggiano's. This place was amazing. First, we didn't really think to make reservations, but when we got there, there was a two hour wait. We weren't super hungry though. And they got our phone number to text us when the table was ready. This allowed us to walk around Southpoint Mall. Once we sat down, we had some amazing Italian food. We got so much food, and they even gave us another uncooked pasta each to take home for later. I thought that was such an interesting idea. I feel like I probably left Maggiano's weighing 10 pounds more than when I walked in, but it was worth it.

Over the past week, I have gotten really bored with the things I normally eat. I am kind of a picky eater, especially with vegetables. So, when I find something I like, I tend to have it several times a week, which can get old fast. I have spent some time on Pinterest over the past couple of days trying to find something new that I would like. I have found a couple of things that I am excited to try this week, but I am still looking. If you happen to have a great recipe, feel free to share. :)

For the second weekend in a row, I am going go be able to go to Durham. That literally never happens, because of softball or school work or whatever else life holds. I absolutely love visiting Durham, because I still have a lot of friends there from high school and a summer program I did. And it's nice to see my boyfriend. :) The Duke-NC State football game is this weekend, so we are going to that. Usually, I hate football games, but it is really exciting for Duke to be doing so well this year, so hopefully it will be a fun game to go to.

Last Friday, I went to UNC for an information session about the grad program. After I got lost trying to park and walked in ten minutes late, it went really well. Luckily, they did not have a sign in sheet or anything, so it was okay that I was late. The information session made me want to go to UNC more than I already did. They just have so many awesome opportunities for clinical placements. They have two medical schools, three school systems, four great hospitals, and plenty of child care facilities all within about twenty miles. I really think that going here would allow me to gain experience in so many different areas. I really want to get in there so I can be the best SLP I can be. Too bad I won't find out until the first week of March.

So, every year the softball team does a competition in the fall. We have different competitions that give us points towards the bigger competition. In the end, the two losing teams have to cook the team Thanksgiving dinner from scratch. One of the competitions is pumpkin carving. This competition is judged by the amount of likes on facebook. If you have a chance, please go like my team's pumpkin. We don't want to cook the Thanksgiving meal. Our pumpkin is the little martian from Toy Story, and our team name is the Mountaineers. Thanks! :)