"Stop naming shapes! Stop doing the worm! I'm trying to penetrate you!!"

I'm all moved into my new home!!! :D Move-in was Saturday, and to be honest the whole ordeal was fairly painless and simple. I'm really really happy with my dorm, and now that I have it all decorated I'm really really loving it. :)

Some pictures.

My view is absolutely spectacular, and I have lots of space, and I can control my temperature which is great because it means I can make it super cold. :) So it's pretty excellent.

Aside from all of the moving in and such, pretty much it's just been running around to all of the events and finding my way around and discovering which streets are one way and all of that crazy stuff.

This also happens to include figuring out the parking decks and having to remember if we locked the cars or not and avoiding the sketchy streets at dark, which leads me to a very very interesting story.

So, Amy parks in the Bowe Street Deck because it's temporary and only for a few weeks. Well, compared to our dorms it's in like bum-fuck-nowhere. Jared, she, and I go to eat at Qdoba at like ten-thirty, and Amy can't remember if she locked her car or not. Jared has to go home soon anyway so we go get his car and he drives us to the other parking deck. As we walk up to Jared's car, Amy sees this.

Actually she sees this minus the pocket knife, but still... what else could that be? Yeah. So yeah. So Jared drove us over to Amy's parking deck to check her car. This is how it goes. Situation: Eleven PM. Dark. Approaching the sketchier part of town. Empty parking deck. 18 year old girl. Clearly she can't go in by herself.
Chelsea: "I'll go with you." Jared pulls into parking lot across the street; parks facing away from the deck. Amy: "At least park facing the deck so that if I die you see it!!!" Jared: "I'm coming with you!" Amy: "Oh! I thought you were staying!" Jared: "Well I don't even know what I would do if I saw you die!! That would be horrible." Chelsea: "Well at least you could be a witness." Amy: "Yeah... he'd be like 'Male... Medium build... About 6 feet tall... Dark...' Just like oh, 90% of the male population in Richmond." Jared: "And then I'd be like 'And she saying something about a square, and doing this *spastic squiggling motion*." And then the conversation spiraled into Amy talking about the rapists reaction which would be, "Stop naming shapes! Stop
doing the worm! I'M TRYING TO PENETRATE YOU!!!" And then we died.

Richmond is great. :D

...

18 hours. And my life will never be the same.

And I have no words.

Semper Fi...

The deed is done... the contract is signed... I saw it... held it... And suddenly it's all very very real. This can't be taken back. It's all right there, printed in bold black letters... "I am enlisting in the Marine Corps Reserve this date for 8 years..."
I don't know. Maybe I'm just overreacting... And I know I'm definitely not used to it. I know he has to do it. It's just one of those Holden things. And I'd never stop him from carrying out any of his dreams. I'm just not sure how to handle it. When it comes that is. I've spent so much of the years that we've had together missing him and waiting for him... I just don't want that to be what my life becomes. I've never been apart from him for more than a few weeks, much less a whole summer... or more. And I don't even want to get started on what happens if he has to be deployed... It's something I can't even think about.
I know he has to do this. And I know he's going to do it in a way that is best for us and our potential family. But nothing is as good as it could be. Anything that takes him away from me... well it's not too popular in my eyes.
I just want to live. I want to live where I want... move when and if I want... I don't want my life dictated by someone else. And it would all be okay... As long as I have Holden. I know that. I'm just afraid that I won't. And for once... I'm really really scared.
But he needs me. And I'll be here. No matter what, I'll support him and stand by his side. Because it's my favorite place... and it's exactly where I need to be.

Semper fi... Always Faithful.

Vahhhh Beach!

Saturday the bestie and I decided to take a mini, pre-college road trip to Virginia Beach. Any time we do anything, just us, it has to get interesting. So, we plan to leave at nine so we have plenty of time to hang when we get there and not have to drive home in the dark. Remember that. It's important for later in the story. Anyway, of course we didn't even leave til 9:45 at the earliest. I, planning ahead, had used the GPS to write down directions a couple days earlier. It's easy at first, we just get on 64 and drive forever. It was no big deal and traffic wasn't that bad, so we got a little bored. Amy gets the brilliant idea to make a gangsta rap. So, she starts moving around, trying to set up my camera on the dash to film it. She hits the record button, and all of a sudden my engine starts revving, but I'm not accelerating. Of course, I start freaking, cause I mean, I needed an oil change anyway, and it's not like it's a new car. So I pull off the road for a second and Amy discovers the problem... she knocked the shifter into neutral. Remember, this got videotaped (videos up on Facebook). So, once we managed to make it back on to 64, we continued to try to video our rap... four times. Vids also up on Facebook. And yes, no worries, we did finally succeed.

Around 11:30 we start getting very close to the beach. At around, oh five miles? from The Tunnel, traffic stops. GAH.

How I drive when I'm bored.

TRAFFIC.

So... clearly, it takes forever to get through that. Once we did, we followed my directions, from the GPS (bad idea, I don't reccomend it) past the VA Beach signs, and off onto some obscure exit that took us to the part of "VA Beach" where like normal people lived and stuff. We decide to stop for directions at the 7-11, and the guy says, "Get on 64 and there will be signs taking you straight there." I'm like "WE JUST CAME FROM 64." So, we figure, okay forget this guy, let's just go East because eventually, we'll have to run into the ocean right? We go East and just as I've had it up to my boiling point with the back roads and small towns we're driving through, we pull off and the guy at the hella sketch gas station tells us to just take a left at the next light and it'll take us straight there. Thank God. So, instead of getting there at 12, we got there at 2, and then had to park. We were actually pretty lucky with the parking. It was irritating at first cause ALL OF THE LOTS were full, but we eventually found some hourly parking on the street until six.

Once there, the first thing we did was go and eat at the pizza place from our last Bayside trip. :) Then we shopped around a little, and Amy got her tongue pierced.

Fooled you. :) It's totally fake. We found Rachel another obscure gift, and came across these at the candy store.

We were utterly amused. To complete our shopping adventures, we decided to buy a skim board. Well. I have never skim boarded in my life. And as dangerous as it looks... it is. We went out onto the beach (which was crowded as hell) and attempt to skim board, pretty much just asking to make ourselves look like fools in front of everyone. So, Amy tries and kinda just steps on the thing. Well I actually went for it... and completely fell on my ass. It was totally great. And I got laughed at by the guys that were skim boarding with a boogie board and giving us not so helpful information. =/

I must say it was one of the better failing moments of my life. And I finally got the hang of skim boarding a little. :D

For the rest of the day we hung out on the beach, and went to dinner at some Italian place. We ended up having to move our car at six... So we drove around to find another space for two hours. Lots had opened up, but all of them charged flat rates of like $7 or $10, and we were not about to pay that for two hours. But, we're awesome and found a meter spot right outside of a lot. (HA!) So for the last two hours we went and got our traditional henna, and bought a pound and a quarter of fudge. Nom nom nom.

Love it. :)

We finally got out of there at 8. Yeah, remember how we wanted to be home before dark? We left at dusk. And, about thirty minutes out... just after it got dark... it starts DOWNPOURING. I mean torrential. f-ing. downpour. Like slow down to 45, put your flashers on, and/or pull off the road downpour. It stopped after about thirty minutes though and the rest of the drive wasn't bad. Until I needed to take my medicine and Amy had to pee, so we stopped at a rest stop with vending machines that didn't work and took my money and then we had to stop again at another hella sketch gas station and scrape up 91 cent to get a can drink. *sigh*

I think we ended up getting home around 11 something and I spent the rest of the night with Amy. All in all, another interesting and excellent day in Amy-Chelsea history. :D