duck beach 2007

i'm converted. completely and overtly converted. to the beach that is. before this last weekend's trip down to the outerbanks of NC, i considered myself an anti-beach goer. years of growing up in a family that perhaps visited the beach once (and that's a huge maybe -- i can't imagine that we never visited the beach but can't recall a specific instance), you tend to not have an affinity for all things water related.

but after proding and convincing from a dear roommate, i relented and went down to duck. i was amazed at how much i enjoyed myself. (mind you i never once went for a swim but to me that's not what the beauty of the beach is). i spent my time walking along the sand, chatting with friends, and my personal favorite, running barefoot along the water's edge with charlee.

other highlights of the trip include: (and in no particular order of preference minus the first one)

~finding my very own duck beach crush (most likely the largest reason why all of us venture down there in the first place)
~seeing a sting ray washed up on the sand and having charlee give me the grandfather talk of "tracy, all things die one day..."
~driving back with three guys and being the token girl who discussed and analyzed each of their dating lives
~catching up with my dear, sweet friend cristy meiners
~staying at a beach house with 30 other people
~attending a ward that the congregation consisted of 800, most likely 700 of whom were all single, lds kids
~chatting on a dock out by the water with a random guy playing the guitar in the background

all in all, great weekend.

until i can figure out how to write captions for my pictures, here is a list of who's in the above photos, in order of their appearance:
~me and my dear roommate laura who really i have to thank for this trip as she was my inspiration for coming and never gave up on me
~our lovely friend caroline who came all the way from st. george, ut to be with us
~charlee strutting her stuff across the beach
~my coworker mauri and i
~the one and only cristy meiners

start spreading the news...

and oh how i am...

ny, ny, how i love you. granted this love is only temporary as after a few days i no doubtedly am ready to return to my quieter and oh-so-much cleaner city but still, it's love nonetheless...

i had the wonderful opportunity to spend wednesday and thursday in new york for work training. i've been to new york before and, well, let me paint a picture of what my prior trip was like so you can fully understand how great this last one was.

my last trip consisted of me riding a 5-hour crammed chinatown bus that cost me a measley $20 and left me wishing i had spent another $20 on a portable fan as there was no AC. my roommate had a traumatic experience using their in-house bathroom that she could only describe as "the grossest experience of my life." she still has flashbacks but has made incredible progress.

clearly we were off to a good start.

upon arriving in ny we were dropped off who knows where (i honestly had no clue) and found ourselves in a nasty part of town somewhere around chinatown, upon which i fittingly stepped in sewage that would not dry for hours (my own fault, i know). after meeting up with some friends, we then proceeded to cram 4 girls into one queen sized bed in a nice, but allbeit small, hotel room. that's right, 4 girls, one bed. just think about that for a minute and let it inspire gratitude in you for whatever bed you do have.

so you get the idea.

insert my trip this week. i arrive at the airport to have someone take my carry-on and hand me a valet slip for my luggage (since when do they do that?). i could already tell i was off to a good start. after a whimpy 39 minutes in air i was there and ny welcomed me with all of her glory. it was a beautiful day (did i fail to mention that my last trip there was cold and overcast? fitting no?).

upon landing i took a cab to the manhattan temple to do baptisms. (side note-if you haven't been to this temple i will personally donate $5 to the fund to get you there, that's how much i want each of you to go see its beauty...) as i was technically there for work, we then had meetings on the second floor of the building where the temple is.

then (and this is the best part) i went and checked into the Marriott Marquis at Times Square. Me, staying in a hotel in Times Square! It was beyond beautiful. My room overlooked Times Square and as I walked in and tried to decide which of my two queen sized beds to sleep in that night, I realized I had come a long way.

gone were the days of taking the subway and fitting an obnoxious amount of girls in one bed. replaced were lots of cabs around town, amazing restaurants and my first ever broadway, the drowsy chaperone.

all in all, i'd say i've made significant progress since my last trip. will i ever have another trip as nice as this one to ny? you bet your life i won't. hence why i have to write it down.

So in the end, I am spreading the news...And the news is that no matter if you're walking through sewage or seeing a musical, ny is a great place to be.

pursuit of happiness

friday night i watched "the pursuit of happiness" with will smith. i had seen ads for the movie when it came out and was sure that it promised to be a happy go lucky tale of a man's story of being homeless and his triumphant life afterwards.

what i got was a sobering story of one man's quest and determination to pick him up from his current, and heartwrenching, situation. it turned out to be not quite what i expected and at first i was bothered by this. i wanted to see he and his son ride off into the sunset of their new happy life now that he has found a stable job but the more i think about it i like the way it ended.

because really, being happy is a pursuit. plain and simple. pursuit to me denotes that it is a journey and that it requires effort. there are a lot of factors in life that could seemingly allow one to not be happy but as abraham lincoln said, we're only as happy as we make up our minds to be. i couldn't agree more.

the next morning i took a run into the city and ran by several homeless people. i am so accustomed to seeing them that they honestly they don't affect me anymore. but this morning i tried to make it a point to look in their eyes and wonder what their life has been like to get them where they are. so many of them seemed so resigned to what life had dealt them.

i walked away with more of an appreciation for the power of our attitude and just what determination can do. there truly is nothing that you can't do if you set your mind to it. that thought intimidates me and my first reaction is one of saddness for accomplishments and goals not attained that i know deep down could of been. but more than that it fills me with a great sense of power and motivation. the sky is the limit my friends as to what we can do and accomplish...

mirror mirror

saturday i accompanied my darling, and engaged, sister tabitha wedding dress shopping.

my sister and i set out for our 1 p.m. appointment at david's bridal. what is it about that store that irks me? perhaps the cookie-cutterness of all their dresses, perhaps the fact that there are a billion people in there or perhaps the fact that i was hungry when i went. (hunger probably played the largest factor in my disapproval).

my sister braved dress upon dress to try to find just the perfect one which, well, was never found. but it is not the dress that i am intrigued by but the scene that takes place upon trying to find the dress.

they put you in a small room and have a complete stranger (aka saleslady) help you try on and off your dresses. then once you have your dress on you walk out and stand on a platform surrounded by mirrors. now add on that there are 20 other brides around you all trying on their dresses and standing on their own platforms. does this seem weird to anyone else?

i laugh to think of what we put our poor to-be brides through.

but when i think that they have found their "one and only" and are about to have the happiest day of their life, then i don't feel quite so bad.

dining with the first lady

yesterday i had the great pleasure of having lunch with the first lady herself, mrs. laura bush. we enjoyed the wonderful setting of the lovely hilton hotel, the beautiful day outside and discussed her new project to raise money for purchasing books in areas hit by katrina. it was a lovely lunch.

oh. and did i mention that there were 2,000 additional guests at this luncheon? and that my seat was such that when she came out i could barely make out that it was a person?

but all in all, i would say we bonded. wouldn't you laura?

15 minute blog

i've had several things reaffirmed to me today about myself. one of which being that i cannot stand to be alone. let me clarify. i cannot stand to be alone for more than 4 hours. under 4, piece of cake, over 4...not a piece of cake (it's the end of the day people and i can't think of something witty...)

case in point. today i come into the office to be greeted by only one coworker as everyone else, for various reasons, is out of the office. he leaves to go to capitol hill with the "i'll be back in a couple of hours" line. four hours later, and i'm feeling awfully lonely and wondering if he has been abducted by a senator.

luckily, both he and my boss come strolling in together around 3. since then it has been the complete opposite as my boss comes in every few minutes to give yet another assignment.

perhaps the loneliness wasn't so bad after all.

back by popular demand

after an overwhelming majority of people demanded that i continue writing on my blog (thanks karon and melissa), i have decided...drumroll...to post again. will it be another month before another post? two days? a year? who knows. we'll see how this one goes over with the masses.

last weekend i went to utah to help my sweet mom in her quest to babysit my brother derek's children while he and his wife wisked away to cancun for a needed vacation. no sweat i thought as i purchased my plane tickets, i've got babysitting down to a fine art right?

little did i know that not only am i not ready to be a mom, i'll go as far as to say that those kids completely and unabashedly wore me out. how can people so small be so time demanding? my respect for mothers at least quadrupled this weekend.

probably one of the most hilarious hours of the trip was spent at church as i strolled in in my new heels and trendy outfit toting my 16-month-old niece ready to conquer the world and show that i can handle a baby. one hour later, chocolate stains on my skirt and several runs down the aisle to pick her up, i finally resigned.

good thing you only have one kid at a time.