Airports and Realizations

I can not sleep, as usual, so I found myself on my blog for once in almost 2 months. I thought I would share something I've been thinking about for awhile.

Last weekend I went to visit my friend Zoe up at her school in Tacoma, WA. It was a really nice time and I'm glad I could see her. Not to mention the almost perfect weather in Seattle/Tacoma while I was there. On my way back to Los Angeles (rather Long Beach... because that is where I flew into), I realized something while getting off the plane. As I walked past the portable gate that they have at Long Beach Airport, past the inside gates, and past the mirrored exit, I walked out to see so many people greet their loved ones. Hugs were shared. Kisses were shared. Even simple handshakes were shared. This type of thing is a very typical scene at any airport exit or entrance. I bet I have seen this type of scene a multitude of times in my life already, not to mention having experienced it for myself a multitude of times. But as I walked past all those people and thought about that familiar scene while waiting curbside for my friend to pick me up, I was really thinking about it. Airport goodbyes and hellos are a perfect metaphor for what should be the most important aspects of our lives. The people in it, that is.

 I think it is obvious to say that the people in our lives are most important to us, however, I think we get caught up in our minds and in our daily routines so much and we loss sight of what is truly important. It is even easier nowadays to loss sight of the importance of the people in our lives because we are so worried about the future of our country (with the election being 8 days away...and if you are my family, the fear of having another Republican in office for another 4 years), or if the economy is going to get worse, or if we didn't do as well as we think we should have on that psychology exam (or the grade we think we deserved because of all that damn studying....*cough*), or if we are having a bad hair day, or if we just embarrassed ourselves by tripping all the time, or if the LA drivers/traffic makes you crazy (I MEAN REALLY! What is with all the honking people?!!! huhh? Answer me that. You really aren't better than everyone else! People need to calm the heck down. This isn't New York... or Chicago even.), I think you get the idea. What should really be the most important things to us are the people who we are talking to from across a table, or the people are walking with around school or around town, or the people we have phone conversations with because we can't seem them a lot due to distance. It all goes back to that scene at the airport. The hug of someone that you haven't seen in awhile. The smile of your parents faces after not seeing them for almost 3 months. The feeling in your heart when you talk to a dear friend on the phone. That should be what we think about. That is what is MOST important in life. As human beings we are all connected. We share more feelings than you might think. 

I have been trying harder this year to call all my friends more often, because I know it is important to stay connected with the people we can't see all the time. Last year was tough for me and looking back on it now, I wish I would have called my friends more often. I probably would have felt a lot better everyday if I talked to more of the people in my life more often.

Since I am doing it more now though, I really suggest it! Stay connected! Call up an old friend or a new friend...I promise it will make you feel good :) 

A Good Day

OKAY...SO...here we go..

Things that have happened over the summer since the last time I wrote:

Got into LMU as a transfer (I am here now and loving it!)

Got back from Maine and spent some time with my parents

Packed all my college stuff

Went back to Orange County  for a month to see all my lovely friends and to spend some quality time with them

Turned 20. (or did I?)

Anyways...now more about today:

I spent some time with my big sis today. We started off the day by going to Pearl Art Supply store. I had to get a few last things for my various art classes. Kim also bought her own art box for her stage management usage. She later decorated it with Disney stickers! She gave me some to put on my art/note book. What a nice big sister thing to do! We are 6. 

THEN, we went to LACMA and explored modern and contemporary art. We

 walked through giant steel maze-like sculptures. Walked into a room with a 

giant sized kitchen table. You could actually walk under the chair with out ducking. It was amazing. I felt like I had shrunk to Thumbelina size. I wish I got a photo of that. The security guard in that room kind of gave off a bad vibe though... so I was not going to mess with it. We gazed at sculptures by Brancusi and Giacometti as well as works by Picasso, Paul Klee, Cindy Sherman, and Rene Magritte (namely: La Trahison des Images [Ceci N'est Pas une Pipe])... among many others.  I believe I am going to be writing a paper about Magritte's famous work soon. I might choose another (less famous) work by Soutine though. I haven't decided yet. What a good day at the art museum. 

After that we went to the Farmer's Market near The Grove and we enjoyed some amazing French food and an iced coffee. That place is so cool! Lots of little shops (that is where Kim bought the Disney Sticker Book (AMAZING.) After that, we walked around the Grove and mostly just window shopped/admire. We tried shoes on at Nordstrom, but didn't buy any of course. Good times.

Walking back to the car we saw JC from N Sync sitting outside of a restaurant. I thought it looked like him...but I didn't actually believe it was him until Kim said, "Woah! Did you see that JC guy from NSync"...he just didn't look the same to me. It might of been the lack of the frosted blonde tips in his hair. haha. That was my celebrity sighting of the year I guess....too bad Kim and I were die hard BSB fans. Ha. Oh well. That was a pretty hilarious coincidence.

We got back to Kim's apartment and we decided to watch the amazing Disney movie Mulan of course. That movie is SO GOOD. Every time. Not going to lie.

Yuuuup. Great day. Hope everyone is having one as well!

I'll leave you with this because I love The Beatles:

"Living is easy with eyes closed, misunderstanding all you see. It's getting hard to be someone but it all works out. It doesn't matter much to me"

Meg.

 

Maine is Magnificent!

Here I am in Maine. It has been a full week now and it's absolutely beautiful here! We used to come here every summer when I was little, but stopped after awhile due to many reasons. I came to Maine a couple of summers ago for a photo workshop around the same time, and that was awesome. I am so glad to be back here. My family and I are visiting all the places we used to go to when we came here 15+ years ago. It is so interesting to see places again that I only vaguely remember. Most of my days, however, are spent on the beach. It is glorious. Even though the water is frickin' freezing. I think I am going to go all the way in today, instead of only getting wet from my stomach down. That should be a great time.

The first morning here I woke up early and we all made blueberry buckwheat pancakes and sipped on coffee. It was delicious! The next thing you know while we are cooking away we hear a strange noise coming from the ceiling. *scratch scratch scratch...fumble fumble....BANG!!* We found out that there is a whole squirrel clan living in the part of the cottage in between the first and second floor. They have since quieted down, but it was fun hearing them roll around nuts or whatever up there. What a bunch of cuties! At least they haven't figured out how to get into the actual cottage. 

My Great Uncle and my Great Step-Aunt came the third day we were here. They are from TN and I don't get to see them that often, so it has been great spending time visiting with them. Once my Great Uncle heard that I was interested in learning German, he decided he would teach me German phrases one by one. I have only remembered a few so far, but its only been a few days. The man knows three languages! English, French and German. It's insane. My Great Uncle is from the French (Huguenot) side of my family (my Nana's brother). I hope one day I can say the same thing about myself (knowing more than one language fluently that is). I believe I only know one and a quarter languages right now since my Spanish is very rusty. My Step-Grandma Bev from New York came the day after and I haven't seen her in more than a year. So it has been very nice seeing and visiting with her as well. 

Well, I think that is it for now. I might write in more later. Who knows.

Meg.

Things that we didn't film for our documentary and the crazy things we said on our road trip.

Things we couldn't quite get on film:

1. Great rock cliff

2. "Moose X-ing" sign

3."Snowmobile X-ing" sign

4. Dead End Road (an actual name of a road)

5. Mini size Noah's Ark

6. Captain's Winery

7. A Llama (yes, we saw a llama)

8. An old barn burning down

9. Barn yard animals

10. Totem pole

11. Jamaica 

12. Kid doing jig in a coat (with tails) and a top hat

13."No Camping" sign on a small circle of grass next to some out houses

14. 70 m.p.h. sign (a lot more exciting than you would think)

15. 94.1 moose FM!

16. sign with a moose on it that said "this moose probably wont look both ways"

17. hitchhikers 

18. bleak bear bolding a mail box

19. A wild turkey

20. a heard of wild turkeys

21. Bambi (aka a deer crossing the road...right in front of us!)

A lot of these were way more exciting when we actually saw them. 

And here are some choice words that fell out of our mouths while driving:

1. "I am not a fan of the speed limit!" - Zoe

2. "TRUCKS are passing me!!!" -Zoe

3."I just saw a moose crossing sign and you all missed it." -Zoe

4."Hulk...ANGRY!"

5."CAPTAIN!!!!"

6. "WOAH! A man just appeared from the woods! You know what he was doing."- Meg "Hunting moose?"-Zoe 

"OH, that's what you call it. Pull over, I got to go hunt some moose!" -Meg

7. "Ohhh raspberry mint! Yes please!" -Meg

8. "We should clean the windshield next time we stop because of all these things falling on it now"-Michael 

"Yeah, I don't know what it is but I kind of don't want to know"-Meg

 "Oh...I know what it is"-Michael 

"What? Bugs?"-Meg

 (five seconds later) "POPCORN!" -Michael

9. "Why are there so many antique stores up here...is that a big thing here?"-Michael 

"People like to go antiquing"-Meg 

"...What's the obsession with old shit?"-Michael

10. "Not making any assumptions, just...just..."-Meg 

"Judging" -Michael

11. "It's wandering again" 

12. "We're so proud of you little arrow! You found yourself!" -Meg (talking to the navigational system thing)

13."When he's hungry he gets all quiet." -Meg

About the last snippet of our road trip:

The three of us on our ride over to Mackinac Island...it was cold.

Me!

Michael!

Zoe!

SOOO, here I am again, almost 20 days later. Finally writing about the last leg of Michael, Zoe and my road trip. I'm not very good with keeping up a blog turns out. I always...ALWAYS put it off, but I really do enjoy it. 

Anyways, after we left the B&B in Sudbury, Ontario, we started to go back the way we came, back to Sault Sainte Marie to cross the boarder. The wait wasn't so bad. We were probably in about half an hour worth of traffic. However, when we finally got to the front of the line to make our way back into Michigan, the scary boarder control man asked us for our passports, looked them over (well... Zoe had her ID and birth certificate, which works for driving to Canada, by the way) and asked the three of us about five time how we knew each other. We answered, "we are friends from high school." Then he asked, "so are you in school right now?" The whole time I'm thinking..."yes..yes we are obviously in school right now, which is why we are also here at the Canadian/US boarder." ha. Then he asked again how we knew each other, we answered and explained that we are now in college, but we all met in HIGH SCHOOL. Then he asked, "So you are done with school right now and you are all friends from college?" By this time I was almost curled up in a ball in the passengers seat humming to myself and swaying back and forth. Or just banging my head against the window. Either way, you get the idea. Then he finally lets us through, but informs us that we had been "randomly" chosen for a search. He went on to explain how this procedure was very RANDOM. He must have used the word random about four times. Just incase we didn't get the idea the first time he said it. Believe me, all of us new EXACTLY what these boarder patrol were thinking. Three teenagers on a "road trip" with a bunch of "camping materials" packed in the car. We all knew what was going on. COME ON! They were looking for the drugs that we were obviously smuggling across the boarder... because we are teenagers on a "road trip." It sounds like I am bitter about this situation, but I really just find it quite amusing. I was hoping that they didn't have to unpack everything that was in the car, because that would have taken ages to pack back up perfectly AGAIN. Luckily they didn't. They just took their little tools.... scraped it along side all four tires, the engine area, the trunk. They looked inside the windows and everything as Zoe, Michael, and I were lined up behind a table about 20 feet away. 

This trip has made me less a fan of authority figures than I already was. A speeding ticket AND giving us grief at the boarder because we were teenagers. puhh-lease. 

When we got into Michigan we drove to a town called St. Ignace. This drive was probably the drive where we got the worst weather. Poor Zoe was driving when it was pouring down rain, windy, and on narrow, crappy roads. We were driving in a construction zone where half of the road was smoother than the other half. Therefore, two of my tires were skidding, and the other two were fine. It was so strange, because the car was making an odd noise (which I believe was the anti-skid kicking in) and trying to straighten itself up every time it skidded a little. Now Zoe has some bad weather driving experience. *sigh*

In St. Ignace we wandered around the little town, bought famous "Mackinaw Island fudge" and then later took a swim in the hotel pool (which had WAY too much chlorine in it). After that Michael and I took a walk down to the beach and found some interesting things. A crooked playground, a scary looking swing set with a huge spider web, and the most symmetric tree I have ever seen in my whole life. Then we ran across the street like crazy fools and walked back to the hotel room. Then we all played a few rounds of gin rummy. The card game, not the drink.

The next day we went to Mackinac Island! At first we walked around a little, then we decided to take a bike ride, which I think was the best idea of the whole trip. That was so much fun! I got pretty good footage of it too. After our ride, we ate a nice lunch and then walked around and found souvenirs for our family members back at home. It started raining right when we left the island. Perfect timing. Then we drove to a town called Ludington for the night. That night was pretty eventless, we watched a movie.

The next day we woke up at the crack of dawn to catch the ferry that would bring us across Lake Michigan, and back to Wisconsin. On this ferry ride here is what happened:

1. We got on the ship

2.We sat down at a table

3. Michael feel asleep at the table

4. Zoe and I read/listened to music

5. Bingo game from hell started...with a theme song that went to the tune of the Gilligan's Island song (or something like that) and an over excited host saying strange things to try to make the "crowd" more awake.

6. After asked if we wanted to play bingo, we moved from the table

7. We found the quiet room...and promptly fell asleep. All three of us.

8. I tried to film the upper deck, but it was far too windy. I only got like 30 seconds of gray windy weather. so sad.

9. I went back to sleep and about half an hour later, woke up, looked around, realized that we were the only ones left in the room.

10. We left the room, and everyone was already about to leave the ship because we had docked already. Good thing we woke up in time.

After an interesting morning on the S.S. Badger, it was time to drive back to my house in Madison. OR Middleton, to be exact.

We had a nice five days at the end of our trip to explore Madison/hang out at my house before we had to drive Zoe and Michael to the Chicago O'Hare Airport. That was sad. I miss my road trippin' buddies terribly, but I know I will get to see them again very soon (as well as all my other favorite people!)

Later I will record in my blog certain quotations that slipped out of our mouths during the trip as well as a list of things that we failed to document on our little documentary. So....I guess for my whole 3 readers that I have, you can look forward to that. 

All my love,

meg.

Greetings from Canada!

So... Michael, Zoe and I are on a road trip! We are currently in Sudbury, Ontario. Not the most hoppin' city ever, but still interesting in its own way. Its all about the adventure...right? We started out at my house in Wisconsin and checked out Madison a little. Then on Monday morning we ventured up to Sturgeon Bay, WI (one speeding ticket later...damn speed limit... still a little bitter) and camped at a camp ground there. For first time campers (without my parents camping skills there with me...that is), we did a pretty good job putting up the tent, cooking, cleaning, avoiding bugs (well at least at this campsite), etc. The next morning, we packed up our stuff, got in the car again and looked around Sturgeon Bay a little before our 7 hour drive up to Salut (pronounced "Su"...think French) Sainte Marie. This drive was very pretty.

We stayed at an Indian Casino on the American side of Sault Ste Marie, which was nice. Expect the rooms were a little strange. The window looked out to the inside of the hotel. We got a pretty good shot of that on our little documentary that we are making. 

The next morning we crossed the boarder, took out some Canadian dollars from the bank, ate lunch, went to a grocery store to stock up for our next two nights of camping, and then hit the road again.

Fast forward to 4 hours later. We arrived at the next campsite (Chutes Provincial Park) which was in a very small town called Massey, Ontario. We found our site, set up the tent and everything again. Made dinner, played some gin rummy, and stayed away from Black Bears. All of which we could have been having a LOT more fun doing if it was for all the MOSQUITOES!!! BUGS EVERYWHERE!!! According to both Michael and Zoe, our Deep Woods Off spray didn't work too well. I think it did. I mean, the bits could have been worse. But the bugs were super annoying and now we all have little souvenirs all over our bodies (even in strange spots) from that campsite/park. The best part about our stay at Chutes was the amazing waterfall and lake we found on our walk. I was expecting some waterfalls from the website, but this was far more than I had expected. It was beautiful. As soon as I have the capabilitly to load pictures up here, I will do so. 

This morning we packed up the tent again and drove an hour-ish north east to Sudbury, and checked into a nice little B&B. Yes... we are staying at a B&B. It's funny...I'm sure. Seriously though, it is sooo nice to be bug free while sleeping or doing anything for that matter. Today, we checked out the town of Sudbury, which, as I said early...kind of...well, interesting. We went to a Science Museum called Science North. I made a snow flake cut out (I had some folding difficulties) which I will give to someone when I get back. Not sure who yet though. The museum was pretty cool. We saw a beaver and a porcupine! They both did not smell very good. We also learned OH so much about the human body and how its bad to smoke. We tested out our eye sight (my astigmatism is still there), listened to our hearts beat, lied down on a bed of nails (craziness), leaded about that thing we call water, walked through a tunnel, saw dinosaur bones, and looked at creepy animals like snakes, scorpions, spiders, cockroaches, etc. (we did not stay long in that section), AND saw an amazing rap music video about bees! Later today we went to see "Forgetting Sarah Marshall" at a local movie theatre. We only paid $2!!! How amazing is that?!!!

We have decided to cut our trip short by one day because Zoe has a little bit of a cold, and we don't want her sleeping outside in a tent for two more nights. Also...we are all tired of those crazy bugs. OUR SKIN CAN'T TAKE IT ANYMORE!!

Tomorrow, we are driving back to the states through "The Sault" again, then we are continuing on to St. Ignace, MI (in the Upper Peninsula...for those of you who are unfamiliar). We are going to take a side trip to Mackinaw Island while we are there. The next (or night...we are not sure yet) we are driving down to Ludington, MI, staying a night there, and then taking a ferry bright an early the next morning across Lake Michigan. This will land us in Manitowac, WI. Then we will drive three or four hours back to my lovely abode in Madison. I will write more about the last leg of the trip after it happens... which probably won't be until I get home. Then I can also put up pictures.

Now that I have written a whole essay about the first part of our trip, I think I will go to sleep. I hope everyone is just fine and dandy! 

Much love,

Meg.

An Empty Room...and Anxiousness

Today I packed all of the things in my dorm room into my parents car and they drove home with it all. Now, besides a set of sheets and my suitcase, my room is completely empty. It is super strange and my bed is not as comfortable with out the squishy egg cart thing. I have been reading for about 45, and still didn't get tired and fall asleep, so I decided to update my blog. 

The only things I have to do for school now are to edit my research paper after I have it peer edited, print out a final copy and go to my 2D design class for the last time (yes!) on Wed. morning. Then I have the rest of Wednesday to clean around my dorm a little, so it looks good when I leave, and then check out...so I'm ready to go at 6am Thursday morning for my flight to LA! 

My sister is graduating from USC on Friday! I'm so excited for her! After I spend some time with my family, I get to see all my best friends!!! I am way beyond pumped for the weekend. I am so close to being done, that I can smell freedom. Being back in California will be so nice! I am extremely ready to be around the people I love being around this summer and just loving every minute of it. It is going to be glorious. 

This blog was not too exciting, I know, but writing about my day gave me something to in all my sleeplessness. Back to listening to jazz while reading Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close (for the second time...because it's amazing) and trying to fall asleep.

Next time I write, I will probably be in the Golden State... Can't wait!!! (hehe...ohhh end rhyme.. I'm so good) 

I hope every one's morning is cheery and bright! With a side of a delicious cup o' coffeeee!

love love love love love,

meg.

Meg travels to Blogger

Helloooo Blogger!

I have been using word press for awhile, but now I have decided to use blogger instead. It just seems easier to me. 

Here is my old blog if you wish to see my previous blogs:

http://megpatch.wordpress.com 

Can't wait to start blogging here! Hope everyone is having a great day/night!

God Speed,

Meg