it's been an interesting few days.

i'm now living in my new apartment. i love it. it's so nice to have my own bathroom and be sleeping on a bed bigger than a twin. i'm now living the luxury life i think. i have more space than i know what to do with, to fill with stuff i don't need. and i'm loving every minute of it.

so a few days ago, i went back to my aunts house to get the remainder of my clothes and stuff. and as i'm getting onto the 405 freeway, my phone rings, it's my roommate asking me if i would pick up her phone at her old house. i said sure and started heading that way. (the way the freeways are here, the 405 and 5 both run south. the intersect like a y and then 405 disappears and the 5 heads to san diego. if you want to get from the 405 to the 5, you take the 55. i know.) so, as i'm halfway between the 405 and the 5, on the 55 on my way to pams old house, i'm crusing along with the top down and all of a sudden, i smell bleach. not good friends. so, i try to stick my hand back between the seats and feel around to see if anything is wet. nothing wet but i feel this thing that seems like a water balloon. again, NOT GOOD. so, i quickly cut across 5 lanes of traffic and zip to the side of the road. i jump out, avoiding semis and vehicles that are coming too close to the side of the road and i start pulling everything out of my car. ah, but it was a little too late. see, when i packed, i thought, it'll be easier to pack my clothes in laundry bags than suitcases, so i did that. when the bleach spilled, the clothes in the laundry back absorbed the majority. REALLY NOT GOOD. i lost about 3/4 of my clothes. and the best part is that it got all my good clothes. big, big bummer. i know it could have been much worse. trust me, i know that. but that was wednesday.

thursday, i worked. i hung out at home and organized my new space.

friday. i get off work, and head to dinner with my friend kat and all of her family, including her wonderful husband joey, and we went to a rest. called islands. her grandparents own it and it's very good food. so we ate there and then joey, kat, brandon and i went out for drinks. we went back to the mall where i work and went to a place called dave and busters. needless to say, we ended up at champps because dave and busters is like a college nasty bar. gross. so, we leave, i get home, i go to take my stuff out of my car and...it's gone. I GOT ROBBED! so bitter. i lost about $500 worth of stuff. including the new digital camera and the new memory card that my mom bought me. i'm so upset about it. it was a rough couple days.

saturday i went with friends to see the inside man. it was good. really funny one liners. they had some interesting language at points that really didn't make any sense. it's like the writer or director thought, "this scene isn't random enough yet, lets throw in this word that makes people flinch." it was good. but i recommend waiting until its on dvd. not worth TEN DOLLARS to go to the theatre.

well, my friend amber has threatened my life now, or at least my shins, so here is my update. i was tempted not to blog so i could get her to come visit but, i'll post, you know, for the shins' sake.

k

wow it's been a while


i've signed a lease. i now have an address in laguna niguel california...craziness.

i've turned 25. weird. and realized how old i really am. i've gotten to the point in my life that i really didn't want anyone to know that it was my birthday. i avoided telling anyone at any cost. i don't know if it was because i wasn't near family or if it was that i'm really old. i had dinner with a friend....i signed a lease...i went to ikea and spent 1.50 on lunch. and that was my day....more or less. it wasn't the same having the typical family birthday dinner. and this year, my stinkin family went to hana yori. i LOVE that place. instead...i'm here. but at least i spent march 13th driving around with the top down...


other than that...

st patricks day was friday. meredith and mike and i went to a concert ON the queen mary (for those of you like me, who have no idea what the queen mary is, it's a ship. a very large ship. reminded me of titanic, from the movie of course) and then we spent the night on the queen mary. you can actually sleep on the ship. it was so cool!



i'll be moving in mid week this week. so odd. it's official. i live in california. at least for the next year.

oh yeah, i met dave attel too. no, not dave chapelle as much as my brother wishes that were true, it was dave attel. my friend tim thinks this guys is the greatest and actually, tim is the only reason i knew who this guy was when i met him. funny how that works out.

in other news. i'm bored.

until next time...

check out this picture i found of my dog when i first got her... i miss this face!

The best day off in a long time.

The best day off in a long time.


My friends Holly and Mike came to town this past weekend from phoenix. They came with a group of their friends to check out a couple churches in the area.

I worked all day on Saturday until about 7pm and then got off work, jumped in the jeep and headed for Santa Monica for dinner. Santa Monica is about an hour away. We met at a restaurant called Gladstone’s on pacific coast highway. I’ve eaten there a few times before. I love that place. When you’re done, they wrap your left overs in tin foil in the shape of sea creatures. It’s fabulous. So we had dinner, laughed a lot and then got back in the car to head back to Huntington Beach but only after the waiter wrapped my left over food into the shape of a crab. LOVE IT. Freeway driving can be fun if you know how to do it. ☺

Sunday morning I headed over to the Hyatt at Huntington Beach to meet up with the group to head off to the first church. Their group they are here with is about 20 people that fit into about 6 cars, including mine. This is when freeway driving is not so fun. Especially when people don’t know how to keep up. It kills me. So, we head out from the hotel and hit the road and arrive at Saddleback church for the 11:15 service. It was incredible. Rick Warren was preaching. Amazing. He’s an incredible speaker. Their service was so great. It was like being at home. Everything seemed to be just like it was for me at home. It was comfortable.

After church, we headed over to Irvine spectrum Center where I work. It’s a really cool outdoor mall and has a variety of restaurants to choose from. It was great. Too bad that all 20 people decided to eat at the same stinkin restaurant. Very unfortunate.

After lunch we all jumped back in our cars and headed into down town LA. Side note: if you own a soft-top vehicle and drive with the top down, put the dumb thing up before driving, at night, through downtown LA. So, after about and hour and fifteen minutes we arrive at this building called “The Mayan.” This could be one of the coolest places I’ve been in a very long while. We parked the cars and headed in. This is it. This is what I’ve heard about for years. It’s a dance club. (for those of you who know me, you’re thinking, “Katie? In a dance club? That’s just not right.”)
One of my top three favorite speakers is Erwin McManus and he’s the pastor of the church called Mosaic. INCREDIBLE the building it’s self if phenomenal. I can’t even describe it. It reminds me of the Morris in south bend but…cool. I’ll have to take pictures. So, we walk in and since the floor seats are filled, they send us to the second level. Again, this is an old theatre. It has the main floor. Then, between the two floors are the bathrooms and then the upstairs. And all through the building there is incredible detail on every bit of the building looking like a Mayan…temple maybe. I don’t really know. It’s pretty incredible. And as I stand there in the middle of phenomenal worship I found myself thinking, “this is the church I’ve been searching for.” I felt like I fit in here. I’m surrounded by people my age in a building that is so far from a church that it’s almost ironic and I found myself at home. After thinking that I’ve found a new church home, I found myself thinking, “Crap, I’m going to have to sell my car so that I can attend here. I can’t drive a soft-top car in LA. I’ll have to sell my car.” Incredible service. Erwin spoke. Unbelievable. The whole sermon was about living to your fullest. Erwin kept repeating, “What would you do if you weren’t paralyzed by fear?” And at that point so many things in my head started to pan out…

What a phenomenal day. I heard Rick Warren preach about truth in the morning and then learned form Erwin McManus. Are you kidding me? I used to spend hundreds of dollars going to conferences to hear these men speak and now I live within driving distance between both churches. Craziness.

After church, I got into my car…well first, I had to get to my car. Holly and I start walking and I hear footsteps behind us. I kinda glance, trying to keep aware of whats going on around me, and I see this guy following behind us about 15 steps. It raised my attention level but no big deal. We get to our car and he says, “thanks for coming ladies, have a wonderful night.” We got escorted to our car. This is how…different this neighborhood was compared to what I’m used to. How cool.

It was a great day off.