The Adventures of Kinky Reggae: A Vagabond for Beauty

I'm rereading the Twilight series again. I think I've lost count of how many times I've read these books. It's more than a little embarrassing. There are so many problems with these books; I won't even try to defend them. (Especially not Breaking Dawn. I don't plan on rereading that one.) But I recently read this post by The Bloggess and decided I would not feel guilty about loving what I love. Every time I start rereading Twilight, I can't put it down. I get so caught up in the story. My only explanation is that Bella is so relatable. (For me, at least.) The insecure girl who falls down a lot and can't believe the super hot, unattainable guy would actually like her... I think it also makes me nostalgic for high school. When Bella's sitting next to Edward in biology, I reminisce about sitting next to Brad in biology. I wasn't good at science, anyway, and he made it hard to concentrate. He was such a bad boy (complete with long hair),

I had a panic attack on Friday. It was a relatively mild one... It felt more like a baby elephant was sitting on my chest rather than its mother. Lately, I've been in a bit of a funk where I hate the world and the world hates me. I was so glad to be getting out of town that day. I knew some time alone in a beautiful place would help. I felt better as I got off the highway and took the winding dirt road through Arivaca. The sunset was divine, and I had to be careful not to drive off a cliff as I took in the scenery. My soundtrack was the Inside Llewyn Davis album. Perfection. I arrived at the only campground in the area just as it became dark. Normally I would prefer dispersed camping, but being just a few miles away from the border, it seemed wise to stay near other people. I had dinner, set up my bed, and got comfortable. I was reading a good book on my Kindle, listening to Bon Iver, and gazing at the stars. I was in my zen place. And then I noticed that the ground was feeli

When I talk to friends I haven't talked to in a while, they want to know what's happening with Bernie.  I don't know. He doesn't know. Some of my friends are wondering why it's so hard for me to just be done with him. Here is a list of things I love about Bernie: His love of terrible pop culture (He has a crush on Kelly Ripa.) His devotion to his family. His knowledge of the outdoors. I’ve never met anyone who knows so much. He can identify every plant, animal, rock formation, etc. He picks up trash we find when we’re hiking His Jeopardy skillz (Is he an idiot savant?) He takes his time and wants to see everything while traveling. (Ok, actually, this one makes me crazy. But it’s how we see the best stuff. Like when he found those petroglyphs. Or when he had me pull over and came back with a handful of raspberries right off the bush.) His artistic abilities. The way he created a little symbol for us when we’re adding to a pla

My blog has mainly turned into a place for me to document my adventures, but today I feel like writing about my love life. I figure I should mention it at least occasionally, or else change the name of my blog. (Maybe I should do that anyway, since no one really calls me Blueberry anymore…) Bernie and I have been on and off for a year now. Whenever we’re “off,” I feel the need to date someone else to prove that I can be happy without him. I am always wrong. Every other date I go on just makes me wish I was with him. But this post will not be about Bernie. This is about Darrell. I met Darrell during an “off” phase with Bernie a few months ago. We met online and had a slightly awkward first date at Cibo. I am shy in large groups, but I usually do well with one-on-one conversations. This was not the case on our date. We struggled to find things to talk about. However, he wanted to see me again, and I believe it’s good to always give it a second date. (Unless, of course,

This canyon was fabulous for so many reasons. I went with my friend Sia, who previously was just a friend of a friend. We are at about the same ability level.   As we planned for the two rappels, Sia said, “I know how to do the clove hitch thingy” and I said, “I know how to set up a double strand rappel” so we figured between the two of us, we’d be able to handle it. It also helped that Sia had done the canyon before, so she knew the entry and exit. We had such a great time because usually, we are with bigger groups where everyone knows more than us and just kind of does everything for us. It was nice to problem-solve and make our own mistakes. I think the funniest was on the first rappel, when I started going down and realized the rope was taking me right into the deepest part of the pool and I’d be swimming. “This is happening! This is happening!” I yelled as I swam as fast as I could through the icy water. We laughed and laughed. We thought we’d only be wadi

I was looking forward to this day with Amanda for a long time!! One of my favorite things to do on weekends is just get in my car and explore. There is just so much to see in this state! On Saturday, Amanda and I took at little trip down to Tucson. Our first stop was Tucumcacori National Historic Site, a mission that was built in the early 1700's by the Spanish. It was fun to explore a site so old, and this was probably not somewhere I would have gone if it hadn't been in my Passport to the National Parks. The highlight of this stop was definitely the flower making booth. This adorable elderly Mexican lady makes crepe paper flowers. She tried to teach us, but we failed miserably. She kept saying, "It's easy, it's easy," and we felt so stupid. We finally just purchased flowers she had made. Amanda is on a mission to become fluent in Spanish, and this was great practice for her. She and this lady conversed quite a bit on a wide variety of topics.

I was diagnosed with asthma in high school. Honestly, I didn't take it seriously at all because I was smoking (which I didn't tell my doctor). I had a few asthma attacks, but it went away when I stopped smoking, so I kind of forgot about it. I've been sick for over two weeks now, and one of my symptoms has been difficulty breathing. I finally saw a doctor the other day who says that I've had asthma this whole time, and just kept it under control. This actually kind of makes sense. When I run (or I should say, jog slowly), I have this thing where I have to go at a pace where I can breathe through my nose. My runner friends have told me this is weird, and my response is that I have to keep my breathing under control. Perhaps this is related to the asthma? Anyway, the doctor gave me an inhaler, which made an immediate difference. She also gave me one of those peak flow things to measure my breathing. Apparently, "normal" is 450. I was blowing a 310. The inh