3. drink only water (for the entire week)

whoa. i actually did this. *gets cocky*

okay, well, sort of. *hangs head* i drank only water all week with the exception of one cup of cranberry juice and one cup of orange juice, all together. how awesome is that? i have never done that before.

i definitely thought i was going to die. i love juice too much! much more than the average person, i'm sure. which is good, but it's actually bad, too.

monday, i kinda forgot that i was doing the only water diet, and jesse bought me something spicy (jamaican jerk chicken) for lunch...as we all know water does absolutely nothing for a spicy mouth. that food actually made my head feel like it was going to explode.

...but it was so good. i'd tolerate that spice all over again, just to have that jerk chicken from this awesome place in northwest dc.

so i had a couple sips of jesse's tea, just to knock out the spice that was taking over my life for about 5 minutes.

the orange juice. my favorite drink in the entire world, honestly. i drank less than 6 oz of it on wednesday morning because i'd just been in a car accident and went to breakfast for some comfort. it was a not so awesome morning, and i had to call out of work (which i hated) to handle claims and blah blah blah.

another segue--the car accident. i was in shoulder to shoulder, bumper to bumper, rush hour traffic on i-495 on wednesday morning. this...woman (i had a few other words in mind, but i'll leave those to your imagination)...drives onto the shoulder, only to return to the lane by sideswiping my car.

she was originally driving behind me in the far left lane. i put my signal on so i can attempt to get into the next right lane, because it seemed like the "fast lane" was not moving at all. i never got a chance to get over because none of the cars driving in that lane would allow me to do so. so i take my foot off the brake and start to creep up a bit, when pow! dumb ass the lady strikes my car on the front driver's side.

now, being the hot headed cynic that i am, my first reaction was to stare at her car as if to say "are you kidding me?" she puts her car in park, gets out, looks at my damage, looks at hers, then yells, "oh okay!" um, no ma'am! pull over. thanks.

when i got out of the car and looked at my damage, this is how the conversation went:

me: ma'am. are you serious right now?

her: what? i thought you were getting over.

me: ma'am. really? did i ever leave the lane? no. what in the world were you doing on the shoulder?! it's not a passing lane!

her: well you had your blinker on--

me: --ma'am, because that's what people use to let other people know that they are trying to yield into the next lane. it doesn't magically place my car in the next lane!

her: well didn't you get back over?

me: *hardest sigh ever* ma'am, that would insinuate that i left the lane, which i never did, which is why you found yourself on the shoulder. who does that, ma'am?! are you kidding me?

her: oh. well, i'm sorry.

me: yeah are you, ma'am? are you serious right now?

*pause*

me: should i call the police? is that what would help you decide what to do next?

her: no! it's my fault, we can exchange insurances.

me: *sigh* fine.

so i spared her, because i'm guessing she didn't want a couple of tickets and fines for being in the shoulder and using it as a passing lane, especially during rush hour traffic.

it gets even better. i called her insurance company about 4 or 5 hours after the accident, just to give her a chance to call them first and file the claim. she never called and they had no idea an accident had occurred. so i had to file the claim with the rep, talk to the claims adjustor, and the appraiser, all before she'd even called them. now the adjustor's called her at least 5 times and she's returned the call and left a message once, and he hasn't spoken to her live once.

mind you, i've already had the car appraised for damages. while they are menial, i still want them repaired because i'm still considering trading in my car in about a year or so.

so that's why i drank orange juice. i also had a ny strip steak with eggs and home fries that morning, too. with biscuits. it felt so good.

then friday, i had a glass of cranberry juice, accompanied by water, at dinner with my twin, keturah (i'll talk more about her in another post).

we went to an italian restaurant called brio. i highly recommend it for the atmosphere and of course, the food! everything on the menu looks amazing, and the prices aren't too bad, either. we got appetizers, entrees, and desserts for around $60.

so, i purged my entire week, just by telling you what i drank. how exciting.

are you trying out the 52 in 52 challenge? if you've completed some of your adventures, what has been your favorite one so far?

book update: the help

so i got a chance to finish reading the help over the weekend.

hands down, the book is so much better than the movie--and i loved the movie. it's a lot more detailed and has more exciting moments than the movie did.

i have a few favorite parts in the book, but the one that still sticks with me is when skeeter's mom said, "don't let him cheapen you."

leading up to that, skeeter was dating stuart, the local senator's son. he'd just gotten out of a relationship where his ex-fiance cheated on him and then moved to california (from mississippi). they'd been dating a few months when his parents invited skeeter and her parents to the house for dinner. it didn't go all that well because stuart's mom talked about patricia (stuart's ex) the entire evening, directly and indirectly, making it awkward.

afterward, skeeter told stuart to go find himself (paraphrasing) and that she knew he still had feelings for patricia. she didn't hear from him for a while, considering they'd been seeing each other twice a week for months at this point.

out of the blue, stuart calls skeeter. after the phone conversation, that's when her mother (mrs. phelan) says, "don't let him cheapen you."

in a nutshell, it meant that she deserved better from someone who claimed to love her. she's not a "piece" and she shouldn't make herself available just because he is. also, he doesn't get to have his cake and eat it, too, and that he needed to choose where he was going to place his efforts because skeeter didn't need to settle.

all of this coming from her mother, was really amazing. mrs. phelan rode skeeter about shoes, accessories, her height, her hair, her clothes, the fact that she smoked cigarettes, the fact that she wasn't ready to get married...pretty much everything. and there was always a negative connotation to anything she said to skeeter. so to hear her build skeeter up, telling her that she could do better, was really touching.

there are so many great things about this book, especially the fact that the book help was published (within the book), and exceeded the publishing company's expectations so much, that they printed a second run of 5,000 copies. pretty awesome.

so, i would highly recommend the book! and the movie!

i also saw columbiana over the weekend. amazing.

52. write a [good] haiku

feeling low today?
talk to a good friend who cares.
never give up hope.
**
i wrote this saturday after a very emotional friday night. i was feeling a bit depressed about a few things going on lately, and out of the blue, a very close friend checked on me and i was able to talk to her about some things. to have a girl friend who can relate to what you're dealing with, not judge you, and not make you feel crazy for feeling the way you do, or even more depressed, is truly a blessing.

today i am feeling so much better about life...i feel like i have a new outlook on life and i'm ready to start working on some lifelong goals.

mood: extremely grateful and humbled.