Wrapping up

The last few days have been great. My last day at work was the twentieth, and one of my coworkers suggested we go and get sushi with his girlfriend and my boyfriend and then go bowling and drink White Russians after (we're both big fans of the Big Lebowski). The restaurant was amazing. We all shared our food and every single piece I had was amazing. I absolutely have to go back. After that, we went to go bowling and almost all of my coworkers were there! It was a surprise going away party and it was awesome. It was really nice to see how many people turned out. We bowled, we drank, we talked -- it was great.

The next day, I got up at 5 in the morning and headed to Venice! The show was a lot of fun, Nick won all of his classes and paid for his show bill and Bruno's. I can't complain about that. We're here again, but mum's with me this time. Nick won a class today that actually won me a helmet so that was pretty cool! It's one of those new Circle K helmets that people are starting to wear. I have to get fitted for it, since I guess they don't want people to just eBay it.

Nick is pretty bombproof. Bruno thinks he's dumb

Drinking out of his dog bowl! He loves it

I ended up getting a new car. Jerry went out and bought me a new Toyota RAV4 and it drives great. It's getting shipped out to California tomorrow and I was allowed to pack a suitcase with up to 100 lbs in it, so I managed to put all of my textbooks and a couple articles of clothing in there.

2010 Toyota RAV4!

Before we left for the first Venice, I rode Wally and we actually jumped our first jump! He was perfect, didn't care at all. Unfortunately, he flipped out when lunging and tore some skin off of my fingers. 

Ouch!

The middle finger got swollen and won't stop oozing. The skin is slowly taking over the nail. 

My flight leaves for California at 6:50 AM on Thursday, so I need to get ready for that at some point in time and hope my finger is better!

The countdown begins!

It's officially time to start counting down. It's only 11 days until my twentieth birthday (goodbye teenage years!) and 14 days until the big move to California. I've been putting off packing mainly because I'm not packing for a trip, I'm packing to move and that means most of the stuff I'd pack is stuff that I'm actually using day-to-day. I am going to go through all of my clothes though and actually get rid of stuff that I won't be keeping at all.
Dr. Jackie, at work, gave me some awesome books that I'm really excited about. She gave me one on pathology, one radiology book that I love flipping through at work, a couple clinical nutrition books, and then the small animal nerd book. I'm going to miss working with Dr. Jackie quite a bit. My boss said she'd keep me on as seasonally employed, but she mentioned this in passing, so I'll have to see if she was serious about that. It'd be really nice to come back and pick up hours over breaks.
As promised, here are videos of the regional championships in Atlanta! Yeah, they all start the same way, but I promise they're different videos!

First team qualifier
First individual qualifier, second team round
Final team event, and victory gallop!

The victory gallop is definitely one of my favourite parts! The victory gallop in New York, after M&S Finals was too much fun. I showed in the adults, and so a lot of them didn't want pictures afterwards, in front of the banner and with the president of the organization so I very sheepishly approached him, asking for a picture. I wasn't missing out on that opportunity! And then mum, Peggy, and I stood in front of it as well and made Lauren take pictures.
I'm taking off to Venice on Sunday for three days, then coming home for a couple, and then leaving again from the 25-28 (my birthday!). It'll be Bruno's first time in Venice, so hopefully he behaves. Nick loves Venice, so that shouldn't be a problem.
Also, I have three followers now, so hi followers! I'm at 299 page views right now, so hopefully I break that soon!

Home again

It's been awhile since I updated! Week two was a ton of fun, especially with the regional jumper championship. I have some videos on YouTube that I'll have to post later. Florida ended up winning gold in the children's championship and us adults won bronze! I also won sixth in the individual event (that damn first class!) but a Floridian took home gold which was awesome!

Team Florida before our victory gallop! 

Nick sporting his ribbon

And of course we had orange braids to represent Florida 

The drive home was extremely long. It took about 7.5 hours and we only stopped three or four times. I had Taylor for company and the first thing he said was that he wanted to sleep! Absolutely not, on a trip like that, you have to keep the driver awake.

Almost 500 miles in one day

I came home to find a pair of shoes that I'd ordered (yay for new shoes!) and my diploma. Now I just have to get it framed, I guess. I don't really know where I'm going to put it but I don't want to just stuff it away somewhere; although, that'll probably be what happens.

I've been staying pretty busy by  picking up hours on the days that I'm not scheduled at Banfield at my parent's store. It's pretty easy, mindless work. I've been sorting cards, sticking stuff in sleeves, and pulling selected cards out of boxes. It's pretty nice to have an extra source of income too. I've been riding my two year old again, and he's been perfect! He's starting to understand which lead is the correct one, which has been a challenge since he'd only pick up the right lead in the beginning. I know we're a long ways off from worrying about that at all, but it's such a good feeling when something like that comes together! Bruno has been great since we got his left stifle injected as well, I think he was just a little unbalanced. Switching the bit on that horse and getting his stifles injected is the best thing we ever did to him.

Another fun thing I've been working on is teaching myself ASL. I should probably be focusing on regaining fluency in French, but ASL seemed like a fun, new challenge for now. I watch a pretty bad TV show centering around a deaf girl and I noticed myself picking up some basic signs, so I figured I could actually actively learn it. I only know really basic stuff so far: "Hello," "how are you?" "my name is..." "what is your name?" "see you later," and I'm trying to teach myself Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star, so we'll see how that goes!

My dad ended up emailing me and telling me that work is forcing him to take seven weeks of vacation. He's thinking of going to Wales to practice his Welsh, since he didn't think he'd make it to America in time with me leaving and everything. I told him it'd be nice if he tried, but I'd understand otherwise. I haven't seen him since I was about ten, I believe.

Registration for WesternU opened on the first. It's basically just a placeholder, because first years don't get a choice of electives. Unfortunately, I had a hold on my account because they apparently didn't receive the health clearance forms I faxed in ages ago... So I faxed them in again, and emailed them just to be safe. Turns out my doctor ordered the wrong titer for Hep B. Which I got revaccinated for due to the results of the titer. WesternU said I should be able to ask him to just call in the order to the diagnostics lab, but he did so yesterday after they closed and today I got off work after they closed, and tomorrow they're closed for a holiday. I'm hoping to show up at 7 AM, when they open on Friday, so I can get in there before I work at 8:30.