Much left to be desired.

So I decided to go shopping after lunch, because I was supposed to run out and I’m almost never that way, so I decided to take advantage of a few coupons that I had.

First up, was one of my favorite stores – Express. They had a new scent that I just fell in love with when I smelled it. They have another, called Honor, that is a lot fruitier than this one. I’m big on colognes, if you didn’t know – currently I prefer Burberry Touch, as “metro” as it sounds, it’s a solid summer scent that I’ve used for years in the warmer months – and yeah, I really do dictate my cologne by that. Don’t judge. But I had a coupon  for $15 off $30 and also for $30 of $75, so I saved a ton of money on both of these. On top of that, I had also been looking for a smaller, travel sized cologne for air plans so that worked out.

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You can even check out my old wheelchair in the background. :)
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I am obsessed with Woodwick candles – they crackle as you burn them, as the wood wick burns, so it sounds like your’e by a fire. They are getting harder and harder to find, and the Hallmark in Roanoke actually only had ONE each of three different scents. The one in Christiansburg is much better about variety – but these candles are fantastic.

I’m traveling to Greensboro this week for an Admissions visit, and decided that I wanted to invest in more orange and/or maroon ties. The result is the following. Burlington Coat Factory (and Ross) has GREAT deals on ties.

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And, never being one to runaway from a good sale, I’ve had batteries on my grocery list for the longest time, and found these duracell batteries on sale at Big Lots for only two dollars a pack. I had a coupon for one dollar off any pack, and Big Lots scanned it for me three times so um HELLO super cheap batteries! :)

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Overall, this shopping trip left much to be desired – I didn’t get to the mall until about 5:00 p.m., to realize that it closed at 6 o’clock, not 7 as I had assumed. :( But still got away with some good stuff. Still looking for a good deal on nice messenger bags – Burlington Coat Factory was slacking on selection. Let me know if you guys have any ideas…

The Homeplace.

Today, I had the opportunity to go to The Homeplace with some of the students that I’m in mentoring for the summer through the McNair Scholars Program. If you’ve never heard of The Homeplace, and you are Virginia Tech student, then you probably just weren’t a Virginia Tech student. The Homeplace is an all you can eat style restaurant. It’s called The Homeplace because it literally feels like home because you’re passing around all different kinds of food to everyone, in endless bowls that just keep pumping out from the kitchen.

There are green beans, fried chicken, mashed potatoes, pinto beans, country ham, fresh biscuits, and everything in-between. Today, the fresh vegetable or fruit of the day was apples. It was the first time I ever had them, out of the half dozen or so times that I’ve been to The Homeplace, and they were delicious. I’m the kind person that tries to watch what they eat, but today, I really realized that best part about not always having a watch you eat is being able to in just over 3,000 calories in one meal.

Okay, no, I’m not completely sure that’s how many calories I digested, but it certainly felt like it! My favorite part about going to The Homeplace is the Arnold Palmer that you can make out of the deliciously sweet iced tea and lemonade.

I really enjoyed introducing some of the Hampton Scholars to The Homeplace for the first time. The best part about the entire trip, though, was the views.

The restaurant is actually set on an old dairy farm in Catawba Virginia and I decided to take a couple pictures of the views during and after the meal, and those are below.

I ran into John Dooley and Bo Hart on the way out lunch, and it just goes to show that if you are part of the Hokie community and you’ve never been, then you’re definitely an outcast. I mean that in the nicest way possible. :) So make sure that, even if your’e not a big southern food eater, at least, one time you try to make it out to The Homeplace because you’re definitely missing out if you don’t.

 

This is foreign.

I just woke up at 7:00 AM completely on my own. My dog was laying completely on top of my face and her leg was shaking as if she had Parkinson’s. Now I can’t go back to sleep, and I feel like today is going to be one of those really strange days where abnormal occurrences are constant. We shall see…

Winning Choices.

Winning Choices is a character education program in Montgomery County public schools. If you know anything about my volunteer experiences while a student at Virginia Tech, you would know that I really enjoy volunteering with elementary school-age children and being an example for them in their everyday lives as well as helping them academically.

Yesterday, I got a phone call from Shane, one of the real workhorses behind Actively Caring, and after a discussion with him I’m happy to announce that I have officially accepted an offer to be a keynote speaker during the “Winning Choices” week that is going to happen in the schools in the fall.

The Actively Caring for People program here at Virginia Tech recently received a $20,000 grant from the American Psychological Foundation. This is going to enable us to speak to two schools in the fall into schools in the spring in the local area and hopefully get the program started in the school. Winning Choices is part of the character education week in October and I’ll be able to speak to them, kind of a premature version of the TED talk I’ll be giving to the general public, in November, as well as a teaser of the keynote address I’ll be giving at the Campus Ambassador Conference in November.

People have always told me that I should take an interest in being a motivational speaker and really being able to communicate my spirit in my storage other people, and I’m really excited because everything is falling into place the seems like it’s just the beginning of great things to come.

Not only am I excited about these opportunities because I’m being able to get my name out there, but also because I am  going to be speaking to people who are so interested in what I am as well. I love educating little kids on disabliities, and showing them that just because you have one doesn’t mean that you are any different, in a bad way, than anyone else.  I think that if we can start by educating youth, then the prejudices, judgmental stares, and lack of knowledge that most able-bodied people have about those with disabilities, eventually will go away.

Fingers crossed.