Back in the Summer of '09

May through September of 2009 was one of the most trying times of my life! The last 12 hours of my graduation requirements consisted of completing a 480 hour internship. I was in a car accident in March of that year which kind of put a damper on my internship search. I ended up finding out in the middle of April that I got an internship with the Greeneville Astros. The Astros are the rookie affiliate of the Houston Astros, playing in the Appalachian League. I was so excited about the internship for a few reasons. I love baseball, Greeneville is pretty close to Knoxville, and I was going to make great connections and get a job at the end of the season! In short, by the end of the summer I was over baseball, was so sick of the pavement between Greeneville and Knoxville and I was unemployed!

One of the first things I quickly had to decide was where I was going to live for the summer. Since I would still be paying rent in Knoxville and this was an unpaid internship, getting an apartment in Greeneville was pretty much out of the picture. After talking to one of my best friends in college who was from Greeneville, she told me that she would talk to her parents about staying in their basement apartment for the summer. I was very relieved at this possible option because it would be free and was only about five minutes from good ole’ Pioneer Park. I ended up going up to visit Brittany and her parents and deciding that this was a great option. I am so thankful to the Pilons for being my family that summer!

I knew that I would be one of six interns for the summer, but I wouldn’t get to meet them until the first day of the internship. I was so anxious and excited to meet the people I would spend my summer of baseball with. Our first day basically consisted of getting to know each other, our bosses, and a little about what we would be doing for the summer. The six of us were all very different and came from all over the country – Texas, Kansas, Michigan, Virgina, East Tennessee, and Georgia. One of the interns was a student at Tusculum and was returning for his second year as an intern, two had played college baseball, and the rest of us all had some sort of interest in baseball.

I could write a book, a movie, or a sitcom series about this summer, but I have to remember this is just a blog! I could write about the intern that was obsessed with the mascot costume and took it home at night to “make sure nothing happened to it.” I could write about the intern that bolted and headed home after day one. (I am still certain that he was the smartest one.) Or I could write about the intern that may or may not have gotten a virus on the computers from looking at porn. Instead of writing about them, I’m going to write about two of the best friends I have ever had.

I guess when you spend 15 hours a day for seven days a week over the span of five months, you can either really dislike someone (hate is a strong word) or form friendships like none other. When it comes to Chris and Trey, we definitely have special friendships. I talk to Trey pretty much every day about everything from politics, relationships (one of us goes through a lot of those), baseball, and of course memories of that one summer! I will be participating in Chris’ wedding in September and could not be happier to see him start this new chapter of his life.

There are A LOT of negative things I could say about that summer, but what I like to focus on are the two amazing friendships that came out of it. I hope that we will continue to laugh about that summer for many years to come! Here is a picture of the three of us from a “Reunion Trip” we took to St. Louis:

The Facts of Life - Mine At Least

It has been awhile since I have blogged, and I’ve missed it. People have been asking about why I haven’t been blogging, and my response has been, “life!” My life has been consumed by my classes, work, and just everyday life. After being on a computer all day at work, I feel like the last thing I want to do when I get home is get on my laptop to blog. Basically this blog will just be a catch-up on my life!

I have always had really bad problems with my sinuses/allergies/asthma. I had my tonsils and adenoids out when I was in third grade, allergy testing and shots starting shortly thereafter, and quite a few ER trips for asthma attacks. In the past 6 months, I have felt worse than ever. After taking antibiotics for sinus infections 4 or 5 times, I finally went to see an ENT. My first appointment was a little disheartening. He basically told me that my sinuses were so bad that medicine couldn’t help and that surgery was my only option. He couldn’t even decide what kind of surgery I needed because my sinuses and nasal cavities were too swollen to do a scope. He put me on some medicines to help with the swelling and such for 3 weeks and then wanted me to come back to decide what to do. The medicine did make me feel a little better, but it did whatever it was the doctor wanted because when I left my appointment, I had scheduled my sinus surgery. My surgery is on March 19^th which is the beginning UT’s Spring Break. I won’t have to miss any classes and there shouldn’t be too much going on work-wise because most of the faculty will be gone. I’m nervous and excited about the surgery. I’m just really hoping that it works and I can finally start feeling better and actually get an uninterrupted night’s sleep.

I have been out of town the past few weekends. The first two I was in Atlanta because my dad has been sick and had surgery. He got to come home last week only to be admitted back to the hospital yesterday. He had gastrointestinal surgery so his stomach hasn’t started working again therefore he cannot get any nutrition. They will start giving him TPN (nutrition) through a PICC line tonight and then he will be able to go home with that until his stomach starts working again. Hopefully this means that he actually is finally on the road to recovery. I took this picture of the Atlanta skyline while sitting in traffic on the way to the hospital (notice the Varsity sign):

Last weekend, I headed to the Blue Ridge Mountains. It was David’s birthday and he wanted to go home to see his parents and hang out with his best friends. We didn’t do anything too exciting. I did a little bit of shopping, ate some Mexican food, he went hunting for 12 hours and didn’t kill anything and I did some school work. I did go to a place called the Glass Palette which is on the Downtown Mall in Charlottesville. According to the website, it is an Interactive Glass Art Studio. It took me forever to decide what I was going to make! I finally decided on a picture frame. The only thing that stinks is that I have to wait a couple weeks for it to be fired and fused. I can’t wait to see what the final product looks like! Here is what it looked like when I left it:

I know this post was a little long, but I’m planning/hoping to blog more regularly so I won’t have to do as much “catch-up.”

Sister, Sister

I read that a good blog entry for first time bloggers is to give some random facts about yourself so your followers will know a little about you. Considering I don’t have many “followers” and frankly don’t want them I thought it was kind of silly, but it did get thinking about the “25 Things About Me” Facebook note that circulated a while back. I went back to look at my note and see what 25 things I thought defined myself at the time. They are all still true today, but one thing stuck out at me- four of the facts about me were actually about my sister. My sister is a huge part of my life and is way more than just a sister. She is my best friend and I cannot imagine my life without her. I have some really great friends that I grew up with and friends that I met in college, but nobody gets me like my sister. We are six years apart so she was in college when I was starting middle school and then she moved to Raleigh when I was in high school, but that never got in the way of our relationship. She was always just a phone call, text message, or a $49 AirTran flight away. We get asked all of the time if we are twins and it kind of annoys both of us because we don’t think that we look all that much alike. We have different color hair, completely different shaped faces, and she is a smidge taller than me. That being said, I definitely do think you can tell that we are sisters. We have a lot of the same mannerisms and I think that is attributed to the fact that growing up, I always wanted to be just like her. I wanted to look like her, dress like her, talk like her, be like her, and eat like her. She has helped shaped me into the person I am today. I have looked up to my sister since I was little and I still continue to do so today.

Watch Out World, I'm Blogging!

Well, I have entered the blog world! With some pressure from friends and finally my PR teacher, I decided that it would be a good way to practice my writing and let my friends and family keep up with my life. Don’t expect anything too great because my life is pretty boring. My daily schedule consists of work, class, homework, NCIS, and bad reality TV. Having said that, I did get some exciting news last week. I have been accepted to the Public Relations master’s program at UT. I am taking a prerequisite PR class this semester as well as a graduate level Sport Studies class that will count as an elective for my degree. The program doesn’t officially start until this fall, but I will take a few classes this summer to go ahead and get started. I’m really excited about this program and think (hope) that it will make me more marketable in the job world! I didn’t have too much luck after finishing my undergrad so hopefully my luck will change after adding another degree to the wall. Speaking of adding a degree to the wall, I still need to have my diploma framed!