Are you smarter than a junior higher?

I found a link to The Blog Readability Test on someone else's blog a moment ago and with fear and trembling I tried it out. My score:

At least it wasn't elementary level like his. I guess I need to push myself to sound like I have a B.A.

Sometimes there are things I just can't change...

... and that frustrates me more than anything in the world. If you give me a puzzle I will sit and work at it for hours if I feel like I'm making any kind of progress, and it is hard to pull myself away because I want to find the solution. I get obsessive. I want to be in the field of psychology because I want to help other people solve their problems. The only thing is, I don't know how to solve my own. I'm realizing more and more that people are mysterious and there are some things about the way we work and think and emote that are unexplainable. At least for me. I know psychologists are doing studies all the time to find out patterns of how people work, but there isn't one theory that explains everything about the human psyche. There isn't even a combination that can! All that is to say I feel frustrated, anxious and angry right now and I don't know what to do about it.

Car Trouble?

This past weekend I was looking forward to going to a wedding in Santa Barbara for a number of reasons. First of all, it's Santa Barbara and I haven't been to the beach in years. Second of all, I love a good road trip with friends. My sister, friend Heather, and I left Friday evening in a van belonging to Heather's mom. We were about 2 1/2 hours into our trip when the acceleration began feeling irregular. I was behind the wheel at this point. We pulled over on the side of I-5 in the middle of Nowhere, CA and discovered that the car was not going to move anywhere. For the next 2 1/2 hours we sat in the van waiting for a tow truck to find us while semis driving by gently rocked us. Turns out we weren't really sure where we were, and after talking to a rude emergency dispatcher (I called 911 for the first time in my life) and 3 or 4 tow truck companies we were found and taken to the nearest hotel. The town and the next day is another story that maybe my sister will tell. As for my luck with cars, there is more to the story. Last night, the dash of my car started to go berserk. Then this morning I started it and it was acting funny again. I couldn't get it to shift so I turned it off to try again only to find that the engine wasn't firing up at all, but my windshield wipers were moving feebly even though they weren't on. I called my dad and told him about my possessed car. Of course, after I had it towed out to his shop I learned that it only needed a new alternator and I was on the road again before noon. The moral of the story is if for some reason you are thinking of letting me drive your car, hold on to those keys!

As a side note, according to iTunes the theme song for today is "Company Car". Yeah, I know.

Musical Answers

Sometimes I play the iTunes game. This is how you play:

1) Set your iTunes library on shuffle
2) Make a statement like "My mom's theme song" or ask a question like "What's the weather going to be like today?"
3) Hit play and see what song comes up. That song is the theme song or answer to your question and should be interpreted immediately.

You can ask iTunes anything and get all kinds of answers. This morning I started with what I always start with: theme song for the day. The title that popped up was "Ball of Confusion (That's What the World is Today)". That doesn't sound promising. Usually the answers aren't that clear or obvious, but they are always fun. I'll let you know how it goes today.

Average

Whenever I get sick I think, "This is the worst kind of sickness. I feel like I can't do anything!" The thing is, every sickness can't be the worst. It's the concept of average. For instance, most people think they are above average in appearance. That just can't be the case. So most likely you're average. It's okay, we can be average together. Anyway, I spent the first 4 days of November at home feeling slightly nauseous. It's over now. Today I went to work and life went back to normal.