the one where i went to ikea

[disclaimer: if you've been to IKEA, this may bore you] 

I recently made my first trip to IKEA. I have wanted to go to one ever since Tyler Durden's obsession with IKEA sparked my curiosity. How can a store be that great? Is it really like what they show in 500 days of summer??! I MUST FIND OUT.

So find out I did. That first trip was exceedingly overwhelming. The store is deceptively large. And the sunday crowd was unexpected. I could not fathom how people effectively shopped there. I was fortunate enough to have my roommate with me for support. She's part swedish, so that counted for extra. (extra what? i don't know.) When I finally decided what I wanted, we headed to the pickup section, which was IMPOSSIBLY HUGE. THERE IS NO WAY THAT BUILDING HAD BOTH THE STORE AND THE PICKUP WAREHOUSE. no way. 

And there were multiple aisles that were miles long. Well, we successfully navigated this vast expanse of neatly boxed up furniture. I picked up my bed in a box, along with a mattress in a tightly bound roll, and headed to checkout with my cart that kept veering right..right into displays..right into little kids... And let me just say, if it wasn't for the smell of the cinnamon rolls just on the other side of the checkout, I don't know if I would have made it. Of course, I didn't even buy a stupid cinnamon roll because I just wanted to get out there.

BUT I LOVED IT! SO I WENT BACK TWO MORE TIMES!

Fall

It's fall. I'm sure many of you are like me in wondering when this happened. But at the same time, welcoming it with open arms? Yes, fall, you can stay for a while. Whenever a new season rolls around, I say to myself - self, THIS is my favorite season. (okay maybe this happens a little less with winter) But I'm starting to think that fall is my favoriteEST of favorite seasons. The cool air is perfect for runs after work. The leaves are juusst lovely. Fall food, okay squash, is mah favorite. And, of course, college football.
But enjoying all that fall brings will be hard because I have acquired myself a busy schedule. Since I haven't blogged in a while, here is a brief rundown, in words and pictures!, of my life now:

the majority of my first few days back in dc

was spent putting together IKEA furniture

i'm baking my own bread

i have 3 great roommates.

one is a rat.

and i have an awesome internship

in downtown DC

i'm also studying for the LSAT.

but nothing associated with that warrants a picture.

Summertime done...

..come and gone, my oh my

Summer's over. That means a couple things. One - i'm back from camp. Two - i'm updating my blog. Thinking back to the summer and my lack of blogging, one topic I meant to blog about was the title of my blog and where it came from. I reference it on the left hand column, but it's a long essay, and there's a lot more meaning to it for me.

My camp is divided up into multiple sessions, 3 of them being "senior" sessions. Our camp director begins each of these senior sessions with a reading from the foreword of A Sand County Almanac, which is a discussion of the value of wild things. On the final night of each session we have a "final ceremony". During this final ceremony, staff members share poems or songs, we give out "awards" (ex: Commander Salamander or Helter Skelter in a Summer Shelter or King of the Ant Hill ...thank you nature camp), and our director does another reading. This final reading is parts of Loren Eiseley's "The Bird and Machine". Because she has read it at the end of every senior session, I've heard it more times than I can count. No, that's not true, I can probably count the times. But it's really a wonderful essay if you have not read it.

To me it means more than just what the essay provides. It also means camp, which has been my home for many a summer. And it means an end, the end of a session or the end of a summer. Not a bad end, but a reflective one. How has my summer reflected what is written in this essay? This is often not a hard answer to come by, given life at nature camp.

So that is why... it's life I believe in!

[ ps, that there is a bald eagle! ]