Busy Busy Busy!

Wow -- my "funemployment" has certainly been busy the last few weeks! I swear I'll officially kick off my job search soon! 😅

Anyway, here's what I've been up to lately.

Easter

I celebrated Easter with my family in Dayton, Ohio about 2 weeks ago.

While I was in town, we visited a bookstore that my parents heard about called Rabbit Hole Books. Amazingly, every book in this bookstore was only $1.00!!! I definitely want to check this place out again in a few months!

While I was there, I also learned that Dayton was in the path of totality for the upcoming 2024 Solar Eclipse. Unfortunately, I needed to be back in DC during the upcoming week. Still, this was probably the best opportunity to experience a total eclipse that I would ever have; therefore, I purchased some (expensive!) tickets to return the Dayton the following weekend.

Karaoke Finals

Finals for District Karaoke were on Thursday, April 4th. Our team was themed around Taylor Swift; yet, shamefully, we had barely performed any of her songs throughout the entire season. So, we set out to remedy this during finals!

During Round 1, one of our team members performed "I Knew You were Trouble" while singing to another team member (who was dressed up as a gigantic martini 🍸).

We performed "Shake It Off" during Round 2. What were we shaking off? Why, zombies, of course! 🧟

Finally, we performed "Blank Space" during Round 3. This time, our gimmick was that we were advertising our brilliant multi-level marketing company called "My Lovely Makeup" (MLM). If people "signed their name" to our MLM Recruitment Form, then they were allowed to obligated to come on stage and perform with us!

Did we come in 1st place? No... but we did come in the highest place! 🥉

Little Shop of Horrors

Two days later, our Karaoke Team and a few other friends went to see "Little Shop of Horrors" at Ford's Theatre. Lawrence Redmond really stole the show with his performance as Mr. Mushnik!

Eclipse

The next day, I hopped onto a plane back to Dayton to catch the Eclipse!

Was it a life-changing experience? Um... probably not. Still, it was certainly an interesting experience that really can't be captured on video!

During the hour leading up to the eclipse, you could barely tell that anything was different. Roughly 15 minutes before the eclipse, I got the sense that a thunderstorm was on the way. I could tell that the temperature was dropping a little, and it seemed a little darker than usual. Meanwhile, our solar eclipse glasses showed that the sun was already mostly covered!

Suddenly, it started to get dark outside very rapidly. Within about 1 minute, it went from looking like a cloudy day to a cloudy night, and all of the birds stopped chirping. I accidentally glanced towards the sun as I removed my solar eclipse glasses, and OH MY GOD A GIGANTIC SNAKE ATE THE SUN!!!!

Seriously, though: the glance that I caught of the Eclipse was one of the strangest things I've ever seen in my life. It looked like a gigantic spirit was hovering in the sky!

Happy Sad Feet

When I first got back to DC, my left foot was a little sore. A day or two later, it started feeling numb, and occasionally it would feel extremely hot. (But weirdly, it didn't feel like it was burning. It was just hot! 🥵)

I spent a good chunk of the next week going to various medical appointments to figure out what the heck was going on. I haven't really learned anything new so far, but I at least had my legs re-measured. So, perhaps we'll find that I need to adjust the modifications to my shoes. 🤷‍♂️

Pittsburgh

As if that wasn't enough, now I'm on an Amtrak to Pittsburgh! 🚂

Or at least, I'm on a train going in that general direction. I'm actually traveling to a town near Pittsburgh to attend a surprise party for one of my friends, so 🤫

Sure, it's a loooong train ride, but this is really the first opportunity I've had to sit down and work in about 3 weeks! 😅