Amanda Raeanne Heinsch - the formative years

So a bit about the aforementioned Heinsch family video Christmas present ..

There is a side of me that wants to burn the video. Burn it so that the world may never know what I was like in my 13th year. Burn it so that no one can see my ungraceful and awkward transition from childhood to young womanhood. Burn it so that humanity can be spared raw footage of my acne and wretched fashion sense.

You see, homeschooling allowed me to miss out on any public documentation of my beastly transformation. I have no school photos, no yearbooks, no school plays or choir performances recorded on videotapes. Nothing...except this.

Sure, there are a few family photographs, but those can easily be dismissed. I mean who doesn't look bad in a photo or two (or three or fourteen)? But when you have a living, breathing, moving representation of who you were in the midst of puberty, well there's just no forgiveness. The video camera doesn't lie.

So with no further adieu, here are 15 observations on my life from 1996 to 2002:

1) When I get to heaven, I need to thank God that cheeks thin out as one ages
2) Hair down to my butt, parted in the middle and quasi-greasy. WHY DIDN'T ANYONE LOOK AT ME AND SEE THE PHYSICAL MAKINGS OF A FUTURE DRUGGIE?! WHY WAS THERE NO INTERVENTION?!
3) Gah! So tall at such a young age!
4) Dear Mandi - why don't you wear shirts that fit? Sincerely, Stacy and Clinton
5) Ugh, my facial features are being eaten BY MY OWN FACE.
6) I had better softball form than I remember...still, the glasses that take up half my already-large face are unforgivable. My high socks are awesome, though.
7) Yep, there I am. Left field. Probably batting 8th. It wasn't that I totally sucked...I was just going through this funk with my swing...oh, and I was afraid of sliding and getting dirty.
8) And BIG SIGH OF RELIEF. We cut to high school graduation and I'm actually starting to pull it together. 9) I open my mouth WAY too much when I laugh.
10) Hey, my makeup was really nice on grad day! And my hair very acceptable. I think I'm very datable!
11) Ugh there's the girl who got the solo that I wanted. *crosses arms*
12) I graduated with high honors! I forgot about that...funny how everything you do in high school means nothing down the road.
13) And there I am walking down the graduation aisle with the tallest boy in class. I remember feeling weird about that...but it turns out it looked ok. And at least I got to walk with a boy, am I right??
14) My close HS friends are all in this!
15) And then we cut to Ryan's basketball game. Note to self: when filming future sporting events, do NOT tape the whole thing.


And there you have it. Adolescence in a nutshell...and the joy of growing into your own.

Grapefruit Confessions

You’re sitting at your desk, eating a perfectly delicious red grapefruit. You don’t normally eat grapefruit. Especially not at work. But 2011 is the year you’ll finally get fit and stay fit, and so all your snacks of CheezIts and chocolate are replaced by apples and green peppers. And grapefruit.

You’ve sliced it in half and set the halves before you. Carefully-placed slits free each fruit section from the rind. Generously-sprinkled Splenda sweetens their tartness. And yet, you laugh to yourself as the red fruit puckers your lips and squints your eyes.

First one half, then other. Piece by piece, you polish it off, knowing full well that co-workers may find you strange for choosing such an odd snack. They eye you from across the open room or walk past your desk, and you can almost hear their inner dialog about you and your grapefruit.

Or maybe, you’re just being paranoid.

Once empty of their ruby fruit, the grapefruit halves sit before you, full of juice. Wonderful, tangy, healthy juice that would be drunk within the minute if you were in the privacy of your own home.

But you aren’t home. You’re at work, in a room with no barriers or blockades or cubicles. And your coworkers might see you.

What do you do? Do you drink the juice or throw it away?

Do you remain true to your quirky self or do you follow social convention?

After a moment of deliberation and a glance over your shoulder, you drink. And it tastes lovely. Once you’ve wiped your mouth, you sit back and think about how excited you are that you have another grapefruit for tomorrow.

And how lucky your coworkers are that you had the office sense to squeeze the juice into a cup instead of sucking it straight out of the fruit’s shell like some kind of crazy person.

Running Fear

The rational and irrational fears I have while running outside:

1. A bug will fly into my mouth (this has not happened, but plenty of bugs have flown into my eye)

2. I will trip and fall in front of someone (this has happened)

3. Dusk will come sooner than anticipated and a guy on a moped will drive onto the grass to talk to me (this has happened)

4. My lung will pop (this has not happened, but it did happen to my friend Kyle whilst he was running uphill)

5. My knees will snap and bend in the opposite direction (this has not happened to anyone I know, but it is horrifying to think about)

6. My keys will fall out of my armband and I won’t realize it (this hasn’t happened, but could)

7. Two children will decide to simultaneously pass me from behind on their bicycles, one on each side (this happened and I was so surprised at seeing the child on my right that I overcompensated and crashed into the child on my left)

8. Children will see me and run into their homes (this has happened)

9. Children will see me and talk to me (this has happened)

10. I will see someone I know (this has happened, both when I’ve been running with my contacts in and when I haven’t).

Thankfully, while running, I have zero fear of dogs. In fact, I welcome them and secretly wish that the ones roaming freely in their yards would follow me so that I could either run for a bit with my hand on their heads (if they’re big enough) (this has happened) or if they’re small enough, stop, pick them up and say, “Let’s find your parents, you poor, poor doggy.” (This has not happened … yet.)

Experimenting with Size 8

Tomorrow I find out if it's possible for a person to go on living without breathing for, say, six hours. In anticipation for this big event I have:

1) Worked out less
2) Eaten more
3) Blogged less
4) Worked more
5) Worried way more

I expect to go into a state of shock approximately one hour into the study. By hour two, I will begin to feel dizzy, accompanied by possible waves of nausea, neurosis and psychosis. By hour two and a half, I will lose all feeling in my feet and hands. This will slowly spread to my legs and arms and by hour four, I will, unbeknownst to those around me, move in and out of consciousness. At a quarter past hour four I will enter a preliminary stage of nirvana, and by hour five I will be frolicking in fields of wildflowers and dancing with sea lions. Only to come back to reality once hour six hits and my dress is unzipped.

Yes. Tomorrow is Ashlee's wedding, and my dress is way way way too tight.

A Tennis Player's Bane

Me: I think I want to be Maria Sharapova.
Tad: The tennis player?
Me: Yeah.
Tad: She's like a stick.
Me: A beastly stick.
Tad: Yeah, in one arm.

Ba-da pshhh*

*the sound drums make when someone makes a joke.

His Airness

I had a perfectly awesome and witty post ready, but I left it at work. Literally. I wrote it up quickly and was going to post it when I ate my lunch .... but then I didn't. And then I left work. And now it's on my work laptop and I don't feel like recreating it.

So, what's a girl to talk about on the fly?

Let's take a walk down memory lane. Prepare to cover your eyes:

And they wonder why I really really really hate chubby cheeks?

The back reads:
Mandi - July 16, 1993
At Danny Z___'s Birthday
Party, Hanover Park, IL

I still don't know how they managed to get MJ out there in the prime of his career, but what can I say? The guy has a big heart.

P.s. Thanks, Dad, for sending me this one!

Wedding the Maiden from the Fields

Once upon a time in the land of Sir Wayne's Fort, there lived a lonely boy named Andrew. Every Thursday evening at approximately 9:30pm, this boy was visited by the matchmaking gypsy, Amonda. It was during one of these visits that this foreseer took pity upon the boy and said, "It is not good for Andrew to be alone. He shall have a girlfriend."

Amonda told the boy of a fair maiden with golden hair who lived in the fields. Her name was Ashlee with Two "e's".

At first the boy seemed to question Amonda's vision, but after a zillion fortnights of poking and prodding, and a number of sessions in which the constellation, Cassiopeia, was sought for counsel, the boy stormed to the fields to rescue fair Ashlee with Two "e's" from her life in the middle of nowhere.

Three full moons later (or however long eight months is), the maiden agreed to be his.

The pair will be wed in January. Festivities to follow.

Congratulations, Ashlee and Andrew!
And now, a few funny photos . . .

Stiff fingers:

And I can only assume she's trying to be a dolphin in this photo . . . or dead weight:

But we like this one as long as the smooching is minimal (no, we are not jealous):

And we definitely like this one:

So, there you have it. My reason to lose weight . . . a bridesmaid dress!!

*Photos courtesy of Ashlee's facebook page . . . because there are a zillion there.

Staying Above the Yellow Line

Here is an unflattering photo of me in a shirt I haven't worn in public since circa 2007. This is because I became too skinny for the shirt. Now, as the picture clearly shows, the shirt has shrunk.

Or, I have grown.

In a conversation with my sister, we joked that I was the perfect candidate for a commercial:

"After getting married, I just lost motivation. I gained weight and got to the point where no matter what I did, I wasn't capable of summoning the strength to work it off."

The REAL joke, however, was that I've only been married 3.5 months. 3.5 months and I'm already a walking, talking infomercial. Apparently, I fall off the wagon hard and fast.

But there's good news! I once again have a reason to loose weight. But it's top secret.

(More info coming later . . .)

Look! It's Shredder!

As I limped across the parking lot toward Britton (work) today, I had a sudden and terrifying realization:

Should one of my co-workers haphazardly careen into the parking lot, I would be a goner.

Should zombies, Terminators, or Uruk-hai appear in the distance, there would be nothing I could do. I would be dead. I would be so dead.

I'm on day 3 of Jillian Michaels' 30 Day Shred, and the suffering is immeasurable. My knees give out mid-stride, my arms shake under the sheer weight of a laptop case, and my ability to maintain forward motion is embarassingly unreliable. Why, only last night, Tad had to physically help me off the couch because I was incapable of standing up on my own. My legs and arms simply would not oblige.

So, I'm a sitting duck--a perfect target for any of the aforementioned monsters. I am unable to save myself from the throes of terror because I am unable to move. Yes, that's right. UNABLE TO MOVE.

So until my muscles kick in and resume their position of allowing me to walk without looking like an idiot, I'll leave you with a quasi-appropriate quote from John Conner . . . yet the only thing I could think of as I hobbled across the parking lot and glanced over my shoulder for any sign of red eyes or squealing tires:

"We are dead! WE ARE ALL DEAD!!"

The Point at Which My Former Fat Self Takes Over

"Welcome to Penn Station, can I help you?"

Instantaneously, I smiled. "Yes, I'd like a small Italian no tomato and a small fry."
Absolute heaven.

"And you, sir?" she asked Tad.

"A medium club, no tomato."

"Any fries with that?"

"Nope."

What? No fries? This could only mean one thing.

"Why didn't you order any fries?" I asked as we made our way to the register, my voice sharp.

"I'll just have some of yours," he said.

My absolute heaven disappeared. My former fat self took over.

"Some of mine?" I snapped.

"Yeah, just a little bit."

"I specifically ordered a small sandwich so that I could have the entire order of fries to myself," I said through clenched teeth.

"I'm only going to have a little bit, really. I don't want that many."

"But a little bit always turns into half." My tone was accusatory, my intent was to hurt. There was no way I was sharing my fries. MY fries. MY FRIES.

"No, not this time," he tried. "I only want a few."

But I was unreasonable. "A few? Like how many?"

"Just a few."

"How many?"

"I don't know. . . like five."

"Five?"

"Yeah. Five."

I thought about it, my inner fat beast subsiding.

"Okay, then."

And I acutely watched as he selected five fries out of my basket.