Amanda, your relationship destiny is to Find the One That Got Away

Sighing, swooning, daydreaming. Whether you've already met your match or are still looking, you know that your love story is about coming together with your one and only. A true lover like you knows that luck, chance, fortune — whatever you want to call it — has a funny way of toying with people's hearts. And you don't mind the ride. After all, isn't the element of surprise part of the fun?.. br-->

A free spirit, you try not to live in the past or focus all your attention on the future. You know that it's most important to enjoy every moment, whether or not Mr. Right happens to be there. A hopeful romantic, you know love will find you when it's time. That's amore!

As I lay me down to sleep my restless mind begins to speak, racing through the twists and turns the verdict is what motive earns.

~A

ROAD TRIP HELL

We (as in my cousin Kayla and I) left Medford on Thursday about 7pm which was way later than I wanted to leave but I had a lot of things to do and didnt really think they would take that long. (Apparently they did) We drove to Stockton and then decided to get a hotel because my cousin was trying to keep her eyelids open with toothpicks (boy did she look pretty) She didnt want to fall asleep while I was driving because she thought that I might do the same. I wasnt really worried that I would fall asleep considering we both had about 5 caffeine pills and coupla Rockstars....(later we discovered that a caffeine pill is only equal to one cup of coffee!!) So we get a hotel and sleep for about 5 hours (ya that caffeine and Rockstars didnt work obviously) We left the hotel Friday morning at 7am and had breakfast at Denny's (that is my most favorite place for breakfast). We left Denny's at about 9 and we were on our way. I think that it was the most beautiful scenery we had ever seen..rolling hills of dirt and dry grass on one side and flatland as far as the eye can see on the other ....I call the rolling hills mowhawk hills because they had fences on them that looked like they had mowhawks  (original I know) We got to Los Angeles about 3pm and the gas light comes on...so we have about 30 miles to go before we run out! The traffic there was so bad!!!!! It was about 5 miles an hour for oh I dont know.... Forever!!!!  It was so tiring, especially since my car is a 5 speed. My toes went numb!!!!!   Anyway we are about to run out of gas... so we decide that we need to get off the freeway and get gas. The only problem with that is that it's 4 lanes of wall to wall traffic and people in Cali suck!! But...if you say anything you will probably get a cap in your ass...its a sure thing.
So getting over to the other side of the freeway is impossible unless you just force your way in..which we eventually learned to do. We finally get over to the other side of the freaking freeway and relieved that we are going to be able to get gas we discover that we have exited the freeway into Hong Freaking Kong, Little Tokyo, China Town. I am not sure exactly where we were at there were no distinguishing signs...in English anyway!  It really would have been a cool town if we had been there under different circumstances we probably would have enjoyed it but ....we were almost out of gas and there was not a single gas station in site. We were way downtown where they have pedestrian crossing lights...yes pedestrian crossing lights lol ...like a stoplight but more like in the middle of the street and at intersections. It was crazy! At one point we passed a car wash sign that said HSAW RAC, I think they were trying to confuse us but we knew...we are not totally dumb blondes.  I was half expecting Godzilla to show up. Then out of sheer desperation and fear we asked this guy where the gas stations were and he laughs and says that he cant think of one around here but tells us to go to seventh street. Hoping that 7th street was gas station street you know like a whole street of gas stations we go down 7th street. There was no gas station on seventh street...there were a bazillion oriental people who kept staring at us like we didnt know we were from out of town and god knows what else but not one SINGLE gas station!!!!!!!!!   
So I say screw it and decide to turn down some street in an attempt to get out of the downtown area. Oh we got out of the downtown area all right and we ended up in East Los Angeles!!!! In case you dont know and mind you..we didnt know either but East Los Angeles is like Compton....If you dont know about Compton then lets just say gangs, drugs, freaky people....not a good place to be in. The good news is (yes there is good news)  we found a gas station. We pulled in and got gas and directions to get back on I5, back to the wall to wall 5mph traffic that seemed to go on FOREVER!!! As it turns out Oceanside is only about an hour from Los Angeles. So we finally get there and its cooler and prettier than I thought.  I wish I could say that was end of our problems...but I cant. I had mapquested the trip from Medford to my sisters address..little did I know...she had moved 2 months prior to this trip. so here we are relieved that we finally are there and we get out and try to call my sister, but she is not answering her phone. My cousins phone was almost dead ...(reasons for the cell phone battery being almost dead are non descript to protect the innocent) and we dont know what apartment she lives in (none there) SO... we go into the renting office and see if they can tell us....guess what they tell us? LOL no one by that last name has an apartment here....so we try to call my parents and thats when my dad informs me that we are at the wrong address..THEN....THE PHONE DIES!!! There we sit..no phone, no plug in to charge it, wrong address in the middle of some freaking place we have no idea how to get around!! We had seen some stores a couple miles back where we came in and decided to go there to see if we could find a pay phone to try and call my sister again....APPARENTLY THEY DONT HAVE PAY PHONES IN THAT AREA but there is a bed store. I bet you are thinking what good is a bed store to us...well we pulled in and went inside and took a nap. Just kidding. I took my cousins phone and the charger and went in to see if I could plug it in and use it. The guy was very nice and said no problem. He even let me use a pen and some paper. (my impression of California is that people are jerks which is 99% true. But there are some nice ones!) He laughed at the situation when I explained it too..and he didnt even know what or where Oregon was. Ha HAAAAA..... I plugged the phone in and called my parents and my mom gave me the correct address which was in a place called Fallbrook about 20 minutes from where were sitting. This is fabulous! I tried to call my sister again but no answer. My mom said that they were at a doctors appointment for the new baby. Great....so I went back to the car to get my laptop out thinkin I could try and mapquest the route from the bed store to Fallbrook to my sisters house. Figuring I could just pull up some WiFi signal and check it out....well sure enough there was about 14 satellites that I picked up and not one single freaking one could be used. Why? Because in the age of technology we are now able to lock our internet signal!!! Our only re-course now was to find a gas station (not this again!) to get a map and hopefully some directions. We took off of course, in the wrong direction not even anywhere close to a gas station either. Just as we had given up all hope my sisters husband calls us....(keep in mind we had about 2 mins of talk time left on the battery) he told us get back on the 78 East and we would meet him at a coffee shop that it ran into, in a town called Bonnville..(since i never ran into this town and we never saw a single sign for it I am not sure that is the correct spelling ) anyway...we had a tiny bit of battery left so we called to confirm that we were going in the correct direction.."yep you are they say"...(we still havent ran into a coffee shop or a town called Bonnville) then we called them one more time and told them that we are passing a sign for San Marcos....."um" they said....."you are going the wrong way" (insert several cuss words here). This is super fabulous! So amidst the swearing and yelling we got off on the next exit and then got back on the 78 west. We went all the way down this and it does end at a small town of which we never seen a sign for so I couldnt tell you where we were. Just that we were on vista and coast highway at a donut shop that was closed. The good news was that there was a pay phone. I guess in California the pay phone business is slow because its only 30 cents for 15 minutes. I had 4 quarters so I put two in and I dialed the number including the area code...I waited to hear it ring but all I heard was something about not dialing the area code ..I tried to get my change back but nope...(so thats how they make their money) I put the other two quaters I had in there and dialed the number without the area code this time and unbelievably..IT RANG! You thought I was going to say it ate the other two quarters too huh! Well, while that would go with the rest of the story it simply is not the case.   So I called my sister and told her where we were and they meet us there. Come to find out her husband thought or meant to tell us that we needed to get on the 76 not the 78....now thats fabulous! We follow them to Camp Pendleton. He decided to go through base so we pulled up and they let us through but they told him that I would have to get a pass just in case I get pulled over on base and they needed my license, registration and insurance. Having only one out of three of those available with me posed a problem. Apparently I had forgotten my insurance card and somehow my registration grew legs and walked right out of the jockey box. Luckily (and that is not a word used loosely in this) my sisters husband was able to talk the lance coporal into lettting us just pass. I know you are wondering what would have happened if he hadnt..we would have had to go all the way back and through some horrible Los Angeles style traffic!!!  Finally we got to my sisters house. What should have been a twelve hour drive turned out to be 24 hours. If we dont count the 5 hours sleeping in the hotel, breakfast about an hour the next morning, the hour lost in Hong Freaking Kong, and the hour we spent trying to get ahold of my sister the trip actually took us 16 hours (YOU LIE MAPQUEST)!!!!

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Nothing is so bad there cant be good to the ones who love you have only one choice to make your way into the world is as empty as you want it to be is an existence of some proportion at least an understanding can be accomplished if needed something can take the place of nothing is so bad there cant be good.

There is no end in this game of pretend,

How false pretense does allure

To encounter with doubt as it all plays out,

Just what one soul can endure.

Deception in truth, such a lie such a ruse,

As beautiful gold for a fool.

Genuine for a fact? Or just the perfect act,

Ever so shining a jewel.   ~ALM