Girls Weekend, Another "W", a Job, and Macklemore!!

Last weekend I hopped on the Greyhound and headed for Ellensburg, Washington. The Katz family have a "cabin" (really more of a house) in Teanaway- just outside of Cle Elum, WA. The nearest "bus stop" (which consists of a plastic shed a bit bigger than we have in our backyard with a Greyhound sticker on it located on the side of a gas station convenience store) was in Ellensburg, so there mom was waiting in the Trailblazer to collect her smiley cargo.

Obligatory Greyhound pic

"Knock knock, who's
there? Orange...Orange
ya glad I didn't say a
person?"

The bus experience was truly a new one for me. I hopped on with pillow, blankey, and backpack in hand. It was quite an eclectic group. The first seat opposite the driver was open and I took it gladly. I sat next to an orange the whole way there. He was there when I arrived and I just didn't feel right moving him, after all he wasn't mine. Oddly enough I sort of enjoyed his presence. He gave the black pleather seat a nice orange accent. (I stress "pleather" because once many years ago my brother Matt tried to convince us that the bus he had seen driving by as we sat in Subway housed seats made of real leather. We'll never let him live that one down.)
The scenery left much to be desired, but with iPod plugged in and head rested on my pillow (just realized I haven't washed it since I got back... questionable), I was quite content.
The first stop we made was at a gas station near Moses Lake. Having never rode Greyhound, I was under the impression that we were making a potty-break for all on the bus to smoke a cig and buy some chex mix. Unbeknownst to me, it was an official "stop" which I didn't realize until we pulled up to our next stop at the gas station in Cle Elum and I realized "I best get off because those Moses-Lake-bound people on the bus probably did get off at that last gas station..."

To note: brow, best friend, "cabin"

Anyway mom picked me up and she and I went to Mangos salon (highly recommended) in Ellensburg and got my eyebrows waxed, then went to Safeway and picked up ingredients for a fajita fiesta, and then headed toward Teanaway. The minute we pulled up to the cabin, the snow started to fall and about 2 inches accumulated that night. It was so beautiful! We made dinner, watched Envictus (also highly recommended) and went to bed. Lillerz and I stayed up and had some much needed girl talk. It was so nice to see her! We practically do see each other every day (via Skype) but this was much better.
By the time she and I rolled out of bed, the moms were out hiking around in the snow with Bennie (forgot to mention his presence, how could I? It was Girls weekend + Bennie--whatta lucky guy). We got out in the snow for a total of ten minutes before the cold chilled our bones and we were ready to come inside and enjoy the post-snow activities of bundling up by the fire and drinking hot chocolate.
Lillerz brought her guitar (as prodded by Deb and I) and we played some old favorites. She's got a beautiful voice and a knack for the guitar; we had a really fun time with it as did my mom... (see the video posted here).
All good things must come to an end, and mom dropped me off at the gas station at 12:30 on Sunday for my trip back home. This was wasn't as notable. It did feel good to arrive back to my dorm and see my Dooley ladies.

Chels and I bundled doing our shift
Sunday night

I didn't stay posted up in my dorm for long. We camped out Sunday night for the WSU v GU basketball game on Monday night! Boy was that a trip. It snowed on an off throughout the night and into Monday afternoon (so yes it was easily below 32 degrees) and we crammed us 6 girls into a 4 person (honestly more like four little person) tent. We snuggled and kept warm for the most part, but had to endure the tent full of loud and obnoxious freshman boys next to us all night long... we were not as enthusiastic about it as Lionel. Three of us did a shift until 3 a.m. and the closers came in and stayed in the tent until dawn. The only stipulation for camping out is that there has to be someone from your group in the tent at all times. Between classes Monday we all traded off paying our time.

With fellow Seattleites/good friends Kaitie
(left) and Kelsey (right)

A picture captured of the TV screen- Proto Cred: Mom

The game was amazing. We were second row of the middle section. It was unreal. Freshman Kevin Pangos singlehandedly scored over 30 points. I requested his friendship on Facebook that night. Doubtful he will accept it but I figured might as well go for it. I had mom and dad record the game on TV and go through carefully to see if they could spot me! SUCCESS! I got on ESPN!

I had a job interview for the position of an Advertising Account Executive with Student Publications on campus the afternoon after the basketball game. It went very well and I felt confident walking away. I got a call yesterday evening and was offered the job! I'll be trained this year, and will be working out in the Spokane business community next year, building a list of clients who would like to be advertised in our student publications here at GU. I'll be paid on commission too- how cool is that? I'm very excited about it, if you couldn't already tell :)

Here I am at Macklemore with some friends fro GU that I met
last year when I visited- Sarah and Megan! :)

I celebrated by going to the Macklemore concert last night. He is an amazing performer. Though I wasn't as close to (sitting on) the stage as I was when he came to perform on Vashon, it was still awesome. It got a little more rowdy than it did at Vashon, and there were a couple people crowd surfing. I was sure to duck when I saw someones shoes advancing toward my face. I guess I didn't contribute to their surf, but I think they got along just fine without me.
This weekend, I'm going to take it easy. I've had quite a long week. Tonight I'll go to the rockclimbing gym with the GU outdoors club! It's free transportation, free climbing, free pizza. How could you pass that up, as a college student? Saturday, Alpha, Conner, and I will meet to finalize our spanish portfolios, and Sunday I'll go to church and rest.
For now, naptime.
More later.

Love Nat