It rhymes with BEER.

Aside from volunteering twice a week with Utah Pets (NMHPU), I have some fun updates. I put money down on an apartment. It is dirt cheap and in downtown in SLC (who's shocked?). I found it on a drive one morning when I got out of the kennel early. I went back three times to make them show me the apartments. The maintenance guy finally felt like we were old friends, and showed me and my aunts the entire building behind the scenes. Including the dungeon! There's a boiler room thing and a partially excavated dirt cellar, full of rows and rows of 100 year old French doors with original hardware. I almost peed my pants. I said this guy could put an ad in This Old House and sell those buggers off and buy an island to live on. I picked an apartment, the cheaper and smaller one of the two I was contemplating. We left, and the old guy that just bought the building (and is having it all restored) hung his head out the third story window and started yelling. "Hey! I forgot I have another one up here you might want to see." Then he hucked the master key set down to us on the sidewalk for us to check it out. Good to know he's not uptight.

He joined us in the unit a few minutes later and I turned around and said "I'm like, kinda mad I almost didn't know about this Larry. What if I had left before you told me?" Because basically it was identical to the unit I picked, but with more light, a better view, bigger closet and bigger bathroom. It's just unfinished. I am not able to move in until the end of February anyway, since I'll be in Brazil ogling everyone's boobs for the next two weeks. (Just tried on some tank tops; they will not be ogling mine. Sorry Brazil. Mine are the boob counterpart to widdabrain. They are widdaboobs. Remember, there is one con to weight loss. It's widdaboob). So what do I care that the floors are waiting to be refinished? They have three weeks to make it all pretty for me. I told my new BFF, the maintenance guy, that I wanted those French doors from the dungeon put up in my new apartment. And the AC unit from the other place. And a bunch of other customizations. He shrugged and said sure. And I think this is going to be a good fit.

The 80 year old landlord guy did pronounce my name Kristen and then Kurrsten, and I told him it's Keeersten. And the things it rhymes with. Ear. Fear. Volunteer.

I'm packing for Brazil today. I have panic issues with packing. Let me tell you why. I have a whopping 40 minutes between landing in Dallas and lifting off to Sao Paulo. I am terrified that either a.) my stuff, b.) my self, or c.) both of us, will not make that Sao Paulo flight.

Plus, if I check baggage, I must buy a $25 ticket per bag. These bitches don't get any more of my medium-hard earned money. So I'm taking carryons ONLY. For a week and a half trip. {!!!!!!!!!!!} Anaga telling me she'll give me shit if I pack like a chick, really helps the anxiety. In her defense, I showed up in West Yellowstone for baconfest with like 14 bags plus a certain quilt. I could have brought my purse and been golden. I was off the tic-tacs by then, so I was undergoing a little adjustment. It was The Month I Didn't Brush My Hair. Off-limits. I text "What should I plan on for daytime clothes?"

"Zeke says anything you'd be comfortable really hungover in." Yeah, I'll really be wearing Reboyfriend's snowboarding clothes in Rio de Janeiro. "He added 'big black sunglasses.'" I love these guys.

Keep in mind that the last plane I flew in crashed the next time it went up. So, in a few days I'm looking at three flights to Rio, plus a flight to Florianopolis and back to Rio. Then three flights from Rio to SLC...

I don't know what Rbf would be prouder of...me partying on his old stomping grounds or me facing my newest phobia head on. I had to get some new tictacs (some intense ones) just in case I start to wig out somewhere in the turbulence that killed my boyfriend and his family. The Dumkes are already going to be in Rio when I leave, so I'm flying alone. And I want cred for this, valium or none.

I will be leaving on the six-month anniversary of the day we found the plane (today is the six-month-mark of the day they died).

I cut off that big chunk of my hair he loved so much to bury him with. It is weird to see it growing out.



Someday it's going to be long and blend in with the rest of my hair, and it will be like I never gave it away. And that makes me kind of sad.