Hello? Hello? (You're wasting money!) - A call from my cell phone bill

Although cell phones have made our everyday lives much easier in many ways, the ease doesn't always mean cost efficiency. My parents agreed to buy me my first cell phone in my early high school years, allowing me to pick out my very own "Tracfone" which operated through buying monthly minute cards and adding them by calling a certain number. At first, this was fine. But then I had to pay for my own minutes and when each text equaled .5 units and one minute equaled 1 unit, texts and chatting added up pretty quickly and I found myself spending more than I'd hoped.

So, I followed the masses and signed my name on a piece of paper that chained me to Verizon Wireless's talk and text plan. At first I was blinded by the so-called benefits: free night and weekend talk-time as well as unlimited talk and text with other Verizon users. Sounds pretty great, right? Yeah! Until you realize that your friends with Verizon are friends you don't talk to all that often and that you're paying more to have texting benefits with everyone else!

While I just loove Verizon (sarcasm? no, of course not), after a year and a half into my 2-year contract I've made the decision that I won't be renewing my contract. Instead, I will be going cell phone free and can be reached by mail pigeon or Facebook.

Just kidding. I'm probably going back to a prepaid phone plan (gasp). But definitely not the same one I had before. Upon searching, I found that a company called Virgin Mobile sells some pretty sweet phones and for over $30 less than with Verizon, I would be getting the same phone services and more! PLUS, there is no contract to sign my cellular-life away for two whole years.

Yay for saving money!

A Horror Scene

I am the type of person who avoids most things that are stereotypically "scary" (dark rooms, horror films, walking alone at night...etc.)

Sometimes, I have no choice but to come face to face with my fears. Unfortunately, this happened twice last night. The first time while sitting on the floor in my living room and the second while looking at the calendar in my bedroom.

From the depths of somewhere in my house, an array of spiders always find their way out of spaces and around corners, crawling stealthily and speedily towards me. 95% of the time I am overcome with involuntary fright and an occasional scream in my attempts to relocate or squish.

The horror comes in one of three levels of seriousness:

1: Floor crawling > 2: Wall scaling > 3: Ceiling hanging

Level 1: For squishing, anything can be used! Which makes level 1 crawlers the least scary.

Level 2: While many things can be used for squishing, you must now take into account the color of the wall and whether or not you want the mark of the spider on the wall or a dent in the wall from whacking it too harshly.

Level 3: These spiders are the most horrific because they are most difficult to reach and they have the power of dropping themselves onto you or past you, therefore making an escape.

I'm sad to say that last night I had a Level 1 spider and a Level 2 spider. One was successfully squished. The other managed to jump past me and is now somewhere in my bedroom.

20 Things I've Accomplished Since Turning 20: #1

Tonight I met with E1 and E2 (for the safety of minors I'm not disclosing their names), two little girls who are starting on the oboe! Not only was this their first lesson, but also my first time teaching anyone the oboe!