i think i can dance (aka- the day pasha hugged me)

Go HERE to see what I did last tuesday. Otherwise known as the greatest day of my life.

You're making tears come outta my face!

Seriously, Jean-Marc Genereux! I never thought it would be possible for you to make me cry. But there I was... tears running down my face. Beautiful.

And Twitch and Kherington, COME ON! Could you two BE any more amazing?!

But Mark and Chelsie H... wow. You guys are my favs!

Wait! Matt and Kourtni, YOU guys are my favs!

And Joshua, you are so darling. I just want to carry you around in my pocket!

AHH! There is just too much to love about this show!!

Am I right in saying that the choreography this season is already above and beyond?

the wait is over

I apologize to all my fellow SYTYCD fans out there for taking so long to post my photos from the tour. I would love to give you a valid excuse as to why it's taken me so long but really I've just been lazy.

And just to remind you of my devotion to SYTYCD (the best show ever in the whole entire universe)- 3 of my friends and I flew... on a airplane... to a different city... where it was fareeeeezing... just so we could support our best friends (ie- the cast). We're so hard core.

Something happened to my camera a while back so I can't really see what I'm taking pictures of. I'm using the "point the camera in the general direction of the subject and hope for the best" method of photography. Mostly I got a bunch of crazy blurry photos. But, I did get a few good ones (captions above photos):

The SYTYCD posse (minus J who saw the show in CA)

I know the popular thing to do is be in love with Neil (and I am) but, I am so in love with Kameron! So, so in love.
Kameron & Lacey dancing the infamous Mia Michaels contemporary number.
OK Ladies. Here he is! NEIL!
It took me a while to figure out what this was a picture of. Can you guess? It's Neil. Doing a back flip. Very high. In the air. HELLO! This is from the disco number with Sara.
More Neil acrobatics. This time with Sabra doing the Mandy Moore contemporary to Sweet Dreams by The Eurythmics.
Pasha being... Pasha. And Dominic in the background mimicking with a red handkerchief. We got pretty lucky the night we saw the show. It was the LAST stop on the tour so not only did we get to see the Top 10, we got to see the Top 14 (including the 4 alternates who subbed during the tour for those who were injured, etc) and every single number that involved said alternates. So, that meant 3 solid hours of SYTYCD magic! It was heaven. And since it was the last tour the group was a little silly and doing some hilarious stuff. They were having such a great time together!
Another example of the groups last night of the tour antics. Had this moment not been totally hilarious (like, make you cry hilarious) I would have been pretty upset that they ruined one of my fav dances. This was the Shane Sparks hip-hop piece with Sabra and Dominic. However, half way through the dance out walks Hok dressed as a full on TRANNY and steppin in on Sabras part. So, ridiculously hilarious!
And this is the part where I was kind of crying (and also, not the only time I was kind of crying during the night. I mean come on! It was magical!) This was the Mia Michaels contemporary piece with Neil and Lacey. It was so beautiful how the whole cast came out dressed in white carried the daisies for the stage. Beautiful! Also... I may or may not have audibly gasped when they eluded that Mia Michaels herself was there to explain the piece. I really, honestly thought she was going to physically be there, so I was sad (and a little embarrassed about the gasp) when I realized that they meant she'd be talking about the number via pre-recorded video. Alas, still moving.
This one is especially for the ladies again- can you see Neil's abs?? Yeah?? Yeah?? Oh yeah!
The whole cast at the end of the show. So, my tour observations were thus: Danny- not as annoying as he used to be. I could actually tolerate him. Lauren- still totally hate her (and I mean hate with fiery indignation). Jaime- psycho and totally annoying. Seriously. Everyone else- LOVE!! The group numbers were so much better live than they were on the show! It was such a fantastic night. There were only one or two dances that I wish they would have done (including the sara/pasha suspender dance). I was so happy that they did all my favorites. SO HAPPY!
Sometimes I forget that I'm not Grace Kelly. I think the silliness of the sytycd cast wore off on my because this happened during intermission:
And don't worry that I totally bought a tour t-shirt and I totally wore it to the Angels & Airwaves / Against Me / VHS or BETA concert that I went to last night. Not even a tiny bit ashamed. (Also, don't worry that I came home and made a bitchin' spreadsheet detailing every episode of sytycd- the songs, performers, styles and choreographers... nope, not obsessed at all...)

I'm not kidding when I say you should be jealous of me. Be very, very jealous, people!

For the sake of posting...

1. First and foremost- the So You Think You Can Dance Tour was AMAZING!! I'm not even exaggerating one bit when I say that was the greatest night of my life... ok, maybe it's in a tie with the night I saw the Backstreet Boys in concert. But, still, ahhhhmaaaayziiiiing!! I'll post pictures tonight and elaborate a little more (though I really don't think words can do it justice).

2. I started running more consistently (again) and upping my mileage slowly (again). I'm doing 3-milers pretty easily this week which is pretty good for me especially since a few weeks ago (after not really running for the last 5 months) I was dying after just 2 miles. However, I've got a steep climb this month in order to get ready for the 1/2 marathon in January. I'd forgotten how much of mental game running really is. I know I need to push my limits more but when I'm going around that track for the 16th time (seriously, the track at my gym is a dizzying 5-1/2 laps per mile... yet better than running outside in the cold and dark) it's pretty easy to justify 3 miles as 'good enough' for the day.
I kind of can't believe I'm going to do a 1/2 in a month from now. I never thought that would be something I could do this soon. But, now it actually feels within reach. I really thought a 1/2 marathon was the absolute most my body and mind could ever do. But, now that I'm actually going do it I feel like a full marathon is a conceivable goal. Pretty cool.
This week I mixed up my playlist a little. Normally I have a lot of upbeat, fast, loud songs that pump me up. But, I was getting sick of the same old songs on repeat so I made a new playlist of songs that I just plain like regardless of their tempo and volume. It actually made for a pretty relaxing run.
I'm also trying to figure out the correlation between what I eat and my energy level when I'm running. I've been trying to eat more healthfully lately but I'm having a hard time balancing all the food groups (or whatever I'm supposed to do with them). It just seems like some days on the track I can go around and around without getting tired, other days it's like I'm carrying around a ton of bricks and am winded after my first lap. And I can't yet figure out what I need to do to feel like I have endless energy. I guess I'm gonna have to get less lazy in the kitchen. Hmph.

3. It's Christmas time. I have to keep reminding myself.
I've been in Las Vegas for 7 years (whoa!) and have acclimatized to the heat and lack of cold. Yet, I've never really been able to get in the Christmas Spirit here. To me Christmas involves freezing cold weather, snow, pine trees, snow capped mountains, seeing your breath when you walk outside, christmas lights, cranking the heater, scraping the car windows, coats, boots, gloves, scarves, hot chocolate and wassail, etc. It does not involve sunny weather, palm trees, rolling down the car windows, flip-flops (or clip-clops), short sleeves, frozen yogurt, etc
I've got my house decorated, tree and all, but I still kinda feel like I'm just pretending that it's "the most wonderful time of the year". If only I could get some snow up in here!

AHH!!!!

OHMIGOODNESS!! You have no idea how excited I am! Glee is bursting forth out of my soul!!
In just 24 hours from now I will be in Reno preparing for the SO YOU THINK YOU CAN DANCE TOUR!!! AHHHH!!! Seriously, you do not even understand how excited I am about this!
In preps for tomorrow night I've been watching some of my fav performances. Enjoy! By the way, did I mention that we'll be sitting on THE FOURTH ROW?!! It's totally ok to be jealous of me right now.

My Girl SABRA!

Ah YEAH!
My girl Sabra took the crown! We all screamed when Cat announced her name. Mostly because we were all in a panic that Danny might win and if that happened then we'd all have to disown america and move to a different country, which as Tif put it, would have been very inconvenient for making it to work on friday. But, all is well in the world because the rightful winner won.
Confessions from last night:

• I cried more than three times during the finale
• I CRIMPED my hair for the very first time IN MY LIFE (not sure if I'm ashamed or proud of this) in test preps for the most amazing bday party ever (you'll see photos. don't you worry)

so nervous!

I'm so excited for tonight! I'm so nervous about tonight! I have no idea who is going to win (though if it's danny i'm going to disown america). Last night I dreamt that I was hanging out with the SYTYCD dancers all night! It was great.

I really feel like there is no clear front runner for tonight's finale. I feel like Sabra should win because she's been amazing at everything and is the most versitile dancer of the group. But I just don't know! Ah!

As much as I love Neil I just don't feel like he's going to win and I'm fine with that. I think my very favorite moment of the entire series is was last night when he said, "Shane was all, like, asking me to be sexy and stuff. And I was like, 'Shane, that's like asking Nigel to be British.'"
Also... Neil is totally my #1 friend on MySpace as of today. Here are some hot hunky photos for your viewing pleasure:

i swear this blog isn't always about sytycd

first off i just have to apologize for pretty much only blogging about sytycd but it's the most exciting thing in life right now. i promise i'll stop blogging about it soon... as soon as the show is over.

wednesdays show was the first week of random partners and i was sad to see my fav couples busted up but excited to see new partner combos. kameron and sabra were beautiful! but my absolute favorite dance of the entire season thus far was sara and neil doing disco! it was phenomenal!! (and i can't find a video of it dang it! help!) sara has been one of my favs all along and neil has totally grown on me (i think lauren was totally bringing him down) so it was fun to watch them together. and seriously, how sexy was sara?! oh i have to mention as well that lacey was so hot this week... again! she's always sexy. see lacey is stripper sexy whereas sara is just sexy sexy.

anyway, i can't even tell you how sick of that stupid john mayer song i was by the end of the show. i hated that song to begin with. and i thought nigel's non-apology on thursdays show was pretty humorous.

so jaimie got the gong and i was totally happy about that. but darling kameron got the boot as well and i have to admit i was totally broken hearted about that. even though i really do think that he's not the best dancer and lacey really carried him the whole time, i love him and his crazy red mohawk.

ok i could say more but i won't. in fact, the only reason i wanted to blog about this was to post the sara and neil video but i can't find it online anywhere so this is just turning into a lame post.

but isn't Christian Bale just lovely? i know this is totally unrelated to everything but i just saw a preview for his new movie that comes out today called Rescue Dawn. i'm so going to see that.

wade

we were pretty amped to see little wade robson appear as a judge on sytycd tonight. tho if wade's judging that means wade's not choreographing. oh well. i was perfectly content to watch him judge.
we got talking about how we'd love to see wade dance, which got us talking about 'the wade robson' project (none of which i actually got to watch on mtv because i was busy serving the Lord), which then got us talking about how we could probably find some stuff on youtube.

so, ladies and gentlemen... may we all take a moment (or 6minutes & 30seconds) to appreciate how amazing wade robson really is:



oh, also... i have no idea who's getting sent home this week. my best guess is hok and lauren (if she makes it to the bottom 3) but really i had a hard time guessing this one. my fav of the night had to be dom & sabra. so fun.

sytycd psychic

so last night after watching sytycd i pretty much guessed exactly who was going to be in the bottom 3 and who was going to go home tonight. i was totally right. good call on the part of the judges. oh, and can i just say that my very favorite part of yesterday's show was when Adam Shankman said that danny was arrogant. AMEN! it was so classic.

so at this point kam & lacey, pasha & sarah, dom & sabra are all in a three way tie for my favorite couple. and i finally figured out how to add video (so not hard) so here's dominique and sabra doing hip hop choreographed by shane sparks. SO HOT!! seriously, when he picks her up? HOT!!

WORST EPISODE EVER! and a 3 miler

i seriously am so mad and almost crying right now. i cannot believe they voted off jesus and jessi!
i can't even talk about it! i HATE lauren and neil- they suck! and i HATE danny and anya! what the hell was she wearing?! and he is such an arrogant jerk. ARGH! SO SO MAD!

"i can't talk about it anymore. it's giving me a headache"

tonights run:
3 miles, 33:40mins
i need to learn to pace myself better at the beginning of my run so that i don't get so tired so fast. but the cool thing is that when i was done running my head wanted my body to keep running! but i was tired... and late for sytycd.

obsessed!!!

folks. this obsession is bordering unhealthy. but this show is SO AMAZING!!! so, it is ok. right?

ok this week may be my very favorite to review because I have so much to say. so much awesome and so much bad happened yesterday on SYTYCD. but let me first say that jessie & tifani are my new fav sytycd watching partners because they seriously have every bit of last season memorized (and on DVD! HELLO! JEALOUS!) and they are just as obsessed as i am. we have a fan club. jessie is pres, tif is vp and i am the treasurer. my duties are to collect $ to pay for our trip to see the tour. so so excited.

anyway... let's talk about last nights episode. AWESOME!!
*i'm still trying to find some good pictures online

sara & jesus (krump) - one of my very fav couples. they seem to have such a fun time dancing together. i love sara because she is so tough but so feminine. i was pretty excited to see the first krumping routine of the season. mostly because krump is such a funny word and the krumpers (?) take their dance form so seriously. but these two really are so versitile and so fun to watch always.

cedric & shauna (contemporary) - mia michaels is insane and i love her! i really do want her hair. just like the judges said, she was brilliant in limiting how much actual dancing ced did. but i loved, loved that debbie allen offered him a place at her dance academy. TAKE IT CEDRIC! IT'S YOUR ONLY HOPE! and i still can't decide if i like shauna or not. hmm...
bottom three

lacey & kameron (quick step) - what can i say other than i'm so in love with these two! brilliant performance. so fun to watch.

anya & danny (hip-hop) - can someone PLEASE explain to me why the judges are so in love with these two? seriously? they are not good. she reminds me of a 40 yr old woman and he's so gay! danny don't ever pelvic thrust in debbie allen's general direction ever, ever again! in fact, just don't do that ever again anywhere! i really do not like these two at all. and i thought their performance was totally weak (even though i love dan karaty).
bottom three (i hope!!)

sabra & dominic (rumba) - LOVE THEM! seriously, they don't stand out as much as they ought (aught?) to but they are so great. dom was seriously playing up the sex appeal an cracking me up and sabra, as always, was beautiful.

lauren & neil (tango) - blah. bottom three. awful dress & i really don't like him.
bottom three

hok & jaimie (jazz- really?) - BRILLIANT!! what wade robson choreography isn't brilliant though. he SO played to their strengths and i was fascinated by this performance. i really wanted jaimie to be voted off this week (not because of her dancing but the awful inflection in her voice!) but after this piece she deserves to stay at least one more week. she was wonderful.

pasha (cha-cha) - OH PASHA!! WE LOVE YOU! no seriously though, we had to watch this over and over because first of all, he was hot, second of all that woman! omg! hilarious!!!! i can't even express how i feel about this performance. i know she's a world champ and all but really i was just laughing so hard i was crying. pasha was such a good sport. that woman though- living every frumpy housewife's dream! loved it! it would have been great to see him dance this with jessi (even though she's not my fav) but it wouldn't have been nearly as entertaining, i'm sure.

so there you have it. my predictions for tonight: jessi's not gonna make it back (unfortunate) and cedric may have talked his way out of the bottom 3 last night. if so, i say neil gets the boot. otherwise ced's out.

i love airport tvs

i was a little panicked that i'd have to go a whole entire weekend before finding out what happened on thursday's SYTYCD results show. i was supposed to be on my plane headed to Utah. but, when Lis and I got to the gate we found out that our plane was delayed. this may be the first time i've ever been happy to hear that my flight was delayed because the tv just next to our gate was showing SYTYCD!!! so happy! the timing was perfect because we got to watch the entire show then boarded our plane as soon it was over. thank you McCarren airport!

so here's what i thought- i was a little dissappointed to see ricky go because i would have liked to see him attempt the other dance styles. but, oh well. the dance he and ashlee did on wednesday was pure crap.

Lets talk...

You knew it was coming right? My review of SYTYCD? Well, here it is.

this was the first week of the top 20 couples dancing and i have to say... LOVED IT! i lost track of how many times but i did get a little teary eyed more than once. i guess i just know what i like (dancing) and get a little emotional when i see it done well.

anyway... let me just say this- dominic is so cute! i still love hok. and i was really disappointed in ricky. he's weird but i had high hopes for him. i thought lacey and kameron did an amazing job even though their routine was a little wacked out. but what can i say i'm crazy for that contemporary crap.

but the clear cut winners for me were sara and jesus. i LOVED how they totally got into character. i loved this routine but that's probably because i LOVE me some wade robson. seriously.

what did y'all think?

i'm nervous to see who goes home tonight. my predictions are faina and neil. tho, i'm going to be on a plane to utah while the show is on so i'll have to wait until i get back to vegas on monday to watch it on my friend's tivo. i don't know if i can wait that long!

ps- i'm heading to utah for the 'vanconcklestyne' wedding and i'm pretty excited to go to utah. i'm a little homesick for the utah weather and mountains these days. also when i get back i'll post photos of where i was last weekend because it was amazing! *hint... i was up at brianhead. beautiful!

have a great weekend everyone!

I kinda cried...

I can't help it. I've just been feeling weepy lately. Good weepy. But the tears sometimes come on at inconvenient times. Like tonight. I was at the gym, on the treadmill (first time running on the treadmill since I started training and probably the last... but I had to considering it was 9pm and my show was on), watching SYTYCD. I wanted to cry when some of the people were asked to leave. And I REALLY wanted to cry at the end when it came down to Hok and Twitch. Ohmigosh! So sad! I mean... I'm excited that Hok (my total favorite) is in the top 20 but it was so tender how they were so sad to have to part. *pardon me while I go get a tissue... sniff sniff*

Oh, and did you LOVE last night when that goofy Lindy Hop kid mouthed "dance for my life!" That was seriously hilarious.

Anyway, I totally cried during last weeks episode too. Mostly because I was so overjoyed that ANNIE! sent me the episode I missed on VHS. Seriously girl- you have NO IDEA how happy that made me! It was a great episode, by the way. Anyway, that really dramatic girl, who's mom's dying wish was that she try out for sytycd, started crying... and even though I don't even like her that much... I started crying too! What's my problem?! I think I just love this show way too much. I'm seriously choreographing songs in my head to every song I hear on my ipod.

Anyway... Vegas baby! We're down to the top 20 and now the real fun starts! I can't wait for next week!

The blood letting...

For the last few months I've gotten 3-4 calls (well, messages since I never answer my phone) a week from United Blood Services asking me to make another attempt at giving blood. I've always prided myself in being a good blood giver. I'm healthy. I've never had sex with a man who has given someone else drugs or money for sex, or anything of the like. My veins can pumps some serious blood and they can do it fast!
However, I failed at my last donating attempt because of iron deficiency. I was so crushed when they told me I wouldn't be able to donate. I mean... I failed! I failed at donating blood! I hate failing. Because of my failed attempt I was a little hesitant to try again. But I was really getting tired of avoiding their calls and getting their voice mail. I decided the only way to get them to stop was to actually go in and give them my blood.
Now, I'm all about giving. It's not like I didn't want to give them my blood. I just didn't know if my ego could stand being turned away again. So, today was the day. They tested my blood and guess what... IRON DEFICIENT! But, not deficient enough to be turned away. Phew! I was still able to donate but I was only asked to give one unit instead of two. I was a little nervous when they told me they'd be pumping stuff back into me. But, all went well and I survived.

Topic 2- SYTYCD is on again tonight and I'M MISSING IT!! I'll be at the temple so I expect a full report from YOU my readers. I would record it but I still refuse to get TiVo and I haven't bothered to figure out how to use my VCR because seriously... who still uses VCRs??

Topic 3- While I was in Utah on monday I went for a 2 mile run and I didn't feel like I was going to die! It was great! I thought for sure my lungs would be burning due to the elevation change but I was just fine. Now I'm not so worried about running my first 10k at 2000 feet above what I'm used to. I can totally handle it. And speaking of running... the music!! Thanks for all of your suggestions. And SPECIAL THANKS TO CHLOE!!! I got your CD in the mail yesterday and it pretty much rocks my whole world! I'd totally go running tonight with my new tunes but I'm pretty sure my body is going to be too busy making blood.

SYTYCD week 1

Here's the roundup for week one:

I love this show. Somewhere in my dreams I still believe I'm going to grow up to be a dancer. While I was watching my roommate kept trying to talk to me and tell me stories but I was so into the show that I couldn't even look at her or respond. I feel bad but I think it was a good lesson in how she should not distract me from this show in the future.

So, I remember who the most annoying judge is- Mary Murphy! Most annoying voice and laugh. Oh man! That woman drives me crazy. But I respect her judging skills. I just wish she wouldn't talk or laugh or scream.

Right off the bat I'm liking the Russian girl and the dance teacher & her student.
Craziest couple of the night had to be the guy from midtown Manhattan who was dancing with his ex-girlfriend. They were great. So crazy.
Speaking of crazy, I also remember why I don't like the tryout episodes of this show. I love watching the crazies but I just feel so bad for them. They are so delusional and too many people in their lives have lied to them and told them that they are good dancers!
And let me tell you a little something about having dreams. It's great to work towards your dreams. Really. Give it all you've got! But there are some things in life that demand God given talent. You've got to know your limits. And if all you've got is passion for your dream then please do not be upset when people tell you that reaching your dream is not within the realm of reality. These people are not trying to be mean. They are trying to save you from future embarrassment. Come back to reality. Please. OK... I'm getting down off my soapbox now.

One last thing. Did you know that Dan Karaty choreographed the dancing in the movie "Music & Lyrics"? Dreadful show, yes. But, the dancing- especially in the POP! video- was awesome. And by awesome I mean hilarious.

Dear you...

Dear Elizabeth Hasselbeck,
I FREAKING LOVE YOU!
Thanks for fighting with that fat, ugly, bi-otch that I can't stand. Seeing that on the news yesterday really made me happy.
You rock.
republicaningly yours,
cropstar

Dear body,
Thank you for being able to run farther than my brain thought I could run last night. Let's keep this up. Also, I'd like to apologize for not letting you sleep enough. But, thanks for the bags you put under my eyes as a gentle reminder that staying up late does nothing for me.
cheers,
cropstar

Dear Mom & Dad,
I'm kind of feeling like you hate me since you always leave town when I come home to Utah. I sincerely hope you have a fun vacation, wherever it is that you end up going. I'll try not to break anything.
love you,
your youngest

Dear Sun,
Remember on monday when I was "sick" and stayed home from work and got to spend hours next to the pool under your warmth? I wish we could do that together everyday. I miss you.
faithfully,
cropstar


Dear sisters,
Thanks for calling me at work yesterday to tell me about how great surfing in Hawaii was. You're jerks. Can't wait for our trip in November though.
aloha nui,
baby sis

Dear So You Think You Can Dance,
I'm so excited that you are starting again tonight! I can't wait to pick out the most slutty girl, most gay guy and the most annoying judge. This is going to be fun.
krumpingly,
cropstar