Things that made me smile today....

- For those of you who know me well you know that I LOVE Hane's or Fruit of the Loom men's tagless tees. I wear them to sleep at night, I wear them on hangover days with huge shades... I love them. What I LOVE even more is my mom doing my laundry. She visited this weekend with my dad and brought a bag of these AMAZING tagless tees that SHE WASHED to give to me. It was pretty freaking awesome and I am wearing one right now. There is little in life that is better than the smell of fresh t-shirts, especially ones washed my your mom. I may be older now, but let me make it clear that I am NEVER too old to have my mom do my laundry.

- I ran into one of my professors today while I was downtown killing some time during a break inbetween classes... we are on a first name basis now. I have taken every class he has taught and I'm sad because I won't have him my last semester at Tech, but regardless, I caught up with him for a few minutes and it was great. PS: he used to be a rapper. This probably totally raises my credibility downtown... "I know people." Haha.

- I also visited my fav. store downtown while I was there. I love it because the owner is so into fair trade and sweatshop free clothing. She carries a lot of brands that promote that, namely American Apparel. With my love for all things basic, she told me she'd be putting in an order for a couple of the American Apparel unisex v-neck shirts for me! :) Can't wait for them to get here. Oh that aside, we had a great conversation about her trip to Mexico where she stayed in a very remote part of the country. She said that at this particular place she stayed, their economy wasn't really supported because they reject government rule. She loved it because a) it wasn't tourisity and b) because she knew that all of the money she spent there would go directly to them. I was so intrigued. I was also telling her about how unfair it was in the Dominican Republic - I told her I was buying jewlery and of course they had jacked up the prices because they knew we were tourist and I specifically remembered feeling so guilty giving this guy at the resort money knowing that very little of it was going to the person who actually made it.

- My friend Gabe was passing through Blacksburg on his way to Florida to take his grandparents on vacation with his sister. It was perfect, really. I'm really glad it all worked out - I was making dinner for a bunch of friends anyway and he wanted to get dinner so he came over and ate with us and even brought a bottle of great wine! :) That aside, I LOVED the idea of him and his sister getting together and giving back to their grandparents. How amazing is that?! Oh PS: I am super proud of him. He rolls up to my house baller style in his brand spanking new Mercedes GL class, fully loaded... oh this on top of news that he just bought a brand new townhouse. Seriously, not too bad for only having been out of college for a year and a half. On top of that, of the 10,000 realtors in his region, he is ranked 31 which is especially impressive seeing as the housing market isn't doing so well right now. Imagine what he can accomplish when the market is working WITH him. Seriously, I am so proud of this kid and SO glad to see that he is doing so well. Geeze, imagine all this at 23. See you when you're 30 and retired. Haha no... but in all seriousness, I'm so glad I got to catch up with him today. I've known him since High School and during his years at Tech and it's just amazing to see how much people change. Aside from catching up on everything going on in our lives... at one point we ended up in the kitchen talking about our friend Stack, he mentioned visiting the new memorial tomorrow and it just came up. As sad as it is that Stack's gone, we were just standing there talking about some of our favorite memories of him. Gabe went to elementary and part of middle school with Stack in Atlanta and by some odd twist of fate, they ended up at the same college. I don't know, I guess it was just what I needed tonight. It's good that we can talk about our friend without crying. There were just lots of smiles... just like it was when he was here. I guess it's true... people will come in and out of your life, but the impact that they make will stay with you always. I'm thankful for that.