Hi from Blade

Blade wants to wish everyone a Merry Christmas!! He got a brand new toy from my roommate, Kathryn. He loves to lay on it.

The other day he met up with his friend Emma to play while Jessica and I exchanged gifts.

And I couldn't resist adding these pictures of him as a puppy, to remind the world of how cute he was/is.

Blade is the happiest pup I know. He smiles the whole time he is at the dog park.

 With that look we should have known he would turn out to be so mischievous

 Blade loved to play on the fire place!

 Asleep in his food bowl. Eating is tiring!

Learning to Fly!!!

Captain Taylor

As you know I recently jumped out of a plane with a man strapped to my back and a parachute strapped to HIS back. I know, that is Army Ranger territory right there. It was thrilling and exciting and I loved it.

My friend Dan and I are starting our "bucket list" early. But I actually hate that phrase because it's not like we have some list of things to do before we die (aka turn 30...just kidding all friends over 30!!) but we've decided that while we are young and don't have any commitments we should just do what we want to do! If an exciting opportunity comes our way, usually via Groupon, as we are still trying to be thrifty, we just do it.

Our last adventure was awesome. We got to be pilots for a day. We arrived at Blue Line Aviation at RDU airport bright and early on Saturday at 8:30 AM. It was a beautiful day. We didn't really know what to expect. The Groupon said we would get an hour of flying time with an instructor and a free t-shirt.

After grabbing some Starbucks coffee (which Dan brought on the plane as he was horrified to hear there would be no beverage service) we arrived at RDU.

Inside the building we first met our instructor's mom. She was working in the office and was very friendly. We expected some kind of terrible power point presentation about flying and the rules and what all the buttons do, but when the instructor arrived he just took us right out to this very cool and very vintage-y Cessna. We didn't know this at the time but we were only his second clients...ever...so the protocol may tighten up over time.

He went through the checklist with us and put up with our picture taking shenanigans. That is him checking the fuel on the plane. Why is the fuel in the wing? I don't know! I guess I wasn't a very good student....

Dan was terrified* so I got to fly first. I sat in the pilot seat with the instructor in the co-pilot seat. Dan was folded up in the back seat. I asked how hard it would be to flip the plane over (my biggest concern) and the instructor said it would be really hard. He didn't seem worried about anything so I decided not to be worried about anything.

Once on the runway I got to take control and take off all by myself! It was so cool. Once we were in the air I got to do lots of twists and turns and wing dipping. We flew to the Louisberg airport where we had gone skydiving the month before. From the plane we could actually see a bunch of skydivers with their parachutes open, coming in for a landing.

I steered clear as best I could...but my best was not good enough...

KIDDING! I was no where close to them.

After an hour or so we landed at the Lousiberg airport (no, I wasn't allowed to land the plane myself) and Dan and I switched places. He flew us back and did daredevil stuff like really steep turns left and right.

It was a beautiful day and we each logged our first hour of the 40 hours needed to get your pilots license.

The instructor said that either I had flown many times before or I was a natural. I think it must be the latter as I don't have any memory of flying before. However it does run in my family (on both sides!) My dad's father owned a plane and and used to fly all over the state of Wisconsin. When my mom was my age she got her pilot's license when living in Madison and would fly my grandpa's plane back and forth to Three Lakes.

I don't think it is in the cards for me to get my own pilot's license at this point, it is a little pricey, but I really hope that I can someday.

*Dan was not actually terrified

Gifts that keep on giving....

 

It was my birthday! I turned 28 this year! I have been looking forward to this particular birthday for as long as I can remember.

28 is probably the hugest milestone of my life and I did it! I turned 28! And the craziest part is that I did it while I was asleep!

Impressed? I know, it's incredible that the annoying saying "I could do it in my sleep" just got really real.

Sadly, the day after my birthday I discovered I had gotten an unwelcome gift. I came down with a horrendous coldflubug that I am still fighting off. I am much better today than I was this time last week. I was so weak I couldn't even blog!

Keeping on the topic of gifts...As you may know,  I stole was gifted Blade by my parents over a year ago. He is the best dog ever, I love him so much. However, since I took Blade as my own I noticed that my dad's gift giving began to take an eerie change.

It went from Kindles and Flip Cams to THIS:

Birthday Gift of 2011



and then this year I got THIS: 

Birthday Gift of 2012

(I hope my use of a larger font has served my intention of subliminally heightening the drastic-ness of the situation)

Maybe these are things I NEED but it sends a loud message: TAKE GOOD CARE OF YOUR/MY DOG! Even though Blade is MY dog (my dad just borrows him for hunting). In fact, they have been training every weekend in the woods for the past month or so. And guess what happened??? The weekend after my birthday I picked up THIS!

My poor little pup had to get stitches! He was attacked in the woods! By a vicious tree, or branch, or rock, or something.

(did telling you about the subliminal bolded bigger font thing make it lose it's effect?)

Luckily Blade has recovered well from the tree/branch/rock bite and is back to normal. Though he does seem to be milking the attention a little bit more than usual.

Usual cute attention seeking behavior:

Post "the accident" severe cute attention seeking behavior:



I know what you are thinking! Look at how much more Blade is trying to look cute now that he is wearing that cast!

Anyway, thank you everyone for all the birthday wishes and gifts! It couldn't have been a better birthday (except for getting sick....so I guess it could have been a better...but that happened the day after my birthday so it probably doesn't count). yay!

Happy Wednesday!

As promised....more skydiving!

I got my pictures in the mail along with a great video. Here are just a few:

Dan and I on the plane! Dan is strapped to the man right behind him.

Solo jumper and his videographer jumped right before us, I think I blacked out because I don't remember this looking so scary:

 Here we go!

 Camera guy: SMILE!

 The jump:

 I love this shot from below of us falling from the plane:

 And off the plane goes and down we go!

 Little fluffy clouds

 The free fall lasted 60 seconds but it didn't even feel like we were falling. It felt like we were just in suspension with a wind machine keeping us up.

All I remember is not being able to breathe because the wind was insane. I do remember thinking "SMILE, Kyla, this is being filmed!" It was really hard to breathe when I smiled but I did it for the BLOG!

We got to float down for about 5-6 minutes, it was really beautiful and surreal. The only thing ruining this moment was that my ears had some serious popping to do. I felt like my head was going to explode, but I did all the tricks (yawning, holding your nose and blowing) and I could just hear it squeaking when it was coming out of my ears.

 Perfect landing! That was so amazing.

We skydove!

Last weekend my friend Dan and I went skydiving! Spoiler alert: we both survived!

The whole thing started with a list Dan and I were making because we felt life just needed some more excitement...plus there was a groupon for it! We both signed up immediately and made an appointment for the one and only day in September we could both go.

The night before we celebrated our possible last day of life with good friends Jessica and Melissa by doing 'skydiving shots' (that we found how to make on the internet). I don't think the bartender had half the ingredients for it but his concoction was....great...

In order to actually skydive you need near perfect clear skies. On "dive day" as we experts like to call it, we rushed to Louisberg, NC (about an hour away) and arrived on time at 10am. Well, actually we got there at 10:35 am because Dan was relying on this navagation system on his phone called "Wayz". Lesson learned: be skeptical of any navagation system called "Wayz".

Once we arrived we were met with gloomy overcast. It was predicted to burn off at some point, but we had no idea how long that would take. So just like at every other airport I've been too, we waited.

  

And waited.....

  

And found a frog which means good luck before jumping out of a plane! (no citations found)

 

2 hours later, after a rushed trip to Sheetz (a gas station/food place) to grab lunch, the sky had cleared enough for us to suit up!

  

Some of us looked cooler than others....

 We boarded a tiny plane with about a dozen other skydivers and made our way up to 13,500 feet. It was one guy's first time ever FLYING ON A PLANE, let alone jumping out of one!

Dan and I both hired our own personal videographers to jump with us. They jumped solo beside us with cameras strapped totheir helmuts to record the whole thing. They gave us amazing video footage of the whole process from before getting on the plane to our landing on the ground. We also got hundreds of still photos.Currently I only have Dan's pictures because mine are being sent in the mail, but here are a few that are amazing.

The most anticipated part: jumping from the plane

 

After that you free fall for about 60 seconds. We fell from 13,500 feet to about 6,000 feet. Personal videographer capturing every moment:

Then our experienced parachuting guide (that were were very tightly strapped to) pulled the chute at 6,000 feet

 For 5-6 minutes you just glide through the air, seeing all the best views of central-ish North Carolina...

Afterward we celebrated our survival:

 Our friends were happy too:

This comic came out the same day we skydove!

When I get my pictures you can be sure that I will share them, stay tuned!

Dirty Southern Monkey Business

I haven't lived in Madison, Wisconsin since 2009, but I was so excited to see that I am still a part of the Monkey Business Institute family! As you can see from the facebook snapshot below, I am in the picture! I like to think this is because everyone wants me to come back and just thinks of me as being on a long vacation....but it is probably because they haven't gotten around to a new photo shoot. WHATEVER the reason, I think it is cool to still be connected.

Monkey Business is where my improv life started and I have the BEST memories of all our classes, our practices, our shows, and of course all of wonderful improvisers I got to work with.

This was where I found my favorite thing in the world! I do improv to mentally escape, to challenge myself, to learn, to live in the moment, and most importantly to play and have fun.

Now I live in Carrboro, NC and I have a new family at Dirty South Improv (DSI). I adore my new community and get to play in lots of shows. This summer I've been especially immersed, being at the theater 3-5 nights a week. It's awesome; not just because I PASSED MY QUALIFIER (did I mention that?) and don't have classes this summer, but because I'm working with new people and different combinations of people all the time. Everyday is a new experience and I've been having those A-HA moments pretty regularly. (Also there are lots of WTF moments which are exciting too).

My next challenge is to MC a show. I haven't done this before and it makes me super nervous. More nerves than a regular show. I don't know why this makes me more nervous than when I am a player in a show, but I actually cried in practice the other day because I felt so overwhelmed! I've watched people MC shows a thousand times yet I still get tongue tied. However, even though I am scared out of my mind, I am excited to do it. The nerves and adrenaline keep me from becoming complacent and keep me in the moment, good or bad. I really really really hope it's not bad!