The One Where I Time Travel and Introduce Nalla

I swear, sometimes, there are seriously moments where I feel like I literally just time traveled. Usually, it's not very far into the past (always in the past, though... I'm not as cool as Theresa Caputo, able to go around predicting the future* with some enviably teased hair like such: 

"My nayme is Theresa Caputo and eye lyke to think of meyself as a typicawl Lawng Island mahm..." 

* - Yes, I realize she's a medium, which means she connects with the dead, she doesn't really predict the future, but I just wanted to include her in this post. So sue me.)

I have had a few particularly strong time travel moments in the past few weeks. For example, the other night I went to Trader Joe's for some groceries (since I'm so different and original compared to every other twentysomething living in the Greater Los Angeles area...) and as I was leaving with my brown paper bags (side note: what do you think they'd do if I brought my own plastic bags with me? Imagine!) and as I'm walking my car I swear to GOD I spy a girl wearing exactly this:

Hat photoshopped on to Vanessa Hudgens, who so graciously agreed to be my model, by yours truly

I mean... this is just so 2003/2004. Now, to be clear, things from this time period DELIGHT me. If I could live the entire rest of my life in the 90s/early 2000s, I would be such a happy camper. It's just so surprising to see such a complete throwback. Usually, you get the hat or the Uggs and the sweatshirt, but not the full sweatsuit. I was pleased with her commitment to the full look. 

Then, I heard this on the radio last week:

Jessica Simpson - I Think I'm in Love With You

This Jessica Simpson song and video are so good, for so many reasons. First, it's JSimp. Hello. Second, she is literally dancing in a Jeep with her belly button showing in the video. Who did NOT want that to be their life when this video came out? I sure did! Unfortunately, by the time I was old enough to drive (and I actually drove a Jeep in high school!) my desire to dance out of the roof of my Jeep had faded. 

Another reason this song is so good is because it reminds me of my Other Half, the girl who makes up the other half of Nalla, my bestie forever, Calla. The very first day I met Calla, at college, this girl Lauren (different from the Lauren previously featured on my blog!) who lived in my dorm freshman year, went to Calla's dorm room to get a brow or bikini wax... unsure of that detail anymore. Anyway, the point is, Calla is a licensed aesthetician and so Lauren knew she could go to her without fear of death from waxing. So we walk into Calla's dorm room, and this is what is staring back at me:

And I remember thinking "... All right. I think this girl and I are going to be friends. She might be a lesbian, but that's fine." And oh, how right I was. Minus the lesbian thing. We survived our psychology major together (which included a lot of late nights and McDonald's) and we've survived living 1,200 miles apart from each other for the past 3 and a half years, closer than ever. We still talk every single day. Well, mostly text. But still. Every day. I love her so much and I'm gushing about her because I get to go visit her for a long weekend in 2 weeks and I am just. so. freakin. excited.

This is the first picture of us together ever tagged on Facebook, taken right around the time we became Nalla, when one of our psych professors combined our names while asking one of us a question:

Obvs, taken at a sushi restaurant because that's all we ever like to eat around each other. Calla does not look like that anymore. She, over the past couple years, has lost over 100 pounds, which makes her a total inspiration and even more badass than she was previously.

This is me and Calla at her bachelorette party this past September:

And, my favorite picture of us ever taken, our "Christmas card photo" from two Thanksgivings ago:

Don't be too jealous...

I hope she and I are still friends in 40 years like my mom is with her college bestie, Gail. And we're still texting each other ridiculous stuff like this:

I mean, a girl can dream. Expect a ri-DIC-ulously long, picture heavy post featuring the two of us narcissists after our Presidents Day Weekend Extravaganza. Don't say I didn't warn you.