Dannelly is my own personal southern belle. We all call her dweeb because her initials are DWB. Dannelly hates it when I say 'whatever' because she knows I'm secretly being passive aggressive, and she no longer lets me get away with it. She keeps me honest as there is no pretending when she is in the room. She loves hugs, lots of beer, and ice cream, and normally in that order. She calls me on all my crap and I call her on hers. She is emotionally constipated but one day she will learn to love. She also is impossibly hopeless in the kitchen and will wait for you to cook something and then look forlorn and pout until you feed her, but that's part of what makes her so lovable. Dannelly lives in San Diego and works for NASSCO sea testing all those big boats the Navy orders.
 

Conchita is probably my oldest friend. We have a really long, complicated history involving prank phone calls in London, homemade pad thai, her giving me all her inappropriate CDs, sleepovers at her house, robotics, etc. The list could literally go on forever. We first met sitting next to each other on the bus to Sea Camp in 7th grade, and she shared her rice krispy treat with me. I love how we can quickly catch up months and years of our lives over dinner and I look forward to seeing her every time I come home. Conchita is little Miss Washington DC now and lives there working for the Colorado delegation on immigration issues. My favorite part about Conchita is how her life plan changes so immensely every time I speak to her (4 months ago she was going to graduate school in Spain. Now, not so much).

Francine (Frankie) was one of the first people I met at Michigan. She was friends with a girl in my hall and in most of my classes too. As I got to know her, I began to love her easily-manipulable Catholic guilt complex, her constant staring off in to space, and her whining when we went to the bar and she couldn't because she is 2 years younger than all of us. I've lived with her pretty much all through college and she understands me in an deeply intuitive way. I have few memories of Michigan that don't involve her. My favorite part about Frankie is how she cleans the house aggressively when she is upset. She now lives in Seattle and works for Microsoft doing secret X-Box things that she can't tell me about.
 

Gabi is the easiest person to open up to. I have known her almost as long as I've known Conchita, from way back in middle school at Carrollton. I found a note she wrote to me the other day for my birthday in 9th grade and it made me cry; she is an inspiration in kindness and patience. We have so many amazing memories together, my favorite of which is probably spending an entire evening at Sunset Place talking in British accents. Much of our recent relationship has been spent trying to decide on a career for Gabi (I suggested a dolphin trainer at Sea World). Gabi's ability to "go with flow" is something I admire tremendously, until it's time for her to decide on a movie and she can't make a decision! Gabi is recently engaged to Miguel and I am enjoying having someone to commiserate with about wedding planning in Miami. She is currently getting her Masters in Human Resources and working full time too.
 

Caro is my fellow nerd and secretly she knows it's true! I had nerd jealousy when she got an internship at Wired Magazine, which was the coolest thing ever, especially when she got to sit in on an interview with Trent Reznor. She loves Star Wars but still has totally normal social skills, it's amazing. I've known her for as long as I've known Gabi. We always hung out together in a group and would get up to no good, as witnessed by that amazing Halloween we had which ended up with us covered in flour, dressed in Gabi's sister's dress-up clothes, in a big wheels, rolling down the street and singing at 2 AM. Totally normal weekend for us. I miss Caro's amazing sarcasm and her sense of humor.

Maggie was and continues to be a total shock to my sense of political correctness. I met her in my first Civil Engineering class and secretly hated her because she had such pretty dresses. As I got to know her though, and realized what an awesomely outspoken individual she was, I couldn't help but love her. She says out loud what we are all thinking, even when it's totally inappropriate and you can't help but cringe. I have immense respect for her ability to be completely honest and utterly loyal. I was a bridesmaid in Maggie's wedding and I am happy to return the favor! Maggie lives with her husband, John, in Royal Oak where she works designing city planning, traffic circles, and other fun stuff.
 

Dylan is my amazingly cool little brother who I still call Bug. I take some credit for the way he turned out though because I made sure he listened to Nirvana when he was a baby. He plays the French Horn and is a self-professed band geek, which is great because I love listening to him play, even though I can still hear those same 25 notes from Till Eulenspiegel in my sleep. He also is a very good long jumper and likes playing ultimate frisbee. When he is not plotting to overrun medieval Europe, he enjoys watching Germany play soccer and graduating from high school. Dylan will be attending Penn State in the fall and I am SO excited to have another reason to watch Big Ten football.