...

We had a nice quiet Christmas this year broken up with a few bits of noisiness that I was thankful for. Heather and Chad invited us to their family Christmas Eve gathering that included a big loud family, lots of kids and a dirty santa game that involved alot of shots. (I think I would have been more homesick without being a part of a big family - so thanks!) Very fun night till about 11pm when I was trying to sleep and realized I ate to much and my stomach did not have room for it. Christmas day was back to quiet with just Jeff and I. We got to eat a Honey Baked Ham turkey dinner my dad sent. (yeah, no cooking). I was a bit sad not to see any of my family for Christmas, but so it goes. I guess next year we'll figure out what traveling with a baby is really like.
Friday morning I headed out to Penney's and the mega sale. I finally got some towels and guest sheets. I even picked up a couple baby girl dresses. Then I went to Pier 1 and got wrapping paper for next year.

Friday afternoon, we drove to Bham to see Jeff's family. We exchanged gifts, and I was excited about the gifts I got (impressed since I didn't really help people for ideas). Then Jeff's parents treated us by going out for an Italian dinner. Very good food, though I missed out on the wine and a couple good appetizers that were not pregnancy friendly. I think I've determined everyplace in Bham is small, crowded and loud, but it was a change from Hsv that is full of mostly chain restaurants. The next morning we had bagels from Panera - again no cooking :)
Saturday we headed back home, so I could meet up with some friends from highschool - a range of people were meeting at Monaco. I kind of forced myself to go since I was not really in a mood to converse with people I only see every few years or not even in 14 years. But I was glad to catch up with a couple people. (hopefully I didn't come across as a snob, but I'm not the best at putting on a false smile) And while they were all drinking I got a big fat ice cream cone (luckily it was a warm night).

I am wondering now if Jeff will go into gadget withdrawal. In the last week or so we've acquired several new gadgets and things he's had to put together or figure out: Garmin GPS (company present), HD video camera, PC tablet (for me), smoker/grill (from his parents), garage code key for door, new computer ram, and something else I'm not remembering now.

Hope everyone had a great holiday.

This past weekend we had Jeff's company Christmas party. He got a new Garmin GPS and I won the door prize - the flowers :)

We also played with the new video camera. I have alot of learning to do. I will say that I love being married to a smart geek that loves new technology. He picks stuff up faster than me, including the editing software. I started trying to film the nursery, but static rooms just aren't exciting. Maybe we'll take it to a party Wednesday or New Years for some action shots.

Last night we got our video camera in so Jeff has a new gadget to play with. I was going to hold off till after the baby came, but I figured now may be best when I may actually have time to learn how to use it and the editing software. I'm open to ideas if anyone has anything that we can go shoot this weekend. (At a minimum I may have to buy some catnip for the kitties and see what happens in our house.) I'm hoping I figure out how to add songs and music over it too. I'm not about to take it to an Adobe Premier level like some friends, but I'd like to know some cool editing stuff. And for those interested we got a Canon Vixia that records in HD.

Yesterday was a little news worthy with the weather. It snowed 4" on the Vegas strip. And North Alabama is finally out of the drought. It does seem like years since we've had so much continuous rain and I'm sick of it. Rain can just bring down your mood. I was thankful to have some girlfriends over last night for a wrapping party to help alleviate some of my gloomy mood from the constant mist. We just sprawled out on the floor and wrapped our own gifts and shared paper. Angie was thankful for the help and I think Heather was glad to have another person writing name tags 'from Santa' since her kids know her handwriting. Yes I took a mental note for future years :)

Now we have Jeff's Christmas party this weekend and then it'll be a slow week at work before Christmas.

I wish I had found this a few weeks ago before all the dirty santa gift exchanges. These soy candles are supposedly better for the environment and air quality than paraffin wax. Scent of a Scandal - has very creative names like: ‘Me So Thorny’, ‘Santa’s Pole’, ‘Hanukkah Bush’, 'Ho Ho Homo' and ‘Challahback Girl’.

Found this cool website:
http://howmanyofme.com/.
There used to be 69 people with my name (maiden name) but now there is only one me in the US. yeah for unique last names :)

Story background:
I work in an old building for a very safety conscious gov't agency. An average of about 4 times a month they will have an asbestos outage at 6pm where no on is allowed in the building till the next morning. (they're doing work in the walls or ceiling and may release some asbestos)
There has been an on-going saga with the ladies bathroom on my floor for about a year. When they couldn't fix the clogged sink, they removed it, busted the tile, and then duck-taped cardboard over the gaping 3 foot+ hole. I've heard the old 50's blue tile is on order - for at least 6 months now. The other day I was fed up with seeing the gross pipes behind the wall, revealed by the loosening duck-tape. I decided to send an email to a new person stressing my concerns of being pregnant and asbestos. Well there were 4 guys working on it this morning. Guess a pregnant lady has more of a voice than the long time employee that has been working the issue for a year. Now I'm still concerned that I've been exposed to some dangerous stuff for so long.

I came across an article that mentioned a few free money tracking/budgeting websites. I decided to try one out (Expensr), so in my down time at work yesterday I went through last months credit card and debit card transactions and put them in (gotta love online banking - have everything at your fingertips). I hope I can keep up with putting in my purchases everyday b/c it is pretty cool to see where the money goes. You also put in your deposits, so it shows you a green or red balance number, then you can break it into categories that shows you a pie chart of where you're spending the most money. So far I'm doing good with a green balance and the biggest chunks going to food, bills and savings. I even got Jeff to start it last night. Again we'll see how long we stay motivated to keep inputting the numbers :)

I saw snow for a few minutes today, but the white ground didn't stay more than another 5 minutes. oh well. It was a bit of a shock after wearing flip flops on the beach all weekend. I do love the beach, but it's not quite as much fun when it's too cold and/or rainy to get in the water. Still, it was a fun family weekend.

I ordered my Christmas cards tonight but I may have accidentally checked for slow shipping, so I'll be sending those out the week before :)

I saw a friend wearing a shirt the other weekend that said save the ta ta's. I just thought it was a funny shirt. then today I saw a network with that name on a friend's facebook page. Save the ta ta's is promoting breast cancer awareness and donates to the cause. Kinda cool with a catchy name. check it out: www.savethetatas.com

My view of the bright orange leaves is diminishing. Twice today we had a gust of wind that blew the leaves upward and in a circle - it was an amazing, beautiful site!

Saturday night we went to the UAH hockey game against Bemidji. They started a new tradition - to introduce the parents that traveled to see their kids play (most of our players are from up north and Canada). All the parents were sitting in 2 sections of the box seats and they did make it to Kurt Russell and Goldie Hawn who stood up and waved (Wyatt Russell is our goalie). I've heard they try to be normal parents and attend all their kids functions - pretty cool. We were sitting across the ice from them and I saw at least 3 people with digital cameras with bit zoom lenses taking photos of them :) After the game I called my father-in-law and got to mess with him - he loves Goldie. I think they'll be coming again this year for a hockey game :)

Wow, haven't written on here in a long time.

We went to the Biltmore in Asheville, NC for our 3rd anniversary. Had a great trip and gorgeous weather including seeing the fall foliage, which we took the long way back so we could drive part of the Blue Ridge Parkway.

Obama was elected president with about 52% of the popular vote. I think it's great but a few friends think it's the beginning of the end for this country. I teased them that they sounded more emotional that me -a pregnant woman :)
Now stories are coming out about how horrible Sarah Palin is, throwing temper tantrums, calling Africa a country, etc. I think it's funny. I agree with so many others that if McCain really wanted to win he (an old man) would have picked someone with more experience to be his second in command. I won't complain anymore, just hope Obama is full of the greatness we believe and can change the minds of the other voters.

Everyday life is still the same. So far having a healthy, non-eventful pregnancy which is good. Work is the same. Though the view outside my window is absolutely beautiful. Whatever kind of tree is just inches from my window now has bright orange/red leaves, and I can see all the fall colors in the hill in the distance. Even with fog and rain, it's still pretty today. My officemate is weeks away from getting moved to a cube-farm, so I keep teasing him to enjoy the view.

Holiday planning has begun with my sister-in-law. So nice to have another female in the family to help out with that sort of thing (and other things that don't occur to the men). I've got alot of Christmas shopping done - yeah - I hate the crowds and I refuse to go to the mall after dark, which is now very early.

This is a snippet of conversation I heard from a group of ladies walking to the next building:

"She said she was channeled and that the aliens are coming on Oct 14 and will be hovering over Alabama..."

Then it trailed off and I was too far to hear. I was tempted to follow them - I mean, I did hear it at NASA, so she could it be a legit source, right? haha :)
I then had a huge smile on my face for the next few minutes and passed a few people that gave me strange looks. Though they smiled back - ah the pleasantries of living in the south.

The latest McCain ad using the Ayers controversy pisses me off. They are saying Obama's character is corrupt because of something someone did when Obama was a kid. Here's the timeline:

* Bill Ayers - active in the 60s and 70s with the weatherman group and tied to some bombings - did some damage, but no injuries and he was never convicted (Obama was a kid then).
* Bill had kids in 77 and 80. Then he got involved with education. (I'm guessing grew up and is becoming a responsible adult)
* Ayers and Obama were on the same board for an anti-poverty foundation in the late 90s and lived in the same neighborhood.
* sometime in there Ayers contributed a whooping $200 to Obama's campaign.
* Currently Ayers is a distinguished professor at U of Illinois-Chicago.

In February 2008 (when Hilary brought up the issue), Obama spokesman Bill Burton released a statement from the senator about the relationship between the two: "Senator Obama strongly condemns the violent actions of the Weathermen group, as he does all acts of violence. But he was an eight-year-old child when Ayers and the Weathermen were active, and any attempt to connect Obama with events of almost forty years ago is ridiculous." More on wikipedia

Wow, just checked my 401K balance and it's down $14k for the year. And I know my balance is small compared to people close to retirement. I'd be freakin out if I was about 50+ years old right now. I keep hearing it's great for me (and other relatively young people), it's like the market is having a big sale, but it doesn't really help calm fears.
I found this comic yesterday - Damn it feels good to be a banksta. I immediately thought of the movie Office Space where the white guy is sitting in traffic in his beige Corolla with the song 'Damn it feels good to be a Gangsta' just blaring loud. So anyway, I found this comic hilarious. Thinking of the song also brought back a memory of driving through Nashville with some guy friends (white) while they too blared some gansta rap music with the windows down. I felt a bit silly but was laughing most of the time.

My friend Jon got married, so Jeff and I went to Austin for his wedding. We got there early on Friday and since it was so hot (about 92) we didn't walk around as much as I'd like, but we did take the Austin Overatures tour - a van ride for 90 minutes. I liked our guide (kinda reminded me of my friend Liz) and I saw more of the city that I ever had. The Austin City Limits Music Fest was that weekend, and we had to deal with some traffic, so after our tour, we tried to avoid downtown. I still love Austin and it is on a top place of mine to live one day, but I think I'm becoming more of a wuss to the heat. Or maybe I can blame the lack of tolerance on my pregnancy ? :) Jon didn't have people over to his house till 7pm Friday, so we still had a few hours to kill. Near our hotel was a place called Central market. A gourmet grocery store. Man, I wish we had one here. They had an olive bar that was at least 18 feet long, a salsa/dips bar, an entire aisle of cheeses, and then half an aisle for already prepared food ready to take home. The rehearsal dinner was a small gathering of friends and family, so that was nice.

Saturday morning we met my long time friend Maya for brunch. It's been about 7 years since I last saw her and another 7 or so before that (we grew up together). We had fun catching up then went to check out the huge costume store nearby on Congress St. I was about to take a photo, but Jeff stopped me and pointed to a sign prohibiting it - too bad. that place was huge and had thousands of costumes. We parted ways with Maya and her boyfriend, and Jeff and I continued to stroll the funky shops. It was hot again, so you had to keep going in shops for the A/C. We bought our first baby clothing purchase. They had several cute ones to choose from, but this one made me laugh most.

We made our way to the wedding location, a simple but pretty park in Austin. I think their wedding was as short as ours, and they were also married by a lady. They had a mariachi band for entertainment and Schlotsky's afterward. We were on the road headed to my dads about 4pm. The family visit was pretty uneventful and relaxing. I brought home a few more things of my grandma's including my dad's baby quilt she made, so that is neat.

Oh, I do hope that is my last plane ride till after the kid is born. I couldn't take cold medicine to help open my ears, so the plane descent was more painful that I remember before. Though, I found out Tuesday is a good day to fly - neither plane was full.
(pictures to be posted on picasa tonight)

Fast way to kill your day at work:
have a co-worker tell you she's about to go to New Zealand on an active vacation. The website: www.activenewzealand.com - has some amazing photo galleries. Especially the photo for kayaking Milford Sound. I want to go now! oh wait, I have baby duties coming up. I can still dream for one day :)

I got an email from a friend with a wonderful idea - donate to Planned Parenthood in the name of Sarah Palin. They send her a thank you card :) So I just did. I think it's a great organization. Here's the email:
Make a donation to Planned Parenthood. Of any amount, in Sarah Palin's name. Here's the best part: when you make a donation to PP in her name, they'll send her a card telling her that the donation has been made in her honor. It won't change the election but it will support an important organization and it will make women's voices heard. (And even if this was cooked up by a PP person -- I don't care!)

Here's the link to the Planned Parenthood website

You'll need to check "make honorary or memorial gift," and fill in the name of the person you want to "honor," i.e. Palin. Fill in the address to let PP know where to send the "in Sarah Palin's honor" card. If you use the address for the McCain campaign headquarters, they'll get the message.
McCain's headquarters address:
McCain for President
1235 S. Clark Street
1st Floor
Arlington, VA 22202

I heard from my parents last night that my brother stayed in his bay house a couple nights ago. There was some water inside but no major floor cave ins or cracks that he found so far. My dad was worried about the structure holding up, but they are more worried about looters. So sad - it's their own neighbors that do some of the looting. So they are staying there with a generator. Their neighbor that had a one-story house on a slab only had 2 interior walls/rooms remaining. When they went over to talk to him, he said you could see the water line - at the very top of the wall, so the waves just lifted the roof right off. And then they talked to the cops with dogs - cadaver dogs, and yes they had found 2 bodies somewhere in the vicinity. Kinda spooky.

So I've been hearing talk of trying to subpoena to get emails on personal email accounts from Palin and her husband. I was not sure what all that was about. I found some clarification in this article. Seems Palin had her husband around the office all the time even included him in meetings. Soon people were cc'ing him on emails for official city/state business. I wonder, he has his own job and 5 kids - didnt he have enough other stuff to tend to?! Will this be allowed in Washington?

Another article with some interesting quotes from others that know Palin.

"She looked in my eyes and said, 'Yes, I think I will see Jesus come back to earth in my lifetime.'"

"The real disturbing thing about Sarah is her mind-set. It's her underlying belief system that will influence how she responds in an international crisis, if she's ever in that position, and has the full might of the U.S. military in her hands. She gave some indication of that thinking in her ABC interview, when she suggested how willing she would be to go to war with Russia."

Howard Bess (a Baptist pastor) adds, "this person's election would be a disaster for the country and the world."

Sarah Palin stated in the ABC news interview her biggest credential is her work in energy. "...this state that produces nearly 20 percent of the U.S. domestic supply of energy."
That is wrong. Alaska produces 14% of oil for US, but she said "energy" not "oil". Alaska produced 3.5 percent of the country's domestic energy production. Big difference! More on factcheck.org.

Texas family update: One brother's house fared good with minor damages. The other brother with a house on the bay has not been inside yet, but a friend said the main house is still standing (on the stilts - is that what it's called?). The one-story half house is gone, and ofcourse their pier and new boathouse are gone. Both of his neighbors on either side had one story houses on the ground and they are gone. The yard is gone and water is now almost up to the pilings. Maybe I'll know more tomorrow. So glad they evacuated. So sad for all the work and clean up that is ahead of them.

I made Jeff suffer thru a hour or so of hurricane Ike coverage this morning. He's not as interested in it as me, but he didnt grow up there either, with relatives that had to evacuate houses on the bay. The local news site has started posting viewers photos - beautiful skies as the storm was coming in: www.click2houston.com/slideshow/news/17453226/detail.html. I'm still anxious to see more, just waiting on the reporters to get out more.
I read where the Kemah Boardwalk and several surrounding million dollars homes are submerged. I'm glad I got to see it just a few months ago.

I saw an interesting news headline that McCain voted against a law requiring free rape exams. This ofcourse peaked my interest since I'm pro-choice and he's not, so how could he also do this. Sometimes the readers comments have more information than the actual article. I love that other people do the research for me. I knew that pieces of legislation are huge and packed with several sections, but I had no idea they were this big! This H.R.3355 is over 300 pages. I did skim through it, and to me it look like there was alot of good stuff in here, community grants, gun safety for youth, some prison stuff, etc. I dont think I could be a law maker though and have to keep up with several of these going up for vote. Anyway, it did pass, you can see who voted here (Biden voted yea, McCain nay).

I did watch the ABCnews Palin interview last night. I was not impressed. She sounded rehearsed, so much so she repeated herself and couldn't come up with a new answer, several times making me feel like I was lost in a sea of words. And the clips of her speaking in a church, saying OUR soldiers were on a task from God scared the crap out of me. Let the people in the middle east fight a holy war, not us!

Looks like several of my relatives will get a direct hit from hurricane Ike. I really hope my brother's bay house holds up. I saw that they started mandatory evacuations in Houston. I hope they do a better job with the roads and evacuation routes than they did with Rita. What would normally take 3 hours to get to my parents took them 12 hours. Guess I'll call later and see how much company my parents will have.
I was looking up Houston news, and they have a huge list of traffic cameras set up everywhere. It's interesting to see the roads already filling up.

I'm still baffled by how many people are talking about Sarah Palin, and talking like they'd vote for McCain just because of her. In my opinion she has barely any experience and was only chosen to fill a demographic to get Hillary supporters away from Obama. I decided to write down a few things that are big on my list for voting this election.

Obama(Columbia Univ, Harvard Law- top of class)
- 47 years old
- would increase taxes for extremely wealthy (unlike McCain)
- does not take contributions from lobbyists
- opposed the Iraq war since 2002
- called to repeal the Patriot Act
- excellent ideas for education reform
- 10+ years Senate experience

Biden (Univ of Delaware 506th of 688, Syracuse Univ College of Law 76 of 85)
- 30+ years Senate experience (plenty of info available)

McCain (US Naval academy, 894 of 899 - come on -even Bush went to Yale)
- 72 years old
- crashed 5 navy aircraft
- POW, returned home to former model wife now 5" shorter and with her own injuries, so he cheated on her w/in a year, and later marrying someone 18 years younger than him
- admits not knowing how to use a computer
- said on camera he does not know how many houses he owns
- 20+ years Senate experience, 5 in House of Rep
- voted to extend the wiretap provision in the Patriot Act (which is totally against everything the constitution stands for)
- uses talk of terrorism to keep this country scared and voting republican.

Sarah Palin (5 colleges, finally graduating from Univ of Idaho in journalism)
- PTA to town council to mayor of town of 7,000 to governor for less than 2 years.
- when will she finally do a real interview and answer hard questions?!
- yes she seems real and can speak eloquently, but do we want a hockey mom for #2 in line ?! Several people have said how they like that she's just like anyone else. That's great for a city mayor, but the US is a major player in world politics - I want someone more prepared to handle it, someone that is highly educated and prepared for the role.

Added 9/11: Matt Damon did an interview where he said it was like a scary Disney movie. The numbers say there is a 1 in 3 chance McCain will not live through is first term, so we'd have this hockey mom working relations with Russia. scary. So true!

I found some more information on the study of US clothing sizing and vanity sizing issues. In 2004 they scanned 10,000 subjects of all ages and races and took measurements. A couple interesting results:
* Of course we're getting taller and heavier, but heavier faster
* In 1941, the average woman’s measurements were about 35-27-37 (mostly white women measured for this though)
* In 2004, the average woman's measurements were 40-24-43 (all races)
* Average weight has risen to 157 pounds and Average sizes are now 14 to 16
And at the end of this paper, there is a note implying that Levi stopped their customization option for clothing where they'd scan your body and make the perfect jeans just for you. Well I didn't think I'd get back to San Francisco anytime soon (where I was told that store was).

Most of the family knows, and yesterday I told my boss and put it on facebook. So it's out in the open - we're pregnant with our first.
I started a separate blog for the baby stuff: http://babymach.blogspot.com .

Yeah a 3-day weekend! Saturday, I took off to my friend Stacy's house and then we headed to Franklin, TN to go shopping. They have a very cute downtown with cooler shops than anywhere in Hsv. And we usually hit lots of antique shops too. We started off with a large breakfast at Dotson's - looks like a hole in the wall, but very good food. The past 2 years we've been a little before Christmas and I think I liked the selection better then, since I dont usually decorate my house for fall harvest. Main St downtown was blocked off for a Jazz Fest but it didnt start till 5pm, so we didnt stick around that late. When we got back to Stacy's that night she showed me their new pregnant goat and the guineas and chickens and all the house renovations. Yes she stays busy. I came home to find a clean house and cut grass - Jeff was busy :) We thought his friends were going to have to stay here b/c other relatives were evacuated from Louisiana and were staying at her parents house but I guess they shifted them around b/t a few houses.

I called my parents today and it looks like my 2 brothers did not make it out of Houston in time (one lives on the water and another in Clear Lake). Houston had not called for an evacuation, but all the Louisiana people made friends with Texans and were headed west, so the roadways were already deadlocked with cars and gas stations were drying up. I hope Gustav doesn't make it to Category 4 and they ride it out ok.

Gotta make a couple dishes to take to a cookout...

This past weekend we went to Bham to hang with Jeff's family. My sister-in-law picked up a beautiful pink cake. Normally I don't post unflattering photos of myself, but this is pretty funny. I don't think I've blown out birthday candles for close to 10 years. We had a good time. Sorry I didn't get more photos.

Yesterday I ran into a friend from work who said he'd been to Italy recently and was heading toward Greece for fun. I mentioned how my cousins were there a few weeks ago. Well today I got their photos (gorgeous as expected). Then Allen fw'd his Italy photos. So - you can guess it - I'm longing for another amazing vacation. Why is it that Alabama just can't seem to keep me entertained ? ;)
I do have a Texas trip next month to look forward to - friends wedding and then visit my family. I am really looking forward to that, its just on a different level than Europe. C'est la vie.

Jeff got back from San Diego and couldn't hold in a surprise - asked me if I wanted my birthday present early. I said only if he still gives me something on my actual birthday (like flowers). I was very impressed with the necklace - definitely the coolest piece of jewelry he's ever given me. My wedding ring is beautiful, but this is cool. I think he said it was some kind of shell from New Zealand.
Last night we tried out the Dolce restaurant in Beale Street - heard it was half off on Sundays. I'm glad we didnt have to pay regular price since I was not that impressed. And watch out if you order a side salad - they are $9 - that's crazy!
We had a lazy weekend watching alot of Olympics. I have a co-worker whose daughter is swimming the backstroke. Pretty exciting.

So I have tried out 3 different teachers for the wine and canvas type parties. I think I still like the first the best. A couple weeks ago there was one at the Monaco, and that teacher was a flake. She kept saying stuff like, oh use whatever color you want and if that's where you want to put it well you go right ahead honey. And she didn't even start her own painting till 1.5 hours into it. That's not teaching! Last night was another lady that came to my friends office. She was a better teacher and more likeable overall, but the painting was a bit ambitious for new painters. Most of the other/student paintings in the room did not have much dimension. She had one painting done, and then the painting she painted in class was with mostly different colors. So that made it a bit hard for me to follow. I'm not crazy about mine - still deciding if I'll hang it up in my kitchen or not.


The wine and cheese is the most recent. The Van Gogh style one is from the Monaco party - supposed to be Starry night over Huntsville. I may have to buy some paints and work on that one some more.

Friday night Jeff and I left work a little early to head over to Bear Creek Canoe Run and get our campsite. We arrived about 3:30 to find the place closed and gate locked. So we drive 20 minutes back to town, call leave message and piddle around dollar stores. The owners returned about 5:30 (some emergency kept them away). We set up our tent in some drizzling weather. 6pm - no sign of friends. I guess about 6:30 we drive back up the hill a couple miles to get cell signal and leave messages. The brothers are lost but found some cool Bluegrass festival with old men missing teeth. I think a little after 7 the others get there. Claire brought a pop up tent which turned out great since the rain didnt stop. We also had portable tiny charcoal grills which we had to cook on since we couldn't get a fire. About 10pm the bottom dropped out and lots of rain came down. I was ok with rain, but the lightening kept bringing flashes to mind of all the downed trees in our neighborhood last weekend and I knew our tent would not stand a chance against a tree. The heavy storms lasted about 2 hours - no sleep for me when the ground kept shaking! Afterward the slow steady rain was nice except that I had drips on my legs (yes rain guard must have leaky seams). It kinda reminded me of chinese water torture - when was the next drop going to fall. So I guess I got about 4 hours sleep that night.
For breakfast we boiled omelets in a baggy -pretty easy and tasty. We went kayaking about noon for the half day trip. We went down lower bear creek, that had class I and II rapids. I think there were only class I rapids though. The water was a bit murky after all the rain, but it was a pretty float trip. In the middle we found a beautiful waterfall that you walked over shallow rocks and under a cliff edge to get to. The guys went in the swimming hole which was freezing. They guys also jumped off a rope swing a few times in another spot. After we had floated for 4.5 hours we got worried that we somehow missed our exiting spot, but we found it - guess we were just slow paddlers. Sunny managed to flip her kayaking 3 times I think. Jeff did once and had to struggle to get the water out and get back in (sorry noone stopped to help). So there were a few bang-ups in the bunch, several bug bites, one ankle twist, and one puking incident, but that was about it.
We returned home Sunday morning exhausted with alot of wet muddy stuff to clean up.

My long weekend in LA, Cali was jam packed and very fun. Stephanie and I went to see Patrick get married. That wedding is now on the top of my list as most beautiful that I've been to. Ranch in Malibu, garden set up, lights and flowerballs hanging from the trees, a big sweeping tent with more lights for the reception... you get the idea. The only 'super star' I noticed was Justin Guarini (Amerian Idol season 1) but he didnt do any singing, they just had a DJ. And after the wedding they had a bon fire - yes even that was glamorous :) For the other days we mostly stayed around the beach areas of Venice Beach and Santa Monica. Riding bikes from the hotel down the bike path was alot of fun! (Though my own bike seat would have been more comfortable). One day we did cruise over to Hollywood Blvd, Beverly Hills and Rodeo Dr, and then went down Mulholland Dr and on to the Getty Museum. That was another gorgeous place - set back in the hills, cool art, amazing circular garden, and there just happened to be an assortment of live music to add to the atmosphere. I think the only 'bad' part of the trip was that we kept forgetting our jackets and were a bit chilly at night with a breeze in the 60s. Ofcourse we stepped off the plane coming home and couldn't breathe in the 97 degree hot humid weather. That definitely meant the mini vacation was over!

Now for something closer to home - we're camping and kayaking this weekend. maybe next weekend I'll stay at home. or not :)

This morning the XM radio wasn't working thru the TIVO so I had to listen to VH1 for music while getting ready. I became paralyzed for a minute (or two) and had to watch - New Kids on the Block has a new video out. My biggest memory of them is that I didnt know who they were and felt rejected in my first classroom in 8th grade. I'll backup...
When I was in 7th grade in Houston my musical influences were from my brother - Rock music like Guns & Roses, Def Leopard and Led Zeppelin -- and another friend who listened to Depeche Mode and Erasure. Move forward, I get transplanted to Alabama arrive in a new school and all the girls are asking me which NKOTB was my favorite. I had no idea what/who they were talking about so they looked at me like I came from another country. Instead I made friends with Carole, the one chick in the class wearing mostly black and a studded necklace. From then on I was into GlamRock and went to all the rock concerts that came through town (Poison, Skid Row, etc). And it took a while, but I did befriend the other girls in the class, and we stayed decent friends through highschool.

This past weekend we went to the Hsv Farmers Market. It was free corn day - man, that brings out lots of people! I thought it'd be free raw corn still in the shucks, but no, it was small 1/3 cobb pieces that were grilled. We did pick up some plums, cantaloupe, blueberries and squash though. I was not over impressed with the plums and cantaloupe though. And why is a guy there selling plums from California?! I guess I misunderstood the purpose of a local farmers market. I do like the blueberries in my cereal, though they are pretty pricey. I'm still hoping the (closer to me) Madison farmers market grows more to include more food items instead of plants and soaps. And before I go back, I'm going to take a notepad to the grocery store and write down prices so I can compare and see if it's worth the gas money to go back. It sucks how I think in terms of gas money now. For example, my company is having a free ice cream social today. It's approximately 16 miles round trip for me to go. That makes it about $3 in gas, so technically not free. and it's not bluebell, so is it worth it?

I'm back from the Alaskan cruise. This was a family trip with several of Jeff's family members - 12 of us all together. We were on Royal Caribbean ship out of Seattle going to Juneau, Skagway, Prince Rupert and back into Seattle. A great time was had by all. We had beautiful blue skies and clear weather at all the ports. I was most excited about the whale watching excursion. We found 2 sets of mama and baby humpback whales and several other hb whales. No orcas though. We saw 2 glaciers, hiked through a rainforest, hiked a different 6 mile trail to some waterfalls, battled mosquitoes larger than Texas ones, got woken up by the foghorns, saw sea lions, walked on a beach to find petroglyphs, stretched our bellies from all the good food, battled with Ramada when a nest of ticks was found in the bed, and much more that I'm not remembering right now. I think part of the post vacation bliss I'm feeling right now is realizing how cool a family I married into. A mother-in-law that paid for and planned a vacation like this, being there and having fun, and coming back and liking them even more - life is good!

Now the mission is to get 1200 photos (combined from everyone) condensed into a single photo album. That will be my project for the next few weeks. Right now, a few photos are found here (in folders by day)
http://picasaweb.google.com/themachamers

That is the caption of my photo taken today showing me in a space suit on Mars. The photo is not exactly realistic looking, but it's still cool. It was part of a NASA traveling exhibit with freebies, so of course I tried it out, hey it got me away from the desk for a few minutes. It is in a big 18-wheeler trailer split into 2 rooms. The first part shows a very quick video and then 4 players use a touch screen panel to add components to a lunar base. Then there is another quick movie about going to the moon and the 6 sites we've already been to. They also have a small moon rock that you can touch (it looked like a regular rock to me). Then the tour (about 10 people at a time) moves into the next segment which is a circular kind of hexagon shaped room. They show video on 4 walls and on the floor. It starts off like you're in the water looking at an island and you can stomp on the fish and make them move more. Here, I envision kids going crazy and making the trailer shake :) Then the video went into more moon stuff and how NASA has helped other areas of our every day lives. And another part had moon rocks moving everywhere that you could stomp on again. I think I got carried away with the stomping because I've already forgotten part of the video's message :)
I'll add the scanned photo if I can find the guy with the scanner on this floor.

Bittbox posted a new list. I was shaking my head in agreement at most of them, but these in particular:
2. Your clients pay you for your professional expertise and skill, yet you’ve run into one of ‘those’ clients, that refuses to take the advice from the very person he/she is paying for advice (you).
4. You’ve requested a vector logo from a client, and instead, they email you a 72 dpi image they grabbed from a website.
10. You’ve had a client ask you to “Make the logo bigger.” There is also a separate funny video for this.
12. You’ve learned to over-price web design projects because most clients are more picky about their websites than a high school girl picking out a prom dress.
19. You’ve done everything but give up a body part to talk a client out of a “Flash Intro.” Yeah. I said it. Flash Intro. Sad, so so sad. (goes along with #2)
24. You’ve had a client that wants a website they can “update” on their own, but doesn’t know shit about websites.

I can't remember who now, but a friend had words to the final countdown song in an email or chat and it's in my head now. We leave for Seattle in 2 days for the Alaskan cruise. So far the weather channel is predicting rain everywhere we go. I may kick myself for not buying some gollash (sp?) boots that were so fashionable in the Memphis mud. Then again I'm already worried about how much luggage I'll have.
My mother-in-law has planned this entire trip and kept up with all the confirmation numbers for hotels, cruise, cars, cabs, etc. I think I'm going to tease her about quiting the dental field and going into vacation planning.
We have our regular cat sitter lined up - I think we're his cash cow - he loves it when we go on vacation! Yesterday my boss held a 4.5 hour meeting, so I'm definitely ready to forget about this place for a while.

Not much else to speak of besides yard work and some movie watching. We saw Indiana Jones. And depending on all the plans in Seattle on the return, we may try to see Hancock, Will Smith's latest movie. Hopefully we'll catch some fireworks in Seattle somewhere.

I had my first gas tank that cost more than $60 today. Locally we are holding at about $3.99 and I'm thankful to have a car that doesn't want premium grade. I do remember when gas was under $1. I think that was about 12 years ago. Those were the good ole days when you could cruise for fun and not worry. Now I calculate a trip to store X will cost me an additional $4 b/c it's 10 miles across town. Or even leaving for lunch will add an extra $3, making now even cheap Taco Bell go up to about $7 so it's hardly ever worth it.

My group at work had their awards ceremony today. I liked the casual setting at the botanical gardens, but it was hot. I'm waiting to see if anyone got sick from the potato salad. (I stay away from mayo when it's served in 90 degree weather). I was nominated for a peer award under the communication category. I had a suspicion that I would loose to the younger, cuter, always happy and now pregnant girl and I was right. Everyone likes her including me, so I wasn't upset.

Before going to the Botanical Gardens I went to the Space & Rocket Center to see our exhibit getting set up. This was my first time in the new Davidson center. I was impressed. They did a good job of setting it up so you can walk under the Saturn V rocket. I'll have to take Jeff back with me and show him the fake moon dirt glovebox I helped create.

A few weeks ago our 3.5 year old oven started acting up. It would sound a horrific alarm and shut down if the temp got higher than 375. After some research I came to the conclusion that GE sucked and it was not worth another $400 in parts and labor for a $700 oven. (Yes we lost $50 to a repairman who said they discounted the parts). So we got an upgrade, a Whirlpool convection oven. We also decided to try to install it ourselves before paying $120 to install it. I helped Jeff move both ovens (he should be glad I'm not a 5 foot 100 lb lady -the type he used to be attracted to, or maybe still dreams about, ha). It started off easy, but ofcourse he did have to pull the saw out and cut off about an 1/4" off the wood cabinet. It made our house smell like sawdust but everything turned out and it works. yea! I only baked some rolls in it tonight, so I'm still dont have enough info to compare a convection oven with a traditional one.

In other news, I heard a new (what I think is) redneck term. Some people were near a line talking and someone else came up and asked if they were in line and he said, "no we are just bumping our gums". WTF? Jeff and I laughed. I guess it means just talking. sounds stupid to me.

Friday night we hung out at Keith & Angie's for Keith's birthday. The no-kids night was definitely more calm after the past 2 kid-filled parties at their house. Oh, Kaylee's first birthday party was very cute last weekend. The castle cake was amazing. Saturday was Jeff's birthday. We didn't do much besides clean house and some yard work. Jeff got his new Tivo HD hooked up, as well as XM radio coming thru the tv. Sunday we had some friends over the pool and then back to our house for a cookout. Overall a nice pleasant weekend with good company.

Today at work I got to hear about some bikini-bull riding. A few guys went to N.Carolina for some training, met up with other customer/friends including some from Sweden and went to a bar advertising bikini-bull riding. The story wasn't as wild as I was hoping, but I couldn't help but wonder if they have bikini-bull riding in Sweden. I think they only saw fully clothed girls (though some in dresses) ride, so I'm sure it wasn't anywhere comparable to the nude beaches they have access to in Europe. Still, it's funny to think of Europeans in what was probably a redneck bar. ha!

I first saw an article about the solar tree - a large combination of street lights in a modern shape. (It is actually in Milan but designed by someone in Vienna.) This is so much prettier than a standard looking light post with a couple square flap looking panels attached.

Today I read an article about another solar tree, more like plant-sized version that comes potted. The leaves are organic thin-film solar cells.

I always get excited when I can see that designers have involvement in making something functional also beautiful. (I'm on the hunt for some more cool examples) And for the plant-size version, I'm hoping they come out with a palm tree size one. Jeff has been saying no to me when I ask for a palm tree saying it wont fit in our suburban setting (which I agree), but I'd make the sacrifice of standing out for a solar version.

I think I've made a friend of mine jealous about some upcoming travels/vacations. I can't help but to talk about going places and wishing to go places since everyday life seems too ordinary to talk about and probably boring to most people. I think I am a person that likes to stay on the go and escape my boring desk job, which I clearly remember saying I would NEVER have as an adult. I think those words came out of my mouth before I had to make my own money to survive. Lately I've been pondering how do people come up with a balance in life and planning, that is, spend enough of your money to have fun in your youth, while saving enough to retire on comfortably. I've seen too many examples of deaths too soon into retirement, or a disability limiting mobility. When I think of those examples it's easier to say sure, lets fly off to that destination since there is no guarantee we'll be around long enough or healthy enough to do it in our 50s or 60s. I'm also afraid of more family obligations I'll have in the coming years. My parents have buried 3 of their parents in the last few years, with many years before that consumed with providing care for them. Now they are working on fixing their own misc ailments as well as taking their siblings to the doctor for misc problems. That does not leave enough room for fun. Hmm, so yeah, I think I just validated my reasons for some trips this summer. Alaska is in a few weeks, then a friends wedding in Los Angeles. And recently Jeff's friend invited him to London, so I'm working on figuring out how to fit that in.

Last Friday Hsv police were in a high speed chase that made it's way on the arsenal. Communication didn't flow in time to move the barricades at the gate and the 2 ladies didn’t crash their car for several more miles on base. That crash resulted in the death of a NASA employee. Today a MSFC rep talked to everyone and answered questions. The usual questions flowed, why couldn’t they shoot the tires out, did the police call to warn the gate guards, this means they aren't prepared for a terrorist, etc. The terrorist question drives me crazy. I wish the country didn’t live in fear, it's not a good way to live your life. Anyone can die in a car crash at any time or a freak of nature like an earthquake. The latest story I heard was that this man had just come back from lunch with his family and his two boys, ages 6 and 3, begged their daddy to stay home and play with them. How sad to think that the 6 year old will probably grow up remembering that. It was another instance in life that makes me more aware of how lucky I am for so many things, family, health, friends, too many to list.

On another note, today is voting day. On the local ballot is a sales tax increase to 8.5% with the benefit going to schools. In my frustration yesterday trying to find out details of who and what else was on the ballot, I also looked up what Alabama property taxes were in comparison to the rest of the nation. AL ranked #49, and that is probably a correlation where our schools rank. If they want better schools, why can't the state or people of the state raise the property tax. That will hit those with money harder. Instead they propose a sales tax that hits everyone hard including the poor and lower income that rent. And for future reference if you need to do research on candidates, this is a great site: www.votesmart.org.

I have a new record for amount of time to get through the gate at work. Normally my commute to work is about 12 minutes. Today it was 37 minutes. I thought there was a wreck or maybe some random car checks since we had a highspeed police chase on base that resulted in a fatality last week, but no, the big slow down was so that people could take their badge out of the plastic sleeve and show to the patrolman. This is a new part of our special badges - a plastic sleeve holder since we can't punch holes in them to attach a clip. Now I have a new fear - this sleeve will become loose and my badge will fall out in the toilet.

Jeff and I finally finished painting the kitchen this weekend. Yes, thats me on top of the fridge in order to reach above the cabinets. Before I tried out a light green and it just didn't work with the rest of the tan elsewhere in the house. And since I'm not ready to paint the rest of the house, I decided to go with a darker color. It looks great and even goes with the ceiling color - yea, one less thing to paint. Here is another larger version.

I took a cute photo of Ginger near her new feeder. This is her usual pitiful 'feed me' face. If you click on the image there is a larger version that also shows the timer dial that comes with the feeder. You can set it to go off every 15 minutes if needed. So far Ginger has not tried to bang this one around like the last feeder.

I read a few articles about a miracle fruit/berry that tricks the tongue to make everything taste sweet, including lemons. It seems to change the flavor of most everything that hits your tongue for 30 minutes to 2 hours after eating the berry. A guy in NY has had a few flavor tripping parties to experiment with food. It sounds pretty cool. One lady was pouring Tabasco on her tongue and another said that Guinness beer tasted like chocolate milk. Here's the link for the NYTimes article. Even funnier was a video of the G4 network hosts trying it out, the chic couldnt handle it :) A guy in Florida is selling 30 berries with overnight shipping for $90. This Wallstreet Journal article has some more history on it and other peoples efforts and failures to work with the FDA for diabetic uses.

This cracked me up. I had dinner with a friend and in the middle of telling a story she mentions going online to smellywasher.com and buying their product. Great website name! Evidently front-loading washing machines tend to stink. So bad, that Linda's whole house stunk. How horrible! but the magic trick is to just use borax detergent with every load and it wont stink. So that website is ripping people off by charging $16 for plain Borax (or so Linda said, since I dont have one and have not tried it).

I took off on Friday since I knew the office would be dead. My goal of the day was to get my wedding photo album done (yes 2.5 years late). And I made excellent progress, I'm just lacking the honeymoon photos. This is my first time using blurb.com so I have my fingers crossed. They give you the exact size of the pages, so most pages I did my own collage in photoshop. Friday night we got a call from Jeff's friend that he was going to be in town and we should come down to his parents lake house. That was an offer we couldn't refuse. So Saturday we spent at the lake and caught up with Aaron and Karen who we had not seen since their wedding in California. The water was very cold so I didn’t stay in long. His family had a house full with 3 kids there and 3 grandkids, so we left after a wonderful dinner of bbq'd beef and pork tenderloin. Sunday we got caught up on yard work which I followed with an hour at the pool, and then a nap and then off to Keith and Angie's cookout. They had a big crowd, maybe 40 if you included all the kids. It's funny to think how their parties have changed to include the kiddie activities now. Monday I got the kitchen painted a rusted red color. I love it. Now I just have to paint above the cabinets. Most muscles in my body are sore from something or a combination of things I did this weekend. I guess now they'll stiffen up sitting at work.

Update on the cat saga - instead of buying child gates, we got online and looked for a different automatic feeder. Jeff found an expensive one, but hey, I could feed Ginger 48 times in a day if I wanted. The place had great customer service when I emailed a few questions - the guy was even funny and said the cat couldnt break it unless of course she was the size of a small dog and body slammed it. It arrived yesterday and Jeff took some pleasure in putting together a new gadget. Then we tortured the cat while testing it out to get just a little bit to come out at a time. It has a chute of sorts and the bowl is under that. It was pretty funny to watch her have to use her paw to move the pieces that were under the chute, but she ofcourse figured it out. And later we were watching tv and I heard a noise that sounded like a metal fence rattling or something. I had already forgotten about the feeder - Jeff laughed at me for getting startled. Ginger didnt know what it was either and we had to coax her to the bowl. She must have figured it out throughout the night because she did not meow at us at all until Jeff's alarm went off. Yeah! so far so good. I also think this feeder will be easier for my cat sitter to figure out when we go on vacation.

I'm attempting to build up some stamina for hiking and walking in Alaska.
Last night Jeff and I went out to eat and then looked at ovens and paint, so I didn’t walk.
I'm meeting some girl friends tonight, so I don’t think I'll be walking after a martini, so I decided to bring a change of clothes and walk on the little trail near by my office. It's a half a mile loop, part of it shaded and part open and sunny. I forgot my MP3 player so here are some of the random things that popped in my head...

* The wooded area is also close to the steam/piping (?) lines. Today they are making a constant chug chug sound that makes me think of a monster breathing heavy while chasing you and I'm walking along what is now a secluded wooded curvy path, perfect background for a scary movie.
* Ah, the smell of honeysuckle brings pleasant thoughts back
* Ooh, wild strawberries, I loved strawberry shortcake when I was a kid. When I was a kid I didn’t have to worry about exercising, oh how it'd be nice to be a care free 5 year old again. I was usually only scared of some of my brothers friends and could go hide under my tall bed with the strawberry shortcake comforter.
* Ah, the smell of freshly cut grass.
* I see 5 construction workers, 1 is holding something, 1 is hitting it with a sledge hammer thingy, and 3 are standing around watching - wonder how much gov't money is being wasted just in that little group.
* Those people passed me on the trail and didn’t say hi, they must not be from the south.
* (looking through the trees), ack that man is not wearing a shirt - it's highly improbable that he is one of the 4 good-looking men I've seen around here, must walk faster so I don’t run into him.
* I wonder how different the trees and foliage and greenery will be in Alaska. It'll be nice to be in completely different surroundings. Man, what do cityslickers do when they are just surrounded by concrete and buildings. Guess I'm pretty fortunate to be able to break up my work day with nice walks like this in 74 degree weather.

My cat won't shut up. She wants food all the time - will eat till she pukes, then eat the puke. Every morning she'll come in and meow at the top of her lungs between 4 and 5am. I have already bought a $50 feeder than opens automatically by a turn dial, but it doesnt allow the times to open more than every 5 hours - this is a problem in the middle of the night. Here are the options I'm considering:
- Buy 3 child gates and lock her in the kitchen/utility room area all night, every night
- Find a shock collar for small animals
- surgically remove her vocal cords.
So I think the first one is the most humane :) Guess I'll break my personal rule and actually go to Walmart this weekend to purchase the kiddie gates.

I got an email from Trip Adivisor saying I had been to one of the best destinations for 2008. I was intriqued so I clicked on it. Out of the top 100 world destinations I've been to:
#11 Salzburg, Austria
#16 Victoria, British Columbia, Canada
#34 San Francisco, CA
#41 New Orleans, LA
#52 Napa, CA
#62 Prague, Czech Republic
#75 Munich

Several of the top 25 U.S. destinations were in Hawaii and California. I already have the travel bug and this didn’t help any. I just added more places on my list to explore.

Quick synopsis of my running around lately:

Apr 19 - Bham - hang w/brothers and see a comedy show

Apr 26 weekend in Houston/Kemah to hang with my parents and more brothers. This time water and a boat was involved :)

May 2 weekend in Memphis for Beale Street music festival. Tunes, mud and lots of people describe that

May 4 flew to Chicago for a web design conference. Lots of brain stimulating presentations broken up with fun people and bars and pizza!


I'll write more when I have time. Now it's on to planning a mothers day weekend and doing laundry.

Friday night a friend invited me to a girls night out, painting party. This lady had a business where you get a group of 10 ladies, bring your own wine, and the canvas and paint is provided and she basically instructs you how to paint it where anyone can do it. It sounded like fun, so I said sure sign me up. Later it grew to be a combined birthday party for Cortney and her mom (neither of who I knew). I just showed up at someones house and later a limo picked us up and took us to the studio. This was the most fun I've had in a long time. Partly b/c a couple of the ladies were pretty wild and fun. Oh, and maybe the 10 or so bottles of champagne and wine helped :) I'd highly recommend it. Oh, and I did find myself pretty jealous of the artist Rebekah - pretty cool job!

This just made me happy after watching it, so I had to put it somewhere that I'll remember to watch it again. Turn the speakers on, there is a funky beat.



Cute Kittens Bop Their Head - Watch more free videos

Saturday Jeff and I moved the baby maple tree with attached bush to the backyard. Maybe it'll have a new friend tomorrow if they are giving away free tree seedlings for earth day tomorrow at work.
We got to Birmingham about 1:30 and had a late lunch with the brother clan (this now includes a sister-in-law, but I prefer the shortened terms). We took a side detour to check out Jim's apartment - very nice for an apt - older building with high ceilings and curved arches. Later the boys played foosball on the floppy table and then we grilled kabobs. While sitting on the deck we watched a neighbor cat play with Rita's previous kill of the day - a chipmunk. Stardome Comedy club was packed when we got there, but we made it in without too much trouble. Our table location was great, lower floor in the back. The first comedian was not very funny at all. James Gregory was ok but hard to look at, sorry he's just an ugly man. Bits were funnier toward the end but I think some of my party was falling asleep by then, not sure if it's because it was 10:30 or if it was all the beer :) The guys made an awesome breakfast of omelets and pancakes Sunday morning. Jeff and I headed home in the afternoon and made a stop in Cullman for the Bloomin Festival. It's just a small town arts festival but I was disappointed with the more crafty vendors. I did get a cool hummingbird feeder, hopefully it's not too late for the birds to find our house. It was a nice break from our usual weekend and fun to hang out with the guys.

Jeff and I have been watching the daylilies come up and upon examination of the rest of our flowerbed we thought we found a new weed. It's right next to a small bush. Turns out it's not a weed, we're pretty sure it's a baby maple tree, hopefully a japanese maple (looks like the one at our last house). So I need to look up if we should dig it up now to move it, or wait till winter when they go dormant. Its probably only 12 or 15" tall right now but the base seems pretty thick. It's just right next to a bush and within inches of our house, so I think it definitely needs to be moved.

After reading this I was pretty worked up. Feds to collect DNA from every person they arrest. They plan to take and store DNA from every arrest, not just a conviction. If you're tried and found guilty, sure store the convict's DNA. but what if the police officer makes a mistake, and you're never even tried. Now you have to spend your energy and probably money for lawyers to get your DNA removed from CODIS database. I have no confidence in the gov't being able to protect and secure that much information. Not to mention pay someone to keep up with all the unnecessary entries. I know how gov't contract rates are padded like crazy and to me it's a waste of money and a very unnecessary risk for people that will undoubtedly be falsely accused.

I learned something new yesterday that cracked me up. I dont have kids yet, so I miss out on these things. My officemate was telling me about going to his kids preschool and how the teacher had them sit in a circle, criss cross applesauce while they were reading. I said - woa, back up, what was that applesauce part. He said to be politically correct they can not use the term 'indian style' anymore for sitting down crosslegged. I laughed pretty hard. You just never know what will offend some people anymore.
That was the only funny part to my day that was sucked up with a 6 hour meeting on rocks. As part of that, our lunar geologist spent an hour explaining the process for me to capture in a flow chart but after so many chemistry terms and making up rock names by adding 'ite' to the end, my brain just hurt.

Check out the Bahrain World Trade Center - Beautiful sail shaped towers with 3 huge turbines in the middle to generate power. It is forecasted to provide the equivalent of 11-15% of the power for the two towers when fully operational. And here's another link with a couple more photos and a video.

We got our new camera in this weekend, the Canon Powershot SD950 IS 12MP Digital ELPH. Now I need a fun roadtrip to test it out. Or maybe I'll get a lunch together for the Botanical Gardens tomorrow (free day). I need to master it, so I can take it to Chicago and get some cool shots. I get to go to Web Design World in Chicago in May. I'm pretty excited - new city, and a fun conference. I've been to 2 others (Seattle and Atlanta).

As my friends know, one of my goals in life the past couple years has been to be nicer, or rather not vocalize everything that comes into my critical mind. (yes it's still a struggle) Well I have a new inspiration source. A guy I work with is always so friendly and always cracking jokes (he's actually funny). He was part of the group for a work trip recently and that is where I realized that his niceness would wear me out. I'm not just talking nice to the co-workers - I mean to everyone from the flight attendant that ran her fingers through his hair (true story), to the gas station clerk - everyone! So even if I'll never be on his level, I can still use him a reminder to set me straight. Today was another example. I go over for a meeting and somewhere after cracking a joke with us he mentions a headache that is going on a couple days. Then maybe 15 minutes later he makes a remark that the loratab still hasn't kicked his headache. OMG - his headache is so bad he had to take a loratab, and he can still function normal and be smiling. I'm amazed b/c in comparison I'd just be sitting quietly at my desk not making contact with anyone for fear of being to grumpy. Actually if it were loratab I'd be curled up in a ball on the floor shaking and sweating, but that’s another topic of my reactions to pain pills.

going to work today, arrive at the gate...thats 5 lanes of traffic coming to stop and each lane slowly moving up inch by inch all at different speeds. but today, it's 7:20 and I'm kinda zoning, then realize both lanes around me are moving and I'm not. I can't describe the feeling but for 20 seconds each lane on either side of me was moving forward and I was not. no idea why my lane got stuck for a while but it made for a weird feeling looking around. I kept thinking I had seen this in a movie or something.

My husband told me a nice airport story. One of his flights last week was in the midst of all the airlines canceling flights to get up to date on their inspections. There was a man in military uniform waiting on standby, already late for his brothers wedding. An older lady went up to the counter and wanted to give him her first class seat, and she'd wait on standby. The Delta agent said that was nice, but there were several people ahead of the gentleman and all of those passengers on standby would have to approve (in other words that wasn't going to work). Later Jeff overheard a pilot (waiting as a regular customer) say that the situation was taken care of. They worked it out so the pilot could ride co-pilot and the military man could get on this flight.

For someone that has an art degree, I sure do have a hard time picking paint colors. I have no ability to judge what one 2 inch piece of paper will look like covering the walls. I bought 3 sample size paints on Friday night and spread it on the walls. I've been wanting a green kitchen, a happy color to brighten up the boring beige walls. I knew it'd be hard to get a color light enough without it looking like a mental institution green. We just finished and so far I think it looks mental. It needs more sage in it. One of my samples was closer to what I wanted but when it was up, it had too much gray and it was depressing. So anyway, we cleaned up the room and I'm going to have to live with it for a week or 2.

On other notes, I was very sad today to hear USA canceled the 4400 - one of my most favorite shows, up there with X-Files.

And our Earth Hour was only half an hour since we got home at 8:30. I had 2 candles lit, which I know creates more CO2 than the CFL light bulbs. I read how those are high in mercury and need to be recycled but not enough people know about that and put it in the trash, so in a few years our grounds are going to be polluted with mercury from all the broken CFLs. Joy. So if you break a CFL bulb, put strong gloves on to pick it up and double seal it in it's own bag.

On March 29, 2008 at 8 p.m., join millions of people around the world in making a statement about climate change by turning off your lights for Earth Hour, an event created by the World Wildlife Fund.

On the main website: www.earthhour.org it sounds like several major cities are on board. I wish this had more press, but I think it will still be successful.
Sign yourself up!

I just got an email from a friend that moved away a couple years ago. She mentioned liking my blog, which cracked me up because I only know of 2 people that really read it. Anyway, after thinking of my last post and not complaining, I laughed thinking of her and how much of our day was filled with complaining about work and the people at work. There are many things to find to gripe about in any job, probably especially in a gov't setting with scientists that can be too smart to communicate with the general public. We'd laugh everyday and usually several times a day Linda would have to follow up a saying with, 'oh I'm going to burn in hell for that one'. I always liked that saying. Maybe b/c I see it as a stab at all the fire and brimstone Baptists I'm surrounded by living in the Bible belt.

In the summary of the last book I read the author mentioned starting a Happiness Journal - writing down one thing every day that made you happy. I liked the idea, and started it last week. I only forgot to write something down 2 of those days (not too bad).

One of my favorite shows is CBS Sunday morning (kind of an arts & culture show). Most shows have an ending segment from the quirky reporter Bill Geist. He's very odd and finds the weirdest things to highlight and usually this is my favorite part. Some past segments have been on cliff dancers, tractor dancing, small town gathering for a sunset that ends perfectly at the end of a railroad track, best hamburger in the country, etc). Yesterday he traveled to a church in Kansas that is promoting a complaint free lifestyle. They ship out these plastic bracelets all over the world. The goal is to not complain for 21 straight days (the length of time it takes to form a new habit). If you do catch yourself you switch the bracelet to the other wrist as a reminder. He said most people have trouble with things like traffic and restaurants. I have to agree I'd probably fail there too.
While I'm not sure I can completely go to a complaint free lifestyle, I'm going to try to do less so I can highlight the happy stuff.

OH NO!!! I got my first whiff of the stinky trees. I hate Bradford Pears!

I just finished the book ‘Eat, Pray, Love’ by Elizabeth Gilbert. The title makes it sound like a self help book, which it does have parts of it for the author, but it did have some hilarious moments. I loved the section on Italy. Going to learn Italian and gain back some lost weight with amazing food, wow, how wonderful would that be. Not sure I’ll ever know, so I’m thankful she could describe it so vividly. Which brings me to her writing style. She’s a bit over the top. I’m not sure I could ever feel or think half the thoughts that come to her mind. Maybe I’ll think of a better way to describe that later. The sections on India and Bali were considerably slower. There is a character, Richard from Texas that is awesome. I hope I can meet someone that can speak that clear and to the point one day in my life. (he’s real, he was on Oprah with Elizabeth). And Bali has some cool cultural information but the love life thing is a little too melodramatic for my tastes. Again, I’m just not sure I can believe a man could worship any woman’s body as much as she describes. Either way, I’d recommend this book. Here’s a piece from her experience in India. I really loved this. She still needed to forgive her ex-husband and her friend wrote this for her and sent her up to a rooftop….


Instructions for Freedom

1. Life’s metaphors are God’s instructions.
   
2. You have just climbed up and above the roof. There is nothing between you and the Infinite. Now, let go.
   
3. The day is ending. It’s time for something that was beautiful to turn into something else that is beautiful. Now, let go.
   
4. Your wish for resolution was a prayer. Your being here is God’s response. Let go, and watch the stars come out – on the outside and on the inside.
   
5. With all your heart, ask for grace, and let go.
   
6. With all your heart, forgive him, FORGIVE YOURSELF, and let him go.
   
7. Let your intention be freedom from useless suffering. Then let go.
   
8. Watch the heat of the day pass into the cool night. Let go.
   
9. When the karma of a relationship is done, only love remains. It’s safe. Let go.
   
10. When the past has passed from you at last, let go. Then climb down and begin the rest of your life. With great joy.

http://www.elizabethgilbert.com/eatpraylove.htm

We had a pretty mild weekend but it was fun. Friday night we met some friends at a Mexican restaurant and I ordered sopapillas. My sweet tooth was happy! Saturday we went to Dicks Sporting Goods to get ping pong balls and a worker there informed us that it was fun to give water snakes pp balls b/c they think it's an egg and will eat it but then they can't swim under water. He did admit maybe it was just a redneck thing :) Some friends came over that night and we just played poker (I won! and Jeff was a sore loser) and their kids played ping pong and their DS. More of my friends have toddlers and babies right now, but these kids are 6 and 8 and can fend for themselves. I love it. They can be cute and wild but dont need your attention every second. Sunday we took a drive to Decatur so Jeff could get something from the office. We drove around some of the old houses and I was a little sad looking at all the beautiful houses with character and charm, wishing I could have one. Maybe one day, when I feel like having all the up-keep :) Jeff went out to Home Depot to get some mulch later that afternoon. I didnt even think to look where he put it in the garage. So guess what I did this morning - took one of the bags with me halfway down the driveway. That was fun to clean up in nice work clothes.
I'm still waiting to hear if any friends are going out tonight, so I'm not sure if I'll get any green beer or not. Happy St. Patricks Day!

I saw something that disgusted me yesterday. A license plate that said 4GEORGE. Now I'm used to seeing the 'W for president stickers' everywhere; I do live in a red state and work on an army base. But this person paid an extra $50 for a custom tag. He could have donated that to something worthwhile. I'm ready for a new president, I'll take anyone over George :)

Tonight is margarita girl night. Though I'm going to have to come up with a new name b/c I'm giving up tequila for a while. The last 5 outings where I had either one margarita or 3, I've felt like crap the next day. So tonight is martini night...with chips and salsa :)

After that lack of a voice problem I went on to sound like a man for a while. Good news is that is all gone. Now I'm on to other worries. My job has a wellness program and I have the chance to get $250 if I pass a series of items including blood work, weight, blood pressure, etc. The only one I'm worried is blood pressure. The last couple times I had it checked it was 118/87, so the lower number is high. So I'm on a time crunch before the 25th to cut out sodium and exercise more.

Not being sick, having a couple girlfriend nights coming up and warmer weather make me happy.

At first I just sounded like a rough Kathleen Turner, now anything past a whisper is a struggle. I knew Jeff was a quiet guy, but this past week has really shown me how much. I also realized how I'm used to pointing out stupid stuff or saying something just to say something and now I dont even make an effort. The lingering cough has me worn out enough, I'm not going to bother straining my voice.

On a happier note, the windows are open and it's a gorgeous day outside. We bought 8 bags of mulch and got about 1/3 of the flowerbeds near the house done. I hear snow is in the forecast, so I guess the rest is going to wait.

It was my turn to get sick. I started running a fever on Saturday and got a little freaked when it was 102.3 on Sunday. Now I'm left with a horrible cough, chest congestion and a voice that will startle anyone. I'm about to go to the dr and hopefully get some stronger cough syrup. I do feel a little better today, that is when my abs aren't aching from the coughing.
My dermatologist called back today and after 2 years, I finally know what I'm allergic to that makes my eyes swell up. Lanolin and FD&C Yellow Dye #6. Now I'm on a hunt to figure out what products contain those. And I'll write to Clinique and see if they'll give me a list of products I can use. It's been so long since I've worn eye makeup.

Jeff is sick right now so I've been following him with the lysol :) He's not complaining of body aches, so hopefully it's just a cold. He's had a bad cough so I slept in the guest bedroom last night. Man, is that weird. It just seemed odd to be sleeping apart when we haven't been fighting or anything.
I'm still keeping busy with freelance work. oh, and I need to get tax stuff together. I have my fingers crossed for a decent refund this year.

Work sent me to set up and man a tradeshow booth in Albuquerque this past week. Overall the days were long but I had good company and plenty of laughs. The conference was at a hotel on the edge of Old Town which was full of cute shops and restaurants. Monday night I had food poisoning of some sort but I was good for the rest of the trip, though scared to try more of the red chili sauce :) They gave the exhibitors a 2 hour break for lunch, so after going to lunch with the group I usually walked around old town where I got some more silver jewelry and did buy a small piece of pottery. Exhibitor hours went till 7pm, so by Wednesday we started tearing down at 3pm, so I could hopefully see a sunset. We were on the tram going up the Sandia Mountains at 5:40 but it was really cloudy so I was a bit worried. We lucked out and it was gorgeous. Just freezing and windy - but worth it. We actually had to wait on standby for about 35 minutes while they added extra weights to the cable cars since winds had picked up (probably over 40mph). Then we headed out to a local restaurant recommended by a newspaper lady and that was definitely the best meal of the trip. Jim and Ken's stuff sopapilla was the size of their head! I stuck with soft tacos that had wonderful guacamole. Then we headed home yesterday before the snowstorm struck :)

It's been a while since I drove down Holmes Ave and I saw a whole street of houses missing and the ground torn up. I'll have to go back and examine more. I'm glad to see UAH expanding. Maybe they can eliminate the rest of the small subdivision and build there, so kids won't have to walk across Sparkman Dr. Five minutes searching the university's website yielded no results to what is going across from the fitness center, so if you know please email me.

So I've been reading follow up about the noro virus that affected the cruise I was on a few weeks ago. Seems that people were sick on the cruise before ours, the one I was on, and sure enough the one right after. We arrived on the 28th and it was set to go out again, but this time people were given written notice of the outbreak, what it was and how to minimize it. One person wrote in, that they chose to still take the cruise and sure enough later on you could smell vomit in the halls.
We are booked for an Alaskan cruise this summer and I wonder if they would tell me the truth if sick people were on the cruise right before ours. I'll definitely ask. How do they plan to stay in business if they can't disinfect the ship between cruises???

The thunderstorms woke me up at 3:42 am, but my bladder kept me awake, so when I got up and went in the bathroom, away from our noisy box fan, thats when I heard the tornado sirens flaring. I woke up Jeff and we both ofcourse go look out the window :) (what you are not supposed to do). I turned on the TV as the weather guy was saying street names about 4 miles to the west of us and a second rotation about 3 miles due north of us. That woke me up. Luckily no major activity in our vicinity. And while I tease the weathermen for adding drama to every passing storm, I'm glad they gave us warning days ahead of time about the possibility, because I might not have gotten up and heard the sirens. Last time I looked news was reporting 4 deaths in Alabama. Tennessee and Arkansas faired much worse.

I voted for Obama this morning. My parents would be so disappointed :) While I'm not thrilled with our candidate choices, I am proud that we have a black man and a woman this far in the election. Amazing stuff for history! I really hope people are not voting for Hilary just b/c she's a woman. I really don't trust her at all. A friend just sent me a link to a news article about her raising $800k from lobbyists while Obama only has $86k from employees of lobbyist firms. And that whole crying thing, I think she's pulled it twice now, was a crock of bs in my opinion. I could go on, but I'll stop. I have my fingers crossed that Jeff will vote tonight. Everyone should vote - if you don't vote you can't complain later :)

Even though we are not having a Mardi Gras party this year I still wanted a king cake. So while at Publix today I picked one up. Then I got to talking with a friend I ran into and looked down and saw a black baby with my king cake. For some reason this cracked me up - you can choose whether you want a black or white baby for your cake.

We just returned from our second cruise to Cozumel. Last Thursday we left Mobile on the Carnival Holiday ship. The seas were a bit rough but I had the behind the ear patch that worked great. There were 19 people in our party, so it was fun to have people to hang with whenever. Some of the group was Angie's family that may have tested her nerves but hopefully her friends evened out the fun part. The adults got several breaks from the kids since they loved the kids camp activities. I managed to keep Jeff out of the hairy chest competition that involves cheesy dancing which would make me cringe. Our day in Cozumel was split between some shopping, lunch at Jimmy Buffet's Margaritaville, and lounging on the beach. The kids got in the ocean but it was still a bit cold so we stayed out. No snorkeling this time unfortunately.
We were on the ship by 4:30 and the ship started to leave at 5pm. We were all on the deck waiting to get far enough out to see the sunset that was blocked by the larger Royal Caribbean ship. As soon as we got far enough out to see the sunset we started moving backwards and heading back to the pier. The announcement said that medical help was coming to take one of the passengers away, and sure enough an ambulance was driving down the pier. I'm still not sure what that was about. We were aware that the Norovirus had already affected 145 people on our ship. (Thats the stomach bug that causes vomiting and diarrhea) Yuck. We only knew about this because one friend went to the infirmory to get a seasick pill and saw people laying all of the floor. Carnival never made any announcements over the intercom -only on the TV, and that was dated 2005, so it was not clear there was an outbreak ongoing. I just learned that 2 of the kids and one mom have gotten sick today. Now the paranoia starts for me.
Overall it was a fun trip, and I'm definitely glad we had many friends to share it with. My photos are in the usual place on picasaweb.

I will never go on network solutions website again! Every time you do a search to see if a domain name is available it locks it for 4 days, then when it releases it, it's on a list that people are waiting to purchase and try to sell to you for crazy dollar amounts. So in the meantime during those 4 days people are scared into purchasing through Netsol for $35 instead of the going rate of $8 everywhere else. Netsol posted a response but I still think it's a crock of shit. In the meantime I may have just screwed a freelance client. I hope the .com version of their domain is available in a few days. I am so pissed right now. There is alot of talk on several websites about the legality of this and how it's just a matter of time before a class action law suit is started. I hope Network Solutions goes out of business.

UAH is hosting Yale this weekend. Jeff's parents, one brother, and 2 family friends will be at our house in a few hours. For Saturday night's game there will also be a 10 year reunion for the '98 UAH Chargers team that won the national championship. I'm not sure what all is planned for that, but it should be fun. I've also been told that tonight will be the first time they sell alcohol at the hockey game. The next piece of drama may be the snow. You just never know how much to believe the weather guys around here.

The drive home was pretty - snow flakes flying almost horizontal onto the windshield. Unfortuneately we only got a small dusting that is already melted. Doubt I'll be getting out of work tomorrow.

So last week was a bit crazier than normal. I'm not used to being on the phone much, but lots of family calls were exchanged. After several revisions, we got the obituary written and I posted it in the Houston Chronicle. You can read it here. We were all shocked to find out how much they charge to run an obit ad - almost $12 a line (with a line being 3 or 5 words). so this was almost $200. I've heard other cities are free.
I don't want to get into it too much here, but there are some truly kind people my mom made friends with in CR that helped take of her. Words can't express my gratitude and I'll always be thankful there are people in this world that can love a friend so much. One of her friends fw'd some pics from the memorial they had at the house. This one is clickable to a larger version in a new window.

Friday night we went out to eat with some of my work buddies since Philip is leaving town. Afterward 4 friends came back to our house and we played pool and ping pong. Overall, nice fun night.

Since I'm a planner, work is a bit stressing right now. I'm trying to plan a booth for a tradeshow and I'm still waiting to hear what all we're bringing and if I'm going. Shipping has to get done before my cruise on the 24th. I haven't had time to enjoy the planning part of the cruise yet. It will be a very nice break - no phones or email for me to hear the latest family drama. I'm not used to family drama! :)

Have you ever seen a fire in a cemetery? It's pretty creepy. Yesterday driving home I passed a small cemetery near our house and I saw the smoke from far away and when I came up on it there was a guy stirring pine needle brush into a couple small fires - right on top of graves. My first thoughts were isn't that sacrilegious or something? Or maybe he was driving away evil spirits with some kind of fire or smoke ritual. My mind was racing! When I got home I asked Jeff if he saw it and he said 'yeah, I thought the guy was just clearing brush'. It was no big deal to him. Even with all the fantasy books he reads, he said an evil spirit thought didn't enter his head. go figure!

For New Years Eve we partied with Keith and Angie and friends at their house. Now days I'd rather a fun house party than a smokey bar so we had a great time.

Friday we flew into Austin to visit with my family. My step brother and his wife came with us to the Salt Lick for BBQ. Definitely the best BBQ I've ever had, well maybe Rendezvous Ribs are better, just for ribs though. The weekend continued with eating red meat everyday including market wienies, homemade tamales and finishing off with Akaushi beef. There was an article in Texas Monthly about this HeartBrand beef started by Japanese cows brought to a ranch near Yoakum, Tx. The going rate is about $95 for one steak in a restaurant. Dad took us to a place in Moulton, Tx where it was only $35. He got a ribeye and Jeff got a sirloin. Both said it was good but not worth $95, but they were still glad they could say they've tried it.
In the morning we had to have calaches for breakfast, later We had cake for Alan's 12th birthday and ofcourse had Blue Bell ice cream with it. Elise got a really cool handmade firepit for Christmas, so we made smores one night. Looking back now I think we just ate meat and sweets :) We had great weather and did spend some more time going through my Grandma's stuff. I came home with lots of buttons, some costume jewelry and more photos from my childhood.

Saturday night my aunt called to say my mom passed away. I'm glad my brother and I were together to get the news. A couple hours later Courtnay got a call about her dad in the hospital, but word today was he was doing much better, so hopefully that scare is over. Overall it was a good trip interrupted by that bad news.

We flew Northwest airlines who started enforcing a 1 carry on bag rule. And one small bag, not an over stuffed backpack as we had. So that resulted in one of my Christmas presents breaking. Luckily that one is replaceable and it wasn't the fostoria glass platter I brought back from my grandma's stuff.

4 days seemed longer than it was. Back to the routine...