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My Cooking Show!
Maybe you have heard of the new FoodTv cooking show hosted by me? It’s called “How to Make Delicious Foods While Almost Burning the Apartment Down.” Here is why:
Brittney,
Jen,
The Insides were indeed good! Eliza ate the burned parts
Then today, IM with sister:
But the Peach Tapioca Pudding is good!
One Button is Enough!
Who says my life isn’t exciting? I made two batches of soup and mini quiches all evening. On top of that, I figured out how to change yarn color and am working on a new, less fuzzy scarf. By the way, crepes are no match for tortillas. See my mini quiches are supposed to be poured into individual cups made by crepes. But the Kroger in Dallas could care less if someone wanted to use crepes, all they had were these thin uncooked tortillas. But those tortillas made some fine quiche cups. Houston, on the other hand, has crepes – and the crepes burned. That is a pretty weak performance in my book. I had to pull out my quiches before I had crepe charcoal. No worries, I killed the salmonella with the microwave. They still taste good once you pull of the crispy tops of the cup. Who cares if Brittney’s blog has more views than mine? I’m not pouting at all… nope, I’m just eating a yummy crepe-quiche! Yum! At work today, I had to go to a Business Practices Review that is required for all new hires. It was basically a guided walk-through of our Standard Business Code of Conduct. Most of it was pretty obvious stuff, like don’t start a new company from your work office. But there was a lot of gray area. Like entertainment and gifts from vendors. For instance, tickets to an Astros game might be ok, but tickets to the Superbowl are not. Did you notice the might? There is no cut and dry “This is ok, This is not”. No bribes are allowed… but if you feel like your life is in danger, pay up, and then disclose it as soon as possible. That one is a no brainer, losing my job is preferable to the alternative of losing my life for $100. There were also these corny vignettes demonstrating what was not appropriate behavior. They were a bit over the top, but the people in charge assured us that they were all based on episodes that really happened. Number one thing to come away with? DON’T USE THE COMPANY CREDIT CARD FOR PERSONAL USE!!! Biggest no-no ever apparently! So I was wearing Ann Taylor pants today. Pants that have three buttons. Two visible from the front, stacked vertically, and one clear button on the inside. Two too many! Halfway through my BPR meeting I look down and see my fly is unzipped. You have got to be kidding me. I know what happened. Three buttons is too much for my brain. By the time I button all three buttons, I have totally forgotten to zip my fly. And if I am wearing a belt, one button may be too much. I seriously have the attention span of a cocker spaniel when it comes to getting out of bathroom stall. Fortunately we were sitting at tables, so I just scooted in my chair so I could unobtrusively zip it up under the table. Nowhere near as bad as the time had his unzipped in an interview. Isn’t that the worst feeling, looking down and seeing a gaping zipper? At least no underwear was visible – thank goodness for small favors. Other than that, an uneventful day. Tomorrow I have a meeting to discuss a possible four month project with gravity/magnetic data. It sounds like it might be a neat project, but I’ll have to let you know how it goes. Tandis (coworker) has been given a bit more than expected with a shorter timeline than expected. Fun!
Wedding Weekend
Warning: This is a long blog… My cousin Julie got married this weekend, and as a good cousin, I flew up to Delaware for the weekend to attend. This meant leaving Eliza at Petsmart all weekend (to be fair Matt would have taken her, but I couldn’t go 2 weeks without my baby!), and I dropped her off Friday morning with toys, food, and snack bags to make her stay as enjoyable as possible. I left work a bit early after not being able to do much work all day – our plotter wasn’t working for some reason, and not having maps meant not getting work done. I left my car at the economy parking lot and headed through the security. Apparently there was a bit of a security scare at IAH, a stick of dynamite someone bought as a souvenir from what I heard. I was already a bit anxious about going through security. I didn’t have any liquids, but I did have knitting needles. I checked online that they are allowed on the plane, but everyone I talked to thinks they wouldn’t be allowed and was worried about having a screener who was not up to date on the rules. While the person in front of me did have a water bottle removed from her bag (duh!), my knitting needles caused no stir. I knitted while waiting for the plane, knitted on the plane, and finished a square right when we were about to land. But then I couldn’t remember how to bind off the end of the square… uh-oh. I tried in vain to remember, but I ended up messing up every time. The people in my row had no idea, they were impressed with just the knitting I was capable of. There was no way I was asking across the aisle, creepy guy wouldn’t stop “looking” at me, and I was avoiding all eye contact. I figured Aunt Dot would know, all people older than my mom should know how to knit – she doesn’t, so the people in the know must be older. I meet up with the sister in Maryland, we take off to Delaware in our sweet rented HHR. The drive doesn’t take us too long, and we get to the relatives house around midnight. Aunt Dot and Uncle Angelo are very happy to see us, but Aunt Dot does not know how to bind off. Well this isn’t so bad since I notice I have added a stitch, I therefore feel the need to unravel and fix this mistake 10 rows down. Dot finds a book – the reference book to everything or something like that. It has a section on knitting, and a short blip about binding off, but I have to wait to catch up. We go bridal gift shopping in the morning and have way too much fun in Bed, Bath and Beyond buying a ton of kitchen gifts. Mom, sister, and I pool our money to make a monstrosity of a wedding gift. We also go to Wal-Mart where I decide to buy another pair of knitting needles – this way I can leave the square as is until I get home to my books. Then I decide to buy big needles and fuzzy yarn to make a scarf. I want to make something and finish it to boost morale. My mom and sister decide that they want to learn to knit and buy needles too. While we are all perusing the yarn we strike up a conversation with an old lady shopping for yarn as well. Heather tells us about the binding off problem and she explains how to do it. I am convinced I can do this, so I put back the normal sized needles. The minute we get back to the car, I bind off the square – of course I had it in the car, I knit every spare second! : ) Then comes the actual wedding, which was nice. The church was beautiful, an old granite church with stained glass windows and a hundred year old organ. Saw the rest of the family and Julie’s adorable baby Kayla. Her brother Matt and Paul’s (groom) brother carried Kayla down the aisle as part of the ceremony (she’s only a few months old), then handed her off to Julie’s mom Brenda (Brenda is my actual cousin, but my second cousins are closer to my age).The whole ceremony was pretty short, but nice. Then we headed out to the reception at a ‘nearby’ country club. The colors Julie picked were peach and pink, they looked really good with all of the colorful flowers. Mom was there before we were and had helped decorate the night before – tying sashes onto chairs and some other fun stuff. The craziest thing about the reception was the DJ – a Rod Stewart look-a-like named Sky! He was hilarious. Apparently he asked my 2nd cousin Mandy to dance and she told him she hadn’t had enough drink for that. My cousin Linda heard this and decided we needed to prank Mandy. We grabbed one of his informational brochures, and I wrote “CALL ME!” on it in my manliest handwriting. We snuck it over to her table setting and waiting for her to find it. She found it like 15 minutes later and immediately blames 2nd cousin Gina – who was not the brains, but a total accomplice. Then we decide to up that. We ask the DJ to dedicate a song to Mandy – and we come up with the song “Mandy”. Well in the middle of playing “I Like Big Butts”, he pauses the song and says, everyone, I would like to dedicate this to my girlfriend and plays Mandy. Only a short short clip, then he switches back to Sir Mix-a-Lot. She is now convinced he actually did write that, and no longer blames the actual guilty party. The expression on her face was hilarious! The DJ was then going to dedicate “You’ve lost that loving feeling” to Mandy, but we left before it actually happened. We spent the rest of the night back at Dot’s house chit-chatting and me trying to show Mom and Heather how to knit. They picked it up slowly, but I think they have the hang of the basics for the moment. I think they both unraveled their work at least 3 times, which I totally understand. The three of us stayed up way too late, but it was good times. I was trying to finish a scarf to give to Aunt Dot, but I gave up around 1 AM and decided that I could always mail her one. Heather and I had to leave right after breakfast to drive back to Maryland. We got to the airport with no trouble. We knitted on the shuttle from the rental car place and everyone asked about taking the knitting needles on the plane – a common question it seems. Heather was pulling more yarn out of her bag and it ripped. It was so sad, but sorta funny if it wasn’t you. We had lunch and then chatted and knitted until I had to board my plane. I ended up seated next to a sweet old lady who knew how to crochet, and we chit chatted the whole way back. She didn’t know you could bring the needles on the plane, so she had packed hers in her suitcase – otherwise she would have been teaching me crocheting! The steward asked how I got through security with the needles, and I explained AGAIN that they are legal! He teased me about them every time he went by – Do you want the can of juice, I don’t want you unhappy with those needles! Etc. I finish my scarf right before we landed. Well not so much finish, as decide that maybe it is long enough. It’s almost as tall as I am, so I decided to stop. It’s cute though! I finished my first knitting project! I finally landed back home and ended up in the shuttle with a co-worker – small world! Then I headed to go rescue my baby! I was really hoping she would be in the front room where I could see her. I’ve never seen how she interacts at day camp and I always wonder if she really likes it. Well she wasn’t in the front room, but she was in the room that has a closed circuit camera. She was in with the small dogs and actually seemed to be enjoying it! The lady said it was the end of the day so all the dogs were a bit tired, but she was walking around with the other dogs, chasing toys, etc. That made me happy to see – but not as happy as Eliza was to see me! She was sooooo excited! We get out of there so I can love on her in the car. She licks me, jumps on me, and generally is in a great mood! Yay, she still loves me! Take that Matt! : ) But there is one weird thing. I had taken in her two frog squeaky toys – little frog, and the newer big frog that Matt had brought her last weekend. Little frog was missing a leg and a little crusty from being carried around all the time. Well little frog was perfectly clean when I picked Eliza up. He was all fluffy and smelled good. Weird. So either they like washing pet toys for no reason, or Eliza puked on it. I’m not really sure. She smells a bit different too, but that just could be because she was there for 3 days. It is a mystery.
My first project finished. Well mostly finished, I still have to knit in the ends. And yes that is my awesome camera phone - I didn't trust Eliza to be a model on this occasion! I cannot wait until it is cold enough (never) to wear my new scarf. I might wear it anyways just to show it off. :)
Yarn Therapy
It has come to be – through a heart to heart with hubby – that I need to find a hobby. Something to keep me occupied and not obsessing with how not busy I am, or something like that. I decided that I needed to learn how to crochet. It’s not as out of left field as it sounds, I’ve wanted to learn for awhile. My grandmother crochets blankets for everyone in the family, and I wanted to figure it out before she’s not around to ask for help. I go to Hobby Lobby to buy some supplies. I get some pretty bluish, purplish, tealish yarn and white yarn. Pretty! But I can’t decide on a hook size. Oooo a multi-pack. Grab that too. Then I decide I should make cup-cakes. I want to make cool cup-cakes like Brittney. She hasn’t so far answered my phone call about what icing tip to buy so I wander over to look at the choices. So many choices. I debate, call my mom about the hook size, obsess about tips, try and call Brittney again, then finally grab a few and head to check out. Brittney calls me back right before I check out, so I run back and get the tips I actually need. Yay! When I am pulling out my yarn to start the crocheting, I realize the hooks are gone. At some point I set them down and never picked them up. So I go back, buy a H hook, and some knitting needles, and some knitting/crocheting books, and some free patterns. I go home and practice the rest of the night, ignoring my previous desire to make cup-cakes. I’m having some trouble, and decide I need a bigger hook. I go back to Hobby Lobby the next day and buy a size N hook. I also see that Hobby Lobby offers cake decorating lessons… yeah I’ll probably sign up for those too. The knitting has stalled out somewhat, I need to find someone to help me. I got all the stitches casted on, and half of those actually knitted, but I am having trouble with slippery needles. Sigh… But I have got the basic crochet stitch figured out. The straighter one is the second one I did, with my made up stitch pattern, or at least I think I made it up : )
Bowling Fun
Apparently my employer is the largest contributor to the United Way in the gulf coast region. They encourage employees to donate both time and money through campaigns and activities. One of these activities was the United Way Bowl-a-thon scheduled by the development company. I am not in the development company, but a friend is and they had an extra spot on their bowling team. I happily ponied up the entrance fee (it is for charity after all). The theme for the event was a tropical one. I wanted to be one with the theme, but I have no Hawaiin shirts! I went to party city the night before and bought leis for everyone on the team, and bought myself a grass skirt. I refrained from the coconut bra – it is a work event after all. The bowling starts at 11:30 – which for those of you who can’t guess – I get to leave work to go bowl with company blessing. Sweeeet. We got lunch, popcorn, a goody bag at the door, and then tickets for door prizes. All the goody bags were filled with safety items, I totally scored with a blood pressure monitor. Everyone was confused why I was so excited which meant I had to explain the Hoyt (Matt and I) competition to always have a lower blood pressure at Wal-Mart. Anyhow I ended up bowling a pretty good game, 148 for the first, 147 for the second, and then a miserable 105 for the last. I managed to hit the pin bar during warm-up because it dropped unexpectedly after I rolled the ball. Everyone had a good laugh out of that. I ended up winning a door prize – a cool padfolio with the Sakhalin logo and bid on some Mountasia tickets for the silent auction. There were at least 150 people there from my calculations, with teams of 5 and at least 30 lanes with people bowling. Plus the silent auction, we must have raised some good money for the United Way. It was fun enough that I would totally do it again. And find a Hawaiin shirt!
Funky Jen
For some people, Monday is the worst day in the week. For me, it is Wednesdays. I hate Wednesdays with a passion. Wednesday is generally the furthest from when I get to see Matt. As I am sure most of you know, I am living in Houston, Matt is living in Dallas. He works T-S, I am M-F. I work 7:30 to 5, he works 2-10:30. For those of you that can do logic problems you can see that I don’t get to see him much, and then on top of that when one of us is free to talk, the other is at work. Even on weekends, we never get a full day together. This seems to bother me most on Wednesdays. I really thought I would make it longer than 2 months before it would bother me, but no such luck. Maybe it’s just a bad week, but I miss my husband. Sorry it wasn't a funny story today. I will return with one tomorrow, Friday at the latest!
Pet Peeve
My car travels a lot these days. It goes to Dallas at least every other weekend, plus all the rainy weather throws a lot of road grime up on the poor car. I’m not the best at keeping my car clean these days either – it’s just going to get dirty anyway. The floor boards are a bit unkempt too – ok, my car is messy. I don’t leave food in it, that makes it smell gross. But it wasn’t bothering me too bad. I get out of carpooling because my back seat is covered in dog hair. Today several of us were planning on going to a lunch and learn lecture on the MFD skill group across the freeway. Two people ended up backing out, and that left two. One of which did not have a car, so I had to drive. I said no big deal – the front seat doesn’t have much dog hair at all. But man my car is dirty, I apologize, and realize I am really embarrassed about how dirty my car is. That is pretty much all I can think about on the drive. That’s when I decide I need to wash my car. I decided to wait until it is a bit later, a bit cooler. I run to the bank, then the dry cleaners, and then to the coin wash. The coin wash next to the dry cleaner won’t give me any change, so I go down to the street to the more ghetto wash place. This one does give me change and it’s actually not too bad of a wash place. The stalls did down in the middle quite a bit so you can easily wash the roof if you stand back and use the brush. Which brings me to one of my pet peeves… Why do people using the brush at the car wash neglect to put it back properly? Most of the time the brush hangs from hooks up in the air. People who put the bristles facing out when they are done force the next person who uses the brush to get doused with foamy soap. Why can people not think more than 2 minutes ahead of what they are doing? Anyhow it took about three attempts with the brush to get the car clean. That thing was dirty! I went back to the normal car wash to vacuum and clean the interior because I felt safer there… don’t make fun of me! Now my car is squeaky clean (except the windows), and I love it! Why do I not clean my car more often??? In a side note, I have been doing great at the yoga – I even got Brittney to yoga with me on Saturday. She liked the DVD enough to buy one of her own. I am converting people to yoga! Although I do not understand why Eliza feels the need to sit on my chest when I am trying to do the relaxation part! She also attacked my hand a few times. She can’t even be without attention for 30 minutes.
Corny Matt
Back to Dallas again this weekend. The house is almost completely empty now – we got the weight bench apart and I moved some more boxes to Houston. There hasn’t been food, dishes, glasses or silverware in the house for quite some time. We have plastic cups that Brittney bought for the mojitos, but that is about it. Saturday night I went to a welcome back/birthday party for Brittney thrown by her family. It was a good party, as is any party with free margaritas. : ) But my tummy wasn’t feeling well so I didn’t really each much of the great BBQ. I think it was because I did yoga early on a full stomach – I think that is not the best way to practice yoga. On my way home much later, I passed the grocery store THEN realized I wanted OJ in the morning. I call Matt and ask him to buy some on the way home. When he gets home, he doesn’t have OJ, but he did buy V8 splash. That’s ok I guess. He gets on the computer to look up bicycles, and I lounge around on the air mattress chit chatting with him. It then occurs to me that I am hungry. I relay this to matt, to which he responds, that’s why I bought you corn dogs. How did you know I was hungry? To which he replies – you are always hungry. I can’t argue with this, and go make myself a corn dog. Even though it exploded in the microwave it was the best tasting food at the moment! This may not be the only reason I love my husband, but it is why he is such a keeper!
Thank You MTV!
I have a Diamond Rewards Citi credit card. You accumulate points and can redeem those points for lots of cool stuff through their Thank You network. For the first year I have 5 times the points on grocery stores and gas stations – the latter of which does me no good now. The sign on bonus was 10,000 points, and I am now well past 30,000. I wanted to get something back, I wanted to redeem something! I thought about an Ipod, but Matt talked me out of it. Then I decided to do something small, so I went perusing. I almost got a yoga set with a video, blocks, and yoga mat. But after careful reading I noticed the video was really a video, not a DVD. No good, I have no VCR at the apartment. Then I found a yoga DVD made by MTV. Cool! Then I found out there was a 3 disc set – Yoga, Power Yoga, and Pilates. I ordered it! After check-out the Thank You network tells me it will be here in 5 to 6 weeks. Boo! It gets here in a week! Yay! I bring it in the house and it sits there for at least another week unopened. Wednesday I finally open it and decide to yo-ga for it! (sorry) I am thinking, no big deal, 30 minutes of yoga, I can do it. I’ve never done yoga. It is much harder than I thought. Even holding my arms up in the air for 10 seconds is tiring – and there is a lot of arm holding. All these poses are stretchy and hard to maintain. Several of them cause my leg to jackhammer around while trying to balance. Eliza doesn’t understand what I am doing and tries to join in the fun. My upward facing dog collides with her sideways facing dog. My downward facing dog has her tummy in my face. Fortunately her kicking legs manage to avoid my face, and she finally gives up on helping me. The tree pose kills me, warrior 3 is impossible, and I am convince that my arms are too short to hold my legs out all the way while still holding on to my toe. I just stick my foot on the chair instead. Whatever. Yesterday I was sore from all the yoga-ing – my rib cage was especially tender. I was going to do yoga again last night to work out the tenderness, but felt I owed Eliza some loving time to make up for the late pick-up. So I decide to do it today. Still a little bit tender in some of the stretches, but I am finding them a little bit easier to perform. I even managed to do the tree pose without falling over or putting one foot down, and almost did the warrior 3 without falling more than once. I will master the yoga! And yes, Eliza tried to help again… she wants to be just like mommy!
Not Tipsy, But Can’t Find the Clover!
I had to go downtown for a social get together prior to the new hire orientation tomorrow. The mixer was just to network and meet people. Four of us carpooled because we all live on the North side of town, and didn’t want to all drive to downtown. We were saving gas! And to really stick it to big oil, the guy driving has a hybrid! :) We get there and start talking to some pipeline guys – I got some questions answered that Matt had asked me about. Needless to say it was enlightening, but I did make sure that the gasoline won’t contain more than 10% ethanol. My CR-V only allows a max of 10%, and I didn’t want to mess up my poor engine. After the mixer the three other people decide they want to meet up with some coworkers at happy hour, being held in Midtown at the Tipsy Clover. Well we can’t find it after driving around for awhile. We finally park near where we think it is, and decide to walk. I am in heels, and against this idea. After walking around for 10 minutes, I take my heels off. We finally give up and decide to go to Woodrow’s. We stay there for longer than I would like, being as how I need to pick up Eliza by 9pm or she gets locked up in doggie day care jail. I finally convince everyone we need to leave at 8:15. We walk back to the car and notice we are parked right next to the Tipsy Clover. How did we not see that??? We all make fun of us being bad geologists and head back to Greenspoint. The garage my car is in has all the gates down – I’m getting really nervous by this time about not getting to Eliza in time, it’s 8:40. My carpool drops me off in front and say they will wait until I can make it in. There is a guy cleaning or something and he left the door propped open. I go in, wave, and then run up the stairs to my car, get in the car, jam it in gear and go! I’m driving not so safe-like and reach the end of the ramp to see the cleaning guy wave frantically at me. I slow down and notice he is pointing at the door. Crap! I locked the cleaning guy out! I get out and run over there. I let him in, and apologize. He doesn’t look to upset, but I bet he was concerned. I go out the back entrance and head to Petsmart. I get there at 8:55pm. I hurry inside to the hotel and as I am walking in the door, the lady at the counter says, You must be here for Eliza. I say yes, I’m a horrible mom, I was in a carpool, yadda yadda. I have to go pay at the register and they hold Eliza hostage in the lobby until I pay up. I run back to get her and she is so frantic to get out of there. I apologize for being such a horrible mom and get her home. She licks me and jumps on me until I think she has forgiven me. I’m glad dogs have such short memories!
An Eliza Mystery
Eliza has been a bit of a pain lately. First it was my black work shoes – just a bit of leather chewed off, still wearable. Then a campaign against my freshly made bed, three times. Then the shoes that you can see below – not wearable, this required more yelling. Then I come home today and my umbrella is missing its top and there is something weird about where my shoes are laying. The umbrella top comes off pretty easily, maybe not her fault. Then I look at the shoes. The insole is missing on one of them. Oh no. I look around for it, and can’t find it or pieces of it. I call Matt to see if it was maybe in the car. While it is ringing, I find it under the umbrella. Whole, not chewed. How did it get there? It was in the shoe before, and now it isn’t. No bite marks anywhere on the shoe or insole. I would have noticed it missing when I brought it up from the car. How did it get out of the shoe??? Eliza looking like a saint.
Eliza showing her true colors! (Yawning)
Sam, the Tasmanian Devil!
My husband did a good deed this weekend and offered to dog sit for a co-workers dog, Sam. Sam is a 9 month old mix of some kind, but we know for sure that he is part boxer. I think he started watching Sam Thursday night, and I was coming home late Saturday night. Brittney is such a good friend she came down to Houston and picked me up… what a friend! I get home after Matt, so the dogs are running around the house when Brittney, Eliza and I get there. Sam is so excited! Eliza is not sure what is going on. Eliza is a great dog, but she’s not the friendliest or welcoming dog. We don’t do much that night, I fall into the air mattress and guard Eliza from Sam until Matt lets Eliza and I sleep. Sam decides he’s been in the kennel too long sometime in the morning, and Matt puts Natalie and Sam out. Sam doesn’t want to stay out. We eventually get up and let the dogs in.
Sam is a handful. All he wants to do is play with these two new doggies. Natalie tries to bite him when he licks her, and Eliza is downright mean to Sam. I feel bad for Sam, but try to keep him and Eliza separated. I finally give up and decide its Eliza that’s the problem. So I put Eliza in his kennel so Sam and I can play.
Sam’s version of playing is trying to fit my whole arm in his slobbery mouth. He tries to punch everything – thus the boxer mix. Matt said his M.O. is to punch Natalie then kick her, then bite her ankles. I didn’t believe it until I saw it. He’s quite a handful, but oh so cute. Not much interest in the humans, but he wants to play with everything in the house – playing means putting in his mouth!
Then Matt and I were chilling in the bedroom and finally decided we needed to get moving on driving back to Houston. I look around, where are my sunglasses? I just had them, moved them cause Sam was licking them. But they were right here… what is that black piece of plastic? What is Sam chewing on??? Not my sunglasses!!! Seriously? They are in his mouth – what’s not scattered around the floor anyways. Sigh… sometimes dogs drive me crazy.
Why Eliza, Why?
I give this dog everything, she is spoiled rotten and this is how she repays me! Ruined!
In other news, Brittney and I went and saw the movie Scoop - really cute, I would recommend it, it was really good. Woody Allen was hilarious, and I can forgive Scarlett Johannsen's clothes because Hugh Jackman always looked so hot!
What is it With Parking Garages?
I went out for another recruiting dinner – a time to get some nice food and tell people why I love the company I work for. I carpooled to the last one, so I was a bit worried about getting there. I printed off two maps – detailed and overview - then left my apartment with 45 minutes to get there. This was going great until I hit traffic. I was getting nervous about the time, but actually made it off the highway with 7 minutes to spare, and didn’t get lost finding the restaurant – a rare occurrence. I pull into the parking garage and immediately decide that maybe my work garage isn’t so bad after all. This garage has clusters of parking areas randomly oriented and spaced. A bit confusing to say the least. I see a spot right up front next to a Corvette. I try to park there, but apparently it is a compact spot (a real one!) and I am afraid of hitting the Corvette. A guy in the row behind me is backing out, so I decide to go around and take that one. Somebody steals it from me! I am gritting my teeth and decide to go further into the garage. There is a spot right next to the wall that looks relatively safe. I park, put on my cardigan and get out. (It’s still hot in Houston, but a girl has got to have style!) The guy who stole my spot is also getting out of his car. He says, man that is a great spot. I tell him that he stole mine! (In a friendly manner of course!) He immediately apologizes and says he had no idea. I tell him it’s ok, as a matter of fact, thanks for stealing the spot – I like the one I got better. He said he’s never been thanked for stealing a spot. I just say I’m a nice kind of person. We walk into the restaurant and I find my co-workers and sit down to a wonderful dinner – so good! After dinner I am walking to my car and there is a note stuck in my door frame. I immediately think that someone has hit my car and left me a note about it. But that’s not what it says at all:
How flattering! I call Matt and tell him how proud he should be. I relay the story and read him the card. His obvious conclusion is that he should buy me a bigger ring because the guy obviously didn’t notice I was married. I agree with this conclusion, and even make suggestions on what else he could buy me in ring form. All I need to do is sneak a few notes on my car when he is around and I am golden!
Eye Am Scared
I started my 3 mini-rotation in the Gravity/Magnetics group yesterday. So far the rotation seems like it is going to be fun. They’ve had us working at a pretty good pace for this week – even taking some stuff home to read… homework! To be near the mentors for this group, we had to relocate to the workroom in another building. My office doesn’t move, but I spend most of my time over there. Now I don’t know if I have mentioned this before, but my employer is very safety conscious. Safety First is probably our biggest motto. Well there are safety awareness signs randomly scattered around the buildings. This is an example of one of the signs:
This sign is right next to my work computer. I walked by it a few times not paying much attention to it – hey I’m not always a model employee! Well anyhow, you can’t tell from the picture, but the eye is the kind that closes and opens when you walk by it. Except the eye is kinda dark and doesn’t work that well. So I was working hard at my desk today when I noticed something out of the corner of my eye. From the angle of my desk, the eye is half closed and glaring at me. Once I notice this, I can’t look away. I can’t work with the EYE staring at me. I point this out to my co-workers and we all agree the eye is freaky and staring at me. It’s right across from my desk. If that eye is missing, I swear it wasn’t me!
Inline Adventures
I bought rollerblades 2 weeks ago, convinced the reason I don’t exercise is because I don’t enjoy it. That’s why I never used the pink and silver running shoes that I knew would make me run. I hate running. The one pair of rollerblades I had, I paid $20 for, and I used them all the time, even though they had no padding, barely fit and killed your ankles. I like rollerblading. But I still hadn’t gone because I promised Matt I wouldn’t skate without the proper safety gear – unlike before. Finding pads that fit is a problem. I am picky enough as it is. The one set I found that I really liked didn’t have elbow pads. Since I am against elbow pads, that was ok, but I was trying to be good. So I kept looking, then I realized I needed a helmet. That brain is what will be paying our bills! These are my knee pads and cool skates:
Today I finally went and bought the stuff, and I bought the set without elbow pads – bad me! I get all my gear, grab Eliza and find a spot to make a practice run. The spot was right behind the complex, a dead end side street with absolutely nothing on it – no traffic possible – and a dead end barrier I could tie Eliza to. Perfect! While I am putting on my safety gear, two mosquitoes buzz by. It occurs to me I am right next to their swampy breeding grounds – and I have no spray! But I do have dryer sheets. A neighbor told me that dryer sheets repel mosquitoes and they don’t leave you smelling like a chemical factory. So I decide that this will truly test that myth. I rub my exposed areas and Eliza down. Then I get my skates on, tie Eliza to the barrier and start the skating. Just like riding a bike, it comes back naturally. I have a few moments of questionable balance, but overall I am ok. Eliza is not. In her perspective, I am running away from her and she barks to make sure I remember I am leaving her. I turn around and skate back. This goes on for about 10 minutes, before I try to brave having her with me. I’m no fool, dog pulling me around by the leash makes for good comedy – or trip to the ER. She does great! I mean she runs fast, but I am keeping up with her – 4 legs = 8 wheels! She turns around with me, runs back. I decide I need to figure out how the brakes work, the road slopes downhill and I can’t stop real well yet. She prefers to run on the grass beside the road instead of on the concrete, but that is her prerogative. The only problem occurs is when she realizes she has to poo while running. Luckily I see this about a split second before it happens and I can slow down enough to keep from jerking her while she is busy. I laugh at her – it is funny, and pull out a blue bag to clean up. I have to leave the bad sitting there, it was hard enough picking it up with a wrist guard on – tying the bag will be impossible. After a few runs, she decides she will let me skate alone for the rest of the time without complaining. She sits at the end and watches me. This picture is her seeing me skate up with the camera. Her tail is wagging so hard it looks like it is missing.
After about 40 minutes, I decide to stop. I lose my balance, and practically throw my back out to keep from falling. I am covered in sweat, so it was either a good workout or I live in Houston… This is encouraging for my new workout plans, I can do this! And no mosquito bites!!! (I think)
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