RANDOM ACTS OF BLOGGING

1) I sang at morning services yesterday, and my mom, Grant and Tommy all came to hear me! I was so glad to see them! It was the first time mom had heard me sing since before Papa died, and the first time Grant has ever heard me sing at all, so I'm glad I didn't screw up too badly. I sang "Ain't No Grave," which I love, but I kind of cringe every time I have to say "ain't." I know, I know, it's part of the song, but still. I probably could have sung something a bit less...bouncy, I suppose, but that particular song had been a request. How could I say no to my fans? I'm totally kidding, it was our music minister's little girl who wanted me to sing it, so I obliged. Anyways, they finally got to hear me and we got to have lunch together. It was lots of fun.

2) Speaking of singing... I can't remember if I've mentioned this before (and if I have, forgive me) but I bought something a while back called "Singers Saving Grace" which is a throat spray that is supposed to help keep your throat clear. I haven't used it much, but whatever I'm allergic to in the fall has started to bloom or go to seed and I had already had a coughing fit after practicing my song before Sunday school, so I pulled it out and sprayed some in my mouth just in case. The stuff is DISGUSTING. Seriously, it's foul, but if it follows the rules of medicines, the worse it tastes, the better it works, right? Well, after I sprayed some and struggled over the taste, I noticed that the smell of the stuff was pretty strong, like Absinthe. I turned over the bottle to read the ingredients, and along the list of various herbs and plant extracts, the bottle says it's 65% grain alcohol! Holy cow! I happened to say to Steve that it smelled like liquor, and he said, "Yeah, I noticed when I sat down next to you." I had only used a little bit of the stuff, and it smelled like I had been doing shots! It was a cloud around me. Oy. I tried drinking some water, but that didn't help. I was so embarrassed, because one of the deacons came over and hugged me and I knew my breath smelled like I'd been drinking. I had to avoid everyone until I could get to our classroom where I finally got some gum and that got rid of the alcohol smell. The smell went away, but the shame lingered.

3) I made a batch of lemon-strawberry jam, and it actually jammed! I didn't think it was going to, because I checked it after several hours and it was still really liquidy. I was disappointed, because I had worked really hard on making it and hated to throw it away. The next day, I was getting ready to move the jars out of the way so I could empty them and saw that the jam had finally set up! Nice! Of course, now I'm going to have roughly eleventy thousand jars of jam and stuff this year. You will probably get some from me. You have no choice in the matter. I'll be the jelly fairy. Every time I go someplace, there will be a jar of jam left behind. AND YOU WILL LIKE IT!

4) You want to know something embarrassing? When I first saw the section of "Organic" veggies and fruit at the supermarket several years ago, I was confused. I said out loud "Organic? Of course it's organic! It's carbon based, right?" I got some weird looks. Stupid words with lots of meanings!

5) This morning when I was at the gym a lady walked in who looked visibly pregnant. I didn't think much of it, I mean, even pregnant ladies need to exercise, right? However, when she got closer to me, I saw her face and she looked...old. I mean, much too old to be pregnant, not exactly MeeMaw old. In this day and age of medical assisted pregnancy, women can wait longer and longer to have kids, but geez. I tried not to stare, but it was difficult. It was even more difficult when she got on the elliptical machine next to mine. I kept looking sideways at her, pretending I was looking at something else. I couldn't help it! It was weird! I just wanted to stop, grab her by the shoulders and ask her WHY! Why did she want to be pregnant at her age? Does AARP cover pre-natal care? Did she want to knock another one out before menopause hit?! POR QUE?!!!!! I didn't, though. I'm fairly certain that I would be asked not to return to my gym if that was the case, and I don't want that to happen. I guess I could be wrong, of course. Maybe she isn't that old, but goodness...if she isn't, then she needs to get a good moisturizer or something.

6) I'm sorry if that last bit sounded rude. I'm not usually this judgmental and catty this early on a Monday. I blame it on my lack of sugar so far today. My apologies.

7) I got some business cards! Well, actually, they were sample cards I got from MOO, because I'd heard good things about their printing and I wanted to see what it was like. I paid a very small fee to keep the Moo logo off the back and I love how they turned out. They are very well done, shiny, slick and thick. My only problem with them is that I didn't put the business name or logo I do my freelance work under on them and I used my home number instead of my cell - but all of that was my fault. I'm not too bothered, though, because these were just samples. I'll give these out to people I know well, and order more with all of the right info on them later on.

RANDOM ACTS OF BLOGGING

1) The jelly making of 2010 has commenced! Mr. Lee brought me another several billion muscadines and I reduced them to molten, smashed grapes, with only a couple of painful grape burns and a random spattering of dark purple spots across my face, floor, clothes and stove. :) My first batch of jelly didn't actually jell, which I found out the hard way when I opened up a half full jar that I'd put in the fridge and tried to put it on a bagel. It came out of the jar in a jelly-like way, but as it reached room temperature, it kind of...melted. It still tasted OK, though. Better than last year's batch, IMO. There is apparently a fix, so I think I can save that batch. My second batch was much better, but it kind of exploded all over my kitchen. I saved most of it, but the rest had to be scraped off of my stove top, floor and counter top. Hopefully it will come out of my clothes! I don't think there is exactly a non-messy way to make jelly or jam, but at least I didn't set anything on fire. The smoke alarm went off once, but there were no flames! Score!

2) We got a call from the Macintosh repair guys, and they were able to fix my iMac and save all of the info on it! Whew! I don't like the idea of my computer being in a stranger's hands. I mean, it's not like I have naked pictures of myself on the hard drive or anything (that's what thumb drives are for after-all) but anyone who owns a personal computer winds up saving all kinds of things on there that may seem odd to people who don't know them. Maybe the guys who fix the computers don't even look through the files, but who knows? I totally would! At any rate, I'll be glad to get it back so that I can start putting my portfolio together again. I'll save everything to dozens of disks if I have to!

3) It has started getting cooler, which has been so very nice. It's not quite "cool" yet, just not melt-your-face-off hot anymore and that is good enough for now. I can't wait for fall, though. I love it when the trees change color. I've seen a bit of that happening around here, but mostly everything is still green. I have seen quite a few trees that have an odd look to them. The leaves are still green, but it is almost as if you can see red glowing through. It's like the leaves are blushing because they realize they've overstayed their welcome, and are embarrassed about it. I'm so ready for fall.

While getting groceries the other day, Steve was lucky enough to locate some kind of wonderful blueberry cornbread stuff that was quite delicious. I think it was actually some kind of cake made of cornmeal instead of flour, but whatever it was, it was great. It wasn't rich, but it wasn't something you could eat a lot of at a time either, so the small loaf of the stuff lasted quite a few days. After lunch one day, I was jonesing for something a bit sweet, and I saw that we had one last slice of the cake and I decided I would eat it before Steve got home from work (so I didn't have to share, you see). I popped it into the microwave to give it a bit of a nuke, I poured a glass of milk and settled down at my computer desk to read something and enjoy my cake.

Now, because I was seated in front of the computer and reading something, and also because the nature of blueberries is to stain any surrounding cake, muffin or bread a purplish-greenish-blue, I didn't notice that I was about to take a bite out of a cake that contained a rotten blueberry. Even had I been paying attention, I still don't know if I would have been able to tell it was rotten, because blueberries baked inside pastry of any kind tend to already look smooshy and oozy, so at this point, I was boned. I took my first bite, chewed for a second, and thought to myself "What foul hell is this?!"

Apparently, inside my head, I talk like Frasier Crane.

A person faced with something this gross would have the initial reaction of spitting the cake out, don't you think? I might have done that, if I had been anywhere else but my office. However, I have learned over time that spitting food all over your computer isn't the proper way to care for electronics, so I simply sat there not chewing OR ridding myself of the food in my mouth. Also, since my brain had started this adventure with the idea of "YAY, DELICIOUS CAKE," for some reason it didn't hit me right away that something was actually wrong with the cake itself. I seriously thought to myself "Wow, is the milk bad?" Keep in mind, I had not tasted the milk at this point. It was as if my head was so wrapped around the idea that the cake was good, that it tried to convince me that something else was wrong entirely. It took another few chews before my tongue and brain agreed that it WAS the cake that was dodgy and my throat slammed shut, refusing to let me swallow my food, thereby keeping the foul, spoiled blueberry in my mouth even longer. A foul, spoiled, warm blueberry. That it was warm somehow made it worse.

I realize now that all of this happened in seconds, but as with other terrible things, time stretched out much longer, so this simple experience wound up feeling rather epic. Homer himself could have written volumes about this terrible thing and not adequately expressed the horror.

Don't worry, this story doesn't end with projectile vomiting or anything of the sort, and I did finally engage my faculties enough to spit out the cake and throw the rest of it away. I did have to run my tongue under the faucet in the kitchen, though, so I'm glad no one with a camera was around. It did teach me one very good lesson, which I will share with all of you. It's because I care...

**Never, ever eat the last piece of blueberry cornbread cake stuff. Always save it for your loving spouse. This way, if it is indeed rotten or spoiled, it isn't YOU who has to deal with it.**

:)

*HeadDesk* *Repeat*

Yesterday the power went off. Well, it went off, came back on, went back off, flickered twice and went off again. In the process, my iMac got fried. It was plugged into a surge protector and everything, but it still died.

Steve messed about with it, and found out that the hard drive crashed, possibly for good.

I'm sad about my computer, of course, but the worst part about it right now is that my files may be irretrievable. The Mac is where I had all of my photographs, graphic files, and Adobe software. It's also where I kept the straggling remains of my professional portfolio. If the files are lost, then my portfolio won't just be slim, it'll be graveyard dead. Oy. That is everything I still had from college up to the freelance work I had been doing over the last week.

I'm sure the nice folks at Mac Resource will be able to retrieve my files (fingers crossed), and hopefully I will have some digital copies of at least SOME of my work stashed somewhere on thumb drives, I just have to find them.

I may cry.

SO VERY SARI

Oy.

Yesterday, Steve and I decided to take advantage of the holiday and the lovely weather and go on a drive to Scottsboro. We wanted to visit the First Monday sellers, but we managed to get there too late to really see very much. We saw a few junk dealers and some great antiques, and were even offered an insane deal on a set of antique furniture (seriously $50 for a sideboard and wash stand) by a man who didn't want to repack them. I would have loved to take advantage of that, but we were in the Challenger and wouldn't have been able to take them home! :(

Since we were too late for those guys, we decided to go over to the Unclaimed Baggage store! It was packed in there, mainly because it was their 40th anniversary, so we didn't hang around for too long. Neither Steve nor I enjoy really crowded, indoor places. Plus they had a freaking DJ blasting music that was honestly too loud for the size of building we were in.

Anyways, for the short time we were there, I got to peruse the "International" section of clothing that they have. I'm always kind of fascinated with the materials and clothes they have. Lots of Indian, Arabic, and African stuff is usually the norm, but occasionally they have other things sprinkled in. While I was looking through it all, I found a gorgeous red scarf with Indian embroidery on it, and the price was too good to pass by. I also found a 3 piece Indian outfit I liked, a long flowery thing, and what looked like a long, black dress with beads around the edges of the sleeves and a matching scarf. I was excited, because they were all so pretty and very cheap! True, I don't normally wear clothes from other cultures, but quite frankly it's because I didn't have any! I decided to change that!

Once we got home with my purchases, I decided to try them on. I know, I know, I should have done that at the store, but I didn't. My bad. There were just too many people in the store for me to want to wait in line for a dressing room. So I pulled out the lovely red scarf and looped it around my neck. Then I looped it again. Then again. It wasn't a scarf, apparently. What I took to be a scarf was a Sari, which is a long length of cloth that Indian women wear draped over an under dress type thing. I didn't realize what it was, because it had been folded in such a way that I couldn't tell how long it was. I'm not too disappointed, though, because it's several feet of gorgeous red silk, and I know I can figure out a way to use it!

The Indian outfit is something called a "Salwar kameez," at least according to Wikipedia, and it is a long tunic over a pair of M.C. Hammer pants and it also comes with a matching scarf thing. It was too small, because of course it was, but I think I can alter the top to fit. I'm at least going to try, because it's so pretty and I WANT to wear it! The Hammer pants, however, fit everywhere except in the calf part of my legs because they taper in a big way. Honestly, I'm not that bothered with the pants! :)

The long flowered thing turned out to be an African dress that is too big, but very comfortable. It makes me look like Mrs. Roper, so maybe I'll just get some big, smoked amber glasses, a bad perm, and some gaudy beads to wear with it. I suppose it will be my first official mumu!

The long black dress turned out to be the big mystery. It wasn't a dress at all, but more like a robe that had three buttons at the top and had a slit up the front to the waist. It obviously was meant to be worn over something, but there weren't any more pieces to the outfit. It wasn't until I put it on that I noticed it was very severe and modest, even with the beads around the wrist part of the sleeves. I also couldn't figure out what the scarf was for, since the neckline was so high and I couldn't find a place to attach it on the bodice. I was kind of nonplussed. I had figured everything else out, but not this! I finally threw the scarf over my head, and everything clicked. I went to college with a Muslim girl who dressed like this, only not as fancy! I have no idea what it is called, but the scarf is supposed to wrap around your head and the long cloak thing is to cover the rest of me. I thought it was called a burka, but I was wrong. I still have no idea what it is, but I don't think I will be able to wear it as it's supposed to be worn. At least not without winding up on no-fly lists across the country! I can fix the robe thing to be appropriate for church, though. I just have to fix the neckline and possibly the sleeves and find a skirt or under dress for it. I can also use the head scarf as a wrap, because it is long enough and has beads around the edge. Of course, you realize that the one thing that fit me perfectly would be the one thing that I couldn't wear as-is. Typical.

PETTY PEEVERY

I have discovered another peeve quite recently.

Sometimes things just fly right up my nose like one of those tiny, fluttery bugs that you don't see until you accidentally walk into a swarm of them. You know what I'm talking about, right? They get up there, and even though you are pretty sure the bug flew right back out again, you still have the sneaking suspicion that it might have laid eggs in your brain or something? What...is that just me? Oh, well...sometimes I get the same feelings about something I read, see or hear.

For the last couple of months, I have been on the search for some little things that I can do to make my life a bit healthier. I am not talking about going to the gym or throwing out all of the food I have with high fructose corn syrup in it (suck on THAT, Jillian Michaels), but more like little changes I can make that don't overwhelm me so that I might be more likely to stick with them. Since we have a Fresh Market and an Earth Fare within easy reach these days, I thought that maybe bringing healthier snacks and more organic products into our house a bit at a time might be a nice thing to try. So far, this has been going pretty well. I mean, I can't say that everything I've gotten has been spectacular (i.e. health shakes with algae in them), nor have I had any earth-shattering, positive health changes since trying the new stuff, but I've found a few new things that I like a lot and knowing that they are better for me is a good feeling.

I took my search to the internet to find other small ways of making healthy changes, and I discovered an entire world I wasn't really aware of: the granola crunchy, tree huggy, raw food, all natural, nuevo-hippies. These people are SERIOUS about being natural in all kinds of ways. They are a Volkswagen van and a couple of Burning Man tickets away from basically setting up a commune.

OK, let me clarify, I wasn't UNAWARE of these kind of people, but I never really knew many details about them or the way they did things until I was doing my research. I have found people who only eat organic foods and people who don't cook their food in anything hotter than a food dehydrator. I've found folks who will only wear makeup that is made from beets and algae, as well as people who never use any chemicals when cleaning their houses. There is a whole new world of weirdness out there, if you know where to look.

I've actually learned a lot of very interesting and useful things by reading about these unconventional ways of life. I have begun eating Chia seeds, which you can put on anything, are very good for you (and they make a weird kind of gel if they get wet) and I've started washing my face with honey. I even tried making some of the makeup with the beets, but it didn't work out too well. These things sound unusual, I know, but they are actually good things that make some sense when you read about why people do them. There are genuinely some websites with good advice, although not everything is useful for everyone. The things I've learned about came from many different sources, and while all of them differ in some way, they almost all have one very irritating thing in common and that thing is what peeves me.

It isn't my intention to judge these people for the way they live, so please don't think that is where I'm going with this. I'm also not condemning every person I've come across, because it isn't all of them that do it. The fact that there are people who sew their own reusable maxi pads out of old pillow cases and never eat wheat isn't the thing that irritates me. It is their all consuming, highly convicted, absolute surety that what they are doing is right, and anyone who does it differently is a complete and utter idiot. Yes, it is the self-righteous hippies that have earned a place in my menagerie of pet peeves.

It wasn't so obvious at first glance, really. I mean, almost everyone has their own preferred way of doing things, so you expect to see people really extolling their lifestyles if they are going to go through the trouble of writing about and photographing it. For example, if someone is a vegetarian and writing about it, you expect them to talk about how much they like being vegetarian. I'm cool with that, and I admire people who have the self control to be vegetarian, at least until they begin telling me that meat is murder (delicious, delicious murder.) Vegans are worse, because they get mean about it. I'm generalizing, I know, but every vegan I've come across has been defensive and judgy about anyone who isn't also vegan (I chalk it up to the lack of meat in their diet.) I actually bought a vegan cookbook by accident,decided to give it a chance, and had to give it away to a friend because the people who wrote the book were insufferable.

Then we have the Raw Food people I came across, which weren't so much mean and judgy as much as they had a superior attitude. Maybe they didn't even mean to sound like that, I'll give them the benefit of the doubt. The more I read, though, the worse it seemed to get. I mean, eating nothing but raw foods (nothing heated over 160 degrees, I think, because they believe that anything higher than that kills the nutrients in the food) is both complicated and inventive. Seriously, it's a hard way to do things when you have to start your dehydrators a day before to make sure you have dinner ready on time. It also calls for unusual combinations of foods to make sure everything sticks together. It's an interesting way to live, certainly, but why exactly does that make them feel as if they need to pat the rest of us on the heads and marvel at our plebeian attitudes towards food? They drink raw milk? Good for them. Personally, I think that's dangerous (and so would Louis Pasteur.) They feed their kid nothing that wasn't 100% organic to begin with, completely vegetarian, and never, ever let them have anything as common and vulgar as a french fry? Good for them! Although I hate to tell them that it won't give their kid super powers, and also, if they ever let their precious snowflake go to a friend's house, they will probably be given something to eat with artificial colors in it. They are the equivalent of those annoying people who are on diets, who then watch you eat and then tell you how fattening the food YOU are eating is. I'm completely fine with people who eat differently than I do, but when they start trying to convert me by being condescending and judgmental...that's when I begin to want to stab them with a fork.

Food aside, I was reading a blog about natural beauty products and clicked on an article that was quite interesting. Everything was fine until I reached the part where the reader is admonished for using products that have chemicals in them. OK, fine...that writer IS writing for a health blog after all, and may have been shilling for some product. I can totally dig that. It just got worse, though. By the time I got to the comment section of this article, things had devolved to the point of actual ugliness: "I just can't believe there are people who are stupid enough to use products that aren't all natural." Uh...ok? And how does that make them stupid? Or my personal favorite "I never wear makeup, but..." and then they go on to talk about how silly people are for buying and using makeup from a conventional brand instead of buying organic and natural stuff from some obscure company that is located in the wilds of Nova Scotia or wherever. Nice. That is like me saying "I never watch football, but here is why I think your favorite team is overrated and badly trained, and why I think you should be fans of this other team I also don't care anything about because they practice on real grass instead of AstroTurf and have an endangered species as a mascot." There was even one person who mentioned the dangers of deodorant. I kid you not, they actually said "I always use *whatever product they were talking about* but not even every day. You don't even NEED to use deodorant, really, if you stop using it for a while."

Say what?! Okay, everybody out of the pool.

Look, I can understand that these people have found something that works for them, and that's great. If they want to spend huge amounts of money on organic and natural products that are hard to find, more power to them. If they get a warm fuzzy for using these things or eating certain foods because it makes them healthier, good for them. What I can't understand, however, is their almost universal disdain for people who do things differently. Everyone, everywhere, does things differently, don't they?

I also don't like the fact that they guild the lily a bit when they talk about how this whole organic lifestyle thing works. If you listen to them, this is the picture you get:

Maybe some people actually live like this, I don't know. You'd think, by the descriptions of the people who talk about how great this lifestyle is, that once you purge your life of all of the chemicals and artificial colorings, only buy organic cotton clothes and shoes made from hemp and recycled newspapers, and buy all of your vegetables from the most DARLING farmer's market (and oh, PLEASE don't even get me started on the farmer's markets) that your whole life becomes this beautiful, natural, easy experience. Not so much.


What they don't tell you is that some of those chemicals you use in shampoo and soap were created for reasons. Not everyone can wash their hair in olive oil and milk...I know I can't. They tell you that there are natural ways to wash your face no matter what kind of skin you have, but those ways don't always work. Sometimes it will just give you a rash or pimples the size of dimes. They don't talk about how natural deodorants might keep you from smelling bad, but they don't stop the giant pit rings from soaking into your shirt. They don't talk about how easily cotton clothes shrink, or how natural dyes fade quickly, or how sometimes wearing hand sewn, fair trade shoes don't give your feet the support they need. They also don't talk about how stinking expensive it all turns out to be. It's all good and well for people who can afford it to buy and use these products to do so, but it is ridiculous for them to look down on people who can't afford them, and although they don't say it right out loud, I always get the feeling that they don't care if you can honestly afford it or not, they will still judge you for not doing it! UGH!

SIGH. OK, I guess my rant is just about done. I realize I have just ranted and raved over something kind of stupid. I can't help it if smarmy better-than-you types make me mad, though. I suppose this is why it is petty.

A QUICKY

This kills me.

RANDOM ACTS OF BLOGGING

1) The week started off on a sad note for my nephew, Logan. Two of his friends were killed in a car accident on Monday. I feel so sorry for him, because I remember I was about his age when one of my best friends and her sister were killed in an accident and how hard it was to deal with. It's always difficult for kids to deal with death, especially when it happens to someone their own age. So sad. Let's keep the families and friends of these boys in our prayers. It's going to be tough for them all for a long time.

2) On a happier note... Steve bought an iPad and thus far, I'm loving it! He uses it mainly for reading and I use it for everything else! Granted, it's basically just a larger version of the iPod Touch I've had for 4 or so years, but it has still been a lot of fun to play with. It has an app that allows me to "finger paint" and then post my drawings directly to Twitter. I've basically been drawing my Tweets instead of writing them, which I hope isn't annoying my very few followers. I'm having fun doing it, though. I mean, a picture is worth a thousand words, but you only get 140 characters if you type. I'm clearly coming out ahead!

3) I found a new song that I like a great deal, but it is full of very bad language. It isn't fair! It's got a funky, old-school Motown sound, which I love, and I wish very much that it was appropriate for listening to without ear phones. I won't even post a link to it, because I don't want to be responsible for anyone accidentally playing it while kids or easily offended mee-maws are around, but it's called...uh... "F**K You" by Cee Lo Green in case you want to look it up on YouTube or something. It's a great break up song, too. I will not be held responsible for pearl clutching, so don't listen to it unless you are prepared to hear cursing! You know who you are!

4) I've been making jewelry and things like crazy this week and I have a whole lot of new stuff to give to the lady at church! Unfortunately, it's going to take me ages to make the packaging and display cards. That's my least favorite part of it all because it's so tedious. I am also doing some freelance graphic design! Woot! It's unpaid, of course, but I'm at least going to be able to put it in my portfolio which is practically empty at this point. I would have a lot more for my portfolio, but I didn't really think to pull anything from my network folder before I was let go and that was where my artwork was stored. I contacted one of my former coworkers to have him send me some of my files, but he said my folder was gone. Whahuh? Did they nuke everything I did out of existence? Certainly they just relocated my files, because that folder was 5 years worth of signage and things. Even if I sucked as bad at my job as they said, I would think they would at least have saved the stuff to show the new lady who got the job what NOT to do. Ugh, if nothing else, I hope they saved the vectors I made of the aircraft schematics. That took months to finish. Of course, now I feel like a complete idiot for not pulling things for my portfolio as I went along, but there is nothing to do now but start over. Oh well...I'm a graphic artist, so going back to the drawing board is just part of the job, right? :)

5) Speaking of making things, I'm on my 231st hat! Technically, I'm still behind if I'm going to make one for every day, but my nifty circular knitting machine helps catch me up when I get too far behind. The hats it makes are very, very simple, but will be perfect for the charity as long as the yarn cooperates. It doesn't always, you know. I'm running low on yarn I can use, though, so another trip to Hobby Lobby is in store. I'm going there a lot these days. At this point, I feel like the cashiers should yell "NORM!" when I come through the doors.

Here is a video I shot while visiting Jerry Brown Pottery earlier this month.



The quality isn't so great, so forgive me for that. I'm working with what amounts to ancient technology these days! :)

FOR YOUR INFORMATION

PAJAMAJEANS

A few entries ago, you might recall that I made a sleep deprived and probably ill advised online purchase. Here was my initial thoughts about it:

"Speaking of impulse buys... I bought something the other day that is both sad and embarrassing. There was a night last week where I couldn't sleep at all and I spent hours on the computer just aimlessly browsing around. I was reading an article on Listverse (I think), and I followed a link to an "As Seen On TV" website. I promise you I wasn't looking to spend money on anything, and if I hadn't gotten to the point that I was getting kind of punchy and floopy because of lack of sleep, I wouldn't have even thought about ordering anything. Also, if the credit card hadn't been nearby, I probably wouldn't have used it either. It was like the universe pooled all of it's forces and tricked me into making this order. I ordered a pair of Pajama Jeans. *SHAME* It was like I was hypnotized! I opened up the link, and the video started playing, and my brain just, I don't know, took a leave of absence. I was like "Wow, they do look comfortable! They look like jeans, but they are made of DormiSoft (TM) fabric! Contrasting top stitching! They DO look like they were designed by some European designer! I need these! I need them now!" So I ordered them. Now that I've had sleep, I'm deeply ashamed of my lack of purchasing control. I have no doubt that they will be kind of cheesy, and probably end up being yoga pants with screen printed yellow stitching down each side, but darn it, I'm going to own my mistake. They haven't gotten to me yet, so I have to reserve complete judgment, but...Pajama Jeans? My hopes aren't that high."

In light of full disclosure, I'll admit that as I waited on them to be mailed to me, I began to anticipate being able to wear them. I mean, who wouldn't love a pair of jeans that were so comfortable that you could sleep in them? At the very least, I figured that I'd finally found a pair of pants that looked enough like jeans that if I had to run a quick errand without changing clothes, I might not end up on the "People of Wal-Mart" website! My main issue was that I wanted to get them for our trip to Texas, because I knew that I'd be sitting in a car for 18 or so hours and I thought that, at the very least, I could get to our destination without suffering the imprint of a GAP button on my lower stomach!

Luckily, I got my package a day or so before we left on our trip! I was excited and immediately got prepared to try them out!

Since you get the official PajamaJean T-Shirt (for free!) I got a whole comfy outfit out of my package!


There was a heather gray shirt and the mythical pair of PajamaJeans! *cue angel chorus*
The shirt was just your normal, albeit well made shirt, so I don't need to tell you about that. The pants, however, are what we are here to talk about!

At first glance, they do indeed look exactly like a pair of slightly flared, dark wash jeans! My favorite! They don't feel like denim, of course, but the DormiSoft (tm) material was thick and soft. I was pleased to see that they were constructed exactly like jeans actually would be, with actual (and not screen printed) top stitching, seams along each side, back pockets, and even rivets. There was even a bit of Trompe l'oeil in the front that gave the illusion of a zipper but without the ouchy button of regular jeans.

In your FACE Levi Strauss!

So far, the infomercial had not overstated anything in regards to the product. I don't know how jeans made my a European designer look, exactly, but sure...why not.

I had ordered according to the sizing chart, and by the measurements, had to get a larger size than what I wish I had needed. I even went and measured my curves one more time to make sure I was ordering correctly. I know that most clothing is not exactly friendly to the...um...pleasantly zaftig, so I wasn't exactly unprepared to see that what sounded like an enormous pair of pants were - by the chart - indeed my size. Boo. I want to make it very clear that the pants -BY THE CHART- were my size, maybe even a tiny bit bigger than I needed, but not by much. That is an important tid-bit.

So I pulled the PajamaJeans on, and they slid right down my hips. Um, ok... So I pulled them back up and they slid down again. I am not too ashamed to tell you that I was confused. Clothes usually are too small on me, not too big. I mean that honestly, I can buy clothes that say on the tag that they are my size...but they don't button, or if they do, you can hear the threads screaming through their effort to keep from splitting off of my body Hulk style. So I looked on the tag again to make sure I didn't accidentally get pants a size too big by accident. No...they were the size I ordered. Huh. Well, I thought about keeping them, but realized that there was no way I could walk around in pants that clearly didn't want to stay up. I mean, I could, but nobody wants to see that. Nobody! So I gathered my long awaited PajamaJeans back up, packed them for returning, and decided I would get the next size down, which - BY THE FREAKING CHART - were a too small for me. I rationalized a return - and not a refund - because I could see potential in the pants. I mean, I didn't know if they'd go from-bed-to-date-night wear like the commercial promised, but I knew they were something I'd be glad to have for traveling or whatever. Even if they were a bit too small, they'd stretch, right?

Skip ahead a few weeks and I got my new pair of PajamaJeans! I didn't bother taking pictures because they looked and felt exactly like the last pair. I even got another gray t-shirt with them! I was immediately worried, because the shirt was too small. It was weird, because the shirt was a size that should have been roomy on me, but it was quite snug. Poop. I took the pants back to my room to try on, with the full expectation that they'd probably cut off my circulation. If the shirt was uncomfortably small...how must the pants be? So I put them on.

They were still too freaking big.

Don't get me wrong, there is NO ONE else in the world who would love to discover that they had woken up 20 pounds lighter without having to have large tumors or limbs removed than me. No. One. Trust me on that. However, I see myself every day and I haven't been going to the gym, so I knew that wasn't the case. I was still the soft and squishy lady I have been. These pants weren't as huge as the last pair, but still...they were too big. I went back to the website and made sure I wasn't wrong about the measurements, but I hadn't been. By all means, the size I got should have been snug, if not downright tight, and they weren't. I decided that these would be OK, because even a bit big they weren't THAT huge, so I decided to go about my day and see how they worked.

The pants are comfortable, I can't fault that. They feel like yoga pants and look like jeans. I was actually comfortable, even though they were too big, for a while. I had to put on shoes, because I kept stepping on the hems, but if you've ever looked at my regular jeans, you know I pretty much walk the hems off anyways. I'm too short for normal and too tall for petite, so I do what I've got to do. Things went fine for a while. I worked on my crafts, I did a bit of laundry, and cooked. Not exactly a very active day, but I didn't have a lot of plans. Everything was going fine except that the pants started sliding down my hips again. At first, I didn't even notice, I'd just hitch them up and go about my business. However, while standing at the spice cabinet, they literally almost fell off. The commercial talks about how they don't stretch like sweat pants do, but that just isn't true. These had stretched alarmingly, and I promise I hadn't been doing calisthenics in them. I thought that if they had belt loops, I might be able to make it through the day, but there were none. I even tried pinning them on the sides, but they material was too thick and all of my safety pins were too small. I finally decided that I needed to just wash them, because sometimes new clothes shrink a bit when they are washed for the first time. The material is 95% cotton and 5% Spandex, so certainly that was it. I even threw them in the dryer, even though it says not to. I simply hoped that drying them wouldn't melt them or anything. It still didn't work. If anything else, they feel as if they've stretched more! Color me a disappointed purple, because I wanted these to be awesome.

Look, I'm not saying these are bad. In fact, I think I'd love them if they actually fit. They look pretty good and they would be wicked comfortable for long flights or car trips in situations where you don't want to actually wear your pajamas. I can't return the ones I have for YET another smaller size because I've already worn, washed, and removed the tags from them. I'm trying to figure out if I can sew them on the sides a bit to take them in, because I'd rather not have wasted the money, but I'm afraid that may be out of my skill level. I won't even tell you not to buy them, because I think you'd like them too, if you got a pair that fit. However, I don't know how you can do that if the sizing chart is that far out of whack. Hopefully I can figure out a way to alter the ones I have so that they fit, but I'm not holding my breath.

I give these 1 thumb down and the other one in the waistband holding up my pants.

RANDOM ACTS OF BLOGGING

1) Good grief. I woke up with another case of pink eye and I am furious about it! Granted, being furious about getting an eye infection is not very productive, but it makes me feel better about the utter injustice of it! Yuck. Luckily, I knew what was going on this time, so I grabbed the very last of the bottle of eye drops that I saved from last time, put them in and waited an hour. My eye seemed to get a little better, but I wasn't taking any chances. I went back to the Doc-in-a-Box and got another prescription for the eye drops. I felt kind of bad going to the doc when my eye didn't seem that bad, but I couldn't face the idea of my eye being as bad as it was last time. *shudder* A nurse practitioner and a doctor came and checked me out, so I was well taken care of. The doctor told me to come back in 5 days or sooner if my eye got worse, but the N.P told me to come back on Thursday to be rechecked. I have no idea if I should go back or not. Who's directions should I follow? I'd rather not pay the co-pay again unless I have to, but... Any ideas?

2) I found a neato heath food store nearby. Well, actually I found it a while back, and I probably have already talked about it on this blog, but I've only recently been going back on a regular basis. When I went the other day, I briefly talked to the lady who runs the store and she gave me a promotional calender that she had gotten from one of her vendors. About 15 minutes later, she came around a corner and asked if I needed any help, but I declined. Right before I checked out, she looked at me and said "I thought I saw you come in here! I just didn't know where you went." Huh...O.K. I'm not so sure she knew I was the same person each time she saw me. Weirdness. The store sells a lot of unusual things, and I'm fairly sure Harry Potter could find all of his potion ingredients there. Need a bundle of sage to clean a negative room? You can find it there too. I'm guessing it's the local Wicca Superstore. I found a few interesting things to try, including a shake mix that is supposed to be good for you. I got a few different packets (different flavors) but so far I'm not impressed. It wasn't terrible, but it wasn't great, either. It kind of tasted like it had chalk in it. It also had algae in it, so maybe I'm just mentally unprepared for drinking it in the first place. I'll let you know.

3) It finally rained in our neck of the woods, and our ornamental peach tree lost a big chunk during the high winds. Now it looks all lopsided. :( Our grass suddenly had a resurrection and now it's way too high. I need to mow it, I know, but it's just too hot and I'm procrastinating in hopes of a freak snowstorm that will just kill it all. What? It's not unheard of!

4) I'm working on a few new things, craft wise. I'm going to be putting a bigger variety of my things in the shop the lady at my church owns, so hopefully I'll be able to sell some more stuff! Fingers crossed!

TABELLE'S JEEPUS* ADVENTURE!

- - Note: This is long. I warn you now. - -

I've got to be honest with you guys. I'm an adventurer at heart, but I very rarely put my adventures into practice. There are probably actual good reasons for this but mostly it's because I'm lazy, or scared to go places on my own, or because - lately, anyways- I have had this sneaky feeling that people who do not have jobs should not have too much fun.

Yeah, I know that's dumb. Trust me on that one. However, it followed the same thought pattern I once had that if I called into work for being sick, even if I wound up feeling 100% better halfway through the day, I shouldn't do anything that a sick person couldn't do. You know, like vacuum or run marathons. :)

At any rate, there was a part of me that figured that if I wasn't contributing something useful to the world, then I shouldn't go out and enjoy said world. Only recently did it occur to me that that was SUPREMELY STUPID. I have these bursts of realizations from time to time. Saves a bundle on therapy.

At any rate, I explain all of that to tell you that yesterday I was determined to leave my house for a while and have an adventure, even of the most benign variety. I decided I would find something interesting that I had never done before, grab the G.P.S., plug in the address, and just go. That probably doesn't sound very adventurous to you, but for me? Oh, my yes. Heehee. See, I don't go many out of the way places on my own, and I have only used the G.P.S. once, so I figured that I could go someplace completely unknown and kind of do a trial by fire thing with the Garmin. If a magic box with a voice and a satellite beaming down a map from space can't help me find a place, then there is no hope for me at all. Am I right?

So, I picked out a place that looked interesting and I went! I am SO glad I did!

I decided to visit Jerry Brown Pottery, in Hamilton, AL. I only recently found out that this place - and this man - existed, despite the fact that I'd seen his work on some Alabama tourism brochures. Please read this guy's website for the in depth stuff, because it is fascinating, but in short he is a 9th (!) generation potter from North Alabama who uses local clay to make beautiful, hand-thrown pottery at his own shop.

The drive down was surprisingly non-eventful, except for the fact that I somehow missed a turn in Decatur and wound up driving through quite a bit of residential area before finding my way back to the road I needed. Do you want to know what lies between Decatur and Hamilton, AL? Not an awful lot. I drove roughly two and a half hours down a stretch of highway that seemed to have no end. It wasn't a bad drive, just...empty. I had my Neil Gaiman novel playing on my iPod to keep me company and Sandy the robotic, Australian G.P.S. voice to talk to me, and I was good. Just past Russellville, I got hit with a rainstorm of epic proportions that actually scared me so badly that I probably should have pulled over, but there was no place to stop. I was on a twisty road running through some woods and the shoulder wasn't wide enough to pull over without getting hit my someone coming around a curve, so I soldiered on. Luckily, I got through it and found my way. At the last minute Sandy told me to turn right instead of left, and I literally wound up in someone's barn. I'm not kidding, I had to turn around in this person's barn and go the other way. Thanks, Sandy! At any rate, I found Mr. Brown's pottery place at last.

At first I wasn't sure it was open because there were no other cars around and an older-ish couple sitting on the porch. I pulled over to the side of the road and asked if they were open, and indeed they were (phew). It turned out that I was in the presence of Mr. and Mrs. Brown themselves! I was their first (I think they said) customer of the day and Mrs. Brown led me inside the shop. I don't know how many people get the same feeling I do when faced with art - good stuff, I mean, not like Damien Hurst and the giant, wooden bottle nipples favored by some of my college classmates- but that feeling struck me while I walked around the modest little room lined with shelves. Canisters, pots, plates, bowls and all kinds of things crammed the walls as well as tables that ran down the center of the room and I was just in awe of it all. That probably seems a bit of a grand statement, but it's an honest one, I was in awe.

I didn't take many pictures inside the store itself because I was just too interested in the pottery! This stuff isn't that pansy slip-molded stuff I learned how to make at community college. This was gorgeously hand-crafted, heavy duty, hand thrown pottery. I was cool at first, walking around and talking with Mrs. Brown, who takes care of the sales. She was a delightful woman and was so very sweet. Mr. Brown came in, because it had started to storm and he didn't want to get wet, and he was just a righteous dude. We talked a bit, I picked out a bowl to take home, and Mrs. Brown said that if I wanted, she would show me the pottery shed and Mr. Brown would do a demonstration for me.

Of course I said I'd love to see it all and she took me around and showed me the kilns and the pottery wheel. She explained the process and told me where the clay came from and how it all worked. Unfortunately, the donkey wasn't anywhere around, but I'll catch up with him next time, I guess. I know that she didn't treat me any differently than she would treat anyone else that come by, but I thought it was nice that she still gave me the whole tour even though it was just me. Then she put on her apron and started making the clay balls that Mr. Brown turned into things. The way she threw the clay made it very obvious that she would be able to beat someone to death easily with her bare hands, so don't piss that lady off. :)

She handed over the clay balls to Mr. Brown, and that is where I completely geeked out.

This man took a plop of clay and made it dance. I know that probably sounds silly, but I have no other way to explain it. He had these giant, beautiful, gnarly hands that just...I don't know, just made magic.

I have a deep, deep respect for anyone who can make things. Not just make things, but MAKE things. There is a difference, trust me. I was literally open-mouthed hypnotized when he began spinning the clay. I've seen videos of people doing this, but I've never seen it done it in person and to watch the clay grow into these beautiful things was just, almost overwhelming. I got a little light headed watching him. I'm sure if you asked him, he would just tell you he was doing his thing, but he has to love what he does to be able to do it so effortlessly.

I asked questions and he answered them all. He told me jokes and asked questions of his own. He finished this one bowl (he made 8 or 9 while I watched) and asked me what the problem with it was. I couldn't see anything, but I guessed that maybe he didn't like the divot at the bottom - nope, he could fix that. Was it the fingerprints at the top? Nope, he could fix that. I asked what was wrong with it and he said "It doesn't have any 'nanner puddin' in it!" Seriously, he was a righteous dude.


I don't know how long I actually stood there and watched him, but I could have done it all day. I'm glad he didn't mind me taking pictures, because I wanted very badly to remember what he was doing. It was fascinating. While I was watching him work, I realized that THAT was what I wanted to do when I grow up. Not pottery, necessarily, although I would love to know how to do it. No, I realized that what I wanted to do is MAKE things. I'll give you a moment to roll your eyes at me. Go ahead, I know you want to.

........

OK, are you done? Good. We can proceed.

I realize that a person can't just decide to be an actual artist and expect to do it as a job, but watching him work made me realize that I'm really only happy when I'm creating things. I think that's why I liked my former job so much, because even though I was making signs, I was making them with my brain and with my hands. I'm not especially good at any one thing, but I want to be good at something. I want to be good enough that I can make things and people can take them and use them, and keep them and pass them down. That's what I want to do. Now I know. Anyone know how I can make it happen? :)

It had been raining very hard the whole time he was working, but when the rain let up, I realized I needed to head back home. I apologized for staying so long, but they seemed to enjoy having someone there. I got my bowl, got back in the car, and found my way back home.

It was a great day.

*I overheard someone talking about a "jeepus" the other day and couldn't figure out what they were talking about. It wasn't until they said "The jeepus couldn't find the way" that I realized they were talking about a G.P.S. I don't know if they really thought that's what it was called, or if it was just what THEY called it, but now I can't think of them as anything else!

OY VEY

While we were hanging out at the motel in Hattiesburg on our way back from Grandma's house, Steve and I were watching "The Fifth Element" on the crappy television set in our room. We probably wouldn't have stopped on that channel except that it was one of the few channels that worked and didn't dissolve into a fizz of snow and what sounded like microphone feedback.

During one of the commercial breaks, the longest and - I swear - most graphic "Male Enhancement Supplement" commercial came on and would not. Go. Off. It was only mildly embarrassing at first, because let's face it, I am uncomfortable watching a commercial of that kind with my father-in-law. As you know, I like to pretend that parents don't know about that kind of stuff, and no one can make me feel differently. Shut up! Don't even try, because I won't listen!!! Had it even been one of the less... descriptive commercials, I probably wouldn't have cared, but it was awful. I looked at Steve and we both made awkward face and waited for the commercial to just be over.

However, the commercial kept on going. It also just got more descriptive. Mr. Lee was on his laptop, so there was hope he wasn't hearing it, but we knew he could hear the TV because he had asked a question about the movie we were watching. The commercial had gone on long enough for me to begin to worry that somehow the dodgy cable had switched channels on us and we had landed in the middle of an infomercial or one of those "Real Sex" documentary shows. Steve and I left awkward behind and cracked up, only we were trying hard not to laugh out loud so that Mr. Lee wouldn't know we were laughing about the commercial.

In reality, the commercial probably didn't last more than 2 minutes, but from my point of view, we might as well have switched on one of the bad, late night Cinemax movies. I'm not kidding, that commercial was...too much.

I'm so glad my father-in-law had enough class not to make a joke. I might have simply died on the spot.

BLOGGED ALONG THE WAY: FAMILY REUNION 2010

SUNDAY/MONDAY - AUGUST 1 & 2

CONROE, TX - HUNTSVILLE, AL

I decided to consolidate these entries because mostly we just drove.

When we were getting ready to leave Grandma's house yesterday, after another giant breakfast, she kept telling us she didn't want us to go. Actually, she said she would keep Mr. Lee and Steve, so I guess I was free to go. :P She cried, which made us all feel bad. :(

We got back on the road and I plugged back into my iPod and got out my yarn. Unfortunately, though, my wrists and hands were sore from all of the crocheting I had done earlier in the week, so I basically just sat and stared out of the window. We didn't make many stops this time, because I suppose we were just trying to get as far as possible before we had to stop for the night.

We did stop at the Louisiana welcome station, which is on another swamp, but the ramp through the area was closed.


I was walking around the side of the building to get some pictures of the lake, when something bumped my foot. I looked down and saw a locust that I'm sure would rival anything that flew during the plagues of Egypt.

And lo, God did smite the Louisiana Welcome Station
with a plague of big-assed bugs. Yea, verily.

Holy cow, ya'll, it was huge and it had come within an inch of jumping up my pants leg. I'm very grateful that it didn't, because I wasn't in the mood to freak out and strip down to my unmentionables in a public place. Ugh. I also kept running into a creepy janitor guy at the welcome station. I don't know if he was actually following me, or if I just kept getting in his way, but I was very glad Mr. Lee was nearby after Steve walked off without saying anything, because the guy kept talking to me. I now know three different uses for cattails, two of which could save my life during active combat, and that he was in Vietnam. I was glad to leave that place.

We probably could have made it all the way home, but we were very tired by the time we'd been on the road for a while and so we turned into a group of motels in Hattiesburg, MS to find a place to stay. Luckily, we found a decent place, but this is the same area we stayed in last year, and I get some bad juju vibes from this place. I don't know why, because I'm sure Hattiesburg is a lovely city, and I have no idea why I get so unsettled while I'm there, but that's the way it always is. It always makes me feel nervous when we stop there. At least we stayed in a motel that was decent and had indoor hallways. My biggest concern was that the room reeked of ammonia. It almost knocked me over when I stepped inside, although neither Steve nor his dad seemed to find it overpowering. Ugh.

We went out to dinner at a local Mexican place "Rio Grande" which was very good. I recommend it if you're ever in the area! We happened to see what was either a prostitute or a very badly dressed prom date while we were in the place, which caused quite a stir. I've seen a lot of things, but I've never seen that much ass on display in a family restaurant before...eeeesh. After that excitement, we came back to the hotel to get some rest. The ammonia smell was still thick, but there was nothing I could do about it. What was I going to do, call the front desk and complain that the room smelled too clean? I did happen to see some weird stains on the carpeting right outside the door that concerned me, but they stopped at our door. I fell asleep with the smell of ammonia in my nose and the sincere hope that no one had recently died in our room and the cleaner was just there to cover up the smell.

The next morning we got back on the road and made it home by about 3:00! I was glad to be home, but it had been a good trip!

BLOGGED ALONG THE WAY: FAMILY REUNION 2010

SATURDAY - JULY 31

CONROE, TX - WILLIS, TX

**I am a swollen bag of food. My ruse didn't work and Grandma kept feeding us. I think I'm going to explode. Help Me.**

This morning I awoke with a lovely rash all over my face. Great. I see these people once a year, at most, and I wake up looking like I have some kind of flesh eating bacteria nomming on my face. At first I thought my skin was just having a bad day, but I didn't have pimples like this on even my worst adolescent moments, so I have no idea what is going on. I can only imagine what was said about me while we were at the reunion:

"Mommy, what's that?"
"It's called a leper, dear. In polite society, we shun them. Run along and play. DON'T LOOK IT IN THE EYES!"

Nice, huh?

After breakfast, (ugh) we got all dressed up and headed over to the big house where we had our family reunion!


For once it didn't come a flood while we were there, but the temperature got to be over 100. Needless to say, I stayed indoors almost the whole time. I spent most of my time talking to some lovely cousins about different places I could travel. They were older than me, so they've traveled more and I got some good advice. Now I have a few more places to add to my wish list! Yay!

After those cousins left, I sat in the living room and watched "The Adventures of Milo and Otis" with another cousin, who is 11 years old. His mom is either a vet or a vet's assistant, so he knows a lot about animals and told me all about the different kinds of animals on the movie and also about the animals that he has at home. I had to control my laughter when he happened to notice that neither the cat nor the dog in the movie had been neutered. He kept pointing testicles out to me! It wouldn't have been funny if he were doing it to be gross, but he was very matter of fact about it, almost as if he didn't think I knew what they were! :) I didn't laugh, though. Heehee!

After the reunion, we took a rather cheerful detour to look at Steve's grandpa's grave. Whee?

Then Grandma took us to this gigantic supermarket called H.E.B and it had a lot of interesting things in it.


We got a bunch of weird Mexican and Jamaican drinks. That should be interesting. Once we arrived back home, we had dinner, I did a load of laundry and now I'm writing this! We leave tomorrow morning, and so the adventure will then run in reverse. Onward!

BLOGGED ALONG THE WAY: FAMILY REUNION 2010

FRIDAY - JULY 30

CONROE, TX

Today is going to be a rather lazy day, thank goodness. This will also be kind of random because nothing of real note happened today.

We started out with another giant breakfast. It simply does no good to tell Grandma we don't need that much food. She wants us to be stuffed at all times. It doesn't even do any good to put just a little on your plate and tell her you don't want any more, because she will literally hold the serving plate in your face until you take something. I'm going to try an experiment at our next meal to see if I can fake her out, but she's a wiley old bird... She will probably see right through me. I'm going to gain 15 pounds this weekend if she doesn't stop feeding us so much. She loves us, so I'll keep eating. I'd never hurt her feelings.

I've spent the last 3 days with the song "Me & Mrs. Jones" stuck in my head because someone planted it there on purpose. It's driving me nuts! I thought I had it on my iPod and if I listened to it, it would go away, but apparently I took it out of my play list. I used to think that person was my friend, but I'm not so sure of that anymore. :P

We didn't do a great deal (besides eat) today, but we went to Grandma's favorite Mexican restaurant and to a bookstore named Hastings. We don't have a place like it in Huntsville, as far as the range of stuff they carry, so we always try and visit while we are here.

Poor Mr. Lee! While we were out this afternoon, Steve, Grandma and I were sitting in the van waiting for him to come out of a store when a similar blue van parked next to us. The lady left her two kids inside while she ran in, so there was a girl in the front seat and a baby strapped into one of the middle seats. Mr. Lee came out of the store and headed right for the other van! Steve said "He's going to the wrong van." So I started banging on my window and yelling "MR. LEE! MR. LEE!" He got as far as opening the door to the other van before he realized it wasn't his. I'm sure the kids in the van weren't pleased, but he finally came back over to us and got in. Bless his heart! :)

After that, we've just been relaxing. I've been crocheting while everyone else watches TV. Steve put his leg over on me while I was trying to do a stitch and he kept bumping my arm, which irritated me, so I grabbed my scissors and cut a big bald spot out of his leg hair while he wasn't paying attention. I don't know how he didn't notice what I was doing, but it looks hilarious! What makes it even funnier, is that all he brought to wear is shorts! That'll learn him.

BLOGGED ALONG THE WAY: FAMILY REUNION 2010

THURSDAY - JULY 29

METRAIE, LA to CONROE, TX

The first thing I did this morning was wake myself up by ripping my starfish necklace off of my body and screaming a curse word.

I was dreaming that I was being choked by a chain (for once, I'd like to be Slave Leia in this dream) and so I grabbed it and pulled as hard as I could, only to wake up and realize that I had ruined the beautiful silver necklace that Steve had gotten me from Tiffany's for my birthday several years ago. I didn't break the chain, exactly, but I stretched it over three inches and now I'm too afraid to wear it in case one of the links gives way. I started crying because I felt so bad! I hardly ever took the necklace off and I've never done anything like that to it, and now it's ruined. I also now have a "rope burn" across the back of my neck where I pulled the chain so hard. I don't know how I got it off without breaking it, but the clasp still worked when I hooked it back together. On the bright side, I can honestly say that Tiffany's Peretti collection has wonderful craftsmanship, so in case you were thinking about getting anything there, at least you know it won't break! Silver lining. :(

After we partook of the complimentary breakfast, I bullied the guys into taking me to the French Quarter of New Orleans! Well, I didn't actually bully them, but I did ask. I kind of felt bad because it was out of our way and in the opposite direction of where we were going, but they took me anyways! We didn't get to see much because A) It was a million degrees. I'm not sure that's even an exaggeration, it was grossly hot, and B) we still had a long way to go to get to Grandma's house. We walked down the south part of Jefferson Square and a short way down Decatur Street (I think). That was the first time I actually remembered to take a foot picture in New Orleans!

WHEE!

After that, we drove and drove and drove some more. We made a stop at a Store Outlet shopping center so that Steve could get some shoes and so we could have lunch, and then we went back out on the road.


I must really go into some kind of Zen place while crocheting, because before I knew it, we had crossed over into Texas. We stopped at the welcome center, per our usual, and I went out on the walkway over Blue Elbow swamp to take some pictures.


Mr. Lee joined me, but we didn't stay out long because it was really, very hot and humid out there. We didn't see any snakes this year, but we did see a big turtle! Amazingly, that was it for wildlife. When we went back inside, I SWEAR I saw George Lucas picking up maps. It looked too much like him not to be, but Steve said it wasn't. Oh, well, I'm going to pretend it was him. It makes a much more interesting story, doesn't it? :) On our way out, we got hit up for money from a man who "ran out of gas" and as usual, we gave him a bit. He probably didn't need it for gas, but it never hurts, I guess. Maybe it'll give us some good karma, right?

We got back on the road, and after a couple of hours, we finally made it to Grandmas house! She immediately fed us. I had to warn her before we actually made the trip that she didn't need to feed us so much, but she never listens. Oh well... After we visited a bit longer, I finally had to give up and go to bed. It had been a long, butt-numbing drive and I was just glad to be in bed.

BLOGGED ALONG THE WAY: FAMILY REUNION 2010

WEDNESDAY - JULY 28

HUNTSVILLE, AL - METARIE, LA

This morning, Mr. Lee came and picked us up at the crack of dawn so that we could, once again, drive across the dirty south to visit Grandma!

The first leg wasn't exactly eventful, really. We stopped for breakfast at Mr. Lee's favorite breakfast spot, Hardee's, and made our way to Metarie, Louisiana, where we would be spending the night. I spent most of my time plugged into my iPod and crocheting, which really made the time fly by. I didn't realize we were already in Louisiana until right before we stopped at the welcome station. That place is strange! Well, the place isn't strange, but the ladies behind the counter all but tackle you to get you to sign their book. Creepy! I was also chagrined to see that they had repositioned the state-shaped sign to face the parking lot because it meant that I had to practically lay in the street to take my foot picture. Yeah, I got some strange looks for that this time.

It wasn't far to our hotel, which I'm sure is lovely most of the time, but right now it's next to an overpass under construction, and it sounds like it's in a war zone. Not to mention the torn up roads made it difficult for us to get around at first.

We had gotten to Metarie early in the afternoon so that Steve could go by one of the branches of his company and install some equipment for their network, so after we dropped off our luggage, Mr. Lee and I dropped Steve off at his building and went shopping together. It was kind of weird, because A) we didn't know our way around the town and B) he and I don't tend to spend a lot of time shopping together without Steve. It was fun, though! We stopped by a couple of stores that we don't have in Huntsville. I almost got him to stop at a Whole Foods, which I'm curious about, but we didn't need groceries - so we passed it by. : ) Then we went to a mall we found and walked around. THAT really was kind of weird. Malls are very women focused, which I've never really thought of before, so trying to find stores that we could go into together was difficult. It was fun, though. We walked around, I bought some Godiva, and he and I had dinner at P.F. Chang's, where our waitress was juuuuuuuust on this side of ignoring us. I'm going to chose to believe that she was just really busy, though!

It was after seven by the time we got back to the hotel, and Steve wasn't meant to be done until later, so Mr. Lee and I hung around the hotel and watched TV. Steve didn't actually get done with his work until after 10, so by the time Mr. Lee went and picked him up and they got back, the day was over.

Today I had to run an errand across town, and since it wasn't so darn hot I decided to pull the top down on my car. I also wanted to pull the top down, because I figured that it would help get some of the dog hair out.

I keep forgetting to take Lois to the car wash place and use one of their vacuums, and our upright is not conducive for vacuuming out a vehicle, so needless to say, the inside of my car is a grassy, furry mess.

As I'm driving, the dog hair starts to levitate and fly all around me. It wasn't so bad at first, since I wasn't going very fast, but as soon as I hit the highway, dog hair starts pelting me all over the face and sticking into my lip gloss. Also, my hair has begun to fly all over the place (I had forgotten my hat, you see.) By the time I made it to my destination, I looked like this -

- but with furry lips. It was very attractive. Luckily, I had a fold away brush in my purse that tamed the 'do before I went inside the store.

Unfortunately, I didn't have anything to help with the furry lips.

RANDOM ACTS OF BLOGGING

1) I think I may have a very weird problem. I'm afraid I'm checking my mail multiple times a day without realizing it. What I mean by that is when I go out and check the mailbox, I get the feeling that I might have already been out there to check it that day. That in itself isn't weird, I guess, because lots of people go to the mailbox more than one time a day if they didn't find anything in there the first time they checked, but I'm starting to get the suspicion that I've checked the mail, actually GOTTEN the mail in some instances, and yet still go out there to check again later. You'd think I'd remember, especially if I've actually already taken the mail to the house, but almost every time I go out there now I get the feeling that I've been out there already. The only proof I ever get that I haven't checked the mail is when there is something in the mailbox, but I wish I didn't have a brain block when it comes to whether or not I've been out there already. What if I'm actually doing this? What if the neighbors see me walking to the mailbox and say "Wow, there's that woman again, looking in her mailbox. What is that, like, the 8th time today?" They probably think I've got some kind of crippling OCD and if I don't check the mailbox multiple times a day, I think the world will explode.

2) The other day Steve and I were heading home from church when we noticed a trashed up truck riding beside us in the other lane. There is nothing too weird about that, since we have to drive through a kind of skeezy area to get from church to home, but this truck was purposefully keeping up with us. Steve said "Uh, oh..." and I looked over to see the driver of the truck had the window down, his overly tattooed arm out pointing at the car and was staring in at us. I quickly turned my head forward, not knowing what the proper etiquette is for a situation like that and said to Steve "What do they want?" Because, of course, Steve would know, right? Anyways, I gathered up my courage to look back at the driver (because, if nothing else, I'd like to be able to give the police an accurate description of the man who drove us off the road and killed Steve with a pick-axe if it became necessary) and the guy smiled at me and yelled "NICE CAR!" and gave me the thumbs up, then they drove off. I simultaneously felt relieved and embarrassed for judging the guy in the truck. Obviously I didn't learn much in church that day. :(

3) There is another cat in our neighborhood, a giant Maine Coon, and it has begun creeping around our place. It won't let me pet him/her, and I don't know where it comes from, but I feel really sorry for it. I don't feel sorry for it like I did for Garry and Spot, because it obviously belongs to someone. I feel sorry for it because it is constantly, and I do mean constantly, being chased by 3 blue jays. I've never seen anything like it! The first time I noticed it, I thought that maybe the cat was near the jay's nest or something. But I can't imagine that is the case anymore, because I've seen that cat in three or four different places and the jays are always swooping down and chasing it! Steve's even seen it, so I know it isn't just me. It's so bizarre. What would cause three birds to constantly chase after a cat? What's even sadder, is that the cat is now so used to the birds that it doesn't even try and protect itself anymore. It just walks and lets the jays attack it. It's both funny and sad.

RANDOM ACTS OF BLOGGING

1) I did a little forensic investigating the other day and think I've figured out why so much of my neighbor's trash ends up in our yard! I happened to pass by their SUV the other day, and I saw that there was a trail of papers and things going from the back of it into our yard. Since I'm fairly certain they don't just sit in their vehicle and toss things out of the window, I am led to believe that they just have a junky car and they leave the doors open long enough for cross breezes to blow their crap into out of their car and into our yard! I mean, it doesn't account for everything we've ever found, but at least it explains some of it. They've moved down a few notches on my "List." Elementary, my dear Watson! (Just in case you are wondering, no, I'm not obsessed with the trash thing. I promise.)

2) Sara and I had a nice, girly day yesterday while she was hanging out on my side of town. We had lunch at Lynn's (which I recommend if you get a chance to go in. Yummy stuff!) We also went to the local farmer's market - which wasn't anything like I imagined it would be, and I forced her to go to Gigi's for cupcakes. Forced her, I say! :) Good times, noodle salad.

3) Steve and I recently bought a Sodastream. Basically, it's this gadget that allows you to make your own soda at home. It's been a lot of fun so far, and hopefully it will replace some of the bottles and cans we end up throwing away. Seriously, we have been a tree-hugger's worst nightmare with all of the glass and aluminum we throw away. The thing came with a sampler pack of soda syrups to try out, but most of them are kind of gross. They are made with Splenda, and I don't care what anyone says, that stuff is nasty. I don't like artificial sweeteners at all, and you can really taste it. However, some of them aren't that bad at all. My future plans involve learning how to make my own syrups and just use the machine to charge the water with CO2. If nothing else, it'll make soda water with no sodium in it, which is awesome. My favorite part of using the thing is the sound you get when you pull the bottle forward to unscrew it from the machine. It sounds like the space shuttle unhooking from the external tank! Very scientific. I am soon going to need a new kitchen just to store my gadgets, I think.

4) Speaking of impulse buys... I bought something the other day that is both sad and embarrassing. There was a night last week where I couldn't sleep at all and I spent hours on the computer just aimlessly browsing around. I was reading an article on Listverse (I think), and I followed a link to an "As Seen On TV" website. I promise you I wasn't looking to spend money on anything, and if I hadn't gotten to the point that I was getting kind of punchy and floopy because of lack of sleep, I wouldn't have even thought about ordering anything. Also, if the credit card hadn't been nearby, I probably wouldn't have used it either. It was like the universe pooled all of it's forces and tricked me into making this order. I ordered a pair of Pajama Jeans. *SHAME* It was like I was hypnotized! I opened up the link, and the video started playing, and my brain just, I don't know, took a leave of absence. I was like "Wow, they do look comfortable! They look like jeans, but they are made of DormiSoft (TM) fabric! Contrasting top stitching! They DO look like they were designed by some European designer! I need these! I need them now!" So I ordered them. Now that I've had sleep, I'm deeply ashamed of my lack of purchasing control. I have no doubt that they will be kind of cheesy, and probably end up being yoga pants with screen printed yellow stitching down each side, but darn it, I'm going to own my mistake. They haven't gotten to me yet, so I have to reserve complete judgment, but...Pajama Jeans? My hopes aren't that high.

5) I want to send out a request for prayers for my Aunt Brenda, if you please. She had a small accident and broke & dislocated her shoulder. From what I understand, she is doing OK, but I'm sure having a broken shoulder isn't pleasant. Also, we hope she doesn't have to have surgery to fix anything! Get well soon, Aunt Brenda!

6) I recently sent in a request to ITT Technical Institute for information on their Drafting program. It was the only place I could find in town that offers classes in AutoCAD, and I just wanted to see what was involved. Now the stupid recruiter keeps calling the house and I wish he'd stop until I get my brochure. You'd think that ITT Tech was more of some kind of cult than a school by the way they keep calling. Seriously, three times a day every day. Since I don't know what kind of questions to ask about the program yet, hence the request for a brochure, I don't answer the phone when they call, but it's getting really old. If they are this desperate for students, they are going about getting them in the WRONG way.

MY LAWN. GET OFF IT. NO SERIOUSLY. GET OFF IT.

This is a public service message: I am within an inch of becoming the crotchety old lady who wants the neighborhood kids to stay off her lawn. One day soon, I'm going to find myself out there, resplendent in a yellow rayon mumu, sitting on a ratty old lawn chair, and threatening children with a fly swatter while screaming unintelligible obscenities at them. This is my destiny. I can feel it.

Don't get me wrong, I don't want to become that person, but I'm beginning to believe that I live around some of the most disrespectful people on earth and they are MAKING ME THIS WAY! See, I don't usually try to hold a lot of importance on material things. I mean, I don't want people trashing my home, of course. Stuff is just stuff and if something got damaged I might be irritated, but I don't think I'd unravel. I say all of that to you so that you realize that the way I feel now isn't a knee jerk thing. I'm simply and totally done with the jerkfaces next door treating my property without respect.

This has been going on a while. It was bad enough when we had the people next door who were obsessive about their own yard. When I say obsessive, I mean it. The dude had this fancy mower with the leaf bags attached that I swear he used every three days. He mowed his lawn in a plaid pattern! PLAID! Like a golf course is plaid. I wouldn't have been surprised to see the man down on his hands and knees measuring each blade of grass to make sure they were all the same size. He had no problem destroying our grass by letting the company who sodded his yard drive through our back yard, but he once asked Steve to sweep off his yard after Steve accidentally drove the lawnmower the wrong way and blew some grass onto his property. When that guy moved, and the new folks moved in, I was so glad to see that they were just normal yard people. However, I soon came to realize that while they weren't obsessive about their yard, that also meant that they didn't give a rat's ass about our yard either.

I'm sure I've mentioned before how when their kids were little, they'd throw toys over the fence to our dogs. That was irritating, but not a huge deal. I like to think they were just sharing with our boys. Of course, stuffed animals led to toy cars (and I swear Butler actually ate one) then to hand tools that our dogs would destroy, all the way to really large things like the netting that went around the sides of their trampoline and blankets. That's when I realized that they weren't giving things to our dogs to play with, they had turned our back yard into their personal dump. However, they were kids and kids do dumb things. I could dig that. We threw away all of the stuff they put in our backyard, didn't say anything and soon the large objects stopped getting thrown into our backyard. The junk stopped, but the trash soon appeared in our front yard. At first it wasn't a big deal, just a candy wrapper or something like that, but it got worse. I probably wouldn't have ever noticed at all, if I hadn't started accidentally hitting things with the lawn mower. It's one thing to pick up a random ice cream wrapper or the occasional chip bag. It's another thing altogether to pick up a million scraps of paper that have shot out from under the LawnBoy! I probably should have checked the side yard for debris before mowing, but I swear, I'd never see the stuff in our yard until I was right on top of it.

Here is an illustration of the problem: Please excuse the crudity of this model,
I didn't have time to build it to scale or to paint it.

You can click on that to make it bigger, but that is the gist of what I'm talking about. I never see trash in their yard, only ours. I know it isn't our trash, because A) we don't eat or drink things in our side yard and B) it's just freaking THEIRS. Of course, there isn't that much stuff in our yard at a time, at least not unless I don't see the trash before I hit it with the lawn mower, and then it goes everywhere. I've also been hitting some pretty large limbs in our yard, and those are almost impossible to see if they are buried in the grass. As you can see in my drawing, we don't have a tree in that part of our yard anymore.

I know how I sound, and honestly, I realize that I shouldn't be as irritated as I am about all of this. I mean, kids are kids and they don't always think. However, it isn't just the kids, and I know this because I happened to look out of the window while the dad was mowing his lawn the other day. I kept hearing this terrible sound, but I didn't know what it was. I looked out and saw the dad pushing a lawn mower on the strip of grass next to our yard. Their giant tree (labeled Happy Tree) drops limbs and sticks like crazy and he was running over them with his push mower. I watched him as he walked around his lawn mower, picked up a big stick and tossed it into our yard. I was kind of like "What?" I know they are just sticks, but that is the base of the problem. Neighbor guy throws things he doesn't want in his own yard into ours, so I'm guessing that the kids think it's acceptable behavior. It isn't even really the sticks and the trash that make me mad. It's the fact that they seem to have no respect for our property. I'd no more throw a stick in someone's yard to get it out of my own than I would knock over someone's garbage cans. It's just trashy behavior, and that is what bothers me. I don't care if the kids come into our yard. Heck, they could have picnics and pony rides there if they wanted, as long as they clean up after themselves (and the pony) when they are done.

Of course, I'm not going to say anything because when it all boils down, it isn't a big enough deal to either embarrass or anger our neighbors. We don't really know them at all, and I don't want their opinion of me colored by a bout of hysterical weepings and raving about trash. I will continue to return the hastared soccer balls that wind up almost weekly in our back yard, and we will just keep picking up (or running over) trash that winds up in our front yard. Why? Because I'd rather not have some petty neighborhood Hatfield and McCoy type thing happen because our neighbors are slobs. I'm just going to "do unto others" on this and just complain about them on my blog! I'm allowed to do that here, right? :)

Now, I've just got to find a yellow rayon mumu and I'll be all set.