Daydreaming Lorelai

What the new year brings

2011-10-06T10:54:00.001-05:00

Into my second year of teaching. Well they certainly do make the first year easy on a gal. I mean I only had 3 classes on my own, had 5th off (the lunch period so I have 1.5 hours to myself in the middle of the day), a total of 20 students, and 17 case manager students (half of which were in one of my classes) and coached a debate team of approx. 8 students.

This year I have 4 class periods (5 different sections), 7th off (the last period of the day), 36 students, 26 case manager students (only 1 is in one of my classes), and coaching a debate team of 24.

Did I mention one of my case manager students is blind? That takes up my conference period every day. So when exactly am I expected to write lesson plans, pull worksheets, copy worksheets, grade papers, call parents, and do paperwork on my other 26 case manager students?

Also, new state laws require me to do a heck more paperwork than last year for my case manager kids. Luckily, my son has been home with strep for 3 days, so I am practically done with all IEP writing for the entire year. Too bad our software that we use for that is only available on campus...guess I'll have to get that done in my invisible time...

But onto happier things:

1. Jill Mansell's new book was released, "To the Moon and Back". SO far so good.

2. Completed "The Luxe" series by Anna Godbersen and read "Bright Young Things", the first in a new series by Anna. Currently have "Beautiful Days" on hold at B&N.

3. Started another series, "Paranormalcy" by Kiersten White. Ready for "Supernaturally", need to pick that up later today.

4. "Son of Neptune" also ready to pick-up at B&N. The second in the Lost Hero series by Rick Riordan.

5. My TV schedule is filling up quickly. Here are the shows I am currently watching:

Sunday: Desperate Housewives, Pan Am, Once Upon a Time (coming soon)
Monday: Terra Nova, Gossip Girl, The Playboy Club, 2 Broke Girls, Two and a Half Men
Tuesday: Parenthood, One Tree Hill, Ringer, Body of Proof, Glee, New Girl
Wednesday: Up All Night, Free Agents, Harry's Law, Happy Endings, Revenge
Thursday: Community, Parks & Recreation, The Office, Whitney, The Big Bang Theory, The Secret Circle, Charlie's Angels, Grey's Anatomy, Private Practice
Friday: Grimm (coming soon)

If I am missing any shows...well I think you get the picture as to how much time I spend watching TV :)

I am still seeing the same guy, nothing new to report. We're now into 2 years together, and we pretty much act like an old married couple (he routinely wants to go to Luby's for dinner, and is incapable of folding his own laundry). We're happy, but sometimes I feel like we're stuck in the same place, not moving forward. I know I should talk to him, but I hate talking about my feelings. I tend to cry. I hate crying in front of people. So thusly, I have not brought it up. I hope I can convince myself to actually do it soon.

That pretty much sums it up. Til next time. XO

Ahhh 10 weeks off

2011-06-14T12:39:00.000-05:00

So I am into week 2 of my 10 week vacation. Being a teacher is great. I'm getting paid, but I don't have to wake up at 5am and convince teenagers that math can be fun. On the downside, I don't get to see my debate kids at all...

So I am tutoring 2 kids 3 days a week, coaching a debate class once a week, and taking ballet and tap classes this summer. And Kiddo is in soccer this summer, so once a week I get to sit outside in the heat while he runs around and kicks a ball. But he is SOOO cute in his soccer gear so its worth it.

Going to the zoo Friday with a friend and her daughter. I love the zoo now that it has some shade added in and has ice cream. In case you were wondering, the Houston Zoo has THE BEST chocolate ice cream I have ever had.

So what else is going on? Oh yes, Kiddo is into week 2 of swim lessons and still won't stick his whole face into the water. I may need to take him to the pool and dunk him in a few times until he realizes that getting his face wet won't kill him.

Been using Blockbuster's June promotion. Rent 1 movie with a blue dot, and you can exchange it for movies without a blue dot as many times as you want until July 15. Yay movies!

Oh yes, and technically I am still with the same guy...although I haven't spoken to him in over a week. The thing is, I just don't know how I feel about this whole situation. Sometimes he is really sweet and attentive, and other times its like he's counting the minutes til I leave. And no matter how he acts, whenever I leave him I cry almost the entire way home. So 2 weekends ago after I left him, I took some time to think. Did I tell him I needed time to think? No... I just didn't reply to his texts...one on Monday, and another on Tuesday. Then he left for Vegas. Again. Also again not asking if I wanted to go. How am I supposed to feel about that? I mean he is going to play poker. He says that is all he is doing, eat, sleep, poker. But still, I sleep too. I also like eating. And I can entertain myself while he is at poker, I'm not 12. SO here I am, he should be coming back today, and I have no clue where we are.

I know that I need to talk to him but I SO hate confrontations and talking about my feelings (possibly the only thing not girly about me). And may be staying in Vegas for the whole of June. He mentioned it but hadn't made a decision last time I had checked. And what if he does stay? What does that say?

So as you can see, I have too many things to think about when it comes to him. So I prefer to read my Sherlock Holmes Complete Illustrated Edition (on my new Kindle), and watch movies and therefore avoid having to think about my own life for a little longer.

Am I delusional? No. I know avoiding it won't fix anything. But while he's not here, I don't want to think about it. So now it's time to go back to the Game Show Network and tell the contestants they are idiots for not knowing the answers :)

Life Update

2011-01-12T15:54:00.000-06:00

So I really will try to update more often, I just don't really do all that much.

My debate team took home a trophy this past weekend. Yay!

Also giving out finals this week. So far no one is going to fail the semester. Having said that, I have one student whose final isn't until Friday who need to get a 100 in order to pass the class...not likely...so we'll have to see how it goes...

I'm still seeing the same guy as before. We're happy. Nothing dramatic. Still waiting til he has a job before deciding if I want to broach the "where are we going" talk. I mean, I don't know what he is like when he has a regular 8-6 job. I don't want to commit myself to someone who is perfectly reasonable now, but turns into a crazy workaholic who is stressed and has anxiety. I mean, who would want that???

So I'm happy for now.

Oh, started ballet class again. I am SOOOO sore today, but in a good way. I am planning to go Tuesdays and Thursdays from now on, so hopefully this will get my metabolism moving.

Next step, go to the gym on non-ballet days. Since I hate weights, and running in front of complete strangers in shorts...this is not likely. But we'll see what happens.

I'm off to go pick-up the Kiddo from his new sitter's house and watch some more DVR shows.

Leave me a message to let me know you've been here. No feedback = no fun for me :)

Oh dear

2011-01-02T20:35:00.000-06:00

Forgot to log in on Thanksgiving didn't I? Naughty Lorelai...

How was everyone's Hannukah/Christmas/Kwanzaa/Festivus (because surely if you don't celebrate any or all of the first 3 you celebrate festivus, right?

Let's see, my Grandma is mad at my mum and her sisters because they took away her checking privileges. So she's not sending anyone checks this year. Which was quite some news to pops who went out and bought 4 HD tv's and 3 Blu-Ray players because "there was no reasonable explanation why I shouldn't at those prices". Then we were informed that instead of checks, everyone would receive the savings bond she bought them in February, 1992. Yes, 1992. I had no idea she had done this. So instead of $500 for Christmas, my Grandma sent each of us (including my baby boy) a $1000 savings bond that matured in 1999. Which turns out was actually worth about $1300 when we cashed them. $$$$$$$$$

I did SOME shopping. Ok, maybe a bit more than some. But I did put some away into savings...

Anyway, so I had to give dad money for my tv and blu-ray since they were intended to be gifts "from Grandma".

Onto the good stuff then: inventory of Christmas (I am an adult and apparently do not get gifts from the family anymore, I don't particularly like this side of being an adult):

5 Kate Spade bangle bracelets
Jewelry Box
Just Dance 2 for the Wii
3 sets of 700 thread count sheets
duvet cover set
Percy Jackson and the Olympians - The Lightning Theif on Blu-Ray
Eclipse on Blu-Ray
Beauty and the Beast on Diamond Edition Blu-Ray/DVD
Tote bags from: The British Museum, Stonehenge, Paris, Rome, and Venice
750 GB external hard drive
Lovely Yankee Candles
Nine West Gift Card
Old Navy Gift Card
Jo-Ann's Gift Cards (2)

Not too bad. I've already spent all of my gift cards on pretty little somethings, and went on a mini-spree through one of the teacher supply stores near me (there are 3, really not fair).

Oh yes, and the best part...I got an iPhone 4 today!!!!!!! It's so pretty...and I can actually take it into the Apple store if there is a problem. Lovely init?

And in case you're wondering, I've spent my Christmas break reading WAY to many books, most of which are written in the lovely UK and I have begun using random British words in my everyday life. So if you are reading this, please go out and buy "Holly's Inbox" by Holly Denham. Absolutely, wonderful!

Thank G*d for Thanksgiving

2010-11-24T16:42:00.000-06:00

Been a bit busy over here since the school year started. I'll update later tonight, but I just have to say THANK YOU for reading my blog (as sporadic as my posts may be).

A whole week off! YAY!

Sometimes I Wonder...

2010-09-26T10:37:00.000-05:00

Sometimes I wonder why the government hasn't started requiring adults to get a license before conceiving children. Now before you start to rant and rave, here is an example where that would have been most appropriate.

I have a student in my Algebra I class who hasn't been in school in a year and a half. He was pulled out of 7th grade by his mother halfway through the year. Why? Absolutely no reason. He was allowed to drink alcohol, do drugs, and be sexually active for instead of going to school.

So why is he back now? An acquaintance had an enlightened moment and decided that God had put these people in her path for a reason. She moved the boy into her home, got legal guardianship of him, and enrolled him in school. The mother was willing to check her son into Texas Youth Commission where he would have stayed until he was 18.

The acquaintance is now buying him clothes (a new thing for the boy), a backpack (he cried because he hadn't had one before), and keeps him fed. Sad really that these are things a child hasn't had before. She enrolled him in school and told him that if he wanted to stay with her and continue to be fed and well cared for that he had to graduate, quit the drugs and drinking, and behave himself completely.

Well, lets just say that behaving himself wasn't something he was used to doing. I was constantly having to redirect him since he wanted to talk instead of work. He constantly copped an attitude, and sometimes refused to do any work. 4 weeks of this and his guardian had enough. She packed up all his stuff and drove him down to his parents' house. They were not home at 10:30 at night on a weeknight because they were at a party. By midnight they made it home. They spoke to the guardian and said that they would drop him off at TYC on Monday. He they were done "raising" him. Well the boy cried and cried and begged her not to leave him there. He promised to be better behaved. That didn't last very long. The next week he was doing the same thing. So she threw his stuff in her car and drove him back to his parents. On the way he cried and cried and promised to behave himself better.

Apparently he was not used to someone who set rules and consequences and actually abided by them. After all this, he finally came back to school, apologized to me for his behavior and promised not to do it again. That was Thursday. Friday he actually was very calm and well mannered. I hope this actually will continue.

So as you can see, licensing wouldn't be an entirely bad thing.

Changes

2010-09-11T14:49:00.000-05:00

Updates June-August:

Last day of work was Friday June 25
Saw Eclipse 3 times within a week of it opening on June 30
Packed and moved myself and Kiddo back home by the end of July
Went to 2 job fairs for teachers and got 5 job interviews
Got 1 job offer within 2 days of the interview
Accepted job offer within 12 hours
Officially signed paperwork for job first week of August
Sat through a lot of workshops and seminars as part of my new hire/new teacher training
Found out my room wouldn't be ready until 3 weeks into the year
Then found out my room was ready the Friday before the kids came back to school.
My room was originally an office that now has to house 2 teachers, their desks, 12 student desks, a computer center with 5 terminals, 2 bookshelves, a file cabinet, and a locking cabinet.
We feel like sardines, or some kind of science experiment
Took 2 weeks to plan entire 6 weeks lesson plans
Met kids
Tried to forget some of the kids :)

I LOVE my new job. It has all the structure and support I was craving at my last job. It lacks some of the flexibility on a daily basis, but has more flexibility as far as family time and vacations are concerned.

I am now a teacher certified in Math 8-12 and Special Education EC-12. For those of you not on this side of the pond, EC stands for children between the ages of 3-6, and 12th grade is the final grade level in school before going on to college.

I have 3 classes of my own that range from 5-11 students, and I co-teach in 3 classes of 21-28. I am teaching 9th and 10th graders who need modifications to the regular classroom environment or curriculum. Now before you judge, some of these kids need a safe and supportive environment to succeed, and are at or above level for their grade. Some others just need a small teacher-student ratio in order to be able to successfully control their behavior.

That being said, they are all good kids. Some just need more help showing that than others.

Meet the Teachers night is Monday. An hour and a half of parents coming through and asking why a student is teaching the class.

Yes, that's right, I have been mostly mistaken for a student by both faculty and parents. I guess that will be a good thing when I'm 30 and feeling old. Right now it is frustrating to constantly have to draw attention to my ID badge showing I am a teacher.

That being said, my students certainly know that I am their teacher. I have mastered the art of disapproving looks (thanks to all that training by kiddo).

Speaking of whom, he has adjusted well to the move. And why not, he now has his grammy around 24/7 to give him what he wants. He got new furniture (my brother's old furniture), new bedding (Spongebob, G*d help me), and goes to one of my best friend's house for childcare everyday. She has a Wii, 2 dogs, 2 frogs, a fish, a bird, and 2 kids. He is most happy to be there. He is also going to school 3 hours a day, but the school has to provide transportation so he gets picked up from her house and dropped off everyday.

He is still in the process of potty training. He actually went 2 weeks of actually seeming to be potty trained. He kept a dry diaper, asked to go to the bathroom, and successfully went on the potty. All day, every day, even at restaurants and while playing the Wii. Then he suddenly stopped. I feel that it has something to do with the move and all the changes. But it has now been over a month since we moved everything down, shouldn't he be getting settled? He is also resisting going on the potty now. I am of the opinion that he will do it eventually. My mother has other opinions and has attempted bribing him. That's now exactly working...I tried to tell her it wouldn't :)

I'll do details about my teaching experience later, now its time to make sure I have submitted my grades for the first progress report, Oh boy!

Analyze This

2010-05-23T19:52:00.000-05:00

Text messages between me and the guy I'm seeing from yesterday:

9:17pm
Me: Hi

11:28pm
Me: Alright, I'm going to bed now
Him: U hung up on me 4 reading the news, im with Joe
Me: I asked you to stop twice. You didn't listen. Did you really want to listen to me cry?
Him: No. I didnt want you to cry.
Me: Then you should have stopped
Him: I didnt think u would cry. Just reading the local news that made Yahoo's home page.
Me: I don't read the news. It makes me paranoid or cry.
Him: Ok. Have sweet dreams!
Me: Have fun.

2:17am
Him: U awake?

Feedback please. He acted totally normal today, but I still don't know how I feel about him not listening to me.

G*d I'm bad at this

2010-05-22T23:02:00.000-05:00

Is it obvious I never kept a diary? Well I didn't. Or maybe couldn't is a better term to use. Either way, my first instinct is not to write down every thought and/or feeling. Not even if I'm the only one reading it.

So why have I decided to write again now? Good question. I may have some pent up emotions that were released in the form of of a 3 hour cry fest last night. To be fair, the first 2 hours was during the season finale of Grey's Anatomy. Did you watch it? Well if you haven't been watching, don't start with that one. You WILL be confused, and probably won't cry as much. And it wasn't just what was going on, but some of the things said would trigger my mind and cause me to cry.

Not just tears occasionally falling onto my cheeks. Not a torrent of tears and nose running. More like someone sucked all the air out of my lungs, silent screaming, flood of tears, wake up with red puffy eyes crying. Confused? Perhaps you should watch the episode and read this. All will be clear.

But why the 3rd hour of crying? Let me catch you up on my relationship status since the last time we talked.

I am still seeing the guy that I started seeing in September. We see each at least every two weeks. But nothing is really going anywhere. We are still doing what we were doing before. Going out to eat, coming home, sleeping, wake up, do our separate things, meet up later, go out to eat...

And sex is still there. Still great. Is it 5 times a day? No. But it average out to twice a day, and form what I'm told that is more than most people.

But we haven't talked about our relationship. Haven't identified what it is that we are doing. Haven't determined if this is going to last.

To make is worse, last night we were on the phone, everything was normal. Until he starts reading a news story about a mom who came home to find her teenage son bound and dead surrounded by blood. I asked him to stop twice and he didn't. So I hung up.

Is that uncalled for? I asked him to stop. He might not know ALL the details about my brother's death, but shouldn't he be aware that I am sensitive to these types of stories?

Or was I extra sensitive due to the Grey's Anatomy episode?

Either way, I cried on and off for another hour and passed out. During that hazy period before total unconsciousness, I heard my phone beep to let me know a new text message had come. Then 15 minutes later my phone rang with his ringer. I just couldn't muster the energy to answer.

So today, I haven't received any texts from him, nor any phone calls. I texted him at around 9pm tonight, but he hasn't responded.

We have never gone 24 hours without talking in some form.

So now I am sitting here watching Bridget Jones' Diary and wondering if he just wasn't that into me and maybe his trend towards acting like a jackass was him letting me know to leave him alone.

Although I may point out that he is usually the one to call or text first each day.

I am so confused.

And tired.

And emotionally drained.

And I feel a little better after writing this. If everything turns out well, I may not be writing. However if this guys breaks my heart, I may be back sooner rather than later.

Life Changing Decisions

2010-03-16T20:59:00.000-05:00

If my last post wasn't a clue. I've decided that I am not happy in my job anymore and am in need of a change. So here is The Plan:

1. Turn in my notice at work. Last day of work 6/30/10, to ensure qualified replacement is found and provided enough training to perform job.

2. Get accept to iTeach program and obtain Probationary Teaching Certificate.

3. Apply for teaching positions.

4. Learn how to toss out the accumulated crap I have in the apartment. Friend will be here this weekend to start with the closet and bedroom.

5. Research and apply for Pre-K program at elementary school zoned for parent's house.

6. Pack and move any remaining possessions into either parent's house or storage unit near parents house.

7. Complete 6 instructional courses and observational videos before 2010 school year.

8. Complete first year of instruction and take 2 final certification tests to receive Texas Standard Teaching Certificate.

Not too bad, eh? My parents have agreed that it would be best to move home to get expenses under control and develop a good savings base before moving out. Kiddo starts Kindergarten fall of 2011 which will greatly reduce childcare costs. Until then, Friend has offered to watch Kiddo after Pre-K until I get off from teaching for less than what I would pay for a preschool or childcare center.

Friend has also offered herself, her husband, and their 29 foot trailer to move me back home.

So all in all, it seems that this is God's plan for me. It will actually give me a slight pay raise, while giving me summers and the X-mas holidays off each year. I'll keep you posted on my progress :)

The letter I didn't send on Friday

2010-03-14T13:36:00.000-05:00

Boss-A

Just for your records, here are my previous e-mails about the transfer to Account X.

I apologize if my tone was rude or insulting, I did not intend for it to come across that way.

I understand that everyone is running around alot and things are falling through the cracks. But it isn't just impacting you and Boss-B and Josh as you said to me over the phone. I have just gotten around to bank reconciliations for December, not to mention the reports Jack asked me 2 weeks ago to run and now there are reports for John that he is requesting me to help with. I can barely accomplish my daily and weekly tasks that you have required me to do to keep the bank accounts accurate, bills paid, and customer payments coming in. This employment situation impacts me greatly and your comments to me today made me feel like a second-class employee whose time is less important than everyone else.

I have done a lot for this company over the past year and a half that has saved you a lot of time and money. Just to name a few:

1. I managed the entire sales tax audit, reducing the liability so much that a professional tax audit reduction company couldn't reduce it any further

2. I took over all bank reconciliations except Main checking resulting in a reduction in Accountant fees.

3. I had our insurance requoted and reduced our annual cost by 2/3 what we were paying before.

4. I took over responsibilities for Jane and Joe when you downsized the retail stores, without receiving any sort of monetary compensation.

5. I activated a Purchase Order matching policy for all vendor orders to reduce over charges and unauthorized freight charges.

I understand that I am not perfect, and in the 6+ years I have been with this company there has been only 1 major mistake on my watch, which had many people involved in the situation happening in the first place.

I don't need a response to this, I just felt that you needed to be aware of the atmosphere you have created in the office.

-Lorelai

Tax Time Again

2010-03-01T21:42:00.000-06:00

You know, sometimes I wonder why I was so happy to have children. Then I looked at my tax return. Oh yes, that refund coming my way. :) YAY!

What will I be spending it on? Hmmm... I don't know...new clothes may be nice...new sheets...I'll have to think bout this...

And then I have my 4th quarter bonus to look forward to...that may add up to quite a jackpot. Maybe a vacation may be in order...I wonder...

Books! OMG How can I forget books? Amazon UK has SOO many books I don't own yet...

Oh god this is tricky.

I need to win the lottery, then I wouldn't have to worry about deciding what to spend my hard earned refund on :)

Well shouldn't complain, some people owe taxes this year. Some people still owe taxes from 5 years ago.

Happy Birthday to me!

2010-02-23T08:18:00.000-06:00

I had my 26th birthday on Friday :) No longer able to convince myself that I am in my mid-twenties, it was a pleasant shock when the waitress at the Cheesecake Factory announced that I was turning 21 that day :) I pass for 21? YES! Thank you Mary Kay and all your anti-aging products.

I got 2 birthday dinners, one with family, one with friends. Both well attended, and I got the best of both worlds: Seafood gumbo and fried shrimp, then chicken piccata and cheesecake. All with some alcohol to make it just that much better.

I also found the time to watch Valentine's Day and Percy Jackson & The Olympians: The Lightning Thief. I may have to pick up those books, they didn't completely butcher Greek mythology. In as weird way, they kinda made up completely new stories with the Gods and Goddesses in it without offending. I'm definitely looking forward to the sequel.

In today's news: IT IS SNOWING!!

Here in the Lone Star State it is snowing! Big white fluffy snow balls falls quickly from the sky. On the plus side, its very pretty to watch. On the downside, I am wearing high-heeled boots so walking outside is quite difficult. But regardless, its a birthday miracle! Maybe I'll find out I'm getting a raise, health insurance, and a 401K all paid for by my job. That would just be fantastic!

Feeling Underappreciated?

2010-02-16T08:21:00.000-06:00

Work is a regular blur of inane questions, and "what the bloody hell did you do?". Had to figure out why the inventory count over the weekend caused a $300,000 change in the income statement... Well perhaps its because you did it wrong? Yes, I believe that's it...

But do they ask me about the procedure to conducting inventory audits? Nope. But did I have to fix the report they created to conduct the inventory audit? Yup. Did I have to spend 3 hours trying to figure out why the valuation was off? Yes. Was it because the moron entering the information kept making mistakes and didn't fix the calculations? Yes. Did he have to fix it? Nope. Did I? Yup. Did I get a bonus/raise/lunch for recovering $300,000? Are you insane????...no...did not.

But thus is the story of my life there. They wouldn't be able to function without me. Which kinda makes me want to play the job offer card...if I were to actively seek a new job. Which may not be too far off if something doesn't change soon. Everyone keeps hounding me about when I will just move back to Houston. Perhaps its time to look into that...

Europe?

2010-02-11T08:42:00.000-06:00

Had a friend over for dinner on Tuesday night. I made lasagna (c/o Stouffer's freezer section), garlic bread, and salad. Tasty good if I do say so myself :)

She informed me that she wants to plan a trip to Europe next summer (2011). Two weeks while her fiance is on a 6 week trip for school. She wants to hit the three major cities: London, Paris, and Rome. Neither of us has ever been to Europe, and desperately want to go. So now the planning starts.

We are hoping to get 2 more girls to come with us (reduces the per person hotel cost). Going sometime in June I believe. But there is SOO much to look into. Obviously, we will be flying into Europe, but which airport? Do we start in London, make our way to Rome, then fly out of Rome? Fly into London, then immediately fly to Rome and make our way back to London? So many options! Do we rent a car or take the Rail? How much does the rail cost anyway? How long does it take to drive from London to Rome?

Good thing we aren't travelling for over a year. So many things to look into before going!

Sleep, I need Sleep

2010-02-09T08:34:00.000-06:00

Long time no write :) Last week as a bit of a blur. Boy was in town M-F, then I was with him in Houston F-Sun. Returned to A-TX in time to get to my Mac Class on how to use iChat and all the lovely features of Mail.

But before all that happened, I spent Jan 29-31 with Best Friend pulling night duty with the baby. SOO cute!! But SOO tiring!

Since she's hypoglycemic, she HAS to eat every 3 hours, no exceptions. This puts a cramp in the "let them sleep" policy I was taught when I had kiddo. By this time he was sleeping 4-6 hours at a time at night, which meant I slept 3-5 hours at a time. With Mini-BF, one is lucky to grab 2 hours of sleep at a time. Here, let me demonstrate:

7:00 am:

Wake up
Make bottles/get bottles heated
Measure out medicine
Wake up baby
Change baby (record contents of diaper on chart for doctor)
Poke baby with a sticker to test blood sugar levels (record reading on same chart for doctor)

7:30am:

Feed baby the 10mL bottle with medicine
Feed baby the 100mL bottle
Burp baby
Catch spit up on one of 3 cloth diapers handily laying about

8:00 am

Put baby in bouncer
Wash bottles
Rotate laundry

8:30 am

Sleep if the baby is cooperating, otherwise stare numbly at the tv, try not to change the channels with the car key-fob

10:00 am: REPEAT

Now she only gets medicine and blood sugar checks 3 times a day (7:30, 1:30, 7:30), but those don't take up too much time. But clearly, on a good day one can catch 1.5-2 hours of sleep between feedings. This does not provide for a sane mommy.

Now Mini-BF DID sleep between the 10:30 pm, 1:30 am, 4:30 am and 7:30 am on Friday night. So I got about 5-6 total hours of sleep. Not too bad, and she slept in her bassinet right next to me.

Saturday night however, she decided to show her true colors...after getting up at 7 am that morning, by 4:15 saturday night/Sunday morning, I was about to cry. I carried the quite perky and cooing baby into BF's room and said "BF Hubby, you've been drafted".

He had no complaints, he had gotten like 8 hours straight of sleep friday night, and about 6 straight hours Saturday before I got him up. In his head, that's the most sleep he had gotten in a week!

So needless to say, I am now quite aware of what its like to have a newborn in the house, and I think I can hold off having another one until I can afford a day nurse and a night nurse...Mommy needs her sleep!

Goals 1&2 Accomplished!

2010-01-28T08:41:00.000-06:00

2 days later and what am I doing? Pretty much the same thing. On the upside, I did accomplish a few goals yesterday at work:

1. Start auditing checklists again. As a member of "management" it is my duty to collect everyone's checklists and make random audits of items off each checklist to see if they actually did what they say they did. The last time this actually happened was last May I believe. Yes, sometime before the Move and the Israel trip. Man have people gotten lazy. Not to worry though. Control-Freak Lorelai is on the case. Now if I could only convince my bosses that there should be a punishment system for people not actually doing their job...not likely...they're libertarians...

2. Get a temp agency on file. This has been a MAJOR goal of mine for the past year or so. Currently, if someone calls in sick, or goes on vacation, my bosses just have one of the other drivers/warehouse person call a family member to come in and work. No paperwork filled out, and a check written out-right at the end of the day. There is so many things wrong with that I don't even know where to start. So finally on Wednesday I got the go ahead to research and chose a temp agency that we will use whenever we need ASAP employment needs, or on a per project basis. THANK YOU GOD! Now when a person is brought in, they've been drug checked, background checked, and have the experience to actually drive a forklift. Not to mention their General Liability and Employer's Comp is covered, and I don't have to write a check on the spot, the agency bills us later. BLISS!

So the other goals for this year are coming up:

1. Make payroll paperless :)
2. Get an assistant :)
3. Create a Safety Manual and training program.

They may not be in the order of importance, but they are in the order that they will most likely be accomplished.

On personal news...not much really. Things are still the same with Boy. We talk every night, text all day. Its good. I'll be seeing him Super Bowl weekend :)

Alright, time to get to reading. TTYL!

Seeing Someone

2010-01-26T09:01:00.000-06:00

News, in no particular order:

Best Friend brought Baby Girl home from the hospital on Friday after a nearly 6 week stay in the Neo-Natal ICU. I got to hold Baby Girl for 6 hours Friday and 6 hours Saturday. Kiddo was NOT pleased.
Got new office supplies for X-mas (from Best Friend) and now my boss is jealous and wants to take it. I told him no, but I'd be happy to go shopping at the Container Store for him. With his card of course :)
Dad e-mailed me a link he got from one of his sisters to our family tree. My dad's side has been a bit of a mystery since his family immigrated in early 1900's. But I can go back to my great-great-grandfather in Poland. I have relatives in Australia, England, Poland, and Brazil at least. Cool huh?
Changed Facebook status to remove "single". Didn't replace it with anything, just want old boyfriends/acquaintances to stop texting and IM-ing me. I told this to Boy, who in turn said, "What kind of boys?" Hehe. I didn't want him to think I wanted to put out relationship on Facebook, which I don't. I just didn't want to catch him off guard.
The above conversation then in turn turned into a "What do we introduce each other as?" Conversation. I was talking about how these past boys have been asking me out, and I make excuses (because technically Boy and I are not BF/GF or whatever adults call it). Boy then said, "Why do you tell them you are seeing someone?" To which I replied "Am I?" A bunch of "I don't know"s followed this, ending with the result that I am "seeing someone". Not in a relationship, but "seeing someone". Well that's at least more definitive than "I don't know". I'm sure more updates will follow.

Alright. I believe that's it for me. Off to read a bit, pick Kiddo up from one school and drop him off at another, then off to work. Later? Mac class on using Numbers in a more advanced fashion. If it is anything like Pages, I am going to be SOO excited.

Doing my Part

2010-01-21T08:08:00.000-06:00

Stumbled across this website created by bloggers trying raise money for the people of Haiti. Please click here to donate.

Hormones can drive you crazy!

2010-01-19T08:04:00.000-06:00

Well I think I may have been hormonal this past weekend. After reviewing my last post, and really thinking about what had happened, I think I may have overreacted...just a tad.

I have no idea why, that time of the month isn't scheduled for a while.

And he has been every bit as wonderful to me since he's been back in Houston as he was before.

What is wrong with me?

In other news, out of the 10 books I ordered off Amazon being shipped from England, 4 cam in yesterday. YAY! New books!

Time to update my reading list, and get back into my book. TTFN!

Boys are stupid, throw rocks at them

2010-01-17T17:14:00.000-06:00

Boy came in this weekend. That could explain the silence on my end over here.

Well mixed bag of feelings on this visit. This was the first visit over a weekend with the kiddo here. Also, didn't pre-book a baby-sitter, so by the time he told me we had plans on Saturday night (on Saturday afternoon) my baby-sitter wasn't available. So I stayed in and did laundry while he went out to meet his friends.

Also went out to dinner Friday night, where he displayed just how much he doesn't understand what being a parent means. He spent dinner throwing wads of paper at the kiddo (not that it hurt him, but its a habit I'd rather him not pick up) and other such bad habits that can get kiddo in trouble at school if he repeats them. I tried to be nice about asking him to stop, but he didn't listen and I eventually had to yell at him in order to get him to listen. Then spent the rest of dinner not talking to him because I was soo mad.

And yesterday he was playing rough with the kiddo. Still wouldn't listen when I told him to stop. I had to physically take the kiddo away from him, which made the kiddo start crying, and I had to take a time out in the bathroom to keep myself from crying in front of Boy. I don't know why he keeps doing this even though he KNOWS I don't like it.

Learned a lot this weekend. One of which is that Boy just isn't ready to deal with being around a kid for a prolonged period of time. Is this something that can get fixed? I don't know. Is this something that Boy and I are going to talk about later tonight when he gets back to his place? Definitely.

Why is the first guy I get into a serious thing with have to act like a 5-year old, not seeing the consequences of his actions?

Sigh...but better to know this now.

Why do they like to stress me out? I just yell more...

2010-01-14T08:40:00.000-06:00

Tonight is my company's first company-wide meeting. We are going over what we accomplished in 2009 (nothing besides making Lorelai annoyed and stressed) and the goals we want to set for 2010 (hopefully this involves making Lorelai less stressed and less annoyed. More than likely this will stress her out more and cause a nervous breakdown).

Here's Lorelai's Goals:

Become OSHA compliant
Become ADA compliant
Get HR procedures compliant with all Federal and State Laws
Write a Safety Manual
Create a Safety Training Program and Retraining Schedule
Upgrade Payroll system to be paperless, thusly reducing errors, and make payroll simpler

My bosses goals:

Open a new store in San Antonio and have Lorelai make all arrangements
Fix the website, via having Lorelai make mass updates
Re-work the Quantity Pricing Schedule on inventory, via Lorelai manually changing each item
Get the new Outside Sales Rep to bring in more clients, Lorelai gets to process more credit applications, and tax forms, as well as make more collections calls

And I believe I am not even scratching the surface on my bosses' goals. Tonight should be fun. At least there will be pizza.

Kiddo got 2 new Wii games in from Amazon.com yesterday. He got an Amazon gift card from my brother, so that went towards more games. So far he has played both, Diego coming in the lead by far. It looks interesting, the kid has to get up and jump and reach and stuff to play so he's getting his exercise. Can this count as his outside playtime on the weekends? I just can't seem to peel myself out of bed...jk

Ohhh, and found a 2g 8gb iPhone on craigslist for $180. Already unlocked. We'll see if they are still willing to sell. That would just make my day.

In Boy related news, he's coming up today. Much later today seeing as he was still up at 7am watching more episodes of Chuck and hasn't gone to bed yet. I see his Yahoo IM is Idle, so I hope that means he has stopped after ep.10 Season 2. Mind you, he only started watching Chuck this Monday...and there are 13 episodes in Season One...silly boys

Have finished watching this week's Chuck, Desperate Housewives, Accidentally On Purpose, and 2 1/2 Men. Fell asleep before Big Bang Theory was over so i get to re-watch that tonight. Also on the agenda: Heroes, Cougartown, Ugly Betty, and all of this week's Jay, Conan, and Jimmy...although I hear that line-up is changing soon...at least according to the Today show and the hosts of the morning show on Majic 95.5...

Undefined

2010-01-12T08:45:00.000-06:00

5 followers, woop! Does it count that 2 are the same person, whom I've known since I was 11?

Ahh well, in other news...

Been having lots of thoughts about where this thing with Boy is going. We talk everyday, and text pretty constantly when both of us are awake (note: he usually pours himself into bed around 5am and rolls out around noon). He sweet, caring, and such a gentleman. The only question to remain is: What are we doing?

We haven't defined what it is we are doing, 3.5 months in. We haven't met the other's family, but have met the other's friends. All our friends know we are together. Niether one of us is seeing anyone else. Its understood that we are going to be together over Valentines Day. He even mentioned that he would go see Eclipse with me when that comes out...this summer.

Yet, when we met his friends unexpectedly on New Years Eve, I was his "friend, Lorelai*". Friend? I'm not sure if he just didn't want to define this right there, since we haven't really had that talk. But his friends clearly didn't think that we are just friends.

All so confusing.

And on top of that, I've been having weird dreams that involve getting married... Haven't had those since I was in high school. And I keep looking at Wedding magazines. Haven't bought any, I'm not completely psycho. But my eye is drawn to them alot more lately than they have since Best Friend got married.

Stay tuned to see if my dreams are psychic, or just plain crazy :)

Lazy Sunday Mornings

2010-01-10T11:19:00.000-06:00

Have you ever ironed your sheets? I did. And my pillowcases. They are SOO pretty. Not like anyone else is going to see them. But I do and I love them.

In other news, I cut Kiddo's hair yesterday. He looks like a boy instead of the hippy child he has been looking like for the past 2 years :) Sad, but it will grow out...although he is awfully cute...maybe I'll keep it like this. Will be easier to wash...

Picked up new curtains at Wal-Mart yesterday, unfortunately they are about a foot too short. I'll find another use for them I'm sure, they are soo pretty. Right now I have fashioned them into a sort of valence over my bedroom window. New, longer curtains will just have to wait.

What's on the agenda today? Finish laundry, go grocery shopping, but firstly, get out of bed and shower.

So much to do, so little energy to do it. Stay tuned to see if I actually accomplished anything today :)

Yay scarves!

2010-01-07T08:40:00.000-06:00

Once again, not much to report. It is officially cold here in the lone star state, and won't be getting better for about a week it looks like. Thank god I love all clothing winter-related. Scarves, hats, coats, boots...it's so wonderful to actually get some use out these things :)

Today is the National Championship game in college football. "How do you know this?" You ask. Simple. I got a phone call this morning from Boy. He hasn't gone to bed, what with his obsession with playing poker and late nights. So he is home, playing Tiger Woods golf and waiting for the championship game to start. I assume he'll be going to bed when the game is over...I hope so...he's quite intolerable when he is sleepy.

So I'm off to read. If something interesting happens in my life, a rarity but sometimes it happens. I'll be sure to keep you informed.

Tuesday Mornings

2010-01-05T08:38:00.000-06:00

Not much to report here folks. Caught up on Jay, Conan, and Jimmy from over the holidays. And watched the new Desperate Housewives...did not see some of that coming, but interesting none the less.

Work was nice yesterday, seeing as I got the excuse to leave early so I can pick up the kiddo from school instead of staying til 6pm when we properly close. :)

Took the kiddo over to a new pet store yesterday to pick-up crickets for his froggy. This store has bunnies that are out in the open so you can pick them up and cuddle them. Kiddo wanted to hold ALL of them. Thankfully not all at the same time. Also saw snakes, spiders, lizards, frogs, and sugar gliders. No, we weren't at PetsMart. Its just a local shop that I had heard about because their crickets are cheaper than PetsMart.

Gave kiddo a proper bath when we got home, all those reptiles gross me out.

Now am sitting at Starbucks preparing to read my book for an hour before transporting Kiddo from one school to another. Oh the joys of Tuesday mornings :)

New Year, New Name

2010-01-03T20:21:00.000-06:00

Got my own domain name today. Less than $15 for 2 years, and now I don't have that long URL anymore. So for those who didn't get here via the brand-spanking new domain name, its: http://www.daydreaminglorelai.com !! Yay!!

Had another One-to-One session today at the Apple store. This time about iPhoto. Gosh I love iPhoto, I can do so much! Like create calendars and books, and cards. But not just a book, a real hardcover book with a cover jacket and everything.

However, I just learned that a majority of my photos that I've taken are in too small a format to work on the calendar and larger books. Should be ok for cards though. But going forward I am going to use the biggest size possible when taking pictures. I'd like to create calendars and books for people later on :)

Next class is going to be about iWork and using Pages. I kinda got used to Word, so Pages may take some getting used to.

Now time to put the baby to bed then read all my blogs :) Nite!

Welcome 2010

2010-01-02T20:36:00.002-06:00

Well its been a fun week. Let's catch you up shall we?

Sunday: My One-to-One class went well. Learned lots of neat shortcuts and features that I didn't know about before. Afterwards, met up with boy's friends to watch the Cowboys game. And woo-wee his friend is some kind of Cowboy's fan. We're talking jumping out of his chair yelling, red in the face, table slamming kind of fan. On the upside, I learned the names of the offensive positions on a football team. Still haven't learned the defense, but I suppose I have time.

Monday: Work, blech. My boy went home while I was at work, so went and saw Nine afterwards. Fabulous movie! I love Fergie in it, she was fabulous. Went home and downloaded the soundtrack that same night. Still listening to it on loop :) Oh yes, and got 3 more venues down on Beatles Rockband. Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds is deceptively tricky on the guitar...

Tuesday: More work :( Then off the movies to see Sherlock Holmes. Another fantastic movie. Saw the preview for the Iron Man sequel. After the movie I went to Blockbuster to rent the first movie, but they were out :( So I rented Funny Girl instead :) Yay Barbara!

Wednesday: Had to be at work at 8am...yuck. Finished all my work by 11, and my bosses were out of town so I just sat around the front office chatting with my co-worker and finding new projects to do. Bosses were supposed to arrive by noon, but rolled in at 4pm. Thank god we made a food run at 1, or we'd have starved before they arrived. I got 2 new projects to do, thank god, or I would have been bored out of my mind. Came home and packed up for my trip back to Houston. Only two more whole kiddo-free days left of this holiday vacation.

Thursday: Last day of work in 2009 :) Completed as much as possible on the two projects given to me on Wednesday. :) I love being efficient. Got to leave work an hour early to head into Houston. The drive was lovely. Sang VERY loudly to the Moulin Rouge, Chicago, Phantom of the Opera, and Nine soundtracks.

Got to Boy's place just in time to find him in the middle of a HUGE laundry run. Guess who had to fold clothes just to find the bed? Yup, that would be me. Curled my hair, put my face on, then had to figure out what to wear. I made Boy look up the dress attire for the restaurant he had made reservations at. "Upscale Casual"...WHAT THE HECK IS THAT? This new revalation resulted in a massive google search for upscale casual attire. Most unhelpful. Ended up having to call in reinforcements to help me decide between two different dresses. Ended up with the same dress I wore last new years eve with my gold peep-toe heels and kelly green jacket. Quite adorable I must say.

Got to the restaurant on time for our reservations, and went to the bar to wait for out table. Well who would have known it, but 6 of Boy's friends were there. So we ended up joining them for dinner. Now pay attention to the timeline on this dinner. Remember, this is New Year's Eve:

9:00 pm: arrive at restaurant, nice upscale seafood and steak house.

9:15 pm: seated at nice table upstairs with a view of downtown Houston

9:20 pm: Appetizers ordered - Boy and I split a crab cake (SOO yummy)

9:30 pm: Salads and entree's ordered - Boy and I split a Caesar salad. I get the Filet & Fish (Filet Mignon and Lobster Tail with mashed potatoes and asparagus) he got Country Fried Rainbow Trout with green beans.

9:35 pm: Appetizers arrive

9:40 pm: Waiter returns to tell us that they are out of the 6 oz lobster tails that come with the Filet & Tail (I was one of 4 at the table who ordered this), and brought us menus to decide what we want instead. I suggest that we could just substitute another seafood choice instead of the lobster tail. He said that should be fine but a manager would be coming to speak with us.

9:50 pm: Salads arrive - YUM, also had some of the salad the others had ordered...they didn't even touch the hard boiled egg...well they clearly weren't Jews...Boy and I attacked that first :)

10:00 pm: Manager arrives, to inform us that the chef wants to substitute 8oz lobster tail for the 6oz for an additional $5. Well that just set off one of the girls we were with, mind you she didn't even order this entree. About 10 minutes of arguing back and forth we came to the conclusion that I would still get my scallops, but the other three still wanted the lobster tail at the additional $5.

10:15 pm: Salads have been finished, plates cleared. Water refilled.

10:30 pm: One fo the guys comes back from the bathroom to tell us that our waiter pulled him aside on his way back to inform him that they ran out of the redfish, but there were taking care of the substitution.

10:45 pm: ?? No food yet

11:00 pm: A waitress came over whom one of the guy's thought he knew, but turned out it was the other "xxxx" that works there. She asked if we needed anything, at which point we said that we were just wondering if we were going to get out food any time soon. She said she would go check. Came back to inform us that they were plating out food now and would be out in 4 minutes.

11:05 pm: Food arrives along with a complimentary bottle of Merlot from the manager.

11:20 pm: STUFFED! I got the Filet Mignon Medium Rare and it was SOOO good. I finished up the Filet and the scallops :)

11:30 pm: We ask for the check, the manager comes to inform us that he is sending over a dessert platter, on the house, and that they are adjusting our check accordingly.

11:35 pm: Dessert arrives: Chocolate Chip Cookies, Warm chocolate caramel brownie with Ice Cream, Key Lime Pie, Cheesecake, and Bread Pudding. What the heck is Bread Pudding? I still don't know. I had the chocolate caramel brownie. The check ended up being $200 total for all 8 of us. I can safely say that just with the entree's our meal would have cost over $200. They comped an awful lot of food and drink to make up for the 1.5 hour wait for the entree's. If they only just subbed the 8oz lobster tail for the 6oz without making a big deal, they wouldn't have had to comp so much.

11:45 pm: Finally leave the restaurant. Geez it was cold out.

We all head over to one of the guy's house for the countdown and some champagne. Got my first official New Year's kiss from Boy :) Then settled in to watch The Hangover. I half fell asleep cuddled up next to Boy, so he took my home around 2 am.

Friday: Slept in, then met a friend for lunch, followed by a 4 hour nap on her couch :) Hehehe. Then went to Starbucks to read a bit, then wandered next door to Barnes and Noble. 50% off calendars. Got one of shoes for the house, and one of handbags for the office. Then back to friend's house for some of her mom's seafood and sausage gumbo. Chatted for a bit, then headed back to Boy's place. Read more of my book, watched Alvin and the Chipmunks, and fell asleep. :) Yay for sleeping whenever you want.

Today: Slept in, had breakfast at a local diner, then headed home to pick-up the kiddo. Finally made it back into the car and on the road by about 4pm. The kiddo slept for most of the ride home, so it was pretty enjoyable. I chatted on the phone (hands free) for about 1.5 hours with a friend to make the time fly. And it did :) Now back home. Kiddo played some Wii before bed. I put away all the clothes, and threw all the laundry into the basket. That can be done tomorrow.

So now I'm on Season 3 of Seinfeld and updating you all. Hope everyone had a happy new years!

Merry X-mas and Happy New Year

2009-12-27T11:47:00.004-06:00

Its been a nice relaxing time off since Wednesday. Drank a little, ate a lot, and took naps. What more can I ask for?

Beatles Rockband for the Wii, that's what. I only played about 12 songs last night before bowling a frame on Wii Bowling, but last night my wrist hurt something awful. Who knew Come Together could kill a person. That is one hard song to play on the guitar.

But back to my past couple of days...

Went to a friend's party on X-mas Eve and my boy met me there. I tried to warn him that they are from Texas, and that means deer heads on the wall and screaming children running around. What I didn't realize was that my friend's husband and son would take out the heads of their recent kill (unmounted and still bloody) and walk around with them and take pictures. Of course my boy quietly asked me if it would be possible to take a picture with one of the heads. I don't think it was because he thought it was cool, but my friend's husband seemed pleased.

We left earlier than I normally do, but my boy wasn't feeling well and I was tired. So actually got some sleep that night before the kiddo woke me up in the morning.

Had the biggest brunch known to man at a place in Pasadena (TX). We're talking full breakfast buffet, traditional turkey dinner, chicken tenders, mac & cheese, corn dogs, a fajita station, omlette station, waffle station, and carving station, tables of pastries, salads, seafood, and desserts. Oh, and did I mention all you can drink Mimosas?

I took a 2 hour nap afterwards, couldn't keep my eyes open. Woke up in time to go to my neighbor's house for some pie :)

I love X-mas.

So that was my holiday. Now I'm back in A-TX with my boy :) hehe. Got my first One-On-One class at the Apple Store this afternoon, yay!

In case I don't get back on here, have a happy New Year!

Imma Be

2009-12-24T13:33:00.003-06:00

I never knew how addictive the music by Black Eyed Peas was until this week. I can't stop listening to Imma Be. In the car, on the computer, while reading a book, it doesn't matter. I just want to listen to it over and over again.

But anyways...

Work was pretty crazy Tuesday, then met the other room mom at The Cheesecake Factory for dinner. We spent about 4 hours just talking, not really anything that has to do with the school though :) The food was good, and her 2 month old is SOO adorable. And so good, he just slept and ate the whole time. I even got to hold him for almost an hour. Yay!

She just signed up on the Jewish dating site that I'm on, we talked about it a little bit through e-mails before. And she mentioned she had started dating a guy. And she started to describe him and I was like "And his name is _____?".

And the look on her face, priceless. I was like, "yeah we dating briefly over the summer. We slept together". And then we both started laughing. She asked if it was weird, and I told her absolutely not. We didn't click, it was no big deal. But then we joked about doing a double date and not telling him first. That made me laugh harder.

She's really cool, and she doesn't really have a lot of friends here (long story, she is in the middle of a divorce) so I told her to call me whenever she needs girl talk. So yay, another mommy friend closer to my age :)

Best Friend's baby is still in the hospital...so it looks like Best Friend will be spending the holiday in the NICU instead of at home. I'm going to bake today and tomorrow for her.

Yesterday, work was really slow and I was able to leave early and head back into Houston. Spent last night with my boy, and now am home with my parents, brother, and kid. Chinese food later, YUM!

Why can't everyone just hug and be done with it?

2009-12-21T19:40:00.003-06:00

Stumbled upon a Facebook group today via a friend's profile. Now for the most part, I avoid the news. Newspapers, radio, tv...it either makes me depressed, annoyed, or paranoid. This Facebook group makes me depressed AND annoyed.

The purpose of this group is slightly unclear, since the description doesn't necessarily match the content that I have been reading (still not done, but don't know how much more I can read).

The point of the group is to assemble people who do not want the Israeli government to make any agreements to divide or give away Jerusalem.

Now I am a Jew, and extremely proud of it. I love my heritage, and I value and respect the state of Israel as a safe place for Jews who are persecuted in their country. That is why we were granted the state in the first place.

Now I'm not stupid, the idea of forcing non-Jews to recognize this new government was going to be hard. And I don't think anyone expected them to just willingly abandon homes they have been living in for generations. I wouldn't ask them to. I mean, look at what the Pilgrims did when they came over here and pushed the Native Americans into reservations and lower class citizens. But that's an opinion better saved for another time.

The Jews have been connected to the land of Israel for thousands of years. Long before Christianity and Islam were developed. Which anyone would know if they actually learned about all three of these religions and found they all come from a common ancestor, Abraham.

We all have a connection to that land, and especially Jerusalem. Was it right for the Muslims to build the Dome of the Rock right on top of the Temple Mount? I mean Muhammad was born AFTER the temple was built. It clearly was there first. I'll let you make of that what you will.

But I digress from my purpose.

Basically, I believe that people should educate themselves about the world and people around them before making conclusions about what kind of people they are. How are the children raised? What is the basis of their religion? A lot of people don't even know that Christianity stemmed from Judaism. How is that even possible? Jesus was a Jew for crying out loud.

And I would like to remind you all of the fact that ALL three of the major mono-theistic religions (religions that believe in only one god, as opposed to poly-theistic or dual-theistic religions. Think Greco-Roman mythology) claim Abraham as their father. We are all brothers and sisters.

I have friends of many different faiths, and we get along just fine. They are not terrorists or bible thumping crazies. I realize that there is more to the issue over Jerusalem besides people not liking each other, or their ability to get along. Clearly it is possible not to go around shooting everyone all the time.

We need to come to a resolution that does not deny ANYONE from accessing their holy sites that have been there for thousands of years. Stop destroying pieces of history with missiles and bombs. Open up the borders in the Middle East and let everyone experience the history that it has to offer, but cannot share with the rest of the world because closed minded people believe that being born of a particular race, or religion make you less than human and you shouldn't be allowed to view these things.

Its disgusting how much ignorance and stupidity are spread faster and wider than knowledge and understanding. I hope that I am alive the day that people realize that they are killing each other for NO GOOD reason.

The end. And go spread the love, no matter where you come from. Give someone a hug. :)

TGI Friday's moved? Where have I been?

2009-12-20T16:18:00.003-06:00

So I spoke too soon. My mom ended up coming in last night, picking up the kiddo and taking him back to Houston with her. So I was kid free by 6:30pm last night.

So what did I do? I straitened my hair, slapped some make-up on, and went to Blockbuster :) I love browsing the movie shelves without having to chase down a kiddo. Now usually I look like the evil bed monster when I go in there because I haven't done anything to my hair besides throw it in a pony tail and god forbid I put make-up on. So when I walked in there looking like a human being...well..they were shocked. That's the only way I can explain all the attention I got. When I was leaving, one of the guys even said "You look really good tonight" :) Weirdly enough, he wasn't there when I came in earlier in the afternoon with kiddo...interesting...

So picked up Passengers and My One and Only, then went to TGI Friday's to meet a friend for dinner. Turns out, TGI Fridays closed or moved. Don't know which, all I know is that its not there anymore. When did that happen?

So ended up at Macaroni Grill. Yummy wine, yummy croutons, delicious Shrimp Portifino (no mushrooms), and topped it all off with a warm chocolate cake topped with chocolate ganache and chopped pecans. YUM

Today went shopping at the San Marcos outlet malls. In 3" boots. No, of course my feet don't hurt...

Got fishnets for $0.99 at Victoria's Secret, among other things...hehehe...and polka dot pj pants at the Gap. I was good, spent less than $100 total :)

Now gonna finish my "grande 2 pump Raspberry 2 pump Sugar-Free Hazelnut, non-fat, with whip latte" and head over to the NICU to visit BF, BF's hubby, and BF's baby. :)

Kid Free in less than 48 hours

2009-12-19T08:00:00.001-06:00

That's right ladies and gentlemen, my kiddo will be spending 2 weeks at my parents' house this holiday season. Merry Christmas to me!

My mom is coming up today and driving the kiddo back with her Sunday. I'll make a brief appearance at my parents X-mas Eve and X-mas, but I have my first One-on-One session at the Apple store on Sunday so I have be back by then.

So it'll just be me and the cat for about 2 weeks. I might just have to take up reading more blogs with all the free time I'll have. :)

Or like I said before, catch up on all the movies I haven't watched at Blockbuster...I believe there are a lot.

And I think that my new beau will be spending a couple of days over here during my kid-break. A luxury to not have to coordinate a baby-sitter just so we can go out for Sushi :) Or for bowling :)

Time to watch Land of the Lost.

Best Buy 1 week before X-mas

2009-12-18T08:00:00.001-06:00

Not as crazy as I thought it would be.

Had to go pick up the group gift for kiddo's teachers today. They have to share the school camera with all the other classes, so we decided to get them their own camera for the room.

Thankfully, it cost less than $10 per kid to get them a digital camera with a 4 GB memory stick and a case.

And I got to use my coordinating wrapping paper, ribbon and bows to wrap everything all pretty. I hope everyone remembered to sign the card by this evening since I will be taking the gift and grabbing the cards from the lobby tomorrow morning to give to the teacher.

On a side note, all my TV shows are winding down for the holiday break, which means I get to catch up on my movies and abuse the unlimited DVD rentals at Blockbuster. Oh, and new movies out this X-mas means I will be attached to my local theatre. On the list: Sherlock Holmes, Alvin & the Chipmunks, Nine.

Bitching & Moaning

2009-12-17T08:30:00.003-06:00

I've been getting increasingly frustrated at work. Its nothing new...really...

Well they did just hire another person, while telling everyone else that we are going to be working 4 day work weeks to save money. And she's salaried, so I can probably kiss my raise good-bye. Its not like I did anything of value this year...just keep the place from falling apart is all.

I mean if someone needs something fixed, do they try to figure out what's wrong? Nope, they just call me. And how about having a new report made? They don't even try, they just send me an e-mail that's so vague it takes me 12 versions of the report in order to get it to be what they need.

Did I mention that one of my co-workers already got a raise this year? Not for working anymore hours either. And my bosses gave themselves a raise. But me? Nope.

And its not like my bosses are perfect. I am constantly finding problems with things they have done, and do they care? Nope. Do they fix it themselves? Nope. I fix it. Because apparently that is what I am here for. Not to make sure that everyone pays sales tax, or make sure customers pay their bills. Its not like I manage all the bills and make sure we do not overpay anything. Its not like I obsessively pay bills on time, or do all the financial reporting.

And please, taking care of 4 different legal entities' bookkeeping, AP, and AR is NOTHING. Really. At least according to my boss it is. No reason to give me a raise.

The idea of leaving is tempting, even if its just to see what they end up doing about all the stuff I took care of. I mean they are going to have to hire at least 2 people to take over what I have been doing, and they will have to pay them alot more than they pay me. Serves them right quite frankly.

I have been looking into getting my teacher certification. It will cost $5000 after all the classes, tests, certification paperwork and so forth. But I will get holidays and the summer off to spend with the kiddo and save money on daycare. Awfully tempting.

But I just don't know. I should try to schedule a meeting with my bosses to discuss what I am unhappy about. But I know that it won't really change anything. They still won't attempt to do things right, or fix their own mistakes. They will still make excuses for everyone else when they repeatedly do things wrong, despite the numerous attempts I have made to get them to fix the problem.

Sigh...I need to get married and quit working...now to convince a man that's what he wants too...

Lorelai's Library

2009-12-16T08:00:00.013-06:00

I have compiled a list of all Must Reads for every woman who likes to read about happily ever afters. This does not include books that make you cry at the end (Time Traveller's Wife), or make you depressed (Wuthering Heights). I have separated these into categories, in case one of them doesn't float your boat...but I would suggest you try at least one or two of the authors just to see if you actually like them.

And for your convenience, I have included the titles of all the books I have read by each author.

The links below are as follows:

Author Name - Goes to the author's site, or Wikipedia if the author doesn't have a site

Book Title - Barnes & Noble page for the book.

Chick-Lit (fun reads, not a lot of sex)

Authors:

Sophie Kinsella (Pen-name for Madeleine Wickham)

Madeleine Wickham (actual name of Sophie Kinsella)

Books: I have only read one book by each of these authors (listed book first)

The Thing About Jane Spring - Sharon Krum
The Glamorous (Double) Life of Isabel Bookbinder - Holly McQueen
Jane Austen Ruined My Life - Beth Pattillo
Chloe Does Yale - Natalie Krinsky
Someday My Prince Will Come (True Adventures of a Wannabe Princess) - Jerramy Fine
The Chocolate Lovers Club - Carole Matthews
Post Grad - Emily Cassel (no website or wikipedia page for her)

Chick-Lit (fun reads, a bit more sex than above)

Fantasy Chick-Lit (Vampires, werewolves, and witches oh my!)

Stephanie Meyer

Charlaine Harris: The Sookie Stackhouse Novels:

Barbara Bretton

Good grief, I own all but maybe one or two of the books listed above...I think I might have an addiction...oooohhh there are books I haven't bought yet...off to Barnes & Noble's website to make my shopping list

M.I.A.

2009-12-15T21:00:00.000-06:00

Wow, 2 months since my last post appeared, I have been a naughty girl. But then again, I'm surprised I am still writing on here at all. I am not a writer by nature. Never kept up a diary or a journal. Hated writing classes. I even opted out of papers in order to take more tests. That's right. Clearly I am insane.

But anyway. I'm still with the guy that I wrote about here. Its going really well so far. He's met one of my good friends, and I've met several of his. The party I went to Saturday was hosted at his place by his roommate, whom I hadn't met until that night. He's very nice. Dating a girl who lives in Ireland.

He's coming to my friend's X-mas party with me X-mas eve, so he'll be meeting more of my friends then. I would have introduced him to Best Friend, except that she's been uber-pregnant.

Speaking of whom, she had her baby girl December 7. I was at the hospital all day with her, and the rest of their family waiting for the baby to pop out. Finally I had to get my kiddo from school, and by the time I made it back she was still in labor. 3.5 hours of pushing and a pair of forceps later, the little baby girl finally made her appearance.

Weighing in at 9 lbs 7 oz, she was one big baby. It actually turns out that she had really low blood sugar, so they put her into the NICU (Neo-natal ICU) that night. She's been getting better, but she has been on an IV of sugar water and a feeding tube is in so she can get her nutrition and sleep at the same time. At last check-in, they had reduced her IV to less than half of its original amount, but it looks like a couple more days before she is off the IV. Then it will be a matter of slowly weaning her off the constant feeding from the tube and get her to eat normally. We're hoping the baby comes home by X-mas.

Let's see, anything else?? Nope, not that I can think of. Now its time to catch-up on all the blogs I haven't been reading :)

On the First Night of Hannukah my Daddy gave to me...

2009-12-15T07:58:00.003-06:00

One pretty MacBook Pro :)

Yes, that's right. My days of having to use the external 10-key to type a "1", or copying and pasting an exclamation mark are over. And I don't have to use Caps Lock in order to type a capital "A".

I am so happy!

Oh, and lets not forget the god-awful beeping that my old laptop started making on boot-up. It was SOO embarrassing to go out in public with that thing.

But now...oh its so nice. Everyone is looking at my laptop. I know they want one. And they should get one. They are so nice. And they boot-up so much quicker.

Next thing to get: iPhone. Although its going to be a cold day in hell before my bosses actually decide to get me one. So I'll be on my own for that.

So Hannukah started Friday night. I have so far accumulated my MacBook Pro, a new set of PJ's, a glitterly mirror compact, and sugar cookie car air fresheners.

Went to a X-mas/Hannukah/Kwanza party on Saturday night. Got a Hello Kitty toaster, that actually toasts Hello Kitty's face onto the bread :), and the Twilight Scene-It DVD game. How did I end up with two gifts? Well my friend ended up with the Twilight game, and I ended up with the Hello Kitty toaster. I had brought the game and she had brought the toaster. She didn't want the game, so I told her I'd switch because I DO want the game. But she just gave me the game and said the keep the toaster too. I tried to give it back to her, but she refused to take it. So that's how I ended up with two.

And the kiddo saw the toaster on the counter this morning and wanted Hello Kitty toast.

On Baby Shower Planning

2009-10-14T20:18:00.002-05:00

Not much to update at this point.

Finished 21 baby shower invitations, 10 more to go. I would have been done this weekend, except the first place I called to book the reservation told me I was down for that particular day and time, then called back the next day to say, " Ooops, sorry someone already made a reservation for that day." Umm, didn't you have to look at the calendar in the first place to put me down for that day? Idiots. I had also already completed half the invitations with the first location's address, so I have to buy more invitations. I finally called location B and made sure that we were down for the right day and time. So I have addresses all the envelopes, stuffed and sealed 21 invitations (including registry insert), and now have to pop back into Party City to pick up more invitations.

While I'm there, I MAY pick up some decorations...hehehe I've already picked everything out online, wrote down the part #'s nd everything :)

So other than planning the shower, my life this week has been TV, work, and kiddo (not necessarily in that order). I've got about 2 hours of monday night TV to watch before I get to yesterday and today. Better get cracking :)

I apologize for the delay

2009-10-13T20:53:00.002-05:00

But I have been busy being kissed.

That's right, kissed. By someone I haven't even mentioned yet. So here's the lowdown:

8 yrs older than me
Grew up in a suburb of Houston
Graduated same university as myself
Works in the Financial Industry
Likes the Yankees
Listens to corny 50's and 60's music

We actually first went out 2 weeks ago in Houston. Wine bar, sports bar, then one last bar on Saturday, Starbucks on Sunday. It went very well I think. So did he (yay) because he actually spent 5 days up here this past weekend. He took me out to a very nice restaurant, I got a little buzzed from the very yummy wine, and...

Hallelujah

And because I'm not a complete crazy, I didn't make him feel bad for not spending every waking hour with me. He spent a lot of time playing poker and watching sports with his friends. Which gave me time to read, sleep, and in general be lazy. He did meet up with me for two movies, The Invention of Lying and Couples Retreat.

Is it too early to say I really like this one? I mean he throws popcorn at me in the movie theatre (not a kernal or two, I had a torent of popcorn raining in my direction once the movie was over), which usually annoys me but I couldn't help but laugh. He actually talks to me, not at me, and not just in response to a question.

Oh, and he likes The Big Bang Theory. Yay

In other notes, I have finalized the location for my friend's baby shower. Just have to finish writing out the invitations and get them in the mail. I also looked at the budget for the shower. Woowee I must love this girl. Thankfully both her mom, her mother-in-law, and my mother all want to financially assist with the shower.

Stolen Idea

2009-09-24T19:50:00.000-05:00

So I just finished reading 2 blogs by fellow single mothers, and felt compelled to write my own little shpeal.

I am a single mother by choice. Not choice as in, I went to the baby bank and picked out a stranger's donation. But choice as in, got pregnant by someone I had no intention of marrying and didn't marry him. Now while getting pregnant by someone I could see no future with wasn't the smartest move I've ever made, deciding not to stay with him is.

Now originally the plan was to for him to move up here, get a job, and then I would move in with him. But months after this plan had been decided, he was still in his dad's house, still at his old job (the same one he'd had in h.s.). He'd made no effort to help support me or his kid. No calls to check in, no visits, didn't even ask about doctor's appointments. Well like I said in my post back in November, I decided it was time to cut my losses. I have been acting like his mother for years at this point, and it just struck me one day in April that I didn't have to keep doing that.

So in my hormonal state I informed him that the two of us were over. Calmly, rationally... yeah because pregnant women can do that :) It was more like a verbal beat down with all my pent up frustrations and anger came pouring out of my mouth. I did make sure to include the fact that if he wanted contact with his kid, he was free to do that.

Well after months of not hearing from him except through his mother, he finally called a month after my baby was born. I told him I had no intention of letting him dissappoint my child and cause problems by being an on-and-off dad. With my kid he was either his dad ALL the time, or none. He couldn't just show up or call randomly then dissappear for 6 months. He can't break promises to his kid, like he had done to me for all those years. I am an adult, or at least the same age, a kid doesn't always understand.

My best friend has a dad like that. He moved when she was 16 and never even told her. She found out because we were driving, happened to drive near his house and saw the for sale sign on his front lawn. Needless to say, he wasn't invited to her wedding, and I don't think he even knows she's pregnant. I don't want my kid to go through what she did.

So there you go, I'm a single mom who will one day have to explain all of this to my kid. I'm sure I will come off as the bad guy when he's still young. But hopefully when he's older he will understand why I did all of this. For him.

The upside to ending it when I did was that my kiddo didn't have to witness any anger or arguements between the two of us. He won't remember mommy and daddy being together. For him, just living with mommy is normal, the way its always been. So in a way, its easier for him at this time. When he gets older and starts asking questions... well at least he'll know I love him enough to brave doing all this alone.

For those mom's who are separating from their husbands, you can do it on your own. It may not be as convenient, you not be able to use the restroom without little fingers wiggling under the door, you may not get to wash your hair everyday, but you WILL be happier. And when mommy is happier, ultimately the kids are happier too. They love you, and that's all that really matters, not who they are living with.

Is that guy serious??

2009-09-22T21:33:00.000-05:00

NYC Guy showed up in my IM today. Had the gall to say he still had a crush on me.

Is that was 3 months of silence is supposed to mean?? That you have a crush on me?

Well after gafawing at that statement he wants to know if I'm still interested. Interested in being left for 3 months at a time? Interested in being the ones who gives and gives and doesn't get anything back?

"What if I'm in contact more?" "Maybe, but you won't be getting any" "Then we are at an impass"

Ummmm

Excuse me?

"Seriously?" "Yes" "Well I'm looking for more than a shag every now and then when it strikes your fancy." "Well good luck"

Why are men pigs? I mean this is the first one to say it outright, but I have a feeling he isn't the only one to think this way.

Don't get me wrong, sex is great. Great when its with someone you care about, that you actually have conversations with before and after. Someone who calls to talk to you, not have phone sex. Someone who takes you out to dinner, goes hiking with you, sailing, swimming, shopping. You know dates, a relationship.

Here's to hoping that I meet a guy who wants to do all the dating stuff as a main priority, and if he gets sex, then that's great too.

Sigh

2009-09-22T16:26:00.002-05:00

Today did not start well. The kiddo did not want to get into the car. Once in the car my boss calls me to tell me of a crisis at work. On my day off. Brilliant. Now i get to spend some of my well deserved free time doing errands for work.

Fast forward to me sitting calmly in my chair at the hair salon when the phone rings. Its work, again, only this time to tell me kiddo's school called. Fab. Called them back to find out he's bitten someone. For "no apparent reason". He's had a history of biting, but its always linked to the bitten child having taken a toy away from mine, or some other cause. I take him to playgroups and he never bites another kid, even when they are fighting over a toy. It just doesn't make sense. Good thing I already scheduled a meeting with the school for tomorrow.

During the hair straightening process I get another call from the school. He's bitten again. That's twice within an hour, and I have to come pick him up. Thank god I was finishing up at the salon.

Ran by work to pick up some stuff, then met Best Friend for lunch. The kiddo behaved himself thank god. Finished up some work stuff and came home.

So now the kiddo is napping and I am finishing up my latte. Then its off to clean... well anything to keep me busy.

1000 Yellow Daisies

2009-09-21T22:34:00.005-05:00

As I looked over yesterday's post, I realized that it has been 11 since I started 9th grade... that's more than a decade... the mini-whores on tv weren't even in school yet...some of them still in diapers... Ok moving on

Well his ears must have been burning because NYC guy just IM-ed me.

Oh you read that correctly.

Just to "Say hi, I'm on my way to bed".

It's been about 3 months since I last heard from you, but you just saying hi on your way to bed is COMPLETELY normal. Sure.

Why doesn't Baby Daddy just show up on my door wearing the same clothes he had in high school. Yeah its right up there on the things I'd like to do.

Why can't Logan Huntzberger show up on my doorstep with 1000 yellow daisies and an Asprey engagement ring? I'd totally welcome that.

Men - A History

2009-09-20T20:53:00.010-05:00

I wonder if I've posted my relationship/dating history on here? I don't think I have. Well lets travel down memory lane today and take a look at the disaster I call my dating life. PLEASE NOTE: I am only 25, and have only just recently started dating again after taking a 3 year break...so much of this is high school...

Jan 1999-March 1999 (9th Grade) -Pot Head #1
- He was the best friend to my best friend's boyfriend. We basically just made out in the back of his friend's Explorer while they drove us from one place to another. I remember hanging out at someone's house watching Pulp Fiction while almost everyone else was smoking pot. I didn't smoke it, but apparently being in an enclosed space with all the pot smoke milling around does just about the same thing. Ooops, it would be another 5 years before I actually was tempted into trying that first hand.
-He gave me a cheap pink ring for my birthday (Feb). At the time I hated pink...poor boy
-He broke up with me because I was too busy...I think... he ended up dating one of my other friends later in the semester.

May 1999-June 1999 (9th grade...still) - Army Buff
-Friend of a friend that knew he had a crush on me. We made out a couple of times. Then I went on vacation, came back, and found out he had slept with some girl who worked at Toys'R'Us... nuff said

August 1999-September 1999 (10 grade) - Mr. Deaf and Dumb
-Another friend of a friend. I tried to tell the guy that between dance classes, school, and flag core I didn't really have too much extra time on my hands. He didn't listen. He broke up with me 3 weeks later because "You never have anytime for me". What did I say in the first place? Who didn't listen? Although this one did actually take me out on dates.

February 2000-May 2000 (10th grade) - Pot Head #2/Baby Daddy
September 2000-September 2001 (11th & 12th grades) - Pot Head #2/Baby Daddy
February 2002-June 2002 (12th grade) - Pot Head #2/Baby Daddy
-I can group these all together because as you can see, its all the same mistake :) We met in 7th grade through his cousin. We were friends up until we couldn't take it anymore. We hung out with friends sometimes, but mostly we were locked in his room talking, making out... you know teenage stuff. I lost my V to this one about a month after my 18th birthday. Who was responsible for the break-ups? Let's see. I broke it off with him the first time, don't really remember why. He broke it off the second and third times. The third time he broke up with me after not returning my phone calls for a week then called me the day after I graduated H.S. to tell me he wants to date someone else. Fab.

June 2002 - Mr. Man Slut
-Friend of a friend. Rebound. Enough said.

July 2002 - One-Minute Man
-Met through mutual friends. Not much to the relationship... Kinda just fizzled out.

November 2002-January 2003 (Freshman year of college) - Pot Head #3
-Good lord I was in love with this guy. I mean WAY more than anyone else...ever actually. The first time I met him, I don't even remember what happened because I was very very drunk. I went to a party at his house with a couple of friends. We all got smashed, after being told we had safe beds to sleep in, and I proceeded to play Drunk Jenga. I will NEVER do that again. Well I woke up the first time in a weird room next to my friend A. I had to be fed toast and water because apparently my limbs weren't working. A drove me back to our dorm and put me in my bed. Woke up the second time to find my ultra Christian roommates staring at me "Whose clothes are you wearing?" was the first thing I was asked...ummm... I don't know actually. I'll be right back. ran down the hall to A's room. Threw open the door and asked "Whose clothes am I wearing?" "E's" "Who's E?" "The guy who held your hair back while you threw up in his bathroom. the same person who put you in bed and made sure you didn't die until A came upstairs." "Oh..." Swoon.
-Well he had a GF so i didn't do anything about it. Not that it stopped him really. I was back over there a couple of weeks later to do laundry with my friend M. (Why pay money to do laundry when you know people who will let you use their washer/dryer for free?) M gets her laundry done and waits for me. E offers me a back massage, I politely decline. E offers M a back massage and she's all "hell yes, you are crazy Lorelai". Well her's is done, I decide, ok I could go for a back massage. I am SO stupid. M leaves during the middle of my massage. I wonder if E planned this? I still had laundry in the dryer so I had to wait. Plus I was now stranded without a car. E promised to take me home. The back massage turned into him tracing random patterns on my back while talking. Then he kissed me. Yes just like the song. And double swoon. 3 hours laters we leave to take me back to my dorm.
-Fast forward 1 week, I have told A everything. We are back at E's house for another friend's birthday party. I avoid E, A approaches E and informs him that if he hurts me, he will die. Such a good friend. I get a call the next day from E saying we need to talk. We meet, he says he wants to see where it is going with his gf and he's sorry. But that if it ends with her he'll be knocking at my door. I told him I wasn't going to sit around and wait. Not like it took long or anything...
-2 weeks later he breaks it off with the gf the day after her birthday
-3 days later we get together
-He takes me out on dates, we have sleepovers (at his place obviously), he makes me breakfast. In general I was pretty happy. When I came back from the holidays,. he picked me up from the airport with flowers and Wendy's in hand. He even parked the car and came inside... Sigh
-3 weeks later he dumps me because he doesn't have the time I deserve...
-within a month of our break-up, he quits one job, loses the other job, and basically quits going to classes so he can get high. Well that's what he gets from breaking my heart.

December 2003-May 2004 (Soph year of college) - Pot Head #2/Baby Daddy
-Pretty much just shagging. He says he loves me, yet can't seem to wrestle the energy to take me anywhere outside the bedroom. I break it off because I'm tired of being ignored until he wants to...you know.

October 2005-April 2006 (Senior year of college) - Pot Head #2/Baby Daddy
-I am in a delicate mental state, 1 year anniversary of my brother's death coming up. I need a distraction. Cue Pot Head #2. I didn't intend for this to get serious, but I got myself pregnant on the anniversary date of my brother's death. I've already written the details of how this ended. Sometime in December 2008 I believe.

January 2009-June 2009 - NYC boy
-Well I've written about this one too. The first guy to really get to know me since before I was pregnant. He was extremely flighty, always making promises without the intention or the ability to keep them. I last heard from him in June...hopefully not again.

February 2009-May 2009 - Mr. Shoes
-Went on two dates, no real spark. We kissed. He never called again.

June 2009-Present - Comic Man
-Took me to one of my favorite restaraunts, watched some Big Bang Theory, kissed. Altogether a nice first date. We still talk and see each other occasionally but niether of us want anything too serious.

June 2009 - Older Guy
-Not much to tell here, we talked a bit. He came to visit me when I was stuck in Philly. We made out. He stopped calling about a week later.

July 2009 - The Cop
-Went on 2 dates. I thought went well. He stopped texting about a week later.

July 2009-Present - The Single Dad
-This one I really like. He's my age (graduated h.s. same year), just got out of the army earlier this year. He's divorced with 2 kids, one of which is in my kid's class this year. We talk ALOT, just through text but it can be a text here or there starting in the morning and going until one of us goes to bed. He hasn't asked me out on a date yet, but his wife left him Dec 2008, so perhaps its too soon. Why he was on JDate if not for a date? I don't know. But I'm certainly not the kind of girl who will make the first move. Fear of rejection too strong to overcome.

August 2009-Present - The Well Dressed One
-Been on three dates with this one. He really takes pride in his clothes. More than I do. Is he gay? After date #3, I'm going to say no. He texted me yesterday. No 4th date planned as of yet.

And finally:

September 2009-Present - The Younger Guy
-We started chatting yesterday. We talked for quite a bit. He asked me out for "sometime this week". I gave him my number and told him to text me when he has a date for me.

So there we go. Every guy I have had a relationship with, dated, or just talked to with the intent of dating. Please don't take pity on me. I should really learn my lesson.

Strep throat can't be that bad

2009-09-19T20:37:00.002-05:00

Seriously? I can't remember ever having strep in my life. But according to my mom my brothers and I passed it around like a football. But back to this week.

I got a call from my kid's school Tuesday saying that the teacher had discovered a rash on his chest and tummy. They were worried it was strep, and advised me to take him to the doctor. And since I am a paranoid Jewish mother, of course I ushered him into the GP during after-hours care only to have the doctor see nothing wrong with him, but on the safe side they would run a double strep test. This consists of two swabs being rubbed against the tonsils, one for a test that takes 30 minutes, and the other for a test that takes 24 hours.

The first test came back negative, and the doc said that this is 95% accurate and it was ok to take the kiddo to school. Which was good news since my tonsils had at this point swollen to the point where I could (and can) feel them touching. I subsequently had an appointment made for myself the following morning.

Took the kid to school after he ate a bagel with cream cheese and chocolate pudding for breakfast, then dropped into the GP's office armed with a book and a fuly charged phone. Got taken back only ten minutes after my appointment time, refused to look or hear my weight then got taken into a room. Waited around some more for the doctor, who was quite pleasant. She looked in my ears (fine), then asked me to open up and let her take a look. One second later I was pronounced to have strep. No sore throat, no fever, no nothing besides very large tonsils with white patches all over them.

Well i picked up the very large pink amoxicillin tablets that they expect me to pass between the boulders in my throat and went home. I layed about watching TV and napping until my phone rang. The lab got the second test back from my kiddo, he DOES have strep. Oops.

Now I have to drag my cat hair covered self out of my warm comfortable bed to go collect the more appealing pink liquid amoxicillin (which my son thinks is liquid candy) and pick the sickie up from school. Just a teensy bit embarrassing to explain that in fact, he does have strep and no I won't bring him back tomorrow.

So Thursday was spent in all manners of laziness. I loafed around in bed watching tv while my kiddo attempted to re-inact a tornado using all his toys, books and puzzles in both his room and the living room. Fab. Too tired to care then...too tired now...perhaps tomorrow I will feel like picking it up...

So in short we have been condemned to ten days of amoxicillin for having the mildest case of strep known to man. On the plus side I only worked three days this week and am feeling very much less stressed than usual. Perhaps I should take down the number of hours I work.

Perhaps I need to get married to a nice Jewish man who respects my 60's housewife nature and will let me stay at home watching soap operas while washing dishes and vacuuming in heels and pearls.

Well one can dream...

Hello there lost friend

2009-09-10T20:16:00.003-05:00

It's going to be a bit random, but that's just about all I can manage today, here we go:

dad's getting me Beatles Rockband and the Wii for Hannukah this year :) YAY
the kiddo got his first hair cut, he now actually looks like a boy...still has the red curls though :)
have officially watched every episode of The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien and Late Night with Jimmy Fallon. Yes, my DVR is certainly getting its work out :)
So You Think You Can Dance Season 5 ended a couple of weeks ago. So happy Jeanine won, she was my favorite. And Jeanette sucked, don't know why the judges really liked her.
So You Think You Can Dance Season 6 started this week :) this show usually only runs in the summer, but they brought it back for a fall season...either FOX gets really amazing ratings for this show, or they had a gap in the Wednesday/Thursday schedule that they needed to fill. Either way, I'm happy. And currently not available to go out Wednesdays and Thursdays until the season is over...not like I was going out then anyway...but now I have an excuse :)
Glee also started, yay. Who doesn't like a show where people sing and dance all the time??
Just recorded The Vampire Diaries, we'll see how it is. The previews make it look alot like Twilight...
Watched all of Season 1 of True Blood, then read all 9 published books that True Blood is based on. When does Season 2 come out on DVD? I'm dying here...no pun intended
Need to buy another full sized bookshelf...have run out of primary shelf space, and have started stacking books in front of other books, currently have 6 stacks going...yeah...new bookself definitely necessary.
Want to get an iPhone, but don't want to pay more than $100...also need to to be jailbreaked so it will work with T-Mobile
Didn't know you could jailbreak a phone to work with T-Mobile until this guy I'm talking to (keep reading) told me that he did it and now uses the iphone with his T-Mobile SIM card.
Speaking of whom, started talking to a guy right after I got back from Israel, so for about 2 months now. Its still in the texting-getting-to-know-you phase. He's 26, graduated h.s. same year as me (2002). Has been in the Army for 6 years, just got out earlier this year. He's been separated from his wife since 12/31/08, currently in the process of getting a divorce (apparently his ex is pregnant with another guy's baby. and in TX you can't get a divorce while the woman is pregnant, regardless of who the father is). They had 2 kids together, one of whom is actually in my kid's class this year at school. Its very weird how that happened since we didn't talk about the kids school for a couple of weeks. So we've met, picking up the kids at the same time (he has primary custody, so he's picking up the kids most of the time) and at parent teacher meetings. I think its going well, but he hasn't asked me out yet. Don't know what that means. I'm certainly not going to ask him...I mean seriously...do I look like a woman who asks the guy out?? No. Definitely not.
Other guys? Well I've gone on a couple of dates with this one guy, he texts me sporadically now but not really much going on with him.
Best Friend is going to have a girl in early December. YAY. It was really cute, last night we went out to The Cheesecake Factory with the kiddo and he hit his head and started crying (no that's not the cute part). Then BFB (Best Friend's Baby) starting freaking out and kicking her mommy like crazy. as soon as my kiddo calmed down, so did BFB...so cute.
have 2 b-day parties for 3 kids this weekend, and my parents are in town so some free time for me, YAY
going back to H-town for my friend's b-day. We're going to go see Fame :) :) :)

Ok, that's enough about me, what about you?

Israel Part 7, Back in the States Part 1

2009-08-12T20:30:00.000-05:00

June 25

Last day in Israel, I think everyone was both excited to make it back to the states, but sad to leave.

We drove to Rabin Square in the morning to visit the site where Yitzhak Rabin was shot and murdered on September 25, 1982. We took group pictures in front of a walled filled with graffiti that was drawn in response to Rabin's murder.

Next stop, Independance Hall. We watched a video about how Tel Aviv was created in response to the over population inside the walls of Yafo. We also heard a speaker talk about Israel's fight for freedom, and how the fight continues to maintain that freedom.

Then, sadly, it was time to go to the airport :(

Said goodbye to the 6 or so people who extended their stay, picked up our group t-shirt and picture, and headed into the terminal. And I had a good time shopping in all the duty free shops. Picked up some Michel Negron jewelry and Israeli candy for the plane ride.

They didn't keep everyone from our group together, so we were all spread out across the plane. I sat near the back with a window seat. My neighbor had this new Sudoku game using a bit more math than regular sudoku, it was FABULOUS. He let me play it for a little bit while he took a nap :)

Had a chat with some people hanging out at the back of the plane sometime in the middle of the flight. I should probably mention that our flight took off at 4pm, and arrived into NY around 8:00pm. The flight last 12 hours, so it was 3:00am Israel time by the time we landed. I didn't sleep the whole trip in order to reacclimate myself to NY time better.

Everything went smoothly when we landed. I shared a cab with 2 other girls into Manhattan. They weren't very familiar with it, and I mad sure that they made it to their hotels ok. Got back to my aunt's apartment, changed, and then went back out into the city. Mind you it is now 11:00pm NY time, 6am Israel time. Got to meet up with my cousin, his gf, and my aunt for a drink before I left with my aunt to grab my first non-kosher meal in almost 2 weeks. Bacon Cheeseburger anyone?

Finally got to bed around 1:30am (8:30 for those of you still following this time line).

June 26

Woke up at 8:30am, just couldn't help myself. Got NY bagels and coffee for breakfast then headed out of the city.

Got to visit another cousin and her kids at their house. The last time I had seen her was when she was pregnant with her second kid and they lived in an apartment in the Village (in Manhatten for those who didn't know). Her daughter, who is now 5, looks just like her. Its like looking back in time.

Caught up with my other aunt at Costco and got to experience shopping with the two of them. Later on Dad said he's surprised I survived, and that they didn't insist on buying me crap (Dad just got back from visiting them and couldn't leave until he agreed to let them buy him an iPod Touch, damn his luck).

Took a nap at around 4pm while watching the ABC Family channel.

Had shrimp with angel hair pasta for dinner (yay for the non-kosherness of that meal), and got to catch up with another cousin and his fiance. I got to bed around 2am. Yay for continuing the no sleeping thing :)

JUNE 27

Had breakfast at a local diner before my aunt took me to the train station. Mad it onto the train just fine and read a book for the 3 hour train ride into Philadlphia. And for the first time I was alone...and I missed the bus...and the 43 other people. I mean I wasn't ALONE on the train, but you know, I wasn't travelling with anyone...so no talking...

Checked into my flight 2 hours ahead of time and went to the terminal to wait for my plane. We were delayed 40 minutes before they let us board. Everything was going fine, my connection in Chicago was scheduled to be a 2 hour layover so the 40 minutes was fine. Then after everyone was settled and buckled, they announced the lavatory was broken, and since it was the 3rd time for it to be reported, they have to delay the flight until it got fixed.

So everyone had to deboard the plane. I got in line along with everyone else to find out how long the delay would be, and would I miss my connection? Well the line wasn't moving, so I got on the phone with my travel insurance company who got on the line with my airline. With all 3 of us on the phone, we found out that there was no other flights out of Philadelphia that would get me into Austin the same day. So I could either get back on this plane when its fixed and fly to Chicago and spend the night there, or stay in Philly 1 night and fly out the next morning.

So the airline paid for my hotel in Philadelphia, I got my lugguge off the plane and spent the night at the Ramada. And compared to the hotels/hostels we stayed at in Israel, this was paradise.

JUNE 28

Back to the airport, everything went smoothly this time. One of the guys that was on my trip ended up sitting behind me on the flight from Dallas to Austin, so that was pretty cool.

Got to hold my baby for the first time in over 2 weeks, and yes, I did cry. Had some Kerby Lane with my parents, then they left for some baby free time (3 weeks off from baby duty was much needed). and thus, my vacation was over...and hell at work began.

Still pretty hellish at work...maybe that will end soon too. :)

Too Tired to Do Anything Else

2009-07-20T21:27:00.004-05:00

So I'm posting another Taylor Swift video from YouTube. This one is my fantasy in high school. Except it wasn't my neighbor I wanted, actually, I can't remember who it was now, but no matter.

Never Thought That I'd Admit It

2009-07-19T21:38:00.002-05:00

But I like Taylor Swift. Her songs pretty much some up my love life from teenager to now. Here is a recurring song in my life:

Israel Part 6

2009-07-15T20:58:00.002-05:00

JUNE 23

Had one of the best breakfasts the whole trip. REAL filtered coffee, and lots of fruit. And the requisite hard boiled eggs and salad.

Drove a little further South in Israel and climbed Mt Tzfachot. It was 115F and very dry when we unloaded at the base of the mountain. Carrying only my 1.5L bottle of water and a camera I started the climb. And the sun beat down upon my head. And I was still climbing.

Oh look shade. Yes we did stop and have a water break in said shade :)

Back up and starting the more uphill part of the climb.

No more shade.

But more sun.

It's a good thing that I started out at the head of the pack, because with all my little pit stops for water I was near the end by the time we made it to the top. It was beautiful.

We could see Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Israel (obviously) and Egypt all from the top of this one mountain.

Looking out over the Red at Jordan. Saudi is off camera to the right, Israel to the left, Egypt behind us.

Then we were told we had to hike down.

And I thought the hike up was bad... Let's just say I almost cried many time on the way down, I only cried twice so yay for that. But actually one of my friends on my trip was in front of me and held my hand as I climbed down the steeper parts of the trail while telling me the best places to put my foot. He was very very nice.

After that we were released at a Red Sea beach for lunch and free time. I rested on a lounger in the shade for quite a while. Don't worry, I did get into the water for a little bit. The beach was very very rocky and not really that nice on the feet.

We left the beach :( and drove north to Mitzpe Ramon. We got to tour an IDF officer training facility. Our guide had the most AMAZING blue eyes I've ever seen. I almost swooned. Instead I just followed him around the facility and hung on every word :)

Then we went to the hostel, threw our bags in our rooms, and grabbed dinner. Then we had a "surprise".

As in "Surprise you get to spend the next half hour in pretend IDF boot camp". I now hate surprises. I do NOT do push ups and do not appreciate having to do them. Nope, not at all.

But then we had a group "love circle". No explanation necessary. Just a big circle of all the people together, telling each other how much they love and appreciate them. Very nice. I almost cried.

Bed time was much appreciated.

JUNE 24

Saw some alpacas on my way to breakfast, very exciting.

Drove north to Kibbutz Sde Boker, the kibbutz that David Ben-Gurion retired to when he left politics. The view was beautiful.

Next stop, Sderot. In case you haven't heard of this city, it is less than 1 mile from the Gaza Strip, and in previous years has been bombarded with rockets from the Terrorist organizations running the Gaza strip. We could see the actual city of Gaza, as well as the Israeli power plant the supplies most of the power to Gaza. Interestingly, the Terrorists attempted to bomb the power plant, I guess they are against Jews and electricity. Our view of Gaza below:

We then drove into Tel aviv, dropped our bags off, and headed to Yafo (the older part of Tel aviv). Saw at least 3 brides having their photos taken with their new husbands. also saw a true cat lady. No joke, like 20-30 cats all gathered around her. Listened to our guide tell the story of how Tel aviv came to be. Had dinner on our own in Tel aviv, did some quick shopping, then back to the hotel to change to go to the bar.

View of Tel Aviv from a viewpoint in Yafo

We went to a bar ON THE BEACH. Not near the beach or next to the beach, ON the beach. as in chairs and tables in the sand. Just a short walk to the water. In my opinion, not the best place to get people drunk, but I don't own a bar.

Got a wee bit silly, damned vodka, but not too silly. I passed out in my own bed around 2:30am. That's more than I can say for some people who shall remain nameless, who instead swam at the beach until the sun rose.

And that was my last night in Israel. Stay tuned for my last day in Israel, the flight back to the states, and my adventures trying to get back to the Lone Star State.

2009-07-15T00:49:00.001-05:00

Update: a guy who went M.I.A. Reappeared today saying he lost his cell,got a new number,AND ended his subscription to the dating site, do i believe him?

Israel Part 5

2009-07-13T20:31:00.007-05:00

JUNE 21

Woke up and had breakfast...more instant coffee...

We loaded up and prepared to leave Jerusalem. Just one more stop to go, Mt. Hertzl. This is the military cemetary where IDF soldiers, and heads of state are buried. This is also where we met 8 IDF soldiers who joined us for the rest of our trip. We had a very interesting ice breaker game where everyone got name stickers on their back, and had to ask everyone else questions to figure out "who" they were. There was a mix between fictional (Minnie, Fred Flintstone) and real (Princess Di, Sarah Jessica Parker), and once you found out who you were, you had to find your "partner". Guess who I was...guess :)

Angelina Jolie, woop

So for the rest of the day I kept my "Angelina" sticker on my backpack :)

We visited the grave site of Hertzl and Rabin, as well as those of "regular" people, the IDF. The picture below is the grave site for Michael Levin mentioned earlier. It is a custom in Israel to put stones on a gravesite instead of flowers because while flowers die, a stone is forever. It represents how the person lives on forever.

After Mt. Hertzl, we took a group photo (not shown to protect the privacy of my group members), then we headed out of Jerusalem. We stopped at an actual mall, escalator and pretty pretty stores with a food court, for lunch before heading to the Midras caves.

I didn't go into this cave due to the fact that most of it was hands and knees crawling, with some stomach crawling involved. I got a bit clausterphobic in the water tunnel where I could pretty much stand up straight the entire time. So I sat outside with about a quarter of my group and watched people's cameras/sunglasses.

We then wound our way into the desert to the Bedouin tents at Kfar Hanokdim. First thing, we rode camels at sunset. Below are pictures of just that, first the camels, then the sunset over some mountains in the Negev desert.

It was SO much fun riding the camels and talking with everyone while we watched the sunset. Afterward, we were served dinner in a big tent where everyone sat on mats on the floor and we ate family style. It was like Israeli BBQ? They had rice and veggies cooked with pita bread, salad, and sauces, then they brought out skewers of meat. It was followed with fruit for dessert, yummy.

We were then gathered in a communal tent where everyone relaxed, we had coffee and tea, and learned about the Bedouin culture. They are nomadic people who settle in different parts of the Negev throughout the year. They are a very hospitable culture, making it a part of life to take in guests and make them feel at home. They are also polygamists, our host was actually planning to get married to his 4th wife the next month (or week?).

They had real bathrooms and showers which was a relief, as well as a store to sell their handmade stuff. I actually missed out on the shopping because I had a headache and went to bed early, which was actually a good thing because we had a 4am wake-up call the next morning.

JUNE 22

Like I said, 4am wake-up call.

Before we even got breakfast, we loaded the bus and drove to Masada. We actually got to hike up the "easy" side of the mountain in the morning, in time to see the sun rise. And while most people took 20 minutes or less to get up the mountain, my little group took our sweet @$$ time and did it in about 30 minutes. Still before the sun rose. Below is a picture of the sun just peaking over a mountain top across the Dead Sea.

We walked around the top of Masada, visiting a water cistern, Roman bathouse, and a synagogue. Our guide told stories about the fortress, how/why it was built, seiges that took place there. Most of which I had already studied in school, but it was nice to be reminded and to see it first hand.

Then we hiked down the "hard" side of the mountain. Yep, definately glad we didn't have to go up the hard side. It took about 45 to get down it, and that was really without stopping. It would have taken me hours to get up it. The steepest part had a railing to hold onto, but about the last half of the walk was without a rail. I almost cried. But I did it and it was amazing.

Got the bottom and FINALLY had breakfast. Pudding and hard boiled eggs with orange soda anyone? Oh, and the fruit was good too. Got to shop at the store (placemat for the Toddler with the Hebrew alphabet on one side, and vocabulary words in 7 languages on the other) before loading the bus to head to the Dead Sea.

We stopped at a Dead Sea product factory where we got uber discounts on spa products (I bought mud hehe).

Then we drove the rest of the way to the Dead Sea, had a quick hike up a creek, then got to spend about 4 hours at a Dead Sea hotel/spa. Yes, I got in the Dead Sea. It was so weird, I was walking into like, "This doesn't feel so different". The I turned around to face the beach and get ready to float, I lift my foot a litle higher than I had been and woosh, I'm floating. It was SO strange. But good. I didn't stay in very long I was hungry.

Had to shower on the beach to get all the salt off my body, then hung out inside until they served lunch. YUM. Swam in the pool, then had my 1 hour back massage. Bliss. By the time I got out, it was time to get dressed and leave. But I was so relaxed I didn't care.

It was a pretty long drive, which I think everyone slept during except the pit stop for ice cream. When we made it into Eilat, we stopped at a jewelry store. YAY. I got a gold star of david necklace, very very nice. I'm actually wearing it right now...

Then it was off to the hotel to change for dinner/bars. Got another hour and a half to get ready, still don't know how we did it, but we were back downstairs ontime. Walked the 20 minutes to dinner, then across the street to the bar. The bar was split between a bar-bar and a dance bar, and you had to have a stamp on your arm to go between the two. Because out guide was so cool, he knew the guy who owned the bar so all 50 of us got in for free.

Lots of dancing and drinking were had by most, then taxis back to the hotel for bed.

Just another jam-packed 2 days in Israel. I'll post more tomorrow :)

Israel Part 4

2009-07-12T16:30:00.012-05:00

JUNE 19

Had breakfast, oh the joy of instant coffee and hard boiled eggs. Loaded the bus with our luggage and headed to the Old City. Had a nice downhill walk to the City of David, next to the Temple Mount (Mt. Moriah). We got to walk through a water tunnel that was created to channel water from nearby streams into the city. The water was VERY COLD, and about 10 feet into the tunnel we had about 5 ft of walking where the water was up to my upper thigh. But after that it was about just above my ankles.

Next we drove over to the Jerusalem Artist's house to see some original Israeli art. Everyone was tired and hungry, but for the most part people payed attention to the tour guide as he talked about the art. Here are a couple of shots:

Afterward we drove back to the Old City, and walked down to the Kotel. This would be the first of three visits to the Kotel, but it will be the only time we could take pictures at the wall (out of respect for the more Orthodox Jews, pictures should not be taken during Shabbat because you are creating something, which is forbidden on Shabbat). It was such an amazing experience. I cried like a baby.

Afterward, we walked back up to the bus to get our luggage to drag it downhill to the Hostel that we would be staying at for both the entire Shabbat. We were then given time to get ready for Shabbat.

We met downstairs and had a small ceremony for Shabbat, everyone was given a candle to light, the prayers were said, then we walked the 5 minutes back to the Kotel.

You could definately tell who was and was not a Jew down there. The Jews were all covered (shoulders, knees, chest, midriff) and not carrying cameras or phones. The non Jews were flashing away in their tank tops from the top of the stairs leading down to the Kotel.

For anyone who isn't aware, the Kotel is divided between men and women's sections. More accurately, it is 2/3 men, a wall, then 1/3 women. Yep, that's right. The women have much less space at the wall than the men. This is a step up from women not being allowed at the wall at all. And to be fair, the men need all that room to be loud and noisy and dance around with everyone. The women only stand/sit and cry/pray/sing to themselves. I'm totally not a feminist, so this didn't really bother me, however there were several very offended women on my trip who just didn't understand tradition.

I got to watch through a mesh barrier what was going on inside the men's side. It was so funny. Fully grown men, a lot in the top hats (some in the furry top hats) in big circles dancing and singing. There was even a conga line going for a while.

Then we came back to the hostel, and had a hige Shabbat dinner. Like 8 courses huge. We said the blessing over the wine (Kiddush) and the bread (Ha Motzi), and stuffed ourselves until we couldn't walk anymore.

Then we got to go to bed and sleep.

JUNE 20

Still sleeping :)

Coffee and cake were served from 9-10, a big difference from 7-8 that we had been doing all week. Then back down to the Kotel for the last time.

Following that we went back up to a place with seating still in the Old City and had a Bar/Bat Mitzvah ceremony. I was one of about 8 people having their Bar/Bat Mitzvah that day. Very awesome.

We than had a little workshop about what it means to be Jewish. We were split into 5 groups, and given a set of 20 cards. We had to divide the cards into the 10 most important things about being Jewish, and the 10 least. That was pretty easy for my group. Then we had to divide our top ten into the top five. This was a bit more tricky. I can't really remember them all now, but when the groups compared their 5, we were the first to go. And 4 out of 5 of our top five everyone else had too, which was very cool.

Following that we had another huge meal for lunch. And we were released for the rest of the afternoon.

I took a 4 hour nap :)

Then we got together for dinner and had our Havdalah ceremony to celebrate the ending of Shabbat.

Afterwards we walked to Ben Yehuda street for some shopping and drinking. That's right. We left the hostel at around 9pm to go out, and all the store were JUST now opening. Its the great thing about Israel, everyone is closed all day for Shabbat, so everyone opens their stores at night on Saturday to catch the customers. Its is truly amazing to go shopping at 10pm, and not at WalMart or HEB.

Picked up a star of david silver necklace and a Shrek dreidel, then joined the majority of my group at a Hooka bar. We eventually got kicked out because my group was dancing to the music in a place where dancing wasn't allowed, who knew? So we moved across the street to a dance bar to finish out the night. Then we walked the 20 minutes back to the Hostel. To pass out in bed.

A break from Israel

2009-07-10T21:35:00.003-05:00

Today I don't really feel like blogging my trip, and as it is Shabbat, I'm not gonna :)

Instead I'll be relaying some thoughts to you. OK, ok, keep your pants on, its coming.

Took some Facebook quizzes today, and got results that I always knew were true:

Mental Age: 43 (actual age: 25)
Decade You Should Have Been Born: 1950's (actual decade: 1980's)

although if I was born in the fifties, I'd be in my fifties by now, so my mental age is younger than the decade I should have been born in...interesting

But it does make sense. I have the values of a person who grew up with poodle skirts, and mom's who didn't work outside the house. I want to get married, not work, have babies, take said babies to mommy-and-me yoga classes, have a full staff to clean my house and cook my meals, drive a mini-van, and vacation to Disney World. Is that really so wrong? Any idea of a guy who is interested in a woman as described above? Please give him me number :)

As for my mental age, I've been told I act like I'm in my 30's. And the 40's are the new 30's, so I guess its the same. Might explain why I get along with a guy who is 46, we're really only 3 years apart. Unless you take in a guy's mental age (about 10 years less than his actual age), in which case I'm 7 years older... Interesting

Speaking of guys, I've noticed this weird pattern with the guys I talk to:

They contact me.
We talk for a while via e-mail/im
We text for a while (he texts me alomst everyday, which is fine since I have a loving relationship with my cell phone)
We go on a date
They contact me via text/call within 72 hours
They disappear

Is this normal? I though we had a good time. I thought we had chemistry. Apparently he didn't. So when I text him like 4 days later and he doesn't respond, do i take that as a blow off? Why can't he just say so? And they say girls are complicated, men are freaking anomolies.

I mean I'm not asking for you to talk to me everyday. I mean I forget to check my phone sometimes, or I'm actually out with friends. But just show some interest if you are interested. Don't pretend I don't exist for a month and then show up and expect me to forget that time where you ignored my texts. Girls are not a boomerang, if you throw us away, we do not coming flying back into your arms when you expect us to.

But in all seriousness, this dating thing is good. It gets me out, and interacting with new people, which is something I avoid generally. Plus my friends aren't so worried than my kid will grow up without siblings. He desperately needs some (you know after I find my wealthy Jew who wants to take care of me and have cute Jewish babies with me).

Israel Part 3

2009-07-09T21:14:00.010-05:00

Now back to our regulary scheduled program:

JUNE 17

Wow, I totally woke up and was in serious pain. Perhaps that hike DID work some muscles. Or maybe all of them. Should getting out of bed be so difficult?? Thank god no hikes were scheduled for today.

After breakfast, another day of coffee, toast and hard boiled eggs, we were back in the bus on our way to Tsfat (Safed, Zafed, it has a lot of ways to spell it in English). A little background on Tsfat:

Tsfat is best known for its spirituality, and mysticism, and as the breeding groundf for Kabbalistic ideas. In Kabbalah, the holiest book is the Zohar. It has been claimed that this book was written by Shimon Bar Yochai in a cave in Peki'in. Shimon Bar Yochai is said to be buried in a mountain near Tsfat, bringing more Kabbalists to the city.

We visited a couple of temples, after a lot of stair climing to get there. We heard stories from our guide about different temples and people in the city. He truly knows everything, or almost everything.

Tsfat is also known as a center of Israeli art. Which brings us to one of our stops on this trip, the house of artist David Freidman. You can visit his site to see his work, it is truly amazing. But I must admit, I'm not really a visual, static art kind of person, I usually don't get it. But the way he explained Kabbalah through his art, it was truly an amazing experience. Please, please visit his site, I have 3 of his pieces in my office.

After the art, we got some free time to wander around and grab some lunch. Had more shwarma, then wandered around for a bit. Ended up hanging out with 3 friends at a silversmith which was right next to a juice stand. Now if you had asked me if I would want a melon-banana-soy milk smoothie before my trip, I would have said no. But now I say HECK YES.

And then we were off to Jerusalem, or as it was known on the bus, nap time. We mad a pit stop on the way to get ice cream and drinks, then back on the bus to watch "The West Bank Story". So funny, I loved it. Then before I knew it, were driving into Jerusalem.

AMAZING

We had a Shehecheyanu on Mt. Scopus, then drove to our hotel. Now the guide warned us that we would be staying in a hostel. But this place was freaking amazing. It was like a really nice dorm room. And dinner didn't suck either.

We had an info session to prepare everyone for our upcoming visits to Yad Vashem and Mt. Hertzl. We discussed the Holocaust, personal family stories, as well as discussing the incident at the Holocaust Museum in Washington D.C. We watched a video about Michael Levin, an American who joined the IDF after he graduated high school.

So after all the crying, we were all ready to go to sleep.

JUNE 18

Woke up in Jerusalem. Wow

Visited Yad Vashem. Had a walking tour where we all wore headset and the guide talked into a mike. It was very nice because despite it being incredibly crowded, I could hear the guide the whole time. I learned a lot of new things about the Holocaust, most of which were very upsetting. although one story did stand out. I don't really have the room, or the memory, to retell it here, but you can go here to read about it.

Next we got to go to the Shuk, or Machane Yehuda Market. an outdoor market, primarily for foods and spices and such. Being Thursday, the market was very busy with people getting thier shopping down beofre the Sabbath starts on Friday. I picked up a Kippa for Toddler, and a little silver dreidel.

We went to the CEO's house of the organization who gave us our gift for dinner. We met another group they are sponsoring there and we had a feast of hummus, hot dogs, Israeli meatballs, and chicken along with salad, pickles, pita and cookies. Very yummy.

Ok people, I'm exhausted. You'll have to read about Shabbat tomorrow.

Israel Part 2

2009-07-08T20:20:00.012-05:00

So let's see, we left off the night of the 15th, my first night in Israel.

JUNE 16

Had lots to pack for today, so triple checked my backpacks (yes I packed 2) before leaving the room for breakfast.

"They have salad for breakfast?"

Yes I did ask that. Along with salad, they had unflavored yogurt, hard boiled eggs, cereal, toast, some fruit, coffee and tea.

At least the coffee was good :) I wouldn't have survived the day without that.

First thing we drove about 2 hours into the Golan Heights (Tiberias is on the Western shore of the sea of Galilee) and hiked the Gilbon Creek. The Golan Heights is a large plateau on the East side of the Jordan river in the northern part of Israel. The plateau has cracks in it, where creeks have forms and run into the Jordan river. Very steep going down, a little less steep coming back up. I believe the whole thing took about 2 hours. Some people swan in the waterfall, I wasn't about to get in that cold cold water.

We were scheduled to go to a winery after the hike, but we actually ran into the couple who owned said winery and they were on vacation. Guess there was a little miscommunication. So instead we went to the Capernaum Olive Farm, where we learned about olive oil, and got to try soap and other body products made from olive oil, and olive pits. I bought a gift set of olive oil and olive soap for Best Friend and hubby, he likes olive oil - she likes natural soaps. I picked up some "Body Milk" which is an after-sun lotion. Very silky, very nice. And I smell like olives and lemon when I use it :)

Had lunch at a "mall", yay for cheese pizza, ice cream, and a diet coke. Met a nice couple with a son around Toddler's age. So cute, same long curly hair :)

After lunch, we drove down to the Jordan river and went rafting. We were told kayaking, but there were 4-7 people per boat, and they looked alot like rafts. I realized I was not meant to raft. I don't like getting splashed with water, and people flipping themselves backwards out of the raft make me paranoid. But it was good when everyone was safely in the boat and we weren't crashing into trees...or other rafts. But seriously, it was fun.

Then as if we didn't do enough that day, we drove even further North to Mt. Bental. It used to be a military base for the IDF, but now it is a tourist attraction. We were able to see Syria from the base. It was very cool to be so up high, able to see so far. They also had this really neat sign post, like a road sign with different arrow signs pointing in different directions showing the way to different cities around the world, take a look.

Made it back to the hotel a little late, but still dinner time so YAY.

Then they gave us an hour and a half to get ready to go out for the night. Let me remind you that they made the room assignments where 3 girls are in 1 room, sharing 1 bathroom. Yeah, we'll all be ready in an hour and a half. We will be finished showering in an hour & a half. Well my room was ready in time, but we hauled but, and we aren't the most high maintenance girls (read this as no need to use a hair dryer or other electrical hair design tools).

Well, we get to the bar around 9:30, and realize there is no one there. No matter, 40 people populate the bar quite well without other people there. And Israeli's usually don't show up at bars until 11pm so we had time to liquor up before then. I didn't drink too much, but you have to see the label on the back of my Corona bottle.

Kosher...hahaha good to know. I checked the Corona bottles here in the USA, no such label. Damn. I guess I'll have to buy Israeli Corona for Passover :)

Some people did not follow my not-so-drunk lead and got themselves shit faced. Luckily is was 1 girl and 1 guy and they stayed away from each other. The guy made every girl dance with him, while professing his love. He was later seen running around the lobby of the hotel with no pants on, he did have boxers on thank the lord. The girl didn't act that drunk until she got back to the hotel where she proceeded to scream at anyone walking by, whether or not they were part of our group. I gave her some water and went to hunt down the staffer that went to get her room key from the front desk. The next day we found out that they were not allowed to drink the next time we went out as punishment for their bad behavior.

Went to bed around 2:30am after another shower, they actually allow smoking in bars over there in Israel.

Ok, that's a lot of typing and it only got us through day 2. This may take a while to get through the whole trip. Well stay tuned :)

Israel Part 1 - Click here for map

2009-07-07T19:26:00.014-05:00

So its taken me a long time to get around to writing this post, and it may have to be split up between several posts, but we'll see. To sum up: Left Austin June 13, arrived in Israel June 15, travelled Israel June 15-25, arrived back in USA (NYC) June 25, arrived back in Austin June 28. For more details, please read the following:

JUNE 13

Got to the airport at 6:45am. Flew with American Airlines from Austin to Dallas, switched planes at DFW, and landed in Philly.

Well I landed in Philly. My luggage landed in Chicago...

Yes that's right. Chicago.

Five hours laters...

I get on the train (with my lugguge) from PHL to the 30th street station to catch the amtrak to Penn Station NY. Get into Penn at 12:30 midnight, just in time for the boxing match at Madison Square Gardens to release all the people. Lovely.

Fought the natives for a taxi, in the rain...wearing a sundress...and no jacket...or umbrella...or a hat...but with a rolling suitcase and a back pack.

Finally made it to the Upper East side around 1:30am. Passed out in couch bed.

JUNE 14

Got up at 7am to shower and get ready to go to JFK. Got bagels at THE most awesome bagel shop around the corner.

My aunts drove me to JFK, and actually gfot me there 15 minutes before I was supposed to be there, YAY

Met my group (39 group members, 2 group organizers), confirmed my ID via passport. Everyone was very nice, although it was evident that there were groups of people who already knew each other before the trip. Usually that scares me but luckily I clicked with 2 people right from the beginning, brother and sister, so I felt more comfortable than if I had been on a the outside of all the groups.

Got moved like a cattle herd into a long line to wait to check our bags (there were 2 other 40+ person groups flying the same flight to Israel).

2 hours later...and after about a dozen security questions like "Who packed your bag?" and "Did you have a Bat Mitzvah?"

Grabbed my last American meal before going through security with my 2 new friends. YAY

Boarded my first trans-Atlantic flight at 1:30pm. And wowee. 3 seats - aisle - 4 seats - aisle - 3 seats. Biggest plane I have even been in. It reminded me of the plane on the Brady Bunch movie. I hoped there would be a choreographed song and dance on the plane. As you will read, that did not happen on this plane. :(

There was however a TV screen on the back of every headrest, and each seat had its own remote. Hehehe. I will only flew planes with TV's now.

Watched New In Town and He's Just Not That Into You, ate a kosher dinner, took a nap, ate a kosher breakfast, and changed into clean clothes during the 9 hour 40 minute flight.

JUNE 15

Landed in Tel Aviv at 8:30am. Surprisingly a lot of English was being spoken. I learned quicly that most signs in Israel are in Hebrew, Arabic, and English. And here I thought the having all signs in English and Spanish was annoying. This pic is at the arrivals lobby at Ben Gurion Airport near Tel Aviv.

Had possibly the longest orientation session with our group organizer's CEO in the hot Israeli sun. He didn't sweat...very interesting...

Oh, did you know that there's about 4 shekelim for every 1 dollar. Awesome.

Loaded the bus, met my new seatmate, whom I sat next to almost the entire trip (stay tuned for details).

Drove to Caesaria, walked on the beach, had another orientation session, saw the ancient Roman aquifer (and yes, I did learn about this in school).

Drove north, past Haifa, to Acco, had some Israeli shwarma for lunch. Saw an ancient battle fortress. Visited with some Israeli teenagers. Went to a big event where the Israeli's welcomed us back home, saw some kids dance, ate a lot of food. Left early because our driver can only work 12 hours a day and we had to drive across Israel to get to our hotel (2 hours).

Stayed in Tiberias overnight. The organizers did a good job about rooming people together tha they saw interacting well with each other. My roomies were awesome.

Ok, that's all I've got for now. :) But I could use feedback. Was this enough detail? Too much detail? Do you want more pictures? I'll try to use your comments to build the remaining posts on Israel. Oh, and in case you didn't notice, the title is a link to a Google map my friend mad for me. It highlights key points on the trip, and the basic route we took around Israel.

2009-07-04T09:14:00.001-05:00

Happy 4th of July!!!

2009-07-01T12:45:00.001-05:00

Will update about Israel later, be patient :)

Its Raining Men (I Wish)

2009-06-05T22:01:00.002-05:00

So you know about the 2 long distance guys. But 2 more have just popped up in the past 3 days. Here's the breakdown:

I was e-mailing with a guy back in January, then he just stopped replying. I didn't really think anything of it, figured he got bored, or scared :) But he popped back in on Wednesday. So we've been e-mailing back and forth again. He seems nice, my age (actually he's still 24 which makes me older), going into grad school next year. He's trying to decide between a career in Archeology or going to Rabbinical school.

Then a new guy started IM-ing me through the website IM feature. He's 25 and a PhD candidate for UT's Dept of English. He wants to be a Professor. On the plus side: he's from Long Island. On the down side: he doesn't exactly have a job. Side note: He's teaching a class about Comic books this summer...interesting

I may need to nickname these guys in order to keep them straight...hmmm

Ok I've got it:

Future Rabbi for guy number 1
Comic Man for guy number 2

But I can't forget the other 2 guys I'm talking to:

NYGuy ... no explanation needed
OlderGuy ... again no explanation needed.

How did I go from 1 to 4 in less than a week? Ah the mysteries of dating websites :)

So in other news, we are at my parents this weekend because my brother decided to make a surprise visit. He lives in L.A. working for a visual effects company and doesn't make it in too often. So its going to be alot of of Wii playing and reading my book this weekend. In between loads of laundry to get ready for my trip.

Almost done packing, I just need more shorts. Ugh, I already tremble at the idea of me in shorts in public. Israel watch out!

Only 1 more week left before I leave, and I think my bosses just realized that, they had a lot for me to do today. Next week is going to be hellish.

So I'll take lots of pictures and MAYBE post them...probably just the scenery ones...you'll get what I give you and like it :)

In continuing with my stream of randomness: So You Think You Can Dance is back on. YAY! We just finished Vegas week and we now have our top 20. Which means next week the public gets to vote for the first time this season. I was very disappointed with some of the dancers. Tey had really great auditions, but their performances fell flat once they got into the finals. Very distressing but hopefully they'll work hard and come back in the fall.

Well Don't I just suck at this blogging thing

2009-06-02T19:29:00.002-05:00

Well, at least I've kept up with this better than with any journals or diaries I have written.

So I've got more news on the boy front.

Still talking to NYGuy, he's nice, but it doesn't seem to be going anywhere since he lives so far away. I love talking to him, and a smile lights my face when we're texting/talking, but is that really enough?

Am I continuing with guy in order to avoid someone closer geographically to me?

And THEN...

I started talking to a new guy on Sunday. His profile pic is very cute and I didn't notic his age when we started talking. He's fun to talk to (in the 2 days that we've been talking). He makes me laugh, and is easy to talk to. He's divorced with a kid of his own that he shares custody of with his ex. He has his own house. And he's 46.

46

Old enough to be my dad. In fact, 5 months younger than my best friend's mother.

Should that matter?

Oh, and he lives in Pennsylvania. So again with the geographical distance thing. And the age thing on top of that.

My friend's say NO. He's too old, too old to have more kids (which I want), too old to actually grow old with (which I think I want, I'm too young to judge on that). But he's settled in his job, knows what he wants, and isn't one of the 20-somethings that go around trying to get laid all day (and night).

So is it worth pursuing? Should I continue talking to him? Is it too early to be making that kind of judgement? I mean, if I didn't know his age (which btw he looks more like 30-35 than 46) would I be thinking these things?

How much of an age difference is btw Demi and Ashton?

I <3 My Curling Iron

2009-05-09T14:52:00.002-05:00

I curled my hair yesterday and it is so pretty :)

Just wanted you to know.

Went to a 3 year old girl's birthday party today. It was at one of those places with the moonwalks, and inflatable slides and such. Toddler had SUCH a fun time. And the cupcakes were the icing on the cake.

Stopped by my friend's store today afterwards. It's a children's consignment shop and she has a walled off play area. YAY. I just threw him in there, and sat around and talked for 2 hours :)

Then grocery store and home.

How is it that I've done everything I needed to do outside the house before 3pm? Makes it very hard to procrastinate on doing laundry. Its staring at me...

Oh, and NY boy and I are talking again. Not much to report, we'll see if he is willing to stick around this time. I'll keep you posted.

I love space planning

2009-04-29T22:13:00.003-05:00

Is that weird?

I've spent the past two days playing with a floor plan layout for our new office that we are moving to next month. The bosses are planning construction, so they want to see what I come up with to add a couple of things, and find a place for everything we have.

SO MUCH FUN

The latest floor plan involves me getting my own office with real walls. I think I will paint them yellow. And maybe paint a window on one of the walls, to make it feel more open...I wonder if paint is in the budget...

And the best thing about me having my own space, vs the current situation of having one large communal space, is that I can have a place to put stuff to entertain the toddler when he has to go to work with me.

You know, the basics:
-Lego table
-Art Table
-TV w/DVD player

So much easier to work when he is actually entertained.

I wonder if my bosses will let me paint their offices...I'm thinking blue or green...

Off to Never Never Land

2009-04-27T21:43:00.003-05:00

Well back in March, I got my confirmation letter that I got one of the sports on the scholarship trip to Israel.

Yay

So now I have to shop for all the clothes I have to bring. I mean honestly, they expect me to wear shorts. Me. Not a 16 year old girl wearing size 2 in the juniors section. Shorts...

Ahhh well, that will be the last thing I buy.

In the mean time, I have bought hiking boots (cute), hiking socks (not so cute), extra batteries for my digital camera, and a new dress for shabbat in Jerusalem (cute and on sale for 55% off).

So actually, I don't have that much else to buy besides shorts.

Shorts don't hide the evidence of carrying a child (you other mothers know what I'm talking about).

I know its not a fashion show, but seriously. I will be in pictures, I need all the help I can get. That usually involves something flattering, like a dress and Spanx.

Oh yeah, I need to buy more Spanx...no time for laundry on this trip...

So I will probably want to post a slidshow of my pictures online so people won't ask me to send them all to them. anyone know of a free site? I've never needed to look them up before.

Defintely should not blog for a living

2009-04-26T17:05:00.003-05:00

Its a good thing I don't get paid to blog, because I would be even more broke than I am :)

Well, as you can probably tell, nothing new has happened in my life. Which is both good and bad I guess.

Well, not "nothing", but nothing to write home about :)

I just haven't wanted to get online, does that happen to anyone else?

I'm online for 7 hours a day at work M-F, and when I come home, I really don't want to turn my computer on.

Although, I do like reading blogs, something I have fallen behind in and are looking forward to catching up on other people's lives.

But back to my life:

Took the Toddler to a birthday party at the Jewish community center today. It was one of those gymnastics parties.

I really don't understand why people throw these parties for 2-3 year olds. I mean do you really expect them to all sit down and listen while you explain a game? No, they won't. They will, however, run around screaming and climbing on things while you explain your game :)

And then there are the older children whose parents aren't paying attention to them. I really hate to comment on people's parenting, since my kid watches as much TV as I do, but seriously. If you your kid is swinging himself up above a two year old who has waited for their turn, you make them get off an apologize. Why is it that I was parenting these children while their parents sat around eating and looking at the babies in the strollers? God only knows, but I hope they don't have anymore kids.

Wow I'm a bitch today. Good thing there's no one here to be annoyed by that :)

Wow I am a slacker

2009-03-19T21:53:00.002-05:00

Almost 2 weeks since my last post, and has anything interesting happened? Let's see:

-I saw Race to Witch Mountain. Very entertaining, but not a continuation from the original 2 Disney films from way back in the day. I guess that makes sense...

-Read 4 books all the way through in 1 weekend. Which means I spent a lot of time at Starbucks

-Decided that Meg Cabot is an amazing adult chick-lit author.

-Thought I started my monthly...you know. It lasted for a day then stopped for 8 days. Now it is back very slow. (TMI you say? I didn't force you to read) :) So now I am wondering if something may be wrong. Going to make an appointment with the lady doctor next week, just to be sure

-Caught up on Ugly Bett yesterday, and am now behind again since I am just now watching Monday's shows

Oh yeah, and NYC IM-ed me again on this Monday. I was very surprised, and didn't act like my usual bitchy self to him. after a couple of minutes of chit-chatting I told hi, I was confused since his words to me before our date basically had "blow off" written all over them.

To which he replies, "I have _______" (type of cancer, I feel wrong to insert actual name here).

Ummmmmmm, well now I feel like an ass for being bitchy the last 3 weeks. But how was I to know? So we both got out what we had to say, and we've been talking again since.

Not really in the same capacity as last time, since obviously that took a toll on my psyche, and he has a lot on his plate at the moment.

But yay for not being rejected

Now time to catch up with One Tree Hill.

Maybe I'll remember to post tomorrow.

Or maybe I'll pass out watching TV...who knows :)

Monopoly

2009-03-08T16:40:00.000-05:00

If you haven't gotten on to pogo.com, please don't.

It is more addictive than chocolate or coffee.

I have spent a good majority of my free time playing Monopoly and Poppit on that website, and have neglected my domestic routine.

Which resulted in my spending all day up until now cleaning, washing, folding, and putting things away.

But my apartment smells AMAZING now :)

Anne Hathaway movies have kept me motivated through the day. I've watched Ella Enchanted, Devil Wears Prada, and Becoming Jane (currently watching as I type).

Well that's all from me for now. I have a 4 day weekend next weekend, I don't know what I am going to do with myself :)

Surprise Visit

2009-02-28T17:09:00.003-06:00

So my parents were planning to come up here this weekend, but they started getting sick during the week and called to say they weren't going to be coming up.

Then last night I get a call from mom, we're coming up in the morning.

YAY

So now I am sitting at Starbucks on my laptop, drinking my signature latte (if I were a famous person it would be called the "Lorelai"), and obsessively checking on all my favorite movie stars to see what movies they are coming out in.

In other news, the guy that took me out on Thursday night asked me out for this Friday. We had discussed work a bit, and I mentioned that I am working a 4 day work week through the end of March.

So he asked if I had next Friday off, and would lunch and movie sound good. And I replied, well actually I DO have next Friday off, and that sounds great.

So now I have something to look forward to over the next week besides the new episode of Ugly Betty on Thursday.

I like the idea of a movie date. It allows me to be around him, without talking (which I tend to ramble on and on so this is a good thing).

And update on the straightener front. My hair is still straight, YAY. I have yet to wash it though (scheduled for Monday night) since it takes at least 72 hours to set in.

My hair is pretty stubborn, so I'm giving it an extra 24 hours to really grasp the concept of being straight.

So we will see if it air drys straight like they say it will. If so, I will praise God and take Toddler to Tot Shabbat more often. If it doesn't and my hair curls into ringlets that take a good 6 inches off the length, then I will eat Cheesecake.

But since it only cost me $50 instead of the regular $300 (they were training the stylist on this new Brazilian hair straightener) I won't be too upset.

Stopped at Target to use up a gift card I got for my birthday. I got a really cute white beach hat and this neato 60's-ish green and white tote bag to use at the beach/pool/boat (I don't have one but someone may invite me out on one and I should be prepared).

Also, just for fun, I tried on some bikini's.

Well...

I tried on just the tops first, since that is the most critical piece. And my body just isn't made for two-pieces.

First of all, I am small framed (I wear bra's with a 32" band) with boobs that are WAY TO FREAKING BIG. Now don't comment on how you'd kill for big boobs, really, they aren't that great.

So I laughed at myself in the mirror wondering who actually wears the size XL tops, since they cover about 40% of myself, and I'd call the twins extra-large.

So perhaps I'll have to stick to the 1 piece I bought last summer. Its really cute and has a tummy flattening thing on the stomach. I actually like the way I look in it, which is new for me to feel when wearing a swim suit.

Hmmm, could I have been anymore random? I guess its the lack of distractions here.

Not a Spark

2009-02-27T20:58:00.001-06:00

I successfully went on a date.

The guy asked me out, and I said yes. We set a date and time.

I showed up 5 minutes early and sent paranoid text messages to all my friends. He actually showed up, YAY.

It went pretty well I think. We talked for just over 3 hours. It might have been longer but Best Friend called at 11:15 to say it was past her bedtime and to please come home.

It was very easy talking to him. I can't even recall all the subjects we broached but here is the gist about him:

He is 30, divorced, has a 6 year-old, college educated, works for his parents (they own a chain of retail stores), he is funny, has great eye contact, open doors for girls, and waits for a girl to sit before he seats himself.

And he has seen Gilmore Girls, enough to name Rory, Lorelai, and Emily without prompting. I was amazed. I had a really big smile too.

I had fun, but I didn't feel the 'spark' that alot of people talk about. I don't know if that always happens for everyone though.

So to sum it up, the date didn't blow my mind, but I didn't run away. So I guess it is a typical first date? Its been so long...I don't even know how to categorize it :)

Off to bed early tonight...desperately needing sleep.

Why I'm Still Single/Why I Am Great

2009-02-26T20:30:00.001-06:00

I think if I list all the reasons why I doubt myself, why I think I'm still single, maybe I won't obsess over them as much as I do now.

I am currently on a date and cannot post tonight, so instead you get Lorelai's Reasons Why I'm Still Single:

I have a two year-old who scares me, his own mother, on many occasions
I have residual evidence that I carried the above mentioned child for nine+ months on my midsection
I have an unnatural connection the Gilmore Girls, and I mention them alot
I like watching Disney movies, not just the animated ones
I'm a bit OC with random things like my DVD and book organization
I don't like doing dishes, and yes I do leave them in the sink
I am an attention whore, but only from my friends, not strangers
I hate making decisions (being responsible if said decision yields bad results) but I like to retain veto power if someone else makes a suggestion
I constantly compare myself to other women and find myself lacking in something
I like to have discussions on heated topics with my friends, usually ending in a stalement, but believe that that shouldn't have an effect on the following discussion
I rebuff compliments with an insult about myself, or I just laugh (not exactly the reactions I would pick, but I can't stop myself)
I always have an opinion, even an uninformed one
I make lists like this in my head

And to end on the upside, Lorelai's Reasons Why I Am Great (or so I am told):

My hair can go from curly to straight in 45 minutes, from straight to curly in 1.5 hours
I have very pretty eyes
My rack ain't that bad (don't ask what size, I won't tell)
I am smart, enough to graduate from UT in 4 years with a double major and minor in Business
I am funny when I don't concentrate too hard
I care about people, friends and strangers
I am not full of myself (see the first list)
I am not ashamed to sing loudly in the car (this may also belong on the first list)
I am graceful, when I'm not walking into stationary objects
I like to listen to my friends, good or bad days
I always look at an issue from both sides of the arguement
I like to live the high life, and also just stay at home in my jammies
I am great with kids, more so when they aren't my own

Well I'm spent, I'll see you all tomorrow :)

Pre-Date Jitters

2009-02-25T20:58:00.003-06:00

The outfit is picked out...

The baby-sitter is lined up...

Timed it perfectly to give me enough time to do my make-up after picking up the Toddler from school...

Now I just need to get some beauty sleep (and not have the new chemical hair straightener I am having done tomorrow make all my hair fall out).

Off to pick out what eye shadow to wear (I have 30 choices, this may take a while... :)

Laundry Time

2009-02-24T21:52:00.000-06:00

I can't remember the last time I used my washer/dryer... tha may be why I am having a hard time finding socks to wear...

Sorry for the short post, I'm already asleep whilst I rotate clothes and stare at HSM3 playing on repeat on the DVD player.

Hopefully I'll have something interesting to say on Friday...

Oh just remembered, remember the guy that blew me off 3 days before our date on V-Day?

Well he IM-ed me Monday night out of the blue.

Just "Hey there"

WTF?????

So I answered him back politely, wondering what is going on since I was pretty sure the excuse he gave me was a "nice" way of blowing me off.

"What was the excuse, you never told us..." you say?

Well, he said he got some test results back from the doctor and that he couldn't travel for at least a month. That its possible what is wrong would interfere with us having a relationship and he didn't want to hold me back from other men.

Hmmmmmm...sounds like a blow off to me.

and "hold me back from other men"? ummmmm, wasn't planning to hold myself back for a guy that I haven't met yet so...

Well though our conversation on Monday I asked how work is (he was worried that the no travel would make work life difficult) and he said "I'm off for a month"

and no he doesn't want to talk about it.

I ask how he's feeling. "Been better, don't want to talk about it".

Well wtf are we going to talk about because YOU messaged me, and then you want to ignore the pink elephant in the room.

If you are going to IM me, please have something to say AFTER "hi"

I'm beginning to think guys are bigger drama queens than girls, honestly.

Anyone experience something similar? Comments on the oddity that is my online dating life? Feel free to comment...or not... :)

Hmmmm, NOW its laundry time

Is it Wrong for a 25 year-old to like HSM?

2009-02-23T20:46:00.002-06:00

As in High School Musical... as in made for TV (except the third movie) Disney movies

I own all three, and I watch them alot.

My two year old loves the first two movies, and hasn't seen the third except right now for the first time.

He's not that into this one, not sure why. Maybe its the lack of boys swinging baseball bats.

Either way, my time will now by consumed by watching 20-something actors play high school students :)

Off to sing and dance

Happy Birthday to me

2009-02-22T20:08:00.002-06:00

So I went home for my birthday this weekend, and had lots and lots of Cheesecake.

Kalhua Cocoa Coffee Cheesecake to be specific.

Had lots of fun with friends, but still didn't stay out too late

Saw Confessions of a Shopaholic and Push. Good movies, very different though.

And now we are back home, to clean up and pretend like we keep it that way for when my parents come into town next weekend.

And I have been bombarded with new guys e-mailing and IM-ing me on the dating site i joined a while back.

Which is good, I am getting used to talking to people, not talking too much about myself and such things that I normally do.

Trying to set-up a coffee date with one of the guys, he was trying to meet this weekend (he lives in my city so much easier to coordinate) but since I was out of town, I'm hoping next weekend is good for him too.

So here's to many coffee dates. Hey, a girl tries to get as much free coffee as possible :)

Boys are SO frustrating

2009-02-17T22:23:00.000-06:00

I could use the word "men" instead of "boys", but I think my instincts are correct on this one.

So it didn't take me that long to get over my anger, but I have been out of town, then adjusting to being back in town. So I finally have time to sit down and write.

Well, needless to say, the date on Saturday didn't happen.

The explanation for this is very...creative. The optimistic side of me would like to believe the story. The realistic side of me says he never planned to come and waited until he couldn't avoid it anymore and cancelled.

Either way, he decided to inform me 3 days before he was supposed to be here that he wasn't coming.

You would assume I was mad. But I wasn't, more like frustrated with the situation and upset with myself.

I normally put walls up to protect myself from being rejected. It's not pleasant, and I need to be functional in order to take care of the 2 year old by myself. He's not going to get up, get dressed, get fed, and get to school on his own.

So I spent an entire day telling myself "I told you so", and wallowing in the disappointment.

So we spent a very leisurely weekend...with Gilmore Girls...

So now its back to the regular routine of eat, watch tv, read a little, and then to bed.

The house is a wreck because I can't find the motivation to do anything beyond making sure nothing is growing in the house besides the Toddler.

But I get up every morning, play with Toddler for a while, make sure we're clean, dressed, and fed before leaving the house. I work just as efficiently as before, possibly even better. And we come home and do the above.

I'm still functioning, the world hasn't ended.

So maybe rejection isn't as bad as I had made it out to be. But it sucks all the same.

What the...

2009-02-11T19:37:00.003-06:00

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

That just about sums it up for me.

Learning to Trust

2009-02-10T06:52:00.000-06:00

I've had several long talks with one of my close friends about why I was in the relationships I was in, in the past.

Very interesting when he was honest with me.

Although the honesty hurt a little, but it was good.

Basically, I was with guys because ultimately I'm afraid of getting too close with someone that I could have a future with. What would possess someone to do that?

Well, because I'm afraid of getting hurt. Fear. And I push people away who would be good for me.

Well, after hearing this, I am like "I don't want to be like that anymore".

But how do I do that?

How do I learn to trust people?

I mean, I trust people. My close friends, my parents, people I have known for a long time.

But trusting someone I have only known for days, weeks, months?

I don't know if I can handle having my trust broken, or my heart broken, and still be able to take care of the Toddler.

I don't even think I've had my heart broken. Guys have broken up with me, yes. And I cried, yes.

But I don't know if I was in love with any of them. Not even Toddler's dad.

I mean, if you knew the guys, you would see how easy it was to NOT fall in love with them.

Hmmmmm, wonder why I stopped seeing that therapist...

I mean, I want to believe everything NYC guy says, but a part of me is still holding onto the fact that he could be saying all of this because its easy to do that over the internet/text.

Is that the same as not trusting? Is it any better than being naive, and believing everything everyone says to me? Is there middle ground there?

Very serious topic to be pondering before I've had Starbucks.

Is it too early for bed?

2009-02-07T19:54:00.002-06:00

I am completely knackered. And I have no idea why since I've basically just lazied around on my bum all day.

Well I did take a bubble bath.

And went grocery shopping.

And did some dancing with the Toddler.

Hmmmm, very full day actually.

Well I'm off to make some tea and curl up with a good book in my Laz-E-Boy. I may just pass out like that...we'll see.

Sorry for the uber boring today. Not much up for entertaining writing.

Maybe tomorrow something interesting will happen...

Yay for The Domain

2009-02-06T20:05:00.000-06:00

Today was brilliant.

Got this

and this to wear underneath

and this just because its navy and good for layering

at Free People for my V-Day date (day portion).

Then went to Aldo and got this

and this

to go with my little black dress for V-day dinner.

Now I just need to make my hair appointment so I can get my hair to behave itself that day. :)

Birthdays

2009-02-05T22:24:00.003-06:00

Best Friend's birthday is today. Yay.

Called her promptly at 8:30 this morning to wish her a happy birthday whilst simultaneously interrupting her work day. :)

Did work in the most efficient way possible so i could leave early.

Just finished ~~hiding~~ picking up the house before the baby-sitter got here.

Drove faster than a bat out of hell to get to the restaurant on time.

Danced to swing music while driving. (Glen Miller can really get a girl "In the Mood". Hahaha, yes I am laughing thank you)

Got a yummy tequila drink as soon as I stepped into the door.

Yapped about random topics while eating chips and salsa, and enchiladas.

Yapped for about half an hour after the bill was paid.

Stopped at ATM to get money to pay sitter. (I like her, and I need her to like me back so she will watch Toddler all day on Valentines)

Got home and checked the mail. Got a birthday card from Grandma. (my birthday is in 2 weeks exactly)

Paid the sitter.

And now typing this blog.

:) Well just reading all of that is exhausting, good thing I stopped at Starbucks this morning. (And yes, I stop at Starbucks every morning. but today it was most beneficial)

Boys

2009-02-04T20:32:00.000-06:00

This won't be very long, I promise.

I talked with NYC boy yesterday, about lots of stuff, but touched base on the best way to handle him when he's pissed or annoyed. Yay. So I feel alot better about things.

Also confirmed our date for Valentine's Day, and now have to completely go through the closet to find not one, but TWO outfits, as I need something casual for the day-portion of our date, and something more dressy for dinner. I have no clue what we are doing, but I weaseled the outfit requirements out of him today to make sure that I am appropriately dressed.

Does anyone else do this? I just hate feeling out of place, it draws attention. Something I do NOT like doing.

So I'm thinking of this Chinese influenced cotton dress for daytime. Its cute, but not dressy. I hope he isn't planning anything to strenuous, the dress is a tad on the short side.

For dinner I've got a dress I got on sale for New Year's Eve. It's black, but cuts low enough to show off God's gift to me, and it's very twirly. Don't know if we're dancing, but if we are then I'll be ready.

I figure I utilize jewelry and shoes to dress up/down the dresses as appropriate.

God, I only have two weeks...I'll probably change my outfits ten times before then.

And please do NOT ask me about make-up, I'll have a nervous breakdown. But please remind me in a week to get started on that project. :)

Thanks for listening.

A Day Off Work...and Other Things

2009-01-28T18:48:00.003-06:00

So I'm sure you're all aware of the state of the economy.

So my work has taken preventive action to protect our "assets". Which means everyone was required to take 2 non-paid days off in January.

When I heard the news my response flew out of my mouth before I thought about it "OMG YES". Well my bosses were surprised by my reaction, to say the least.

The first day off was last Friday, I went home for an extended weekend and got smashed practically every night. It was grand.

The other day off was today. I managed to take a meeting with my insurance broker, have a lunch date with Best Friend, and renew my car registration all before 1pm.

So I treated myself to a little window shopping. at Neiman Marcus. and Tiffany & Co.

Yay. I found the most FABULOUS Diane Von Furstenberg dress at NM. I just have to wear my corset in order to get the monster twins in there without bra straps.

I still have to figure out what shoes I want to wear with it.

At Tiffany & Co. I fell in love with my future engagement and wedding rings.

Don't act so shocked. Girls do this kind of thing.

Well after all that overload of fabulous things, I had to relax my brain. So I went to Starbucks (for the second time today). Yay for Skinny Hazelnut Lattes.

Now you may be wondering about the boy.

Still looking good. His birthday was yesterday, but he had a pissy day at work and was in a bad mood. He didn't want to talk about it. In fact, he didn't really talk at all.

I have a history of being very pushy in the communication department, and I am trying not to harass him as he is very busy with meetings today. I only texted him once this morning (as he usually texts me at some gawd awful hour in the morning) and once after my adventure at Tiffany.

He replied to the second text to let me know that he can't talk, but asked what was up. I replied that I was shopping, and didn't want to interrupt.

And that's where we left it at 3pm today.

So since it has been a while. Can I get some feedback? Is he just having a bad day and that's why we haven't talked like we had been for the 2 weeks previous, or is it the guy way of saying "I'm bored with you, please leave me alone"?

When it rains it pours

2009-01-27T18:41:00.002-06:00

Well I guess it figures that once I have something to write about, I forget to get on here. Guess I haven't made it enough of a habit yet :)

So the last time I wrote, I was unsure about this guy I met through an online dating site.

We have been talking EVERYDAY since.

Sometimes for just an hour or so, but one night we were up until 5am my time, 6am his. I had to go to work the next morning. Let's just say I didn't make much sense that day.

I have been happily sleep deprived for the past 2 weeks.

Not alot of phone talking, mostly IM and texting since I have things I need to do when I'm at home.

But my DVR has been feeling awfully neglected lately.

and I find myself texting with him during my 'me' time in the mornings. And I don't mind that.

Weird. I thought I would.

There are also plans for him to come down and take me out on Valentine's Day.

:)

It's never been like this before. Maybe its because the last relationship I was in I was still in college. That makes a big difference.

But do I know how to do the adult relationship thing? I guess I'll find out soon enough.

I have also been neglecting my favorite blog writers, so I'm off to catch up on other people's lives. Always so much more interesting than mine...

Am I ready for this?

2009-01-14T19:12:00.000-06:00

Well I'm still talking to New England Guy.

We have talked about all kinds of subjects, and he is a pretty interesting guy. I really like talking to him.

Actually, I smile a lot while I'm talking to him.

And we've already talked about expectations of where we are seeing this going.

For me, I'm not sure I really want to have a serious relationship with a guy. I've just gotten Toddler to go to bed on his own in his bed at 8-8:30, which gives me my "me time" in the evenings.

And I haven't really gotten enough me time, I don't really want to share it with someone.

Or more specifically, I don't want to feel obligated to share it. I want to do whatever I want, when I want, without having to worry about how it will affect other people.

For instance, when my parents come into town, I usually spend all day on my own. Drinking and reading at Starbucks, taking myself out to eat, doing some window shopping. And there is no one to get upset that I didn't spend time with them.

So I told him that I am interested in dating him, but I don't know where it will go. Which I think makes the most sense to me. If we go out a couple of times, I may decide I would rather share my me time with him than alone, or not. But I won't know that until I get there.

He said that makes sense, and we'll see where we end up. He still wants to come down here, in early February I think. So that will give me enough time to talk to him more before I meet him.

Which makes me kind of nervous.

I mean I haven't had sex in 3 years, heck, I haven't been taken out on a date in 6 years (Please don't point out the obvious, thank you).

So the idea of a guy taking me out on a date makes me a little crazy. But I'll have to do it at some point right? and why not in a city I feel completely comfortable in. Not to mention filled with people who know me and can rescue me if he turns out to be a freak.

Wow, it's nice to be able to let all of that out without someone yapping at me and telling me I'm wrong or crazy. Very therapeutic.

So I guess if he wants to come down here, let him. It won't hurt to try.

And his profile pic is cute in that "Dark hair, dark eyes, smart Jewish boy" kind of way :)

Online Dating

2009-01-12T20:07:00.003-06:00

I joined a Jewish online dating site back in May of last year. Not a lot happened, mainly because I couldn't get online that often.

I started talking to a guy on it, then on IM, then on the phone. We talked for like 3 months, after which he was telling me he loved me.

Ummm, does anyone else think that's weird?

Well we stopped talking shortly after my best friend's wedding. Perhaps it was because he spent most of the two weeks leading up to it talking to my voicemail instead of me, but I was the maid of honor, I had things to do.

Well its been really quiet since then until yesterday.

This guy IMed me using the website's IM service, we talked for a bit but I had to go so I gave him my AIM screenname in case he wanted to talk later.

We talked for two hours yesterday, and we are talking right now actually.

So today we are IM-ing, BS-ing you know. And he brings up the idea of sex. Well, I'm not that surprised (he is a guy), but I made it pretty clear that a couple of dates would have to preface that kind of activity.

and he's like alright, you want me to come down there? (he lives in the New England area)

and I'm all "Are you serious?"

He is.

Is that weird?

I Hate Crying at Work

2009-01-05T19:45:00.003-06:00

So I had a sit down with my bosses today to go over my gross oversight during my holiday.

I got so upset with myself I actually started crying. They didn't even yell.

Well, the rest of the day wasn't bad at all. I got caught up on most of my AP/AR duties and sorted through about 200 e-mails.

Now I'm watching Momma Mia and cooking dinner, so I'll just let you watch another video by one of my favorite bands, The Pipettes:

Fat Start to the New Year

2009-01-03T23:41:00.000-06:00

Gawd, I've eaten so much potato salad in the last 48 hours I think I've gained 10 pounds right in my ass.

Well camping was much more fun that I had anticipated. I mean I did everything I planned to do - sleeping, eating, being lazy - but I didn't realize how silly people get when they drink beer all day.

My god were we silly.

Not many details are needed to express my point, but we had come up with a "meaning" for each spot on the Battleship game board.

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that drinking was on my to do list. Yes, did lots of that.

Alcohol seems to have a different effect on me than on other people.

Most people get slutty when they drink and their clothes start falling off. I get stupid when I drink - all my slutty escapades (the ones I did when I was 18 and stupid) were all done completely sober. In fact, I usually get more prudish when when I drink.

So how I ended up in my friend's tent with her husband trying desperately to get out is all due to the fact that I was stupid enough (thank you Corona) to play Battleship in his tent because the picnic bench was "getting uncomfortable".

Now before you go making assumptions. This is NOT the same guy from the previous post who thought I was planning to jump his bones. Nope. Different guy.

His wife was sitting there the whole time laughing at me and saying that I got what I deserved since I simply agreed with someone's statement that I hate wearing pants. Well, its true. I like skirts and dresses much better, but not the point here.

So I spent the better part of an hour trying to get the big lug to let me go and get out of the tent. Apparently I am a lot of fun to tickle.

Hmmmm, maybe I do get slutty when I drink...

But NOTHING happened. For god sakes there were kids outside the tent telling me that next time I shouldn't go near the "Beast's" tent.

And eventually he released me so that I could breathe fresh air again.

That was about as much exercise as I got on that trip.

But molesting aside, it was a fun and relaxing trip. We are trying to plan another trip in the fall (it gets too hot here to camp in the spring and summer months with coming down with heat stroke) to someplace a little more remote.

Apparently we were very loud our first night and had to be told to be quieter. Damn neighbors.

Camping, Who'd of Thought?

2009-01-01T17:00:00.002-06:00

So as you are reading this, I am out somewhere in the wilderness freezing my ass off getting in tune with nature.

Actually, I am probably laying around all snuggled under a blanket and reading a book. Probably Twilight again.

But I didn't want to leave you wondering like I did over X-mas, so without further ado...your entertainment for today:

Royally F***ed

2008-12-31T14:00:00.000-06:00

So I fucked up for the first time in 5 years at work last week.

How can you fuck up if you're not even there?

Well, it's my job to run payroll every 2 weeks, and that happened to be last week. Now normally, I have until 2pm on Thursday to run it for direct deposit into all of my employee's accounts. But since X-mas was Thursday, the deadline was 2pm Wednesday. And I spent most of the day laying around in my jammies watching TV.

So imagine my surprise when I get a call from one of the owners at 3pm asking if I ran payroll.

And if my life was a movie I would have been having a Bridget Jones moment in the manner of the word "FUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK" appearing at the bottom of the screen.

Its not all shit though, my boss just had to hand write all the paychecks. The only hiccup with it really is that everyone had to come in on Saturday to pick up their checks (we were closed both X-mas day and the day after). So at 4pm on X-mas Eve I was calling every single employee to apologize for my royal screw up and let them know that they WILL be paid, it just won't magically appear in their bank account. I am so grateful that everyone was so understanding.

I had EXTREME guilt for the rest of the day, and even on X-mas. But that's what I get for being lazy.

Why do people automatically assume I am a slut?

2008-12-30T19:30:00.000-06:00

Perhaps it's because I got pregnant at 21 while still in college and not married.

Perhaps its because I can be overly friendly with people I know well (and with people who know that I am more talk that action).

But anyone who has known me for any significant matter of time, like lets say 6 years, would know that I am in fact not a slut.

Not having sex for 3 years does not make someone a slut.

Why am I going on about this?

Well, I have a friend, whom I went out with briefly when I had just graduated high school, who likes to flirt outrageously with anything that has tits. He calls me up just to make me blush. But we are friends with the same group of people, and when I come into town we usually end up hanging out in a big group.

Well I was at my friend's house haning out with her, her husband, her kids, and my kid when HE comes over. Everything was normal, went took the kids out to a couple of shops and then came back to watch movies until the kids fell asleep.

Well I sat down on one of the sofa with my feet propped up on my ex's lap asking him to give me a foot massage (I make everyone do it, even my friend's husband). So he does, HAHA, and then at some point later we are cuddling on the couch watching a kids movie.

Now I like cuddling, I cuddle with all my friends. Especially when it is cold outside. I mean my cuddling ususally involves just spooning and watching TV and chatting a bit.

His version of cuddles was running is hands up and down my arms and legs, nibbling on my ear, and biting my neck.

Now excuse me but is this the kind of behavior of a guy who is dating someone who does not belong to the ear that his is currently blowing into? NO. And definately not someone who has been dating said other girl for a year and a half.

So lets just say I spent most of the time shoving his face away from me (I was cold so getting up was not an option).

Well this is relatively normal behavior from him so I didn't think anything about it.

So on Sunday, it was one of my friend's husband's birthday and we have a huge party. And by midnight, it was just me, 2 girl friends, and the birthday boy left drinking at the kitchen table.

Well we women got very silly and starting making up things that we were "going" to do on the camping trip this weekend. Harmless stuff really. We're all a lot of talk, even more so when we are drinking.

Then we get a call on Monday from Flirting Boy asking if we had a "plan" for the upcoming trip. Apparently, Birthday boy called him to warn him that we were planning to be evil this weekend in front of his girlfriend. (And they say girls have big mouths).

He apparently thought that I was intent on jumping his bones in front of his GF. Now mind you, its the "in front of his GF" that he has a problem with, not the "jumping his bones" part.

Well that just about set me off into a fit.

How dare he assume that I would do that? Especially after the previous night of me shoving him away when his GF wasn't even there?

I was SO pissed that night. In fact I'm still pissed. I should hit on the GF when we go this weekend. Ha.

3 days of not staying and home and sitting on my rear end...

2008-12-21T20:40:00.000-06:00

Well, its been a busy couple of days so I'll catch you up

Friday:

Dropped my cat off at a friend's house to be babysat while Toddler and I spend the holidays at my parents house. I stayed for 30 minutes to see how she was doing. There was a lot of hissing and hair raising...much due to the fact that one of her cats is the "Welcome Committee" and went right up to her and started sniffing her butt. And I don't blame her, I would be hissing too if someone I had just met started sniff my tush.

Did not have a nervous breakdown at work, so all in all, a pretty successful day.

We drove the 3.5 hours to my parents house without one screaming fit.

Toddler refused to go to sleep until 11pm...loveliness really.

Saturday:

Left home at 9:30am, spent some quality time with the lovely people at one of the 5 starbucks within a 1/2 mile radius of my parents house.

Went to my friend's house for a Mary Kay party. Lots of fun and free facials, yea.

Returned home for a brief period before leaving to go to a neighbor's house for an ornament party. 26 women, 26 gifts, lots of food, and lots of alcohol. It was a blast. :)

Came home to find the baby asleep on the sofa with dad watching football (American). So of course, I turned around immediately and went out to visit with another neighbor and her kids.

Eventually returned home around 11pm and passed out in my bed.

Today:

Woke up with Toddler in my bed at 6:15 this morning. I let him lead me into my parent's room so he could wake them up. After he got up into mom's arms, I went back to bed.

Got up and went to breakfast with another neighbor.

Took Toddler next door to play with my neighbor's nephew who is the same age. They mostly ignored each other the entire time while Toddler attacked my neighbor's 9 year old.

Ate a lovely homemade Mexican buffet.

Took neighbor's 15 year old to the mall. Always an adventure (More on that later). But I got my scary bushman eyebrows waxed so not a complete disaster.

Had our first night of Hanukkah. I got PJ's. Toddler got a toy guitar that plays Queen and B52's songs. I love it, for now.

And now we are watching 101 Dalmations and getting settled down to put Toddler to bed. I'm getting ready to go back next door and play Rock Band. Hehehe.

Pretty blue box

2008-12-18T23:05:00.000-06:00

So today started out fine. I got my latte, read some more of Breaking Dawn. Then I went to work where I didn't do much of what I was planning to. I don't really want to go into the details, as it makes me hyperventilate just replaying it in my head, but I ended up in my boss's office shaking with frustration because one of my co-workers is completely daft.

Needless to say, an emergency run the The Cheesecake Factory was in order. and onc I had stuffed half the slice of cheesecake down my throat, I was feeling much better. Yea.

I also got to go shopping on my little break. Toddler's class is doing a group gift for the two teachers in his class at preschool, and as room parent it's my job to coordinate and shop for said gifts.

I told them I was thinking about something small, assuming people would give me like $3-5 (with 2 kids in the class that makes $36-60 for two gifts). Well I ended up with $140. Ummm, what do these people define as a big gift?

So combined with my contribution and the lovely 15% off discount at my local bookstore, I got each teacher the complete Twilight series. I know one of them wants to read them and doesn't own them, I'm not sure about the other. But they both got gift receipts so they can exchange them for something else if they would rather (hey, $80 credit at a bookstore is nothing to raise your nose to).

So I will be giving them their presents and cards tomorrow morning, since they are both gone by the time I pick-up Toddler.

But back to my day.

We went to Best Friend's place for our gift exchange after I picked-up Toddler. She got him 3 Dr. Suess books, which he immediately screamed and ran away from. I got Best Friend really cute naughty stuff from Victoria's Secret (its our tradition).

And then I opened my gift.

Just the box was gift enough. It is beautiful, eggshell blue with the tiny printing in the center of the lid "Tiffany & Co.".

OMG

I immediately said "This better not be a joke, because it won't be funny".

She got me the Tiffany Riedel Sommeliers Riesling Grand Cru wine glass. Ahhhhh. I should probably mentio the Riesling is my favorite wine, and alcohol of choice actually, in case you were wondering what to send me for Hannukah. That, or another glass to go with the one Best Friend got me.

I have the best best friend ever.

And Toddler had lots of fun tackling Overlord (Best Friend's husband) and pretending that we was a pony. It's funny when its not me. Hehe

My first blog Meme

2008-12-17T23:22:00.000-06:00

I got this from a post of Penelope's from way back in March of this year. And seeing as I am pretty brain-dead tonight, it will have to do for now. Enjoy :)

1. How old will you be in five years? 29, Gah. I'll be OLD...

2. Who did you spend at least two hours with today? Toddler, Ava-the barista at Starbucks, Evie-my co-worker

3. How tall are you? 5'2", at least that's what my DL says.

4. What do you look forward to most in the next six weeks? Hannukah, Christmas, New Years, and the 2 weeks off that encompasses it all. Oh yeah, and the full inventory that I get to do at one of our stores (no I'm not actualy being sarcastic) :)

5. What's the last movie you saw? In the theatre? Twilight...it was heaven...maybe I'll go again...

6. Who was the last person you called? Best Friend to talk about our trip to NYC next December :)

7. Who was the last person to call you? Megan - Friends since I was a senior in high school and her toddler mad a nuisance of himself.

8. What was the last text message you received? I don't text message...

9. Who was the last person to leave you a voicemail? My Jenny Craig consultant to confirm our appointment

10. Do you prefer to call or text? Umm, I believe #8 answered that but I'll do it again. Call.

11. What were you doing at 12am last night? Sleeping, all alone, in my bed. Bliss.

12. Are your parents married/separated/divorced? Married, but they have never had sex. I was brought by the beautiful baby fairy. I don't know where my brothers came from...

13. When is the last time you saw your mom? Dec.7, she and Dad came up to visit Toddler and give me a break.

14. What color are your eyes? Brown, always brown.

15. What time did you wake up today? Well the alarm clock first went off at 5:45am, but after hitting snooze several times I got out of bed at around 7:30am

16. What are you wearing right now? Pj bottoms, Tank top and T-shirt, socks, glasses, and a blank expression

17. What song are you listening to right now?No music, just the sounds of athe washer and dryer, and The Late Show with David Letterman.

18. Where is your favorite place to be? NYC :)

19. Where is your least favorite place to be? The ob-gyn's table

20. Where would you go if you could go anywhere? Greece, well, the entire Mediterranean actually, but Greece is a start.

21. Where do you think you'll be in 10 years? Well, Toddler will be 12, so I will probably be holed up in my room so as to not embarrass him in front of his friends.

22. Where is your cellphone? Tossed in my purse with the rest of the small electronics I can't live without.

23. What did you fear was going to get you at night as a child? I thought there was something under my bed (probably was since I just stuffed everything under there when I was "cleaning" and then forgot about it), so I would leap on and off of it if it was dark.

24. What was the last thing that really made you laugh? Toddler howling like a dog in the bath tonight.

25. How many TVs do you have in your house? 2, both fully equipped with cable and DVR. God bless.

26. How big is your bed? Full size, just enough room for one short adult, one cat, and one Toddler.

27. Do you have a laptop or desktop computer? Laptop, as I like to surf the web on my bed, and at Starbucks in addition to the more regular location, like in the recliner.

28. Do you sleep with or without clothes on? Well, in college I slept without clothes on, guaranteed my roommates would try to sneak in and borrow things if I wasn't prepared. But now seeing as I have a 2 year old who up uintil 4 nights ago shared the bed with me, I now sleep fully clothed.

29. What color are your sheets? Chocolate brown jersey sheets with pink flowers :)

30. How many pillows do you sleep with? 1

31. What is your favorite season? Winter, I love all things cold and white and snowy :)

32. What do you like about fall? Not much, its hurricane season so I get unusually long visits from my parents who live near the Gulf and are subsequently near a flood plane.

33. What do you like about winter? EVERYTHING. Snow, winter clothes, winter boots, winter foods, holiday songs, the holiday feeling, Hannukah, Christmas, scarves...I could go on...

34. What do you like about the summer? Ummmm, since that encompasses 75% of the year, being able to wear flip-flops

35. What do you like about spring? CLOTHES

36. How many countries have you lived in? 1, I've never even left the USA.

37. What cities/towns have you lived in? Houston, TX, Austin, TX, Tallahassee, FL

38. Do you prefer shoes, socks, or bare feet? I usually walk around barefoot, but I love shoe shopping :)

39. Are you a social person? Once you get to know me. I tend to try to blend into the background if I am around a lot of people I don't know. Like at clubs and bars. But drunk people are very entertaining to watch.

40. What was the last thing you ate? Muenster cheese...yummy

41. What is your favorite restaurant? The Cheesecake Factory, God bless.

42. What is your favorite ice cream? Sweet Cream with strawberries and chocolate chips

43. What is your favorite dessert? Kaluha Cocoa Coffee Cheesecake from The Cheesecake Factory

44. What is your favorite kind of soup? My mom's Beef Stew. Or my mom's Potato Leek Soup.

45. What kind of jelly do you like on your PB & J sandwich? Grape :)

46. Do you like Chinese food? Yes, especially on Christmas Eve.

47. Do you like coffee? The employees at my Starbucks all know my name and have my drink ready when I'm done paying. So, no?

48. How many glasses of water, a day, do you drink on average? Hmmm. Probably 2 ?

49. What do you drink in the morning? Coffee, juice, whatever I can get my hands on.

50. What was the name of your first pet? Mia. (Greek feminine singular for one, I was studying Ancient Greek when I got her)

51. Do you sleep on a certain side of the bed? Is the whole bed a certain side? If Toddler is with me then the left side. Now that I think about it, that's also the same side as my mom. Weird.

52. Do you know how to play poker? Only if Best Friend is also playing. We help each other out so neither of us loses :) Her husband has resigned to this :)

53. Do you like to cuddle? Only if I don't plan to go to sleep.

54. Have you ever been to Mexico? Nope.

55. Do you have an addictive personality? Yes and no. I get addictions to food that last for a couple weeks then I get over it. But my addiction to Caffeine will probably never go away.

56. Do you eat out or at home more often? Since trying to lose weight, at home.

57.Where is #57? Hmmmm...good question

58. Do you know anyone with the same birthday as you? Yup, Evie at work was born exactly 4 years before me

59. Do you want kids? Well I can't exactly answer no now can I? But I do actually want more. Later. After I am married and can afford to have more kids.

60. Do you speak any other languages? Nope. I am a snobby American who thinkgs everyone should speak English. Even in their own countries. No, not really. This might be why I haven't left the country. Maybe I'll to England. They speak English there...well...British really but closer to English than Japanese.

61. Have you ever gotten stitches? Yes, after I had my wisdom teeth removed, and after I had the Toddler.

62. Have you ever ridden in an ambulance? Nope.

63. Do you prefer an ocean or a pool? Pool. No sand, no jelly fish, no seaweed

64. Do you prefer a window seat or an aisle seats? Definately the window seat.

65. Do you know how to drive stick? Currently own a manual SUV :)

66. What is your favorite thing to spend money on? Shoes...Nine West shoes

67. Do you wear any jewelry 24/7? Just a watch.

68. What is your favorite TV show? Gilmore Girls. But it ended after only 7 seasons and I was heartbroken. I don't like to talk about it.

69. Can you roll your tongue? Nope

70. Who is the funniest person you know? Ummm, Toddler

71. Do you sleep with stuffed animals?Not anymore.

72. What is the main ring tone on your phone? Some guy whistling

73. Do you still have clothes from when you were little? I have clothes from when I was in middle school...

74. What red object is closest to you right now? My round Minnie Mouse stuffed animal from Disney World.

75. Do you turn off the water while you brush your teeth? Nope

76. Do you sleep with your closet doors open or closed? Closed if Toddler is with me, open if he's in his own room.

77. Would you rather be attacked by a big bear or a swarm of bees? Neither. Unless its a big bear of a man ;)

78. Do you flirt a lot? No, not intentionally. I actually don't think I'm very good.

79. What do you dip a chicken nugget in? BBQ sauce or ketchup

80. What is your favorite food? Buffalo Wings...yum

81. Do you know how to change the oil in a car? I can pop the hood up for the mechanic :)

82. Have you ever gotten a speeding ticket? 3 while I was in high school and none since.

83. Have you ever run out of gas? Once, in the parking garage at school and a friend was there to drive the to the gas station to fill a can up :)

84. What is your usual bedtime? 10pm...don't pay any attention to the time stamp on this :)

85. What was the last book you read?Currently re-reading the Twilight series, I am in the middle of the 4th, Breaking Dawn.

86. Do you read the newspaper? Nope, too depressing.

87. Do you have any magazine subscriptions? Waste of trees in my opinion. I will buy one if it strikes my fancy though.

88.Where is #88? Very philosophical, I will have to get back to you on that one.

89. Do you watch soap operas? I did when I was at home in the middle of the day

90. Do you dance in the car? I have been known to stop traffic. What? Everyone dances like that to the Chicago Soundtrack :) Cell Block Tango got the most attention.

91. What radio station did you last listen to? Umm, I listen to CD's, and my iPod.

92. Who's in the picture frame closest to you? John Lennon, sigh

93. What was the last note you scribbled on a piece of paper? Hmmm, not sure...

94. What is your favorite candle scent? Sugar Cookie

95. What is your favorite board game? Clue

96.Where is #96? Again, very deep, give me a moment

97. When was the last time you attended church? Church? Best Friend's wedding. But I took Toddler to Tot Shabbat in October.

98. Who was your favorite teacher in high school? I don't remember high school much...

99. What is the longest you have ever camped out in a tent? Umm, I don't do camping. Sleeping on the hard cold earth along with the bugs and animals? I don't think so. Maybve if there was one of the giant RV's with air conditioning, a full suite bathroom, satellite TV, and a kign size tempurpedic bed I might be enticed to try :)

100. Who was the last person to do something extra special for you? Ava out extra whip cream in my latte this morning :)

Will Power, Tea, and WTF?

2008-12-16T22:48:00.000-06:00

Didn't think I had any of this left. But after writing this, I decided that now was the time for change.

For the past 2 nights, I have been putting Toddler to sleep in his own bed. The first night, there was a lot of screaming, but he slept until 6am then came in and cuddled with me for an hour. But last night he must have crawled into bed without waking me because I fell asleep without him there, and woke up in the middle of the night to have him curled up next to me. Then he wanted to get up at 5am. Oh HELL no. I cuddled him till he went back to sleep :)

And so tonight I have read him 2 stories and put him into bed. He got up twice but has since stayed in bed without restraints. Lovely. I'll keep you posted on how long I can keep this up.

Nice time to start packing for our trip :) and make some tea...brb

Ok, much better.

So this morning I was watching the Today - while I got up, dressed, made breakfast & lunch for Toddler, threw a Lean Cuisine breakfast pocket in the micro, got all 500 layers of clothes on Toddler (-4C this morning), and cleaned up the kitchen - and became immediately disturbed. Why? No, not because Tom Cruise was on, that was yesterday. The first story that played was about how 3 teenagers beat and kidnapped a 75 year-old grandmother from her home. What is going on with teenagers today? If they're not beating old people, they're throwing their classmates blindfolded and bound into a pool, or just having a lot of reckless sex and getting pregnant (then expecting their parents to take care of them and the baby). "It was the same way when we were teenagers" I hear alot. Well, I can say for certain that

I have never beat an old person up (not anyone actually).
I have not pushed anyone into a pool that wasn't already in a swim suit and were fully capable of not drowning.
I didn't even have sex until I was 18, and even then it was with someone I had been dating for 2 years. and I didn't get preganant until AFTER I was legally allowed to drink in public (in the US) and I had (have) a job.

So there you have it. Proof that I am indeed not 24, but more like 42.

But back to my disturbed state of mind this morning. I just stood there watching this segment, and they even had the woman interviewed via remote satellite. It just about broke my heart to see her "looking better". Thank you for not showing the before, btw, don't know if I could have made it out the door this morning.

Five Questions

2008-12-15T21:16:00.000-06:00

So I saw this on my FAVORITE blogger's site and decided to play. If you want to play, read the rules and instructions below. :)

1. If you could live anywhere in the world, where would it be?

Ahhh, that would definitely be Greece. The actual location changes, but somewhere in the Peloponnese. Perhaps near Ancient Sparta. I love Sparta. (More to come on that later).

2. How much has having a child changed your life?

I appreciate my parents a heck of a lot more than I did. Especially my mom. I am much more aware of my actions, and I am a lot less reckless than I used to be. I have realized who my true friends are, and the ones that found it to be convenient. I grew up in a short period of time, which is good for Toddler's sake, but bad that I didn't really get to experience life as a single, out of college, 20-something. I'm not complaining, just a fact that isn't lost on me.

3. If you could change anything, would you?

Not a thing. Everything that has happened has made me who I am. There are some issues I am still dealing with from events in the past. But without them and those people, I wouldn't be where I am today. The mother of an amazing 2 year old. I would NEVER give him back.

4. This time next year you write a blog post about...?

Hmmmm...interesting. I can't see into the future you know :) But hopefully my social life would have picked up a bit in the guy department. Someone who is not a loser (definition of NOT a loser: has a career, his own place, his own mind, a sense of humor, and not bad looking would be a plus).

5. What made you start your blog in the first place?

Oi vay. I'm not sure. I was bored one day and started searching the Google blog search for "single mom". I cruised through a couple of sites and they were very entertaining. Then I happened across Penelope's site and fell in love with it. and I realized that I wanted an anonymous outlet to vent all my feeling too. Plus I'm pretty sure Best Friend is going to love not having overage charges on her cell phone because I will talk for hours.

Here are the rules and regulations. But be warned, I will be asking you the questions. Hehehe

Link back to the original post - in my case that was this.

Put the rest of the rules in your post:

1. Leave me a comment saying, "Interview me." (Or email me at daydreaminglorelai@gmail.com). I will respond by emailing you five questions. I get to pick the questions.
3. You will update your blog with the answers to the questions.
4. You will include this explanation and an offer to interview someone else in the same post.
5. When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them five questions.

Good night's sleep

2008-12-14T17:30:00.000-06:00

I never had any intention of having my son sleep in the same bed with me. It started out pretty well. He slept in his bassinet next to me for the first two months. But then we moved, and he wouldn't sleep. Even though he only slept 5-6 hours during the night, it was still sleep and I needed it too. He would only sleep if I held him. Now, I know that it would have made sense to let him cry it out. But at 2 months old, it broke my heart to hear it. And with no one else around, there was no support to tell me it was going to be ok.

Also there were the neighbors. Living in an apartment is all I can afford, and the neighbors don't like babies crying all night. So I did what I had to do to get us both to sleep, I took him to bed with me.

So now I have a 2-year old who likes to sleep with his feet kicking my boobs all night and I'm not getting any sleep. Which makes me very cranky and stressed, which leads to stress eating. Not very good for the diet. And I had been good on the diet too. Until the damn audit at work and I've gained back ten pounds in stress.

So as you can see, not sleeping isn't very good for me. And Toddler has his own bed, his own room even. But he screams in terror if I leave him in there. He won't actually stay either, he just comes running out and up to me pleading in his little toddler voice with little toddler tears for me to hold him. How do I say no?

At the same time, do I want my child sleeping with me for the rest of my life? Not really. I do want to get a life at some point in the near future. And a kid in the bed would definitely be a problem.

Hmmm...difficult...

Nineteenth Nervous Breakdown

2008-12-13T16:23:00.005-06:00

Not just a song you know. Toddler is a big fan of giving me these right after he gives me a panic attack.

Oh, you want a for instance. Well let's talk about a seemingly harmless trip to Starbucks. I get my latte, milk and a sweet for him. He picks out where we sit, and then he waits patiently for his slave to bring him his goodies (No this did not trigger the panic attack keep your pants on). He takes one sip, then proceeds to spend the rest of the time running around the store. I decide its time to leave, but with my purse, book, and two drinks I can't exactly forcibly remove him without letting something go.

Cue the extra hands. Not really, but I tuck a kid under one arm, a book under the other with my purse around my wrist and a drink in each hand I make it out the door just before he wriggles out from my arm. I just get my purse and book into the car when he takes off around the corner. I now have to hit the lock button on the key fob and leave the drinks on the hood whilst I run after him in 3-inch boots and a sweater dress. I finally get a hold of him and carry him screaming back to the car. Not sure what people thought about that. I really don't care.

It took ten minutes of slow-deep breathes in the front seat to calm me enough to drive. He wasn't even phased. Just kicked off his shoes and started singing to himself. So needless to say, a trip to the pet store to look at the puppies and kitties was no longer an available option for Toddler.

We went grocery shopping after taking a very long driving detour. No too bad in comparison with The Starbucks Episode, but enough to force him into a nap when we got back. Ahh, the sounds of silence. If only the cat would keeps her fury self out of my face (laying on my stomach on my bed as I type, I should have known better).

In hindsight, he usually does his fleeing from Starbucks bit everytime we go. Such a shame that my addiction to their latte's overshadows the impending doom I will face when its time to leave. At least its my only real addiction; reading and TV can't count seeing as I don't put them in my mouth or body :).

Thinking about family

2008-12-13T00:13:00.000-06:00

Perhaps by now you are probably thinking "Who the heck is this person?" I will not leave you in the dark for much longer. Let me give you some background information.

**WARNING** This will be long with a lot of very short sentences. Deal with it...or not. :)

I love my family. They may be crazed and out of their minds, but their mine. And that's just my dad's side. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

My dad is one of 4 children who are first generation Americans. His parents immigrated from Eastern Europe between WW1 and WW2. My two older aunts were born in the early 40's and then my dad and his lil sis came around in the early 50's. Which meant that he was a living dolls for his older sisters :)

My mom was born in a small college town in NY and was the middle of three girls. She grew up on a farm and had a pony. Yes, you read correctly, a pony. Her own pony. and why don't I have one? Who knows...

Well my parents both went to college and Florida which is where they met...at a bar. How romantic...

So they got married and moved to CA for a year before my dad got transferred to the Lone Star state. Then after 5 years they had my older brother. I think he really got used to being the only child because when I came around he didn't acknowledge that I existed. And to make it worse, my mom got pregnant again when I was 5 months old and that's how I became the middle child. At least I was the only girl so that made it a little easier. Well once my little brother was out, my mom had "the procedure" because it was going to be a cold day in hell before she got pregnant again.

I had it pretty easy growing up. Being the only girl, I never had hand me downs, and my mom liked to dress me up. I took ballet and tap starting at the age of 3 and didn't stop until I graduated high school. I took an aversion to the outdoors and spent as little time as possible outside. What? I'm a girl. I had a lot of friends in elementary school, but middle school was...well...I don't talk about middle school. Let's just say that pre-teen girls are mean. Very, very mean.

I met my best friend in high school. We were linked by one common goal, avoid the mean people. She learned quickly to avoid giving my Coke and brownies...I had a low tolerance for caffeine and sugar at the time (now I can 3 latte's and be dead tired). High school went by in a flash, not completely without their nightmares.

My little brother had a lot of issues. I'm not sure if we could have seen all of them coming. But I'm sure it couldn't have been easy for him to follow-up after honor students. By the time he was in middle school, he was getting into trouble, hanging out with the wrong people, and getting into drugs. I spent as little time as possible at home because he was SO mean and dark hanging around the house when he was grounded. I don't know how my parents survived. I actually moved out of my house my last month of senior year. I had finals and AP exams to study for, and my brother, in one of his terror fits, spat in my face and threatened to kill me. I left for dance class, came back, packed my bags, and went to Best Friend's house. Her parents were real understanding and let me stay with them until the end of the school year. We shared a room, a bed for that matter, and a bathroom and we survived.

I left for college after that. I spent my freshman year at a state school in Florida, barely studying, going to parties and drinking. Now don't judge, not much studying was required and I made mostly A's with a couple of B's that year. That was my one and only experience with alcohol poisoning. I also met Ethan that same night. I don't remember meeting him, but the stories from my friends say that it was his house that I passed out at, and he held my hair back while my body attempted to purge itself of the copious amounts of alcohol I had consumed. We started dating a month later. It didn't last long, but it was nice.

I transferred to a state school in Texas the next year, for no other reason other than I had a feeling I needed to be there. Sophmore year went uneventful, but the summer before my junior year my mom got diagnosed with breast cancer. Now to flashback a bit, my dad's mother died of ovarian cancer and his little sister died of breast cancer. So this was not news I wanted to hear. I fled from home before junior year started ad spent a week with my cousin whose mother was my aunt who died of b.c. so he understood what I was going through. It was nice to get away and not think about it.

She went through all the traditional and homeopathic treatments (chemo, acupuncture, physical therapy, positive thinking). In November, she went in for pre-surgery testing, and they couldn't actually find any cancer. Yea. But the Sunday before Thanksgiving a huge storm came through and drowned my car. Literally. The next day I had it towed to the car dealership, came home and got a phone call. I should preface this next part with the fact that my dad sometimes has a sick sense of humor. My dad called and said "Lil Brother has died". I told him to stop joking, it wasn't funny. But he just repeated it and the sound in his voice made me realize he wasn't joking. Dad came home from work and went to check up on him in his room, he usually slept all afternoon, and he walked in to find him unconscious in his bed with blood all over the place. The hospital said it was an accidental overdose. He had taken some kind of really strong Advil pills and combined with alcohol over a period of time eroded his stomach. He coughed up blood and passed out.

Well, lets just say it is very confusing to be incredibly upset, and somehow relieved at the same time. I know that sounds mean, but I still have nightmares of the things I was afraid he would do to me, only to wake up and realize that he is dead. So you see, relief and grief at the same time.

His friends all said he was so happy all the time, my family was SHOCKED to hear this since he was always mean and moody and sulky when he was around us. We still hear from them around this time every year.

So I got pregnant exactly 1 year later, and named my little boy after my brother. It may not seem like I was likely to do that. But I think if he had lived, he might have gotten his act together and done something with his life. He was really smart when he actually put an effort in.

Now I have the most adorable, annoying, funny, whining 2-year old in the world and I wouldn't change a thing about my life.

So that's my family (extended relatives not included), and a bit of personal history. My many phobias, idiosyncrasies, glitches, defects, and otherwise alarming traits will be revealed in no time I'm sure.

5 days and counting

2008-12-12T13:03:00.001-06:00

Only 5 more working days until I am off for 2 WEEKS! Yea! I haven't
taken 2 weeks off since...well...never. The last time I even took 1
week off I was 4 months pregnant and went to Disney World on my last
spring break of college.

Funny story there. So I am obviously pregnant, and we are in Epcot
taking pictures with Pooh and Tigger inside the toy store, you know
where I'm talking about. Well, Tigger and Pooh start tickling me, then
they start trying to nudge the other one away from me. I'm not sure
still what to think about that. But it made for some pretty funny
pictures taken by my friend.

I miss Disney World. Its been so long I can't remember what the Magic
Kingdom smells like :(

Just bought my brother's X-mas gift online. I love Amazon. Not that I
don't like going out shopping for real, just not when I feel rushed.
And since he gave me the list and said, "Buy it on Amazon its cheaper
and you can get free shipping", I thought that I should follow his
instructions. Hopefully my mom will wrap them for me before I even get
into town. That would be lovely.

Wow. I just read that and can you say random? Now I understand my
friends' looks when we are having a conversation...

I saw this on another Blogger's post and had to try. And no, I'm not British. I've never been outside the continental U.S.

You Are 65% British

Congrats, mate. You're are probably British.

(If not, definitely Australian. Or Kiwi. Or Canadian.)

You enjoy most aspects of mainstream British culture, without being stereotypical about it.

You also have a typical British temperament. You wouldn't dream of being impolite.

How British Are You?