no rest for the road warrior

tomorrow i head back out to fabulous las vegas for work. i kind of feel like i'm going to be gone for forever or maybe that's just because my suitcase is so full and heavy. you can't own too many shoes but you can in fact pack too many.

what brings us all here?

thirteen search referralsweek #12 wow. i haven't blogged since last thursday. um. i have a good excuse, i'm sure of it...i spent the weekend snuggled up to my husband (he's still in the army and i live in a different town so for a little while longer but not too long, i won't see him everyday), and then i left for a work trip. i've been in staunton, va. its pronounced st *ant* on even though there clearly is a u in the name and so you'd think it would be st *aw* nton. work was good and now i'm home. in the meantime, i keep checking my site's stat counter and i'm kind of amused at the things that people searched for which led them to me. some of the things make sense and some just do not. 1. "spaulding's doughnuts," i get a couple of hits a week from people searching for these fatty tasty gems. i think i only mentioned them once and i don't even recall why now. and i'm likely to get a thousand more hits since i've now gone and mentioned them a second time. how completely odd. 2. "pudding-buddha," i did an entry on these jelly molds that make little edible jiggly buddhas. 3. "lexington joyland park history," its a closed down rollercoaster ride and former TT topic 4. "spicy and fruity salsa," that's how i described chutney 5. "chucky cheese santa maria," i do not understand how those two things go together or why 6. "fun pancakes," my first recipe entry 7. "goes lexington ky anne mongolia," i don't know anyone named anne mongolia 8. "tucson car," we just bought one except its not a car but a mini adventure vehicle 9. "creek freak wv," i can't even come up with a quip for that one 10. "what restaurant was at bangkok house lexington ky before?" i think that's just what its always been 11."alberton live mash up," i don't know what that means. maybe some of the words are homonym typos? 12. "leftist propaganda," i don't think they found quite what they were looking for on that one 13. "blue john skim milk," so. is that a brand name or some cia code word?

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i love magnets

thirteen things on my fridge week #11i adore magnets and have a great many on my fridge. so many that most aren't holding anything up, they are just hanging onto the fridge looking like a fun time. and i'm kind of weird about my collecting habits. i also collect shot glasses. i want to buy my own shot glasses from only places i've been. i'm just not that excited about ones purchased by other people from places i've never gone. BUT, i never, which means rarely rarely, buy my own magnets. i seem to only want ones gifted to me by other people while they are at fun exotic locations (or sometimes found at mundane places like the kitchen store in the mall and used as stocking stuffers, etc.) 1. a german stein purchased by andrew, my amazing husband, while in germany in 2005 2. under a couple of magnets are the obligatory coupons, some probably expired 3. a french breakfast tray purchased by my mom while on layover in paris 4. i also have the fall church choir schedule pinned up by a couple of magnets 5. i have a collection of madona, most with child (i think there are over a dozen in the set but only five are pictured here), that i purchased while visiting maryann in arizon, but she talked me into buying them (being named mary herself and raised catholic and all) so i think these still count 6-7. the fuzzy lion toy has magnets in his toes! so he walks across the fridge! its just the cutest thing ever!! this was a stocking stuffer from andrew the first year we dated (the other stocking stuffer was a chapstick cozy/key chain and between the two items, i knew it was true love). the other item shown is one of many chinese carryout menus stuck to my fridge. 8. there are several other take out menus pinned up including patchen thai with the best veggie tempura in town 9. i have a note pad shaped like an orange slice, great for grocery lists 10. noah's ark pair of magnets bought on ebay. one is just the boat and animals, the other is the boat on the water, so its sort of a story/timeline thing 11. and there are a couple of recipes pinned up, including the famous chocolate gravy (terribly bad for you and oh my gosh yummy on extra buttery biscuits: warm 4 cups milk and 1 t vanilla on med heat; mix separately 1 cup sugar, 3-4 T flour and 3-4 T cocoa; pour 1/3 milk into dry ingredients to make a paste; return past to soucean with remaining milk; stir unti it thickens but don't ever let the milk boil). i cannot give this any higher of a recommendation than that sort of eye's roll/shudder sort of memory goodness 12. a german cuckoo clock also bought by andrew but given to me in 2004 after he was stationed there for a while 13. these are supposed to be dancing pigs. i worked at a kitchen store while in college and that is what the corporate discription of them was: 'dancing pigs.' and, well, not to be overly graphic because this is generally a family friendly site and also my mom reads this blog...*blush*...but we all had quite a time laughing at the magnet because it was sort of top heavy and so sometimes the pigs fell over and 'danced' horizontally. naturally when the store went out of business, i had to nab the 'dancing' pig magnet

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monday madness

i wasn't feeling terribly creative all on my own, so i'm filling out a meme. and in case you are following along with the home game, here's how i feel about these things

1. How do you eat an oreo cookie?
whole. i shove the whole thing in my piehole

2. How long does it take you to eat lunch?
can this be in seconds? i really think i either shove it down at the speed of light, while at my desk, or take a couple of bites and then get caught up with something, at my desk, and the rest gets cold and goes uneaten. i know, so very pathetic.

3. Caffeine or decaf?
caffeine all the way baby. i would never drink a decaf version of something that clearly should be caffeinated.

4. Chicken or beef?
whatever is on the plate in front of me

5. Pen or pencil?
mostly pen and i particularly dig on green and purple precise v7's

6. Autumn or spring?
spring i think. i love how everyone dresses in tank tops and shorts on the first even slightly warmish day of spring (even though they should be frostbitten at 50 degree weather, they are just so excited that its maybe a little bit spring)

7. Baseball or basketball?
neither. football.

8. 'Survivor' or 'The Amazing Race?'
nope, neither. i'm not a fan of reality tv, nope, none of the shows. i know, i'm the only one alive who's not into something...

welcome to monday

the results are in

if you are going to have a really unhealthy dinner, what is your food of choice?

62% of my readers prefered pizza
14% prefered hamburgers
24% prefered tacos
0% sadly no one prefered cupcakes

i have, but i think only one time, had cupcakes for dinner...the little two pack from the gas station with the polymer icing...you know what i'm talking about...the orange ones are the best. otherwise, i think i rank my preferences the same as the other voters. i do sometimes get a craving for chili cheese dogs though. sonic's got some good ones but no one really tops gold star chili. its too bad my fridge is currently stocked with healthy things so i have no excuse to run out and get something terribly bad for me for dinner.

so now a new poll is up...go over there and vote on this months poll

autumnal equinox

thirteen things i want to accomplish this fall (week #10) the first day of fall is next week, 9/23. i kept meaning to make a to do list for the summer, clearly i didn't accomplish anything this summer as i never even managed to make the list. *sigh* i'll do better this fall. really. ok, maybe. hopefully. the first day of winter is 12/22/06, so i have a couple of months to get these done. ok, so some of them are going to happen no matter what. the wheels are in motion, but i can accomplish them with greatness or with mediocrity (i'd prefer the first option). these are in no particular order of importance or schedule 1. organize all my recipies, they are scattered on postits and emails and pages ripped out from magazines. i have one of those make your own cookbook books and have been meaning to get it all organized for a while. now is the time. 2. finish personal address book. this is almost as bad as the recipes. i just need to get it all into outlook or excel or something i don't even care what but all in one place. 3. organize the craft supplies and craft projects. i have a couple of plastic tubs of crafty things and then a whole lot of crafty things that won't fit. so i need to buy a couple more tubs and get it all squared away. 4. secure enough walkathon prizes. the walkathon is going to happen whether i accomplish this or not, but i'd rather i got this done. it would just be nicer all around if everyone got a prize. 5. remember to write thank you notes for walkathon sponsors. i think handwritten thank you notes are the most amazing thing and since no one else in the world does this, it carries an amazing weight. but at the same time, its a lot of time and work, so we'll see. 6. figure out what to do: lease is up in october 7. probably move, hopefully just within this complex, either way, andrew should be moving in so that counts as a move too 8. finish one non fiction book (i keep starting them but never finishing) 9. attend all possible Room in the Inn meetings (i was a bit hit or miss last fall/winter and this is the homeless program that i volunteer with so its important) 10. my job feels very up in the air at the moment and while i have no control of the company's decisions, i want to find the best possible solution for me and mine 11. i want to knit something. i tried to start knitting a couple years back and never did much. i'd like to finish that potholder. 12. i'm really hit or miss with excercising. one or the other: i want to either break it to my inner self that i'm a lazy couch potato or finally get into a real excercise habit. 13. i like to try a new recipe every couple of weeks. but andrew is home now and he is a much, MUCH less adventurous eater/cooker than i. so, i'd still like to try new things, about every other week, but i want to try new and different things that i think he'd like. this could either end up rather boring or with hedious deaths.

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more leftist propaganda

today's lefty one-a-day calendar says: it is good luck to see the moon over your left shoulder. that seemed kind of odd and random so i tried to look into it. however, i could not independently verify this though google. i did discover that it is very very bad luck to view the new moon for the first time over your left shoulder. new moons should apparently only be viewed over the right and i guess, according to the calendar, all other moons over the left. since it is now morning and there are no moons out, i guess i'm good for the day.

additions to the family

yesterday we brought home our new car, a 2006 hyundai tucson, mini adventure vehicle. the altima now has a new baby brother...i just hope she's not too tramatized about how, like a good many people out there, her little brother is bigger than her...

part of me will always mourn

today, i am honoring carlton w. bartels who was 44 when he died in the wtc. this is a part of a match up program. bloggers everywhere signed up and then were paired with the name of one of the victims. i was given carl and i think i would have really liked him, had i ever been given the chance to meet him. at first i was worried, what if i was matched up with someone crummy or uninteresting but that is simply absurd. every person who is born has the capacity to be someone wonderful. everyone is interesting in their own ways. everyone is a precious snowflake. part of me will always mourn because some people, like the hijakers, use their capacity for harm but not carl, he wanted to save the world. he had a brilliant mind and spirit to match.

carlton was an electrical engineer by training and had become, at 26, one of the top utility regulators in vermont. later he was a pioneer of cantor fitzgerald's greenhouse gases brokering systems; he designed a way to help companies and governments reduce emissions worldwide. he loved to camp, canoe, hike, skydive and cook tasty things for his wife and two daughters. his father-in-law just wasn't too sure of carl's intentions, when long haired and clad in a frindgy jacket, carl showed up on their doorstep. during his 20s, he travelled the world and made a fashion mishap. while living in a thai village, carl took to wearing a favorite sarong, which later turned out to be a woman's sarong. the villagers giggled but so did carl, who continued to wear the outfit years later even while living in staten island. friends called him a renaissance man, so i think he must have been a lot like my husband, always good for a bit of random trivia. he was full of intelligence, insight, enthusiasm and boundless energy. his family called him a superb father and husband. he is survived by his wife Jane Muller; parents, Charles and Marion; daughters, Melina and Eva and two brothers, Gary and Richard.

most of this information came from Newsday, CNN and New York Times. i know this is a hard day for a lot of people out there, but i'm glad to know that occationally good people like carl come along and brighten up the world for a while.

breakfast pie

i am a fan of pie. dessert pie and not-dessert pie. i like dinners that can be all in the same dish, pan, pot. i think i like not-dessert pie even more because its called pie. i like shepherd's pie. i like chicken pot pie. i like quiche and am delighted that its a brunchy sorta pie. my mom sent me this recipe and its like a really easy quiche; its a full on breakfast pie. i'll post the recipe as i make it but you can do whatever you like. any kind of breakfast meat will do. use any sort of cheese you like. i like onions and red peppers. maybe you like green peppers and mushrooms or maybe even asparagus. there is a little european restaurant downtown called natasha's and one of the dishes is called midnight chicken. its my favorite there but it always has slightly different veggies in it. the idea behind the dish is that sometimes friends drop by unannounced and you just have to throw what you got in a pot. the recipe is like that.

breakfast pie

3 cups of shredded, thawed shredded hash brown potatoes
1/3 cup melted butter
1/2 lb maple sausage
1/2 cup yellow onion, chopped
1/2 cup red pepper, chopped
1 cup shredded cheddar
5-6 eggs, beaten

preheat the oven to 350. spread potatoes into a 9" pie plate, drizzle butter, toss about to coat. you can cut calories by using non stick butter flavored spray, but you kind of half to use a lot and toss a couple of times. bake for 25 minutes until golden and crispy. brown sausage and onions until cooked thoroughly. spread across potatoes. spread red pepper on top too. beat eggs and mix in cheese. salt and pepper to taste. pour eggs on top of everything, spread to cover. bake 25 more minutes or until eggs are done to your taste. i like my eggs very done and Not Jiggly At All which ends up being about 30 minutes. this is great fresh, reheated, and as cold leftovers. enjoy!

the smiles are slightly different

saying good bye



saying hello

its been a long year for a lot of folks

the army finally called yesterday...i get to pick up my cute husband tonight. his second tour is just hours away from being completely finished and done and over and then we get to be normal people again. nothing could make me sad today!

its less confidential if you fax it to the wrong place

i adore my officemates, just not all my coworkers. my company works in about 15 states, therefore i don't work with all my coworkers on a regular basis. and on occasion, my office likes to poke fun at the other offices...so yesterday was a really funny day.

everyone in other parts of the company fax their work to my office. we were getting so many faxes that our several fax machines and phone lines could not keep up. about two years ago we switched to a fax server. we can now receive over twenty faxes at the same time, and on occation actually do. everyone faxes to an 888 number, their fax travels the world, it is changed to a pdf file, and arrives in our office as an email attachment. everyone in my office has access to a generic email account which receives all the faxes. every so often i log into the account, pick out the faxes that are for me, and leave the rest for my officemates. many times a day we receive someone else's fax. someone in another office meant to fax to a local business or to a different office but wasn't paying attention and put in our #.

at some point earlier in the week, someone in a different office was written up for doing a particularly poor job. the write up detailed the specific things the employee was terrible at and encouraged them to do better. it was signed at the bottom, labelled confidential at the top, and the accidentally faxed to us. and while i feel really bad for the employee, we all had a great big laugh about this since we all got the email and all opened the attached fax and all read the "confidential memo."