365 days left

yesterday i turned 29! since 2008 is a leap year, today i still have 365 days left in my twenties. i think this was one of the best birthdays ever.

andrew fixed crepes for breakfast. one time long ago, i read a little article about how some sap had felt terrible for all the sugar that humming birds ate, so they mixed up the red food using sweetnlow or something. the little humming birds ate and ate but their little tummies were still empty, not having any sugar in them, and so they died. i kind of felt like the little humming birds yesterday morning. my sausage was turkey. my crepes were made with egg beaters. the toppings were all sugar free. my milk was skim. but then i ate a whole box of creme puffs! and i had fish n chips for lunch and chocolate rum cake for dinner. so it was good to have such a sensible breakfast.

here we are out for an evening birthday celebration:

its the simple things in life

thirteen simple pleasures week #27 1. waking up on saturday morning without the alarm clock 2. napping beneath ceiling fans 3. making homemade banana splits 4. cool clean sheets again bare shoulders 5. holding hands 6. wiggly tiny baby toes 7. pressed black dress shirts that are completely free of all cat hair 8. feeling grass between my toes 9. ice cold diet coke 10. grilling steaks on the new grill 11. kitties that curl up and purr on you 12. tipping your head back for a mouthful of fake whipped cream from a can 13. i can't think of a last one; what's your favorite simple thing?

disaster strikes again

hopefully this isn't the second of three catastrphies. first the window washer, now the master bedroom closet, what could be next?

we were quietly eating our dinner last night when we heard the most awful noise and saw the cat scamper by. that's really a sign of instant blame. guiltily scampering by after a crashing sound. turns out it wasn't zoe, or at least we couldn't figure out how she could have single handedly done this: the entire master bedroom walk in closet collapsed in a heap. all the shelving just pitched themselves off the walls and onto the floor. it was like something out of a tom hanks movie. you can just picture him hanging the very last shirt up, calling to his wife to come view the finished project, and as she enters the room, with his back to the closet, the entire thing avalanches to the floor.

andrew thinks he can fix it. i think we should call maintence to come fix it. i guess we'll see when i get home tonight which of us was right on that one.

calamity might be my middle name

the window washer fell on me and we both nearly died. except with slightly less drama and a bit more laughter.

at work we hire a company to periodically wash the office windows. apparently our housekeeping staff doesn't do windows. so yesterday a couple of fairly dirty men pulled up in a remarkably dirty van and cleaned our windows. my first thought was wondering how they could manage to leave something cleaner than when they found it. well, they did have to go around the outside windows twice.

then they came inside.

my office is kind of cramped. mostly due to the excessive number of filing cabinets lining two of the walls. so when the guy came into my office to wash the windows mostly behind me, that left me mostly trapped at my desk.

he said, "don't be startled, but i'm right behind you."

and then he fell off his ladder, rammed me more into my desk, hit his head on the wall, and slid down the wall. there was no blood but he did leave a mark on the wall. and also broke the mini blinds. the ladder he had been standing on looked like it was made of aluminum foil. it certainly crumpled like it was made out of aluminum foil.

i felt kind of bad for the guy. and also all afternoon my coworkers kept teasing me about how guys are always falling for me.

i can't say for sure, but i have a fair hunch

andrew keeps suggesting that i post this recipe. i keep suggesting that he make this recipe for me. how can i possibly recommend something to my readers if i myself have not tried it?? well, i have read the ingredients list, and i have a fair hunch that its pretty darned tasty. i mean, i like everything in it. so maybe now that i've posted it, he'll finally make it.

*fingers crossed*

peaches and cream dessert

3/4 cup flour
1 t baking power
1 3oz pkg instant vanilla pudding mix
1/2 t salt
3 T butter
1/2 cup milk
1 egg
1 20oz can peaches
1 8oz pkg cream cheese, easier to mix if room temp
1/2 cup sugar
3 T peach juice
1 T sugar
1/2 t cinnamon

mix up together then flour, baking powder, vanilla pudding, salt, butter, milk, and egg in a bowl. beat for two minutes. pour into greesed pie plate. drain peaches, saving juice. mix together the cream cheese, 1/2 cup sugar, and the peach juice. spread peaches in pie plate over the first stuff. spread cream cheese mix over the peaches. mix 1 T sugar and the 1/2 t cinnamon. sprinkle over the top. bake at 350 for 30-35 minutes. if you don't know to serve this with somewhat melty vanilla ice cream, there is simply something wrong with the world.

its one week until my birthday! i'm fairly excited...its my last birthday as a twenty something. we are all going out to my favorite casino to celebrate and i cannot wait. if i know you and you want to join us, email me. otherwise, you've still got a week, so no need for everyone to rush the mall today. some of you can go tomorrow...

what's in a name?

thirteen names i will never want to name my kid week #26 first off, i do not have any children nor am i expecting any children; i have just recently noticed a lot of bad naming going on out there. second, if one of the names listed below happens to be the name you have choosen for your child, please don't take my opinions personally. third, there are several names on the list which are not bad names at all, they just for one reason or another don't fit well with me. that being said, there seems to be a huge section of the population that does not give any long term concideration in naming their children. they don't seem to realize the fact that their children will someday grow up, must live with whatever crazy name they have been given, face the terrible prospect of junior high or job interviews, and often grow into those names (so if your last name is Hooker, don't name your child Destiny. i know, its so tempting, but you must resist). parents need to remember that they are naming people not puppies. i think there has to be some coorelation out there between the amount of thought put into baby names and the income/education level of parents, but i have no data to back that up. 1. names that are misspelled (Jyon, or Paychence) 2. names that have apostrophes (J'ohn or A'zyian) 3. overly biblical, especially old testament names (Obediah) 4. brand names (Lexus, Loreal, Courvoisier) 5. nouns (princess, destiny, apple) 6. similar to celebrity names (Paris Nicole) 7. two common and/or short names back to back (Fred George Smith, it just doesn't seem to roll off the tougue well.) 8. names that are overly clever (Adream, or Neveah which is heaven backwards. all else aside, you probably aren't the first one to think it up) 9. names from groups or ethnicities to which i do not belong (Juan and Moonbeam are great possible names but since i'm neither Hispanic or Native American or a hippie, i should choose something else) 10. twin names that match (Ruby and Pearl. Lily and Violet. Dakota and Cheyenne. Gabriel and Gabriele. twins may or may not be identical. and also, even if they do look alike, they are in fact separate people. i think i would grow up to be a psycho killer if i not only looked just like my sister but also had the same name. every moment of my life would be annoying) 11. names that are either a combination of two names or a combination of the parents names (you are Kylie, he is Tyler, and then name the kid Kyler) 12. having more than three names, or having more than one middle name. i get how this sometimes happens. it is a cultural thing or its a family obligation sort of thing. and since, as far as i know, i don't fall into either category, i can safely avoid this. 13. naming the child names that are shortened versions of other names. Nicknames are great, but birth certificates shouldn't actually say Timmy, Tommy, Larry, etc. for some laughs, and some really snarky remarks, visit: the bad baby name blog

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everybody congratulate andrew! he's been dieting and working out and has actual fitness goals and he's lost ten pounds!!!

some days are stranger than others

i know i'm going to get some fiestier google hits after publishing this story, but i think it will be worth it. its just not every day you visit a half dozen porn shops and buy a coworker an inflatable husband. unless of course, you live in las vegas and then maybe its not so strange.

one of my coworker's had a birthday last friday, and she very much enjoys crass sorts of things. she's loads of laughs and organized a girls night out to see chipndales (i declined. honest.) her husband left her about five years ago and i don't think she's dated recently. my boss suggested we go in together to get some tacky present, like a blow up doll, and then without technically nominating me to be the shopper, left town on a business trip and thereby defaulting me to be the shopper.

i didn't want to bring a completely inappriopriate gift to work. i wanted something more in the line of adult novelty not adult toy. there is a big difference. after visiting several stores, andrew and i were disheartened. yeah, i dragged him along.

at that point, we are driving around looking for more adult emporiums and andrew states, "i don't know if i'm psychologically damaged from the army or if i'm psychologically damaged from living here, but i just want to point my machine gun at all the bad drivers." i think about this for a while and finally decide to ask for clarification. turns out its from the army. after a couple tours in iraq, he generally associates radically poor driving with car bombs. so if you are driving around baghdad and are driving like someone from las vegas, the army is going to assume you have a car bomb and they will probably point their machine guns at you.

then we found the perfect present. we found a ken doll inflatable husband complete with a barbie-doll-pink carrying case much like the old happy meal boxes. on the front of the box, he's standing there in a pair of boxers, in the kitchen, looking for all the world like he just did the dishes for you. the back of the box had a couple of paragraphs detailing how wonderful the product is: he'll listen attentively, he will not interupt, he won't tell you how to manage your money, he'll never pass gas, and he floats! andrew started to read this all to me and instinctively i said, "shush. they'll think we are weird..." he looks at me, "you think that These People will think that You are weird??" "yeah...good point..." we were clearly the most normal people in the building.

at walmart we found an appriately funny old people card and a gift bag. and off to work i went with the present. my boss and i gave it to her first thing before everyone else got there but then at 3 we all had cake and out came the present. most everyone in the room was female and the boys all mysteriously wondered away. we passed around the box and all giggled. suddenly everything everyone said had a lewd conotation. and in the end, the birthday girl just had to get him out of the box.

he was only three feet tall!!

and.

and, he had about five chest hairs drawn on him.

it was hysterical! i don't remember the last time i laughed that much. i wiped so many tears away.

in the back there, you can kind of see the gift bag. its this thousand year old guy with his bowling ball. and the bag says: chicks dig jocks.

oh the horror

on saturday morning, i paid for my second nevada haircut. and promptly went home and cried. they just don't listen. i didn't want more layers; i wanted the back shorter. but in the end, its just hair. and i don't really see it all that much unlike my hand or knee or somewhere i can glance at without a mirror.

so to celebrate having such scary hair, i've spent most of the rest of the entire weekend watching scary movies. i started with the classics: the exorcist and psycho. and then moved on to the other scary movies we randomly own: stir of echos, skeloton key, gothika. after all that, i don't think my hair looks all that bad anymore.

kids can be cute sometimes

my dad sent me one of those email forwards about cute kids. i have no idea where this originated or if its even remotely true, but i really enjoyed this one:

The children were lined up in the cafeteria of a Catholic Elementary school
for lunch. At the head of the table was a large pile of apples. The nun made a
note, and posted on the apple tray: "Take only ONE. God is watching."

Moving further along the lunch line, at the other end of the table was a large pile of
chocolate chip cookies. A child had written a note, "Take all you want. God is
watching the apples."

the things we do for love

uff. i got up at 4am this morning to take andrew to the airport. its his first weekend with nv national guard and he had to fly up to reno/carson city for in processing. yup. that's right. we've been in nevada four months and this is his first weekend with the guard.

i normally get up at five. i suppose four isn't that big a difference, but you know, it really is. still, i couldn't bear for him to go to the airport alone, or really more importantly to arrive back home alone with noone meeting him. so, the things we do for love...

how was your easter?

we had a good easter. we got all spiffied up and went to church. afterwards we went out for breakfast. lent is over so i ate a ton of bacon and sausage while andrew drank his body weight in soda. then we went home and napped since our tummies were a little unhappy.

breakfast was a little strange though. we were the only people in the restaraunt in church clothes. its just so weird to feel like the only twenty something that goes to church. humphft.

the easter bunny also visited, bringing dvd's and chocolates and a cute game of catch and toss.

its the expression on the bunny's face that really sets it off. he just looks so stunned. like he was raised to be a good, decent bunny. his mom hoped he'd be a lawyer or doctor or sportstar but instead he ran off to vegas, fell in with the wrong crowd out at the palms, and one day woke up and realized he'd signed a contract with the easter product people. as he flies through the air, i can hear him thinking, 'but i went to college. i should have a better job than this...'

a recommendation

i recently discovered this blog: 52cupcakes

every week she posts a new cupcake, the pictures are almost as good as actually eating the real thing, and her dog is cute too. what's not to love? check it out...

good times

thirteen things i did and/or learned during my parents' first visit to las vegas earlier this week

week #25

1. be at the airport, in the right spot, to pick them up on time. that way if they take a different escalator, can't find you and think you've forgotten about their visit, they at least hear airport sounds in the background of the phone call

2. people watch at the airport. my parents flew in on a sunday, the day most people fly out. you can really tell the difference between the happy people flying into vegas on friday night and the bedraggled people flying home on sunday afternoon. yikes. bachelor/bachelorette parties really take a toll on some people.

3. despite being nearly thirty, i think my parents are always impressed when i cook for them, or possibly that i can cook and no one dies mid dinner.

4. drive around and point at all the spectacles including condos starting at the mid 800's, cabs with a dozen naked butts, pink stucco gas stations and cell phone towers disguised as really really tall palm trees.

5. there are several inexpensive and/or free things to do on the strip, my favorite of which are the fountains and the gardens at the bellagio.

6. visit shoe stores that are supposed to be selling discount shoes. get there and realize the cheapest shoes are over $100 (i don't know why we were surprised, the outlet was next door to a lamborghini dealership after all). get into the car and drive to the shoe store with the big sign in the window: hundreds of shoes $3.99

7. visit all the various breakfasty restaurants their hometown does not offer: blueberry hill, IHOP, the original pancake house, etc

8. watch the NCAA championship and cheer for florida. not because we especially like florida or hate ohio (though they are probably going to have a complex if they lose to florida in baseball this summer) but because we want donevan to move to kentucky (and the best time to negotiate any move is after a big win).

9. eat your weight in ice cream. i sprained my ankle this week. can't run anyway, might as well eat ice cream. peanut butter cup. cookie dough. cookies n cream. butter pecan. yum yum yum.

10. if you want to go to hoover dam, prepare for this to be an all day event. yes, its only twenty or so miles outside of town, but the last billion of those miles seem like a parking lot. i think the last four miles took over an hour. and then there would be funny signs telling us to reduce speed up ahead...

11. not everybody wants to try new things. i took my parents and andrew to a little mexican place that served more authentic dishes. mom got her standard chimi. dad got a burrito. andrew cried because he couldn't order enchilada suprema. i was the only one who tried something i'd never had before. but they were happy with their things so maybe i shouldn't press them for change.

12. drive around and point at all the specticals including how every community is gated but the gate isn't ever closed, or how every community has a wall but the wall is only four feet high, or how some roads are three lanes and sixteen ft wide and some roads are one lane and thirty two feet wide, and just in general the shear number of sea green stucco houses.

13. saying good bye is always hard, whether you live two hundred miles away or two thousand.

Excitement!

Woo! Our first visitors since we moved are coming today! My parents are on the way even as I write this. Tra da la!