Kimba

A penny saved...

Leap Year! How great is having one extra day? Had I any guts I would have called in sick today and spent it lounging in bed eating bon bons. Or shopping till I dropped. Or heading down to the sandy beaches in Santa Cruz. Or exploring San Fran. Instead? Instead I went to work just like any other day and worked on mundane projects until 5:30.

To make up for it, I made reservations for Caleb and Mark and I (sadly, Bridge is out of town...hope you're having fun!) at Amber India, a local higher-end restaurant. I felt we should celebrate! And celebrate we did, with delicious foods I can't pronounce. It was fabulous. They had floating flower petals in a bowl in the bathroom, tiled flat sinks, and I don't think my water glass ever got below 3/4 full. (Which is pretty crazy, since Indian food can be spicy...)

On another note, I decided to flip through my journal to see what I was doing last Leap Day. I had just returned from visiting Caleb in Houston, where he'd moved to work for a year. It was in the middle of winter in Utah, and Houston was so refreshing, so warm and sunny. We drove to San Antonio for the day and walked The Riverwalk. Halfway through the day we were strolling along the walk when suddenly we were bombarded by a ginormous splat of bird poo. Orange, drippy, bird poo. It covered my hair, my shoulder, my arm, part of my pants, and went all over my shoes. And that's just me. Never in my life have I ever seen a bird poop that much, but there we were on The Riverwalk, three hours from a fresh change of clothes. And a shower. When we finally found a hotel that had public bathrooms, I rushed inside to clean up, only to discover the soap was nearly out, and all they had was one tiny sink. One tiny marble sink. It sucked.

I was also working two jobs to save up enough money to spend four months in Australia to study abroad. I was in school. I was helping my best friend get ready for her wedding. I had no idea whether I wanted to marry Caleb or not, and he had known for years. I was insanely confused and frustrated by this, and spent every waking (and sometimes sleep-filled) moment trying to decide what to do. I couldn't fathom what the next four years would be like, where I would be and what I would be doing.

I think about this alot, what it's going to be like next year. Next month. What will have changed, what will be the same. What will I have learned, what will be important to me. I can't even begin to imagine what will have happened by the next Leap Year, but I'm thinking it's going to be pretty different than where we are now. The younger you are, the more things change in a short period. I hope that the next four years will be as good as or better than the last, and I hope that next time? Next time I'll be able to enjoy Leap Day. Celebrate with a few kiddies or something.

Next time, there will be bon bons. That much I know.  

Three cheers for Science!

Seriously, where would we be without these scientific break throughs? Back in the Stone Ages, that's where.

Because it's a Wednesday, I'm thinkin'...

While I was running around doing errands today I saw a man standing on the side of the road with a sign, hoping for a handout from the various people waiting to get onto the freeway. This is very common, as I'm sure you know, and as for me and my house, I tend to ignore them. Heard too many stories, feel like if they really needed help, they wouldn't be standing in the same spot every single day. Because there are regulars, you know? And that just seems wrong to me.

Anyway.

So this man is standing there, and since I'm right next to him I check out his obligatory cardboard sign. It read:

"Down and Out Today. Any help?"

Down and out.....today. Like, yesterday was fine, the day before that kinda sucked, but today? Today blows. Please give me money to make my tomorrow better.

I could do this. You could do this! Who doesn't have a bad day here and there? Do you see me putting on ratty clothes, running a vacuum hose over my head to get that nice frizzed-out look, and setting up shop by the outlet of Target? NO. YOU DON'T. I handle my bad days the same way the rest of the population does, I plop down into my bed, No-Pants-Mood in full swing, with some chocolate and wait it out. Because as Ms. Annie always says, the sun will come out tomorrow.

That's all I'm sayin'.

Save Mart drop off...

As Caleb and I were walking back to our car with four thousand dollars worth of groceries tonight, we were suddenly reminded of this one time...

We had only been here a few months and I was slowly trying to faze out Caleb's Single-Man Accessories. Namely these two small denim covered pillows. I hated them, they were hideous and I wanted them out. OUT DEVIL DENIM! So I made a huge pile of Crap, and trucked it off to the Salvation Army.

*bytheway, I love the Salvation Army, I drop off a bag at least once a month. Shirts I haven't worn, shirts Caleb hasn't worn since we've been married, our old paper towel holder, etc. etc. etc. I get to get rid of the junk and feel twice as good doing so! Can I get an amen? Hmm?

So anyway, I dropped off  The Goods and washed my hands of the whole thing, not knowing that the two Evil Pillows were still in the trunk, shoved into the back. They blended right in. There they stayed for months, me telling Caleb to please drop them off, him promising he would, never happening, and round and round it went. One day as we were loading up our groceries I saw them, grabbed them and put them in the child seat of the grocery cart. I told Caleb that one of the homeless men would find it and have two nice denim (albeit ugly) pillows to lay his head and bum on. Genius idea, right?

He walked the cart back to the front of the store (he always does this, and I love him for it!) and took off in a jog, like a school boy running from the house he'd toilet papered. As he was running, one of the bag boys (that sounds so derogatory, what's their real title?) called out, "Hey! Man! Are these your pillows?"

And Caleb, never looking back yelled, "Nope!", and literally ran to the car. Meaning...not any more!!

I think you had to be there.

I have a horrible habit of leaving things in places they shouldn't go in public places. This drives Caleb insane. I can't count the times I've been browsing the isles of Safeway with my little basket when I suddenly decide I really don't need that jar of spaghetti sauce. So I place it, very lovingly, next to the tubes of Crest and Colgate and keep browsing. One time I actually took something out of my cart and put it at the end of the isle and lined it up just so. I straightened to find Caleb staring at me, slowly shaking his head. Busted.

Do you do this? Or something similar? What's one of your weird, quirky habits? Let's all share here, everyone's loved...

And the madeleines go to..

Time to announce the winner! After scouring the internet for a random number generator, finding said generator, figuring out said generator, and using said generator, my random number was 3, which means (Liv)ia is the winner! Congrats! I promise, they're delightful. Please send your address to dancingnancy_1 at hotmail dot com, and I'll ship 'em out!

Thanks to everyone, again, ya'll are fabulous. I'm not worthy.

When laughter strikes...

I read in a magazine the other day about this website called Stumble Upon, or stumbleupon.com.  Basically you create a profile and then pick a few categories you like. They add a little tool bar up there with all the other little gadgets and gizmos,(there's a lot of there, isn't there?) and you click on the "Stumble" bar and it randomly chooses a web page for you based on your preferences. You get to log whether you like it or not and the more you use it, the smarter it gets.

Got it? Go check it out, it's pretty neat.

Anyway, so I was stumbling today (great phrase Stumble-people...fabulous...) and came across a Wiki paged listing unusual deaths over the years. Don't ask me why this came up, contrary to popular belief, I am not fascinated by death. (I know, shocker...) But...I was curious. Of course. Who wouldn't be? You'd look, right? Right?!

Well, here's my favorite in case you wouldn't have looked. Just doin' my civil duty...

*458 BC: The Greek playwright Aeschylus was killed when an eagle dropped a live tortoise on him, mistaking his bald head for a stone. The tortoise survived.

*207 BC: Chrysippus, a Greek stoic philosopher, is believed to have died of laughter after watching his drunk donkey attempt to eat figs.

^* 1410 Martin I of Aragon died from a lethal combination of indigestion and uncontrollable laughing.

*1478: George Plantagenet, Duke of Clarence reportedly was executed by drowning in a barrel of Malmsey wine at his own request.

*1599: The Burmese king Nanda Bayin reportedly "laughed to death when informed, by a visiting Italian merchant, that Venice was a free state without a king."

Are you sensing a theme? It's only because I can't bear to put up some of these ridiculously morbid ones. I'm not that sick...(alright, so maybe I am...but I won't make you suffer for it...)

*1660: The Scottish aristocrat, polymath and first translator of Rabelais into English, Thomas Urquhart, is said to have died laughing upon hearing that Charles II had taken the throne.

*1975: On 24 March 1975 Alex Mitchell, a 50-year-old bricklayer from King's Lynn literally died laughing while watching an episode of The Goodies. According to his wife, who was a witness, Mitchell was unable to stop laughing while watching a sketch in the episode "Kung Fu Kapers" in which Tim Brooke-Taylor, dressed as a kilted Scotsman, used a set of bagpipes to defend himself from a psychopathic black pudding in a demonstration of the Lancashire martial art of Ecky-thump. After twenty-five minutes of continuous laughter Mitchell finally slumped on the sofa and expired from heart failure.

Aaaaaand....that's all I've got. Hey! On a happy note, I'll be announcing the winner of the lovely dipped madeleines tomorrow! I know you're all excited....

One year older and wiser too...

                                                              

I was so busy this week I completely spaced the fact that Wednesday was my 2nd Blogiversary. Where does the time go? I mean, I didn't even get myself a card. It's the least I could have done, right? I have so loved this wonderful journey, I've met so many great people, people I would never have known otherwise. It's been so wonderful to vent about the stress of holidays, the mischievousness of my mutt, my little OCD tendencies...and to find that I'm not as alone as I thought I was. Anyway. To say thank you, I'm going to send out a lovely little box of chocolate dipped madeleines. (Cause we're only down to 8 million now...) Just leave a little note in the comment field  by midnight Monday night, and I'll randomly choose the winner. Thanks to everyone, mwah!

Internet Conversations with Caleb...

Kimba says: What are we going to do tonight?

Caleb says: STUFF!

Kimba says: sigh

Caleb says: LET'S WATCH RENT!!!! (note the sarcasm) (also note, I have never seen Rent before...) (also note, I know, I know...)

Caleb says: YIPPEE!!!

Caleb says: (Singing) "FOUR THOUSAND THREE HUNDRED AND EIGHTY THREE DOLLARS!"

Kimba says: Uh....no

Caleb says: isn't that it?

Kimba says: Not quite. But close enough.

Ladies, empty your purses...

I've been tagged. I spilled the contents of my purse, all nine hundred and ninety nine pounds of it, for your viewing pleasure.

1. The Historian - just started reading it, am loving it. What is up with vampires these days?

2. My trusty U of U student planner. I haven't been a student at the U since early 2004, but I continue to find a way to get their planner every year. It's the perfect size and I couldn't function without it. Period.

3. My little book of...stuff. I write down recipes, quotes, cosmetics I want to try, etc. usually found when perusing all of my magazines. I have it all in one place for future reference. Ask me what was voted as the best fudge brownie, or 2007's best eyeliner. Or how to make Basmati Rice. I'll whip out my trusty notebook and fill you in.

4. My green tampon cosmetics-turned-tampon carrying case. I usually don't carry it all the time, but since we've been trying to conceive I've sorta been a Regular Sue (totally just made that up) with Auntie Flow. Which is new and different for me.

5. My black Benefit cosmetics-for-real case. Holds my pill case, lip gloss, etc. etc. etc. So everything isn't rolling around in the bottom on my bag. Such good intentions...

6. My keys. Of course.

7. One coupon for Flat Earth crisps. I actually printed this off one of the ads on the side of my blog today. Is that cheating? I couldn't help myself, Flat Earth is amazing stuff. I Heart Flat Earth. And it's a coupon for a free bag! Of my choice! If you haven't heard of it, be on the lookout for the ad, then go find it. You can either get sweet or savory crisps, and each serving is made with 1/2 serving of fruits / veggies. And they're absolutely divine. Shameless plug.

8. One receipt to Safeway. Two boxes of cereal and a loaf of Dutch Crunch bread.

9. One coupon (expired) for Borders. But don't worry, I have another to print off...it seems that I always have one of these in my bag, just in case I find myself with a book craving.

10. Card that came with my Valentine flowers. Which, bytheway, are still in full bloom.

11. 4 tubes of various lip stuff. Because they don't fit in my makeup case? I'm not quite sure.

12. One pack of Orbit Mint Mojito gum. "EXOTIC new flavor"...

13. One insert from Shape Magazine. I pulled it while I was flipping through it in line at Safeway. I've been thinking of switching from Self to Shape, and wanted to compare prices...because that's my way.

14. One Crystal Light Raspberry Ice On The Go packet. Mouthful. This stuff is awesome when you're sick of regular water.

15. Three Orbit wrappers, one Trident wrapper, one dark chocolate raspberry Hershey's kiss wrapper. Bought a bag to set out for Valentines Day, and sweet Beatrice are they divine.

16. One receipt ad for Target's Global Bazaar, reminding me that once again I missed the boat. Time to start perusing the online isles...

17. One coupon for Banana Republic Outlet. Kathy gave this to me before she left for the MTC, since she won't be needing it. I told her I'm sure I could find an excuse to hit the outlets...

18. One small bottle of Olay Quench lotion. Love.This.Stuff.

19. Orange Fossil wallet. Love this. Picked it up a year ago at my uncle's jewelry shop.

20. (Thanks Heather!) And one mini bottle of Purell. Cannot live without this stuff.

And now to pass it on. I will tag Kjersti (cause I'm dying to hear from her), and Mary Elizabeth.

Do not disturb...

Light posting tonight, it appears that I am holed up in a business suite. Another one of Caleb's job perks? Possibly.

Came at the perfect time, what with my little egg timer going off and all.

Sigh. I must get back to sprawling out on my side of the globe, er, king sized bed. I've got to get me one of these. Another little marriage saver... Sweet dreams!

When life gives you madeleines...

Besides the fact that Caleb's job provides for our family, ya know, brings home the bacon and all, (wait, family? I mean the two of us. Not a family yet. Bear is not my child.), and has a bright and sunny future, and leaves us with a nice secure feeling....

Where was I? Uh.....

There are times when the customers he visits feel so overwhelmed with love that they feel the need to bestow upon him some of their goods. Once he brought home an orange-flavoured home spray. A spray so potent it filled out entire two level townhome in Oregon with orangey-goodness. Once he brought home a pressure cooker, used of course, and it sat on my dryer until we moved. Then it was sold in one of our two garage sales. Another time he and Brian brought home several wicker baskets. They now are used to fill up the couch when we're gone so that Bear doesn't decide to perch his stinky little butt on my new baby.

On Monday, he visited a new customer of his, a large maker of french goodies. He brought home two boxes of made-that-day madeleines. Nine thousand cookies. What in heavens name are we going to do with nine million (yes, they grow exponentially!) madeleines?! Slowly eat one a day until I'm old and wrinkled? Gumming the sweet cakes until they're a mushy mess...

Or. We could dip them in chocolate.

Oh yeah, baby. Mmmhmmm. That's right. Now we're talkin'.

Except that now we have nine million chocolate covered madeleines. Doesn't exactly solve the problem, does it? In fact, I think we could argue it exacerbates the problem. Now I just want to hole myself up in my bed eating chocolate madeleines and watching Pride and Prejudice. Or maybe in the tub with a good book. OR! OR! On the beach with a pina colada in the other hand.

But mostly likely I'll start tossing them to anyone with a hand. And a mouth.

Come on, doesn't this look heavenly?

Oh, and I almost forgot. The madeleines are soft. Are you pining yet?

The Dove will set you free...

Tonight my friends and I were joking about The Soap Issue at our house. Caleb and I have our own bar of soap in the shower, which to me doesn't seem that wild and crazy. But that might be because of our circumstances.

When you're first married, no matter how much you knew each other beforehand, there's always a little bit of "getting to know you" time. Or at the very least, "learning to live with each other" time. That was more of our adjustment, after dating for over four years we felt that we had a good handle on each other. No big surprises. What we didn't think about was the fact that we'd have to learn to mesh our daily habits. The largest one for us was the soap in the shower. I've already mentioned Caleb's dubious ancestry (read under The Kone photo), so couple that with the fact that his idea of soaping up includes rubbing the actual soap bar over his body. Like he's buttering up corn on the cob. When he handed me the soap bar that first time, I nearly dropped dead right there. It looked like it was alive, like it would suddenly sprout legs and scurry away. After a few days of dealing with it, picking off every single errant hair, I gave up, completely exasperated. We could afford $3 for an extra set of soap bars, a small price for my sanity.

I think it's the little things that can save a marriage. Sure, no one's going to look back over their lives and tell you their secret to staying together was separate soap bars. If it were that easy everyone could do it. (And the soap companies would have a hay day, rack up their prices, $30 for a cake of Dial?! COME ON!) It's these little things that pile up though, that really make a marriage work.

So.

Now that I've waxed all philosophical on you, tell me. What's one little trick you've discovered? A little nugget of sanity? A happy compromise?

Has to be a Hallmark

How is it that you can find a card for your significant other that seems to say exactly the right thing in exactly the right way?

This was my card to Caleb.

And because I couldn't help myself, I bought this one from Bear to Caleb. Again. It's like THEY KNOW HIM. Hallmark conspiracy.

The only way it would have been more accurate is if they'd  mentioned something about his love for pulling all things disgusting out of the garbage can. Because that's how he shows his love, offering up a half-chewed, half-puked up chunk of corn on the cob.

Beauty, thy name is Room & Board

Behold! We have a couch!

(Don't mind my unicycle back there...he knows not what he does)

I can't tell you how excited we've been, we ordered this baby in early December and it has been a LONG TIME COMING. We finally have a place that we can feel comfortable inviting people over, we actually have seating for more than two! It's a miracle! Praise the couch gods! Look at that light coming through those windows, you can almost hear the angels singing, can't you?

But is it comfortable, you might be asking yourself. You might be remembering our last couch fiasco...

Ahem. It wasn't pretty.

I think this will answer your question...

Poor little Mark, our Couch Warming Party (complete with Mexican food...that has nothing to do with a new couch, bytheway...I just thought it would be fun) tuckered him out. (Don't mind the little high chair seat back there...)

It is so choice. I am so in love.

For Sale: One Mutt

I don't know if this is reason to get another play mate for the dog, or if two dogs would mean sheer insanity.

Right now I'm thinking the latter.

And also that it might be time to drive the mutt out into the country and "set him free". Or send him to boarding school. Or to the butcher. This dog is going to be the death of me.

He doesn't eat it so much as he just pulls it out, chews on it for a minute, and then tosses it aside. Just to piss me off, I swear it. And he knows he's not supposed to, I can always tell he's been in the garbage the second I get in the door at the end of the day. He doesn't jump up like usual, but wiggles nervously bouncing from one foot to the next. He doesn't follow me into the kitchen to his food dish like usual, but hunkers back waiting for his punishment. He won't even look at it, he'll throw his head this way and that making sure to keep his handiwork out of view.

He knows.

Anyone out there looking for a four year old Aussie? Chases squirrels and cats, hates bodies of water larger than his bowl, and lives for his Frisbee. Must also have room for an adult male because Caleb is rather attached...

Soleil

The weather has been so wonderful the past few days I've been afraid to write about it for fear Mr. Golden Sun would retreat back from whence it came. On Saturday Caleb and I woke up and walked down to a local bakery with Bear to get some breakfast. I didn't wear a coat, or even a long sleeved tee, and it was perfect. Perfect. Sun! Birds! Blossoming flowers...

I'm sorry, I know a large part of you are waist-deep in snow right now. I offer you my condolences. And we don't have an open room right now (Brian is down to work for the next 10 days) we will soon, and it's available for the sun-deprived. I'll feed you oranges and frozen beverages as you soak up some Vitamin D.

Until then, here's a few blossoms from the yard to tide you over.

This bloomed on the side of our house, a total surprise. And to think I was going to rip out the greens to plant something else...it's a good thing I procrastinated.

(Doubt I will ever say that again in my lifetime. Bask in it for a minute...ahh...)

I have no knowledge of flowers, for all I know this is a weed. But it's a gorgeous weed.

These grow on the side of the "garage" (aka. dark, dank, bottomless pit for misfit garden tools). I have no idea what they are either, but the bees love them. Thank heavens for my telephoto lens.

These appeared out of nowhere from the bushes in front of the house. We've been here since July and they haven't changed at all, we didn't even know they flowered, and then one day we walked outside and there they were, opening up to the sun. And we couldn't blame them.

Sweet, sweet fantasy...

Seen this picture before? Maybe...a decade or so ago? Yeah? You probably thought these sorts of pictures had been done away with. I know I had. Tossed away with the scribbles of roses and letters sealed with wax. Mariah Carey's, "Fantasy" in the background. Please tell me I'm not the only one who has these horrid, repressed memories.

This just so happened to be on the wall of our hotel room in Orlando. So no, our room didn't look quite like the picture.

But we didn't have any ants, which was a plus.

(Disclaimer: long and detailed. Read at your own risk)

Despite the nostalgia, we did have an enjoyable time despite our lack of photos.

Waiting to ride the tram to Epcot. Brian, looking oh-so-thrilled to be there.

Also oh-so-thrilled to be there. And then some random girl in the back ground...she looks thrilled to be there, as well.

Not quite what his teacher had in mind...

Tonight Mark, Bridgette, Caleb and I were sitting around after we'd finished this documentary (that movie in itself could be an entirely new post. I don't even know where to begin, it's just pure insanity. There's nothing that could be said. You just have to see it.) and started talking. Eventually the subject turned to embarrassing stories and then odd and strange things we've done. And so on and so forth. Caleb decided to regale us with a story. He started like this:

"Up until the 12th grade I took a tutor....."

And that was as far as I got. I was lost. For the next 20 seconds I sat there, my brain slowly trying to wrap around that phrase, "I took a tutor". And then I started to giggle. And of course, I had to make him clarify. "You did...what?

He tried to back track, tried to explain what he meant, like, ya know, "I took a math class...I took a tutor..." but it just didn't stick. How could it? "I took a tutor" is now going to be common phrase around here, there are just so many ways to work it in. Such as:

"Oh, man, I was working on this report today, and I totally tutored it..."

or,

"Dude, our class went on a field trip to the grocery store, and the butcher totally tutored the cow..."

or maybe,

"I went to go pick up Bobby from daycare today, and he'd totally tutored in his pants."

or the ever popular,

"I tutored."

Delays much?

I could have nearly driven to Utah by the time it took me to fly there on Monday. I'm not kidding, I wish I was, but it's true. I got to the airport at 4 pm to discover that my flight, along with nearly every other flight, was delayed. Very delayed. Like, two and a half hours delayed. I know that isn't terrible, it could have been worse, but it sucked. I immediately went up to the counter to check on my connecting flight in Vegas (because that totally makes sense, fly down to Vegas before heading up to Salt Lake. I love that.) and the man at the counter cheerily told me not to worry, that flight was also delayed! Well! Lucky me!!! And since we were all delayed (I say we because things like this tend to bond people) we flocked to the restaurants and newsstands trying to choke down our misery. With greasy pizza and dripping Chinese food. To make an insanely long story short, I didn't arrive in Salt Lake until 1 am that night. Or the next morning, I guess. 8 hours later.

Oh wait, there was one funny tidbit. I was sitting in Vegas, waiting ever so patiently to board the airplane, listening to my new iPod (wahoo!) and trying to forget the fact that if I'd driven I'd be in Elko by now, when an older man sat in the chair across from me. He had long shaggy hair and a tattered old plaid shirt over a grey slogan t-shirt. After a few minutes he caught my attention and asked, "Have you seen the movie?"

And I sat there completely dumbfounded. Movie? Had I missed something? Had I spoken out loud? Finally I managed to ask him what in the world he was talking about (in so many words...) and he pointed to the little bit of my t-shirt that was visible underneath my sweater. And then I understood. I was wearing a belated Christmas gift:

I watched Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles every single day when I was little. My sister and I got up at 5 am to watch the cartoons and we watched the movies even more often. I had crushes on them. We were SURE that they were the ones singing along with The Beach Boys in their song, "Wipe Out", even picking out which voice was which turtle. We were devastated when our father broke the news to us, stupid Fat Boys!  I thought they lived in my basement. Or rather, I imagined that they did, and had conversations with them. Oh, how I wanted to be April!

"No," I said, "I haven't."

I had heard it was really lame and hadn't wanted to blemish my mental shrine. I'm holdin' on...

Magical rodents

Saturday morning Caleb and I lay awake in our bed, thinking about getting up. I say thinking, because that's what I do every single day, lay in my bed thinking about getting up until I'm either late, or it's so late in the day that Caleb drags me out. I'm not much of a morning person. Anyway, we both realized it was Groundhogs Day, and so Caleb decided he'd look up on his Blackberry (from bed still, mind you, ah, modern technologies!) to see what Mr. Groundhog had found. And I contemplated this, still in bed, and wondered where the freak this holiday tradition came from. Who started this madness? We're relying on a rodent to predict our future? You're telling me that once a year we drag a big, fat, helpless little groundhog out of his hole, hold him up in the air, check for his shadow, and shove him back in?

We're odd, that's all I'm saying.

So I decided to look it up (hours later of course, there was still bed-contemplating to do) and figure out who to blame for this madness. After checking out wikipedia though, it seems that this tradition comes from a lot of places, and I couldn't find a clear answer. It seems that it either came from the Germans or some Scottish poem, but the only people who've decided to actually go with this nonsense is the United States and Canada, suckers that we are. You mean to tell me this groundhog has special weather powers? Sign me up!

I can wrap my head around the origins of Santa, the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy (alright, that one's a little weird...), and St. Patrick's Day, but Groundhogs Day?

Which brings me to my next point, my love for the idea of the movie Groundhogs Day. Haven't you always wanted the chance to do-over a day? I love the scene when Bill Murray and what's-her-face are at dinner, and he basically tells her that her degree is crap before he realizes his mistake. The next scene cuts to his next attempt and he spits out this perfect French poem, totally reeling her in. So classic.

I do this sometimes, say or do things without thinking first, like the time I ran back in my office having left my keys inside, and said quite loudly, "I am so retarded!". Without going into too much detail, I work for a non-profit company that deals specifically with developmentally disabled people. The "R-Word" is sort of frowned upon. Just a little bit. Thankfully my fellow coworkers are good-natured people and didn't fire me on the spot. They just like to remind me of it every once in a while, usually in front of another employee from the company who hasn't yet heard of my faux pas. There are few left.

Tonight I'm flying home for a few days (more like 48 hours or less) to visit my sister before she leaves on her mission. Posting may be light, but I do promise to try. Also, I'll be picking up our charger for the camera, so I should be able to post up a few pictures, finally. I need to show you my favorite belated Christmas gift, it's a good one.

Cheers, and Happy Super Tuesday tomorrow! Get out and vote! Because I'll be in a different state and forgot about getting an absentee ballot. Woops. Blunder.

Till we meet again