A Thousand Words

I feel excited this morning. Or, maybe excited is the wrong word. I just feel happy. Things in life just feel kind of right. Know what I’m saying?

I love that I’m leaving for a vacation in a handful of days. I love the people in my life. I love that I’ve stuck with the Picture A Day thing — even though it’s only been a month. I love that I’ve been doing well with working out and eating well and just overall making healthier decisions. I love that rather than flowers, a boy buys me an oreo blizzard. I love the Eric Church CD. I love feeling accompished at work and the more responsibilities that I’ve been given. I love reading back through old blog entries because it makes me laugh. Good things.

Anyway, that’s all for now. Have a nice’n peeps.

Edit: I do not love that I just accidentally shot a whole bunch of lotion into my coffee cup.

I’m facing a bit of a dilemma. I have long prided myself in having never watched American Idol. When people would chit chat about it around me and throw an occasional glance my way and ask, “you watch?” I would stand tall and say, “NO. As a matter of fact I do not.” I rather liked it that way. For some reason I just did not want to get sucked into the whole thing and thought most of it was ridiculous. Especially those judges. ‘Sup Dawg?!

Here’s my problem. For the last two weeks, every Tuesday and Wednesday, I’ve been laying in bed reading and I can faintly hear the show on the television. After a little while I’ll saunter in to the kitchen and put together my stuff for the following day, all while glancing up now and then at the contestants and their mostly horrible auditions. Pretty soon, I find my ass sitting in the lounge chair for the next hour and a half completely GLUED to the screen. I’m mostly in shock because I can’t believe such crazy people actually exist. And, no I’m not just talking about Paula.

I keep telling myself that I’ll only watch the shows that have the auditions. Deep in my heart I know that’s not true. I’m going to want to see how  well the Seattle brother and sister team and the best friends from Jersey do in Hollywood. Pretty soon I’ll be watching the whole damn season. Arg. Then, I can never again guffaw at the people who ask me, “you watch?” And that, my friends, is a little unsettling.

At least I can still proudly say, “NO. I do not watch Survivor.” I actually think that might make me feel a little more triumphant.

At approximately 4:47 last night I was rolling through our neighborhood after a hideous day at work. Ahead of me I noticed a long line of cars slowing down suddenly, trying to avoid something right in front of our house. As I inched closer, what did I see lying (literally) in front of me? Alejandro.

I was shocked, saddened, and deeply hurt by the actions of some punk kids who chose to rip him from our yard and toss him carelessly into the street. But, most of all, I was laughing my ass off because seriously…it was hilarious.

Below is a photo taken of the crime scene. Caution: Image contains graphic content.

It’s hard to believe that only a week ago we were laughing and joking and having the best times of our lives, and now he is gone. He was with us for only a short time, but I do believe he had purpose:

1. He is one of my favorite pictures of the day.
2. His scattered body gave me something to laugh about after an awful/miserable/crapper kind of day.

I am going to choose to remember him as the strong man he was, and encourage you to do the same. Although he was with us for only a short period of time, he will forever be in our hearts.

I raise my Icee to you, Alejandro. May you rest in peace.

Meet Allez. He’s the most beautiful thing I’ve seen in quite some time. I have decided that I will have him by June. I will be pinching pennies and resisting the urge to buy large cherry dipped cones from Dairy Queen to make this happen. Okay, well maybe I’ll downgrade to a small. A girl needs to eat after all!

Okay, seriously. This snow has GOT TO STOP.  I love looking at it, frolicking in it, taking pictures of it, but I hate having to be mobile in it. We keep joking that we’ll set Emma up on a dog sled to get us to and fro — but more and more I am NOT joking.

One thing that makes this whole blizzard ’07 tolerable is knowing that in two-ish weeks I will be going back to Maui for 8 luscious days. This weekend  Buck, Heids and I did a tentative schedule so we could evenly space out all of the “big” stuff. For quite some time Heids has expressed interest in horseback riding while we were there. Horseback riding isn’t necessarily on my top list of things to do while in paradise, and quite honestly I have a bit of a tumultuous history with horses.

When I was about 7 or 8, my dad bought a Shetland pony for us. I’m not entirely sure why he got it. I don’t recall either my brother or I expressing interest in having a horse, and I’m pretty sure Homedog was too young to care.  We named him Chingo. Again, I’m not entirely sure why my dad chose this name, I still to this day don’t know what it even means. I remember riding him exactly once down the dirt road. I’m guessing the whole point of the horse was to teach us responsibility. We’d have to feed and water him daily and everything. I got pretty tired of it after a month or so because I didn’t even LIKE horses and it was seriously cutting into my lounging around time. My relationship forever changed with Chingo one Christmas day. It was my turn to water her/him and as I was doing that, my new sweatsuit got caught on some barbed wire and RIPPED. I was disgusted and resented Chingo from that day forward. When it was my turn to water her I would just run the pump to get water everywhere to make it look like I had actually fed her. I never did. I even started blaming her/him for things. I remember cutting my upper lip with a razor blade. I’m not entirely sure why I was using a razor blade – but I told my parents Chingo bit me. ON THE MOUTH. (what??!) A month or two later I remember coming home and my dad had said we no longer had Chingo, the he/she went to a little boy who really wanted a horse. Was this the same as saying he/she”went to the farm?” For all I know Chingo was clinging to life due to severe malnutrition and they had to put her/him down. I never questioned my dad…but thought it was weird that he never knew the kids name that got the horse.

A couple of years ago we were at Ocean Shores and they had some horses to ride. It was sunset on the beach, and what the hell…we went for a horseback ride. My horse was a portly little thing named “Flash.” The entire first part of the way down the beach, Flash was lolly-gagging in the back of the pack and basically wouldn’t do anything I asked him nicely to do. But, good LORD, as soon as we rounded a bend and headed back to the hitching post Flash started GALLOPING down the beach. It was the last ride of the day and he knew he was going to get fed, so he was making sure he would be the first at the trough. A horse after my own heart. The leaders of the ride tried to get him under control as I held on to dear life, but it never really worked.  That day I thought I was going to die. That’s the last time I thought I’d ride a horse. But, oh…no I was wrong.

I felt a little guilty not quickly jumping on the Maui horseback riding bandwagon, so I told Heids I would join her. We will be taking a FOUR HOUR trail ride into the CRATER OF A VOLCANO. Dear, God I hope I make it out alive.

Okay, so let me tell you about my lunch. I met the guys at the burger joint at noon and we ordered and hello, my guy is so much cuter when I’m standing two inches from him and when he is sans hard hat. Although, don’t get me wrong — I do love a man in a hard hat. Anyway, we got our food and sat down. And the first thing my guy says is: “We just need to tell you something first. We’re both married!” hahahahah. Well, I sort of maybe suspected that, and they probably thought we would never be face to face so they figured they could flirt as much as they wanted with me. Boy, were they wrong!

Anyway, we had a surprisingly enjoyable and entertaining lunch. They are both pretty funny and I’ll admit I still have a crush on my guy, but I am not a home-wrecker and will no longer have visions of accosting him and making out with him somewhere. They asked me if I could go to lunch with them next week too, so maybe I will soon be hanging out with them and their wives. Who knows. It seems like something that could easily happen with me. I must say I am a little relieved because I’ve got the beginning stages of something else going on and now I don’t have to worry about juggling three mens at once. Whew.

So THEN…Wednesday night we got a snowstorm. It was nuts. Snow in Seattle is problematic for anyone who drives or…anyone who wants to leave their house because of all the hills and lack of snow removal equipment. As soon as I left work at 4:30 it started hailing/snowing and I sat on the freeway for a good 45 minutes not even moving. See:

It took me an hour and a half to get 5 miles, and then I just drove down to the mall, met my old roommie Lisa, and we walked home. We’ve got a little hill going up into our neighborhood that no one could get up. Cars were abandoned everywhere. Nuts. So, yesterday we had a snow day and I took tons of pictures and we even made a snowman. His name is Alejandro. See:

So, this morning I decided I HAD to go to work because I would have gone stir crazy if I didn’t. So, I packed everything up and walked about a half hour in the 15 degree weather to get to my car. On my way, my leg was nearly impaled by a tree limb, and I am now missing about 2 inches of skin on my leg. HOWEVER, I am fine.

More snow pictures are here in this set. Choose the slide-show option for best viewing. Peace out peeps!

P.S. Krysten, I was not successful in finding the magical swimsuit. It remains elusive to this day. Best of luck in your search for it. 🙂

After months, and I mean months, of shameless flirting there has been significant progress with my construction worker guy(s). About a month ago I actually stopped my car to talk to them. I mean, I sort of had to because they were blocking the road. And then I made them cookies, which they absolutely loved. And THEN…the other day they told me they would like to take me out to lunch because I made them cookies. Score! So, I gave them my number last Friday and told them to call when they wanted to go. I got a call from one of them yesterday, but told them it wouldn’t work because I was super busy. In all reality, I had to go to Target to find a swimsuit that miraculously took 45 pounds off my body. So anyway, it looks like we’re doing it (having lunch) tomorrow and I’m totally stoked. I really have no idea what I’m getting myself into, but who cares!

To be continued.

Happy New Year peoples of the Internet! New Year, New You! And other completely cliche crap!

Last year I did this whole resolution thing. This year I will not make that same mistake. I suck at following through with goals and junk. Although it is fun to see what I failed at:

:: Finish the resolution I started 6 years ago — Nope.

:: Involve myself in more activities that push me out of my comfort zone — As comfortable as ever.

:: Volunteer  — I did…a little.

:: No more of the same guy re-run I always find myself in — Well actually, yes a little better this year.

:: Take at least one picture every day — No sir.

:: Learn to knit mittens — Where are my knitting needles?

:: Run a marathon — Hahahaha!!

:: Take more trips — Done!

:: Knock 30 minutes off my triathlon time — Actually, I added 20.

One thing I want to try this year, but I am NOT, I repeat NOT making it a resolution, is taking a picture a day. Seems like a fun way to keep track of what does or does not happen in my every day life. So, I’ve started a flickr set for them. I’m already off to a rocky start. I almost forgot the first day! Oh, well. There are two in there now. Hopefully there will be more than two in there at the end of the year.

That is all.