Embarassing Moments

It occurred to me that in my rash of tiredness, I forgot to tell you about my stellar first day as a student here at the college. I had put much thought into my back-to-school clothes shopping, and had obtained several outfits that say "I'm older than you, but not so old that my pants get pulled up to my chest." but also said "Because I am older than you, I will not try and dress like you, but I will look cute, dammit!" and so I was ready to go!

On the first day of school, I got up right when my alarm went off (at 6:15! An hour that was non-existant to me prior to this), did everything that I needed to do and was running perfectly on time. I got to my first class a couple minutes late, but that was due to the fact that I had not calculated the time it takes to get from my car into the building in my travel time. But I was feeling pretty confident.

After my first class was over, I had (and still have) about two hours to kill between classes, so I headed down to the "commuter's lounge" to eat my lunch. I wasn't even uncomfortable with the fact that I would be dining alone and actually welcomed the chance to get a head start on my reading. But, I made the stupid mistake of trying to text and walk at the same time. As I went down the little flight of TWO WHOLE STEPS, I misjudged my footing and ended up tripping down the last one. I landed flat on my face and hit my head on a table and chairs on the way down. Yes. I am AWESOME! I shook it off, and fortunately for me and my fragile ego, there was only three or four people that saw it. I pretended like it didn't hurt and made the comment "that's what I get for trying to do two things at once" and then sat down. I ended up with a minor bump on the side of my head that hit the chair, and a busted fingernail.

Stellar start to my first day, right?

Like I said, I am OH-SO-AWESOME!

A Summary of Summer

Mostly I'm just tired of seeing the snow from a couple of posts down. Seems like eons ago that it was THAT cold. We've been running like crazy people. It's been fabulous. A few points:

Community Ed Baseball - Diva and CJ both had crappy baseball years. Their teams one one game each. CJ does a good job, it just wasn't their year. Diva's team, however, was. . .well. . .it was very obvious that they were very young. Diva had more fun being a cheerleader--weather she was on the field or off the field--than she did actually playing. They were very glad when it was over.

Family Vacation - I had high aspirations for the Stimulus check. We were going to get back home to San Diego. Then the crappy oil cartel had to go all insane and the hop in gas prices kept us close to home. But we still made it to Duluth, which is waaaay up at the top of this state and we are waaay down at the bottom of it. But it was gorgeous and I want to live there now. Don't know how I'd feel about the frigity of the winter (the city is on Lake Superior, so it gets way more snow than we do, courtesy of something called "lake effect snow"). We had tons of fun, and are most likely going to make going up north an annual trip.

School - We're done with our back to school supply shopping. For all three of us. Diva has the same teacher that CJ had in second grade, and CJ has his first male teacher. They are both very excited for school to start. As am I. For them. These children need to be in school because I am seriously on the brink of insanity here. I start school a week from today. Not entirely sure how I feel about that. Maybe if I decide to start blogging more than quarterly, I'll have more thoughts on it.

The Olympics - Are addicting this year. Courtney talked about how great the events have been. I wanted to give poor Alicia Sacramone a big hug after the balance beam incident of the team finals. And that Shawn Johnson is just too cute for words. When you hear her talk, she's just so gracious and sweet. It's nice to see that there are still people in the public eye that it's worth kids to look up to. And that Michael Phelps? Holy hannah! That guy is insane! And also sweet. I just got done reading an article on the NBC Olympics page about a friendship he forged with a kid that eventually succumbed to cancer. That takes a special person. On top of all the medals, to hear that he's like that just makes him even cooler.

Now, on to the important factor of the games. The US may not be winning the most gold medals, but am I the only one noticing that we have the BEST LOOKING athletes at the games? Hooo, damn! That Ryan Lochte is enough to send my little heart into palpitations. And the boys in their tight swimwear? Insanity, I tell you!

So, that's all I've got. Off to watch all the Olympics that I've DVR'd over the past couple of days. Because while these have been the best games we've seen in as long as I can remember, I am the only one in my house with any sort of interest in the games. So, I have to watch them at very strange times.

2008 Has to be Better, Right???

Fun Ways to spend the last days of 2007:

Win $100,000 on a scratch-off ticket

Travel to NYC and be there when the ball drops

Travel to Las Vegas and watch the crazy man clear a 322 foot cycle jump

Be in Minneapolis and spend New Year’s Eve toasting your very best friends

Not Fun Ways to spend the last days of 2007 (aka how I spent them):

Have husband be informed that he will no longer have a job sometime within the next 4-6 weeks

Have one vehicle’s transmission slowly dying, the other one refusing to start, and the other one leaking oil of some sort (2 of the three are now fixed, but still)

Wait ever so patiently for the rest of 2007 to be over so you can just get OUT of this madness for the love of all that is Good and Holy.

So, the car and van have been fixed. The truck’s transmission has been crapping out slowly over the last three years (the fact that it’s 14 years old and has 230,000 miles on it *might* be a contributing factor, but you know), so we’re just hoping it doesn’t crap out any time soon. And I have been constantly alternating between the mantras “Please, God, only one thing at a time” and “I am trusting. Everything’s going to be just fine”.

CB has a meeting today with a company right here in Podunk, so we’re feeling cautiously optimistic. It would be nice for him to work in town after spending the better part of the last eight years driving at least 30 miles round trip. The last two has been 70 miles round trip.

I’m also doing the weight loss thing for real this time. I’m on a team with three other people (We’re the Rockettes! So fun!), and there’s a community-wide weight loss contest. What’s the prize? $1,000! Which means $250 per person to buy new clothes after all the weight comes off. Sounds awesome, right? And if the money won’t motivate me to do it for real, I am not sure what will!

So, I’m being Miss Always-Look-At-The-Glass-Half-Full and saying that 2008 is going to be a year of awesome change. New job for CB, school for me, healthier eating habits for all of us, and who knows what else is in store?

What are you most looking forward to in ’08?

The Best Christmas Gift Ever

My dad's far away. He lives in San Diego. I haven't seen him since my wedding almost 8 years ago. But sometimes he calls me on my birthday. One year I told him how much I missed the sunsets back home. He told me he was going to send me one for my birthday. He did and it was fabulous. Today I received another one for Christmas. My Daddy sent me this:
It's the best Christmas present I could ever ask for. And it came just when I was feeling weepy and nostalgic, so the tears are still burning behind my eyes.

Merry Christmas everyone.

God Bless,

The Glamorous Redneck

It's a smell. A smelly smell. A smelly smell that smells. . . .smelly.

For those of you that have already had babies, do you remember those pregnancy cravings (for those of you that haven’t had babies. . .just wait!)? How you’re all “I must have this one thing RIGHT NOW and if I don’t I will just continue to puke until you (DH) feel sorry enough for me to just go and get me some damn CHEESECAKE!!!”? Well, I have been blessed in the fact that those cravings never went away for me (no puking, however, so that’s a bonus) except they are a lot less often. But when they hit, I am OBSESSED with whatever I’m craving until I eat it and the craving is gone.

The last couple of weeks that craving has been for Chicken Fried Steak. I know, right? So not healthy, or really all that hard to make for that matter. But every time I was at the grocery store, I would forget. Until I got home and I was all “CRAP! The CHICKEN FRIED STEAK!” Wednesday, however, I finally remembered at the store, and while I was already planning dinner for that night, Thursday was just around the corner. Thursday, glorious Thursday!

I obsessed all day and as soon as it was time to start making dinner, I did a little happy dance out to the kitchen. I made my mashed potatoes, country style gravy, and buttered corn. Then I popped the CFS into the oven and set the timer. Everything was going according to plan. . .

When the timer buzzed, I made my way back out there and popped open the oven door. An odd colored smoke (blue-ish gray-ish brown-ish) came billowing out. Now, while I’m no Rachel Ray and have been known to burn a thing or two in my time, it really is near impossible to burn CFS patties. I looked at them and they didn’t look burnt. So I pulled them out and THAT’S when I noticed it. The little blue and red pool of melted plastic on the bottom of the oven. That’s when I established what the funky, yet familiar, smell was that had been permeating the kitchen since I opened the oven door.

Turns out CJ had left his prized eraser (he’d just gotten it for taking a reading test & getting a good grade on it) on my table. When I put the pan on the table before putting it in the oven, the eraser must have stuck to the bottom of the pan and fallen off when it started heating up.

Imagine if you will, the scene in A Christmas Story where Ralphie’s dad has been looking forward to the Turkey all Christmas morning, only to have it be devoured by Bumpass’ dogs. While there were no dogs present in my story, THAT’S the devastation that I felt.

And we ended up having Chinese afterwards. Which is good, but still not CFS.

CJ felt horribly bad, so I shared the story about the time I made my mom go on an Easter egg hunt and I hid an egg in the oven. She didn’t find it and I forgot about it. Until she started preheating the oven. Needless to say, we had a good laugh about it and I made my chiropractor laugh so hard she couldn’t even adjust me. So, it all turned out all right in the end, I guess. And after a mid-day full of people dumping bad news on me, I really needed to laugh.

How about you? Any good plastic-in-the-oven tales to share?