Monday, May 24, 2010

The end of the Internet

Have you ever been browsing and poking around online and realize that there is nothing else for you to look for? That every site you usually frequent you've hit, you've checked your Google Reader, caught up on your webcomics, played Farmville on Facebook...and there is nothing left?
That's how I feel.

Well, to be perfectly honest, I partially feel this way because I don't have a computer at the moment. Sadly, my computer turned on this morning, but the screen did not! A visit to the wonderful folks at the Genius Lab in the Apple store, and we determined that the video card needed to be replaced. They checked it in, and took it for 1-3 days. Unfortunately for me, I leave to go down to visit Geoff's family in 2 days. So I decided now was as good a time as any to take an internet break.

Before you unsubscribe from my blog, however, don't worry! I will be back, probably next Tuesday once I get my computer back and am home again. And I'll have a few exciting things to post about then, too! Just, until then, I need an internet break.
So I'll see you in a week!

Thursday, May 20, 2010

If you realized how often people think about you, you wouldn't worry about it as much

I'm a worrier and a stresser. I stress and worry about money, I stress and worry about my weight. I stress right before I have to go weigh in, and I stress after, when I didn't lose weight. I stress about not having a job, and about the fact that the few part time jobs I have keep me from the housework that needs to be done. Believe me, it's tough to stress and worry!

One of the biggest things I stress out over though, is this blog, believe it or not. I worry that I don't have anything to say, I worry I'm not posting enough, I worry I'm posting too much of one thing! More than anything though, I stress about "marketing a product". I'm serious.

Once upon a time, when blogging was new, there were simply online journals that only your friends read and no one really cared about what you said, but it was nice to keep up with your friends. I had a Xanga account for that very reason. It's different now. I'm a member of Blog Frog, but I find the whole site so overwhelming that I often don't go on there. Not that there is anything wrong with it, I do notice that there are a lot of people who know each other, and there can be interesting discussions and good advice out there. But maybe it's just not for me. Maybe blogging isn't for me, either, because I notice a lot of people who are "building a product", attempting to get readers, commenters, advertisers. I worry that I'm not doing well enough, that I'm not doing just that with my blog. Then I wonder how I'm supposed to build a product on a site full of mothers and women trying to get pregnant, and realize I may be way out of my league here.

Then I remember something. Blogging isn't about the money, for me. It isn't about the fame, or even the comments. It is about having a place for me to write, to get my feelings out, to exercise a creative side that I don't have an outlet for, at the moment. I blog for me, and for no other reason. Anything else just happens to be a fringe benefit.

Why do you blog?

Tuesday, May 18, 2010

Unique


We had many unique things at our wedding, things that made it ours that I absolutely loved. We walked out of the church to Harry Potter music, walked into the reception to Star Wars. We had cupcakes, toasted with beer, a mashed potato bar and button bouquets for our flowers. But my favorite unique touch of all? Our cake toppers.
I owe this idea to my friend, Lydia. She, jokingly, of course, suggested that we use Ron and Hermione as cake toppers. Of course I took to the idea right away. Geoff, being red-headed, me being a brunette, and, of course, in love with Harry Potter, I thought it was perfect. It took a bit of searching to find the perfect toppers, and I finally ended up having them made by someone on Etsy, but it was worth it in the end.
Now, they are proudly displayed on our mantel, and I will happily tell anyone the story of them, if they ask (and maybe even if they don't!)

Monday, May 17, 2010

Life is tough...


...when your day consists of lying in the sun and napping.

Sunday, May 16, 2010

Garden update!


It's been far too long since I've had a good garden update. Up here in the Pacific NW, we're a little behind as far as gardening goes. Friends in the south already have flowers on their tomato plants while mine...well, lets just say it's growing very slowly. Slow and steady my plants are growing though!


Our sugar snap peas have grown tendrils, so I put a couple bamboo skewers out there because they were curling around each other! It's fascinating to see them wrap their way around. I tried to get a picture of it, but couldn't get the camera to focus on the swirls. Oh well.


Hopefully they will soon be big enough to reach the rails and wrap around them. The other plants in that planter are cucumber, and they too are growing nicely. Not vertically as fast as the peas, but they're coming along!

The bulbs, of course, continue to grow like crazy. We have two planters with bulbs, but the second one is a little behind (I didn't take any pictures of it today) because it was in the back, where there is less sun. However, after just a few days on the front patio with the rest of these plants it is already sprouting!

Can you believe they looked like this a week ago??

Last but not least, our strawberries! I have to be honest with you, I think it's fascinating how fruit and squashes pollinate. The fact that there is a "male" and "female" flower, and there are far more males than females on a plant, probably because it takes so much energy to grow a pumpkin, or squash! Strawberries, however, I can't figure out. However, something is happening, because we have several little green strawberries that are growing! I love watching them get bigger every day!

Friday, May 14, 2010

Repurposed bananas


These poor bananas! I have issues with bananas. On the one hand, they're very cheap, so I love to buy them. However, I don't like to eat them once they start to get freckly. I also have a banana limit, I've been known to eat all but the last bite or two of a banana and decide I'm done. I know it's strange.
Anyway, Geoff likes bananas just fine, but we still ended up with these four leftovers because I promised to eat more bananas, and Geoff just didn't get around to it.
Luckily for me, one of my favorite blogs, The Frugal Girl, had a post about banana chocolate chip muffins! So I send Geoff to the store to get me some chocolate chips last night, and decided he needed to bring these to work!


They came out great, if I do say so myself, and even though the recipe only produced 15, they aren't lasting long around here! Needless to say, they did not make it into work...

The recipe calls for 1 cup of mashed bananas, and it turns out that is two medium sized bananas! So I mashed the leftovers and froze them for future over-ripe banana usage (I love making banana bread, but I have to say these may be my new favorite banana recipe!)

Wednesday, May 12, 2010

"Things could change, Gabe. Things could be different...There could be love."


I've been slacking in my blogging, mostly because life is actually busy again (a good thing, trust me!) but I miss it. In an effort to continue to blog, I think I will post some photos from my 365 photo project. I figure it will help me keep blogging, even when I have nothing else I feel like saying!

I used to say I couldn't pick a favorite book, because I loved too many. I'm not sure what happened, but I was talking about The Giver once, and suddenly realized that it is my absolute favorite book. I've had this copy for more than 15 years, and I've read it at least 50 times, probably more, I'm sure! I have a better copy of it, in hardcover, but I choose to read and reread this copy, because I like the way it feels to hold it. It's almost a comfort object for me.
I chose to take a picture of the book because I love how worn it looks. It gives it a lot of character, I think. I changed it to black and white, because the characters in the book are colorblind, though you don't realize it until about halfway through. As a side note, they are making the book into a movie, and I'm interested to see how they address this.

The Giver has two companion books, Gathering Blue and Messenger, which I recently decided to reread, hence the Giver reread as well. I love them, and I love the way they tie the whole thing together, but The Giver is my absolute favorite, hands down.

What's your favorite book?

Saturday, May 8, 2010

Growing growing growing...

I've recently decided to take on the 365 project, where you take a picture every day for a year. I'm really enjoying the challenge, though other people's pictures sometimes intimidate me, and there are times already when I run out of ideas!
I just took this one for today, and love it. I love the sharpness of the leaves, the edges of the turquoise pot in the background, and the out of focus dirt on the bottom. I also find it fascinating that it used to be nothing more than a stick, and it's neighbors (not pictured) were bulbs! Amazing what a little sun and rain will do for a plant. And I can't wait to see it with actual flowers!

Friday, May 7, 2010

Tales of a census worker

It has been a very busy week, and to be honest, I love it. I wrote last week that I was having a hard time fighting my depression, but the business of this week has most definitely stopped that where it started. This week was reminiscent of my weeks at school, where I left the house around 8 a.m. and didn't get back until 8 p.m. This made for several long and slightly exhausting days, but they are happy days as well. Clearly, I need to be busy.

One of the things keeping me busiest this week is working for the census! I have finally started, and received my Assignment Area (AA). This week I've been knocking on doors, making phone calls, leaving notices, and, apparently, generally irritating people.
Without going into detail, of course, I wanted to share a few interesting stories from this week.

First, we had the landlord who insisted that the apartment with open curtains that was clearly vacant, was occupied. Alright, buddy. I called him twice to talk and the second time he got quite snippy. I'm pretty sure these people don't understand that we will continue to bother them until we get the information we want!

Then there was the woman who stated that, though she is white, she doesn't like to call herself white. And that the census doesn't have "the right races" on it. Ooookay!
This same woman almost refused to give me her daughter's information, even though I told her at least 50 three times that all information is confidential.

Another woman told me her age and birth month and day, but didn't want to tell me the year, because "there's so much identity theft out there!" I probably told her about 50 three times as well that all information was confidential, and that I took an oath to keep the information confidential. It's amazing how many people just don't believe me, or trust the government (not surprising though!)

Of course for all the irritating people, there are several cooperative ones, which makes it all worthwhile. Plus, I'm a huge fan of crossing things off lists, and this is exactly that! When I hit a house and conduct an interview, I'm done with that house which makes me feel very accomplished! I'm also learning and retaining a lot of interesting information about the census. For example, there is a $5,000 fine if you impede a census worker from filling out a questionnaire. If you flat-out refuse to complete the questionnaire, it is a $100 fine. And yes, they will find you.
Basically, it's best just to answer the questions. This only comes about once every 10 years, and the information is private for 75 years. After that, it's public record (but who really cares about that anyway!)

I'm enjoying my census work, now if only I could figure out how to work the 25 hours a week they would like us all to work!

Monday, May 3, 2010

Trauma, trauma, trauma!

I was getting ready to head out for several errands this afternoon, but I was first playing around on the computer, and watching Hermione. She was staring intently at the refrigerator, which really isn't all that unusual, she tends to stare at random things from time to time. However, I soon realized that she wasn't just staring at nothing when she lunged and then trotted into the living room with a mouse in her mouth!


I had no idea what to do, so I called Geoff. Being the girl that I am, I immediately started yelling into the phone: "Geoff!! Geoff!! It's a mouse! In the house!! How did it get here?? What do I do??" and so on and so forth, until he got me to calm down.
I ended up covering it with a pan, running down to the office and having one of the men there take care of it for me (he didn't kill it, just took it away and said he was going to drop it off far away from this part of the complex)
I'm not normally a girly-girl who screams at mice, honestly, but it completely shocked me! Plus, I really don't want to hear that we have mice in the apartment, that's just not good. What most likely happened is that it squeezed in, somehow, most likely last night because it got really cold. We haven't found any droppings so there is no reason to think it had been here for a while, or has friends.
Luckily, I think Hermione traumatized it enough that it won't be back here!

Sunday, May 2, 2010

Hiking...or not

All week I've been looking forward to a youth group hike that was supposed to be today. Well, looking forward is not exactly what was happening, but I was anticipating it, anyway. I was eager to get out and get moving...until I arrived at the church to go. Canceled because of rain.
I'm so disappointed, and I didn't think I would be. So instead, I'm sitting on the couch, thinking about watching a movie and cross stitching. Not a bad way to spend a Sunday, just not what I wanted.

I didn't get any comments on my latest depression post here on the blog, but thank you for those who do read and commented or encouraged me elsewhere. It meant a lot to me. I'm still struggling through this particular funk, but I'm anticipating that the change in my schedule this coming week is going to help my mood a lot.
For now...movie and cross stitch, and I'll try to ignore the fact that it's not currently raining.

Saturday, May 1, 2010

Oh, to be a cat...

They rarely have a care in the world.

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...