it's days like these that keep me on my winning streak

My dastardly plan to turn my mother into a Firefly fan isn't working out too well. "Are you still watching that stupid space show?" "Yes." "Well, I'll just stay in the bedroom then." =/ But I did snare both my brother and his friend! Of course, I think DJ was watching cause "that chick is hot" but whatever it takes, right? ;)

Today has consisted of watching more Firefly, doing laundry, snuggling with my dog, annoying my mom's dog, and eating way too much food. Tomorrow's list so far has shopping and pedicures. Maybe a haircut. Notice that we still haven't gotten around to doing any painting. Maybe on Thursday.

I could get used to this not working thing.

This weekend was fairly lovely. The weather was gorgeous! Although it is probably sad that I got really excited about the severe weather last night because that meant more Sven on TV. =/ But other than the short storm, there really couldn't be any complaints about the weather. It was in the 70's!

I tried to spend some time outside on Saturday, but I got my oil changed and then had to work and then I was exhausted by the time I got home. Stupid cold is still making me miserable and tired. Instead I spent a LOT of time on Fri & Sat cleaning up my music files and erasing things on my iPod to make room for new stuff. It's almost ready for my upcoming road trips!

Yesterday was a lovely day. I went on a walk with taylorea & hubby and then we went to the *gasp* rival bookstore, Borders. We then went back to their place and I gifted them some of my pirate booty. And then we ate and gossiped and watched The Office. It was a wonderful way to spend the day!

Oh yeah. A trip to Borders = more books to add to the list of books I've bought this year.
#49 Animal Instincts - Gena Showalter
#50 Kitty Takes a Holiday - Carrie Vaughn
Bren gave me a book too, but I can't remember the title. I'll add it into my next list. And how many books have I read so far this year? 15. Not bad, I guess. Plus, I should finish The Sparrow either today or tomorrow. But I need to step it up to hit my goal of 75 books for the year.

I found out that I'll be dog sitting again this weekend. I kind of wasn't expecting that. I may have to skip the Kim Harrison book signing because I'm also going to the Boiled in Lead show that night, and if I'm gone ALL day long the puppies will have a fit. I'll have to see what I can work out.

Next weekend will also be devoted to coloring my hair. I have a plan worked out and I'm pretty sure it'll turn out cool. I just desperately need to do something different with it! One of the curses of having curly hair is that you're very limited with your style choices. You can change the length but that's about it. You can't really get a "style" done.

Also, my nails are really getting too long. It's causing problems when I type because I keep hitting the extra keys with my nails. How do chicks with those super-long fake nails do it? I'm loathe to trim them off though. I think I've told this story before, but I used to bite my nails when I was a kid. Really bad. My mom tried to do everything she could think of to make me stop but it never worked. When my grandpa was dying from lung cancer, the very last time I saw him he made me promise that I'd stop biting my nails because he wanted to see my hands look like the hands of a young lady. I've never bitten them since them and I have a hard time even just trimming them. The few times I've gone for a manicure, I usually make them just shape my nails and not trim them. Even though they're usually all different lengths from breaking off at different times. I may have to break down and trim them though because it's getting a little ridiculous.

I really, really wanted to call in sick this morning. First, I overslept because I didn't hear my alarm. Then I couldn't breathe very well. And lastly, it's supposed to be in the 70's again. Really, those are the perfect reasons to sleep in and then spend the rest of the day outside. Instead, I am here because I had a training session this morning and since Tuesdays are super busy for me, I didn't want to have to also have to get caught up with Monday's stuff. Bah. But a couple people in my department did call in today. Fuckers.

I think that's everything for now. Oh! Don't forget to mark May 1st on your calendar for Trivia for Boobs II: Electric Boobyloo!! I'm hoping that we can get enough people involved that we can break off into two teams. I'm still hearing about how much fun everyone had at the first trivia night, so you'll want to be sure to be there too!

( My boring ass day is this way )

Check out all the other 12 of 12ers over on Chad Darnell's blog!!

Flavor of Love: Whatever Flav & New York were doing in that hotel room was seriously grossing me out. How anyone can kiss and...whatever...that trollish man is beyond me. And yes, I'm referring to both Flav and New York with that statement.

But of course I keep watching, because it is dramatastic! I'll be sad when it's done.

The Office: OMG!!!11!!!eleventy! How much did the premier rock?? This show just gets better and better.

London Bridge: Quite possibly the stupidest song ever made. And I CANNOT STOP listening to it!

Pirates: taylorea's birthday/pirate party was Saturday night and it was lovely. I did indeed dress up, but I didn't get a photo of my whole costume. I did take a couple head shots though, so maybe I'll post one when I get home. The party was fun, the food was good, and the company was great. We listened to random piratey music and watched The Pirate Movie, while playing party games. Unfortunately, one of the side-effects of kicking my caffeine addiction is that I now tire easily and ended up leaving rather early.

Speaking of the caffeine thing: I'm doing pretty well with the whole not drinking soda. All last week I managed to only have a can of soda every other day, which I'm trying to continue this week. Which also means that I am trying to get through a Monday without any caffeine. Ugh! I have an emergency Dr. Pepper sitting on my desk, but so far I've been able to resist opening it. It's about 1pm now and that's a good sign that I should be able to make it through the rest of the day. I barely got any sleep last night though and I'm yawning something awful and will probably end up taking a nap when I get home.

Other healthy things: I haven't really mentioned it, but I kinda started a diet. Well, more like a plan to be aware of what I'm eating and to encourage myself to get up off my ass and do something, rather than sit in front of the computer/TV all night. Anyhow, thanks to seimaisin, I joined SparkPeople and so far it's going pretty well. I lost five pounds last week, which is more than they encourage, but I'm sure it's mostly because of the not drinking soda and not eating kettle chips. (man, I MISS kettle chips) Once my body gets more used to not eating stuff like that, I'm sure it'll get harder to shed pounds. I'll admit I'm still eating some junk, but much less. That's the whole SparkPeople idea. Ease into things so it's not such a shock to yourself and you quit in disgust.

Taco Bell: Damn you and your TV commercials! I was so hungry for a tostada last night! To the point where I was prepared to get in my car and drive there at 11:30 last night. But I told myself that it was a bad idea and went to read a book instead. I've planned my eating today so that I will actually be able to go to TB for dinner tonight and eat a couple things. It'll make my tummy happy!

Minnesota Twins: GO TWINS!! The magic number is 2 to get into the playoffs and that should get demolished tonight. YAY!! Time to dig out the Homer Hankies. We're still in a race for the division title though, and that probably won't be decided until the last few games. Stupid Tigers. *grumbles*

Minnesota Wild: WHY ARE THE PRESEASON GAMES NOT ON TV?? So stupid. I need my hockey!!

scottielovers: So adorable! I WANT A SCOTTIE PUPPY!

So, my parents decided that they can't keep the puppy. Boo. But Earl has been a wreck since they brought Jack home. Earl refuses to come out from under the bed, hasn't drank any water in a couple days and has been pulling his fur out. Riley isn't too fond of Jack either, checking around corners to make sure he isn't around. They're both just too old to deal with an energetic puppy being around, I suppose. We knew all along that this might happen, but it still sucks. My mom already found a good place for Jack to go though, so I guess it's not so bad. At least he's not stuck in that pet store anymore.

In more depressing news, I don't think I'm going to be able to go to Hollywood for the Cathouse show. There's NO way I can get three days off from work. I don't even think I can get one day off. I had a bad feeling that this might happen so I haven't bought my plane ticket yet, luckily. So, if you know anyone who wants a ticket for the show (or want it yourself), let me know.

In other news, I bought the new Monopoly Here & Now game today, because I'm a sucker for stuff like that. I also had to force myself from not picking up Totally 80's Trivial Pursuit. I keep having to remind myself that I live alone and have no one to play games with.

Okay, now that I started looking under Scoodle instead of Scottiepoo (seriously - Scoodle? lame) I actually found some photos and stuff of what the new dog might look like.

Lots of photos of this one
But this photo is the best. OMG! How cute! (this dog seriously has Riley's face)
CUTE!

So adorable! Now I'm even more excited to see the new dog!!

This is pretty much going to be the abbreviated version of the weekend. But if you want to skip the reading and go right to the photos, I don't blame you.

Saturday
I finally didn't feel like I wanted to die, so our plans were definitely going to happen. dazeebean and taylorea met me at my place, and they were nice enough to bring birthday presents. Including a giant Captain Jack Sparrow standee! *drool* I haven't decided where he's going yet, but the bedroom has not been ruled out. ;)

We headed off to The Fair and went straight to the Kare 11 barn, where I bought my Sven T-shirt. *rawr* We stood in line so I could get Rick Kupchella and Amy Hockert's autographs, and I was very disappointed that Shaver was not there. We went off to get cookies and then went back to the barn to wait for Sven. But, sadly, there were storms off to the West and he had to stay at the station. I DID NOT GET TO MEET SVEN ON MY BIRTHDAY! *whines*

Disappointed, I went off to drown my sorrows in root beer. And then we went to the butterfly house, which was super cool. The rest of our party arrived, so we went to meet them and then trotted off for food. We decided we wanted to see aminals, and shuffled off in that direction. With plenty of pip stops.

Including at The Slingshot! duckduck and I decided that we wanted to spend a ridiculous amount of money to be shot hundreds of feet into the air, and so we did. It was great! We got the video of it and I'm going to work on getting that uploaded tomorrow.

We finally made it to the aminals. And they smell. That's about all I have to say. I wanted a apple cider float, so we headed back to the Grandstand after wandering through the barns. I thought the floats were divine last year, but they were even better this year because they had cinnamon ice cream in them! *drool* It was, in fact, a nice moment of zen as we sat eating our ice cream and apples while listening to the Gear Daddies on the Grandstand stage.

We walked through the International Bazaar where I bought the most awesome (and useless) magic wand and then decided to head home. Since it was still early, I decided to drive up to the cabin. Which was probably a bad idea since I spent almost two hours driving through a torrential downpour. Ick. But, it stopped raining eventually and I made it up okay. Riley and Earl happily greeted me and I crashed out.

Sunday
Didn't really do anything exciting. Since I feel better but not fantastic, I decided to take things easy. Plus, after just getting over a high fever, I didn't want to sit out in the sun. So, I mostly sat in the shade and read, with Riley curled up next to me. He loves it when I'm up there. My mom made Lebanese meat pies for dinner and we had strawberry shortcake for dessert as my birthday dinner. I watched Flavor of Love, of course. I cannot get enough of that show!

Monday
Ummm, kind of the same thing. Reading, sitting, dog curled up next to me. Came home. Did this.

WTF?? There's nothing going on around here for weeks on end, now everything I would possibly want to do is all happening on the same night. I just found out about another show.

Things I won't be doing on Sat night:
1. Attending seimaisin's birthday outing
2. Going to the Holiday CD Release Party at Bunker's
3. Seeing Even Flow (the Pearl Jam tribute band who haven't played here in ages) at The Rock

What I will be doing:
1. Eating bday dinner with dazeebean
2. Dog sitting for my parents, which is why I can't be out late having fun, because they get lonely if someone's not there with them at night

There is nothing - I repeat NOTHING - that I've seen or heard about Sahara that would make me actually want to see it. It looks horrible.

It's quite obviously Friday, as I just went on a bathroom run and noticed that most of my cow-workers were standing/sitting around chatting. I love it when nothing gets done around here.

It's SO weird to be home every night now. Not being at the bookstore really hit me on Monday night as, unless I asked for it off, I've worked every Monday night for two or three years. Same thing with Friday night. I had to go to ye olde B&N on Wed night, as our bookgroup met there. I managed to mostly stay out of sight, so I didn't get really get noticed.

I got a new work computer a couple weeks ago, as it was time to update me from 2000 to XP Pro. They didn't remember to block streaming audio/video like on my last 'puter, so now I can acutally listen to/watch things at work again. It's lovely! But they took away my Solitare! Those bastards!!

I'll be dog sitting for my parents this weekend, as they're going down to Sioux Falls to see my brother's baseball games. I'll get to see him myself next weekend as his team will be in St. Cloud. Yay! Dog sitting means that I won't get anything productive done this weekend, since I'll be trapped at my parent's house. With their craptacular computer. Boo. Well, I will get free laundry done. That's always a plus.

I've been watching Season 3 of Crossing Jordan this week. I've actually seen most of the episodes already, since that's when I started watching the show. Wow, they make a lot more sense now. Especially "Oh Brother, Where Art Thou?" I was so confused the first time I saw it, and now I know why. Holy cow is that season screwed up though! Even if I didn't know all the episodes were out of order, and even if I didn't have the production numbers to know the order they were really in, it's like so obvious which episodes go where if you just look at how pregnant, very pregnant, missing, or obviously breastfeeding Jill is.

And I really need to stop compulsively watching "Revealed." It's turning into a sickness. *points to new icon*

Boredom produces memes. Ganked from Julee, who posted it on MySpace.
( clicky, clicky )

Oh! And I found out yesterday that Homicide Season 7 comes out on DVD on June 28th, which is now written on my calendar in huge, colorful letters. It's so sad though...because that's it. What will I do after that???

Last night I began yet another stint of dog watching at the 'rents house. It's not a big deal as I love spending time with the pups. But it does suck that I'll be away from home until Sunday. However, it does have its advantages. Like the fact that they left me the keys to their brand new Ford Focus. And by brand new, I mean it had 16 miles on it when I climbed in to drive them to the airport. My mom hasn't even driven it yet! So, let's see, do I drive my 11 year old car with the busted up speakers and rickety old tape player to work today, or take the brand spanking new car with a nice CD player?? *evil grin* I'm in love with the car already.

Saturday night, the usual gang is coming over to have a wild toga kegger. Or to play 90's Trivial Pursuit. One of those two for sure. duckduck should be bringing her canine companion, which my dogs will love. They always adore having new friends around. And it's 'posed to be like 47 degrees, so they'll be able to frolic about outside until they wear themselves out.

The downer of dog sitting is that I had to get up at 5am this morning, so I'd have time to walk the mutts. Ugh! That was painful, but it's pretty nice out so at least I wasn't freezing too. It's also really hard for me to sleep there, since I'm used to complete quiet and being alone. I have a hard time getting used to Riley walking around and jumping on and off the bed. And when he's on the bed, he MUST scrunch up as close as humanly...err, caninely possible to me. That's fine, it just makes me really hot.

Normally, I would also have Earl sleeping between my legs, which is ultra annoying. But he recently strained a muscle or something, and he won't jump on or off the bed. He barely makes it up the stairs, which means I'll be carrying him alot. So, instead of sleeping with me, he just stays in his hiding place under the bed. But, he looked kind of sad last night to not be with me.



And that's about it! I just thought I'd make an actual update about what's going on around me.

Oh, I started a new journal, scrap_this. If you go there, you'll notice that there's nothing there yet, but there will be. I'm planning on putting up all my scrapbooking pages and any new tips or ideas I've had. Nothing too exciting. I'm just hoping it gets me motivated to get some actual pages done. So, if you're interested in hearing about my tales of using my Scrappin' Weaponry, friend me!