Hi.

OK. Clearly I suck at this. I kinda forgot about having a blog until about 10 minutes ago.

Shit.

More later

Friggin' Dog...

So, husband and I had spaghetti for dinner this evening. No big deal, however we are like cave people and we don't use our beautiful dining table... No... We use TV trays.  Super classy.

After we finished eating, I got up and went to the restroom with the intention of putting my plate in the sink when I got back. While I was out of the room, husband got up to do whatever in the kitchen.

When I got back into the living room, I saw dog standing up on the couch with his little face in my plate. I scolded the dog mainly just to get his attention and get him out of the plate.  About that time, I looked at husband's plate, which was also left on a TV tray, and I realize that 1/2 of the spaghetti that was left is gone now.  That's right friends, dog finished off most of husband's food and then started on mine. After just sitting and staring at nothing and looking like he was the happiest dog ever, he went and drank all of the water in his bowl.

Honestly, I am both impressed and a little bit nervous because I'm terrified he is going to throw up or poo all over everything tonight. Dog is currently laying on the couch between me and husband looking a little bit sick and kinda miserable from being too full. His little tummy is pooched  out and he has been laying on his back for about 15 minutes now.

I guess the question of the hour is... Can I give my dog some Pepto? I think he is gonna need it...


********************************************************************************************


Updated:  Dog now has horrible gas.  He farted himself awake. I fear that it will be along night of poo and gas.  I may go stay in a hotel.

"Fat bottomed girls you make the rockin' world go round..."

So, husband and I are always talking about how we need to exercise more.  That period of "more" started this weekend apparently. Holy crap. It did not start out well. My dad has been a bicycle-r  for several years now, which is good because he knows all the ins and outs of this activity. Well, my mom started riding bikes recently and convinced me and husband to start as well. Holy hell  y'all, bicycling is hard. Husband and dad went on Friday to get new tubes and tires for my bike since they dry rotted - it's been a while since I rode a bike, so they went and got it all fixed up for me. Saturday morning rolls around and we (me, mom, dad, and husband) all decide we are going to ride bikes. For some reason,  my front tube would not hold air, so husband and dad went to the bike shop to get me a new tube. Before they left, they instructed me and mom to go ahead and start and they would be back soon.  Husband left his bike for me to ride while they were gone.  Guess what, bikes are made in different sizes.  Guess what else... When a bike is too damn tall, you can fall off of it from a standing position. I was standing there on my very tip toes trying to get myself up on the seat and I straight fell over in the parking lot. Awesome. I scraped my shin and my elbow and smacked my head. So, being the trooper that I am, I got back up and attempted to ride my mom's bike instead, but she is a little bit taller than I am, so I fell off her bike as well. So I proceeded to be a grown up and sit in the grass and cry. Not one of my finer moments. Finally husband and dad came back with my bike in working order and we were finally able to ride. On the way back to the car, my foot slipped off of the bike pedal and I scraped the crap out of my calf. Awesome. About half way through the ride, the song "Fat Bottomed Girls" by Queen popped into my head and it has been there ever since. Yay.

This morning, Husband was up moving around and woke me up and said "are you going riding this morning?" so, I reluctantly got out of bed and we went to meet my mom and dad again to ride. Well, I did not fall off this morning, so that's good. But we ended up riding in the heat of the day and by the time we were done, I thought I was going to die, but I didn't, so, YAY! :)

Ok... So, I learned some stuff this weekend that I will share with you now.

1: Padded bicycling shorts are a must have, however, if the shorts do not fit correctly, then the padded part will not hit you in the right place and then the padding serves no purpose. However, it will make you walk like you have a saddle in your undies. So cute... :|

2: 9 miles on a stationary bike is VERY different than 9 miles on an actual bicycle outside. Holy crap.  Y'all, I rode my bicycle 9 miles this morning with mom, dad, and husband. Around mile 8 I thought I was going to throw up and die, more from the heat than the actual exercise.

3: When you are dehydrated, Gatorade tastes freaking amazing, otherwise, it tastes really not awesome.

4: I seriously need to remember to wear sunscreen and I do not tolerate heat well at all. We got in the car to go home from the trails where we were riding our bikes and the thermometer said it was 100 degrees outside today with like 75% humidity. It was rough y'all.

I have decided that I will be riding a bike a few times a week, but it is put on hold until I can figure out the padded butt/shorts/seat situation. Cause let me tell ya something, that is uncomfortable yo. But until then, I'm going to lay here in bed and think about how sore my muscles are.

Since September.

I kinda forgot about this blog until I got the desire to write one day and thought "I should start a blog... Oh... Wait a minute..."

So, new things. I started a cupcake company, Jessicakes - so, that's awesome. They are gourmet cupcakes and icing made exclusively from scratch.  Ideally, I would like to make it a full time thing eventually. We will see what happens.

Husband and I bought a new car - YAY!  2007 GLI Fahrenheit VW. Super stoked, love this car. We owned the car for less than 48 hours and a random person who was standing on the side of the road threw a brick and bounced it off of the hood, not cool, but the hood was replaced and painted and all is good now.

Got to watch my baby brother graduate from high school. It was an incredibly proud moment in my house. I am so proud to say that both of my little brothers have graduated high school and are in/on their way into college. Super proud of them.

There have been marriages, engagements, dating, and break-ups. I have had several friends announce that they are starting/continuing their families, I am super excited for all of my friends and family who have been announcing new stuff.

I kinda feel like there is no logical way to end this post so I'm just going to stop. So... That's it for now folks. :)

10 years...

This is going to be a "I remember..." post. Get ready...

10 years. 1 decade. 520 weeks. 3650 days.I still remember where I was when it happened. I was a senior in high school, sitting in the back of Mr. Smith's history class. I remember that the teacher from across the hall came in and told our teacher what happened and all the color drained out of his face. We turned on the news and saw that the first plane had hit. I felt numb and hollow and extrordinarily scared. Then the next one hit, and I started to cry.

I cried for all the people on the planes and their families. I cried for everyone in the towers who died and for all the people who would never see them again. I cried because my boyfriend at the time was in the military and I was so afraid of what would happen to him. I cried because I knew our country changed that day.

I remember everything stopped that day. All day at school, we watched the news no one really spoke. It was scary and awful and sad, but it was nothing compared to what all the people who were directly impacted had to feel.

It's been 10 years. We did come back, we did rebuild, we grew as a country, and we found justice. Are we completely back to the way we were? No. Will we ever be? Probably not. I do know that I am so very thankful for each and every person in the military who has gone and protected us. Thank you all so very much.

9/11/01... Never forgotten.

Repo

So, as you all know, husband, dog and I live in an apartment. When husband and I moved in here, it had been a long time since I had lived in an apartment, so I had to get used to apartment living. I was not at all prepared for what I would experience.

One cool spring night, husband and I decided to sleep with our bedroom window open. It was around one am when I was woken up when a vehicle smashed into the empty dumpster. Ok, did you guys know that when a car hits an empty dumpster, that makes a loud ass bang? I'm here to tell you, it does.  So, I heard the "BANG!!" and shot up in bed and immediately thought "SHIT!! The apartment exploded!!" I'm not the most logical person when I awake due to loud noises. Anyway, husband being the awesome guy he is, gets out of bed and opens the blinds on the window to survey the damage, and to make sure the source of the bang wasn't someone smashing into our cars. He informed me that a tow truck had smashed into the dumpster and was trying to back up to our neighbor's car.

Husband watched them for a few minutes and seemed concerned. The following conversation ensued:

Husband: Neighbor's car is an all wheel drive.

Me: Uh... ok...

Husband: The repo men are hooking up to her back axle.

Me: *blank stare*

Husband:  You can't tow an all wheel drive vehicle by the back axle while it is in gear. It will mess up the car.

At this point, husband is awake enough to call the cops, just to have them say that since it is not our car, then there is nothing they can do about it and to call back if they smash into any vehicles. As soon as husband hangs up with the police,  the repo men started to drag the car out and I immediately understood what he meant about not towing an all wheel drive vehicle by the rear axle. There was the loudest episode of squealing tires/dragging plastic that I have ever experienced in my life. We got to listen to the repo drivers drag the car up the driveway, out to street, and then fade away into the distance as they got onto the interstate, dragging the car behind them.

The next morning, I went out to get in my car and go to work and there were long, dark black tire marks and a white scuff mark (the car was white) all the way up the parking lot, down the street, and onto the on ramp for the interstate. It was amazing. Luckily we haven't had to wake up to repo men again, thank goodness, but I will never forget that night. Those neighbors moved out soon after.

How about you, any crazy neighbor stories?

Graceful... totally...

Do you ever have days that make you question your intellect or question why in the hell other people let you live on your own or drive a vehicle?  I have those days all the time... Saturday was one of those days for me. I went and got my hair cut and styled that morning, then, I stopped and grabbed some lunch and went to work. I have to hike up 3 flights of stairs to get to my cube. Alright, so I’m on my way up the stairs w/ my lunch and my full, large Dr Pepper… (you see where this is going right?) and I am on the last flight of stairs, I can see the door… and I catch the toe of my flip flop on the stair and fall down. I dropped the DrP and it went EVERYWHERE… but this was overshadowed by the fact that I landed w/ all my weight on my right “girl” and hit my stomach and knees on lower stairs… awesome. So… now… I have a huge bruise on my chest right above my right "girl" and it looks awful and it hurts. I also have matching bruises on my stomach and knees where I landed on the edge of the stairs.  Not to mention that my hair style was ruined because I soaked myself in Dr Pepper. I had to use an entire roll of paper towels to clean up the mess I made and my "girl" hurt for the rest of the day. Awesome. FYI… did you know that Dr Pepper has more “hold” than any gel or hairspray I have EVER used?? It totally does, but it makes your hair crunchy and kinda sticky at the same time, so I would not suggest it

Out of everything I was thinking “DAMNIT! I really wanted that Dr Pepper!” because it was all hot and gross outside. The next thought was "Thank God that this happened on the cement stairs, not the carpeted ones", because I really really really did not want to explain that to our director.  I didn’t even really notice the pain until after I went to the bathroom and cleaned myself up and washed all the Dr Pepper off my hands and arms and neck and chest and face. Then the pain kicked in, it still kinda hurts to move in certain ways and to breathe really deep. I slept on Saturday night with a big bag of frozen corn on my chest to avoid further bruising... it didn't work.

My stepmother has called me Grace since I was really young, yeah, this is obviously the perfect nickname for yours truly.  Maybe, someday, I won't be so damn clumsy... but I doubt it.