The last days of twentysomething

I came upon an alarming revelation yesterday as I was emailing a friend of mine. He and I have been trying to get together for a beer for a while. Attempted to get together last night, but he was too busy (me, I’m never busy unless I have social activities double-booked). So he suggested next Monday. Which made me look at the calendar. Epps! I will be 30 next Monday*! I should be out living it up this week, my last few days as a 20-something. But true to usual Erin fashion, I’m not. And Will is out racing all weekend, so I won’t even be living it up this weekend. Sucky!

What’s worse is that my birthday falls on a Monday. I’m pretty tempted to just take the day off (ensuring I have a good day). Or maybe just go to swim practice, work a half day, then leave at lunch…..

Then do I need to sit back and reflect on my 20’s, develop a plan for my 30’s? I’m not really the type to do resolutions at new years, so I doubt that doing this now is going to help me out. Besides, I have no idea what I’m doing next week normally, much less being able to plan out an entire decade. Maybe this should be a list of “things to look forward to in the next year”.

1 – must. get. new. job.

2 – camping in March at Big Bend Nat’l park, and not being too sick to do anything active (like last time we went)

3 – swimming at the USMS nationals event in Florida next May.

4 – hopefully taking the much-talked-about-and-little-acted-upon trip to New Zealand’s South Island over Thanksgiving.

See, lots of fun stuff! 30 is the new 20! or something like that.....

*sending me presents is completely optional

Critters and Lush

Found out what the "critter" in the bottom of the pool was.... turns out it was a huge rolled up Ace bandage. Which we all decided was still pretty icky. But not as icky as a bloated dead rat, I guess.

Got my Lush package last night. And well, um, its on the stinky side. Love my Snow Fairy shower gel - with its glitter and candy smell. Mmmmm.... My dusting powder scent is growing on me - its jasmine and vertivert. I don't think it smells that strong, but my swim team ppl did. My soft couer massage bar has potential, but it does smell really, really sweet. My Love Bug, well, lets just say I have it in a ziplock baggie and I can still smell the thing. It does have lovely golden sparkles. I just don't know about the scent. I'm hoping that it mellows out when I wear it. My freebies have potential. Two bubble bath bars, one in my Candy Fluff scent, and one is supposedly lavender (but all I could make out by that point was the stinky Love Bug). So we'll see if I like what I got. I'm thinking I will, its just a bit different than what I was expecting...

I am *dying* with anticipation

Hopefully when I get home from work today, I will finally have my package of goodies I ordered from lush waiting for me. I truly am a tad bit too excited. My friend got me the Rock Star soap, Candy Fluff dusting powder, and Melting Marshmallow Moments as a present last year. Love this stuff. But for some reason, never had the courage to order some on my own. Partially b/c its expensive - partially b/c there is so much to choose from and its overwhelming. And hard to pick things when you read what the ingredients are and you have no idea what they smell like. Such as neroli. What exactly is neroli?

For my first (of I'm sure many, many orders), I purchased 2 massage bars (one with glitter! the other with honey and chocolate!), another scented dusting powder, and a shower gel (pink! with glitter! that smells like my beloved Candy Fluff). And part of a promo deal, I get two mystery freebies. Combine the mystery freebies with the exceptionally long delivery time (15 days since I ordered.... which sadly is std since its handmade and comes from Vancouver), and I simply am dying for my order.

A statement you never want to hear during swim practice

From a swimmer in the fast lane (the opposite side of the pool from where I swim):

"Coach, there's a dead critter at the bottom of the pool. Can you hand me a flipper so I can remove it?"

Um, ewwwww. I'm so glad I own my own flippers so there's no chance of that dead-critter-retrieval-tool ever touching my feet. I don't even want to go there about the whole swimming in a pool with a dead critter thing. Or what kind of critter it was. Ew.

Beer chug swim relay results

First of all, I have three mystery bruises on the side of my left leg that really hurt. And my abs were sore for 2 days from doing those starts. Had to get my whining in first. Swam 8 events. Sounds bad, but it was really only 1x100, 2x50 and a bunch of 25s. Started with 100 back, which turns out, I haven’t swam since July 1994. Woo! I’d swam 50 back in meets in the past year, but not 100s. Turns out, I beat my estimated time (1:27 actual), so I was happy. Swam 50 breast, improved on that time. The rest were 25s or fun relays, so the times really don’t matter. Plus, they’re relay times, so they’re “off” by a few seconds anyways. FYI, I am one of those anal engineer types who has a spreadsheet tracking every event that I’ve swam since returning to swimming, complete with meters/yards conversions. I’ll try to post times next time I swim in a meet (mid-March maybe).

I did two “fun” relays. And by fun, I think it was more fun to watch from the sidelines than to participate.

First up, the sweatpants relay. As in you swim while wearing sweatpants. Then have to get out of the pool, strip, and have the next person put the wet sweatpants on. So dude jumps out of the water and strips the sweats off. I sit on the blocks and have two teammate guys in speedos wrestle with the ginormous wet sweatpants and my feet. My feet didn’t want to cooperate. Then I dive in. First thing that happens is the sweats fall down past my ass. So, I pull them up and swim the best I can while wearing XXL sweat pants. Get to the shallow end. The guys on that end YANK me outof the water by the shoulders and flop me sideways on the deck, then proceed to de-pants me. You know, that’s every girl’s dream, to be de-pantsed on deck by a bunch of balding men in speedos. I figured it was best just to lay there like a dead fish and let them have their way with me and the sweat pants.

Second fun relay – the much anticipated beer relay. Complete with Budweiser! Fortunately for me, I only had to consume half a can of the vile stuff. But man, just the smell reminds me of the time I was at a frat party in Missoula where there was 1” of beer on the basement floor. Ew. Anyways. Deal is, you have to chug your beer then sprint a 25. This old lady on my team kept telling me how to chug my beer. As if this would be a problem. If anything, when I am faced with having to consume crappy beer, the only option is to chug it, so you don’t really taste it. Besides, Bud is basically water, so its not like it was a big deal. So, I chugged, spilling a good portion of it down my face and on the deck (sooo glad I don’t swim at this pool normally or have to clean up – can you imagine the smell?). Then I sprint my 25 free. Let me just say that chugging icky beer then sprinting is really not the best thing for my stomach. I just felt ICKY after that.

Wherin I do my impression of a flopping beached whale

Relay meet is tomorrow. So, we spent half of practice doing relay starts. Pretty entertaining really, as one of my friends hasn’t done a start off the blocks in oh, 25 yrs. I’m certain we were a graceful bunch. Confirmation is from all the red marks on my upper thighs (regular start) and back (backstroke start) from my body smacking the water. And all the bruises I’m sure I will have tomorrow from me scraping my shin as I climbed out of the pool (I hate using the ladder) and on my arm from when I smacked my arm against the block as I was not-so-gracefully climbing out of the pool.

Hey, at least my goggles stayed on!

The Shayla ate my baby

There is something you must know about my husband. He can take any real life event and turn it into a Seinfeld episode, complete with a quote from the show.

So last night we went to the friendly neighborhood pub for the regular Thursday Subaru happy hour. (And on a side note, I was going to post a pic of my newly painted fingernails, inspired by Aarwenn, but well, it was either take a pic of my nails or drink $3 Boddingtons. Sorry blog-world, the Boddington’s won. And now every finger is chipped from swim practice, which serves as a reminder of WHY I normally don’t paint my fingernails.). We sit down and notice that our waitress isn’t completely there. I nicknamed here GED, as I’m sure that’s about as far as she got. Nice girl, but not really there. It was her 4th day on the job. And we knew that she was new a)b/c we’re there every Thurs (and sometimes more often) and we know all the waitstaff and b)she introduced herself (Shayla) and shook each of our hands and asked for our names. Which really was odd. Who shakes hands after receiving a beer order? So after introductions and she walks off, Will comes up with (in his best Elaine-Australian voice) “The Shayla ate my baybey.” Which nearly caused me to shoot beer out my nose. The Shayla thing continued on as we ended up with ~12 ppl at our table and each time someone would order, she would be missing either her notepad or a pen. We’re still not sure how that happens, as she had one of those pocket-apron deals on. And if I was new, I’d be sure to have about 5 of each stashed in those pockets. It just became a running joke and became quite amusing. But I’m sure its one of those things where you had to be there to actually find it funny.

Random mumblings for a Wednesday

Spent most of last week in Oklahoma City for a job. Actually had a splendid time. The client and site people were really nice to me. Actually treated me with respect and didn’t question my every move. I got to relax, have fun, and feel confident in my skills. This week I’m back in the office and its back to the usual crap. Fun fun! Makes me wish I was in the field more often.

Swimming was crazy amounts of hard Monday and Tuesday. Mainly I think b/c Sunday was simply not enough rest for my poor arms. So, I’m taking today and Thurs off. Then hit practice on Friday, and my meet on Saturday. And being that I have OCD about swimming, its killing me that Coach refuses to tell me what I’m swimming. Absolutely killing me. It’s a relay meet and no individual leg is over 100 yds. So, for the entry sheet, he asked for our split times and for us to tell him which events were ok to swim and which events fit into the category “no way in hell”. Well, I told him that everything EXCEPT 100 fly was fair game. Fly is my nemesis. They made me swim it my Sr year in HS and it was agonizing and humiliating. But since a lot of the other schools couldn’t place 3 ppl in that event, it was an easy way for me to get points for my team, even if I did come in last out of 4 or 5 swimmers. Anyways, I fully believe that fly aided in the destruction of my shoulders. I guess destruction is not the right word, as they’re mostly functional now. But at the time, not being able to lift your arms over your head b/c the tendonitis had calcified seemed like “destruction”. So, from then on out – 100 fly is evil. Somehow, though, in my skewed head, 50 fly seems ok. Go figure! So last week, I “attempted” to swim 50 fly with flippers. It was horrible. Of course, part of the reason for it being horrible was that I did it at the end of a 75 minute workout. But still, all I can think of is humiliation and pain and horror. I also told coach that 3 to 5 events would be ok. And I listed times for 100’s of everything, including the IM. So, in my warped mind, I’m swimming 50 fly, 100 IM, and 100 breast, in addition to a few other things. All back-to-back of course. Which makes me hyperventilate! Coach claims that he refuses to tell ppl their events prior to the meet b/c he’s had a good history of people whining about what the got stuck with or simply drop out, which makes his job that much harder on the day of the meet. Good point, but it still doesn’t do much for my OCD.

A funny from Will. He is thinking ahead this year (points are deserved here) and has made reservations for dinner on Feb 12th. The 12th b/c I have to fly back to OKC on the 14th. So, per his email, I am telling my IIF’s. To quoth him, “I deserve positive points for thinking ahead!!! Write them down and tell ALL of your web buddies. I have to keep my status as most desirable but un-obtainable web buddy husband!” So, you have been informed. And I’m thinking of referring to him from now on as “MDBUOWBH”. Damn, that’s a mouthful.

And I seem to have no motivation to do things. Work… home stuff. Even jewelry. No idea why. Must get over this soon though, b/c its annoying.

And speaking of work stuff, I should actually work on well, work. Instead of blogging. Even though this is way more interesting and fun.

Postal swim results

The swim challenge wasn't in our usual pool at the High School (which has been repaired but it needs a few days to flush out all the algae that I'm certain has took up residence in the past 2 weeks). So, we met at this outdoor pool - in January. Which was trippy since I still associate January with cold, but hey, this is Texas. Its warm here. Actually, once I got warm, swimming outside was nice. It was nice to look at the clouds and the trees while I swam.

Anyways, I met my goal of 3,000 yds in 60 minutes. I actually swam 3385 yds, w/out pain or losing focus or being horribly bored. Yay! My arms are beginning to be sore now, though, so I'm very happy I planned ahead and scheduled a massage tomorrow :)

Thanks for all the good luck wishes :)

Next week I have a relay meet - should be fun. Events include a beer chug relay (while you swim). I'll report back in a week with results. :)

I need this swimsuit

Now, I won't look as good as the model, but I still think "Rock Star" is highly appropriate for me :)

Small adventures in Oklahoma

So, I'm in Oklahoma City for work. The place I'm at had a h-u-g-e fire a few months ago, and as a result, the landscape looks quite martian, with the red dirt poking thru the charred remains of grass and trees. The after affects of the fire are pretty cool. I mean, the entire site smells like a campfire, which makes me happy. And the trees! This place is loaded with cedar trees. And as it turns out, when cedar trees burn, they EXPLODE from the inside out, resulting in this tree I took a few too many photos of.

Far away shot of Cedar Explosion Tree:
Closer shot of Cedar Explosion Tree:
Another angle:
Another crazy feature left over from the fire were these crazy little balls scattered all over the ground. I asked the plant guy what they were, and he said they were some sort of vine fruit, and during the fire, the vines burned but the fruit stayed. I thought they were really interesting as well...




So, this has been my week at work thus far. Sure beats being trapped in my office!

3500

That's how many yards I swam today all on my own. In an hour! Woo!

The regular pool is still broken with parts on order. The team practiced today at this outdoor pool, which I elected not to join. Its really not my idea of fun to swim outside when its 45 degrees and misting out. I paid my dues in summer league in HS in Colorado, swimming at 6 AM when it was 55-60 degrees out. I figure that was enough torture for this girl and I've paid my outdoor swimming dues.

So, I swam at yet-another 24-hour fitness this morning. 3 different pools in 3 workouts. Water was cloudy and for some crazy reason, they decided to have the horizontal jets BLASTING cold water at one end of the pool. And my blasting, I mean forceful enough to push me over to the side as I swam by.

I decided to treat today as a test for my 1-hr swim. Swam 48 minutes straight for 2800 yards. Crazy part is that I was barely even winded.... But my arms weren't tweaky/sore like they have been for the past few week and I didn't get bored since I broke up my swim into 12 minute intervals, with each interval having a different set of stuff to do.

Crazy people in the pool report:
- 1 lady doing very slow water jogging - but at least she was wearing appropriate attire.
- 1 hispanic younger lady fully clothed (t-shirt and shorts - but at least they were black!) who would swim 1/3 a length then stop for a full 2-3 minutes then swim another 1/3 length.
- and thanks to Stacers for commenting on this, we had old dude with flippers and full on snorkel gear doing freestyle. Sad part is that I was lapping him even w/out flippers.

The pool is always greener....

Isn't that how the saying goes?

The chlorine pump at my pool is dead. It was a little cloudy yesterday (before we knew the pump was dead) and we showed up this morning and you couldn't even see the shallow end. Although the water was a pretty aqua color instead of mucky green. So, seeing as how my Postal is in 5 DAYS, myself and a friend headed over to a nearby gym where I have membership to swim. We get there and all 3 lanes are taken - by SLOW people. One lady had good form, so she is forgiven for her slowness. One guy had eh form, but he did offer to let me split the lane with him, so he is also forgiven for his slowness. Then there's this dude in the center lane. Older, going bald, wearing a speedo. Ok, you think, not so bad? So, he's swimming side stroke and wearing goggles on his forehead. Then he flips over to do backstroke - a very limp wristed version of backstroke, still with the goggles acting as fashion accessories rather than being on his eyes and functional. Then finally, mid-workout, I look over and see him doing elementary backstroke. Which, if you don't know, is face up and you do a frog kick. Older, not in shape gay man doing face up frog kick in a speedo.... I hope you weren't eating when you read that - if so, I'm sorry.

Then as a bonus, there was a chunky latino lady who was wearing shorts and a *nasty* saggy sports bra, with a clear shower cap over her head. She got in the lane with slow-but-nice guy and proceeded to spend a half hour jumping up and down. In the water in a saggy loose WHITE sports bra.

So, after all this, I guess the okd dude with both nipples pierced w/heavy gauge rings, parrot girl, and hermophrodite lady really aren't all that bad!

Hermaphrodite swimmer “lady”

There’s this “lady” on my swim team. “Lady” only b/c she uses the women’s locker room instead of the men’s one. She’s a twig of a woman and well, not very pretty, with a very whiny nasally voice, that ironically isn’t far off from SNL’s Pat character. Her haircut looks like someone took a bowl to her head and used that as a guide. Her clothes strongly resemble men’s clothes - flat black loafers, trousers, and a button-down shirt (buttoned all the way to her neck). Oddly enough though, she has some interesting jewelry, from her travels abroad for work.

She only shows up to practice on Wednesdays. She shows up, puts her gear bag on the deck – open for all to see the contents as we walk from the locker room to the pool. She generally has a baggie of maxi pads and tampons on the top of the pile in her bag (further proof that she’s not a man?), which ew. Is it really that difficult to put your bag in the locker room like everyone else? The building is generally secure with little threat of things being stolen. Unfortunately, she likes to swim in my lane, which sucks, b/c her lane etiquette is horrible, and she’s actually much faster than she thinks she is. She always skips warm up and stretches. Then puts her cap on, without cramming all of her hair inside the cap. She’s got her bangs and the back of her hair sticking out of the cap. Which begs the question, what’s the point of wearing a cap? And really, I just can’t get past this whole hair/cap issue, b/c its really just so weird. And then the most annoying swimming feature – she refuses to wear flippers for the “flipper designated” swim sets. Which just upsets the natural order of things, as you really don’t have much time in between sets to set up a new swim order. Oh and did I mention she’s an over-achiever during practice? Little to no rest, and she swims more distance than what is required which usually causes her to swim over into the next set, which again upsets the rest of the swimmers in the lane b/c we have to accommodate her and fit her actions into our new set and swim order.

And then finally, the “what’s grosser than gross” portion of her demeanor. After practice, most of us generally take a shower in hopes that our skin won’t glow green from all the chlorine. So, I’m happily enjoying the hot water after practice. And every Wednesday, my post-workout vegetative state in the shower is interrupted by the sound of her blowing snot rockets IN THE SHOWER. She seriously can’t wait to get out of the shower and use tissue. And this morning was particularly gross, as she did this about 6 times and the drain was semi-clogged. Every time she shot a rocket, I mumbled “gross”. She’s pretty clueless and definitely would not see this as a hint. But for some reason, I can’t manage to bitch-up and chew her ass out for this disgusting act. Which is very uncharacteristic of me, b/c generally, there’s nothing I love more than to get my bitch on. Maybe I have been inhaling a few too many chlorine fumes?

A matter of degrees

So, the thermostat at the pool is a goner. As in we have no temperature control – the heat it either on or off. Not a huge problem in summer. But right now, its not so fun. The HS kept the heater on all weekend, and on Monday, the pool’s resultant temperature was 85 degrees. Think bath water. Think Gulf of Mexico in summer. Think of me trying to swim a hard workout without puking due to the heat. Sure, it was easy jumping into the pool, but even during warm-up, I was too hot. Coach killed the heat after practice. Today’s resultant temperature was 84 degrees. I dipped my toes in and it felt *much* colder. I even shivered a few times during practice. It amazes me how HUGE of a difference a degree or two makes for water temperatures. 5 degrees is a matter of being too hot, too cold, or just right. Can we say Goldilocks anyone? Should I be swimming in porridge instead of chlorinated water?

There’s air temperature degrees. We’re in this oingo-boingo phase where the temperature undulates from warm to cold, from cool and crisp to muggy and uncomfortable.

Then there are other degrees. The fancy diploma I have on my wall which tells me I’m an engineer. Even though lately, I don’t feel like much of one. Being an engineer was so much a part of my identity. And now that those brain cells have been on hiatus for so long, I’m not sure I remember how to be an engineer. How to have confidence in my skills that the framed document on my wall professes me to possess. And I’m not sure I want to be an engineer anymore. I’m sure that if I was happy with where I was work-wise, things would be different. But they’re not and at this point, I’m not sure that even switching jobs would help. Or if I switched jobs, I could be motivated to perform or behave like an engineer.

And finally, there’s the degree in which I feel like I should be making an effort with things. Like my job. Sure, I have work to do. And some of it is even interesting for once. But given all the crap that transpired in the past month, I just don’t really feel like putting forth the effort. To me, its much more fun and rewarding to work on promoting my jewelry, reading TWOP and gossip columns, and dreaming of what my life could or should be like.

Place your Vote: Freak Magnet T-shirt

So, I was bored the last 30 min at work and came up with these designs (courtesey of http://www.t-shirts.com/... Place your vote in the comments and I may or may not pick the majority winner.

#1 - conventional, but gets to the point

#2 Bold graphic tiles... refridgerator magents perhaps?

#3 Mr. Roboto. I don't know, clunky robots = freaks?

#4 Rocket Turtle! I mean, what's cooler than a rocket turtle. Really, come on. He's cool and needs to be on a t-shirt.

Ummm, yeah.... thanks

Went on a site with a new client today - with a new co-worker. At lunch, with new client, Co-worker actually said out loud and in front of new client that he would sit with his back to the TV so that way I could watch the soap opera that was on. I blinked in disbelief. Thought about saying hey that's ok, my TiVo has that issue covered just to be a smart ass. Except for the fact that I loathe soap operas and I didn't want this guy to have the impression that I was a "girl" who was the type that enjoyed vapid pointless shows that are only on during the day. So I just told him that I don't watch soap operas, but thanks for thinking of me. What else can you say?

Then later, I'm driving us back to the office. The highway exit is on the left side of the highway. I typically don't drive on that part of the highway and was a bit unsure of where the ramp was. So he kindly informed me of this bit of trivia. Yes he called it trivia. And he said it in a very friendly, "I'm just trying to help kind" of way. He told me that for highway signs posted overhead, its standard practice for exits on the left to have signs on the left. That way you can always tell which side of the highway the exit is on.

Yeahhhh, thanks for that. Why can't I get coworkers that are normal. Its because I'm a freak magnet. I really should make myself a shirt that says that. It would be very appropriate.

Wednesday Updates Galore!

NYE Update: we were incredibly, pathetically lame this year. Seeing as how I was pretty tired of drinking fdue to my mid-day work week adventures, I actually turned down the St. Arnolds brewery tour (and free beer!). I just didn't think that free and relatively unlimited beer at 1 PM was the best thing for me. Instead, I stayed home while Will went and stained cabinets. Then we went to dinner and watched Fantastic Four and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. We sure know how to party. But sadly (and pathetically) it was nicer than last year where after who knows how many tequilla shots, I ended up passed out under a tree downtown.

Burn Update: The burn on my finger from the ill-fated Christmas turkey flip STILL is in scab form. Since I was in gloves doing my cabinets right after the burn, the blister came off. Then it became infected. And while it’s not infected anymore – it still hasn’t healed! This sucker’s gonna leave a scar. Must figure out how I can apply Vitamin E without being licked to death by Swift kitty. She looooves vitamin E oil. Its just not right.

Cabinet Update: I’m about 90% done. Stained and varnished them last weekend. And they do look quite nice if I have to say so myself. All that’s left is to knock off the drips with a utility knife (and not injure myself in the process) and put the doors back up. Time spent so far on cabinets: 30 hrs.

Work Update: After being an ultimate slacker last week (as in leaving at lunch Wed and Thurs to go drink alcohol…. and not doing so on vacation time..), I now have to actually WORK this week. And I actually have some work to do. Hopefully my managers will let me actually work without impeding me with idiotic emails and questions.

Swimming Update: strangely, we haven’t been doing crazy long distance sets at practice. As in “choose a distance you can complete in 30 minutes. Now go.” We’ve been doing smaller intervals, which is ok, but I show up every morning being mentally psyched to swim long distances, and then the longest distance we swim w/out stopping is 300 yards. Its kind of a let down. Sure, I’m still getting in some decent overall yardage (2900 yds today – I’m kinda pissed I didn’t push to get in that extra 100 yds to make it an even 3k), but we’re 3 weeks away from our hour challenge and I’m one of those types who has to plan and practice then plan some more.

Chlorine has been fixed in the pool, which is soooo lovely. Its nice to not have to wake up in the middle of the night b/c my skin is itching so much. Those 2 weeks of over-chlorination really did wreak havoc with my gear, though. My Velcro watch band went from back to chartreuse and is very threadbare. And my swimsuit, while being chlorine resistant (these suits kick ass, btw – totally worth the extra money) the straps were not immune to the chlorine and are a lovely icky shade of gray and are stretched out. I really would love to send the HS coach an invoice asking him to replace my gear.

Diet Update: Since I got on different thyroid meds and was diagnosed as hypoglycemic, I’ve lost 10 lbs. Yay me! The hypoglycemic diet is going pretty good – its really not all that hard to follow, as long as I’ve planned ahead and make smart choices. Last week, choices were not so smart. Too much alcohol. It appears that any more than 2 drinks and my blood sugar gets all out of whack and it takes at least a day to get back to normal. Which sucks, b/c it makes me feel like ass, but I had none of the fun the night before.

Homebrew Update: Will purchased 2 more mini-kegs, so we are up to 3 mini-kegs for a total capacity of 15 gallons. We are currently researching a mini kegarator for our beer room. B/c right now we have a full keg o’ beer, but its warm, and therefore not so appealing to me. As if I have any business drinking beer, as evidenced above.

TV Update: TV this week still is sucking. I’m all caught up on Supernatural. Methinks I could watch Dean all day long…. Mmm, Dean. I Tivo’d the What Not To Wear marathon on Monday, just so I’d have something to watch during the week. Lost is new – they supposedly have 2 episodes, but I suspect the 1st one this week is a recap montage of what has happened to date this season…. I’ve also recently read that JJ isn’t even writing for Lost this season, due to his commitments for Mission Impossible 3. a) do we really NEED MI:3? No. And b) JJ seems to be having issues staying focused on his projects. Project jumping really isn’t a good quality b/c then your other shows seem to suffer. On a good note, Battlestar is back up this week, which ALL THE BETTER. I missed my weekly Apollo fix. I'm very curious to see where they go with the rest of the season.

Christmas Checklist - 2005

Here’s a checklist of some pretty standard Erin-Christmas traditions. How many of these things happened to you?

• Eggnog lattes: 3 this weekend. Home made. Actually discovered that I have yet *another* half gallon of the stuff in the back of my ‘fridge. More nog for next weekend!

• Number of days 70 degrees or warmer: 3. Put this under my list of “why I hate Texas, reason # 537”. Sure, it snowed here last year when we were in Idaho, and ironically had zero white flakes up there. This year, 70’s and sunny. Blech. It doesn’t seem like Christmas when you’re wearing shorts and sweating….

• Kitchen accidents: 2 burned fingers, one on my hand, one on Will’s. Turkey recipe called for the turkey to be roasted at 500 degrees, back-side-up for 30 minutes. Then to take it out and flip it. Not an easy thing to do – especially when everything is 500 degrees! And flipping a 12 lb bird is awkward. Methinks I’ll be skipping that step next time I make this recipe. To top it off, the skin from my burn blister peeled off, so now its even more sore. Fun!

• Smoke alarm soundings: technically twice, but it was from the same incident described above. Boy was that a fun 10 minutes. Bring out this fiery pan from the oven with the herbs and onion and drippings already black and smoking. Have 2 people attempt to flip turkey over, burn fingers. Begin yelling at each other b/c you both have burned fingers and the turkey STILL isn’t flipped. Have smoke alarm go off. Yell at husband to leave the turkey flipping to me and TURN OFF THE DAMN ALARM. Alarm goes off a 2nd time. Yell again – TAKE THE BATTERIES OUT!!! Followed by husband cursing at wife and fire detector at the same time. The batteries are still removed from the smoke detector. Its probably safe to put them back in. Hey, at least Will didn’t light the marshmallows of his Sweet Potato Surprise dish afire as he’s done in past years. Of course, that could be because we didn’t make it this year, either.

• Home improvement project: 1. Got my cabinets sanded down. 1 trip to Home Depot to buy sander (I had gift cards), 1 trip to Lowes for more sandpaper (its closer to my house), another trip to Home Depot to return sander when it inexplicably died on Day 4 of project, another trip to Lowes to buy 2nd sander, b/c HD did not have another one readily available. Quality time spend with the sander: 15 hours over 4 days, plus 2 hours of down time b/c the sander broke and had to be replaced. Quantity of sawdust inhaled: who knows, I just know it was probably more than is safe. Injuries: none (go me!). Emasculated husbands: one. I wouldn’t let him touch the sander. I figure he had his opportunity several years back when he was laid off and I asked him to do this – and he refused. Besides, this is a detail oriented project. I could see him getting bored with the amount of time it took to a)remove varnish and b)remove stain, thus resulting in me basically having to go back and re-do the sanding. Besides, he seemed to prefer playing computer games all weekend.

• Bottles of wine consumed: 3.5 (2 during a party). Hey, considering it was only the 2 of us for most of the weekend, and I spent most of it covered in sawdust!

That was pretty much our holiday weekend in nutshell. Really pretty boring. Hope the rest of you had more fun that we did!

Nothing says Christmas like refinishing your kitchen cabinets!

Preface: I blame this whole scenario on my mother. She does stupid insane crap like this all the time. And I see her do this stuff and think that she's crazy, yet here I am doing the same exact thing. Damn genetics.

We have wood kitchen cabinets circa 1983. They're decent, but the varnish is peeling and it looks like crap. When Will was laid off and doing nothing for 9 months, I tried to get him to refinish the cabinets. But instead he pretty much did nothing but watch a lot of movies and take a month-long road trip to Idaho.

So, I basically have two 4-day weekends in a row. And I think to myself, when will I have a window of opportunity like this again? I can sand one weekend and stain/poly the next. Then it will be done, how great?

So, I buy myself a sander and in my head this all seems splendid. Then I start working yesterday. We don't have a workbench that I can work on. Will built one, but its so tall, that I truly cannot reach past halfway on the table. Not exactly practical. So, I'm sitting on one cooler, and using another cooler as my work bench, b/c otherwise, I'd be sitting on the garage floor the whole time. Its really not *that* hard, but it is tedious. And the sander vibrates so much that my hands stay tingly for quite a bit. And the thing is shaped for man-hands, and well, mine are quite smaller, so I have to hold it with 2 hands. My thumb that I broke 3 yrs ago is still weak as well, so that's not helping. But I did the rough sanding on 8 (out of 13) cabinet doors yesterday. Figure I'll just take it in little chunks. Plan is to finish the rough sanding on all doors/drawers today. Tomorrow I'll either fine sand or start sanding the cabinet fronts. Next weekend will be staining.

No idea if I will actually finish this all by the end of next weekend - or that it will even look good. All I know is that my muscles are already sore after 4 hrs of this yesterday, and I have many, many more hours to go.

Do I know how to have a fun time or what?

Merry Christmas everyone!