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October 4, 2005

I've been pretty busy lately! Whew! Was away last week in Nashville for work. I got to see a friend of mine from college that I hadn't seen in four years. The last time I saw her was four years ago this month at her wedding when four of us drove up from Texas to Indiana in one weekend to be there. I got to meet her baby Gabriel while I met her. It was so good to see her!

We tried to clean out the garage this weekend, actually make it liveable. HAH! We dragged half of the stuff out and then the rain clouds formed and we were dashing between rain drops and eventually pouring rain to get everything back in before it gets wet.

I have some Garden photos up if you check the garden section of the forum. Took them this afternoon after work.

I got my new book A Breathe of Snow and Ashes by Diana Gabaldon last week. I'm about 250 pages into the 900 page book. It's soooooooooo good! Erin, you'll love it!

Well, here are some pics of the kitties and then of my scrapbooking/crafting/writing closet.







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Samson is getting a sore on his head...again. We're threatening the cone again. Leo has become a toilet paper monster and will shred toilet paper if we leave it out. He also likes paper towel and now he's taken to chewing my purse and then I just wielded my watch out of his mouth. I don't know. You'd think he was a two year old kid. Gah!


This is my area that has all my crafting stuff in it. You can see my bookshelf where I keep my Anne books and then also all of my other childrens books.


Bins with stuff! One has a bunch of gift wrap stuff, bags etc from the wedding. I couldn't bear to part with it. Might use it! HA!


The left hand are all of my scrapbooks and then I have the photoalbums on the right. I am going to go through them and label the outside so I can lay them on their side.


This is my writing desk. It was my grandfathers and we refinished it. I have all of my Writers magazines and my scrapbooking magazines as well as an old photoalbum that I am using as a three ring binder to hold a bunch of emails my friends and I sent each other the first few years of college. They are really funny. ;)

And that is all for now! See, don't post for awhile and then I write a big post!



September 23rd, 2005

This is spurred from Robin's rant about weight loss and whiners. Most of you know I am into fitness and doing exercise and stuff like that. I've been rather lazy lately, so I know I am often saying "I need to do this, etc etc". The first point I want to make is, no matter what size someone is, even if they are "skinny", most people still don't see themselves as "perfect" or being happy with themselves. Perhaps I can fit into a certain size of jeans, but I know I certainly don't look great in a bikini with a belly pouch hanging out. It's all comparative too. Someone else bigger than myself may "pashaw" me and tell me I am fine, but then again what is fine to someone else is not fine to me.

Another thing that bugs me is when people tell me I am too skinny and that I don't need to work out. Well, if I ate crap all day and didn't work out, I'd gain weight. Which is exactly what happened in college. You don't lose weight by eating a pint of Ben & Jerry's (or my favorite Dreamery's chocolate truffle explosion!) and watching Friends. Nor do you lose weight by skipping breakfast, eating ramen noodles for lunch and dropping by Taco Bell, Wendy's, McDonald's etc for dinner after class or work. I get some of this from a few people at work and I brush it off because honestly, it isn't worth it to argue or fight back. I can't stand it when people want to make me eat something I don't want to eat. "Sure, have this piece of cake, you can afford it". No, really I can't afford 500 calories and 20 grams of fat. I've even gotten to the point all the sugar makes me nauseous. Since when is it a sin to want to eat healthy, take care of your body? I am far from perfect. I will never be some cover model, and I may not ever be able to see a six pack abs, but at least I will be able to have the endurance to run a mile, lift some weights and be flexible.

The point is, as long as you are happy with yourself, you just gotta move on and be polite to those who irk you. Sure, I cave and have popcorn at work, a piece of cake here and there. I'm human.

So, I hope I haven't pissed anyone off.



September 11th, 2005

I finally got the Kindred Blogs webring website almost finished. I took over the webring months ago and just now got around to working on it. I have to change some of the photos and do a little bit of tweaking and then it'll be done.

We've been having some nasty thunderstorms lately. I dumped the rain gauge out this morning and it said 1.5", but I'm betting more. I didn't have time to work out in the garden this morning because the rain came this afternoon. It's ok with me, stuff was needing it!

I bought a new comforter for the bed today. It was on sale at Target. It's really more of a quilt, but it looks nice. I had the other one for four years and it was looking so ratty.

I suppose that's about it for now. Hopefully tomorrow evening I can take some garden pics.



September 4th, 2005

Just watched The Wedding Date with the folks. It was really good! Been a busy weekend. Friday we went shopping, WOOHOO, and then at dinner in Ft. Lauderdale. Yesterday we drove over to Sanibel Island and Ft. Myers to hang out at the beach. I loooovve the beach. I miss the beach. I need to go more often. It's just so different on the other coast than over here. I wish I could get a marine bio job. Maybe I'll look for one. Though I'd hate to leave my job too. I dunno. Ack. Then we ate at Snug Harbor, which is a yummy restaurant!!! Today we ran to Big Lots and Walmart and came back and vegged. I've been trading some golden lotus banana's for other plants and when I got back I worked on that some. Gah, it's sooo frustrating....we sent our rent check two weeks ago and usually it takes about two weeks to clear. So, I'd been watching and waiting and then Chris informed me that our landlord said he never got it. Well, it was mailed just about two days before Katrina came and hit here. So, who knows where it may be at. So, I had to write another check out and I hope that the other shows up soon, or gets returned. It'd be annoying if it wasn't!

Speaking of Katrina, it's a travesty the amount of time it took for relief efforts to arrive. There are many people at fault, state, local and national. It's just ridiculous, sad, depressing and deplorable. I can't even watch tv anymore.



August 29th, 2005

It's been three months since that last entry! I honestly don't know if I am that interested in keeping a blog anymore. Maybe the more I write, the more I'll get back into it. I've got a Samson laying here on the desk, a Leo looking around on the desk/window ledge. My little kitties are soo cute. We found a Leo/Sam lookalike, we say that because it has the same patch work that Leo has, but it's black instead of grey. Gray/grey? Which is it? lol! It is probably three or four months old. He climbed a tree behind our house yesterday and has been snooping around. It's friendly because I called it and it came over, but it looks like it has had a collar on it before.

Anyway. Not much else.



May 29th, 2005

OOHH, has it really been a month since I've posted??? I'm at chris' work at the moment so I can write something. Moving went well and we are still unpacking. It's coming together slowly! Anyway, I'm alive and well and I miss reading everyone's stuff. Hopefully we'll have internet again soon, but until then no posting because I don't like to post or read blogs at work. *hugs*

April 16th, 2005

Yes, yes I am alive! Not that anyone has cared!!! ;) This week has been busy. My parents were in town from a week last Friday to this past Wednesday. I was also doing the Everglades Study for work so we were out in the field all day for five days and I wasn't up to doing much else. I have pictures but they are on my work camera and when I upload them Monday I'll put them here also. We saw tons of deer, wild hogs, lots of flowers, and I saw a scorpion on a cypress tree on Friday. Pretty neat all in all. My parents visit was good too. :) They got to see their grand-kitties.

I am going to do the Rock Hard Challenge starting this Monday. I've just gotten back from the grocery store to stock up on good foods and am going to attempt have zero to no added sugars this week. I've had too much crap this past week, most of it from the lunches that were served on the Study. Fried foods, lots of sodas, junk all around. I didn't eat too terribly with my parents, but still it was more than I am used to and I've also eaten badly these past few months anyway. I'm also going to try to wean myself off aspartame and those substances and drink only stuff with Splenda. I've found Diet Rite is good and that supposedly Coke is to come out with Diet Cokes with Splenda. YAYAYAYAYAYAY! I'll post my starting pics and stuff on Monday and then show the monthly progress. I really hope it's good. I think if I can succeed with this, losing some body fat, building some muscle and getting stronger, I'll very well try to follow through with the half marathon training plan I have that I've kept putting off for so long. I think that might take up almost do the Tropical Half and Full Mary's in January next year. *cross fingers*. I hope I have the dedication.

More tomorrow.



April 7th, 2005

Well, packing is coming along. Not much to tell. I had lots of stuff to write but I can't remember right now! My parents are coming tomorrow for about six days. :) YAY! I have to work Mon and Tues though which sucks, because it's the Everglades study where we go out and "study the everglades" so to speak. ;) But I have Wed off because I conned my boss into letting me off! lol! Oh well he was nice about it so that's a good thing! Well, that's about it.



April 1, 2005 No April Fool's hijink's from me...just some photos:








March 30th, 2005

Alas, I have started packing. I started last night packing books. There's gotta be at least 20 boxes full of books. My goal this week is to get the spare room finished, all pictures packed and then start on knicknacks. I need to leave something for my parents since they will be here at the end of next week to visit. Maybe I'll leave the linens or the kitchen stuff. :) lol! So, I'm packing and going "OMG, I haven't read this yet?" and "OMG, I forgot I have this book!". Seriously, I'm severely lacking in the reading department. Like I've said before I have too many hobbies and interests. I suppose that keeps me well rounded but then I'll never be a master of one! (well maybe reading if I can conquer Pride and Prejudice eventually). Ah well.
;
I'm also excited to note that I had shrimp for the first time in two years tonight. And I don't have a guilty conscience! Chris went fishing last night and his friend brought a shrimp net to catch some shrimp where they were at. So, we had some shrimp, wasn't too many, with fettuccini tonight. YUMMMY! Now, I can get used to this. I'll go collect to have enough in my freezer for when I want it. I can't wait for lobster season again so we can have lobster this year. I *love* shrimp.

Our air conditioner went out on Sunday and our new landlord (luckily we just received notice of who to contact!) sent someone out yesterday to fix it but they had to come back tonight with a new compressor. Anyway, this morning I woke up and Samson was sleeping at the foot of the bed. Usually he stirs when I wake up and stretches, gets down or lays there and looks at me for a minute. Well, I petted him but he wasn't moving. He didn't appear to be breathing and I shook him at least four times calling his name before his eyes barely fluttered open and he let out a deep "meeeeeegrrrrrooww". *phewww* For a few seconds I thought, OMG he's dead. He was that still and his body was all tight. I was about to freak out. Boy he must have been in some deep sleep. Chris was in a deep sleep last night because he asked me to "Get the branching frag" several times. I told him ok. I dream about yarn, he dreams about coral. Go figure! LOL!

And the little quiz thing everyone keeps doing:

Accent? Well, I suppose Texan, but I've had multiple people ask me if I am from the mid-west.
Bra size? 34B/C or 36B. Either or usually.
Chore I hate? Dishes. But I do them all right now. GRRRR
Dad's name? Ricky
Essential make-up? Lately I don't really wear it, but usually eyeshadow, eyeliner, blush, mascara and chapstick. not into powders, they make me break out.
Favorite perfume? Sanibel
Gold or Silver? Silver
Hometown? North Richland Hills, Texas
Interesting fact? I once competed in a regional typing competition for my microcomputer course in highschool. LOL, I went for obscure here...there were others to point out too.
Job title? Environmental Specialist
Kids? None. Two cats though who are like kids.
Living arrangements? Soon to be a 2/2.5 townhouse with my hubby, two cats and like 300 gallons of water with fish.
Mom's Birthplace? Ft. Worth, TX
Number of apples eaten in last week? None.
Overnight hospital stays? None.
Phobias? I like spiders that don't look creepy, but that is just about 0.0005% of them, so the rest scare me. Making cold phone calls to people. I rehearse things in my head for like 30 minutes before I do them.
Question you ask yourself a lot? Did I lock the door? (good one Mary!)
Religious affiliation? Christian. I don't believe in denominations.
Siblings? One brother, 21.
Time I wake up? Between 7 and 7:30 usually.
Unnatural hair color? I really liked a strawberry blonde I did once in college with my friends. :)
Vegetable I refuse to eat? Green peas. Sorry, but they are mushy and just disgusting.
Worst habit? Uh, I'll go with gossping like everyone else has said, but I don't really do it that often. Though I usually do the whole gossip thing when I haven't talked to people lately, but not really at work. I can't stand bad mouthing. Though, yes I see a reason for gripping, but there's a fine line between a gripe and gossip. Gotta find that line and not cross it.
X-rays? Once for my finger that was broken, and the dentist stuff like Mary said, and what else? I dunno...mom you know of any?
Yummy food I make? Potato salad. Pizza (with Chris)
Zodiac sign? Cancer. I'm crabby, just ask Chris. ;)

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March 26th, 2005

Good news: We got a townhouse we put in to rent last weekend! It's a nice little place with a screened in patio so Samson will be happy he can roll around "outside" again. Leo is banned from going out because he is a little too claw happy and just loves to use his claws. We move in on April 23rd. It's north of where we are now but it puts us closer to Chris' job a bit. The rent is more than what we have now but that's not really a choice anymore. Grrrr!

The bad news: We got in a wreck yesterday, in the nice, new car of ours. It wasn't our fault at all! We were near Chris' work. I'd gone in with him because he had to put a few hours in and so I took a sleeping bag and slept on the floor of his office. (It's a portable trailer at the work site so it's not like a real office with real people there all the time. Three rooms and Chris is the only one a lot of times). Anyway, we'd just eaten lunch and had waited at a light at a major intersection for a train to pass. The light changed and it was time to go again and so here we are going across the intersection when this 18-wheeler like truck decides to come into our lane. Chris is laying on the horn and we're both freaking out. I should say luckily it was only their tire and the tire well area that rubbed up against the car. The only damage is some paint rubbed off in one area and a big rubber mark is all over it. So, Chris gets out of the car and asks them what the heck they were doing. They start blaming us and we're like "what the hell?". THey had no clue that they were coming into our lane and don't even realize what lane they were in to start out with. The most frustrating part of the whole thing was that we had a witness, Chris came to the car to get a pen and the friggin' people couldn't wait 10 seconds for him to come back and get their information. They took off!!!! GRRRR! DOUBLE GRRRRR! So, here we have no way to prove that it was them, other than the physics of the way their truck hit our car and it would have been impossible for us to have the marks we did if we'd come into their lane and not to mention, they NEVER honked, we were honking! We waited an hour for the cop to come and he believed us, but he had nothing to go on in order to issue them a ticket or anything like that. There wasn't even a camera at the intersection. So, this whole thing could have been solved if the friggin' witness would have waited for a phone number. We priced a replacement for the area that was rubbed off and it's $100 but comes unpainted. It'd probably cost that much just to get it painted. So, not sure what we'll do, but it's not a priority right now. The whole thing could have been worse. Oh, on top of this, we had two other near misses after that. Both times were from people trying to come into our lane! What is up with Florida drivers? IDIOTS! It's not like we have a little convertible, it's a decent sized truck. Good grief.



March 22nd, 2005



That's my little blanket kitty!



Those are my two little blanket kitties. Soft. Cuddly. They come. :)

Just finished that blanket for a friend yesterday.



March 17th, 2005

I'm here I just haven't felt much like writing lately. Not up to too much. Rainy season is starting here. Also summer is upon us: muggy, mosquito's are coming and the rains. WOOHOO...not.

Just wanted to say "I'm here".



March 4th, 2005

It's a small world in the marine biology sphere. I'm sure some of you have heard of the Dolphin stranding in Marathon, FL. Well, a friend of mine from college who works up the coast has been sending emails regarding it because she works for a marine lab and they do rescues. Anyway, I first found out about it because of an article on MSNBC and then I clicked and on the picture was a girl I went to college with. Celeste is in the red bandana on the left. I was sort of friends with her for awhile, she ran in a circle of friends I was in for awhile in college but then kinda went off and did other things and she also worked at the aquarium I worked at. So, I've been trying to find out more about volunteering if I have some time tomorrow afternoon and I call the marine animal rescue here in Miami and they give me her number! It was weird! LOL! But yeah, it's a pretty sad situation at the moment. :(



March 2nd, 2005

Today was an expensive day. Well, it started yesterday when Chris' car broke down. It's all the way almost an hour away near his work at the dealership getting fixed so he took mine to work this morning. Rather, he started taking it to work, only to call me shortly after he left to say something was wrong with the clutch. Only a mile away from the house, I took my bike to go see what was wrong. Yep, clutch was out. They wanted $2,000 to fix Chris' car (AHHHHH!), and we thought mine would be totally covered under the 100K mile warranty we have, but it won't cover the clutch and that'll be $600. *sigh* insert about 50 of those. Options are: fix my car all the way, which we'll do, and fix Chris' to where he can drive it to a Ford dealership to where we can get a discount on a new car and trade it in. It's either $2,000 off the bat and risk having it break down again (not to mention we've already fixed the radiator this year too) or go ahead and have another car payment. Freakin' A. And we're looking to find a place to rent soon. This is so sucking.

Oh, please check out Kindred Blogs webring and tell me what you think of it so far. I haven't done much other than the photo. It's a photoshoped photo of Green Gables that I found on a website that had taken screen caps for folks to use. Does it look to weird? Let me know. I'll probably be playing around with it and i'll let you all know when I finally get it totally up and working. :)



February 26th, 2005

Uh oh. Just what I need. Another hobby to search for online and read about all day long. Ok, so all evening long. I decided to look up "crochet blogs". I've gotten myself into a heap of trouble by learning that there's an entire community out there just like the scrapbookers. I even got myself into finding out about garden bloggers. Now that I've finished my scrapbook for my friend and mailed it off to her I can now pick up on some crochet, reading and other artsy/creative stuff I have. It's so cool out there in crochet land!!! I'll probably rework this page a little bit and add a section for different types of blogs. Yeppers.

The quiz thing was addicting wasn't it? Seems like everyone is making them!

Didn't get the townhouse. Supposedly they are selling it instead of renting it, but we think it may have been a lie by the landlord because we can't move in until April and they probably want someone sooner. We went back searching today and went four places but they were all out of our price range or had a problem. We will probably just start calling townhomes we see in the paper for the next few weeks and see how that goes. Totally frustrating right now. Gah!

I'm in a total "Friends" mode. Pulled out my Season 2 DVD and have been watching it. I miss that show! :( Ooooh, Alias was great this week. I think it was probably the best episode this season. Although this whole release, chase, try to catch, chase again Sark thing is getting old because somehow they seem to do that every season that Sark's been in. Vaughn needs to cheer up a bit too. And I'm glad they are working in Rambaldi again. Maybe we can get this figured out. Wasn't Will supposed to come back this season?? Robin or Jessica fill me in!

Well, it's late, time to shower and get some sleep. Going to do some geocaching tomorrow since we haven't been in about a month. :)



February 20th, 2005

ETA, 8:39 pm: I have two cat stories to add. Leo has this loooonnng tail that I call a Tigger tail. I swear if he was an animated cat, he could bounce around on it. So we decided to measure his tail versus Samson's tail. Leo's tail is a foot long! 12"! Samson's is 2" shorter at 10". Anyway, I thought it was funny. ;) Then, another Leo story. He's addicted to these little mouse toys. One of our mom's brought him some mouse toys when they came down and he was forever addicted to them. He'll tear them apart and leave the catnip behind, towing the shreds of fabric instead. Well, he's learned to fetch like a dog and takes off like a dog when you toss it. He brings it back, but not quite as good as a dog and sometimes he has to go rampaging through the apartment first before he comes back. Anyway, when he was little he used to get under a bookcase of mine. He hasn't done it in months since he's gotten too big. Well, yesterday we saw him under there. Today we figured out why. He gets up on the ledge, throws the mouse under there and then crawls under to get it out. When he doesn't throw it too far he gets agitated and tries again. It's the funniest thing in the world! Anyway, that is my added cat stories for today.

There seems to be a wide outcry to the choice of my favorite book. Chris disagrees that that is my favorite book (as in the quiz) but my mom knew the right answer despite my dad telling her otherwise. It was a tough choice. Even as I was writing the quiz I was going, well, which one is it? Gah! I went with the one that I choose because it was the first book my mom gave me and was the first book I read as a child (though I remember something about a scarecrow in a book). Anyway, very tough decision and honestly I probably should have made it more clear as to what would be choosen.

I just went for my second run of the week! Go me! :)

Yesterday we went apartment/townhouse hunting since we have to move in April. We're trying to move a little further from my work and a little closer to Chris' work so that our drive is evened out. We went to a rent finder place and told them what we were looking for and our max price range. We only looked at one place, it was a townhouse, 3 bed/2.5 bath with a one car garage and a tiny little back yard and something that I wouldn't even call a front yard. Looked great, was exactly what we were needing. You just have to get past the forest green carpet that's throughout that clashes with the pale yellow walls and some outdated/older appliances. I mean, if we were buying it, it would be a perfect fixerupper. The rent is a little more than we wanted, but we were hoping to find an apartment complex with a garage and pay a little extra anyway, but for an extra bed and half bath, garage and yard for the price in Miami it's great. We have a hard time explaining to people that what we are getting is cheap. In Texas, my friend rents a duplex for $500. You'd be in section 8 housing in Miami for that. It sucks, but I can imagine how much we'll resale out house for in the future when we eventually buy one. Chris always says we could make a fortune off of our house in Miami/S. Florida and move back to Texas and get a huge house with tons of land for cheapo. Perhaps one day. Anyway, so I went today to sign the papers, write a deposit check and then they fax the info to the landlord they decide if they want it for our "asking price" and if we are suitable for them and then they let us know in a few days.

I suppose that's about it. I'm off tomorrow. YAY! :)



February 18th, 2005

Totally copying Jessica here, but I thought her quiz was fun so I figured why not make my own!
Take my Quiz! and then Check out the Scoreboard!

I did my first run in two months today. 1.5 miles. Slow, but good.

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February 16th, 2005

Look, look, I'm posting! :)

Valentines Day was pretty nice. I got home and all day I had been thinking "I really want Olive Garden. Chris said we could go only if I didn't complain about the wait, which we knew would be enourmous. I also got a pocketbook plant instead of roses which was fine by me, because seriously this plant is so cool. We were at Home Depot a week or two ago and they had a few on one of their little end cap thingies and we both went "What on earth is that?". It's so cool looking! Anyway, it costs wayyyyy less than roses anyway, so that's fine by me.

So, we drive to Olive Garden, which is actually about twenty minutes away and is weird because most cities have several Olive Gardens, but this is the only one in this part of town. We got there and the wait was an hour so we went over to Petsmart and Linen's & Things to browse while we waited. By the time we were seated the wait for those coming in was two hours!!! TWO HOURS! Wow. Dinner was great and then we stopped by JC's house on the way back to look at his terrarium. Chris has convinced me we need a terrarium after we move. I must admit, they are pretty cool. We're going to convert one of the fish tanks that has two freshwater fishes in it now to a terrarium after we move.

Not much else going on. I have chores to do that I really don't want to do. OHHHH yeah...just remembered...last Friday I was driving to work and trying to flip to a station that plays modern rock etc and they have Lex and Terry a morning show on (they are around the nation also) to find some other weird people talking on it. They were talking about good liberal stuff and then cut to commercial and I heard "Air America Radio". I was seriously jumping for joy! During the commercial they said they were on AM940 and so I flipped to that just to see and sure enough they were. I had no idea they were here in Miami as the last time I looked they weren't here. It would have been great if they had stayed on FM, but on my way home all I heard was spanish music. I later found out Clear Channel was changing several stations nationwide to spanish music stations. Seriously, Miami has no use for another spanish station. Loads of people are royally pissed that there isn't any contemporary rock now. I am too. They had Pearl Jam at 4:45 I had found lately. So, now I am happy flipping between NPR and AAR. WOOHOOO!



February 13th, 2005

My once a week post...lol!<;br>
So, the weekend has come and gone already. Chris and his friend went to the Keys during the day yesterday, even though it was freezing in the water, to collect coral so I went and got a hair cut. I also stopped by Target and got a Dwarf Red banana that was four dollars since our friend JC told us to get. Picked up a cool little succulent as well as Love Actually on video for $4.99 and The Hours on DVD for $5.50. I couldn't believe how cheap they were! Went to the mall to get a haircut since my hair was looking tacky. It's a short bob again. I guess it's about chin length. I then found Breakfast at Tiffany's at FYE for 4.99 also! Target had a Audrey Hepburn trilogy in it and Charmed Season 1, The Golden Girls and P&P. Me want. :)

I rented The Notebook last night since my Dad said it was good and I had been wanting to see it too. I read the book about two or three years ago and loved it and then read the "sequel" The Wedding a few months ago. Both of them I highly recommend. The Notebook was wonderful and they got great actors to play the characters. Incredibly sad, uplifting and just makes you think a lot about love. The movie does not end the same as the book, just so you know.

Today we went orchid shopping. I'm sure you all are going "Misti, you don't need any more plants!!!!!". Chris sold some frags of coral the other night and so we had a little over $100 to go for our Valentines shopping spree of orchids. I'd printed about seven orchid nurseries out and we knew of about three others. Our other psycho plant friend JC came with us today. You can see pictures under the Photos section. It was an awesome day. I saw so many I wanted, but I think we did a pretty good job. JC is a variegated nut. He wants anything varigated. Seriously. It's so freakin' funny because he drools over anything varigated and he wasn't supposed to spend any money since he just spent $200 on carnivorous Australian plants, so he ends up seeing a Varigated Desert Rose for $15 and he got it. Chris and JC went crazy at a bonsai place we stopped. I don't get the thrill of bonsai. But, we ended up hitting the motherload of orchids at RF Orchids. They had an awesome variety. Chris saw something weird and rare, a Bulbophyllum macrobulbum (can't find a good picture) and so he asked if they had any to sell. They come out with a piece that was $100!!! I think for about 10 seconds Chris seriously contemplated not getting any other orchids but that one. However, this orchid stinks like fertilizer. It's disgusting. You wouldn't want to be sniffing this at all. Anyway, we did that all day long and got home and spent the rest of the afternoon fixing up the orchids and other plants

And a little comment about an article i just read here. This woman is insane. I would never buy a book. She's pretentious, snobby and just all around narrow minded. I'm sorry, you can dislike Valentines Day, or not like its commercilization, but don't trivalize it for the people out there who do enjoy it or have very important things in their love life happen on that day. As for this quote: "And I totally understand why girls date guys in rock bands -- BECAUSE THEY LEAVE.", how utterly ridiculous. Maybe the small minority of girls out there who just want a one night stand think this, but I think that a lot of women actually want to find some sort of attachment with any guy that they are interested in. Sorry, but I don't like this "author" and I think she's a total dummy. That is all.









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February 7th, 2005

I know, I know, been a few days since I've last written. My brother came into town with his girlfriend on Friday morning and I spent the past three days with them. Friday we went around Miami doing geocaches and then over to the beach after dinner to show them the beach, albeit it was at night. Saturday morning we got up early to go out to Big Cypress National Preserve to camp out for our geocaching event at Bear Island (not an island). It was a great time. We had a few things for people do to such as finding these little first aid kits we made up with their GPSrs, having a Survivoresque contest in which you had to start a fire with a piece of flint and magnesium, dryer lint and then burn through a piece of rope. The winner got to take home an ammo can we'd camoed so they could hide it as a cache later. My brother and his girlfriend came in close second about 11 seconds behind the winners, Chris and Sarah, some friends of ours. I think everyone like it and it was a pretty fun thing. Chris and Sarah then hid the ammo can out in the woods for a night cache later on that evening since they said they had enough ammo cans and caches out at the moment. My brother went off in the woods with a group of cachers racing to be first to find, only to come back empty handed because he and another cacher ended up thigh deep in water. It's dark out there, ya know? LOL, he also got his phone wet, much to the dismay of his girlfriend who had bought it, but the next morning it ended up working again.

We made a huge campfire, had cobbler we make in our dutch oven, roasted marshmallows and made smores and then turned in for the evening. Yesterday we got up, ate some breakfast and then went to the Fakahatchee Strand State Preserve to do a few geocaches in there and also to see if we could find some orchids. We found a Vanilla orchid (as in what you get vanilla extract and vanilla beans from) on the way in and then on the way out we were all excited because we thought we'd found a ghost orchid (with flower). It turned out to be another leafless bendt spur orchid instead, but still awesome anyway. There were also some ground orchids but they are an exotic orchid that has escaped and made it's way around south Florida. Afterwards we had some lunch, ran up the road five miles to the Picayune State Forest to find a cache and then tried to head home. There was a wreck though on the most direct route home, a two laned road, so we had to go about 30 extra minutes or so out of our way to get home.

After getting cleaned up the four of us headed over to dinner at Chili's and then to catch the 7:10 showing of Million Dollar Baby. It was an excellent movie and probably one of the better movies I've seen in awhile. I won't give any spoilers, but I highly recommend seeing this movie. I said bye to my bro and his gf at 445 this morning since Chris was taking them to the airport for their early morning flight.

I've got pictures up if you click on 11 under Photos.

Well, not much else going on. I have a lot of picking up to do this evening and will be chilling afterwards. Alias is back this week, YIPPIEEE! It's deranged Sydney this week I believe. :) That's it folks.



�60;b>January 29th, 2005
I've got some new plant photos up. Click Photos and # 10. We went to an Orchid show today and got a few orchids with our friend JC. Talk about heaven! :) Also, anyone else having new windows open when you click a link on the page? Lemme know. I'm having it happen and it's annoying me.



January 28th, 2005
I suppose I can tell you all now. It's over and done with and I didn't get it. A job that is. In the beginning of December I saw a job on my sea turtle list-serv I am on and it was for a job right up the coast doing things I'd done before. I was giddy and excited and told no one but Chris and one geocaching buddy by default. I applied because, well why not? So a few weeks ago I got a "short list" email from the guy. I was stoked and excited and I've been thinking about it on and off for like forever! I figured no way I was going to get it or even an interview. Sea turtle jobs are few and far between and usually go to people who've done a lot of stuff with them, more than my meager internship and volunteer experience. So, I was supposed to go to the interview this past Tuesday. Well, I was sick Monday night/Tuesday morning so there was no way I was going to make the interview. I called in and ended up going on Wednesday instead. Yes, I did a bad thing by calling in sick to work and going on another interview, but I'd taken a comp day on Tuesday to do the interview but was sick, so it kinda sucked. So, I went to the interview but was really turned off by the whole thing. Other than seeing a loggerhead when I got there while it was being weighed to be released down the beach, the whole set up just frustrated me. The pay was good, actually was going to be better than my job now. Insurance, everything. But there wasn't a proper lab set up, and the area the turtles are netted, tagged and released is on the power company's property, which a power plant was right up the road. That didn't bother me, it was the outsourcing of the turtle jobs to a temporary company that bugged me. I did not want to be working for a temporary company again. The guy said that he and a few other colleagues were hoping to take over the contract within the year, but how sure was that to happen? So, there were two portable buildings and no proper lab (what can I say? The hurricanes destroyed the other buildings, not sure they were much more since he said they looked like the shed that was nearby). Ok, so I was like 50 yards from the water. Yes, awesome set up. But with field work came having to be on call (no problem), working a weekend a month (no problem as long as properly scheduled), but then I started thinking about Chris having a job that he's at now, the functionality of the whole deal and well, it's on the beach and you have to take many, many side streets which are going to be hard to get through and more than likely my travel time to work would double. I heard from the guy today and found out I didn't get it and I'm actually not bothered. Yes, it could have been an awesome stepping stone (another downside, no room to move up) to a better job elsewhere or grad school, but there's too much at stake to mess with what I've got right now.

So, there. Chris accidentally told his dad, though I'd said to keep it hush hush cause I didn't want to get overly excited or jinx things, but I think I thought it'd be too good to be true. I was expecting a lab, or at least a decent office building. Am I becoming spoiled? Or am I already spoiled? ;) lol! There ya have it.

PS: Alias was awesome! Scored the tape from my boss and watched it over dinner tonight with Chris!



January 27th, 2005
I don't think I am as bold and daring as Robin. There is no way I could do the 28 days of blogging. Not that I don't want to, it's just that life seems to get in the way of blogging a lot for me. I used to blog constantly. Now the past few months have been once a week is good for me. Ack....

I came home today and it was a gorgeous day outside for gardening. My plants were suffering from my lack of being here last week and then sick earlier this week. I planted a loofah (yes it's a plant!) that our friend JC had gotten for us and had to fix a bunch of my irises that were leaning over and bugging the crap out of me. And I have just had a eureka moment...for the past year we've had these lily bulbs. They didn't look Asiatic at all, but a little while ago I saw something that was labeled Crinum lilies and they looked exactly like what we've got. Surfing for some pictures, I think I've found them! I have a feeling they aren't going to be blooming unless I get them in tons of water because Crinum's tend to be water oriented. Anyway, I plan on taking pictures soon because things are looking good in the garden. I have the one orchid that has bloomed and countless other things that are looking good right now.

I don't think I've said this anywhere but I've become a fan of King of the Hill. Maybe I have but ignore me then. Since we have a whopping five or six stations and F/X being one of them, King of the Hill reruns most evenings. It's set in Texas and yes, there are a lot of Texas sterotypes, but it's just funny! They even show a Whataburger (and there aren't many of those out of Texas!), and just several odd ball things that are uniquely Texas. It's replaced my Simpsons fix that I used to have as well as my Friends fix. Ah, I missed Alias last night. My boss was out today so I didn't get the tape, so hopefully he'll be in tomorrow and I can watch it at lunch! I hear there were some good moments between Vaughn and Syd. And a proposal before she lost The Two?

What else? Uh, seriously behind on just about everything you can think of around here. Laundry? Piling up (though mostly clean pile up). Dishes? Clean, but in the dishwasher. Filing? Sitting on my floor waiting to be put in the cabinet. Scrapbooking? Ohhh, a bazillion friggin' weeks behind. More like months probably.

And next week I am making my primitive camping debut. Let's see if I can handle going to the bathroom outdoors when there's a bunch of people around in the middle of nowhere (literally). We're going to Big Cypress National Preserve for a geocaching event that we are holding. My brother and his girlfriend are coming down just for an event (takes geocaching to get him to visit his sister! I haven't seen him in a year!), a few of our geocaching friends and some other folks we haven't met before. Should be quite fun and maybe we'll see a panther or a bear.



January 26th, 2005
Ugh. For the past two days I've been sick. Monday around 2 or 3pm at work I started feeling queasy and just not good at all. I took off work around 4 and made it home in time to run to the bathroom and throw up. The cats followed me in trying to comfort me (Leo was most curious about what was in the toilet) and I layed around moaning and sick for the next three or four hours. I finally decided to look up an urgent care center that took my insurance and Chris drove me over. Got there only to find out it'd be several hours wait and I did not feel up to sitting there with a pounding head, chest hurting, nausea...ugh. Chris ended up sick shortly after we returned home and we spent the night taking turns getting up, tossing and turning and yesterday laying around resting.

I took today off also and am going back to work tomorrow. Not much is goign on otherwise. I have a messy apartment and am trying to get it back on it's feet after being gone most of last week and sick the first part of this week. I am so behind on my scrapbooking. I was planning on finishing a book for my friend this week, however that is going to be nixed more than likely.

Samson still has his cone on. He actually could have taken it off this week, but we came home from Tampa this weekend to find out he'd taken it off and promptly scratched his head again. GRRR! More than likely Leo aided him in the operation. They have a tendency to fight and sometimes it gets knocked off. Well, gonna eat something I suppose.



January 21, 2005
Howdy folks! Sorry I am such a bad blogger. I was in Melbourne last weekend, Atlanta the past few days and am going to Tampa tomorrow. Gah. I'm sick of traveling! Not much has been going on. It was freezing cold in Atlanta but it's tolerably breezy here now. I had a super expensive dinner that I didn't have to pay for in Atlanta at Morton's of Chicago. Can we say the consultant was loaded??? I had a nice filet mignon with crab meat on top, creamed spinach and a delicious lobster bisque appetizer. MMMMMMMM....

As you can see I am working on a re-design here. Got a lot of it done tonight but will need more tweaking later. Do that next week. Also, I am taking over the Kindred Blogs webring which has a website, so I'll be trying to deal with that also. Alrighty folks. That's about it. Gotta do some chores before I leave tomorrow. I promise to have new pictures soon of some stuff in the garden as well as my kitty cats. :)



January 12th, 2005
So, for the past two days, yesterday and today, I have noticed small little mosquito looking marks. Well, mosquito's bite at random, not in straight lines or small clumps. Been itching and red and I busted a small welt like one yesterday that reminded me of a burn or something. So, Chris mentions that it may be poison ivy. I was bought some calamine lotion stuff anyway and when I came home, I googled poison ivy welts and sure enough, I have it. This is all thanks to my geocaching excursion on Sunday! I've gone through so much plant life and haven't come out with it yet and I finally had my share of it.



January 11th, 2005
I know, I know. I'm a bad updater. Just haven't felt like writing lately.

So, I finally got to see last week's Alias premiere. My boss taped it and I sat and watched it oogly-eyed for an hour and a half last night. WOOHOO! Can we say YAY and Awesome??? Other than a few things like what happened to the Rambaldi stuff, I don't think it was a let down at all. Perhaps I hadn't hyped myself up like others, but I loved it. Ok, so I hated that SpyMommy was killed by SpyDaddy, but she was gonna have her own daughter killed. Now, there are speculations abounding on how true this was and what the ultimate goal of this was, but I wonder about the truth in it all. The SpyLovin' that was going on between Syd and Vaughn was great too. Oh and Marshall...I Love Marshall! He's so freakin' funny and I love that he ate eggs with Sark. I hope they can bring Weiss in because he's the only one left. I wonder what they told him about Marshall leaving.

Not much else been going on. We went kayaking on Sunday to try to get our 400th cache. We got out there but found out that the cacher who placed it, one of our friends, had forgotten to change some stuff when he relocated stuff after the hurricanes. So it turns out the final cache was out on the island in the lagoon that we'd kayaked too, however we'd already pulled the kayaks out and were back on shore when we found that out. So, we'll have to head back another time. Looks like we are going up to Melbourne this weekend so we will probably be doing our 400th there instead.

We went to a really awesome plant sale the other day at the Fruit and Spice Park. Our friend JC called us and told us to come down cause it was really awesome. We got three ferns: Cotton Candy fern, Birds Nest Fern and a rainbow fern, three Vanda orchids, three bromeliad airplants, a pitcher plant and a ric-rac cactus. We so could have cleaned up more if we had a yard! It was really awesome! Yesterday we planted stuff and I moved a few things around. Got more birdseed so we can get the blue jays back. They haven't been around in awhile.



January 2nd, 2005
So, I had a not so fun New Years Eve and Day. I had to work. The Tribe puts on an arts festival and I had to sit in a booth and be bored all day long. I did end up buying a really cool necklace that was made by a Sioux and some lavendar soap and a bag of lavendar to put in little simmering pots and stuff.

I've made Leo's appointment to be fixed. I'm taking Thursday off because we have a geocaching meeting with the parks department here (they are being stingy about caches) and decided that was a good day to go get the little goose snipped. He's been too rowdy at night, running around the bed, jumping onto my back and legs with all claws open and hanging on for dear life. Not to mention wandering aimlessly around meowing only at night. Sounds like a cute cat, right??? LOL!

Samson is getting better. His hair is growing back on his scabby, but he's still not so happy about wearing his lampshade. The first night we put it on him, it was too big and he was pulling it off. Too big around his neck and too big as in he could stick his head out to eat anything. So we trimmed it down and tightened it up and now it's ok. He still kind of bobs his head around and we have to go and scratch his face because he's used to doing that. I've even had to go wipe his face after he eats because he can't clean himself like normal. He's still playful; he was chasing Leo around one morning.

I got a hydrangea! :) I'm so excited because I've been wanting a hydrangea for forever. Wallyworld finally had some so I ended up getting a pink one. WOOHOO! Chris got his bonsai, which was a juniper. I got a ghost orchid.

Well, it's off to do stuff now! :)



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