I heart my Mac.

I wasn't going to make a post tonight, because I am pretty busy with other things, but I've been struck to say something really briefly...


I love my Mac. I'm not one of those "Mac fanpeople" that owns every Macintosh related products, or hisses every time someone mentions Windows. Heck, I use a Windows machine every day at work, and I game on one at night.

My laptop is a Powerbook G4 that I've had since 2004. I've done a lot on this machine -- design projects for freelance work back in the day, watched many a full length movie and DVD, played copious amounts of World of Warcraft on it for at least 6 months while it was my main gaming machine. I've taken it everywhere, dropped it on its head, loaded it up with stupid anime episodes and downloaded long music mixes late into the night. And I cannot remember one time where it hasn't worked or given me any sort of problem in the least. Not one. Nothing. It has always turned on, always worked flawlessly, never needed any new parts or maintenance. For being utilized nearly every day for the past 5 years, that's not bad at all.

Yeah, it was expensive. But well worth it! Its name is Tybalt (The Prince of Cats!) and I heart it. :) The end!

List of Updates

This post is going to be a list of updates, in handy bullet form. How exciting!

x Finn is ok! :) Thanks for all of your well wishes for him; right now it looks like allergies, food allergies in particular, so we're going to put him on a hypoallergenic food. I can't believe I never thought of that!! Some ex-veterinary worker I am! They did a cytology, and we are happy it's nothing dastardly and evil. :)

x My workplace let go about 25 contract people over the weekend. EEEEEEK!!! Being a contract person myself, of course this didn't settle well with me! Myself and fellow contract-ees are a little concerned, obviously, because this really is a temporary position and we are on the tail end of a big merger... so who knows. I think this is a wake-up call to update my resume and get looking, though... while I love my little beach town the job market can be kind of desolate lately.

x My mom bought me some plane tickets to visit her for a long weekend over Labor Day! YAAAAAY! So excited!! I haven't been home since Christmas! :) September in Massachusetts is gorgeous <3

x I got sunburned yesterday! AND I almost lost my bathing suit to the turbulent sea... that'll teach me to wear a little flimsy suit in the ocean! I usually don't go all the way in the water because it's chilly, but it was nice and warm yesterday, so in I went, and away my suit almost followed! Yeesh. Hafta wear my sturdy suit next time! But I got a little sunburned too, so today I was itchy. :[

x Making TACOS for dinner! Yummmmm!

Murphy's Law .. Finnegan Murphy ... yeah, it all adds up.

Poor Finny has a lump on his chin! It's right below his lower teeth, a little smaller than half of a dime. I've been calling him Jay Leno, and sometimes it looks like he's pouting. I only noticed it yesterday morning and it came up really fast so I don't know if he was bitten by something (do we have creepy nighttime bugs in our apartment??) or if Kerri booted him in the face when they were playing, but it hasn't really gone down in size. I made him an appointment for Tuesday afternoon so we could kind of watch it more over the weekend. Poor guy -- first a chain event of leg surgeries, now this. It really is Murphy's Law when it comes to Finnegan. (Murphy -is- his middle name...) He's happy as a clam though, so I'm not too concerned. But it'll probably have to come off -- I worked in the veterinary field for 6 years, and just looking at it, I don't think it's going anywhere on its own!

I was going to post more photos of the cats I took on Wednesday when I was home at lunch and being adorable... that's a lump-free Finny up there, and I guess for even measure I'll post one of Kerrigan, too. :)


Work hard, sleep hard!!

At any rate, it's the WEEKEND!!, and I hope everyone has a good one. :) We are getting ready to go out for a Chik Fil A breakfast (Chicken Minis... mmmmmm... ) and probably not do a whole heck of a lot else. I like lazy weekends!

Game

The ever-awesome Moonjava has found a fun game to play, and I've decided to get in on the fun too! :)

Her blog had 5 questions, that she had gotten from someone else; I commented on her post saying I'd like to play, so she left me 5 questions in the comments of my last post for me to answer here! So if you want to play and have 5 random questions to answer, leave me a comment here and I'll find you~! Looks like a fun way to learn about your followers, so why not? :)

Here's mine!

-In the tv show Friends, who do you relate most to and why?
You know, I never watched Friends!! I'm a bad female demographic! *cringe* Judging from what I know though, I'd have to choose Chandler, just because of his attempts at wit. :)

-If you could choose one power, what would you choose: to be able to fly, or to be able to read minds?
Oh, definitely to fly. Save money on visiting family and friends, and easy travel!

-Why did you start blogging?
I've actually been blogging since around 2000 (wowie); I can't remember why! Some friends of mine had blogs so I made one too, and it was fun. :) And here I am 9 years later! Some of my earlier blogs were on blogger, and I go back and read my old entries... ugggh, I kind of made myself shudder with my naivete and giggly college idiocy! Barf! ;)

-If you had one hour to pack 3 things and take a trip to a foreign country, what are 3 things you'd bring, where, and why?
Can I pack people?? ;) If so, I'd pack Matt, a nice versatile outfit, and a camera and go to Germany! (Or Prague, in Checkoscosslovakia, that I can never spell..) Oh, if I couldn't pack Matt, I'd take my cell phone! LOL

-What is your dream job?
Pharmacist or some kind of medical research. I wish I would have known this information when I was 18. :/ Go figure!



I took some cool pictures of my cats, will post them later. :) I need a wider layout to post my pictures bigger...

My confession.

I have a confession to make.



I play World of Warcraft.



Yeah, that crazy MMORPG that all the gamer-nerd boys that stay up late drinking Mountain Dew and eating ramen noodles and raiding dungeons and babbling through their headsets to other players...

... Yeah. I confess. And that's actually a gargantuan stereotype up there; it's such a wide variety of people that play the game that I very rarely encounter those kind of stereotypical uber-game-geeks. It's such a more modernized thing now, I think, that more types of people are playing these games and enjoying them! (Like me!) I've been into video games for as long as I can remember, on consoles at least, but I never tried an online game until a few years ago, by the hassling of my boyfriend (we weren't dating yet) I started to play WoW.



An old picture of Ananth, my Tauren Druid.


So yeah, confession, I'm an online gamer geek. I play a big cow that can turn into other animals, I raid, I babble on my headset to friends and people in my guild, I'm leveling other characters... and I probably won't talk about it too much on this blog (I doubt I have a WoW audience!) but I figured I'd post about it because it's something not a lot of people expect from me. Game stereotypes! Ha!!

Beach food!

Monday is OVER! Woohoo! Matt is away for a few days on business, and he said when he gets back we're going out to eat somewhere awesome :) YUM, come on Friday!!!

I'm watching Unwrapped on FoodTV with Marc Summers (Remember him from Double Dare days?? I do!!) and the show is on beach food... and one of the things they're profiling... fish tacos!!!! EWWWWW~!!!! I know, I live in a beach town... and they really are everywhere, but blah!! Don't get me wrong, I really LOVE fish and seafood, but... tacos, that's pushing it. I can't get behind that!

I'd have to say my favorite beach food is shrimp. I LOOOVE shrimp... fresh off the grill with a little sweet & sour sauce, or plum sauce! Yum! Like 'em fried too. You really can't go wrong with shrimp! I like fried dough too, but they only have those on the boardwalk, and that's a bit of a drive.

Shrimp & margaritas!!!! :D

Last day!

Just wanted to post for anyone that doesn't follow Fantabulously Frugal, the mega-giveaway ends tomorrow!! Last chance to sign up!! (Of course, I just remembered, LOL...)

Here's the link:

http://www.fantabulouslyfrugal.com/2009/06/favorite-things-giveaway-bonanza.html

Hope everyone had a good weekend -- I finished a really wonderful book I should review this week, and ready to go back to work tomorrow... blah! Oh well, money is always good. ;)

It's that day -- Father's Day.

Father's Day comes with sort of a little black cloud for me -- my dad died very suddenly and out of the blue in August of 2005 at the age of 55, and was the catalyst for a chain of traumatic and not so exciting events that would completely throw myself and my mom off our casual, relaxed way of life and into completely new and foreign paths. If you told me four years ago where I would be today, I probably just would have laughed. Although I am extremely happy now, probably happier than I have been!

Maybe I'll tell my wacky story sometime. But for now, Happy Father's Day!!!



On a related note, I've been trying to go shopping for some new work shirts, and all my sales are gone thanks to Father's Day sales. I can't wear menswear! Well, I can, but I'd look like a major goober. :(

Paddleboat day!

So today I took the day off from work! Yay!! Sometimes you just need an extra day to the weekend. :)

My boyfriend and I went paddleboating at Greenfield Lake Park, an awesome park in our town. I took lots of pictures; they're not the best really, because my camera's kinda crummy (saving up for a dslr... slowly...) and it was REALLY sunny out, so they came out pretty light, but I tried to level them off in Photoshop. :)



Ducks! Obviously around people a lot, these ones didn't mind being photographed.




Takin' a snooze in the shade.




Awesome scenery! There were tons of overhanging trees and Spanish moss... it was HOT as heck out, low 90's, so we tried to stay in the shade as much as possible!








We had to stop paddling to let these guys go by!




Turtles!! There were turtles sunbathing everywhere... so many awesome birds too, but my camera couldn't capture them well. :(




There were all these little awesome "passageways" between big clumps of trees and moss that we navigated through... :)














I am happy! And very sweaty by this point! But happy!









Okay, that's enough from me... don't want to flood y'all with nature images! ;) What a great day to start the weekend. I got a definite tan from being out in that sunny, hot weather all day!

Aaaand... I've got iced tea chilling in the fridge and baked potatoes in the oven - yum!!

Award stuffins!

I got a blog award from the awesome Moonjava's Muse!! Yay!! :)







"The HonestScrap award comes with a caveat or two. Firstly, you have to tell your readers ten things about you they may not know, but that are true. Secondly, you have to tag 10 people with the award."

Okay, ten things about me:
1. I love Japanese horror films!
2. I am a second degree black belt in Taekwondo.
3. I am happier than anything to have paid off my car!
4. My favorite restaurant right now is probably any kind of fondue, like the Melting Pot (or locally, Little Dipper)
5. I barely passed math in college.
6. I worked in the veterinary industry for 6 years.
7. I lived in Maryland for 5 years, but only visited Washington, DC a handful of times.
8. My favorite sports team is the Red Sox!!
9. I love fresh, unsweetened iced tea on a hot southern morning. :)
10. My first concert was Radiohead.



Tag 10 people... yikes... ok!! (Do they all read this blog? We'll find out!!)

West Coast Newlywed
The Baffled Blogger
i'll go eat worms
Anything But Blonde
The Girl With the Pink Teacup
After 'I Do'
Perfectly Cursed Life
Life, Laughs, and Lemmings
The Hush Blog
Advice and Humor from Mr. Condescending



Those links took longer for me to produce than the 10 things about me. Yeesh! :)

Life Lessons

So I'm going to blog about my awesome award that Moonjava gave me tomorrow, because it's getting late, but I do have something I wanted to post...

My mom is totally guilty of FWD'ing me FWD's to my work mailbox. Most of them I'm just like, eh, but this one was really a great read and I wanted to post it here for everyone else! It really all rings true, and makes you remember what the important things in life really are ... enjoy, and have a good night all!! :)



By Regina Brett, 90 years old, of The Plain Dealer, Cleveland.

(To celebrate growing older, I once wrote the 45 lessons life taught me. It is the most-requested column I've ever written. My odometer rolled over to 90 in August, so here is the column once more.)

1. Life isn't fair, but it's still good.

2. When in doubt, just take the next small step.

3. Life is too short to waste time hating anyone.

4. Your job won't take care of you when you are sick. Your friends and parents will. Stay in touch.

5. Pay off your credit cards every month.

6. You don't have to win every argument. Agree to disagree.

7. Cry with someone. It's more healing than crying alone.

8. It's OK to get angry with God. He can take it.

9. Save for retirement starting with your first paycheck.

10. When it comes to chocolate, resistance is futile.

11. Make peace with your past so it won't screw up the present.

12. It's OK to let your children see you cry.

13. Don't compare your life to others. You have no idea what their journey is all about.

14. If a relationship has to be a secret, you shouldn't be in it.

15. Everything can change in the blink of an eye. But don't worry; God never blinks.

16. Take a deep breath. It calms the mind.

17. Get rid of anything that isn't useful, beautiful or joyful.

18. Whatever doesn't kill you really does make you stronger.

19. It's never too late to have a happy childhood. But the second one is up to you and no one else.

20. When it comes to going after what you love in life, don't take no for an answer.

21. Burn the candles, use the nice sheets, wear the fancy lingerie. Don't save it for a special occasion. Today is special.

22. Over prepare, then go with the flow.

23. Be eccentric now. Don't wait for old age to wear purple.

24. The most important sex organ is the brain.

25. No one is in charge of your happiness but you.

26. Frame every so-called disaster with these words: 'In five years, will this matter?'

27. Always choose life.

28. Forgive everyone everything.

29. What other people think of you is none of your business.

30. Time heals almost everything. Give time time.

31. However good or bad a situation is, it will change.

32. Don't take yourself so seriously. No one else does.

33. Believe in miracles.

34. God loves you because of who God is, not because of anything you did or didn't do.

35. Don't audit life. Show up and make the most of it now.

36. Growing old beats the alternative -- dying young.

37. Your children get only one childhood.

38. All that truly matters in the end is that you loved.

39. Get outside every day. Miracles are waiting everywhere.

40. If we all threw our problems in a pile and saw everyone else's, we'd grab ours back.

41. Envy is a waste of time. You already have all you need.

42. The best is yet to come.

43. No matter how you feel, get up, dress up and show up.

44. Yield.

45. Life isn't tied with a bow, but it's still a gift.

I am so doomed.

I am a hypochondriac.

I always have been, always will. I fully admit to this. My head hurts, I have a brain tumor. My jaw hurts, I have a root canal. I get a little light headed, I'm having a stage five million heart attack. Yeeeeah. Compound this with the fact that I tend to worry over anything worry-able that presents itself to me and I should be the poster gal for Paxil. (But I'm not on anything! My nerves are all natural, baby.)

So I've been having these small chest pains today. Only two or three sporadic times, but the first time it happened at work, I was convinced I was going into cardiac arrest. (Even though I had an EKG a year ago and it came back a-ok.) I sit at my desk, staring wide-eyed at my tea mug, wondering if my co-workers would catch me as I tumbled out of my chair, before my head hit the harsh steel of my file cabinet. I breathe slooowly like all the relaxed people do, and it goes away. Cool. But as I'm working I'm still thinking about it.

A few hours later it happens again, briefly, and I'm about ready to write my will. I go to stand up but as a side effect of nothing but my pure worry my legs feel heavy. Holy crap HEAVY LEGS I HAVE A BLOOD CLOT FOR SURE, AAAAHHHH. At this point the rational side of my brain (that is getting flailed on by the freak out side of my brain) says I need to go outside for a little bit and relax. And I do. I feel better!

On my way back inside I realize that my throat hurts, and this is more than likely all due to bad reflux I got last night after eating one of my food nemesis, hot dog. (I had coffee too, that doesn't help.) Damn you, hot dog and caffeine! I feel better when I can pin my not-so-strange symptoms on something. :)



So yeah, I'm a mega-weenie when I start to have strange health symptoms. I'm doomed!!! Luckily, my boyfriend knows this very well, and takes all my freak outs in stride. <3

Ee, awards!

I've been tagged by the awesomely creative Valerie at a visible spectrum with the lovely blog award!



The people I tag with this award are:
Nonchalant Girl
Moonjava's Muse
Teasingly Diverse
Through Squirrel Eyes

Yay for blog love! :)

I haven't posted in a while... I've been SO BUSY! And tired!! I'm biting the bullet and taking off Friday -- even though I won't get paid for it -- because I want a relaxing 3-day weekend! I mean, I'm coming home at lunch and napping. Yeesh! And besides, the 4th of July holiday falls on a Saturday this year, so we won't get a 3-day weekend for that. So I'm planning a nice, relaxing little beach outing, and lots of napping. :) Matt and I are going to go rent a paddleboat at Greenfield Lake Park and paddle down the rivers! Wooooo! Hafta bring the camera for that one... :)

Hope y'all had a nice relaxing weekend -- although I took a few naps, I was still tired this morning, but I did have a great little weekend. Felt way too short though! Oh well, 3-dayer soon. ;)



( I used the word 'nap' a ton in the post... can ya tell I love 'em??)

My F.P.U List

I figured it was about time I explained this! (I will also link this post from my F.P.U list for reference.)

So, if by now you haven't seen the F.P.U list, I'll ask you to scroll down a liiiittle bit ... a little more ... yeah, right down there on the right ... the list of bizarrely random things! That's my F.P.U list, which stands for Four Paws Up list; basically a list of things you want to try to see, do, or accomplish before you go four paws up, a.k.a bite the big one.




He's only sleeping!


Some people call them bucket lists (kick the bucket) or daisy lists (pushing up daisies), but in a land far far away, when I was working at a veterinary hospital, I coined the term 'four paws up' and thought it would fit! Things I've crossed out are things I've done already, and the rest are still up for accomplishment. Who knows if I'll ever get to them all, but it's great motivation to try new things, whether it be something small or on a grander scale. And it's a good way to get down on paper (or a screen) a bunch of fun ideas and activities, without forgetting them! (I have the memory of a turnip...)

Right now I've only got 30 things, but that may change & grow as I cross more stuff off my list! :) Yay!!

Blood drive day!

I gave blood today!!!!!!

I've never done it before, so when the blood drive came up at work again I bit the bullet and signed up! It wasn't bad at all, although I'm a little tired this afternoon. :) I've never been really scared of needles, I think my big thing was, because I'm rather tiny, worrying about fainting. But I did fine!

Definitely a cool thing to do if you can, if my blood can help save a life I'm happy to donate!

I need a shoebox...

So after another nearly $80 grocery trip yesterday, I've decided I'm reverting to the time-old method of saving money at the grocery store ...



Yeah, clipping coupons. I'm about 30 minutes away from a shower and a walk down to our Harris Teeter to grab the Sunday paper!

We've been trying -so- hard to save on groceries; buying what's on sale as opposed to what we usually would, but our grocery bills usually hover in the 70-ish range. Things are expensive, and we like things, I guess. We could do more and buy our bathroom toiletries and whatnot at WalMart, but you could not get me into this WalMart here for less than $100,000 and a week long vacation to Europe. (It's gnarly, folks.)

So I'm reverting to my mom, and I have many memories of myself as a kid, clipping coupons and sorting them with her in a big old shoebox. So in that respect it kind of made me smile. (I probably wouldn't have dug that memory out of my brain otherwise!) But yeah. I wasn't even sure if Sunday paper coupons even existed anymore, that's how out of the loop I am!

So here I go into a new foray of savings! Actually, on this last grocery run, we saved $17 by shopping just sales. If I can save an additional $10 a week, that's $40 at the end of the month that's not spent on groceries. And we need every bit of cash we can get in this economic craziness...

Let me know if you have any tips! ;)

[edit]
So after today's paper buying, I've discovered that the coupon section is EXTREMELY pared down from what I remember, oh, 20 or so years ago. I got two foldouts of coupons, about 15 pages each, at least half of that filled with infomercial-like advertisements for the Dual Action Lipo Tummy Shaper, or a Classic US Stamp Collection.

I managed to clip two coupons, one for hot dogs and one for tampons, and now I am conviced the universe is laughing at me.

Let's see how I saved:

Paper: -$1.49 (the paper is $1.50, but somehow I saved a penny)
Coupons: +$2.00 worth
Savings: = $0.51

Gotta start somewhere? Sheesh!

Freebie Fail

So for the past week, I have been futiley trying to win a free Burts Bees Lip Balm thanks to a tip I caught on the amazing Fantabulously Frugal (which, by the way, is an AMAZING site; love it love it!!) ... Burts Bees is celebrating its 25th Burt Day by giving away 1000 free lip balms every day between the hours of 9 and 12am... but they don't say when the time the giveaway starts is, to make it fair I guess, so it's randomized.

Where that leaves me is sitting at my desk every morning, with the Burt Day page up behind all of my other open apps, and clicking on the Sign Up button every 10 minutes. I definitely missed it yesterday, I stepped away from my desk for about 15 minutes to socialize and came back, and boom, giveaway done. Those 1000 go FAST. And that'll teach me to talk to coworkers.

Today I was a little more diligent, checking every 10 minutes, but I still managed to miss it. I'll have to step it up to every 5. Now I wonder, is it really worth it for a lip balm I could get for three bucks? Every 5 minutes, having to stop my work flow and click on a damn register button? I have to time my bathroom breaks between my button clickings? Timing my printer runs, my workroom runs? I think I might give up on this one.

If someone manages to snag one, come back here and brag to me! :) I think I've lost my diligence!

Dude, where's my car?

Just a little while ago I was heading out of work to my car, or where I usually park my car, when I realized my car wasn't there.

Where -did- I park my car??

I usually try to park in the same general area, but when you take an odd lunch time it's hard, because you come back and all the spots are taken. And me, in the somewhat frazzled state I have been in lately thanks to the rigamarole of new homebuying, forgot where the hell my car was.

I walked around for a few minutes, hitting my lock and unlock buttons on my car remote, listening for it. I found it, but in doing so had visions of old ladies with big rubber-ball like Mickey Mouse heads on the ends of their car antennas.

That will never happen to me though, because the antenna on my car is busted and won't extend when I turn my radio on due to an accident a few years ago that never got fully fixed.

But at any rate ... felt like a dumbass. Hopefully no one was watching from the 3rd floor.