Saturday, August 25, 2007

Trouble with Toilet Paper

I am a terrible human being. Cases in point:

1.) While shopping at the local grocery store, I saw a woman with something odd and white tucked into the backside of her pants and flapping in the wind. I stepped a bit closer, and discovered that it appears that a piece of toilet paper somehow got tucked up and her shirt was just short enough that the last square was visible. Do you think I stopped this poor woman from facing humiliation throughout the store as she unknowingly reached for a box of cereal or a can of spaghetti sauce and the world was drawn to her backside and therefore the square? Nope, I did not. I couldn't figure out how to approach this lady and tell her that I was watching her back end and saw the paper. I have no idea what made me see this...and I wasn't sure how to begin the conversation--"ooh, have you tried this...and by the way, you have something on your rear" didn't sound right. I actually started towards her twice, but couldn't bring myself to interrupt her shopping.

2.) While out and about in public, I magically ended up in the stall without any toilet paper. (No, this did not happen after the above incident, but rather a couple of days prior to the grocery store incident, so it wasn't fate or God's way of teaching me a valuable lesson for not helping the other lady). Fortunately, I am addicted to paper napkins from fast food restaurants, and almost always have some in my purse (I guess eating all the Happy Meals and such with my sorority sisters' children have taught me to be prepared, especially since I'm pretty quick to mop up the kiddos and their spills). So I am washing my hands and see a lady from another stall leave the restroom with a piece of TP attached to the heel of her shoe. I was so fascinated with the pondering of how it is that where TP is not needed, there it is, that I let her leave without saying anything. And in this case, I honestly would have told her!

Just to prevent fate from sticking me in a stall without TP or a situation that might lead me to be the person looking like a fool, I am getting ready to switch out purses that will a) carry a roll of TP and b) be large enough to push over my shoulder and around my back end so that most of my back end will be covered. Or I may try just checking out my rear in a mirror while I'm drying my hands.

Wednesday, August 22, 2007

Georgia on my Mind

Vacation time is rapidly approaching, and as I'm at work on my day off wishing I was elsewhere, it's totally on my mind!

Every year hubby and I have gone to a different state for our anniversary. When we reach our 50th, we'll have been to all 50 states. What a fun idea--and not one we conjured up on our own. I actually stole it from an attorney that said she and her husband were going to do this--it was around the time of our second anniversary, and so I went home and announced we should be just like So-and-so...fortunately, hubby agreed.

So for the past six years we have gone to various states. Our personal spin on the idea--can't be total posers--was that we'll go some place we haven't been or wouldn't normally go. Our first year didn't really count; my grandfather had recently passed away and we were in Maryland to check on my grandmother and to attend a friend's wedding over our anniversary, so we'd been there before. The second year we went to Pagosa Springs, CO...had a "free" (sit through the resort presentation and stay in the area 2 nights for free) hotel and we're nothing if not thrifty! The third year we were broke, and stayed in NM but rode the Tram in Albuquerque--something neither of us had done. Year four found us in Liberty, KS at the Wizard of Oz Museum...surprising because neither of us just absolutely loved the movie; it was a place I'd wanted to go since I was like 10 because someone I knew went there and it sounded fun. Year five put us alone on a horse ranch in OK (haven't lived until you've watched my husband ride a horse for five days in a row, twice a day). Year six we waited until the last minute and had to break our rule of going somewhere to do something new, so we just went to Vegas (but we stayed in a new hotel and saw things we hadn't before, so that sort of counts, right?). Which brings us to this year.

Because last year we waited until the last minute because we were still pretty rocky, hubby was surfing the net and found ghost tours in Savannah. It was WAY too much money for a last minute ordeal, so we agreed to contact a travel agent and go the following year. After a year of repeatedly hunting down the travel agent (and having her tell us to book everything but the airline tickets ourselves--what a waste of time!), we are set to go. We're taking a mystery cruise, going to Paula Dean's restaurant, driving down the coast to see an island where wild horses roam, taking a ghost tour (if I get off my duff and book it!), and finally, FINALLY, hubby will see an ocean.

How does someone live to be over 30 and not see or swim in an ocean?

Anyway, as previously discussed, I love the south, and I'm sure I'll fall in love with Savannah. If I only make it that far...how is it that Tuesday feels like a million years away?

Sunday, August 19, 2007

Too Much Thinking Too Early

I think I need a vacation.

I'm watching a dispatcher and an officer draw pictures (some amazing artwork to go on our fridge at work...stick figures and such are fascinating) and flip through TV channels--they keep stopping on the NASA channel; who watches this channel enough for it to be on? It is, to quote my officer "action-packed"--and waiting desperately for someone to need help NOW.

I'm thinking about a conversation I had with hubby earlier this week about maybe doing something else with my life because after only a year and a half of working full time, I think I'm done.

I'm surfing strangers' blogs and wishing my life was more interesting, and admiring that some are brave enough to share everything with the world. I wish I could, but living in Podunk, I'm sure it's too easy to track me down...and I wonder if really the better way to blog is anonymous, but I gave hubby and friends my blog address...which I don't really regret, but I am aware that there are results from this (see post where hubby was mad I called him homeboy).

I'm wondering how many times I have said "really" in the last sentence, and I'm wondering if it could have been used more often.

I'm thinking that although we have the NASA channel and stick figures, the hours between 0113 and 0442 have dragged. Stinks that we only have NASA, the Weather Channel, the History Channel, MSNBC (already watched "To Catch a Predator" for a couple of hours tonight), CNN, UCTV (how many people can brag about that?), the local Fox/NBC/ABC/CBS and BookSpan to chose from. Plus we already watched a movie...oh yeah, and we did respond to a couple of calls. I know, your taxpayer dollars at work.

That reminds me--it may be just me, but I was listening to an employee of the National Lab complain about the fact that she pays my salary--if she's employed by the National Lab that's run by the Federal Government via grants/contracts/etc, doesn't that mean that I also pay HER salary?

I may have to point that out next time. Or maybe that's something that should be filed under things I wish I could say but have to wait until my parting shot as I retire.

I wondering when I'll have something more interesting to say, or at least something positive. I think that will happen when I'm on vacation. Only 9 more days until Savannah, and we'll be there awhile, so I should be refreshed. I'm sure the sweet tea will improve my world then too :)

Thursday, August 9, 2007

Bourne to be Annoying

Last night we went to the movies. One of the pleasures of living in Podunk is that there is only one movie theater (and I should note that it went away for several years and just fairly recently did we get another one) in town, and if a hot new movie comes out, for the next week or so the theater is generally packed. So last night we got there and once the previews were beginning we had to readjust so that three teenage boys could sit next to us.

I love teenagers. I think that starting at about 7th grade youth get very interesting and by the time they are in high school, it's totally fabulous to watch how they're trying to find themselves and who they want to be--just to know that during college/first time out on their own as adults it will all change. I used to spend a huge portion of my life with teenagers. We've had several teenagers live with us. I'd like to think that for the most part I can handle anything a teenager would throw at me.

Apparently not anything. This kid directly next to me checked his cell phone about every 5 minutes. This caused the lit screen to distract me every 5 minutes. Dude, you're at a movie--stop texting. You just paid a million dollars to sit in this DARK theater. When he wasn't checking his cell phone, he was biting his nails. I'm sure you're wondering why I heard it over the movie, right? That would be because he propped his arm up on the armrest between he and me and gnawed away. Is there a more irritating noise? Not during a movie there isn't. If I could have crawled out, I would have bought him a $50 bag of popcorn and suggested he chew that instead.

So while the eye candy on screen was great, I have no idea how good the plot was...I just know that apparently it was nailbitingly/have to tell my friends about it good.

Tuesday, August 7, 2007

I Ate a Turtle

Just had an awesome experience at the local ice cream store and had to share it!

Baskin Robbins makes clown cones...ice cream scoops with the cone sticking up like the clown hat and then it has frosting decorations, eyes, mouth and hair along with a cherry nose. What a fun way to eat ice cream! So although I'm 28 and checking out the clown cones, even I cannot bring myself to eat some sort of blue berry slush or shocking green gunky ice cream, so I'm totally bummed out and I guess the cute little girl in the Baskin Robbins shirt thinks that I'm a little slow and thinks she should take pity on the aging crazy lady that is distraught over the clown cone choices, because she points me to the other case.

That's right--the other case. The case that normally just has cakes. Not tonight though (or possibly not other nights too--I'm just trying to build up to the excitement). Tonight, there are also...

Cats! And Turtles! And some sort of weirdly decorated scoop that had a rubber ducky on top! (Not so excited about the duckies) The cats are two scoops with eyes and whiskers of frosting and they broke cookies into triangles to make ears. Darling, right? However, although I am a pig needing a child's ice cream (break out my pigtails), I cannot possibly eat two scoops. So hubby points to the turtles, and I am in love. An ice cream turtle here is the scoop of ice cream in a bowl smothered with green frosting (about 1/2 an inch worth in some spots--they fill up the area surrounding the scoop until it's even with the top of the bowl) and decorate a "shell". For the head peaking out, it's another enormous glob of green frosting piped into a disturbed looking neck and head, and then more frosting is added for eyes and a mouth. Yup, I ate a turtle. However, I could not bear the frosting, so as a word to the fellow turtle lovers out there--it's really hard to peel the ice cream out from underneath the frosting shell and head. I had to use another bowl and rock it back and forth.

Totally worthwhile experience for me and for the turtle, and for anybody watching me eat it, I'm sure :)

Sunday, August 5, 2007

Cheesecakes and Bikinis

Who goes to The Cheesecake Factory and doesn't eat dessert?

So I joined hubby in Phoenix this past week while he was there in training. I flew out Tuesday after a hurried "clean up the house for the cat sitter who is a 19 years old boy that doesn't care and is only house/cat sitting to get free satellite, food and freedom" frenzy. I seriously slept for like 3 hours and then began to clean the house so I could drive 2 hours and sit in an airport for another 2 hours for an hour long flight. I probably could have driven to Phoenix faster...

Anyway, because hubby was in class all day long, I was left to amuse myself. I swam in the pool at the hotel and slept forever and a day. I spent way too much money (great to have shopping choices!). Of course, no shopping trip is complete without a trip to Build-A-Bear, so my bear, Greggory, now has clothing from Arizona--and I bought him a fireman outfit.

When we travel, we have a rule that we have to eat somewhere that we can't get in Los Alamos or Santa Fe...so when I told our friends K&A that we'd met them for dinner any place that abides by those rules, A told me that she knew that ruled out McDonalds and Sonic, but everywhere else was fine :) So we ate at a Mexican restaurant with K&A...again, we generally avoid Mexican because it's not New MEXICAN, and that can lead to disappointment. However, we really liked the food! We ate at P.F. Changs (which we can now get in Albuquerque), Cold Stone Creamery (they closed the one in Santa Fe...grr!), and then we ate at The Cheesecake Factory.

I think we disappointed the waiter when we didn't really want a big meal. Of course, we were eating at 4:30 because I had to catch the flight home. I was disappointed when I didn't have room for dessert...who goes to this restaurant and doesn't eat dessert?!?! And it's not like there weren't a million choices of cheesecake. It's not like I don't love cheesecake. I've never met a dessert that I don't like--and if I hadn't wanted cheesecake, I could have had one of the many other choices. Instead, we left the restaurant, bought some more books at the book store, and then I went to the airport where I got hungry and had to settle for nasty airport food.

Which reminds me...when did the airlines stop giving out peanuts? When I went to Georgia, we were given stale trail mix. Going to Phoenix I got the standard small cup of flat Diet Coke, but I didn't get peanuts or stale trail mix. You'd think for the bazillion dollars it costs to fly anywhere there would be peanuts.

Final travel thoughts were that I had the pleasure of sitting behind a woman coming from Seattle to Albuquerque. She was sitting next to a man that was visiting New Mexico (I don't know where) for the weekend. I guess he's been here before, because he felt comfortable answering this woman's questions even though he answered incorrectly ("where's Santa Domingo? Isn't that north of Santa Fe?" and he answered "yes" or "aren't there like 4 feast days for the state" and again, he made up an answer). They seemed to become bosom buddies along the way, and I couldn't figure it out until I saw them deplaning...he with his sandals and white socks and straw hat, her with her bikini top blatant under a shell that had fallen off her right shoulder. He met the stereotypical description of most scientists here in my town, and she was the stereotypical free spirit hippie of Santa Fe. It's interesting that when a stranger shows interest in us, we gain confidence and begin to lose the confines of "our" type and just become part of the human race...I doubt he even noticed her bikini top.