Saturday, April 23, 2005

One good turn deserves another... right? - From my LJ Blog

Apr. 23rd, 2005 @ 10:53 pm One good turn deserves another... right?


Current Mood: sleepy



Today was busy but good. My mom is with my aunts in West Palm Beach trying to relax and speed along recovery after her knee surgery.



(Daisy and I drove her to our normal halfway meeting place, the restaurant “Maneros” in Stuart on Wednesday. I know I’ve mentioned their Gorgonzola salad before. I had that and a NY Strip Steak cooked to medium rare perfection and creamed spinach)



… anyway. Her car is living at my house until tomorrow when my dad will bring her by here to get it.



Grammie is sick and has been all week. She is a miserable sick person :-( She doesn’t want to take medication to feel better, and doesn’t want any help, doesn’t want to eat… oy… Anyway, we usually go shopping on Saturdays that Shaun is not working, so I called her this morning to see if she was up to it, and she said no… and I asked her if she needed anything.. no… she said well, I need juice, but I’ll get that the first of the week… oh, and stamps, but don’t worry about that… I asked her if she wanted company.. she said no… …. I am pretty sure no with her means… “I don’t want to be a burden so I’ll just suffer”… So I got into mom’s car



(Mom’s car has the sticker so she can come and go through the guard house where Grammie lives without Grammie having to call her in.)



…and I drove to the grocery store… got some ginger ale and root beer, ice cream (I know she’ll at least eat that! ) Some Advil multi symptom cold medicine, stamps, cran raspberry juice and a few other things since I know she likes them and they are on sale… and tilapia and veggies to make for lunch.



I got to her house and surprised her… She was not mad… whew… then she saw the grocery bags! ROFL… She started yelling at me… said she had enough food to eat for weeks and didn’t need anything blah blah blah… She was happy to see me though… I stayed for a while, she said she had just eaten a big slice of my pumpernickel toast not long ago and wasn’t hungry, so I told her I’d take the fish and veggies home and cook them at my house tonight so I didn’t have to mess up her kitchen and we’d reheat them for lunch tomorrow. She was happy with that!



So… to make a short story long… ROFL….



I dredged the tilapia in cornmeal and fried it in corn oil, seasoned with salt… served with Crystal Hot Sauce… heaven!



I took an eggplant, peeled it, cubed it, cubed zucchini, yellow squash, asparagus, onion, sliced fresh garlic, added a few springs of fresh thyme, tossed with olive oil and salt and pepper and roasted in the oven. (this is one of her favorites).



I had that for dinner.



I bought fresh asparagus on Wednesday for .88 per pound!!!! I made Cream of Asparagus soup with that… mmmm it is good!



Now I’m ready for a nap!



Oh yeah… Back to mom’s car… I noticed that she was supposed to have the oil changed in JANUARY! And it hadn’t been done, so I thought I would surprise her and I went and had that done, and of course… the battery died… so I had to get a new one of those… plus her car was out of gas and it takes Premium… and she drives a boat for a car… I stopped filling it at $20 – I was afraid to find out how much it would cost to fill it up at $2.48 per gallon for premium!



ZzzzZZzzZZZZ



And... Shaun is out tonight at the CK.... I wasn't feeling up to going out after the day I had... so he went without me. Which is fine, but hopefully he won't stay out really late. He's got to work in the morning....



Shaun and I had a date night last night. Well it started out that way anyway. We went to Red Lobster for dinner, and it was great. Pretty good service, even though I think they hire their servers from the funny farm. They are WAY to cheerful! We were going to see Kung Fu Hustle, but the line was too long, and we both hate full theatres, so we passed on the movie. It was nice anyway.

Saturday, April 16, 2005

What a beautiful day! - From my LJ Blog

Apr. 16th, 2005 @ 05:03 pm What a beautiful day!


Current Mood: content



It is such a nice day today, I want to just lie on my bed with the windows wide open, 72° breeze passing through the house and read today.



Unfortunately… life is in the way….



I just finished balancing my checkbook… on Quicken.



This is like the 5th time I’ve tried to use quicken… lets see if this lasts longer than 6 months! I don’t know what my problem is… it’s like starting a journal! ROFL!



I actually went back and added in all transactions since the beginning of the year (with the help of the automatic download from bank feature) and I think I have everything set up. It gives me a nifty snapshot of my net worth and I can see exactly what bills are due and what has been paid. I really like it – as long as I can keep up with it.



The other thing it does is a budget… now I haven’t been very good at sticking to a budget lately… but I’m hoping this will help me see the error of my ways… it’s kind of hard to not feel guilty about spending money on stuff you don’t really need when your DEBTS are staring at you in red…. With a big minus sign next to them… oy!



I went to JoAnns fabrics yesterday and got the little do-hickey I needed to fix the sewing machine I’m “storing” for grammie. It works like a charm now, and I fixed a pair of pants! I really need to change to black thread, but I’m scared to death of trying to thread the machine. I really need to make a sketch of how it should be done, before I goof it up. I know like 3 people who have perfectly good sewing machines but don’t use them because they don’t know how to thread them! That isn’t going to be me!!!!



On Tuesday while Grammie and I were waiting for mom to get out of surgery, I had her re-teach me how to crochet!!! I have a set of about 9 hooks in a little plastic box, and I brought those and some yarn, and we just went to town. I made a cute little something or other, that is skinny on one side and wider on the other… I was crocheting too tightly in the beginning… I taught her how to knit too. We had a good little bonding session!



Grammie takes dish towels and cuts them in half and crochets a little top on them with a button so you can hang them from your oven door in the kitchen. I’m going to have her teach me how to do those next.



I gotta think of something to sew. I guess if I’m going to start sewing, I’m gonna have to break down and buy an iron… ROFL!



Well out side with me. I’m going to either trim the hedges and pull weeds in the front, or I’m going to try and do something with the garage. Wish me luck!

Saturday, April 9, 2005

Cooking is my stress buster... - From my LJ Blog

Apr. 9th, 2005 @ 12:00 pm Cooking is my stress buster...


Current Mood: cheerful



This is going to be a good weekend, I think.



I’ve been grocery shopping today and I got enough groceries for an army.



Mom is having knee surgery on Monday, so I’m going to cook up a bunch of things for her and dad to eat so she doesn’t have to cook next week very much.



I’m planning on making the following:



New Orleans wine sauced chicken

Cheese tomato soup

Vegetable beef soup

Barbecued short ribs

Broccoli Casserole

Rice and Bean vinaigrette salad

Cheeseburger meatloaf

Mashed potatoes

Homemade pumpernickel bread

Egg salad



We’ll see how far I get 



CJ

Tuesday, April 5, 2005

Quicken - From my LJ Blog

Apr. 5th, 2005 @ 09:56 pm Quicken


Current Mood: annoyed



Quicken actually has online tech support chat. Free... how cool is that.



Too bad they can't help me!



They tell me that because I download my credit card transactions, I can't enter the finance charges in the reconcile box. How dumb is that. Pretty dumb if you ask me!?!



Then they tell me to "Kindly leave a note" on the feedback page, and after entering my life story, and hitting submit, it tells me it can't connect to the database.... grrrr!

Sunday, April 3, 2005

Life - From my LJ Blog

Apr. 3rd, 2005 @ 11:43 am Life....


Current Mood: blank



This last week has been so terrible and so good all at the same time. I don't even know where to begin. I can't even begin. Suffice to say, Shaun and I had a conversation Tuesday night that has been a long time coming. I think everything is ok now. But basically he just had to get a lot of stuff off his chest and it confirmed a lot of things I already knew but chose to ignore.



I am happy we had the conversation. I'm happy that he finally feels like he can talk to me about anything and everything. I think we will be stronger for it. But it took a lot of talking and reassurances to make us both feel better.



We still have a few unresolved issues... like when we're going to start a family. But all in all, we are going to be ok.



I had a chat with Summer yesterday about another thing that came to light in my conversation with Shaun Tuesday, and hopefully she can help out on that end.

Friday, March 4, 2005

A note about sheets :) - From my LJ Blog

Mar. 4th, 2005 @ 11:45 pm A note about sheets :)


Current Mood: sleepy



Since I started Flylady about 2 months ago, the rule around here is last one out of the bed makes it.



We have a waterbed and I use a mattress pad and a flat sheet on the bottom, then a top sheet and a comforter. The sides of the bottom sheet stay tucked for the most part all week, so all we do is fluff the pillows and smooth the top sheet and comforter over the bottom sheet.



My favorite day by far is the one day a week that I change the sheets. I love getting into a bed with clean sheets and a freshly made bed.



The best thing about making the bed every day is that it makes the bedroom look cleaner. Kind of like keeping the kitchen clean. It seems that if my kitchen stays clean the rest of the house does too. We always make sure to empty the sink every night and empty the dishwasher each morning so we can start the new day and have a place to put the dishes so the sink stays clear.



Have I mentioned that I love Flylady!

Friday, February 11, 2005

Carpe Diem - From my LJ Blog

Feb. 11th, 2005 @ 10:02 pm Carpe Diem

What a great day!



My boss gave me the day off today for my birthday (yesterday)!



I decided to spend it at Summer’s house with Mason!!!!



What an incredible day. He is so good. He basically slept and ate and slept and pooed, and ate and slept…. He did look around for a while and I got to hold him a lot.



I have had two sister’s in laws that have had children, but nothing compares to having your sister have a child.



Absolutely. Unbelievable.



I feel so blessed.



Mmmm another thing we did today was go to lunch. We went to a place called Siam Garden. A Thai restaurant that my sister has been raving about for years. Wow was it good!



This is what we had:





Spring rolls – Clear noodles and vegetables wrapped with spring roll skin



Good. Nothing out of the ordinary



Tom Yum Goong soup – Shrimp prepared with chili paste, bell pepper, cilantro, onion, celery, mushroom and lime juice



This was very tasty. Had a very fresh flavor. There were only 2 shrimp though… Very good.





Tom Ka Gui soup – Chicken soup prepared with coconut milk, bell pepper, onion, celery, mushrooms, cilantro, lemon grass and lime juice



This was very good as well. This was Summer’s favorite, but she was too chicken to try anything new. She said she liked the other soup better. I honestly couldn’t choose a favorite, they were both so different and good.





Stir Fried Basil Pork – Medium heat – Pork with fresh basil leaves, bell peppers, onions and an assortment of vegetables.



This was good. It kind of tasted like the flavor of egg foo yung, maybe because it was in a brownish gravy. It was good.





Red curry Pork – Medium heat – Red curry cooked with coconut milk, string beans, pineapple, bell peppers and bamboo shoots.



This was very good. It had the flavor of the Thai fish that I make. I liked the addition of the green string beans.





Banana Delight – Slices of banana wrapped in wonton wrapper and deep fried. Drizzled with honey and sesame seeds.



HOLY COW… these were SO good! Summer says she has made them before at home, she said just to trim the wonton wrappers so they aren’t so big.



I loved this restaurant.







Char

Thursday, February 10, 2005

Happy Birthday to Me! - From my LJ Blog

Feb. 10th, 2005 @ 10:19 pm Happy Birthday to Me!


Current Mood: cheerful



What a great Birthday! It's all uphill after you hit 30.



I had a lot of people appreciate me today. I feel very lucky.



I also realized we're in the best financial situation we've ever been in. That's nice to know.



I'm in the process of building a budget, and a financial plan. It's about time, don't you think? :)



Today was incredibly wonderful!

Monday, February 7, 2005

Mason Russell Moore - From my LJ Blog

Feb. 7th, 2005 @ 10:05 pm Mason Russell Moore


Current Mood: indescribable



He was born today. I was there, but kept my distance... a hard task indeed. We got the call at 5:30am, and he was born at 11:52am. 7lbs 12oz - 21" long.



A beautiful day.



Char

Saturday, February 5, 2005

Doctor... I don't need no stinkin doctor - From my LJ Blog

Feb. 5th, 2005 @ 06:07 pm Doctor... I don't need no stinkin doctor


Well, yeah I did. It started Wednesday, I wasn't feeling quite right. Not that hungry (That should say it all right there!). I started getting a sore throat on Thursday, but I worked all day anyway. By Friday I was having trouble breathing, and I had bad pain on the right side of my chest when breathing deeply or coughing, my voice was mostly gone. Plus there was the little fact that I had been coughing up green stuff for the last two days. Friday when I came home from work I decided to take an antibiotic leftover from last year when I hadn't taken the entire RX. I know, I know.. beleive me I've had the lecture about 25 times now. Anyway, I felt worse that night.



Saturday I woke up and the pain in my chest was even worse and there was definite breathing issues. I told Shaun that I was worried, then I called my mom. She said that it could be pneumonia and she wanted me to go to the Doctor. Well my doctor doesn't work on Saturday! I called his office and someone called back and said there was a clinic that I could go to that would accept my insurance, co pay and all, so Shaun called and they said we could come in. I was kind of leery, because insurance is so screwy, that I never trust what they say. All I know is that my co pay is $20 and if I would have gone to the emergency room it would have been $200! So off we went.



These were the NICEST people I have ever met in my life. Every one of them, from the receptionist to the nurse to the doctor. I swear I thought I was in the twilight zone.. AND they only charged me $20!



It turns out, I had bronchitis and my asthma flared up again. I haven't had asthma symptoms in 10 years. The doc says once you have it you always have it. Well that explained a lot of things for Shaun. He never knew I had asthma. So when he would tickle me and I couldn't breathe that would explain why... there are probably a million times I could have used an inhaler, but I never thought that I needed it, I just thought it was me... I don't know if this is making sense or not, but I'm so glad I went to that doctor. It's going to make my life a lot easier having this inhaler now.



He gave me the inhaler, prednizone, an antibiotic (that I have to take for ALL 10 days), and some narcotic cough medicine that tastes like ASS!



I'm backdating this because I didn't have a chance to write it in on the day, but it is now Feb 11th and I am feeling much better!



CJ

Friday, January 28, 2005

(headsmack) - From my LJ Blog

Jan. 28th, 2005 @ 07:38 pm (headsmack)

Current Mood: happy

Current Music: Groovin



How could I leave out:



Battlestar Galactica

Stargate SG-1

Stargate Atlantis

Aqua Teen Hunger Force

Good Eats



from my list of Must See TV??



Busy day at work today, but I seem to have gotten a lot done. It's amazing how much you can get done with the boss is gone!



We were headed over to Casselberry tonight to see my brother in law who is in the hospital from surgery when we got the call that they were going home. That's good! He wanted to go home, and I really didn't want to make the 1.5 hour drive, just to get up at 7:30am and come home since Shaun has to work at 9am tomorrow.



Extra bonus: I bought my sister a dozen roses, and now I get to keep them!



I've got a full day planned tomorrow. Well not really planned, but I have a lot that I want to do. First of all I need to go through my flylady emails and see what projects I've missed. I need to get in my garage and really tear it up. I need to clean out the fridge from top to bottom. Plan dinners for next week and then go grocery shopping with Grammie.



I also have to get some work done from home this weekend. Stupid training for our new computer system. I am not thrilled.

Thursday, January 27, 2005

eeeooowwwwnnnkkk - From my LJ Blog

Jan. 27th, 2005 @ 11:07 pm eeeoooowwwwnnnkkk

Current Mood: sleepy

Current Music: Rockabye Baby



I'm sleepy... long day today.



The accident guy called again today. He wanted to thank me again, and told me that he is a hairstylist and invited my husband and I to come to his salon for a free cut/color/highlight. I told him that was sweet but not necessary. He insisted, so maybe we will call. The strangest thing is this... Shaun and I have tried about a dozen different hairstylists around here, and are still looking for one who can do a good job. How ironic that this guy may be an answer to our own problem of finding someone to cut our hair. Too weird.



He said he's been doing it for a long time, and used to do it in high profile salons in Chicago. I can't wait for Shaun to meet him. I think it's going to be a very interesting friendship. I'm so intrigued by his Russian accent. Am I odd?



Anywho... Flylady is going great. I was telling my sister Daisy about it the other day, and she said "You know, I think I should try that". Wow.. I was surprised. She has laundry issues, but her house is always clean when I visit... maybe she's more like me than I realized... I dunno. I printed out some information for her and told her about just starting with a morning and before bed routine. We'll see. Work was insane today so I didn't have time to chat with her.



G'nite.

Wednesday, January 26, 2005

Order in Chaos - From my LJ Blog

Jan. 26th, 2005 @ 11:09 pm Order in Chaos

Current Mood: content



I don't think I've mentioned how much I like Star Trek Voyager. Well I like it.. a lot. Shaun and I have watched in order all the way to the middle of season 5. I really enjoy it and even look forward to it. Other TV shows we watch regularly:



24

The West Wing

Smallville

Navy NCIS

CSI

CSI Miami

CSI NY



We probably watch too much TV. My sister and her husband decided to stop watching a lot of TV one day... the next thing she knew she was pregnant :) Something to think about!



The man from the accident called me today. I called him back when I got home from work. He was very nice. He thanked me, and let me know he gave my name and number to his attorney. He invited me to lunch. I told him that my husband and I would like to meet the rest of his family, but he didn' t have to treat or anything - that I was just happy they were ok! I also asked him about his accent. He is Russian. I thought it was european... Russian I would have probably not guessed even though I knew it wasn't british. He didn't talk a whole lot that day though. He said that the reason he didn't go to the hospital in the ambulance is because he didn't trust the doctors in this area, he said they mis-diagnosed his wife and that led to her early death. He went to the Vero Beach hospital and took his young son with him. They are both doing ok. Thank goodness.



I hope to meet with him and his family soon. He seems like a wonderful guy.. with his hands full with three young kids and just losing his wife. Someone was looking over his shoulder on Tuesday.

Tuesday, January 25, 2005

Decisions, decisions, decisions - From my LJ Blog

Decisions, decisions, decisions Jan. 25th, 2005 @ 07:30 pm


Current Mood: distressed



It's incredible how simple decisions you make during the course of the day have the ablity to alter your life.



Take Saturday... Shaun and I go to our favorite place for lunch, a little hole in the wall Italian joint that has the best lasagna in town. We sit down, and wait, and wait and wait... 10 minutes later the "new guy" waiter still doesn't acknowledge that we exist, so we get up and leave... we go to Chili's for lunch. We're starving by now. so we order and appetizer... we never order appetizers... it turns out that these two decisions will leave us both violently ill for the next two days!



Take this morning... I leave for work, I don't take my regular route, because i'm running late and that route is more scenic than direct, so I go to the next most common route, I turn onto the main road, and boom.. traffic is stopped and it doesn't move... I make a U turn, go back the way I came, and hit the next main road... I'm waiting to turn onto US-1 from this main road and in two cars in front of me I notice the light changes tick tick tick tick.... a tractor trailer carrying a flatbed runs the light going at least 60mph, i think to myself, boy he ran that light late... my eye is following him... and he ended up hitting a big red SUV that had pulled out into the lane next to him must have just clipped him with the trailer or something... this SUV does a barrel roll and lands on it's wheels... all I can think of is the poor people in that SUV and that bastard in the big rig that nailed him. I grab for my cell phone, shaking like a leaf as I pull over and run to the SUV to see if there is anything I can do... my heart sinks, there is a carseat in the back, I hear someone saying the baby is ok, he's fine, I run around to the drivers side door, the man is turned around in his seat checking on his baby. I asked him if he was ok, he said he was hurt.. he has blood dripping from two gashes in his head. Somewhere in there I called 911.. probably with about 10 other people who saw the crash. Some men come over and help the man out of his vehicle, he sits down on the ground, one of the women has the boy in her arms, he's about 3, she's comforting him, he's shaken a bit, but not hurt. I go get a pillow from the debris that tumbled out of the car from the crash, and bring it over to him so he can lie down on the ground. I ask him if there is anyone I can call... he said he just lost his wife... I am crushed.



I recover and ask if there is anyone I can call. He says no.. he just dropped his two other children off at school... A lady comes over and says his name, takes the child.. I ask who she is, she says she is the wife's best friend... I'm so relieved, someone he knows is here.



I tell the police everything I saw, I gave the man my phone number in case he needs help. I'm so thankful that they were ok. What a terrible way to start the day.

Saturday, January 8, 2005

Heh - From my LJ Blog

Jan. 18th, 2005 @ 08:40 pm Heh


Current Mood: bouncy

Current Music: Duet by Washing Machine and Dryer



I guess I can't pick on other people for not posting...



Work is hell and home is getting better.



I've decided I'm living in clutter and it is making me insane.



I've joined www.flylady.com to get some help.



Seems like it's going to work out great!



I'll let you know!