Oh, by the way...

In 2011, it was my goal to post something to my blog once every day for the entire calendar year.  But at some point, I realised that I was posting for the sake of posting.

In 2012, I realised that I wanted my blog to have a direction.  So I pondered.  And pondered.  And pondered.

Wedding blanket finished this summer

In 2013, I decided that I would just blog when the mood struck.  When I had a book review to share, I would.  When I had an exceptional recipe that I was excited about, I would let you know.  When I finished a knitting/cross-stitch project and I wanted to show it off, by all means...

But I wouldn't feel pressured.  I wanted my blog to be something people WANTED to read -- not something that was a chore to read.  And I decided I'd ease back into blog writing.  We're into September, and I figure an average of one post every four months should give you plenty of time to catch up.

Let's catch up on a few things that have happened this year, shall we?

I had hip surgery where the surgeon went in and cut some extra bone off of the joint.  The rehab is going really well.  In fact, the surgeon says I'm MONTHS ahead of schedule!  For the first time in YEARS, I'm walking without either a cane or crutches!

I got reunited with a friend I'd lost touch with several years ago.  She's local, and we just happened to run into each other on the sidewalk outside of work one day when I was walking to lunch and she was walking to a parking garage to pick up her car.

I got accepted to a doctoral program in my field; it was my second time applying.

I quit my job so I can go back to being a full-time student.

I just joined three fantasy football teams, each with a different format (not that I'm excited about football season or anything).

But that's pretty much all I've had going since the last time I wrote.  

Like I said...  I'll just pop in and write when I have something to say.

See you again in another four months!

Days with Friends

After work tonight, Rachel is coming over, and we're going to catch up on some tv.  Since she hasn't been here in awhile, we have a LOT to catch up on.  So many choices!

We're going to eat Pronto Paella and Jello Pie.

Tomorrow, I'm meeting my friend Joanna for supper.  I'm super excited to hear about her recent trip to England, and I want to catch her up on some things that have been going on in my life.  I saw her briefly at Rhinebeck, but I only had enough time to tell her about The Maple Cotton Candy story, and then we both needed to get going.

I'm not sure yet where we'll be doing, but I'm sure it'll be yummy.

Random Rhinebeck Ramblings

Market baskets should not be allowed.  The fad this year was market baskets.  People bought these huge market baskets that they would then tote their purchases in.  Said baskets were usually carried on the arm of the person, which put at my eye level.  These baskets were hard and had no give.  The fact that I didn't come home with two black eyes is completely unexplainable to me.

There was also a man who was carrying his toddler on his back in a huge-ass back-pack-like contraption.  not one of those small, cosy, things that kept baby close, but a huge contraption that was basically a carry-all, a tote, and a storage bag all in one.  Okay, fine.  But then you might want to mind when you're backing into people, things, displays, etc.

I found out that it simultaneously amuses and annoys me when I pet a sheep and he poops as I pet him.

I will never again hear Peruvian flute music and not automatically want to pee.

I will never know what the other ladies in the bathroom thought when Ria, Rachel, and I went into a stall one-by-one and came out laughing.  But it really worth the trip.  And it was totally hysterical.

I still don't understand when they think they're going to the punkin chunkin.  "We told them they can come any day."  But it's a two-day event!

Some people really just do NOT understand that when they start telling you a story and the first part of the story is "Can I ask you something really inappropriate" and they are a complete stranger, that maybe the rest of the story/question shouldn't be asked/told.

The potato chip/dip man may think the sale to Ria and I wasn't worth it.  But I do!

I think we scared the poor guy who asked if he could help us.  When he said "You could have just said 'no,' that probably was a bad sign.

All in all, I don't think I stopped laughing (well, after I stopped crying when I told Rachel about The Work Incident).

I'm sorry I'll miss Rhinebeck next year.

Rhinebeck, Part III

Sunday morning, before we left for the fairgrounds, I made sure to update my notebook with exactly what I needed.  Whew.  My plan to be more organised was complete.

Now that I knew exactly what I needed, I was set.  We set out, and I was pretty bummed because I hadn't been that excited by what I had seen for the one pattern that I DID know what I needed.  And we only had a few barns left.  Boo.

But we did some pretty serious power shopping, and by the time it was time to go home, I had secured yarn for all three of the patterns I needed yarn for.  The optional patterns didn't get yarn bought for, but my budget had been met, anyway.

We set sail for home, and bid Rhinebeck adieu.

I was particularly sad since I won't be able to make Rhinebeck next year, unless I want to miss the Kansas race for the second year in a row (which I probably won't), so I'm bummed.  BOOOOO.

Rhinebeck, Part II

Friday night, Ria and I went through the patterns that I wanted to get yarn for while at Rhinebeck, and I wrote in my notebook what kinds of yarn each pattern required.  I was trying to be systematic this year since in past years I've gone home with two yarns for the same pattern, but no yarn for a second pattern, or the wrong type of yarn for a certain pattern because I was going by memory.

I also wanted to have a small notebook with me so I could note if I saw certain yarns at a place that I liked but wanted to come back to later in case I didn't find something better later.  Rhinebeck is large enough that it's dangerous to buy things on Saturday or buy the first thing you see unless you ABSOLUTELY fall in love with it and MUST have it (or aren't on a strict budget).

The problem was that for two of the patterns I needed, I only wrote how many skeins of the suggested yarn I needed, which isn't helpful since I hadn't looked up how many yards each skein of the suggested yarn had.  Blech.  So on Saturday we mostly went around looking at pretty things, getting ideas for the one pattern I did know what I needed, and getting possible ideas for the others.

At the end of the day, we made sure to hit the wine and cheese barn so Rachel could have some wine to drink while Ria and I watched the NASCAR Sprint Cup race.  However, because of the stuff that happened at work on Friday, I ended up falling asleep almost as soon as the race started at 7:30.  The connection?  I barely got any sleep Friday night.  Combine that with walking around and shopping all day, and I was a sleepy knitter.

Rhinebeck, Part I

Yesterday (after receiving the suckiest work news of all time -- yes, suckier than being laid off - at least when I was laid off, my character wasn't attacked), my friend Rachel came over, picked me up, and we headed off to pick up our friend Ria in north Jersey.  But first, we had to raid Target for some road trip snacks.

After that, we were off.  We had some great conversation on the way up, although I wish Rachel had mentioned earlier in the trip that she didn't have a GPS so we could have used mine.  Oh well.  We got to Ria's house in 2.5 hours.  It would have been 2 hours, but SOMEONE doesn't know whether to turn right or left off the exit to get to her own house.  (See if I trust HER directions again!)

Once we picked Ria up, we were on our way to Rhinebeck - whee!  Our tradition is to hit this lovely sushi place every Rhinebeck weekend Friday.  I think I need to stop mentioning it, though, because it was pretty crowded this year.  Hmph.

By the time we got there (not that late, really), we were hungry and ready for our sushi.  Rachel and I always talk about the Godzilla roll, which we both ordered, but I was disappointed by it this year.  I don't know if I was just too full by the time I got to it, or if my tastes have changed in the past two years (when I last had it).  But the Mexican roll and the Kamikaze roll were both SOOOOOOO good.  Rachel was going to order the crispy potato roll, so we could share it, but they gave her crazy spider roll instead.  Boo.

Then it was back to the motel room where we could watch the rest of the NASCAR Nationwide Series race and strategise for the weekend.  Whee!

How Wrong is Curt?

Very, extremely, awesomely, hugely, exceedingly, immensely wrongity wrong wrong wrong.

Just so you all know.

Let's Go, October!

The bad news: For the first fall in many years, I'm missing the race in Kansas.  I could have gone (I told work from the beginning that I needed this weekend off), but I decided (well, Grandma decided for me) to save my days for Christmas/New Year instead.  Race weekend is also my Grandma's 90th birthday, so we'd have to leave the Saturday race mid-way to go to Grandma's birthday supper.  And it didn't seem worth missing two days of work and flying halfway across the country to see a 1.5 races.  And Grandma would rather see me for longer at Christmas, instead of just for a short meal for her birthday.

The good news: I had to miss Rhinebeck (NY Sheep & Wool Festival) last year since I was unemployed, but I get to go this year, with my usual crew of Rachel and Ria.  I'm super excited, and I'm already planning my shopping (mostly based around Christmas knitting).

My new physiotherapist is pretty good.  She's no Sandra, but I do like her so far.  She does seem better than the first guy I worked with.

The maybe news: A friend of mine is awaiting the results of a job interview.  I really want her to get this job.  It would super awesome, for myriad reasons.  I told her the other day that I needed one thing to go right this month (she interviewed in September), and I was picking that.  So it's potential good news.

I also scheduled the consultation with the sleep centre at Jefferson Hospital.  So I've got that going.

In the past week

I found out that my father is dying, a friend of mine hurt my feelings by calling me petty, I found that good friends of mine are moving across the country, and the first question my new physiotherapist asked me was whether my doctor has discussed surgical options with me.

There are only a few days left to September, and I'm rather thankful for that.

Restaurant Week Night

No recipe to share this week since I haven't been cooking.  But tonight I did go to La Fontana della Citta with one of my new co-workers for Restaurant Week.  Usually, you get three courses for $35, but this is one of the places that was going above and beyond.  We got four courses - yay us!

My first course was a seafood soup; she chose an arugula salad.

The second course was standard for everyone.  A trio of pasta which included gorgonzola gnocchi, penne putanesca, and a ravioli with pink sauce.

For the third course, I had veal parmigiana, while she chose the pollo marsala.

And for dessert, we both chose the tiramisu.

We had a fun time choosing the restaurant, as there are a TON of places to choose from.  I initially gave her a list of places, she narrowed it to five, I narrowed those to three, and then I let her pick the winner.  We found out over supper that we each used the same criteria -- we each wanted to go somewhere we had never been before and would usually be a bit out of our price range.

And - bonus - we each took a doggie bag home!  As per usual, I didn't eat much throughout the day (two granola bars, and a vending machine bag o' chips), and I was able to put away the first, second, and fourth courses, but only made a tiny dent in the entrée.  When I looked, what I took home filled the entire take-home tray.  Sigh.

But I had a great night out, great food, and excellent company. 

Chilling with Ria and Curt

Ria and Curt helped their daughter Angie move back in to Temple yesterday.  As is custom, as soon as her stuff was unloaded, they were ceremoniously kicked out, which left them free to hang out with me.  Yay!  We had lunch at Chickie's and Pete's, where I introduced them to the wonder that is Crab Fries.

We also went to Target, where I crawled around on the ground in an attempt to fix the truck (I failed miserably).  We hit Modell's, in an attempt to de-funk-ify my sneakers (we failed miserably).  We then hit up Lowe's, where we were more successful -- Curt got a screwdriver set he wanted, and I got some keys made, some sneaker odour-remover stuff, AND I pictures of Chad Knaus!  (Okay, a fake Chad, and not even Mini Chad, but a Chad nonetheless).  Ria got an even better picture of him, and we decided it shall be my screen-saver for my new job.

From there, we headed to my place to hang out and let lunch settle until we deemed it time for supper.  We hit up Pattaya, where they generously treated me to supper as a "congrats on the job" meal - yay!  I didn't realise this was Curt's first foray into Thai food!  A great time was had by all, I think.  I got the drunken noodles, Ria got the late night noodles, and Curt got something that wouldn't kill him (sans shellfish and peanuts).

Curt headed home, Ria and I watched and episode of "Brad Meltzer's Decoded" (it's my mission to get everyone hooked on this show), then we hit the hay.  Today, we hit the Gold Standard Café for breakfast, then the post office where Ria nearly got us kicked out for making a scene, the pet shop, and then back to my place for two more episodes of "Decoded."  (Ria's nearly through Season One - just in time for Season Two!)

Just as she was about to leave, the earthquake hit!  More on that tomorrow!

I also want to give a huge shout-out to Julie who sent me an über-sweet note of luck and encouragement yesterday because she thought it was my first day of work.  It truly is the thought that counts.  Thank you!

Gearing Up

As you know, my last week was filled with meeting friends and catching up.

This coming week is equally filled with "stuff" to do.  Tomorrow, I'm actually waiting for the DIRECTV person to come.  I got tired of losing a satellite signal every time the wind blows hard or the sky even LOOKS like it MIGHT rain, so I called today.  They actually had appointments available for tomorrow, so I'll be here either knitting or reading while I wait.

Tuesday, my friend Rachel and I are going work clothes shopping.  We have a plan!  I have gone through my work pants and have sorted them into "definitely don't fit," "don't fit well, but I might be able to make them work until I have actually started working and can afford to buy more clothes," and "definitely fit" piles.  The problem, though, was that my "definitely fit" pants are black, navy blue, grey, and grey.  Great colours for mixing and matching my tops, but I don't want my new co-workers to think I'm wearing the same pair of pants to work every day.

So, Rachel will come here, she'll help me decide which pile the "maybe I can make them work" pants go in, we'll look at the tops I have, and then we'll go shopping.  Since I'm an AWFUL clothes shopper, I'm also treating her to lunch.  It's the least I can do for what I'll be putting her through.

I have an appointment in the city on Thursday.

Then, next week, my friend Ria will be here visiting Felix Monday and Tuesday, and Thursday I'll be helping out a friend in the suburbs.  And that's my last week of unemployment!

In the meantime, here's what I've been doing to gear up for work:

• adjusting my sleep schedule so I'm going to bed earlier/waking up earlier
• getting my work clothes in order
• doing laundry (see bullet point #2)

I've been out of work now for just over a year and a half, so tell me -- what am I forgetting?

Can Someone Explain...

why doing so little is so exhausting?

All I did today was walk through the city, have an appointment with my therapist, walk back through the city, buy some egg noodles, buy a few things at Trader Joe's that I need to make a recipe for tomorrow, and then come back home.  And then I fell asleep watching tv tonight.

I'm chalking it up to walking around in the sun (unlike all of the other summer days this year that I've walked around this year).

So far, this week has been great.  On Monday, I got to have lunch with my friend Anjeanette, which was MUCH overdue.  I wish we had more time -- stupid work lunch hours!

On Tuesday, I had lunch with my friend Shelley, which was even more overdue than spending time with Anjeanette.  Again, we needed more time.  Again -- stupid work lunch hours!

Sometime in the next couple of days, I expect to hear from my friend Kristi, and we'll be making plans for this weekend so I can see her while she's in town.  I suspect that will also be too short of a visit, but not because of work.

I'll try to write something more exciting this weekend.  There's a GREAT recipe in store for you tomorrow!

This Week

So far this week, I have lunch scheduled with two friends - both are people I haven't seen in awhile.  One I haven't seen in several months, and the other I literally haven't seen in years, although we have kept in touch.  It's a little ridiculous that we haven't seen each other since she works in the city, but she travels a lot for her job and when I worked, I worked on the opposite side of the city.  When I didn't work, I didn't really have the extra money to be travelling to the city just for a lunch that I couldn't necessarily afford.

But I do want to see her this week since she served as a job reference and helped me network and all that good stuff.  Also, I'm going to be inviting her to my "Yay - I Got a Job!" celebratory supper, but her daughter is getting married in two weeks (a large wedding with a LOT of out-of-towners coming in), so it seemed like getting together for lunch was a safer way to go.

I have an appointment on Wednesday.

And an out-of-town friend will be in town this weekend.  Her daughter has a Girls Rock Philly concert on Saturday.  I was invited to it, and while I'd love to support Iris, I didn't want that to be our "catching up" time.  I'd much rather have time alone to ACTUALLY be able to talk since I haven't seen Kristi since she moved to South Carolina.  Again, she and I have kept in touch, but much of that has been about her book, my job search, and other blah stuff.  I really want to actually TALK to her.

Finally, plans for this week are a little difficult because I may or may not be working at the part-time job I mentioned last week.  It's increasingly looking like I won't be, but I'm trying not to book up too much since I hate breaking commitments.  So pretty much every plan that I make is with the caveat that the plan is tentative unless it's an evening plan.  Blech.

Wednesday Weigh-In

I gained 0.6 pounds this week.  I felt a little bummed about it as I could see the numbers creeping up slowly throughout the week, until I went to the tailor yesterday to get my interview suit pants altered.

See, the last two interviews I went on, the pants were loose, but I made do.  While I can do some alterations, they weren't loose enough for me to mess with.  Plus, they're my GOOD pants, so I didn't want to mess them up - most of my other clothes (yes, even my work clothes) are thrift store purchases, so if I mess those up, it's no big loss.  But when I tried these on this week in anticipation of an interview next week, it was awful.  So to the tailor I went... and we had to take them in an entire inch!

In other news, my friend Julie and I were discussing last night... well, it's a long story.  But it ended with us coming up with East Minville and East Julietown.  And Julie decided that East Minville would have great restaurants, awesome bookstores, and a Neutrogena store.  (Our cities had to start with "East" because that makes them sound "bad."  It's a rule.)

So, my question to you is this: If you had a town named after you, what stores would it have?  What would the population be?  Rural, urban, or suburban?

Wednesday Weigh-In

This week I lost a whopping 0.2 pounds!  lol  (You know you're jealous.)

Earlier today, Rachel came over and we ran some errands.  I decided I wanted a new shredder.  We went to Staples and a new shredder was acquired.  Then we went to Target and got a few other things.  It was nice, too, because we got to talk about some crap going on in my life with a couple of people, and Rachel is always a great person to process with.  A quick stop at McDonald's for a lunch, and then we were set to come back to my place to accomplish the main point of today: listing a crapload of books on eBay to sell.

Thanks to my friend Diana who had given me some really helpful tips and tricks, Rachel and I pulled all of the books from my "books that need a home" bookshelf and set up a system.  Rachel looked up books on her laptop, slapped information on a sticky note, passed it to me, and I posted the books on eBay.  Since Rachel was much faster than I, when she was done, she started reading the info off to me to type in, which made it go even faster.

When we were done, we ate at an Ethiopian place for supper.  Yum.  The guy who runs the place probably thinks I can't cook because I'm there so often.  But Rachel and I were originally going to eat at a different place, but when we got there, it was closed for maintenance.  Boo.

In the meantime, we had a peach cobbler in my Crock Pot for dessert.  We were so full when we came back, we watched some trash tv for awhile (clearing the TiVo FTW!) and then ate the cobbler.  It was a new recipe that I want to play with before I post it, so you'll have to wait; sorry.

The best news?  Before the night was over, I had already sold two books!  My local friends have already browsed my books, but for out-of-town friends, if you're interested in seeing what's for sale, drop me a line and I'll send you the eBay link.

My Weekend

Yesterday was a really great day, despite feeling sad about the second anniversary of Michael's passing.

Rachel came over in the morning, and we went to get my Angel Food pick-up.  I love that they always have some young men (and some older men) there to help the women carry the boxes to their cars.  There's one young man who I found out is saving money to go to school, so I always make sure to tip him.  I don't tip him much, but boy is he ever grateful!  I'm always careful to do the "thank you, here's some money" handshake so as to not make it obvious that I'm giving him money, because I'm not actually sure if him accepted a tip is frowned upon and I don't want to get him in trouble.  (The pick-up site is a church, as most - if not all Angel Food sites are - and I think the helpers are considered part of community spirit, so I really don't want to get him in trouble, especially as the pastor is usually overseeing.)

Then Rachel and I made the Crescent Zucchine Pie, which we decided should be called Zucchini Quiche.  Rachel had brought over last year's Harry Potter movie (HP and the Deathly Hallows, Part I) since I haven't seen it yet (I tried to earlier this year, but that was a whole debacle), but since the quiche goes into the oven for 25 minutes, we decided it would be dumb to start the movie, then stop it to get something out of the oven, plate, etc.  So she relaxed while I processed some of the fresh fruit and veggies from Angel Food.  And by relaxing, I mean that she went through some of the clothes I'm getting rid of.  She scored three items.  She also scored a mango, a watermelon, some lemons, and a bag of frozen carrots from my Angel Food box.  No wonder she likes coming over!

We watched the movie (and made fun of several parts of it - especially when Ron started actually like a little bitch).  We really had a laugh at one part that was miscaptioned.  I didn't know it had been miscaptioned, and I got REALLY confused.  I don't want to spoil the movie, so no details, but I basically thought Hermione had gone spectacularly stupid.  When I repeated what I thought had been said to Rachel and added, "What the hell?  That doesn't even make sense!!!"  She burst out laughing and explained that it was miscaptioned.  Then, for the rest of the movie, that kind of became a running joke.  "Well, you know, had you just [what I thought Hermione had said]."

This is one reason I don't go to movies in theatres much.  There aren't that many movies that are captioned at the theatres, and the assisted listening devices only help SO much.  And unless I'm with a really good friend who understands my CAPD and doesn't mind me going, "Wait - what'd they say?" every once in awhile, it's just not worth it.

 Anyway, after that, my friend Naomi is in town this weekend, and she came over a couple of hours after that.  I was so glad we went to eat at one of my favourite restaurants, Vietnam Café, because I was famished by then.  We both decided to be brave and try something we'd never tried before there, even though we'd been there tons of times before.  After, we went back to my place just to hang out for awhile and continued to chat.  I got to catch Naomi up on all the job-ness that's going on, which was nice because I don't blog about all the nitty-gritty details, and it's really just too much to IM to someone.  For dessert, we intended to grab ice cream at a local place called Milk & Honey, but they close earlier on Saturday than they do during the week, which I didn't realise.  So we wandered back up the street and tried out a new place, Mood Cafe - yes, Mood Cafe, not Mood Café.  Milkshakes... yum.

All in all, a great day full of fun, friends, and food.  What could be better?

New Yarn!

For my birthday, my friends Anju and Naomi gave me a gift certificate to Loop, my favourite LYS.  I'd been there once on a scouting trip, but I finally went there last week determined to buy something.  The thought that I might leave town before having a chance to spend it was too much to bear!  (Fellow crafters will understand this feeling, I'm sure.)

The scouting trip was a little disappointing because I really wanted to use my gift certificate on something I wouldn't ordinarily buy - something new, something different, something I haven't bought before.  But the two workers who were there on my scouting trip (who I love dearly, btw) both have the same taste in yarn that I do.  Not helpful for my mission.

When I went this week, however, I got a different worker (one I also love but rarely see because she's not there on days I'm usually there) and I was able to see with new eyes, so to speak.  I got a yarn that has fibres I still love, but it's a yarn that I've never had before, I've not worked with these fibres in this combination, and I'm excited to get started!

I bought a yarn called Road to China Light (they also have a worsted, but I bought the sport weight).  It's 65% alpaca, 15% silk, 10% cashmere, and 10% camel.  What's not to love about that combination?  It's soft, soft, soft, and then soft some more.  I just could NOT stop touching it.

So then the next question was figuring out which colour I wanted.  Which begged the question: What did it want to be when it grew up.  Not too long ago, one of the designers on the Free Pattern Testers board I moderate on Ravelry had posted a pattern for this Half Patent Checkerboard Scarf (or Silk Scarf Narrative, whichever one you want to call it; it's a free Ravelry download) that I really loved.  The pattern isn't difficult, and I love that motif.  But I didn't have the right yarn for it.  Technically, it calls for DK, and Road to China Light is a sport, but it's a scarf, so who cares.

I figured out who I wanted to give the scarf to, and then I chose the colour.  It's a really rich blue.  Yum.

I believe she'll be happy.

Thanks, Anju and Naomi!

Bonus - I still have a wee bit left on the gift certificate - sweet!

Wednesday Weigh-In

This week I lost 0.8 pounds, bringing my total since I decided to start tracking to 4.2 pounds lost.  It's not bad since I stopped working out about a month ago when I got the MR arthrogram (aka: the big-ass needle in my hip with the crap injected into my joint) and then started physiotherapy soon thereafter.  Although some would say that physio is like working out, so there you go.

Most of mine has been through eating better, except this past week, which has been stress eating, which is to say "Not eating much at all, except weird food combos."  (Don't ask.)

I was going to lighten things up today and show off something I knitted recently, but since tomorrow is recipe day and Friday is list day, I'll give one more update today, show off my knitting Saturday, and give an update on Sunday.  (That's the plan, anyway, barring some unforeseen event between now and then.)

Today, as planned, I worked on my bedroom.  I focused on the storage boxes under my bed.  I condensed four storages boxes down to two, which may not be as impressive as it sounds since the two that are empty are the smaller ones (about 2/3rds the size of the larger ones).  I filled a bag for recycling, I filled a bag for shredding, and I have a smallish-sized box of things that can be donated or are ready for a potential yard sale.

The bookshelf in my bedroom has three shelves of books that are ALL books I've been trying to get rid of.  So if I have this yard sale, they will all be on the lawn.  So that's done.  Next up is the closest and weeding through clothes.  I don't know if I have energy for that today, since today was kind of emotional.  The stuff under the bed was mostly pictures and newspapers and magazines of EVENTS.

At point I just burst out laughing (Ria and Diana will probably be the only ones who get this).  I'm picking out newspapers and magazines one by one to see if there are any I can part with.  John Ritter's death.  Christopher Reeve's death.  George Brett's retirement.  Wayne Gretzky's retirement.  Obama's win.  Johnny Cash's death.  John-John Kennedy's death.  Papers from September 12 and 13th.  Clint Bowyer and Greg Biffle win at Kansas Speedway - wait, WHAT?  Yeah, recycle.

I also discovered a lot of pictures.  You remember back when we took our film to CVS or Eckerd and got it developed?  Yeah, pictures.  Felix when he was a little kitten, looking terrified of everything.  Oscar drinking out of a cup on the coffee table.  New Dog sleeping with his hedgehog on my bed in Missouri.  Mom's wedding and reception.  A friend's wedding I went to in Boston.  The boy I nannied for in Missouri, who passed away from Huntington's Disease when he was 10 years old.

I'm glad I had duplicates, because I set aside some pictures to mail to some folks.  I think they will be pleased to get them.  As much as I like digital cameras (and, yes, I know I can print off the pics), it was fun to flip through all these and laugh and cry.

The Week: Looking Back, Looking Forward

This past week has been largely uneventful, except that I turned in official notice to turn off my COBRA health insurance at the end of this month.  I knew this was coming, but it was still a gulp-inducing moment to get the official notice that said that as of 01 June 2011, I would have no health insurance.  Eesh.

Yesterday, Rachel came over.  We picked up my Angel Food boxes, which meant that I spent part of last night and today processing (cleaning, chopping, properly storing for maximum freshness, etc.) the produce.  I like to do this all at once so I can get the bulk of the garbage out of the house all at once, and it's all done so when I go to cook, I can get down to it.

Rachel and I hadn't planned ahead with what to cook, so we cheated and ordered in a pizza.  For dessert, I made a batch of chocolate chip cookies.  We finished the Top Chefs: All-Stars season, and then we watched a few episodes of Millionaire Matchmaker, which is a show I've sucked her into.  It's so much fun to watch millionaires have the same problems trying to find love that the rest of us do (and sometimes fail even worse than the rest of us do!).  And we discuss the advice that Patti (the matchmaker) gives her clients.

This coming week, I've got physical therapy on Tuesday and Wednesday.  Tuesday evening, I'll see my friend Anju so she can pick up her share of the Angel Food stuff.  Wednesday, my friend Megan are going to hang out.

And, that, my friends, is the über-exciting life of me!