Thursday, December 31, 2009

The emodillo curls up backwards with his belly exposed and says "hurt me"

Tonight Josh and I are driving to Memphis to spend New Years with his sister at their new house.  It should be relaxing.

Yesterday Josh realized that he forgot to renew his car registration, which must be done by the end of the month.  So today, we slept in until 8, and then went and got the car emissions tested.  There was a very short line...which was bad because I accidentally stunk up the car just as we were pulling in.  Oh well.

His car passed easy (which we weren't sure of that happening) and we then drove to the north end of town to the DMV.  I like it there.  It's in the flood plain of the river, so in order to build all the buildings there including a sweet art school campus (it's tiny...just two small dorms and the main building) and the practice field for the Titans.  The practice field looks like an inflated balloon.  Anyways, to building these buildings they destroyed wetlands, and that's bad, so as a law, for all the wetlands they destroyed, they had to create new wetlands.  There are tons of ponds and naturey areas all around everything.  AEGIS is there, which is a science lab I applied to once.  I was pretty bitter because I never got a response and I even talked to them at a job fair.  I'm glad now that I didn't get the job because it would be an hour long drive in rush hour traffic for me every day if I did work there.  At the DMV there was no line at all...so it was super easy AND we remembered the check book, so we didn't have to pay an extra 3% to use our credit card.  The woman chatted the whole time about how she wanted siblings her whole life.

Last night Josh and I were going to play racquetball, and I decided it would be tons more fun to do it drunk.  So we started drinking, etc.  When we got there (the apartment club house...we didn't drive anywhere!) it was all locked up and we realized we needed a code to get in.  So we didn't play.  Even if we didn't drink, it gets locked up when the office closes at 5 (before I even got home), so no matter what we weren't going to play last night.

Josh and I did invent 2 comic strip characters, the emocorn and the emodillo, they are emo cousins of the Unicorn and the Armadillo.  I like armadillos a lot.  I also like hanging out with Josh a lot and not working a lot.

I pulled out one of my favorite black sweaters I got as a hand-me-down from my cousin Ashely back in highschool this morning, and it still is one of my favorites.  I used to wear it in high school b/c I was skinnier and my belly showed when I wore it.  Then long shirts under short shirts came into style and I wore it that way in college.  Then I didn't wear it for several years b/c I didn't buy and appropriate long shirts because I was poor and too busy to focus on fashion.  The other week I realized that the J.Jill Perfect Tanks are indeed truly amazingly perfect!  So I bought 4 or 5 of them in different colors and haven't looked back since.  I put the black sweater on top of the salmon (oops...currant, my mistake) colored tank top, and I looks so rich and skinny and shapely!  It's because the jeans I'm wearing are also J.Jill...so they are $90...not 15$ from JCPenny 3 or 4 years ago like all my other jeans, and the tank top is 24$...not from the Target cleanance, and the sweater...even though it was a hand-me-down, it came from DKNY which is a super expensive store, so it was probably 60$ or so.  This is probably one of my most expensive outfits!  And since it looks so good on me, it only proves that paying more for quality clothes is totally worth it.  You just have to be smart and only buy what you need and make sure you are buying classic pieces.  Tim Gunn would totally agree with me.  What I do though is only buy clothes at stores I work at so I can get a 40% discount and be friends with people who buy lots and lots of expensive clothes.  I'm planning a shopping trip soon to the goodwill to get work pants and sweaters.  Since this is the Nashville goodwill, not the Fremont one, there is a higher chance of finding quality clothes and not free t shirts, that people donated.  I am incapable of buying only what I need and classic pieces, I like to own lots of clothes, so I have to shop appropriately.

Tuesday, December 29, 2009

Fitting the Square into a Circle

Only me and one other girl are at work today for my end of the hallway/department.  Everyone else is either on leave or sick.  I wonder if I finish all my work today if tomorrow I could bring in my laptop and play WoW all day because I'll have nothing else to do.  Probably not.  There's ALWAYS more to do.

Hey the sun's coming out!

I rearranged my office a little and moved the computer screen to another part of my desk.  It took me 15 min to do.  It seemed like 5 min. to me though.  I had to unplug the screen and my phone.  I was worried that the phone would erase all it's memory and not be set up for my office anymore once I unplugged it, but it didn't.  I can't figure out my phone, it's a mix of old fashion phone buttons and digital buttons.  And there's no enter key.  How can you make something without an enter key?  The Enter Key is the YES DO THAT key.  It took me forever to figure out how to redial yesterday.  Infact I gave up once and had to try a second time.  Shit.  I just looked at it and there is the digital word "redial" on it. That was NOT there yesterday.  There is a Shift button...what in the world is that for?  And a Quit button, but no Enter button.  How can you have Quit but not Enter? It was probably made by an old person for an old person.  Only old people work in offices right?  yes.  That makes me old, and as proof...I cannot work the technology. 

Before Christmas Break I was finishing a handout I am making for work, and Lisa was helping me design the cover.  Apparently in the real world you can have things like color and designs and just use a template that word gives you, and it's okay.  You can't do that at school, white paper with Ariel or Times New Roman is the only way.  So I was trying to put the company logo on the cover, but all the saved versions of it have the circle design  in a white box.  This looks bad and unprofessional (the white corners of the box) on covers, and later I learned, company cards, and anything else the assistant has to make.  They wouldn't have this problem of a white box if they stopped using all the fancy colors and just stuck to white.  But anyways, I saw it on my cover sheet, and I was like, How do I make the square picture round?  La la la la la la la la...I press a few buttons, I wish I had photoshop....la la la la...Here it is the Make-The-Picture-A-Circle Button.  I swear to you in the newest version of Word there is one of those.  So I pressed it and BAM the white corners are gone.  I had to do a few adjustments (remove a border and a shadow) and it was done.  This apparently is the most impressive thing I've done since I've started working here...let me tell you.  There was a party in my office when I showed my supervisor how to do that. 

Back to me rearranging my desk, it's so much better now.  People can't see my computer screen from the door, and it's so much more comfortable to sit at it and work.  The whole arrangement is just better.  It always amazes me how little adjustments can make such large differences.  I learned this in our old apartment.  It took us several tries and probably one year of rearranging the furniture until we found the best formation.  AND my favorite part of it, the lazy boy chairs facing each other by the windows over looking the street with the world's tiniest table in between them, wouldn't never have happened if I didn't break my leg.  we set it up that way so I could look outside and sit down.  That tiny table became our dinner table and craft table.  Some day I hope to have a table to work at that doesn't require me to fold in half to get down to it.

Wednesday, December 23, 2009

Use It (Your Brain)

Following:  I have something important to discuss.  It makes me so upset and it involves stupid people, so listen up and make sure you don't get put on my list.

I've been researching biodiesel production quite a bit lately, and it seems like this magical solution to all of life's problems. But let me tell you, just as there is no spoon, there is no magical solution.  People don't realize that for every 10 gallons of biodiesel they make, they will also make 1 gallon of glycerin.  And that adds up.  Sure you can use it for soap, but if you make 250 gallons a month (like at Vanderbilt) that's 25 gallons of glycerin a month!  Do you use 25 gallons of soap each month? I don't think so. They give it away.  It's free soap, but the only people who use it are the true "greenies" the people who only flush their toilets once a day and eat only raw vegetables (and me because I like how it makes my hands feel).

There isn't the infrastructure in place yet for our society to deal with so much crude glycerin.  There is TONS of WRONG information on the internet about what to do with it.  Even on websites that homebrewers refer to a lot and use as an ultimate source.  Like for instance, a person CAN dump glycerin down the drain because water treatment plants are able to take care of soap, which is all glycerin is.  Yeah, that is true, but when you use the soap you are technically only dropping one tablespoon or less down the drain...NOT 25 GALLONS!  That shit goes in there and messes things up and all of a sudden all the fish are dead and your water treatment plant is unable to treat water.

Another lie:  That glycerin made with NaOH can be used as a catalyst because "some people just assume it's not a fertilizer, but it is still found in the soil, just in less amounts."  Yeah maybe, but that means to add it to your soil you need to dilute it so that for every gallon of water you have 2% or less is glycerin and then need to spread it over acres of land.  They don't say that.  Instead someone is going to dump it out back and wonder why everything died.  It died because NaOH forms a salt in glycerin and they are SALTING THE EARTH with it.

Finally, if the home-brewer or even large company or anyone does remove the excess methane from the glycerin...bam, instant poison.  Seriously people.

I don't get it.  People want to be green and want to save the earth and want cheap fuel, but then they go polluting it in one swift stroke.  They are trading one thing for another.  In order to save the Earth we are going to have to change our diets.  We use to much oil and carbon producing things...anything in excess is dangerous, even water.    Just use common sense and logic.  Think things through to completion.  It's not that hard. So says I who constantly forgets to turn my lights off.

On a happier note my coworker just got me a 10 foot scarf for Christmas.  It's awesome.

HALF DAY OF WORK TODAY

I got a little upset last night when I realized that I watched tv and relaxed with Josh instead of....finishing my Christmas cards.  Therefore my Christmas cards will most likely not go out until after Christmas.  I hate that.  Next year I'll hopefully have less to do and can start earlier.  I mean in theory I would have less to do, I'll have an 8 to 4:30 job and no kids.  I should have all the free time in the world right?  It sure doesn't seem like it.

Next year I'll have 5 days in a row to not work at Christmas time (our floating holiday was unfortunately added to Christmas so I don't know now if Josh and I'll be able to take a trip in the spring...unless I magically use some sick days).  Don't think too much about this, it is a year away, but we're hoping to go back to Michigan next Christmas.

Yesterday I drove to work...in the foggy fog fog that was freezing...and I got out of my truck and it was dinging.  Josh told me that my ignition was loose and would do that sometimes, so I jiggled the ignition, and it wouldn't stop, like he said it would if I did that.  I got really annoyed and was a little late for work, so I went in.  Half way to the door, I heard a plane but could not see it (fog) but it was soooo low and loud!  I have expected it to drop right out of the fog and hit something.  It didn't, it probably just landed at the airport nearby.
When I got out of work I got in my truck, and bam! No battery b/c the dinging was trying to tell me that my lights were on, not that my keys were still inside.  AND Josh got me jumper cables for my birthday but I didn't put them in my truck yet.  Lame.  Luckily the security guard had some and was able to help me.

When I leave work I have to turn left and there is always super busy rush hour traffic.  There is a median in the road first, so it's always super risky and scary b/c no one actually pulls into the median area in the right spot b/c there are no lines and since there are no lines there, there are no rules!  it's a free for all with your car!  So I pulled half way across the street and stopped in the median to wait for traffic and I was about to go but was so frazzled still from killing my battery, that I stalled out.  I nearly freaked out b/c what if my battery wasn't charged enough yet!?!?!  oh man that would have sucked! But it did and I was able to go on my way accident free.

Until I got to my apartment complex and a dude pulled out in front of me without stopping or looking.  I honked my horn at him.

Tuesday, December 22, 2009

Uses for Glycerin

I linked the Love Potion words to website I found it on.  Just thought this was funny. 

Love potion

Nitroglycerin's action as an effective vasodilator led in 1998 to the release of RESTORE, the "first ever fully tested, effective topical cream for the safe treatment of male erectile dysfunction (impotence)".
http://pharmacology.about.com/library/98news/bln0309a.htm

"Restore" contains 1% nitroglycerin and is "effective within minutes of application of achieving an erection of up to 45 minutes duration. No significant side effects or instances of priapism were reported."

Want to double the effect? Forget it: do NOT take
Viagra (sildenafil) if you are taking any form of nitroglycerin, whether for heart pains or for heart pangs. The combination could kill you.
http://www.cnn.com/HEALTH/9805/21/viagra.warning/

Watch Out for that Freezing Fog

I hit the icey fog today.  It was horrible, truck parts and floating ice chips every where.  I almost got a floating ice splinter right in the eye. 

Just kidding.  The radio called it freezing fog and I looked up and I was like, Damn, I'm in it! So I turned on my headlights and wished the giant truck behind me would stop tailgating me.  The roads are all twisty turvey with a stop light around every curve, people don't need to tailgate in the fog.

Last night after work, I stayed and did the eliptical for 30 minutes!  I feel fit already.  And I ate appropriately yesterday too, except for second dinner at 9:15 pm.  It was food.  Do you ever make food? It's something not particularly delicious, but it's not bad at all, and it has no name.  It's usually a jumble of everything you have in the fridge.  I made that two days ago.  I cut up all the veggies we had that weren't bad and fried them up, added spices, added some water so the carrots would boil and soften, and then dumped a bunch of cooked rice in.  It was like stirfry without stirfry sauce and like fried rice with out the egg.  So, I guess it really was just fried rice.  Josh didn't like it b/c I added cardamom pods, and you can't eat those, only he did, and I added sundried tomatoes and Josh doesn't like those.  Silly I know.  Oh, I added a can of beans for protein.

I had a dream last night that three different jobs I had called me in to work tonight and I was like...Um no.  But it was really hard to say no because they all needed me.  What if the world ended because I didn't go to work?  But I did say no to all of them, but I ended up stopping in at J.Jill to see if they needed my help and because I couldn't remember if I was suppose to go in or not.  When I got there the store door was open and all the girls there were sleeping because they had worked so hard but were done now.  I was so annoyed at having to stop in for no reason.  That was the end of my dream, and I feel like it sums up my life a bit.  THOUGH good news, they called and told me they were Very Sorry and had to cut down peoples hours....so I was cut from working Christmas Eve!!!!  I was so  happy and excited!  They were sad for having to do that to me, but I was not sad at all!  Now there's totally time to cook and watch Pauly Shore movies and drink white russians!

Monday, December 21, 2009

Ice Fog

I am home from San Francisco. I really enjoy the city a lot, but I didn't take the time to explore it.  Someday I'll go back and I want have a conference to go to.  Presenting my poster was my favorite part. I always like answering people's questions, even if it is hard if I don't know the answers.  I talked to Allen Glazner about his poster.  I almost worked with him instead of Calvin, but I am glad I didn't. Glazner is known in the volcanology/petrology/geology community for creating these large crazy ideas and arguing for them, but everyone else knows that these ideas he comes up with are just plain wrong and crazy.  Guil says that what he does isn't pointless though because it causes others to argue his points and really think about them, and pushes science to go forward in that way.  I agree with Guil.  So....Glazner's poster was on how large ignimbrite forming volcanoes (the REALLY REALLY BIG ones) are affected by climate.  He states that when the climate is dry, there is not enough ground water to convect the heat out of a magma chamber, causing it to remain melted and grow large, while smaller volcanoes or pluton clusters are caused by wet climates, where there is enough water moving about to convect the heat out, sufficiently cooling the magma chamber beyond eruption.  An example would be Yellowstone.  Yellowstone will not erupt, according to Glazner, because of all the hydrothermal activity (geysers) removing the heat.  Most everyone is skeptical of this theory, and if you can't see why, you'll just have to trust me.

My whole poster was presenting data that proved a paper Glazner wrote in 2008 wrong.  Luckily he didn't come to my poster.

But Bachmann did.  Olivier Bachmann.  I read his nametag and I knew it was him.  But I did not connect it to my poster where I had a curve of data that I cited as his.  So when I was discussing my poster, I showed him his own data and his name and then I discussed how my data was "better".  Not necessarily better b/c his data is good, mine is just more complete.  I think though he was the type of guy who would have found that funny.  I hope so.

This morning Josh got up and helped me get ready for work, and he was checking out the weather for me.  He told me it was Frosty with Ice Fog.  There were two accidents, one on 40 right where I work due to the ice fog caused by the dam.  What in the world is ice fog?  Josh told me it was a giant block of floating ice and is very dangerous because if you run into it it's like running into a wall.  I drove my truck in watching out for frost and a giant cube of floating ice.  I found neither, and I have concluded that these southerners are crazy.

My fifteen minute break is now over.

Thursday, December 17, 2009

San Francisco

Well, hello.

I am currently in San Francisco right now.  It makes me sad because ever since I came here last year I couldn't wait to bring Josh back for Christmas this year.  But when it was time to order the plane tickets we couldn't afford it...even with my ticket being paid for.  Mom has always wanted to visit this city with me too, and again I am here, alone.  Not really alone, I am with all the girls from the Vanderbilt Geology department.  Which is nice and all, they are nice girls, but they are much more interested in learning geology from the conference we are at and in finishing up papers and projects for the end of the semester.  I just want to go shopping or go home.

We walked so much yesterday, and it was with Ayla, and she walks super fast.   My legs and ankle are so sore today.  Hopefully this will jump kick me into exercising more when I get home.

So my brain is a little slow.  I'm going to stop now.

Wednesday, December 9, 2009

And I always listen to Tim Gunn

Two days ago I believe, I was heading home around 8, and I called Josh and he was heading home too! Only he wanted to stop at Target to buy these ridiculously expensive boxes of magic cards that he was going to sell on Ebay for a profit.  Working the auction house, if you will.  So I told him I would meet him there, and I did.  I bought a present for someone and then we found the bowls.  I don't know how or why but Josh and I don't have enough bowls in our set and then he went and broke one.  So while we were in Target we purchased 3 more bowls and some smaller dip ones.  I've never seen these smaller bowls that match our set before.  I was pretty excited because small bowls are my favorite...though Josh said we had to get rid of some of the ones we have to make room for these.  We'll see.

So we were waiting in line and the woman in front of us bought a box of off brand douches (though...what would a brand name douche be?  Tiger?  Ooooohhhhhhh Snap!) and she also got a five pack of chapstick and a box of Magnum condoms.  Man oh man, we knew what she was doing that night!

Then it was our turn and the little bowls didn't have a price sticker on the bottom of them.  The cashier guy just didn't know what to do, you could see him thinking, "Little bowls...little bowls...what the hell do I do?"  I made his night by volunteering happily to go get another bowl (from the very farthest away point of the store) with a sticker on it.  When I got back the sticker fell to the floor and Josh saw it.  I was glad it didn't fall while I was walking back.  The guy scanned them and wrapped each bowl up individually in tons of paper.  He admitted to never doing something like that before so he wanted to make sure he did a good job.  I was just itching to take it out of his hands and do it myself.  I could have wrapped all those little bowls up in one piece of paper so good and then stacked them in the larger bowls and wrapped it all up perfectly twice as fast as what he was doing.  I've gained this skill from moving and working at Hallmark.  He did a good job, even if slow, but then he was afraid to put all the clothing and thongs I bought in the same bag.  I had to tell him more than once that clothing can go in with the bowls, I'm not picky.  Because really all it will do is protect it more!  Speaking of thongs, they were only 75 cents each!  That's less than a dollar!  So I bought a bunch to wear with all my work clothes.  Tim Gunn says that underwear lines are unacceptable.

Tuesday, December 8, 2009

Mini Muffins Are Mini Food

People.  I. Am. Awesome.

I just measured 10 tablespoons of the cheapest off brand canola oil into a baby-food jar I just happened to have laying around and then added one tablespoon of rubbing alcohol.  Then I shook it! 

And now we wait.

Soon I shall have a baby food jar with 10 parts biodiesel and 1 part glycerin, if I'm lucky.  It turned milky white when I shook it.  Kimmy's dad made biodiesel when we were in high school and she brought it in and showed me in chemistry class. It was pretty awesome even then.

I am making corn bread mini muffins for work tomorrow...though it is my bed time and josh is not home yet!  He is buying the milk so I can finish the recipe.  I was out of sugar too!  I had to substitute  brown sugar but I bet this makes it taste even better.

It rained sooo hard today, all day long.  Then in the worst of it I had to drive from work to Vanderbilt.  At one point, as 40 turns into 24 and then turns into 440 in one swift move all the lines on the road disappeared.  They had been doing roadwork and they ripped away all the lines! I didn't know where I was going or what I was doing or where I was suppose to be.  People were passing me left and well left (not right) and I was so scared.  They weren't passing me on the right because without knowing I was slowly drifting in that direction.  I was suddenly next to the shoulder and I didn't know how I got there.  It was horrible.  I was hydroplaning I'm sure and my car slipping.  On the way home it wasn't raining hard but I did not want to take the expressway.  The roads don't drain and the spray up from all the cars severely decreases visibility, and I don't like to drive on 5 lane roads with people who want to go 55 in the left lane 80 in the right lane and the same speed as me in my blind spot.  So I took the Briley Parkway exit and got onto Murfreesboro and took that to Bell road and then that home, and I only went 45 the whole way and no one was bothering me. It was truly wonderful and I think it prevented a gray hair or two.

I washed my dishes with biodiesel glycerin soap and now everything smells slightly funny like fish. But it cleaned my stove off really shiny and nice!


Yesterday I had a meeting with Calvin and Guil about my poster.  First it took 15 min. to find a computer and open it, as a read-only file, so we couldn't actually change anything or look at the diagrams I had on the outside of the poster.  Now that I think of it, doing it that way was counter productive to what I wanted to do at the meeting.  BUT we did get to use the computer screen that is the same size as my tv.  And I have a large tv.  At one point Calvin was like "Now look, Lindy, at these three figures over here, I like these." and then he pointed off somewhere in quick Calvin mouse motions somewhere in the far end of the screen so I said "Wait, where is the mouse? I can't see it." and Calvin got all flustered at me and was like "Lindy, where do you think it is? It's over here at this part with the map and the figures!" and I was all "Calvin! The screen is huge and I lost the mouse and there like 10 figures, how do I know which one it is?" and I'm pretty sure this whole time Guil is trying to say something too.  Then Guil and Calvin laugh and I glower b/c I just want to get on with things, and Guil goes "this was just like a year ago...nothing has changed!" and I was like "A year ago? Really?  I feel like I haven't even left yet."  I didn't say that part because I couldn't comprehend it being so long since we had a meeting and argued.

So that's that.  Oh, but I did want to say that I got enough sleep last night and I am feeling a lot better about things.  I've decided that even though I can't do "what I want when I want" I get to do a bunch of things that I only get to do once a year.  It's a bunch of adventures!  I can do what ever I want any time, but I only do Christmas now....that's all in theory of course.  I doubt I ever get to do whatever I want.

I wonder if I added enough alcohol to the oil.  The ratio is the most important part of the whole process I've read in my research.

Monday, December 7, 2009

I've figured it out.

Austria here I come!

It's still Christmas, but it's anti-Santa and commercialism.  I can handle that.

I Feel Better Now

I feel very stretched out.  Everyone wants me for something.  I need to work every Saturday at J.Jill (my fault I know), Calvin and Guil need to meet with me about my poster, I need to make my poster, and then go to San Fransisco (not paid) and possibly sleep on the floor b/c even though the trip is funded by grants we still need to squeeze 5 girls into a 4 person room. 

Tonight I have to go right away after work to Vandy to meet with Calvin and Guil, then I have to go to my bible study.  Tomorrow I have to work on my poster and make corn bread muffins and type up the recipe for a recipe exchange for work.  Then on Wednesday we have our work holiday party and I get the afternoon off.  And you would think this is a good thing but I am going to take that time to finish and print out my poster.  Then go grocery shopping and cook dinner for my birthday, which Thursday.  To celebrate my birthday (which would have been perfect to do on my afternoon off if I didn't have to do that poster) Josh and i are going to clean the apartment and decorate for Christmas.  I want to be excited but i'm not...it just sounds like more work.  Then on Thursday I have to go to Calvin's for a celebratory dinner because Danny and I finished our thesis.  Which sounds nice and all, but I told Calvin thursday wouldn't work for me, Wednesday would.  But I didn't say no strong enough I guess, because Danny couldn't go on Wednesday so we HAD to do it on Thursday.  Friday was an option but I wasn't going to go without Josh and he only gets Wed and Thurs nights off.  Then Friday is the Jesus People Group holiday party and I have to bring a side dish to that.  And that starts at 6:30, but I wanted to have a get together for my birthday that night, but everyone is going to be at that instead. And then I work 10 - 6:30 at J.Jill's on Saturday and Sunday is J.Jill's holiday party from probably 8 or 9 till whenever.  It is also Bosco's Holiday party and I am going to have to miss it because it doesn't start until 10 and that's my bedtime.

Yeah, on all those nights I want to try to go to bed by 10:30 at the latest.  Riiiighhhtt...that never happens because Josh never gets home until 10:30-11. And so then I am tired all day at work b/c I only got 6 or 7 hours of sleep and it makes all of this even worse.  I hate Christmas time and my birthday time.  I hate obligatory Christmas parties that require you to bring food and make an effort.  I hate that everyone just assumes that I want to go to all these things.  I think that's what I dislike about all of this, because really, when am I not that busy?  Never.  It's just that I don't feel like I am choosing to do any of this, I am just being forced to, and I also am being forced to enjoy it because it's Christmas.  I hate Christmas.

AND THEN my family and friends are always asking me "when are you coming home?"  like that's what I want to do.  When are you coming to Nashville?  I live here now.  When I'm coming home I'll tell you.  And it won't be until it's warm in Michigan...and it'll only be because I have to.  Since I was in elementary school I've planned on moving out of Michigan and to Europe or Canada or anywhere that's not Michigan and is exciting, and I've told people about this my whole life.  And even after I've lived in Tennessee for 2 years, people are still "What? you're not coming home? You're moving FARTHER away?"  Yeah...I've been telling you this for a while now. 

About the whole visiting thing...don't worry I know it never happens.  None of my family visits my Aunts and Uncles who live out of state on a regular basis, and none of Josh's New York family visit his dad in Michigan unless there's a wedding either.  I always wonder why they decided to move so far away from their families.  It makes me glad to know that they did though, I am not alone.

I didn't mean to be such a baby about all of this.  Everyone is always busy.  I want to be excited for all of these things...I can even drive my truck to them now! I'm just tired.  I dont' get enough sleep and I just want it to calm down for a day or two so I can relax and go to bed on time.  I also want this horrible mind numbing headache that is behind my eyes for 2 days straight to go away.  I think if that went away, life would be a little easier...focusing my eyes wouldn't hurt so much.  I also want Josh to work during the days.   I should just make him...it's not imperative that he get as many hours as possible now.  It's imperative that I see him more than a 1/2 hour in the morning before work.

Finally I was telling Josh last night, I finally have everything I want, a truck, a car, all-terrain tires, a growing wardrobe, no homework.  My life is good.  I just need to wait and ride this whole damn Christmas thing out and try to enjoy it.

Actually I still need a kitchen table and chairs.  Then my life would be complete.  We are up to 3 chairs now.  Josh bought another camping chair from walmart the soul sucker, though their commercials this season are amazing and funny I am sad to admit.  He also bought wood glue and fixed this broken wooden chair we have and is using it as a computer desk chair.

Josh went to Home Depot alone the Sunday or Monday after Thanksgiving.  There were packs of 60 AA batteries for 10$ calling his name.  He was smart and didn't buy them because we have rechargeable batteries and don't go through them as much as we used to anyways.  I think it still hurt him deep to soul though not being able to buy them.  BUT he did buy a 12 pack of fluorescent light bulbs and changed out almost every light bulb in the apartment.  He was very excited about that.  Which is cool and all, but they aren't as bright as what we were using, I suppose I'll get used to it.

I am wearing my winter skirt today, with what I thought were teal knee high socks, but I just looked at them and the magically changed from teal to navy on the way to work.  I'm not even joking with you.  They changed colors.  I know because I liked the color they were when I bought them but I don't like this new color.    I was also a little disappointed because they are built for tall people.  I put them on for the first time this morning and they stopped on my knee.  On it.  Not just above it or just below it, but on it.  Which means I am the one person this one size fits all sock can't fit.  If I pull it all the way up and stop it on my knee, the second I start walking it will roll up on itself. So I pulled them down and have a lot of extra room at my toes.

Saturday, December 5, 2009

Independence

I drove my truck home today, alone, on the expressway.  That's right, I was brave.  What I am mostly worried about is the getting on the expressway and the merging, and this fear of getting on the expressway has definitely been validated.  There are so many people I see who get stuck in a lane that's ending because the douchebags next to them refuse to get over to let the merging person enter.  It even happened to me earlier this week! Fortunately I was in an exit only lane so I just took the exit.  It was a very horrible experience trust me.  But tonight in my truck it was not too bad. I was so proud that I stopped and bought some beer to drink.  Plus it's Saturday and I get to sleep in tomorrow.

This morning Josh and I went to a nursing home with people I work with to hand out christmas cards to old people.  It was one of the most terrifying things I've ever done.  I was so scared!  We would get off the elevator, and BAM 15 old people sitting around in wheel chairs doing nothing except watching the elevator or nothing.  One guy sang us a christmas song and he had one of the most beautiful and amazing singing voices I've ever heard.  Someone made people shadow boxes with keepsakes from the person's life to keep outside their door.  Those always made me want to cry because it was like seeing the persons whole amazing life all at once, and then knowing they were sitting in this building, alone, unable to be free, and forgotten about.  I'm kind of excited to be this old and be able to sit and relax for forever, but I am not at all excited because I don't want to do it if Josh isn't with me.

One of the old ladies fluffed Josh's goatee for him.  That was the best part.

Then I worked at J.Jill's all night.  That was fun even though I complained about it all day, but really like it once I get there. I helped a lady pick out some clothes. I actually brought her different sizes and clothes to the changing room and told her what I thought about the outfits.  Then I was paying attention to a mom and daughter...I was folding clothes and smiling at how funny they were being, and they left, and I said bye, and then the mom saw a sweater on a mannequin and wanted to see it in other colors, and so she and her daughter came back in, and tried on tons of clothes, and bought tons and then opened up a credit card!  Which is good for me because it's documentation that I am an awesome worker and am doing my job.

Oh, when I was helping the women open her credit card, I had to call someone to see if the woman already had a credit card account with J.Jill.  I don't really understand this process and I guess there are whole support teams to help the J.Jill store and credit card holders.  So I got on the line with an actual person, not a computer and she was like "Hi, my name is Lindy, how may I get your name please?" and I was like "Uhhhhhh....my name is Lindy."  She replied in a very skeptical tone of voice: "Your name is Lindy?"  Yes. Yes it is.  She is the first non-cheery Lindy I have met who wasn't excited to meet another Lindy.  I've even had mom's of people named Lindy come out of nowhere talk to me about my name.  But really...how do you people act when you meet people with your same name? Is it weird? Do you feel like your identity is being stolen? Do you feel a little jealous or upset like someone is stealing something from you?

Last night I went out with some friends for one of them's birthday.  We watched the Nashville Christmas Parade.  It was pretty awesome.  There were fireworks and balloon floats and a decorated garbage truck float.  That one was my favorite.

Thursday, December 3, 2009

Pauly Shore is NOT Dead

...because I saw him tonight! And he put his arm around me.  As you can see in the picture below.




Josh and I kicked off Pauly Shore Christmas 2 this year by seeing him perform, live, in person at Zanie's Comedy Club.  He barely did the weasel thing...he says it ruined his acting career.  It's probably true...but he was still hilarious!  Josh and I got to sit front row, touching the stage, center.  We shared the world's smallest table with a couple who didn't particularly want to be there. 

Josh almost high fived the second comedian, but didn't see the comedian raise his hand for the high five b/c he was laughing so hard.  In the end though it was good he missed it because the comedian wanted to high five a KKK joke, and we aren't really about the KKK here in the Colombini household.

The best part was when Pauly Shore was talking about how awesome Nashville is compared to LA because here you don't need to worry about your image, and then he pointed to Josh and said "You can't wear that shirt in LA, man, you look like you're 12!"
And then later when Josh was laughing at a raunching sex joke, Pauly Shore was like "Stop, you can't laugh at that, you're 12."
That was my favorite part.  That and when he would start acting like the Wheee-eee-zul.  Awesome.

Just so ya'll know, Josh and I have started a tradition called the Pauly Shore Christmas, where we watch all his movies in order of when they are produced the week before Christmas and finish it up with Pauly Shore Is Dead on Christmas day.  We by the way now own a signed copy of that movie.  We started it last year and you can't really watch Jury Duty more than once a year.

On other less exciting news, Josh and I found a drawer cabinet desk thing and an upright lamp in perfect condition next to our dumpster.  Both were perfect for our den.  Josh had to remove the broken drawer and buy some wood to fix up the desk thing, but it is really the perfect tv stand/entertainment center.  And it was all free! 

One of my coworkers caught me sleeping today....but it wasn't like I decided to go to sleep.  I was reading a book about Indian Laws in the US sitting upright and I wasn't even holding my head in my hands.  I was just sitting there reading a really dry book and bam, eyes closed!  I heard him walk up (my office door is always open and people can see right in when they walk down the hall), and I opened one eye groggily and stared at him, and he watched me visibly try hard to wake up.  He is a really nice happy guy though and thought it was hilarious, and sat down and talked with me for a while to wake me up. Which was hard because my brain was still groggy and not working right.