...And a month later

I realize that I said I was going to update about Epcot and the rest of our Florida trip as soon as possible, and I really wanted too, but I cannot get a break at work. It has just been HELL.  Right before I left for Florida a decision was made that I would now be taking over 2 different jobs on top of the job I was doing. Do you ever get SO stressed out that you become physically ill?  That is what was happening to me. I am too young to feel like a 70 year old woman at work. Everytime my boss gives me something to do, I can feel myself aging and my hair turning gray.  It's not the fact that he is giving me work that is stressing me out, it's the fact that he is giving me work on top of all the other work I am doing.  We are seriously understaffed, and the school I work is becoming bigger and bigger by the day.  It is a physical impossibility for one person to do all the work that I do.  I am not saying that to brag or 'toot my own horn', I am simply stating a fact. I am to the point where I am neglecting aspects of my job, to tend to other parts of my job. For example, I will avoid answering my 70 or so e-mails a day to work on forms and paperwork. Or, I will take a day to neglect my forms and paperwork to work on student files to get them ready for graduation. If I'm not working on the student files, I'm answering my e-mails. In the midst of all the chaos, I am trying to answer all of my phone calls. Now, when the students want to call, it is normally because they want to tell me that they sent me an e-mail.  After they tell me they sent me an e-mail, they want to explain to me the contents of the e-mail. What is the point of sending me an e-mail, if you are just going to call and tell me what was in the e-mail?  If I tell them that I got their e-mail and will respond to it when I get to it, the next million dollar question is, "When are you going to read it?"...This question really gets to me. I'm not sure, let me take out my crystal ball and predict the future for you...It's silly because they are serious, and they want an answer.

So Epcot was one of my favorite parks.  It didn't have a lot of rides, and compared to Universal and Magic Kingdom, this one was very laid back.  A storm had also rolled through the area and the temperature had dropped almost 20 degrees. It was a steady 75, cloudy, and in my opinion, perfect. We'd been getting scorched in the hot Florida sun for the past 3 days, so the change was more than welcomed. I wasn't aware when we got there, but the inside of the giant Epcot golf ball is actually a ride called 'Spaceship Earth'.  It's a ride that takes you through all the stages of life since the beginning of man. Out of all the rides I rode while in Disney that week, this one was probably my favorite. It's slow and probably boring to a lot of people, but I loved it. We also went on Test Trak that day, and Mission Space.  Has anyone actually ever gone on this peice of shit 'ride'?  There were warnings all over the place that if you get motion sickness, it is advised that you DO NOT go on this ride.  So what did I do? I went on the ride. I should have gotten off immediately when I saw a pouch of barf bags on the ride, but alas, I stayed on. Now, for those of you who have never been on this horrible abomination, let me tell you about it. This is Wikipedia's version: "Mission Space is a motion simulator thrill ride at Epcot. It simulates what an astronaut might experience aboard a spacecraft on a mission to Mars, from the higher g-force of blastoff to the speculative hypersleep."

Now, let me tell you my version.

First you start out in a dark room with a group of people. Gary Sinise pops on the screen and starts rambling about space ships and moon landings and blah blah blah.  Yes, Gary Sinise was also the shinless, but awesome, Lt. Dan Taylor from the amazing movie, Forrest Gump. If you have not seen this movie, or do not like this movie, I feel very sorry for you and suggest you stop reading my blog now and light yourself on fire.  After Lt. Dan stops blabbering, you are broken into groups of four and sent into separate doors and loaded into your 'spacecraft' cockpit. They lock you in, equipped with barf bags, and the cockpit rises upwards so you are now facing the ceiling.  There is a small screen in front of you, similar to the Nintendo Virtual Boy from the early 90's, except in color.  They also do something where you experience G-force while watching this 3D monstrosity. Right away, some bitch pops up on the little 3D tv and warns the riders that 'closing your eyes will only intensify the motion sickness', so at this point, I am panicking. The 'ride' starts up and a movie starts. It's basically a spacecraft taking off from a landing and flying to Mars. We weren't even off the launch pad yet and I was already ready to barf.  My eyes were going funny and watering, I actually did try shutting my eyes, and that bitch was right, it made it worse. So I opened them and fixated them on the barf bags. Ben was giggling and holding my hand and kept asking me if I was ok and I kept hesitantly responding, 'no', in fear that opening my mouth would excrete barf on myself and the 14 year old passengers we were stuck riding with. After 2.5 excrutiating minutes the peice of shit was finally over and I staggered off and fumbled for the exit for fresh air.  NEVER again will I ever go on that ride, and quite honestly, I do not understand how people enjoy it. It should be shut down and burnt so I can pee on the ashes. I didn't end up barfing, but I definitely didn't feel right the rest of the day. 

After the torture was over, we headed over to the 'Countries' and walked around. We took a relaxing boat ride through Mexico, went on another relaxing boat ride in one of the other Countries, then settled in Germany for an amazing lunch of authentic German food, and get this, it was a buffet of authentic German food.  They had a stage set up where a band of lederhosen wearing men were playing. It was great. I loved this place.

After we filled up on great food, we walked around some more, went on 'The Seas of Nemo and Friends' which had an actual aquarium at the end of it which delighted me. I have a soft spot for animals, fish or not.

After that, we went back to the hotel and got ready to go to the Electric Light Parade at the Magic Kingdom. If you haven't been to Disney, or haven't had the opportunity to see this, I recommend you try to do it at some point. For those of you who may think you are too cool for this, it's most likely because you suck. You are never too old, and never too cool to see the Electric Light Parade.

Yes, I took this picture.

The next day we headed over to the Animal Kingdom.  This had to have been the most congested park of all of them.  We only managed to go on a few rides and stand the scorching heat, little kids and sweaty bodies rubbing on us, for roughly 5 hours before we called it quits and went back to our room for some swimming. We went on the Kilimanjaro African Safari, which would have been a lot more awesome if half the animals hadn't been hiding. I still appreciate the fact that I had the opportunity to ride this, it's a demanding ride at the Animal Kingdom. We also went on Expedition Everest, which is a coaster that travels up into a mountain where the 'Yeti' lives. Awesome. As you all know from my previous blogs, I'm not a huge fan of instense roller coasters, but this one, I ended up LOVING. I would go on it again with no hesitation. Of course, it's not a coaster with big drops and what not, or I would have hated it most likely.  We finished out the day eating at place called Yak and Yeti, which featured Asian quisine and an unforgettable dessert. Normally Ben and I don't get dessert's when we dine out, but it came included with our Disney meal plan, so we got some.  It was a large plate of fried cream cheese wontons with vanilla ice cream, topped lightly with hot caramel syrup and fresh strawberries. It was one of the best things I've ever tasted. It should be featured on one of those shows on the Travel channel.  I can just picture Adam Richman sitting at the table taking big bites and making all the weird sex noises he makes while engorging his face with all kinds of good shit.  Speaking of good shit, I left out a few details about the nights that Ben and I went out for some fancy dinners.  The meal plans are probably the best thing you can do for yourself if planning a Disney vacation, because we ate market fresh priced fish quite a bit on this trip. One of the places we went (Captain Jacks in Downtown Disney), I ate a big slab of grilled Talapia with mango chutney, ahh-mazing.

Friday was our free day.  We got up early and went back to the Magic Kingdom to see the 'Hall of Presidents'. By the time we were done doing that, it was already scorching hot out by 11 am, and I was exhausted. We went back to the hotel, relaxed and packed.  That night we went to a place called 'Ohana' as our last fancy dinner in Orlando. This was a Hawaiian restaurant where they would stuff your face until you wanted to puke.  They would bring rounds of meat on skewers to your table, along with pot stickers, salad, Hawaiian rolls, and noodles.  Completely stuffed, we took the monorail back to the hotel and passed out for our early wake up at 4:15.  The Disney bus took us to the airport around 530 and we were home by 11. This time, I had the bright idea of calling Southwest and asking them if it was possible to check in online, which it was. So we checked in as early as possible and were in the first group boarding. Not only did I get to sit by Ben, but I got a window seat. You better believe I took advantage of it and drank gin and tonics on the way home and got to relax this time. I  I loved Florida, but you really don't realize how much you love home until you don't get to see it for a week. I haven't slept that good in my bed since we got back from our 31 hour drive from California in 2009.

Since then, we've already bought tickets to Phish's Superball IX in Watkins Glen, New York at the Watkins Glen International race track.  My brother asked us the other day, "Are you guys ever home?"  I guess not...Luckily, this is only a 10 hour drive, and not 31.

Pictures from Bubba Gump Shrimp - Universal Studios

Disney World Continued

So the first day, after the flight fiasco we got settled in our hotel room.  For anyone who ever books a vacation package through the Disney website, please be aware that whatever hotel you are staying at takes your bags directly from the airport to your hotel room, which is amazing, but not if you don't know that. We stood at baggage claim for a solid half hour and even started checking other flights thinking it got mixed up. We kept looking at each other in a panic. I had a laptop in my bag, about $500 worth of clothes, all my make up, my hair dryer, straightener, my life, you know, those kinds of things. Finally we went to the information desk and they explained this to us.  Would have been great to know at some point before that.

If you've never been to Disney before, it's literally a 'whole new world', and I'm just trying to be lame and steal quotes from Aladdin--It's seriously like you've stepped out of the real world and into a warp of somesort where everyone is extremely jolly and friendly.  There's 'Disney magical express' busses that take you to all the parks, except Universal Studios, that's not part of Disney. Ben had to remind me of this at least 16 thousand times while we were there. If the busses can't get somewhere, then the Disney monorail system will whip you around to restaurants and what not.

The Magic Kingdom was really fun.  I'd have to say my favorite ride here was definitely the Haunted Mansion. It's really amazing how they do some of the effects on these rides. The ballroom part of the ride is the best part, and you walk out of there actually feeling pretty creeped out. Sounds a little stupid, but bits and peices of that ride would pop up in my dreams for like a week after. I found a video of it on youtube, but it's pretty dark. If you move it to about 3:48 you'll be able to see the ballroom. http://youtu.be/LG7n2ZD1z_U It just doesn't do it justice though, it's something you have to see for yourself. We went on Space Mountain, which I loved. It's a pitch black, indoor coaster. Buzz Lightyears Space Ranger spin, Pirates of the Carribean, and of course, It's a Small World.  Wow...that ride is annoying. After that, I was so exhausted.  The lack of sleep from the night before started to really hit me, so we headed back to the hotel and we passed out in our beds. Heh.

The next morning (Sunday) we had Alamo car rental come pick us up so we could rent a car.  I am 25 and have a valid driver's lisence, so we figured we wouldn't have a problem. Wrong.  I guess you have to have a major credit card, and I only had my bank card (which is a Mastercard...I didn't get it...still don't).  Ben, who is only 23, ended up having to put the car in his name with $40 extra for insurance.  As the guy is ringing us up he says, "Would you like to be upgraded to a Camaro for an additional fee?'  Ben's eyes lit up.  "How much extra?"

"80 dollars a day."

After a brief moment of hesitation, a smile stretched across his face. "Screw it, let's get the Camaro."

And off we went in a 2011 Camaro. 

Universal Studios was next on our list.  It was sunny and 85 by the time we got there.  I was feeling much better today having gotten a full nights sleep.  I'm sure you all remember that the 1 place I wanted to see most was The Wizarding World of Harry Potter.  This place was amazing.

Once inside, I had made up my mind that I wanted a want from Ollivanders wand shop. We waited in line for 45 minutes in the scorching sun to get inside this place.  While we were waiting, Ben got us some Butterbeer, which is not beer at all, but a VERY rich creme soda with a frothy melted ice-cream substance on top. I could only handle about a half a glass of it. Both Ben and I felt sick after drinking it--definitely not something you should get while walking around in the sun for hours and going on rides. Of course, right after we drank Butterbeer and left Ollivanders with our new wands, we went on the Dueling Dragons rollercoaster. I had such a headache after that. Between the heat, Butterbeer, and being whipped violently about on that coaster was not a good combo.  We went to Jurassic Park after that and sat down for some dry as leather chicken strips.

(Side note: I found out just recently my idol, Bert the Conqueror was there the very next day after we were. I was SO crushed.  Bert is the only reason I went on the Raging Bull last summer.  I would have loved to meet him!  http://youtu.be/ZXDhICjInVk )

We went on a few more rides before we called it a day. My head was starting to throb at that point and all I wanted to do was go jump in the pool at the hotel and cool off. We went to Universal two days in a row, ending our second night at Bubba Gump shrimp before we went back to the hotel for some much needed beers.

And this is where I leave you my friends.  Once again the work day is over and I will start with Epcot next time:)

Byebye.

3 Floyds and Disney World

 Hello,

I really hate that I cannot keep up with this thing.  I dissapoint myself when I come back and notice I haven't updated in over a month. I decided that today I would temporarily neglect the piles of files on my desk to get an update in.  Before we left for Orlando, we took a trip over to Munster, Indiana to visit what in Ben's mind, is heaven, 3 Floyds brewery.  For those of you who read my previous blogs (bless your hearts) you know that I do not like crafted beers. I prefer light 'piss beer' as beer connoisseur's would call it. Beers like Select 55 and Michelob Ultra, you know anything light and watery that my weak stomach can handle large liquidy portions of.  My first beer was a Gumballhead, a golden, 5.5% ABV, wheat ale that I actually enjoy.  Floyds has a great menu, consisting from fennel, schnizels, and basic sandwhiches. I got a grilled chicken sandwhich with their homemade horseradish mayo for dipping, and I've been craving another one since we left. I normally do not like horseradish or anything with horseradish in it, but this stuff was amazing. I'm sure it's a very simple recipe, but it's good enough to eat on sandwhiches and fries, and that's what matters. My second beer was some kind of Japanese rice beer that I cannot remember the name of, but it wasn't one of Floyds beers, it was just one they carry.  That one was pretty gross, and I had a hard time getting it down.  I was also extremely full at that point, and pretty lit from the first beer.  I am a puss, I know. Ben drank a Dreadnaught, a verrry hoppy ale, with a 9.5% ABV and a Ham on Rye, which literally tastes like a smoked ham sandwhich. I even liked this one!

After we ate, we went to see the tour of the brewery.  It was more of a Floyds history lesson since there wasn't a whole lot of 'touring', but it was fun nonetheless. I posted the pictures of it below. Every year Floyds has a Darklord Day where they only sell their famous Darklord Beer that one day.  By some stroke of luck (6000 tickets sold out in 3 minutes) Ben and I got 2 tickets and are attending Darklord Fest at the end of the month.  I'm pretty pumped.  We went last year (when they didn't provide tickets--obviously not expecting the turn out) and got there at 9 in the morning and the place was PACKED shoulder to shoulder. When I say place, I actually mean 3 streets worth of people as the fest is obviously outside. People were throwing up in the streets already, sleeping on the sidewalk, it was pure chaos. It was pretty stupid because of that last year actually, so we left empty handed.  This year, they have time slots for groups of people to go and get their bottles of Darklord and we got the 5-7pm time slot.  This year it should be more enjoyable because we will actually be able to go and taste beers and have a good time (I hope).  Ben is brewing a batch of his own beer right now, a Boysenberry IPA, so I'm rooting for him since he's a rookie, that it turns out good. 



You can read more on it at http://www.3floyds.com/. I'm not sure if you can actually purchase their beer online, but if your interested, I'm sure it's possible.  Needless to say, we got home that afternoon and took nice long naps.

So, the night before we left for Disney, I wanted to be in bed AND sleeping by no later than 9 pm seeing as though we had be up at 3:15 to get to the airport.  I tend to get cranky when I don't get my sleep, and we weren't just landing in Florida and going to the room to take a nap before venturing out into the World of Disney, we were landing, dropping our stuff off and starting the day. So I drank a few beers, popped a sleeping pill and dozed off shortly after.  Ben came to bed about an hour later and of course I woke up. I hadn't been asleep more then 20 minutes probably, if that. So he passed right out, and I was now wide awake.  Long story short, I watched Pee-Wee's Big Adventure twice before I put Beetlejuice in the dvd player, cryed like a baby for a few minutes out of frustration from lack of sleep, and ended up falling back asleep at 2:30am.  So, 3:15 rolls around and I'm back awake, tired, and extremely irritated. I would have been ok with even 4 hours, but roughly 1 hour of sleep? Come on.  This was also my first plane ride, and I was terrified.  So we get to the airport, check our luggage and go get some hot dogs in the food court. Finally when our flight is called, I notice that Southwest is loading people on the plane in groups.  Our tickets were group C35 or some shit. In other words, Ben and I were two of the last people on the plane and Southwest is also open seating in rows of 2, seats of 3.  So of course, to make this morning even better, much to my disbelief, Ben and I are separeted on the plane. I'm stuck in the front between two black people, and Ben is way in the back. Not to mention, the dumb bitch who had the window seat had her window closed, and was casually napping on it with her leopard print pillow. She had a Steve Harvey book open in front of her that she would periodically open one eye and glance at for a few minutes.  The seats were tiny and if I ever so slightly brushed this woman's arm or something, she would slowly turn and stare at the spot like I just poked her with a cattle prod, which at that point, I would have LOVED to do.  Like I said, I'd never been on a plane so I at least wanted to sit by Ben to have someone to talk too, or AT LEAST get to look out a window, but instead I got stuck in between Tokin and Rawanda who was SLEEPING on the window. BITCH! Thankfully, the ride was 40 minutes early and we were off the plane in 2 hours. I kept myself busy by playing Nintendo DS and thinking happy thoughts.

We got to the hotel once we landed in Orlando and got ready to go out. At this point, I was more awake and excited.  For some reason they gave us a double bedded room, so we compromised...

We started our trip with visit to the Magic Kingdom...

Unforunately this work day is now over and I will have to continue this, I WILL get more pictures up asap...

To be continued...



So I've started tanning this week, and by tanning I mean really tanning, or as some people call it, fake baking. It occured to me that spray tanning was not going to get my skin ready for the raging sun in the Sunshine State of Florida.  I am a naturally pale Irish girl, and taking me from a cold winter inside the house to a week filled of outside activities in Disney World, will fry me like a lobster.

Last summer, our friends Paul, Natalie, and Ben and I went to Turkey Run State Park in at a hotel called the Billie Creek Inn, in good old Indianer for a weekend.  The first day we drank ourselves into oblivion and ran wild outside the hotel, literally. As you can see from the picture, there was plenty of room for us to do so. After a long day in the pool, we were throwing a light up frisbee acting like assholes in front of my little brothers and the neighbor kids.  My parents and the neighbor parents were sloshing it up at the pool, double fisting Miller Lights and what not until wee hours of the night. It was a good time. The next day, the four of us decided it would be a good idea to go tubing for 3 hours in the river.  Turkey Run provided large blue tubes and give you a start point and an end point.  I believe it was only 5 miles, so we figured it wouldn't be that long.  They loaded us up on a couple of busses and shipped us down to shore to see us off.  Before letting us off, the hippie that was driving starting giving us the rules and badgering us drunks about drinking in the river. "There are conservation police all over these trees, scoping you out with binoculars, so all you underagers, don't drink--but since I know you are going to anyway, try to keep them in coozies or don't do anything stupid to draw attention to yourselves. You are going approximately 5 miles, which will take roughly 2 1/2 hours.' AH! We all exchanged glances...2 1/2 hours? I guess that makes sense since we'd be floating roughly 1.5 miles per hour. I figured an hour tops, and my dumb pale ass had forgotten the sunscreen. That being said, we unloaded and hopped into the river. About 3 hours later we got out at the end point, tired, starving, burnt and angry.  I was under the impression that floating down a river would be relaxing, and it was, for the first hour. After the second hour, you're very much ready to get out. I swear I could literally hear my skin sizzling after that second hour too.  There are a few brief moments of shade during the float, but nothing that will really help.  We left Turkey Run shortly after that, grabbed some quick Burger King and headed home.

About 30 minutes into the ride I started getting 'cramps'.  A day in the hot sun, followed by a greasy BK lunch was not something my body was prepared for.  A case of the 'D' word fell upon me rather quickly and we were forced to stop in a teeny town along the way so I could use the teeny bathroom. I was rather embarrassed.  Do you ever get those cramps? They are HORRIBLE...and they come in waves. They go away after you relieve yourself, and then come back full force 20 minutes later until there's nothing left.  You're literally forcing nothing after so long. I don't get it.  From what I remember correctly, I did make it home ok. When we got back to town it was rainy and chilly out, which was a strange change of events considering it was warm and sunny just 2 hours ago when we left Turkey Run.  We both got home and examined our charred bodies in the mirror.  By no means whatsoever am I exaggerating or lying when I say that we were both as red as fire trucks. Ben tans easier then I do, so naturally I was almost more purple then red.  Since we'd been sitting in tubes all day, there was a very awkward white crease across my stomach, as well as some other inconvenient white patches amongst my Jet Puffed Marshmellowman body. We both scrambled for the aloe and started generously bathing ourselves in it.  It was horrible.  The streaks didn't go away for at least a month. It was very attractive.

 

Hello World

I have gone quite a lengthy amount of time here with no post. I simply haven't had the inspiration lately.  I find myself at work being a slave to the countless e-mails I get each day and long droning phone calls from whiners for 8 hours, that I swear I hear them in my sleep at night. I guess that's why I have a job though, is to WORK, so I can't complain, but that's why I haven't been posting.  I've often thought about how nice it would be to sit at home all day and play video games, but honestly, I'd be so bored. On those particular weekends when there isn't much going on, I find myself wanting to aimlessly spend money, or bake fattening cookies to discourage my weight loss plan.  That's still going good I guess. I'm still at my 27 pound plateau though which is really bothering me. I still work out. I've been trying to switch up my normal cardio and light weight routine, into more heavy lifting and Pilate's exercises. The places I want to lose the most weight are my lower abs (what woman doesn't?), and my arms. We are going to Florida on April 2nd for a week and haven't looked good in a bathing suit in 5 years. How I long to step outside in a bikini with confidence instead of wishing I could shrivel into a tiny raisin and dissapear. I definitely look better then I did last summer. My waist has shrunk significantly, but I still have a month and a half to shrink my beer gut more, so I'm ready. Once I take some pictures in Florida, I'll post a few maybe. We'll see how they turn out.

I've taken on a new obbsession with spray tanning lately. In my personal opinion, it's definitely a better alternative to tanning in a bed.  It's more expensive, but I think it's more beneficial. It takes up less time, is obviously better for your skin, and looks natural without all the burning and radiation.  A new spa and salon opened up 2 blocks from my house and they offer the spray tanning services.  You tell them which shade you would like (light, medium, dark) and they put the cartridge inside the booth. Once the booth has warmed up, you step inside in your birthday suit.  There are numbers on the floor of the booth, and the booth's woman voice will tell you when you need to rotate, and where to put your feet. I will admit, I felt pretty silly the first time I went...like I was being taught how to dance by a robot voice in a booth while I got sprayed from head to toe with a brown mist that smelled like Chinese food....but you're only in the booth a total of 3 minutes so it's overwith before you know it.  Once you get past the mild humiliation, it's actually pretty relaxing. Surprisingly, it really does look natural too. It doesn't streak and is not orangy at all. It usually rubs off after 3-4 days, which is the only downside, but I still like it. You can't really beat $60 a month for unlimited sprays considering it's $25 bucks a session normally. I go probably 3 times a week, so you can do the math there.

So, I was at Wal-mart over the past weekend, the day before Valentines day, and you'd think it was Christmas. I was trying to buy groceries and people were running into me, pratically mowing me over to get to the Baked Lays...wtf was going on here? Come to think of it, I was actually in Wal-mart around Christmas time and it wasn't even as bad.  People were practically falling over each other in the 'featured aisle' section trying to get heart shaped boxes of chocolates and cheap stuffed bears. You know, the 4 seasonal aisles that are usually conveniently placed right in front of the entrance? I decided I would take a gander, because I wanted to get Ben one of those little hand held back massagers that look like spaceships. I walked down one aisle and there was a Mexican family of 9 hanging out in he middle of the aisle. The parents were standing staring off into space awkwardly while their 7 kids or whatever ran about the aisle, poking and slapping things.  I quickly backed the cart out of that mess and tried the next one. There were two woman standing there, and a pole with a phone on it.  On the right of the pole it was clear, but too small for my cart to fit. On the left side of the pole, was the two women who acted like I wasn't there and giggled to each other about something. I waited patiently, finally said excuse me, and they continued to ignore me. Why are people so rude? Get the fuck out of the way! Had I been anymore pissed off then I was at the current time, I probably would have pushed my way through, but at this point, I was relatively calm since I had just gotten there, and just sighed loudly and left the aisle.

Later, I was done with the grocery portion of my shopping and decided I would look for the massager again. I saw a group of Wal-mart creatures standing in the middle of the walking path, chatting loudly, so I walked up and waited for an opportunity to interrupt. I was starting to get the feeling that I was invisible because the idiots just stood there and continued talking even though I was standing there staring at them.  Finally I said loudly, "DO YOU GUYS CARRY THOSE LITTLE VIBRATING BACK MASSAGERS?' One of the woman said, "Probably in pharmacy--So anyway..." She continued talking to her friend/co-worker.  As I walked away I said, "Thanks I guess and excuse me for interrupting your conversation!" Bitches. I felt like I was in one of those videos that they make new employees watch..."...And this is how you NEVER treat a guest here at Wal-Mart!' Cut to the scene of me being ignored and walking away frustrated with fruity 80's music in the background. So I wandered down to pharmacy, only to find that no such thing existed in pharmacy. Those damned assholes.

Once I got out of that hell hole, my next mission was to find a deshedding tool for the furry kids. Poster sheds like a sonofabitch and regular brushes just don't cut it because he gets knotty and matted with his long ridiculous fur.  The only ones I could find were $40!!!!! These things are seriously no bigger than a Bic razor.  I searched EVERYWHERE for this thing and couldn't find one for under $25 bucks, so I ultimately ended up buying one of Ebay for $10.  I also bought 16" brown and blond extensions that I should be getting at the beginning of March.  I'm excited.  My hair has grown 4 inches since October since I started taking Biotin for hair and nail growth.  Anyone trying to grow their hair out, I would HIGHLY recommend taking it.

Well I'm out, 'til next time:)  While your waiting, check out these websites I love:

http://www.peopleofwalmart.com/

http://www.damnyouautocorrect.com/

One of my babies, Poster Nutbag.

Christmas and Chick-Fil-A

I feel that this year I had a way more successful Christmas than last year.  I had more money this year, which equals more Christmas presents for the man and family.  Last year I was pretty much broke and wound up getting everyone $20 gift cards. By everyone, I mean Ben's mom, Ben's sister, and got my parents a gift card for Red Lobster. I had to go halves with Ben's mom on a PS3 for Ben, which wasn't an easy task.  I wanted to put it on layaway so that I could make payments on it since my life revolves around making payments to everything, but the only store that offered layaway was K-mart, and they were permanently sold out of PS3s for eternity I guess.  Eventually, I got one from Best Buy and all was good. I decided to get him the PS3 because he deserved it. He's taken me to countless nice dinners, on vacations, it was the least I could do.

This year was much better. I was able to get my parents gifts that I was genuinely proud of...mostly the 2 foot long Abbey Road street sign that I got my dad for his man cave. I went to great lengths to obtain that sign.

About a month back or so, 3 weeks, whatever, I ordered what I thought would be an 18", metal, road sign off of Amazon.  I waited roughly 2 weeks for this and received it 3 days before Christmas.  As those 2 weeks were passing, I kept pulling up after work waiting to see a elongated package waiting gleefully for me on the front porch, but I never saw it. Finally one day, I open the mail box and pull a 12" envelope out of the mailbox.  It was flimsy and bendable and much to my dismay, when I opened it, I pulled out what looked to be an Abbey Road bumper sticker. I was livid. I stormed into the house, whipping the 'sign' about and having a tantrum. I just kept looking at it like it was magically going to grow into the sign I'd imagined, but alas, it did not. Then I just started laughing.  I laughed for a good 9 minutes, just looking from the 'sign' to Ben, Ben to the 'sign'.  Finally Ben says to me, "Why don't you just return it?"  Of course, this thought did occur to me, but what's the point? So we hung it above our living room doorway. Our house is not the typical Pier 1 Imports decorative display, but rather a colorful little thing full of blues and oranges and Grateful Dead, John Lennon and Phish art work and posters hanging everywhere.  We agreed upon moving that our house was to look more like a museum of music rather than a Martha Stuart 'Living' magazine cover. Screw that. It's our first house, we want it to be original.

So after making peace with the whole ordeal, I came to the disheartening conclusion that the only way out of it was to drive 40 minutes North to a hell hole called Orland Park, Illinois.  Orland Park mall was the only mall in the tri-county area that had a store that sold the actual sign I was looking for.  I hate Orland so much...that's why I decided that buying it off Amazon and paying extra for shipping and handling would be worth not having to drive there. I'm thinking this was more the reason behind my tantrum in the first place than the $14 dollars I spent on the thing. You'd think that $14 dollars would have been a good clue that I was being ripped off, but did I check? Nope, I'm an asshole. So, after work one day, I sucked it up and started on my journey to Orland.  I had listened to a co-worker on how to get to Orland 'quicker', so I got off the exit she suggested.  As soon as I get off the exit, I am stuck in dead stop traffic, and still roughly 20 minutes away from the mall.  Immediately regretting my decision, the road rage starts to set in. Naturally, the whore in front of me wants to slam on her breaks as much as possible which is only increasing my hatred for Orland more and more. I finally turn onto the road the mall is on, and wouldn't ya know it, I get stuck in another bout of dead stop traffic.  Finally, after nearly an hour (this trip should not have taken me more than 25 minutes), I arrive at the mall and start looking for a spot.  As I suspected, there weren't any, so I found myself having to park at the veeerry end of the lot, literally 2 spots away from the road.  So I practically jog inside as I'm trying my darnedest to get in and out of there as quickly as possible, and luckily the store I needed to go too was directly across the particular entrance of the hell hole I'd entered.  I power walk furiously into the store, grab the sign, and get into the check out. As I'm exiting Hell, people are just mindlessly slamming into me like I'm not even there, emo kids are hanging out doing emo things, it was a mess. I think I had a mild panic attack trying to get out of there. Once I got outside, it occurred to me that my car was so far away that I risked being stabbed or mugged on the way back to my car, so started running...I must've looked like such an idiot, but I didn't care. I had gray sweatpants on, black boots that Ben calls my 'pirate boots' that kept bunching up at my ankles, a dirty white coat with fingertipless gloves. I'm pretty sure I probably looked like a bag lady who had just robbed someone and was on my way back to my bridge or shopping cart or whatever bag ladies live in. I let out a huge sigh of relief once I finally planted my ass back in my car.  Just when I'm home free and attempting to exit the mall's enormous retarded lot, I accidentally wind up in the one exit that only goes one way, which of course, was the opposite way of where I had to go.  Eventually I turned around and wound up in the Chick-Fil-A drive thru to pick up a bag of fried cholesterol for Ben and I for dinner.  I don't get it people, what's the deal with this Chick-Fil-A hype?  I had a deluxe chicken sandwich, which is a basic sandwich, they just added cheese, and it tasted no different to me than any other fast food chicken sandwich with cheese.  The Polynesian sauce that everyone raves about is nothing more then Burger King's sweet and sour. Seriously.  Try them both, prove me wrong.

By the way, once I got home, I took a picture to compare both signs...the top one is obviously the wrong one!

Until next time...

"Here at Globo Gym we're better than you, and we know it"

So I started going to the gym in the mornings now instead of the afternoon.  I find that going after work is such a pain in the ass after a long day in the office.  All I want to do when I get off is go home, put on my pajamas, most likely do a pile of dishes, and then cuddle up on the couch with my cats, is that so wrong?  Plus when I go in the morning, it helps wake me up, gives me the incentive to go to bed earlier, and quite frankly I just like it better.  The gym is much less crowded in the morning too.

The only problem I have with my morning gym routine is the town gossipers that invade the place every morning.  Several elderly women, a middle aged woman who looks like Carrie Fisher circa 1991 who is a complete nutcase, and a few elderly men.  I have become quite accustom to this morning crowd, and learned to drown out their constant rants with my Ipod.  I believe that "Carrie" is an obsessive compulsive exerciser.  She is there every morning when I get there at 7:50, already drenched in sweat, and vigorously power walking at an alarming rate of speed.  After about 20 minutes she gets off, puts her foot weights on, and starts pumping iron.  She's quite a gangly one.  There's no depth or definition in her muscles as far as I can see, it's quite strange. You'd think from all that iron pumping and dynamic cardio she'd be ripped like a washboard but she isn't.  Her and one of the elderly men are constantly yapping during their workouts. I heard her one day (over my Ipod I might add) telling him, "Yeah! Can you believe it! My daughter goes away to college and suddenly wants to be in a Jewish sorority house! I'll tell you what!..." Of course, this only led to a heated debate over religion and discipline.  All the other old woman chime in, "Well in MY day!..." All the while, these screech monkeys are taking up all the treadmills, squawking back and forth to each other. Defeated by the unusual onslaught of old people every morning, I am forced to use the ellipticals.

Yesterday morning, I was doing one of my normal routines, starting on the elliptical, moving to the stair stepper, and onto the arm presses.  There was an abnormality in the gym yesterday morning, as there was a new guy there. He was roughly 5' foot tall, resembling that of a pinched off loaf, sporting a sleeveless tee, black gym shorts, work boots, glasses, and a large back support belt.  He wandering from machine to machine holding an 'O-Men' magazine and grinning strangely at everyone who would go within a 5 foot radius of him.  Since he seemingly was guarding all of the arm presses, I went to the ab machine. As I'm using the machine behind him, enjoying some Primus on my Ipod, he's using one of the 3 arm presses (sorry, I do not know any of the actual titles of these machines, forgive me).  The one he was using is the one where you sit down, and push the handles forward. For some reason, he decides to dramatically let go of the handles.  I guess he was done using them and wanted everyone to know.  The 7003849 pounds he was pressing went crashing to the floor with a deafening clang.  Like I said, I had Primus blaring my ears, so the sound was considerably muffled, but it was definitely loud enough to scare the bejesus outta all the old folk on the row on treadmills. Quite startled, they all stopped squawking long enough to turn around and gape at him awkwardly for a few seconds before resuming to their gossiping. He got up and went stomping around the gym like an incredible asshole, checked himself out in the mirror and started working on another machine that was too close to me for comfort.  I got up and started on one of the arm machines, that was next to the previous one he'd just been using.  Not only did he not wipe down the machine he was sweating all over, but he left his O-Men magazine laying in front of the machine, displaying a whole 2 pages of lubed up steroid ragers like himself.  I had not even gotten one lift in (this was the one you push upwards), and he was already careening around the corner from the back of the gym and walking right up to me.  I quickly looked at the floor and pretended I didn't see him coming, but he just stood there. I finally looked up at him, Primus still blasting, and he said to me, "Let me know when you are done with that"...I read his steroid lips, but I knew he what he said.  What the hell man?  This is not your personal gym where you can leave your secretly gay magazines laying all over and question people trying to use the machines you may potentially want to use in the future. You also aren't wiping the steroid sweat off the machines! I was pissed. I pulled out my earbud and said, "Why don't you wipe the other machine down first and we'll see."  Which is what I should have actually said, but what I really said was, "Yep."  I didn't tell him though. I just got up and left. That'll show him.

Current weight loss: Fluxuating between 23/26

Pant size dropped: 2

New Goal: Drop 20-25 more pounds by the time we go to Florida, March 19.