Come on baby in our dreams, we can live our misbehaviour*

I am going to use the collective power of the internet.  Hopefully someone out there knows how to do this:

There is a keystroke in Excel that allows you to copy/paste the exact cell above into the cell below.  (No, it's not copy/paste).  Basically, it prevents iterations from happening.  So, if I had a date in the cell above, I could use this keystroke and it would put the same date in the cell below (whereas copy/pasting puts the next day's date). 

It's very frustrating because I knew this keystroke for all of about 5 seconds, and I've forgotten it already.  D'OH! 

So, have at it, tell me what I'm supposed to use. 

Moving on.

Yesterday, I was having some issues breathing.  It kind of felt like I had an elephant sitting on my lungs all day.  It was very un-fun.  However, it was ALSO my first day of my new training plan (I finally picked a race to train for!), and I was going to be so angry at myself if I already messed up my training plan on the FIRST DAY. 

So, I got home and threw on some clothes, used my inhaler again, and ran out the door of the hotel.  I ran pretty damn fast considering I don't think I breathed IN the entire run.  And it was actually a really relaxing run. 

I then came home and hung out with Oscar for a while before heading to the grocery store where I spent almost an hour in the produce section.  Oh, I LOVE Wegman's produce section.  SO MUCH FUN!  I bought all sorts of fun veggies to eat for the week.  I also bought some chicken which I am attempting to cook in my crock pot today.  However, I'm not entirely sure how well that's going to go considering I just kind of threw some stuff in there.  It will either be really yummy, or the worst tasting stuff ever.  I'm also starting to wonder if I actually turned ON the crock pot.  I may have to go back to the hotel real quick and check...

Anyways, hope everyone is having a fantastic day!

*Arcade Fire

Everybody knows it sucks to grow up*

So, I'm going to say something I NEVER thought I would say:  

I really did NOT like the Harry Potter movie.  I wouldn't go so far as to say I hated it, but I was SO BORED.   It was so slooooow and drawn out and nothing happened, and even the so called "sad" parts, I was so un-invested in this movie, I felt nothing.  

They could have eliminated half of the stuff, and just made one movie.  But, it feels like they just didn't want to give up their cash cow and decided to make you pay two times.  Seriously, not fun.  

However, other than the people I went with, I appear to be the only one who feels this way.  Everyone I talk to has LOVED the movie.  (Are these people insane?)  Seriously, I could have taken a nap and not missed anything.  

So, the second half had best be better.  

I went with my friend Mike to the movie.  So in addition to the not good movie, I also had an awkward night meeting Mike's family.  I don't do well meeting new people.  And while they are quite nice and very friendly, I can't remember the last time I felt so awkward.  

At least my Thanksgiving was lovely.  J and Baby V and I did a 5k Thanksgiving morning (J is hardcore...she ran part of the race with Baby V strapped on her belly in the carrier...crazy lady!).  It was a nice way to start the day, and makes the yummy food that much more enjoyable.  Then, we all went to my grandma's house for Thanksgiving "dinner" and as always, I love seeing the family.  Unfortunately, I forgot to take any pictures.  So, I have to post one of my sister's:

The adorable Baby V eating her Thanksgiving Day party dress.  What a cutie!

All in all, it was a mostly successful weekend, however, I'm really not ready to go back to work tomorrow. I kind of want another day off.  :-)

*Ben Folds

You just smile politely, and I grow weaker inside*

I am not a fan of daylight savings time.  

It's bad enough when it was getting dark at 5:45, and I barely had time to go for a run after work, but now, it's getting dark at 4:45, which means that it's dark before I even leave work.  This is entirely not working for me.  

I also am feeling the lack of reflective clothing in my dresser.  

My daddy gave me his reflective vest to go running in, but honestly, I look like an ass in it (and while I do enjoy being a LIVE ass, it's still not my favorite look).  

I bought a new running jacket, however, it does not have any convenient reflective strips anywhere on it.  I have been attempting to find reflective tape, but apparently nobody around here has ever heard of it, and I can't find it anywhere.

So, I bought some fun reflective stickers that are supposed to be used for biking helmets and made a fun decorative jacket.  I still look like an ass when I wear it (and I bet planes could try to land on this thing, but at least it's more comfortable than that vest thing).  

 Seriously, doesn't this thing look like a landing strip?

So, I took it out for a run the other evening, and it worked wonderfully.

I just hope these things stick long enough until I can find some reflective tape.






*Ben Folds

And there's so much where we ain't been yet*

I have this amazing ability to attract weird people to me. It could almost be a talent (if it wasn't so obnoxious).

In college, I used to take the train home, and it was almost always an adventure. Some person would feel compelled to sit with me and spend the hour talking to me. Except, I could never have NORMAL conversations.

One time someone spent an hour telling me that I was too pretty for my own good and someone was going to feel compelled to hurt me. Um thanks? Creepy!  Another time, I listened to a guy tell me about the weird warts on the bottom of his feet and his genitals.  (REALLY???).  Listening to my mp3 player did nothing to deter these people.  In fact one person actually removed my headphones so I couldn't ignore him. 

Or, the time I took a train back to Virginia and there was a really smelly guy sitting next to me telling me that I was obviously meant to be with him forever.  Or the drunk guy that kept trying to give me weed randomly and telling me we should go make out in the bathroom of the train car.

Or the time on the Metro in the DC area where the guy was doing something inappropriate to himself while plastered up against me on the train (it was a full car). 

Or the time I was flying back from Indiana, and the guy sitting next to me kept trying to convince me I should fly on to Florida with him and help him house sit.  And then proceeded to rub my arm, ALL FLIGHT.  And the flight was full and I couldn't move.  And he wasn't being OBVIOUSLY touchy-feely.  He kept playing it off like it was an accident.  But really, it was not. 

Last night, I was in a funk and I went to get some takeout sushi.  While waiting for them to finish my order, I was sitting in the front area of the restaurant.  A guy randomly walked up to me, looked around all kind of furtively, and then pet my head a few times and stroked my arm. 

He looked around again for a few seconds and ran out the door as I just sat there in shock. 

I'm not some freakishly attractive person.  I'm pretty average, so what in the world is wrong with me?  Why do people feel the urge to come up and just be weird around me?  Or as we like to say, why am I flypaper for freaks?  They just come and stick themselves to me.

It's bizarre. 

*Josh Ritter

And you know you've seen it all, in daddy's car thinking you'll go far*

I have a definite case of the Mondays. 

So, I'm going to post about the lovely weekend I had instead. 

Actually, this lovely weekend started out kind of shitty.  I woke up at 5:30 in the morning on Saturday to Oscar vomiting blood.  Usually he throws up multiple times before getting to the blood stage, but this time he appeared to be in a rush and just went straight for it. 

Sigh. 

He seemed ok and didn't do it again, so being the heartless mom I am, I decided to just keep an eye on him, and if he did it again, we'd go to the emergency vet, but otherwise, we were waiting until the normal vet opened at 8.  (Other than needing to poop twice in the next 2.5 hours, he was ok).  Off to the vet we went. 

Waited about 40 minutes for a doctor (I had no appointment, just kind of walked in, so I was surprised it wasn't longer).  An internal IV (those things are so cool) and a few shots later, we walked out with a bunch of meds to give Oscar, and he already was acting much happier so I wasn't too concerned.  And he's fine.  Doesn't seem to be showing any adverse side effects from being sick, so, we're good. 

In addition to drama queen Oscar, I had invited my sisters and their families to come to breakfast at my place (yes, I am crazy and invited 8 people to eat in my ridiculously tiny room...but that's just how I roll). 

But, my lame oldest sister L (ha!  last week you were awesome...but this week you're lame!) had completely bailed on me and NOBODY from her family came.  And then, JP was supposedly "too sick" to come (although he made a miraculous recovery in time for his co-workers party...), so it was just J and baby V.  Which was actually great.  I had way too much food for just the two of us to eat (I had planned for at least 4), but it was really fun hanging out with J, I feel like I didn't get to do that enough the past 5 years. 

Then, in the afternoon my parents came up for the evening. 

My mom has been wanting to learn how to bead and make jewelry.  So, I spent Saturday afternoon/evening teaching her how to make a necklace.

And seriously, her first attempt is freaking AWESOME:

I'm impressed :-)  (Also, best teacher ever...)

My parent's stayed the night, and we went to breakfast Sunday morning at the diner up here (it's a really good diner...best french toast ever!). 

They went home after breakfast, and I cleaned and fell asleep on the couch (that early wake-up call on Saturday took a lot out of me), and waited for JH to call so we could go out for her birthday dinner.  (While helping my mom, I made a necklace for JH's birthday gift.)

We just went to the Applebee's across the street from my hotel for some drinks before dinner (so we could watch the game), and we ended up just staying there for dinner as well.  Our bartender couldn't get any candles for her cake (apparently they don't have candles???), so he held his lighter lit for her to blow out.  I suppose that was creative. 

Then, I came home and went to bed so I could go to work at 5:30 (that didn't happen, but it's a story for a different day).

All in all, I had a lovely weekend (minus the bloody vomit) and it was so nice to see everyone (except the lame L). 

*Dead Kennedys

A penny for my thoughts, oh no, I'll sell 'em for a dollar*

I got a weird email today and it's put me in kind of a shitty mood. 

There is someone in VA that I'm not a huge fan of, and to be honest, I kind of never want to see again.  This person is an asshole and pretty much is just a terrible person.  I unfortunately ran into this person last time I was in Richmond, and it just kind of re-emphasized how happy I am to not be living there anymore.  

I forgot that I still had this person as a friend on Facebook (this person quickly got unfriended).

BUT I AM SO MAD AT MYSELF FOR NOT THINKING TO DO THIS SOONER.

This person saw some pictures from this past weekend and decided it would be fun to email and make comments to me about them (Yeah, there is nothing bad in any of the pictures, don't worry mom and dad).

So now, all I can think about is how angry I am at this person, and how much I can't get over what a douche-bag this person was.  And I'm mad at myself for letting this get to me. 

And, yeah, I've just been mad pretty much all day. 

*The Band Perry

So bar maid bring a pitcher, another round o' brew*

I mentioned in a previous post that Oscar has been a little concerned lately with how often he gets left at my parent's house. 

I left him there again this past weekend in order to head to North Jersey to see Little J play in a soccer game, and to go to the bar crawl that a bunch of my college friends were at.  

I had a great time this weekend. 

The soccer game was so funny to watch.  However, the other team was full of douche-bag parents and coaches that are teaching their kids to be assholes!  They beat little J's team like 17-0 (I honestly lost count after 13-0, so it may not have as bad as I said, but it was BAD).  AND, they kept telling their kids to KEEP SCORING!  WTF????   Keep in mind, these kids are like FIVE.  What are you teaching them??

After the game, I headed down to New Brunswick for the bar crawl and I got to see A LOT of people that I haven't seen since graduation.  It was the most random gathering of friends (it's crazy how your circles of friends can intersect and you aren't even aware of it).  I saw old classmates from my Chem-E days. I saw old floor-mates from Freshmen year.  I saw my old roommate JH and hung out with Mike again (it's crazy how many times I've seen this guy in the past two months.).  

I got very happy that night.  Probably a little TOO happy.  I was thinking of posting pictures, but that requires posting pictures of myself, and I kind of have a policy about that...so...no pictures.  Just know that I had a great time and it was reflected in the pictures.  

Oscar on the other hand, apparently did NOT have such a good weekend.  

When I got home Sunday evening and started unpacking, I think Oscar thought I was getting ready to leave again.

Because he crawled into my suitcase and made himself at home.  He just REALLY wanted to make sure I couldn't leave him behind this time.

And, on a side note...guess whose oldest sister gave her their old camera?  That would be me...I can now take pictures!  That look like pictures!  And not big dark blurs!

Isn't she awesome?

*Jimmy Buffet

And I thank my lucky stars, that you are who you are*

My sister J's mother-in-law bought her a cool little dress form that is a jewelry holder (it's about 12" high, not a real dress form).  While it's not something I would have originally bought for myself, when I saw it on J's dresser I wanted it.  That instant. 

Unfortunately, J likes it too, and wouldn't give it to me. 

So, I've been searching for about 8 months, attempting to find one of my own.  I've dragged multiple people to multiple stores that could potentially have this.  I managed to find ones that were huge (like 3 feet tall) and super expensive, but not the size or style I was looking for.

Then, yesterday, at Ross, I found it. 

My precious (and it was on clearance!).

I quickly yanked it off the shelf and carried it with me throughout the store.  It would have taken an army to get me to let go of this thing for any reason. 

I excitedly brought it home and hung all my necklackes and earrings on it.  I decided to leave it sitting on my vanity outside the bathroom where I can look at it every morning as I get dressed.  I think it adds a special little something to the hotel decor...

*James Taylor

You're a butterfly and butterflies are free to fly*

Yay random bullets!

• My lunch on Tuesday made me feel...not so hot.  So...I bailed on my run and went back to my hotel.  However, I felt bad not doing anything even remotely physically active, so I decided to do some burpees in my room (as recommended by BS).  As BS pointed out, burpees are great total body exercises and if I had any "distress" issues, my bathroom was right there. 
• My burpees are lame.  I did a set of countdowns.  So, I did 10, rested a minute 9, rested a minute, 8...and so on down to 1.  I was able to do good ones for the first 10, 9 and 8 sets.  However, the set of 7 came along and my push-ups got super lame.  In fact, I'm not entirely sure you could classify them as push-ups.  It was more of a bend my elbows so I start to lower and catch myself really quickly and call that good enough.  I am so weak. 
• I had no "distress" issues, but I was definitely toast by the time I finished the last one.
• I woke up Wednesday feeling remarkably not sore.  Then, I proceeded to stand on the manufacturing floor for 3 hours for a test, and I could barely move after that. 
• I went for a "recovery" run yesterday hoping it would loosen up some of my muscles.  I only went two miles.  At the 1 mile mark (and the turnaround point) my legs finally felt like they were moving normally.  Then, at 1.75 mile mark, my legs wanted to break off.  They were done.  I finished the two miles and tried to stretch and could barely lift my leg to stretch it.  My quads felt shredded.
• I call that a failed recovery run. 
• Today is a rest day (my favorite day!).

I am done with the exercise talk for today.

• I wore my new snow/rain boots today (it's raining).  They are super cute, but I look super lame tucking my pants into them.  They make my pants do this funny balloon thing where I look like a pirate.
• As much as I am obsessed with pirates, it's not a good look for me.  I untucked my pants and just made sure I was careful not to step on them.  Kind of defeats the point of rain boots. 
• I need to go buy some new long sleeve shirts for work.  I got rid of most of mine when I moved because I never wore them (I got used to 80 degree offices) not thinking this place would be colder.
• I'm freezing cold all the time.  I need some sleeves. 
• On a positive note, so far I have finished both my sister's and one of my brother in law's Christmas gifts.  Only have to knit for 5 more people.  I'm so not going to finish. 
• This weekend is our bar crawl in New Brunswick.  So far there 14 bars scheduled.
• And people wonder why binge drinking in New Brunswick is so prevalent.  We have so many bars there!  We're not even hitting all of them. 
• I feel that 14 bars and me driving home is not a good idea.  I will be staying in a hotel in downtown New Brunswick. 
• This means another night for Oscar at my parent's house.  Poor little booger.

I bet people are sick of bullets.  I kind of am.

Have a lovely day today! 
*Elton John

All my bags are packed, I'm ready to go*

There has been a lot of knitting and "traveling" lately. 

As I mentioned before, most of the knitting is Christmas knitting, so I can't really post pictures of anything.  However, in the midst of Christmas knitting, I was working on my sock of the month club sock.  I made October my "Mystery Sock" knit along (basically, once a week, the lady who wrote the pattern published part of the pattern.  You had no idea what the finished sock would like until you were finished).  I finished these last night. 

 I hate these socks.  The colors looked so pretty in the hank (or skein, whatever you want to call it), and did absolutely NOTHING for me while knitting them.  In fact, the longer I knit them, the uglier they got.  The pattern wasn't a terrible pattern, however, it was a pain in the ass to knit this many cables with tiny yarn.  Drove me insane at points.  The pattern of the cuff to the leg also drove me insane.  It's hard to see in these pictures (I blame the lighting in my room and the crappy phone-camera), but they don't match each other.  As in, the cuff has little tiny cables.  Really annoying little tiny cables.  Then, the leg has weird checkerboard type boxes. 

THEN, the leg has bigger little cables.  WTF?  It irritated me so much while I was making them.  Checkerboards and cables DO NOT MATCH.  I felt intense hatred for the checkerboard part.  (I don't know why I was so irrationally disliking that part of the sock, but whatever).  I guess overall I will say that it's a nice enough pattern, and some people love the cables and checkerboardlook, it's just not my normal style that I would knit. 

In addition, while knitting these socks, I thought they were the UGLIEST things I HAD EVER SEEN.  But, once I actually finished the sock, it came together a little more and was a little less ugly to look at.  (It also looks cuter on the foot than off). 

However, this sock also proves how different my mom and I are when it comes to taste. 

She loves these socks.  In fact, they will soon be in her little hands so I can stop looking at them. :-) 



In addition to the knitting, there has been the traveling.  I spent the two weeks in Virginia for work.  Then, the weekend of Little H's birthday, I went to L's house in North Jersey, and this past weekend was spent in DC.  Poor Oscar has not been able to come with me on these little trips.  He spent the two weeks I was in Virginia with my parents (they are seriously awesome for taking him), then he got boarded at the vet's the weekend I went to North Jersey, and this past weekend he was back at my parent's house. 

Oscar already has some abandonment issues from before I adopted him.  All this change has left Oscar a LITTLE ANXIOUS about where he is.  I packed Sunday evening and got ready to head back to my place. 

Oscar made sure he sat in my pile of stuff I was bringing back to ensure he was not left behind.  He just wanted to remind me that he should come with me.  (Again, sorry about the quality of picture.  Stupid lack of a camera.)  However, he's the black blob next to the plastic bags.  He sat there until I told him to get in his crate and he jumped right in ready to go home. 

He better be careful, my parents might get the idea he doesn't like them. :-) 


EDIT:  I HAVE NO IDEA WHERE THAT LITTLE SOCK PICTURE IS COMING FROM...IT'S NOT IN THE DRAFT...IT JUST MAGICALLY APPEARED. (AND APPARENTLY IS ONLY IN GOOGLE READER? SO CONFUSED)

*John Denver

'Cause this is thriller, thriller night*

I'm hoping everyone knows that this past weekend was Halloween.  If not, please crawl out from under your rock. 

I didn't personally dress up as anything, and didn't really do anything Halloween related (other than hand out some candy to the kids that came trick or treating at my parent's house).  However, I DID try and help Baby V with HER costume. 

This had some mixed results. 

Here are the pieces that I made for her

The weird thing that people thought looked like a turkey or an octopus got felted and didn't really look anything like that at all.  

Here, is how Baby V looked like in her costume:

As you can see, she absolutely hated it.   In fact, she screamed bloody murder the minute J attempted to put on the sweater.  This is what her awful aunt's knitting does to her.  (I will say I have learned my lesson.  Never knit sleeves and seam them to the sweater again.  Apparently her she-man arms are too powerful for a mere seamed sweater). 

So, this is what she ended up actually wearing.  At least the hat/ears are ok with her.

However, is she not the cutest Yoda you have ever seen? 

*Michael Jackson

From gay men who love football to straight men who like 'Glee.'*

I had a great weekend.  I'm exhausted, but I had so much fun. 

Saturday morning, Mike, Mike's dad, and I drove to D.C. to attend the Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear and had such an amazing time.  (Also, Mike and I have now managed to see each other more in the past two months than we had in the past 7 years...so that's an accomplishment as well). 

As for this picture, I just really liked the people sitting in the tree at the rally.  The cops however, did not.  They escorted the one kid out.  We have no idea if he got in trouble or not, but we booed the cop for being a dick.  So that was fun. 

The crowds were INSANE.   We got to the Metro station in Maryland around 10AM and parked the car.  The line into the station wound all around the parking lot and was probably about half a mile (if not longer) long (we were smart and went directly to the station and realized we didn't NEED to stand in the line, the machines were running and the lines were much shorter for these.  People were just getting on line thinking they had to.) We managed to bypass at least an hour long wait.  The parking lot itself filled up by 10:45.  The station we went to is one of the larger commuting stations, so the parking lot is HUGE.  The fact that filled up that early was amazing. 

My biggest complaint I have about the whole event is how terribly the Metro service handled this rally.  They didn't increase the number of cars on each train, they still expected people to swipe their pass card, and they had at least 3 lines not running for routine maintenance.  All of these things were frustrating, but still tolerable (It was so crowded.  You didn't even need to hold onto anything while standing because we were jammed in so tight there was no where to fall.  I made friends with a lot of people's armpits on the train rides)

However, the swiping of the pass cards pissed me off.  Most stations in DC have 2-4 turnstiles to swipe your card through.  There were 600 people getting off the trains at a time (I'm guessing this number, it may have been more or less but it was A LOT of people).  This led to a HUGE bottleneck and an insane fire hazard.  It took us about an hour to get from the train car to outside the station.

I don't do well being underground or super crowded (I have some claustraphobia issues) and I was starting to get really freaked out, but once I finally got outside it was ok. 

The amount of people in the mall was so incredible.  Usually the rallies take place around the reflecting pool, but this one took place at the Capitol end of the mall.  When we got there, it was 11:30ish and it was already packed from the Capitol to 7th Street, and was filling up on the other side of 7th street. 

We walked up the side and managed to get about 2/3 of the way up towards the stage.  We were really far to the right side of the mall, and couldn't really see the stage, but we had a decent view of the screens (see the picture to the right) and were close to a set of speakers so it was actually a decent spot. 

You can sort of the see the stage in this picture (to the left).  Look in the middle of the top.  The stage is the rectangle thing directly behind the tree.  However, the really cool thing about this picture is the guy in the front in the baseball hat looking towards the side.  He was wearing hand-knit socks (sadly, with sandals, but I'm overlooking that fact because he had on some nice socks).  I attempted to take a picture of them, but, my phone took a very dark picture with some darker lumps in it.  You couldn't even see they were feet, let alone socks.  So, that will not get posted. 

I still don't have a camera, but I tried to take a few photos of the crowds by holding my phone over my head:

This picture was taken in just my general area, so imagine how crowded the entire mall was.  Lots and lots of people.  I loved it.  And, the crowd was SO WELL BEHAVED (you know, rational and SANE).  There was no stomping on people's heads, no calling anyone Hitler (in fact, a lot of people were carrying signs proving that the only person who is Hitler, was Hitler himself), and just nice, normal, moderate people. 

I enjoyed myself so much.  However, at the end I was slightly confused.  A lot of people were sitting on the port-a-pots there. 

As in, sitting ON TOP of them.  You can see  the tops are starting to cave in.  They do not seem to be the most sturdy of seats, and really, do you want to tempt fate by sitting on top of an un-sturdy structure that is housing people's crap (literally)?   I thought it was bizarre. 

But, all in all, I had a great time and I'm so glad I went. 

*John Stewart/Stephen Colbert