they pee in my garage

my neighbor's dogs.. not the neighbors themselves. well, the black and tan dog appears to be getting used to daisy. i think he is actually a big fraidy cat who just barks a lot. when we go out he comes over to see what is up and to say hi. then, when she goes to sniff his butt and say hi, he gets scared and pees. i've seen it several times. i think he needs a puppy therapist to deal with his issues. you know daisy is scary enough to cause another dog to pee...

waste fraud and abuse

i work for the government. waste fraud and abuse are rampant. today i was a part of it. so far i've spent 45 minutes on the phone (most of it on hold) with tech support for gateway. i'm having a pc problem. our it guy told me to call tech support for the computer becuase i think a part needs to get swapped out. so, instead of the it guy calling in, an engineer is being charged to a project for an hour plus to sit on hold and get nothing done. you know that they are trying to streamline the it process and this is how it is being done.... one it guy for 150 people... obviously this does not encourage waste, fraud, or abuse. i'm about ready to just hang up for today.

word of the day: sausage wallet

i haven't posted much lately. now that i'm a working woman, i feel like i don't have nearly enough time in my day. i feel like i get up in the morning, go to work, come home, walk the dog, fix dinner, clean the kitchen and go to bed. thank goodness i took two weeks off to move in, otherwise i wouldn't be able to get my stuff unpackd...

today i was supposed to get a call from the plumber telling me he was at the house. the pipes in the master bath seem to be having problems. they are making bad noises and producing air bubbles. when the shower is running air bubbles appear in the toilet. likewsie for the sink. The good nes that goes with this is that i decided to shower in the hall bath. i don't know why i would ever not shower there. it i some GREAT water pressure! hopefully they wil call tomorrow.

right now i've got to admit my guilty pleasure: the girls next door. it is on rght now, and i love to hear these girls talk. they are so funny. their lifes are so unreal that i actually enjoy it. this episode involved the renaissance fair. we learned something new; the elizabethan word for ho is sausage-wallet!

daisy dogg had another incident htis morning. she was out in the front yard. the bad doggs were out. the black and tan one started plaing with her. he is still a bit of a puppy too, and all he des is bark. i think they became friends this morning. then his sister the tan dog ame over and bit daisy for no reason. then the little black and white one started running circles, barking, growling, and nipping. of course, daisy didn't want to walk into the house since she doesn't know what to do when the gang up on her. i ned to get up on this whole fence thing. the good news is that this evening when we got home from our walk they all came up as usual. the black and white one started being all bad ass again, and black and tan actually started barking and chasing him away. i think we are making progress

not to much else to report. i just need to get the kitchen clean so i can get some sleep. this weekend i need to us the extra day to get some work done around the house.

Murder at Union Station

Last weekend i finished another book

no. 5

title: murder at union station

author: margaret truman

this was a light-ish read. margaret truman is the daughter of former presdient harry s. truman. she is the author of a series of murder mysteries taking place in d.c. this one was like the 20th one. some of the books have been great, some have been not so great. this one was ok. i give it a 3 out of 5 stars. this one dealt with corruption in high dc offices as well as the everyday life of dc. it brings in a series of scenes that take place at union station (a cool place to visit). several of the characters are reappearing, and i've loved their books in the past, but they were not the main part of the storyline here, which made me sad. the ending picked up a bit fast and it left me wanting a little more explanation.

where's the beef?

so i wound up at happy our tonight with a few friends. tom, erin, jeff, jennifer and i hung out at the loft after work. somehow i sort of enjoy the loft. it is pretty nice, and itis not very uppity unless you want to be uppity. on the way home i drove by the wendy's. it did remind me... although i haven't actually been yet, it is nice to live in a land that has a wendy's.

i also was called miss jersey by a coworker this morning. he is new since i left for school. he seems like a nice guy - the type who would be ver respectful. but, i'm only like 5 days older than him - definitely not old enough to deserve ma''aming or the title miss. hoepfully it was liking my last name (it is loveable). the other acceptable alternative - he thinks i deserve respect because all he knows about me is that i just got back from phd'ing - so he thinks i must have much more age/experience and actually deserve some sort of respect. hate to break it to ya buddy - i'm not even 30 (yet).

yay!!!

i now have an oven!!! the man came out and fixed it this afernoon. i look forwd to actually being ale to cook!

double yay!!!

billy bob, dancing king on the tellureen

in the spirit of birthdays, i devote this post to my dad, bill. yesterday was his birthday ( i am behind on my blogging). he is starting to put on the years, as this was the big 5-5. obviously he is too young to have a daughter as old as me. my dad is a life long illinoisan. with the exception of a couple of years in college he has lived his entire life in the chicago suburbs. he actually grew up in oak park, just up the street from one of the frank lloyd wright homes.

i am very proud of my dad. for financial reasons he was unable to complete college. when i look at how far he has come in life and everything he has accomplished despite this setback, it amazes me. how far he has progressed in life has always been an example of what you can get if you are willing to work for it. now-a-days dad works for a bank in downtown chicago. i think it is chase manhattan, although i might be wrong. the way these banks are constantly buying one another out, i never really know who he works for. likewise, i never really know what he does. what i can tell you is that they ahve been filming the new batman movie accross the street from his offfice. as a result, he brought in a big blowup batman to put in their window. and people wonder how i turned out to be such a dork????

you ask, why is your dad a dancing king? he LOVES to dance. he is the best wedding date ever. he is out there dancing every dance that a middle aged man should be dancing (he avoids the hip hop for some reason). But, he is can get out there and swing with the divorcees or he can polka away the night with his daughters. In fact, in his slightly younger years i even remember seeing him go do the russian dance wehre you jump up in the air and do the splits.
despite being a hard worker, and a crazy dancer, my dad knows how to have fun. or, at least he knows how to be a smart-ass (once again, we wonder where i get that from?). one time we were eating dinner as a family. i must have been somewhere around 5th grade. my mom was lecturing one, or all, of us kids on table manners. as usual, someone had been playing with their food. about the same time that she finished her verbal whipping with the wet noodle dad decided to get some seconds. he took two slices of cucumbers. he then proceded to eat the middle, seeded parts and put the outsides over his eyes like a set of glasses. what a dork! how my mom didn't kill him that night, i'm not sure. :-)

on that note, i say happy belated birthday billy boy.

even rock stars get fat!

no. 3
title: size 14 isn't fat either
author: meg cabot

add another book to the list. i read this one this weekend. it was actually a re-read. i was looking for something lightweight and easy to read while procrastinating getting ready for the real world again. on a quality scale it was probably albout a 2 out of 5 since it is total chit lit fluff. however, on the chic lit scale it is a 4.5!

i need to state, i would not have bought this book. the title aloen would have made me ill. i'm tired of chic lit about "fat girls" that is unrealistic and provides unrealistic expectations for women today. the lives that these fat girls lead are absolutely unrealistic, and most of them aren't actaully fat. i like to escape into a good book to get away from reality, but these books are so far from my reality that i can't read them. plus, these books actually make me feel worse about myself (who thought i could actually feel worse...) however, my mom gave me a pile of books and the book before this was in the pile. i wound up reading it and really enjoying it.

the author, meg cabot, is actually the authoer of the princess diaries series for little girls (and adults like me). really, who doesn't like the concept of an average girl finding out she is actually a princess and having to change her lifestyle to fit in with what is expected. this book was about heather wells, a washed up pop princess. she is a fictitious tiffany or debbie gibson - the girl who played innocetn (pre brittney) bubble gum pop in the malls. then her mom stole her money and took off for south america, leaving her to fend for herself. fast forward to her late 20's, and heather has broken up with her justin timerlake-like boyfriend and is trying to lead a real life. she works as a residence hall assistant in a small new york city college. unfortunately she has a knack of getting herself into trouble, in the manner of dead bodies in the dorm. in this book the head cheerleader's head is found sitting in the ktchen one morning and heather works her way through the clues to find the killer. in the middle of all of htis her dad is released from prison and comes to live with her and her ex-fiancee is in the middle of marrying the up and commying dirty brittney spears-esque singer who broke him and heather up. of course, heather lives with her ex-fiancee's brother to make things a little spicier. i enjoyed this book immensely. if you like a cheesy mystery story with a small amount of chic lit thrown in, i highly reccomend it!

back in the saddle again

so i returned to the working world yesterday. it wasn't as bad as i thought it would be. i essentially spent the entire day talking to co-workers. the early partof the the morning was filled with hello's and hugs - people do start to miss you when they haven't seen you in a year. everytime i finished talking to someone another person would come by and talk. then we had a two hour team meeting. it was a good way for me to hear what was going on so that i could get acclimated. by then it was lunch time - so a bountiful feast of barbeque was in order. in the afternoon i continued the catch-ups and i started unpacking.

my office is officially a disaster zone. how do i have so much stuff and where did it come from? i swear i cleaned it before leaving. i guess my stuff multiplied, and then the summer students left a bunch of stuff in the office when they returned to school. it is slowly getting back to normal. unfortunately (or fortunately) i already have work on my desk to do. that being said... time to get back to the grind. i guess it is good to be back. a week from now i will be behind and i immagine that two to three weeks from now i'll be traveling again.

lost and found

no. 2
title: Lost and found
author: carolyn parkhurst

this was another new novel for me. it ranked approximately 3.5 stars, maybe 4.

a short synopsis of the plot: the book focuses on the stars of a “reality” tv shown called lost and found. i don’t watch reality tv much, but the show is a sort of amazing race-ish show. the teams are made up pairs of people. the teams are competng for big money, and they are traveling around the world doing puzzles and doing “daring” stunts. the main characters are a mother (laura) and her 18 year old daughter (cassie). laura wanted to be on the show as an opportunity to try to regain the lost bond with cassie. cassie had a baby a few months back, and her mom never even noticed!!!! other teams include a set of middle-aged recently divorced brothers, a married couple who are both in “recovery” from alternative lifestyles, ex- high school sweethearts looking to re-try their relationship, and two former child stars. each person on the show has their reasons for being on the show. as the novel progresses the teams go through a series of ordeals from which we see the individuals grow.

i really liked this book. it spoke to me. it was well written, and the characters were interesting. plus, i liked the way it portrayed the dreaded reality tv. plus, it asks you, what do you think you are looking for - and when you findi t will you really be happy?

angry dog

actually, angry protective dog. when the doorbell goes off on the tv she jumps up and starts barking like mad to let me know the doorbell rang. not so useful if the doorbell is on tv :-)

paint me baby one more time

how trashy am i? here is some proof.

here is a close up of the awesome paint job done by the a's. it was taken after i taped for this paint job. as you can see, they were obviously down with the whole taping/painting carefully thing.

here are in progress photos:

now the walls have their first coat on (green in case you didn't notice). it looks hot. i need to do a second coat to the walls tomorrow morning. it is going to look great. then i get to do the cabinets and the trim. now that the walls are nice it makes the trim look dirty and nasty.

in terms of the cabinets, it is slow going. i got one of the doors off. i am the master of engineering to get it off. now i have to sand down the door and the cupboard because of all of the dried up old paint. i'm so doing this the right way instead of the quick way. it is a challenge, but a challenge i will have to overcome for the bathrooms eventually.

i also bought the goods to make a roman shade and to cover the shelves. next i need to get new hardware for the cabinets and to get the goods to re-wire the outlets. i'm going to try installing gfi outlets. since the laundry room is a "water" room it seems like a good idea. i found directions and it seems pretty easy. So, hopefully by the end of the weekend i will have one room done before going back to work.

meanwhile dog just dumped over her basekt of toys. she seems more interested in the basket than in the toys themselves.

trashy, of the white variety

yes, if you came into my house (almost wrote apartment there) right now, you might think i was white trash. my dryer is currently sitting in the middle of my kitchen. there is a reason for the trashy-ness. after talking about it for weeks, i'm finally painting. i'm starting with the laundry room - hence dryer in the kitchen. the laundry room is a good place to start because no one will see it unless i want them to, so i can test my painting skills. this is also a good place because the last time the previous owners painted they must have forgotten the paint tape. i think that it would have killed me to leave it be for months. plus, they had tons of "built ins". not just the built in cabinets, but several home made shelves. i decided the shelves needed to go, so they went out. it was sort of fun to get to start demolishing things.

so, i spent today washing walls (amazing how filthy they were - thank you God for amonia, vinegar, and baking soda: they do wonders) and removing shelving. then i got to pull out the spackle. this was always my favorite part when i was little. between the holes from the shelves and all of the other random nails and screws, there were a lot of holes to fill. i even did a whole patch in one spot! i'm proud of my work. i started taping too, so tomorrow morning i'll finish taping and get going wtih the paint thing.

the other big problem i'm having is with the bulit in cabinets. three of them have doors. the previous owners did things the quick and easy way - they just painted over the hinges. that is a big no=-no in my book. i wanted to replace the hinges when i repain the cabinets, so i'm attempting to get them off. it is proving to be bigger trouble than expected - i can't get the doors off by pulling out the pins, and most of the screws are painted in so tightly that i can't get them out. :-( if you have any suggestions, i'm all ears. somehow i will get this done.

meanwhile daisy is loving being in the house. last night we just walked up to the stop sign and came back home. then i put her on the tie out in the back while i fired up the grill and watered the lawn. she really likes the hose. when i sprayed water in her direction she started chasing it and having a ball! one day i'll put her under the sprinkler and see what happens.

tomorrow i'll post a mid-point picture of the laundry room. for now this "before" will have to do. from the picture you can see the excellent job that they did on the trip. you can also see some of the home-made shelves that are no longe a part of this room. considering how much spackle got put up today, i think that next time the room gets done i might need to re-drywall it!

hot time summer in the city

heat index = 109. i don't do this. i think we might be skipping our evening walk tonight. daisy d. would like a walk, but i think she may actually prefer to stay in the house. i know i will. she currently looks to be dead on the floor courtesty of the heat.

so happy to be here

today i went to lunch with a bunch of the girls from ms. i missed them. it felt like i was at home being out with them. now i just have to get the house in a condition for them to come see it. then, this afternoon i went and got my hair cut. i love haircut day. i always feel so cute on haircut day. pairing my pretty, short, blondish hair with my new, smaller sized skirt made me quite the happy little camper.

OK. here is some crazy good news. my advisor was just "reminded" that he needed to give me a grade for my independent study. he gave me an a. because i hold myself to extremely high standards i felt like i could have done so much more than i did. apparently, he didn't. i'm cool with that though. so, party party at sarah's house now!

things that make you go huh?

driving down the interstate last night: a concrete truck. towing a u-haul trailer. which contained a motorcycle.

weird, huh?

vacation... all i ever wanted

so this vacation thing is sort of nice. i could definitely do the housewife thing and just spend my days working aroudn the hosue, making the house look pretty, and taking care of dog and kids. now i just need to find a sugar daddy.

this morning i had to go over to jackson for yet another doctor's appointment. this is the last official appointment for this vacation. thank goodness, as i was starting to tire of commuting to and from the doctor's office. unfortunately tonight i have to go over AGAIN tonight to go to a "how to eat class". i have a bad feeling it will be as "useful" as the last one. i'm not really big on this whole diabetic thing.

today's thanks go out to stephen for offering to send his brother over to mow my lawn for a moderate fee. it was a nice effort, just way to late buddy. if i'm lucky one day i'll be like him and i'll find random neighbors who like me for no reason and just offer to come by and mow my lawn. until then it is pay or play.

no longer a girl... not yet a woman

ahhh britney your words sum up my morning. i did it. i no loner live in the amazon rainforest. i broke down and mowed the lawn this morning. it may sound trivial, but for a spoiled suburban brat who grew up in a townhome complex and has never mowed a lawn, this was a special day. the good/bad thing is that it appears that as soon we were under contract, the previous owners gave up lawn care of any sort. i must have picked up about a hundred little branches when cleaning up prior to mowing. the other thing to note is that she had a green thumb and could grow stuff, but obviously he knew nothing about growing a lawn. it is really thin and lots of big brown spots. that made mowing easier, and a lot dirtier. hopefully over the next couple of hears i can get the grass growing again. if anyone has good ideas, i'm all for them. so, to sum up my morning i can only use the words of a woman slightly older than britney - as madonna so eloquently put it: like a virgin..

act your age not your iq

last night we had our second visitor. my friend haley bell (i love her name - she has one of those names where you have to say her first and last together) came over to check out the house. haley works with me, and she and her husband are also my new neighbors. they live a few streets over. once the heat cools down we will be adding their street and subdivision to our walk to take it from 1.5 miles to 2.5 miles.

haley brought her puppy wrigley over to check out the house and to meet a new friend. in case you can't tell, haley's husband is a huge cubs fan. wrigley likes to ride in the car just as much as daisy - so it was a fun treat for her! wrigley is 7 months old and she is an adoreable little dog, a cairne terrier i believe. she weighs a whole 10 lbs, so it was funny to watch the two dogs. daisy may be 13 months but she acted like a 3 month old puppy the whole time. the two of them just ran around the house and chased one another around like they were best friends who had been seperated at birth. it was so cute. we will have to let them play more, especially once i get a fence up in th back. until then they will have to run around and skid on the floors indoors.

perusing the pages… 50 in 52

someone gave me the idea of blogging the books i read. if you read one of my previous posts, you know i love books – they make great friends. so, the goal was to read and blog 50 books in a years time. i’m starting this today. hopefully i’ll come across one or two good ones that you might enjoy too. i’ve probably got a lot of travel coming up for work, which should give me ample opportunity to do 50 in 52.

no. 1
title: me and mr. darcy,
author: alexandra potter

i picked up this book thinking it sounded cute. like many girly bibliophiles, i love jane austen. i knew it was probably chick lit, but it sounded cute.

the book was ok. i would probably give it a 2.5, maybe a 3. the premise sounded great – main character, emily, is a bookstore manager with really bad luck dating recently. she gives up on love because she realizes no guy is as great as mr darcy. (note: i think we’ve all had at least one moment such as this – it may not be mr darcy, but there is always some person from the media or some character from a book/tv/movie who gets put on a pedestal and makes other seem unworthy.) rather than going on a drunken girls week in mexico emily decides to go on a jane austen tour in england. the story is set up to parallel jane’s own pride and prejudice. the flaw is that it doesn’t do a great job paralleling and the character development is slightly lacking. however, since it is a pride and prejudice parallel, it is a fun read – just not as fun as bridget jones’s diary.

it was fun, lightweight book. i didn’t have any great revalations while reading it. i did like the final point the author made – mr darcy might seem like a great date, but in the end, he isn’t real. we all need to come back to earth and find someone who we can love in spite of their flaws, which may even be what endear them to us.

we’re having a heat wave, a tropical heat wave

maybe it isn’t so tropical. the heat indices the last few days have been up as high as 106. for daisy and I that is a bit warmer than we are used to. it does make for some fun walks. our little dollop of daisy (credit jano) is quite the pain. come 7 pm she absolutely wants to walk. she doesn’t understand that it is hot and we can’t walk. if i make her wait, she just cries and whines until i give in. then i am stuck dragging her home when we are halfway around the lake.

Back in the M-I-S-S…
we are back in ms. i’ve finished the school stuff J yay! it is definitely interesting being here. i may have felt like i wasn’t doing as much work as i wanted during the summer semester, but now that i’m not working for the next two weeks i realize that i actually WAS working a fair amount. i imagine that after my two weeks of cleaning and painting are done i’ll be ready to get back to work.

i’ve officially joined the world of homeownership – i finally bought a lawnmower. i’m waiting for early tomorrow morning to give it a try. there is absolutely NO reason to do it in the middle of this nasty heat. considering how bad it looks I can’t wait to get my lawn mowed

also an update on the stove. the repair man came out yesterday. he attempted to fix it with some parts he had. that didn’t work. so he had to order parts. we’ll be another 9 days before it comes in, and then it will be another couple of days before they can come out here. good thing i don’t need to bake any cakes.

where’s the venison?
remember when i got hit by a deer last winter? well, it is 8 months later and i nearly got hit again. this morning at 10 am i was driving into town and a deer bounded across the road about 100 feet ahead of me. luckily, i didn’t get hit. since i now live in the money pit i don’t see a new car in my future.