Hello ladies -

Quick post for me...just to say "hi" and TGIF!! After work yesterday, I applied for a couple San Diego jobs...one of which I'm absolutely PERFECT for. Then I went to the gym and did 1/2 hour on the recumbent stepper, then met with my wellness coach. After work today, I'm going to do laundry, grocery shopping, and finish an email campaign for a client. Tomorrow is the spring festival with a friend. And Sunday will be the gym, relaxing and re-packing (as in sorting through stuff that's packed in boxes).

Happy - I hope the blood draw went okay...and that the results turn out great!

I'll try and post tonight.

Much love,

Morning all. TGIF!! No, make that DOUBLE TGIF!! This week has crawled by.

Ceejay - Glad you're already enjoying your weekend. Re McD's - I just don't want to know what's really in the burgers. I've been following the blog of a woman who reports almost daily about the bad things that happen to our food. It's informative, but I often question if I really want to know because some of it's pretty darn scary. Hope the snow doesn't make you change your weekend plans.

Shad - I really don't know what's with this site. Very balky for me at times. Hope you had a good flight home and that you have a nice Saturday.

Annie - Love the photos.

Happy - Hope the blood draw went well yesterday. Hearing other people's problems with that makes me glad my veins are easy to draw from.

Just in case you're lurking....Hi Mel!!!
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The car problem was the case of our blue tooth thingy going kaput several weeks back (but we were ignoring it for the time being) and then proceeding to drain the battery in some sort of parasitic fashion. So we got the bluetooth replaced and all is well, and the car is clean too. (Love that the dealer washes the car after servicing it.)

On my train ride to work yesterday, I realized I'd forgotten about a symposium I'd registered for and so I was not only dressed too casually, I'd also skipped the foundation part of my makeup routine. I decided to skip it, but the boss and sr. mgr went (started late morning). In the late afternoon there was a social thingy to kick off the basketball tourney, and so I grabbed one chicken wing and a few chips and a light beer and brought it back to my desk, and then took an earlier train home. (Very social of me, but the admin and I did it together, so that's social enough for me, LOL.) It was really nice being out in full daylight, and it was nice and sunny walking home from the train. I needed my Vit. D!!

At home, I sorted and relabeled a couple more files. Slow going at this pace...

We had breakfast for dinner because nothing else occured to us. Yum. Scrambled eggs with red bell pepper and cheese mixed in and two slices of bacon. Bf has been baking the bacon in the oven and it's really tasty that way. Not a good point day, but the scale was still kind to me this morning.

Nothing planned this weekend. I will do a circuit class Saturday morning. BF and I might head out to a Pottery Barn store - we have a gift we received ages ago that we haven't used and don't want. It still has the gift receipt on it, so we'll see if we can return it and buy something else. This is something that was cleaned out as part of the office move.

Okay, I'm just babbling away, so I'll stop now. Everyone have a lovely Friday/Saturday/weekend!

Hey, next Sunday's Easter! Might have to dye some eggs this weekend!

Laura
I try not to think of things like that but I too have read of such things. Won't go into detail. That's one of the reason's I've started cooking again.

Michelle
Sending good vibes on those job openings.

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Think I'm worn to a frazzle as I'm not in the mood to do any driving this week end. I want a week end to myself. And I'm thinking about cancelling my trip to MO next week end also.

Hi Michelle! Busy night for you last night. re the perfect job in the perfect (IMO) climate!! Enjoy the festival tomorrow! I might have to take myself to a garden center just to get some more springtime, even if it's indoor flowers and plants.

Good Morning Girls...

Getting prepared for this snow storm heading our way on Sunday, blah. Get this..one weather station says 2-4" the other say 4-6", guess they have it covered whichever we get. I hope it just passes us by.

LAURA...I love gift cards and rarely do I let them sit very long. I can think of something to get. I love breakfast for dinner, my kids used to love that when they were little. Especially if it involved pancakes, waffles and bacon. Glad the car was an easy find/fix.

CEEG...I am with you on the Mickey Ds burgers or most any of the fast food. C is sold on the baconater at Wendy's. I cannot seem to get up the nerve to eat any of that. Snuggle up this weekend with some good tea and a good book and relax.

SHADDIE...ah, home sweet home. All good at home?? Relax my dear.

CHELLE...hope that perfect job in SD, CA comes through for you, wouldn't that be awesome. Yeah!!

Sunday is our Easter dinner at a nice restaurant. We are doing it this weekend because it is just a fiasco on Easter with different places all the kids have to go to celebrate. Unless the snow holds anyone back, we should have all there except the brother from Illinois.

That is about it for me. Only exercised once this week do to the overload of at work this week. I have been through about 2000 physicians files this week. I have burn out.

Have a great Friday/Saturday.

Hugs.

Morning peeps,

The blood draw did not go well. The new young nurse found a vein but then the supervisor horned in. She stuck me, missed and stuck me again. I flinched a few times - she said "did that hurt" I said YES IT DID. Only because she kept poking around. Finally she yelled out "Oh thank you JESUS, someone in heaven is looking out for me today". She was amazed she found a vein. DH was not feeling well at all yesterday so instead of running errands we went back home afterwards. All the way home my arm started aching and hurting in strange places. Then I noticed this huge (and I mean like an egg size) knot at the injection site. It's nothing to be worried about - just means some blood leaked into the tissue but it sure did prove this goofball has no business drawing blood. Today I have a very large black and blue bruise about the size of a rim of a drinking glass. The knot is there but has subsided to about half it's size. While there I asked if they were going to do a cholesterol panel - apparently the doctor forgot to write it down on the orders. Miss Ditz pulled another vial for it and promised me that she'd leave a note for the doctor asking her to authorize the cholesterol test. If the results come back and that didn't happen, I am going to complain to the clinic. I know there's not alot of people to pull in the resource pool but they need to get people working in the labs who actually know what they are doing. Not everyone will be easy peasy.

DH rested and I tried to keep it quiet so I worked on some of my school work, cleaned up a hot spot pile of papers and did some laundry, cooking and dishes and before I knew it the day was done.

As for the classes, here's my initial assessment. Apparently the University has teamed up with a vendor who produces online classes and affiliates them through the college to the public. Class consists of reading materials, writing examples and a discussion board. The workshop class has over 110 students in it. That's a huge class! You could spend hours alone on just the discussion boards. I don't see how we can get any kind of constructive feedback with a class that size. You post your assignment online and ask questions online (where they encourage students to also answer other students questions). With that many students, you could have 200 plus posts per session to read through (and their discussion board software is kind of clunky and not really designed for that much interaction). I will echo the new popular quote of the day "Ain't nobody got time for dat". The other class is smaller - about 25 people and the teacher encourages people to read the materials and ask pointed questions of her so she can mentor us properly. So basically I have paid 90 dollars each for an expensive online "book" with a social media chatboard. I'm not complaining, the materials I have read so far are good and ninety dollars today is cheap for a class. I'm just surprised that for a subject like writing where you expect to get feedback, I'm not sure that's going to happen. So far it does meet my goals of: occupy my time (looks like about 6 - 8 hours a week), some thought provoking material, and it will challenge me also. Beats getting in the car and driving an hour to the next town to attend classroom courses

I wish I knew why my screen resolution / font size keeps randomly changing on the fly - it gets smaller and smaller. I was blaming my touchpad on the laptop but I'm not so sure that's it. REALLY ANNOYING!!!!

Ceejay - you have been doing alot of travelling. Maybe a weekend at home is just what you need. Recharge the batteries, relax and enjoy. Then you'll be ready to get a move on again. As to your question about the music class - this is basics - composition and reading music and all that stuff I once learned but long forgot about since Miss Lindy's freshman high school music class. I hear music as one big pot of stew so to say and have great difficulty separating out individual instruments that make up the harmony, melody, etc. DH has tried to explain the various guitar stuff - lead, rhythm, bass but he way overexplains stuff and it just makes my eyes glaze over so I stopped asking... But I'm still interested with the right teacher

Laura - I was going to ask you for that blog name but as the other's have said, I probably don't want to know. Once I looked up an article on factory farming of chickens and I was so sick about it that I almost gave up eating chickens and eggs for good. I sure would like to find a local farm that sells their eggs around here. I wonder if my neighbor down the road with the self sustaining mini farm would be interested? We love breakfast for dinner - nice light meal and always seems yummy. My sister only cooks bacon in the oven now, she swears it's better tasting and crispier than in a pan and no getting frustrated when the bacon curls up and doesn't cook properly.

Michelle - yay on finding some jobs to apply for in CA! Good luck with that. You have time to plug away at it which is so much better than worrying about how things will fall into place at the last minute. Glad to hear that your bloodwork came out great - that had to be a relief! I think things will calm down as you get past the worst of the stress bump. Sounds like you have a busy weekend planned. Are things working out with the roommate?

Shad - hope you had a good flight home - looking forward to more pictures of that cutie pie grandchild.

Mel - good thoughts to you my friend

Annie - well you sure had a day full of shopping. I'll bet C will look extra handsome in his new duds. At least as you say he will get alot of wear out of the suits. Bummer on the rings, who'd a thought? Hope you got some nice bands. How nice that Charley and Barney's still had the good food you remember. Alot of time has passed, sometimes your memory remembers it way better or they just plain change the cooks. Good use of an afternoon off. Did you get your wedding dress yet? I remember you talking about it, can't remember if you were considering it or actually purchased it? I'm sure it will coordinate nicely with C. Just post larger pictures - my eyes are too old and bad to see much detail in the thumbnails. Must be the way this site handles them as I have no problem with your pics on FB.

Well we have a week's worth of errands to run - I should have just gone out by myself yesterday as I'm sure DH will moan and groan about all that needs to be done but it has to so ... Have a good weekend all...

HAPPY...I did get the dress, it is very pretty. I will try to post. If you click on the thumbnails posted here they enlarge. Try that. C is wearing a pin stripe suit with a gray shirt/gray and black tie. It will match my soft pink rose dress perfectly. Hope DH gets to feeling better. Samantha's Chris came home from work early on Wednesday with 102 temp and still home yesterday and today with temp/sore throat/coughing. The doc prescribed the Z pak for him. Sam is trying to stay away from him and keep the babe away from him also. Sassy missed her doggy days at Sam cause I didn't want to be in the germ invested house. Lil man went to the doc on Monday with a temp except he had double ear infection. He is on an antibiotic also so maybe that will keep him from getting Chris' crap. All this blood draw misery is making me squemish for my draw next week. Not really, I usually have no trouble. I wouldn't mind taking a writing class, but don't want to put the effort into it right now. Good for you smarty pants...lol

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Oh Annie - that dress is GORGEOUS - I love the detailing on the front also. And just the most perfect color for spring and for you - I'm sure you will look Absolutely Fabulous. Sounds like hubster2B is perfectly coordinated also. Great job! And I love the flounce for dancing or just running down the beach to each other with arms outstretched in slow motion

Sorry Chris is sick. Hope everyone else's germ shield protects them.

Got all but one of our errands done - the last is to check out a side table we ordered for the living room. I have a feeling it will not match the oak trim we have all around the windows and such. But we'll look at that tomorrow. I did pick up season 1 of Downton Abbey. I have only a week to watch the entire season as the videos are in great demand right now and our loan period is one week which can be renewed twice as long as they are not on a wait list (which they are ) Looks like my weekend will be alternating between videos and homework. THAT must be why it got up to almost 40 degrees, sunny and springlike for a change

Thank you Happy, I am in love with the dress ...do watch Downton Abbey...it is so good...I am on the second season and loving it. Will have to get the 3rd season, which is right now because I won't be done with season 2 and season 3 is already rolling. Hope to be on board on season 4 when it is on TV, so I do not have to rent/buy it.

Evening all,
I've spent part of today fighting with that freakin phone trying to download the latest pics of the grandbub. Not working!!!!! Not happy. Finally gave up in disgust and emailed ds1 to send the pics by email. Don't hold your breath waiting.

Rest of the day has been spent setting up Mays medical month, cooking meals for the freezer, talking on the phone and sleeping.

Annie - nice gear. Should look very smart and chic on you.

Happy - enjoy your week of Dowton Abbey. Hope you can interpret the upper class British accent.

Laura - don't need to see the blog site for fast food. They did an experiment on it here for one of the current affairs programs. Seems that if you leave the contents of one of those burgers for around two years they look very similar to the fresh ones. God knows what they put in them to make them last that long.

Ceejay - good on you for cooking. Fresh is best in the long run.

Michelle - geez, sounds like you are coming back to life with a vengeance. Goodonya.

Time for bed. Back sometime tomorrow. I have to go see the DS2 tomorrow and then my friend Chris down the road who lost her job last week and needs to apply for another and so must get the resume up to date. Their computer is so old, it won't open a lot of the latest programs.

Happy
I've had both music theory and appreciation. Have fun. In my early years I was majoring in music. It's still inside of me but I didn't pursue it.

Shad
Glad you are home.

Annie
I love the dress. You and C will be a beautiful couple on you wedding day.

I tried posting last night but it hung so I'll try again today. Woke up with a headache but I'm going to Paragould to eat lunch with my uncles. May not stay.

Have a good day.

Morning girls,

I think it's that time of the year when I get alot of headaches and somewhat strong dizziness and vertigo when I stoop or put my head down. I do remember this happening twice before. I think it's fluid in the ears or something like that. Comes, hangs around enough to be annoying for a good while and then goes away on it's own. Reasons like this I started a blog when I moved here - with the intent to document things like this so that I could keep track of stuff. I see I only made a few entries last year. Good on intentions, quite bad on the follow through In writing class they encourage you to write for an hour every day.

Last night we went out to dinner - yummy grilled salmon and fresh pineapple and some steamed broccoli. I also sinned and got a banana pudding dessert for take out which will be portioned to 3 servings. I have not had southern style banana pudding since I left Memphis so one dessert in 16 months is acceptable in my book. Came home and I watched the first DVD of Downton Abbey. I do like it except that the music is 3 times as loud as the talking bits I'm glad it's not heavy on the British accents - I did listen with my headphones on just in case I needed extra subtle listening skills. Not sure how I will swing season 2 from the library. There is a big waiting list but they have about 25 copies. I did get season 1 fairly quickly. I know I won't have time to watch it when DH has his procedure so I think I will wait to order it from the library right before we leave so that it comes in shortly afterwards. I could purchase it like Annie but I have to admit I have changed my spendthrift ways and am now choosy with my money. I save my money for garden books it seems

Well it appears that we have a former artist (Mel) and musician (Ceejay) on the team here. Quite interesting. How did you come to leave music Ceejay?

Shad - sorry to hear that Chris lost her job. Guess that's not limited to just this side of the pond. Good of you to help her out. Hope you get the baby pictures one way or another.

Mel you've been gone for quite a while. Missing you

Laura - have fun and a good workout at your exercise classes this weekend.

Annie - when is the wedding again?

Michelle - hope you make some progress on the resume / job hunting.

Think I'll watch another episode of Downton Abbey, then I'll make some lunch. We went grocery shopping yesterday - so nice to have some fresh berries in the house. Actually most of my grocery purchases were fresh fruits, vegetables and meat. Have a good weekend all...

Finally, I managed to download those pesky photos.

Seems upload and download mean something different to the normal on this phone.
I would say Jap Cr*p but it isn't Japanese.

Pesky phones.

Shad
What an adorable child! In fact she's beautiful. Grandma should be more than proud.

Happy
Not sure why I left the music except I find it hard to play in front of an audience.

Drove to Paragould today for lunch with the uncles. Had a good time as always. My aunt usually likes to go shopping so I took her to Jonesboro to J.C. Penny's. I bought 4 tops from the Alfred Dunner collections. But I didn't stay. I want to be in my own bed tonight. And it's suppose to be pouring down rain tomorrow and I'm becoming a wimp in bad weather of any type.
My new yoga exercise DVD arrived today. I did 30 minutes of the easy poses. Now onto to the bike ride.