Goddess of the Pig Skin

We had a relatively quite weekend. Friday night we had a "date night" - we cooked fajitas together and watched No Country for Old Men. It was repulsive. It was meant to be repulsive. I think it should be labelled a horror movie, I found it much scarier than most movies I watch. I disliked the ending though, too abstract for me. I then finished The Unlikely Disciple: One Sinners Semester at America's Holiest University, which is a book about a liberal Brown student who goes undercover at Liberty University (created by Jerry Falwell) to see what it is really like on the other side of the political and religious aisle. It was very well written, the author offers a lot of insight into stereotypes, the purpose of religion, and many other things. I highly suggest it as a read. Then I started a second book, I stayed up late into the night then reading Sky Blue July, my book club read for nestie bookclub. I did not like it. It if wasn't a book club book I would have stopped 20 pages in (if not 2).

Saturday I read a lot more. I finished Sky Blue July and started a new book - The Remains of the Day. We spent the day laying around and relaxing, fixed the toilet, did some cleaning. Then, in the evening, friends came over to watch The Lord of the Rings: Two Towers, extended edition. While I had seen the movie several times I had not seen the extended edition. I was not as impressed with it as I had been with the first movie's extended edition. Unfortunately there were some added seens that did not follow, or skewed, the original book. But, overall I was happy because there was more ents and walking trees involved than in the regular version.

On Sunday, I was labelled the Goddess of the Pig Skin. We laid around watching football. I finished The Remains of the Day and then jumped back into the middle of Water for Elephants. The Remains of the Day is very good. Written by Kazuo Ishiguro. It is about a Butler in post-WWII England reflecting on his life and trying to figure out if it was wasted. It is very well written. I highly recommend it. We also watched football. During the Green Bay - Arizona game one of the announcers made the comment "Green Bay has not been down by 14 points this entire season." My immediate response was "That cannot be right, I want to fact check that. I would swear that the Vikings beat them by more than 14 points in the first match-up of the year," but because I had Hot Sauce all over my fingers (mmm. donatos wings), I did not fact check it. But, sure enough, 10 minutes later the announcer made the correction, that on Nov. 1st the Vikings had beaten Green Bay Packers 24-3. DH labelled me master of football knowledge and Goddess of the pig skin on the spot.

Now.... back to work.

Actually, I just want to tack on that I finished Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde today at lunch. I was surprised how short and insubstantial it was for a work that is so commonly referenced. I think its the case of an idea that is infinitely interesting to humans - the idea of alternate selves and such, but not good execution.

Handyman Klutz, Handyman Success!!

Last night I was brushing my teeth when I realized the toilet looked odd, the water level seemed really low, so I flushed. The bowl rapidly filled to near the rim. I grabbed the plunger and tried to plunge it with no success, the plunger did not seem to be getting a seal and just was not working. I called in DH. He tried the plunger with no success. DH decided to empty the tank of the toilet to try something out (I am pretty sure, this 24hrs later, that his motivation for emptying the tank was completely misguided, but I cannot be one to talk). Anyways, he wanted to empty the tank, so I was supposed to stand their holding up the floater so it was easier. Well, after about a minute of this task I stopped paying attention, pulled the floater too high up, snapping the plastic at the joint. Water started squirting everywhere. We frantically tried to push, cover, pull, then all of the sudden we realize there was massive amounts of water gushing from somewhere onto the floor. I threw a towel over the heat vent that the water had started to trickle down and DH turned off the water. While I towled up, DH tried to figure out where the water had come from, and whether there was anything else to do. We figured out eventually it came from the bowl. We emptied the bowl and tank as much as possible.

We talked about whether we needed a plumber or whether we thought we could do it on our own. I googled "toilet repair for dummies" and came up with this website: http://www.handymanteacher.com/plumbing-for-dummies.html
It offers a a video tutorial on toilet tank repairs, which we watched together and decided we could manage.

This morning we headed over to Home Depot to grab some supplies (think they would pay me for this advertisement). We came home, and together gave it a shot. DH did most of the actual assembling while I interpreted the directions and made sure we were getting every step. 30 minutes later, success!! We have an unclogged, fully flushable toilet that doesn't leak. I never knew I could be so happy and proud that a toilet flushed. Do I get a merit badge for this or something? Next weekend: The downstairs toilet that has not flushed properly since we moved in. :-)

Another Work Post

I left fifteen minutes early for work this morning because of all the hoopla about the weather. I got to work more than 15 minutes earlier than normal because there was no traffic at 7am and the roads were fine. I started work a half hour early. I get to leave 45 minutes early due to staying late on a different day. On top of that, we had a 2.5 hour meeting this morning which made time fly. The good thing about this is the day is passing really quickly. That bad thing about this is that I still have the same ammount of work I should have gotten done. But, I am becoming fairly laid back about this whole "having work left" thing, its just life here at the BDD.

I know there will be more and more work posts as I become more and more busy at work. I mean, in March and April I will not have a single day off, just 5-day week after 5-day week from President's day in February to Memorial Day. Hopefully I can keep my sanity.

I was going to post what I consider to be a funny work story, but I have found that what we consider to be funny in this job often is just sad to other people, so I will hold off. Hope everyone has a great weekend!!

Snow Isn't Bad

Snow isn't bad, its the Columbus lack of ability to manage it that gives it a bad name. Its not snowing that hard or that fast, the city should be able to handle it. I don't know what genius decided that plowing + salting should not happen until the storm is over, but its just plain ridiculous.

I love snow. Its so pretty and peaceful. Have you ever laid on your back in a snow covered field and stared up into the sky?

Forget the field, I have done this in my back yard and its almost as good. Close your eyes and feel the snow flakes falling on your face. Its so silent outside when there is snow, even in the city. I love it.

I know you are all sick of me waxing poetically about my love of snow but I can't help it, especially when I see so much negativity towards it. I know it can be inconvienent, even when it is properly taken care of, but the inconvienence is totally worth it.

Reformat?

I really want to give this blog a makeover, especially its layout. I would like to have a three column layout so that I can put a book list on one side that grows as the year goes on. I am not sure if this will happen, that is quite a bit of work and I have plenty on my plate.

Work is chugging along. I will go up to 40 cases today, and I am beginning to feel every addition. It is set up so they are slowly tightening the screws day by day. Eventually, unless I am extraordinarily quick at processing and talented, I will have 150 cases in my pending and be getting a new one for everyone I get rid of (up to three new cases per day).

That is all. :-)

Busy Bee Makes Time Fly

This was a three day weekend that went by in a flash! Besides the New Years Eve Party on Thursday, on Friday we did end up going over to a friends apt to watch the Rose Bowl (Go Bucks! Still can't believe they won!!). Then, Friday night my cousins C&K ended up staying with us. I spent Saturday morning with them - we went walking in very cold weather for recreational walking down at Whetstone and then headed to Banana Leaf (previously given excellent reviews on this very blog) with almost all of my cousins on that side of the family.

In the afternoon DH and I joined 6 other friends to go see Avatar 3D. DH and I were not that interested in the movie (ok, thats an understatement), actually we were planning to boycott the movie because the ridiculous hype and the high probability it would have no plot, until we found out my cousin C worked on it (yes, the same one who stayed that night at my house). He put helicopters into a lot of scenes, so if you saw any helicopters flying around upsidedown or sideways or something, it was his fault. Anyways, we saw Avatar. It was better than expected but still not great. It was indeed visually stunning though. I think the worst (and most hilarious moment) was when a giant robot pulls out of knife to be in a knife fight. Seriously?? 20 ft tall military robot with all sorts of armour and machine guns etc etc etc has a hunting knife in its belt?? Wow. Anyways, after that we went to dinner at a Thai place in Grandview, it was yummy.

On Sunday I finally De-Christmassed the house, worked on Christmas cards (yes folks, they are still coming), and then headed up to Mount Vernon to visit Grandma. I can't believe its already Monday again! And this is going to be a long week, since I have not had a fully week of work since Dec 18th.

2010, Here We Are!!

Its officially 2010. I am sitting in my family room watching Hell Boy with three cats and a big, sleepy black dog. It is snowing outside. Life is good.

We went to a friends house last night to hang out with some friends, play some board games, watch the ball drop. We mixed black russians and crazy russians and irish coffee and some tasty peach champagne drink. We called my family from the future. We came home and fell asleep watching Little Mermaid.

Farewell to 2009, year of three weddings, two graduations, one friends death. The year when I finally left school with no intentions of returning, when I got my first real job. What excitement will 2010 hold? We will just have to wait and see. :-)

Now, onto New Years Resolutions. Some people make them, some people don't. I understand the perspective of people who say that there is no reason to make a resolution for change on January 1st if you were not willing to make those changes days earlier. But, I think there is something to be said for it - not for January 1st specifically, but for setting clear deadlines, with clear start and end dates, for your goals. It also is helpful if these are widely accepted deadlines that many people agree on, giving a peer group of support for changes. Both DH and I are setting New Years resolutions. DH wants to run 1000 miles and read 10,000 pages. Both good goals. Here are mine.

(1) Get Organized!!! This is my biggest goal, and DH is on board. Lack of organization is a big problem for both of us, in many aspects of life. Neither of us are natural organizers. This goal includes organizing the house (the basement, offices, books, kitchen, garage, DVDs, etc), organizing the business (bills, mail, etc), and organizing time (appointments, phone calls, etc). I hope 2010 can be as much the year of organization as 2009 was the year of personal rediscovery.

(2) Cook More, Eat Healthier Here is another one DH is on board for. This was a goal last year as well that I had some success on, but was never consistent. Lets see if I can do a better job!!

(3) Reading Goal And of course, after how much joy reading brought me in 2009, I want to continue it in 2010. I have debated quite a bit what my specific goal should in. In 2009 I read 107 books, around 35,000 pages. Crazy to think I could keep that pace up for the rest of my life and still not come close to touching the entirety of human creation, not that all of it is worth touching on. Anyways, my goal for 2010 is to read 40,000 pages. I decided on a page goal instead of a book goal so I can get in some of those tomes I have been meaning to read forever - Les Miserables, Ulysses, and others.

(4) Grimmy Grim Give Grim more of what she deserves and get some exercise doing it - take her on more long walks. She gets walked twice a day but it has become very routine and relatively (for her at least) short. With weather permitting, I want to increase the length of her walks. Even in bad weather (below 20, above 75), I still want to make sure she gets one nice long walk per week. When the weather is perfect, 40-75 degrees, my goal is for 4 of her 7 evening walks per week to be nice and long.

Thats it!! Just a few... right? Should be doable. LOL. We will see.