Wednesday, December 26, 2007

Merry Christmas, Mr. Potter!




Christmas this year was good. We spent the night at my mother in law's on Christmas Eve. I was planning on going up to my grandma's to spend the night with her and help her out, but it didn't work out. I got on the freeway near my house and there was some wind and a little rain. By the next exit (3 miles later) I had to get off b/c I was being blown all over and I couldn't see in front of me. It was like instant blizzard.


It ended up working out fine, though, and we stayed in my sister in laws room in the basement. That room has an interesting climate... it was probably about 50 degrees in there when we finally turned on a space heater before going to sleep. The heater probably brought it up to about 60 which was at least bearable. A couple hours later, I woke up sweating and stuffy. The heat had kicked on for the whole house, and the vent in her room had heated the room to probably about 90 degrees. We had to open the door down into the basement and the window before we cooled off enough to fall back asleep.


On Christmas morning, we had breakfast with Erik's family and played some games. It was really fun and breakfast was tasty. Then we headed up to Sandy and had breakfast again with my dad's family, which was also fun and tasty :) We played more games and spent some good time with the family.


We came home and made a chicken for dinner (we would never finish a turkey, hehe...) and then watched Spiderman 3, which we got from my brother. It was good, I'm glad we have the set of them, although it was also pretty corny.


So that was our Christmas. I had a Dr. appointment today and I'm dilated 1 cm (woo hoo!). They're going to plan on inducing me a few day earlier than my due date unless I go in to labor naturally. That means that in 2 weeks or less, all of you will have a new niece/granddaughter/daughter/godchild/friend's daughter. :D


Oh, and just so everyone who hasn't been pregnant knows, when they check to see if you're dilated, it is INCREDIBLY uncomfortable. It's part painful, part discomfort, and part annoying. yuk.

Saturday, October 20, 2007

Friday, October 19, 2007

My horrible Dr. appointment

Ok, so first of all, everything with the baby is fine and I'm fine and everyone is fine


Now, the reason that the appointment was horrible:


It started before the appointment. To make sure I'd be at my 3:20 appt on time, I was going to leave a half hour early at 2:30. Well I got a call at 2:10 that lasted for an HOUR. Normally my calls are 10 min long or so, but it is tech support so they have been known to last longer. Well by the end of the call, I was starting to worry and I called over to tech 2 since I couldn't figure out what was wrong, and I told the guy who answered, "Hey, I have a dr. appt in 20 min and if I leave right now I'll only be a little late... and I have not been able to figure this out and have been on the call for an hour. Do you think I can just delegate it to your queue and if you can't figure it out then you can leave it as an open ticket?" (this was after he had spent probably 10 min looking at it without saying anything... AND I had already talked to 1 other tech 2 who didn't see anything basic that was wrong) So this guy says, "I just don't know if that's a valid reason". And so I was like... "ok..." and sat there some more while he looked at it. I ended up escalating it to them, and it got fixed about an hour after I left.


Well that guy (who never pays attention to what I'm saying anyway, jerk...) made me cry... b/c I knew I was going to be late after that. I was about 5-10 min late to my appt and then waited in the waiting room for about 20 min. Then they had me go give my urine sample and weight and blood pressure. Everything was fine except it turned out I had a slight UTI (which I didn't even realize, so it can't have been too bad). I then went and waited for the Dr. in the exam room.


Well, he comes in and says, "So you had a bladder infection recently" and I said, "I did?" and I said that I usually drink 2 liters of water a day and no sweet stuff (because it usually makes me feel all bladder-infection-ey.) He looked me up and down and said, "for you... " and looks me up and down again and says, "yeah, for YOU, you need to be drinking 5 liters of water a day". So i was like, "ok, I will" (and I have for the past 2 days) :)


then he wipes the ky on the little heart monitor thing and puts it on my stomach for about 10 seconds and then wipes it off. He then looks at my chart and says, "your weight gain looks good, the baby's heart beat sounds good, blood pressure is good." and closes the chart and starts to move towards the door.


Then I pulled my piece of paper out of my pocket (I only had like 4 or 5 questions, nothing bad and it was on a small sticky note) and said, I have a few questions. He stopped in his tracks and looked at my paper and said, "It's amazing how much writing you can fit on that tiny paper" and I was like... "um..." and said, "ok, the first think is that we're going to florida in a week and a half..." And he immediately looks exasperated and says, "If we had known about this sooner I definitely wouldn't have recommended it" and I told him that they've known about it since I was 10 weeks, at my first appointment, and that the Dr. then said that it would be fine up until a month of my due date. And then he said, "well THIS one will be fine since it's already planned, but we don't usually recommend traveling in the last 12 weeks of pregnancy"


So I said, "ok, well I'm also supposed to be going to Denver to visit my parents for thanksgiving" and he said, "well we don't recommend traveling within the last 8 weeks of pregnancy". And I started to cry (of course, already having a bad day) and he said, "If you're gonna cry, I'm not going to tell you you can't go".


He told me to make sure that I got a "fly letter" from the girls up front before I left in case the airline asked for it. I asked him what it would say, he said that it woudl say that they had discussed the risks of flying in pregnancy with me and that I was ok to go. So I asked him, "what are the risks of flying in pregnancy (still crying...)" and he said, "No, it's risks of TRAVEL in pregnancy. I mean, if you're going to Florida, they're not gonna stop the plane for you in Tulsa". And he left it at that...


I also asked him what the braxton-hicks contractions felt like and how often I'm supposed to have them, b/c sometimes I feel crampy and wanted to know if that was it. and he said, "well I doubt you're having them b/c the baby is still pretty high" and that was it... didn't say anything about the crampiness.. which I'm pretty sure is fine b/c one of the earlier docs told me that as long as there was no spotting, it wasn't something to worry about... but I still wanted to know what to expect...


He asked if I had any more questions, which I did, but I was embarrased and didn't want to talk to him so i said no and he left.






So... Pretty much, I got no answers, and then when I left, I found out I had a bill to pay and had to talk to the billing people about it and just came out feeling like I could NOT afford to have this baby and feeling upset that I can't go visit my family for the holidays... and just feeling upset.


I'm going to call and see if I can talk to a dr. today... to see what they really think about me flying since I got no input from the dr. the other day and he contradicted himself and what the first dr. i saw at my first appt said... (it's a group of drs that are all part of the same practice)...


and that's why I spent the rest of the night upset and then finally Frik and I went out to get something to eat and then wasted time wandering around grocery store, which made me feel better.

Tuesday, October 9, 2007

2 posts in 1 week??

Crazy! I have to tell you though, we found a good vet and I was soo excited about it. I'll tell you first about our last experience with the vet:


So duke had an ear infection in both of his ears. This was about... 6 months ago or so, maybe a little longer. Erik took him to the vet, who before he even touched the dog, called in 2 of his assistants to come restrain him. They put Duke in a choke hold (or so erik says) and then the vet poked his little ear looker thing into dukes ear and saw that it was indeed red and that there was nothing inside of it.

He then asked erik if he ever scratches. Erik said, "Well he is a dog." and the vet said it was probably allergies, then. He gave Duke an allergy shot and told erik there would be some prescriptions for him at the front to give to the dog. The whole experience cost $90, and the worst thing is that the Dr. tells you what you need and then sells it to you, so he could sell you all kinds of stuff and you wouldn't even know you didn't need it.

so then about a month ago, it looks like duke is getting another ear infection. Just on 1 ear this time, but it's starting to get nasty and he's scratching at it all the time. Erik doesn't want to take him to the vet b/c it was expensive and the vet was really ridiculous. I started cleaning out Duke's ear every night to hopefully make the infection go down and it looked like it was getting better, but then it started to bother him more and he just kept itching it, so I finally convinced Erik to let me take him to the vet, as long as it was a different vet.

I called around to a few different places yesterday since I had the day off. The first place couldn't get me in until wednesday. The second place couldn't get me in until 4 in the afternoon, after erik would have already taken the car and gone to work. Then I called this place that was "Johnsons veterinary hospital" or something like that. I was asking the girl if there was any chance she could fit us in today, and she said that she didn't think so but she'd go check with Dr. Johnson (so the actual guy the practice was named after). She came back and said that they could see him at 1.

I showed up 15 min. early so that it would be more convenient for them to be able to take me whenever their schedule opened. I waited for about 10 min and then this guy in a pair of jeans and a flannel shirt opened the door and said, "why don't you bring duke back and we'll take a look at him". This guy is probably about 60 years old, and he told me that in his 35 years of practicing he'd seen lots of ear infections. He started talking to me about what might be causing it while he picks up the dog in his arms and steps onto a regular bathroom scale, then sets the dog down and again steps on a scale and punches the numbers into his calculator to see how much duke weighs. (71 lbs, by the way. This guy was a lot stronger than he looked, haha).

He then takes a long qtip and swabs some gunk out of duke's ear. He wiped that on a microscope slide and put some red stuff onto it and started looking at it under the microscope and tells me that he doesn't see any bacteria, just yeast and fungus. Much more scientific of a diagnosis than, "Does he ever scratch?"

He gave me some ointment, cleaned out duke's ear really good and showed me how to put the ointment in his ear. He also gave me some solution that he said to use once a week after the ear infection clears up just to keep it away. he said that if i wanted to, when it was gone, i could bring it back and they'd fill it up for a couple of dollars, or i could just go get a vinegar douche from the drug store and use that (sick, i'm douching my dog... my male dog...)

He also said that since duke's been scratching it so much (hi sear was all red on the back) he'd give him a shot to make it feel better which should last about 10 days. He said he wouldn't charge me for the shot. He also said that if I had any problems, they don't charge for rechecks, so just call them and bring him back in.

The total cost of the visit was $55: $35 for the check, $12 for the prescription, and $8 for the douche. Needless to say, I was really impressed by him and how much he seems to actually care about the animals and not so much about the money. Even if you buy the prescription online, it costs the same amount, so they can't be making too much of a profit on that.

so now duke is feeling better and I'm glad. If anyone is in UT valley and needs to know the name of a good vet, just ask me b/c i found one! :)

Sunday, October 7, 2007

The past month... and a half...

Well it seems like the only person who hasn't updated more recently than me is Wudan, so here it is :)

My mom just came to town again and we had fun. we got to see the grandparents a few times, went to my cousin's wedding reception where there was a lot of dessert, and watched conference. The parts of conference that I stayed awake for were good. I am sick :( and so took a nap through probably about half of conference... a little less than that, I guess.

Lately I've been really hot all the time. Everyone else can be shivering and I'm just starting to not sweat. It's annoying, but I could be putting up with worse stuff I guess. :)

Everything is good as far as the baby goes. We had our ultrasound about 2 weeks ago, and for those of you who I was too much of a bum to contact (which doesnt' mean I don't like you, haha) I am having a girl. Everything looks normal. i have a few pictures, but don't have a scanner so I'll have to get those posted later on. Hopefully Frik will take them to campus one of these days and scan them at the library.

Other than that, work is going well. I'm feeling more comfortable with the products we support and starting to feel like I'm at least as smart as most of the people who are calling in for help :)

Oh, we bought a new laptop. well, a used laptop. i like it. It's a little slower than our other one (it's 3 years old) but the keyboard and touchpad are 100% better than our old computer. They actually work, haha.

Well... that's about all for my update. I'm feeling sick... I got a cold and it's not gone yet, so that's frustrating, and hopefully it gets better soon. :) Ok, that's really it now.

Wednesday, September 5, 2007

A little sad, but mostly good.

So this weekend was good. My mom came into town and we cleaned up and played games (see Sukie's blog) and watched movies... The best thing is how much cleaner my house is now. Since we moved in, we haven't really had a place for everything, but mom helped me to find a place for a lot of stuff (mostly the kitchen stuff) and now it's so much easier to put stuff away.


Daxsaito came and helped put on some doorknobs and stuff, too. We also went up to my grandparents and spent some time with them on Sunday and made them dinner... and broke their sink. But it's fixed now, so everything is back to happy!


The thing that I'm a little sad about now is that yesterday, I decided to drop all my classes. You can defer for a semester at BYU (or a few years, if it's for a mission) but you can't defer for just 1 year. So that means that I'll have to reapply as a former student (which apparently makes it not to difficult to get in). It's mostly good... because for one, I would be 8 mo pg at the end of the semester, which wouldn't be comfortable in those little desk chair combos. Also, we'd have to take out more student loans in order to pay for me this semester since we don't have the money saved up (we were just unprepared this year). It also gives me more time at home (since I'm working 40 hrs/ wk also) to get stuff done and relax a bit and actually get some sleep. The thing that makes me sad about it is that I just have this feeling like I'm giving up, even though I know I'm not. I haven't not gone to school in the fall since I was... 4? Before kindergarten anyway. I came to UT to get my degree, and now I'm stopping before I have it. I fully plan on going back, too, but plans don't always work out (thus I'm still in UT 4 years after coming to get a degree...)


So it was a hard decision, but I think it's the best for my sanity. I just have to deal with the disappointment that I have that I haven't finished yet and am right now not doing anything to finish. I was seriously crying about it yesterday when I had to click the little "D" next to all of my classes in my schedule. Esp the one that Frik and I were going to take together.


Speaking of Frik, you'll notice that his blog is down. It's not because of inappropriate content like mom thought, but because he accidentally gave his IP to a customer at work and didn't want them reading about his personal life. Maybe I can get him to move his blog over to my server so that the chances of him updating once in a while go from 0 to... about 2%.

Friday, August 24, 2007

No more bum hurts!

Sweet, so I went to the dr after my "broken tail bone" started to spread and hurt all the way around my entire bum... and then yesterday when it started bleeding (not from my bum hole, but right at the level of my tailbone...) Well I figured that either my tailbone was coming out of my back or that this was something different all together.


It turns out it was never broken, but that I have a Pilonidol Cyst (which is kind of like a boil, and I think it's sick. If you want to read up on it, do, but I won't make you), and that there was an infection.


As I've looked around the internet, I've seen a lot of stuff where people, when they first have an infection or whatever, they think it's a broken tailbone, so I don't feel too dumb. :) It's good news, kindof. It means that I'll have to have surgery after the baby is born, but it'll feel better in the mean time as long as I can keep it clean and take hot baths every day.


You will all be happy to know, I'm sure, that I woke up this morning and felt no pain at all. I'm sitting on a chair right now that would have killed me before. I am happy, but also grossed out.

Monday, August 20, 2007

Anyone else ever had a broken tail bone?

I can't sit or lay down or stand... unless I'm very careful about doing any of the previous three and make sure I don't move once I get into a position that doesn't hurt. It wasnt' too bad a few days ago, but for the past couple days, my tailbone has been killing me. Tylenol doesn't touch it, and I'm not allowed to take any other pain relievers, so I'm just lost. I have to sit at work, but that's the worst thing to do b/c I have to lean forward in order to sit, and you can't do that for too long comfortably.


I was reading about how they diagnose a broken tailbone, and it said that they stick their finger up your bum and feel the bone and see if it moves. Sick. I know I've bruised my tailbone before, and that hurt in about the same place, but only if I leaned on it. I was actually crying yesterday b/c it hurt so bad... This was after all day at church on their less than comfortable chairs, so that probably contributed.


Does anyone have any suggestions?


In other news, I've got an appointment set for the 19th of September, when we'll have the ultra sound and be able to tell if we're having a boy or girl. I'm excited. Also just to see the baby will be exciting. I'll have to let you all know what I'm having sometime shortly after that :)

Tuesday, July 24, 2007

Ratatouille!

Went to go see Ratatouille (sp?) today with some friends. It was really cute! The show started at 10:45 am, and no one in the house set an alarm... I don't know why... so I woke up when my friend called at 10:30 asking where we were... It's a good thing we only live about 5 min from the theater. Had enough time to brush my teeth and grab some yogurt before we drove off. We only missed the first little bit of the pre-movie short (which also looked pretty funny....)


Yesterday, we put our doors back on upstairs. When we had our carpet installed back in may, we had to take off all the doors (including closet doors) in any where that the carpet would be going through. now 2 months later, we decided to put them back up and they look really good :). We switched out the doorknobs. They had those shiney brass ones that were popular when the house was built in the mid 90's (same as my parents have) which isn't bad, but we prefer the brushed nickel look. The old ones were also pretty low end when they were put in, so they were all scratched up and some were loose. It looks nice now with the new ones, though, and probably some of the old knobs are in better condition than a few at my parents house, so you guys are welcome to them. :)


We still have some boxes left to unpack... quite a few, actually... But we'll get there. One of these weekends, Mom has said that she'd make it over here and help us finish the unpacking. She's good at that kind of stuff, so I'm looking forward to her making it over here. We've also got a little bit of painting left... One wall that Suke started writing her name on and we never finished (hah!) and then some touch ups downstairs, and a second coat on the wall that leads up the stairs. Plus there's the kitchen that we have to paint, too... It'll be totally fun when we actually get around to it. It'd probably help if we both had a day off together some time...


Everything pregnancy related is going fine. I've started to get heartburn, which I've really never had... but it's usually avoidable if I don't eat pizza and stuff like that, and if I do, then tums will normally help... or a glass of milk... mmm.... I can also feel that I'm pregnant, now. When I lay down on my stomach, it feels like I'm laying on top of a lump or something, so I generally avoid that. Don't want to smash the baby and end up with a flat child... haha....

Tuesday, July 17, 2007

5 little monkeys...

So... We went to Costco today. It was a good time. As we were standing out by the car, loading groceries into the trunk (well, actually, I was watching FRIK load the groceries), I decided to be helpful and put something in the trunk. Well apparently the trunk door hadn't opened all the way, b/c when I leaned over, I hit my head on the edge of the door. It didn't hurt, but I was somewhat embarrassed. I looked at Frik and my eyes started welling up with tears as I said, "I didn't want to bump my head!". That's when my lips started trembling and he got a look on his face like he wanted to say, "You're not going to cry about this, are you?" but instead he just said, "Don't cry! it's ok!" And yes, i broke down for about 1 1/2 minutes.


I don't know if I can blame that on pregnancy emotions, b/c I've always been pretty emotional... but come on.... that was just ridiculous! It was kind of cute the way that Frik reacted, though. Hah...


Other than that, everything is going pretty well. We went to the Dr on Monday for my second scheduled appointment. Basically, like the doctor said, "no news is good news". Nothing to report on that except we heard the baby's heart beat again. It's a little slower this time, which is normal... but still about 150 bpm, which is also normal.


Work is also going well. I'm starting to understand more of what I'm doing. Poor Frik though, answering all kinds of dumb questions all day long. I feel worse for the people who I ask questions to when he's not there (every Monday), because as far as they know, I'm actually understanding what's going on and sending out good emails on my own accord, and then every Monday i suddenly become stupid... hah, it's not too bad, though.


In other news, Sarah is home from her mission. I've talked to her a few times. She sounds good. It's different being home of course, but she's pretty happy and everything went well. I'm in the process of finding her a place to live. The guy who was supposed to have signed her up for a complex near campus a few months ago fell through, so we're kind of in crunch mode now. Hopefully I'll be able to find somewhere that's not too far away and still somewhere that she won't be the old weird RM girl room mate.


Well, that's about it for my update. It's been a while, but that's all i've got for now.

Sunday, June 17, 2007

Quarterly Update

Anyone who's been over lately, or has read Carolyn's blog knows that we're still living out of boxes. It feels like we're settling in for the long haul, which is a really scary thought. I'm prepared for it though, I've already got plenty of excuses :) My #1 problem is that I have a hard time working unless everyone else is too. It's something really juvenile that I just haven't been able to grow out of.
The good news is, we actually made a ton of headway the other day when Scribbles came over. Maybe we need to bribe her into spending another day over here cleaning things up. I just hope that by the next time we move I'll be making enough money to hire some Oompa Loompas to do all the work.
Speaking of making enough money.. I've finally gotten around to applying for a promotion at work. To be honest, I probably should have started applying months ago, but I figured that if I were going to even have a shot at getting the job I'd need to actually believe I deserved it. So, about a month ago I decided I could do the job at least as well as some of the current Tech 2's. Shortly thereafter, a position opened up, and I applied. Sometime this week we'll be finding out who got the job, but if history is any indication, then I won't be getting the job. Historically, you have to apply about 3 times before you're given serious consideration. It sucks, but thats office politics.
In other news, Mario Party 8 is awesome, LOST is still the best show ever created by man, and season 4 of the 4400 has gotten off to a great start.

Sunday, June 10, 2007

Microwave

We installed our over the counter microwave today (and by we I mean Frik with about 20 seconds of my assistance). It looks nice, and It's nice to have the counter space cleared out. We actually have had our old microwave hooked up in the storage room b/c the kitchen has boxes and stuff all over it... so any time we wanted to cook something, we'd have to crawl into the storage to use the microwave. (the storage room is under the stairs with the Harry Potter type door).


Instead of unpacking all our stuff, we're getting used to living out of boxes. It's kindof ridiculous. We are starting to know which box all the important stuff is in. The worst thing is that we don't have any motivation to actually unpack. I decided that I hate moving, and that I'm only ever going to move 1 or 2 times again in my life... hopefully...


I guess not really much else to say. Trivia has been going well, for the 4 players or so that we have who are coming regularly. The winner so far is andreao. Congratulations!

Monday, June 4, 2007

Trivia for Funness!

I created a trivia game, thanks to Basilica at work. It should be fun, everyone who likes me, go to this site and register, and we can answer trivia questions every day.

You know you think it sounds fun...

Thursday, May 24, 2007

Firefly....

Your results:
You are Zoe Washburne (Second-in-command)
























Zoe Washburne (Second-in-command)
85%
Kaylee Frye (Ship Mechanic)
75%
River (Stowaway)
70%
Malcolm Reynolds (Captain)
65%
Dr. Simon Tam (Ship Medic)
65%
Derrial Book (Shepherd)
60%
Wash (Ship Pilot)
60%
Inara Serra (Companion)
45%
Jayne Cobb (Mercenary)
20%
Alliance
20%
A Reaver (Cannibal)
15%
Dependable and trustworthy.
You love your significant other and
you are a tough cookie when in a conflict.

Click here to take the Serenity Personality Quiz

Tuesday, May 8, 2007

Codorado

So we went over to good old Colo. for Chaelomen's wedding over the weekend. It was pretty awesome. We left here at the butt crack of the morning on friday and got in by 1:00, which was sweet. nice to have almost an entire day to hang out before the wedding. It was especially nice because I got to sleep for most of the ride over, and the time that I didn't sleep I wasn't driving so I didn't really have to pay attention.

We stopped at this sweet diner that looked like the diner from "the kid" for breakfast on the way over. I'll have to post some pictures of that later when I'm not at work.

After we got to Colorado, the girls all went to get a pedicure (sort of a pre wedding tradition for us, I guess). We convinced sukie (who lied about her ethnicity to the pedecurists so she could be a little vietnamese spy) to paint little flowers on her big toe, so she is totally girlie now. It's so much cuter than just a straight paint job.

We then went to a barbecue at Berserk's which was very fun. Got to see the little kids and spend time with Valkyrie, who I honestly do not know incredibly well, but it was fun getting to talk to her some and get to know her a bit better. The food was also good, and trex let me try his cheeseburger with jelly on it... mmm.... Thanks, spongebob.

The actual wedding day was good. It was good to see Chaelomen and MJ at the temple. They both looked very happy and there were a lot of people there to see them. we got some good pictures of all the family together, which we haven't done for a while. Of course Chaelomen and MJ had to be incredibly tacky and not even show up to their own luncheon... so disappointed... doing the unmentionable... sick.

The reception was also good. I liked the pinata. Afterward, The whole family give or take a few went out to lonestar and had dinner.

Sunday was good until we actually started driving... I went to drop of my dad's key for him at the church and couldn't find him in the building, so I left it with one of his counselors and left. About 20 seconds later, he called and so we turned around and drove past a cop who then pulled us over. I mentioned on Wudan's blog that this pulling over was justified, but completely heartless. The reason it was justified is because frik was going 11 over in a 25 zone... so pretty much way too fast. It was heartless, though, for several reasons: The street totally looks like it should be 35 mph, we were from out of town so didn't know that it was 25 mph, and when we got to the church (which is where we pulled in for the cop to come write us the ticket), dad came out and the cop totally heard me saying goodbye to him and that we got pulled over... So I think she should have let us off with a warning, but once again, the 11 over in a 25 kindof justifies the ticket.

It's funny how positive Wudan was about the whole situation... He was saying that we couldn't have a great weekend without at least one thing bad happening, trying to make the situation less crappy. His outlook was completely different when Sukie got pulled over, though... Maybe something about him having to pay the $100 fine is different than me having to pay it... :)

Then we drove forever and I felt sick the whole time. The nausea and cramping didn't stop until this morning, and i'm still a little crampy... I think I must have caught a bug or had a very mild case of food poisoning.

We did finally make it through wyoming... which was good. Went to af and picked up the dog and then drove home, opened the door, and collapsed on the bed (we didn't even bring our pillows in from the car).

Today Frik went and tore out the carpet from our new place. I'm excited, b/c tomorrow we get to go take all the lightswitch covers off and get everything ready, some taping off and buying brushes for our awesome PAINT PARTY!!! woo woo! I hope you all remembered about it, b/c it's gonna be totally sweet. :)

Wednesday, April 18, 2007

Does this count as a blog post?

I am Qui-Gon

Training

So my work training has been going well. I don't think I mentioned it to all of you, actually, that I got a job working for the same company that Frik does. I've been training for the past few days now on how to do some of the stuff that my brilliant spouse does every day. He's a smart guy, and the training has been pretty tough so far. I've been able to get everything that we talk about in class. I just hope I'm not holding us up too much asking questions.

I think we're going to get more in to UNIX stuff tomorrow and the next day. I am nervous about that. It's something that is more intimidating to me than any of the other stuff we've looked at so far.

Compared to the roaches project, It's much different (mostly in good ways). First of all, there's the pay and benefits that are hands down better than roaches. Plus, it's a lot more challenging and thought provoking. At roaches, we trained for 9 weeks on how to use 5 or 6 different kinds of blood glucose meters. Shockingly, though, most of them work the same. Here, we're covering tons of different product plans and how to use them... and computers in general are just more temperamental than a blood glucose meter. Plus, with roaches, if we can't fix it, we send out a new one. It only costs probably $1.50 to the company, including shipping.

It's kindof weird that out of the 160ish employees in this office, only 20 something are female. Most of the guys I've met so far have been really cool. I already knew most everyone on Frik's shift. Now I know 3 more who are all pretty nice guys. It's a new feeling, though, being completely dominated by males. It's not bad, b/c most of them are respectful, especially since this is, in general, a male dominated profession and a woman who is smart enough and brave enough to go into it does earn some respect solely based on her gender. I have had a few experiences that are interesting, though. Like people who do and don't hold the door open for me. I don't mean the holding the door open until you get a chance to grab it, but the grabbing the door and stepping aside until you go through. I can't really expect it one way or another. If they always held the door for me, that would be sexist... but if they never do, it's almost disrespectful... As for me, it doesn't bother me either way. I just think it's interesting to observe how they act. Like this one guy who I don't even know... I was standing in the hallway, and there are 2 doors into the break room. Well, he came out of the bathroom and burped and started walking towards the door that i was standing near. I had only seen him out of the corner of my eye, so we didn't make any sort of contact, but I heard his footsteps stop and then he turned around and went to the other door, even though he was already closer to the one I was standing next too. I don't know if he decided to just go in the other way, or if he was trying to avoid contact with anyone, or if he realized that I was a woman and didn't want to be embarrassed for burping, so he was hoping that I hadn't seen him at all... don't know, but like I said, it's interesting.

I have been having a good time though. I was playing with Frik's server today. Not doing anything big, but I think he's proud of me! :)

Woo Hoo!

Saturday, March 31, 2007

Thursday, March 29, 2007

Paint Party!!!

I know you all are super pumped for the awesome paint part that will be taking place MAY 12TH!!! do not miss out! we will have an exciting round of "tape off the trim" followed by a short break, and then we'll roll it all on. Then we'll buy everyone pizza.

Sound too good to be true? well it's not. I swear it's for real.

Seriously, though, any help you can muster up would be appreciated. we're gonna be painting our entire house (inside, not outside) and pretty much just have the one weekend to do it all in, so we'll need LOTS of friend power.

disclaimer: this party will not be taking place if for any reason the sale of the house falls through

Wednesday, March 28, 2007

Grass and Hail

or is it Hale... probably Hale, but now that it says Grass and Hail, i think that could be something symbolic and meaningful, so I can't go change it now. heh...

so it haled and snowed last night, and now it's raining. So weird... i don't mind it, b/c i know it'll all be melted in a few days. It reminds me of colorado snow, when colorado snows in march. It's pretty much gone already, so hopefully it'll be sunshiney tomorrow or the next day.

Also, we dug up some dead yellow grass that duke killed and replaced it with seed. there were a lot of places that had to be replaced. hopefully duke stops peeing soon so we don't have to replace any more grass before we leave. probably not gonna happen. It's a lot of work to replace grass. You have to dig out all the dead grass, loosen up the top 2-3 inches of soil, and then spread the seed and water it about 2x a day for 2 weeks. suck... oh well.

other than that, I just can't wait to close on the house... i can't believe we've got another full month before we get to start moving. once I get a free minute or two, we should really start packing up our stuff and getting it ready to move over.

Other than that, I had a paper on this book called, "No contest" due today. It's an interesting book. the main point is that americans compete too much and that if we eliminated that sense of competition, we would be a better society. it's very idealistic, and more than slightly socialistic... but interesting none the less. We apparently have a created scarcity in our society. We are always trying to be the best, when we really can just concentrate on being good. It's hard to explain, but before i read the book, i thought it would be interesting and have a lot of good points... i guess i thought I would be in favor of what is presented in the book... but after reading it and how poorly the auther supports his views, I feel more republican than ever. No more taxes!!! (heh...ahem...)

Maybe this post really is about grass and hail...

Friday, March 23, 2007

Promises, Promises...

Ok, so every week may be a bit too ambitious for me, especially since i don't really have anything interesting to write about....

I've been planning Meryl's baby shower for the past little while now. Sent out invitations and all. The thing is, the RSVP number I put on the invitation is my home number, which we have disconnected, so I hope everyone is coming... heh... oh well. Other than that, we've got everything ready. I've got food and... food... and games and it'll be pretty fun. Tomorrow (Saturday) at 1 at my house, for those of you who don't know.

So... I'm still at work. I did a bunch of homework today. that was good. It's always a good feeling when you catch up or actually stay ahead of all the work that there is to do.

Other than that, i really have nothing to say. I apologize for being so boring. Maybe I'll write a little about the shower tomorrow. :)

Thursday, February 22, 2007

Ok, ok...

I guess I'll post again. :)


Sorry it's been so long. I have been so busy, not that it takes long to type something up.


I promise I'll update at least once a week from now on.


So for those who do not know, which is probably most of you, we are buying a townhouse. We put the offer on it yesterday, and it was accepted, so now we wait for all the stuff to be done. We're not moving until May--we close on the 30th of april--so that give all of you PLENTY of time to get pto and come help us! hee hee...


seriously, though. We are going to paint and put down new carpet. I'm thinking we'll have a painting party, just invite everyone we know and then we can all work and we'll provide food. It'll be cool, right? Otherwise, it'll take us forever.


We've been looking around at carpet and flooring and we found some really nice hardwood floor for way cheaper than it should be. it was at a scrap place, where they sell the stuff that they don't have enough to let people order from, but there's enough to do at least a few rooms. This hardwood is the traditional 1 inch thick style, and it's a good color. we compared the prices to those that would be ordered from other stores, and it's about 1/2-1/3 of the price. We're gonna put it down in the dining room.


Then we'll do carpet for the rest of the house, and Erik wants to do some tile in the kitchen and entry way. We'll stick with vinyl in the bathrooms. We have a $2000 allowance from the owners, which we could have just taken off of the price, but we wanted the allowance. That allowance won't pay for everything, of course... but it's gonna cover the majority. and it will cover more if we don't do the tile :)


Does vinyl hold up well in all of your kitchens? I know that at my parents house, our linoleum looked fine. nothing tore or anything, and we've had the current linoleum there for probably 10 years... But Erik says their linoleum got tears and cuts and stuff like that all over... I'm wondering what the difference is, b/c we had 6 kids walking all over and dropping stuff on our linoleum, too...


Anyway, though... I'm at work, on break, so I better get back. Adios muchacos/muchachas!

Tuesday, February 13, 2007

Google Docs and Spreadsheets is awesome!

everyone try it.
make a table
if you want to
or if you don't
you don't have to.

Tuesday, January 23, 2007

Hello world!

Welcome to WordPress. This is your first post. Edit or delete it, then start blogging!

Monday, January 15, 2007

See ya later… Boyyyss


Good old Nintendo. Almost makes me want to go buy it again :)