Hmmm Ideas...

So apparently if I'm going to get a 2nd tattoo in November, I have to have some ideas...

This is the current one. On my back. I like the idea of keeping in the same style as that one but with a different picture...

This is a crappy paint version of what I think would be okay. (I had to use spray paint because I was having a hard time getting the circles right, but it would definitely be much more polished.) This would celebrate my unholy love of the mouse... :)

This is another idea. Just the regular mouse. Now either would be very small... Maybe 3 inches at the widest point... I can't ever decide where though. I like the idea of one I can actually see, but for those that were around for the original tattooing, there are limits. It can't be anyplace I can't cover with business attire and it can't be in a place that will eventually sag. (The other one is between my shoulder blades. Sometimes the antenna show depending on how low the back of my sweater is.)

Notice to Joanne

Every time Joanne comes to visit, we say we are going to go see a psychic but we never actually do it. Next time, when she comes for Thanksgiving, I think I want to go here for new tattoos. Joanne, be thinking about what you want for #2. I am going to get my lizard covered with a dragon.

R-E-S-P-E-C-T

It's really hard to look all professional and boss ladyish when you're wearing a blue terrycloth handtowel as a bib. But I'll be damned if I'm going to ruin one of my new shirts on the very first day I'm wearing it.

I shouldn't be left alone sometimes...

Stephen generously (or foolishly depending on your point of view ;) ) has left me with his car while he is on vacation. After I dropped him and Benjamin off at the airport, I took it shopping. And hoo boy did I shop. I bought a ton of new clothes at the fat chick outlet store. I saved almost 1/2 off on everything I bought. It was all replacing old or worn out stuff... 4 new t-shirts, 3 new dress shirts, 2 new bras, 4 new pairs of socks, and 1 denim skirt. (Ok the skirt isn't replacing anything, I just liked it. :) )

After that I tried to go to my GF bakery. Sadly they were closed. AND they do that thing that I hate... they don't post their hours. I hate that! It makes me so much less inclined to go there anymore.

I stopped in at Safeway as well. I needed some cheese and soda and apparently a huge amount of ice cream. :) Safeway has these little teeny tiny haagen dasz containers and little teeny tiny Ben & Jerry's containers. I bought 4 of the haagen dasz ones in chocolate and vanilla. Unlike my usual issue with buying haagen dasz ice cream, I actually managed to get the flavors right. Yay! I also picked up a pint of Mayan Chocolate and Mint Chocolate Chip.

Now I'm fighting the urge to stay up until 1 AM watching Grease 2. My love for this movie is completely unholy. I was just thinking of adding it to my wishlist on Amazon, but then I realized that the best way to watch Grease 2 is on those random times you see it on the TV. (Looking at the imdb entry for Grease 2, though, clearly the movie was a career killer. Michelle Pfeiffer seems to be the only one who has had significant success. Although the little sister went on to be a rather successful voice actress who voiced Ashley Spinelli on Recess and Moose on Pepper Ann - both are kids' shows that I LOVE!)

What happens if...

I was just sitting here listening to a song by Roxette and remembering the time I used to listen to it in high school. I had this terrible crush on a guy in the science club with me. (Ok seriously, how nerdy was I?!) He too had a crush on me, (I found out later) and actually had tried to ask me out but we were so damn shy and awkward I didn't figure it out and he didn't actually get right words out. I remember we talked about it later when we were both older (older being relative I think that we're comparing 14 to 17) and friends. He told me I shot him down and we talked about the conversation and I recalled it and realized I had no idea that was what was happening. The whole thought process made me smile. :)

Towels

I went to dinner tonight with my friend Stephen. He had mentioned that he wanted to stop and get towels for his step-mother for her birthday. Sure I agreed. I thought getting towels translated to how I buy towels. Pick up a set or two and call it done. The last time I bought new towels it was Target and I think it took me like 15 minutes total. We clearly had a translation issue here. :) He mentioned Macy's and we were talking about other places to go and I foolishly suggested Target. Now for me Target towels are all I really need, but for others they aren't so great. (And after touching the 40 dollar towels at Macy's I may almost get it...). So Stephen ends up going through almost every towel there. He buys, I believe, 5 double sets of towels. (A set of towels for this purpose is 1 large bath towel, 1 hand towel and 1 - 2 washcloths so 5 double sets are 10 of each thing). Some he's planning on giving to his step mother. Then we head over to Macy's. (Now you have to keep in mind that the whole time in Target we're bickering like an old married couple. Seriously, though, if you saw the colors of towels he picked out... you would argue too. AND he kept looking at those toilet seat covers. You know the kind... terry cloth and fluffy)

So we go to Macy's where the process starts all over again. He picked up towels. Looked at them. Matched them with other towels. We started out in one area where they were on sale and at first those were the ones. Then he looked at others. He'd pick up one color and match it to another color and back and forth. So he'd have all these sets picked out and then he'd wander to another rack of towels and the process would start over again. I was so thrilled when we were finally done.

Tangentially related... since we were in Northgate and the Macy's is near my health food store, I got cookie dough! The good stuff! Yay!

As Mickey is my witness... I shall never go back again!

So I got my new fancy pants wireless modem in the campus mail today. I have just finished setting it up. Oh holy hell is it fast! I can't believe how fast everything is. I can't believe what I used to put up with! :) So I am now a part of the 21st century. I am not even sure how to cope. I could download episodes of The Office if I want to! :)

In other news I couldn't give blood yet again today due to low iron.

And I saw the blind literally leading the blind today. While I was walking to try to give blood there was a man with the dark glasses and service dog and a woman holding his arm and she had a cane in the other hand. At one point one stopped and touched the face of the other.

This is how I end up getting so much take out...

I was walking home today after work and I thought I wanted tacos for dinner. So then I realized I needed cheese because I'm out. So then I thought hmm I probably should get chicken for my tacos because I only have bone in in the freezer right now. Then I thought I should get some hard taco shells for a change of pace. Then I thought if I'm buying all the parts for tacos and spending so much money anyway, I may as well get take out.

Bourne Ultimatum

While I read the book The Bourne Ultimatum all I could think was how on earth is the movie going to do this? In the book Marie (who died in the beginning of the 2nd movie) is alive. Conklin (who died at the end of the first movie) is alive and Bourne is in his early 40's I think. (Maybe 50's). I've never read the other two books to know how the other two movies fit the books but in this case I think the only thing they share is the same title and the same main character's name.

I'm leaking!

Or at least it looks like it. It was raining when I walked to work this morning and my rain jacket was here. I could've pulled out my Mickey Mouse rain poncho but I didn't think of it until just now so I just pulled on a hoodie. My boobs and shoulders are soaked. The rain just soaked right through my hoodie. Sigh.

In other news, I did have a Sunday adventure yesterday. But I have no photographic evidence since the EMP and the SFM won't let you photograph inside the building. I went to the EMP (Experience Music Project) primarily because they have a Disney Music Behind the Mouse exhibition going on right now. Otherwise I would've saved the $15 entrance fee. Here's what I discovered about the EMP... I don't really care about how music is made. I like music. I like live music. I like listening to music. But all the behind the scenes stuff.. mostly not interested. I did enjoy the Northwest Alley because it was all about artists from this area - besides Kurt Cobain and Eddie Vedder who also were featured - It was interesting to discover that the Kingsmen who did that song, Louie Louie were from the area. It was also interesting to read the FBI report on the song. :) But I dislike Jimi Hendrix. I'm not that overwhelmingly excited about guitars. I didn't play in the booths because well - 1 - I'm not an exhibitionist and 2 - I'm a terrible musician and 3 - the lines were long. :) I went into the story area and only listened to about 5 stories. Kate Pierson talking about Love Shack was interesting. Surprisingly Mike McCready talking about the song writing process - uninteresting. (Actually that isn't that surprising. Listen to anybody from a band talk about the song writing process and it is a whole lot of "Well we get together and jam some stuff and sometimes it works out and sometimes person X brings lyrics or person Y brings a melody..." Even Kate Pierson said something similar in her songwriting talk. (I listened to two of her stories - one specifically about Love Shack and one about songwriting. Love Shack was infinitely more interesting.)) Sir Mix-A-Lot was interesting. He was talking about Posse on Broadway, which I've never heard but then talked about Baby Got Back and how it was really a response to the waif look of the time. He had originally started writing a serious song but then realized nobody wants to listen to a song about bulemia. So there were some interesting stories, but there were kiosks and kiosks worth of artists and I listened to about 5.

Once I was done at the EMP, I headed across the hall to the Science Fiction Museum. I found this vaguely intersting as well. It was a lot to look at and that was fun. I loved the costumes upstairs. That was very cool! I learned some things I didn't know and saw some cool things like Darth Vadar's costume. So that was more fun.

Apparently I need to go back to Civics class.

(Did anyone else notice that the word civic is a palindrome? I just noticed it now.)

So today was the Seattle Paint Out and I went with a group from my employer. While I was out working on a sign, an older gentleman came over and talked to me. I made the comment that the legal grafitti really bothers me. And that the sign should've been taken down in 06 and didn't belong up anymore. (That's what I mean by legal grafitti... it did have a purpose but then nobody removes the signs when the time is up.) He makes the comment that they could check to see if the land use permit was still outstanding. And I commented that we shouldn't have to deal with this stuff, the companies should take care of their own stuff.

Little did I know that I was talking to the mayor. Whoops! :)

So today's Paint Out was fun but frustrating. They started late. There was no organization into groups happening. We had to come back at 11 (and we barely left the firestation by 10) for a photo op with the mayor. They were going to make us go back and then come back at 12:00 for lunch, but the pizza had been delivered and mob rule overtook the leaders. We ate. Then we went out for more clean up. In about an hour and a half we cleaned about 1 and a half blocks. Sad. But there is so much on those blocks. I'd have more success turning the tide.

I'm not 100% sure I'll continue to do this. I like the cleaning up part, I like making a difference but the disorganization of the events really overrule my enjoyment in doing it. I don't like standing around with nothing to do or not knowing what is supposed to be going on. (nobody does, I know.)

Celebrate!

It has been announced officially that I am the new manager. It is kind of exciting. (In case y'all have never noticed, I don't really believe things until they actually happen. Like when I go on vacation, it isn't really real to me until I'm on a plane.) It now seems really real. :) Although it will be REALLY REAL when I see the new cash in my paycheck. :)

To celebrate I bought myself a treat at the grocery store, some chocolate mousse. :) It made me happy.

My new employee has been in my office for 3 days so far and it is almost killing me. She's always there! (That's what's killing me, she's actually very nice and we seem to get along really well and all that.) Luckily on Friday and Monday my boss is out of the office so I can sit in my boss's office and leave her in my office (or the other way around).

Magic Kingdom Photos

So it has taken me forever to get around to posting the other half of my Disney photos. Here they are! (Aren't you excited? You should be.)

Mandy and Kayla on the ferry to the Magic Kingdom from the Transportation & Ticket Center.

The Castle! I love the castle. It just makes me happy to see it. Also, please notice how few people there are. It was really not crowded which surprised me quite a bit. Of course this was also at the crack of 9:00 AM and the park had just opened.

Which makes it the best time to ride Dumbo! We headed straight back to Fantasyland when we arrived and got to go on all the little kid rides right away with like no waiting for most of them. That was awesome because most of them don't have fast passes. (Although we didn't use any fast passes at the Magic Kingdom anyway. There were no lines more than 30 minutes.)

The Country Bear Jamboree is one of my father's favorite shows. I don't think it has changed at all in the whole time I've been going there. Since I was like 4. I can practically recite the entire show. That's probably wrong. :)

Kayla and I on the Speedway. The child should not drive. Really. Ever. Also I had to do the gas pedal because she couldn't reach it well.

Kay & I on the Big Thunder Mountain Railroad. This was taken while the ride was going. I like to take pictures like that.

And one of my sister also while the ride is moving. Fun.

My niece tends to get picked out of crowds to do things. She got to do a show at Animal Kingdom the last time we went to Disney. This year she was chosen to learn from Captain Jack how to sword fight. The guy was good actually.
And here he is making his getaway.

Gluten Free bun! I asked for no bun and she offered the GF bun. It wasn't totally awesome, but since it was a GF bun for my bacon cheese burger it was awesome. Really. (Plus they cook the bacon in an interesting circle so that it covers up the whole patty and you get a bite of bacony goodness with each bite instead of the way usually when there's just two slices across the burger.)

While we were waiting for Kayla's food she totally fell asleep on my backpack in this position. That was totally funny.

The three of us in front of the Pals statue. I love the Pals statue.

Mandy and Kayla in front of the castle.

As we were pulling out there was a rainbow. See, our trip was smiled upon! :)

Camping with Stephen

Here are some of the pictures I took while camping. Stephen and I camped at the same place I go to with the girls, Cape Lookout.

Who says you can't have candy for breakfast? We had s'mores as an after breakfast treat. :)

Ben wanted to be buried in the sand. "Dig me in the sand" he'd say. Totally cracked me up.

Here's Ben climbing on rocks. He's quite the adventurer.

In the afternoon, after the beach, we went on the nature trail. It is a 1/4 mile trail that has all sorts of points. There's a map that shows each spot and there are letters to identify each spot. Ben had a grand time racing around the trail and finding his letters. We walked it 3 times before my need to pee intervened.

A cute little mushroom. "If you touch a milky mushroom..." I wish I could remember the words to the fungus song.

There is a word for what these two trees are doing. I forget it already. It is where 2 seeds start next to each other and they basically grow intertwined until one over takes the other. The dark tree is killing the light one.

The ball of plant at the top of this tree is called a fern ball. I just like how tiny this picture makes me feel.

There's a special word for the notch. It is where the wood cutters cut the notch and then put a plank into the notch to stand on while they used a saw to cut down the tree. Interesting that.

Little secret hidey hole. You know how I love those.

This tree fell over. I can't imagine what force it takes for a tree bottom this size to fall over. It was as big as me I think.

Fake hotdogs cooking. They creep me out. They didn't seem to cook the way I'm used to hot dogs cooking, they just seemed to get discolored. Please also notice my awesome fire. I bought fire starters from the ranger station. They ROCKED!

Ben took this picture at the Tilamook Cheese Factory. The factory always photographs yellow like this. I'm not sure what it is in the lighting since it doesn't look like that to the naked eye. You have to turn off the flash to take any pics because otherwise you'd have reflection of the flash off the glass. Ben was kind of fascinated by the factory.

Wiped Out

Today I started training the new person. It is exhausting. I talked the whole day long. But I think I'm getting excited about this opportunity.

This weekend I volunteered a lot at The Paramount. I volunteered for the Young Frankenstein show. Megan Mulally is awesome. Actually, the whole cast is really great. I'm not a huge Mel Brooks fan, but I found the show funny. Oh, it also has Andrea Martin who was in Big Fat Greek Wedding and she's hysterical too. This is a preview/premiere before it goes to Broadway. Also, it is so cool that Mel Brooks is in the audience. If you watch the show (here), you can see him dash to the side door during the intermission and just before the true end of the show. And I heard a little rumour that the guy who played Jack in Will & Grace was here Sat night to see Megan's performance. The true premiere is on the 23rd.

I also went into the office and got some work done. I sent out 3 boxes of crap to be recycled. They actually vacuumed my office last night! That never happens. :)

Freaking out

The new person we hired to take my job starts on Monday. I'm freaking out. I don't know how to be a boss. I was a boss once. The whole thing was weird and it was while I was working at Girl Scout Camp. So I was the boss of two camp counselors. (One of whom was Michelle's sister who at the time I wanted to kick in the head. Now I like her, but before... whoa.) Plus now everything is on me. I don't want to talk to a salesperson, I still have to. Something goes wrong.. me. Bad news... me. All me. Sigh. I keep thinking I'm not ready for this. I've wanted this, don't get me wrong, but now that it is here I'm freaking out. FREAKING OUT I SAY! (I'm neurotic, y'all knew that right.)

The bottom line is that I'm afraid she'll be better than me.

Instant gratification

Screw my 3 year plan. Maybe I'll save my money to go on this... Winter Cultural Tour China. (Although now that I've looked at the dates, I totally can't do it. That is smack dab in the middle of open enrollment and since I'll be the boss it isn't like I can just take a 19 day vacation. Plus who knows if I'll have 19 days of vacation saved up by then. Actually I do know. I won't have it. Sigh. But how awesome would it have been?! Someday I will go there.)

The reason this comes up... I got an email that was actually apparently a reply to all indicating that this guy wanted off the mailing list and never ever email him again. Are people unfamiliar about how to respond to an email without using reply to all? And also this was a list you had to opt in to be on so it is his own damn fault he's there. (Although if he hadn't apparently I deleted the email without even reading it and so I never would've known about the trip. Hmmm.... maybe I need to see if we ever offer something like that and if they ever need chaperones... ;) )

Lunch

I am so excited for my lunch today. It is kind of ridiculous. I'm having these huge deep purple grapes. They are so plump and juicy and awesome. And then I have some black forest ham and turkey and cheddar from Tilamook. And then for dessert I have these cinnamon crackers that I love. I kind of can't wait until 12:00. :)

Update: Even though I am now the boss of everything, I still have desk duty at 12:00. :( Oh well, I can at least eat the grapes while sitting there. :)

3 year plan

I have a 3 year plan. I am hopeful it will work out.

My boss has just decided to retire from her job and yours truly is getting promoted. (Go me go me go go go me)

So here's my current plan (which works out with my plan/hope of starting to adopt kids in 2 to 3 years.)

For the first year and a half I'm going to pay off debt. Thanks to the length of time I was unemployed or underemployed Citibank and AMEX own my ass. With the extra money from my new fancy pants promotion (did I mention there was the word "Manager" in the title? :) ) I can send all of it to one of the two and start paying down my credit cards. I'm already used to living on what I currently earn so that extra money, while nice, can be useful.

For the second year and a half I'll put all the money I was sending to Citibank and AMEX into a savings account so that I can build myself up a nice little down payment for hopefully a 2 - 3 bedroom condo. It won't be the whole thing, but still better than zero. :)

So then by year 3 I'll be poised and ready for project adoption to begin. Maybe my weird friend who believes in fate and things happening for a reason and there are no coincidences is actually sort of right. (Of course if I believed that I'd also have to believe that the 3 light bulbs that burnt out in my apartment in the past 4 days are also a sign. :) )