45 posts tagged “school”

Today I Like:

     Charter will soon be gone from my life!

     Caribou Coffee

     Cool-looking, long painted fingernails of uniform length, despite the fact that they interfere with almost everything I do.

     Cherries….dark red, sweet, & juicy.  And on special at the grocery store.  Yum!

     Cottage cheese & red peppers

     Copious amounts of Diet Pepsi

     Cleaning supplies – from my Norwex party I got a free mop, cleaning cloth, body cloth, laundry detergent, and most of a jar of cleaning paste (as in I only had to pay for a bit of it…I am getting a full jar J).  I also bought some dryer balls so I don’t have to use fabric softener on my towels yet hopefully they won’t be scratchy.

     Cake…as in my birthday is tomorrow!  Not like I’ll do anything but it’s fun just the same.  I might buy myself this for a present.

     “C”-ing (OK, that was a stretch) a new number on the scale this week.  I’ve now officially hit the twenty-pounds-lost mark.

Today I Don’t Like:

     Logging on to my school email this morning and realizing that I have to take a final tomorrow!  It was on the schedule I got at the beginning of the semester but still it sneaked up on me.

     Lake cabin party for work that I’ll be missing tonight due to the aforementioned lack of planning on my part.  L

     Losing my Charter email address after tomorrow.  It’s hard to try to notify everyone when I get a new one.

     Labor – as in work, as in sitting at my desk today when I’d rather be at home studying or sitting out in the sun (or both)!

I just wrote a long post about my week and now it's gone.  Internet Explorer just completely flaked out.

Short version:

1. I'm exhausted.  It's been a long week.  Not in a bad way, just a lot going on.
2. Charter sucks.  Fortunately it will soon be gone from our lives.  I don't care if they offer it free, after next week we will never be Charter customers again.
3. My Norwex party went well.  I'm getting free stuff!  If none of my guests end up booking a party, I might book a second one so I can get a free mop.  (I can't talk about having a mop without thinking about Michael Richards' character in UHF.  Yep, the Weird Al movie.  Rent it if you want a mindless laugh.)
4. For the first time in a month I'm feeling semi-caught up on school.  I think it's because I'm seeing the light at the end of the tunnel.  Just a couple more weeks, hopefully, until I get a break.
5. Bailey came home from camp yesterday.  She had fun.
6. The bathroom remodel is going well.  Brian had the place gutted as of last week and Monday-Wednesday, the plumber, electrician, and ductwork guy came & went.  Yesterday Dale Earnhardt, Jr. came and hung the sheetrock.  Who knew that was what he did during the week?  I wouldn't think he'd need a second job, but whatever.  :)  Some pictures:
   

   Kind of a before shot

Who knew ten-year-old girls liked demo?

Gutted

Shower on the left, ridiculously big built-in linen closet on the right

Sheetrock'd

Brian's on his way to pick me up from work, so in lieu of doing actual work while I wait (as if), here's my lowdown.

• My main floor bathroom has now been officially gutted.  I moved out yesterday* so every morning for the next month or so I'll be getting ready for work in the upstairs bathroom.  I'm going to miss listening to my beloved Fox & Friends from the kitchen TV, but being as it's temporary, I think I'll live.  Construction was supposed to start tomorrow, but our contractor guy had to take an emergency call from some mutual friends who have some kind of hole in their basement wall with water gushing in.  I suppose that is more important at the moment than my bathroom.
• My little guy left for church camp this morning.  He comes home on Saturday.  I'm not worried at all about him getting homesick, especially given that he went last year so this isn't his first time.  He's going to have a blast.
• Speaking of Joey, we signed him up for 3rd grade football in the fall.  How funny is that?  How funny is spending $132 on second-hand equipment for an 8-year-old?  Ack!  Thank goodness for Play It Again Sports!  But he really wants to play.  He weighed in at 74 pounds.  I'm curious as to whether that'll qualify him as a lightweight or heavyweight.  He's neither fat nor skinny, but he's kind of tall, so I'd guess on a team of 2nd and 3rd graders, he might be among the bigger ones.  I hope he doesn't get pummelled.
• Speaking of camp, Bailey goes on Sunday - the day after Joey gets home.  Our church camp is about 4 hours away, and I get to be one of the vehicles in the caravan taking them up there.  So my Sunday will go something like this: Go to church.  Leave for camp from church, drive 4 hours.  Help get kids settled in and hopefully say hi to a couple of friends up there.  Drive back home 4 hours, hopefully with a stop at Trader Joe's while passing through the Twin Cities.  Get home around 8 or 9 and crash, all the while thinking I should do some homework before going to bed.  But I'm going to let myself not do any.
• Speaking of homework, I have so much this summer it's not even funny.  I'm wishing right now that I'd have taken a clue from Hannah and taken the summer off.  There are too many other things to do, like go to Joey's baseball games and try to get my house ready for some of my girlfriends to come in a few weeks (I apologize in advance if the house looks like crap when you get here!!).  One class has me reading government regulations, which I expect to have to do for work, but it's kind of depressing to have to do it for school.
• I'm having a party on Wednesday.  You know those parties where you send out about 7 million invitiations to everyone you've ever met, and about 3 people come because the goal of the party is to sell stuff?  Yeah, one of those.  This party is for Norwex cleaning products.  The best part is that she wants to demonstrate the products so I really don't have to clean my house!  Woo-hoo!  I need some ideas for quick, easy hors d'oeuvre that don't look like they were quick and easy.  Ideas?

OK, I got a call that Brian's on his way.  See ya!

*I mean I moved all my makeup & stuff out.  I personally didn't move out of the house.  :)

....that even though I've been behind on my homework pretty much ever since the start of the summer semester, I can't seem to find that kick in the pants that I need to just work and get caught up???  Logic would state that if I'm behind, I would work harder, but yet the more work there is to be done, the more I shy away from it.  What the heck?  Either there's something seriously wrong with me, or I'm not fulfilling the real purpose of my life...which obviously must be to just lay around all day and do (next to) nothing.

All right.  Must. listen. to. lecture.

Lesseee....pretty calm day today.....

I'm not liking:

• The fact that I need to listen to the second half of a 2-hour-45-minute lecture on things I already know for school.  I'm so tempted to skip it but I'm sure there will be one or two things in there that I'll need for the test. 
• Knowing I'm a procrastinator - I'm blogging instead of listening to lectures on things I already know.
• Running.  But I told Brian I might try to train for a 5K in August.  In the same event, he would run a half marathon.  He'd do the half with Erik and I'd run the 5K with Erik's wife Erin.  What on earth was I thinking, saying that?  (I'm tempted to back out so I'm writing about it here, which will require me to follow through.)
• Going back to work after a three day weekend.
• When the kids whine & argue with everything I say.  Grrr.

I'm liking:

• DVR.  HD-DVR to boot.
• Free tickets to a baseball game in June.
• Good hair days.
• Having my picture FINALLY get updated on the intranet directory at work.  My old picture was from 2003, and I looked forty.....which would be fine if I had been forty at the time.  I was twenty-nine.  The new picture is much better and less embarrassing.  I shudder to think that people would look at that old picture to see what I look like!
• Little-guy baseball starts this week.  I love watching Joey play.  He's not a bad hitter and also has a pretty good arm.  (Yeah, and I'm not biased or anything.)

I think that's it.  Happy Tuesday!

What I’m annoyed by today:

·      Cranky coworkers

·      Anemia – the exhaustion, headache, and coldness.  I’m going to take iron for a few days; eventually I should feel better.

·      My messy desk

·      Computer trouble that keeps me from doing my job and drives me to blog instead.

·      That the only color printer on this floor is under my desk and everyone and their brother knows about it and uses it, then expects me to drop what I’m doing and get their crap off of it.

What I like today:

I wasn't going to do this today (because if I do it every week I'll become predictable), but what the hey.  Here goes:

Today I loathe:

• Spending all day at work reading about FDA inspections.  I'm writing a mock inspection for our students to do as a learning tool.  Important stuff, but reading about the FDA all day sure makes me tired.
• That I slept horribly last night and as a result am quite tired today.
• That it's only Tuesday (see above bullet item).
• Being unmotivated to study for my coag final.
• Bad hair days.

Today I love:

• Red wine.
• The killer lasagna I have in the oven.  I can't wait to eat it!!
• That I fixed a door at work today.
• Long, painted fingernails, makeup, great shoes, jewelry, and other things that make me feel like a girl.
• The color scheme we've decided on for our bathroom.
• My kids.
• Spring - finally!  I'm even ok with those fabled April showers, as long as they're not snow showers.

That'll do it.  :)  Gotta go get my lasagna out of the oven.

I just got 100% on my coag test!!!

I ROCK!

Things I love:

• Let the demo begin!  Brian is using his spring break week to start tearing out walls for the bathroom remodel.
• Cinnamint tea from Caribou.  I think I've mentioned this before but it bears repeating.  If you appreciate herbal teas at all, you must try it.
• Healthy food that actually tastes good.  I made a killer lasagna last night with lots of veggies & whole wheat noodles.  I did use Italian sausage, though.  Even Picky Bailey liked it!
• My coag test this morning.  I think I did well!  It was easier than I expected.
• It's Steve and Janie's anniversary!  I love that they found each other.
• The B-52's have a new CD out.  I'm streaming it right now.  I'm only on the first song but I love it!  It sounds pretty much like their 80's stuff, which in my book is great.
• Raising Sand, a duet CD by Robert Plant & Allison Krauss.  Whoever thought of putting the two of them together is a genius!  One of my favorites is below.  I think it's actually used in a commercial of some kind.  (I'm not sure who that guy in the picture below is but if you click the video you can hear the song.  You will see pictures of RP & AK.  I had to link to YouTube because while I think I'm going to download the whole CD, I haven't yet.)

Robert Plant & Alison Kraus - Killing The Blues

Things I loathe:

• All the mess from the aforementioned remodel.  I hate sheetrock dust.  I hate it.  I suffer through because the end result will be well worth the hassle.
• Snow on April 1.  I only wish it were a joke.  I heard it's supposed to be in the fifties by Friday.  We'll see.
• Speaking of commercials, there's this one for Benadryl where the person can't sing at all.  I think it's intentional, like it's supposed to be cool or edgy or something, but it just comes across as tone-deaf.  I wonder if that means I'm getting old.  (Back in my day, people who sang could actually sing!.....well, not really.  Anyone remember Tiffany?)

Hey, how 'bout that?  The good outweighs the bad!

I knew it had been a while, but I didn't realize it'd been that long.  Wow.

Mostly I've been just doing life.  Work's been busy.  Last week a pathology resident started and it's my turn to train.  The first 2 weeks or so of our training make for some long days for the teacher, between lecturing, conducting lab, and preparing samples - not to mention the pile of stuff that's slowly accumulating on my desk.  Ten hour days with no time to blog or check my other beloved message board.  That is just not right.  The good thing is, my resident is doing really well, and when she's done with my training and is out on the "hot seat" she's going to make me look really good.  (Because it's all about me, right?)  I'm simultaneously starting the training for one of our two new people.  Yay for adequate staffing!!

Last week I had coag lab for a few days.  That was kind of fun.  I like coag - I kind of thought I'd hate it.  Not only do I enjoy the subject matter, it's also not very hard - which is always a bonus.

This weekend was Joey's birthday party.  He really wanted a bowling party, which was fine with me.  He and 5 friends got to bowl under blacklight for 2 hours, with a pizza and pop for sixty bucks.  Sounded like a bargain to me.  It got even better, though, because as soon as we got there, Brian ordered a cheese pizza from the bar.  Forty minutes went by and no pizza, so he decided to go ask about it.  I think they'd forgotten about it.  They said they'd put it in.  But then, about 10 minutes later, this guy comes out and tells us that someone had taken our cheese pizza, but they had this pepperoni one and if we wanted it, we could have it and they'd bring our cheese when it was ready.  Heck yeah!  So we got a bonus pizza out of the deal.  After bowling we took the boys back to our house for cake & presents.  They had fun.  The nice thing about this age is that you don't really have to entertain them....they kind of take care of themselves.  Like a bad mom, I didn't get any pictures. 

Birthday season is officially over in the G household - except for Joey's actual birthday on Thursday, but that will consist only of Brian ordering Pizza Hut as per Joey's request (I won't be there).  Our present to him this year is to redo his room, which won't be done for a few weeks.

Earlier that day (Saturday) Joey had been in a science fair for 2nd-6th graders.  It was just about the cutest thing ever.  I had volunteered to be a reviewer, so I got to talk to several kids about their projects and they really did some kind of neat stuff.  I even learned a thing or two.  It was all meant to give them a positive attitude about and encourage them in science, so they got all positive feedback.  Joey was just psyched when he read his feedback - he's already thinking about what he wants to do next year.

Joe science fair

Again, like a bad mom I forgot to bring my camera, so I had to use my phone. 

(For anyone interested, Joey tested pool water, faucet water, and distilled water for pH, chlorine, and hardness.  We made him read about hardness, water treatment, and pH so that he could speak intelligently to the judges.  We also asked him a bunch of questions that the reviewers might potentially ask him so that he'd be prepared.  At the end of the science fair, Joey said to me, "Mommy, they only asked one of the questions you said they would ask!"  Oh well, such is the peril of being the child of an educator.  But he learned something, and that was the point.)

Bailey went to Snow Camp over the weekend.  It was up at our church camp, which is about a 4-hour drive from Rochester.  My awesome friend Lisa drove Bailey, two of her own kids, and two other kids up there, stayed the weekend, and drove them back.  She didn't even want to accept any gas money from me - that's how awesome she is (but I insisted).  Bailey had so much fun.  He favorite things were tubing down a giant hill and playing blacklight dodgeball (doesn't that sound fun??).

So yeah, it's been a crazy week.  For your entertainment, here are a couple of examples of the dumb things I do when I've got too much on my mind.  Have a laugh at my expense.

• On Friday our cleaning girl (Lisa's daughter, actually) was supposed to come.  I, like an idiot, forgot that on the days when she comes, I DON'T turn on the security alarm.  The poor girl came in and the alarm went off - she didn't know what to do, so she freaked out and locked up and left.  She ran 2 blocks to the house of someone she knew and called her mom.  Poor thing - it scared the crap out of her.  She's only thirteen.  I felt like such a jerk for scaring her like that.  But I did talk to her on Sunday and she said (and I quote) "it's all good."  We're probably going to get a fine from the city because based on the footprints around the house, I think the cops came by.
• On Sunday, Joey had another birthday party to go to (one of three over the weekend).  It started at 1pm at McDonald's and church had gotten over at noon.  Both our church and the McDonald's are literally at the opposite corner of town from our house, so Joey and I went to the grocery store to kill some time.  (Brian had already gone home in the other car, which was there since I'd had to be at church early to help lead music.)  We went to Hy-Vee and got about $35 worth of stuff.  As the kid was scanning my groceries, I started to dig into my purse in search of a credit card, when I realized......I didn't have any money with me.  Crap.  Fortunately, Hy-Vee is all about customer service and they finished scanning my stuff, suspended the sale, and I was able to walk over to customer service, call Brian, and have him give me our credit card number.  They punched it in and I was on my way.  Duh.  Joey was five minutes late for the party.

Well, since this is like the longest blog post ever (I have a week's worth of stuff...and I didn't even mention it all!) I will close this out.  I have to go start packing anyway.  On Wednesday I'm leaving for Savannah, Georgia, for a conference.  I think it will be very fun - and MUCH warmer!!  I've never been to Georgia.  I always love to go places that I've never been, but I wish that Brian could come too.  I'll have coworkers, but there's just something better about going someplace new with your best friend.  I'm going to look for some peach wine for him.  We made some peach wine a couple of years ago and it was skank.  I'm sure there's some good stuff out there, and where else to find it besides Georgia??  Oh yeah, and we fully intend to go to the Lady and Sons restaurant (Paula Deen's place).  Butter & deep fried food....mmmmmmm........