8 posts tagged “tv”

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!

Am I the only female alive who has absolutely no use for Sex and the City, either the TV show or the movie?  I mean really, I have to admit I've never seen it, but what is the appeal of watching women with perfect bodies be promiscuous and then bragging about it?  I guess if I'm a prude then I'm ok with that.

Hi!  Remember me?  It's Mello!  I'm back!

No, I didn't go anywhere.  I just haven't really had anything to say over the last week or two.  I've been feeling kind of like what I imagine a rock might feel like.....just sits there, stagnant, no original thoughts...just....blah.  Don't necessarily believe anyone who says that not being in school will make you less busy!  This has been a rather exhausting week.

Most of the week has been spent getting ready for a HUMONGOUS garage sale.  I usually want nothing to do with garage sales.  I used to shop them occasionally when the kids were little.  It's a good way to get clothes for them when they're at an age when they outgrow their clothes way faster than they wear them out.  These days, I just don't want to take the time to go to garage sales.  Most of them open on Fridays, when I'm at work - and I'm not about to sacrifice the only day I can sleep in (Saturday) to go look through someone's picked-over junk.

So why did I have a garage sale when I hate them?  Well, a bunch of us from my church decided to do it as a fundraiser to help raise money for gas to get all of the kids to and from camp this summer.  The math goes something like this:

2-3 large vehicles/camp session   X   400 mile round trip for 3-4 camps   X   gas prices over $3.50/gal   =   EXPENSIVE!!!

For the last several weeks we've solicited donations from the church body and we got a TON of stuff.  It just so happens that my friend Patty lives across the street from me and also attends my church.  The sale took place in both of our garages.  Patty had the household & furniture-type stuff, and I had toys as well as kids' and adults' clothes.  On Friday we planned to start at 7 am, but actually ended up opening the doors around 6:50 because there were people sitting outside at 6:30!!  There are some hard-core garage salers out there! 

There was a 90% chance of rain on Friday, but thanks to a LOT of praying, it only rained lightly & intermittently throughout the day.....and poured literally ten minutes after we closed up shop for the day. Today it was c-c-c-cold out there at 7 am, and business was quite slow.  It was rather miserable, actually.  We made a few sales, but stuff really started to fly off the shelves after we declared around 11:00 that everything was free.  :)  We figured the more they took, the less we'd have to pack up.  We'd declared from the start that anything that didn't sell was going to be brought to the Salvation Army, so we figured we'd make our lives easier.

At the end of the day, we'd made $969.00!!!!  If that doesn't pay for all of the gas, it'll come darn close.  And as a bonus, I didn't have to help clean up since I had to take Bailey to her soccer game (a very cold, ridiculously windy experience.  Bailey twisted her foot but was back in play by the second half).

In other news, we're getting DirecTV installed today!  We've been toying with the idea for years, but ever since we got the big HD TV, Brian's really been chomping at the bit and the other day finally just bit the bullet.  We currently have a bundle deal for internet, phone & cable through Charter, so we were a little afraid that cancelling part of that would cause the other components to skyrocket.  But Brian called and actually it'll cost about the same overall, so there was no reason not to do it.  The guys just got here, and I had to call Brian to get his butt home so he can "make sure they know what they're doing."  He wanted me to do it but I refuse to micromanage professionals.  Really, the only thing I care about is that it works and that it's done by the time the race starts tonight.  Woo-hoo - short track racing at night in HD!  I can hardly wait!

Let the remodeling begin.

Remember last spring (some of you might anyway) when I chronicled the building of our new laundry/mud room?  That was Phase 1.  I think we can officially say that Phase 2 is underway.  If you follow the above link and look at the first picture, you can barely make out the trim that surrounds the door into the main floor bathroom.  Currently, it's a 1/2 bath.  You can actually go through the bathroom into what's now an empty room (with the walls and floor partially missing now), the room formerly known as the laundry/storage room.  Eventually, the wall between the two rooms will come down and we will gut it all and build a 3/4 bath.  I say "we" - hah!  I'm just the designer.  I'll also be the painter when the time comes, and the stainer of woodwork. 

Does anyone have any ideas of how to keep sheetrock dust from taking over the house, namely my kitchen?

Oh, here's another question.  Would it be absolutely over the top if I was able to talk Brian into letting me get a small flat-screen TV to put on the wall in there?  I use that bathroom to get ready for work, and there's a TV in the adjacent kitchen that's tuned to Fox & Friends 7 mornings a week.  So I can always hear it; I just can't see it.  Plus the TV in the kitchen is distracting to the kids, because apparently it's impossible for them to watch TV and eat their breakfast at the same time.  Not to mention that when your son starts singing "Viva Viagra!" it might mean he's watching too much Fox News Channel.

We have the flooring (we bought enough travertine last year to use for both rooms - got a fantastic deal at Home Depot), the faucet, towel bars, sink accessories, and even towels (found a great deal yesterday).  My color scheme is going to be cabinetry in a darker/cherry finish (to match the rest of the house), natural travertine tile on the floor, and a coordinating tile on the shower walls (I think it's ceramic but it's got a nice look to it).  I have a Silestone picked out that we're going to order for the sinktop - it looks a lot like the travertine on the floors.  I think the walls will be a cream-dust-taupe color, something that coordnates with the cabinetry when we get it.  I got brown towels (I debated burgundy but eventually decided on a monochromatic look).  All of my fixtures and the trash can/soap dispenser-type stuff are bronze.  Even my shower door will be finished in antique bronze.  I'm going to have to special-order it, but for once I'm being insistent that I get what I want.  Usually Brian wants to do the prefab, bottom-of-the-line stuff, but if we're going to be in this house forever and eventually sell it, I don't want the main floor bathroom to look cheap.

New stuff is always fun.  Now I just have to live through the nightmare of getting there.  At least we have a deadline - August, when a bunch of girlfriends are coming to spend the weekend here.  I'm not sure yet just how many there will be in my house, but it's going to be more than one shower can accommodate, I'm sure!  And it'll be nice for us too.  Although my girlfriends are awesome, they're not the only reason we're remodeling....sorry guys.)  :)

New Shoes

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1 comment

I got these for $6.60 in the shoe room at Herberger's.  How much does that rock?

They hurt a little bit on Monday when I wore them for the first time, but whaddya gonna do?  They'll stretch.  I'm going to need surgery someday because I will have destroyed my feet from wearing high heels all the time.  The problem is, though, that most "comfortable" shoes look like they should be worn by my grandma.

New TV

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Brian surprised me with this on Tuesday night, after telling me we weren't going to get one, after telling me for months that we'd get one with our tax return.  He claims he did that on purpose; I think he changed his mind when I got mad at him.

It's a 46" LCD HDTV.  We don't have HD yet, maybe later.  Just for now it's fun to have it be big.  This TV replaces one that's about 30", and that one was taken upstairs to our bedroom to replace the 19" one that died (which is how this all started).  The new/old one looks pretty ginormous in our bedroom:

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New Number on the Scale

I'm happy to report that after 8 days on SBD, I've lost six pounds.  Brian's lost 11.  I have yet to see the weight loss in the mirror, but for now the number on the scale helps keep me motivated. 

What television show stands the test of time?

MASH

When I was a kid and my parents used to watch M*A*S*H (during its original run), I would get mad because I hated it.  The only thing I liked about this show was Klinger in dresses trying to get a Section 8.  The rest was stupid and boring.

Somewhere maybe around high school, I started watching it in reruns, probably because there was nothing else on (back then you couldn't get cable unless you lived in town so there weren't a lot of choices).  I started to appreciate the skillful and just all-around well-done writing, and of course the part of me that likes medical stuff liked that part too.  And the characters are great too, although Hawkeye sometimes got a little preachy for me.  There's just nothing bad about this show.

In the last few years, Brian has started to watch it with me too.  I think I've seen every episode at least a couple of times, and he's not too far behind.  (I'd love to get all 11 seasons on DVD someday.)  We love it when TV Land is showing M*A*S*H at night because we can fall asleep to it without having to try to listen, because we already know what's going to happen in every episode.  But yet they never get old.  That is the sign of great television: you can watch the shows over and over and you just never get tired of it.

I just discovered that there's a Vox group devoted to House MD.  I don't watch any of the "cool" shows like 24, Lost, Desperate Housewives, Grey's Anatomy, etc. (although I have seen Scrubs and The Office each a few times), but I do love House.  I don't know anyone in the group but hopefully noone will mind my being there.

Not that I don't watch TV, mind you.  We just have always tended toward cable, and lately it's been a lot of Discovery Channel.  We watch Mythbusters, Man vs. Wild, Survivorman, What Not to Wear, and Dirty Jobs.  (I have a mini-crush on Mike Rowe - I like a guy who isn't afraid to get his hands dirty and calloused.  Plus he's funny.)  HGTV is also a good standby.  But House is the show we make our schedule around.  House is so awesome - I think he embodies the way a lot of us, myself included, would love to act some days.  Maybe that's it: House is like therapy for me on those days when I really really want to tell someone how stupid they are, but am prohibited by social consciousness.

Video: Show us a TV series you own or watched on DVD.

Well, this is our newest acquisition:

They were our Valentine's Day gift.  (Yeah, romantic, I know.)  This show has always cracked me up, ever since it was originally on Fox.  It's not quite as off-color as the Simpsons, which I can do without.  It's just wacky.

We also have all 7 seasons of Star Trek TNG.  But we're not really all that interested in outer space or the future; it just so happens that 2 shows we really like are set that way.  Another collection I'd like to start working on is M*A*S*H.