Welcome to Nevada!

I finally got my Nevada driver's license and license plates this weekend. I got in the Information line at the DMV at 8:25am and walked out of there all done exactly an hour later. That was a lot faster than I thought! All went well except I had to cheat a little on the eye exam. My right eye is so bad I didn't see the final box of letters that I had to read. I read the first two and the lady prompted me to read the last one. Oops! So I closed my right eye and viola! There were the missing letters. I guess now that I have the DMV crossed off my list, I can work on getting myself to the eye doctor! Even though I am happy to be in Nevada, I am kind of sad about getting my new DL and plates. Maybe because I wasn't allowed to keep my old plates. When I moved to Virginia, I was allowed to keep my Washington plates. Oh well. I'm also a little disappointed that my temporary license doesn't have a copy of my photo. I know I had some stupid cheesy grin. I could tell. At least I have a way at work to look up my picture! I was facing some pressure at work (from one individual in particular) to get my stuff changed. So, is it bratty of me to not say anything and let this person discover the change on their own????

Going to New Heights

My old cat, D'Art (short for D'Artagnan), was the king of "perching." He would sit on top of the fridge alot, but his favorite spot was the top of one of the two armoires in my parent's bedroom. After getting in the morning to eat his breakfast, he would go to his "perch" as my family called it, and would stay there until 10:30am or 11am. Longer if it was rainy. Well, it seems that Mandy has found her perch in the house.

When I came home Friday afternoon, Mandy promptly showed me what she had been working on all day. She hopped up on the counter, the the fridge, then the tops of the cabinets, and THEN she hopped up onto the wall around the kitchen. I measured this morning and that wall is 9 feet tall! But of course my crazy kitty wasn't done yet! She then leaped across the hallway to the ledge by the front door. Mandy ended her journey in the half-circle window above my front door!!! It was at this point she freaked out a bit since she couldn't turn around to go back the way she came. She made a few leaps to the floor that really scared me. I was worried my Little Girl would hurt her leg or back or worse!! But she seems to enjoy herself up there!

I just know that the day I finally do have people over to my house, will be the day that Mandy decides to go to her perch ,and because she can, she will leap down onto someone's shoulders. Most likely the person who dislikes cats the most!!

I don't wanna grow up.....

So this weekend I went somewhere I haven't been in years....wait,....I was there at Thanksgiving. It was years before that though that I had been this place - Toys R Us (Please forgive my non-backwards R). I was there looking for a birthday gift for someone but thought I'd take a stroll around - for fun. I found Legos - I LOVED those as a kid. Then the board games. Trivial Pusuit with three levels of difficulty? Who wants that? Now the stupids of the world can compete in that game? Not when I'm around!! There was also the revamped Clue - two thumbs down on that too. Then I saw them. Little. Belgian. Blue. It was Smurfs!! I guess it is the 50th anniversary of the Smurfs. One item they had was a small stuffed Smurf that spoke when you pushed its hand. I find something terribly wrong with the fact that the first thing Smurfette says is " hey there boys!" The others say something like "have a Smurf-tastic day" or something else Smurfy. That just proves that Smurfette was the village bicycle!! Well, I'm guessing Brainy never got a ride. But I digress....I even found GI Joes and they actually looked like the ones from yesteryear. I think the Barbies were the weirdest. When did their look change? Not quite Barbie, not quite Bratz. And I even saw a Barbie doll with fishnet stockings! That didn't seem right! The only toy of my youth missing was Playmobil. I loved those more than Legos - probably because my brother couldn't control things as much. I wanted the old Victorian house SO BAD, but had to settle using my Fisher Price house for them. It was pretty cool though. It opened in the middle and locked so you could even carry it around. The garage door opened and closed and even had a working doorbell. But it just wasn't the Playmobil house that cost over $150 - in the 80s!!

This is the Playmobil house I wanted......

This is the exact Fisher Price house I had....

Tag! I'm it!

I was tagged earlier this week by Carol to post the 6th photo from the 6th folder of my My Picutres folder. Well, I too am super organized, and my folders are divided into subfolders. So I went to the 6th folder (2009), but there were only 4 folders (February, January, MLK Weekend, and March)! What to post? The 6th photo from the first folder has actually already appeared on this blog! So maybe the 7th? Nope. That's been on the blog too. Okay, I know - I'll go with the 6th photo I took in 2009. Well, it's kind of boring. I was trying to get an action shot of Mandy jumping for a toy and all I got was a shot of the carpet. Hmmmm....I'll go with the 6th photo from the 4th folder! So here it is!! I present my friends Diane and Dallas at lunch on St. Patrick's Day.

Chi-town Adventures - Day Three

I got up this morning and actually didn't feel too bad or hungover. The eyes weren't too bloodshot or really even red. I was still a little unsure of my stomach though and the fact that we'd be flying. I did not want an episode like my trip home a Christmas a few years ago where I got really, really, motion sick.

We found a place to grab a quick breakfast and then headed to the airport. Everything went smoothly there. I was a little worried as everyone was boarding the plane and a guy stops and my row and starts to place a car seat in the seat next to me (I had the window.) I kind of started to tweak out a bit. It didn't help when the guy made a little comment about getting ready for an interesting ride. Say what? Thankfully his little girl (who boarded later with her mom) was perfect! She was a little cranky at first after getting strapped in but once I got my headphones on, I was dead to the world!

I got home around 3pm this afternoon and to say that Mandy was happy to see me is a gross understatement!! I cleaned up her litter boxes and gave her some hugs and kisses before I had to take a nap! It's nice to be home but I think I am actually a little lonely after spending almost three days with two other people and spending almost every waking minute with them. That's even more than when you just see people at work! I am just glad that today is Friday and that I still have the weekend ahead of me to recuperate!!

Chi-town Adventures - Day Two

Today was the day of our meeting. We got to the office around 9am or so. It was just a quick cab ride from the hotel. We had stopped at Einstein Bagel for breakfast before the meeting but there was a pretty good spread there - coffee, doughnuts, bagels, water. The meeting was interesting to say the least. DB was getting fired up and for some reason I am always entertained when he gets fired up! But we were done by about 3pm. It was back to the hotel to chill for a while before going to dinner with a friend of DB's who works in the CHicago office.

We met up around 4:30pm in the hotel bar and watched some basketball. We were just waiting for the call from DB's friend. He had to go home first and switch cars before heading back into the city. We went to dinner at this really neat place. I can't remember the name though! It was an Italian place. We all got the pizza pot pie, which this place is known for. Your pizza comes to your table still in the dish it was cooked in, looking just like a pot pie! Then the waiter inverted the pizza on a plate so that it was like eating out of a pizza bowl! After dinner we hit the restrooms before heading out and I got a little nervous because the bathrooms were single rooms only. I warned DB that I have a penchant for getting locked in bathrooms. My fears did not subside either when I got in the bathroom and saw on the door a label saying "push to lock door." I'm guessing there have been problems in the past. I was worried because I kind of turned the locked as I pushed it in. But I made it out without having to call one of the guys!! I know I would never live that one down!

The Pizza Pot Pie.

We then drove to Wrigley Field for a photo op. before heading to a blues club. I have never been to a blues club before so I wasn't sure what to expect. All I could think about was that scene in "Animal House" when the guys take their dates to the blues bar!! Apparently, so did DB because he kept quoting a lines from that scene! This place was awesome! it was almost like two bars. Two bands were playing that night and instead of switching spots on stage, there were two stages and the patrons moved back and forth! I ordered a beer which caused some concern with the guys since I drank the night before. I was also ordered a second Corona by mistake even though I didn't really want one. But I drank it anyway - just slowly. At one point I made a comment to DB and ML about feeling like I was in the scene from "Adventures in Babysitting" when they end up in the blues club (in Chicago) and can't leave until they sing the blues! Then not 5 minutes later, DB's friend says the exact thing and calls me Elisabeth Shue! The guys tried to get me to go up in front of the stage ans dance with the lead singer since he was standing there. I got my picture with him but I was too chicken to dance with this guy. They were trying to help me create a "story" since I don't have any good ones.

Me and the blues singer.

The evening there was a lot of fun except towards the end of the night, I kind of felt like a third wheel. Like I was keeping the guys from talking how they really wanted to talk because I am female. At one point DB said something I really never wanted to hear him say - I have even blocked what it was that he said! - and he turns to me and says "ear muffs!" I almost felt like they were talking about me too. Things were fine and dandy until DB orders some greasy fish and chips. That combined with the fact that I drank more beer than I wanted to, made me get a little queasy. I only threw up a little. I get perfomance anxiety about puking in public places! I can usually hold on until I get home!! Okay, that was probably a little too much info for you there - sorry! Anyway, it was still a great night!!!

Chi-town Adventures - Day One

So for the past few days I have been in Chicago, theoretically for work. LOL! I left on Wednesday morning with two of the guys from the office. (They don't know about my blog so I kind of feel bad talking about them by name, so I'll use initials: ML and DB.) I of course had to get to the airport early because I'm not allowed to skip security like they are. But I entertained myself with free wireless access which was pretty cool. Most airports charge...anyway....we got to Chicago around 3pm Chicago Time. Somehow we took the long way to baggage claim because by the time we got there, there were two bags left on the carousel - the guys' bags! (I carried mine on with me.) We then got a cab to the hotel. It was right by the river which was no longer green. My room was really nice. We pretty much dropped off our bags and headed out to find food. We were all pretty damn hungry.

We walked around the hotel trying to find a place to eat. I can't remember if we got any suggestions from the hotel staff or not. We ended up going with the recommendation of some random utility worker on the street. Yes, just some random dude. He sent us to the Rockit Bar and Grille. I think it was a cruel joke on the out-of-towners! We started dinner with the Rockit Shrimp. Nothing special. Then DB and I had the angus burgers and ML had the "kobe" beef burger with date aioli and truffle fries. My burger was overcooked and the fries kind of sucked. The pretzel bun wasn't too bad. DB was kind enough to share his sweet potato fries with me though. I tried the date aioli - yuck. I tried the truffle fries - quadruple yuck. I had never heard of truffle fries before. Apparently they are french fries sprinkled with truffle oil. At least dessert wasn't bad - we all shared a hot fudge brownie sundae. I really just wanted the cherry that came on top of it!

The Rock It Bar and Grill - it didn't really rock.

After dinner we tried to go to the House of Blues but there was a private event going on and it also looked pretty dead. We actually ended up going to a bowling alley right across the way from the House of Blues. That rocked! I haven't been bowling in a couple years and am proud to say I kicked the guys' butts! DB had a slight impediment to his bowling. Let's just say he had an accessory on his waist that he was a little worried about and it wasn't his cellphone. It even made him take this cute little hop in his approach!! There was a jukebox and when your song came on, the video would be played on a couple big screens at the end of the lanes. ML tried to psyche me out with "Under Pressure" but it didn't work. I of course annoyed the guys with "The Final Countdown"! DB tried to find a favorite song of his at the jukebox but was accosted by a pack of cougars!! That was HILARIOUS!

10 pin bowling alley - now that place rocked!

The bowling alley also had the black lights on so it was kind of a cosmic bowling atmosphere, but not totally. I was wearing a sweater and a t-shirt and I was getting pretty hot so I took off my sweater half-way through the first game. Towards the end of that game or the start of the next, I was waiting for the pins to reset and noticed that my shirt was glowing in the black light. I thought, "that's odd, my shirt isn't white." It was at that point that I realized it was my WHITE BRA showing through my apparently thinner-than-I-thought t-shirt!!!!! The guys didn't' say anything and acted like they didn't notice and would have said something if they did. Somehow I am not buying that.....what do you think? I put my sweater back on but it was too darn hot, so I said screw it and eventually took it off for the rest of the time! After bowling we went back to the hotel (which was just across the street) and had a drink at the hotel bar before calling it quits for the night.