Ahh...The Good Ole Days

I'm still unpacking. We have everything moved out of my storage unit now, so it's only a matter of time before I get through all my boxes. I actually think I only have two or three more to go through, then it's a matter of getting everything put away somewhere. It's actually been pretty fun. A while ago, I posted that it was just like shopping but without having to spend the money. Kai asked me what I had found. So I decided to take a few pictures.

Once upon a time, when a little company named Pier 1 had all these cool employees working for them, and they were doing well in sales, they allowed the priveledged home office workers to have an bi-annual sample sale. This meant that you could get great imported things for super cheap. For example, any candle bigger than a pop can was fifty cents, and anything smaller than a pop can was a quarter. Anyone that buys candles knows that a good candle the size of a pop can retails for at least $15. So this was a super fun time. The whole office would plan to be there early. My firest year, I think Kai and I got up around 6 to be there for when the doors opened at 8:00, and we were still quite a ways away from the front door. (Supsequent years later, I got to shop the day before because I was part of the merchandising team.)

When the doors opened it was a mad dash for goods. You'd grab anything you thought you might like and throw it into your bags. I got a lot of great furniture for cheap. Here are some of the little things I got too.

These are cool candles, but I have no idea where I thought I'd put them in my place. Now, maybe I can use them in my guest bathroom or something.I

I love this thing. This actually was in my bedroom at my last place, but I thought I'd take a picture anyway. I think this was one of those things I found that no one else wanted or something, and I picked it up for fifty cents. I think it'll go in my formal living room once I get furniture for it.

This is one of those things I forgot all about having, and when I unwrapped it I was excited! It's a candleholder, and it will look great next to my downstairs fireplace.

This is a great score because, although I hate dead flowers (OK they are dried, but same thing to me.) I need something to brighten my upstairs bathroom, and I decided I'd do this with red accents. This will work! And I didn't have to spend any money! (OK, maybe it was a dollar or something at one point in time.)Once upon a time I thought I'd use these as trivets in my kitchen. My kitchen was going to be red and black. Now I don't know what I'll use these for. Maybe I will sell them on ebay. They are solid wrought iron. I also have two red candles that would go nicely. Maybe I'll sell them as a package deal.Funny. There are no bugs in Texas. So why the heck did I pick these citronella candles up? Humm... don't have a clue. Like I said, you just grab things sometimes. But now I will be taking them to the lake and burning them like crazy all around me.

I don't know. I grabbed these candleholders because they were cute and thought I'd use them as a gift for someone sometime. Now that I've found them again, I might use them in the baby's room for something. The biggest one is about 3 inches tall. I'm sure they'll get destoyed pretty quickly if I do that, but oh well, they were cheap anyway.

Things That Piss Me Off

1. Something is eating me alive while I sleep.
I have woke up the past two days with a new bug bite each day. The first one on my wrist and now one on my calf. They itch like crazy. As if that wasn't bad enough, I have been seeing at least a spider an evening since we moved in and have told my husband I bet it wouldn't be a bad idea to have an exterminator come in and spray since who knows when the last time that was done. He doesn't want to do that a. because of the money factor and b. he doesn't want chemicals sprayed in a house with a baby in it. He does have a good point for point b.

I also looked at getting those bug things that you plug in to your outlets and it sends some sort of current through your house and makes the bugs get out of the walls. But I'm worried that they would just get out of the walls and into the house instead of out of the walls and into the yard or wherever it is they would go that would involve not being in my house.

So what do you think? Get a guy to spray or not?

2. Fuckin' Air Conditioning
Now I know I will get sympathy from Kai on this one. (BTW, I am no longer linking to his blog because I started getting crazy spam comments on my entries a while back and I think it was b/c I linked to one of his posts. So you'll just have to find his blog posts yourself now.) I have a bi level house. The upstairs is hotter than the downstairs. We haven't ran the AC yet because it has still been butt ass cold. Until now. Last week it was nice so we hadn't turned it on yet. This week, a little hot. 85 degrees outside hot. Oh, I should also mention that most of our windows in the upstairs are on the west side. You know, the side the sun sets on. So in the evening hours, it gets pretty hot. Turned the air on Monday when we got home. It was 84 inside. We turned the air on at 76. It froze up and never did cool down the house. We thought it was because we were asking it to do too much right away.

Next day, turned the air on at noon before it got hot. Guess what? It froze up right when it needed to be working the most. It was 89 degrees in my upper level last night!!!!! The baby and I sought refuge in our lower level. This would all be fine and dandy if we had our couch from the other house down there already. But we don't. So I had to lug the not so comfortable little rocking chair from the baby room down there for something to sit in and rock the baby to sleep. I set the pack-n-play up in the guest bedroom, and we spent the whole evening down there. 5:00-11:00 when the baby finally fell asleep. We both slept in the guest bedroom. Don't know when DJ got home but he slept upstairs. I think he knew better than to disturb me because he knew I was pissed at the whole situation. Smart man.

Luckily though, we have this supplemental house insurance that we forked over $400 for. Basically, it covers things that could happen to our appliances during the first year of us living in the new house. So if our fridge goes out, we get a new one for free and so on and so forth. Of course it has it's loop holes. So I called them, and they are sending a guy out this morning. Hopefully they will cover the whole cost of repairs. I think the AC isn't strong enough for the size house we have. What I'd like to do is setup one of those windowless units in one side of the house to help offset the stress we're putting on the AC unit. We'll see what the dude says though.

3. UPS Can Suck My Ass!
You know, when they had that stupid strike several years ago, I thought "The hell with those selfish bastards." I didn't give them my business for a long time because I thought their reasons for striking were stupid. Then I started up again, because it was convenient for me. (UPS Store near my house.) I sent a box of gifts to my parents for their birthdays and mother's and father's day on May 11th. I spent $44 on shipping!!!! Guess who hasn't gotten their package yet? It's been sitting in Omaha since 5/22!!!!! WTF! If they lost my package, so help me God, I am going to kick some brown uniformed ass. And if it's contents are broken once they do finally get it delivered, I'm going to kick some brown uniformed ass some more!!!!

Checkout this letter they wrote my dad when he emailed a complaint to them.
My Dad's complaint.
This package has been just sitting in Omaha, NE. for the last month. I always thought UPS was better than the US Postal service. Right now you are looking to tie them....

Their comment.
Thank you for your inquiry. I have checked the status of your shipment in our tracking system. Unfortunately, our records do not indicate the reason for the delay of your package. Our records indicate that your package was last scanned on 05/22/08. Unfortunately, it has missed its scheduled delivery date. I apologize for the delay in the delivery of your package.

At this point, a package investigation is required to further research this shipment. We strongly suggest that you contact your shipper to initiate this investigation. Shippers are encouraged to report lost packages because receivers may not have all the shipment information needed to perform a thorough investigation. In addition, claim notification letters are not sent to receivers. All claims are settled with the shipper.

Fucking bastards. Like I have time to fuck with this! Guess who's gonna give me my shipping money back though? Oh yes. When kb gets pissed, she gets what she wants. Just ask my co-workers and a couple of my friends. They are amazed at how I can get things from stupid companies that screw up.

4. Suicidal Animals.
Karma's a bitch aint it? Well, I don't think I deserved this, but last Wednesday (my first day back to work from maternity leave) went just swell with the baby at the daycare, and me at work. What didn't go well, was the cat I totally splattered on the way home. It was terrible. I was driving down a country road singing along to Keith Urban or someone, and this cat comes running out right in front of me. I didn't even have time to think before I had splatted it.

But like I said. Karma is a bitch. In return for my inability to prevent this display of road kill, the cat demolished my radiator and punctured my transmission fuel line. All I wanted to do was get home to see my baby, so I just kept driving until I thought I couldn't anymore. Luckily my SIL was in the area and picked up the baby, then came and got me.

She told me that she killed a bird that morning too. The stupid thing was flying over her and suddenly just dropped in front of her hood.

Then, just yesterday (or was it Monday?) DJ and I were driving somewhere, and there was this bird in the middle of the road. It never moved. He thinks he got it. I think he didn't.

What is with animals these days? Does it have something to do with Global Warming?

Peonies!

Checkout my awesome peonies!

It may be hard to tell but that trunk is about 2 feet wide, and that vase is about 1 1/2 feet tall. So that's a BIG bouquet of peonies! I love my peony bushes! I've always wanted a peony bush, and I'm thinking these have been here since the house was built. They are hug blossoms! I'd say close to 6 inches diameter or more.

MY LIVING WILL

Last night my sister and I were sitting in the backroom and I said to her, 'I never want to live in a vegetative state, dependent on some machine and fluids from a bottle to keep me alive. That would be no quality of life at all, If that ever happens, just pull the plug.' So she got up, unplugged the computer, and threw out my wine.

She's such a bitch.

ha! My boss sent this to me this morning! It's Great!

Check It Out!

I found my old cell phone from college. I remember then it was one of the smaller ones out there. It was a limited edition nokia in "sea foam" green. I was so cool.

This phone was awesome. It took a lickin' and kept on tickin'. Kai, this is the phone that fell into the toilet that one New Years. I had to take it apart and lay it on the counter for three weeks to get it to work to get the phone numbers out of that. But after three weeks it worked again! Dang that phone was awesome.

BTW. The water was clean. Blue and everything. I hadn't peed yet.

$336

That's what I got on my last paycheck.

Well, at least I got something. I thought I wasn't getting anything. Thank GOD I have a big line of credit open, otherwise I don't know how I'd get through the next two weeks with no money.

Email follow-up comments to

Has anyone noticed this feature on blogger? It is great! When I make a comment, and I want to keep up with everyone elses comments, I subscribe to that post, and I get them emailed to me! It's great! I don't have to check back with the comments to see if anything more has been said. I love it!

Just thought I'd mention it if no one else had noticed it or used it yet.

I wish they'd offer an option to email people when you make a new post. If they have that feature let me know.

Are YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?!!!!

I ordered a JVC camcorder from Amazon. I've been eagerly anticipating it's arrival. It came today! Yippie! I open the box, and guess what? No camcorder! Some bastard in a warehouse somewhere probably stole it out of the box, and whoever picked my order didn't notice that the box was light. Or... I guess I could remain positive and think, "maybe my box was a floor model somewhere" and some bastard didn't notice the box they picked for me was light.

Either way. I was pissed. But now I'm happy. I've never had an issue ordering on Amazon, so I didn't know for sure how to get a hold of someone. They have a feature that says, "We'll call you", and then you can tell them when to call you. I told it to call me right away, and sure enough, my phone rang right away! Put me on hold for about 2 or 3 seconds and I got a nice lady that I told my issue to. She put me on hold, and in about a minute she was back online telling me she had put in a replacement order and expedited the shipping. So now I will get my camcorder on Thursday. I'm glad she expedited the shipping without me telling her to. So it's a good think Amazon has good customer service because I'd be PISSED!

Closet Space

Ho Hum... Woah is me! Maybe you didn't hear me. I said, "WOAH IS ME!"

I have no closet space. OK. I have some, but the closets in this place are terrible. TERRIBLE I tell you. I have no room for my cloths, DJ thinks he needs space in our master bedroom closet too, and there isn't enough space for a quarter of my stuff. I really wish I had Carrie's closet that Big builds her in the movie. That would be so wonderful. We could very easily build me nice closet in the living space in the basement. Who needs office and sewing space! I need space for my accessories!

I thought I could take over MG's closet. But she's already got quite the wardrobe building up in there, plus, I'm keeping all her diapers and whatever else is needed in there. So that's off limits. So it's down to the guest bedroom closet. I will have to think of some sort of rotational process between the two closets. I'm also thinking of getting a rolling bar like what you see in clothing stores to store some stuff in one of the rooms downstairs. Then, when I have company, I could just roll it out of there and into the garage or something temporarily....

Got to go, baby crying...

Sex Again

So... Sex after baby. Let's chat about that for a minute. I got the "green light" from my OBGYN at my 6 week checkup. I managed to stave off the deed as long as I thought I could without causing my husband to run off with another woman.

But let me tell you, what I used to enjoy has now because one big massive stress ball. Why? You ask. Well, because I had an episiotomy. It was not fun while it was healing, and now that it is, I am not interested in getting it back. So while my husband is happy as a clam, I'm thinking, "OMG! Is it tearing open?! Ouch! That hurts! I hope he doesn't feel like he's 'throwing a hot dog down a hallway' (Got that from Jenny McCarthy's book) and, "Is this going to be over soon?" Oh, and lets not forget the breast feeding concerns. "I sure hope he doesn't touch my nipples, because they are sore today. I also hope I don't spring a leak like I've read can happen sometimes."

So sex - at this point anyway - is no fun to me. I wonder if I'll ever find it fun again.

Phew. MG is down for the count for a while. She is not liking that I'm not picking her up. But I'm trying to prepare her for daycare. I put her in her swing hoping that she'd fall asleep, and I think it worked. I'm trying to think of all the things a daycare person might do or not do with her since she's got other kids to tend to. I sure hope this whole daycare thing goes well. I'm seriously freaking out about it. DJ has this cousin that worked at a daycare center for a few years, and she's really good with kids. I asked her if she'd move to our town to watch my kid. She said yes, but her husband wouldn't like that much. :o( Woah is me.

I finally feel like I'm getting things done around this house, and soon I'm going to have to go back to work. It sucks. The weather is finally looking good today (other than the wind gusts). I'm trying to decide if MG and I should try to take a walk, or if we would get blown away.

I'm looking forward to going back to work on a few levels. One will be that it's a controlled food environment. I only eat food during lunch, and maybe a snack if someone brings something in that is good. Right now, I snack too much. Even though I don't eat much for regular meals. You'd think that'd even things out a bit. But I don't think it is. I feel like I still have a sumo wrestler belly. I would love to have that mostly gone by now so I could at least fit in to some really cute shirts that I forgot I had. When I go back to work, I intend to start up my daily walks around the neighborhood once or twice a day. Before I got preggers I had a good little routine going that got me out of the office and losing a few pounds.

I found a pair of jeans today that I bought and wore once right before I got married. I have pictures of me in those jeans. I looked hot. Even though then, I thought I was a lard ass. I don't think I'll ever fit into those jeans again. I'm not even going to try. I am donating them to Goodwill. I wonder if I will ever look remotely attractive again. Especially since it's very hard to get out of the house with MG right now. I planned on joining a gym and getting a personal trainer, but the thought of being away from MG more than the 11 hours I already will be is way too much for me to deal with. Maybe I'll come up with something to do on my own on the weekends for a couple hours while DJ watches her.

Unpacking = Just Like Shopping!

DJ has been bringing me loads from my storage unit every time he comes back to the house with his pickup. When I moved up here, I put a lot of things in storage, knowing that I wouldn't have places for them.

Four years later. Opening boxes is like opening little treasures! I have found some really great stuff that I forgot I had! Great stuff that I got for super cheap when I worked at Pier1, and just other great stuff! I'm so excited! It's fulfilling my shopping needs without me having to go out and spend a dime! Which is really good since I will be without a paycheck this pay period because the last two weeks of my maternity leave are unpaid. :o( Or so I think they are anyway. We'll see on the 15th if I get a paycheck or not.

The Things I Do For a Burrito

Thursday I had a day to myself in Fargo. The main reason being my six-week checkout with my OBGyn. Guess what? He was a little concerned about my delivery. In fact, he had a FULL PAGE of notes regarding my whole ordeal. He told me that next time I need to be sure to tell him to look at his notes on the first one because apparently, he normally only administers one of many different types of medications to stop bleeding during labor. He then continued to tell me how he used every medication on me to stop my bleeding. So although it's unlikely a "hemorrhaging" trend with me and childbirth, next time he'll want to be better prepared with all the medications in the room with us. He also mentioned that he'd want to induce me earlier next time. Oh, and I'm supposed to make a smaller baby next time too. Yeah, isn't that an easy request? I found out a bunch of other interesting yet freaky information while I was at the office. All leading me to believe that childbirth really isn't worth all the trouble. Seriously. I'm also starting to think my mom wasn't really being as melodramatic as I thought she was being.

After I went running around doing a bunch of errands, all with the intent to eat lunch at Qdoba. I hadn't eaten breakfast because I wanted to be sure to enjoy every morsel of my burrito. I didn't make it to the big Q until 6:00. I was about to pass out. When I pulled into the parking lot, it was raining cats and dogs. But I wasn't about to miss out on my burrito now! Not after starving to death all day long. So I got drenched running in and out of Qdoba. But the burrito was totally worth it.

I L-O-V-E Amazon.com!

Who loves Amazon? I love Amazon!

Things that I can't find anywhere else, I find on Amazon. I went straight to the manufacturer's website to find some mosquito netting for my baby stuff (An absolute must in this frickin state), and the stupid website is out of stock of 2 of the 3 items that I want. So I went to Amazon. Guess who has everything I want? And guess who suggested some other things that I didn't even know I wanted? AMAZON!

Want to know what else I couldn't find in stores? Infant sun hats. Want to know where I found several? Well.... Maybe I won't tell you my secret.

Tomorrow I'm venturing off into the "big city" with my brave husband. It will be scary, but I think we will get through it. And Thursday, I get to go into the same big city all by myself. I'm totally excited about this! DJ will be with the baby all day long. Woo hoo! My daycare lady suggested that I bring the baby by for a couple hours at least so she (the baby) could get familiar with all the kids. This is a good idea, but I'm also sad and scared. I don't want to leave my baby alone with anyone. Even though I think this lady will be just fine. I just don't want to do it. I also don't want to leave her for 9-10 hours each day either. :o( The daycare lady is going to see my baby more than I do in a weeks time. It's so sad. Maybe I need to quit my job and be a stay at home mom. Who knows, maybe this whole kid thing will force me to implement one of my business ideas. Lord knows I can't afford to be jobless.