First time east

Well, we're off to Virginia tomorrow and will be back Saturday. Alan's sister, Joanna, is graduating from college in Buena Vista (they pronounce it B-you-na not B-wey-na), so I'm going to attempt to say it correctly while there. Might as well say something right, since I'll probably get picked on for my Texas crap. But this is Virginia - they're not exactly accentless. The bulk of the trip will be traveling Thursday and Saturday, with graduation Friday morning. I'm not sure how Mormon grads party it up after the ceremony, but I'm thinking there will be no beer and margaritas on hand. Hmmm. It'll be good to see Alan's family.

It takes me ALL day to get ready for a trip. I have to think of everything I might possibly need and have to plan out every outfit. But what really takes time is I have this hangup about the house being clean before we leave. Isn't it the greatest feeling when you get back home, and everything's in order? I love order. The rest of the people who live in this house, not so much.

I'm on a winning streak

Update: I won again - a door prize in class last night. :-)

Picked me up a blue wooden rocking chair for the backporch from the auction Saturday. $15!! I spent a big part of Sunday afternoon and evening in it watching Alan mow and reading my book that I'm only 250 pages behind in. I'm 30+ pages behind in another book and can't read on airplanes without getting nauseous, so....oh well. Speaking of which, we leave the house Thursday morning around 4:30 a.m. for the airport. Nice.

Besides winning the bid for the rocking chair, I won a contest at a football game Saturday night. This was some arena style football game for which the Odessa Roughnecks are returning champions. Anyway, at half-time you throw these mini nerf type footballs from the stands out into the center of the field. The closest ball wins. I had my eye on my football the whole time and KNEW I had won. Actually it wasn't my football - this other guy from Oxy bought it but had to leave early. I'm hoping he'll do the right thing and split the prize, which is 10 free tickets to another game and some added treats I think. Yea, me. (The Oxy co-ed softball team is soliciting my skills, now that they've seen my incredible throwing arm.) So we had a good time at the game, since we managed to sit with some other Oxy folks that didn't mind making fools of themselves. By the way, went to Alan's softball game last night. Wow, they really sucked. But Alan did his part and was quite Andruw-esque in the field. Go Big Al!

Well, I've been up since 4:20 doing homework and am thinking it's time to go back to bed. It won't happen of course, but a girl can dream.

"Whadya give me fo?"

Alan and I have become auction nerds. They only come around every few weeks or so, so it's not anything that we can become obsessed with. Anyway, there's an auction this morning and I'm excited. It's even more fun when you're actually bidding, but I can be entertained by just sitting and watching, too. The auctioneers have their own language, like the phrase above. No need to have all the words in the sentence, just the necessary ones.

But the real fun is when you bid and you WIN - cool! It's like you outsmarted everyone, but really you were just willing to pay more for one man's junk. The smart people though are the ones running the place. They know how to get people to come back by making them feel important. They'll reserve seats for you up front with your name on them. They make you your own special laminated paddle with your name and bidder number on it, and when they see you coming in, they start digging for your paddle. I'm so easy to please. Just be nice and friendly, and I'll buy that old beat-up chair and shoebox of doilies.

I beg to differ

That's it - that's the phrase that annoys Alan that I was trying to think of a while back. I say it on occasion. I still think it's better than his "six one-half dozen or the other." It's even annoying to type it out! Speaking of the words "a while back," I've noticed that sometimes here in Texas it comes out as "a wall back." How embarrassing. I know I'm guilty of that. But here's one I've recently heard Alan say when talking about doing something quickly: "Okay, I'll get right on that toot-sweet." OMG. Trust me, I did not let that one go by. I said, "Alan, how old are you really, 89?" Who says that???

Time to head back out into the rain - it's awesome. We've had rain, hail, thunder, lightning, the works. Really cool.

Our progress so far...see previous blog for "before" shot

One of the nurseries gave us free sod because it was so dry. It should be fine after a good week or two of water - we hope anyway. We (mostly Alan) hauled about 1600 lbs of top soil and about 50 squares of sod today. So as Alan would say, it's Beer-thirty.

I had to post a pic of this little passion flower vine. I like how it wraps itself around the trellis, but maybe you can't see that very well. In a couple of months this vine will be all over the side of the porch and under the eave and will have these HUGE purple flowers. Plants are cool.

It's Summer!

Apparently we're going to bypass Spring and move straight into Summer. It's 90 plus degrees here for the next week. Love it! Alan and I both have today off, so we're going to spend it taking care of the large eyesore in the backyard. We have a 10' diameter circle that's been resembling a compost pile for far too long. Hopefully some dirt and sod will get our backyard looking decent before company arrives in May. (I'll try to take a "before" picture when the sun comes up.) By the way, my flowers that I planted from seed never surfaced. It might be because I planted them right beneath the bird feeder and the birds found the seeds. As if they didn't have enough from the feeder!

I was cured of my sickness this week by a hamburger. Perhaps it was a sign that I had taken things a little too far on my diet. I get a simple little cold and you'd think I had the flu. I was so run down for two days. So my body said, "Girl, you need fat and red meat." Yes!!! Alan took me to get a Texas Burger and tater gems, and within ONE HOUR I was a new person. I am now rethinking my diet and realizing it sort of needs to include some iron and protein. Duh.

Maybe I'm just in a silly mood right now from being awake since 3:15 a.m., but please check out this website sometime. When I got to page 3, I think it was, and saw the photo of Katie Holmes pregnant and read the blog, I laughed until I cried. Anyway, if you need a good laugh this site is awesome: www.thesuperficial.com.

Pity party

I'm sick. Feel sorry me - I sure am. At least I have taste buds back today. Last night the Nyquil went down without the slightest grimace from the taste. Could have been koolaid for all I knew. I have a paper due tomorrow on the Chicano movement in Houston in the 60's-70's. I just don't want to read or write about it. I can't put my brain around why I'm so not interested in their issues. Can't be a good sign.

Day 10

Yes I'm counting the days, because I don't want this to last more than a month or so. Drastically changing my diet is not something I intend to do for very long. I just like food too much. However...it's interesting how creative you can get when you feel deprived of something. I haven't been eating much meat, so here's something I came up with. You can take 16 of those small pepperoni slices (reduced fat ones, but I can't tell a difference), zap them in the microwave for a few seconds, and then throw them in a salad. 80 calories and 5 g of fat and yuummm! I think I should send this idea to the McD's and Wendy's of the world - The Pepperoni Salad could be all the rage. I've also learned how to work in certain must-haves like fritos and bean dip. The hardest thing to give up, although I haven't entirely, is cheese. You're lucky if you don't have cheese cravings. I welcome any ideas.

I hope I can get through this cold or whatever I have without binging. Something about having a cold makes me an even bigger pig than normal.

What's happening?!

I pride myself on staying mentally young. But something happened on the way back from taking Bailey to school this morning. I passed a newly posted speed limit sign and actually said to myself, "That's too fast." And I meant it and still do. Very sad.

Proud Mom

We need a little laughter this weekend and Junior stepped up to the plate.

So the concert was fun….I guess. Well, the music was good. Miranda Lambert is quite the rocker! And I have just two words to say about Jason Aldean – Hot Mamma. But between Alan getting sick and Bailey and her friend complaining about the cold and the cigarette smoke, it could have been more enjoyable. And good LORD – there is no shortage of sleezy, drunken, wanna-be cowgirls in Midland-Odessa. I wish I had taken the camera.

Addison didn’t make the dance team, but I couldn’t be more proud of her. She tried her best, and I'm amazed that she went through what she did. I was a loser in high school because I wouldn’t dare try anything, much less anything that required performing and being so critically judged. Anyway, it’s cool when your kids far surpass anything you ever did at their age.

Go Rebs

A little slow at keeping up with blogging this week....between writing lesson plans (don't I sound like a teacher already?) and playing taxi driver to a host of teenage girls, I'm happy it's Friday. The big news this week is that Addison has been going through a four-day tryout for the Midland Lee Rebels "Dixie Dolls." I'm not letting Addison know how big a deal this is to me. I would equate it to an alum Dad whose son is trying out for Rebel football. And although I don't agree with how everything was portrayed in "Friday Night Lights," I guess we do have this weird West Texas high school pride that sticks with you throughout life. At least it has for me. And I didn't even like high school after my sophomore year. Anyway...we should know the results late Saturday night.

Alan and I (and Bailey with her friends) are going to a Texas Country concert Saturday in Odessa. I'm mostly going to see Miranda Lambert, but Jason Aldean will be there too. Some other guy is playing, but his is the corny country stuff I don't like. Alan doesn't like country - period, so he's being a good husband by not making me go alone. :-) My favorite song of hers is playing on my myspace page: www.myspace.com/trsintexas. Turn it up!

Cha-ching!

The garage sale was actually kind of fun, not to mention profitable - $500! Of course most of that came from the next-to-new stove that we sold. It's now become a mission to see what people will lower themselves to buy at a garage sale. Last year at my parent's house, I put out a partly used container of toothpaste. It sold quickly. This year can't top that, but we did sell a half-used bag of cat food. And of all things that didn't sell - my set of dishes. No interest whatsoever. So off they and the other leftovers went to the Salvation Army. I couldn't get Alan to part with his nearly floor length suede jacket. It reminds me of something Sherlock Holmes would wear, except it isn't tweed. Anyway, it's still hanging in the hall closet and will never, ever be worn...unless it can be used in a future Halloween costume.

Passed my first certification test Monday and have one to go. Starting to see some light flickering at the end of that tunnel.

Ready to dicker

I couldn't sleep this morning and am hoping it's not because I'm anxious for the garage sale to start. How nerdy would that be. So I got up and went through cabinets trying to find more crap to sell - woohoo!! Looks like I'm finally giving my dishes away from when Matt and I got married. It's not that I've been holding on to them because of marital sentiment, but because they were my first dishes ever. And really -- they are adorable. I thought I was an adult then, but I was such a kid. Nearly 20 years I've been packing and moving those dishes around. The set is hardly a set anymore and there are chips galore. Feels weird to figure out a price for some things. But $7.50 it is!!

I pointed out to Alan that this is our first garage sale together. He thought it was the one that we had over at my parents' house, but that doesn't count. This is the first one at OUR house. We're still newly-married enough that we still have "firsts."

By the way -- it was bugging me so I looked up "dicker" on dictionary.com, and it's a real word and really spelled that way. Some words you don't think about until you write or type them out. That's when you chuckle.