Bzzzzt

Have I already said that I am excited about this weekend? People are visiting! The Goddess arrived this morning and everyone else arrives tomorrow. Woo-hoo! There is still much cleaning, food shopping, and beer purchasing to do, so I am not very interested in being at work today. Or tomorrow, for that matter.

Plus, I just drank a half cup of regular coffee (not decaf, like usual) and i am bouncing off my cubicle walls!

boing

Don't you coo at me!

Does anyone else think this is weird?

"A West Yorkshire hospital has banned visitors from cooing at new-born babies over fears their human rights are being breached and to reduce infection."

I hate unpacking and putting together furniture

Have you ever worked on a project that felt like it would never end and you get so tired of doing it you just want to throw all of your stuff away? Well, I have. And watching football at the same time doesn't make it better.

That aside, I AM SO EXCITED FOR THIS WEEKEND! Johnny's 30th birthday and housewarming party is Saturday night and I can't wait. There are some Philly-ites (?) making the 8 hour trek and we will probably have about 10 people staying at our house. It is going to be soo fun. There will be beer, kareoke, laughing, and hopefully no rain. Here's a weather report for you travelers out there.

Donovan, I have missed you

I went to meet my dad last night to see a movie at the $1.50 theatre and on my way home Johnny's car broke down. My phone was dead so I had to walk. I was going down the ramp, realizing that my chances of being picked up by someone not-scary were slim, when my wildest dreams (at the time) were answered by a very nice couple in their 60s, who took me to the gas station and let me use their cell phone. What a relief.

In honor of The Nicest Couple of All-Time, I feel moved to drink coffee and eat a donut at 10:00, the coffee hour!

For you football fans, we totally got the NFL Sunday Ticket!! They came to install on Wednesday, so now we have about 4 million channels as part of our limited-time promotion, including the Eagles! Whoo-hoo! We missed the last 2 games because people around here want to watch the Bengals, Browns, or the Steelers, for some reason. So now, Johnny and I can watch all the NFL Sunday action we can take. I can't wait.

I heart maps

I really love maps, and therefore I also love cataloging them. There are 2 map people here, but they also do Arabic, so my lack of language skills may or may not be a welcome break for them.

I was working on these mine maps and they often include the old map techniques which list ranges, section and townships of areas of the rural west. I had called something a range and Map Man was looking things over and kinda gave this haughty sniff and scoffed, "well. that does have sections, but" (here he actually snorted) "not ranges."
Catalogers are such a funny sort. We get all snobbish about our subject specialties (or language specialties) and talk about them in a certain way. I will think of a word to describe it someday.

Also related to work, here is a blurry photo of that weird being that lives in the shrubs outside my window. I think it is a woodchuck.

But don't you think it looks like a prarie dog?

Whirlwind

Thursday night I set out with my brother, sister-in-law and 2 nieces (1 and 4 years old) to southwestern WVa to visit my sister, brother-in-law and The Tiniest Baby Of All Time. She is precious and 6 pounds (just a little bigger than a small white dog I know) and slept, ate & cried pretty much the whole time. The 1-year-old niece looked like a giant ogre next to her. But a cute one.

We came back on Saturday afternoon and I learned that Johnny had somehow scored tickets to see The Kinsey Sicks , who are a "Dragapella Beautyshop Quartet." The show was incredible and very political and funny, which I always appreciate when packaged appropriately.

The next morning we got up early and drove to Pittsburgh to meet our former neighbors, the Goddess and the Man. We went to the Warhol museum, which I greatly enjoyed, and then to a diner, coffee shop, and some shopping. We found out that The Man's furniture business got a write up in Philadelphia Magazine's Home & Garden, which features a great picture of them and some of their work.

After that, Johnny and I went to IKEA (which is now a 3 hour trip away from our home, instead of about 5 minutes) and spent a bunch o money on curtains, a rug, a coffee table, and some other stuff I don't remember.

Today, when I went up to get my coffee, the Cafeteria Singer was breaking the 80s tradition by belting out a passionate rendition of "I Believe I Can Fly." I almost tipped her.

Fair Food and Foreigner

The Foreigner concert was so Freekin Fun. We went with our friends Jake and Leo and got there early enough to walk around and eat corn dogs, fries with vinegar, and caramel apples. As if that wasn't enough junk, we went in search of some popcorn, because it is the popcorn festival after all. We bought this $6 bag of freshly popped kettle corn that was literally the size of my right leg. We met up with my little sister and her boyfriend who offered to help us eat it and headed toward the Main Stage. I could hear people cheering and music playing as we approached. The first words I heard were, "Is everyone havin' fun? Does everyone have some popcorn?". I knew immediately that the show was going to be awesome.

There was a great crowd of all kinds of people (kids, parents, grandparents, bikers, us) and they played all the hits I could ever think of from my childhood. There was maybe one song that i didn't know all the words to, and during that song we went to the ATM to get cash to buy our t-shirts (which I happen to be wearing at this moment).

I recorded some of the songs with my phone and here is a sample for you fans out there. (.wav) You can hear us screaming in the din.

Here is also a very poor quality photo taken with my phone:



but you get the idea.

When we went to get the T-shirts, Johnny asked if they were vintage. Ha! The guy was like, uh, no. My co-worker asked me that same thing today, if I had it for a long time. I admitted that it was new and that i felt a bit like an imposter.

On the work front

I talked someone into putting me in charge of a project cataloging maps! For those of you who know how I feel about maps, you will completely understand how great this is. I just spent all morning with The Map-Guy and I even got my own tape measure. yay!

In Foreigner news, we are totally going. We are leaving at 6. I will try to remember to take my camera.

Juke...box...he-ro...!! I will completely have stars in my eyes. And popcorn in my hand.

Urrrgent, wait and see

Last week my mom told me that Foreigner is playing at my hometown Popcorn Festival on Friday. I totally want to go, it just depends on how early Johnny can get home and whether we have to keep up this blasted house painting.

Just think, I could be eating popcorn, drinking beer and swooning over these guys

while I ROCK OUT to a 70s and 80s hit parade!!

Oh man. Plus, mom thinks that they might possibly stay at the hotel where she works. I begged for an autograph, and if i get it, i will completely make it a major part of my blog.

"Ah, it's no big deal..."

That's what my sister said when I asked her about GIVING BIRTH at 12:30 this morning.

She is so funny.

She has always been laid back, and kinda "go-with-the-flow" about life, not making an affair of things that are really worth being excited about. My mom calls to give me the baby vitals (girl, 6 lb 11 oz) so I immediately called her up at the hospital.

I get her on the phone and in a little bit of a sleepy voice, she tells me about the schedule of events:
9:30 -- leave house in rural WV
10:30 -- get admitted around into hospital in town
11:00 -- go into labor
12:30 -- have baby

She didn't even have time to have an epidural.

I told her I was going to write about her 1 1/2 hour labor and she said, "No sense in messin' around with it, get in there, get it done."

I said I would quote her.

What about the bus?

So gas prices are on the rise, which wasn't a big deal for me when I lived in Philly, but here I think I go through about a tank every 10 days and I get pretty good gas mileage. I have looked into riding the bus to work, but it would result in a 1 1/2 hour ride that takes me downtown and then into the suburbs where I work. Each way. Today I wrote a letter to the bus company to tell them they needed to take advantage of the gas situation to expand their service. I offered to meet with a representative, so I hope they take me up on it. It would be really great not to have to drive every single place.

Our floors are now sanded and they are looking quite nice. The refinisher-man will be putting the first coat of finish on today, and the cats are locked in the basement. He told Johnny we'd be able to walk on it this evening. He'll do another coat tomorrow and then it has to sit a couple of days before we put furniture on it.

The weather is doggone beautiful. 80 and sunny all through next week! I am so glad that we have Monday off so I can start doing yard work. All the rain is going to make the plants really grow, so I want to intervene before it becomes out of control. What's everyone else doing this weekend?