Where did December go?

This month has flown by, and there’s not that much left and plenty to still do. The first weekend of December, we went to the Festival of Lights in East Peoria with my parents. Started with the drive through section and then we went to the section inside the Festival of Lights building. They had a lot of different decorate trees that were cute, but otherwise not much in there. Outside they were doing hot air balloon rides. It was tethered at 90 feet, but was still pretty cool. Not sure I’d want to go any higher. The rest of the weekend was spent doing decorations.

The second weekend of December was a trip to Minneapolis, Minnesota for Mr. B’s car club Christmas party. We went up a little early to go to Mall of America and got about half our Christmas shopping done. Mr. B also bought a bunch more work clothes on sale. We stopped at a few specialty stores and an outlet mall to get a bit more shopping done on our way home. The third weekend, we went to Madison, Wisconsin for a family Christmas party and to visit with the rest of the family.

The fourth weekend really started the Christmas frenzy. I finished with work for the year on Friday afternoon. Friday night we went out to get some of the last minute little gifts and gift certificates we hadn’t managed to get yet and bought some more Christmas decorations on sale. Saturday was spent wrapping presents, running out to get some stocking stuffers for Mr. B, getting all the various cards, and then we took a break to go see the new National Treasure movie. Pretty good movie. Definitely worth seeing.

On Sunday, we celebrated Christmas with Mr. B’s family. On Monday, Christmas Eve, Mr. B and I celebrated our Christmas during the day then celebrated with my family that evening. On Tuesday, Christmas Day, we went back to spend some time with Mr. B’s family and then had dinner with my family. On Wednesday, Mr. B went back to work and I started cleaning up around the house by doing a boat load of laundry and dishes. We then ran out to do some exchanges and also to buy a much needed DVD rack. Mr. B put that together last night and I got all the DVDs on it.

Today I rearranged the DVDs slightly to try and make the stand a bit more stable (more bottom-heavy than top-heavy). I also cleaned up and organized the four piles of magazines in the rack under the TV. I got them all divided and ordered and into 10 magazine files that we bought at IKEA while in Minnesota. I then had to rearrange a couple bookshelves in order to fit all the magazines, but also managed to pitch a bunch of stuff that will go out with the garbage tomorrow. In between all that, I managed to get more laundry done. Tonight we ran out to do a few more exchanges, but ran out of time before we got all our shopping done.

The last item is an attempted fix for our remote. The infrared LEDs are apparently shot in the remote and it’s no longer in warranty, so Mr. B is going to try to solder a few new LEDs in place to fix it. We’ve heard the necessary supplies are at Radio Shack, but we didn’t make it there before they closed, so that will probably need to wait for another night. *sigh*

So there’s been a lot going on, and a lot accomplished, but it still feels like I haven’t really even made a dent yet. How sad is that? And unfortunately, work is coming back around oh so quickly. Why do vacations always seem so short? I need more time I tell you.

On the Bookshelf #25

The Book of Clouds, by Carl Richter

This has got to be the oddest method I’ve ever come across a book. A little over a year ago, Mr. B moved…to the house next door. Their neighbor was moving to Southern Illinois and they rented the house for a couple months while Mr. B’s roommate worked through financing to actually buy the place. When they moved in, a family friend of the guy who previously lived there was temporarily renting a room, so for a few months, Mr. B had a second roommate. When he left to go back home, he gave them a copy of a book he had written that Mr. B gave to me to read since neither of them really read much in the way of novels or fiction.

I enjoyed the book. There were a couple spots where I guessed what was going to happen, but it kept me interested pretty well. Rather than try to summarize what the book was about, I’m just going to quote the back cover, or I’ll probably end up giving away something that I shouldn’t.

Danielle Moreland is a recently released project manager for a large corporation. When someone attempts to kidnap her son for an unknown reason, she turns to detective Chris Montrose, the son of an infamous father, for help. As the two seek to find the failed kidnapper, they soon learn of a large, all-powerful sect that desires Danielle’s son Michael for some unfathomable reason. As their investigation continues, it soon becomes apparent that they are no longer the hunters, but rather the hunted as The Order increases its efforts to gain access to Michael. Chris and Danielle ultimately face The Order, and it becomes clear that neither Chris nor Michael are exactly what they seem.

Color Me Impressed aka iPod Woes (No Longer)

I must say, the whole Apple service request went rather well. Last we left it, I had just dropped my iPod off at a DHL drop to be shipped to Apple. That was a Thurs at 6 pm. It was picked up around 7 pm and in Apple’s hands mid-Friday. Friday night, they diagnosed my iPod, and on Saturday, a new one was being shipped out to me from New Jersey. Checking the DHL site, it was supposed to be delivered on Mon. However, the ice storms or snow or something that went through that weekend caused some changes in that plan. DHL never updated the estimated delivery date on their site, which was also quite difficult to read given things were all out of order. It was finally delivered on Thursday, though no one was around to sign for it since in the morning it still didn’t appear anywhere near being delivered.

Since we were planning on going to Minnesota that evening, I called to make sure they wouldn’t keep trying to deliver it and would just hold it until I could pick it up. They took my information and said they’d call me when it came back in on the truck and they’d hold it for three business days. An hour later, I got a call that it would be available for pick-up in about 1-1/2 hrs, so I was actually going to be able to pick it up before we left. About 30 minutes later, a DHL truck pulled up and handed me my new iPod. Got no clue why, but I wasn’t going to complain.

When I opened it up, I had an iPod that was in very good shape. Couldn’t see any scratches. Can’t tell if it’s new, refurbed, or an open box type of used. So no complaints there. Except for the pains in waiting for the iPod to arrive, which DHL made up for by redelivering my package the same day, the entire process was quite simple and quick. And I’ve been using the new one for over a week now with no issues.

The best laid plans…

Yeah – they never quite work out the way they’re supposed to, do they?

The plan as it started out was to leave for Minnesota on Thursday afternoon. I took the afternoon off to finish packing and take care of a couple things around the house. Mr. B only had to work until 2:30, so then he was going to get cleaned up and come to my house to get his car packed quickly. We were going to drop my car off at the shop so it could have the tires remounted and balanced and an alignment done, since it desperately needed it, and then get on the road. We wanted to get out of town well before any of the weather hit.

Well, things started out OK. I left work on time. I got home and got everything taken care of around the house. At about 3:30, Mr. B called and said there was a change in plans. He was sitting in the middle of an accident on the Bob Michael bridge. Apparently a car had died on the way up the bridge from East Peoria to Peoria and was sitting at a dead standstill. He realized the car was going slow, but not that it was completely stopped until the car in front of him ducked over to the other lane at the last minute. He had a car next to him, so he slammed on the brakes and came to a stop a few feet from the car. However, he was then hit from behind and drilled into the car anyway. Then that car was hit by a truck. So the front and rear of his car is banged up. Apparently the back end of his car was a couple inches off the ground where the car behind was wedged underneath. It was still driveable, but he didn’t want to make a long trip in it since he wasn’t completely sure what all was damaged, not to mention the back hatch wouldn’t open because of the damage.

The phone call basically consisted of him telling me he was in a car accident and we were going to have to take my car. Never once said that he was OK, though I figured he was since all he was talking about was the trip. Well, he called the car shop, Goodyear in Pekin, owned by some friends of his family to see if they could get my car in to at least get the alignment done quickly. But I’d been worried about the tires lately cause I’ve been having trouble getting traction, so I was especially nervous about going further north and in the weather that was supposed to go through Thurs. night/Fri. morning. I hurried out to the shop, and they said my tires were “iffy” and weren’t sure whether I should go with them or not. Luckily they had the correct size in stock, so in an hour they had 4 new tires mounted and balanced and an alignment done on my car. They rock.

I hurried home and met Mr. B right as he was getting there. We threw stuff into my car and got on the road right as the snow was hitting (over 2 hours after we had planned on leaving). Unfortunately we were heading out the back side of the storm, right through the areas that it had already passed through, so it was slow going. It took us 3-1/2 to 4 hrs to go from Peoria to Cedar Rapids, IA – a trip which should have taken about 2-1/2 hours. We had taken the nationwide number of Choice hotels with us and called when we stopped for dinner to find out what they had in the way of open rooms along our route when we started to figure out how far we might get. After dinner, the roads had been cleared enough that we didn’t really have any issues, though we still weren’t going full speed cause there were a couple of icy spots here and there.

The only real issue we had was slightly before we stopped for dinner. We were driving through the Quad Cities along a section of interstate three lanes wide. Still not completely sure where we were at the time. Mr. B had been on the phone for a few minutes with his family getting weather updates and filling them in on the situation with his car. I was asking him to get off the phone cause it makes me nervous when he’s on the phone and the roads are bad cause I know he’s a little less observant when he’s on the phone – though he swears in that kinda weather, he’s fully focused on the road. All of a sudden, a deer ran out in front of us. Mr. B slammed on the brakes, we started sliding, luckily pretty straight down the middle of the three lanes, and the sound of the tires must have scared the deer away cause he hopped up into the air, turned right back around and ran off. It was at that point that Mr. B then remembered my car doesn’t have anti-lock brakes. It freaked me out pretty well, but otherwise no big deal. Mr. B did get off the phone, especially cause at that point, I was pretty shaky and was really giving him a bad time about being on the phone.

The next morning, we made the rest of the trip to Minneapolis without any issue at all – and at almost full speed. He was still taking it pretty easy on the roads just cause there were some bridges that were a little slick, though nothing big enough that we really had any problem with losing traction. The rest of the weekend went without incident except we nearly bought more than we could fit into my little car, but that’s probably another post…

I will never have another cat

I currently have a single cat. A 5-year old female. And, yes, I’ll never have another cat. There are times when I’m wondering why on earth I have this one. Why? First off, cat’s aren’t trainable, at least not by me. I’ve failed in just about everything I’ve attempted to train her not to do. Stay off the kitchen table and counters? Failed. Stop chewing up cords? Failed. I’m sure there are other examples, but at the moment, I’m not coming up with anything else I’ve attempted to train her on. And it’s not that she doesn’t learn. She knows she’s not supposed to do it, but she does it anyway, just to get attention. She will look at me to make sure I’m watching before she attempts to chew on the computer’s power cord.

For some reason, lately, she’s really into the mini-blinds. She dives between them and reaches up through them, though I have no clue why. Well, when she does this I’ve been shooting her with water from a spray bottle that I keep on the end table next to the couch. It used to be half water and half vinegar, but she always came over to the spray bottle trying to get a drink. After a couple weeks of not getting anywhere with this, I ended up raising the one set of mini-blinds up higher than the chair-back she normally sleeps on. All the other mini-blinds had long since been raised well up above this point. I still occasionally have to spray her to get her down from standing up on the chair and rooting around under them, but it’s a lot less painful for both of us. I sometimes wonder which one of us got trained in this situation.

However, just the other day she started doing this same thing on one of the bedroom windows. And since we’re only in the bedroom to sleep, she’s usually doing this when I’m trying to get some sleep. And of course, since it’s the bedroom, I refuse to open the mini-blinds. Well last week, she decided to keep me up all night doing this. I spent the first 15 minutes try to give her some attention so she’d settle down. I spent the next 10 minutes trying to swat her on the head or butt to convince her she wasn’t supposed to be up near the window. I spent the next 5 minutes spraying her with water and throwing her out of the room. I then gave up and locked her in the bathroom for 15 min because that usually calms her down. But I felt bad leaving her in there too long, so I let her back out. She immediately began digging through the mini-blinds again. After about 10 minutes of chasing her around again, I locked her back up in the bathroom and tried to go to sleep. A couple hours later, I woke up feeling extremely guilty and let her out of the bathroom. Less than 5 minutes later, she was at it again. Mr. B got up for work shortly thereafter, but she still kept at it. I think the only sleep I got that night was the couple hours when she was locked in the bathroom.

Luckily, she’s been pretty well behaved since then. That’s not to say she’s not still doing it, but she’s stopped when I’ve told her to. Let’s hope she keeps it up. I don’t want another night like that.

How quickly I revert

Wow – made it one day past ScaBloPoMo and done. So fleeting huh?

Well I did have a blog post half written, and I do have a couple that I can write, so I guess I’ll still shoot on getting them out while they’re relevant. Considering everything going on the next couple days, well week actually, it’s probably gonna be pretty quiet around here. *sigh*

ScaBloPoMo Wrap-Up

Hooray! It’s December 1. Normally, I wouldn’t be all that happy for December and its weather to be here, but right now that means no more being required to post each and every day. The amusing part is the last couple of days of November, blog-worthy things just started happening, such as getting hit on at the gas station, etc. I didn’t even manage to get them all posted, so you’ll continue to see posts for at least the next couple days until I get them all blogged. I can’t guarantee how long this is all going to last though. Like Josh, I had considered seeing just how long I could keep it going, but since I’m traveling to Minnesota for a Christmas party next weekend, I’m doubting it’ll last long.

I ended up with 31 posts in 30 days, though the reason I had two on one day were cause they were both rather small. And since I managed to write each and every day, I even met the true NaBloPoMo rules. Didn’t think that would happen. I even had my highest ever hit count for a day at 24 on Nov. 9. I think I even had my second highest hit count on the 29th, but I can’t tell. Still cool though. I’m gonna go ahead and call the month a pretty good success.