Happy Anniversary, Pumpkin!

Happy 10th Anniversary, Pumpkin! 10 years ago I was working at Bruno's (a grocery store in Tallahassee) as an office manager/customer service person. Cody and I worked together and were in the early stages of our flirting. We may have even gone on our first date by this time, though I think that was in November. Anyway, our manager said we could wear a costume if we worked Halloween (which of course I did), but the problem was I had no costume - nothing. So I went to the fabric store, bought some cheap orange fabric and black fabric paint and sewed up this lovely costume. Just stuff it with newspaper and bam, you have a pumpkin. I have now worn this costume for 10 straight Halloweens. I even made it in the Tallahassee Democrat one year when I wore it to work at the mall (I was working at Victoria's Secret at the time) and was handing out candy to the mall trick-or-treaters. The hat was added in law school when my friend Virginia convinced me I needed something more to the costume. It works great! I even have candy corn earrings I wear with it, circa 1985. It's become a classic costume for me. It always works and I'm alway the only fat pumpkin at a party. So this year I got to pull it out of the closet early for a Halloween party we went to Saturday night. Fun fun fun. I've decided next year I might pass the pumpkin on to Cody - yeah he can fit in it too - and for now on I'm going to be a bride. Yup, I figure I'll just wear my wedding dress every year after the wedding. After all, what else would I ever do with it and it has the added bonus of encouraging me to fit into it year after year. :)

Thursday's Big News Items

I meant to post this on Thursday but got busy. . . .

1) The Cardinals made it to the World Series!! This is my third post-season in St. Louis and the second time we've been in the World Series. Pretty impressive. As you may already know, by the time I got around to posting this tonight, the Series is already underway and we're up 1-0. Game 2 is actually on right now, as we sit in the Boy Room with the space heater and all three cats, watching the Cards as they're down 2-0.

2) I scored my first goal in soccer on Thursday! Wow! Okay, actually it wasn't that impressive since the other team didn't show up (Game 7 of the NCLS was on) and we just split up our team and played Us v Us. So both of our teams were playing with 4 or 5 people and I scored the ugliest goal EVER! I think I actually tripped and fell into the goal and managed to take the ball with me. :) I was proud nonetheless.

Stupid Cardinals!

Way to blow a 3-2 lead! Now we have one more chance to win in New York for a chance to go to the World Series. Not that I think the Cardinals DESERVE to go to the World Series, but this town goes nuts for the Cards and I like the atmosphere.

For Cody's Dad

Hey Rick - Cody wanted you to see the pictures of his brake job last weekend. Just click on this link. I think he wants to show you the calipers - something about how there's no where to lubricate them. Enjoy! I hope all is great with you guys!

Why I Love My Future Husband #893

When I get stressed I can be a beast to deal with. A real beast. I've learned in my years not to take out my stress (at least the stress that's not Cody's fault) on Cody as it doesn't really get anything accomplished. Instead I just vent. And then vent some more. And then sometimes some more - I vent "with" him, instead of "at" him (at least that's what I tell myself). Anyway this week has been the worst week known to man. First, Monday our power went out because it rained all day. Yes, it rained, the wind must have blown and we lost power. So I came home from work to a cold and very dark house. So I packed my crafting stuff and went to the craft store to work on my Save-The-Date cards - I'm STILL trying to design them. Anyway, I figured the power would be on by the time the store closed at 9:30 pm. No luck. So Cody props #1 this week: he was nice and calm as I bitched constantly about how cold and dark it was as we sat in the kitchen with all the burners on the stove. We even made rice krispy treats as we sat in the kitchen trying to stay warm without dying of carbon dioxide poisoning. Anyway, he's quite the trooper. At 1 am when we went to bed, still no power. By the time we woke up the next day, still no power. We didn't get power back until sometime Monday during work. To make a long story somewhat shorter, Tuesday sucked. And then today sucked - it rained all day and I had to drive to Jefferson City. So last night I was at the end of my rope - I hadn't done laundry, dishes, I still didn't have Save-the-Date cards done, I had a million things to do for the wedding, work was a beast, etc. - so I went on and on about how stressed I was to Cody. Being the patient person he is, he was encouraging and patient and just listened to me and all my stress. And I really went into it - just on and on and on about my "to-do" list (a list that would scare most CEOs). So we went to bed, woke up late to start another crappy day. Then this evening I went running while he was heading home. While running I debated what to make for dinner, another thing on my eternal list. But when I walked in the door the house smelled like food. Sure enough Cody the Wondeful had gone to the grocery store and made us dinner. Sure it was just frozen pizza and salad with chicken, but it was dinner and I didn't have to make it. AND he even bought me a cookie and some Amaretto (I know it's a wussy drink, but I'm on an Amaretto and lemon juice kick - I think I just like adding the cherries)!!! Just when I was at the end of my rope, he goes all sweet on me. I am so thankful to have someone who listens, understands me and my needs, and is so good to me! And he's cute to boot! :)

My New Coat

I look like an eskimo! But at least I'm a very warm eskimo! :) This is a picture of my new winter coat. Last year my "winter coat" was a wool peacoat - it was nice, looked cute, but seriously underinsulated. Then I saw my friend Melanie's coat - it was fabulous - she looked like an eskimo but she was warm. I asked her where she got her jacket - Lands End - but it was too late in the season and I couldn't find it on their website. So I ordered their catalog and waited - past the spring, then summer, then fall and finally a few weeks ago I got their winter coat catalog. And there was the coat! So I promtly ordered it. The only problem was the sizing. I would have picked an XS (coats are always sized huge) but they only had XS in petite and while I may be able to do petite height-wise, I can't with my arm length. My arms are too long for petite stuff, so I had to order a regular small. The arm length is perfect but I can fit me, Cody and the three cats in the coat part. But who cares because I will be warm!!! This lovely thing is rated for -40 with warm clothes on and -20 with light clothing!!! Super! I've already worn it a few days and even wore it around the office one day when it was freezing in my office - it was fabulous!!! I'm going to be so warm this year! I'm sick and tired of being freezing! Oh, yes, I had my pajama pants on in that picture - and you can see my dining room paint job in the background!

What a weekend.

Not often do we have weekends like this one. A nice mixture of getting "chores" done, relaxing and having fun.
Friday night we decided to just hang out at home, as I was beat after my week and Cody wanted to get his contacts out as soon as possible. So we hung out together, made dinner and shamelessly watched television. First we watched "Grays Anatomy," a show I am ridiculously addicted to. It comes on Thursdays but since we were out Thursday (viewing for our friend's mom who passed) I missed it, but got to watch the replay on Friday. Then we watched the Cardinals beat the Mets in the second game of the NLCS. That tied the series 1-1. Then we watched "Walk the Line" which Cody had rented on his way home from work. Actually a pretty good movie. That was our shameless TV night - a lot of time in front of the TV for a couple that barely gets the watch the news on a regular basis. :)
Saturday Cody did the brakes on the Jeep, while I ran 17 miles. Yes, that's 17 miles. It was tough but I think I'm getting used to these longer runs because it wasn't half as bad as my 15 mile run - not to say it was easy, because I still felt like I had been run over by a truck. I napped for a while after that, as that much running really takes a lot out of me. Then we went to a friend's party/fish fry over in Illinois. It was a pretty fun party. The crowd was happy as they watched the Cardinals beat the Mets to take the lead in the series to 2-1. Cody and I, however, were on the verge of tears as Auburn managed to beat the Gators. It was awful - I could write pages on the game but will just say that I honestly think we were robbed. First, we were dumb enough to hold someone in our own endzone, giving them a safety - this is critical as much of the second half they were only up by 1 point - without this moronic move, we would have been up 1. Then in the second half they called a fumble on our QB when he was making a FORWARD MOTION!!! WHAT IN THE HELL!!! I'm not a NCAA rules nut, but my understanding is that if the QB is in the process of throwing, i.e. his arm is moving forward, then if the ball comes out it's an incomplete pass, not a fumble. We challenged, the fumble call stood, we lost the ball and our last time out. It was all downhill from there. Sad night in Gator Nation.
Today I let Cody sleep in while I worked around the house - cleaning the kitchen, living room, doing laundry, etc. When he woke up we decided to go bike riding in the park and play some one on one soccer. We had a great time biking around in the fall weather and he taught me a lot of cool soccer moves (I still really really suck but am getting better, slowly but surely). When we got back we ran our errands to the grocery store and Cody made dinner! Yup, Cody made dinner. His special spaghetti. Yum! I made desert - frozen eclairs from Smart Ones - they're really good and not terrible for you. :) Then we did our Sunday evening chores - cleaning, bills, etc. while watching the Cards get their tail kicked by the Mets. We were getting beat so bad we stopped even watching the score.
So, all in all a nice, relaxing, yet productive weekend. Makes you hate going back to work tomorrow!

I hate wedding dresses.

I really do. I thought I would love them and have a great time searching for one and when I found "The One" I would cry and laugh and just know it. Obviously that didn't happen. But while Cody's mom was here I thought I found one that would work for me. So today I went back to try it on with the proper bra and undergarments. I really loved the dress. It's really pretty and I love the feel of it. But then Marissa brought up that it looks like a prom dress. I don't necessarily think it looks prom-dressish but more evening dress-ish. So then I started to feel like it wasn't "bridal" enough and felt more like I had on an evening gown with a train. I tried on a few more and they were okay and then I went back to one before - a lace one. And I loved it too. Everyone asks which I like better and there really isn't a way to compare them - they are TOTALLY different dresses. One of these days I HAVE to get a dress! By the way, if you go to the website, click on August 2006, I've narrowed it down to Dress #6 and #4.

Thoughts and Prayers.

A friend's mom passed away yesterday. She emailed today and I was at a loss for words. What do you say in that situation? I cannot even fathom what she is going through right now. I would not wish that on anyone in the world. It just has to be the worst feeling ever - especially when it's unexpected. So I did the best I could and offered to help in any way we could. The viewing/wake/memorial service (depending on your religion or traditions) is Thursday and Friday. We'll go hoping to offer her the tiniest bit of consolation and in the very least let her know she has a friend to lean on.

It sucks getting older - a rather unfortunate side effect is that it's less of a shock with a friend's parent dies. We're still young enough for it not to be happening on a regular basis - as a matter of fact I think I've had more friends die young then friends I've known whose parent has died - but we're getting old enough that it's becoming more and more a fact of life. Ten years ago if a friend's parent had died it would have been totally and completely tragic and unfair. It's no less tragic now but as we get older we accept the fact that those around us do as well - and our folks just happen to have a big head start on us.

So, as you read this be thankful for those in your life still alive, be blessed by the ones that aren't and please keep my friend in your thoughts and prayers - whichever you believe in.

"Safety Violation"

This past weekend we went up to Wisconsin to see some of Cody's family - most importantly, Grandma Raffensperger (aka Grandma Raff) - though she is actually Cody's GREAT-Grandma (making her Baylee and Brandon's GREAT-GREAT-Grandma). She is 97 years young and is such a great woman. The last time I saw her was the family reunion in 2000 and she seems just as good now as she did then. She has more family then most of us can ever imagine and they all care about her more then I can explain.
Well, other then our guest of honor, we also got to visit with Sara, Larry and Baylee and Brandon this weekend, which was simply wonderful! Brandon is one now and walking around like mad. He walks sort of like a drunk person and just will run into anything in his path. This kid seems fearless. And boy does he love to walk. Walk walk walk. No holding or sitting or stopping - just walking. He's adorable though - I can't wait to see how much he changes in the next few months over the holidays. And then there's Baylee. This little girl is smart as a whip and cute as a button. She's really amazing. And she is actually the subject of my story.
So, on Saturday afternoon we were heading to Trish and Joe's for a gathering/BBQ. Since Brandon was sleeping we took Baylee while Sara and Larry waited for him to wake up from his nap. We put her car seat in the middle seat in the back of the Cruiser between Donna and I. Well, about 15 minutes into the trip, she looks at me and says, "Missy, your knob is up." I was terribly confused and said, "My what is what?" Well, she pointed to more door lock and said "That's a safety violation." Sure enough I had no locked my car door and the door lock (aka "my knob") was up. And Baylee was observant enough to issue me a "Safety Violation." I felt like I should write my name on the board or get a sticker taken away. :) So we joked about that for a while until we got to Trish and Joe's.
We were having a great time at their house, playing with the kids, catching up with everyone, when Baylee walks right up to Joe (who had just finished smoking a cigarette) and says, "That's a safety violation. You're going to die." Everyone CRACKED UP! It was hillarious. At least my Safety Violation wasn't accompanied with a "You're going to die." :)

In a funk.

There are some days when you're just in a funk. Today is one of those. First, I'm horrible at good-byes. Cody's parents left this morning and I managed to hold it together just long enough for us to wave them good-bye. Then I just broke down. As Cody closed the door, I just cried and cried and went on and on. Going on and on about how it's so hard to live so far away from family. And it's not fair that everyone in St. Louis (okay, I was exagerating here) lives near their family (because most of them never move away). And why do we "have" to live so far away (knowing all the while that living far away is just as much my decision as Cody's). And on and on. All day I was just bummed. I know that sounds dumb, especially since they're my in-laws and most people jump for joy to get rid of their in-laws, but I have REALLY great in-laws. And we had a REALLY great time with them. Even walking around the house this evening with Cody at work seemed lonely since they weren't here. I wanted to walk into our spare room and see them there. I wanted to sit and drink wine with his dad and beer with Cody and his mom. I wanted to just chat some more and pick their brains some more. I can't even explain how smart these people are! And how "together" they are - they're just so pragmatic and give such great advise. They are able to just put so much into perspective in such a non-assuming way. For instance, we were talking about us living far away from family and I how I sometimes felt guilty for not living closer and helping out more with the family and they just casually explained that Cody and I will be each other's families soon and that has to be a top priority. There's something about the way they said that that just made sense and made me feel better. There's no on thing I can ever put my finger on and no particular specific quality that's so great, they're just all round good people. And now I miss them.
So today's kind of been a funky day. I pouted and whined to Cody all day and he, like the great guy he is, has come to be patient with me on days like this - especially when it's good-bye days. I know he's got to be missing them too, but he manages to just put that aside and deal with my much more emotional, outward display of missing them. What a guy!

Soccer.

Well tonight I had my third consecutive start for our indoor soccer team. Yeah, I guess I didn't mention that we only had three girls (which you need three to play) so there were no subs, thus I had to start. :) Actually we ended up with four girls total so we did have one sub between the three of us.

I'm getting better. I'm not good, but I'm getting better. Tonight I worked on being more aggressive on defense and actually getting to the ball instead of just standing a few feet away from my mark. The only problem with this is I feel bad about invading someone's space or hitting up against them, so I constantly apologize every time I bump into someone. But it's a fun game and I'm learning.

Finally Maybe?

Finally. Maybe. This afternoon I managed to somehow talk Cody's mom into going wedding dress shopping with me - actually we didn't so much as go shopping as we did just go look at the ones I had narrowed it down to. Poor lady didn't know what she was getting herself into with the beast that is me and dress shopping. :) She's quite a trooper though - and she's not even MY mom! Anyway, we went and looked at them and for some reason whatever she said to me resonated and I think I've picked a dress! Not totally yet, but 75% sure. Remember how I said how wonderful his parents are and they have a way of saying things that make sense? Well this is one of those instances. I can't remember exactly what she said or how she said it but she listened to what I was saying and watched my movements in a way that when she did give advise I really understood it. She basically picked up on my actions in a way I can't and pointed those out to me. When we were done looking at them and discussing them, I just felt more comfortable with one of the dresses in particular. She pointed out that I just kept saying "But I love this dress" over and over whenever the salesperson or I would notice something about it. So even though it's the least forgiving dress in terms of body forgiveness and it might wrinkle a bit more then others and it's not as dressy or fancy or lacy or sparkly, I just kept coming back to "I love this dress." Anyway, I really have no idea how she just makes you feel at ease with decisions but she doesn't push one tiny bit but rather somehow paves the way for you to feel comfortable in your own decision. I really need to learn that skill. I sometimes tend to give a bit more then my two cents worth when most times both I and the person I'm listening to would probably be better off if I had the skill to just point out observations about their choices and make them feel comfortable in their own decision making. Anyway, for what it's worth, I think I made a decision about my wedding dress. Now if only I could move forward with all the other planning and decision making there is to be done!!

Bumble Bee, Baby and Biopsy

It's "B" Day! First up: Bumble Bee.

On Sunday we took Cody's parents to the wineries out in Augusta, Missouri. Wineries in Missouri? Yup, that's right we have wineries right here in Missouri. And they're not just glorified beer halls that serve wine. They're actually pretty nice and have decently good wine. Yeah, we're not Napa Valley or France, but it's still gorgeous scenery (especially this time of year when the weather is great and the leaves are changing) and good wine. Anyway, we took them to Montelle which has really good white wine (and fruit wine - raspberry, strawberry and blackberry) and a great view of the Missouri river - they have a great multi-level porch/deck system for tons of great seating. So we sat outside in this beautiful weather and this bee starting buzzing around me. Well, I tend to talk a lot (a bit of an understatement) and this bee actually flew into my mouth! Yes, Marissa (my friend with a serious irrational fear of bees), the bee actually FLEW INTO MY MOUTH. So naturally I shut my mouth, felt the bee and then promptly spit it back out. Lucky me it didn't sting me or anything! He just flew away on his happy little life. A friend of his came back later and almost got into my nose, but you can bet I kept my mouth closed!

Second: Baby!

Yup, Cody and I have a new baby!! Bet you didn't even know we were pregnant! Just kidding! Our fish was pregnant and had babies! We were sitting with his parents in our living room/reading-fish room yesterday and his dad noticed a little baby fish. It looks about a week old and he managed to live this long! The others were most likely eaten by the other fish in the tank but this little guy managed to live and survive the wrath of the big fish! So we scooped him up and put him in his own little mesh area inside the big tank so we can feed him special food and have him not eaten by other fish. So we have one more animal in our house - a new baby fish. On another, much sadder note, our big Bala Shark died in the same tank. Circle of life I guess. I got Cody that baby shark with two others for Valentine's Day back in 1999. I put them in a 10 gallon tank with all orange and blue rocks. When I went to clean the tank a few months later I put all the fish in a bucket and when I went back to put them all back into the tank two had jumped out of the bucket and killed themselves - this one was the only remaining from that first batch. So our 7 year old fish finally died - he survived many moves and a lot of crazy fish situations but was always a trooper.

The final "B": Biopsy.

This one the guys may not care much to read about. Consider yourself warned. I usually don't talk too much on here about deeply personal stuff - unpleasant medical situations, arguments with Cody, ugly family situations, bad work events, etc. - but I figure I might as well give it a try. So, today I had a second biospy of an area which I'll just call "a very sensitive girl area." I had the first two years ago and have continued to have problems, so my now THIRD doctor decided to do another one. So not only do they cut a large piece of skin out of a very sensitive area but then they put in THREE stitches. Yes, stitches. You can't even imagine how stitches feel there, unless, I suppose, you've had a child. Then maybe you can understand. Anyway, I came home crying, half because of the pain and half because I just want them to figure out what in the hell is wrong already. How many damn doctors does it take to diagnose things these days?!!? Not only is this my THIRD doctor but she's also referring me to yet another specialist - yes, that's doctor #4! So, that's today's issue. I'm in pain and I want the doctors to be miracle workers - is that too much to ask? It's just I hate not knowing things and then I start thinking that Cody and I will at some point want to have children and I don't want to do that without being totally positive that I'm 100% healthy. I just want this whole situation to be over - it's been going on for too damn long. Speaking of kids, in case you're dying to know, the answer is no - we're not having them any time soon.

So those are the "B"s for today.

Go Gators!

Today was another great day with Cody's folks. I ran 15 miles this morning while they hung around the house (see other blog for more on the running). It was a very hard 15 miles but I'm glad it's over with. Then we went out to Ozzie's and watched UF beat up on Alabama in the Swamp. Great game.
Tomorrow we've got outdoor soccer in Creve Coeur and hopefully the wineries. :)

They're here!

They made it! They made it! Cody's parents finally made it here. We were like little kids waiting for the Easter Bunny all day waiting for them to call and let us know they were close. They got here this afternoon, we hung around the house - which the last time they saw was a wreck with boxes everywhere, with our bed still in the living room and the fish tanks on the Boy Room floor - and caught up on everything and then went out to eat for Cody's mom's birthday at Blueberry Hill. As those not from STL might not know, Blueberry Hill is a St. Louis institution. The restraunt/bar takes up an entire city block in the U City Loop (a very hip alternative area of town). Quite good food. They purport to have the best hamburgers in town but for others of us they also have great trout, red beans and rice, and pancakes at all hours!

While we love living here, living our fiercely independent lives, doing our own thing, whatever that may be, whenever we might want to, we regret not being able to see family more. It's so wonderful to have people visit because then we get them all to ourselves, and vice versa - whereas when we're in Tally we get to spend two hours with one family, two hours with the next, sleep a few hours and then hope to catch the rest of the family in the remaining 30 minutes. We don't have time to really talk about live, etc. because we're just busy saying hello, good-bye and catching up on the obvious. Anyway, it's great to have family here - I'm looking forward to next weekend in Wisconsin to catch up with the Wisconsin crowd and Sara, Larry and the kids - apparently Brandon is walking now - I can't wait to see it!

Life is good.

A First.

The thing is the older you get the less "firsts" you have. You can only have one First Pet. One First Plane Flight. One first whatever. Unless you starting counting retarded things like "First Slice of Strawberry Pie on a Tuesday After Turning 25 When it's Raining." And then you must just really be bored. Anyway, today I had a first. As some of you know, I've been playing soccer on Cody's indoor team (certainly a first). Well, today I got my first ball impression on my body. Yup, someone kicked the ball so hard at me it left the soccer ball shape on my leg. My knee actually. There's a fat bruise and you can make out the shapes of the soccer ball - in my SKIN! That's insane. I am never again going to stand between a big guy and the goal. Ow! I swear it took my 30 minutes to regain feeling in my knee/upper leg as the entire area went numb it hit so darn hard. Oh well, the price we pay. :)

Cody's parents get here tomorrow! They get to watch us play soccer next week - my first spectators. :)

The Truth About Driving in St. Louis

This came to me via a forward, but it was too funny not to post:

If you live in St Louis, you'll understand this. If you've ever visited St.
Louis you'll understand this. If you've never been to St. Louis, consider
this your Visitor's guide To Driving in St. Louis.

1. There are 75 "official neighborhoods" in the City of St. Louis. St.
Louisans commonly give directions (especially for restaurants) to strangers
based on these neighborhoods which aren't marked on any maps that are
handed out by the tourist board, the AAA or Mapquest.

2. There are 54 school districts -- on the Missouri side alone - each of
which has their own school bus system and scheduled times to block traffic.

3. There are 91 official municipalities in St. Louis County. Each
Municipality has its own rules, regulations, and often their own police
departments.

4. More importantly, most have their own snow removal contracts so it's not
uncommon to drive down a road in winter and have one block plowed, the next
salted, the next piled with snow and the last partially cleared by
residents wanting to get out of their driveways.

5. Snow plowing is never a problem in the City of St. Louis. They plow
nothing, and if the forecast calls for snow, they close everything. Except
on "The Hill" (refer to ..1 above) where each homeowner goes out to the
street and shovels out one car-sized rectangle and then stands watch over
it.

6. Any car parked longer than 4 hours in the city is considered a parts
store.

7. The City of Ballwin actually proposed that drivers use connecting strip
mall parking lots to get from place to place rather than drive on
Manchester road to cut the traffic on Manchester.

8. Laclede Station Road mysteriously changes names as you cross
intersections. As do McCausland, Lindbergh, Watson, Reavis Barracks, Fee
Fee, McKnight, Airport Road, Midland, Olive and Clarkson. Gravois Road can
only be pronounced by a native. Ditto for Spoede and Chouteau.

9. A St. Louisan from South County has never been to North County and vise
versa.. West County has everything delivered.

10. No native St. Louisan knows that Lindbergh runs from South County to
North County! And, if you tell them, they will not believe you.

11. Lindbergh belongs to every neighborhood except Kirkwood, who had the
nerve to creatively change the name to "Kirkwood Road."

12. There are 2 interchanges to exit from Highway 40 onto Clayton Road and
2 for Big Bend. Stay alert,people!

13. If you need directions to O'Fallon, make sure to specify Illinois or
Missouri. This is also true for Troy, Maryville, St. Charles,
Springfield,Columbia....

14. The Page Avenue extension and Airport expansion projects took over 20
years to get approved and St. Louisans lost track of how many political
figures claimed them as their own ideas.

15. St. Louisans were aghast when the federal government required them to
redo the highway signs
to indicate that the federal highways went to cities in other states
instead of local municipalities.

16. Drivers are starting to cut their OWN plates rather than go through the
Missouri Department of Motor Vehicles to get new tags. You can also
purchase tags from dealers behind QuiK Shops in the city. They are cheaper,
the clerks are nicer, and the service is faster.

17. Lambert Field and St. Louis International Airport really are the same
place. The East Terminal, however, is a different place.

18. Highway 270 is our daily version of the NASCAR circuit. (Same goes for
Highway 70.) You can go all four directions on Highway 270: North and South
in West County, East and West in South County, and East and West in North
County. Confused? So are the St. Louis drivers.

19. The outer belt is Highway 270 which turns into Highway 255 in South
County. The inner belt is Highway 170. Highway 370 is an outer-outer belt.
Highway 40 is the same as Interstate 64 (but only through the middle part
of St. Louis).

20. The morning rush hour is from 6:00 to 10:00 AM. The evening rush hour
is from 3:00 to 7:00 PM. Friday's rush hour starts Thursday morning. Never
ever try to cross a bridge in St. Louis during rush hour unless you have a
sack lunch and a port-a-potty in the car.

21. YIELD signs are for decoration only. No native St. Louisan will ever
grasp the concept.

22. If someone actually has their turn signal on, it is probably a factory
defect, or has been on for the last 17 miles.

23. Construction on Highways 40, 64, 70, 255, 270, 44, 55 and 170 is a way
of life, and a permanent form of entertainment.

24. All blue haired old ladies in Cadillacs (driving on Olive west of 270)
have the right of way.

25. If it snows or rains? Stay home!!

26. It is called a rolling stop at any stop sign intersection. Only native
St. Louisans can do it just right...

Drive Safe!!

Cody's parents are leaving tomorrow from Florida to come visit us in St. Louis (See? I still don't say I live in "Missouri.")!!! I am so excited! They haven't seen the house since we first moved in when our bed was still downstairs, there were boxes everywhere and the fish tanks were all set up on the floor in the Boy Room. So, for weeks now I've been telling people that my in-laws are coming. The overwhelming response is "I'm sorry." Every time I hear that I think to myself, "Man, I have it good." I seriously, no joke, have the best set of to-be in-laws in the WORLD. To begin with they are just wonderful, good people. And good people are hard to come by these days. That would be enough in itself, but they have this way of making me feel like I was born into the family (in a non-incestual way since I'm marrying their son) and just treating me like one of them. They always listen if you have a problem and give advise in a way that is caring, understanding and wise, yet not lecturing or belittling. Anyway, they're just great people and I'm really looking forward to their visit. What's even more special is it's Cody's mom's birthday on Friday (the day they get here) and their anniversary on Saturday! How cool is that!

As for plans while they're here, we, of course, are taking them to the Gator game at Ozzie's on Saturday (v. Alabama), Cody's soccer game on Sunday and our indoor game on Thursday. The next weekend we're taking a road trip to Wisconsin to see the family, but most importantly Great-Grandma Raffensperger (yes, Cody still has a GREAT-Grandma, leaving Baylee and Brandon with a GREAT-GREAT-Grandma). She'll be visiting from California and since she's crazy old and lives in Cali we hardly ever see her, so that will be a nice visit. We're also hoping to take them to the wineries because the weather should be beautiful for it and the leaves are just starting to change their colours.

Well guys, have a safe trip! At least Missouri has the lowest gas prices in the country right now - Cody filled up for $1.99 a gallon today! Wow!

Juice.

This goes in the category of funny, off the wall things Cody says that just make me crack up.

When we finally awoke at 2pm Saturday afternoon (not too bad for us), neither of us felt much like doing anything except watching football. So we dragged the laptop downstairs to keep track of ESPN Scoreboard and watched some network TV football. Since we live in the Midwest we were cursed with having to watch Illinois. They suck. Ron Zook is now their coach. He sucks (he was the coach at UF after Spurier in case you don't keep track of those things and lost about a zillion games). Anyway, at least they were playing a ranked Iowa team who didn't suck so bad - but I guess you really couldn't tell because they were playing such a bad team. Anyway, Illinois had a player named Juice Williams. No kidding. Want proof? Who in their right mind would name their child "Juice"? Are you just sick in the head? Anyway, lest I digress from the story. So, at some point the announcer asked something to the tune of "When is Juice most efficient/effective?" He was, of course, refering to his offensive ability (he's a QB), but Cody just answered "When you're sick." Just as plain and matter-of-fact and straight-faced as you can get. But of course, Juice is most effective when you're sick. Thanks Cody. You crack me the hell up sometimes.

Happy First Day of Fall - Late, as Usual

Happy Autumnal Equinox! Well, it was actually on Saturday (the 23rd) but I was too lazy to actually post on it that day because of the party so I'm posting on it now. :) I guess it's officially fall now. I am officially in cranky mode - the days are now shorter then the nights. I make no bones about it - I love the warm sunny days. I love the long days. I love sunshine and the outdoors. The winter? Not so much. I can tolerate it for about a week and then I'm done. I get cranky and pouty and just want to sit inside in my warm pjs with some warm food and then more warm food and more warm food - you get the drift. I am not a winter person. People say winters aren't bad here - I guess those people never grew up in Florida.

Well, it's fall and it's certainly showing around here. The leaves are changing and twice already I've had to wear a scarf to work - I've worn a jacket quite a few times and actually have busted out the coat a few times as well. It's not just been cool or chilly, but downright cold already a few days. I guess it had to come sooner or later.

I touched an NBA player!

At the Gator Club gathering yesterday to watch the Kentucky v. UF game, David Lee was there!! And I got to meet him! And shake his hand!! For those of you who don't know, David played basketball for UF and now plays for the New York Knicks. He's the son of one of our great Gator Club members in St. Louis, Susan, and was in town visiting his mom (he's from St. Louis). Anyway, I was giddy like a moron meeting a celebrity - shameless, really.

Party pictures are up.

In case you've been sitting in utter anticipation of the party pictures - they're up now on the website - www.cody-missy.com. It was a great party - at least in our humble opinion. Our first guests arrived around 6 pm and the final ones left around 4am (not counting the ones who stayed the night). We finished the keg around 10:45 but then finished off another 120 or so beers after that, so if that's any indication that it went well, then it did. :) It was a "Birthdays Party" for several of our friends who had birthdays either the past week or so on in the next week or so - apparently we have a lot of "blizzard baby" friends. Thanks everyone for coming out and we can't wait to have the next one. Oh - check out the pictures of the newly renovated/refinished dining room! The chandelier is down because I broke it about 20 minutes before the party started but you can at least see the paint job! :)

Caulk.

I love this stuff. I really think it's what is holding our house up. The damn thing would be falling down if it weren't for this wonderful material. I can't stand the gaps and cracks that are EVERYWHERE in our house due to it's age (my mom thinks her house is old because it was built 60 years ago - ours is easily pushing 100) so before I paint anything I fill every gap, hole, etc. with tons of caulk. Pretty much every place in our house where two things meet has caulk it in. The corner where the walls meet? Caulk. Where the baseboards meet the wall? Caulk. Ceiling hits wall? Caulk. Window sill meets wall or other part of window? More caulk. I'm telling you, before I paint any surface in this house it has to be caulked. Plus I just love the stuff - it's fun to play with. I AM the home improvement goddess after all. I can't wait until we get this house finished!!!

Cody's folks are coming soon and I CAN'T WAIT to show them all the work we've done since they were here last! Until recently most of the painting done in the house was done by them when they visited last July - but I think we jumped ahead of them when we finished the dining room (yes, a year later, but we at least got it done). :) I am seriously so excited to show them the house and around STL!!

Foreman Pickles.

Tonight Cody and I worked on painting our hallway/entryway for the party we're having on Friday. Party? Didn't we just have a party not too long ago? Yup - it seems like just yesterday but our last party was for Cody's birthday. In the past few weeks and coming week we have a ton of friends with birthdays so decided to throw them all a party - Dude's big 30 was yesterday, Marissa's birthday was last Thursday, Cassidy's is next Monday and Dave's was Saturday - lots to celebrate! So as people who will take just about any excuse to party, we're throwing another one!!! Yipee! But so much to do to prepare. Starting with working on the painting yet to be done downstairs (no one goes upstairs except us so it's not a huge priority).
Well, when Cody and I are working together (we use the same strategy with disagreements) we have a third party we can blame stupid stuff on so we don't blame each other. Who might that be since we live alone? Mr. Pickles of course! So tonight while painting when I gave Cody the crappy job of putting the ceiling light back up (I took it down so I figured he could have the joy of putting it back up) and the smoke detector. He of course blamed Mr. Pickles, the foreman on the job, for giving him the "crappy" jobs. Then when I was using the big roller and he got stuck with the baby roller, he again blamed foreman Pickles for the lack of proper supplies. See? Having a blame cat sure does help keep the peace around here. Plus, when I asked for a Mr. Clean Magic Eraser (the BEST home cleaning tool EVER), and it was delivered dry, instead of wet, I could blame Mr. Pickles.

p.s. For those of you who aren't blog regulars, Mr. Pickles is our cat, formerly known as Nala. LONG STORY!

We're a mess today.

(Opps. This was yesterday's blog but I guess I didn't hit "Publish" on the computer before I went to bed).

My whole body feels like I was hit by a bus. Cody's got a cold/mini flu. We're just a whole bunch of mess today. :)

Mine at least is explainable. I ran - a good darn bit. I still can't get over that I ran it in under 2 hours. Running is such a deeply personal thing and all your goals are tied to personal accomplishment rather then competition. I couldn't have cared less what anyone else in that race did yesterday - I'm happy for all those that finished, proud of those who at least tried, and hope everyone got a personal best - but in the end it was just me versus me. And I think I won that one. It just makes me so happy to see the improvement in my running.

Cody is another story. After a "rough" night Friday, a football filled Saturday and a VERY early Sunday (our alarm went off at 5am to make it to the race), he's got himself a nice little cold/flu. He's hilarious when he's sick.

A quick week update.

Wow. Another week gone so fast! I sometimes sit and wonder where they go so darn fast and then after 30 minutes of thinking about it realize that I just passed another 1/2 hour that I'll sit at the end of the week and wonder where it went. :)

Anyway, this week was mild in comparison to some of our weeks, but fun nonetheless. Cody worked a ton of overtime this week (still!) so I got some time to work on some projects around the house. Some good "me time." :) Thursday was the first indoor soccer game of this "season" and the first game where I'm actually a real player. Yup - that's right - I'm playing soccer this season! I still have no real clue how to play soccer but I figured I'm not getting any younger, so might as well give it a shot and hope I don't blow out a knee. :) I figured I'd start with indoor because it's more moving around, and might lend itself to better practice for me. Anyway, I didn't play a lot because my shins were killing me and I didn't want to get hurt before the 1/2 marathon. We won 6-3 so it was great! There's a great group of people on the team so I think it will be a lot of fun. Marissa's birthday was also on Thursday so we took her out to lunch for her birthday at work and then all went to Barcelona (a tappa's restraunt in Clayton - very spify) for dinner and Tejas for drinks afterwards. Barcelona was good - I think the boys were all still starving after dinner but the sangria was great. Tejas was Tejas. :)

Friday we went to a happy hour at Syberg's out in West County and then to the Funny Bone to see Kevin Nealon. He was, of course, HILLARIOUS! We ended up at some blues bar where Cody thought it would be a good idea to have three double Jack and Cokes in the matter of an hour after only having a cucumber for dinner (yes, he had a cucumber because he had it leftover from him lunch - I put a cucumber in his lunches because he'll eat them like apples). Needless to say that didn't end greatly. So in addition to dealing with him another friend of his (who will remain nameless) had a few too many and I ended up attempting to carry him out - didn't work too well. :) Anyway, we all had fun.

Saturday was, of course, more football. The Gators played Tennessee - in Knoxville. Every year the St. Louis Gator Club gets together beforehand for a fun little tailgate in the Ozzie's parking lot. As usual, it was a ton of fun. The game was a nail biter, but they pulled it off - by a whole one point. For those of you who care, FSU didn't fare as well and managed to lose to Baby Bowden at Clemson all because their "top rated" defense couldn't stop Clemson from driving 80 yards in the final minute of the game! Insane! Anyway, it was fun. One funny note from the night that I have to credit Tina for: Our great AB friends offered to pick up everyone's tab for the game for AB products - free beer! Only problem was I wasn't drinking becuase of the half marathon. I explained this deliema to Tina who easily responded, "Missy, there are always 1/2 marathons to run - but how many nights do you get free beer?" So that ended that debate.

So we got a few hours of sleep Saturday, woke up for the 1/2 marathon, ran and came home and crashed. Luckily it rained so Cody's outdoor soccer game was cancelled because I can barely walk. We watched a movie tonight while I laid on the futon with bags of frozen veggies on my hips where my tendons hurt so bad I can't hardly walk. :) The joys of running.

Tomorrow - Monday. Boo!

Okay, here I actually look happy.

This is about mile 1ish. I'm still happy here. At least I don't look like I'm dying. :)

Gorgeous.

Great, huh? Don't I look happy and wonderful? Yeah, that's me after 13.1 miles this morning. A very very hard 13.1 miles. The entire saga is on the other blog, but I'll briefly summarize here.

So, as most of my blog readers know by now, today was the Louis and Clark 1/2 Marathon out in St. Charles. A while ago a friend decided she wanted to do a 1/3 marathon so we've been training together over the past few months. I think we started running back in May for it, but then with Germany and a bad bout with shin splints that turned into stress fractures in my shin, we didn't get to run most of June and part of July. In any event, in a cruel twist of fate, she sprained/strained her knee last week playing soccer so couldn't run today. Unfortunately I hadn't really trained to run the race fast, I just wanted to run it to finish with her. I really wasn't concerned about my time or anything, I just wanted to be with her for encouragement, etc. throughout the race. Then when I found out this week she couldn't run it all got turned upside down. I didn't want to do worse then I did back in April (I ran it in 2:09 in April), but I wasn't prepared to run faster.

Long story short: We woke up at 5am, got out to the race a bit after 6am. The race started at 7am and I finished 1 hour, 58 minutes and 40 seconds later!!! YES!! I actually beat my last time and made it under 2 hours!!! I can't even express how excited/stunned/proud I am. I NEVER thought I would beat 2 hours, much less after not training for it. Granted, I feel like I was run over by a very very very large bus and at the end of the race I had to have Cody come into the Finisher's Area because I thought I was having an asthma attack - but I DID IT! I can't really move right now and I can hardly make it up the stairs (Cody had to help me put on my jeans this afternoon) because my hips hurt so bad (all that moving back and forth much faster then I'm used to), but I MADE IT! As you can tell I'm quite excited! Of course, right now I never wnat to run again, much less a marathon, but we'll see how I feel in a few days. :)

News Quote of the Day.

Rose said she does not take her monkey through buffets.

Click here to read more.

A nice weekend.

Gators won. Seminoles won. Notre Dame kicked the hell out of Penn State and Ohio State beat Texas. I'd say that was a good weekend. Okay, I guess some will say there is more to life then football - but don't tell Cody that.
Friday we went to dinner with friends at my favorite Greek restaraunt - they have an amazing spinach pita! Saturday Cody fixed my car and I ran. Yes, that's right! Cody fixed the clutch so now I can drive again! I was quite impressed - in less then 1.5 hours and for less then $50 he fixed the entire problem! The dealer would have charged a few hundred dollars and likely taken days! It's so great to have someone handy around! Not only can he replace parts, but he can diagnose a problem, figure out what needs to be done, and then can fix it!! Yipee! Go Cody! Then of course, it was football time. And then more football. And then some more. The Gators looke good - against a sub-par team. The Seminoles looked awful against and even more sub-par team. I was simply happy Notre Dame and Ohio State won.
Today was soccer for Cody, biking for me and then Cody went into work the rest of the day. I cleaned the house and ran errands. Actually a quite productive weekend - especially the car part!!

Job seach.

Okay, along with considering going back to school, I'm also looking at changing jobs/fields. So tonight I was looking on Boeing's website for job openings in STL, mostly in law, but was looking in other areas too. One area was "Unmanned Air Vehicle Pilot." If it's unmanned, then why do they need a pilot?

Same old.

Same old, same old here. Cody's been working ridiculous overtime. I think he's got over 36 hours in just the three days of this week - yikes! Yesterday, I rode my bike to the parts store to get a part to bleed my clutch this weekend when we get around to fixing my car. I had a really nice bike ride around the park and then hung around the house doing chores. Today I had to go to Columbia all day for court. Some good cases, some bad. Not a bad drive, but not great either - a pretty boring mid-Missouri 2 hours. Good talking on the phone time. :) Since I had the only available vehicle, I got to run a few errands - Michaels, Target, Old Navy, etc. Then a quick run, the grocery store and pick Cody up from work. Not too terribly interesting.

I did get some great news today though! I have a new niece! Well, not really, but sort of. She was already my niece but now the government agrees with what we all already knew. My brother officially adopted his daugther and it cleared our legal system! While we already considered her 110% family, the law now agrees! I'm so excited for my bro and his fam! They are such a cute family and Kim and David are AMAZING parents! I'm sure when we decide to have kids - at least ones without four legs and a lot of fur - we'll be calling asking for advice. :) Congrats guys!

Car-less

Boy do I feel "American." For two weeks in Europe this summer and then an entire summer a few years ago, I survived with no car. I managed to travel all sorts of places, big and small with no vehicle. Tons of people over there have no car and they live perfectly good lives. But here I go now with a few days without my car and it's as if the world is falling apart around me. :) This morning Cody gave me a ride to work since he woke up early (usually he wakes up as I leave the house) and I got a ride home from Mike. But just the thought of not being able to leave whenever is weird (even though I could go home at anytime and take the train). Plus, I've got shopping to do - grocery store, Target, etc. - and that's really hard with only one car in the family - not to mention Cody didn't get home from work until 9.30pm. Oh well. Just a few more days and I'll have my "freedom" again. By the way, I hate the hyjacking of the word "freedom." Just a note.
On another note, ran 10 miles tonight and feel just dandy about it. I'm super excited about the 1/2 marathon on the 17th and even more excited about the marathon in a few months. The person who actually inspired me to run the marathon, my lawschool friend Kari, actually just had her first baby this past weekend. She emailed pictures and the baby is just precious! Really really really adorable! She and her husband will make awesome parents. She is one of those people you really admire in the world - really down to earth and real and just really has their head on straight. There's a girl at work who is like that too - super smart and well spoken, yet funny and interesting all at the same time. Where I tend ("tend" may not be a strong enough word here) to babble and just spit out the first thing to come to my head, these people really have insightful thoughts and are so very intelligent and interesting. I'm lucky to have met a lot of the people I have in my life.

Busy Weekend.

We had a good time this weekend - fun, but busy as always. Friday we headed off to Wisconsin for Cody's cousin, Chad's, wedding in Appleton. We got in pretty late (1 am) so pretty much just crashed. Saturday we hung out with his Aunt Jackie and Uncle Fred (they're awesome folks) and then went to the wedding. It was a beautiful ceremony and all - very nice. The reception was at a Performing Arts Center so that was great too. We got to see a ton of his family which was really great. They are all such wonderful people. We had a great time visiting with everyone and a great time at the wedding. Sunday we drove back after the present opening, Cody mowed the lawn and I ran. Since we were exhausted after the drive we just hung out and watched a movie.
Then there was today. It seemed as if nothing could go right. First, the clutch on my car went out last night. All of a sudden the stupid thing just wouldn't go into gear and the clutch petal had no tension behind it - it just went out. So instead of Cody working today to get ahead on hours (they are super busy so instead of working all 12 hour days he was going to work some today so he would only have to work 10 hour days this week) we needed to fix the car. BUT we couldn't find anyone that was open that had the part. One place could order it but it would be $50 more expensive then we found it online. And the dealerships weren't even open so we couldn't even ask them if they had the part. Doh! So we decided to sit outside and ponder what to do with our day - well, Bumpis, aka Dumb Cat, was looking at us from inside so we let her out on the porch to sit. She was just being lazy sitting on the porch so we weren't really paying much attention to her. We decided to pull some weeds in the garden and then when we went to go inside we couldn't find her. So we spent the next hour looking around the neighborhood for the stupid cat. Sure enough she was two houses down in their back yard and just thought it was great when we found her because then she wanted to play hide and go seek and run from us. Dumb cat.
After that mini-adventure we decided to bike downtown to my office to see how bad it would be for me to bike to work. Yes, I could easily take the train, but I thought it would be nice to have a built in 30 minute work-out each morning and afternoon. The problem is to get to work is super easy by car - get on the interstate, go and then I'm there - but on bike there are a lot of turns, hills, etc. in order to avoid the interstate. It took about 32 minutes to get there and 36 to get back (more uphill, we took a longer route and goofed around). Not bad but I really don't want to show up to work sweaty and smelly, especially if I have to be in court. So I might try it one cool day to see how bad it is, otherwise this week I'll be taking the train into work without a car.
This evening we headed to our friends, Meghan and Danny to hang out with them and their adorable baby and watch the FSU game. This was pretty much my highlight of the day as we (1) got to see Elizabeth who is just too cute for words and (2) got to see FSU win a game - albeit, it wasn't pretty. So that's it for now. Off to try to clean up before heading to bed to go to work. fun fun

One more thing.

I read that it is nice to have a running log, or blog, to keep track of your training and stuff. I guess it's nice to look back and be able to see progress, etc. Anyway, in case anyone ever wants to check it out, I made one. I'll have to see how it goes and if I keep up with it. It won't be interesting, just a run down of my work-out, nothing fancy. But if you're interested it's http://marathonmissy.blogspot.com/. I felt like I was sort of cheating my naming it "Marathon" Missy since I haven't actually already run one, but I figure it will be even more motivation. :) Plus if anyone doesn't like it, then they can take it up with Spreckles (the new fish who seems more Phirrana then Damsel). :)

I finally made up my mind . . .

No - not about a dress. About running a marathon this fall. You see, for some retarded reason, unknown to even myself, I have always wanted to run a marathon. Why someone would want to put themselves through that I have no idea. Then I started running half marathons. Since moving to STL I've done two and have another one in a few weeks with Marissa (it's September 17th if anyone wants to know - it's in St. Charles if you want to come cheer us on). Then I talked to my friend Kari in April (she ran the New York Marathon!!! How cool is that?!?!?) and she got me really excited about i. Then decided I wanted to run it before I got married.

Well, I was going to the Chicago Marathon in October but I wanted to wait until we got back from Germany to sign up because I wanted to see how my stress fractures in my shins cleared up. Well, they're doing decent, but the Chicago Marathon is full. So, on to find another. After a lot of running to see how my shins are doing and a lot of internet searching, I have finally decided to do the Memphis Marathon on December 2nd. I hope it won't be too cold then and I won't be miserable for the race and I hope the training runs aren't too cold either, but if I want to do it, now's the time. Now that I've made up my mind and am not waivering around anymore I am getting really excited! I can't wait for the half to be over so I can really start training for the marathon! Don't worry - I'm sure I'll keep everyone posted. :) If I like it I think I'll do the Nashville one in April (after the wedding). Sounds fun, right? Yeah, right!

It's that time again.

Fall. Football. Cold weather.

Wait! Hang on! Already? It's still AUGUST!!

Yup, folks, that's right. It's all here in Cold Corn Country. First, football. I used to always think of football as an after Labor Day thing. Not anymore. Football officially started tonight with South Carolina v. Miss. State - yeah, there were other games on too, but no one really cared. All we cared about was watching Spurrier play. Too bad we couldn't "watch" the game, since we have "baby cable" and we don't get ESPN (we get ABC, NBC, CBS, TBS, FOX, WB and that's about it - only $5 a month though!!! We rarely watch TV.). I would seriously trade every channel but one of the big four (so I can still get the news) all for ESPN. I would even pay extra for a "sports package" in order to just get ESPN, but nope, can't do that. You have to get the HUGE cable package to get ESPN and in order to get any extra sports channels you have to first have the huge package and then pay more. So it's not happening, we're not getting ESPN, so we had to "watch" the game on ESPN.com's GameCast - for the Gator games we just go watch them somewhere. Anyway, cable companies, if you're out there, here's what I want - ABC and ESPN, and I'll even pay $10 a month for it! That's it. No more channels. Anyway, football's back. Gators play Girl Scout Troop 109 on Saturday and FSU opens with Miami on Monday night! I LOVE football season!

Second, chilly weather. "Chilly?" you ask - it's only AUGUST! Yes, fall. For three days in a row now I've worn a jacket/coat and long sleeves. We went to the Cardinals v. Marlins games on Tuesday (with Meghan, Danny and Elizabeth - thanks for the tickets!!) and Wednesday (ate yummy pretzels with Marissa and Cassidy) and both nights it was quite chilly. I sat on my hands most of the game because they were cold and that was with a jacket on. At work it's even been a bit too nippy to sit outside for lunch. I can't believe it's this chilly already and we haven't even passed Labor Day.

And finally, fall. Yup, Labor Day is only a few days away, marking the official end to all things fun, laid back and well, fun, in the north. Summer is considered over and fall begins it's slow decline to winter. Everything cool closes at Labor Day and from here on into Memorial Day you pretty much just work and try to make it through the winter. While I love the feeling of briskness in the air and I really love Halloween and pumpkin carving (check out the carvings from last year on the webpage), fall is terribly depressing as it only leads to the end of Daylight's Savings Time (I see no reason it should end - it makes my life so happy) and winter. And everyone knows how I feel about winter. I HATE the cold! HATE really isn't a strong enough word for my dislike of winter. I am miserable, cranky and more miserable in the winter. Luckily I can rejoice that Cody is open to moving to a warmer climate at some point. :)

I hope everyone has a great Labor Day! We're off to Wisconsin for Cody's cousin's wedding in Appleton (it's near Green Bay). It should be a great time. We get to see his mom's side of the family - his Aunt Jackie (amazing lady - and hillarious!), Uncle Fred, Uncle Harold, hopefully Kristy, Cory and Cory's family, and Bev and Matt (very cool guy our age). It should be nice to get to hang out and get away from STL for a few days. It's just too bad we're not going somewhere warmer. :)

New Pictures.

More new pictures of Malhia on the webpage!

Maliha!!!

I finally got to see the baby elephant on Sunday!!! She is so amazingly cute!
Check out the adorable picture! She's about 3 feet tall and 350 lbs. She was born on August 2nd (Bo's birthday!), but they've kept her away from the public until last Friday. Unfortunately she is only outside from 9am to 11am and then 4pm to 7pm, so I didn't get to see her while my mom was here. So after we took her to the airport, we rode our bikes to The Zoo (we only live about a 10-15 minute bike ride from The Zoo) and checked her out! Just so cute!!! We found out today that the naming contest resulted in her being named Maliha - I voted daily for this name so I was happy!

Wedding Dresses.

Well, a quick update. My mom came in town last Thursday, we hit four dress shops that day. Friday, we got our hairs cut (Mommy cut over 9 inches!!) and then hit up a few more shops. Saturday, we got up yet again, gathered my friend, Marissa and hit up three more shops for a second shot at a few dresses. When all was said and done we think we've narrowed it down to five dresses (see http://www.cody-missy.com/Aug06F.htm). There are seven listed, but I think we've knocked off two. Then we found one more was discontinued and I probably can't order it, so now it's likely down to four. Yes, that's not a choice yet, but at least it's progress - it's much better then having 20 I liked and couldn't narrow down at all. :)
As for the voting, I'm still tallying all the votes! Thanks so many people for voting! So far dresses #2, 4 and 6 are tied with the most votes (11 each)!

Wedding Dresses.

Busy right now but wanted to post the most recent wedding dresses. I think I've narrowed it down to 7, probably five. I put them on the website so everyone can look at them and provide an opinion. My mom was in town this weekend and we pretty much did nothing but dress shop - crazy stuff. I just don't think I'll ever find "the one." Anyway more on that later. Let me know what you think.

Game Over.

Well, we worked and worked in all our house "zones" and got the house as good as it's going to get before my mom comes. She gets in here in about 9.5 hours so we figure we might as well rest, get some work done (at work in the morning, not more work at home) and what's done is done and what isn't we'll hide. :) We got the downstairs done and part of the upstairs but none of the spare room - since that's where we dumped everything it looks like a tornado hit it but unless she wants to (a) play on Cody's computer (with Linux), (b) play with my scrapbooks, (c) work on on the gym thing or (d) do the treadmill or bike, she really has no reason to be chilling in there. And if she wants to do (c) or (d) she can always go to my gym as me for free. :)
So, for the next three days Cody and I are sharing a bathroom. He likes the downstairs one and I like the upstairs one - it works much better like that anyway. :) Not that we don't share well, or don't share bathrooms at all, just that he likes his stuff downstairs and I like mine up. Plus, he likes the shower downstairs (it's just a shower stall, no bathtub), where I'm a more traditional, want my bathtub and space girl.
On another note we got a new salt water fish today. He's pitch black like no fresh water fish you'll ever see with two white dots. It's just a little cheap Damsel fish but he's cute - I'd hate to buy a $65 nice salt water fish and have him die on me. I really wanted to name whatever fish I got "Nemo" - yes, I know I'm SO original - but now I don't think it fits him (he's NOT a clownfish - those are at least $20). I'm thinking maybe "Spot" or just name him "Bubbles" again. But I don't think that would be fair to our lost Bubbles. "Mr. Pickles" is already taken so that is out of the picture. Any name ideas for my new fish? :)
Well, better get some rest before Mommy gets here and we go wedding dress shopping mad. I am determined to find a dress this weekend!

Cody emailed me this today.

Another reason I love my new computer!

I love my new computer! First, I swear the monitor is bigger then our TV (yes, this is an exaggeration, but we do have very small TV's - on purpose). Second, it's wicked fast. I'm mean super duper wicked fast. I hava tendency to have a lot of programs running at one time (7 internet explorers, outlook express (yes, my computer friends, I do know it is a crappy program, but I like it so leave me alone about using it), Word, Excel (wedding guest list is always open for edits), and Front Page) - my old laptop would freeze up and run really slow. But not new super fast computer - it's great. Third, it's super light. I love laptops and I love light ones even more. Forth, the keyboard rocks. I type a lot, thus I love keyboards that are nice. This one is nice.
I figured out even another reason to love it tonight. As the whole world knows, I take a lot of pictures. I mean, A LOT. On the old computer, I would have to find my cord, hook the camera up to a USB port and download them using a very crappy Kodak Gallery program. First, the cord was always missing. Second, the camera had to stay on throughout the download so if the batteries were low it would shut itself off and all the pictures wouldn't download. Third, since I don't use Kodak as my editor, I would have to download to that program (because I have a Kodak camera), and then move them to Picassa - I love Picassa. Now, I just take my SD card out of my camera, put it directly into a slot on my computer and instantly the pictures upload to Picassa. No cords, no downloading, nothing. Just inset card into slot and done. FABULOUS!

Our First Nice Dinner

Cody and I are kind of weird when it comes to eating out. We typically don't go out to eat a lot and when we do we like good food (not fancy but relatively good for you -I'm pretty picky about what I eat out) but aren't really into fancy stuff. Our favorite restaurants are Crazy Bowls and Wraps, Subway and Bandana's (it's southern BBQ). Cody loves BW3 (Buffalo Wild Wings now, I think), but there's really nothing I like to eat there. Our average restaurant bill is probably around $20. We're usually just not into spending a ton of money on going out to eat. Going out with friends to bars, is another story, as we can drop quite a bit of money there. Anyway, the last "nice" restaurant we probably ate at was Anthony's in Tallahassee where he took me for Senior Prom in high school. He took me to a nice place here when I was up visiting but they served pizza which knocks it off my list of "nice" places. :)
Anyway, we've been trying to get together with some old friends for quite some time and finally all found a date we were free - Friday. Someone wanted to try a new place in the Central West End - Savor. I was quite excited to get to eat somewhere different and nice. We got their early for the drink specials - two for one wine pours and $5 martinis. I got a great Reisling from the Mosul river area in Germany (I'm a HUGE fan of German wine - sure, their beer is fine, but their wine is fabulous!) and Cody got a regular Martini (with Tanqueray). Cody, of course, liked the martini because it was almost pure booze, I thought it was one of the grossest things ever. I took a sip and then rubbed my tounge to try to get the taste off. :) Anyway, after drinks was dinner. I got an AMAZING salmon with a crap stuffing stop and Cody got some kind of pork thing with great mashed potatoes (but of course they didn't call them "mashed potatotes" they called them something much more fancy but that's what they were). I really enjoyed it. It was great to see our friends - they were two couples we used to see a lot more but just with life being busy we haven't gotten to see as much. We got to talk a lot about weddings since one couple is getting married in March, us in April and the third in May. Of course the other two girls have already found their dresses, but not me! It was a really great time. We did spend more on dinner then I think we ever have before (we did order a bottle of wine too with dinner), but I think one in a while, it's worth it. Now if we went every weekend and spent a ton of money on dinner I think we would have problems, but every now and then it's nice to go somewhere insanely nice and fancy and share good food with good friends.

Float Trip!

In reverse chronological order, on to Saturday's events (those I suppose on the blog this will read in chronological order).
Saturday we went float tripping. Or on a float trip as most people say - I love the phrase "float tripping" though. Anyway, for those not from Missouri, let me explain. Down in southern-ish MO, there are a bunch of "rivers." These are not like the Florida rivers I'm used to like the Suwanne, St. Johns, Appalacicola, etc. They are more like glorified streams, just deep enough in most places for a canoe to travel. You really can't boat on these "rivers" because they're just too shallow. Anyway, people here like to get a bunch of beer, Jell-O shots, booze, whatever will possibly get them the drunkest the quickest (lest I remind you I live in the state that is the nation's leader in meth so these locals like their substances), rent canoes/kayaks/rafts and float down these "rivers" - they call it going on a "float trip."
Anyway, it's actually quite a fun time once you get over the drunk/obnoxious locals. The rivers are really pretty and it's nice and relaxing to get outside and get some sun (something I sorely miss living in Missouri). I typically like to go "float tripping" on Sunday's to minimize the locals disturbance, but since soccer has been every Sunday it just hasn't worked out. So we got together with Dude and went canoe and kayaking yesterday on the Big Piney river. It was a great time. Everyone got a good bit of sun and Cody and Dude got a good bit of drinking in (I was the driver for those two fools - lucky me). We managed to gather quite a few rocks for the turtle tank as well as about 8 minnows for the tank. They will end up eating some of them (which is fine since we forget to feed them all the time), but some will live happily with the turtles.
We did have a good bit of shallow parts/mild rapids due to the draught we have going on and we even managed to tip the canoe over, cooler and possessions included, once. We were going through a particularly swift part, hit a branch, the canoe and everything in it tipped over. We all got dragged along the rocks since the water was only about a foot and a half deep and lost everything down the river. Cody grabbed the canoe, got it on shore. I chased the cooler, kept it closed and got it on shore farther down and Dude got the kayak and collected all our floating belongings. So far all we've realized we're missing is one of my shoes. Not a huge loss - I have dozens of flip-flops. :) So, we're all a bit scraped, bruised and cut up today but it was all in good fun. :) It's a good story to tell at least.

Cardinal Sin

Since I've been told my blogs are too long, I'm going to break this one into several installments. The first is our adventure in Wal-Mart today.
First one of my biggest pet peaves, when it comes to myself, is making the same mistake twice, or three times or even more. I have no idea why I tend to do something stupid and then months later think it's a great idea and won't be stupid this time. Yeah right. Anyway, case in point - going to Wal-Mart on a Sunday evening.
I would love to get all my errands done on the weekdays. Every week I say I am going to save the fun stuff for the weekend and do all the tedious errands during the week. But sure enough, every week we end up at Wal-Mart Sunday afternoon, after Cody's soccer game. The Wal-Mart we got to is horrible on Sundays. It's packed, they're totally out of everything I ever need and it's just a stupid madhouse. But once, a while ago, we didn't make it there until the evening, not the afternoon as usual - it was 10 times worse. Absolutely horrible and I vowed never to do it again. I also vowed last year never to shop at Wal-Mart in late August/early September because of the insane "back to school" shoppers. I hate back to school shoppers.
Anyway, today Cody's team played their second playoff game, won, and then had to play in the Championship Game. Good news is they won the Championship for the first time, bad news was that put us leaving soccer later and thus getting to Wal-Mart around 7 or 7:30. It was miserable. The play was a wreck. They were out of most of the items on my list (yes, I'm a dork and go to the grocery store and Wal-Mart with a list), including fish filters, cat litter, toilet paper (the brand I like at least), the soap I like, etc. So, I committed my Cardinal Sin of making the same mistake twice (or more) - I should have known better then to go to Wal-Mart Sunday evening. Never again. And if I have to then I'm going to the one in Kirkwood and not in Brentwood (for all you STL people you'll get why).
On a less frustrating note, we went to Target afterwards and it was an amazingly peaceful experience. Plus they have this super cute gray pinstriped suit for $70. Unfortunately I left my giftcards at home and will have to go back - hopefully when Mommy visits this week - and try it on.
Congrats to Cody's soccer team, Tap This, for being the Champions in the Budsports Co-Ed Soccer League! Great job!

Back to School.

So, I'm debating going back to school - again. I'm not sure exactly why (maybe I should figure that out before paying even more money for a useless education), but I want to get as much education as I may need before I get too old to go back or have kids and not have enough time/money, etc. And I figure I may not always want to do law so I'm considering things that might expand my career possibilities. I think every time I get far enough out from being in school I miss it and want to go back, hence the law degree (and the inability to spell - is it "hense" or "hence"???). :)
For instance, I can get a Masters in Math, then I could teach math (in college, not K-12) or stay in law. I could go for a few more classes and get a Bachelor's in Engineering, then I could do engineering stuff if I ever so desire, or I could sit for the Patent Bar. I could go for a Masters in Computer Science (provided my minor in CS will get me into a program without too many prereqs), then I could teach math or computers, or sit for the Patent Bar. I could get an MBA, then I could do law or do law type business things. So many options. And such expensive options. I was looking at UF's online MBA program and knowing how affordable undergrad was I figured it would be as well. Nope. $39000 for the two year, online MBA program. Not what I call cheap. If I do go back to school, I would not be leaving work. I would want to do an evening/weekend/online program. It would be neat if Cody and I could do a program together and we could both get a degree, help each other out and have Boeing pay for his! Of course we'd still have to pay for mine since, aside from a great office with a view of Busch Stadium (and my rockin' secretary who can spell better then anyone you've ever met), I really get no perks at my job. None. Not even free internet time. But that's another story for another time. Anyway, that's my current debate.
Oh, today's "zone" was supposed to be both bathrooms, but I only finished the upstairs one. I figured we could not touch it until my mom gets here and only use the downstairs one and then I can just clean the bathroom downstairs right before she gets here. :) I did get both fish tanks in the living room clean though. So now we have all clean fish tanks - not counting the turtle tank though. :)

Is it murder if you kill a rock?

Tonight's "zone" was our bedroom. We picked that since, after the living room, it's pretty much the easiest room in the house to clean. Since it's crazy hot upstairs in the summer, to save on electricity, we sleep downstairs on the futon in the Boy Room - plus Cody swears the futon is better for his back. So the bedroom is pretty much just a big closet all summer. Anyway, we wanted an easy room tonight because (1) we're generally lazy if allowed to be, and (2) tonight was Party in the Park and we figured we'd better go, lest they cancel it again.
A quick Party in the Park lesson - for those of you not from STL, people go crazy here in the summer - the winter sucks so bad they try to fit in everything cool and fun into the few short summer months. One of those fun things is Party in the Park - it's just what it sounds like - in Shaw Park in Clayton (a really nice part of St. Louis) they set up a band, some food and beverage (read: beer, wine and booze) vendors and throw a party from 5 pm until 8pm - it's a sort of after work, extended outdoor happy hour. Anyway, it's the second Wednesday of each month and this summer it seems it always storms on the second Wednesday of the month so they cancel it and move it back to the next Wednesday. Unfortunately in July, the third Wednesday was an amazing heat advisory so they cancelled it all together for July. So we figured we better get one in before they're over or they cancel another one. So after work we headed up there and met up with friends - as usual a good time was had by all - especially since it was amazingly nice outside tonight!
Okay, back to cleaning. So tonight was our bedroom, which consisted mostly of putting away the multiple baskets of clean clothes and gathering the baskets of dirty ones. Then we put up my "pet net" a net type contraption that hangs from the ceiling/wall to put stuffed animals - yes, I still have a ton of stuffed animals and just not enough room to store them so the "pet net" works great - I get to keep my keepsakes and they're out the way, but not just sitting in bags in the basement.
Finally we had to deal with the salt water tank. Up until January (yes, JANUARY, 8 months ago), we had a salt water fish in the tank, Bubbles, who lived with just herself and her live rocks. You see, in salt water tanks, you put rocks that are alive - they actually are members of the salt water community and contribute to the tank environment. Well, in January Bubbles died - she was a few years old so she lived a good fish life - but instead of getting around to getting another fish we just left the rocks in the tank to live by themselves. Of course, in the past 8 months I haven't done much to keep that tank up to par, so it's sort of fallen in disrepair, if you will - until today while on my cleaning binge I decided we needed to do something with the tank. We had a few choices: (1) clean the tank (a big pain), change the water (an even bigger pain because now that I live in the Midwest I have to MAKE saltwater), and get a new fish (which then I would have to feed) or (2) be happy with the three tanks we already have, clean the tank and put it in the basement. The problem with (2) is what to do with the rocks. I would pretty much have to "kill" them. To "kill" rocks you either put them in bleach or put them in the sun outside a few days and that pretty much kills off anything living on them. For whatever stupid reason I just hated the thought of "killing" my rocks.
First, as an old anti-war friend described me during our war discussions, I'm pretty much a pacifist and hate killing - including rocks (thanks Adam if you ever read this!). I guess I could have donated them to a pet store to live in their tanks of for them to resell, but then it's like taking your cat or dog to the pound because you didn't think hard enough about the responsiblities of pet ownership when you got him/her and are now too lazy to take care of it. I didn't want to be THAT person. Second, live rocks are expensive and I just knew if I killed mine then I would decide in two weeks that I wanted to reset up the salt water tank and I would want to buy new rocks.
So, what did we do? We spent the better part of a few hours, draining the water, cleaning the tank, making new salt water and setting up the tank all nice and clean again, all so I wouldn't have to "kill" my rocks. Now my rocks are happily living in clean water, with a clean filter and light system. Yippe skippy rocks. So hopefully this week I'll find myself a salt water fish store in St. Louis (someone in the Midwest has to have salt water tanks, right?) and buy a new fish. On a less pain in the butt note, salt water fish are crazy beautiful and I look forward to picking out a very pretty one. :) Maybe I'll name him Bubbles 2 or Nemo. I LOVE Nemo!
Now, remind me who ever said rocks can't be pets??

Missy's House Cleaning/Prepare For Guests Strategy

My mom is coming to visit next week, actually in exactly 10 days, to hang out and help with the wedding. Mostly, I need her help finding a wedding dress, so I called whining and begged her to come help. Our objective? Hit as many bridal boutiques as necessary to find "the one" or at least "the good enough one because we're tired of looking at dresses." Anyway, whenever a family member comes to visit I get very excited. We don't get to see our family often and they get to see our humble home even less often, so I get excited that they're coming to see us in our house and our city. And I want everything to look as nice as humanly possible for their visit. You see, they get to see our siblings houses all the time but ours only once in a blue moon, so I want to make a good impression and at least trick them into thinking we keep our house this nice all the time. So I have a plan when family is visiting.
I divide the house/property into rooms, or "zones," if you will. And there are 10 "zones" - Living Room, Dining Room, Kitchen, Boy Room, Bedroom, Spare Room, Bathrooms, Hallways and Stairs, Basement, and Yard (front and back) and Porch. So each day I have a list of things I want to do in the "zone" I have assigned to that day. For instance, today's "zone" was the Living Room. So I came home from work, painted the trim around the window (the rest of the room was painted last June but for some reason I hadn't finished the trim yet), got started on the trim around the doorway (actually Cody did this part), washed the couch covers (in a feble attempt to remove the cat hair), vacuumed the rug, cleaned/dusted the coffee table, book cases and fish tank stands, reorganized the bookcases totally (we have an enourmous amount of books filling bookcases in ever corner of this room), swept and washed the wood floors, cleaned the blinds on the front windown, and then just general straigtening. Unfortunately I didn't get a chance to put the second coat on the doorway trim or clean the two fishtanks, so that will have to eat into another "zones" time later in the week. I can't wait until I have all these little chores done and the house looks super nice.
We also found out that Cody's parents are coming to visit next month! I'm super excited because they came up with us last July when we moved my U-Haul of stuff into the house and did a great job helping us paint, but they haven't seen the house since so they've missed the house looking like an actual lived in house! I can't wait to show them all we've done and they can see how we've organized everything. I think they'll really like what we've done with the place - especially since the last time they were here there were boxes in every room and we were still sleeping on the floor. :)
Well, off to shower after a totally grueling 45 mintues on the eliptical today. I don't know how 45 minutes on that damn thing can seem harder then running 7 miles. Go figure.
p.s. Wow I love the new computer - the monitor is ginormous!

Palpable Happiness

Wow - I get a new computer and I go blog crazy. One more for good measure - a quick update. This past week was crazy busy, as they usually go for us. I worked my butt off redoing our dining room and Cody had to work a lot of extra time at work. I got the entire chair rail up, nailed in, caulked and painted all by myself. All I really have left to do in the dining room is paint one section of the chair rail and one coat of paint on the doorway leading to the living room. Yippe! Another project almost done!!
Saturday we had the SEC Softball Tournament with the Gator Club. Cody played on the team, after not playing softball/baseball for about 10 years. He was actually quite good - being a natural athlete and all. After the tourney (which the Gators won I might add), we headed to Greg's pool party. More fun in the sun! Saturday night we headed downtown for the LIVE concert at Live on the Levee. Yes, we've seen them in concert quite a few times before, but as usual, it was a great show. There's just soemthing about seeing that band in concert that is just really amazing and moving. They do a really great show and it really gets the crowd moving. After the show we watched the always wonderful firework showcase. Sometimes happiness is practically palpable.
Sunday Cody's soccer team had the first game of their playoffs. It was a hard fought victory, but a victory nonetheless. Great job guys! Now they play next week for the Bud Sports championship! The rest of the day we ran errands, did chores, etc.
Today I went wedding dress shopping . . . . again. Still no luck. I think I'm destined never to find "the one" and just have to settle on something that looks decent. We'll have to see once my mom comes up. After dress shopping, Marissa and I ran 7 miles in preparation for the half marathon next month. Getting closer . . .

Happy 10 Years!

10 years. Wow - that's a long damn time. As a matter of fact, that's how long Cody and I have known each other this second time around. Second time around? You see, we first met on the Deerlake Middle School 8th grade trip to Washington D.C. He and his friends were on the same bus as my friends (hey there Meghan, Christine and Rachel!!!) and I on the trip up to D.C. Anyway, I had a HUGE crush on him so we sort of middle school flirted a bit here and there on the trip. Actually my friends and I pretty much stalked him and his friends because some of my friends also had crushes on some of his. I have about a zillion pictures of his butt from the trip because we were always following him and his friends around taking their pictures. Okay, we were lame. :) I do have one really great picture of him on the bus with his huge glasses. As soon as I figure out if my scanner still works, I'll scan it onto the website. :) Anyway, we even had a bet on the way back to Tally as to who can stay awake the longest and wrote notes the whole way back - I think I even have some of the notes. Anyway, upon returning to middle school, he went back to his friends, I back to mine and we really never talked again.
So that leads us to the second time around. 10 years ago this week, I got a job working at the grocery store where he worked. I had already worked for the store (Bruno's for those curious) at another location so got hired at his location working with him in Customer Service - where you buy lottery tickets and make returns. Anyway, I hated him because he didn't remember me. I refused to talk to him or really even be nice to him. I was really mad/hurt that he didn't even remember me when I had such a huge crush on him back in the day - come to learn later that it wasn't personal, it's just Cody and his faulty memory. :) So, when I first started working there not only did I hate him for not remembering me but I was dating someone else. When that relationship sort of fell apart, I noticed that Cody wasn't such a bad person after all. He trained me one Friday night on the office closing procedures (I was "promoted" from Customer Service to Office) and was really quite a funny guy. Anyway, jump forward a bit and he came into the store one evening while I was filling in as cashier and said he had to see the movie "Romeo and Juliet" for extra credit for English and wanted to know if I wanted to go. Obviously I said yes. To be continued . . . .

New Computer!

After months and months and months of pleading my case, I finally talked Cody into letting me get a new laptop! Actually, I just saved and saved my mileage checks until he couldn't argue with me anymore about the necessity of a laptop. You see, I get paid mileage for every out of town docket I go to so in the past I usually put half in savings for us and the other half I spent on whatever I wanted - clothes, etc. But since the old laptop finally broke, I've been saving my mileage checks for a new laptop. Well the time finally came and Cody went and got it this morning. You see, Cody is a desktop guy. I'm a laptop girl. Though he probably uses my laptop about 90% more then he does his desktop, he sees a desktop as a necessity and a laptop as a toy. I'm the opposite. I don't see why anyone in the world would want a dumb desktop - they're practically useless (especially ours since it's upstairs where it's currently too hot to even hang out and plan on the computer) and totally immobile. Laptops just rock. They're mobile, I can take it around the house whereever I need it. They're just cute too. :) In any event, I got a new laptop and am thrilled. . . though Cody's being insane about making sure we're careful with the hinges (I have a thing with hinges - they always break around me - cell phones and laptops being the big ones). :)

More Paper Towel Wisdom

A while ago I posted about my cheap-brand paper towels (Sparkle, for those interested) and the wisdom they have recently attemted to pass on to their users. Well, I bought some more paper towels and low and behold they have more wisdom to empart. Here goes:

"If you love life, life will love you back."
- Arthur Rubinstein

"The greatest happiness in the world is to make others happy."
- Luther Burbank

"With every rising of the sun, think of your life as just begun."
- Anon

Thanks, cheap Sparkle towels.

I'm a home improvement godess!

It really hit me right before we left for Germany that we'd lived in our house for a year now and still haven't finished painting or unpacking and really hadn't gotten a start on all the projects I had such high hopes of accomplishing the first few months in the house. Life just got busy and there was always something else to do . . . . until this last weekend. Friday night I decided that come hell or high water, I was determined to get something done on the house. So we went out Friday night and started working bright and early Saturday morning on the dining room. Since we bought the house I knew I wanted to do something different with the dining room, but didn't really solidify any ideas for a while. Cody was actually the one who thought of the idea for the dining room paint decor and we actually bought the paint, I think, last Labor Day, and until now just hadn't gotten around to it. Anyway, Saturday we primed and painted the dining room. Add in Sunday in there and we primed the whole room, painted the top part a tanish colour and put three coats of burgundy/red on the bottom. There will be a white chair rail where the colours meet. Oh, and yes, I said THREE coats of red. The first coat was just awful and the second made the room look very Aztec or something - like a Mexican restraunt - but the third coat made a nice deep shade of burgundy which really adds a richness to the tan and white in the rest of the room. So after working so much on that project I was obsessed. After work I came home and painted all the baseboards and trim around the doorways white to match the chair rail (which we picked out but haven't purchased yet). The house is a zillion years old so not only does it have a ton of trim, but it's very thick trim. I'll have to post a before and after picture when I get the chair rail up. Anyway, in line with my general dorkiness, that has been what I've been up to - redoing our dining room so it looksl ike grown-ups live here instead of a bunch of lazy college kids (no offense to my college friends). Next up is to paint the entry way/hall way, then tile the back splash in the kitchen, redo the carpet/hardwoods, and then redo the downstairs bathroom. :) Sounds fun, huh? Oh, the joys of homeownership.

On another note, I was all excited this weekend because it was tax free weekend in MO (on "school" items), so I was going to go ahead and get a new laptop while there was no tax (for you Florida people, our tax here is over 8%). So we searched the ads to find one I liked, that was cheap enough but still nice enough. We knew we wanted at least 1024 MB of memory, a fast processor and as much hard drive space as I could get (with all my pictures and music). We finally found one we liked at Circuit City on sale, but before running out to buy it we decided to check online at Dell first. Turns out with Cody's Dell discount (another Boeing bonus), it would actually be cheaper for us (including shipping and tax) to buy one on Dell. So it looks like we're going to finally get me a new laptop, just have to pick it out and order it now! :) Yipee! No more ghetto broken hinge!!!

Website Update

The website, www.cody-missy.com is now officially updated with new decor, minus the wedding section which my brother is working on. Also available are recent pictures for July and August, including last night's soiree at Double D's. Enjoy!

Flash.

If you wonder why my house is a mess and I never get anything done, today is a prime example. Today's schedule: Wake at 7 am. Leave for work at 7.30 am (Yes, my goal is to wake up, get dressed and ready to go and out the door in less then 30 minutes - I pride myself on my low-maintenance mornings). Work all day. 5:30 leave work. 5:50 arrive home, change into work-out clothes. 6:00 leave for gym. 6:10-7:10 Cardio Kickboxing class. 7:30 arrive home, call Cody back from the three "missed calls," find out everyone is going to Shafly Brewery (a local St. Louis brewery - awesome Hefeweizen) to watch "Flash Gordon," find out movie starts at 8pm. 7:30-7:45 eat quick dinner (frozen salmon cooked in microwave), take shower because I was stinky, and get in car. 8:00 arrive at Shafly, watch "Flash," laugh uncontrollably. 10:30 pm arrive home, having not done laundry, dishes, vauccuming, sweeping, yard work, or any other possible task I had on the never ending "to do" list. You know though, damn life is good and I wouldn't have it any other way. :)

Peace.

I'm writing earlier then normal tonight because Cody is coming home soon and we're going to watch a movie (a rarity in our house as we never ever have time for such things) and hang out (another rarity lately with his work and social schedule and my always seemingly conflicting social schedule). But as I was about to take a shower, snacking on graham crackers and Neutella (thanks again Germans for the Neutella - wonderfully delicious!), I realized that amid all this craziness in our lives - work, the house, working out, friends - there really are moments of peace sometimes. They often don't last long (the cat jumped on the counter trying to eat my Neutella, ruining my peaceful moment) as we move to another task or event, but it's nice to know they're out there when you need them.
In other events, it's the kitties birthday's today. They were all born right around four years ago. I got them four or five weeks later, when they were just little bitty things. I told everyone at work today they were all related and no one belived me (Bumpis, the fat one, looks nothing like Wiggles, the skinny co-dependent kitty, or Mr. Pickles for that matter), until I explained that the vet told me that one cat can have a litter of kittens with different dads. I guess the kitties mommy was a little hussy. And Tubby's (aka Bumpis) dad must have been really fat and fluffy. Thinking they are four years old makes me think of four years ago. I had just come back from a whirlwind summer in Europe. Amazing trip - did a lot of thinking and growing up. I also decided to swear off boys forever. I was single and planned to stay that way forever (sort of like saying "I'm never going to drink again" after a long night out with Jose Quervo). So I decided I might want a cat. That thought of possibly getting one cat (to which I am deathly allergic) one day in the future ended up being three kittens. Yeah, I'm a sucker for "They were abandoned. If no one adopts them then they will be put to sleep. One cat will need a playmate while you're in school/work all day. But you wouldn't want to break up a set of three sisters would you? They should stay together." Alas, three cats and four years later I sit here writing about their birthday. So, happy birthday furballs! May you live many more years tormenting Cody (he *swears* he hates the cats - but loves them more then he'll ever admit - proof? See "Mr. Pickles Page" on the website) and making my eyes itch!