Tips for keeping your money

I used to follow the financial meltdown of the global economy pretty regularly, but then I realized that there was just too many banks failing and too much of my tax dollars were going to people I wouldn't hire, so I just gave up. But I can see how in all this uncertainty it can be hard to pick a bank. Will it still be open tomorrow? Does this bank still give out suckers? Do their checks look cool? All of these are important questions. It's hard to pick a good, solid bank, but one bank near my house is making it a little easier than the others. It is standing above the rest and helping you make up your mind. It's their sign that reads,

"New Home Lone Rates"

that boldly proclaims that you should take your money elsewhere. Preferably to a bank that can spell. And maybe count.

Hopefully this Christmas season you placed your money in a better bank. Have a wonderful Christmas! Enjoy the time we have to celebrate the birth of our savior, Jesus Christ.

Snow Day

The rain, ice and snow came and it's shutting down everything around here. I haven't gone into work because I am a chicken and would rather not get hit by a crazy driver. I must say that the best part of winter storms is the news coverage around here. They go crazy. They interview people buying snow shovels, the provide live coverage of the "snow falling! From the SKY! And landing on the ground!" and they tell just exactly the road conditions - treacherous. Which could mean slightly damp or it's a death trap. They use the word pretty liberally around here.

While we were watching the news this morning to see if I should venture out there were two reports that I really enjoyed. In the first report the reporter directed the camera to her feet where she showed us that the snow "covered her shoes". This is breaking news people. The snow covered her shoes. The second report covered the main road in town and was showing how slippery it was. To demonstrate the bad conditions, the reporter WALKED ON TO THE ROAD in front of oncoming traffic and slid around on the ice. Because nothing speeds up the morning commute or boosts T.V. ratings like a live video of a reporter being struck by a car. Thankfully that didn't happen, but I am hoping that from now on that reporter is regulated to the news desk. Where it's dry and there are no cars to leap in front of.

If it's snowing near you, stay dry and enjoy some hot chocolate.

What's in a name?

I need your help. Old, Comfy Shoes may have run its course. I used to love writing funny stories about what goes on in my life. Now I feel like I have run out of material and I am keeping this blog going just out of obligation. It's hard to come up with stories when 11 hours of my day are taken up working or driving to and from work. Since I can't blog about work it really puts a crimp in my style. Also, I've become nicer and can't make fun of people on my blog which removes about 90% of my content.

What I want to write about is how we could do something about the crap that goes on in this world. I want to write about why we should do things about the problems we see, why as a Christian it's important to do something about the environment, poverty and racism. These are things that I enjoy discussing and want to write about. I want to get people's feedback on different books and make people aware of opportunities they have to get involved. I want the time I spend writing to mean something.

There is just one thing holding me back: I can't come up with a name for this new blog. There's no point in registering a new site if I don't know what to call it. Do any of you have any ideas? Could you send them my way? Leave them in the comments if you don't mind. I'm sure someone out there has a brilliant idea that they don't mind me stealing.

We are good friends...

Yesterday was one of those days. Everything went wrong. I came home to find out that our credit card number may have been stolen and new cards would take 1-2 weeks to arrive. Awesome timing since I was planning on doing the Christmas shopping tomorrow. Awesome. Our internet was down and someone couldn't come out until Tuesday to fix it. I put sour milk into the eggs I was making and the flour I was going to use had worms in it. It was not a good evening.

But now it's Friday and after 4 days our internet is FINALLY fixed. It is a much better day!

Last weekend our friend Scott got married. Congratulations Scott and Olivia.

We gave them a set of unique trivets.

And Ben got to do the worm at the reception. I think that this makes it a good wedding.

We also pranked their house, which apparently is not done here in Kentucky. When I describe how we booby trap the house or rearrange all of the furniture while the couple is on their honeymoon, I get told I am mean and not a good friend. I don't think that they understand; that's just how we treat our friends in Ohio, we take all the labels off of their cans and fork their yard to show our love. Fortunately Scott lives in Ohio and he's participated in plenty of pranks. He had it coming.

We re-did the bed

the shower,

the pictures,
and the basement.
We also left them a welcome home note.

In all actuality this is pretty tame. They should be happy that Matt didn't release all those pregnant hamsters in their house. That would be a real surprise!

Happy Veteran's Day

To all the men and women who served in our military - thank you!

Here are some pictures from our veteran's day parade:





And of course no parade would be complete without a guy with a cat in his coat:

Vote!

Did you?

Up until last night I was an undecided voter. Neither candidate had what I was looking for. Both had really great qualities and both had some really bad qualities. In the end we finally decided on one candidate but it wasn't easy - we had to pick which candidate got heads and which one got tails, and that took quite some time. So congratulations America, we've managed to pick two candidates that I can't get excited about.

I will say that even when I am not excited about the choices - I am very thankful to be able to vote. Not everyone gets or had this opportunity and I realize that this is a privilege. I hope you got out and voted even if you weren't excited about the race.

To the people with excessive Halloween decorations...

Hello,

I thought about mailing you this letter but I couldn't see your house number for all the Halloween decorations in your yard. It really is impressive that you could fit so much stuff in such a little yard. I will have to admit that I was pretty offended when you first started decorating. The lone life-size mannequin with the butcher knife chopping up a body was pretty disturbing. The fact that you put it right at the curb where I couldn't help but see it really frustrated me. I considered complaining.

I am glad that I didn't. I might have missed out on all the other mannequins you had to set up. When you brought that trailer over with all the additional decorations that you had kept in storage, I knew that we were in for a treat. You set up an entire haunted house worth of characters, flashing lights and tombstones all in your little 10x10 foot yard. You managed to get all the horror stars out there - Jason, the headless bride, Freddie Kruger and so many others. It was better than a wax museum. And the music! You probably had at least 3 different songs all playing simultaneously. You really outdid yourself and anyone else who lives in this county.

So thanks for the mini-haunted drive in your yard; however, it's November 2 and Halloween is over. I may still be offended by the chopped up body and fake blood. Could you take it all down now? I just can't wait to see your Christmas decorations...

Thanks,
Andi

Shh... don't tell anyone

Ben and I were invited to a "Sola Scriptura Costume Party" last night. We were supposed to come dressed according to scripture. You really can't get much bible-nerdier than that. We were pretty excited. Some of the more creative costumes were "Potipher's wife" dressed in fishnets and a bustier, "Drunkeness" dressed in beat up overalls and carried the "fruit of the flesh" in a brown paper bag, and our asian friend who dressed as the "wise man from the East".

I tried to come up with the cheapest costume possible and when I realized that Ben wouldn't let me dress as Rahab the prostitute, I settled on spies to Jericho. Behold our costumes:

We actually won an award for the most creative costume. I've never won a costume award and I am pretty pumped about this one. I am totally displaying the trophy in our living room.

I see said the blind man as he picked up the hammer and saw

I've begun to realize that I am getting old. I am noticing wrinkles on my face and I can't stay up past 10 pm anymore. I don't think that I am old, I'm just moving in that direction. The biggest sign is that I have to squint at every presentation and street sign. I've put it off until I am 25 - but I think I may need to just suck it up and wear contacts or glasses all the time now.

I went to the eye doctor on Saturday to get a prescription for contacts. I've never worn these before and let me say - I am not a fan. Sticking something in my eye is crazy unnatural; it's right up there with tanning beds and Donald Trump's hair. Some things are just not supposed to exist.

I am going to give them a try a though. They do seem uber convenient. Saturday and Sunday went pretty well; it just felt like I had an eye lash in my eye the whole time. Monday morning was a wreck. I was running late and couldn't get the stupid lens in my eye. Then it fell in the sink and I had to take the time to clean it, but I didn't really clean it so when I did get it my eye it burned. Bad. Which caused me to yell and hop around the bathroom grabbing at my eye. When your eye is burning it doesn't really like to open up which made it ridiculous hard to get the lens out. When I finally did pry my eye open and pull the lens out I was so fed up that I threw the lens away, grabbed my glasses and headed to work.

Today I was able to get them in without burning my cornea off, but getting them out was another story. It took a LONG time and involved me scraping the inside of my eyelid with my nail. Twice. I'm not sure this is going to work out for me. I am either going to blind myself or master contacts. I hope it's the latter.

Dramatic Lemur

It's creepy and cool all at the same time.

I give you the dramatic lemur:



*Thanks Nate for showing me this!

Free!

Free dresser for the taking.

Solid wood. Has been stripped and repainted white. It looks good, but there is remaining paint stripper that soaked into the wood and is causing the new paint to become tacky. Currently unusable.

With some hard work this dresser could be stripped, sanded, primed, painted and sealed again to possibly be a beautiful piece of furniture. Possibly. Or it may be the largest time sink hole EVER.

Any takers?

Sometimes it's best to not even start

I know. The VP debate was soooo last week. And there wasn't anything remarkable about it at all. I was hoping for some major blunders and there weren't any. Sigh... instead we shall talk about my blunders....

Ben says that I overestimate my abilities and underestimate the amount of work a job takes. He says that I don't set reasonable goals for myself. I say that he doesn't dream big enough. Can we clean the whole house, mow the grass, discuss our marriage AND plan our financial future all on a Thursday evening? Yes we can! Dream big!

But... recently I think that I might have taken on a project that morphed into a time-sucking-waste-hole and maybe it was over my head. Maybe. It all started with this dresser:

I had redone it a couple years ago and had decoupaged antique postcards on the drawers and top. It was a unique dresser and I liked it, but it was time for a change. It was time for all of my furniture to match. Like a grown-up. The plan was to paint my headboard and dresser white. In one Saturday. Simple right? Just prime it, paint it and seal it. Yeah.

Well when I painted the dresser last time I was lazy and didn't prime it and the paint started peeling and then the cards wouldn't come off.... and it turns out I needed to strip the whole thing!

Every project always morphs into something that is so huge it's ridiculous. So I drove off to Lowe's and I convinced myself to buy a soy-based paint stripper because I care about the environment and am secretly a closet hippy. It actually worked surprisingly well - it just took longer to soak in and required a little more elbow grease than the burn-your-skin-off stripper. And when I say it took longer I mean that it took all of Saturday and most of Sunday to strip the dresser to look like this:
I can't decide if it looks like a designer urban grit piece of furniture or if it looks like it should be on the side of the road. It also smells like paint so all of our clothes are currently chilling on our futon and the headboard is hanging out in the hallway. Ahhhh!

Now that I've put this much work into the dresser part of me thinks I should just strip it down to the wood and stain it. But that would defeat the purpose of the whole project - to get my furniture to match. So on Saturday I hope to finish stripping it and paint it white! I hope. Anyone who wants to help is more than welcome. I still have a headboard and a nightstand to do. Dream big!

Politics - The new Survivor

While we were hanging out with some friends this weekend, Matt put a finger on why I am so intrigued by this year's presidential race. It's like a T.V. drama. Each day it just keeps getting better. I have to tune in every day just to find out what happened.

When I thought McCain couldn't win, he picked Palin as his running mate and things got more interesting. When I had thought someone had said the dumbest thing ever, they let the vice presidential candidates talk. When I thought that there couldn't be anything left for the candidates to talk about, our financial system tanked and Obama and McCain rushed in to rescue us (which last time I checked they weren't actually economists or on any finance committee). This is like the best reality show EVER. And I get to help vote someone off. You can't ask for better entertainment.

I cannot wait for the VP debate. It's going to be hilarious. Biden says whatever pops into his head and Palin doesn't seem like she is ever really sure what to say. This will be a great debate. I have no idea who to vote for, but I am certainly being entertained while I figure it out.

Favorite quotes from a V.P. candidate:

Biden on the 1929 market crash:
"When the stock market crashed, Franklin Roosevelt got on the television and didn't just talk about the princes of greed. He said, 'look, here's what happened."
(Roosevelt wasn't president then and television wasn't invented until later)

Palin when asked what magazines or newspapers she reads:
"Um, all of them, any of them that have been in front of me all these years."

I love this country.

A Timeline of Poop

July 22: A bird poops on me while I am walking into work. Not a good start to a day.

August 21: Again, I am pooped on by a bird while walking into work. I can't win.

September 20: Ben is pooped on by a bird while sitting outside reading. I do a little dance because for one it wasn't me.

October 19: I plan on staying inside and avoiding windows.

Next time I'll get Tooth of the Month

Friday I went to the dentist. I was a tad bit wary about going to a new dentist down here. (Wary, by the way, is the word that lost me a spelling bee. It's not spelling W-E-R-Y.) I had gone to the same small dentist office in Ohio since I was 5. I didn't really want to find a new dentist and I had heard horror stories about dentists down here. Unnecessary root canals. Crowns that weren't fitted. Cavities that didn't exist. So I put it off until it had been over a year since my last visit and I wasn't getting my money's worth from the insurance I was paying.

OH MY GOSH! Dentist offices have gotten so high tech. This office that I went to was HUGE! It was like a teeth cleaning warehouse! There was a whole hallway of rooms of hygienists just cleaning people's teeth. I had never seen anything like it. Then, they took my blood pressure. Just to "make sure I was relaxed". (Or for cheaper malpractice insurance. You pick.) But the best part was the x-rays. I hate getting x-rays taken of my teeth. HATE IT. It makes me gag and it's no fun. But this office had digital x-rays. That instantly popped up on a screen in front of me. X-rays of my teeth. Just like that. It was so cool. Well until it showed that I had 3 cavities between my teeth from not flossing. Ever. And a 4th one forming. Guess who is the queen of flossing now?

The downside of the visit was that I had a cheerleader-sized version of Helga the Hygienist who felt that it was her duty to not only stretch out my lips but also floss down to my toes. My gums are still sore. I think she was trying to make a point about flossing. I get it. I'll floss now.

Don't call us, we'll call you

Today I read a job posting for a truck driver.

Wanted: One driver capable of maintaining a hazardous material license. Must be detail oriented and be able to multitask.

I don't know about you, but I don't want hazmat truck drivers multitasking.

It saved a wretch like me

Lately I have realized that I need to be a more graceful person. I need to extend more grace to others and to myself. Especially to myself. I am realizing how my perfectionism is not helping, but hurting me. Philip Yancey defines God's grace as this: "There is nothing I can do to make God love me more, and there is nothing that I can do to make God love me any less."

This is a hard concept for me to grasp emotionally. Grace in the abstract seems good and idealistic, but grace in practice seems stupid. Surely I have to do something for it. I find myself working hard to be good enough for God's grace or berating myself for not being a gracious person. I think that I am missing the point.

The other day while doing my devotions I was reading in Romans trying to understand God's grace more. I know that because of God's grace I have salvation and a relationship with God, but how does grace play out in my daily life. What role does grace have in working out my salvation? I came across Roman 8:1-2: "Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death."

Did you read that? There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus! That phrase alone is worth a party to end all celebrations! I don't think that I have ever really understood that. I had always held myself to the standard of perfection as a Christian, and I never reached it. I kept failing. And you know what? In Christ it's ok! There is no condemnation for my short comings. God does not keep punishing me because I am not God. There are consequences for my sin and God teaches me to live more like him, but I am not condemned because I am not perfect. I don't have to carry around the guilt of my imperfections and sin. I AM NOT CONDEMNED IN CHRIST JESUS.

Do you know how freeing that is? I can enjoy life because all I have to do is try my best to be obedient to Christ. Once I confess my sin and turn from it I can move on. God does not require me to grovel and pay penitence for my sins.

We serve an amazingly good and gracious God. How can you not love Him?

That's snot my job.

Now I am sick. Obviously I know what my body thinks about camping in the rain. I won't tell you what I think about my body right now because we are fighting. Fighting with snot and tissues. I think I am losing.

Also, nothing says welcome back to work like cold chills, achy joints and 471 unread e-mails. Yep. I had 471 unread e-mails when I logged on today. When I left I had 38. That's a lot of e-mails to read and file. Which made me want to go back home dive under the covers and watch movies until I felt better. Instead I bought myself a sprite and popped some DayQuill. (Mom read: I drank some wheat grass juice and took some vitamin C tablets.) Needless to say today was less than stellar. Hurray that this is only a 4 day work week.

Anyway, back to the vacation stories. Ben and I have this theory that people when they are on vacation think that they are invincible. Which is why they stop in the middle of the road to stare at rainbows, swim in unknown waters and get really close to large dangerous animals. Nothing bad can happen to them! They are on vacation! The stupid thing that we saw someone do on our trip (besides go running towards a bear) was climb over the railing and walk out on to a rock cliff at the top of lookout mountain. Like a cliff that dropped several hundred feet. He walked out onto the ledge to take a picture of a bronze statue of an eagle. The statue was about 5 feet from the railing and I am sure that his zoom lens would have given him the same shot, but nope, he had to risk his life instead. But he didn't fall because he was on vacation! We tried to get a picture of this stupidity in action but our memory card was full and I couldn't decide which picture of us to delete the fastest. Also I needed to go pee. Oh the people you see when you travel....

Are we there yet?

We are back! And I never want to ride in another car again. Sitting in one for 11 million hours driving from wal-mart to wal-mart is enough. Our vacation originally was going to be a camping road trip of the South. But since we (and by we I mean Ben) didn't plan on it being cold in the mountains or it raining almost every day of our trip our vacation morphed into how-many-wal-marts-can-we-visit-in-one-week. Even with all our money going to feed the Man, it was a good trip.

First though I have to tell you a little bit about our trip to D.C. Being true to our overacheiving selves we crammed in as much stuff as we could. Even to the point of hauling our luggage around Arlington Cemetary the last day we were there. (Wouldn't recommend that.) But the highlight of the trip occured while Ben was sitting in the hotel room doing homework. The day before we had gotten into a "discussion" about how close to the road you should stand waiting for the crosswalk signal. Ben stands about as far away as you can because "these drivers are crazy". I like to stand right on the edge of the road and dare someone to hit me. Or at least I did, because the next day Ben saw a lady at a light drive over a curb and A GUY'S BICYCLE as he was waiting for the crosswalk. She drove over his bike. Like he had to pull it out of her wheel well. So I guess that means Ben gets a point and I'll stand next to him away from the street.

The one thing that I realized while camping is that I don't like to live far away from civilization. And by that I mean restaurants and stores. Driving 30 min into the nearest town that has a Wal-mart and an Applebees is not my cup of tea. Also I realized that camping in the remains of a tropical storm are also not that much fun. In 24 hours the side of the mountain that we were on got 2 inches of rain. The other side of the mountain got 8 inches. Which meant no river tubing or water slides for Andi. Sad.

We did get to do some really neat things though, hiking in the smokies, mirror maze in Gatlinburg, hiking through a gorge in Georgia, visiting Ben's family in Georgia, seeing Rock City and visiting the Chattanooga aquarium.

I have about a million other stories but right now it's lunch time with no food in the house and my father-in-law is coming over tomorrow and he'd probably like to see the house and not so much all these piles of laundry.

I have no idea what happened

So here's an update on my gardening skills. It started off looking like this:


Which grew into this:

Which turned into this while I was in DC:

All I can say is that it's a good thing that I am not responsible for growing food for us to eat. Because I am pretty sure we would starve. I really don't know what happened. The plants just started dying. There had been an oil spill near the steps some years ago... but grass seems to grow just fine there, so I have no clue.

Our trip to DC was awesome. I passed the training that I was out there for and we crammed in tons of sightseeing. I also learned that while Continental Airlines are helpful and friendly, they cannot be trusted. They will tell you that you are on one flight when, whoops, look, you're on a different flight flying to a completely different city! They like to keep you on your toes. It still puzzles me that we paid $250 for Ben's ticket and they always rebooked him on the better flights. My company paid $1250 for my ticket and I got rebooked on the worst flights. But we ended up flying together and surprisingly all of the flight changes worked out in Ben and I's favor. More to come on that trip!

God is Good

This week Ben and I have received two great blessings from God:

1. Ben's school gave him a scholarship that makes next years financial situation a whole lot easier.

2. An unexpected gift of being able to go out to eat after a long, hard day.

Right now it feels like God is saying, "I know", which is humbling in deed. Who am I that God is mindful of me? We serve a good and loving God.

Here's where I bow out gracefully

Things have been pretty crazy around here lately. Staying busy, lots of changes (no I am not pregnant!) and a lot of travel coming up. Which means that posting will be light. Hopefully I'll have some funny stories from our trip to DC and our road-trip vacation next month. In the mean time enjoy some reading at these sites:

The Simple Family. A blog focused on living a simpler life with less stuff.

All or Nothing. Humorous by a small boutique owner.

Nothing But Bonfires. A lighthearted blog that always makes me laugh.

Catch you at the end of summer...

It was one of those days...

Today I was walking into work and a bird pooped on me. Right on my skirt. And I touched it with my hands trying to figure out what it was.

Feel free to laugh. I did.

Random things I have seen go past my kitchen window

Or why this town is so awesome....

• A man riding bareback on a horse
• A golf cart
• A backhoe shoveling snow
  
• A tricycle/rickshaw made out of the back of an old VW beetle and half a motorcycle
  
• A 3 year old running through the street by herself
• The neighbors dog run over to poop in our yard
• A man on a riding lawnmower....that he had driven across town
• An ice cream truck that played no music... instead the driver pulled a string inside that rang a bell on the outside.

I'd like to point out that I don't live on a busy street. And we've only lived here for 6 months. This town is so weird it's awesome.

A random fact about me

I have to wear socks to bed no matter how warm it is. Without the socks it feels like my toes are wild and unrestrained, they might just run off in the middle of the night. The socks keep them where they belong.

In the same way I can't stand for Ben's toes to touch me. It doesn't matter if they are in a sock or not - there is something weird about the feeling of toes touching me.



What is a random fact about you?

Climbing that ladder

At work we were discussing an upcoming visit from corporate and how they would probably stop by the building where we work. I commented that that would be a good day to wear my "I am management material" hat in to work. Another co-worker suggested that a t-shirt that read "willing to relocate" might be helpful. Because nothing impresses like a t-shirt. Possibly pants with "promotable" written across the butt would work as well. I've got some time, so with a little more brainstorming I might just be announcing my promotion on here....

Look, Ma! No Hands!

Dear Fellow Drivers,

You are the reason that my insurance premiums are so high. It is you and your crazy driving. I am not sure I can take it any more. I kindly ask that you please start staying inside your lane, using turn signals and stop cutting me off.

I know that sometimes there are more important things to do than drive. Like that time you had to eat that sandwich with both hands or the ice cream you needed to eat with a SPOON. Obviously those are a higher priority than watching the road while driving 80 mph, but do you think that you could maybe stop text messaging while driving?

I must admit that you are stylin' up there, all alone, in your Chevy Suburban. I envy your hauling capacity and extra head room; my small Miata cannot compete for your space on the road. I just ask that you not take your space on the road out of where I am driving. Maybe look before you merge into me. Or try using a turn signal. I'll get out of the way.

We are all just trying to get to work, school or home safely. I promise I'll stop chewing you out in my head if you will stop playing wack-a-mole with my car. Deal?

Your Friendly Neighbor,
Andi

Over a year...

To celebrate our anniversary last weekend Ben and I went to my cousin's wedding and visited with my extended family. We know romance!

We also stayed at bed and breakfast that was beautiful but also kind of creepy. Not that they decorated it in any creepy way or anything. It was well lit it's just that old houses creep me out. It's hard to relax when you worry about turning around and seeing a ghost. I don't think that I should have ever watched The Others.

We reserved a whole suite with a pool table and a private porch. Because nothing says romance like a game of billiards (I won!). The porch was very nice and relaxing and we ate our old wedding cake out there. The wedding cake that we saved from our reception which wasn't a year ago, but rather 10 months ago. So I guess we got off better than most couples who get to eat year old cake.

Eating the old cake was interesting since Ben has developed an allergy to wheat. The whole ceremony of the cake consisted mainly of me eating it and telling Ben that it wasn't very good, it was rather dry, and he wasn't missing much. Ben licked his piece and then took a bite and surprisingly was not sick the next day. We refer to it as the miracle of the cake.

The suite were we stayed had a guest book for us to sign and because I am super lucky I opened it to the one page that should serve as an example for why you should not have a guest book:

Yes. It says "Our passion filled this room." After I read that I was afraid to touch anything in the room. Seriously, why would you write that? Who wants to know that? The owners? I doubt it. Future guests? I certainly did not. I disturbed me enough to take a picture of it and share it on my blog. Aren't you glad that I did?

At one point Ben realized that he had left his tennis shoes at my parents and so he had to go on a walk with me dressed like this (only he wasn't fuzzy in real life):

All in all it was a nice and relaxing anniversary.

One Year Later...

One year ago today I Ben and I tied the knot. It wasn't how we had planned but we had a beautiful ceremony that was just perfect.

Happy Anniversary Ben! I love you so much!

Gross Bugs

I've been really grouchy lately. Ben says it's from lack of sleep I prefer to blame it on these bugs that are ruining my life. Cicadas.


They are everywhere. And I hate them. Their little shells are all over my stuff outside. The noise they make is deafening and they like to fly and land on me. Which is why my garden hasn't been weeded or watered. I don't like to go outside. I wanted to take a video to give you an idea of what it is like but I just couldn't capture it. At least you can get an idea of what they sound like though....



I also haven't been driving with the top down. I did that once and I was afraid to slow down. The bugs were everywhere! This week Ben and I walked to the grocery store and it was frightening. The cicadas were COVERING the trees lining main street. Walking through this corridor of bugs was like walking though a gauntlet. I couldn't take them flying at me anymore and broke into a flat out run. Which startled the cicadas and caused them to swarm Ben. He should have run too.

So cicadas basically live underground for 17 years, come out, eat, mate and die. Well except for the females who come out, eat, mate, lay eggs and then die.


I really wanted to give you all a feel for how these bugs swarm so I convinced Ben to shake the bush that they were in. Unfortunatly I think that you just have to be there in person. Please excuse my screams....

More Wedding Pictures

Isn't that a wonderful picture of my sister? She is so pretty! This past weekend was a whirlwind of crazy. My sister and I sometime are a true study in contrasts.

I was more stressed on her wedding day than on mine. This was mostly because Sarah's way of handling stress was all "ehh... it'll get done." While I, on the other hand, was running around waving my hands in the air yelling, "It doesn't just get done! Someone has to do it!"

Poor Ben got the brunt of most of it. At one point we had stopped to get food and I opened the bag, saw something that I didn't order and promptly yelled at Ben for ruining my life. You would have done the same thing if you were looking forward to chicken nuggets and instead found chicken biscuits. You too would have felt like your life was ruined. And then I saw the sticker letting me know that the biscuits were free. Ben suggested we go back to Chick-fil-a and throw them at the nice lady. How dare she give us free food! Sarah on the other hand forgot to eat.

The ceremony was beautiful and everything went as planned.

Well except for the part where my brothers forgot to bring the aisle runner down, but my mom forgot to reserve them a seat at the reception so they called it even.


The cake was a wonderful cheesecake that people lined up to get. I have never seen people line up at a wedding for cake. Good choice Sarah!

The dancing was a lot of fun. Ben got to teach a Chinese student how to do the Bus Driver, the Shopping Cart and the Walker.

Sarah - I am very happy for you. What a great wedding!

Wedding Bells...

This weekend was crazy busy what with my sister getting married and all. Yep. I cried a lot. And now I am tired so I'll just post some pictures that I stole from the photographer's web-site. She rocks.

In case my day job doesn't work out....

First off, this is the 300th post of the blog at this address (oldcomfyshoes.blogspot.com). That makes between my old and current blog, 550 blog posts. Do I seriously have that much to say? Apparently. Although less people read it now than before so I am guessing I am getting more boring. Sorry.

But! Today Ben and I came up with a BRILLIANT idea. Bill Gates has nothing on this innovation. We think that the features of two great programs, Facebook and Outlook, should be merged. Think about it. You are sitting at work and someone sends you a nasty e-mail, in this new program - FaceLook - you can throw a sheep at them. If a coworker does a great job you could send them a smiley face or a unicorn. You could choose how you want to send back that return receipt on that e-mail with either a thumbs up or a flaming bag of poop depending on your mood. You could set-up polls to see where your coworkers want to go for lunch or to find out what everyone really thinks about your boss. In FaceLook you could not only be professional co-workers but you could also be friends.

I think that this will catch on, it just may take a few years...

Strawberries!

I love three day weekends. Love them! We packed this weekend full too! Yesterday we got up and went and picked strawberries! Tomorrow we are going hiking all day. Did I mention I love three day weekends with beautiful weather? I do!

Here are some pictures from the strawberry patch:

This is before Ben starting doing any of the work. I am all alone in a big field.

Oh wait, now Ben is working!

I FOUND ONE!

YUM!

We picked two pounds by the time we were finished. Just enough for the two of us.

Also, the cicada's are coming out. Gross.

Have a fun and safe memorial day!