I REALLY Am A Chicken

I’ve said it once and I’ll say it again, I really am a chicken! It’s pathetic really. I determined I just have this fear of things running/jumping out at me, which is why I don’t go in my attic. I also don’t like to move boxes in spaces that might harbor mice, snakes or spiders. This brings me to my latest dilemma.

My house has this storage space under the stairs which is great for storing holiday decorations, etc. Problem is, there is also a hole in the wall that I think goes out to the garage (not really sure where it leads). I intended to patch the hole after my mom “de-spidered” all the Rubbermaid containers that had been in my garage in the old condo and put them neatly away in the storage space (what can I say, she loves me and has become quite aware of how depilating my fear can be). Of course, I didn’t around to it before my roommate moved in and put some of her own stuff in there. Now the storage space appears to be full and the only way I can get to the hole is to pull her stuff out of the storage space – hence my problem.

With cooler weather approaching, I need to get in there and patch the hole before a mouse decides to move in and take up residence. But to do this will require moving my roommates stuff out of the way and I can’t do it. I have tried do build up the courage and I just can’t. I had a hard enough time just opening. It seriously freaks me out (like the furnace incident). What’s even worse is that I have some really great fall decorations that I would like to put out, but again, I’ll have to crawl into the storage space and pull stuff out. My plan is to put up sheet rock in there and maybe even install a light – but that won’t be happening this year.

I hate that these kinds of things freak me out so bad. You should have seen me when I would go to get the seasonal decorations out of the garage. I would pull out a box, set it down really fast, and then run. When I thought it was safe, I would get a broom and sweep any cobwebs away and then off to the next box. Just thinking about it has me anxious and stressed. I’m not being overly dramatic here – it really freaks me out. I have laid in bed the last several nights trying to figure out how I’m going to deal with this.

Now, if I see a spider, I can kill it. If I see a mouse or snake from a distance anywhere other than where I am living or sleeping, I’m okay. It’s the whole element of surprise from these creatures that I can’t handle. Really causes some issues when you are a single homeowner. IF I ever get married, he can’t be afraid of stuff like this – he is going to HAVE to be the attic and crawl space inspector of the family.

Oh, and on a side note, though slightly related – I am now a firm believer in keeping my shoes in shoe boxes (especially plastic shoe boxes.) When I moved into my house, I decided for organizational reasons, to start keeping my shoes in shoe boxes and purchased some clear plastic shoe boxes for the shoes that did not have a home. This morning when was getting ready, I pulled out a pair of shoes I hadn’t worn since last fall and opened the box. Low and behold, there was a dead spider in the box. Which means that spider had been in my SHOE at some point. Yeah, flip flops are now the only shoes allowed to be without a box. YIKES!!!

More Fun Quizzes

Okay, I don't think the first one discribes me very well, but the second one hits the nail on the head (especially the last line)!

I'm a Chevrolet Corvette!

You're a classic - powerful, athletic, and competitive. You're all about winning the race and getting the job done. While you have a practical everyday side, you get wild when anyone pushes your pedal. You hate to lose, but you hardly ever do.

Take the Which Sports Car Are You? quiz.

I'm a Lifer!

To you, a job is what pays the bills. You put in your hours, follow the rules, and then go home. Occasionally, you consider quitting, but then you think of how bad the job market is and you reconsider. Whatever happiness you get, you get from your life outside the workplace. Relationships, family, hobbies, and outside creative pursuits are what really matter to you. You're probably taking this test at work because you don't have anything better to do.

Talent: 51%
Lifer: 56%
Mandarin: 38%

Take the Talent, Lifer, or Mandarin quiz.

College Randomness

I was reading Krista’s blog yesterday and she made the comment “no good decisions are made after 2 o’clock in the morning.” It’s true, we do weird things when we’re tired, stressed, sleep deprived and some how, being in college, surrounded by people who are in the exact state of mind, just becomes a breeding ground for all kinds of randomness. This got me to thinking about all the random things I did in college (with help sometimes), that probably lack in humor if you weren’t there, but were stink’in hilarious at the time. Here are some examples:

Chinese Christmas Decorations
At Thanksgiving my freshman year in college, my Grandma P gave me some Christmas decorations she had from when she used to work at the Senior Citizen Center. They were metallic looking, and were primarily red, gold and green. So we decided to hang them in the hallway between my room and Jenn’s room. It looked like a Chinese resturant. They were hideous, but they stayed up till we left for Christmas.

The Gong Show
My sophomore year, my roommate Jenn and I were listening to this “new song” on the radio that was just horrid. So I got up, grabbed a pan and started hitting it like they did in The Gong Show. The next time I went home, I brought back this small brass gong that my mom had and every time we thought a song was bad or someone was lacking talent, we’d hit the gong. Again, you had to be there, but it was funny.

My Song Writing Abilities
A little known fact about me is that I have a tendency to make up little songs when I’m bored. RARELY does anyone here them. Normally, I’m just singing them in my head, but occasionally – I bust out and share one of my little ditties with the world. My friend, Jenn (you know, she was a part of a lot of my random experiences in college), was fortunate enough to experience one of these performances. It was shorting after school started and I found myself bored, and laying on my bed. Since I was being left to my own devices, I picked up this pink metal basket that normally sat on my desk, and put in on my face. No reason. Just felt like it. (BTW, there is a picture out there somewhere of this event). This led me to spontaneously start singing the following song:

It’s time to get a date,
When you’re sitting on your bed
With a crate on your face.

Yeah, I won’t be making a career out of this.

Trouble-Causer
Is there a statute of limitations on being punished for something you did in college? I hope so. I’d really hate to get sent to the Dean now. So here goes.

One night while living in the dorms, I was studying with my friend Tammy in the lobby. Some girls down the hall were fighting with their next door neighbors. Not sure what was going on, but the girls from one room kept going and banging on the door of the girls in the other room and yelling at them. This went on for a little while before it stopped. Don’t ask me why, but I decided that it would be funny to go bang on the door of the room of the girls who had been banging on the door of their neighbors. I convinced Tammy this would be a good idea (I didn’t have to work too hard to convince her). But instead of doing it ourselves, we convinced our friend Carrie Dawn to be the “knocker”. Tammy and I stood in the bathroom across the hall and held the door open while Carrie Dawn when and banged on the door. So Carrie Dawn bangs on the door, runs into the bathroom and we all hide in the toilet stalls (we needed an alibi).

Oh, it hit the fan then. We could here all kinds of yelling outside. We waited in the bathroom till things calmed down and then went back down the hall and continued to “study”. A few minutes later, our RA came and asked us if we saw anyone bang on the door down the hall. Of course we didn’t – we were “studying”. Our hall director had to come upstairs and intervene. I think one set of girls maybe even ended up moving to a different room. I don’t even know who lived in those rooms, so if you’re reading this, I really hope you don’t know who I am. And if you do, sorry. I’m going to plead boredom. =o)

Second Source of Income

I have found a second form of income. Not steady, but not back “pocket change” now and then. I’m going to become a human guinea pig. Kind of makes it sound like I'm selling myself, doesn't it?

I had to go to the allergist today for a follow-up. Which before I go any farther, I have to note that I sat in the exam room for an HOUR waiting to be seen. One of the ladies did have me come do a clinical trial for her while I waited – which gave me something to do for 5 minutes of that time. Next time, I’m taking a good book!

Anyway, the doctor is asking questions about how I’ve been doing and then tells me that I would have been perfect for a clinical trial they just finished on people with weed allergies. She thought it paid around $250. Even though I missed out on this one, she wanted to know if I’d be interested in doing them in the future. Shoot! Sign me up!!! I can handle the risk of being miserable for a short period of time for that kind of money. I know several other people that have been doing clinical trials with this same doctor for a while now. I guess one of them got paid $1,000 once (rare, but hey – that would be new flooring if I got the opportunity).

I was joking with a co-worker that this is how I could finance the booth I’ve wanted to open at The Market.

It HURTS

Yesterday afternoon, I had a funny thought. I decided that maybe I just needed to cut off the entire right side of my body. My right jaw hurts, my right hand hurts, my right knee hurts and I have a blister on a toe on my right foot. Then last night, the icing on the cake. I was getting something out of the freezer and I dropped a container on my right foot and it seems I might have fractured one of my toes. It HURTS. The only way I can walk on it is to walk on my heel. And I cannot stand for anything to touch it. Needless to say, I didn’t sleep well last night because the blankets kept touching it and waking me up. It doesn’t throb as much as it did last night, but I avoid walking as much as possible. This morning I called the doctor to make sure there wasn’t anything else I should be doing other than icing it and taking ibuprofen. There’s not – so I just get to suffer for the next several days at least and wear open toed shoes. Did I mention – it HURTS!!!!

No Smokers Here

Twice now, in the last week, we have received mail at our house for a former resident. Not unusual I know, but what it weird it that it is cigarettes. Sample packs from Camel. And what I find strange is that I have lived there for almost a year now and we’re just now starting to receive these packages.

I think it is weird – and wrong. The package says it’s illegal to mail cigarettes to minors, but how to they know a minor isn’t going to gain access. I didn’t expect them to come in the mail. If I had teenagers that checked the mail, they could easily take them without my knowing about it – because again, I wasn’t expecting them in the first place.

I keep putting “return to sender” on the box hoping to get off the mailing list, but we’ll see.

Bummer

This morning I woke up thinking it was Friday. It wasn’t. I was bummed. I’m still bummed.

Random Thought on Jury Duty

I have been wishing lately I would get called for Jury Duty again. I wasn’t thrilled the last time, but when I think about it – I get paid to be there PLUS get paid by my normal job. Granted the last time, I never made it on a jury (only made it out of the jury holding room once). Being on a jury might have been more exciting, but I got a lot of reading done. I think I could handle being paid to sit and read for a few days if I had to.

0 for 2

Last night was BK. After church, I noticed I had missed a call. Turned out to be a friend who called to make sure I was still going. He said to just swing by his apartment on the way and we could ride together.

I get to his apartment complex and walked up to his door and knocked. No answer. I knock again. No answer. As I’m standing there I noticed that his grill was gone and wondered what happened to it. A little puzzled to where he might be, I head back downstairs to go to my car and call him. That’s when I look up at the building next to him, see his grill and realize I had gone to the wrong apartment. What’s funny is that I’ve done this before, but the last time I had a plate of cookies and a strange guy answered the door. But what’s sad is that I’ve been to his apartment MANY times before, so I should have known better.

But it gets worse. We head over to Tracy’s for BK. We’re driving down the street and find the house number painted on the street. I park, we get out and I walk up to the house and ring the doorbell. We’re standing there and no one comes to the door. While we’re waiting, we notice that it really smells like cigarette smoke outside her house which didn’t seem right. We quickly realize that we have gone to the wrong house. I just assumed I knew what house it was, but never really looked that closely at the house number.

My friend was a little worried if I would make it home. I plead sleep deprivation.

My Lullaby Collection Needs Some Work

This weekend my friends came to visit with their 5 month old son. I put them in my room because it would be a lot more convenient for them with the baby and all. Recently, I took my portable CD player from work and brought it home because I never used it anymore. Tonna & Kael always play music softly in the room that Zaine is sleeping in, so when Tonna saw my CD player, she decided to turn it on. She looked down, and saw the nature sound CD case that was next to the CD player and assumed that was CD in the player. Instead, she discovered it was a Scary Sounds CD from Halloween last year (shows how long it had been since I used the CD part). We got a good laugh out of it when she told me the next morning.

Saturday night, she decided to put the nature sounds CD in. Zaine was asleep and we were all sitting downstairs watching TV when I started hearing birds. She told me she put the nature sounds CD in, but I just knew there was no way we’d be able to hear it all the way down stairs. But none the less, we kept hearing birds. Finally, Kael decides to go to bed and is standing at the foot of my stairs and it really sounded like it was coming from upstairs. So I went into the room where Zaine was sleeping and sure enough. The babbling brook part of the CD is really quiet – so Tonna had turned it up quite a bit, which made the bird sounds so loud we could hear it all the way downstairs. How he slept through that, I’m not sure.

Tonna informed me on Sunday that I really need to work on my lullaby collection.

Blog Neglect

I know I haven’t posted anything lately. It hasn’t been from intentional neglect. I’ve actually sat down to write several posts, but never had time to finish or post. The jury is still out on whether this one will make it to blogger land or not. Here is the Reader’s Digest version of everything that has taken place lately:

I’m in LOVE!
Sorry, not with a guy – with a truck. Last Thursday I rented a pick up to go to Kansas to get a bed from my mom’s house. Enterprise gave me a brand new, black Chevy Colorado. I am so in love with that truck. The gas mileage wasn’t bad for a truck, but still not as good as my little economy car. I was sad to have to turn it in. Only 3 payments left on my car and the temptation to trade it in is getting tough. A truck like that would be practical for me, but not economical. My goal is to try and hold on to my car for at least another year.

Chair Rail
First of all, for anyone who thinks like a particular “un-home improvement savvy” friend of mine – a chair rail is NOT one of those things that you sit in and it takes you up and down the stairs. A chair rail is a wood border that is placed on the wall as a design divider. I was going to get help from a friend’s husband, but it was hard to find a good time to have them over. So I got online and found a good do-it-yourself site and borrowed the necessary tools from someone at work. On Monday, Amy came over to help me put it up. It was comedy because we couldn’t figure out how to get the saw to work (we needed to remove the safety pin, but wasn’t sure how). At one point, I called a friend from church and asked him how to make the saw work and my explanation to him was “we’re girls”. We managed to get the first wall up without a lot of difficulty (can’t say my cuts were the best, but wood putty and paint fixed it). Our problem came when we tried to do the inside corner. We could not get it to work the way the directions instructed and couldn’t figure out how to make the miter saw cut it the way we needed it. So we gave up. Yesterday, I decided to give it another shot. I finally figured out how to miter the ends so that they met up in the corner the way I needed them to. I managed to get the second wall up all by myself. I just have one more wall to do and I’m done! Not the most professional job, but only a professional could tell and well – not bad for my first attempt.

I’m Quitting My Job and Becoming a CSI
For the last two years, we’ve been having a problem with cash theft in our building. On Thursday, someone had their wallet stolen out of their office. Granted, it wasn’t too hard for the thief because the last person to leave our office left the door open. What this thief didn’t realize was that he was on candid camera. When my co-worker told me she couldn’t find her wallet and was afraid it had been stolen since the door was wide open when she returned to this part of the building the evening before, I pulled up the security tapes and started watching. Since we didn’t know exactly when it happened, I had to start with right after she last used her wallet – which was a good 6 hours worth of viewing. After two hours, I was quickly approaching the time of day when she left and she was starting to wonder if she went someplace else that she had forgotten about. Then all of a sudden, we both gasped and there he was. The man we’ve caught wondering around the building on several occasions. We watched as he walked into the office, looked around, walked into her office and left. I used my “skills” to view him exiting the back the north entrance vs. the south that it was assumed he would have left. I really think I need to become a crime scene video technician. I’m all about making people pay for their wrong doings (I think I need to work on grace).

Shoes
I have been shopping for at the very least, a pair of black heels to go with a pair of pants that I have. Doesn’t seem like it would be a difficult task, but I can’t find anything in my size that are comfortable and not ridiculously over-priced. It’s becoming frustrating – and I have looked just about everywhere. The only place I haven’t looked (mainly because they close before I have a chance to get there) is the Shoe Gallery at North Park Mall. Shopping for black heels should not be this hard!!!

So that’s about it (at least for the stuff I’m going to talk about on a blog). This is me signing off and hoping to head home at a decent hour for once!