Treading water

Do you ever have one of those days when you look up at the clock at work and it's almost 4:00 and you wonder what you've been doing all day because you haven't gotten anything accomplished? Well, that was today. I have NO clue what I did all day. I know I was actually working, so I had to have done something, right? It just seemed like when the day was over my head was just barely above water, you know? I hate that.

So, because of that I don't have much to blog about. I did spend part of my lunch break at Gina Miller's new digi-scrap store that just opened today, which you can find here: http://www.ginamillerdesigns.com/. I'm not entirely sure why I posted that because I don't think anyone that reads this is even mildly interested in it, except for Laura, and I know for a fact, she's already been there. I bought my first few digi-scrapping items, which I haven't used yet because I was finishing up another layout that none of those things really fit with. Here is the latest (page #3). So far the biggest pain in the neck, but I really like the finished product. Thanks Laura for all your help with this one!!

Just so I feel like a real digi-scrapper here are the credits:

Paper, metal heart (recolored) and red bow from Avec Amour by Zazou
Mat and medallion paper: Backnewspaper from Melany Violette
Black twill tape (recolored) from Gina Cabrera's November kit
Swirly photo corner is Michelle Coleman (Antiquated Swirl #3)
Metal swirl clip also Michelle Coleman
Round metal frame from Michelle Coleman's Old Metal Frames
Font is SP Inspired


Hope I didn't miss anything...

I took this picture at Mammaw's on Easter, and I know Mommy doesn't like it, but I really do. So there! I think it's a very sweet picture. I'm looking forward to printing it out and seeing what it looks like on paper. Happy Wednesday!

The answer to the question...

is no! You will all be the first to know when the answer is yes!

Blech....Heat and Chinese Food.

And I mean that...Blech!! It's soooo hot. We did pretty much nothing all morning, then my allergies started up, there's nothing like sneezing 15 times back to back. Really, there isn't. So, I decided to go outside and get some things done out there. The grass needed mowed badly, and while that doesn't sound like a smart thing to do when your allergies are acting up, it doesn't usually bother me. So, off I went to mow the yard on my poor little old riding mower. It's a sad little thing, I really should post a picture so you could get the full effect. It's pitiful, and slow. So, after Mark and I finally got the poor mower to start, I mowed and mowed and mowed. I'm getting much better at it too, I was almost impressed with myself! Eventually the mower decided it had had enough and stopped. It does that, when it's done, it just stops. It had gas, it was just done for the day.

By this time I've been pouring sweat for an hour or 2. I didn't really think it was going to be quite that hot today, but apparently there's a heat advisory out...I really should have checked that out ahead of time.

After showers and some more sneezing, Mark and I drove to Lowe's in Union City to get a belt for his mower and some new smoke detectors for the house. As we're walking out of there, I'm still not feeling so well. The heat and the allergies were having quite an effect. But we decided to try the new Chinese restaurant that just opened down the road from Lowe's in U.C. And so we did. I got about 10 bites down and a glass and a half of sweet tea. Then I started feeling extremely green. So, I managed to locate the restroom and let's just say that Chinese food didn't stay down well. Unfortunately, I still wasn't feeling all that well, so we left pretty quickly. And here we are back at the house. I'm basking in the air conditioning. I think I'll stick to popsicles & Gatorade for the rest of the evening. I really don't want a repeat performance.

The upside to this (and yes, there is one) is that I had downloaded some music last night and had a fresh, new CD to listen to in the car. It's mostly Ryan Adams. You may remember the song New York, New York that came out shortly before 9/11 and went on to be played pretty frequently afterwards. If you live around Nashville, you may also have heard some of his stuff on Lightning 100, they used to play alot of it. I'd kind of forgotten about him, but I love the stuff I downloaded and may actually go back and download the rest of his CDs. Man, it's good stuff!! Kind of a mix of rock and country...a little folksy. He actually has a wide range, some of it is very rock, some is very country, some is very Bob Dylan. I think Itunes has it classified as rock, but it's kind of alt-country really. Mark seems to like it too, which is a rarity, so I really should download some more. Which I think I'll do now...

Much better...

It's Thursday...really feels like it should be Friday, but that's ok. The week has gotten better as it went along. Monday was a pretty bad day. Tuesday wasn't much better. Yesterday the tension in the office started to go away, today things are good. Everybody is themselves again. It's been a rough couple of months, everyone has been stretched to their limit. Apparently that makes people (including me) cranky. We are interviewing people to take over my position at work. That way I can concentrate on what I was promoted to do (almost a year ago). So, I'm preparing to move myself from the front office to the back. Ah...finally!
Unfortunately this rolls over to home too sometimes. Not so much with Mark and me, we just bitch about work alot. We're just so tired when we get home. Nothing gets done. I expect the house to be declared a disaster area any time now. I've got to get it under control!!

Alright then...let's try posting this scrap page again...

I can't believe it finally worked! I've been trying to post it for DAYS!!! Woohoo!! Tell me what you think...Happy Thursday!

Page 2

Today was such a Monday. Our bathtub decided it didn't want to drain anymore so I got to take a shower while up to my ankles in 4 inches of cold standing water. I don't think I felt much cleaner when I got out than when I got in. Yuck! Mark's been working on it all night and it still hasn't gotten any better. I don't know what kind of clog is in there, but it's not budging. This after plunging, Drano, a little more Drano, some more plunging...I may be taking a shower at Nan's tomorrow.

That's really not the way to start off your week, is it? And that's pretty much how the rest of the day went too. I got nothing done at work because I had to go to Halls (about an hour away) to work on a printing problem that turned out to be not really a printing problem. The problem was that the software they were trying to print from was designed to work with Windows 3.1...Windows 95 at the latest. So it had no idea what to do with a printer driver designed for a Windows XP system. I suggested they upgrade their program and luckily she was fine with that. This, not to mention the recurring HP printer problem at the bank across the road. I got hit with that again first thing this morning. Blah...

***Breaking News***

The clog is fixed!!! Woohoo! I can take a real shower now! Mark's so good...I swear he can fix anything!

I'll leave you with the latest digi-scrap page. Well, the latest being my second ever. I'm not sure I'm done with it, but I'm done enough to post it... here you go. Have a great Tuesday!

Ok...so blogger won't upload it...I'll add it later...stay tuned.

My first digi-scrap page

I spent an hour or so the other night on the phone with Laura, trying to figure out the basics of this digital scrapbooking thing, and I finally finished my first page. It took hours! I'm sure I'll get a little faster at it. I have been meaning to scrapbook our wedding picures (with paper) for a long time (the whole 9 months we've been married). I managed to get a few pages done this way, but it's such a pain to get all that stuff out and put it all back up. So I thought I'd give it a shot this way. I think this will be my cover page....Here it is...

I think Mark really hates that pictures, but I always liked it. It makes me think of how nervous he was when it was taken. The photographer took a bunch of picture while we were waiting for the minister who was stuck in traffic. I think it's sweet.

Anyway...I've spent all morning on the computer and it's such a pretty day outside, I really should go enjoy the slightly cooler weather. Have a good weekend!

Friday!!! Woohoo!!!

It's Friday, it's Friday! My brain has already left the office. I really should just leave work at 2:00 on Fridays...I'm useless after then anyway. Thus...I'm adding to my blog.
I've still got some loose ends to tie up though, so I guess I'll get back to work...if I have to.

I just wanted everyone to know...it's Friday. You got it?

It is HOT!!!!

Who knew my family was so into herbs? I sure didn't. And for the record...Mark makes wonderful Rosemary Chicken. At least I think it's rosemary...yeah, pretty sure.
So, it is HOT!!! The air conditioner in my car can hardly keep up! I know this because, unfortunately, I've spent a good part of my day in the car. And, so far, I don't feel like I've accomplished anything. The customer that I went to see this morning wanted me to do something I couldn't do. They have some proprietary software that small local governments use and she wanted me to add her Sharp copier (which is a network printer) to that program's printer list. Well, first of all, she just called to tell me she wanted it added to another computer. That's a piece of cake, so I did that. Then she said she couldn't see it in this one particular program. So, I looked at it, poked around in it a bit. Maybe I could've done it, but it's not software I know, and it's a bit beyond the scope of what I am supposed to do. So, to be safe, I told her she would have to call her IT people and/or their software people. I'm just not thrilled with the idea of screwing up someone's very specialized software by changing things around when I don't really know what I'm doing. I would've been shooting in the dark. Anyway...
Isn't my job fascinating, in a very dry, boring sort of way? Actually, I like it, but it's not interesting to talk about, especially in a blog. But that's my life, so I'm compelled to do it anyway.
Yeah, so did I say it's hot? Roasting hot? Thank God for central heat and air...which is working very well, even in this heat. It's so steamy outside and the air's so heavy you can hardly breathe out there. It reminds me of Savannah. Ah, Savannah...how I miss it. I think Mark and I may go in the fall. Last year we went in August (not by choice) and it was sweltering. Of course, as I told Mark the other day, I'd rather be sweltering there than here. At least there's a beach nearby. Really, would you rather be hot at home or on vacation. Yep, vacation...that's what I thought. Because, even if it's hot, there's a beach (at least in my vacation scenario).
OK, I'm rambling on and on and I'm at work. Actually at the Paris office right now waiting for our new Paris Sales Rep to get here so we can go install a Canon scanner. Oooooh, aaaah...yes, a scanner. It's so small, it really shouldn't work, but it does. It's tiny...cute though, for a scanner. Well, enough...I should find out where the heck she is because we have to be there in 15 minutes.

Seriously...

Katie (aka "the cute one" aka "hot stuff") has a good point. I type 3 sentences about frickin' cilantro and I get 5 replies!! Apparently it takes a nice, concise blog about herbs to get you guys interested. Here's your herb of the day...discuss amongst yourselves...

Rosemary

Thought of the day...

Salsa isn't salsa without a little cilantro.

And I don't like cilantro, neither does Mark, so we left it out. And the salsa is OK, but missing something...something which we finally decided had to be cilantro.

Vegetables, home improvement, pictures and more vegetables...

Daddy sent me the picture to the right...as you can see, it still didn't work out as well as I would've liked. If you look at it enlarged it looks fine, but that small it looks funny. This pretty much tells you I don't know exactly what I'm doing, right?
My day...ugh. You know how Sundays can kind of just drag on forever? Sometimes I think that's nice, sometimes not so much. Today was one of those not so much Sundays. I got up at 9, which is about perfect. I got to sleep in a little bit, but not so much that I have no day left at all...which, come to think of it, may have solved my day dragging by problem. Anyway. I had some cereal for breakfast, this is notable only because I hardly ever eat breakfast, even on the weekends, unless it is made for me. I'm just not interested enough in food that soon after I wake up to bother making anything myself...generally including cereal. Today I must've been feeling particularly energetic because I actually poured the cereal and the milk myself...Yes...ooooooh...ahhhhhh. It was all downhill from there. Mark was most definitely in a couch potato mood and I was most definitely not. So I decided to go to Jackson. I tried, quite unsucessfully, to get Mark to go with me. It's an hour away and that drive is kind of boring alone, not that Mark is much of a talker in the car anyway. So, I sat down at the computer and downloaded some music to listen to on the way. KT Tunstall, Miranda Lambert and some other stuff. I highly recommend both. Then I drive to Jackson...to the nearest Target. We needed a lamp for the computer table. Got that (can't fidn a picture, sorry). I needed CD labels and a labeler thing. Got that (at the 3rd store). I went to Lowe's and got paint for the library. It's called "Camel" for those interested parties. So you can pretty much deduce the shade. I really like the way soft tans look with clean white trim. So, that's what we're doing. Then I'm going to hang some lighter, floatier curtains. Hopefully this will brighten up the room some. I want to keep it rather masculine still, but the super-masculine border that's currently in here has got to go! Log cabins, ponds, ducks...it's not so much in my vision for the room.
On to the vegetables...the garden produced about 3 squash last year and that's pretty much it. So, this year we fertilized it well and added some top soil to the clay. As a result we've had way more vegetables than we can possilby eat. We probably have 8 squash in the refrigerator right now and that's after getting rid of 15 last weekend! We also have lots and lots of cucumbers and purple-hull peas and tons of tomatoes. So we made a very large batch of salsa today. That got rid of almost all the tomatoes and several green bell, jalapeno and chile peppers (we have tons of peppers too). Now I just have to come up with something to do with all the squash and the remaining 500 peppers. People buy this stuff, right? I need my very own truck garden. Maybe then I could get rid of the 8 dozen eggs too.
So, while it seems like I've had a pretty full day, it's still dragging on. I suppose bedtime isn't far off.

Aaaarrrggh!!

Why are there no decent pictures of me??? NONE!!! I'm trying to find one to put on the blog...so at least there's something, but I can't find one that's sharp enough or good enough to post. So, if any of you people have a picture of me that won't make me (or anyone else reading this) cringe, please send it my way. It would probably help if I knew what the heck I'm doing when I try to size it down in PS. It's been awhile since I've done much with PS and I'm not having fun with it. I'm pretty good at airbrushing and cropping, etc, but that would require having a pic that's good enough to even be airbrushed! The best ones I can find are 5-10 years old! What does that say about me? That's a rhetorical question!

This is the best I've got...I wish I were kidding, but I'm not...and I had to steal this one from the Garrity website!

Does it make me a bad person that I'm blogging at work? I just needed a mental break.
I was thinking last night about how cheesy the title of my blog is...but then I thought, well, it's appropriate. I was lying in bed thinking about how different life is where I live now. I suppose the title implies that we're farmers or something, which we're most definitely not. It is a real farm, there are people that farm the land we live on, those people just don't happen to be us. Hmm...I got off track...Right, I was lying in bed last night thinking about the differences between the places I have lived. All pretty much city or at least suburban places. And I've liked the places I've lived, for the most part. I was noticing one night last weekend when I was standing on my parents' patio how much different it sounds than standing in my backyard at night. There were commonalities...tree frogs singing, crickets, etc. What I was noticing though were the things you hear in Hendersonville that you don't hear where we live. Traffic noise, which never bothered me when I lived there (and really still doesn't, I just notice it), airplanes circling...things like that. That all use to be just background noise that I didn't notice. Every place I had ever lived before moving to Martin had that (except for Pembroke, but we had artillery fire to make up for it there). The daytime sounds are different too. I really and truly thought I would never get used to the roosters (who actually crow all day, not just in the morning...who knew?). They used to wake me up every single day...EARLY!!!! Now I don't even hear them, unless I'm outside and they're all crowing in unison. Weird how fast you get used to something, isn't it?

Let's see how this goes!

Who knew it is so easy to set up a blog? I didn't know! I thought this would be fun, but now that I'm typing it...I have absolutely nothing to say! I'll follow Laura's stream-of-consiousness blogging technique and just type random things that come to mind.
Seriously, I'm going to have to come up with some material...because I have NOTHING!! No amusing Jack anecdotes even. I can, however, talk about the cats. Not that there's much to say there since they are all 3 sleeping in separate chairs right now. About an hour ago it was wild kingdom in here...the floor was shaking as they chased eachother around. Then that turned into hissing and biting and Mark having to separate Zoe and Furball. They were playing...really, they were.
It's amazing how boring my life suddenly seems now that I'm trying to come up with something to say. Seriously...today, I went to Paducah and hooked up a copier as a network printer. Then I trained the customer on how to use it as a printer. I know what you must be thinking..."ooooooohhhhh, interesting! If only my life could be that exciting!" Yup, I'm a lucky girl! Oh, oh...and then after work, Mark and I came home and ate some frozen Taquitos for dinner (this isn't a regular occurance...just no one took the initiative to cook anything better), and then I downloaded some music and went to Wal-Mart. On the edge of your seat yet?
We did just get the computer last weekend (wedding present nine-months removed from Mommy & Daddy), and we had wireless internet installed today. It's pretty fast...just like my cable internet was. I really like it! Despite Mark's assertions that he's anti-computer, I know he's enjoying it too. He refused to go to Wal-Mart with me just so he could spend some time on the computer. Like I'm hogging it or something! Puh-lease! Just because I was in music-downloading withdrawal...
Terribly boring post, I know, I'll have to conjure up some good material so I can blog again this weekend sometime....until then, try not to think my blog is too sad...