Me, Myself and Boredom

I am so astonishingly bored right now I don't even know what to do with myself. I'm restless... so I figured I'd make a list of the top 10 places I'd like to be right at this exact moment (with my husband as my #1 companion, of course) ... not in any particular order:



1. Gatecrasher, Sheffield, UK. I could kick myself for letting this opportunity pass by. What were we thinking?

2. Sitting on the beach in Los Cabos drinking a Sol staring at the bonfire with my feet dug into the sand, thinking about the next day's activities of snorkeling at Lover's Beach and eating a fabulous dinner with crab tacos.

3. Drinking a peach almond tea latte from the Tea Zone with a huge pile of books in Powell's City of Books cafe in downtown Portland.





4. In Alaska with my sister and her family.

5. Bar hopping and bowling with my friend Stacy and whoever else wanted to tag along.

6. On the roof of the Griffith Park Observatory with college buddies, reading scary stories and goofing off.

7. Road trip to nowhere... well preferably a lot of state parks with good hiking trails. I'm particularly inclined toward White Sands, New Mexico right now.





8. Camping in Eastern Oregon, near Steens Mountain.






9. Ballynahinch Castle, Eastern Ireland then on to the Cliffs of Moher and the Giants Causeway.





10. At the Sey residence with the gang.

If I HAVE to exercise...

This park is only a quarter mile from my house and contains a 3 mile loop that I love to walk a few times a week. A couple of weeks ago I was so taken with the colors I decided I wanted to take some pictures to show you all how lovely my little corner of Oregon is. Unfortunately, I took the pics a bit later in than I was hoping and these colors aren't as stunning as I'd hoped. It didn't help that it was really overcast on my walk this day. Too bad i don't have an IPod or something... Chicane would be perfect with this view.... Enjoy.

Can you see the shingles?

Our roof is shallow, but you can still see how much better it looks! I'm so happy with the new shingles!

Rain, Rain, come again

Because we are ready for it! Our roof is finished, yay!! I'm very pleased with the way it looks, and I'm so relieved. Having it finally done gives me great peace of mind about the coming Oregon winter.

I'm the pee queen!

Or so they designated me at work today. I had to read over 20 urines today.... it was a thrill, let me tell you! But I did wash my hands, don't worry.
I came home to sample tiles for my roofing job on my front porch. I'd like to know what kind of person puts bright green or blue shingles on their house. I picked a dark brownish color that will go well with our house paint. And apparently he's coming tomorrow to start the job. After 4 months of phone tag, it's a bit of a shock that it's actually happening. So, that will be interesting. I feel like I'm actually getting somewhere now!
I also made a couple of meals for the week because I'm so bad about getting up in the morning to pack my lunch. Something about it being dark outside, cold in your room and nobody to wake up to makes me not want to get out of bed in the morning. I'm averaging 5-6 snooze hits. Though, I was so proud of myself this morning because I only hit the snooze 3 times! (Really, I just woke up to the first alarm, decided to skip the normal routine, and went straight to resetting the thing for a half hour later :)
Now I just have a HUGE pile of paperwork to go through. I don't ever read my mail right away, it's bad. So if I'm going to get to bed in a decent hour, I better start to plow through Paper Everest!

The simple joy of convenience.

Internet is here! Hurrah! And so is the rain. I had an hour after the internet guy came to mow and weed my lawn. It is a good thing I decided to do it right away because it is just pouring out! I feel much better about that now. All I have left to do tonight is put away about 5 loads of laundry. Yuck. So, I'm going to go watch a movie now.

Teapots and fall days go well together

Well, aside from the horrifying dream I had last night, I'm doing better. It's not so scary in the house anymore, and I've been getting stuff done a tiny bit at a time. I'm also getting enough sleep, which helps.
Today was an interesting day. My church is offering an 8 week fitness class on Saturday mornings that I attended. The lady is totally going to whip my butt into shape. For example, she had us doing one-armed side push ups. It was hard. It's a sad thing to face how utterly out of shape you are. My consolation was to do all my grocery shopping at Whole Foods with my mom. I don't know why, but it made me feel better.
Anyway, after church my mom and I met my aunt, cousin and grandma for tea at this wonderful tea shop in Sherwood that serves the traditional high tea on china. It was really fun. I love that place.
So, now I just have to head home and clean a bit. I'm planning on watching some movie tonight, I'm not sure what. Last night I watched Soylent Green for the first time. It was depressing. Way to "1984" for me. Obviously I understand the point, but it still doesn't give you a feel good moment to know it.
Oh, and (yay for me), we are getting Internet installed at our house tomorrow. I know, it's a miracle!!!

So this is life

I think I'm in a prolonged state of melancholy. Everyone has left me now, and here I am all by myself left with nothing but the hugest "to do" list ever. It's depressing. Work is still going really well and is, thankfully, keeping me busy during the day. Tonight is my first night running solo, I'm kinda creeped out.
I miss my husband, my sister, my brother-in-law, my nieces, and my friends.
Does anyone else get so overwhelmed with the stuff that they have to do that they don't do it and then make themselves even more depressed? That's how I'm feeling. The strange thing is that now that I'm done with school I actually do have a ton more free time. Unfortunately, I keep filling it with stuff, and don't really feel like I have much down time. I've realized I'm a lot more introspective than I thought I was, and that I require a lot more quiet time than I thought I did. So, I guess I'll just keep trying to forge ahead with balance. Pray for me.

I hope you get how perfect this shirt is for me.... Jeffrey bought it for me :)

Beginnings are strange...

Today was my second official day of work, glorious work. The first day was eight hours of hospital orientation, and was extremely dull. Today was just more training. I start my actual schedule in November, working nights. I'm really looking forward to not having to get up at the butt crack of dawn. I'm definitely not a morning person... but I am really enjoying it so far. I also have a 12 day break the first of November just scheduled into my month. You know what that means... I get to see my husband! I'm going to try to get down to LA on the 3rd and stay through the 14th. Already something to look forward too.
My family got together tonight. There were 16 of us minus a few spouses and including 4 babies. It was good fun. I really love my family. My grandparents were here from Arizona, and it is always such a blessing to see and spend time with them. All of us girls are going to tea on Saturday, which I always love.
We also found out that my cousin and his wife are pregnant... something we weren't expecting, but are so happy to hear. It's funny to enter this stage in our lives. We were taking pictures of my sisters girls with my cousin's baby. Charlotte, the oldest girl at 16 months, was sitting in the middle of the two babies with her arms around both their shoulders and kissing them alternately. It was adorable, and reminded me of when my sister and I were babies with our cousins. Now we are all growing up and having kids of our own (except me :)... but it's really weird!
My sister and her family are leaving tomorrow, as is my dear friend Liz from Michigan. Things are going to be so quiet without them all, and I'm already sad!
So, I'll be by myself in our home. Hopefully I'll be getting a lot of reading done. This will probably be helped by the fact that my outlets downstairs have died, despite my repeated flicking of the circuit breaker. I have no clue what happened. Guess I'll be calling an electrician this week.
Miss and love you all who are far away!!!