The girls and I’ve been doing a ton of baking lately. Blueberry cheesecake, holiday biscotti, chocolate chip cookies. I have an electric mixer but I wanted to give my arms a good workout. Look what happened…
Dec 072011
Dec 022011
We just got back from the mall and let me tell ya, it was packed! There was a big sale going on and we didn’t know. Well, now that we do most of our shopping online, there’s no reason to keep track of what’s going on in real life.
We figured we really didn’t have anything to buy except maybe more nail polish?! To quote Raine, one more color, or four, never hurt anyone. This then is her “very humble” collection 
. With today’s 4 new additions, she needs a bigger box to accommodate them all *bah*.
So we were milling around in the crazy crowd being bumped around by folks who clearly have no concept whatsoever of personal space. While I was engrossed with trying out some nail colors, one lady practically glued her body onto my back as she attempted to squeeze between me and the clothes rack. Guess the words “excuse me” don’t exist in her vocabulary .
Never mind that. Another surprise was waiting for us as we turned the corner to the memory foam mattress section. There standing right behind Raine was our neighbor’s DIL (who, by the way, also lives next door with her husband and kids)… with a big toothy hi, no less! I swear my jaw dropped to the floor even as I struggled to utter my most neighborly hi in reply!
Here’s a woman who has never acknowledged us in all the years she’s lived next door! The only 2 occasions she’s ever spoken to me on the phone (like we were old friends?! *gag*) were when she desperately needed to get in touch with her MIL (a really nice lady, btw) and their house phone was out of service! That’s it!
Here’s a woman who peeks over our fence to see what I’m wearing, and then soon after, I see her wearing something similar. Ultimate fail! I don’t know what it is with her – is she competing with me, or is she just a fan of my fashion style? Well, she can try… but she sure don’t have my cute J Lo butt, so there!!
And yes, this chance meeting with my biggest ‘fan’ really freaked me out, big time! If only all my neighbors were THIS warm and friendly! No, seriously, imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, love the woman *shrug and 
* !
Racing with Murphy
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Nov 282011
The girls and I have been mostly cooped up at home all weekend. I think we may well have run out of malls to crawl, if that’s even possible and we’ve moved on to greener pastures? That’s a story for another day. In other news, the weather’s been weird this year. Anyone noticed that?
This is the morning sky that greets us as we head out to the gym just before 7:00 in the morning. For all intents and purposes, it looks like the beginning of another blazing hot day in Tropical unParadise.
By early afternoon, the grey clouds are having a face-off with the white. It’s hot and sunny up till this point so it’s anyone’s guess which way the weather will go.
By late afternoon, there’s no mistaking who is winning. Thunder is a lot like labor contractions. The first rumbles are spaced fairly far apart. As the flashes and growls grow closer and louder, the skies unleash bucketfuls sending us on a mad scramble to unplug our precious modem before it gets fried.
Today we raced through groceries hoping to beat the rain. But Murphy beat us by 20 seconds. But of course! It was pouring elephants and tigers when we got to the exit. We’re city folks which makes us terribly impatient. We couldn’t just stand there like normal people and wait for the rain to ease up.
We had to make a run for it, make a mad dash to the car with our just-bought tissue boxes over our heads. That’s us ! Smack in the middle of the downpour, we were throwing everything (except the eggs!) into the back of my minivan and just as we were pulling away, the rain trickled to a bare drizzle! Thanks, Murphy, that’s real considerate of you.
Nov 182011
Have I ever mentioned what a blast I have with the classes I teach? Truth is I do, and this time, it’s no different. I have a class of students from far-flung countries. It’s a mix of college kids and adults in their 20′s and 30′s. I have a guy who works in real estate and another who is never far from his medical computer.
It’s great. Even as I’m teaching them English, I’m learning about their countries and cultures. I usually get to class early and as the students start rolling in, some of them would come up and chat with me. It’s a great opportunity for them to practise their English and for me to get to know them better.
I get asked some pretty wild questions which often center around origins and families going way back to the why’s and wherefore’s. Now that’s gotten me wondering about my grandparents and great-grandparents, and that whole ancestral bit – seriously 
.
We had a class about food and one of the guys offered to take me to lunch to try the food from his country. On and off, someone would offer me a small snack before class. Between the bag of M&Ms I brought to class yesterday and the speed word game we had afterwards, I think we’re all good for a great start to the weekend.
Nov 072011
Here’s a funny story that my girl friend and I still laugh about when we get together. Back in the early years when we were both working fulltime, we often lamented that we were married to two of the most unromantic creatures in the world. Sad but true. Why is it that the world’s most hopelessly romantic women somehow wind up with the world’s most unromantic husbands?
In all my married life, I’ve only received flowers once, and my girl friend, never!! While we were always looking for birthday and husband anniversary gift ideas, we never got a single petal in return. She was going on about how her co-workers were always receiving flowers and proudly displaying them at their desks, and she had nothing to show. Yeah, sad, I know. No one ever sent me flowers either. I could so relate. And so you have it – a pity party in progress!
Suddenly I jumped up and said, hey, why don’t I send you flowers on your next birthday and you can strut them around your office? And so that’s how this little annual ritual of ours got started. I would order flowers to be delivered to her office, signed “Happy Birthday, From your secret admirer” and she would do the same. For years, that’s how we redeemed ourselves in the eyes of our co-workers.
- I couldn’t find the post office near our house. They’ve moved again! That’s how outdated I am.
- The bank teller handed me the date stamp and told me to stamp the deposit form myself while she went to photocopy the check. A shining example of taking customer service to a new level.
- I drove down an almost-vertical ramp in a basement parking lot. Free roller coaster ride, anyone?
