I'd like you to meet my new friend, Greg.

I'm back on the West Coast, Internet, and I don't know how I feel about it. Actually, that's a lie - I do know how I feel about it. I feel a little bummed. It was a good trip and a much needed break from real life. I wish it could have lasted longer.

But, here I am. 10:57pm on New Year's Eve, cuddled up in bed, blogging. That's how I ring in the new year. I'm a regular party animal.

I thought about writing a Christmas recap (complete with pictures and all the details I know you've been dying to hear) for my last post of 2008 but decided to do something a little better. I'm going with a story. Sort of a combination of my favorite type of posts - "Conversation of the Day" and "On the bus today...".

Except this conversation wasn't on the bus. It was in a restaurant.

And it wasn't short and sweet, like most are. It went on and on. And on.

On the evening of my first full day in Michigan, my parents and I did a little shopping and had dinner at the Beale Street Smokehouse - a small restaurant tucked away on a side street and attached to a gas station.

Sounds shady. Looks a little shady. Totally legit.

I'm a sucker for a pulled pork sandwich. In a perfect world I would eat one every day. And after we left that night I couldn't stop thinking about the one I had just eaten. I kept saying, "Man, that was so good!" the whole way home. And for days after. So it was decided that we would eat there again before I left town.

A week later we hit up Beale Street again. We had no idea what was in store for us.

We sat at a table near the "bar" (three or four stools at the short counter). I was facing it, my parents sitting on either side of me at the square table. As we settled in I noticed the man at the bar watching us. I tried not to notice until he said, "You know, I'm watching you guys....I'm watching you guys, here together as a family...with love...and I just wish I had that growing up."

Awkward? Most definitely.

He talked at us (I can't really call it a conversation) from the moment we sat down until we got our food. It was so uncomfortable. He fancies himself as a people-reader and shared with us several things:

• I need to appreciate what I have. (He repeated this five or six times.) He wished he had what I have when he was growing up.
• I look like my Mom.
• I look like both of my parents.
  
• I'm a New York City girl. I don't belong on the West Coast.
• My dad is less expressive (I wonder how he guessed that? Maybe by the fact that he stared at his menu and didn't look at Greg for the first half of the conversation.) and that my Mom is more talkative.
• My dad was either an educator or a psychologist. He was totally thrown when we told him the truth.
  
• My dad is a people-person. (This is where my dad told him that he hates people. That shut him up for about 3 seconds.)
  
• My parents have independent children. And they gave us the strength to be independent, which is the most important gift you can give a child.
• I look just like my Dad.
• Back in the day, the city my parents grew up in was full of "corn fed" people. Farmers. Or not.
  
• I love my Dad. (He repeated this seven or eight times.)
• "I'm just going to say one more thing...she loves you, man. She loves you."

I thought the man was never going to stop talking and I was nervously waiting for the moment when my dad would snap and tell Greg to shut up. Surprisingly, that moment never came. Our waiter just stood back, like he didn't want to interrupt the great moment we were all sharing. I finally had to give him the eye so he would come and take our order.

Needless to say, my food wasn't as enjoyable as the first night. There's something about being stared at while you eat that puts a damper on the experience.

But hey, at least now I know that NYC is where I belong.

Don't Be Jealous

Sunday, December 21
6:15pm - Leave for airport in the snow.
6:45pm - Finally make it out of the city after searching for a freeway entrance that didn't include a giant hill.
7:11pm - Arrive at Sea-Tac after seeing a car facing the wrong direction on the freeway.
7:38pm - Bags are checked. Despite being the 3rd person in line and having checked-in online, it still took 30 minutes. Two people working the counter.
7:55 pm - Arrive at gate S7 and prepare for "2 hours" of waiting. Flight is still showing an ON TIME departure of 10:40pm.
9:00pm - It is announced that the flight will be delayed until 12:15 am due to the late arrival of the inbound flight crew. I miscalculate and think the delay is only 35 minutes.
9:30pm - Finally realize that the delay is 1.5 hours. Bummer.
10:00-11:00pm - Watch five episodes of Rob & Big with commentary on. Best decision I made while packing. Worst decision - not packing all of seasons 1 & 2.
11:45pm - Inbound flight crew arrives.

Monday, December 22
12:30am - It is announced that there will be further delays due to mechanical problems with the de-icer. What they should have said, "We have no de-icer".
1:14am - Announced that flight will leave at 1:35am.
1:30am - People start lining up at the gate. I stay in my seat.
1:55am - Still waiting on the de-icer. Told it will be another hour.
2:45am - Flight delayed until an unknown time but it definitely won't be until morning. News flash Northwest Airlines- it is morning.
3:00am - Flight delayed until 1pm. For the mathematically challenged that's 10 hours.
3:15am - Make my way back to my chair and try to mentally prepare for another 10 hours.
4:00am - Sleep.
8:00am - Wake up after the most uncomfortable, interrupted night of sleep.
8:30am - Call work and let them know that I won't be able to work from home.
8:45am - Head to Hudson News to find a toothbrush. They were sold out. Buy gum instead - NOT THE SAME.
10:30am - Call in for a team meeting at work.
10:35am - Announce that the plane we will be taking to Detroit has finally arrived.
12:00pm - Announce that the flight will leave at 12:30pm.
12:25pm - Waiting for flight crew (again) because they were told the flight was leaving at 1pm.
12:40pm - Flight crew shows up.
12:59pm - Sitting in my seat and trying not to breathe on my neighbor.
1:20pm - Wake up to the plane clapping and cheering as we lift off the ground.
8:30pm (Eastern) - Land!
9:30pm - Bags show up after a slight heart attack thinking they were lost and get picked up in the freezing cold temperatures.

Looking Forward To It

Fourteen inches of snow in one day and currently 15 degrees.
You'd better believe I'm taking these bad boys with me.

It Depends On How You Look At It

I'm working from home today due to the "Shut Down City" game plan. Linds is kickin' it at home today too and we just had this conversation:

S: What if I want to eat a peanut butter ball? I've already had one today.
L: You've only had one and it's already 11? Go for it.
S: No, it's only 11 and I've already had one.

See the difference?

Winter Mayhem

Dear Seattle,
I don't know if you know this, but winter comes every year. I realize it doesn't snow all winter long, but it will at least once or twice. Maybe it's time to come up with a game plan for such occasions.

A game plan other than "Shut Down City".

A few suggestions:
-Snow plows
-Salt trucks and salt
-Implementing said salt prior to the storm
-Wait to cancel school until it actually snows - not a full 24 hours before the first flake falls

Oh, and give my bus driver from this morning a raise. It may have taken twice as long to get to my destination, but we didn't hit any other cars or pedestrians or get stuck. Sure, there were those two times that we fish-tailed into the curb and that other time that we slid down the hill into the street. But all-in-all, a stellar job.

I don't know, I'm just thinking out loud here. Maybe next year.

Love,
Stephanie

Looking down out the stairwell of my building.

Looking North up 1st Ave from my building.

The Goose Is Getting Fat...Or Maybe I Am

I'm normally a little (or a lot) on the lazy side when I get home from work. I just don't feel like doing anything that would require me to leave my house. Let's be honest - I don't feel like doing anything that would require me to even get up from a sitting/laying down position.

Last night, however, I caught the Betty Crocker spirit. My house was like Santa's workshop...or maybe Mrs. Clause's kitchen.

Lindsay and Jared made cookies.
They taste as good as they look.
I actually had to go to the store to start my treat making extravaganza. THE STORE! I don't know why but I die inside a little every time I have to grocery shop. Even as a kid I opted to sit in the car while my Mom ran in to "grab some milk" (which meant shop for an hour and come back with a cart full of groceries). But I needed a key ingredient for these bad boys, so to the store I went.

They're a little naked here in Step 1.
While my little peanut butter friends were doing their thing, I moved on to the turtles. Yesterday a co-worker was describing a delicious treat her mom always makes and as it turns out they are a family classic for me as well! Must be a mid-west thing.

Chocolate chips, butterscotch chips, peanuts - you can't go wrong.
(Remember how I tried to make these two years ago and the store was completely out of butterscotch chips and I almost had a nervous breakdown? Good times.)
After the turtles I moved on to Step 2 with the peanut butter balls - dipping them in chocolate. Try and tell me you don't want to eat one right now.
I tried to take a bunch to work and push them on my co-workers but with the Seattle blizzard we had going on, there was hardly anyone there to eat them. Hence my consumption of 5 peanut butter balls, 2 turtles and 2 cookies today.

Hmm...maybe this wasn't such a good idea.

Tell Me How You Really Feel

As I was running off to catch the bus this morning I found my ginger bread house on the table.

Like this.
Apparently Max wanted to show me what he thought of my creation. Either that or Lindsay was jealous that she didn't get to make one. It really could go either way.

In related news, I kept calling the frosting "glue" while we were building it, but it REALLY is like glue. I tried to throw it away tonight and literally could not get it to budge. In the end I had to hold the plate while Lindsay bashed it into pieces and then ran the plate under lava-like temperature water.

Word to the wise: Ginger bread houses are just for show.

First Time For Everything

I hate to say it, but I think I'm an official FHE-goer. LJL's new calling in the ward has brought me into Activity activity. (I was already sold on church in general, just not all of the activities in addition to Sunday services.) And you know you're official when they ask you to host FHE. Sure, they announced it as being "at Lindsay's house" but since I live there too it kind of counts.

I made gingerbread house for what is possibly the first time in my life. And when I say I made I mean Breann made and I assisted. (Do you like our unplanned matchy-matchy brown shirts?)
I will admit, I wasn't thrilled about the gingerbread house idea but once I got that bag of frosting in my hand I was unstoppable. Breann had all the brilliant ideas and I just placed some of the items. It was a giant mess, especially in our tiny living/dining room, but the night ended up better than I had anticipated.
The finished product.
All of those gum drops and red hots were place with love. Merry Christmas!

Toys

Remember how I bought a new camera AND Photoshop Elements and I don't know how to use either of them?

On the bus today...

...there were so many things going on. Lately I've been falling asleep on the bus a lot and missing out on all of the action. But today I was particularly alert (which I am crediting to the fact that I was in bed by 10:30 last night).

A couple observations:

1. My bus driver looked like this...
Just add a moustache and a smile. I was on the lookout for a tank of compressed air.

2. The man behind me talked to his neighbor about prostitution the whole way home. (I have no additional commentary for this one.)

3. The middle-aged woman that smells like pine (Have I ever mentioned her before? She's a regular.) also likes techno music. I can't handle techno at 7:45am.

4. There was a lady wearing a cloak.

A cloak Harry Potter style.
Only with a hood. Little Red Riding Hood style.
Only black and with a point. Night cap style (minus the ball and really long).

PS - This is the single greatest picture I've ever posted to my blog.

I wonder what people go home and blog about me? On the bus today the girls who always falls asleep sat next to me. And fell asleep. They wouldn't be wrong.

Moving On

Internet, I'm afraid I have some bad news. After this weekend Chats McGee and I will no longer be cube neighbors.

Who's going to say ridiculous things for me to blog about?

Quote of the Day

"Steph, my one wish for you is that you marry Tim Riggins. And not the actor who plays Tim Riggins, but the actual character so you can 'make some mem'ries'."

-Lindsay

Wish Me Luck

I'm heading out for some Christmas shopping. I hope I survive.

2008 Christmas Tree Debacle

The week-long Christmas tree saga all began on Sunday night when I hauled the decorations up from the garage. Lindsay and I started putting the tree together, maybe had to restring the lights three times after Linds got a little gung-ho on the bottom section and ended the night with a tree that looked like this.
Yes, it's leaning to the right. The stand broke and that tree ended up in the trash can.

*Note: This is where I lost the Christmas spirit and gave up the desire to have a tree this year.

Lindsay takes her Christmas decor very seriously and came home the Monday night with a new tree. By Tuesday it was back in the box. It didn't make the cut.
Wednesday included some online tree research done by Lindsay and another tree purchase. This tree was pre-lit, which you'd think would be a bonus. Unfortunately the lights were multi-colored and those doesn't fly around here so those lights were stripped off.

When I got home from work today I saw this.
The third time was the charm and I must say it does look charming.

News Flash...I'm Still Chubby

I went in for one of my torture sessions tonight at the gym and (lucky me!) it was weigh-in time. How did it go, you ask? Well, I've taken the "Lbs. Down" list off of my sidebar.

That's how it went.

It's depressing. And although 65% of what I've gained in the last two months has been muscle (at least according to the crazy-a calculations of my trainer) I'd rather not continue to highlight my failure.

[Sigh.]

Rub-a-dub-dub

Lately my tub has had issues draining and since some heavy duty Drano had been applied just a few weeks ago, I thought there might be something else going on.

Boy, was there.

When I unscrewed the plug I couldn't believe what I saw. And when I started pulling it out of the drain I really couldn't believe it. It was like a rat had died in the drain. A dead rat that, oddly enough, had hair exactly the same color as mine.

I'm not gonna lie - I dry heaved a little. Or a lot.

You'd better believe that I lured Lindsay upstairs with a "Linds, you HAVE to see this." and she was just as disgusted. Probably even more so, actually. But Internet, you should thank her because I contemplated taking a picture of the obstruction and posting it for you all to share in the experience. She convinced me it was a bad idea.

The good news is the tub is back in business!