Moving Trip : Part 2

Sunday 2/23 : Los Angeles, CA. We went to Hollywood to see the sign and all the stars on the sidewalks. It was really cool. The Academy Awards were that night too so there were a lot of extra people around trying to get pictures of the stars. I didn't think that was a big deal for me to see anyone, but it was cool to see the amount of security they had to go through to get in the door. Also, seeing how much everyone else cared about the celebs was interesting too. We also took the subway. It was kinda scary. I don't think I'd ever take it alone. There are a lot of shady characters in subway stations. We went to the LaBrea Tar Pits and museums. They were really cool too and smelled like a road construction zone.

Monday 2/24: Los Angeles, CA-Stockton, CA. I've been sleeping a lot more during our trips which means seeing a lot less cool things and getting fewer pictures. This trip is just wearing me out. WE passed a bunch of mega-dairy farms that we could smell a few miles away. "Happy cows come from California" , yeah right, they were all penned up in tiny stalls. Not grazing.

Tuesday 2/25: Stockton, CA - Roseburg, OR. We drove through the Mount Shasta area and it was gorgeous. It was very mountainous like Southern CA and AZ, but these mountains had a lush greenness to them. Our motel was pretty nice so we went swimming and stuff there at night and fell asleep, absolutely exhausted.

Wednesday 2/26: Roseburg, OR - Olympia, WA. The morning was the most gorgeous view ever. There were some low clouds that we drove right into, and because of the constant dampness, all the trees were covered in moss. It was cool. I slept a lot today too. We went running along the shore today : all the boats and the smell of the sea. I loved it. On the way back from our run, I saw something on the ground that looked like money. I even pick up pennies, so I stopped. It was a bill... a $50 bill!!! We took it back to the hotel to see if the desk clerk had one of those pens to detect counterfeit bills. She said it was real. We decided to go out to dinner for seafood -- figuring a port town would have fantastic seafood. We brought along the $50. We spent about $30 on drinks and a salmon dinner. We left the rest as a tip. I figured that we got a dinner out of it, we might as well share the wealth. It will suck when the person who dropped it finally figures out its missing. The odds of the person who dropped it finding it again are slim, so I decided to take it. No point in turning it in. It wasn't in a wallet or anything. Yay. Free dinner !!! :)

Moving Trip: Part 1

Wednesday 2/20: Edmond, OK-Amarillo, TX. We left our home in Oklahoma at about 1:30. The morning was full of cleaning, packing, and returning borrowed things. It was very exhausting. I didn't sleep well the night before on the floor, so we decided to go to Amarillo. The weather was cooperative until we hit Amarillo, then the snow started--so we got there just in time. I was tired so I slept a bunch of the way.

Thursday 2/21: Amarillo, TX- Gallup, NM. This day was by far the most boring so far. North Texas and New Mexico are so flat. It's a really boring drive, but at least we got to drive fast. Its amazing how uninhabited much of this area is. And what is left is very dirty and littered with tires and trash. The plants are kinda ugly too. I've lovingly called them Roughage. We got to Gallup and decided to go running. So we dressed up in our winter gear and were ready to face the winter sleet. I didn't want to run too far because I wasn't very inspired. Thats about what ended up happening. We ran along a busy road --in the dirt. I hit a soft spot all of a sudden and was instantly up to my knees in a foul smelling mud. I was sooo pissed. We went back to the hotel and I cleaned off my shoes and pants (took nearly an hour). Matt still wanted to run, so I ran in my walking shoes and we ended up completing a total of 4 miles or so. I'm glad that we finished the run, because the sleet had stopped and it was much more enjoyable.

Friday 2/22: Gallup, NM-Bullhead City, AZ. This part of the trip has been the most beautiful. We continued through the boring part of New Mexico.. Then it got hillier and higher in elevation and it began to snow. At one part, the car was fishtailing so badly that I just wanted to pull over somewhere for awhile. But we slowed down to about 45 mph and kept on going. The snow was beautiful and was exactly the kind I had missed having all winter : the big fluffy flakes . :) We ate lunch at Denny's in Williams (outside of Albuquerque) and watched the winter wonderland. As we moved from there to Bullhead City, we went down through a bunch of valleys and the land turned back into desert. It was kinda sad to leave the snow behind. The mountains here don't really look like mountains, but like gigantic piles of gravel. We got a lot of fantastic pictures of things, but we were sure happy to get to our destination for the night. I was exhausted. We went to dinner with Jason and Andrea. They took us across the border to Nevada and we went to a big casino that was full of other things to do : shop, bowling, arcade, shows, etc. It was like a Vegas casino, but on a smaller scale. Then we went back to the apartment and hung out with Zoey. She's doing well on our trip. The first couple nights she was terrified, but now she's comfortable faster. Andrea really loved Zoey. she wanted me to leave the kitty behind.

Saturday 2/23: Bullhead City, AZ-Irvine, CA. This part was mostly desert, the Mohave Desert. I think this is the only desert in our country, but there was really nothing there as far as people, plants, and anything but sand. This kinda looked like New Mexico...empty! When we got past Apple Valley, CA, it got much hillier. It was soo beautiful. I think most of my pictures from that day were from there. The hills were beautiful and didn't look as rocky. A lot of them were snow-covered too. As we got nearer to Los Angeles, the traffic got heavier. I'm glad that Matt drove! We took a toll road into Irvine and it went right through the area that had all the wildfires last spring. It was sooo green. After not seeing anything green since November in Oklahoma, it looked especially beautiful. We went to the ocean with Rob and Leah. It was beautiful. There was no fog or haze like there usually is (they tell us) and we got to see a bunch of little sea critters that washed up on the shore. I liked hermit crabs the best. Then we went to a different beach and waded in the water. It was really cold, so we didn't go swimming like we had planned. We went to dinner and had lobster ravioli. They were expensive , but delicious! :)

It's my last day in Oklahoma. I don't really see any reason to come back, so I will probably say goodbye to it forever. It's nice here this time of year, but I'm glad I don't have to endure another summer of scorching heat. I will miss the pool, however.

This last day sure has been a busy one so far. I've been working on cleaning and packing-- nonstop since I got up. I'm taking a lunch break with Matt at noon, so that'll be nice. Then I'll take part of the afternoon off to watch Dawson and go running. I'm glad that I didn't work today. It would be really difficult to clean AND work all day without becoming extremely exhausted.

Speaking of work, yesterday was my last day of work. I substituted for a very ill middle school science teacher. She went to work and then decided she was too sick to finish out the day. I went in at 9:30. I hope I don't catch whatever she came down with, because that would suck with a very long trip. Anyways, I worked at Sequoyah Middle School. That provides some closure to it all. I had my first day of subbing at that school, and coincidentally, my last. I couldn't have asked for a better group of kids. They were 7th and 8th grade, and they worked really well. I had to do hardly any disciplining. It was a breeze compared to my very first day at Sequoyah. :)

Well I'm off to grab the laundry and meet Matt. TTFN.

What's on my mind today? Well, a few things actually. Mostly time has been taken up thinking about moving (packing, travel, cleaning, etc.). I wonder how Zoey is going to take all of this. Ever since the apartment became empty, she's been a little crazier. She doesn't sleep as much as she used to and she's super-playful. Does she sense something coming? Do cats even analyze like that? I dunno.....

I want to go running today. I hope Matt is up for it when he gets home from work. I rarely go running without him anymore. He makes the run go by faster and makes it more enjoyable. :)

That unmotivated/tired/sick slump that I was in for most of January seems to be over. I'm pretty sure it was seasonal depression and maybe a little bit of mono or something thrown in there too. I'm back to my old self, motivated to do stuff everyday and energetic. I actually WANT to go to work and clean and workout and stuff again. :) YAY!

While attempting to change the air filter on our car, I was approached by a pre-teenage girl in very conservative plain clothing. She told me that her christian school gives out scholarships each year and they raise funds for scholarships by going door-to-door selling cookbooks. Well, since cook books would be about the only type of book we'd even consider buying, it was a pretty good thing for her. I also liked that the money helped pay for a scholarship to a religious school. I'm not particularly religious, but I think it's good to support kids that are very religious. I have problems with how some churches operate. For example, the church we WERE members of was very interested in getting money out of us. Every week in the bulletin, there was a mathematical equation that would help you to calculate the proper amount that you were EXPECTED to pay each year. For us, we were supposed to put up 1/10 of our yearly income to the church! and we barely scrape by with rent, utilities, and food. I absolutely hated being guilted into giving money, and just the fact that they expected us to do it, that we eventually stopped going at all. I believe in God and try to be a good person, but going to church and smell greed when I walk in the door, it's not pleasant. Everyone here tries to out-do the other in church, in the way they dress, and the cars they drive. It is just so materialistic, and I don't like b eing reminded of it every week, so I choose not to go.

Anyways, this is my long-winded way of saying this : If a child comes to me asking to buy something to support their church group, it usually goes directly to the kids and not to a greedy church, so I give it to them. Besides, she was cute and innocent... it was like having to say "no" to a cute little bunny rabbit.

Have you had one of those days that everything seems to go wrong? Well, today is my day. It all started as soon as I got up. I got up reasonably early so I could find a sub job. I found one that I wanted (HS Latin) and kept trying to accept it. Sub-finder wouldn't let me, saying someone else was reviewing the job and I should try again. So I tried, for about 30 min to pick up this job. So I went to the phone Sub-finder and picked it up 10 min before the job was to begin. Then, I called the school to tell them I was indeed coming, but I'd be 10 minutes late (which they said was ok), so I rushed to get dressed and make a lunch and was putting on my shoes when the phone call. As it turns out, the Sub-finder system was a little screwed up and somehow had assigned me and another lady to the same job. So after all the rushing, I ended up with no job.

Then, I figured I'd be productive. I cleaned marks off of the wall and started some laundry. In between changing loads, I ran to the post office with a package for Emily. Since we have no packing supplies, I hadn't packed my box at home. I loaded my list of things to do (which I wrote in my food diary for the day), the stuff I was sending to Emily, and a box, into the car. At the post office, I bought packing tape and packed up my box. It cost $10, a little high for PJs and a tshirt, but whatever, shipping stuff is expensive-- plus, it included the $3 for the tape. Anyways... I went home to change the laundry and thought of another thing I needed to do today, so I began looking for my list of stuff. I couldn't find it anywhere. After ripping the house apart, I began retracing my steps. No, it wasn't in the laundry room. I didn't drop it outside the car at the apartment. I thought, it MUST be at the post office. I drove there really quick. It wasn't in the parking space I used, it wasn't at the table I used, and after asking a teller, determined it wasn't at the post office. So I am completely frustrated right now. I hate not knowing where my things are. The ONLY place I can imagine it being is inside the package going to Emily. I'll have to wait a week or so until I find out if that is indeed where it went to. I'm such an idiot. Grrrr! So I need to go buy a new food diary and try to think of the things that I was going to do today. GRRRRRRR!

Matt and I are trying to decide which way to go on our trip to Seattle. I want to make it somewhat like a vacation and stop to see fun things, but he just wants to get there. We have extra time so we'd make it there days early if we just drove on and on. I don't know if I want to go through California or through the mountains and Utah. There's not too much terribly exciting through the mountains except for the mountains themselves. Our California route would add a lot of miles (about 8 hrs of driving) but would include the ocean (!!!) and the Grand Canyon. I would like to go through California and see the ocean and all that stuff, but I don't know how Zoey would like doing all the extra travelling.

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Another thing I keep wrestling with is what to do with my hair. It's doomed to be baby-fine forever and there's not much I can do with it other than use the frickin' blow dryer all the time. I could get another perm and that would eliminate almost all the maintenance, but they are frizzy and sort of out-dated. I dunno...... We'll see what happens as it gets longer...

The movers came yesterday and now it seems as though my apartment has grown 3 sizes larger in the matter of just one day! It's kinda like how the apartment was when Matt first moved in. He only had the stuff that fit in his car, so there was no bed, no couch, no tv, and pretty much nothing else. It's very spacious. :) I do miss the TV already. I wish I could watch the news while eating breakfast like I've grown accustomed to doing. I also miss the lamp, whose light switch is near the door. It sucks having to walk through an entire room before being able to turn any lights on. Ah well, it appears that we will have enough suitcase room to accomodate everything we're flying to Alaska with. So that's excellent. :) I just hope nothing gets broken because of the way it was packed. As long as they don't shake things and turn them upside down, they should be fine. Zoey is sure confused. She was locked in the bathroom for this whole moving/packing process, so she came out at the end of the day to a room that had NOTHING in it. She misses having a nice comfy place to sleep. We won't let her sleep on our bed anymore since it's an air mattress and she's got claws....poor confused kitty. Sorry Zoey, but this is only getting worse until we get to Alaska.

It's "Super Tuesday", the day that all the remaining states vote in the primary election for president. Oklahoma's primary is set up in such a way that you can only vote if you're registered as a democrat or a republican. So I go to the voting place and have the republicans and democrats look me up in their books. As it turns out, I am part of neither and had registered to vote as an independent. So I couldn't vote, and that bummed me out.

It's raining today and I'm a busy bee. The movers come tomorrow so I'm busy cleaning, doing laundry, and sifting through everything, trying to make sure I'm not forgetting anything. I have to put all our remaining stuff into a closet and hide it from the movers. It's less of a disaster today too.... there's less stuff strewn about. Well, back to work...

Ahh, the Super Bowl. The biggest football game of the year. Two weeks ago was the biggest game for me. I so wanted the Packers to win. They came farther than anyone had ever imagined, but it still sucks when they lose THAT CLOSE to the Super Bowl. Anyhow.... I have a lot of fond memories of Super Bowl games through the years that I thought I'd share:

Growing up, the family went to Rick Olson's Super Bowl party. It always had 3 tvs and an amazing smattering of snack foods. For a kid, this was heaven. My parents never let us eat a lot of junk food, so we always went nuts when we were faced with nearly every type of food at once. Also, as a kid, I was a bottomless pit that could eat for hours and never get full. We'd play on the floor in the living room while eating and drinking (pop) ourselves silly. Brynn and Neal were always there so we had our food and best friends.

In college, I didn't have TV or friends interested in football, so I didn't watch the Super Bowl at all. The year I was doing cancer treatments, I had a Super Bowl party in the hospital. I was getting chemo and ended up falling asleep after eating pizza with Jenna and Dad. I don't remember anything about the game and the whole day was a haze.

This is actually my first Super Bowl since cancer. Elliot, Steve, Matt, and I are having a small party. Elliot got a new big TV and we're going to bring snacks. It should be fun, but nothing will ever measure up to Rick's parties. :)

Now that I think about it, I haven't had the flu since I was about 10 years old. I must've been due for one, because HOLY SHIT, did I get it bad on Thursday. Today is the first day I've been able to go online without feeling like I'll throw up all over the computer. I also had to reintroduce myself to solid foods. But now that the peeing out my butt is over, I'm starting to feel better. It's kinda funny that the first thing I wanted to eat when I was feeling better was tortilla chips and queso dip. Wierd hey?

What else is news here... Everything about the move is finally arriving. We're getting rid of our stuff on Wednesday. Woohoo! I hope the air mattress from Mary is comfortable.