My what a big month April was.  Kip and I had our second anniversary, as he posted about, there was Easter, I decided exactly when I would be quiting my job, and I have sprained my foot pretty seriously by falling down the stairs at church on Easter Sunday.  That is correct ladies and gentlemen, I said fell down an entire flight of stairs, and as it was on Easter Sunday, I was dressed appropriately in my new Easter outfit.  I was told that my skirt did not go over my head though, so I managed to remain modest on my quick trip down to the basement of the church.  So, I spent my Easter Sunday in the emergency room of Northeast Medical Center in Concord, NC.  I fell down the stairs because the heel of my shoe caught on the step and I lost my balance.  I am very heart broken because the very tip of the heel, or the grip of the heel, broke off when I fell down, and those were the shoes that I wore on my wedding day.  They are irreplaceable.  After spending the day in the emergency room, having a pregnancy test (it was negative for those of you keeping track or at all interested), having four x-rays taken, and waiting for quite awhile, we learned that they couldn’t see that anything was broken, so they think it is simply a sprain.  However, the doctor told us that if it still hurt after a few days I should to to the orthopedist to have them do a more thorough exam of my foot.  Well, it is now several weeks later and I still have a sore foot, and it pops almost daily.  On the shoe front, Kip took me to the mall and I bought the cutest flat ballet slippers that were eyelet material to match my Easter skirt perfectly (the same one that I fell down the stairs in).  Of course they were flats as I have pretty much decided to give up high heels for the time being until my foot heals and I will be able to walk in them again.  I shared all of that to share that within the month of buying these brand new shoes, that I absolutely adored, I ruined them too.  I wanted to wear them to Scott’s (and for those of you living under a rock, that is my brother-in-law) graduation ceremony at High Point University.  I didn’t expect it to be such a miserable day, or that we would be sitting on folding chairs on the lawn.  Needless to say, wet grass and perfectly white cloth shoes do not mix in a positive fashion.  The shoes are now grass stained, and no longer white.  I did enjoy Scott’s graduation, and the fun of listening to the arguing African-American family that sat directly in front of us for the better part of the ceremony, and listening to Bill Cosby give the graduation address without having planned a speech (we think).  All in all, it was an ok day.  I go to the doctor on Monday to see how my foot is doing, and exactly what is wrong with it.  I’ll keep you posted on the foot and shoe fronts as the week progresses.

I recently was asked to come into work on a Saturday at my place of employ.  I have no problem with coming in to work on a Saturday if my work requires that I come in to finish something that has not fully been completed during normal business hours.  However, this day was a mandatory work day for the entire company, and the area in which I work had nothing pressing to accomplish that day.  Instead, the upstairs lab came in to work solely to clean the lab from top to bottom.  True, it needed this scrub down terribly, but still not badly enough to make us come in on a Saturday.  And that isn’t even the worst of the situation.  We were required to come into work at 5:30 am!!!  On a normal day I don’t go into work until 7:30 am, but on mandatory Saturday workdays, we have to go in two hours earlier, to clean.  We were also in no way compensated for coming into work that day.  Normally I would expect to receive time off back in place for this extra time we were putting in, but no that didn’t happen.  Also, if I decided not to come in on Saturday, they would take a day of vacation from me, even though I already put forty full hours that week.

There were about three other problems I had with coming to work this particular Saturday.  Shall I tell you about them??   I think I will even if you don’t like it.  The first being that I acquired a small chemical burn from the chemical cleaner that we were using to clean the lab.  I accidentally sprayed some of the cleaner on my forearm and about thirty minutes later, I had four or five nickel sized whelps on my arm.  They are now just a few red spots on my arm, but it has been over a week since it happened.  The second thing I had a problem with was that one of the other people I work with somehow managed to do practically no cleaning at all in a full eight hours.  He spent most of the day sitting at his desk chatting with everyone else in the lab while they cleaned around him.  When our bosses came back up to the lab, he continues to simply talk to them instead of clean while the rest of us cleaned our little tooshies off.  Well, needless to say, we cleaned and cleaned and he got the credit for it.  He has made procrastination a true art form.

I know this wasn’t exactly a fun or exciting post, but hey, at least I finally got around to making one!!!  Have a great day!!

What is the deal?  Tonight, Kip and I were stopping by BJ’s to pick up milk on our way home from church, and they were closed.  It was 8:30 in the pm, and they are usually open until at least 9 pm if not later.  That wasn’t the part that annoyed me though.  I don’t have a problem with businesses closing early, I have a problem with businesses closing early and not announcing to their customers in some form of LARGE sign saying that they are closed at this time and for this reason.  But no, BJ’s did not do this courtesy for their customers.  Instead they had an employee stand at the closed and locked automatic doors and yell at you that the store was closed.  Which brings me to the real reason for this rant.  I do not, and I will repeat, DO NOT appreciate being yelled at by a sales person, whose sole job is to satify the customer, for something that I was not previously informed of, like the closing time of a store prior to its normal time of closing.  And more to the point, it was the way that she informed me of their closing.  I walked up to the automatic doors and when they didn’t open, I began to search for a reason as to why they didn’t open, like the aforementioned sign.  The employee proceeded to stare at me, and then shouted “WE’RE CLOSED” very angrily and slowly I might add, as if I were currently trying to pry the automatic doors open with my bare hands while wearing my church clothes like some crazed lunatic.  As I walked away it occurred to me that tomorrow is a holiday and that could be the reason for the early closing.  But as I got back in the car with Kip, we realized that tomorrow is a holiday, but not one of the major ones like Christmas Eve or New Year’s Eve or President’s Day Eve.  All of those holidays might merit leaving early to attend a party of function of some kind.  But who really goes to a Martin Luther King Jr. Eve party???  I mean, it can’t really be a holiday as I have to work tomorrow and so does Kip.

Today at work, I did absolutely nothing productive.  Now some of you might think, “Yeah, right.  It just feels like you did nothing productive.”  But, truly, I did absolutely nothing at work today.  Everything I touched turned into waste that I threw out at the end of the day.  So to pass the time of this interminably long day, I came up with an idea for the post that I am now making.  (And yes, I do realize that a similar question was posed on “The Office” in Season 2.)

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island for the rest of your life, and were allowed to take five movies with you, what would those movies be?  Ground rules being that any mode of movie is allowed be it VHS, DVD, reel-to-reel, etc, and compilations or multi-disc movies count as a single movie.

My personal TOP 5 (“High Fidelity” geeks are enjoying this) are as follows:

5:  Sahara
Matthew McConaughey...need I really say more?  However, I will humor you.  This movie is excellent in my opinion.  The relationship between McConaughey and Zahn (Al in the movie) is hilarious, and neither of them is bad to look at for two hours over and over again.

4:  Anne of Green Gables Box Set
Ok so there really isn’t a box set, but it is a movie divided into three parts (the last one being absolutely fictitious and not from the books), and I want all of them.  It’s my list, so I make the rules.  It is a wonderful story, and has sentimental value between Kip and myself.

3:  Legally Blonde
We all know that deep down inside, we all wish we were blonde.  The movie is so funny, and cute, and corny, and great that it has to be on everyone’s’ list.

2:  Pride and Prejudice  (The A&E version only, any other version is a sheer abomination.)
This movie is by far one of my favorites.  I love the book, and this is the most accurate adaptation I have ever seen.  The acting is phenomenal, the clothes are classic and accurate, and the actors themselves really fit the parts (can you say Colin Firth is Mr. Darcy).  The music is excellent as well.

And at the top of my list...

1:  Kip and Stephanie’s Honeymoon Video from Hawaii
If I’m going to be stranded on an island for the rest of my life without my husband there in person, I at least want to be able to see the two of us together while we were both very happy, in a beautiful location.  I would miss him too terribly to not have some part of him there with me.  I’m sure all of you are thinking that is the dumbest, corniest pick yet, but I don’t care.  I love Kip!!

Now it is your turn.  Post your lists if you dare allow the rest of the world (or at least our readers) know exactly what kind of person you really are.

I know, I know, it has been way too long since I last posted anything on the site.  I’m sorry to all those who are just waiting to hear what is happening in my life lately.  Well, here’s the scoop...

Kip and I are officially an uncle and aunt respectfully!!  My older sister, Emily, gave birth to a bright-eyed baby girl on August 2nd!! Riley Paige was welcomed into the world by a very loving and happy family to meet her.  Though I haven’t seen her yet in person, and I can’t wait to do so at Thanksgiving, there are pictures of her online for those of you curious to see what she looks like.  She definitely looks like Emily as far as her hair goes (Emily was born with a full head of dark black hair, who’d have thought that she would be a total blonde).  Riley does have Dustin’s very distinct forehead though.  I think she is just so precious and I love her to pieces already!!!

I’m now officially the Nursery Coordinator at church.  I find it ironic that the only married lady without children in the church should be in charge of the ministry that takes care of all the babies in the church.  My duties (go ahead, laugh, I know you want to) include: organizing the schedule of who works in the nursery when, making sure there are enough snacks and diapers and whatnot in supply, and creating a working list of nursery policies to be followed while working in the nursery.  That last one I actually took on myself simply because to my knowledge there wasn’t one, and we weren’t exactly following the recommended policies to the full extent to which they covered.  The first job was the schedule, which I know you are thinking sounds really easy.  Well, it isn’t as easy as one might think.  You have to take into account who teaches Sunday school, who is scheduled to play the piano and organ during the church services, who teaches AWANA on Wednesdays, who has a preferred time slot that they like to work, who doesn’t want to serve a whole lot, and who loves to serve and wishes they were always in there.  I have to also make sure that people are getting into the services regularly to hear some good preaching.  It was kind of complicated to begin with, but I got the hang of it.  So I think as far as that goes I’m doing ok.  I do know that I have the full support of my husband, the pastor is behind the changes I’ve made (though he doesn’t want me to offend people with creating too many changes suddenly as people are often resistant to change), and the police officer and his family that attend our church.

Another big development at church is this years Christmas play.  I have been asked to direct the acting portion of the performance.  I am very excited about this, but also extremely nervous, as I have never actually directed before.  Those of you who know me already know that I am extremely dramatic, so it isn’t that much of a stretch to see me teaching other people how to be dramatic.  But still, it is a little different when you are acting in the performance as well.  That’s right, ladies and gentlemen.  I’m also acting in the play.  The lady I had cast as Mom, decided that she had too much to do this fall, which I respect as she is a school teacher with tests and papers to grade.  So the task fell to me to portray Mom in this year’s performance of “A Peanut Butter Christmas”.  We will be performing on December 17th, in the evening service, if you are interested in coming and watching.

I guess that gets everybody caught up on my life.  If you didn’t want to know all the cool things happening, well, then why did you read my post??  If you did want to know all the cool things happening, now you know, and knowing is half the battle!! :)

Growing up, some people might say I was a little sheltered by my parents.  Looking back, I would say that I agree, but I don’t feel that it was a bad thing at all.  We didn’t watch all this garbage that is on TV these days.  Then again, I don’t really remember what was on TV back when I was growing up.  However, I do remember one thing that we loved to watch over and over again, and in my opinion this is what really kicked off the “Princess” fad.  My mother would go to library repeatedly to check out the Shelley Duvall’s Faerie Tale Theatre.  This was a series of the old faerie tales that we all know and love, but performed by real people, some of my more favorite movies being The Dancing Princesses, The Three Little Pigs, and of course, The Princess and the Pea.  I tell you all of this background because this past weekend, Kip and I were up in Raleigh visiting with friends and my little sister.  While we were there, Mandy and I watched her copy of Rogers and Hammerstein’s Cinderella.  This prompted me to tell Mandy that what I would really like for Christmas this year, was a copy of The Dancing Princesses on DVD.  She proceeded to say that it was totally awesome.  When we got home, I had to go to BJ’s to get new tires for my car, and while waiting I wandered around the store and found a DVD which was the complete collection of Shelley Duvall’s Faerie Tale Theatre.  Of course I immediately bought and have been watching the movies contained on the six disc set of movies.  For those of you that are unaware of the number of movies contained in the collection, I will quantify it for you; there are 26 faerie tales in all.  And they are all totally amazing.  Kip has been “watching” them with me, but doesn’t seem as totally enamored with them as I am, but he doesn’t seem to understand the awesomenisity of their awesomeness.  He doesn’t realize that growing up watching these movies and totally loving them then has caused me to not care how old they look, or how bad the acting is.  They are the movies that helped to mold and shape my young mind.  I will always love and cherish them for as long as I live.  What is even cooler is that the next generation of little Princesses is going to get to experience the magic of this series as well since my mother wanted me to get a copy of the collection for her to give Peanut (my soon to be niece) for her to watch as she grows up too!!!

For the last month or so, my mother-in-law has borrowed my copy of “Legally Blonde” and apparently watched it every day.  So for Mother’s Day, Kip and I bought her a copy of the movie for herself so she could watch it whenever she wants.  This also means that I will get to take my copy back to Charlotte with me, so that I can watch it.  So what do I do?  I get up today and decide to watch it right here in Newton this morning, and Kip’s dad commented that Deborah watches it like everyday. ;)  It has been awhile since I’ve watched it, and it is “super fun!!!”

Also, I’m trying to win tickets to go and see the premier of “Cars”, the new Disney movie that is showing at Lowe’s Motor Speedway in like a week or two.  The radio station I listen to in the morning on my way to work is giving tickets away by quizzing people on lines from Disney movies.  So could there be a more perfect “game” for me to play to win.  I mean, I have seen almost every Disney movie ever made!!!  What I can’t get over is the fact that people don’t know these clips.  One morning no one could figure out that this one quote was from “Aladdin”.  I mean, am I that old that the children of this generation don’t know that movie, all they know are “Monster, Inc.”, “The Incredibles”, and movies like that.  One guy even guessed “Shrek” as the movie and that isn’t even a Disney movie!!!!  The deal is that they give you three clips and you have to get them all right or you loose.  So I’ll keep trying all next week to get through to win tickets for us.  Another funny thing is that you win four tickets to go see the movie and Kip and I don’t have kids to take, so we don’t know who we would take to see the movie.  If you would like one of the tickets feel free to leave a comment with why you feel you should get one of the extra tickets.  It will be enteretaining to see your reasons even if we don’t win.

As of yesterday afternoon, I became a member of the working class of America.  It only took the company three and a half weeks to realize I was the best person for the job and offer it to me.  I start Monday morning, and I’m very excited and very nervous.  I can’t believe that after all this time i will actually have a real grown-up job.  I’ve never had one before that I had real responsibilities.  I’ve always been just an intern where what I did didn’t really effect anything else.  Let’s all hope and pray that it goes well and that I like it.  I won’t be doing anything to extreme my first few days, just getting orientated and reading a bunch of SOP’s (standard operating procedures for those who aren’t familiar with the acronym).  Then I get to shadow a veteran employee until I get the hang of what they do exactly.  But I will be getting paid and not sitting home all day eating my self into obesity.  So congrats to me for landing a job.  I’ll keep you posted on how it goes.

YIPPEE!!!  I had a job interview today!!!  Isn’t that super exciting!!  I’ve been waiting so long for someone to recognize the total awesomeness and potential that is within me, and someone finally did!!!  I interviewed today with a pharmaceutical company that makes generic drugs and it was not at all what I was expecting.  Has anyone else ever gone on an interview where they were asked no probing questions at all???  I mean, all the interviewers did was tell me about the company and then we sat and chatted for about fifteen minutes about life, football, and my dog.  It was excellent!!!  I just hope that their constant asking me if this was someplace I could see myself working is a good sign, and that I hear back on Friday that they would like to hire me.  Anyway, if I do get this job it will mean that my husband at one time was a drug dealer for his mother, and I will be the drug maker that will be providing the drugs that she sells, isn’t that fun!!  Anyway, I’m very excited about this and I wanted to share my excitement with all of my wonderful readers out there!!!  The job however will put a damper on my Solitaire play.  Oh well, the paycheck will be enough consolation for me, I’ll make do.

Later peeps!!!  I’ll keep you posted!!

About four weeks ago, I got a phone call that I wouldn’t normally have even answered, but I was in a good mood that day.  As it turned out, the call was from the Nielson Ratings people.  The woman asked me if I knew what the Nielson Ratings were, and I said yes.  She then asked me a bunch of other questions about what kind of shows I watch and how many tv’s we have in the house.  My favorite question was when she asked if we had DVR.  I answered yes, and then she proceeded to clarify that she meant the device that digitally records shows off of tv, and not the hardware that simply plays DVD’s.  While I could have replied, “Is that the thing what plays them small shiny discs?” I composed myself and simply said that I knew what DVR was and that I was sure we had it.  The last question she asked was to see if I was interested in being a Nielson Family for a week and filling out a booklet reporting what shows I watched and the times that I watched them.  I thought this was entertaining due to the sheer volume of shows that I watch everyday as I am currently not employed with nothing else to do.  (If you wish to remedy my lack of employment, please feel free to contact me.)  The woman told me that I would be receiving a booklet for each tv we owned in the near future and that we were to record our show schedule starting February 9th.  By this time, Kip had gotten home from work.  He was confused by the strange look on my face (amusement) and the things I was saying on the phone.  He was especially startled when I got off the phone squealing because the last thing the lady said to me was that in appreciation for our participation in the process they would be mailing me $15 with the booklets.  I was excited because that is like “free money”!

Well, three days ago the booklets arrived, and to our surprise the $15 included was not in check form which we both expected but in the form of a ten and a five!!!  So it really was free money!!  We have officially started recording the shows we watch.  The only problem I have with this whole process is that the Olympics are this week, which means all of the shows that we normally watch are doing reruns this week.  So it isn’t like this is an accurate account of the shows we normally watch.  But I can’t complain because I got $15 for watching tv!!