What Would Jen Do

Archive for the ‘links’ Category

I am so excited that I still have one more day off work.   One of the best parts about working from home 2x a week is that when we have long weekends like this I don’t even have to go back into the office on Tuesday as that’s a work from home day for me.

Arizona always seems to be in the news for the dumbest things. Evan Mecham, Fife Symington ( are you people old enough to remember how their antics were ‘answers’ on Jeopardy?’  We have a crazy sheriff, there’s SB 1070, you can now carry a concealed weapon without a permit…….  I mean politically Arizona is, how can i say this delicately…. weird.

This week our governor managed to make a fool of herself like 3 days in a row.  Keep in mind she’s not the one we elected into the position.  Obama took Janet Napolitano to be his Homeland Security secretary and that pushed Brewer into the governors seat.  In the past week the entire country has been talking about her and her latest TV appearances.  If Saturday Night Live had started a new season, guaranteed they’d be doing a skit of this.

generally I do not like to talk politics at all.   unless it’s with my husband.  I am in the minority where I live.   I believe what I believe and don’t feel the need to push it down anyone’s throat.

The Cardinals let Matt Leinart go, the guy who was supposed to be our star Quarterback.    He was supposed to be the starting QB on our team and was until he got hurt and then Kurt Warner took over and just blew Leinart out of the water.   Warner retired and in pre season games it appears Leinart couldn’t cut it, was let go and is being replaced by rookies.   ROOKIES.

Speaking of Kurt Warner, he’s on Dancing with the Stars this season and I bet you right now he gets talked to about his posture.   He’s kind of a huncher.

Still speaking of DWTS, I cannot believe Bristol Palin is on the show.

*To play..hit the button above, copy the questions and then link up!

I haven’t done any hops for a while.    If you’re here from one of them, hello and thanks for stopping by.   And if you feel like reading a little more about me I suggest This post or maybe even this one.

I don’t know if you guys watch Dancing With the Stars, but this seasons stars were announced yesterday and I am none too pleased.   I am especially unhappy about one of the ‘stars’.   She’s not even a star, she’s there based upon who her mother is and she’ll probably run away with a ton of votes because of that.    Everyone thought Kate Gosselin was a bad pick, this was worse.  As you can see, I’m very passionate about my shows!!

Have you been to Tammy’s Two Cents or Menopausal New Mom yet to link up for Thursday’s Friends and Giveaways?  This is a blog hop and a giveaway linky together!  Two separate linkys easy to find under one post!

Speaking of Thursday, I can’t believe it’s only Thursday.   This week has dragged on FOREVER.

Remember this shirt that I wanted so bad?  My husband bought it for me!!!   Except I’m fat and it doesn’t totally fit.  it like 98% fits.  And as stated previously, I spent the last year emotionally eating.  After I figured out that I was doing that, I emotionally ate for a little while longer because I was so sad that I had done that and didn’t care.    In the past year I have managed to cancel out almost all of the good habits I spent a year or two creating.

Hey I’ve had a rough year, cut me some slack!

August was the month I decided to get back on track (minus the birthday weekend eating extravaganza)  and so far so good.   Baby steps.   I am the only one that can control this part of my life and while I still want to be lazy and eat chips and brownies all day long, I know I can’t.  so now I will only eat them half of the day!!

Point being, I mean it, that shirt will fit soon.  101%

This one, who certainly looks innocent and lazy hanging half out of his castle (yes my dog has a castle)

has been barking at one of our windows every night (morning) usually between 2:30am-4:00am.   I am fairly certain he barks at my neighbors kitchen light.  There is nothing else he can see from that window.  SO annoying.

I guess I need a new phone, mine won’t charge past the 1st bar.  I just got a new battery so I guess it’s the phone.  I HATE PHONES.   I don’t use it, I only have it for emergencies.  And I don’t want to spend the money on a new phone either.

You’re not supposed to talk about your work on your blogs because it can get you fired, but I’m starting to not even care.  If you watch The City, my treadmill show, you’ll know how Erin feels about Olivia.   She gets whatever she wants, never gets into trouble, doesn’t do the best job, coasts thru.  Erin is constantly frustrated and no one will do anything about it.  Eventually she has to take matters into her own hands.   Today I am Erin.   and depending on how tomorrow goes, well…. I’ll just wait until tomorrow.

I am so thankful that my home life is top notch.  I couldn’t bear having to live in a house that I didn’t want to come home to.  All I ever want to do is come home to my house and my husband and my dogs.   If my living situation were less than ideal, I’d probably lose it.   There is enough other stuff going on in my life, I need a peaceful place to come home to.

Also beer helps.

And candy

I also need this shirt really really pretty badly

so on to the good, no matter how small it is, it’s still GOOD:

Doing another Bountiful Baskets this weekend, still splitting it with Cat.   Even tho it doesn’t seem like that much food, it really is.  And it’s kind of hard to use it in a week, we’re not ready for a whole basket each.

I am a season behind on Bones and just finished season 4 today and it had the crappiest ending ever.  Season 5 isn’t being released until October and I could only find episodes 13-the end on line.   But Cat also had the same problem and she sent me the link her husband found her for Season 5 episode 1.   WIN.   Now that I feel I have closure I can wait until October for the DVD release.

I am trying desperately to catch up on True Blood, fortunately for me it’s On Demand on my cable and I’m about 5-6 eps behind. I can probably catch up this weekend, because apparently something MAJOR happened (don’t tell me what it was) and now I need to know.

Also this weekend is a bday/graduation party for Cat.   I guess I’ll have to be social and mingle amongst humans for a few hours.

So back to my birthday.   Aside from the whole crazy drunk driver situation, it was a very good birthday.

The day of my birthday I ate free twice at two local places owned by the same guy. He actually owns three restaurants and you can hit all three for the birthday trifecta but I couldn’t swing breakfast on a workday.   I also got me some red velvet cake at lunchtime.  note to self, when you bring red velvet cake home make sure it gets its own box.  otherwise it tastes like the mini hamburger you also put in the box.

The hot stone massage I got was just ok.  Not sure if it was the massage therapist, the actual hot stone massage or the fact that it probably would have been better in winter, but i think i’ll pass on another one.   It did make me pretty tired tho.

Friday i made my husband go to golden corral at like 2:30pm. but it was so awesome, I ate everything in sight.   twice.

Saturday we went out for dinner to  a tiny little place in the middle of downtown.   It’s (pulled from their site) a charming re-creation of a neighborhood French bistro, but with a BYO twist.  the food there is TO DIE FOR.   I brought home the rest of my chocolate caramel tarte.  (it got its own box)

and then there was the zombie portrait. I know that’s not for everyone, but I really love it and it’s an original. It’s about 16×9 and i can’t wait to get a frame this weekend.

For as much TV as I watch, I am almost always continually a season behind on say 30% of my shows. This is so I can watch as many as I want in a row on DVD without having to wait for a new one to start up next week.  some new shows i don’t even bother to watch, just put them straight into save in my netflix dvd queue.    Lots of major networks only let you watch the last 5 on line and that’s a pain in the ass if you aren’t up to date.  ok so now that i’ve given you a lesson in the best way to utilize your time watching TV, my actual point was that I was actually 2 years behind on The City.  Which is actually the entirety of the show.   This is the show I watch on the treadmill.   Unfortunately I am almost done with it, and I have no idea when season 3 starts.    And my actual real point was that if you watch that show, which you probably don’t. I want Kelly Cutrone to be my real life friend.

Because she said this

really … who gives a f**k about her opinion? No, she’s dead! She is f**king dead! Because I’m gonna f**king come up like a shark underneath a glass bottom boat and f**king whip the s**t out of her.”

Welcome to Way Back Wednesday with The Adventures of Goober Grape & Monkey Man, The Life of a Sippy Cup Mom!, The Scoop on Poop! and The Nerdy Katie!

This week is all about your first car.  I didn’t start driving ‘legally’ until I was 21. I didn’t have a real desire to get my drivers license until it became pretty much a necessity. Plus I couldn’t afford a car or the insurance so I just took the bus to work for about a year and saved up some money.    I didn’t have any credit at all when I went to buy a car and had a really hard time getting a loan.  Most people buy their first car for cash after they’ve found the car of their dreams on a street corner with a for sale sign in the window. But I didn’t have that kind of cash saved up and needed a car, so financing it was.

My first car was a 1994 Geo Metro.  If you click on that link it takes you to Edmunds and it shows that the trade in value is $135.  I’m not kidding you when I say that if I could find another one of these for under $500 that ran, I’d buy it.

This isn’t my car but that’s what my car looked like, down to the color.   It cost me $6000 but with the high interest rate from not having credit my payments were $155 a month.  My insurance was $160 a month.   I bought it in September of 1995.

I later refinanced and my payments were $75 a month!  that’s how high my interest rate was.

This car was pretty awesome for being a death trap.  It had three cylinders, couldn’t make it up a hill going the speed limit and would shake if you hit 75 mph.  You also couldn’t idle at a red light and run the AC because the car would shake and threaten to stall out. No AC at red lights in AZ in the summer is not a good idea.

but it got excellent gas mileage.  back in the 90′s getting upwards of 38 mpg was unheard of.  It only had an 8 gallon tank and that was back when gas was 99 cents a gallon. (this makes me sound really old) so i could get a lot of gas into it with the change I found on the floor of my car.   I used to get so pissed because you could get things free with a fill up but a fill up was considered 10+ gallons.    Tires cost about $20 each,  the doors automatically locked when you hit 3mph and didn’t matter if you went that 3mph in reverse, they still locked.    My AC completely broke in summer and the door handle on the drivers inside busted on more than one occasion, but it was still under warranty so everything was fixed for free.

I got this car to nearly 100,000 miles and it was still going pretty strong but I was ready for something new.   so I got my next car which was a one year old used 1998 Chevy Cavalier.  that one cost me $9,000 (talked down from $11k)   I  got that car to over 100,000 miles before I traded it in for my brand new 2008 Mazda 3.  So yes, i am just about 36 and have only had 3 cars.

I keep cars a long time because I don’t like change and I also am pretty stingy with my money and don’t like spending it on cars.   If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

My friend Cat and I did the Bountiful Baskets this morning.  There was a bit of confusion (probably only on my part) when we got an email that said YOUR PICK UP TIME MAY HAVE CHANGED.   when I signed us up there were two choices for pick up 7am and 7:30am.  i went with the 7:30am.   then suddenly on the website there are 3 times.  7, 7:20 and 7:40.    so we just showed up at 7:30 and it was no big deal.    Everything in the basket was basically stuff I was going to buy today.  Cat got the lone cantaloupe and basket of strawberries.   I got the celery.  but we both got bananas, tomatoes, nectarines, carrots, blueberries and bell peppers and maybe something else i can’t remember.

Last night I randomly looked in my spam folder in email.  normally I just delete everything that is in there without looking because i don’t need a larger penis or  rolex watch or viagra.   and that’s all that’s usually in there.  but i saw an email from Philosophy and opened it because i love Philosophy.   And it was a b-day E-gift card from my mother in law!  HOORAY.   I went straight to the website and spent it.   I ended up with these 3 in 1′s  (shampoo, shower gel, bubble bath)

calm me (it’s lavender scented)
pineapple coconut
red velvet cake
vanilla birthday cake

Philosophy stuff is an indulgence I would never purchase for myself.

The dogs are currently on a partial raw diet, stew meat on top of a little bit of dry food.  Voodoo, the big one has turned savage now.   Any plastic baggie you take out of the fridge he assumes is full of steak for him and he follows you around all cracked out.   We’ve only been doing it about a week but it seems like they are a little more feisty.

1. Are you a neat sleeper or a messy sleeper?

both I guess. I wake up with bed head and sometimes dried drool on my face. But my side of the bed is also pretty much already made when I wake up, I just need to smooth out the quilt.

2. Fill in the blank. I wish I was more _ambitious___.

3. What is something that you wish you had been warned about?

I honestly can’t think of anything.

4. What was the best thing you ever found at a garage sale/flea market?

I’ve honestly never shopped at a garage sale,  and I’ve only been to indoor and outdoor swap marts here, and I don’t think I bought anything except maybe a churro but let’s face it those are pretty awesome.

5. If you could have any meal brought to you right now, what would it be?

It would be the fried chicken and deep fried okra at this southern BBQ joint that closed down.  OMG BEST FOOD EVER.   I still mourn the loss of it.

Does anyone watch UFC?  Probably not…. Anyway Anderson Silva is fighting this weekend and i’m tempted to get the fight.  But if you do watch UFC then you’ll remember his last fight he actually danced what I think was a jig in the ring, told a few jokes and acted a complete fool.   He’s a great fighter and that was really strange.   Everyone was pissed and if I could have gotten my money back for the PPV  I would have.   Part of me wants to watch to see if he’s going to do that again, but part of me is also afraid to waste my money in case that happens again.   Word on the street is that if he does do that again he’s fired.

of course it’s Friday hop time!

I’m really feeling like August is going to be a good month for me, and not just because it’s my birth month.  Even tho it’s hotter than crap outside and that usually makes me lethargic, I’ve gotten back a level of energy that I definitely didn’t have in July.   I’m taking advantage of that energy and have gotten back on my treadmill, which was all but abandoned last month.   My lungs do not agree with running for really any period of time, thanks to childhood asthma that made a comeback last year.  It’s worse in humid weather and inhalers and/or meds don’t really help much, so i don’t bother.  I can live with it the way it is and jog for very short periods of time.

anyway, my point is, i’m taking advantage of my new found energies and putting them towards something productive.  I really love walking and the 4 months a year i can walk outside, i do.   I got the treadmill specifically for the hot weather months.  And probably to the surprise of everyone, it didn’t become a clothes rack.   Like I said, I watch TV whilst on the treadmill and that really helps pass the time.   otherwise walking indoors is rather boring.

i’m also dedicating August to doing new, fun, interesting things or things that make me happy.

Strange side note here, my big dog often lays on the couch or bed or chair with his head hanging off and this makes his nose drain.   Just right now his nose drained right onto my shoes!! GROSS.

Example:

The yellowish color on the photo is from taking this picture in the dark with no flash.  He was sleeping on New Years Eve, apparently worn out from all the partying he did.

My friend Cat (go visit her) and I signed up for Bountiful Baskets this weekend.   that’s where you pay for a basket of half fruits and half vegs that is locally grown.

From their website:  Each week different items will be in the Bountiful Basket! We base the basket contents on what is in season, high quality, good value, and local. We generally have 6 fruit items & 6 vegetable items. We focus on what would be well received in our homes, and the extensive surveys we’ve done with participants over the past 5 years to know what families eat.

Cat and I are splitting the first basket for a few reasons.   Neither of us has done this before and we’re both too scared to go alone.  The closest one to our houses that had this going on at the time I wanted to go (i’m bossy like that) only had one basket left and also i have heard/seen that you get a crapload of stuff in these baskets and we weren’t sure if it would be too much for one household.   so we’re feeling it out this weekend to see what it’s like.

Happy birth month to me!!  My birthday is the 12th of this month and even tho I’m so excited that it’s my birth month, I don’t actually care about celebrating my b-day with a party.    I pretty much use it as an excuse to take a day off of work at eat at The Golden Corral.   I am a huge fan of buffets.   My husband does not share my fascination with them and seems to especially hate the Corral.  But I get to go there on my birthday and I basically count down the days until I get to go.   If you hit a buffet like this at just the right time, you’ll pay lunch prices but get the dinner menu.   I’m just sayin’…..

This year I am also treating myself to a hot stone massage. The spa I go to and have a membership at, offers deep discounts on upgrades like this  to their members.  I’ve never had a hot stone massage before and am not really sure what to expect. But people that have had them rave about them.   I also just remembered that I won a gift card to my spa for being the first person to answer a Sex and the City question on their twitter.  So the upgrade is technically free.     here was the question: who said- I’m homeless! I’ll be a bag lady! A Fendi bag lady, but a bag lady!!   The answer is Carrie!   Watching TV came in handy.