An Arizona Cheesehead's Thoughts

Another project complete! Picasso would be proud. Or, more likely, rolling in his grave. Here's what the box showed it should look like. Seven hours in. Sixteen hours in. Eighteen hours of my life I'll never get back. That last one looks done, right? So. Not. Done. The final step is to pore over every section and see if you missed any little dots or lines or even larger sections. Then, you have to figure out what color it should be because you've somehow painted over the number. After comparing the canvas to the box picture multiple times, you just decide to use the color that's currently on the brush in your hand. Repeat previous paragraph ad infinitum because no matter how many times you think you've found them all, yet another spot jumps out at you as unfinished. It's not like you're A) getting graded, B) anyone will notice and C) anyone will care so, eventually, you have to call it done. Tadah! Probably close to twenty...

I was "transferred" to a new office on March 16. It's pretty roomy, has a nice view of the great outdoors and easy access to snacks. Perhaps too easy. Overall, it wasn't a bad transition despite having to sit at my kitchen counter to work. My VOIP phone has to connect directly to my only router and I couldn't find a 75 foot ethernet cord to go from the living room, down the hall and across my actual office in the chaos that was our last day of full freedom here in AZ. Could I order one online now? Sure, but I'm too lazy to move stuff. While my new working digs may be nice, my new colleagues are a nightmare. The girl is a complete narcissist. Everything is about her, all the time. It's a constant barrage for attention for most of the day. She messes with my computer and interrupts all of my calls. I'll give her one thing, she's completely comfortable with her body and proudly shows her butt on every video call. I'm waiting for you! ...

My new kitchen has probably more than four times as much storage space as my old one. I'm really trying not to exaggerate on that, too. At least double the cupboards and a corner pantry have given me a much bigger playing area for where to put stuff. What happened in the old kitchen was that I had to Tetris in items all the way to the back of the cupboard. Out of sight, out of mind as I often forgot what I had. Anyone need a veggie chopper? I unearthed three when I packed to move. Now, I can go to Costco or even my local Fry's and take advantage of bulk buys. Eight cans of green chilis? Sold! Multi-pack of black olives? You bet! Baking binge so three bags of flour, 2 of regular sugar and another of powered sugar? Gotta have it on hand! Look, I'm saving money! I was feeling pretty good about it all. A place for everything and everything in its place. Then, one morning, The Container Store sent me an ad with a picture of this pantry in it. Be. Still. My. Heart. ...

We had a “Welcome to the team” lunch for our newest colleague and I was in charge of the icebreakers per usual. One of the questions I asked was, “What’s your dream job?” The caveat is you can’t pick your current job. That’s just a suckup move anyway. Two people answered they wanted to work with horses (ugh), one said police officer, two said chefs of some sort, another said electrical engineer and one said the answer I had prepared. Writer. Which is laughable in a way because the only writing I’ve done is for our newsletter and (small) pearls of wisdom emails from the President (that’s me) of Parrot Heads in Paradise. I started thinking about what was stopping me from doing any real writing. I couldn’t come up with any good reasons. Oh, I had reasons, of course, but not good ones. Can you legitimately say you want to be a writer when you don’t actually write? I might have well have said I wanted to be an Olympic athlete. Both seem just as likely when you’re making zero effort. I also...

I can't recall the last four days in a row off from work that I've had that didn't revolve around a trip, a family event or being sick as a dog. Maybe never. But, I did last weekend and it was glorious! The 4th of July is a work holiday and several departments were encouraging their people to take the 3rd off as well. We all knew it was going to be a slow day. I thought, "Why the heck not?" and marked myself down for vacation. My plan was simple. Reading and sleeping. I started with Friday night. After a couple of beers with Steven, I headed home and hit a book for a while. I then stayed up clearing shows off my DVR before heading to bed to read some more. Saturday was a wake up, read between doing laundry and watching some more TV. Sunday was great because there was no laundry. Just books, a nap and TV. Monday looked to be a lather, rinse, repeat activity but my friends, The O'Malley Babes, enticed me out with an opportunity to hang in thei...

I have a confession to make. “Forgive me, football gods, for I have sinned...” I didn’t watch one minute of the Super Bowl. Not the pre-game, not the game, not the half time show, not a single commercial. Having neither affection nor antipathy for either team, I couldn’t summon the energy to care. I figured I could see all the commercials that people liked online afterwards so that wasn’t a draw. And, I guess Wayne Newton wasn’t available so they asked Madonna for halftime. Seriously, is there not one contemporary artist or group that they could find? The closest I got to the game was when Crime Dog posted something about 9 and 0 being a good square so I went to NFL.com to see who had the 9 and who had the 0. Alas, my 9 and 0 were the wrong way. Based on my Facebook feed, the game was either a mess by the Patriots or a great game by the Giants. And, Madonna was either the best halftime show ever or just meh. There were only a few commercials that people talked about so I think don’t ...

This is the second message I received from the cleaning gods that leads me to believe I should just give up. I tried to check my Yahoo account on my MacBook Pro and the page wouldn’t load. It said I didn’t have an internet connection. Here’s what I did to troubleshoot: Turned the airport off and back on. Closed and reopened the browser. Flipped over to my virtual windows machine and tried it there. Completely shut down and restarted the machine. Unplugged my wireless router for a minute then plugged it back in. Hit the reset button on my wireless router. Fired up my Dell laptop to see if it connected. Unplugged my cable modem for a minute then plugged it back in. Plugged the Mac directly to the modem to see if the router was bad. At this point, I assumed the problem was with Cox. How to look up Cox’s phone number since I don’t keep paper phone books became the next problem. I tried to load their page through the browser on my Droid. Their page is clearly not designed for m...

OK, I admit cleaning house is not my thing. I do the bare minimum to not look like one of those crazy hoarders people until I have someone coming over then I actually do “real” cleaning. But, the cleaning gods are trying to send me messages that it’s not worth it. This was message one. I have a dark rug in my living room. Dark rug plus cat with all white belly fur is not a good combination. Dark rug plus cat with all white belly fur plus cat who got and shredded green glitter balls for Christmas is an even worse combination. I pulled out my vacuum cleaner and started in on the carpet. After a few sweeps across the floor, I noticed it was not getting any cleaner. In fact, there were big clumps of matter being deposited on the rug. Nothing to do but tip the vacuum over and check the suction. Yeah, it was blowing air (and what was in it) out instead of in. I suspect a broken or slipped belt. I think I have a spare somewhere but no clue where it is. So, I went to the vacuum that I though...

When I first got George, her birth Mommy's owner sent her home with what I call a crackle ball. It looked like a tin foil ball and it made a cracking sound when you squished it. We used to play fetch with it every day. I would throw it, she would bat it around then carry it back to me. Repeat, repeat. When I woke up in the morning, she would bring it up on the bed and we started our day by playing fetch. At some point, all of the crackle balls disappeared and the fetch game stopped. Until tonight. I bought her a cat stocking at PetSmart this past weekend. 25 toys for something like $3.99. Cheap! As she bugged the crap out of me while I was trying to address my holiday cards on Sunday, I doled out a few toys. She paid a minimal amount of attention to them until tonight when one struck her fancy. (I was still working on cards and not paying attention to her. Coincidence? I think not.) Go get it, George! It was another ball, this one with glittery threads on it. She carrie...

The larder is quite bare here at the Cheesehead's home. I had two oranges for breakfast then heated up a can of baked beans for lunch. That was about all there was and I still had dinner to worry about. Because I'm going to be out almost every night this week, I didn't want to go to the grocery store for just one meal. So, creativity was called for. I had a whole organic chicken in the freezer and assorted organic veggies and fruits. After browsing the web for some recipes, I formulated my own based on available ingredients. You know what? It turned out pretty damn good. Here's my recipe: Jumbled together in a roasting pan: 4 red apples, quartered and cored 1 full head of garlic, peeled (which should go without saying, don't you think?) 4 small red onions, quartered 2 green onions, finely diced a bunch of dried Rosemary (wish I'd had fresh but oh well) Place full roasting chicken with Kosher salt and cracked pepper on the outside and on top of the fruit/veggie m...

So, the weather is quite nice right now and I had the front door open with just the security screen door between us and the axe murderers. All was quite peaceful until George started fussing. I paused the TV and investigated but found nothing to indicate what her issue was so I went back to the TV. A few minutes later, she was hissing at the door so I checked it out again. Turns out, there was this incredibly fluffy cat right on the other side of the door taunting her. Seriously, it was a total bully. Trying to save my baby from distress, I partially closed the door but she wouldn't get out of the way so I reached down to pick her up. Ouch. Dang, that picking up idea was a huge mistake. I not only got hissed at by George, I got scratched like you would not believe. It hurt like a mofo, in fact. I would like to think that she felt bad because she did move away a moment after the scratching so I was able to close the door and she did come investigate my injury after I had to run it u...

I left George in Steven's care while I was off to Key West for the week. They have this strange "sibling" rivalry thing so it's not the best situation for either of them, frankly, and they're both pretty vocal about it. What happens is that George hides from Steven most of the time. When she does come out, he picks on her because he's mad she won't be friendly. She then goes back into hiding. Lather, rinse, repeat. New Dude picked me up at the airport late on Monday night. When we got to my place, George went a little nuts. She randomly jumped around, meowed loudly and wouldn't settle at all. She was clearly upset. Our usual routine when I get home is I kick my shoes off in my bedroom then sit on my bed. She jumps up and we have some Mommy/Kitty time where she tells me about what happened while I was gone and I scratch her ears and chin and pet her. So, I went down to my room and sat on the bed thinking she would join me and I could calm her do...

3:00 AM( ish ) Wide awake for no apparent reason. Toss. Turn. 4:06 Look at time. Curse. Sigh. Discover that George is wide awake at 4:06. Play fetch with crackle ball. Headbutted into giving ear and neck scratches. Receive kitty bath. Go to bathroom. Return to find stuffed mouse in my sleep spot. Try to decide if mouse was already there and the reason I woke up or a new addition courtesy of George. George isn't talking so I give up. Fling mouse down hallway hoping to get George out of the room. Try to think happy thoughts. Contemplate lack of love life. (NOT a happy thought.) Make mental grocery shopping list. Toss. Turn. Get up to see if paper was delivered early. No paper, so grabbed book. Read 10 chapters of book. 6:20 Eyes are very tired. Try to go to sleep. Distracted by toilet running. Try to figure out why toilet is running but have no clue. Try to go to sleep. Get up and put hammer under bar in back of toilet to keep it from running. Leak somewhere, I guess. Try to slee...

I spend a lot of time watching TV. Even with the DVR, it's many hours a week. However, I don't think it's a lot until this time of year. Most of my shows are on break so I'm only recording 4 or 5 hours a week. I can get through that in a Saturday morning. My computer time is down, too. Usually, I'm multi-tasking by watching TV and playing online games or Facebooking. Now that I'm not glued to the tube, I'm finding the lure of the laptop has decreased. It's so freeing! I've had time to clean (OK, not a lot but still), listen to music and read. I will even have time to cook. And, I'm getting more sleep which is a good thing. My reading had dropped down a lot but I'm getting oodles in now. I have a year's worth of Information Week and Arizona Highway's magazines stacked up that I'm now going through. Also, Dawnie's daughter was selling subscriptions for a school fundraiser so I started Time and Cooking Light. My reserve...

In our last session of our latest health class at work, Christine asked us what we are doing now (good things) that we weren't doing 14 weeks ago when we started. She was trying to get us to see that even small forward steps are still, well, forward. One of the guys said he started reading food labels. I had already been doing that but mostly looked at calorie and fat counts and nothing else. Now, I look at ingredients to spot high fructose corn syrup and trans fats and I'm also paying a lot of attention to the fiber counts. Our suggested daily amount is 24 grams and, trust me, it takes an effort to get to that. One of the girls said she's now eating at home 6 days a week. Wow. Not only is she controlling her own ingredients, she's also saving a bunch of money. She bought a Weight Watchers cookbook and she makes at least three new recipes each week. She and her fiancee rate them and have found some keepers. That got me to thinking about how much I eat out. I go...

I made dinner for The Rocket Scientist last night. It was the least I could do since he spent most of the day installing my dishwasher and hooking up my ice maker. Since we had "company", I cleared off the dining room table. The empty space alone was enough to attract George to it. Then, I put the plates and silverware on and those were even more of a kitty magnet. I chased her off twice. The second time was pretty funny because she wanted to jump off on to the chair by my laptop was on there and she just didn't know how to get away. The third time, I snuck up on her and picked her up off the table. That got a pitiful mew out of her because she knew what was coming. Yep, time out in her room. She didn't cry as much this time as she did in her last time out. But, she didn't want us to forget she was in there, either. So, she kept her paw out under the door. Just a little reminder, "Hey, don't forget me in here!" Hello! I let her out as soon as I had t...

I've had some domestic parts failures of late. Two lights in the bathroom, the wine cooler, the light bulb in the fridge and, finally, the dishwasher. I managed to replace the bathroom lights without an issue and I started looking for a new wine cooler. My old one held 12 bottles which isn't quite enough so I wanted a bigger one. The Rocket Scientist found one for me at a pretty good price. Only problem - it was at Home Depot. Ugh. I'm so not a Home Depot girl and it's not just because Lowe's sponsors Jimmie Johnson. I find the stores too rough and intimidating. Lowe's is cleaner and more inviting for some reason. But, a deal is a deal so we headed off to Home Depot. The one he saw was actually on sale so it was a really, really good deal. But, there was this one thing...I wanted a better one. What I really wanted was a dual zone unit so I could let me reds age while keeping the whites nicely chilled. I know, it's hard to believe I could let a bot...

I really appreciate the sentiments of Mother's Day and Father's Day but, when it comes down to it, it's hard to pick out presents for people who have everything they need. How much perfume and how many golf shirts do the folks really need? After some brainstorming, Steven and I decided to make dinner for my parents at my house for Father's Day. Shorty always wants to come over and hang out for some reason so I knew it would make him really happy. And, it did. He was quite excited about it. Steven came over at noon and we scanned some online recipes before deciding on a veggie pasta salad and stuffing filled pork chops. It seems an odd combination to me but Steven was actually doing the work while I paid the bill so I let him decide. After checking out the pork at the store, we ended up with a pork roast instead of the chops but he split it and stuffed it anyway. The parents came over around 3 just as I was catching the end of the race. My poor Jimmie – led the mo...

My friend sent me pictures of George and her siblings today. She said they're getting big but they look pretty small to me. Aren't they adorable? And those blue eyes are so sparkling and bright! I sent all of the pictures on to a few people and heard back from The Rocket Scientist, "Yeah, that will scare the ax murderer away!" I replied, "It will melt the axe murderer's cold, evil heart!" Another of my friends opined that people might think I was naming her after W. Um, no! This is the George I'm naming her after. A true classic.

So, I made a commitment tonight that maybe should get me committed. My friend Ann sent an email out a few weeks ago. She'd taken in a stray cat who turned out to be pregnant. She now has four kittens in addition to two adult cats. Two girl and two boy kittens. She sent pictures out soon after they were born and they looked like rats. I called her today to see if she'd gotten them all adopted out yet. She told me, "Yeah, except for one of the girls." Dang it! I told her I was hoping she would say the girls were gone so I wouldn't have to make a decision. Yeah, I'm getting a cat. She should be weaned from her Momma in the middle of June which fits nicely into my travel schedule. It's right after Salt Lake and there's over a month before I head back to the Mid-West to see Jimmy in Alpine Valley. Her name will be George, of course.