I Know Myself Well

I am a thirsty person. I drink a lot of water. I know this. I used to drink it only at meals, but when I was working I got into the habit of drinking throughout my day at my desk, partly because I frequently didn't have time for a "real" lunch and at lunch at my desk, too.

I hate waste, though. And it's possibly that I'm a bit ... frugal. Ergo, I'm not about to cart around plastic bottles of water for a number of reasons. Instead, I have my own BPA free bottles of water, and they do travel with my everywhere from PTO meetings to tae kwon do to the gym to carpooling and more.

And since I drink a lot of water, it's the 40 ounce version. Ummm no, not a typo. I actually go through two or three of them a day.

I owned six of them at one time. I now have four. One got left behind at a school meeting a couple years ago and disappeared. Another I gave to my mom, although I don't believe she uses it. The other four? They rotate into use, washed every couple of days by my kind husband.

Best part? They're metal. That's the only reason I haven't had to buy a carload more.

Note that the bottle doesn't stand level anymore. And it is dented slightly near the bottom. And ummm has a huge dent near the top. Thank goodness I was thinking when I bought them!

You know, that reminds me... I should probably get a cover for my Droid sometime soon.

Current Giveaways:
$50 77kids gift certificate here
Little Wonders Company personalized hardcover book here
$25 Build-A-Bear Workshop gift card here
Thomas and Friends Adventure on Misty Island Mega Blocks set here
Lawry's Complete Meal Ideas Gift Pack with casserole here

I've Got Issues

Before I forget... I have a Pay It Forward going on. Enter it here. Now back to your regularly scheduled post.

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If I could take the day off work tomorrow, I'd so get organized and caught up on the things I like. I tread water pretty well and get the daily stuff done that I need to, but the things that I'd like to do just don't always get done, and a day off work would really help me. I'll give you an example.

I was reading the paper yesterday, and when I got to the sports (yes, I read the sports and I save that for the end because it's the best part of the paper) I read about football and hockey and some high school sports.

What were those high school sports? Baseball, of course, with some track and field thrown in. And the football? Talking about the upcoming draft. Hockey? Talking about who was going to make the playoffs.

Yeah. It was a paper from April. Like I said, I've got issues.

We get a daily paper, and in my mind, if we pay for the paper (and the extra $0.40 per week to have it delivered), I'm darn well going to read it. Eventually.

Every day, my goal is to get through reading the paper. I start with the neighbor section, then read the business section, then whatever "special" section that day has be it Lifestyle and Entertainment or Health or Food, then the front page, and then sports. Same order every day. But some days I get busy or caught up in something or am tired, and I don't finish it.

Whatever sections I don't finish go on my nightstand. And for awhile there, I was only sometimes even getting to the beginning of the front page. My stack grew and grew. It got pretty sad, actually. My husband urged me to throw them away, but I couldn't throw them away without reading them first!

For the last two months, I've been concentrating on getting the day's paper finished and then trying to read at least a section or two of the unread, older paper. And I did. The trips to Vegas and Minnesota and St. Louis helped me whittle the stack down some, fortunately.

Reading the paper backwards (because I had to read the newest old paper first just because) was actually really interesting. Some stories stay in the news for awhile, and as I would read older and older stories about the same item, it was fascinating to see how information changed and sources changed their slants on the item. Kind of like an archaeological dig in a weird way (OK, maybe just in my head).

But yesterday? I read that last paper. I'm officially caught up. And right now, I have only the sports section to finish off. So what does that mean?

Now I need a day off to read the magazines that I've been ignoring for the last oh year or so. Actually, I may need more than one day off work for this one. I subscribe to no magazines right now. But yet, I still get them. When I started to think about how many magazines I get, it started to make me giggle. Let's walk through them, shall we?

1) My alumni magazine comes quarterly.
2) The alumni magazine for the school I went to within Northwestern comes quarterly, as well.
3) My health club sends me a (I think) monthly magazine. I actually discovered this on the plane to St Louis -- and there's more to that story yet to come.
4) The consulting company I used to work for sends me a quarterly very dense (but interesting) business journal they put out.
5) I made the mistake of subscribing to Parents for four years when Mister Man was one. That's still arriving every month.
6) A friend bought me a subscription to Cooks Illustrated two years ago for Christmas, and I still have a few of those issues that I haven't read (LOVE that magazine, by the way, hint hint).
7) My SIL bought me a subscription to Southern Living for Christmas last year. I'll say no more on that one, either.
8) I did a four year subscription to Cooking Pleasures awhile ago. I used to really like that magazine but I've grown weary of that one. I think Cooks Illustrated killed the joy for me.
9) Costco sends me a monthly magazine.
10) Our Realtors send me a home and design magazine that arrives monthly, as well. Not that I rip out pictures from it of beautiful bathrooms or kitchens or anything....

I was going to post a picture of the stack of magazines I have to read. It's over two feet high. But then I decided it was too embarrassing. And I refuse to officially measure it. Do you think my work would give me a sabbatical so I can catch up on those magazines? Maybe that one day off wouldn't quite do it.

We've All Got Quirks

The wedding recap will come, but I want to post the pictures with it, and I’m too exhausted to do that tonight. Let’s just say that it was a good weekend.

While traveling with people, you tend to learn things about them. There were many things learned amongst all of us this weekend, some of which I’ll share over the next few days.

One of the first things we learned, however, is that our quirks are sometimes contradictory and don’t always overlap. In the airport on the way to Houston, we had our first enlightenment.

I can’t take liquids through security, of course, but I like to drink a lot of water. I generally carry around a 24 ounce mug and drink several of them a day. As we headed to the gate, I told my friend that I needed to stop at a fountain to fill up.

She started to freak out. “You can’t do that! Go buy a bottle of water. You can’t do that!”

“Uhhh, why not? I need a drink for the plane.”

“That’s so gross! I’ll buy you a bottle of water. You can’t use the fountain.”

“I’m just filling up my cup; it’s fine. I just need a drink.”

“Suit yourself, but that’s so gross. People put their mouths on that thing.”

I walked back to her a moment later with a full mug, and the lightbulb went on. “Ohhhhhh, you were filling up a cup. That’s different. I thought you were drinking from it.”

Apparently, it’s ok to fill up a cup from a fountain for my friend. However, actually using your mouth to drink from the stream – without touching the fountain itself – is disgusting and can’t happen.

Interesting. Then again, since I can’t drink “bathroom water” I suppose I can’t talk. Yep, if water comes from a faucet in a bathroom – including in my own house – I can’t drink it. And yes, I do know they all come from the same source. It’s called a quirk.

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When I landed in Houston, my hair went from normal, to hair on steroids. It literally rose up and out about four inches between the time we landed and the time we got to the Houstonian. Truly impressive.

But it got me to thinking…. Texans have big hair – stereotypically – and it works for them. They have haircuts that work in the humidity. My haircut is not designed to work in the humidity. It’s a challenge when I go from regular humidity to Texas humidity.

But what about people from Texas? Specially, what about people from Texas who compete in beauty pageants? Specifically, what about the Miss Texas competitor in the the Miss America pageant? She has her hair all nicely done in and for Texas. It works great there. Then she goes to Atlantic City, and her hair doesn’t rise the way it does at home. It’s flat! It doesn’t work with her haircut anymore. I wonder if they have the same issues that I do but in reverse.

Yep, the trains of thought tend to really wander when I’m tired. But man my hair had fun in Texas!