Family news update, local tragedy, movie & book

Last week, Terry’s boss from hell was demoted and sent to another office; another undesirable peon is likely to follow – he gets a new boss tomorrow and couldn’t be happier about it.

Justin’s birthday was fun – we went to Chili’s to celebrate. I took him to Guitar Center to pick out his presents which turned out to be two books of sheet music from bands including AC/DC, Green Day and other favorite bands. I also got him two really cool CDs of generic background music – one Rock and one Blues. He can play them on his stereo and then “jam” as lead guitar to them. It’s like having his own backup band and it’s teaching him how to improvise. Plus it sounds really cool when he plays!

Eric isn’t up to much but this Wednesday he’s going to get his schedule at school. He accidentally (?) signed up for girls’ Phys Ed which I don’t think will fly with the school. He’s getting nervous about playing football, evident by the doubts he’s raising – which he always does with things like this. We are confident he will do well and enjoy it immensely as always.

You may have heard about a terrible helicopter crash that happened in Phoenix on Friday. Such a tragedy – it’s the top story on all the local news channels (TV, paper and Internet). Several news helicopters were reporting a police chase and capture when two of them collided mid-air and crashed to the ground. All four persons aboard were killed.

On a much lighter note, I went with my friend Kathy to see Hairspray on Tuesday night. It was a cute movie, very much a chick flick. I have three things to say about John Travolta:

1. His performance as a woman was not convincing (though maybe not meant to be) and very distracting
2. It’s disappointing that the person who makes the decisions about casting didn’t instead find a beautiful heavy white woman to take the role instead of making this character out of a man.
3. I recognize it was a huge P.R. stunt that wouldn’t have gotten many people to see the movie (probably including myself).

I also finished another cute book by Sophie Kinsella called Can You Keep a Secret. It was just as enjoyable as her Shopaholic books, but with a different character. It is probably the 6th or 7th book I received from www.bookmooch.com and I am just loving this site! I love that you can get a book for FREE simply by accumulating points (partially accomplished by sending some used books of your own).

Big meeting this week so I had better get back to my to-do list. This blog entry was a nice diversion though!

Summer birthday, working like a dog, new restaurant, summer is here

So yesterday we had a birthday party for Justin. The conclusion: It sucks to have a summer birthday. Although he invited about 8 or 9 kids, 6 said they were coming and only 3 showed up. They had fun, I think, though one of the kids is just the brattiest little terd on earth. And it was hotter than hades again – but sticky humid from the rain. Next year, I’m going to let him pick one kid to sleep over and we’ll spoil them with a movie, dinner out and video games. It would have been cheaper and easier to just buy him some new titles for his PS2 than what I ended up doing – planning for 8 kids, baking a bday cake from scratch (will still do that part), researching and running games, getting prizes, making goodie bags and just overall running the show for 3 hours. I’m exhausted and actually Justin is taking a nap right now. Oh, and I truly believe that water balloons are the work of the devil.

Work has been busy as ever. My next big meeting is next week and I feel very unprepared. I’ve got a dozen other projects I’m working on too, which don’t just go away when I’m offsite working on something else. I’ve just been working on birthday and ordinary household stuff all weekend, and have no desire to do anything job-related.

Terry was sweet yesterday though, he recognized how I worked my butt off for that party and treated me to dinner last night, just the two of us. We went exploring a little bit, to an area we don’t normally go, and stumbled upon a restaurant called Bonefish Grill. We thoroughly enjoyed it. The food was excellent and the service was way above average. The atmosphere was elegant but we still felt at ease in our casual shorts and flip flops. The prices were fair, not cheap by any means, but well worth the meal. We enjoyed a light-crusted freshly baked bread dipped in olive oil and pesto. Terry had corn chowder with crabmeat and I opted for the dinner salad – both excellent. For an entree, Terry took the surf & turf and I had the filet mignon – both were fabulous. They had creme brulee on the menu – my favorite – so of course I couldn’t pass that up. We left stuffed and satisfied and made it home in time to batten down the hatches for the upcoming dust storm.

Speaking of dust storms, as of yesterday, our monsoon season has just started. You can really feel the humidity in the air and the cicadas are noisier than ever. Things won’t be getting drier or cooler now til at least the end of September, mid-October. I’m content to just sit and soak up the A/C. I’m paying nearly $200 a month for it (budget plan) so I’d better enjoy it!

It’ not easy being green

 

ECP scores range between 150-900 and they measure your private “Earth Conservation Plan”. The lower your score, the better – it has to do with your footprint on the Earth. The average score in America is 325 and in Canada 305. The average carbon output in the USA is 20 tons and in Canada 17 tons.

I learned recently that my ECP score is 431 and my carbon output is 20.7. One of the things bringing it up is the amount of round trip flights I take in a year and my long commute which I can really only do by car (gas-guzzling SUV unfortunately). I did learn however that there are things I could change for the better, such as unplugging appliances when not in use and switching to energy-saving lighting and shower heads. I’m also going to launch a personal campaign with my boss to work a partial week in the office and telecommute part-time.

Before any of you start to think I’ve become a granola-eating, birkenstock-wearing, crystal-reading, yoga guru - let me put your mind at ease. If you know me, you know I’m more realist than idealist. I do not personally believe in Global Warming. I do however believe that the humans which populate this Earth produce far too much waste, which has the potential to create an unnatural imbalance (regionally and maybe eventually globally) and diminish the quality of our lives. If we can do our part to recycle, conserve and use our resources wisely instead of wastefully, why wouldn’t we do that?

Grant you, I will not get carried away here. I believe in conserving money too, and last I checked, many of the recycled products out there cost upwards of 20% more than their first generation counterparts. I guess it’s important to find a balance. If we each just do a little more to brighten our shade of “green” think of how much brighter the world would be!

Links:

• Visit this really cool link for some flash-based stats: BreathingEarth 
• What’s your Live Impact? Find out how you compare to others in your community.
• Visit earthlab.com to see how you can reduce your environmental impact.
• Green shopping at Gaiam and Recycline.
• Learn more about conservation at the US Department of Energy’s Fuel Conservation Site. You can also find out how “green” your car is.
• Learn more about recycling at earth911

List-mania for today

People I hate today:

• The a-hole driver in the double-load rock-moving truck who cut me off, then proceeded to shower stones onto my vehicle
• Catty women at work (this girl is too fat, that girl is too thin, the other girl is always at the office, the next girl is never around…. you get the picture)
• People who, on a speaker phone/conference call, talk and talk ad nauseum, not realizing that I might easily be able to provide the answer to their question or solve their problem if they’d just SHUT UP for five seconds.
• People who, on a speaker phone/conference call, ignore the common etiquette of putting their phone on “mute” when not speaking to avoid the overpowering background noise of a vehicle, barking dog or television. Usually these are the same people who commit the previously-listed annoyance.

People I love today (not in any particular order):

• My 9 year old who always greets me with a “Hi Mom”, a warm smile and a huge hug when I get home from work.
• My 15 year old who regularly and effortlessly entertains us at dinnertime with comedic episodes.
• My husband who commented on my culinary mastery, even though dinner was just a throw-together dish (but it was pretty good, I must admit)
• My chiropractor who eradicated 99% of the excruciating pain caused by today’s back to back migraine episode. (Likely caused by the conference call I had earlier in the day)

Today’s mysteries:

• How can the 5′7″, 127 lb. body of my teenage son exude such a large volume of gas?
• What makes John Travolta think he can really carry the role of a woman?

Results of today’s experiments with the dog:

• She attacks my 9 year old if he is beating on my husband
• She attacks me if I am beating on my husband
• She attacks me and bites my hair if my husband is beating on me
• The dog will no longer get any treats, leftovers or counter-droppings from me

Travels, working at home, books

Did ya miss me? I guess you can always tell when I’m busy or traveling due to my lack of blog posts. This week, it was both.

I was in Galveston doing a site visit for a May 2008 meeting. All looks good and I think we will be going to contract with the hotel – Moody Gardens. The place is really nice – great rooms and lots to do right on the hotel grounds. They have an aquarium, rainforest exhibit, IMAX theater, special effects/4D film, manmade beach area (far better and far cleaner than the “real” Galveston beaches) and a brand new Schlitterbahn water park. I will tell you something else Galveston has, especially this time of year – HUMIDITY. I was reminded of those hot, humid summer days growing up in upstate NY when we would break records. Add about 10 degrees to that. Needless to say, I’m glad to be home. The flight was a nighmare – try sitting in the back of the plane outside a restroom that decides it wants to spew raw sewage odors for a 2 hour 20 minute flight.

So tonight I’m enjoying a quiet evening at home while Terry’s out at the baseball game with a friend. Tomorrow night we’re going to play euchre at a friend’s house but no other major plans for this weekend. Oh yeah, except for work. I have to make up for being out and having limited Internet access. At least I can pick my hours and even work poolside if I want. Ah, the miracles of modern technology.

Last weekend I took the kids to see Shrek the 3rd – it was cute, but we enjoyed Transformers (all of us went on Sunday) much more. The special effects were awesome, and although it was a bit juvenile in some places, it was a good story which kept us on the edges of our seats.

Last week I read The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini, a book that I highly recommend. It’s a touching story and very well-written, though it is not exactly “light reading.” It’s about a man who grew up in Afghanistan, then when in his late teens moved to the USA with his traditionalist father. Usually when I’m done reading a heavy hitter like that one, I like to follow with something light, so this week I chose the fourth Shopaholic book, Shopaholic and Sister by Sophie Kinsella. It was a really cute story and I enjoyed reading about Becky Bloomwood-Brandon again – now I have to finish up the series with her fifth and final (as of yet) Shopaholic and Baby.

On another subject, Eric thinks he’s found a place that might hire him. Dairy Queen apparently will take applications from kids about his age, so we picked up an app tonight and will be returning it tomorrow. Gotta love him – he’s anxious to make some money of his own instead of relying on me for allowance. I don’t have the heart to tell him about all the taxes that will be taken out of his check on a regular basis. Ah well, life is full of disappointments – maybe I’ll let him figure this one out on his own.

Lazy summer Sunday

Hot – hot – hot! That’s the best way to describe life in Phoenix right now. Yesterday we went to Jim & Kathy’s for a little get-together. They had guests in from back home (they are from Buffalo) and we had fun hanging out with them and some of our neighbors. Surprisingly, once the sun went down it was not really that hot. I didn’t even get in the pool, and never broke a sweat. Kathy made beef on weck and we all brought side dishes. Her cousin Kathy S. brought her signature Chicken Wing Dip which is to die for. I ate way too much of it.

Today is just R&R – Justin has some buddies over and they’re playing their usual video games. Too hot to play outside, though they were in the pool a little while ago. Eric hasn’t been feeling well – he’s got a cold. There’s nothing worse than to have a stuffy nose in the summertime, especially when it’s so brutally hot.

Earlier today I made a short trip to Tempe to check out our local Whole Foods store.  I’ve been to the authentic one in Austin and found ours to be a micro-version of it. Although I was successful in finding one specialty item I haven’t seen elsewhere in Phoenix – Salt Lick Barbecue Sauce – there really wasn’t anything else I couldn’t have found at the Sunflower Market only 1/2 mile from my house. I’m glad I checked it out though, because now tonight’s barbecue ribs will have real Texas flavor!

Tomorrow it’s back to work :( and Tuesday more of the same, then I’m out of the office until Friday the 13th. I have vacation days at the end of this week, and traveling out of town for a site visit next week. I’m hoping to do the “carry-on only” thing for this trip so we’ll see how that goes. I haven’t attempted this since the new liquid restrictions went into place.

Hmmmm… I think I’m going to go for a dip in the pool and start a new book while floating on my raft til dinner is ready (I put the ribs in the crock pot this morning). I just love summertime! Here’s the recipe for Chicken Wing Dip – serve it with Wheat Thins, carrot sticks and/or celery sticks.