The Life and Times of My Stomach

I have been blessed in my life so far to be pretty much food allergy free.   Thank goodness because I eat like a grade schooler.  My favorite foods are pizza, mac n cheese, grilled cheese, those old school cheap-o fruit snacks, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, and the like.

That's not to say I don't have more "sophisticated" tastes as well.  I'm all about the salmon, chicken marsala, and other "adult" foods.  I assume they are adult foods because kids eat things like fish sticks not grown-up salmon.  Right?

And I must admit that since high school I haven't done that well with fried foods in restaurants much to the dismay of my food loving friend, Beth.  But other than that I could eat pretty much anything.

However... bum, bum, BUM!.... over the last couple months, things have changed.  After eating (so most of the time) I have had stomach cramps and felt just not that great.  I mean, it has been to the point where I don't want to eat things.  Not even brownies.  And that is a travesty!

So, I finally, after much procrastinating, dragging of my feet, complaining to friends who convince me to make a doctor's appointment only to hear a week later that I still haven't called, made the appointment.

And, horror of horrors, the doctor took dairy out of my diet for TWO WHOLE WEEKS!  Do you know how hard it is for a girl who has a glass of milk a day, loves cheese, ice cream, cheesecake, cupcakes, cookies, lasagna, not to mention the above mentioned mac n cheese, grilled cheese, pizza, and generally anything with milk and cheese in it, to give up dairy completely for TWO WHOLE WEEKS!?!

Do you know how many products have milk in them?  A lot!  Pretty much everything!  Bread, a lot of dry cereals, pancakes, mashed potatoes, butter, pizza, mac n cheese, all the other foods I mentioned before.  So this has been pretty hard on me because I love food.  I mean, I LOVE food.  Sometimes one of the lady's at work and I will just sit there and talk about food.  It's been very hard giving it up.

Needless to say, I've cheated a couple of times.  I mean, how much can a couple slices of pizza bother me, right?  The answer, a lot more than I realized.  While I've been on this two week non-dairy clense, I have been feeling better (most of the time).  So when I decided to partake in the cheesy goodness that is pizza I felt glorious and vindicated. Take that non-dairy diet!  I'll eat whatever I want!  Until two hours later when I was rolling around on the floor clutching my stomach in agony.  And that was only a slight exagerattion.  I wasn't rolling on the floor.  I was in the chair.

Anyway, yesterday I had my follow-up appointment to see how this new boring food diet was going.  And since there were still times when I was on my non-dairy diet (and I really wasn't even cheating) that I still got/felt sick/bad/uncomfortable my doctor decided to take some of my blood (and it wasn't even a hot vampire taking my blood, just a middle-aged lady) and do a celiac test to see if I have a gluten allergy.

She's apparently going to try different diet changing means and blood tests on me before she tries "more invasive" tests.  I'll let you just imagine what that all entails.

But, on the upside, for Thanksgiving my doctor wants me to try to take some imodium before eating a meal that would usually give me problems to see if it helps to alleviate some or all of the issues.  So, on doctor's orders, I must eat mashed potatoes, pumpkin pie, and other foods that have dairy in them.  And that's what I'm thankful for this year.

Chicago Here I Come!

Tomorrow is Shelly's and my fourth annual Chicago Shopping Trip! I am so excited to take a day to walk around Chicago and shop with one of my favorite people. We've been going on an early November shopping trip every year since we both graduated and never see each other except for a couple times a year so I really treasure the day.

A really old picture of me and Shelly with Jayme because I just realized I

have no recent ones with just the two of us.  This must be rectified.

Every year I get a little braver about the trip as well. The first year I rode the Amtrak up from Bloomington and met Shel at Union Station in Chicago where she had arrived earlier on the metra. The next year I drove up to her apartment in New Lennox and we had breakfast and headed in on the metra. The next year I met her at her place in Lisle and we again rode the metra. (PS The Metra freaking rocks. It's so easy and inexpensive. My sister and I have also driven up and taken the metra from New Lennox or Lisle for a Cubs game and a concert so we didn't have to worry about parking or the fact that neither of us have ever driven in Chicago before.)

But this year is different. This year Shelly lives IN Chicago and I am going to be driving all the way up to her place in the city which she says is really easy to get to and not too busy trafficwise. We'll see. Either way I am excited and a little scared for a new driving adventure. I tend to get nervous around bigger cities but have driven on interstates through Atlanta (that really broke me in), Memphis, Scranton, Erie, and Nashville. I have also driven IN Indianapolis (downtown) with the directional help of Jayme and the GPS. I'm excited to see how I do with Chicago.

Atlanta Traffic

Whenever I do get there, Shel and I will be jumping on a bus, then transfering to the L and heading first to some awesome 25% off sales at H2O. 

Then we'll have to see where Chicago takes us next.  We will most likely hit up Water Tower Place

sometime during the course of the day and maybe head to Nordstrom's Outlet.  And we will hopefully find some really great deals.  I'm excited!

"And we're back!"

Fall TV is officially back in session!  This is like school being back in session but much more fun and entertaining.  Also no homework.   Unless you miss a class, I mean episode.

And of course, with good tv shows coming back on the air, there is also the addition of a lot of new and awesome shows.

With DVR I can now watch two things that are on at the same time!  I love TV technology.  So, while watching one show I can record the other one I wanted to watch at the same time.  This works out wonderfully except on Monday nights when there were 3 things on I wanted to watch.

So, I am unveiling my fall tv schedule to you.  What I watch is regular type, DVRed is italics, wish I could watch but is apparently impossible except for online is in gray.  I've also marked the ones I'm not hooked on with  "trial" after the name.  We'll have to see how they go.  Midseason start shows are in blue.  My favs and the ones I'm most excited about are in uppercase and with an exclamation point for added excitement (as you do).  #organization  PS All times are for Central timezone.


MONDAY
7 - 9 pm - Dancing With The Stars (ABC)
7 - 7:30 pm - How I Met Your Mother (CBS)
7:30 - 8 pm - 2 Broke Girls (CBS) - trial
7 - 8 pm - Terra Nova (FOX)
9 - 10 pm - CASTLE! (ABC)

TUESDAY
7 - 8 pm - Glee (FOX)
8 - 8:30 pm - NEW GIRL! (FOX)
8:30 - 9 pm - Raising Hope (FOX)
8 - 9 pm - Dancing With The Stars Results (ABC)

WEDNESDAY
7 - 7:30 pm - Up All Night (NBC) - trial
8:30 - 9 pm - Cougartown! (ABC) 
9 - 9:30 pm - Modern Family (ABC)


THURSDAY
8 - 9 pm - BONES! (FOX)
8 - 9 pm - Person of Interest (CBS) - watching until Bones starts on #Nobember 3rd
8 - 9 pm - Project Runway (Lifetime) - hopefully it ends before Bones starts...
9 - 9:30 pm - 30 Rock! (NBC)

FRIDAY
8 - 9 PM - Grimm (NBC) - trial
8 - 9 PM - Supernatural (CW) - Don't have the channel.  Sad face.

SATURDAY
Who watches tv on Saturday?  Saturdays are movie days or catch up days if anything.


SUNDAY
7 - 8 pm - Once Upon A Time (ABC) - trial
9 - 10 pm - Pan Am (ABC) - trial


So that's my schedule.  I pretty much DVR everything just in case and then play catch-up on weekends and Wednesdays or whenever I decide to stay up late.  And with this crazy tv schedule I have less time for movies so I have to be pretty picky about what I watch otherwise load down with movies on long weekends and try to catch up.  I know I'm crazy and a giant movie/tv nerd but I love it.

I know I'm a blog slacker but every time I think about posting something on here I can't think of what to write.  What do I really want to share with my nonexistent followers?  Is my life really that important?  What do I actually care about enough to share my thoughts and opinions on?

And while I know the happenings in my life don't really matter in the grand scheme of blog life I still keep this blog going.  Why, I don't know.  And maybe I don't have anything to share because I don't have anything big or important going on in my life.

I've noticed that in the last couple of months I have been a lot less involved in the tech world.  I really only log on to places like twitter or facebook and update via my phone.  At night I read, watch movies or tv shows, and sit around.  Maybe it's the effects of losing Zoe.  Maybe it's a bit of a depression but I don't know.  I just don't have anything worth sharing. 

Or maybe I'm just tired and missing my kitty today.

So, Grandma.

This post is going to be dedicated completely to Grandma and the big changes that are coming up.

First things first. She has a boyfriend. This makes me feel pretty pathetic since my grandmother has a better love life than I do. So, yeah, grandma has a boyfriend. He's a guy she went to school for 4 years with some 60-70 odd years ago. Since then she has had no contact with this man. Until this year that is....

Apparently, they reconnected via facebook and after grandma visiting down there twice she has decided to move in with him ("This modern generation").

So, coming to a Texas town near you this July... my grandma.

Anyway, this all came as quite the shock to me. I mean, grandma has been around here and less than half an hour away for the entirety of my life. So her moving some 800 miles away is kind of a big deal.

I know I should be happy for her, and I am. I'm glad she's found someone to keep company with and pal around with (that may be putting it too lightly) but part of me feels very wary about the entire situation. First of all, it's happening so quickly! They met via facebook in January, say each other for a couple of hours in May, and then grandma visited for two weeks in June. And now she's moving across the country to be with him. I know she's 83 and that she probably can't give it all the time that someone my age can but I still don't like the whole situation.

Secondly, we have really no clue who this guy is! We know just a little about him and have never actually seen a current photo. He's going to be coming up to take her back so we'll see him then but really, that doesn't really count. We'll have one dinner to meet and get to know him and then he's whisking her down to Texas to live with him. I don't know. It's weird.

Thirdly, it really annoys me that he wanted her to sell her condo and move down there. It almost feels like he's going to swallow her identity. He seems to want her to drop all things currently in her life and glean onto his. He doesn't even really understand closer families so I'm not sure even how often we'll see her.

Which brings me to number four... she's 83! How often am I going to get to see my grandma again in my life. It feels like she's kind of leaving us a little right now. Like we're losing her. And I guess that's the biggest problem of all.

I just don't know. I'm torn.

Life and Other Nonsense

I know I was going to try to blog more often but let's face it, I'm never going to do that.

But here's what's happening in my life now...

Summer Reading - The Summer Reading Events are in full swing. Events have been set, plans are finished or in progress, prizes have been arranged, and my life has officially been taken over. With events one or two times a week I've been keeping very busy. Check out everything that's going on for the teens with our Midsummer Knight's Read Summer Reading theme.

Facebook Slack-off - In other news, I am currently a huge facebook slacker. I stopped playing all the games and now only go online once a week if that. Usually, though, I will be posting via twitter or facebook from my phone. So if you message me, tweet me, write on my wall, whatever, I will usually respond back if I can do so from my phone.

Dental Drama - Coming up this week is some added drama of a tooth issue. I broke a tooth while on vacation in Florida in March (stupid carmel corn). Since I have not had an issue with said tooth I decided to wait until I could actually afford to go get it fixed. Unfortunately the tooth is now causing me problems so I'm going to have to get it taken care of and add yet another bill to my never decreading pile. It seems like every time I pay one off another bill takes its place. Ugh! So at 8 AM tomorrow I will be meeting my dental fate - hopefully it will be a quick and inexpensive fix as I really can't afford many more bills.

Summer Trips - Since Kelly and I took a Spring trip to Florida, I've been taking little day trips here or there when possible. After talking about money issues above it probably sounds dumb to take trips but none of them are that expensive or the tickets are already paid for so there's no going back now.

• Trip 1 - Memorial Day Picnic - Kelly, her friend Chrissy, and I went to Turkey Run in Indiana for a picnic with some friends of ours from when we were little. The Bobos lived in El Paso for a time and our three families were fast friends. Kelly and Chrissy were the same age as their kids John and Mary, Amy was the same age as Sarah, and my friend Beth and I were the same age as their youngest, Bekah. The Bobos have invited us to their Memorial Day Picnic for the last couple of years and we were finally able to make it. We filled the time with talking, hiking, eating, and fun. It was so great to see them and I am excited to go back again next Memorial Day.
• Trip 2 - This Is Teen Event - Wednesday, my friend and co-worker, Erin, and I will be headed to Naperville, IL to go to the This Is Teen event with Anderson's Bookstore. I'm really excited to see some of my favorite authors at the event including Meg Cabot, Libba Bray, and Maggie Stiefvater.
• Trip 3 - July Tubing Trip - Beth and I will be going on a tubing trip in Northern Illinois with her former roommate and other friends. Should be fun!
• Trip 4 - Katharine Hepburn/Lucille Ball Roadtrip - Kelly and I plan on taking a road trip to Kent, Ohio during the first week or so of August to see a display of Katharine Hepburn clothing and what not at Kent University Museum. As this is as close to me as I've ever seen Kate items, I am going for sure! In addition, we dedcided to add on Jamestown, NY to visit the Lucille Ball sites (Kelly's a big fan) in her hometown. As an added bonus, we found out that they are having a 100th Birthday celebration that week so we plan on getting in on some of the festivities.
• Trip 5 - KINGS OF LEON CONCERT in Indiana at the end of August. I am beyond excited. My first rock concert! And Kings of Leon!!!

Other than that, life is pretty normal. Kaden is getting too big (he's three now!), my other jobs are normal, I've been reading a lot and watching movies, catching up on Gilmore Girls (we're now on Season 4), sleeping, and seeing my friend, Chip's band (The New and Slightly Used) play.

Why, hello blog. Remember me?

"That's a Dealbreaker!"

A friend of mine told me about a recent date she had been on. I thought these kind of situations only happened in books, movies, and tv shows. I have never heard of anyone I actually knew encountering this particular circumstance.

My friend has been chatting with a guy that comes into her work at least once a week. He's a nice guy and they always talk about movies, news, and other light topics. The other day he asked if she would like to meet up at a coffee shop and then hang out while they ran errands around town. As she was talking to him on their date she found out that he is married and has two children.

But not to worry, he told her they have an unconventional marriage. Apparently, once he reached the age of 30 he was determined to have children. Somehow, he found a woman who was willing to give him a child without all those messy emotions and whatnot. She had the baby and he decided he might as well just marry her. About a year later he decided he wanted another child. So, the two have two children, are married, and live together but don't love each other or even share a room. He mentioned that he explained to his now wife when they got married that he did not love her and never would. He also informed her that he would also not be faithful to her.

By this time my friend was wondering what she had gotten herself into. When the date was finally over, she said goodbye, hopped out of the car, and headed to her own vehicle. As she was walking away, the guy rolls down his window, and (from his car - he didn't even get out) asked, "Hey, don't I get a kiss?" To which she replied, "No."

Needless to say, she will not be hanging out with this man again.

Snowpocalyse!

The weather reports are in and the snow has been falling for the last couple hours.

FINALLY! Central Illinois will get a snowpocalyse the likes of those in New York, DC, and other parts of the east coast! More Info

DANGEROUS ICE ------- HEAVY SNOW

I'm super excited. Here's the forecast...

Issued by The National Weather ServiceLincoln, IL 1:24 pm
CST, Mon., Jan. 31, 2011
... BLIZZARD WARNING IN EFFECT FROM 6 AM TUESDAY TO
NOON CST WEDNESDAY...
THE NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE IN LINCOLN HAS ISSUED A
BLIZZARD WARNING... WHICH IS IN EFFECT FROM 6 AM TUESDAY TO NOON CST WEDNESDAY.
THE WINTER STORM WATCH IS NO LONGER IN EFFECT.
* TIMING... SNOW WILL
INCREASE ACROSS CENTRAL ILLINOIS LATER TUESDAY MORNING AND THEN BECOME HEAVY
TUESDAY AFTERNOON THROUGH TUESDAY NIGHT... THEN DIMINISH WEDNESDAY. SIGNIFICANT
BLOWING SNOW WILL OCCUR TUESDAY AFTERNOON THROUGH WEDNESDAY.
*
ACCUMULATIONS... SNOW ACCUMULATIONS OF 12 TO 18 INCHES ARE EXPECTED...
ESPECIALLY ALONG AND NW OF I-55.
* WINDS... NORTHEAST WINDS OF 25 TO 35 MPH
WITH GUSTS TO 40 MPH WILL OCCUR TUESDAY AFTERNOON AND TUESDAY NIGHT. WINDS WILL
REMAIN STRONG ON WEDNESDAY AS THEY BECOME NORTHWEST.
* IMPACTS... BLIZZARD
CONDITIONS WILL CAUSE EXTREMELY HAZARDOUS TRAVEL TUESDAY AFTERNOON THROUGH
WEDNESDAY... OR LONGER.

Central Illinois - check
NW of I-55 - check

I'm hoping for the 18 inches. BRING IT ON!

PS How pretty (ane exciting!) are these maps!?!

Bucket List

Recently I was thinking about how I've been doing a lot of things in the last couple years, and planning to to things in the future, that I have always said to myself, "I would like to do that in the future." So.... I decided to be a couple years late to the game and make my so called "Bucket List". Hold on to your butts.

The Bucket List

• Visit New York City
• Visit Hollywood/LA
• Travel in Europe (i.e. Paris, London, Rome, Venice...)
• Marry a man who adores me and whom I adore
• Have 3 kids (preferably 2 girls and a boy)
• Always have a cat (so far so good)
• Visit Disney World
• Visit The Wizarding World of Harry Potter (I'm headed there in March!)
• Go skydiving
• See the Pacific Ocean
• See the Atlantic Ocean (Also in March)
• Swim with Dolphins
• Drive a motorcycle
• Visit Japan and/or China
• Visit Washington DC
• Visit every state in the USA (24/50 down)

I know there are things I'm forgetting (especially as I write this at almost 1 AM) but basically, I want to experience life. I want to travel, have a family that always included a cat, and see and do as much as I can. I don't have aspirations to be someone rich and famous but if I can experience as much of life as possible I would be happy. And to be happy would be a pretty good life.

The Mystery of the Time Lapse

A weird thing happened to me a couple of weeks ago and I have no explanation for it. I'm going to tell you the whole story and let you decide because I really have no clue and am slightly disturbed by the whole situation. Obviously, if it's still on my mind a couple weeks later.

On Wednesdays I work at the church office in the morning and at the El Paso Library at 3:00 pm. Usually I work, get lunch, maybe run a few errands, head home for a bit, then go to work in El Paso. The drive between Bloomington and home is 20-25 minutes and the drive from home to El Paso is only about 7 minutes. Easy peasy. No problem.

A couple week ago, I left Bloomington at about 2:15. I took the county roads which still had a bit of slush on them so I had to go a tad slower. The trip home should have taken 30 minutes at the most and I would have been able to go inside, pick up a couple things, and sit for a few minutes before heading into work.

However, when I got home and walked in the door my mom looked up and asked, "Shouldn't you be at work?" I replied, "In a little bit." To which she said, "It's 3:15."

I was a little shocked at this news and obviously rather confused because there is no way that drive should have taken me an hour! NO way! I didn't run into any obstacles other than a bit of slush for a couple of miles and I didn't stop anywhere once I was on my way. I was going the speed limit (or slightly under on the slushy parts) the entire way. So what happened? I lost a half an hour of my life with no explanation of what happened.

And before you say, maybe you looked at the time wrong when you left, I also called the pastor and asked him what time I left and he told me about 1:15 or 1:20 as well.

The situation is really confusing me. Did I get abducted by aliens? Did I hit some kind of time portal? WHAT HAPPENED? Thoughts? Hypotheses?

An Observation

I like working at the reference desk. It's peaceful, unless school is out or we are busy, and the questions are generally easy. And while you have to answer the phone every time, it is usually something easy like, "What time do you close?", "Can you renew my books?", "Do you have such and such movie/book on the shelf?". So, you can usually get a lot of other work done while working the desk.

However, when a patron does come in, you can usually tell which ones to dread. It's that person who is not walking directly to the desk but meandering and taking their sweet time getting to where their going. Sometimes they make eye contact but more often then not they just slowly trudge along observing everything going on around them. The quick, eye contact people generally know what they want and the question can usually be met with a quick answer. But those meanderers.... they have the questions you despise. The ones you try to avoid like, "Can you help me with my resume?", "I need books on an obscure topic, can you help me?", or "What is the value of this stamp?" More often then not the question really means, "I have this project to work on but don't want to put forth any effort. Can you do it for me?"

Ugh... meanderers.