So, guess what everybody? Baron & I have finally found a place to live! Ok, so there's not a house there yet, but hopefully there will be eventually. We have reserved a lot in Highland Ridge in Prattville. We get to build a house! I have never lived in a brand new house, so this is very exciting to me. I have also never owned a house, so that is also exciting (yea - mortgage payments...). Anyway, I'm including a picture of the floor plan just because I can. If you are anything like me, you can't tell a whole lot from a floor plan, but hopefully one day I will have a picture of the actual house for all to see.

Praise God for answering our prayers!! Now if He will just keep hurricane season nice & mild for our construction...

circa 1997

So, last night I went to Lagoon Park to watch Baron play softball. I got to the bleachers, laid out my towel to keep the red dirt off my hiney, and sat down to enjoy the game. Suddenly, it hit me. "Wow, it's really breezy out here. I wish I had a jacket with me. Oh wait...I have my black Old Navy anorak in the car!" So I made the trek all the way back out to the car and retrieved my anorak. I believe we no longer appreciate the value of the Old Navy anorak. I mean, this thing packs into its own pocket! How cool is that? Granted, it may be a little out of date...ok, a LOT out of date...but it's still convenient, right? They were so popular when I was in high school (and of course I didn't actually get mine until my freshman year in college because I've always been a little behind on the trends...still, to this day). So my mom & I were sitting there - she in her flannel jacket and me in my black anorak. What fashion bugs we are!

Out of curiosity...does anyone still wear their Old Navy anorak? I'd hate to think I'm the only one...although I probably am...WOMP WOMP...[reference SNL skit]

e-robots

Ok, this is not going to be an entertaining post, but I wanted to take this opportunity to plug two websites that I use quite often. In today's time, we rely so much on e-mail, blogging, myspace, etc...whatever mode of electronic conversation you prefer. Because we place so much confidence in e-mail, we tend to believe anything we receive via e-mail. I would like to take this time to introduce, or re-introduce, you to a couple of websites that I strongly urge you to use before mindlessly forwarding an e-mail.

If you go to either www.snopes.com or www.truthorfiction.com, you will see a search field on both of those pages. Type a few words from the body of the e-mail you are verifying and click search. In most cases, either of these sites will have a version of the e-mail and will explain whether or not the e-mail is true. They describe their answers and give links to references concerning whatever the topic of the e-mail is.

So, before you send me an e-mail about how to lower gas prices (I've received that one 4 times in the past 2 days), how to help a kid with epilepsy by simply forwarding an e-mail, receiving free coupons for Applebee's or Starbucks, signing a petition to keep religion on TV, or whatever other life-changing information your e-mail might contain, PLEASE consider checking the validity of it on one or both of these websites. I have made it my personal goal to spread the word about these two resources, and I hope you will do the same. Maybe one day there will be more people who actually check what they blindly forward than there are people who resemble e-mail robots by clicking forward every time they receive an e-mail.

mic check one...

Is anyone out there?

For a long time, I refused to get a blog because I was convinced I didn't have anything to say. If I did have something to say, it was easier just to post a comment on someone else's blog. But then I joined Myspace, and for some reason I suddenly had interesting stories to share with the world via the web. So, like my fellow myspacers/bloggers Baron, Ashley, & Jamin, I decided to get a separate blog instead of using the myspace blog. Well, I can honestly say that I feel like my blog has been a flop. I don't feel like I ever have anything entertaining or interesting to talk about. On top of that, I rarely get comments, and when I do, they are from the 3 or 4 loyal readers I have who probably feel obligated because they are my friends (and my husband).

Please don't misunderstand this post. I am not looking for a pity party. What I am looking for is a roll call. If you are reading this blog, I am asking you to post a comment so that my blog-induced faux self-esteem can be boosted. Don't get me wrong - I do not confuse my blog world popularity (or lack thereof) with my approval rating in real life (unless you think I should - in which case, please just don't tell me).

Anyway, if you are reading this now, just give me a little "hi" or "present" or "here" in the comments section just so I can know if anyone even knows my blog exists. And if you are reading this and aren't a member of the Blogger, go ahead & sign up. No obligation. You don't even have to start a blog - it just gives you the right to post meaningless comments on other people's blogs.

Ciao.

Mantis, Party of 21...Your Table is Now Ready

So, the other day I bought some pink tulips for our dining room table. Tulips are my favorite, so I try my best to keep them around as long as I can. Yesterday when I got home, I took the tulips into the kitchen to change the water. I grabbed the tulips out of the vase, and when I looked down, I could not believe my eyes. Baron was walking in the door at that very moment when I stepped back from the counter with a look of shock on my face. What were those tiny bugs all over my flowers? Are those...praying mantises?? Yes! They were baby praying mantises! There were 4 or 5 of them crawling on the flowers, the vase, and now, the counter. So my first thought is that somehow these baby mantises were in the tulips when I bought them & they are just now coming out. Great, I thought, now I will have to throw the flowers out. I hate throwing flowers out. I usually wait until they are drooped over the side of the vase & the petals are all over the table before I throw them out. Well, I couldn't bear to throw out perfectly good tulips, so I demolished the baby mantises and put the vase back on the table. (At which point I discovered a few more of the tiny bugs on the bowl on the table.)

Later, we were eating dinner at the table (which almost never happens), and we discovered a couple more mantises. One on the bowl, a couple on the vase. Good grief, these things are every where. Well, about 5 minutes into our dinner, Baron looks at me & says "Don't look up." Oh my goodness...never say that to a female. He scares the crap out of me when he says that. I said "What? What is it? You're scaring me!" He told me they were on the ceiling. And when he said "they", I knew exactly what he meant.



Bugs on ceilings scare me. I guess since I can't crawl on the ceiling, I doubt their powers to do so. But I looked up anyway. Wow. There were probably 7 or 8 baby praying mantises on our ceiling. Is this a horror show? Is our home being overcome by praying mantises? I could just see them growing overnight into huge monstrous creatures that devour our flesh while we sleep. They would come crawling up out of the floor furnace from the crawl space beneath the house. The would crawl out of the fireplace, and through the open bathroom window. It was a living nightmare.

Needless to say, Baron captured the bugs and we finished our dinner in peace. I'm sure we didn't get all of the little buggers, but I can rest assured that at least 21 of them are gone for good.



Learn about the praying mantis

a short synopsis of my life

one of god's beautiful creatures

I came across these pictures today of an albino peacock & I just had to share. How beautiful!!

herding cattle

I feel like a heifer. No, I don't mean that I feel fat. I just got to work after driving through the corral we like to call Interstate 85. I mean, really...it's a corral. Every morning I dread the trek to work, not only because of my destination, but also because of the journey there. I could make this a rant about the hundreds of incompetent drivers I encounter each morning, but instead, I will share a bit of amusement I experienced during the morning herding today.

I was sitting on the exit ramp to get off at Perry Hill Road, waiting for the green light. I looked in my rear view mirror at the driver behind me, and I couldn't help but chuckle. If you were a child in the '80s, do you remember the sunglasses they had for kids? They were like plastic versions of the big round shades our parents wore. I specifically remember a pair that I had. Hot pink, big, round, plastic sunglasses with really dark lenses because they were cheap. Well, to my amusement, the large black middle-aged woman in the car behind me this morning was wearing an exact replica of those sunglasses. It reminded me that when I was about 7 or 8 years old, I lost my sunglasses. They were my favorite sunglasses in the world. Did this woman find them? I bet she found them on the floor in Phar-Mor and decided to hang on to them until they came back in style. Well, her time has come. The big sunglasses are back. And apparently, the big round hot pink shades have stood the test of time.