Hi

Wow.  May 7th was the last time I blogged.  Oops.  I'm not even going to pretend that I have a good reason for the big pause, just life in general I guess.  I've been going through a lot both physically and mentally.  It's been rough, but it's getting better.  :).  Probably won't go into a lot of it, but that's okay.

I finally feel that after 19 months of working from home (how is that possible??), I have my groove down.  Well, I had it down quite a while ago, but I haven't blogged in forever.  Anyways.  It's finally feeling 'normal'.  And I LOVE IT.  I really do.  I feel completely blessed to work for a company that supports their employees 100% and has a fantastic flexibility and so much mental/emotional/work-life support.

I'm working from home full-time.  Hubs is working from home 3 days per week.  He goes into his office here in town 2 days per week.  Occasionally he will go to his Santa Fe office, but for now, he only has to go to this office here in town.  Which is only 2 miles from our house which is awesome.

On the 3 days that we are home together, our work spaces vary.  Most of the time he works downstairs in our sunroom (his choice) and I work upstairs in our joint office.  But sometimes it's the opposite.  It all depends on what meetings we have going on that day.  Like today we both worked upstairs in our joint office for a few hours.  If he has an on-camera meeting, I will grab my laptop and head downstairs.  And vise-versa.  We've made it work.  Thankfully, neither of us has a lot of meetings, let alone 'on-camera' meetings.

I still have a lot to work on as far as my general routine goes, but it's pretty good right now.

I'm still reading a lot, but have obviously failed at updating my reads here.  I'm on Goodreads though!  So all (well, most all) of my reads are tracked there.  I'd like to say I'll go back to the monthly reads blog, but that probably won't happen.  I think it's more likely that if I read a fantastic 5-star book that I will mention it here.  Maybe ha ha.  I have a lofty reading goal for next year, mostly to get my TBR down.  It's too humiliating to mention how many books I have on my shelves to be read.  Yikes.

We haven't traveled at all, mostly because I am paranoid about Covid still.  And I don't think there's anything wrong with that.  I see the horrific numbers and am just still super cautious.  We still have strict mask mandates here.  We are going to Arizona next month (a whopping whole state away) and I'm even a little paranoid about that.  But we really need a get away.  We haven't been anywhere just the two of us since December of 2019.  It's time!!!

Let's see...that's probably all for now.

Random

*MUMS!  In our backyard.

*I went bowling Friday with my team for our quarterly team building event.  I did terrible, but it was so much fun!

*Trader Joe's has some really nice plants right now.  For cheap!

*The weather here has been beautiful.  We had two bad days last week (cold, windy, rainy, etc.) but since then it's been gorgeous.

*I have a reading buddy at my Barre class.  She brought me this mug last week.  So sweet!

*Someone named Macy has been enjoying the views from the front room (and the sun!)

Random

*Costco has started selling SKYR!!!!!  It’s not widely found in the United States.  We have found it at Sprouts and Whole Foods, but it is way expensive.  We LOVED it when we were in Iceland and it was one of the few grocery items that was affordable.  We get 2 cases of it each time we are at Costco.  It’s 4 Weight Watchers points for one container.  15 grams of protein.  There are other products out there (Siggy’s, etc.) that claim to be Skyr, but they’re not.  This one is the only one available in the US that contains Icelandic Heriloom Skyr Cultures (from Iceland’s oldest farmer-owned dairy).  It was a happy, happy day when we discovered it.  It’s the little things in life, you know?

*I’ve pretty much given up TV.  I watch maybe 1 hour on the weekends.  That’s it.  And sometimes not even that.  And when I do watch, it's usually something I've watched before like Parks and Rec or Downton Abbey.  And you know what?  I don’t miss it.  I’ve been READING LIKE CRAZY.

 

*We went back to English.  We talked and prayed about it for months now and felt it was the right decision for our family.  I am relieved, but I am also heartbroken about leaving our French family.  We truly are a family.  And it’s going to be hard to find that again.  But at the same time, English has already given us a huge spiritual boost.  And our new congregation has lovingly welcomed us.

*This hairbrush has changed my life.  Well, not really, ha ha.  But again…it’s the little things.  I LOVE it.  It’s the Conair Ceramic Porcupine Cushion Brush.  My hair takes less than a minute to brush out as opposed to 10 minutes ripping through it with a wide-toothed comb.  I don’t know why I waited so long to switch to a brush.  I got it at Target….I think it was $9?

 

*Monsoon season is still going strong.  This is the heaviest monsoon I’ve seen since I’ve lived here.  My mother-in-law says the same thing and she’s lived here 20+ years.  It’s been raining almost every night.  I love it!  The dog…not so much.  The picture below is from abqjournal.com.  It is a very accurate portrayal of monsoon season.  This is looking East (the Sandia mountains are right behind the rain) and the Rio Grande is where all the green trees are in the middle.  We live on the East side (so basically, right where the rain is dumping).  Anyways...the sun will be out, then all of the sudden one part of town will look VERY ominous and there will be an isolated monsoon that dumps a crapload of rain for a good 15-20 minutes.  Streets flood, traffic comes to a stop.  And then the next day, there are traffic crews out cleaning up the rocks.  Because there isn't a lot of grass here, there are rocks in it's place.  And when there's a tremendous amount of rain, the rocks get washed into the street. 

I just have to give a shout-out to my washer and dryer.  Ha ha.  I do at LEAST one load of laundry per day, sometimes more (gym clothes, work clothes, meeting clothes, towels, bedding, etc.).  They are LG Front Loaders.  I love them!!!!

I'm working from home today.  He is not making it difficult AT ALL: 

Random

*Let's talk Target (again).  Have you seen their Beauty Boxes that they are selling in stores now?  They have 4 different types, and you can see exactly 

what's in them.

They are sample sized products (with the exception of at least one full-size product, in this case it was the Burt's Bee's lip balm).  But the sample sizes are decent!  I set them next to my electric toothbrush for perspective.  :)

And the best part?  They are only $7!!!  Target is just KILLING ME!!!

*I'm about to show you probably the most random picture I've ever taken:

These are the waterproof phone cases that I ordered from Amazon.  The instructions said to test them out and slip a tissue inside each one, submerge the case in water for 30 minutes, then remove the tissue and make sure it is completely dry.

The problem though, is that I ordered the 'floating cases'.  Meaning....if my phone is in a waterproof case and I drop it in the bottom of the Blue Lagoon, the waterproof case isn't going to do a bit of good.  So of course I bought the floating cases, so if i drop it in the water it will float (there's a lanyard attached to it as well to wear it around your neck).

ANYWAYS....the 'submersion' didn't work because the case kept floating to the top.  So basically I forced these under the water for about 5 minutes.  The tissue was dry.  They work.  Good enough!

*Currently as we speak, there are 6 guys at my house watching soccer.  And eating and drinking.  I helped set up the food, made sure everyone had what they needed and quietly retreated upstairs.  I should be packing and cleaning, but blogging is more fun.

*The camera on my new phone is AMAZING.  I took these after we got home from the assembly last night:

No filters, no edits, these were straight out of the camera in portrait mode.

*I'm done packing!!

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha.  RIGHT.

I did bring the suitcases upstairs though.

And I have many piles going.

AND all of the laundry is done, we have everything we need for the trip, etc.  I just need to actually PUT the things into the suitcase.  But my piles are kind of all over the place:

So we don't really have an itinerary for our trip.  We have a map, which I have marked places to see.  There are only two things we needed to book tickets for. One is the Blue Lagoon, which we will do straight from the airport.  

And one is the glacier tour, which I booked on Wednesday.

Anyways...here's the map of the Western half of Iceland:

As you can see from the giant white arrow (where we're staying), everything we want to see is fairly close (the map is deceiving...Iceland is about the size of Ohio).  

There is one exception though, shown on the OTHER half of the map...Eastern Iceland:

See that green tag farthest to the right?  That's where I just booked our glacier boat tour.  It's about a 4-5 hour drive (each way) from where we're staying.  I booked our tour for 1:30.  I'm not concerned about daylight, because currently in Iceland, the sun is rising at 5:00 a.m. and sunset is not until 10:00 p.m.  So we plan to get up early, make the drive, do the tour (which is about an hour) then take our time coming back.  Apparently the drive is supposed to be breathtaking, so we wanted to give ourselves plenty of time to enjoy it on the way back and stop if we want to.

So Wednesday is really our only 'planned' day.  And the Saturday that we arrive (Blue Lagoon).  Everything else in between we're just going to 'wing' and decide as we go and hopefully get to check everything off of our list!

And more random....in the 'Names for the Sea' book that I read last month, the author mentioned that every time she looked at a map of Iceland, she saw a sea monster (and then described it).  And now...I can't 'unsee' it!!  It's too funny:

*Tonight we have tickets to see the new Avengers movie.  I. CAN'T. WAIT. !!!  From what I hear, all the hype is well-deserved.

The end.

3 Random Things

I was looking through the pictures on my phone and came across a few random photos.  So, because I'm kind of bored, here they are.

1.  This shirt I bought last weekend at the mall.  It makes me laugh.  If you don't watch Bob's Burgers, you won't get it.  If you do, well, you're welcome.

2.  I pulled up to our house the other night and it looked so cozy.  It's taken me a while to get used to this place, and it doesn't feel completely like 'home' yet, but it's getting there.  Things like this make me love it a little bit more each day.

3.  Earlier in the week, we went to pick out some things for my mother-in-law's kitchen.  It's actually happening!!  Hopefully they will start next month.  She picked the tile, cabinets, and counter tops and hardware.  I love the place we went to, they had all of our 'in budget' options laid out for us so we could pick and choose.  It was super easy.  She picked and I LOVED the choices.  She will have two red brick walls in her kitchen which will go well with her choices as well.  I'm excited!  (although I know it's going to make me want to redo my kitchen also ha ha).

That's all.  :)

Misc. Europe

*Netflix streaming in Europe has different shows.  Like Big Bang Theory.  Every night, hubs and I would prop up my laptop and watch Big Bang theory on streaming Netflix.  However, it’s not available on Netflix here in the states.  Also, some shows are a bit different.  Like they have ‘House’ and it’s the exact same episodes, but it’s called ‘Dr. House’. 

*In Europe, public bathrooms are few and far between.  The only places required to have public bathrooms are restaurants.  There are some paid restrooms like in train stations (like .50 to .70 usually) and they are quite clean (we used them more than once).  But it’s not like you can run to a gas station or run to Target or Walgreens to use the bathroom.  I cannot tell you how many times one of us said “I have to go to the bathroom, is anyone hungry?”.  Ha ha.  Because we knew by eating we could use the restroom.  And the bathrooms are all downstairs in the basement.  And about 50% of the time they are unisex.  Yikes.   

*The Euro is funny.  The lowest ‘paper’ money is a $5.  There’s a $1 coin and a $2 coin.  Well, we would withdraw money and when we paid for something would only use the paper money and just kind of forget about the change, because that’s what we do at home.  Our U.S. change usually just goes into our change jar (and forgotten about).  We realized on our way to Belgium we had almost $40 worth of change (mostly the $1 and $2 coins).  We used a lot of it to tip the maids every day in our hotel room, but then we would accumulate more throughout the week.  So then at the airport on our last day there, we had like $25 in change still.  So I marched up to a food shop to get us some breakfast and the bill came to $20.10 and I plunked down all of my change.  I was only embarrassed for about 10 seconds.  The guy counted it all quickly and didn’t make a big deal about it.  I apologized but he didn’t seem to care at all.  Money is money, right?  We ended up with less than $5 in euros to bring home.  Not bad!

*If you speak even a LITTLE French, it makes all the difference in the world in how you are treated there.  The French people were incredibly nice to all of us.  In fact, we thought the people there were friendlier than the people in London.  And don't even get me started on Belgium...the friendliest people EVER!!

Favorite Blogs

I don’t read as many blogs as I used to.  Ones that I used to check every day I’ve found that I check maybe once a week or once a month.  My all-time favorite blog, Young House Love, stopped blogging.  Boo!!  Oh well.  So I can cross them off the list.  Lately I seem to check websites every day instead of blogs.

Here’s the few I still check in on occasionally:      

www.ABeautifulMess.com

I check this one about every other day.  It is run by 2 sisters, Elsie and Emma.  The blog was started by Elsie YEARS ago.  I followed her way back then.  She got her own line of scrapbooking products, which were really cute.  She then began painting. Then her blog grew, her sister joined her, and now they have around 10 people working for them and have built a million dollar company.  The blog is a little bit of everything, but here’s why I read it regularly:  

*Emma is a cook, and is also a vegetarian.  So there are TONS of vegetarian recipes on the site.  I’ve made a few of them and they are really good. 

*They offer a lot of e-courses.  I haven’t taken any of them  yet, but I have one that I purchased that is ready for me whenever I want.  It is a DSLR Basics class.

*There’s plenty of content.  They post usually twice a day and usually once on the weekends.  I skim a lot of their posts (like their fashion ones…because their style is soooooo not me).  But I read most of the others.

*They created a photo editing app, which is just amazing.  It is sooooo easy to use.  It’s .99, and worth every penny.  All of my pictures in Instagram that are collages or have text or doodles on them were edited from their app.  This app is what was a game changer for their company I think.  It was a huge hit.

*They introduced me to Kelly Moore bags.  Enough said.

Here’s a few that I check once every now and then (usually once a week or once a month)

www.thepioneerwoman.com

Everyone knows who she is.  I used to check every day, but not so much anymore.  I like her Home & Garden section the most.

www.theartofdoingstuff.com

This is written by a DIY maniac (I mean that in a nice way) that lives in a super old house in Canada.  She is hilarious.  And she has chickens.

http://iheartorganizing.blogspot.com/

My favorite organizing blog, hands down.  Jen is awesome.  I check this one usually twice a week.

www.theboldsoul.com

I’ve been reading about Lisa’s journey of moving to Paris for a few years now.  I love reading her blog about her life in Paris and especially her ‘No Love Locks’ campaign to keep the ‘love locks’ off of the beautiful bridges in Paris.  I emailed her a few months ago and attached a brochure that I found at Jared Jewelers (of all places) advertising a new line of ‘love lock’ jewelry they have.  Sickening.  She emailed me right back and thanked me for my support.  I told her how I ranted in the jewelry store (yes, I actually ranted).  Tourists need to STOP doing this.  Anyways, she was very sweet.  I like her blog.

And….that’s pretty much it as far as blogs go.  I just don’t read them like I used to.

There are a few websites that I check every day though:

www.weightwatchers.com

The message boards.  Always helpful, sometimes entertaining.

http://forum.youneedabudget.com/

YNAB, YNAB, YNAB.   The forums (message boards) are by people who are using the product.  You can post questions, complaints (although I have yet to see a complaint), success stories, random things, anything on these boards.  I am not a participant, but I could be if I wanted to I suppose.  I just read read read read read.  The forums are open to everyone, although there are certain areas that are blocked unless you create an account (which is free), like the Journals.  The Journals are amazing.  These are what I read the most.  I stayed up until 1:00 a.m. on Saturday a few weeks ago reading one journal.  I couldn’t put it down!  She started journaling her financial journey a couple years ago, and so there were pages and pages and she is still journaling.  People write about their budgeting wins, losses, plans, getting out of debt, living on a super tight budget, how to make extra money, etc.  It is just very inspiring and I love reading them.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again…YNAB is amazing.  I highly suggest it to anyone who needs a budget tool.  I converted my sister and she is a believer now as well.

www.cnn.com

I don’t watch our local news or any news for that matter on the television, so I read CNN for the latest headlines just so I’m not completely oblivious to what is going on in the world.

That’s pretty much it.  I used to check People.com daily but now I check it maybe once a week.  I’m finding that the older I get, the less I care about celebrities.  My time is too valuable to waste it reading about what Kim Kardashian wore (or didn’t wear) or who is dating whom.  I just don’t care.  

I’d rather read about a single mother of 3 who manages to live on practically nothing each month due to her incredible budgeting with YNAB.  Or the woman who moved with her husband and two kids to England and bought a fixer-upper house, sharing her budgeting ups and downs along the way.  :)

Random

*Did you know that London is one of the most expensive cities in the world?  Like…more expensive than Paris?  We are only staying 2 days and honestly I don’t think we could afford to stay longer than that.  Geez. 

*Sometimes after work I will run an errand or two.  I ALWAYS try to remember to take my work badge off or tuck it into my pocket when I go into public places.  Why?  Because I can’t tell you how many times I have been stopped at Target, Petsmart, the mall, etc. with this:  “Oh you work at Major Hospital?  Can I ask you a question?” and the person proceeds to pull out their medical bill from their purse (who carries these around anyways?  People just hoping to run into a random employee??) and then starts asking me questions about their bill.  I’m never rude and sometimes I always try to help, but mostly I can’t.  I politely tell them that I’m not in the Billing Dept. and direct them to the customer service number located on their bill.  Ugh.  I know I should have a better attitude about it, but really?    I AM NOT IN THE BILLING DEPARTMENT.  My favorite question?  “This says ‘THIS IS NOT A BILL’.  What does that mean?”  Um….it means IT’S NOT A BILL.  Yes, I know it’s confusing and I’m still not 100% sure why insurance companies send these out.  I just tell them to keep it for their records and wait for the real thing to come along (and believe me, it will).  

*The month of April is nutso, hence my lack of blogging.  Sorry.  It's been crazy.  May probably will be too.    

*A few days ago, the Apple IOS 8.3 update came out.  I updated my phone, and then my Target Cartwheel app wouldn’t work.  This happens sometimes.  Sometimes apps need a few days to catch up to update themselves after the general software update.  Anyways, I was AT Target, the app wasn’t working, but at least ¾ of the stuff in my cart would have been discounted on the app.  It was mostly Market Pantry (Target’s generic food brand), and Up & Up (Target’s generic ‘everything else’ brand).  Anyways, I asked the register clerk if there was a way that I could call customer service with my receipt  info to see if they could at least give me credit within the app of my purchases (the more you save, the more ‘spots’ open up in the app for your cartwheel items).  She said she wasn’t sure and so she called her manager over.  The manager said the only way to get me the discount was to manually type in the discount on all eligible items (about ¾ of my cart).  Now, if there were a line of people behind me, I wouldn’t have had them do this.  But Target was dead (I went on my lunch break) and they insisted it was no problem.  The clerk asked me how much the discount was on these items usually and I told her it was at least 5% off Market Pantry and Up & Up brands.  And the manager looks at the register clerk and says “give her 10% off just in case.”  !!!  Reason #46,798 why Target is the BEST.  They gave me 10% off most of my cart.  Then I got an additional 5% off for using my Redcard.  Target = great customer service.

*My most favorite band ever is Of Monsters and Men.

They are from Iceland.  There is just something about their music that is so DIFFERENT and it makes me want to go climb a mountain or something.  On Wikipedia, they are labeled as ‘indie folk pop’.  That’s probably accurate I guess.  The gal (Nanna) is the lead singer, although the guy (Raggi, the one to the right of Nanna sitting down) sings just as much as she does I think.  Their first album ‘My Head is an Animal’ was awesome.  It’s funny though, the song they’re known the most for (“Little Talks”) is my least favorite (the radio version anyways…they recorded a live album where they slowed it down and sang it practically without music and that was really cool).  But the rest of the album is great.

Their next album, ‘Beneath the Skin’ is going to be released on June 9^th.  I cannot wait!  They’ve already released their first song from the album, Crystals, and it is amazing.  I downloaded it from iTunes immediately.  They are going on tour this summer, but nowhere near New Mexico, pooey.  I even looked on their website to see if I could catch them in Europe when we’re there, but the dates didn’t work out.  That’s how much I love these guys, I was willing to stalk them in Europe ha ha. 

If you’ve never heard any of their music, go to YouTube and search ‘The Secret Life of Walter Mitty trailer’.  One of their songs, ‘Dirty Paws’ was featured in the trailer:

*Have you seen ‘The Secret Life of Walter Mitty’?  If not, please stop what you are doing and go watch it.  It is a GREAT movie.  And if you hate Ben Stiller (a lot of people do I guess…I’ve always liked him though), watch it anyways.  This is not a typical Ben Stiller movie.  It’s just REALLY good.  AND a good portion of it was filmed in Iceland.  You won't be disappointed!

*That's all for now.  I have a talk tonight in French that I need to practice some more.

Random

*The older I get, the more the Daylight Savings Time change has an effect on me.  My sleep has been messed up all week.  I’ve been waking up around 4:00 in the morning, and I’m usually not able to fall back asleep.  ??? Hopefully this doesn’t last much longer.

*I’ve been watching my Seinfeld DVDs again.  I’m on Season 4.  Sooooo funny.  My husband doesn’t like Seinfeld though, so I watch them in the bedroom with my cat Macy.  She likes Seinfeld.  

*I have set a goal to walk 1,000 miles by the end of the year.  I started Friday.  I’ve discovered that it is pretty much the only form of exercise that I actually enjoy.  I’ve tried running (like….really tried it).  Hated it.  Hated every single second of it.  I do like riding my bike, but I’m scared to with the insane drivers around here (bicyclists get killed frequently around here, I wish I was exaggerating).  So in order to make it, I have to walk an average of 3.4 miles per day.  For a 5’5” person, I should average about 2,321 steps per mile, which equals almost 8,000 steps per day. 

I should strive to get 10,000 steps per day, but I figured I would account for Wednesdays (our meeting night) and also the weather.  I know that I won’t be able to walk outside every day.  So I think 1,000 miles for the year is a good goal for now.  If I make it AND even exceed it, maybe I will set it higher for next year.

*Our 5-year wedding anniversary is coming up.  To celebrate, we were originally thinking of a weekend trip somewhere, but decided against it for a couple of reasons.  First, we didn’t want to leave the dogs with my mother-in-law, who will already be watching them for 2 weeks+ while we are in Europe.  It’s….a lot.  Secondly, it will save us money if we stick closer to home.  So I think we are just going to take a couple of day-trips.  We can leave the dogs at home, yet still get out of town for a few hours.  We are currently discussing a few options and I’ve been consulting our ‘Day Trips from Albuquerque’ book.

*Abby is doing great.  It’s been just a little over one week since her surgery and she is just tearing all over the house acting like a crazy puppy.  Which is good, but also scary ha ha.  She has SO much energy.  She and Watson play all the time.  She literally crawls all over him.  She’s so light I don’t even think he realizes it.

*Today is one of our two 'free' Sundays per month.  I made breakfast, laundry is started and I'm hoping to meal plan a little bit for the week.

That's all of my randomness for now!

A Day in the Life - February 24, 2015

Today was a particularly busy day….I usually have a day like this once a week.  If every day was like this, I would go nuts.

I woke up at 5:45, got ready for work, made our lunches and left for work.  I got to work around 6:45. 

6:45 – 10:30 – work.  I did a bunch of research on atelectasis (collapsed lung) for an appeal I have to write.  Then I spent about an hour looking for particular cancer infusion drugs and injections on a handful of accounts.  I spent about 30 minutes trying to find an echocardiogram result from 3 years ago (I found it…filed electronically within the account in the WRONG place by the nurse….thank you nurse.  Ugh.).

10:30 – I took a break and copied and pasted the French TMS into the English TMS that my sweet Dad sent me.  It is a lifesaver!  I emailed it to my husband and mother-in-law so we are ready to go for meeting tomorrow night.

11:30 – I left for lunch.  My gas light was on so I stopped to get gas first.  Then I dropped off our monthly Homeowners Association dues check to the clubhouse of our condo park.  Then I checked the mail.  When I got home, I FREAKED out because usually when I come home, I am greeted by two dogs (Watson and Hannah) right by the door, and one dog who is whining in our bedroom.  Today, I walked in and….nothing.  Crickets.  Silence.  I crept into the dining room and saw Watson on the couch.  Once he realized I was there, he perked right up and got his lazy self off the couch to say hello.  But…no Hannah.  I called her and called her and NOTHING. Panic.  So then, I went to the bedroom and the gate was up (to keep Abby contained) and I peered over the gate and there was Hannah and Abby both just staring up at me wagging their little tails.  My husband left Hannah back in the bedroom on purpose to keep Abby company.  That’s fine (Hannah probably loved it because she got to sleep on our bed all day), but jeepers!  I took them outside to do their business.  I fed Abby (she needs fed like 4-5 times per day until she’s about a year old).  I grabbed my grocery list that I had forgotten this morning.  I then rooted around for something in the fridge to throw in my lunch bag, but there wasn’t anything quick and I didn’t feel like making a sandwich or soup. So I had frozen waffles with peanut butter and grabbed a yogurt and an apple for the road.  I put Abby back in the bedroom and was on my way.

I headed back to work and admired the pretty mountains along the way.  It’s cold here and it actually snowed for like 2 minutes today so the mountains were all misty.  I KNEW we weren’t done with winter.  Spring teased us with about 3 weeks of 60-70 degree weather.  Although I still shouldn’t complain…the average temperature for the rest of the week is the mid-50s, with some possible rain.

12:15 – back at work.  I spent about 5 minutes updating our YNAB app on my ipad and reconciling our bank statement.  It only took 5 minutes because I did it yesterday as well.  I had to enter our receipt from Costco last night and a couple of other things.

12:20 – 2:00 – started researching the coding sequence for pancreatitis and cholelithiasis (one of the most confusing aspects of coding in my opinion).  I returned a few emails and emailed one of our vendors because their website was giving me fits and I couldn’t get into a particular audit that I needed.  I started cleaning out my email a bit and got it down to only 10 emails in my Inbox (I only keep ‘active’ emails in my Inbox…ones I am still working on ).  If I’m done working on it, I either delete it or I save it to a folder.  I try not to have more than 30 active emails at one time.  And I work in date order (oldest first), so right now I am on 2/17.  Not bad!

2:00 – 3:15 – updated our Home Health audits.  I only do this about once a month because there are never many updates and it’s easier to update them all at once than update them as they come in.  Glad it’s done (it’s kind of a pain).  Went downstairs to check our mail box.  It was full.  I check it once every couple of days.  It’s usually just audit and appeal results.  Cleaned up my desk, shut down my computer and left at 3:15.

3:15 – Target.  Got everything on my grocery list and then some.  After Target I stopped at Whole Foods.  We were out of aloe vera juice.  We give it to our 19 year old kitty at least twice a day.  It helps keep her....regular.  Then I had to go to the pharmacy to pick up some meds.  We get all but one of our prescriptions at Target, but this particular one Target doesn't carry, so I have to go to a separate pharmacy.  

5:45 - Finally get home.  Take the dogs out first, then unload the groceries from the car and start to put everything away.  Husband got home around 6:00.  He fed the dogs while I started dinner.

6:45 - Dinner.  Tacos, beans and rice.  It was really good!

6:45 - 10:00 - Finished dinner, watched two episodes of Parks & Rec from last week, watched the Big Bang Theory from last week, cleaned up the kitchen, started the dishwasher, and then settled in from 9:00 - 10:00 to watch the series finale of Parks & Rec.  I cried.  More than once.  Oh my.  It was so good.

10:00 - 10:30 - Took the dogs out, medicated the cats, took Benadryl because I had been sneezing all night and finally got into bed.

Whew.  Thankfully, not every day is this busy.  However, it's CRAZY unusual for me to sit down and watch more than an hour of television.  But i had planned for it tonight all because of Parks and Rec.  I'd been looking forward to it for some time!  It did not disappoint.

And that was my February 24, 2015.

Random

*We went to Olive Garden this week for dinner one night and had the BEST service I think we've ever had anywhere.  I left like a 40% tip.  Good service makes all the difference in the world!  Our waiter was amazing and on top of everything, AND he was running the bar as well.  Double duty. 

*Work is crazy.  I haven't had to do any overtime yet, so far I've been able to keep on top of everything.

*This morning we did a 3 mile walk for the American Diabetes Association.  My husband's firm made a donation.  We agreed to do it because it's one of things we COULD do, since we don't do holiday parties or anything else like that.  It was a nice walk!

*We may have some exciting travel plans for next year, but everything is up in the air right now and nothing is for sure, so that's all I'm going to say about that!

*I got two new pairs of glasses.  I was long overdue.  I went to Stanton Optical, because they had a buy one get one free deal going on.  However, you pay plenty for the first pair.  Also, because my vision is so terrible, I have to get special lenses that are thinner and lighter.  If I didn't go with these lenses, the frames I picked out wouldn't be able to support the weight and thickness of the lens.  Lovely.  And of course, that drives the price up as well.  Oh, and the only pair that I found that I loved was Guess, which is designer, so they were more expensive.  Of course.  I made sure my second 'free' pair was from the designer shelf as well.  Oh well.  I wear glasses for years, so I probably won't order any more for at least five years ha ha.

*We got home around 11:00 a.m. from our walk and I was sooooo tired.  Like this wave of exhaustion hit me really fast. I closed the drapes in our bedroom, turned on the fan and slept solid for 2 hours.  This was a HUGE accomplishment for me because I can usually never take naps.  I try and try and sleep for 10 minutes and wake up feeling terrible.  But today?  Totally refreshed.  I think I really needed that extra sleep.  I woke up, studied my French Watchtower and then we went to meeting.

*Balloon Fiesta starts next weekend.  It doesn't really 'feel' like balloon fiesta yet.  It doesn't seem cold enough.  It's still been in the mid to high 80s every day.  It cools down a lot at night, but the mornings aren't cold at all.  I guess a lot can happen in a week though!

*My sister sent me some videos of my nephews on their dirt bikes and....wow.  They are amazing!

*I love the Huskers alternate uniforms.  I think I'm the minority.  I love them though and I think they should wear them every week.  The helmets are super cool too.

*We watched The Fault in Our Stars last night.  I cried more the second time than the first time.  How is that even possible?  It's soooo good and soooo sad.  And the music is amazing.

That's all my randomness for this evening.