Livestock in suburbia?

I saw the most random thing yesterday on the way home....

As I was sitting at the intersection of Glenridge Dr. & Johnson Ferry Road, I watched a very nice black Toyota pickup truck pull out of one of the upscale neighborhoods...with two BILLY GOATS in the back! In the infamous words of my good buddy Matt...what the pants?!?

Ok, yes I know this is Georgia, and it's not uncommon for people to let their dogs jump in the back of the truck and make a quick trip to the store...but I just don't see someone in a nice suburban neighborhood in Dunwoody saying "hey honey, ive got to run to the store and im taking the kids" (and by kids, I mean baby goats...yes, pun intended), then toss the goats in the back and head on down to Kroger? Hmm...not exactly something you see every day. I'll admit, I had to do a double take.

I laughed half the way home, and wondered what type of livestock or maybe even exotic animal I might see hanging out of the sunroof of a Lexus on Ashford-Dunwoody tomorrow...;o)

Wednesdays with Mema

With a busy and often chaotic schedule that keeps me all over the place, sometimes its nice to have just a little bit of pleasant consistency...

I know that I can look forward to this every week...I know that no matter what other crazy things are going on during the week, Wednesday evening means that im going to make the weekly trek up to Acworth for dinner with my grandma, a tradition we started when I moved a year and a half ago. She lives alone, and was so afraid that if I moved away from her (we used to live in the same neighborhood), that she would never see me again. So to make sure that didn't happen, I promised to come take her to dinner once a week to catch up, run some errands and just have quality time.

We go through the same routine every week - I call her when im on the way, and ask her where she wants to go eat. It's always the same response.."I don't know, where do you want to go?" When I get there, we ponder ideas of locations to eat while watching GSN (for those of you not in "the know", that's the Game Show Network....yes, ive gotten rather skilled at Lingo, Jeopardy and Who Wants to be A Millionaire...look for me on Wheel of Fortune one day!). One of her favorite things to do is have breakfast for dinner, so we frequent IHOP often...no complaints here, I love a good stack of buttermilk pancakes for dinner! One night, a man eating at the table next to us asked if we were sisters...we both looked at each other and died laughing. She was flattered (of course), I started to wonder how bad those smile lines on my face really were...but we both knew he was just a lonely old guy who wanted to strike up a conversation with someone...anyone, and flattery is always a good way to get people to talk back to you. Who doesn't like a compliment?!? ;o)

Our dinner conversations often center around the events of the week...the weekly bingo update with how many prizes she won, and of course how "so and so" wasn't there this week because they had health problems, or how "so and so" has a new great-grandbaby. I fill her in on my week, and then we'll often talk about her next field trip with the Senior Citizen group at her church, or how her next door neighbor is driving her nuts because he keeps taking her trash can from the curb instead of his own. And aside from someone mistaking us for sisters, we often have good laughs like the time that she tried to cut a baby tomato on her salad, but it flew across the table and landed in my drink. Our waitress saw the whole thing, and I thought she was going to fall in the floor from laughing so hard - we were all in tears.

Dinner is often followed by a late night trip to Kroger to pick up a few items, and get her weekly case of water that she cant pick up by herself. We do a little shopping, and when we get to the register, she always asks me if I have her "Kroger Plus Card" ready, and make sure to tell them to give her the Sr. Citizen discount! I just smile and say yes, as always (if I haven't gotten that routine down by now, then clearly there's a problem..haha). I'll fill up her car with gas (because she is still scared to pump it herself), and we head home.

Back at her house, im put to work...performing little tasks around the house that she needs help with, like changing light bulbs, etc. We'll sit around and watch her favorite Christian TV station, and sometimes we'll pull out old boxes of pictures to sort...we laugh (and sometimes cry...I miss my grandaddy dearly), and make fun of old hairstyles and clothes. But I always love to hear the stories that go with the old pictures of when they were young.

When it's time to go, she always walks to the door and says the same thing..."I love you, be careful, call me when you get home." Yes, im almost 26, and I have to call her every week to let her know I made it home safely...if I forget, she hunts me down. Even if it makes me feel like im 8, I happily oblige, because I know she does it out of love.

Our weekly rituals may be monotonous and expected, but I look forward to them every week. I know one day when im older, ill look back and long for that simple routine...so while I can i'll cherish every Wednesday, and all of the prized predictability that comes with it. :o)

Is it Sunday already?

I love the weekends...when else can you cram as much fun as humanly possible into a 48 hour period and not worry the least bit about sleep deprivation? (hrm...or maybe thats just me....but I refer you back to my motto in my very first blog.."ill sleep when im dead!") Sleep is highly overrated. This weekend, just like so many others, brings a smile to my face when I think of all the fun and excitement it brought about. I won't bore you with a play by play, but here's some of my highlights...

- New roomies
- Root, root, rooting for the home team with 25 of my closest buds
- Fireworks in the city skyline
- New friends
- Random detours around Atlanta (and when I say around, I mean AROUND...literally)
- Salsa shaking my 'bon bon'
- Late night heart to hearts in good company
- Sleeping in, even when we have a ton of things to accomplish
- One word...IKEA...enough said.
- Doing laundry, FINALLY
- Family dinners, lots of love and Grandmommie's home made cookies
- Amazing baptism testimonies
- Crawling into bed at 1am Sunday night, thoroughly exhausted, but already anxious to do it again next weekend..

Have I mentioned lately that I love my life...?

"Praise be to you, O Lord...Yours, O Lord, is the greatness and the power and the glory and the majesty and the splendor, for everything in heaven and earth is yours. Yours, O Lord, is the kingdom; you are exalted as head over all. Wealth and honor come from you' you are the ruler of all things. In your hands are strength and power to exalt and give strength to all. Now, our God, we give you thanks, and praise your glorious name."
- 1 Chronicles 29:10-13

I'm in love...

...with my new ipod Nano!!! Now I can literally take the soundtrack to my life everywhere!

Yes, I know it took me a little while to get with the times - I'm usually the one on top of the latest technology (because im a techie nerd at heart, with a super cool exterior), but hey a single workin' girl's gotta pay the bills. Anywho, so last Saturday I finally spent about 4 hours loading my entire cd collection onto Iggy (yes, Iggy the ipod, I named it - I name everything-my car, our apartment, the plastic fish that used to sit on my desk...im retarded, deal with it), and started creating some really fun playlists. I love the fact that I can create crazy playlists like "Cheesy 80's Music" or "Line Dancing Songs"....anything to fit my mood! And I love the fact that if I want to pop in my earbuds and practice my John Travolta-esqe strut to the Bee Gee's 'Stayin' Alive', I can without ridicule from the outside world, because noone knows what im actually listening to!

I love music. I love to listen to it almost 24 hours a day, and I have been known to bust out in just about any song when random conversation triggers my almost ridiculously accurate memory of lyrics. I may not be able to tell you what I ate for breakfast yesterday, but I can spout out every single line of "Ice Ice Baby" on a moment's notice. (pitiful, yes I know - but you wouldn't believe how many times my lyric knowledge has come in handy!)

Seriously, if it weren't for the sheer fact that I would appear socially exclusive, I would wear my headphones everywhere I went. I can drown out the world, and surround myself in my guilty pleasure...music. It's my outlet, its my expression, and now thanks to Apple it's always at my fingertips!

Iggy, this could be the beginning of a beautiful friendship... :o)

I got tanked!!

And no, I don't mean that in the way you're thinking! Yesterday during lunch, I decided to stop for gas on the way back to the office. As I was listening to Q100 and pulling into the gas station, I heard them say to be caller 100 to win free gas for a month....and guess what, I WON!! Wahoo! The DJ thought it was hilarious that I was actually at the gas pump as I was winning, talk about irony!

Now here's the funny twist to the story...

So, as I pull up to the pump, my gas gauge is literally on E (yes, I procrastinated filling up when the gas light came on the day before, but I figured I would just stop on the way to work). What I didn't know (because im a new Costco customer, and this was the first time I used their gas station), was that they only accept American Express or their Costco card, to which I had neither...AND no cash on me. Normally this would not be a big deal, I would just drive across the street to another gas station, except there is NO gas station anywhere near there or within a few miles of the office. At this point, im running pretty late to get back from lunch. I figured I probably had enough gas to get back to the office, but I had no idea whether or not I could make it from there to find another gas station in the opposite direction.

When I left the office that afternoon, I prayed all the way down the parking deck that if I could just make it to the gas station, that would be super. :) I've never driven so easy in all my life - usually my lead foot likes to take the lead, but I was barely tapping the gas pedal for fear of using up the fumes I was probably running on by then. To make it more interesting, it was pouring down rain...wouldn't that just be the most fun time to run out of gas...rush hour traffic and torrential downpours? Nice!

Luckily I made it to the gas station with a sigh of relief. And next week, ill make sure my gas light doesn't come on before I fill up, compliments of Q100! ;o)

Don't touch my stapler...

I, like Milton, often tell people in the office "dont touch my stapler," but with good reason...you might get your finger involuntarily stapled off! You see, I have this electric stapler that sits on my desk right next to my computer. A week or two ago I noticed that every couple of hours I would hear a slight buzzing sound, and then ZAP...my stapler would automatically just staple (absolutely nothing), all by itself. (One time it went off with my hand dangerously close to it...I almost jumped out of my chair!) I determined that either my stapler was demon posessed, or it was the curse of Milton.

Today I figured out why it really goes nuts...

Since ive been working here, I always sit my cell phone in the same spot on my desk - next to the electric stapler. Apparently if you sit it too close though, the phone has the capability to transmit through the stapler! (kind of like when you put your phone too close to the tv, and you hear a chirping sound before it actually rings) I kid you not, as I am typing this blog, I hear it chirping again...creepy.

Which leads me to my next thought....if a cell phone has the power to make an electric stapler work all by itself, what the heck is it really doing to our brains when we hold it to our heads? Yikes!

And the moral of the story? Handsfree is a good thing....mmmmkay?

Chivalry is still hanging in there

Sometimes it's the little things that make me smile...

Yesterday afternoon I packed up my laptop and headed for home as usual. Onto the parking deck, where I waited forever on the eternally slow elevators. When the door opened I got on, pressed 6 and went straight to the back to make room for everyone else - it was 5:30pm, and a full house because everyone was anxious to go home. The door closed and I found myself in an elevator full of about 7 men (talk about lack of estrogen, ha!). They all seemed to know each other, carrying on various conversations about the events of the day, while I stood silently in the back corner, ready to breathe a sigh of relief as I get in my car and know im done for the day.

We took the elevator all the way to the top. Ironically everyone in there was parked on the same floor (which is uncommon, but im not complaining - that just means fewer stops and that I can get to my car that much quicker). And then something rare happened. When the door opened, every single one of the men stopped talking, stepped back and cleared a path to let me off the elevator first. It was like the parting of the Red Sea.....of men! Now I know what Moses felt like on a much, much, much smaller scale. ;) How polite!! I gave a nod and a thank you (hoping they didnt see the astonishment on my face), and went on my way. But as I walked to my car, I couldnt help but crack a little smile. Ahh, there are still a few gentlemen left out there who remember the manners their mothers taught them.

Boys, take note...it really doesn't take much to make us happy - even the simplest of gestures can make a girl's day. ;o)

I Love Random Road Trips!

So we're back, and in one piece...and oh what fun we had! There's something to be said for random road trips, I LOVE them! We packed a bag, threw in our favorite cds, a camera and our favorite snacks (not to mention a ton of caffeine), and made it to Indiana just before 1am. I dont think ive laughed that hard in quite a while - in fact, a few times I almost ran off the road. Here's an example of some of the dialogue that went down on the way up there... this was after stopping off in a gas station/Buddy's BBQ (yeah, odd combination, I know but the one next door was a gas station/Taco Bell/Dairy Queen...talk about weird!)

Casie: "We have to get going, we just wasted 20 minutes in that gas station!"
(doing what you ask? I have no idea...)
Jamie: "That's ok, ill make up for it with my lead foot"
(after about a 3 minute pause)
Casie: "Wait, I thought it was your right foot...?"

Ok Jessica Simpson...I said LEAD foot, not LEFT!!! haha. We had six hours of conversation like this, but by far my favorite was this dialogue after we got stuck behind a big slow 18-Wheeler that had the words "England" printed on the back of it...

Jamie: "That truck is so slow, I wish it would just go back to England, haha"
Casie: "Can it really drive all the way there, or is there water that separates us?"
Jamie: "Please tell me you're joking!"
Casie: "Oh you know I dont know geometry!"
Jamie: "Uh...Cas, I think you mean GEOGRAPHY..."

Yeah, that would be about the time I had to snatch the car off the shoulder and back on the road because I was laughing so hard! The rest of the time was filled with great conversation, and of course belting out a few of our favorite songs at the top of our lungs like we were rockstars (and yes we did this with the top down, so my apologies to those innocent bystanders who had to subject their ears to the debauchery we called "entertainment" haha)

On to the tiny town of Vevay (pronounced vee vee), population...about 3,000. To put it in perspective, I realized that the size of her town is about the size of the 7/22 crowd on a given Tuesday...HELLOOOO Mayberry! And it was everything you could imagine a cozy small town would be - one stoplight in the middle of town (no, im not kidding), two gas stations that closed before midnight, and Moe's steakhouse - the local hangout (and one of the only places to eat), where everyone dined and where we were welcomed with a warm smile....[cue Cheers theme song]. If you ever needed to find the policemen or EMTs in an emergency, you can bet they'll be eating dinner down at Moe's on just about any given night.

Ah yes, there is something to be said about small town charm - everyone knows everyone, and nobody locks their doors. And on Sunday morning, we all headed down to the Baptist Church. It was family Sunday - Casie, her sister and I even got up and sang a song for the congregation - a last minute decision by Casie which was pre-empted by an hour or so of practicing with "mics" (aka. hairbrushes) in her room late at night (see dorky picture). But it didnt matter that we weren't on the program, the preacher glady worked us in and we had a blast! After saying our goodbyes, it was already time to get back on the road again...

The trip home was just as much fun as the one up, but much more caffeine was involved. Who would have thought we could be so tired after visiting a sleepy little town? We donned our pj's and hit the road, making a 1-hour pit stop at an outlet mall, and of course what road trip would be complete without some gas station hot dogs? I think we consumed more junk in the car than all our weekend meals combined..yum! About 900 miles on my car later, we made it home sweet home...back to the land of sweet tea, hey y'alls, traffic jams and 1,000 Peachtree Streets. It's always fun to visit new places, but there's nothing like good 'ole A-Town! (and I think we even convinced Casie's mom to come see it for herself!) Monday morning, back to the grind, but our next road trip is already in the works....all I have to say is the next city better beware, here comes trouble!