My Random Thoughts

I was at the gym today and my worst nightmare came true. As I was on the bike, the empty ones around me were filled by a group of young thin fit women - who were all together and leaning to and fro talking to each other - Thank goodness for ipod!

I had noticed them earlier, not for their youth, but for the man who was ‘training’ them. He was adjusting their speed and resistance while they were on the stairmaster or taking them to the treadmill. And why should this bother me? I have a trainer? At Bally’s, you purchase your personal training from Bally’s. You can not bring your own trainer into the gym. It was pretty obvious that he was training them and not just helping them while doing his own workout. First, he was working with about 6 girls, walking back and forth, second, he wasn’t sweating, third, he had his sunglasses propped on top of his head. And he was slimey looking (ewww).

In my writers mind, I put this scenario together - he was a porn producer and was keeping his stable of girls in shape. That was as far as I had gotten, but I’m sure I can come up with more!

When I was finsihed with my workout, I was walking back to the locker room. As I passed the Personal Training room. This is the dynamic workout room that is used by the personal trainers for their clients. Its kept locked when not in use, as they have bands and balls that could easily walk out of the gym.  I see this woman trying to get into the room. She asks the maintenance guy when they started locking the room and where could she get the key. Uh, it says right on the sign on the door - FOR PERSONAL TRAINING USE ONLY! If you had a trainer, they would have the key. No trainer, no entry, no exceptions!

Finally, as I was probably 1/2 mile from home, putting along, but doing the speed limit when 2 cars decide they have to go faster than the speed limit! Stupid idiots. GAWD.

And now I’m going to take a shower and take myself out to lunch. I wonder how many more idiots I’ll run into today.

We’re in the middle of the season and we’re been pretty lucky so far! (YAY). I’ve been watching Ike. He looked like he was going to be a threat, but I’m hoping the forecast tracks they have right now are correct, it would be life should be good for me, but not so good for the Florida Keys - and that’s why people suck.

I came home from Greenville today. I was in line at the airport behind 6 people who were going diving. I started talking to the one woman and of course talk turned to hurricane. She saw the 8am track, which had the storm going in around Miami. She said, oh shouldn’t bother her, it’s going in there, blah blah blah. I told her I saw the 11am track and the had moved it south, coming in across the Keys. I wished her a good week and told her I hoped it didn’t impact them, but wasn’t looking good at this point.

When I was boarding the plane - she happened to be in front of me and says, OH they turned the track again, its going to hit 3 miles north of Ft. Lauderdale.  Uh huh, 3 miles, right. And you’re a bitch.

That was just so uncalled for. I don’t know what the heck her problem was. They keep pushing the track south, so I think, unless she’s leaving Monday, she’s going to be hating life.  As it turns out - they are doing some mandatory evacs - visitors starting tomorrow, residents on Sunday. Ah well, it happens!

Its been about 2-3 weeks and the apartment is pretty much set. We need more furniture (like a couch, a chair and a desk! I’m writing this from a bed tray on the queen size bed that gets smaller every night I sleep on it).

Jeff keeps giving me crap about not taking the more uppity apartment with the integrated garage, which was more money for less space! pbpbpbpbpbpbpb to him.

And now for the rant - I need to buy a house, fast! Faster than fast - yesterday! The first thing that makes me crazy is the dumb bitch who parks in the spot which is not a spot. Its the space to the right of the handicap space - you know the one they would use if they had a wheelchair to get into??!?!? yeah, she parks there. It’s also right infront of the ramp up to the sidewalk.  Perhaps I wouldn’t be so upset if it wasn’t CLEARLY MARKED that its not a space and that NONE of the other ones are parked in.  If I think about it while i’m going to/from the grocery store, I will stop in the office and give a word to the management company. JUST MAKES ME CRAZY!

And then there are the elephant children who live on the 3rd floor. It not just the regular walking around, or the occasional drop, it’s the running up and down the stairs and the squealing as they do it. Obviously it bothered more than just me, as the apartment complex sent out a note to everyone saying please be considerate of your neighbors and the breezeways are not the playground. You shouldn’t be congregating there. THANK GOODNESS!

Now the rants on poor Jeff……I brought up some ’stuff’ to decorate the apartment to give it a more homey touch. I dared to hang something on the wall - I thought he was going to have a fit. I used the 3M command adhesive strips. It was just a small little thing, and dude, they are keeping most of the security to repaint anyway, so who cares! it’s not like I was putting holes in the walls! GAWD!

I can’t wait to get my own home. I’m going to put holes in every surface i can find. I’m going to paint every surface i can find and i’m going to be happy about it!! I think I”m going to go home this weekend and paint a wall in my current house, just cuz I CAN! so there!

I have figured out how to create the perfect little virtual office. I have a small external speaker for my IPOD. My cell has speakerphone and I have a laptop!  What would make this perfect would be a printer and a larger worktable. I’m not going to get the table, but I’m going to bring the printer back when I come back after labor day.  This is good, I can come visit Jeff and spend a week.

Next step is getting something to sit on in the living room and move the TV out here. Jeff has it in the bedroom, which for him alone, is not bad, however - i may not want to go to bed so early, or if I can’t sleep, I have no place to roam. That will change this weekend. I think a trip to Pier 1 is in order since we’re not bringing furniture back after Labor day. Stuff yes, furniture no.

I have an agenda for this weekend:

1. Craft Store

2. Some furniture (a chair?)

3. Harley Party

Tonight we’ll probably hunt a good place for dinner and then I’m going to drag Jeff to the Haywood Mall, maybe. Tomorrow will be the craft stores and furniture and the harley party. Sundy will be home.

We need to get a schedule. Maybe we’ll figure that out this weekend.

but since I don’t have a picture, words will have to do. Nut steals. Yes, my cat has a problem with taking things that don’t belong to her. She started with pens and pencils. She would jump on my desk, pick one up in her mouth, jump down and walk away. She didn’t play with it, she took it.  I figured she was working on the great american novel, or was writing reports back to the mothership on her life here on earth.

Recently her item of choice has been - yarn! Again, its not that she wants to play with it. She will pick up a skein from my pile, or pick up the skein i’m working with, jump down and walk away with it. It’s really funny to watch her walk away with a big skein.  After a few feet, she’ll just drop it and start taking a bath, because if you don’t know what to do, a bath is the thing to do.  If she has the skein i’m working with, a tug of war will usually ensue.

Today, though, she was a kitten. She picked up a ball of yarn, rolled over and started playing with it like any of the traditional kitties with a ball of yarn play. I didn’t have a chance to get my camera, but it was oh so cute.

I was updating my ravelry projects. All of the ones I’ve completed so far have not followed a pattern. I’ve used ideas from patterns, but didn’t follow anything exactly. And I like it that way. I am working on a shawl for myself. I finally found the time to work on something for me. I have a few other things lined up for the house behind this (like some placemats and tablecloths oh and the sewing projects and and and), but I really want to get this finished. I love the yarn. Its La Boheme by Fiesta Yarns. Oh is it nice to work with. Speaking of which, I’m going back to it right now.

Since I’m ‘legal’ with the bike, Jeff and I have been going out so I can get more experience on it. I had my first fall today. I’m glad it happened, now I don’t have to ‘wait’ for it. I was going slow and it slipped out from under me on the edge of our driveway. Since I live on a dirt/sand road there was no damage to the bike and more importantly, no damage to me.

I haven’t really been out of the neighborhood yet. It’s kinda fun putting around the streets. I’m probably going to start taking it to the gym just to get more miles and more experience. I got into a little bit of traffic today, that was good for me to experience. I think I may ride it to church tomorrow. How fun would that be!

they must be in love

Originally uploaded by DivingDuo.

I went to a wedding over the weekend. Matt (the groom) - wow, I’ve known him just about all of his life. I used to roll down the hill with him. Jeff spent HOURS building an erector set with him on Christmas.

I wish we could have been at Jen’s wedding, but it was so close to Christmas, travel plans didn’t allow it.

We’ve been friends with the family for many years, watching the kids grow up, watching jobs come and go (both Jeff and Don were employed and then laid off from USelessAirways). We moved away, but they’ve been down to visit.

Seeing Matt get married and seeing Jen playing with her two boys at the reception - yeah, I’m feeling old. Ah well, I’m really just a 21 year old trapped in a 40 year old body!

I have passed my motorcycle safety course. Once I get the endorsement on my license, I will be STREET LEGAL! Yeah, you should be scared.

The funny thing is the more I learn, the more I need to learn. Ignorance really is bliss. It’s scary out there. I’m thinking, how hard could this be. Yeah…. it’s not that it’s hard, but everyone is stupid and I need to watch out for them. I’m going to need to do a lot of riding to get some confidence up on the roads around here.

Jeff and I did a victory lap tonight, and while it was all of the same skills i learned in class, having other cars and trucks on the road, while trying to remember what to do and what not to do and do it at road speed took a bit of concentration. I’m glad I live in a rural area where I can get my feet wet a little bit at a time, rather than trying to pull out in traffic. It’s going to be a while until I’m read to even take an easy ride with the local MC club, but I want to make sure I get out often to grow those skills, even if it is a few miles at a time.

Month, Week, Day? Take your pick. Yesterday was Jeff’s last day of work. (YAY JEFF). Today I’m having a party for him, this morning I took my first day of the riding portion of the motorcycle class. I passed the written portion last weekend. By noon tomorrow, I’ll have my endorsement and will be legal to be on the bike.

The state chick was observing the class and critiquing the instructors. Based on what she was saying to Jeff, I should have no problems with passing the riding portion. Jeff said she was just all complimentary of my riding. So YAY ME! Can’t wait to get it finished so I can ride my bike and start putting some hours on it.

Next week, we’re driving up to PA for a wedding, after finding an apartment in Greenville. I’m keeping the faith this house will sell, but I don’t know when that will be. We may need to consider renting it out first. We’ll have to talk about that on the way up and that will help us decide how long of a lease we should get on Jeff’s apartment. That is just an ugly situation, I won’t be able to move until we get tenants in here, I don’t want carry the house and a more expensive rental fee. Probably six months will give us what we need to know in terms of budgeting and locale. I’m hoping that after the election things will start to turn around a bit.

So, I have an hour before our guests are too arrive. Time to throw another load of laundry in.