Follow-Up to Previous Post

Okay, so it seems I need to do a follow-up to the previous post. Item #68 referred to my Darth Vader Money Bank, and both my dad and my aunt commented on the story behind the DVMB. They both think I need to give you more details on that story, and since it is so strongly etched into my mind, I think I will do just that.

First of all, you must understand that for the past 30+ years (ever since my grandparents had more than 1 grandchild), they have traditionally gotten their grandchildren the same gift(s) for Christmas. One year, they got all of the grandkids these really cool tables, and another year it was super hero pajamas. The year prior to the whole money bank incident, we each got a really good hammer (that hammer also has a story behind it, but that is for a later day).

The second important fact is that there are 7 grandchildren - 5 boys and 2 girls (counting me). The 5 boys and I are pretty very close in age, while the other girl is about 14-15 years younger than me. So, it was the 6 of us that each got the same gift for so many years.

Well, the Christmas morning of the money bank incident, everything seemed to be going as usual. We ate breakfast. We opened our stockings, and then it was time for gifts. As we started opening the gifts, I saw the cool money bank that the boys were each opening. It was a Darth Vader money bank who played the theme song, spoke, and used his light saber when you either put money in it or pushed the button. And, I started looking forward to opening my own not just because it was the special gift for that Christmas, but also because we were all Star Wars fans (yes, please feel free to openly mock my inner geek).

I honestly don't remember what all I got for Christmas that year. I feel certain that I received some really nice items because my grandparents (and their shopping elf) always did a good job of selecting gifts. However, when the realization set in that a Darth Vader Money Bank was not among the gifts that I opened, I was heartbroken.

Yes, you read that correctly. I was heartbroken.

I remember hearing my grandfather tell my grandmother that he told her if she was getting one for the boys, then she should get one for me.

After all of that on Christmas morning, I tried to just brush it aside, and not worry about it. The boys, in all of their kindness and sensitivity, set about reminding me each and every moment of that day that they each had a money bank and I did not.

Unfortunately, it did not end there.

When I got back to college a couple of days later, there were messages on my answering machine from Darth Vader. In fact, for many weeks after Christmas, the boys would take turns calling me and "playing" their money banks.

In the end, my grandmother ended up sending me a late Christmas gift...a Darth Vader Money Bank, and I still have it to this day.

Hello, Saturday!

Okay, folks. I think I have found my calling in life. Are you bursting with anticipation to hear what that is? Okay...so here it is...drumroll please...a Veggie Tales cast member. Wouldn't that be awesome? I wouldn't try to be Bob the tomato or Larry the cucumber. No, I really don't think that I have acquired all the necessary skills to aim for one of their spots, but I would be an amazing cast member because I can do all of the Boys in the Sink moves.

Speaking of Boys in the Sink, is it a little strange that I find the Veggie Tale parody of the boy band (Boys to Men, Backstreet Boys, N'Sync) so hysterically funny? I'm a little embarassed to admit that.

We did have fun last night, though. The kids loved it, and it was a really well done show.

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Also, I didn't realize it until one of my friends pointed it out to me last night, but yesterday was my 100th post. So, in blog tradition, here are 100 things about me.

1. I was born in Dallas.

2. I was raised in Longview, Texas (deep East Texas where the family trees do not fork).

3. I have one brother.

4. Even though, my brother and I were in the same grade, we graduated on two different days.

5. He went to high school in Pine Tree ISD, and I went in Longview ISD (see #4).

6. I have two chihuahuas that I got from a family at Saturn Road.

7. I have Bachelors degree, a Masters degree, and a Doctorate. However, it is not the good kind of Doctor that can write prescriptions.

8. My favorite colors are lime green and bright orange.

9. I worked cheerleading camps in the summer for a number of years.

10. During this time, the majority of the cheer camp staff was Canadian, so we all embraced our Canadian heritage and learned Oh Canada and God Save the Queen.

11. I am a complete and total clutz.

12. I broke both of my arms in two separate incidents one some (see #11).

13. I do not like to celebrate my birthday.

14. One year in college, my roommate threw me a surprise party. Since she and I were coming home from a rehearsal, everyone was already waiting in the apartment. They had locked the dead bolt, and so as I am trying to unlock the door, I feel someone pulling it open. I briefly thought I was about to be murdered. This is not the reason for #13.

15. During the 1996 Olympics, my friends and I re-enacted the Kerri Strug vault numerous times.

16. I love love love to vacuum.

17. I do NOT love love love to mop.

18. I love the fact that I get to wear jeans and a tshirt to work everyday.

19. My favorite season is fall.

20. I lived in Russia and worked for the Peace Corps.

21. I was evacuated out of Russia in 2001. On the day before Christmas, they took me from Novosibirsk, Siberia (where I lived) to the US Embassy in Moscow. The others and I had to stay in the Embassy Christmas Day because they couldn't get us out until the day after Christmas.

22. I got surface frostbite on my nose (see #20).

23. I love to read.

24. I have a bad habit of throwing things away when I get fed up with how messy things are. My mother is the same way.

25. I love listening to NPR. I download the podcasts for Click and Clack (Car Talk) and Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me.

26. I checked under my bed for monsters each night until I was well into my teenage years.

27. I favorite books of the Bible are the "ians".

28. My not-so-secret dream is to win the National Spelling Bee.

29. I also want to be a contestant on Jeopardy, but I could probably only win the kid version.

30. I hate to make my bed.

31. When I was younger, I would sleep on top of my covers or on the floor (see #30).

32. I see two of everything and so I will often close one eye to look at something when it is close to me.

33. I have strabismus and insufficient convergence (see #32).

34. I regularly remind my parents that I am a joy in their life.

35. I also remind my parents that I get to choose their nursing home.

36. I really do have good parents that are able to laugh at my sense of humor.

37. My favorite sport is basketball.

38. I can lay radiant floor heating, a floating wood floor, and I can dry wall.

39. I volunteered with Habitat for Humanity for a few years (see #38).

40. I have broken the same leg 2 times.

41. The first time I broke that leg, I was volunteering at Special Olympics.

42. I can name all of my favorite church songs by the page number they are in the song book.

43. Singing is my favorite part of the church service.

44. I can only sleep on my stomach even though it is not good for you.

45. I love all things pumpkin.

46. While I was working on my doctorate, I taught Integrative Arts and Humanities at the university.

47. In grad school, I tried to convince my 20th Century Compositional Techniques professor that analyzing John Cage's 4'33" was a legitimate project and good use of all that he had taught me. He did not agree.

48. I was one of the editors of my high school's literary magazine.

49. The youth minister at my church and I went to high school together, and he sometimes reminds me that I didn't put his writing in the magazine (see #48).

50. The magazine was called The Lupus which is a type of wolf (our school mascot was the Lobo), but it is also a degenerative disease.

51. On my lecture recital (AFTER I had already passed the defense of my dissertation), my entire lecture consisted of the sentence, "My research was on the selected works of Verne Reynolds as it pertains to his duo pieces. If you would like to know more about my dissertation, I will give you a copy to read." Then I performed the pieces.

52. My roommates and I used to give people nicknames in college to identify who they were such as cumberbund boy and opera man.

53. I love to play board games, card games, and dominos.

54. I truly enjoy spending time with my family.

55. I love the fact that my entire family (extended family too) work so hard to all get together each year.

56. My grandfather passed away 1 month ago, and that has hit me harder than I ever expected.

57. I grew up spending a great deal of time with both sets of grandparents.

58. I knew 6 of my 8 great-grandparents.

59. I can run a module builder out on the farm.

60. I learned how to drive on a tractor.

61. I often use the phrase "in my reality", and I often think that people don't realize that I am joking.

62. I am not a morning person.

63. I am also not a very sentimental person.

64. I absolutely love what I get to do for a living.

65. I do not cook very well, and therefore, I am not a big fan of cooking.

66. I still remember the Fifty Nifty United States song from elementary and can use it to my advantage if I am ever called upon to recite all 50 states from memory (mmwwaa ha ha ha - it's my secret weapon).

67. I carry a note pad around with me each Sunday to write down what people tell me needs to be done or bought, etc. Otherwise I will never remember it.

68. I have a Drath Vadar money bank that plays a song and speaks every time you put money in it.

69. I love musicals. I think that comes from my secret desire to be able to break out into song or dance at any moment in my life.

70. I talk to my grandmother every Sunday and Wednesday night as I drive home from church.

71. One of my nicknames growing up was Gertrude Bovina. We called my cousin Felicia Juanita. My niece was Roberta LaQuitia.

72. Now, I call my niece Matilda Jane. Her name is actually Brittany.

73. Some of my favorite movies to watch are the Anne of Green Gables movies.

74. I love love love doing math.

75. I get very excited when I have to help my niece with her math homework (see #74).

76. I am awful at telling jokes because I never can remember the punch line, but I envy those who can tell jokes well.

77. I can be a major procrastinator when I really don't feel like doing something.

78. Every year on Thanksgiving night, my mother and I look at the circulars and make our plan of attack. Then, we get up for the 4am day after Thanksgiving shopping.

79. I have already figured out what I am getting everyone in my family for Christmas (woohoo!!!).

80. I love looking at old family pictures. I have determined, though, that what we once thought were bold fashion choices were really just bad clothing choices.

81. My childhood best friend and I watched the Saved by the Bell Marriage of Zack and Kelly while on the phone with each other. We were both at separate colleges and had always watched the show together.

82. I have naturally frizzy hair. This is not a good hair texture for Houston.

83. Most days, I really enjoy the drive to and from work.

84. I really enjoy reading everyone else's blogs. I am not good about returning emails, and so it helps me keep up with everyone.

85. The same red suitcase has been sitting on my coffee table for 2 weeks now. I hate to completely unpack it and put it away since I will be heading out again at the end of this week.

86. I am usually cold. In fact, during the summer, I rarely have to run my air conditioner.

87. I think I am going to move my office at church into the server room with all the electronics. The rest of the building is so cold, and that room is nice and toasty.

88. Even though I do not cook well at all, I actually can bake very very well.

89. I love watching infomercials.

90. I have Hannah Montana, the Jonas Brothers, and HSM music on my Ipod. I claim that it is for work.

91. I just recently unpacked the last remaining box from my move here to Houston. It had set in the corner of my living room for over a year.

92. The fact that I have come up with this many "about me's" is amazing to me.

93. I love Diet Coke's from Sonic. I think it is the combination of the ice, the caffeine, and the carbonation.

94. Every so often, I think it would be nice to just live out in the middle of the woods in a little cabin that was away from it all.

95. I enjoy blogging.

96. I pray in the morning before I get out of bed.

97. I hit my snooze button each morning as many times as it takes for me to finish my prayer (see #96).

98. I feel very blessed to have been given the opportunities that I have in life.

99. I am also very thankful that I am almost to the end of this list.

100. If you have made it through the end of the list with me, then I thank you for reading.

What To Do?

Hmm...what to do, what to do???? Today is my day off.

I could catch up on work. I could clean out my closet and drawers (the messiness of both of those have been driving me crazy for weeks). Or, I could run errands; the oil in my car desperately needs to be changed.

I have a whole day ahead of me with boundless possibility. Well, not actually the whole day. I am taking a group from church to the Veggie Tales Live show tonight.

Regardless of what I decide, I should probably make a decision and get started with my day because 10am is just too late to still be in my pajamas.

Lots of Tidbits

Good evening, all.

First, some good news about the day. The church finally got electricity back on today. We are all feeling very thankful and blessed. Next step is getting our internet service back up and running. Comcast is still a little behind on their fixing of lines, but since they had to fix the lines for approximately 2 million people, I won't quibble about it.

Secondly, I successfully cooked yesterday. I know. That's pretty huge. I made spaghetti with tomato sauce and white beans. Nothing even remotely difficult about it (some noodles, some Ragu, and some beans), but the important thing is that it actually tasted good after I made it. So, now I have leftovers to eat that are tasty.

Next, I discovered something about myself today, I am one of "those" people, and by "those" I mean a person who breaks out into the shakes when she has to take her cell phone in to be repaired and must actually leave it there for even just a short while. Yep, even though I am really not a fan of actually talking on the phone, I apparently go through withdrawal when I have to hand it over to someone else. In fact, you should have seen my reaction when they told me that they were going to have to do a hard reset, and I would lose all of my contact information. I guess I must own up to my problem. My name is Jennifer, and I have become one of "those" people.

On another topic, I have to announce that I messed up. I have a bad habit of only checking my mailbox about once a week. I rationalize this saying that the post boxes are at the front of the complex, and I live at the back and enter at the back gate. However, in reality, it is a little bit of laziness of having to sort through all the junk mail. Anyway, I made my weekly stop by the post box this afternoon, and it turns out that my postman apparently thought I had moved due to the buildup of mail. So, he sent all my mail back to the main post office to be returned. After spending a little over an hour hunting down my mail this afternoon, I am thinking that it would just be easier if I checked my mailbox regularly.

Working from Home

So, I have discovered that I am really not meant to work from home. I too easily get off task. I try so hard to work, but then I think of something that I have always wanted to know, and I google it.

In honor of my moments of wasted time, here are some of the things I learned today.

• Polar bears are left-handed, and when they are hunting prey, they will cover their black nose with their paw to help hide themselves.
• When bats exit a cave, they go left out of the cave.
• 1 out of 20 people have an extra rib.
• Orcas (killer whales), when traveling in groups, breathe in unison.
• The typical lead pencil can draw a line that is 35 miles long.
• More people are killed annually by donkeys than in plane crashes.
• 2.5 cans of Spam are consumed in the United States every second.

There is one other piece of information that I happened upon. You can buy real sheets of uncut money to wrap gifts in. They are sold by a place called Maus & Hoffman. One sheet of wrapping paper is 32 one-dollar bills. However, it costs $60. So, essentially you waste $28 to purchase $32 that you are just going to waste.

Pictures of Ike

Okay, so a number of my loyal blog readers (all 1 of you) have been asking about pictures from Ike. I don't have any other than the few that are in my last post taken from my car phone. Here are some from my friends.

The main damage that occurred were trees blown down and fences blown down.

Here are a few pictures from the church. The main damage to the church was in the form of trees (whole trees, brances, and limbs) coming down, water damage from the roof leaking, and still no electricity.

Lastly, I was very fearful of whether or not my car would come out of this unscathed. My car was fine, but the car below definitely was not.

All Things Fall

So, technically it is not quite fall, but it almost is, and in honor of that, my post today is in honor or all things fall. I aboslutely love fall. Granted, I live in Houston where fall consists of 85 degree weather, but even though, this is the time of the year that Starbucks pulls out their pumpkin spice drinks (yum yum), and you can walk through the grocery store and easily find a spaghetti squash.

For those who have not experienced the spaghetti squash yet, you really must search out your grocery store for one. Even in my limited cooking ability, I will whip one of these up at least once a week during the fall.

My other favorite fall food is the pumpkin. First off, it is orange, and I do love all things orange (especially the fake orange cheese found in boxed mac and cheese). Secondly, it is so versatile. You can make a pie, bread, cheesecake, soup, and pumpkin risotto. What other food offers you so many options?

If you haven't had the chance to embrace fall, I encourage you to break out your tea kettle, open up your windows, and settle into a nice slice of pumpkin bread. You will be filled with autumnal joy.