The Jewish Martha Stewart.

Wow. I just got back from having 2 days off for thanksgiving, and all I can think about is "when is my next vacation??!"

This past weekend was rather awesome actually. Josh calls me "The Jewish Martha Stewart". No, I haven't been in jail anytime recently, and my home-ec prowess is not a 100th of Martha's, but I must agree, I do get a rush from accomplishing some of these things. Besides being on a constant quest to perfect everything about my house, I love to host events for any reason possible - be it at my home, or elsewhere. He gave me this nickname months ago, and it kinda just stuck, perhaps because of it's appropriateness.

Thursday was thanksgiving. My parents wanted to go to FL for the week to spend time with the relatives, but I a) don't have any vacation to waste since I'm using it all for my Argentina trip in January, and b) was going to the game saturday, so even if I did go, it'd be a short trip. So I decided to stay in Atlanta (as did both Moshe and Leah), and my responsibility was to dog-sit Reuben.

On thursday, I went down to Locust Grove to have thanksgiving dinner with Leah. Before going, I had a chance to go for a run, and somehow destroyed my feet in doing so, and then went to DZ's to make a pumpkin dessert to bring to Leah's, and managed to cook my hand at the same time. But I survived it all, and went to Leah's parents' for the meal. They had a ton of relatives in, as well as Leah's sister Cara and her fiance, and Josh. After a huge plateful of food, and options between about 10 different desserts, I went home, nice and full.

Black Friday. Unlike some of my insane siblings and relatives, I will not go for the deals on black friday. Call me crazy, but I'd rather spend the extra $20 to not have to wake up early, search for a parking space, wait in line to get into a store, get beat up, wait in line at the register - all for a small saving. I did however make a run to Kroger and to Lowe's that day, but neither of those places were out of hand. Josh, DZ and I also went to the shooting range on Friday, and I shot a 45 caliber for the first time. I must say, I am a pretty good shot now with pistols, so attackers, watch out! A few weeks ago, I thought it would be a good idea to host a Shabbat dinner Friday night after thanksgiving. People may have had enough of their family by then, plus hopefully, a lot of people would be in town. Well, of the usual crowd, nearly no one was in town, but I did end up having a total of 18 people at my house for dinner. It was huge. It was also pretty fun. The problem with that many people is that you don't really get to socialize with everyone, but having it be potluck makes for good conversation between strangers. Everything came out really well, and I was just as full for the second night in a row. I had a huge mess to pick up, but like I said before, I love hosting.

Saturday was the UGA/GT game. geez. this was our year to have won. It really was. Going into the game, our record was 9-2, we were ranked #16, and of course, UGA wasn't ranked at all. We choked. There is no other good explanation. We didn't play well the whole game. and Reggie was our losing leader. I'm sorry, if you go back 15 yards to make a pass, and you're about to be tackled, THROW THE BALL AWAY!! there's no reason to hold onto it and lose yardage every time. Also, try making passes down the field when it's obvious from earlier in the season as well as earlier in the game that running the ball isn't the best idea. The funny thing is that we could go 0-10 all season, but if we beat UGA, we'd be happy. However, we have a great season, ranked all season and doing great, but it means nothing if we lose. It's a funny world. But the day itself was fun. We drove up and hosted a tailgate - me, Josh, Leah, Greer, DZ...and a ton of people found their way to us and joined us. what fun! I purchased a grill with Josh the day before at Lowe's, and got a good price on it! now I can tailgate any game!

Sunday was a much slower day. Josh and Leah left town in the morning, and I went to Rina's wedding shower in the afternoon. For the rest of the day, I pretty much spent it recovering from the weekend. Mom and Dad picked Reuben up on Monday, and things are back as usual. Though, I could still really use a vacation.

What if.

I have always had this dreaded complex that something bad will happen. It really is a horrible thing to think, but I’ve always felt like one day, something really bad is going to happen to me. Maybe it’s my type A personality trying to plan for all possible issues in a plan (this plan being – life). Maybe I have a slight case of paranoia. I don’t know. Maybe it’s a totally normal “what if” type mentality – what if someone gets deathly ill, what if I cause a horrible accident, what if I have a child with a disability, what if what if what if…

I don’t normally mull over any of these what ifs. I am just curious…anyone else have a case of the “what if”s?

let's walk around the world.

Matt just sent me to this webpage. I like it, and think it's funny and is right up my alley =)

Neil's House for Sale

My coworker Neil is selling his house, and I think he thinks I have more friends than I do.
Either way, if you happen to be in the "shopping for a house" market, buy his =)
It's simply lovely
(click the link)

Bailed out.

I am alive. I am sorry I ditched everyone this weekend.

This is what I didn't do this weekend, that I was supposed to do:
Go visit Leah and be there for her winging (Congrats!!)
Go to Amanda's for dinner
Go to a GTDA dance
Go out with Jeremy for Jeanine's b-day
Go to the GT/Duke football game
Go to the Southern Belle Swing Bash
Go to Andrea's party
Go to Kenny's Party
Go to Jeff's B-day dinner.

This is what I did do:
watched a lot of movies on TV.
Saw some friends from out of town to watch the OSU/Michigan game
Baked cookies.
Spent some quality time with DZ

So, I pretty much didn't leave the house this weekend at risk of getting the rest of the world sick, and although I thought the sleep and lack of social enjoyment would make me feel better, I think my cough has gotten worse, so I sacrificed the fun times - apparently for nothing.

I hope I get to see everyone soon, and I also hope you don't all hate me for skipping out on your particular event this weekend.

recovering...

The last week has worn me out. All the previous traveling, and on top of it, a cold, and then visiting David this week, I am pooped. I took Wednesday off from work to try to recover (my first sick day since I've been working), but I still am not 100%. Hopefully this weekend and the coming holiday will give me a little much needed recovery time.

Bad Day

I don't think this poor bird had a very good day.

On a better note, I taught a dance class tonight to the CSI 20/30 group, and had a lot of fun. I got a lot of good feedback, so it seemed like everyone had fun. I think it may have been a little long for some people, but overall, I think it turned out great, and we had ~25 people in attendance

Fresno.

well, I am alive, and back. I arrived from Fresno at 6:30 am today, and am actually for some reason not as wiped as I would've expected. I brought my new camera with me, and snapped a couple pictures between Fresno and Reedly (the city we were actually in). I took these pictures from passenger window in the car, going about 55 mph.

I really like this picture, taken from my side window. You can't even tell we were speeding by these fruit orchards, protected for the winter by the tarp.














I just really liked the color of the sky here, but couldn't get a clear shot of it. It was dusk and we were driving, and if I used the flash, it was reflecting, but without it, I didn't have enough stability to get a clear picture. You get the idea though.









This is a lone palm tree in the middle of acres and acres of fruit farms. It was kind of strange just hanging out there with the tractor thingy (which I am told is called a "back hoe")















if you look at this picture closely, you'll see the little oranges on the trees. I guess it's not california unless there are some oranges?

Back, and then back out.

yup. I showed my patriotic side today, and went to the polls to vote. All the volunteers were about 90, and most of the voters at my precinct were at least 80, but I felt like I was doing something good going in there to vote. I actually went in for the primaries too, so I've been a good citizen this year. Maybe it is because I have been hanging around marines too much. Speaking of which...

I went this past weekend to Pensacola to spend some time with Josh and Leah. I got to go to the marine ball, which was actually not as good as last year because of a couple minor issues, but all in all, the weekend was nice, and it was nice to get away from stuff here. And really, I haven't been here really all that much lately, but still, it was nice to be gone for the weekend. Now that I've been back here in Atlanta for 2 days, I am leaving again; this time to Fresno. I'll be gone just a couple days and back this weekend. But I am excited that I should be here in town at least for a few weeks after that. yay! =) anyway, here's a picture from the weekend.

PackExpo

This past weekend was filled with good dancing and a wonderful football game vs. Miami. At the beginning of the season, when it was announced that homecoming would be vs. UM, we were all a little worried. Then Miami started losing and we were winning, and we got a bit cocky heading towards the weekend of homecoming. We were in for a big loss against Clemson, but I think that opened our eyes, and after the Miami touchdown in the first 30 seconds, Tech was in the game and came through for a great win. This means that almost definitely, we’ll be going to the ACC championship game in Jacksonville in a few weeks!

Once Monday rolled around, I was headed to Chicago to PackExpo. It is a packaging show where all the vendors of all the different packaging equipment set up sample machines and you can see them run while at the same time meet a lot of the vendors face to face, and see the newest machines on the market. My flight was scheduled to leave a little after 9 on Monday morning. The plan was to wake up at 5:30, finish packing and get out of the house by 6:30, pick betsy up at her new place, and then head to the airport. Great plan. Except I forgot to turn my alarm on. I don’t think I’ve forgotten to turn an alarm on in years. Well, I WAKE UP at 6:45. I flipped out. It turned out alright, and I didn’t miss my plane, but man, was I stressed for the rest of the day. The show was exhausting, but quite interesting to see everything. Both Monday and Tuesday evening began with drinks in the lobby with coworkers, and were followed by dinner. Monday night after dinner at Lux Bar, I opted to skip on the trip to the House of Blues with my coworkers, and instead met up with my sister and brother in law (evin and noah) to go to swing dancing at Fizz. There were a few great dancers (and of course a few creepy ones), and I had a ton of fun dancing. I got home just as the crowd returned (a bit more inebriated than me) from house of Blues. Tuesday night we went to a steakhouse called Keefer's, and I had a fabulous piece of fish, and we all shared some delicious desserts.

Wednesday was a little slower. We went to the show in the morning, and then in the afternoon, Betsy and I took a couple hours to have lunch with evin and noah and baby kesiah. It's amazing how the city works with money actually. Betsy and I went to the curb to catch a bus to the CTA station to then catch the train to meet up with the fam. well, we wait 15 minutes, and when the bus finally comes, I hand the driver a $20 and ask for 2 tickets. She says she doesn't have change!! so, instead of letting us ride to the station, she kicks us off the bus. So we take a cab to lunch instead. After lunch, we go to the station to head to the airport, and the machine takes whatever money you put into it, and puts it on a card. well, I didn't want a $20 bus pass for one ride, so I went to the desk. No Change. what the hell?? I go up out of the station for a minute, and see a Chase Manhattan bank on the corner. I go in and ask if they can break my $20. "are you a customer with Chase?" "no" "we don't make change for non-customers". Damn! I turned back around, remembering that I have a mortgage through them. They grudgingly agreed to make change for me. but seriously! the taxi drivers also don't like to take credit card. they'd rather take less money with cash, than have you pay credit. maybe they pocket it, I don't know.

Anyway, once I got back to Atlanta, I was home for 30 minutes when Moshe walked in, looked like he'd just seen a ghost, and told me this story. Poor kid. I hope everything works out for the best!!