It boggles my mind...

I subscribe to Popular Science magazine.  I also subscribe to Natural History.  This is because I am really nothing but a nerd at heart.  I make no apologies for my choice of reading material.  I dig that kind of stuff. 

Tonight I was perusing the latest Pop Sci and I came across an article on this new Mars Rover that is being tested.  It will help in the quest to identify life on the planet.  This 'bot, nicknamed Zoe, can move around on it's own power, and can also be controlled remotely from Earth should it ever loose it's own power or functionality.  This is pretty similar to the current Mars rover.  True, we lost contact with the 'bot that is currently up there a time or two, but we did have some contact with it for long spells.  That being said, tonight I was talking with a friend of mine, Wendy, and using my cordless phone from my kitchen.  As usual, I brought the phone into the den with me, and as usual, it began to lose reception.  And I thought to myself, how is it that we can control a robot on Mars from Earth, but I can't get my reception to work on my cordless phone from the kitchen to my den?   Hmmm??

Crayfish and Crawfish and Mudbugs OH MY

I do enjoy the premiere episodes of American Idol.  A guilty pleasure indeed.  To be honest, I couldn't care less about the rest of the season or who will ultimately win the competition.  I just love the losers they have during the first week or two on the show.  I laugh so hard it hurts.  I have people that I send instant messages back and forth with as the show is going on and we just howl at the antics.  I have actually come close to falling out of my chair, hyperventalating, and choking on my mint tea as I watch.  It's simply a great way to end a stressful day.  Laughing that hard MUST have medicinal properties because I swear I sleep better after I watch it. 

Ok, side note...my dog has sleep apnea.  I am convinced of it.  She snores like a man, then stops breathing and twitches herself awake.  Very odd.

I have been here in the Shreveport Bossier area for just over a year now and have learned one great truth about this quasi-city.  These people love...nay...they WORSHIP their crawfish.  They have nicknames for them, like crayfish and mudbugs.  They have an entire festival dedicated to the crawfish that takes place every spring.  They make them into gumbo, etuffee and just plain boiled.  The crawfish to them is everything.  I admire their dedication to the little crustacean.   I, however, have a different impression of the crawfish.  My first experience with a crawfish was in the 8th grade where we were required to dissect one in science class as part of our final exam.  My next and only other experience with the mudbug was 20 years later, right here in Shreveport.  This is partly because I have never again had reason to even think about the crawfish once I passed my science class, much like I never again thought about the worm we were required to dissect as our first project in the class.   Now that I was here, bombarded daily by everything craw, I figured  I would at least try and see what all the fuss was about.  When in Rome, right?  Admittedly, I had a tough time getting past the whole 8th grade dissection thing, but get over myself I did.  I went to a local restaurant, and had myself a mudbug.  I immediately knew why it got the nickname "mudbug".  Because that is exactly what it tasted like.  A bug that someone dug up out of the mud, heated up and put on the plate.  Crawfish are tricky little suckers too, they show up on your plate disguised as little midget lobsters.  Do not be fooled.  They are really, reallly NOT lobsters.  Really. 

Disappointed,  I had to step outside myself and see if I was just being biased.  Too consumed consciously or otherwise by the science class all those years ago, perhaps?  I came to the honest self realization that I was not biased.  In fact, the truth of the matter is, I think the people here eat crawfish for one reason and one reason only.  They can't afford lobster.

What a blast!

Whoo hoo!!!  The chick trip was a rousing success!!  Actually the entire trip was awesome!  I saw my sister in law, my brother and my two gorgeous nephews.  My sister in law and I went to Las Vegas for three days of my trip and my o' my.  Las Vegas is something that must be experienced rather than described.  However, I will attempt to describe at least one part of the trip.  My sister in law and I went to see the show Le Reve at the Wynn.  Done by the same guys who put together Cirque Du Soleil. Yee ha.  I have come to the conclusion that two men, with the right physique, are downright sexy together.  Holy macaroni.  The entire show was sensual, emotional, and had its share of eroticisim.   Splendid.  Holy hot men.  Don't get me wrong, the show wasn't just about sexy men.  Not by any means. However, that is what I chose to focus on.  Hee hee. 

I also went to a spa for the first time at the Bellagio where we stayed, and had my very first massage.  My sister in law does that kind of self-pampering all the time, but I have never had the desire really to partake.  I get a pedicure about twice a month, but that doesn't really count as self-pampering, does it?  It was somewhat nerve wracking at first because all of us women were running around naked.  I think i was the only one with a complex about it.  Once I got over myself, I was able to relax and enjoy it.  And the Bellagio has really good coffee, among other things... 

We got back to Seattle, and had a chance to really enjoy the city.  Washington state is beautiful.  Even raining it's just fantastic.  The mall in downtown Seattle is serious.  It's anchors are Niemen Marcus, Sax's, Macy's, and Nordstroms.  That's what I'M talkin' bout!  Not a freakin' Sears or Dillards to be found!  LIFE IS GOOD in Seattle!  I might want my next assignment to be there.  It was almost painful to come back to Bossier City.  As I have said before, there are worse places to be than Bossier City.  It's not bad here, but we don't even have a Macy's.  Have I said that before?  I think I am starting to develop a pattern here...

Less than a week away!

We are officially at 5 and a wake up before the chick trip!  I am so excited. 

I am sitting here, after just having returned from my evening run, and I am listening to my dog try and catch her breath.  It amazes me how it takes her so long to get back to herself after we run.  We run almost every day, and you'd swear she'd never run before.  She started becoming very distracted lately when we go running.  She stops and sniffs everything and it's very counter productive when it comes to my run.  I end up having to stop every 30 seconds so she can sniff stuff.  I try and yank her away from whatever it is that got to her nose, but when she digs her heals in, i am stuck.  She's a big girl.  She never used to do it before, and now i end up having to take her for a walk and go for my run separately.   I really enjoy running with her and would prefer to do it that way, but somethings gotta change!  Maybe i will take her to a class at PetSmart.

Speaking of bad things my dog has done lately...a while back I agreed to pet sit the dog of a colleague of mine.  A big drooling lab.  Sweet dog, and i decided to watch her at my house. I figured that Macy would have a playmate for a week.  Well, this other dog had a habit of digging holes in the yard, and Macy picked up on it.  She never dug a single hole before this other dog came along, and now my yard had these 5 massive holes in them.  So this weekend I ended up going to Lowe's and buying five 40-lb bags of dirt to fill in the holes, grass seed, and chicken wire to cover the spots and keep her from digging them up again.  Chicken wire.  What fun.  That is some nasty stuff.  Thank my insight for buying gardening gloves to work with it.  It seems to have done the trick and no more holes have been started, but what a pain.  Since this is my first dog, I really need to figure out how to stop these things.  She is generally very disciplined.  She doesn't bark even when the neighbors dogs are at the fence, scratching and barking their heads off.  I am thankful for that.  She is house trained, comes when called, sits, stays (most of the time), etc.  I need to learn how to teach an old dog new tricks I guess. 

 

Chick Trip!!!

Whoo hoo!!!!  Chick Trip!!!!

I am going on a vacation to Tacoma Washington and then to Las Vegas with my sister in law in about 2 weeks and I simply can't wait!  I have never been to Las Vegas, and to be totally honest, I have never even had the desire to go.  I am not a drinker, and I find nothing fun about gambling.  However, we are going to go see Cirque du Soleil (and I KNOW I destroyed the spelling of it, but oh well) and I am really looking forward to that part of it.  I have always been a fan of live theater and I have been wanting to see that show for a long time. 

Work is going great, and I am in a nice groove.  I am a little sad that my current commander is going to be retiring in about 4 months.  Ok, i am VERY sad about that.  I have had a lot of bosses since i have been in the work force, but i can count on one hand the number of really good ones that I have had.  This guy is one of the good ones. 

I must interject a thought here; As i am writing this entry, i am listening to this Deal or No Deal show on the TV, and it's sick.  Oh my, I am not even on the show, and I am sweating.  Gotta tell ya, my stomach couldn't handle a show like that.  I am just not a gambler.

I had PRK vision correction about 2 weeks ago and I am hoping that my eyesight will be better by the time i leave for my chick trip. It's probably about 20/30 right now.  I realize that the difference in immediate results between PRK and LASIK is pretty extreme, but PRK is a much better and safer procedure, and worth the extra healing time it takes to be able to see clearly again.  The procedure itself though, PRK, i mean, was quite painful.  They warned us about the level of discomfort, but man, eye pain sucks. 

I hope that those of you who are reading have a very merry Christmas and a happy Hanukkah and if you are in a place that has nova, cream cheese and bagels available, please have some for me!

duh

So this past weekend, I was going to mow my lawn, like I usually do.  I bought this brand spankin' new lawnmower about 6 months ago.  My first one ever!  Of course, this was my first house with a yard so I needed a lawn mower.  I didn't buy the best one, but I didn't buy the worst one either.  It was a middle of the road model.  Craftsman something-or-other. 

Any-hoo-ha...I had noticed that it seemded to be very difficult to start for a brand new lawn mower.  I would have to pull that starter cord thing 15 to 20 times each time I tried to start it.  I would be exhausted before I even started!  And I am not in bad shape, either!   So it had been a couple of weeks since the last time I had to use it becuase it's been dry as a bone here.  We had some rain a couple of weekends ago and my grass finally started growing again.  So out comes my lawnmower and I proceed with my ritualistic cord pulling.  I must have yanked that thing 50 times.  I gave myself a rubbing burn that went right through the glove and onto my thumb (that still hurts now, for criminies sake).  So during the course of the past couple of days, I would complain to random coworkers and colleagues and generally anyone who was willing to listen to me gripe, and each time, the same thing was asked of me..."Well, did you prime the motor first?"  I had no clue what they were talking about.  I expressed as much in the conversations.  Each person told me that there is a little red rubber button thing near or on the motor part that you have to push two or three times to get gas into the thingy and that makes it start easier.  I had never seen such an animal, and I figured that maybe I just didn't get a high end enough lawn mower to have this primer button thing.  So i looked it up online while i was at work, and even the cheapest low end mower had a primer.   I got home today from work, thumb still all raw, icky and throbing, and went out to my shed, looked at my lawnmower, and there it was...in all it's rubber glory...the primer.   It may have been imagined, but I swear I could hear my thumb yelling at me and calling me a dorkess.

A leave cut short!

I was very excited to go on leave last week.  It was my first leave since I came back into the Air Force a year ago.  I went home to South Florida.  It was wonderful eating real food again.  Of course, to me, real food means deli (corned beef, nova on a bagel with cream cheese, etc.) as well as some yummy bakery goods.  Black and white cookies, rugaluch, halavah, etc.  Here, they have never even heard of these things.  They think Krispy Kreme is the creme bruele of the buyou. 

So I got my fill, and then on Wednesday, this little tropical storm, Katrina, formed in the Bahamas.  Much to my dismay, Katrina began to come on shore at my dad's house where I was staying in Delray Beach.  I made a decision after the first feeder band hit to leave right then and drive back to Bossier City.  Who knew that my timing would be perfect?  If I had waited, i wouldn't have gotten home until sometime next week.  All was not lost though, as I had an awesome time and enjoyed the visit with my family. 

So it's back to work for me tomorrow.  Although, i did work some this past saturday just so I wouldn't be so overwhelmed with work when i go back tomorrow. 

On another note, I am dog sitting for one of my co-workers.  Sam, their dog, is a really huge black lab.  He is only 2 years old so his paws and head still look to big for his body.  He and my Macy seem to get along.  More like sibblings who squable occasionally.  When it gets to loud, they both get the boot out the door.  Two big dogs and little ol' me.  What a concept.  It's going to be an interesting week.  :)