flynn called this morning:
"stinna, are you coming to church for the chili cook-off tonight?""yep -- i'm coming!"
"okay, and you have to wear your costume."
"oh. i don't have a costume."
[short pause]
"... you don't have *any* costumes??"
it's shocking, i know ...
i told my manager mark that he was now my #4 favourite, according to google. one month ago, he was #6.
he is now determined to become #3.
he'll have to beat out my mother for that spot.
pretty sure i'd have to seriously evaluate my life if that happened. maybe quit my job.
so, my google phone flags my contacts as favourites based on frequency and length of phone calls. i'm sure there's some fancy algorithm behind the calculations here so, i mean, this must be scientifically accurate information.
here are my top ten "favourites," according to google:
cute guy
my mom
my manager john
college boy
my manager mark
eerch!
hold on. what? what did that say? really?
yes, friends, you read that right: two of my managers in my list of favourites.
in the top ten, no less!
my managers are my favourites?! does that mean work is my favourite?!?
i can't go on with the list. this is just too sad.
...
...
i think i am going to go eat some ice cream ...
it's a sad, sad life i lead ...
welp, after entirely too much concentration wasted on work endeavors, i had to check yahoo one last time before hitting the sack tonight. on the main page, yahoo! finance was featuring an article called "The 5 Best Low-Cost, High-Mileage Cars", which conclusively and with authoritative finality answers the question, "what car would you buy that is well made, gets good gas mileage, and doesn't cost much?".
of course i had to check out the lineup. and guess who's number one, friends!
i couldn't agree more: jerry, you're awesome.
(in case you wanted to ask: no, i don't know who else made the list. i got carried away in celebration for my boy and stopped reading at #1.)
every morning, when pat asks me a computer question, this is actually *precisely* what i do.
i got a message today:
"so i'm standing here, washing dishes, minding my own business ...
and flynn says,
'mom, if you would be christianna, you would have crazy hair.'
so ... apparently, good thing i'm not you."
thanks, bud.
i am in utah on vacation. heading home in the morning. i'll post stuff and pictures then ...
enjoy the anticipation.
my little sister inge and i made some stuff:
hers took 9 months. mine took about a year and a half ...
... obviously, mine was a *little* more complicated.
at what point do you have to start introducing yourself as a bum? i slept in my car on saturday night.
"hi, i'm christianna. nice to meet you. i'm a bum."
saturday was a *very* full day. i woke up in a panic at 7:15 -- i was supposed to be at the red cross at 7! dangit! quick pit stop in the bathroom to pull a comb through my hair, then i was out the door. i started the car just as my phone rang: it was the red cross asking if i was okay and if i was coming. "yesss ..."
after getting there, i crossed my fingers through the whole donor intake process -- well, except for the part where they prick my finger -- just hoping that my iron levels would be high enough to donate. (ever since i started this no-beef thing i just can't keep enough iron in my blood! anyone have any suggestions for that? i have recently started taking iron supplements, but those don't always work, either.)
i passed. yippee!
so i spent the next two hours reclined, smothered in blankets and hot rice bags, and enjoying juno. i gave a double-unit of platelets. pat myself on the back: pat, pat, pat.
from the red cross, i drove straight to the church building for ... enrichment super saturday!! where i made this:
on the way back home from enrichment, i called jenn to organize our beach outing, then called my sisters, et al, to pass the word along.
got home. got showered. got back in the car. got drove -- err, i mean -- drove. parked. walked. 
found jenn. laid out my towel. grabbed my boogie board. got tossed around in the waves. landed really hard on my shoulder on the beach. saw a big bruise on my shoulder. got out of the water.
then my sister, et al, arrived and we set them up and got back in the water. it was fabulous! so much fun. i love going to the beach!!
after a few hours in the sun, we packed up, walked back to the cars, and headed home. where i showered once again, cleaned the boogie boards, and got back in the car to drive up to eden's.
we met up with some friends of hers for pizza and blue grass at vincenzo's pizza esperienza in new hall, ca. a fun blue grass band plays there every saturday night. it really is a pizza esperienza. really.
then we went back to eden's friends' house to play ... dun dun dun 
... rock band!! i must say that the several performances of the members of the troupe were quite impressive. but i think the "best of show" prize definitely goes to clint, for his vocal stylings in our home-grown rendition of iron maiden, "the number of the beast".
we finally retired the drum sticks and bass guitar at 1:41am, and, after assuring my bro-in-law that i was "fine" to drive home, i got back in my car and found the freeway.
however, i soon discovered that my eyelids were much heavier than i have ever known them to be -- it must have been the junk food i'd been nibbling on all day -- and so at 2:22am, i found a parking lot, locked me in my car, set the car alarm, and crawled into the back seat. at 3:34am, i woke up (much pleased that i was still in the backseat of my car and not kidnapped) and drove the rest of the way home -- about an 8-minute drive -- where i assume i crawled in my bed because that is where i was when i woke up the next morning.
and so, you see: i am a bum. i don't think i can argue that now. i slept in my car.
p.s. -- yes, i remember *exactly* what time things happened. i'm an accountant. i am good with numbers. apparently.
okay, so friday i met up with my sisters, bro-in-law, and cami (a real australian -- yeah -- in real life) to go down to 3rd street promenade for some good old-fashioned people watching and foot slaughtering. (eden even asked me before we went if i wanted to put on my flip flops. but i wanted to be cool in my snakeskin shoes, towering over the rest of the party. i'll admit that was a bad idea. because it was.)
so after a couple hours of walking around, and maybe one more limping around, and then another one waiting hopelessly at a restaurant that only had open seating -- which can be okay unless you happen to be in a party of 6, in which case, open seating is such a bad idea -- so, after all those hours ... we finally gave up, decided to find food somewhere not at 3rd street promenade, and limped back to the car -- well, okay, i was the only one limping.
on our way down santa monica blvd, my bro-in-law saw a denny's! yea for denny's! (did i really just say "yea for denny's?" uh huh. i did. just checked. mmeh, oh well -- we were really hungry.)
so after we got seated there, i had to go wash my hands. (we really should take a tip from the brasilians here: let's put a sink out in the restaurant reception area so we can all be a little more hygienic. don't you agree? c'mon, who's with me?)
so as i hobbled to the restroom with my frizzy-because-of-the-santa-monica-humidity hair tied in a knot and held in place with a sharp stick, i saw a familiar face. took me a couple seconds to flip through the catalogs of "familiar faces" in my head, but finally found him:
umm, airplane boy.
whoa, weird.
(amy, i stole your blog title. it was just so fitting!!)
to celebrate the birth of our country, i took advantage of every single minute of this day off.
having gotten home from my sister's at around 2:30 am the night before, pulling myself out of bed at 7am was a bit difficult. but i had groceries to buy and eggs to fry. so ... decked out in my pajama shorts and my i-mess-with-texas t, i headed for vons. (i'm still keeping my distance from ralph's, unfortunately. besides that, vons is closer to my house. yeah.)
after the quick outing to the grocery store, i came back home and cooked eggs for our ward fourth-of-july breakfast. dropped those off at the church and came back home to shower and get ready for the day.
unfortunately, i took too long. by the time i got back to the church with my stomach growling, my glass dish was empty and already washed and the only edible thing left was some maple sausage. so ... i grabbed a couple of those and drove home.
the sun
soon my phone rang. it was jenn. she gave me directions to zuma and told me they were by lifguard station 4. half an hour later, so was i.
jenn and her boyfriend had been there for maybe an hour already and were taking a boogie board break. but as soon as i arrived, they were ready to go in again.
the moon
i haven't ever been boogie boarding before, but, oh my goodness, i had such a good time! and i have the bruises all over my ribs to prove it!
oh -- i found out that my swimming suit bottoms are a little too big. which was a bit unfortunate for all the beach-goers at zuma that day. oops. sorry.
the stars
the evening was spent under the stars up in valencia after a delicious barbecue with my sister's friends. the city put on a fabulous fireworks show. my nephew loved it and clapped after each really big one. he's such a fun kid.
the day started out pretty well, actually. well, kind of. i woke up in a panic at 740 am: my dentist appointment was at 8. crap.
so i rushed to the bathroom. i had spent the night on my sister's couch so that i could go to the dentist early (my dentist is up near her house) and then i would get to work about the same time i normally do, but with a numb cheek. as i hurried down the hall with my shower things in hand, my 2-year-old nephew was just coming out of his room and headed into his parents' room to wake them up ... but he saw me instead! so, since i am way more fun that either his mom or dad (uh huh), he followed me into the bathroom.
great. hmmm.
well, i tried to think of what part of my morning routine i could do in there with him present ... brush teeth, we can brush teeth. so we brushed teeth. after 3 minutes brushing mine (and following his instructions: "paste", "water", "brush brush", "spit", "dry") and a couple more minutes trying to get him to follow the same steps, we were done brushing teeth. and i had 5 fewer minutes to get the rest of me ready for the day. but the boy wasn't done hanging out with his favourite aunt and he really wasn't done playing with the sink ...
so ... well ... hmm ... don't tell his mom or dad, but ... i used the potty. had to. like really. and the kid wasn't leaving. he didn't seem to mind, anyway: he was actually pretty encouraging.
after doing my business, i got a very enthusiastic "you did it!" from the short person.
yes, he's been potty-training, and it's always very exciting when he does his business. so ... there you go. i deserved a "you did it!" and i got a "you did it!"
after his vote of confidence in my ability to accomplish anything i set my mind to, this day had to be great. so, let's review the rest of the day:
8:00 am -- went to the dentist to get a filling replaced.
8:40 am -- got stuck in traffic on i-5, i-405, and us-101. yes, traffic on all three.
9:30 am -- arrived at my client's office only to find that my evil manager had decided to unexpectedly show up to "put a fire under us" or some other over-used and completely inaccurate cliché because we get so much less done when the manager is there.
12:00 pm -- left for lunch after putting up with my evil manager's attempts to be jovial all morning. the good thing was that my evil manager had to leave for a meeting and would not come to lunch with us, nor would he be at the client site for the rest of the day.
12:05 pm -- waited in the hall while my evil manager chewed out my senior for "not identifying issues with revenue sooner". issues, i might add, that could not have been identified until we performed our testing, so they wash out when they wash out.
12:15 pm -- ate lunch at islands without my evil manager and discussed politely the occurrences of the morning. and when i say "discussed politely", i don't mean politely. or kindly. or even objectively.
1:30 pm -- went back the client's office and pleasantly confirmed that the my evil manager really had left for the day.
3:30 pm -- my senior left to drive down to irvine for a meeting.
4:30 pm -- the phone rang. it was my evil manager. that morning, he had requested that i send him the spreadsheet i was working on. having had some time to look at it, he wanted to talk about everything that i have done wrong concerning revenue. for the next hour and a half, he criticized my work and quizzed me on regulation and contract terms & conditions.
6:00 pm -- hung up and had to take a walk.
6:10 pm -- came back and the client informed me that my evil manager called back and requested that i return his call. guess he thought of something else i did wrong.
6:15 pm -- called my evil manager. he made a handful of suggestions of what else to include on my spreadsheet -- all of which were already incorporated into my spreadsheet. then he thanked me for all my work. but it was too late. the damage was already done. already done, i tell you. don't think even a "you did it!" could have helped at this point.
6:30 pm -- got back to work.
7:30 pm -- packed up to go home.
8:00 pm -- practiced my harp, whined to the lady i live with, and started some laundry.
9:30 pm -- got a phone call from my senior because he had spoken to my evil manager and wanted to make sure i was okay.
10:00 pm -- sat down on the couch, surrounded by revenue contracts and invoices. think i fell asleep sometime around 11:30, dunno. but i did wake up around 4:30 to get started on yet another (i'm sure) fabulous day ... i thought busy season was over ... guess i was wrong ...
anyway. this day will not be included in my "top 10 days of my life" list, despite its shining beginning. my nephew may think i am amazing, but the rest of the world treats me as a peon (at least on this day).
according to wikipedia, "in the english-speaking world in general, the term peon is used colloquially to mean a person with little authority, often assigned unskilled or drudgerous tasks; an underling. in this sense, peon can be used in either a derogatory or self-effacing context."
i still say they should spell it "pee-on". that's certainly how i felt.
growing up in a family with six kids, i think my parents put in extra effort to help each of us find something within us that made us unique. at least that's what i tell myself when i try to find a reason why my mom gave me a skateboard when i was 7, because i can state with all confidence that i did not ask her for it.
my skateboard was red with blue wheels. and i liked it. i rode that thing a lot. like, a lot, a lot. the last time i saw it, the paint was chipping off and the wood was splitting. the blue wheels were pretty worn. i don't think we have it anymore. but it might be somewhere in my parents' garage: they liked to have it around come moving day -- it not only served as a distraction for those always underfoot, but on moving day it made a pretty decent dolly for my dad's overstuffed filing cabinet.
i was a nervous kid even back then, so i didn't generally have the courage to ride my skateboard standing. (sorry guys, i *am* a girl.) so usually i rode my skateboard on my knee, using the other foot to paddle myself down the sidewalk. and that's what i did. and that's what i loved. back and forth, up and down my street, day after day.
one day, not unlike many others during that era, i was out in front of the house riding my skateboard back and forth, up and down the street. my sister wanted to play soccer in the front yard. but i didn't care, i was skateboarding. (it's my story: i can call my lily-livered one-knee paddling "skateboarding" if i want.)
to set up the "soccer field" in our front yard, my sister dragged the garden hose across the lawn to mark off the half-way line. why she even needed a half-way line marked off when she was playing soccer by herself, i'm still not sure i really understand. oh, well.
so, my sister stretched the garden hose all the way across the lawn. and then across the sidewalk. which interrupted my skateboarding. this frustrated me. to say the least. i thought the world should revolve around me -- and in select moments, around my skateboard, too. (not only was i a nervous child, but i somehow managed to be a spoiled child -- even being the second of six kids. figure that out.)
so i moved the hose, picked up my skateboard, walked back over to the end of the sidewalk and quickly got back to my skateboarding. to ease my frustrations. i was very frustrated. i needed to skateboard. so as i came back down the sidewalk trying to lose my cares in my skateboarding, the wind blowing through my hair as i picked up speed, i was completely oblivious to the fact that my sister pulled the hose back across the sidewalk -- she needed to mark off the middle of her soccer field, you know.
and i didn't see it until it was too late, at which point my face was already heading straight for the sidewalk.
i don't remember much of what happened after that. i remember crying. i remember it hurt. i remember that recovery was long and slow. i remember going to the dentist. i remember losing a tooth.
and that, friends, is the scandalous skateboard story. hope you didn't miss anything good on tv in order to read it.
my youngest sister matti and i decided earlier this year that we wanted to go to new york -- well, she wanted me to take her to new york and to be her tour guide. swell.
but then we found out that sibling #5 is expecting her first baby! (yea!) so we changed our destination to something a little further south -- houston -- and i abdicated from the tour guide throne.
so matti talked it out with #5 and decided on the end of may. then matti talked it out with me and decided on mid-may ... and we decided not to tell #5. heh heh heh. we did tell #5's husband, though. and he was more than excited about the tricksy plan. mwah ha ha ha.
matti and i were extra careful to make sure our plan wasn't discovered so we carefully instructed mom to not let it slip. and actually, i am kinda impressed that we were able to pull it off. i even called #5 from the houston airport after i arrived and was waiting for matti's plane to land -- called "just to chat" and i thought it would then make for an even better surprise when we showed up at her house in the middle of the night. heh heh heh.
oh, and it was a *good* surprise! i have seriously never heard #5 scream in terror like she screamed in terror that night.
my only regret is that we didn't get it on film.
i am quite happy that she didn't go into premature labor, though. 
for the record. (thanks for that, inge.)
so yeah. then we just had so much fun, a week full of fun. and we didn't even wait to get started. having arrived at inge's apartment at 230 am, we promptly sat down and played mario kart for about an hour before heading to bed -- it's so much fun to be sisters when mom isn't there enforce bedtime! :D
the next day we gabbed like sisters. well, we *are* sisters, so there's that. 
and we planned all the fun stuff we wanted to do while we were there. here's what we came up with:
thursday 5/8:
hang out at the house and plan the week
play mario kart and guitar hero III
dinner at whataburger (mmm! it was vacation so i declared the whole darn week to be beef day)
watch the new episode of the office
friday 5/9:
go to the houston space center
dinner at jack-in-the-box for matti's sake since there aren't any in utah
take a ferry ride from galveston to the bolivar peninsula
walk half-way to this cool park (it was tooo far)
take a ferry ride back to galveston
saturday 5/10:
stay home because the baby was upset that we did too much yesterday
play more mario kart, guitar hero, ... and tanks!
pizza from all-star pizza
watch some episodes of firefly (oh my goodness, i love this show!)
sunday 5/11: mother's day!
go to church
take naps
make chicken bundles for dinner (way yummy, inge!)
play games
monday 5/12: inge's birthday!
open birthday presents
play in the gulf of mexico 
get sunburned
play miniature golf
dinner at el toro
eat birthday cake at home
tuesday 5/13: girls day!
watch enchanted
pedicures
facials 
make-up
dinner at brian's texas barbecue (mmm ...)
play parcheesi
swim at the rec center and play on the spiral water slide
wednesday 5/14:
pack/clean up
visit gordon at the sea center texas 
learn that gordo is not a jewfish; he's a grouper
lunch at jack-in-the-box, again for matti's sake since there aren't any in utah
go to the airport
fly home
... thanks, inge & jared -- i had a fabulous time! matti probably did, too. :P
it was so much fun to visit you again.
oh. and i just *had* to take this picture:
my car's name is reginald huntington III.
just before i moved to new york in 2005, my poor little chevy cavalier pedro got totalled in a parking lot accident. so a quick change of plans mandated that i fly -- instead of drive -- to new york and there buy a new car.
i had told the mom of the family who i was going to live with that i would need to buy a car, and she was so sweet to contact her car dealer and let him know what i needed and how much i could pay for it. so the day after i arrived in new york, she drove me up to meet with the car dealer, who had just found a 1997 toyota corolla that would suit me great. so i bought it. and he's been a good car.
finding a name for my corolla was a bit difficult, though. definitely needed to be a boy name, but he's not a very *manly* car: i mean, he's no dodge ram. after a few discussions with my sister inge, we settled on reginald huntington III. (we added the "III" as a sort of family name because the dad of my new york family was named kirby brown III. thought i owed them at least some tribute for putting up with me for almost 10 months.)
so, reginald huntington III. but we call him reggie. and you know that he's a boy because reggie *loves* driving girls around: he bonded with the girls in new york on several road trips to boston and upstate new york, bonded with my new york mom on a trip down the east coast to virginia, bonded with my sister inge on the drive back from new york to utah, and bonded with my mom and inge (a second bonding for her) on the drive from utah down here to l.a. oh, and he's spent plenty of time with my older sister eden and her family, too, with the drive up to utah for Christmas this year.
and reggie's such a good sport. he's been through a lot lately: what with partying late with friends and cleaning up my messes.
so i sent him to a spa -- err, body shop -- for a week, and i am pleased to announce that he just arrived home today and he is so happy:
an accountant's tale.
part of my responsibility here at gt is to represent the firm in our recruiting efforts at fine educational institutions such as byu. and i willingly oblige. last year i made a 10-day trip out of my recruiting assignment. and when a second opportunity arose to wave the grant thornton flag over the hills in provo last month, i tried to pack just as much into that trip.
friday morning, my flight left lax at 715. which meant that i had to be to the flyaway for the 5 o'clock bus ... which meant that i had to wake up by 4. or, 430. because i hit the snooze several times. as usual. especially since i had been up until 230 finishing some stuff for work (this was still in the middle of busy season) and then packing because i prefer to do everything last minute. (i think it sounds better if i say that i "prefer" to do something. don't you agree? makes it sound like i am more in control of my life, huh?)
after sleeping on the bus and then sleeping again on the plane, i was somewhat coherent when i arrived in salt lake. at least enough so that i noted that avis really does try harder.
from there, i drove down to provo and picked up my brother and sister to go out to lunch. we learned that the trunk to my rental car was pretty big:
actually, really pretty big:
yup, that's me *and* my brother *and* all my luggage and computer in there. impressed? i know. i know you are.
we had a quick lunch at wallabys smokehouse in orem (pretty good barbecue) and then dropped matti back off at work. jorgen and i went to his apartment and did his taxes. then i had to be responsible for an hour -- had a conference call for work -- after which i left for fat cat's for the recruiting event ...
... a st. patty's day bowling party! wahoo!
it was pretty fun! i think most of the students that came (and there were so many that came!) were happy to have a laid-back event after some intense midterms. i talked to so many students and quite a few were interested in coming down to socal. which is great news for the firm!
i love recruiting. have i told you that before? i do. it's so much fun. i love just talking to everyone, meeting new people, socializing, etc. it's great.
after the recruiting event, i met my mom and aunt susan kay up in salt lake for dinner. i'd had pizza and cake at the recruiting event, but anyone who knows me at all knows that i can most usually pack down more food whenever presented. (elise ... member that one buffet where we almost killed ourselves by eating so much food because we were trying to stock up before fast sunday?? ha. oh, my stomach still hurts just thinking about it.)
the three of us then spent the night at susan kay's in riverton. (not riverdale, which is near ogden. i can never remember where susan kay lives except that i know that she lives in the river__ city that is *not* near ogden. and i remember that riverdale is near ogden. so she must live in riverton. pronto. yes, it's a round about way to get to that conclusion, but it's the only way i can do it. just thought i would let y'all in on a little bit of the lunacy i have to deal with on a daily basis just by nature of being inside my own head. now be grateful *you* are not inside my head.)
in the morning, we woke up early and packed everything in the car to head up to ogden. we left susan kay's around 830, dropped my rental car off at the airport on the way, and had an easy ride up i-15. once in ogden, the plan was to swoop in and pick up dad and then zip out of town. well ... it was a stretched out swoop and slow zip, if that. everything takes longer when a 
sorensen is involved. and there were 3 of us at this point. so you can just imagine. i think we were on the road by again around noon. (that's susan kay and i -- we made a mcguyver-esque window shade using only notebook paper and post-it flags to remove the sunglare on my computer screen for the drive.)
... 4 hours later ...
we arrive in boise, idaho. i like boise. i love to visit. and on this weekend we were visiting my 
grandmother and all the aunts and uncles on my mom's side because my aunt kathie and uncle joe were preparing to leave on their mission! (they got called to the florida ft. lauderdale mission and left for the mtc on april 7.) before leaving, they wanted to get all the siblings together for a nice dinner, and i'm so happy they let me come crash the party.
sunday morning we had a lazy time with yummy breakfast made by my grandmother, which included grandpa's skillet potatoes. mmm. grandmother then showed me how to crochet an edge on the baby blanket that i have been knitting for inge. (inge ... i really need you to tell me if the baby blanket needs to have some pink on it. like, really.)
anyway, and then kathie and joe came over with yummy homemade chicken soup for lunch. it was nice to see them and spend some more time with them.
then we loaded the car again and started the drive south. we got to ogden around 630, quickly unloaded some things from the car and then got back in the car ... because my flight back to l.a. left at 915 that night. i got back to my house around 1130, and didn't even pause to unpack or anything -- not sure i even changed clothes -- before getting in bed. i was exhausted. it was a fabulous trip, but it wore me out! and the next morning was more busy season.
thinking back about it right now, i'm really not sure how i did that. but i know that i did.
what do you do when the power goes out?
well, when the freezer is full of ice cream and you aren't sure when the power will come back on, i think y'all would do what we did:
make fruit smoothies using a battery-powered hand drill.
it was ingenious!
we jury-rigged the drill: hooked it up, first, to a blender blade to chop the fruit and then to a beater to mix it all up. then we enjoyed our concoction by candle light while playing super munchkins!
okay, so friday night was game night up at my sister eden's. they do it once a month. on the third friday. i know this. i can recite the schedule on command. but ... eden still has to call me every time and say, "hey, it's game night -- are you coming?"
game night is so much fun. it's usually at eden's house. or sometimes we go to other people's houses (don't worry -- eden knows all those people). and the agenda, you ask? well, mostly we play games. and we eat treats. and we play more games. and eat more treats. ... you get it. i'm telling you: so. much. fun.
so yesterday i was at work kinda late (even though busy season is over, whatever), trying to finish some stuff so that next week will not be so hectic, and eden called at about 6:40 to say, "hey, it's game night -- are you coming?" my response: "heck yes i am!" (or something a little less napoleon-esque, but just as excited.)
so i packed things up, drove home to change, and then headed up.
and so i'm driving, right. and i noticed this tube of lotion that i've had in my car since, oh, probably the 29th of november. it's the lotion i got from the pharmacy. my doctor had prescribed it for some really dry skin that i have on one of my fingers. so since i wasn't doing anything else at the moment besides driving, i decided it would be a good opportunity to apply said lotion. (ha ha: when i just typed that word, i actually typed "lotino". that's a fun word to say. say it: "lotino". ha ha. anyway ... )
well, it's been a while since i used the lotion, so the tube was a little clogged with some dried-out lotion. i thought maybe i could squish the lotion out so i squeezed it a little: nope. so i used the pokey end of the cap to poke it a little: still nope. i massaged most of the lotion up to the top of the tube. still couldn't get it out.
but when i stopped at the next stop light, i decided to just give it all i had -- it *had* to come out, right?
and ... umm ... i got it.
yeah.
i reeeally got it: all over my freakin' car!
yeah. i squeezed the tube with my muscles and the dried-up lotion that was clogging the tube shot straight up! followed by about half the tube of lotion! it was everywhere: on the ceiling, on the sun visor, on the window, on the windshield, on the dashboard, on the steering wheel, on the radio, on the gear shifter, on the arm rest, on the other arm rest .. and on me: on my head, on my hair, on my face, on my arms, on my shirt, on my pants ... and on my finger, which was fortunate since that was precisely where i wanted to put the lotion anyway. hmm. so that's good, right?
oh -- and additionally: it had been a hot day, so the lotion was rather melted and runny. so not only was it all over everything, but it was now dripping off of everything and getting on *more* everything. oh my goodness.
it was the funniest thing ever! i laughed and laughed and laughed. and i looked around to see if anyone else was perchance enjoying this spectacle. nope. no one. not a single person. not anyone. which is why i really wish you were there. really.
then i laughed some more, pulled out my handy wet wipes, and started cleaning up my mess. seriously: it was everywhere.
13 hours in the car. google says that the drive from l.a. to ogden, ut, should take 11 hours. but google doesn't know that we had a 1½-year-old in the car. so it took longer. but he is a really cute 1½-year-old. see?
who wouldn't want to be stuck in a car for 13 hours with this cute kid? really.
so, eden, clint, and i packed the boy into the car at 7am on december 22. the drive wasn't too bad -- one person drove, one person kept the driver awake, and the third person entertained the boy. and we rotated responsibilities. it worked out great.
we arrived at my parents' house at 7pm. after a long day, all we had energy for was a birthday dinner and then headed off to bed. (my dad gave me a box *full* of dark chocolate -- now, that's love!)
the next morning was church. it was so much fun to go to church with almost my whole family -- it's been a while. we took up two pews! well, the short side pews, but still. haven't done that in a while.
monday was Christmas eve (as you know), so we set out in the mid-morning to finish up some last-minute shopping. and then the afternoon and evening were spent wrapping, making other preparations, and playing games.
oh my goodness, we played so many games during the whole week. it was *fab*-u-lous. i loved it. these are most of the games we played (i think):
mystery of the abbey
shadows over camelot
ticket to ride: märklin
bang! (with dodge city and high noon expansions)
citadels
incan gold
monopoly express
speed scrabble
mario & sonic olympics
raving rabbids 1 and 2
cars
mater-national
after opening presents on Christmas, we played more games. then the next day we played more games. and more games the next day. it was perfect. (which, by the way, if anyone out there wants an opinion on any games, let me know. if i can't answer myself, i know my sister or brother-in-law could certainly help you out. they are game gurus.)
friday i finally broke free from the house and went to see my friend amy in bountiful. i love visiting her! we went to a park up near her apartment and took some pictures in the snow (so that all my so-cal friends can really see what a white Christmas was all about). then we went back to her apartment for hot chocolate and chit-chatting. she is so much fun and i just love seeing her whenever i get to utah.
that night we watched stardust with my whole family. it was so much fun to share that with them! i still am absolutely in love with that movie.
the next morning we got up, packed the car, and headed back to l.a. yes, another 13 hours. we got to l.a. pretty late that evening. overall, it was a fun trip. i'm glad we got to go and that eden & clint could come for Christmas this year.
spent the day driving from l.a. to ogden, utah, with my sister, her husband, and their 1½-year-old, where we had yummy spaghetti birthday dinner, sang happy birthday, and opened presents. then slept. :)
