On the road again... just cant wait to get on the road again....

Sorry gang, no picture for this one.

I made it to my little brother's house safely with only one minor miscalculation. And it only added half an hour onto my trip. I took the mapquest route, which was my first mistake. I should have gone with my gut instinct and taken 27 to 96 to 275. But no... I had to take 23. And 23 branches off into a bi gillion different routes that I could maybe get to where I want to go to on.

Where 75 branches off towards Detroit and the sign for 23 says Ann Arbor is where I made my snafu. In my little brain I thought, "Hey, Detroit... I'm headed to Detroit....." But in reality, it should have been screaming... "You haven't gone the right number of miles to get to your next step... Keep going where you're going." So, I had to pull a loop and conquer. In "Downtown" Downtown Flint no less. My sporty little escort with its front bumper taped on fit in surprisingly well there. Everyone should be proud of me! I pulled out my Rand McNalley and found my way to Jon's (my brother) house all by myself.

We met up with a couple of his friends, (All of whom are really nice) and went out to PF Chang's for dinner. They have a Gluten Free menu, so I can order like a big girl and actually get something off of it without having to special order. A nice treat; to be able to be like everyone else just for a little while. And the food was good too. (Though the fortune in the fortune cookie left a little to be desired.) Then we came back to Jon's apartment and talked and listened to music. A perfect ending for a somewhat stressful week.

Well gang, Its time for me to turn back into a pumpkin. We'll be up and out the door early to get the best deals on our shopping extravaganza tomorrow morning. If you're good, I might even post a picture of me in one of the new outfits in tomorrows blog. See ya tomorrow.

Loop and conquer!

Ok, I'll admit it. I'm terrible with directions. I get lost going in a straight line. I need maps in triplicate if I'm going to go anywhere.

My lack of directional skills is legendary. Just ask my any of my friends about the purple Mexican restaurant. I have a general idea of where things are, it's just the fine print that throws me. God forbid there's road construction... Then I'll never get there.

I've come up with a system for getting to places though. I call it "loop and conquer!" I get in the general vicinity of the place I want to go, then I drive around in circles until I find where I need to be. I basically loop until I conquer the location.

I've tried for years to improve on my direction comprehension. I've gotten to the point where I can tell East from West and North from South. Especially at sun rises and sunsets.. Since the sun rises in the East and sets in the West. Dad taught me that North is always to the right of West. (To help during hunting season... The swine deer are headed North, coming from the West..) I set landmarks on maps to help me find places. Like anything on the same side of the state as Grand Rapids is west of where I am and anything one the same side of the state as Detroit is east. Anything headed towards Traverse City is North and anything below where I live is South.

I could really use one of those Tom Tom portable GPS car navigation system thingies. Something that will tell me "Turn left here," "Go 75 miles north," and "You have reached your destination." Either that, or I need to find a rich boyfriend who has a limo that can drive me around. (I'd settle for a bus driver or a cabbie, just kidding...)

Tomorrow I am headed South East to visit my brother and go shopping in the Detroit area. Then I'll head North West to my parents house to water their plants and bring in their mail while they are in Chicago for the weekend. If I'm not back by Monday, send out the search parties. It means I'm driving in circles lost somewhere.

Fortune

Your Fortune: "Your wish is about to come true... "

The best part about eating Chinese food is the fortune cookie. Because of my food allergies, I can't eat either the food or the cookie, but that doesn't stop me from getting my fortune. The only dish that I can get is the chicken and vegtables at the Hunan's resturant. (They use a white sauce instead of a soy sauce.)

I don't believe in horoscopes or that type of thing, but they do provide some mindless entertainment. Something that everyone needs from time to time. If the fortune is good, I'll add it to the collection that I carry around in my wallet. The running joke with my friends is that you add "In Bed" at the end of each fortune. Childish, but it makes us laugh. I've personally had ones like "You will be a contest winner.. In bed," "There are big changes for you but you will be happy.. in bed," and "The day only gets better... in bed."

Why am I writing about fortune cookies? Because I don't have anything else of real interest to talk about tonight. I got farmed out to another office today because their secretary is off on medical leave. So, Nothing interesting happened at work. I ran errands after work, went to the tanner, and exercised. I'm so ready for it to be the weekend. I'll see ya'll tomorrow.

Are we there yet?

Are we there yet? Is it Friday yet?

Well, today was every bit as nightmarish as I expected it to be. While having a 3 day weekend was nice, The backlash from it at work hit with a vengeance today. All 3 phones had both lines ringing off the hook, the printer never stopped spewing out orders from the floors, and the whirlpool was double booked. Everyone was running around like chicken with their heads cut off. It seemed like for every step forward that I took, I took 3 backwards with everything I attempted to do. Then for added fun, I had to run to the dentist (an hour away from where I live) after work for a shade check (I'm having my teeth whitened.) One of my old fillings is falling out and needs to be replaced. Fun... Fun.. Fun! All while picking up donations for the auction that I am volunteering with.

While today was awful, it was made bearable by the knowledge that the weekend is coming back soon. And the upcoming one is going to be a fun one for me. I'm going on a shopping extravaganza. As I've mentioned in previous blogs, I've been on a diet for the last 8 months and am going on vacation next week. So, I need new clothes in a big way. I'm going to spend the weekend shopping and spending time with my little brother. He lives in the Detroit area. I've squirrelled away my tax return and any extra cash so the sky is the limit. With my new clothes, my freshly whitened teeth, my new thinner physique, and my freshly highlighted hair, ya'll won't recognize me.

Well gang, It's time for me to hit the showers and then go to bed. Tomorrow is going to be as busy as today was and I need to be prepared.

Cha Cha Cha!

(Insert Salsa Music Here!)

Today was salsa day at mom's house. It brings a spicy end to the canning season. So far we've done sweet pickles, strawberry jam, and cherry jam. (Michigan is known for its cherries.) There's a slight possibility that mom will mix up some raspberry jam later if she has time, but for all intents an purposes we're done with the canning season.

The day started innocently enough. Mom started preparing our home grown tomatoes (plus a few from the local farmers market) and set to work on our secret salsa recipe. Dad and I ran to the store on a quest for the peppers. The kind we had were to "hot" for those of us with sensitive digestive systems. We also had to get our hunting licences so we rode together to save on gas. The plan was to get the licences, then grab the peppers and make a run for the border..aka, Salsa Central.

Our first stop put us at Meijers. After hunting down a clerk (who was caught smooching his lady friend,) we got our licences and wandered over to the vast produce aisle. Strike one, they had every type of chili pepper known to man EXCEPT the one we were looking for. Ok, we can handle this. There's another store close by, we'll just run in and grab some there. Strike 2, the only kind of peppers that Ric's grocery store has are bell peppers. While we want our salsa mild, we do want a little "bite" to it. On the road again we go. By now we've been gone for over an hour on an errand that should have taken half an hour. We'll stop at Wal-Mart because they have just about everything and it's on the way home. Guess what, Strike 3. We're out. Apparently banana peppers are REALLY popular because there isn't one in the entire city. After a quick check of the recipe we settled on some yellow bell peppers (for the yellow color) and some Poblano peppers for the bite.

Mom had gotten a new mixer with a chopper attachment and had everything all chopped and ready to go while Dad and I were gone. The tomato mixture was bubbling away on the stove top. This is the part I like best. Adding and tweaking the ingredients like some high school biology experiment. A little garlic here, a little more pepper there... let simmer for a while and Voila, Salsa!

Besides being chief taster, my job while the salsa was cooking was to make sure that the jars were clean and ready to use. Mom and I set up out assembly line and we were off. (Dad had gone onto another job at that point.) Mom ladled the hot salsa mixture into the jars and I put the lids and seals on each one. Then it was time to place the jars back into the boiling water to finish the process. All that work for 23 jars of salsa. We had 24, but one of the jars broke. So we had one casualty for a full days work.

Well gang, It's time for this little chili pepper's siesta. I'm dreading going into work tomorrow after having a long weekend. Who knows what havoc's been wreaked by the weekend crew while I was away. I'll see you tomorrow. Olé!

The call of the wild.

Today I spent the day in the woods. Making sure that the area I am going to be hunting is ready for the upcoming whitetail season. (2 months from now.) My dad, older brother, and myself drove out and did the preliminary look see at the 80 acres that we rent for hunting. Our hunting party (dad, brother, sister in law, uncle and myself) have our favorite spots that we hunt from. Dad takes the front corner, Bill the back corner, Uncle Dave the pines in the middle, Hilary takes the pines in the back corner, and I take the stilt blind in the middle to the west of Dave's pines.

We've even given some of the blinds (our home away from homes) names. Hilary is in the "Primal Place." I'm in the "Push" blind. It's called the push blind because my brother tried to open the door by pulling the door out towards him. Nearly pulling the entire side off. Then when he went to climb back down the ladder he leaned on the door and fell fight through the door which had to be pushed to open. Bill's in the "Tree house" There's also the"Ring of fire."

We cleared the fire lanes of the branches that had sprouted up since last season. The guy who owns the property had gone around with a brush hog last weekend, so there wasn't that much we had to trim down. He added a couple of firring lanes for me which will be nice. Shooting from my blind was like firring through tapioca pudding. Any which way you went you hit something. But, I've taken 2 smaller bucks from that spot, so I'm not complaining. All that's left is to replace the floor and some of the tar paper on the sides of my blind and I'm ready to go.

Last season we got a total of 6 deer between us. My sister in law filled her combo tag the first day. It was her first time hunting. Beginners luck! It took me 5 years to get my first one. Dad got a large doe, Bill got a medium sized doe, I got a small buck to finish out our time hunting. (Uncle Dave couldn't go last year.) We only shoot what we can eat, so when we had all gotten one we hung up our rifles.

This coming season we are going to be giving out awards for the biggest and smallest deer. The "Brown boot" award will go to the hunter with the largest deer and the 2nd place weenie goes to the hunter with the smallest animal. The brown boot comes from the "lucky" brown boots that my sister in law had worn in the woods. And the 2nd place weenie comes from a trophy of a hot dog that mom and I found at a garage sale this summer.

I can't wait for all the new deer camp stories. Last seasons will be tough to top.