Old Friends

Looking back to the carefree days in high school, I find my eyes glistening over with love from our high-spirits, love of life, idealism and possibilities of the future; the future which seemed so far away and so full of limitless dreams. There was some drama in high school as there is in all aspects in life, no matter how much we attempt to avoid it, but my romanticized notion of what life was like without the boulders of the failures, is not over-exaggerated at least in my mind. I preferred my mind and heart, open, and trusting, to one that is more cautious and jaded.

I saw some old good friends from my past a few days past, and our meeting reminded me why we became friends in the first place. Laughter was overriding as we sipped on raspberry tea. Hope and affection were surly ingredients in the leek, chili and potato soup as it seeped out of our pores.

Kyle and I have met a good many different people through our travels, tribulations, and experiences, some keep in touch, while others fade into the blue hue of yesterday. But each time I meet with good friends from my past, from those times of naivety and light-heartedness, I am reminded of my former self, one less self-conscious, one less caught up in the tediousness of life and I wish that I could somehow transport myself to those untainted emotions. I wish I could remember daily that 26 is not old and that I still have my entire life ahead of me. I assumed, credulously, that by 26 my life would be sorted out, that each piece of the puzzle would at least start fitting together. I supposed, ignorantly that I would at least have the border in place, but instead, I don't even think that I have all of the puzzle pieces on the table, and sometimes, I am not sure there aren't more than one puzzle involved in this game. Am I to incorporate these pieces and design my own masterpiece, or should I sort out the unfamiliar pieces and work with the what I ascertain is the correct, original puzzle? It is all so confusing, living life without a manual, without instructions. Many people are given outlines, I threw mine out a while ago by choice, but now I feel that I am wandering lost without a charted map. And I find myself wondering if I shouldn't have kept it, that outline, just as a reference or if it is better what we have chosen. Only time will tell however, if those decisions will create the masterpiece we had in mind. We have endeavored to live life on the clished moto of "live life to the fullest" which is more fulfilling that living by the book, yet as we have quickly discovered, it is not quite as simple and as there are higher mountains with this lifestyle, so are there deeper valleys.

I must look upwards however because I no longer want to nuzzle next to the jagged rocks. Here is to climbing our mountain! Here is to soaring above and beyond what we believed possible. Here is to blindly believing that life always works out in the end. Cheers to my past to my friends, idealism, naivety and joviality , cheers to the present and taking pleasure in the small things and remembering to be appreciative of our blessings, and cheers to our unknown future, where ever it may take us, may it bring us joy and send us soaring!

The mind, once stretched by a new idea, never regains its original dimensions ~ Oliver Wendell

(Does this quote fit at all here? A friend sent it to me and I wanted to use it, so I just kind of shoved it in this puzzle as I feel like I do with many of those loose odd-fitting pieces)

Shara and Mike (now living in Arkansas), Kyle, me (living here and there) and Andrea (in corpus). It's funny how non of us girls have the same last name as we did at the beginning of our friendship.

Visiting with Andrea and her hubby and adorable baby boy in Corpus.

My lovely Shara :)

Hallelujah, it rained!

It was automatic
Systematic
Hydromatic
Why there was great Lightning (last night!)

It was positively electrifying!

Ok so I switched around the lyrics a bit to try and fit what I was trying to say, and although it makes no sense, it made me laugh so I ain't changing. In fact, I am listening to John Travolta sing Grease Lightening as I write this post. That was the best musical ever made- cheesiest, but the best!

But I digress... the point of this was to sing hallelujah to the electric band of hard metal angels that rocked out last night like there was no tomorrow. And man, did they have a spectacular light show. There were times the entire Texas sky was alight in that illuminating white light that can either mean 1)you are on your way out to the great golden gates in the sky so gather your belongings 2) or there is a Texas thunderstorm overhead. A flash in one corner, and then in another, followed by some punk percussion playing angel pounding his heart out. I can just imagine a chorus of angels dressed head to toe in black, classic gothic style, dark sunglasses hiding clear eyes of one, a tatoo of Jesus on the hairy chest of another, while yet another has a hot pink neon halo adorning his head, all playing the largest set of drums imaginable sitting atop a dark ominous cumulonimbus cloud. While a classier angel, dressed in the classical style of an orchestra conductor complete with the tuxedo tails, throws his hands up in the air, back and forth, to the left, softer now, harder now, leading this band of angels in the magnificent thunderstorm that was last night. It was quite the show, a short one, but an amazing delectation for all it's guests, all that aren't afraid of a little thunder and lightening that is. The combination of lights, music and that magical life source, water, pouring from the heavens, pounding on every vulnerable naked surface was nothing short of genius. I, along with most of central Texas probably would have payed to see the show, but as it turned out, it was free. Maybe not exactly free as it has been about a year without significant rain in San Antonio, and we are in a pretty severe drought but I didn't spend any of the green paper I keep tucked away in the banks or under a cushion in my living room but I'm not telling you ;) . The rain last night, may not have solved our water issues, but the plants today are smiling into the sun rather than their typical saturnine disposition, curled in on themselves looking sullen and gloomy. Today is going to be a majestic and glorious day now that the angels have blessed us.

Realy!? Kitty wigs?

Has it really come to this? Is our world really so superficial? I would call myself an optimistic person, one who tries to see the best in all humans, but I am having a hard time fathoming a grown woman, or man for that matter seriously purchasing something so silly as a wig for a cat. I admit, that as I child, I enjoyed dressing up my cats, when they weren't wildly batting at me, claws unleashed, but I have outgrown my fanciful days of dress up the poor kitty cat after the age of 7 years. Some adults, nah, many adults according to Chronicle books are going purrcrazy for these silly over priced CAT WIGS!! How is it, that there is a market for something so ridiculous and so ludicrous!

The Kitty Wig craze—sprung from the feverish imagination of Julie Jackson and her purring partner in crime—has swept the globe. Glamourpuss presents 60 stylish portraits showcasing furry models in the most fetching custom-made cat wigs ever created.

You have to see their marketing- you will not believe this. Under each $50 wig, it tells of how it will make your cat feel:

SILVER FOX

Silver is all about sophistication. Indoors or out, this wig takes Shaft to a special place -- where everything is sleek and svelte, young and foxy.

Silver makes your kitty feel sexy and smart, like a cougar on the prowl.

(Exactly my thoughts, this cat already looks more like a cougar on the prowl!)

PINK PASSION

Pink is the color of fantasy. Our model, Chicken, looks like her mind is elsewhere when she wears this wig -- somewhere in a land of cotton candy and pinwheels where the air smells like sugar kisses.

Pink makes your kitty feel elegant, modern and quintessentially feline.

( I didn't know that modern cats were lacking the quintessential feline feeling! I am so glad that there is a pink wig to help them feel like a real cat again!)

ELECTRIC BLUE

Blue is edgy and electric. In this wig, Chicken sports some serrrrious attitude: she’s thinking saxophones, smoke and snapping fingers.

Blue gives your kitty a sharp look -- jazzy and totally copacetic.

( Snapping fingers eh? Can cat snap their claws? In case you didn't know, copacetic is a rarely used word, especially outside N. America to mean excellent, fine, going just right. I am pretty sure this cat's feeling about this dress up game is quite the opposite however. "When can I stop playing this stupid game and go chase that butterfly out the window" is probably what this cat is thinking)

No QT! No matter how much you beg nor grovel nor give my leg unwanted love bites, I am not giving in to those pleading eyes! I know you want one of those wigs, that you feel incomplete without it, but you will not find your feline-ness in a wig, only within no matter what the advertisement says.

Alright, alright, electric blue it is. How can I say no to you! Plus you do have polydactyl toes (five toes) so maybe you can learn how to snap.

How many of me are there?

"What is in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet." (Who can name that quote?)

When I married my love-a-dub husband, one of the many things we discussed was the changing of our last name. In English speaking cultures it is a societal norm to change one's last name to that of the husband's. Ironically, when we lived in Chile, a very macho-oriented culture, this was not the tradition. Rather, the children take both the mother and the father's last name. But the end by-product results very much the same. The mother's last name eventually is dropped when it is given to the next generation, as in our culture.

Can you imagine what their names would be like if they took each surname of both their mother and father, grandparents, great parents and so on. It would be like reading the first few pages of the Bible everyday; this is John Mike Smith, Johnson, Rogers, Baker, Pain, Peters, Torres, son of Cain..... Somewhere the chaos has to end, and someone's name has to make the cut or else insanity would ensue.

It was interesting when we would introduce ourselves as Kyle and Vanessa Rogers. A bewildered look would squirm across their faces. Despite the number of American movies brought to their country either through legitimate means or pirating, I gather that they still didn't make the connection as to how the transferring of last name works traditionally in the U.S.. We were often asked if we weren't brother and sister nearly everytime, and we would have to explain, "No, in the U.S. traditionally the wife takes the husbands last name." The response to this was often, "how machisto. How sexist" in a condescending manner, the irony blatantly oblivious to the founders of the machisto society.

But they have a point, it's true, our tradition of dropping the maiden name can be considered sexist as in our history it demonstrated the transferring from the father's control to the husband's control. Additionally, it implies that the woman has no surname of her own and her name is merely a reflection of her relationship to men.

Kyle and I discussed our options when planning our marriage. We could leave our names as is, but the problem with that is the lack of unity in the family unit. Eventually, we would like children, and felt it was important that our last names represented that we were a family. So the discussion continued to other options, taking my last name, hyphenating our last names, even creating a new last name out of our current names. Brogers was the most popular of our creative options. In the end, we went with the traditional method, and I changed my last name. The switch was both wistful and a joyous occasion all tied together in a messy ball of confusing and expensive paperwork. My maiden name had been mine, had represented me throughout my entire existence and now symbolized a past self, a pre-marriage self. In some ways it was hard to leave behind the name that in some way had helped to mold me into who I was, but in another, I was illustrating to the world that I was permanently attached to the man I loved and we were then and forever more family.

I mention this now because I recently came across a website called How many of me, which tells you how many people in the USA have your same name. There are a total of 21 people with Vanessa as their first name and my maiden last name as their last, however my current last name, which is by far the more widely used, has 186 of us roaming around the US of A. These statistics made me feel a uninspiring, and unoriginal. It also got me to thinking; who would I be today had I had a totally different name. Would a rose really smell so sweet if it had a different name. What if a rose was called gerg or scat, something that didn't roll off the tongue so sweetly. Would the disgust in our mouth from creating the unpleasant sound taint our image of the rose? How important is a name? Do people see me differently now that I have changed my last name? How many of you are in this world. How does that make you feel? How has your name shaped your life if at all?

The Visitors

Texas, the lonestar state, is known for many things, it's big beautiful blue sky, the perpetual and sometimes unmanageable heat, it's size, not only the mere size of the state but the largeness of the people as well (we have three of the fattest cities in the USA), and it's wildlife. The other night we were visited by some very unconventionally beautiful guests. Some in fact might even consider these creatures of the night to be frightfully repelling, especially when they literally walk out of their skin to leave their outer shell hanging like a deserted evening gown hung on the side of a house. Yes, I am talking about ghosts! No, no, no, I kid, I kid. I am speaking of the lovely cicadas that serenade our summer evenings with a orchestrated high-pitched roar which efectively drowns out any other evening noise. If you are unfamiliar with their songs, you can click here: The songs of cicadas





This little bugger was hanging out on the brick outside the front door, a dangerous place for a bug considering the prowling habits of QT, the magnificent cat. However, this particular evening, he was not alone, he had brought along a friend of note, a dragonfly. When we float down the river, a common activity in the unrelenting Texas heat, we often are visited by pairs of dragonflies taking a rest from their manic mating, landing on our shoulders or heads. They are not an uncommon critter. However, this particular one, was quite extraordinary, and in fact, I have never seen it's equal. Because of her remarkable coloring, she will hence forth be called she because if it is a male, he may be confused about his sexuality, wearing pink and purple as his primary colors. And yes you read correctly, pink and purple. Every dragonfly I have ever come across in my life have had green and blue coloring, but this astonishing flying animal was colored to go out on the town and paint the town red, or pink and purple in her case. How wonderful nature is to have such astounding creatures. Nature is something that I have always loved, respected and feared equally. It never ceases to astound me. What is it about nature where you live do you love?



An old post from our Italy blog about critters. It's fun! Go down a few posts to check it out. There are some funny old photos there.

Show us your world!

Lions and tigers and bears OH MY!

I mentioned a few posts back about our trip to the zoo. You may recall it as the poop conversation by the mom and daughter standing next to us so embarked upon because of the zebra pooping that spurred Kyle to tell perfect strangers that I, Vanessa, his lovely wife also poops. I know, I know ladies, calm yourselves. Keep the fighting over such a stellar spouse to a minimum. I was afraid to even release said information, in fear that total pandemonium would ensue due to sheer jealousy over the envy invoking male specimen I have scored. Hair pulling, and eye gouging will not be acceptable means in which to fight for him. And please pack away the killer nails. I must admit that he is amazingly charming like that, telling a five year old and her mother that I have bowel movement with the rest of them, but no matter how much you try to bribe me, I won't give him up. (Although , I might recommend checking Ebay from time to time )

The San Antonio Zoo is a pretty awesome zoo, especially for animal lovers like ourselves. Surprisingly, despite the overbearing 100 + heat, we were not TOO hot. The ancient, gargantuan oak trees provided a substantial amount of shade. It is amazing, how much difference trees can make.

One of the more interesting things we saw- and I am not sure if this makes us perverts- but two Galapagos Tortoises mating or at least attempting. We noticed only because of the strange and loud grunting noises coming from their open concrete enclosure. It is a dangerous chore for these animals since they have such huge shells that can be broken in the process. That is why the two Galapagos tortoises at Disney were kept separate. Poor George, the male who repeatedly broke the females shell, had to resort to befriending a log in his loneliness, which often confused the guests at Disney who often thought he was just stuck and couldn't remove himself from it.

We took along our camera for the ride, and I thought I would share some of our eventful day with you.

Kyle and five year old Bryce, Amanda's little brother posing in the kind of lame photo shoots. I think Kyle might be trying to eat the photo. Poor boy is probably hungry.

Whoa, who is that beautiful butterfly?

Well hello...
Mr. Hippo, hello mr. hippo, you surely are a big fella aren't you! How much water is displaced so that you can float?


"I thought Africa was hot, but man Texas, you sure are trying to compete. I don't plan on getting out of my pool all day long!"

"I'm tired of jumping. It's time for my nap"

"Are you talking to me, Are YOU talking to ME? That is what I thought!"
"I see you. That's right, I am looking right at you. yum yum"

One of the highlights of the trip was watching the spider monkeys being fed their afternoon snack. But just like humans if they don't use their brains they loose them so they were encouraged to work for their food. Each bottle had ice and nuts inside and it was stuffed with a decorated paper skillfully completed by each of the kids watching. The monkeys were sure that the treats were in the paper, and when they couldn't find them they threw the bottles on the ground. They didn't like the ice, which we found odd, since it was so darn hot outside.

"Food, food, where are you, are you in here?"

"Who needs a reclining chair when you have a tree limb."

"I could hang around all day."

Look how adorable they were!! So ADORABLE. The zoo wouldn't let me take one home for a pet though, something about wild animals... stupid rules! :)

Crazy DIET tips!!

I just finished watching an episode of Oprah, a show I have a lot of respect for, and which I sadly haven't watched in years. Today, however they were talking about child obesity and American diets. I love learning about health. I am a health fiend you might say. Any article I see about health, I typically will devour; one because I strive really hard to lead a healthy life, and two, health experts are always discovering new and surprising facts about what is healthy and what isn't. Sometimes I feel like I care so much about my body because it is one of the small things I can actually feel I have some control over in this chaotic world of ours when so many of the things we plan don't work out in the way we had hoped.

As an adolescent, I was awkward and overweight as many are. Not obese in any way but I had some extra and unwanted pudge. I think most adolescents hate how they look, and honestly I don't blame them; their bodies are so out of whack, they aren't kids any more, but they aren't adults and their bodies and minds are just as confused.

At twelve, I started to pay attention to labels, mostly fat content. I never really counted calories, but if something had anything higher than a 7g fat content, I wouldn't eat it. I would always choose the fat free items.

Over time, along with the rest of America, I have started to avoid fad diets and began learning more healthy ways to eat, by choosing more holistic foods; foods that come from the ground, or from nature rather than a box or processed until it has no resemblance to REAL food. I also learned that our bodies actually NEED fat! Good fats mind you and probably not as much as the Big Mac has to offer but still, some good fat, in good amounts is....good!

Oprah's guest speakers were the editor of Men's Health, and the author of Eat this not that.

The audience was given a quiz of foods that they should choose over the other. One of the more surprising things they listed was pork bacon vs. turkey bacon. Obviously there are many different brands out there, but the consensus seems to be that because the sodium levels of turkey bacon is so much higher, pork bacon is actually the healthier choice. Another surprising choice was a multi-grain bagel with low fat cream cheese vs. a glazed doughnut.

vs.

Answer: glazed donghnut.
Why: Multi-grain is deceiving, just because it has many different grains does not mean that they are whole grains. It needs to say multi-whole grain. And the amount of carbs and calories in a bagel are astounding!

Wait what!!? Why have I avoided doughnuts for all of my life!!? Hand them over!

The website even has a game which is astoundingly enlightening! Play it! Really, it is lots of fun to get so many answers wrong!!
The worst thing I found out while taking this quiz was the caloric intake of any of Schlotzsky's sandwhiches, which are some of my favorite but I may never be able to eat one again :(

Our health is something that we should all value, because without our health, we don't have anything. Love yourself enough and choose to make good choices. Sometimes it's difficult when there is an open bag of M&Ms in the kitchen and you have a choice between fruit or chocolate. I know I don't always make the correct choice because it is hard, but the right choices in life are most of the time not easy. I'm not preaching here, I just found this program extremely interesting, surprising and informative and I wanted to share with all of those who also are health conscious.

Trip to the coast AGAIN??

This past weekend we packed our things away using HEB (our local grocery) canvas bags instead of actual luggage into our tiny itsy bitsy Corolla without a working radio and drove the 3 hour drive to Padre Island to celebrate the Father-in-laws birthday. I am telling you- we are so classy with our grocery luggage bags and gheoto-licious car, it is hard to beleive we aren't on one of those trashy reality shows!

It was a shorter trip than usual but as we had a DUMP (it's a cajun styled dish with red potatoes, shrimp, corn on the cob and sausage DUMPED on the table for finger-licking fun) and a delicious cooking light carrot birthday cake, we branded it a successful trip! It's all about the food- Why is it that I am always thinking of food!! Sometimes I think about writing sonnets to food expressing my love and devotion.

Right before we were to leave to go back, we were graced with the presence of a blue heron in the figurative backyard. Kyle's grandparents live on a canal so the "backyard" is actually a series of several decks. The beautiful snake-necked bird with the grace of a ballerina landed on the deck and preceded to stare into the abyss. We tip-toed around the deck taking pictures of the gorgeous oddity standing only a few feet from us. At one point when Kyle was inside looking for the camera, the bird turned his head eerily to what looked to be nearly 45 degrees to stare right in my direction. It was unclear whether he was actually looking at me or in my direction, but regardless of the truth, I felt that his calm stare was fixedly on my person, almost like he was communicating through his eyes that he was aware of my presence. The camera fogged up as soon as we began taking his photo as the humidity never ceases to lower below 90 percent. (We even went for a short run around 12:30 am and it was like breathing wet air. I was a little afraid of drowning)

You can see how foggy the lens was here.

He/she was so beautiful and elegant. Oh how I wish I possessed either one of those qualities!!

A beautiful end to our celebration trip!

And for those bakers out there, I thought I would provide you with this delicious recipe. It is certainly scrumptious and has two unusual ingredients: ground up oats and carrot baby food (to cut the amount of oil used)

I would also recommend doubling the recipe as it produces a rather small cake otherwise.

Carrot Cake with Toasted Coconut Cream Cheese Frosting

Ingredients

• Cake:
• 3/4 cup all-purpose flour (about 3 1/3 ounces)
• 1/4 cup quick-cooking oats
• 1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 1/4 cup canola oil
• 1 (2 1/2-ounce) jar carrot baby food
• 2 large eggs, lightly beaten
• 1 1/4 cups finely grated carrot (about 4 ounces)
• 1/2 cup golden raisins
• Cooking spray
• 
  Frosting:
• 1/3 cup (3 ounces) 1/3-less-fat cream cheese, softened
• 1 tablespoon butter, softened
• 1 1/4 cups powdered sugar, sifted
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/4 cup flaked sweetened coconut, toasted

Preparation

Preheat oven to 325°.

To prepare cake, lightly spoon flour into dry measuring cups; level with a knife. Combine flour and next 5 ingredients (through salt) in a food processor; pulse 6 times or until well blended. Place flour mixture in a large bowl. Combine granulated sugar, canola oil, baby food, and eggs; stir with a whisk. Add to flour mixture; stir just until moist. Stir in grated carrot and raisins. Spoon batter into an 8-inch square baking pan coated with cooking spray.

Bake at 325° for 40 minutes or until a wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool in pan on a wire rack.

To prepare frosting, combine cheese and butter in a large bowl. Beat with a mixer at high speed until creamy. Gradually add powdered sugar and vanilla, beating at low speed until smooth (do not overbeat). Spread over cake; sprinkle with coconut. Cover and chill.

Amp it up!

So we are on a diet...

I gained 5 pounds when I got home....

yeah, not happy about that.

And Kyle, well, he is always unhappy about his weight so we decided to take drastic measures and don don don go on a REAL diet. It's not that serious of a diet, just cutting back strictly on carb in take by eating mostly veggies, meats and fruits and only eating a few carbs a day, mostly with oatmeal and those new whole wheat gold fish, yummy. This is not a permanent diet, it is only till we get at our desired weights. Plus with the help of Billy Blanks and his new amplifier which works your core, back and arms, we are turning our slushy bodies into stone. However, the amplifier set that Kyle purshased only came with ONE amplifying bar. And as you can see there are TWO of us. That caused a bit of a problem. I mean, we share well, we eat off the same plate, drink out of the same glass, I sometimes borrow his t-shirts to sleep in, but we can't use the same amplifier at the exact same moment in time...

... that is until Steven Hawkings figures out how to warp the time/space continuum.


So we put our creative minds together, literally, we bumped heads, and it hurt... and came up with a cheaper solution than simply buying another amplifier for $15 (I know I know, we are cheap, but we are also poor). We made our own amp bar with pcv pipe, sand +water inside and ankle weights at the ends. The Billy Blanks amp weighs 3 lbs which when working out is plenty. But since Kyle is a boy... oh sorry, I mean MAN (really he is a five year old boy trapped in a big boys body) he wanted his to weigh more. I don't know to prove his manliness.

Here Kyle is looking sweaty after our work out.

I know, I know, we are geniuses. We pat ourselves on the back several times for this achievement, and so far it works great. The only problem is that there are no sweat bands on our version like on the Taebo version. Any ideas anyone?

Look at that strong boy, ahem, I mean MAN. He is looking buffer already!

AND... we found a new recipe that we think all who are trying to be healthy and also eat more blueberries for their antioxidants will like. We really liked it.

We found this recipe in SELF magazine. But we only used half a pint of blueberries rather than the full pint because we thought it was too much and we would not recommend seeding your jalapeno because it made our salsa rather weak. To strengthen it, because we didn't have anymore jalapenos on hand, we used cayenne pepper and Tabasco sauce and that really seemed to kick it up a notch.

Turkey Roll-ups With Blueberry Salsa

Serves 4

INGREDIENTS

• 1/2 cup reduced-fat mayonnaise
• 2 teaspoons curry powder
• 1 pint blueberries
• 1 jalapeño pepper, seeded and chopped
• 1 kiwifruit, peeled and diced
• Juice of 1 lime
• 1/4 red onion, finely chopped
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 8 butter lettuce leaves
• 4 slices deli turkey

PREPARATION

1. Combine mayonnaise and curry in a bowl. Place blueberries, jalapeño, kiwifruit, lime juice, onion and salt in a bowl; stir to combine. Top each of the lettuce leaves with 1 tbsp mayo mixture, 1/2 slice turkey and 1 tbsp plus 1 1/2 tsp blueberry salsa. Roll up to serve.

The skinny

145 calories per serving, 5.5 g fat (0.1 g saturated), 22.3 g carbs, 3.5 g fiber, 5.4 g protein

Boring

Do you ever feel like your life is too boring to blog. I feel like there should be something to report, but nope, there is just nada in my life right now. In fact this is me. I have turned into a big lazy cat. Soon, there will be news, I feel it in my blood. So for now, I will pressure kyle into writing several posts that I have been wanting him to write for months now, such as The tale of squimo. Read it, it's funny :)

Random lessons I learned this week:

** very random, pointless post, be aware of the absurd randomness**
-don't eat habaneros and serrano peppers for dinner before you go for a run. Fire in the pit of your stomach will ensue. My stomach is currently speaking in passionate tongues.
-Everybody poops! We went to the zoo on Friday with a friend and her five year old brother. While we were admiring the giraffe facing the corner as if he were in time out, Kyle pointed out, rather loudly, that the zebra was pooping. The little girl next to us said, "ewwwwww, yucky" to which her mom responded with, "everybody poops. Lizzy poops, you poop, the zebra poops." Kyle chimed in, "Vanessa poops." even though we had never met these people before.
-This summer's heat is unrelenting, but boy do I love getting in the pool to cool off.
-I love my hubby boy. He makes me happy :)

I warned you these were random tidbits. Almost a worthless post. But I just wanted to make sure you didn't think I had forgotten about you or that you forgot about us :)

How to open a wine bottle without a cork screw

Learning by experience: Oh what fun that can be!

Step 1: Have record heat of 100+ weather for 45 days and the hottest July on record in Austin, Texas EVER recorded!! And although this does not help in the wine opening, it is estimated that the drought in Central Texas is the worst in the entire United States right now. Lake Travis is the lowest it has been since 1963, 27 ft. under capacity.



Step 2: Leave wine bottle unopened in the car for the majority of the day.

Step 3: Put very warm bottle in the freezer to quickly chill.

Step 4: Watch the cork blow straight out of it's socket without any help from humans because of the building pressures caused by the miracle of chemistry which I never fully understood. (Luckily Kyle caught it before it spewed wine all over the freezer. The plastic covering over the cork had been broken and the cork was a half an inch from being completely dislogdged. "Did you open this wine bottle?" Kyle asked looking at me accusingly. "Nope, must've been the freezer gnome." Science surly is AMAZING! You learn something new every day.

The Tale of Squimo

So I'm a turtle. A Kemp's Ridley Turtle to be exact and I'm about...oh 5 months old now, give or take. I look a little something like this


and let me tell ya, life SUCKS right now. It all started the day I was born. I woke up one morning with my head crunched up somewhere near my butt and I thought to myself, "this freakin ping pong ball is totally crampin my style." A turtle's gotta move dude. My bros and sistas were getting the same vibes I was. So there we were, all squirming and fighting and finally, I busted outa that crib and then I was like, "what's up with all the sand?" And someone else was like, "where the heck is mom?" And someone else was like, "What are we supposed to do next?" So then I was like, "well all the noise is coming from up so...dig up?" So then we all start digging and we're making some progress right, so then we're all getting excited cause we're thinking mom is gonna be waiting for us when we finally dig ourselves out but THENNN, I make it out and there's this huge freakin ball of super hot super bright light and I'm like, "OH MAH GAWD! I'M BLINDED!" And mom's no where to be found, and the stinkin sand is burning my flips off, and then I see it! The big blue wet, and somethin just clicks and I'm like, "That's what I'm talkin about!" And so we were all like yep, that's where we gotta go, so we all start runnin right, which by the way is mega hard for us little turts. So anyways, we're like half way there right, and outa no where this big crazy white thing falls outa the sky right next to me so I freeze...and I slowly turn my head to look at it...and it looks at me with these black beady eyes, down it's giant sharp looking mouth and goes, "MINE!?" And I go, "BWAAAAAAAHHHH! RUUUUNNNN!!! And we're all runnin, and these giant white things are snappin at us yelling "MINE!? MINE!?" And I'm huffin and heaving! It was pure chaos man! But then I made it to the wet and I'm like, "ahhhhhhh, that's muuuch better." And don't ask me how but somehow I know how to swim and I'm quick too. So I'm swimmin, and the waves are rollin, and life is good. So for like the next few months I'm just doin mah thang, eatin some seaweed, chillin with what's left of my family, and you know, it's kinda scary cause I'm all small and there's like these big shiny monsters that swim by and eat a cousin or a sister every now and then but I'm fast and I'm good at hiding so it's cool and life is pretty legit. Then, one day, I'm swimmin along, goin with the flow and I see this tasty lookin morsel crawling along the sand about, I dunno 10, maybe 12 fins below me, so I look around and the coast is clear so I start workin my way down. I snap up the little booger and I'm takin my time, savoring my little mid afternoon snack when suddenly it get's all dark all of the sudden, and I'll be honest I think I peed a little, cause I turned around and all I see is teeth, HUGE, WHITE, TEETH! So then I was like, "BWAAAAAAHHHH! I'm gonna die, I'm gonna die, I'm gonna diehihie, wahhhhhh!" And I'm like a freakin windmill, and then BAM! SUCH PAIN!...Then I passed out I guess cause next thing I remember was waking up in a huge pile of seaweed on the flippin hot sand again. And I was like, "This...seriously...blows..." Did a quick damage check and I was like, "This...blows...big fat baby chunks!" The teeth took a front flip and a few toes dudes. Super, SUPER lame. So there I was mourning my flip and just basically drained from my wipeout, not to mention a little messed up in the noggin from like almost dying, and then the craziest thing happened. This HUGE and I'm talkin HUUUUUUGE, crazy lookin turtle walks up to me, WITHOUT A SHELL!!! BUCK FREAKIN NAKED DUDES! And he must be albino or somethin cause he's super white, and I'm freakin out cause he's lookin at me like he's gonna finish me off, and I can't do anything cause I'm super tired and Don't wanna make any sudden movements that might put him into kill mode ya know? Then, he runs over to this other group of huge naked albino turtles, only some of them are a lot smaller than the others and they're like making homes that are way to small for them with the sand and the first huge naked albino says somethin to them and they all come runnin over to me and I am seriously freakin out. Then he sticks me in this bucket with some seaweed to make me taste better or something and then things got really weired cause he carries me to his shell I guess but it's WAY to big for him, so big in fact that 2 other huge naked albinos get in with us and then we start moving, but we're like not in the wet at all! Anyways, long story short, he takes me out of his shell like 15 minutes later and hands me off to this other huge, naked, albino turtle that puts me in HIS huge land shell, and then he takes me out and puts me in this room and he's pokin me and proding me and I'm all traumatized but there's nothin I can do about it and THEN he puts me back in the wet! And I'm like sweeeeeeet! I mean, it's a much smaller wet than I'm used to but it's still pretty nice and there's a few other turts in here that have lost some flips just like me! Anyways, I've been here for like a month now and I gotta tell ya, I'm not sure I wanna leave. No monsters, steady food supply, and I've made a few friends here so things have definitely turned out real good, and it's all thanks to that huge, naked, albino dude that saved me. If any of you know who I'm talkin about, let him know I appriciate it k? Though, maybe leave out the huge, naked, albino part. Oh ya, so I've been learning this Eenglish language that all the huge, naked, albino turtles speak and I got to thinkin about that day I washed up on the beach. The two little huge, naked albino turtles that were making homes outa sand, ya they weren't gonna eat me cause apparently they thought I was super cute and they said I looked like the turtle named Squirt from finding Nemo whatever that means, but that I had a bad flip like Nemo so they decided to name me Squimo, so that's what the huge, naked albino that put me in my new home calls me. I kinda like it! Ok, got some squid to eat. See ya later dudes!

So this isn't the exact one I rescued but same type, only Squimo is a little darker and missing his front left flipper and a few toes off the back left one. He's one lucky turtle and is quite happy at the UT research center in Port A.