Traveling next week

Next Tuesday I'm off to Cartersville GA to visit one of our mills that is doing a very intense supervisor training program. I'm looking forward to it, especcially since I'll fly into Atlanta and be able to visit with Becks at her apartment. I'm back in NJ then for a week and then off to Tampa and Brazil ... so posting over the next couple of weeks will probably be light.

Self Check Out - Aaarrgghh!

Ryan and I learned a valuable lesson this morning when we went shopping at Acme. We did regular shopping and since the checkers were all pretty busy, we decided to go through self check out. Big ... big mistake. Not only does the annoying woman annouce the price of everything you purchased, she also gets very testy if you try to move your bags back into the cart. We had to have the self check out monitoring employee help us at least 3 times because our items were not heavy enough to register the weight and the women kept asking us to "Please return item to bagging area." Lesson learned: only use self check out at Home Depot and when you have 2 things to buy. Otherwise, wait in the line.

Traffic

Thursday morning, 7:07 am: I leave for work. Halfway there I remember that I need to stop at Dunkin Donuts to pick up breakfast for a training class.
Thursday morning, 7:58 am: Arrive at work. Good day.
Thursday evening, 5:20 pm: Leave my office, hop on the Turnpike.
Thursday evening, 5:30 pm: On the turnpike ... stopped. Find out on the radio that the turnpike is closed 5 miles down the road.
Thursday evening, 6:05 pm: Back at work after I find my way off of the turnpike.
Thursday evening, 7:30 pm: Ryan calls wondering where I am. Still on the road. Miraculously only 7 miles from home.
Thursday evening, 7:59 pm: Finally pull into the driveway. Total travel time: 2 hours, 40 minutes.
Friday morning, 6:37 am: Leave for work.
Friday morning, 7:15 am: Pick up Adriana, a colleague from Corporate at her hotel.
Friday morning, 7:30 am: Arrive at work. Good day.
Friday evening, 4:00 pm: Drop Adriana back at her hotel. Hop on turnpike.
Friday evening, 4:10 pm: Not again! Turnpike is once again backed up.
Friday evening, 5:40 pm: Pull into driveway. Total travel time: 1 hour, 40 minutes.

2 days normal travel time: 3 hours
Last 2 days travel time: 5 hours, 50 minutes

Traffic sucks.

The car is better

And it only took $613.54 to make it better. Now the radio doesn't work though. Apparently when a battery is replaced you have to reset the radio with a code. Ry took it back to the dealership and apparently got the code, but still no dice. We're still minus one radio. Always a circus.

Not kidding!

And here's the proof of our ridiculous cats.

Freaking Fantabulous

After a lovely company picnic in Sayreville, Ryan and I were driving home to nap, make snacks and get ready for a college football party. Haa, ha, hahahahahahaha! For those of you have been in New Jersey, we were heading south on the NJ Turnpike and about 9 miles from home, the car battery light came on. Within 1 minute the car started seriously overheating. We pulled over on the side of the road (complete with people whizzing by at 80 miles per hour). We coaxed the car off the turnpike (go half a mile, let the car rest for 5 minutes, go half a mile, let the car rest for 5 minutes, go ... well you get the picture). We pulled into a gas station with the coolant attempting to escape the car hood. Luckily, we have USAA roadside assistance. The last time our vehicle broke down, we called, and half an hour later the surfer truck driver showed up and we went about our business. This time .... this time we waited for 3 HOURS for the tow truck guy to show. Needless to say, we aren't going to the party, which started an hour and half ago. I guess with a 12 year old car, we're gonna have hiccups, but this was not a pleasant roadside assistance experience.

Really, a tragedy

I just got finished watching Oprah's show from yesterday. She reported from New Orleans/Mississippi/Houston and other places that were affected by or are housing refugees. The images and stories she showed made my heart hurt. I don't know if or how a response could have reached these areas more quickly, but it is a human travesty that people lived in filth and terror for days in the New Orleans Superdome. What I do know is that this cannot happen again. If it were me, I would be gone from New Orleans to somewhere that wasn't below sea level. I hope that the city is rebuilt further from the coast so something of this magnitude cannot happen again.

Another great weekend

We spent the weekend in Illinois. SOOO much fun. On Friday we went to see Lance's new love shack, complete with Illini room. We saw the best football game on Saturday (I know ... Illini football fun?!). After a depressing first 3 quarters, our guys kicked it in gear and kicked some serious Rutgers butt. Ha ... ha ... hahahahahahahahaha. Not too much rubbing it in today, of course. The rest of the weekend was fun times with friends and relatives. Even Kimmy was in town from Tokyo last weekend. She looks great with red hair, although she's a bit too thin, even for Kimmy.

My overall realization this weekend was how much I miss central Illinois. We had a great time and can't wait to go back. Ry may go back for Homecoming weekend while I'm in Brazil. Mmm, Brazil.

Finally, Curtains!

We couldn't have curtains up in the living room before the kittens got declawed because ... well ... because they wouldn't be curtains anymore. Mom made us these lovely curtains when she was here in July and we finally got them up! I love our new curtains!.

Kitty Face!

Yeah, not a great picture, but very typical of of Elf.

Kitten Updates

After the weekend of HUGE cats, we came home to our relatively small kittens. Here's Elf in his typical pose after chasing after some imaginary bugs. They may still be small, but they've grown so much since we got them!

And Chief

And Chief of course!