Oh, the weather outside is frightful.........okay, not really......

Today, like most other days, I was very bored at the house. I knew that another cold front (read: 60 degrees) was blowing in, so I wanted to get some cheap long-sleeve shirts. Where does one head for this? Why, Old Navy of course!

Most of the time, I hate shopping for long-sleeve clothes. They never fit. Never. I have been blessed with ape-like extremeties, making it difficult for just about anything to fit me properly. Most people tell me to just push my sleeves up to make a 3/4 length sleeve. These people are almost undoubtedly short. Always. I've done this for years. In fact, I think I should be attributed for single-handedly starting the 3/4 length sleeve trend. But I digress.

I went to Old Navy and found myself 3 tees that were $10 a piece. They fit okay, even if the sleeves are a little short. But they're not as short as usual, making them much more tolerable. Of course, once I get home, I check out www.oldnavy.com and see that they actually carry tall t-shirts. Who knew? When did this trend start? But, be wary of online pricing. The t-shirts I bought for $10 are on sale online for $12 but only if you buy at least 2. Without further ado, here's my t-shirt.

Of course, the colors I bought are no longer available online, but you get the gist. These will be great for lounging around the house. Now if I could only find a great pair of jeans that actually fit my world would be complete.

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Poor, poor pitiful me.

So I've been feeling a little sorry for myself lately. Now that the house is fairly settled into, I've gotten bored. There's only so much TV and cleaning you can do in a week. I've been looking for a job, but there's just not much out there. And with companies like Citicorp that are laying off 50,000 people, this may not just be a short trend. It would be nice to have more disposable income, but the truth is that I'm just bored. I would like to have some more adult interaction and responsibility.

Yes, I admit it. I actually MISS responsibility. Thank God that Jason & I can get along on his income for now. He tells me there's no hurry, but I beg to differ. At least I have this guy to keep me sane all day:

His name is Cassius and he loves to cuddle and be petted. He is such a sweetie. But he doesn't pay enough!!!!

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Wurstfest: A Salute to Sausage!

On Friday, Jason & I made our way to New Braunfels to partake in their annual salute to beer, sausage and everything fried or on a stick: Wurstfest. For those who aren't familiar with the tradition, this is New Braunfel's 10-day version of Oktoberfest.

At this festival, a lot of drunk Germans can be found. People are eating giant turkey legs and holding stacks of empty pitchers. I even saw an older man wearing liederhosen giving high fives to anyone who would humor him!

I made sure to get one of my favorite things while I was there: Fried pickles! They are so yummy and just the right amount of salty. We met up with my friend Shana and her boyfriend, Ian and proceeded to pig out! Here they are with another friend, Bekah. The three of them decided to buy Wurstfest hats.


Shana & Bekah got traditional German hats while Ian opted for a non-traditional chicken hat. Unfortunately, his hat suffered from "limp hat syndrome" in most of the pictures. Somehow, they talked Jason & I into trying on the hats ourselves:


While walking through the Wursthall looking for more food, we were able to talk this nice gentleman into taking a group picture. He was serving up some type of pastry in his overheated booth. You see, Wurstfest is also a time of comraderie.


So here we are, enjoying the last weekend of Wurstfest together. Yes, that is me being lame with a water bottle in hand. To be honest, it's being used to cover the fried pickle oil that dripped on my shirt.

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The wheels on the car go round and round.....

I've known for a while that the tires on my car were getting a little old. I received a letter in the mail about a month ago telling me that the valve stems were faulty and caused the tires to lose pressure. Huh. So that's what's been happening the THREE years I've had the tires. So I wasn't crazy when I took my tires back and asked them to check for a leak. (They never found said leak.)

Anyway, on Sunday morning Jason & were about to leave to go visit his parents. Naturally, we planned on taking my car since I get good gas mileage. Apparently, Sunday's not such a good day. We found a bubble on the front tire that was the size of a grapefruit! It was friggin' huge! Let me tell you that Jason & I had driven all over the city earlier that day searching lighting stores. We also went to a housewarming party that was 40 minutes away in each direction.

When we returned from Jason's parent's house that night, the bubble was gone. In its place was a slit that was several inches long. The bubble had burst! I'm glad we weren't there because the noise would've been so loud. I bet it scared the neighbors!!

As most of you may have noticed, car manufacturers have gone el-cheapo and are only putting those temporary tires in cars to use as spares. Since the tire store was closed on Sundays, Jason was going to change the tire on Monday, then I'd meet him for lunch and get all the tires changed out. By the way, the tire store is 13.5 miles away!

Things went as planned this morning. I left the house driving just under 50mph. I had to get on I35S driving like a grandma. People were honking and giving me dirty looks and hand signals. It was the longest drive I think I've ever had to drive! I couldn't breathe until I was able to exit the highway (the highway was 90% of the drive).

Thankfully, we were able to buy 4 new tires and get them put on quickly. Then, Jason & I went to a romantic dinner (ha!) and grocery shopping. What a way to start the week!

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Just a friendly reminder.....

Make sure you VOTE tomorrow if you haven't already!!!!

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Halloween Party Numeros Dos y Tres

My Spanish is good, huh? Or, maybe......Mi Espanol es muy bueno. Whatever. I suck at foreign languages. Anyway, on Friday Jason & I headed out to a Halloween party just 1 and 1/2 miles from our home. How much better does that get?!? We heard that there might be a few people we knew there besides the party-thrower, but unfortunately, they were all too lame and didn't come. So J & I were left to mingle with people we didn't know. The house was decorated fully....spiderwebs, pumpkin & ghost lanterns, fog machine, Halloween music, Halloween food (yummy, yummy food!) and even spider ice cubes! We did our best to interact with everyone, but when we were asked what "group" we were from, I had to explain that we weren't from any "group." We were our own group....duh. That got a strange reaction. By the time the cops were called because of the loud washers tournament in the backyard, we were ready to head home. Here's a pic of "Mr. I Don't Do Costumes" and "Miss Diagnosed":

Halloween party Numero Tres was a Dead Hollywood Party. Everyone had to dress as a dead Hollywood actor/actress. Naturally, Jason rocked the "I Don't Do Costumes" shirt for the third time. I went as Marilyn Monroe, or as Jason lovingly nicknamed me, Marilyn Mon-hoe. Before we could even leave the house, I had a wardrobe malfunction! I learned that my husband has a hidden talent: he can sew! So, picture me sitting very, very still as Jason sews up the ripped seams. After that was fixed, we were good to go! The best costume idea of the night went to Amanda who came as Anna Nicole Smith. She had the giant hair, tiny blue jean shorts, a white tank top that said "Trim Spa Works" and giant pillow-like fake boobs underneath. It was hilarious! Runner-up goes to Deseere who came as the Oscar statue. She painted herself gold (even her hair and toes!) and wore a gold dress. It was awesome! Best hair goes to Jenn, who was able to make her beautiful red hair look like Lucille Ball's. We had lots of mystery punch and ended the night with smores! Here I am posing by my picture. Sadly, there was no air beneath my dress this time to blow it up, but I'm sure you get the point.

Hope everyone had a happy Halloween!!!

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The tree is finally gone!

Today marked the continuation of the dead tree saga. Obviously, this went down before I started blogging. I'll do a little catching up here. When Jason & I bought our house last June, we knew we would have to take down a huge dead mesquite tree. After a couple months, Jason's dad came over to help trim it down. They were able to get rid of most of the bulk (without ladders, making it a bit scary). What was left was a solid tree trunk about 7 feet tall and almost 2 feet in diameter that we wanted to give to my uncle. His hobby is woodworking and we wanted it to go to someone who'll make something really cool out of it rather than use it as firewood. So today, my uncle came over with a couple of woodworkers and a tractor. The problem was that the tree was in our backyard and was way too big to fit through our fence door. Plus, the tractor was also too big to fit through the door. The tree guy cut down the huge trunk and then chained it to the tractor sitting in the front yard. Then, after some rolling of the trunk, they were able to drag the trunk to the front yard. Luckily, the yard wasn't even damaged! They estimated the trunk to weigh over 1000 pounds! That's a lot of wood!! Anyway, we thought we'd be working (or, watching in my case) for 2 or 3 house. Instead, they were done in 30 minutes! What a wonder! To refresh everyone's memory, here's what the tree stub looked like. I forgot to take out my camera, but I'm sure you can guess what our backyard looks like without a tree. This is the tree after only one limb was cut off.

Here's my hubby acting as the tree monkey. He was able to climb the tree without ladders. Plus, sometimes he & his dad were passing around the chainsaw while it was running and suspended on a rope! Talk about scary!

Finally, here's what was left of the tree that is now going off to the mill. This is an
"action" picture capturing the fall of the last limb. The tree trunk underneath is what is going. Fun times!

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