So Thankful

Since tomorrow is Thanksgiving, I thought I would name a few of the things I am most thankful for, in no particular order...

- My amazing husband Glenn. We've been together over 13 years now (still not sure how that's possible!) and married for 4, and he's still my best friend. I'm so lucky to have a husband who supports me when I'm at my highest and lowest, always lets me know I'm loved and can always make me smile. I am a lucky, lucky girl.
- My wonderful parents. They raised me well, loved me and helped me soar. I can always count on my parents to cheer my successes and give me advice when I need it. I am so lucky to have parents who are also friends.
- My four crazy kitties, Bailey, Zoey, Kenny and Sophie. They keep me company while I work from home, and give me lots and lots and lots of love.
- My incredible friends. In girl scouts we learned to make new friends and keep the old, one is silver and the other gold. I'm so lucky to have some of those "golden" friends...both those that have been there all along, and those who I've just recently rediscovered. And so many new "silver" friends who have been such an indispensable support system as I've started my business.
- My business, Perceptivity Studio. I quit my job on November 1st last year and can't believe how quickly this year has gone. Looking back at all of the work I've done this past year, I'm amazed at all I've accomplished, and so proud of the work I've done for my clients. Going out on my own has allowed me to really be "creative" again, so much more so than when I was working for someone else, and it means a lot to me to have a portfolio of work I'm proud of. I'm so lucky do get to do what I love every day.
- My "commute" (or lack therefore of). As I was driving down 275 this morning to take Sophie to get fixed (Yeah, did I mention she's in heat? Delightful!), I was reminded how grateful I am to work from home. I used to spend about 1.5 - 2 hours every day in traffic driving to South Tampa, and now I get up and walk down the hall. You can't beat it.
- Being an American. Even with our country in an economic crisis, we are still so blessed to live here. I have a roof over my head, food in my pantry and so many nice things surrounding me. It's easy to focus on the negative right now, but even when our country is in bad shape, it's still so much better off than so many others around the world, and we are so lucky to be here. And I'm also thankful that Obama will become our president in January, and hopeful for how he will change the direction our country has taken.
- My health, and my family and friends' health. Enough said. May we all continue to be happy and healthy.

I'm sure there are many more, but I think that sums it up. I said it many times throughout this post, but it bears repeating: I am such a lucky girl. I am so thankful for all of the wonderful people and things in my life, on Thanksgiving and always.

If you're reading this, thank you for reading, and thank you for being my friend. Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

Don't Vote, Part 2

I just saw the new Don't Vote video, and I think this one is just as great as the first one. Maybe not as hysterical as the first one (which did get a bit crass), but so well done, and it actually brought tears to my eyes when they were listing their reasons.



So GO VOTE on Tuesday!

Don't vote.

I know it's been a long time since I've blogged. Life is good, and I've been super-busy with work, which is a good thing. And since my to-do list is still quite long, here is the reason I'm taking time out of my day to blog. (There is some profanity, FYI.)



Really, really great message. Both funny and poignant. While I'm sure you are all already registered, if not, what are you waiting for? Hurry up! And don't forget to pass this along.

Homicidal oven

My oven tried to kill me last night...it felt kind of like a scene out of Final Destination.

I was broiling some chicken for dinner, and unloading the dishwasher while it cooked, when all of the sudden there were blue sparks coming at me and a really loud buzzing noise that sounded kind of like the garbage disposal. I screamed bloody murder because it scared me half to death, which of course scared Glenn half to death from upstairs in the office. It stopped very shortly thereafter and the whole oven just died. Thankfully I wasn't touching it when it decided to self-destruct, and it didn't set a fire or anything either. But man, my heart almost jumped out of my chest in the process!

So now I have to figure out how to fix an oven. From Googling "oven blue sparks" I found out it was probably the element blowing out, and hopefully it will be an easy fix. While I'm not the greatest chef in the world by any stretch of the word, it's a pain not to have an oven, stove, timer or clock in the kitchen! :P

Double Standards

OK, I realize that there are most likely a ton of double standards over on my side of the political arena as well, but this just made me laugh.

100 things to do before you die

How's this for irony? Dave Freeman, the guy who wrote 100 Things to Do Before You Die just died at age 47 before he completed his list. The good news is that he was about halfway done with his list, which included all kinds of neat things, like attending the Academy Awards, running with the bulls in Pamplona, Spain, taking a voodoo pilgrimage in Haiti and "land diving" on the Island of Vanuatu. I'm sure while accomplishing the items on his half of the list, he saw and did more than the rest of us normally would in a lifetime.

I've had the opportunity to see some incredible places and do some crazy things in my life so far, but now I'm thinking that I need to make my own list so I make an effort to see all of the amazing places in this world that I haven't seen. Like Europe, for one (or several dozen, I guess).

What's on your list?

Can we elect her?

I watched Michelle Obama's speech online last night (yes, I'm a bit behind), and if I could vote for HER for president, I would gladly do so. What an awesome speaker.



I also watched Hillary's speech live last night and think she did a great job with a very difficult situation. I really did think she would make a great president at the beginning of the election, but by the time she and Obama were neck and neck, and trading nasty words, I really didn't care for either of them.

That being said, I wish I were as passionate as Barack Obama as most of his supporters are, and I'm trying, but for some reason I just can't help but be skeptical...of both his relative inexperience and our nation's (not my) ability to see past his skin color. I really wish there were a democratic candidate I really felt strongly about, and that I could strongly support, instead of just voting against the other guy. Sigh.

Virtual School Rant

I heard a report on the radio yesterday that virtual schools may soon become the only way our children are educated, and I almost drove off the road. Instead of actually going to school, our kids may soon just sit at their computer and learn from lessons that teachers post online. Here's what I heard.

The scary part is that they were trying to make this sound like a good idea! School budgets have been slashed, and educating students virtually is so much less expensive than the cost to send them through the public school system. Kids can learn at their own pace, and supposedly kids being taught virtually perform higher on test scores. Currently about a million kids in the US are being taught virtually.

Am I the only one who thinks this is a horrible idea??? First of all, kids learn their social skills at school. They learn to make friends and interact with other people. They learn discipline...they have to be somewhere at the same time every day, and if they're late they get in trouble. They get some (probably not enough) physical activity. If you no longer GO to school, these things will all be eliminated. Not to mention how are parents supposed to go out and work if their kids are home all the time!

My generation, Y, is already causing a drastic change in the workforce. We are a completely different animal than previous generations with our style of working, our expectations and our skill sets. But I feel that our generation is still contributing to things in a positive way. The generation below me will be even drastically more different, growing up with computers and cell phones and texting (don't even get me started on how texting is single-handedly ruining the grammar of this country). Now imagine if the following generation grows up sitting in front of their computers all the time, not even going out in the world to go to school. Can you even picture what these kids will be like when they get out into the real world? Sure they might be wizards on the computer, but how will they interact with clients? Coworkers? How will they learn all of the important non-education-related things that the rest of us have learned at school?

The report went on to say that with education budgets getting slashed left and right, soon virtual schools may completely replace brick and mortar schools, while the alternative could be no education system whatsoever. SERIOUSLY?!?!?

Can we please stop bombing Iraq long enough to give our kids and their kids the future they deserve? Yes, I understand that sometimes war is a necessary evil, but I just can't even fathom how they can spend billions of dollars on a war when they can't even properly take care of the people in our own country. Yes, I realize we are so lucky to live in America, but we still have issues. The education system is one of them. A real issue, not a virtual one. Can we please work on fixing it?

Hey Fay, whaddya say? Stay away another day!

As evidenced by the proliferation of rhyming in this blog title and a late-night trip to Walmart last night (which must really signify desperation because I HATE Walmart!), the hurricane threat is getting to me. :P

I didn't even realize there WAS a hurricane until yesterday afternoon, but now I'm getting a bit worried. While recent projections here and here show it heading to Ft. Myers, you know those pesky predictions are rarely accurate. After all, Hurricane Charley was SUPPOSED to hit us, and it hit them instead. Granted that was a big storm and this is just a little one, but still. After Hurricane Frances became an uninvited guest at our wedding in 2004 (has it really been almost 4 years already??), I'm not the biggest fan of hurricanes. :)

And now for a rant. As I mentioned before, Glenn and I went to Wally World last night to pick up some bottled water and an extra cat carrier since we're up one cat since the last hurricane season. What a madhouse! Every time I go to Walmart, I leave saying "that's the last time I ever do that," kind of like I used to do with drinking in college. But just like that one magic time I finally realized that drinking (and the inevitable miserable sickness afterward) just wasn't worth it, I think this trip to Walmart did the same thing. There were boxes and carts everywhere, it was dirty and smelly (YUCK!) and the people were just as "delightful" as ever. (I won't even get into the people in front of us in line who made the ridiculously long lines manage to take even longer.) We both really felt gross after leaving, like we needed to go home and sanitize. After being in our nice, pretty, CLEAN Target the day before, it was quite the contrast. While Walmart has a new logo, I think the quality of the store, at least the one in New Tampa, has gotten exponentially worse. Boo Walmart!

OK, I'm done ranting. Everyone do me a favor and visualize Fay leaving us the heck alone this week!

Yee-haw!

Most of you probably know that I'm not the biggest fan of country music, to put it mildly. So when my friend Devon asked me to go out country line dancing this past weekend, I was a bit wary, but decided to get over myself and just go.

Surprisingly enough, I had a great time! Devon, her friend Tammy and Tammy's sister-in-law Bree and I went to the Roundup on Saturday night. I was the DD, which was partially so I could keep my brain functioning long enough to learn some line dances, and partially to avoid puking my guts out. Jenni + alcohol = puke city, which is never a fun thing when you're out at a bar. :)

Bree was a great teacher, and soon I was out on the dance floor holding my own. I certainly wasn't earning any style points, but I was proud of myself for keeping up. Among others that I don't know the name of, I danced to the Boot Scootin' Boogie, Darlene, Neon Moon and Cotton Eyed Joe. There were a few that I attempted and failed miserably because they were so darn complicated....spins and turns and jumps, and yikes, get me out of here! But hey, I survived and got some exercise in the process. :)

We left the bar at 2am, and after a trip to Steak 'n Shake and driving everyone home, I got home around 4:30am, which is the latest (earliest?) I've been up in ages. So while I don't expect this to be a regular occurrence, I'm not ruling out a repeat performance of my mad line dancing skills. :)

The Girls

I was very sad when Gilmore Girls went off the air a few years back, but I've recently discovered re-runs of the show on ABC Family, and I've been DVRing them every day. When I watch each episode, I'm reminded why I loved the show so much when it was on. The mother-daughter-friend dynamic between Lorelai and Rory is just so wonderful, and their fast-paced, witty dialog is unlike anything else on TV. It's just so freaking clever and intelligent and FUNNY, and I laugh out loud frequently during my Gilmore marathons on the weekends. (There's something to be said for watching any show back to back without having to wait a whole week for the next episode.) In addition to LOST, which is just a whole 'nother level of obsession, I think Gilmore Girls is officially tied as my favorite TV show of all time. If you haven't watched it, you should. ABC Family every day at 5...set those DVRs.

Weight Gain 4000

Kitten food is like a drug in the McKay household. I call it Weight Gain 4000 (South Park reference) since it basically just makes them all fat, or big-boned as Cartman would say.


Since Sophie is still a tiny girl, I give her kitten food twice a day: once in the morning and once before bed. Since I despise canned food, I stopped giving it to her a couple of weeks ago (to Zoey and Kenny's chagrin), and have just been giving her dry kitten food. Well the three "big kids" in the house absolutely adore it.

So we've developed a routine, and it's driving me bonkers. I used to be able to shut Sophie in the back bedroom with her kitten food, then go let her out 15 minutes later when she was done eating. But the other cats sit outside the door like vultures, and apparently Sophie now has ADD. The minute I leave the room, she comes and sits by the door and whacks her paws under the door at the other cats. So even if I leave her in there for 15 minutes, she doesn't eat her food! So then I have to go in with her, put her up by her food and sit there while she eats, as if I don't have anything better to do. In the meantime, the other cats start to get antsy, and Zoey literally sings and warbles by the door because she wants in. Once Sophie decides she's done, I let the other cats in and they all (especially Bailey, who really loves Weight Gain 4000) make a beeline for the food dish and scarf up her leftovers.

Pretty soon I'm going to have three very large cats!

Idina Menzel

It has been a very crazy week to say the least, but instead of focusing on the negative, I'll focus on the positive!

Last night my mom and I went to the Idina Menzel concert at the Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center. While the name may not sound familiar, if you pay any attention to Broadway, you probably know who she is.






She starred in the original Broadway cast and the movie version of RENT as Maureen:



And she was the original Elphaba (aka the Wicked Witch of the West) in Wicked.




She also has a new pop-ish album out called I Stand, and her new music was the main focus of the show last night.

When my mom original suggested going to the concert, I wasn't quite sure what to expect. I love Idina on Broadway, but wasn't sure how that would translate to a solo artist on stage. I downloaded her album beforehand so I was familiar with the music, then we went to the show last night. We had GREAT tickets...second row center, so we were smack dab in front of her, which is a great way to see any show. (My mom wished we could have had those seats when we actually saw Wicked too!) Everyone seated around us, and most of the audience actually, was a major Idina fan, to the point where I almost felt bad for having such incredible seats when I really didn't know much about her.

After watching the show, I can see why so many people love Idina. In addition to her amazing voice, she's such a likable person. She bantered with the audience, joked around and seemed genuinely grateful for how many people were there to hear her sing. While most of the songs she sang were from her album (and I really like the album much more having heard the songs in person), she also sang a few songs from RENT (Seasons of Love and excerpts Over the Moon) and Wicked, including an a capella version of her part of For Good that brought tears to my eyes, and a sing-along encore performance of Defying Gravity that she performed with her feet hanging over the edge of the stage. Here's a video from someone sitting way behind us (it gets less blurry toward the end).



It was such a wonderful show, and just what I needed to cheer me up after a rough week. While there are still much bigger Idina fans out there, I'm definitely one of them now.

RIP Fishy :(

If you've read my last few posts, you know that my poor fish CM has been having some issues. I don't know if it was truly constipation that did him in, or if he did have Dropsy, a fatal fishy disease, but he passed away while we were out today. He was a good fishy, and I'm sad to see him go, but he really did seem pretty miserable, so I'm glad that he's out of his misery now. I'm sure he's hanging out with Robyn's fish Luci in fishy heaven now.

SYTYCD

Have I mentioned I love the show So You Think You Can Dance? After dancing in one way or another for 15 years of my life, I have a soft spot in my heart for anyone who can dance half as well as any of the contestants on the show. While it's hard to pick a favorite, I think Katee took the lead for me this week (though I still have half the show to watch on DVR) with her solo to This Woman's Work, embedded below.



This song has a special place in my heart. My sophomore year of high school, the fabulous Michael James choreographed a warm-up dance for my winter guard team to Kate Bush's original version of the song, and we danced it before every show. Then it became our end-of-the-year dance performance as well. Love that Katee danced it too!

Animal House

For those of you who have read the fishy post below, he is still kicking. Still constipated, and still not eating his peas (give peas a chance!) but still kicking.

Here are some new pics of the kids for your viewing pleasure. :)

Here's Kenny, looking very handsome, and SO BIG! Where did the tiny kitten go?


















This is why we call Zoey a manatee. She really doesn't look that large normally, but then she sprawls out like a beast. But at least she's being sweet to her sister!


















Sophie loves to climb our desk chairs like a little monkey.























And then she sits on top of them, triumphant. Sigh!























The first time I've had all four of them in the same place. Doesn't Bailey look like a monster kitty? We call that his "divot" on the sofa, and all of the cats love to sleep there.

My fish is constipated...

Yes, you read that correctly, I have a constipated beta fish.

I've had my fish CM (which stands for Cyan Magenta, but he often gets called Fishy) for a very, very long time. Much longer than I ever thought I would have a fish. He was my office pet at my last job, and the two other people in the creative department had started the trend with their own beta fish too. I think it was late 2005 perhaps?

Fish #1 (I honestly don't even remember his name, it's been so long!) was abandoned when his owner was let go from the company, and while Phil, his new foster parent I guess, tried to take care of him, he went to fishy heaven soon after. Robyn's fish, named Luci (short for Lucifer because he was bright red), stuck around for quite a while as well, but he went to fishy heaven about a year ago.

And then there's CM. When I quit my job last year and took him home with me, he stopped eating for about 2 months. I have no clue how he survived, but somehow he did. I would feed him every day, hoping he would eat again, and one day he just did, and he's been fine ever since. Until a few days ago that is.

Glenn and I noticed the other night that his abdomen is very swollen, to the point that it looks like he swallowed a marble. I searched on the beta fish message boards (yes, these exist!) and it was either a sign of Dropsy, which is a fatal disease (nope, not that, his scales aren't standing up) or....yes, you guessed it...constipation. My fish is constipated!

So I'm fasting him now for a few days, and then I'm supposed to feed him some mashed up peas to help his digestive system. This is easier said than done. Peas aren't a part of the beta's diet, so they're not too keen to eat them, plus instead of floating nicely on top of the water, they immediately sink. I tried to give him some yummy peas yesterday with no success. I kept trying to drop the little pieces down in front of him so he would eat it, but every little piece just sunk to the bottom of the tank.

I imagine this must be similar (in some strange way) to feeding mashed peas to babies who don't want to eat them either. Sigh.

Wish us luck!

Get lost...

I heard today that the Sci-Fi channel will be airing 4 hour blocks of LOST every Monday at 7:00pm starting September 15. The episodes will run in order up to the season 4 finale. So for those of you who have not yet become obsessed with my favorite show, now is your perfect opportunity to give it a shot!

Dentist

I really hate going to the dentist. A lot. So I was less than thrilled to go there today for a cavity filling. They found two small cavities at my last cleaning, one on each side, and I'd planned to get them taken care of one at a time, but once I was in the chair, I decided it was probably best to kill two birds with one stone, so that I did. They numbed both sides of my mouth, but since the cavities were on top, I'm not a complete drooling fool like I expected to be, which is always good. So now I'm officially cavity free, woo hoo!

Human Mirror

I will pay more attention next time I step onto a subway. I love the double-take reactions of some of the people! :)

Feedburner

I just set up Feedburner, so now you can subscribe to this blog via email or a feed reader (Google has a free one, along with all kinds of other fun stuff with a free Google account). I thought I would give it a test here before I add a feed to my Perceptions from the Studio blog.

13 years

I'm still not quite sure how I'm old enough to have been with someone for 13 years, but that's what Glenn and I celebrated on Friday while the rest of America was celebrating the 4th of July. :)

We went down to Sarasota for the day...drove down the highway to Bradenton, then down the coast from Anna Maria Island to Sarasota, and back over to Siesta Key. We went geocaching (a very nerdy thing to do), which is basically a treasure hunt with a GPS device. You enter in the coordinates of a "cache" and then have to go find it.

The one we found was called Secret Beach, and we really did find a beautiful little beach far away from all of the tourists. It was very peaceful, and we found some very pretty seashells that hadn't been picked over by thousands of other people. We hunted around up in the brush where the GPS coordinates sent us, and found the little treasure box.



We found the cache right before the sunset, then walked back with our feet in the water and the sun sinking fast.



I wrote our initials and the date in the sand, so here is our "self portrait" for the day. :)




Then we went back to the Siesta Key bridge and watched the fireworks display from across the bay at the Sarasota marina. It was a lovely way to celebrate our 14th 4th of July together. :)

Back at home again, I thought you would like to see how Miss Sophie is doing. She's fitting in quite nicely in our crazy cat house.

Where the Hell is Matt?

Thanks to E, one of my favorite bloggers, I was clued in to one of the hugest YouTube sensations, and it's someone who actually deserves his 5 minutes of fame. This goofy guy named Matt has been traveling around the world, and everywhere he goes, he does this silly little dance. The first video was released in 2005. Stride Gum liked it so much that they sponsored his next one, which was released in 2006. And they also sponsored this new one, which is the best of all. People actually started dancing with him, and it's really incredible to see how all over the world, even in places where they have nothing, people can be goofy and dance like no one's watching, even if millions really are. Many people, myself included, got a bit teary over just how special his journey really is. What can I say, I'm a sap.

Matt has a website, called Where the Hell is Matt which he originally put up so his family and friends could keep track of him as he traveled. Now his videos are up there, and his journal is quite amusing to read.

Here is the first one from his 2003-2004 travels:


Here is the next one, from 2006:


Here is the newest version, which just went up this month:



They're great in high-quality, so I highly suggest you take a look here to really see all of the beautiful places he's been.

Mitzi Mozzarella

Growing up in South Carolina, we didn't have a Chuck E. Cheese, we had a Showbiz Pizza. It was THE place to have birthday parties. I loved it so much that I named my beloved teddy bear (yes, the same one that was at my wedding) Mitzi after the lovely cheerleader mouse in the Rock-afire Explosion band, named Mitzi Mozzarella.

I just read in Buzzwatch that current pop hits are being lovingly programmed into remaining Rock-afire equipment, videotaped and posted on YouTube. So here is the Rock-afire Explosion singing 4 Minutes by Madonna and Justin Timberlake. So funny! I especially like the tick-tock motion with Mitzi's ears. :)

Maddy Wyatt

Three posts in one day, I think that's a record. Can you tell I'm slacking off today? :)

One of my mom's childhood friends has a daughter who is a singer/songwriter in New York. Her name is Maddy Wyatt. My mom passed this along today, so I thought I would share. She's very talented, and I think it's a nice message.

Zoom zoom

With gas prices continuing to rise and Glenn's commute to Clearwater not getting any shorter (80 miles a day!!!), we'd been thinking about trading in his Explorer for quite some time. Especially considering that the gas bill was almost as much as our car payment, yikes! So yesterday we went over to the Mazda dealer near our house, where we bought my CX-7 last year, in hopes of becoming a "two-zoom-zoom" family.

Glenn wanted to get a Mazda 3, but we test-drove that and the 6 and he liked the 6 much better. Plus there were special incentives on the 6 that helped up drag ourselves a little further out of the negative equity from the Explorer. (Since gas prices have gone up, the auctions are completely flooded with SUVs, so our trade-in value was ridiculously low compared to what we still owed on it!)

There was much negotiating, including us almost leaving twice, but whaddya know, they figured out how to meet us where we needed to be for this to work (amazing, right!). Considering that they'd all stayed nearly 2 hours late to do it, it doesn't surprise me. And they even called the owner at home around 9:45 to approve giving us even more money to make the deal work as a last ditch effort. Moral of the story, if you want to get a good deal on a car, go at the end of the day when it's been raining for a week at the end of the month, and they will bend over backwards to sell you a car. :)

We have a loaner today, and we should have the new car when Glenn gets home from work. Zoom zoom! (Times 2!)

Vogue

The Buzzwatch blog alerted me to the following: "In early June, faux political pundit Stephen Colbert sued a new challenge to his followers: Spice up a green-screen video clip of John McCain’s “tired mayonnaise” (in Mr. Colbert’s words) rhetorical style. Now that the Web’s video buffs have had time to work their magic, some particularly creative clips are hitting YouTube."
Here is my favorite, which totally cracked me up!



For the record, while I'm not a fan of McCain (to say the least), I do really like his daughter Meghan a lot. Her blog is definitely interesting to read. Too bad she's not running for president. :P

Texas Roadhouse

Glenn and I went to the restaurant Texas Roadhouse quite a bit when we went to UF. It's nothing fancy, but they have really yummy food, including hot rolls with cinnamon butter that are to die for. We'd actually contemplated driving up to Gainesville from Tampa to go eat Texas Roadhouse when nothing else sounded good to eat. (Yes, there are other roadhouse restaurants here, but it's not the same!) So you can imagine our excitement when we heard they were building one not only in Tampa, but in Wesley Chapel, where we live! It opened yesterday and we braved it for an early dinner today. I am completely stuffed from eating too much bread, but it was well worth it.

Isn't she lovely?

Here are more pictures of my crazy kitten Sophie, including some good ones of her crazy ear fur for my dad. :) She is such an adventurous little critter! We're still keeping her in the bedroom at night for her own protection, but she's been out and about with the other kitties most of the day today and they seem to be doing well, except when she attacks the big cats' tails...they don't much seem to like that! She is sleeping peacefully in the office with me right now on the same green towel from the pictures, so all is currently quiet at the McKay household.

In other news, I'm foraying into the world of journalism. I'll be writing business features for Brandon Magazine, a new upscale magazine for a nearby town. They have me busy-busy right now, so I need to cut this short and get back to work! Wish me luck. :)

Here's Sophie, and a cute one of Bailey and Zoey...no shortage of kitty love there!

Introducing Sophie McKay

Yeah, yeah, yeah. You all knew it would happen because we are just big suckers for cute animals! We've decided to adopt our little black kitten friend, and we've named her Sophie. She develops more personality each day, and has more energy than I've ever seen. We're still trying to keep her in her bedroom when we can't pay attention to her because she won't stay in one place, and as I type, I can hear her squeaking away because she wants her breakfast. So let me cut this short to go feed her. I leave you with the funny picture my mom thought was so cute! (She is standing on my leg as I'm trying to take a picture of her.)

It's a girl!

I took the kitten to the vet yesterday and got a big surprise. The little boy kitten is really a little girl kitten! The vet said she's about 2.5 months old since she's only 2.5 pounds. The best news is that SHE tested negative for feline leukemia, and was de-wormed, so now we know she's healthy.

We've started introducing her to our kitties...surprisingly Bailey, who HATED our kittens last year, isn't too concerned about her, and Zoey, who will carry around a little stuffed cat by the scruff of its neck, is not a happy camper. Not surprisingly, Kenny, the cat who is scared of his own shadow, is scared of her. :) Here are some new pictures.

Her eyes are a light green color, very pretty.

















Being sweet and cuddly with Glenn

















Look at that ear hair!

A rose by any other name

Stolen from LeShayne, here's something to do while I'm eating my breakfast! :)

COUNTRY WESTERN SINGER NAME: (mother & father’s middle names)
Jean Francis

NASCAR NAME: (first name of your mother’s dad, father’s dad)
Nelson John

STAR WARS NAME: (the first 3 letters of your last name, first 2 letters of your first name)
Mckje

DETECTIVE NAME: (favorite color, favorite animal)
Red Kitty

SOAP OPERA NAME: (middle name, city where you were born)
Jean Anderson

FLY NAME: (first 2 letters of 1st name, last 2 letters of your last name)
Jeay

GANGSTA NAME: ( fav ice cream flavor, fav cookie)
Sweet Cream Sugar

ROCK STAR NAME: (current pets name, current street name)
Zoey Tullamore

STRIPPER NAME: (name of your fav perfume/cologne, fav candy)
Alabaster Reeses

PORN NAME: (1st pet, 1st Car)
Radar Tercel??

AMERICAN GLADIATOR NAME (model name of your current car)
CX-7

Time to go feed the kitten!

Anyone want a kitten?

Tonight was an interesting night. Glenn and I went up to Petsmart to get some cat litter, and when we were checking out, there were some "lovely" people ahead of us in line. There was a dad and two teenage girls, and they had a little black kitten that they were trying to dump off to Petsmart, who couldn't take him. One of the girls was on her cell phone, asking someone if she could "take him" or else they were going to have to "dump him somewhere." After figuring out what exactly was going on, we watched them leave, paid for our cat litter and left.

When we were pulling out of the parking lot, we saw them walking away and dropping the cat down on the ground over by the retention pond. We pulled up next to them and asked if they were abandoning the kitten. The man said, "No, he's going to follow us home. Why, do you want him?" Then he picked him up and handed him to us. As cat lovers we couldn't let these people just abandon a poor little kitten, so we took him.

Since we already have three of our own kitties, we're hoping we can find a good home for the little guy. We're guessing he's about 3-4 months old, very tiny. He's black/dark brown, with fluffy long hair. He hasn't stopped purring since we got him in the car, and he's very sweet and cuddly. We just gave him a bath and some kitten food, and he's sleeping in our guest room. All three of our cats, who officially look like giants right now, are a bit stressed out by the situation, so we're keeping them apart. Know anyone who wants a sweet little kitten? Here are some pictures.

Hi, I'm a cute little kitten. The mean people who abandoned me called me Danny, but I think I would rather have another name instead. What would you name me?


















I just had a bath, and now I look a little bit like a wet rat! I was shivering like crazy after my bath, so I got wrapped up in a big towel and cuddled a lot.


















See, now that I dried, I'm nice and fluffy! My fur is a mixture of black and chocolately brown, and I'm very soft! Do you want to cuddle with me?

Music Catch

Being a part of the Blogosphere, I like to read a lot of other blogs too, one of these being the Wall Street Journal's Buzzwatch. Last night I read this entry in their blog and now I'm obsessed with the silly game called Music Catch. The piano music is very soothing when you need a break from work. My top score is 1797568, and while I'm not exactly big on video games this one is so my style.

Sun-kissed

I took a wonderful beach day with LeShayne, Tori and Tristan today. It had been a LONG time since I'd had the pleasure of relaxing on Clearwater Beach, my old high school beach stomping ground, where I could be found quite frequently in my teenage years. It was so great to crash in the sunshine with the cool white sand in my toes and chat with one of my oldest and best friends, just like we did when we were younger. (Speaking of which, Tori asked us today if we used to have "playdates" which I thought was so freaking cute!)

As I've mentioned in earlier blogs however, I'm probably one of the whitest white girls in Florida (aside from one lady we saw getting into her car when we were leaving!), and when pale people go to the beach, there isn't much good that can come of it! On our way home, LeShayne's shoulders were red. When we got to their house, Tori's back was red (or "sun-kissed" as LeShayne called it). And I couldn't figure out why they would be red when they both saw the sun much more frequently than I do. Well let's just say it was a delayed reaction. I am crispy-fried fuschia now, especially, for some strange reason, my ankles...guess I totally missed them with sunscreen, but OUCH! :) The backs of my legs aren't feeling so hot either. But ah, the price I pay to be tan(ish!). And while I will probably be hating life for the next few days, I sure did have a great few hours! :)

6 months, 130 pounds

Yesterday I hit two milestones. It was the 6 month anniversary of quitting my job to start my new company, and I hit my goal weight of 130 pounds.

Regarding the first milestone, I can't believe how quickly those 6 months have passed, but I'm so happy I took the leap because I'm a much happier person today than I was 6 months ago.

Regarding the second milestone, I'd hit 130.something a few times before, but yesterday was the first time I was actually 130.0 on the scale. For my skinny friends, I know that's not the biggest of deals, but it was my first goal weight, and even though I'm not really dieting anymore, I'm proud of myself for still continuing to maintain the momentum I started 6 months and 15 pounds ago. I guess it's time for a new goal weight. While I don't really foresee losing much more, it sure would be nice to see the 120s again. :)

Painting, Part Deux

Yesterday was a much more amusing painting experience than my laundry room was (see previous entry!). My friend Robyn and I had a fun girl's day to catch up. While we used to see each other every day at our old job, our get-togethers are now too few and far between, so this was a fun day!

First we went to BD's Mongolian Grill, which is a really fun create-your-own stir fry restaurant in Oldsmar. Very yummy! Then we went to Cafe Kiln, a paint-your-own pottery studio (I'm sensing an unintentional do-it-yourself trend here!) for some creative expression.

I made a "Perceptivity Studio" coffee cup (it has brown and green stripes like my company's identity), and sure it looks like a four year old painted it, but it's cute, and it's something I will use frequently for my morning tea. Plus I painted a gator because I couldn't resist having a fun gator figurine for my desk! Here they are before they've been glazed and fired, so the colors will be much more vibrant when they're finished!

















Robyn painted a flower pot, complete with adorable lady bugs and a bumble bee.


















Here we are together.






















Robyn is a wonderful friend, and we always have a great time when we're together. I'm so lucky to have her! LTW!

Painting

I always forget how much I hate to paint until I'm midway through a room.

When we bought our house almost 4 years ago, the walls were all new-construction white...the flat, ugly white you can't wait to cover up. And cover up we did.

We started downstairs in the living room, and have worked our way up into today's project, the laundry room. Over that time span, we've been through 12 unique paint colors (and no, nothing has been painted over, we have that many different colors in our house), including 3 different colors of Ralph Lauren Suede paint...actually the total is 13 if you count the lovely Pepto pink primer that's under the red paint in our powder room downstairs. Plus 3 different colors of stain on various pieces of furniture, and white paint on other furniture. (And I'm sure I'm forgetting something along the line.) My painting clothes, a ratty t-shirt, pair of scrub pants, and an old pair of socks, have remnants of all of these all over them. They're kind of a mess, but an accomplished mess, I guess you could say.

Before moving in, I had never really painted anything before (unless you count LeShayne's splatter painted bedroom in high school, or the stencils we never got around to finishing in the kitchen of our first college apartment), and now I can definitely say that I have painted. And painted. And painted some more.

So for today's project, I quote Glenn, "You realize we're painting the laundry room." Which I realize is a bit ridiculous. It's the laundry room, already. But after our pretty new front-load washer and dryers were installed last week, I felt I owed it to them to spruce the place up a bit. And how hard can it really be to paint the laundry room? I started at 6 and it's now 10:30, and I'm still not done yet. It's harder than I remembered it being.

So again I say, I always forget how much I hate to paint until I'm doing it yet again. And now that the last coat is dry, it's time to shuffle around the aforementioned washer and dryer for the third time and finish covering up some of the last remnants of white paint left in the house.

In case you're keeping score, the last ones after tonight will be in the 3rd and final bedroom, and the sky-high walls in the loft over our stairs. Are we done yet?? OK, back to work.

Bitten by Steve & Barry's

Ever since they featured the Sarah Jessica Parker "Bitten" line of clothes on Project Runway, I've been wanting to go to Steve & Barry's. The only one in the area is at the University Mall, which is a bit sketchy, but we went there today to buy a new washer & dryer at Sears (it's the closest mall to our house), so I dragged Glenn in. Everything at the store is $8.98. I knew it was cheap, but seriously! SJP and Amanda Bynes both have really cute trendy clothing lines there. I got a pair of jeans, two shirts and some satin ballet flats for under $40, how cool is that? I'm completely hooked.

Where in the world is Jenni?

I made a travel map for my Facebook profile today, so here it is! The locations called out at the bottom are my favorite places in the world.

1. Sydney, Australia


2. Fraser Island, Australia


3. Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park, Australia


4. Nadi, Fiji


5. Zion National Park, UT, USA


6. Wind Cave National Park, SD, USA


7. Jenolan Caves, Australia


8. Gainesville, FL, USA

• Create your own travel map or travel blog


• Visit TripAdvisor.com

Happy Birthday Tori!

Today was so much fun! LeShayne and I surprised her daughter Tori with a tea party at a tea house in Safety Harbor for her 8th birthday today. We had yummy tea, scones and dessert, then after picking up her son Tristan, we went back to the Maddex house to play for a bit. I really had a great time!

Since I'm an only child, I've adopted Tori and Tristan as my niece and nephew, and I love those kids to death! Thanks LeShayne for letting me be a part of Tori's special day.

Here are some pictures.

Our vacation!

Glenn and I got home from our fun May vacation to Virginia and D.C. on Wednesday, and we had a great time! Here is an illustrated report of our vacation. Warning: very long with lots of pictures! (Click on the pictures if you'd like to take a closer look.)

We landed at Dulles on Saturday afternoon, then rented a car and drove down to Charlottesville, VA to see our friends Drew and Sarah and their daughter Caroline, who is seriously the smartest 1.5 year old I've ever met! (Glenn and Drew were in architorture school together at UF, and Drew was in our wedding back in 04.) Here's Caroline, who I think looks like a young Shirley Temple. (And did I mention she's a genius? Seriously!)


We had a "date night" with Drew and Sarah on Saturday night (Caroline was at their church's first co-op babysitting night), and went to downtown Charlottesville, which has a cute town center, with stores and restaurants lining a pedestrian walkway. We went to the Nook for dinner, and even had dessert! :)

Sunday we got to experience the great outdoors. We drove into the mountains to Sugar Hollow for a hike, which was beautiful, and we had perfect weather.
Drew wore a baby backpack with Caroline. Caroline definitely got Daddy's hair!

We climbed up into the mountains a bit, and the creek was way below us.

Then we hiked down to the creek where the boys proceeded to go off exploring while Sarah, Caroline and I relaxed by the creek.

Then we walked across the creek, and then back again. It was COLD water! Here is the second (and last) picture of me and Glenn from the trip, but for those of you who know Glenn, it's amazing I got two pictures! :)
Here is the cute Fleming family.
And a pretty purple flower along the trail.After a bit of rest and a really yummy dinner Sarah cooked for us, we went down to the University of Virginia for the evening. Drew got his Master's there, and it's a beautiful school that was designed by Thomas Jefferson. The middle of the school has a big green, and we went there to play Bocci Ball, which I'd never played before. Despite my complete lack of athletic ability, I was actually pretty good at it, and Glenn and I won!

Here we all are at UVA on the night before we left Charlottesville. We had a great time with the Flemings!

Monday morning, Glenn and I drove up to DC. We parked at Union Station and walked over to the Capitol Building, which is much bigger in person than it looks in pictures. Actually, that's how everything in DC was...larger than life.
Here I am at the Capitol Building.

Since we didn't have much time on our first day, we stayed on the east side of the National Mall, and we jumped into the United States Botanic Garden, which is an indoor greenhouse, and very pretty. I won't bore you with too many flower pictures. :)
In front of the Capitol Building is a big pond with lots of ducks, and there were some ducklings!
I call this one "Legally Brunette." :)
Here are some pictures from Union Station on our way out for the day. It is a beautiful old station.
On our way out of DC, we came across our first Ikea, so of course we had to stop! I realize they finally built one in Orlando, and they're building one in Tampa, but Glenn and I had never been, so we were thrilled to finally go to the "mecca" of affordable, cool design. While we didn't have too much time to spend, we got all kinds of ideas, and definitely plan on making a trip over to Orlando soon to buy some of the neat stuff we found!Next up we stayed with our friends Nate and Shelly. Glenn and Nate have been friends since high school, and I've known him almost as long as I've known Glenn. Nate was in our wedding, and Glenn was in his and Shelly's wedding last year. We got to Nate and Shelly's house up in Severn, Maryland, then went out to dinner with them, then down to Ellicott City, a cool historic town. Many of the buildings there are built into the rocks, and a river runs underneath a lot of the buildings. We went to a little restaurant down there to celebrate Cinco de Mayo with a bit of alcohol and a lot of loud music, then went back to their place to crash and rest up for a big day of DC fun.

We drove down to the park and ride lot and took the Metro into the city on Tuesday morning, ready for a marathon day of epic proportions. I didn't realize how ambitious our plans were, but from everyone's reactions, we covered a LOT of ground in one day! We went to the National Archives, the Smithsonian Air & Space, Washington Monument, World War II Memorial, Vietnam Memorial, Korean War Memorial, Lincoln Memorial, FDR Memorial, Jefferson Memorial, and the Smithsonian Natural History Museum. Phew! If you've been to DC, you know just how far apart everything really is, and we walked everywhere.

Here is the outside of the National Archives, home of the Constitution, Declaration of Independence and Bill of Rights.


Once you get through crazy security, you get to go to the Rotunda, where all of the important documents are housed. Now it's pretty dark in there, and they are adamantly against flash photography, so the pictures aren't the greatest, but it was really amazing to see the founding documents of our country. They are very faded, but if you look carefully at the Declaration below, you can see where John Hancock signed in the middle toward the bottom.


Here is the Constitution, and "We the People" is easy to see at the top.
Next we went to the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum, which had all kinds of historic aircraft and spacecraft hanging around inside.

Here the Spirit of St. Louis, which made the first transatlantic flight.


Here's the Wright Flyer, the first airplane.Here's SpaceShip One, the first privately funded spacecraft.

And amusingly enough, Glenn and I both had planes named after us at the museum. Here is the Glamorous Glennis, the first plane to break the sound barrier.
And a "Jenny" plane too.

This is a neat statue out front of the Air and Space. Look at the beautiful blue skies we had all day!The Washington Monument is out in the middle of the National Mall in the hot sunshine, so we didn't linger there too long. If you're more prepared than I was, you can take an elevator ride up to the top and look out over the city, but we missed that one. (You can see the people waiting for the tour at the bottom of this picture.) We did hear an interesting story from someone else's tour guide about the monument. They started building it out of one material, then ran out of money, so about 1/3 of the way up, they switched to a less expensive material. If you look, you can see the dividing line going across the monument.


Next we went over to the new World War II Memorial built in 2004.

Since my Grandfather Nelson fought in WWII, I especially wanted to swing by the New Jersey section in honor of him.
He fought at Guadalcanal, so here is a picture of the Pacific side of the memorial.


No trip to DC is complete until you've been up to visit Honest Abe at the Lincoln Memorial. Again, the building is larger than life. Here is one of the columns.
And here I am with Abe!
Looking back across the Reflecting Pool (which reminds me of Forrest Gump) toward the Washington Monument.


Next up were the Vietnam and Korean War Memorials, which are much less grandiose than WWII, but still very touching. The Vietnam Memorial was much smaller than I 'd envisioned (I didn't take any pictures there), but it's incredible to see the number of names going across the black stone. So sad. As my mom said, it's like a scar going across the hillside.

Here is the Korean War Memorial, which I'm told is incredible at nighttime.



Then we took a long (LONG!) hike down to the Tidal Basin because we'd been told the FDR Memorial was wonderful...and it was! It's very different from the other memorials, as it's much less imposing. It's hard to explain, so here is the description from the website: "This is a memorial not only to FDR, but also to the era he represents. The memorial traces twelve years of American History through a sequence of four outdoor rooms, each one devoted to one of FDR's terms of office. Running water is an important physical and metaphoric component of the memorial. Each of the four "rooms" representing Roosevelt's respective terms in office contains a waterfall. As one moves from room to room, the waterfalls become larger and more complex, reflecting the increasing complexity of a presidency marked by the vast upheavals of economic depression and world war."

Here I am with FDR.
Here is one of the waterfalls.
"I hate war."

Me and Eleanor.
Next up on the marathon, we walked around to the other side of the Tidal Basin to the Jefferson Memorial. This was the only stop of the day that requested silence inside, a welcome request after a day of screaming kids on field trips everywhere we went!

There is a huge statue of Jefferson in the middle.


After a long hike back to the National Mall, we swung through the Smithsonian Natural History Museum. By this point, we were pretty pooped, so we took a quick run through the museum, saw some dinosaurs among other things, and of course the Hope Diamond.

Then we collapsed on the Metro and headed back to Nate and Shelly's, had some pizza for dinner, and crashed again!

The next day we drove out to Annapolis to see my college friend Elizabeth. Annapolis was beautiful, and we had a yummy lunch outside at a cute little restaurant in Eastport.

Then we drove back into DC to go to the National Building Museum, which focuses on architecture. We saw a really interesting exhibit on Eero Saarinen, who designed the St. Louis Gateway Arch and interestingly enough, our next stop for the day, the Dulles Airport. It was like history in action to go from the museum, where we saw drawings and a scale model, to the airport to see the building in person. Here is a picture I grabbed online of the outside so you can see what it looks like.



I took this one inside the ticketing area, where you can see the curved roof.

Finally we headed to our gate in one of their "mobile lounges" which I dubbed the "moon buggies." They drive right across the runways to transfer people around the airport.

After a short flight home, we were back in Florida again. While it was a short vacation, it was a "long" short vacation, and we packed a lot into our five days! It was wonderful to see our friends, and to finally make it in to DC for the first time.