Jenzavoo

Yep, the dog has his first bout of gas and boy does it a) STINKS and b) those sucker sneek up on you! We were sitting in the family room watching television when all of a sudden, whoosh a Bax Bomb! After confirming that it was neither myself or my husband we concluded that it had to be the dog. How does this happen? The only thing different in his diet would be the potato peels that he convienently picked up for me on Thursday and the new dog treats I made him...I really think it's the tators. I have since learned that raw tators are NOT good for dogs and this must be his way of punishing me for letting him be my personalized dog vacuum.

Aside from the dog farts (which continued into the night) the Thanksgiving weekend went great. The meal (my 2nd turkey in 31 years) went over fantasticly, my mistake lead to my fortune. Turns out that the legs of the turkey should be pointing up and not down when you cook it, did you know that? Well since I intended to cook it upside down in the first place but thought otherwise while rubbing it with butter, salt and pepper, I flipped it only to find out later when my parents came by that I had it wrong the whole time. Ah well it lead to a very moist turkey breast so I was the hero, yeah me, SUCCESS! Following dinner I spent the night taking money from my relatives during our poker game. Gotta love family!

Friday consisted of manic cookie baking, yep 7 different recipes of sorts and a TON of cookies later, I was exhausted, as were the other women in my family who helped. You would think that the exhaustion would lead us to our beds but nope, it lead us to the "not so great" movie theatre to see the fourth installment of the Harry Potter movies. I highly recommend this film, the screenwritter was able to fit a 400+ book into a 3 hour movie. Brilliant! It was way better then the third one and all of it's far away shots and scenery. Mad Eye Moody was by far my favorite part, had me laughing outloud.

The movie experience was not all it's cracked up to be and it just rehashed the reason why my husband and I do not like movie theatres, the people. The theatre was packed to the gills and we just happened to be sitting in front of the worlds loudest commentator. There weren't enough shhs or stares in the world that could stop this pint size menece, did I mention he was like 10! Um hello there's a reason it was PG-13 so that little twerps like that can't get in. It finally took a very loud shhh and a dirty look to get him to shut his trap. Our next movie venture will be to see RENT, my all time favorite broadway production. Let's just hope that little kid isn't there telling me all about how Mimi loves Roger but they both have baggage so they have to part ways and oh they both have AIDS.

Saturday was spent on the couch doing absolutly nothing which includes not getting out of our PJs. Afterall why would one want to go shopping in a mall during the Thanksgiving weekend when they could sit around and catch up on their tivo? Crazyness!

Sunday was yard day, that little bug that so joyfully shows up in my ass showed itself again on Sunday. Up and at em I'm ready to rake leaves. clean the yard, get my bulbs in and put up the Christmas lights but alas I'm stopped with "it rained last night". Bummer, so I thought heck with it, it's only a little wet, we can get the yard done. 4 hours and soaking wet later the yard was void of leaves and the bulbs were in. The Christmas lights will have to wait.

I hope everyone elses weekend was as good as ours. Now what do I do with all the leftovers! EEK!

Yep, my first Thanksgiving dinner in which I have to cook! It's two days away and surprisingly I'm looking forward to it. There will be 10 of us, all the fixins, and a 20 pound turkey, do the math people that is 2 pounds of turkey per person! Thankfully, we don't have any vegitarians coming to dinner. Along with my bird recipe I'm also going to hunt down some turkey leftover meals for the next month!

Along with getting the food ready for Thursday we're also cleaning the house. We've lived there over a year and I don't think either of us knew that we had so much stuff. I'm walking around with a very large garbage bag and if I haven't touched it in a year I'm tossin it. If I didn't need it then what's gonna change in the near future that I will need it now. hmmm nothin'.

My husband was a little skeptical about me doing Thanksgiving in our small kitchen. I get frustrated trying to cook for two, what makes me think cooking for 20 will be any easier? So I've requested Friday off of work to recouperate from the stress that this will cause. Doesn't stress help you lose weight? Excellent, I can have seconds and stress off the food while I go along.

Happy Thanksgiving!!

I've started this blog why? I'm not sure. I've got an extensive stash of blogs that I read on a daily basis and they all have "themes", mostly mommybloggers but there are a few that are more on the feminist front. So I'm trying to find my direction with this. I'm all for telling the world about the crap in the back yard that Baxter has left us to pick up this week or that my poor husband has a gall bladder problem but I think that would be too much information. I've been trying to figure out what and how much of my life I want to share on here. I've got no comments so that's a sign that no one is reading so I should just open up and spill it all right? I don't think so for fear that someone will actually find this and read it and get hurt. I've seen it happen people, these things are NOT a way to talk about people, they always find out.

So until I find my direction you're stuck with my ramblings :)

Santa if you are reading I've been really really good this year. Besides this I also want a new brown Coach purse (not too expensive) and a nice watch. I'll be sure to leave you your favorite cookies on Christmas Eve.

Thanks,
Jenzavoo

Ok, so we're back from the MOA and the shopping trip of the season. Man, that place was huge! It took us a better part of Saturday just to get through the first and second levels. And the people! I've never seen a mall so crowded in my life. Together my mother and I filled the "big" suitcase with our purchases. It wasn't hard, there's no tax on clothes and Eddie Bauer had a sale! Two of my favorite things, no taxes and a sale. Walked out with a nice new wardrobe. Not to forget but they also have a Legoland and well they had cool stuff so we picked up multiple sets for the nephews back home.

I realized that spending over 48 hours alone with my mother may not be happening again in the near future. Do NOT get me wrong I love my mother and well she paid for my flight but there's just something about being with her alone for that amount of time. I needed a "buffer". I'm one to be easily annoyed, especially before coffee and well she doesn't walk in a strait line so I had to bite my tounge alot. I'm sure that she doesn't do it on purpose but gosh, it was hard to not push her over. I remedied my frustration by just walking 2 steps behind her, watched for the sway and having multiple cups of coffee.

So that's it, I'm back in Illinois and I'm ready to sleep, the early morning return from out of town does wonders on your sleep or shall I say the lack of.

My mother and I are off to the Mall of America, home of tax free clothing, for a mother/daughter weekend!! Have you seen this place? It's 4 levels of pure shopping enjoyment. They have a ton shoe stores and I'll be in heaven for over 48 hours strait! My husband has warned me "no shoes!" and that's because I'm pretty shoed out and the shoe shrine is over flowing with gorgeous heals and flats. I'm sure I can find something to ease the blow when I come home with a few "extra" pairs in the form of a nice sweater or t-shirt. You can't just walk past a shoe store, you have to go in and look, did I mention it's all tax free? Wheee. Let's just hope that we don't kill each other while we're out there, cuz I'm not bringing any extra money for a casket.

Have a good weekend!!

If my mother were dead she would have rolled over in her grave but since she's not she'll just have to roll her eyes. Last night prior to R.E.M. sleep our dog decided he needed to be spooned and who better to do it then me. So we spooned and he took up most of the bed. I kicked him out for being a hog only for him to return to the end of the bed to lay between my legs. : / My mother would flip over this, Why? because how on earth will we create a grandchild with me spooning the dog?

On another note, the scent of Pachooly is filling the air here in the office and can I just tell you that I am about to puke. NOT one of my favorite smells by any means and it was put on with a spray bottle the size of Mt. Everest! Think of your co-workers people!

To quote Napolian Dynamite, "You're ruining my life! gaaahh"

Wow, I made the leap. I've been thinking about creating a blog for a while now but just never jumped off. But now since I'm wet I might as well keep it going.

My husband and I lost a great internet friend yesterday. We never met him in the flesh but he was clearly a presence in our lives. I never thought that I could feel so empty knowing that he won't be back. I re-read his thoughts and our banters back and forth and continue to laugh through the tears. I will miss our friend tremendously but I know he's up there looking down and we will be together some day. RIP DJ.

I didn't intend for my first post to be so deep but that's what this blog is for, my thoughts.

Raise a glass to a better tomorrow.