HELP! (seems like an appropriate title for this week's adventures)

I took a crap load of pictures in NYC! 

Had so much fun, that I wanted to document every moment.  But I don't have any time right now to do all that stuff......boo.

But this has been a busy week and weekend.  Trivia finals, painting class, tax appointments....yada yada yada

Had a disgusting experience earlier in the week when my favorite little cat brought me a mouse and laid it on my pillow......while I was sleeping.  Thankfully, the dog had woken me up running around the bed....and in my sleeping stupor I said to myself "this dog is acting like it's chasing something, I better look".  So I turned on the light and there was that mouse in all it's disgusting glory.

Of course, I did the only thing a person would do at 4am when they are frightfully awakened....I wrapped the mouse up in the blanket and tossed it on the roof.  I really was hoping that it was just faking dead and it would run away once I threw it out there OR that some other animal would come along and want to eat it. 

However, much to my disappointment......it was still there in the morning when I got up.  Here's the proof:

 

That was a huge Texas sized mouse.  But then began the wondering of:  did the cat catch the mouse outside the house OR did she find it in our house??????  Both thoughts creeped me out....but I was really hoping she brought it in.  Well much to my horror.....this weekend as I've been cleaning house, I've been discovering some mice droppings in a couple of different locations.  I'm just hoping that this was a loner mouse and that he doesn't have a whole family living here.

 

So at this time, I would like to thank Misty for guarding our house against disgusting vermin.  However, the next time she finds one I am hoping she disposes of it on her own and not put it in my bed.  As you can see right at this moment in time, Misty does not give a crap about mice hunting at this time.

 

 

In other breaking news......the little dog got involved with an ant pile this afternoon.  After our last scary adventure with her.....I immediately brought her in the house and tried to hurry and get the ants off of her legs and gave her a dose of Benadryl.  Two hours later......she's still looking good.  Hopefully, she's not really allergic to ants -- just had a bad experience with them last time.

Gotta go......got plans for tomorrow and a busy day ahead for me.  Yippee.....it's going to be a fun day!

The day you've been waiting for....I know my mother has!

I know you've all been waiting with baited breath to see what our exciting adventure in New York City was like.

Don't want to disappoint you......but, I took a MILLION pictures and I just haven't had time to put them here yet.  I've been busy doing my job.....you know PZ stuff.

But......I am so excited to get this trip documented before I forget it.....so you are going to get a sneak peek.  However, I have not downloaded the pictures off of the camera yet.....so you are only going to get a preview of the pictures that Paul took on his phone (because for some strange reason his pictures just automatically download and mine have to be done manually.....boo).

So without further adieu........here's a preview of our exciting New York City trip!

WARNING:  you are getting un-edited pictures in random order.  We are only posting these to give you a flavor of our awesome trip!  These pictures are for your entertainment only and will come without commentary. 

Today's the day I've been dreading

I have to put on shoes for the first time in 3 weeks.

As  you can see, my toe is still a fat little sausage. 

(yeah.....I know it's blurry)

 

We're at the point now where I can go a couple of days a week and it doesn't hurt.  But then, there's still days where it still aches and pains me.  I've been very, very careful with it and trying not to bump it into something or have someone step on it.

I bought new shoes and I need to get them broke in before we leave on Saturday.

I love these shoes.  They are so light and comfortable.  I love them so much that I now have 2 of them in different colors.

The black ones look somewhat dressy when paired with jeans and a nice shirt.....and yet my feet are so comfortable for all the walking we'll do. 

The white ones are daytime wear with my shorts.  Now that I've impressed you with my style techniques, we'll just move along now.

Yesterday I spent a good deal of time making reservations and booking stuff that we still needed in NYC.  I wanted to go inside the statue of Liberty, but they limit how many tickets they sell for that....so I was able to get one on the last day we are there.  Not doing the crown....just inside the pedestal.  And since we'll be in that area of Manhattan to take the ferry, I bought our tickets for the 9/11 Museum for that same day and we'll do that in the morning before going to Ellis Island in the afternoon.  Also had to have tickets for the Eilen Jewell concert that we are attending Tuesday night.

Tickets, tickets, tickets.....still need to get transportation set up for Newark, NJ airport into Manhattan. 

Lots of thing to get accomplished this week, so I really shouldn't be wasting my time here....I'll just move along and see how many things I can get done.

And in other news......the husband decided that late yesterday afternoon would be a good time to drain the spa, wipe it down, and refill it.  However, this was how far we got.  Need to get out there later this evening and finish the job.....in my "spare time".

Ups and Downs and All Arounds

I hate the first of the month when it's also payroll week.  Too much to do. 

Doesn't help that I've had lots of trip planning and other business-related things to plan.

But I'm just going to stop working on all business related stuff as of right this minute and work on some other fun things.  Like clean the refrigerator, fold towels, put away laundry, load the dishwasher....you know...those kind of things.

Been lots of ups and downs this week with the New Mexico trip.  Had lots of plans made, plans cancelled, phone calls, more plan changes.....I'm exhausted, but I think we've got most of the details ironed out right now.  We've got some exciting things planned for when we go.....can't wait.

But before that trip is New York City and I have to say I'm pretty excited about that too.  There is so much to see and do there and we barely saw anything when we were there last time.....so it will be like a brand new adventure for us.

Well I hear the washer singing me a cute little tune which really means "get your butt in here and unload me".  At least next week at this time, we'll be packing to head to the big city.....yay!

But just so this blog isn't so boring, I'll post a few pics of our last trip there in 2012.  (I was scared and thought I had lost these pictures when my last computer died......but I use Carbonite and just found them there because they got backed up and saved automatically for me....Thank you thank you thank you.....I am so glad to see these again!)

Just wasting some time

Just finished storming and it looks like it will be storming all night.

I've got about 20 minutes or so until the husband comes home and picks me up for trivia.

Not enough time to get much accomplished, but I don't want to just sit and waste time either.

It's the first of the month, which brings along a LOT of extra work.  It also happens to be payroll time again, and I always seem be be catching up so that I can get it done by Friday.

But right now, at this quiet time in my house (except for this awful smell which I think is because the dog farted and not because she took a crap on the floor), I decided to just write down all the crazy crap that's been happening here the last couple of days.

We've been really trying hard to find a cabin rental for when we go to Santa Fe.  Not going to share all the details yet, but the little town we need it in for 7 days is having some BIG GIGANTIC CELEBRATION that only happens once a year and it's the weekend we'll be there. 

I've found AWESOME places we need to rent, but then things happen and things happen and we still haven't gotten the perfect thing yet.  We've had it in the grasp of our hands TWICE, but lost it just as quickly. 

I've been working with a national coordinator on a pizza party for a local shelter and ironing out some details. 

We've been planning a bowling party for our employees on the 4th of July since we close on that day.  In the past, we have done a softball game, but the weather here is just too brutal to play outside.....so a bowling game it is.

We've got New York City coming up next weekend and there's still some things I need to do with that. 

Just a brief list of the FUN things that we've had going on.  I won't bore you with all the boring things we have.....but it's always exciting at the Gainor house.

Well, need to start getting ready for trivia.  Looking forward to a fun night out with my husband.  Haven't had a night out in awhile......we need it.

Hope to start sharing some of the other details of our life here soon!

I should have been a travel agent!

Those of you who know us.....know we LOVE to travel!

Right now we have all our tickets for New York City and for Santa Fe.

Paul and I have been tossing around ideas for what we want to do in NYC while we are there.  We missed so many places last time we visited 3.5 years ago.....so there are lots of choices.  Our must do's so far are:  Coney Island, 911 Museum, Statue of Liberty, Broadway Shows, PIZZA, and the Hudson River Museum.

Aaron and I have been tossing around ideas for what we want to do in Santa Fe while we are there.  Last night we spent an hour on the phone and came up with some genius things to do.

So excited.....still have some planning to do, but our trip there will include these things:

We are going to have an AWESOME time when we visit.   Can't wait until the details and plans are all final so we can share our adventure!

Last full day of London (Part 2)

Here's a refresher of where we left off:  we just ate lunch.

Got on the subway and started planning on our remaining time we had left.  We realized that we would not have enough time to visit the Maritime Museum, buy souvenirs, get a brief nap, and be on time to meet with James and his wife (Paul's friend) for our evening plans.

We had to scrap something and it ended up being the museum.  We have learned that you "can't do it all" and you should save some things to do when you come back for a visit.

Our plan was to head back towards our hotel and stop on the way and do some souvenir shopping at an open street market Paul had researched in Covent Garden.

Our subway ride back to the hotel required us to transfer and it just so happened it was the station where the Dr. Who Tardis was located.  So we popped out of the station and took some souvenir photos:

See those Pizza Zone magnets stuck on the Tardis?  Of course, the people standing around there thought that we were totally wacky.....but who cares?????  we are tourists!!

 

After the picture opportunity, we hopped on the subway and headed to Covent Garden.  We had a slew of souvenirs to buy. 

 

The whole time we had been in London, I kept telling Paul we just had to take an iconic picture next to a London phone booth......after getting off in Covent Garden, we had that opportunity!

 



Love those phone booths.....and they are seriously all over the city!

We found a souvenir shop where we purchased plates, beer glasses, tote bags, shot glasses and all other kinds of cheesy London souvenirs. 

As we were headed back to our hotel, we passed through the open market and ended up with a couple of pictures for ourselves.  Love, love, love this painting:

Having a hard time finding the perfect spot for it......but it such an awesome painting!

Since we hit the jackpot at the first store for getting souvenirs for Cris, Aaron, Shay, me, Paul, and whomever.....we had time to go to the hotel room and freshen up a little bit and get an itty bitty nap.

We got on the subway and headed to Stratford (about 45 minutes by subway) to meet James and his wife at a casino and have dinner.  Dinner for us was very light (mushroom soup for me and a little sandwich for Paul) since we had eaten a late lunch.  We really enjoyed talking with them during dinner and then it was time to head into the casino.

I just have to say that it was very difficult to understand some of the games, but we spent a couple of hours there and I actually came out a little ahead on the money.

Around 10:30pm we called it a night since we had to ride the subway back to the hotel and get all packed up for a very very early wake up call in the morning.

We stayed up for about an hour cleaning the room up and cramming everything into our suitcases.  We certainly didn't want to do it in the morning, since we had to leave the hotel by 6:30 am to get us to the airport in plenty of time.

We made it with lots of time, got on our flight.......which was 10 hours going home (we were on a slower plane).  They fed us, gave us ice cream, and kept us hydrated and entertained the whole way home.  We tried to sleep some.....but that's hard on a plane. 

Of course, after we landed (about 2:30pm Houston time), we had to go through US Customs -- which was a more tedious process than when we landed in London.  Then of course, we couldn't come straight home....we had to stop at the Restaurant Depot and pick up supplies to drop off at Pizza Zone.  We finally made it home around 5pm and then it was time for Paul to go to work and me do payroll (yuck).....but the employees really wanted their paychecks.

It was a fun, amazing, and a once in a lifetime trip and I'm so glad I got to do it with my best friend.  We had such a great time and I can't wait until we can take our next international trip again.

We even came back with some English money we had to exchange at the bank!

So as another fantastic journey ends.......there's another new adventure waiting on the horizon!