Cupcake Day!

It has just occurred to me ... back in the day, when I was at A&M, on the first day of finals each semester all the engineering professors and staff would each bring in about 3 dozen or so homemade cupcakes. For those of you that think that's not that many cupcakes, there are about 900 Civil Undergrads at any given time and I could always eat cupcakes until I was sick to my stomach. They actually lined the corridors with them.

Sweet, luscious, mouth-watering cupcakes.

Somehow I doubt I have that to look forward to here. I have a feeling that not every university does that. Come to think of it, it may have only been the Civil Engineering Department. I do, however, have my very own professor that I sleep with every night. Maybe he'll make me a private stash. I like the white ones. With the pink icing. Maybe rainbow sprinkles inside too.

New Pet Peeve

When someone messes with all the settings on my camera and I don't realize it and I take two dozen photos and then I go to upload them and they all look like monet paintings.

A man and his dog

a man and his dog
Originally uploaded by missyajg.

I didn't get to see my family ... ahem ... my now extended family (that's a shout out to the new fam, dr. j) but my uncle sent me some great photos from the celebration. My brother's post-Thanksgiving naps are becoming legendary. I wish I could follow this up from the ones I have from previous years. I think I will someday, if I ever can get around to it.

We're In!

Remaining boxes are generally all piled in one room so the place is fairly livable now. Tivo, fridge, phone has arrived, and we are just waiting on them to come do something with the phone line that is just LAYING in our yard.

I don't even want to think about how far behind I am with school/work right now. Rest assured, you won't hear much from me in the next week.

DONE!

Small glich, but it was overcome. As of 4 pm today, Dr. J and I had signed all the papers, had our celebratory wine bottle, and have parted ways to get back to Thanksgiving prep / work. Official move in is two days hence.

Countdown to new countdowns

My life is just full to the brim with anticipation. In the on-deck circle is ...

Tivo (sweet lord, it's about time!)
satellite (bye bye little rabbit ears that have sat diligently in our rocking chair)
full-sized refrigerator
Christmas decor (love it! love it! love it! love it!)
future kitty (we have already decided where future kitty's food and water bowls will lay)
internet service at home
and finally ... a nod to next summer and some very likely upcoming travel

House Update

We are supposed to close tomorrow, and all is in order for that to take place.... all except that the electricity isn't hooked up, so the inspector can't inspect it, and we can't close till those things take place. Why isn't the electricity hooked up? Beats me. But now it is because yesterday it rained (heavy sprinkle all day) for the first time in 3 months, and the electrical company can't hook up the electricity in the sprinkle. More sprinkle today as well. Why did they wait until today to do this? Some questions can never be answered. In the meantime, we can show some new pics ...




Dr. J continues to forget to take pictures of the other rooms or useful bathroom perspectives. I'll see if I can take that camera away from him. Actually, the bathrooms aren't his fault. Since there's no electricity yet, those rooms are very dark. Hopefully soon though ...

Lost thoughts

Am I the only person left that didn't like Ana Lucia before Wednesday night's episode and still doesn't like her? Aren't you all still pissed at her for shooting Shannon? I didn't see anything redeeming in her character this week ... I do like Eko more though. And I can't WAIT for the Bernard-Rose reuniting ... CAN'T WAIT!

I take it back

The house is all but done. Get ready to pop the corks off your champagne bottles, we're gonna dance on the 23rd after all! Be ready for a lengthy photo posting this weekend.

How to put a damper on a good time

This weekend, here in mini-bottle land, is the big Clemson-USC rivalry game. Haven't heard of it before? Me neither!

Which is why I feel like such a putz when everyone from my 6th graders to the guy checking my groceries at the store asks me if I'm a Carolina fan!?!? Even if I lie, it's hard to get anything more than a halfhearted "sure" out of my mouth. I mostly want to talk about the fact that the new Harry Potter movie is being released on Friday and FOR ONCE this town doesn't have to wait for the wide release (still no word on when Pride and Prejudice hits theaters here). Anyhoo, so half the time I just confess I'm not from here, and if they are really nice they might ask where I'm from, to which they really have no reply to since most of them have never been west of Atlanta. No offense, little confederate flag bearers, but you haven't. Anyway, so I'm a conversation killer. You just can't fake school spirit like that.

Clearly, UT sucks and I'm all over that bandwagon. =)
(that's for you Karo - I know how much you love it)

Next Wednesday

I haven't been posting pictures on the house much because, to be honest, not much is happening there. Dr. J and I are preparing, but no one else seems to be. We are supposed to close in 10 days and the To Do List includes:

- Complete kitchen cabinets
- Paint kitchen cabinets
- Put hardwood floors in the entire house minus two rooms
- Put carpeting in those remaining two rooms
- Paint the walls (one coat is on ... but very blotchy, desperate need of multiple coatings)
- Install all light fixtures
- Install appliances
- Touch up all the little places you beat to death while trapesing in and out
- Anything else that's not obvious to your average lay-person.

Let's see a show of hands that thinks we'll be going to see the new John Cusack movie on the 23rd instead of closing. There's really not much we can do about it, so I'm preparing a Thanksgiving Grocery List and wrapping up my Christmas shopping. We did, however, buy a washer and dryer this past weekend. Refrigerator is next on the list.

Huh.

This guy is either going to end up as our president or in jail. Do you think that city council meetings will be considered an excused absense? Would he technically be his principal's boss? There is an endless amount of wondering to be done here.

I'm back on!

YAY!!! I got a new computer at work today and I am back in Messenger! At least MSN, but it's at least a small step forward. And I even think computer guru man is warming up to me enough that he might let me install some of that software that I like have but tight-wad-tech-geeks freak out about. Happy Friday to me!

That and I'm hacking up lots of mucus to day. Not fun (or quiet), but better out than in. Also better than feeling like slushy poop on the couch with tickley snot throat (i.e., yesterday).

Raider, P

Raider, P
Originally uploaded by missyajg.

This guy, who has always been known to me as "P", is The Biggest College Football Fan. And sadly, he, like myself, is being forced to watch the Aggies muddle their way through '05. P is my cousin, the whole lot of us are Aggie grads and none of us are discussing the feat of the Ags this season.

Fortunately, the rest of us didn't make bets with our co-workers that would put us in this position. You can't imagine what a sore loser this guy is (that guy, the one in the right-background knows though, he definitely knows). But we love P even more for it. It just wouldn't be a family gathering if P wasn't getting pissed about losing something.

Beasley Grubbs

Beasley Grubbs
Originally uploaded by missyajg.

Presenting the newest member of our family, my neph-pup, Beasley.

Beasley joined the ranks a few weeks ago and just endured a rough weekend of vets and vaccines, so let's give the little tyke a hand. Dr. J and I intend the snuggle the poop right out of that guy come Christmas.

We loves ya, Beas!

Now He's just showing off

So things seem to be moving along, maybe the builder is actually going to make our November 23 close (and move) date. I was watching TV last night and see a preview for an upcoming attraction starring, none other than John Cusack.

The Ice Harvest, starring John Cusack, is being released not-so-coincidently on Wednesday, November 23.

Very spooky.

Not one to waste an opportunity ... it would fulfill me a million times over if a perfect stranger would show up at our closing and offer to pay off our mortgage.

God feels bad leaving me here in ColUmbia for Thanksgiving but he's trying to make it up to me

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire: 11/18/05
Pride and Prejudice: 11/11/05
Rent: 11/23/05

There is little else I love more dearly than these three things: Jane Austen, Broadway, and Harry Potter ... oh and movies (especially free ones - where's that pizza guy?). If I could just get John Cusack to stop by and help us move into our house, I could die a very fulfilled and happy girl.

Just call me Missy McLucky

So, poor Dr. J has had this horribly busy week ... yes I even had to sleep alone one night while he practically pulled an all nighter. So last night I wanted to surprise him and go pick up a pizza (all the poor guy ever wants is fast food and that mean wife of his just doesn't go for it).

I'm standing there alone at Papa Johns waiting on my pizza to be done and this pizza delivery guy walks in the door, back from a round of deliveries. He starts to walk past me, but then he stops and he says to me, "Do you think you'd use these tonight? I'd hate for them to go to waste and I have to work", and hands me two tickets to see The Fully Monty at the Koger Center in downtown. It takes me a minute to realize he's just handing me a pair of musical tickets, to a musical that starts in an hour. I try to be polite and suggest that maybe he'll be able to go, but he insists. So, I thank him, get my pizza, and make my way home.

Despite the fact that Dr. J is already in his pajama pants, he doesn't want to pass up the free seats, so we scarf down a few slices of pizza, change our clothes and make our way down town. It's not until we arrive that we actually look at the tickets and notice they are in the Lower Orchestra Section. That's right folks, pizza guy gave us third row tickets to a musical.

We really enjoyed the musical, we both agreed it was much better than the movie by the same name. I have to admit though, we didn't actually expect to get the full monty, but get it we did, it was hilarious. Even conservative South Carolina seemed to agree. However, we were definitly reminded how red this state is during a particular romantic scene (a VERY quick one) where two of the guys that became friends almost kiss. The entire audience actually groaned and you could hear hundreds of very audible "oh god"'s! Now, obviously I'm not gay, and I don't anticipate moments like these, but COME ON! It's not like those guys were trying to kiss the men in the audience.

This IS as good as it gets

Witness Harry and Hermione as of Friday eve:
Note the detail (not all of which appears here). There's the obvious lightning bolt scar, the crazy gel-ed hair (for both of us, I suppose), Harry's got his Nimbus 2000 (in case someone hadn't read all the books and doesn't know of the more advanced broomstickery) and a wand for each of us. But Crookshanks is there also, Hermione is toting one of her favorite textbooks, and our wardrobe is consistent with the white button-up shirt and tie overlain by the grey v-neck and black unzipped robes that appear in the films. On closer inspection, you will see that we located a Gryffindor symbol on the web, printed it out, and since I could not find a safety pin at the apartment, I stitched the crest to the robes. And by "stitched" I mean I pulled out the needle and thread and SEWED.

I mention all of this to you because we managed to attend a Halloween party with 30-ish other people, NONE of which had ever read any of the books or seen ANY of the movies. I can't imagine that a collection of 30 people exist in any portion of the english-speaking world where this is even possible. So we had to continually explain who we were and nary a soul appreciated the detail of our wardrobes. No less than 10 people during the course of the evening made mention that "oh and you brought a cat!", to which I would reply, "It's Crookshanks", and receive this retort, "wow, you even named it"! It just about killed me that we had to constantly say who we were so people didn't think we were "students".

Oh, and to top it all off, everyone now thinks I'm this huge sci-fi and fantasy fan because I've read all the books and people keep trying to ask me about Star Trek.