Black Friday on a Saturday in January

Yesterday was a big day for the YMCAs in the Triad. They held registration for a program called Transformation Nation Triad. TNT is a 16 week FREE event that the Ys and WXII (a local news channel) are sponsoring. The program includes once-a-week group classes and information on nutritional information and is open to anyone needing to lose weight. To register for this program, you just had to go to the YMCA location where you wanted to participate. Each location offered different time slots (about 5-6 at each location) and you could pick which slot you wanted to be in.

Jason and I had heard about TNT and we were very interested in signing up because, god knows, we need some help with this weight loss thing. I think we need to be held accountable to someone other than ourselves because we allow each other to cheat with snacks and what not.

The main website for the Triad Ys advertised that sign-up for TNT would be held from Saturday, 1/28, to Friday, 2/3. So, when we discussed our game plan for Saturday, we decided we would just sleep in and then mosey over to the Y closest to us (Robinhood, which by the way, we're members of) to sign up.... Our plans ended up being changed when Jason read the Facebook status of one of the trainers at the Robinhood Y (he's friends with her on that site). The trainer's status stated that the Robinhood Y opened at 7am and anyone looking to sign up for TNT should get there early. For some reason this made me nervous. I told Jason that I thought we should get up and get out there, rather than sleep in. He thought this was overkill, but he realized how freaked out I was and agreed to get up at 6:30am on a Saturday.

Soooo, we got to our YMCA around 6:50am... to find a line semi-worthy of a Black Friday sale at Best Buy. Our eyes popped. Neither one of us was expecting this. So, we hustled out of our car and started to head to the back of the line. As we were heading there, a lady in line decided to let us know what we're actually lining up for - A. Waiting. List. Huh??? It turns out that each YMCA location was only taking 125 people And, there were waaaay more than that in line. This meant that the first 125 were getting registered and the rest of us were being put on a waiting list in case an opening became available. The very first people in line (a couple) had gotten there around 1:30am. What the hell? I think the rest of the 123 people were in line by 5:00am or so. Seriously?

Jason and I got in line, but continued to discuss if it was actually worth it to do this. The waiting list was, obviously going to be a first come, first served process and we were so far back in the line that even if replacements did get into the program, the odds of us being those replacements were slim to none.

In the end we decided to stick it out and get our applications in. We're hoping that the YMCAs and/or WXII will decide that there were too many people getting turned away and will hold this event later this year and give the waiting list people priority or, even better, they somehow find a way to make things work now for us all. I doubt the latter will work just because of space. I knew there would have to be a finite amount of people who got into this program, but I didn't realize it would be such a small number.

Sigh. So, Jason and I are just going to have to suck it up and do what we have to do to lose the weight on our own. I know it can be done. We just need to figure out how.

I never learn

Dang it! Last night, Jason and I had a silly moment... Wait, rewind. I had a silly moment and Jason was, as usual, just putting up with me (as in, shaking his head and going about his business). I told myself to write down this funny moment so that I could capture the image of the situation and then turn it into my new blog post. Buuuut, I have such a short attention span. We were in the processing up putting on the final touches of our new bathroom light fixture (putting on the globes and screwing in the bulbs), by the time we finished all that, I forgot all about the silly moment.

So, I have got to learn to always keep a pen and paper nearby so I can capture hilarious moments like that one. Because I swear, I'm a funny person and I have a lot of funny moments. But I just can't remember them. Poop.

Here's a random one that happened to me just a couple of hour ago. I wanted to hit the Sirius XM channels on my Dish Network box. When I entered the channel number on my remote control, I missed a digit. The channel I was taken to was the Barbie channel... What? This really exists? Why????? I actually sat there for a bit, just taking this in. I was actually too shocked to change the channel. Finally I came to my senses and pushed in the correct numbers.

Seriously. The Barbie channel. Trust me, I can't make this stuff up.

Got any extra willpower?

Uuuggghhh! Why does bad food have to taste soooo good? Why does exercising have to be work? Why do I not have any willpower. Why am I so lazy?

I'm trying, excuse me, wishing I were actually trying and not just pretending to try, to lose some weight. After I got married, I was able to to maintain my weight for the first couple of years... but then I guess I got comfortable in the married life and started letting it all hang out. So over the past few years, I've been adding weight.

Jason and I decided to set weight goals for ourselves for 2012. If we hit those goals on May 31st, then on June 1st we were booking a December cruise. Why December? That would give us the time to build up the money/pay off the trip. Plus we like to get the hell outta dodge when it's cold here. Ya know, go somewhere warm and laugh at our friends and family that are stuck here in Coldsville.

My total weight loss goal is 40lbs. By May 31st. Totally doable. I broke it down into baby steps to make the end goal less daunting - if I could lose just 2 pounds a week, I'd actually be a tiny bit over my goal by the due date. TWO FRICKIN' MEASLY POUNDS. Yeah, it's the last full week of January and how am I doing? Wellllll, at least I haven't gained.

I just have no willpower when it comes to food. I love all the bad, unhealthy stuff and think that all the "good for you" crap tastes like... well, crap. I'm usually pretty good about getting to the gym (going about 4 times a week and then working out a 5th day at home). But even that's fallen to the wayside lately. I haven't worked out since last Wednesday. As in January 18th (my birthday). Damn. It. I'm supposed to be training for a 1/2 marathon that I'm doing at the end of March. Crap! In my defense, I haven't been working out because things have been super busy at Moorefield Mansion (disclaimer: Moorefield Mansion may not be a real mansion). But, that's not an excuse. You're supposed to find time to exercise.... But, I've seriously misplaced that time (it's gotta be around here somewhere!)

Since I haven't been exercising lately, I've been trying to eat somewhat healthier than normal. By this I mean watching my portions and trying to cut out snacking. One thing that's helping is we actually don't have anything worthwhile to snack on in the house. We do have some popcorn - both the microwavable kind and "kernels for the air popper" kind. The only reason I'm not chowing down on any of that is because I'm too lazy to actually make any of it. Huh, my laziness does come in handy sometimes. Oh last weekend we bought ice cream (which I was craving), but the kind we bought was disgusting, so that killed my craving. Hmmmmm, note to self - buy more of that crap.

Anyhoo - after a long day at work, Jason and I decided to go out to eat. Where did we go? To a pizza buffet joint. Oh swell. Just what we needed. A plethora of food at our disposal. We actually stayed pretty contained, though! We probably ate more than we should have, but we didn't eat nearly as much as we normally do at buffets.... I stopped before I hit that miserable point.

But then we screwed ourselves by going across the street to Dewey's Bakery. We were going to get one cake square a piece. But Dewey's suckered us. They have a deal where if you get 5 of any baked goods, you get 1 free. Well, 5 + 1 = HELL YEAH! There are 2 of us and HELL YEAH divides equally between 2. We couldn't pass up that deal... Damn you, Dewey's, damn you.

Soooo, I'll keep you posted on this weight loss thingy. But for now, please excuse me. I have a cake square calling my name.

It's like a bad car wreck

Good grief, I can't look away. I don't want to blink because I might miss a quick second of excitement... yet I'm ashamed to be admitting this. Hello. My name is Missy and I'm a closet WWE (World Wrestling Entertainment) fan. I'm still looking for my 12 step plan.

How did this happen? Well, when Jason and I first met, he liked wrestling. Back then it was WWF (World Wrestling Federation). Since I had a huge crush on him, I was able to overlook his fascination with this male soap opera. Somewhere in our dating timeline, Jason stopped watching wrestling. It was not because of me. I swear. Hey, throughout our relationship, I've had my own dirty-secret shows (there was a period where I thought One Tree Hill was the shiz. Thankfully, I woke up... oh and the show got really stupid. Even stupider than it originally was).

In the past year or so, Jason got back into watching this madness. He always DVRs it, although he normally starts watching it about 30 minutes after it starts because he just can't wait any longer (the only reason he waits as long as he does is so he can fast forward through commercials and some of the drama that gets dumber than normal). When he first got back into watching this, I would curl up beside him on the couch to read... but I started realizing that my eyes kept drifting to the screen as random guys proceeded to kick each others asses (and sometimes some women). My catch phrase back then was "is that legal?!?!?" as Wrestler A pulled off a move on Wrestler B that should've caused some damage to B, but didn't (seriously, how tough are these people??). My shame grew as I realized that my thug side would come out anytime I heard John Cena's theme song. Seriously, why was I rocking out to this?? (in my defense, it's got a good beat).

To this day, I try to pretend that I'm not interested. But, Jason calls me out on it as he realizes I haven't turned a page in my book in 10-20 minute or that I'm sitting with the laptop on my lap, but nothing's happening. I will say that my favorite part of wrestling is making fun of some of the wrestlers. Does that help to save my soul? No. Probably not.

Everyday I'm writ-en-ing...

Ok, so that didn't have the same cool flow that the line "everyday I'm shuffling" does, but I do what I gotta do. Right? I must say that I'm glad to know hubby is able to overlook (or put up with, whatever) my weirdness. Take tonight for instance...

We elected to skip the gym because we like to be chunky monkeys. Ok, no, that's not true - we are chunky, but we don't like it. Anyhoo - we decided to skip the gym to work on cleaning our house. I seriously don't understand how in the course of a week our house gets so destroyed. Oh, wait, it's because we're lazy and we have a bleeping plethora of animals. Got it. Since we like our down time - a lot - we decided to break the house cleaning up over the course of this week. As I mentioned in a previous post, we're having house guests coming to spend Saturday night with us, so we've got this entire week to clean... and keep things that way. Good luck to us.

Jason came home with a to-do list. "Here's what we're getting done tonight," he states while giving me The Look - the one that says I hope you're paying attention. Snort. I DID do some work. Just not the amount that he did. Correction - is still doing. Doesn't he know he's making me look bad as he folds those sheets? (In my defense, I am seriously incompetent when it comes to folding sheets...and towels... and clothes). Also, I didn't do one bit of work that he had written on his to-do list. I guess I clean to the beat of a different drummer (HA! I am soooo witty).

My two favorite parts of tonight's cleaning process were these:

1. My birthday was last week and my friend Melissa had bought me one of those pointy party hats.... Hello Kitty of course. I randomly put that on as I (half-heartedly) helped Jason change the sheets on our bed. Jason did do a small double take when he realized what I was wearing. But, other than that minuscule head shake, he didn't miss a beat. He's a little too used to my strange ways.

2. We lost Simon (our cat). I searched all over the house, more than once. I even checked the dryer. Jason randomly suggested that I look under our bed. Huh? Our bed is off the floor, but not THAT high. There's no way he could've gotten under there. But, fine I'll look just to look. How surprised was I to find my cat looking back at me from under the bed? What the crap? I wanted to see if he was really stuck under there, so I got a bag of treats (Temptations, his fav) and shook them. Nope, he wasn't coming out even though he was trying, damn it. He was trying. He even, in a last ditch effort, stuck his little paw out under as if begging that I

put some treats in his paw. We figure he snuck under the bed when Jason lifted the mattress at one point (we don't have a box spring. Underneath our mattress are wood slats that have enough space between each slat for a slinky cat. Here's a picture of our bed pilfered straight from the Ashley Furniture website...

I can't wait to see how much we... er, I mean, I have tomorrow night as we clean more of our house.

Where did the weekend go?

This is a question I ask myself every Sunday evening (well, except for the Sundays where I don't have to go to work the next day). This weekend seemed to really fly by.

On Friday I got home from a laborious day at work to find Jason with a case of cabin fever. He had taken the day off work to begin painting our master bathroom. Although he had left the house earlier in the day to run a quick errand, he had been home for many more hours than he'd been out of it. And most of those hours were spent painting. Needless to say, when I got home he was a bit starved for fun... also, I think he may have been a bit high from paint fumes. We did make a quick grocery store run to get a few things and to clear Jason's head a bit. We returned home to continue with the painting.

I won't bore you with the details of our weekend. Just know that the majority of the time was spent painting. The good part is, it's over. The bad part is, only the painting is done. Now we have to put everything back in place and clean the rest of our house, which got neglected during The Great Painting Period.

We usually use the weekend to overhaul our house, but... well, you know how we spent this one. Some of you may be thinking "just let the house go and clean it next weekend. Unfortunately, no can do. We've got house guests coming to spend Saturday night with us (yay!) and, obviously, we want our house cleaned before they come. Jason and I have decided that we're going to tackle one piece of the puzzle each night, rather than overwhelming ourselves by trying to clean it all in one night. I mean, you've got to take into consideration that we've got to work a full day and we've got to get our exercise in (need I remind you about the 40lbs that I'm cursing). Oh and did I mention that we're both lazy bums who like a lot of down time? Sigh. I need to quit my day job and be a stay at home wife just to get everything done.

My short story

As I mentioned in one of my last posts, my friend, Melissa, enrolled me in an online writing class for my birthday. In the class we are given 2 assignments a week. The assignments are "handed out" every Wednesday and Friday. Friday gave us our first writing assignment.

The instructor gave us 5 sentences. Our instructions were to pick one of those sentences and begin our story with the one we chose. The story had to be no more than 300 words and had to have a twist at the end. I wanted to share my story with y'all! Here it is. It's called One Day in Paris.

Looking at Paris in this light was breath taking. Standing at the top of the Eiffel Tower, watching Paris’s nightlife hustle and bustle below me, I replayed in my mind the amazing day I had had up to this point.

My husband, Daniel, and I were celebrating our fifth wedding anniversary. Throughout our marriage, we had taken smaller trips, quick little getaways. We decided we needed to go bigger for our fifth anniversary.

We had arrived at our hotel midmorning. After a quick trip to our room to drop off our bags, freshen up a bit, and exclaim over the swanky amenities, we hit the cobblestone walkways to explore this beautiful area. We wanted to see it all and we wanted to see it now!

“Where should we head first, Penny? Daniel asked.

“To the Arc de Triomphe,” I decided. “The one thing I ask is that we save the Eiffel Tower for night time. I want to be able to see the city lit up at night.”

“That sounds perfect to me,” Daniel replied.

From the Arc de Triomphe, our sightseeing around Paris took us here, there, and everywhere. Each landmark seemed to be more wonderful than the last. I even got to do a little shopping in some of the boutiques we came across. As the sun set over the city, we headed to the Eiffel Tower.

Once we reached the top of the Eiffel Tower, hand in hand, Daniel and I looked out over Paris.

“This has been the perfect day,” I said with a sigh.

“Yes, it has,” Daniel agreed. “What do you say we head back to the hotel? We’ve got a lot more of the Vegas strip to check out tomorrow.”

Sniffing paint fumes...

I'm beginning to think there's something wrong with hubby and me. 10+ years ago we bought our house and painted our master bathroom a pretty dusk-pink color. Fast forward to about 5 years later and we decided that the pink needed to go.

After much careful debate, we selected a pretty sea foam color. We had grandiose visions of doing a beach theme in the bathroom. We bought white rugs to represent the shore and we hung pictures of tropical locations. We were done, never painting this room again....

Fast forward again. Toward the end of 2011, we decided that the sea foam need to float away. The color was starting to make us gag a bit every time we walked into the room. We both agreed on the color blue. But what shade?? We brought home more swatches than I can count. We taped all of them to one of the bathroom walls and over the course of a few days, we slowly eliminated choices as we saw them in different lights. Finally, we chose a color: Blue Thistle - a pretty light blue with a grayish hue.

We decided that this coming weekend was THE weekend this bathroom was getting transformed again. We started the beginning process tonight of taking pretty much everything out the bathroom and cleaning the floors/walls/etc. Tomorrow Jason is taking the day off work to begin The Task. We are determined to be finished with this whole project by Sunday.

Now you may be thinking, "if Jason starts painting tomorrow why shouldn't you be done by Sunday?" Weeeell, see, we tend to get side tracked when painting. First of all, I get bored and whiny somewhere in the process, so Jason has to continue without me (notice this time he's starting without me. Smart move.). Next, while waiting for a coat to dry, we start to watch TV... and we forget to stop. Eventually the bathroom (or whatever room we're painting) gets finished, it's just past our expected completion date.

So, keep your fingers crossed that we stick to the task this time. Or better yet, come over and grab a roller.

Happy birthday to me

So, today is my 33rd birthday. It's been a really great day - got some good presents and felt the love from everyone in my orbit as they sent me birthday wishes. But the one present that I'm really excited about is a push in the right direction.

My wonderful best friend, Melissa, enrolled me into a class at Forsyth Tech. I've been saying for years that I want to better my writing skills and I'd love to actually do something with my writing (be published in a magazine or write a book or just have a blog with 50 million followers). But, I'm a procrastinator... and that whole self-doubt thing kept getting in the way too. Yeah, ok, it was mainly the procrastinating thing.

Well, Melissa decided to take matters into her own hands. She found a writing class that actually started today. The course also repeats at the end of March and Melissa gave me the choice of starting today or waiting for the next round. I figured since this first session started today (on my birthday - as in I'm a year older... which should mean I'm also another year wiser), I'd take that as a sign that I should be in this class NOW. Soooo, I just finished reading over the class notes and the instructions surrounding the first assignment. I'm so excited about this.

To Melissa - how in the heck can I thank you for this awesome present??? You are truly a blessing to have in my life. I am honored to call you my friend!

What have I done...???

I am a semi-athletic person. I used to do cardio kickboxing and Tae Kwon Do. Now, I go to the YMCA regularly to do many types of classes and I work out at home. A couple of years ago I got into doing 5Ks. I do a walk/jog combo to get me from the start line to the finish line. My time is not all that fast and that doesn't bother me (I'd like to get quicker, but I'm not too concerned with it). If you ask me if I'm a runner my answer is a hard and fast "NO! I don't like running. I am sooo not a runner." In my head runners are hard core sickos that I envy. Me - I'm a chunky little Sushi roll waddling down the road.

In December 2011, Jason and I did our first 1/2 marathon. We had decided that we wanted to push ourselves and just do it. Somewhere in the middle of the race my left ankle gave on me. I didn't sprain it... I guess it was just really strained. All I know is that it hurt like hell and I couldn't walk for about 2 days after the race. During and after the race I proclaimed loud and clear that I was never doing another 1/2 marathon. EVER. I had proved to myself that I could do it, so I didn't need to that again. I was comfortable with just doing 5Ks, thank you very much.

But, then we heard about one that'll be held on March 25. It's at the Charlotte Motor Speedway. I wasn't really interested in doing this race (need I remind you AND myself about my declaration??)... until I saw the medal. Holy mother of all that is good and holy, the medal is a work of art. It has lights and moving parts on it. In other words "Oooo, shiny." I want it. I want it bad. So, yeah, guess what I just did. I signed up for another 1/2 marathon.

Just to get a medal.

Reposting...

Ok, in my last post I mentioned that I had written a piece about mine and Jason's first visit to Ikea and posted said piece to Facebook. I stated that I would go pull that piece and re-post it here on my blog. I'm finally doing it. Yeah, I'm slack and I know it. Get over it. Anyhoo - without further ado, here is the Ikea piece I wrote on December 21, 2009:

Recently Jason and I made the pilgrimage to the Ikea store in Charlotte. Holy mother of cow patties, talk about an adventure. We got there right at 10:00am - opening time. We didn't leave until a bit past 6:00pm. By the time I left I was wishing I could walk on my hands because my feet hurt that bad. Seriously for about 2 days after that fateful day, anytime I heard/said/saw the word 'Ikea' my feet would start to throb. Part way through our experience, I decided to whip out my handy dandy notepad and jot down some things that I didn't want to forget.

Here are some of the poignant memories of that extra special day (in no particular order):

* Seeing the hilarious gay couple. Well only 1/2 of this couple was hilarious. The hilarious guy was the weirdo walking around with his cell phone in his hand, listening to music. At first Jason and I thought it was his ring tone and he was enjoying it so much that he didn't want to answer his phone, but then we realized that, no, this guy was just dancing around the store in his own personal rave. Sweet. But our FAVORITE moment with this guy was when the non-hilarious 1/2 of this couple asked the hilarious part about their kitchen cabinets. Obviously they were in the process of redoing their cabinets and non-hilarious guy asks hilarious guy "What do you want the kitchen to say about us." Hilarious guy's response? I kid you not (trust me, I can't make this stuff up) -" I want it to say middle aged hip new fresh idea." This was the moment that I knew I had to record the special parts of this day.

* Jason was so overwhelmed with the enormity of this store that he kept asking if we'd have to get our hand stamped for re-entry into the store. I had to keep reminding him that this was not a theme park... although I'm not sure I believe that myself.

* If you've ever been to an Ikea store, then you know in the show room part of the store they have "rooms set up." They even went so far as to put clothes in the armoires/closets and shoes on the shoe racks. As I would come across the clothes, I would start checking them out. Jason continually had to say "Would you stop clothes shopping?!?!" Hey, some of the clothes were cute. As for the shoes... I found a pair I REALLY liked, but they were screwed onto the shoe rack so people couldn't take them. Damn you Ikea.

* Again with the set up rooms - it was funny to watch people take items from one "room" and put them in another "room" to see how Item A worked in Room B. For example - in the Workstation Area, I witnessed one guy take a desk organizer from one desk and go into another area, putting the organizer on the desk in the 2nd area. He kinda made his own little set up.

* Being proud of myself for going to the bathroom by myself. Ok, I know how funny that sounds. But, believe me, I'm completely directionally challanged. This store was soooooo big. We were some where in the middle of the store and I had to pee... and I was bored. There's only so long I can stare at kitchen cabinetry before my eyes start to cross. So I told Jason that I was going to run to the little girls' room. Being a gentleman he did ask if I wanted him to go with me. But I decided to be a Big Girl and go alone. Somehow I made it to the bathroom AND found my way back to Jason WITHOUT using bread crumbs or any other trail markers. I will admit that since I didn't have a store map on me (my big mistake - and for the folks who have never been to Ikea, yes, they do have store maps that you can get to carry with you) I didn't take any short cuts. Those short cuts would've been helpful, cutting off at least a day's worth of trek. Also the paths between the set ups is a gray floor with arrows pointing the way. I could've cut corners by walking through display areas, but I was too scared to get off the chosen paths. So, again, that added another day and 1/2 to my trek time. Sheesh.

* My only regret about the day was that Jason and I didn't think to keep a running tally on how many times we said "Check this out" or "Look at this" or something along those lines. By the time we'd been in this store for about an hour I was already sick of hearing those phrases... but neither one of us could stop.

All in all, this was a happy magical day in a happy magical place. I think this place ranks right up there with Disney World. We're already plotting our return trip (we saw a lot more furniture that needs to be in our house). We're hoping to go back sometime after Christmas and get a whole lot more in debt. Ahhh, I love you Ikea

My Random Saturday.

Yesterday was just an all around weird day.

It started off with Jason and me getting up around 8:40-9:00am. We had meant to get up around 8:15-8:30am because we were heading to Charlotte for a full day. Yes, I know we didn't get up horribly later than we were planning, but for some reason it threw the day off for me. Actually, what threw the day off for me was that I woke up in a funk. I was just in a bad mood. No rhyme or reason, just ill. As Jason and I headed to Charlotte, my mood got better. That is, until we got to our first adventure...

We had gotten discount tickets off of Living Social for the mummy exhibit that is currently at Discovery Place. We got there, got into the exhibit... and quickly questioned the sanity of some people. Quite a few people there had their children. That was fine and dandy, kids should be cultured to this kind of exhibit. But, quite a few of those kids showed off his or her lung power. At one point I was pretty sure both of my ear drums had been ruptured thanks to Screaming Babies in Surround Sound. Hey, maybe Junior was trying to wake the dead??? What about mom and dad who have become selectively deaf to that noise. Really? You don't hear that coming from 2 feet away from you? That's strange, because I hear it loud and clear and I'm on the other side of the bleeping room. Oh and by the way, do ya really think Timmy should be knocking on the case enclosing the mummy? I was kidding earlier about him trying to wake the dead, but I see that maybe the joke's on me.

After that, we headed to eat. Nothing exciting happened there, thank God. After some good eats, we headed to adventure #2 - Ikea. For those of you who have never been there, congrats for being strong. For those of you who have been to one (and I'm assuming they are all the same), holy mother of goats, what is wrong with us? Yes, I am in love with it... yet the place scares me just a bit. How can it not? The sheer size, the amazing products that you suddenly realize you have to have (why yes, I do need that funky chandelier thingy that looks like a cream puff), everything combines to make it one awesomely frightening place. Hell, the first time Jason and I ever went there (in 2009), Jason kept thinking that if we wanted to leave and come back in the same day, we'd have to get our hand stamped. I had to keep reminding him that this was NOT an amusement park, although I understood why he thought that. By the way - you do no want to know how long we were there on that first visit. Let's just say, I was expecting to get a paycheck. I actually wrote a little piece about that visit that I posted on Facebook. I'll have to dig it out and repost it here. Anyway, I digress...

We had gone to Ikea with a small shopping list. We wanted to get a mirror for our bedroom and some shelves for our bathroom. We didn't get either of those things.... but we still spent $70+. Remember how I said they had AH-MAY-ZING products that you didn't know you needed until you saw them? You thought I was kidding, huh? Negative. I'm still (over 24 hours later) in a state of shock and not really sure what the hell we came home with. But I know whatever we got, it's all awesome.

After that, we came home to rest and enjoy the rest of our evening on the couch. Yeeeaaaah, I should've known better. We decided at 10:40pm to head to one of our local Walmarts. We thought (brilliantly, snort) to go ahead and get our weekend grocery shopping trip out of the way so that on Sunday we wouldn't have to leave the house at all. First of all, remember I said we headed to Walmart. Jason and I avoid that store like the plague. Yes, prices are unbelievably cheap... but so are most of the people who shop there. Unfortunately, I became one of those people last night. I have never been prouder of myself (snort). If you've ever been to this wonderland late at night, you know this is "shelf stocking time". We randomly found a still wrapped pallet of a bunch of cereals that intrigued me. Flavor of Cheerios that I've never seen before - Dulce de Leche and Peanut Butter - and Frosted Cinnamon Toast Crunch. I excitedly told Jason to make a note of these cereals for when we got to the actual cereal aisle. But, when we got to the cereal aisle, those aforementioned boxes of happiness were not on the shelves. Whaaa? Don't tease me like this. I blankly looked at Jason and sputtered "should I just go rip into the pallet and make myself at home? I want at least one if not all three of those cereals, damn it." Jason studies my face for a minute, trying to gauge the crazy level. Should he try to talk some sense into me or should he help me rip into a pallet like the wild beast that I'm threatening to be? I figured since this wasn't Thanksgiving night/Black Friday I wouldn't get tased for ripping into the pallet and I really wanted to try the Peanut Butter Cherrios. So, I took my chances and went for it. Thankfully no alarms sounded, no Ninja employee sprang from hiding to attack me. I was home free with my new cereal and my newfound pride that I had sunk to some all time low.

Yeah, yesterday was just a weird day.

So just let me introduce myself. My name is Missy...pronounced with an issy.

First off - for those of you that got the title of this blog, I give you mad props for being cool. For those who didn't get it... what the hell's wrong with you? Ehh, moving on...

Most of the folks who are currently reading this blog (all 2 of you) know me and know me well. But, in the hopes that some new folks may jump on the bandwagon, I decided to post about my favorite topic: ME! Ok technically, all my posts will probably be about me, but... just shut up and go with it.

Hi. I'm Missy and I'll be your tour guide. I'm currently 32 years old, but my 33rd birthday is approaching fast (12 days from today, to be exact. I accept cash, checks, and gift cards). I'm married to a man (Jason) that words can't even begin to describe - he's my best friend and my soul mate. I could do a whole post on adjectives that describe him and still not be able to explain how wonderful he is or how much I love him (I'm a little obsessed with him). In December we celebrated our 10 year wedding anniversary and we're ready to see what the next 10 will hold for us. We don't have nor want any human kids, but we have 9 furry babies that are our children.

My favorite activities include reading like a fiend (I'm a voracious reader), keeping our DVR box cleaned off, annoying the crap out of Jason, and just hanging with friends. See, nothing too exciting. I can be high maintenance without meaning to be. I have a temper with a very short fuse, although I'm trying to work on the length of said fuse... but, honestly I'm not trying hard enough. I hate stupid people. I'm open-minded, yet closed minded to what I believe is ignorant. I get bored easily. I'm the typical girl in the sense that I hate my body (damn those 40lbs I wanna get rid of. Where did you come from anyway??) and I have low self-confidence even though I have great people in my life who tell me I'm beautiful and try to build that confidence. I'm hoping this blog will help me believe those people.

I live in the grand metropolis of Winston-Salem, NC. For all of you that just thought to yourself "Grand metropolis? What the hell is she talking about??" Let me back up and explain that I grew up in a town called Kinston, which is in eastern NC and is a pock mark on society. It was once an ok town, but now it's dying. I got outta there as soon as I could. I love being in Winston!

As I've said, I'm hoping by starting my blog I'll be able to build confidence. I'm also hoping that my posts will teach me a thing or two about who I am and what I want to be when I grow up. If not, then at least I'll have fun just jotting down whatever random thing comes out of my head.

My Year in Review

So we're a few days into 2012. So far, so good. But, I wanted to take the time to reflect on 2011.

2011 was a pretty good year! The year started off with me turning 32 in January. Not a bad age. I celebrated by having a handful of friends gather at my house for a night of good companionship and some fun Wii time.

In March, Jason turned 34. Thanks to Groupon (seriously - I HEART Groupon), I was able to buy him The Perfect Present - getting to drive a Nascar car at the Charlotte Motor Speedway (through the Nascar Driving Experience).

In 2010, Jason and I got into running 5k races. My time is slow, but fairly steady. This year, Jason got it in his head to do a 1/2 marathon. Not wanting to be left behind, and with the encouragement from my friends, I decided I could do it too. On December 3rd, Jason and I did it! We did the Mistletoe Run Half Marathon. What an accomplishment. I am so proud of Jason (although not surprised that he did it because that man is a machine) and myself.

Also in December, Jason got his first tattoo!! Talk about a shock. I have three and have often asked Jason if he would ever get one. He always seemed... while not against it (obviously), just not totally for himself getting one. In late December (after deciding in November that he was going to do it and "shopping around" to find the right artist), he went to get it done. He's not finishedyet. He has to go back, probably next week, to get this one finished. But, the man has already plotted out future tattoos!

The biggest thing to happen in 2011 is that Jason and I hit our 10 year wedding anniversary (14 years total)! To celebrate, Jason surprised me with an overnight stay in Savannah, Ga, where we did a ghost tour and stayed on River Street. What a beautiful city! It was a shame we couldn't stay longer... but the surprise continued south with a trip to Disney World. We had gone there for our honeymoon and we were reliving that period - we stayed in the same resort we stayed for our honeymoon. We had been back to Disney two times between our honeymoon and this milestone, but we always have a great time when we go, so it was perfect.

So, now, I'm a few days into 2012 and am excited about what this year is going to bring! I'm hoping to grow as a person (isn't that cliched??), lose that damn 40lbs that is bogging me down, and just keep on keepin' on.