Quick note...

I stopped by the ceramics studio and glazed all of the remaining pottery today. I will go back sometime next week and see how it all came out. They changed out most of their glazes so who knows how it will look. I am excited to have a few usable pieces from the class. John will also be very excited about his two pieces that have survived so far.

Oh, I am also without internet connection for a few days until I regroup with Comcast so if you email and I don't answer promptly, I apologize in advance. I am writing this post at work...yes I am actually doing work too. I have already approved some timesheets and finished my own. I will log off here and write the letter I came to work on too. The faster I get it done, the faster I get to go home and rest. Ah, rest.

Oh and for anyone wondering how the wasp stings are doing, the swelling is gone and now they just feel bruised and tender. I will live, although you wouldn't know it by the two screams I made when it happened this morning.

Jacene

Vacation? ...I think not.

When John and I finally made our way back home after a VERY long day he said it was like we had been on vacation because we had been gone from the house so long. We left at nine this morning and pulled into the drive way a little after six. We started out picking up female family members and going to Harriman to visit my grandmother. When discussions turned political, then racial, and then the inevitable "the end of the world is almost here" I packed up John's stuff and we both went to the car to wait for the others to follow. It was about lunch time and so we ate out and then John and I dropped everyone off at my parent's house.

John and I booked it over to the downtown Regal to catch the 1:40pm showing of "Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian". It was equally as entertaining as the first one. I laughed out loud multiple times. John and I gave it two thumbs up.

After that we went to Mighty Mud to glaze his beehive. I didn't notice the note on the door saying they closed at 4pm today as we were sauntering in at 3:55pm. I asked if we could glaze the one item and they were ok with that. They have seen John quite a bit recently and like him. We were there for about 15 minutes and then off again, this time to McKays used book store. We bought about 10 or so kids books and headed out again.

I will need to give a little background for the next stop. John has characters from the first "Night at the Museum" movie. No, they didn't actually make any but we found a site that carried Odyssey Toys that have historical characters. He now wants to get some more to be able to play the new movie. Anyway, we did find some of the characters in town last time and so we headed over to Target to see what we could find. I didn't expect much and we didn't find much.

Our last stop of the day was Sam's for gas and food, namely coleslaw that I am suppose to bring to a cookout tomorrow. We picked up some other things as well and then headed home.

Before you all pass judgement, I had packed snacks and drinks for the day so the child was not abused. He was actually so full by the time we made it home he didn't want supper. I dunked him in the tub, trimmed his hair, fingernails, and toenails, and read one of the books we bought and tucked him in. He is one tuckered out camper. Ha, vacation indeed.

Jacene

...it has started

I have bought the first thing for the new house, a string trimmer. I bought it based on the consumer reports recommendation. I may not be able to mow...or store cold food...or wash or dry clothes...but I will be able to trim the grass around things. :)

This weekend I also plan on buying a bed since there are sales galore right now. I will save $100 on it. It isn't a huge amount but it is still $100 that I couldn't save a week and a half ago when I went to check it out. I am ashamed to admit it but I am buying it at Rooms To Go. I now feel bad for making fun of RTG for so many years. There stuff isn't so bad for mid-line furniture. Look at me and my frugality. :)

Jacene

Add this to the list of firsts for me...

Today John and I visited the "Redbox" machine and rented two movies, one for him and one for me. I did lock up a little when I had my date for today mixed up but once set back on the right path everything was fine. How that happened in the first place, I don't know. I had written down today's date earlier in church. Oh well. Look at me doing a trendy and frugal thing. :)

Jacene

Another try at Little Ponderosa Zoo

John and I have been to Little Ponderosa Zoo before...about 2 1/2 years ago for a classmate's 4th birthday party. It was a stressful experience for me for several reasons; missed turns, just me and John, very cold, poor parking and planning so that I had to leave John and move the car while someone came to pick up a horse or something...anyway, stressful. I really never intended to go back but there was another classmate's birthday party.

So, I held my breath and tried it again. Me and John alone again at Little Ponderosa...oooh, doesn't it just seem ominous already? Well, I missed one turn and had a car to follow part of the way so getting there wasn't so bad. I miss turns all of the time so that wasn't too bad in and of itself. We get there and the parking isn't as crazy today...good sign. The birthday girl's dad is at the door to greet us and we are on our way for a tour of the facilities. It is MUCH different now. It isn't as redneck scary as it was. Now it is more like a little redneck zoo. They do have a lot of different animals and I am not sure how or why they are all there but it is interesting. We walked around, fed some animals, rode the ponies (well, John rode the ponies), used the swing set, and went back inside for juice, chips and power ranger cupcakes. It was an enjoyable afternoon. I have included some photos of John doing cute things as well as the Zonkey they have on site. Enjoy.

Oh, and check out the crazed look in the deer's eyes in the background. It kept following us and "barking" well it was more of a belching bark. Weird.

A broken heart

Today has been a day of catching up on things I have needed to continue to need to do; the gym, studying, work, planning for the move, and ceramics. This brings me to the reason for the blog title. I went to Mighty Mud to use up the rest of my clay. I missed class Wednesday night because another class that I started conflicted. The new class isn't as fun as ceramics but it will hopefully be as beneficial for my stress levels.

Oh yeah, blog post title explanation. I made a heart out of clay like the one in my pastel back in March and it was ready for the first firing and before it made its way to the kiln someone accidentally broke it. It lay there in 4 pieces when I went in today. I recycled it in the greenware bucket so my heart will be integrated with other pieces one day. It made me sad.

It was the piece I worked on when John was with me. His birdhouse/beehive and most of his gingerbread man made it out of the first firing. The gingerbread man lost his left arm. I am not sure where the "man in a car" is. Maybe it will show up soon.

Some of my first attempts at cups came out of the second firing all glazed and ready to go but they are not at adult human scale. I will take some photos and add them to the post in the next couple of days. Other than being the right size for a small child's tea party, they look pretty good. :)

Jacene

Nostalgia

I stepped out of the car after getting home late from a class tonight and was overtaken by the smell of honeysuckle. I was taken back to childhood memories of playing out in the yard on warm nights and how the smell of honeysuckle was so thick you could almost taste the sweetness in the air. It was a nice memory.

Jacene

Squat update

I am holding at 150lbs on the squats. I feel like I get shorter every time I do them and I make noises that sound almost like barks trying to stand back up. It is sort of sad. I did bust through pretty mightily on that 135lb plateau I was stuck at for a while. I think that now if I ever get in a bar fight with a very light and rigid person, I could take them...or at least squat them. It could happen, there could be rousing game of Ouija at a bar somewhere..."light as a feather, stiff as a board." :)

Give me an inch and I will take a mile

I have been troubling a coworker (not the same one I am going to bother about the LEED exam in the previous blog post) for new music to listen to. It started out as something sort of funny. Every band he ever spoke of listening to I had never heard of. It isn't that I couldn't place a song of theirs...I had never heard of the band name. I felt very old and unhip...well, I have never felt very hip. So anyway he let me listen to a couple of CDs and now I badger him occasionally for other bands to try. I have found some that I like so much I have added them to my "favorites" play list on my Ipod.

I started feeling a little bad about it for two reasons. One, I am now asking for new bands instead of him offering...crossing the line to pushy. Two, I am listening to them on my Ipod which means I have copied them and I need to purchase the ones I like and am listening to so that I am not one of THOSE people. I have been trained over the years on this point.

I will share some of the band/artist's names that I have recently heard and really liked but you can't make fun of me for not knowing about them before if they are common to you. Remember, I live my life in a little hobbit hole and don't venture out much. There are others that I like too but I need to listen to them more before making final judgement.
Morphine
Hothouse Flowers
David Garza
The Beautiful South

I did it...well a little bit of it anyway

I finally studied today. I had to leave the house to do it. I retreated back to my old study haunt, Panera's on the strip. I studied for 2 hours before becoming freaked out by what the test was going to cover and deciding that I really needed to talk to one particular coworker that recently took the test. I am hoping he can point me in the right path of what to study so I don't spend time on rote memorization of the wrong areas which is what it looks like it mostly is made up of. Good googly moogly...if that is what it is, I am doomed. It is a whole bunch of tables of information, ick.

It was enough to kill the momentum and I downed two tall cups of coffee in the process. Don't worry, since it was after 4pm, I only had decaf. :)

Jacene

John's Ceramic Artwork

Bear in mind these are not complete. Heck they haven't even been fired yet. This is what John and I worked on last weekend when I forgot to bring the camera into the studio. I went back yesterday and took these photos. He is on his way to fame, not fortune, as a potter hobbiest. :)

Jacene

Does this house make me look fat?

Over the past little bit I have been trying on houses...some were too big, some too snug, and some were just down right scary, but this one seemed to work. I put an offer on the house a little over a week ago and so did two other families ON THE SAME DAY! So my realtor, I love her and recomend her to anyone wanting to buy or sell a house, said "give me your final and best offer to bring to the table tomorrow". *gulp* I gave it to her and waived a home warranty...didn't get it.

To continue the story, I look at more houses and am a little sad but hopeful to find another house that fit as nicely as this one seemed to. Low and behold, I get a phone call in the women's restroom in the Denver airport and it is Laura. No, I wasn't in a stall, thank you. The other buyer backed out and I was runner up. Yippie. I said that I was still interested and by the end of the day when I was back in Ktown I had signed updated offer papers and am on my way to being a homeowner in a west Knoxville neighborhood. All you soccer moms...beware! Hopefully I will close at the end of the month and John is SUPER excited about having his very own bathroom which is the biggest one in the house.

Jacene

Where in the world is...Jacene?

Hi! I am still messed up from the latest trip last week. It is amazing what a few days on west coast time will do to you. I was up really late last night and took a nap today. I have to be straightened out by tomorrow morning or I will be in trouble. So anyway, to answer the question in the post title, I was in Palm Springs California last week for a couple of days on business. Sometimes I REALLY like my job.

I am attaching some photos; one of the Rocky Mountains (from the plane of course) and a couple of the view from the resort where I stayed. I am making this a quick little post because most of the trip was social events and what happens in Palm Springs...stays in Palm Springs and besides, it was pretty uneventful. I did hopefully make some good contacts and will get some restaurant work out of the deal, heck, that is what I went there to do.

Jacene