Exceedingly Mundane

I couldn’t think of a thing this morning to post, and now I have two that spring to mind. My two happies for today are:

1. I read in today’s paper that our new Hobby Lobby is going to open Monday. YEAH! Finally, somewhere to shop for craft stuff besides our horrible ole Michaels. Plus, HL has some great seasonal stuff. Can’t wait to go, they open Monday. 😀

2. It’s raining, and has been for the past 20 or 30 minutes. I love it when it rains. Number one, it’s great for the grass and flowers and the new tree we planted. Number two, it means I won’t have to get out in the next day or two and drag sprinklers around the yard. Number three – I absolutely love going to look at my love note on the back fence from Tim. 😀 And number four – it’s all dark and cloudy and so I’ve lit some of my Yankee Candles. Hard to beat all of that, huh?!

Well, I haven’t been able to think of anything remotely interesting to write about lately (like that’s all that different from any other day, week or month!!). And it’s just a “same ole, same ole” kind of week, so nothing to report in the way of dates, shopping or something fun or exciting (like a new car!!) Not that I have those very often at all. I lead a very mundane existence. Happy, peaceful and quiet, but mundane. And I have no knack for writing catchy or thought-provoking blog entries. I seem to write just the way I talk, matter of fact, practical and very long-winded!

Click the -More- if you want to read a few blah things that are going on with us!

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What makes me happy today…

Oreos!

We bought a bag of Oreos the other day and I’ve been eating them every day. Bad, I know. But, to be fair, we only buy “store” cookies about 2 or 3 times a year. I make cookies and brownies sometimes, but we don’t splurge all the time. Buying and eating Oreos is a very once-in-a-while splurge for us. And they are so good, especially dunked in milk!! 🙂

I just paid a couple of our bills online. I love doing this. Do most of you pay yours electronically now, or are you still writing checks? We do almost everything electronically, either online or via bank draft. Makes things so much easier.

I’m constantly surprised by how things have changed in my lifetime. I can remember when I got my first apartment, I had so many checks to write. Apartment rent, my one credit card, every time I went to the grocery or Wal-mart, every utility bill, dry-cleaning, newspaper, etc. I bet I wrote 30 checks a month or more. These days, I do good to write 3 a month. I think that’s one of the best advances of technology, at least for me. I love doing things online – paying bills, ordering, researching items. Most of my life I didn’t have the Internet but today, I couldn’t live without it. How about you? 🙂

Vacation…

1. Name the two places where you would love to go on vacation: Number one is England, Scotland and Wales. Number two would be a toss-up between France and an Alaskan cruise

2. Name two places where you would never want to go on vacation: places like Cambodia, Thailand, Vietnam, Nepal

3. Which is more interesting to you, driving or flying for your vacation? We have almost always driven. We like spending the time together and seeing the sights from the car and being able to stop (although we rarely do!). We’re starting to exhaust our options of where we can drive to in one day though, so I imagine there’ll either be longer vacations in the future or more flying ones.

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Really late on this one, I think it was posted over the weekend. Word associations…

I say … and you think … ?

Complexion:: clear
Teach:: school
Back to school:: school supplies
Months:: days
Nominate:: candidate
Favorite curse word:: darn
Concerned:: caring
Better:: feeling… ?
Escalate:: push up the chain
Unveil:: unmask

My branch of the library in Madison is closed this week for inventory. I went last Friday to drop off books and get more to read. I found one that day, but two others that I was looking for were at another branch. So, I headed over there this morning to look for these books.

This branch is older, but it’s bigger. I do believe there are a lot more books, videos and other material available at this branch. I might have to go here more often and check it out.

Anyhoo, I had read on another lady’s blog that she had read and enjoyed some of the “Harmony” books, which she likened to the Mitford series. Now, I’m a huge Jan Karon fan and I have loved every single one of the Mitford books, so I’m hoping these are as good, funny and heartwarming.

I checked out two from this series – Home to Harmony and Just Shy of Harmony. They had two or three others, so maybe I’ll have more to look forward to this fall. 🙂

My happy for today…

I spent a little while outside this morning. I planted a fresh flower in a pot to put on my deck. Yellow, a sunny happy color! I also filled up my bird feeders with more birdseed. We have tons of birds here and I very much enjoy watching them attack those feeders and see how many we have at one time and how long it takes them to clean it out. So, my bird feeders make me happy today!

I was sad to see that the Sunday Brunch meme (which I liked and have done many times) is closing. Seems to me that the way of the meme is disappearing. I hope some of my other favorites keep on going! Here’s one I like to do most of the time:

From

Appetizer
Briefly describe your living room.
We are going for an overall theme of comfy and cozy in our house, so I hope that’s what it is. Oversized couch, oversized matching chair, chair and a half with ottoman next to the fireplace, entertainment center with too many electronics to mention, surround sound, dark wood tables, area rug, lamps for cozy lighting, Yankee Candles, lots of family pictures on the walls and tables.

Soup
List 3 things you’d like to accomplish before the end of 2005.
1) Blog on a daily basis. I haven’t missed a day since we went out of town over Memorial Day weekend and didn’t have Internet access
2) Read at least 5 more books before the end of the year
3) Go to as many football games with Tim as he wants 🙂

Salad
When you’re online, what do you spend the most time reading/playing/doing? Suggest a site for us to visit.
I am on our family site all the time, I visit several scrapbook message boards, I have a lot of blogs I check out (some daily, some every week), and I window shop at scrapping sites, Amazon, etc. Every now and then I play online games at Real Arcade.
Check out Blingo for all your searching. They use the same engine as Google, but you can win prizes. We have!

Main Course
What would the title of your autobiography be? Wouldn’t be written, I haven’t led an interesting life whatsoever. The name of my blog sums me and my life up to a tee – Exceedingly Mundane.

Dessert
What time do you usually go to bed? Normally, I shoot for 10:30 or 11:00. But, I tend to mold my schedule to whatever Tim is doing. If he’s up later, I usually end up staying up later as well. Or at least I try. I seem to require more beauty sleep than he does 😀

Awww man – I just read in yesterday’s paper that our new Cold Stone Creamery in Madison opened yesterday! I had so wanted to go when they opened and sample everything. I had already driven by there last week and saw a huge red “Coming Soon” sign out front, so I was hoping it would open soon. It’s next door to our new Abner’s and I have already forewarned Tim that I am going to plan a trip to eat chicken at Abner’s then walk next door and get ice cream for dessert as soon as Cold Stone opens. Guess that will have to be this coming weekend, after Tim weighs in next Friday. Yipppeee!!!

P.S. If you’ve been to one before, let me know what you like and what’s good (not that they aren’t all good, sorta like picking a cheesecake at Cheesecake Factory!). Or do what I’ve been doing and check out the link and drool at all the choices!

OK, my happy for today is that Terry and Zack spent the night last night, so we got to see them again today! We all had breakfast together (I made waffles), and then, Tim, Terry and Zack went to the Wildlife Extravaganza at the TradeMart. Tim loves spending time with his brothers and nephews, doing guy things, so I know he will be really happy when he gets back. And when Tim is happy, it always makes me happy!

Yesterday was fun – well, for those of you who like hanging out with guys and doing football related things! The big enlightenment of the day for me was that I learned that when they are promoting a “Black and Gold Scrimmage Game”, they are really doing false advertising. Scrimmage = Practice. Plain and simple. Stretching Exercises, Drills and a few fake plays. In the beginning, they weren’t even tackling each other, just touching each other on the shoulders. Lightly. Later on it got better, and then we had the autograph session. Boy, was that an experience.

Click the -More- link to read more about the Saints Family Fan Fest, and the rest of the day overall (yesterday, I’m a day behind!). Consider yourself warned, it’s very long and rambling, but does include lots of photos!! 🙂

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OK, today’s happy would have to be family and football.

My dad is on his way up, as well as Tim’s brother Terry and our nephew Zack. We’re all going to the Saints Fan Fest at the stadium this afternoon, then the Saints scrimmage game tonight. Hopefully it will be fun. I know Tim and Zack are excited!

Hopefully I can get some good pictures and post later on in the Photos section of Hambones, or on here. 🙂

Nothing like tooling around in a shiny new red car (SUV) to make a girl smile 🙂

I went to the library today, and returned 3 books and checked out one more. My little branch of our county library system is going to be closed next week for inventory, and I had a hard time finding some books I wanted. I checked the computer and they have them at another branch (that will be open next week), so I just got one today and plan to go next week to the other branch and check out one or two more. I’ve read on other blogs and message boards about the Harmony books. Several people compared them to the Mitford books by Jan Karon, which I love and adore. So, if the Harmony ones are half that good, I’m really looking forward to reading some of them.

I also went to Tuesday Morning and Big Lots…

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It’s Friday, so that always makes me happy. I always look forward to spending more time with Tim on the weekend. He goes on-call today, but that’s ok, we still get to be together, even if he ends up having to work. Which hopefully he won’t.

Anyhoo, it’s Friday and I’m headed out to some of my favorite spots. The library. That’s a very happy place for me – books, movies, magazines, all for free. I’m also headed to Tuesday Morning to look for some scrapbook stuff for me and Amanda. Scrapbook stuff always makes me happy.

So, I’m overflowing on the happy stuff today. Hope everyone else has a wonderful day too! 🙂