Exceedingly Mundane

Tim and I have been tossing around several big ticket items to get for the house. New flooring, a new stove/range, and several other things are on the agenda. I also have been looking for a Wii to get for Tim, but haven’t been able to find one in stock anywhere. Another thing we talked about getting was a treadmill. I was really resisting that, because I didn’t want a “crutch” to keep us from taking Beau out on a walk. We haven’t walked much lately, between Tim hurting his knee, his work schedule, the weather, etc. The list is long, but basically, none of us were getting much exercise.

Tim woke up Saturday morning and decided we should go get a treadmill we had seen at Sam’s. So we did! It’s an early anniversary present, as our wedding anniversary is coming up in a couple of weeks. 🙂

The thing is a LOT bigger than I thought it was going to be. We really don’t have room for it in our tiny house. I had wanted to put it in our spare bedroom that serves as our office. But a) we don’t have room without a major cleaning and overhaul and b) Tim didn’t want me to be on it while he was working. He works from home almost every day, and he didn’t want me in there distracting him while he was trying to work. That left the den and the garage. We’re trying it out in the den for a while, but boy – it does NOT go with my idea of home furnishing and home decor 🙂 It’s basically an eyesore, but we are enjoying it so far. I like having it in front of the TV, so I can catch up on stuff I’ve recorded or watch something on TV. The treadmill does have a plug for the iPod, so I can listen to music while I walk, instead of watching TV. Right now, I’m enjoying TV 🙂

We’ve only had it 3 days, but so far we’ve both used it every day. Tim is jogging some, and I’m just walking. Tim is convinced that we will keep up with it, but I’m worried that the newness will wear off sooner or later. Tim says if we start not using it as much, or it REALLY bothers me being in the middle of the den, that we can move it out to the garage. But, I keep telling him – I won’t use it in the garage in the summer. When it’s 100 degrees outside, I don’t plan to be in the garage, which is basically a sauna, on the treadmill.

Anyway, it’s a great new toy and so far we are really enjoying it! Tim has even gotten Beau on it twice! We watch a lot more of “The Dog Whisperer” since we got Beau, and we’ve seen Cesar putting dogs on the treadmill. After Beau’s first attempt, we decided that those dogs get in a lot of time on the treadmill before they put them on TV! Beau is going to take a few more times before he’s really comfortable on it 🙂

So, I’ll post a couple of “Questions of the Day” and a photo on the inside page. Click for more!
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Gosh, seems like it was just a day or so ago that I was planning the menu and posting it. Sigh, it’s been a whole week! Be sure to head on over to Laura’s blog, OrgJunkie, for lots more menu ideas and even recipes. Thanks to Laura for hosting this every week!

Here’s what I’m looking at… as always, this is subject to change during the course of the week 🙄

Sunday – we had General Tso’ chicken (from the freezer), brown rice, and potstickers (from the freezer)

Monday – Imitation Crab Cakes, smashed potatoes, green beans or other veggie

Tuesday – Tacos, fat free refried beans

Wednesday – Egg McMuffins, turkey bacon

Thursday – Jambalaya with turkey sausage

Friday – Date Night or pizza

Sat/Sun – TBD

I finished my third book in Annie’s “What’s In a Name Challenge” a couple of days ago. This is a book that I picked up on a bargain table at Barnes and Noble quite a while back, so it was good to finally get it off my TBR shelf and actually read!

I must admit, I was a bit worried about reading this book. The only other book I’ve read by Shreve (that I can remember) is “The Pilot’s Wife”. A couple of tidbits of trivia about this – it’s one of only a couple of Oprah’s book club books that I’ve read. The most notable bit of trivia is that, as best I can remember, “A Pilot’s Wife” is the very first book I ever ordered from Amazon.com. If I remember, it was back in 1999 and I had been thinking about ordering from Amazon and finally did and ordered this book.

Ok, back to the current book. I didn’t just love the other book I read by Anita Shreve, but the blurb on the back of Light on Snow looked promising. I won’t type it all up here, but you can read the blurb or reviews here at Amazon. I worried for nothing, though, because I really enjoyed this book. It hooked me right at the very beginning and it was one of those “hard to put down” kind of books for me. I read it very quickly and was very happy with it! I enjoyed the writing, the beauty of what she was describing, the characters and how she developed them, and the overall plot. Very engaging book 🙂

Have you read any of her books? If so, do you have one to recommend? As I said, I wasn’t thrilled with “The Pilot’s Wife” and so I stayed away from her books for a long time. I know I’ve read some reviews and blurbs on other blogs about books of her that are good, and not so good. If you have read one by Anita Shreve that you liked, leave me a comment and let me know. I imagine my local library has most all, if not all, of her books. Thanks!

So, for the record, I’ve completed 3 of the 6 books I picked for the “What’s In a Name” challenge. As far as this year goes, I’ve read 11 books, for a total of 3,571 pages. Up next is “Playing for Pizza” by John Grisham. I’ve read a lot of girlie books lately, so it’s time to switch it up a bit. 🙂

Happy Reading!

Appetizer
Name one thing that is unique about you. Well, I couldn’t come up with anything, except my odd “Monk-like” habit of always putting things in their place. You know, like when Tim comes in and drops his keys on the kitchen countertop. I go move them and put them “where they are supposed to be”. Things like that 🙂 I asked Tim and he said immediately “your eyes”. Which surprised me. And when he told me why he thinks my eyes are unique, he took my breath away and nearly made me cry. So there, a dual answer 😀

Soup
Fill in the blank: My favorite _________ is __________ but I like _________ too. My favorite food is Chinese, but I like {love} Italian and seafood too!

Salad
What type of wood do you have for your home’s furnishings? Darker woods, cherry and mahogany type woods mostly.

Main Course
Who do you talk to most often on the phone? Ugh. I’m so not a phone girl! Either my sister or my dad, I’d imagine. I talk to Tim when he’s driving places without me, because he likes to talk to help pass the time.

Dessert
What level of responsibility do you have in your job?Well, I’m the queen of all I survey around here! My last job, I was a peon, but Tim lets me decide most everything in my new, favorite job of “keeper of the household”. I plan meals, do all the shopping and purchasing, etc. It’s a great job if you can get it 🙂

Happy Valentines Day to everyone! It will be a very low-key day here at the Exceedingly Mundane house. Tim has been working so much lately. They’ve been doing a lot of work at night, and he’s been up until 3, 4 and even 5 AM several nights a week for the last few weeks. Last night was no exception. Irregardless, Valentines is not a huge thing in our house. I always love the “excuse” to get extra stuff, candy, a card, but it’s just not a big deal to Tim. Slowly, over the years, I’ve come to understand and agree with him. He told me when we first got married, that he didn’t need or want someone, a card company or whatever, to tell him when he needed to buy me something, surprise me with chocolates or flowers, or tell me that he loved me. He wanted to do it any day of the year, every day of the year, in whatever way he wanted. And he has, and he does. I’ve come to know what he meant – that means so much more to me than something on Valentines Day. When he and the rest of the known world went out to buy a card or flowers or candy. 🙂 OH! And yesterday was a hoot. I ran to Walmart for some things, and you should have seen the people flocked to the Valentines areas. They were putting out tons of flowers and balloons in the aisles up front, and the people were swarming around them like bees to honey. It was actually kind of funny to watch! So anyway, we will celebrate today with some chocolate cookies I got us yesterday at a local bakery, and some steaks on the grill tonight. We’ll watch Survivor and Lost and it won’t be a big deal. No more going out on Valentines for us. One year we waited two hours for a table at a favorite restaurant, and then had very sub-par food and bad service. Never again!

Hope you all have a great day!

This week’s topic: After the Honeymoon

Have you ever fallen out of love with a favorite author? Was the last book you read by the author so bad, you broke up with them and haven’t read their work since? Could they ever lure you back?

Good question! I don’t think I have ever fallen “out of love” with an author. I do have a couple of authors that I used to read years ago that I just do not read any more. It’s not so much that I read a book that I didn’t enjoy, but more that my tastes have changed, and my reading has “evolved” a bit. I used to read a lot of Danielle Steele years ago, and my mom read her also. I loved buying a paperback of hers, so I could read it and then share it with my mom. I also used to really love Barbara Delinsky, and while I would still read her now, I just don’t ever think to check for her books at the library. I have so many other authors that I’ve discovered now to read, and many more I want to try, as well as new genres that I’ve found that I enjoy. I don’t think I’ve ever read a book by an author I liked, and the book was so bad that I swore off them. I have done that with a new author, though. I read one Joyce Carol Oates book a year or so ago and hated it. I won’t read her ever again.

Happy Reading!

I posted a “Question of the Day” last week, about telephone etiquette. For whatever reason, my husband decided to do his once or twice yearly quick perusal of my blog (no, he doesn’t read it regularly. He might read it four or five times a year, I’m just being snarky this morning!) and he latched onto that post. He proceeded to tell me that was a great question, and that I should do a follow-up question. Since Tim always has great ideas, I had to ask his follow-up question! 🙂

So, let’s say someone calls your house or cell phone after hours. It might be later at night than you would normally answer the phone, or earlier in the morning. You answer, or you see on caller id it’s someone you know, maybe a family member or friend, so you answer the phone. But — you were asleep! Do you be straightforward and say “hey, I was asleep, you woke me up!” or do you immediately lie and act like you were awake or it was ok or whatever?

Tim is always the “I was awake, it’s fine” kind of answer. Me, I’m not so sweet. It’s not that I want people to feel bad, but I am a girl who loves my sleep. If I’m asleep and the phone wakes me up, I’m usually pretty grumpy. Even if I wasn’t, I’m usually too sleepy to put together cohesive thoughts and fabricate a lie. I won’t jump out and scream “good grief, you woke me up!”, but I will admit it if someone asks. Tim won’t however. It’s funny, though, because people can usually tell. They usually call him on it and say “you WERE asleep, I can tell!”.

So, how about you? If some one calls you while you’re asleep, just to chat or ask a question, not an emergency, do you tell them you were asleep? Do you automatically lie and say “it’s ok, I was awake”. Or do you care?! 🙂

Thanks Tim, for stopping by my blog, reading it and giving me a Question of the Day! I love you, sweetheart!

Lynne tagged me a few days ago with this fun meme about blogging. Her post is here 🙂 Thanks Lynne!!!

How long have you been blogging? A little over three years – I just had my 3 year “blog-aversary” on February 3.

What inspired you to start your blog, and who are your mentors? We had our website set up and running for about 6 months. We had forums where I could post and ask questions (trivia, talk about movies, tv shows, girlie stuff, etc), we have a section for storing recipes, a section for posting reviews like book reviews, a photo gallery for sharing photos, and even a journal section where I could write journal entries, like an online diary. But– it is all very compartmentalized. I wanted a free-form way of doing all of this. I wanted a way it could be just for me, not for the entire website. And I wanted to try something different. I got to surfing around and found out about the concept of a blog. The rest is history 🙂 Oh, and no mentors really. Although I had found a couple of blogs I liked and sort of knew what I wanted to do with mine.

Are you trying to make money online, or are you doing it just for fun? Just for fun. We do have an Amazon Associates thing setup, but that’s mostly at the main site. I do have it on my sidebar, but I don’t think anyone has ever used it! I don’t do a pay per post thing and won’t be headed in that direction in the future.

What three things do you love about being online? Being online – everything is at my fingertips. I can check the weather, our bank balance, pay bills, look up movie actors, song lyrics, read cooking forums, find recipes, look up people’s thoughts on books, order library books, get movies from Netflix, etc. Anything and everything. When my computer is down or our Internet is out, I’m totally and completely helpless. Dead in the water 😀

Chat and IM? I used to, but not much anymore. Mostly email.

Tag I won’t tag anyone specifically, but please feel free to play along. Let me know if you do, so I can come check out your answers! 😀

It’s Monday, so that means it’s time to plan and post the weekly menu. Such as it is 🙂 Head on over to Laura’s blog over at OrgJunkie for lots more menu ideas and even recipes. Thanks to Laura for hosting this every week!

Here’s what I’m looking at… as always, this is subject to change during the course of the week 🙄

Sunday – we had Chinese take-out, yummy!

Monday – Pork Chops in the crockpot (with that wonderful stand-by, low-fat cream of mushroom soup all over them!), butterbeans, rice or salad

Tuesday – Crockpot BBQ chicken, baked beans, mashed potatoes

Wednesday – Crispy Ginger Ale waffles, turkey bacon

Thursday – Valentines Day… Tim will grill us a steak and we’ll have baked potato and salad most likely 🙂

Friday – Tacos or maybe Black Bean Chili with cornbread. Then again, it could be a date night!

Saturday-Sunday – TBD

Well, what’s a girl to do when there’s no new questions posted over at Friday’s Feast? After all, I’ve been playing along over there for a couple of years now. So, I thought I’d babble a little about what’s going on with me, and incorporate that into a “Question of the Day”.

I’ve had a sore throat for the last couple of days. Some congestion and coughing, but nothing too serious. Not serious enough to go to the doctor for drugs. Just serious enough to bug me and for Tim and Beau to get tired of me being sickly and whiny. Yes, I’m whiny when I don’t feel well. 🙂 Anyway, I have been keeping up with most of the work around here, laundry, cleaning, some cooking and running errands. I think I’m going to take today and veg though. I did some yesterday. I sat down and watched some cooking shows I had on the DVR. I still have ALL of the Jane Austen movies from PBS on the DVR and I haven’t watched a single one. So, I’m hoping today to curl up on the couch and watch one. That’s not normal for me, though.

So, how about a “Question of the Day“, along these lines. Do you or your family ever plan or end up spending the day in your pajamas? This could be whether you’re sick, just needing a mental health day to yourself, or you plan a day to stay home and do family things together, in your PJ’s.

Oh, and just to clarify – I won’t be in my PJ’s. That seems to be something I cannot do. I will have to get a bath and get dressed. I also make the bed, every single day, 365 days a year. I won’t curl up in bed, or stay in my PJ’s all day, but I do hope to veg some on the couch later. 🙂

So – how about you? Do you ever take a day to just chill out and catch up on movies, books, reading, etc. Do you let everything else go? Do you only do this if you’re really sick or your kids are sick? Leave me a comment and let me know!

This week’s topic: But, Enough About Books

Okay, even I can’t read ALL the time, so I’m guessing that you folks might voluntarily shut the covers from time to time as well… What else do you do with your leisure to pass the time? Walk the dog? Knit? Run marathons? Construct grandfather clocks? Collect eggshells?

Well, that’s an easy one! I like lots of other things. I also read magazines and have way too many subscriptions. I watch a ton of television. You could even call me a TV junkie. 🙂 Normally, when the shows are all on, we might have 2 or 3 shows a night that we watch. We also love movies. We have been doing Netflix now for about 8 months and we’ve watched a ton of movies. Tim likes to go to the theater to see movies, which is fun, but the practical side of me prefers to stay home and rent them. Much cheaper, and my popcorn is healthier 🙂 I also love taking photos and playing with my camera. Needless to say, the computer sucks up a lot of my time. Blogging, reading blogs, browsing online shopping sites, playing games (lately, Text Twist), surfing cooking sites and gleaning recipes, etc. I do like to cook and bake, usually, but I go through phases with that. Beau gets a lot of my attention. We used to walk regularly, but Tim injured his knee and we haven’t been able to walk a lot. It’s starting to heal, we hope, so I’m hoping we get to walk with Beau more often. Beau loves to play out back, play ball, chase birds and squirrels and cats. When the weather is nice, I like to just sit outside with him and enjoy the sunshine.

There, that was a boring answer! 🙂

I’m recycling some old questions from the early years of my blog. You know, back when I only had 2 or 3 readers (Hello to my sisters!).

Today’s “Question of the Day” is all about telephone etiquette. With so many people carrying cell phones and being “available” with it 24×7, I think some people’s views of what’s acceptable with phones has changed. I know a lot of people have disconnected their home telephone and just use their cell. I know I see people, every single day, talking in every imaginable place in public – in their car, in the store, at a table in a restaurant, etc. So…

What time of day is too late to telephone someone? Or too early? Do you have a set time that you don’t usually telephone others before or after, or that you prefer that others don’t call you? Say, 8 AM and 10 PM? 6 AM and 11 PM? Or are you always open, always available? What if you’re at dinner with your family, do you still answer the phone? In the middle of a movie? What guidelines do you use for yourself and your family as far as the telephone goes? Leave me a comment and let me know!

Lynne posted this “Two Things” Meme on her blog last week (original post, here), and I thought I’d play along! Thanks Lynne!

Two names you go by… Stace and Boogie (do NOT ask!)

Two things you are wearing right now… Sweatpants and a t-shirt

Two things you would want (or have) in a relationship… have trust and commitment

Two of your favorite things to do… read and watch tv/movies

Two things you want very badly at the moment… chocolate and a good night’s sleep

Two pets you have or have had… Sally (the golden retriever) and Beau the wonder dog

Two things that you did last night… watched an older movie and played Text Twist

Two people you think will fill this out… no idea!

Two things you ate today… oatmeal and coffee so far!

Two people you last talked to… Tim and Gail

Two things you’re doing tomorrow… going to the grocery store and doing laundry 🙂

Two longest car rides… to Colorado when I was nine years old and to Washington DC with Tim

Two favorite holidays… I guess Thanksgiving and Christmas, but let’s break with tradition and say Super Bowl Sunday and Christmas Eve 😀

Two favorite beverages… Coke Zero and orange juice

Two people no longer alive who you’d like to talk to… my mom and my grandma Presh

I won’t tag two other people, but if you decide to play along, be sure to let me know!

We’re still in a post-Super Bowl haze, post party weekend mood around here. Sort of a Manic Monday, to say the least. 🙂

We had a great weekend, busy, but fun. Friday night was date night and we finally went to the new P.F. Changs that opened last fall really close to our house. We called about 5 PM and they had reservations booked through 9 PM, but we went ahead and got on the list anyway. We had a great meal – appetizer (Sizchuan style chicken flatbreads), two entrees (spicy chicken for Tim and Shrimp with Candied Walnuts for me) and then, as if that wasn’t enough, Tim wanted to get dessert and coffee. We splurged and got their 6 layer “Great Wall of Chocolate” cake with raspberry sauce. Suffice it to say, we were stuffed! It was delicious though, and I look forward to going back and trying more items on their menu. Saturday was spent going to several stores to get food for our party, and cleaning up the house beforehand. Sunday morning, we went to early church and then hurried back to start food. We had about 20 people here, at differing times, from 12 noon until after 10 PM. We 6 slabs of ribs, burgers, hot dogs, sausages and cheese, boiled peanuts, wings, potato salad, chips, veggie tray, Li’l Smokies, cheesesticks, cookies and hopefully everyone had enough and enjoyed it all. I know we did!

We were thrilled with the outcome of the game, of course! The last few minutes had most of us up on our feet, cheering, clapping, hi-fiving and everything else. 🙂

I haven’t planned a menu for this week yet, and probably won’t for a day or so. We have a little bit of food left that we’ll eat for the next day or two. I won’t plan meals until we’ve exhausted all that we bought and had. After we’ve cleaned all that out, I’ll probably fix breakfast food one night for dinner, maybe a pasta dish or maybe get Tim to grill out meat and me fix some veggies one night. I’ll be back next week with a “regular” menu. 🙂

Today is all about cleaning. My very small house is not really a place to entertain more than about 4 or 6 people 🙂 I have quite a bit of cleaning up to do. I’ll be pretty busy today and tomorrow getting everything cleaned up, and laundry done, etc. I’ll try to be back tomorrow with something interesting to blog about 😀

I didn’t take a lot of photos on Super Bowl Sunday, but I thought I’d post a couple. The ribs going on the grill, and poor Beau, who was confined to our little laundry room for most of the day. Pathetic, isn’t he?!

Well, this weekend marks the third anniversary of my little blog! We’ve had our website for a little over 3 1/2 years. The first few months, I was updating things on the website every day, but it wasn’t in a format I wanted to use. We had our forums, but I wanted a more free-form method of posting things: recipes, book reviews, quotes, funny stories, blurbs about movies and TV shows, photos, etc. Everything on Hambones is compartmentalized; plus, I wanted a space just for me. I did some digging around online and discovered the concept of a “blog” or weblog. I researched software, and after the holidays, got Tim to help me install WordPress and figure things out. I played with it for a few days, then posted my first post on Feb 3, 2005.

I thought it would run its course quickly. After all, growing up, I tried over and over to keep diaries and journals. I have a few left from my childhood and preteen days. They have faithful entries in early January, then they start thinning out. By February or March though, they are few and far between. By May, they are nonexistent. I thought the same would happen with my blog. I made myself a goal in the beginning to blog every day. Even if I just posted something that said, “nothing going on here, I can’t think of anything to blog about.”.

Little did I know how addictive it would become, how much I would enjoy it, or mostly -what a wonderful community I was joining. I’ve made so many blog buddies and gotten to know, in a cyber sort of way, so many wonderful people. I honestly feel like I know so many of you, after reading your blogs, peeking into your lives and families, likes and dislikes, seeing your photos, reading along to the things we have in common, and not. It’s an amazing thing, really.

I certainly never thought it would last this long, but here I am. And at this point, I have no desire to stop blogging. I can’t foresee how long I will do this, but I’m thoroughly enjoying it while it lasts 🙂

Happy Blog-aversary to my little blog. Exceedingly Mundane. You’ve really become a big part of my life 😀