Mmmmm... peppermint (ice cream, that is)...

We’re back from our quick weekend trip to Chicago. It never seems like we have enough time up there to do everything we’d like to do. There are just too many great places to eat, and cool things to see, and museums to explore, and coffee shops to visit. In fact, we almost missed our chance for ice cream at Ghirardelli, but managed to squeeze it in on our last night. And even with the temperature in the 20-degree range, the ice cream shop was completely packed. Apparently the only time their business REALLY slows down is when it’s snowing. And then, if you can pull on some warm boots and trudge through the drifts to Ice Cream Mecca, you are rewarded with the same delectable hot fudge sundaes AND plenty of empty tables to choose from. Which is unlike what we encountered Saturday night, when we had to stand in line behind a dozen other patrons and then split up to sit at two different tables (because there were no four-person tables available). Actually, we were lucky to get ANY table… sheesh… you’d think people wouldn’t have such a craving for ice cream when it’s below freezing outside…

And I was so glad we did decide to brave the cold and the crowds of people, because Ghirardelli had a peppermint hot fudge sundae on the menu – which is a seasonal thing. They don’t usually have it. And peppermint ice cream is one of my absolute FAVORITE ice cream flavors. It’s really weird, because I hate peppermint candy – like if you handed me a candy cane, I’d just toss it aside somewhere and forget about it. But give me peppermint ice cream or a peppermint milkshake, and I am in ice cream heaven. And peppermint ice cream covered with Ghirardelli hot fudge? That’s just perfection on top of deliciousness… :)

While we were there, we went out to Home Depot and helped Eric pick out a carpet for his living room. Eric’s condo is starting to look so good – like someone actually LIVES there. When he first moved in, I think he had a bed, a couch, a TV and computer. And that was about it. You had to sit on the floor if you wanted to use his computer. His “coffee table” was a little wooden cat. It was a very minimalist lifestyle. :) But over the last couple years, he has acquired a desk for the computer, a dining room table, a nice big TV table, and a coffee table. And since his condo has all hardwood floors, the new carpet in the living room is a nice addition. It’s a little bit more “homey” now.

We also went out looking for condos of our own on Saturday, and found one we REALLY liked a lot. And then we discovered yesterday that it’s already been rented. Oh sure, there are places that have been on the market for MONTHS, but this one only took about two weeks to go off the market. I guess it really was THAT nice. Oh well… at least now I have an excuse to fly back up to Chicago and look at more condos.

And now I’m off to work out, since I haven’t been on the treadmill since we got back (and all those peppermint hot fudge sundae calories aren’t going to work themSELVES off…).

Off to Chicago...

I’ve been busy all day – doing laundry, packing, and cleaning up the house in case anyone drops by to view it (someone really is supposed to come by this week… I hope they don’t forget…). Echo is definitely on to me – I try so hard to be casual and nonchalant when I start packing for a trip, but somehow she always knows that I’m up to something. I very calmly take things into the closet and stack them in piles, so I can quickly pack everything into my suitcase once Echo is over at Rick’s parents’ house – if I were to bring the suitcase out while she’s here, she would DEFINITELY know I was getting ready to cart her off to another house. But I always hope that by waiting until she’s gone, I give her a few more hours of calm… and yet she STILL knows that something isn’t right…

We leave for Chicago tomorrow morning… and I’m SO ready for some cold weather (oh, that reminds me – I’d better not forget to pack my coat…). It was almost 80 degrees here today – that is just NOT right when Thanksgiving is only a week away. The temperature in Chicago is supposed to be in the 30s while we’re there. Which is good for two reasons – one, because it’ll actually FEEL like November… and two, because fewer people tend to visit Ghirardelli when it’s cold out. (Yay! Who’s ready for hot fudge sundaes at Ghirardelli? :))

I’m leaving to take Echo to Rick’s parents’ house at about 8 o’clock, and then I can come back here and finish packing. So far, the cats seem none the wiser… they’re both conked out on the couch. (It must be so hard to be a cat and to have a constant need for power naps…)

So hopefully I’ll get some pictures of some Chicago-y stuff up within the next few days. Hope everyone has a good weekend!

Random randomness...

So Rick is off to another week in Chicago, which means I’ll be falling asleep with White Noise Fan this week. After he got to the hotel last night, Rick decided to experiment with the Chicago transit system – he had a 7:30 meeting downtown this morning, and he didn’t want to fight the morning traffic to get there. Especially when there’s a train platform right outside the hotel. And he successfully managed to wend his way downtown, even though he got on the wrong bus at one point and called me to say he was “lost in Chicago.” (He wasn’t really lost… just in the wrong place… he figured it out eventually.)

Last week was good as far as house-viewings goes… and there’s at least one person planning to come by this week. So at least people are starting to look – which is more encouraging than absolutely NO one coming by to look. I mean, it only takes one person to buy the house – but how will anyone know if they want to buy it if they never LOOK at it?

So the other day I was eating an English muffin and reading the side of the box (because I was obviously extremely bored or something… who reads English muffin boxes??) and noticed the package proclaimed that these muffins have “tasty nooks and hearty crannies.” Mmmm… tasty nooks and hearty crannies. Hey, wait a second – aren’t “nooks” and “crannies” technically just SPACE? So really, nooks and crannies would be the ABSENCE of English muffin. There IS no English muffin in the nooks and crannies. So how can they be “tasty” and “hearty”??? The nooks and crannies are tasteless… they have no texture… there’s nothing interesting or unusual about them… they are devoid of any nutritional value whatsoever. But I suppose “tasteless nooks and nutritionally devoid crannies” doesn’t have the same ring to it…

I really love Anthony Bourdain on the Travel Channel. Not only is he a great writer, but he’s got an amusing cynical, snarky attitude that translates well to his television show. (And once again, I find myself asking – how does one manage to find a job that pays you to travel all over the world? I so want that job…)

I AM getting ready for a bit of travel myself – but only up to Chicago for the weekend. And I will be moving there eventually (assuming someone buys the house within the next few months or years or whatever) so it’s not really a vacation. Because you don’t vacation where you live, right? It’s more of a scouting mission… have to scope out the neighborhoods and see what kinds of apartments/condos/houses are available.

Okay, that’s about it for today… I’m too preoccupied to write very much… I keep thinking about how I need to steam clean the carpets and straighten up the kitchen before anyone comes to view the house. I can’t wait until it sells… :)

What's that noise?

So I have a new friend who’s been keeping me company while I sleep at night (no, not Piva… and no, not THAT kind of friend). My friend goes by the name of White Noise Fan. I love White Noise Fan. White Noise Fan is the only reason I’ve been sleeping better the last couple weeks…

When Rick got the Chicago job, I knew he’d be flying back and forth until the house sold and we could actually MOVE up there. Okay, no big deal – it’s not like I haven’t spent nights alone before. I lived alone for a while before we were married, and over the years Rick has taken many a business trip – when we lived in New Jersey, it wasn’t unusual for him to be gone for a night or two. I guess the difference is that NOW I’m in a really big house… probably a little TOO big for just two people. And definitely too big for one person. It’s hard to fall asleep when it’s quiet and every little noise makes you think about how big your house is and how many closets there are for monsters to hide in…

So when Rick got the job, I fell back on my old trick for falling asleep when I’m alone – I turn on the TV and keep the volume on very low, so I have the “illusion” of someone else in the house. It has to be on something totally innocuous, like the Weather Channel, or a station that plays nothing but sitcoms. The last thing you want is to fall asleep to an episode of “Seinfeld” and wake up several hours later to the sounds of screaming and chainsaws, because the channel switched over to “Friday the 13th Part 57 – Jason Sneaks Into Your Bedroom.” Not good.

In the past, my low-volume TV trick has worked pretty well… but the new TV we have in the bedroom is rather strange – even when it’s on the lowest possible volume, it’s still loud enough to actually sit and watch and comfortably hear everything everyone is saying. The only other way to go is mute – and that totally negates my efforts to convince myself I’m not alone. So I’d been leaving the TV on a channel that plays nothing but sitcoms and talk shows all night, even though it wasn’t as quiet as I would’ve liked. But this resulted in a very restless sleep… even when I WAS sleeping, I could swear I could still hear that TV. I’d wake up every couple of hours, try not to listen to whoever was talking on the TV, and eventually drift back to sleep. And then around five or six in the morning, I’d get annoyed with the TV and turn it off anyway.

And then there was the week “The Strangers” was released on DVD. I don’t know much about that movie, because it was NOT something that looked appealing to me in any way… but apparently it’s about a group of strangers who randomly pick a house so they can terrorize the occupants (why on earth would anyone want to watch a movie like that??? It just sounds horrible…). So while the movie itself was not on TV, the ad for the DVD kept running every hour or so. I had to change the channel to avoid hearing eerie music and creepy voices all night. That was the point I decided I needed some other way to help me fall asleep…

So my mom, who stocked her guest bedrooms with white noise fans, graciously lent me White Noise Fan. I placed it on the floor of my bedroom, and it has made SUCH a difference. I can leave the TV off, turn White Noise Fan on, and I fall asleep in about five minutes. The last couple nights I’ve even slept straight through the night without waking up, which I hardly ever manage to do. I usually wake up two or three times during the night. White Noise Fan is my new best friend when I’m sleeping alone in the house.

Oh, and in “trying to sell the house” news – apparently letting the housework fall by the wayside worked. We’ve already had THREE people call to see the house in the last few days. This is the first time since it’s been on the market that ANYONE has wanted to see the house. So I’m cautiously optimistic about the house sale…

Because I don’t want to need White Noise Fan forever…

San Antonio...

Aunt Carol and Steve and Jess and Grace are here for a visit, so we all drove down to San Antonio today. It seems like every time I'm down by the Riverwalk, it gets more and more crowded. I think eventually they'll have to widen all the sidewalks to make room for the tourists... except the only way to do that is to either encroach upon the shops and restaurants (which would entail a significant amount of remodeling), or widen the sidewalks into the river -- which would involve much less effort, but result in a much smaller river. It would turn into the Creekwalk... or the Brookwalk... or the Streamwalk... And how many tourists would show up for something called the Streamwalk???

Here are a few pictures from today:


View of the river (soon-to-be stream...) from the restaurant where we ate lunch...

Grace was having too much fun eating her after-lunch ice cream...

Christmas decorations were already displayed on the buildings along the river... (Seasons Greetings! It's 80 degrees! Wait -- which season are we celebrating??)

More Christmas decorations...

Outside the Alamo...

I'm not even sure what this building is -- I just liked the ornate tower with the flag on top...

Saw this blue merle Sheltie outside the Alamo... I hardly ever see any blue merles besides Echo, so I had to take a picture. Shelties are the best... :)

Surprise! More random stuff...

It seems like all my posts have been random thoughts lately… and since I don’t have anything substantive to talk about today, it looks like this one will be no different. So here we go:

I am drinking a Starbucks peppermint mocha in a red holiday cup! Peppermint mochas taste like Christmas… (and crayons taste like purple… but that’s another story for another time).

So a new president has finally been elected (I say “finally” because doesn’t it seem like the presidential campaigning for this election started somewhere back in 1987 and just NOW came to an end??). He is not, in my opinion, the best person for the job… but perhaps the best person for the job wasn’t even running this year. Eh, what’re ya gonna do? Presidents come and go. And I’m willing to give him the benefit of the doubt, but only for about three months. After three months, I’d better see some magic happening. I’m serious – Obama had better be able to control the weather and spontaneously create jelly beans out of thin air and provide every American household with one of those big blow up castles that you can bounce around in… otherwise, I will honestly start to wonder what all the hullabaloo was over this guy…

I’m also starting to wonder if our house will ever sell. Even with all the open house traffic we’ve had, no one has bothered to come back. And no one has requested to see the house through their realtor, even though the fliers out by the curb have been disappearing at a very rapid pace. I mean, c’mon – it can’t hurt to just LOOK at the place. No one will force you to buy it if you hate it. I guess the way to assure a viewing is to allow the house to fall into disarray. So from now on, I shall cease to clean – dirty dishes will pile in the sink… cat hair will collect on the couch… dust will settle on all surfaces… the carpet will need a good vacuum… the counters will be cluttered with junk mail and odds and ends. But I will resist the urge to straighten up – because once the house looks horrible, THAT will be when a realtor calls and says some people would like to stop by. In five minutes.

I wish it was cooler here. It’s hard to drink a peppermint mocha that tastes like Christmas when it FEELS more like Memorial Day…

My computer has been very temperamental lately… it continually disconnects me from the internet and then connects again at random intervals. It’s really sort of starting to annoy me. It’s obviously time for a new computer…

I keep hearing and reading about how we’re depleting the oceans of fish and how half the fish out there contain dangerous levels of mercury and can be hazardous to eat. So there’s a lot of talk about eco-friendly fishing, and which fish are mercury-free, and how we can be responsible seafood consumers. But I have a better idea – how about we just stop eating fish? I, for one, have NO problem with that at all. I mean, what if someone came out and said that cheese contains all sorts of contaminants and destroys the environment? You think dad would have a hard time sacrificing his cheese habit?? Absolutely not. And I am willing to do the same with fish to save our oceans…

Well, I should go hop on the treadmill and work off the calories in my peppermint mocha… (I need to not make this a daily habit… :))

Monday random thoughts...

So how was everyone’s weekend? Mine was extremely uneventful, so I really don’t have much to say. (Well THIS doesn’t make for an interesting blog post… :)) Oh, except for the heartbreaking UT/Tech game on Saturday. If UT had just managed to move the ball a little more slowly in those last couple minutes, Tech wouldn’t have had time to score that last touchdown. And there’s one thing that annoys me more than ungracious losers – and that’s ungracious winners. Storming the field and pulling down goal posts is NOT a classy move…

And speaking of ungracious winners and losers – tomorrow is Election Day… and I fully expect to see examples of each, no matter the outcome. To be honest, I’m so glad this election is almost over. I’m seriously getting tired of hearing about it day after day after day after day. Although I don’t know – I suppose it was a refreshing change from the usual Bush Bashing the media pours out on a regular basis…

I’m listening to Christmas music on my iPod. Yeah, that’s right. Christmas music. I figure if my television is already bombarding me with holiday commercials, I might as well succumb to this particular seasonal diversion. I just made my list of Christmas gift recipients last night, so I can start to peruse online stores. As usual, I plan on doing the bulk of my Christmas shopping online. It’s much less hectic that way (unless your packages get lost in the mail or the item you wanted has suddenly gone on backorder until February… then it can be a bit of a pain…).

I’m drinking my usual morning cappuccino… and as I mentioned in my last post, I can’t wait for the holiday drinks and the red and white cups at Starbucks. Our store has a few of the new drinks written on their “coming soon!” board – they’re coming out with something called an “espresso truffle,” which just sounds like something too wonderful for words. My guess is that this drink will include a generous infusion of chocolate. And of course they’ll be serving peppermint mochas and gingersnap lattes (which I’m assuming is similar to the gingerBREAD latte they’ve served in the past). I’m so excited… is it silly to be excited about coffee??? Yeah, it probably is. But I’m DRINKING coffee, so I’m sure half my excitement is related to the copious amounts of caffeine now racing through my veins…

Well, I guess that’s all I’ve got for today… I now go to await the unveiling of Starbucks’ new holiday drinks… (do you think I’m addicted to coffee?? Nah, I just LIKE it… there’s a difference… right???)