This has been a crazy car month. On my way to Joe's to get the car looked at, I smelled something burning. I looked in front of me at the car in front of me going "is it him, or is it me?"

It was me.

The car was overheating!

I mean, how much of this can I take? Seriously! Usually the car is about 2 clicks below the halfway mark on the temp gauge. It was 3/4 the way HOT. And going up! So I did the only thing I knew to do, which was thankfully the right thing. I turned the heat on in the cab.

Now keep in mind, my AC isn't cooling anymore so I've had to drive around with the windows down recently anyways. And I live in Texas. In Austin. And it's July. So I'm already sweating, but my car is more important than I am at this point so I turn the heater on. And for the next 6 miles I watched the gauge. I had my eye on the spot that I would exit the freeway at if it got too hot, I made mental notes to see if I had any water in the car I could cool it off with. I was thinking the whole time "please keep working, please keep working.. just 8 more miles and you're AT THE SHOP!"

And it did. So I got there, an Joe seems like a nice guy, pretty young all things considered. I could give you all the details but I'll just copy what is on the receipt. This is the first receipt like this, I guess this is what one looks like when you're not trying to rip off customers.

( Cut for the non-interested. )

I called Joe, the brother of my coworker, L, and told him "Hi! L told me to call you because he said you would help me fix my car and not make me cry."

He laughed :D

So wish me luck, I'm going to see him tomorrow at 8am! He said it should take about an hour to fix the stuff wrong.... I am nervous but hopeful.

Yesterday I looked up how to improve penmanship, which was the first thing I put on my list of 10in3 (catchy name, isn't it?). The first thing I learned is that I have learned how to write wrong. It's a common problem, so I don't feel too bad. According to this site (which was the best I found so far) I'm supposed to be writing with the arm – in other words, not "drawing" the letters with my fingers. I did not know this. If you write correctly, words are supposed to be written using mainly your shoulder muscles. Shoulder! Who'd have ever thought? So I tried when I was doing an entry on my warrant logs in dispatch and sure enough, after just trying to write with my shoulder my handwriting improved dramatically. I need to practice rewriting with those pieces of training paper that they have for little kids... apparently there is a reason the little kids start off writing with big letters
and move to smaller... that way you learn the motions and just have to decrease the size. So I bought a notebook to start practicing. I'll start when I get bored here, or if I'm on a long phone call.

I haven't really had much of a chance to exercise over the past few days because I was out of town and then just exhausted yesterday (I stayed in and watched some episodes of House). But while I don’t consider it real "exercise" I did get to go swimming in the Ocean for several hours on Sunday evening after getting the car partially fixed.

Oh! I forgot to mention that – Justin and I drove ALL the way to Houston to get the car fixed with his Dad's help, right? Well, the STUPID people at Brake Specialists cross-threaded one of the bolts on a tire!! So we couldn’t even get the bolt off to fix the car! Ooo, I was so mad! That is the second time that has happened to me, and honestly, it’s kind of ridiculous. After that happened (aside from the being mad) I realized I was just so incredibly frustrated with being treated like crap at every mechanic’s shop I have EVER been to. I mean, really, why do they ALL have to be scumbags? I talked to one of my coworkers, we'll call him "L" and he told me not to even bother fighting with them, he said just to go to his brother-in-law's place. His brother-in-law will be able to fix it and give me a quote on getting the AC fixed in the car now that it stopped working too (I think it just needs Freon, it works it just doesn’t cool). I'm still not
decided. Do I go to Brake Specialists and make them feel guilty for trying to take advantage of me and make them fix my car for free? Or do I go give L’s brother some money so I can get it fixed by someone who is supposedly reasonable?

Let's see, what else do we have going on? I'm trying desperately to get some time off the first part of August for my brother Jake's engagement party as well as my friend Robby coming down to visit. We'll see, I should find out today if someone can switch with me.

I have an interview next Tuesday for the Supervisor position at work. If any dispatchers/dispatch supervisors out there have any advice PLEASE! Share! Jess and Jen, this means you!! Coincidentally, I do not have anything "professional" to wear, so I'll probably be getting something nice looking to wear. I don't want to spend too much, but I'm hoping to find something decent quality. I have to keep in mind that I'm trying to buy better things without going over my budget... so we'll see how well that works.

So besides the spanish, the church, and the friend thing.. I'm doing pretty good on my list. As long as I keep it up I should be finished in a year or two – maybe less than three!

Now I just have to learn to paint my fingernails with my opposite hand. Sigh...

I love my husband!

He made me dinner today AND cleaned up the house a bit while I was at work. Woohoo!

I'm pretty speechless.

Also, I will be spending only 6 days this month away from work. That doesn't sound that bad, but most of those will be 12 hour shifts. A few are just days I have to attend meetings. One of those is an interview for a supervisor position. But yeah. At least I don't have to tell them I'm dedicated... I'm pretty sure my schedule should speak for itself!

Tonight we drive to Houston to get the car fixed. Hopefully we won't run into any major problems. Maybe I'll take the Mustang out for a spin.

Dedicated to _53, who has lost his faith. Feel free to pass this on or repost the link.

( Unanswered )

Make Babies with friends and celebs!


Yeah... cute kid! I wonder how accurate this actually is... Teresa, you should do this with Tim and see if it looks anything like Mandy!!!

2: Justin and I went to the park yesterday and I had SO much more fun than I did when I went by myself!!! We jogged, and walked, I walked for a while alternating a side kick and roundhouse kick (good to stretch those muscles!)... we played on playground equipment and jogged up and down a mini retention pond that's built into the park... before I realized it an HOUR had passed by! And I was pretty active the entire time. I did a lot of walking, and I certainly didn't walk/jog in 90 or 60 second intervals... but I had fun and was dripping sweat. So, good workout.

I didn't even have any residual pain from the previous days walk to the mall, and no real pain today.. muscles in my lower extremities are a little sore, but nothing painful. It's the good kind of sore.

Mentally I'm kind of... blah. Not really depressed, just bummed I have to spend 200 dollars on parts for the car, then drive to Houston on Sunday to get them installed. I decided to get calipers for both sides of the front end, since everyone keeps telling me that if you only replace one you risk messing up the other side or having a pull to one side. So, new calipers and one new rotor cause I'm pretty sure the left one is still fine. I'm going to have to put it on the credit card, but hopefully this next check will be hefty (I got like, over 20 hours of overtime on it) and I'll be able to put a chunk of it on the card. If nothing else I think this has helped Justin see our need to really get a budget together. If we plan to do things like go to the movies in the budget we won't feel guilty when we go. So we'll see. I have a feeling a real budget is still a ways away for us, but at least we won't be wasting any money the rest of this month!! We still need to save some money to go to Florida with Tim and Teresa with. I'm super looking forward to that vacation... just hanging out with my favorite relatives? Awesomeness.

The only highlight to the week so far was seeing Teresa and Lyss and Max yesterday. We got to catch up and laugh over lunch... I really need to make time/budget allowances to do that more often!!!

Anyways. I know that I should do things like fold laundry, clean the car out for the trip this weekend, go exercise, make myself dinner.... but I'm going to sit here and watch Goku kick everyone's butt in the World Martial Arts Championship. Mmmkay.

I don't think I can review this movie adequately without spoiling essential plotlines, so read on with caution. To summarize, imagine my husband making a thumbs down motion while sticking his tongue out and going "how to you type pppffffbbbttt?"

( Cut )

Pictures tomorrow, because I'm exhausted and want to tell a story with the pictures :)

So Justin took the car to the Tire shop in Cedar Park. They are usually really good to me, and they seemed to make Justin happy too. We needed a new tire in the back and got a rotation done. That was 80 dollars, but well spent since tires are important (especially with the torrential downpours we get here). He said he looked at the brake pads and they were worn, but nothing that looked like it would be causing the horrible grinding noise. So I called Hyundai dealership and they couldn't take us until the end of the week because they were booked solid since the other 2 dealerships are closed for building upgrades. Great. So I called around, read some reviews, and finally decided to call the Brake Specialists in Cedar Park. Didn't find many reviews, but no news is good news and I didn't like what I read from the other places. So they could get me in at around 1 (I got off work at 12) but they were short staffed so they said just be ready to wait a while for the car if it needed work. OK.

I knew it was going to rain today so I had picked a place close enough that I could walk to the mall and people watch. Turned out to be a good idea, as that was the exercise for today. Little bit of uphill, and in the heat, was pretty sweaty but I tried to treat it as exercise and not just walking to get someplace. I think I did pretty good, and probably walked (throughout the hours I was waiting) about 3 miles. Feet were not sore and I didn't have any pain from it, but I was also leisurely strolling through the mall and I don't think that really counts as a workout - but it was movement, and I'll take it.

I'm digressing. I stopped at about 2:30 to get a bite to eat in the mall food court (there is this tiny shop that does fruit drinks and panini sandwiches that are AMAZING). Brake place called while I was eating, which was good as I had a paper plate to write on. Here's what they told me:

The grinding noise was my rotors on the front right side. The calipers were uneven, causing uneven wearing of the brake pads. He said I had to get new calipers, rotors, and pads for the front. Then he told me that my wheel cylinders in the back were leaking brake fluid and I needed new shoes in the back as well as the drums machined.

The total for all of that? 1,093.00 + tax. YIKES.

So I told him I would need to call him back, because there was no way I had that kind of money available (I should have a fund for this, but I don't, I'm working on it but I'm not there yet). I tried calling Justin but had no luck (turns out he was in a meeting while this is going on). I called David, my father in law. He listened as I said everything then when I told him how much they wanted he said the equivalent of "oh heck no!" He told me to call Auto Zone and price the calipers and rotors.

So I did. Calipers at Auto Zone are 96.99 each for my car, and you can't just get one because having a new one and one with 136,000+ miles on it is going to have the same problem it has now. Rotors are 28.99 each.

David said if we can manage to get to Houston this weekend he will help us install the parts. He's done brake stuff before (as has Justin) so he said it would probably be doable in one day. I called the brake place back and told them just to put the new pads on - that way we can safely make it through the week and to Houston. They weren't happy about it, but they said OK. I still ended up getting a bad deal of it though, because the pads and labor were 174 dollars!! 80 for the pads themselves (which I could have gotten at Auto Zone for 40) and almost 80 in labor.

*Sigh*

See? I walk into a car place and they go "ooh! ooh! Easy target!!" It sucks.

And I was exclaiming my woes to Teresa and she said when she went to a local place they told her she had a leak in her back brakes, but when she went for a second opinion there was nothing wrong. She said she thinks it's just their staple "woman walking in, must make there be a problem with the back brakes" - which sounds accurate all things considered. I almost hope that's the case, because then I don't have to replace mine!!

One of my coworkers has a brother who does automotive work - found out when I was talking to him about the Mustang. Not sure if he does just older cars or newer too, but I'm going to find out and maybe go to him in the future. I hate that I can't trust people in that industry. It's really a shame.

So it looks like another drive to Houston. I was really hoping we could stay home and do things like clean, but it doesn't look like that's in the cards for us. It's still drizzling outside, so I think I'll grab my exercise ball and watch some Dragonball. Goku always cheers me up.

Anyone know why my brakes would make a weird grinding sound every once in a while? It has happened randomly over the last few days. Sounds like it's grinding against something pretty badly, but then 10 minutes later it will be acting normal. I thought when your break pads started to wear out you heard that screeching noise from the little pin? This is like, worse than that.

I'm taking it somewhere tomorrow, I don't know where yet. I'm really bummed. So much for having enough money to get by until next payday. *Sighs*

Any advice so I don't get royally screwed by the brake people? I'm super easy to take advantage of in car shops :\

5:18 AM Edit: We're taking it to the tire people first. My theory? The tires needed rotated anyways, so I'll just ask them to look into the front right tire area. I read online about a lady who had the same noise and it ended up being a piece of plastic from the AC that had fallen and was bumping against the grinder or something. Another guy who had the dust on the break thing. So who knows. I just got called into work (yay overtime, boo working another day) but I might only have to cover a few hours. I think Justin will be bringing the car in. He's a man, and one who knows at least a little about brakes, so maybe they will BS him less. We'll see.

I can’t reply to comments while at work, the computer won’t allow it. But as an addendum to yesterday:
I did not realize that by calling my jogging “running” (as that is what I considered it) I would confuse people. My sincerest apologizes; I thought that the words could be used interchangeably.

For the record, I am attempting to follow the plan here. One of the challenges I encountered was the need for better arch support; that is because I do not have any arches. Literally. There is the slightest curve to my foot, where an arch should be, but for the most part they are completely flat. When I get out of the pool and step on hot pavement, there is no curve to my wet footprint. My husband explained to me yesterday the importance of good arch support (to help the back, to align the hips, to prevent osteoporosis) so I will look into good footwear to wear. He also warned me that if I bought shoes with arch support that I would be in pain for about a month while wearing them. So I’m not in too much of a rush! Will probably wait until I get paid again.

The definitions below were found browsing online, and it’s the best definition of the difference between running/jogging I found. So I’ll be sure to use the correct verbage next time to prevent people telling me I’m overdoing it. I didn’t; I just used the wrong word.

Walking is when both feet contact the ground at the same time with straight legs. Distance Between Footstrikes = Distance Between Feet

Jogging is when both feet contact the ground at the same time for an instant with bent legs. Distance Between Footstrikes = Distance Between Feet

Running is when both feet never contact the ground at the same time. Distance Between Footstrikes > Distance Between Feet

Sprinting is running where a large proportion of the time is spent with neither foot touching the ground. Distance Between Footstrikes >> Distance Between Feet

2: Notes from my run/walk
*Running is hard! But, so far, not as scary as I thought. Definitely harder than it should be.
*I need better shoes, I think. 25 minutes of walking and a tiny bit of running and my arches hurt. Will give it a few more days before I decide.
*Must. Build. Back. Muscles. Will improve posture and give my chest more support.
*Need a better way to measure time. Perhaps a stop watch to go around my neck? *Carrying a watch doesn’t work, it’s too hard to look at the buttons.
*I need a place to put some water. There are several areas along the trail. I need to get some bottled water, or a water bottle with water. There is a fountain on the trail, but it tastes like monkey butt.
*This will take me longer than 9 weeks. I’m thinking probably 12 to 15. But still. I will get there.
*Look into charity runs that will be going on in 4-5 months. If I have a closer goal than 3 years from now, I may feel more motivated.

5: My search for a church
We’ve been trying to find a Sunday morning service to attend, but I only get every other Sunday off. So I am looking into Sunday night services.
http://www.turningpointeaustin.org/ - Close to home, college age to 35. Looks promising, and I’d be able to get there if I went straight from work. Not having service tomorrow.
http://stdave.org/site/worship/cat/schedule/ - Their 5pm service is too early, but their 9pm looks interesting. Can anyone educate me on what I could expect at that service?? St. Aidan’s was much more modern and this seems much more traditional.
http://www.phoenixchurchaustin.com/ - This guy has two churches. This one at night, and another during the day. The night service is at 6, so I wouldn’t be able to make it. But I might check both services out on a Sunday I have off sometime.
http://www.austinbible.org/ - They have stuff Sunday nights, but I don’t want to start out by going to a prayer service.
http://www.legacyfellowship.org/ - Again, looks good but no services I can make it to.

*sigh*

It’s my bedtime. I’ll look some more at work I suppose. Lots of places to check out on my Sundays off in the meantime. And there are some Wednesday services that look promising. We’ll see!

The last few days have kind of been a tad sad for me. I’m working a lot, which is fine and wonderful, but I’m working with coworkers who I don’t really have a lot in common with. Usually I am OK with that, but these are girls around my age that I should be able to connect with about something. But I don’t. So I sit silently in the corner, only talking when it’s about a call or work related. The whole thing is made worse by the fact that I’m reading “The Revolutionary Communicator,” which happens to shine light on my lack of communication. It’s an awesome book about how Jesus communicated with people, but it very much makes me aware of my lack of friends and connections here in Austin. I’ve met a ton of people, but not so many that love me and want to spend time with me.

So in lieu of continuing to make myself miserable by being sad about it, I’ve decided to turn the negative feelings toward the positive. About a week ago I decided that instead of fad dieting (even though it works for me, at least temporarily) I would go for a healthier, long term solution to my health. The solution? Eating healthy and exercising. Woo!

I know people say that most magazines are trash, but the ones I get always make me think. Body+Soul is the newest magazine I’ve subscribed to, and while I don’t get that much out of it, the articles I do like end up making up for the ones I don’t like. They had an article in there about the Importance of Taking Risks (link, thank you internet). I really enjoyed it and it sort of planted a seed in the back of my mind. I’ve always wanted to run in a 5k or 10k, but I’m hindered by the fact that I hate running. No, see, really. I. Hate. Running. I used to joke that I skipped high school purely so I could quit running in Physical Education. I’m bad at it, it makes my lungs hurt, just generally… bad. Body parts bounce too much, I have weak joints, you get the picture.

But I would love to “be a runner.” I’d love to be able to get out there and have some endurance instead of getting tired after 15 minutes. So I decided to start running. I’m actually starting out by consciously moving around more in my day (a big deal for someone on her butt 12 hours a day) and walking at night. There is a track near the house. Good so far. Then I decided, why stop there? Why not set a goal for myself, something tangible I can say “I have this much time to do this in.” That would also be a little scary for me. But in a good way.

So, I present for your consideration, my goals for the next three years. To be completed by the 4th of July, 2011.
1. Learn to have better penmanship (I started that goal by handwriting this list first!)
2. Run a mile in under 10 minutes.
3. Improve my wardrobe to include more “polished” pieces that fit me better.
4. Own a comfortable pair of high heels.
5. Find a home church.
6. Learn to give myself a good manicure/pedicure.
7. Be debt free.
8. Take a fantastic trip somewhere, anywhere.
9. Learn Spanish enough to have a conversation with a native speaker comfortably.
10. Find 2 new friends in Austin that I can “connect” with.

I have to tell you, I’m pretty proud of this list. Most of this stuff scares me – number 1, 2, 5 and 10 are particularly scary. I don’t even know if 4 is possible. 3 will be a work in progress, but as I lose weight and my body changes I’ll make wiser clothing choices. 6 is long overdue for a 23 year old woman (who is too cheap to go to the salon), 7 is probably not possible if I want to do 8, and 9 is long overdue. I may reward myself with 8 if I can pull off 7, a lot of that will depend on Justin.

I’m going to set aside time each week to work on these, and hopefully I will be able to keep updates and actually make some progress at bettering myself. Scary thought :)

Wall-E
Wall-E is the type of movie I should have cried at, but didn't. I think it's cause they were robots... and I only cry at human movies. It has romance, it has amazing scenery, great acting (in a Pixar kind of way), adventure... it has a lot of amazing things in it. You can find the political message in it if you look hard enough, but it's really about a lot more than that. It was a simple story but a well told one. And sometimes, the well told simple stories are best of all.

Hancock
I've been looking forward to this movie since I heard about it several months ago, so there was a lot of possibility I'd end up disappointed. I saw the bad reviews. I saw the accusations that it was just a plot-hole filled mess. I saw the 34% on Rotten Tomatoes. But you know what I've learned? I'm a LOT easier to please than the reviewers are.

I *really* enjoyed this movie. Yes, they throw the A-hole around a lot. I'm not going to justify that. Yes, it changes course pretty dramatically in the middle of the movie. No, the trailers do not do it justice.

I laughed. I cried (twice). I cheered and booed silently in the theatre. I love Will Smith as an actor, but I liked this movie for more than just his acting. I liked the story. We all love superheroes. So what happens when one of them falls? This is a story about that. About other things too. If you wanted to see this before you saw the reviews, and the reviews have deterred you, don't be deterred! Give it a shot. You might like it.

So I work with this girl that has an almost-one-year-old. I remember her before her pregnancy as a happy go lucky personality who was head over heels in love with her husband. She would gush about how amazing he was and I’d secretly envy her happy marriage with hopes that the relationship I’d been in at the time (with Justin) would eventually lead to that. She had “plans.” Plans of when she wanted to have a baby, plans of when she wanted to buy a house… you know, plans.

Well fast forward almost 2 years, I’m about to celebrate one year of marriage with Justin and her son is about to celebrate his first year of life.

I’m happy and while I try not to gush too often about my husband, he’s amazing and incredible and I love him a lot. We’re disgustingly cute, and we BOTH like it that way.

She appears miserable. I mean, she acts happy enough. Especially when officers come in or there is a bunch of people around to listen to her talk (she’s one of the most narcissistic people I’ve EVER met) but she snaps at her husband when he calls her, gets angry at callers for little reason, and is just generally… really mean. I don’t work with her too often as we are on opposite day shifts, so the difference is all the more apparent because I haven’t seen the daily change. I’m not going to go into too many details because they aren’t really relevant. But seeing her like this, and seeing her how she was, has made me think.

Let me preface the following with this: I graduated high school ridiculously early and went to college and graduated (with a 2 year degree) by the time I was 16. The result was that I started working when I was 14 (to pay for said college degree) – and not flipping burgers, but at a semi-professional place. That means I’ve been working now for almost 10 years. So yes, I am only 23, but having been in an environment with so many older people for so long, and just now starting to catch up, I’ve always felt older than I was. I don’t regret the decisions I’ve made, but I’ve always understood that I got along better with the older crowd. I’m not saying that to brag but just to explain myself before I get to my next point.

See, I want to start a family. Not today, not even this month, but sometime in the possible future. But seeing this – talk about discouraging!! On the one hand, I tell myself that I won’t be like that, and we won’t be like that, but I’m sure EVERYONE says that, and what makes us different? I’m also very selfish and I don’t want to have to spend all my time devoted to a baby. I like my life. I like being able to drive to Houston with my husband on the weekend with no regard to anyone. I like deciding, spur of the moment, to go visit a park and just hopping in my car and going. I like spending my extra money (when I have it) on a new purse, or a video game, or a night out at the movies.

Right now if I wrote out a list of pros and cons to raising a family, the cons would be more numerous than the pros. But since when does the “satisfaction of raising an intelligent child” rate the same as “giving up date nights”?

The real question isn’t so much whether or not I should have kids – both Justin and I want some, although we’re pretty divided on how many. I want a lot of kids; I grew up in a family of 7 and I loved it. We were mixed – half siblings and step siblings – we were poor most of the time, we fought a lot, but they made me stronger than I would have been and I wouldn’t trade it for anything. Justin maybe wants two, depending on how the first one turns out.

So the question isn’t whether or not to have kids. The question is when. We’d obviously like to spend some more time being a couple – hopefully at least another year. Maybe two. Or three. When is a good time? What age is a good time? I’m turning 24 this year and Justin just turned 27. I’d like to be done with the initial 0-18 by the time we’re 50 or so, which leaves us with a few years. But do you ever get to a point where you say “Ok, I’m ready to have kids.” There’s this part in Juno where Vanessa says “a woman becomes a mother when she gets pregnant, a man becomes a father when he holds his child” which is great and sweet and sappy, but how do you determine when to start that? Why can’t there be like a nine month warning alert “All couples be advised, in nine months you will reach the appropriate maturity level and patience to have a child of your own, it is now safe for you to attempt to have a baby.” Wouldn’t
that be awesome?

I suppose if I’m worrying about when the right time is, it obviously isn’t. But in a world where plans don’t really work out for people, unplanned babies turn out fine (heck, I’m one!) and having a good family is a goal, why wait? It seems that as much as we’d like to predict our life to go a certain way, it usually doesn’t. And as much as Justin hates planning and I obsess about it, we have to find a happy medium. Is it ever the right “time”? We can’t wait forever, so what are we waiting for?

Geeze. I think I should have just talked myself into starting now. Except the selfish part of me still says “nope, not until you’ve been married at least 2 years.” Nobody told me that the hardest part of starting a family is figuring out when to start trying to have a bigger family. Justin looks at it this way: wait until we’re ready or God gets impatient.

I guess, in the end, that’s all I can do. But I standby the idea that we should get a nine month warning alert! ;)
--

Just a quick update. In the great state of TN right now. We've been having a wonderful trip so far, met lots of relatives and all of them seem to like me (or at least fake it really well!)

I'm enjoying my time away from work, but I miss my cousins and my cats.

We went to a bar club type thing yesterday night, and saw people line dancing to that song "apple bottom jeans" ............

I had no words. I actually got video, I'll upload it to youtube when we get home.

How is everyone doing in their worlds?

Hey all! Quick update: VACATION! Justin and I got the rental car this morning, and we're in Houston and the in-laws. We're watching Juno (my third time and it's STILL a great movie!) and having a good time visiting. We got here early enough to go to the beach, so we got to have some fun there. Chris (Justin's cousin in the military) came down for his last "weekend" before shipping out to Iraq. He brought 2 friends with him that are in the Army and they were hilarious!! We swam and had dinner, it was amazing stuff. Now we're relaxing.

The plan is to head to TN tomorrow morning and relax, fun, and um, relax. I'm really looking forward to a week without work, maybe I can stop dreaming about it :)

Today we stopped at an outlet mall near Houston and Justin made eye contact with a sales dude. 20 minutes later we spent some money on some sea salt from the dead sea with healing properties and fragrance and pretty stuff. It was amazing, the sales guy looked EXACTLY like Zohan's cousin in "Don't mess with the Zohan." He was very amusing, kept telling Justin that I was beautiful and telling me that I had a "very smart man" for a husband. He did such a good job we half bought it to pay for the entertainment! But the salt scrub was awesome feeling so I'm excited about it. Soft hands and feet for the win !!!

Anyways. Life is good. VACATION!

YAY!