A game of tag.

KHC tagged me for this one. She is procrastinating on her Barbri studying, I do believe. If you are looking for blogging material and feel inspired, identify yourself and TAG! you're it.

Ten things for which I am grateful

1. My family (how cliche, right?)
2. Having close friends from all the stages of my life
3. The four seasons
4. Living in a time when I can travel as I have and see so many things
5. The internet. Without it, I would be watching a lot more TV...Hmmm...which is worse? Okay, it also, theoretically, makes it easier to stay in touch with people if you actually email them.
6. Summer produce. Yum.
7. My health. Seriously. I have had surgery and broken a bone, and managed to slice my hand open on glass in the trash. Even though I did not know it was not life threatening until after surgery, having my thyroid out did make me want to be more aware of what I eat and how active I am.
8. Knowing that if I ever need anything, the hardest part will be deciding who to ask for help because I know they would all say yes.
9. Knowing that I will be able to get a job when I finish grad school and that it won't be too far off.
10. Being able to cook and bake and enjoying it.

This is a lot harder to try to make meaningful. I felt a little cheesy writing 'my family', 'my friends', blah, blah, blah. But I am grateful for them and everything else on the list. I am also grateful for a lot of other stuff that I can not think of right now. Even what I listed has a lot behind it. Take cooking and baking for example. I can and enjoy doing it because my parents to and we were allowed to and I did some in 4-H. I do know that any of my friends or family would help me if I ask. KHC dropped her studying for an exam the next morning when I called one night. Living in a time when travel does not entail weeks on a ship? I would go crazy taking a ship to Australia, China, or Senegal and got to fly to all of those places.

Anyway. Like I said. If you feel inspired, you're it!

SO FUN.

The weekend spent in Maine celebrating my friends' wedding was amazing.

I met the bride in my old job. We were both technicians. When I left to go to grad school, she, her now husband and I shared an apartment with their two kitties.

They are great together and I love that I could be a part of their ceremony. Everything was great. There were many stories, but it is already much later than I wanted to go to bed. I can't believe I have to go to work tomorrow?!

I caught the bouquet...Well, sort of. The groom's sister knocked it to the floor and everyone was staring at it and I have been at a wedding where people just kept telling others to pick it up. So, I just picked it up so we could move on. :-)The bouquets were beautiful. This one was mine and I think it was the best. This is their kitty checking it out when I got back today.This rose between the two hyacinths (?) is my favorite part of the bouquet.

A break for real

This isn't so much a post as an announcement. I went to the conference for a week and posted a little adventure. Tomorrow I head to my friends' wedding for the weekend and I am not even going to pretend that I will post. This is a dry run for the first couple of weeks in August when I'll be traveling. Maybe I will take a special blog picture everyday. No promises though.

Peace out until Sunday!

Not really racist exactly

I had a regular car maintenance done yesterday, and I really love the place where I take it. I am pretty sure it is a Brazilian family, and they LOVE Volkswagens (which I have). So the guy calls to tell me my car is ready, that everything looked great, the car looks brand new (it has 50,000 miles), and that there was no major work they recommended doing. I told him that this was great to hear (?!), to which he replied, "Yeah, especially because I have four other volkwagens here and the owners are not going to be happy to hear they have a lot of work to do." It was obviously my lucky day.

So then I take the bus to go pick up my car and it starts raining the second I step into the shop. The guy reiterates that my car looks great, explains one common repair they made that is not my fault at all, and gives me a sheet with the next recommended maintenance (a big one). THEN he says, "Your car really looks great. My Dad said...Well, you know, I don't want you to think we are racist or anything, but my Dad said that for a woman's car, yours looks great."

Thanks? I want to know what woman are known for doing to their cars? I mean, I take it in for oil changes, I have the alignment done, I put dry gas in it, I check the tire pressure.

Besides, are woman really a different race? If you are male, don't answer that. :-)

Crazy weather

There is a New England (Boston?) joke that goes something like this: If you don't like the weather in New England, just wait 15 minutes and it will change.

It is usually unpredictable here, but not as unpredictable as it has been! The strangest thing is that every afternoon we seem to get a storm. After a day in Boston with the family doing and seeing crazy stuff like this...

A guy jumping over six people (of course wearing Celtics jerseys because they are the champions and all)...And balloon hats at lunch. My niece's had pink balloons and said 'Princess'. I am wearing my nephew's.
...we saw this after a downpour during dinner.
This is maybe the third time I have seen a good rainbow in the last month!

Today, there was a ridiculous downpour with small hail and wind. I managed to be inside during the worst of it, but it was at least the second time that it was sunny and then all of a sudden there were storm clouds and it was pouring today. I was just sitting here catching up on my email and trying to do some work and noticed how pretty the sky was as the sun was going down and the storm clouds are passing.Then I went out back and took a picture from the other side of the house.So basically, my point is that the weather has been crazy, but the sky has been pretty because of it! And I wanted to post some more pictures. :-)

Mmmm...beer. A mini-review.

Some of my favorite beers from the beer fest:

One Eared Monkey, a peach ale, from Papercity Brewery in Holyoke, MA.

A raspberry porter, Southern Tier Brewery, Lakewood, NY.

Jasmine Pale Ale, Rock Art Brewery, Morrisville, VT. I like jasmine tea and this had a slight hint of jasmine without being weird.

There is another beer fest I have been to with beers with odd ingredients (like beets, EWWW), and these three beers would fit in. I like trying the different ones that you can not get in the store at these festivals though!