Yeah, I don’t have kids but I’m a cat mom to an annoying great cat named Jeeves. I always hear moms talking about their kids following them around and how they can “never even go to the bathroom alone”. So, can I be a mom for a minute?

OMG, this cat follows me around EVERYWHERE and won’t even let me go to the bathroom alone. Seriously, I think there’s some invisible velcro that attaches the two of us somehow. It’s crazy. I thought it was irritating great when I was working here but the poor guy misses me so much now that I’m not here during the day. I just wish he’d learn to play with his toys during the day and not sleep the whole time so he’d sleep at night when I sleep.

But, I have a really funny following me around the bathroom story for you. Seriously, it’s HILARIOUS. But, first I have to tell you what happened right after I got him. It was late and I was getting ready for bed and went to the bathroom. When I got up he decided to check it out, jumped up and landed IN the toilet. In the unflushed toilet. So, at 11PM I got to give a kitten a bath.

So, now I am really careful about closing the lid as I get up to save myself the torture task of pissing off bathing my cat. So, the other day I got home from work and the velcro cat followed me into the bathroom where he proceeded to sit on the tank lid so he could be closest to me (I guess winding around my legs wasn’t close enough). So, I got up when I was finished which startled Jeeves causing him to lose his balance. I heard the commotion and turned around worrying about the bath that would soon follow only to see him close the lid AND flush the toilel on his way down from his precarious perch landing gracefully on the lid and staring at me with a very proud stunned look on his face.

Yes, I have a talented cat.

Oh, and for the record, I am very close to being done with my Christmas shopping.

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Seriously, seriously over.  You don’t believe me?  Check out the temperature when I woke up the morning.

And, in case you don’t know how to read my indoor/outdoor thermometer the number on the left is the outside temperature.  The number on the right is the inside temperature and the number on the bottom shows how early I was up this morning.

And to prove that my thermometer isn’t broken…

It’s even time stamped for you.  You do notice the date, right?  OCTOBER 9!  But, that’s not the best part.  No, check this one out.

Need I say more?  But don’t worry, it’s not the first flakes I’ve seen this “winter”.  I saw two Monday night only I’m in denial on those.

I love Idaho, I’d just love more than one season in Idaho.

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Candy over at The Beauchamp Family called me out for neglecting my blog and MADE me do this.  LOL

So I have to tell you six things you may not know about me. So, uh, I guess I have to figure out six things you don’t know about me.  Hmm….

1. I secretly think that I’m Wonder Women and overextend myself all the flipping time.  As in coming up with great business ideas and deciding I can’t “not” do them to taking orders for something before I actually have the item made to sell them.
2. I’m hoping this is a secret, but I’m afraid it isn’t (and it won’t be after I post this) I talk to my cat as if he were a child.  I also would write a book about all his crazy antics but then I’d really be crazy.  Did I tell you about the time he flushed the toilet???
3. I have dreams about winning the lottery.  No, seriously, I actualy DREAM about winning the lottery.  OK, so sometime’s they are daydreams but I’ve actually dreamed that I won the lottery.  But now it doesn’t matter because someone bought the house I wanted to buy when I won the lottery so what’s the point.
4. I work with middle schoolers but I still don’t understand them and sometimes I think my working with them is a testament to my lack of sanity.
5. Oooohhhh, this is a good one.  I have one more payment on my car then it’s fully, completely, 100% MINE.
6. My dream vacation is to take a trip across the country and visit every single professional baseball stadium and watch a game there.  (OK, maybe I do still need to win the lottery, or sell that crazy business idea mentioned in #1 for lots of money.)

And now, drum roll please….it’s Carolyn,  Connie, and Laura’s turn. 

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another summer that is.

Can you believe it’s September?  Where did summer go?  I was going to stay busy all summer but here it is, September 2 and I just got back from my first fun trip.  :(  But, at least I got one in and I have another planned…assuming I didn’t screw up the passport problem.  Grrrr…..

My brother and his family and some of our friends planned a camping trip for this past weekend.  We were first going to go up Friday morning.  Then it got changed to Thursday afternoon.  Then Wednesday late afternoon I found out we were leaving bright and early Thursday morning.  Uh, can you say Freaked Out Lanel?  That was me, I had a few hours to pack and finalize plans for someone to check on Jeeves.

My Jeeves plans unraveled before my eyes but at the last minute I asked my neighbor to check on him.  She happily agreed so I was relieved.  I did the best packing job I could do in a couple hours time when my brain was in a panic.  Unfortunately, as you’ll read, my packing job wasn’t as great as I’d hoped.

I put out all my “I’m gone so leave me a message” messages and off we went at 9AM Thursday morning.  Now, can I just tell you that I honestly can not remember the last time I had a no phone/no e-mail/no way for anyone from the outside world to contact me vacation.  How sad is that?  But, I DID IT!  :)  I even survived it.  I even had fun, for the most part.  LOL

So, we got to this remote camping spot along the St. Joe river around noon on Thursday.  When I say remote, I mean, the closest somewhat populated town (I think it’s a town) has 400 residents.  And that was about 20 miles away from where we were.  So, we got to this camping spot and someone had set tents up to “reserve” the upper part so we too the lower part.  It was actually really nice because we were right on the river and all we could hear was the rush of the river from our camp.  It was AWESOME.  Late Thursday the other campers showed up and they seemed nice enough.

Thursday and Friday we hung out around camp and at the beach.  My niece, nephew and I explored some “secret paths” and took walks up the river with her grandma.  My  brother and sister-in-law fly fished.  Late Friday our friends started arriving.  Sounds fun, right?  Well, I forgot to mention the weather.  I think the high was about 55 the entire weekend.  That wouldn’t have been a problem if I’d brought more than one sweatshirt and maybe some thermals to wear under the one pair of jeans I brought.  But, no, I got to be cold.  Seriously, I don’t know why I was so cold all weekend but I was FREEZING.

Saturday we got to “meet” the neighbor campers when they took their horses down to the river for water and left a trail of horse poop through our camp and all over the beach.  Yes, you read that right horse poop everywhere.  Which wouldn’t have been too gross if they’d picked it up but of course they didn’t.

The hunters didn’t have much success with their elk hunting but I guess they had fun.  All I know is that they STUNK.  (Which, if you ask me, is why they DIDN’T find any elk.)  Saturday I attempted to fish (but don’t tell anyone because I kind of wasn’t supposed to) and actually had a lot of fun doing it.  :)  Sunday was still cold but I got to take a shower so it was a great day.  LOL  Monday we left to come home.  The weekend went by way too fast.

But, assuming my passport comes in time I have another trip planned for the end of September.  WooHoo!!  Which will be really nice because as I’m looking out my window all I see is grey yuckiness.  I guess fall is coming early.  Sigh.

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It’s Friday again.  First, I need to share this story that someone shared with me.   My first response was, oh my goodness.  My second thoughts was OH MY GOODNESS! it’s in an UK paper.  Yeah, the US is so smart.

Now, on to our regularly scheduled programing.

1. Did you know that Voila is how you spell that work that sounds like whalla.  Yeah, I didn’t either because I don’t speak French.
2. I lost three pounds this week ~^*^~ <== that would be my happy dance.  LOL
3. I guess my sister and nephew will be moving here around November 9th.  When I say here, I mean HERE as in my place.
4. I’m keeping my eyes open for a bigger place.  (You did read #3, right?) I just keep going back and forth as to whether I want to buy or rent.  I’m leaning towards renting.
5. The fair is going on right now.  I might go tomorrow but don’t really know.
6. It’s been so cold this week.  Last weekend was so hot.  Now it’s cold.  I’ve been wearing sweatshirts most days and had to find my umbrella.
7. I cleaned my office this week.  OK, maybe cleaned isn’t the right word, I sorted and organized, kind of.  OK, you can see the floor and my desk has room to work on it again.
8. I think I’m going to eat leftover pizza for dinner tonight.  Maybe, I also took some beef out to make beef rolls but I might do that tomorrow instead.  Too many decisions.
9. Many of you know my really good friend Carolyn.  Well she made a super cool announcement this week that knocked my socks off.  Seriously, you have to read her news and send her congrats.  (Yes, that’s random but I keep opening that page and rereading her news because I’m so excited for her!)
10. It’s Friday, I kind of want to take an early weekend but the work is calling so….

Have a great one!

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I seriously don’t know if I will ever get used to Idaho weather.  It’s CRAZY.  Sunday it was 106 out.  Hotter than hot.  I spent the day on the boat, or rather, in the lake beside the boat because it was the only place that you could be that didn’t make you feel like your brain was frying.  Monday was 103 and miserable beyond belief.  Today, I’m wearing my winter socks, a sweatshirt, and pants and FREEZING.  Seriously, I’m about to get my gloves so my hands will warm up because they’re so cold.  Hmm….maybe I should close the windows.  LOL  OK, I guess I shouldn’t really complain too much when I have the doors and windows open.

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