Renovation is Complete



I had to crawl under the plastic to get into the pantry and sink



The house renovations are complete for now. For the last two days I've had painters working on my ceilings and bathroom. Let me tell you I didn't think it would get done after the disaster that I saw when I arrived home on day one. Everything covered in plastic. I couldn't use my bathroom or get into my closet. Don't even think about watching tv or eating. The poor dog couldn't even get to the back door to go outside. I had to take down some plastic so we could function.





No tv for us that night



Closet completely blocked off





The bathroom looks so big with it being all one color



But when I got home last night it was almost done. They were just finishing up cleaning and touchups. The color we picked for the bathroom ended up being almost the same shade of blue we had done our bedroom in 10 years ago. I guess we liked that color. And the ceilings no longer have cracks.



Our living room celing no longer has settling cracks





Kitchen finally complete

Review of The Voice

I gave up on American Idol years ago. I hated listening to the bad singers and then it seemed too karaoke for me. But I thought I would try out The Voice last night. For those of you who haven't seen the gazillion commercials, four established musicians will have teams to try and find the new voice. The best part that I really liked is that they picked their teams blind. They couldn't see the singers, just hear their voices. This took care of the nasty problem of having people deemed "not attractive" kicked out just because they look normal. Look we all can't be a size 2 with perfect teeth. I'm interested to see once they have their teams, how things progress.

Best singers - Jeff Jenkins, who would never have gotten past Idol auditions because he is baby-faced and overweight. A beautiful heartfelt voice and everyone wanted him on their team.

Frenchie Davis, the one who got kicked off Idol years ago because she had "racy" photos from a big and beautiful website. She was definitely talented then and still has got it. You know you got it when Cee-Lo recognizes you.

I like the one-up gamesmanship these coaches have. And the positiveness that they are giving the singers.

Patting myself on the back

I don't often pat myself on the back for a job well done, but today I'm going to. I won a big award at work for financial stewardship. They only give one out a year and there are a lot of financial managers at a university. Thanks to the dedication of my boss for writing nomination letters for years, I finally was recognized. There was a nice ceremony, had my picture taken with the university president and provost and received a nice check. After two years of no salary increases, it certainly is nice to get a little extra something

Another scholarship

Whitney got a letter saying she had won an Oklahoma heritage scholarship. You had to take a 100 question multiple choice test for this one. What is funny is that she is in Oklahoma history right now and they haven't even made it to statehood so the questions were all foreign to her. She came out of the test saying that it was the worst test ever. She must have guessed well.

Trying to understand Extreme Couponing

OK, my new tv show obsession is Extreme Couponing. I'm drawn to it like a moth to a flame.

For those of you who don't know, this show is about "extreme couponers". The kind of people who spend 30-40 hours a week going through coupons, plotting grocery trips and making every room in their house a storage facility for everything they have bought. They are proud of the fact that they have 300 bottles of body wash, 1,000 toothbrushes, 3 gazillion paper towel rolls (ok a made up number but like 3 years worth). And everything has to be lined up facing forward so they can read the label. They rotate their stock so the old stuff doesn't go out of date. Really OCD.

One of the extreme couponers with part of her stash

My question is why does anyone need 3 years worth of paper towels? Are you that messy? And then if there is a good coupon/sale you will go out and buy more. I don't understand this concept. I don't want to look at all those products. If I did, I would GO TO A STORE.

These people have stacks of coupon inserts that they organize by date. Then they cross reference sales to the coupons. They call the stores to make sure coupon policies haven't changed. And then they feel the need to wipe out the entire shelf of sleep medicine. Too bad for some poor soul who really needed to go to sleep that night and the store was out.

I understand the concept of coupons. I use them myself, but only on products that I was going to buy already. And so many of the times the store brand is cheaper even with a coupon and tastes just the same.

If you feel the need to do this kind of shopping, why don't you donate the extra stuff to a food pantry or shelter? Some of these people buy as many products as they can because with the coupon/sale they actually are making money they can apply to something else. If you don't plan on using it, please give it to someone who would be happy to have a toothbrush. I'm sure that you could get a nice tax donation to charity if you did so.

Rain Conspiracy

I have decided that the only way to deal with this drought is to continue to believe that it will never rain again. That way I'm not disappointed when it doesn't rain every day. Oh, the weather people keep showing 20% chance of rain. HAHA. What a joke. Then they show it raining on the state border. Its like teasing. Not any fun.

So when it rains (and yes I know someday, maybe ten years from now) I'll be pleasantly surprised. I'll look outside and wonder what that is. And then I'll remember, it is rain. A gift from nature. Something that will make the roads slick, make people cranky and gripe about getting wet. Maybe I'll run outside and take a rain shower.

Extreme Fire Danger

Oklahoma is in the middle of the worst drought since the dust bowl. Yes the dust bowl. You know that little thing that blew dirt from one side of the country to the other. That thing that was in the middle of the depression. Grapes of Wrath dust bowl. We need rain so desperately. I'd even take hail because it would melt and be some form of precipitation.

But we have been in red flag fire danger for quite awhile. Every morning you turn on the tv and see the whole state covered in red flags. They always remind people we have an outside burn ban. Don't throw your cigarette butts outside. Don't do any outside welding. But of course, we still have stupid people doing all of the above.

So my advice to you is don't do anything stupid with fire outside. Don't think that oh I'm just grilling a steak. That little steak could wipe out a neighborhood.