Beer bottled.

Today we bottled our Pumpkin Ale and the West Coast Pale Ale.

Lucky Number Seven

My name written in Chinese calligraphy. This was done for a suggested donation of $1 at the Hudson River Arts Festival.

To move to a completely unrelated subject… I am seven weeks along. When is it okay to tell everyone? Thirteen weeks? Can we really wait that long? Alright, so far I can notice a change in the size of my boobs. I have a sick to my stomach feeling if I get too hungry. I eat saltines when I wake up. I eat saltines even before I can see clearly.

Wii!!

I finally got myself a video game system. I am the happy owner of a Nintendo WII. The last game system I owned was Nintendo 64. I freaking love super paper mario and need to find some help. I am stuck at some stupid wall.

Pumpkin!

Today we brewed at Pumpkin Spice Ale & a West Coast Pale Ale.

Why am I going crazy?

This is my day off. Why am I going crazy? I don’t know what to do. I want to re-arrange my house. I want new furniture. I want functional pieces not hand-me-downs or half thrown together mish-moshes of junk. I want a bedroom large enough to hold all of my bedroom furniture. I want a closet - hell I want two - one for me and one for Eric. I want central air. I want a climate that doesn’t huge and drastic temperature changes. I want my own beach. I want a finished house. I want to not want to eat.

It seems as though I want everything. The only question I am asking myself is “when the hell do I plan on taking it?”

Magic

I want a magic bullet. I have been thinking about drinking veggie fruit smoothie deals for a while now. I need to eat better. I need to eat less cheese. Keep those eggy cheesey meals on Sunday morning. Fruit and veggies the rest of the week. And What happened to my salads? I freaking feel like wiring my jaw shut. My freaking beer belly is starting to piss me off. Alright Addie, less talking - more doing.

That freaking magic bullet is sixty bucks. Maybe my mother doesn’t use hers….

Chill it baby.

Brewing number nine and bottling a pale ale.

Flowers from the Farm

I am at work right now… the phones are very slow and the streets are blocked off. The past hour has been quite long….. There is a bike race in Poughkeepsie today. Once every so often I see a pack of bikes wizz by. Its quite fun.

The last shot of the night...

BBQ at the Albert’s. Starting next week I plan on taking pictures of the crazy lady?s pile of stuff on the side of the road. I hope to take the picture and make a little blurb about the interesting pile of stuff. It baffles me.

Happy Fourth of July

I took this shot on July 3rd, on the way home from work. Once I saw the shot it took me forever to get my camera out and on… but luckily I was slow… the sun behind the bridge is perfect. Happy “fuck taxes” Day!

Smiling Honey

Happy July 3rd. I guess Wednesday is the only day you get screwed with a holiday… and no holiday weekend. Why not just give us two little more days off? Nope. Bah! Should have had just the 5th and 6th off…

Me in my crocs

We went camping last weekend. Our site was right next to a beautiful stream. Sloshing across it was freaking fantastic; there were great rocks that were perfect to sit on! Gotta love the skirt tucked into my shirt, my basketball shorts and maryjane crocs. I am truly a dork.

Jam.

So for the second time for me, I had the privilege of listening to Mr. Zimmerman and his band rehearse. Now everyone knows!

Nonny...

This is our puppy, we miss him dearly. But I really just wanted to see the ugly walls compared to our new green ones! Wow. I am so freaking happy that we got rid of that ugly paneling. I have about a half an hour left of this week. We are going camping tomorrow! And we will be rafting on Saturday. The weather forecast looks excellent. I am very excited. Right now I am jamming to some excellent tunes, oh and yeah, I am at work. Very nice.

New Green Walls

I love my new green walls.

Walls...

I am so freaking happy with the small changes that we have been making slowly but surely here at our home. I realize that Eric insists that we need a new roof and new siding but I am happy with small changes inside that I can see. I want to re-do my bedroom and my bathroom!! Someday…

Dr Bronner

A while ago, KP recommended that I try Dr. Bronner’s Magic soaps. She was a little shocked that, being the silly hippie that I seem to be, I hadn’t tried any yet. I have been looking online and the price is right at Amazon.com but I haven’t brought myself to purchase it yet (maybe because it’s not part of prime). Anyway. While I was out shopping with my mother last Monday the magic soap caught my eye. A smaller bottle for less than five bucks. Why not try it? I purchased the “Organic Peppermint & Mentha Arvensis Oils Creates an exhilirating tingly-cool body space and increases vitality and clarity” flavor.

I used it this morning in the shower. Wow. I definitely learned my lesson. No peppermint on any sensitive zones. Wowza!

Eyeballs.

Last weekend was jam-packed with all sorts of crazy goodness. On Friday I hear Lonestar perform at UPAC - when they were warming up I hear a little bit of Johnny Cash! Excellent. On Saturday I repainted and recarpeted my living room with a lot of help from both friends and family. No more stinkin fake wood paneling! Sunday was Stephanie’s surprise graduation party… some how I distracted her. We all think she knew and played it off well. Sunday night we moved the grad party to the Albert’s house and I got completely drunk and Eric drove home. Jesi hugged the side of her house in the rain. I left my phone, sweater and whatever else at her house. Monday we sat around in our new living room and a bunch of people stopped by all day long. Did I mention that I got a new phone and I love the army man green of my living room!

Let’s not forget that the Albert’s got hitched on the 19th!

Bottled beer.

Bottled the Organic California Lager "L" (brewed on April 7th, 2007) and an ale (brewed on April 21st, 2007) we purchased from Northern Brewer "A". The organic beer is always fucking awesome but a but pricey - as is anything labeled organic. The beer from Northern Brewer was a gift for the Albert Wedding... it was good and quick. We decided at the last minute to brew them a batch of beer and that kit was the fastest one we could find. It was good but I prefer the organic any day!

Weekends...

It’s strange to think that it feels like I am at work all the time. I have to say I rarely work more than 40 hours a week but strangely enough KP and I don’t have weekends. I will be working this entire Saturday and part of next Saturday. And as KP so beautifully expressed in a staff meeting a few weeks ago, we actually have some real weekends coming up… it will be nice to have two days off in a row… one day off in the middle of a bunch makes it feel like you live there. Okay blah blah… because I really love my job. And I also really love my days off. So with that being said, I am going to straighten up this house, go to the store, and then clean this house. All the while I will sneak in some Golden Girls and some crochet & knitting.

I also wanted to mention that I have done some work on kp.com (which I need to make safari/ie/ compatible) and still need to fix up my mom’s site. I have a big day a head of me. Woot! Let’s get it started.

YPF

Well, its now the day after the Young Playwrights Festival. THANK GOD. I have to admit I did have fun on Friday… all 15 hours of fun. But I don’t think that me being miserable for the week prior is really worth it. I don’t get to “bond” with any of the children or the actors. I felt like an un-creative gofering fool. I haven’t even mentioned that I think my brain fell out onto the floor and there was no food in my house.

Your a big breasted woman...

So I am sitting at my desk at work today and an older gentleman approaches my window. He tells me that he has a delivery… he didn’t look like any other delivery man I have encountered. (And yes, they have all been men so far…) Anyway, after dropping off the stuff near the bar (which he was upset about doing because “How, then, could he get a drink?”) he asked me to sign the slips. I asked if I could sign anywhere - he proceeded to tell me “Don’t sign anywhere, sign your name.” Haha! This guy is a joker. Alright. While I was signing I could have sworn he said, “You’re a big breasted woman.”

I sort of did a double take and said, what? He then continues, “If big breasted women work at hooters, where do one legged women work?” I played along and said where? “IHOP.”

Here I sit...

I am at work sort of hiding…. the lights are off, the automatic door is switched off and there are signs that read “Theater closed today.” I am watching people walk by holding steak on a stick, cotton candy and balloons. It is Kid’s Expo 2007! I have been warned. I have been advised to keep the shades down and the front door locked. I am really too chicken shit to go that far, but right now sitting in the dark seems to work. Now, when I have to pee I should lock that front door. Fun. That will be fun especially because I am waiting for an order of cookies and brownies to be dropped off.

So I did bring knitting, a sock that I will not fuck up this time. I do wish I had brought in a movie. That would really kill a lot of time. Um, yeah it is completely strange watching a little girl run in the street that normally has loads of traffic on it… lets hope the phone starts ringing or something….

KP Kissing the Brew

We are brewing beer today. Yum yum. Right now the wort is outside cooling. Its still well over 150 degrees!

Beer.

We brewed beer again.

Good?

I am a catholic. Never really understood why catholics are insanely depressing. Good Friday is really more like Bad Friday. Whatever. Crazy bastards. Gonna brew this weekend. Gonna stitch this weekend. Gonna bitch this weekend! And for the first time in my life I burned my sauce.

The word is out.

I have been getting google alerts about this bit of information so I guess the word is out. Last week Bob Dylan rehearsed at the Bardavon last week. Now I have to admit that I did enjoy Dylan’s music but I wouldn’t exactly call myself a huge fan. Well I realize that this might sound silly but I am now converted. After listening to him and his band play all week, I am now addicted. They were excellent and I will miss hearing them rock my afternoon away.

Cleo & Eric Kissing

Aren’t they so cute - don’t you just want to puke?! I love them both so much. I thank KP for giving me my Sunday. I just love having Sundays to cook, read magazines, knit, play with the puppy, watch movies with the old man and other various lazy day things.

Why not check out a groovey new site Super Craftylicious.com. Speaking of movies, I am off to watch “Thank You for Smoking”.

Saturdays at work... is it summer yet?

I haven’t used the treadmill since Tuesday? No. Monday. Tuesday I went to the doctor. Wednesday? Um… yeah… oh yeah. I ran Wednesday for seventeen minutes. I haven’t since then because we are watching our friend’s dog Gus. I can’t wait to run again. I also can’t wait to brew more beer. I think we will be doing that Easter weekend.

Last night Kathleen and I stayed late because the movie was cancelled. We had to sit there just to tell the thirty people that showed up that someone else rented the movie. Ha! There are crazy bidding wars for movies from the 1950s… Around 7:15 or so Kathy and I heard some odd beeping sound. Puzzled, we looked at each other and she said, “someone armed the theatre!” I jumped up and yelled, “we only have thirty seconds to disarm!” We then ran to get to the alarm pad to disable the alarm. How funny would that have been? I am sure that we wouldn’t have set off the alarm just sitting in the box office… but once a customer walked in or we walked out of the box it would have blared! Two minutes after the heart racing jolt of excitement Chris called the box office and said “I see your car in the parking lot… so you are still in the box office, huh? Did you get the alarm in time?”

Can you imagine what would have happened if we didn’t disarm?

Busy Week

On Tuesday I went to the gyno - my first official trip to an official medical group. No more planned parenthood for me. Please realize I don’t find anything wrong with planned parenthood but I have health insurance now. My job takes better care of me - I don’t need to use the services there any longer. I did begin to feel like a sore thumb. Most girls were teenagers and here I am - pushing 27. While visiting the gyno she did recomend that I jog for thirty minutes a day. Now I am only hitting eleven to thirteen minutes… I made the effort yesterday and went for seventeen… I am sure I can do more but time is what is against me now.

Well, okay. Time isn’t the only anti-fitness factor this week. We are dog sitting and its just too much for me in the mornings. Eric and I have to watch the dogs eat Cleo and Gus have different diets. Ack. Then we must ensure that everything comes out okay…. yada yada.

And work. This week is kind of nutty. Not really sure whats going to happen this weekend.

St Patrick's Snow

I would say that we got well over a foot of snow yesterday and last night. I was able to get to my mother’s house before the snow started to jog .76 of a mile in 13 minutes. That might seem pathetic - but its good for me. I really wish … HA! No idea… at work… distracted. groovey.

Early & Late

I woke up early and went to my mother’s to jog - did .76 in 14 minutes. I went in late to work because I am staying until 6pm so the HVP members can purchase tickets for the show this Sunday. And I am completely freaking out about May 19 - I hope I can make it to Jesi’s wedding. I don’t even know what time of the day the actually vows will be sputtered. Wow- not knowing what events will be confirmed is making me a spazoid. I will be crushed if I can be there for them… I am supposed to get drunk off my ass and pass out in their backyard… And I am sure that KP will do her best to make sure I can be there… but if certain things unfold like they might… there might be little she can do… ack!

Based on my employment history I have spoken with many many people. It’s weird how one person’s voice can totally sooth and calm you and how another’s voice can make you want to rip out your eyeballs and peg them in the face.

Crazy.

p>This morning was quite insane. I killed the battery in Eric’s truck on Saturday. We found out at 6:15 this morning. I ran out to start our cars and guess what? - His was completely dead. Damn sirius radio… mine turns off automatically - his does not. So I quickly turned my jeep around facing his… uh… I don’t know how to pop his hood and its freaking dark out. Damn Daylight Savings Shit! I finally told him that mydumbass needed his help. I couldn’t find the flashlight, I found the flashlight… no batteries. Had to open the batteries and insert. Its dark out. Damnit!

Some how he left at a regular-ish time and might have only been a few minutes late. Strange. He started out having a difficult time finding clean & dry clothes. And some how he regained his cool when his truck was dead! Strange.

Went to my mother’s and ran .67 in 13 minutes. The dogs played like nuts. This time one of them landed on the treadmill.

I did jinx myself… I am a pizzaface.

Cold.

This morning was bitter again. The cold air just hits you like a brick. I made it to my mom’s to use the treadmill. In 13 minutes I went 0.70 mile. I don’t want to jinx myself but my face looks clearer. Alright and here’s something interesting. I needed another pack of pills and called to see if my little sister could pick them up for me. The lady on the phone said “Sure, no problem… do you want to make an appointment now or would you like to call back?” That was fantastic because I am not going to make a new appointment - I am going to go the medical group in Poughkeepsie. I have insurance! I am going to go to a place that other women go to - not 13 year old girls who yell about how much they want to have a baby.

I am getting off track. When my little sister went to get my pills the lady gave her something that looked different. As soon as she walked out the door she looked inside the bag to find two pills. “Plan B” Yep, my little sister walked out of there with the morning after pill. Wow. Yesterday was a doozey.

Puppies...

How cute are these dogs?! Cleo just loves Baily… they often play together and some how Baily’s entire head fits into Cleo’s mouth. I am so happy that they see each other in the morning now. They run and jump and play and its wonderful.

Speaking of my morning “run” today I only went 0.5 mile in 10 minutes. It was freeeezing out and I was not in the mood to run… and the damn bruise on my arm is getting bigger and weirder. Go Graceful Addie!

Daytime Performances...

What can I say about the day time performances? Loud. Very loud. Lots of little ones and lots of loudness.

It’s freaking cold as hell… or perhaps its just the opposite of hell… anyway… I jogged .66 of a mile today in 13 minutes…

Why I Love My New Job.

I started here in August 2006… I was complimented today. Just a general “it is good to have you here” compliment. I never ever ever recieved a compliment for anything at my old place. I knew that my boss appreciated me - she actually hooked me up with a half a day here and there. They could never officially give me kudos for anything. Just wanted an excuse to pay me nothing - or just less than I was worth. I know I made more than most people at that stinky hell hole. Working there makes me appreciate this place so much more.

Because I am a cheeseball… I am going to list a few things that rock here. (1) Firstly, I have the ability to check my gmail and write this without feeling like anyone is going to cut off my fingers.

(2) Another sweet ass perk about this place is that I can wear jeans; of course there are a few occasions when I must dress up a bit… but I am more than happy to do so because so many other days I can be comfortable. Screw ETC and the unfair no-jeans rule! - if you work from or after 12:00pm you can wear jeans… so the client can see that half of you have on ratty ass clothes and the other half (data entry included) are attempting to wear business attire.

(3) I can listen to music. I have speakers! I have microsoft excel! At ETC music is non-existant. I had no speakers and a big-assed monitor. When I was “promoted” I got stuck in the corner (where I was clearly not wanted) and I got a shittier computer with a fatter monitor and no microsoft word, excel, etc… Come on, you can stick baby in the corner but don’t take away excel.

(4) They buy me food! Wow! At ETC I was a part of the “compliment call club!” (ha!) and you were supposed to get various rewards… sometimes the rewards were a free lunch. Did I ever see that free lunch? HA! Hell no. I came in no matter the weather or my health - runny nose and all. Did I ever get employee of the month? hell no. God I am very bitter at the fecking place. I need to get over it.

(5) I have a drawer! I have sharpies! I can ask for more! There is a whole supply closet containing wonderful office goodies and I can take what I need. Of course I something is getting low I pass on the word to order more… but I don’t have to ask my supervisor to get me a pad of post-its. They view me as a human here - a human with the ability to think and reason and get her own pens!

(6) I have seen a ton of awesome shows in my seven months here! Seven months! I feel like I started yesterday! And something about having Fridays off in the summer! Wow!

Pineapples

My Cleo is a nutball. She won’t eat the plain piece of pineapple that fell on the floor. However, this puppy has no problems munching on a piece that I dipped in the sweetened cream cheese sauce… She knows what she wants. I love her so much!

Box Office

Today I am alone in the box office at work. Kathy took the day off to do something fun for herself and I could not be happier for her. All work and no play makes people crazy… wish I could do something fun for Eric, but I don’t know what can get him out of the funk he’s been in lately. I would really like to plan a weekend get-away for us… but I don’t want him to call out of work. So this will have to be discussed…

Anyway… getting back to the point of this little story. Alone in the box office… a gentleman slowly walks in the front door and inches his way to my window. He proceeds to ask how much it would cost him to rent a box. Puzzled, I looked at him and asked him to repeat his question a little bit louder. Again, “How do I rent a box?” I started to realize he was looking for the post office, not the box office but I can understand how the two sound similar.

When I told Kathy the story she asked if I thought he was stoned or foreign. The answer most definately is yes.

Valentine's Blizzard

Just a few days after the blizzard… it is now finally winter. Fantastic. The heat has been on nearly every twenty minutes… the wind blows right through the windows. I have blankets covering each window in our bedroom. I realized that Wednesday was the last time I had a snow day in nearly ten years. It was strange, to not have to go to work… strangely wonderful.

I ordered a pair of boots for the gala… which turns out that they are not going to work out very well… it’s a shame really. But I am going to exchange them for a different pair… just to have. I have always wanted boots that fit. My damn calf width is just insane. Even after I loose weight I will have large calves got some crazy muscles there… blah blah blah… I need to find something to wear for Gladys Knight…

New Obsession

I love knitting. I don’t want to stop. I have the urge right now… it keeps me from figeting.

Well I might as well use this...

I might as well start my online journal again… I did pay for this site.

I have started knitting and crocheting again thanks to Kathy. I am faster this time around… the first scarf I ever made I gave to Katie and that damn thing took me about two months to finish. A few days ago I knit my little sister a scarf and handwarmer things. I am going to take pictures so I can admire them forever? HA!

Mmmmm, beer!

We brewed at Porter today!

Homebrew!

We brewed an IPA today! Yummy.