Vida

today kicked my butt today was a dome day and the school we went to was in austin (farrrrrrr west side).  first, we found our route was detoured because of construction, which made our set-up time very limited. liz and i worked at lightning speed and were ready in time for the kiddos.  the time with the kids actually went pretty well. then we brought everything out to the curb in a light drizzle and i went across the street to pull the car up.  oh my the sound that car made when i turned it on.  i've never heard anything like it in my life.  as liz and i tried to describe the sound to the igo lady we paused and decided on grinding while adding it smelt bad.  liz decided we would die if we drove it... maybe slightly dramatic. eventually igo called to say we needed to get a cab to the closest car (2.7 miles away).   in the process liz & i popped the hood to "look" at it, since we were just sitting there.  the only thing i know abo...

i love peanuts.  i always love shelled peanuts too.  my family's never been into peanuts at the ball game, but for some reason shelled peanuts make me think of the baseball and it makes me happy.  especially during baseball season. i keep seeing bags of peanuts at jewell or walgreens, etc.  but they all say cubs .  it just turns me off from buying them.  i can't explain it.  i know it's silly. when i was at home running errands, i went to schnucks and they had cardinals bags.  i couldn't help but buy a bag.  yes, this meant i took a bag of "cardinals" peanuts on the plane with me just so i didn't have to buy a cubs bag.   and the thing is i know it's ridiculous. after an exhausting day at work yesterday, i ate some last night while watching the cardinals game though and it all seemed worth it =)

whew what a trip. it felt like there was not a moment of downtime during my trip to missouri for easter. you heard about the trip home...ugh.  that would not be placed in the positive column.  but i know many people had it worse than me.  i worry about my grandma friend (vicki).  she decided to spend the night on a cot in the terminal and rebook for saturday.  turns out saturday lambert wasn't up and running yet.  so i'm sure she's back by now, but i hope she got home in time for her Easter brunch.  then as mom & i drove to the airport this morning that area got hit hard.  so many houses...   say a little prayer for them. saturday was a full day with completing the final leg of my journey to ste. gen, helping my parents move into their new house, visiting with one of my high school friends and getting to see the house her and her husband are building (it's beautiful), going to mass as a family.  and it rained off and on all day....

i've had some pretty horrid travel experiences this past year, but this one definitely comes close to taking the cake. travel started at 5 o'clock with my bus ride to the el after work.  whew.  the museums were busy friday so the bus was brimming with tourists who don't understand the bus system.  i escaped that craziness and hopped on the el to midway airport. my 7:30  flight was already delayed, but not to terribly so.  i read and waited. they continue to delay my flight we all board.  the plane gets in the line to take off.  we're just hanging out on the runway waiting our turn when... they turn off the engines and say st. louis is being hit by a major storm.  so we're going to wait for it to pass.  next announcement:  the airport was hit by a tornado, it might be two hours.  we're going to sit.  next announcement:  the airport was closed indefinitely.  we're going back to the gate.   when we were leav...

this week i've had a bit of glum about going to my parents for easter.  i packed everything up and got a prime seat on the bus on my way to work.  as we got closer to museum campus the bus got more and more full.  signs of a very busy day. i had a meeting in pilsen for what turned out to be the majority of the day.  i got an email saying one of the major streets in pilsen was blocked off for the good friday procession.  this got me super excited!  i didn't mind my bus being rerouted.  i also preferred that i missed the procession.  they are pretty brutal in their depicition.  easter in mexico was my second favorite holiday there (first:  dia del nino).  as i walked down the closed street with everyone walking in the opposite direction with their goodies, after seeing the procession.  i pretended i was reliving last year on good friday.  it was rainy and quite cold, but i could almost feel the strong sun on my face and sw...

did you know earth day has a theme?  it does.  a billion acts of green. i've been thinking about earth day for awhile as we started planning for earth day at work months ago.  the statement we came up with to develop our programming is:  Earth is special because it provides us with everything we need to survive, like liquid water and breathable air.  We haven't yet found any other planet like the Earth.  We can do a lot to celebrate and protect the things that make Earth special.   We ended up developing a sort-of dating game show with planets/moons and their characteristics.  The point is:  Earth Wins!  I sat in a rehearsal (i was a contestant for awhile) yesterday and it's super cute. =) as we prepared and execute a special cart to honor earth day at work it made me  pretty upset because for some reason i felt like news stations used to have "green week" and talk about green tips everyday and i haven't watched a lot of news, bu...

i love thrift shopping. yesterday i got around to taking some of my donations into brown elephant (one of my fav thrift shops).  i was sort-of looking for a bread maker.  i would like to make my own delicious, just the way i want it bread, rather than buying bread.  and one of my co-workers said she got hers at a thrift store.  so i figured i'd give it a try.  yesterday i just wanted to check them out.  i wasn't ready to make the plunge ... yet. i found several bread makers that looked good.  the one i really liked was $8 and the smallest.  it needed a little cleaning up, but only on the outside.  i decided to wait, but i was in the thrift shopping mood.   i swear you have to be in a certain mood to thrift shop.  i have to feel like searching or something.  i mean there's A LOT of stuff to root through and it's not exactly organized.  it's sort-of how i have to be in the mood to shop or else i just walk in, walk ...

as i searched through my itunes thinking my ipod was missing something i just didn't know what.  i found it:  in the park by fox baby gosh, i guess it was junior year of college this student group called fox baby came and played at a bunch of open mics and i fell in love with their in the park song.  =) it's just so funny that hearing a song can so easily take you back to that time and you can almost feel it.   seriously.  as i was scanning through my songs i felt spring air coming through my junior year apartment while eating breakfast when i saw jack's mannequin to being in our overheated sophomore year apartment in winter listening to hot hot heat.  (by the way that's just a coincidence that was the name of the group.  we didn't pick them out because our apartment was overheated...) ----------- i was searching for fox baby on myspace so you could hear in the park.  and coming up with nothing.  then i remembered. i bookmarked it senior ...

chicago international movies & music festival i checked out cimm fest with a friend friday night.  we watched bollywood dream.  a story about 3 brazilian women moving to india to be actresses.   honestly, i really enjoyed it.  they were speaking brazilian (it that what they speak in brazil?) and indian and i couldn't see the subtitles at all where i was sitting, but i still enjoyed it.  i liked watching them work so hard to dance bollywood.  it sort-of reminded me of trying to learn salsa.  sort-of.  no, i don't know what the drama in the movie was (couldn't read), but emotion is universal so i picked enough up from that to enjoy my experience. this screening was located at the cultural center downtown.  i loved the laid back atmosphere and it was full!   there was a high school dance happening upstairs so mike and i watched it a little (pretending we were looking at the dome) and then continued walking up to the top of the buil...

today i rode up to work to see every major news channel's van set-up outside the adler.  which reminded me that today was the big announcement for who would receive the shuttle.  then i thought, 'they're not even making the announcement until noon.  what are you doing here?'  but i later found out a lot of them did some morning broadcasting there. there was excitement in the air all morning around the office.  i would be lying if i didn't say i enjoyed it. we all, at least all of education, shuffled into the theater where they would show the announcement.  it was pretty full of media folks so we stood against the wall at the beginning after receiving an email stating we should not sit until the visitors sat.  personally, i think it just made it awkward for the visitors who came and walked past us as we lined the walls.  during this time this woman i've never met before starts telling me how great i looked in the commercial .  yep, the o...

so i've been trying lots of new recipes lately.  i'm getting pretty comfortable in the kitchen.  basically i use the recipes as guidelines and tailor it to my tastes. SO what have i cooked lately: *chili uno-dos-tres *curry in a hurry *grilled sandwich-this was surprisingly delicious.  i kind-of expected it to just be a sandwich.  the dijon mustard made it.  (although now i have to find something else to use that mustard with...) *easy pot-o-chili-this one had hot peppers in it.  i learned in mexico that if you take the seeds out of the peppers they won't be as hot.  i definitely left the seeds in.  i like spicy food.  i actually wish i added more peppers. *chinese fried rice *potato skillet hash-this was my second favorite.  delicious. *when mom & dad came in december (i think) mom & karen made me spinach balls (mmmm... yummy) and left the stuffing stuff and i realized when i was reaching the bottom of my food that i still had ...

this is why st. louis loves albert pujols.  by the way.  awesome article on craig too.  he's doing well.  yea!!!!

being outside more honestly just makes me a happier person.  maybe i suffer from a bit of weather depression because i feel like when the weather gets better i come alive. i mentioned my first bike ride of the season and i've been getting in some serious mileage (for me anyway) so that's awesome.  and i started running outside too, which requires a lot more energy, but has so many more benefits. i have such a clear head.  and makes me calmer too.   and after a seriously exhausting week (i was seriously tired all week) sunday was just what i needed.   it included a long walk.  where i found a panderia (mexican bread) somewhat close to me.  i also walked past a tattoo parlor.  i was almost pulled in.  don't worry family i didn't get one.  but i feel that's how i generally make my decisions.  impulsive.  i don't necessarily think things through.  i guess a tattoo is something i should think through.  it looked really n...

i VERY rarely remember my dreams when i sleep.  sometimes i'll wake up and think, 'whew that was weird.'  but i won't remember what happened.  a couple days ago i had a dream and i just remembered it todayish january 19 (my bday) was being skipped next year because the earth is spinning faster.  so they said everyone who's bday is jan 19th would celebrate on april 14.   weird? ummmm i think so.  what would those dream dissectors say... i do feel like i heard the earth is spinning a little faster after the earthquake in japan.  although i might be mixing a little with my dream and getting confused so i would look that up before you believe it, but i actually did hear a little faster.  not fast enough to completely delete a day.

saturday i was running one of the spring break programs (i swear they're going to be the death of me).  this program is way advanced for me.  i am not being modest when i say i am not qualified to run this program.  it's called planet hunters and i have my speech memorized that i say to explain what's happening and that's all.  when more advanced people come in and start asking deeper questions i stumble my way through.  it's bad.  i mean, before the stumbling happens, people ask me if i'm an astronomer.  that's how advanced the program is.  i obviously say no.  luckily, it's developed by an astronomer at the planetarium so i can give out his email so he can get back to them. anyway that's nothing to do with the subject of this post. so saturday this guy comes in and i could tell by the way he was looking at me while i was talking that he was ESL (english as a second language).  so i slowed it down (my speed of talking), so i knew he ...

opening day and the second game of the season for the cardinals were a bit rough.  opening day we should have won, but errors...  ugh. saturday was just ugly except craig came through (remember i'm watching him) and pujols hit his first homer. today i got together with some friends to watch the game and it made me love it even more. first i started watching the game on my computer because it was a free day or something.  then as i walked to my friend's place i used my new app to listen to the radio.   i have to tell you about this app.  it was definitely a splurge for me.  well... paying anything for an app is a splurge for me.  this was actually the first app i've ever paid for and i LOVE it.  i can listen to games all season on my phone as well as getting updates, videos, news articles, etc.  and they're doing a promotion for the month of april to even watch the games for free.  yes please! yadi brought in the first run of the g...

i'm just so excited for springtime!  and i'm starting to see signs around... i already mentioned baseball, which is a definite sign of spring.  last night when i went out i saw LOTS of cubs fans (they'd probably been out all day for the cubs home opener), but i was happy to see a cards hat on my walk there.  which made me smile. i started seeing buds poking out of the ground on my street.  can't wait for that! and today i had my first bike ride.  bike to work day for me.  the sun was beautiful and i couldn't wait! i noticed immediately my tires were basically flat.  they were in definite need of air.  i wasn't worried because i knew i would pass north ave. on my way and they have free air.  well... it's not open yet.  not only are flat tires really bad on my bike, but it also makes me put forth a lot more effort.  i decided to search the office for a pump when i got there and if worse came to worse i would use the pump the...