Stuck plus a PB - ugh!

This morning, I scarfed down my cheese stick and turkey slices breakfast.  Not good.  It got stuck and while I didn't have time to PB, boy did it hurt and there was tons of slime.

Then tonight, prior to a meeting with one of our clients and their employees, they invited us to join them for dinner.  Chicken, mashed potatoes with green chili gravy, corn and salad.  I took two bites of the chicken and a bite of the potatoes and not only was I stuck, but I knew I had to PB.  I excused myself to the restroom where I proceeded to PB into the sink.  Gross.  Finished there, got back to the table, attempted a small bite of my salad.  Yeah, I'm done.  I come up with the excuse that my stomach was in knots due to my speaking to such a large crowd, and I'm able to wrap my leftover dinner for later.  I go to put it in the fridge in their kitchen and PB some more into the kitchen sink.  Thank God that no one was in there to see me.  Big huge globs of slime and salad/chicken coming out.  Yuck!

But, I made it through the presentation, got a round of applause from their employees, and finally go to sit down.  My feet were killing me after standing for two hours and being in my high heels.  Perhaps next time I should wear flats.

I came home and made me a shake as I knew I shouldn't attempt solid food after my day of eating.  And you know what is funny?  I had a Las Vegas roll at a local sushi restaurant for lunch today and had absolutely no problems with it.  Go figure.

No exercise today.  Hoping to get to the gym after tomorrow's meetings.

Relaxing weekend ***UPDATED WITH PHOTOS

Friday night my SIL and I left after work to head up to the mountains for a bit of R&R. We met our hubbies and in-laws who went up on Thursday. It was gorgeous up there!

We camped out at the O'Haver Lake camp ground located near Salida, CO. We rode the ATVs.

Sat around the camp fire.

Making our kissy faces.

Father in Law above. Mother in Law below.

Went fishing. Got some sun. Ate some s'mores.

Saw some wildlife.

And some not-so-wildlife.

It was so nice to get away and relax.

The dogs enjoyed it too. My MIL brought her little yorkie. She is quite the Alpha female. She tried to boss around Cinnamon and Sugar. Cinnamon is too passive and let her get away with whatever. Sugar on the other hand gave her crap. It's too bad my MIL was around when the fighting was going on, otherwise I would have smacked that little yorkie right on the nose. I've done it before, and she settles right down then. Oh well.

Today I'm back at work, fighting the yawns. I think I need to go across the street and get me a venti iced black coffee, shaken not stirred, from the Bucks (short for st.ar.buck.s).

Speaking of (.). No, not AF or my monthly period. I'm talking about putting periods in between the letters of certain words so your blog isn't brought up in a search for that word. I think I may have to start doing this more often. Remember my Sweet 16 post? Yeah, the store I mentioned in that post must do a search of the net for stories about their clothes. Well, they posted the link to my blog post on their fa.ce.bo.ok page. Yeah, it was nice to get the props for reaching a size 16W, but on the other hand, my blog isn't common knowledge to 98% of my family or friends. A few know about it, but most don't. And my co-workers (with the exception of two) don't know about my WLS. So now, if any of them happen to be a fan of that store on FB, they could very well see my post, therefore outing me. So just a little lesson that if you don't want to be discovered, you may need to use those little dots in the names of common names such as FB, or SB, or DB (wow, all those have Bs in them and they are not the same word). Oh, I think you can go into your blog settings and say you don't want to be included in any internet searches, so if this becomes a problem for you, you could do this too. Or so could I.

Work appropriate?

Hey ladies,

I have a question to ask you. I bought some new sandals this weekend and want your opinion. I work in a professional office where during the summer time, we do not have to wear hose, and they are not too strict on footwear. However, I want to ask if you think these shoes are okay or not. I mean, they do bare practically all of my foot, even though I do have a nice pedicure going on.

Okay?

Not okay?

Thanks!

Crazy day at work

Yesterday was a wild day at work. Between PMSing and a boss that I wanted to strangle, it was one of those days that I cried out to Calgon. lol

We are in the middle of quoting all of our large clients whose insurance renews January 1. That is stressful in and of itself. But when you add in a boss who asks a question then talks right over the answer, it doesn't help. This just drives me nuts! We had a meeting with one of our clients yesterday afternoon that didn't get done until 6 p.m. I was so wound up that I didn't go to bible study.

On a different note, my car is back in the body shop. They are working to correct all the things that are wrong with it. They didn't tell me how long it will take, and my insurance isn't paying for a rental during this time, so Hubby and I are sharing his car. I bring it to work in the morning, then when I go home for lunch, he brings me back and then picks me up at 5:00. We can do this for a short time, but I don't know how long it'll last.

I'm still open to questions from all of you. So far I've only got one. Perhaps I've told you everything that you want to know about me already. lol Who knows?

I came back to work today!

We've probably received about 6-8 inches, and with the drifts in some areas in town (or at least in my back yard) up to 2 feet. But like a good employee, I pulled my car out of my garage (thank God I have a garage!), and slowly made my way into work. It wasn't too bad, but I did avoid the interstate where everyone who drives on it thinks its a motor speedway regardless of the conditions.

Here's a couple of views from my office window. You can't really tell how deep it is, but it is snow!

And yes, Colorado weather is all jacked up this season. Our last real snow was back in the beginning of December. Then we had spring and summer like weather for two months. Now we finally get our spring storm. This isn't unusual though. We normally do get a real heavy snowfall in March, or even April. It isn't unusual to have a little snow in late May or early June. As we say here, if you don't like the weather, wait 10 minutes, it'll change!

Snowy car

The "blizzard" that is supposed to hit Eastern and Southern Colorado has finally arrived. Here's a picture from my office window of my car. As you can see, it's not too heavy, but boy is the wind sure blowing hard! Can I go home now?

Peri visit today!

Today I'm taking one step closer to cycling! I go to the perinatologist today. He'll tell me blah blah blah that I'm fat, therefore I'll be high risk, but he'll love me so much he won't be able to wait to deliver my maybe baby. Ha! How's that for realistic positive thinking??

I'll try to get back on tonight at home to post how it went. This afternoon, our entire company ~ across the country - and I think even our Canadian employees ~ is closing at noon for a community service project. It's called XXX Gives (without revealing the name of my company).

"During this time of economic stress, many charitable organizations are suffering from diminishing donations while the numbers of people who rely on them for support is increasing. Our staff is proud to support the XXX GIVES initiative and do our part in giving back to the local communities during these tough economic times."

I really think this is a great thing to do. Our company is great about giving monetary donations, but sometimes actually lending a helping hand goes so much further.

Oh, and darn B.O. for giving his press conference last night! I stayed home from bible study (I know ~ bad of me) to watch American Idol, and it was pre-empted. So I'll be watching it tonight. I loved Adam's rendition of Ring of Fire! Can't wait to hear what he sings tonight!

A week away from work & IF notes

How nice! I really needed some time away from work. I enjoy my job, but I needed the break.

What am I doing during my time off? Not much. House cleaning, cooking, playing with the dogs, and my new Nint.endo DS I got for Christmas. My brain age indicates that it is older than my actual age, so I need to work on that.

We're going to have our annual New Year's Eve party. I made up my list of appetizers that I'll make. We'll have spinach dip, queso dip, salsa (my Hubby's competition recipe, unless he decides to try his new recipe), tortilla roll-ups, BBQ wienies, veggie tray, cream cheese with spicy jalapeno jelly, crackers and chips. I'll have punch, hot spiced cider and sparkling juice. I'm sure Hubby will light a few fireworks to bring in the new year. Hopefully the skies will be clear so we can see the annual Adaman's firework show off of Pikes Peak.

If you're in town and want to stop by, feel free. I'm sure we'll have plenty of goodies to enjoy.

***

On a baby making note, I tried calling my old RE's to see if they sent my medical records over to Conceptions, but they are on limited holiday office hours. I'll call Conceptions today or tomorrow and see if they received them. Eight more days till our appointment!

And on a different but somewhat related note (TMI ahead), my AF this month was not normal. I didn't have to use a single super tampon (I use those usually for a day and a half). Most of the time the tampons I did use were not completely soaked through. And I was done in about 2.5 days, normal is about 4 days. That's still too much for implantation spotting, don't you think? I only have an expensive digital test and I'm not wasting my money on it to test. Do you think I should?

I just had to buy this!

I just had to buy this! I collect Aflac ducks and MetLife characters, and normally get them for free from my carrier representatives. However, when I saw this online today when I was doing some research for work, I just knew I had to have this.

The proceeds benefit cancer research for children, so if you decide that you have to have it too, please feel free to click here.

Thugs

We came to work today and our building was covered in graffiti. Grrrr. And what timing too! Our big bosses (from Phoenix) are coming in tomorrow. What a first impression.

Luckily, we were able to get in touch with our painting guy and he was able to come out today to paint over the graffiti on the building, and last I looked, he was working on removing the graffiti from the cinder block fence that lines our parking lot.

Stupid little thugs!

Open enrollment = decision time

The annual open enrollment for benefits at work ends tomorrow night. I had to make a decision about my flexible spending account (FSA). Do I take out the full $6,000 ($250 a paycheck) or less? What to do, what to do?

I decided to finally just leave it at the $20 a paycheck. If we go ahead and pursue the donor eggs, we're having to pay that out of pocket, and that will definitely be more than 7.5% of our adjusted gross income, so we can deduct it. If not, then I haven't taken out so much money that I'll lose it at the end of the year.

Oh, and speaking of decisions, DH and I have made a decision. I'm not sure if I'm quite ready to blog about it, but do ask for your prayers and good thoughts. These past five months have been such an emotional roller coaster. It's probably the only roller coaster that I'm not too big to ride on. One thing I can say is that my faith is growing stronger and my reliance upon God has increased.

Infertility: it will either break you or make you stronger. I chose to be stronger!

Phone call

Last week I had a missed call from my RE's office. I couldn't figure out why they were calling me. When I called them back, I found out it was their accounting lady who called me. I know I'm paid in full, so it couldn't be that unless of course they didn't post my last payment properly (which wouldn't surprise me one bit).

Turned out that they are interested in having me quote their group health insurance (did I tell you that I'm a health insurance agent?). I wouldn't mind writing their insurance. That's additional money in my pocket. We'll see though as the office manager is talking with a couple other agents as well.

The receptionist was really nice when I did call them back. She asked if I'd made a decision about continuing with my treatment and she wished me the best. She said that she hoped they'd see me again soon. She is very nice!

Non update, really

I didn't even pretend to have a 2 week wait this month. So when AF showed up yesterday, it was neither a surprise nor a let down. Just another monthly visit.

Hubby and I did some talking this weekend about what we think our plan should be. With the way the economy is, we are very leery of taking out any loans. With what's been going on at work (we've had several people let go within the last six months), I know not to think my job is a sure thing.

So that's it for my update. I know it isn't much, and probably leaves a lot to be desired, but I just don't have the gumption to do a better job of explaining myself.

It's like night and day

Today, the person who snapped at me yesterday has been nothing but nice. How the tides can turn.

I'm selling my car if anyone is interested in a 2002 Dod.ge Stra.tus coupe, Indy car red, with 80,000 miles. It's in good shape, never been wrecked, although it did sustain hail damage the summer of 2002 that has been fixed. It's a six cylinder, four speed automatic, and is a smooth ride. Here's a picture of what the Stra.tus looks like, but this is not the actual car (mine is a much prettier color!).

The "Job"

I enjoy my job. My career. Like many others, I have my highs and my lows. Today is a low. It sucks. Tomorrow is a new day and hopefully higher than today.

I think the company who bought us last year is placing a lot of stress on a lot of people here, and I was just now the recipient of some of that stress. Not sure how much fun we are having here, despite the fact that when they first bought us, they gave us all "The Fish Story" and promoted how we should have fun on the job. That's not happening.

Calgon, take me away!