I’m alive! I’m alive!

I know y’all thought I fell off the face of the earth!  I really am still here!

We still have no internet at the house.  And no idea when we’ll have it.  Turns out they don’t run all the necessary wires to houses when they build them here.  Instead, they wait for someone to move in and request service.  Then the phone company comes out, runs around for about an hour (seriously, it was quite comical watching this guy run up to the house, then out to the street, then across the street, then back to the house, then back across the street, etc. He did this for 30 minutes until I finally got ahold of my landlord, who then ran around with him for the next 30 minutes.   And *bonus* the installer spoke ZERO English!) just to tell me they had to run a wire from down the street to the house.  He claimed it would only take a week.  It’s been almost two and still no wire.

I can steal internet from one of our neighbors, however I only get a signal while standing at my kitchen sink, which isn’t very condusive to blogging.  I’m on a two-day trip to Germany right now, so I’m taking full advantage of the free internet in the room!

So, to all my blogging friends: I’ve missed you!  I read when I get the chance, but don’t always get to comment.  Hopefully, I’ll have internet by the end of the year and will be back in all my glory!

Random Tuesday Thoughts: I want a Walmart!

We move into our house this week. I have very mixed feelings about this. Part of me is glad to finally be able to start getting settled. Part of me likes the security of living on base, close to the places we shop (tax free and cheaper than downtown) and with people who speak English. We pick up the keys tomorrow, but probably won’t actually move in until later in the week. We need to make sure the gas and everything is on and working first.

I’m rethinking our plan to ship our stuff so late in the game. I did it thinking we’d be able to use loaner furniture once we got here. We’ll have loaner furniture, but everyone we’ve met who has used it says the mattresses are hard as rocks and that we’d probably be more comfortable sleeping on the tile floor. Great. I’m hoping we’ll be able to find a nice feather bed to sleep on and maybe be somewhat comfortable.

I’m having a hard time getting used to not being able to find everything I want, right when I want it at the local Walmart. We have a BX on base (BX stands for Base Exchange for those who don’t know) and it’s kinda like Walmart. Well, if Walmart were small, expensive, and kept running out of stuff (but hey, they don’t charge sales tax (that’s the sales pitch they use to get people to shop there)). I went today in search of D size batteries. They had every size of battery known to man, EXCEPT D size. Seriously? Was there a run on large batteries at the BX? Or maybe they were hijacked by some mysterious battery stealing terrorists the media has been hiding from us.

I never thought I’d see the day I’d kill just to shop at Walmart!

My Feedjit thingie wasn’t working right on my other blog. I tried, in vain, several times to get it to work. No matter what I did, it didn’t work right. So, I set out today to fix it. I must have copied and pasted the script 100 times. On try #101, I noticed the words at the top of the Feedjit page. Words that said something like, “If you’re using WordPress, click here to get the non-java version.” I know those words weren’t there the FIRST 100 times I tried. It’s a conspiracy. They’re all out to get me!

I love peas. Canned peas, to be exact. That is all.

“A bra is what keeps your boobs from getting huge.” According to my 9-year-old anyway. I guess I need to stop wearing my bra if I want bigger boobs. Wonder if there is some miracle cure that will put them where they were before I had kids? THAT would be awesome.

Our American TV programming here is on the Armed Forces Network (AFN). Over the years, AFN has evolved. It used to be one channel. Now we have 10 (woohoo!). What hasn’t changed is the commercials. We don’t get “real” commercials here. Instead, we get commercials produced almost entirely by the Department of Defense and consist of pretty much nothing but PSAs. For a taste of them, go here (love YouTube…you can find almost anything there!). Now imagine watching those all. the. time. After two weeks of it, I’m ready to go insane!

We have to be careful with the Italian commercials though. Tony and I were flipping through the channels late one night and saw what can only be described as soft core porn. They blurred the appropriate parts, but you could soooo tell what was going on.

I watched Guiding Light for the first time in forever yesterday. I’m sad that the show is ending very soon (I think in just a few weeks). And it makes me mad that CBS pretty much drove the show into the ground in recent years. The final straw was them switching the way they did the camera. It made the show look like something my kids put on in the back yard rather a show produced by a major entertainment company.

This random mayhem was brought to you by Keely over at www.theunmom.com. Want more randomness? Go check her out! Shoo! Go! I hear she has cookies!

My clothes don’t fit anymore, it must be time for HASAY!

It hardly seem like a month since I last update. But Casey says it’s been a month and she wouldn’t lie. Would she?

I wish I had some success to report. I haven’t been on a scale since we left Georgia and that wasn’t pretty. I weighed a mere 4 pounds away from the weight that drove me to Weight Watchers in the first place. Since my clothes have only gotten tighter since then, I imagine I’ve closed the gap a bit (either that or all my clothes shrank on the plane ride over…hmmm, I think I like that explanation better).

I could make up a bunch of excuses. We’ve been moving. The food is too good here (well, that one is true, but we’ve only eaten off base three times since we’ve been here and three times in two weeks doesn’t equal a weight gain). We’ve had too much to do, so there’s no time to cook. But the truth is I’ve just been too lazy and apathetic. I don’t feel like eating right. I don’t feel like exercising. So I don’t.

That has to change. Today. I fitness test in November. November. As in less than two months away. I haven’t failed a fitness test yet and now is not the time to start.

*I NEED to lose these extra pounds I’ve put on since March.

*I NEED to start running again.

*I NEED to work on my push up and sit ups again.

*And this year, I NEED to keep it up after I test (they’re changing our fitness standards next year and will make it about 50 times harder for me to pass).

I’ve already taken the first step. I started counting Points again yesterday. Now I just need to keep it up!

Random Tuesday Thoughts

• At least I think it’s Tuesday. The last week or so has kinda morphed into one day. The good news is we’re slowly but surely getting adjusted to the new time zone. Being on the go all day, every day has a way of helping you adjust faster (guess, that’s why they made sure our first week here was jam-packed with things to do!).

   

  • More good news: I think I may finally be able to kick my Diet Coke habit while we’re here. Some of you know of my love for Diet Coke and my unsuccessful attempt to kick the habit earlier this year. My all-time favorite way to drink Diet Coke is from a fountain, second is from a bottle, and lastly is from a can. I usually only tolerate it from a can though…something in the aluminum completely changes the taste. Well, in Europe they have Coke Light. I don’t like it. It tastes just like regular Coke to me (which would be great if I was still a Coke drinker, but since I’ve started drinking Diet Coke, I can no longer stand regular Coke…go figure). The one and only way I can get Diet Coke is from a can. I think I’m down to one or two cans of Diet Coke a day (some days a bit more…usually only because we’ve run out of water).
    

     

• We found a house! Read all about it here. (Like the way I cleverly divert you to my other blog?)

   

  • I’m watching Wedding Day right now. I’ve never heard of this show in the States, but it’s one of the shows that plays one of the 10 channels that we receive. As the couple is dancing their first dance, Amber is clapping away. I’m not sure why she thinks she should be clapping…nobody on TV is…but it’s cute all the same.
    

     

• I’m getting irritated with Big Brother. Every year, I watch the people who are my “favorites” to win make incredibly stupid decisions. I liked Jeff to win, but now I think he’s making incredibly stupid decisions and trusting the wrong people. Now, I’m at the point where I hope it bites him in the ass.

   

  • Angelina and Amber were both sick last week. First it was Angelina and then Amber. Amber had a much milder case than Angelina, thank goodness. She was still sick enough to keep her out of daycare though.
    

     

I recently discovered a feature of Microsoft Word. I can create an entire blog post in Word and then click a button to have it posted. This is most helpful since we don’t have Internet access in our rooms. Now, I just write my posts, go to the lobby, connect to the internet there, open my post, and click “Publish.” And my post is updated. Yay!

 And in an interesting twist, I typed most of this on Friday and am uploading it on Sunday. So, if any of my faithful readers notice that I’m not linked yet, please link me. J Mille grazie!
 

• That’s all the random I have this week. If you want more, go visit Keely over at www.theunmom.com.