I <3 Craigslist

So I have heard lots of things about Craigslist, cheap junk, easy tracking for Boston serial killers, ya know the whole nine. But I have never actually gotten on Craigslist because I didn't have a reason...until now. I am moving into a new place and I'm more than excited about it. I am also furnishing a one-bedroom by myself. (Until now I've never needed furniture) Well, I have gone crazy over this apartment and I bought a couch. My very first practical, grown-up purchase. Then I turned to Craigslist and let the magic happen.

First, the powers of other people's junk brought me an add for a W/D for $125 (no pic), well I enlisted a bodyguard to come with me to check it out. Safety first. The washing machine was okay, but the dryer has definitely seen its share of jumpers, bike shorts, parachute pants and oversized sweatshirts...(circa '83 if you haven't picked up on the references) So I decided to hold off. In the midst of planning to go see the afore mentioned set, I made an appointment to check out a set on Sunday and found a coffee table. It wasn't just any coffee table either, it was THE PERFECT coffee table (just what I had imagined in my sweet little head) and they wanted $85 for it. Well, I am one cheap cookie, so I talked her down to $60 in cash that night. Jackpot. We picked up the table and it was everything I had imagined and more. I was so excited about this coffee table, you would have thought it was the Fountain of Youth or something.

It was official, I was in love....with the coffee table and with Craigslist. I was able to curb my excitement enough to enjoy the weekend, then Sunday evening I scored the perfect washer and dryer (white, technical, fancy) and you'll never guess the price tag...$150 for the set!!! Its like a dream come true. I am so excited I can't stand it. I pick them up next Tues. Pics to come.

So that brings the new apartment funishing grand total to right around $715!!! That includes: New Ashley Couch, washer/dryer, coffee table and dining room set. Sweet, huh? I will keep you posted on my finds.

The Broiler will be the death of me

I love food and tonight I was amped about my delicious quesadillas I was going to make. However, I have yet to master the perfect cooking method. In a pan, the tortilla always messes up or you have to use much better and if you use the microwave, then they get all soggy. SICK. Anyway, I decide that the oven is the way to go.

Well, you see I tend to want everything to move quickly and what's the fastest way to cook things in the over....BROIL. Exactly. So I put them in the oven and proceed to rummage through the kitchen to find lovely compliments to my delicious dinner. Unfortunately, in all my 24 years of living I cannot for the life of me time the broiler correctly. One minute you look and it doesn't even look warm, the next minute your item has completely disintegrated into a pile of ash! Tonight was no exception. Of course I was on the phone when all of this was going on, but I started to smell smoke (guess they're done!) and my top tortillas were a charred, bubbly mess. Luckily, I could salvage the rest of the dang quesadilla...but not after setting off the smoke alarm in my apartment. Embarrassing. Well, after some frantic waving of the oven mitt in front of the detector, it stopped going off and I was able to replace the tops and eat dinner.

Whew, what an evening!

Tea Parties, Creme Pie and the Red Sox

I have a pretty cool job that allows me to get out and about every once in a while. My trip last week was to Boston. It was my first trip to Massachusetts. I love it.

Well, if you don't already know. I am a HUGE baseball fan....no particular team, just the sport. I love the history, the stadiums, the players and of course all the baseball movies ever made. (P.S. There was a baseball movie marathon on ABC Family on Saturday and it made me sooo happy!) Anyway, while in Boston there was only one thing I really wanted to do and it was....duh, see Fenway Park.

Since it was a work trip, we had tons of stuff we had to do, go to the office, meetings, conference calls, networking and of course a BIG career fair, but we tried to play as much as possible. Tuesday night a friend of mine from Boston, Dan and his roommate Drew took us to The Bleacher Bar....its a bar built into the bleachers of Fenway. The have a garage door that opens to a grate and you are literally surface level with the field. Its unbelieveable. I was wicked excited about that.

Wednesday was the best part though because thats when we got to tour the park. In the press box, on top of the Green Monster and through the walk of fame....it was sheer baseball greatness. I couldn't even stand myself most of the tour. So now that I am an avid Red Sox fan, I can't wait til they come play the Rangers.

P.S. Opening Day is today, so watch some baseball.

Carley Needs

INSTRUCTIONS
1. Go to Google.com
2. Including the quotation marks, type in “[YOUR NAME] needs” (in my case, it’s “Carley needs”)
3. Take the top 10 results and post them

**Carley needs some coaching in the area of social development.
**CARLEY NEEDS YOUR HELP!!! This is Carley, a 10 week old, 1 pound 3 ounce bundle of love and wet kisses.
**Carley needs your help..
**Carley Needs to Sell Buyers on Highest-Priced Condos in Chicago.
**Carley Needs Your Help at the GodlikeProductions Conspiracy Forum.
**Carley needs to be taken to be toileted.
**Carley needs Simon and so do the viewers because its a snorefest the way it is and Simon treated her with respect and love,the s/l to leave ...
**Carley, needs an academic boost, Gretchen and Francis Wells hire author Bree McEnroy to write a book to Carley's ...
**Carley needs to look at my heroes. www.TheUsedNews.com's myspace
**Carley needs any airbrushing is her boyfriend Ricky Whittle, who plays Calvin Valentine on the show

There is a fine line between logic and stupidity

Last weekend was super busy for me....but it was a fun enjoyable one. Friday was pretty low key, dinner with Megs and her momma (Palio's of course) then Tyler came over to hang (more info about Tyler to come).

Saturday morning was freezing cold and ridiculous windy, so Megan and I thought it would be a great day for a long run..our longest so far. We left the house planning to run about 7 miles. We took off and kept running and running and running, by the time we got back to Megan's we were exhausted and convinced it had to be more than 7 miles. (With my luck it was probably closer to 5 or something, but I kept thinking positively) I got in my car and drove our route to get an exactly calculation and all be darn it was 8.9 miles!!! Can you even believe it? Longest run ever for me. We were stoked.

The rest of Saturday was fairly low key as well, I baby shower where I apparently "one-up'd" everyone with my handmade diaper cake! (Shown above) Then stopped by the parentals' casa for some delicious grub and to see the baby newphew.

Sunday was a treat because we did a service day with our church which involved demolition of a million dollar crack house in West Dallas. I know baller status, huh? I was awesome until I got about 3 gallons of ash, dirt and who knows what dumped all over me. That stuff was in my hair, down my shirt, in my jeans....it was a mess. So I had to get cleaned up and there were a ton of options of places to do so...NOT! So in I go to the port-o-potty. I preceded to pray for my health and safety and strong stomach as I took my shoes off and stood sock-foot in the stall. SICK! I very quickly removed and shook out every article of clothing, redressed and joined the demo crew. No one should be shocked by these events because it is totally my luck, but the day went on.

After service day, Megs and I decided to go blading to enjoy such a beautiful day. So we grabbed our skates and headed toward Irving where we ran our 10K. The trail is one of those that is a collection of short trails and its really hard to tell how long it actually is. Well, we set off to make the loop....or what we thought was a loop. After about 5 miles in POS blades, I am rocking a ginormous blister and the end of the loop is no where in sight. We asked a couple that was running how far the end was and they said that the trail was a dead end about a half a mile further. Well, crap. Now we have to get back to the car. So we turned around and kept on truckin. Megan was an awesome friend and offered to switch skates. Her's were great, but it took her about 10 yards to realize what trash mine were, so we opted to walk back. After that we noticed the main road,Now, we're looking at about 4.5 miles in sock-feet. Yikes. We walked on the trail for a while and a man offered us a ride (which we politely declined) This particular man was on the trail in jeans with no fitness equipment and looked a little out of place. After he creepily left, we noticed Riverside Dr. was really close, so we head to the main roads to walk back. Duh, the shortest distance between two points is a straight line. We walked a little ways over the grass and trash and glass and what-not on the side of the road and came across a park entrance. At this point we're in a time crunch to get back to the car in time to get to Bible study, so we're getting desparate.

Just as we're starting to panic about how the heck to get back to the car and man in a Mercedes with a bike on the back pulls up and offers us a ride. We hesitated for a minute and then accepted and jumped in. Now before you get all "Taken" or "Natalie Holloway" on us, we did some quick justification before getting in the car. The man had a bike (therefore purpose on the trail), he drove a Mercedes (killers drive vans without windows, everyone knows that) and we had seen him ride past a few times earlier. Once we got in the car, there were more positive signs, a car seat in the back (kids and safety!) and there was a coloring page featuring Bible characters! Jackpot. We had just been rescued by a God-loveing, kid-friendly, wealthy, fitness enthusist!!! He dropped us right off at our car and we made it to Bible study on time.

It was quite an adventure, but we survived. The moral of this story is buy better rollerblades and learn how far the trail is. More to come soon.

Much Love,

C

New York! New York!

In honor of my upcoming New York/New Jersey vacation, I feel compelled to share my account of my first trip to New York. It was perfect my best friend/roommate, Kacee and I were going to NYC to visit one of her friends. This particular friend happens to play for the New York Jets....seriously. Anyways, another one of her friends works for American, so we got really cheap flights and we were staying at the Jets' house (his name is Drew) in Long Island, so all in all the trip is looking really good. To make it even sweeter, Drew told us he had to practice the whole time, but that a friend of his would be available to show us around and take us anywhere we needed or wanted to go...and probably in a limo. We were stoked.

We arrive in NY and Drew and his friend are there to pick us up. We walk out to the pick up area and are greeted by a royal blue Expedition with shimmer, marbleized paint. Oh it gets better. This ride has 26" rims and Lamborghini doors! The inside is fully loaded with a stereo system that vibrates more than a coin-operated hotel bed, flat screens, and metallic gold ostrich quill seats. I had no idea what to do with myself. I drive an Altima.

As we're loading our things into the car, Drew's friend introduces himself. He said, "Nice to meet you, name's Naaaad." I was like, "Excuse me". We went back and forth a couple of times and finally he said, "Nard, short for Bernard" I should have known this, but I hadn't yet notice his four gold teeth. These particular teeth had "Nard" etched in them....one letter on each tooth. And don't get the wrong idea...this was no Paul Wall grill, this was straight gold teeth and the letters looked like they were scraped in by a pencil. Lord help us.

Nard was to be our "great NY tour guide." Unfortunately for us, this was Nard's first trip to New York too and he's actually from East Texas...great, what the heck is this guy going to show us. Nothing. And that's exactly what he showed us. Nard wore me out the entire trip, but the worst was when we were going to the game at Giants stadium. We were riding the family bus with all the players' wives, families, girlfriends and he shows up looking like a "gansta in paradise" Embarrassing. He also lost one of his gloves between the car and the bus. Note: It is December in New York and the temperature is in the 30's and Nard did not pack one single pair of pants. Are you kidding me? No pants? It's flipping New York in the winter.

Well, that is about the tune of the trip...at least the parts with Nard in them, which was most of it. The parts when Kacee and I were lost in New York or the poor white guy thought we were car jacking him and almost peed his pants were definitely a good time.

Luckily, my next trip to New York was amazing and I got a real tour of the city with a native tour guide. The world can only imagine what kind of trouble, Megan and I will get into in a few weeks when we return to the Big Apple. Until then...tata

Hello and Happy New Year

Well, welcome to 2009 and welcome to my inner monologue...or for those of you who know me, more external monologue. I tend to be a pretty dramatic story teller, even when the story itself is not that exciting and I like to talk, so it works. After some debate, I have decided to join the masses in this blogging fad. (This is kind of a big deal because I'm usually at least 2 years behind any cool fads, trends, etc.) I hope this is entertaining and maybe a little humorous. Enjoy and I hope you come back to visit.