I must be crazy thinking that I will be able to keep up with NaBloPoMo again this year. Sheesh. So I took a little weekend trip to Philadelphia this past weekend which I will detail in a further entry as it was quite lovely. School exams and projects have been making me a little crazy. It hit me last week that this year will be the first year in many that I will not be part of the Vagina Monologues and that really bums me out. I was going to actually accept a part this year! Oh well. I’m not going to dwell on it. The ex Mrs. is the director if you are wondering why I can do it this year.

I also had some mini adventures featuring rescuing dogs and my obsession lives on with LUSH. I went on a little shopping spree in Philadelphia. More on all that later.

You’re going to get me everyday for a month so I’m sure this mini entry will seem like a blessing. Ha-ha.

So I have no idea when I will have access to the pictures that go along with this post. As some of you know I recently sold my camera on eBay so I will let you know as soon as these pictures are up. Until then here is what happened on my trip to Atlantic City, October 14 & 15.

Sickness aside I just had one of the best weekends ever. It was so fun and spontaneous. Just what I needed. I was still a little sick off and on, but I didn’t even care.

Kasey came over at about 11:30 pm on Sunday night after her 5 year high school reunion. We set the alarm and went to sleep soon after that. At 6:00 a.m. my alarm buzzed me into consciousness and I got up and took a shower and got dressed. I awoke Kasey at 6:40 and we were on the road on our way to Atlantic City by 7:30. Not too bad!

We stopped off at Wawa for coffee and breakfast and we were on the PA-Turnpike by 8:00 a.m. Our trip was going fabulously and Kasey had created many CDs for our drive. We were merrily listening to a mix of songs from various musicals.

All of the sudden the car started shaking while we were in the fast lane passing a bus. I hear Kasey say, “Oh no. Oh crap! This isn’t good.” I still don’t really know what is going on. Luckily we were able to get over and pull over on the side of the road. She gets out and inspects what is wrong. She comes back to the car and looks at me. The tire is flat. She starts to apologize and tell me that she should have checked and she wasn’t thinking. So I get into my calm let’s-manage-this-it’s-an-adventure mind frame. We both have Triple A memberships so Kasey calls and they say it will be about 45 minutes. We pull the car up more so we can be out of the way.

All of this is all well and good except that I really have to pee. As a matter of fact I have had to pee for about an hour of the drive and just didn’t want to stop until we were in New Jersey. So here we are stuck on 76 just outside Philly and I have to pee. I take note of the fact that there are coffee cups in the car so I have an escape route. Luckily the Tow Guy comes in about 20 minutes so it isn’t necessary.

Tow Guy assesses the situation and is very friendly and helpful. He puts on the spare and directs us to a place where we can get the tire patched. This place is almost open (it was a Sunday). So we get off at the Girard exit and look for this tire place.

It seems to be a pretty abandoned stretch of road. Most of the buildings are messed up and missing windows, etc. We see the tire place Bo’s Used Tires. It called to us like a beacon of hope. He was open and took us right away. He patched the tire, charged us $10 and said that it was guaranteed for life. He said we could drive on it right away and the patch would outlive the rest of the tire. “Great!” we say, “Fantastic!” So thrilled are we at the cheap tire fix and we are praising our Tow Guy how wonderful was he to suggest this place to us.

So I still have to pee. We go to this gas station, but I’m pretty sure we are in some sort of Philadelphia ghetto and they won’t let us use the rest rooms. A guy outside says they never do. He promptly asks us for spare change. We’re thrilled to be in the good company of a patched tire so we give him $1.

Then get back on the road. We got off an exit in Philly and saw a hospital. A hospital! What a great place to use the bathroom. We go in the parking garage and parking is free for less than 30 minutes. Lovely! So we use the bathrooms there and get going.

Back on our way to Atlantic City! We’re so super psyched! That could not have gone better. We make it just outside Philadelphia and we hear a very loud pop. The car shakes. Uh oh. We start cursing Bo and his shady tire. Kasey looks upset. I get back into calm mode. This will be fine. We just have to call Triple A again. There new time estimate is an hour. Well we have no other choice so fine. We’re waiting and I see a truck pull up behind us. I tell Kasey and we are both staring out the back window in suspense. Will this person help us? Then I realize it’s a NJDOT truck and it starts to pull closer to the car. A man, let’s call him Tow Guy #2 hops out and pulls on a neon yellow vest. We get out of the car to greet him. Kasey says I should flirt with him because he looks like he’d like me.

He says he’ll help and Kasey calls Triple A back to cancel. So I am standing with the guy as he fixes the tire and he starts to talk and he really does flirt with me. A lot! Asking where we are going, do I like to cook, do I live around here, do I come to jersey much, how late is the wine fest, etc… It was so funny. When the tire came off it turned out there was a second hole that Bo must have missed. So after that we weren’t mad. Who could have known there would be so much wrong with this tire? It’s noon at this point. So Tow Guy #2 puts the spare back on and tells us we can go a few hundred miles on it, but not to go above 55 miles per hour.

So that is what we did. We drove the rest of the way to Atlantic City going 55 miles per hour even in the 65 zones. You know, it really wasn’t bad. We even had a group of cars following behind us for some reason even though it was a three lane road with no traffic.

Finally we got to the Atlantic City Conference Center. We parked and went right in. It was different than I expected, but enjoyable. Not much wine. We tried Baklava “Hoopah!”, Crepes, fondue, and a few other things. They were all little samples though and we were hungry so we went to look for somewhere to eat.

We almost ate at a diner, but there was this angry guy standing outside and he spit forward and it almost hit me! We went inside and the guy came in cursing and he apparently worked there and it seemed like he was cursing about us talking about him. We got our seats and my stomach was still funny and the food was all greasy foods and I was uncomfortable so we left. We walked around a little and we stopped at a crepe place. I thought that would be nice, but it was café style and I really wanted to go to somewhere with a waitress and air conditioning. It was hot! So finally we went to Applebee’s. Kasey was so sweet. I really can be a pain when it comes to eating out or being in public places because I get uncomfortable and certain things make me cranky.

I wasn’t too thrilled about Applebee’s either, but it was there and I had already changed my mind twice. It was actually really good! I got a yummy chicken salad and Kasey had delicious honey glazed salmon. They also had adorable little desserts for $1.99. So I tried one of those. It was just really nice.

During our meal Kasey told me about a credit card she found in her drawer at home that she had forgotten about and wasn’t sure still worked. So she called and it was active. So she paid for dinner and we started talking about spending the night in Atlantic City.

We put that out of our minds for a bit and did some shopping. There was a COACH outlet and I was adoring all of the gorgeous bags when Kasey decided she was going to buy me one and could not be convinced otherwise. So I got the most adorable little Bordeaux suede bag. It’s nice because all my purses are huge and this one is the prefect size. I’m so in love with it. Kasey got gift wrap because she knows I love opening presents, but I couldn’t wait to use it!

We headed over to Caesar’s casino and parked the car. We looked around and it was gorgeous. Kasey decided we should ask how much a room would be just for fun. We got how much and we decided to call some other places too. They were all about the same so we went back in and booked the room! At Caesars! I was pretty excited. We sent up to the room and it was gorgeous. We didn’t have any clothing or luggage though. We headed over to the pier shops to get some toiletries and they had a LUSH store. I was totally against Kasey buying me anymore presents, but she is really sneaky.

Here is what we got: (note in store those soaps can be cut to any size so they weren’t those prices)

• Charity Pot - 100% of proceeds from lotion go to the charity on the lid. Great lotion too.
• Karma Soap - This smelled so good.
• Coalface - I have been wanting to try a coal face cleanser for a while. Hopefully this lives up to the hype. Good in store because I could buy a $5 slice instead of $10 before I know if I like it.
• Happy Hippy shower gel
• The Olive Branch shower gel

They were very friendly there and gave us a ton of samples. The Lush Times catalog wasn’t out yet, but they said they would have them in tomorrow. Fantastic.

We wanted to get PJs to sleep in and panties, but we couldn’t find any and since it was a Sunday things were mostly closed by then. Oh well.

We had dinner in Caesars, but it was wildly expensive and not good. ($8.95 for two eggs, hashbrowns and toast!!) So that was a let down. We went back to the room and choose to take a nap and wake up later. We set the alarm for midnight and went to sleep.

When we woke up we went downstairs. I ordered a Crown Royal Washington Apple straight up because I had just read about it in the Philadelphia Style magazine they left in the room. It was really good. The we played $20 in the casino. We, of course, lost it all pretty quickly. We also walked around and looked everything over. Neither of us had finished our dinner from before. (It was really bad.) We thought about getting room service, but it didn’t seem worth it. I don’t mind paying for good food, but spending tons of money of bad food is just ridiculous. So we drove over to McDonalds. My stomach was a little funny so I just got a McFlurry.

We wanted to watch Hairspray, but for some reason the movie wouldn’t come in so we watched something else. A short while later I was feeling really sick so Kasey went down to the gift shop and got me some medicine. That was so sweet of her. By time she got back it was 4:00 am and we went back to sleep.

The next morning we got up at 9:00 am and went out to the shops. We needed to get underware and clothing for that day. I got a cute top at PacSun, panties at Jockey and bras from Lane Bryant. Kasey got a complete outfit at PacSun and boxers from Jockey. We went back to the room showered and got out of there.

We put our stuff in the car and went to have something to eat. This time we went to the buffet at Caesers and it was really good. Then we went back to the mall because I wanted to get some make-up from The Body Shop with my gift card. I got one of their new holiday palettes.

The pier has a little sort of outdoor patio that is right on the ocean. Kasey and I went out there to take some pictures and look at the ocean. It was gorgeous! Then we noticed there was a bit of a commotion and some people were pointing out into the water. We strained to see what they were looking and we started to see all this things hopping in and out of the water. It was dolphins! Dolphins! I have never seen wild dolphins ever. It was amazing. There were at least 20 of them traveling along. We did our best to get a picture, but it was really hard to catch. It was just one of those unbelievable moments.

After that we knew we were going to have to get on the road soon. We stopped at Lush again because we tried one of the samples they gave us, Honey I Washed the Kids and we both loved it so I wanted a bar. We also got the Lush Times and got her to give us more samples. Hooray!

We got the car and called Midas to see if they could check out our tire. We went there and they said it was a gash on the side and the tire would need to be replaced. Damn. So Kasey told them to go ahead and it would be about an hour or two. So we walked down the boardwalk and just enjoyed each others company. Once the car was done we were on our way.

The ride home went much better with no problems and we were home by 8pm.

That was such an amazing fun weekend. I just had such a good time and I loved it. So crazy. Sorry for the long post. I wanted to get everything in so I don’t forget.

Title - “Sunrise” by Nina Simone

I had a really great time in Atlantic City. Almost too good a time. I wrote a full post about it, but I wanted to add pictures so I am waiting for those to get uploaded. In a brief moment of insanity I sold my digital camera on eBay and then I spent the money (after my credit card bills) I was going to use to get a new one on two shirts. Not the brightest. Oh well. I pretty much don’t buy clothing anymore especially since I have been banned from the #1 place I go to buy my tops. (Gap if you remember is where The Ex Mrs. works and they only carry my size in Gap Outlets and that is the only one around.) So it will be nice to have some more clothing to choose from and they are really cute. They are being custom made so I won’t have them until early November. I’ll put up the pictures and links then.

I turned in another paper in Women & Politics and I got a B, which was good. I got an A last time though so I am kind of obsessed with seeing what I did differently. We have another test next week and on the last test I got a 78% and that was actually one of the highest grades in the class. I want to do better next time though. I want to come out of this first semester of school with two really outstanding grades.

I am really enjoying political science. However, I don’t think this would make a good career for me. I mean…political science. That would be lawyers and politicians, right? I’ll have to look into what I would be able to do with that degree. I think instead of trying really hard to do one thing and feel destroyed if I don’t make it I will go the more general education route. Even though I am about 4 years older than my classmates I feel like I am still learning a lot about myself. It’s going to be the rest of my life so I want to make sure I can end up doing something that I love and that I can be successful at.

This weekend my cousin and I are going to a cemetary walk during the day. It’s not a scary one. This one is more historical with some stories added in. It should be fun and it is something my cousin has wanted to do for a while. We’ll also be doing a little more pumpkin carving. Hopefully it will go better than last time. Though I did seem rather proud of myself.

Oh and update on the hair falling out and the sickness.

Hair is still falling out. It actually seems to be getting worse. I’m trying not to stress about it because if stress is the cause that would be just make it worse.

Still oddly sick. Guys. I have never really been sick like this and I am the kind of girl who can’t talk about being sick like this. I really don’t know what to do and I am hoping it starts to pass. Still drinking Pepto. That is for sure.

I am wishing I could go to the doctor again. Man. Having partner benefits was amazing. This year is becoming a lot for me to handle. Thank goodness for these little trips away or I think I would have lost my mind by now.

Trying to focus on the positive…hoping things get better.

Title : “Paperweight” by Schuyler Fisk and Joshua Radin

Quick update!

Those other eBay auctions were all listed and I am choosing to give 10% of each sale to a charity. I chose Sweet Binks Rabbit Rescue and I have a little link over there on my side bar. I wanted to choose somewhere small where I knew the money would go to good use right away. I also think it’s the sort of place where any little bit would help. I also, as many of you may know, love rabbits so I am pretty thrilled to be able to do something good for rabbits before I own them. It also really changed my view on how I am going to acquire a rabbit. I have been researching breeders and such and now I see that I should adopt a rescue rabbit. So hopefully I’ll be able to go to Sweet Binks when the time is right. They are located in Rhode Island and I have never been there so that would be a fun trip.

I also had the worst sickness of my life last night and to tell you about it would be to speak the unspeakable. Let’s just leave it as it was horrific. I journeyed to my aunts house this morning to borrow stain remover for my assaulted clothing and Pepto Bismol. I used the entirety of each. The Pepto was gone by noon and I actually drank it from the bottle in two gulp swigs every half hour.

I joined Netflix because I wanted to watch movies online. Aparantly you can only watch a few hours of movies a month and my computer doesn’t have the proper software. Oh well. I have the $8.99 a month plan and my first movie is going to be Miss. Potter. I’m sort of excited about renting movies only I want to watch and seeing them on my own. It seems wonderfully indulgent.

I bought baked goods on Etsy in a moment of period induced weakness. I bought a mystery box too so I don’t even really know what I’m getting. Try explaining that impulse puchase to people. I have to be honest though. I am pretty excited for it to come in.

Okay…Oh I am also going to a gourmet food and wine fest in Atlantic City. I can not wait! More details on that later.

So I think that’s everything for right now. I hope you’re all enjoying your weekends.

My eBay items went really well. I’m adding more items this week though they will be much more random. The problems I was having with the COACH scarf resolved themselves. See, my problem was that I really loved that scarf, but I never wear it. I wanted it to go to someone who would love it as much as I did and get some use out of it. Then the person who was the highest bidder was someone who just bought and sold COACH items. I had a feeling they would buy my lovely scarf only to resell it. So I wanted someone, anyone to outbid them even if they didn’t pay me as much just so I would know it went to a good home. (I’m very sentimental about my COACH things. Anyway a very nice woman from Singapore was the winning bidder and she is a COACH enthusiast so I know it is going to a good home. I am more than satisfied with the outcome and I think I’ll be more careful about listing items with sentimental value to me.

This week I will be listing some Maui Jim sunglasses, Birkenstocks, Dollhouse stilettos, Pampered Chef items, a Longaberger basket, baby girl clothing, a MASH book and some mint condition stamps. Hopefully they will all be up sooner than later.

I have also been toying with the idea of listing some of my paintings, jewelry and various crafts on Etsy. I already created a seller’s account, but I’m just not sure how my art would be perceived. I’m very go with the flow with my art. I usually start with no idea of what is going to come out. I just create. There are some really good artists on Etsy and I worry mine would stick out. I’m not sure. I also tend to use quality materials which I think would increase my prices and make things more unattainable. I also don’t know the first thing about getting prints made of my artwork and I worry about selling them and never getting to see them again. It would be nice to have prints to sell and keep around. Lastly, I’m not great at photographing my artwork so it’s difficult to get colors correct. I’ll try to take some in natural light in the next few days.

Here are some samples of two paints I have made: (These photos were taken in my bedroom in artificial lighting.)

Wrap Me Up

A close up:

This is one called With Your Hand In Mine and it’s one I wouldn’t sell, but I thought you guys might want to see it. It’s a painting I made of Kasey and I.

I might also post some jewelry samples so you can see what I am talking about with that. I would be nice if I could start selling my art though. I enjoy making it so much. It would be nice to know others enjoy looking at it.

The new about me page is still in the works. I was hoping to get more questions out of delurking day, but apparently no one lurks. Oh well. I’m writing a paper today and working on making some money. As soon as those are out of the way I will continue work on that about me page.

Oh! I want these two bunnies SO badly! This one would be Penelope and this one would be Isobel. Aren’t they perfect? It kills me. I would do anything to be living in my own place right now so I could adopt and love these two. I wish they weren’t in a shelter. I hate that they don’t have a home and someone to love them. It would be nice to have some little critters keeping me company at night when I’m alone too. It might make it easier to sleep…maybe next year.

Alright. I better get back to work.

P.S. - I kind of want to be a sailor for Halloween. [Edit - Whoops! That link didn’t work. It’s all fixed now. I think it’s cute, but I don’t know if it would look good on me.]

Title: “This Is How It Goes” by Missy Higgens

So I woke up this morning feeling blue. I didn’t want to get out of bed. Before I even got into the shower I was plotting not going to class today. Then I went downstairs and Good Morning America was on. They had Nicolette Sheridan on and then some thing about how we can all eat guacamole and drink beer. So I was watching this mindlessly while getting dressed. Then they had on this fellow named Matt Harding who dances around the world. At first I was surprised because I thought he might have copied Loralee’s idea and then it dawned on me that she made her own because of Matt and I was just woefully late to the party.

In any case this was just what I needed! Seriously you guys. I love these videos. For some reason I got teary when he was dancing in that one village with the children, but that may be more because I’m hormonally imbalanced.

Then there is Loralee’s amazing version of her dancing all over Cache Valley.

Now I am basically obsessed with wanting to make one of me dancing all over the Poconos. I so need a video camera. You have no idea how badly I want one. I would be putting up YouTubes all the freaking time.

Need more dancing? Here is the original by Matt.

I freaking love it.

Title: “The Brilliant Dance” by Dashboard Confessional

I really did mean to update this past weekend. Whoops! Perhaps I spent too much of that time venting on a Myspace blog. I’m glad I did it there and not here. You guys, blogging? At 2 in the morning? It should not be allowed.

This week is my first week without Biology and I sort of miss it. I am feeling much much better emotionally this week. Hopefully that lasts.

I really didn’t think making a new about me page would be so time consuming and I really hope the interview idea isn’t too cheesy. (Btw, If you didn’t submit a question yet or you did and thought of another one you can submit those here.) My goal is to have that finished and up by Friday.

The other project was putting my stuff on eBay. That I did! I am still trying to find more stuff to list or more things I am willing to part with. You can check out those listings here. I don’t know if what I am thinking about my Coach scarf listing is illegal or not so I won’t go into detail here. I am however feeling wary about having it listed. So if you have any interest at all in owning a lovely Valentine’s Day themed 100% silk Coach scarf (worth $80) PLEASE contact me. I will tell you my thoughts and it very well might go to you. I would love to detail this, but I’m not sure I can. If it just sells I will tell you how I felt after it’s gone. I’m not feeling too good about that right now. Everything else seems to be going fine. There are bids on everything except my green evening gown and that at least has a watcher so I am feeling good about it.

I have been considering listing things like my iPod Shuffle (it is the old version), my pink Nintendo DS (I thought I would play it, but honestly I never do) and it’s two games, my pink Coach bag, my Gucci sunglasses and my Willow Creek doves. I don’t know though because some things like the doves are just so precious to me. I know they would sell for a lot of money because I have never seen them on eBay and they were discontinued like 4 years ago. I’m not sure what I want to do about those things. It would be nice to have money again, but I don’t want to sell everything and be left with nothing. Something to think about.

Oh and also if you were curious about the new eBay name The Ex Mrs. and I used to share an eBay account and afterwards I found that the password had been changed and all of that so this is me starting over*.

I didn’t end up going to the Apple Festival or the Fall Festival this past weekend. There was talk of going to the Balloon & Timber Festival later this month, but they want $200 per person to ride in a hot air balloon and it must be cheaper somewhere else.

This Saturday is the Cape May Wine Festival and it is going to be great. I am so looking forward to it.

I’m also going to be putting up some men’s clothing later on this week. I’ll let you know about that when it happens.

Okay…time to get back to work on that About Me page.

Don’t Forget! Today is…

So all you lurkers don’t be scared to spread the love today! Don’t know what to say? You can ask me a question on my last entry and make me not seem so nerdy.

Title - “The Consequence Of Sound” by Regina Spektor