Cell phone providers are modern day vampires...

Seriously, why do they have to be the only carrier of the iPhone right now? I hate them. I didn't really hate them before, but I do now.

Why you ask? Well, I'll tell you. As I went to pay my bill online, a surprisingly large number popped up in the payment section. Since I pay a ridiculous amount of money to them every month anyway ($150 for 2 phones/550 min.), I was caught off guard when I saw that I owed $345...wha Wha WHAT?!

Here's my problem. Ok, we went over our minutes. I get that. But charging us 45¢/min is absolutely ludicrous, especially considering that when we switched plans (not carriers, just PLANS), we lost 9000+ rollover minutes. Yeah, that's minutes that I paid for and never used, just gone down the drain. So, that's why I'm pretty upset when they charge an insane fee for going over a small fraction of that. AT&T, I'm not amused.

There are a couple of things that have made me happy lately. First, I sold my camera: YAY! Can't wait to buy a new one, but right now I really needed a new work wardrobe. So I took some of that money and put it towards clothes. The greatest thing about this is that it was Jeremy's idea for me to go shopping for myself. How great is that? Absolutely LOVE that man. My friend, Kari, and I went out shopping on Wednesday. She was shopping for cute dress to wear to a wedding, so I tagged along. Thank goodness we didn't make it to the mall because I spent about $300 at Kohl's, Target, and the Dress Barn. Came out with some really great pieces though. Got 2 pairs of shoes, 5 pairs of pants, 8 shirts, necklace, and earrings. Not bad, I think. Simply cannot wait to do it again!

Jeremy's planning on selling some of his extra music equipment to give us some extra money to put towards some small renovations on the house and just to have a little cushion in the bank. If everything sells, it'll give us around $6,000 (part of which goes to a new camera?). So keep your fingers crossed for us!

Yet another thing that made me happy is a call I got from my new employer. They wanted to know what day I wanted to start. Turns out they want me to start on a Monday instead of the previous Thursday. This will give me a 5 day weekend in between switching jobs. LOVE IT!

We've also got some friends who might be coming into town. They're in Virginia right now and we're trying to make plans to meet up somewhere. More than likely they'll just spend the weekend with us. It'll be great because they're so flippin' funny! Our plans were foiled by the snow last time they were around, so hopefully everything will go smoothly this time. So excited!

Ugh...it has happened again. I get on here to write about one thing and I just start rambling on and on about an entirely different subject. Oh well. Maybe next time I can stay on topic ;)

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Just another boring Monday...

Another busy weekend that flew by WAY too fast. Spent most of Saturday driving around. Went to Jeremy's old church to get some barbeque and tomato plants they were selling (but I got them for free...let's not kid ourselves.) Then I went to get more compost for my garden from Jennifer and John's house (also delivered some barbeque.) From there, it was on to the Plum Tree Market Place to get more plants. The Barnes sell plants there and it's really interesting if you've never been. I highly recommend it. Got lots of plants for my grandmother, and a headband and grape hull conserve for myself. Finally....headed back to the house.

Forgot to take a photo of it, but I spread some of the plants around in my little flower bed. They're getting big, people! I might be a gardener after all! I'll set my self a remind to snap a pic when I get home.

After working in the yard and getting burnt (doesn't take much for me), I was on the road again, this time to deliver the plants to my grandmother. Tomatoes, cantaloupe, marigolds, and spaghetti squash <----can't wait til my own start producing :) Anyway, after helping her with some stuff around the house, I forced her to order my fav, Greg's Pizza. Seriously, I pity all of you who haven't tried ANY of the food from there. SOOOOOooooooo gooooooooddddd. While I was there, she wanted me to take a picture of the flowers in bloom. This one is her favorite. All I had was my phone, but it's not too bad.

I'm going to steal a vine of it to put at my house, she just doesn't know it yet. Well, after getting treated for my sunburn with aloe and my mammy's secret "talking the fire out," I was back in the car. This time the destination was hell Walmart. I was inspired by the headband I bought at the market to finally open up my sewing machine a year after I bought it. I have all these beautiful fabrics that I purchased that have been sitting on the shelf. So, I went to Walmart and bought elastic since I was determined to make one that night.

It's so hard to believe that I used to be able to make purses a couple of years ago, because I can't make anything now. Seriously, I had to watch the dvd that came with my sewing machine to figure out how to thread it. It was pitiful. My hard work was not in vain, however! Here's what I've made so far. Not too shabby, I think. In fact, I'm wearing the green one right now :)

Maybe the skills are coming back. I'm going to make an attempt for a camera strap tonight. Of course this will have to be right after I finish my crocheted elephant (I'm so close!) Maybe I'll have a photo to post of it tomorrow. You never know.

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Oh the joy of a clean house...

That rare, elusive creature was just within my grasp this past weekend, so I reached out, grabbed it, and held on for dear life. I know that in the next few days it will slip through my fingers though. It's such a simple pleasure to be able to open up the windows, breath in the aroma of clean laundry, and just be able to relax. (Bear in mind that I'm completely ignoring the part of my house that has been closed off since the beginning of winter. I'll get to it another time.) There's also nothing like starting the day with someone making you eggs, bacon, and grits <----can we say "yummmmm?"

I'm quite certain that my Sunday afternoon was much more enjoyable than Jeremy's. He spent several hours underneath our cars changing the oil and trying to fix some of the issues with mine. So, to reward his valiant efforts to make me happy, I made dinner along with a chocolate fudge cake (ignore the fact that I ate two pieces before he even saw it.) I'm becoming so domestic...lol, yeah right!

I almost forgot to mention Saturday. Not sure how much I actually helped, but I ATTEMPTED to help paint Kari and Jackie's new home. I think I actually made more work for them to do, but hey, it's the thought that counts. I even left them some abstract art in the form of a paint spill on the floor. You're welcome :)

As far as today goes, yuck. I'm all for rain as long as I can stay in bed and drift into sleep listening to it as it falls on my tin roof. Having to drive and walk around in it? No thank you. Now, before I starve to death, it's time to go have lunch (which just happens to include a certain chocolate fudge cake!)

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It is so Monday...

I think that if I was somehow closed off from the rest of society and had no means by which to tell time or dates, I would still physiologically be able to recognize when it was Monday. Is there anyone who actually likes Mondays? If so, you're weird. Sorry, it has to be said. Go seek some counseling. Monday's are horrific. I've been staring at the clock for the past three hours, but it seems like it's been 12. Today probably wouldn't have been nearly as bad if I had something to do. Things are so bad that I actually thought proofreading would help pass the time. Now I don't even have that to do. Now that you understand my dilemma, don't judge me for blogging at work. Haha!

So, last night I was making every attempt possible to become a criminal. Well, sort of. I was "technically" making back up copies of movies that I own, just to figure out the process. I was almost successful too! To pull a line from the first Pirates movie, I could quite possibly be the worst pirate someone's ever seen. For some reason it skipped over the last chapter of the movie that I was copying and it went straight to the credits. But being the technical nerd that I am (or at least some people think me to be), I have no doubt that I will perfect the process in the next couple of days, hopefully without having to purchase any additional software.

Speaking of purchases that I really don't really want to make, I finally broke down and bought a new flash for my camera. In case I forgot to post about it previously, the built-in flash got destroyed when I knocked my tripod over with my camera mounted on top of it. I almost cried....seriously. I've been making due without a flash for a while now, but I have a couple of things coming up in the future that make this purchase necessary. So, here it is:

Nothing fancy...well, except for the price. This little thing cost $469. Eventually it will pay for itself, but right now that price hurts a little bit; mostly because I start thinking about how many new items of clothing I could buy with that $469. Jeremy was really funny when I was asking about whether or not I should spend that much on a new flash. He just replied with, "I have no idea what you're talking about, so just buy it if you need it. Just don't ask me because the moment you start talking about megabytes or pixels, I zone out."

Now I'm going to shoot off in a completely different direction. I have a little brother named Derek.

Cutie, right? One thing I like to do with Derek is take him to different places that he might not otherwise get to go to. For instance, I took him to see the exhibit of the Dead Sea Scrolls when it came to Raleigh. We don't always get the chance to take a "bigger" trip like that though. But he loves to just be out somewhere with me, so I decided to take him to Greenville to do some shopping. We ended up just going to the mall because the weather was terrible. Unfortunately for him, the game room has closed down. That's the only thing he was really interested in doing. He's a sweetheart though and was content with just walking around with me while I did some shopping. While I was trying on clothes, he "pointed out" that I might not be as fit as I once was. I was wearing a tank top, which I thought looked pretty good, but apparently this is what he saw:

So, for those of you wondering what I'll be doing later, you can find me on the bowflex or the treadmill.

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