Guilty Pleasures

Here are some of mine:

Reality TV--It's not really reality at all. But I've watched nearly every reality show on TV at some point--Big Brother, America's Next Top Model, and some of the crazy ones like Average Joe and For Love or Money are some of the ones I like. And I love Project Runway. Is that reality television? What about What Not to Wear? Love that. Someone nominate me. I'll take that 5 grand in a second.

Movies that make me cry--lifetime movies like Dawn Anna are a shoe-in

Romance novels--a woman's version of porn, with an actual plot and sweet sensual love making instead of just sex.

Harry Potter--I'm addicted. I have read the whole series multiple times, visit fansites daily, and will most definitely be buying the final installment at midnight in July.

Web Surveys--They are just fun. And trying to come up with witty answers is awesome

Bad-for-you-food--Chocolate, french fries, pizza, and a huge love of bread. Plus sweet high-calorie alcoholic beverages.

Yawns.

Seriously, why is yawning contagious? The Mythbusters proved that it is. And so does, you know, everyday life. I just made someone yawn just by yawning on the phone. And why do my eyes water when I yawn? Is that normal? I had a boyfriend once that said that wasn't normal. I read somewhere that yawning is actually a sign of not getting enought oxygen. So what does that have to do with being tired? I really don't think I am so tired that I'm forgetting to breathe enough.

Our trial baby

My husband and I don’t have kids yet. But we are having something of a trial run. That came in the form of our beagle, Gracie. About a year and half ago, I was pretty down. I had lost a job, my parents were living with my husband and I in our two bedroom apartment style condo, and I was trying to decide whether I should keep going to college or drop out and find a full time job. I needed something good to happen in a bad way. So I got it in my head that I wanted a dog. My older sister had been living with us too, with her dog Misty. I had a lot of fun walking Misty and taking her to the fenced dog park down the street, hanging out with the neighborhood dogs. I liked the companionship and affection you get from a dog. And I’d never had a dog of my own. We had them growing up, but they were primarily one of my sister’s or my parents. I had cats, but cats are affectionate on their terms. Dogs love unconditionally. So when my husband got home from work, I started in on him. At first, he resisted, but it didn’t take too much before he relented. So we got out the paper and looked at the ads. We vetoed a few larger breeds—we both agreed we wanted a small dog. Eventually I pointed to an ad for beagle puppies for sale for $90. Adam asked what a beagle looked like, so I pulled up a picture of a beagle pup on the computer. That was all it took. Moments later I was on the phone to the owner, who told me that there were several girl pups and one boy left. Their home was about an hour from my house. But I couldn’t wait until the weekend, so Adam and I had a hasty dinner and got into the car to choose a new member of our family.

It was already getting dark when we got to the little house in a rural area. We knocked on the door and introduced ourselves to the middle aged couple, who led us to the back yard to see the pups. Adam and I knelt on the patio and let the puppies play and explore. There was one that would come up to us, play for a minute, wander away and find her way back again minutes later. She was a tiny thing, tri-colored with brown trimmed black ears and a cold black nose taking up most of the space on her small head. She was playful, but cuddled close too. We looked at each other, knowing that she had chosen us. We paid the couple and got back in the car. The little pup didn’t like the ride at first and she whined a little in my lap. Eventually I zipped her up into my jacket and she settled down to sleep.

Since then, Gracie has become our baby. From midnight potty runs (we don’t have a yard, so my husband has to walk her in the middle of the night) to ruined carpet from frequent puppy accidents, we have learned the responsibilities that we’ll need as parents. We even upgraded to a king sized bed to accommodate her—she’s still small, but she can stretch out pretty far!

Gracie is a total joy. She is sweet and funny and fiercely determined. She can run with the big dogs and hold her own, though she is skittish at first. She’s very smart, learning commands and words much like a toddler does. She has learned to sit and to speak (which for her means that trademark half bark/half howl). She knows some of her toys, including a stuffed hamburger, by name and can fetch them from anywhere in the house on command. She has learned that there are ways to get what she wants too. She learned to jump onto our hips to get to a toy we were holding out of reach. She’s also and award winning mootch—she loves people food. Her best friends include my sister’s dogs Misty and Honey, our neighbor Pat’s toy poodle, Boo, and our cats, especially our all black cat Dobby. Dobby and Gracie wrestle and play fight, leading us to coin the phrase, “Gracie’s munching on the kitty”.

I’ve been told that once you have a baby, you dog goes back to being just a dog. I don’t believe that. Gracie will always be my first baby.

Ok, it's not that I want to work but....

I like to take it easy as much as the next person. But my forms of “taking it easy” include reading, watching television, and web surfing. I rarely just sit. Even if I’m waiting for someone, I usually have a book to read. I don’t like to be bored. At all.

You might not think this is such a big issue, as most of the time I can plan ahead and avoid a painful death by boredom. But you are wrong. You see, I have a job that one week a month is insanely busy. And the rest of the month is smattered with moments of work among hours of nothing to do. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t want to be busy all the time, just rather steady. It makes the time go faster.

Let me back up and explain a little of what I do for a living. I work for a large company that builds utility trucks. That is, they build the huge trucks with buckets and diggers on them, used by utility and tree trimming companies and the like. Of course, I’m not involved in the building of the trucks (anyone who knows me will agree that wouldn’t be good). I invoice the customer for the truck. I also do various administrative tasks. We have just come off an extremely busy post-9/11 period. We’re still steadily building, but things have slowed down a bit. That, coupled with the fact that I am apparently pretty quick about getting my work done (I don’t rush, I just don’t dawdle either) makes for a lot of down time.

This wouldn’t be such a problem. My boss is extremely cool and has said in no uncertain terms that if I have nothing to do and I’ve checked with the others in my department, I am welcome to use the internet—read news sites or whatever so I’m not just staring off into space.

So that solves it right? Wrong.

No. Our company has a pretty strict internet policy. Many sites are blocked. We are prompted for our username and password fairly often. And they have just cracked down, big-time. It started with an email reminding us of the policy. I blew it off. After all, I had my supervisor’s permission and I wasn’t looking at anything inappropriate. However, another email soon followed, forcing us to take a mind-numbing quiz regarding the internet policy. A coworker who has done a lot with computer and tech support in the past warned us all that this was serious, that we were definitely being watched. So bye-bye recreational internet usage.

And hello hours of boredom at work. Sure I listen to music (If they try to take that away I’m outta here). I try to stretch my work. I email a friend throughout the day (not allowed, but I’m not giving that up either). I even sneak in some work for my part time jewelry selling business (check it out www.liasophia.com/melissalong ). But most of my time is spent trying desperately not to fall asleep. For example, today I got to the office at about 7:30 am. By 8:30 am all of my invoicing for the day was finished and I was BORED. All of the other people in my department at in a training class this week. So there is no one to ask for work.

So here I sit…wasting 10 minutes typing up a blog that I’ll have to email to myself and post from home.

But sitting here is paying the bills…right?

Creativity run amok!

Ok really I'm starting this because I read my twin sister's and it was frankly, awesome. I don't know if I'm as witty or can come up with really anything that someone might want to read, but we'll see. Or I will, anyways and anyone who may stumble upon it.

For today, here are some awesome sites to visit when you are bored:

cuteoverload.com
Awesomely cutalicious pictures of animals of all kinds. And adorable captions to go with them.

projectrungay.blogspot.com
Hilarious recaps and pic on everything Project Runway, one of my guilty pleasures

televisionwithoutpity.com
Recaps with sarcasm!

tomatonation.com
Awesomely entertaining blogs of randomness

Yeah I have a lot of time on my hands...or I did, before my work cracked down on their internet policy. :-P