Some people

I drive a lot. I see all kinds of things while I'm driving, I felt the need to write letters about some notable nuisances.

Dear People of Minnesota,
What is different in the way you learn how to drive versus the rest of the country. Why is it that during a drive through Iowa I often come upon people with license plates from the land of the lakes that just don't seem to be able to drive with um consideration for the rest of the people on the road. On my most recent trip through Iowa I came upon two separate cars from your state that clearly have no idea what cruise control is. Both cars were newer and I assume they both have cruise control, yet both failed to maintain a consistent speed for 5 minutes at a time. One felt the need to remain in the left lane, without any cars in front or next to them, and never going an exceedingly fast speed. Personally I try to avoid passing on the right as I feel it is rude. Well have several miles not at a consistent speed and slower than I wanted to go I was forced to go to the right lane, for my sanity. People of Minnesota, I have friends from your state, I even spent a summer living on one of the 10,000 lakes, but when I see I car with plates that say Minnesota...I become quite sad. Please learn some consideration and everyone take lessons on cruise control.

Signed,
The very frustrated Elantra driver.

Dear Creepy Suzuki driver,
I do not appreciate when large, hairy, creepy looking men blow kisses at me and make gestures through their cars. What possessed you to do such a thing? Were you trying to flirt? Really, it is not going to get girls if you act in such ways. In fact, girls will try to stay away from you. No, I did not feel at all flattered, I was disgusted. I felt trapped and tried my best to fall way behind you. I was beyond relieved when I finally saw you take the exit off the interstate.

Signed
Disgusted in Omaha

Stupid People

Do you know what happens when someone requests the utilities in a certain location get switched to their name? The current resident of that location has their account closed, the security deposit returned, ect. ect... Just like that, a flip of the switch. This weekend I got a notice that my account was closed with the Omaha Public Power District. I called a little confused. The guy was pretty much like yep you don't live there anymore. Well sir, all my things are here and I still pay rent so I'm afraid I still live here. Apparently some Alicia something or other (I got her bill in the mail along with my notice) thinks she lives in my apartment. I haven't noticed any strange girls around so I don't think she's actually living here.

I guess maybe I didn't need to call, then I wouldn't have gotten a bill until Alicia decided she wanted electricity at her actual home. Oh well.

And then there were 3

As of Saturday morning at 4:02 AM there are now 3 babies in my family. Brady Robert was born 6 minutes after Ashley Hope. My dad tried to tell me the babies were born 6 seconds apart when he called and told me about the births. Honestly I'm not sure if I managed to convince him that 4:02 is 6 minutes after 3:56, we'll just blame it on the lack of sleep he had the night before and his long week.

It's a little crazy to think all the babies are born. This summer is flying by. So many things have already happened and others are about to happen. I have seen my family more this summer than well I honestly can't remember the last time I saw this much of my entire family maybe freshman year of high school..maybe. I will be making another trek to see them all before the summer is over making that the 4th trip for family since the end of May.

Have I mentioned I hate driving? Hate's a strong word and oh, I mean it. I like to always be doing something and in the car there's really not much to do. Especially along I80, there is nothing exciting to see. I have been brushing up on my Spanish, but really there's only so much of that this girl can handle. Why isn't there a better way for me to get across the state of Iowa? Flying is too much of a hassle for the places I'm going. Teleportation needs to actually work.

I think I successfully rambled enough for today.

Runners are good people :)

This weekend I was running along a stretch of a fairly busy road just minding my own business. Then I see a man in the middle of the road picking up tree branches. I was quite confused. Especially when I saw he was alone and didn't have a car, cart...anything. He was just picking up branches from the middle of the road and moving them to the median. By the time I got to where he was here were only a couple twigs left in the road. The man saw me staring at m grumbled about inconsiderate people that litter and ran off in the opposite direction from me. Oh it was a strange site apparently during this man's morning jog he saw branches in the road and didn't want there to be an accident so he took it upon himself to clean up the mess. Makes me proud to be a runner.

Follow the rules much?

I understand rules are made to be broken and there are very few people if any that follow every rule. That said oftentimes rules are made to make situations better. Case in point Flying J truck stops are, in my experience, almost always busy and to cut down on the congestion of cars facing every which way to get gas they have the direction you are suppose to be facing posted by every fuel island(or whatever they are called) as well as signs that let you know that the hoses will reach around cars, so please use the first available pump. Simple, right? Well the lovely patrons of the Flying J in Davenport, IA just do not understand this. Cars at this truck stop seem to enjoy causing traffic jams and holding up others that are trying to spend the rest of their life savings on a tank of gas. Really, I swear the hoses really will reach around cars, it's not tough. Sorry I just got back from a weekend of driving far more than anyone should in 72 hours.

Also,
To whom it concerns at Flying J of Davenport, IA:
If all of the pay at the pumps are broken please put signs up.
Signed,
A less than satisfied customer.

It's all in a name

The last year or so it seems as though everywhere I turn someone is talking babies. Friends and family. Maybe I really am growing up. My sister-in-law gave birth to the first great-grandkid on both sides of my family last night. Sadly there are no great-grandparents to enjoy such their first great-grandson. Even so my brother and sister-in-law honored my granddad by naming their son Jack after him.

When I was told the baby's name I was surprised I hadn't guessed that would be the name. While my brother, sister and I were never close to my grandparents (due in part to never living less than a two days drive from them), my brother always had some sort of connection with my granddad. My brother even looks eerily like my granddad did.

I love it when babies' are named after people. It is like a legacy for those they were named after. I was named after 3 glorious ladies named Alice, each one lived/lives a notable life and I hope I can live up to the name. I had wanted to name a son after my granddad although I'm happy my brother beat me to it. It shows how great a person he was that two of us had the same thought.

With the parents Jack has, I am confident he will grow up to be someone people want to name their babies after.

Half Marathon

I ran my second Lincoln National Guard Half Marathon today. Sometimes things aren't quite as fun the second time around for me because I miss the excitement of the unknown of new things. Today was, however, a good time. I wasn't sure how I'd run this year because I've been sore and I haven't been training as fast. I ran a better race this time around, however. I think I was more even..I am bad at remembering splits and I don't have a garmin and hearing times that are off my by like 20 seconds just confuses me. I was dead tired at the end again and decided I really am in no shape to do a marathon 26 miles is so intimidating.

Anyway fun things I saw/heard today

• I watched an 11 year old run his second marathon...if he kept up his pace for the second half he did pretty well.
• I saw a girl be proposed to at the finish line of the half.
• I saw 2 men run barefoot marathons
• I ran with a man I know who forgot his shoes at home and ran in socks!
• I heard a man talking about ultra races he has run. He almost ran in a 24 hour race last weekend but no one would drive him to the race. Yet he was worried what the surface would do to his legs. Seriously you put tons of miles on your legs I think you can handle 26 miles on a road.
  
• I heard many people yell "go girl(s)" at me and other girls near me. Made me laugh, I was always around men when this happened. I guess people don't care about the guys.
• I saw the man that wears a tux to hand out water.
• I saw unfortunate cars that were stuck at intersections for a very long time.
• I saw some creative messages written on the ground.
• I saw people do push ups after finishing running.

A guy stopped me after I got my finishers medal to take a picture, I'm sure I look great drinking red gatorade completely exhausted. At least that's better than a picture during the race... Why must people insist on taking pictures of runners?

Cheap

Most people that know me know I am not a fan of spending money. In many cases I'll go without instead of paying a couple dollars. I am the one that will shop around for the best price and I'm not a fan of full price. I blame it on growing up in my family. (Except I don't think my brother and sister ended up quite like me..eh I grew up much later than them) So you'd think I'd always shop at the cheapest place for what I need.

That my friends is definitely not the truth. I avoid Wal-Mart if possible. I recently read The Wal-Mart Effect and I have a renewed determination to avoid the original big box store. Wal-Mart is undoubtedly the cheapest place to buy everyday items as the store forces its suppliers to sell products to them cheapest in exchange for pushing the products in thousands of stores. Sure that sounds all great. Because of the size Wal-Mart has gotten the retailer has been able to bring prices down in many stores, it has even caused businesses to streamline their processes. The book begins with a stores about how Wal-Mart forced deodorant manufactures to get rid of useless packaging; lowering prices, creating more space on the shelves, and helping the environment.

I'm sure you've also heard all the nasty things people say about Wal-Mart as well. "Wal-Mart moves jobs overseas" "Wal-Mart forces mom and pop stores out of business" "Wal-Mart forces people to work in horrible conditions". It's for these reasons and more that I avoid the big box I come to every mile or two. Back when Sam Walton started the store it was no frills, good quality, good price. COmpletely something I stand for. Now the store forces manufactures to lower the prices on goods every couple years. Everyone must realize this simply isnt possible without something hurting. This causes manufactures to go bankrupt, move manufacturing out of the country, or lower the quality of product or a combination. When Sam Walton was around he encouraged employees to go to competitors and see what they were doing better than Wal-Mart. Now Wal-Mart will not give information about itself to anyone. How is any company expected to compete if Wal-Mart doesn't even share information. Fed Ex was given an award by Wal-Mart, the only thing they were allowed to say in response was a small blurb about how proud they were ect ect. I understand not sharing company secrets but the company just goes too far. In my opinion.

End rant, time for me to go on being cheap.

Creepy!

Nope I'm not talking about creepy little bugs (although I did see some rather spine tingling creatures at the zoo this weekend) I'm talking about creepy older men. For the most part I encounter decent people in my every day life. A couple old men I met last summer at my apartment complex do not fit in this category. One has two teenage sons, is divorced, was in the Navy, and from what I can gather just sits around all day trying to pick up younger women. He's so pathetic I almost feel sorry for him. (I'm just not that nice) Every time I run into him I get invited out to dinner or drinks or something. Sadly, I never take him up on such offers.

Another guy I don't encounter quite as often just stopped me as I was walking back to my apartment from lifting weights. This guy lives in an apartment on my way to the gym and always has his blinds open. He was saying how he never sees me blah blah. "and it's sad because I enjoy watching you walk past my apartment" Gah creepy old man. What possesses people to open their mouths?

Makes me want to walk the long way to the gym.

Cutting Edge?

I'm pretty sure I never thought traffic lights (or stop lights, or if your from middle of nowhere Wisconsin stop and gos) could be cutting edge. They are plain and simple lights with red, yellow, and green to let you know when you can go through an intersection. There are some variations of course, each town likes to come up with the best version of this simple traffic device.

A certain town I have been visiting on a pretty regular basis over the past year seems to want to be on the cutting edge of traffic lights. The first variation I had the pleasure to experience I would not recommend for any town that does not have an unusually high population of blind people. I know several towns have the lights that beep when changing...this town's was the first to keep me up at night. This experience with the lights actually was one reason I had a bad opinion of the town for several years (this girl likes her sleep)

This past weekend I was back (as I often am now adays as I have found a reason to overcome my dislike for the town) They have begun to upgrade another set of lights. This upgrade I am actually a fan of. The lights have a display positioned below the walk/don't walk sign. The display counts down for 10 seconds before the light turns yellow. I am such a fan in all regards and more towns need to adopt such lights.

I guess I am silly and such a thing should not excite me, but eh I'm random and weird and proud of it :p

Rude

Omaha received the biggest snow storm of the season the past couple of days. Really that's not saying much seeing as this is probably the 3rd or 4th time for it to snow all winter. Me being the silly girl that people tell me is crazy went running in the wonderful snow. It was perfect snow running weather. It hadn't been too cold so the sidewalks and roads weren't getting a lot of accumulation and there was no ice so really it was just all pretty and a change of scenery. I had a great run for 6 miles. Then as I'm just about home I encounter a rude teenager who needs to have his drivers license taken away. I know driving in the snow is a bit different and sometimes it is hard to control your car. But this kid was clearly aiming to do what he did. He drove right next to the curb. You know that space where the snow plow deposits the snow so there's a nice little pile? He only did this right when we passed me clearly in an attempt to get me all snowy, wet, and cold. Luckily I was an alert runner right about then and got to the opposite side of the sidewalk and stayed dry. Seriously who does that? I thought the rudest thing people did to runners in the snow was neglect shoveling. No this deliberate action clearly awful. /end rant/

Bananas!

When we went to help my parents move into their retirement house. A certain someone remarked that if he didn't know better he'd think we were moving a family of 12. Either my dad thinks my mom and him are a family of 12, there are 10 people I don't know about living in their new house, or my dad has no concept of portion control.

In a recent conversation with my mom she told me about a trip my dad made to a grocery store (my dad is the buyer of the groceries after all because that makes sense since he never cooks) My mom said my ever bargain hunting dad came back very proud because he got a good deal on bananas. 12 pounds of bananas to be exact. My mom was taken aback by the purchase. Her response to my dad was, "you know we are going to be gone all next week?" didn't seem to faze the proud owner of 12 pounds of bananas. As I was talking to my mom she was making banana cake. Hopefully that put a small dent in their supply.

Blog worthy

So I recently took a trip to middle of nowhere Kansas. I don't think I had visited that state for quite some time. And it was an experience. I love small towns, not to live in but to visit. They have such charm. The particular town we visited had some sort of odd fascination with old houses and pointless museums, seriously Greyhound Hall of Fame? Really reminded me of a place my family would have gone on vacation. Maybe we did at some point.

Anyway...On to the most blogworthy part of the trip. Our hotel had a hot tub which we decided to test out. Good plan, right? So we turn the knob for a half hour and suddenly can't hear ourselves think. This thing sounded at times like a car trying to start other times like some sort of ogre or something. In order to quite the poor hot tub we clogged up the hole above one of the jets with a towel. I have never before been in a hot tub that sounded as though it was in some serious amounts of pain.

Politics

Ben asked me to take one of the silly "where do you stand politically?" tests after Bush and the state of the union tonight. Here's my results

You are a Social Liberal (65% permissive) and an... Economic Moderate (43% permissive) You are best described as a: Centrist Link: The Politics Test on Ok Cupid Also: The OkCupid Dating Persona Test

100 Things About little ole me

1. I've never lived anywhere more than 5 years
2. I've lived in 6 states
3. 11 towns
4. I went to 7 schools k-12
5. I was asked today if I was in high school or college
6. I've been out of college for 2 years
7. While I am young for my grade I was not the youngest girl on my floor freshman year of college by 3 months
8. My birthday is September 10th
9. Sometimes that is grandparents day
10. I only met 2 of my grandparents
11. The 2 I'm told I would have liked I never met
12. I say I am a youngest child and an only
13. My brother and sister are 11 and 13 years older than me
14. I only drink carbonation when drinking alcohol
15. The last time I had a pop (or soda or whatever you call it) while sober was my senior year of high school
16. I rarely wear nail polish
17. I once had a pedicure, if I were less cheap I'd probably have more
18. I am not a fan of spending money
19. I rarely wear makeup, more now than ever before, though
20. There are only 3 states I've never been to (Alaska, Hawaii, and Florida)
21. The only country I've been to besides America is Canada
22. I almost went to Japan one summer in high school
23. I've been running competitively since I was 14
24. I was afraid of running cross country until my senior year of high school
25. In college it was my favorite sport
26. I didn't own a car until I was 21
27. I didn't really want one before that
28. I am hopelessly addicted to peanut butter
29. I still keep in touch with my best friend from elementary school, I moved away from that town when I was 10
30. I love camp
31. I have either been a camper, volunteered at camp, or worked in every position possible for 11 summers
32. Last summer was my first summer in recent memory not to be involved with camp, I was not a fan of last summer
33. I used to hate beer, now I have beer I actually like
34. I drank strange combinations in college
35. I find excuses to not clean
36. I like to cook, not for my lonesome though
37. I took piano lessons before I owned a piano
38. I took violin lessons in 4th and 5th grades, I wanted to play longer but the next time I had an opportunity wasn't until 9th grade
39. I learned to cross country ski my senior year of high school and good a varsity letter for it
40. I love that I have running partners
41. Sometimes I have to force myself to run, I'm always glad I did
42. My brother and sister both ran in high school
43. I'm the only one that kept it up all 4 years and continued in college
44. I wasn't planning on running past high school
45. Strawberries used to be my favorite fruit
46. I still love strawberries, but bananas are my favorite now (especially with peanut butter :))
47. I lived off pasta in college
48. I love going to local places even if it costs a little more
49. I once ate a 2 lb burger
50. All in one sitting
51. I've been told I'm skinny and accused of being anorexic throughout my life...I'm not
52. I love finding bargains
53. I can't imagine life without google
54. My parents and I went on a 2 week long marathon college visit tour visiting 13 campuses between Nebraska and Maine
55. I didn't want to visit Ripon, but ended up loving the school
56. Legos are cool
57. I like strategy games
58. I don't like it when people younger than me get married or have kids, they are just kids
59. The last time my family all lived together was in 1988
60. In 2004 we were all within an hour and a half of each other, until I moved 7 hours away
61. I'm glad I've had a chance to live completely on my own, away from everyone I knew
62. My mom was more nervous about me moving out on my own after graduating from college than she was when I was a 17 year old going to college several states away
63. Sometimes my mom doesn't make sense to me
64. I love my family
65. I have gotten closer to my sister since moving away from her
66. Oh the power of cell phones
67. When I was little the only seafood I would eat was shrimp
68. While I still like shrimp I would always choose another type of seafood over shrimp
69. I love mushrooms, yay fungus!
70. I was born with my foot broken
71. My first tooth came in with a cavity
72. While alive I have never broken a bone
73. I cried when my dog died when I was 15
74. I brought of picture of my dying dog to show and tell in second grade, my sister told me that was morbid, it was how I coped
75. I fall often
76. My brother, sister and I were all born in state capitals
77. I was born in Springfield, IL
78. I don't watch very much tv
79. I do watch Gilmore Girls most of the time, however
80. It doesn't bother me if I miss an episode
81. I only own 2 dvds, most movies I don't care to see multiple times
82. I hate making decisions
83. Until I am comfortable in a situation I am pretty quiet and people tend to think I'm shy
84. Once I'm comfortable, however, it's a different story
85. I like to be silly
86. Once I put my mind to something I see it through to the end
87. I am stubborn
88. I had my ears pierced twice, both times I had to let them close up
89. I hate dancing
90. Unless I'm very hyper
91. I'm allergic to milk, I love dairy products anyway
92. I used to be a pack rat
93. I quickly realized that's silly for a person moves so often
94. I love candy
95. If I don't run for a long period of time, I suggest avoiding me
96. I love going back to places I've lived and seeing how they have changed
97. I want to retire in Wyoming
98. That might change between now and retirement
99. I'm pretty random
100. I have a bell collection

Piano

I need some advice. When I was 10 I was given a piano. The deal was I would get it when I grew up and had a house of my own. My parents graciously moved it around with us tuning it a couple times even though I only played it for a couple years, but I loved that piano, it was mine, the biggest bestest, most unexpected present ever. An older lady was moving into a nursing home and had no family of her own so she gave it to me because she wanted it to go to someone that would appreciate it. Well now some people think I'm an adult and my parents are once again moving, this time to their retirement house. They apparently don't think it will fit in their house or something silly like that. My brother sister-in-law told me I can keep it at their house, "for a little while." But I think with that plan I would need to pay to move it over there. Pianos are expensive things. Well I have no clue when I'll have a house of my own, so I can't promise that I'll only need it at my brother's house for a short time. Should I just get rid of my piano? And if so should I be a nice kid and give it away because it was given to me by a kind lady or should I sell my piano?

Christmas Cards

This is the season people like to keep in touch will old friends or at least make a half-assed attempt at keeping in touch and seeming interested in old friends', acquaintances'', and families' lives. As a result of that I receive quite a few Christmas cards. Some are really sweet and are a card with a hand written note. Some just have a newsletter type letter that goes to everyone that person knows. Some of the newsletters have a line or two at the bottom personalizing the letter for the recipient. I think both of these types of letters are great even though most of the time 90% of the letter is about the good things going on in the writer's life and they just make you want to puke and feel like lesser of a person because you didn't win the peace prize or find a cure to cancer. But the third type of Christmas letter..this type is just not worth the time. This would be the cards that just sign your name. What is the point. Two lovely people in my family did this this year and I just don't get it. Is that worth the effort to get cards, find addresses, and the price of a stamp? I don't think so. Maybe these people think quantity in cards is more than quality of cards. But I don't think so. Maybe the cards with simply a name is ok if you see the person daily and just hand the card to them. But if you live across the country and rarely talk to the people..no card is almost better than a card with just a name. End rant.

Daylight Savings

I'm not a fan of daylight savings time. It already gets dark pretty early in the winter and the last Sunday in October you have to put your clock back an hour to make it get dark an hour earlier! It means I get very little daylight time after work. The added darkness makes me want to sleep, not run so much. But when I run with others...it can be entertaining.

Wednesday I was running with my friends, me met at 6 just like we have been since last October..so clearly it had to have been dark for a few months while we were running last year but we didn't remember it being quite so dark. One of the girls is apparently very afraid of the dark, dogs, and fish. Running by water or the woods is a frightening experience for her. Apparently once she was chased by a see through fish.... Wednesday we added another animal for her to be afraid of. We ran by a skunk that had its tail up. Luckily it didn't spray us. Could you imagine me explaining that stench the next morning? "Um I was running by a skunk..." I'm told it takes a lot to get skunkd but really I don't want to find out...

Silly

So this is an insanly warm fall so far. I know we'll probably have an awful winter with tons of snow and subzero days. But I guess there's nothing we can do about that. But today, October 4th in Omaha it was over 90. Yesterday was in the 80s. Yesterday the air conditioning went out in my building at work. So this morning there were construction guys trying to fix the air conditioning, something I found funny because well tomorrow it's suppose to be 30 degrees cooler and my desk is in the coldest part of the building at the moment, so I wasnt bothered...until...The "fix" turned out to be this massive ac unit (I'm talking as tall as a door and takes up a corner) that blows cool air up and little box fans on the floor at the end of every row. We think the goal was for the box fans to blow the cool air towards the middle of the building. But um the cool air was going up and the fans were on the floor. Anyone see an issue with this? I actually think the whole "fix" ended up making the place hotter and really really noisy by my desk as the massive contraption was at the end of my row. Oh well it better be gone tomorrow because it suppose to be 60.

Safety part 2

So with the safety campaign came a silly contest of sorts. The department with the best safety ideas or whatever would get this trophy the construction department made. This really really tacky thing with toy trucks glued to the base and the trophy part is an outline of a person and there is a place cut out of the head for a light bulb. But that's not all the stupid light has a motion detector. So yeah a guy on my team submitted an idea, the slogan on our trucks is ""Driven to succeed" and he suggested adding safely to the end. Seriously I think he's the only one that submitted anything so we get this silly thing and it goes on top of his cube. I now have a blinding light in the corner of my eye all the time, occasionally it clicks off for a second but people are moving so often it's generally on all the time. I think this is taking away from the safety of my department and me and it is a fire hazard! We have it right next to the ceiling and the guy on the other side of the cube from the "trophy" put up a paper shield so that he wouldn't get blinded or get a sunburn from the great thing. AND when we plug things in at work they have to a sticker on them saying they were inspected by construction. (granted this was built by the construction department) The silly "trophy" has no such thing!

ok end safety rant.