Chuck and Winner Winner Chicken Dinner

Well the big news tonight is that CHUCK IS BACK!!!



Now I know that I am one of only a few people who watch Chuck religiously, but it is one of my most favorite shows.

You know that last sentence makes it sound like I have other favorite shows.

I don't.

Just Chuck.

I wish I had other favorite shows, but truth be told I just don't watch that much prime time television.

I have television show commitment issues.

Either I don't have the time to give a television show, or I give my whole heart to a show and it leaves me like Seinfeld or Friends.

It is a sad thing.

But now I have Chuck...or at least I will tomorrow. You see that is another problem. I live on the west coast. Our prime time goes from 8:00 p.m. to 11:00 p.m. Yes you heard me right 11:00 PM...yes just one hour from it being the next day. I just cannot stay up that late. So tonight we (and when I say we I mean Andrew) have set the DVR to record Chuck 'cause the premier is tonight from 9:00 p.m. to one hour from tomorrow.




So enough about Chuck and on to the borrow-away...

So Bella helped me out and drew a name from the numerous four entries for the borrow-away.And the Winner is:

YEAH!!! Joyce from this side of the pond is our winner. So Joyce if you are out there e-mail me your snail mail address and I'll whisk the book away to you.

I just won't be tomorrow...

...cause I'll be watching Chuck!!!

More Later

- A Ro

Project 365 - A Picture a Day

I decided to join Sara at Make Music From Your Heart to the Lord for Project 365. We take a picture every day and post them on Sunday's...a sort of pictorial "day in the life". Here are my week's pics...

Sunday - I posted on my blog that I got engaged so I decided to re-post the picture I took last Sunday. It is my amazing ring given to me by an amazing man...
Monday - Rich (my amazing man) is obsessed excited about the iPod touch I gave him for Christmas...boys really do love new toys.
Tuesday - It was my school's Music Alumni Day. Here I am with 5 of my chorus alumni. I just love this day. I just love these guys. The two on the right surprised me and just showed up. It was so nice to see them. I miss them all very much. Have I mentioned how much I love my job!!
Wednesday - We go get ice cream every Wednesday night at Baskin Robbins. This little, high caloric, tradition started shortly after my ex moved out. It was my kids and I little weekly ritual. We walked or scootered to the store and enjoyed some ice cream. It has stuck and now we include Rich.
Thursday - This is where my vacuum cleaner has sat since last Saturday. It is plugged in and ready to vacuum my bedroom. But have I done it yet...no. But it is good and ready should I choose to do so. Let's just say I am a prepared procrastinator.
Friday - I got a gift certificate to this really she-she-fru-fru Japanese restaurant in Malibu owned by Robert DeNiro. Rich and I decided to have a date night there. We saw Ryan O'Neill but sitting in that fancy restaurant made us feel like fish out of water.

ha ha get it...sushi...fish out of water...ha ha..


**tap...tap...tap...is this thing on?**

Saturday - I went out to run errands and really thought this view from my front yard was spectacular...so I snapped this picture. I do like some aspects about living in So. Cal.



So there you have it...it is obvious from these pictures that I am excited about getting married, my students, my awkward date night, and ice cream, but really need to just vacuum my room and get on with it.


More Later

- A Ro

P.S. Don't forget to enter my borrow-away...just go to this post and post a comment. This ends tonight (Sunday) at 8:00 Pacific Time.

Borrow-Away...and a new trick...

Thanks Robin for dumbing down teaching me the concept of putting a line through text. I usually, sometimes, never can figure these things out for myself. So I thank you!!

Thank you also for the numerous four comments to my question about blogging comments. It is obvious from reading your numerous four comments that there isn't a right way to do it. I think that since I am a relatively new blogger that I will continue to visit the blogs of my commenters and leave a comment there. Since I have a large number a few commenters each day I'll get to visit many a couple of new sites...should be fun.

Ok...Ok...I'll let it go now soon...

Now for the borrow-away!!!

Robin at Be Still and Know had this great idea to have an I Won...You Win giveaway. I read this book and now I am giving you the chance to read it too...

Here is Robin's idea (taken from her website):
The idea for “I Won…You Win” is two fold. Once a winner is chosen I will send the book out into the blogosphere. My hope is that whoever wins it will keep the “I Won…You Win” giveaway going. The second requirement is once you have finished the book place your blog address on the inside cover, as well as the date you finished the book and then continue the “I Won…You Win” Giveaway on your blog. Link back to me in you giveaway let’s see where this takes us. I also want to encourage everyone who reads the book to mark your favorite chapter in the book with a note in the margin telling future readers why you enjoyed the chapter. Use your imagination, tuck a special note in the pages or a pretty bookmark, but put “yourself” somewhere in the pages of the book. I am so excited to send this out into the blogosphere.

So here's how I'll do it:

I'll take comments until Sunday evening at 8:00 pacific time (cause that's where I live). Just answer this question in my comment section and I'll randomly choose a winner.

Being a relatively new blogger I want to know when you read a new blog what keeps you coming back to that blog for more??

Is it comedy, content, political views, pretty background, number of spelling errors, or is it how well the blogger can overuse use the word strike trick??

Man if that last one is the only criteria I am in like Flynn!!

More later

-A Ro

Blogger Etiquette

First of all I am trying to figure out if I spelled etiquette right or not...I guess I'll find out if I remember to spell check before I post. It is a coin toss each time I blog.


Before I forget I am doing my I Win You Win book borrow-away from Robin at Be Still and Know on Friday so come back and bring your friends and join me, The Bug, Linda at 2nd Cup, and Robin at Be Still and Know and try to win a chance to read the book Sisterchicks in Wooden Shoes. It is a fun book about a friendship that isn't dependent on proximity.


Now that I have been blogging for nearly a year and still haven't read my Blogger for Dummies book, I am still a little in the dark on the ins and outs of blogging. If you haven't guessed by now I am a fly by the seat of my pants kind of girl.
However my current question is probably not in this book because it has to do with blogger etiquette...Here goes:

When someone posts a comment to your blog are you supposed to respond in a comment on your blog or a comment on their blog?

I am afraid if I post to my blog they aren't going to know about it unless they come back...and quite frankly people I am lucky to get someone to look at my blog one time let alone come back. If I post to their blog which obviously will have nothing to do with their current post I'll seem a little loony...and I know that isn't a far stretch, but I'd like to keep all of that loony-ness a secret as long as possible. I am usually sneaky and comment on something that is relative to their blog and then sneak in a response to mine, but then I always worry that I am committing a faux pas. Kinda like wearing dark nylons with white shoes...not SO bad but someone will notice and think I am a tool.

I know that my comments are few and far between, but I am a chit chatter by nature and I like to answer back when someone says something to me. It seems like I am virtually ignoring them by not responding. Kind of like virtually yelling at someone when you type in all caps. Which drives me crazy by the way. Especially now that I am channelling a 21 year old girl with the news of my engagement...I would like to virtually squeal with all those kind souls congratulating me.

What do you think? What do you all do? Please leave me a comment and depending on your response maybe I'll comment back...

More Later

- A Ro

P.S. I'd also like to know how you draw a line through one of the words you type...I know I should really quit while I'm ahead.

It's back...Random Dozen

We are back at it!!! Click on the button??(not sure that is what that thing is called) and go over to Linda at 2nd Cup and link up your answers!!!
1. On a scale of 1-10, with 10 being a cranky-baby-hissy-fitter, how much of a complainer are you?

Geez I hate it when you ask questions like this...hmpf.

I am not normally a complainer by nature, but my mirror neurons must be very acute because get me around people who start to complain and I just fall right in line. This is why I avoid the faculty room like the complaining plague it can become. I would say, though, generally I am a 3.

2. When someone else is talking, do you listen, or are you thinking about what you're going to say in response?

Well according to my kids I don't listen at all. They always catch me doing the old "uh huh...uh huh"...I do tend to tune them out.

There goes my Mother of the Year Award...oh well.

To most people I do listen but I am a little self centered so there is a little of "what am I going to say in response that is brilliant"

3. I just deleted 1062 messages from my email account. Do you have any plans for a clean sweep this month--of anything?

Well my bank account has already been clean swept...so that is out. Ha Ha I am trying so hard to clean sweep my entire house. Pantry, closets, freezer...I'll let you know how it goes. Probably next year as the 2011 comes into view and it is on my New Years Resolutions list again.

And now, here are some brilliant questions from a gal named Angie at Angie's Ad Lib who graciously offered to let me borrow her brain. Please go over and see Angie because it was so nice of her to help me out. Thank you so much, Angie!
4. Tell us about your perfume. Was it a gift? What does it remind you of? Do you have a signature scent?

My ex husband was allergic to perfume so I didn't wear any. My husband-to-be (wow I like saying that) really likes the scent I currently wear, Bath and Body Work's Warm Vanilla Sugar. I like it too. It has been my "scent" for awhile now. I know it isn't perfume but I like it...and so does Rich :)

5. What is your best organizing tip for the new year?

Let the mail touch your hands one time. Look through it and put it somewhere right then and there...trash, bill tray, coupon tray, shredder, recycling bin...don't just let it pile up.

6. What is your favorite comic strip?

I have always loved Family Circle. Funnier now that I am a parent. My favorite is the "Not Me" character.

7. Do you sleep with a fluffy or flat pillow?

Two Flat-ish pillows...there must be some kind of study about what that says about my personality.

8. What color is your kitchen? Why did you choose that color?

I did sort of choose it...Earthy tones...dark reds and browns...there must be some kind of study about what that says about my personality.

9. What’s the most interesting bumper sticker you’ve seen?

I really like this one.

10. Do you prefer an expensive writing tool or whatever is lying around? (Are you a Montblanc or a Papermate?)

I equate spending money on an expensive writing tools with spending money on expensive sunglasses or watches. The amount I spend on those items are in direct proportion with how fast I lose them. In fact the pen that I have lived with the longest is a free one from the lady who waxes my eyebrows. I'll have it until the day I die...it won't work, but that has never been a criteria for how long I keep a pen...c'mon you know exactly what I mean.

11. What chore doesn’t feel like a chore – you just enjoy it (at least most of the time)?

I really do like organizing things. It feels good to purge and it feels really good to have an organized house. However, my overwhelming procrastination problem really overrides this enjoyable chore...

12. If your parents often repeated themselves, what is something one of them said more than once?

My father was the king of repeating himself...here are a few:

Measure twice cut once
It would be easy to raise stupid kids
The word assume makes an ass out of u and me
Always leave someone happier than when you found them


In summary: I really need to stop complaining, listen to my kids, and find something to do with that can of pumpkin, broken suitcase, all the empty boxes in my garage, and those dried up pens stashed in various drawers in my house...I need to figure out what my pillows and my kitchen colors say about me. But really I need to start channeling my dad!!!

More later

- A Ro

Big Plans and a Few Pictures

Well the fact that I am getting married...again...is settling in with me. I am very excited and feeling a little juevinile showing off my ring and squealing.


When I got married the first time I was very excited as well. However, back then I was more excited about the wedding itself...my colors, my bridesmaids, my flowers, my reception...This time I am WAY more excited about the actual marriage. When I was going through my divorce I read the book Lies at the Altar by Robin Smith. It really opened my eyes to the wedding vows we all just say and take for granted. It takes each vow and tells how one blindly says them, but we don't think about what they really MEAN. Rich and I both read that book and think now that every 18 year old should read it before they get into a serious relationship. It truly was an eye opener.



Anyhoo...I now am very excited about this marriage, this partnership. So my actual wedding is not in the forefront of my mind. Really our only invitees are family members, and maybe a few friends. I originally wanted to get married at the Marriott's Tan-tar-a resort in the Lake of the Ozarks. It was Rich's old stomping grounds, and I visited while dating him in High School and really loved it. It was going to be a family vacation with a wedding attached. However my mom started looking into the cost of rooms there and was blown away at how expensive it is to actually stay there. The wedding packages were very reasonable. She suggested we look at a lake in Iowa closer to home.


Now I now what you are thinking...a wedding on a lake in the mid-west...could get a little "rustic" and not so much "quaint". I don't think I could handle getting married with wood panelling, deer heads, and fishing lure as decorations. But my mom planned my first wedding entirely...I was living in Arizona and got married in Iowa...she is good and I trust her completely. I almost want to say to my family, you all plan your family vacation and Rich and I will just get married while we are all there. In other words I really don't care where we get married...I just don't....with the exception of the aforementioned decor.


So the first thing on my to do list is to decide on where. The when was easy...it is the first weekend in August...it fits in between my summer "job" and school starting for me, my mom, and my sister...all who work within the school system.



I'll keep you updated...I know lucky you!!



I thought I'd throw a couple of pictures at you from my vacation. This one has a great story...

My daughter still believes in Santa...I think. If she doesn't she really puts on a good show. So Christmas morning both of my kids run down the stairs and as they are opening their stockings (shortly after reading the response to Bella's note to Santa) she notices something in the fireplace. She says "look mom part of Santa's coat got stuck in the fireplace". Andrew, Rich, her dad (I'll save that story for another post), and I look at each other trying to figure out who did that. We were completely perplexed on how that "piece of Santa's coat" got in the fireplace when no one fessed up to it...all the while trying not to look too surprised. We sat there for a minute in shock when all of the sudden Bella said "Gottcha". She spent the greater part of Christmas Eve day concocting this plan to fool us...

She is a planner...and schemer...


Hey...do I have a job for her!!!


More Later

-A Ro

A Story With a Very Happy Ending

Well first of all you must forgive me. My last week has been filled with so much, but here are the real reasons I have not blogged.

Yes I know that those are very good reasons for not blogging, but I wear guilt very well. So I thought I would make it up to you with a story today, and a giveaway later this week. Well it isn't so much a give-away as a borrow-away...anyway I'll clue you in later this week. But, here is my story:

Once upon a time, well actually it was the summer of 1985, this young girl went to one of her friends birthday parties. It was at his apartment's swimming pool. There she met a very handsome, tall, hunky football player. She was taken by him and over the course of the next year she discovered that he was a great boyfriend. He always made her feel like she was the only one in the room and simply adored her.

If you have heard this one before don't stop me...it gets better.

Well as you might have guessed it that girl was me, and almost twenty five years later she found herself standing at that very pool with that very boy. Except this time that boy had grown into a man. A tall, handsome, hunky man. A man who still makes her feel like she is the only one in the room and who adores her more than she deserves. A man who is a wonderful father to his two children and a great role model for mine. A man who brought me to that pool 25 years later, told me how much he loves me and cannot live without me and then pulled out this amazing ring.

He asked...

I said yes...

Thank you fate, thank you God, thank you dad and Dick, and Ryan for helping me find my soul mate. But most of all thank you Rich for becoming the man you are, for loving me the way you do, for believing in us, and for saving my life. I love you.

I used to not believe in happy endings...

but now I do...

More later

-A Ro