Off to see the wizard.

Yesterday afternoon while I was watching the news a tornado watch was issued for some surrounding areas, including the county I live in.

Normally I just ignore them.  I know that sounds terrible, but I have been fortunate enough never to see a tornado in my area my whole life.  Plus, I'm a lover of crazy summer thunderstorms.

Last night was different though.  When the warning was issued I started to get anxious.  I was upset because I was scheduled to work at 11 last night, & I was planning to be napping when the wicked storm was supposed to hit.  DJ wasn't going to be home, & I was convinced that the house was going to be blown away without me knowing.  He assured me I was crazy, like usual.

Although I slept a little, I kept having bad dreams & ended up waking up long before my alarm was set to go off.

I turned on the news, & what do you know?

The report was bad.  The storm was headed to us, & would be on top of us within a half hour.  People were reporting seeing tornados where it was already raining, & the meteorologists were seeing cloud rotation close to me.

When the storm was about 10 minutes away & a few towns over, the weatherman said, "There is definite cloud rotation.  We can't confirm whether or not a tornado is already on the gound.  It's heading for Renee's house (I know I souldn't joke about this, but wouldn't that have been funny?).  You have 10 minutes to get into the basement."

And so, that is what I did.  I took my laptop, knowing I would lose power & not get news reports from the TV.  I just hoped the internet would hold out.  It did not, by the way. 

Next I trapped my 2 girl cats in the basement, which was easy enough to do with a bag of treats.  Then, I had to carry my dog downstairs.  She had never even seen a flight of stairs until we lived in this house, & she is not brave enough to venture down.  Once that was done, I had to fight with my boy cat.  He doesn't like to be held, so it was an  epic battle...that I ultimately won.  I essentially hog-tied my cat, covered his head with my shirt & ran down the stairs while trying desperately to hold on.

Once my fur babies were safely downstairs, I didn't dare open the door.  In my panic, it didn't occur to me to grab my flashlight or candles or anything I might actually need.   No, no, instead there I was with 3 misbehaving cats, a terrified dog, my cell phone & a laptop that soon proved to be worhtless when the internet failed.

In an attempt to keep myself calm, I talked to my mom & MIL periodically.  I had no idea what was going on.  There was no way for me to know what the situation with the storm was.  My only view of the outside world was through a tiny (& dirty, because I don't clean it) basement window.  I couldn't see anything because the sky was black, except for occasional pink lightening.

I'll be honest, I was pretty freaking terrified.  I was also sure this was not going to end well.  Thankfully, it did.  We got a severe thunderstorm & nothing more.  Everyone was safe.

We were without power for a few hours, so when I ventured back upstairs I lit every candle in the house & read a book by flashlight.

DJ got home shortly after the power came back on.  And although I was able to laugh a little about my disaster precautions, I was still a little on edge.

In hindsight everyone will probably think it was silly of me to go so overboard, but I don't think it was.  Not only did the newscaster say it was specifically headed to my town & I had 10 minutes to take cover, but I knew this was coming since 3 in the afternoon.

Call it a message, or maybe a sixth sense, but I was sure this storm was going to be bad & I needed to be awake when it arrived.

I guess the moral of my story is this:  trust your instincts.  They're right more often than you think.

Tuesday Ten

It's raining today.  It's been raining since Friday. It's supposed to rain until at least Friday.  It's left me with a total lack of inspiration.

Imagine that?

So today I'm phoning this one in.  I'm not being a Tuesday Ten hater, I'm just saying that I don't even have the energy it requires to make my Tuesday Ten creative & funny like my buddy G.

(Do you see what I did there, Gini????  I'm totally impressed with myself now.)

Anyway, enough of the inside joke.  Now to the Main Event:


1.  I took my mom shopping for a Mother's Day gift last night.  It was a week late, but that was her fault.  She wanted to get Ugg boots, but ended up with a ring instead.   That made me happy. 

2.  I came home from the grocery store to find a flock of geese milling around the field behind my house. Random.

3.  I'm still on vacation, & I don't go back until Sunday night.  The plan for the rest of the week?  Laziness.

4.  Maury reached an all time low today by having a stained blanket tested for an angry wife.  I'm still trying to wrap my head around the idea that Maury could have gone any lower than he already was.

5.  Is it wrong of me to want to delete some distant relatives from Facebook?  Is it wrong that I don't care if it's wrong?  Then, do those two wrongs make a right?

6. On my way to my next door neighbor's house this morning, I found 4 four leaf clovers.

7.  I don't care if chips & salsa aren't a suitable lunch.

8. According to some religious zealots in my area, the world is going to end on Saturday.  I'm glad I had vacation this week.

9.  I bought a new lunch box last night.  It has owls on it.  You know you're jealous.

10.  Given what the poor people in the south are currently bracing themselves for, I find it a little offensive to see a "flood watch" symbol in the corner of my TV screen.  The worst thing that's going to happen here is that we may not be able to use a low-lying road for a while.  Not really a flood, if you ask me.

Tuesday Ten

Lately I don't have the energy to string together enough cohesive thoughts to make an actual blog post, so I'm stealing an idea from one of my favs, Ms. BFG herself.  Stop over & take a look...after you read mine, please.

Here's my Tuesday Ten


1.  Yesterday morning when I was driving home from work I saw a turkey politely waiting to cross the road.  Only after I passed did he look both ways & start to cross.  Total genteman.

2.  Dear Mother Nature, Please decide to just be warm.  I can't handle one nice day followed by many not so nice days anymore.  It's cramping my style.  Thanks!

3.  I have been saying I'm going to decorate for easter for a while now.  Still not decorated.

4.  I don't now why everyone always makes fun of Rachael Ray (& by everyone, I mean my grumpy boyfriend & his friend) but I love her.  In protest, I think I'll cook only Rachael Ray meals for a while.  Sucks to be him.

5.  Speaking of the Food Network, did anyone else watched the Chopped All Stars Tournament??  I am so not a fan of the guy who won.  I didn't appreciate his comments about the other (better, more well established, etc) chefs.  In poor taste, random guy.

6.  I requested to extend my upcoming vacation (before it even started) & I'm crossing all my fingers & toes that it gets approved.  Eleven days off.  Oh. My. God.  My head might explode from joy.  I hate that place.

7.  Does anyone else love making up your own situation approtiate hash tags on Twitter? #ido

8.  I woke up this morning afternoon & when I opened my living room curtains the first thing I saw was some dude driving a riding mower up the road past my house.  Weird.

9. I'm addicted to crappy horror movies on the Sci-Fi channel - especially when they involve crazy, unrealistic sea monsters.  Dinoshark, I'm looking at you...with love.

10.  I've got 3 terrible, horrible, no good, very bad cats.  Anyone want them?

With a capital "G."

As you probably know I'm a transplant to the rural area where I live.  I was born in raised in the city, & I embraced my ghetto roots this morning.

I should probably be ashamed of what I did, but instead I'm going to share it with you.

Here goes...

I used a box of generic Tuna Helper to make tuna noodle casserole for dinner.

It doesn't get much more ghetto than that.

The fact is, I need to go grocery shopping.  As I was looking through the cabinets last night deciding what to defrost, I saw the Walmart "tuna skillet" dinner staring back at me & thought, "I've got bread crumbs & frozen peas.  Hrmmm..."

So dinner was born - no defrosting necessary!

I just ate a few spoonfuls after it came out of the oven, & I have to say that it was pretty friggin' tasty.

You can take the girl out of the city,  but you'll never take the city out of the girl.

I let him go because he didn't want to be my new best friend.

I came home from work Tuesday night to find my cat trying to dig through the sliding glass door to our deck.

This is not uncommon.  He does this if he sees the dogs lead laying out there, or if there's a leaf blowing around.  He'll just run back & forth chasing it around, & gets so disappointed if the leaf goes out of sight.

I assumed that was the case on Tuesday, but when I turned the porch light on to let the dog out I got a big surpprise.

This is what Scooter was so feverishly trying to get to:



Image from Google.

I've seen a lot of weird things since I've lived here, but that was my first toad.

He was headed toward the tall end of the deck, so I went outside to try to redirect him (& to decide if we wanted to keep him, because DJ & I were both thinkin about it).

The poor, little dude was definitely scared.  Everytime I tried to pick him up, he would dart in the other direction.  When  finally did pick him up his little legs were going like crazy to get away.  And the weird thing was, he was making a very unexpected noise.  No "ribbiting."  He was chirping like a little birdie.

In any event, he clearly wasn't interested in staying with us for a while, so I just took him back down into the grass safely & put him away from the dog's reach - just in case.

Wordless Wednesday: It'll be here before you know it!

Day 21 - Didn't have a camera by my side this time.

I'm supposed to share a picture of something that makes me happy.  I had this plan to take tons of pictures yesterday at my PopPop's birthday party, because my family is what makes me happy.  I had also planned to tie this into the post I skipped from earlier this week, which was supposed to be a picture of my family.

Perfect, right?  Well, it didn't happen.

They were all here, & I had my camera in my pocket the whole time.  But instead of chasing everyone around with a camera all day, I chose to participate in what makes me so happy.  Our day including:

• Discussing if what we ate was pork or turkey.  We ultimately decided it must have been "porkey."
• Several trips into the corn field behind the house, which resulted in my deck being covered in corn.
• DJ & the little ones "hunting" my cats in an attempt to get them out from under the bed.  I walked into the bedroom at one point, & my 4-year-old cousin was flat on his stomach staring under the bed saying, "If you come out, I won't find you!"
• Once again discussing my aunt's belief that my dog's name should be Cocoa instead of Ripley.
• Opening my birthday gifts from my mother & having her explain where I'll be putting all of them.  She had it all figured out when she bought them, you know.
• And of course, there were the spiked lemonade slushies.

Day 20 (On day 21) - Everyone is at church.

I did not blog yesterday.  Gasp!

My PopPop's birthday party was held at my house yesterday, & there was far too much going on.

Yesterday's Today's 1st prompt is the meaning of my blog title, Closed on Sunday.

Ever since I started working at age 16 I have hated working on Sundays.  I've always worked rotating Saturdays & several nights a week.  That has never been an issue for me.  But for some reason, Sundays just made me crazy.  I didn't have anything pressing to do, like go to church, I just simply felt that Sunday was a day to sit around & do nothing.

The second part of the story stems from me moving in with DJ.  I didn't grow up in some sprawling metropolis or anything, but it's a far cry from the rural area where we live now.  One thing that will always drive me crazy is that everything here is closed on Sundays.  We're talking restaurants, stores, etc.  Basically, any family owned business (and some not family owned too) are all closed on Sunday.  So on those days when I refuse to clean or do anything productive, there's nothing for me to do.

Ain't that a pisser?

Day 12 - B.F.E.

I'm supposed to share pictures of the "town" I live in, but there's really not much to show.  The town part consists of one main road where there is a bank, a post office, a tiny movie theater, a pizza shop, a small grocery store, a bar & a country decor shop.  Everything is one one place, & it's nothing spectacular.

So, I'll share these pictures instead.

These pictures were taken from my deck.  The view is definitely a lot more interesting than the post office of bank.  Although I sometimes complain about living in BFE where everything is closed on Sunday, I have to confess that I enjoy it from this angle.

Day 6 - You can't keep it in the house.

I was born & raised in the city, so it was a huge adjustment for me to move to the country when I moved in with DJ.  It's far too dark & quiet when I come home at 11:30 each night - which makes it impossible for me to see the crazy hillbillies that I know are stalking me from the cornfield.  But, I digress...

One thing I do love about living in this area is all the animals.  There are farms everywhere you look, & there are plenty of birds that you just wouldn't see in the city.  Since I moved here & started sizing up our big backyard, there is one pet I've told DJ I really, really wanted:  a goat.



I'm sure there's some kind of law that says I just can't have goat, but it drives him crazy so I continue to share my goaty plans with him. I tell him I'm going to keep it in the house because it gets cold at night.  I tell him I'm going to teach it to use a litter box & let it sleep in bed.  This does not make him happy.

There's a place near us called Green Dragon, which is like a flea market/farmer's market kind of place.  It's the place where everyone goes to buy their knock-off handbags & homemade Amish woopie pies.  If you've ever seen the movie Mall Rats, it's kind of like the "dirt mall" where they meet the fortune teller with three nipples (While I've never seen her at Green Dragon myself, it wouldn't surprise me to find her one day).

The reason I tell you about Green Dragon is that you can actually buy a goat there!  I think they're tiny goats, pygmy goats maybe?  DJ & I were there once with my friend Amanda & her husband Ross.  There we are, eating our deep-fried vegetables (that's right, I live in Pennsyl-tucky, & that's how we roll) when Ross shouts, "You know that you can buy a goat here, right?"

DJ's eyes turned a shade of red that I've never seen on a person before.  He wasn't mad at Ross for making the joke, he was mad at me because he knew he couldn't stop me if I really wanted a goat.  And he's right, he couldn't. 

But I wouldn't bring a goat home as a pet...would I?

Aren't they purdy?

A few months ago my MIL pulled a shit ton of stickers & other weeds out of a "garden" left in my backyard by the people who lived here before.

There are a ton of poppies out there that we knew about, but much to our surprise there's a bunch of other healthy stuff that was being choked by all the crap.

Right now, we've got these:

Tell me how you really feel.

I can't very well mention Sunday in my blog title & then not post on Sunday - although at this point, I realize I'm talking to myself.  In any event, I figured I'll take this opportunity to explain where the blog title came from. 

There are two influences: 

The first is my shocking realization that everything in this area is closed on Sunday, & the even more shocking realization that things are closed because everyone in the county (aside from the people I'm related to) is at church.  I mean everyone.  Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that going to church is a bad thing.  But what about the rest of us?  What fun things are we supposed to do on our lazy Sundays if all the fun things are closed?

The second influence is just my overall opinion of Sunday.  As you might have already gathered, I'm not a "get up & go to church" kind of girl.  And even though I'm kind of annoyed about everything being closed, I generally refuse to do work of any kind on a Sunday.  I love nothing more than doing nothing on a Sunday, although I usually spend the day doing boring, grown-up chores.  Lame.

But, in honor of the new blog, I decided to take the day off.  Below is a list of things I should have done today, followed by a list of things I actually did today.

Should have done:

•  Laundry
• Cleaned the bathrooms
• Cleaned the kitchen
• Vacummed
• Gone grocery shopping
• Dyed my hair (which is long overdue, I might add)
• Continued organizing our spare bedroom, which is where I piled all the junk from our recent move...in January.  Tee hee!

What I actually did:

• Laundry (Ok, I let that one slip.  But only because I need something to wear tomorrow.)
• Baked chocolate chip muffins.  And by "baked" I mean filled a muffin pan with pre-made batter.
• Wasted time on Facebook
• Wasted time on Blogger
• Took a half-assed shower (I rinsed my hair, but didn't wash it because I wanted to dye it & dye sticks better to dirty hair.  Gross...)
• Watched Kull the Conqueror because my boyfriend is a loser
• Watched a 2-year-old put a dirty cat toy in her mouth, then crawl around on the floor that I didn't vacuum
• Cleaned up 3 piles of doggie diarrhea.  It was runny too.
• Watched a neighborhood cat use my yard as a litter box
• Watched The In Laws with Michael Douglas & Ryan Reynolds.  That was cute; much better than Kull the Conqueror

Maybe this can be my theme?  Sure it can!  In honor of lazy Sundays, I'll keep a similar list each week.  I'll be able to keep track of how unproductive I am (How depressing?), & hopefully give someone a good chuckle...if anyone ever actually reads this.