Some really cool pics

Here are some of my favorite pictures from Banff....

Peyto Lake

The gorgeous flowers from all the hours of sunlight. These are poppies outside the Fairmont Hotel in Lake Louise.

Johnston's Canyon and a bear sighting on our drive to the glaciers

Geeper Creepers

I'm sitting on hold with the vision insurance division of our insurance company while they try to wriggle me out of a $68 bill for something that I shouldn't be paying for. I'm listening to fake classical music hoping that my insurance representative is ripping the eye care "professional" a new bum hole.

Ten years ago, I stumbled out of my local Lenscrafters with a slight prescription for nearsightedness. Now as I near the age of thirty unable to read street signs or computer screens without my glasses or contacts and I'm constantly sticking my fingers into my stigmatized eyes with the latest and greatest in contact lens technology. Don't get me wrong, contacts are amazing. But just like ever thing else these days, solution is a bloody fortune (a $17 bottle of the premium stuff for allergy prone folks like me lasts a little over a month). And while glasses are all the rage (I mean Tori Spelling wears them), there's just a lot to them. It's tough to run a marathon while your sporting your artsy black plastic million dollar please-don't-let-these-fall-off-and into the oncoming traffic specs.

And with contacts...you should have to have a license to own those suckers. Cleaning and disinfecting, remembering to take them out before you sleep, realizing that you can't open your eyes underwater when you're wearing them.... Add in the fact that I'm prone to pinkeye, have eye dandruff (eww, but really it exists), and have dry eyes to boot; contacts are just a huge pain the butt and in the wallet.

My insurance company just called me in the middle of this post to tell me that they will not pay nor will they have me pay the price the eye care professional is asking me to pay. There was talk of supervisors and official reports and all kinds of crazy things.

Really this is just a post about how if I wasn't a teacher with the summers off, I'd totally have to pay the $300 in illegitimate bills because I wouldn't have time to sit on the phone during business hours to listen to fake classical music (while running up my cellphone bill).

Life Altering

Would a Starbucks drive-thru opened on your 45 minute commute change your life?

It's changing mine.

I know I know Fair Trade, local coffee shops. I know. It's just that I've never been through a Starbucks drive-thru. I'm a little excited.

PS: I only have three more days to commute but that's 6 lattes if you consume one each way!

Things That Make You Go Mmmm...

In the midst of several world crises (which I should write about) I'm struck by this story. A young woman who was denied entrance to her prom because her dress was too skimpy. Not only is she removed in handcuffs but she maintains she still likes the dress. Not only does this remind me of something you'd see in the "what not to wear" section of a fashion magazine, this makes me think that maybe we should do more to help our young people explore their individuality.

Cnn Clip

Some things to write about

I don't really have a real reason for posting this. I'm baking some other posts in my mind right now. So...
My favorite food: Morning Star (fake) Bacon and Avocado on toasted whole wheat
My favorite song ever: Piece of My Heart, Janis Joplin
My favorite song this year: anything new by Mary J. Blige
My favorite person to fight: obnoxious teenagers who think they know everything
My favorite obsession: preventing chapped hands
My favorite restaurant: Baba India
My favorite place to visit: anywhere my girls are
My favorite TV show of all time: Dawson's Creek
TV show right now: I'll be honest...I listen to NPR and hardly watch TV anymore
My favorite color: baby blue
My favorite website: amazon.com
My favorite person to laugh with: Megan Foley because her laugh is infectious
My favorite sport to play: none...but I love to run
My favorite movie: Amelie (a french film)
My favorite holiday: Easter at my grandparents house
My favorite candy: Twizzlers OR Wild Oats dark chocolate truffles
My favorite dead Beatle: I don't have one
My favorite last name of all my friends: Blank
My favorite first name of all of my friends: Manon or Martha
My favorite grocery store: Sunshine
My favorite engineer: Mr. Pete
My favorite indulgence: wine and sushi or pedicures
My favorite snack: Peanut butter and apples

On repeat in my car: The Wicked Soundtrack
My "default" shoes: Dansko professional clogs (flip flops coming soon)
Strangest Pet Peeve(s): When people talk through the checkout on their cellphones, chewing or slurping noises
Weakness: fear, reading blogs for too long
Strange Fears: dark closets, MRSA
Great Quest: at the moment finding a coffee table...then I will continue my great quest for truth
Something I wish I knew when I was younger: parents are supposed to be imperfect
Something I hope to learn soon: How to be confident in my own skin
Dream job: part time barista, part time educational consultant

Want in on the action? Cut and paste this into your blog OR leave your info in the comments.

A Proud New Owner

I am the proud "new" owner of....

That's right a 2003 Honda Civic. I bought this beauty FIVE years ago when I started my first teaching job. I used to drive this

I called her "The Pickle." She was christened early in her life as my car by a errant deli tray I placed in the back seat. Since she was green and she smelled like a pickle, the name seemed suitable. In my house, when you called someone a "pickle" it meant that they weren't terribly easy to get along with. They were, in fact, acting grumpy or difficult. As fate would have it, this car became her name. The driver and passenger side windows did not roll down and the AC broke. These ailments came at the beginning of my teaching career while I was teaching summer school. I would arrive to teach summer school (at a very nice school where my students drove nicer cars than I did) soaked in sweat from my stifling drive to work.

The ultimate pickle experience came some time in January of 2003. I stepped out of my classroom one day, leaving my cellphone on my desk. I returned to find it missing and endured the tsking and head wagging of both my principal and the resource officer. It was a cold January day and I headed out to Verizon to beg for a new phone. With very little money (read: NONE)saved up, I wasn't very excited about purchasing a new phone at full price. Verizon, of course, offered to let me buy the same phone with insurance for $1 million dollars. A very generous offer on their part. While I didn't want to pay for the same new phone, I was still at the point where a cool cellphone mattered to me and would not succumb to the blue plastic Nokia that would later become my trademark (I was the proud owner of one of the largest cellphones known to humankind).

So I left the store empty handed. I was ready to drown my sorrows in the crackly sound of my grand am's radio and had just entered the on ramp to 71 South when I heard a sound that sounded like a million paper clips being flushed through my engine. Then I heard a loud smashing sound and I pulled to the side of the road. Very long story not so short, the transmission on my Grand Am died. I was on the side of the road in the pickle with no cell phone. I had to hike back to Verizon where I had left in tears to use their courtesy phone to call my roommates. After a few days of bickering and debating with the local Honda dealership, I came home with my baby. Those were the days.

My Finanical Situation in January 2003

Total Income: a generous teacher's salary but still not much

Bills: brand new gym membership, brand new cellphone (not paid for) and two year plan, rent in a dirty apartment with coin laundry, ridculous groceries that no 20-something person should buy (ie expensive cheeses and organic juice)

Savings: None

All this to say, I am very excited that my Honda is paid off.

Some things

There's been a lot of hobbling around, whining, and a general procrastination of all things productive here at the Pete household. You won't believe what you can't do with a broken toe (think logicially, grade papers, pay bills...the list goes on I tell you). I think the toe is healing rather nicely. The jury is still out on the nail. It's now a dark shade of black (think OPI's Mrs. O'Leary's BBQ or Midnight in Mosco...good thing dark colors are in).

Other than that, it's been pretty quiet. I'm going to post soon about all the "green" information I've been collecting lately. Mr. Pete and I are in the market for a composter and energy efficient washer and dryer. We also purchased a share of a co-op farm. More about that later.

Since we haven't had any snow days (that's what winter's for), I find myself daydreaming of spring time. I can't wait to get out in our garden and tear things up.

That's all for now.

Birthday Girl

I just turned the big 2-? and I'm pretty stoked about being that much closer to 30. It was a fun filled birthday complete with delicious sweets and a mini spa day from Mr. Pete.

This was the first birthday when I didn't have time to retreat to my favorite coffee shop for an annual time of reflection and journaling. Mr. Pete and I had a packed holiday schedule and decided to host a little soiree in the new abode. I usually spend my time rereading my journal from the year and reflecting on how quickly time passes. This has been a big year: we bought our first house, I taught my first college class, Mr. Pete started grad school, we celebrated two years of marriage, I started my sixth year of teaching, and I bought a Swiffer (hey it changed my life). Needless to say, we've had some monumental changes.