Insert Clever Blog Name Here

Hubby and I stayed up really late last night then got up early this morning to go to breakfast. Now, I'm trying to stay awake...the change from CST to DST always screws me up for a few days. Ugh.

Finally took down my Christmas tree/decorations today. Heh.

I'm working the "late shift" this week which is 10:45-7 officially. But I'm going to try to work some overtime by coming in at my usual 9am each day. We'll see how long that lasts. I want to make some extra money on my last check of the month which is one of two during the year with no SF deductions taken out. Need to make the extra to pay my share to the IRS...we owe $650 this year...racka fracka.

My step-brother is in the hospital again. Keep him in your thoughts for me, please.

Baby Max does have a middle name, I'm told, but I still don't know what it is. I have been refraining from calling my daughter because with a newborn in the house, I'm not sure what her sleep cycle is like and I'd hate to call and wake her up. I'll be seeing them all in a couple of weeks, so that'll be great. Check out some new pics.
( Behind the cut. )

It was a beautiful, mild sunny day today here in Middle Tennessee. I'm looking forward to spring.

My friend Holly has started her own business--selling leather goods. Check out her site: North Georgia Leathers

I can't really think of anything else. Gads, my life is dull.

Thanks for reading.

Happy Halloween to all! It's funny how, as you get older, Halloween just doesn't seem as "special" as it used to. We don't even get very many trick-or-treaters, so blah.

Had a lovely weekend with hubby. We just basically lazed around the house, enjoying each other's company. He was disappointed by his friends on Saturday, which really upset me. He has been planning a camp out for at least three weeks. He had spoken to his friend and left a message for his brother about camping on Saturday night at their usual campsite on hubby's family property. Saturday came, hubby was all excited. He got ready, got supplies and then called before he trekked out there (thank goodness). He was not able to get in touch with anyone at first, except his dad who said he didn't think they were going. WTF?? Finally, he got his friend and yep, the others had decided not to go because of various reasons. Nice of them to let him know, eh? Fuckers. He was so disappointed, my heart just broke for him. They decided to try again next weekend, and I hope he gets to go this time. At least it's supposed to be "warmer" this weekend, in the 50s rather than the 30s.

Because he didn't go camping, I didn't get any work done on my fic. It's too hard for me to write while he's there...he's too distracting.

In other hubby news, he bought the "Resident Evil" game for the PS2. Let me tell you, that game is really scary! Even being in the same room while he played it was freaky. My heart pounded and hubby jumped several times. He really likes the game, but it's so intense, he can only play it for an hour or so before he has to take a break.

Things in South Florida are apparently still pretty bad. The reason there's not much news about it outside of FL is apparently because there's pressure not to make Jeb (the idiot Bush's brother) look bad. WTF? My sister and her family are back in South FL now, have the generator set up and running and are doing as well as can be expected. My son told me his power came back on last week, so he's doing okay. He was able to obtain gas from his job...he works as a security guard, so they need him there. I haven't heard an update yet from my daughter or my brother. I heard through the grapevine that my brother was doing okay, he has a generator. His biggest problem was that there is a gas station literally right behind his back yard, and they got their power back on last week. This caused people to start lining up at like 3am, and the line wound around the block to the street in front of my brother's house. People were trashing the yard, with not only trash, but also peeing there, too. YUCK. But it seems that there are more gas stations with power back now, so that situation should be better.

Work still sucks, I'm just marking the days until I can leave.

Well, I've heard from both of my children who live in Ft. Lauderdale, FL. They and their families survived Hurricane Wilma with a minimum of damage. Neither has electricity. My son's apartment (last I heard) did not have running water, although my daughter's had gotten a trickle back by yesterday. They both said it is the worst storm to hit since Andrew. There are trees and poles down everywhere. Because there's no electricity, there's no gas stations working. My daughter said the closest working gas station is at the Pompano Service Plaza/Rest area on the Florida Turnpike. She also said the line was miles long.
I still haven't heard from my sister or my brother. I heard from my son that my sister lost her fence and did not have electricity or water. She was thinking of going north to hang out with my Dad for a few days, but I'm not sure if she did or not. Apparently, the building she works in may have sustained structural damage...which would be kind of awful since it's the American Express Southern Region Operations Center. Where I used to work before I moved here. *frets*
I tried to call my sister's house a few minutes ago and got no answer...don't know if that's because the phone service isn't working or she's not there. I am going to call my Dad in a little bit to see if she is indeed going to go up there.
I'm a bit worried, and I did tell the kids if they needed anything I would try to ship it to them...I also offered to have them come up and stay, but I don't think they're going to do that. I don't know why--it's only 900+ miles away. ;)

Just a quick entry to share a couple of pictures with you. My kids and grandkids and the t-shirt my husband designed for the Murfreesboro State Farm March of Dimes Walk America Walk-a-thon folks.

( Fair warning, the pics are HUGE )

I received a belated Christmas gift today from my children. Gorgeous pictures of their babies. And included was a disk of many, many other pics of the babies, family and friends. I won't bore you with all of them, but I insist on sharing a few. ( First Family Christmas Pics )

It was wonderful to receive the package this morning and watching the slideshow brought a tear to my eye. I miss my family so much.

On another note, I think I'll go to the fabric store today. I want to try out my new sewing machine and I thought I'd break it in by attempting to make a shirt for myself. I'll let you know how it went.

Chapter 10 of "The Binding..." was emailed to the betas tonight. Snape's revenge! W00T!! I love how it turned out. So Slytherin.

The next chapter will have much lemony goodness and Lucius Malfoy. But I think I'm going to detour a bit and work on the KA Christmas Challenge first...

Hubby and I spent a quiet day at home...we are going to spend Thanksgiving at his folk's house in the country and stay over Thursday and Friday nights...it'll be nice...

I miss my family in Ft. Lauderdale most at this time. The holidays with that gang of people are just like what you see on tv...and I miss that. Maybe next year I can go down for one or the other...

That's it for now, gonna go play a mindless video game and try to coerse my dear one into bed... with ulterior motives! Buwahahahahahaha!

Just a quick update to let you all know that we got back Monday night, safe and sound. The trip was emotionally exhasting, but very good. Saw my grandbabies, kids and assorted other relatives...some of whom I haven't seen in years.

I will post a much more detailed entry as soon as I get the pics and some other stuff I want to share with you all.

On a completely different note, tomorrow is our fourth wedding anniversary. (And they said it wouldn't last!)

I wrote four more pages of my fic last night, I may finally get it updated this weekend--W00T!

Now, I'm off to catch up on all my forums, websites, blogs, LJ's...

Because I got rear-ended (not THAT way you pervs) last night on my way home from work. On Interstate 24, a couple of miles before my exit, they are doing roadwork, widening the road from two lanes to four. During rush hour, the traffic backs up as all the cars try to squeeze into two lanes. I was in the far right lane, completely stopped when WHAM! A lady in a red beemer smacked into me. Luckily I was stopped and she was only going about 10-15 mph, but it was a hell of a bump. I was wearing my seat belt, but I still got a huge jolt. We pulled over and got out, there was no damage to the car, so she apologized and we both went on our way. By the time I got home, my shoulder/neck area was sore and it got progressively worse during the night. By this morning I was so stiff, I could hardly move, so I called into work.
What a (literal) pain in the neck.

On a brighter note, I have heard from everyone in my family except my dad. He lives in north-central Florida in the country, so it's possible his phone/electricity is out. But, I still wish he or someone would drive into town and find some way to contact someone--because I am a bit worried. Everyone else came through the storm with minimal to no damage. I am very thankful.

The Amazing Race lived up to its name last night as they went to New Zealand! (Not a hobbit or elf in sight, unfortunately) They did a cool water sport called "sledging" which is like taking a boogie board with handles down white water rapids http://www.frogz.co.nz/ . And they did another thing called "zorbing" in which you blow up a big plastic ball and get inside and roll down a hill http://www.zorb.com/ . I want to go to New Zealand even more, now. The twins, Kami and Karli were eliminated (YAY!) but I'm worried because my favorite team, Chip and Kim are in fourth place. There is a curse on the people who are fourth when there are only four teams left...they have been eliminated every race so far. I hope Chip and Kim are the ones to break this curse.

I am going to take advantage of my day today to work on Chapter 9 of "The Binding", which I outlined the other night. I'm thinking of adding a smoking hot scene with Draco and the girls, which came to me last night as I was drifting off to sleep.
I wish more people would review it, tho. *sigh*