Anyone Need A Roommate?

My apartment complex is awesome. And by awesome, I mean not awesome at all. I called today because my lease is nearing its 60-days-until-it's-over and I wanted to know what my options were. Needless to say, apparently I was supposed to get a "letter" explaining my options two weeks ago so I would have time to decide. No letter has been received and now I have to give my notice by tomorrow if I decide I want to move out at the end of my lease.

If I move out, fine, great, but I will have to be out by the end of February (yikes!) and I'm pretty sure I'm not ready to move yet. If I stay, I have two equally craptastic options: a) sign a 12 month lease along with a rate hike of almost $125/month or b) go month to month with a corresponding rate hike of $300+/month! Given that I'm paying $650, that's at least a 20% increase in my rent for no other reason than we changed management companies! You have to be kidding me!

So needless to say, if anyone wants to pick up a couple hundred bucks and a roommate for a few months while I house hunt, I'm in the market! I swear I'll be a nice roommate and I shouldn't be there long - I just don't want to rush the house hunt because who knows where that would stick me. Ugh. Stupid apartments. Stupid, stupid, stupid apartments.

Merry Christmas!

I hope everyone has a very Merry Christmas! I'm sad I haven't gotten to spend the holidays this year with family, but everyone around here has done a very good job of making this a special year.

And extra thanks for all of the super cool presents! I got everything I wanted and then some... I'll post pictures later today - along with my second decorating job for the year. It's pretty sweet. :)

But for now, I'm going to go cuddle with Lillie and enjoy a relaxing day at home! Merry Christmas everybody!

12 Christmas Facts

Let the tagging continue... Dana tagged me for sharing 12 Christmas facts about me. How ever do I narrow them down?? :)

Here they are in no particular order...

12 Christmas Facts

1. My favorite Christmas TV special of all time is "A Claymation Christmas." If you haven't seen it, come talk to me. It's amazingly bad and awesome at the same time. I mean, it has the California Raisins!! How can you not like it??
2. My mom made ornament lists in order to keep us from fighting over who's ornaments were who's at the end of each Christmas season. The lists contain the ornament description and who gave it to us by year... it started when we were born and continues up until she gave us each our boxes upon moving out. (And people wonder where I get it from...)
3. Every year my mom makes us Christmas breakfast (which of course we eat after we open presents). For several years she made this AWFUL dish called a "puff pancake". It was this weird fruit filled pastry and I don't think anyone in our family liked it. Nobody had the heart to tell her so year after year we all suffered through the puff pancake and joked about it when mom left the room. Finally, about 3 years ago someone (I honestly don't remember who, but it was probably me) got up the gumption to ask why, after all these years, we continued to have puff pancake since nobody likes it. Mom had no idea we didn't like it - she didn't even like it and luckily, the puff pancake has never graced our presence since.
4. All of the kids' stockings in my family were sown by (I think...) my mom's aunt. I'm pretty sure they were hand made anyway... Though I'm probably going to have that sweet memory dashed by posting this and getting corrected by mom. :)
5. My mom is the only person I know that has a completely separate set of dishes she uses around Christmas.
6. Colored lights anywhere is a big no-no in my book. Colored lights inside the house should be a criminal offense. It drives me BATTY! (Even though for the first 15 or 16 years of my life our house was filled with colored lights everywhere.)
7. I own three santa hats. Why do I own three? I don't know. Just in case? And for the record - they are awesome.
8. It 100% does not faze me that I had to remove my TV, find a new place for an arm chair, completely rearrange my living room, and ask a friend to house my TV console for the holidays just to fit in my Christmas tree. It's all for the cause...
9. My Christmas music folder comprises almost 35% of the music content on my hard drive. I have everything from A Twisted Christmas to Kenny G. And yes - I listen to all of it. Oh yeah - for me, Christmas music season doesn't start at Thanksgiving. It starts somewhere around early November with pheasant hunting season. Do I hunt pheasant? Nope. But my ex did and we started the tradition then. Even though we aren't together any more, I think it's a good policy so I kept it. :)
10. Every year we get underwear in our stockings. The sad part is, most years it's one of the things I look forward to most! It's a tradition, what can I say. I can't wait until I have nieces and nephews (because, let's admit it - I'm probably not going to join the kiddo band wagon) so I can put underwear in their stockings too!
11. My dad played the Grinch one year in our church Christmas play. We were all Whos who didn't know what to do. It was hilarious. And the biggest thing I miss about being home for Christmas? The candlelight service on Christmas Eve with the handbell choir. I'm still looking for something like that around here.
12. My favorite Christmas candy of all time is my mom's homemade toffee. Each year she makes around 8-10 batches to give to people. And each year I get warned that I'm not allowed to eat it all. And each year I end up eating 3-4 batches on my own, rather handily I might add. I love the stuff. Most people eat it in 1" pieces. I knock off a fourth of a pan (they are about 12" round pans) at a time. It's amazing.

This reminds me - I really need make a batch of toffee. Maybe that's why it hasn't felt like Christmas yet...

Oh yeah - I tag Todd, Josh & Lisa, and Melissa! Quick like a cat - it's almost Christmas!

Finally!!

It's Christmas!! I know, it took me FOREVER to get these posted... but for your Christmas enjoyment, I now present to you (and don't get too excited. I don't think they are as good as last year.) ...

The Decorations!!

Found!

I discovered two things this morning:

1) If I'm not looking for something in my apartment, it's only because I haven't realized it's missing yet.

2) My camera cord was buried in my stack of mail that I need to sort through.

I discovered these things as I was on a frantic hunt for my car keys trying to get out the door in time to make it to my sim. Apparently I was more desperate this morning than I was the other day looking for my camera cord because I was looking in weirder places. But happy day, I found the keys and the cord and now I can post pictures tonight. Yippee!

Note to Self: Get Directions

What was supposed to be a 6 mile run quickly turned into ... well, a bit longer run. Apparently the map I made earlier in the day somewhat stuck in my head and mixed with the 6 mile route I was supposed to run. Needless to say, after about 2.5 miles and reaching an intersection I was never intending to get close to, I realized that my 6 miler was going to take longer than I thought. Turns out it was about 2 miles longer than I thought.

This is the route I thought I was doing...

This is the one I ended up on...

Not only that, but I wasn't aware (for those of you from the area) that El Dorado from Brook Forest to Hickory Knoll does not have sidewalks. Who doesn't have sidewalks?? I was jogging along, all kinds of excited that I was surviving this run, when -- BAM!! No more sidewalk. So after 15 minutes of off-roading for about a quarter mile (man that killed my mile time) I finally made it back to sidewalks and enjoyed the rest of my run.

Best part about it? This was a BIG personal accomplishment for me! Up until now, the longest run I've ever done on my own was about 3 miles. All of my bigger runs have been with Nel or someone else by my side egging my pride to keep going. Today was my first big run by myself! I'm very excited. VERY! Usually on a run like this I would stop about every 1.5 miles to walk... and usually it's just because I'm worried I won't finish if I don't. This time, I only made one stop at my water break for a few minutes. Though I consider my off-roading a break. I wasn't moving very fast and I kept having to stop to let traffic have the right-of-way. Either way, I finished! WOO!!!

I think I might survive this half marathon thing after all...

Insert New Angry Face...

Apparently in the midst of my cleaning frenzy I decided that it wasn't important to know where my camera cable is and hid it from myself. I have a camera full of pictures and no way to get them to my computer. Amazing. Abso-freaking-lutely amazing.

And on the sad face front... I'm not so sure I'm going to be able to get a house as soon as I would've liked. I'm hoping my new pay grade will help out a bit, but we'll see. If not, I guess I'll be renewing my lease for another term. Not exactly what I had wanted to do, but keep your ears to the ground. I really want to get out of renting soon.

Oh yeah. And my Roomba is blinking the red light of death. Apparently this isn't a good sign. This is the point in the bad-day pie when I normally say "Check, please!"

Insert Angry Face Here

Today was a good day. I had a sim. It seemed to go pretty well and I got good, constructive feedback that will help me next time. Good stuff. I was happy.

Then I got a double dose of ... ehhh ... news. Not terrible. Not at all what I wanted to hear. And definitely frustrating. I'm not really willing to comment on either item yet today because I'm angry about them both and I'm 99% sure that my temper is largely due to the late bedtime and early wake up time this morning. I need time to cool off first.

Needless to say, I really hope I wake up from my nap to realize I've blown everything out of proportion and it's not as bad as I feel like it is right now...

The good news for my readers? I clean when I'm angry. I clean a lot. And I am not a happy Erin right now. This means pictures should be a nearly done deal by the end of the night (assuming my camera decides to cooperate).

No Turning Back...

It's official. I'm definitely going to be attempting to run the Houston Aramco Half Marathon in January. Up until this point I had the option to opt out and sell my registration to someone else should I not feel prepared... I've decided to hold onto it and give it a shot. Cross your fingers folks!!

I've also gotten suckered into running the Austin Half with a bunch of friends... That one should be a lot of fun, but man. I never thought I'd be one of those "running people."

On happier news, I am now ~95% complete with Christmas decorations. Another day should do me and today is looking to be that day. My goal is to post pictures by this evening sometime... Keep an eye out!