Greetings from sunny Florida!

Well, it's Day Two of my vacation, and I am loving not having to work!  In this blog post, I'll tell you about Day One, what is to come later on Day Two, and what you can expect blog-wise whilst I'm overseas.

So got up at 6 yesterday to go to the airport.  Mom got us past the long security lines and into the super special awesome flight attendant room.  The flight was good, not that long, not that turbulence-y, and very relaxing after running around for the last week.  Then we got to my aunt's house and went to dinner.  After dinner, we went to Kohl's for some late-nite shopping and I got a cute new outfit.  Becki managed to get ahold of her old friend, Amanda, and she spent the night last night.  I tried in vain to get on Skype and talk to Will, but it was down.  :(  If that seemed like a boring paragraph, it was because nothing too special happened yesterday.  :P

Right now, I'm sitting in my Aunt Jan's kitchen, waiting for Becki and Amanda to make pancakes.  Then, some Skype time in with Will (show him my aunt's mansion).  Later today all the womanfolk are going to dinner together, then going to see the Russian Ballet perform The Nutcracker.  Lastly, an early bedtime in an attempt to get on East Coast time and get some sleep before I get on the cruise.

And speaking of the cruise, here's my itinerary, in case you NEED TO KNOW where I am at any minute.

Day	Port  ***	Arrive	Depart	Activity
24-Dec	Fort Lauderdale, Florida		5:00 PM
25-Dec	Cruising
26-Dec	Labadee, Haiti	7:00 AM	4:00 PM	Docked
27-Dec	Cruising
28-Dec	Cartagena, Colombia	7:00 AM	1:00 PM	Docked
29-Dec	Colon, Panama	8:00 AM	6:00 PM	Docked
30-Dec	Puerto Limon, Costa Rica	7:00 AM	7:00 PM	Docked
31-Dec	Cruising
01-Jan	George Town, Grand Cayman	8:00 AM	6:00 PM	Tendered
02-Jan	Cruising
03-Jan	Fort Lauderdale, Florida	7:00 AM

As far as my blog goes, I, of course, will not have Internet on the ship, but I plan on making blog updates on my computer anyway.  When I get back to the States, I will post these updates then, so you can all see what I was up to in the middle of the ocean.  See you all in ten days!  Have a merry Christmas!

A November to Remember: Part 2

OK, I guess I'm on a roll and I should keep going.  The next big event in November: The Harry Potter movie release!

Nicole and I had been planning on this one for a while, and I did remember to ask for this one off.  The next day, that is, so I could sleep after the midnight showing.  We had gone shopping for Harry Potter clothes earlier in the week, so our outfits were ready.  Our tickets were purchased.  All that remained was line-waiting.

I got off work at four that Thursday, which meant I wouldn't be home until 4:30, and I wouldn't be to the theater until at least 4:45.  I knew that once the high schoolers got out of class the line would grow exponentially, so I gave Nicole very clear instructions.  Call the theater at three to see how long the line was.  Be in the vicinity of the theater for quick action.  Get us a good spot.  She promised she would.

She didn't.  I had to work late and everything, counting on her to get us a good spot, and what does she text me?

Sorry, we stopped to eat because I was hungry.  (I hadn't eaten anything all day, so I was unsympathetic.)
Did you pick up something fast?  (I was a half-hour away from home)
No, it's a sit down restaurant.
Is it at least close to the theater?
No, it's by my house.  (fifteen minutes away from the theater.)

She was also eating with her grandmother, who has no sense of urgency at all and was probably taking her time.  I was so mad.  I had been planning on picking something up for us to eat in line, but now I had to hurry and get there.  I hadn't eaten all day, and now I didn't have time to.  I was furious.

I got in line around 5 or 5:15, fuming.  Nicole eventually showed up, redeeming herself because she brought me food.  I didn't say much as I ate, letting the anger leave as my stomach got full.  It was around 5:45 at this point, and we settled down for a long wait.

But not that long.

Just minutes after I finished my sandwich, this guy from Harkins comes walking down the line.  He's far away and all I hear him say is "7:00... need to fill the theater..." and I see two passes fanned out in his hand.  My brain immediately tells me, I don't know why, but this is the time to act, and I yell "Two!  Us!  Right here!"  I didn't think he heard me, because he was still saying other things to other people, but when he got to us he handed us the tickets and started walking back into the building.  We grabbed whatever stuff we had lying around and ran to follow him.  It all happened so quickly!  All of a sudden we were seeing the movie in 30 minutes rather than 5 hours and 30 minutes.

The seats were close to the screen and way on the side, but we weren't about to complain!  A pair of lawyers had rented the two theaters for their clients, and we were crashing.  Sometime before the movie, Nicole pointed out that our original tickets had not been ripped, so we could get our money back and will have seen the movie for free!

"Or," I suggested eagerly, "We could keep them and see it again at midnight!"

So that's what we did.  We saw it twice.

We had to wait in line for the second showing, of course.  But we ended up getting much better seats and we had the added entertainment of watching a teenage girl hang all over her slightly embarrassed boyfriend.  Haha!

But the story doesn't end there.  I ended up seeing the movie again with Jessica the very next night!  We went to the IMAX at Arizona Mills and decided to make a day of it.  We shopped all through the mall.  I found a pair of brown boots I liked at Payless but decided not to buy them, only to discover later that I had left my Gryffindor hoodie there and had to go back to retrieve it.  We perused the wedding dresses at a clothing shop.  We had dinner at Johnny Rocket's.  And the end of the evening, seeing Harry on the ginormous IMAX screen, was so cool.

Those two days were pure fun and excitement.  An awesome break from how hard I had been working!

A November to Remember: Part 1

So, Will has been all over me to update my blog, here.  I guess it has been a while.  I'll fill you in on what's been happening.  While, in October I was pretty bummed, hating my job and all, November brightened everything up!  I had three straight weeks of exciting events.  What a great way to raise my spirits!

The first exciting event was our Celtic Thunder concert.  In case this is your first visit to my blog, or in case you don't know me very well, you can check out the music of Celtic Thunder (CT, cuz I'm already getting lazy) right there in the upper-right hand corner.  This was the third CT concert I have been to, the first being right after Thanksgiving in 2008 and the second being in LA in early November of 2009.  This concert I would be joined by my best friend, Nicole, of course, as well as Kim, who came to LA with us last year, and Heather, Nicole's younger sister and Becki's best friend.  (Becki, in case you were wondering, does not share our enthusiasm for CT, and missed out on this remarkable experience.)

This concert snuck up on me, because I forgot to ask for Wednesday, November 10th off.  By some miraculous occurrence, my boss scheduled that as one of my days off, as well as the next day, Thursday.  Nicole had no classes scheduled for every Wednesday that semester, and so she was free as well.  We decided to make the concert an entire-day thing, and I texted Kim to let her know to come whenever she had free time.  Lo and behold, Kim's class was cancelled.  I called it fate, she called it luck of the Irish, but either way, it was amazing.

I had this idea that we should spend the day making Shrinky-Dink rings.  I had never worked with the stuff before, but I thought it would be fun to show our CT spirit.  So a quick trip to Hobby Lobby, and we were on our way!  Nicole had a slight mishap with the crayons...

 

That last ring was a tribute to Damian McGinty, the youngest and my favorite member of the group, whose song Puppy Love got me hooked on CT for the first time two and a half years ago.  Remember it; it's important to the story.

So after ring-making, it was time to get ready, which was an adventure in and of itself.

 

All ready!

So, after a minor miscommunication about our directions and a car ride full of pent-up excitement, we made it!

We headed straight for the merchandise, of course.  Gotta get the swag.  I ended up with a souvenir program, as always, as well as a Damian poster and a new T-shirt.  Then it was time to take our seats.

This CT tour consisted of three parts.  ONE, a brand new selection of traditional Celtic songs as of yet unreleased on CD.  TWO, "It's Entertainment," the selection of songs released on CD in early spring of this year that pays tribute to different music genres through the years.  And THREE, the Christmas music, released on CD in October.  The way the tour works was as follows:  Before Thanksgiving, the shows would consist of ONE before the intermission and TWO after.  After Thanksgiving, the shows would be TWO before the intermission and THREE after.  Kinda sad because there was no way to hear all the music without traveling somewhere else for a different show, but we were glad we got to hear the songs we had never heard before.

Our favorite one from the new songs was when they sang "Place in the Choir,"  about how all the animal noises make up a symphony.  It was fun, and Damian sang the bass part all by himself.  His voice was so low, it was hilarious.  My concert-mates misunderstood the words, and thought that the word 'place' was a much dirtier word.  They were baffled to hear the lyrics "All of God's creatures have a p*** in the choir..."  I, however, have a much more refined mind, and did not make that mistake.

Other than that, nothing about the concert itself was very notable.  We were very disappointed with the crowd.  They were not enthusiastic at all.  We wanted to be screaming and cheering and standing up, but the atmosphere was not right.  I guess that's the risk you run when you like a band who gets all their publicity from PBS.  Sometimes the audience is just a bunch of old farts.  The most excited they got was when Keith messed up in the song "Hallelujah" and started laughing.  But the boys performed well and it was so exciting to see them.

After the concert, we rushed back to the backstage door to watch them come out.  We had done this in LA last year, and all it got us was sore feet, frostbitten noses, and lots of disappointment.  After standing for 45 minutes, they just got into a van that was parked inside a garage (so we didn't even see them) and drove away.  This year, however, I was lacking the uncomfortable shoes, the weather was pleasant, and there were no garages in sight, so our hopes were high.  Well, except for Heather.  She didn't outwardly complain, because she knew nothing she said was going to move us from the temporary fence they had set up, but she did say she thought the endeavor was a waste of time.  "They're just going to walk five feet from that door to that bus," she said.

"You never know," I replied.

Paul was the first one out.  We yelled his name with the rest of the crowd as he loaded his bag onto the bus.  Then, he dug through it to find a Sharpie, and started heading our way.  OMG, it was a freak out moment for all.  Paul Byrom, THE Paul Byrom, was coming to give us autographs!  I opened my program to his picture and thanked him profusely for his signature.

He left, and we were all still hyperventilating when George Donaldson came out and followed suit.  This was too good to be true.  Paul AND George, both giving us autographs???  We were so lucky!  George, the oldest of the group, was very friendly and actually held several conversations with us.

"Have any of the other lads come over here?" he asked.

"Just Paul," we answered.  I added, "But George Donaldson is the best one!"

He laughed and answered, "That's just because I'm the one that's over here!"  A true statement.

He also wanted to know who had traveled the farthest to get here, and we told him about our previous year's trek to LA.  There was also a point where he was signing and the whole crowd was silent, watching him, and he said, "This is the quietest I've ever heard a group of people," to which I quipped, "That's because we think if we don't scream, you'll stay longer."  He laughed and admitted that was true.

We asked to get a picture with him, but he told us since people pay for Meet and Greet tickets through PBS, it wouldn't be fair to them if he took pictures with us too.  As he was finishing up, Keith AND Ryan both come out of the backstage door!  By this time, we were all thinking how great it would be to get autographs from all of them, and they did end up coming over!  Ryan and Keith must have been ignoring the PBS rule, because they both took pictures with us.  I pushed Kim through the crowd, which was quite sizable at this point, to get a picture with Ryan because he's her favorite.

Finally, there was just one more member left: My favorite, Damian McGinty.  And guess what.  He came over too!  I was so excited!

Sadly, he sided with George on the picture issue.  However, I really wanted to show him the Damian ring I had made.  My time with him was running out, and I couldn't think of a casual, witty way to bring the subject up, so I said what was certainly the dorkiest, most stupid thing I've ever said to a celebrity, but I just couldn't let this opportunity slip through my fingers.

"Hey, Damian!  We made Celtic Thunder rings today, wanna see?"

Well, idiotic as it sounded, it got the job done.  After looking politely at my Celtic Thunder ring, he squinted at my Damian ring and (contrary to what the girls had been telling me all day, that it would freak him out) he yelled "Yeah!" and gave me a high-five.  That's right.  Damian McGinty high-fived me.  Suck it, girls!

After Damian left, we were visited by Neil Bryne, which was an unexpected surprise.  He had been with CT from the beginning, playing guitar and doing back-up vocals for the singers, but lately he's been getting his own solo songs too.  It was icing on the cake.

And so ended one of the greatest nights of my life.  It was the definitely an evening I won't soon forget.

CT, Half-Price Books, and Scorpion Scares

My my, what a night I had last night.

First of all, my Celtic Thunder Christmas album arrived in the mail last night!  I bet you can guess what I'm listening to as I write this.  And what will be in my car for the next three weeks.  It's amazing.  I can't wait 'til after Thanksgiving.  I can listen to Christmas carols all I want now, but they never feel quite the same as they do during the Christmas season.  This CD is such a new release, the tracks weren't on iTunes.  I had to enter them all manually.

After I finished listening to the album and eating dinner, I decided I wanted to go to Half-Price Books.  I've been wanting to visit for a few days as I have been out of reading material.  I'm ashamed to admit I spent a decent amount of money there.  Among my purchases: The Digimon Movie, the second season of Red vs. Blue (What are the odds?), John Tucker Must Die, and four books.  I must say, Half-Price has certainly bulked up their YA section.  It's halfway decent.  The book I decided to start with is called Maze Runner, a book that I'm drawn to every time I visit Borders.  The YA Hardcover price always scared me away, but since the book was half price, I deemed it affordable.  So far, it's good.  It reminds me of a more mature version of Holes, for some reason, and it's keeping me guessing so far.  After I finish, I'll pass it on if it's any good.

So I got back and Mom and Dad were already in bed reading.  Tagalong ran to the top of the steps to greet me, then ran down to follow me into the bathroom (for some reason, he thinks bathroom breaks are group activities).  On the way down the hall, he stopped to sniff something on the tile and I almost had a heart attack when it started moving!  It was a scorpion!  I gasped quite audibly and started yelling at my parents for help.  Mom put a cup over it, and stretched out it could almost reach both sides of the glass.  Huge.  We went to find Tag, who had been surprised enough when the object of his sniffing started running across the floor, but my gasp had freaked him out.  He was sitting with his tail between his legs in the living room, nervous because he was picking up on my fear.  We figured he was okay because he hadn't yipped when he sniffed the scorpion and his nose wasn't tender and didn't seem to be in pain.  He has since made a full recovery, and the scorpion has met his end through my father's shoe.

Que Tragedy!

So, kinda bad stuff lately.  Not too bad though.

First, one of my magnety balls has gone missing!  Now, I know what you're thinking.  "Paige, there are like a ton of magnety balls.  Who cares if you lose one?"  Wrong!  There are not a ton, there are 216.  And 216 was a magic number.  Just the perfect amount to make everything!  Divisible by three, divisible by 6, and divisible by 9.  It was always just enough to make the shapes I needed without any left over.  215 is not magic!  It's a disaster!  It's almost not worth playing with them anymore.  I lost the ball in my room the other night, and believe me, a thorough search will be conducted.  And dagnabbit!  Just looked on the website, and they don't sell them individually.  My magnety balls are called Bucky Balls, and I chose that brand because they were available at Game Daze at the mall.  I know another brand, Zen Magnets, sells theirs individually for cases such as this, but if their magnets are just a teeny bit bigger or smaller than my magnets, the magnets won't align correctly.  Oh!  Woe is me!

Then earlier today I was an hour late for work.  I thought I was working the afternoon shift, but I actually had to work in the morning.  Luckily my boss blamed it on the fact that he changed the schedule, but I still really should have known my hours.  What an idiot I am!

Another work related boo-boo that happened today:  Whataburger has this thing called the Whatagames every year in Texas.  It's kind of a quiz thing, with prizes.  Anyway, they call with three phone surveys to see if your store will go or not.  Unfortunately, I answered the phone today.  I only got one out of five questions right!  I felt horrible!  I really am an idiot!

Well, despite all this bout of bad luck, my day doesn't feel ruined.  My mood is still relatively high.  I'm going to sub for my mom's Bunko group tonight, and my aunt and uncle are in town so tomorrow I get an expensive dinner.  Yay!

Christmas in September

Okay, so normally I get annoyed when stores/radio stations/people start celebrating Christmas before Thanksgiving.  I think that the day after Thanksgiving is a perfectly acceptable time to think about Christmas.  Dad says Costco already has Christmas things out.  Awfully early, don't you think?

Well, I suppose carrying Christmas items is acceptable.  Some people like to shop early, get it all out of the way.  Stores should accommodate those people.  It's when they start playing Christmas music immediately after Halloween that it really irks me.  Thanks.  Now I'm going to have to listen to the same music for two months straight.

Now, notice the third word of this post is 'normally.'  I've decided this year not to let all this bother me because last night, I ordered the brand new Celtic Thunder Christmas CD.  If you are unfamiliar with Celtic Thunder, and I'm not surprised if you are, you can check them out in my little video box in the upper-right hand corner of this page.  Maybe they are singing to you right now.  However, if you know me at all, I've probably tried to force them on you at some point, and you know how excited I get about them.  So I can tell you, when that new CD arrives at my house, I will be religiously listening to Christmas music in September.

That's why I won't get mad at those who start celebrating early.  I will be celebrating too, and I try not to be hypocritical.

The only thing to be careful of is to listen to this CD ONLY until I've enjoyed it JUST BARELY enough.  Can't get too burned out on Christmas music too early in the year, because soon it will be forced upon me, and I really don't want to be in the mood to kill so close to the holidays.

I think of wierd things when I'm at work.

Came up with two little brain nibblies today.
(In case you were wondering, 'brain nibblies' is a term for little bits of food for thought.)

First, I think that if a dog doesn't want to have puppies, it would be called an abarktion.

Secondly, what does wistfully mean?  Full of wist?  What the heck is wist?  Wait a minute, spell check isn't catching wist... is it an actual word?  To dictionary.com!

It says it's the past tense of wit, a verb meaning to know.  Well that doesn't make any sense!  The word wistfully implies full of wist, which would make wist a noun.  Not to mention wistfully has to do with longing, not knowing.  How strange!

My dog is psychic!

So I was just getting a drink of water downstairs.  Tagalong was relaxing on the couch, but when he saw me open up the freezer to get some ice, he jumped off and ran over to the edge of the kitchen.  Tag likes ice.  A lot.  So I didn't pay much attention and filled up my glass.  Meanwhile I see out of the corner of my eye Tags looking at the freezer.  All of a sudden I realize why he jumped up so quickly; he just wanted some ice.  So after I'm done, I turn around to get him a piece, but the freezer, that I just shut, was open.

That's right.  My dog looked at the freezer door AND IT OPENED.

Amazing.

Heehee I gots 2 minions!

Why, thank you, friends!  I am so happy that people want to read what I write!  You two people are the best!  And, since you don't know each other yet, Jessica, Will.  Will, Jessica.  I know you two have heard a lot about each other.

Tonight was a good night for me.  After I made this blog and played with my magnety balls, I went to pizza with my dad and then we watched Airplane!, which I had never seen before.  It was really funny.  That's pretty much all...  My toe still hurts.  I wonder if I got bit by something?  If I did, it's in too hard of a place for me to look at.  I'm sure it'll feel better in the morning.

Now, I'm sure you are all tired of hearing me talk about my toe, so here.  You can look at some pictures of the awesome things I've been making with my magnety balls!

I made this tonight.  It was awesome!  It was all 3-D and stuff.

I made this yesterday.  It's a goblet! ^_^

Alright, time to get ready for bed.  I've got work in the morning.  Don't take any wooden nickels!

Is this it? Am I doing it?

Whee, there is a blog here!  I guess it's time to post what's on my mind now... My current thoughts are as follows:

Thought 1) Everyone else gets a blog!  Why don't I get a blog?  I want a blog!

Thought 2) Yay!  I have a blog!  Consider Thought 1 moot.

Thought 3) What is going on with this enter button?  I don't think this blog works well...

Thought 4) My toe hurts, like I have a splinter or something.  Ow ow ow.  But it started when I got out of my shower and stepped onto the laminate floor, so where would I have gotten a splinter from?

Thought 5) I wanna play with my magnety balls.  I bought some the other day.  They are fun.  I can make shapes.   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-JpM4A4657k

Boy, are my thoughts boring.  Oh, well, I guess for a first post it's not so bad.  I guess I'll play around with this a little and post something actually worth reading later.  See ya, peeps.