Zucchini Bread

Growing up, there was no time to waste when the zucchini bread came out of the oven.  My Mom would beg us to let it cool, but there was no time.  When you have five people all anxiously awaiting a piece you had to fight your way for firsts, seconds, and even thirds.  A loaf did not last long in our household

For some reason I have never made zucchini bread.  It kind of seems like some superwoman skill only possessed by my mother.  However, this weekend I was bored so I decided to give it a shot. I have to say that I missed fighting off my brothers...

Recipe adapted from Betty Crocker

INGREDIENTS:

-3 cups of shredded zucchini (about 3 medium size zucchinis)
-1 2/3 cup sugar
-2/3 cup vegtable oil
-2 tsp. vanilla
-4 large eggs
-3 cups all purpose flour
-2 tsp. baking soda
-1 tsp. salt
-1 tsp. ground cinnamon
-1/2 tsp. baking powder
-Optional 1/2 cup of raisin, nuts, or chocolate chips

DIRECTION:

1. Move the oven rack to a position where the top of the pan(s) will be in the center of the oven. Heat oven to 350 degrees.

2. Grease the bottom only of either two 8x4 or one 9x5 inch loaf pans.

3. Mix zucchini, sugar, oil, vanilla, and egg until well mixed.  Stir in remaining ingredients except nuts, raisins, or chocolate chips. Mix well.  Stir in the optional ingredients if desired.

4. Bake 8 inch loaves for 50-60 minutes, or 9 inch loaf for an hour and 20 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean (it took me and hour forty).

5. Cool for 10 minutes on wire rack.  Loosen sides of loaf and remove.  Cool for 2 hours.

6. Eat it quickly before everyone else.

Sunday Post

Head on over to Seven Dames a Week to read my Sunday Post "41 Days."

Book 7: Spoken From the Heart by Laura Bush

I recently finished "American Wife," a fictional book loosely based on the life of Laura Bush. Coincidentally Laura Bush's Autobiography "Spoken From the Heart" was released right when I was finishing up "American Wife" and I thought it would be fun to compare the two so I read them back-to-back.  I was excited to read this book because the Bush administration is the first presidential era that I remember intellectually engaging in.  During the Clinton years I was a bit too young to know what was going on, but the "W" era hit me at my political prime: end of high school and college.  I have always been a huge political junkie, so my hopes were that this book would shed some light on the inner working of the Bush White House.

If I could describe this book in one word it would be this: enjoyable. This book is not an epic page turner, but I found myself reading from it a little every night and never feeling like it was a chore (unlike how I felt about Barbara Walter's autobiography "Audition," which is still sitting on my bookshelf, half read).  Some of it is become very "list-y" in the sense of "I did this, and then this happened, then I started this initiative, then I visited this person." Yet I kept in mind throughout the book that this was not only her personal autobiography, but an important work of history so she was likely trying to mark all notable events and trips that took place during her time as first lady.

I found the book to be extremely candid, but nothing too salacious.  However there was a few really interesting tidbits scattered throughout.  For example, she spoke about how Bill Clinton fell asleep during Bush's first inauguration because he and Hillary had stayed up late the night before watching movies in the White House theater. In a factual manner she told the story about how the media had railed on her when she was late for her first meeting with Hillary Clinton, when really it was Clinton who was late and didn't call for Laura's car until after their scheduled meeting time. There were also some lighthearted moments, one of which she recalls how she wore the same Oscar de la Renta gown as three other women at a reception before the Kennedy Center Honors...and after laughing it off crept back upstairs to change into a navy blue dress different from the others.

One really interesting part was when she wrote about how on 9/11 she was scheduled to visit with Edward Kennedy and was in his office right when the towers were struck.  Instead of being glued to the television, like the rest of America, Kennedy pretty much ignored what was going on and kept talking to Laura about education policy while the towers fell on the television that was echoing in the background.

I have to be honest, silent tears fell down my cheeks as I read about 9/11.  I have already repressed so much of what our country was going through during that time, and it was shocking to relive it through her perspective. One of my favorite parts of the book was when she recalled George meeting with a Lieutenant Colonel Brian Birdwell, who was injured in the attack on the Pentegon. She writes:

...George raised his hand to salute the injured solider on the bed. for almost a half a minute, Lieutenant Colonel Birdwell worked to move this heavily bandaged hand to his head to return the salute.  George would not break his salute until the solider was finished with his own.  In the military, there is no higher sign of respect than for an injured officer to be saluted first by his commander. (pg 208) 

The book was not defense of her husband.  She very obviously made the choice to have her husband discuss his political decisions in his own memoir which is coming out soon.  She does, however, set the stage for his defense by describing in detail what was going on at that time and reaffirming her belief that he made the best decisions he could with the information he had available to him at the time. She writes:

"I wondered if Barack Obama, who spent far more time attacking George than he did his opponent, John McCain, would want to amend his words once he discovered the reality of the White House and was himself confronted by the challenges and crises that hit a president every day, all day." (pg 412).  

Overall I enjoyed the book.  I would not suggest this book to anybody but my dorky political friends, but if you have a bit of political dork in you this might be an interesting summer read.

...now that I have got in some "smart" reading my next book is Emily Giffin's "Heart of the Matter" that I am going to blaze through this weekend so I can have it finished by the time of her book signing on Tuesday in Dallas.  Anybody else going to be there?

Don't forget to friend me on Goodreads! My username is DuolyNoted. 

I Now Run Marathons

Last Friday I was asked to speak at four sessions for a local Middle School's Career Day. I immediately said yes to the opportunity as I love nothing more then prattling on about the do's and dont's of law school and the like. I made some minor tweaks to some presentations I have given in the past and then tried to psych myself up for middle school children. The panels and events I have spoken at in the past have always been for college level students so I knew I was going to have to bring it down to their level and have a lot more energy.

But Oh. My. God.

At first I was feeling confident about the cool factor of being a lawyer.  That was until I arrived and saw firemen, chefs, dog trainers, and cosmetologists.  Being a lawyer totally sucks compared to these professions.  I was greeted by a local NHS ambassador who was supposed to get some general information about me for an introduction she gave before the start of each period. One of the questions was "what is your hobby?"

Me: Um. Well, I don't know. I started running in races. I guess you could say that.

Girl: Like long distance races?

Me: Uh, yea. Well, they aren't sprints if that is what you mean.

Girl: So like marathons?

Me: Oh my gosh no, like 5ks and 10ks, but I am training for a half marathon.

Girl: Uhhhh...I am just going to say marathon, it sounds better.

Me: I don't think anybody is going to believe that I run marathons.

Girl: I had a teacher who ran marathons once and she was way bigger then you so people will totally think that you run them.

So there I was being introduced to a group of kids and at the end my little NHS representative would proudly proclaim "...and she runs marathons!"

It is always good to start off your presentation with a total lie.

Now I like to think that I am a pretty good public speaker.  I am energetic, ask questions, give out prizes.  I rigged my powerpoint presentation with sound effects and funny pictures.  But I'll be damned if I didn't have at least five kids in every session who looked like they wanted to gouge out their eyes with boredom.  In hopes of trying to reengage them my gestures got bigger and my voice got louder. By the end of the day I was completely hoarse and felt like I had, in fact, just ran a marathon.

The moral of this story is this: I take my hat off to all the teachers in this country.  It is a really tough job to try and get students to listen to you and learn from you on a daily basis. I can't imagine preparing lesson plans into the night and then having your students fall asleep during them in the day.  I only got a taste of your job, but it was enough for me to realize what a difficult (and important!) job you have. 

One Year Ago Today...

The fridge was full of chocolate covered strawberries...

My bridesmaids came prepared to stop all pre-wedding jitters....

I had to rush to put on my dress because I was really, really late.

We had our first look, which I was skeptical about doing, but in the end so glad that we did. That special moment right before the ceremony definitely calmed my nerves. 

I swallowed a bug because I was smiling so much.

The boys messed around with the Hummer.

We said "I do" in an outdoor ceremony.  I spent a whole year worried about the weather and on that day it was a perfect 80 degrees, not a cloud in the sky, with a light breeze you didn't even notice.  We were so blessed.

We were joined by a special group of family and friends...

I tried every bit of food that we ordered.  We laughed until we cried at the toasts.  My wine glass was magically refilled after every sip.

We cut the cake...

...and took a moment to enjoy the setting sun...

And then danced and danced and danced all night...(and yes, I think everybody might be doing the lawnmower in this picture.) 

One year down - here is to many, many more to go!

*Photo Credit: Summit Photography

Sunday Post

The ladies of Seven Dames a Week are doing a theme week on all of our daily rituals.  Mine should come as no surprise to anybody who knows me, read it HERE and let me know if you are the same way. 

BBQ Fruit

We are grill people.  We love to grill everything: hotdogs, hamburgers, chicken, steak, you name it.  However, we had to leave our grill in Spokane upon the move last summer because it would not fit in the U-Haul (a major problem that comes with moving so frequently....things just get chucked out the window with the stress of everything and you miss them later).  This weekend I left Dan with one of my credit cards for "emergencies" while I was gone (his wallet got stolen last week. Awesome).  I came home and we had a grill. Apparently it was an "emergency."

Last night was the grill's ceremonial first BBQ and we made shish kabobs with steak, squash, zucchini, onions, and pineapple.  That is when I got my great idea, why not BBQ fruit?  I mean if you can do pineapple surely you can do bananas and strawberries, right? RIGHT?

Dan thought I was crazy but I googled it and you most certainly CAN grill bananas and strawberries.  I made a sauce that was 1/4 cup butter, 2 tbs lemon juice, 2 tbs honey and brushed it onto the fruit (but not the pineapple). Then, Dan grilled the fruit for about five minutes on each side.

Lo' and behold it was delicious! I'm serious! It tasted really good! Who knew BBQ bananas and strawberries could be so great. We also grilled some pineapple and I sprinkled cinnamon and sugar on them for dessert. Fantastic. I love summer.

Lets Hear It for Chiiiiccaaagggooo

Concrete jungles where dreams are made of! There's nothin' you can't do!

Oops wrong song.

Well I am back from Chicago...a day later then expected but I will get to that in a moment.

The trip was ridiculously fun, and I think a good girls weekend was just what the doctor ordered. I have known M. since we started our first day of Jr. High, so 14 years.  She was the MOH in my wedding last summer, and this June I am the MOH in hers.  She recently moved to Chicago, and this was my first time there (well, other then my cross country road trip where I went to Navy Pier.)

On Friday M. and I wandered around the downtown suburbs and went veil shopping.  She is going for a short veil with Russian lace, and I am so jealous because I wanted to wear a short veil but it did not go with my dress.  After about four hours of shopping we found the perfect one and she is going to look so amazing in it!  This photo is obviously NOT of veil shopping, rather from downtown.  None of the little boutiques would let us take pictures of the veils, which angers me to no end.  I know that there is a fear in the bridal industry of having people copy/get your veils for cheaper - but its so frustrating shopping for such an important day and not being able to look back at pictures to compare.  Once we tried on veil 8 it was difficult to remember what veil 2 looked like. If you have the best veil, we are going to buy it from your boutique.  Have confidence in what your selling and let us take pictures.  I think its just good customer service.

I also tried my first bubble tea at a very authentic little Taiwan place and it was delicious! What a fun drink! I can't believe I have never tried it before.  I have to find a good place in Dallas to get some because I simply cannot go the summer without more of this beverage.

Dallas is the first place that I have ever lived to have a Whole Foods.  I have heard wonderful things, but every time I think to go there it is on the weekend and the place looks like a zoo.  After hours of veil shopping we stopped by for some impromptu sushi and I am now hooked.  What an amazing store! I must go back and try their buffet lunch!

The night of the Bachlorette party I was really nervous about all of the locations I chose - but I got some great suggestions from all of you and I really have to thank everybody for all of your help (especially missris and Footsteps Through Life who are locals and gave me the low-down on the Chicago area via email).  I was really nice to M., she only had to wear a sash and Mardi Gra beads (which she gave away to those who bought her drinks!)

We started off at the Hancock Tower's Signature Lounge for fun drinks and a great view.  We arrived around 7PM which was perfect because you have to stand in line to catch the elevator to the 95th floor and the wait was not too long.  At around 9 the line was ridiculous, so I am glad we made it our first stop.  We were able to grab the perfect table right by the window and this was our view:

We watched the Chicago skyline go from this.

To this! 

Finally to this! (A bit blurry but you can imagine the scene, right?)  

It was the perfect place to start the evening and we stayed there for way longer then expected.  Then we went to Fado Irish Pub which was so fun, but very packed despite being three levels.  We ended the night off at Howl at the Moon Dueling Piano Bar which was perfection because they totally took care of us and there were like five bajillion Bachlorette parties there, hence everybody was in a good mood and there was lots of singing and dancing. 

And then of course the next morning I realized I am old and seriously cannot party like I used to....yikes. 

I was supposed to fly out around 8 PM that night.  I had previously printed out my itinerary and upon looking at it I was like "oops, I printed out the same itinerary twice." Wrong. I realized at around 4:30 on Sunday that I PURCHASED TWO FLIGHTS FROM DALLAS TO CHICAGO as in I NEVER PURCHASED A RETURN FLIGHT. Dumb! Dumb! Dumb! Thank God I bought tickets on Southwest (the only airline to fly) because they were great about finding me a flight the next morning and crediting me what I had already paid with my useless flight towards my new flight, but I still had to shell out an extra $200.

Other then that, awesome weekend, and now we are just counting down the days until they are Mr. and Mrs.! Can't wait!

365 Project Photos 4/11-5/11

Here are some selections from the last 30 days of my Project 365:

April 13

It was around this time that our giant tree in our front yard started puking pollen. Everywhere.  I was refilling Kadira's water bowl for what felt like 100 times a day but those little buggers always fell right back into it.

April 16

Routine.  Every morning, a cup of coffee at my side while I mindlessly peruse blogs, emails, twitter...and sometimes work.  If you are a coffee drinker, its important to find your right "pace" mug.  You don't want a mug that is too big that you can't drink it in time without the bottom getting cold. This cup is the perfect mug for me and my morning cup of joe (currently being supplied by a very dear friend who sent us various packages of deluxe coffee in the mail! Best surprise ever!) 

April 21

Vines started overrunning our backyard from whatever-the-hell is happening over in our neighbors yard.  These pictures were taken right before they were chopped off for encroaching on our property just a bit too much. 

April 22 

As I said before, the fun and challenge of this project is when nothing else is going on in your life you have to attempt to capture little things.  This is just a fence. Nothing special, but I did end up liking the photo.

May 3, 2010 

Apparently this time of the year is known for its thunderstorms in Texas, and the other day the cloudy skies just let loose with a torrential downpour and lots of rain.  Then, out of nowhere, it just stopped and a fully formed double rainbow appeared in the sky (sorry for the bush in the picture, I had to hide in the garage because it was still raining and I didn't want it to ruin my camera). 

-Continued Below-

As the sun went down that night the sky literally exploded into an furry of orange, and I swear on my life I did not photoshop that picture one single bit. It was that stunning.

To see the photos from 3/11-4/11 go HERE. 

I am off to Chicago for the weekend for my childhood best friend's Bachlorette party!  Thank you for all your comments and emails on planning this little shindig.  I am very confident that it is going to be an epic evening. 

Tuesday Q&A

Hillary over at A Gal and her Dog tagged me in a question and answer game that was just too much fun to not take part in! (PS You have to go check out Hillary's blog, her dog Maddy is totally Toby's girlfriend.) 

1) Who is your style icon?

I have two:

(Photo Source)

First, Michelle Obama, because she always looks so classy and fabulous no matter where she is.  She also wears a ton of red...and ya'll know how much I love the color red.

(Photo Source) 

Second, Kate Middleton.  She looks stylish all the time. It make me wish that I was still in England so I could get constant coverage of all her amazing clothes.

2) What is your favorite Socialite Lit book? 

I have no idea what that means.  Maybe because I am not a socialite? But I would like to take this time to plug a book that is very near and dear to my heart...

The highly anticipated fourth novel Heart of the Matter by Emily Giffin is being released today! Yipee! If you aren't familiar with Giffin I recommend starting with Something Borrowed, which is currently being made into a feature film.

3) Favorite party theme? 

If there is a party that centers around watching a Gonzaga basketball game, I will be there. 

4) Go-to Halloween costume? 

I think, with rare exception, I have either been a Catholic school girl or a 50's poodle skirt wearing person every single Halloween. How lame is that?

5) Extravagance you can't live without?

Wine. Every time I go to the grocery store I think about how much cheaper my bill would be if I would have just said no to that bottle Shiraz (but it was on sale, I've never tried it before, its good to have a stock of wine for unexpected company!). Excuses, excuses.

6) Living person you admire?

Oh this one is too easy. One word. OPRAH. Do you think she'll have me over for dinner when I am in Chicago this weekend?  I sure hope so. 

7) Greatest fear? 

Turbulence on airplanes. I am not actually scared of airplanes at all, it is when they start rocking around that the blood rushes from my body and I have to resist the urge to claw off the arm of the person sitting next to me.  I did, however, sit next to a very nice former pilot who explained to me that a commercial airplane going down in the continental United States is practically impossible.  We spent the flight from Seattle to Boise discussing how a plane is created and how the entire US flight system is configured.  I now feel much better about flying...but I still don't like turbulence.

I also, ironically, have a fear of being kidnapped while running outside.  Its totally ridiculous, I know, but I still wont run outside by myself. I blame it my overexposure to the murder of Jeralee Underwood when I was a little kid.  To this day I wont watch any TV shows about murders: Cold Case, SUV, all those.  Not for me. Totally freaks me out. 

8) Trait you deplore in yourself?

Probably refusing to run outside because I am scared of getting kidnapped!? Can you imagine what better shape I would be in if I would just run outside? Or the fact that I could save money because I wouldn't have a gym fee to my super creepy gym?

9) Which talent would you most like to have?

Photographic memory because not only would it come in handy in my career, it also would provide great party tricks. Case in point.  My husband literally has a photographic memory and he can do totally weird things with it. The other day I was saying how I wanted to learn how to say the ABC's backwards (I don't know WHY I just DO!).  He then, without skipping a beat, recites the ABC's backwards.  I am shocked. "When did you learn how to do that?" I say.  He responds, "I didn't. I just visualized the alphabet in my head and read it backwards."

TOTAL FREAK.  I wish I could do that. 

10) Greatest achievement? 

Well I got my bar card in the mail last week which was definitely the smallest part of this whole "becoming a lawyer" process, but in some ways it was the most meaningful.  Why? Because it was over. All the tests, all the classes, all the paperwork.  It was done.  I can call myself a lawyer now, which is something I have wanted to do since I was 12 years old.  

Want to take part in the fun? Consider yourself tagged! Feel free to link your answers in the comments! 

Book 6: American Wife by Curtis Sittenfeld

(Photo Source) 

Recently I went to my local Half Price Books and picked up a copy of American Wife by Curtis Sittenfeld via a recommendation by Rachel over at In No Simple Language. 

This book was really interesting!  I am a bit of a modern presidential history fanatic so I love to read presidential biographies and I REALLY love biographies about first ladies.  I have read a great deal of books on the Bush family, and politics aside I find them fascinating (as you may have guessed by my many tweets when Laura Bush appeared on Oprah recently).  I was really surprised that I had not heard of this book before...but it came out while I was living in my little law school hole so that explains that.

This book is self described as a "work of fiction loosely inspired by the life of an American first lady." i.e. Laura Bush.  Essentially, Sittenfeld uses what we know about the life of the notoriously private Laura Bush and then fills the gaps with salacious bits of fiction that makes the book not only a page turner, but also makes you wonder...

Throughout this book I kept giggling to myself because in many ways you could tell it was written by a man who was so desperately trying to invade a woman's psyche.*  While overall Sittenfeld did a very good job writing from the perspective of a woman, there were some moments where I thought to myself "only a man would think a woman would ever have that kind of a thought." It was a also a little crude, like only a man could write.  Especially when it came to all of Charlie's jokes.  Only a man could create the character of Charlie and think for one minute that a women like Alice would find him endearing (obviously, I thought the character of Charlie vs. George Bush was a little misplaced). Definitely a man's fictitious dream.

The only part of the book that I really did not like was the scene with Pete Imhof.  However, I must admit it is often hard for me to separate whether I don't like a particularly graphic part of a book due to the mere graphic nature of the scene or because I think that the content was misplaced.  I don't know that I thought the content of the scene was misplaced in this book, as it did create a drama that ran through the book very well, I just really hated the scene in part because I did not see it coming. 

What I did like about the book was that it provides a unique and unfiltered perspective regarding what it would feel like to the wife of George Bush (although, as stated above, I felt like the character of "Charlie" was a little manipulated by a liberal author with a bit of an agenda).  I love the middle, where Alice and Charlie fall in love. I really enjoyed the character of Alice and thought her character development was done very well. Only the last hundred pages or so deals with the actual "White House years," but it was a new perspective to see the White House from the view of the first lady that wasn't funneled through the administration to determine whether it was "on message."  While it was a work of fiction, we do know that a great deal of first ladies have disagreed with their husbands on major policy issues but rarely ever do they ever speak out about it.  This book, despite its fictitious nature, gave us a view inside the mind of a woman who might completely disagree with her husband's political ideology but is forced to keep it to herself because he is the president of the United States.  That for me this was a unique insight and one I enjoyed very much.

Now I mentioned in the beginning that I am a huge lover of political biographies...so it shouldn't be surprising that my next book that I am excited to embark into is Spoken From The Heart by Laura Bush herself.  This is particularly difficult for me because I have been ANXIOUSLY anticipating the release of Emily Giffin's fourth book Heart of the Matter which comes out tomorrow but I feel like it would be fun to read Laura's book right after American Wife to see how they compare.

Has anybody else read American Wife? What did you think?

*I have just been informed that Curtis Sittenfeld is a woman. Well then, I think she writes like a man.

FIND ME ON GOODREADS: username, DuolyNoted

Happy Mother's Day

A mother is a person who seeing there are only four pieces of pie for five people, promptly announces she never did care for pie.  ~Tenneva Jordan

(A quote that describes my mother exactly.) 

Happy Mother's Day to my Mama and all of yours!

*Note, this is the same post that I posted over on Seven Dames a Week, but the sentiment was so important I felt it worthy to be posted twice.

Pretty Flowers

Yesterday was not a good day. In fact, it might rank right up there with one of the worst days ever, but it definitely, definitely wins the grossest.

Dan takes Kadira out every morning at whatever ungodly hour he wakes up at.  More often then not, when he gets up I have literally only been asleep for maybe 3 hours.  Kadira then goes on a walk, eats breakfast, and then she makes pretty flowers. Because that is what dogs do after they eat, they make pretty flowers.

You following me? Because I am not going to say it in case anybody reading this just so happens to be eating.

Right before Dan leaves for work he puts her back in her crate and I usually get her out at around 10 (after I have some coffee, and mentally prepare myself to deal with all her shenanigans for the day).  So at around 8:30 I am still sleeping like a baby because I could not fall asleep the night before and was up until 3 AM watching Kardashian reruns and RHNJ marathons.  Then I hear Kadira barking and whining and pounding at her crate from the other room.  She always does this when she wants out, but I hesitated to go right away because I was exhausted and she still had a good 1.5 hours until she's used to getting out of her crate. So I waited...and waited until she calmed down.  Then, I finally got out of bed and went into the other room where we keep her crate to let her out.

Every morning Toby trots behind me to go greet his little sister, but this morning when we walked into the hallway he turned around and hightailed it under the bed.  Then I was hit with the smell...the smell of pretty flowers....and when I opened the door PRETTY FLOWERS WERE EVERYWHERE.

Flashback to last night.  

I made a really disgusting dinner.  So gross that Dan and I both took a bite and were like "oh my god this is awful."  As a joke, I gave Kadira an ity bity bite of the dinner, to see if she would even eat it (I promise it contained nothing harmful to dogs, but we traditionally don't feed her table scraps so she wont start begging at the table. The dinner was so bad, however, that I did not have the fear of her begging at the table for more.).  Well apparently she liked it, because unbeknown to me she ate some out of the trash can that night.  Dan caught her in the act and thought that she didn't eat that much...but apparently it was enough to really upset her stomach.

I proceeded to put Kadira in the backyard and attempt to clean up the mess.  I am pretty sure a Hazmat team should have been called in because it was that terrible, toxic of a situation. I threw in piles of towels we had lining her crate (lovely), sprayed off her crate with a hose (we had not used the hose since last summer, AKA, lots of spiders), sprayed off Kadira with a hose (she was not amused), and then cleaned the carpet with my fabulous new Woolite Rug Stick (its amazing, I totally swear by it).  Finally things were under control about an hour and a half later.

Oh but it gets better.

At the time I did not know she had dabbled in last night's dinner, so the only thing I could think of was that maybe she had heat stroke or something. I ran upstairs to get a fan that she could lay in front of downstairs while napping.  I took my eyes off her for five seconds. FIVE SECONDS.

Pretty flowers all over the office carpet.

I have now spent over 4 hours cleaning carpets.  Dan had to come home from work and help me because she is so sick and the carpets were so bad that I had to go rent a rug doctor, and if you are going to pay to rent the damn thing you obviously have to do all of your carpets. So I washed all the carpets in our house, because you know, I have nothing better to do with my day.

I am happy to report Kadira is feeling much better.

The carpets look better then ever.

And I need a glass, nay, bottle, of wine.