Tuesday, January 30, 2007

Blah, blah, blah, blah.




That pretty much sums it up. Not much going on in my life, or I would have posted about it (I swear....). We are through the first 16 episodes of the first season of Star Trek, so making SOME progress there....I am now working 10 hour shifts, alternating Mondays and Wednesdays off.......just did my taxes on Monday (woohoo refund!!!), our first refund in about 4-5 years........going to Sonics games.......

Pretty much nothing.
Blah, blah, blah, blah.




That pretty much sums it up. Not much going on in my life, or I would have posted about it (I swear....). We are through the first 16 episodes of the first season of Star Trek, so making SOME progress there....I am now working 10 hour shifts, alternating Mondays and Wednesdays off.......just did my taxes on Monday (woohoo refund!!!), our first refund in about 4-5 years........going to Sonics games.......

Pretty much nothing.

Wednesday, January 10, 2007




No, my house is NOT yellow.......but this is the entry and living/dining rooms upstairs....






A full length version of the Europe video

Tuesday, January 09, 2007

Much much much excitement....

Okay, have spent OODLES of time now looking/dreaming/thinking about going on vacation.....the Dominican Republic it is....since I don't really care where we go, can't think of cities to search in for cheapie all inclusives, so this works.

We are going to stay at the Riu Mambo or the Riu Merengue in Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic. They are located right next to each other, along with the Riu Bachata, which is a teeny bit more spendy (so we are not staying THERE). We stayed at the Riu Jalisco in Puerto Vallarta and LOVED it, so this should be awesome. We have decided to fly out late Thursday night (like 1030pm), which gets us to our hotel around 3pm, after our taxi/shuttle ride out there. We will spend 8 wonderous days and 7 fun filled nights there, then fly out the following Friday.

This is where it gets cool.

I know, I know--this is ALREADY quite cool, but......the flights home all totally suck. So, I am going to attempt to get the suckiest of them all--we will fly out at 130pm and get to Newark/New York at 530pm, then check into a hotel next to the airport and have a night in New York City, which is less than 5 miles away. Maybe see TImes Square or the Empire State Building or the Statue of LIberty...something--we do have all evening! The next day (Saturday), we fly out at 1:50pm and get to Seattle around 4:30pm local time. Doesn't that sound awesome?!? A totally sucky layover becomes a touristy stop!

Quite excited, and already having nightmares about getting sunburned.....but I will do my most very best to stay pale!!

Monday, January 08, 2007

Gettin out of Dodge....

So.




As you may know, Ethan and I have been planning to use our time share to exchange for a time share in Hawaii this spring. I called the timeshare people and there are NO units available to exchange for. None. Not a crappy one, not at a later date, none. They get snatched up as soon as they are made available. So, we are going to put ourselves on a waiting list for the three resorts we liked, and just wait for the phone call that tells us a unit has come up. Maybe next year?? They say it can be quite a wait--apparently Hawaii is the most popular and difficult place to get into.

So, no timeshare. But do not fret--we are still going SOMEWHERE!! We had some discussions, and our options basically were A-use the timeshare exchange to go somewhere else; B-go on a caribbean cruise and use our airline miles for the flight (caribbean cruises are CHEAP); C-find an all-inclusive resort somewhere and use our airline miles for the flight.

We are going with option C (I think). I LOVE playing travel agent, so I spent many hours looking and searching and planning and thinking.....the frontrunner right now is in the Dominican Republic. When we went to Puerto Vallarta in '05, we stayed at the Riu Jalisco. They had an amazing deal, so I went back to their website and looked this time around. Their three resorts in Puerto Plata are all on massive sale, so we are thinking of doing that. I am still searching out other all-inclusives, but this would be awesome already.

AND...as many of you may know, the Seahawks won in an improbably victory Saturday afternoon over the Dallas Cowboys. Amazing, incredible, so very fortunate.......look for them to do it again this Sunday at 10am vs the Chicago Bears. Wear blue!!!

Wednesday, January 03, 2007

***** WARNING *****

I have not posted in many moons. Please be warned that there are now FOUR, yes FOUR posts on this blog. (including this dumb one...).










PLEASE, pace yourselves. I don't want anyone going into blogger shock and needing assistance. Take it nice and slow....

New Years Resolutions

Do you make New Years Resolutions?? Do you keep them??

My first ever actually kept New Years resolution was in 2005. My resolution was to study for and take the Orthopedic Nursing Certification Exam, and to pass it. On October 15, 2005 I took the test, passed, and got my $1 an hour certification pay raise. Woohoo!! I am one of only 2 ortho certified RNs at Harborview, which is a nationally renowned ortho hospital. Very cool.

This year, I am hoping to have yet another successful resolution. After much thought and discussion, Ethan and I (well, I), decided that this year's resolution is to take better care of the house. This is in three separate parts--take care of the physical house by doing a better job keeping it clean and taken care of, taking care of the spiritual house that is my relationship with Ethan, and taking care of my own personal house, which is exercising more and eating better (mostly so that I look wonderful in a bathing suit next time we go on vacation, but I digress...). Ethan and I discussed this, then took our outside arms and made a little arch like the roof of a house over our heads, and had the kitties sit with us under the roof arch to seal the deal. So it's gotta work, right??

So.....Ethan has been instructed to motivate me to jump on that $^%$& machine and work out; my goal is at least 4 times each week (his goal is 7).......and I now give official permission to each and every one of you to call me out of the blue and remind me to get my butt on that machine. Actually, I enjoy it--no stress on my knees, I use it with just two pairs of socks on, which is more comfortable for me--in shoes, my feet go a little numb for some reason when I use these sorts of machines, but with just the socks I am fine. I have rigged up a system to keep a book open on the display part, so I can read while I work out. The system consists of a piece of ribbon wrapped around the console with the book tucked behind it. The simplicity is genious!!! I just read and pay no attention to anything and it is totally relaxing and I feel so good about myself. THe hardest part is actually DECIDING to get on the machine. Once I do that, it is no problem. I just think of SO many excuses why not to!!

So.......do you make resolutions?? What are some of yours?? Do you need some motivational help to keep yours going?? THe best way to keep a promise to yourself is to make it public--that way you look like a complete idiot if you don't follow through, and I don't know about you, but I really don't like looking like a complete idiot........so I guess that means I will be one hot beach babe this time next year!!

Cheer us on as we embark on an adventure!!

Ethan and I have made a New Years resolution of sorts. This is big. We will be boldly going where no Amerson has gone before.....



We have decided to watch every single episode of Star Trek, in order, for all the series. I have in my DVD player at this very moment disc one of season one of Star Trek, the Original Series. We will watch ALL of these, then go to season two, etc, then Star Trek: The Next Generation, then Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, then Star Trek: Voyager, and finally onto Star Trek: Enterprise.

It will likely take us more than a year to do, since we have not decided to dedicate our entire lives to watching these, and we will actually get out of the house on occasion, but this is the goal. When we are all done, we will return to Vegas so we can go through the Star Trek museum at the Star Trek Experience and actually READ the massive 300 foot long timeline that tells the entire Star Trek history, and actually KNOW what they are talking about!! Won't this be fun??
Yes, yes...long time no post. But.....in my defense, absolutely NOTHING has happened since my last post. We stayed home and watched movies for Christmas.....I worked New Years Day, so I went to sleep at 9pm on New Years Eve......regular work stuff, boringness. Absolutely NOTHING to bore everyone with. So there.