E-A-G-L-E-S EAGLES!

That could very well be the first word Katie spells the way its being chanted around the house these days. Daddy and Katie are watching the game right now, but I wanted to share a couple of quick pictures of them.

Katie and her Daddy cheering on the Eagles!

Katie rooting for a touchdown!

As a tribute to her Kakie and her Aunt Kim she'll even cheer for the Steelers to score!

And for her Mama who couldn't give a lick about professional football-- she has the cutest shoes ever! (I wish they came in my size!)

Vampire Kitty!!!

Craig managed to cut his foot open last night-- and after a quick consult with my mom we decided it was not an ER worthy injury. So today though, he FINALLY has a check-up appt and they will check on his toe and at the least give him his VERY VERY overdue tetanus shot. Why are guys such wimps when it comes to dr visits??--- I swear, if it weren't for the injury, he'd still not be going for the shot.


I will say the injury itself I missed, I was inside when he got home-- and opened the door cursing. I walked over and he is dripping blood all over the floor. I got him a paper towel to try and sop up the mess and so we could see just what damage he had done. Meanwhile, Tiki wanders over and decides to explore her vampire side by licking at a drop of blood on the floor. Craig then freaked out-- I mean hollering like a mad man at the cat. She tore off quite confused to hide for a little while. When I came in from the kitchen with more paper towels-- I asked what they heck that had been about. His answer "I didn't want her getting a taste for blood" Ah yes dear, the cat is going to go dracula on you at night... silly boy.

Craig then dripped his way up the stairs and we got his foot cleaned up, antiseptic-ed and bandaged. Wings were slightly delayed due to the hijinx-- but all in all things are fine. He's got a half-dozen bandaids wrapped around his toe-- the duct tape ones-- those are seriously the best thinsg ever-- but since the box I had did not contain the "man's big toe" size -- I've got a bundle of them stuck all over to keep it on. We'll see what the doc says when he goes in.

Lesson learned-- time to get a real first aid kit-- and more bandaids.

Craig's Birthday

Today is the dear husbands birthday, if you ask him, he is turning 21-- but first thing he said this morning when he woke up. "I'm old, you're married to an old man" So I think the big 30 is hitting him a little bit.

I made peanut butter brownies with chocolate frosting to cheer him up-- stay tuned for a review on those.

If you see him, Wish Craig a Happy Birthday!

Wegmans wonderful wegmans!

Mechanicsburg PA now has a brand spanking new Wegmans! YAY! Thats only about 25 minutes away. They opened Sunday, guess where I was?? That's right, I dragged Craig along to the food mecca for a gloriously piggish tour of the new store. It was a ZOO.

But, excepting the mobs of people-- we enjoyed our trip. First, at every corner there were free samples... fruit, fresh mozzarella (my biggest weakness), bagels with LOWFAT!! scallion cream cheese, breads fresh from the oven-- you name it.

Amazingly, we did not do TOO badly there-- We came home with Prima Donna Cheese (extra aged, super delicious)-- and half gone from dinner, red pears (organic, but tasty which was why we chose them), tiny new red potatoes, pencil thin asparagus (that was 1/2 the price Giant has wanted for their monster thick ones for the last month!), paella rice, DIGESTIVE COOKIES!!!! (best things ever, and even the chocolate coated ones!- got hooked on those in Spain), two fresh breads--- one a loaf of ciabatta and one a foccacia like-spinach parmesan bread (sampled that one twice!-- also half gone from dinner last night)-- Then Craig found the deli counter-- We got some yummy looking (but not allowed for me) salamis and then I saw they had lomo. Lomo is a Spanish cured pork loin that you slice for sandwiches and stuff. Its a whole tenderloin rubbed with pimenton (smoked paprika) and garlic and some other stuff and then dry cured--- the texture is jamon serrano or prosciutto like--- but YUM. They also had jamon and prosciutto-- the poor jamon hadn't been sliced at all, and if I could have justified eating it (or the price) I would have taken some home with us. But-- all in all a super successful and amusing day at Wegmans.

I hope to get back in a few weeks and check it out more carefully when it is not such a nut house-- we couldn;t get into the prepared food section at all, cheeses were SWAMPED, and I couldn't even SEE the butcher/seafood counters-- another time though-- because now its just 25 minutes away!!!!!!!

Random updates

So another week of me being a bum has passed and so time for some updates.

Work-- My boss was out last week and today our amazing wonderful lab manager is out. Its been chaos. I want to go back to my nice little world of just supervising myself and my college intern. He's actually done next Thursday-- so this week has been a bit of a scramble to get his data all together and get him ready to present it at the poster symposium. In other news... his mom makes a damn good chocolate cake. The moistest (is that a word??) cake I have ever had. Not too sweet, and then dusted in cocoa. YUM. Its like a cross between a mousse and a cake-- served chilled. YUM YUM YUM. We have been begging for the recipe... and as soon as she translates it out of French... It will be mine. I will try and share!

Home-- My kitchen floor is all done, complete with thresholds and all that kinda stuff. I can finally go in my kitchen barefoot. I also finally got a doorbell button too--- no more touching the bare wires together to signal guests or anything. Plus its easier to pick on the Murph now... the doorbell drives him bonkers.

Tadpole-- Not too much news on that front. My stomach's still not so happy with me-- and well, that kinda is depressing. Its been 3 weeks since I have cooked anything more involved than buttered noodles. And for me, that's just sad. I just have no interest in food. Oh... and one big food aversion is making itself VERY clear. Craig and his love for pepperoni being what it is, its a BIG problem. Seriously one whiff of that stuff and I could have happily thrown him and his "pepperoni quesadilla" out the window last night. ugh. Never had that response before. Craig thinks I am really nuts. Other than that though, Craig's being a really good sport with my being under the weather. I was complaining that I wasn't doing anything "useful" and his response was that sure I was, I was growing our baby. So that was sweet of him. He's also been willing to run out for whatever kind of food I mention I might possibly feel hungry for pretty much whenever I ask-- so he's been spoiling me. I've really been a lazy bum though-- I make it too work and then get home eat a little and go to bed... I don't remember the last time I went to bed at 7 every night!

Things here are good, its blazingly hot-- I want fall to get here already-- then I can get some work done around the house without suffering from heat stroke and we can get started on cleaning out and decorating the Tadpole's room.

Congrats to Mom on her latest triathalon finish! She cut 6 minutes off of her previous best swim time!! Great job!

Introducing the Tadpole!

So, if the title change for the blog and then the picture didn't give it away-- Here's the big announcement-

Craig and I are expecting a new family member-- sometime in early March. I am about 8 weeks pregnant and got my first picture of the Tadpole this morning. I have scanned it in here in all its grainy glory to share with the world.

For those confused by the picture, the baby is the grayish blob inside the blackish blob-- its kinda got a line going through it, that is from the measurements the doc did today-- and is only a part of the computer processing. I am happy to report that the Tadpole is currently about 13.9 mm long (for those not into metric-- thats somewhere around a 1/2 inch) -- and that puts them right on schedule as far as growth and all that.

We also got to "see" the babies heartbeat. Granted it was only about 3 pixels on the little screen-- but they were flickering like crazy-- Apparently the flickering worked out to 150 beats/minute which is I am told just dandy and right where it should be.

So all seems well with the Tadpole! Craig and I are thrilled, both sets of parents and siblings are excited and well... things are pretty darn great!

So I will apologize for the lapse in posting, but I have been feeling kinda lousy (whoever named it "morning" sickness should be hung up by their ears from the rafters -- its more like all day any-- anytime-- don't even think about eating that sickness) Also, posting about normal day-to-day stuff while I knew this seemed kinda weird, but I wasn't ready to share yet. I wanted some more reassurance that everything was going well. And while there are no guarantees-- everything today looked just as it should-- so we decided it was time to spill. (Plus my Mom wants the pictures!) We actually found out we were expecting the same day I got my new station wagon-- so I've been sitting on this secret for a little while now. So please excuse my bad blogger-ness over the last few weeks, I will try and be better-- and they promise that I will soon regain control over my own stomach so that should help too!

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (the movie!)

So last night Craig decided he would take me on a date (crazy boy that one) to see the latest edition in the HP movie series. We got to the local movies early (about 30 minutes before the show) even though we had bought tickets earlier in the day to be sure we got a seat-- and I am glad we did. The place was PACKED-- jam packed. The movie finally begins-- and other than questioning how some people were raised (the 30+ woman behind me with the dry crackly feet who thought the head rest of the seat in front of her was the place to put her nasty feet-- the 17 year olds behind me who giggled and chatted and looked at their glaringly bright cell phones every 2 minutes etc) most of the audience was pretty good. (and thankfully QUIET!)

The movie got going, and not 20 minutes in, the film starts to skip-- the bottom half of the picture was on the top half of the screen and all-- it was just unpleasant to watch. Eventually someone in the audience (after ~3-5) minutes of this got up and went to find an employee to fix it, they did and then 45 minutes later it happened AGAIN. Same result-- a person on an end eventually went out and asked for it to be fixed. The film also went blurry a few times and the sound level was poorly managed. After the movie let out, I went to find the manager. I was pretty displeased that for the crazy price of movie tickets, they could not have someone to WATCH the projectors to be sure they worked. I know when Grammam worked at the movies when I was little and we used to "help" that someone was usually up there to keep an eye on it all. So I explained to the manager that this was unreasonable and I was unhappy with the theater. She tried to get out of it for about 2 seconds and then asked if we wanted a refund. Well yes, thank you I would-- but I would rather have not had my movie repeatedly disrupted! She gave us back the money we had paid for the tickets and we left the theater. Craig's comment on the whole thing "I should take you out more often, you're a cheap date!".


Now, on to my thoughts on the movie itself--
I enjoyed it, I found it better than Prisoner of Azkaban on details-- and a good bit more accurate on plot than the goblet of fire movies-- so that was a nice surprise. I was disappointed in the scenes selected to be cut from the film-- some of my favorite parts of the book were missing. As always-- the movie did not explain everything as fully as the book-- and took a few other liberties-- but I think the general plot was pretty close to the book. I was sad to see the fight scene clipped at the end-- but I understand not everyone wants to sit through a 6 hour HP movie like I would (crazy folks out there apparently some of them have LIVES!?!?!) Umbridge is delightfully evil and bureaucratic-- and very very pink. Really a scream. Kreacher gets cut out a lot, which is kinda sad-- he was funny in the book.

So overall-- I would give the movie a 3/5 on accuracy to the book, but I would rate it a 4 or maybe a 4.5 out of 5 in terms of fun and enjoyable movie. So go on, go see HP#5-- its fun, exciting and a little spooky.

Ratatouille?

So as if my days are not yet full enough of rodents-- my plan for tonight is to go see the new disney-pixar film

I will try and get a review on here soon. I have heard good things about it, and the clips I saw looked both funny and cute. And well, a mouse who can cook is way way way more cute and exciting than a mouse with a boob job-- well, at least for most people!

Outside of that, I've got some catch up work to do around the house (eg... clean the kitchen and the bathroom!), Craig's got to get the lawn mowed before Murphy gets swallowed by some sort of prehistoric mutant grass, and we've got to get to work on digging out the cellar and the nursery. Stay tuned for more hopefully this weekend.

Bits and pieces

It seems Craig has managed to pick up my cold. So hopefully he's not sick for too long. I am finally feeling better after going to bed at 7 last night-- yep, you read that right. I slept from 7pm until 7am... and finally feel almost human. Now if I could only stop coughing like a 70 year old chain smoker I'd be back to normal. Winnie had another day with no messes-- YAY! She does have the most painful ear splitting bark though--- ugh, I sure hope she doesn't do that all day while we're at work. 5 barks is enough to make me want to try and chop out her vocal cords.. I can only imagine what the neighbors think after a day of that noise.





I've got a long and hectic procedure at work today, so I am hoping to be out of here by 5. The one thing I can say about this procedure is that when it is done I have TON of data. So its nice to show the boss that I can be productive-- it just makes for an unpleasant work day. Keep your fingers crossed that it works!


Here is one pic of a previous run of this experiment. The procedure takes mouse boobs (yes, the techinical term) and turns them into a soup of single mouse boob cells. Then I can run those cells through a machine called a flow cytometer that lines them all up single file and looks at them. It looks at them for what they have on their outsides--- (that is, are the tags I stuck on there)-- I can then see how many cells that have a certain tag (A) also have other tags (B, C, etc)-- then I can quantify how many cells are A+B vs B+C, vs A+C--- which tells me something about the kind of cells that make up the mouse boob. The big problem for me is that I put a LOT of cells in, but only the ones circled in the picture are the ones that matter. So it takes me a long long time to get enough of the important cells--- oh yeah... and it takes me 6+ months to get a mouse with the right combo of genes to be old enough for the experiment--- so there is a lot riding on it working right--- cause if it doesn't I have to start over with breeding more mice-- YUCK!









Other than a big science day, we have cake class tonight--- no actual cake this week, just working with fondant and gumpaste-- we're learning carnations, "fantasy flowers" and daisies. Should be a quick and easy class. I'll try and get some pics up tomorrow for everyone to see.






Also-- if you have any recommendations for an affordable reliable car-- 4 door, decent gas mileage (ok, so anything will be better than the blazer was), has a radio, good safety record, would hypothetically hold a car seat and associated progeny related crap, that doesn't look awful-- please, let me know.
The blazer is dead (may she rest in peace) and I need to find a new car. I figure I am going to have the new one for a bunch of years, so practicality is important. All suggestions of models or makes are welcome!

not strep.. well, I think?

So Nyquil did the trick last night and I was actually able to sleep. YAY! That helped a lot. Today I feel better, not great-- but better, so I think probably not strep.

Last night I met Leah's mom and got my translating duties figured out, then went for pizza "Old world style" The sauce was over the cheese... odd, but tasty. Craig and I met Mike and Leah's family and hung out for awhile. Then we tied 130 little multi colored bows on their programs. So, I have paid back the time she helped me tie bows on all my programs.

Tonight is rehearsal and rehearsal dinner-- yay food!

mini-doglet crapped 4 times last night in our bedroom doorway. and then vomited huge piles on the rug... what do I do with her?!?!?! The food she is getting is obviously not agreeing with her, but its what we were told to feed her. Any suggestions for gentle on puppy stomach meals? Cause a few more days of this... and well... I'm either going to super-glue her back end shut or she's going to have to be an outdoor dog. (ok, I'm only venting, but really... something has got to change)

Strep? and other ramblings

So I think I may have Strep Throat... ugh. I don't like this. My throat hurts-- keep me awake all night kinda hurt, but no fever. So do I try and get a doc appt or just muddle on?!?! Is this just some little viral thing that will pass or am I going to suffer if I don't go get some antibiotics now.

Oh yeah.. and this morning, my car started smoking. Yuck. I really need to get a new car. and soon. I hate to say goodbye to the blazer, but it barely runs anymore-- its just not reliable. I need something that I KNOW will start-- and gets some better gas mileage too. Time to start looking more seriously for a new (to me) car. Not an expense I am looking forward to at all.

Work is ok, we're getting a new imaging system in today that could make my life a LOT easier-- that is, if it works. I have to go demo it at 1pm. Keep your fingers crossed. Green glowing mice are good!

In other news-- Winnie is a moron. After her long walk this morning, she came inside and immediately crapped on the rug. Then turned around and ATE it?!?! WTF? This dog has serious issues.

Sad Pirate Happy Pirate

Just two quick bits of evidence that I am married to a nut! (ok, a loveable nut, but a nut all the same. )

He then wore said paper pirate hat ALL THE WAY HOME. At least he didn't sing "Yo, Ho, Yo Ho a pirate's life for me" the entire way!

Our Craptacular Neighbors

Yesterday evening, our lovely White Trash, Jerry Springer fodder, bum with multiple baby daddies and a prepubescent boyfriend all living in the same house neighbor decided to entertain. By entertain, I mean she invited over a bundle of men and their ridiculous motorcycles. I appreciate a good bike... one of my gal friends from HS rides regularly-- so its not the bikes that bother me. These were funny looking though-- I guess some sort of defective combination of a big wheel kids bike with a grown-up motor cycle... but hey they had NEON! Woohoo.. that just screams class doesn't it?? What my big problem is was it was 10 pm (and then 10:30 and then 11:30) when they decided that a fun activity is to sit on the bikes in the street and rev them up loudly, over and over and over. Needless to say, adult beverages were involved in this event. Also, these morons parked up the whole street so there was no where for me (carrying the load of groceries) nor anyone else to park. They thought this was quite funny and would laugh as residents drove slowly down the street looking to park. They also participated in high speed drag racing up and down the block from 5-9pm-- not so good in a small quiet suburban neighborhood.

Sometime after 10, I went across the street to ask them to cool it with the reving engines, as it was getting pretty late. I got mocked. And one of them complained that Craig while mowing the lawn got grass clippings on his bike. I laughed and said there was no way I was going to complain-- my husband mowed the lawn -- as far as I cared, that was good.

So the moron troupe continued their noisy revelry into the night-- keeping the future Jerry Springer kiddo stars out and shreiking as the adults kept drinking and hollering. Seriously, what is wrong with people. This was a MONDAY night. Not a weekend-- not a holiday. Not that any of those excuses rude neighbors and their trashy guests-- but seriously-- 30 people drinking and motorcycling and shouting at 11 at night on a Monday?!?! There is just no reason.

Any one have any ideas on how to deal with this. They are just awful neighbors. I don't want to start a war with them, but I don't think I should have to deal with their carrying-on all the time.

Tempting as it is to just sit on the porch with a shotgun and pick them off for the betterment of the human gene pool-- I am pretty sure that is illegal... and immoral. So any realistic solutions are more than welcome. Meanwhile, I will pay a damn sight more attention to the neighborhood before we buy our next home-- and keep praying that those three rental properties across the street get sold out from under them to nice normal families.

Oh, and NEVER NEVER NEVER will I let my (hypothetical) kids play in those peoples houses or be unattended while they are around. They're just BAD BAD BAD news.

On a side note-- not all our neighbors are awful, its really just the 3 rentals across the street from us-- and one more up the block a little ways. Most of our neighbors are young families, who work hard, and try and keep their properties up-- but a few bad apples... well, you know the story.

Weekend in Review and plans for the week

This weekend was largely spent catching up on laundry--- the oh so exciting life of newlyweds. Woohoo. We did go see Pirates 3 :return of random sword wielding squid yesterday. Craig enjoyed it, I found it loud... and very random. But, if you like random fish creatures fighting against colonial British forces and pirates, this may be the movie for you! (ok, and Keith Richards makes a brief and to me comical cameo) Swashbuckling fun-- but at least it was a couple hours in air conditioning!!!
More exciting was that we then went to dinner at Passage to India in Harrisburg. Delicious as always-- and even better when we had a buy one dinner get one free coupon! (for once hubby's need to save every piece of junk mail we get worked out for the better!!) I had some sort of lamb -- lamb Rogun Josh or something like that. It was quite tasty-- not too spicy-- just nicely flavored. And as a bonus, there were enough for leftovers-- I just have to make up some rice-- that's the kind of dinner I can handle any night-- even when it is 90 in my kitchen.

Today we got some laundry done, I got my veggies transplanted outside (heres hoping they survive), polyurethaned the outdoor sink and the new front door step, and got the guest room cleaned out for this coming weekend's guest. Not too bad a day-- the good thing about laundry folding is that it is the ideal fit for chick flicks! Today-- Circle of Friends, Dance with Me --Vanessa Williams AND Chayanne! ;-)-- and When Harry Met Sally-- one of my all time favorites ever. So it was a nice afternoon. Craig is locked down in the dungeon working on his homework for his online course. I guess that's what I get for encouraging him to go back to school and get his Master's finished up. Two of us in grad school... what was I thinking?!?!?!

This week looks to be a full one. Monday has my semi-monthly or whenever we remember to schedule it rotating dinner with two of my friends from grad school, Tuesday brings cake class -- stay tuned. The first cake we're doing this time is "Ireland"-- Should be pretty good. (and yes, I will share recipes) Wednesday is wings night here again. Thursday Craig and I have dinner at our friends who are getting married this weekend to meet their parents who we'll be helping get around while they are here, then Friday rehearsal/dinner with the to-be-wed Mike and Leah, and finally Saturday is their wedding. Should all be fun, but some Sunday I will definitely be looking forward to a NAP!

Stay tuned- I should get some decent pics to share this week. If nothing else, I have a pic of Craig in a pirate hat that is BEGGING to be shared!

ok... I admit it...

ok, I admit it, I miss him. And I am slightly annoyed that he won't answer the cell so I know when they'll be home.

Also, TV sucks on a Sunday afternoon-- there is NOTHING to watch. So here I sit... well, at least I got a little photo editing done.

Time to round up some lunch.