KimNovak.me — I am not an actress

My queendom for a Vicodin or any other prescription drug that will take away this godawful pain in my head. It's time for my annual holiday sniffle fest and sinus headache. Blah. I have 1/2 mg of Xanax. I wonder if that would help. I hope I feel better tomorrow.

Oh good lord... I just turned on the TV to get ready for the Holiday bowl and there's 1 minute left in the final quarter. I thought it started at 7:00 p.m.

Oh wait... it's ESPN classic. I hate that channel. It's kinda fun to see Major Applewhite again, though.

Will someone come take care of LilyDawg and all her evening demands while I lay on the couch and watch the Holiday bowl and recuperate from my woeful illness? Please.

I just got back from shopping. The purpose of the trip was to buy a fan at Walmart, but I also wanted to see where the adventure would lead.

First I found myself at Chik-Fil-A. There was a man with a very tall ladder right in front of the drive thru speaker, so I had to go inside. No big deal, really... just sayin'. I broke my good "no caffiene" habit, though. I can't go to Chik-Fil-A without getting a big cup of unsweet tea. Yummy!!

Then to Walmart where they didn't have a fan. They had ceiling fans, but no portable fans. Boo Hoo. They had plenty of space heaters and one even had a cool fan setting, but I'm kinda scared of space heaters because I accidently melted a trash can with a space heater once.

So with Walmart being a bust, I decided I needed to do some good feeling shopping. Next I found myself at Borders Books and Music. There was a guy in a wheelchair who had a fluffy dog. I asked if I could pet the dog, and the man said "Absolutely!" Awww... cool fluffy dog.

I looked around Borders, but I just couldn't get excited about anything. I almost bought Book 10 in Robert Jordan's "Wheel of Time" series, but then I remembered how long the checkout line was last year and decided I could just as easily get it at Amazon. Plus I couldn't remember if it was on my Amazon Wishlist, so I was afraid I'd buy it and then get it as a Christmas present.

Then I headed for Bath and Body Works. I found a couple new (to me) scents... Mango Mandarin and Lime Coconut Verbeena. Yummy to both! I didn't buy anything, though.

Unsatisfied by my shopping thus far, I decided to go to the grocery store and buy stuff to make treats. I miss my Mom's Christmas treats. She used to make Fantasy Fudge (at least one batch with no nuts for me), Peanut Butter Bars with Chocolate on top, and Chocolate Tarts which were like tiny fudge pies. She would put a giant pecan piece on top of each Chocolate Tart so I could pick it off easily.

I ended up buying stuff to make fudge and stuff to make Magic Cookie Bars. It's odd that I like Magic Cookie Bars because they have walnuts and coconut in them, but I do. My friend Kelley made them before. The only thing I did wrong, though, is I forgot to buy butterscotch chips. Boo Hoo. I'll either make them with all chocolate chips or wait to make them until I go to the store again and get butterscotch chips.

Anyway... I still don't have a fan. I've been sleeping okay without one, so I guess I won't bother until it gets to be warm again and the stores put fans out for sale. Funny thing... one of the checkers at Walmart had a fan blowing at his station.

It's been a while since we talked, eh? I mean... I've been posting memes and search strings and links to things I've found interesting, but I really haven't talked about what's going on. Probably because there's so much going on.

Today I went shopping. Woo-Hoo! I thought it would be a nightmare, but it was fine. I only went to stores that I could get to by a secret back way.

First, though, I went to Starbucks. Very disappointing! I so count on Starbucks' consistency of quality. But they didn't have any individual Cranberry Bliss Bars, so I had to settle for a not so great looking Chocolate Cream Cheese Muffin. It tasted okay, but I also had to settle for a nasty tasting iced mocha. They put too much chocolate in it and the coffee tasted burnt. Yes... there is such a thing as too much chocolate.

Next, I went to my favorite little clothes store and bought a bunch of new clothes. I hadn't been in a while, so they sent me a boatload of coupons in the mail. Now I need to do a 27 Fling Boogie in my closet to make room for the new stuff!

I also got some Christmas shopping done. Yay! Bed, Bath and Beyond (B³) wasn't really very crowded. Kohl's wasn't very crowded, either. Did everyone finish early or is everyone waiting until Wednesday? Or maybe they were all at Walmart? That's the one place I need to go that I'm avoiding like a hungry rabid coyote. I need to buy a little fan and that's the only place I can think of that would have one. I was hoping B³ would have one, but no.

If you're wondering about where all the new music is... I'll be recording a tune this weekend. I'm not sure if it's a secret, so I won't say what tune and with who. But when it's done, I'll let everyone know.

If you're wondering about why I don't update my picture blog... I just got burnt out. I like taking pictures, but processing them makes me tired. I'll get back to it one of these days, but probably not as a daily thing.

I hope everyone is relaxed and happy and ready for the upcoming holidays. I know I am!

I am back from a weekend road trip with an iPod in hand! Christmas came early this year!

Uh oh... hard drive failure on my PC. I'm desperately trying to copy stuff over from the PC to the laptop, but it's touch and go. Boo Hoo. My biggest problem is that I can't focus enough to figure out what I really need to copy over. You know... priorities! Well... I better get back to it. Say a 'puter-prayer for my hard drive to stick it out long enough for me to copy stuff over.

4:00 a.m. I can't sleep. Work stress. Blah.

I just took Lily out in the backyard and was amazed at the sky. The clouds that made things gloomy around here for days finally dissipated. The stars are so bright tonight! I saw Orion. It always takes my breath away. I saw Cassiopeia. And Sirius was almost blinding. The moon is bright, too. It was casting shadows on my lawn. So I turned on the computer to look at the Star Map.

I'm yawning so much it hurts, but anticipated conversations keep running through my head. I just wanna sleep. Back to bed to try again....

I heard on the radio why there's no Starbucks at the Austin airport. The city council has said no to Starbucks because they want to keep the airport "Austin-y." They would rather see a local business have a coffee shop there. That's okay with me. There are no less than 5 Starbucks I pass on the way home from work (that's about 1 every 2 miles!). Now that I know there's no Starbucks at the airport, I'll just stop at one on the way. Yeah right... like I go to the airport often!

Anyway... the deejays were saying they're not sure any of the local coffee shops could afford to have a shop in the airport. Wouldn't that be a kicker... Austin City Council saves room for local business at the airport and the rent puts them out of business!

The re-org at work was painless. At least for me. Two people I used to work with and a guy from another division were merged into my section. The same three people who will be doing the bulk of the work with me on the two major projects I'm managing. So it's a good thing.

One lady is being forced to use a PC after using a MAC all her career, though. She's not very happy about it.

This afternoon, I got a lot done on the java application I'm working on. Usually, I have a lot of interruptions and can't concentrate and get frustrated. But today things were pretty calm. I love it when that happens.

There's a lot of stuff going on at work. Tomorrow is a division meeting where a probable reorg will be announced. From rumors I've heard, I think the reorg will be a good thing. Something else is happening that could mean a promotion for me at some point, but there's a project I have to finish first. I won't finish until probably next Spring. And I'm not sure I want the promotion, but I'm not ruling it out. There's something else happening that I can't even hint about right now that's stressing me out a little bit, too.

Then at home, I have tons of projects I need/want to work on:

I have 3 more photo galleries to build from my Arizona trip.

I want to totally rebuild the Strange Sandwich Music site.

I also want to change the home page of my website. It has a spot for new songs I recorded, but I haven't recorded any since February, so it's making that page pretty stale. Maybe I'll replace it with daily random songs.

I've got lots of photos I want to use to make more free wallpaper.

I'd like to make a halloween themed stylesheet and banner for my website. (I just thought of that one this second!)

I need to clean up and rearrange my back bedroom to make room for a new bed. Then I need to get rid of that durn futon I sleep on.

Of course, instead of doing any of that stuff, I just watched some TV, surfed some blogs, checked out some Connect 8 projects, and made a new Kim's Place banner with Lily Dawg's newest picture.

There's lots more stuff, too. But right now, I'm going to bed. Maybe I'll have a freaky dream to write about tomorrow. That's always fun!

I got behind on my scheduled meme blogging, so I'm catching up today. I also posted tomorrow's Sonnet today because I might not get to it tomorrow. I see a zoo in my future. I hope you all have a great weekend!