Jack Frost can take a hike!

I've made every attempt at keeping this blog more about the stuff I love and less about the stuff I severely dislike. Well I've been bottling this up so long and this morning's events just drove me nuts so you're gonna get to hear all about frost and my utter disdain for it.

Yes, winter is upon us and that means hot chocolate, lots of fudge, cheese balls, crackling fires and...frost. What would a winter be without frost? I say it would be a lot more bearable. I don't know about you but I despise scraping my windows in the morning. Hate it. It's the worst five minutes of my day. It's worse than the first five minutes after you wake up in the morning when you dread exiting your cozy bed knowing you'll get instant goose bumps.

Use the defroster, right? Well, kind of. See, the rear defroster in my car is broken. The little light comes on when you push the button and you swell with hope. Five minutes later you realize you've still got an ice field back there and you have to bust out the scraper. I should ask Santa for a new rear defroster. I guess that's life. I don't like it though...

This is a picture of what my car looked like this morning. Okay, so maybe not. But it was pretty close!

It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year!

As much as I love Thanksgiving, and believe me when I say that I really love Thanksgiving, I can hardly wait for the day after. No, not for the 6:00 am deals at the local Dillard's, for the music. It's the day when it's 100% acceptable to begin listening to Christmas music. Yes that music that no matter what Christmas holidays of past have brought, you believe that this Christmas can be a magical one.

Some people sneak in the Christmas music before Thanksgiving and I completely support that. In fact, I started listening to Christmas music on Oct. 28 this year. Hey, my sister plans her Halloween costume in July and I listen to Christmas music before Halloween. There's no real harm done.

It's safe to say that most don't start dusting off the Bing Crosby, Nat King Cole and Trans-Siberian Orchestra Christmas favorites until shortly after Thanksgiving. At this point, I'm so hopped up on sentimental tunes I don't care when you start the Christmas music. Just make sure you turn it on soon. After all, it is the most wonderful time of the year!

Gotta have good notes to pass the test!

I have rediscovered my passion for outlines. I'm not talking about tracing hearts onto red construction paper for your latest valentine project, I'm talking about informational outlines, aka, notes.

I. How do I outline?
A. General information
1. I prefer the roman numeral (in"capital" form), capital letters, standard numbers,lowercase letters and then "lowercase" roman numerals formatting
2. If necessary to outline beyond small roman numerals, bulleting is preferred
B. Definitions
1. Definitions of key terms are not typically given their own position.Generally they are notated by an asterisk
2. If the definition is included and necessary to the understanding of another key concept, the key term will be underlined.
C. Spacing
1. Spaces are only used in the instance of major breaks in concepts. Typically, I only space between roman numerals.
2. If inserting a table or example problem, spaces are encouraged.

II. Why do I outline?
A. Because organized information is usable information. Who wants to sort through clutter and unnecessary fluff?
B. Helps to visually represent steps or smaller pieces to a larger idea.
C. Because I really like it when people see my notes and comment on how organized and neat they look.

Okay, enough with the outlining. Seriously though, I have renewed my desire to have neat, organized, beautiful notes. Why? Because I'm studying for this little exam to receive PHR certification. That's right, I'd be Christie Horton, PHR. That's a professional in human resources for those of you outside the HR world. What else does this mean? It means that until January 29th, I'm reliving my college days by spending them in Hale Library at K-State or hunkered down in my living room pouring through books full of information.

Although I've rediscovered my love for outlining, I've discovered that I have no desire to head back to school for a masters degree any time soon.

* despite my every effort to maintain the integrity of my outline, blogger simply will not adhere to my desired indents. Alas, the visual beauty of my outline cannont be fully realized in this post.

More socks please!

It is my opinion that socks are one of the greatest things on earth. Seriously. Socks have the ability to help you feel calm and cozy in the midst of craziness. Now many people could argue against me and say that bare feet are best. I don't disagree. Having bare feet is a glorious feeling when you want to feel fresh, clean and casual. But when you are searching for coziness, comfort and warmth, look no further than a pair of socks. Let's examine an example of socks and their awesomeness.

Let's say you've taken a quick trip to the grocery store in your flip flops. In mid October this won't always be a bad thing but think of the weather recently and how upset your little toes would be after several minutes of exposure to the chilly air. You sit down and just want to relax for the rest of the evening but to do that, you'll want to warm up first. You reach for a pair of socks and as you slip them over your chilled toes you can't help but feel a little more cozy.

Socks, my friends, are magical. Even if you aren't cold, socks will comfort you. Now for those of you who think I'm crazy, check this out: Several times in my short 3 year working world life I have taken a pair of socks to work with me. When I know I'll be at my desk for an hour or two, I'll kick off my heels and slip into a pair of socks and I've never felt better. LOVE it!

I want a typewriter

Okay, maybe I don't but I definitely don't want to see another copier/printer for several days. This post is not about something I love, rather something I loathe after last Friday at work. I must begin by saying that the Canon 2230 printer/copier was very nice to me Thursday and early Friday morning. Here I am trying to print out 85 benefit books that are 75 pages each for our employee benefit meetings on Monday and it had printed 65 for me as of Friday morning. Things were going smoothly until around 11:45 when I checked the printer tray to make sure enough paper was loaded so I could continue printing while I was at lunch. It was full. I was going to be able to make progress while at lunch and just have a hand full of books to print when I returned from lunch. Then, the patron saint of copier/printers decided to pull a fast one on me. It decided that the printer was going to start pulling paper from a different tray, thus my pages were printing incorrectly. That wasn't all. It also decided to stop printing double-sided pages. Remember how I said the book was 75 pages long? Yeah, well I'm an environmentally conscious gal...I print double sided!

Needless to say, the last few minutes before my lunch and a good 45 minutes after lunch were spent sifting through menu options, trying to convince the printer my paper was not rotated in a landscape format and opening numerous trap doors in an attempt to recover phantom papers that were supposedly jamming the printer.

Now I know that you're concerned about whether or not I was able to get those last 20 books printed. I decided to give up for the weekend and attempt again Monday morning. Sure enough, that printer sat there lonely all weekend. Sometimes you just have to put printers in their place. I refuse to be someone who is beaten down by technology.

I'm a super nose.

The past few years I've become very sensitive to smell. I've developed a super nose. I can walk into a house and within a couple sniffs I can tell what you ate for dinner yesterday. Okay, maybe I don't have that talent but it's pretty darn close. So much so that I keep bottles and bottles (currently three) of Febreze air freshener in my 2 bdrm apartment so I wont' run out if there is a scent crisis. It's important to me that nothing associated with me stinks. I'll take great offense if it does. So I freshen a lot.Usually I'm the kind of gal that picks a scent and sticks to it. I'm currently a huge fan of the Febreze Lavender Vanilla & Comfort scent. It's amazing. I love it so much I never stray. Until this past summer. Typically I febreze my car with my standard scent, but as I was aimlessly shopping I decided to pick up a summer scent for my car. Since I can't go to the beach, I decided to bring the beach to me with the incredibly fresh
Sun & Sand car gel. I loved it. It reminded me of days at the lake with my Aunt Punkin. Her name isn't really Punkin, but that's another post! That one stray from my norm was all it took for me to repeat my seasonal scent purchase today as the fall weather seems to be settling in. As I was shopping for just the right fall scent, my mind couldn't help straying ahead a month or two when the winter scents arrive. Ahh, the joy of anticipation. For fall I decided to mix Pumpkin Spice with Vanilla (both from WalMart) and let me tell you what folks, its great! The perfect blend of spice and smoothness. Try it, you'll love it. It puts you right in the mood for some turkey, stuffing and mashed potatoes. Seasonal scented candles (say that three times fast) are my new LOVE.

I'll have the apple cake, buttermilk pancake and pie crust...

recipe that is! Lately I have been obsessed with collecting recipes. Am I an avid baker/cook? Nope. But I aspire to be one. I come from a maternal line of old fashioned home cookin'. I have no doubt that Grandma Kranz (mom's mom) could run any bakery or catering business with her own recipes. The woman rivals Martha! Of course I don't let her experience go to waste so I call her from time to time just to get a copy of that recipe that makes me feel like I'm seven years old spending a week of summer on the farm. Lately I've also taken to scouring numerous web sites for recipes. The internet offers endless possibilities when it comes to recipe hunting. I'd like to say I have a fantastic database of recipes stored on my laptop at home but if I'm going to advocate for cooking and baking from scratch how dare I not utilize the under appreciated recipe card/recipe box method?




Well this week I've taken a new interest in my recipe collection. And even though I might not have the time to make that gourmet meal and dessert from scratch yet, I'll have the recipe on hand when the time comes. I am quite addicted to receiving compliments on my cooking and baking. And yes, there is a difference between cooking and baking. God and genetics willing, I should turn out to be one hell of a cook and baker extraordinaire! If you don't believe me, just try one of my chocolate chip oatmeal cookies or one of my meatballs. If you ask nicely, I might share the family recipe. Cooking with recipe cards handed down in the family, LOVE it.

Feel the burn!

Now there are times when I honestly don't mind "feelin' the burn." The first day you lay out at the pool you want to feel the burn, just so people can tell you spent the day outside. Or how about when you're hitting the stationary bike for an extra 15 minutes because of the cheeseburger you ate at lunch. Those are (for the most part) a good type of burn. Well the burn that I'm talking about today has nothing positive about it. I'm talkin' about freezer burn. That's right. That frosty little attachment to the last of grandma's homemade chocolate chip cookies that have spent one month too many in your freezer. I have to admit that I usually brush off the ice crystals and cook/eat my food as normal. Not the case a week ago. I found one single chicken patty left in the freezer and thought I'd found a hit for lunch. Not so much. One bite into that tasty looking chicken sandwich and I tasted something that I can only describe as frozen mold. It was AWFUL! It was at that very moment that I truly learned of the destruction freezer burn can impose on an innocent lunch item. I thought I knew what freezer burn tasted like but wow, I learned something that day. So folks, I advise you to go out of your way to protect your food from the evil, nasty, flavor zapping terror of freezer burn! It'll save your taste buds (and gag reflex) a whole lot of trouble!

Surprise!

If you ever want to get on my good side, just surprise me with something!
I love surprises. You could surprise me with a box of dirt and I'd be happy about it. Big or small, I'll take any sort of surprise I can get. Why is a surprise soooo great? Because it's not expected...duh, it's a SURPRISE! Surprises come in all forms and I enjoy them all equally. Good news, a card in the mail, a gift for no reason at all, a phone call, birthday cake, people coming into town without telling me, they're all great. I guess I like them because when you don't expect something nice to be done for you the joy you receive from the surprise is multiplied. Yeah, you expect people to be nice to you on your birthday and Christmas. Those things are wonderful and very much appreciated. However, a card in the mail just to say "hi" or someone burning a CD of your favorite sing-along songs or even searching the internet far and wide for your pal's favorite color of discontinued lip gloss, that's a surprise. Now, if anyone out there feels the need to surprise me with a black Honda Pilot fully loaded with leather interior please proceed. If not, I'll gladly take a surprise visit the next time your in town.

Give another cover girl a shot!

I don't like Oprah. I know, how dare I say such a thing! Well I said it and I'll say it again. I can't STAND Oprah...on most days. Now before people start listing Oprah's list of good deeds I have to admit that I admire Oprah the philanthropist. I just don't like Oprah the celebrity. Why you ask? Because she thinks she knows everything and is better than everyone else. She invites people on her show who have made mistakes and then psychoanalyzes them without any qualifications to back up her reasoning. A phrase I hear her say often is "...now you were thinking you could (insert derogatory comment), weren't you." Oprah, you have no idea what the man was thinking, quit assuming you do! My biggest beef with Oprah is that every month, for the last 5+ years she's put her picture on the cover of O magazine.

Nothing says "I love me" bigger than having a monthly photo shoot and plastering your face in a magazine that is seen on the racks by millions. Thanks for the lesson in humility Oprah!

I def speak in abbrev cause its magnif!

I LOVE abbreviating. I love abbreviating so much that I started doing it way before it caught on with text messaging. I was abbreviating back in high school, that's the late 90's folks! I abbreviate everything. Now for most of you, you're probably okay with abbreviating in emails and text messages. Lately, I've taken it a step past that and started doing it when I talk. There have been days at work where I have to refrain from saying "I def agree this is a sig ish" aka, I definitely agree this is a significant issue. To be honest, I don't even realize I'm doing it sometimes. It's just become one of those things I've incorporated into my every day speech. So pls don't thnk that I'm lzy, I jst LOVE to abbrev!

Snack Attack

I snack. I snack mostly at work. Aside from the never ending stream of cookies and cakes from the resident work place Betty Crocker I've got my own personal snack stash in my office. Soy nuts, nah. Granola bars, no way! Two separate items are all I need to satisfy my cravings. A bag of semi sweet chocolate chips and a bag of Crasins. Some days I feel the need for something sweet, enter the Crasins. Other days I want the richness of dark chocolate, bring on the chocolate chips. But the days that I really need some comfort the two combine to make one simply fantastic, incredibly satisfying, sweet, rich snack. Crasins and dark chocolate, LOVE it.

LOVE & the other stuff

What does it mean? Well it means that I'm going to tell you all about the things I love in life. Some are big and some are small but if they make an appearance here, it's because they make me happy. Now about the other stuff. That's just stuff that drives me nuts. You can agree, you can disagree. Either way, hope you enjoy it!