Duty

Not the kind most of my readers are thinking of (I know you all have poop on the brain), but the kind the Army has to do. Corey has to pull duty several times a month and whenever it falls on the weekend I go up to Carlisle, PA with him and we basically just drive around and find things to look at and take pictures of. Here is what we saw on Sunday:

Christmas Party & Concert

Corey's work party was a few weekends ago. I haven't gotten dressed up in a while so I thought I should curl my hair to look extra fancy. After an hour of holding the curling iron up I was losing patience and blood flow and started getting irritable. This is how it always goes in our house. Corey will tell me what time we need to leave at. I will start getting ready way too early, lose interest and then about 10 minutes before we leave he will remind me and I'll start frantically getting my crap together. Then, when the announced time has arrived he will say, "Babe, let's go" to which I will reply, "Why are you always rushing me?! Aaaahhhh!!!" He will remain silent and stand by the open front door while I hastily and angrily finish getting ready until we are in the car and I start apologizing. I'm so glad I have such a patient husband who has gotten used to living with a crazy woman. I know I'm no crazier than anyone else so he would've gotten a crazy wife regardless, but he has adjusted so well :) 

We spent the night at Pamela's house and were able to go to her Christmas concert the next day. She plays the clarinet in 2 different bands and we went to a Veteran's Day concert last month, but I forgot my camera. This band was more energetic and it was such a great show.

December Survival Guide

The only true way to survive the winter is hot tubbing. I used to pretend that snowboarding got me through the winter but I never TRULY wanted to go. I went because once I got up there and warmed up a bit I had a good time until I started getting tired, falling and getting wet. So it was fun, but there were so many disadvantages. Hot tubbing is fun with no downside. It's easy. No hard work getting your equipment together and risking the snowy road up the mountain. It's cheap. Barring you are mooching off someone else's hot tub. No lift ticket to buy. And the whole time you're in, is enjoyable. There are those 7 seconds of hell when you have to get out and run into the house. Sometimes you even have to help put the cover on and that is torture but so much less than snowboarding. The lazy in me is really coming out lately and I've given up on having fun that takes a lot of work. 

Trig....sucks/makes me sick/can't go on/cos-1

This may look familiar to you, but most likely you took your last College Algebra/Trig class several years ago. Not me. I couldn't focus long enough to go to college so now that I'm in my late twenties I have  have the joy of dealing with triangles.

Unfortunately I hate math and I've been doing a lot of thinking about why and have decided that my hatred for math is because it deduces me to feeling stupid then helpless then defeated. In about 25 minutes I go through all the emotions that lead to me wanting to drink from a bottle. Ok, it's not that serious but I'm convinced that I got sick this weekend just from worrying about my math class. I fell asleep thinking about the Pythagorean theorem the other night and that is not okay.

My class is over mid December so that is somewhat comforting. I really like my teacher, but the dude worked for NASA. Yeah, like he's even capable of dumbing himself down to our level. The not comforting part is that next semester I should sign up for Pre-Cal and get it out of the way since I will need it and I can save $ because I can use the book I got for this class...Even with all signs pointing to yes I absolutely do not want to take Pre-Cal. Why can some things be so fun to tackle and other things so horrible? I have totally tried talking myself into the exciting world of math but that part of my brain has never developed I guess. How do you develop it?!! 

West Point

Yesterday I experienced the joy of revenge when the Air Force beat the Army at West Point. A few years ago Corey took me to a Texas Long Horns game in Austin. He said he bought me a shirt for the game so when we got down there he gave me an Oklahoma State Cowboys shirt to wear. I was the only fan cheering for the Cowboys at a Texas game. This payback has been a long time coming.
My brother-in-law, Dave, hooked us up with tickets from his brother who works for the Air Force football team. We met his wife, Inger, and their friends up there. Apparently after however many years of having football games on the Army base, they've yet to master any type of traffic control. It took us 2 hours to get onto base! We parked by the ski lift (which is insane that there's a freaking ski lift on an Army base) and they bussed us to the field. Luckily it was such a beautiful day and I didn't get cold until the third quarter. After the game we got to go on the field for a few pictures but were quickly kicked off.
West Point is definitely the most beautiful military installation I've ever seen. It was gorgeous! We didn't walk around too much but the view from the bus was great :)

Clemson

Our good friends, Devin and Sarah, got us tickets to the Clemson vs. Georgia Tech game last weekend. Sarah couldn't come with us because she just had a baby so we picked Devin up and drove to South Carolina. First of all, I love going to new states and I've never been to the Carolinas. Technically we went to North Carolina too, because we drove through it, but unfortunately I did not locate any smashed penny machines to prove it. 

Second of all, it was amazing and I never wanted to leave. Devin gave us the tour de Clemson and it was awesome. It's such a great college town and I've never seen so many tailgaters in my life. I've heard the south takes their football pretty seriously, but it was a little more than I expected. 

We also ate the best food you can have in one day. Before the game Devin introduced us to the Mellow Mushroom pizzeria. Swear on my life it is the best pizza crust in the world. After the game we had ribs at Sardi's. Incredible. These are the times in my life when I wish I could be bulimic. 

The game was great. We had good seats, Clemson killed Georgia Tech, the fans around us were hilarious and we got to see the most exciting 25 seconds in college football. When the players rub the rock and run down the hill it's claimed to be the most exciting 25 seconds in college football. I peed a little so you know it was good.

We totally bought Clemson shirts so we would blend in and because we love being posers at football games. Get ready for some orange.

Summers Farm

I'm back from Texas and so excited for the beautiful weather and the time of year. I freaking love pumpkins so I really wanted to go to a farm and this little gem is just down the road. But seriously, I'm obsessed with pumpkins. Not so much for decorating (although they're cool) but more the eating part. I will eat damn near anything if it is pumpkin flavored. Muffins are okay, but if it's a pumpkin muffin it's going down. I could pass on pancakes, but not my pumpkin spice friends. Pumpkin funnel cake?! WTF! How are you supposed to say 'no' to that. 

Luckily my friend Christina came with us and brought her sweet little baby so Corey and I didn't feel as weird about going. We don't like to be too creepy.

Just a little bit creepy.

 

Cunningham Falls

I begged Corey to take me to the majestic Cunningham Falls today. It's just up the road from us and Corey has a special relationship with the falls. He and his friend, Alan, dumped a few bottles of dish soap in the mighty river for a senior prank. I always imagined a large waterfall with so many bubbles flowing freely down to the wading pool below only to build up feet and feet of bubbles. After the 4/5 mile cliff hike the elusive falls appeared...

Not exactly what I was expecting. It is fall and we've had little rain so I'm sure it gets bigger but I guess I was expecting an Oregon kind of waterfall. I loved the hike though. Also, Corey's greatest fear slithered across his feet at the start of the hike so we made it in record time. I like to tell him that he's like Indiana Jones. Brave but afraid of snakes. That made me want to watch The Last Crusade tonight but Netflix decided to be a butthead and not make it a play on demand movie.

I got back Tuesday night from visiting my family in Colorado. On Wednesday I got the ultra-rare opportunity of observing an autopsy at work! It was awesome. Sick, I know, but I loved each and every second of it.

 I also finished 1776 on cd so I was feeling very scholarly. Tomorrow I'm leaving for some pre-deployment training in Texas for 2 weeks. I'm not deploying but I volunteered for the extra TDY money ;)

3 Reasons to go to Colorado

Passport to Merriment

We went to the Maryland Renaissance Festival over Labor Day Weekend. Sorry to disappoint everyone but we did not dress up. I couldn't find my wench dress so we just went casual. I've heard a lot of good things about Ren Fairs and I was pretty excited. Mainly for the turkey leg and other amazing fair foods. I did tear up a turkey leg. That was the real passport to merriment. Corey's mom came with us and we met up with Jason, Christina and Liam. 

I noticed a few things I found odd and slightly frightening. A knife and metal star throwing booth?

 No, it'll be fun! 

WTF?! Seriously. 

Less frightening but still weird. 

I love people watching and if you share these feelings I highly recommend a Ren Fair. Not to mention all the great food, lots of stores (mostly containing Medieval accessories so you'll likely not spend a lot of money), they had some really good Celtic bands, belly dancers, jousting, knights in shining armor, lots of medieval cleavage and the list goes on. I'm not going to lie. If peer pressured just a little, I'd totally dress up. 

The Nationals

Sarah, Devin and Eva came up last weekend for a Nationals game. That same day Glenn Beck was having his rally on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial and we figured we should check it out. Eva turned 2 the day before and somehow she knew it was time to turn up the sass in her life. She demanded that she get to walk in her plastic high heels almost a mile and a half to the Lincoln. I'm serious, she wasn't having it any other way. I have to admit that she was rockin' those heels and she probably walks better in stilettos than I do.

We arrived at the back of the rally and couldn't hear anything so we stuck around for 10 minutes then walked back to the US Marines Memorial. Sarah wanted to check out this Thai restaurant near Dulles because the cook beat Bobby Flay so we got some Pad Thai. It was really good but a little spicy. I can't handle spice at all so I couldn't really taste flavor, mainly just the snot that was falling out of my nose. I'm a wimp.

The Nationals killed the Cardinals so it was a pretty exciting game. Eva did amazing at the game but started to have a break down around the 6th inning so we stayed for the 7th inning stretch and busted outta there. It was totally bobble head night at the game so I have a new present for my nephews when I go to see them in a few weeks :)