[July 24 2008]

Family Weekend

Tomorrow, after work, Shaun and I are driving to Phoenix to spend the weekend with my family. Kyleigh just moved into her own place, with her boyfriend.... my little sister is all grown up! Saturday, we plan to spend the day hanging out by the pool, drinking margaritas. Mom might even come join us. Saturday night we're all going to dinner - I have a feeling they'll be turning it into a birthday thing but I'm hoping I'm wrong.

And no computer all weekend. Hooray! I still have text messaging though, so I'm sure I'll be included on whatever drama comes along while we're away.

On a totally random side note, I went by Safeway after work to pick up milk and a tomato for dinner (not to eat together... the milk was for my coffee in the morning and the tomato was for our grilled cheese sandwiches. But I digress). Anyhow, as I'm swiping my debit card to pay, the cashier notices my business card in my wallet. She proceeds to ask me "Do you work at Chase?" Upon answering affirmatively, she questions me again. "Isn't that a conflict of interest?" It's at that point that I realize I'm using my Wells Fargo card. I laughed and told her yeah and tried to explain that I just started with Chase and haven't had time to make the change over of all our bank accounts yet, but she just laughed at me and told me that it would be like her shopping at Smiths. I found it amusing.

Posted by CelticRain at 11:31 pm
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[July 21 2008]

A balancing act

I'm having a real hard time balancing my life lately.

As ridiculous as it sounds, I can't bring myself to break away from our full-time raiding schedule to actually incorporate other things into my life. We raid Monday through Thursday from 6pm to 10pm our time. I get off work around 5:15pm and have a half hour drive home... which leaves me barely enough time to consume a TV dinner at my desk while organizing warlock invites and performing other random Officer duties.

Don't get me wrong. I love my WoW friends. I love my guild. I love being involved with the inner workings of a successful group. But part of me would love to get home from work, get a few little odds & ends done, change my clothes and go out to a bar for an hour or two with some friends. Or actually cook a full course meal. Or lay in my inflatable pool and finally finish the book I've been reading for almost a year now.

And let's not forget that I still hope to take the GRE and apply to graduate school... which leads me down an entirely different gripe about not living in a place where I can attend real University classes. How am I supposed to follow my passion when we don't even live in a place where that's possible? But we can't sell our house right now. We can't afford to move and have two residences. Shaun isn't even really all that keen on moving anyhow. And I don't know how much of my disdain for living here is simply because I have a phobia of spending my entire life in the town I grew up in.

I know the obvious answer is to give up my WoW obligations, focus on my life, and make whatever changes are necessary to be happy. But somehow that doesn't seem to be a workable solution. I have friends in WoW, friends who count on me to show up consistently. Friends who would probably disappear if I gave up full-time raiding, and then where would I be... living in a small town with no one to talk to after I got off work other than Shaun - who would be busy raiding LOL Maybe I should just give up sleep.

Meh.

Posted by CelticRain at 11:51 pm
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[July 19 2008]

Testing....

I'm just testing, for future reference, if I can post from my phone.

Posted by CelticRain at 6:18 pm
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[July 13 2008]

Weekend in Sedona

I spent the weekend camping in Sedona with my dad, his girlfriend & her son, and my two bio-sisters. Unfortunately, Shaun had to work Saturday so he wasn't able to join us. He missed a great time at a beautiful location.

The 89A from Flagstaff to Sedona was possibly the most amazing drive I've ever done. It's about 40 miles of switchbacks taking you down over 2000 ft into the canyon area. You go from dense forest to vast canyons with every turn, and because you have to go about 15mph most of the way, you are actually able to take in a lot of it.

Our campsite was right beside a creek.





At night, quite a few critters came out to check around our site. While I was sitting in the Jeep, talking to Shaun on the phone (yes, I had cell service), I watched a skunk walk up to the fire pit area and rummage around for scraps of our dinner. I'm not sure if it was a skunk or a raccoon, but the next morning something left me a trace of its presence.



We went into the city part for a little while on Saturday to get a fishing license and some real coffee. The attempt to make it via percolator at the campsite didn't go over very well.



I was also able to get a few decent pictures of just how beautiful it is there.





Non-fat latte in tow, we then went to go fishing in the creek. My dad only brought a pole for himself and a small one for his gf's son, so I started out just sitting back and relaxing. Her son is 5, so after about 10 minutes of holding a pole, he became bored with fishing and started wandering around and doing what little kids do. I picked up his pole, recast it, and within two minutes caught what ended up being the only catch of the day....



Oh yeah. I'm amazing!

We spent the rest of the day bird watching, hiking, falling in the water while I tried to cross it.... and enjoying each other's company. This morning we packed everything up and headed our separate ways, each of us with several hours worth of driving to do. The trip was fantastic. I can't wait to do it again. I am looking forward to sleeping in my own bed tonight however.

And on that note, I think that's exactly what I'm going to do!

Posted by CelticRain at 10:08 pm
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[July 06 2008]

Three Day Weekend

I hope everyone had a wonderful, safe 4th of July weekend. I know I did.

A three-day weekend was exactly what I needed after such a hectic past few weeks.

I was able to spend some quality time in my inflatable pool, saw Hancock, watched fireworks with my BFF and beautiful god-daughter, and caught up on a ton of stuff. I had an incredibly long To-Do list for this weekend and amazingly, I was able to get all of it checked off. It's a good thing too because next weekend I will be camping in Sedona with my sisters, my dad and his girlfriend and the weekend after that I'll be working Saturday. Plus, I have to find a weekend to make it back to Phoenix because Kyleigh and her boyfriend just moved into their own place and therefore I must be a good big sister and buy her house warming gifts and inspect her new grown-up home.

But for now, I must get some sleep because I have to return to the working world tomorrow and that makes me a little sad. Good night all!

Posted by CelticRain at 11:35 pm
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[July 01 2008]

Home again, home again, jiggity jig...

Well I'm back from Ohio. So glad to be back in my element again. Though I do have to say that it was a little fun to be able to just go out and make friends and not worry about chores and raiding and all the other obligations I have on a regular basis. That's not to say that it wasn't a busy, hectic, stressful week. Long days of training class on a three-hour time difference... yuck.

But I saw a lightening bug and that made it all worth it! Yes, a lightening bug. I've never seen one aside from on TV - and they're SO much cooler in real life. They're like little shooting stars but at eye level. I wish I could take one home with me. And I heard my first tornado siren. I thought I was going to die.. but no one else seemed to care. Apparently a tornado siren means Have Another Drink when you're out at the bar after a long day of class. We made it through, obviously. And I was able to jump in a few puddles on my way back to the hotel.

Yes... I'm a big kid when it comes to some things. Especially things that are abnormal to me, like lightening bugs and rain and beavers. I forgot about the beaver - It was just swimming in the pond outside the training complex. I sent Shaun a text message about it. It was 5am for him... he wasn't as excited as I was.

But now I'm home and back to the same old grind. They managed to get Illidan down while I was away. Of course. But I helped out with the 2nd kill tonight. No loots for me, but Shaun got his bow. We'll probably spend a few more weeks raking in the Tier 6 before moving on to Sunwell. It will be nice to start working on something new again.

Posted by CelticRain at 12:22 am
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[June 21 2008]

On the move...

I'm sitting in a hotel room in central Phoenix at the moment, halfway through a grueling two weeks. I started the new (hopefully temporary) job on Monday and spent the rest of the week traveling to various other branches to "shadow" people before they fly me to Columbus, OH tomorrow for their training program. So far everyone has been very friendly and I think it will prove to be pretty easy money as long as I learn to work with the team - which should be cake. Once everything settles down I think I'm going to start studying for the GRE. University of Florida has a correspondence Masters program in Forensic Science.

Maybe since I'm writing this down, and making it public, I'll actually do it.... let's hope at least.

On a side note, I discovered RadioLab podcasts recently (thanks Eddie) and they've proven to be a savior during all the traveling. If you're into science or philosophy or just want to hear some interesting facts on various topics, check them out on iTunes. They're produced for WYNC public radio.

Posted by CelticRain at 10:58 am
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