I get really happy when people do nice things/the right thing so I wanna tell this story:
Yesterday, I went in to DC to watch the Michigan game and then go out with a group of friends for the night. After a long day and night and watching Michigan lose (again) and hopping from bar to bar and in and out of a few cabs, I finally decide it is time to call it a night around 2am. So my friend and I hail a cab to head back to Alexandria (the metro stops running at 2am on weekends and we were too far from a stop to be able to make it). In the cab I was texting and calling people so I knew that I had my phone with me at that point. I get back to my apartment, pay the guy (thankfully with a good tip) and walk through my apartment door and realize I do not have my phone. CRAPPPPPPP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (other things were said/yelled but I like to keep the blog clean).
So, its too late to run back down because the cab has already left and I have no idea what cab company I took. Also, while I have a land line phone, I couldn't use it to call my cell phone because I don't have long distance service, and my number is still my Michigan phone number (I don't even think I could have just done it and paid a fee, I don't think it even works long distance). So the next morning I realize how hard life is without a phone. I had no way of contacting people other than IM and if they weren't at the computer, I was out of luck.
So a little while later, mom calls my land line phone because she had received all of my IMs about losing my phone and she gave me a calling card number to use so that I could make long distance calls. I called my phone a few times hoping anyone would answer it and I got nothing. Finally, a couple hours later, I decided to try again and the cab driver answered!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I have never felt so relieved, it was great. I talk to him and he gave me his home address so I could drive there and pick it up, which I did about half an hour later.
It makes me so happy when stuff like this happens, he could have made no effort to get my phone back to me, I can't believe he gave me his home address but I am so relieved I got my phone back, I had no idea how attached I am to my phone until I was without it for about 12 hours.
I definately need to start being a lot more careful about grabbing my things when I get out of cabs!
Sunday, October 19, 2008
Monday, October 13, 2008
More new stuff for my apartment
Wow, two posts in one day...that is nutters!
For graduation this year, mom and dad gave me some money to buy "fun stuff" for my apartment and I finally finished spending it today! I have been looking for a small hall/console table to put next to my front door for a really long time and I finally found one today at homegoods. It's a place where I can put my keys and mail when I come in the door to try and keep some of the clutter off of my desk.
I also found a great deal on a set of kitchen ware including some canisters for flour and sugar, a container for my wooden spoons and other large kitchen utensils, and a ceramic thing to put my hot pans on.
Before today I also bought a throw pillow (which can be seen in the picture of my couch a few posts down, it the one with embroidery) and two tall bookcases from Ikea that I now have in my living room and bedroom, so all in all, I think I got a lot of good stuff. The apartment is pretty much complete for now, I have all of the essential pieces of furniture to not feel like I'm in college anymore, yay!
For graduation this year, mom and dad gave me some money to buy "fun stuff" for my apartment and I finally finished spending it today! I have been looking for a small hall/console table to put next to my front door for a really long time and I finally found one today at homegoods. It's a place where I can put my keys and mail when I come in the door to try and keep some of the clutter off of my desk.
I also found a great deal on a set of kitchen ware including some canisters for flour and sugar, a container for my wooden spoons and other large kitchen utensils, and a ceramic thing to put my hot pans on.
Before today I also bought a throw pillow (which can be seen in the picture of my couch a few posts down, it the one with embroidery) and two tall bookcases from Ikea that I now have in my living room and bedroom, so all in all, I think I got a lot of good stuff. The apartment is pretty much complete for now, I have all of the essential pieces of furniture to not feel like I'm in college anymore, yay!
Go USA!!
Matt and I went to the US soccer game vs. Cuba this weekend at RFK stadium in DC. I got the tickets for Matt's birthday about a month ago so I was excited the weekend was finally here. The game was a world cup qualifying match (for the 2010 world cup in South Africa) and Matt tells me that winning this game got us in to the next round of qualifying. The US won 6-1 so it was an exciting game because there was a lot of goal scoring, most soccer games are pretty low scoring. Matt also told me that this was the first goal the US has allowed in a qualifying match yet, and it was a bogus goal because the Cuban player was offside anyway but they never called it (no instant replay in soccer!). Also, a Cuban player received two yellow cards in the first half and therefore was ejected from the game.
In soccer, severe enough penalties result in a yellow card being given to the offending player, this serves as sort of a warning that you better be careful because if you commit a second yellow card offense, you will receive a red card, which means you are ejected from the game. Sometimes, if the penalty is bad enough, the red card will come out right away with no yellow card. The most significant result of getting a red card though, is not only are you ejected from the game, but your team has to play one man down for the rest of the game, they can not send in a substitute when a player is kicked out. So for the end of the first half and the second half, Cuba had to play with 9 players on the field, while the US got to have 10 (not counting goalies). Matt tells me that red cards are relatively rare, however I feel like whenever I watch a soccer game, I see someone get ejected from the game so I must pick the good ones to watch :)
Here are some pictures from the event:
View of the field from our seats, there weren't very many people in the upper deck but the lower sections on both sides seemed to be sold out, so I'm not sure they even tried to sell most of the upper deck seats
US team warming up
US soccer flag over what seemed to be the crazy fan section, everyone on the other side of the field seemed to be very organized with their cheering and they were all jumping up and down in unison, it literally looked like they were on a platform moving up and down because they were so in sync, Matt and I were trying to figure out how to get over there...
Final score
Self Portrait, I am sweet at these :)
So all in all it was a good time, I would go to another game but the only problem is they play all over the country, never consistently in one place so it might be tough to be in the same place as them again.
In soccer, severe enough penalties result in a yellow card being given to the offending player, this serves as sort of a warning that you better be careful because if you commit a second yellow card offense, you will receive a red card, which means you are ejected from the game. Sometimes, if the penalty is bad enough, the red card will come out right away with no yellow card. The most significant result of getting a red card though, is not only are you ejected from the game, but your team has to play one man down for the rest of the game, they can not send in a substitute when a player is kicked out. So for the end of the first half and the second half, Cuba had to play with 9 players on the field, while the US got to have 10 (not counting goalies). Matt tells me that red cards are relatively rare, however I feel like whenever I watch a soccer game, I see someone get ejected from the game so I must pick the good ones to watch :)
Here are some pictures from the event:
View of the field from our seats, there weren't very many people in the upper deck but the lower sections on both sides seemed to be sold out, so I'm not sure they even tried to sell most of the upper deck seats
US team warming up
US soccer flag over what seemed to be the crazy fan section, everyone on the other side of the field seemed to be very organized with their cheering and they were all jumping up and down in unison, it literally looked like they were on a platform moving up and down because they were so in sync, Matt and I were trying to figure out how to get over there...
Final score
Self Portrait, I am sweet at these :)
So all in all it was a good time, I would go to another game but the only problem is they play all over the country, never consistently in one place so it might be tough to be in the same place as them again.
Wednesday, October 8, 2008
"Well it turns out, I have a rose garden"
Well, I blew it, I went more than a week without blogging and I didn't even realize it until today! I need to set some sort of alarm that goes off if I forget to post.
Well, moving on, I got to do something this week that was really spectacular. Mom, dad and I got to tour the west wing of the white house! My dad's friend's cousin is Brent McIntosh, whose official title is "Deputy Assistant to the President and Deputy Staff Secretary". I got the impression that his job is to take bills that congress passes to the president so that he can sign them, his U of M and Yale degrees don't really help him out with that but whatev, he works in the white house and therefore, we got to tour. Here's a brief rundown of what we saw:
The Oval Office - pretty much sweet, I had no idea we would get to see this on the tour so that was awesome.
The Roosevelt Room
The room where the cabinet meets (I dont know if this has a special name)
The rose garden
The press briefing room
Here are a bunch of pictures, there was also some sort of breast cancer awareness benefit going on and the white house was lit up with all pink lights and looked pretty cool. We weren't allowed to take pictures inside, except for in the press room, so all the pics are outside:
Well, moving on, I got to do something this week that was really spectacular. Mom, dad and I got to tour the west wing of the white house! My dad's friend's cousin is Brent McIntosh, whose official title is "Deputy Assistant to the President and Deputy Staff Secretary". I got the impression that his job is to take bills that congress passes to the president so that he can sign them, his U of M and Yale degrees don't really help him out with that but whatev, he works in the white house and therefore, we got to tour. Here's a brief rundown of what we saw:
The Oval Office - pretty much sweet, I had no idea we would get to see this on the tour so that was awesome.
The Roosevelt Room
The room where the cabinet meets (I dont know if this has a special name)
The rose garden
The press briefing room
Here are a bunch of pictures, there was also some sort of breast cancer awareness benefit going on and the white house was lit up with all pink lights and looked pretty cool. We weren't allowed to take pictures inside, except for in the press room, so all the pics are outside:
Sunday, September 28, 2008
There's no place like home
This weekend was my first trip back to Michigan since I moved to Alexandria. I went to Grosse Pointe Thursday-Friday night, then picked Matt up at the airport on the way to Ann Arbor where we got to see lots of friends who all came back for the event. We went to the football game (I'm hoping anyone who reads this knows how that went). It was in my top three best Michigan games I've ever been to. The other two are OSU 2003 (my freshman year) and MSU 2004 (my sophomore year). It was so awesome to be back in the big house and to feel the energy of the student section during that comeback, it was such a rush! The pictures below are a recap of my football game day. I included pictures of the stadium contruction for people who have been to Michigan stadium...it was really strange to see all of the steel framework going out around the stadium but I am interested in seeing what the finished product looks like, hopefully it turns out looking good. I'll let the pictures speak for themselves, enjoy.
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
Lets go (Navy) Blue!
So, this past weekend, since there was no Michigan football game, I went to the Navy football game in Annapolis against Rutgers. My friend Kelley invited me since her sister is a "firstie" (senior) at Navy. It was a lot of fun and very different than Michigan football games. First of all, since it is a military academy, there are a lot more rules that students have to follow. Every student is required to attend every football game from beginning to end, no leaving early. They all march in with their company in uniform (30 companies in the academy) and commanders(?) of each company get introduced and everyone lines up on the field. I took my disposable camera that I bought in New York when I saw the Little Mermaid because I wanted to finish it so I could get it developed (ahhh the good old days of film cameras...not knowing what the picture looks like the second after you take it!). Well, big surprise, I haven't gotten them developed yet. I was going to wait until I had the pics to post, but then I would have to go against my new rule of never going more than a week without posting so I'll just have to update it later when I get the pictures back.
So anyway, after all the midshipmen marched in, the game started. It was actually a really good game because both teams were at about the same skill level. (I also have to add that I felt weird there because it was Navy (a blue and gold team) against Rutgers (a red and white team). I felt like I was supposed to hate anyone I saw in red, I kept forgetting they weren't from THE...Ohio State University). Navy ended up winning with a late in the fourth quarter field goal, 23-21.
After the game, we went to a couple tailgates (at Navy, everyone tailgates after the game since they are not allowed to be drunk at the games, or even buzzed for that matter). We got lots of free food and I got to meet several of the people in Colleen's company...men in uniform :).
Also, John McCain was at the game, although I did not see him. It was homecoming and parent's weekend and I guess his son is in Colleen's company. They didn't do anything special for McCain though, if I hadn't been told he was there, I wouldn't have even known.
All in all it was a good day, fun to experience another college football stadium, totally different feeling that Michigan. That being said, I am going to Ann Arbor this weekend for some good old big ten football action. This time I will have my non-disposable camera so I can update with pictures any time I want.
On a side note, even though I know almost everyone who reads this blog, also reads Ted and Sara's blog, I just wanted to include this link to some pictures of my niece that were taken by a professional photographer and turned out adorable! http://sherryhammondsblog.com/
(just scroll down a bit until you see the photos of Leili!)
So anyway, after all the midshipmen marched in, the game started. It was actually a really good game because both teams were at about the same skill level. (I also have to add that I felt weird there because it was Navy (a blue and gold team) against Rutgers (a red and white team). I felt like I was supposed to hate anyone I saw in red, I kept forgetting they weren't from THE...Ohio State University). Navy ended up winning with a late in the fourth quarter field goal, 23-21.
After the game, we went to a couple tailgates (at Navy, everyone tailgates after the game since they are not allowed to be drunk at the games, or even buzzed for that matter). We got lots of free food and I got to meet several of the people in Colleen's company...men in uniform :).
Also, John McCain was at the game, although I did not see him. It was homecoming and parent's weekend and I guess his son is in Colleen's company. They didn't do anything special for McCain though, if I hadn't been told he was there, I wouldn't have even known.
All in all it was a good day, fun to experience another college football stadium, totally different feeling that Michigan. That being said, I am going to Ann Arbor this weekend for some good old big ten football action. This time I will have my non-disposable camera so I can update with pictures any time I want.
On a side note, even though I know almost everyone who reads this blog, also reads Ted and Sara's blog, I just wanted to include this link to some pictures of my niece that were taken by a professional photographer and turned out adorable! http://sherryhammondsblog.com/
(just scroll down a bit until you see the photos of Leili!)
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
More ramblings about my life :)
How has it already been almost a week again since my last post??? I don't even feel like I am doing that much and time is flying by, September is more than half over!
Here are some things that I've done recently that I didn't mention in my last post. Two weekends ago, I went to New Jersey to visit boy for his birthday, which was Sunday, Sept. 7th, he turned 23. Yes, I am older than him, but only by 7 weeks. However it seems like more than that since I was a year ahead of him in school, but since I did an extra year of college, we both graduated and started our jobs at the same time so I usually forget I graduated high school a year before him and that I am therefore much wiser :).
I went there Thursday night (ahhhh the beauty of working for the federal government) on the Amtrak, which by the way was the first successful trip with no hiccups that either of us has experienced trying to visit each other since we've lived out here. It was so awesome to not have any glitches. I left work at 4:45 to take the metro into downtown DC to catch my 6:10ish train. Left right on time and arrived in Hackensack at 9:15 in only 3 hours!!!!!!!!!! So worth paying about 5 times more than the bus. Since this was Thursday night, Matt had to work Friday so I stayed home and played guitar hero/nintendo wii and watched all the HGTV I wanted while I still had control of the remote.
I also planned to make a cake Friday and I knew that Matt would not have the supplies, so I packed my cake pans in my suitcase from Alexandria and on Friday, walked over to CVS to buy the rest of the supplies. I managed to make a pretty pathetic looking double layer chocolate cake with vanilla frosting. I have to say that no matter how hard or how many times I try, my cakes never even come close to looking like mom's always did when I was a kid. My cakes never stick to the pans, but they are always a weird shape. They end up being much thicker in the center of the circle than around the edges, so the top of the cake is never flat. Or, if I want the top to be flat, I end up having a huge gap around the edges between the two layers that I attempt to just cover up with frosting. However it was pretty warm that day and by the time Matt got home, the cake had sort of started to collapse and the layers were sliding apart. Matt was a trooper though and told me the cake looked great and we enjoyed it all weekend :)
Also, for Matt's birthday I gave him two tickets to the US vs. Cuba world cup qualifying soccer match being played in Washington DC on October 11th. Matt is a big soccer fan (and so am I) so I knew he'd be excited and neither of us has ever seen the US team play. After that game I will definitely have pictures to post (so long as Matt asks me to go with his second ticket!).
Next weekend, Sept. 26th, I will be going to Ann Arbor for the Michigan vs. Wisconsin football game, which I am so excited for. Matt will be there as well as several of our college friends so it should be an awesome time. Also, Matt's parents are generously donating two (of their four) season tickets to us for the game so we do not have to go through the ordeal of trying to find tickets. Although with the way the season is going, that might not actually be too hard.
First week of production almost done, so far things are looking pretty good, my trainer was out yesterday so he is a little behind in reviewing our cases, but he will catch up with us way before we have more cases to give him so I'm not too worried.
Hope everyone is doing well and be sure to check the updated version of my previous post (couch!) and the challenge I posted in the comments!
Here are some things that I've done recently that I didn't mention in my last post. Two weekends ago, I went to New Jersey to visit boy for his birthday, which was Sunday, Sept. 7th, he turned 23. Yes, I am older than him, but only by 7 weeks. However it seems like more than that since I was a year ahead of him in school, but since I did an extra year of college, we both graduated and started our jobs at the same time so I usually forget I graduated high school a year before him and that I am therefore much wiser :).
I went there Thursday night (ahhhh the beauty of working for the federal government) on the Amtrak, which by the way was the first successful trip with no hiccups that either of us has experienced trying to visit each other since we've lived out here. It was so awesome to not have any glitches. I left work at 4:45 to take the metro into downtown DC to catch my 6:10ish train. Left right on time and arrived in Hackensack at 9:15 in only 3 hours!!!!!!!!!! So worth paying about 5 times more than the bus. Since this was Thursday night, Matt had to work Friday so I stayed home and played guitar hero/nintendo wii and watched all the HGTV I wanted while I still had control of the remote.
I also planned to make a cake Friday and I knew that Matt would not have the supplies, so I packed my cake pans in my suitcase from Alexandria and on Friday, walked over to CVS to buy the rest of the supplies. I managed to make a pretty pathetic looking double layer chocolate cake with vanilla frosting. I have to say that no matter how hard or how many times I try, my cakes never even come close to looking like mom's always did when I was a kid. My cakes never stick to the pans, but they are always a weird shape. They end up being much thicker in the center of the circle than around the edges, so the top of the cake is never flat. Or, if I want the top to be flat, I end up having a huge gap around the edges between the two layers that I attempt to just cover up with frosting. However it was pretty warm that day and by the time Matt got home, the cake had sort of started to collapse and the layers were sliding apart. Matt was a trooper though and told me the cake looked great and we enjoyed it all weekend :)
Also, for Matt's birthday I gave him two tickets to the US vs. Cuba world cup qualifying soccer match being played in Washington DC on October 11th. Matt is a big soccer fan (and so am I) so I knew he'd be excited and neither of us has ever seen the US team play. After that game I will definitely have pictures to post (so long as Matt asks me to go with his second ticket!).
Next weekend, Sept. 26th, I will be going to Ann Arbor for the Michigan vs. Wisconsin football game, which I am so excited for. Matt will be there as well as several of our college friends so it should be an awesome time. Also, Matt's parents are generously donating two (of their four) season tickets to us for the game so we do not have to go through the ordeal of trying to find tickets. Although with the way the season is going, that might not actually be too hard.
First week of production almost done, so far things are looking pretty good, my trainer was out yesterday so he is a little behind in reviewing our cases, but he will catch up with us way before we have more cases to give him so I'm not too worried.
Hope everyone is doing well and be sure to check the updated version of my previous post (couch!) and the challenge I posted in the comments!
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