Hair Choppage

This is what I looked like yesterday:


This is what I look like today:


Any Questions?


(p.s. all the clothes in the background are because I am doing laundry, not because I am a slob...mostly)

Winter Sports = Owwww

Monday was president's day so Matt and I both had long weekends and a while back we decided we were going to use the opportunity to go snowboarding. Matt has been snowboarding since he was in 8th grade so he is good at it and has no problem, I on the other hand only tried snowboarding for the first time last winter, and only did it for two days at that. I really enjoyed it and couldn't wait to do it again, but this was the first opportunity since then that I have had to be able to do it. I knew that since it had been a while since I had snowboarded, that it would almost be like starting all over again...and believe you me, I was right.

Last year when I did it for the first time, I learned that what everyone tells you about learning how to snowboard is true...you will fall...a lot!!! Snowboarding looks a LOT easier than it is, in my opinion, it took me a lot of tries last year just to get the hang of not "catching an edge" while trying to go straight and subsequently falling flat on my face or flat on my butt. This year, I tried to focus more on switching between my heel edge and my toe edge. This is pretty self explanatory but I'll explain it anyway in order to take up some space.

Lemme back up a little bit...snowboarders either ride "normal" (left foot forward) or "goofy" (right foot forward), hey, I didn't make up the terms. Most people who are right handed prefer left foot forward, but it is really just a question of which way makes you feel more stable. Now, regardless of your riding "style" you are always always always supposed to lean so that you are putting a lot more weight on your front foot, otherwise you will spin around and end up with the wrong foot going foward down the mountain. This is one of the hardest things to get used to because you naturally want to lean back when you want to slow down, but this will just make you spin around and fall over and put on a nice show for all the people on the lift above you.

Now that we all know about normal and goofy, the next thing you need to know about snowboarding is that you are always supposed to be on an "edge". Heel edge means your weight (while still mainly on your forward foot) is supported by your heels, while toe edge natually means your weight is supported by your toes. Heel edge allows you to turn left, toe edge allows you to turn right. Generally, you are supposed to switch between edges in order to basically continue in a straightish path.

As I said before, I made it my goal this time to work on switching between edges without going splat. Well, I would say I can do it about 50% of the time, I have a lot of trouble going from heel to toe which means I fall on my knees alot. And boy do/did I have the bruises to show for it. These pictures do not capture the full essence of how bright purple my knees really were, but they do show how much surface area the bruises covered.




I tried to buy knee pads on the second day, but they didn't sell them so I went without, luckily I didn't fall as much (mostly because I was afraid to turn right) and I didn't last very long as my entire body was one big sac of soreness. Also, I wanted to take pictures, but if I had had my camera with me on the mountain, it would have ended up in a couple hundred pieces by the end of the day.

Matt was very very patient and stuck with me on the greens the whole time, so I was very appreciative of that because I know he wanted to do harder stuff. He did a few right before we left when I had had enough so hopefully he still had fun! And don't worry, I wore a helmet and wrist guards the whole time!

It's about time

So way back in September, I wrote a couple posts about going to NYC to see the little mermaid and then going to Annapolis with my friend Kelley to see a Navy football game. In those posts I mentioned that I had taken pictures with a disposable camera because I had forgotten my regular camera and that I would post the pics "soon," when I got the pictures developed.

Well, I finally got the camera developed this weekend so I am ready to post the pictures now, they aren't of the greatest quality, the colors seem sort of dull, I guess we are all just used tot he quality of digital now. Sorry it only took me like 5 months...

After the show outside the theatre

We sat in the corner on the grass, this is a while before the game started

After all of the navy "midshipmen" marched out onto the field by company. Apparently they do this before every game, and every student has to attend every football game, there is no choice

The did a flyover before the game with these weird planes that can convert into helicopters mid air and land vertically

Toward the end of the game, me and Kelley

Movin on up!

On Tuesday, I moved out of my training room and in to my new, permanent office at the PTO. I have one officemate, Mike, who started on the same day as me and was in my lab with me for the whole 6 months and is one of my hang out friends outside of work, so that is nice. We are also in the same "art unit" which is mainly the reason we got placed together.

My office has an actual door that closes and locks, I have a name plate thingy by my door, two whole desks to myself, my own bookcase, and my very own printer!! The computer setup is no different than what I had in the training academy but there is definitely more space. I am also now in the same building as my SPE (supervisor) and all of the other people in my art unit.

I actually feel like I am more a part of the PTO now because before, we were in a building that was next door to, but not connected to the actual PTO complex of 5 buildings. The 5 buildings are all connected on a concourse level below ground, so I don't have to go outside for anything anymore (now that it is getting warm of course).

Here are some pictures:

The name plate outside my office:

About a week before I moved in, I went over to check on things in the new office, and they had spelled my name Catherine Burke...let's just say I was not pleased. I had a gut feeling that that would happen because they also spelled my name wrong on the first day when I got my badge, so they had to give me a new one of those too. This sort of thing makes me so mad, I realize that the conventional spelling of Burk is with the e, but I get very touchy when people spell my name with the e because it happens so much and it is only because of pure laziness. Because my name is spelled wrong so much (Katherine Burke, doesn't even look like the same person) I make a really concerted effort to never spell people's names wrong, even when they seem conventional, and I know how frustrating it can be, I feel like this is the story of my life. I can not tell you how many times I have said "Cathy with a C, Burk with no e". My World history teacher in 6th grade and cross country coach in high school, Mr. Cooper, used to just call me that whenever he addressed me, I guess he like the ring it had.

View into my office from the hallway, the chair you see is my office mate's, my area is closer to the door:

This is where I sit:

My bookcase, this is to the right of my desk if I am sitting facing my computer, against the wall the door swings open toward:
Well, there it is, not bad eh? I am going to try and get a bulletin or white board this weekend to put on my wall to try and bring some life to the place.

I can see!!

(Check out both posts from today!)

So, I think everyone in the family is aware that sometime between Christmas and New Years, I lost my glasses. Everyone in the family searched through their stuff and through the van looking for them for me but to no avail. What is funny though is that it took me a good two weeks or so to realize I didn't know where they were.

Not having glasses is especially discouraging to me because I spend my day at work looking at a computer screen and it strains my eyes after several days without my glasses. I don't need my glasses for general living, only really for intensive reading or if I am really tired, which I think explains why I didn't notice not having them for so long since it was Christmas/New Years and I wasn't working very much. However, after a few days of being back at work, my eyes were killing me and I had constant headaches, it was really hard to get any work done at all, however I kept holding out because I figured they would turn up somewhere, but no such luck.

So, after about a week of suffering, I called the eye doctor and made an appointment. My choices were that current day in about 20 minutes, or more than two weeks later, so I took the one that day, even though I knew I had no prayer of making it to the appointment on time (it takes about 15 minutes to drive there minimum and I wasn't even dressed yet as I called first thing after waking up before going to work). I had called the place where I got my last pair of glasses and they sent me my prescription since I had never been to an eye doctor without my old glasses and I didn't want them to have to start fresh with a new prescription since I knew what worked pretty well. I got to the appointment late (of course) and had to wait about an hour/hour and half for them to squeeze me in, but I really didn't have a choice because I could not work without them. Once I picked out the frames I wanted, I asked the woman how long it normally takes for them to come in and she said "about 5 to 7 business days" and my heart sank (I've always gotten my glasses the same day before). I told her how desperate my situation was and that I really needed them as soon as humanly possible so she put a rush order on them to be ready in two days. So off I went back to work with no glasses.

Two days later I went back to the eye doctor to pick up my new glasses and I LOVE THEM!!! Here is a picture with me wearing them (I had to do about ten takes with my camera set on auto timer before I got a half-way decent picture). The frames are the type that only surround half the lens, so there is no frame on the bottom. Also, the sides (which can't be seen in the picture) have little pattern details on them that I really like. Here they are:


If you look at the left side of the picture, you will notice that my Christmas tree is still up. And also, I thought I'd announce that I just took my Christmas lights down from my balcony about ten minutes before taking the picture. I think I'll leave the tree up.

January trip to AA

I know this is a few weeks late since this trip was about three weeks ago, but I just wanted to post some pictures from the weekend. I was there Thursday-Sunday and got to see lots of friends again, although it snowed the ENTIRE time I was there, it was my first time seeing snow this year!

Thursday night, Scott (lifetime family friend if you are not in the know) was there, whom I had not seen since his return from studying abroad in Budapest, or for a while even before that, so that was really exciting. We went to Mitch's (let's not talk about how pasty I look compared to Scott, who just spent a week on a beach in southern Florida:

Friday night, we went out to dinner at Cafe Habana with Matt's sister, Kim. It was really fun to see her and catch up. Later that night, my friend and her housemates had a party attended by almost all of my friends who are still in AA. This picture is with my friends Aaron (left) and Austin (right):


Roommate!!

The next night, one of my best friends from high school and college (and former roommate in West Quad), Sara, came in to town from Toledo (where she is attending medical school, I know, she's a smarty pants) and we made it out to the Brown Jug and Charley's (completing the South U bar crawl scene) and actually ran in to a bunch of people that I went to elementary/middle/high school with, some of whom I had not seen since high school graduation. Then we made it to yet another party where I knew pretty much nobody except the group I came with:

It was a busy weekend and I have to say, I've already lost some of the stamina I had in college. I could do three day weekends every week with no problem, but this one was a little bit of a struggle...I guess I am growing up :)

Sunday morning I got to see my family because we went to my aunt and uncle's house in AA to celebrate Christmas, and since my aunt is a spectacular cook, those visits are always superb!

Sorry it took me so long to write this post up!

The wonderful world of SkyMall

I went to Ann Arbor last weekend and on the flight, I was doing my usual skymall catalog perusal and came across this item for sale:

This of course immediately reminded me of the Snuggie commercials we had all been watching over Christmas break, so I had to take a picture of it. Then, I decided it would be hilarious to take pictures of the most ridiculous things I saw for sale in the catalog. Later on, I was talking to mom about what I had done, and she suggested I make a blog post about it, which hadn't even occured to me, but I thought was a brilliant idea, so here goes. O, and for those of you who may not have realized, here is what the text actually says in this ad: "Until now "Footed Pajamas" have been typically hard to find in adult sizes. Well, your search is over!!! World famous Jumpin Jammerz are great for dancing, goofing around and let's not forget sleeping too. Jumpin Jammerz makes a great gift for that hard-to-shop for person. Perfect for pre-teens, teenagers, adults and even you!" If that is not blogging gold, I do not know what is...

Well, I guess this stuff is (you have to click on the images to truly appreciate their madness/read the hilarious descriptions):

Is that really large, cheap, crappy looking piece of plastic on your front lawn actually a massive boulder?? You could have fooled me!


If I saw someone sitting next to me on a plane with one of these things, I think I would die laughing, even if he is sleeping comfortably and I'm stuck sitting between two people I don't know

Worried about people seeing your cat's litter box? Don't worry, just get this fake planter/litter box hybrid and no one will ever know...aside from the smell taking over your entire living room...

This was just cute, and also kinda funny. Imagine how Kody would like to be stuffed in a roller bag

Who would not want a "Bigfoot: the garden yeti" sculpture in their front lawn?

Same comment for this one except for replace "Bigfoot: the garden yeti" with "alien gnome bandits!" And in case you are wondering, the ceramic gnome is included, in two sizes, 8" and 15"!!


This is just absolutely utterly ridiculous looking

Too cool for a hearing aid? Why not get this hearing aid disguised as a blue tooth device! You will be able to hear AND look like a bad ass grandpa


Yeah, right...

That managed to take up most of the duration of my flight, so that was good. Does anyone else enjoy skymall as much as I do??