My Kindle on Vacation
By richmo32 | July 6, 2009
Hmm…I really thought I had updated this site recently. I guess I am losing my mind. Oh well. Darren and I had a great time in San Francisco this past weekend. The weather was beautiful, the game was excellent, and the company was pretty good too. :) I always enjoy visiting my family. Its nice that we can go to different places to see them too. Darren had a pretty decent recap of our weekend so I won’t tell the whole tale again. He always beats me to the good stuff. I do want to say that I absolutely love my Kindle! It was my first trip taking it and I love it even more now than I did when I first got it. I am able to download the main magazines I read on airplanes, so I don’t ever have to buy one anymore. I can also get various newspapers if I want to. These are very cheap to buy just an issue or two. My Time magazine is only 49 cents an issue! That sure as heck beats the cover price at the newsstand. Of course, I don’t get all the pictures and graphics you find in the print version, but I don’t read Time for the pictures anyway.
In addition to the magazines I also have my books that I am reading. One great thing about the Kindle is the “save for later” feature. A big problem I used to have is remembering which books I wanted to read. I would read or hear about something that sounded interesting, but by the time I wanted to look for it I had forgotten what it was I wanted in the first place. This is where Darren would say “just put a reminder in your phone”. Blah! I hate when he says that. I hate putting reminders in my phone! With the Kindle I can hear about a book I might like and immediately search for it on Amazon. Then, rather than purchase it right away I can just add it to my “save for later” list and buy it when I finish what I am currently reading. I have several books listed in there now. Plus, I can download them instantly when I want them and start reading in just a minute. You can’t beat the instant gratification! I really love the smaller space it takes up on the plane too. I didn’t realize how annoying it was to turn pages. With my Kindle I just set it down and push a button everytime I want a new page. I don’t even have to touch it if I don’t want to. It’s nice to not have to hold the pages open. This comes in real handy when I am exercising too. I have decided to really get back into the exercise/diet routine this week. Usually for exercise I just do my Tae Bo video, but I wanted to do extra this week, so I am doing Tae Bo plus a half hour on the treadmill. I never used to read while on the treadmill because it was too hard to hold the book while walking. Plus, I want my hands free to lift weights or move my arms while walking. Now I can just set the Kindle down and read effortlessly while I walk. Its amazing! I am reading like crazy now. :) This was definitely worth every penny I paid for it.
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A Bad Day
By richmo32 | June 24, 2009
Today was a bad day. Things at work did not go the way I had planned them and I was very disappointed about it. I left work in a bad mood and figured it couldn’t get worse. Apparently I was wrong. Yesterday I went online and refilled 2 of my prescriptions, my folic acid supplements and my prenatal vitamins. I get a 90 day supply of each every time I refill them and they are each $30 for a 90 day supply, or they USED TO BE. Both prescriptions are generic versions of what my doctor prescribed. Well, when I picked them up today my total was not $60 like I was expecting, it was $135! That is a $75 increase! I was extremely upset. I questioned the pharmacist about it and he looked up my history. I am not crazy. I really did pay only $60 last time. He verified it with the insurance company and it was the prenatal vitamins that were the difference. My copay for the vitamins went up to $105 from $30. I left the pharmacy even more upset than when I left work. Its not that I can’t afford the price, I just wasn’t expecting it and had not put that in my budget. I immediately called the insurance company when I got home. The lady on the phone was very nice and helpful and sympathetic, so I was at least happy with my customer service experience. It seems the problem is that the vitamin my doctor prescribed me is no longer being made. Well, since they stopped making the “brand name” version of this vitamin the generic is the only one on the market, so it automatically becomes the “brand name” option. On top of that, its not considered by my insurance company as a “preferred brand”, so I have to pay the “non-preferred brand” price, which is $35 for a 30 day supply. This is absolute bullshit!! How does a simple vitamin go from being generic to non-preferred brand in the matter of a couple of months? Its the same damn stuff! I wish I hadn’t paid for it, but at the time I was just so upset I didn’t consider my options. I still have a couple of days left of the old vitamins, so I’m not hurting at the moment. I’m going to call my doctor in the morning and see if I can get a prescription for a different brand. They are just vitamins, so I’m sure it won’t be a problem. Any brand should be just fine. I’m also going to attempt to return the prescription I filled today. I’m not sure if its possible, but I will try. If not I will just consider it an expensive lesson for the future. I am still annoyed that this happened. The insurance company lady said it happens often with things like vitamins, so I’m sure I am not the only person who has had this problem. They really should be required to send a letter out when changes like this occur. Its really not fair and I can see how it could cause major problems for a person who depends on a certain drug. At least mine is just a vitamin, and I’m not even pregnant right now, so it really is just an inconvenience. I just didn’t want to deal with this today. Oh well, Darren made french fries for dinner so that made me a bit happier. 
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Our Big Vacation
By richmo32 | June 23, 2009
We have been planning a trip to Japan for a while now. Its scheduled to happen the last week of October. While I am very excited about it, Japan is definitely not my first choice of trip. I wanted to head to Europe, but Darren has his heart set on Japan. I jumped on board and started looking at things to do and see there. The problem is I am a very poor planner and I get bored with things easily. I started learning some Japanese, but I got bored of it and I haven’t practiced in a while. I also bought a Frommer’s guide to Tokyo, which is a great book, but I got bored with it too. I like the pre-planned vacation. Just lay it all out for me and I will be there. That’s a main reason why we got married in Vegas. If I had planned our wedding it would not have turned out very well.
I really enjoyed the cruise we went on in April. Its was a great vacation for us! We didn’t have to plan a thing. Its was all part of the package deal of food, entertainment, and destinations, and it was really fun! Well, the other day I was browsing the Norwegian Cruise Line website when I happened upon an amazing cruise! It leaves from Barcelona and goes for 7 nights throughout the Mediterranean. You can see the itinerary here. http://www.ncl.com/nclweb/booking/cruisedetails.html?packageId=1620751
In my opinion that cruise would be the perfect vacation, and it leaves on the exact day in October that we wanted to go on our vacation. I tried to talk Darren into going, but I think he has his heart set on Japan. Maybe I can convince him otherwise. He did find an interesting tour package for Tokyo. I would really like to book that if we go. It would be so much easier to just have a tour group than to try and plan it myself. You can even add a bus trip to Mt. Fuji as part of the package. I REALLY want to go there! Darren does not want to go to Mt. Fuji at all, but I may have to insist on it. I am going to an auto show, a fish market, and an entire area of the city devoted to electronics stores! I think its only fair that we do at least one thing I would like to do. I suppose we will see what happens. Nothing is ever set in stone with us. It is still 4 months away, but this year seems to be flying by. Stay tuned! This will definitely be an interesting adventure no matter which direction we decide to travel.
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Flying to Sacramento
By richmo32 | June 19, 2009
Yesterday I wanted to get to Sacramento. My cousin is getting married this weekend. I worked a full day last Saturday so I could take today off work without burning a vacation day. My company is really great about being flexible like that. So, my plan was to leave after work yesterday and hop a flight to Sacramento. Of course, my nice and easy flight plans usually don’t work out so well. There are only 4 flights a day to Sacramento and only 2 were after I got off work. For some reason those flights always end up being totally full. I think there must be a lot of last minute business travelers there since it is the state capital. Well, yesterday was no exception. The last 2 flights of the day were completely full. If I had been able to go on one of the morning flights I would have made it on just fine. No worries, I had backup plans in place. I was going to either take a late flight to San Francisco and have Jami drive there to get me, or I was going to fly on American to San Diego and then hop on a Southwest flight from there to Sacramento. It costs a bit more to fly Southwest, and I would be the absolutely last person to get on the plane, so it is a bit more risky. I didn’t want to get stuck in San Diego. I was watching the flights throughout the day at work yesterday and they all were looking really bad. My backup flight on Southwest even started looking bad when the previous day it had been good. I started to get stressed out about it. By the time I left work I was kind of resigned to the fact that I wouldn’t make it to California that day, especially since I still had to take the dogs to the kennel. Darren is working all weekend, so he couldn’t watch them and we couldn’t get the pet sitter because Darren wasn’t sure what his actual schedule would be. It sucks, but thankfully we don’t have to use the kennel very often. When I got home Darren suggested that I list myself on the 4pm flight to San Francisco. The flight was totally full and it had a whole bunch of revenue standbys waiting to get on it. I was sure I wouldn’t get on it. Darren offered to take me to the airport and then drop the dogs off for me. I took him up on the offer, but was still sure there was no way I would make it on that flight. No matter, if I didn’t make it I would just get rolled over to wait for the next flight and that would just keep happening until I either got on a flight or there were none left for the night. This particular flight was on a very large 767. I had listed myself for first class. We always list for first class because first class usually doesn’t fill as quickly as coach so we have a better chance of getting on a particular flight. So, I’m standing at the gate for the 4pm flight and I am watching the list on my phone. About 10 minutes before the flight left they finished working the standby list and there were no seats left on the plane. There were 3 people left standing at the gate, including me. No big deal, I figured that would happen. I was just standing there waiting for the gate agent to finish and roll us over to the next flight. That’s when it all went crazy. It was 4 minutes before the flight was scheduled to leave. The gate agent suddenly called us all over and said he had some no shows and he could run us all on the plane. I even scored a first class seat! The problem was we had to gate check our bags. I always carry my purse and a standard size carry on. I had most of my important stuff in my purse, but my beloved laptop was in my bag. In the rush to get on the plane I forgot to take my laptop out of my bag! I didn’t realize it until we were already in the air. At that point I panicked. We had just left our bags on the jetway and I wasn’t even confident the bag would make it on the plane since it was so last minute. Plus, who knows what baggage handlers do. If the bag happened to get open that laptop would be a prime target for getting stolen. I was completely freaked out about it, but there was nothing I could do at that point. I just had to relax and enjoy my first class flight. The movie was really good. It was one I had never heard of before called “Inkheart”. It is a fantasy type movie with Brendan Fraser. I always enjoy his movies. Darren wouldn’t like this one. He doesn’t like those types of movies. The meal was decent. I had cheese tortellini and a salad. It was the desert that was the best though! It was a chocolate ice cream sunday with berries and cheesecake pieces on it. I am not normally a fan of chocolate ice cream, but this desert was amazing! It was the best desert on a plane I have ever had. I know Darren is extremely jealous. :) So, I arrived in San Francisco at 5:30pm and waited half an hour for my bag at baggage claim! Jami and mom got stuck in horrible San Francisco traffic so the timing worked out well. Of course, the whole time I waited for my bag I was terrified that it wouldn’t be there. Thankfully the bag and my laptop came out just fine. I have learned my lesson though and it will not happen again. Now I am going to enjoy my weekend in Sacramento. Getting home could be just as crazy as getting here, but I am not going to worry about that for now.
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Kindle DX
By richmo32 | June 16, 2009
I just purchased a Kindle DX! I am so excited about it! If you aren’t aware, the Kindle is an e-book reader made and sold on amazon.com, and the DX is their lastest and fanciest version. I can instantly download books, newspapers, or magazines from anywhere with no internet subscription. It’s going to be so cool! I am happy to get rid of the paper books. I think that is part of the reason I don’t read as much as I would like to. I actually have to go out and browse for a book to buy. With the Kindle I can just browse the website and buy it electronically. It’s instant and environmentally friendly! Also, it doesn’t take up space on my bookshelf, which is a big bonus because I have no more space on my bookshelf. I can download an entire book and start reading within a minute! I can also download a selection of newspapers and magazines as well. It will be so cool to not have to purchase magazines before my plane flights, and it will take up less space in my bag too. The Kindle is only as thick as a typical magazine, so its very lightweight and easily portable. It’s supposed to hold a charge for days too. Hopefully it lives up to my expectations. It wasn’t cheap, but Darren paid for half of it as a birthday present! I am headed to Sacramento for the weekend to attend my cousin’s wedding. I would have liked to get my Kindle before I leave, but it won’t ship until Monday. Oh well, one last weekend with a paper magazine. I will survive!
I am not sure when I will leave for Sacramento. I was hoping Darren would come with me, but he couldn’t get his schedule moved around this month. I’m disappointed to be going without him, but it’s ok. We can go back anytime. The flights to Sacramento are pretty sucky though. They don’t have too many flights a day there and they are always full. I’m hoping there is a seat open for me, but I have a few backup plans I’m working on if I can’t get on those flights. I want to go Thursday evening, but it may not work out. It’s a good thing I’m flexible.
In other news, I signed up today to be a bone marrow donor. It usually costs money to sign up because of the need to pay for your tissue typing. However, if you register before June 22nd it is free. Just fill out the information online and they will send you a kit in the mail to collect cheek swabs so they can do the tissue typing. Its such a great cause! I have always thought about doing it, but they have made it so easy right now that I couldn’t let this one go. If you want to sign up too just go to www.marrow.org
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It’s been a while…
By richmo32 | May 18, 2009
It was suggested to me this evening that I should update my blog, so here it is. I haven’t posted in a while because there really hasn’t been much to say. Darren keeps leaving me to go on long trips and I am left behind with nothing exciting to fill my life with. I have pretty much just been working and watching TV. Well, I guess I did do some things over the weekend. The most important thing was cleaning in preparation of my mom’s arrival yesterday afternoon. I wouldn’t dare let her see the normal state of my house. I hate cleaning and it just doesn’t seem worth it most of the time when I live with a tornado. The only time I do a real “deep” clean is before mom comes. Of course, this weekend it was a bit tougher to do because I actually was pretty busy on Sunday. I had a baby shower from 2-4pm and then a baptism shower/birthday party from 4-6pm. The baby shower was for our good friends Wendy and Chris. They are expecting their first baby (a boy) at the end of July. The shower was nice. I don’t get to hang out with that set of friends very often, so I enjoy catching up. Hopefully they will still be able to get together sometimes even with the baby. I didn’t realize it beforehand, but the house I went to the baby shower at was literally 3 minutes away from the house I attended the other party at. It worked out really well. The other party was a birthday party for the daughter of our friends Romy and Art. Their daughter Alessandra just turned 2, and they combined her party with a baptism shower for their son Javier, who is 3 months old. It was fun, but I had to attend both by myself. Darren was invited to both, but he was sent out on an overnight trip. He has been gone a lot this month. I am used to it, but I still hate always having to explain why I’m by myself. I think eventually people will stop asking. I know I have many more years of events by myself. I have a post-wedding party to attend on the 30th. I RSVP’d with a yes for me and a maybe for Darren. Perhaps he will be available that day. At least all my friends know Darren very well and its not like I have some “mystery” husband that people will never meet. We do get time together though. We are headed to Oregon on Thursday and we will be there until Monday. I’m looking forward to it! Maybe I will have exciting things to say about our trip. :) Tomorrow is my birthday. I’m sure I will have nothing exciting to say about that though.
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Fixing the fence
By richmo32 | May 5, 2009
Dealing with our stupid fence problem has not been fun. Darren just got home last night, so I have been dealing with it all myself. I stayed home from work on Monday and got a couple of estimates. It actually isn’t as bad as I thought. We can get it fixed for $300. Now if only we could get our neighbor to cooperate. I won’t get into details, but it may be difficult getting any financial help from her on this. I am going to remain optimistic though. At least the fix won’t break the bank for us.
The repair people will be here first thing tomorrow morning to fix it. I was hoping Darren could take care of it because we are very busy at work. He tried to bid his schedule for tomorrow so that he would be home in the morning, but it didn’t work. That is the bad thing about being the bottom guy I guess. Its a good thing my job is so flexible. I will just have to go in late tomorrow and make up the time throughout the week. I was told this should be a quick and easy fix, so maybe I won’t be in too late. We’ll see. I will just be glad to have it done.
May 16 - What is it about this day? There are a lot of events planned for that day. Its a good thing I didn’t try to plan anything for my birthday because it would have been planned for the 16th too. My actual birthday is the 19th, but that’s a Tuesday. Its very boring. Anyway, I have 2 coworkers getting married that day. I am not attending either wedding because one is in Hawaii and the other I wasn’t invited to (I think its a pretty small wedding). Besides the 2 weddings I have a baby shower to attend and a baptism/birthday party too. My friends Wendy and Chris are having the baby shower from 2pm-4pm and my friends Romy and Art are having the baptism/birthday party from 4pm-6pm. Their daughter Alessandra turns 2 that day and they are celebrating the baptism of their baby boy, Javier. I am going to both of these events, so its a good thing they live not too far from each other. It should be a fun day anyway, even if none of the events are celebrating me.
Things are going well with my Japanese lessons. I have slowed down a bit. It gets more difficult as I go along, but I have plenty of time to learn as much as I need. Darren and I had a discussion this evening about what to do while we are there. I am really interested in seeing the country outside of Tokyo, but Darren doesn’t seem too excited about that idea. We may not have enough time for too much outside the city, but I’m going to look into it. Today on Amazon I bought a Frommer’s guide for Japan and a Frommer’s guide specific for Tokyo. I’m sure these books will give me some good insight into the things we absolutely have to see and how much time it all might take. I have never had to really plan a trip before, so this should be interesting. Darren has been bugging me about hotels too since I shot down his “hostel” idea. I don’t want a community bathroom! I need to find a nice hotel at a reasonable price, so we don’t end up at his choice. Its a good thing we have lots of planning time.
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Our fence fell in the storm
By richmo32 | May 3, 2009
Yesterday we had some pretty bad storms roll through the Dallas/Ft. Worth metroplex. Darren has been out flying for the last couple of days. The storms yesterday caused him to get stuck in Little Rock. I was home by myself with the dogs when the first really bad wave of storms rolled through. I was out running an errand when it all started. It was just sprinkling at the time, but Darren called and told me to go home because it was about to get really bad. I usually disagree with him about the severity of weather, but I did agree to go home this time. Its a darn good thing I did! I immediately made my dogs go outside to pee because I figured it might get pretty bad and they refuse to go outside in the rain. I didn’t want any accidents in the house if they couldn’t get back outside for a long time. The rain really started about 10 minutes after I got home. It is not uncommon for bad thunderstorms to roll through the area in the spring, so I don’t usually think anything of it. This storm was especially bad though. I turned on the TV and was just settling down on the couch when I heard a loud crash through the rain and thunder. I went to the window and peeked outside and this is what I saw.
This is the backyard fence between our house and our neighbor’s house. Of course, my neighbor is currently out of town. I may leave her a note on her door. This is very inconvenient for me for several reasons. First, Darren is much more suited to dealing with a problem like this than I am, but he is not home and won’t be back until Monday night, so I’m left to tend to it myself. Second, I can’t let my dogs outside by themselves anymore. I had to lock the dog door and I have to follow them outside every time they want to go out just so they don’t wander into the neighbor’s yard. Third, it was Saturday. I called around to several places and couldn’t find any fence repair places open on the weekend. I did leave a few messages and actually got one to call me back. Which leads me to reason number four. They can’t come out until Monday morning! Now I have to take a sick day on Monday to deal with the stupid fence. Lastly, this is quite an unexpected expense. I’m not sure how much it will be, but I know I don’t want to pay it. It’s not that we can’t afford it. We definitely have enough to pay for whatever it costs. I just don’t want to pay for it. This incident has prompted Darren to set up a new savings account though. He is going to drop a bit of money into it every month just in case we have an issue like this again. Hopefully we won’t, but you never know. It would be good to have some money designated for just such a purpose. So, my weekend kind of sucks now. Oh well, it could definitely be worse. It could have been a tornado. We did have at least one of those yesterday in North Texas. Plus, no one was injured like they were with the collapse of the Cowboys practice field yesterday. The weather in North Texas can definitely be treacherous sometimes, but I would rather take my chances with some severe storms than with hurricanes or earthquakes. The fence can be dealt with, but a destroyed house or injured people would be too much for me.
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Craigslist
By richmo32 | May 2, 2009
Over the past 5 years I have sold several things on Craigslist. It is a wonderful service (if you don’t count that killer guy anyway). I sold a mattress, a tv, an exercise bike, and just today I sold an old couch. Everything sold without a problem. Poor Darren has not had the same luck. All he ever wanted to sell was our old washer and dryer. He has been trying to sell them off and on for the last year or so. He seemed to be getting a bunch of flaky people who never actually showed up or didn’t want to pay the asking price. There was even the one guy who drove all the way over here and then decided he didn’t want them. Well, today that all changed! While Darren was out flying 2 guys came to our house, gave me money, and took away the washer and dryer! Yay! We have made much progress with decluttering now. Unfortunately Darren has this idea that he is buying a slot machine with the washer and dryer money. I don’t have a clue what put this idea in his head but I am very upset about it. I don’t want a damn slot machine in my living room! Yes, that’s right. Darren has decided it needs to be in our living room! Who the hell does that? Apparently just my crazy husband. I am 100% against this idea, but I am losing the battle. I always lose. I cannot seem to get a rational thought to stick in his brain. His argument is that he didn’t want 3 dogs, but I got them, so he can have this. What can I say to that? Oh well, I guess I lose again. Its the story of my life. On the other hand, if you are looking for a casino just come visit us instead. You can play all you want, but please don’t hit a big jackpot because we will not pay it out. You can get comps though. I will cook you a nice lean pocket for free or you can stay a free night in our guest room. How great does that sound? All I can say is Darren better play with his stupid slot machine for a minimum of 1 hour each night. I bet it won’t take long until he stops playing it at all. Then it will just end up as a dust collector in our house and he will spend another year trying to sell it on Craigslist. The circle of life continues…
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Damn Swine Flu!
By richmo32 | April 29, 2009
To all those crazy people panicked about the swine flu: please stop buying up all the surgical masks! It won’t make you any more or less safe. We use those masks for legitimate purposes at work. They help us prevent contamination of our evidence samples. We don’t want our DNA getting into the evidence. The masks we use are those basic disposable surgical masks that you currently see all over your TV screens. This sudden demand for masks has made it much harder for us to find them. We were told today that we have to start saving and reusing our masks because there is now a shortage of them and they are on back order. I am really upset about this for a couple of reasons. First, they are disposable! They get all sweaty and gross from our faces and they should be thrown out after each use. I don’t like having to save them. Second, reusing them makes my face breakout! It really sucks! I haven’t had this many zits in a very long time. This swine flu panic better end soon! Its so stupid anyway. Thousands of people die from the regular flu every year and no one ever panics about that. You give something a funny name and suddenly its going to kill us all.
In other news, I purchased 2 Japanese language software packs from Half Price Books. I debated the expensive software for a while, but decided I would try the cheap kind first and see what I could learn from that. It was only $30 total, so no big deal if they weren’t any good. I have been working diligently on my Japanese lessons for 4 days now and so far I’m doing well. I am surprised at how much I can retain when I just put a bit of focus and effort into it. I am really serious about this. Hopefully I can learn a good amount before our trip. At the rate I’m going it shouldn’t be a problem. I am really enjoying my lessons.
In other, other news. I found out yesterday that my brother and sister-in-law are expecting another baby. They already have a 3 year old daughter. I am really happy for them, but I was also slightly jealous. I really do want to have a child. Darren has been waffling on the issue for a while, but yesterday we finally managed to work it all out. We are going to try again after our trip to Japan in October. We have a lot of plans coming up in the next few months, so I don’t want to start trying now. I am also really looking forward to our Japan trip since I’m putting so much effort into it. I want to do that first. Then we can settle down a bit at the end of the year and start trying. The timing will be good because we never travel over the holidays anyway. There are lots of things to look forward to now! I hope my brother has a boy this time. We need to have a balance in the family and I already have 2 nieces. It will probably be another girl though.
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