Lets give the South Africans some maps... or something like that. What?

Sorry to say I don't have much to write about. This weekend was pretty laid back, which was awesome! On Friday night Russ restocked my ice cream supply. After that the weekend was one long series of sugar highs and lows. On Saturday night, however, we did catch the last 30 minutes of the greatest beauty pageant ever! The Miss Frickin Teen USA pageant!!! As if the Donald wasn't a big enough perv, he had to create a pageant for 15 year olds who literally have to thank him in their world peace speeches! The pageant was a long stream of past-their-prime weirdos and Dancing With the Stars rejects, including Mario "AC Slater" Lopez as the host! Melissa Joan Heart, Joey Lawrence (you totally want to hear my WHOA! impression right now, don't you?) and some other B-list losers were the judges. It was America at its finest. But here is the best part. In the greatest moment in pageant history, Miss Teen South Carolina gave one of the most amazing answers to a pageant question ever. It made Billy Madison's speech about The Puppy That Lost Its Way look like Shakespearean prose. It was so incredible, you have to watch it immediately:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lj3iNxZ8Dww

Ooh, its like camping. Even better, its like Frontier House!!!

For those of you that didn't know, a monsoon came through Chicago. Russ called to tell me the power has been out since 2:30.
5:00- The power is still out and its time for dinner. Russ lights the stove top with a match. Ooh, how resourceful!
5:45- Russ, Josie and I sit down to eat spaghetti and meatballs in the dark. With all these candles, this is down right romantic.
7:30- Josie is in bed. This is usually when I lie comatose on the couch until it is late enough for me to go to bed without feeling like a loser. The power is still out, but there are lots of candles and it’s kind of nice. Hey, maybe Russ and I could actually talk to each other.
8:30- I love talking! Except it sort of backfired. I thought all the candles and talking would make Russ wax poetic about his love for me, but instead he just gave me a 20 minute overview of The Brothers Karamazov. We decided that having no power was kind of cool as it helped us to conserve more energy. Maybe we will devote a weekend to no power in the future. We can use our camping lanterns and play cards! This is kind of like living my dream of being on the reality show Frontier House! We are 1860ing our brains out, baby!
9:15- It is hot and humid! I wish they had fans in the 1860s. And the cordless phone is beeping like crazy and sort of making me irate. I have wrapped it up in towels and shoved it in a drawer.
9:30- I’m sick of everything. Going to bed.
2:30 am– So. Hot. Can’t. Breathe.
6:30- Good morning! Josie is awake and so are we. Still no power? Should I go to work today? I need to shower! Shower attempted… FREEZING. So no power also means no hot water. Not sure if I could hack it in the 1860s without the ability to tame my fro. Which means I might have to go to work with a fro today! Oh hell no!
7:00- Our fridge and freezer is thawing and there is water all over the floor. Russ says “Shit, Josie’s milk and all of our produce!” I say, “My ice cream!!!” Russ breaks into bowls of cereal to try to use the milk before it goes bad. I consider scarfing all remaining ice cream before it melts, but I’m not blowing my daily calorie allowance because ComEd sucks. I am sort of pouting about losing the ice cream, though. (Oh yeah, and Josie’s milk.)
7:45- Off to work. I am totally sweaty and heinous, but maybe people will pity me. After all, I have been through a trauma- ice cream lost and no curling iron. Were people in the 1860’s this shallow? I’ve always known I couldn’t hack the manual labor, but apparently I also can’t hack the loss of a styling utensil. Russ says “where can I get a cup of coffee?” At least I am not the only city-slicker in this family.

My first blog ever!

Hello! I am Gmax and this is my blog. Why start blogging? Good question, because I fear that having a blog means you are a total narcissist. With that in mind I promise to avoid talking about my feelings or hypothesizing about what is "real." If you want to read about that, I suggest reading some of Britney Spear's website postings.

So here I am, getting my blog on. A little background. I am 28 with a cute husband and an even cuter daughter. Here they are at my Dad's wedding in July:

In this blog I will attempt to share a little about my life, my attempts to protect the environment, and my husband's fear of technology. My husband would role over and die if he knew I was this into technology. I'm sure he is carving something on a cave wall right now. But I am free to do what I want, so here begins my first blog.

Because Russ drove our car to Sycamore, I had to take the train to work today. I was already a few minutes late when I left the house. I have an important lunch meeting today, so I dressed up but threw on some commuter shoes so I could actually walk. Half way to the train I noticed that my flip-flops had been flip-flopping mud all over my yellow skirt and white jacket. YIKES. So I had to turn around and run home and change! I clearly missed my metra train, so now was way late. When I actually made it to Chicago I decided to cheer myself up and buy myself a coffee. Because of my new resolution to create no waste, I suddenly felt guilty about the paper cup. So I bought a reusable cup, and when they rang it up it was like $17! So then I panicked slightly because of spending so much money (and because that is ridiculous) but there was such a long line that I couldn't change my mind. Then I was really late so I had to take a cab to work rather than take the 2 buses (and 45 minutes) required therefore spending another $13. When I got inside I saw myself in a mirror and realized all the running plus the humidity made my hair look like a drowned rat and my second outfit totally wrinkled. Heinous! So now I have spent $30 before 9:00 am, totally wasted whatever impact on the environment I was making by buying the plastic cup by taking a cab, and look like a mess for my meeting.