Janet’s Webpage

Had a hard time concentrating this week.
I got a document to review from Kim, and I basically dragged it out all week. It had diff eq and all sorts of good stuff that the majority of real world engineers don’t deal with anymore (… well, engineers in the nuke industry at the very least). So I put it off for days. When I picked it up again on Thursday, I realized that it was as easy as pie… I have no idea what I’ve been thinking in the beginning…

  

Three dinners over Thanksgiving weekend, great success!! Here are the pictures:

We’ve made stuffed pork loin, turkey, stuffing, steaks… all sorts. It was a good time!

  

I always thought day after Thanksgiving is called Black Friday because of people’s mood… however, it’s because holiday sales are suppose to tip store accounting ledgers from red to black.
We went to Sommerset today. I got some great prices on this really nice suit (Mini Check Inser Waistband Jacket and Flared Skirt)
Ah~ The feeling of purchased happiness…

  

Katina and I had an awesome time today! Paula Deen Live was so much fun! She is hilarious and now I really want to read her autobiography.
We got to Chicago by the South Shore Line and had breakfast at Borders. I like the Chicago Theater, I think SO and I saw David Sedaris there as well. Outside the theater, there were a lot of demonstrators (I think for Smithfield ham…)
I’ve tried a few of Paula’s recipes before and I like her in “Elizabethtown” (her, and Orlando Bloom, and Kirsten Dunst, but no in this exact order), but I’ve rarely seen her show so I wasn’t sure what to expect. Well, she’s really funny and she tells jokes that my grandmother wouldn’t. I think I’m going to try stuffed pork loin recipe for Thanksgiving.
I was really inspired by the story of how she started her business. It seems like such a brave step and I’m really happy for her being so successful.

Afterwards Katina and I went shopping. I got Dad something for Christmas and I also got “The Tipping Point” at the bookstore. The train ride was long and crowded (because lots of people went to Chicago to see the festival of lights today), but I had a real good time today.

  

Katina and I are going to Chicago to see Paula Deen tomorrow.
Somehow, I signed up for this Chicago Theatre tickets pre-sale newsletter. About 3 months ago, I saw that Paula Deen tickets are on sale, so I forwarded to Katina. She’s a big Paula Deen fan and I haven’t been in Chicago for a while, so I think we’ll have a great time.
More updates/pictures tomorrow.

  

Featured in this month’s House & Garden, Domestic Bliss, was Amy Sedaris. No offense to Amy, but I never thought that she would make it to H&G. In the article, she showed a painting by Hugh and I was ecstatic! That’s so cool!! So I started looking on the web to see if he actually sells paintings… but so far, I haven’t found anything yet.
(I did find some of David Sedaris’ articles that I’ve never read before.
Sedaris old diary entries on Slate
Reading of “The Squirrel and the Chipmunk”)

  

Outage is finally over.
By 6 AM this morning, I was at the OCC. Course, Jay didn’t trust me to run the OCC by myself (even if we are at 97% power), so he stayed over till the sign off.
Anyway, took some pictures of the property. SO’s new spruce trees (12 trees, approx. 6 ft each… impulse purchase due to bargain price).

  

Since Glenard’s getting his pilot license, I’ve decided that I should become a race car driver!! If only to improve my driving skills.

  

Some days, I think my combined affairs will be the end of me…
Each one by itself is fine, simple almost. But put together, my day turns into a 13 hrs work affair that requires fermented beverages at the end.
I’ve been trying to figure out what a “leisure lifestyle” would be like. If I had all the money in the world, what would I be doing everyday. It’s really really hard to imagine… I suppose rich people are just born rich and are used to having nothing to do all day, or they become rich and just do whatever it is that they do to have made them rich in the first place… complicated. The best scenario I can come up is to take a year off to supervise the building of my dream house (our future gold plated house, as SO like to call it). Maybe afterwards I will be consumed with the landscaping and the decorating as well…

  

Comcast had an outage, so the internet was down for the longest time.
Drove to AA on Tuesday to have dinner with Mom. Had to tell her that we DIDN’T get a puppy….
Logan came over to trick or treat. He was dressed as Yoda.

(yes… my blog is filled with other people’s pictures)