My Weekend

Friday night was pretty low key and ended up being pretty fun. We went to a local bar (Rojo), for this End-of-the-year-Party for Tom's GSA (Graduate Student Association). I say it was pretty low-key because Rojo is a pretty chill place and there weren't a lot of people there. So we had some free burritos (compliments of the GSA) and munched on some yummy tortilla chips and salsa. We were sipping our beers that we had just purchased when Tom's name got picked out of a drawing to win a free pitcher of beer! Don't say you've never won anything Tom! So we enjoyed a pitcher of New Castle and the company of a couple of our friends who were there as well.


Saturday I woke up at 7:15 to get ready for work (second job) and Tom dropped me off at 8 before he headed to UAB for a full day at lab. When I got there, I saw that the census was low and thought to myself Sweet, this is gonna be an easy day! Then another PT showed up and I thought we would have no problem managing it. Then a THIRD PT called and said she was running late and we realized that the manager probably cancelled one of us due to low census but none of us had received any messages. So I called her cell and turns out I was cancelled :( I never got the message, apparently she was having "phone troubles." So I ended up getting Saturday off unexpectantly! Yay for me :)


Sunday I was relaxing in my new favorite chair on the balcony, sipping some coffee and reading the paper, when I saw some interesting looking things that were going on in Bham that day. (Tom was in lab). So I went to this giant "Garage Sale" hosted by the Jr. League of Bham in search for a lamp. We need another one for our bedroom but keep putting off buying one. So I purchased this ugly excuse for a lamp

for $4 (okay so it's really not that bad, it's just not something I would pay more than $4 for).

Then I went to Magic City Art, an arts festival downtown. I thought I would go check it out, not really expecting to buy anything (while simultaneously secretly hoping they had exactly what I was looking for). And they did!!! I've been wanting a larger piece of art that somehow incorporates turquoise water, AND I FOUND IT! It was a complete impulse buy but I knew I would regret it if I didn't buy it. I'm not really sure Tom agrees :/ And it wasn't quite as good of a deal as my $4 lamp, but I couldn't resisit! It's not hung up yet but here it is.

Vacation all I ever wanted...........

15 days until our trip to the beautiful Gulf Coast!!! We are going to the lovely Destin, FL, rumored to be one of the prettiest beaches on the gulf coast. I CAN'T WAIT :D Sure, we've gone on lots of trips since we've moved to Alabama, but we haven't been to the beach since our honeymoon almost 2 years ago. And it's a sin that we've lived in Alabama almost 2 years and haven't been to the gulf coast yet!! Everything seemed to fall into place with the beach, the hotel, and the entertainment the weekend we are going. We're going for 3 nights and 4 days.

Mostly, we are going to be relaxing on the beach all day :) But there's going to be an arts festival about 1 mile from our hotel that weekend. That should be pretty cool to check out. Our hotel seems pretty nice too. It's across the street from the beach, has a made-to-order free breakfast every morning, and has a free happy hour every evening! Also, quite a few restaurants have been recommended by friends who frequent Destin. Oh, and our hotel is like 1.5 miles from an outlet shopping center (Yipppee!). Also, I can't wait to check out Bad Ass Coffee Co. Yummm.

Here's a pic of the beach from the hotel website. I can't believe I've been THIS CLOSE (~4 hours) to turquoise water for 2 years and haven't been there yet! One of my friends who moved here from California about 10 years ago says the Gulf Coast beats the Cali beaches hands down. I can't imagine how it's going to compare against the Jersey shore!!!!!

Happy Earth Day!

In honor of Earth Day I decided to post things we try to do in our daily lives to help the environment. As I’m trying to think of things, I’m realizing that we don’t do as much as we probably should!

-We have huge bins in our pantry to recycle everything we can recycle: glass, aluminum, plastic, newspaper, and cardboard. Once every few weeks (or when the bins start overflowing) we gather everything up and make a trip downtown to recycle everything. Unfortunately, our apartment complex doesn’t recycle. I’ve asked them about it, but they said it “wasn’t an option.” Whatever.

-We re-use plastic grocery bags for lunches, trash bags, etc, and the ones we don’t use we recycle at Walmart.

-We still seem to accumulate a lot of those plastic grocery bags though! So a few months ago my mom got me a reusable, insulated grocery bag. I try to use it every time we go to the grocery store (Tom looks at me like I’m crazy), even if we’re not getting items that need to stay cold.

-We turn off the air/heat and open the windows if it’s nice outside (although, I have to admit, that is more for the budget than the environment).

-We bought a faucet filter and have a PUR water pitcher instead of buying cases and cases of plastic water bottles (I was never one for the plastic water bottles, me and my PUR pitcher go back a long way)

-Unplugging appliances/electronics during the day when not in use (again, more for budget than for being green!)

-Wash clothes in cold water.

-I dry most of my clothes on the drying rack or hanging up in the spare shower. Although, this is more to preserve my clothes than to save energy from the dryer. I also am working on convincing Tom to use the iron to get rid of wrinkles instead of throwing a shirt in the dryer for 5 minutes every morning ;)

-In public bathrooms I always try to use the hand dryers instead of paper towels.


Here’s some things I would like for us to start doing to stay green:
-Buy produce from local farmer’s markets instead of grocery stores (even though this means getting up early on sleep-in Saturdays!

-Switch to all paperless statements (I have such a trust issue with cc companies and banks, I like having things in writing…..most of our stuff has online statements but some doesn’t….like our crappy bank).

-Do a better job of convincing our apartment complex to start recycling…..a lot of college kids live here. I was one of those once, do you know how many aluminum cans and glass bottles they go through?!?! ;)

I'm sure there's LOTS more but at the risk of being late for work that's all I have time for right now!

Stay green :)

My second job....

About 16 months ago when I started considering taking on a second job, I have to admit I was doing it solely for the money. But in the past 16 months I've come to really enjoy it and consider it as a blessing (and not just the money part!). I try to work 1-2 Saturdays a month, which has been working out extremely well for Tom too. After he drops me off at 7:45, he goes into lab and is able to get a lot of work done (there's not a lot of people there Saturdays, so less distractions!). If he doesn't have to go into lab (which is rare), he's usually pretty productive around the apartment or he is able to run some errands for us.

I also really enjoy the people I work with. It's really a good set-up, since it's rehab I stay mostly in one place and am not running all over the hospital like I do M-F. Sometimes we'll have some low-level, difficult patients, but the change in pace, patient diagnoses, and age really sets it apart from my regular job at Children's.

Lastly, if there are 2 (or even 3...gasp...) weekends in a row when I don't work, I find myself becoming "bored" on Saturdays and just kind of lounging/moping around accomplishing nothing. On the weekends I work, I looooooooove my Sundays because it is literally my only day of rest, but on the weekends I don't work I seem to take Sundays for granted.

Having 2 jobs isn't something I will probably do for long, and most definitely not when we move back to the Phila-ish area, but for now, it seems to be working out pretty well :)

Breaking the news........

Last year we were fortunate enough to be able to make a trip home for 9 days in August, during a week that both of our family reunions happened to fall on. Unfortunately, we won't be making the same trip again this year. Two of our full time PT's at work are pregnant and are due within 10 days of each other in June. They will be out on maternity leave until the middle of September and our director has already said absolutely no week long leave/vacations will be approved :(

That being said, we might try to swing something in September. One of our friends is getting married on the 20th and my dad's 60th Birthday Bash at the Penn State vs. Illinois game is the 27th so we're trying to play around with some dates and see if that works for us. We probably won't get to see as many people (from my family at least) as we would in August but right now this is looking like our only option. (Unless everyone from my fam reunion comes to Penn State for Dad's bday!)

Happy Birthday Beer!!!

"In case you didn’t know, today April 7, 2008 is a solemn and joyous anniversary in the annals of beer history. It’s the 75th Anniversary of the repeal of Prohibition for beer in the United States.

During the summer of 1932, Franklin D. Roosevelt campaigned on the platform that he would repeal Prohibition (he called it the “stupendous blunder”), put American workers back on the job and help end the Depression. So, of course it’s no surprise that he won the election by a landslide.

True to his word, with one stroke of the pen 20 days after taking office, he signed the Cullen-Harrison Act, making 3.2% beer once again legal in the U.S. This meant that Lager Beer which was predominantly 3.2% alcohol by weight would precede heavier beer styles and hard liquor by almost 8 full months.

So, at 12:01 a.m. on April 7, 1933, beer was back. 25,000 people celebrated here at our St. Louis Brewery that night and the rest of the country listened to a special live broadcast from August “Gussie” Busch, Jr. that was carried on radio stations coast to coast. Happy days were here again!

So today on the 75th Anniversary of the Repeal of Prohibition, raise a glass to the wisdom and fortitude of great men like Gussie Busch and Franklin Delano Roosevelt with a Budweiser, the Great American Lager.

Cheers!"

*Taken from an email my dad sent me from Budweiser. Why he gets emails from Budweiser, I have no idea ;)

Moss Rock Preserve

Yesterday was GORGEOUS here! In a few years when we're sludging around the mushy sleet/snow in the cold in Philadelphia (or some other northeast city) this time of year we are going to COMPLETELY miss these beautiful Alabama springs! So to take advantage, we went on a hike yesterday at a local state park called "Moss Rock Preserve." We hiked to a place called Boulder Field. Here are a couple of pics from our hike :)

Tom Qualified!!!!

Tom passed his qualification exam for his PhD on Thursday! Basically what that means is that he's been given the go-ahead to work on/finish his thesis project. He submitted a written proposal to his committee (of 5-6 professors) about 2 weeks ago. During his qualification exam, he gave an oral presentation about his thesis and the professors could ask him any question about his thesis, previous research done that relates to his thesis, anything he learned in his classes the past 2 years, etc. And he passed! Yay! I'm so happy for him :)

Coupon-mania

So for the past year I've been obsessed with our budget. I look at it, crunch numbers, look at it some more, move around some numbers, look at it some more, and change some more numbers. No matter what I seem to do to the budget, money just never seems to magically appear on it! :)

So I've been trying to cut down on our grocery budget. I've been printing out coupons online for the past 6 months or so (for free) because I'm too cheap to buy the paper........but just recently I found out that the Dollar Store sells the Sunday paper for $1 ($0.50 off....yeah!) So I started buying the paper on Sundays for the coupons (and for the news too, of course ;)

Anyways now I'm obsessed with coupons and finding deals and I can't wait for Sunday to get the paper :) Here are my two best deals from last week:
1) 2 boxes of Betty Crocker Potatoes - Grand total = $0.19
2) Jar of Pickles - Grand total = $0.35
(Yay for double coupons and BOGO sales)

It's like a game! I LOVE going to Publix (local grocery store) and having the "Total Savings" section be more than "Total spent!"

Back to organizing coupons.............



P.S. Tom meets with his committee to qualify for his PhD on Thursday morning at 9 (central time). Please send him good thoughts!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Happy St. Patty's Day!

I love this day :) I don't know whether it's the fact that I get to wear green (favorite color) or the fact that I get to drink beer (favorite beverage). Or some years a combination of the two (green beer!) Today was actually a pretty normal day for me, work, gym, dinner. No green beer. BUT we did have a little St. Patty's Day bash on Saturday that was quite fun. And yesterday the weather was gorgeous......a sunny 74 degrees. Below are a few pics.

Our beer mug cooler :)

Irish Car Bombs for all!!!

"If you don't like the weather, wait 5 minutes"

........Or one week. That's the saying in Alabama. Last weekend was beautiful. Mid 70's both days. Yesterday we woke up to snow!!! OK, not really "snow" in the sense that we are familiar with.....more a "light dusting." But still! Here's a couple of pics of the Great Snow of '08!

View from our balcony

This is the most snow our car has ever seen!

5 1/2 hours and no more information later.........

Thursday evening we spent the entire evening and night in UAB's ER. NOT what we had planned :) Our usual "after work" routine consists of me going to the gym and calling Tom when I'm finished, then we walk to the parking garage and drive home together. Well, Thursday I really didn't feel like going to the gym, so I called Tom when I was finished with work to see if by chance he was ready to go. Turns out he had a lot of work to do, so I figured it was fate telling me to get my lazy butt to the gym so I went. After I was done at the gym I called him again, but he still had more work to do so I decided to run to the library real quick to return some books that were due. Surely by the time I was finished at the library, Tom would be ready to go.......or so I thought. That's where things took a turn.

Tom called me and said that he had gashed his fingers open when a glass pipette broke in his hand and he was cut really bad and he was going to the ER to make sure there wasn't any glass stuck in his hand. I ran out of the library and drove downtown to meet him and we got to the ER around 6:50. About 15 minutes went by and they called us back to triage. They took all his vital signs and told us it shouldn't be a long wait. Then about 10 minutes after that they called us to registration and we filled out all of the paperwork. Then we returned to the waiting room, where one lady sprinted past us with her hand over her mouth and barely made it to the bathroom before she puked, and another guy had about 8 layers of gauze wrapped around his whole head covering his eye. Then of course there was the guy who kept combing his hair and laughing at nothing.....I don't even think he checked in.

So we sat, and sat, and sat......then at 9:30 I couldn't stand it anymore and ran across the street to get some chips from Qdoba (neither of us had eaten anything since lunch!) Around 10 they finally called us back and put us in a room. The medical student came in first and asked a bunch of questions, took off Tom's bandages, and I don't think he was prepared for the gushing blood that came out of his fingers after he took the bandages off. He took a look, determined he knew nothing (sorry...that was mean!), and wrapped them back up. Then the resident came in and decided to get a finger xray to see if there was any glass. Now it was about 10:30.

They decided that they "thought" they saw some glass in his finger so they then proceeded to numb it up with lidocaine and dig around to find the glass. After about 5 minutes of poking and prodding, they found nothing. So they left. Then at 11:00 they decided to get another finger xray to see if they still saw the glass. Around 11:30 Tom got another xray. Then around midnight the attending finally came in and said "Looks like there is still some glass in there but it will work itself out. Just make sure you wash your cuts daily."

So at 12:15 we finally got to leave the ER with no more information than we came in with! They were able to cut away some skin that was barely hanging on, and I do have to admit I would have freaked out if we got home, took the original bandages off, and Tom's fingers started gushing blood everywhere.

Tom's fingers are fine. Now that all of the blood is gone and the extra skin was cut away, the actual cuts look teeny tiny. Thankfully no nerves were cut and there was no permanent damage!

THON ON!!

Penn State's Dance Marathon was this weekend and they raised over 6.6 MILLION dollars!! $6,615,318.04 to be exact! FTK! Here's a blast from the past just for fun :)

Circa 2002

Mom and Dad's Visit!

My mom and dad came to visit us for a long weekend from the 14th-18th. We had a great time! On Friday we took them to lunch at Jim 'N Nick's (one of our favs!) for some good Southern BBQ. Then we drove downtown to show them UAB, the Alabama Theater, and Pete's. After that we went to the Botanical Gardens to walk around (not many flowers were out but it was a beautiful day to walk around!). Then we went to Mountain Brook and got some fresh-squeezed limeaid (my new FAVORITE!) and some fresh bread from a bakery. After that we drove to Ross Bridge and checked out the resort and the golf course. This place was great......it's like a hidden get away practically in our back yard! Friday night we went to Landry's for dinner (Thanks Jackie!!!) and it was so good.

Saturday we went to the Morgan Creek Winery and enjoyed some fine muscadine wine. On the way back we drove through Mt. Laurel. It's this new, quaint little town literally in the middle of nowhere. It was really cute, but reminded me of something out of a movie. Then we went to the Vulcan musuem and up on the Vulcan to overlook the city. For dinner we went to Dreamland for ribs. I think this was my dad's favorite part of the trip! After some finger-lickin' ribs we watched the UAB v. Memphis basketball game. Unfortunately UAB lost by 1 point, but it was still a good game to watch!

Sunday we went to church (like all good Southerners do) and for brunch went to the Irondale Cafe, formerly The Whistle Stop Cafe. If that name sounds familiar to you, it should! This cafe was referenced in the movie Fried Green Tomatoes! Then we went into Tom's lab and he showed us some cells. After that we just relaxed and I made beer can chicken and twice baked baked potatoes for dinner. Here's a couple pics from the visit!

Vulcan

Dreamland!

Nashville and Mercedes

I had a great time in Nashville for APTA's Combined Section Meeting. We stayed at the Opryland resort (which was ridiculously huge) and we didn't even leave the resort the whole time we were there! I would really have liked to have gone into downtown Nashville but we were so exhausted every night that we didn't quite make it. The programming was really great and I got to see a lot of people I haven't seen in a while (co-workers from CHOP, classmates, professors from Drexel). All in all it was a good trip! Here's a pic of the view from our room......this was only ONE of the many atriums inside the gigantor hotel!

I got back from Nashville Saturday night (the 9th) around 7pm and less than 12 hours later Tom and I ran in the Mercedes Marathon Relay with a few of our friends! We each ran 6.2 miles (a 10K). The course was divided up between two 5K's, two 10K's, and one 12K. It was beautiful weather yet again! Here's a pic of the relay team and one of me and Tom.

The Best Play of the Game.....

.....by far was the former Penn State lineman sacking the former Michigan quarterback!

Happy Super Bowl Day!

Even though I could absolutely care less about who wins. The only thing that would make it worse would be if the cowboys were in it. And I am actually dreading the commercials this year (not that I was ever a *huge* fan of them before). It makes me sick to my stomach to think about how much money is spent for just 30 seconds of advertisement. Imagine what this country could do with HALF of the money that is being spent on commercials tonight. Sickening.

OK, enough complaining :) We're going to a friend's place to watch the game. They're having their 2nd annual "Souper" Bowl party. I'm making broccoli salad. Sounds healthy, but trust me, it's not ;) I worked yesterday at my second job. It was actually fun and I got out early (although that's not necessarily a good thing when you're paid by the hour!) Tom was in lab literally all day yesterday and he's been there all afternoon today. He's been working so hard and he'll be able to take his qualifying exam sometime in March. After that it's smooth sailing until we move back home ;)

I'm going to Nashville on Wednesday for the APTA's Combined Section Meeting. I'm pretty excited because
1) I don't have to set foot on a plane
2) We're staying at the Opryland Resort and
3) There is actually a decent amount of programming on pediatric oncology

Finding any continuing education on pediatric oncology related to physical therapy has been next to impossible. I'm really hoping to get a lot out of it! We come back Saturday afternoon and then Sunday morning Tom and I are running the Mercedes Marathon as a relay with 3 other people. (Both of our legs are 6.2 miles). I'm looking forward to the free beer and Jim 'N Nick's after the race :D

The weekend after that (2 weeks from now) my parents are coming to visit! It's going to be a Southern filled weekend for sure! Y'all check back now, ya' hear? ;)

I heart weekends with nothing to do!

Ahhhh. Finally a relaxing weekend with nothing to do :) Not much new to report. Tom and I have both been busy with work this past week. I'm also anxiously awaiting all of our W2's to come in the mail so we can file our taxes and be done with it. I'm making beer can chicken for dinner tonight, and it smells amazing! I can't wait to try it. If I can get a good pic of it I'll post one in my next blog. Last night we went out to the dueling piano bar again.....good times. Tomorrow we're going over to a friend's for dinner. We're going to start a monthly dinner club on Sunday nights so it should be a good time. Here is a pic that Sarah's friend Jess took of the chinchillas when she was here. Yeah, she's kinda awesome at photography :)

SNOW!

Yes, non-believers, I was one too once, but it CAN and DID snow in Birmingham yesterday! Disclaimer: It snowed for about 2 hours, did not even stick to the roads, and any snow that did stick melted about an hour after it stopped ;) I didn't get a chance to play in the "snow" because I was working, but I was more bummed I didn't get any pictures of it! Someone in our complex built a snowman and I took a pic with my phone, but my phone is currently disobeying me and not wanting to let me send the picture to my email. Here's a pic of a snowman I found on the news website:

Sarah's Visit

It's been 2 weeks......I guess it's about time for a blog update :)

My cousin Sarah and her friend Jess came to visit this past weekend. Jess is moving to Seattle from Erie so they took the "scenic route" and ended up coming through Birmingham. We had a good time. Friday night we went to a hip little bar called The Bottletree Cafe and enjoyed some vegetarian inspired dinner and a couple of bands. Saturday we went to Jim 'n Nick's for lunch and ate ourselves full. Yum. Saturday afternoon Jess left for Austin (but not before she locked her keys in her car....sad!) and we spent the rest of the afternoon sprawling on the couch being over-stuffed full of Southern BBQ and slightly hungover from Sarah's mad martini making skills :) We headed to a friend's Saturday night and explored the Vulcan on Sunday before Sarah's flight. Good times were had by all :)

Martini's from Bartender Sarah

The practically vegetarians taking the meat right to their mouths!

Me & Sarah at the Vulcan