Laughter is the closest distance between two people.

Why Carrie doesn’t Twitter
So I’ve been really looking at this Twitter thing. For those of you who don’t know, it’s a website where you basically update your every move and thought throughout the day. Famous people do it, TV shows do it, heck even Anderson Cooper does it.
I really don’t think this is such a good idea for me. To prove my point, here is a sample of what my Twitter day will look like: (apparently there is a cute little picture of you and a balloon box that comes up with your thoughts-so just imagine that)

Carrie thinks that getting up before the sun should be a crime.
Carrie thinks that she doesn’t want to brush her teeth this morning, but probably will.
Carrie is looking at her bed longingly.
Carrie is checking her email and facebook.
Carrie is waking up Seth.
Carrie is making breakfast and feeding the babies ham from Seth’s sandwich.
Carrie is trying to decide what to take for lunch.
Carrie is running late.
Carrie can’t find her black motorcycle boots to wear today and it makes her mad.
Carrie is wearing her pink tennis shoes…again.
Carrie is running very late.
Carrie almost hit Seth’s truck backing out-per usual.
Carrie wishes it was legal to shoot a paintball gun at people who cut her off in traffic.
Carrie thinks the crew on 94.1 is hilarious in the morning.
Carrie wishes she was brave enough to call into the morning shows.
Carrie thinks that 106.9 Big Boy in the morning has some funny topics too-but not today.
Carrie loves English muffins with cream cheese-YUM.
Carrie hates how pop splatters everywhere when you open it while driving.
Carrie wishes it was legal to gentle rear end people who are going 50 in the fast lane.
Carrie wishes this drive was shorter.
Carrie hates the sun-especially when it’s bright and shiny in her eyes while she is driving.
Carrie wishes Fort Calhoun would move 10 feet to the left so she didn’t have to slow down to 25 when going thru the town.
Carrie is sitting in security hoping they don’t search her because she forgot to take out the bottle of wine her mom gave Seth in her backseat-AGAIN. Dang!
Carrie is giving the security guards Bambi eyes
Carrie made it thru! I need to send myself a reminder email after I boot up my computer to get rid of that wine.
Carrie just remembered she forgot to get cheap red wine for her Shepherds Pie this weekend-Double Damn.
Carrie is thinking maybe she can use some of her wedding wine for cooking.
Carrie is trying to find a parking spot.
Carrie is running into the building-it’s COLD!
Carrie is peeing.
Carrie is getting hot water for tea!
Carrie is hiding from creepy old guy who always tries to rub her back.
Carrie is booting up her computer.
Carrie is sending out her morning emails.
Carrie thinks even though she is sending all these out, she probably won’t hear back on any of them and that makes her sad.
Carrie is listening to coworkers fight-FUN.
Carrie is emailing Jenny.
Carrie is listening to her boss step in.
Carrie is giggling at Jenny’s reply.
Carrie thinks he should fire them and pay her more.
Carrie tells Jenny that.
Carrie is attempting to look busy while she finishes her secret project.
Carrie is thinking she has MAD mundane task skills.
Carrie is trying to figure out how to print all 258 pages of her secret project 3 times without anyone noticing.
Carrie is going to wait until after 4 to do that.
Carrie remembered that she has mucho scanning to do after four today, nuts.
Carrie’s vitamins are hurting her tummy.
Carrie is on her way to the file cabinets to get files to audit.
Carrie wishes she had won the lotto.
Carrie is thinking the weekend is going to be REALLY busy and she’s sad about that.
Carrie just wants to take a nap.
Carrie thinks she should get Zio’s this weekend.
Carrie is in love with Google. Google Reader, Google News page-AWESOME.
Carrie is sad for the people in Germany and the school shooting and the people in Alabama, but she can’t stop reading about it.
Carrie really HATES Pink, Nickleback, and the new Kelly Clarkson song. And she’s really sick of having to turn her radio off every other song.
Carrie is going pee.
Carrie is reading Grey’s Anatomy spoilers.
Carrie is wondering if her Dad would like to see Fleetwood Mac when they come to town.
Carrie hates radio commercials, especially Woodhouse ones.
Carrie thinks the clock is going SO SLOW.
Carrie is so friggin smart, she just cut her secret book printing in half by landscaping…Shazam! Word Wizard!
Carrie just got an email from her mom! Yay!
Carrie is now trying to figure out how to secretly print 132 pages 3 times.
Carrie wishes that her book writing skills were as good as her twittering skills.
Carrie is printing off sections at a time of the book because its taking forever, then she’s just going to photocopy them.
Carrie is drinking warm V8 and eating pretzels- 10 o’clock munchies!
Carrie is going pee.
Carrie can’t believe it is only 10:08.
Carrie had to turn off the radio for that Taylor Swift song-blech.
Carrie is actually doing some work.
Carrie is reading Big Love spoilers.
Carrie is bloated and wants to take off her pants. She is the bloated beast of the Balrog.
Carrie shouldn’t be watching Lord of the Rings before she goes to bed, it makes her want to quote lines all day.
Carrie is going pee.
Carrie enjoys sleeping late, being snowed in, and saying the word bananas but not eating them.
Carrie is wondering what Seth is doing.
Carrie needs to change out one of her desk pictures because she looks sauced in it. (she was)
Carrie misses her beeps (the baby kittens, I don’t know why we call them beeps)
Carrie is still SO MAD about Pushing Daises, Jericho, Firefly, and Eli Stone getting cancelled.
Carrie wonders if she is the only person who watched America’s Best Dance Crew and So You Think You Can Dance and American Idol because no one wants to talk about it, is it a dirty secretly, like TV porn?
Carrie oddly enough does not like Dancing with the Stars.
Carrie wonders what Rob Thomas is up to, is there going to be a new Matchbox 20 cd soon?
Carrie wishes No Doubt was coming to Omaha, she would take Kathy because they used to rock out to No Doubt as kids.
Carrie just smiled when she remembered NKOTB concert with Kathy.
Carrie thinks it is hilarious when people interview here, you can always tell, they are wearing three piece suits.
Carrie is going pee.
Carrie is having to help someone with transmittals, is it really THAT hard?
Carrie is pretty excited, Right Said Fred is making a comeback! Remember I’m too Sexy??
Carrie just got the whole Britney “If you seek Amy” song controversy, it took entirely too long, she is old.
Carrie is listening to snippets of Jewel’s new lullaby cd and wondering if she likes it…
Carrie is checking her Amazon gold box
Carrie thinks the gold box deal sucks-who wants the Narnia movies on Blu-Ray?
Carrie is oh so smart with her sectioned printing (which took forever) and then her photocopying-secret book project-done!
Carrie’s top 7 favorite foods are burritos, French fries, nachos, her homemade tomato soup, grilled cheese, and Fat Potato Fat Fat (that was a top 3 but I had to expand.)
Carrie wonders what they are going to have for dinner tonite. She is thinking mac and cheese.
Carrie is shocked about how easy it is to make soup from scratch.
Carrie hates that they are building a new stadium in Sarpy County for the shitty Royals.
Carrie is cold.
Carrie has 10 minutes until lunch!
Carrie has lasagna for lunch.
Carrie wishes Pam was online so they could chat
Carrie is wondering what her Dad is doing.
Carrie wishes it was warm out so she could go running.
Carrie still feels like Bloaty McBloaterson
Carrie is going pee.
Carrie is getting ready to go eat lunch!!!

And that was only half my day people. Seriously-I should not be allowed to twitter. I shouldn’t even be allowed to facebook update. Don’t worry though, it won’t happen anytime soon, it’s blocked at my work and Seth isn’t buying me a new phone until 2009. Boo.
Have a great day everyone!
Love (to constantly update),
Carrie

No man is exempt from saying silly things; the mischief is to say them deliberately.

This week will not end people. I woke up happy it was Thursday because it kind of snuck up on me, but now this day is feeling incredulously long. Arg.
Many thanks to Karie who helped me figure out the Howie Day concert on 98.5. I hope I get to get in because it’s free Qudoba, but it’s only for like 50 people, and I’m sure they won’t let me bring Seth. Did I mention Qudoba? I used to eat that with Annie at TEKsystems all the time, and I’m feeling serious withdrawls. Mmmm…Howie Day and 4 cheese nachos. I’m digging it.
Basically I’ll eat black beans and cheese on anything. Heck I’ll eat pinto beans and cheese on anything. I’m pro bean.
And now I’m rambling. It’s been a while since we’ve had a list here at Carrie-on Baggage. Let’s do that. Yay!

Things I’m excited for this weekend:

Sleeping in
Getting the house painting finished (minus the hallway and possibly entryway, it depends how many people show up)
Seth taking a day off on Friday (although this is iffy now because he his having an uber bad day at work…)
Getting my hair done!! I have no idea what I’m going to do, but that is usually how it goes, I totally freeball it, I just hope I get a good cool hip hair college student who doesn’t look like she’s about to have a baby or is going to stab me with the scissors. *a digression* I started going to hair colleges about a bajillon years ago and I love mine here in town (I have horror stories about other out of town ones I have been to-like the time I got a spiral perm with hair down to my butt and it took 3 girls and about 8 hours). I like the young innovative kids who if you tell them, I need something new-they don’t give you the Rachel with bangs or just give you layers. I like that they are open when I say, “I want mahogany stripes in my hair” and because I have the mental capacity of a 12 year old, I like when they snark with me about random things. Plus! Bonus! It usually only costs me that of a real salon. And I know everyone is like, yeah but how can you trust them? Their instructors are standing there the hole time and frequently come over and check on their progress to ensure you aren’t going to have your hair fall out. The only drawback is with my hair, a trip to the salon is usually a four hour adventure (I have a lot of it) and it’s a personality crapshoot on the type of girl you are going to get. But it’s worth it because I would say, at least for the first month or so, my hair is pretty awesome (then I neglect to go back for 6 months, but that is a different digression I won’t take you on…) *end digression*
Eating pizza!
Not having to drive to work!
Wearing sweatpants for at least 55% of the weekend!
Watching DVR shows

Okay I’m done…
Jesus Mary and Joseph! I just checked our bank account and almost crapped myself. Earlier this morning my bank was having issues and was telling me I had no accounts, but apparently the US government depositing our federal refund caused a complete meltdown of my bank and me, because I was like WHAT DO YOU MEAN I HAVE NO ACTIVE ACCOUNTS!??! How can there be too many calls to take my call? I’ll sit here on hold, that’s fine, because apparently I have NOTHING BETTER TO DO SINCE I HAVE NO MONEY. It’s all fine now, but thank you federal government-WHEW. I’m sad that all of that money is going to other accounts so it can make more money. But for right now I’m thinking of buying a jet and going to Italy for the rest of the winter-anyone want to join me?

I’m tentatively thinking about my Vegas extravaganza. I’m not sure when the best time of year to go is (read: cheapest). But that’s when I would want to go. And I want to stay on the strip, and I want it just to be a quick weekend thing. Like Fri-Sun or something. Anyway, pipe dream, I know.

Alright well I’m out of witty things to write, I’m hoping this afternoon goes by faster than the morning did, but that’s not looking good as my email seems to have died, Seth is having a bad day, and my trainer just left me with a big audit. Boo.

Love (the federal government tax return and pizza!),
Carrie

It matters not whether you win or lose; what matters is whether I win or lose.

I wish my work didn’t have any clocks. I think it would help my day go by faster. If I didn’t know that I had been sitting for an hour watching someone write an email, I think it would be MUCH easier to tolerate the constant backspacing and sitting and thinking it took that person to write a three sentence email.
It is supposed to be AMAZING out today. And today only, of course it supposed to snow right when I’m going to get my hair done on Saturday.
I just discovered that Amazon has a “warehouse” website where they have refurbished or slightly damaged or return items. I could be in BIG trouble here people!
Someone just came to look at the new pictures that I put up in my cube and some were from my wedding, and I started talking about my wedding to her, which I haven’t done in forever. And I got all squishy about it again. Just describing my dress and how I found it and my bridesmaid colors. *swoon* Good times, good times…
I’ve sucked it up and started listening to 94.1 at work really low. I just can’t stand what they play on 98.5 anymore. Plus if I have to jump to turn of Nickleback or Pink one more time I might just throw my radio over the cube instead. *shudders* I hate them…I just have to remember to keep my radio low and to turn it off when I leave my cube. I can’t get 104.5 or 101.9 to come in to save my life and those are the kosher stations around here. Although I did hear on 98.5 yesterday that they are hosting a Howie Day concert and I practically FELL OVER but I can’t find anything on the web about it, or even about him touring. LOVE Howie Day, LOVE.
Speaking of other artists-Leona Lewis…I really like her songs, but I swear I flash back to the early 90’s every time I hear them. She is so early 90’s Mariah Carey and Celine Dion it’s unreal-even the videos. I mean I love her-but can a girl get a beat? The only song that is tolerable is “Bleeding Love” and that’s because they used it in So You Think You Can Dance (which means an automatic A+ in my book) and Ryan Tedder of One Republic (LOVE HIM) and Jesse McCartney produced and wrote it (respectively). If you would like to hear me expound on how much I love Ryan Tedder-just let me know. Basically it involves being Timbaland’s wingman for years and producing some of the greatest songs you probably never knew he produced. Wait until Chris Cornell’s new album comes out that they both worked on, you will pretty much die from the awesomeness. That is if you are crazy into music like me anyway…
I totally didn’t know that the whole Fat Tuesday, Ash Wednesday, Lent season was upon us until my mom asked me to come to church with her tonite. I wish I had time and the desire, Seth’s mom made a good point, that once we have kids, it will be easier to get back into church and that’s when most people do it. And we have always said that it is important to us to have our kids be involved in church like we are, but right now, we just can’t get into it. Its not that I don’t believe in God or Jesus or anything like that, I am very spiritual-but at this point in my life, I’m of the mindset that I think the whole church thing is more about fellowship and I rarely find when I do go, that I listen to the sermons and they affect me on some level, like I feel they should. So I feel like I’m wasting my time just to appease my mom. My relationship with God happens on my own terms, in my own words, on my own time. And right now I really don’t feel like I need church to facilitate that. But I know I will when I have kids, because I know I don’t have all the answers or all the knowledge to give my kids when it comes to religion, plus some of the greatest times I had where in church related activities as a youth, and one of my best friends (Kathy) grew out of a church relationship. So I’m not totally against church, I’m just not finding it useful in my life right now. But I know it will be again when I have kids, so I’m not too worried about it or about finding a church family. And I hate going to church just to appease my mom, because that feels SO wrong I can’t even begin to tell you. Anyway this was a horrible digression to say I learned something interesting about Lent today from an article called the Truth about Lent:
Q: Where do those ubiquitous ashes come from?
A: For centuries, Ash Wednesday ashes were created by burning the palms from the previous year's Palm Sunday Mass. But now, in a nod to modern efficiency and neatness, most churches simply buy prepackaged ashes, either online or from a religious goods supplier.

Who knew??

Let’s see what else??? We have been trying to get ready for painting on Saturday-that’s been fun, Seth fell of a chair last night and came down hard. Yikes. That was scary, I was brushing my teeth when it happened and I came RUNNING and tried to help him in my towel-which means I was not helpful at all.
Alright I’m off to try and find the Obama speech from last night since I totally missed it because I was taking off trim…
Love (of Jesus and my Mom)
Carrie

*insert title here* or blogging with bloggers block

What do you do when you have blog block?

I’ve been trying to think of topics all morning to inspire me to write, but nothing is coming.
I’m teetering on the edge of crabby and perfectly pleasant. It’s a thin ledge.

Plenty of things have happened to me today to illicit the crabby. I have made a list of thus so far:

1) Bagheera, in a desperate move to receive the affection he is so greatly STARVED of in the morning jumped into my lap and tried to reenact a 6 year old African tribal girl’s worst nightmare while I was trying to pee. Needless to say I have a pretty unexplainable scratch in my lady parts.
2) I couldn’t figure out what to wear so I after minutes of hemming and hawing I grabbed a shirt that now almost five hours into wearing it is decidedly TOO SMALL for me. I’ve spent half the day pulling it down from around my boobs and holding the sleeves over my wrists while the buttons hang on for dear life.
3) Bagheera got mad that Seth didn’t clean the cat pan last night after his squirt fest so he decided since we took the cat pan out of our bedroom, the pile of Seth’s gym clothes and shoes in the corner was the PERFECT place to pop a squat. Seth caught him mid stream.
4) Now I have to do laundry tonite.
5) And clean the carpet.
6) Today is “Chili Feed” at lunch today and I brought a beautiful perfect cornbread Johnny cake that Seth was SO MAD I wasn’t leaving at home because it came out that perfect. Which means no lunch for Carrie-I had bread and cheese and some olives.
7) The day is going SO SLOW it’s unreal.
8) I have about 300 things on the DVR and it is making me a nervous WRECK because last time we had this much on the DVR the thing seized up and refused to tape anything and wouldn’t delete anything and Cox had to reset our DVR and I almost had a meltdown about the lost shows. So now I am ANAL RETENTIVE about getting our DVR cleaned out. Joss Whedon’s “Dollhouse” is starting soon people! I need to be prepared for Joss’s return into television! My life will finally feel WHOLE again. Or George Clooney coming back to ER!?!? THESE ARE MOMENTS THAT I CANNOT MISS!! (I need therapy-or two DVR’s)
9) It’s supposed to SHIT STORM on Sunday, right before I have to drive to work. And the snow is supposed to continue on for a lovely 7 inches through Tuesday. And barely double digit temps means it’s going to be icy. Why can’t it snow tonite?!!? So I can be trapped in my house all weekend.
10) Seth will not be coming to dinner or the car show tonite because work is trying to steal my husband!
11) Have I mentioned my shirt is too small? I feel like its SQUEEZING ME TO DEATH!!

Now here are a list of things keeping me relatively sane and NOT crabby:
1) It’s Friday!
2) Grey’s Anatomy was really good last night.
3) I get to go out to eat with my family and to the car show with my Dad tonite!
4) I am going to be cooking up a storm on Saturday and if as a sign from GOD everything for lasagna was on sale at the grocery store last night. Also I have had multiple requests from people asking if they can stop by and have some chicken enchi’s which makes me feel all warm and fuzzy that people like my chicken enchi’s. I will also be trying a new enchi-Black bean and cheese enchi’s so if you are feeling adventurous-stop by and try them. Saturday Night for dinner.
5) I am making chocolate chip cookies this weekend from a new recipe that is supposed to make them super soft.
6) My “Band of Brothers” on Blu-Ray DVD shipped today!!
7) I got Seth’s Valentine’s Day gift all planned and ordered. Way ahead of schedule!
8) My house is relatively clean so I won’t have to do MUCH cleaning this weekend.
9) I’m on the downward slope of the workday.
10) It is not snowing yet.
11) The Meatball Muffin’s I made Seth last night were a success and the perfect thing to stick in his lunch! I think I need to make mashed taters with them though. But anyway-SUCCESS! Even if Seth now calls them Meat Muffin’s which makes them sound like the dirtiest thing EVER.

So as you can see, I’m balanced, but barely.
Last night I finished “People of the Book” and got a good chunk into “The Russian Concubine” and also I am thisclose to finishing “Even After All this time” I sorta hate when this happens because then I have to start new books all at once and sometimes the stories get muddled. Usually I like to phase in and out.

I thought People of the Book was really good. My only qualms with it were that the story kind of went al screwy at the end. The “main” storyline felt forced and like the “plot drama” was just kind of shoved in there at the end. When I heard the author talk about that character-I remember she said that she was kind of like that friend that shows up and sleeps on your couch and suddenly she was part of your everyday life and wouldn’t leave. That’s exactly how her storyline felt. I wish she would have saved all the weirdness in the main storyline and just had it been about finding out about the different parts of the books history instead of creating this weird forced plot device. I swear she stole the entire relationship of Meredith and her mom from Grey’s Anatomy and stuck it in the book for giggles.
But still! Still the background stories were the ones I liked the best. And they made this whole book worth it. So I give it 3 out of 5 stars. I liked it, but probably wouldn’t read it again and probably wouldn’t pass it on to my friends unless they were interested.
Ooo that reminds me I need to ask Ellyn if she’s read any Gregory Maguire's and if not give her my collection. He’s the guy who wrote Wicked, but he wrote tons of other books that I like to call “F’d up Fairy Tales.” They are lovely. Like the true story of Cinderella and Snow White and Sleeping Beauty. Granted the Wicked series is the best by far, but these are pretty great too.
OH MY GOODNESS-I just went to his website and he has a new book out! Must buy now!!!
FYI-if you EVER love a author, go to their website, some of them have the BEST websites and you can learn the COOLEST things about them. Or sometimes they blog and it’s the greatest thing ever.
DOUBLE OMG!!! I just saw that today’s Friday Five special on Amazon is Ludacris’s new cd!!! Just FYI for all you ITUNES users out there, I just discovered that Amazon has the EXACT same thing, except their prices are cheaper and they have way more selection and awesome deals, such as this Luda deal that I will RUSH HOME and take advantage of-because I already love 3 of the songs on the album, which totally justify it’s purchase. Now I just have to figure out how to get that BOOK since I used up all my BOOK credits this month already with Seth. *goes off to ponder*
I hope you all have a LOVELY weekend!
Love,
Carrie