Nothing much new. I have been working a lot. Berta, to answer your question, no time for hobbies like cross-stitch either ;)I think all our weekends from now until fall are booked. We have two weddings, bridal showers, stags and stagettes, fittings, doggie dates, road trips, camping, family reunion, Mom's eye surgery twice...once on each eye on different days....birthday parties, girls night out, friends visiting from Ontario, and the list goes on and on. Somewhere in there we want to finish all the renovations. Also, we have been trying to get a walk in every night after work, which means every night except tonight, we went in the dark and one night in the rain. Fun. But seeing the photos from my trip to Houston was a real wake up call, I mean I knew I was fat, but how the fat really makes me look ugly is really sad and depressing. Anyway, enough of that downer stuff!! Now I am trying to get back into running, starting with walking and small portions of jogging as long as I can, then I go back to walking again. Daisy really seems to enjoy it to.

Here are some of my pics from Houston. I tried for an hour to add some more last night but then I finally had to give up and go to bed. Blogger is not always cooperative. It won't add any more today either, so here it is.


My hotel room:



The grounds at the office in Houston were beautiful and had walking trails, a lake, bridge, palm trees and some animals. Here is a peacock and some ducks we made friends with. The peacock didn't want to talk to us until we starting playing with the ducks and he got jealous, so he showed us his stuff.



Here is a bunch of us during a refinery tour. It was SOOO hot out that day and we had to wear these fire proof jackets in case of a flash fire (yea right, I was about to burst into flames I was so hot) and we had to wear these oh-so-beautiful hard hats and eye glasses which kept sliding off because I was so sweaty. We were all ready to pass out, meanwhile we were climbing up ladders and walking on mesh metal catwalks just for fun. Oh yea, but we had the hard hats to protect us if we passed out and fell to our death. It was very odd to see miles and miles of refinery. There are so many oil refineries there that they take up the land mass equal to about the size of Saint John. It is refinery as far as the eye can see. Even in the water, there are oil pumps everywhere working away.

Where is Waldo....I mean Jennifer..?? Can you guess which one is me?
Here is the Alamo in San Antonio, Texas. It is an American war shrine where Davey Crockett lived and fought.

San Antonio is a beautiful historic city with old buildings and wonderful architecture. Everyone was super nice and the police had brown short sleeve uniforms with brown cowboy hats. We saw ones on the highways driving in pairs on motorcycles like in Chips, the old TV show with Eric Estrada (I know I can't spell....sorry).It is sort of the opposite of Houston, which is all big city with skyscrapers and highways, and everything is new and concrete.If it is old, it is torn down. And I didn't see one cowboy the entire time I was there!! Not even someone in a cowboy hat! Not a cowboy to be seen....actually us white folks (I think) were the minority. I don't know the stats, but I think there were more African Americans and Mexicans than any other group.Houston was not what I expected at all. Great shopping though,and tons of stores!! I mean, SO many!! It was really nuts!

I really loved San Antonio and would love to go back there. For you trivia buffs, that is where Eva Longoria from Desperate Housewives is from. Everyone in all of Texas was very nice and friendly, which was really odd for such a big city. I must say, they even put us Canadians to shame. It must be that "southern charm" everyone talks about.

Here is Davey Crockett Hotel:

Here is a neat, skinny building in San Antonio and a street shot below. I think it is city hall, but don't quote me on that.There were stores in San Antonio, like one along this street below, that only sold stuff that looked like someone took a bedazzler to it. I mean, an entire store of stuff completely covered in fake jewels and studds. It was weird....and a little scary~!

Here are some shots of Shamu at Sea World. I wasn't all that interested in seeing the show, but once I was watching it I was in awe! It was amazing!! Totally unexpected!
Here are some shots from a 45 min boat tour we took of The River Walk in San Antonio. There are shops, restaurants, entertainment, and hotels all along the river, with a walking trail if you have the time. We opted for the boat tour instead and even that was long. They showed us the window of the hotel where Jennifer Lopez stayed when she was there filming the movie about the singer, Selina. They filmed part of the movie along the river and on one of the many little bridges that cross it. Can't remember which one and I have so many pics I can't show them all, so guess now you will have to just go rent the movie if you want to see.





We went to a baseball game in Houston at the Minute Maid Park. It was fun because of all the people and all the energy, but I got bored out of my tree about and hour into it. Plus, I still had the mumps at this point and think I was running a fever that night, so I was pumping the meds into me like candy. What really surprised me was that even near the end of the game the ladies bathrooms were pretty clean! I mean, way cleaner than our local big mall on a Saturday afternoon. There was still TP in the stalls and there was no garbage on the floor and there was still room to put paper towel in the trash bins. But a popcorn and pop cost me almost $20. The pop was something nuts like $7.50. It was really out of this world. Oh well, you only live once.Plus, I needed something to do to keep from going out of my mind with boredom (sorry all you baseball fans out there!) Too bad it wasn't basketball instead...or hockey, tennis, volleyball...well you get the idea...

Here is a pic of the dinosaurs at the museum in Houston:

The pink flamingos at Sea World are below. Hey, has anyone ever seen a 4D movie before? We did at Sea World and it was so neat!! You wear 3D glasses and there is water that shoots out at you in the face from the back of the chairs in front of you, so that (for example) when someone in the movie pukes, it sprays you in the face and eveyone in the theatre freaks out like it is real puke. What a blast! They vibrate the seats and shoot air at you as well. In one scene there were rats running around on the ground in the movie and they had something moving under our seats. I jumped so high that I hit my forehead on the back of the seat in front of me. It was really fun, but by the end of it I was cold and wet and tired of being sprayed at so I put my hands up in front of me over the nozzle so I wouldn't get so wet.

Here is the roller coaster we went on at Sea World. It was my very first roller coaster ride. It had 150 foot drop at 65 miles per hour with a g-force of 3.5. It was nuts and I lost my breath and thought I was going to pass out.I was riding this thing, wondering Will this bar on my lap hold me in if I pass out? That's me in the middle seat of the center car, on the right in a black t-shirt. Krista is the funny expression beside me, like she is dropping to her death. As soon as we got off, she was like, Can we go again? Uhhh...NO! Mandey (behind me) and I basically fell out of the cars and stumbled to the side by some flower pots to get out of the way of the next riders. Don't get me wrong, it was fun and I can't wait to do it again, but the losing my breath thing really scared me at the time. Mandy said it happened to her to and both of us were sick, so maybe it had something to do with that cause Jodie (next to Mandey) and Krista said they were fine. Or maybe there is a trick to it and we should have taken a deep breath before the drop or something. I don't know.

This photo of us makes me laugh every time I see it! Priceless!

All in all, it was a good trip with some great memories. Some were good, like Sea World. Some were really bad, like the visits to the doctors and the days I spent hugging the toilet. But you have got to take the good with the bad. My ruptured ear drum has healed, I can hear again, my infection is gone and the mumps are done.

Until next time....