The Daily DeMo: Of Cribbage, russet potatoes, and Dave Chappelle

The Daily DeMo - Edition 14

DD105 :: Saturday - I learned the code to someone else's house and how to set the alarm.

DD106 :: Sunday - Jared taught me how to play Cribbage and I can most definitely be a little bit competitive. (That's me in as the green pegs.)

DD107 :: Monday - I learned that Jay Prater likes to say "KAKE's VIPER 3D" way too much. Is he trying to meet a quota or something?

DD108 :: Tuesday - The russet potatoes that you can buy in the bag are much smaller than the big potatoes that you can buy separately. When you're warming up a little one to make a baked potato, if you go the usual 7 minutes, you will end up with a wrinkled potato and not much to eat. So, cook 2 potatoes and cut down the time to about 3 minutes, flip, then 2 minutes and they will be perfect.

DD109 :: Wednesday - Did you know that there is such thing called alternate play in golf, and pure alternate play? Alternate play is when players use the same golf ball, but take turns hitting, no matter who hit the last shot or where it lands. It's different than a Scramble because in a scramble all players drop from the same spot and hit their own ball.

DD110 :: Thursday - Dave Chappelle made an appearance in Portland that was unknown except on Twitter. I'm not a fan of Dave's but I think it's cool how Twitter was used to bring so many people to one location. It's also a cool case study of how a majority will control the minority in a crowd (like when the ppl said NO to the others who were trying to take stuff down).

DD111 :: Friday - Shopping for a new hairstyle online is nearly impossible. The websites are either full of high fashion magazine-style photos (definitely not everyday styles), too full of ads, or low-quality pictures. This is a rare example of when I would rather look through a magazine to find what I want than look online for it.

Swapping stories

This is my first blog swap for 20sb and I'm excited to have Erin from erinuncensored post here! I hope that you enjoy what she has to say, and you can find me here (but I'll be back tomorrow)!

ola amigos!
how are you? my name is erin from erinuncensored, and i have hijacked PresentlyDeMo. umm, okay that is not actually true. i'm here because the two of us are participating in the 20something bloggers blog swap today!
this is only my second time doing this, so i am still learning the ropes, forgive me if this post isn't as exciting as you'd hope ;)
DeMo and i really weren't sure what we were going to write about today. so, in trying to do something similar, even if its random, we are both going to spend a minute and talk about a place which is important to us.
one of my favorite places in the world is norfolk, virginia.
technically, i would love anywhere in the hampton roads area, but i am slightly nostalgic about the area of ghent in norfolk.
i'm a typical new england girl who decided to pick up and move south after i graduated college.
(most southerners call me a "yankee" i despise that nickname and prefer to be labeled "a member of red sox nation." i can't be associated with the new york yankees. its against every thing i believe in.)
anyway, digressing. i apologize.
i miss virginia; i miss my friends. i miss everything about it. its been a little over 2 years since i've been back up north, but that area will live in my heart forever.
so, here goes... just a quick random list of some of my favorite places, people, memories, etc:
- the taphouse. Best. Bar. Ever. it was kind of common ground for everyone. i even had a friend who didn't drink that would spend time with us there. amazing food, company and moments.
- elliots fairgrounds- i don't ever think i will find a coffee shop i love more in the rest of my life.
- chik-fil-A... need i say more?
- sweet tea
- the word y'all, only if it is used correctly
- the fact that everyone holds the door open for everyone else...seriously, if you get a door close in front of you down there, you should take that as a major insult, because it barely ever happens.
- rylo: a rockabilly/dirty gutter blues band that impresses me more and more every time i see thing
- all the block parties
- the weddings i have and will make flowers for. i love to see my friends happy.
- the navy. i am so glad that part of my life is over, but i am honored to know some of the best sailors and am thankful for everything the military does for us.
- fried green tomatoes... i've only eaten them once, but i did it down there.
-floris apple. best cider.
- the mermaid trail.
- and i guess as silly and obvious as this may sound, but my friends.
gosh, they really helped mold me. their presence in my life is something i cannot imagine having never known. i'm so glad to have spent the time i spent with them.
i guess i didn't write too much about norfolk, va as a "place" (but feel free to email me and i can be your tour guide, lol!). i guess its just "home"- and it will be forever. a place i feel safe, a place i started to grow and a place i will always cherish.
thank you DeMo, for letting me stop by and share my random information with your readers. thats the thing i love about blog swaps. it gives you the chance to find someone new whose blog you may have never even stumbled upon before. i will absolutely be back regularly! and if y'all are looking for me, i can be found here, at erinuncensored!

Daily DeMo: Make your own flubber!

The Daily DeMo - Edition 13

DD98 :: Saturday - Thanks to This Old House, I now know to hang my ceiling drywall perpendicular to the floor joists.

DD99 :: Sunday - It is impossible for me to read John 17 to my grandpa without crying.

DD100 :: Monday - Mindee and her daughter, Reagan taught me that these lyrics to a country song If you're going through hell / Keep on going, don't slow down / If you're scared, don't show it / You might get out / Before the devil even knows you're there are actually based on a quote from Winston Churchill.

DD101 :: Tuesday - Make your own flubber! If my nephews and niece lived closer, I'd definitely do this with them.

DD102 :: Wednesday - Thanks to Norm Abram, I know that if I go buy wood from a lumber store, to let it sit for 3 days before working with it so that the moisture level in the wood can equalize to that of my (non-existent) shop.

DD102.1 - Apparently turning 25 means that the grey hairs show up more frequently.

DD102.2 - The Eli Young Band cost me an $8 cover charge to see at a bar a year ago. I saw them for $0 during RiverFest when they opened for Pat Green. And now they have another radio hit and tix are $17.50 at the Cotillion.

DD103 :: Thursday - My church has a pdf of their positions on abortion. I'm not sure when it came out, but maybe as a result of Dr. Tiller's murder?

DD104 :: Friday - Salsa steps! I already knew the Basic Back, Mambo, and Cha Cha, but tonight I learned some turns. You should definitely get into dancing if you don't do it already!

Free Couch to 5k Week 6 Podcasts

Wow! I've had quite the workout in the last two days! I pulled the massive amount of weeds from my neighbor's 6x6 flower bed last night, ran 2 miles this morning, and did some salsa dancing tonight! I can honestly say that I am sore from hips to toes.

Here are the links to the podcasts that I made for Week 6 Couch to 5k. The playlists are below the links. You won't hear any techno-heavy stuff or explicit lyrics like the other podcasts that I've found. Each podcast starts with a 5 minute warm-up walk, and ends with a 5 minute cool-down walk. When it's time to transition, you'll hear the ominous countdown man. You can find the Couch to 5k schedule here.

Week 6-1 | Week 6-2 | Week 6-3

Week 6-1
When I'm 64 - The Beatles
If I Had a Million Dollars - Barenaked Ladies
The Best of You - Foo Fighters
Bullets - Augustana
Night Air - Teddy Geiger
Best Days of Your Life - Kellie Pickler
Change - Taylor Swift
Cold Shoulder - Adele
Summer of '69 - Bryan Adams
Stickshifts and Safety Belts - Cake
The Littlest Birds - The Be Good Tanyas
Snails - The Format

Week 6-2
Over the Rainbow - IZ (Israel Kamakawiwo'ole)
Question - Old 97s
She's Country - Jason Aldeen
Red High Heels - Kellie Pickler
Jet Black and Jealous - Eli Young Band
Wish I - Jem
Minor Swing - Whizbang Shufflers
Mood Ring - Relient K
You, Me and the Bourgoisie - The Submarines
Red Light - David Nail

Week 6-3
Everything Else - Howie Day
Midwest Skies and Sleepless Nights - Augustana
Better off Dead - Faders
Track 9 - The Bless
Life is Short - Butterfly Boucher
Change Your Mind - The Killers
Reason to Believe - Dashboard Confessional
The Answer - Shane Barnard
Texas to You - Johnny Cooper
Run Baby Run - Cheryl Crow

Don't worry. I won't be telling you how drunk I was last night*

Stephany tagged me for this meme. I'm not crazy about memes because most of the memes I see have the questions with yes/no answers or "how drunk were you last night?" or, "Who was the last person you texted?" So what? I don't feel like it's worth my time to read it (or do one) if I don't think I'm going to learn anything from it (because we're all about learning stuff here at Presently DeMo). This meme is an exception though, because I get to talk about me. And you get to learn about me. And we're all happy about that!

I'm supposed to pick 7 things to write about, so here they are.

(one) I used to have a severe disdain for anything Shania Twain. Her music, that feature about her on CMT where they talk about how she was raised in Alaska, her music videos, pictures in magazines... I can put up with her now, but I went through many many years of changing the radio station (and making my friends do it also) whenever a Shania song played.

(two) I perfected my typing skills by using Yahoo and AOL instant messenger. Except because I could get away with it, I never got really good at using capital letters. I just took a typing test and got 70WPM with 91% accuracy. I took the test again but read the text before I started and got 78WPM/97%.

(three) I rarely haul groceries in my trunk. And this is why. Contained within are a pair of shoes, 2 sleeping bags, air mattress, 2 camping chairs, pair of flip flops in a shoe box, first aid kit, a Bible, a pair of shoes with socks (for unexpected nights of swing dancing), a floaty thing to lay on in the pool, and a bike rack. That's all I can remember being in there. I think that maybe if I clean stuff out, I can improve my gas mileage...

(four) I have this dislike for feet and toes. It's getting better, but I still will most likely move away if you put your feet on me.

(five) I named my wireless network WHMS because When Harry Met Sally is my ultimate favorite movie. I love it so much that I don't mind watching it over and over and over, and watched it at least once a week my last year in college.

(six) I keep fingernail clippers on my keychain. I've learned to never be without them, especially when bowling.

(seven) I absolutely hate it when I'm writing on paper and hear that gritty crunchy sound from some tiny speck of something underneath the paper. I will stop everything and wipe down my desk so that it doesn't happen again.

I'll pick 7 to tag later today.

*Yes, I will tell you. No alcohol was consumed last night. Got your attention though, didn't it? :)

Fail Whale Pale Ale and Wall Street

Today I got lost in the netherworlds of the internets and bookmarked about 500 links to my delicious (which I really need to update). There are so many links! Whoever started calling it the "world wide web" back in the day was definitely right. It's kind of overwhelming the amount of information out there. In my perusing, I've found some great blogs to read that might get lost in the abundance of links already in my blogroll. I'm planning to highlight those soon.

There are some changes happening on the blog! Nothing too big, just minor stuff. Like over to your right is my Currently Reading. And I've gotten rid of a lot of the extra blogroll and it's now up there where it says BLOGROLL. Oh! And I brought back my search box. I was looking for a post of mine the other day and I had a hard time finding it. I figured that it's my own blog and if it's hard for me to find something, it's definitely hard for you! I hope that you find these changes to be more reader-friendly, and if you think of something you'd like to see here, please share in the comments!

Now on to the latest edition of the Daily DeMo!

The Daily DeMo - Edition 12

DD91 :: Saturday - Making brownies earlier in the day will make the impromptu after-fireworks visit to the apartment that much more enjoyable.

DD92 :: Sunday - There used to be a water well @ 5th & Main in Newton. The stone archway is now located at the park behind Midtown Towers, and there is a metal plaque in the pavement at the intersection of 5th & Main.

DD93 :: Monday - Pesto is not in the aisle with the Prego. It's with the garlic in the fruits & veggies section. Also, store-bought pesto does not look as bright green and appealing as fresh pesto.

DD93.1 - Orlando, Florida was originally named Jernigan. (Thanks, Conan)

DD94 :: Tuesday - One of my fave bloggers, Erin was interviewed by FantabulouslyFrugal. She got started by working at a publisher and ran her own jobs on the printing press. Ahhhhh my dream job!

DD94.1 - If you are trying to reflow text on a page and you're noticing that the text is changing proportion, chances are your text is set to "point" text. Right click on the text and select "Convert to paragraph text." This will let you reflow the text without a problem.

DD94.2 - Gmail BETA is gone! But you can add the BETA sticker.

DD95 :: Wednesday - Twitter lovers + Beer = Fail whale pale ale

DD96 :: Thursday - I learned an overwhelming amount of information about HTML and CSS.

DD97 :: Friday - Blogger friend Erin informed me that the DOT in her home state prefers to use Charmin toilet paper to cover the tar lines that they put down. The toilet paper keeps the tar off your tires. Now isn't that sweet of them?

DD97.1 - And yet another blogger friend Erin wrote about the history of Wall Street in New York:

Most of us know that the Dutch built a wall across the top of their tiny settlement to keep out unfriendly natives, and when the threat was over and the wall was torn down, the place became Wall Street.

DD97.2 - Duct tape was used to repair a mudflap on Challenger during an Apollo moon mission.

What did you learn this week?

Attitude is Everything in Couch to 5k

{Are you starting Week 6 of C25k soon? You can find the podcasts for Week 6 here. Be sure to subscribe or check back for more running music!}

My perfect record of running every interval of Couch-to-5k so far was busted this morning. I just wasn't into it. I went to bed too late last night, woke up at 12:30am dripping sweat, woke up again at 5:30am (which I do nearly every time that I run my a/c at night) and finally rolled out of bed 15 minutes later than planned. I was tempted to skip my run this morning and run tonight but then thought better of it when I remembered that the temperature is supposed to be 105° today.

I was distracted by everything today. I was bummed that I hadn't put together a podcast to time my running (which meant that I had to break concentration and shuffle through songs), I was praying for Janel (who is currently in the hospital with some form of typhoid fever. Please pray if she comes to your mind.), it was HUMID, the sidewalks that I chose were bumpy and I had to turn a lot of corners, the jigglybuns decided to show up and slow me down, and I really didn't want to do the full run because I might be late to work.

I would like to say that I was able to knock down everything that was weighing on me this morning, but I didn't. I stopped 6 minutes short of what I was supposed to run. Failure. I am not one who lets failure totally get me down, I'm pretty good at brushing it off and starting over, but I have a feeling that if I don't ignore the challenges of running, it's going to kick me next week.

There's no Ctrl-Z in life to start over and try again. I just have to push harder next week and make sure that the distractions don't get the best of me. One of the things I love about running in the mornings is seeing the sunrise. I sometimes make my running more fun by trying to find the best roads to take me to the best view. Seeing the sunrise reminds me that God is in control of all the situations in my life and I can just let Him take care of it all: my running, my friends who are hurting, family circumstances, my own struggles. It's a good reminder to not just run toward the sun, but to run toward the Son.

Quarter-life Fun

So... 25 is pretty fun. I can't tell much difference, except today I had to think twice when answering a question about my age. I almost wrote "23". What's up with that?

Like I've been promising, here's a recap of my birthday. And this isn't just for you to listen to me say "lookie at what I got!" but this is also for me, so that I will remember you wonderful gift-givers for a very long time. It seems like every year I forget what I've gotten from people, unless it's a picture or something that sits on a shelf. This year I changed that and was armed with a list of many possibilities. And even though people shopped from that list, I was still surprised at who chose what, and every gift this year is practical and useful in some way.

{Leatherman "Kick" from Neighbor John.}
{I've already used it to get TJ's hood to close and rewire a lamp.}

{Lots of pottery toys from m.t.}
{I'm going to take pottery classes with j.f. and h.y.
during August. SO. EXCITED.}

The other stuff from my family all fit into a skillet. :)
Let me unpack it for you. This should be fun!

{A 12-pack of DP and some
DP popsicles that didn't make it into the picture.}
{A very frilly shirt to wear dancing.}

{Eats, Shoots & Leaves -- for the grammarians. Hilarious book.}

{A cushy bike seat pad. Very comfortable!}

{And the skillet. A very deep, easy to clean skillet. With a lid.}

{This bistro table is something I've wanted for a loooong time,
and I'm definitely putting it to use!}

{I walked in after work and saw this. Totally a surprise!}

My kitchen has probably 3 square feet of intentional counter space, so anything extra makes a big difference. A while back I'd sketched out an idea of what I wanted, and Dad made this for me and installed it without me knowing. The note at the top of my blog is what he left for me...on the inside of a cracker box because he couldn't find any paper. haha!

I spent most of my birthday at work, then rode up to Newton with Becky who was going to see her brother. I hung out with mom & dad and grandpa & grandma. Mom had gotten up early before work to get a head start on dinner, and dad grilled steak for us all. Yum! G&G are so cute. They love it when I come up any other day that's not a Sunday, because it feels like an extra treat for them to see me more than once a week. They were pretty much smiling the whole evening.

The night after my birthday I went to a party for my friend Gayle who shares my birthday. She was celebrating 25 also (for the third time...). Then Saturday night was the party for me! About 30 people showed up and I came home with Starbucks cards, and itunes cards, and wine!

{That's Gayle next to me. We got BTS cake! With Reeses on top!}

{Vin et fin.}

$100 Giveaway

But it's not from me! (Did you think I could afford that?!)

Molly Lou Gifts is giving away $100 worth of her oh-so-cute stuff. July 10 is the last day to enter, so hop over and let her know that you want in on the fun!

Hat tricks and mackerel skies

The Daily DeMo - Edition 11

DD83 :: Friday - Petunias create very small blooms when it's 100 degrees outside. Alyssum will wilt if not watered every day.

DD84 :: Saturday - "Doug and Angela have yet to redecorate their home since getting married and they are totally ghetto with an entertainment stand laying on its side."

DD84.1 :: It takes approximately 4 hours for my air conditioner to knock the temperature down in my apartment from 80* to 75*. Wayyyy too long.

DD85 :: Sunday - Learned lots of stuff about rewiring a lamp!

DD86 :: Monday - Budworms are eating my petunias!

DD86.1 - Treece, Kansas is quickly becoming a ghost town and EPA won't do anything about it. Very interesting article & pictures.

DD87 :: Tuesday - Sorry, Brandon. Melissa's engaged.

DD88 :: Wednesday - After a hat trick in a hockey game, the hats go to one of four places. {Not only was this article interesting, but I'd never heard of a hat trick. Either I don't watch enough hockey, or it's just not a big deal for the Wichita Thunder.}

DD89 :: Thursday - When the clouds look like this, it's called a "mackerel sky" because the clouds look like the scales of a fish.

DD90 :: Friday - I learned how to make potato salad. And it turned out well!

Almost as good as the real thing

My favorite restaurant in Wichita right now is Caffe Moderne. The other day I had The Moderne, which is prosciutto, tomato, mozarella and pesto. I've been wanting to make my own for a while and finally got around to it tonight (after searching Dillon's for some pesto and asking a guy where it's at and he points me down the spaghetti aisle ... to the Prego. [FYI, it's in the fruit & veggie section with the garlic jars]).

Theirs

Mine

I'll share some pesto with you (but not the fresh mozarella). The jar cost me $5 and I probably used about a penny's worth of pesto. Feel free to contribute any pesto-related recipes so that I can get my money's worth out of it!