{crazyjen}

Thank you to my brother the Veteran and Soldier

Thanks...for everything. I am not eloquent enough to get it out right so I'm just going to say thanks.

I got the first hug when he came home the first time from being overseas in Iraq.

Dad, Jimmy and Mom. 
  

Death by Recliner

So...here's a story for ya.

I'm driving home from the Science Museum with Kim and Krysta, we went to see the CSI exhibit (it was good, not spectacular but good) and I'm going south on I35 from the Cities, in the left lane, about a mile from the Northfield exit and all of a sudden I see the car directly in front of me (about 20-30 yards, more than likely less) swerve to the right. Immediately I see why, there's a recliner and some cushions right in the middle of my lane. Without really thinking, just on instinct, I take my foot off the gas and swerve to the right. I still ended up clipping the damn thing though. Just barely on my left front fender. I didn't bust out my headlights but I busted a chunk out of the fender. Anyway, after I swerve right I start fishtailing, so I go left, go right and then straighten out and get myself to the side of the road, pull over and um...breathe.

My heart at that point was back to normal and right away I say, "Krysta, you okay? Kimmie you okay?" Kimmie said the same thing. We were all fine but my car was not. I went out right away to check on it and saw the gaping hole. Lovely. So I called the cops and was told that I should drive along and a trooper would contact me.

Basically it took forever to get a phone call back and I had to call them back myself which it turned out they tried calling me when I was calling them. Turns out nobody reported any furniture in the road and nobody else hit it. Lovely so now I have to get my car fixed and I have to pay for it. That f'in sucks.

After saying that, I will say that yes I am ticked off but I am happy that I didn't hit that damn recliner head on, I didn't hit another car and didn't roll my car with my passengers in it. I was a little freaked out after it happened but my first thought was, "is everyone okay" and then I was so glad I hadn't hurt anyone. Yes I realize it wasn't my fault but I was driving and if I had hurt anybody I would be very very very upset.

So afterwards me, Kimmie and Krysta were joking around about it and Kim says my blogpost should be "Death by Recliner"

Other comments, praphrased of course:

"I'm feeling lucky, I should buy a powerball ticket."

"I could have died." - All of us.

"Kimmie are you going to go home and have sex with Thomas?" - uh, that's me. LOL

"We should have been driving my car because then it would have been totalled and I could have gotten a new one." "Yeah, but Kimmie, your car doesn't have power steering so we would have hit the damn thing head on."

"Hey Kimmie, if you would have died, Thomas would have been a rich man."

"What the fuck is a bunch of furniture doing in the middle of the road?"

"Jen, you have quick reflexes." - Krysta made me feel so much better after saying that.

"Um...we are definitely stopping for DQ now." - Kimmie

"How is it that nobody else hit that friggin' furniture?"

VOTE TODAY!!!

While this blog is generally not political I just want to say to make sure you get out and vote today! Your vote counts no matter if you think so or not.

Get out there and vote. If you'd like to see what your ballot looks like prior to going in, check out this site. Voting

Emails I send

So I just sent an email to my father and it made me think about all the emails I send in a day...it's quite a lot actually. Some are funny, some are serious, some are work-related (yes I work for a living), some are me being a pest, some are just retarded but I send a lot.

So here's the email I sent my father:

Subject: Hey Dad!

Body: We should try this recipe. It looks good. http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2007/07/peach_crisp_wit/

Dad's a big proponent of trying new recipes and making his own up. This one is a recipe for a fresh peach crisp. It looks good. For some reason after I sent it I laughed to myself...probably b/c it seemed funny to send Dad an email like that instead of my mother. She's not a big fan of peaches though and Dad and I are.

Yes, this post is boring but it is all I've got. Maybe when I get home I'll take some lovely fall pictures and post them. It's beautiful outside right now albeit a bit chilly.

Politics

This blog is in no way shape or form a soapbox for Politics or Religion. In fact I purposely stay away from either topic but I would be remiss if I didn't mention something about the Presidential Race/local races going on right now.

1. I hate, absolutely hate, all of the ads out there. They are mostly slinging mud at the other candidate. They never tell you the whole truth so I don't even bother to watch or listen. It annoys the f*ck out of me. How much truth could you possibly get across in 30 seconds anyway.
2. I am currently listening to the Presidential Debate on MPR and I am going to shut it off. Seriously. All they keep doing is throwing accusations and dodging accusations about them personally and their campaign. That does nothing for me. Tell me what you're going to do the fix the economy not how your opponent's plans are garbage.

Okay, that's all I'm going to say.

I-35 bridge in Minneapolis, MN

We drove by the bridge construction just to see how close they were. Michelle said they are supposed to be done by 9/11 or somewhere around there. That was a fairly lofty goal if you ask me.

The bridge fell 8/1 and they had it done in a year? Interesting. So here's a couple pics.

From Washington

on Washington.

35W Bridge Collapse

It's been a year since the bridge collapse. A year since that horrible event. A year ago I was driving that bridge twice a day. It was less than a mile from my place of employment. I could have been on that bridge. Boy am I glad that my sisters and I decided to go to the Olmsted County Fair meaning I left work even earlier than usual.

Boy am I glad. That's the phrase of the day.

Here is my post with pictures from the collapse.

http://jennifermartinovici.typepad.com/crazyjen/2007/08/35w-bridge-in-m.html

Road Trip - Polaroid-style

I took a trip to Wisconsin this weekend and snapped some shots of the scenic route along the way. No that doesn't mean I got lost. I never get lost. Seriously, I don't. I always figure out where I'm going, occassionally I take a wrong turn or something but I figure it out right away. I'm not bragging just stating a fact. That's my dad in me. Boys eat your heart out. I always say my sister and I should go on that Amazing race show. We'd kick some serious butt. I mean Michelle not Kim. Kimmie has problems with directions. :) (hee hee haa haa Kimmie!)

Anyway, that's beside the point.

Here are some of my favorite pages that I did. I used a 7 gypsies album. I cut my pictures down to a 3x3 size and mounted them like a polaroid image. I think it looks cool. It only took me a couple hours to do. It isn't that exciting but I had fun doing it.

minnesota to wisconsin.

 

this is me int he rear view mirror

DQ...need I say more? I didn't stop though. I was in a hurry.

A picture of my car's shadow. So, by looking at this picture can you tell which direction I was going?

i just like the paper i used, the letter stickers from american crafts and the journalling pieces in the corners from making memories.

Okay, here's the album so you can see all of them. Road Trip - Polaroid Style

Blizzard

This is what a MN blizzard looks like.

Leaving Montgomery, MN

Driving into Owatonna.

Very windy, blowing snow causing white-out conditions. Basically I couldn't see more than 1 telephone pole in front of my car. Lovely. Very lovely considering I had my 4 month-old niece and two sisters in the car.

Oh, you'll like this. We were just leaving Montgomery after our Daughter's of the Union Veterans meeting (that's Civil War) and had just realized how bad it was outside. So here's a para-phrased conversation that we had.

Michelle: We don't even have any blankets in the car.

Jen: I'm sorry. That's my fault.

M: Well, do we have any food?

Kim: I've got a brownie.

J: Me too and this crystal container full of M&M's. They say you can survive up to 30 days on chocolate. So we should be good there.

M: I've got breast milk but none of us but Gracie can have that. Do we have any water?

J: I've got a bottle right here and some frozen ones we could defrost in the trunk.

M: You know the real problem would be keeping Gracie warm. One of us would have to take her out of the car-seat and stuff her under our shirt and coat to keep her warm. Direct body-heat.

J: Yup.

K: You know if we called Guy he'd come and save us.

J: Unless he went into a ditch or got into an accident.

this is what I was thinking but didn't say.

He'd come and save you guys then murder me for getting into trouble in this cold blizzard weather and endangering the lives of his wife and child.

conversation ensues

J: Michelle, am I driving okay?

M: You drive like an old lady.

J: Well, I can't see and I don't worry so much about me but I do worry about that car whose 200 yards in front of us or any nut-bag hot-shot punk-a$$ driver behind me who could at any time hit me because they are stupid.

M: Well, it's your car.

J: Yeah, holding my niece and two sisters.

Anyways, I liked this conversation because a. it was funny and b. because we are funny in that we immediately start thinking of what we would have to do if we got into trouble. When in reality I should have thought of this before-hand. Like putting a blanket in the car, having some extra food and water, some candles or heat source. Stupid. You'd think I just moved to MN or something.

Monster Snow-Drift

Hey Dad! Check out this monster snowdrift in the yard!

The drift. Starting from the house to the pasture fence getting only bigger as it reaches the fence. I know, not really good perspective but check this out.

Here's a close-up of my snowman measuring stick next to the fence. So the first rung is about 2 feet tall. Now look at the above picture again. The top of the snowdrift reaches the second rung. So let's just say, on an estimate that the drift is about 2.5' tall.

The beginning of the drift. As you can see it is 15" tall in the middle. Notice my footprint on the bottom? I only sunk in about 3-4 inches which means the snow is hard-packed. The wind blowing the snow was so friggin' cold. It's below zero again. The bridge of my classes froze which made my nose hurt. I felt like a boxer sitting down after a round all hot and sweaty only to have some doctor take a hunk of metal that's been in the deep freeze and stick it to my face. Almost gave me a headache.

Here's a close-up of the snowman. I love how the snowdrift has layers. Reminds me a bit of how the grand canyon looks. A little.