Monday, October 16, 2017
Fall Weather - warm & cold - up & down
Happy Monday. The weather has been so strange for October. This past weekend it was pretty warm and also weirdly humid. We went for a short walk/hike yesterday and the humidity was really high. So strange for mid October. But then tomorrow morning we are supposed to have a frost warning and only a couple degrees above freezing. But then I think it's supposed to warm up again. So weird.
Had a nice and relaxed weekend all in all. On Saturday we slept in late and then went for lunch at 121 in Oxford. Later met up with our friend John and hung out for a bit longer. And yesterday, Sunday, we went for the walk/hike at Weird Farm (it's a National Historic Site, part of the National Park network) We have been talking about going there for ages and finally did. Looks like they have a few more trails to check out. Might be nice when the humidity is not crazy but hopefully not too cold either. We will see what the rest of the season brings.
In the late afternoon/evening we caught up on some more recorded TV until close to midnight and yeah, now it's Monday again. Nothing much planned for this week besides work. Oh Friday I have an appointment for x-rays for my braces. I am finally going to get started on getting those. We will see how that turns out. I will know more after Friday I suppose. Other than that nothing much else planned for the week.
Well, we will see how it pans out. Have to get through Monday first. :) Been contemplating buying a new bedroom set so that's something on the horizon for the future for the next few weeks. That's the one I have been mainly looking at but there are a few others that are nice too. We will have to measure and figure out how it all would fit. We would probably have to move one of our old dressers upstairs into the attic. The old bedroom furniture is truly old (from Mike's parents) so it's definitely time to upgrade. But it's always nice to have some extra storage space so if we can keep one of the older dressers in the bedroom in addition to the new set I'd prefer to that. I know it won't match but I am always looking for storage space so I'd value that over everything matching. Anyway, just something to ponder. Haven't quite decided what we are doing yet.
Letter/Mail Update: Received a letter from/owe a reply to: Eloine/NY and Eunice/Malta.
Posted by Hanna at 07:39 AM in Nature, Outdoors, Weather | Permalink | Comments (0)
Sunday, April 23, 2017
April Showers, Bailey and more
And somehow it's Sunday again. Not even sure how that happened. The week was a pretty busy one. I guess this is the starting point of our summer season where it all starts to ramp up so it's the beginning point of the craziness. There is definitely "crazy" in the air. But it's a good feeling knowing that everyone at work is very supportive and everyone pulls together to power through. It seems like getting through your "first summer in relocation" is some sort of rite of passage so we will see how it works out. Fingers crossed. :)
Switching gears for a moment, I realized I never wrote about our cat Bailey. Her blood tests came back and nothing too crazy was in them thankfully. She had elevated white blood cells so she had to have 2 shots of penicillin (one was two weeks ago, next this coming week) and hopefully that should kill whatever infection she was harboring. Other than hat she seems to be ok for right now. Fingers crossed it stays that way.
Not too much else going on. Had a pretty low key weekend. Saturday we slept in late (which felt glorious) and then had lunch at 121 in Oxford. Today we went to see the movie "Gifted" (really enjoyed it, somewhat predictable but still really cute) and then had lunch. Now we are home and going to catch up on some TIVO'd shows while enjoying some cheese and crackers and wine. Should be a nice low key evening.
Tomorrow it's back to work and real life. But for tonight I will enjoy being low key. Lots of events coming up in the near future. My friend Lena and her husband Joseph are coming to visit from Australia in May so I will try and take a day off to spend with them in NYC. That should be fun. Also have my friend Megan's bridal shower and wedding coming up. As well as a get together of some work people not too soon in the future. Let's see what else? Oh yeah, Eurovision is in May too so I will most likely hang out at home and watch that too. Wish I had some friends who are into that here but I guess I will enjoy watching it by myself as well.
Alright that's all for now. Will update more again next week. Really happy that spring has finally sprung here in the Northeast and some of the trees are blooming and sprouting leaves. I know Mike's dealing with seasonal allergies so I feel sort of bad about that but I am still happy that it's finally spring. :) The weather has been typical April weather. Showers, sun and sometimes both in one day. :)
Letter/Mail Update:All caught up on my mail at the moment. :)
Posted by Hanna at 06:24 PM in Cats, Weather | Permalink | Comments (0)
Monday, March 27, 2017
Rainy, dreary March
What a dreary gloomy day today. It was one of those mornings where I would have loved to just stay in bed. It was really dark most of the day. Ugh.
Yesterday my dad told me that he was planning their vacation for September. They are going to be heading back to Croatia. Fingers crossed that I can manage to take some time off and join them. I will try and figure that out over the next week or so. Will try and request time off. By September I should have enough vacation time accrued to make it work. Fingers crossed.
In less fun news my tooth saga continues. Had 3 appointments Monday and Tuesday last week. On Tuesday I had the tooth pulled. It really is startling having a big gap right in the front. Luckily they fitted me with the flipper the same day and it looks pretty decent. I need to stay away from spicy or crunchy foods for a week. Only bland and soft foods. We are close to the 1 week mark now and I think things are healing up ok. Eating with the flipper is still somewhat of a challenge but it's getting better. Talking is a bit weird still too but not awful.
I have a check up appointment next week on Monday (week from today) and also need to make an appointment with the orthodonist for a consult on braces. Ugh.
The weekend was quiet and uneventful. Just wish it wasn't Monday already again. Lets see what this week brings.
Letter/Mail Update: Letters went out last Friday to: Eloine/NY and Lotte/Denmark. Received letters from/owe a reply to: Nina/WA and Eunice/Malta.
Posted by Hanna at 06:47 PM in Family, Food and Drink, Weather | Permalink | Comments (0)
Sunday, March 12, 2017
Daylight Savings, Pizza, snow on the horizon
Happy Daylight Savings Time to everyone here in the US (well except AZ) Ugh. I am really not a fan of the springing ahead and losing an hour. And it being dark again in the morning when I have to get up. It's worse that we do this even earlier now than the rest of the world. That's a fun Bush legacy. Ugh.
On a more fun note. We went to check out "Colony Grill" in Fairfield today. Been meaning to for ages and finally got around to it. Delicious pizza!! Super thin crust and just really good. It's pretty much a bar with pizza. No other food. Full bar, beer, some wine. But such amazing pizza. Yum!
Been busy at work as I started covering for a co-worker on Friday who is on vacation. Definitely have my work cut out for me but powering through. :) Always good to learn new things and figure out how to handle different scenarios. Never a dull moment. :)
There is a bunch of snow (possibly a foot and a half .. 1/2 meter) of snow in our forecast for Tuesday. Ugh. I am ready for spring. We even had some really nice weather in February, not normal winter weather at all, but now it's turning back to actual winter weather instead of spring. Ugh. I am not ready for it at all.
Letter/Mail Update: Received letters from/owe a reply to: Laura/Spain and Lotte/Denmark.
Posted by Hanna at 04:43 PM in Food and Drink, Weather | Permalink | Comments (0)
Sunday, January 08, 2017
Snowy Weekend and Golden Globes
Snowy Weekend. Didn't even get that much snow in our area (about 6 inches = 15cm) but because of the brutal cold everything was sticking and not thawing/going away so things were a bit of a mess. But all in all could have been much worse of course. Just not a big fan of winter, the snow and crazy cold. Can I hibernate until spring??
The week went by ok. Survived my dentist appointment on Tuesday. I switched to a different dentist office and was pretty happy with the first visit. But going to the dentist is never fun for me. I still need to get my wisdom teeth out. I will try and tackle that over the summer. Also need to look into getting braces because of the way my teeth are, upper and lower teeth grinding against each other and causing issues with the structure of the teeth. I really don't want braces but I guess I will go for a consultation after my training in Pittsburgh and see what they say. Consultations are free so I guess it can't hurt to at least evaluate my options. Also have 2 front teeth with very short roots that may cause problems and have to be replaced with implants if they come loose. Fun. This is why I don't enjoy the dentist. No matter how nice they are the news is never good for me. Ugh.
Saturday we had an appointment with Bailey at the vet. She healed well and they were able to remove her sutures and she was able to come home without her cone. Yay. So the vet visit was definitely much more enjoyable than the dentist visit. Haha. :) Check-up in 3 months for x-rays to make sure the cancer and bladder stones don't come back.
Today we went to the movies to see "Hidden Figures". What a great movie. Really enjoyed it. Now we are in Oxford at 121 for lunch. Eventually going to head back home to catch up on some shows on TiVo before watching the Golden Globes. Should be a nice night. Then tomorrow it's back to work already again. Weekends always fly by too fast. :)
Letter/Mail Update: Received letters/owe a reply to: Kimber/Canada, Celia/MA and Lotte/Denmark.
Posted by Hanna at 02:31 PM in Cats, Film, Weather | Permalink | Comments (0)
Thursday, September 15, 2016
Job Hunting & Interviews
Can't believe that it's already Thursday this week. Somehow this week has flown by completely. It's been a whirlwind of phone interviews, in person interviews, back and forth with the staffing agency and whatnot.
Of course it's a good thing that my job search is now progressing into the interview state which is making me happy. I applied to various jobs over the last few weeks, both on my own and through a staffing agency (someone I used before at my old job when I had to find employees for my department), hoping that those applications would turn into interviews. Of course not everything did but things are moving along. I pretty much interviewed with one place or another, either over the phone or in person, every day this week. Another interview today at 1pm. And one more set up for Tuesday next week so far.
Keep your fingers crossed for me that one of these things ends up panning out. I do have a favorite among the jobs but I don't want to post about that here just yet. I don't want to jinx it. Let's see how things go first. Job hunting and interviewing can definitely be pretty stressful. It's interesting in some ways too though. Intriguing to see different businesses, how they run and operate etc. Having worked at the same company for the last 14+ years I haven't done a lot of job hunting or interviewing so it's interesting learning about all the processes. I have only been on the other side of it, interviewing and hiring at my old job for my department.
Well, let's see how things go. I will keep posting as things progress. This coming Saturday we have another vet appointment scheduled for our cat Mindy. Let's hope I can get her into the carrier this time. Fingers crossed for real for that! I bought a new hard shell carrier that's top loading so hopefully we can get here into there a little easier that way.
The weather has been pretty nice. It feels fall like today. Brisk blue skies, a little breezy and cool. Supposed to get warmer later, mid 70ies F (23C), so should be pretty nice. Maybe we can get down to the city one of these days, pending how the job search and interview schedule continues.
Letter/Mail Update: All caught up with my mail at the moment.
Posted by Hanna at 10:42 AM in Weather, Work Stories | Permalink | Comments (0)
Friday, July 22, 2016
Sadie & ugh this heat
Been meaning to make a quick update but the days are just getting away from me. Not even sure why exactly. :)
Tuesday we had a vet appointment with our cat Sadie. She was doing fine for the most part, eating, playing, acting as she normally does but she was having this weird cough on and off. I wasn't sure what was causing it so after about a week and a half of her doing that I decided that we should take her to the vet to get things checked out.
Sadie is a sweetheart but to say that she's neurotic on a good day is an understatement so you can only imagine that the trip to the vet was not any fun. I lucked out getting her into the carrier as she was sleepy so I was able to grab her relatively easy. Once she realized that she was trapped she was NOT happy though. She normally doesn't talk/meow very much or very loudly but oh my god the volume she developed was ear piercing. She was bouncing around in the carrier like a tasmanian devil trying to get out. I felt really bad.
Well to make a long story short, we got her to the vet, they checked her out, took x-rays and determined that she had a bit of a respiratory infection so they gave her a shot of antibiotics. She also has mild asthma so they gave her a steroid shot that's long-lasting so she should be ok for some time. If she starts coughing again then we will take her back to the vet and she will get another shot but hopefully that won't be needed for at least a few months.
In other news ... ugh it's so freaking hot. The weather was pretty decent and actually really nice on Tuesday and Wednesday. But yesterday it started getting really hot again. Today it's hot and humid and tomorrow is supposed to be even worse.
We have tickets to see "An Act of God" on Broadway tomorrow. Looking forward to it but not looking forward to being in the city when it's that hot and disgusting out. At least we won't be outside very much, just walking in between Grand Central, the theater and the restaurant for dinner afterwards. So all in all it should be fun of course. :)
Letter/Mail Update: No outstanding mail at the moment :)
Posted by Hanna at 02:42 PM in Cats, NYC, Performances, Weather | Permalink | Comments (0)
Sunday, April 17, 2016
Chicago Update
Hello from Chicago. :) The weather has been sooo much nicer compared to the last time we were here in 2007. To be fair it was February then. And crazy cold. Sooo cold, even for Chicago. Record breaking cold snap. I remember being bundled up and still being cold. Even then we did have fun but I do have to say I am enjoying the nice weather on our current trip better. :)
Yesterday our alarm went off at 3.45am. Ugh. We parked at a closeby train station and took the train down to NYC. To Harlem - 125th Street where we caught the bus to LaGuardia airport. Pretty stress free all in all. LaGuardia is such a miserable airport though. Out of all the NYC airports it is definitely the worst. I know they just approved plans to pretty much completely overhaul and remodel it. It needs it - desperately.
Anyway, our flight was fine. We had a crazy tail wind so we arrived super early. No turbulence either. Very happy with that. After we got into O'Hare we caught the subway (the El) to downtown which is about a 45 min ride. Really easy though. Gets you right to the Loop/middle of the city. We walked to our hotel, checked in and then headed to the Hard Rock Cafe for lunch.
After lunch we walked over to Navy Pier. Really nice weather so it was fun to be near the water. From Navy Pier we walked along the water over to Millennium Park where the bean is. Such a neat thing to see in person. It's hard to describe. Anyway, we walked A LOT and by the time we were done we were both really tired, especially after having gotten up that early. But it was a fun afternoon.
Had dinner at Elephant & Castle, which is a British-style pub chain. Conveniently it's right downstairs connected to the hotel so that worked out well.
Today we slept in a bit, grabbed something at Starbucks and are now just hanging out. Going to be meeting up with my friend David who is coming into the city from Indiana to meet us. Looking forward to seeing him again. We will be heading out to near Wrigley Field to have lunch at the Julius Meinl cafe there. Can't wait. :)
Mail Update: Received a letter from/owe a reply to: Charles/TN, Carmen/Malta, Laura/Spain, Lotte/Denmark and Jessica/DE.
Posted by Hanna at 12:04 PM in Food and Drink, Travel, Weather | Permalink | Comments (0)
Friday, February 05, 2016
Josh Groban Stages Live + snow
Here's a quick update to talk about yesterday's fun evening with my friend Jana. I had never been to one of the Fathom Events at the AMC movie theaters before. Here's a link if you're curious. They are usually either screenings of older movies/classics or broadcasts of shows, musicals, operas etc.
This time around it was a broadcast of Josh Groban's new DVD special, a recording of a show in L.A. followed by a live Q&A from Los Angeles. It was a lot of fun and nice to be able to watch the performance in a movie theater with surround sound and on the big screen.
Had fun hanging out with my friend Jana - a fun girl's night out. After the screening and Q&A we met up with Mike and her husband John. All in all a fun Thursday night.
Much better than today where we had to deal with snow and all the annoying side effects that come with it at work. Originally we weren't supposed to really get much and the storm was supposed to pass us by but then we woke up this morning and that didn't quite happen. Grrr.
So we had to deal with an annoying snowy ride into work followed by annoying stuff at work. I guess it could be worse and all in all we have been pretty spoilt this winter. It's already February and this is only the 2nd storm we have had. I guess we will see what the rest of the month and winter brings.
At least tomorrow is Saturday. We do have to work but hopefully we can get out at a decent time and then it will be the weekend. No big plans at the moment. Maybe the movies? Guess we will see.
Mail Update: Received a letter/owe a reply to: Jessica/DE, Celia/MA, Charles/TN.
Posted by Hanna at 02:35 PM in Performances, Weather | Permalink | Comments (0)
Sunday, January 24, 2016
Snowy Weekend
Here comes the snow. :) Had our first real storm of the season although our part of CT only got about 6 inches (16cm). We lucked out. A lot of areas around us, especially on the coast and south of us got buried in snow. New York City got about 30 inches (70cm) and had a travel ban (roads, subways, etc) in effect for a good part of the day yesterday and overnight. Washington DC and a lot of other areas south of us got hit much worse too.
We decided to stay home Saturday and worked from home. Then when we were done with work we caught up on some TiVo stuff. So all in all a relaxing day. And today all the roads are cleared so it's fine. I do expect some residual problems at work in areas where we deliver. Guess I will find out tomorrow.
Today we are just taking it easy. Slept in, went for lunch etc. Started reading my friend Falguni's book finally. Not looking forward to tomorrow and work. :(
Mail Update: Received a letter/owe a reply to: Jessica/DE.
Posted by Hanna at 04:04 PM in Weather | Permalink | Comments (0)