Is That A Spider In My Bed or...

The other night as we were trying to go to sleep, I felt P&AF jerk violently next to me. I looked over, and he seemed to be brushing off his arm.

M: "Is everything okay?"

(Pause, P&AF seems to be furiously brushing at his arm and looking around."

P&AF: "Yeah, I just felt something..."

At this point, I'm a little freaked out too. I'm thinking there is a cockroach or a spider in the bed or something. While trying not to get me involved in the situation, P&AF is being none too revealing about the whole thing. The whole process repeated itself about three times.

It is then that we notice Henri. She is sitting innocently on P&AF's nightstand. She isn't facing us though. She's facing out into the room. She is also, very sweetly, letting her tail hang back on the bed, so that every now and again, she can swish the tip of it right across P&AF's arm, causing him to violently jerk up and try to brush the "spider webs" off of his arm.

I guess we aren't used to those new darker window treatments we got yet!

Llamafest!

We went to Llamafest in Spanish Fork, Utah last weekend. It was quite the fun adventure. There were tons of llamas everywhere. They had a llama show, where they judged the llamas like dogs in a dog show. They also had a llama obstacle course, however, the llamas did not seem nearly as happy to run through the course as the dogs I have seen doing similar courses. They often had to be dragged.



Here we are with one llama at the end of the day. I didn't learn its name. I am also very squinty in the picture; I was feeling a little under the weather. I couldn't leave without visiting the llamas though! They were the whole reason for the trip.

The funniest thing to watch was the llamas getting really excited to meet other llamas. As soon as new llamas showed up, they would all run over to greet them. They don't seem to care about people all too much, but when it comes to other llamas, they were very social.





We picked up this lovely llama Christmas ornament. I am sure it will look beautiful on the tree!












We watched one llama show while we were there, which was for the young, male llama category. The llama who won was named "Chancho." I had picked up this information earlier on during the show, so when they announced the winner by number, I exclaimed, "It's Chancho!" There were some echos around me of "Chancho," and soon the announcer also stated the llama's name. Somehow, P&AF didn't know that they had announced the name earlier in the show. He thought that I had randomly made up a name for the llama, and that then the entire show heard me declare, "It's Chancho," and subsequently they all started calling him "Chancho" too. He was nearly hysterical until I managed to clear up the situation and explain that "Chancho" was really the llama's name. It would have been pretty funny if it had all played out the way he thought it did.

Cicada Rescue Mission

We were in the pool the other night, when a strange screeching noise erupted from the shallow end. I had my suspicions that a cicada had landed in the pool, so I went over to check it out.
Upon closer inspection, it was evident that a cicada had ended up floating in the shallow end. The haphazard (rather than steady) screeching made it seem like the creature was quickly drowing.

M: "Come over here. This cicada is drowning."

(P&AF paddles over on his tube.)

M: "Here, I'll push you towards it, and you rescue it with your foot."

(M pushes P&AF towards the cicada in distress. He manages to get it on top of his foot. He starts shaking wildly.)

P&AF: (Frantically.) "Owww! Owwww! It's biting me!"

M: (Bewildered.) "What? They bite? They don't bite? It's biting you?!?!"

P&AF: "Get it off! Get it off! It stings. I think its wings have stinging stuff on them."

M: "What? It stings? It's stinging you?"

(The stinging cicada was then successfully shaken from his foot.)

P&AF: (More calmly.) "I don't know. It's the wings. They're sharp or something."

M: "Okay, I have a leaf. Let's just put it on this leaf to get it out of the pool."

P&AF: "You do it."

M: "What? I can't do it. You have me all freaked out that it's going to bite me or something. Was it seriously stinging you?"

P&AF: "Okay, here I'll do it."

P&AF was successfully able to fling the cicada from the pool after that. It flew off as soon as its wings were dry again.

I'm not certain as to why we're (I'm) perpetually compelled to rescue drowning bugs from the pool - minus those pincher butt bugs and the cockroaches. I stay away from those.

Simple Economics

As I opened one of my retirement fund statements this morning, I had a little conversation with myself, or maybe with the statement itself. As with a lot of investments, the balance has been steadily dropping in recent months. For the purposes of this little conversation, I'm just going to use a random example number of ten thousand for the balance I was hoping for.

-"Please don't be less than ten thousand, please don't be less than ten thousand."

(Opens the statement.)

-"Ugh...nearly $500.00 below ten thousand." (That's also a random $500.00)

(Upon further study of the statement, I realized that I had already gone below $10,000.00 as of the first quarter statement. I, apparently, forgot, or possibly emotionally blocked the traumatic occasion.)

-"Well, it only went down $100.00 since last statement. That isn't so bad..." (Another random $100.00)

It's sad when I have to put a positive spin on losing $100.00.

Technologically Challenged

Happy Fourth of July!

1) I still can't figure out how to use speaker phone on my cell. I have had it for a few months now.

2) I also can't figure out how to download just one ringtone for my phone. Just one. I've done it with my past two cell phones. But now it seems like everyone wants me to have a ringtone subscription. I just want one ringtone. I don't want a million ringtones for $9.99/month. Just one. I couldn't figure out how to do that.