Dallas

I love watching Oprah in the afternoons, and I am very lucky my job, 99% of the time, does not conflict with this.  Right now, she's at the state fair in Texas.  How I miss Dallas.  Makes my heart hurt!  I was just in Dallas last week, and had a great time.  The week began pretty rough, with a complete nasty hotel fiasco, but it worked out (not without a number of tears!) and ended great. 

Not only was I playing, again, with a great orchestra, I got to be with Kayla on her 16th birthday, and really get to know Stef and Jarrod, and their amazing baby, Levi.  I enjoyed all my time in rehearsals, backstage, and getting to see people I hadn't seen in awhile.  It made me enjoy playing the viola for the first time in months, and inspire me to work hard again at what I do.  Even though the trip was only a week, it renewed confidence in myself, and gave me memories that I will remember forever.

My favorite websites when I'm bored

Besides my friend's blogs, Facebook, and Craigslist, I have a few websites I follow regularly. 

1.  FML  :  It's a website that stands for f*** my life...or what a crappy day I've had.  Most are PG, and very funny...although a few are PG-15.  Hehe.  Very short anecdotes (sp?).

2.  Texts From Last Night :  You can submit your text conversations to this website if they are funny or crude (apparently).  Some are very funny and you can see yourself in college (or now) having written it.  Some are gross.  In my opinion, the good outweigh the bad.  :)

3.  People Of Walmart :  This is one everyone can appreciate.  The commentary is hilarious, and I'm sure we have all seen these people in Walmart at one time or another.

4.  Fail Blog :  This, along with the other tabs up on the top of the page, provides hours of entertainment a week.  My favorites are the graphs, lolcats and loldogs. 

Enjoy my dear friends, enjoy.

I heart Fall.

I love Fall.  I love Summer too, but sometimes it gets too hot for my liking.  I am a sunshine girl, and love my flipflops... but gosh, Fall is amazing.  I love watching the leaves turn.  I love drinking hot drinks while walking around with a coat on.  I love the anticipation of Halloween and Thanksgiving.  I love the colors of orange, red and yellow.   I really, really wish I had screens on my windows, because I'd leave them open occasionally.  It's quite nice that the merchants haven't started over heating their buildings just yet too.  I'm surprised by the abundant snow in the north, but since the last few winters have started a tad on the late side, I guess I shouldn't be too surprised.  I'm hoping we get snow soon too.  However, Kansas City isn't exactly ever prepared for snow, and has no idea how to deal with it, so I shouldn't hope too hard!  :)

I went to a corn maze last week with David, a new horn player in the orchestra.  It was at Louisburg Cider Mill, and we had a great time drinking cider, eating Apple Cider donuts, and walking through the maze.  It looked really big, but we schooled it....completing it in about 15 minutes.  Haha.  Afterwards we headed over to the goats and went back inside for more donuts.  :)  I love things like that!

So yeah, I got overly excited when I was there, but what I'm REALLY excited about is going up to Liberty and going through their maze.  While this one was maybe a 1/2 mile through (although it looks much bigger in the aerial view), the Liberty Corn Maze is 4 miles!  We could die in that place!  But, I have this knack (apparently) for doing mazes...and so does David.  That place has bridges periodically through the maze so that if you get lost you can climb up on one to see where you are in the maze.  Wicked cool!  That's in 2 weeks! 

So yeah, I'm in a happy place since it's Fall if you can't tell.  :) 

*Sigh*

I know, I know.  Two posts in one day.  Right before I am going to bed, I had this thought.  Why do people complain so much about such insignificant things?  I mean, really people, if it's 67 degrees on stage are you REALLY going to die?  (as opposed to the regulation of 68 degrees)  I understand it's the principle of the matter, but sometimes it would be great if we could just relax, take a deep breath, and try and understand that not everyone is out to get you all the time.  And no, it's not personal.  The above is just an example, but if people really knew what was being said behind their backs, I bet we would all act a little differently.  (Including myself, I'm sure).  Just saying. 

As I put in my Facebook status update the other day....

Remember when you are running late, and you find the PERFECT parking spot?  It feels good, right?  Well, how about all those times you have an extra few minutes, you park at the first spot you see, and get a little exercise by walking 200 extra feet...and make someone REALLY happy.  :)

Happy Fall!

Happy FALL!!!!

At this point, I'm calling it my favorite time of year. I absolutely love decorating for seasons, love ice skating in the winter, sledding, etc..., love going to the park on picnics and walking around the lake in the spring, and love going to the beach and on vacation in the summer. But, even though I get excited about each new season, I have noticed that my glee is at its highest is during the beginning of Fall. I'm definitely not a cold weather girl, and not too hot, which is probably why I love the end of September and October the most! :) Also, (and again, maybe it's just a fad) I love burnt oranges, browns, greens and reds. They are such beautiful, calming colors.

My favorite thing about the midwest is the changing colors on the trees. I love driving around Kansas City and seeing the leaves fall and turn beautiful shades of yellow, orange and red. The best drive is up to Minneapolis, though, through Iowa. I try and take pictures with my camera out the window when I'm driving, but seeing as I can only get one or two non-blurry pictures, and it's quite unsafe, I try and restrain myself! :)

Plug

I found this blog awhile back called, Freebies 4 Mom. I know I'm not a Mom, but it still doesn't hurt to get a few things for free, right? Especially since I'm on the computer so much, I guess I might send off for a few samples, or download a few coupons. But, sometimes it's much more...like telling you where to actually get free stuff if you ask for it at stores. :) Check it out!

I went to dinner at an old friend's house last night. Funny, because we were friends in Dallas, and then I hadn't seen him for about 4-5 years. All of a sudden, we find we are both in KC and he's married with a kid on the way! His child now is 14 months old, and the cutest little thing, with such a big personality! We all had a great time at dinner (steaks and salmon!) and I can't wait to see them again! I didn't know that his wife stayed at home with the kids (she watches her nephew too), so we'll probably plan an outing to a park or something soon! :)

This new symphony season will bring good things, hopefully! We had a great season last year, and I can only see things going up! (Not that it's bad at all!) We added a new subcription concert, and are playing with some GREAT bands for our Pops series. We just played with Michael Cavanaugh (Billy Joel Tribute guy) and it was FANTASTIC! I can't wait for the upcoming concerts...too bad we only do 4 a year! But, in February, ABBA (tribute band) is coming. I'm very conflicted whether to ask specifically to play in the orchestra for that, or to be able to have it off and be in the audience dancing around! :) We only use 6 violas out of the 9 for those types of concerts.

I decorated for Halloween and Thanksgiving (mainly fall) in my loft the other night. It was a lot of fun, and I credit my parents and Karen for giving me my decorations. It's great to have people around that LOVE to decorate so much that they are always buying new things, and handing down the old ones. :) I did go out and buy a few pumpkins....which are SUPER cheap around here....guess there is ONE benefit of living surrounded by fields...and they are around my house too. I got a potted Mum, but me being the "great" gardener that I am (NOT), bought the one that you are supposed to put in the garden, not the one that you can keep on the porch or house. So, it'll supposedly live for a few weeks and then die. Oh well. Haha.

This weekend is the first subscription concert of the season. We are playing a Haydn symphony, Rapture by Christopher Rouse and a Brahms piano concerto with Yefim Bronfman. Should be a great program! I'm really more excited about the donuts that we are getting at break today. :)

Julie and Julia

I discovered the joy of cooking a few years ago, and I've really been "into" it for the past year. I think it's really fun to discover new foods and new ways to make them. Thus, I was REALLY excited to see this movie...especially since it has Meryl Streep AND Amy Adams in it. I enjoyed every part, and was not disappointed! In fact, it has inspired me to start cooking more, and to start cooking for more people. I have several cookbooks that I use, and the internet is invaluable, but does anyone have any recipes that they love? I would be more than grateful!

With the exception of a few bad words, the movie can be enjoyed by anyone who loves cooking, or loves movies. I'm not sure that small children would like it, but if it's not PG-13, it should be.

I've been up in Minneapolis for a few days, visiting, helping and hanging out with friends. My friend Amy had back surgery last Monday (almost two weeks ago), but can't drive for 2 weeks. I love the entire family, and since I had a week off, it was almost too easy but to drive up here and hang out/help for a week before I had to return to work. I love this city, and everything about it. We have had many walks around the lakes and neighborhoods, and almost every morning at 10:30am, myself, Maureen, Amy and their mom, Karen go out for coffee. It's a great start to the day. I've gotten to hang out with Hannah, Amy's daughter, too. She'll be a freshman in high school in 1 week!

I go back to KC on Sunday morning, and have a dentist appointment on Monday morning. Work starts on Thursday! Wish me luck!