For your listening pleasure.....


Get a playlist! Standalone player Get Ringtones

Monday, November 30, 2009

The Art of Racing in the Rain

So I just finished reading my first book as a member of the No-Obligation book club from Real Simple called The Art of Racing in the Rain by Garth Stein. Let me just tell you: it was A.M.A.Z.I.N.G. Narrated by the family dog, the book follows a family through life. Being a dog lover, I just ate this up. It makes me look at Sugar in a completely different way now and I find myself talking to her as if she were a person in the chance that she might understand what I'm saying. And I'm just sayin', she has started cocking her head to the side as if she is truly pondering what I'm saying to her. The book definitely has its sad parts but it also has parts that made me laugh out loud in inappropriate places : ). I would highly recommend this book to anyone looking for a good, easy read.

Tuesday, November 10, 2009

David and I went to North Carolina this weekend...

to visit my sister, brother-in-law, their dog, and their bun-in-the-oven , Emily, Paul, Lucie and (insert the baby-girl name of your choice here....as the sibs have decided not to share their kiddo's name until she arrives : )    ). We had such a wonderful time. Em and Paul are quite the hosts!! Sugar and Lucie hit it off from the get-go (no pun intended...Sugar literally spent the weekend hitting Lucie in the face with her paw).

Unfortunately, I got to take one picture with David at the farmers' market in downtown Durham. And then, in true Megan fashion, I placed my camera down at one of the vendor's tables to look at something and then walked away completely forgetting about it, never to see my camera again. : (.  Emily has been calling the vendors and the farmers' market in hopes of tracking it down, but no luck yet. Say a prayer for my cute little pink camera.

Besides that unfortunate event, we had a great time!! I found some pictures online of some of the things we did to give you an idea of what we saw.



durham.jpg

First thing Saturday morning we went to Elmo's diner, my favorite breakfast spot in Durham. I've been looking forward to it for a number of weeks now and they certainly didn't disappoint.






2367826358_d81464e6a1.jpg

Then we made our way over to the Durham Farmers' Market. (RIP little camera). It was such a neat place, with a ton of vendors selling various veggies, meats, plants, wine. E and P got some vegetables and meat and I got some pictures of pretty places in Durham that I've been to over the past couple years of visiting.



2366975819_af918742b2.jpg






3041369264_1b35e6fdf2.jpg

Then we made our way over to the Handmaid Market. This is an indoor market of, see if you can guess.........handmaid things!!  So fun to walk around and see all of the pretty things people have made. The boys were good sports and walked around with us, pretending to be interested and then took off explore downtown Raleigh while we continued to shop. I love things like this...great for Christmas shopping which may or may not have been done ; )


3146939330_7259cc0977.jpg


On Sunday we went for a hike along the Eno river with the dogs. We hiked to this spot called Bobbit Hole. This is a picture of it, but instead of dead winter trees, imagine all of these trees with golden yellow and red fall leaves. It was so beautiful. Sugar loved playing in the river and almost caught a fish!! (Go girl!!).


Thanks Emily and Paul for such a fun weekend!! Love you both!

Wednesday, November 4, 2009

...and the list grows on

Another slow night at work. It's crazy to me that we have been lucky to keep 1-2 patients at this time of year. Notoriously, the fall and winter months are when the pediatrics department blows up. This time last year there were a few nights when I didn't have time to eat my lunch. But here it is 12am and I am scratching my head trying to come up with things to do to keep me awake as I have exhausted all of my reading material PLUS the reading material of my co worker and all of my regular websites. WHAT IS A GIRL TO DO??? Thats right, do what I always to: make an over-ambitious list. On the list of things to do tonight:

  1. Join the RealSimple No-obligation Book Club (!!). This month we are reading a book called The Art of Racing in the Rain by Garth Stein. I am pumped as this is a book about a family seen through the eyes of the family dog. I so wish that Barnes and Noble was open at 7am so that I could go and pick up a copy when I get off work in the morning. Its probably better that I don't though, seeing as how I have to wake up a bit earlier tomorrow afternoon in order to make it to my kickboxing class (my hamstrings are SCREAMING tonight from Monday's class)
  2. I am going to learn Spanish. I took three years of it in high school so I'm hoping it will come back easier than I think it will. At the start of the summer I took care of a special-needs girl who was non-verbal. Her mother, however, was not. Her mother was VERY verbal! Spanish verbal, that is. Everytime I went into the room, girlfriend started talking to me in Spanish. Didn't try to give me hand motions to help me understand what she was talking about, draw pictures - nothing. But I was suprised at how much I actually understood of what she was saying. It took my a little while to get my ears accustomed to deciphering the words, but I stood there and listened as best I could interjecting an occasional "lo siento" as she told me of the hardships she and her family have faced sice they moved to Florida from California. In the morning before I left, I got a HUUUUUUGE hug from the, at this point, sobing mama who explained that she doesn't normally have anyone to talk to and was so grateful that I just listened to her all night! I think Jesus gave me ears to hear her that night. All that is to say that I think I would like to learn a little espanol so the next time I am in a situation like that I have a little more to say than "lo siento." Especially if I find myself living in, say, So. Fla one day and taking care of LOTS of spanish speaking kids and families.
  3. Learn to play piano. This desire started almost a year ago when David and I were driving back up to Tallahassee from a visit to So. Fla and listening to Chris Rice's Living Room Sessions album. It was so pretty. I remember hearing my Mom play paino after dinner when I was little and have very happy memories of that. My sister knows how to play paino too, so I decided that there was no reason that I  shouldn't know how to play. It will give me something to do on my days off from work and allow me the possibility of having a really pretty grand piano in my home some day when I'm a "grown up" without being looked at as a poser : ). I had looked into "learn to play paino books" a number of months ago but decided that I amd not really a disciplined reader (a trait I'm hoping to kick with number one on this list) so a book on learning to play piano may not be the most effective way of learning. I think I need someone to teach me. Anyone have any suggestions of someone who wants to take on this task?
I realize this is a pretty ambitious list. So I'm going to leave it with that. Although, who knows. I'm on page 90 of 336 in this months RealSimple Magazine, so I may just add a few more things in a little bit : )