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Please follow me to http://www.jenreally.com/.

Thanks!

I know, I know. I'm hopeless at blogging. Ironically I have been doing some posting, just not that much here. But don't be sad- you're always be my first.

Christmas was good aside from a miserable cold that hit Christmas Eve and would not let go. Wonderful to see the family and just hang out and relax. My brother and his wife have big plans to be pregnant again by next December (and keep telling everyone about it!) so that may be the last time we're all together for awhile.

Went to NYC for New Years. Had a great time with with my friends and got to see a lot while we were there. Times Square was... cold. I actually think I got frostbite because my feet have not properly recovered.

Jenny is SO grown up! She's standing now and oh so chatty and sweet (now that she's cut a few teeth). She'll be 9 months next week: crazy.

We discovered about a week and a half ago that the beloved family dog, Maggie, has a tumor. It's pressing against her lungs and heart and she has only a short time left. Her breathing is getting tougher and she has a hard time eating, though she's still in good spirits.

Maggie is a wonderful dog. She's undoubtedly one of the best behaved dogs I've ever seen and so sweet! She has a great temperament but she was also trained by my father, who did a great job working with her. She's his dog more than the rest of us and this has hit him hard. It's been very difficult to watch it all but I know Maggie's had a good life. I'll miss her; we all will.

So that's the "highlights" for now. I'll try not to let it go so long next time, or at least post my other stuff up here as well. Hope everyone is doing well, had a great holiday. Happy (quite belated) 2009!

The Cookie Affair

Every year I participate in a cookie exchange with some ladies from work. My mom does so much cooking that I like to try to help out by bringing home 6 or 7 dozen cookies to keep the troops occupied satiated with sugar.

In case you're not familiar with the concept of a cookie exchange, I have to make 6 dozen cookies and I trade them with a dozen cookies 6 other people have made. Of course I also like to make a dozen to take home for myself because I (unbiasedly) believe mine are usually the best anyway. With 7 dozen cookies to make, I like to try to find something simple (with 7 dozen cookies even easy recipes become a challenge) and this year after considering several options, I decided to go with a recipe my friend Garrison sent: Chocolate Oatmeal Cookies. Garrison assured me they were super-easy and, to his credit, informed me that the standard recipe went a long way- he got almost 5 dozen cookies out of the recipe for 2-3 dozen.

So I woke up this morning, pulled up the recipe and wrote up my shopping list (trip #1). I figured I'd make 6 dozen and the overage Garrison warned me about would cover the dozen for my family. Naturally, I did not bother to look in my cabinet before I left. I "knew" I had sugar and Vanilla extract but I needed everything else. An hour later I came home a realized I had just bought my third container of unsweetened cocoa (the second one had never been opened) and had less than a cup of sugar. So I hoofed it back to Harris Teeter (trip #2), returned my cocoa and grabbed a bag of sugar.

Back at the house I was ready to go. I melted my margarine and mixed my cocoa etc. It was going well and smelling good but when I got to the point where I had to add the oatmeal I quickly learned the entire container I had bought was only 5 cups of the 9 cups I needed. I actually went through the thought processes of "do I *really* needed another 4 cups?", and "who do I know that wants to run out and get me oatmeal?" but in the end I knew what I had to do. So, with the stove on very low I ran back to Harris Teeter (trip #3) and bought another container of oatmeal. At this point the manager and the cashier both knew me and asked me how the cookies were going. I admitted to my inability to do math as I dashed out the door.

Got home, again, and I dumped the rest of the oatmeal in and stirred. Cookies done = yeah! Next step: lay-out the cookies. They're no-bake but they have to cool and harden so they need to be laid out on wax paper (btw, I bought that too and already had a roll at home...). So I started putting cookies out, and kept going and going and going. Ran out of counter space and put several trays in the fridge. Garrison was not exaggerating. The recipe was for 72 cookies and I have about 120.

Happy Holidays, everyone! Enjoy the season and may you all have too many cookies!

The General World of Jen

I love the holidays. There's a purpose behind them: once a year we have to slow down and look around. Whether or not you like what you see it's a chance for reflection and, hopefully, gratitude.

I visited with my cousin and her daughter (cute baby at left) to exchange presents this afternoon. I won't see them for at least three weeks and it's bumming me out. But no present in the world can beat falling asleep with a baby on my chest while watching 'A Muppet Christmas Carol'. That's what life is all about right there.

Sadly I can't focus on the holidays quite yet. Heading home and seeing family is still a week off, and a very busy one at that. There's Christmas parties and cards and more gifts to buy and for some reason I have tons of meetings this week. Don't people know it's the holidays?!

And in others news I'm keeping busy with a new project: contributing to movie-recipes.com! No, you've never heard of it. It's a site that a friend of mine does. Rather than review movies it tells you what the movie is made of. Hopefully it will give you an idea of whether or not it's worthwhile based on the movies it's similar to. You can check out my inaugural post here.

Always Look on the Bright Side of Life (Monty Python)

My crazy cousin has a great blog where she spends lots of time talking about her sweet little baby (http://jellybeanmama.blogspot.com/). Her post yesterday ("It Could Always Be Worse") resonated because I, and I suspect many of you, have been feeling the chill of recession and tension of questionable job security lately.

So here is my contribution to positive thinking. The 5 things I am grateful for today:

1. Friends who have you over for a fantastic (and free) home-cooked meal. Comes with great conversation.
2. A home that has a mortgage I can afford.
3. Having a skill and a job (with awesome perks like health insurance and coworkers I like) where I am able to help people do the stuff they want to do.
4. That the interweb will let me buy all my presents and will send them to me so I can avoid the mall and save a little money.
5. My family and the technology that let's me stay in touch with them (Welcome to Facebook, Lisa!)
   

iLove iPhone

I'm sorry, I completely glossed over this fact in my last post: I got my iPhone. Woohoo!

Before I geek-out completely I'd like to state publicly, for friends and family that have had to deal with me over the last week and forever after this-- I'm sorry if I'm ignoring you. My name is Jen and I'm addicted to my iPhone. (Hi Jen.)

It's just so damn cool! I've had the phone for 9 days and I've downloaded 38 apps. I have 3 email accounts, 2 calendar tools and a task manager. I've created 4 ringtones, taken 2 dozen photos and downloaded 10 games. It's an addiction. I blame Apple.

Speaking of cool technology, I've decided I'm ok with Google taking over the world. And really, cane you blame me? These guys have a functional calendar, online docs and integrated add-ons for Firefox, Thunderbird and, of course, the iPhone (I could probably do a shout-out for their blogging tools too, huh?). And they're always pushing the enevelope with new stuff like Grand Central and today's release, the Google Friends Connect.

And a final nerdy thought for the evening: I'm now on Twitter. Feel free to follow me (ncsumarit). I can post from my iPhone! < (That's enough. I'm sick of me too.)

Thanksgiving: The Horror

Yes, all right, it's been a month since I've posted. I am going to add a "Post to blog" task on my "Remember the Milk" list and monitor it via my iPhone. I know, it's hard to believe I don't have time to post since I obviously don't have a life.

So I am one of those people that, when asked by friends and neighbors "how was your Thanksgiving?", feel compelled to really answer. A simple "fine" is not in my vocabulary. And when I stopped to recall this Thanksgiving, it was really quite chilling.

First there was the conversation at Thanksgiving dinner. Somehow I ended up sitting between my dad and my uncle and their conversation was nothing short of macabre. Seriously, all of the following came up:

• Who they know that's dying and of what
• My uncle's friend, the coroner, and a review of "what not to do when contemplating suicide" (including a review of blood splatter clean-up)
• Hunting/ cleaning animals (and I don't mean a bath)
  
• And to round it up, great moments from the movie "Deliverance"

Then on the Friday, I did something I have never, ever done before: I went shopping the day after Thanksgiving. To be clear, I don't like to step in a store after Thanksgiving. Anything that hasn't been bought before t-day gets bought online. But my aunt and cousin (and cute baby!) were there and there were some good deals (seriously, a crock pot for $10?!) so off we went. On the bright side, I didn't trampled by ravenous shoppers, though I did hurt my back holding that crock pot while waiting in line for 35 minutes.

Finally, the real horror: my mom burned the turkey. I can't say enough about how out of character this is (and Lisa, if you mention this to her I will cut you!) and it's not like this made the turkey bad. It's still turkey. It was just... different. And it was done early, so I wasn't that hungry yet. But I still ate too much. It just threw off my whole Thanksgiving experience. For the record, I am aware that I am a big whiny baby.

So please respond and share your turkey stories. Hope everyone had a great holiday! And I'm going to download the iPhone app that let's you post to your blog so keep an eye out for more posts!