thank God it's sunny out

or i might be having a bad day. but those of you who know me well know that i can't help but be in a blissful mood the first several weeks of spring. (and it didn't even get really cold this year...)

so why might i have been in a bad mood otherwise, you ask? well, it really comes down to three things: pants, receipts and food.

let's start with the pants.

while being pregnant, and especially now that i'm getting rather large, i have really tried to focus on the things i can do instead of things i can't. and because God is gracious, i can still do lots of things.

for instance, karate. i can still do self-defense techniques, jabs and punches, and katas, even though i can't much kick anymore or (sigh) do the crunches and push-ups during our warm-up.

what does this have to do with pants? i'm getting to that.

another thing i can still do, much to even my own surprise, is paint my toenails and shave my legs. be impressed. this is significant because it means i can also wear skirts, capris and sandals. again, those who know me well know how eagerly i await the first chance to don such clothing every spring.

which brings us to the pants. i had this great idea to roll up my maternity jeans today--you know, with big fat cuffs--thus turning them into cute little capris. only said maternity jeans decided not to fit so comfortably. fortunately, a friend in my department has so generously lent me several pairs of pants, including some brown gaucho maternity pants, so i wore them instead. but i did have to forego my rolled capri look, about which i had been really excited (insert only half-serious pouty face here).

well, to cure my pseudo-poutiness, i tried going out to the JCPenney at the mall to exchange a couple of shirts i got for Christmas which i thought i'd grow into, but still haven't. they're really cute polo shirts (one is lime green!), so i was pumped about getting them in a smaller size. just one problem--this JCPenney has no maternity section. okay, so i'll get store credit, then use it to buy the shirts online, right?

wrong. apparently, amid the big stack of JCPenney gift receipts i brought along, i had managed to misplace the one for these shirts. obviously, since the shirts had been bought a while back, they were on super-low clearance now, so returning them would only give me a few bucks to spend online. way to go losing that receipt, jenna. (insert sincere pouty face here).

which brings us to the food. the other part of my poutiness-recovery plan was to stop by our apartment on the way back from the mall to pick up the leftover pesto chicken pasta i had planned to eat for lunch today but had forgotten at home this morning.

but then a reminder sounded from my cell phone which read: "be at office early--1pm". apparently, i had made an appointment with a student for half an hour before my office hours usually begin, but i had forgotten about that, too. fortunately, my keen foresight had led my to put this appointment into my phone. unfortunately, this also meant no lunch.

so here i am, in my office, hungry, wearing ever-so-comfy-but-not-what-i-had-planned-to-wear gaucho pants, devising a plan to shrink these polo shirts by washing them in really hot water and drying them with high heat (they're 97% cotton, so it should work, right?), and wondering...

where the heck is that student?!?!?

hey, mr. kroger bagger,

why did you stop putting my milk in a bag? now, when i carry in my groceries, it takes a whole hand to carry just the milk, whereas i used to grab three or four bags with that one hand.

can anyone tell me if this is a trend throughout the whole kroger organization? do they do this at your local kroger? would it be rude to ask for my milk in a bag? i mean, i do recycle those bags, so it's no harm done to the environment...

moving on to other topics, is being rude and reckless a requirement to own a Toyota Sequoia? i can cite three different instances just this week to support this hypothesis. but i thought people who bought Toyotas were supposed to be smart and practical.

maybe it's because they're still trying to hold onto the american dream of driving a huge suv, but at the same time they're trying to save a little gas money? perhaps this internal conflict is what has driven so many Sequoia drivers to such completely asenine behavior on the road?

on a more positive note, all is well at the grem place. william has started playing a kicking game with us, i.e., when he pushes out his little foot, we push it back in, then he kicks...it's kinda like a foot fight, only we're just using our fingertips. very fun, indeed. also, we should have another picture of him this coming tuesday--this time in 3D!

hope all is well with you, whoever you are, as you read this mostly pointless and rambling post!

Metaphors

I'm a riddle in nine syllables,
An elephant, a ponderous house,
A melon strolling on two tendrils.
O red fruit, ivory, fine timbers!
This loaf's big with its yeasty rising.
Money's new-minted in this fat purse.
I'm a means, a stage, a cow in calf.
I've eaten a bag of green apples,
Boarded the train there's no getting off.

~Sylvia Plath