Last week was winter carnival and this years theme was "Games we know caught in the snow" It was a lot of fun like always with events going on all week along with seeing old friends. Unfortunately I had a really bad head cold this year during it so I felt like crap the entire time. My sorority didn't do a statue this year.... well, they started and just decided to give up on it. It was a bit embarrassing... The winners this year did Mario (fraternities) and Pretty Pretty Princess (sororities). Mario was Incredible! They had the flower guys that bite made completely out of ice along with mushrooms made out of ice and blocks and Bowsers spikes were all ice as well. I didn't take any pictures but here is the MTU website with some. http://www.flickr.com/photos/michigantech/ the pictures aren't great.

brrr it's cold in here...

This weekend started out with a horrible bang, but luckily finished up good. Friday, Cory and I went to Sault Ste. Marie because I had to take an exam for work. We had been planing the trip for a couple of weeks so it wasn't anything real spur of the moment. My exam was scheduled for 12:30pm and it's about a 4 1/2 hour trip so we decided to leave at 6:00am to make sure we got there in time in case we ran into bad weather. The weather channel had extended the winter storm warning for our area for another 2 days and was predicting 11-17 inches to fall in the Houghton area. We actually got on the road early and were on our way, kind of, before we left the driveway we noticed the heat in Cory's car being finicky again but decided that it wasn't that big of a deal and then we were on our way.

Bad. Idea. By the time we got to Baraga (half hour down the road) the heat would only work if I kept my foot jammed up between the under part of the dashboard area and where the floor slopes up. Believe me, sitting like that for another hour was not fun. By the time we got to Marquette the heat had stopped working completely. We stopped at 2 different auto part stores to see if the had the tools Cory needed to do a quick fix. They didn't so Cory just did a temp. fix. that lasted about another hour. We stopped at another store in Munising to get some more wires and parts to try to fix it again and it ended up braking even more. Have you ever ridden in a car for 2 hours with the heat not working at all and it being 2 degrees outside? Ya, not pleasant. Luckily, Cory had an electric blanket that plugs into the cigarette outlet of a car in his trunk. His dad bought it for him 7 years ago when he first came up to school and used it for the first time this weekend.

Finally, at 12:45 we got the the Soo and I took my exam. I happened to bring the number of the testing center with me so I was able to call ahead and tell them that we ran into some car trouble and they understood. Thank God I passed my exam. 4 hours of sleep and the most miserable 61/2 hour ride of my life weren't really playing in my favor. Cory was also able to get the heat kind of working so we wouldn't completely freeze and we had 2 blankets on the way home so we were able to stay warm.

Besides that, the weekend was good. Saturday Cory and I went to see Jeff Daniels in show up in Calumet. I had never been to the old Opera house up there until this weekend, it is beautiful in there! ground floor plus 2 balconies built in the late 1800's = wow. We sat in the front row and I ended up getting called on stage to do the "Big Bay Shuffle". Jeff Daniels wife is from Marquette, and he has filmed in the U.P. before so he is really familiar with the area. Big Bay is the name of one of the towns up here and the "Big Bay shuffle" is a dance that he saw in a bar one night when he was in Big Bay. It's essentially the dance that all 6th graders do awkwardly by not moving their feet and just bobbing. The twist is that you are holding a beer in each hand. He didn't give us beer though, I had to just pretend like I was holding them.

On Sunday, Cory and I went snow shoeing and ended up finding a waterfall that we never knew existed in Hancock. I want to go back in the spring to see it running with all the spring run offs, I think it will be really cool. I have pictures of our adventure, I'll post them later.

Oh Christmas tree!

Cory and I put up our tree last night! We even cut it down ourselves. I think that is the only way we would have been able to get a real tree small enough to fit in our house. We don't have very many ornaments and we haven't put on the lights yet so it looks kind of sad. We need to get an extension cord before we can put them up because there is not a plug close enough. Also, we don't have any room to put the tree on the floor so it's on our table :) oh! also, Cory made the star . we couldn't find a star small enough for the top so we bought 2 ornaments, but one in half and then glued the star to the tip of the other.

What about the Pilgrims?

So I was at Wal-Mart today, like usual, I typically go there almost every other day it seems like these days, mainly because that is because it's pretty much the only store in town. Anyways, while I was there I was looking around and noticed all the Christmas stuff that was out already. They already have the fake trees up, candy out, along with wrapping paper and ornaments out. I think this is wrong. Firstly because it's still 2 months until christmas, and secondly because I didn't see a single decoration for thanksgiving! Not one little turkey wearing a pilrgram hat, one single indian fether, or "Happy Thanksgiving" sign! This saddend me because Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday. ever. There is nothing better than eating copious amounts of food and enjoying the afternoon with your family, and pretending that you care about who wins the football game. After I thought about it for a while, I decided that I can't be too sad about not seeing any Thanksgiving stuff because that just means that Corporate America hasn't gotten its nasty, dirty, little paws all over it like they have with every other holiday. I think that is why Christmas isn't my favorite holiday. People these days don't seem to care about the true meaning of Christmas, or really any holiday really, they just care about selling as much as they possibly can.

Ok. I'm done with my negative nancy ranting about corporate america. I came up with a new game. Here is how you play: go to any store and while you are shopping just smile at people and see how many people smile back. It can't be a creeper smile though, nothing really big either. Just a simple smile. thats it. It's not really a game, but it's fun to do. And it makes me happy when someone smiles back. My statisitics show that mostly elderly people smile back, and it almost seems to make their day, people between the ages of about middle aged people fall in the middle, some smile back, but it's normally jsut one of those I'll smile to be polite, and others give you a funny look like why are you smiling at me. kids between the ages of 12-18 don't really count becasue they only care about themselves so they are most likely not paying attention. And then little kids just think you're smiling at them because they think you think they are cute. Yes, I left out people in their 20s and 30s, thats becasue I don't have enough data on this age group yet to show any real statistics. Anways, it's fun and I think you all should try it!

cold piggies

I think our house is backwards, or confused. We don't have a timer on our thermostat or anything like that and we don't ever touch it, but it's always really cold during the day and WAY warm at night. It wouldn't be a big deal except for the fact that I work from home so I have to deal with it. I generally end up sitting on the couch (because I don't have a home office, or table) under a blanket to stay warm. I'd go to campus or somewhere else to do m paperwork but I'm afraid to go somewhere with more work space with EVERYBODY in town with the flu. I think the count of people I know is up to 6 and a bunch of the public schools have been closing for a day or two because of it. and all the people I have been meeting with for work have been talking about it and saying how they have someone out with it. I know I could just go and get the flu shot but I'm not going to because it always seems like whenever I get a vaccination shot it ALWAYS makes me sick. So, I'd rather take the chance of getting the flu rather than getting the shot and knowing that I'm going to get sick.

Top 10 reasons I love fall

1.) The gorgeous colors the trees turn
2.) New seasons of tv shows
3.) The crisp weather in the morning.... there is nothing else like being bundled in your jacket and the cool breeze!
4.) Sweaters can start to be pulled out of the closet again!
5.) Scarves and pea coats... I'm weird and I like the smell of wool pea coats. yes, they have a smell.
6.) Pumpkins!
a.) picking them out
b.) roasting the seeds and eating them
c.) carving them
7.) The first snowfall
8.) The first snowfall that sticks
9.) Thanksgiving!
a.) delicious food
b.) family and friends
c.) just an all around good holiday!
10.) Being able to bundle up under a blanket and drink hot chocolate and not get funny looks! :)

I just noticed, these are pretty much in order of how Fall in Houghton goes too! haha :)

Our little home

Here are a few pictures of our house... It's kinda messy but I figured I'd do it while it was on my mind because I'd probably forget to take them after I tidied up. The first one is the bedroom view from the bed, and the second is from the other angle in the bedroom. The third is our little kitchen and the last one is from the front door... on the other end of the couch is where our table is..unfortunately there isn't enough room to sit at it...we just use it as a mail table and have a bunch of stuff under it for storage. Notice our HUGE TV that take up half our house.