Yin & Yang

They say opposites attract but geez, sometimes they are annoying as hell!

Dan loves his mornings, I (I'm Laurie, BTW) do not! There are many things I adopted from my parents which I still live by (I know, crazy huh?), sleeping in is one of them. Dan usually makes it a point however to take that away from me, wanting me to tackle the day with him, ugh!

Well, today was no exception of me wanting to sleep in. After staying up late to watch a movie, then being up even later with a sick Kylie, I had no intention of getting up before 9:30 this morning. To my surprise, Dan shut the door to the room so the dogs could not bother me and I would not hear the roaring of the TV or music. I thought, wow! perhaps it is because my birthday is in a couple of days, or because he appreciates the fact I took care of the sick little one last night... either way, I was pleased that he cared so much for me to let me sleep.

As Dan entered the room I became slightly coherent and asked him how Kylie was doing. He responds with "She is laying right next to you, that is why I shut the door- so the dogs would not wake her."

Hmm, well I still appreciated being able to sleep in today. Thanks Ky!

The Joys of Public Transportation

I ride public transportation to and from downtown Salt Lake City pretty much each day of the week, riding the Fast Bus is actually quite enjoyable, UTA uses nice coaches to shuffle mostly business people to and from downtown, the stops are limited and the service is quick. Riding the bus it takes about an hour to get from South Jordan to downtown Salt Lake City, driving takes about 40 minutes. I spend 40 hours a month locked in a steel tube traveling down the freeway at 65 MPH, here is what I can and cannot accomplish in 40 hours:
- I don't single-handedly release 1000 lbs of CO2 into our atmosphere
- I do catch up on sleep
- I don't spend $150.00 in gas.
- I do enjoy my coffee in the morning
- I don't stop at the gas station to get doughnuts and/or a Monster Energy drink
- I do catch up on email
- I should do my homework
- I do read the newspaper before I get to work
- I don't spend $30.00 a month on maintaining a vehicle.
- I do come home not stressed from driving
- I can't go golfing at a moment's notice
- I do get to make faces at other drivers as we fly past them in the carpool lane
- I do catch up on reading
- I can't stop to use the facilities because I drank a pot of coffee right before I left work
- I learned to empty the bladder before getting on the bus
- I can farmer blow on the window and have someone else clean it up but, I don't
- I don't put 1083 miles on a car in a month

Don't get me wrong, there are cons; on public transportation I get to deal with these types of people:

- Mr. Talks-To-Air - even with headphones on, you can still hear his side of the conversation
- Mr. Needs Personal Space - I'll sit in the aisle seat, just so no one will sit next to me.
- The Mannequin - once I sit down, I'm staring at a fleck of dust in the window till I reach my stop.
- The Speed Reader - After I spent untold amounts of money on the Rocket Reader program, I am determined to show off my newly found talent: reading my book cover to cover before I get off the bus
- The Sleeper - I fall asleep as fast as possible and try to wake up as close to my stop as possible, sometimes missing my stop completely.

I fall into the last 2 categories, although I haven't missed my stop yet.

Most importantly, 98% of the time, work leaves when the bus does, so I come home relaxed and ready to spend time with Laurie, Kylie and the dogs, this reason alone is reason enough to ride public transportation.

The 70 pound protector named Kota.

When I was a child my Dad used to put me on top of the refrigerator. It was suppose to freak me out but eventually became play time with Dad.. oh such memories.

So, Dan is having play time with Kylie tonight and in re-living my memories, I tell him to put her on the refrigerator. She screamed at the suggestion but the closer she got to the top of the refrigerator, the harder she laughed.

Once Kylie was up there (still laughing her head off), Kota started to growl. As Dan looked down at Kota's reaction she starts to bark at him. We look at each other like, "Did that really happen?". A couple seconds later Kylie is in Dans arms on her way back up to the top of the refrigerator and sure enough, the hair on Kota's back is on end, tail stuck straight up and she is barking at him again.

We will forever be safe as long as our Kota is there to watch over us.

Anyone have about 40 minutes?

As 5 year olds do, ours has a unique way of understanding everything perfectly...

Kylie joins us in the kitchen to spark up conversation about her new finding of the "clock" in the bathroom.

"Hey Mom, you know that clock on the floor in your bathroom?"

"Um, yeah."

"Well I am forty minutes!"

Oh, how would it be to not have to worry about any extra "minutes" you might have?

Church + Paper + Crayons = Embarassment

It's been approximatly 10 years since I've been to church on my own willingness. Kylie has been asking about it lately so I took her last Sunday, being 5 years old, I brought a pen and paper with me to help entertain her while I took a nap. OK, so I didn't nap...

Ahem, while I was paying attention to the pastor, yeah that's it. A couple ushers saw Kylie's interest in coloring so they brought her a few crayons and MORE paper.

I glanced down halfway through the service and saw her drawing frantically, she was drawing a person with what looked to me like three legs, trying not to be a dirty minded person, I was a little uncomfortable with the drawing. I leaned down and asked Kylie who she was drawing and she said 'A person'.. Hmm, interesting.. I left it at that, still a little uncomfortable..

After service we got home and a proud Kylie showed her picture to Mom. Mom did what I didn't want to do.. Mom says "Why does this person have 3 legs?"

Well, lets just say this..

- It wasn't a leg.