The Blonde Diaries

About three weeks ago, I received an email from Carnival Cruise Line. It was in the 40s here in Houston and I was wearing my knee length puffy jacket and working 13 hour days. I have to tell you, this was not exactly an email subject line I wanted to see at the moment. LOL

But it did get me thinking and the next thing I knew, Mike and I were booked for a Cruise heading for the Caribbean where the weather will be in the 70s and 80s. I cannot wait. I have been in serious need for a vacation and it seems like it is going to work out for us. If only I could find a new job to go with this vacation so I can come home to working more normal hours with less stress.

So looking back, I have to say thanks Carnival for reminding me that there are warm destinations out there waiting to be explored. Unfortunately, the ice skating rink won out over the huge pool slide so I’ll be vacationing with Royal Caribbean but one day I might give the slide a whirl.

Wow, it is Thanksgiving already. I can’t believe how quickly the holiday season has come this year and I know things will only continue to fly by. I thought I was doing well by planning ahead and beginning my shopping last month but in reality, I have only been able to get a few things done.

This week, I started noticing some of my fellow book bloggers signing up for their 2010 book challenges. I haven’t even finished all of my 2009 and we are thinking and planning for 2010 already. I need to get a move on it. I feel like I have a fire lit under my bum and I’m trying to read as fast as I can. I have a feeling I can finish 2 out of the 3 I signed up for this past year and will just work on the 3rd one in next year’s batch.

Another thing I need to start thinking about is vacation planning. Crazy I know but we have to submit our budget and staffing requests before the Christmas holidays and I need a pretty good idea on when I want to take vacation so I can plan accordingly. I have a good feeling that Mike and I will be going on vacation next fall and it will probably be on a cruise but I’m not sure where we will sail to. I keep thinking of just going to Mexico but then I see a cruise that has a great destination like st lucia and then I’m back to the drawing board. I really really would love to take a ride on the Oasis of the Seas but that is out of the budget right now and the ship doesn’t hit St. Lucia or any of the other Virgin Islands. I think I just need to find a higher paying job so I can take 2 fabulous cruise vacations each year so I can see every bit of the world as fast as possible. I think I finally have Mike talked into an Asian cruise but I think that will have to wait until our late 30s. Sigh. Never enough time or money.

Tonight Mike and I were goofing around on our Twitter accounts.  Mike decided to sign up the other night to “reserve” his name before someone else could grab it.  He’s not much for social media in the form of blogs and tweets but he tends to keep his Facebook account fairly current.  I think once he gets a crackberry he might be more inclined to playing around with social media, such as Twitter, a tad more.

So he has managed to find all of his favorite UFC fighters and basketball players to follow so he is pretty happy.  He also managed to customize his profile with photos of the two of us so I thought that was fairly sweet.  Looking at vacation photos always makes me happy and tonight was no different.  While he was looking at the fun Europe photos I was looking at our destin florida photos from our first trip to the beach in 2007. It was so much fun and I absolutely love the white sandy beaches of Destin. If the economy doesn’t get any better I think we might be taking a trip over to my parents timeshare and forgetting a fancy trip to Disney or on a cruise ship.

I found this photo of us with the white sandy beaches and thought I’d share. We are at the Crab Trap on the Old Hwy 98 along the coast. Delicious restaurant and great scenery. You couldn’t ask for anything more.

Oh man! We have had a cold front come rolling through this past week bringing lots of rain and cooler weather. The past two days we have seen highs in the 60s here in Houston. I know that is a far cry from the 30s and snow photos I’ve been seeing on some of the blogs I read so I really should not be complaining. But… I am a wuss when it comes to weather and if it is colder than 75 I freak out and pull out the blankets and the sweaters. I am just not made for cold weather. I have been visiting the Royal Caribbean website thanks to the weekly emails announcing sales. I am really tempted to book a cruise, pack up my Eagle Creek luggage, and run to some warmer weather! Hopefully we won’t have a really cold winter here as I’m not sure what I am going to do. I guess ramp up the heater and think of warmer climates to get me through.

Alrighty. I finally have a few minutes after another crazy week at work. Just when I thought we’d get to move on and start tackling the planning portion of the year end audit, I get a heads up that nope this upcoming week will be spent working on extra filings. Sigh. One day I’ll get to start working on the important stuff.

So the Wordless Wednesday photo I posted in this post is the photo I took of the Turkish rug Mike and I bought on our Honeymoon. We had absolutely no intention of purchasing a rug while in Turkey. We were just going to attend our tour of Ancient Ephesus and the Virgin Mary’s house and then politely sit through the rug presentation at the end of the tour and head back to the ship. We really had no chance.

The bus trip between Ephesus and Kusadasi is 45 minutes. The minute we stepped on the bus our tour guide started up with the history of the Turkish rug, how important the rugs are to the Turkish people, and how the weaving techniques are being lost as less and less people continue the tradition of rug weaving. It is all pretty fascinating as you listen to the history of the country and their nomadic culture. So the wheels started turning and we thought maybe if the price was right we’d consider a rug. It was a big “if”.

We made it to the rug shop and were led into a large showroom with the rest of our tour group. Talk about gorgeous. Rugs were on the walls, on the floors, rolled up on displays. They felt divine. If you’ve never felt a Turkish rug I highly recommend rubbing your hands and feet on a silk on silk rug. Just don’t spill on it as it will set you back a very pretty penny.

The presentation started after we were all given free drinks (yes alcohol was flowing freely – we declined the Turkish Raki). I don’t know who the guy giving the presentation was exactly – ie manager, owner, etc – but boy was he good. He could sell ice to Eskimos. The presentation lasted about 30 minutes and in that time we must have seen and walked on 50 rugs unrolled in front of us. All were absolutely gorgeous and I would have taken them all home. Unfortunately, my pocketbook is not as deep as Queen Elizabeth’s so we couldn’t bring home the replica of the rug she bought from the store last year (price tag: approximately $1.1 million, photos all around of her and this guy and that rug). It was beautiful and definitely would work in a palace.

We made it through the presentation and started just browsing around. No prices were given during the presentation so we went into this whole browsing experience blindly. We quickly found that our price range wouldn’t go too far but we were ok with that. We ended up with the neutral colored wool on wool rug and it looks great in our living room.

Now some fun facts about that rug. It is hand weaved using a double knot. The double knot means that as the rug is walked on and “stressed” the weave gets tighter and the fibers will not fall out of the rug due to the double knot technique. This rug took someone between 7 and 9 months to make working every day. Turkish rugs appreciate in value. Used rugs cost more than new rugs because the older rugs have proven to be good “strong” rugs.

So we are stomping on this rug every day when we get home. This darn thing better prove itself as a rug and better look new in 50 years when we pass it down to the next generation in our family. LOL.

So there you have it, the rug. It was quite an ordeal to get it and one that we will not be forgetting any time soon. If I can figure out how to upload to YouTube, I’ll post the video I have from the bus ride where our tour guide begins the discussion on the rugs and the history.