Good Search

If you google a lot you might check out Good Search http://www.goodsearch.com/ . Its a search engine powered by Yahoo! that allows you to select a charity and for every search you preform that charity gets 1 penny. This can really add up over time as more people use it to search...

Its been a while

Its been a while since I last posted something, and yet it doesnt seem like much has changed. I am still employed, perhaps over employed would be more suitable. My project at work has become a massive endevor, suposedly on the radar of the CEO. It seems like I am always behind where I should be and can never seem to get to a place where I can take a breath and relax. One of my good friends is moving to a different area, which is sad for me because his work is very good and I could use the help. Its a good opportunity for him though so thats the happy part.

Outside of work, the summer is well. Don is here so life is pretty good. We have been to Austin and San Antonio but not really farther than that. The days quickly turn into weeks and the weekends are too short, particularly since I seem to be spending a lot of them in the office. In fact that is where I write this blog...my office on a sunday. Its not pretty here since the ac is turned off on the weekends and Houston summer without ac is unbearable.

I wish I had some really exciting thing to post but unfortunatly nothting comes to mind. If I'm not at work I am working out at the new company gym or reading/watching movies. In a way its good since I can save some money to put towards my car, but otherwise pretty booring.

Don and I did go see a frogs exhibit at the Museum of Natural Science. It was really cool. They had all sorts of different frogs on display with some facts about each. They also had some preditors (snakes and piranahs). I'll try to be better at keeps this up to date....

Running in the Rain and other News from the past month...

February 24th, I ran in my first 5K race. It was exhilirating. Well I didn't run the entire way but I finished in about 43 minutes. Not bad for my first time, huh? It was the 20th annual ConocoPhillips Rodeo Run. There were over 7,000 people participating and it was raining for pretty much the entire time. All the money raised goes to support scholarships.

I guess this is also from February, but we (a charity orginization at COP) had its annual Chili Cook-Off. It went really well and was a lot of fun. As you can see from the above picture, I was on a team "The Mad Cow Chili Chefs". Don't ask how we got someone to dress up in a cow costume but it did get us an Honerable Mention for Theme.

In the weeks since that time things at work have been very busy. I think this month is probably the most extreme. I will be away from home for some period of time every week this month. Yikes... at least I am earning some miles for most of the trip. Some highlights so far....

Amarillo: I was in the Panhandle for a few day and I was supprised that there is a canyon that is actually quite pretty. Also, most of the towns were bigger than I expected (bigger than Yale for the most part). We made sure to stop by the Big Texan but no one attempted the 72 oz. steak.

Oklahoma: I just got back from Oklahoma, for the most part its the same as I left it. My flight was 3 hours delayed because of bad weather in Houston. Its the state's centennial this year so that was neat. Plus is was good to see some friends and family.

Up for this week is Dallas and Austin for work related stuff, and then back to Oklahoma next week for some new hire training. I think that is all that has been happening recently. Oh, I did move to a new apartment, only its the one next door to my old one. Its a long story but basically the complex is remodeling and now I have a remodeled apartment.

How Well Traveled are You?

Your Travel Profile:

You Are Very Well Traveled in the Southern United States (62%) You Are Well Traveled in the Middle East (50%) You Are Somewhat Well Traveled in Scandinavia (40%) You Are Somewhat Well Traveled in the United Kingdom (38%) You Are Somewhat Well Traveled in Western Europe (36%) You Are Somewhat Well Traveled in Southern Europe (33%) You Are Somewhat Well Traveled in the Northeastern United States (29%) You Are Somewhat Well Traveled in Africa (25%) You Are Somewhat Well Traveled in the Midwestern United States (25%) You Are Mostly Untraveled in Eastern Europe (20%) You Are Mostly Untraveled in Latin America (7%) You Are Mostly Untraveled in the Western United States (5%) You Are Untraveled in Asia (0%) You Are Untraveled in Australia (0%) You Are Untraveled in Canada (0%) You Are Untraveled in New Zealand (0%)

How Well Traveled Are You?

National MS Awareness Week

Its National MS Awareness Week this week (March 5-11). So in to raise awareness here are the basics on MS (FYI... I did plagarize this piece from the National MS Society so if you want more info be sure to check out www.nationalmssociety.org).

Multiple sclerosis is a chronic disease of the central nervous system that affects the brain and spinal cord. It usually strikes adults in the prime of life, between the ages of 20 and 50. It is a disease of the central nervous system that affects the brain and spinal cord. One new case of MS is diagnosed every hour.

What Is Multiple Sclerosis?

• MS is thought to be an autoimmune disease that affects the central nervous system (CNS). The CNS consists of the brain, spinal cord, and the optic nerves. Surrounding and protecting the nerve fibers of the CNS is a fatty tissue called myelin, which helps nerve fibers conduct electrical impulses.
• In MS, myelin is lost in multiple areas, leaving scar tissue called sclerosis. These damaged areas are also known as plaques or lesions. Sometimes the nerve fiber itself is damaged or broken.
• Myelin not only protects nerve fibers, but makes their job possible. When myelin or the nerve fiber is destroyed or damaged, the ability of the nerves to conduct electrical impulses to and from the brain is disrupted, and this produces the various symptoms of MS.
• People with MS can expect one of four clinical courses of disease, each of which might be mild, moderate, or severe.
• MS is a chronic, unpredictable neurological disease that affects the central nervous system.
• MS is not contagious and is not directly inherited.
• Most people with MS have a normal or near-normal life expectancy.
• The majority of people with MS do not become severely disabled.
• There are now FDA-approved medications that have been shown to "modify" or slow down the underlying course of MS.
  

Relapsing-Remitting Characteristics: People with this type of MS experience clearly defined flare-ups (also called relapses, attacks, or exacerbations). These are episodes of acute worsening of neurologic function. They are followed by partial or complete recovery periods (remissions) free of disease progression. Frequency: Most common form of MS at time of initial diagnosis. Approximately 85%.
Primary-Progressive Characteristics: People with this type of MS experience a slow but nearly continuous worsening of their disease from the onset, with no distinct relapses or remissions. However, there are variations in rates of progression over time, occasional plateaus, and temporary minor improvements.Frequency: Relatively rare. Approximately 10%.
Secondary-Progressive Characteristics: People with this type of MS experience an initial period of relapsing-remitting MS, followed by a steadily worsening disease course with or without occasional flare-ups, minor recoveries (remissions), or plateaus. Frequency: 50% of people with relapsing-remitting MS developed this form of the disease within 10 years of their initial diagnosis, before introduction of the "disease-modifying" drugs. Long-term data are not yet available to demonstrate if this is significantly delayed by treatment.
Progressive-Relapsing Characteristics: People with this type of MS experience a steadily worsening disease from the onset but also have clear acute relapses (attacks or exacerbations), with or without recovery. In contrast to relapsing-remitting MS, the periods between relapses are characterized by continuing disease progression. Frequency: Relatively rare. Approximately 5%.

Top Ten London - Finale

So to finally finish my London post (only took me one month)....

8) Borough Market ~ Spending Saturday mornings browsing the market for goodies like fresh fruits, cheese, and of course brownies. YUM! This open air market is perhaps one of the coolest places in London and its featured in "Bridget Jones' Diary". In fact we saw where she lives in the movie just by shopping at the market.

9) New Years Celebration ~ New Year's Eve was a cold and rainy night, but luckily for us we had a wonderful inside view of the festivities. Not only could we watch the fireworks through the windows, but we also got to see all the crazy, drunk people down below. Loads of fun!

10) Walking ~ London, unlike most American cities, is an amazing place to just walk around. There is so much history and so many amazing buildings that you can find just by walking around the city. This year we decided to walk from Royal Alber Hall, through Hyde Park, by the Palace and Green Park, past Westminster, across the bridge to the London Eye, and then on to the apartment. Its a long way but very worthwhile.

Weather Stuff

Apparently there was supposed to be a massive ice storm move into the Houston area Monday night. Well I went to the grocery store for my regular food shopping and and lo and behold...so did everyone else. I think the whole community must have been there preparing for what they thought was going to be a blizzard. I have never seen the grocery store that crowded. Anyway the ice never hit and life is returning to normal.

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Work is good. It looks like I will be moving to a new area shortly, Permian. I will still be based in Houston (which is good because I just renewed my lease), in the same office even. But I am excited to be joining a different area. Its more active than the Panhandle for us so there should be some challenges. The move will officially be in the next month or so but I have already gotten some work from the new area.

Top Ten London - PartTwo

To continue.....

5) Trips outside the city ~ Ok perhaps they dont belong on a list of "Top Ten London" but really one of the cool things about this trip to the UK was getting outside the city and visiting Windsor Castle (a royal residence for over 900 years) and Bath.
You cant take pics inside the castle so all I have are outside shots but it was really awesome and worth a day trip (or half day if your like us and sleep in). Bath was also cool, we only saw the Roman Baths and the Abbey then walked around the city. There are many more museums that we didn't get to.

6) Food ~ I never thought I would say that a top ten thing about London was the food but its suprisingly true. I think my favorite was L'Atelier de Joel Robuchon (five stars, lamb chops were outstanding, mashed potatoes out of this world, I wish I could have gotten 10 of the prawns). Also good were the Butcher and Grill (pork chops were excellent), the Savoy (Christmas Dinner), and Browns (gotta have fish and chips). Of course for places easy on the wallet Wagamama is great noodle bar and La Tasca is good for their selection of Tapas (yum!). I'm sure I'm forgetting some but the food in London has definitaly improved in the past few years.

7) Shopping ~ Well let's face it most girls like to shop, in keeping with that tradition....I really like ot buy clothes in the UK . I dont know why but they just seem to be very smart in style and fit. Although you have to be careful since the size scales are different from the US. My favorites are Next for work stuff and Monsoon for more casual / fun clothes.

ok I'm about to be kicked out of my apartment computer lab so ...till next time.......

London Top Ten

1) Ceremony of the Keys ~ Probably the coolest thing about this trip to London was the Ceremony of the Keys, or the nightly locking up of the Tower of London. It is a ceremony that has been preformed every night for the past 700 years. You can go and watch but you have to request tickets 2 months in advance. Check out
http://www.historicroyalpalaces.org/webcode/content.asp?ID=704 for more information.

2)Tea Time ~ What could be better for a tea drinker than a country that actually sets aside time in the day for drinking tea. Not only that but not just any old tea will do...the variety of teas is amazing...assam, darjeeling, breakfast, earl grey, oolong. And to top it off, you can have tea in a 300 year old tea shop that sells to the Queen.

3) Stonehenge (aka Stonehedge) ~ After racing around the English Countryside in the rain, when we arrived at Stonehenge the rain stopped and instead rainbows were out. Of course part of the fun about Stonehenge was a certain person mispronoucing it.

4) Theatre ~ For only being in London for a little over a week you would like it difficult to see many theatre preformances and concerts....wrong. We went to four shows (Wicked, Spamalot, Avenue Q, and Phantom of the Opera) and two concerts (Christmas Eve Carols and New Years Eve Vienese Music).

ok I got to top four....the rest are comming soon.....

Celeb. Look Alike

AARRRHH, Matey

Happy Halloween!!! I'm starting to think I work for one of the few groups that likes to have fun. Today is Halloween, and one of the charitable groups of the company decided to have a lasagna lunch complete with pumpkin carving and costume contest. Our group decided to go as Pirates, "Land Lubers" to be accurate. There was only one other group entry (they were the different candidates for the state's gubnatorial election, and they actually won the contest). There were some other individual entries but ours was only one of two with group entries. Well, below is a picture of me and a friend from work! Aaarrrrhh!

Amazing Iced Pumpkin Cookies

Cookies
2.5 cups all purpose flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
2 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp. ground nutmeg
1/5 tsp. ground cloves
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup butter, softened
1.5 cups white sugar (you can also substitute brown sugar)
1 can panned pumpkin puree
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla extract (I usually use about 2 tsp.)

Icing
2 cups confectioners' sugar (powdered sugar)
3 tbsp. milk
1 tbsp. melted butter
1 tsp. vanilla extract

Directions
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg, ground cloves, and salt; set aside. In a medium bowl, cream together the 1/2 cup butter and white sugar. Add pumpkin, egg, and vanilla to butter mixture, and beat till creamy. Mix in dry ingredients. Drop on cookie sheet by tablespoonfuls; flatten slightly. Bake for 15-20 minutes. Cool cookies, then drizzle glaze with fork. Enjoy!

To make icing
Combine confectioner's sugar, milk, melted butter, and vanilla. Add additional milk as needed to achieve drizzling consistency.

The end of a busy week

Its Sunday which really means a new week is about to start...but in reality, the new week is likely to be less busy than this past one. Last weekend I was in Golden, enjoying a relaxing three day weekend. Didn't really do anything exciting but it was great to get away from H-town and work.

The beginning of the week seemed to be off to a rather slow start when I decided to do something about it and help out a co-worker who has a lot of things happening. Well that added to my workload but its good to be helping out and have something to contribute. I guess what really added to the week's activities is the past few days....it all started Thursday night when I went to a professional organization's Executive Night. It was pretty cool. I got to see a lot of people from school and work. I also met our EVP for North and South America. Then Friday, I spent the afternoon helping out at a charity golf tournament. It was a lot of fun, driving around the links selling beer to the golfers. I am reminded how many people in this industry in particular play golf....perhaps I need to take it up? Well as much fun as it was...yesterday was more fun. I was invited to another industry org.'s picnic. It was a lot of fun basically spend the morning/afternoon playing games, eating bbq, and socializing. Another plus was that my pumpkin cookies (see the recipe posted) were the hit of the picnic. Then yesterday evening I had dinner with a friend from Mines who just moved here. It was nice to catch up.

Well apart from all the social group/professional org. activities of this past week, things are going well and I have been keeping myself busy with a new book I bought for the plane ride from Denver. Its called "The Historian" and it is amazing. Its about Dracula. I would recomend it to anyone looking for something good to read, particularly with Halloween around the corner. It is a mix of fact and fiction, with various character's stories intertwined in a race through Eastern Europe and Turkey on a quest to find the location of Dracula and his tomb.

Clear Plastic Bags Make a Safety Difference

Ok. I know its all the in the name of safety and national security (and therefore we cant argue) but really, if my liquid/gel is not in a one quart sized clear ziplock plastic bag is it that much more dangerous! Perhaps we are to feel safer since we have to jump through a bunch of hoops to fly these days but clear plastic bags....not making me feel safer. What would make me feel safer is catching Osama Bin Laden. Novel Idea!

In case you are unaware of what I am talking about, among the ever growing list of safety rules surrounding carrying bagage into an airplane cabin, there is the new rule that any liquids and gels must be under 3 ounces (I can live with that) and MUST be carried in a clear one quart sized ziplock bag. Even if you only have one liquid/gel it must be in a bag. And if you dont have a bag its getting thrown away.

DRACULA

On Saturday I went to the Ballet again, this time for Dracula. It was amazing. Very dark, and haunting. Dracula had a huge cape and all the "brides" danced in white flowing gowns. The vampire dancers flew through the air during parts of the dance and at the end Dracula was killed by bursting into flame (fireworks) once the sunlight was let in. The music was classical but also fit well with the darkness and Eastern European theme.

Other than that, I have been busy hanging out with some friends from work (yes there are a few young people at oil companies, athough not many). We are trying to have some get togethers (ie. movie nights, happy hours, etc.) since so many of us are new to Houston.

Paris

Just thought I would spice things up a little and put in some pictures. Here is one of the Eiffle Tower taken last year while we were in Paris.

Things happening

As Jess reminded me in an email this week my last post was from April and I really need to update my blog. So.....Houston has been very busy recently. Don is back at Mines, so the weekend trips to Denver have started back. Also I have a much expanded area at work and am no longer the "new girl". Since we have had so many people quit recently and we have a new hire start in August, I have been given an area that I am responsible for. Its not too active from an internal perspective (we aren't drilling a lot there) but I get loads of requests from outside parties so I spend a lot of time dealing with other parties. In addition to having more responsibilities and having my own area, effective Sept. 1 I got a promotion and 10% raise . Its pretty exciting considering I have only been here for 9 months.

This past week, for Labor Day weekend I went to Colorado to visit Don. We went to the Garden of the Gods in Colorado Springs, and the Pearl Street Mall in Boulder. It was a lot of fun. Of course we also spent some time in Golden hanging out.

Tuesday, I was in OKC to testify before the Oklahoma Corporation Commission for work. It was pretty nerve-racking. I had to get sworn in and establish credentials, but pretty cool since now I can say I'm an expert witness.

This weekend, tonight actually, Don is here in Houston and we are going to the Symphony...its Opening Night so it should be pretty fun. The performance is from Carmen and other Spanish/Gypsy type music. I am so glad that it is once again theatre season and there are all kinds of things going on here. I am going to try to get tickets to the Opera, Ballet, and some plays (musicals of course). Well that about catches you up on what is going on here, its pretty boring outside work, which is where I spend the majority of my time right now. I'll try to be better keeping this blog up so ya'll can know whats happening.

Astros!

Well I was sitting in my office at about 4 pm on tuesday when one of the supervisors stoped by to see if I was interested in 4 tickets to that nights Astro's game. Sure, I thought, it beats sitting at home. So I gathered up some co-workers and headed out to see the Astros vs. the Dodgers at Minute Maid Field. Luckily I went with an Astro's fan, and she explained all the intricacies of the game. We had a foul ball land right in front of our seats, but someone else caught it. We saw George Bush Sr. and Barbara, although not upclose...they were about four sections away and in the first row behind home plate. That was the excitement for this week.

Its been a while...

Well I know its been quite a while since I have updated this blog. Since the last post I have done a few things....Don and I went to the Symphony. It was really good, music from Russia. We also watched some movies "V for Vendetta" and "Tsotsi" . Both were excellent. The first stars Natelie Portman and has a great message about government, the second is a South African film about life and redemption in SOWETO.

As some of you know Don and I drove to Oklahoma and Colorado this past weekend to visit mom and grandma and also to take the mustang to Denver. I have driving through Kansas, but I did sleep for quite a portion of the time. Unlucky for Don. I was supprised at the brownness of the region. Oklahoma and Colorado both seem like they havent gotten rain in quite a long time. It doesnt bode well for the summer.

Once I got back to Houston I learned that we had record heat here and the electric companies had to initiate rolling power outages, so Monday my apartment was without power for about 10 minutes. Also doesnt bode well for the summer. I cant believe that summer is around the corner. Yikes!!

Other than these things not much exciting has been happening... I am headed to Dallas for a one day conference on Monday. It should be pretty interesting but its a work thing. I am getting more of a role at work because the work load is starting to pick up and so far all our wells have been successful. Hopefully the rest of the year is the same way.

New Car

Okay, so although most of you already know... this past Friday I bought a new car. I dont think its quite sank in yet but it is pretty cool. So of course now you want to know about it so...

Its a Toyota Highlander Hybrid (SUV) 2006 Limited
Its metallic blue outside and gray inside.
It has leather interior, heated seats, sunroof, navigation system, 6 disc CD player.
It was owned by the dealership before I bought it so instead of the MSRP of 42,000 I got it for $37,000. Which is quite a bit of money but considering it is 2006 Hybrid, its not too bad. In comparision with a brand new hybrid without any of the extras is 36,000. A Highlander Limited without the Hybrid system and with all the extras is $39,000. So for about 9,000 miles on the car I got a decked out Hybrid with everything I wanted for much less on the price. Also I got awsome security and safety systems and a 7 year- 100000 mile warenty.

I love it and am glad to have bought the Hybrid version. I looked at Prius, the hybrid car but it was hard to see out the back and had some really bad blind spots on the sides. Plus its nice to have the space of the SUV. I know I should publish a picture and I will once I take some. But for now you can see a similar version on Toyota's website.