My View of Winter

So you may have heard about a blizzard in the Northeast. Mitch and I were trying to fly back to New York when the Eastern seaboard closed. I plan to post a full account of our travels after I've deboarded a plane, taken a train, and gotten out of an automobile... and gotten back home. For now, this is the only view of winter we've had in two days.

Inaugural Voyage

Well, helloooooo everyone! For those that haven't guessed yet, this is my (Mitch) first post on the blog.

I thought it was appropriate that I start today in order to offer some closure on L'episode de la Souris. I was first introduced to Fievel while I was working last Friday. Amanda, as she previously mentioned, called in a bit of a panic. I tried to relay all of my mouse-catching expertise (read: put a bowl over it, slide a flat surface under it, and flip!), but it amounted to nothing. Fievel got away.

As fate would have it, Fievel showed up the day I left for Atlanta for the SEC Championship (more on that to come). Apparently, he showed up a few more times over the weekend, but despite Christen's best efforts, I returned to a mouseful house. In the meantime, the ladies put out a number of mousetraps.

Now. Last night, Bo got a little worked up over something in our room. We were sure he'd found Fievel. I went to investigate, but we couldn't find anything. When Bo lost interest, we started to wonder if he'd smelled Fievel at all.

Turns out, the dog is just lazy. He DID smell Fievel. He just lost interest. On a side note, if anyone is interested in a dog, we might have one available. How disappointing.

How do I know he found the mouse? Because I got another call at work today. The lever was flipped. One of the mousetraps was sprung, but Amanda wasn't going to check it. That was left to me when I got home. As the old saying goes: nothing says "Welcome back my love!" like a deceased rodent.

Sadly, the mouse trap does not shield the "caught" mouse from your vision. It just encloses him on two sides so you don't have to touch him. When I checked it, I saw Fievel. In case you were interested, he did not make it out West. He's in the trash can outside, and we are once again rodent free.

Just let this be a lesson: mousetraps do not "catch" mice. They kill them. Amanda was less upset about this news than I was. When she said she wanted him "gone," she did not mean "outside." Glad we had this talk. I'll post on a more interesting topic some other time.

PS. If you want to know why Amanda and I love Auburn so much, watch this and remember none of these people went to the game but still took the time to hit Toomer's:

War Eagle everyone!

A Mouse and Wonderful Friends

What do these two things have in common you ask.....my weekend!  I shipped Mitch off to Atlanta to cheer on the Auburn Tigers (War Eagle!) while I hosted three of my closest friends from Charlottesville.  We had the most amazing girls weekends.  We shopped, ate a lot, laughed even more and encouraged one another.  It was so much fun to show them our new home and our new neighborhood.  They enlightened me to the world of ABC Home and we visited an old favorite that my best friend Katie introduced me to last summer.  We enjoyed wonderful desserts to celebrate Emmaline's birthday on Friday night and on Saturday night we saw one of my favorite Broadway shows.  They had a late flight out last night, so we were able to spend the whole day in Williamsburg shopping, eating and drinking coffee.  They are wonderful friends that I will have for a lifetime.  


You might be wondering where the mouse comes into the equation.  Well on Friday afternoon before the girls got here, I was cleaning the apartment and noticed what I thought was a very large roach in my hallway.  I went to put on my shoes to kill said roach, but as I got closer, I realized that it had a tail.  It took a second for me to process the fact that I had a mouse in my house, but when I did, there was a LOT of freaking out.  I ran and grabbed my phone and called Mitch.  He tried to coach me on how to catch the mouse, but I was too terrified to get close to it.  I searched for my big girl panties for a good ten minutes before I headed down the hall, broom in hand.  I jabbed the broom under our shoe rack, behind the coat rack and into the umbrella and wouldn't you know, nothing happens.  I will repeat NOTHING happens!  Where did it go?  I did a quick check around the apartment and didn't see the mouse, so I carried on very cautiously with my cleaning...I did have company coming in three hours after all.  Friday night and Saturday came and went with no sign of the mouse and just as I started to let my guard down, he showed himself.  We got in from the show after midnight Saturday night and as I was changing into my pajamas, I saw him dart into our room from the living room.  I panicked, put on my boots and ran to the guest bedroom to tell the other girls.  I was about in tears because it was late, there was a mouse in my house, and all I wanted to do was sit down with the girls and eat a late night snack as planned.  As I tearfully broke the news to the girls, Christen comes to the rescue.  In her words, she "is clutch in these types of situations."  We spent around two hours trying to coax the little mouse out and almost got him several times, but he is about as fast as Speedy Gonzalez.  We admitted defeat around 2:30 and went to sleep.  We picked up a few of these while we were out yesterday, but the little mouse has not shown himself again.  I kind of knew this was going to happen at some point, but I didn't think it would be this soon!  Momma and Daddy, we will try to make sure little mousy is gone before you get here on Saturday!  


A few pictures from our fun weekend!  I hope you enjoyed yours as much as we enjoyed ours!

Rain and Christmas Music

I just experienced one of the trials of living in New York City, the rain!  When I woke up this morning, I noticed that it was extra windy outside, but I didn't think too much about it.  I got ready to take Bo for our morning walk and to doggy daycare and on a last minute thought grabbed my raincoat since there was a chance of rain (I decided against the umbrella because of the wind).  We got outside and it was as windy as predicted and it was misting just a little bit, but no big deal.....until I turned the corner of our block and almost got blown away with a gust of wind and a flood of rain.  I stayed dedicated to the task at hand, get the dog to the park so he can go to the bathroom, but I would be lying if I said that I didn't think about quitting halfway through.  By the time I got Bo to doggy daycare, we were both a wet mess.  The daycare owner took one look at us and couldn't help but chuckle.  By the time I got home, my face was dripping rain and I looked like I had just jumped in a pool.  Needless to say, I will be asking for these rain boots for Christmas because I hear they are the best for rain and snow.  It was quite the experience and luckily made me laugh instead of cry.  


When I got home wet from head to toe, all I wanted to do was throw on sweats, drink a cup of coffee and listen to Christmas music.  So I grabbed one of my Christmas china mugs and had a wonderful cup of coffee spiced with cinnamon and listened to one of my favorite Christmas albums.  These are my two favorite Christmas albums (one and two) what are yours?


The next time when it is raining and all you have to do is run from your house to the car, say a little prayer of thanks because I know I never gave it a second thought....until I was walking down the street soaked in rain and car less.