We Did It!

Here's the picture of Jen, Jessica, and me at the end of the Women's Fitness Celebration last Saturday. We are all soaking wet from running the entire distance in the rain, but we were proud of reaching our goal! We did it ladies!

I Broke Down...

... and got cable television this week! I have been in my house now for 4 1/2 years and have always used bunny ears to watch tv. I have this awesome projector so my tv is GIANT, but usually it's pretty fuzzy (I can't seem to get the bunny ears in a position that works for all channels). I even have one television in my front room inside a beautiful armoire that I've never been able to watch because there is no way I am putting bunny ears on top of the armoire. Unfortunately without the bunny years all I get is gray fuzz! Anyway, I debated and debated before I actually got cable. I don't watch a whole lot of tv, so was it worth the extra cost? I decided it was, based on these two facts:

1. In a few months, I was going to have to purchase 3 converter boxes so that my tvs would work at all (because of the digital tv transition). Those run between $40-$70 each, so that's $150 I don't have to spend. Plus, I don't even know how that would have worked with my projector...

2. I love Boise State football. I decided this year I really wanted season tickets, so I got on the waiting list, and was stoked when they actually called me telling me there were tickets available. The down side was that the tickets were $283 (I get half price, so I would have been able to get two sets for $283), but they were pretty good seats so I would also have to pay a $625 BAA (Bronco Athletic Association) fee in addition to the tickets. In a moment of weakness I agreed to buy the tickets, only to get home that night and freak out. What was I thinking? I was seriously going to spend $908 on football tickets??? That's over $150 per game!!! Thankfully, I called the next day, and I was able to get out of it. Needless to say, I saved myself almost $1000 by not getting season tickets, but I still wanted to be able to watch all the games. How was I supposed to do that without ESPN? :-)

So... there's how I justified to myself that it was okay to get cable, even if I'm not a huge tv watcher. Sounds to me like I'm saving myself a lot of money!

Free Money!

Thanks Sally for telling me about a way to get 1/2 price gift certificates today. I got online first thing this morning and scored myself some fabulous deals. I even picked up a couple as Christmas presents :-) I love free money! If you live in Boise, check it out, but hurry because today is the last day of the gift certificate sales and some of the best ones are already gone!

Women's Fitness Celebration

Today I was informed by my coworker Mandy that I was going to lose my blogging fan base if I didn't post soon about the Women's Fitness Celebration, so I figured I had better get right on it :-) The truth is, I would have blogged on Saturday immediately following the race if I had taken my camera with me instead of relying on someone else. So I have semi-patiently been waiting for almost a week now for a picture so I could post. Guess you'll just have to wait a little longer to see me looking like a drowned rat. Why a drowned rat you ask? Well, because it POURED the entire race! I woke up Saturday morning to thunder, lightening, and pouring rain. Ugh! If I hadn't been training for 3 months for the race, I am pretty sure I would have just gone back to bed. But there was no way I was going to give up what I had worked so hard for.

We were told to arrive at the start of the race 30 minutes early, but this year that meant getting soaked before the race even started. I'm sure that was lovely since we were all wearing white race shirts :-) I felt pretty good the entire race. I felt like I was running at a good pace and not once did I think I wasn't going to be able to run anymore. I am super proud of myself because I accomplished my goal of running the entire 5k (no walking!). I also accomplished my secondary goal - I ran the race in exactly 30 minutes and zero seconds (the clock at the end of the race said 29:35, but my official time was 30:00). Hooray! That's under a 10 minute mile. I thought that was pretty good for barely being able to run a mile 3 months ago. I'm still not to the point that many of my friends are - I don't just love running, but I definitely don't hate it as much as I used to. I have a few more short races planned between now and the end of the year, so I guess I'll have to keep up the training!

Here's a picture of my team the Cutler Crew. This is before the race and before we were soaking wet!

1000 Miles!

I reached 1000 miles on my bike today! Pretty lame that I didn't reach that milestone earlier since I've had my bike for 5 months now, but I really have loved riding it and haven't regretted my decision to by my Harley even once. I seriously still smile each time I ride... the wind, the power, the sound. I think all I need now is some of those screamin' eagle pipes :-)

Listener Appreciation Concert

Each year a couple of the local country stations band together and put on a free country concert for their listeners. They hold the concerts at the beautiful Idaho Center outdoor amphitheater. Sara Evans was the main singer this year, with an opener by One Flew South and James Otto. I had tried for a couple of months to win tickets (you can't buy them - you can only win them), and was stoked when Jessica got a pair of last minute tickets (thanks Megan!) and asked me to go with her. The weather was beautiful, the atmosphere was super cool, and the music was amazing. I had a blast singing along to the songs with the over 11,000 other fans in attendance.

Blogging Absense Excuse

So it's basically been forever since I've posted anything on here, which is totally unlike me. But I do have a good excuse! The last couple weeks have been spent moving practically the entire contents of my house into my garage for my most recent remodeling project - I got new floors! I absolutely LOVE them. I now have beautiful walnut hardwood in my entryway, living room, dining room, and kitchen, and a new tan carpet throughout the rest of my house. It is SO much better than the ugly old gray carpet I had before (and it was pink in my bedroom!). I couldn't be happier with it all turned out. I've got a couple other small house projects up my sleeves, but once those are done, I'll definitely be having a house re-warming party :-)

A view of the living room and dining room without carpet!

The family room with the dining room and kitchen in the background.

Steals and Deals

As if I don't already spend enough time on the internet, I have two cool new sites that I have to check frequently throughout the day - SteepandCheap and WhiskeyMilitia. Both of these sites only sell one item at a time, but at a huge discount off the regular price. SteepandCheap is targeted toward sporting goods, whereas WhiskeyMilitia has a different variety of clothing, watches, etc. I just bought my first item off of WhiskeyMilitia - this super cute sweater for 60% off the regular price! Oh, and just in case you're a Google Reader user (which if you're not I HIGHLY recommend that you start using it), you still have to check the site because reader doesn't update as quickly as the items change.

Oh, and I think I'm the last person on the planet to jump on the CraigsList bandwagon (I know, weird that I haven't done this earlier, huh). I have sold a couple things on CraigsList before, but my sweet mom actually did all the legwork for me (posting, corresponding with those interested, etc.) Well, Saturday I bought a couple of new bar stools and decided to sell my old ones. I posted them on line yesterday and just a few hours later got an email from someone who wanted to buy them! They picked them up today and now I'm a little bit richer :-) So then I was hooked. I posted three more items today and hope the money keeps rolling in!