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Treadmill Kittens


If there isn't the two most popular things in one little video! These cats apparently love to exercise, put her up to ten boss!

Last night my husband and three of his friends were playing poker at a card room.  They had a deal that they would split evenly any jackpot over $200.

In a lot of cash games they have what is called a Monte Carlo jackpot.  Out of each pot the casino takes a cut to add to the jackpots that are listed on a board in the poker room.  The jackpots keep growing until someone gets a hand associated with a jackpot.  A Monte Carlo jackpot hand might be for example, four of a kind, or the four possible royal flush hands (diamonds, hearts, clubs, and spades).  Last night one of our friends in the group hit the royal flush of diamonds.  The jackpot for that was $13,700!  Yay!

Here is a picture puzzle for you.  What is the expression represented by these images?

Click and drag your mouse between these two stars to find out:

*  Cold hard cash!  *

  OMG - This is too funny!

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Guns N' Roses karaoke scares teacher - Weird news- msnbc.com
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I love the tiger costumes that the piglets are wearing!

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Tiger nurses piglets


Dec. 3: A mother tiger nurses piglets at a zoo in Thailand. Msnbc.com's Dara Brown reports.

OMG - I want this sooooooo bad!

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Burt Builds a Bandit - 1


Get reacquainted with Burt Reynolds and the car from Smokey and the Bandit

Yikes! This weather sucks!

On Saturday DK and I were wine tasting all day in Woodinville. It started to snow in the afternoon and that was fun & exciting. Everything looks so pretty covered in snow. I was so excited! I couldn’t imagine a better day than drinking good wine with my wonderful husband and watching the snow fall all around us. The novelty soon wore off when it was time to drive home after dinner. By that time there must have been 4 inches of snow on the roads. To say the least it was an eventful trip.

I put the Pathfinder in 4-Low for the 15 mile drive home. As we were getting on the 522 in Woodinville I lost control on the ramp and ended up facing the wrong direction. Yikes. I got back on track and kept on going. We approached the ramp for the 405 south; you may know the one, it must be 2 stories or more above the freeway. We were inching along, shocked by all the cars on the guardrail or the few that had spun out and were facing in the wrong direction. All of a sudden the Pathfinder starts sliding sideways towards the guardrail. Luckily we hit a section that didn’t already have a car on it and we were only going a few miles per hour. I have never been up-close and personal with a guardrail before but I was pleased to learn that they have a little concrete curb on them so if you hit them with the side of your car, completely parallel like I did, that little curb hits your tires first and keeps the body of your car from hitting the actual concrete and metal rail. (*See diagram below.) Awesome! Disaster averted! We drove the rest of the way home going 25-30 on the 405. I was really happy to get home.

On Sunday I was out wine tasting again with Bri. The roads where clear but it was dumping rain. We had a great time and later met the husbands in Bellevue for dinner. At dinner DK told me that it was really windy at our house. At one point he heard a banging noise. An hour or so later he realized that we had left the mudroom door unlocked and the wind BLEW it open! Holy crap! He walked out the door to find our two cats (who are NOT allowed outside - ever) sniffing around our garden shed! I am so glad he found them! I guess they knew they weren’t supposed to be out there because they ran back into the house on their own without DK even having to chase them down. I suspect that a short time in the wind and rain was too much for our spoiled little babies.

The rain is still pouring down and as of this morning our driveway has turned into a pond and the mini-horse farm near our house no longer has pasture land, it has a lake!

Most of you know Bumble my 1971 VW Transporter. I love Bumble. I find that when I am driving Bumble I smile a lot. It just makes me happier. But of course with old cars come little problems. Luckily, old cars are also easy to work on if you need to fix little things here or there.

That brings me to this morning...

 My morning commute is not bad at all. 15 minutes usually. I start by driving about 2 miles on hilly surface streets. Then I hop on the freeway and drive for about 6 miles, exit and drive a mile or so to my office. Usually on cold mornings Bumble will stall at the bottom of each of the 2 big hills I drive over to get to the freeway. No big deal. I know when it’s going to happen, so if I hear the engine sputter a little I just give it a touch of gas or let it stall and crank it over again when the light turns green. Once I get on the freeway the engine warms up and it won’t stall again.

This morning Bumble didn’t stall at all! I was shocked! Wonderful! Amazing! Then I was idling in neutral and noticed that the engine was idling higher than normal. The tachometer doesn’t work so I have to listen for when to shift, etc. The idle sounded out of the ordinary. Oh well, at least it’s not stalling! I continued on my way. I got off the freeway and was pulling into my office parking lot when I realized that my gas pedal was stuck about half way down! I put it in neutral and coasted into a spot with the engine revving. I pulled the parking break and reached down and pulled the gas pedal back up.

I think the pedal mechanism just needs to be oiled so I am going to try that. For now I tied a piece of twine around the gas pedal and tied it to my dash board with enough slack that I can floor it on the freeway. Then when the pedal sticks down I can just pull on the twine and that makes it pop back up!

My friend Brently emailed this to me and I thought it was soooooo awesome I had to share it. Behold the beer tree...

I have 10 tickets for the Washington State Lotto 25 Year Anniversary Raffle. The drawing is tonight. Only 375,000 tickets were sold. This game offers the best odds the lotto has ever offered. They are giving away a total 3.75 million. Since it is a raffle, each ticket number is unique so prizes cannot be split.

The prizes are as follows:
$1 million – 3 winning tickets
$100,000 – 4 winning tickets
$1,000 – 350 winning tickets

The most I can win with my 10 tickets is $3,403,000.  Wish me luck!

Last week I was sitting on my front porch around 10:00 pm reading a book. I heard a few noises in the bushes but didn't think anything of it. Our neighborhood has lots of outdoor cats and lots of strays. Then I heard a noise in the grass right in front of me. I look up and there is a cocker spaniel-sized raccoon standing right by my foot, staring at me.

OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG!

It was so close I could have kicked it. I love animals but I DO NOT like raccoons. I don't want to hurt them, but they are dangerous and volatile** and I don’t want them anywhere near me. Unfortunately, the ones in our neighborhood are supersized and not the least bit frightened of humans.

I let out a shriek and froze like one of those creepy living statues. It looked surprised and took a step back. In a split second different scenarios were running through my head.
Should I not move and hope it moves away?
Should I grab my pet rock on the table next to me and whack it over the head?
Should I try to kick it?
Should I throw my book at it?
Should I throw my bottle of water at it?
Should I scream and wave my arms around like a maniac?
Are raccoons even scared of maniacs?

I went with option one, stay still and hope it moves away while silently repeating “get away” to myself. That worked. He backed away from me a few feet and then he turned and scurried off into the bushes. Yikes – It took over an hour for me to start breathing normally again and for the adrenaline to die down. It scared me so bad that it made me nauseous.

Do not let a raccoon’s adorable little face and chubby body fool you! They are finely tuned killing machines! They lure you in with their cuteness or sneak up on you when you are minding your own business reading a book and then BAM – they attack! I was lucky to avoid the attack.

**I used to work at this web dev place and one of my co-workers told me that his grandpa was killed by a raccoon! Kind of a strange fluke thing, but he said that a raccoon got into his grandpa’s cabin. The grandpa was a mountain man – no phone, no electricity, no neighbors, etc. He tried to swat the raccoon out the front door with a broom or something. The raccoon bit him on the wrist and latched on. The old man’s first and only instinct was to shake it off. In the process his wrist really got torn up and he ended up bleeding to death because there was no way to get help. I realize that story may not even be true (although I think it is) and it’s a really strange and rare sequence of events, but I am not taking any chances!

Please enjoy this new take on "Thriller"; THE classic Halloween video. I wanted to post the original, but it can't be embedded.

P.S. This video is so cool. It must have taken FOREVER to make!

This Saturday I play in a quarterly poker tournament.  To get to this tournament I had to get a weekly tournament (30 - 40 players) first place win which put me in a monthly tournament.  Then I had to place in the top 3 in the monthly (50 - 60 players).  The quarterly (33 players were invited) on Saturday has a first place prize of $2,000. (Or a free buy in to the World Series of Poker in Vegas.)  I would totally take the $2,000 cash.  $2,000 in cash in my pocket is better than a chance at millions against thousands of pros.  Don't you think?  The experience would be really fun and exciting, but I'm not rich enough to pass up $2k in cash for a fun (long shot) experience.

Everyone who reads this, please send me positive thoughts on Saturday (11/3/07) at 12 noon pacific time!

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Scranton, Pa., to Host 'Office' Party
Scranton, Pa., Home to 'The Office,' to Host Convention Celebrating Popular NBC Show

On Sunday DK and I went to the casino to play in the bounty poker tournament. It was a $50 buy in each. $40 of that goes to the prize pool and $10 of that pays for a bounty chip*.

*When you go all in you have to push your bounty chip in too. If you get knocked out, the person who won the hand gets the bounty chip. At the final table, the bounty chips are worth $10 each.

There were about 130 - 140 players. 12 tables of 11 plus a handful of alternates.

Early on I was able to accumulate a big chip stack and I earned some new nicknames in the process. Two different times I busted out guys that were all in with pocket aces – also known as “the nuts”. I beat them both times with straits. That earned me the nickname “the nutcracker”. LOL!

I caught a LOT of straits and combined with my big chip stack that earned me the nickname “Bank of STR” – the STR part meaning strait.

At one point, with two tables left I had about $100,000 in chips. Most of the other players at my table had between $2,000 and $15,000 in chips. If a short stacked player went all in (including their bounty chip) and I had a decent hand, I would usually call them. I had the money to do it and we only had two tables left. Any player that I can take out for a small percentage of my chip stack is one player closer to the final table for me. Plus that $10 bounty chip is always tempting. I took so many people out (10 by the time we were at the final table) that everyone started calling me “the bone collector”. A short stack would push all in and I would call and one of the old guys at the table would say “Uh oh! The bone collector is coming to get you!” That was fun. I took one guy out and his friend who was also at our table looked at me and said “Hey thanks! You just won me $5.00. I bet that he would go out first.” So the next hand the $5 winner went all in and I called and took him out too! Ha ha haaaaaaaaaa! That was fun.

I also earned the nicknames “the destroyer” and “the black widow”.

I was the last woman in the tournament and the player with the most bounty chips at the final table.

I think I was second in chips when we started the final table. Everyone at the final table was going to get paid so I was really happy just to be there. One guy was knocked out quickly. I played three hands against my husband and lost all three. In the process I also lost all of my chips. He had the best hand every time and he also played it right every time so he totally deserved to win those chips. Plus, if I am going to lose my chips to anyone at the final table, it hurts a little less when it’s my husband.

I was really happy with my play and with my winnings. I won $110 for my bounty chips and $160 for 9th place for a total of $270. Not bad!

DK made it down to the final five and at that point all of the remaining players decided to split the remaining prize pool. They each won $750 plus DK had seven bounty chips for a total of $820. As a couple we profited $990 in four hours! Not bad!

It seems that small towns are a magnet for strange people and things.  Check out these examples from our recent beach trip.

The Welcome to Aberdeen sign.  Kurt Cobain was from Aberdeen and we thought the reference was nice.  It was funny because we put on Nirvana when we knew we were getting close to Aberdeen and Come As You Are was playing when we passed this sign!

Hand made sign in a motel by the ferry dock.  (You have to go in there to buy tickets for the ferry.) The whole place was very Psycho-ish.  (Eeeee, eeeee, eeee, ee!)

Speed limit sign entering the Quinalt Casino.

A very friendly deer head in Cadillac Jack's bar.  This is the joint that played "She Thinks My Tractor's Sexy" on repeat.

Isn't this terrible?!?!? 

Couple fights loss of home over $1.63 - U.S. Life - MSNBC.com

UPDATE:  Benefactor helps La. couple keep home

I have been going to the gym religiously as planned.

I got measured.  Bad news... Up 2 inches!  Damn!  How did that happen?  Oh well, it's not that much, just a half an inch on 4 different spots.  But I have been busting my ass so to GAIN inches is frustrating.  I am going to work really hard for the next 2 weeks and get measured again.  Those inches had better be gone and while they are at it, they can take some of their friends with them!!!

DK and I went to the Clearwater Casino this weekend. It was really fun! We didn’t win big, but we didn’t lose big either. In my book that’s a win!

The hotel is beautiful. The beds are like giant marshmallows. All white, soft and squishy. Very nice.

Overall it was a great trip. My one complaint was that the hostesses at the steakhouse were very rude. The wait staff was great but those hostesses were horrible. Everything was a one word answer, not helpful at all. Also, one of them was looking at me like I had a giant hairy wart on my face or something. That was interesting because our friends CJK and AJ were looking at the Clearwater as a venue for their upcoming nuptials. They said that the event staff was rude and hard to deal with. (That is the polite version.) Too bad because the Clearwater could have great marks all around if it weren’t for those hostesses and the event staff.

Here is my review:

Hotel: A
Hotel staff: B
Hotel value: B
Steakhouse food: B
Steakhouse wait staff: A
Steakhouse hostesses: F
Steakhouse value: B
Buffet food: C
Buffet staff: B
Buffet value: B
Casino games: A
Casino staff: A
Calculated average grade: C+
Perceived average grade: B