My Truck Is Almost Done… and so we’ll have to get an alarm. I don’t think our new neighborhood is a problem, but more for when we’re driving around out in town.

Unfortunately, I’m on a budget. What does one do when you can’t afford an alarm, but can’t afford to replace this top and stereo one more damn time?

Answer: Give rob an official license to nag.

With this not built-in feature I can be reminded every time I walk away from the vehicle without removing the faceplate or the Ipod from the car. If I do, there will be an alert in a grating voice that will ask “did you bring in the faceplate and ipod!?!”. It will run continuously, and without interruption until I do so – so therein lies the motivation to go back and remove them at once!

I know it’s not the same as having an actual alarm – but maybe later in the summer I can scrape the pennies together for this.

Besides, in the meantime – it’s far cheaper, much louder, more annoying than a car alarm and you don’t have to have bulky ‘booper’ in your pocket. Hell – I may put off getting an alarm indefinitely!

Well, we made it home safely. It was a long drive. Basically about 21 hours. Whew. But, it was nice and in the end, we drove through like 7 states. We had a little chevy though that got good gas mileage and we had good music and it was a nice weather. Mostly.

We had a very Lego Christmas. Ryley, our nephew, is totally into the lego starwars thing. So, Rob spent his holiday sorting through thousands, and thousands of plastic pieces.

I – went shopping – for glassware. I mean, I am in the glass capital of America right? But, I was surprised that the only pieces I bought were all made in China 😦

Come to think of it – so was everything else. I was surprised that these glass pieces weren’t even made in America and so when we went back to mom’s I checked all the open gifts, and was surprised to find ‘everything’ was made in China.

Wow.

But we had a great time. There’s one picture here of Malcom the fatt cat. He was so cute.

Glad to be home in Austin. Sounds funny to say Home and Austin still in the same sentence. But, it’s so nice – there’s no snow here!

On a trip to Michigan for Christmas. I put “Chismas” in the title, because we were still giving Rob’s Mom a hard time from last years’ place settings. Mine said “Chis” and so we’ve taken to celebrating Merry Chismas.

It was a very long drive.

14 Hours to St. Louis, and additional 9 to Michigan, but I likes to drive. What I didn’t like was the snow. We didn’t get too much of it thank goodness. But, what we did get slowed us down and so I had to concentrate hard which of course makes you exhausted once you reach your destination.

Stopping in St. Louis was fun! We finally had an opportunity to visit with Rich our good friend who we have been saying we should stop and see but never seem to find ourselves in Missouri!

Now we had a chance.

This picture of Rob was on a particularly sassy cold portion of our trip outside Indianapolis when he was giving me a hard time about how balmy that mid 20’s weather is. He likes to play up his midwestern roots sometimes while my teeth are chattering.

Fine.

I simply got the in the car, cranked up the heat and locked the door. He finally said through the closed window that it wasn’t that warm outside. I thought not.

There was some snow on the ground. I took this picture over the head of Mom’s figurines in the window so that you could see it looks mighty cold outside, because it fricken is! I don’t care what these thick blooded Michiganders and Ohioans say. I’m looking forward to hitting the Texas stateline!!

Brrrrr.

There’s a great site that has photos of the campaign. It includes pictures of the candidates, but more importantly a variety of supporters. Some really, really cool pictures. Take a look!

Well – It’s Christmas time and we’ve been doing the usual. Staying busy trying to set up home – meetings – and work.

We’re getting ready to drive to the midwest for the holidays and I’ve been checking the 10 day forecast for the conditions in St. Louis and Michigan.

Yah.

It’s going to be a slower drive than I thought. It’s looking pretty wet and cold and so that means we’ll be creeping along. But hopefully not so slow that we dont’ get there until new year!

Here’s a picture of Yoda in a stupid game I got sucked into the other day on the web. And our new roommate Johnny. He’s a nice guy and it is so (SO) easy to kick his *ss in Risk – that’s it not even believable. But – he’s got Mikey our other roommate advising him in strategy. Maybe he should find a new advisor!!

Here’s also a picture of Rob in our laundry day the other evening when we were at home and realized over half our towels are trashed! I think I know what we’ll use our gift certificate for Linens and Things for (thanks Mom, Rocki & John, Peter & Gina!)

And we dined at whole foods on Sunday. Ahem. Ok – I like whole foods. It’s a great place with lots of selection of healthy tasty items. But there’s a reason some folks call it whole paycheck. I had an order of sushi, a salad & a cranberry drink. Total? $19.35. Wholly cow! I’ve spent less on dinner at a restaurant. But, at least we had the birds to watch. They fluff up and dive into the stream to take a bath and boy are they loud too. But, it was a beautiful day.

So, it had been a while since I had a weekend that I wasn’t running ‘every’ minute. It was nice! We went to San Antonio Saturday night to visit friends and go to a meeting.

We went out afterwards to a great dessert place in San Antonio the “Candlelight Cafe” and here is a picture of us having dinner at a BBQ place on the way that had the best bbq sauce I’ve tasted yet! Way better than last weekend when we stopped in Elgin.

Then here’s Rob giving me his no you may not face. He does this a lot.

Lastly here’s a Calvin and Hobbs strip that I thought reminded me of so many folks I know! All is going well here, and I hope it is going well with you too. Let me know!

Click on the link above to receive Christopher’s holiday greeting. It’s fun.

So maybe you know how much we love Guitar Hero in our home. Well, actually Rob loves guitar here (it’s one of the games he kicks my butt in every time).

So now there’s one coming out called Rock Band and that’s great, and that sucks. It’s great because in this newer version everyone gets to participate with a lead guitar, bass, drummer and vocalist. It’s sort of like Karaoke with a judge. If you hit the wrong notes or words you’ll get boo’d off stage.

The only problem is it’s on XBox and I don’t see a PS2 version. Darn. I don’t think I can justify the expense. Especially since we don’t have a place to sit while we play!

Hope you’re doing well. Check in and say hi!

Rob Being Sassy – Again
Originally uploaded by ChristopherSolis.

Alright – it is clear that Rob and I have a difference of taste. I mean – I have all of it, he has none. Well. That’s a little harsh. He has some (it’s in his mouth).

This has led to some tug-o-war over the type of furniture we have in the livingroom. We both agree on a sectional but where he wants formal, leather upright, stiff and slippery – I want something a little cushier, not necessarily black or chocolate brown and maybe suede.

Which, led him to send me this depiction of Jeannie’s bottle with my face inserted and the accusation that if I had my way – our house would look like this!!

Please!

I hate stained glass.

(But, then again – look at how comfy that looks!)