Blown Back Again [Update at bottom]

Sooo I don't know if anyone remembers a loonnngggg time ago when I had the tornado-strength winds plow through where I lived back in Iowa? Well, wind is at it again. Granted, I haven't had to evacuate down to the tunnels that don't exist this time around, but the longer I sit here, next to the worst place in the house (the window), the more I wish I had some tunnels to hide in. God is mighty...period! (Does saying period and adding an exclamation point seem like a paradox to anyone else? There were definitely birds flying backwards today. Poor bammas. As this picture shows, apparently I was the only one dumb enough to drive out in this hurricane. The cars driving the other direction are heading away from Sandy's wrath, but of course I couldn't help but try to befriend the crazy cane.

It wouldn't be my life if my job didn't decide to close until after I needed to stay inside of it, but that's a different story entirely. So far we still have power in the house, so until we lose it I guess I can update this. I'll also do another plate full of words, and this time it's for my latina/o people's. Definitely had another super nice experience at work. One of the regulars just came in and bought the crew some papusa revuelta y curtido y salsa. It was pretty good. Even threw in some jugo de maranon (accent over first N).

From my understanding, papusa revuelta is corn tortilla filled with cheese, beans, and pork. The curtido is fermented cabbage relish. Salsa is exactly what you think it is. Jugo de maranon is the juice of a maranon fruit...again, accent over the first N. Overall the papusas were the best papusas I've had, but according to my salvadorian coworkers, not the best ever.

Even though I couldn't make the trip to Richmond tomorrow, the inclement weather also destroyed any chances of jury duty, so that's a plus. And since I work alternate hours this week, the day off is just a freebie. Woot. Probably do some writing for the nonprofit and go from there.

Welp I'll keep you posted on this dirty storm. As always, thanks for listening with your eyes.  

--------------------------------------------UPDATE--------------------------------------

Sooo the hurricane definitely eased up through the night. God kept my family safe and the power on. Definitely had the most fun with the leak in the basement. Glad God has a way of turning a calamity into family bonding time. I wish there were more pictures I could show you guys but Moms says they're too "embarrassing" to share with everyone. But i do have a picture of the contraption below.

ALERT ALERT You'll have to utilize your mind's eye for most of this. Think of my family (as crazy and quirky as we are) building a contraption to keep the leaking hurricane water at bay. Not sure if you guys remember back when my moms basement flooded from the last hurricane, but this hurricane brought on more leaking. My mother and sister tried everything (puddy, duct tape, other crap), but in the midst of all three of us, we devised a path to success. We, drum roll please, we used aluminium foil! That's right, we taped aluminium foil to the walls and pipes where the leak was, formed funnels with it, and then drained the water into buckets. Imagine all three of us working together to keep wet duct tape to a wet surface while forming foil and trying to keep dirty water off of ourselves. The success made things much easier on everyone. Goes to show what a little family power and wisdom from God can do. First picture shows the contraption, second picture shows how effective it was (we had to change the buckets regularly).

Even learned something new. Discovered that if you put large amounts of water into a toilet, it will flush on its own! Crazy right (you better not be over there laughing at my ignorance). Mom says it's cause I grew up privileged. Well that's it for the update. So unless sandy is a phoenix I think she's done for this area. Prayers go out to all the people affected by the storm. As usual, thanks for listening with your eyes. 

Today Everyone Was A Colored Person

So the color run finally happened! It was super packed and super messy, but overall it was a good time. There were a bit over 6000 people running in the 5K, so if I told you I was trying to come in first, things didn't go as well as planned. They released groups of runners in waves of 500 to 1000 people at a time, so I'm not sure who the very first person was, but thank the Lord  I still got a good run. Not sure which wave I actually finished with, but it wasn't competitive so I guess it doesn't really matter. Not sure of my time either so don't ask. Yay to my girlfriend and Ana and Quin (SP?) for finishing as well! Woot team fitness. We taped our shirts with the team name so the color made an outline. Sweet!

The back of Missy's was better looking than mine, but the tape was falling off so we didn't get a good picture of it. Some paint brushed down over my E, but you can still kind of read it says Team Fitness. 

People weren't lying when they say you get paint everywhere! My silver underwear is definitely stained yellow, my socks were pink, and I was definitely blowing rainbows out my nose for a few hours. Luckily all the paint washed off, but I'm tossing the shoes. They were old and moldy and now that they're covered in paint they really aren't worth wearing. Good thing I'm about to get some new ones. Enjoy the pics. Got some nice ones of the event. 

We hit up a restaurant called ketchup when we were finished and it was decent. They definitely had six different types of ketchup, none of which were very good lol. Guess nothing beats the original. I was going to  do a separate Plate Full of Words entry (cause I know how much you guys and gals adore reading about all the food I eat) but I figured I'll just cram it all onto this. So here are the pictures from the restaurant. Def had a burger they called the king. Was peanut butter and fried banana. Pretty good, but I can feel my stomach's anger. 

We hit up that crazy man out of sand statue after and peeped the peeps store before heading back and getting stuck in traffic. Feeling down from the wait, we got another free redbox and some ice cream to end out the night. Enjoy the pics, comment if you want, and as always thanks for listening with your eyes. 

Plate Full of Words - Me With an Empty Plate?

I know these Plate Full of Words editions are supposed to be about food and such, and this one kind of is, but yes the title is telling the truth. I participated in the taste of DC event this past weekend (Thanks Jaz and Mom for the rides), and I did not buy any food from the event the entire day! Cray cray right? Of course, I blame them for my lack of desire to purchase from the row of restaurants (everything was cash instead of with tickets), but either way I didn't purchase a thing. I did walk away with these lovely samples of tapioca based non-dairy products that actually weren't half bad. The top is a pepper jack flavor and the bottom is cheddar and havarti flavors.

The trio was a lot better than I ever imagined a tapioca-based anything would taste (considering how emesis inducing tapioca pudding is). But that did not make up for otherwise empty plate I endured for the entire event. They had me serving beer for five hours, and I'm pretty sure I'm the quickest cup-filler with the name Jeremie Guy, but aside from that it was at least fun to walk around. Saw an old friend from Towson, though we didn't have a chance to hang out.

Since I didn't eat at the taste, I decided to go to Subway and try their Tuscan chicken melt.

I got it made like the picture they advertise (with some spinach and onion) and it was decent. No where near my favorite sub, but I'm not bad I bought two. No I didn't eat them both sadly. I demonstrated self control and will eat the other on Monday evening. If you want to see the couple other pictures I took at the event, click Here. 

Still on the job hunt so keep praying. I forgot to give God the glory with my last post, talking about the short story I recently had published, so...TO GOD BE THE GLORY! If you missed the last post but still want to read the story, click Here. It's a horror story called Family Time. Feel free to post any comments or send any feedback. Hope you enjoy. As always thanks for listening with your eyes. 

Plate Full of Words - TGITuesdays

Started off the weekend of food with some family fun time. Mom had a coupon for Ruby Tuesdays so we decided to see what was cooking. It's been a little over half a decade since I've set foot in a Ruby Tuesdays, but I must say I was not disappointed. Granted, service in a restaurant will vary based on the waitress, but our waitress put up with my stupidity so I give her an A+. She even gave me a lemon just because I forgot to buy some for my daily guacamole consumption.

Now my guacamole can be tangy and awesome just like it should be. I tried to finagle a free refill on my plate, but apparently that only works for drinks. Meh, I tried, and she awarded me with some miniature biscuits  Times are tough, even for restaurants. Picture is grossly enlarged (the biscuits were good, but not bigger around than a silver dollar. 

For the main entree I had Asian glazed salmon with a side of asparagus and spaghetti squash (with a little lemon butter for dipping) which was well worth the 13 buck price tag. Though, I'm not sure why it was Asian glazed because it was just a tangy BBQ sauce. Meh, it was good either way. 

Overall a good day. To make matters even more yummy, I managed to get another short story published. This time it's getting published in Liternational's October issue (as a part of their Santa Claws contest). I entered the "Claws" portion so far, and had my short story "Family Time" accepted. If you want to read it, click Here. As a semi-finalist, I'll be eligible for the contest prize but I won't hear back about that for a while so keep me in your prayers regarding that. 

Still no luck on the job front so keep praying! And as always, thanks for listening with your eyes.

Home Sucks

So if you've read some of the previous blogs you may remember that I had some issues with the landlord and had to move out. Well, I'm finally back home and it sucks. If the hour commute to work every day wasn't bad enough, moms still wants some rent. I did persuade her to only charge me rent for the bills I was actually increasing, I.E. electric, water, etc, but it made me wonder what she was trying to charge me for before I talked her down? Talk about a crazy home life. She's fo sho a hustler? Guess that would explain where I got my old ways from, but sheesh, is it too much to ask for a break from people trying to suck money out my pockets? If it isn't my mother it's the grocery store. If it isn't the grocery store it's the government. Anyone want to give me some money for a change (teehee you caught that right?).

To add to the long list of governmental victimization I've suffered in the past few months, I now may have to pay 1000 dollars and/or spend 30 days in jail. Yes, this is another incident that is technically my fault, but I'm still the victim here! I was not living at home when I received the court summons, but thank the Lord my sister actually read it (you would think an English major would read more). Apparently I was supposed to mail back a portion of the summons for jury duty or be subject to said 1000 dollar penalty and/or 30 days in jail. BTW whoever said ignorance is bliss obviously never had as many ignorant run-ins with the law as me. For someone who tries to live life in an upstanding manor, I sure do get into a lot of legal trouble.

Someone pray for me. Still job hunting so keep that in mind too. As always, thanks for listening with your eyes.