19.1 Hat - Happy July!

Photo taken at House on the Rock (of course)

I meant to do a Five for Friday last week, but I just ran out of time because last week was a WEEK around here and even though I took off Thursday and Friday (floating holidays that had to be used by the end of June), I was mostly dealing with some medical stuff with my husband and all the "free time" I thought I had actually went to "doing important things." Anyway. Here are some things.

1) Two pieces of background knowledge that may make this story make more sense. Way back in the day before my husband and I were even dating, we were walking down the street in Minneapolis and came upon some raccoons in a tree staring at us. As some of you may know, Hannah the Dog is not the bravest of dogs and she freaks out when things in her immediate area change. I have encouraged her to be curious and sniff things that are unusual (new yard decorations, signs, and trash at the curb are common things I will encourage her to sniff).  

So we're walking down the street and Hannah is super interested in sniffing the storm drain on the corner of the street. You know the kind - it looks like this?

Not the actual drain in question - I'm scared that one has a family of raccoons living in it.

I'm not opposed to her sniffing because I want her to be brave, but I don't want her to go in the street, so I gave her enough lead to get to the edge of the curb, but not enough for her paws to actually go in the street. I spied something sitting in the storm drain and I thought it was a black and white stuffed toy - maybe a panda or a really badly done husky?  I stepped closer to take a look and then it moved and I realized it was a real-life raccoon waving its freaky hands and I screamed and pulled Hannah away as fast as I can. And that, friends, is how you undo training you've been working on for years.

2) We're halfway through the year, so let me do a brief report to you on how the Pop Sugar Reading Challenge is going for me this year. There are fifty prompts and I have completed 25. I feel pretty amazing for being spot-on in terms of number of books read. Unfortunately, I've done all the easy prompts and now things are going to get harder.  If I start to review some books and seem really down on them, you'll know why!

3) At work we have these magnetic nametags. It's nice that they aren't the kind that pin into your clothes and leave holes, but they also fall off all the time if, say, you are the type of person who flails your limbs around wildly while you are talking and you hit your nametag with some frequency. 

(Note: I've learned that most human adults are at least partially aware of where their limbs are in relation to things/people around them most of the time. I am not one of those people. Just today I was doing something with stickers in the unorganized totes under the bed in the primary bedroom and I stood up and absolutely whacked my CHIN on the wooden foot of our bed. It's super tender and I'm concerned it's going to bruise and how in the hell am I going to explain that?!) 

ANYWAY. I am not the only one with this problem. The problem I am seeking your help with is placement of said nametag. Do I put it way up over my boobs? Honestly, when I do that, it seems like my nametag is by my neck, which I do not want to draw attention to.  (This is not to say my boobs are super perky - I have great bras to yank those babies up.) Do I put it over my boobs? That seems...distracting for some folks who may the information on the nametag. How in the world do people wear nametags?!

4) Pantry/fridge tour: Awhile back, I asked Sarah for a tour of her fridge and food storage because she feeds a family of seven!! She provided that tour and I said I would do the same, only I never did. Mostly because we have two adults here and it's just not as interesting. But here goes.

a. Fridge and freezer. You'll note the only things in the freezer are a bag of blueberries, a bag of chicken for the dog, and a bottle of limoncello that we got as a gift at a party more than a decade ago that has been moved three times. If you come over and I offer you some limoncello, please take it. Take the whole damn bottle. On top of the fridge, I store food with gluten - right now it has some questionable tortilla chips (they're labeled gluten free, but Gluten Free Watchdog gives them a bad rating) and a bag of pumpernickel pretzels (so good!).

b. Pantry. Our pantry is small, but tall. On the left you have the bottom of the pantry and on the right you have the top which requires me to use a stepstool to use, so it mostly has baking supplies.

c. Two kitchen cupboards we use for additional storage. The one on the left is what we call the "dessert" cupboard and currently has Kind bars, Rolos (gross), a couple of white chocolate KitKats (thanks Kate!), and the dog's probiotic. The one on the right has granola, peanut butter, crackers, and all of the vitamins and medications we take. 

d. Basement overflow. Generally we don't need the overflow, but sometimes when we come back from Costco with flats of chickpeas, black beans, stock, and fizzy water, we end up resorting to the creepy basement. Right now it's all paper products except for some chicken stock.

The basement is terrible. 

That's it. My husband has a mini-fridge at work and I have a cupboard at work with some lunch supplies (mostly filled with gluten). We don't have a second fridge or a deep freeze. 

5) If you want Dr. BB to do a guest post, I need some questions to ask him! Right now I don't have enough questions and I think he's starting to have hurt feelings. Please fill out the form here. You can remain anonymous if you like - just make up a fake name and email and I'll never know.  

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How are your reading goals for the year going? Do you have a dessert cupboard? What's the closest you've been to a raccoon in the wild? Where do you wear a nametag?