This blog has moved...

We decided to make a joint blog instead of just one for me... if you've been looking for me, you can find me here:

anglinsonline.blogspot.com

Rock You Like a Hurricane

So here it is, 8 days after Hurricane Ike hit our area. I have to admit I was not expecting much, as living in this part of Texas for over 16 years has not brought much in the hurricane department. Here's what happened...

On Friday, school was cancelled and everyone spent the day getting ready. For us that meant bringing in lawn furniture, cleaaring out a space in the garage for my car, and making sure we had "provisions" in the pantry (chips and salsa, oreos, cereal... sure, we were prepared). We watched the waters rising in Galveston and on Bolivar ahead of the storm on the news, and thought that at most we'd see a lot of rain. Then we waited... and waited... and waited...

Friday night we "slept" downstairs in the living room so we could keep the news on. We didn't actually sleep much -- the wind was literally howling, and it was knocking down branches and trees, so we were hearing unfamiliar noises. The eye of the storm passed our area around 5 AM, and the power was knocked out about an hour later.

Saturday we expected a lot of rain, and we weren't disappointed -- rainfall totals for our area were between 10 and 15 inches. The rain slowed by the afternoon, so we drove to check on our parents. We had to turn around a few times due to high water before finding a road that was passable (most had either water or entire trees across the roadway). Our families were lucky -- none of us had major damage from falling debris, just a lot of mess to clean up.

What we did not expect with Hurricane Ike were the days without power. Ours went out on Saturday morning and didn't come back on until Thursday. Thankfully, God sent us some unseasonably cool weather, so it wasn't a typical miserable Texas September while everyone was trying to recover!

Now things are slowly but surely returning to normal, and most jobs and schools are resuming this week. I think this was a major lesson to all of us in the area about tropical activity -- the dangers are very real and we all need to be prepared when a hurricane starts churning in the Gulf.

I'll try to post some storm pictures soon. Until then, here's a video of damage to the Woodlands Mall and the Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavillion (a top concert destination in Houston):

http://cosmos.bcst.yahoo.com/up/player/popup/?rn=4226712&cl=9745510&src=news

Where the Light Is

Todd and I went to the John Mayer concert this weekend, and let me just say right now that it was fantastic! I will definitely try to get tickets whenever he's in town!

Now I will say that if you're looking for him to play all of his radio hits, you should just buy them off of iTunes. The majority of his concert was him being John Mayer the musician instead of John Mayer the top 40 artist. His guitar skills completely blew me away, and this concert was filled more with smooth, almost blues-like, interludes. He covered some great songs (Free Falling, Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For), but my favorite cover was of Duffy's new song "Mercy". John was joined on stage by a great band with a standout sax player, which really helped him ease into his mellow vibe. I am definitely looking forward to more "live" recorded releases in the future!

What was even better than the music was seeing John Mayer the personality -- he told stories, chatted with the audience, and did a few duets with Colbie Callait (his opening act). I was impressed by his down-to-earth nature and constant energy, mellow as it was. I highly recommend taking the opportunity to see him if you get a chance -- this was probably one of the best concerts I've ever been to!

Concert Spoiler: John's now sporting a much shorter 'do and apparently decided that he no longer needs to wear shirts while performing.... during our concert, at least...

YouTube of JM playing "Mercy" at our concert: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ygoz8xymSlw

What a difference a year makes....

Wow. My last post was really over a year ago? I'm shocked that it's been so long, but at the same time, it seems like I wrote that just yesterday.... At any rate, let me fill you in on the last year of life!

Last August, Todd and I packed up and moved away from San Antonio. Todd had recently joined a new company that allowed him to work from home, and we took that "freedom" to relocate. I'm still teaching school, so it was important to be somewhere and settled by the start of the new school year. Everything was fine -- until our house in San Antonio sat on the market. And sat... and sat... and sat. What was even more frustrating was the fact that we couldn't buy another house until we sold that one, so we were stuck in limbo. Our saving grace was that we were living with family, so it was really much better than it could have been. The house finally sold in February (almost a year on the market!), and we purchased a beautiful home and are working steadily to get all moved in.

On the job front, I'm still teaching 7th grade math. This was my second year teaching, and it was fantastic! I absolutely love the school I'm in, and I'm looking forward to the new school year. If you ever want to check out what I'm doing in class, you can visit my class website at www.anglinmath.com.

Let's see... as for family, everything is going well. Todd's brother graduated from A&M and will be starting his new job in a few weeks. Abi will be starting 9th grade (I know... can you believe she's already in high school?), and both of our parents are doing well and keeping busy.

Whew... that's a pretty fast summary of the year! Hope this last year has been as good to you as it was to us!

Summer TV

I know, I know, just a few short days ago I was waxing poetic about summer cleaning. Well, now that I've spent the last few days cleaning (and I mean DEEP cleaning!) our house, I've come to the conclusion that I HATE it! There is nothing fun about scrubbing a toilet or washing windows. I do like the end result -- everything pretty and sparkling -- but it's such a pain to get there!!

In other news, I've become immersed in summer TV -- I have it on in the background while I'm cleaning and stuff, and I've come across a few shows that I can't seem to get enough of. Real World: Reunited (the Las Vegas cast is back for round 2 of Real World fun!), Hidden Palms (kinda an OC wannabe by the creater of Dawson's Creek), and Buffy the Vampire Slayer reruns are definitely can't miss shows! Of course, these will soon be replaced when Big Brother, Top Chef, and Project Runway come back, but they'll work as entertainment for now. I've also been playing lots of Guitar Hero and Uno on XBox 360.... yeah, let me tell you, I've been SO productive during my first week of summer!! :)

Summer Cleaning

Ahhh... summer cleaning. There's nothing quite like the feeling of going through your entire wardrobe and giving away stuff that you haven't worn in probably a year -- and in my case, sometimes longer than that! I know I'm guilty of the "I know I haven't worn it lately, but I probably will next summer/winter/snow skiing trip"... aren't we all?? Anyway, I have more clothes than I'll ever need anyway, so it definitely doesn't hurt to go through them every once in awhile. Plus, now there's room for NEW clothes... MUAHAHAHA!!! :)



Anyway, that's how I spent my Saturday night... now I'm playing on the computer and watching "Get Over It", a really cheesy high school musical movie I believe I saw with some friends from the theater (...). I mean, come on, any movie with Sisqo in it has to be worth watching, right?!? I will admit, even though I'm now 25 (ahem, thanks for all the overwhelming birthday wishes, friends... are we seeing how many years in a row we can forget Raemi's birthday??), I still like curling up and watching cheesy teeny-bopper movies from our high school days. Maybe it's because they're so easy to get lost in -- it's either guy likes girl he can't admit to his friends he likes, or girl likes guy she knows she'll never have but if she just tried she'd get him -- that make them so freakin' addictive. Maybe it's because they remind me of my cheesy high school memories (oh man, don't even get me started!). Or maybe it's simply because they're such ridiculous love stories but always seem to work out in the end... I guess I'm just a hopeless romantic. :)


So go pop in Can't Hardly Wait, 10 Things I Hate About You, or the classic She's All That and enjoy some good old-fashioned cheesy moments... and you and I both know that while you may be making fun of them on the outside, you'll secretly be enjoying the whole thing!!

My First Official Days of Summer

My goodness... I'd forgotten how nice it was to sleep in and have time to do whatever you want during the day! So far, I've actually read two books, run a ton of errands, showed my face again at the gym, and caught up on wedding/graduation announcements. I really thought that it would be hard to go from 90 mph to having nothing to do, but it turns out that I still have plenty of things to fill my time... it was all just stuff that I put in the "wait until later" category during the school year.

I haven't started missing my kids yet. Does that make me awful?? :) I do miss my cheerleaders and I DEFINITELY miss seeing my friends every day. It's going to be tough to start a new school without them... hope they don't mind getting emails from me like twice a day!!

I also want to start doing all the touristy sight-seeing things before we leave town. Isn't that always the way, you live somewhere that has all these things to do but you never can find time to do them until it's time to leave? Hopefully this summer will give us time to appreciate what's been in our backyard the whole time. I'll start posting pictures soon! Hope you're having a great summer so far... I know I am! :)