Happy belated birthday, Gwyl!

Here are this week’s words:

1. Apposite: suitable; well-adapted; pertinent; relevant; apt.
2. Argot: a specialized idiomatic vocabulary peculiar to a particular class or group of people, esp. that of an underworld group, devised for private communication and identification.
3. Ascetic: a person who dedicates his or her life to a pursuit of contemplative ideals and practices extreme self-denial or self-mortification for religious reasons.
4. Asperity: harshness or sharpness of tone, temper, or manner; severity; acrimony.
5. Assuage: to make milder or less severe; relieve; ease; mitigate.

Yesterday started out as a very frustrating day, but it ended with a lot of fun!

For the past two weeks, I’ve been going to a water aerobics class.  It’s been a lot of fun and a lot of hard work.  I realized the first week that I needed a new swimsuit.  My suit is many years old, the elastic is basically gone, it’s a little too small, and there’s no support for those out-of-the-water jumps!

Today was the day I decided to go looking for a swimsuit.  I wasn’t exactly looking forward to going swimsuit shopping because I’m already self-conscious enough about certain areas of my body and swimsuits just seem to enhance those areas.  But, I know this is for a good cause–becoming healthy and fit–and frankly, I love to swim. My niece Megan and I went to four different stores looking for swimsuits.  Because autumn fashions are here, the pickings were slim in some stores, which I was expecting.  However, there’s a store completely dedicated to swimwear around here and I figured I’d be able to find something there at least. Fat chance! This store only caters to smaller women, so there was nothing that met my needs.  I even called three different stores asking them if they carried plus-size swimsuits.  They all said no.  It was so frustrating!

I decided to look on the Internet for a swimsuit because I figured season fashions don’t affect what’s available and they probably have more sizes to choose from.  Fortunately, I found a swimsuit I liked at WomanWithin.com and it’s purple! Woo hoo! (The above picture is an actual picture of the swimsuit I ordered.) It’s a two-piece, which is nice when it comes to getting in and out of it, and it has built-in support. I ordered the suit and it should be here no later than October 2. Hopefully, it’ll fit properly. *keeping fingers crossed*

Megan and I also went to a couple of stores looking for a specific brand and color of yarn, but we couldn’t find that either.  I had seen it in a Walmart on Friday afternoon and I would’ve bought it, but I got the color that I needed mixed up in my head and didn’t buy it because I didn’t think they had the right one.  They did have one skein, which is all I need.  Megan and I went there yesterday and the skein had been bought.  The frustrating thing about it is that Walmart is getting rid of this brand, so they won’t be getting anymore of it in. (Once I got home, I looked for the yarn online. Luckily, I can still buy it! That helps a bit! I love the Internet! )

We did find a couple of things that we needed so it wasn’t all bad.  Megan wanted to get Brisingr and it was sold out when we looked on Monday, but she found it today.  I also needed a couple of new bras and found a style that fits me well, offers great support, and shapes me nicely.  (I know that was probably a little bit of TMI, but in order for you to realize the awesomeness of my find, I had to tell you. )

After we went shopping, Megan and I went to Jamba Juice with my friend Debbie.  I had planned to do this with Debbie and since Megan came shopping with me, she tagged along.  Debbie and Megan seemed to get along nicely, so that was good.  I haven’t had a Jamba Juice in so long!  It was so yummy!  It was just what I needed after the long day of shopping and from having been in a hot car on a hot day for four hours (our air conditioner doesn’t work ).  We talked for about an hour at Jamba Juice before we headed over to Debbie’s to do some more talking, hanging out, and having fun!

While we were at Debbie’s, Megan, Debbie, Tarl (Debbie’s hubby), and I played Scene-It on their XBox 360.  It was so much fun.  You get points for answering the questions correctly and quickly.  We played two games in which I won both. I was extremely surprised.  I just hope Debbie and Tarl won’t stop playing the game with me.

In the final round, the more questions you answer correctly, the more points you get because your score doubles with each correct answer.  If you get one wrong, then you start back at face value.  During the second game, I was winning by maybe 10,000 points, but then I got lucky and the last question had to do with Jurassic Park! I ended up winning by 30,000 points.

As many of you know, I’m kind of obsessed with that movie because John Williams composed the score and it was the first scary movie I ever watched without having nightmares afterward.  I was so excited when they showed the Jurassic Park scene that I actually screamed! The questions are listed below. I’ll put the correct answers in the comments; the distracters aren’t the same ones that were used in the game because I can’t remember them all.

1. Who directed Jurassic Park?
   a. George Lucas
   b. Robert Zemeckis
   c. Steven Spielberg
   d. Ridley Scott
2. What dinosaurs are in this scene? (Click the picture for a bigger image.)
   a. Galamimus
   b. Velociraptor
   c. Teranadon
   d. Dilophosaurus
3. What year was Jurassic Park released?
   a. 1992
   b. 1993
   c. 1994
   d. 1996
4. Which actor played Dr. Ian Malcolm?
   a. Sam Neill
   b. Sir Richard Attenborough
   c. Joseph Mazello
   d. Jeff Goldblum

When I got home from work yesterday, I was surprised to find our friends, James and Meagan, in our living room! We try to hang out every couple of weeks so this was a pleasant surprise.

Normally, when they come over to hang out, we usually eat pizza and watch some shows that have been recorded on our TiVo–Burn Notice, Futurama, Family Guy, and sometimes, Robot Chicken.  However, this time around, we didn’t really have anything recorded.  We decided to eat at Coney’s and then come home and play some Nintendo games.

Coney’s was so good!  Their frozen custard is the best!  Unfortunately, their service wasn’t the best last night. We ordered our dinner and asked the staff if we could have our custards after we were done.  This is normal at Coney’s, so they had no problem in obliging our request.  However, when it came time to get our custards, they served everyone else before us.  They had lost our order and they didn’t want to take the time to talk to us about it.  They just kept saying, “Yours will be right out!”

Corey didn’t order anything with our dinner, so I got in line to order him one and the girl glared at me and said, “Are you wondering about your ice creams again?” I was ready to turn into Corey and do something to get her fired.  But, I didn’t.  After everyone else had their custards, the girl come to our table and said, “I’m assuming that I haven’t brought your custards out yet.  I must have lost the order.  I’ll go look for it now.”  About 30 minutes later, we finally got our custards and a $5 gift certificate.

Before we went to Coney’s, James was talking about how much he liked to play Sim City.  So, I was excited to show him the version I had.  Little did he know, it was on the Super Nintendo.

Once we got back from Coney’s, he decided he wanted to play Super Mario World because it was one of his favorite games when he was younger and even though he’s conquered the game before, he’s never seen all the worlds and I have.  We took turns being Mario and passing all the worlds each and every way they could be passed.  We got to the Vanilla Dome Ghost House after a couple of hours of playing.  Since it was time to go home, we saved the game and will resume another time.

I thought I’d post a poll about what you’d like to see on my blog in the future.  My friend Debbie did this on her blog and I thought it was a good idea.

Here are this week’s words:

1. Anathema: a formal ecclesiastical ban, curse, or excommunication.
2. Animadversion: very harsh criticism; strong disapproval.
3. Antediluvian: of or belonging to the period before the Flood.
4. Aplomb: great self-confidence; self-assuredness.
5. Apotheosis: the elevation or exaltation of a person to the rank of a god.

A couple of weeks ago, I mentioned that my friends’ son Jack wanted to spend some time with Uncle Corey and Aunt Jenni all by himself.  He got that chance today! While Tyler was at the BYU vs. Wyoming game today and Ali was shopping with Sheridan, Jack came over to our house for a few hours to hang out.

Whenever Jack comes over to our house, he likes to play with our computers, my Mr. Potato Heads, and our blocks.  He also loves to spend some time with our kitties–Cassie, Tigger, and Dax–even if they don’t want to spend time with him.

He loves to take pictures on our computers because of all the fun filters.  He likes to use any of the filters that turn him green because green is his favorite color.

Even though he loves to take pictures, his favorite thing to do on my computer is go to YetiSports and play the “penguin game.”  I showed him these games about two years ago because he wanted to see what we could do on the computer.  He was instantly hooked!  His favorite game is the “Seal Bounce” because he can play that one without my help, although he does laugh at all the other games too.

After we played the “penguin game,” he wanted to play Mario Party and Mario Golf.  He’s never asked to play them before; he’s always looked at our games and asked what they were, but that’s it.  This time, however, he kept saying, “These are my favorite games.  I’ve never played them, but remember they’re my favorite.”  Uncle Corey spent some time with him on the GameCube.  They tried Mario Party, Bomberman, Mario Kart, and Mario Sunshine.  Jack really liked Mario Sunshine because he could fly and squirt the water.  He did a pretty good job at controlling Mario.

After that, we went outside and kicked the soccer ball around for a little bit.  Jack also found a “wand” in the backyard and turned Uncle Corey into a monster and alligator a few times by saying the magic words, “Bibidi bobidi boo” or “Ala kazam.”  Once Uncle Corey was vanquished, Jack and I had a wand fight.  That was a lot of fun and Jack came out as the victor because his wand broke mine.

After we were done with our wands, Jack wanted to walk by his old house.  He and I went on a little walk around the neighborhood.  We took lots of shortcuts through the fences into the common areas on the way back.  We even walked by a couple of his friends’ houses.

Before Ali came to pick him up, he told us he wanted to stay for a really long time and he wanted to sleep in our bed. We told him he had to go home to sleep, but he could come hang out with us by himself another time.  He liked that idea.

Here are this week’s words:

1. Abstruse: hard to understand; recondite; esoteric.
2. Acumen: keen insight; shrewdness.
3. Adumbrate: to produce a faint image or resemblance of; to outline or sketch.
4. Aggrandize: to widen in scope; increase in size or intensity; enlarge; extend.
5. Ameliorate: to make or become better, more bearable, or more satisfactory; improve; meliorate.