Happy Birthday, Nova Sophia!

{One year ago: November 26, 2012}

 

One year ago today, my sweet little niece was born. Nova, you are the sweetest, smartest one-year-old I know. So much has happened in the last year, but most importantly, you helped to expand our family and bring us all closer together. We love you so much, Novy-Bear! Happy, happy birthday, Sweet Pea!

 

Some highlights from Nova'a first year with Aunt Mo-Mo (are you ready for picture overload??):

 

{Christmas 2012-just a teeny, tiny babe!}

{Even though Mommy Heather is a Jayhawk,
Auntie M always provides the proper purple apparel.}

{Valentine's Day 2013}







{Six months!}

{Halloweenie 2013}

 

Bama-Rama



{Welcome to Selma, Alabama!}



I am currently getting ready to wrap up my second solo trip. It’s going well! I am truly starting to enjoy the travel and the actual job I have when I arrive on site at a pharmacy. Everyone has been super nice and I haven’t had any major issues yet (cross your fingers and knock on some wood…I have heard horror stories involving dead robots and irate pharmacists). So, yeah! Getting in the groove. This trip sent me to Selma, Alabama. I had never been to Alabama, or really anywhere in the south, and this trip was an eye-opener. So, I have put together a little collaborative list of tidbits I have gained so far from my ventures in Bama.

Southern draaaaawls? They’re real. I love them. I especially love Mr. Alfred, who is like 70 years old and has worked in the pharmacy for 40-something years. And he talks like a true southurn gentleman, all long, drawn-out syllables and soft vowel sounds. The colloquialisms down here are lovely: “How you be this mornin?”; “Now, I’ll see ya’ll real soon”; “I’m fixin to head on ova to the store here in a bit.” It just sounds friendly. And they call everyone “mister” and “miss,” and say “yes sir” and “no m’am.” I LOVE IT.

Alabama has the best drink selection at fast food restaurants I have ever seen. I’m talking purple Fanta in the fountain at McDonalds (“MacDonalds,” really). And one restaurant has the COOLEST drink fountain I have ever seen. It’s touch-screen and there are over 100 drink choices. I had lime ginger ale tonight. Have you ever had lime ginger ale? Didn’t think so.

 

{Umm, yeah. That's a touch screen drink fountain. And yes, I took a pic of it.}

Umm, hello Zaxby’s! You should head on up north and open up a few franchises. (Hmmm…retirement plan…) Zaxby’s is amazing! It’s kind of like a Chik-Fil-A in that there are a lot of chicken choices, but it has way more fried sides to choose from (spicy fried mushrooms? Spicy white cheddar bites? Onion skins? Yes please!) and the afore-mentioned ah-mazing drink fountain. I may or may not have eaten dinner there three nights in a row. But that is also because this little town has nothing but fast food restaurants to choose from. Fast food and churches. There are a LOT of churches. And loan stores…? Like, every other building is a loan place. Speedy Cash, Payday Loans, Speedy Loans, Car Title and Loan, I mean….it goes on and on.



{My poor picture quality does not do this place justice.}

Small town pharmacies have the best candy selection. (Not just in Selma; Kinsley was pretty kick-ass as well.) Who knew there are such thing as cinnamon Mentos? Also, I have discovered I eat a lot of candy when it is readily available. Today, I ate two sleeves of Mentos (rainbow, also delish), a bag of sour gummy bears and a bag of peach rings. And…some Reece’s Pieces. My teeth are currently tingling.

Selma is very historic. I didn’t really realize it when I arrived, but I found out that Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.  led several now-historic walks through Selma on the way to Montgomery. I crossed the bridge they marched across several times. (Pic is above.) Many of the buildings in the downtown area are over 100 years old. In fact, the pharmacy I am training at has been around since 1870. The reverence and history are palpable here. In fact, today, my new-favorite pharm staff took me exploring through the floors above the pharmacy, and those pics deserve their own post, because it was SO. DARN. COOL. Check back soon for a full post devoted to the fab pharmacy that is Pilcher-McBryde Drug Company. 

Canada, Oh Canada

{Apparently, mine is pointing north.}

I have had a week. You know, one of those weeks that you sit down at the end of each day and just go, “ughhhhhhh.” Nothing catastrophic, per say, but just enough little things that add up and start to wear on you. (Basically, this post falls under the “poor me” category. Get ready for some self-indulgent venting. And yes, I realize that I have a wonderful life and these are not true problems. But again, see the previous self-indulgence disclaimer.)

It started on Monday. I was working in the office (not traveling this week, which is fine, but consequently less hours, which of course equals less paycheck, a headache in and of itself) and talking to a few other trainers who had been with the company for a while. We were talking about the Schedule (the oh-so-important Excel-spreadsheet-trainer-schedule that shows where everyone will be, when; hence, the capitalization) and checking out the upcoming months. Okay, so I’m going to Alabama, Texas, North Carolina (southern states! Hooray for warm climates!) and then….ON. ON? What state is ON? Oh, let me tell you friends. It’s Ontario. As in Canada.

 

Okay, so Canada. I can handle Canada. I have my passport. It will be chilly, but I have lots of cute coats. And then I look at the dates. December 28-31. New Year’s Eve. Okay. My first question (a dumb one, I’ll admit) was, Canada celebrates New Year’s, right? Shouldn’t everyone have New Year’s Eve off? Why is this silly Canadian pharmacy training people on New Year’s Eve? I’m a little bummed at this point; I mean, New Year’s is an overhyped holiday for sure, but I already found a cute dress, which is half the battle right there.

 

So thoughts are racing through my head…I’ll have to pack my dress and shoes and makeup and change as soon as I land, and then just head to the party, wherever that may be….that’s not so awful. I can handle getting ready in an airport bathroom. No biggie. And then I GoogleMap where my actual site is—Ontario, sure, but Ontario is apparently ginormous. It is also a good three or four hours from the international airport in Toronto. (Who can tell the exact time, because why does Canada use kilometers? I HATE CANADA ALREADY.) And we can’t leave a pharmacy site before 2:00pm. And I will have a four hour drive. And there are no international flights out of Toronto at 6:00pm. And I will have to get a hotel room by the airport and leave the next morning. Thus, I will be spending New Year’s Eve in a hotel, by myself, in Canada. By myself. BY MYSELF IN CANADA! It’s sad. It’s a tragedy. I am throwing myself a pity party. My friend Kelly said that we could Facetime with bottles of champagne. To which I replied wailed, “you can’t even get cell reception in Canada. Sniff.”

 

So, I will be all by myself on New Year’s, huddled in a crappy old hotel room (actually, probably a nice Doubletree, but STILL) in another country while the rest of the world rings in 2014 with friends, family, kisses, killer beats, champagne and party poppers. (I think I will miss the poppers the most. Nothing says “celebration” like confetti. Or champagne-induced dance moves.)

 

I’m sure I’ll have more to say on this subject as the time draws closer, but I’m going to end my lamenting on that subject for now. The rest of my week? Let me just share: Rascal killed a baby mouse and brought it in my house on Monday night. He was proud. I gagged. And then I picked it up in a baggie and threw it in the trash. Also, I messed up my timecard for work and got a tersely worded email from my boss. She was also not impressed (read—I got a look) with me when I mentioned that maybe someone else would like to spend New Year’s in Canada. And I forgot to set my DVR for Vanderpump Rules. (I know, I know. It's a trainwreck of a show, but I just can't stop watching.) Sigh. It’s just been one of those weeks.