Today is my friend, Terri Burnett's 50th birthday. We went to a surprise birthday party at her sister Mary's house. It was a lot of fun. Here are some pictures. The first picture is Heather, Terri, Amanda, Laurie, Marie, Daniella, and Alyia. The next picture is Terri and Laurie, then there is Dave, Bob and Kevin.









Mary has a very cool and sweet Great Dane named Oso. Here is a picture of Dave with him. He (Oso) weighs 160 pounds.









Here is a picture of Terri and Kevin. Their 31st wedding anniversary is coming up next week.











Then finally, I HAVE to post this picture of Kevin. It's a keeper.

We had another Chick Lunch at Inlet Harbor in Ponce Inlet with Betty and Karen. I love that place. We sat out on the deck that overlooks the river and marina. It was pretty warm...90 plus but they had ceiling fans. We had oysters and I ate some wings. I'm still sticking to my Atkins diet. BTW, I've lost 12 lbs so far.

Today, I just hung out and did absolutely nothing. I love those days. I take that back. I did get involved with a little neighborhood battle. The condos at the end of our street on A1A had their carports destroyed in the hurricanes last year. They blew apart and flew down our street. It was like flying missiles. Well, they are reconstructing their carports. One of my neighbors has started a campaign to make them stop. He's writing letters to everyone short of George Bush and insinuating that he is the spokesperson for our street. I've only met him once, but he seems like sort of a crack pot. Anyway, I disagree. As long as the Condos have a permit and the new carport is built to code then they have a right to build whatever they want. Who are we to say they can't? This IS America. So, I wrote a letter to the Condo owner, the contractor, our county rep and the Code manager (whom he wrote) and told them that he is not our spokesperson and I felt they had the right to build them. I probably should learn to keep my mouth shut but I can't help it.

Tonight we had our ENA (Emergency Nurses Assoc) meeting at Gene's Steak House. Yummy!!! A lot of the race car drivers eat there. It was awesome food. I stuck to my diet and brought Dave home my cheesecake.

We had a really fun party last night. The theme was "Cajun". We had 25 awesome guests. Everyone, including Larry, wore beads and we had Cajun music playing. Everyone brought Cajun foods. We had Jambalaya, Gumbo, Low Country Boil (not really Cajun but we pretended), Dirty Rice, Crawdads, Cajun Seafood Casserole, Onion Pie, Bread Pudding with whisky topping, Spicey Chicken legs,and the list goes on and on. Charley made a huge selections of oysters prepared in different ways (my personal favorite, if there's oysters...I'm there!). We had beer, tea and Hurricanes to drink. Hurricanes are famous in New Orleans but, also, as Trish pointed out that yesterday was the one year anniversary of Hurricane Charley. So Hurricanes were very appropriate. Keith (next door) kept whipping up "Georgia Peaches" in the blender and bringing them over. Terri followed him around like a puppy dog.

Scott and Lisa brought a bottle of Patron Tequilla. OMG! That's awesome stuff! Can it get any better than Patron and oysters? Larry had a great time stealing food and humping guests. Dave put in DVD's...Santana's "Supernatural" and Eric Clapton's "Cross Roads". They were a big hit and had people on their feet dancing. We had some VooDoo dolls (we got in New Orleans) and tried to heal Karen of her snoring and Jane of her "seriousness". Keith said he needed special healing and stuffed the VooDoo doll down his pants!

I finally got to meet Cliff's girlfriend Sandra. I was beginning to think she was a pretend person. Cliff made a marinaded mix of peppers, okra, baby corns that was really good. Poor Dave Z. had a cut and had 3 drunk nurses (sorry Mom) trying to glue him back together.

Kevin made sure he stayed awake this time. At the last party, he ended up with painted fingernails and toenails. This time we had the pink panties out and waiting for him.

Peter Jennings died yesterday. That's very sad. I've always had a crush on him.

Yesterday we had a "Chick Lunch" at the "Blue". It is a restaurant on A1A in Flagler Beach. It was great food and a neat atmosphere. I'm still on Atkins, so I had a Skirt Steak Salad that was awesome. Jane and Karen had Barbeque Chicken Salad that they liked. And Betty had a rare burger and fries. She might as well have bitten into a cow. She loves her meat rare. Then we went shopping and then to Jane's house. We also checked out Jane and Charlie's properties. Gosh....I feel so inadequate! It's amazing how much property value in this area has increased.

Last night I was running late for supper. Charlie told me a cool way to fix chicken. You cut down both sides of the back and remove it. Then open the chicken up and flatten it. Then put it on the grill (the guts side down) and cook it about 30-45 minutes until it's done. I put some butter and herbs on top in the beginning. You don't have to keep checking it because if the bottom burns then...so what? You don't eat that part anyway. It was yummy and soooooo easy. Now I have to experiment with different variations of this.

I'm trying to learn Spanish. Maybe one day I can be a skinny, spanish girl. I got a book and 8 CD's to learn beginning spanish. Man, I must be a little slow. Yesterday I got a "Let's Sing and Learn Spanish" children's book. The CD is in Spanish and the song book is in both Spanish and English. Hey, whatever works. Adios amigos!

Well, I started the Atkins diet yesterday. I know, the diet is not in vogue now but it's the only one that will help me drop some lbs. I plan to go off it every other weekend for a mental health break plus it seems to jump start me when I reach the plateau that always come with the diet. I'm a forum junkie so here are a few websites with good diet forums:

3 fat chicks forums
Low carb friends

Also, if you want to look up calories, carbs, cholesterol, etc, here is a good guide to use. You just type in the name of the food:

Calorie King

I guess I have to get off my butt and exercise too. I think I'll try to incorporate yard and house work (YUK) into the exercise program so I can kill two birds with one stone. Also, I'll be going with Dave when he walks Larry (or Larry walks him, I'm not which one is correct). I started walking with them yesterday and Dave said that is the slowest they've ever walked . Thanks Dave.

We drove home on Sunday. Check out this rain cloud that we saw as we drove over the St. John's River bridge in Jacksonville. We drove into it a few minutes later.

We went to Atlanta over the weekend. It was a great trip until we got to Locust Grove. Then, Holy Moly! The traffic was bumper to bumper. It took an hour to get to Mom & Dad's house. This pic was in South Georgia where the traffic was much better.


When we got there the roast beef, mashed potatoes and gravy, peas, corn on the cob, pecan pie, carrot cake, and cherry cheese cake were ready and calling our names. We always eat like piggies when we go to mom & dad's. Saturday morning we had bacon and eggs, homemade biscuits and bulldog gravy, OJ and coffee. Everyone came over Saturday afternoon and we had fried chicken, mashed potatoes, pan gravy, biscuits, corn on the cob, green beans, baked beans and the same desserts. Then Sunday we had sausage, eggs, bulldog gravy, OJ and coffee. How's that for adding a few more pounds to the rear end? It's all their fault!


We looked at Rachel's pictures of her month long visit to Africa. How awesome! I want to go so bad. However, I'd be afraid of bumping into naked boy in the desert!





Dad has been working in the yard. It's hard work, especially with that red clay. But the results are great. Steve brought over some cuttings from a flowering bush (I don't remember the name) and Dad planted these twigs around the perimeter of the back yard. Now they are twigs with some green leaves. We are going to take pictures of these twigs every time we go up so we can document their progress. Here is one shot of them (you have to look very close).









Also, here is a picture of mom and dad sitting by some of his gardening handy work.
Aren't the flowers beautiful?