Halloween is tomorrow. I still haven't carved our pumpkin.

FINALLY! We saw "The Last King of Scotland" this weekend. We drove 40 miles to see it. It was worth it. It was creepy and mezmerizing. Actually filmed in Uganda, the poverty is definitely still rampant, but the green hills and red dirt roads were beautiful. Unfortunately, it is not playing much of anywhere so if and when it comes out on DVD I highly recommend it.
(I know that my mother will probably comment about how she wants to see that movie about the Queen of England. I think this evolved from her not remembering that "The Last King of Scotland" is about Idi Amin, cruel dictator of Uganda, and immediately thnking fothe Queen of England when I said King of Scotland. Something to do with the Stone of Scone maybe?)

Firday, I dreamt I had a third eye. Of course, I didn't realize that I had a third eye until I was putting in my contacts and I had this nifty three-part container for all three contacts I was about to put into my eyes. I wonder if this has something to do with my chakras being aligned or something?

Overall, I think we had one of our busiest in-town weekends. Depsite that I have approximately 3 people in all of the Chicago area that I consider close friends, I was amazed at how much stuff we managed to do this weekend:
* Friday afternoon I went to Dave & Busters for a team building afternoon for work. * Friday night I had dinner with some friends who I used to work with
* Saturday, I did a little email reference work, went to two shindigs.
* Sunday, I attended a Sisterhood luncheon at the synagogue where everyone was probably at least 10 years older than me. We had a speaker talk about finances for women over 40.
* Sunday evening we dorve downtown, went to Kiehl's, the Aloha Grill and to see a movie about Idi Amin. So all in all, a lovely enjoyable weekend!

The pool cover has officially been on for two weeks! Of course it has been raining for almost that long and it's starting to resemble a pool on top of a pool with a small island in the middle (That would be the bubble that you put on top of the water to keep it from doing something. Freezing, collecting water? I'm not really sure).
I keep having dreams about The Amazing Race and I'm always eliminated but Phil keeps me around becuase he finds me interesting. This last dream we were in Miami Beach. The funny thing is we haven't watched the show in about a month. But dreams never mean what you actuall dream. This dream would probably be interpreted as "you will face financal victories at work" or some such craziness.

I also dreamt the other night that me and two friends won the lottery but in order for me to get my share, I had to marry one of the two friends, the one who happened to be gay. We had this weird wedding and all the bridesmaids were wearing long red crocheted dresses and the location was like this pay-by-the-hour motel with banquet facilities.

My dreams are much more interesting than my regular life on most days.

I have social events lined up all weekend. I feel very popular, but it's definitely a rarity. On Sunday I play bunko. that will be odd since I think it has something to do with dice and maybe the bunko squad will show up?

On a weird note, I left work at 5 yesterday since I didn't take a lunch break and then sat in traffic for 45 minutes because some driver decided to either wreck, stall or skid off the road and traffic was at a standstill. Should have just stayed at work. That'll teach me. On the other hand I got to tell ninjagirl all about my weird dreams and things.

My parents are in town visiting. They came in on the 19th and are leaving tomorrow. My birthday was last Wednesday. Martin bought me roses and my parents bought me a ceramic bull head from the fine people at Terra Fina Market in St. Augustine.

On Thursday evening after they arrived late on AA, as usual, we had dinner with many people, including ninjagirl and Dave-O at the Tiki Terrace. it was delicious. Our waiter, homesick for Guam, was thrilled to know people that had actually gone to Guam.

On Saturday we went to Naperville to see my cousin and aunt & uncle. We also wanted to go to Sur La Table and the Penzey's spice store. It was nice weather, depsite everyone saying it would rain all day. It only started raining when we headed home.

On Sunday we went to Architectural Artifacts and decided taht most of thestuff there is neat but overpriced. They had a pachinko machine in horrible condition for over $300. But it was really cool looking. We kept thinking that the last time we were there that there was a bab y coffin there, but Mom informed us that it was a sample coffin, not a baby coffin. The salesman would carry around to people's houses and show them a minature version of the larger size. I still think it was a baby coffin.

We also went to Old Orchard mall and Paper Source in Evanston. That was nice since there aren't cool places to buy paper like that in the burbs, or anywhere west of Oak Park actually. We even got to have lunch at the Pita Inn, which I love love love the Baba Ganoush!
Lat night we watched Super Troopers. My parents apparently know one of the guy's in there's parents. I'm sure they are very proud. Did I just use an inappropriate apostrophe? I'm not sure...

So, busy weekend. Still need to do some laundry.

Things I completed on my pseudo weekend:
*created a lovely collage using paper cranes from my wedding
*vacuumed upstairs & downstairs
*bought frames for the Rome prints my mother bought for us in, Rome.
*had a lovely Indian buffet lunch with Ninjagirl. (I wonder if she likes this new nickname I just penned for her?)
*waited in line at the P.O. behind some idiot with four wild hellions she probably calls children.
*made pot roast
*did not make challah from scratch
*three loads of laundry
*winterized the pool while it was snowing- on OCTOBER 12!
*got pool cover on in a record-breaking 25 minutes
*told neighbor boy I wouldn't buy a Christmas wreath

We returned to lovely autumn weather last night after our jaunt to South FLA this weekend to celebrate the marriage of two of our friends, James & Rose. The wedding was quite lovely and quite pink! They probably had the best appetizers that I have ever experienced at a wedding... everything from crab rangoon to beef patties and chicken quesadilla wraps and conch fritters! Wow, they were all quite delightful. The ceremony was lovely but brief. Thankfully so since the weather was rather toasty. We enjoyed sitting at a table at the reception with several other graduates of Martin's university. Strangely they knew people I had worked with in the library. Strangely they all insisted on acting like they were at dance club and grooved to the music on the dancefloor with beer bottle in had. I swear that one of the girls with them drank about 20 beers. Sometimes I don't get that.

On Sunday we experienced Jai Alai in Dania Beach. For those of you unfamiliar with why this is so fun, Martin & I used to go watch when I lived in Orlando. Click on the link above to find out how it's played. Unfortunately, it's a dying breed and not many people are interested in watching and betting on Spaniards play a more violent version of racketball. I picked a player to bet on that had a similiar name to a player I had enjoyed watching in Orlando about three years ago. Found out this morning that he did play in O-town in 2003 so I think it's actually him!!!

So after some trouble with unnamed new-ish airline headquartered in Florida, we made our way back to Chicago.

I just wanted to let everyone know that I got called a cracker today. Not the crunchy yummy kind, but the weird derogatory word for some sort of SOutherner that I am most certainly not.

So there was a crazy rain storm last night, supposed to be another one tonight. What fun it is to live in Illinois!

We observed Yom Kippur without incident yesterday. The lightening was a very cool addition to last night's service however! We attended the last service of the day, 2 hours long, and then broke the fast with the rest of the congregation. There was really yummy egg salad but I probably should not have eaten so much of it.

This weekend we did a little bit of nothing. (nothing meaning a whole lot). We got togetehr with my high school buddy Heather on Friday in the Loop for some dinner at the Grill Room. We had eaten there back in February when we went to see Demetri Martin in concert and stayed at the Palmer House Hilton. It was good to see heather since i haven't seen her since Martin and me got hitched.

We got the pool partially ready for winter by unhooking the filter and electricity. Now the pool is fuller than ever with all the rain! I planted some lovely mums in the front of the house in hopes that they will grow where nothing has grown before. I'm hopeful. I am also almost finished spreading mulch around the yard in places that need it. It's amazing what a difference it makes.

I have also moved to my new cube as of today. I might just have to take a picture of the gorgeous view I have now. I also need to procure a mirror so that I can enjoy it when I'm working at the computer. The daylight already feels as if it's better for my eyes!