Selling my Cybook on eBay

I finally took the time to list my Cybook on eBay tonight. It's hard to let it go but.....I have to do it. Here is the link in case any of you are interested. I am selling it with 79 books loaded onto it. I have a list of the books in the auction, as well as details on the Cybook itself. =)

Holy Strawberry Batman!

I thought I would take a picture of my huge strawberry. Teehee This is just one of them. I bought 4 plastic containers of them because they looked so yummy. The boxes were only $2 so frankly...I couldn't resist. I haven't seen strawberries like these since I left California 7 years ago. Now.....do I snack on them out of the box or do I make something with them? Hmmmm decisions decisions.

My cat is driving me insane!

Many of you have seen my videos of Chewie and think he is the cutest thing. In fact, some of you have told me that you would love a cat like him. Well....after this week, you can have him! He is driving me insane.

Don't get me wrong, I love my cat. He is very sweet and cuddly. He snuggles and has this really cute snotty sounding purr when he is really happy.

I have been trying to monitor how much he eats because he is starting to get a little heavy and has a kitty belly. According to the new bag of food, he should be getting about 3/4 - 1 cup of food a day. SO....I am using a 1/4 measuring cup and feeding him 3 times a day. Well, that was the plan, he's getting fed about 4 times a day because he keeps whining. When I say whining, please translate that to mean - caterwauling, jumping on top of me, trying to get into his food in the kitchen, and doing things he knows he isn't supposed to do. I'm sure you know what I mean if you have children. He does that thing where they think any attention is good attention. Chewie's particular bag of tricks includes chewing on my shelves, chewing on the metal handle that opens my window, licking my pictures that are accessible to him when he squeezes his head in a drawer, etc.

He does this, like clockwork, at 5 AM in the morning.....every day. I am trying to not "reward" him when he is being a pain so I have to wait until he shuts up for at least 2 minutes before I feed him. At 5 AM, those minutes seem to last forever. Why can't he be good like his brother, Tigger?

Object of Joy Part 1

Today I received my new object of joy, this BEAUTIFUL signed jersey. For those of you that aren't familiar with Liquigas, it's a cycling team from Italy. This jersey was signed while at the Tour of California this year. The riders on the team were: Ivan Basso, Kjell Carlstrom, Francesco Chicchi, Daniel Oss, Jacopo Guarnieri, Vincenzo Nibali, Brian Vandborg, and Alessandro Vanotti. Thanks to Rory for helping me out on this one.

I was pretty bummed that once again, I would be missing the Tour of California. Of course they started the ToC AFTER I moved. What's up with that? I was even more disappointed because a few days before the ToC started, I found out that the Tour of Missouri isn't going through Branson this year. BOOO I don't get to help organize the Branson leg of the ToM, the thing I have looked forward to for the past two years. That also means I don't get to see the riders/teams AND that my trying to learn Italian is pointless (seeing as there aren't any Italians out here).

The ToC was a great race this year. The crowds were INSANE! I suppose part of me was a little relieved that I didn't have to deal with those crowds. I don't like when people walk right through me...it tends to tick me off. I loved watching it on the VS channel each day and reading the different blogs and seeing the pictures. It helped me keep up with things and I didn't feel like I was missing as much, or so I kept telling myself.

That being said, the jersey wipes all of my complaining away. =) Now I just need to figure out a good way to frame it. I have found a few great ideas but they are pretty spendy.

Here's a pic with me wearing it. YEP, I know it's a tad huge but that's ok....I won't be wearing it, just framing it. Wahooo

Beanie Babies

I really should have taken a picture of my collection but honestly, all of the items would NOT fit into the picture. As I have previous stated, I am a collector of many things. Back in the 90's Ty Beanie Babies were high on my list. Many of you may remember the Beanie Baby craze. $5 bean bag animals that took over the world and spawned a nation-wide craze. People would pay high dollars for those rare and hard to find toys. The fad created such a high demand for the retired ones that counterfeits were made. It was these counterfeits that brought down the values, much to my dismay.

I got into the craze early on and made a decent amount of money off of these things. I would line up at 6 AM, along with all the other crazies, to purchase these little treasures. You would be surprised by the amount of money someone would pay you for something that will be available everywhere in another month or so. For instance, when the Princess Diana Bear came out, I bought it for $6, traded it with someone online for Rex, a retired one, and sold it on eBay for over $800! Craziness I tell you. OH, and yes, I did mention trading. I traded these online so that I could get better ones or complete my own collection. Also, every weekend I would go to Beanie Baby trade shows...pathetic huh? It was a culture unto itself. You had to learn all of the different hang tag generations and make sure that the tags were in mint condition with a tag protector.

I also got into the Disney Beanies and Ty Attic Treasures. *sigh You can only imagine my collection.

Today Adam and I finally went through my boxes o' toys. I have literally hundreds of these things. My next mission...eBay them all outta here. Well, I AM going to keep my favorite ones, including one, Peking, that I could have sold for $2000. YES, I am kicking myself for hanging onto it. I also have 2 pairs of the Patriotic Trio: Righty, Lefty and Libearty, that sold for $1000 at one time. Ah well...no sense in crying over what could have been. WAAAAHHHH

Our 7th Anniversary

This year we had to celebrate our anniversary late. The actual date is January 5th however, we couldn't do anything until February 20th because Adam has been on tour. As per tradition, we went to the Chateau on the Lake. It's a beautiful hotel situated on Table Rock Lake. We decided to grab lunch instead of dinner and...well....I liked it better it better than the dinners that we have had.

This is the view from our table. It was waaaay too cold to sit outside.

Because it was our anniversary, they gave us a complimentary dessert. Yummmmm

and the winner is...

THE SONY

I finally made my decision. Honestly, I'm not 100% sure of my final decision but....there it is. I decided that I wanted to keep the Sony because, well....I WON IT! I figured I should keep my prize. I do like the side button functions that allow me to get to my library of books faster. The page turn is also faster than the Cybook. I still think that the bottom right circular button is useless. It is supposed to be a history button or something like that. I plan on using a hack so that I can use that as a page turn button. Hopefully the hack will work because it is where the page turn button is on the Cybook and I am used to that location. Frankly, it makes sense to have it on the right side as opposed to the left side, which is how it is configured.

So...my plan is to sell my beloved Cybook on Ebay along with the books that I have already bought for it. Hopefully I will make enough money back to replace some of those books on my Sony. That being said...I still may hang onto the Cybook because it is so stinking light! I'll be sure and post if I sell my Cybook.

mmmmMuffins

The muffins looked much yummier in person. I suppose I should have wiped the spray off of the pan to make it prettier. I used the last of my fresh blueberries for this batch. Yummm. You have to love exploded berries! Adam has been gone for a week and came home tonight for one night. I tried to time the muffins to come out of the oven as he walked in the door. He came home as I was putting the last one on the cooling rack. How's that for timing?