I'm really glad because it's starting to really warm up down here. The air is in transitioning from the spring with chilly undertones to the moist night air of the south. Some call it humidity, I call it heaven.

I was at Orange Beach last weekend and it was a little chilly. I still have that Ohio winter in my blood I guess. I remember moving form here back to there in October. That winter was the COLDEST I have ever felt. BONECHILLING. I'm happy to tell all of you that I haven't been experiencing that total body cramp when I walk outside, my teeth no longer feel like they're going to crack into tiny pieces and I no longer have to put my fingers under the faucet to get them warm. Sweet.

Today I woke up and went to meet Ashley and her SWWEEET daughter Bristol at Pensacola Beach.

Ashley is a girl that I worked with every morning, at the Dressage Farm -oops, Academy (I consider it to be the place where I learned how to ride, sorta...except for when I was scared.)

Her and I cleaned out stalls and did all that goodstuff. She's a southern girl with the softness and patience of the "stero-typical southern belle", however that she is not. She's the toughest girl I with the most sense I ever met. She made me think Wranglers are cool. I saw a HUGE (young) draft cross turn around and kick her square in the chest. She dropped to her knees. STILL holding the horse... I wanted to run over to her. I couldn't do anything with two horses in my hands and I could have sworn he just at LEAST made her next step be: being rushed to the hospital. She got up, brushed her knees off and said "I'm fine." (!?!?) To me that says a lot more than just the words, "I'm fine". She could've said "I'm awesome." She's got two beautiful little kids now and her husband, Michael built her a great barn on this great property, with this great house. I will keep my horse there. There will be a covered arena and lights too. Except we will probably fight over who gets to clean stalls.

It's so cute to me when little kids want to be naked on the beach. Is it cool to the public? Hell, I'd say "hey whatever". I mean little kids, like two years old. That's not old enough for sex offending child molesters is it?

I laid there for a little while longer, that's when I saw the dude totally from LOST.

that's him, in the middle

I got the urge to go over to the vacation-ie everything for you with PENSACOLA BEACH silk-screened-onto-it store. They have bathing suits too. After driving around the parking lot six times I went BACK to the parking lot of the public beach so that I could walk across the street to the store.

It took me 15 minutes to get across the street and then I had to drive around THAT parking lot for another 20 until I found a place. I was thinking that Flounders (read about that situation here) was having a shift change in about a half an hour so I tried to hover around those spots. Now I'm laughing out loud at my computer.


it's SPRING BREAK!

I didn't go into the water because the surfers had wet suits on. Still too cold for me. I thought that I had covered all of my body with the sunscreen but I guess I missed the middle of my back and the top of my legs. Crazy that you can see the outline of the fingers where the sunscreen ended. It's kinda burnie and itchy right now. I used to have a HUGE aloe plant, it was used often by visitors. It's the best thing for sunburn, I mean why would you put some chemical filled aloe lotion on when you can go right to the source? Aloe stems 2 inches wide, just crack it open and RUB. NO BURNING after about a minute, I SWEAR.

game is way too simple

A leftover lover that can't control his intake for the good spirits and did nothing but treat her in such as way that she didn't so much as utter his name in the places he frequented. After two years and he still tries to keep his dirty little secret(s).

She was careful to know that the accusations were true and with just a little bit of time, she found out. About everything. Well, almost everything. You know how she knows? He's silent. The only time he shut his mouth of all the lies and moral code of don't-ask-don't-tell he abides by was when he knew he was fucked. Like that criminal that still refuses to admit any guilt standing as defense with hardcore DNA as proof. He would be one of them. Sadly enough he has trained himself to act in such a destructive way even though she thought he was much better than that. I think the reason he won't even admit it with all kinds of proof is only because deep down he knows it's not normal.
What can you do with those kind of people?

Don't worry. You will be slaughtered with photos of this beautiful place soon. I haven't even been able to get to the beach.

mister twister

I MISS TWISTER. I miss the barn. I miss my hour of grooming before I ride and combing a solid gallon of Cowboy Magic in his great tail and mane. I miss feeding all the horses. I'm missing that green rake and helping John out around the property. I even miss cleaning stalls. I miss being a part of something that I've always wanted to be a part of, a GREAT barn with great horses and great people.

I have been riding twice since I've been here. I went to the place where I worked and rode last time I lived here, a Dressage place outside Pensacola. It's pretty nice there, I got to ride in a deep seat Dressage saddle!

The point in which I realized that I missed that part of my life was when I arrived for my lesson, the horse was saddled for me and I was handed the bridle...because that's what you do with people that show up once a week to take a lesson in jeans and tennis shoes.

I HAVE to find a place to be a horsegirl around here!

I MISS TWISTER! He loves me so much he won't even let anyone spray him but me. haha.

by means of "The Secret"

Well. I'm here. I officially live back in Florida before my Florida Drivers license expires (next year).

I LOVE my new job it has led me to the suma cum laude of Wacom tablet usage and the need for a VERY LARGE tablet instead of the little one. The difference between driving my sweet little Jetta and cruising down the road in my parents Cadillac (providing that the mouse is the ford taurus or something). You can do the same things, but much smoother.

My Wacom tablet has a SPRING LOADED tip! and they make FELT TIPS TOO!! really. I HAVE some. O.M.G. IT HAS CHANGED my LIFE as a computer artist. I did all the black lines on an illustration in under an hour just by drawing it right over the scanned illustration no stroking no holding the shift key for accuracy. HEAVEN.

I am in a larger than usual cubicle. Computer on one side badass drawing table on the other. Windows directly to my left. Oh, and how could I forget? The beach seven minutes from my house.

LaQuinta is spanish for "blog update"

Mutchie cold lampin in the Florida sun

I'm feeling creative and right now I can't wait to go to work because it's fun. Oh god, I just said work is fun? ahem.

I'm working on an illustration of a busty wench for a restaurant in Terra Verde and the caption is "Floggings will continue until morale improves". Funny that it's one of my first jobs...those six words were pretty much my mantra in Youngstown.

It's been hetic here and there but mostly the move went off without any huge dilemmas. Compared to a champion Bass fishing tournament the drive was timely to say the least.

It was the trip down here from Ohio to find a place to live that almost had me convinced I was going to loose (if not dump on the side of I-65) any decision making ablities I thought I may have possessed. I'm not sure if it was the realization that "LaQuinta" pretty much means everything that is associated with staying comfortably in a hotel right down to " FREE WIRELESS INTERNET" or the continuing rental car dilemmas (which made me waste two days here). It was a fight for first.

So I didn't want to spend my cash for a cab back to the hotel from the airport (sans rental car) and jumping on the public bus for $1.50 sounded better than sitting at the airport for another 40 minutes to wait for the Holiday Inn's shuttle that I could then hitch & walk a half block to my hotel. LaQuinta is NOT spanish for SHUTTLE TO AND FROM AIRPORT.

The bus driver told me "yeah, you can get to the the LaQuinta from here" only to realize TWO bus rides later there were actually three busses.
"Ok. Here's your transfer, go over there and wait for bus 42." the woman said as she pointed to a bench across a four lane highway in the part of town with bars attached to the windows of the stores. This is the spot I am to get on bus number three.
I looked at her. I looked at the bench. I took a deep breath.
"ok. when does that bus come?" I asked. "fifty minutes" she replied.
"FIFFFFFTYeeee MINUTES?!" and I got off that bus. Crying. Laptop, purse, important bag in tow and proceeded to crawl under that bench and made a phone call to someone who knows how to deal with me freaking out in an old school way.

You might think that there was no reason to handle things so bad at that time but I haven't even begun to tell of the events leading up to that point. Did I mention to you the trouble you will have if you go to rent a car without a credit card in YOUR name because for some reason YOUR credit card payment had not posted yet?

I had a car. That's the reason I was stuck at the airport. I returned the car I had that was rented for me by an angel. Trying to be considerate I returned the car the next day, I thought my payment would have posted by that time and I could re-rent on my card. It didn't, and I could have kept the car but I checked it in outside in the parking garage. So anyway, when I had the car I went to look at a few places...one was a huge 5 bedroom house in a upper middle class neighborhood. It had a built in pool and big yard. The ad was a college girl looking for more roomates. It was really nice but can you say "party house"? not a good situation.

I found an ad online for another place and from the photos it looked like my dream house. Like a converted garage with high ceilings and windows everywhere. The man that owned the place was very nice and creative himself. I was willing to overlook (no pun intended) the fact that he "took a shower and hot tub" outside. He wasn't even talking about putting up a curtain either. Not even a CLEAR curtain. He just kept emphasizing about the "taking" going on outside. Ok, it was still alright with me, I'm hippywhatever.

The only part that held me back was the whole thing where he would come into to the upstairs area where my bedroom and main living space would be - to get a book. A certain PAPERBACK book off of a huge shelf that he would need at the drop of a dime. A book that when he wanted it, he would go into my living quarters to get. When I asked him about this, he said that he would not want to wait until I got home to retrieve it for him because "sometimes I want things NOW" and furthermore told me that it made him question my integrity. Even though he reconsidered after I informed him that was not an option and being a 34 year old SINGLE woman I have to lookout for myself. I mean WTF? I would have taken the place had he said RIGHT away that my privacy was not a problem. He was nice though, I'm sure he meant no harm.
My phone was ringing like crazy with call backs and I was slubbin this slub with notes written on my hands for god's sake because I've already used all the random places to write things on any piece of paper I had. Good thing the new episode of LOST was on when I got back to the hotel. GOOD thing. I told Summer that it was probably a very good thing we didn't get on The mazing Race because after all this, I might-could SUCK at it.
My motivation was not hindered.
I got a car the next day and that's when I really made some progress. I found this little place I am living in now. I have a little coffee pot that has a timer on it and that makes me happy. So does the sunshine.

Now. where do all those hot Navy boys hang out?