Weekly iPhone Roundup {12.4 - 12.9}

 It's been a pretty eventful week to say the least. There's been lots of traveling, gift wrapping and tacking stuff at home. I literally went somewhere every day this week and I hate it. I would literally be happy staying home all the time, which is usually the way it is when we're not Christmas shopping.

Drove home from work/Perryville Monday, made it halfway to Poplar Bluff Tuesday, all the way to Poplar Bluff Wednesday, had to go to Annapolis super late Thursday for wrapping paper and nametags, then back to Annapolis today. Yikes! I mean, I could've had to drive to Cape twice this week, so honestly I'm pretty lucky, but it makes the weeks fly by when you're always doing something or on the go.

Other than the horrible ordeal Tuesday night, earlier that day I set up our new Brightspeed internet. It was supposed to be good to go last week, but after talking to tech support for over an hour, they finally told me to wait until Tuesday. Luckily things went well Tuesday and it only took me like 5 minutes to get set up. So far so good, fingers crossed. It's only 3MB download speeds, but that's better than the .3 that we were getting from HughesNet. At least this is consistent and we're finally able to actually watch some of our streaming services!

With HughesNet we used to be able to watch YouTube with no issues. I mean, we had to pause a lot, but it still worked. We also used to be able to stream Netflix and sometimes Shudder, on the very rare occasion Hulu, but not often. I literally logged into all our streaming services and every one of them played, thank God! Here lately Netflix wouldn't even load up all the way - Hulu wouldn't even open! It's unreal to get to watch stuff now, I love it. 

Wednesday when we went shopping we hit up Five Below, Dollar Tree, Petsmart, Marshall's and Walmart. I wouldn't say it was super successful, but we did get a few more things. We're SO far behind this year and it's killing me. Like I'm literally getting so stressed out over it all. We're wanting to come home through Cape Monday and then go to Farmington later next week and hopefully wrap up our Christmas shopping. I'm hoping and praying that's the case.

Christmas present wrapping is like killing my back this year. Like, it legit makes me feel like an old lady, lol. It's probably because I sit like a shrimp all day when I'm watching tv or playing a game. It's really my own fault. Plus I prefer to sit on the floor all day every day, lol.

Anyways, I think that about sums up the week. Hope everyone had a great week!

Saw these guys Sunday in Perryville. They had this interesting truck that appears to be very heavily customized and modified. At least they're in the Christmas spirit with their little hats, lol.

A lighted Christmas ornament lantern my mom made.

Bath & Body Works order that arrived Monday. These are gifts for 4 different people. They had an awesome sale and all their full size scents were like $4.25!

First Christmas present that got wrapped this season!

A Bud Light mug that arrived Monday for my step dad.

All the presents we wrapped Monday.

This picture of the gloomy highway is from our failed trip Tuesday.

You can see how eerie everything looks.

Cloudy, rainy and foggy by the old drive-in.

The fog got considerably worse by the time we went home.

This is the Patterson Church we were broke down next to.

This was from the drive home Wednesday night after got done Christmas shopping. It was super rainy!

Butterbeer barrel with flavored candies inside. This was very much an impulse purchase because LaVaughn and I are both HUGH Potter fans. The candies kinda sucked, but I love the barrel. This was from Five Below, btw.

Still can't believe I found this HUGE bottle of Torani sugar free salted caramel syrup at Marshall's for $6.99! The tiny bottles from Walmart are $5, this is like 4 times as much and Walmart doesn't carry this flavor. Definitely my favorite purchase.

Facebook Messenger video chat with my mom (top left) and LaVaughn (bottom) Wednesday night. I'm obviously the top right.

Max pretending he doesn't see the security camera, lol. It's an easy way to tell he wants inside without hearing him bark first.

Christmas Tree with presents under it, which I adore.

I still wish I had the lights on around the door, dammit.

I love tree pics, but John Redcorn really throws the pictures off, lol. I still love him, though.

Christmas present wrapping Thursday evening.

My travel buddy. Max loves going for rides.

He had his face plastered next to mine just before I snapped this pic, jerk. Sorry for the no makeup face.

Doomed from the start...

Never, and I mean NEVER, start the days journey to a pet store off by saying, "We need to promise that we won't buy any animals today!" That's pretty much a dead giveaway that we bought a living, breathing creature today... isn't it? Ugh, why oh why did today happen? Why couldn't we have just gone to Hasting's and left it at that? Why must we be weak, why must we love rats SO much?

Well there you have it, we bough rats today. Yes, plural... rat-S! Two gorgeous, sweet, tiny little boy rats.

We almost bought a hairless boy from Pets-R-Us, but decided not to due to the fact that he was rather large and older. Still, I wanted to bundle him up and carry him home. Leaving him there nearly left me in tears. Of course, as soon as we get to Petsway I'm practically pulled to the rat tanks by some type of magnetic force field. And there at the bottom of the tanks were gorgeous "small" rats. And what they mean by "small" is too young to be taken from their mothers, but we're money hungry so we're going to do it anyway.

It wasn't even the size that did it for me, it was because out of the 7 baby rats that were in the tank, only one came running up to the front, practically ripping his nails off trying to get to me as if I was his long lost mother. It made things 10 times worse that he looks almost exactly like Sally. Even though it was against our best interests, I decided to ask one of the workers to let us hold them. BIG mistake! I held him and one other, but pretty much decided against it when we figured out they were boys. We're really only in the rat business for girls, so we passed and walked away.

We pissed some time away looking at some things for Sookie -- even though I still think she's a devil hamster -- then eventually made our way back to the rat tanks where that same little boy literally ran towards us and JUMPED on the glass trying to get to us! That basically sealed the deal. I tried not to run towards one of the workers, but I couldn't help myself. LaVaughn went and picked out a nice size Critter Keeper to carry them home in.

We, of course, decided on the little boy that looked like Sally, but we also decided to get the little boy that was following him around like a lost puppy. They were the only two that were out and about, so it was kind of meant to be.

The rest is pretty much history. We're are now owners of two gorgeous little rattie boys named, Opie and Jax. They're gorgeous, sweet, and probably the best thing since sliced bread. We're not 100% sure we're going to stick with those names, but as of right now it'll do.

After we calmed ourselves, we decided to go to Hasting's were we actually bought movies instead of just browsing around and buying The Walking Dead memorabilia! Since the only movie shopping we've done in the last 2 years has been online, it was such a rush to actually buy movies in an actual store! We left with a mix of blu-rays and DVDs... 10 of them. And not just run-of-the-mill crappy movies, movies that we love and have always wanted!

We were feeling risky on the way home and decided to stop by Wendy's to try their new Bacon and Blue. Not terrible, but not the best thing I've had either. I loved the aioli, but the blue cheese was a tad too pungent at times. Still pretty good, though. I'd probably try it again.

And now that I've rambled for the past 30 minutes, I guess I had better go. I need to go play with the new boys anyway.

Love & Peace

-Megan

This is their EXTREMELY temporary cage. I'm in the process of ordering them a new cage.

This is"Jax"

And this is "Opie"

This cat is obsessed:

Here's a nice look at all the movies we picked up today. SO excited!!

Remember when Sookie bit me? Well look at it today! O.o

Yesterday's happenings and the iron throne...

Yesterday seems like a dream, now that I think of it. We got woke up before 10 due to the guy putting a new roof on the house. I know, fun stuff! He only staying until 9 or so today, so I was able to sleep until noon. I fear the same thing will happen tomorrow, like clockwork I will be awoken to the sounds of thudding and hammering.

LaVaughn and I decided to make our day even weirder by going swimming just after 1 PM yesterday. Of all damn days, someone was at our new favorite watering hole, Mine Fort. Since we hadn't got a chance to try one of the most popular digs in town, we decided to give Posten (or is it spelled Postin?) a try. To our surprise, not a soul was there! Mindy was right, that place is swift! She was also right about how clear it was, so that made it okay.

It was midday, so we both agreed to SPF 50 sunblock. Sun rays are something I cannot, and will not play around with. After we basically painted our faces white, we decided to go for a dip. We got to swim in solace for nearly 30 minutes before a family of 4 pulled up. The nerve of people anymore, I tell you! They set up camp literally RIGHT on top of our stuff! We had our shoes, sunblock, and car keys sitting right there on the bank in plain sight! Did that stop them from piling their things on top of them? Of course not! The lady nearly had her chair on top of them. It was so rude.

We stayed for maybe 15 more minutes before we decided to call it a day.

When we got home, we fixed yet another cup of coffee and sat down for a little afternoon TV -- which is super creepy, by the way. We both contemplated the idea of going to town to get something to eat, but decided against it, due to the fact that it was only 3.

The thought of going to Poplar Bluff crossed my mind, but I wasn't exactly sure just how I felt about the long venture. I decided to go ahead and pitch the idea to LaVaughn, and she happily obliged. We showered after we got home from swimming, so there wasn't much "dressing up" to do.

We left just after 4 PM and made it to Pets R Us about an hour or so later.

As soon as we walked in, I heard kids remarking about how ugly something was. Then I heard another mumble "hairless rat". It took me less than 15 seconds to make it over to the cage they had them in. And there they were, 4 gorgeous little hairless boy ratties. I asked the lady if we could hold them, luckily she said yes.

I tested the water before I picked them up, but of course they were sweet as pie. They didn't really look older than 6 months, so they were all still babies. Everyone gathered around in amazement as I gushed and cooed about them -- all the while LaVaughn was doing the same. The thought of adopting all 4 crossed our  minds, but neither of us were keen on the idea of spending $40 on 4 rats that we didn't need, but we couldn't help but think about it. I feel so sorry for rats, they're one of the most misunderstood animals out there.

The store lady took us in the back to where she had her "breeding tanks" set up, if you could call them that. There were quite a few little babies, all of which I wanted to take home. She was showing us her other hairless rats in hopes of finding us a female, which she had 2 of. We still decided against it and went on our way. The smell in that place was enough to drive someone loopy! LaVaughn practically sneezed her way to the next store.

I can't fail to mention the phantom little boy that kept showing up out of nowhere and talking to us. Mainly to LaVaughn, but she's a kid magnet, which is funny because she doesn't really like kids.

Petsway smelled about the same, which was a shock considering they normally smell semi-decent. There was absolutely nothing new in there, other than a couple new and over-priced parrots. Oh, lets not forget the poor flying squirrel they had captured. We ended up leaving with a new crock dish and chew treats for the rats.

After our pet store fiascoes, we decided to go to Hastings, a place has haven't ventured to in such a long time. We found SO, SO much Walking Dead stuff, I was about to die. Almost all of it was overpriced, so not much made it home with us. We did, however, find two of the COOLEST Walking Dead mugs I've ever seen in my entire life! It didn't hurt that there were only two, so it was kind of like fate in a way.

LaVaughn also found me an awesome lanyard for work. It says -- I Love Daryl -- which I do, so it was cool. It also has 3 ears (refer to season 2 of The Walking Dead) hanging at the bottom. Those are sure to please at work. Like I was telling her, I'm going to be the most popular one there, lol.

We also found Zombie Diaries 2, which is a movie we've been looking for since 2011, so that was an awesome find. We also found the Veronica Mars movie, another good find. All in all it was a successful day. I wish we could have gotten more Walking Dead stuff, but I didn't really feel comfortable paying $17 for a pair of socks.

Of course, we didn't leave without getting a bite to eat. Since neither of us have ate at Steak & Shake before, we decided to give that a go. They have really, really awesome burgers, I highly suggest. And they're easy on the wallet, so it's a win win.

We didn't do much when we got home, I mainly just fretted about silly things, like the roofer coming today (and the rest of the week). Not to mention, I've been obsessing about taking the dogs (we're taking aunties dog as well) to the groomer tomorrow. It's always something. I have no plans for today, so there wont be any blogging later tonight. Not that I ever blog more than once a day, so I don't really know why I said that.

We did get the first 3 seasons of Game of Thrones on DVD today -- yay!! We also got season 11 of Degrassi, so I think we have plenty to occupy our time. Until next time...

Love & Peace

-Megan

Pictures from Pets-R-Us:

These are the little hairless rattie boys that we held:

Okay, $49.99...

For this:

Um, what makes this guy SO special? Oh, did I mention that it was on sale?

Pictures from Petsway:

This is a funny sign.

I wanted SO many of these mice.

Such a beautiful boy!

Oh the memories.

Yes, they had a flying squirrel. *eye roll*

The drive home:

My awesome 'I Love Daryl' Walking Dead lanyard.

One of our awesome 'Fight the dead fear the living.' Walking Dead mugs.

Game of Thrones on DVD!

Some adorable pictures of Violet with her bracelets:

The trio, or, 'the triplets' as we like to call them:

Random pictures of Boone:

Hilarious pictures of Fiona hiding, yes hiding, in her corner hammock: