Family!

Mom, Dad and Matt arrived on Saturday afternoon and left this morning. It was so good to see them again. It's interesting because when I see them, no matter how long it's been since the last time I saw them, it feels like I just saw them yesterday. There's no awkward re-adjusting period. We had a lot of fun, too. We went to the beach on Sunday and walked around for quite a bit. Mom and Dad had never seen an ocean before, so it was pretty cool to watch as they walked along the water for the first time. We saw dead jellyfish on the beach. They feel surprisingly leathery.

That night we came back to our place and played board games and had some dinner. Yesterday we went to the Space Center. It was my third visit there, but I still learn something new every time. Again, it was really cool to watch Mom, Dad and Matt as they tried to take in all of the information that they saw. We also saw a lot of gators, and even saw one pretty close up! I got some pictures and will have them posted soon. I love you guys and thanks for coming to visit :)

The Daytona 500

So in my last post I mentioned that Matt and I were going to the Saturday race here in Daytona. Well, it turned out that my company had extra tickets and we got to go to the actual Daytona 500 on Sunday (today). I turned out being a lot more fun than I had thought.

Our day started at 9:30, when we arrived at work. We had some breakfast and headed over to the speedway around 11:30. We had all access passes as well as tickets to the race. My company had a tent in the corporate area, so we had some lunch and then headed over to the fan zone. This was the coolest part of the day. We got to actually walk around on the track and infield. We got to see a really close-up view of all of the pit areas. We also got to see some of the inspections. Then we headed to our seats, which were on the pit side.

The race was also a lot cooler than I had expected. I thought the race would be pretty slow for us, but it really flew by. Here are some of my observations from the day:

1. 50 degrees is really cold in the shade and wind
2. Anything and everything can happen during the race. Some of the top racers ended up being taken out early.
3. Hot chocolate is your friend in the windy shade.
4. The banks are really steep on the track.
5. Kelly Clarkson was not my first (or twentieth) choice for musical entertainment pre-race
6. Traffic sucks after the race (it took us 1.5 hours to get home - we live 5 minutes from the speedway)
7. There are a lot of people drinking at 9:30 in the morning before the race.
8. There are a lot of drunk people on the roads after the race.
9. The cars aren't as loud as I thought they'd be.
10. Apparently, Jim Beam and Diet Mountain Dew makes a good drink (at least that's what the people sitting next to us thought)
11. Some people think that mullets are not out of style
12. A lot of guys that go to races look like Dale Earnheart

All in all, I think we were very fortunate to have the opportunity to go to the race. If we have the chance next year, we'll probably go again. It was fun, but neither of us can say that we're NASCAR fans...yet.

Let the games begin

The redneck games have begun here in Daytona Beach. Now, I know that not all NASCAR fans are rednecks, but they seem to make up the majority. Our city has officially been overrun by racing fans. There are already a large number of people camped out in their pop-up and RV campers on the side of the road that I work on. And I mean a lot. The nice part of this is that the area always smells like grills. Matt and I are actually going to a race on Saturday. We get free tickets through work, so I figured we should just go so we can say that we've gone. I really doubt we'll stay the entire race.

My struggle with weight

I have a couple of factors working against me when it comes to my weight. First, I'm taking medication that can cause weight gain as a side effect. Second, I've got a couple of medical conditions that can lead to being overweight. I don't like it at all. I've analyzed my diet and really don't think I need to cut back on much. I don't eat much, at least not anything excessive. I worked out for an entire month, at least 20 minutes a day, when we first moved here. I gained three pounds.

I'm trying to take a new approach now. In the past, my exercise routines were very structured. I always felt like I was forcing myself to do it. I went out and bought a bike tonight. Matt and I are going to go for bike rides, not every day, but more when I feel like it. I'm also going to buy some small weights and use them while I'm watching TV. I'm not sure what else to do!!

Happy birthday, Matt!

It's my hubby's 27th birthday. We don't really have anything big planned, but I did make his favorite brownie cheesecake chocolate swirl cake. I'm thinking that we might also go out for chinese, his favorite. We don't really do much special for either of our birthdays, just enjoy each other's company.

:)