Back at home

We were able to pick Sissy up from the Vet Wednesday and she was so happy to see us and even happier to be back home. She is still confined to her crate and will have to be for the next few weeks. She still isn't walking but is showing signs of muscle tone in her back legs and will support her weight on her back legs. 3 times a day I have to do some exercise therapy and she seems to be doing better with it. Her attitude is that nothing happened and she still wants to go go go so that is a plus.

The other dogs want to be near her, but I have to keep them away in case they jump on her and hurt her staples. I'm hoping to see some definite feeling back by at least a month and walking within 3 weeks. Time will tell.

I had a good Friday-I got the $3,000 check that I won from Digital Insights in the mail and I'm expecting to see the $1200 that I won from Albertson's in next week!

I hope everyone had a Happy Thanksgiving!

A great win!

I got a call today that I won $1200 from Albertson's!!! That, added with the $3,000 from Digital Insights in October will make for a wonderful holiday season!!

My win blog

Close call!

Rotten Tomatoes had a twitter poem contest and although I didn't win, I was one of the 20 finalists! The winner got a trip to the premiere of a new film called Paper Hearts.

It was a hard poem to write, you had to do it with your twitter account and you could only use 140 characters! Mine is listed as jefftexas88 on this list.

Follow me on twitter if you have an account over there.

Surprise Win

But not for me!!

I normally have Friday's off but I had traded a day off earlier in the week and worked on Friday. I was at my office computer typing and had my radio on. I heard them announce Rick's son Brad's name and said he had 10 minutes to call in!

I was able to get hold of Brad and he called in. The station had a promo going on where if your name was called on the hour, you had 10 minutes to call in to be put on their payroll. You win $50 for that hour and then at the top of the next hour they call another name-if that person didn't call in within the 10 minutes, you stay on the payroll for another hour and earn another $50.\

He ended up winning $250!! I was so glad that I just happened to hear them call his name.

I hope everyone had a great weekend, and here's to a great week ahead :)

Back Home

The last day we called in for an extended checkout until 6pm and wondered around the beach some more. We had a great last lunch at Burgers in Paradise and wondered around the beach some more.

Finally we slowly wandered back to the hotel to clean up for the trip home and get everything organized. I had packed most everything the night before thankfully!

From our balcony we saw a bunch of sea turtles out from the beach a bit. I think they might have been there the whole time but we didn't notice them. I have a thing about heights so I didn't look straight down much. Actually I think twice. I was talking to my friend Ginger when we first got there and I looked down-I think she could hear the panic in my voice!

The flights were fine, I was able to sleep a bit. We got in at about 12:45pm central time and I had to work the next day. It was tough. I am slowly losing my sunburn. Rick had an extra 2 days off to recover. I'm still in shock I think!

I'll post the last of the pictures this weekend and maybe a video or two.

I hope everyone is having a great week so far :)

Lost on the Kamehamaha Highway AKA Highway Ends Here

With directions from google maps in hand, we set off to see the USS Arizona Memorial in Pearl Harbor. We felt really good about how things were going until we see a sign that says "highway ends here"!

We make an illegal U-turn to get back in the direction we came from and find a Jack-In-The-Box where a nice oriental couple tells us how to get going in the right direction. Somehow we had missed a turn-off and had gone way out of the way.

We finally make it to the memorial and I am really glad we did. It is such a humbling experience and I wouldn't have missed it for the world. It was so nice and peaceful there and there was a nice gentle rain while we were there.

We made it back to Waikiki without getting lost! After eating we walked up Kalakaua avenue and I walked on the beach a bit. We made it back to the hotel and I finally talked Rick into walking on the sand. It was really relaxing to feel the sand between my toes.

We have to return the car and check out by 11 AM and we have until about 6:15 PM until the bus picks us up to take us back to the airport and back home...sigh...I don't want to leave.

We get back home on Sunday around 1 PM and I have to work on Monday-jet lag, sun burn and all! I may wear a Hawaiian shirt to work in protest of not wanting to be back!

North Shore by convertible

We finally rented a car, a nice Chrysler Sebring and headed off. After 30 minutes of getting lost after the first turn from the car rental agency we finally headed around the bed of Diamond Head. Here is a google map of our route:



We stopped a lot and took some pictures and at little roadside stands that sell fresh fruit and gifts.

We had some of the famous shaved ice from Matsumoto shaved ice in Haleiwa.

We finally ended out day at the Polynesian Cultural Center for dinner and a show.

I think it is the season for Japan and Australia to come here as that is the majority of the people we have seen most of the trip so it was funny while we were at dinner Rick hears a man ask in a heavy southern drawl "Ya'll got any ketchup?"!

We made it back to the hotel with only one wrong turn on the way back. I am tired, and sunburned to a crisp. Rick is cranky, more sunburned and more tired than I am! We both look like lobsters. All in all it was a good day and well worth renting the car. We have the car tomorrow so there is no telling where we will get lost!

We finished the day off at 11:00PM at Hagen Daaz-me a green tea ice cream in a waffle cone and Rick had a Hawaiian smoothie.

The scenic route...

We started off lost and it kept getting worse. We took the bus ride from hell and couldn't seem to get the bus drivers to help find where we were going!

What should have taken 20 minutes to find ended up taking 2 hours! We finally made it to the Iolani Palace and took the tour. After the palace tour Rick found someone on the street that gave us even more bad directions and we walked and walked until we finally got good information from a man walking his dog.

We got on a trolley and made it back around 7:00PM (We started at Noon!)

We took some pictures on our scenic tour and some were from Rick's camera from yesterday:

More of Waikiki

We walked towards Diamond Head today and stopped at the zoo, aquarium and walked along the beach. The zoo is the best one I have ever been at-the grounds were amazing with all of the beautiful plants and trees.

I was erasing a blurred picture off of my memory card and accidentally erased ALL the pictures on my memory card-I felt sick at my stomach until I remember that I had uploaded the pictures onto my laptop the night before. I still lost a few pictures from that day but made them up on the walk back to the hotel.

You can point your camera anywhere and take a great picture here. It's beautiful here with the water, lush plant life and the beach.

Tomorrow we plan on heading the other way down Kalakeanua Blvd. and see Iolani Palace, the memorials at Pearl Harbor and take a tour of the Dole Plantation.

Honolulu

The flight wasn't too bad. I dozed here and there, read a bit, did a bunch of crossword puzzles and watched a movie.

I am so jet-lagged and I'm at that point where I am too tired to sleep. The hotel is really nice but everything around here is ultra expensive so we ventured off a bit and found some local food that wasn't too pricey.

I haven't had a chance to take too many pictures because by the time we got unpacked and freshened up it was getting dark but I did take this from the balcony of the room:



I'll try to post more when I get some sleep and feel human again!

Hawaii VS Hurricane Ike

My flight out of Houston was canceled :O What is odd is that it is still showing the flight from Amarillo to Houston is active.

The Travelocity coordinator was great and worked hard to get me on another flight, but it'll have to be Monday. Sheraton Waikiki was very nice and moved my reservations as well.

So Hopefully, Monday afternoon this will be my view:



I was so under prepared, so this will give me some extra time to pack! I'm so nervous about the flight-I don't do so well flying. I used to be okay with it when I flew several times a year but I haven't flown since '05 when I won the trip to Las Vegas.

I have been having fun with my sweepstakes still-I passed the $12,000 mark for this year.

I am taking my laptop (if the flight Monday isn't cancelled!) and I'll post pictures at the end of the day from Hawaii.

I hope everyone has a great weekend and my thoughts are with everyone affected by Ike.

I won!!!

I'm still in shock! I won $10,000 on the Burger King Reveal the Secret instant win game! I got all of my paperwork in to them and now it's official-they put my name up today as the latest winner. Now when I take the trip to Hawaii that I won, I can splurge a little!



I hope everyone has a great weekend :)

Sunday

I got all of my papers back to the prize coordinator and she called and told me everything is in order and the next step would be to talk to the prize coordinator at Travelocity and choose the dates I wan't to take the trip.

I have been doing some research on the internet of the fun things to do while we are there-5 days won't be enough!

Aloha Waikiki

I finally got the email with the affidavit of eligibility and the details of the prize I won. It is a trip to Waikiki on Oahu. We will be staying at the Sheraton Waikiki! It looks really nice. I have always wanted to pay my respects at Pearl Harbor and it isn't too far away from the hotel.

All I have to do now is fill out the paperwork and fax it back to the prize coordinator and then I will receive more information on how to redeem the prize.

I had got into a rut about entering my sweepstakes since my wins were few and far between-this win has taken care of that! I never think of it as luck that I win anything, its just persistence, patience and entering a sweepstakes at the right time.

I hope everyone has a great weekend :)

Hawaii here I come!!!

I just got an email from the Blockbuster Great Gift Giveaway Instant win game that I am the potential winner of the grand prize trip from Travelocity!!

I looked up the rules and there are 4 trips on the grand prize list. They are all 5 days in different destinations in Hawaii!

I have to wait for another email with the affidavit of eligibility and I'm not sure when I'll find out which destination I won. I looked them up and they all look amazing. The prizes were: Kauai, Maui, Waikiki, and The Big Island. The hotels all looked very nice! The ARV ranges from $4,300 to $5,000. I can't wait to find out which one I will be going to-I'll have until November of 2008 to take the trip.

I have been entering this every day since November 13th, they send you an email after you enter to let you know if you have won and all the emails I have gotten so far have said sorry-you are not a winner. So tonight when I looked I was shocked to see Congratulations!

I hope everyone is having a great week! :)

Can you hear me now??

I entered a sweepstakes online Monday from a radio station out of L.A. They take random entrants and call them to be the people that play in the on-air games for the next day.

I got a call from them about 30 minutes after I entered asking me if I wanted to have a call the next day to play a game on-air. I was so excited and she told me that it would be between 4-5:30.
I was ready to win!

The next day rolls around. 4:00 rolls around and right at 4:05 I get a call and I'm on the air ready to play "Beat the band" and win a prize. We have some fun banter on-air where the host tells me that he is from the city I am in and that we would be right back after a word from our sponsors. So he comes back on the phone while we are waiting, then my cell phone crackles. Can you hear me now???? Then he says get ready, 10 seco......and my freakin' cell phone drops the call :O

I didn't expect a call back, I'm sure they just go down the list to the next caller. I hope they won a good prize! I had to laugh about it, otherwise I'd still be sulking!

I hope that everyone has a great weekend :)

Back to reality

The Las Vegas trip was more than I expected-we had a great time. We never had to pay for a thing except the inital $20 I put into a slot machine that paid me $501!

I didn't expect the limo rides, the extra nice room, and overall I won $1200 on the slots. Rick did pretty good too-on the last night he won about $150.

The Cirque Du Soleil show Ka was the best show I've ever seen. The Rodney Carrington show was a hoot and getting to meet him afterwards was nice.

We went and saw the Shark Reef at Mandalay Bay, it was smaller than I thought but it was still nice.

Here are a few pictures we took: