Friday, July 22, 2016

Breyerfest has officially started... also known as...

The Friday In July Where Brenda Gets Very Little Work Done.

Breyerfest started a bit early this year since it's a NAN year in Kentucky (even numbered years) so a lot of people arrived on Monday in preparation, either because they're showing or to take advantage of the extra people for room sales, I don't know. Most people show up on Wednesday or Thursday because Friday is the day the 3 Day Weekend starts and nobody wants to miss any of the fun. Except me. Well, it's not that I *want* to miss it, I just have a problem with the 4 hour flights and the social anxiety that goes along with traveling from Arizona to Kentucky and then be squished with 7,000 of my closest new best friends. hahahaha. Anyway, so every year Breyerfest has a surprise horse. A mold nobody knows what is until the very first Special Run line goes through at 10am and someone buys it and reveals what it is. Then, there's the additional wait to see what colors it comes in and if it's only available in matte or glossy or both. The past couple of years they've done both and have switched it up which is more hard to come by. Three years ago, the glossy was the hardest to get, then it was the matte and then it was glossy again. Well, it looks like they've done it a little different this year in that only one of the 4 colors is difficult to come by and it's in matte, which is fine because I want to glossy version anyway. I'm not a huge fan of glossy horses, but this one looks much better as a glossy.

Every year there's always speculation as to what mold will be used. They try to figure out the odds based on what has been used before, what hasn't been used before and how it could possibly tie in to the theme of the current year...Carnival/Rio is the 2016 theme. Well, a few people guessed the Esprit mold and that's what it ended up being. One in a funky, clear-ish decorator color and the other 3 in more realistic ones.
The one I want is the Tobiano that is 2nd from the right.  The photo shows him in Glossy and that's what I want.  The palomino on the left has dapples and the black Overo is very flashy-looking, but I want to Tobiano.  I prefer minimal white on my paints.  I have a pick-up person who will be hopefully obtain me that model and another one I have asked for.  Hopefully she'll be able to get it for me.  I don't know how many customers she has this year, but she has 2 people helping her so hopefully between the 3 of them I'll get the Tobiano.  If I'd bought 2 of the 3 Day tickets, I could've gotten the Overo as well, but I had forgotten you could only get one Surprise model per ticket and I wasn't depending on the Surprise being something I collected.  And I don't collect the Esprit model, but the color is something I can't pass up.
I wish model in the photo was horizontal rather than vertical, but oh well.  And then the deco is funky but I don't like decos unless it's a realistic pattern but in a fun color, like a silver dapple they did a couple of years ago
But the reason why I don't get much work done on opening day of Breyerfest is because I'm too excited to see what the surprise model is and then I get caught up in all the hub-bub on Blab and I don't get my work done.  Well, not much of it anyway.  Right now I'm on lunch break so I'm safe for another 40 minutes.  Hurray for getting an hour on payday!  I wasn't going to take lunch until 11.30am, but decided I couldn't wait the extra 30 minutes.  hahaha. 

Tune back in on Monday and I'll share some neat photos of NAN that an attendee gave me permission to use.  I'd like to do it today, but I do need to actually work and blogging with a bunch of pictures from my iPad is no fun so I'll do it on Monday when I can use my work computer again.

We may already know the theme for 2017.  Someone apparently took a picture of a digital sign outside the Kentucky Horse Park that shows the theme and dates, but the picture I saw was of the display on the back of the camera and was posted to Instagram so I'm not entirely 100% sure it's correct, but apparently it's going to be Gateway to India and the dates are July 14-16.  If it IS Gateway to India, and I should know for sure come Sunday when it's usually made public by Breyer, then I'm going to try very hard to go since there's a very good chance there'll be at least one Marwari, which would be ironic since I posted on a Facebook group yesterday that I'd love the opportunity to be "turned loose" with a Marwari and my camera and now I may actually get a chance.  I guess it depends on how easily Breyer or KHP will be able to get one to have on-site for a few days

Look at those ears!  Don't ask me when or how I became enamored of this breed, but I can't resist those ears.  hahaha.  I'm torn, though.  I know quite a few people on Blab that would like to meet me in person finally and Breyerfest would be the best place to do it.  Every year they keep hoping I'll make the trek out and every year I have to disappoint us because of the flight.  So what do I do...?  Do I let them know that I'll be doing my best to make it next year or do I not say anything and then surprise them?  If I don't say anything, then they won't know if I chicken out again, but if I don't tell them, I'd hate to lose out on an opportunity to meet them because they didn't have "time for me"... this will take some thought.

An update on my awesome water bottle.  In my last post I "complained" about the plastic ring that keeps the lid on the bottle because it doesn't lay flat when you take the lid off, but rather sticks out straight.  So, I cut the connecting piece off.  But then I didn't have any convenient way of carrying it.  Oh wait!  I know!  Maybe the lid on the Hydro Flask is the same as the lid on the Klear Bottle and it'll fit.  So I brought it in to work and...hurray!  It fits!
Now I just need to figure out a way to get the plastic ring off the neck of the bottle because it bugs me being there.  hahaha.

Okay, I guess that's it for now.  I hope everyone has a good weekend.

Tuesday, July 19, 2016

Just some randomness and a small vent

Let me get the vent out of the way first. On Sunday, July 17th, I reached my 15th anniversary with the company I work for. To me, it was a big deal, but apparently I'm the only one who cares. My supervisor came by my desk on Wednesday to give me my certificate, but he thought my anniversary was Wednesday so I guess it should come as no surprise that my anniversary came and went with no acknowledgement other than the certificate. None of my co-workers knew. Nobody knew. In the past, our supervisor would bake a cake and have a special unit meeting so the person could be properly acknowledged for their milestone. I believe Wilma got a cake and special meeting for her 15th back in May. Our supervisor's 15th was in June, but he doesn't go for the attention. Normally I don't, either, but this time I wouldn't have minded. I was going to casually bring it up in a meeting with our lead today, but she is out of the office and postponed it until next week and by then it would be silly to bring it up. I don't really care about the meeting or the cake, I just want my milestone to be recognized, you know? Twice I have written an email to my supervisor asking about it, but twice I deleted it and never sent it. I'm torn between bringing it up and just letting it go, but I can't figure out a way to word an email where it won't sound whiney and greedy or whatever. I don't know.

Breyerfest is this week. Friday is when it starts. I wish I was there, but I chose not to go. I can't really afford it anyway since I'm still paying the hospital for my 8 hour stay. I've got a long way to go because I can only afford so much per month and still be able to get my other bills paid. I have too many credit cards. hahaha. I did pay one off the other day, though, and will pay another next month. That will help. A little. The fact of the matter is, even though I have a good paying job on paper, once Uncle Sam and the state are done with it, my take home pay is disgusting. Plus, I have rent and car payments. blah blah blah. Maybe next year I can go to Breyerfest. I had a trip planned for the fall to San Francisco, but I'm probably going to have to cancel it because I remembered my car registration is due the same month. Ouch. I haven't gone anywhere since Las Vegas in 2014. I used to travel quite a bit and now I don't at all. No, there's nothing stopping me from driving somewhere. That would sure cut down on costs, but I'd be limited in where I could drive to by myself so I don't bother. Oh well. Anyway, Breyer's Special Run models aren't very exciting this year. I have a pick-up person who's going to get me a couple of models, including the Surprise horse, which we won't know what it is until Friday morning. Hopefully it's a mold I like. Anyway, because it's also a NAN year for Kentucky, there's people at Breyerfest already. People write mini blogs about the trip so it's almost like being there and I watch the "Breyerfest Adventure" videos on YouTube and then there's the Haul videos. Those can be fun.

Now, I want to talk about this awesome water bottle I got off of Amazon last week. Recently I had gone to Whole Foods and ended up buying a Hydro Flask. It's made of 18/8 stainless steel and is vacuum insulated. The first time I used it at work, it wasn't a pretty sight. I had chosen to get the 40oz over the 32oz because, well, it holds more water. But it was too tall to fit under the ice dispenser at work, so I went to Amazon to find a 32oz one since Whole Foods isn't convenient enough to go back and get another. But anyway, I hadn't finished my water so I took it home and ended up leaving it in my room. When I went back a few hours later, it was still half full of ice!!! So, like I said I went to get another one on Amazon and this time I got a Klear Bottle brand because it was a little less expensive, but it had the same features as the Hydro Flask. Yesterday I tested it out, filling it with ice about 7am.

Approximately 6 hours later, it still had plenty of ice...

I then forgot about it and accidentally left it on my desk overnight. As of 7am this morning, it still had some ice and was still very cold

The only thing I really don't like about it is the doo-hickey that keeps the cap attached to the bottle. I doesn't bend back very far so it kind of gets in the way, but I guess I can live with that.

Our monsoon season has finally decided to show up. It used to be, the season started when the dew point hit a certain point, but now they decided on a specific date in June. As per usual during the summer, you get a build up of clouds nearly every evening, but usually it doesn't produce any storms, but last night, boy did it. While watching the news, a wall of dust came creeping in and the news even had live video of a microburst. Not up close, of course, but from a distance, which was pretty cool. For awhile we weren't sure we were going to get anything, but then about 6:30pm or so, the winds really picked up and there was thunder and finally some rain. It only lasted 10 minutes, but it's better than nothing, right? I think so.

Well, I'd better get back to work. I hope everyone is doing well and if you're going to Breyerfest, have fun!