New blog is (sorta) ready

So come visit me over at http://wisesass.com/. Why? Because I'm wise & sassy. Okay, okay - sometimes I'm a wise-ass too.

Homework, HTML & Hardware

I am going NUTS trying to work on this blog re-do, re-design, re-everything. There's a problem with mapping my new blog domain to my new blog platform and when I inquired of technical support their response was that "it's a bug in our system." YOU THINK? You can't map a domain to other nameservers and YOU THINK there's a bug in your system? Holy hell, people. 

And then there's the whole theme editing and html stuff and what do you mean I have to use HTML to change the font? Or upgrade. And how come the new font only shows up on half the blog post? And a Gravatar? And Favicon? And, so, yeah, that. Going nuts.

And I was on a business trip to my company HQ in San Francisco last week (where I got to spend 2 days in a conference room with no less than 5 stinky sales men at any given time. Lucky, lucky me). 

And my oldest son AND my husband started school on Monday. My youngest doesn't start until Tuesday next week so I have to work from home while the hubby is gone to school some mornings. You know, so my youngest doesn't burn the house down playing with matches or decide to scale the roof or something.

And my work laptop decided to crap out last week while in San Francisco. Perfect place for it to happen though; my IT guy there worked on it all day. It should be good as new. Should be. Except now I can't get on my home wi-fi network. Which makes working from home rather difficult.

This too shall pass. This too shall pass.

I will get this damn blog stuff figured out. Even if it means transferring registrars and begging and pleading for help with the html. The work laptop stuff will get figured out too. That's why we have IT guys. And little one will be in school next week and we'll get back into the school routine. 

It always works out. Everything always works out. It's just an absolute bitch to get there. 

In the meantime, here's my guy on his first day:

First day of 4th grade

He loved it. He called me at work when he got home to tell me it was great and his first homework assignment was to eat Oreos and then write about it. His teacher obviously knows how to win over her students. 

Okay, as I was writing this missive I took a break to go outside and get the mail. Little Bubba decided to come with me and ride his bike. He has a very little bike because for quite some time he's been too scared to ride without training wheels. Just last week we took the training wheels off and he hopped on and rode like a champ. Like he's been doing it all his life. But the bike is so small that his knees come up to the handle bars.

So I said, "hey, little dude, try out your brother's bike and see how you like it."

At first he didn't want to try, but he's a good kid and he likes new things so he agreed to try. Here's the result:

I have to go buy a new big boy bike now. SMH. 


Ta!

Ode to Idaho in IG

We moved here almost 6 years ago. We left a congested city, a small house, bad air pollution, and, the only bad part, my family. There have definitely been ups and downs, good and bad, but overall I'm so glad we made that move. 

We have such a better living environment here. For reals. Bigger home, better neighbors, better feeling of community. It's safer. It's a healthier lifestyle for the whole family. 

I miss my family terribly at times. It has gotten easier with every subsequent year, though, and I have found that I (mostly) get my fill of family time in our regular visits. It's tough to miss the good things - like visits with my grandma, holiday celebrations, weddings, or baby births - but missing the drama, the inevitable family bickering or gossip or intrigue that happens with a close family, really balances things out nicely.

Here's some IG to prove Idaho awesomeness:

We bought wood on the side of the road coming home from my in-law's one evening. Just grabbed a bundle and put $3 in the money box. Yep. NBD. 

As the hubby was grabbing the wood, I snapped this pic. Farmland sunset. Hello? Gorgeous. This was taken 5 minutes from my house. And, okay, maybe I could get this same pic back in California but I didn't. I got it here, in Idaho. 

The drive-in. The only drive-in in the area and it's about an hour outside of town. It's extremely family-oriented, clean, and has been run by the same family (who live next door to the theater) since the 70's. Oh, and all the bathroom stalls have doors. This is a step up from my hometown drive-in, believe it or not.

I live in a beautiful, community-minded city. This is a pic of the Saturday Farmer's market. It spans 2 blocks one way and 3 blocks another way and it's ah-maz-ing. Good food, good people, good vibe. I love that the downtown area is essentially shutdown for foot traffic only for like 5 hours every Saturday. Awesome sauce. 

There's so much more. The river that bi-sects the city. The 30+ miles of greenbelt. The Shakespeare Festival. The gorgeous parks. 

I miss the ocean & the beaches of Califorrnia. I miss Disneyland. 

I can still visit those places, but I can really LIVE here. 

It's time for new things

I'm a fickle little thing and I'm feeling the need to change things up a bit around here at Hear Me Roar. Here are the likely changes you'll see happening semi-soon:

1. I'm likely moving over to Wordpress. I think so. I'm almost sure. I hate Blogger's comments section. I want to be able to comment back on specific comments. I also want to section out my blog so I can have multiple sections - which takes us to point two . . .

2. I'm probably going to segment the blog out a little bit and add a section on cooking. This is primarily inspired by my niece, Jenell, who called me yesterday and said, "Aunt Stef, I need you to show me how to cook. Can I have some of your recipes?" She's young, married just a few years with two little kids and a husband who works a lot. She needs some basic recipes and techniques to work with; the basics and a bit more. I said I would send her recipes and then I thought, OH MY GAWD, I can't imagine organizing my recipes enough to send to her without doing something MORE with them, you know? Like putting them out there in a blog for other people to use. So, that's just what I'm going to do. 

3. Name change. Yep, I'm changing Hear Me Roar to something else. I have a few ideas. Nothing set in stone yet, but maybe something with "sassy" in the title. Because I'm sassy. (My husband says so).  Hear Me Roar is always going to be aligned with the women's lib movement and, though I'm AM a feminist, I don't necessarily write about those things. I need a name that will reflect the foodie in me as well. So the name change is about finding a name that's perfectly me.

Back to the foodie thing. I have to admit it: I am a foodie. I love good food. My husband said the other day that he thinks when we really cook a good meal it's better than what we can get at most restaurants. Plus it's made with love just for us and our friends and family. 

I love cooking & baking. Love it. If I could quit my job I would go back to school to be a baker and open a bakery/coffee shop thing of some sort. (As if we don't have enough of those, right?) But, seriously, my husband worked as a barista eons ago and managed a coffee shop - we could do this. The thought just absolutely makes me giggle. And if it was a used book store too? Heaven.

Okay, so that's a bit of a pipe dream, right? Right. In the meantime I'll be changing my blog so keep an eye out.