as my blog material has grown, it has been interesting to watch the searches that direct people to this site. here are some of my favorites:• picture of a bird wearing a helmet- birds? yes, especially the magnificent quail. sorry, no birds wearing helmets on this site.

• nacho libre cornhusk in eye – undeniably, the best part of the movie
• picture of a lowly minion – i can only assume they were directed to my mullet picture
• ugly cat
• ugly bride
• ugly face – the pattern here is starting to disturb me.
• picture mullet hiccup – hmmmm. how can a mullet become more awkward? the answer: having a hiccup fit. luckily, this never happened to me.
• benadryl to shave cat – to the person who submitted this search: if you are still here and reading, please leave my site now. and if the person who googled this phrase is my mother in hopes of giving my cat yet another stylish cut, put the clippers down and LEAVE MY CAT ALONE.

yesterday was the six-month anniversary of ten-cow.com! what does this mean? it means that for the past six months i have been documenting my embarrassing moments, irritations and my ooey gooey feelings. if you came in during act IX, this is what you’ve missed:

• many wildly exciting trips to cedar city, utah
• my heat rash/paint fume rash from a weekend painting project
• three basement floods
• the mutant zucchini plant
• my lunch date with chandler from friends
• the. mullet.
• show girl vegas makeover
• cat shaving catastrophe of 2006
• three bad blind dates
• red-bellied spider infestation
• pictures of my best friend as bridezilla
• shoes
• charming my way out of three speeding tickets
• obscene diet coke consumption
• the unveiling of ten-cow design
• continual embarrassment at the gym
• tribute to the birds
• an invading sheep herd
• my family’s mac addiction
• proof that i am capable of making a scene in any state
• and much more!

one of my friends asked me if all of the stories were true. i believe her words were, “even the part about your mom shaving your cat?” i was proud/mortified to tell her that, yes, it’s all true. the blind dates really were that bad.

let us hope for many more moments of truth and wisdom over the next six months!

• 5:15AM is a horrible time to be awake.
• why do girls wear makeup and jewelry at the gym? i was lucky to brush my teeth.
• despite my very best efforts, i cannot prevent my ipod’s headphones from becoming a tangled mess on a daily basis. very irritating.
• are the seats in spinning class deliberately hard and uncomfortable in attempt to make the standing hill climbs feel like a break?
• hmmm. i wonder if burger king still has those cinaminnie things….

while i was visiting cat i got my first glimpse of how this site looks on a PC through Internet Explorer: ugly. it reads my dotted line as a dashed line, and that makes me sad. approximately 1/3 of you seem to be using that particular web browser so i thought i should offer a little advice – STOP NOW.

maybe look into this browser, or that one, even this one. i highly recommend the first, as does forbes. not only will your web surfing be a more beautiful, designer-friendly experience but you’ll also be better protecting your computer from viruses, pop-up ads and spyware. then we all win!

for most of my life i’ve had great vision. while sitting in an auditorium-sized chemistry class my sophomore year of college, i realized my eye sight wasn’t as clear as i thought it should be. i went the doctor to have things checked out and he sent me home with the most slight prescription available.

having spent a few years inches away from computer screens and buried in books, my distance vision has continued to change. monday i had an eye exam.

i hate things touching my eyes. HATE. the whole air-puff-in-eye-pressure-check thing freaked me out. the OD had to blast both eyes multiple times because i couldn’t keep my head in place nor my eyes open. after what felt like an eternity she confirmed that my eyes have worsened slightly; i now have 20/40 vision. because the prescription is so minor it’s up to me whether i wear corrective lenses full-time or only when i feel i need them. after discussing the options we decided to give contacts a try and to follow up next week to decide which route to take.

this morning was the first time i put my contacts in myself since my doctor supervised my first attempt in her office and i completely spaced it yesterday. it only took me twenty minutes, a tremendous feat. i don’t like touching my eyes so putting contacts in is extremely high on my “dislike list,” second only to grabbing at my eyes to take them out.

after i got to work my left eye started bothering me. i ignored it for a while but as it persisted i decided to take out my contact to see what the problem was. here is my left contact:

this the very same contact i have been wearing inside out for the past three hours. most people spend their junior high years mastering the contact-lens process while i, a working professional, sit across the hall from my company’s executives with saline solution running down my face.

my dad recently went to an Apple Computer Inc. meeting and, knowing that i am a fanatic, he bought me a baseball cap adorned with the lovely apple logo. here i am wearing the thoughtful gift while working on my laptop:

apple hat. apple computer.

so dorky, i know. but i can’t help it; it’s in my bloodline.

this is my dad, working on two macs while talking on his PDA. life is good as a geek.

when my parents told me they were uprooting and moving to southern utah i was not pleased, to say the least. i resisted all efforts made to pack up the home i grew up in and cried the entire month before they moved. i made sure there was no question concerning how i felt about the situation. while on a trip to check out the building project, i wandered the equipment-laden lot documenting construction worker’s litter, rusting nails and mud puddles with my camera. my parents were not amused.

over the past year i’ve come to terms with the situation; i know my family is happy there and during my drive last saturday, i had to admit to myself: southern utah has the most amazing sunsets.

i didn’t dare touch this picture with photoshop because some things just shouldn’t be tampered with. some moments should be kept intact. the sky was the most amazing blue juxtaposed with the orange clouds. i realized cedar city ain’t so bad; it’s not as small-town as i thought and is beautiful in it’s own way.

and then there was this moment:

pardon the glare of the dashboard, but my fear that the fast-approaching SHEEP HERD would sense my terror and trample me flat overpowered my ability to roll down the window.