What if's?

I'm having a little anxiety over speed dating tonight. Have I mentioned here I'm going speed dating? I am. Tonight. There will be 15 men and 15 women. The age brackets seem to go from 25 - 35. I'm going with 2 friends. While I am hope that I'll just have fun I'm having a brief fit of anxiety. We will have 7 minutes with each person and then check off yes or no. If there are 2 yesses, the place will forward contact info. All my little anxieties are what ifs? Like what if no one picks me? And what if they are all weirdos and I don't want to pick any of them? And well, really I think those are the big 2.

Hmm... this is puzzling

I had a note slipped under my door saying that the hot water issue will be fixed by Monday. I have no idea what the hot water issue is, but I have a very very bad feeling that I will be taking a cold shower before going speed dating tomorrow night. And a cold shower on Monday before work.

New!

My mother ordered a jacket for me for Christmas. She originally was going to have it sent to her in Arizona, and I would get it for Christmas. They told her it was backordered. Interestingly enough, it arrived today. :) I had already picked it out after a lengthly discussion so I knew what it would look like. I opened the box and took it out so that I could try it on and check it out. I likes it. :D It may get used before Christmas. :)

My girls are so creative

Check out their shirts. You will see weird blocking I admit, but their names were on some of them.

My new girl's shirt. I like the tiara.

My other new girl's. She had traced a drawing.

Hard to see, but it is a bear holding a marshmallow in front of a fire. She traced a picture I printed out.

SpongeBob. One of my girls LOVES SpongeBob.

A sunflower done by one of my youngest girls.

Mine. :) I started it and then let the girls who were done finish it off.

I'll take more pics of the completed shirts. Mine has some large flowers garnishing it now. :) I had 2 new girls join at last night's meeting. So now we are predominately a Brownie troop again.

New Shoes

(Random other thought does anyone remember the band NuShooz?)

Today I have the day off thanks to Veterans. Thanks Veterans! I had physical therapy for the great tendon problem earlier in the day. It's just going to take time blahblahblah. I go back again in 2 weeks. Sigh.

But on happy news I bought new shoes! Yay new shoes! They're just plain and oxfordy and I like that about them. There was another pair that was too small that I liked that had more frou frouness but I think these will be good for my purposes. (Work and well looking nice on my feet at work.) :) I've needed a new work pair of shoes since the weather has started getting cold and I can't wear my cute little black ones.

My feet in new shoes!

Hand out the cookies, take the money. How hard is that?

How long is the stupid cookie training? Where the hell are you? Get online already, Joanne.

Christ will this day end?!

The answer is, no. It is 4:54 and I'm still in my office hanging out. Tonight is one of our meetings for the girls that sell cookie group that I lead. That will end at 7:00 and usually I'm exhausted. Will I get to go grab some dinner and go home and vegitate in front of the sitcom Joey? No. Because I will be magically teleporting myself (or checking out a flexcar and driving, you decide) to the meeting where I will be trained to be the group cookie manager because the mom who volunteered can't go to it. Of course I will obviously be late since my meeting ends at 7:00 and I have to be there at 7, but what can you do? I'm not cancelling the girls another week. Then I return the flexcar to my employer's parking lot and field trip to forage for food and maybe a video before I head for home. I at least remembered to set the VCR to tape Everwood. Yes I said set the VCR. Yes I said Tape. :) I'm still old school like that yo.' Ok I'm thinking about Tivo but I still can't convince myself it is a necessity of life. Although I have almost convinced myself that whatever a housekeeper would charge for once every 2 - 3 weeks would be a necessity. In order to reward myself with no future house cleanings, I have to get my apartment into ship shape cleanness so that I wouldn't be embarrassed when the housekeeper came to clean. Yes sometimes I do have issues. :)

Not for the faint of heart (ie don't read this one Matty)

I burned my hand on the toaster oven at home yesterday. I hadn't really realized how badly I burned it until today. I didn't do any of the right things I usually do like run it under cold water because I really thought I moved fast enough to not have burned it. I didn't move fast enough. There is a distinct line across my left hand/thumb area just below the joint. That's not the gross part. The gross part... it's blistered and there's fluid.

Ferrets!

As you know I adopted Tess & Rigby from a shelter. I decided today to send them an update about the babies. They posted it on their site! You can view it here to see the pics too, but here's what I wrote:

Greetings!

It's been about 6 months since Tess & Rigby joined me in my little apartment on First Hill and I thought I'd send an update about how they are doing. In the pics Rigby is flopped on the sidewalk because she gets bored, or tired or annoyed by the confines of the leash I'm not sure which, and just stops walking. Tess is ready to go home and will pull me there by the sheer force of her mighty will.

I adopted Tess & Rigby after my 2nd ferret, Baxter died. I had originally been hesitant to get another ferret and considered getting a cat or just going animalless, but after about a week of all aloneness in my apartment I decided a little bundle of fur was just what I was looking for. When I got to the shelter I had originally made up my mind that I would only adopt 1. Famous last thoughts. I spoke with the volunteers just checking out the ferrets and they mentioned that Tess & Rigby were cagemates and had been there already a year. They weren't kits anymore and that made them harder to place. That made up my mind for me. They came home with me that day. It's been 6 months and I think we are all fairly happy. Tess is still a little bit skittish sometimes, but seeks me out in the morning to wrassle with her. She has an incredible curiosity and a penchant for digging in my potted plants. I've given up on the health of the plants and just let Tess do her thing. Apparently the dig box with dirt from the plants is not the same thing at all. I've been most excited recently to find Tess curled up on my bed in the morning. Not every morning, but the mornings she does make me so happy. That was always one of my favorite things Baxter would do, sleep in a little warm ball next to my knees. Rigby is my trouble girl. She is into everything! She has found that by climbing on the trash can in the bathroom she can fall into the tub and join me in the shower. She's usually happy with that until she realizes she's getting wet. Then she discovers that the walls of the tub are too tall and slippery for her and she jumps around like a spastic squirrel until I rescue her. She's like a little puppy sometimes, following me all over the apartment to see what I'm doing and where I'm going. Our one disagreement is her tendency to bite my feet. She gets a little time out when she does it and a lot of praise when she sniffs around my feet without the little love nip. She also seems to like being on the leash in the great outdoors more than Tess does. Although once she gets bored or tired (who knows?) she just flops down wherever we are and that's it, we're done I have to scoop her up and carry her home. We go to a park near my house and they can scurry in the grass and dig in the dirt. Tess historically has been very upset when I take her outside so I don't force it and then this is just time for Rigby and me. They both get to be free roam in the apartment and have explored all the corners. Tess has found some balls of fur that she has claimed as her toys. She carries them around the apartment and hides them in hidey holes. She will wrassle the big hand to death if I try to take them away from her. Rigby has claimed all the cheweasels as hers and has collected them all into my carrier that they both came home in. She found about 5 of them floating around the apartment. Apparently I was under the misguided impression that Baxter actually ate them. She didn't, just hid them. They are providing me a great deal of joy and humor every day. Even when I'm cursing them for walking across my head at 3:00 AM or knocking a fresh can of soda off the bookshelf I find myself smiling because it is far better than no little fuzzy friend at all.

Observances

1 - Chocolate cake is good. You should eat it often.

2 - Men on the bus with long fingernails freak me out. Men in general with long fingernails freak me out. Especially when only like 1 fingernail is long. I saw a guy on the bus today with 2 extremely long (longer than my 'active' length) nails and I think his pinky was really long too. That's just weird.

3 - Matty P & I were in Starbucks partaking of a beverage. In case you care I took Peeved Michelle's friend Michael's advice and tried a pumpkin spice frapp, creme formula since I hate coffee. It is pretty good although a little heavy on the nutmeg. Totally not the point of the story though. There were 2 law students at the next table. They each had a laptop out and a cell phone sitting on the table. One had a rather large Coach bag sitting open on the floor. I think it was real, Matty thought perhaps it was a knock-off. Moot point. The other had a nice little case that looked like it was probably a wallet of some sort also by Coach. At one point in the evening both girls gathered up their coffees and stepped outside for a smoke break. Leaving everything out and open on the table just like that. Not only that, they didn't seem to be anywhere they could see all that crap. I could've just walked out with any of that stuff. Just ridiculous. Matty and I were both a little surprised about THAT level of trust in one's gear. Matt did point out that there are cameras all over the place, which is a fair thing to say. But I suspect an experienced thief could walk up to that table, drop his or her napkin and without even raising an eyebrow have reached into the open coach tote and snagged the wallet and the cameras would be barely the wiser. If the cameras are even hooked up to anything. I used to know someone who worked at one of the big chain stores and he told me that although there are domes all over the store, not all of them have cameras in them. It's just a ploy to make us think we're being watched. He said the public would actually be surprised at how few of them have the cameras. Not that I want to test the theory to find out, but for my kidnapping plans I find that good to know. :)

4 - I have a theory of relative naivete, with regards to sex. It goes something like this, if I meet a person and become friends with the person I will assume that their sexual experiences or whatever are similar to mine. It isn't something I'll say outloud or even actively think, it is more of a passive thing. But if I were to hear later that that person especially enjoyed something like having sex on the sledding hill behind Patty Center (in Alaska) in the snow, that would shock me because whilst I know that people have sex in public, it would never enter into my realm of consciousness that someone I know would have sex in public. Conversely, it would never dawn on me that anyone I know is a virgin, despite my current friendship with several. Matty & I talked about this today. He seems to think that I may have something there. If only some of my other theories would pan out. :)

It's a jolly holiday with you!

I'm back at work today. I survived the sickness. Although I'm now moving into phase 2 of the sickness where I have a cough like I'm dying only I'm not. It usually alarms those around me far more than me.

Today's a Disney day at work I've decided. I loaded all my Disney CDs* onto the computer last night (an effort that took far longer than it should have). I then moved them to my MP3 player which I have plugged in to my speakers to play me a wide selection of my favorites.

Just in case you didn't know... Everybody's got a laughing place. :)

*I say all my Disney CDs like I have a ton of them. I only loaded the 5 Disney Classic CDs. I don't have too many others besides them. I have Tarzan and The Little Mermaid and one I got from McDonalds and that's about it.

Sometimes I overshare

I eat while sitting on the sofa at home, not at a proper table. I live alone. Sometimes when I'm eating food I know I'll be messy with, or just when I'm wearing a shirt I actually like and don't want to ruin, I'll just pull it off and eat in just a bra. I live alone, who cares. Except every once in awhile I have to return to the kitchen or wander around the apartment. Because I have plants on all my window sills I don't have the blinds shut all the way. So apparently I'm probably giving the hospice next door quite a show. Sometimes I should think more. Also, tonight while eating pizza this was a brilliant idea because I dropped a big glob of sauce and it just hit me not my very white shirt. Except I got a lot of pizza crumbs in my bra and that was not good.

Silly things to say today :)

Firstly, the flexcar I was so excited about finding is parked in a very tight spot. I am neurotic about driving the flexcars so it took me about 20 minutes to pull out of the spot. That's just ridiculous. I was just so afraid of hitting one of the cars parked on either side of me or the one right behind me that I inched my way out of it.

Secondly, Matty & I went to lunch at my favorite restaurant. I had a pretty good time eating lunch. There was a couple at the next table who was totally eavesdropping on us. That wasn't hard since they were inches away. And Matty & I tend to talk about interesting (to muggles at least) topics when we're together. We mostly talked about his love life, although I refrained from asking him all the specific questions I wanted to ask until we were safely in the car. The girl's hair would've curled had I asked what I really wanted to ask within her earshot. The best part of the whole field trip... I got some more GF baked goods! I love that they bake essentially crap food GF and don't make the assumption that just because I eat gluten free I also don't use refined sugars and I like carob and all that rock & twig crap. There's another bakery here in town that makes a bunch of GF foods, but I don't like them as much because they are "all natural." Blech. :) (And yes, Matty, I am eating my cookie right now!) :D

Thirdly, I bought the babies new treats and now Tess is greedily gobbling up the few I tossed on the floor for her. Rig is still sleeping, although I did call for her and shake the treat bags so she would come. She didn't. They had been following me all morning long, driving me nuts and dancing under my feet in the hopes that I'll give them what they want.

I think that's about all I gots for now. Obviously I'm spending today making up for all of my sickness time. :D

Hot damn!

There's a new flexcar in an apartment complex that's even closer than any of the other flexcars! I'm so excited about that. (Yeah, it doesn't take much.)

Take out the papers and the trash..

I swear if I could get a handle on the recycling crap I create that would eliminate about 57.4% of my mess. I have a theory that if I had 3 trash bins besides my normal trash can this would help me out. I could have 1 for glass (because glass can't be thrown with the other recyclables), 1 for aluminum cans and 1 for everything else. I just took out an embarrassing number of bags of soda cans, 1 bag of glass, 2 bags of paper and 1 bag of plastic containers. I think if I were to take these other 2 kitchen chairs that I don't use down into storage, I could set up a whole little recycling station in my kitchen as opposed to where the recycling currently piles up which is in my living room in front of the radiator and then under the unused kitchen table that's also in the living room.

Keys!

I've found my keys! Yay! And Michelle (as always) was right. She sent me a link about how to find lost objects. It was 100% correct. The keys usually live on the sewing table with my MP3 player and wallet. They were underneath the sewing table in a bag of stuff that was under there. I personally think that Tess & Rigby were responsible for this, but I'm probably wrong.

In other thoughts, Bon Jovi can still rock and I think I like 'em. Plus still seriously hot.

Finally, is it wrong that I want to have kids not so much because I want to have kids, but because I want someone to excuse my love of toys and I just want someone to play with? I have a new plan about kids. I think I'm going to kidnap* one. It is a long running joke between my coworker friends (who I went camping with) about the ideal age a child should be if I want to kidnap him/her. Two is that age in case you care. About the age I start liking children but not old enough to be verbal enough to say 'Hey this chick isn't my mom!' I scope them out every once in a while, but damn those parents, they keep a tight hand hold on their kids...


*Ok I'm kidding. No, really, seriously. I have absolutely no intention of kidnapping a child. That would cause so much guilt I wouldn't know how to cope.

Yoohoo I'll make ya famous!

Tess & Rig were made famous on Jeopardy tonight. Well, their kind was. The answer to one of the Jeopardy questions under the catagory unusual pets was ferret. And 2 out of the 3 contestants got it wrong. They are not smart. It was the young one who finally got it right.

I really need to eat more than one meal on Saturdays. I'm so starving I could die by the time I made dinner. But a yummy dinner I made. Roast beef and twice baked potato. YUM!

Hey! A book that Lunacy mentioned was also a clue. Babycatcher is a story of a modern day one of these. I got it right even if the real contestants didn't.

Many things

I am officially going to visit my family. I know I've been bitching about it for months. I know I've been fretting over it. But I have finally bought my ticket. I emailed my mother my itinerary and surprisingly enough she didn't bitch about it. I leave on the 24th and return on the 30th. She did ask if I got buddy passes from my sister. Two things about this... 1 - I've never gotten buddy passes from my sister and 2 - I am so not stupid enough to fly standby during the holidays. That's just asking to spend an extra month in Phoenix. Or, more accurately, to never arrive there to begin with. Hmm... Why didn't I think of that sooner?

You know how when you've been sick you start to feel better so you overdo it? I did that today. I've been in the house since Thursday afternoon and needed groceries so I ventured out. On foot even. Walking home I was so exhausted I wanted to just curl up on the sidewalk and nap.

I think tomorrow I am going to my restaurant for lunch. That will make me happy. :)

Yay Keys!

Yay! Apartment manager just brought by another set of keys for me. I am very happy about that. Now I can take a nap. :) I have given in to the sickness and just stayed home today rather than try to fight it.

Just one of those mornings...

I'm still sick. Rather sick. But this morning I convinced myself to come to work so I could have our meeting with the girls tonight. That's not happening though, since I can barely function right now. I am planning on leaving after my 12:15 appointment. Here's the high drama though. I've lost my apartment keys. They are in my apartment. I spent an hour searching for them so that I was late to work anyway. I cried. You know how when you're sick EVERYTHING is high drama? Finding these keys was high drama for me. So now my front door is unlocked but I am locked out of the main building. I'm hoping when I go home either my landlord will be around or someone will be entering or leaving the building to let me in. Sigh.

I must be high

This cold must be effecting my brain. I do believe I just agreed on a family vacation next spring break time. With MY family. With MY family who I'm already dreading visiting in December. We would all be descending upon Southern California (interesting how when I lived there they never visited) and doing the SoCal citypass. It is my little sister's idea. I think she wants us to be closer as a family. (Now I know my cold is effecting my brain... since duh that's fairly obvious.) I am slightly shocked that my mother is going along with it since the trip will include: 3 days at my holy land (Disneyland), 1 day at Knott's Berry Farm (it is hard for me to find food there), 1 day at Sea World and 1 day at either the San Diego zoo or the Wild Animal Park. I'm so driving... :) (As the least bad of all the drivers, and the one who is at least partially used to LA traffic. Oh and I've been to all of these places to boot.)

Voting?

There are 2 issues that are coming up for me to vote on in the next election. I don't know the right answer for either of them. I've read the pamphlet the election people put out. Is it better to not vote on an issue or to research an issue as best I can and make a decision even though I'm not 100% positive it is the right one? (And no, Matty, it isn't the smoking ban proposition.) :)

Buh-Bye Zicame

I just took my 2nd Zicame quick dissolve pill. I was about 1/2 way through it when it made me gag and then I wanted to throw up and had to spit the rest of it out. Clearly, stuffing a q-tip up my nose or spritzing my throat (or really anything) is infinitely preferrable to my reaction to those quick dissolve tablets.

Fuckit!

The good/bad balance of this evening is odd at best.

Good - I bought some groceries to make enchiladas tonight for dinner. This will allow me to have lunch the rest of the week.
Bad - I saw the bus go by as I was walking out of the store which prompted me to go to the ATM to get cash so that I could buy a RealChange* newspaper for $1.00 from the vendor.

Good - I got some cash to buy a RealChange newspaper.
Bad - I needed to break the $20 so I went back into QFC to do so. I figured the service counter would be quick so I got in line to buy a lottery ticket, and thus break my 20. Apparently of the 5 people ahead of me in line, 2 were doing transactions that required a person with a special key. That person was not at the register, she was at the U-Scan. Is it me or is that completely illogical? So I waited a lifetime for my lottery ticket. And when I got outside the RealChange guy was gone, so no newspaper for me. And I saw the bus go by so I missed another round.

Good - (relatively) I capitulated to the rock & twig freaks out there and bought some Zicam to fight my pending cold.
Bad - Have you ever had these things?? Really?? My choices were: nasal spray, nose swab, quick dissolve tablet or throat spray. I went with quick dissolve tablet. Because the other options were grosser. For future reference, the quick dissolve tablet is beyond nasty. I don't like to chew weird chalky things in my mouth like Tums. The Zicam quick dissolve tablets were not good and that texture. I finished at Bartell and went out to catch the bus... yes I missed yet another one. So I walked home. Despite the instructions not to. I also didn't make it to the library to return my overdue books. I have to go tomorrow now.

Also in the bad catagory, no convo lately with WC. I know I say it on a regular basis, but I really need to find a new one.

*RealChange newspapers support the homeless. They buy one for 35 cents then sell them for $1.00. (Ok I don't know how many they have to sell at a 65 cent profit to actually do any good, but whatever.) The articles are frequently about homelessness issues. I find it kind of interesting.

Visitation

I really don't want to visit my family over the holidays. There's no nice way of saying this. The more I think about it the more anxious I get. By the time I'm supposed to leave I'll be on a bajillion milligrams of Paxil just to get through. (Of course Group Health would have to consider me crazy enough for me to even see a shrink to get my bajillion milligrams of Paxil, and since that isn't likely I guess I won't get my bajillion milligrams of Paxil and I will have to self medicate with the Cabana Boy. There's a whole side story here involving me and a trip to a shrink at Group Health back in maybe February or March of this year. I was having a bit of depression, situational not chemical, and just wanted to hash some things out. Since I wasn't a threat to anyone and I don't have a condition that is treatable, just the blues, they sent me away apparently until I do get a condition that is treatable... I still find that funny as hell, even though I really shouldn't.) Wow, did I digress! Oh so I'll be self medicating with Cabana Boy Cherry rum and lemonade or with Malibu Pineapple and OJ (or both... probably both). I'm very different from the child I was when growing up. I'm very different from my family now. And spending time with them means I'm always on my guard. This is a chore for me, not a joy and I wish I didn't feel like that. Even just purchasing the plane ticket to go see them is stressing me out. But it has been more than 3 years and I did hurt my dad's feelings the last time Christmas came up and I went to CA instead of to visit them so I go because I am the dutiful daughter. Even if I need an intervention in January from all the drinking. Matty, you and Michelle go ahead and start planning that. :)

Volunteer day 2

Today I volunteered again at the Pacific Science Center. It wasn't quite as fun today as usual because I spent more time at treat stations than trick stations. Treat Stations are what they sound like... stations where they could get candy. Trick stations were arts & crafts stations. I like them more because they give me a chance to interact with the kids a little bit more and help them out. Just giving them a piece or 2 of candy isn't so fun to me. But it was still good. I may do some more event volunteering for them. I would volunteer regulary for the PSC, but they want 4 hrs per week and that's a lot of a commitment.

I grabbed some dinner in the Center House. Mmm a burger and fries. :) I ended up spending more than I wanted to there because I was having a dessert difficulty. Nothing I bought made me happy so after about 5 sips of an Orange Julius it ended up in the trash. And about 3/4ths of a chocolate shake ended up in the trash. They just weren't what I wanted.

I forgot in my story about the cornmaze... I only had a chicken breast from QFC for dinner that night. Again, nothing was making me happy. :S So that was all I had before we headed out mazing. After we went through the corn maze, we stopped at Dicks for burgers and all that. I had a chocolate shake and french fries. Damn were they both good. Exactly what I needed at that moment...

Random other thought... I had a dream the other morning that for some reason has stuck with me since yesterday. I dreamt that I was in a restaurant and picked up this guy who was cute in a geeky way. He gave me his number and I was kind of excited. And then someone I know came up behind me and did the hug from behind thing people do. Except he kept putting his hands on my tits. In front of cute geeky guy that I was into. So I kept moving his hands away and he kept putting them back until we were walking with my hands behind my back holding his hands to keep them from touching me. It was so weird.

Final thought... I was watching Logo just now. (Logo is the new network for the gays. I like Priscilla Queen of the Desert which is what I was watching.) The movie ended and this news program came on. The news reporter was so god awful I couldn't believe it. It was beyond belief and I had to change the channel.

Yesterday, a recap

Yesterday was my first day volunteering at the Pacific Science Center's Halloween Extravaganza. I think their official title is Tricks & Treats & Science Feats. With only one exception, I was the oldest one there... by a lot! They were mostly high school and college kids fulfilling their service learning requirements for their various groups. Not that it would've effected me since I was a Girl Scout leader in high school, but damn I'm glad they didn't have these requirements when I went. Of course in Arizona, it still may not be a requirement. It wouldn't surprise me if it wasn't. I had fun, though, like I always do. There were 3 craft stations and 3 treat stations. The craft stations were much more fun than the treat stations. I think my favorite craft was the thermotrope, which is one of those pictures that trick your eyes. You put part of the picture on one side and part on the other and then put it on a stick. If you spin it around it looks like the 2 pics are joined. It is pretty cool. We were also making masks and bloody finger boxes. I've discovered there are 2 different schools of thought with regards to the crafts. I say let the kids cut out their own stuff, a lot of others have pre-cut supplies out. Hell that's half the project. I wandered around the Who done it? Exhibit. That one's very cool, the kids are trying to solve a robbery and murder. There's fingerprinting and DNA and exhibits about bones and facial reconstruction. It's all very interesting. I'm excited to go back today.

Myth vs. reality (I think this has been a title before...)

So I had been agonizing over going to the Cornmaze but decided to go anyway. I hadn't realized that the first part of the cornmaze would be just evening cornmaze. That part was pretty fun. Although this is the last weekend so the corn was pretty well trampled down. The paths were crazily muddy too. My new jeans are brown at the bottom and my tennis shoes (the ones I wear daily) are horrifyingly dirty. I may need to just break down and buy a new pair. :S So then we get to the haunted part. Firstly we stood in line to get in for 30 minutes. While we stood in line we did a little dancing game where one would do a move then the next one would do the first move and then add a move and on and on. So we finally got in and went through a misty tunnel area into the maze. It was mostly following a path. It was definitely fun and only a little scary. We laughed and ran and laughed and laughed. We were all gripping onto each other tightly. The last one to jump out of a bush was a chainsaw guy and he made me run (and maybe push a family out of the way... :) ) I'm glad I went, though it definitely was a good time. :)

Today will be a good day dammit!

This morning I got up and decided today would be a good day. I got to watch my favorite MTV2 show, Video Mods while getting dressed this morning. (Seriously standing in the livingroom putting on my bra and shirt because for some bizarreass unholy reason I love Video Mods). I am wearing my lucky ladybug socks, nothing can stop me! (You know they're lucky because a ladybug landing on you is lucky right?) Of course so far it has been somewhat crappy with the missing the bus incident. And then when I got here coworkers showed me this video and I said before I even watched it ... this isn't one of those that you are watching the video and something screams at you right? They both lied it totally was. I might hate them. :) I screamed. It was all in fun. BUT Today will be a good day. I have spoken.

Day is done!

Thank goodness! We had a great meeting tonight. Only 4 girls, and one of them was a new girl, came. It was great, though. I had forgotten how tired I get at the end of Girl Scout meetings. We started painting on our T-Shirts. I discovered that I have absolutely NO idea what size these girls wear. Apparently most of them are into larges these days, so my mediums were way too small. I have a mom picking up more shirts before next week's meeting. And yes, we've moved back to weekly meetings. I refrained from pointing out that I could've told them that they would want weekly meetings. The shirts so far are so damn cute. I've painted a tent on mine, but I want to put more. I printed out a few cute pictures. One is a bear around a camp fire and one of my girls is working on that. Newgirl worked on a cute backpacking girl.

I also got 2 great compliments today. One from the new mom who said that she had heard great things about me from three (THREE!) different people. She was trying to find a new troop and they recommended mine. My little troop. Have I ever mentioned how about 94% of the time I feel like such a crap leader because I just throw meetings together and we don't do great service unit projects? The 2nd came from one of my other Girl Scout moms. She was talking to newmom and she said that I really loved their girls, which despite all my grumbling about them I kind of do. (And now because I'm a huge sap, I MIGHT be a little misty thinking about it.)

I emailed my contact at the Girl Scout office and told her we'd be willing to talk to the other troop about combining troops. I'm still not sure I could give up control. :)

Love...

How You Are In Love

You take a while to fall in love with someone. Trust takes time. You tend to give more than take in relationships. You tend to get very attached when you're with someone. You want to see your love all the time. You love your partner unconditionally and don't try to make them change. You are fickle and tend to fall out of love easily. You bounce from romance to romance.

How Are You In Love?

Interesting. I think this may be somewhat accurate.

Do I do it or not?

I'm a high strung person. I'm also not a huge fan of being scared. Although I can cope, a little bit. I spent most of the Blair Witch Project peering through my fingers. Although hard to say if that was because of the nausea thanks to the shaky camera angles or fear I'm not sure. After watching that movie, I did have a hard time being at my friend's log cabin in the woods (ok not in the woods but instead surrounded by giant fabulous New Englandan homes but the back of the house did face woods and the bathroom scared me because the window faced the woods.) With the light on downstairs, I had to go up to the loft and turn on the light, then back down the stairs to turn off the downstairs light, then back up to the loft to go to bed. Kate could hear me in her room and laughed her ass off. Anyway... I digress. I'm not a huge fan of being scared. I'm high strung (which makes me a lot more fun for other people that's for certain...). I do like Supernatural which scares the crap out of me. I'm afraid of the dark. (Yes yes I know I'm a wuss!) So here's my question. I have the chance to go with my friends to do a cornmaze. Now I like corn mazes. I went to Kate's in Vermont and that was way fun. Here's the dilemma. It is a haunted cornmaze. I'm not sure I like this. I'm honestly not sure I'm going to have fun if I go. But I kind of want to go because I dig corn mazes... What do y'all think?

Yay more kids!

Once I hear from my girls' moms, I think we will be picking up at least 2 more girls and possibly 3 - 4 on top of that. We will become more of a little girl troop, though rather than an older girl troop, which does change the dynamic a tiny bit, but I am excited for the possibility of more girls. Although this would be a little bit weird to me because now I'd have a co-leader (since one set of girls would be absorbed from another troop.). I am not used to sharing control. :) Although it might be nice to not have to do all the meeting stuff myself. :)

Why I am the black sheep

An actual IM convo with my actual mother...

Jo says:
I think I'm going to fly in on christmas eve day
Mom says:
check with Babysis....maybe you can fly to Phoenix and then drive down with her
Jo says:
but then what about back? would poppy or nephew drive me back?
Mom says:
no littlesis would i think
Jo says:
Am I foolish for suspecting that littlesis doesn't have as many days off as I do.
Mom says:
I want to talk to littlesis before you commit
Mom says:
i don't know ow many days shge hgas off or how many days you have off either
Jo says:
I don't have to be back to work until January 3rd. However I will be flying back prior to that to spend new years eve here in seattle.
Mom says:
o
Mom says:
let me talk to littlesis first
Mom says:
will get back to you later or tomorrow
Jo says:
Ok but before you get all your knickers in a plan. I cannot leave work before 3 PM on Friday the 23rd. So don't go making a plan that involves me leaving earlier than that.
Mom says:
ok]

Now see the bottom line makes me sound like a bitch to my mother, which I am. But there's a reason for this. She has been known on more than one occassion to create a plan in her mind and then discuss it with those involved. Then she gets royally pissed off when we cannot comply with her plan. And becomes convinced that she did discuss it with us prior to said announcement even though more than one of us will say she didn't. (Can you tell I've been burned by this "discussion" before?)

Voltaire! I can't wait for Christmas to be over so I can go back to my little hovel and remain undisturbed.

Happy Monday!

Is there anything more brilliant than clean sheets on the bed? Seriously. I totally didn't want to get out of bed this morning because I was just lying there so cozy in my fresh sheets reading my book. I've been working on reading Mirror Mirror for about the last 52 months I'm sure. (Ok obviously not that long, but it has been a real struggle and I wasn't actually sure if I was even going to finish it. I think I will because it is FINALLY getting interesting, but I had to wade through a lot of slog slow moving crap before it got there.)

I think it was last year that I mentioned I wanted to sew a quilt. It would be made up of T-shirts that I have gotten over the years for volunteering at the various places I go to. Most of them never get worn after the event but some of them are fairly cool. And even the ones that are less cool, I would like to put in because they're representative of things I've done. I may actually have enough for 2 quilts, or to make it reversable when all is said and done. I have A LOT of t-shirts. I was thinking of using just navy blue to bind to each shirt to make a border then attach them all together, but looking at this huge stack of jeans I have right now that are all unwearable due to holes, I am thinking I may use denim. How cool would that be? I've asked for a new sewing machine for Christmas. I'll need something heavier duty than my current old fashioned model. Although I should get the old one serviced so that it doesn't seem to want to smoke when I'm using it.

Finally apparently the ferrets are cokeheads. They knocked a can of Pepsi off the shelf sometime in the night and were very excitedly lapping it up this morning when I got up. Little shits. I should really know better than to leave that lying about, and usually I clean up the half empty cans, but I must've forgotten last night.

Target's redemption

Today I did lunch at my favorite place. I'm now munching on a delightful piece of cake. Although I will put 1/2 of it away in a few minutes to save the rest for later.

This week's plan for the girls is making troop t-shirts. I'm hoping it'll be fun and they'll turn out okay. I bought a variety of puffy paints and fabric paint that we'll play with. So then I need white t-shirts to paint on, right? I'm already at Fred Meyers so I check them. No dice. The white t-shirts have printing on them or there are none. So I head down to K-Mart. Again no dice. So I extend my flexcar time and head over to Target. Yay target! They've been reedemed. Not only did they have plenty of white (albiet long sleeved) t-shirts. They were only 5 bucks each. I had originally wanted short sleeved ones but I think the long sleeved ones will turn out better in the end. I'm thinking of writing the troop number and GS one down each sleeve, but I'm not sure if that would be great. What do y'all think? Somewhere on the shirt will have our troop # and GS so that'll be the one unifying thing on all the shirts. Then the girls can decorate the shirt how they want. Although I will print out some coloring pages of camping images that they could trace if they aren't artistic, like I'm not. Then they could paint in the color. I have high hopes.

Scary and a bad song

The commercial for Saw 2 scares the crap out of me.

I was just watching Tess eating on the floor and it caused me to sing a little song about what she was eating. It was out of tune. And weird. And worse, I thought it was Rigby eating so my song was all about Rigby eating. Which then made me laugh because damn if I had a roommate they'd kill me.

Movies

I went to see Inlaws & Outlaws again this afternoon. It is playing as part of Matty's film festival. Second time I've seen it, and second time I've cried. It really is so good. I hope they can find a distributor so that it could go out into the regular world. The best part, I got to meet one of the people in the film. The little old man who loses his partner of 50 years was in the audience, as were several of the other people. The little old man was talking to 2 friends as we were walking out and he said he was amazed how people respond to him when they see him. So I paused and said that his story was my favorite part and that the 2 times I've seen it I bawl like a baby. Fifty years with the same partner, can you imagine it? I can't.

During the film, they had sign language interpreters off to one side for the 4 people on that side who were hearing impaired. I spent much of the film watching them. A lot of the film is just people sitting and talking so it wasn't like I was missing a big car chase scene, and the interpreters were just fascinating. Their facial and body gestures really conveyed the whole story so well. I was amazed.

Blargh jeans!

Christ I am retarded. Seriously. Today's big plan was to go to Southcenter to go to the Avenue to buy new jeans. Seems like a simple enough task, right. I get on the 150 to go down there. About a stop or 2 later a beautiful woman with a head scarf gets on and sits down next to me. For the next 45 minutes she proceeds to yell into her cell phone in her language and cause me a headache and vague nausea with the scent of her rose perfume combined with her own natural body smell. I get off the bus finally and breathe in the amazing smell of semi-fresh air. I'm so excited. I go into the mall and look at the directory. There is no Avenue listed. I go ask at the information desk. According to cute little old woman not only is there no Avenue, there never has been one there. WTF? Did I screw this up? I am not leaving without jeans so I head into JC Penny and buy 4 pairs of reasonable looking jeans and then catch the bus home. Of course the minute I walk into the door I have to look it up online. Yes, it is confirmed, I am retarded. There isn't one at Southcenter. There are about 5 others for me to choose from... they all require multiple busses and multiple busses into areas I've never even heard of. I am thinking of trying again tomorrow since I have the movie this afternoon. If I find jeans I like better I may exchange my recently purchased JC Penny jeans. Although I'm definitely changing into new jeans today.

Another Friday night of wild & crazy abandon.

I'm watching the Goonies on TV. I've gotten a little thrill from seeing the rocks & houses where we were in Oregan. Christ I hadn't remembered how cheesey this movie is. And some of the special effects! They showed the bats coming up through the grate and fluttering for a minute in front of the bad guy's face. You could see the wires!

I'm such a 12 year old boy. Everytime Mikey says one eyed Willie I chuckle inside a teeny tiny bit.

I am now wholeheartedly in love with McAffee. One of its most recent downloaded updates has the fixer for Winfixer! It scanned the computer today and found the 2 bad files and pulled them and all I had to do was restart. Then restart a 2nd time because 1st time I got a blue screen. Interestingly enough, when I did the giant 15 page instructions (Ok not that long but it really felt it) one of the steps indicated I'd get a blue screen. So I'm currently running IE again. I just like that things are easier with IE. Everything loves it.

I think it is an early to bed night so I can shop til I drop tomorrow! Yay new jeans!!

Simple joy

It's Friday.
I just had hashbrowns and bacon for breakfast.
I'm going shopping for new blue jeans this weekend at what will hopefully be my new favorite fatchick clothes store.
Dave Matthews Band is playing on my Launch cast this morning.
I'm going to the movies this weekend.

How much better can life get?

Can you go home again?

I noticed a job posting at my alma mater for an HR generalist with benefits administration being 40% of the job. Now, the other 60% is the crap I hate and the whole reason I'm NOT an HR generalist. However, I'm really tempted just to throw my app out there. I'm sure nothing would come of it. And I'm fairly certain (about 84.5% I'd say) that I don't want to move back up there right now. (Maybe even 93.6%.) But it is tempting. I always loved Fairbanks. BUT, and here's the real crux of it all, how much of what I loved up there was based on the people that were there with me, and how much of it was Fairbanks. I suspect that too much of it would be the people, and they are almost all gone now, so that wouldn't be worth it to me. (Although the 1k permanent fund dividend annually might make up for it. ;) )

Unintentionally funny

Apparently without even trying I'm hilarious. Two examples:

1 - I was at my chiropractor's office and we were talking about something (I can't even remember what). I made the offhand comment that Matty says that I don't trust people but I do trust big business. And I always think 'Well duh, Disneyland has never let me down.' And my chiropractor said that she loves my inner monologue. I don't know what that means. (Ok I do, don't explain it to me.)

2 - I called in for the encampment lottery yesterday evening*. Earlier in the day I had sent an email to the outdoor program person because I had forgotten I had a chiropractor appointment and would be calling on my cell (whoo look at me all technological and shit). I have absolutely no recollection of what I sent in the email I sent. Something about I wasn't going to be at home so here's my cell number. There was obviously more to whatever I said because the woman who answered the phone (and obviously to whom I sent the email) said she found my email funny and printed it out and shared it with the office. I really wish I know what I had said.

*There are only 33 or so spots available to have an encampment if we want to use one of their properties. There are something like 59 service units in our council. We lottery every year to try to get a spring encampment slot. We did get one for April yay!

Oh my head!

I went out with the boys last night. It's been a fairly long time and it was a school night so now I'm paying the price. V's birthday was yesterday so I joined him and some old friends out for booze. It was good to see the guys again, but damn I'm reminded of why I don't do this anymore.

I got into a rather involved (yet difficult to hear) discussion about why I don't think you'll meet Mr. Right in a bar. I think it boils down to the fact that people who spend every night in the bar have got issues. (V was not present for this convo) And I don't think that I'm incorrect, although they were fighting me on it. At least one of those 2 spends every night in the bar. And I looked at him and said, "Your issue is that you missed out on all of this when you were in your early 20's and now you're making up for it." (OK I will admit that at this point in the evening I'd had 3 drinks... 2 Black Forests [a kind of chocolate cream drink that's all alcohol poured in a martini glass] and a Pineapple Malibu and OJ) I'm actually not wrong on that assessment though. The guy typically dates only 20 somethings and he's in his early 40's. He didn't come out until mid 30's. I even copped to the fact that when I first moved up here I spent every night in the bar drinking because I was unemployed, broke and had 1 friend (who was at the bar too). But I think when life started getting better, I started going there less. And now I'm rarely there. The other one kind of saw my point I think. I pointed out that he rarely spends time in a bar because it served its purpose and now he has a life that isn't the bar. Even the 40 something kind of agreed because he said he joined the rugby team and softball as a better means to meet people.

I got to play darts with this Russian friend of V's. He's usually really good, but I managed to beat him 3 games to 2. Go me! :)

V had a bartender friend from the old bar he worked at there. When he first was introduced he hugged me. I am not, by nurture, a touchy person. We do not touch in my family so I find it weird to be randomly hugged by a stranger. I've gotten much better about being hugged by friends, but a stranger is too much for me. So it was worse when he tried to kiss me! Three times! I wasn't drunk enough to just go with it. And so I was just very "what's happening... what's going on here?" And then I fled, because apparently it has been too long since I've kissed a boy and I no longer know how to react properly. :) I need to find a way to remedy that with someone I actually WANT to kiss. :) (Also it isn't that the guy was unattractive, he was actually kind of cute, but I was just so befuddled.)

The way home sucked. I went to catch the bus (given the no hills rule) and it was 10:56 when I sat down at the stop. Now the sign said the bus comes at 10:53, and I would think I would've seen it as I walked up to the stop. But I hadn't and Seattle busses aren't that great at being on time so I figured I was fine, right? Not so much. At 11:23 the next bus came. Sigh. I got panhandled twice but that was about it. I didn't even think to walk up to the next block to catch a different bus that goes where I need it to go.

Got home. Watched my video tape of Veronica Mars. Went holy cow! And went to bed! :)

Not too terribly surprising.

Raw evil score: 40%

Michelle Fails to Surprise, Yet Again

Raw evil score: 57.78%

Fuzzie bunnies!

To counteract the grumpiness that is me... Here's a couple of pics of the cutest of cute ferrets. :)

Tess outside on her pink leash. She and Rig actually have had to trade leashes because the blue one on Rigby is too small and I can't tighten this pink one tight enough for Tess.

When Rigby gets bored or tired of our walks, she just plops down on the sidewalk and won't move. That's my cue to come over and pick her up.


And finally Rigby up close and personal outside. Rig has the pink nose and tess has a bunch of black on her nose. That's the obvious way to tell them apart. I can now tell them apart based on little things like their size and Rig is fluffier than Tess.

Bucka bucka

I went to Physical Therapy today over the ankle that will not heal. She's giving me another month before they send me to an orthopedist for a boot. That's the first bucka bucka.

She had me do a bunch of different tests. The weirdest thing we discovered... I can't put my feet together and stand straight up. My knees won't allow it. Physical therapist says that it is something to do with my knees and hip bones and apparently there's a problem there. But it isn't the type of problem that anything can be done about. So because of this knee/hip thing I walk on the inside of my feet and that's contributing to the problem. Which is also weird since the wear pattern on my shoes does not indicate this at all. The shoes say that I walk on the outsides of my feet. AND finally my feet don't bend right. There's no flexibility there. The right foot can go to neutral (like the 90 degree angle for standing). The left one (the one with the problem) cannot. So that's what is continuing to agitate the problem and will probably cause me future problems. And at some point in the future I may need to have orthotics. Seriously, this is all very ridiculous.

So now my instructions are: No walking. Really and seriously. I have to take the bus to go to work and home. I have to not walk up hills at all. I have to do all these different exercises. One of them I have to do every 2 fucking hours! The other I have to do 3x per day and this massage thing once daily. In 3 weeks I'll go back for an evaluation. I'm hopeful... very hopeful. (Or not, I'm feeling rather grumpy about all of this). I can go back to the gym to bicycle if I would like or I can go to the pool, except it is only open for lap swim from 7 - 9 AM (which doesn't work with my work schedule) and 6 - 7:30 at night (which doesn't work with my life schedule). It is open on the weekends too so I think I'm definitely going to start going on the weekends if nothing else. I have to do some exercise!

Christmas shopping already?

My mom recently requested my Christmas list. This is always difficult for me because I'm usually one of those people who just buys what she wants when she wants it. However, this year I've come up with a pretty good list of suggestions of things that I like. With links. I just emailed it off to her. This is always a trouble for me because she never looks at the list. She asks for it. I provide it and then she buys what she thinks accommodates the list. Two years ago, on the list was a movie. She bought me a hat with the movie's name on it. From a yard sale. This is what I deal with. It isn't that I'm greedy. (Ok maybe I am, but not really). It's just that if you're going to ask me for a list, I'm going to give it to you. There are things of varying prices on the list. I have an Amazon wishlist that's always updated. I even tell her where I like to shop so gift cards would work. So it isn't like I said I want that 5,000 dollar digital camera and nothing else. I want this to be as easy as possible because I hate it when she sends me crap that I just have to either store or get rid of.

Crunch Crunch

As a girl who grew up amongst the Mesquite Trees and Palo Verdes, we didn't get a whole lot of fall leaves on the ground to slog through. I don't think I'll ever really get over the child-like joy I feel when stomping and kicking and crunching through the fallen leaves.




(Mesquite tree)


(Palo Verde)

Creature of habit

Every Sunday morning I do laundry. It is the only household chore with it's own set routine and time.
Every Sunday morning right around the time I get up.
Every Sunday morning I do 3 loads: a load of jeans/ towels, work clothes & everything else.
Every Sunday morning I load the laundry basket in my room the same way. Everything else on the bottom (I don't want my neighbors to see my panties), work clothes and jeans/towels on top.
Every Sunday morning I set up the washing machines in the exact same manner. The one on the left is cold for jeans, the one in the middle is permanent press for work clothes and the one on the right is cold for everything else.
This Sunday morning, I threw the work clothes into the left, the jeans into the middle and everything else on the right. Oh no! Now my world is thrown upside down. Black is white! Up is down! Chaos is ensuing. Crikey. I'm thrown all off now.

Also, I'm hungry.

Several things rattling around in my head...

Holiday
Right now is the Jewish holiday of Sukkot. It is a joyous holiday celebrating the harvest and it also commemorates the 40 year period when the children of Israel were wandering the desert and living in temporary shelters. One of the ways they celebrate Sukkot is by building a sukkah. They are these temporary shelters that those who are celebrating Sukkot live in during the holiday (although live in from what I understand is a fairly loose interpretation... those who are unable to do not live in them, but may take meals in them). Why do I bring up this lesson in Jewish holidays? Because every year the retirement community I walk past encloses their patio and put tree boughs on the top for the roof for those residents who celebrate Sukkot. I find that so incredibly cool. And I was reminded me again of this a couple of days ago when lo and behold the temporary walls were back up.

Volunteer
Last night was the first day of the big gay film festival Matty works for. Due to a program snafu, he needed a volunteer or 2 to hand out postcards for one of the sponsors. I volunteered and dragged along RBT (formerly virgin gay, he still is those things but we've bonded now so I need a better nickname.). We had a really good time. We went to dinner first at the mall. Then went to volunteer. He's funny and we talked a lot of smack about people. :) While I was passing out my postcards, the guy whose film I worked on said hello and remembered who I was by name. Freaked me out a little bit. I now have several free tickets for the festival and I might actually use them. :) I offered some to RBT but he declined. Although I think I may bring it up again to him and see if there are any he wants to see. While we were leaving the Cinerama the weather was just chilly but nothing wild. We stopped into Cold Stone Creamery for some ice cream for me. It only took maybe 7 minutes. When we walked out it was POURING. So we sat under an awning and chatted. Caught the bus up to QFC and parted ways. It was a good time though. :)

Donation
I got a card in the mail yesterday from America's Second Harvest. It was thanking me for an additional donation I just recently did to them. Currently they are hitting up my bank account for a fixed amount of money every month, but in the wake of Katrina, I knew they were sending down food and supplies so I donated more. It was a nice touch, a card.

Food
I know it would make me sick, but sometimes the new Burger King meat sandwich sounds really good.

Shopping
I have to go on another field trip to buy new jeans. I'm just going to go around here. Hopefully I can find something I don't hate at Ross. (ew Ross, but they're cheap). RBT and I were discussing shoes yesterday and he said something about me earning enough money to buy a pair of Prada shoes if I wanted. He surmised they'd cost about $350.00. I said I guess, but I'd have to save for several months to do it. And he seemed shocked by that. Of course even if I did earn the kind of money to buy fancy shoes, I wouldn't. $350 is just too much for shoes to me. I balked at the over $100 I paid for my Danskos that I love.

VH1
When did VH1 start playing all this R&B and Hip Hop? I've spent the last 1/2 hour with the channel on mute because I didn't like the song they were playing. (Which is a sure sign I'm an old lady!) :)

Flu shot!

I am flu shotted as of 9:20 this morning. Sickies (I hate that word when used to describe me when I'm sick) feel free to breathe on me! :) I am invincible!

Suck -up

Apparently I am a suck up. I receive an email from the Paramount Theater because I volunteer there. One of the shows coming up, Dr. Stephen Hawking. He wrote my physics textbook. I emailed my physics prof to let her know he was coming. :)

Also, how weird is it when someone has your own name and you write them an email.

Joanne

blah blah blah blah

Sincerely,
Joanne

Vaguely troubled

I got an email from one of my kids' moms this morning (for the group that I lead that sells addictive cookies in the spring). I peeved about it, but it has been troubling me all day. The mom said that the other moms have been talking about things they want changed for the coming year. All of her suggestions were nothing too dramatic, but it has been bothering me all day. (Mostly because honestly, I can't let things go. I know this. I'm aware. I don't know if that's something you can start doing or if it is just a personality trait and I'm stuck with it.) I think it bothers me because I'm taking it as a criticism that I'm a bad leader. I don't necessarily think that's their intent, but that's how it feels to me. (Have I ever mentioned I'm neurotic? :P) The changes they want...

• They want to do more outside activities. I've got no issue with that (although they bitch and moan about driving places so...) .
• They want the girls to do more of the planning. That's actually where I was already going since starting this year they are more responsible for the planning. That's the ultimate goal, by the time they're in high school the girls do all the planning. And I told them this the end of last year.
• They want to have a calendar of when stuff will be worked. I can do that too. (That's been a goal of mine, but at the same time, I'm lazy and I've got other stuff going on so I tend not to do that.)
• They want to meet bi-monthly. I've suggested that in the past and been shot down, so that one's never been me.

None of this is earth shattering, yet why do I feel so defensive?

Mad cooking skillz

Tonight I decided I wanted these biscuits I make (from a Bob's Red Mill mix) and I decided to switch it up a bit. I used whipping cream instead of milk (hey it is great in mashed potatoes. Really. Try it.) and I added cheese to make them cheese biscuits (everything is better with cheese right?). Usually they hold their shape quite well. I just looked in the pan, I currently have giant biscuit as the 3 all kind of smooshed together. I just tried a couple of bites. Fairly dry. But they usually are. The biscuits are more like the biscuits & gravy type rather than the light & fluffy type you get from Pillsbury. They taste semi good and once I have doused them in butter they'll be even better!

Edit: Ok I was wrong. Dousing in butter did not help the dry crumblyness of them. The sucking the spit right out of my mouth of them. I broke down and heated up a few tortillas so that my dinner wasn't 100% meat.

Paranoia

I got an email today from my Girl Scout coordinator (she works for the Girl Scouts) about the reorganization of a troop. It was cc'd to all my other girls' moms. I emailed her and said that we aren't part of that troop and we aren't reorganizing. She said she got the list of emails from the troop leader. It's altogether too weird to me. And yes, I'm being paranoid. I'm well aware. :)

Yum!

So (as previously mentioned) I was searching for the difference between apple juice and apple cider. You may recall, that I've been trying to find great spiced apple cider. So I've been boiling apple juice in with these mulled cider spices that I found at QFC. And I mused if it would be better with apple cider instead of juice. So while in QFC tonight, I was picking up a new bottle of apple juice and I looked at the labels. Kroger brand indicates there is no difference. Tree Top brand seemed to indicate there was. (Read the ingredient list.) So I picked up a bottle of Tree Top. It doesn't seem to make it taste any better. (It is still good, don't get me wrong.) So apparently the difference is that apple juice is processed more and cider isn't. Although probably given that I bought Tree Top, both were probably almost the same.

Matty P & I went out to dinner tonight. I haven't realized how much I miss hanging out with MP. I'll be really really glad when his Film Festival job is over. Then he can play with me again! :) He has a different way of looking at things than Michelle does. Not better, not worse, just different. It's interesting sometimes to talk to him just because it is a different perspective.

I've cut out my 2nd evening soda (again). I have found that I'm not able to sleep at night. Then I don't want to get up in the morning. And sometimes I take a mid-afternoon nap. Which then screws me up again for the night. My life is so rough. :P I've had to start taking showers after work just because I'm so tired at night and in the morning I don't want to do it either of those times.

Fuck you Internet Explorer!

So for the 2nd time in less than 2 months, I've been malwared. I was using google (so fuck you too google!) to search for the difference between apple juice and apple cider. The first result came back and I click it not thinking. Holy fuck, it is a porn site. So I back out. It wasn't a porn site actually, it was the malware downloader. So now I'm done. I've joined the techies jumping on the firefox bandwagon. Hypothetically this will relieve me of my malware problem.

It's official!

I'm really going to CA for Thanksgiving. I just bought the ticket. Yikes! :) Now I can't wait! Crafty weekend here I come!

Cheese blog

Yay! I had my Tillamook story posted at the cheeseblog. Go read it. Really. :)

Why did it have to be spiders?

So recently I posted how much I love spiders. After this morning's nightmare I may not love them so much. Arachnophobes be warned... I was dreaming I was in an apartment (very cute 2 bedroom actually) with the ferrets. And I noticed that a spider had formed a web in the corner. Not a problem, until I slowly realized there was more than 1 spider. And they were big. And then there were more and more spiders doing spidery stuff. Some were scuttling around. Some were building webs. An egg sack had opened and thousands of baby spiders were pouring out. There were all different types... some big... some little. I said to my husband (Yeah who knows) that I know I love spiders but something has to happen here so I started trying to spray them with Raid. Except that didn't seem to kill them. So we fled into the 2nd bedroom because there weren't spiders in there, except there were... and then the alarm woke me up thank goodness.

Spiders: To see a spider in your dream, indicates that you are feeling like an outsider in some situation. Or that you may want to keep your distance and stay away from an alluring and tempting situation. The spider is also symbolic of feminine power. Alternatively, a spider may refer to a powerful force protecting you against your self-destructive behavior. If you kill a spider, it symbolizes misfortune and general bad luck. (Hmm I wonder what it means if I tried to kill it but they wouldn't die?)

To see a spider spinning a web in your dream, signifies that you will be rewarded for your hard work. You will soon find yourself promoted in your job or recognized for your achievement in a difficult task. Spiders are a symbol of creativity due to the intricate webs they spin. On a negative note, spiders may indicate a feeling of being entangled or trapped in a sticky or clingy relationship. It represents some ensnaring and controlling force. You may feel that someone or some situation is sucking the life right out of you. (Positive and negative... interesting that)

To see a spider climbing up a wall in your dream, denotes that your desires will be soon be realized. (A girl can hope can't she?)

To dream that you are bitten by a spider, represents a conflict with your mother or some dominant female figure in your life. The dream may be a metaphor for a devouring mother or the feminine power to possess and entrap. Perhaps you are feeling trapped by some relationship. (I don't think I got bitten so this part is probably moot. Although one of the ferrets did get bitten and I was troubled by that greatly. I tried to cage them to protect them but that didn't work.)

Black Widow: To see a black widow in your dream, suggests fear or uncertainty regarding a relationship. You may feel confined, trapped, or suffocated in this relationship. You may even have some hostility toward your mate.
Because the female black widow has the reputation of devouring its mate, it thus also symbolizes feminine power and domination over men. (She was dead I wonder if that changes the meaning?)

Bigger disappointment

I do have a bigger disappointment that I forgot about. I've decided when I go to California to visit Peeved Michelle over Thanksgiving, I'm not going to go to Disneyland while there. It's a completely logical & rational decision. The money just isn't there, and going is pretty damn costly these days. According to their website it would be either 56 or 76 (depending on 1 park or 2 park tickets) just to get in the door. Then there's food once inside and other little things. Because I love souveniers. And Disneyland food. And since it is Thanksgiving weekend it'll be crowded. And that's not as fun. So even though it is the 50th Anniversary and I totally want to go, I'm going to skip it this time. (Ok I say this now, but I may talk myself into it by Thanksgiving, although I doubt it $76.00 is better spent on other stuff like Christmas presents.) AND I think I was just there in March. (How sad is it that I had to open up another window to confirm, yes I did just go there in March?)

6 lbs.

That's how much butter I found in my fridge while poking around inside. I know I buy 2 lbs at a time when I see it on sale and I think I'm out of it. Apparently I always think I'm out of it. Funny beacuse I rarely use butter except for when I make potatoes. I almost never use it for baking since I use applesauce. Crazy.

Disappointments galore

None that are serious... mostly a bunch of little inconsequential things. I was about 1/2 way through my favorite author's latest book, Two Trains Running, when I realized I was bored and will never finish it. I knew that the next book after Weaveworld would have to be pretty damn good for me to want to read it, but I figured my favorite author, Andrew Vachss, would be okay. I love his stuff. (And yes, I realize the weirdness of it all. I don't believe in violence yet all his books are about cold blooded killers.) Two Trains Running was a deviation from his normal stuff, and I didn't like it. There was far too much exposition about who was with what gang and what the gangs were dong to rise to power. And I had a hard time following who was with what group. So I read the last 15 pages and called it good.

I went to my favorite restaurant and had a bacon cheese burger. No disappointment there. In fact moment of joy since they actually had soda. (They didn't have it the last time I was there)

I went to Fred Meyer to find some jeans. Note to Fred Meyer... the Misses section is usually code for the fat chick section. I do not want to see size 4s or 6s in that section. They're undergoing remodeling. I could not for the life of me find the section that had clothes that would fit. Finally as I was about to give up, I found it and bought 2 pairs of new jeans. Yay new jeans! :)

Later this afternoon I headed down to the library to pick up my latest book and return the bad one. Unfortunately I read the website incorrectly so I was too late. And right as I got down there the bus I would take to the grocery store went by so no chance to catch that one. I ended up heading a few blocks over to catch a different bus rather than wait the half an hour for the next one.

In QFC I was hoping to find Country Crock pre-made mashed potatoes so I could make my modified shepherd's pie without too much work on my part. So instead I am making my own mashed potatoes and some beef stew. Which isn't bad either. I also have mulled a mug of spiced cider and now I'm waiting for it to cool down enough to drink. I wish I had ice. (I don't own an ice cube tray, and even if I did, my freezer is too full of other stuff and ice because I need to defrost it, there's no space for one.)

There are new episodes of Charmed and Desperate Housewives on tonight to look forward to. So that's good too. :) So maybe not a totally disappointing day. :)

Less accomplishment

When I used to work at the casino, my psycho bitch boss used to make me make a to-do list every day and then I'd carry over tasks that didn't get done from the previous day onto the next day's to-do list. Christ that job sucked. Anyway, for my Saturday to-do list there were only a few basic things on it...

• Shower
• Get Dressed
• Go to the library to pick up the book I have on hold
• Buy some new jeans since I've ruined every pair I own
• Eat a couple of meals
• Go to the movies

I accomplished: shower and eating 1 meal. So I guess there's some stuff moved over to the next day. :) On the one hand I feel somewhat like a slug for still being in jammies at 8:15 at night, but on the other... life goes on. :) I have to add to the list for tomorrow: go to the grocery store, laundry and maybe change the sheets on the bed and clean the fish bowl. (Plus dishes and find something to make for dinner and something to bake so I have breakfast all next week). We'll see if I accomplish even half that. :)

Now I'm kicking back and enjoying a glass of hard cider. Sometimes life is good. :)

A true story about Joanne & Cheating

Once upon a time, I turned 21 years old. I turned 21 on the Monday of Spring Break. How awesome is that? V & I spent the week out in Chatinika, AK, at a B&B owned by a faculty member. He was not going to be there. For my 21st Birthday a number of people I knew were coming out to party with us. Michelle was part of that group. Moral turpitude was part of that group. My boyfriend of 6 months was not. We were sitting around the table playing drinking games. Well, of course, I got drunk. Apparently because Moral turpitude & his buddy were cheating at them. Not too shocking, though, since that's the goal of any good 21st birthday, complete and total drunkenness. Michelle & I were supposed to be sharing a room that night. The way things actually fell out, this did not happen. Michelle was making out with MT's buddy in the room Moral Turpitude & buddy were supposed to be sharing. Apparently that left 1 place for MT. Yup. My bed. The giantest largest most huge bed I've ever seen. I'm fairly certain it was larger than a California King. We both begin the night at opposite ends of the bed. Quite a bit of coaxing and sweet talking occurs wherein MT is trying to convince me that sex would be great and I'm reminding him that I have a steady boyfriend. I don't cheat. Ever. Coaxing. Reminding. Coaxing. Reminding. The gap between us has steadily decreased until there really isn't one. He claims boyfriend is cheating. That may be I say, but that doesn't mean I will. He's coaxing, I'm weakening and then he says it. The phrase that still mortifies me. It is supposed to be a come on but it did the opposite for me. I laughed. I rolled off the motherfucking bed laughing and had to go to the bathroom I had to pee so bad because of the laughter. I came out of the bathroom and there was a giant amount of space between us again. Ten years later, Michelle & V (who have both heard the story) still torment me with it and an accompanying hand gesture to remind me. I still blush when either one does it. And yes, I'm going to leave you hanging on what the phrase was because 10 years later, I still can't type it.

Fairbanks!

Michelle & I are thinking of going to visit Fairbanks next year! YAY! (MP may join us, but he's unreliable... :P ) I'm excited.

I AM a grown up.

I have the opportunity to go to lunch with 'the girls' today. (The other 2 admins in my office.) Our work study student is here today so the 3 of us were going to go down Broadway to La Cocina. I love La Cocina. (Of ourse as I type this I remember that the last 2 times I've eaten there I've left with my stomach feeling squidgy so perhaps La Cocina does not love me) Anyway... I remembered last night that I can't go to lunch with the girls. I have class. And now that I am a grown up apparently I attend class instead of skipping to go to lunch. I'm not skipping a pass/fail class that I didn't have to pay for and that is unrelated to anything to do. Do you know how many classes I skipped when I was actually in college getting a degree?! DO YOU! Hell, I don't even know... but at least 2 of my classes I attended only on test day. In fact my intro to psych class attended so rarely that when I showed up for the final with a bunch of other students we were greeted with this announcement... "Well, I see now who doesn't attend my class regularly." Apparently he had given the final the week earlier. We still got to take it and I got a "B" out of the class so who knows what I missed out on. Voltaire! Clearly, I'm now a grown up. (or an adult learner, neither are really that pleasant.) :)

hippies & spiders

I'm watching South Park right now. I hated South Park when I was a teacher because my kids would quote it and swear which was annoying as hell. Now that I'm not a teacher, I love it! Tonight's episode... Die Hippie Die! Cartman hates hippies and is now trying to exterminate them. The way he is going through this woman's house... as though he were looking for cockroaches or mice. The best part... (or the part that makes me laugh hardest) the drum circle hippies. Hee. Drum circle hippies. The drum circles are growing at a rate of 2 hippies per hour. They might be setting up for a hippie music festival. hee He's kept the town hippie free since he was 5 and 1/2. I LOVE Cartman.

I love spiders. I read a book as a child called Be Kind to Spiders about how we should be nice to them because they help by killing off other bugs. And since I totally fear other bugs, I'm all for something that will help me get rid of those. :D Anyway, I'm also really fascinated by their webs. As I was walking to work this morning there were 2 spiders building 2 huge webs. They were amazing. I could've stood watching the one for hours as he (or she) worked the legs to crate each strand and hook them together. So cool. I am going to try to remember my camera tomorrow morning on my way to work and take a picture.

Ferret behavior...

I just read an interesting article on Slate about dog behavior and how we humans assume our dog's behavior follows a similar logical path that human behavior does. ie (the example used in the article) This woman's dog is starting to behave poorly because he is angry she went back to work full time instead of being at home. When in actuality that's not the case at all. And through a lot of information gathering about the behaviors and involving a doggie behaviorist they realized the dog was anxious because no one was around to correct its bad behaviors and it didn't know how to act. There's much more to it than that but that's the gist.

It made me think about Tess & Rigby. I'm still feeling a bit concerned about Tess because she seems to be a little (translate that to a lot) high strung (kind of like me) and Rig still has an unholy affinity for my feet (usually investigating their taste with her teeth, she is especially fond of this at 5:30 AM). When they first came to live with me I tried caging them during my work day and then letting them out when I got home. I stopped too soon I think, after only a few days. I'm now wondering if they still have anxiety because of too much freedom and no real clue about what to do with themselves. Hence the problem with the plants, and really any other major chaos they get into such as the bathtub. Now ferrets aren't dogs. They are naturally curious. They do like to dig. They're fairly single minded when they have something on their mind. (ie I can keep redirecting Rig out of the bathroom and away from the tub but short of moving the trash can and shutting the door, she'll keep going back to it until she gets bored on her own.) But I think I need to apply some of what I read to the terrible twosome. I thought by giving them more freedom they'd be happy because they weren't shut up in a cage like they had been, but really I may be freaking them out.

Is this really weird?

So last night I was sleeping, I think I had just fallen asleep and I was dreaming I was walking down stairs of a tomb or crypt. In the dream I tumbled and fell forward and then I woke up. Why? Because my arms and legs were moving as though I were falling and as they fell back to bed that's what caused me to wake up. This isn't the first time. A few weeks ago, I was dreaming that either I was a cat or I was about to be attacked by a cat (I can't remember which) but I put my arms up in the dream and woke up when I could feel my arms actually up like that. And then they fell back on the bed. It is very strange. Of course, I also sit up to turn over which is a weird sleep issue too... But that one is a habit thing because I hate stuff twisted around my body like my t-shirt so I don't like to just roll over.

Oh, on a different note... my hippie chiropractor's new office manager is hot. He seems straight as well. I may need adjusting on a far more regular basis. ;) And so far I like him better than bitchy mcsnot who was there before.

Vaguely troubling

I'm the United Way ambassador for my department at work. I attended training yesterday to learn about how to get people to donate and all that jazz. One guy (very annoying guy actually) made some comment about the Boy Scouts being a UW charity and how some people have a problem with that given the Boy Scouts' history of discrimination. And our trainer jumped on that and that the Boy Scouts in general don't get any support but their after school program which is non discriminatory does. So I've got no issue there (and really I had no issue with them supporting the Boy Scouts. While the group as a whole is discriminatory, not all councils are. It really depends on the location). But then he goes on to talk about how Planned Parenthood used to be a UW partner charity, but isn't anymore. He said that people were concerned because PP does abortions so UW spoke to PP and PP decided to end their affiliaton with UW. And he said that UW was okay with that because this way they aren't making a political stance. I've been thinking about this since yesterday... by having the discussion and then allowing Planned Parenthood to pull their affiliation they actually ARE making a political stance. They are kowtowing to the conservatives who won't donate to UW because of the PP affiliation. Now I can fully understand this. But at the same time it really disturbs me. I contribute, but I'm now conflicted. The United Way supports the Girl Scouts and a lot of other really good charities, and I suppose I'm fairly certain that politics won't affect most of their partner charities, but at the same time one can't help but wonder if they will.

What is wrong with this picture??

I had a wholly other post rattling around in my head about something else that bothers me, but as I was flitting through some photographs in the PI I came across this photo. If I were to see this pic in National Geographic I would've assumed this was a starving woman in some 3rd world country. Her head has that giant look like you see on the ads on TV for Christian Children's Fund. Her forearms couldn't be bigger around than a dixie cup. How does she hold up that gigantic cranium? She honestly, to me at least, looks as though she is sick and pretty close to dying. She isn't. She's a model on the Paris runway this year. Holy sweet fuck! How is this an approximation of beauty? I don't even know what else to say. I'm speechless in my horror at this...

I should give credit to the photo. I came across it in the Seattle PI. It is an AP photo by Michel Euler.

Checkered job history...

I was just filling out this thing for my alumni stuff form high school and they asked how many jobs I've held in the last 10 years. I added it all up and wanted to die... I've held 12 jobs in 10 years. How pathetic is that? Now granted this was some of college and post college still and at least 2 were concurrent, but really. Here they are:
Camp Counselor (summer 95 & 96 & 97)
Student Library Assistant (School year 95 - 96)
Substitute teacher (AK) (96 - 97)
Bookstore clerk (96 - 97)
Temp (Indiana) (97 - 98)
Program coordinator with developmentally disabled adults (Ie babysitter) (98 - 99)
Teacher (AZ) (98 - 99)
Temp (CA) (99)
Dot com in CA (99 - 2002)
Temp (WA) (02 - 03)
Casino (6 months in 03)
Current job (03 - Present)

Bacon flavored?

I'm watching Degrassi The Next Generation (ok go ahead and laugh, I don't know why I started watching the show, but now when there's nothing else on I'll watch.), and 2 of the boys have just attended a sex lecture. They decide to go to the drug store to buy condoms so they are prepared just in case. They're admiring the selection and talking about the different choices. Boy 1 looks at boy 2 and says Pina Colada flavored? Boy 2 says "Why couldn't they make them bacon flavored?" I just about died laughing, and choked a little bit. Bacon flavored condoms...

Cooking

Ok I was going to write a post about how I'm sick of cooking, but I forgot most of my salient points. I don't know what the hell I was going to ramble about. So instead, I'm going to discuss my massive raging crush on WC. I worked late again today, to make up the hour I wasted hypothetically going to the doctor. Over the last couple of weeks, he has stopped in when I've been there late and we've chatted. I'm seriously crushing. We talk about books and hockey and football and geeky stuff. I now know he is in the age appropriate bracket. (I thought he was younger, by maybe 4 years for some reason. He's very much not.) Hopefully things will continue to progress and maybe it won't take until I'm 60 to go out with him. :)

Bus & Stoplight Karma

I have amazing bus karma. I was walking up to catch a bus today, probably later than I should, and it was held up at a stoplight so I managed to just catch it. It is fairly rare for me to miss a bus, and if I do it is usually more to do with my own idiocy in figuring out where the stop is than because I'm running too late. When waiting for a bus and I'm not sure the time, I rarely wait more than 10 minutes before one comes along. Of course this is helped by the fact that where I usually need to go within the hills there are many bus choices that will get me fairly close to where I want and I've got no issue walking an extra couple of blocks. (Unless it is from 19th to 15th because that hike is a bitch.) :)

Conversely, I have awful stoplight karma. It is almost a guarantee that the walking person will change to flashing hand while I'm still half a block away to ensure I will not only have to stop, but wait through the longest possible cycle of lights. Today the 2 karmas collided. I had to cross 2 streets with stoplights to catch the bus I needed. The first street I partially jaywalked. The light was about to turn red and there weren't any cars coming. The 2nd street, I totally jaywalked. If I hadn't I would've missed my bus. So apparently stoplight karma trumps bus karma. Why am I not surprised? :)

Accomplishments galore

This afternoon I did a number of things that needed to be done. As much as I resist actually doing things around the house, I do feel happy when I get a few things done.

• I did dishes. I hate doing dishes. It takes me hours because I wait until I have no clean dishes left and I have to take a break every little while because I am being tortured so.
• I've baked a nice roast beef. Yay for roast beef. :) And a baked potato.
• I have repotted 3 plants and watered the others.
• I have measured my apartment, well using my feet. It seems to be somewhere between 600 & 700 square feet. Christ, some of the ones in my price range tend to be more towards the 400 square feet range. I don't have enough space in my apartment as it is, I don't think I could cut out 200 - 300 square feet. (Matty how many square feet is yours?)
• Ever since I visited my friend in Vermont, I've been on a quest for good apple cider. I bought a jar of this syrup that when mixed with water was delectable. The best cider I've ever had. The little packets are not good. Ever. Today while in QFC I thought I'd try a different tack. I picked up a package of mulling spices and a bottle of apple juice. Ok, now that I've thought about it, apple juice was probably not the right part. I have boiled 4 cups with the mulling spices and I'm waiting to see how the results taste. It is too hot just now. I have high hopes, though. Seriously too hot still.
• Oh I also went to the library and picked up 2 new books and did my usual 3 loads of laundry. Now if only I'd gotten to cleaning the bathroom and mopping the entry way. Maybe next weekend.

Edited: Dinner was pretty good. Unfortunately the potato was undercooked. But the mulled apple juice cider was really yummy. If I use regular cider next time this may even be better!Yay!

Sin City - A prediction

I predict I'm going to love this. I've never read the novels, but I have high hopes. I'll add more once I'm done with the movie.

Edited: Ok, I clearly had no idea how violent and weird this movie could be. Holy crap. I really liked the style... the black and white with flashes of color. I liked the narration. I'm glad I've watched it. I don't know if I'd go so far as to say I liked it. I liked parts of it. And I was fascinated by the whole thing, that's for sure. I couldn't look away, and it is pretty rare for me to actually watch an entire movie without doing a bunch of other stuff while watching.

Happy October!

Yay! It is officially fall, or cold, or something. How do I know this? I have finally shut several of the windows. The bedroom one is still open, but the living room got shut, and the one in the kitchen is now down to only 1/4 of its usual level. I got tired of being cold. :D

I just got confirmation that I will be spending Halloween weekend volunteering for my very favorite thing ever, the Pacific Science Center's Halloween celebration: Tricks, Treats & Science Feats. I did this last year and enjoyed it a lot. I am excited about doing it again. I can wear my poodle skirt again! :D

I went to GF food today. Yum GF food. Yum cake! Yum chicken tenders and did I mention, Yum cake! :) They didn't have cupcakes so I just got a regular slice of cake. YUM!

I've been approved!

I wasn't actually expecting to be approved. I figured when lender said that I was asking for too much and this would put my debt ratio at 64% that was too high and it wouldn't work out. Yet I got a package in the mail today with a pre-approval for 180k. That's not a lot, but it is enough. Maybe. There's a set of condos here on First Hill that I'd think about looking at. They could be all that I need and they're well within my price range. Otherwise I can always look outside the city. Or maybe I just don't sign the paperwork and wait for awhile until something changes in my world that makes this more feasable.

In a wholly other rant, the damn building behind me is under construction. All the destruction they're doing to take down the building that was there and now will be replaced by a new 19 story building, is causing my building to shake. It feels almost as though there's all these mini earthquakes happening. This has been going on since some ridiculous hour of the morning. Sigh.

Another Friday of Wild & Reckless Abandon

Such a wild party girl life I lead. I'm like Tarra Reeeed y'all! Just drinkin' and whorin'. Or not.

Here's how the exciting single girl's life really pans out...

For dinner: Chinese food.
Evening entertainment: 2 movies

1 - Fever Pitch. I liked it. It was cute and it continues my unholy love of Drew Barrymore movies.

Now my #1 movie watching rule is when you watch a romantic comedy it is necessary to watch a very non-romantic comedy movie (preferably with explosions) to expunge all traces of romanticism. So in honor of that I rented...

2 - Crash. I've heard many people recommend it. My boss, KTP, coworker, maybe that's it though. I don't know if I liked it. I suppose that's a sign. It was good. Thought provoking. It'll probably give me nightmares, but lately everything is, so that's nothing new.

Tomorrow, continuing my spree of wild & crazy life, I'll be hitting the library and possibly doing some cleaning. And I have Sin City to watch.