So, I'm surfing my RSS feeds on Google Reader and came upon Seth's post titled Odds and Ends. I have no idea why it caught my eye, but I was happy to note that he recommended the portable hard drive I just bought. If you knew what all I've gone through losing all my files on a variety of hard discs - ugh. Western Digital is the biggest offender. But I just bought the Seagate 1 Tb drive and so far (wish me luck) so good!
What spurred me to blog was a link he had on his blog. Its a collection of Thank You notes, written by a woman named Leah - for random things. I love that they were handwritten notes - like a traditional Thank You. I love that she is thanking just really random things in her life. Some made me laugh, some really touched me and some I just purely related to in an 'I don't know why' sort of way. So, here you go - a link to her blog. Love it.
Wednesday, May 12, 2010
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
My One Mom Post
Its been awhile since I've had the time to journal anything. I think its partly because I really wanted to make this NOT about parenting, yet my life is all about being a parent. My highs, my lows, my challenges... they all stem from being a mom - experiencing and being enveloped by it. And yet, I'm so much more. I have a career. I'm a friend. I'm the one people turn to when they need advice, an ear, a devil's advocate.
I'm a wife, a cook, a housekeeper. I'm an avid reader, a continuous learner, a music lover, a TV addict and a DS player. I revel in my connections with the people in my life. I glow from the obstacles I overcome and learn from those I stumble over.
With all of that in my pocket, I find my joy moments in being a mom. I unashamedly WANT to be defined by how I parent my child. I am not embarrassed say that this is my life. My child. Nothing I do compares or even measures close to that endeavor. Its not a job, its a passion. I give myself permission to write about it in these generalities because it is such a huge part of my life. As a matter of fact that its the perfect way to write about it and include it in my blog.
When I scroll down in a few years, I think I will be proud of the feelings I have written here, and happy that I included this one post about being a mom. I love my little boy.
I'm a wife, a cook, a housekeeper. I'm an avid reader, a continuous learner, a music lover, a TV addict and a DS player. I revel in my connections with the people in my life. I glow from the obstacles I overcome and learn from those I stumble over.
With all of that in my pocket, I find my joy moments in being a mom. I unashamedly WANT to be defined by how I parent my child. I am not embarrassed say that this is my life. My child. Nothing I do compares or even measures close to that endeavor. Its not a job, its a passion. I give myself permission to write about it in these generalities because it is such a huge part of my life. As a matter of fact that its the perfect way to write about it and include it in my blog.
When I scroll down in a few years, I think I will be proud of the feelings I have written here, and happy that I included this one post about being a mom. I love my little boy.
Sunday, January 17, 2010
The Weekend is Over
Its Sunday night, I'm home after a long drive in the rain. It wasn't perilous, but I wish we'd remembered to Rain-X the windshield and rear windows. My husband's upstairs giving our son a bath and I'm unwinding, catching up on FB, blogging, etc.
The weekend was awesome. It was sooo great to reconnect with old friends. Even though I see most of the girls on a pretty regular basis, its so different to just hang out and catch up. Before I left, I wanted to get us each something that was the same - to commemorate the weekend. I went with a friend to Old Navy and I saw some tank tops and pajama pants and picked one up for each of us. Pink hearts for Valentine's day.
I'd wanted to 'brand' it with a band that said something about us. I searched and searched my mind for some common element that we all shared. I came up with an alphabet related name. How about Alpha-biddies (like old ladies - get it?) - which sucked anyway, but then I realized that while 3 of the girls names began with A, B and C, mine began with an L. That wouldn't work. So, I thought, 'How about the A girls?' or 'A-List' since all of our names end in the letter A. Oh, wait, C's name ends in an E. So after wracking my brain, I came up with the lamest connection of all, and made bands that said: D Girls. Because, as I was buying the tank tops I realized that we all wore at least D cup bras. So, D Girls, but also could be like D-girls (as in The Girls).
I shared this with C at the office and she just laughed. She asked, "you can't think of ANYTHING we share in common besides our BRA sizes?" Nope, I can't. She started naming things, but none of them applied to all of us. I have a kid, none of them do, 2 are single, 2 are married. 3 are brunettes, 1 varies. 3 are short, one average. We aren't from the same town, state or countries of birth: Delaware, Hong Kong, Venazuela and France. Now that I think of it, maybe we could have been the International Girls. Well, I didn't think of it before now, so D Girls it is. C admitted that it grew on her.
I brought some board games and we ended up playing Guestures. Its one of my favorite party games for groups. Its silly and really gets people laughing. We laughed until our sides hurt. (Well, to be honest, B fell on a table, it collapsed and she fell a bit more to the floor - so her sides may be hurting for other reasons). I can't remember the last time I laughed that hard or long.
As I mentioned in an earlier blog, we were all charged with cooking something new that we'd never made. I brought up my lobster, ginger and scallions and decided that I was craving chicken wings - so I brought those, too. C looked online and found a refreshing white Sangria recipe with fresh fruit and berries. A came up with Bobby Flay's cauliflower au gratin, and Giatta's French Onion Soup. B made a baked shell pasta with homemade sauce and bechamel and grilled shrimp. At the last minute I thought I'd try to make crystal dumplings with shrimp, asparagus and cilantro.
We started with the chicken wings and shrimp and picked on those while we were cooking. They were pretty good and we ended up eating so much that we were too full to sit down and eat. So we packed up the soup, put away the cauliflower, pasta and put all the lobster-makings back into the fridge. We figured, give ourselves and hour or so and we'd be hungry. So we played Guestures. An hour later, we still weren't hungry but we all got a little plate and sampled all of the food - including cooking the lobster - except for the soup.
Everything was really good. I'm going to get the recipes (and alterations) from the girls -- oops, I mean D Girls -- and post them on my food blog. I took pictures of almost all of the food, so I'll post those on there.
We cooked up the bacon, pulled out the Crumbs cupcakes I'd bought, and assembled and re-heated the French Onion Soup. I'd heard of the bacon cupcakes phenomenon but I hadn't seen it in any of my local cupcakeries. I don't know if I'd spend nearly $4 on that concoction, anyway. But since we had my favorite cupcakes and this scrumptious bacon, I crumbled some on top of the Crumbs Twinkie and tried that. It was surprisingly good! I still wouldn't buy it, but I won't turn my nose up at it, either.
I'd wanted to 'brand' it with a band that said something about us. I searched and searched my mind for some common element that we all shared. I came up with an alphabet related name. How about Alpha-biddies (like old ladies - get it?) - which sucked anyway, but then I realized that while 3 of the girls names began with A, B and C, mine began with an L. That wouldn't work. So, I thought, 'How about the A girls?' or 'A-List' since all of our names end in the letter A. Oh, wait, C's name ends in an E. So after wracking my brain, I came up with the lamest connection of all, and made bands that said: D Girls. Because, as I was buying the tank tops I realized that we all wore at least D cup bras. So, D Girls, but also could be like D-girls (as in The Girls).
I shared this with C at the office and she just laughed. She asked, "you can't think of ANYTHING we share in common besides our BRA sizes?" Nope, I can't. She started naming things, but none of them applied to all of us. I have a kid, none of them do, 2 are single, 2 are married. 3 are brunettes, 1 varies. 3 are short, one average. We aren't from the same town, state or countries of birth: Delaware, Hong Kong, Venazuela and France. Now that I think of it, maybe we could have been the International Girls. Well, I didn't think of it before now, so D Girls it is. C admitted that it grew on her.
I brought some board games and we ended up playing Guestures. Its one of my favorite party games for groups. Its silly and really gets people laughing. We laughed until our sides hurt. (Well, to be honest, B fell on a table, it collapsed and she fell a bit more to the floor - so her sides may be hurting for other reasons). I can't remember the last time I laughed that hard or long.
As I mentioned in an earlier blog, we were all charged with cooking something new that we'd never made. I brought up my lobster, ginger and scallions and decided that I was craving chicken wings - so I brought those, too. C looked online and found a refreshing white Sangria recipe with fresh fruit and berries. A came up with Bobby Flay's cauliflower au gratin, and Giatta's French Onion Soup. B made a baked shell pasta with homemade sauce and bechamel and grilled shrimp. At the last minute I thought I'd try to make crystal dumplings with shrimp, asparagus and cilantro.
We started with the chicken wings and shrimp and picked on those while we were cooking. They were pretty good and we ended up eating so much that we were too full to sit down and eat. So we packed up the soup, put away the cauliflower, pasta and put all the lobster-makings back into the fridge. We figured, give ourselves and hour or so and we'd be hungry. So we played Guestures. An hour later, we still weren't hungry but we all got a little plate and sampled all of the food - including cooking the lobster - except for the soup.
Everything was really good. I'm going to get the recipes (and alterations) from the girls -- oops, I mean D Girls -- and post them on my food blog. I took pictures of almost all of the food, so I'll post those on there.
The next morning, after most of us slept, we got up late -- I think around 10:30 -- went downstairs and made a mish-mash breakfast out of the food we neglected the night before.
We cooked up the bacon, pulled out the Crumbs cupcakes I'd bought, and assembled and re-heated the French Onion Soup. I'd heard of the bacon cupcakes phenomenon but I hadn't seen it in any of my local cupcakeries. I don't know if I'd spend nearly $4 on that concoction, anyway. But since we had my favorite cupcakes and this scrumptious bacon, I crumbled some on top of the Crumbs Twinkie and tried that. It was surprisingly good! I still wouldn't buy it, but I won't turn my nose up at it, either. 
French Onion Soup for breakfast is also a bit odd, but on a weekend of mish-mash eating -- who cares.
We followed our Gour-mash with a game of Scrabble. I broke out my new travel set that rotates and has drawers for all the accessories. Its a cool set. I think the name is Diamond Anniversary Edition. I didn't win. Lets put that out there right away. I held my own but in the end, A's consistent 20+ word plays blew us all out of the water. For the record, B is very smart. She is one of those people that you just assumes knows everything - or close to it. I've played Scrabble with her twice and she is surprisingly bad at it. She knows good words but doesn't seem to utilize the points to their full benefit. To HER full benefit. Just an observation.
C, on the other hand, played an average game but at the last hand, with 30+ points difference, she still felt the need to put her single-point E down somewhere to get the most points -- even though she knew she had no hope of catching up to A's points. That just struck me funny. I think it struck A impatiently - as in "put down your stupid E -- it won't make a difference!" lol.
For the record: Que, Dealtsly, Aine are NOT words. Ide and Ow ARE words.
Here are some shots of our Scrab & Apps:
The weather was getting crappy - crappy-ER - so I had to leave. I knew I'd see my son for 2 hours at the most, and the later I stayed the less I'd see him, so we had to end the day. It was a great weekend for me. A 'toe in the water' way of getting away, but not going too far or being gone too long that I'd feel too much guilt. This was my first weekend/day away from him that wasn't work related. It was a weekend just for me. I thought I'd be thinking about him and feeling badly that my husband was on 'daddy duty' all weekend. I did - but not nearly as much as I thought I would. I know other mom's do it all the time and much earlier than I did. But it was hard for me and I'm very grateful that my friends all understood, and planned a short getaway that I could do guilt-free. They didn't try to make it a long weekend or try to guilt me into staying later or coming earlier. It was perfect. I have some awesome girls. I feel like I went on a mini-vacation. Ahhhhhh.
10 Things I Learned This Weekend
1) Done right, I like a good gourmet French Onion soup.
2) Bacon goes with just about anything - even cupcakes.
3) I make an awesome flamingo (as in 'impression', not as in 'cooking' it).
4) Cheetos are a great appetizer.
5) There are many ways to cut up a lobster tail.
6) Never cheat on your fake, simulated husband in a video game.
7) I apparently do a great imitation of 'stupid' - not sure what that says about me.
8) I can be genuinely concerned when a friend has an accident with a side-table - and laugh hysterically until I cry, both at the same time.
9) Many, many people don't think there is anything wrong with tinkling in the shower.
10) Its OK to take some time for myself, away from the family, and let my husband handle things alone.
And 3 Things I Forgot:
1) I forgot how much I love riding onto the city bridges at night, in a fog, mist or rain. Awesome and beautiful.
2) I forgot what it felt like to laugh until your throat was scratchy, your sides hurt and you couldn't breathe.
3) I forgot what it felt like to do something fun without worrying about your kid or feeling guilty the whole time.
2) Bacon goes with just about anything - even cupcakes.
3) I make an awesome flamingo (as in 'impression', not as in 'cooking' it).
4) Cheetos are a great appetizer.
5) There are many ways to cut up a lobster tail.
6) Never cheat on your fake, simulated husband in a video game.
7) I apparently do a great imitation of 'stupid' - not sure what that says about me.
8) I can be genuinely concerned when a friend has an accident with a side-table - and laugh hysterically until I cry, both at the same time.
9) Many, many people don't think there is anything wrong with tinkling in the shower.
10) Its OK to take some time for myself, away from the family, and let my husband handle things alone.
And 3 Things I Forgot:
1) I forgot how much I love riding onto the city bridges at night, in a fog, mist or rain. Awesome and beautiful.
2) I forgot what it felt like to laugh until your throat was scratchy, your sides hurt and you couldn't breathe.
3) I forgot what it felt like to do something fun without worrying about your kid or feeling guilty the whole time.
Sunday, January 10, 2010
Girls Weekend
The idea behind a 'Girls' Weekend' is to get away from the men in your life, dish with the girls, whatever you want to do without the fellas around. In my case its my 3 year old and husband. I love them both. I'll miss them terribly. I'm really looking forward to getting away. :)
In my single days, there wasn't a need for such. We just had the time to hang out with our girlfriends. And if we went away for the weekend, it was usually just the girls anyway and it was done with wild abandonment mixed with an occasionaly walk of shame for at least one of them (us). It seemed like every weekend was dedicated, at some point, to connecting with your girls. Even weeknights were filled with chatting with them on the phone, instant messaging with them, texting with them. Then boyfriends, marriage, children and, well, LIFE just steamrolled in.
Fast forward a whole bunch of years and even more life changes and a weekend away with the girls is more like: no make-up, jammies all day, never leaving the house/hotel/cabin, playing board games or Wii.
At least that's what we've planned with a group I'm going away with next weekend. I'm really looking forward to it, and after watching Julie and Julia, I'm thinking... I may blog it. Though, from my above description, you're probably thinking its not going to be very interesting. Possibly not, but I'm writing about it anyway.
It started with my friend C (See below for why its just an initial) saying that she loves the idea of girls getting together year after year who when they're old, keep circling back, once a year, and hang with the same girls. We tried to get it off the ground a few times. Finally it was settled and we're all doing it next weekend.
The players are (I know that no one is reading this, but I'll put in their first initials only, just in case):
C (34 - dating her BF for a couple of years, has the oddest frame of mind of anyone I know and asks a bazillion questions and basically just makes life interesting)
B (early 40s. 43? Married for something like 8 years, no kids, a goofball who snorts out loud at her own jokes),
A (32? - single, just started dating her guy a few months ago, but they batted around the idea of dating for a little while before that. The BF won and got the girl. She is brilliantly creative, unapologetically unfocused, and scarily really, really similar to me),
and myself (blah, blah, blah stats you all know if you read any of my stuff. At the writing of this, I just turned 45, my son is a little over 3 1/2, and this entire blog is about ME, so, what's left to describe?).
Our mission is that we are each coming up with random recipes that we have never tried before and meeting at B's house and cooking for each other. It could be disasterous - think Chinese food, meets rich French cooking, meets Mexican, meets Sloppy Joes. Maybe I should bring Pepto. Or Tums. Or a manual on bulimia. Just in case. No one knows what each other are making, although I did tell C what I had in mind.
For C's birthday, I took her to lunch at a local inexpensive Chinese place a few blocks from work. We DEVOURED this lobster in Ginger and Scallions dish. We both separately dreamed about it that weekend. She was dying to tell her BF about it, but he'd lovingly packed a gourmet lunch for her that he'd specially made; complete with a special beverage of some island drink and she didn't eat it so that we could lunch instead. But she had to lie to him so that he wouldn't know she never tasted his food. So, to make it real, we went back to the Chinese place and splurged again on the lobster. It was that good. And now she could tell him.
I think I can do it. That's going to be my dish.
I also picked out a Chocolate souffle - in little mini-cups. I tore it out of a magazine awhile ago. I have all of the ingredients. I've neither tasted nor made a souffle before, so I'm not sure if I'll be able to say if its good in the traditional sense or just tastes good to me.
I love cooking and board games. I'm really looking forward to the weekend and to blogging about it. I'm working on another blog - in the infancy stage - all about food and recipes and I think I'm going to get a lot of material for that over the 2 days.
Wish me luck!
In my single days, there wasn't a need for such. We just had the time to hang out with our girlfriends. And if we went away for the weekend, it was usually just the girls anyway and it was done with wild abandonment mixed with an occasionaly walk of shame for at least one of them (us). It seemed like every weekend was dedicated, at some point, to connecting with your girls. Even weeknights were filled with chatting with them on the phone, instant messaging with them, texting with them. Then boyfriends, marriage, children and, well, LIFE just steamrolled in.
Fast forward a whole bunch of years and even more life changes and a weekend away with the girls is more like: no make-up, jammies all day, never leaving the house/hotel/cabin, playing board games or Wii.
At least that's what we've planned with a group I'm going away with next weekend. I'm really looking forward to it, and after watching Julie and Julia, I'm thinking... I may blog it. Though, from my above description, you're probably thinking its not going to be very interesting. Possibly not, but I'm writing about it anyway.
It started with my friend C (See below for why its just an initial) saying that she loves the idea of girls getting together year after year who when they're old, keep circling back, once a year, and hang with the same girls. We tried to get it off the ground a few times. Finally it was settled and we're all doing it next weekend.
The players are (I know that no one is reading this, but I'll put in their first initials only, just in case):
C (34 - dating her BF for a couple of years, has the oddest frame of mind of anyone I know and asks a bazillion questions and basically just makes life interesting)
B (early 40s. 43? Married for something like 8 years, no kids, a goofball who snorts out loud at her own jokes),
A (32? - single, just started dating her guy a few months ago, but they batted around the idea of dating for a little while before that. The BF won and got the girl. She is brilliantly creative, unapologetically unfocused, and scarily really, really similar to me),
and myself (blah, blah, blah stats you all know if you read any of my stuff. At the writing of this, I just turned 45, my son is a little over 3 1/2, and this entire blog is about ME, so, what's left to describe?).
Our mission is that we are each coming up with random recipes that we have never tried before and meeting at B's house and cooking for each other. It could be disasterous - think Chinese food, meets rich French cooking, meets Mexican, meets Sloppy Joes. Maybe I should bring Pepto. Or Tums. Or a manual on bulimia. Just in case. No one knows what each other are making, although I did tell C what I had in mind.
For C's birthday, I took her to lunch at a local inexpensive Chinese place a few blocks from work. We DEVOURED this lobster in Ginger and Scallions dish. We both separately dreamed about it that weekend. She was dying to tell her BF about it, but he'd lovingly packed a gourmet lunch for her that he'd specially made; complete with a special beverage of some island drink and she didn't eat it so that we could lunch instead. But she had to lie to him so that he wouldn't know she never tasted his food. So, to make it real, we went back to the Chinese place and splurged again on the lobster. It was that good. And now she could tell him.
I think I can do it. That's going to be my dish.
I also picked out a Chocolate souffle - in little mini-cups. I tore it out of a magazine awhile ago. I have all of the ingredients. I've neither tasted nor made a souffle before, so I'm not sure if I'll be able to say if its good in the traditional sense or just tastes good to me.
I love cooking and board games. I'm really looking forward to the weekend and to blogging about it. I'm working on another blog - in the infancy stage - all about food and recipes and I think I'm going to get a lot of material for that over the 2 days.
Wish me luck!
Monday, January 4, 2010
Movies, Movies, Movies
I never go to the movies - I just fidget too much. I'm uncomfortable. I think of all the other stuff I should be doing. And I end up not having that 'escape from reality - enjoy the 2 mindless hours' experience that everyone else has.
So it was a surprise to me that, over the 2 weeks Christmas holiday/vacation I took, I actually watched something like 5 movies. At home of course- and between printing out pics for ornaments, cooking, doing dishes, etc. But I watch full feature films none the less.
Partially, we needed to clear out the DVR and return borrowed DVDs, and partially, I had this extra time where I didn't have to wake up at a quarter till 6 AM.
So, in no particular order, we saw: Up, My Sassy Girl, Sideways, The Accidentaly Husband, Avatar (not in 3D), Julia and Julia, Polar Express, and Hercules.
Granted 2 of these were Disney cartoons and one was a CG animation, but did you really think we'd get away with zero Kiddie movies?
So, I'll review those first.
UP: I'd heard it was sad in the beginning and then kinda plffffttt after that. But I liked it. I liked the beginning where they flash through Mr. Fredrickson's life. I think we needed it and Ellie's passing to connect with what drove the old guy to be so focused on his mission. What I didn't get was how the explorer (and I forget his name) was still alive. I mean Mr. Frederickson had to be about 80 or 85. That would make the other guy over a hundred. And they had a fight scene. On top of a blimp. That was moving at mach speed. Yeah, I know - its a cartoon. Anyway. I liked it, it was entertaining. Nothing in it was scary to my kid, so it got thumbs up for me.
Polar Express:
I got a few phone calls while this one was on so I'm sure I missed a few key moments. Loved the CG - thought it was cool and just enough for this kind of movie. I'll have to watch it again to get it, though. I can't truly review it, but it was cute - the bits I saw.
Sideways: now, we've had this DVD for months and we had to watch it. It was supposed to be about wine. That's what various people told me. My cynical synopsis is that its about 2 guys who spiral out of control that you don't care about.
My girlfriend who loaned it to me agrees, but found that to be part of the charm of the film. In fact, she got many laugh-out-loud moments. I got a forced-out-loud chuckle - once.
Who takes his friend out for a bachelor week and does what HE wants vs what the groom wants? If I were the groom, I'd say, "hold up - we'll do your things when YOU get married".
And do men really spend the week before their wedding trying to bang every woman they see? Don't answer that.
Anyway, I didn't connect with it at all. I don't get the multiple Oscar nominations. But I'm glad I saw it. Just cuz.
The 2 surprises for me were My Sassy Girl and the Accidental Husband. I hadn't heard anything about either and both were entertaining.
The Accidental Husband starred Uma Thurman. Remember her in Truth About Cats and Dogs? Well, this one is like her, 5 years later (not older, just later) and she's taken over Jeanne Garafolo's job as a Radio advice chick. Its not really, but if you watched the Cat and Dog one first, then the Husband one, you could easily make that connection. Anyhow, cute chick flick. Mindless and entertaining. Its the classic Boy meets girl, Boy loses girl, Boy gets girl movie, but I liked it.
My Sassy Girl went straight to DVD. Remember Elisha Cuthbert of 24 fame as the annoying Kimmie (and the name alone is annoying) and later as the playboy bunny in The Girl Next Door? (On a side note, the IMDB one liner is: A teenager's dreams come true when a former porn star moves in next door and they fall in love. lol - I found that funny for some reason). She stars in the Sassy Girl movie as a high maintanence, highly complicated girl who attaches herself to this mild-mannered, conservative guy who has his life entirely mapped out. The film started out making me nuts. When I see movies where one person's bizarre behaviour sends another person's life spinning out of control, it makes me bonkers. (That was partially why I wasn't a big fan of the Sideways movie, too.)
Then about 3/4 into the movie, it all turned around and I ended up really liking it. I'm not posting a spoiler for this obscure flick, just in case you watch it. But I really, really liked it. In fact, I thought about it a few times later, which is sort of one of the marks of a good movie to me; it makes me think about it well after I've watched it. I thought, later, that I might have enjoyed this one so much because it was the first non-tv show that I've watched in ages. But, no, I think I just really liked it.
The final movie I'm semi-reviewing is Julie and Julia. I've been dying to see this. Several of my friends and my sister all saw it and it inspired them all to whip up some fabulous dish or meal. For those that don't know, its about a girl (Julie) who decided to spend one year, cooking everything in The Art of French Cooking by Julia Child. The movie starts by stating that its two true stories of two women: Julie and Julia. As we watch, we follow parallel(ish) stories of their two lives.
I'm a foodie (of sorts) - love food, love cooking, love going to restaurants and try to go home and make up the dishes out of my head. Sometimes I cheat and look up similar recipes online and put in my own twist to make it similar to what we had. Or completely different from what we had. Watching Julie and Julia made me want to... blog. Weird, huh? I totally thought it would make me want to cook, too. It made me want to blog on here - my random thoughts - on my recipe blog (coming soon to a flat panel screen near you) anywhere. It made me want to do something creatively, to pour out my thoughts, write and get my thoughts down. It also made me want to read the blog. Truthfully, it didn't do that right away, but as I was getting the links to the movies on here, I thought... I wonder if her blog is still up? So I looked, and voila! There it was. The Julie/Julia Project. She was right in the movie when she says she curses a lot. A LOT. I don't think either cooking nor blogging cause me to break out in expletives. That's just me.
I know, that wasn't any sort of review of the movie. LOL, and neither will this be... I loved the movie, would totally recommend it. I'm not a huge fan of Meryl Streep. Yeah, yeah, I know, she's a fabulous actress, blah blah blah. Something about her bothers me. Like, why does she have to do an accent in every movie she's in? And her facial bones are flat on her face. No clue why, but it bothers me. In that Bridges of Madison County movie, she drove me nuts. In this one, she had me thinking she WAS Julia Child. I loved the woman from Glee in it, too... she was only in it for like 3.3 minutes, but I like 'Sue'.
I did think about trying to cook my way through a simpler, smaller cookbook of some sort after watching it. But then thought, nah. I don't like ALL food. And, after my 1.5 hour commute, there are days I get home at 8. I have to wake up at the crack of dawn - sometimes, pre-dawn - so who has time for all that? It did, however, make me think... I don't think I've ever eaten a meal or dish I've made myself where I closed my eyes, wrapped my tongue and palette around a bite and tasted it in ecstacy like the people in this movie did. It seemed like every dish she made, she savored it in a 'this is the best bite that's ever passed my lips' sort of way. Maybe I DO need to make a few Julia Child recipes. hmmmm.
I have made her Flaky pie crust. (On a side note, I've tried and tried to find a link to the recipe for this blog but the true recipe isn't posted anywhere). Its the best - and I mean the BEST pie crust I've ever tasted. Its awesome. Better than Delicious Orchards, and their pies are mouth-gasmic. My friend David brought a couple of pies over for Thanksgiving a few years ago. It was the best pie I've ever had. I've talked to David about this recently and he has said that the pie crust is one of those things that people STILL talk to him about or ask him about. It is that good.
This is my first post in ages - on any of my blogs. I'm vowing to do more of them, be more regular about it. We'll see how that goes.
Goodnight.
Note: at the time of my writing this post, I linked to the movies that had websites, some no longer did but had IMDB pages or quotes or both. I linked to that.
So it was a surprise to me that, over the 2 weeks Christmas holiday/vacation I took, I actually watched something like 5 movies. At home of course- and between printing out pics for ornaments, cooking, doing dishes, etc. But I watch full feature films none the less.
Partially, we needed to clear out the DVR and return borrowed DVDs, and partially, I had this extra time where I didn't have to wake up at a quarter till 6 AM.
So, in no particular order, we saw: Up, My Sassy Girl, Sideways, The Accidentaly Husband, Avatar (not in 3D), Julia and Julia, Polar Express, and Hercules.
Granted 2 of these were Disney cartoons and one was a CG animation, but did you really think we'd get away with zero Kiddie movies?
So, I'll review those first.
UP: I'd heard it was sad in the beginning and then kinda plffffttt after that. But I liked it. I liked the beginning where they flash through Mr. Fredrickson's life. I think we needed it and Ellie's passing to connect with what drove the old guy to be so focused on his mission. What I didn't get was how the explorer (and I forget his name) was still alive. I mean Mr. Frederickson had to be about 80 or 85. That would make the other guy over a hundred. And they had a fight scene. On top of a blimp. That was moving at mach speed. Yeah, I know - its a cartoon. Anyway. I liked it, it was entertaining. Nothing in it was scary to my kid, so it got thumbs up for me.
Polar Express:
I got a few phone calls while this one was on so I'm sure I missed a few key moments. Loved the CG - thought it was cool and just enough for this kind of movie. I'll have to watch it again to get it, though. I can't truly review it, but it was cute - the bits I saw.
Sideways: now, we've had this DVD for months and we had to watch it. It was supposed to be about wine. That's what various people told me. My cynical synopsis is that its about 2 guys who spiral out of control that you don't care about.
My girlfriend who loaned it to me agrees, but found that to be part of the charm of the film. In fact, she got many laugh-out-loud moments. I got a forced-out-loud chuckle - once.
Who takes his friend out for a bachelor week and does what HE wants vs what the groom wants? If I were the groom, I'd say, "hold up - we'll do your things when YOU get married".
And do men really spend the week before their wedding trying to bang every woman they see? Don't answer that.
Anyway, I didn't connect with it at all. I don't get the multiple Oscar nominations. But I'm glad I saw it. Just cuz.
The 2 surprises for me were My Sassy Girl and the Accidental Husband. I hadn't heard anything about either and both were entertaining.
The Accidental Husband starred Uma Thurman. Remember her in Truth About Cats and Dogs? Well, this one is like her, 5 years later (not older, just later) and she's taken over Jeanne Garafolo's job as a Radio advice chick. Its not really, but if you watched the Cat and Dog one first, then the Husband one, you could easily make that connection. Anyhow, cute chick flick. Mindless and entertaining. Its the classic Boy meets girl, Boy loses girl, Boy gets girl movie, but I liked it.
My Sassy Girl went straight to DVD. Remember Elisha Cuthbert of 24 fame as the annoying Kimmie (and the name alone is annoying) and later as the playboy bunny in The Girl Next Door? (On a side note, the IMDB one liner is: A teenager's dreams come true when a former porn star moves in next door and they fall in love. lol - I found that funny for some reason). She stars in the Sassy Girl movie as a high maintanence, highly complicated girl who attaches herself to this mild-mannered, conservative guy who has his life entirely mapped out. The film started out making me nuts. When I see movies where one person's bizarre behaviour sends another person's life spinning out of control, it makes me bonkers. (That was partially why I wasn't a big fan of the Sideways movie, too.)
Then about 3/4 into the movie, it all turned around and I ended up really liking it. I'm not posting a spoiler for this obscure flick, just in case you watch it. But I really, really liked it. In fact, I thought about it a few times later, which is sort of one of the marks of a good movie to me; it makes me think about it well after I've watched it. I thought, later, that I might have enjoyed this one so much because it was the first non-tv show that I've watched in ages. But, no, I think I just really liked it.
The final movie I'm semi-reviewing is Julie and Julia. I've been dying to see this. Several of my friends and my sister all saw it and it inspired them all to whip up some fabulous dish or meal. For those that don't know, its about a girl (Julie) who decided to spend one year, cooking everything in The Art of French Cooking by Julia Child. The movie starts by stating that its two true stories of two women: Julie and Julia. As we watch, we follow parallel(ish) stories of their two lives.
I'm a foodie (of sorts) - love food, love cooking, love going to restaurants and try to go home and make up the dishes out of my head. Sometimes I cheat and look up similar recipes online and put in my own twist to make it similar to what we had. Or completely different from what we had. Watching Julie and Julia made me want to... blog. Weird, huh? I totally thought it would make me want to cook, too. It made me want to blog on here - my random thoughts - on my recipe blog (coming soon to a flat panel screen near you) anywhere. It made me want to do something creatively, to pour out my thoughts, write and get my thoughts down. It also made me want to read the blog. Truthfully, it didn't do that right away, but as I was getting the links to the movies on here, I thought... I wonder if her blog is still up? So I looked, and voila! There it was. The Julie/Julia Project. She was right in the movie when she says she curses a lot. A LOT. I don't think either cooking nor blogging cause me to break out in expletives. That's just me.
I know, that wasn't any sort of review of the movie. LOL, and neither will this be... I loved the movie, would totally recommend it. I'm not a huge fan of Meryl Streep. Yeah, yeah, I know, she's a fabulous actress, blah blah blah. Something about her bothers me. Like, why does she have to do an accent in every movie she's in? And her facial bones are flat on her face. No clue why, but it bothers me. In that Bridges of Madison County movie, she drove me nuts. In this one, she had me thinking she WAS Julia Child. I loved the woman from Glee in it, too... she was only in it for like 3.3 minutes, but I like 'Sue'.
I did think about trying to cook my way through a simpler, smaller cookbook of some sort after watching it. But then thought, nah. I don't like ALL food. And, after my 1.5 hour commute, there are days I get home at 8. I have to wake up at the crack of dawn - sometimes, pre-dawn - so who has time for all that? It did, however, make me think... I don't think I've ever eaten a meal or dish I've made myself where I closed my eyes, wrapped my tongue and palette around a bite and tasted it in ecstacy like the people in this movie did. It seemed like every dish she made, she savored it in a 'this is the best bite that's ever passed my lips' sort of way. Maybe I DO need to make a few Julia Child recipes. hmmmm.
I have made her Flaky pie crust. (On a side note, I've tried and tried to find a link to the recipe for this blog but the true recipe isn't posted anywhere). Its the best - and I mean the BEST pie crust I've ever tasted. Its awesome. Better than Delicious Orchards, and their pies are mouth-gasmic. My friend David brought a couple of pies over for Thanksgiving a few years ago. It was the best pie I've ever had. I've talked to David about this recently and he has said that the pie crust is one of those things that people STILL talk to him about or ask him about. It is that good.
This is my first post in ages - on any of my blogs. I'm vowing to do more of them, be more regular about it. We'll see how that goes.
Goodnight.
Note: at the time of my writing this post, I linked to the movies that had websites, some no longer did but had IMDB pages or quotes or both. I linked to that.
Thursday, July 9, 2009
Internal GPS
I think I need to start a new line of products (see Google Me). A couple of weeks ago, I lost my keys. We'd just come back from vacation, it was the next morning and we were rushing to get Tyler off to pre-school so that we could have some long awaited alone time. My head wasn't back to 'routine' status and I'd somehow misplaced my house and car keys - which led to a whole chain of events including a 1+ hour roundtrip to get a spare set of house keys to let us back in our home.
Mike called the car dealer to get a replacement car key and that was $90 plus an appointment with the dealer. Why do we need to book an appt.??
A week later, I lose my brand new work blackberry. As any of you who own a blackberry knows... its your lifeline. It was fairly new so I knew I'd get a lot of hassle over getting a new one.
This leads me back to... I need to start a new line of products that include a subderma GPS for all of my belongings. That clapper and whisle keychain thing they make is useless if you aren't in the same room as the object. I need a full on GPS tracking all of my stuff.
Keys, blackberry, presents I hid from my husband for 'later', bracelets, bills... all of it.
I want it to map me a pathway, tell me how long before I find the item, and indicate when I'm right on top of it.
On second thought, I don't really need to produce this line, I just need to use it. Can someone please come up with it?
As the Captain on Star Trek says, "Make it so" .
Mike called the car dealer to get a replacement car key and that was $90 plus an appointment with the dealer. Why do we need to book an appt.??
A week later, I lose my brand new work blackberry. As any of you who own a blackberry knows... its your lifeline. It was fairly new so I knew I'd get a lot of hassle over getting a new one.
This leads me back to... I need to start a new line of products that include a subderma GPS for all of my belongings. That clapper and whisle keychain thing they make is useless if you aren't in the same room as the object. I need a full on GPS tracking all of my stuff.
Keys, blackberry, presents I hid from my husband for 'later', bracelets, bills... all of it.
I want it to map me a pathway, tell me how long before I find the item, and indicate when I'm right on top of it.
On second thought, I don't really need to produce this line, I just need to use it. Can someone please come up with it?
As the Captain on Star Trek says, "Make it so" .
Monday, April 20, 2009
Sites I've found
Occasionally, I stumble of sites and bookmark them, and never - ever - check them out again. But I thought I'd post them on the blog with the hopes that I'll browse back every so often.
Here is my latest find. Moo cards, they're mini-busines cards. For those of us that are designers/photographers, this is a cool way to customize and print cheaply. For those that aren't there are pre-created designs. Overall very cool. I haven't fully checked out the site, but I'm blog-marking it for later.
And this is a cool page (so far) from Hostess with the Mostest.
Before I forget, I want to remark that evite has some cool links to blogs. That's where I found the ones above. I also found a recipe for a new twist on a 7 layer dip.
Its a bit of a mix between Ewwww and Hmmmm:
http://blog.evite.com/evite/2009/04/sweet-seven-layer-dip-recipe-yes-really.html
http://blog.evite.com/evite/2009/04/sweet-seven-layer-dip-recipe-yes-really.html
Saturday, February 21, 2009
Christening the Basement
"We did it, we did it. I have to say we did it. They said we couldn't do it. But Today, its been done." Thats a loose quote from Professor Higgins in My Fair Lady when they finally got Eliza Doolittle to speak like a lady. They danced around the room rejoicing.
That's how I feel about our basement. There is much, much more to do, but we hit a hard dent. And tonight, we had friends over and actually used the room. Tyler had a friend playing with him in there, the kids had their dessert on the picnic table. It was so cool. yea, us! lol
Which leads me to wondering.... how IS it that I accumulate so much crap? My neighbor across the street has double the kids I do, plus a dog, and has no stuff in her rooms. I have stuff in every conceivable corner. I think my stuff breeds when I'm not there. And its been proven to be bad for me - I found an expired Transit check, that's just lost money - yet I can't ever get a handle on it.
I wonder, is it some sort of gene that causes clutter-people vs neat-freak-people? Like the 15th choromosome or missing enzymes? Color blindness is hereditary, why can't clutter be? I tried all the hints and none of them work or last. Its like I yo-yo clean. One minute I'm doing all the rules, next, I'm wading through papers to get to the ringing phone. Whatever, the machine will get it. Maybe.
I hate to be messy. I sincerely try to clean. It just accumulates back immediately, like when you sqeeze a blob of goo out of a balloon, it quickly oozes back in and fills up the space.
I dunno. I gotta make a New Year's resolution to resolve to be better with my mess. Next year.
Anyhow. Guess what? my basements clean and Tyler's playing in it!
:)
That's how I feel about our basement. There is much, much more to do, but we hit a hard dent. And tonight, we had friends over and actually used the room. Tyler had a friend playing with him in there, the kids had their dessert on the picnic table. It was so cool. yea, us! lol
Which leads me to wondering.... how IS it that I accumulate so much crap? My neighbor across the street has double the kids I do, plus a dog, and has no stuff in her rooms. I have stuff in every conceivable corner. I think my stuff breeds when I'm not there. And its been proven to be bad for me - I found an expired Transit check, that's just lost money - yet I can't ever get a handle on it.
I wonder, is it some sort of gene that causes clutter-people vs neat-freak-people? Like the 15th choromosome or missing enzymes? Color blindness is hereditary, why can't clutter be? I tried all the hints and none of them work or last. Its like I yo-yo clean. One minute I'm doing all the rules, next, I'm wading through papers to get to the ringing phone. Whatever, the machine will get it. Maybe.
I hate to be messy. I sincerely try to clean. It just accumulates back immediately, like when you sqeeze a blob of goo out of a balloon, it quickly oozes back in and fills up the space.
I dunno. I gotta make a New Year's resolution to resolve to be better with my mess. Next year.
Anyhow. Guess what? my basements clean and Tyler's playing in it!
:)
BBC Book List
Here is another one of those FB posts that are running rampant. I'm putting this one on here to share, and again, not have to post on my page. Enjoy!
The BBC believes most people will have only read 6 of the 100 books here. How do your reading habits stack up?
Instructions:Look at the list, copy it and put an 'x' after those you have read.
1 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen ()
2 The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien ()
3 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte ()
4 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling ()
5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee ()
6 The Bible - () only some
7 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte ()
8 Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell ()
9 His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman ()
10 Great Expectations - Charles Dickens ()
11 Little Women - Louisa M Alcott ()
12 Tess of the D’Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy ()
13 Catch 22 - Joseph Heller ()
14 Complete Works of Shakespeare ()
15 Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier ()
16 The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien ()
17 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulk ()
18 Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger ()
19 The Time Traveller’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger ()
20 Middlemarch - George Eliot ()
21 Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell ()
22 The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald ()
23 Bleak House - Charles Dickens ()
24 War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy ()
25 The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams ()
26 Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh ()
27 Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky ()
28 Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck ()
29 Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll ()
30 The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame ()
31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy ()
32 David Copperfield - Charles Dickens ()
33 Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis ()
34 Emma - Jane Austen ()35 Persuasion - Jane Austen ()
36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis ()
37 The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini - ()
38 Captain Corelli’s Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres ()
39 Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden ()
40 Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne ()
41 Animal Farm - George Orwell ()
42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown ()
43 One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez ()
44 A Prayer for Owen Meany - John Irving ()
45 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins ()
46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery ()
47 Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy ()
48 The Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood ()
49 Lord of the Flies - William Golding ()
50 Atonement - Ian McEwan ()
51 Life of Pi - Yann Martel ()
52 Dune - Frank Herbert ()
53 Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons ()
54 Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen ()
55 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth ()
The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon ()
57 A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens ()
58 Brave New World - Aldous Huxley ()
59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon ()
60 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez ()
61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck ()
62 Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov ()
63 The Secret History - Donna Tartt ()
64 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold ()
65 Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas ()
66 On The Road - Jack Kerouac ()
67 Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy ()
68 Bridget Jones’s Diary - Helen Fielding ()
69 Midnight’s Children - Salman Rushdie ()
70 Moby Dick - Herman Melville ()
71 Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens ()
72 Dracula - Bram Stoker ()
73 The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett ()
74 Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson ()
75 Ulysses - James Joyce ()
76 The Inferno - Dante ()
77 Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome ()
78 Germinal - Emile Zola ()
79 Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray ()
80 Possession - AS Byatt ()
81 A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens ()
82 Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell ()
83 The Color Purple - Alice Walker ()
84 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro ()
85 Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert ()
86 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry ()
87 Charlotte’s Web - EB White ()
88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom (x
89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle ()
90 The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton ()
91 Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad ()
92 The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery ()
93 The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks ()
94 Watership Down - Richard Adams ()
95 A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole ()
96 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute ()
97 The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas ()
98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare ()
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl ()
100 Les Miserables - Victor Hugo ()
The BBC believes most people will have only read 6 of the 100 books here. How do your reading habits stack up?
Instructions:Look at the list, copy it and put an 'x' after those you have read.
1 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen ()
2 The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien ()
3 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte ()
4 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling ()
5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee ()
6 The Bible - () only some
7 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte ()
8 Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell ()
9 His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman ()
10 Great Expectations - Charles Dickens ()
11 Little Women - Louisa M Alcott ()
12 Tess of the D’Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy ()
13 Catch 22 - Joseph Heller ()
14 Complete Works of Shakespeare ()
15 Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier ()
16 The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien ()
17 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulk ()
18 Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger ()
19 The Time Traveller’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger ()
20 Middlemarch - George Eliot ()
21 Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell ()
22 The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald ()
23 Bleak House - Charles Dickens ()
24 War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy ()
25 The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams ()
26 Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh ()
27 Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky ()
28 Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck ()
29 Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll ()
30 The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame ()
31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy ()
32 David Copperfield - Charles Dickens ()
33 Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis ()
34 Emma - Jane Austen ()35 Persuasion - Jane Austen ()
36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis ()
37 The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini - ()
38 Captain Corelli’s Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres ()
39 Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden ()
40 Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne ()
41 Animal Farm - George Orwell ()
42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown ()
43 One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez ()
44 A Prayer for Owen Meany - John Irving ()
45 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins ()
46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery ()
47 Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy ()
48 The Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood ()
49 Lord of the Flies - William Golding ()
50 Atonement - Ian McEwan ()
51 Life of Pi - Yann Martel ()
52 Dune - Frank Herbert ()
53 Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons ()
54 Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen ()
55 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth ()
The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon ()
57 A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens ()
58 Brave New World - Aldous Huxley ()
59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon ()
60 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez ()
61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck ()
62 Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov ()
63 The Secret History - Donna Tartt ()
64 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold ()
65 Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas ()
66 On The Road - Jack Kerouac ()
67 Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy ()
68 Bridget Jones’s Diary - Helen Fielding ()
69 Midnight’s Children - Salman Rushdie ()
70 Moby Dick - Herman Melville ()
71 Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens ()
72 Dracula - Bram Stoker ()
73 The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett ()
74 Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson ()
75 Ulysses - James Joyce ()
76 The Inferno - Dante ()
77 Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome ()
78 Germinal - Emile Zola ()
79 Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray ()
80 Possession - AS Byatt ()
81 A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens ()
82 Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell ()
83 The Color Purple - Alice Walker ()
84 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro ()
85 Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert ()
86 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry ()
87 Charlotte’s Web - EB White ()
88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom (x
89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle ()
90 The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton ()
91 Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad ()
92 The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery ()
93 The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks ()
94 Watership Down - Richard Adams ()
95 A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole ()
96 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute ()
97 The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas ()
98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare ()
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl ()
100 Les Miserables - Victor Hugo ()
Friday, February 20, 2009
Linda Needs
I keep getting tagged in FB and rather than torturing everyone with a million posts, I thought I'd do it here. I still think they're fun.
Here’s how it works: Google “[your first name] needs” and share the first 10 results That's it: it is that simple. But be honest! These are actual quotes from the top ten results. Tag the person who tagged you, and pass it on...So here's my google search results (my comment follow the hyphen):
Linda Needs...
1) to be part of a loving, committed marriage - I am
2) mental health - bahahahahaha
3) as much free space at the front of a platform as possible - huh?
4) a new best friend -hey, I need all the friends I can get. lol
5) a tech makeover - er... okaaaaay
6) a fresh perspective - I can always use that
7) our help - ha ha ha ha ha
8) an extraordinary meeting /Aruba - oh yeah, I need Aruba, baby
9) Prayer and encouragement - wow. get to work, folks.
and finally,
10) linda split up with her boyfriend and shes now single if anyone wants her you know what to do hehe. - um... that one really, really doesn't fit.
Here’s how it works: Google “[your first name] needs” and share the first 10 results That's it: it is that simple. But be honest! These are actual quotes from the top ten results. Tag the person who tagged you, and pass it on...So here's my google search results (my comment follow the hyphen):
Linda Needs...
1) to be part of a loving, committed marriage - I am
2) mental health - bahahahahaha
3) as much free space at the front of a platform as possible - huh?
4) a new best friend -hey, I need all the friends I can get. lol
5) a tech makeover - er... okaaaaay
6) a fresh perspective - I can always use that
7) our help - ha ha ha ha ha
8) an extraordinary meeting /Aruba - oh yeah, I need Aruba, baby
9) Prayer and encouragement - wow. get to work, folks.
and finally,
10) linda split up with her boyfriend and shes now single if anyone wants her you know what to do hehe. - um... that one really, really doesn't fit.
Monday, January 5, 2009
Google Me
I have so much to do that blogging should not even be on the list. But I had a thought this morning and really wanted to put this down, before I forget it.
I think someone out there needs to create something that can Google my head. After motherhood, my memory has deteriorated so badly, I can't remember people's names when I'm looking right at them. Or what a food is called that I'm eating. I find myself logging onto Google for daily reminders all the time. "What did I see that actress in before?" - when I'm watching TV. Did I use butter or cream? - when I'm cooking. I don't bother trying to remember anymore, I just Google it, because the file cabinets in my head are full.
Thinking about that made me realize that I need more. I need it for my personal life, not just what is interesting and common to all the other web users. I need a search engine for my brain. For instance, "Where did I put my keys?" I blink and a chip just filters through all the mess and comes up with: Right pocket, brown coat. And extra links will offer, Coat in: Hall closet.
Or I'm staring at some child from daycare and their parents are talking to me and I quickly, invisibly, Google my head for Linda's images and a pic of the kid pops up with "Marcus, age 2 yrs, 8 months" under it, and I continue my conversation, "yes, Marcus has gotten so big, too! But he's nearly 3".
I may pay extra to have the "Google My Office" so that when I go on vacation, I can truly check out and not have to remember work stuff at all. When I return and someone says, "How much are you spending on all of your designers?" I can Google my head in the Office app for Budgets; Designers. Or if my boss askes, " What is the corporate policy on using the Brand in advertisements?" I can Google my Office head and check out the sublinks for Branding, Trade Advertising, Policies & Restrictions and ::poof:: I seem so caught up and in the moment. When in reality, I was still playing in the snow with my son.
But someone please come up with it soon, my cells are decreasing as we speak.
I think someone out there needs to create something that can Google my head. After motherhood, my memory has deteriorated so badly, I can't remember people's names when I'm looking right at them. Or what a food is called that I'm eating. I find myself logging onto Google for daily reminders all the time. "What did I see that actress in before?" - when I'm watching TV. Did I use butter or cream? - when I'm cooking. I don't bother trying to remember anymore, I just Google it, because the file cabinets in my head are full.
Thinking about that made me realize that I need more. I need it for my personal life, not just what is interesting and common to all the other web users. I need a search engine for my brain. For instance, "Where did I put my keys?" I blink and a chip just filters through all the mess and comes up with: Right pocket, brown coat. And extra links will offer, Coat in: Hall closet.
Or I'm staring at some child from daycare and their parents are talking to me and I quickly, invisibly, Google my head for Linda's images and a pic of the kid pops up with "Marcus, age 2 yrs, 8 months" under it, and I continue my conversation, "yes, Marcus has gotten so big, too! But he's nearly 3".
I may pay extra to have the "Google My Office" so that when I go on vacation, I can truly check out and not have to remember work stuff at all. When I return and someone says, "How much are you spending on all of your designers?" I can Google my head in the Office app for Budgets; Designers. Or if my boss askes, " What is the corporate policy on using the Brand in advertisements?" I can Google my Office head and check out the sublinks for Branding, Trade Advertising, Policies & Restrictions and ::poof:: I seem so caught up and in the moment. When in reality, I was still playing in the snow with my son.
But someone please come up with it soon, my cells are decreasing as we speak.
Tuesday, December 2, 2008
Day 3 of my Renewal - To Buy or Not To Buy
Its been uneventful. Nothing to report, but I feel like I should chronical the experience.
Mike's sick with a tummy virus. Tyler was up screaming all night. I slept a little over 2 hours and I was cranky this morning.
But my To Do list is being cracked. I started on the basement. I gathered up 2 large garbage bags of old suits, silk dresses, coats, etc. for good will - or some other charity. I threw away about 3 feet of stacked magazines that Meredith and David S. had left for me. I packed away old baby toys for Linda's twins. I was a busy bee.
That was about an hour.
I confess. I sneaked in some Scrabble and Word Challenge, today, too.
Then I dragged Mike to Costco. And there :::blinggg::: I saw the Acer and HP minis. I LOVE them. So cute and compact - why, rather like myself, I'd say. And they were so cheap! My old laptop broke with out any warning. I was devastated since I had 4 really in-depth work documents due imminently, that I had to do over from scratch. But I also lost MP3s, photos, movies of the little guy, and who knows what else.
Back to the Minis. Love them! They were pretty lightweight. As luck would have it, on the next aisle was the Verizon girl. So I popped over there to ask about the wireless modem plan. Its $60/month. Ouch. Its not a fortune, but more than I'd wanted to spend, especially with that announcement of no raises or bonuses for TWO years.
So I'm doing some creative math in my head. If I cancel the NY Sports membership that I don't use, I can afford to buy the modem package for added sedentarianism (I made that word up, but sounds pretty high-falutin' doesn't it?). So I'm really, really considering it. Whats a little more jiggle to the wiggle?
I have to look up both models and see the + and minus'. Someone talk me out of it! --- or not. ;)
Mike's sick with a tummy virus. Tyler was up screaming all night. I slept a little over 2 hours and I was cranky this morning.
But my To Do list is being cracked. I started on the basement. I gathered up 2 large garbage bags of old suits, silk dresses, coats, etc. for good will - or some other charity. I threw away about 3 feet of stacked magazines that Meredith and David S. had left for me. I packed away old baby toys for Linda's twins. I was a busy bee.
That was about an hour.
I confess. I sneaked in some Scrabble and Word Challenge, today, too.
Then I dragged Mike to Costco. And there :::blinggg::: I saw the Acer and HP minis. I LOVE them. So cute and compact - why, rather like myself, I'd say. And they were so cheap! My old laptop broke with out any warning. I was devastated since I had 4 really in-depth work documents due imminently, that I had to do over from scratch. But I also lost MP3s, photos, movies of the little guy, and who knows what else.
Back to the Minis. Love them! They were pretty lightweight. As luck would have it, on the next aisle was the Verizon girl. So I popped over there to ask about the wireless modem plan. Its $60/month. Ouch. Its not a fortune, but more than I'd wanted to spend, especially with that announcement of no raises or bonuses for TWO years.
So I'm doing some creative math in my head. If I cancel the NY Sports membership that I don't use, I can afford to buy the modem package for added sedentarianism (I made that word up, but sounds pretty high-falutin' doesn't it?). So I'm really, really considering it. Whats a little more jiggle to the wiggle?
I have to look up both models and see the + and minus'. Someone talk me out of it! --- or not. ;)
Saturday, November 29, 2008
Blogger Discovery
I discovered a new feature available to Bloggers . Its these free backgrounds that make them look like scrapbooking pages. I could have searched them all night, but then I realized that I'd forget the ones I liked after looking at 50 pages, so I settled on one and went with it.
Of course, it comes with a permanent advertisement for the site, smack-dab on your page. I guess that's ok. That's how I found it anyway. I'm not one of those who won't carry a Louis Vitton bag because there are LVs all over it. I don't carry them, because I don't see spending that much money for a purse that I don't have the money to carry in it.
I love my new background. I'll try not to obnoxiously change it every other day.
Of course, it comes with a permanent advertisement for the site, smack-dab on your page. I guess that's ok. That's how I found it anyway. I'm not one of those who won't carry a Louis Vitton bag because there are LVs all over it. I don't carry them, because I don't see spending that much money for a purse that I don't have the money to carry in it.
I love my new background. I'll try not to obnoxiously change it every other day.
Wednesday, November 26, 2008
There will be times like this...(a.k.a. the poop posting)
Overall, I love being a mom. I can have the worse day and his face just lights me up like a warm, cozy fire during a blizzard.
And then there is tonight. Tyler had his first bout of real constipation at 2 3/4 years old. It was the most heart wrenching thing to have sit by and watch. He screamed as if he was in such sharp pain. His entire little body arched. I watched him, leaning over the edge of the sofa, bent doubled, toes so raised that he was barely on the ground at all. He looked at me in terror, eyes wet, screaming, "mommmmmeeeee, I have booboo in my diaper!".
I was pained.
He looked over at his grandmother, pleadingly, "Nana! I haaaaave booooo booooo!" She looked pained. She offered to take the boo boo away so that he wouldn't feel it. I would have gladly.
The end result is, we had to go get him medicine and insert it. That wasn't fun. He didn't like it either. He was so sad, just laying on us between excruciating screaming. And, finally, he got relief.
I guess my lesson in all of this is that there will be more. This is the first of many times where he will be upset or hurt and we will not be able to take it away. It will rip at my heart and I will want to step into his skin, or into his head and take it away. But I will have to sit back and let the pain ride its way out of him. And each time, it will be sore.
Thats all part of what I signed up for.
And then there is tonight. Tyler had his first bout of real constipation at 2 3/4 years old. It was the most heart wrenching thing to have sit by and watch. He screamed as if he was in such sharp pain. His entire little body arched. I watched him, leaning over the edge of the sofa, bent doubled, toes so raised that he was barely on the ground at all. He looked at me in terror, eyes wet, screaming, "mommmmmeeeee, I have booboo in my diaper!".
I was pained.
He looked over at his grandmother, pleadingly, "Nana! I haaaaave booooo booooo!" She looked pained. She offered to take the boo boo away so that he wouldn't feel it. I would have gladly.
The end result is, we had to go get him medicine and insert it. That wasn't fun. He didn't like it either. He was so sad, just laying on us between excruciating screaming. And, finally, he got relief.
I guess my lesson in all of this is that there will be more. This is the first of many times where he will be upset or hurt and we will not be able to take it away. It will rip at my heart and I will want to step into his skin, or into his head and take it away. But I will have to sit back and let the pain ride its way out of him. And each time, it will be sore.
Thats all part of what I signed up for.
Tuesday, November 25, 2008
Renewal - Day 1
I thought I'd blog about my Renewal experience. But if the rest of my days are like this one, it will be a snore of a read. Thank God that Thanksgiving is coming up, otherwise, I'm afraid that my rapidly spreading butt would be fused to the sofa.
Today I napped for 3 hours. No baby (he was in daycare). No guilt (I can do it tomorrow - clean, cook, email, rake... whatever).
Then I spent... oh.... the rest of the day on FaceBook. I think I played Word Challenge. I'm pretty sure I played Word Challenge. I played Scrabble. I didn't even get up to eat lunch.
Overall, Renewal is a wonderful thing. You get 4 weeks off and they encourage you to add at least one week more. You are not allowed to check email or voicemail. You are not to have contact with co-workers unless its just for fun. Its great. When this was announced, people did wonderful, soul enriching things like working as missionaries in Africa, build homes in Habitat for Humanities, help rebuild New Orleans.
Me? I plan to clean out my basement. I have a couple of side things planned like going to see Thomas the Tank Engine with my family. But, mostly, non-lofty plans. How lame.
But I'm ok with that. I think this time is for me to do what I want, and I'm going to do that.
:)
Today I napped for 3 hours. No baby (he was in daycare). No guilt (I can do it tomorrow - clean, cook, email, rake... whatever).
Then I spent... oh.... the rest of the day on FaceBook. I think I played Word Challenge. I'm pretty sure I played Word Challenge. I played Scrabble. I didn't even get up to eat lunch.
Overall, Renewal is a wonderful thing. You get 4 weeks off and they encourage you to add at least one week more. You are not allowed to check email or voicemail. You are not to have contact with co-workers unless its just for fun. Its great. When this was announced, people did wonderful, soul enriching things like working as missionaries in Africa, build homes in Habitat for Humanities, help rebuild New Orleans.
Me? I plan to clean out my basement. I have a couple of side things planned like going to see Thomas the Tank Engine with my family. But, mostly, non-lofty plans. How lame.
But I'm ok with that. I think this time is for me to do what I want, and I'm going to do that.
:)
Wednesday, November 19, 2008
Grammaticalifragilistic Expialidotious!
For some reason, this year I've suddenly lost the ability to determine which words I use in what instances.
I'm not a complete dolt. I still get the your/you're, there/they're/their and pair/pare type of uses.
But suddenly - and its truly suddenly because I swear, I knew last month - I can't tell you if I'm 'lost' in the woods, at a 'loss' for words, or should I use 'lossed' - er... Is that even a word? Maybe. Maybe not. I have no clue anymore!
And to 'insure' my continued confusion, I was 'ensured' that this may be all a part of Mommy-brain. Great.
I know the definition of these words. And I'm fairly certain I know the context to use them. I friggin graduated at the to 5% of my class for Pete's sake. But as soon as I go to put fingers to keyboard, its gone. Gone like a Snickers bar left in front of a fat kid on the playground. :::Poof:::
Mommy-brain sucks. I don't have the energy to explain Mommy-brain for all of you who don't know. Maybe that's for another blog entry - could be, but I'll forget, I'm sure.
If Brunetta sees this, she'll say it's payback for relentlessly making fun of her when she told me to 'bare' right to get to her house.
I'm not a complete dolt. I still get the your/you're, there/they're/their and pair/pare type of uses.
But suddenly - and its truly suddenly because I swear, I knew last month - I can't tell you if I'm 'lost' in the woods, at a 'loss' for words, or should I use 'lossed' - er... Is that even a word? Maybe. Maybe not. I have no clue anymore!
And to 'insure' my continued confusion, I was 'ensured' that this may be all a part of Mommy-brain. Great.
I know the definition of these words. And I'm fairly certain I know the context to use them. I friggin graduated at the to 5% of my class for Pete's sake. But as soon as I go to put fingers to keyboard, its gone. Gone like a Snickers bar left in front of a fat kid on the playground. :::Poof:::
Mommy-brain sucks. I don't have the energy to explain Mommy-brain for all of you who don't know. Maybe that's for another blog entry - could be, but I'll forget, I'm sure.
If Brunetta sees this, she'll say it's payback for relentlessly making fun of her when she told me to 'bare' right to get to her house.
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
SomeEcard... responses
Based on my last posts, Chris sent this to me. LOL
It cracked me up so I had to post it.
It cracked me up so I had to post it.
Monday, November 17, 2008
Pre-Renewal
I'm going on Renewal next week. This week I've been breaking out in hives. Renewal is 4 weeks of continuous paid vacation for working here for a long, long time. Its a perk, definitely. But the weeks leading up to it are stressful as anything.
I just spoke to someone in sales who went on renewal. She said, "what stress?"
She didn't have to set up staff to do her job while she was out. She must not have had to create documents and processes in place in order to go. She probably didn't have to constantly hear how her leaving was going to be such a hardship on everyone else (even if it wasn't true). She just turned off her voicemail, set up her out of office and left.
I have had hives for the past few days. I'm stressing about everything and the people at work aren't helping. They probably don't realize they're being unsupportive. Or maybe they're jealous that they aren't going - though I doubt it, they'll have their turn. Maybe its me. ?? Maybe I should just chuck whatever doesn't get done and not worry about it. Let the chips fall wherever they land.
It just sucks that I have to be this stressed out in order to have the bonus weeks off that everyone here is entitled to at this point in their jobs. And the thing that really sucks is that, from the people I've spoken to, they aren't. Maybe they just don't work in my department. lol.
Maybe I just need to go play Word Challenge and stop thinking about work so that I can stop these welts of hives that are erupting on my arm.
I just spoke to someone in sales who went on renewal. She said, "what stress?"
She didn't have to set up staff to do her job while she was out. She must not have had to create documents and processes in place in order to go. She probably didn't have to constantly hear how her leaving was going to be such a hardship on everyone else (even if it wasn't true). She just turned off her voicemail, set up her out of office and left.
I have had hives for the past few days. I'm stressing about everything and the people at work aren't helping. They probably don't realize they're being unsupportive. Or maybe they're jealous that they aren't going - though I doubt it, they'll have their turn. Maybe its me. ?? Maybe I should just chuck whatever doesn't get done and not worry about it. Let the chips fall wherever they land.
It just sucks that I have to be this stressed out in order to have the bonus weeks off that everyone here is entitled to at this point in their jobs. And the thing that really sucks is that, from the people I've spoken to, they aren't. Maybe they just don't work in my department. lol.
Maybe I just need to go play Word Challenge and stop thinking about work so that I can stop these welts of hives that are erupting on my arm.
Linda is
When Alana showed me her 'wall' on FaceBook, I thought, "how strange that this guy speaks of himself in third person - what kind of weirdo does that?" Apparently, ALL the weirdos, since that's how their site works.
So, here is a list of things I'd like to post on MY wall, but thought... Hmmm, I'll really sound like a crazy person now- but just mentally add LOL after each. and to cover myself further, none are meant with any malicious intent:
Linda feels a little like a serial killer speaking in third person.
Linda doesn't get; L'il Blue Coves, Rainforest, pillowfights or pokes. (Or any of them, really).
Linda just burst a pimple in her earlobe that's been killing her.
Linda got her period.
Linda doesn't want to meet you for lunch/dinner/drinks/shopping because all she wants to do is catch up on sleep.
Linda doesn't get people recommending Friends when the recommender isn't friends with that person.
Linda doesn't have a clue who these people are who're requesting Friend(ship) but in the spirit - what the heck?
Linda feels a bit like an old lady playing on her kid's site.
Linda is checking status so much that the computer is now logging on all by itself.
Linda DOES use LOL too much. (This one may go up there for real).
So, here is a list of things I'd like to post on MY wall, but thought... Hmmm, I'll really sound like a crazy person now- but just mentally add LOL after each. and to cover myself further, none are meant with any malicious intent:
Linda feels a little like a serial killer speaking in third person.
Linda doesn't get; L'il Blue Coves, Rainforest, pillowfights or pokes. (Or any of them, really).
Linda just burst a pimple in her earlobe that's been killing her.
Linda got her period.
Linda doesn't want to meet you for lunch/dinner/drinks/shopping because all she wants to do is catch up on sleep.
Linda doesn't get people recommending Friends when the recommender isn't friends with that person.
Linda doesn't have a clue who these people are who're requesting Friend(ship) but in the spirit - what the heck?
Linda feels a bit like an old lady playing on her kid's site.
Linda is checking status so much that the computer is now logging on all by itself.
Linda DOES use LOL too much. (This one may go up there for real).
Friday, November 7, 2008
Joined the Social Networking Wave
True, the wave has pretty much slowed to a swell (to continue the lame metaphor) but it took me years and a lot of resistance. Even when all those around me flocked, I kept blissfully ignorant of the inner workings. I didn't want anyone IN MySpace, nor did I want to be Twittered, nor my Face on any Book, and who needs one more Friend(ster)?
Well, I succombed. Alana came over and showed me the joys and perils of the social network experience, and I'm now horribly addicted. Much of this I can do anywhere else, but somehow, this crazy Facebook just pulls me in. Its hypnotic.
It started innocently enough. I wanted to FaceDouble* my husband because people always stop us to tell him what celebrity he looks like. (Well, more so before he shaved his head). And you had to join to FaceDouble. So I did. I FDed everyone I had photos of. From every angle.
Then it moved to checking notifications (and if you're not on, none of this means anything to you - count yourself lucky), creating and scanning Flairs, Word Challenge - oh the addiction of WC - yikes (WC may require its own blog entry). Now I'm going on every few hours to see if any of my Friends have put in their words in Scrabble.
Oh, look, I can FaceBook on my Blackberry. Great :::I say this dripping with sarcasm, but we both know, in my heart, I'm more like: GREAT!:::
I'm probably going to require an intervention to get me off.
*Note: since this original posting, I found out that you can just go to the FaceDouble site. Who knew.
Well, I succombed. Alana came over and showed me the joys and perils of the social network experience, and I'm now horribly addicted. Much of this I can do anywhere else, but somehow, this crazy Facebook just pulls me in. Its hypnotic.
It started innocently enough. I wanted to FaceDouble* my husband because people always stop us to tell him what celebrity he looks like. (Well, more so before he shaved his head). And you had to join to FaceDouble. So I did. I FDed everyone I had photos of. From every angle.
Then it moved to checking notifications (and if you're not on, none of this means anything to you - count yourself lucky), creating and scanning Flairs, Word Challenge - oh the addiction of WC - yikes (WC may require its own blog entry). Now I'm going on every few hours to see if any of my Friends have put in their words in Scrabble.
Oh, look, I can FaceBook on my Blackberry. Great :::I say this dripping with sarcasm, but we both know, in my heart, I'm more like: GREAT!:::
I'm probably going to require an intervention to get me off.
*Note: since this original posting, I found out that you can just go to the FaceDouble site. Who knew.
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
Planning (a short story, of sorts)
Drew waited all weekend to go back to school. He subconsciously fiddled with his hoodie string, leaning over the curb every few seconds, anxiously waiting for the bus. As he got on, he replayed it again in his head. He knew exactly what he was going to do when he saw Julie.
He'd calculated, planned and rehearsed, anticipating every moment to counter anything she'd do. Other people got ready, Drew got tactical. That was what he was best at. Some called him neurotic and anal. That's just how he was.
Drew was never a spontaneous guy. Doing things on the fly was of no interest to him. He was methodical in everything he did, from making his bed to drawing a sketch. Precision and care were his watchwords.
It didn't bother him that kids in school snickered at his stiffly starched jeans or his clean, bright white sneakers. He didn't care that kids in class raised their eyebrows at his color coded notes. He actually never noticed that he was any more careful or thought things out any more than anyone else. But to be honest, he rarely noticed what anyone else thought of him.
He noticed Julie, though. Drew tried to pinpoint the exact moment - was it a movement that struck him? Was it something he heard in her voice? The sound of her laugh? Was it the tell-tale sign of trying not to make eye contact but looking back to see if he was looking at her?
Could have been all of these things. Could have been none. He noticed her, though, and made note of it. He wouldn't act until he was certain that he read all the signs correctly. He was not going to misstep. He was not going to make a fool of himself, either - not that pride would stand in his way of what he had to do. He was, as you know, calculated and precise.
Over the past weeks, he planned a carefully mapped out course for following her and watching her, he had to be sure. Reconnaissance, he called it. And if he was wrong, that's ok. Julie was easy on the eyes. There were worse things to do than spend days watching her, taking pictures of her. She had this quiet beauty about her that even she did not recognize. Which probably made her appealing to Drew, and unnoticed by everyone else. She hid in the background. She had a small group of friends, but she was still somewhat alone. They had much in common, people that mattered notice Drew, otherwise, he blended in with the walls - which was exactly how he wanted it.
Drew wasn't sure if he hoped he was right about her signals or not. If things went as planned, after this he would be different. This one action would change his life. You can't go back and get a do-over. The one thing you can't plan on is someone else's reaction. What's that boxing analogy? It would be a critical mistake if he bobbed when she was weaving. Either way, he needed to be certain before he approached her. After these weeks of shadowing her, he sure he was. Still, for the first time, he was nervous. He checked his palms and wiped the sweat on a handiwipe from his backpack. His own nervousness unnerved him.
But he pushed it back as the bus pulled in. He needed to have a clear head. He needed to assess how many other kids were around. He needed a clear path in, and possibly out. He needed to read her signs one last time before doing anything. He needed, most of all, to be sure.
He stepped off the bus and saw her by the football field. To the left, her friends were quickly walking away from the school, waving as they headed out toward the smoking area. The bell would ring in a few minutes so they didn't have much time. To the right, kids were greeting each other, filing into the school. Some nodded and waved to Drew.
Drew took all of it in. He wanted to remember this moment. Julie looked over at the kids all flowing into the school like ants heading to a fallen piece of candy. She casually pulled out her cell phone, uncharacteristically grinned slightly to herself. He watched her dark bangs fall forward and dip below her eyes, covering her face as she started to text. Drew knew he needed to act now or he'd lose the moment.
He ran toward her.
He ran at full speed, arms pumping, heart pounding. He rushed at her as if his life depended on it. Actually, everyone's life depended on it - everyone heading into the school, anyway. He crashed into the center of her body - full force. His right hand out, grabbing the cell phone, making sure to keep it open so that it wouldn't activate the code she'd inputted. His left hand moving around to press her arms down. He used his body to pin her as immobile as possible. He felt as if he was moving in slow motion, but it took only seconds to tackle and cuff her. He was precise, just as he was in his planning this case.
He'd calculated, planned and rehearsed, anticipating every moment to counter anything she'd do. Other people got ready, Drew got tactical. That was what he was best at. Some called him neurotic and anal. That's just how he was.
Drew was never a spontaneous guy. Doing things on the fly was of no interest to him. He was methodical in everything he did, from making his bed to drawing a sketch. Precision and care were his watchwords.
It didn't bother him that kids in school snickered at his stiffly starched jeans or his clean, bright white sneakers. He didn't care that kids in class raised their eyebrows at his color coded notes. He actually never noticed that he was any more careful or thought things out any more than anyone else. But to be honest, he rarely noticed what anyone else thought of him.
He noticed Julie, though. Drew tried to pinpoint the exact moment - was it a movement that struck him? Was it something he heard in her voice? The sound of her laugh? Was it the tell-tale sign of trying not to make eye contact but looking back to see if he was looking at her?
Could have been all of these things. Could have been none. He noticed her, though, and made note of it. He wouldn't act until he was certain that he read all the signs correctly. He was not going to misstep. He was not going to make a fool of himself, either - not that pride would stand in his way of what he had to do. He was, as you know, calculated and precise.
Over the past weeks, he planned a carefully mapped out course for following her and watching her, he had to be sure. Reconnaissance, he called it. And if he was wrong, that's ok. Julie was easy on the eyes. There were worse things to do than spend days watching her, taking pictures of her. She had this quiet beauty about her that even she did not recognize. Which probably made her appealing to Drew, and unnoticed by everyone else. She hid in the background. She had a small group of friends, but she was still somewhat alone. They had much in common, people that mattered notice Drew, otherwise, he blended in with the walls - which was exactly how he wanted it.
Drew wasn't sure if he hoped he was right about her signals or not. If things went as planned, after this he would be different. This one action would change his life. You can't go back and get a do-over. The one thing you can't plan on is someone else's reaction. What's that boxing analogy? It would be a critical mistake if he bobbed when she was weaving. Either way, he needed to be certain before he approached her. After these weeks of shadowing her, he sure he was. Still, for the first time, he was nervous. He checked his palms and wiped the sweat on a handiwipe from his backpack. His own nervousness unnerved him.
But he pushed it back as the bus pulled in. He needed to have a clear head. He needed to assess how many other kids were around. He needed a clear path in, and possibly out. He needed to read her signs one last time before doing anything. He needed, most of all, to be sure.
He stepped off the bus and saw her by the football field. To the left, her friends were quickly walking away from the school, waving as they headed out toward the smoking area. The bell would ring in a few minutes so they didn't have much time. To the right, kids were greeting each other, filing into the school. Some nodded and waved to Drew.
Drew took all of it in. He wanted to remember this moment. Julie looked over at the kids all flowing into the school like ants heading to a fallen piece of candy. She casually pulled out her cell phone, uncharacteristically grinned slightly to herself. He watched her dark bangs fall forward and dip below her eyes, covering her face as she started to text. Drew knew he needed to act now or he'd lose the moment.
He ran toward her.
He ran at full speed, arms pumping, heart pounding. He rushed at her as if his life depended on it. Actually, everyone's life depended on it - everyone heading into the school, anyway. He crashed into the center of her body - full force. His right hand out, grabbing the cell phone, making sure to keep it open so that it wouldn't activate the code she'd inputted. His left hand moving around to press her arms down. He used his body to pin her as immobile as possible. He felt as if he was moving in slow motion, but it took only seconds to tackle and cuff her. He was precise, just as he was in his planning this case.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
