MORE RANDOM ACTS OF BLOGGING

1) Well, I'm a genius.  This morning I decided that I was going to be efficient.  I knew I was going to make myself go to the gym and I knew I had to go to the bank.  Since I wasn't going to have to get out of the car at the bank, it only made sense to drive over there after the gym and go to one of the drive in tellers!  Two birds with one stone, don't 'cha know.  I was so proud of myself for thinking ahead and not wasting a trip and all of that, and when I got to the bank I was even prouder of myself for getting there bright and early to avoid the long lines!

Then I remembered that today is a holiday and the banks are closed.  So much for efficiency.

Curses.

2) The Sunday before last, it was very cold outside.  Probably colder than it had been all winter up to that point.  While I was getting ready for church, I looked in my closet and realized that I couldn't stand the thought of putting on a dress while it was that cold outside and opted to wear slacks and a sweater instead.

Unfortunately, I was also having one of those "I hate all my clothes and nothing fits" days (some of you know what I mean) and couldn't find a sweater that fit or that didn't look ratty.  It hasn't been cold enough to really justify buying any new ones this year, so I was stuck with last year's models.  Well, except for one sweater that was brand new and I'd never worn it before, but I was hesitant.

See, last November, we went to the Mall of Georgia and visited a store called Museum Replicas.  This place sells replica movie and television props and costumes, and for reasons I still don't understand, I got a replica Hogwarts uniform sweater/tie combo- Griffindor house colors, in case you're curious.  It was a licensed replica, so it didn't have any patches or words on it that said it was connected to Harry Potter in any way, it was simply a nice gray sweater that looks like this:

Ten points to Griffindor!

I know I don't usually wear ties, but it isn't unheard of, and I thought that since there were no words stitched on the sweater, or a big Hogwarts shield on it anywhere that I could possibly get away with wearing it without any problems.  A lot of our church members are old, so I didn't think they'd recognize it, and since I sit in the sound booth during services, I knew I'd be in the back out of sight anyway.  

Believe it or not, I was told by a couple of our older church members that I looked really nice and they didn't mention anything about movies, so I thought I was home free.  However, it didn't take long before someone recognized it for what it was. Then way more people than I expected to know what it was figured it out.  If they asked, I was honest, but I still felt kind of silly.  I think I probably would have still been OK, if one of the men who noticed what I was wearing hadn't stopped me in front of the youth group and start asking me if the stairs changed around while I was going to class, and then start talking to the picture of King David in the window like it was one of the sentient paintings. 

So yes, I wore a Hogwarts uniform to church.  I wasn't trying to be weird or trying to get attention, I was just trying to stay warm.  I promise.  * Facepalm. *

3) I was checking my page tracker to see what people had been searching for when they came across my blog.  Someone had typed in "What are tapioca balls made of?"  Sigh.  In case anyone else comes across this while asking the same question, the answer is narwhal horn dust.  It isn't suitable for vegetarians unless they aren't that strict. Oy.

4) Last Friday, Mr. Lee took Steve and I out to dinner to celebrate my birthday!  We had a lot of fun, and thankfully we managed to get out of the restaurant before anyone sang to me.  *shudder* He also mentioned wanting to see a movie, and his only stipulation was that he wanted to see a 3D movie since that's his thing.  I think he goes to see all of the 3D movies that come out, just to see how competent the film makers are.  :)  Since there were only 3 of those kind of movies playing, and I for darn sure wasn't going to see Ghost Rider 2 (Sorry, Nic Cage) and I didn't want to see the one with Dewane Johnson in it about a mysterious mountain or island or whatever, we decided to go and see "The Phantom Menace."  Shut up.

It has been a long time since I've actually watched that particular movie, so time had faded my memories of it a bit.  I know that I like Star Wars just fine, and I didn't even remember hating Jar Jar Binks all that much, so I figured it wouldn't be too bad.  

I was wrong.  So very wrong.  The movie was terrible.  Not only was the 3D conversion terrible and unnecessary, the movie itself was just awful.  The acting, save for Liam Neeson and the guy who played Obi Wan, was dreadful.  The dialog, the cartoony-ness of the special effects...just...bleh.  Obviously I'm not the target audience for this, but I can always appreciate good movies, no matter who they are directed at and this was not good.  No offense to Mr. Lucas -mainly because I'm sure his company could figure out a way to track me down and do something else to me - kill my dogs or something since I don't have a job to get fired from this time. (You still aren't forgiven you web crawling bastards!) - but you need to just walk away.  Please.  Leave the movies the way they are and retire or make other movies or something.  This re-release was nothing short of a money grab, and I hate to say that we added our own funds into that pot.

Honestly, and I'm speaking directly to you now George Lucas, I say this with full conviction:  When it comes to movies, you are one of the most brilliant and creative minds on this planet.  You have done things and continue to do things to almost literally create magic.  Without the things you and ILM have developed, I'm sure movies wouldn't be as fantastical as they have become.  You created a wonderful thing with Star Wars, a thing that probably blew up way bigger than you ever thought it could, and that is honestly fantastic, but I'm begging you to just. Leave. Them. Alone. No more tweaking, no more conversions, no more Greedos shooting first...just leave them be. You are bad touching a lot of childhoods, and that is not cool.  I don't care if you made these movies, they no longer belong to you. They belong to everyone who love them and the majority of them don't want you messing with them anymore.

5) Anyway..so I just ranted about Star Wars. This must mean my blood sugar is low and I'm not being rational anymore.  I going to go eat breakfast before I start talking politics. 

1) I had a lovely birthday, thank you for asking!  This year I had a body guard, which really cut down on the bodily harm and fires. :)  Steve took the day off to spend it with me, and we had a nice, low key day.  We went to breakfast at Cracker Barrel (shut up, their bacon is amazing) and then we just wandered around town doing different stuff.  He took me to pick out my gift, because he knows I'm super picky about jewelry (he told me what he wanted to get me and I picked which one), and then he allowed me to drag him into a couple of girl stores.  I feel really tacky about one, though.  I went to Sephora because I am a member of some kind of points program and one of the perks is that I am entitled to a free gift on my birthday.  Before we had a store, if I wanted the free gift I'd have to order something online and have it included, but the email I got said no purchase was necessary if I went to the actual store.  I walked in and said "It's my birthday and I'd like my free thing, please."  I don't normally do that, and I wasn't comfortable doing it then, but I did it anyway.  I still feel really tacky, but I got my free thing.  Hey...it was a really nice free thing!  We also went to Toys R Us and then got groceries, so it was a wild, wild birthday.  I'm just glad no one called the cops.  :) It even ended on a nice note because I got a special birthday song emailed to me from a friend.  I hope to return the favor one day!

As for the annual bad juju, I felt it, but apparently now I'm just passing it along to strangers.  We were walking out of one store behind a woman and she ran her cart straight into one of those concrete barriers that they put in front of the entrance so you can't drive your car into the building, I guess.  If it had only been that, I wouldn't have thought anything about it, but on our way out of the grocery store we passed someone in a blue car was was trying to back out of a parking space, and the car jumped forward and ended up on the sidewalk!  Maybe it wasn't my fault, per se, but we went home after that just in case.

Of course, now that my birthday has passed without mayhem, I'm just waiting for it to catch up with me.  If any of you die, get maimed, lose your job, pet, spouse, or home in some kind of bizarre disaster, I apologize in advance. 

I need therapy.

2) I just heard something fall over and spill things.  I have gone into every room in this house and can't find what it was.  It was loud, and honestly I expected to go into the kitchen and find a mess or see my bead boxes overturned, but I can't find what it was.  Weirdness.  Ghost sounds, y'all!  Even the spirits in my house are messy. 

3) I saw the sweetest thing last night!  I had to pick Steve up from the airport kind of late last night.  Let me just say, I love watching people at the airport.  I love seeing happy people greet each other!  I saw a soldier come home and his mom and dad were so happy to see him, and I saw two people just light up when they picked each other out of the crowd.  However, the best and sweetest thing I think I've ever seen was while I was waiting for Steve to get his luggage.  There was an elderly man, clearly in his 80s, waiting by one of the dividers.  His face lit up and I saw an elderly woman come towards him and he wrapped his arms around her and they just stood there holding each other. I couldn't see her face since her back was to me, but the man reached down and kissed her on the cheek and they just stood there hugging while everyone milled around them.  They didn't let go for as long as I stood there.  It was so sweet that it made me cry.  Crying in an airport makes you look like a lunatic, so I tried not show it.  At least it wasn't ugly crying, but I had to take deep breaths and look up towards the ceiling so no one could see my eyes. Literally, it still makes me cry and I don't understand why because it was so, so, so sweet.  I didn't mean to watch them, and I kept trying to look away, but they were standing right in front of me.  I hope when I'm that old, someone will still be that happy to see me! 

4) Did you know that you can drop a bottle of carbonated juice from just around 3 to 5 inches off the ground and it will explode?  Yep! You know that fizzy grape juice that as in a wine bottle?  Well, I grabbed one off of the bottom shelf and the cap got caught on the shelf above it which caused it to slip out of my hand and the thing just went kablooey all over the aisle.  I stood there in a fizzing puddle of juice wondering what happened, because it took me a second to understand that the bottle could possibly break from that tiny distance from my hand to the floor.  Luckily a "clean up on aisle 4" guy came over pretty quickly and took care of things.  I was so embarrassed.  I had to ask for a paper towel to wipe off the bottom of my shoes so I wouldn't track it all over the store.  I spent the rest of that trip to the grocery store with my socks filled with juice.  Yuck.

5) I made one more round of the house to see if I could find what made that sound and I found it!  It wasn't ghosts.  It was forks.  Our box of plastic utensils fell over in the cupboard.  I have no idea how that happened, but I'd rather it be forks than ghosts in my house, thankyouverymuch.

A PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT

This will be quick, but I feel it needs to be said. 

If you are going to wear a pair of pantyhose or tights that are even just a teeny-tiny bit too short for you, DO NOT wear slippery, silky underpants.  It will not end well.

I feel that this is all that needs to be said on the matter.

Good day.

A QUICKY

Would you like to know something I hate?

What am I saying?  Of course you do!  That's why your here!  :)

But really, I don't like this saying:

Pure, unadulterated evil.

I know that this is supposed to be sweet.  I get that.  I know that it's supposed to show someone how much you love them and that living without them would be unbearable.  Intellectually I know that.

However, this is how I interpret it: Someone who loves you wants to die the day before you do so that they never know the pain of living without you.  However, they don't give a damn that you will spend an agonizing 24 hours of soul numbing pain and heart rending agony because the person you love is dead.

Selfish bastard bear.

; )

MORE RANDOM ACTS OF BLOGGING

1) I managed to screw up part of our Sunday morning music services. :(  I feel really bad about it too.  The minister of music had asked one of his daughters to sing a solo, and the music she was going to sing was on a cassette tape.  I know what you're thinking...a cassette tape? Wha?  Yeah..well, if you are familiar with music accompaniment, you will know that cassette tapes were the norm for a very long time.  Even after CDs became the preferred way to listen to music, for some reason, accompaniment music was still on tapes.  Of course, you also have the fact that a lot of gospel songs don't go out of fashion, so if you find a version of a song you like, you tend to hang on to it.  It makes sense to upgrade your music to CDs or even MP3s now, but that can get pretty expensive.  Not to mention that sometimes the particular version of the song you like may not have ever been pressed (or whatever) to a CD.

OK, I told you all of that for you to understand why this woman was singing with a cassette tape.

Anyway...apparently, I have forgotten how to use a tape player.  Well, at least the kind that have more than 4 buttons.  Sometimes the choir will sing from a tape, and that's where my ineptness has shown itself.  I always rewind too far, or not far enough, I accidentally hit that button that flips the tape to the other side, or I forget which direction the tape is turning and the whole thing goes backwards.  It's a nightmare and it makes me feel like an idiot.

So while she was practicing, I had to leave the sound system in other capable hands so that I could go to class.  When I came back down for the service, I refused to touch the cassette player so as not to screw anything up.  When it came time for her to sing, I pressed the play button and the song started playing somewhere in the middle.  I didn't know what happened.  I also didn't know the song, so I didn't know which way I was supposed to move it.  I rewound, and played it...but nope, still not in the right place.  I did that several times trying to find the right song, but it never worked. All this time the poor woman is standing on stage looking embarrassed and I'm in the back of the church trying desperately to figure out what was going on.  The music minister finally told her to sit down and we went on with the service, but I felt so bad!  I don't know what happened!  I guess I could have bumped one of the buttons without realizing it, but I don't know how I could have done that without hearing it.  I don't know.  I do know, however, that every single part of my body was cringing.  I just felt so terrible.  Ugh.

2) I got my hair cut last Friday and no one noticed.  Well, Steve pretended to notice, but it was because I told him I was getting my hair cut and I'm pretty sure he was trying to be nice.  However, later he told me it looked exactly the same.  This wouldn't irritate me normally but it doesn't look the same. It very much doesn't look the same at all!  I'm trying to let my hair grow out, but since the back was so much shorter than the front, I decided to go ahead and cut the front so that the front would be the same length as the back.  Then I got it layered.  I kept the bangs, but even they weren't cut the same.  It's a totally different hair style. Gah!

Other than that, my other problem is that I have no idea how to fix it.  I wake up in the mornings looking like Russell Brand, and if I'm not careful, when I blow dry my hair, it sticks out in many directions.  I'm just going to leave it alone until it decides to cooperate.  It's best not to anger my hair.  It's very sensitive.

3) The internet is full of weirdos, isn't it?  The other night I had a terrible case of hiccups, and I mean terrible in a way few people can understand.  I've never had little, dainty, cute hiccups.  When I get a serious case of hiccups, I sound like an angry pterodactyl.  I can't control them, and they are loud.  True story, my dogs think something is wrong with me and they try to climb into my lap and look into my mouth to see what is going on when this happens.  

While my diaphragm shredding hiccups were going on, and since I had the iPad next to me, I tweeted that "I have a bad case of hiccoughs. They sound like the mating call of an exotic, unpleasant bird."


A bit later, I saw that I had gotten some mentions on Twitter from a person I didn't recognize.  The person asked how long I had had the hiccups.  Normally, I wouldn't have bothered answering, but I figured that maybe this person would have some kind of trick to get rid of them that I could use the next time it happened.  Seriously, I HATE getting the hiccups and was willing to try anything.

Well, this guy didn't have any tricks for getting rid of them.  In fact, due to a stream of other messages that came to me in quick succession, I realized that this particular person...um...enjoyed the thought of women having hiccups.  A lot.  What?!  Gross.  That was a new one on me.  Not that I have a working encyclopedic knowledge of kinks or anything, but what the hell?  That's just weird.  Needless to say, I didn't respond to him anymore.  Icky, ya'll.

4) I just realized that I typed that word so many times just then that it doesn't look like a real word anymore. Hiccups.

RANDOM ACTS OF BLOGGING

1) Holy cow, it's gorgeous outside today!  We had some bad weather overnight, which naturally was heralded by the sound of the tornado siren and the dogs howling, but this morning it's just beautiful out there.  Of course, it's 61 degrees in January, which I don't particularly like (cause January is supposed to be cold, dontchaknow) but I guess 61 degrees is better than three feet of snow and no power and dying of hypothermia.  I'll just call that the silver lining.  :)

2) I found a new printer! Well, maybe. I'm currently getting my first job printed there as we speak.  That is probably not anywhere near as exciting to you guys as it is to me, but it's great news!  I suppose I should specify that it isn't a desktop printer, but a printing facility where they can do all the fancy stuff, like raised lettering, varnishes, foiling and all that other happy trash!  I have a whole new world of design opened to me!  Plus, I know a guy with a connection to the place and he thinks we can probably work out a pretty good deal on pricing.  Woot!  Now, if anyone needs invitations or whatever, we can make 'em fancy!

3) Oh, and speaking of awesome stuff, some of my hats will finally get a home soon.  The children from our church are going to visit the nursing home in February, and along with the stuff they are going to make for the residents there, they are also going to be giving them each a hat!  The women's group is also taking a few of them to the members of our church that are elderly and home bound!  I'm glad!  I know they are just hats, but I hope that they can give people a tiny bit of warmth and snuggliness.  I'm going to have to go in and weed out a lot of the crazier colored hats and the ones with horns and what-not, though.  We don't need anyone's paw-paw looking like a thug. 

4) While looking at jobs the other day (yes, I'm still looking, albeit not as rabidly as before) I saw that my former job at the SpRocket (ptooey) was back on the market.  It made me a little sad.  I really miss that job sometimes.  I know it's stupid to even care, I really do, but I just enjoyed being there and I have moments of missing it.  I liked my co-workers, I liked what I did, and even when it drove me crazy I could always go out and look at whatever I made and think "I did that, and that is awesome."   Oh, well. Water under the bridge and all that, right?  I know that they must've already had someone in mind for the job since it didn't stay online for more than a couple of days (legally every job has to be open to anyone who wants to apply, but they generally hire who they opened the job for anyways.)  I hope whoever gets the job enjoys it as much as I did and I hope that they are shown more professional courtesy than I was.

I also hope that one day I can drive by the place without giving it the bird.  Baby steps...

5) There is a song that our choir sings that I really like called "I'm Ready To Go."  I wish I could find a YouTube video of it so you could hear what it sounds like, but I haven't tracked down the right version just yet.  Anyways, the song never fails to crack me up.  It's not a funny song at all, but to me it sounds as if it were written by Richard or Robert Sherman for some kind of white-bread, gospel, live action, Disney-esque musical like "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" or something.  Honestly, I get mad giggles whenever they practice it because I keep picturing everyone in the church jumping up and doing some synchronized dancing.  I guess the worst part is that at the end, I can totally see everyone in the choir going down on one knee and a cross being lowered from the ceiling behind them, all while pyrotechnics fire off on each side and shower the congregation with confetti. 

I realize this is not what I should be thinking of during church, but there is nothing I can do about it. My imagination is completely out of my control.

6) Personally, if there is going to be any dancing at our church at all, I'd prefer it to be this kind:



I might even be in the choir if they sang songs like that! :)

A QUICKY

Hee!

Earlier this evening I was reading through our local news website and came across this short article:

Obama Calls Coach Saban

At the end it talks about how the team is excited about their upcoming visit to the White House, and all I could think of was Coach Saban sitting on a park bench saying

"I went to the White House. A-gain. I met the president. A-gain."

And that made me laugh much more than it should have.

I'm sorry.

RANDOM ACTS OF BLOGGING

1) I love bread.  Love, love, love it.  I know it's the worst thing in the world to just sit and chow down on, but it's one of the things I just get a jones for a lot of the time.  My favorite at the moment is Sesame Semolina from Panera Bread.  I'll just go in and buy a loaf every once in a while, and I'm good for a week and a half.  I'm not sure why I'm telling you this except that I just had a piece of it toasted for breakfast and the memory of it still lingers.  :)  Seriously, if you like bread, you need to try it.

2) Oy.  There are people from my church who have friended me on Facebook, and they saw the pictures that Jeoff took of us during our New Year's Eve "party."  They think I was drunk.  I promise, I wasn't!  That's just what I look like, and I can't apologize enough for that.  I was acting goofy when the pictures were made, and now they think I was smashed.  Honestly, there are also kids from my church that are my Facebook friends, and I'd never, never, never let pictures of me stay tagged with my name if I was doing something questionable.  I didn't think anything about those pictures being posted until someone said something to me about them, and now I feel terrible.  I don't know if they believed me when I told them I wasn't drunk.

That entire day, all I'd had was a glass and a half of wine (because I'd finally found some I liked), plus one glass of champagne at midnight, and Josh asked me to try a tiny bit of some kind of foul, red stuff that he said was sweet (but it was a filthy, filthy lie.)  Believe it or not, even with my appallingly low tolerance of alcohol, I didn't even get tipsy until after the champagne...and mostly it just made me very sleepy. After posting one questionable twitter entry, which in retrospect probably could have been worded differently, I went to bed before I could begin emailing people (you're welcome.)  I was still a long way from drunk, though. I've been more buzzed from breathing in Sharpie marker fumes while working on a project.

Bleh. I'm stuck somewhere between feeling really awful about this and sincerely wishing people would mind their own damn business.

3) Speaking of being disappointed in me... I still haven't sent my hats to that charity yet.  It isn't that I don't want to, but the logistics are a nightmare, and the cost of shipping everything to California is prohibitive.  For whatever reasons, I had no idea that the number of hats I made would be so heavy or require so many boxes!  I've given away quite a few hats, but I'd still like the bulk of them to go to people in need.  I'm thinking of calling one of the local hospitals and seeing if they have any kind of program for the people going through chemotherapy.  I may also see if the children's group at my church ever goes to nursing homes to visit, and see if they want to take some to the elderly people.  I feel so bad that this hasn't been taken care of yet!  I just want to do something nice!! 

4) I'm absolutely loving the new coffee maker!  It's so easy to throw a pod into it and make a cup of coffee without making a huge mess or having way more coffee than I'll drink! I know I sound like an infomercial, but I actually do make quite a mess when I make coffee the old fashioned way.  I also love the fact that it makes other stuff, because I recently got some Earl Grey tea pods (I won't lie, it was mostly so I could pretend to be Capt. Picard) and realized I actually really like it.  My one problem is that we have a ton of pods that I don't really care for and I don't know what to do with them.  It came with 4 different boxes of coffee, and I only really like one of them.  Plus, we bought some hot chocolate and chai tea latte pods, and they taste weird.  I thought they had artificial sweeteners in them, but they don't, so I'm not sure what makes them taste so odd. I can't drink them, though.  At any rate, I really like the machine.  I tried the "hot water only" button the other day to make some instant rice, but forgot to rinse the spout out first.  Just FYI...rice made with coffee tainted water is gross.  :)

RANDOM ACTS OF BLOGGING

1) To finish out my story of new year's travels, Monday we left Helen and drove home.  Nothing really exciting happened along the way.  Sorry I didn't dedicate an entire entry for that, but it just felt a tiny bit anticlimactic!  Anyways, I hope you had fun ringing in the new year, even if that meant you went to bed at 10:00 and slept through the whole thing.  We all celebrate in our own ways!  :)

2) Tourist season has begun at our gym, as it does every January.  Things are very crowded there right now, but I suspect a lot of people will stop coming around the end of the month.  I used to think it was funny, but now I hope most people stick with it.  It's hard to take care of yourself and lost weight and all of that.  It shouldn't be, but it is.  Good luck to all the new guys at my gym...but please don't forget that I was there first and you need to get off of the machines when I'm ready to use them.  Heeheee!

3) Last night I had some crazy dreams.  The thing I remember most clearly is that at some point, I picked up a telephone and dialed a number at random and when someone answered, I began to sing "Free Your Mind" by En Vogue.  I sang the whole dang song, codas and all.  I found out later on that the guy who picked up the phone was so transfixed by my song that he stopped in the middle of a crime of some sort and changed his mind about committing it.  I guess that means I'm the lamest super-hero ever.

4) So the University of Alabama is going to be playing in the BCS Championship game again!  Neato!  I hope they win, of course.  How cool is it that for the past three years a team from this state has gone that far?  Alabama: Home of the rocket scientist, awesome football teams, and American Idol winners.  OK, maybe I'm not so proud of the American Idol part, but still...

5)

 

Here is a picture of me and my guys in Alpine Helen.  We had such fun!  Of course, I shouldn't speak for everyone, but I will, because that's just how I roll.

BLOGGED ALONG THE WAY: NEW YEARS EDITION

January 1, 2012
Cleveland & Helen, Georgia

Today we had to say goodbye to Josh and Jeoff after breakfast, since they had to make their way back home to spend more time with Josh's mom before they fly home to Colorado. I was very sad, because I will miss them.

Since Steve, Anthony, and I had a whole extra day to spend, we drove around trying to find the few places we managed to miss yesterday. We stopped at the Old Sautee Store, which was so cool.  It was part modern store that sells some specialty items and things of local interest, and the other part was what I imagine the old store had really looked like.  It was full of all kinds of antique items that they had sold at one time.  It felt like stepping back in time.  :) 

I had to visit the restroom while we were there, and the only one they had was underneath the store. You had to get there by climbing down a set of stairs outside.  The bathroom was small and, when the door latched behind you, very dark.  When I was ready to leave the bathroom, I couldn't find the way out!  Granted, it was only one room, and it was dark, but still...I couldn't find the door.  I began to panic a little, and I even had a moment of thinking that the whole room had rotated and someone had trapped me in there!  I kept turning around and around looking for the door before I realized I was standing next to it, but the shadows in the room kept me from being able to see the door handle and I'd been pawing at the wall panel next to the door the whole time.  I think I need to stop watching scary movies.  I'm getting paranoid.

After we left the store, we stopped at a couple of other smallish stores that were scattered around. Most of the things we wanted to see were closed, either because it was new years day, or because it was Sunday, so we ended up heading back to Helen to try a restaurant we'd seen the day before called Troll Tavern. It was OK, but nothing to write home about.  After we ate, we walked the main road again while looking for any souvenirs we might have missed the day before, and after leaving there, we decided to take the rest of the evening to relax. I think we may be getting old. Heeheehee.

We spent the rest of the evening watching movies and football, and cleaning up the cabin.

Wild, wild stuff.

BLOGGED ALONG THE WAY: NEW YEARS EDITION

December 31, 2011
Cleveland & Helen, Georgia

I was first out of bed this morning and decided to get a glass of milk. I poured one, thinking it looked awfully thick, but thought maybe it was just whole milk or something. Right before (thank goodness) taking a drink,  I realized we'd bought buttermilk by accident. Projectile vomiting would definitely have been a bad way to start my day!

Everyone finally got up and Jeoff and Josh made us all breakfast, which was awesome, and then we got ready to head out to see what adventures awaited us in Helen, Georgia!

If you've never been to Alpine Helen, GA, it's a neat little town in North Georgia that was redesigned to look like a Bavarian village. I am really not sure why that happened, but there you go.  Sometimes the world is weird.  Anyway, the whole town was redesigned, and now it's a tourist attraction in the vein of Gatlinburg or Estes Park. There are a lot of shops and restaurants, mostly full of German themed souvenirs. You can find some lovely things there, but there is a certain amount of cheesy crap there too.

It's also a very dog and cat friendly place, and people were walking dogs everywhere.  I think I actually made the sound "SQUEEEEE!"  I got to pet a few, but there were too many to chase down. One memorable moment was when I sat down to take my foot picture and a giant Burmese Mountain Dog came over and sniffed me. Seriously, these suckers are huge. It came up behind me, so I wasn't expecting it and all I felt was a big, hairy presence. I turned around and saw a mass of fur and a big wet nose, and it scared me to death. It was like being snorfed by a bear.

We shopped, and had an amazing lunch at a very authentic German restaurant called The Old Bavarian Inn. It was seriously delicious.  I also learned how to say "ham hock" in German! :)  The waitress was so funny! Jeoff speaks German, so he made friends with her, and she took great care of us.  I can't remember her name, unfortunately, but we know her son hangs out with Flava Flav!  She's not thrilled with that, but since he lives overseas, there is nothing she can do about it and she has resigned herself to that fact. :)

After leaving Helen, we stopped at Habersham Winery, where Josh and Jeoff did a tasting, but the rest of us went over to the antique shop next door. After that we visited the Nora Mill grist mill And Jumping Goat coffee shop across the street, where we looked around and boosted the economy. You know...just doing our part. :)

We had decided to cook out instead of trying to find a restaurant for the evening, so we grilled steaks and watched tv for a while, before breaking out the bag of crackers (which are for Christmas, I know, but still...) and pulling them apart. I've never had so much fun with a pile of cardboard and cheap, plastic toys!

We almost missed midnight, but we managed to get the champagne poured before the ball dropped. :). Everyone got a kiss on the cheek and we walked outside to watch the people down the street shoot off fireworks (i.e. bottle rockets. Shut up, they were magnificent). I think we may have stayed up another hour, all of us sitting in the same room using smart phones & iPads, you know otherwise ignoring each other, and posting dumb things on our various social networking sites.  I finally had to go to bed, because apparently the champagne did me in.



HAPPY 2012!

BLOGGED ALONG THE WAY: NEW YEAR EDITION

December 30, 2011
Huntsville, AL to Helen, GA

After waking up early and dropping off the dogs, Steve and I set out on another adventure, this time accompanied by our dear friends Josh, Jeoff, and Anthony!  We had decided several months ago to rent a cabin in Helen, GA for a low key new years eve, so after meeting up at the SProcket (ptooey), our caravan headed off. We had our GPS, of course, but Anthony, a seasoned (and by that I mean super old) traveler, knew a quicker way to get to our first stop. It wasn't too far off from what our GPS said, but it was just different enough to confuse it. At the point where our new route diverged from Jeepus' route, it kept "recalculating" and trying to turn us around. By the time we had ignored it through several "recalculations" it basically said "screw you guys" and simply said "there is a better route." Poor Jeepus.

Other than that, though, the first leg of our trip was uneventful. We made it to Cleveland, TN and stopped for lunch, and then got back on the road. This time, however, we weren't following each other, so things got a little mixed up.  Steve and I needed to stop at a gas station, while everyone else was going to head on and get through the Cherokee National Forest. We were going to meet up right after getting through and recombine, but Steve and I managed to go completely the wrong way. Since we had to ignore the GPS once again to get to the Gas station, and since Anthony had also gotten confused and given us the wrong direction to turn, we actually drove around for a bit before realizing we weren't going in the right direction.  We couldn't get either Josh or Anthony on the phone to tell us where to go, so we had to stop and ask for Jeepus' forgiveness before she'd show us the way back on track. Anthony had also gone the wrong way, so we finally got a call from him saying he was on the same road as we were and would be right behind us! finally pointing in the right direction, we made our way into Cherokee National Forest.

The drive through was gorgeous. I'm sure the place wasn't at it's prettiest, since most of the leaves were gone, but it was still lovely. I never realized how much touristy stuff had sprung up around the Ocoee river. I'm also fairly baffled by that, seeing as how Deliverance wasn't exactly a chamber of commerce recommendation of the surrounding areas and it's inhabitants. Steve says he's been white water rafting down the river before, but the river seemed to have been turned down, or dammed or something, because the rocks were very high and the water was very low. Unless I'm completely confused about how rafting works, I thought it was supposed to be the other way around!

We didn't catch up with Anthony or J&J like I thought we would, but I did get several calls from them that my phone would completely drop the minute I answered. (Seriously, I hate my phone.) I finally managed to answer when Steve and I made it into North Carolina. (As an aside, the route to this place was crazy...I mean...North Carolina, what?) Josh and Jeoff were waiting at our rendezvous point right across the Georgia state line, but Anthony was still MIA.  Steve and I weren't that far away, so we met up with them and we waited in an eating area flanked with slot machines! Jeoff, who had never been to Georgia before, "enjoyed" his first taste of boiled peanuts, and we sat and waited on Anthony to arrive. It got to the point where we honestly started to worry that he might have ended up in Florida or something, but he finally made it!  We weren't that far from our destination by this point, so Steve took the lead again and we got back on our way.

The drive was absolutely gorgeous from here. North Georgia is hilly and pastoral, plus the light had a filtered, otherworldly quality that made everything look as if it had been painted in oils. We had to go through another national forest, this time the Chattahoochee, and it took us up through the mountains. The sky had gotten cloudier and everything was misty and very dim. I don't know if we had gotten high enough to be in a cloud, or if it just got very foggy, but suddenly our visibility was gone.  We could probably see about 10 feet in front of us, and the road we were on was very twisted. Very, very twisted. The purple line we followed on the GPS was bizarre and looked less like a road than it did a roller coaster track, but it was almost the only thing we had to find our way by. I think at one point the line even twisted into the shape of a hand giving us the bird, but I can't be sure.  I got a very strong Silent Hill vibe during the ordeal!  Luckily when we descended, the fog was gone and the rest of the trip was easy.

We finally arrived at the cabin and it was so nice! It's very cozy and smallish, although it's plenty big for all of us. There is a hot tub and a jacuzzi, but as I didn't think traveling in January would require a bathing suit, I will not be enjoying either of them.

We stepped out to get provisions at the local Wal-Mart, grabbed dinner, and retired back to the cabin to relax. Josh and Jeoff had bought shorts, so they soaked in the hot tub, and I sat on the edge and we discussed important things! Steve and Anthony were inside watching a movie, so we joined them later on and then finished the evening by playing Scrabble and Scattergories.  So far, we're having great time!

IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE, BUT MAYBE NOT SUCH A GREAT MOVIE.

OK, just so you know, I didn't actually get so depressed after thinking about the "It's a Wonderful Life" scenario that I ate 32 Rolo turtles.  I ate that many because they are delicious.  :)  Seriously, they are awesome, and if I don't get rid of them soon, I'm going to get diabetes or something.  I can't stop eating them.

Actually, I was only depressed for a second or two and then I started thinking about a problem I have with that dumb movie.  Indulge me for a moment...

OK, so George gets upset because of the money troubles he's having with the building and loan company he runs and decides to commit suicide.

-First off...what a dick move, George.  Seriously.  You've got kids and a family, you selfish bastard!  I understand the depression and hopelessness of your current situation, but killing yourself isn't the best course of action, here.  They wouldn't even get your life insurance (if you had any) because they don't pay out in cases of suicide! If you'd shown signs of depression or suicidal behavior before now, or if you'd had some kind of mental or emotional problems in the past, I think I'd probably understand, but geez man.  A sudden attack of things-are-looking-kinda-bad is no reason to kill yourself!

Then Clarence comes along to show him how horrible things would have been if he'd never existed.

-I have no trouble with this part. As freakishly messed up as Bedford Falls (i.e. Potterville) became without his influence, maybe people like that exist. The hubs on which certain wheels of the world turn.  I dunno.  I'm just going to go with it.

When George sees how his existence has made the world a better place, he forgoes suicide, runs home to hug everyone, bells ring and angels get their wings.  The end.  It's freaking heartwarming.

OK, my problem with the movie is this:  George did exist.  George had always existed. George would not negate his existence simply by killing himself.  Granted, I know that the whole purpose of the story is that George realizes that he's done really great things and that his life is really wonderful, but if he had actually managed to throw himself off of the bridge before Clarence could show him everything, the world wouldn't have automatically reverted to that bleak existence that had never included him.  Sure, his family and most of the town would have been devastated that he'd killed himself, but Bedford Falls wouldn't blink out of existence and be replaced by Potterville the second after he died.  He'd leave a trail of heartache, emotional suffering, and possible daddy issues behind him, but all of the things he had done in the past would have still been done.  Lots of people who've done really great things die without the effects of what they'd done in the past wearing off.  To show George what life would have been like if he'd never existed doesn't make as much sense to me as it does to show George what life might be like if he killed himself.

Something tells me that if you show a man who truly loves his family what would happen if he (selfishly) killed himself, that man would not do it. 

OK, look, I realize I've over analyzed this.  However, I can't help but think that the whole reason Clarence hadn't gotten his wings by then is because he didn't quite get the point of cause and effect.  The effect of showing George what life would have been like without his existence was a fluke.  Wings is wings, though, so I'm sure he didn't go back to the Almighty and say "Oops...my bad.  No, don't give them to me yet.  I need to get this right."

Oh, and also, what the hell kind of name is Zuzu?

That is all.

A QUICKY

Over the Christmas holiday, I noticed that a lot of television shows have an episode that rips off "It's a Wonderful life."  You know what I'm talking about, right?  The main character gets depressed and thinks his/her life is meaningless, and then is taken around by some benevolent spirit that shows them how awful everything would be if they had never existed. Blah, blah, and blah.

Anyways, I started thinking that it would be interesting if I got the chance to see how things would have turned out if I'd never existed.  Not because I want to do away with myself or anything, but just out of curiosity, you know?

Of course, then I realized, what if I got to do it only to find out that everyone's life turned out for the better?  How would I deal with that? 

Then I got depressed and ate 32 Rolo Turtles.

Thanks a lot, Jimmy Stewart.

Other than that, Christmas was awesome! 

More later...

As a child, when thinking about what would happen to me in the future, I never thought I'd ever want to become a groupie for a Jewish boy band.

Then this happened. Life is weird.

FIRE AND BRIMSTONE (MINUS THE BRIMSTONE)

Today was the day we had our annual Christmas cantata!  The choir has been practicing for months, and they sounded amazing!  I'd love to give them all the credit, but I can't.  Most of it goes to me, since I was the one running the sound.  :)  Hehe!  Just kidding.  I basically just made sure the music came on, and the choir did the rest.  I wish you could have been there to hear them!  They almost blew away the first four rows of pews!  Awesome!

We did have one small incident, though.

A weird thing about our church is that the choir loft seems to defy the laws of thermodynamics.  It can be freezing cold in the whole sanctuary, people literally bundled up in the fleece loaner blankets we have on hand for the little old ladies, but up where the choir is seated people are fanning and sweating.  I'm sure it has something to do with the placement of the can lights above the stage, but whatever it is makes it very difficult to keep the temperature at a level that won't cause the choir members to pass out while simultaneously throwing the rest of us into hypothermia.  Of course, when they have special musical events, we tend to keep the temperature at the coldest it can be to accommodate the choir.  It's hard to stand and sing for 45 minutes wearing a heavy robe anyway, and the last thing we want to do is have any of our choir members pass out (it's happened before.) 

This morning the temperature was set to 69 degrees, the house lights were turned down to keep the room from getting too hot, and we had the air conditioning fans running hard on both sides of the sanctuary.

We also have the entire sanctuary decorated for Christmas, having done the hanging of the green a couple of weeks ago. We have swags of garland and wreaths and in each window we have an arrangement of artificial greenery, ribbons, and hurricane lamps with tall, red taper candles in them.  It's all very beautiful, and our minister of music wants to make sure that we light all of the candles at every service until the end of the Christmas season. So the candles were lit and everything looked very nice.

(I promise that is all important, albeit in a round about way, so bear with me.)

The cantata went off without a hitch, and I guess the preacher got all excited, because after the singing was done he got up and started preaching a very short sermon.  Well....short-ish.  We're Southern Baptist, after all.  :)   During all of this, I was sitting in the back of the room in the sound "booth" and the associate pastor was standing back there with me.  He'd had to do something earlier during the service and had decided to just hang out in the back so that he wouldn't disturb anyone during the cantata.  I'm so very, very glad he did. 

As the preacher was doing his thing, I was waiting on my cue to turn the projector on so that we could sing the last song.  I hate to admit I wasn't really listening to him, but I was trying to think of what I had to do next.  After about five minutes I noticed a weird smell.  It was bitter and familiar, but I couldn't place it right away.  My first thought was that we'd finally pushed the heating/cooling system to the point of no return, but something made me look over to my left, and I saw fire.  One of the window arrangements was on fire!  Apparently it had been in the perfect place for a draft from the air conditioner to blow the flame of the candle sideways, which caused the candle to melt super-fast, which in turn caused the flame to reach the plastic greenery before the service was over and caused everything inside of the hurricane chimney to burn.

I realize that the whole thing was over in only a matter of seconds, but from the time I looked over and saw the fire, everything sort of went in slow motion.  My first thought was "Yep. Fire."  Then my second thought was "HOLY SH*T! FIRE!!!!!!!"  My third thought was "Why is no one doing anything about the fire? No, really...can they not see that? The fire? Burning where a fire ought not burn?"  Literally, there were dozens of people sitting next to the fire, and no one was moving.  I was in no position to do anything myself, because I was in the booth which is enclosed on 3 sides, and on my 4th side I was hemmed in by a video camera that we'd set up to record the cantata.  I didn't know what to do, so I looked over in panic at the associate pastor and mouthed (so as not to disturb the congregation or preacher) "FIRE!"  I don't think he understood what I was saying, because he just looked confused.  So I pointed (in what I thought was a subtle way, but was told afterwards that I was basically flailing my arms) and panic whispered "THAT. THING. IS. ON. FI-YER!"  What I lacked in volume I apparently made up with panic in my eyes.  He walked over, grabbed the arrangement, and cool as a cucumber escorted it outside and put it out.  Seriously, the man was carrying a tray of fire and he didn't turn a hair.

Me?  I was a giggling mess.  I guess that's what panic does to me... it makes me giggle-snort.  Oy vey.  The smell of burning plastic and florist's foam was strong, but the damage was surprisingly minimal.  The only thing that suffered was the hurricane chimney, the candle and the burnt arrangement, of course.  I'm glad that it didn't become engulfed completely, because the glass could have shattered and hurt several people, not to mention spreading to the wooden window sill and the carpet underneath it.  Whew. 

I still don't understand why no one sitting over there moved.  I mean, I suppose that they didn't want to disturb the sermon, but...but...fire.  It was burning. Flames. The flowers were on fire! Inside the church something was on fire. No one batted an eye.  THAT'S NOT NORMAL!!!!!!    I don't think our pastor would have minded a bit of shuffling about if it meant that the fire was put out.  Oh, well...all's well that ends well, I guess.  Thank goodness.

Oh, and as an added bonus, I got stuck under the sound booth desk before services started.  It was my own stupid fault, though.  I had to make an important phone call, but I couldn't leave the sanctuary because I had to babysit some A/V equipment (we worship in the ghetto...what can I say) that didn't belong to the church.  I was alone in the sanctuary, but I didn't want to make the call where my voice would echo around the room in case anyone came in, so I crawled under the desk and made my call.  I somehow got tangled up and couldn't get out.  I spent a full five minutes struggling before I  managed to crawl out, but not before people came in and saw me under there. 

SIGH.  It's been an interesting day.

PARTY STRESS

Last night, Steve and I attended a Christmas party at the home of a man who is important in his company.  Honestly, I wish I could tell you exactly what the man does, but I'm not sure because I got confused while Steve was trying to explain.  All I know is that he's an important guy.

(By the way: don't worry, I'm not here to ruin Steve's career by telling weird tales about strange things that went on at the party, I promise!  One internet ruined career in the family is enough.)

Anyway, the party was lovely, and the host and his family were so nice and welcoming, and the house...OMG the house.  It was probably the most beautiful family home I've ever been in.  I mean that literally.  It was a big, gorgeous farm-house and I completely fell in love with it.  It looked like something Martha Stewart would live in.  They also had these sweet dogs, one giant (and I mean huge) black lab, a springer spaniel, and two little fox terriers (?) who ran around looking for dropped food.

Anyone who guesses that I spent most of my time there with the dogs wins a cookie.

Seriously, what is wrong with me?

I am just not good at cocktail party mingling, I guess.  I never really learned how to do that sort of drive-by, party chatting thing.  I wish I did, because when I'm put in that position, I always feel like I'm doing it wrong.  I don't remember ever being this shy when I was younger, but now when I'm at a gathering, unless I know the people around me, I feel like a bear in a tutu, riding around on a unicycle.  I don't know if that makes sense, but that is about as apt as I can be.  I feel clumsy and goofy, and like I'm saying and doing the wrong thing the whole time. I honestly tried not to do or say anything weird.  It was harder than it sounds, though, because when I don't know what to say, I generally start talking about the first things that pop into my head and that is usually something abnormal.  I can't help it!  That's just where my mind goes when I'm nervous.  I think I managed to blend in with everyone pretty well, except for one awkward second when I hugged one of the catering staff in a moment of not-knowing-what-else-to-do-edness.  I'm sure he felt violated, but hopefully he just thought I was drunk or something.  I wasn't...but still. 

I know that some of you are probably thinking that I shouldn't worry so much about what other people think of me.  If so...congratulations for having high self esteem and for not knowing what it feels like to constantly second-guess everything you do.  I don't know why I feel this way!  I hate it!  I'd like to think I'm generally charming and easy to talk to...but it's like my brain switches off during these situations and after everything is over, I have no idea what I've said to whom.  I'm going to have to start wearing a spy cam or something to record what I do so that I can at least know whether or not I should go into hiding for a while.

Anyways, I know I'm not the only person to feel this way, but I really wish I didn't worry so much.  At least I know for a fact that I didn't destroy anything or set anything on fire...and that is probably the best I can expect in a situation like that!  :)

RANDOM ACTS OF BLOGGING

1) I hate my cell phone.  I hate it so hard.  If it weren't for the abject fear of something bad happening to someone I love and me not being reachable to be told, only to find out about it on the news or something later on, I'd burn it and dance around the flames like a pagan.  Blerg.  Sorry, that was a bit dramatic, wasn't it!  :)  Actually, I just don't like cell phones in general.  Past the point of being a good emergency tool or whatever, I just think they're intrusive.  I also think that they have caused the public at large to forget basic manners.  Honestly, has anyone noticed how it is now completely acceptable to ignore people around you while people watch movies, or play video games, while sitting in a restaurant? What about having loud conversations (not important ones) while walking around a store?  I'm not even counting myself out of this, because I've done it too.  Also...you have to keep the stupid things charged all of the time!  GAH!  I think that's what has brought on my hatred of my cell phone, in truth.  I don't use my phone that often anymore, and because I'm not constantly looking at it, sometimes the battery just dies without me noticing.  That's usually when someone calls or sends me a text message and when I don't see it for a couple of days it just looks like I'm ignoring them when I'm not! 

Yes, this rant was brought on by the fact that one of my aunts (who doesn't normally call me) called me and left a message to call her back and I had no idea until I charged my phone.  Even the voice mail didn't tell me when she called, so she probably thinks I'm avoiding her.  Now I'm sitting here, waiting for a decent time to call her back.

(All the other ranty stuff I said above is still true, but today my ire is because of the battery thing.  I just figured if I'm going to rant about my phone, I'd just get in all of the salient points.)

2)  We had a lovely Thanksmas, thanks for asking!  There was lots of cooking, which I enjoy immensely, presents and great food at Greg & Kristin's place, and Jon and Amy took us on an adventure to the Mall of Georgia and to a place called H-Mart in Duluth (YOU CAN'T HANDLE DULUTH!).  H-Mart is a giant, Asian grocery store with all manner of interesting things I'd never seen before!  My only issue with the place stemmed from their meat section.  Along with the things I'm used to were things I didn't know people would, or could, eat.  It was like a menu from the Leatherface Cafe or something!  I don't mean to sound culturally insensitive...but why would anyone want to eat a pig uterus?  Steve and I had fun picking out lots of strange (to us, anyways) snacks and things to take home with us. We watched the Iron Bowl too, and I cheered for Alabama on behalf of my dad.  I think I've realized it just makes me sad to watch Bama play, though.  It just reminds me of Papa and how much he enjoyed it. I miss him a lot.

Also, and hold on to your shorts people...I held a baby that didn't scream or vomit on me!  WOOOT!  You have no idea how rare that is.  Jack is a sweet baby. :)  Also, he probably just thought I was his mom because I look so much like her.  I say that with apologies to Kristin, of course...I hope she isn't offended.

3) I am an idiot.

OK, you don't have to agree so heartily, you know.  :(

Heh, actually, I actually did a very stupid thing yesterday that makes me feel like an idiot.  I was in Target looking for a watch battery.  My watch has the battery number on the back of it, but the number didn't match any of the numbers on the packaging.  Brilliant me decided to pull out my Swiss Army knife and pry the back of the watch off so that I could look at the battery itself.  I thought it would be fairly easy to do, but the knife blade skipped and sliced partially through the pad of my thumb on my left hand.  I honestly had no idea that the knife was sharp enough to actually cut anything!  For some reason I kept trying to pry the back of my watch off for another few seconds (probably because I was really invested by this point) but my hand started to bleed too much, so I had to rummage around in my purse for a wet-nap.  I managed not to bleed on anything, but we had to go to the pharmacy and buy band-aids and Neosporin. 

I never managed to figure out what kind of battery I needed, so to add insult to injury, my watch is still running slow.

4) We had a "Hanging of the Greens" thing at our church today!  It was the first time we've ever done anything like that before and it was very nice!  We had a lot of good music and now the sanctuary looks very festive.  I had no idea what to expect from a "Hanging of the Greens" but quite literally, we hung up garland and wreaths, and lit the Christmon tree...so it was aptly named!

Now I'm super tired, though. We didn't get a chance to come home in between services today because we were working to get the Christmon tree assembled and decorated.  We also had to figure out how to make some of the christmons last another year until I can go back and remake them.  Some of the large symbols are completely falling apart, and we had to wire them together so that they'd stay on the tree.  The big ornaments were made by my late, great mother-in-law, so they are very special to people in the church and they hate to replace them, but if they want to keep having a Christmon tree, they will have to be remade.  I'm lucky they want me to do it.  Keeping it in the family, I suppose.  I'm hoping to update them a little bit and make them more sturdy, but I have to get the book so that I know what each symbol entails.  I'll have all of next year to work on them, so hopefully I can make them look nice!  :)

A Quicky

I've got things to talk about...oh yes.  But believe it or not, I'm busy.  Freelancing, plus Christmas time stuff, makes Kelly a dull blogger.  However, I had to share this bit of frustrating minutia:

I was flossing, as I have obsessively done since the root canal 3 years ago, and the dental floss caught in between two of my molars and broke.  Not only did it break, a wad of it got wedged in between those teeth and refused to move.  I grabbed another strand of floss, thinking I'd just floss out the first bit of floss, but the wedged floss was in there so tight that I couldn't get the new floss in between my teeth to get it out.  The new strand snapped in half when I tried!

I was then in the strange position of getting dental floss stuck in between my teeth, while flossing my teeth, and being unable to floss the floss out from between my teeth with more floss.  (Yo, Dawg...)

Huh.  However, the story has a happy ending!

Luckily, I have a permanent wire appliance glued to the back of my top teeth to correct the hillbilly gap I was born with, and I remembered I had a handful of those blue, plastic floss threaders that look like flat embroidery needles.  I was able to go in from above the stuck floss and get it out.

Dental hygiene shouldn't be this complicated.

A QUICKY

Snerk!

Guess who's picture you'll see if you do a Google Image Search for "Sexy Girl in FFA Uniform*?"

Granted, I realize that me popping up on that search has more to do with the "Girl In FFA Uniform" part than the "Sexy" part, but still...that is the weirdest thing I've ever heard.

I was prompted to look it up when I got that phrase as a referrer on my web tracker and had to check it out.

Everything else aside, the fact that someone, somewhere typed that into a search engine because they wanted to find sexy girls in FFA uniforms is a little disturbing, isn't it?  I'd imagine that is one very specific, very niche kink for someone to have.

I mean, the corduroy alone...

So to whomever typed that in and found my picture...I'm sorry that you only found me. 

Now go get therapy.  Immediately.


*I may be off the page now, but I was there earlier today. 

RANDOM ACTS OF BLOGGING: THE TEMPLE OF DOOM

1)  SIGH.  Do you remember a couple of months ago I told you about having a traumatic experience that involved my dog Butler, his kennel, and some severe gastric distress?  Well, it happened again, only with the other dog.  *SHUDDER*  Don't worry, I'm not going to give you a blow by blow of the situation, mainly because I don't like talking about poo.  However, this time Steve was out of town and I had to deal with it all alone, and believe it or not, I think I handled the situation better this time.  Of course, I already had some experience with this, so how could I not handle it better?  It was still gross and traumatizing, but at least I didn't cry or get rained on this time.

Unfortunately, Bear was really sick, and it wasn't just an adverse reaction to eating too many of the wrong treats.  He was so sick that after wrestling him into and out of the shower (gah...) I had to take him to the vet.  Bless him, he hates going to the vet, and he cowered against the wall most of the time we were there.  We also ended up seeing the vet that usually drives me insane with rage, but since I was worried about the dog, I was able to resist beating her about the head and face with my shoes.  The poor doggy had to have an IV and be poked and prodded in every orifice.  He kept looking at me with his pitiful little face as if I was doing all if this just to be mean, and if you've ever seen a border collie look sad, you know that it broke my heart.   Before the vet came back with any sort of decision on what to do, I kept having this awful worry that Bear could be really sick, as in, maybe he'd have to go live on a "farm" kind of sick, and I'd have to make that decision by myself since Steve was in D.C. and I didn't know if I could handle that.  I was almost in tears.  Luckily, though, the vet came back and said that while it looked bad it probably wasn't anything serious, or at least they couldn't detect anything very serious at the time.  They had to give me special food and pills, and probably the most complicated set of instructions for feeding a dog I've ever heard.  They also told me I'd have to keep watch on him to make sure he wasn't getting depressed or more lethargic (and quite frankly, if he got any more lethargic he'd be dead) because that meant we'd have to bring him back and do x-rays and blood work and all manner of terrible things to him.   Happily, he seems to be doing better, so I guess whatever it was has passed or is in the process of passing.  I'm very glad. 

2) I almost broke my arm in the single lamest way possible last week. Before Steve left on his trip, he asked me to wash and dry a new button up shirt to get rid of the creases (and as an aside...why are mens shirts so complicated? Geez.)  Anyway, I don't normally just wash or dry one thing, but since the shirt was new, I didn't want to run the risk of it getting linty or snagged on anything else, so it was the only thing in the dryer when I went to check on it.

Now, something is wrong with our dryer, in the sense that when you open the door, the tumbling doesn't stop like it is supposed to.  It just keeps going.  I keep forgetting about that problem since I don't normally open the door as it's running.  This time I opened the door, saw the shirt, and decided to grab for it.  I honestly don't know what I was thinking, because had I been thinking clearly, I obviously would have turned the dryer off first. When I stuck my arm in, one of the paddles that help tumble the clothes caught my arm just above the elbow and slammed it into the top of the top of the machine.

You know that moment after you hurt yourself, when the pain hasn't quite gotten there yet and you're basically just standing there clutching the part of you that has been injured?  That's when I stood there in a blind panic, hoping to all that was good and holy that I hadn't broken my humerus or dislocated my elbow while drying a damn shirt.  I'm not sure what hurt worse, my arm, or the idea that I'd have to tell a doctor that I hurt myself because I was too stupid to turn off a piece of machinery before sticking my arm into it.  Of course, then the pain hit and all of that flew out of my head.  I'm glad to tell you that my arm, while bruised and lumpy, did not get broken.  It hurts, of course, but I'm taking that as a reminder from God that I should show more intelligence when operating household machines.

Also, and this is just between you and me, I decided if I did have to go to the hospital about my arm, I was going to lie and say I'd broken it while saving a baby from a rabid mountain goat...or something equally heroic.

3) Steve and I celebrated our 11th wedding anniversary last Friday!  Yeah, I know...I'm just as shocked as you are.

Anyway, we had a very nice day!  We didn't do anything fancy, and we skipped The Melting Pot this year, but we drove over to Mentone and spent the day rambling through leaves and antique shops.  I've been to Mentone twice before while I as in high school: both times during band camp.  I'd never seen any of the town at all, so this was way more fun than band camp.  Of course, getting my arm caught in the dryer was more fun than band camp...but I digress.  The place is gorgeous this time of year with all the leaves and everything.  None of the pictures I took could do it justice, and I also forgot to take a foot picture, which makes me sad. :(  Steve and I ate at a restaurant called Moonlight Bistro, which was inside an old log cabiny place.  Steve said it used to be a different kind of restaurant, more country cooking than bistro chic, but it was a nice place.  The food was good...so I recommend it!  We also looked through the souvenir shops and a giant antique store (which was housed in an old hotel built in 1910, I think.)  It was awesome and crammed full of all kinds of stuff.  I was in a constant state of fear that I'd break everything, but it was still fun.  I'll be going back to peruse the giant collection of depression glass, I think. 

Since we couldn't find anything made of steel to buy out there (apparently, the gift for year 11 is steel. Weird.) we drove back into Huntsville and got a stainless steel mulling infuser from Williams Sanoma.  I know that sounds random, but the we didn't need utensils or pots, and this seemed to make as much sense as anything else.  I guess this means we will do some mulling of cider or wine this year.  Just got to figure out what that means!  :)

4) Saturday was the Fayetteville, TN Host of Christmas Past event!  Madison Community Band was performing again this year, so I was there to listen to Steve play!  The band sounded great, as usual, and I managed to record one of their songs.  It was my favorite of their whole set, called "Bugler's Holiday."  The sound isn't so great, because I recorded it with my camera, plus there was a giant generator clacking along behind me and that screwed up the sound as well.


They sounded amazing in person, though.  The guys who play the main trumpet part are so good!  I wish you could've heard how it really sounded.  You could hear all of the yellow.

Steve also played in the brass quintet later that night.  There is some kind of reverse caroling thing that goes on in the historic district where music groups play on the porches of some of the homes and people walk around to listen to them.  They also sounded great.  The video doesn't make much sense because there was a camera-man from a local TV station standing in the way, but I only filmed it for the sound anyway.

EVEN MORE RANDOM ACTS OF BLOGGING!

Yes, my life can be lived in vignettes!  My days have a few notable bits bracketed by long patches of nothing interesting.

1) I have yet to go to the gym this week and I'm feeling both mad at myself because I know I should go and defiant because I shouldn't have to go if I don't wanna!  Harumph!  Monday I didn't go because I was lazy, which is pathetic, but today I didn't go because I think I've borked my knee and I wasn't sure if it would be smart.  I had a tiny bit of knee pain over the weekend, but didn't think much about it because I'm getting old and things just hurt sometimes.  Plus, my knee seemed fine after being off my feet for a while.  Then yesterday I went to the pet store to buy dog food, and knelt down to see the turtles in the bottom layer of tanks and I actually screamed when my knee hit the floor.  Well, screamed the way I do...which sounds like someone stepping on a squeaky toy.  I didn't know if I'd be able to get back up!  It's a bad feeling to be kneeling on the floor of a pet store and wonder if you are going to have to call for assistance to stand back up again.  Seriously, I'm this close to having to wear one of those Life Alert necklace buttons!  I did manage to get up and back home.  The thing is that my knee isn't hurting badly, it just feels like something is stuffed inside my knee.  Like it's swollen inside.  I can't explain it the way it feels, but I know it feels like I have too much knee on one side and it twinges when I bend it too far.  Anyway, I explain all of that to say that I'm not sure if my knee actually has some kind of problem, or if I'm just using that as an excuse to be lazy.  It just seems like it should hurt more if I'm going to use it as an excuse.  Hmmmmm.

2) I bought something neato the other day!  I realize that a lot of people will think it's a dumb thing to own, and I know that my sad little kitchen is already bursting at the seams with my many beloved gadgets, but I was so excited to find one because I've been looking for one like this for over two years!  I got a cotton candy machine!  I know, I know...don't judge me.  I love cotton candy and have wanted a machine for ages, and I know you can find cheap ones everywhere, but I didn't just want a regular one.  The one I wanted was special!  Instead of getting one that only uses the granulated sugar that you pour into the middle, the one I got can utilize both sugar or hard candies and then spins it into cotton candy!  Even though I like the regular sugar kind, making cotton candy out of hard candies is better because the resulting candy floss actually tastes like whatever hard candy you put into it!  See, neato!  I actually found one of these online a couple of years ago, which is where I got interested in buying one, but it was from Japan and cost a lot.  Like, a whole lot.  More than I could justify spending on something I wouldn't use everyday.  I just figured I'd never be able to buy one and left it at that.  However, we did find one in the "Beyond" section of Bed, Bath & Beyond, and it wasn't expensive at all and so I grabbed it and ran.  Well, I paid for it first, but...still.

I've had so much fun making cotton candy out of all the weird hard candy we've accumulated.  You can only put in two pieces in at a time, but even those two pieces makes a ton of cotton candy.   I had no idea it took so little. The only problem is that I'm not very good at making it yet.  Well, actually, the machine actually makes the candy, but it takes a practiced hand to twist it around the cones without ruining it.  You have to keep it away from the heat source so it doesn't melt, and you have to be able to spin it to keep it soft instead of turning into crunchy strings.  Also, you have to pay attention to what you're doing, and I'm not so good at that.  I looked away at the wrong time once, and the machine shot cotton candy floss all over the kitchen and all over me.  It was like an incontinent spider sneezed and sprayed the whole room with web strings.  Everything was sticky.  Eventually I'll figure it out. If you want, come on over with a bag of hard candy and we can make a mess together!  :)

3) Speaking of candy...Halloween was on Monday!  I actually forgot to buy any candy for trick-or-treaters, although how I could have forgotten I have no idea. Target practically buries you in it the second you walk into the door.  I just kept thinking I'd get some later, and then the day of snuck up on me, I guess.  I had other things to do than make a Target run, but I figured we already had something to give out if any kids came by.  Sometimes we get a few kids and sometimes we don't, but I thought for sure we'd have some this year since kids actually live in our neighborhood. 

I started to ransack our snack stash (oooh, say that five times fast) and realized that we didn't really have things that kids would like.  Don't get me wrong, we have sweets.  Lots of sweets.  But it isn't normal stuff that you can get anywhere.  I don't tend to buy a lot of candy for myself unless it's an unusual flavor or something that I've never had before.  For example, we have candy from the different nations of Epcot from when we went earlier this year.  Most of it is in different languages, or isn't individually wrapped, or has something like caffeine and hot chili powder in it.  I wouldn't mind giving that out, but I have the feeling that a lot of parents wouldn't let their kids eat something that they couldn't identify.   We have artisan candy with tea, coffee and ginger in it, which I don't imagine kids would like very much, and we have a lot of booze flavored lollypops I got in a bulk bag with some other stuff, and they just don't seem appropriate for kids.  I mean, unless you let your kids have white Russians and bourbon...I don't know your life.

I did find two candy bars, one being a Godiva bar that was white chocolate and therefore an abomination and could be parted with, but this ended up being my original stash of Halloween treats:

Mostly tricks, I think.

Luckily, I realized I had an entire, unopened box of Hershey bars that came with a s'mores kit, and I decided to hand those out instead of vegan protein bars and old Christmas candy!  Of course, after all that, no kids came to our door, so it wasn't even an issue after all. In the end, Steve ate the Godiva bar and no kids went away with weird treats.  It was a win-win for everyone.  :)


4) You know, I've been noticing something lately that really bothers me.  I know it shouldn't bother me, because I don't think there is any malice behind it or anything, but I'm beginning to suspect that I know a lot of people who think I'm stupid.  No one has out right called me stupid, but I have found myself in the position where people seem to feel as if they need to explain simple things to me.  It's a bit insulting, actually, because I'm not stupid!  Is it because I don't have an advanced degree?  I mean, I know a lot of people my age have or are working towards Master's degrees or PhD's but is that a prerequisite to not being treated like an idiot?  I know I come across as being silly a lot of the time, but I have no idea what I'm doing to make people think I don't understand simple concepts.  Honestly, if I don't understand something, I'll ask.  If I don't ask, then I either probably know what is being talked about, or it means I'm going to Google it as soon as I get home!  Oy.

5) Oh, I almost embarrassed myself so very, very badly yesterday.  While I was out running errands, I went into a store to ask about a particular item. (I won't be more specific, since this is about a Christmas present, so pardon the vagueness.)  Anyway, the particular brand of thing I was looking for has an unusual name that, for some reason, my brain gets confused with the name of a particularly gross sexually transmitted disease.  I don't know if this makes much sense, but the words look so much alike that even though I know they are completely different, when I think of the brand, my brain always translates the brand name into the name of the STD.  I always, always have to remind myself to pronounce it right before I say it out loud.  When I went into the store, I came within an ace of asking the salesman if he had an STD rather than asking for the brand of thing I was looking for.  Even though I didn't say it out loud, I was so embarrassed I practically had to run out of the building.

TRYING AGAIN: RANDOM ACTS OF BLOGGING

If this entry doesn't publish this time, obviously there is information included that the universe doesn't want you to read.  

1) I just got back from the gym and everything on my body is angry with me.  You'd think that it would be grateful that I'm trying to take care of it, but nooooooooo.  All it wants to do is sit in the puffy recliner and eat Krispy Kreme donuts and watch British sitcoms from the late 90s.  Why must my body fight me at every turn?  Also, it keeps complaining that it's getting old and it wants me to leave it alone.  Getting old sucks.

2)  Our sort-of cat (meaning that it is only sort of our cat, not that it isn't quite a cat. As far as I know it's 100% cat...but only DNA testing can tell for sure) Rorschach has decided that he loves me.  I think.  Whenever he sees me, he does the kitty-biscuit thing, which is very sweet, but he also has a darker side.  I suppose you could tell from the haiku posted a few days ago that he has started bringing me offerings of dead and mangled creatures.  Sometimes the critters are simply dead, and sometimes the critters are dissected and strewn about, but they are always on my porch.  Ugh.

Anyway, I wish you could have seen the cat's face the other day.  We heard the cat making really weird sounds, so I opened the door to see if he was OK, and of course, there was a dead mouse-thing on the porch.  It was in the "sacrificial corner" so I assumed it was a gift for us.  Blarg.  So I called Steve to come and sweep it off, because I'm a big sissy and I couldn't do it myself.  So he swept the thing off of the porch and the cat looked absolutely confused.  Seriously, the cat looked puzzled.  He'd look at me, the corner where the mouse was, the edge of the porch, and then back to me.  His face said "Hey! What...hey!  That was a gift, lady! That was a gift for the whole family!"  We just laughed and closed the door.  Later, when we had to go out again, the mouse was back.  I guess he thought maybe it had been a mistake.  Gross.  We just told him what a good kitty he was and thank you for the dead mousie.  Cats are weird.

3) Steve and I just refinanced our mortgage, and while financially it was smart...I absolutely hate paperwork.  Granted, it was only signing paperwork, but that is a terribly mind-numbing way to pass time, isn't it?  The notary came by with a huge stack of papers, and Steve and I waded in with our blue pens.  Of course, we managed to forget to initial one page in that stack, and the notary asked if we could meet her in the parking lot of the ghetto Wal-Mart to finish them up.  She didn't call it the ghetto Wal-Mart, of course, but that was the one she meant.  We met her in the corner of that lot like we were doing some kind of drug deal.  "Yeah, man, I got some interest rates you won't believe!  Just sign here.  Ooooh, cops!  Look natural...look natural..."  *whistles and looks away* 

4) When Steve went out of town last week, I wound up playing about 45 hours of Portal 2.  I'm not bragging about that, and honestly I'm a bit ashamed that I got so wound up the game, and the only reason I know how long I actually played is because there is a parental thing on the program that keeps track.  Geez, parents are sneaky! :)  Other than being ashamed I spent so much time playing a game, I had fun!  Portal 2 is longer and more complicated, and there is a robotic eye that follows you around and talks to you that sounds like Simon Pegg...so it was enjoyable!  A problem I have with playing that game is that it gets in my head and I think about it at odd times.  I'll be somewhere with white walls and I'll get an urge to fire a portal at it. Or I'll be in a room and I'll sit there and think about how I could escape if I needed to.  I even caught myself at church thinking "You know, I don't understand how the neurotoxin could flood that last room, because I KNOW I disabled the neurotoxin tubes, like...way earlier in the game!"  It's not a normal way to live.  Oh, well, I did manage to finish the game, with the help from hints and cheats when things got too difficult for me, so at least I can think normal-people thoughts for a while.  :)

5)  I went to the eye doctor at the very beginning of this year and got a new prescription for contact lenses.  I didn't want to fill the script right away, because I still had several pairs of my old contacts to go through and didn't want them to go to waste, so I didn't actually get around to getting the new ones until the end of September. When I put the new ones in, I felt that something was wrong with the right one, but I thought that maybe because it was a new prescription, I just needed to wear them a while and  get used to them.  So that's what I did, and sometimes I'd be OK, but generally, the right lens is just blurry.  Not so blurry that I can't function, but when I drive or need to read something far off, my eye starts feeling strange and it gets blurry.  So I made an appointment with my eye doc, just to make sure I didn't accidentally get the wrong kind or something.  When I went in, they did some tests and said... "Oh, you can see perfectly, but your eye is just really dry."  I know I must have looked as if I didn't believe them, because they kept telling me (as if they were trying to convince me) that nothing was wrong, it's just that I have dry eyes.  Actually, dry eye, since my left eye is fine. 

You know, I realize they are the "eye care specialists" or whatever, and I don't know anything about vision correction, and I know they know better than I do about what is going on with my eye.  However,  I do know that I wasn't having any problems what so ever with this dry eye thing until I put in my new contacts, and my eye is fine when I'm wearing my glasses.  That isn't to say I thought they were wrong, even, but they were telling me only one eye is dry and that's why my contact on that side is being weird.  OK.  So they gave me a bottle of cleaner, which I already had but don't use that often because it makes my eyes sting, and told me to use that instead of the cleaner that doesn't bother my eyes.  They also gave me a set of drops and told me to use them 3 times a day, every day, and my right contact will start working correctly.  Whatever.  I'm doing everything they say and the fracking contact lens is still acting weird and my vision is still blurry.  I guess I'll just tough it out until my next eye appointment, and hopefully the lady was right about my eye being dry and I don't go blind on one side from wearing a wonky lens. 

SEETHE

You know, I just spent a lot of time writing a post and the rackin' frackin' internet had a brain fart and deleted it. 

I don't have the time or patience to write all that again right now.

Hastared computer.