Miss R and R the Younger both started back at school yesterday. Miss R has begun her Senior Year and R the Younger has begun at the Upper High School, in Grade 10...naturally having them in two different school systems only adds to the usual first day of school confusion.

B goes back next Monday, so in a little under a weeks time, I should almost be back to normal. As normal as my mornings can possibly be, of course.

I started another journal on livejournal. This one is a freebie account, so not that many bells and whistles, I'm afraid. It's called metabolically, short for Metabolically Speaking, a play on words since it's about by diet with Metabolic Research Center. And for whatever reasons, when I try to use 'rich text' and link it, I keep getting a 'bad link' in my entry...but it's a GOOD link dammit! It works and everything!!! THIS is why I keep using html and why I still miss D-X!!!!

Feel free to peruse and comment. As I said in the first entry, I'm not a medical professional and I'm not employed by MRC, I'm simply a satisfied client...if you have any questions about it, feel free to ask. I may direct you to their website or to a center near you, as I can't legally give out more than my opinion and experiences with the program. Which, btw, I think is excellent...it worked for me, although it might not work for everyone.

Okay, pimpage over...

Nothing else really new going on in my life. D is the same. I am the same. Kids are in school.

I finished reading "Breaking Dawn" a little over a week ago. It wasn't as craptastic as I had been led to expect, but I also felt as though Stephenie was trying to please too many fans bases...or perhaps she had fallen in love with Jacob Black as she wrote him, and wanted to find a way to give him what he wanted...or a piece of it, anyway? Oh well, they are her characters.

Hmmm...

Miss R and I watched 'Primeval' on BBCA last Saturday, and although it's somewhat cheesy, we both enjoyed it very much, so I think we're hooked. We added it to our TiVo list at any rate. We also have been watching 'Psych' season 1 & 2 dvds, to catch us up character-wise, since we've been watching Season 3...I think I prefer the earlier seasons. A lot less obvious product placement involved.

Oh, and Degrassi TNG's season finale is this Friday night, also set to TiVo. I guess there is going to be a Season 8, but I wonder if it will be watchable? Hey, is watchable even a real word? Well, according to dictionary.com it is! Just looked kind of weird. Oh, and it's an adjective too!

I need to post. I know.

Thanks for the nudges and emails and everything.

I can't believe that summer is almost over.

( look, there's more )

"Books to the ceiling,
Books to the sky,
My pile of books is a mile high.
How I love them! How I need them!
I'll have a long beard by the time I read them."
~Arnold Lobel


What we have here is the top 106 books most often marked as “unread” by LibraryThing’s users. You know, they sit on the shelf to make you look smart or well-rounded..or they were the book-club choices or possible college literature that you never quite got around to finishing for one reason or another?

Bold the ones you’ve read, underline the ones you started but didn't finish, & italicize the ones you own but have never actually read.

Let's see how well-rounded or pretentious we all are, shall we?

Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell
Anna Karenina
Crime and Punishment
Catch-22
One Hundred Years of Solitude
Wuthering Heights
The Silmarillion
Life of Pi: A novel
The Name of the Rose
Don Quixote
Moby Dick
Ulysses
Madame Bovary
The Odyssey
Pride and Prejudice
Jane Eyre
The Tale of Two Cities
The Brothers Karamazov
Guns, Germs, and Steel
War and Peace
Vanity Fair
The Time Traveler’s Wife
The Iliad
Emma
The Blind Assassin
The Kite Runner
Mrs. Dalloway
Great Expectations
American Gods
A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius
Atlas Shrugged
Reading Lolita in Tehran: A memoir in books
Memoirs of a Geisha
Middlesex
Quicksilver
Wicked: The life and times of the wicked witch of the West
The Canterbury Tales
The Historian : a novel
A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
Love in the Time of Cholera
Brave New World
The Fountainhead
Foucault’s Pendulum
Middlemarch
Frankenstein
The Count of Monte Cristo
Dracula
A Clockwork Orange
Anansi Boys
The Once and Future King
The Grapes of Wrath
The Poisonwood Bible
1984
Angels & Demons
Inferno
The Satanic Verses
Sense and Sensibility
The Picture of Dorian Gray
Mansfield Park
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
To the Lighthouse
Tess of the D’Urbervilles
Oliver Twist
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time
Dune
The Prince
The Sound and the Fury
Angela’s Ashes: A memoir
The God of Small Things
A People’s History of the United States : 1492-present
Cryptonomicon
Neverwhere
A Confederacy of Dunces
A Short History of Nearly Everything
Dubliners
The Unbearable Lightness of Being
Beloved
Slaughterhouse-Five
The Scarlet Letter
Eats, Shoots & Leaves
The Mists of Avalon
Oryx and Crake
Collapse: How societies choose to fail or succeed
Cloud
Atlas
The Confusion
Lolita
Persuasion
Northanger Abbey
The Catcher in the Rye
On the Road
The Hunchback of Notre Dame
Freakonomics: A rogue economist explores the hidden side of everything
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An inquiry into values
The Aeneid
Watership Down
Gravity’s Rainbow
The Hobbit
In Cold Blood: A true account of a multiple murder and its consequences
White Teeth
Treasure Island
David Copperfield

Hmmm, quite few classics, and then...Angels & Demons? Of course I read Life of Pi ages ago (not meant to sound snobby, btw), because I had previously read a book of Yann Martel's short stories and I really like his way with words.

In fact, R the Younger is reading Life of Pi for his summer AP English reading choice...can't wait for his input and opnions.

Can't wait for yours!!!

This was sent to me in an email.

It's weird how sometimes this kind of stuff just shows up when I need to read it/see it/hear it.

So, today it speaks personally to me...it might not speak personally to anyone else reading this, but it does speak to me. Today.

So I Thought
~ Flyleaf

All your twisted thoughts free flow
To everlasting memories
Show soul
Kiss the stars with me
And dread the wait for
Stupid calls returning to us to life
We say to those who are in love
It can't be true 'cause we're too young
I know that's true because so long I was
So in love with you
So I thought

A year goes by
And I can't talk about it

On my knees
Dim lighted room
Thoughts free flow try to consume myself in this
I'm not faithless
Just paranoid of getting lost or that I might lose
Ignorance is bliss cherish it
Pretty neighborhoods you learn to much to hold
Believe it not
And fight the tears
With pretty smiles and lies about the times

A year goes by
And I can't talk about it
The times weren't right
And I couldn't talk about it

Chorus Romance says goodnight
Close your eyes and I'll close mine
Remember you, remember me
Hurt the first, the last between
Chorus Romance says goodnight
Close your eyes and I'll close mine
Remember you, remember me
Hurt the first, the last, between

And I'm praying that we will see
Something there in between
Then and there that exceeds all we can dream
So we can talk about it

Chorus Romance says goodnight
Close your eyes and I'll close mine
Remember you, remember me
Hurt the first, the last between
Chorus Romance says goodnight
Close your eyes and I'll close mine
Remember you, remember me
Hurt the first, the last healing

And I'm praying that we will see
Something there in between
Then and there that exceeds all we can dream

And all these twisted thoughts I see
Jesus there in between
And all these twisted thoughts I see
Jesus there in between

Never heard of Flyleaf...they seem to be an Alternative Band from Texas. I like Alt Music, so I guess I'll check them out...

Hey, have a great weekend all. I'm headed out for the beach for a few days. My wedding anniversary is imminent, so D and I are going for some 'alone time'.

I haven't seen my friends in over a month now. Everyone had 'stuff' going on at the end of the school year, myself included.

I just realized today that it's been March, my birthday, since the last time we all sat together.

I miss them.

This is the kind of thing that can become a habit, if not checked.

The problem with that is, I am usually the one who makes the phone calls or sends the weekly emails, organizing lunch/dinner/movies...and I haven't had time to do so lately, because I've been working.

So it hasn't been done.

Dealing with the day in/day out of D's addiction is only made somewhat easier with my weekly sounding board of my friends. Even if I don't discuss anything with them, it's the knowledge that I can that makes things easier...

Wow, pity party much? Oh, and yeah, I've been stress eating like crazy over the past week...I have to go weigh in by Saturday, and I really don't want to do that. I can easily see that I've probably put on 5-7 lbs since December. That may not sound like much, but it's a slippery slope that I can easily slip right back down...

Okay. Sad over.

Found a source for Alexz Johnson's songs from Instant Star...here is Higher Ground. It probably won't be on the soundtrack, with my luck.

*wiggles eyebrows*

So, I was tagged by measi, and not surprisingly, we have some similar choices.

List 10 fictional characters you wouldn't kick out of bed (in no particular order) and tag five people to do the same.

1. The Tenth Doctor
2. Captain Jack Harkness
3. Spike
4. Mick St. John
5. Gus Pike
6. Tommy Donnelly
7. Coach Eric Taylor aka My TV Husband
8. Guy of Gisborne (BBCA's Robin Hood)
9. James "Sawyer" Ford
10. Luke Danes

So I am tagging: patti, ivydoor, greenfaerie88, texaspeach, & maraudersaffair

"You get a big delight, in every bite..."
~ Hostess Twinkie jingle

I'm a child of the 60's-70's. Proudly so. Every school day I carried my groovy Barbie Campus Queen lunch box, with real game pieces so you can play the game and become the campusqueen!!!(and back then queen didn't necessarily mean what it does today...or did it?), which proudly held one apple, a peanutbutter and jelly sandwich, and either a Ding-dong, Ho-Ho or Twinkie. Wow, that's some pervy sounding snack cakes in this day and time!





To me, the Twinkie was always the perfect snack food. For one thing, being Southern, I always felt with great confidence that with a name like "Hostess", my snack cake was perfect for dinner parties or afternoon teas. Okay, I was only 9 or 10 at the time.

Still, that didn't stop Miss R from purchasing the Hostess Twinkie Cookbook for me at her school bookfair a few years back, thus proving some validity to my choice in snack cakes.



Look! Directly from the pages! Exclusive Twinkie recipe for, get ready, Twinkie-misu.

There are thirty-nine (39!!!) ingredients in a Twinkie and only five or six in a real cake. Hostess, shockingly, declined to reveal said ingredients.

What is it about the Twinkie that inspires such speculation about its ingredients...and its mythical extended (like forever, man)shelf life? Dunno, but in March 2007, Newsweek featured an article which breaks down exactly what's in a Twinkie.



What goes in a Twinkie (from the Newsweek article)

• Shortening (in the form of partially hydrogenated vegetable oil and/or beef fat) is the main ingredient.

• Polysorbate 60 is a gooey substance that helps replace cream and eggs at a fraction of the cost. It's derived from corn, palm oil and petroleum. (sort of makes you rethink the whole petroleum jelly thing, doesn't it?)

• Cellulose gum gives the cream filling that, um, creamy feel associated with actual cream. Again, at a fraction of the price (and extending the shelf life too!)

• Artificial vanillin is synthesized in petrochemical plants! No shit! Real vanillin evidently comes from fancy schmancy tropical orchids that are hand pollinated on the one day a year that they bloom.



Oh, and get this...some of the ingredients used to make Twinkies are the same ones used to make some explosives! So maybe McGyver was on to something?



At any rate, any kid growing up in the 60's or 70's could tell you with great confidence that
nothing can beat a Twinkie!




Even smart spacemen (and girls) know!



Learn more about this fascinating topic at Twinkie Deconstructed, because what better thing do you have to do on a Monday anyway? Really...

"Those three words
Are said too much
They're not enough"
~Snow Patrol, Chasing Cars

"Love is patient, love is kind.
It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.
It is not rude, it is not self-seeking.
It is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.
Love does not delight in evil, but rejoices with the truth.
It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
Love never fails."
~I Corinthians 13:4-8

I've noticed the over-usage of the word 'love'. People 'love' food. They 'love' movies, books, and television programs. They 'love' jokes. They 'love' the weather.

People seem 'love' everything.

Only love is supposed to be special. Love is supposed to be something not easily given or taken for granted.

I think when we over-use the word love that we are taking it in vain. So, I'm making every effort in my life to reserve the word 'love' for those/things truly persons worthy, and not for mere objects.

I enjoy reading books, a good laugh, watching television, listening to music...I 'really like' to go to the beach, to eat chinese food, to ride horses, Kyle Chandler (my tv husband).

I love my friends, my family and my God.

Testing, testing, 1,2,3...

My Sensitive Doer Adjectives: (supposed to describe me)
introverted, practical, emotional, spontaneous, sensitive, peace-loving, reserved, gentle, good-natured, independent, empathetic, friendly, playful, carefree, sympathetic, relaxed, quiet, modest, pleasure-loving, loyal, obliging, caring, helpful, optimistic

"Every child comes with the message that God is not yet discouraged of man."
~Rabindranath Tagore

B is taking a full load this summer at the local community college. This is because his 1st year at Campbell was less than stellar, grade wise. He didn't flunk out, but the academic reviewing committee is 'watching' him...and his scholarship is being reevaluated too.

Not that it matters, because he's decided that he doesn't want to return to Campbell, he wants to go to school closer to home.

He walked in today from class with a big grin. Evidently he aced his Tech & Civ. test. So far, according to him, he has all 100's. According to him, he should end up with a 4.0 average for this summer semester. I wish...

Miss R has decided to give her hair a little vacation this summer. She has long naturally curly hair (that I envy!), which she tortures with a blow dryer and various straighteners into a straight glossy strands.

Last week, while we were at the beach, she bought some Tigi Bed Head Uptight Heat Activated Curl Maker. She sprayed it into her damp hair, scrunched it and let it dry naturally. Her hair looked fantastic.

She opted to leave the bottle at the beach...this morning she came downstairs with the stick straight shiny locks. According to her, the curls were 'beach hair' and not her 'look' for home. Even though she realizes it looked much better curly.

R the Younger will be taking pre-AP English next year, and so he has to read a book this summer and write a detailed review.

R the Younger hates to read.

According to him, I've ruined his summer.

It's only June the 4th...

"Though no one can go back and make a brand new start, anyone can start from now and make a brand new ending."
~ Carl Bard

Swiped from Patti, who swiped it from Scarlett (who I miss)...

Here is what you are suppose to do (and please do not spoil the fun). Type in your own answers to the questions. Post your answers either in my comment area or in your own journal or even email it to me.

1. WERE YOU NAMED AFTER ANYONE?

Yes. My first name comes from a song that my father loved...my middle name is the same as my paternal grandfather's.

2. WHEN WAS THE LAST TIME YOU CRIED?

Yesterday. I was reading James Patterson's, Sundays at Tiffany's...schmaltz and I should know better, because I generally shed tears over Patterson's novels.

3. DO YOU LIKE YOUR HANDWRITING

Unfortunately I am inordinately proud of my handwriting. Makes me a tad vain, does it not?

4. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE LUNCH MEAT?

Ick...

5. DO YOU HAVE KIDS?

I have 3.

6. IF YOU WERE ANOTHER PERSON WOULD YOU BE FRIENDS WITH YOU?

Probably.

7. DO YOU USE SARCASM A Lot?

Yes. Sometimes I find that regrettable, however.

8. DO YOU STILL HAVE YOUR TONSILS

No, I lost them when I was 4.

9. WOULD YOU BUNGEE JUMP?

No...although I recently learned that my 15 year old has bungee jumped.

10. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE CEREAL?

Cheerios

11. DO YOU UNTIE YOUR SHOES WHEN YOU TAKE THEM OFF?

No

12. DO YOU THINK YOU ARE STRONG?

I have to be strong, even though I don't really sit it in myself, but if I weren't strong, then I would have crashed and burned a long time ago.

13. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE ICE CREAM?

Rocky Road

14. WHAT IS THE FIRST THING YOU NOTICE ABOUT PEOPLE?

Their posture. Isn't that odd?

15. RED OR PINK?

Neither really...I am a blue/green person

16. WHAT IS YOUR LEAST FAVORITE THING ABOUT YOURSELF?

Today? My thighs.

17. WHO DO YOU MISS THE MOST

My dad and my 16 year old self...oh, and my babies, because they are all grown now!

18. DO YOU WANT EVERYONE TO SEND THIS BACK TO YOU?

If they would like to do so.

19. WHAT COLOR PANTS AND SHOES ARE YOU WEARING?

Navy blue yoga pants and a bright yellow 'Woodys' t-shirt. No shoes.

20. WHAT WAS THE LAST THING YOU ATE?

Bowl of cereal

21. WHAT ARE YOU LISTENING TO RIGHT NOW?

The Today Show

22. If you were a crayon what color would you be?

Turquoise

23. FAVORITE SMELLS?

Lavender/vanilla, vanilla, chocolate chip cookies baking, Confederate Jasmine, Gardenias, Plumeria, the beach

24. WHO WAS THE LAST PERSON YOU TALKED TO ON THE PHONE?

My oldest son, calling from class to tell me that he made it on time

25. DO YOU LIKE THE PERSON WHO SENT THIS TO YOU?

Yes!

26. FAVORITE SPORTS TO WATCH?

College football and little kids playing t-ball

27. Hair color

Sort of a chestnut brown.

28. Eye color

Green

29. DO YOU WEAR CONTACTS?

Not well. I have 'goopy' tears, so I cannot wear contact lenses more than 5 hours at a time, which is a pain in the ass, unless I'm at a football game or something like that. Usually I wear my glasses or squint.

30. FAVORITE FOOD?

Let's just say I love all kinds of food...too much sometimes. I lean towards sea food and asian cuisine, though.

31. SCARY MOVIES OR HAPPY ENDINGS?

If they are truly scary, and not slasher movies, then I'd say scary. I'm also a sucker for a happy ending, even if I am more pragmatic than that in real life.

32. LAST MOVIE YOU WATCHED?

Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull

33. WHAT COLOR SHIRT ARE YOU WEARING?

Bright yellow. Obnoxiously so!

34. SUMMER OR WINTER?

Autumn, but between the choices given, I'd say Summer.

35. HUGS OR KISSES?

That depends...but if you are talking CHOCOLATE, then KISSES!

36. FAVORITE DESSERT?

Fresh fruit...*bullshit!*...anyone who knows me knows that it is CHOCOLATE!

37. MOST LIKELY TO RESPOND?

Dunno...it will be interesting to see if anyone responds.

38. LEAST LIKELY TO RESPOND

See answer above

39. WHAT BOOK ARE YOU READING NOW?

Aunt Dimity: Vampire Hunter, by Nancy Atherton. Evidently it is a series of books. I just liked the title, so I picked it up to read. So far, it's cute.

40. WHAT IS ON YOUR MOUSE PAD?

I don't have a mouse pad. I used to have one, with Michael Mahonen's (Gus Pike from "Avonlea") face on it, but I've since traded up to a lap top, so no more mouse pad.

41. WHAT DID YOU WATCH ON TV LAST NIGHT?

Nothing

42. FAVORITE SOUND

The ocean

43. ROLLING STONES OR BEATLES?

Yes

44. WHAT IS THE FARTHEST YOU HAVE BEEN FROM HOME?

I'm a retired Air Force Brat, so first we would have to define 'home'. I've traveled quite a bit, in country and abroad.

45. DO YOU HAVE A SPECIAL TALENT?

I don't know...I might, but I don't consider it very special.

46. WHERE WERE YOU BORN?

Canada

47. WHOSE ANSWERS ARE YOU LOOKING FORWARD TO GETTING BACK?

Whoever replies.

48. WHAT DO YOU DO FOR FUN?

Fun? What is this fun? ;) I read, walk, listen to music, write, spend time with loved ones.

49. WHAT'S YOUR ALL TIME FAVORITE MOVIE

Errol Flynn's "Robin Hood"

50. FAVORITE HOLIDAY?

Wow, I love all holidays. Sometimes I make up holidays, just to decorate and celebrate.

"If a picture paints a thousand words, then why can't I paint you? The words will never show the you I've come to know."
~Bread, If

^ shows my age

Swiped this meme from ivydoor, who swiped it from her friend, leighleighla..etc.

Have fun, please play and pass it along!

1. Think of the first word that comes to mind when you think of me.
2. Go to Google Images and search for that word.
3. Reply to this post with one of the pictures on the first page of results (don't tell me the word). The html for images is here: < img src = "your pic address here" />
4. Put this in your own journal so that I can do the same to for you.

"A country without a memory is a country of madmen."
~George Santayana

"If you would understand anything, observe its beginning and its development."
~Aristotle

"With the historian it is an article of faith that knowledge of the past is a key to understanding the present."
~Kenneth Stampp

"There is no history of mankind, there is only an indefinite number of histories of all kinds of aspects of human life."
~Karl Popper

Where do we come from...? That was a question asked by B, the other night over dinner, right before we headed out to see the new Indiana Jones movie (30 years and I'm still crushing on Harrison Ford, btw, because he's Harrison Fucking Ford and old habits die hard).

I think I must have filed that question under 'things to do'...I told him the quickest and briefest history of his father's family and then said I'd look up the rest. Several years ago, an aunt had made some copies of the history for the kids and I remember reading over some of the history. Also, my mother-in-law's sister had just been to visit and we had spoken briefly about their family tree, because I had asked how far the Speigner's went back in Coffee County, Alabama.

Cutting to the chase (oh thank HEAVENS Merm!) I clicked on Ancestry.com early yesterday afternoon...and promptly got sucked into the vortex. So much that I finally made myself go to bed at 1:30 a.m. this morning! I explored D's family tree, all the way to the 1300's in Europe. Distant relation to Giovanni di Bicci de' Medici!

Did I even mention that my husband's family surname is Irish?

Of course on MY side of the family, I'm finding Scots/Irish/French...no HUGE surprises as far as that goes...and of course D has no clue about his family. His father didn't really care about the history of his family and his mother didn't really care about the history of hers...this apathy was passed on to their sons. D didn't even know his paternal grandmother's first name!

This has the potential to suck me in all summer long. I really want to know how two Italians had a son with a suddenly Irish surname. A mystery Scooby-Doo! Zoiks!

"Assumptions are the termites of relationships."
~Henry Winkler

How important is compatibility over chemistry?

12 Ways to Get to Know Your Partner:

1. Protocol: First or Second?Whether it's walking through a door, ordering dinner, or taking a bite out of the freshly baked cookies you have made together, if your partner always have to go first this could indicate self-centeredness. Are you willing to always be the giver?

2. Politics: Liberal or Conservative? How your partner views what is right or wrong in a political sense tells you a lot about his deep inner beliefs about society, and ultimately, the way he will approach your relationship issues. Will his views cause a rift in your relationship?

3. Television: Sitcoms or News? If his tendency is to watch "escape" TV programs versus "newsy/event" oriented ones, you can learn a lot about one's intellect. Do you want a mate who can keep up with your every day interest in what is going on in the world or a person you can run away with to avoid the world we live in?

4. Money: Flash or Stash? If your partner throws money around while dating, he might well be reckless with your joint finances when you move in together. Do you want to hook up with a tightwad or splurger?

5. Stress: Freak or Peak? Under Pressure, does he go to pieces or rise to the top of his game? If the answer is the former, every minor incident in your relationship might become a crisis. Do you like a lot of drama?

6. Conversation: About You or Him? As you first get to know each other does he always talk about himself first or you? If he is usually the topic priority do not expect that to change. Can you subordinate yourself to the world revolving around him?

7. Pets: Warm or Aloof? Believe it or not, the way in which he treats animals will not be dissimilar to how he treats your children. How do you want him to treat your loved ones?

8. Communication: Listens or Ignores? If you have something you want to talk about and he tunes you out as a general rule, can you cope?

9. Strangers: Kind or Rude? How he treats those they do not know (waiters, grocery clerks) often reflects on how he will treat people in general, including you, shortly after the glow wears off.

10. Priorities: Family or Work? You can tell almost immediately where a person's preferences lie in terms of what comes first (a family member's illness or a business trip) by the choices he makes when faced with an "either/or" situation. Do you care if he leaves on the next plane to present the such-and-such report if you or the kids have pneumonia?

11. Appearance: Fat or Fit? How he regards his appearance screams loudly about his sense of self-esteem. Those who eat sensibly, workout reasonably, and who take pride in their appearance are the ones who have a great sense of self. Does he really have self-confidence or might it be a front?

12. Faith: Strong or Weak? If you want a peak at his soul, learn more about his spirituality, or lack of it. What a person believes deep down is often what shapes the way in which they conduct their day-to-day affairs. What is your mate's "words to live by?"

Interesting...

courtesy of Stacy D. Phillips

Ever hear of Farrell's Olde Fashioned Ice Cream Parlour? The job itself, not so bad...the manager was from hell, however and that made my 1st job my lamest of all.

That and the dorky costume, complete with straw hat, that we had to wear...olde fashioned you see.

Oh, we had to sing (this pre-dates restaurants that sing "Happy Birthday" to their unwitting customers), blow kazoos, beat a big bass drum, clang bells and make announcements (like when a customer polishes off the 'Pig Trough'--basically a double banana split)...several of my friends from highschool and myself worked at the Brookwood Farrell's. We were all into school plays and sort of encouraged each other when we had to be outrageous.

Okay, other than my manager from hell (Steve asshole!), it was fun in a really lame sort of way...and you got a hotlink, so you can check out the sexy uniforms we wore.

"If you must have motivation, think of your paycheck on Friday."
~ Noel Coward

Throw your love around:

1. Last laugh?
Watching 'Gene Simmons Family Jewels' finale...Nick cracks me up!

2. What do you love?
Life

3. Gold or silver?
Both. "Make new friends, keep the old..one is silver and the other gold."

4. Who do you hold hands with?
Loved ones

5. Friday fill-in:

There's no time to ____.

do anything right, imho!


Meme courtesy of FridayFiver

"Winning's never been what's driven me about this competition. For me it's just been getting to do something I love for a large audience, which is a trip."
~David Cook

...as in David Cook, American Idol's Season 7 winner, in the much anticipated 'Battle of the Davids'.

Evidently, AI commercials can be 'risky business'...

And here is Archy's version, very cute, but he still gives me the singing Monchichi vibe:

Of course, here is the original, for comparison:

Who knew that one scene in a movie from the 80's would set the tone for Tom's future in
sofa hopping?

What I really liked about the Guitar Hero commercial was the eye to detail. That stupid
crystal egg was even on the mantel, having surviving the attempted 'egg napping' by Trey Atwood AND getting a crack, courtesy of Guido the Killer Pimp!

And Bob Seger & the Silver Bullet Band's hit song...Old Time Rock and Roll.

Risky Business references in TV & film

"I like to pump Bob Seger and dance around in my underwear, but that doesn't make me Joel Goodsen." (my friend Kenny, paraphrasing Joan Cusak in 'Working Girl' and subbing out Madonna for Risky Business reference)

Oh and for 'Six Degrees' fans, Tom was in "A Few Good Men" with Kevin Bacon.

Side Note:
Six Degrees is now a Charitable Effort...this is worth looking into people!

*anyone living in the south has heard this jingle for Cook's Pest Control.

Season 7 of American Idol is officially over...Sleepingmermaid out!

"Your thinking's so complicated
I've had it all up to here
But it's so overrated
Love and hated
Wouldn't trade it"
~ Aerosmith's Jaded

I just finished watching "Pretty Woman". I can't believe how popular this film was, and how much I used to like it...I think this day and time I would much prefer the original ending, where Vivian takes Edward for a ton of money and walks away.

I must be getting too old for "Cinderella" stories. There isn't any real 'and they lived happily ever after.' I think the Brother's Grimm were being highly ironic with those closing words.

'Happily ever after' doesn't just happen, it's always a true work in progress...and sometimes it can be EXHAUSTING.

When did I get to be so jaded?

"Inside some of us is a thin person struggling to get out, but they can usually be sedated with a few pieces of chocolate cake."
~Author Unknown



I over-eat. The sad thing about this is that I realize that I am over-eating and why I am over-eating, but sometimes I just don't give a damn.

Over the past year I have fought to lose over 65 lbs and maintain that weight loss, so stress eating is really not a good way to handle a bad day for me.

And I tend to beat myself up over it, afterward.

Well, at least I now recognize what I am doing to myself, so I'm half-way there. Now if I can find a way to redirect my anger & frustrations in a more healthy way.