More St. John Travelogue

IMG_0603, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

May 10th: Scuba day with Low Key. We went to Lovango cay and Grass Cay. I think I either need to make it a point to go scuba diving once every six months or so or just quit altogether because I didn't really enjoy myself that much. Of course, putting a BC with a heavy tank over my severely sunburnt back may have had something to do with it. After scuba and lunch, we took the kids to Hawknest Bay, a beach I've never been to. It was gorgeous, just like all the other beaches on St. John. Ho hum.



May 11th: We chartered a boat to the British Virgin Islands. This trip was definitely the highlight of our vacation. The boat we chartered was the Born To Rhumb (there are a lot of Rhumb puns in the islands) with a captain, Kevin, and - assistant? first mate? not sure what her official title was. Or name. We headed out at 9 and stopped at Soper's Hole in Tortola to go through customs then had a delay for some shopping (don't ask). Prices in St. John are high, and outrageous in Tortola.



Our first top was the Caves at Norman Island, supposedly Robert Louis Stevenson's inspiration for Treasure Island. We snorkeled around with the kids in tow wearing ring floatys. Brenden refused to use his snorkel but he loved his mask. He'd dip his head in and report on the fish he saw. I saw some small squid and pointed them out to B. He thought those were cool. The caves were caves.



We had lunch on the Willy T, (the William Thornton), a ship that was converted into a restaurant. Yes, you have to park your boat next to the ship to climb aboard. Despite warnings that no jumping is allowed, people jump off her all the time. Including us. All of us, even Brenden. The kids absolutely loved eating on the 'pirate ship'. About that time us adults all started in on the beer.



Next up was a small island with a very nice beach with naked people. They mostly got dressed when they saw the kids. They also left, thank you. The captain told the kids it was 'Gilligan's Island' (heh) so they loved that too. We swam and played on the beach for a while, then we headed to Jost Van Dyke, home of the Soggy Dollar bar.



I just remember floating and drinking. The captain's assistant was kind enough to wing a fresh beer my way when I was empty. Don't ask me about the trip home because I don't remember. It wasn't the beer, it was the Painkillers I had on top of that. Not the drug, the rum drink.



May 12th: that was Wednesday, or recover from the charter day. What the heck did we do? Oh yeah, we got a late start and went to another beach I've never been to, Maho bay. The kids (by simply being kids) pissed off some lady reading a book nearby - people don't tolerate little kids very well. Sorry lady. I hear there's an adults only beach at the Caneel.



May 13th: We went to Trunk Bay, and the surf was moderately rough. Andrew loved the hell out of being tumbled around by the waves and it brought back nostalgic memories of how much I loved the same when I lived in Puerto Rico. Brenden liked it too, but he preferred building a sand castle and Sierra didn't like it much at all. We ate lunch afterwards at the Banana Deck, our go-to place this trip. Brenden loves strawberry daquiris. Virgin daquiris, of course.



May 14th: Our return home was uneventful, except I had a traumatic experience at the McDonalds drive-through when we were coming home from Atlanta. I asked for UNsweet tea, and Jon drove away before I could taste-test and discovered it was sweet tea. I hate sweet tea with a mad passion. If I'm going to drink sugar water, it better be carbonated! It just goes to show you: they FARK you in the drive through! Every TIME!!

The Kids are Alright

IMG_0872, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

So I owe a trip report, don't I?

May 6-7: Travel days. We left for Atlanta, caravaning with the family we were going with: Stacey and JK, and their two kids Sierra (9) and Andrew (11). Even though the kids are older, they get along great with Brenden. We arrived without incident at one of the Comfort Inns near the Hartsfield airport. Did you know you can get a hotel room AND parking for a week for about the same price as parking for a week? (about $80).

I was kicking myself about getting the later flight to St. Thomas because I found out about the Park-Sleep-Fly program after I bought our plane tickets. Our flight didn't leave until 11:50 so we took our time getting to the airport and killed 3 hours by lounging around at our gate. Fortunately the kids all had their DSIs so the whining was relatively minimum.

About 20 minutes out the captain told us we may have to divert to San Juan because the tarmac in St. Thomas was sporting a pot hole. We circled around for about 30 minutes but then the captain told us we get to land in St. Thomas (much applause). He then told us he will have to slam on the brakes because St. Thomas' short runway is now about 1000 feet shorter. He did, but we landed fine so he got more applause.

As it turned out the earlier flight from Atlanta did get diverted to San Juan and landed after us. Ha!

So we collected our luggage and got our jeeps from Dependable, the company we used last time. We drove to Red Hook, and waited for the car barge while watching a very ominous cloud shroud St. John. Our villa greeter, a nice guy named Demitrios, phoned us hoping we had 4-wheel drive cars because the rain was a torrent and some streets are flooded. Anyone who doesn't have 4-wheel drive on St. John is doing it wrong, rain or no rain.

Jon and Stacey talked about stopping at a store, so I spilled my little surprise: I had contacted a villa provisioner so we had lots of food (and beer and rum) waiting for us. After an exhausting day (we got to the villa at around 7 pm) the last thing I wanted to do is worry about food.




May 8 - 9: After the torrential rain we woke up to a beautiful St. John morning. I convinced everyone that our first stop should be Cinnamon Bay. We overdid it, of course - we spent 5 hours out there and I didn't wear a rash guard (I 'out grew' my old one). When I snorkeled around Cinnamon Cay, I burnt my back something fierce. That night I spent a lot of time drinking.




I have no freaking idea what we did on the 9th. That was Sunday. I think it was a villa gravity day. The kids spent a lot of time in the pool. We all ate lunch out and did some shopping later in the afternoon, and I snagged myself a new rash shirt (it's like a rash guard, but more like a tee shirt so those of us who have a little too much weight around their middle don't look like we've been stuffed into sausage casings).



I'll write more later but in the meantime here's a gratuitous chicken photo:

Bet you thought I forgot!

IMG_4057, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday to you!
Happy birthday Bill Paxton
Happy birthday to you!!!!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures

Happy Mommy's Day Y'all! I'm enjoying today from an awesome view from my favorite tiny island. If I weren't so lazy I'd download a pic instead of stealing something from LOLCATs.

see more

I love this photograph. I don't know why.

Enjoying the sun

Enjoying the sun, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

What I'm Watching: Same old stuff.

V: This series isn't doing much for me, except it's nice to see Nicolas Lea again, and every time I see Elizabeth Mitchell I miss Juliet from Lost. Speaking of...

Lost: 3 Episodes to go. I have some ideas, but it's fun to have no real idea of what will happen.

American Idol: Unless she really hoses it, Crystal Bowersox had this in the bag by the second ep of the final 24. I like her singing. I wish she would quit getting lippy with the judges.

Fringe: We've only watched one episode since it returned, and despite the nifty 1985 logo and theme song the ep was a royal bummer. There's nothing like watching a nice, sick kid die onscreen! It made me feel bad for the mad scientist more than I already do.

24 Since it's the last season, Jack Bauer should really spend these last 4 hours breaking Tony out of jail and the two of them could go on a roarin' rampage of revenge. It could be a combination of Thelma and Louise, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, and the Texas Chainsaw Massacre. The body count would be staggering. And gratifying, considering all the morons, asshats, and dweebs the two of them have had to put up with the last 8 years.

Also and speaking of: President Taylor? Laura Roslin would have eaten your lunch. AND she would have airlocked ex-president Logan before he got his first conspiracy out of his bag of tricks. Where's Logan's ex-wife when you need her? Somebody needs another stabbing.

Sleepy men

Sleepy men, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

Nothing new to report - I just wanted to post this picture.

Batter up

IMG_4805, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

This weekend was uneventful even though the weather forecasters were all running around screaming "ZOMG WE'RE ALL GOING TO DIE!!". I do realize some people were hammered that hard on Saturday but we were just soaked thoroughly. There were no trees uprooted in the park so it was fairly tame weather for us.

Friday evening despite a little rain Brenden had his second Calvinball Tee Ball game and he did well. His attention was diverted the first inning because he had to use the bathroom and let everyone in viewing distance know this fact much to the detriment of his father's blood pressure. I marched him to the bathroom as soon as the inning was over.

Here's some more of our league's Tee Ball rules: An inning consists of everyone on the team batting, no matter the outs. The games run 45 minutes or 2 innings. Hitting the tee-ball stand with the bat is a foul. Runners can be tagged out or forced out. I'm not sure if a force out is impossible if there is no one on the base behind the runner. I also doubt there's an infield fly rule.

Any ways Brenden got a hit both times at bat and did good running to the other bases. He played the pitcher's position the first inning and first base the second. He showed some defensive skills with the last batter from the other team hit - the bases were loaded and since it was the last hitter no matter what the coach had them run the bases. Brenden caught the ball and tagged out the last 3 runners one by one as they ran home.

So Saturday Brenden and I went stir-crazy watching the rain and finally for one hour before sundown the sun came out and we played in the mud in the front yard. Sunday I did yardwork while Brenden got himself muddy again. That was our weekend.

Go Tiny Tigers!

IMG_4803, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

We had a busy weekend - noontime Friday I was groundcrew for a skydiving demonstration into an elementary school. Then I hurried to buy supplies for a camping trip. Photos soon come, I think. We stayed close to home at Smith Lake in Cullman. Friday we froze our butts off because I neglected to pack adequate blankets.

Saturday we went fishing but Brenden decided it was more fun to play in the lake than to fish so we let him splish around until he got tired of it. We got him cleaned up and drove back home because he had his first T-ball game in the afternoon. It was quite amusing - the phrase "cat herding" came into mind quite a few times as I watched the coaches try to get the little kids to do what they were supposed to do.

I felt proud of Brenden - he got the pitcher's position. He doesn't pitch of course, but the kid in that position has to field 85% of the balls hit. He did a good job running up and corralling the ball. He's not really old enough to make good judgement calls about when to try to throw the ball, tag the kid out, or run the ball back to the pitcher's circle (that basically takes the ball out of play). I was proud though that he was so heads up during the entire game and not out there digging in the dirt. Much.

He got two hits and a run - but no matter they don't keep score at that level.

Normally I don't have a problem with competition but in this case I think it's a good idea to not keep score. Otherwise I think the parents might get a little psycho.

St. John Soon Come

What's on the Beach, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

We'll soon be going back to my favoritest place on the planet. We'll be going in May for a week. Hooray!

I have been thatching and mowing the lawn the last couple of weeks all with no allergy symptoms. I'm not bragging as much as advertising how well Nasonex + immunization shots have been working for me. Many people here at work this week have been Claratin Zombies.

Old B Photo because I'm Lame

sitting up, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

This last weekend Brenden and I chased a hot air balloon. Well, I chased it in the minivan while Brenden watched Spongebob in the back. I took no photos, like an idiot.

Skydive Alabama celebrated its 10th year anniversary and amongst the festivities were hot air balloon jumps. My job was to chase the balloon, bring jumpers to where it landed, and pick them up again after they jumped. Sunday morning was the easiest chase ever - the balloon went up, the jumpers jumped, the balloon came down. All in the same place.

Other than that, not much is happening. I watched Don't mess with the Zohan, an Adam Sandler movie. It was stupid, and to my shame I laughed. A lot. Wouldn't it be nice though if all of the middle East problems could be solved with hair salons and shoe stores!

Foolish Topics

Hickory Smoked Bacon, originally uploaded by moknits.

This article,, if you read far enough down, talks about vegetarians and about if they slip back into meat eating, it's usually because of bacon.

Mmmmmmmmmmm bacon. The gateway drug meat!

Spring is Sprung!

Texas Tornado, originally uploaded by michaeljames.

It *must* be springtime in Northern Alabama! Plants are blooming, my allergies are on the rise, the temperature is tolerable, and the tornado siren got its first sounding yesterday afternoon!

Whatever it was it passed south of us and no damage was reported. We got a frog-strangler along with some hail for about 10 minutes then the sun came out.

MSTified

TV 001, originally uploaded by bonniegrrl.

What I'm Watching:

UP We finally watched Pixar's latest. Yes, it's terrific and deserved it's nomination with the rest of the Best Movie choices (it won best animated feature) but I was boo-hooing 10 minutes into the movie and plenty of other scenes set me off too.

I'd really like to see Pixar do a movie where a woman (or a female character) is the central character. I'm not complaining, really: I'd just like to see one. Yes, Boo, Dora and Elastigirl are awesome, but they weren't the central characters. I can't rank it yet with the other pixar movies because I don't know if I want to subject myself to that again any time soon.

Zombieland I've pretty much given up on zombie movies, but after an enthusiastic recommendation from Helly Jon and I gave this one a shot and we laughed ourselves silly. It's violent, but not grindingly so, and had some surprising warmth to it. That's about all it has in common with Shaun of the Dead, if you were wondering - the writers of the former freely admit they were inspired by the latter. Zombieland is as American as Shaun of the Dead is British and other than funny + zombies they don't resemble each other at all. Of course I loved and enthusiastically agreed with all of Columbus's 31 rules - I insisted on pointing out some of my own (to my husband's annoyance / amusement) one of which turned out to be a major theme: There's Safety in Numbers. Also: pretending to be a zombie as a prank during a zombie apocalypse is not a smart move.

Mystery Science Theater 3000: I've been loading up my Netflix instant queue with a bunch of these shows. For the uninitated, MST3K was an original program that was shown on the Comedy Channel (later Comedy Central) in the late 80's and early 90's. When it was cancelled it was picked up by SciFi and eventually ended in 1999. I was fortunate enough to catch it from the beginning.

The premise involved a janitor who was put aboard a space station by some mad scientists who would subject him to their evil experiments by making him watch a bad movie every week. In order to survive, the guy created some robots to keep him company. He and the robots would watch the movie and offer plenty of snark along the way. So that was the show: we watch a guy and his robots watch a bad movie.

It was a great show and I miss it. I'm glad that slowly but surely they are being released on dvd. Some of the best episodes are missing because of copyright issues and I hope they will be cleared up eventually. Like a lot of MST3K fans I had a lot of eps on tape, and like an idiot I lent them out.

Is it Summer Yet?

Ilu B me, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

Wow, it's been a while! I think Winter is finally on its last legs, and it's about time. We've managed to burn through a whole cord of wood this season (you yankees - quit laughing!). Jon and I got so good at building large fires we managed to melt our fireplace grate.

So I saw some of the Academy awards. I was tickled Christoph Waltz one best supporting actor - he was the best thing about Inglourious Basterds. I was glad they gave John Hughes such a great tribute - the Academy can occasionally get over it's ART facade and admit that they are a large part of pop culture and Hughes' movies had a large impact on people my age.

I was happy Katheryn Bigelow won best director. As for Hurt Locker winning best picture, I told my brother this: It is better than Avatar and Inglorious Basterds, but District 9 was a better movie (these are the only nominated movies I saw. Yes, I have yet to see the Pixar movie!). Hurt Locker and District 9 both had plenty of exploding humans, but Hurt Locker didn't have any Mecha.

No, really. I thought District 9 was a better movie. Still, I'm glad for Katheryn Bigelow. Hurt Locker is a really good movie, and in it she explores a subject she is very fond of: men. Me too, Katheryn; me too!

Nothing new to report as usual

IMG_3658, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

So my computer died. I wanted to Blame it on Bill but it turns out the Windows patch was incompatible with some malware lurking on my computer. That's what was causing the perpetual BSoD. Reformatting the hard drive and upgrading to Windows 7 was the best thing to do. My computer caught a virus and turned into a zombie!

I'm watching (and digging) the last season of Lost. I actually understand what is going on even if I don't completely know why it's going on. The dichotomy that is John Locke - the pathetic, gullible loser vs. the island leader badass now makes total sense to me.

Ellen DeGeneres is actually a good replacement for Paula Abdul on American Idol. Paula was always the "nice" judge and Ellen fills that role well without slipping into drug / booze addled rambles. The final 24 have been chosen and do I have any favorites? The chick with the bad teeth is really good.

24 is 24. I'm always happy to see Katee Sackhoff, but her character is a loser with a stupid subplot attached. I kept waiting for her to shove a knife in her ex-boyfriend's belly and laugh about it, like she did so many times when she played Starbuck and was being harrassed by the eternally creepy Leobens on BSG. Speaking of, Keith Callum Rennie was co-starring on 24 for a while as well, playing a creep who got stabbed to death by a pissed-off woman (typecast much?), but without so many lives. Maybe Jamie Bamber or Tricia Helfer will show up and we'll have a BSG trifecta.

We're not getting any of this

IMG_2403, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

WTF - everyone SOUTH of us is getting blanketed with SNOW!

I received a perpetual Blue Screen of Death on my home computer thanks to a Microsoft update - that's their ultimate plan to prevent vulnerabilities - if you can't use your computer, no one can!

Instead of repairing it, I grabbed some things off the hard drive, re-formatted it, and have installed Windows 7 (I was on XP). So far I like it, even though it's a little frustrating because the user interface is quite different.

I forgot to mention that Jon and I watched a fascinating documentary: For All Mankind. Someone went through the vast archive of footage of the Apollo missions and made an audio-visual mosiaic of the moon landings. There's no narration except for some archival commentary from some of the astronauts. The documentary conveys what it must have been like to be stuck in a small rocket-propelled can for days in the eternal vacuum of space just to reach a dead alien satellite. I haven't felt that kind of wonder and awe about what we accomplished (with late 60's tech!) since I was a kid. I can't wait until Brenden is old enough to appreciate the Space and Rocket center here in Huntsville.

After watching this documentary, I totally appreciate how well Ron Howard captured the geeks in the control room in Apollo 13. They truly were a bunch of white nerd-boys who smoked like chimneys. And Ed Harris totally nailed Gene Krantz ("not on my watch!"). I need to watch it again.

The Low Crawl of Winter

IMG_3669, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

Ugh. I've had a migraine for two days now. Blech. Or maybe it was because Jon and I watched the season premiere of Lost last Sunday and I'm still trying to get my brain around it. I guess I'll avoid spoilers, but it was sad to see all those dead people.

Brenden and I play a lot of the Wii Lego Indiana Jones game together. There are some tough puzzles in that one!

Even though Bioshock II came out today, I'm re-playing Fallout 3 yet again. I had to try the Point Lookout add-on, and it was kind of disappointing. Mothership Zeta remains my favorite. I do like having an axe for a melee weapon, though. Whee!

Is Fox trying to kill Fringe? They show a couple of eps here and there then take it off the air for a month or so. Way to kill any momentum.

Caprica needs more exploding robots.

More of What I'm Watching

IMG_3664, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

Jon and I finally saw Avatar and we watched it in 3D. Yay! It was good, but not great. I've said before I judge James Cameron harshly because he's better than most directors working in Hollywood today (plus he directed Terminator and Aliens, and I love both of those to smithereens). Someday I'll rank JC's movies but for now I'll place this somewhere between The Abyss and True Lies. It was certainly better than Titanic!

My problems with the movie were with the script. There's nothing groundbreaking here, Humans Are Bastards and they are targeting Noble Savages for their land and a Mighty Whitey is the protagonist). I'm also not certain why Sam Worthington is such a hot item right now. He's very good looking in a generic way but I wasn't impressed with his acting skills. Sigourney Weaver and Zoe Saldana blew him out of the water.

Which is what I did like about the movie: Sigourney Weaver plays a cranky but good-hearted scientist and I loved seeing her again. Zoe Saldana was the main Na'vi character. I never undertood why she fell in love with Worthington's character but at least she had a full range of emotions. Plus she kicked butt and I'll avoid spoilers but I'll say a common outcome with the Final Boss battle was averted here near the end of the movie. Bonus: Michelle Rodriguez, whom I always love seeing. No offense meant to Jenette Goldstein (who played a terrific Vasquez), but I always thought Cameron would have cast Rodriguez as Vasquez in Aliens if she hadn't been like 5 at the time.

Oh, and the main bad guy is a Colonel Badass and much fun to watch. The special effects are amazing and Weta, the New Zealand effects company pwns George Lucas' Industrial Light and Magic. The fight scenes are worth the price of admission alone and Cameron knows better than to use Shaky Cam. So my final verdict: Avatar = Pretty!

More Creeping

IMG_3671, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

Wow, I am such a frakking geek. I bought a couple of Bear McCreary's soundtracks from seasons 2 and 3 of Battlestar Galactica. His choices are so eclectic: you have plenty of celtic and arabic influences, plus for quieter moments piano and / or violin, and then there's of course the constant poundy, poundy drums. He likes them more than the Japanese do. That's saying something!

Anyway listening to it makes me miss the show something fierce. Yes, I'll watch Caprica, but there's no Mom, Dad, or the Twins. No Tigh or Caprica 6 or Baltar. Will there be anything on this new show like the time Madame Airlock told the chief mutineer she would use everything at her disposal, including her eye teeth, to end him? Anything as jaw-dropping insane as the mid-season 2 story arc of the Pegasus and crew? Or as nifty-cool as the Galactica jumping into New Caprica's atmosphere to release fighters? If Caprica doesn't break my heart at least once an episode or so it won't measure up.

24 has started again - yeah, I'm a masochist. Enough said about that. Less than a month to go for the next season of Lost! Yay!

Creeping January

IMG_3662, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

Nothing new to report - Brenden told his first joke (that I understood):

Brenden: "This is yummy!" (referring to his strawberry flavored applesauce).

Me: "I'm glad you like it."

Brenden: "No, mama, you say 'you can say that again'! Ok? I say is yummy, you say 'you can say that again'!"

Me: "Um, ok."

Brenden: "This is yummy!"

Me: "You can say that again!"

Brenden: "This is yummy! Hahaha! Isn't that funny, mama? Isn't that funny?"

Of course it was.

Also: Happy 92nd birthday to Major Richard Winters, the only nonagenarian I have ever had a crush on. Watch Band of Brothers if you have no idea who I'm talking about.

Winter Fire

IMG_3666, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

What I'm Watching / Reading:

Land of the Lost: No Trope links because this is a will Ferrell movie which has become kind of a trope in itself. So I was wrong about my prejudgement about this movie. It was not worse than G.I. Joe. and that is damning it with faint praise. Some people consider this movie a rape of their childhood, but really: Land of the Lost? Sure, I watched it when I was a kid but even back then I knew it was a lame show. Most of the funny moments involve scenes with Matt Lauer.

9: Animated post-apocalyptic tale. Fascinating to look at, but it had some plotting problems.

Extract: I love Mike Judge and here he does what he always does - he shows us idiots being idiotic. The protagonist is a chemist and owns his own business so you think he'd be a little less stupid than the idiots who work for him, but he accidentally takes a horse tranquilizer and ends up getting talked into hiring a gigolo to have sex with his wife. See, this way he can cheat on her, guilt-free. This movie had its moments but on the whole I'd rather see Idiocracy again.

Under the Dome: This Stephen King book is about a thousand pages long and I read it in about 3 days. It's a page turner (kindle clicker?) about a small town that gets trapped underneath an impregnable force-field. I won't go into more to avoid spoilers except near the end of the book I was shaking so bad I didn't want to finish it. I'm glad I did though. I think it's some of his best writing ever. Your mileage may vary, of course.

American Idol is back, and it's Simon Cowell's last season. How the hell can AI go on? The whole reason to watch the show is to see Simon cut off some clueless contestant at the knees then dash a cup full of piss-tinged reality into said contestant's face. All with that dry british drawl. Also Paula Abdul is gone. No more incoherent drug-fueled rambling. How boring! I didn't last long last season, anyway. I doubt I'll make it past Hollywood week for this one either.

2009: The Year in Recap Form

Magic and Dutchman, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

January: Visit to Ed and Jen's place in Massachusetts. Snow! Yay!
February: Disney Cruise to the Caribbean! Yar!
March: Battlestar Galactica ended. Whaa!
April: I got a Kindle (II). Yay!
May: Life (the TV show) got canned. Boo! But, I also got to see a great movie in the theater (Star Trek). Yay!
June: Much remodeling work done around our house. Ouch!
July: I earned a trip to the emergency room due to a bulging disc. Ouchouchouchouchouch. Also new kitties. Meow.
August: Jon and I have our 10 year anniversary. Muah!
September: Great Tampa visit w/ dad and Ilu so Brenden can go to the beach. Whee!
October: We go camping and Brenden catches a catfish. Yum!
November: Thanksgiving in Oklahoma. Yum!
December: Long nothing-doing vacation at home during Christmas. Ahhhhhhhhhh.........!

So there you have my year in review. Heh.

Rabbids

Raving Rabbids!!!!!!, originally uploaded by meljpouliot.

I had a whole week off for Christmas, plus New Years. We didn't go anywhere and just stayed home. Jon did some work on the house but spent a chunk of time at the drop zone. He bought me Dragon Age: Origins for Christmas and I spent most of my free time playing it.

Like Bioshock is distantly related to System Shock II this game is the indirect descendant of Baldur's Gate. BG is an FRPG based on Dungeons and Dragons. DAO isn't D&D but it will be quite familiar to any experienced RPG gamers. At first I thought the story line was too limiting - I think I'm spoiled by the open worlds of Bethesda Softwork's Elder Scroll series, not to mention my favoritest Fallout 3. DAO's characters and story line sucked me in, however.

I won't go into details - there's a blight upon the land and your character is called upon to stop it. You meet people along the way who can join you for your quest and you can get kind of attached to some of them.

Anyone who remembers the somewhat stilted dialog from portions of Baldur's Gate take heart: the people who wrote Dragon Age apparently watch Joss Whedon shows and the conversation is more entertaining than usual. The first NPC who can join your party, Alastair, is a cross between Xander from Buffy and Mal from Firefly. That's according to the people who designed him and it's a fairly accurate assessment.

Brenden got loads of toys besides the way-cool brain-sucking space aliens. He received a Wii game that he's addicted to: Ubi-Soft's Rabbids go home (it is spelled "rabbid" and for good reason). He was entertained for almost an hour when he discovered a portion of the game where one of the rabbids gets stuck in your controller. You shake the controller and the rabbid makes lots of noises while on screen you see a little cartoon rabbid careening of the interior of a Wii remote. The rabbid is pretty happy about it. Anyway Brenden squees and laughs his little buttocks off when he plays.

Which is great, because it gives me more time to fight blood mages, darkspawn, and the occasional archdemon.

Things from Outer Space

IMG_3672, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

Merry Christmas, everybody! By happy accident, Brenden received the best toy I have ever seen. On my recommendation his abuela and grandpa sent him the Imaginext Space Station. It included these horrible looking octopoid aliens as you can see above. Well as you can see in the picture below, they sit nciely on the play figures' heads. Brain-sucking space aliens for your preschooler! Fischer-Price FTW!

We Suck!

District 9 Bus Bench MNU Sign Teaser, originally uploaded by district9pics.

What I'm Watching:

Because of the enormous amount of time I've spent perusing Tv Tropes I'm afraid my reviews will never be the same. That site has become an enormous time waster resource for me. For instance, when I rambled about Kirk/Spock and Hector/Achilles I really, really wanted to do some quick Google searches to confirm my suspicions but didn't want to lose my remaining eye. Tv Tropes, thankfully, provided me with information about Rule 34 of the Internet without going into too many gory details. Their linktastic pages lead me to Ho Yay (which I find amusing and entertaining - I just don't want to read 40 pages of pr0n about it) and No Yay, which I will not link to because while the image on that page is SFW, I found it deeply, deeply disturbing. If you go to TV Tropes and search on that term, you will not be happy. You have been warned. Don't do it!

So anyways. I watched District 9 (the link contains spoilers!) last night, and while I don't particularly like Humans are Bastards stories, this one tells its story in a palatable manner (for me. I want to see Avatar sometime next week and I just know Cameron is going to beat me about the head and shoulders with the same Trope, which is why I didn't try to see it on opening night). It was palatable because the bastardry was mostly believable and because there's a scene when someone does their very best when things are at their very worst (That's a trope exemplified in John Carpenter's forgotten Starman - Big Damn Heroes might be the closest trope I found.) Collectively yeah we suck but we're not condemned to suckage at an individual level.

I just realized I haven't given a plot synopsis. An alien space ship hovers over Johannesburg, South Africa. The inhabitants come across as stupid, ugly insectoid aliens who quickly get sent to a JoBurg ghetto and cause problems. Finally after 20 years the aliens are to be rounded up and moved away from the city and most of the action takes place when a private company (an evil one, natch) sets out to herd them up and move them out. The protagonist, Wikus Van Der Merwe (Sharlto Copley, and I am on the give-him-an-Oscar bandwagon though it will never happen because this is SCIENCE FICTION), has been put in charge of this operation and this bland little Afrikaans twit has himself an interesting time. See the movie it's awesome. F-Bombs and splattage ahoy, though. Oh! and an awesome Macross Missile Massacre! SRSLY!

If you have seen it, here's a great review / examination from a South African's perspective.

FEET

PictureOK3 087, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

Random bits:

Fringe had numerous Re-Animator references last episode. Considering the bad guy was someone whose head was re-attached they were hilariously appropriate.

I have read over 50 books since I got my Kindle in March. When I was in high school and college those numbers would have indicated a slow year. I think that's the most I've read in the last 5 years put together, and yes, I'm sad about that. I've totally fallen in love with reading again. The Kindle has 3 features I love: 1) Instant downloads, 2) book samples, and 3) large font sizes. Yes, my eyesight is going to crap again.

Brenden really loves cooking. We made cookies from scratch last weekend and I'm always looking for recipes he can help me with. I envision many holiday treats this coming holiday break.

While Christmas shopping I found the 1st season of Veronica Mars for $20 so I snagged it. I'm actually going to start re-watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer this weekend though. The reason is this website: TV Tropes. It contains many BtVS references (which made me want to start a rewatch) and is a huge timekiller. Don't say I didn't warn you though.

We watched Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince last night. I thought it was a pretty good adaptation of the movie despite all the missing scenes. Mrs. Damian Lewis, Helen McCrory, has a small part in it playing Narcissa Malfoy. There was no sign of Jason Isaacs or Ralph Fiennes, though. Pity.

What I'm Watching

PictureOK3 136, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

Jon wanted to rent a movie and here were our choices:

Transformers II
G.I. Joe: Rise of the Cobra
Terminator: Salvation
Year 1
Land of the Lost

I voted for G.I. Joe. Even after watching it I still feel I made the wisest choice. The plot involved Chris Eccleston sporting a scottish accent that would make Mike Myers blush and he's a weapons dealer who is evil. And then there's Team America: World Police who trash Paris. Or was that a different movie? Paris does get trashed but the Joe team is multinational. I think - all the main characters were American. I was distracted by all the explosions. Pretty!

Headaches for Mama

PictureOK3 171, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

I cleaned the house Saturday and sunday to prep it for Christmas decorating. When I pulled the white christmas tree from the attic Brenden and both evil kittens were ecstatic. My blood pressure went through the roof trying to keep a small child and two large cats from climbing the tree. So far 11 or 12 ornaments have been broken and when I go replace them I'm going to buy plastic ones.

To top it off Brenden broke the screen on my Kindle Sunday. Fortunately it's still under warranty and the cheerful helpdesk guy at Amazon is sending me a new one and they're even paying the postage for when I return my old one. So Amazon's customer service gets a big "Hooray!" from me.

Oh Noes! Mom is rambling again!

PictureOK3 135, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

While watching the new Star Trek, the good chemistry between Chris Pine (Kirk) and Zachary Quinto(Spock) got me thinking, and scared, and I really don't want to go a-googling, but I'm betting that movie launched a billion slash fanfics. If you don't know what slash is, congradulate yourself and go look at some funny kittys. If you do know, and you read it (or even write it), hey - it's your thing and that's fine by me. I on the other hand accidentally read the beginning of one and an eye popped out of my face kind of like that scene in Friday the 13th 3D. I'm totally fascinated by the idea that people feel the need to write out and share certain scenarios but I have no desire to read them. Just - EWW!

That doesn't mean I don't understand the urge to write fan fiction. I don't write but I've read some (I've learned to look for sites that vet the material first). I understand the urge to change something or add something to a story because I understand the desire to make the story better (or at least less sucky - ask me someday for my very short version of Alien 3). For instance I've been reading all the Trojan War permutations I can find. I have disliked the fate of Troy ever since I read the Iliad, so the Aeneid at least makes up for their fate a little. I've been bothered by the death of Hector's son, Astyanax, so I was glad he gets to live in a movie variation, Troy. Hector still gets killed by Achilles though.

That leads me to David Gemmell's almost uniformly excellent Troy trilogy. It's biggest flaw is the hero, Helakion, A.K.A. Aeneas. He is nowhere near as interesting as Odysseus, Andromache, and an assortment of nifty made-up characters that populate the story. I was kind of put off by Andromache falling in love with this shmoe for unexplained reasons (other than he was hot). And, as if sensing his hero wasn't that great, Gemmell made Hektor an almost nonentity who people talk about but we rarely 'see' in action. But the narrative and the rest of the characters make up for the books. Hektor and Achilles' battle is pretty nifty with a twist I liked, and I could tell the legend of the trojan horse bothered Gemmell enough that he just had to change it. (SRSLY - any town stupid enough to let a hollow horse into their city walls after 10 years of battle pretty much deserves to be destroyed).

Then there's Dan Simmons' Ilium and Olympos which has to be read to be believed. I'll spoil just a little - Hector gets to live! Finally!! And Achilles' fate is well deserved and I'm still giggling about it.

So going back around to slash fanfic - are there any slash pieces about Hector and Achilles floating about? I would place money on it especially after Eric Bana and Brad Pitt got to play the characters in the movie but I'd rather cut out my remaining good eye with a dull spoon than go find out.

This is not where we were, either

Lake Guntersville State Park Campground, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

Hope everyone ate too much. We went to Oklahoma for Thanksgiving (photos soon come) where Brenden rode around with mom, dad and Ilu)on the 4-wheelers, and even got to wheel around in his own ride (I told you, photos soon come).

Ed and Jen were there too, and I seem to recall much beer and wine drinking the entire time we were there. Dad is doing fine and cooked a fantastic turkey. Ilu spoiled Brenden, of course. Dad took Brenden to the store once for a quick trip and Jon and I were nervous - for my dad. He survived. B seems to behave better for other people which is a good thing.

We also visited Jon's niece, Tiffany, whom Jon hasn't seen since she was a baby. She's 17, now. Those visits actually went well and included a trip to the Dallas zoo (photos soon. I promise!).

What I'm Watching: Jen had us watch Hamlet II which is quite funny and does nothing to refute my bigoted attitude towards drama students and teachers. I also had a very long laugh because a couple of weeks before I saw this movie I honestly spent some time wondering about what had ever happened to Elizabeth Shue.

We tried to watch Planet 54 in the theater but Brenden acted up and we left before it was over. I don't think I missed anything. It sucked.

I bought Star Trek on Blu Ray and it's a shiny movie. This time around I still enjoyed the heck out of it but I'm thinking that if the cast and their interaction hadn't been spot-on terrific the plot would have sunk it. Which actually, now that I think of it, is the problem with every decent to good Star Trek movie so never mind!

Random non-sequitur photo Friday

IMG_3139, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

I am currently reading David Gemmell's Troy trilogy; and it's something like the 4th re-telling of the Trojan war that I've watched / read (including Homer's take). It's not as much fun as Dan Simmons' totally loopy Iliad and Olympos, but it's as compelling. Of all people, Hektor's wife, Andromache, is my favorite character so far. I hope her fate is better than it was in Homer's version but I have a bad feeling.

Speaking of Dan Simmons, I ripped through his 3 trashy Joe Kurtz detective novels and I can't recommend them enough.

Massive Dynamic is the best name ever for a shady mega-corporation. I'm just saying.

Vacation Planning

digging2, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

Jon and I have decided to go to St. John again next year for vacation.
Well me, mostly. Jon just looked at my vacation research, which I love to do like a hobby but he hates to do with a passion, and pointed to the villa he liked the most from my shortlist.

The winner is Sea Cay, (pronounced 'sea key', sometimes I have problems remembering how to pronounce cay). It's right next door to a villa we stayed at in 2002 so I know the view is fantastic. I've also heard from people who have stayed there recently that it's in excellent shape.

Brenden will be a few hairs short of 5 on this trip. It's going to be a long six months or so, but it's nice to have something to look forward to!

Nothing much again

IMG_3167, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

Since Brenden has discovered Noggin Nick, Jr. I have had to watch much of that channel's programming. So this is pretty much a What I'm Watching post.

Blue's Clues: I don't know if this show is in production any more, but it's about a guy and his dog Blue. Blue leaves riddles around the house (heh) and the guy collects the riddles and tries to figure out what Blue is trying to say. Cute. Also bonus points for trying to teach kids about deductive reasoning.

Dora the Explorer: Dora and Boots explore and speak Spanish. I like this show. I hope no kid thinks he can keep a crime from being committed if he yells "SWIPER NO SWIPING!!!" long enough.

Go Diego Go!: I think he's Dora's cousin or something. He goes around rescuing animals. Cool for teaching kids about exotic wildlife, kinda boring otherwise.

Ni Hao, Kai-Lan: Kind of like Dora except Kai-Lan is Chinese. And she and her animal friends learn how to cope with emotions and social situations. Dora is more into solving problems. So I like Dora better. Brenden says "xie xie" a lot. I think that means "thank you".

Max and Ruby: Brenden LOVES this show. I hate it. It's about Ruby and her younger brother Max and they are boring bunnies. But Brenden loves it. It could use a retarded starfish or two.

The Wonder-Pets: My second most-hated show. A guinea pig, a turtle, and a duckling go out and rescue animals and sing about it. This program pushes cooperation. I keep hoping one of the carnivorous animals they rescue will treat them like a buffet.

Yo Gabba Gabba: This trippy show is hosted by a guy who desperately needs to eat a sammich or two. Other than that I like it; heck, Mark Mothersbaugh is a regular so how could it be bad? Fun songs sung by people in monster suits that Brenden likes to sing.

Wow Wow Wubsy: I miss Spongebob!

Laughing mom

Laughing mom, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

I'm still here, just nothing to write about.

One big note, Jon and I went back into debt to buy his business partner out. No offense to the partner; he and Jon didn't see eye to eye and it just goes to prove business partnerships suck bad. Don't ever do it.

Brenden went as a clone trooper for Halloween. He didn't have a meltdown this year when I closed the door when we ran out of candy.

Mal and Jayne, unlike Big Fat Kitty, are not afraid of people so they stayed at the screen door the whole night watching people come and go. Both of them like to sit up on their haunches for extended periods of time. Little kids would come to the door, the cats would pop up on their haunches to look at them, and the little kids would scream "I WANT KITTY!"

I had a flesh-eating zombie dream the other night. I got so bored I woke myself up. Seriously. I think my zombie affection is over.

see more Lolcats and funny pictures

I lol'd perhaps too much.

Wild Thing

Don't Ask, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

Stacey took her 2 kids to see Where the Wild Things Are so we went too. I don't think the movie was too scary for Brenden, but the themes were over his head for the most part. I asked him afterwards if he thought the monsters were scary, and he said "No, they his friend!" He also understood that when the boy gets back in the boat, he's going home to his mom. Jon hated the movie and I liked it a bunch.

As the mother of a wild thing I felt empathy for the relationship between the troubled kid and his mom, and I loved that the kid behaved like an 8-year old - he wasn't brilliant or wise nor did he ever act like a little adult. He loved his monster friends but in the end he couldn't fix their problems. I think many people hated how down it was. I didn't think it was down - just truthful. Being a family is hard and sometimes all you can do is let them know you love them.

Speaking of hard: So yesterday I took Brenden to get his flu shot. He was having none of that. His new doctor, whom I like, had to hold him down and he screamed like his leg was being amputated. I think the 6 shots he got for his 4-year checkup pushed him over the edge.

Afterwards I bought him a bag of Skittles and some kool-ade (and me some beer for later) and we drove to see my doctor. I had to get my shots from the allergist. I wanted him to see that if you stay calm and don't look it doesn't hurt. He was fascinated watching the nurse shoot me, but he seemed skeptical about the whole staying calm business. He may be too young for me to appeal to his sense of logic.

One other fun child note: when Jon and I picked him up from his sitter on Tuesday, he suddenly turned around and tapped me on the belly and said "WHORE!"

Before I could belt him into Mississippi, he ran up to his dad (who had as big a "WTF" look on his face as I did) and tapped him on the belly and said "HIM!"

Yeah, he was trying to say "her" - getting the gender specifics of certain pronouns has been difficult for him. So I didn't belt him. We did work with him on his pronunciation.

Forgot to Mention

IMG_3294, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

I forgot one movie: we watched Monsters Vs. Aliens, and it was good. The movie ads were very careful not to mention that the main character is a woman, because we all know that girls have cooties and little boys will suffer from estrogen poisoning if they see or play with anything girl-related.

But: the main character, on her wedding day, is hit by a gigantic meteorite that is imbued with some glowy substance that turns her into a 40-foot giant. She's captured by the military and imprisoned with a bunch of other monsters including a man-cockroach mad scientist, a missing-link fish-ape, and an idiot blob of goo.

Aliens invade, looking for the glowy contents of the meteorite, and the military makes a deal with its monsters that if they stop the aliens, they will be freed.

Besides the thousands upon thousands of in-jokes that b-movie fans will enjoy, I enjoyed that the heroine grows from a shallow bride to a real human being, so to speak, and learns to appreciate her freakishness (and her monster friends).

Dreamworks has dropped the animation ball many times since Shrek II, but in this case: More like this, please.

*chirp* *chirp* *chirp*

Dad and son, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

Slooooooooooow news month.

Brenden invited Jayne to share the bathtub with him. Jayne didn't like it; not one bit. Brenden is lucky Jayne has been declawed.

fishing boy, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

I haven't written much lately because I haven't much to say.

I've been watching Fringe, Dollhouse, and C.S.I., the last of which had a tribute to Office Space with TPS reports and bosses named Lundberg in the last episode.

I forgot to mention Fringe acknowledged its pedigree the first ep back this season when a senator who was questioning the funding for the Fringe division bitched about similar non-results from the old 'X division'. Earlier on in the ep a soon to be dead guy was watching tv where Fox Mulder was getting abducted by aliens. Nifty!

Dollhouse's first ep back was only interesting in that Jamie Bamber guest-starred and he used his true English accent. I bet a lot of people didn't even know he's English.

I saw Race to Witch Mountain, based on that old Disney movie. It was ok. It's a child-safe Dwayne Johnson movie. I think he's fun to look at so YMMV.

Also saw Chocolate, a movie with a non-sequitur title. I finally figured out it was a Thai movie which means many people were kicked. It's about an autistic girl who instead of being able to recognize prime numbers or recite pi to the millionth digit watches too many martial arts movies and imitates what she sees. The plot is stupid, but the stunt people totally earned their money.

The Mushroom is not Relevant

Trail mushroom, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

Well, I have given up giving up caffeine. I'm kind of in a damned if I do damned if I don't conundrum.

First off, I have been drinking coffee since I was a kid and have been hardcore about it forever. I'm talking about a pot a day at least. I never deliberately tried to stop drinking it or to reduce my caffeine consumption in any way except when I was pregnant.

So there I was trying to keep my caffeine consumption to zero and I started experiencing aggravated athsma again. The last time I experienced bad athsma: when I was pregnant.

Check this out, or don't - here's the important excerpt:

Main results: Caffeine, even at a low dose, compared to placebo was found to significantly improve lung function, measured in terms of FEV1, FEF25-75 and specific airway conductance for up to 2 hrs post ingestion. This effect was sustained for FEF25-75 for over 4 hrs. Improvement was also seen in FEV1 up to this time, however this effect did not reach statistical significance. No data were available for specific airway conductance after 2hrs.

Or translated: I'm a caffeine maniac because it wards off athsma.

Bring on the java!

Brenden's First Fish!

Brenden's First Fish!, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

We just got back from a weekend of camping and fishing at Lake Guntersville. Brenden was very excited when he caught this fish. It was at least 3 pounds, and over a foot in length.

It was Saturday night, when we were all wore out from the day. He did not complain when we let his fish go.

Deep fried oreos!

Deep fried oreos!, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

No, I didn't eat one. Interesting concept, though.

By the way, what evil Safety Nazi made the movie theaters switch from coconut oil to vegetable oil to pop their popcorn? I bought some coconut oil and made some popcorn and the taste is 10 X improved! If I'm going to go to a movie in the theater and buy a $6 bag of popcorn, it better be tasty. Nowadays it tastes like styrofoam. If I owned some theaters, I would pop all popcorn in coconut oil and advertise the hell out of it.

We're going camping soon now that the monsoon season seems to be over. Brenden is totally psyched. We are borrowing a friend's boat so we can fish in Lake Guntersville. Brenden is doubly psyched about that. He told me we are going to "catch a fish, cut him up, cook him, and eat him. Yum!" (exact quote there).

The Evil Twins are home and losing their harbls and front claws hasn't slowed them down any. Yeah I feel a little bad about their claws (we didn't do that to Big Fat Kitty but he doesn't use his claws).

Fringe has returned, and I'm a little miffed that the first episode in the writers offed Olivia's partner, Charlie. In exchange the writers seem to be giving Agent Farnsworth more to do even though she's still Exposition Girl. Still I'm happy the mad scientist is back.

Dollhouse has returned as well and is in the ratings cellar (attic?) so here we go again.