Happy Halloween, everyone! This is the 4th photo from my 4th set on Flickr, a meme I borrowed from Helly. I couldn't do the 4th photo in my 4th folder on my computer because I'm just not that organized. If Flickr ever crashes I'm going to go postal.
And Helly, I still have that postcard from Alan! I never throw anything away that resembles correspondence. I'll try and dig it up & post it on the blog. Soon come...
Despite my son's lagging enunciation skills, I have noted some interesting developments in his speaking. For instance, he seems to get the difference between "I" and "you". When his dad lets one rip, he will run up and point his finger at him, and announce "YOU FARTED!"
Likewise when Brenden blows his trumpet, he will say "I FARTED!"
Also, at restaurants especially, he likes to say "I GO POO POO!" if he wants us to take him to the bathroom, or if I get up to go he'll say "YOU GO POO POO! MAMA GO POO POO!"
He can also read one word: "PUSH". He pointed it out to me when we were going out the door of McDonald's last Saturday afternoon.
I've finally made my decision about who I am voting for this year. I don't care for either candidate for the major political parties, and even the Libertarian candidate makes my eyes cross. Therefore I am writing in Dwayne Elizondo Mountain Dew Herbert Camacho as my candidate of choice. RLY.
BTW, did you know that 'decision' and 'incision' have similar roots? That's neither here nor there; I just love etymology.
I mentioned last weekend Jon was out jumping off bridges. It was the annual Bridge Day at New River Gorge bridge in West Virginia. Jon told me this story this morning and I thought it was nifty.
Apparently there were a bunch of students and doctor types running around 'studying' the BASE jumpers (clue to you all: Bridge Day is pretty tame compared to some of the other places they jump). One doctor, for instance, was taking saliva and blood samples from certain jumpers before and after their jumps. Other people (sociology students, I would bet) were going around asking questions.
When Jon finished with one jump, as he was leaving the landing area, one of these quetioners asked him a bunch of things. When he asked Jon what he considered his proudest acheivement, the thing he was most proud of in the world, Jon said "my son".
The student then said, "Really?"
Jon replied, "Not a doubt in my mind."
He loves to sing theme to Cops - Baboy baboy, wha go doo, wha go doo... baboy baboy, wha go doo, wha go doo.. (repeat 50 times).
The Bechdel Test:
I can't remember where I read about testing for real women in movies. It's a fairly simple test:
1: Is there more than one woman?
2: Do they talk to each other?
3: About anything other than men?
For me if a movie fails this test it doesn't make it a bad movie, but I have noted I tend to enjoy it more if it passes. I have subconciously applied these criteria to entertainment long before I read the rules spelled out. When I'm writing my "what I'm watching" blatherings I need to start commenting on whether it passes the test or not.
Please note the comic strip mentions Alien - you would be surprised how few movies you will find before (and after, sadly) 1979 pass the test.
Of the TV shows I watch regularly, only Fringe passes pretty much regularly - the show's lead and a representative of a shadowy megacorporation are both women and they talk pretty much every episode about things other than men. I'm trying to think if J.J. Abrams' other hit, Lost, passes the test. I'm sure somewhere along the line Sun, Julia, Kate, and / or Claire talked to each other about something other than the men. Right?
Sarah Connor Chronicles: I can't think of the last time it passed. Most of the time Sarah talks to Cameron, who is a robot so maybe she doesn't count. Plus they are usually talking about John. But sometimes they talk about other stuff.
My beloved Life fails in the 2nd season because Robin Wiegert got replaced by Donal Logue as the "boss". Even then, though Wiegert and Shahi got to have regular conversations on occasion, they usually revolved around Charlie (though most definitely not in a romantic context, but it still doesn't count). Now Logue's character continually sexually harasses Shahi's character. Yeah, that's an improvement!
Battlestar Galactica: It has passed many times! Roslin doesn't get to interact with Starbuck that much but they have; plus Starbuck and Athena have interacted with the other female pilots. I can't forget Roslin's interaction with her assistant, Tory. The 2.0. - 2.5 Pegasus arc was total win with Commander Cain and Starbuck talking about hardcore military shit.
The last couple of movies I have watched that didn't fail were the two Grindhouse movies. Deathproof especially had nothing but women talking to each other, sometimes about men but not continuously. The 2nd half, with all the motorhead talk, was the best all-woman conversation in movies ever.
Jon and I watched Iron Man last night (FAIL). It was decent. It would have been just ok if they hadn't had the smarts to put Robert Downey Jr. in the lead role.
What I'm Watching:
Jon was out jumping off bridges and Brenden was a little sick and whiny (rash, congestion, low fever etc) this weekend so I didn't do much but catch up on my TV shows. Brenden was fine this morning. When I wasn't watching TV he was watching Thomas the Tank Engine and asking me if we could go on a train ride.
The Sarah Connor Chronicles: FOX has given the go-ahead for a full season. YES!! I had a few eps to catch up on and I'm glad they gave a very plausible reason for Cameron the Terminator to look and occasionally act like a teenaged girl (she, I mean it, was modelled after someone John knew. Will know).
Life: I'm still holding my breath for NBC to give this show a full season. The ratings aren't good but then again most NBC shows across the board have bad ratings and 10pm on Fridays is just the suckiest sucky timeslot ever. Come on, NBC, I need my weekly dose of redhead!
Speaking of, the History Channel was nice to me and had a Band of Brothers marathon this weekend and I managed to watch 9 out of 10 eps. I still marvel at what WWII veterans, especially the airborne, went through - not just D-Day but then the total funparks that were Operation Market Garden and Bastogne. I am almost finished with The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich which is a unique book in that it wasn't written by a historian but a journalist who spent most of his time in Germany while Hitler came to power. I guess that's pretty common-place now but I believe the author (William Shirer) paved the way for journalists to chronicle history.
Adolph Hitler wasn't a military genius nor even a great politician; he was a total bullshit artist that people were willing to believe simply because they wanted his shit to be true. Not just Germans who were smarting about the outcome of WWI but the European powers that bent over for Hitler because they wanted to avoid another war. Seriously, if I had that time machine to go back into history, it wouldn't be to kill Hitler, but to knock some freaking sense into the French and English who not only went on their knees for Hitler, but they held down his other victims like Austria and Czechoslovakia when he had them annexed (to continue the anal rape analogy. Speaking of, did you see South Park with the shot-for-shot remake of the love scene from Deliverance?). Ugh. All I'm saying is if someone had stood up to that nutbag a little earlier many many boatloads of soldiers (including my grandfather) wouldn't have had to die.
Along with a little Fringe and C.S.I I caught up with my T.V habits. I didn't watch any movies but I did squee and chortle like the geeky fangirl I can be when I saw those stills from the new Star Trek movie. Miniskirts, go-go boots, and pointy sideburns are intact! If Karl Urban doesn't get to say "DAMMIT, JIM!" at least once, I will be sorely disappointed.
Brenden spent Saturday night and Sunday morning puking. We believe it was food poisoning - he couldn't hold anything down and we had to give him water a teaspoon at a time for a while. He was better Monday - I could tell because he begged me to take him to McDonald's and he demolished his Happy Meal, ate a quarter of my Big Mac, and then demanded that I get him a hamburger, which he polished off, too.
Jon and I watched Hitman Sunday night. I wish we had done something more interesting but a totally bald Timothy Olyphant held me in thrall - he's a good actor who doesn't get much work but he shouldn't be so misused! Maybe he had a house payment overdue or something. He can play everything from weedy, psychopathic scumbags (Go and Live Free or Die Hard come to mind) or intense, self-righteous sheriffs (the enormously great and sorely missed Deadwood). But I spent this movie thinking to myself - "Dude, you're BALD! Where's your HAIR?" while poor Timothy was trying to inject some life into this crappy movie based on a video game. Meanwhile, Jon was obsessing over the truly hideous costume design. I'm being sincere when I say it made The Fifth Element's costumes look conservative and tasteful. Other than that, there was some nice blood spatter but that's about it.
I went to see my allergist the always-cool Dr. Krishna on Tuesday for a routine visit and I complained to him about reoccuring sinus headaches, mainly because I was experiencing one right at that moment. He listened to my symptoms, and told me to see my general practicioner because he thought the headaches didn't sound sinus-related.
My GP listened to my symptoms: the headache is always on the left side of my face and feels like its behind my eye ( also at my temple and around my teeth), it always occurs when the weather changes, and lasts for three days. Oh yeah - it's hard for me to work because looking at a computer screen is painful and I can't stand loud noises. I can't stand them anyway but it really drives me batshit insane when I have one of these headaches.
Those of you reading who experience migraines are probably laughing, because those are all classic migraine symptoms.
So my GP gave me some sample meds to try - I'm supposed to take them at the first sign of one of these headaches. I'm also going to keep a diary of when these headaches happen to see if there are other triggers other than the weather.
Doc asked me on a scale of 1 to 10 of the pain, and I'd put it at a 7. A 10, btw, is what I experienced when I had my C-section and I tried to sit up in bed and my weight shifted and I was pulled upright. The pain was so bad I nearly blacked out and was close to puking.
If I'm right about the weather being the trigger, these puppies will be easy to predict, however. Jon won't be able to bitch at me anymore for watching the weather channel all the time.
Last Sunday we took Brenden to the Heart of Dixie Railroad Museum in Calera, Alabama. We took the "Pumpkin Patch Express" which was a train ride to this little area near a vinyard that had some fun things for little people to do like get their faces painted, a big inflatable thing for them to jump on, and a hayride. We got to pick a pumpkin too. Brenden was all about the trains of course.
I think the museum in Chattanooga is the best one we've been to, but Brenden enjoyed himself the most at this one because he's just become old enough to really appreciate these trips. Last night he begged me "Brenden go choo choo?"
"You want to go on the choo-choo again?"
"Yeah!"
"OK, we'll go again, soon."
"Oh, thank you, mama, thank you!" And he wrapped his arms around me and gave my legs a big hug. So yeah, we'll be going again.
What I'm Watching:
Life is back, hooray! The ratings haven't been great though. That sucks. I have to admit the cases-of-the-weak are pretty ho-hum, but the characters and their interactions are fun and involving. The scenery ain't bad, either.
Fringe I'm liking this X-Filesy show, and so are a lot of other people. Good!
Feasting on Waves is over, and that's too bad. The show wrapped up in the British Virgin Islands, with Alton Brown closing the show with a meandering but truthful monologue about the difference between good food and great food (He decided it was love - food lovingly made, especially for family, and lovingly eaten). Translation: if you want great food, stay away from the fancy-pants mango chutney restaurants and eat local.
Children of Men: Science Fiction dystopian story about a world where all of a sudden everyone is sterile. 18 years have passed and the world has gone to hell in a handbasket because no one can have babies. Really: the idea is there's no future so everybody lives with despair. I won't say more, I thought it was a fantastic movie and I think anyone who is a parent will be able to empathize with the main characters.
Knocked Up: Better than I thought it would be, although I'm getting tired of Seth Rogan.
Jon and I went to the bank, then went to FedEx and we just next day aired our last mortgage payment to Chase.
So the number you see in the photo is the amount of personal debt we have.
Yes, I'm gloating. And I'm also feeling the loss of the weight of debt. I have owed money one way or the other since I was dumbass enough to apply for a MasterCard in college.
In all honesty the business loans are not separate so there's still that obligation. But, if the business decided to close yesterday we have enough assets that even at fire sale prices we could call it even.
*Whew*.
I hope everyone enjoyed 'DrinkTalk like a Pirate' last Friday. I did not because I'm sticking to my diet and beer does a number on my resolve.
Fall is my favorite time of year in Alabama. Winter is cold without the fun of snow, Spring is tempermental with the tornado sirens going off at least once a week, and Summers are sticky hot. Fall means cool mornings, tolerably warm days, and pleasant evenings. And lower power bills.
Brenden and I went to the nearby park Sunday morning. I noticed, as I have many times recently, that my nose is working at almost %100 capacity. After going so long without a sense of smell it is still a novelty to be able to smell the grass, trees, even the stagnant water in the creek and the mold and mildew on the park benches. Paradoxically it's easier for me to eat less now because I smell more. I had a tough time when I couldn't smell controlling my eating and I think it was because I had to eat a ton of food to get any flavor at all.
Another paradox: when I get that urge to snack I read cookbooks. For some reason it curbs my desire to eat. Not because I'm revolted; matter of fact I usually get to planning the week's dinners. But I don't snack.
Brenden is exhibiting better control of his bodily functions. We are going to bite the bullet and take the gate off of his door this evening and encourage him to go to the bathroom at night by himself. Jon is stressing that he will get into the kitchen and do something silly like chop onions or something so we'll put the gate on the kitchen at night. I figure if B tries to climb that the ensuing crash will be enough to wake us up.
We took Brenden to the Cullman County fair last night. He was in Valhalla, of course. The three of us did a few rides together but I was surprised at how many rides were aimed at little people his age. He went, all by himself, on a mini-rollercoaster called the Dragon Wagon, and several variations of a merry-go-round (including a real merry-go-round). He and I went on one of those that spins you around while spinning your seat around (a scrambler?) and he loved it! No puking incidents.
Overall his behavior was great with only a few incidents of innattentionitis. He of course had to be carried out crying once we ran out of money, but still it wasn't a complete meltdown and once we got to the car he resigned to going home.
He did talk me into stopping so he could have some chocolate milk, and I finally got to try a diet Sierra Mist. I love Sierra Mist and am on the hunt for a diet anything that I actually can stomach. The SM diet stuff is pretty tolerable!
When we put him to bed, he got out again and asked me to come back in his room ("Momma, come here please!")
I did and sat down on his bed and he climbed in my lap and hugged me. After a while (like I'm going to stop him from doing that) he pulled away and said "Truck Broken".
I had busted a tail light by misjudging backing up and hit the company van. Whoopsie.
I said, "Yes, but daddy fixed it today, remember?"
He poked a finger in my chest and said "Truck broken! Mama broken Truck!!"
I laughed, agreed that mama broken truck, and tucked him in. He's so much fun right now.
Short Bites
Dad and Ilu stopped by on Saturday on their way to Oklahoma - dad looks great; he's dieting and has lost a lot of weight he put on as a result of chemo. Brenden remembered them from our visit last May. I showed him a pic of him and Ilu making oatmeal cookies together and he pointed at her and said "Beebop!" (That's their nickname for B).
I'm going to close the pool in a couple of weeks. It's been a cooler summer than normal and it's just getting too chilly. Brenden doesn't want to swim as much as he used to.
Brenden's speech has improved in leaps and bounds in the past month. We went shopping last weekend and he was pointing out to me where he gets his hair cut, his preschool, and of course McDonald's and Burger King. The point is I understood what he was saying.
What I'm Watching:
The Sarah Connor Chronicles is back, hooray! Kinda weak start back from the awesome FBI dead pool cliffhanger from last season but so what.
Lost won't start back until next year, boo, but in the meantime I'm giving Fringe a try (J.J. Abrams created both shows). It's kind of X-Filesy. The pilot ranged from so-so to pretty interesting so I'll stick around for a while. Besides, the obligatory mad scientist character is a protagonist so that's something in its favor.
Feasting on Waves Alton Brown's new 4-part series on the Food Network: he's sailing from island to island in the Caribbean and investigating local cuisine. I am so impressed that he managed to wrangle a paid vacation in such a manner! Like I am, he's totally fascinated /stymied by the fact that so much of the fish served in caribbean dishes is dried, salted cod, usually imported from Canada.
I have 2 weeks to go for new episodes of Life, hooray! I have to wait until January for the last Battlestar Galactica eps. Boo!
Without a Paddle Totally sophomoric comedy starring (get this) Seth Greene, Dax Sheppard, and Mathew Lillard. About as stupid as you would think, but it was funny! And it got the taste of 28 Weeks Later out of my brain.
28 Weeks Later: I enjoyed the first movie, 28 Days Later, about a man in a coma who wakes up 28 days after a plague has swept England. A virus called Rage started infecting people, and the infection is rapid (less than 30 seconds after mucosal/wound contact with blood or saliva) and the symptoms are extreme acts of violence.
Fun, yeah? I don't know, the first movie was harrowing but enjoyable, the second movie is just harrowing. 28 Weeks Later takes place (duh) 28 weeks after the initial infection. Since the spread of the infection was so rapid it was rather easy to keep the infection confined to England, and since victims of Rage had no intelligence left to take care of themselves they eventually starved to death, so people are attempting to repatriate.
Bad crap ensues when they find what they think is a survivor, but turns out she's a carrier. She has the virus but shows no symptoms. Her husband sneaks into her quarantine and gives her a kiss (neither know she's a carrier). Really bad shit ensues, and some military types try to get the 2 kids (uh oh!) of the unfortunate couple out of the area because the repatriation population are rapidly going bugshit. The military types think the kids might have the genetic answer to their mom's immunity to the symptoms of the virus.
Look, I'll spoil it now: rage-infested dad hunts down his kids. Little boy is infected before big sis manages to shoot dad dead. Little boy, however, is immune to the effects, like his mom, but is now carrying. They make it to the helicopter waiting for them (all the people who tried to protect them got offed) and the pilot, out of compassion, flies them over the channel into France. He never knew about the carrier in the first place.
We don't know the ultimate fate of the kids, but 28 days later continental Europe is overrun with bugshit Europeans. The End.
I made Brenden sleep in my bed Saturday night. I STILL HAVE the heebiejeebies. Horror movies just ain't no fun any more.
Brenden enjoys preschool. Yay!
Jon fixed the pipe on Wednesday so we have water again. Yay!
That is all.
I don't give my SO enough credit sometimes. Did I tell you about the time he fixed our car with a bottle cap? RLY! The shifter went out on our Saturn, and he Jerry rigged it with a bottle cap to get it home. He replaced the cap with something more suitable, but I'm sure the dealership would have charged us $700 for what he did with a couple of screwdrivers and stuff we had in the garage.
So anyway, yesterday morning I was pulling the garbage bin out to the curb and I noticed a nice big damp spot in our yard. Now our yard resembles the Sahara because of a big honking oak tree that is notoriously thirsty. It was so thirsty that last year during the ongoing drought it started to kill our neighbor's yard.
I realized that the damp spot started and went downhill from our water meter (uh-oh) so I pointed it out to Jon. I called the utilities folks when I got to work, and they promised to check it out. I get no call back from them, but when we get home, the mud around the water meter has been disturbed so they must have been by.
Jon decided to do some digging and after some agonizing arguments with tree roots he discovered that there is a foot of desintegrating pipe that runs from the meter into some PVC pipe that is between the meter and our house. Translation = the leak is our problem, not they city's. I can accept that but THANKS FOR TELLING US, TWITS!
We have a friend that works for a different township's utilities (I'm sure they are all nice guys and would have called us in this situation to say "not our problem") so Jon talked to him. I was was wondering; don't they make metal pipes out of brass? In this case our friend informed us it was galvanized steel. Galvanization involves coating with zinc to improve corrosion resistance, but I guess after 30+ years even galvanized steel pipe, buried in ACIDIC SOIL, will rust a teensy bit (the pipe just about broke apart at the touch - pictures to follow).
Of course we turned off the water to our house while Jon took that foot-long section of crap off the meter. We were hungry and running out of daylight so Jon and Brenden (who was helping by throwing clods of mud around the yard) jumped in the pool and washed up. We went to dinner at Logan's Roadhouse (mmmmmmm steak), then hit Lowe's. Jon will fix it after work tonight.
I figure even if you throw in the cost of dinner and the parts, Jon saved us about a $1000+ in plumber's bills. I heart my husband.
Jon bought a Wii and I'm not that impressed, but then I'm not a big console fan. I prefer games on the PC. We'll see, though, because Brenden and I had fun playing the bowling game.
We had a decent Labor day weekend. Nothing was accomplished and it was too cold to swim (thanks, Fay and Gustav!).
Brenden starts speech at the elementary school today - when he turned 3 he became eligible to take his lessons through the school. Speaking of, he's working hard now on repeating new phrases that we use like 'shaving cream' and 'railroad crossing' and 'GODDAM' which is totally my fault.
He also starts a pre-school program, from 9am - 1pm on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays at the local Methodist church. I can't wait until he tries out some of his new phrases on his teachers!
We signed him up so he can spend time with kids his own age. He is a gregarious kid and will play with anyone who will play with him. Hope he has fun!
Happy anniversary, Jon! >MUAH!<
Yep, we've been at it for 9 years. Neither of us remembered until Ileana sent me an email this morning congratulating us.
We went to Ruby Tuesday's, which most recenly traded in its old 70's lamps for new 70's lamps, and I had a bison bacon cheeseburger (hold the fries and bun). VERRRRY tasty.
For our 10 year we are planning to visit Puerto Rico. I hope some airlines are still flying at that point in time. Not that I expect them to go out of business, but I suspect in the not too distant future the CEOs of said companies (along with many harried employees) will be tarred and feathered considering the widespread complaining that's going on.
Brenden is back to his old self, though when he thinks we're watching he'll hobble around like a cripple because of the shots he got in his legs. The boy is %100 ham.
"It smells like.... bacon!"
Brenden got sick enough Sunday that we took him to the emergency room that night. He had a 103 temp and he was shaking. While waiting, he puked all over his dad, poor kid. (Poor dad).
They don't know what it was but he was miserable. They gave him an antibiotic shot which hurt like mad. Yesterday I took him to the pediatrician and they gave him another antibiotic shot which hurt so bad he was limping around almost all day.
Guess where Jon and Brenden are right now? At the doc's, getting the last shot. Glad I'm not there. What really sucks is I bet it was one of those ubiquitous viruses so the torture shots are pointless.
Still, I have a hard time ignoring doctor's instructions.
Anyway, the bacon reference is I'm back on a low carbohydrate diet. I'm also hitting the weights. I've been at it for 2 weeks and I've dropped 8 pounds (yes, most water weight but not all) and I feel better than I have since before Brenden was born. RLY!
I've been meaning to do this for a while - I borrowed the idea from Nancy. Basically I searched Flickr using the keywords I came up with when I answered the following questions. Sometimes I didn't use just the first page of results just because.
First name: Sandy
Favorite Food: Steak
High School: Stone Mountain
Favorite color: Blue
Celebrity Crush: Damian Lewis (2nd guy from the left. And the woman next to him, Sarah Shahi, I have a girlcrush on her)
favorite drink: Guinness
Dream vacation: St. John
Favorite dessert: Ice cream
What do I want to be when I grow up: Rich
What do I love most in life: Dreaming
One word to describe me: Lazy
Flickr name: Beesmom
