Dolce Angelo

When you are a tiny baby,
born too soon
you might open your eyes for the very first time in the NICU
and look into the eyes of your nurse.

You will find a compassionate professional
who remembers that you are a person
and not just a tiny object.

Your nurse will give you skilled medical care
and affection.
She will know your family
and guide them through this difficult time.

If your condition worsens
your nurse will want to be there
to care for you
and make you as comfortable as possible.

If you should slip away from this life that we know
she will be honored to take you downstairs
so that it is someone you know, who brings you
to the place where you will be prepared for your next journey
to a church, or a burial ground.

Know this-
though you have not seen anything outside of the walls of the hospital
did not ever get the chance to run, or play, or laugh
you received one of life's most precious gifts.

You were loved.

You will be remembered.

Ossssscar

So, Suzy called me just as the Oscars were starting... for the next few minutes we watched Ellen's monologue and didn't say much to each other. She was laughing ten seconds before I did every time. Damn cable. She lives 20 minutes away but we were totally out of synch. SO she would laugh in my ear and I would strain to hear the joke that she was laughing at. It was a weird sort of time warp. She more or less said "Do normal people do this, sit on the phone and not talk to each other because they're both watching the same show?" I said "why yes, all the time." Help me convince her. Comment, please.

Incidentally I am writing this WHILE I watch said Oscars because they are boring the crap out of me. Once I see what everyone's wearing I lose interest. but don't get between me and the red carpet coverage.

I'm presently entertaining myself by reading the Fug Girls' running commentary and turning myself into an M & M. And no, you can't see it.


Sound editing is a lot like sex. It's usually done alone, late at night, surrounded by electronic gadgets.
~Steve Carell

Dear Teacher

I realize that it's a GOOD thing that you don't want my kid's brain to turn to mush over winter break. And, I realize you don't want him to be bored.

However.

You failed to realize that MY KID is on vacation, and not me. I worked a couple of extra evenings this week, as coincidence would have it. (Plus, we ran around like crazy all week since the coach decided to have extra basketball games... you people all think alike, don't you? And, then there was other stuff going on too. )

So your "clever" math homework really pisses me off. It's the last day of "vacation" and I do not have time to "make a batch of cookies, and then copy the recipe, and convert all of the ingredients to pints." WTF? My cookies are damn good but the very last thing I have time to do today is make pints of cookies.

Or a bocadillo de queso tostado. But that's another teacher's homework so I can't yell at you for that. (Or I would.)

Lucky One

Well the universe is temporarily cooperating with me. The PIKWITH* is apparently going to be fine. My job has actually gone well this week. I'm buying a Jeep Grand Cherokee. Oh, and I started running again. (I have the advil smudges on my palms to prove it... who knew you could eat these things like Pez? OK, I'm kidding.) I ran a whopping 8 minutes yesterday. Not bad for two weeks of sloth-dom. Right? RIGHT???

I do wish it wasn't snowing right now. We DID the winter thing, last week, thank you. I'm done with snow now.

I would frankly like to curl up in front of my tv tonight with a bottle of pinot grigio and some cream puffs, or a nice slice of cheesecake. A really biiiiig slice. I could eat, drink, and root for Mer to stay frozen. Not going to happen....not any of it. Oh well.



*(Person I Know Who's in the Hospital... and no, I don't want to elaborate. The whole thing makes my head hurt. This blog is my happy place.)

Song from way back in the vault- Amy Grant; I'm calling her country to suit my purposes.

Dear Universe

...please quit grinding your spiked heel into my nose.



The highlight of my day yesterday was the half hour I spent with my boyfriend. I don't know what I do without him.

It's funny that I referred to Alton ONCE as my boyfriend and my kids can't forget it, but the 1,000 reminders to "make your bed and take a shower so you don't smell bad" go unheard.

If I had the time I'd doctor this pic to say "To Carly, much love, Alton"... but I don't. So just pretend I did.

How is it

... that you can be sound asleep, minding your own business at around 6 am on a day you don't actually have to get up for work or basketball or anything like that...

and an eyelash can fall into your eye and stab you fiercely? My eye was CLOSED, dammit.

So yes, that's how my day started. Clawing at my eye, which was not even able to water one bit. It's so dry in my house that I could scream. Isn't winter over yet? (I know - we have ONE real snow and I'm done with the whole thing already...)

grrr.

5 4 3 2 Run part 2

Today marks "15 weeks until the race" aka "where the heck did I leave that giant treadmill I spent so much darn money on, and why is it so cold out there in the garage in the first place?"

SO I am basically back to square one, since I have not run at all in the past 2 weeks. Oy. Please, motivate, inspire, or shame me, y'all. But be kind. I'm fragile, y'know. Delicate, like. (snicker)

5 4 3 2 Run

After, well, just about forever, I am almost up to 20,000 visitors in my own little corner of Midlife Crisis Central.

Nice to have y'all stop by. Hey, at least it's not Woollerton.

Now, if you're looking at my pretty little sitemeter off to the right, and feeling a tad confused, I should admit that I actually STARTED it at 503. Johnny Virgil, who has had about 90,000 visitors in the same time period, is laughing now. Right this very second!

So sometime this weekend, visitor number 20503 will stop by, and buddy, you'll win a prize. A great, fabulous, fantastic prize. Really.

Ain't going down

My son realized about an hour ago that he hadn't given me a valentine. So, I got a cute handmade one complete with a sketch of me. Sadly, I have no ears, nose, hands, nor feet.

I know... don't I look good? The running thing is really working out for me. I run until I feel like my feet are falling off.

Here's a sample of 9 year old poetry... or is this some sort of haiku?

M - Mold doesn't stop her

o - on top of everything

m - many times she's on the go

Eat that, Hallmark.



To be honest, I think he's trying to get on my good side because he overflowed the toilet today. OK, mold doesn't stop me, but "Mom, the water's not going down" will, every time.

SO, here's to you Garth, I don't think it's what you meant at ALL, but great song title.

Brrrrrrr

Baby, it's COLD outside!

You can't tell from this, but it's still snowing, getting heavier as the day goes on, and the wind is swirling everywhich-a-way.

Good times. I'm trapped in my house! I am reduced to cleaning out cabinets. Zzzz. Oh, and napping on the couch, watching my boyfriend Alton.

We were also listening to Christmas music. Why not? We didn't have a white Christmas.

Nothin but a hound dog

Watching the Westminster dog show...

I want a dog that everyone else in my family laughed at. But something about those bitty little legs running so fast strikes me as adorable.

The heck with them. And yes I know it's not a hound dog. Or wait, is it? I guess I don't know.

Speaking of dogs... holy crap.

WTF happened to Melissa - the bangs, the uh, robe? dress? ro-ess? Mess? It's something a Japanese anime figure would wear in porn. All she needs is the blue hair.

Good together (bucket and chicken)*

Snow is coming.

Lots and lots of snow.


This means only one thing: Carly, tucked safely away in her house.... eating everything in sight. Especially these:

Pistachios, cashews, and almonds. The can will be empty by noon tomorrow. Treadmill? what treadmill?

(*A funny song, by SheDaisy)

Free

Give me liberty, or give me ....a Cherokee?

Dammit.

I really WANT to drive a Jeep Liberty. I took one for a test drive this weekend. I want to be sporty and zippy and schuss around hairpin turns and have a cute little cargo area that doesn't have to be big enough for backpacks and a trumpet and 8 bags of groceries (which is what we get on choir/band day even though we just went on Saturday).

But the truth is unavoidable.

I am not a Jeep Liberty.

I will probably go with the sensible, "only a whiff of minivan" Grand Cherokee. (I'm not buying new, so the compass is not really a direction I can go in ... heh.) Everyone should have such problems, no?

I would sooner lie down in the street and let Dan run over me with a minivan, than buy one from him. He knows this. I considered buying a station wagon from his lot once, aloud, and he looked at me and said "what?!" with a baffled look. Then he lead me to my usual type of car, with sunroof, and I felt less nauseous almost instantly. I will get a Momma Jeep, but it will have a sunroof, dammit.


(the title is from a song, perhaps my favorite song ever, by faith hill, since I couldn't find "liberty" in my library)

Grammy and Grumpy

While I was making inapropriate remarks about Stevie Wonder, we made up an Awards Show Game. To keep it clean for the kids I told them it would be a bingo game, but we all know it's a drinking game, don't we?

Drink if:

• Someone wears a much-too-sheer ensemble, or ridiculous hair
• Someone praises MLAS Jesus ( aka the Center Square)
• Some old fossil is trotted out for a lifetime achievement award
• Someone makes a "dramatic" intro (ex: prince, "One Word. Beyonce." That's 3 words, ass.)
• A winner duels with the "get off the stage" orchestra music - they always lose. No one is listening to the names.
• A "once in a lifetime" duet is performed

PS -

1. JT totally stole that handheld camera idea from Blue Man Group.
2. Women should Not wear 12" long false eyelashes. I'm looking at you, Mary J.
3. Sting looked like he was enjoying himself but whatshisname on the other guitar looked waaaaaaaaay old. Blasphemy is my specialty.
4. Cover your tats before donning the nice dress - yeah, that' s you too, MJB.
5. I'm sorry, but Pink looked awesome, doublestick tape working overtime and all that. Kudos to her for keeping straight face when that dumbass next to her dropped his cue card.
6. Prince is a troll and Xtina is still orange. So, not much new this year.
7. Were the dixie chicks paying homage to Robert Palmer's old MTV videos, with those black dresses? I like Natalie's new, uh, real hair color.
8. John Mayer needs an effing haircut. He is so not getting anywhere near my wonderland, ever.

PSS - I heard a funny story about someone I know who not only took the walk of shame this morning, but did it carrying a great big (I mean REALLY giant) teddy bear. Priceless.

Snarly out!

Shameless

http://www.gawker.com/artists/dr-tf-chen.php

Something to look through if you're bored. Click through the names of the other artists on the lower portion of the page.

Don't miss Ratcliff, although Ramos amuses me. Anyway, Ratcliff does photos in High Dynamic Range or HDR. Read more here for a cool tutorial about these intense photos.

(Gawker is a trashy gossip website that "offers free exposure in its remnant ad space to artists at its discretion." So I gots me some dirt, and some culture. Win-win-win.)

Not some puppet on a string

Part of my PTA duties involve reviewing all of the junk mail.... uh, bulk distribution information.

Today I got a brochure about a puppet show (it's Character Building....). Depending on where you look in the brochure / web pages, the wife is either brunette or blonde, but she's consistently got a wonky eye like Paris Hilton that makes me nervous. The husband looks something like a beatnik dude. He apparently is a backup musician (He has contributed to "numerous albums and television shows"....* )

The puppets, even my kids agree, look like muppet knockoffs. There's one that's OBVIOUSLY Kermit the Frog after a long weekend at Woodstock. Except as a clever disguise he's wearing a pair of sunglasses (which confirms my suspicion that he's stoned) and an ugly sweater.

On the back is a bird who is obviously on acid - blue face, yellow hair. I mean really. There's a castle that's supposed to look like the one in Mr. Roger's Neighborhood Land of Make Believe. These people are looking at some serious copyright infringement lawsuits if they're not more careful.



But what do I know? My job situation could be classified as "in the toilet, and someone is reaching for a handle". Apparently I need to choose between Option A and some other vague door number 2. Neither option has been consistently explained. It's enough to make a girl head for the nearest casino, with her life savings of $24.00, and bet it all on black.



*There was more stuff there but I did a google on the full quote and of course it lead right to their page ..... I won't post a link to their web page, because this is what these people do for a living and I am just some wench with a blog and a somewhat murky career future. But it's just... so.... ugh. And no, I'm not talking about the Meat Puppets

Still Lost

Okay, so now we know how Sun got pregnant. But I see a new face in this season's promo pictures. Do you?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:LostS3Promo.jpg

to left of Locke, above Jin. Who's that guy and who's the chick to the right of Ben? Oh, I'm annoyed again. Where's Hurley? IS that him next to Sawyer? Do I have to hurt someone? Dammit.

I know

I know that you all are tired of me changing my header by now.

I'm just doing it because I can. I expect the novelty to wear off soon.

When the Stars Go Blue p2

I think I've used this title already. Anyway.

One of the highlights of my day was my daughter's face when I gave her this lobster pillow.

This giant amusement (it's seriously 2' long, mimics a 6 1/2 lb lobster...) comes courtesy of Amelia, who got it as a gag gift last Xmas. Thanks, she loved it and it will be a funny addition to the beach room.

It is definitely not fun to hear your kid say "mom, I failed another science test... but I studied so hard." To see the dejection and self doubt creep back in... sucks. Mightily. She is smart enough to know when she's not performing on the same level as her classmates-- no matter how I try to pretty it up by calling a consultant teacher a tutor. I tell her that I know she's trying to do her best and that I know there are some things that just come harder for her, but I still see her hurting.

I try to remind her that school grades are so focused on specific skills, that sometimes they're just not a true picture of someone's strengths. I mean, it's like going to a dance contest, and you're a fantastic ballerina, and they want you to tap dance. She's a great singer - at the age of 10 she was singing a solo at the school play (Impossible, from Cinderella). But "choir" doesn't get a grade on her report card. Science does.

At any rate, I am always happy when I can throw her a little surprise like this and watch her face light up. Next week, another meeting with the committee for special ed. Happy happy joy joy. I'm bringing reinforcements.

Work continues to be bizzarre. You know what? I work because I need the extra money. Not because I've always dreamed of being a fantastic programmer, the best geek ever. I don't even LIKE Star Trek. I'd be content to be content, i.e. being a reasonably average programmer. I don't like to "play the game" and do the politics and maneuver and try to outguess people. Just give me work to do, and I'll do it, but I want to leave at 2pm so that I can take care of my kids because you only pay me until then and I'm really not interested in working unpaid overtime. Thank you.

The other highlight of my day was when I said "wax on, wax off" to someone in an instant message and he said "Actually I prefer wax on, wax on, wax on, waxonwaxonwaxon wax off."

So it was that kind of day.

Oh Amelia

I would like to ask y'all welcome a friend of mine to the blogging world...

".... My NY resolution was to be less judgmental. It's not working. "

She's going to be perpetually celebrating Safety Week. Link is over there on the right.

* *

In work news, I had a space invader in my office today. You know... someone who scootches their chair RIGHT UP NEXT TO YOU. Sigh. It's bad that I sat way forward on the edge of my chair and used the back as a barrier, isn't it? And he is a loud talker. Very nice guy, but if he said "Sticky database" one more time I was going to start swallowing post it notes so I could shit one out.

* *

Still more work news - I literally got a pink slip last week. OK, it was a post it note, from my boss, but it was pink and it was on my monitor when I got in - "See me ASAP." That's never good. It's still playing out, but today in a meeting I felt like a square peg was being shoved up my....

* *

American Idol. Boring. I love NY. Lost interest. Speaking of which, I'm not sure I'll watch Lost. Oh, who am I kidding, I'll watch and it will piss me off. Ditto, Survivor. Maybe I can stick with Amazing Race now that there won't be football anymore to screw it up.

No song title. What? I'm cranky. It's cold.

You look good in my shirt

So, will someone buy me this?

No?

Okay. It was worth a shot.

(it is so a song title, Keith Urban sings it)

Missing You

I am a little bummed today. No, not a Bears fan.

A Prince fan.

As in, I played the album, yes, a black vinyl ALBUM, at least twice every day my entire sophomore year of college and even broke up with The One That Got Away* while it was playing. Sigh.

Did I watch him last night, during the superbowl halftime show? I only wanted to see him laughing in the Purple Rain.

Nope. My company was collecting their things and going. Damn, damn, damn. Timing is everything.


*And it's probably good that he did, but that's another story.

Song by Trace Adkins....I've weathered waterspouts and hurricanes, Hailstorms and driving rain, And missing you.

Wide open spaces

By the way, my windows wallpaper in the screenshot down below is from

http://www.nottoolost.com/wallpaper/wallpaper.html (specifically, Utah)

...stop by and admire the beautiful pictures.

And yes, I probably am the only person who is blogging right now... I am bored with the game. No, wait, JV is not watching the superbowl; I'm pretty sure.

Still haven't found what I'm looking for

Some website named searchplus exists, and someone found me with a query of Ooops. Classic.
Here's some other google fun that lead unsuspecting people my way. Can you tell I have insomnia?

• libby lu bathrobes (why, why? isn't it bad enough that the store exists?)
• compound machines (this is SO not me....)
• why did Dierks Bentley cut his hair (for a video, pay attention)
• how to dance Techno (Poly, that's just not funny)
• I'll take that as a yes ( a Phil Vassar song)
• scrapbook page made with a vanilla folder (uh, manilla? it's not acid free, so don't...)
• story books on I hate chocolate (yeah, this is me...)

Yes, I'm cheating, the title is not a country song. I'm tired. But I can't sleep.

Nothing on but the radio

Interesting...

Road Runner has radio now. It's very similar to Sirius online, FREE if you don't count paying for road runner, and has 52 stations, 12 music genres.

I admit, we waste, uh, spend money every month on road runner. We have digital cable, a DVR, highspeed online... I love it. The DVR alone makes me extremely happy - no juggling tapes and if I want my kids to go to bed I just record whatever it is they think they "have" to watch.

I justify this expense by not ever going out to the movies (the last movie I saw was, uh, Sin City? Which just about killed me but that's another story.)

So I definitely like the idea of a free online radio. It doesn't hurt my review any that the first thing I did was pick a country station, and I got Phil Vassar. Nice. The popup window is a little bit slicker than Sirius'. It shows album cover, etc.








(by the way, song title by Gary Allan, but I can't stand him, so you won't find it in my iPod, ever. )

If I fall you're going down with me

Weezer, aka Suzy, took my son out on his new snowboard because we Finally. Got. Snow. Honestly, our first significant snowfall so far this winter.

He was a little concerned that we were taking him to Fear Park - then we told him what it was REALLY called. F-r-e-a-r.

He did pretty well for his first time. His stance is a little strange - butt sticking out practically to Kansas. Bend the KNEES, kids. Not that I have the slightest idea how to snowboard, but I don't think it's supposed to look like that. At least he stayed on his feet enough to be able to say "yeah, I did it".

It was worth hanging around to watch Suzy go down on a sled, take a bump, and fly through the air just a little to splat on her face. Awesome.

(She came up laughing, I'm not a total jerk. And, song by Dixie Chicks.)

Almost

Thanks Sgt. Almost there. Sushi is defnitely on me next time you're ever up this way.

Dammit blogger

I am trying to work on my template, and I hate the widgets.


I made a quick graphic to see if I could put it at the top of my page, but I can't. Grr. This is a photo Suzy took at work.

WTF, blogger?

Oh Sandy baby, why eye eye

Ok. I admit I went to see Grease in the 9th grade and loved it, but John Travolta had nowhere NEAR as many miles on him then. No way, no how.

I have angered the karmic gods today, because my daughter is blasting the Grease soundtrack via a cheap little iPod speaker I picked up for 19.99 just before Christmas.

Why, oh why? Yeesh.