This and That

Books
I set a goal to read 45 books in 2008. Last night I counted up what I’ve read since January.

I’m gleefully looking forward to reading 36 more books this year. With roughly eight months to go, that’s what? Four and a halfish books a month. HA. PIECE OF CAKE. I can do that with my eyes closed!

You should consider putting the following books in front of your open eyeballs:

Fat Girl’s Guide to Life by Wendy Shanker
The Book of Lost Things by John Connolly
No Country For Old Men by that crazy motherfarker, Cormac McCarthy

I invite you to browse my to-read shelf on Goodreads.com and make suggestions and recommendations. I am not opposed to adding more titles to that list. Let’s go crazy, let’s get nuts. Let’s make that list impossible to complete!

Blogs
I’ve been mulling over what I should do with this site. Nothing? Something? Everything? I haven’t been spending much time online lately and I like it. But I do wonder if I should do something about this space.

I went through my neglected feed reader today and cut it in half. I waffled about making cuts and decided that I can always add back. What does it matter if someone’s on my list if I’m never reading?

Babies
I’ve had a touch of baby fever lately. If someone has an infant they would like to loan to me occasionally, I would be grateful. I think having a baby around would be the shot in the arm I need to get over this already.

I really do want a puppy. You can offer to loan me yours, but I will keep it. You’ve been warned.

 

Don’t talk shit about Total!

None of you may be wondering why I didn’t write anything for a month. The same number of you might be wondering why I didn’t read your blog for a month. Let me tell you why:

I’m not sure. Sorry.

I spent some time participating on a message board I frequented before I began screaming for attention over here. I obsessed over Big Brother and kept up with American Idol. I started five books and didn’t finish any. I looked for everyone I know and everyone I don’t know on MySpace. I did some laundry, spent a weekend away with my family. I napped once or twice. I watched Tourette’s Guy on YouTube.* I, too, want to know:

Who gives a shit about Big Foot?

I’m tweaking my template because it’s easier than writing right now, so please be patient if you stop by and everything is sideways.

I’ve got some good stories to share. During my hiatus, my glasses snapped in half and my husband “fixed” them. I tracked down my former BFF online and the thing we have in common now? Pretty much gave me a coronary. My brother is off fighting the forgotten war and has issued a plea for help. Also, I pretty much rock and you want to hear all about it.

We’ll talk soon.

*I have this idea that everyone who reads this blog is a nice, sweet, gentle person who is the most politically correct citizen of the world. If that is true, you do not want to watch Tourette’s Guy on YouTube. Not only is the content offensive, but the fact that I watched it all and laughed until my forehead exploded is even more offensive. But I’m throwing it out there because there are some excellent, random quotes in there, Bob Saget. If you do go looking, please note that it is NSFW.

 

Whoa.

I logged in with the intention of making my fingers say something compelling, but WordPress went and changed everything up while I was out and WHOA! It looks all different and junk.

Things are good here. Supafine and such. More later, I’m sure.

 

Garfield Minus Garfield

I’m recovering from the flu and clawing my way over a mountain of laundry. I’d say I’m sorry for not reading and writing, but dude, I have been super sick. I have the mucus to prove it.

While I’m fighting my way back, be entertained, yo:

Garfield Minus Garfield

 

This and That: Pretend Q&A Edition

I’m going to pretend you asked me questions and then I’m going to answer them. That way I don’t have to make paragraphs connect and junk. Here we go.

Hey, coolbeans, what did you do on Thursday and Friday?
I worked and then I did some stuff and then we went out of town for a basketball game. My sister rode with us to the game. She watched movies and played video games with the kids. I think we will start taking her everywhere. Her name is Aunt Harmony.

What was Saturday, February 23, 2008 like for you?
We drove out of town again for the rest of the basketball tournament. We went to Dairy Queen in Smallest Town, USA. Then we took the kids to a hockey game. The kids liked it but my son thinks there should have been more fighting. His father and I agree. My five-year old has been stomping around the kitchen in plastic skates practicing for hockey.

And Sunday? How was that?
I napped. You know how sometimes you wake up and your neck or your shoulder or your arm hurts and you say, “I must have slept on it wrong.”? Well, Sunday afternoon, I slept on my eye socket wrong.

How’s that READING GOAL coming along?
Wow. You’re kind of pushy with the ALL CAPS thing there, missy. Maybe you should CHILL OUT. If you must know, it’s not going as well as one would hope. I’m going to be playing catch-up the rest of the year. Thanks for bringing it up!

I did finish a book this weekend, though. Montana 1948 by Larry Watson. I gave it four out of five stars. I’ve almost finished In Defense of Food and I don’t have much of Outlander left. I’m just not feeling that last one like I was at first. I don’t know. Something killed it for me. Maybe because it’s suddenly idiotic? Maybe not idiotic, but some of the characters are schizophrenic. I’m having a lot of trouble sorting out motivation.

How are you today?
I was tired all morning. Construction demolition and disrespectful, eyeball-rolling kids at work made me nearly lose my mind. I also think I’m sick. I’ve coughed all day and now I’m feeling achy. I better not have the flu. Because I said so.

 

Insomnia=Big Brother American Idol Intervention

This week I’m trying to stop relying on medication to help me sleep. I was using it almost nightly and I think it was messing with my memory. Monday night I went to bed at about 10:00 and was out before 11:00. I slept well. I was off to a great start.

Tuesday night I got to bed a bit later because I was helping my son with homework. (I hate homework.) I was in bed before 11:30 and read for a little while. When I dozed off and the book hit my face, I turned out the light and settled in. Around 12:15, my husband leaped from the bed and raced to the bathroom. Uh-oh. He was sick. I blame Burger King.

So I checked on him and went back to bed, sure I could get to sleep now that I had the bed to myself. NOPE! I was awake and awake and awake some more. It was making me mad, so I got up and watched television.

An aside about what I watched:
I love Intervention on A&E. I do not like the commercials for Paranormal State on A&E. I can’t fast-forward fast enough.

American Idol was alright. I like the rocker boys a lot and that 17-year old and the one with the dreadlocks? They are super. And that one guy? All the great songs from the 60s and he picks “Moon River“? What? Huh? Whahuh?

I do not understand the new season of Big Brother. Are the writers still striking? Can we make them stop doing that?

Anyway, I went back to bed at 3am but couldn’t sleep until after my husband’s alarm clock went off at 4:00. The kids woke me at 7:15 to get them to school on time.

Since then I have done the grocery shopping, unloaded and loaded the dishwasher, wiped down the counters, cleaned the bathroom, swept it and wiped down the floor and entertained/assisted my five-year old.

And I am not tired yet. I am totally paranoid I will get to work at 5:00 tonight and be 100% brain dead.

 

This and That

Question:
Why are my kids out of school today?

Answer:
Seriously. I don’t know.

Another question:
How are you celebrating this monumental holiday of great importance? Should I bake a cake?

Another answer:
My daughter is at a classmate’s birthday party and will spend the afternoon with her friends putting together a dance number for a talent show. My little guy is driving me up a wall. My oldest kid is watching Hillary Clinton on television.

Reading and eating:
I might try to make stuffed crust pizza tonight for dinner. Or not. I’m reading In Defense of Food by “that one guy” - if I don’t change “that one guy”, it means I forgot to look up his name (or that I thought that would be funny if I left it that way. His name is Michael Pollan.) Anyway, reading that book is confusing me. I mean, I know that things with leaves are in and we’re aufing things with wrappers. I’ve known this forever. But it’s SO HARD to eat that way. So far I know the author eats tomatoes and olive oil. I think he is in favor of butter. And chocolate cake. And larvae. I am down with all of the above except the larvae. Unless he gives the thumbs up to BBQ sauce, maybe.

Disappointment:
I worked all weekend and don’t have one good crazy person story to share about it. Except, I think a lady was holding her contact lens in her mouth while she was talking to me. Her male companion warned her not to swallow it.

My 13-year old son says:
“I don’t wear meat and I don’t eat fur.”

 

Meme: Friday’s Feast

Friday’s Feast can be found here. Excuse their mess. They have been experiencing technical difficulties.

Appetizer
Name one thing that is unique about you.

I am allergic to gin, honey and nutrasweet.

Soup
Fill in the blank: My favorite birthday is my birthday but I like my half-birthday, too.

Salad
What type of wood do you have for your home’s furnishings?

Mostly pressed board de la Walmart. Our kitchen table and chairs are pine. Pretty, but really smooshy. Everything we’ve ever written on paper at the kitchen table is etched into the table’s surface.

Main Course
Who do you talk to most often on the phone?

I don’t talk on the phone much. As soon as I put a phone to my ear, my family has very urgent messages for me that absolutely cannot wait. I tell them not to bother me unless they are bleeding or on fire, but they persist. When I do talk on the phone, it’s with my sister, my husband or my kids.

Dessert
What level of responsibility do you have in your job?

I’m the newbie, so I’m responsible for getting my work done and helping people. I don’t get to boss anyone around yet. But being bossy is definitely in my future there. It is my density.

 

Slump

I’m in a bit of a slump blog-wise. This happens from time to time. I just don’t like anything I write or don’t feel like writing. Some of the stuff that’s on my mind lately (religion, work, stuff my older kids are doing) are things I don’t like to share. A good portion of the problem is caring too much what you think of me. What if I talk about something and you go, “GASP!” and two or three years from now I read it in my archives and go, “grrrroan” and “What was I thinking?”

Some of you check in here every day and I have two things to say about that: 1) Thank you. I dig you. and 2) I’m sorry you’re checking this page every day and finding nothing new.

Sometimes posting that I’m in a slump or taking a break is all I need to clear my head and get going again. And there you have it.

 

Sunday Funnies

From i am bossy:

And here is the exact Ina Garten recipe: you take some cream cheese and add something else, and then lemon and dill and then talk about your husband Jeffrey, and then add one other thing while your gay friend strings lights in the garden, then you mix that with some chopped smoked salmon while sucking air through your teeth at the mere mention of sour cream. Delish.

Kristi from Here In Idaho:

I’m still singing!
All the time!
This will never get oooold!

From Fluid Pudding:

I suppose everyone copes with death in different ways. I cope with a furrowed brow and a striped-tight swagger.

From Hidden Mahala:

A heart covered pocket knife, what every girl is just dying to have.