Protected: Psycho Queen – Direct Examination

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Things that make you go… OUCH!

Last night we were discussing the World Series and I was relating to the kiddos my first experiences with baseball.  I didn’t really grow up a baseball fan, although my Dad is a sports fan of the highest order.  I did enjoy watching games with him and I absolutely LOVED going to them.  To this day, I would much prefer attending a game than watching it on TV, although I really liked the Sundays that we ordered hot wings and watched football games.

Anyway, when I was about 13, my family took an extended vacation to the east coast.  It was packed with fun things to do, cool places to see, and seafood to eat.  I got some great pictures.  I took one of the Liberty Bell with a very nice tourist behind it in black socks and shorts.  It looks just like the Liberty Bell sprouted legs with nerdy black socks pulled almost up to its knees.  Too funny.

One of my very favorite parts of that trip was going to a Yankees game at Yankee Stadium.  I explained to the kids how we took the subway and how awed I was at just being there.  Having heard about it for so many years, it was kind of humbling to just step inside.  I had a great time with my Dad and it’s a memory I will always treasure.

Just as I was getting a little misty-eyed at the memory, Freddy says to me, as straight-faced as he could be:

“That’s cool, Mom!  Was The Babe there?”

Um… no.  Because The Babe would be, like, 110 by now.

I am old.  It’s official.

TV Addictions

I have a couple of TV addictions I’ve mentioned in the past.

The first, and most serious, is to Dancing with the Stars. It is the sole reason that I recently purchased a DirecTV Receiver with DVR. I have a meeting every other Monday night and just could NOT bear to miss it.

Since the DVR joined our family, I must admit it’s been easier to indulge my addictions without affecting the rest of my family members. AND? I can skip all the commercials. It’s wonderful.

But the newest addition to my TV Addiction List is by far the best… maybe ever.

Listen (or read) carefully…

Are you paying attention?

You absolutely…

Unequivocally…

Without question…

Have to watch…

Are you ready?

Here it is:

It’s simply wonderful. In the spirit of Big Fish, it has a fantastic narrator, a comic-like setting, over-the-top acting, and a beautiful story. I love it.

I absolutely love it.

My favorite lines from Pushing Daisies so far:

Chuck: I guess dying is as good a reason as any to start living.

Ned: I know, deep down in my primal sweet spot, that I was being unselfish for selfish reasons.

Ned: Everything we do is a choice. Oatmeal or cereal. Highway or side streets. Kiss her or keep her. We make choices and we live with the consequences. If someone gets hurt along the way we ask for forgiveness. It’s the best anyone can do.

Are you watching it, too? I’d love to hear what you think…

Or share your own addictions… maybe there’s another one I’m missing.

The Ant and the Grasshopper Retold

Thanks to Lynda for sending this one on. I couldn’t resist posting it. It sounds so very familiar these days!

Two Different Versions. Two Different Morals.

OLD VERSION:

The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building his house and laying up supplies for the winter.

The grasshopper thinks the ant is a fool and laughs and dances and plays the summer away.

Come winter, the ant is warm and well fed.

The grasshopper has no food or shelter, so he dies out in the cold.

MORAL OF THE STORY: Be responsible for yourself!

———————————————————————–

MODERN VERSION:

The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building his house and laying up supplies for the winter.

The grasshopper thinks the ant is a fool and laughs and dances and plays the summer away.

Come winter, the shivering grasshopper calls a press conference and demands to know why the ant should be allowed to be warm and well fed while others are cold and starving.

CBS, NBC, PBS, CNN, and ABC show up to provide pictures of the shivering grasshopper next to a video of the ant in his comfortable home with a table filled with food. America is stunned by the sharp contrast.

How can this be, that in a country of such wealth, this poor grasshopper is allowed to suffer so?

Kermit the Frog appears on Oprah with the grasshopper, and everybody cries when they sing, ‘It’s Not Easy Being Green.’

Jesse Jackson stages a demonstration in front of the ant’s house where the news stations film the group singing, ‘We shall overcome.’ Jesse then has the group kneel down to pray to God for the grasshopper’s sake.

Nancy Pelosi & John Kerry exclaim in an interview with Larry King that the ant has gotten rich off the back of the grasshopper, and both call for an immediate tax hike on the ant to make him pay his fair share.

Finally, the EEOC drafts the Economic Equity & Anti-Grasshopper Act retroactive to the beginning of the summer.

The ant is fined for failing to hire a proportionate number of green bugs and, having nothing left to pay his retroactive taxes, his home is confiscated by the government.

Hillary gets her old law firm to represent the grasshopper in a defamation suit against the ant, and the case is tried before a panel of federal judges that Bill Clinton appointed from a list of single-parent welfare recipients.

The ant loses the case.

The story ends as we see the grasshopper finishing up the last bits of the ant’s food while the government house he is in, which just happens to be the ant’s old house, crumbles around him because he doesn’t maintain it.

The ant has disappeared in the snow.

The grasshopper is found dead in a drug related incident and the house, now abandoned, is taken over by a gang of spiders who terrorize the once peaceful neighborhood.

MORAL OF THE STORY: Be careful how you vote.

Protected: Just Curious…

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Protected: It Gets my Gizzard

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Things You Might Not Want to Know

I totally stole this meme from That Chick Over There… OK, I didn’t actually steal it because she said, “If you would like to do this meme, help yourself!”

Either way, here it is:

1. What kind of SOAP is in your bathtub right now?

Upstairs, the kids have Beaver Butt soap from our trip to Alaska. If you belong to PETA, don’t stress. There really aren’t any Beaver Butts in the soap. In our bathtub downstairs? No soap. It has jets. Jets + Soap = Bad

2. Do you have any watermelon in your refrigerator?

It’s October. No.

3. What would you change about your living room?

I would change the fact that I don’t have a living room. Just a family room, which I love. But I think I’m permanently scarred from not having a living room. I think my Mother instilled in me that one should have a living room and I’m just not quite “there” in life yet, because I’m still in a living room-free zone.

4. Are the dishes in your dishwasher clean or dirty?

Dirty. I live in a household of 6 people. There is a two-minute window during which the dishes in my dishwasher are actually clean. Then they’re just used again and replaced by dirty ones.

5. What is in your fridge?

Leftover pizza, eggs, Hummingbird feeder stuff that looks very much like Kool-Aid (I suspect some of the members of our household really thought it WAS Kool-Aid and drank some but we’ll talk about that another time), milk, butter, 1/2 teaspoon of Miracle Whip in a GIANT container, other assorted condiments, and some shriveled up grapes.

6. White or wheat bread?

Whole wheat.

7. What is on top of your refrigerator?

About a metric ton of dust and other stuff My Hubby put up there just to tick me off since I can’t reach it.

8. What color or design is on your shower curtain?

I don’t have a shower curtain. I have a shower completely encased in glass–don’t get me started about the genius that decided a shower should be completely surrounded by glass… clear glass, even. You get the picture. It’s not pretty.

9. How many plants are in your home?

There are numerous plants. Too many to count. It’s important to note that these plants only exist because My Hubby takes care of them. I am the black thumb.

10. Is your bed made right now?

No. Do people still really make the bed? Except for when company comes over (like my in-laws or something), why? It’s just going to get un-made in less than 12 hours. I could conquer the world in the time I would spend making my bed every day. I’ll have to get to work on that.

11. Comet or Soft Scrub?

Bon Ami.

12. Is your closet organized?

No. I need a closet intervention, really. Maybe I’ll write to California Closets and get them to do a closet makeover…

13. Can you describe your flashlight?

It’s a big one. Black, holds like 11 hundred batteries.

14. Do you drink out of glass or plastic most of the time at home?

Glass. But the kiddos all drink out of plastic. Shattered glass and wood floors do not make happy feet.

15. Do you have iced tea made in a pitcher right now?

Yes, but it’s fake Iced Tea. It’s Crystal Light Peach Iced Tea.

16. If you have a garage, is it cluttered?

No. My Hubby is ANAL about his garage organization. It’s like a show garage. Seriously.

17. Curtains or blinds?

Blinds on all windows. Curtains in the bedrooms along with the blinds.

18. How many pillows do you sleep with?

One. Unless you count My Hubby and the cat, then three.

19. Do you sleep with any lights on at night?

No. I like complete darkness.

20. How often do you vacuum?

Twice a week. We aren’t home except for twice a week, except to sleep.

21. Standard toothbrush or electric?

Standard.

22. What color is your toothbrush?

Purple.

23. Do you have a welcome mat on your front porch?

Yes. I arm wrestled My Hubby at the store (and won) to get one that looks like little cobblestones. He wanted one that said, “Go away!” He really is nice, I promise.

24. What is in your oven right now?

A couple of oven racks and some carbonized pizza that will NEVER come out of that oven no matter how much Easy Off we spray in there and no matter how long the Easy Off sits on it.

25. Is there anything under your bed?

Cat hair. About 800 pounds of it. Because I have a neurotic cat that pulls her hair out instead of just grooming herself like normal cats do.

26. Chore you hate doing the most?

Cleaning the toilets. I live in a household with 2 boys and 1 man. We have three bathrooms. I don’t have an aiming problem. Therefore I have passed the cleaning of the toilets baton right along to the three of them. Ironing would be a close second. I just let the dryer do the ironing for me.

27. What retro items are in your home?

My Hubby is the keeper of all things retro. They mostly go in the garage. He has a gazillion old hubcaps, oil cans, tin signs, and more. I’m not really a retro kind of gal, unless you count the 80’s as retro. If so, I think I have a pair of legwarmers running around somewhere.

28. Do you have a separate room that you use as an office?

Yes. But I don’t know if I’d really call it an office as much as I would call it a room that holds the 8,000,000 pieces of paper we deal with every month… and the computer.

29. How many mirrors are in your home?

Four

30. Do you have any hidden emergency money around your home?

I have about $30 in pennies in a hatbox. We dump that out every now and again when somebody is short on lunch money. I’m sure the lunch lady loves us.

31. What color are your walls?

All the walls in my house are white, except for the office, which is Sand Dollar.

32. Do you keep any kind of protection weapons in your home?

No. I figure if someone wants my stuff that bad, they can have it. Or I’ll just use My Hubby’s marble rolling pin on ‘em.

33. What does your home smell like right now?

Cinnamon.

34. Favorite candle scent?

Cinnamon.

35. What kind of pickles (if any) are in your refrigerator right now?

Sweet, dill, relish, stackers, you name it. We are a pickle eatin’ family!

36. What color is your favorite Bible?

Blue. It’s a new one. The Message.

37. Ever been on your roof?

No. But I’ve stood on the ground while My Hubby was on the roof, shaking in my shoes, certain that he would fall off! I don’t have a fear of heights for myself, just for other people.

38. Do you own a stereo?

I own a car. It has a stereo, but I never turn it on.

My Hubby has a stereo in the house, but I beg him not to turn it on.

I’m not a big stereo person. You know how people say, “If it’s too loud, you’re too old?” I’m too old. I like quiet.

39. How many TVs do you have?

Four, counting the one in the basement that I got for High School graduation a billion years ago that still actually sorta kinda works, as long as you don’t want to do anything fancy like hook up DirecTV to it.

40. How many house phones?

3, but I’m thinking about getting rid of land lines entirely.

41. Do you have a housekeeper?

Yes! I have four of them. Daphne, Velma, Freddy and Shaggy. Call Social Services if you feel you must. I’m not against child labor, especially when they labor so hard to make the messes in the first place.

42. What style do you decorate in?

I don’t decorate. I leave that to My Hubby–the one with more artistic ability than an overripe grapefruit.

43. Do you like solid colors in furniture or prints?

Solids

44. Is there a smoke detector in your home?

Three.

45. In case of fire, what are the items in your house which you’d grab if you only could make one quick trip?

My Hubby, Daphne, Velma, Freddy and Shaggy… and the cat. Maybe the turtle if I had time and he didn’t hiss at me. And our wedding pictures, which aren’t digitized yet. Everything else, as Chick so eloquently put it, is just stuff… and we have insurance.

If you would like to do this meme, help yourself!