The ramblings of a somewhat bawdy, opinionated, pop-culture-loving thirty-some-year-old woman who feels like sharing her random thoughts with the world.
Oh boy - what events have transpired in the past week. This has got to be the end of the world now, right? The Pope resigned, lightning struck St. Peter's, a meteor exploded over Russia, an asteroid came whizzing past the planet, and some poor cruise ship passengers were stranded for a few days. (Okay, maybe that one's not so scary if you're not on the ship.)
I didn't even know a Pope could quit. I'm sure I'm not in the minority on that one. I mean, think of poor Pope John Paul toward the end of his career. You had to hold him up with a stick and he still kept going. Benny gets a kink in his neck and he's like, "That's it, I'm outta here!" Two things about this. One - apparently the big dude in robes in the sky wasn't so keen on the idea because he sent out a little message:
Methinks someone is not pleased.
And two - this brings forth a new doomsday prophesy. According to something written back in the Twelfth Century, the good ol' Last Judgement is supposed to happen during the time of the 112th Pope. Guess what?! The next Pope is #112. Welcome aboard! Please, read more about it here.
So then there's this little ship that had a little fire and people aboard it got stuck with no electricity and no working plumbing and it got stinky and people weren't happy and now they're back on land and all is well. Moving on...
Then, the event that we knew was coming - the arrival of the asteroid 2012 DA14. A beautiful name, isn't it? It came a mere 17.000 miles near us. That's 5,000 miles closer than our orbiting satellites. We saw it coming, we knew we were safe, and thought it was cool. You could even watch it online and see it whizz by. Bye bye DA14! Yay, science!
But then there was the unexpected event that many of us woke up to reading about -the meteor that exploded over Russia. For us watching it on YouTube and the news and reading stories on the internet, it's simply fascinating. Just think about what the people who lived it were thinking. For those who saw it, was it a meteor, some sort of missile, Superman? But the sonic wave it caused...my lord!
Here you are, going about your daily business and this wave of sound blows out your windows and scares the living begeezus out of you. No wonder there were over 1,000 people injured - nobody saw it coming. A bit of a wake up call to remind us that we're just one little insignificant speck in an enormous universe so vast that it makes my head hurt just trying to think about it. Ouch.
So...is the end of the world nigh....again? Are we all going down sooner than later? Are we in for a disaster of Biblical proportions? Shall we be expecting the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse for high tea?
I think I need a drink. Anyone have four teacups I can borrow?
Ah, it's that day again. Pink fluffy hearts and flowers and so much sugar being shoved down my gullet that I'm about ready to go into a diabetic coma.
I am somewhat amused and disturbed by the number of posts on Facebook and Twitter abbreviating Valentine's Day to the much shorter (thanks to people's lazy fingers) and utterly disturbing "VD". I'm not sure that people even know what VD stands for. We've been living in the world of STD's for so long that they probably don't know that before people found it acceptable to use any variation of the word "Sex" they referenced Venus, hence Venereal Diseases.
In honor of this odd posting trend, I've decided to dedicate this post to some of the great VD Awareness posters of old. Man, apparently we women were evil back then. What am saying - we still are...
Watch out for those loose women, boys! If you want it clean, you'd better have to work for it.
Dang, I thought I was a "Good Time" Girl. I guess my understanding of the term isn't what it used to be. Stay clean so you can kick some Axis ass, boys!
I guess it's about as effective as jumping up and down after sex to prevent pregnancy, huh?
This one's from after World War I. I think keeping America clean shifted from VD to trash somewhere along the line...
Um...wow.
Ooh....that's a racy one for back then!
I think this one has to be my favorite though...
98% of all Procurable Women??? What classifies women as "procurable" and how did the human race ever survive if so many women were doling out so many terrible STD's I mean VD's? It's a miracle!
So there you have it. My tribute. May you make it through VD without contracting a VD.
Dear, sweet Sabrina over at Pouffia (who claims to have the attention span of a hyperactive toddler)has bestowed another honor upon me. Behold, the Versatile Blogger Award!
I suppose the fact that I bounce from movies to hot men to life situations to dreams to feeling fat and back to hot men again makes my blog pretty robust in its subject matter. I guess I am kinda versatile! Muy thanks, Sabrina!
Again, with awards come rules. (I wonder if Oscar winners have rules like these...) The rules for this one are as follows:
Rules:
1. Thank the blogger who nominated you and include a link to their site
2. Add the Versatile Blogger Award picture to your blog post
3. Nominate 7 fellow bloggers that you follow and link to their sites
4. Let them know you've nominated them
5. Share 7 random facts about you
Check #1 and #2 off of the list.
See, here's where I have problems again...nominating fellow bloggers. I read so very few and most of the few I read are specific to one topic (or have become that way), or have just kind of fizzled out, or way too large and run by big corporations that don't take awards like this. I think I need to expand my horizons a bit. Okay...a lot. Anyway, forgive me for breaking this rule. (I'm such a rebel.) I'd bestow it upon Sabrina if she hadn't given it to me in the first place.
Well, that nixes rule #4
On to #5...random facts! Geez, I'm boring. Let me see what I can come up with here:
Factoids:
1. I met two of the New Kids on the Block (Jordan & Joe) when I was a freshman in high school. I took their pictures and had Jordan autograph a picture that I had drawn of him. My friends and I were the talk of the school the next day. Hmmm...I think I'll have to write about that sometime.
2. I never got drunk until I was 21 (our legal drinking age). I was a good girl!
3. I'm nowhere near a Catholic, but I love a good high mass in Latin every once in a while (thanks to EWTN).
4. I have a fear of being near ostriches. They're too big. They're too big to be birds, they're mean and they're strong. Like little dinosaurs. I don't want to be near a dinosaur, so why would I want to be near an ostrich? Odd thing is that there's actually an ostrich farm on my way to work, so I see them every day...from a safe distance.
5. My dream job would be designing exhibits for museums. What a way to put all of my interests together in one nice little bundle.
6. I never knew either of my grandfathers. They both died years and years before I was born. Actually, both of my parents' fathers died when my parents were sophomores in high school, so I was somewhat paranoid that the same thing would happen to my dad when I was a sophomore. It didn't.
7. If I had been born a boy, my parents were going to name me Todd. Todd? I'm glad I was born a girl.
There you have it! Thanks again to Sabrina for the award. I hope I can continue to live up to it!
Okay, so I missed it by a few days. Well, I missed posting about it anyway. My normal writing time has been taken up by work, so please don't hold it against me.
I have had a terrible case of cabin fever this winter. We've had no money to do anything fun and it's been really freaking cold, so I've been stuck in my apartment playing cards, glancing at Facebook, feeling my butt get bigger day by day. I finally had enough last week and was determined to do something fun over the weekend.
Then I remembered that Saturday was Groundhog Day. Sure, that doesn't sound like anything fun to celebrate...and normally it's not....but located only half an hour away from me is the town where most of the classic Bill Murray movie was filmed. You know...Groundhog Day. The town has embraced the movie with affection and has an annual festival showcasing the movie and the places where it was filmed and to top it off - most of it is completely free of charge! I'm there!
I consulted the Almighty Interwebs, consulted their website, and found that there was going to be a guided tour of the filming locations (again..free) on Saturday afternoon. I thought that would be just the right mix of cheese, fun, trivia and IT GOT ME OUT OF THE HOUSE!!! Okay, sure, so the high temp for the day was only supposed to be 16 degrees with a wind chill hovering right around 0, but I'm a Wisconsin chick - I come from the Frozen Tundra (so they say) - I could handle it.
Saturday morning, I got up, exercised, showered, had my one precious cup of coffee, threw on 3 layers of clothing - of course including my Groundhog Day t-shirt:
Okay, so nobody would probably even see the shirt because it was going to be constantly covered by more layers, but I knew I was celebrating in fine style. On went the scarf, the long winter coat, gloves and hat, and I was on my way!
Now, even though I only live 30 minutes away from this town and have been through it on my way to other places more times than I can count, I've never actually stopped there. The downtown area is built around a town square and this is where the bulk of the movie takes place.
The focal point of the Square is the Opera House. In the movie, this served as the hotel that Andie MacDowell's character stayed at and was also where Phil jumped out of the tower and met his demise. Well, his demise until the day started over anyway.
The Opera House = totally haunted
I went to the building and noticed this little sign in front of it, noting that in the movie, this was the Pennsylvanian Hotel:
And then as I looked around, I noticed that these little signs were dotting the square. It was time to investigate and give myself a little tour. Thanks to the signs and the handy-dandy map that I printed out which showed all of the locations that I could visit, I made my way around the square reliving scenes, and remembering classic lines thanks to the help of the other people who were visiting and reciting them to their friends.
I went to Gobbler's Knob...
And I saw the Tip Top Cafe
(which used to be an empty building and is now a taqueria)
And then I saw the famous corner where Phil meets Ned. See...they even have a plaque there!
Bing!
Do you not remember what I'm talking about? Let me refresh your memory.
So if this is the corner, then that must mean that right over here is......
That first step! The doooooozy spot! The Holy Land!
I hear angels.
I could have gone home right then completely satisfied, but I knew that the guided tour was coming up shortly, so I had a quick bite to eat at a nice friendly family restaurant on the square (the one place where I was able to take off my coat so that people could see my awesome shirt) and headed to the meeting spot for the tour.
And then the location manager for the movie, Bob Hudgins, showed up and we began the tour. Well, kind of. We stood at that spot and discussed how the movie came to be filmed there, he gave details and stories of filming and the weather and the snow...and we got colder and colder. When you're standing in one spot in the wind, there's nothing moving to keep you warm.
We stood there for about half an hour listening to him and then after questions were taken from the tour members, we moved on to the next spot. Another half hour passed at that spot before we moved on to the third. By the time we were an hour and a half into the tour and only midway through the third stop of the tour of twelve stops, I could no longer feel my feet...even with my two pairs of socks on. And that was when I decided to take my leave. I had seen what I wanted to see. Even though I would have loved to have heard more stories about the filming, because they were incredibly humorous and interesting, hypothermia is not worth entertainment.
Listening, learning about the puddle scene, and freeeezing.
I drive home, finally beginning to feel my toes once again around the halfway point, turned on our fireplace, bundled up under the world's most comfortable blanket, hot chocolate in hand, and switched on AMC for their Groundhog Day marathon. As it went from scene to scene, I completely annoyed educated my husband with all of the interesting facts I learned while I was there. I have a feeling he's thankful I didn't make it all of the way through the tour.
I think I might make this an annual thing! Well...when it's not so flipping cold. Anyone want to join me?
Some of you may remember the post I wrote last year called boo to bullies where I talked about the bullying I went through as a kid in middle school and the bullying that my own middle school son was enduring. Well, almost a year has passed and there are changes afoot for both of us.
My son is getting picked on less and less. I think it has something to do with the fact that he's actually starting to step in when he sees another student being picked on. He doesn't get violent, he just tells the other kid to knock it off and sometimes physically takes the victim out of the situation. This has happened three times that I know of this year. Once with a kid who kept getting picked on in the cafeteria where he called out the kids as being immature for ganging up on this other student, once when he stood up for a girl who kept getting picked on (she had a bit of a hero crush on him after that), and just a couple of days ago he told a kid to stop picking on a smaller kid after he'd been doing it for quite some time and actually moved the kid out of the situation. I love my son! Now I'm just afraid that someone's gonna end up getting fed up with him ruining all of their fun and take it out on him. Man, I wish we had better health insurance... Anyway, he's really beginning to come into his own with a group of friends and his confidence level is beginning to soar. (Well, except with his actual schoolwork. If we could get him just as passionate about that....)
In my story, things have just taken an interesting turn. The girl who used to pick on me in middle school, who called me names in 6th grade and laughed at me with the basketball coach in 7th grade, who had disappeared from my life after graduation, has just now reappeared in the world of Facebook. And the irony of it all - She's now a 6th grade teacher. I don't hold a grudge against her for the way she treated me. We were all young and I'm sure she's matured since then. I do wonder a few things though, like does she remember or even realize the way she treated me? And if so, does she regret what she did? And if not, does she teach her kids to be accepting and not to judge? And as a teacher, how does she feel about bullying? It will be interesting to see if she shows up at our 20 year reunion (gulp) this summer. But if she does, do I bring any of it up or just pretend it never happened? I guess we'll just see what happens.
Anyway...it's funny that at the same time we're both coming to new chapters in moving on from the negativity thrown at us when the occurrences were so many years apart. Hopefully the next chapters will prove to be even more positive.
Not major issues. I don't want to crawl in a hole and pretend it's not happening. I'm still going to be taking the day off tomorrow, having my "me" day and celebrating, but today something hit me and 38 is sounding really freaking old!
In an effort to make myself realize that other people born the same year as I am don't seem old, I hit up my old friend, the Internet. I found some very interesting things. Angelina Jolie and I were born the same year. So were Eva Longoria, Bradley Cooper and Christina Hendricks. They're not old! Of course, they're much better looking than I am to start off with, can use the highest priced beauty items, afford gym memberships (or more likely, their own home gyms/personal trainers) and they're not forced by lack of funds to shop at Wal-Mart for food that is far from organic.
I'm not sure if this made me feel better or worse.
After being completely discouraged at work (yet again) and realizing (yet again) that there's nowhere for me to go here, I started exploring other options.
I looked at job listings and found nothing.
I looked at education options and found something that I'll think about pursuing.
Not finding what I was really looking for, I decided to go a different direction.
I looked up airfare prices for domestic flights.
I looked up information on how to get a passport.
I looked up airfare prices for international flights.
And then I laughed at myself, opened up a file on my computer and started writing instructions on how to do my job for the next person. One way or another, I'll get out somehow.
I have been on the verge of an anxiety attack (or in the midst of a mild one) all day. Possibly even longer than that - I don't know. I've never had one before...that I know of. All I know is that all day today, and for some time last night when I was trying to get to sleep and at the end of last week for a little while, I've been so tense that it feels like my skin is crawling, my heart rate accelerates from time to time, my mind shoots from one thing to another and I can't focus, I've been dizzy and on the verge of a headache and anytime I'm presented with any little bit of tension, my heart feels like it's about to jump right out of my chest until I breathe my way out of it. What the hell?!
I'm the mellow laid-back one. I don't stress out. I don't let things get to me. I mean, yeah - things have been pretty stressful lately, but they're now starting to turn around. And I had a couple of little hiccups in my groove today, but nothing that isn't going to be okay soon. I don't get it. Why now? And why ever?!
I looked it up on WebMD (because that's the first thing you should always do), and my symptoms matched perfectly. I looked up the causes and it said, "Anxiety may be caused by a mental condition, a physical condition, the effects of drugs, or from a combination of these." Gee, that's helpful.
Okay, fine. I know I'm having some sort of attack so what do I do about it? Ever-knowledgeable WebMD suggests the following:
Exercise. I do this every morning.
Meditation. Again, every morning - sometimes just a quick one and other times for an hour or so.
Don't partake in illegal drugs. Ummmm...duh.
Stay away from caffeine and chocolate. I don't think my one cup of coffee routine is making me wacko, nor is the possible one bite of chocolate I take a day.
So, I'm already doing everything I'm supposed to be doing in order to help calm any anxiety, but I'm still sitting here full of anxiety! So does this mean that I have some sort of a mental problem? Am I going to have to start taking medication? Oh great, one of the other symptoms is fear of having more attacks. Gah!
Okay, okay....I'm going to sit here in my office surrounded by the fragrance of "Sandalwood and Soothe", say some mantras, listen to some 16th century lute music, and sip on some Zen tea. If that doesn't do the trick, someone better have me committed.
Dear Lord, please don't let the cute guy in Cubicle 2A choose today to fall in love with me and take me in the supply closet to have his way with me. I'm wearing knee-highs.
Is it just me, or are these some of the ugliest things ever created for the females of the species to wear? Now I'm not talking about the cute patterned ones that go with frilly little skirts, I mean the regular old flesh-colored half-stockings that we wear to work,
Sure, they look just fine under a pair of pants, (I refuse to use the term slacks - I'm not 60), but if you make the mistake of taking those pants off before you take off the hose, you're in for a scary sight. The elastic cuff at the top of the stocking is tight so that it doesn't fall down, which is a good thing, but if you have any body fat (unlike the above mannequin legs or your typical knee-high models) this creates something more like a tourniquet and therefore a bit of a muffin-top and muffin-bottom around said cuff which also helps to accentuate the knobby knee directly above it..
Of course, if you do take off the knee highs before the slacks, you're still left with an indentation going around your leg just below your knee that will last for at least 6 hours. You really have to plan ahead when you wear these things. No skirts, shorts, hot dates, etc. for the rest of the day. Ick.
That's all. Just an observation. Carry on with your day.
I suppose it's the time of year when I look forward to the next and come up with a list of goals. I was never very big on that whole goal thing until last year when I set a few for myself:
The new and crazy goal that could take some work? Running Crazylegs. Done
Taking care of something that's been on my to-do list for a very long time? Goal accomplished. Done
The little trip somewhere? That one didn't pan out as I had hoped. I was aiming for a few nights in New York...I got one night in Chicago. Not Done
Seeing my friends more often? I couldn't really tell ya. It never seems like it's enough. ???
Laughing with my son as much as possible? Well, he hasn't turned angsty yet, so I still have time. I have been sure to get as much time in with him as I can though - whether he likes it or not. Done
Dancing more often? Hell yeah! Done
I'm having a problem coming up with anything for this year. I don't set weight loss goals or come up with resolutions like "I'm going to lose 10 pounds" because that's not me. Resolutions are made to be broken. I like plausible ideas that are somewhat challenging. Ideas that push me, make me get out of my comfort zone, help me grow and be a better person. Things that make me more...me.
I'm just at a loss. Maybe I don't need any changes or growth this year.
