Since I've been housebound...

for the last month, I haven't been to the grocery.  My well-stocked pantry and hoarding of household supplies has finally come in handy!  Of course, there is nothing in my refrigerator at this point that could possibly be described as fresh - so Ariela offered to take me to Publix this morning so I could stock up again.  Shopping is always fun, but I've never gone to the market with a five-year-old before - so this was an adventure.  Baby was already a little hyped up from whatever sugar he consumed with breakfast, but I may have made matters worse by alerting him to the fact that he could get a free cookie from the lady in the bakery.  I mean, who says no to a free cookie?  I'd also forgotten how unique a child's point of view can be.  When we got to the dairy department, I reached for a container of sour cream and as I went to put it in the car, Baby stopped talking mid-joke to shriek: "Taco butter!" and wanted to know why I was buying that.  I guess sour cream isn't part of a child's vocabulary, but he knows it's something you put on tacos.  I laughed, the guy who was stocking the yogurt section laughed and Baby laughed, too - although I'm not sure he knew why.  I also discovered that Baby is a person of vanilla sensibility.  Ice cream was on sale - I chose peach because it's summer, I asked him to choose the flavor he wanted to take home and share with his dad and sisters.  And do you know what he chose from the plethora of yummy flavors available?  Yep, vanilla.  Maybe I'm just a choco-holic - and while I don't have anything against vanilla in principle, I would certainly have chosen something more exciting if I were five.  When we got back to my house, my sweet friend brought the groceries inside while Baby spun around in my chair and regaled Aggie with a highly embroidered tale of our morning adventure.  Thanks to Ariela, I now have lettuce, tomatoes, veggie burgers (on sale!) and peach ice cream.  Friends are a good thing!

An exercise in visualization...

I'm willing to give it a try.  Think it will work?

I love these funny cat photos and captions!

Have you ever been held hostage...

by a stupid, inconsequential object?  I'm not being deep here -  I mean this ridiculous pink plastic paper clip.  Yes, the one right there.  I've been hanging on to this thing for probably twenty years.  I once discovered this quirky little gift shop that sold oddball office supplies, of which I admit that I am a big fan.  I bought three or four of the pink clips, a few purple ones, some funky pink scissors and a really cute tiny pink stapler.  One by one, over the years, the clips broke and the stapler went the way of earth.  I still use the scissors every day, but  I am down to one last pink plastic paper clip.  For a long time, I used it to mark the current day in my desk calendar - and then I embraced Outlook.  PPC (for lack of a better name) was relegated to marking my place in reading material, clipping bills together, holding my to-do list to the outside of my to-do folder; you name it, PPC is nothing if not versatile.  And then today, while I continued my annual pre-tax season get-the-house-in-order-to-get-the-carpet-cleaned frenzy, I found myself looking at PPC, lying there on the desk - all alone, no longer having any real purpose in the big scheme of things.  I am aiming for a relatively clutter-free work space - like that will really happen, but everyone needs a goal to strive for.  I don't need PPC anymore; he has outlived his place in my life.  I momentarily contemplated encouraging him to end it all by clipping a stack of papers beyond his ability.  No, I didn't want to be an accessory to what would surely amount to a crime against hard-working plastic paper clips everywhere.  I decided to just let PPC go; I took his photo, said thanks for the all of his faithful service and tossed him into the wastebasket.  Who knows where he'll end up - but I hope he's happy in his retirement.

  And no, I'm not insane - I just have really bizarre thoughts sometimes.

Laughter really is the best...

medicine!  I nearly laughed myself unconscious today while I was writing.  I know, that sounds weird, but I wrote some stuff that just struck me as so funny, I couldn't stop laughing.  I'm sure my upstairs neighbor thought I'd gone round the bend, but I don't really care.  The more I wrote and then the more I re-read and edited the couple of paragraphs that had sent me into hysterics, the more I laughed.  I seriously could not stop - and at the point when I started to feel light-headed, I had to get up and go in the other room.  Aggie and Peter are used to brief periods of hilarity at our house, so they didn't pay much attention to me.  I suppose if I dropped over dead on the floor, they'd think nothing of it and just eat my cheeks.  I think e.e. cummings would agree that my day today wasn't wasted at all.

Imagination in overdrive...

is not a good thing - especially when it comes to things that creep, crawl or bite.  I went up to the management office to renew my lease today for another two years.  The new office staff is very nice; the old property manager was a sort of sissy guy who jumped back like a little girl when approached by a small terrier.  Can you imagine?  Anyhow, everything is computerized now and while Andy was entering my information in the computer, my nosy self saw a page entitled Bed Bugs.  Bed bugs!  The seed for a major freak-out had been planted.  Now my rational self knows that we have no bed bugs, fleas or pests of any sort in our apartment, but still...  I signed all the papers and as I was leaving, Andy said, "Oh, this is yours," and handed me a legal-size sheet of paper with the heading: BED BUGS - A Guide for Rental Housing Residents.  Yikes!  Maybe it's an epidemic I don't know about - I laughed and told him it would make a good blog post.  If anyone can make the topic of bed bugs amusing, it's me.  Then I got home and read the thing.  Apparently, bed bugs don't discriminate and can largely be attributed to a surge in international travel.  Fancy hotels have them!  They don't transmit disease, but they're nasty little biters.  The guide went on to provide information on identifying and locating the filthy beasts as well as how to prevent an alien encounter when traveling.  Just like when a vampire knocks at your door, don't invite a bed bug in.  Don't pick up furniture left at the curb - who does that anyway?  It's also not advisable to wait for these flesh-eating zombies to leave on their own - call a professional.  I see a movie here: Bed Bug Busters, starring Dan Ackroyd and David Spade.  Rated PG-13 for extreme violence and over-the-top innuendo from the short, smarmy guy.  Of course, none of this stopped me from thoroughly vacuuming the armchair I got from a pristine, spotlessly clean upscale home in Parrish a couple of months ago, even though there was no evidence of wear, let alone an insect infestation of any kind.  I checked the sofa and chair, the bed and the dog and cat.  No bugs, no fleas - nothing.  I threw the biohazard notice away and set about my business.

And then, while getting ready to go to a Christmas dinner party, I noticed a welt on my arm.  I had apparently been bitten or stung by something - assailant unknown.  It itched like crazy, so I cleaned it with an aloe wipe ("Wipe! Wipe!"), put some cortisone cream on the area, slapped a band-aid on top and off to dinner I went.  Not a good thing - not a good thing at all.  Band-aids and my ghost-like sensitive skin do not mix - and by the time I got home, the raised irritation from the supposedly latex-free bandage was worse than the bite.  Fortunately, the itching had subsided, but the sting site was plenty ugly.  Time to break out the benadryl, more cortisone cream - and something to take my mind off imagining that a lone bed bug had somehow sneaked in here to bite me on the arm in broad daylight.

I'll let you know how that goes...

Amazingly...

Peter has left the tree alone.  Maybe he's just not tempted by the sight of a tree growing out of the dining table, I don't know.  He's never been fond of a scratching post - he prefers the furniture.  Unfortunately.  I just got a kick out of this cartoon.  Now watch Peter develop a sudden interest in the tree...

Ah dint git no rayz in mah allowentz...

but Ah did git sum chikn nuggitz.

Ah stil thinkz Ah shud git mor then a buk a weeek.

An Ah aint the one hoo wantz a monkee.

Do you suppose...

that Hump Day was originally named for Quasimodo?

Just curious...

Craigslist tickled my funny bone again...

this morning with two hilarious ads listed in the furniture section.  Yes, I know, I am out of room for anything new.  I am reminded of that fact every morning when I sit down at my desk and look at the over-sized client chair sitting on the other side.  But I digress...  The first ad that cracked me up was a listing for a "Slay Bed."  What???  Is this a bed in which a murder has already been committed or one that is perfectly suited for any murder the buyer might be contemplating?  It could have just been a simple misspelling, but the mystery lover in me likes to think that something more sinister is at work here.  The second funny ad was for a "Last Supper Rug" in perfect condition.  I can't imagine walking on Jesus and the Disciples, but to each his own.  I suspect that the person who listed the rug couldn't think of the word tapestry.  But, maybe not.

Don't you just love it...

when people make a generalized statement that is completely erroneous?  One of my clients just tried to convince me that there are no good-looking men named George out there.  Has she never seen this guy?  I told her she must live under a rock because I could think of more than a couple hunky Georges just off the top of my head - no research required.

George Eads of CSI fame...

The perennially tan and preternaturally well-preserved George Hamilton...

George Peppard - hasn't she ever seen Breakfast at Tiffany's or even the A-Team?

George Strait...

A young, handsome George HW Bush.  He even aged into a handsome older gentleman.

And well, he may be slightly goofy, but he's another nice-looking George, too.  I'm just saying.

Blogging blahs...

To borrow my friend Linda's words, I've been suffering from the blogging blahs.  I started out 2011 with good intentions and then I'm not quite sure what happened.  Life, I guess.  I was thinking today about things in general and I realize that over the past few months I've spent more than a little time ruminating over what I've lost rather than being thankful for everything I have.  I haven't written a word in my gratitude journal in a couple of months and that's not like me.  I know that I am the one who has to choose happiness - it is not automatically going to come my way.  When I started blogging, it was my attempt at choosing happiness during a particularly low time in my life - it made me think of something positive, uplifting or even funny to write about every day.  I'm determined to get back to that.  Yes, indeed-y.  And so in that spirit, this morning I perused the craigslist antique ads.  That's right - a major source of entertainment for me, as I've mentioned in the past, is the horrific grammar and spelling that runs rampant on craigslist.  And, in case you've been wondering about the photo above, I found an hilarious one this morning:  Bainet Authentic $150.  Puzzling, huh?  I always let my imagination run a bit before I click on the link - it's more fun that way.  What could this person mean?  An authentic beignet?  That didn't make any sense.  Something from Haiti?  There is a town called Bainet in Haiti - but I couldn't imagine what sort of antique would come from there.  A bonnet, perhaps?  I clicked the link and imagine my surprise when this is what I saw:

A bayonet.  Honestly, this person wasn't sure if he was advertising a doughnut or a weapon.  And $150 for a glorified knife?  It just goes to show you that anyone can operate a computer these days whether they are literate or not.  He probably even owns a dinning table.  Made of mehoggenie.

P.S.  And I just noticed that I have two new followers - so I guess I'd better get back to blogging - a few people really are interested in my recipes, book reviews, craft ideas, movie picks and general smart-aleckiness.

Who'd have thought it?

Monday, Monday...

Can't trust that day...  I mean, have you ever tried to sing this song?  Which part do you sing?  Or do you, like most of the free world, try to sing both parts?  I watched this crazy Craig Ferguson movie last night called The Big Tease.  He's a Scottish hairdresser - in a kilt, no less - who receives a letter that he mistakenly believes is an invitation to compete in the world championship hair show in Los Angeles.  A British filmmaker decides to document his adventure and the hilarious story goes from there.  At one point, he's singing California Dreamin' (equally difficult for one person to sing) and then he sings Monday, Monday - just like I do - trying to sing all the parts at once, or together, or sequentially - I don't know how to describe it - but it surely isn't pretty.  What about you?  How does your personal rendition of the Mamas and the Papas Greatest Hits sound?

Not for the easily offended...

Isn't it funny how our brains work?  Last night I was thinking about my friend Kathy in Utah (and no, this donkey does not in any way remind me of Kathy) - we worked together many years ago.  I sent her an e-mail, read for a while and then I went to sleep.  Well, while I was sleeping I guess my brain continued to shuffle through the memories from that time in my life and I woke up this morning having remembered the most hilarious thing that happened back then.  If you're easily offended, stop reading now.  But if you like a good laugh, go to the bathroom if you have to and for heaven's sake, don't drink anything while you're reading.

My first job after college was at a doctor's office - a large ear, nose and throat group.  They also had a hearing and speech center where they conducted audiological testing.  That was my job - assisting the audiologist.  He wasn't a bad guy, I guess, but he'd worked with this gang of MDs for so long that he wanted to be a doctor, too.  So he got an EdD degree from some correspondence school and insisted upon being called Doctor BlahBlah in the most pompous and annoying way.  He also had a very pompous and annoying wife who fancied herself our office manager.  She was one of those people that just made you wish God would come along and thunk her on the head to put her back in her place.  Just a little wake-up call.  I know I've thought that about a lot of people and I'm sure a lot of people have thought that about me from time to time.  We all need the thunk from the Hand of Heaven now and again.  Well, this woman was on everyone's last nerve right about that time and seriously in need of a little thunk.

Suffice it to say, we had some interesting patients.  You know the kind: a lady who complained that she'd lost her hearing overnight (turned out to be a roach in her ear), kids with beans or macaroni in their noses or ears - you get the picture.  One interesting patient in particular was an older woman named Jeannette Wright.  She was a gnarled, wiry and perpetually frazzled sort of a woman with tightly-curled grey hair that went in every direction.  Some people are just odd, I guess and Jeannette was certainly that.  We never knew much of her story until the day she brought her son Steven along with her to an appointment.  Steven was about 40 and developmentally disabled.  Suddenly, Jeannette's frazzled, stressed-out behavior made a little more sense - here she was nearing retirement age and was unfortunately one of those people who had spent all of her life caring for someone with no end in sight.  Steven was a quiet sort, but when he did speak, he had an alarming tendency to make inappropriate comments.  To our receptionist, Trudy: "Does your husband like that you're so skinny?"  He once announced to me: "You have big boobs."  Inappropriate, yes - but a statement of fact.  We just let these comments go, understood Jeannette's strangeness a little better and tried our best to be nice to Steven and make him feel welcome.

On the day that Doctor BlahBlah's wife was so very desperately in need of her much-deserved comeuppance (as my Grandma would say), Jeannette arrived with Steven in tow.  I was asked to escort them into the testing room and the doctor said to his wife, "Come on in on this one, Blah, this should be interesting." I followed them back into the room and leaned against the closed door.  I didn't want to miss whatever interesting comment that Steven surely had in store for Blah.  The audiologist took Jeannette into the booth, adjusted the headphones and then proceeded to give her yet another hearing test.  It was a routine patient visit until Steven leaned toward Blah and said, "Psst."  She ignored him.  He leaned closer and said, "Psst!"  That got her attention.  "Yes?" Blah asked, innocently enough.  At that, Steven said, "You suck."  Blah's mouth fell open and she responded with an aghast, "What did you say?"  Steven repeated, very calmly, "You suck."  Blah began sputtering, obviously unsure of how to respond.  Even more calmly, Steven said, "You suck donkey dickies."  I was having a hard time controlling myself at that point, having actually witnessed the Cosmic Breeze finally blow some crap in Blah's direction, but Dr. Blah was completely oblivious to his wife's shock and dismay at Steven's pronouncement.  And finally, in a finish I will never forget, Steven leaned in again and said, "It's okay.  All my friends do."  I don't know what happened after that because I was out the door and dashing down the hall to my office where my shrieks of glee couldn't be heard by Dr. BlahBlah or his wife.  All I knew was, the Hand had delivered its Thunk.  Big time.

I owe Steven for that; we all had a good laugh (well, except for Doctor and Mrs. BlahBlah) and I learned that we are all instruments of God's work, whether we are aware of it or not.  Thank you, Steven, wherever you are!

Can blonde be a recessive gene?

A Jewish man goes into a bar and orders a drink.  And then another.  After quite a few, he notices an Asian man sitting next to him.  Without warning, he punches the Asian man in the face.  Taken by surprise, the Asian man says, "What was that for?"  The Jewish man replies, "That was for Pearl Harbor!"  "You idiot!" yells the Asian man, "I'm Chinese, not Japanese."  The Jewish man shrugs and says, "Chinese, Japanese - it's all the same to me."  With that, the Asian man punches the Jewish man in the face and says, "And that's for the Titanic!"  The Jewish man rubs his jaw and says, "What are you talking about?"  The Asian man replies, "Goldberg, iceberg - it's all the same to me."

Alan Ginsberg

Daniel Ellsberg

I do have a point - so please bear with me (my maternal grandmother was a blonde).  I'm a child of the seventies and the evening news during the early part of the decade was consumed with Richard Nixon and the whole Watergate debacle.  There were so many players and so many plot twists that it was difficult for my teenage mind to keep track of them all.  Sure, I knew the main cast (Nixon, Haldeman, Ehrlichman, Liddy) but the supporting cast of thousands (or so it seemed) was a little harder to keep track of.  One thing that puzzled me for many years was exactly why Nixon thought it was a good idea to break into the office of Alan Ginsberg's psychiatrist.  I mean, what could the ramblings of a beatnik poet to his shrink have to do with Nixon and CREEP - I've always loved that acronym for the Committee to Re-Elect the President.  It applies to more incumbents than just Nixon, doesn't it?  I also couldn't understand why a man who lived in San Francisco would be seeing a psychiatrist in Washington, DC - that was a little extreme, but hey, maybe he was really concerned about anonymity.  Anyhow, last week the decades-long mystery was finally solved.  I was reading an article about Daniel Ellsberg, author of the Pentagon Papers, and realized that it was the office of his psychiatrist that the White House Plumbers broke into, not poet Alan Ginsberg.  It is indeed good to laugh at oneself, even after thirty-odd years.  And my first thought was: Ellsberg, Ginsberg - it's all the same to me.

Decisions, decisions...

DAWN:  Aggie, could you please move?  Mom needs to vacuum the floor.

AGGIE:  Zzzzzzzzz.  Snort...   Zzzzzzzzzzzzz.

DAWN: Aggie.  Move your butt.

AGGIE:  ZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzz.

PETER:  Shall I wake her, Mom?  Oh please, oh please!!!

DAWN:  At your own risk, buddy.

Peter and I are both still undecided.

He thinks that the old adage to let sleeping dogs lie 

might be the best course of action.

I, on the other hand, will live to vacuum another day.

Delicioso!

Have you seen those hilarious Kahlua ads with the gorgeous Ana de la Reguera?  She starts out by informing us that "In Vera Cruz we speak Spanish because that is what we speak in Vera Cruz, but also because it makes everything sound more intriguing."  She sashays over to a table, picks up a stapler and purrs, "Engrapadora."  Now, don't you just know that if this commercial airs during the SuperBowl that a whole bunch of children born in economically depressed urban areas over the next several months will be named Engrapadora.  You wait and see.  Anyhow, then she holds up a pair of shoes and intones, "Zapatos."  It's just very funny - and then when a guy named Robert ("Roberto!") says that Kahlua is delicious, she corrects him with a sultry look and says, "No! Delicioso!"  Can you tell I love a good commercial?  This one does make a good point that Spanish makes just about anything sound more intriguing - okay, piano is a bad example.  It's especially true of spanish menus; this afternoon Ariela surprised me with lunch from a new Mexican restaurant in town called Los Cabos.  Very authentic - and muy delicioso!

Yes - I ate the beans first.  Then I decided to take a photograph and rave about the amazing meal.  Sorry!  The chicken burrito was perfect - not spicy, but not bland either.  The beans were great and I even ate the rice.  Aggie gave the chicken filling her woof of approval.  There was a menu in the bag and the spanish names for the entrees did indeed make them sound a lot more appetizing than the english translation.  Here's a few examples:

Coctel de Camaron - shrimp cocktail

Godorniz - grilled quail (no thanks!)

Filete de Pescado al Mojo de Ajo - fish filet in garlic sauce

Queso Fundido - flaming cheese dip with sausage

Carne Asada - grilled sirloin steak

See what I mean?  Most men would say that Ana de la Reguera is a hot chick - "No! La chica caliente!"

Battle Hymn of the Tax Tiger...

This logo is from a business in California - I wonder if they're Chinese?
WARNING: Another politically incorrect post.

I've been reading all about the newest scourge of the liberal media: the Tiger Mother who dares to discipline her children and demand excellence.  How dare she!  I mean, what is she thinking - raising independent, responsible children in a society where it's not considered politically correct to take responsibility for one's own behavior and accept the consequences.  Of course, what do I know?  I'm reminded every so often why God, in His infinite wisdom, did not give me children.  I don't have any patience and I prefer children who are seen and not heard.  Gasp - I would have been a Tiger Mother of the WASP variety!  Just yesterday, a client came to see me and brought along her eighteen-month-old child.  Not a problem - until she let him take books off the hallway shelf, relieve them of their covers and proceed to tear at the pages.  The word NO never came out of her mouth and probably never even occurred to her - she tried instead, unsuccessfully, to reason with the child and finally got him to relinquish the books.  Another reminder of why I am childless - I have no qualms whatsoever about bruising a child's pysche, ego, self-esteem or butt.  Whenever my sister and I went anywhere at all with my parents, we sat still and did not speak until we were spoken to.  The more I thought about the whole issue of child-rearing, I realized that we were raised by Tiger Parents.  Anything less than straight As was met with varying degrees of disappointment and an admonition to do better.  If I had a nickel for every time I heard, "This isn't your best work."  We didn't do sleepovers, we participated in very few - if any- extracurricular activities, limited television time and yes, we had chores at home.  I learned to play a musical instrument and entertain myself.  I learned to read at any early age and I have to admit that all of these things made me a better student and, I hope, a more responsible person.  Not that I haven't made my fair share of bad choices and mistakes on my own - but I started out with a solid foundation.  Personally, I think Tiger Mother could make a killing giving parenting seminars.  I know more than a few parents I'd like to sign up!

Lunch at my desk...

is pretty simple today - a can of beans and some extra-strength pain reliever.  I am very thankful for my early tax season rush, but I do need to go to the grocery store and get a few things.  I'm down to one more can of beans on the pantry shelf - and I might - gasp! - have to cook something for lunch.

Heaven forbid!

Ittz all in Mom's hedd...

wen she gitz all uptite abowt eadin meet.  I node sumthin wuz goin on da othur day wen she came home frum da growshri store wif sum meet in da bag.  Wen I saw it wuz a stake I jumpped fur joy.  So she cookt it on that stoave thing and we had dinnur but she gayve mos of it to me.  I wud have et it raw and sayved her the trubble.  She tole her frend that its the smel that getz her and so she aynt byin no more meet cept slyct turkee.  Shez jest sorta crayzee about this meet thing an in a cupple ov munths sheel buy sum agin and I wil get to eet it.

Jes youz wate and see.