New(ish) Feature! Posts In Pictures! Because, Seriously, Sometimes These Things Go On Too Long.
Sorry Sisters. This exactly displays the horror we feel on many occasions. This one was for our brother, who’s having his first baby, after emphatically denying that he would EVER have any children, for most of his life. We took this after the baby shower (haha–baby shower–family and friends, all women, focused solely on him, (and his wife of course. Which reminds me of marriage, another thing he said NO to for most of his life also, if we are keeping track. Which I am.) giving him tiny baby items that he could not care less about or even identify a mere two weeks ago, and will now become the center of his entire universe, when this new little human being will be awake and crying at 2 AM. We took this at his house, while goofing around on his new IPhone, yet another object of the 21st century that he also stated he would NEVER own. We jest because we love.
It’s also the kick-off picture, for what I am hoping will be a new kind of posting, that allows me to post faster and more efficiently, with less words. You know, let the picture “talk”, and me just kind of “caption” the event happening. Although I see I am not getting off to a great start here. That “horror” look is for how long my posts can go on for. And, as a bonus representation, it works for the horror I personally feel, because I never, NEVER, ever, EVER, post a picture of myself. And with good reason if you check the title of this blog site and this stunning picture proof of my “almost good looks”. I am the one on the bottom left as you are looking at the pic. In my defense, I photograph horribly. No lie. People say they take bad pictures, but I truly do. Even goofy, silly pictures. I am not photogenic at all. I look much better in person. And that is a hard truth I accept as fact now, and avoid the camera like it’s on fire or will give me a disease. Or get me pregnant. HA. My sisters look good either way. Luckys.
Once again, I must go, quickly. My stove timer is beeping, telling me I need to get showered and ready for work. (I set a timer for myself for more efficiency and that doesn’t work either.) I am still racing the clock, all the time. More posts to come if I can actually make this picture thing work. I have the pics. I just have to utilize the time. Enjoy your Saturday. I’m out for the next 8-10. (Hours. That is. That reference is to the hours I will be gone. Ugh. Stop typing!) Later!
I Call It: Sitting On Patio With Coffee, Before Work, First Of The Year. Subtitle: Spring In Repose.
It’s Monday. It’s 67 degrees. It’s very windy. (Like, very windy. So much so, that I layed the basketball hoop-thing down because it was creaking and swaying quite loudly while I was sipping my coffee.) Also, one of my tree trunk branches seem to be rubbing in the high wind and making that “limb-falling” sound I have grown to know and dread every time I hear it outside of a Forest Preserve or designated woody area allocated to our world for walking and enjoying nature in its most natural of habitats, the places where all the trees can gather and hang together and lean and fall on each other, or the leafy ground, as they wish. NOT my backyard. Please! Can I get one fresh, new spring day without any tree droppings? Can I get an Amen? Hallelujah people. I am willing all the “high-air” objects to stay there today. Amen.
That’s a picture of the sky facing forward from my chair. Obviously you can’t see the fast clouds moving, but they are. And those are my daffodils. Right on time. In case I never said it before, except that I say it EVERY year, daffodils are my favorite flower. The most faithful of flowers. Hope and trust and loyalty. If a person could be a flower, I guess I would be a daffodil. We share the same qualities if you go by the “meanings of things”. Plus, they are so pretty. Or just shy of pretty…huh? Huh? See what I did there? And they sometimes smell good. Just like me. Yes, I said sometimes.
I have to go. Shower and work. The BF gets to be off because he got a flat tire. Lucky! But if you are reading this (when you really should be outside, though…come on people, it is gorgeous! Go out, then come back in and finish this) and you want to comment or send me your favorite flower with a meaning or just a quick word, I would love to hear it! Something to look at later tonight when I get home. And if you are really fancy and high-tech, you can send a pic. That would be cool! Alright, have a good one out there today. Stay on the ground and don’t let this wind carry you away! Later!
Happy Birthday!!!!!!!!! To YOU!!!!!!!!! I LOVE YOU!!!!!!
Hopefully all those exclamation points will help distract from the fact that I am the most horrendous GF in the WHOLE world! This should have been posted yesterday. On your actual birthday! And I am soooo sorry! I was afraid to back date it though because then it might not get sent out to all the e-mails and whatnot. April 2. You are 40 now, tried and true. I was not there because of work. Then I was late, what a jerk! I sent you texts but that’s never enough. And facebook posts are full of fluff. If I get low census we’ll have some fun and then maybe I will move back up to number 1! That’s really all I can rhyme out here in a few short minutes before I shower and leave. It’s not the worst string of words…
Anyway. I love you. Happy happy birthday. This year was big but I didn’t plan. I am bad and take full responsibility for your personal birthday happiness. For everything. Winkity wink. I will try to make up on all counts of birthday wish shortcomings and poor organization skills and maneuvers. I hope it was still good though. My friend at work said that her first husband went totally cray cray when he turned 40. Like, a complete mental 180. Flipped out. So much so that they actually thought he might have had a brain tumor. Ended the marriage. I’m not jinxing, I’m just saying: You let me know. We can fix whatever you want to change. Or at least we can try. Before the dramatics and mid-life crisis. But I’m going to go on record and say that, based on my experience, and the fact that I take care of A-LOT of 90 year-old-plus people, (men and women), the mid-life crisis really shouldn’t factor in until about 45 these days. Just some food for thought on a Wednesday afternoon. Think. Discuss. Comment if you must. (I have to say, I am really not trying to rhyme everything but it just seems to be happening quite naturally today. So weird.)
Last sentences, just for the BF: Happy Birthday!! I love you! You are the best man, all around, I have ever known, for me and the kiddies. XO. I will call you in a few! Later!
Happy March 32nd!
Just kidding. There is no snow. What a jokester I am. I actually took current, up-to-date, real-time pictures of the backyard and that table, to show you what the outside really looks like right at this moment. 5 pm Central time. Midwest America. It’s not warm today. (We only get the stuttering sixties at this point in the year.) It’s back in the 40’s again and it feels cold. But it’s sunny. Warning! The pictures below are uncut and unedited (for time) and are not very pretty. The yard is a sticks and stumps mess like a graveyard for bark parts or the lost world of tree limbs and branches. And all that sunshine blazing down is just lighting up the debris like a Christmas tree. Look here! Crap attack! You will NEVER be free of the Park Forest Tree! That may be a little dramatic, but you really have to live here to know why that is so scary. And true. Read back a bit on this site or just click over on the right there to “Tree Trouble” and you can see what I am talking about. I dare say I may have had an above average amount of bad luck in the breaking/cracking/ falling down department of tree instant removal and upheaval. They like to fall in my backyard. And they like to fall slowly. One piece at a time. Every few months or so. We started out with 3 very large 50 year old trees with many many branches limbs sticks and leaves. Now we have 2 tall “trunks”, at best, that still give me a run for the money when the wind blows too hard. They barely have proper branches on them anymore. Maybe a few limbs, that are very high up and thin, but that still sway on a windy day like drunk gymnasts trying to land on the roof of the house if they could only get the right arc. It’s ridiculous and my own private natural ghost story. The Tale of The Malevolent Maple Tree! The Evil Box Elder! The Horror of the Hackberry! The Horror of the Hackberry is right. That’s the tree ID that is presently lounging around all over the backyard in various shapes and sizes, providing a fine winter home for all kinds of bunnies and squirrels and skunks and probably opossums and racoons. I think those last two actually live up in the tree, but I can’t be sure and I do not have time to check. I see I have gone on and on like I always do and this was supposed to be quick and fast and funny. April Fool joke and all that.
Anyway my original point was to mention that I had been looking back at some of my earlier postings (4 years in March!) and I was pretty funny if I do say so myself. Go ahead and read some vintage posts if you have some time. You will not be disappointed. I also noticed that I had written about the BF’s birthday at that time and even posted about wrapping his present in the Jewel Foods sales paper. Which is what I did again this year! I thought I was so clever. Turns out I am clever. And I have been for at least 4 years, maybe more! Ha. I took a new present pic:
It’s like a birthday/posting/cheap present wrapping flashback. Now, the BF is on his way and we are going to dinner and celebrating the big 4-0 one day early. Presents and cake when we get back. Yes. I made a cake. He doesn’t even know! It’s his fav I think, at least of the cakes that I make. It’s the “Better Than Sex” cake that I also mentioned many years ago. That cake was only presented in a written description posting. This year I have pictures of the process and the results. That cake weighed 10 pounds I think. I will weigh this one before we cut it and let you know. Ok. Better go.
Thank you to all my new friends and followers! I appreciate the time it takes to find or stumble on something new, give it a few minutes to sink in and then actually do the work to “like” and “follow”. I mostly “like” back and “follow” when I get here. Which as you have seen from these last 2 days is like, once every 2 months. So sad. And I like hearing my own voice and seeing my own words. I think that is also pretty obvious if you have spent even one minute of time reading just one of my posts. They get “wordy”.
Ok. Really now. Here’s the real-time pics of today. Enjoy the evening and I’ll be back. I see some long spring days ahead of me, typing deep into the dark warm nights. Later.
Spring is Sprung. 61 on 61.
That would be 61 days since I posted last. That’s really bad. Does anyone but me even click on this site anymore? I seem to be my only audience these days and I am getting tired of looking at that blue sky picture. And so much has happened in those 61 days. And the 42 days before that. Time flies. Believe it. But of course I don’t have time right now to type it all.
Anyway, the other 61 is the the temp outside. Yep. Chicago. 61. March 31. It’s pretty nice. And it’s Easter! Happy Egg Day or Ham Day or Jesus Day. However each of you beautiful people celebrate. It’s Work Day for me. Not considered a “holiday” in the med world, at least not the med world I work in, but money is money. I’m just going to enjoy the weather on the drive to work and be grateful that low census was put on hold for the weekend.
My kids are in Kentucky as they usually are this time of year and the BF is just chilling at home, waiting for Tuesday (April 2) to creep around, and change his 39 year old ass into 40. Welcome to the dark side honey. Finally. It gets depressing being the only old lady around these parts. One of my CNA’s keeps reminding me that I am the same age as her mother. I’m like, could you please stop telling people that?? Anyway I am a bad GF because I have to work, and I did not plan a super surprise for this special start to the birthday journey that takes you onto the path of old age. And wisdom. Let’s not forget all the wisdom we get when we flip the big digits. He’s not complaining or anything, but I still feel bad. I did get him a present though. It’s been here for a week. AND it’s wrapped, and sitting on the kitchen table taunting him! I’m off tomorrow, so dinner and a present to open on your last day of being able to check the “under 30” box on documents and survey forms. I’ll get him with a surprise 41. They never see it coming!
But I need to go. Now. My uniform is dry and I need to shower. Here is a pic from my daughter that she sent from Kentucky where the air is actually colder. And it was raining. More posts to come. I hope. Later.
It’s Your Birthday! It’s Your Birthday! (One Week Later)
For a girl who cannot take enough pictures of herself, she would not let me get even one picture of her for her birthday. This is the best I could capture, taken under extreme protest. And she looked so cute in her new birthday pj”s from her grandma. Teenagers. Just when you think you know a girl, the 14 year old life truck hits them hard and you can’t push them out of the way fast enough. Sigh. Anyhoo. This is my girl. She turned 14 a week ago on the 21st. The day before Thanksgiving. And a Wednesday. So there wasn’t a lot we could do by way of party or celebration. She had a few dinners and saw a few people, spaced out over the week, so I think it actually worked out better. Her birthday lasted way longer than most. And here is one more day, and a post just for her, to acknowledge the joyous occasion of her birth! She is fully entrenched in teenageville now. And what you can’t see behind the pillow is her new best friend, I-Phone. I hope that little device doesn’t put out any serious UV radiation rays, because if it does we are looking at a generation of young adults that are going to have major face skin cancer in a few years. And probably some crippling finger arthritis too. They hold it so close to their faces. Pushing those tiny keypads with their poor little crampy fingers and thumbs. Tip of the day: Wear sunscreen while operating your mobile device. Slather it on good and thick, especially over the face and neck area. Just in case. And maybe give those hands a break every few hours. Extend those digits outward. All that cracking you hear when you first do it is not always a good thing! Flex and extend. Flex and extend. Jazz hands. Whatever it takes. Alright I need to wrap this up. Shower and work. Must make more money to support the daughters other obsession: fake nails. Oh yes. We buy too many packages of this addiction in a box. I think that I will start posting all the nail work that Stevie has dedicated the rest of her waking time to creating. It will be very easy to make this the new winter feature on this site because she takes a picture every time she sticks any new nails onto her hands, which is practically every day. I am not exaggerating. Stevie’s Nails. Watch for it. In conclusion:
Happy happy birthday! I love you my beautiful, little girl! Hope the day and week and weekend were the best you have ever had! At least until next year! XO Mom.
Veterans Day
To all the soldiers who were, are, and shall be! You let me have the freedom to be as serious or silly as I want on a daily basis. And it’s a pretty good reason to re-post my favorite picture of my dad. Now go out there and get yourself a free meal from whatever restaurant is offering it in your town! It’s the small things sometimes that make a big difference. And since I haven’t won the lottery yet here in this big, free country, I’m heading in to work myself on this glorious, sunny, windy, unseasonably warm, November day! But still, life in America… not too shabby.
Thank you.
Get Your Vote On!
It’s election day! GO VOTE! If you don’t, you have no good ground to stand on when getting into political arguments with all of your friends. Whatever your beliefs may be, if you don’t take the opportunity given to voice that opinion, then you do not have the moral right to bitch about the system and how this country is run. Sorry, but this is your chance to have your vote counted. And don’t give me the argument that it doesn’t matter either way, or one vote can’t make a difference, so that’s why you don’t even bother. It’s a flawed world with an imperfect government and no one will ever be happy 100%, but that’s the beauty of America. You have the unalienable right to pretty much do and think whatever you want, but you have to flex that muscle when the heavy lifting presents itself. Every person matters! If you want to make the big changes, you have to start small. Think globally, act locally. Success works it’s way up to the top, not the other way around. Is that enough poster-board rhetoric for today? Besides, voting is super easy and quick if you use the paper ballot. Pick up that black felty marker and connect your lines for the future. I was number 92 today at 8 am. I wish I was a higher number but at least I was counted.
So that concludes today’s post and the lecture on freedom and democracy. Just do it! (Ha. One more line.) In honor of government and election day, and to all the high schoolers that have or will be, taking that dreaded Constitution test to move on to the next level of education, I would like to end this post with my favorite School House Rock tribute to: The Preamble. You know you have to memorize it right? How many of us sat in those little one armed desks singing this song to ourselves to remember the words?
Anyway…one more time for the cheap seats in the back…GO VOTE!!!
Your Boogers Are In The Chicken
This is the kind of thing I say on a regular basis in my house. We stay up way too late. When we stay up way too late, we get silly. When we get silly, we laugh and make jokes. When we laugh and make jokes, we sometimes say hurtful things to each other. When we say hurtful things to each other, one of us storms out of the room like a little bitch. When one of us storms out of the room like a little bitch, the rest of us just laugh harder. Don’t make the rest of us laugh harder. Stop being a cry baby. Put in a tampon and get back in the game. Wait. No. I think I might be mixing up my metaphors with commercials and football pep talking. At any rate, this whole scenario just played out in the living room about 10 minutes ago. Well, not that scenario. That scenario was based on the above chicken and my sister’s birthday present to my son. Cash and a box of Boogers. Leave it to my sister Noelle to find something gross and hilarious. And we keep all our “back-up” candy in the chicken. (That’s the candy that won’t get eaten right away, but we don’t throw out because you never know when you might need some sugar in any form available. You know, stuff like DumDum’s, Smarties, LifeSavers, Cheap Chocolate Coins, etc.) Like my cousin Linda just said to my daughter today, “We are silly people. It’s in our blood.” Yes. Yes we are. But sometimes it can be a curse. Deep sigh. Insert picture of “Boogers” here:
See? It’s my own fault. I am not a strict mom. I make too many jokes and am never serious enough. My kids like to run off the rails with their witty humor and fast comebacks. Because I let them. And they can. They have the good sense of humor that will be a bonus when they are older but can get them in serious trouble right now. And they like to use my own words against me. Usually I can get everybody back on track without a lot of effort. But this time there were too many wheels in the gravel and the cars were piling up behind the engine. Nobody was listening to the engineer. Me. And the only way to get the control back is to pretty much do a “Hancock” and stop that train dead in its tracks. What this means though, is that I have to get angry and abruptly end any kind of night we are having to get my point across and then send everybody off to bed. Unfortunately, just like in the movie it causes a lot of extra damage. Actually now that I’m thinking about it, it is exactly like that. Everybody starts complaining about the way the train was stopped and its like the train is still moving but now its slowly sliding down the side of a cliff into a ravine with a rapid river at the bottom. (Say that five times fast) It’s no good. Then the train falls into the water and lays there, still complaining, filling up and sputtering for air instead of just getting up, saying it’s sorry and being glad we are all still alive. I might have mixed up my metaphors again, but you get the idea. Focus is obviously not my strong point, at least not here, or when I write stuff down. I have lots of thoughts and slow typing fingers. And I can really lose my own track when I get going so I am not surprised that my kids may act the same way on occasion. Especially when it’s late. And they are tired. My kids have these crazy, smart, dazzling personalities that I am so impressed and fascinated by. I want them to have the big life. But sometimes they have got to just stop when I say stop. And that’s where our weak spot is. We don’t have a good switching system in place. We need a better way to flip the switch and change the direction of the train before it crashes into the abyss. We are working on that. Everyone is still in bed and this night is most definitely over, but we are all thinking about it a little more. And since we never end the night on a bad note, because you just never really do know what might happen, here’s another picture of that Booger box:
Picked out especially for you! Maybe tomorrow I better just post a breast cancer thing. I have a store display, so unmagnificent, to put up here, that you will be sorry you wasted any of your valuable computer time clicking over to my site to even look at. But it’s like a train wreck. You have to look. The picture. Not the site. Well, maybe the site too. Come on! What else are you gonna do?? Click. Scan. Move on. Oh, hey, one last stopping-the-train thing. Spider Man 2 has an excellent train stopping scene in it. I was going to use that as my movie reference but it’s not really a “dead stop” and the people are all grateful in the end. Not applicable to my situation. Plus I don’t feel tired after. I am just glad it’s finally quiet. Anyway it’s a good part in the movie. And finally, here’s one more, completely random, and unrelated to any of the above 900 words, picture, of my children doing something together, and in sync (Comma alert! That last sentence may be a record holder for me. Count em’ and weep.) Here’s that pic:
Happy Birthday, Take 15!
This is from his Homecoming dance last week. Yes, he is that good looking. Period. I will take a break from the pink posts today (and yesterday and the day before, tsk tsk) so I can put up a picture of my handsome son on his birthday. My site. My rule. Besides I think I’m scraping a barrel bottom with some of these forced “pink” postings. Seriously. Cardboard food displays? Toilet paper? It’s getting kind of dry over here. Another picture. It’s just a big awesome face…
Anyway, he’s an easy birthday boy. He played football this morning. It was raining. It was windy. The ground was wet and getting muddy. A fight broke out between the teams 34 seconds from the end and everybody rushed the field. And we lost the game. Plus, there were 4 hardcore October bees buzzing around in the stands trying to sting a fan like it was their job. Isn’t it too cold for bees? Shouldn’t they be flying south for the winter? I mean, even when the rain really started pouring down, those bees hung out, hovering around our heads like we were going to forget they were there. At any rate, the game was over and the team had to wait , dripping outside, for the bus to come and take them back to school. Picture time…
At home, my mom (who did not sit in the cold and miserable rain–ya’ big chicken!) came over with a card and some cash, which is really the only way to go at 15. He got a few more cards in the mail. More cash. He requested a Pepe’s dinner with an XBox afternoon before and an XBox chaser after. So here we go. He’s showered and fresh and ready for the food part of his big day. I imagine the XBox part of tonight is going to be a long one, unless I can get him to curl up with me on the couch while I tell him sentimental stories of the day I birthed him. Yeah right. Sleep in Sunday. We can dig it. Alright, the natives are restless. And hungry. One last picture. Happy birthday my beautiful boy! I love you! XO Mom.
just shy of pretty 