Charlie in Wonderland

I'm not sure whether I've dipped my blogging toe into the midterm election madness, but I've been inspired to start.

Crist in Wonderland Episode 1 from RightChange on Vimeo.

...and part 2:

Charlie's In Wonderland Too from RightChange on Vimeo.

(hat tip: Scott Maxwell)

I hated Charlie as Governor. Oh wait - he's still governing, isn't he? I hadn't noticed. Really, as a Democrat and someone who supports President Obama, I feel like I should vote for Kendrick Meek. But if his chances are as slim as they say, then I might vote for Charlie just to vote against ultra-right Marco Rubio. Anyway, though I recognize the cartoons have a different political goal than I have, I still thought they were cute and well done!

I skipped the primary last month because none of the races I cared about were hotly contested. Now I have to start really paying attention - re-elect that loudmouth Alan Grayson? I'm not sure. Sink vs. Scott? Umm...Rick Scott is a total wacko and I wouldn't vote for him if he gave me $1,000. Orange County Mayor? I should probably study that one a little more closely.

Two months to go...

Attention, Please!

Attention Muslim World: Please please recognize that this crazy horrible man and his crazy horrible followers do not represent the rest of Americans, just as fundamentalist extremists in your own community do not represent you.

Attention Christian World: Keep praying that Terry Jones finds the "sign from God" that tells him this is a bad idea. If he goes through with "Burn a Koran Day" and one single American soldier dies as a direct result, it's not the Muslims he's going to need to worry about.

I stand behind the First Amendment. I'm certainly not asking the Florida or US Government to prevent the protest (is it really a protest, or just a temper tantrum?). I just want the people planning on participating to consider how hurtful their actions will be to the people of the Muslim faith, and instead turn their anger into something productive. Participate in a charity, read a book to a child, or just consider that Jesus probably wouldn't have provoked a group of people who thought differently than he did. Heck, maybe they should join a relief mission and bring the love of Christ along with much-needed food and medicine over to Pakistan. You know...just add something positive to the world instead of adding more hate. We don't need any more hate.

Vaguely related:

Labor Day

It's Labor Day, so I spent my day not laboring. I watched an NCIS marathon, did 3 loads of laundry, and...that's about it.

Let's not compare the "done" list to the "to-do" list, ok?

1-0 and 1-0

Coming off of wins for both Penn State and Alabama yesterday, Scott and I have one week to bask in our undefeated seasons.

One week only.

Next Saturday is Footballageddon as Penn State travels to Alabama. Two teams enter, one team leaves.

Too many movie references? Sorry. For now, I'm high on a win and enjoying it while I still can.

Who's 9?

Who's 9 today? Nope...couldn't possibly be Conner! (that's him in the front, in this picture from 2004)

I literally cried last night when I read on Facebook that his birthday is today. See, to me 9 sounds like an older kid - almost a tween - and I refuse to believe that a kid whose butt I wiped is that old.

I knew this kid when he chattered for hours on end without using any actual words. I knew him when he was little enough for Scott to throw in the air (and the accidentally drop onto his own head, causing both of them to bleed!). I remember watching a cartoon with him and proclaiming him to be a genius when he counted to 12 right along with Dora. I remember scrubbing marshmallow off of him.

Sigh...my little monsters are growing up so fast I can hardly stand it! Amazing, because I haven't aged at all...

Thanks for Asking

We are, in fact, ready for some football!


More on the NCAA Football 2010 season tomorrow.

Happy Birthday, Joshua*

*names changed to protect the innocent child

Scott and I just got back from dinner at TooJays, the closest thing central Florida has to a good Jewish deli. We were seated near 4 old people sitting at a big table. We ordered our drinks, and then the rest of their party showed up: mom, dad, a little boy, and a baby girl.

Fifteen minutes later, the cooing and cheek pinching and baby talk had slowed down enough that we could actually make out grown-up words mixed in. "Happy birthday!" "Do you like your new Star Wars bed?" "Did you think grandma for your new toys?" We got to sit through one of the women (my guess is not the mother) singing the theme song from "Elmo's World" to the baby girl. And then the conversation took a strange turn.

"Your birthday is important to a lot of people." Scott and I were trying to figure out why the Dad was trying to give the kid a Jesus complex. I wanted to turn around and tell the kid that no one outside of that table gave a damn about his birthday, and that some day soon he'd be old enough to know how obnoxious his family was and he'd be embarrassed. But I didn't. And that's a good thing. We had been mocking the conversation when all of a sudden snippets of conversation along the lines of "and a lot of people died..." and "they call it Patriot's Day" came toward us.

Oh. My. God. And so we learned:

a) 4(ish) is the age when you tell your kid about 9-11.
b) if your kid's birthday is on 9-11, you have to celebrate it a full week in advance. (really, the party is tomorrow)
c) TooJay's is the new Chuck-E-Cheese

Scott also got the fringe benefit of watching the family eating. I can't do justice to his description of Mom feeding the baby and herself at the same time, but trust me - I was suddenly glad they were only assaulting one of my senses!

Needless to say, the ambiance just wasn't great tonight. So we got a slice of cake (for my half-birthday) to go. If you'll excuse me, there's a zillion calories in the fridge calling my name.

Happy early birthday, Joshua.

3 Hours of Sleep Later

The answer to the question posed in last night's entry is only partly yes. The other part of the answer is "and continued low-grade constant pain with twinges of much worse pain."

The sunburn. It sucks.

This picture was taken Saturday morning when I was supposed to be packing to come home. That's the front of my right calf, taken from the perspective of the inside of the leg.

I've really tried to be strong and not whine, but jeez does it hurt! And stubble isn't helping matters any. My poor follicles are constantly being pulled back and forth by pants (pants are my new nemesis), but at this stage I still think the razor would do more harm than good. That's why there's no "here's how it looks 5 days later" photo. I mean, I normally crop my legs out of pictures. Taking a close-up of a fuzzy one? Unlikely!

Well, it's been lovely chatting with you and showing off my war wounds, but it's time for me to get ready to go to work. The timestamp is what makes that last sentence so funny.

Hormones...right?

I'm having some pretty deep misery right now. Don't worry, I know that my feelings are disproportionate to my troubles. And I know that this too shall pass. But right this minute I'm overwhelmed. Today started out so nicely, with baking banana bread followed by eating as much hot banana bread as possible while packing it to take to work. It was good. Then at 11:15 my day took a downturn. Here's the bullet points:

• Scott locked himself out of the house without his car keys, necessitating me leaving work for an hour and a half to let him in and therefore missing the potluck. (yes, we're already making plans for a hidden key)
• The 3rd shift meeting for Friday got rescheduled to tomorrow because a "big" manager decided he wanted to attend and Thursday was a better day for him. Two o'clock wake-up call, here I come!
• I got a voicemail from my doctor telling me that if I want a prescription (that we had previously discussed, and that the nurse told me on my last visit would be "called in to the pharmacy in about 10 minutes") that I would have to come in for yet another appointment. I didn't call her back because I was at work and prefer to not have those conversations in public.
• I had an e-mail disagreement with one of the managers I support. Is it really so hard to answer a yes/no question so I can get on with my job?
• I told Scott about the crappy voicemail from the doctor, which led to a crappy conversation about the dentist and how I still need to call them and reschedule the appointment that they same-day cancelled on me last month.
• I got another call from the doctor's office while on the phone with Scott, which I let go to voicemail. This time it was the nurse telling me I needed to schedule an appointment in order to get a prescription.
• I called back the office, navigating the phone tree only to get a receptionist who read my info and told me I needed to make an appointment. I refused and told her I needed to talk to the doctor. She connected me to the nurse.
• The nurse regurgitated the whole appointment thing again, and I reminded her that I was promised a new prescription on my last visit and that I shouldn't have to come back in because the doctor and I already discussed things. She said she'd check with the doctor again, and I told her that if I couldn't get that prescription then she could change my blood pressure medicine to one with different side effects. She said I'd have to come in for any medication change.
• I hung up the phone and cried.

My day really was overwhelmingly positive. My office mate saved me a plate of food from the potluck, I got to "rescue him right back," (bonus points to the person who gets that movie reference) work was mostly good, and of course there was banana bread. I'm trying SO HARD to focus on all of that, but instead I'm ready to curl up in a ball and cry myself to sleep.

Of course, sleeping now would definitely be a good thing! I'll be home by 1:00 tomorrow. Maybe I'll sleep all afternoon, too.

Bananas

I woke up this morning an hour early to bake a loaf of banana bread to take to work. Of course, I didn't have the recipe. I believe I got the ingredients correct, but had no idea whether the oven was supposed to be set to 325 or 350. I had a strong feeling that it was supposed to be 325, but didn't have time or ingredients to fix a mistake. I checked 5 recipes on foodnetwork.com, and 4 of them said 350. So I went with that. That recipe is pretty forgiving, so I'm hoping that it comes out ok.

In other news, I watched two episodes of Glee last night - my first two episodes - and enjoyed it, but it didn't immediately hook me. The shows that I consider appointment TV (or at least DVR TV) are ones that I loved from the first episode I saw. So I think that Glee might be "if nothing else is on" viewing, but not much else. Jane Lynch, however, totally deserved that Emmy. She's a total scene stealer!

Speaking of appointment TV, David Hasselhoff and Jennifer "Baby" Grey are on DWTS this season!!! Also appearing will be Florence Henderson, Brandy, Michael Bolton, some athletes, some reality TV yahoos, and Bristol Palin (I think I might like her, despite her last name, but I'd like to know who's watching the baby while she's in Los Angeles). That starts this month, and I can't wait to see who will be the train wreck this year.

Thought for the Day

Maybe we should develop a Crayola bomb as our next secret weapon. A happiness weapon. A Beauty Bomb. And every time a crisis developed, we would launch one. It would explode high in the air — explode softly — and send thousands, millions, of little parachutes into the air. Floating down to earth — boxes of Crayolas. And we wouldn't go cheap either — not little boxes of eight. Boxes of sixty-four, with the sharpener built right in. With silver and gold and copper, magenta and peace and lime, amber and umber and all the rest. And people would smile and get a little funny look on their faces and cover the world with imagination instead of death.

--Robert Fulghum

Shades of Beige

Exciting color palette, no? In real life, up close, these are all very different shades of beiges and yellows, painstakingly selected one at a time by holding them up to my tile sample. In the photo, they're more like different shades of boring! I'm ok with boring though, because I've come to the conclusion that paint shouldn't be the decoration in the home. It should be the foundation.

Even if you wear blue eyeshadow, you wouldn't color your whole face that way.

We had always considered yellow for both the living room and the kitchen, bot never at the same time. And it will make things easier to choose one shade for the whole downstairs. Yellow/beige will also look good with hardwood floors, should we ever decide to go that route. And once we pick a paint, we can figure out what to do with the empty walls.

Next step: finally deciding to use the tile above (or not) and actually ordering it. Once we have it in hand, we'll decide on the paint color. And then after we've painted? Our next door neighbors bought scrap marble at Lowe's for windowsills and it's beautiful. We're totally stealing that!

And then once the weather cools down, we're finally going to paint (or more likely just white prime) the garage. The bare drywall out there is really starting to annoy me.

Self-Writing Posts

The problem with blog posts that write themselves is that they don't publish themselves. Below is an e-mail exchange between me and Janette, about an e-mail exchange between me and Scott. It's a week old. Sorry for holding out on you for so long!

Janette,

I thought you’d get a kick out of the e-mail exchange between Scott and me this morning…

ME: And did you notice the two clumps of Elph hair upstairs in the hallway? I can tell you they appeared between 6:05 and 6:30, and that when I saw Milo at 6:30 he had a clump hanging off his mouth like the “bad kitty” on the pajamas!

SCOTT: Yeah,I heard the ruckus when you had just gotten into the shower, but it didn't continue for more than five seconds. I figured it was the two boys, guess I was wrong!

ME: Well I guess Elphie wasn’t happy with him at all. When I was toweling off, she was “hiding” (really, I guess she thinks she’s invisible) behind the orange shower
curtain and TWICE Milo went to jump into the tub and she swiped at him mid-jump
and made him fall. It was kind of hilarious, but poor Milo missed out on his morning “fresh” drink.

SCOTT: awww! I feel bad for both of them! I've seen them both this morning, not sure about together though

ME: Nah, don’t feel bad. It’s what siblings do. Well, I assume it’s what siblings do. Didn’t you and Janette ever rip each other’s hair out? ;-)

SCOTT: nah, just hand to hand combat, and mind games. :)

* * * * *

Aww, poor kitties. Well, the drama is just part of being siblings.

We bickered a lot. Scott was a PEST, at least that's the way I felt when I was in my teens (remember the age difference). I kept my bedroom door locked from the time he learned to crawl until I moved out. I swear-to-gawd he learned to walk by pulling himself up on my bedroom door knob and letting himself in. LOL!

I only remember hitting Scott 'for real' once, though we did have the very typical sibling wrestling matches. We were arguing over something stupid and forgettable and he was clearly losing when he suddenly and very dramatically yelled 'OW!!! Whaaaaaa! Mom, Janette hit me!!!! Whaaaaa!' And I hadn't laid a hand on him, the little snot.

I knew I was going to be in a world of trouble so I did the only reasonable thing. I smacked the holy crap out of him. I figured if I was 'going to do the time, I may as well do the crime.' That was one of the very few times in my childhood when I remember getting into real trouble. But I'm certain that smacking him up front prevented years of resentment.

Ask him if he remembers it, he was only about 6 or 7 years old at the time. I can SEE it like it was yesterday, we were standing in the hallway just bickering away until he became a little drama queen. Let me tell you, that was the first and last time he ever tried that little trick!

Other than that the worst thing I ever did to him was pull the warranty to the refrigerator out of mom and dad's dresser and tell him that it was his adoption papers. Much drama ensued and it took mom forever to convince him otherwise. THAT was awesome!

Scenes from the Pond

I was out back last night during the end of sunset chatting with the next door neighbors when Pond Log appeared in the middle of the pond and made his way toward us. He's getting less skittish than he used to be, but we went inside long before he was close enough to be a worry. I had the camera, (because I originally went outside to take a different picture that totally didn't turn out) and snapped a few pictures.

I left this one as a wide-shot because I thought the pretty sunset colors made the alligator a little less menacing.

This picture was a total accident. I didn't realize the flash was on, and as a result the photo was way too dark. Of course, the glowing eye impressive enough that I decided to keep it!

The last photo is one of those that didn't come off the camera in a timely manner. I took it a few weeks ago, and the storm front was so defined it looked fairly armageddon-ish. The storm turned out to be pretty minor... at least here. I imagine someone got walloped!

Pills, Pills, and More Pills

Last week was long and winding. My follow-up at the doctor landed me with another pack of prescriptions. This time I got a nasal spray (which I used for all of three days before I gave up on it - ick!), a pack of pills to clear out my sinuses, of which I took the last one this morning, and a low dose of blood pressure medicine. I'm particularly furious about the last. The doctor and I agreed to it for now until I can make enough lifestyle changes to come off of it. After all, who wants to stay on a drug with a warning like this? As much as I wanted to fight her on it, the fact is my BP is dangerously high. In my defense, I can say with a fair amount of certainty that it hasn't been this high for very long. Scott and I used to take our pressure every time we went to Publix before we moved. In the new store, the pharmacy is after the frozen foods, so we don't stop. But both numbers have gone up at least 20 points since I last checked.

So we're eating healthier. We're talking about walking. (yes, talking, baby steps man!) And we're using the existing junk food in the house to step-down to responsible choices. There's no reason to let perfectly good bacon go to waste, right? I'm in culture shock right now. Sure, I know that a bag of noodles & sauce is bad for me, but have you seen how much sodium is in a bag of flavored whole grain rice? (apparently eating one bag of rice as a meal was a bad call...to the tune of 60% of my RDA) Jeez!

And in the next month, I'm getting actual labs done - anyone want to bet what my cholesterol is going to be? - having my first full physical since high school, and I have an appointment with the "wellness nurse." I don't know what that means, but I'll let you know when I find out. I also let myself get suckered into a 7-week heart health seminar that starts this week. There are going to be guest speakers each week including a nutritionist and some other people. It's a night that Scott works late, and I couldn't think of an excuse to say no, so I signed up.

It's time to make a change. I think I'm also speaking for Scott when I say we're glad to have someone tell us to stop eating and acting like immortal fools. And I'm hoping that eventually my desire to drown myself in a pot of cheese sauce will subside. (note: when I say 'drown myself,' I really mean jump in and eat my way out with a spoon and a baguette. please don't call some hotline on me!)

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off to have a chicken/cucumber/sprout sandwich on whole grain bread.

The Birds and the WHAT?

Did you know that little blue herons have red necks? It's true...check it out! And if you don't believe my identification, here's my proof.

And here's another bird picture. The snake birds love when the fountain gets out of sync with local time!

Oh, and don't you just love it when you find photos on your camera that you don't remember taking? Nope...no drunk photos here! Apparently Scott is documenting the way I'm most likely to die...and reminding me to wear shoes in the garage!

Unpleasant, party of two, your table full of poison is waiting.

I just asked Scott if he killed the spiders after he took the pictures and he said no, "I was waiting for you to see them." And he claims they aren't scary. I think he's full of crap!

Irony, Thy Name is Harley

Scott and I both saw the sick heron catch fish today. Separately. As in we collectively saw him catch and eat two fish. I guess that means he's "not dead yet."




Here's how the heron catches fish:
1. Walks sideways near the water in what could best be described as "bird's last steps"
2. Takes an ungraceful tumble face-first into the water
3. Emerges with a fish in its beak
4. Walks up the bank about 5 feet, prolonging the life of the fish and leading its human audience to believe she has time to grab the camera and take another "OMG BIRD WITH FISH" photo
5. Waits until she turns the camera on and gets to the glass door
6. Swallows fish whole and turns to walk away
7. Waits for human to put down the camera and then spits out a bone. Literally. That damn bird hocked something out about 2 feet. Scott saw it too.

He really does look a little better. Something still seems a little off, but he's not spending 16 hours a day out back anymore either. And now that I know the steps to a successful fishing excursion, eventually I'll get the damn picture!

Bird of the Day

What do we have here? This little guy really befuddled me this afternoon. Something about his behavior made me think he was a juvenile, but not so young as to need parents watching over him. And I knew I'd never seen a bird that looked so much like wet newsprint before.

After reading descriptions of every dark-feathered heron at allaboutbirds.org, I finally decided he's a little blue heron, probably about a year old. And how did I come to that conclusion? Well...

It is the only heron species in which first-year birds and adults show dramatically different coloration: first-year birds are pure white, while adults are blue... Enters adult plumage in the first spring after hatching and may be pied white and blue.

So I guess you could say he's in his ugly duckling phase right now. It's a good find for me, since I've only seen a little blue heron out there once or twice before.

In related news, it's been raining a lot this week. The pond is way swollen. Compare these two photos, taken back in April (with the ducks) and the yesterday:

OK, so maybe they don't look so vastly different in the pictures, but trust me. There's a lot more water out there now!

Air Freshener to Inhaler in Six Short Days

After dinner Thursday, Scott and I stopped in to Bath & Body Works because I needed some pretty-smelling hand sanitizer for my work desk. Sadly, they no longer make the size or the scent that I wanted, so I bought five 1-ounce bottles in different scents. And because it's physically impossible to walk into that store and not spend a mere $5, we also got these cute little portable air fresheners for each car.

I immediately opened Scott's and set it up in his car on our way home. Halfway through our 15 minute trip, I was ready to stick my head out the window. I figured this wouldn't be a problem for me. I had a plan. Rather than open the whole foil lid, I'd just poke a few air holes in the lid so that not as much scent would escape at once.

(This is basically how I always handle any sort of air fresheners. I just don't like a whole lot of scent.)

The next morning, I grabbed a safety pin and headed out the door. I opened the package and poked an air hole in the foil liner. I poked the air hole a little too far. Immediately, scented oil started to ooze out. Very scented oil started to ooze out.

I made it to work on Friday without incident, but the drive home was particularly bad. My eyes were watering, and I had to roll down the window despite the 90-degree weather. When I got home, I left the windows rolled down so that the car could air out over the weekend.

Almost right away, my throat got scratchy. At 8:15 Friday night, I tweeted, "I feel like my lungs are half filled with goop. Strange, I was fine this morning. Wheeeeze." I spent the weekend on the couch, not really coughing a lot, but definitely not breathing well.

I made it through two days of work, but by Tuesday afternoon I could barely keep mental focus on my job. I called in yesterday and had a diet of won ton soup, tea, and orange juice. And it just kept getting worse. Mucinex wasn't helping. Robitussin wasn't touching the cough. And only the ibuprofen seemed to be doing its job on my throat. (no, not combining cough medicines - I know better)

By bedtime, I knew I was going to need to call in again today, a fact that was abundantly clear at 2 am when I awoke to the feeling of a golf ball being shoved up into my sinuses. Up until that point, it had just been the lung goop, the cough, and the cough-related sore throat. And as I drifted off to sleep after the next coughing fit, I noticed that I had a "nose whistle" coming from my throat.

To recap: when I finally woke up for the day, I really thought I had pneumonia. I couldn't breathe at all through my nose, could barely breathe through my mouth, my sinuses were exploding, and every cough felt like it was coming from my spine. And don't get me started on the pain of sneezing!

I managed to get an appointment at the doctor, and I told her about the air freshener incident. After some looking and listening and some other questions, she said that most likely I had an allergic reaction to it, and that the irritation then got infected. The diagnosis: acute bacterial bronchitis (which I believe is just doctor speak for cough with green phlegm) and sinusitis. She gave me prescriptions for antibiotics, cough medicine (the "good" kind with narcotics), and a freaking inhaler!

It's been 4 hours and though I wouldn't say I feel good, I do feel alive. Trust me, it's an improvement. I'm still coughing and sneezing, but it's not as painful as before. Whether it's the inhaler or the cough medicine, I'm able to breathe more deeply (granted, still through my mouth!) than I have in days. And right now, breathing = peace and happiness.

As of right now, I'm planning to go to work tomorrow - for one day - and then I have a three day weekend. By the time I go back to work on Tuesday, I'll be finished my antibiotics and hopefully as good as new. And if not, at least I have my cough medicine with hydrocodone to help me care a little less...

Early Morning Money Post

Remember our visit from the AC repair guy last month? The one where he informed us that our system was installed wrong? I want to find that man and hug him! I just got our new electric bill and it's only $7 more than the previous bill, and $25 more than the bill before that, which I'm pretty sure was during open window weather.

I was terrified that the electric bill for this house would bankrupt us, but keeping the house at a balmy 78 when we're home and 84 when we're not seems to be working. While the bill here is definitely higher than at the apartment, it's not nearly as noticeable as I thought it would be. I expected it to be double, and so far it's been maybe 20% more.

I'm so glad we had that problem when we did...otherwise I shudder to think what that bill would be like now.