Tuesday, November 25

My man is a Rock Star.

So the girlfriend whose house we were going to this weekend?  Also happens to be my former sister-in-law. 
 
The Honey went with me with gritted teeth, bracing himself for cold stares and colder shoulders. 
 
The patriarch of that family would never stand for such a thing, even at ninety-one, but the Honey didn't know that. 
 
Let me tell you, NO ONE in the Honey's family gets a divorce OR remarries. 
 
The Ex's family is the very definition of the blended family.  A second spouse is not anything new, but I was the only Ex who showed up at the party...:) 
 
So my man gets beaucoup points for sucking it up and risking complete and utter alienation so I could meet the nephew's new wife and squeeze both of my boys before they head back to the war zone. 
 
The Ex's family gets beaucoup  points for being as gracious and warm as ever.
 
The new Bride got to see her new family in action, and took it well, in spite of their overwhelming numbers.
 
It was a good weekend.
 
And my man was a rock star.
 

Saturday, November 22

Jennfactor 3.2



So we're travelling to a girlfriend's house today to meet her new daughter in law, and kiss her children before they head back to Iraq. (She has two sons and now a daughter in law in the military, and a daughter still at home. They managed to co-ordinate their leaves, so everyone is home at once!) She also has a daybed for Little O that we can have, if we can haul it. No Problem! I'll just zip up to my Brother's house and borrow his beast!

Oh, my friends, the Honey is LOVING the beast. It's a gigantic (remember, I'm a Honda girl, and the Honey is devoted to his ancient Acura) Ford F350 --complete with running lights and sideboards. It's also diesel, I had forgotten. It's like driving an RV. A noisy RV. Sadly, an RV that cannot take advantage of my thirty cent discount on gas at Safeway that I had been saving up. CRAP.

So last night after work we cleaned and tidied my car, and I asked the Honey if I should use the spare Honda key, because while it only has one key on the ring, it has a pretty large photo keychain that a guy would not want to stick in his pocket. The Honey says just give him your regular keys.

Side note: I'm not one of those people with fifteen keychains, are you? I had a friend that prided herself on the # of keychains she had, but it seemed a little high school for a grown assed woman. Maybe it's just me.

So I take one last look around my car to make sure I got the Honey's glasses, and HIS keys are gone, so I said--you've got the keys? He nods and smiles to me over by the truck (which is running), as my brother shows him all of his toys.

An hour later we pull into the driveway, home again and totally psyched for our journey south the next day. I smile at him and he smiles at me, and we're just pretty happy. Sitting there. Okay, enough of this, I have to pee.

"Gimme your keys, baby"

"You have them."

"I do? did you put them in my purse?"

Yeah, no.

**************************************

We think they are on the counter at my brother's house. But our sweet elderly landlady lives next door and while it is eleven at night, it's got to be done, so we call her, and yay! she has the spare keys.

Except the one to the big old security door does not work. So the Honey shimmies over the fence to unlock the back door, and the freaking doorknob comes off in his hand. Unreal.

He eventually found a way in, and all was well, except that we still have no house keys-- or a back door knob. Locking yourself out with any hope of getting in in a normal fashion being an hour away? Jennfactor 3.2

(Locking yourself out of anything is a 2, add a full point for the distance from the actual keys, and two tenths of point for the doorknob. I think we were eligible for an extra tenth because the spare key didn't work, but we would definitely have bumped it to a four if I had actually peed my pants.)

Friday, November 21

ARGH!!!

I love Life on Mars. Have you seen it?

Well don't look for it anytime soon, because it's gone until FRICKaFRACKIN FEBRUARY!!!!!

I truly enjoy this show, which is almost a death sentence for network television. I am the curse of good shows everywhere. (I have this unfortunate ability at Bath Body Works, too. If I like it, it's gone out of production within months.)

I want to Netflix the British version now, just in case.

sob!

Saturday, November 15

OOh, James

I am a much bigger dork than most of co-workers. I relish this fact. When I saw the release date of the new Bond movie, I told the Honey we were going for my birthday (He's really not a movie theatre guy, but loves movies, it's weird).

Last night my co-workers met me for drinks and mexican food, and then bailed out before the movie.

I'm not spoiling things, I'll just say we really enjoyed it. Here is my grumble:

At the end of the last movie and the beginning of this one, it felt like a giant game of mousetrap with the stunts. I know it's Bond, but a few gadgets in place of one or two steps in the stunt sequence would have fixed this for me, I think. I miss Q. 'Cause I'm a dork that way.

Um, but I still think Roger Moore should shut his pie hole. Moore was the Bond I was raised with, but he would have screamed like a girl at the things Daniel Craig does. I love Craig as Bond. I think he's a much more likely assassin/spy than any Bond since Connery.

***************************

On.My.MorganFreeman.

One more thing to add--the haircut on the villain's second in command? Was he a failed monk? The latin version of dumb and dumber? The necklaces were really bad, too.

That is all.

Friday, November 14

Mmmmmm...books



Who was I kidding? This was never going to be the year I dove into NaNoWriMo. Facebook scrabble keeps me from blogging, let alone devoting hours each night to typing. Are we sure we couldn't move it to January? Seriously, I've got NOTHING in January.


The true death knell of my NaNoWriMo delusion, though, was a fabulous bag of hand me down books from SQT at the Fantasy and Sci-Fi Lovin' Blog.

The first one I dove into was this:

I reallly enjoyed the premise of the book, that aliens have come to earth but want an agent to make them palatable to the human race. It's a clever book and I would have sold the bejeebus out of it, were I still selling books instead of trash. My only complaint, and I'm not even sure that it IS a complaint, was that the cussing seemed a little over the top sometimes. That's a funny statement coming from me, because away from my kids I have the mouth of a gutter rat, but at times it seemed a little forced or over the top. I think what I was reading is an advanced copy, so maybe an editor got out a red pencil and cut out a few...I can't pinpoint why they caught me, because if ever there were an occasion for a high stress vocabulary, meeting a sentient sewer scented jello shooter would do it, but it got to the point that it pulled me out of the story for a minute. I dunno, The book was phenomenal and I can't wait for the next one out of the bag...

Thursday, November 6

Random madness...


I was wandering through Safeway, and I thought I'd make the Honey a little chocolate pick me up.

I don't think I offended him, but I certainly startled the man in the baking aisle when I shrieked "Are you FUCKING kidding me?"

Okay, I didn't exactly shriek it, but I hadn't meant to say it out loud.

I'm all about adding a little goodness into my family's ready to make treats. I read my labels and make my choices based upon the best options I'm willing to cook.

But a TEN dollar brownie mix?

That thing had better massage my colon and buff and shine my lower GI like one of those riding floor polishers you see in high rise lobbies after hours. You know what? You STILL better throw in a coupon, beeyotch. Haven't you heard there's a recession?

**************************************



On a separate, glorious note, Little O consumes books like candy.

I am so tickled. One of the sets we ordered from Scholastic was Skippyjon Jones. He's a siamese cat who thinks he's a chihuahua superhero named El Skippito Bandito. Totally cute. Until Little O is reading (excellently and with different voices!!!) to her father, and she says "you are keeling me!"

The Honey casually pulls the book away from her to take a closer look, and yep. It's typed as keeling. My man who doesn't have a politically correct bone in his body (really, I've seen the x-rays), suddenly has a bug up his butt about Skippyjon Jones and his accent.

I think it's hilarious--the bug, not the accent.

Wednesday, November 5

Wednesday Hero

Cpt. Gussie M. Jones
Cpt. Gussie M. Jones
41 years old from Raleigh, Arkansas
31st Combat Support Hospital
March 07, 2004
U.S. Army

Cpt. Gussie Jones was born in Arkansas and was one of eight children. She began her Army career by enlisting in 1988 as a personnel clerk and climbed to the rank of a sergeant.

In 1986, Jones earned a bachelor’s degree in business administration from Arkansas Central University. She was selected to attend the Army Enlisted Commissioning Program and earned her second bachelor’s degree from Syracuse University in 1998. It was in nursing.

Her career as a registered nurse and a commissioned officer began in September 1998 at Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio. In 2002, after completing a course in critical-care nursing, she was assigned to Beaumont Army Medical Center, where she became a mentor.

"She was a very dedicated person and was always smiling, said a co-worker and friend, Capt. Susan Gilbert. If anyone asked her to do something, she would do it. And she was very kind and gentle and patient with the patients."

Cpt. Jones died of a heart attack while on duty in Baghdad, Iraq. During her 15 years of military services, Jones received a Joint Service Commendation medal, four Army Commendation medals and three Army Achievement medals.

"She was so much a part of their team, and so her death must really affect their morale," Gilbert said. "I'm very worried about the other soldiers because they've lost their battle buddy."


All Information Was Found On And Copied From MilitaryCity.com

These brave men and women sacrifice so much in their lives so that others may enjoy the freedoms we get to enjoy everyday. For that, I am proud to call them Hero.
We Should Not Only Mourn These Men And Women Who Died, We Should Also Thank God That Such People Lived

This post is part of the Wednesday Hero Blogroll. For more information about Wednesday Hero, or if you would like to post it on your site, you can go here.
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Tuesday, November 4

I've been cheating on you.

It's that damned Facebook.
 
Facebook is frustrating to me, coming from blogging, because I like to write and read STORIES, not buttons.
 
Honestly?  I'll pretty up my blog before I spend any more time hunting down funny flair, or throwing food or pumpkins or cats, or growing a farm--jeeze, I'd kill my cyber plants just like the real ones.  But now the people I've friended on Facebook are people I like and I don't want to spoil their fun, and some of the applications are damned funny, but... but... I'm up to 178 unanswered requests for things in one form or another. 
 
I feel bad for ignoring their pleas for green things, or pirate battles, or good karma (is that one going to bite me on the ass, or WHAT?), but sheesh!  
 
However,  Facebook has something Blogspot and Wordpress and Xanga don't.
 
Oh, Dawg help me, Facebook has Scrabble.
 
I would have forty two games going at once, if I knew forty two people on Facebook.
 
It's better than crack!  It's vocabu-crack. 
 
I conned my dad into NaNoWriMo, but I abandoned it because I'd rather play Scrabble.  Okay, and I had no plot or time--now that the Honey's off work is NOT the time to spend long hours writing when I'm finally home--it would not end well!
 
So it's not you, it's me.  I am a weak woman.  I cannot resist the tiles.  I am jonesin' for the triple word score, baby. 

Sunday, November 2

So How was your Halloween?

My Little Gypsy Fortune Teller...

We had a functioning crystal ball and the prettiest Rom Princess ev-ah!



And here we are, me in her giant butterfly wings, because I sweated BLOOD making those for her two years ago and the wretched child would not wear them. SOMEONE was going to wear the damned things.


We went to a Halloween Party later that night, and I felt like a nun. Every.single.female. had gone for the skirt up to here and top down to there. Sigh. The honey wore Little O's grass skirt and a hawaiian polo: