counting blessings

Hello internets. It’s been a very busy week and not all fun so I won’t be rehashing the icky bits, it just makes me tired thinking of it.

Instead a list of good things:
-We are almost done with January
-Roller Derby Weekend with Husband in one week
-Boom Boom's ankle is sprained not broken
-Dan cooked a wonderful dinner tonight
-I have an hour of American Idol waiting for me on the DVR
-My mail order socks arrived and they are everything I was expecting
-Clean laundry

Lust

OMG Would you look at the incredibleness Steve Jobs is making me want today. The MacBook Air is only $1,799. Yes, I am a PC girl and this is a PC household but every time I am working on some giant art progect for the blog or roller derby and my program locks up boots me out and I have to spend the next 7 minutes restarting the PC I longingly look over at the cute young man named Mac and wonder what he's doing.

Richardson?

Pick Your 2008 Candidate For President

88% Bill Richardson
87% Barack Obama
85% John Edwards
84% Chris Dodd
83% Hillary Clinton
81% Mike Gravel
80% Joe Biden
77% Dennis Kucinich
41% Rudy Giuliani
39% John McCain
30% Ron Paul
30% Mike Huckabee
29% Mitt Romney
26% Tom Tancredo
19% Fred Thompson

2008 Presidential Candidate Matching Quiz

Winter Trust

It's seven degrees this morning and Ella goes to school just blocks away. I can't bare to warm the car up for fifteen minutes to drive her a distance that takes us four mintues to walk so this morning we pulled on long underwear and snow pants and sub-zero boots. I wrapped Ella's head in a scarf and tied it in the back and she peeped her eyes out until they watered when the wind blew. After walking a block or so I wondered if she was ok, she seemed like a little drunkard, stumbling along the sidewalk, leaning heavily on my hand. When I looked down I realized why, she had hidden her entire face down into the scarf.

Mickey Who? Where's Cinderella!

So it looks like we’re going to plan a trip to Disney World. I understand a fair amount of planning must take place. We have to reserve a spot at Cinderella’s dinner or breakfast or something and there are shows we should see and places we should be and coupons we must have. So I am appealing to you all – who has been there? What do you recommend? What must we see? And how can we do this without having to take out a mortgage for a three day visit?

The Big Talk

No, I don’t mean that talk, that one’s easy, I mean GOD. So let me set this up for you, my parents were raised Catholic and somewhere in the 70s went spiritualists, Dan family was raised Baptists and Episcopalian and somewhere in the 70s went bowling resulting in nobody under our entire roof currently being baptized or indoctrinated. I believe in guardian angels that keep you from making it to the intersection at the wrong time and Dan believes in Angels with titles, jobs and command posts like Gabriel and Michael and if you happen to meet an Angel it’s because he’s about to warn you that your city will experience some light brimstone showers followed by heavy fire and pestilence and perhaps you should have more than an umbrella with you.

So we’ve discussed what we would tell Ella but not in much detail and we’re pretty sure we agree, but not quite sure what it is exactly we agree on. Aunt Nola this Christmas, just like last, gave Ella a Veggie Tales movie. For the most part they are cute, void of any nailings or famine and pretty funny. I mean who can argue with Lord of the Beans’ basic message that everyone has an important job to do. So yesterday when Ella was telling me about the new Veggie Tales movie she informed me that God is pretend, he’s that character in the movies, I knew I had to say something profound, it started poorly:

Me: Oh honey God is for real

Ella: No he’s not he’s pretend like Bob and Larry*.
*Veggie Tales Characters

Me: Sweetie, God is very famous and so sometimes people pretend to be God in the movies, but God is really real.

Ella: MooooOOoom! God is pretend.

Me: No he’s not

Ella: Yes, he is

Me: No he’s not

Ella: Yes, he IS!

Somehow I managed to elevate the conversation back up to a very detailed story telling about heaven and souls and God and then I answered some heaven questions involving cotton candy, multi-colored kittens and Great Grandma and Great Grandpa and jumpy castles. This meandered around to some biology, concluding my very squirmy conversation with Ella.

Ella: Your soul is in your bones next to your marrow right?

Me: Your soul is everywhere in your body

Ella: Yes, it’s in your belly, and your eyes and it’s in your bones and your blood.

Me: Yes, and when you die you leave all of your body here and just take your soul with you.

Ella: Ok, can we play Hungry Hippo?

Me: Yes.

***

12 films in which supreme actors take on the Supreme Being.

Three Doctors

I went and had cavities filled today and my face is still numb. I feel like the rest of the day is on hold until I can keep myself from drooling, or even feel that their might be spit in the corner of my mouth.

In dog news, our dog visited the vet again this morning. Overnight her whole right eye went milky. She woke up wagging and hopping all over as usual but we were worried and $200.00 worth of diagnosis told us that when we switched her to dog food to one that is is low protein and high fat (because of her liver) it causes her to have high cholesterol and a little eye infection/scratch can turn out milky like that. It'll go away on it's own.

In roller derby news, Subpoena Envy our most blocker extraordinaire fell and hurt her ankle. Annsanity whisked her away to the emergency room where Envy’s fears were confirmed, she broke her leg right above her ankle, in TWO places. Luckily the Dr. said they were both clean. Apparently if you’re going to break your leg, this is the place to do it. They put her in a boot, gave her some crutches and meds. It should heal nicely but she must wear the boot 4- 6 weeks. If you want to send her some well wishes you can drop her a line at her myspace page http://www.myspace.com/subpoenaenvy

Two Reviews

Wednesday night after all the holidays and hub-bub in my life calmed to a dull roar in my left ear, Dan and I resumed date night aka our weekly relaxation ritual aka quick dinner and movie. Ella went to Grandma’s and Dan and I sipped mocha and munched bread and soup while we searched the entertainment section for a good movie. Our choices were; the typical chick flick – nah, the action adventure explod’em up movie – nah, and the Tom Hanks war movie – too heavy, and the kitchy funny movie that only played at 10:30 – long after Grandma goes to bed, and lastly the weird end of the world thriller. So despite my zombie-phobia I threw caution to the wind and figured how scary can a Will Smith movie really be? Besides I had heard it was more intellectual than a simple chase'm down gore-fest.

HA! Any of you who have already seen I Am Legend are laughing really hard at me right now. A simple chase'm down gore-fest would've been a relief compared to the droning dull fear you ride throughthe entire movie, spiked with sheer terrorizing moments and enough psudo-science to make you think about if for days afterwards. Ten minutes into the movie my brain was screaming to me “Get out of this theatre and sit in the lobby while Dan watches this movie” I didn’t listen. I sat crunched up tense on the edge of my seat, one giant ball of panic the entire 100 minutes. Every tense scene I felt the need to smack Dan in the arm and whisper “This is sooo NOT relaxing!” Verdict? – The slight germaphobe with an oversensative reaction towards Zombie movies should NEVER EVER see a movie where an air born virus causes everyone on the planet to become night feeding flesh eaters. ACK! I spent the rest of Wednesday night (until 2:30 in the morning) trying to soak in as much Three’s Company and Friends, trying to find my happy place as I could and I still dreamt the extension of the movie. You know all the parts we didn’t see, all the things that happened after the credits rolled, I got to watch them on the insides of my eyelids. ACK!


***

I started Ira Glass’ new book The New Kings of Nonfiction, and I love this. I know, I know, I’m a This American Life fanatic and this book is kind of along those same lines but hey, yay for finding more of what you like right? Like me, Ira has a giant file of saved stories throughout the years, pieces he’s found particularly intriguing and well written, stories that grab you in right away and contain all the elements of great narration but are also completely nonfiction, items that were so good it seemed a shame to toss them, items you have pulled out and shown people to illustrate a thought. Publishers Weekly describes the collection as written by journalists who are “unafraid to insert their personal perspective into the stories they're telling.” The first reviewer on Amazon says this book is for anyone that wants to “understand the power and allure of nonfiction narrative.” I think the collection is more for anyone that wants to understand the power and allure of ANY narrative. The added bonus is that one can start each story with the qualifier “I swear to God this is a True story….” I sat up and read three essay last night and am forcing myself to hold off today for fear I will devour the book too fast and have nothing to read this evening.

***

So three stars to I Am Legend for scaring the crap out of me long after the movie was over and three stars to The New Kings of Nonfiction for being so good I am reading slowly on purpose.

Warm Part II

Ella and I were in the bathroom, she was soaking in the tub when the first clap of thunder made her dunk low in the water and whine "I'm scaaaaarrred". The dog came to lay at my feet and I wondered if I had ever heard thunder in January before. If I had, I couldn't remember. The sky darkened and I flipped on the bathroom light despite it being the middle of the afternoon. More thunder persuaded Ella to end her soak early. 30 miles East and already far past us a tornado was ripping through the countryside.

Rare Jan. twister blasts Boone homes, orchard

Warm

It's unseasonably warm today for the second day and it's wreaking havoc with my heart. I yearn for flip flops and sand boxes and the smell of green grass in the air is wonderful yet tragically short lived. I wonder why I can't just enjoy the moment... after all, doesn't winter always come back? Don't the dishes always get dirty again? Don't the Repulicans always make it back into office?

I Heart Science.

I'm bored and surfing the net today. I'm digging the National Geographic site and I think I'm probably gonna order a years worth of it. There's no Brittany, no Mitt Romney, no New Years' sales, no stories about picky eaters and certainly no articles about how to make your home brighter, fresher and more inviting with just an old newspaper, four napkins and a paultry $36,000 worth of new furniture.

The Mighty Pen & Paper

States question electronic vote machines
By GEORGE MERRITT, Associated Press Writer

"...The swing states of California, Ohio and Florida have found that security on touch-screen voting machines is inadequate. Testers have been able to disable the systems and even change vote totals...

...But in tests, researchers in Ohio and Colorado found that electronic voting systems could be corrupted with magnets or with Treos and other similar handheld devices.

In Colorado, two kinds of Sequoia Voting Systems electronic voting machines used in Denver and three other counties were decertified because of security weaknesses, including a lack of password protection. Equipment made by Election Systems and Software had programming errors. And optical scanning machines, made by Hart InterCivic, had an error rate of one out of every 100 votes during tests by the state."

It's Really Free... Yes, Really.

I have some items that are perfectly fine but I don't want them in my home any longer. For instance we have this old organ that we inherited with the house, that is just taking up space. Many people have said they'd like to have it but no body every actually comes to get it. I read about this thing called Freecycling and signed up for my local group and have been reading the exchanges for a few days and I'm sold... er ah I'm willing, since there is no money exchanged, in fact there is no exchange beyond "here ya go" and "thanks". So next week I'm listing the organ, if you'd rather have it let me know before next week and come and get it. It's from the 50s, mostly works and has a little water damage on the bottom of one side. Otherwise it'll be the first of many things I list on Freecycle.


"Freecycle IS about keeping things out of the landfill.
It IS about giving away something that has no use in our lifeanymore to someone who could extend its usefulness a little longer.
It IS about giving gifts to people while clearing out our own clutter.
It IS about community.

When you post an offer, you are offering to give someone a gift."

Like Christmas every day only nobody cares that you are re-gifting.

You Know That One Song

Ella: I wanna hear that song that goes zooooOO000ommmmmmm zzzz zzzzooOO0oommmm zzzzoooooom zzzzoooooommMMMmmm zooo00oomm zoooOOOOooooommmmmMMMMmm zzzz zzzzo000ooommmm zzzzooOOO000oooom zzzzoooo000oom zooooommMMmm

Me: This one?

Ella: NO! It doesn't have any words it just goes zooooOO000ommmmmmm zzzz zzzzooOO0oommmm zzzzoooooom zzzzoooooommMMMmmm zooo00oomm zoooOOOOooooommmmmMMMMmm zzzz zzzzo000ooommmm zzzzooOOO000oooom zzzzoooo000oom zooooommMMmm

Me: This one?

Ella: NO! It just goes zooooOO000ommmmmmm zzzz zzzzooOO0oommmm zzzzoooooom zzzzoooooommMMMmmm zooo00oomm zoooOOOOooooommmmmMMMMmm zzzz zzzzo000ooommmm zzzzooOOO000oooom zzzzoooo000oom zooooommMMmm

Me: This one?

Ella: NO! It just goes zooooOO000ommmmmmm zzzz zzzzooOO0oommmm zzzzoooooom zzzzoooooommMMMmmm zooo00oomm zoooOOOOooooommmmmMMMMmm zzzz zzzzo000ooommmm zzzzooOOO000oooom zzzzoooo000oom zooooommMMmm

Repeat through all the instrumental songs I have in the van

Ella: Dad always plays it in his car!

Me: sigh

The Future

Every morning Ella waits for breakfast on the couch while watching cartoons. Every morning the cable that connects our TV to the world fritzes out and the screen goes scrambley. Each time Ella alerts me with a blood curdling scream “It’s happening again!” and I stop cooking and hurry to the back of the TV and knock the picture back into shape with a wrench. Sometimes it takes a few wacks, but it always works. I’ve re-worked the connection to make sure it’s a good link and still the set goes wonky after a random interval every morning until I give it a good thump. Dan has mentioned replacing it, but beyond this one morning quirk it’s a great TV and it’s much better than the old days when we changed the channel with pliers and then readjusted the tin foil balanced carefully on the antenna.

I wonder if Ella will believe me when I tell her about having 4 channels and racing to make a cheese sandwich during commercial break, or doing the pee dance while watching the very end of the Six Million Dollar Man. There will never be a day when she can’t pause it or back it up or watch it at will on her phone. She will also probably never have chicken pox or take a photography class that involves signing up for darkroom time, or get her fingers black changing a typewriter ribbon. She won’t feel comfortable riding in a car without being strapped in and she will never know why moving your fist in a circle means 'roll you window down'. She will however be able to talk about that crappy old TV we had, the one we wacked with a wrench to get morning cartoons.

Dance Dance Dance

Dear internets, I have a treat I'd like to share with you...

http://www.youtube.com/3kidnight

Thank you Cameo

It's the perfect way to kick off 2008, with a giant smile.

Joy

When I was a kid I just knew that when I was grown I would wear a fabulous sparkly evening gown and drink Champaign at a party in the penthouse of a very tall building in Chicago on New Years Eve.

In October of 1999 it became painfully apparent that I didn't know anyone that lived in a penthouse in Chicago or that was throwing a party that required evening gowns. Since my heart was already there, we threw a party and told people to dress us in their most expensive and sparkly frocks, the bridesmaid dresses only ever worn once, the suits bought for funerals and the feather boas only worn on Halloween. We bought cases of Champaign and rearranged furniture, strung soft white Christmas lights everywhere and lit candles in every corner of the house. We collected bebop and dance music from the far reaches of our world and moved our stereo into the center of the house to turn our home into one resonating box of happy. We put giant popcorn bowls of plain white confetti on every table. We turned the heat up and I donned a long silk gown the color of Champaign paired with black heels comfortable enough to dance in and curled my hair, Dan wore his best suit, wing tips and skinny tie. We moved all our TVs into a group on top of an old desk and tuned them each to a different channel in case there was something to see outside of our party.

Friends and family and neighbors and guests arrived in gowns and suits tuxes with dishes to pass and music to share. It was the fanciest potluck in the history of potlucks. We danced and ate and drank until the big countdown when the lights all stayed on, the computers made it past the last second of the nineteen hundreds, everyone kissed and threw giant handfuls of confetti at each other and hugged and danced some more. At three-thirty AM the party's straglers and I sat at the bottom of the big stairs listening to "Ode to Joy" so loud I'm sure that's why the neighbors to the right wouldn't say hi to me for a full three years after. Soaking it all in, the operatic voices climbing high into our consciousness lifting our hopes for the new millennium, I was happy where I was sitting.

Sometimes you can’t wait to get invited to a grand party; sometimes you just have to throw it yourself.

Something Had to Give

Dear Friends and Family,

No, you didn’t drop off my Holiday card list, I didn’t send any (gasp!) Not a single one. Dan and Ella made them and stamped them; I just didn’t sign them or send them. They would’ve said we had a fabulous year and Ella is loving preschool and Dan loves his new job and I love my new roller derby league. I also would’ve included a picture of our family that makes us all look adorably cute. Instead I sat home and drank hot coco with a little Irish in it while we watched Disney DVDs and ate popcorn. I feel kinda bad, but something had to give this year and the good news is next year I’ll have a jump start!

Full of excuses but less stressed,
Jenny

Before the War

It's snowing like crazy and we have company coming tonight. Good friends from out of town are here for the holidays and so we're getting the old crowd together with kids at our place. I'm cleaning like mad and soon we'll put away any toys that Ella doesn't wish to share and vacuum. Dan's picking up Papa Murphy's Pizza (yay!) and I'm putting the booze on ice (yay!) It'll be nice to catch up with everyone.

It's weird to think we used to spend every day talking to each other on the phone and hanging out together every weekend and now we only see each other twice a year. Alas, that was pre-munchkins and we barely had lives of our own then. Back in the day when people knew each other’s phone numbers by heart, because you actually had to dial them, Dawn was the queen of political statistics, reading precinct print outs like Bill Gates reads code, Mike knew everyone and played golf with them but alas didn't even have a refrigerator in his apartment as he found it easier to eat out every meal and Dan and I wrote speeches and ad campaigns for fun but still lived in a basement. We used to obsess over the local scene together scathing about who was jockeying for what position in the county board and state legislature, sharing donuts at 7 in the morning before canvassing a subdivision and spending hours organizing dinners and county fair booths. At 1:00 in the morning election night 2000, when they finally announced Gore had NOT won FL, we cried over a pitcher of beer together in a smoky old neighborhood bar on the Southside.

That's marked in my memory as the beginning of the end of the good old days.

My Own Lists

So everwhere on TV there's somebody's best and worst of 2007. Here's some I'd like to see:

The best strategic plans used in Iraq
Top 20 free songs on the internet
The 10 days Britany wasn't in the news
The best toys made in the USA
The worst dressed bitchy fashion correspondent
25 very fun things to do for free
5 most overrated blockbuster movies in 2008 you should just wait for on video
Funniest you tube videos that I can watch with my kid still in the room

Some I swear to you I saw but wish I hadn't:
Top 10 Hollywood babies
Best Britany Meltdown
Best Vacuum of 2007
Best Games that Remind Me of Your Mother
The Best 12 Days of Golf
Best Celebrity Mugshot


and finally some I liked:
Dickheads of the year
AOL's Best Nature Photographers
Best Surfing the Net with the Kids
America's Best Restroom
Best Visual Illusion of the Year
Best & Worst of 2007: Shameless attempts at cashing in on '15 minutes'
Best & Worst Buzzwords of 2007

Celia Rivenbark, I Think I Love You

Yesterday, I received a hilarious book by author Celia Rivenbark, "Stop Dressing Your Six-Year-Old Like a Skank." The first chapter details a trip to Disneyland fulfilling her family's utter craving for "total escape and plastic happiness." I was laughing so hard in the first three pages I had to read it aloud to Dan. She also wrote "Bless Your Heart, Tamp" and "We're Just Like You, Only Prettier" which I will probably order this week as I'll be finished with the first book this afternoon and together they'll have enough snark in them to balance out all the gooey sweetness of the holidays.

Excerpt here or if you prefer your funny in smaller daily chunks, Celia's column is here.

Merry Christmas Eve Internets!

Last week I bravely accepted an internet dance challenge agreeing to post a home made video of Biz Markie's "Just a Friend". Little did know at the time, it's a four minute song and so I asked to amend the challenge to include friends and family (thank God.) A handfull of my friends helped saved my ass from jerking around wildly trying to dance for four minutes by giving me the best gift I could get this season - their own dancing on video, and so now without further ado I present to you...

The best thing you'll see in the internet today...

Wine Women & Song

After a rowdy SRDD Christmas Party my inner guitar sting has been tuned down a few octaves and isn’t so close to snapping in the middle of the song. Thanks ladies, you are truly good for my soul.













SRDD Pictured December 2007 - Front Row: The Governor, DD Hunter, The Warrior, Emma Hurtin'U, Middle: Redneck B. Yotch, Velvet Vendetta, Tally Tumoil, Bombadee, Annsanity, Sinwagon, Subpoena Envy Back Row: Constance Chaos, Lil' Loca, Jacki O'No, Stiletto Steel, Vamp Helsing, Liberty Bella, Sgt. Chesty, Racy Tracy, SLOCO.

Blink

I have an infinite list of tasks to accomplish in the next five days and my eye has begun to twitch in that way that if I were in a combat situation my peers might start avoiding me and whispering behind my back. Instead I find myself standing in line next to seven other housewives with the thousand-yard stare, and no one knows for sure if they are spotting something down isle 15 on sale, or ready to disembowel the next person that asks them if they’re all ready for Christmas. Even the children sense something very dangerous brewing deep within their mothers, not daring to whimper or whine for checkout isle candy. Ella seems in her own world all together humming quietly to herself and playing with the thread slowly unraveling from my sleeve. She sleeps in the car and while I carry her into the house, thankfully allowing me to get cargo in the backdoor unencumbered. Now, I sip an instant coffee in front of my blog, a few spare minutes alone, planning to put homemade chicken pie in the oven, while the curser blinks back at me… blink… blink… blink…

Concentration

"Santa will be so proud of my snow man faces."

-Ella Dec. 2007

Just A Friend Christmas Dance

Because of this post.

Cameo and I thought it would be fun to have the occasional "dance off" with each other. After a few e-mails, the deal is done!

Here is your official invitation to join the first ever Tromping/Bombadee Dance Off.

Our first song will be Biz Markie's "Just A Friend."

Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to dance - dance your freakin' heart out. Dance with your kids, dance with your dog, dance with the vacuum and video it all!

Dance I say!

Then proudly post your dancing ass for all the world to see on Christmas Eve - a sort of blogosphere gift (um, okay) to each other. Then sit back and enjoy the spectacle of life!

There are no rules.
You can sing and dance.
You can dance with your fingers.
You can dance on the roof or at the McDonald's drive-thru.
And costumes are optional (encouraged, but optional).

So, get to it folks!

You only have 6 days!

Go!!

(Come on KTJ - you know you want to!)

Interviews

The Adventures of Bat Girl

So we had a full holiday weekend. It kicked off with a Christmas program of eighteen 3 and 4 year olds fidgeting their way through Five Little Snow Men and a grand finally of We Wish you a Merry Christmas complete with giant arm swishes. I of course, took lots of pictures and videoed 30 seconds of the 5 minute program and then I secretly videoed all the parents’ videoing. We were parodies of ourselves, the mama-razzi lined up in front of the children yelling Paris! Paris! Over here! What are you wearing today? I felt really silly after that and couldn’t bring myself to record any more and lowered the glass eye and just watched her through my own squishy organic eyes.

I often wonder if Ella is going to be utterly embarrassed by my documentation of her life. It’s why you see a glaring absence in the potty training posts, though it would’ve made great blog-fodder. It’s bad enough when your Grandma shows your butt pics to your fiancé can you imagine having the procedure in which you were toilet trained outlined for the populace of the world, or at least the 40 or so people who read your Mom’s blog? Besides, I’m sure I’ll give Ella plenty of reason to be utterly embarrassed with all that driving her to school in my PJs with my hair in pigtails and my striped derby socks and glasses on.

I digress.

So, after the school program, we hopped through the snow and across the street to the local drinkery and had hot cocoas, beer and fried things for lunch. Ella’s uncles were unexpectedly sitting at the next table over playing Euchre and so when she tired of eating fried cheese and poking things with those little plastic swords she popped over to the next table to ask the fellas about their cards while we finished off the last of the beer and paid the bill. The rest of the afternoon was spent at Granny’s visiting with cousins and taking pictures of snowflakes and the evening spent with friends playing cards and romping in front of the warm glow of holiday TV.

Ella doesn’t get to wrestle around with boys very often and so when they would get particularly wound up, the boys wrestling around wildly, Ella would shriek with laughter and jump in the middle scaring Mrs. Hostess into putting her cards down and yelling into the other room “You boys better tone it down a notch and be gentle!” and I would shake my head and say “It’s ok, she’s having a blast.” It was nice to sit in a warm dinning room with a table full of chips and chocolate and cookies and wine and share stories with old friends and their families while the kids tried hard to bust their heads on the coffee table. It reminded me of all the wonderful people my parents played cards with and their children.

Pictured left to right:

Wolverine, Super Ninja & Bat Girl just before they put their jammies on.

Simpsonize me

It's me.

Getting Ready

Brain Vacation Derailed

So it started I was watching film trailers at Apple and I clicked on “Step Up 2” one of those break dancing movies like the ones I loved so much in the 80s and I heard a song had to have. I spent the next 30 minutes tracking it down, it’s Cupid’s “369” and it samples “the Clapping Song” by Shirley Ellis (1965) which I hadn’t really heard either, but I used to hear the girls in the neighborhood singing this while playing double-dutch or clapping hands and so I paid a dollar for Cupid's version and Ella and I listened to it at least 5 times in a row last night and twice this morning.

While buying the song I decided to look for another song that was in an 80s dance movie called “Breakdance 2 Electric Boogaloo.” I used to skate to it in the 80s and recently at practice the new rink we were at dusted it off and played it. I’ve been thinking of it since then and it took me a considerable amount of time to figure out what it was called... it’s Din Da Da by George Kranz. I didn’t pay a dollar for surfing around trying to find it I did find Artemisbell on You Tube dancing to it. She dancing with such abandon, it’s so raw and true I almost feel like I’m intruding by watching. I went on to watch her do Zoot Suit Riot, Groove is in the Heart, Little Pretty One, White Wedding, Proud Mary, Rico Suave and the Safety Dance. She writes

“Have Fun...Do what you want to do...even if you're criticized.

This is a Dance Mania debute! If nothing else, perhaps you'll like the music. It's a new hobby for me anyway. It's my workout too! I'd like to thank and pay tribute to all the great song writers and musicians and celebrate this great music with my dance.

Dancing is not my discipline, but it sure feels good. I'm having the time of my life!
Thanks for watching and sharing my fun…”

On the third song I realized there’s a different painting in the background of each video and then I realized she’s a painter. So I backtracked and read:

“I'm an artist and if you like art, feel free to visit: http://www.dianacampanella.com/”

I visited her website to have a closer look. She’s in Scottsdale AZ and it turns out she put out a magazine from Aug.1994-Dec. 1995 called "Art & Politics", focusing on challenging vending laws and testing the 1st and 14th Amendment Rights, and how the Supreme Court finally ruled that Art, as it is speech, and is protected. I wanted to follow this train of thought more but about that time Ella fell down the stairs and bonked her head pretty good and I had to read Thumbelina while holding ice to her forehead. She's perfectly fine, just scarred and fully comprehending why we tell her not to walk down the stairs with a blanket wrapped around her whole body.

Anyway - go watch Diane dance and hear Cupid's 369 it'll be fun.

12.08.07 Scrimmage

Quad Cities vs Stateline Divas

It's scrimmage day, we leave for the Quad Cities around 2:00 and that'll give us time for check in, dinner and warm up. I'm so excited, send some protective juju my way today so that nobody breaks anything more serious than a skate.

Seriously?!

Do we really need to specify products we use shouldn’t have poison in them? Seriously?

Go Listen to NPR's Story "...toxic chemicals exist in many of the products we handle every day — agents that can cause cancer, genetic damage and birth defects, lacing everything from our gadgets to our toys to our beauty products. And unlike the European Union, the U.S. doesn't require businesses to minimize them — or even to list them, so consumers can evaluate the risks...."

it's 39 minutes that will change the way you think about everything.

Bundled

Looking at my Palm Trying to Predict the Future

So I've been getting the blue screen of death unexpectedly over the last few days, making me edgy and also making it unwise to start any major projects. I spent the entire day yesterday backing up all of my docs onto the network. Corrupted files all sorted and disposed of and everything safely held in PC purgatory, I finally figured out that the blue screen of death only appears when my screen saver attempts to start. So I turned the screen saver off and no ominous shutting down... anyone heard of this? Is it a virus? a Glitch? Spy wear? A setting? Do I really need to re-install windows and every other program I hold dear to my everyday workings? Is it just a matter of time before I have to pick out a new machine? Should I upload all my address books and calendars to my Palm?

Run Run as Fast As You Can

During our first snow storm, as we pulled up to the house, we discovered we had just missed the illusive Gingerbread Man.

It's all about the toes

Dear Santa Claus,

Hello, hope you and the Mrs. are keeping warm and doing well. We are doing great, looking forward to your visit, in fact I'm sure I'll be calling you several times in the next few weeks to give you regular updates on the kid. However it feels more appropriate for me to tell you what I'd like for Christmas in writting, so here goes: for Christmas this year I would like to have a new floor space heater to keep my toes warm and a couple new pairs of socks to keep my toes warm and it would be nice to have a pair of stylish boots that have a fluffy wool on the inside to warm my toes, a new rug for the bathroom as the old one wore out and that floor is COLD in the winter and last but certainly not least a new kingsize feather filled beadspread so at night my toes stay warm.

Love,
Me

December 1st

It is finally December and I can give in and let Christmas descend upon us. Little town’s Christmas walk is today and we are in the thick of it having volunteered to read books and make ornaments with the kids today to hang on the tree they’ll put up at village hall. We are looking forward to a few inches of snow this afternoon as Ella’s new snow boots have yet to tromp through anything more glorious than cold wet leaves and to his relief Dan can put the tree up. I have coupons to spend and need a place to put my wrapped presents. This year the magic that flows from Ella’s head has swirled around our whole house and we find ourselves in the first Christmas where Santa Clause plays a central role. Where elves whole heartedly peep in on us from the snow globe at the north pole to make sure we’ve all eaten our veggies and washed up for bed and where wishes are easily granted if only you refrain from pouting. Hark the Harold Angels sing – the month of magic and miracles is here.

The Scraps of Life

It could be the very height of self absorption. This week in the mail I finally received my book! Ages ago I got nervous about the entire internet imploding and what has functioned as a scrapbook of Ella’s childhood, this blog, going with it. I searched and researched and found Blurb to “slurp” up my blog. I edited it down and ended with a 354 page book called “Bombadee’s Garden – The Blog from 08.11.05 to 02.28.07” I intend on printing them a little more often in the future. Perhaps next Feb. I’ll order the next volume. If you ever found yourself wanting to publish a book I highly recommend Blurb. The process was pretty user freindly and the software good. The binding, the paper quality and the print quality are beautiful. As for the content - well… it’s mine.

Hey AZ! It was like winning a very tiny lottery!

I found the most perfect present in the whole world today. Ella just loves dress up clothes, I think I posted that already and so the only thing she wants from Santa is this

“Sleeping Beauty Dress, with Sleeping Beauty Shoes and a Sleeping Beauty Crown and a Sleeping Beauty Wand and that’s just want I want to have and Santa can go to the store and buy it for me and I will open it and put it on and pretend to be Sleeping Beauty!”

So at three she wants clothes and at thirty-four I want her to have a place to put them and so we set out to find a tiny fancy wardrobe to put the above mentioned foof. Today while strolling through a local outlet store, way in the very back I found a grown up wardrobe that had no chest of drawers to match – it had been lost or destroyed or blown up, who knows. Anyway this wardrobe was just the top part, just the part where you could hang things and since the bottom was gone, it’s only four feet high and an adult would have to bend over to hang anything in it and who in their right mind wants a fancy carved mahogany wardrobe for someone that has a 32 inch reach and only wears very tiny dresses…. Hmmm. Since the bottom half is missing I paid $40.00 for it. I almost kissed the sales clerk.

12.08.07

Early Christmas for Bombadee

Three Fortunes

After a wonderful meal courtesy of the gift certificate my Grandparents sent to us on our anniversary, Dan, Ella and I opened our fortunes and found the following:















Would you laugh if I told you I took that picture three times to get the right one for this post?

The Saints Smiled Down Upon Us

Recently Saint Apollonia parted the clouds and looked down from her heavenly abode and smiled her beautiful pearly whites at our family. This December for Christmas we found in our stocking dental insurance and a young vibrant dentist with bright eyes a thick Ukrainian accent and a chair-side manor that Mother Theresa would admire. The good news… two small cavities, and the bad… the root canal I paid handsomely out of pocket for three years ago has proved sub par and needs supplemental drilling. Today, I am on the phone learning far more than I ever wanted to know about this fine insurance blanket lovingly knotted and weaved by the gnarly old hands of bureaucracy and finely finished in red tape. Though our blanket is less of a blanket and more of a lace doily I am still happy to have it. I will keep it lovingly under my Christmas tree this year under the presents it will leave money to buy.

tagged with 7 things

Catching up on my regular reading and realized Jennie tagged me. (BTW Totally looking forward to Thursday - big grin)

Rules:
1- Link to the person that tagged you and post the rules on your blog.
2- Share 7 random and-or weird things about yourself.
3- Tag 7 random people at the end of your post and include links to their blogs.
4- Let each person know that they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

7 Weird and/or Random Things About Me:
1. I've never been to Disney World so I'm as excited as a 4 year old about the possible trip.
2. I had the chance to move to a warmer climate and more money but gave it up to remain close to our families and friends... twice.
3. Growing up I couldn't even stand the smell of tomatoes but after La was born I began to crave tomatoes with green olives and cheddar cheese hors devours and often make a plate of a dozen or so just for myself.
4. I have a rather big statue of Buddha on my desk.
5. I'm a bad speller and most of the time I don't care. (this drives Dan mad)
6. I have an affinity for taking photographs of street people and I always give pan-handlers money, if I have any.
7. I notice people's shoes and judge them a little based on them.

I don't think I can tag 7 people, I just don't know 7 very well and I bet Dooce just aint stoppin' by the ol' Garden to see what's shakin', so I am tagging...
Utah Jo
Chrissy the Libraran on Skates
a Very Lucky Lady
and
The Fabulous Paula

Enchanted

I saw Enchanted last night and thought it was superb. It was nice to see the damsel in distress pick up the sword and chase the beast, even if she was wide eyed and bushy headed. It was just the right amount of scary without inducing nightmares and the signing was syrupy sweet while still being self deprecatingly funny. I give it three majic beans.

Bonjour

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving at my Mom’s house even though I had a tooth ache. I was able to down enough wine to numb me up enough to chew. It’s better today and I’m seeing our dentist first thing Monday. Yesterday me and Lala ventured out to the big mall and shopped until we almost dropped. We saw Santa, got portraits done at the department store and bought presents and an outfit for all the upcoming festivities. I think we may go see Enchanted tonight and I’m going to try to get some sushi with friends worked in somewhere too. So it’s indeed been a wonderful kick off to the holiday season.

***

I finished “The Virgin Blue” and it took a really odd turn at the end. It seemed very disconnected to the rest of the book. I kept having to re-read things wile thinking to myself “What?! Where did that come from?! How odd.” So, I’m moving from 16th century France to 16th century Tuscany in “Mirror Mirror” next. I’ve had it for some time, but haven’t found the right mood to read it. After this perhaps I’d like to try some of the historical novels Dan’s been reading over the past few years about the 30 Years' War. It seems this winter’s reading will have a theme, the Early Modern Era/Europe 1500-1800. Perhaps I’ll do a little genealogy too, who knows maybe I’ll locate the lost Dauphine.

***

Speaking of fancier times, my daughter has made the decision to stop wearing modern clothes altogether and is now only wearing “princess dresses”. I'm pretty sure if we owned a little powdered wig, she'd have it on her head every morning just after her servants rouse her. She’ll be taking tea on the fainting couch later.

I procured a dress from one of the finest designers in Disneyland for Christmas yesterday. The box we'll wrap it in will be as big as she is. "Satiny bodice topped by a golden lace and brocade collar, smocked inset plus golden ribbon and lace ruffles, bell sleeves finished with sequined organza and lace cuffs, red organza overskirt with sequins and lace over gold organza skirt, tulle and taffeta underskirts make it extra-captivating for swirling."

The Virgin Blue

I started a wonderful new book the other night and plowed through the first third of it before I couldn’t keep my eyes open anymore. The Virgin Blue was written by the same author who penned (typed? Do people still pen anything?) The Girl with Pearl Earrings. The problem is every other chapter is great. Those are the chapters that take place during the 30 years war and the chapters I can’t wait to get past altogether are the ones that take place in the modern day French countryside. I’ll probably be done by the end of the weekend; I’ll let you know if the weaker chapters get any better.

See it Before the Full Moon

Three weeks ago, Comet 17P/Holmes, a periodic planet in our solar system, suddenly became one million times brighter than normal. It began shooting out gas and dust in such volume that it can be seen with the naked eye. According to astronomers at the University of Hawaii Institute for Astronomy, the comet has become the biggest object in the solar system, bigger than the Sun. Hal Weaver, a planetary astronomer at Johns Hopkins University, advises looking for the comet in the northeastern part of the sky in the constellation Perseus early in the night.

· NASA: Astronomy picture of the day
· NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope
· Astrodon - Don Goldman photos
· Astrophotography by David Kodama
· HubbleSite.org
· Sky and Telescope.com

9 things & 1 picture

9 things I am thankful for today (besides the obvious)

Instant coffee
Settlers of Catan
The space heater under my desk
Noggin
Our crock pot
The cozy pink knit sweater AW gave me
Lists
E-mail

The litttle birds outside my window

Alice

Ella's preschool class made crafts for Thanksgiving next week. Today, when I came to get her she told me her "Indian name" is Alice the Princess and she could wear her headband on Tuesday at the feast. I feel like this maybe the opportunity to talk about some history here but she's three and I'm not sure what to say. Perhaps we'll talk about how Native Amrican's saved the Europeans from starving and freezing to death when they came to North America and now we celebrate that by collecting food for the needy and having a feast. Maybe we'll talk about celebrating the harvest season. Maybe we'll get some books about Native Amercan culture. Maybe we'll say what we're thankful for. Maybe we'll just go to school and eat sliced deli turkey and cheese squares while wearing headbands with feathers in them... sigh.

Annie

I took Ella to see Annie last night and she was dumbfounded for the first sixty seconds at the action on stage and the song. She's watched Annie the movie perhaps a thousand times, maybe a million but when she saw actual kids on stage singing "Maybe" it was soo much for her process she couldn't move and then after that she couldn't stop grinning. She was glued to it, unmoving and when intermission came she almost cried "Is it over?! Is that it? What happens to Annie?" as if she hadn't seen the movie. "No honey they're just taking a break so we can go potty and get a drink, it's called intermission" I told her and she responded with "OOoooh, they paused it for us?"

Before the show we actually got to pet Sandy and meet Daddy Warbucks in the lobby and before that Ella and I went to this little shop up the street Chocolat by Daniel to eat up a little time, two ginger truffles and some orange soda. The whole time Ella was talking as if we were on our way to a movie. "Are we going to get popcorn?" she'd ask, "will they turn it up loud?" We'd been to plays and musicals before but lately something in my child has switched on, an awareness that she didn't have before. Lately she seems to be cataloguing memories and understanding humor and logic in a new sort of way, so it didn't surprise me that she really hadn't remembered being at the Coronado before. When we walked into the auditorium she looked up and gasped "Look mom STARS!" at the faux dark velvety sky and the twinkling lights embedded in it.

At the end, after happy tears and Annie's adoption, Ella and I lolly gagged around the theatre making a stop at the powder room and then going up to the lobby to sit in the fancy chairs and take pictures of each other. We were just waiting for the crowds to thin before we went for the door. Finally, we made our way to the lobby and while we donned coats she treated the remaining ushers and stragglers to an impromptu performance of "Tomorrow" and when she threw her arms out wide and crooned "A daaaaay a waaaaaaaaaayah!" we all clapped.

Thank you Dan.

Monday Marker Blues

Hey! What the?!!

We scrimmaged last night and I forgot what it’s like to try to get your teammates together into a certain pattern but have a mouth guard in and refs are yelling fouls from two different directions all the while the jammers are making her way through the pack and skaters are knocking into you so hard that instead of being able to reason “go left while Subpoena Envy goes right and we’ll block her with a vee formation” the only thought you can put together in your head is “Hey! What the *&%$! – quit knocking into me!” “HEY! Get the Hey! HEY! Get the $%^4@ outta my WAY!” Tempers flare, that’s what good blocking does, it confuses you and makes you want to scream things but with a mouth guard in it mostly comes out “Guh! Shah fah fuh guh!” while you drool on yourself. So it’s frustrating at the least and fun as heck at its best. It’ll be so much easier when we’re playing someone else and I can focus the frustration at someone who’s real name I don’t know. I can hardly wait, I am glad to say we have some hard hitters skating interference and I’m glad their on my team that’s for sure.

More Golden Bonus Days

Wednesday is her old self this morning. She goes in for some blood test tomorrow just to make sure she's out of the woods but if I'd paid the vet more, he could tell me why she got sick in the first place. The conspiracy theorist in me wonders if some punk kid got grounded for stealing all my Halloween candy came down and fed my dog antifreeze for lunch but really she's probably just old. What matters is we have some golden bonus days with Wednesday and she's wagging and rolling around on the couch again.

***

So my beautiful 26" monitor lost it's power supply the day before yesterday and it now sits on the buffet black and dusty waiting for me to find someone that can repair it for less than the cost of replacing it. In the mean time I have a little 17" to fill in and it feels kinda like a little sports car on my desk, small, sleek and fast. Don't ask me to explain - I can't.

***

Last night Dan and Ella and I were playing Candyland and Hungry Hungry Hippo and we were all hoping for Ella to win and when it became clear she wasn't going to she exclaimed "Son of a butt!" and Dan and I laughed really hard on the inside.

Ah yes, life is good.

Wednesday's at home

Well, they called this morning and said it's her kidneys. So, we took her in to the vet and got some IV fluids. They wanted to keep her for 3 days for more tests and a constant IV. Instead I

brought her home and have to bring her back tomorrow for more IV fluids. I'd rather she felt crappy in my living room then she felt crappy in the kennel. I've got antibiotics, pepcid AC and chicken stock into her and now we just wait

until tomorrow when I take her in for more IV fluids and reassesments.

It's so hard to know what the right thing to do is, she's 10 years old and he said according to her labs her kidneys are in dire shape. I don't know if hundreds of dollars worth of tests will tell us anything more than she needs more treatment and then she's still in the same shape but she's been poked prodded and spent nights on a cold cement floor alone at the vet. So, for now

she'll stay in her fluffy bed at home and get chicken soup and frequent visits to the vet, I'll carry her down the stairs to pee and pet her lots until she either gets better or not.

Wednesday

3:00pm update

She's pukey, dehydrated and hasn't moved in three days accept when I carry her down the back stairs to the yard and when I took her to the vet. We're waiting on blood work. So far the possibilities are: She ate something dead in the back yard and got a little 'food poisoning' or she is old and has cancer or something. I should know more tomorrow. Right now I am cooking up some chicken and rice for her while she sleeps. sigh.

Wednesday

The dog is sick. I’m off to the vet today – update later.

Praise Artemis for a Victorious Hunt

Our excursion lead us through 3 stores, one restaurant and one mall play area. We found the first store utterly futile and spent many minutes in the dressing room sighting no quarry. We decided to hunt elsewhere; the grounds were too picked over leaving only odd sizes and irregulars. Upon arriving at the second locale I thought I spotted my illusive prey however when I went in for the kill I was nearly mauled by frenzied shoppers circling the sale racks scavenging what they could. I was unable to find suitable game and resorted to stalking the perfect catch elsewhere. After searching through endless fields of denim, I did manage to bag a fine pair but when my hunting partner took a shopping bag to the head while reclining in her stroller I knew it was time to find refuge, luckily it was only a scrape.

We arrived at the play area ready to run but found it infested with the frantic offspring of many irritable parents. Among shouts of “Kaliegh! Why don’t you play over here?!” and “Conrad! You say your sorry right this instant!” my dear companion attempted to move down the slide. She was thwarted and knocked to the ground landing square on her head. The gasps of surprise from the natives scarred her further and we hurried out into the distance grasping each other closely for safety. We sent for backup and arranged for a rendezvous with our support party at IHOP just a few miles away. Making our way through a veritable stampede we arrived intact and dined on the finest crepes and smiley face pancakes available in such wilds. Upon filling our bellies we took our leave for base camp happy aft a sparse but no less successful hunt.

Oh yeah, the kids were cute too.

Last week I had the pleasure of joining Ella’s Halloween Dance Party during ballet class. The kids were dressed in white and colors that would glow and they had the black lights on while the Monster Mash inspired them all to march and wiggle around. I was terrified. There’s nothing quite like coming to terms with how terrible your pants look on you like seeing yourself wearing them in a ballet studio. My bad jeans went on for eternity bouncing back and forth between the full wall mirrors, sagging off me in all the wrong places. After a summer of strength training and roller skating I find myself yet another size and shape, so today with child in tow I jean shop. Later I may be drinking.

I am old.

Instead of yelling "Freeze you little sh*t!" I snapped a picture and posted it on tiny town's web board. Yes, I am that crotchety old lady, I posted this last night.

"Happy Halloween dear neighbors, I hope everyone stayed safe and warm. My husband and I took our daughter up and down the block this year. While we were gone, we left a bowl of candy on the front porch with the sign “take one please” just like we do every year. While we were just next door 4 young men on razor scooters wearing clown wigs of various rainbow colors relieved our bowl of the rest of the candy in it, about two bags worth. I hope their mothers or someone that knows them read (tiny town's web board)

PS I snapped a picture of one of them. "