Laugh Till You Cry a Little

Have you ever seen something so funny that it made you laugh uncontrollably? Like, laugh so hard you couldn't breathe? We're talking seizure-esque here. Ever laughed so hard that tears streamed down your face? (probably from the lack of air in your lungs) I just have to share this blog post from someone else that has been making me laugh for over a week now. I even get a glimpse of it when I go to the page to link to it and I choke on my own spit. Ok, so before you click this, try to have an open mind and don't think me so sick and twisted for finding it so damn funny.

[edit]
I submitted this to

If you wanna see some other funny stuff, check out this blog.

Can't Get Enough of This:

I just love watching this video! Haven't seen it for a while and someone blogged it and now I have to too! Enjoy!

Valentines Day Marketing is Evil

Sunday Weigh-In Day
I love my husband. He is such a sweet guy, but he is not helping when it comes to losing weight. How do I tell him to stop bringing things into the house that throw me off my game? Do I blog about it and hope he reads it? Hmmm. Maybe.

Sweetie, I love you. But could you stop buying soda and candy for the next couple of months? If it's here in the house, I'm weak and I'll eat it. — Thanks, Love Wifey.

How about, if I lose 20 lbs., then you can spoil me and lavish me with chocolate. That would be cool.

I still think you're Super Hubby and you rock!

So here's the thing. Valentines Day marketing is pure evil. Why? Because men like my husband are drawn to the damn candy stands like moths to a flame because they know we can't turn down chocolate and it will make us happy. They know that if they come home with chocolate, they done good right? Um, yeah, maybe if their wife is Jessica Simpson. (don't they wish) (ok, I speak for myself.)

We can't complain because then they'll never buy us chocolate again, right? Plus we get that heavy breathing of "well, for Pete's sake woman, what WILL make you happy!??"

Then you end up like me, sitting here eating Hersheys Chocolate Kisses filled with cheesecake. Not just ANY old cheesecake either. We're talkin' New York Cheesecake. Yeah, my Hubby knows how to pick a good chocolate, huh. I'm a spoiled brat.



It's heavenly. Take my word for it. Don't buy any. They are sin wrapped in chocolate. Did I mention they are also filled with New York Cheesecake? Did I mention they are Limited Edition?

So now that I've made this dramatic introduction, on with the stats.

This morning (er, afternoon by the time I remembered to get on the scale.) I weighed 193.5 lbs. I gained 2 lbs. back. Big shocker there. I've been slacking off the last few days on the work out routine too but I have been busier and getting out of the house more, so that's a plus. So, I will just have to work harder this week. Much harder so I can reward myself with a cheesecake kiss.

Hubby, please hide the bag! Help!

That Reminds Me...

A friend of mine is getting ready to have a baby. She told me (emailed me) that she is terrified and excited all at the same time. Yep, that's about right. She also asked me what my labor and delivery was like. Simple question, not so simple answer. So, I started writing her back. I'm debating yet about what exactly I want to tell her. Should I try to keep it short and simple or should I continue the long letter I'm composing which chronicles all of the details?

I don't yet have a whole lot of experience being on the other side of the fence talking to pregnant women about what to expect. It's still kinda fresh for me yet. I'm still not 100 percent over being completely traumatized by the event. I can at least talk about it fondly and without breaking into a puddle of tears, but there are details I still find so horrifying that I'm not sure it would be a good thing to disclose to someone about to embark on the journey of labor and delivery.

What do I say to her? Does she really want to know the truth? Should I give her all the gory details about what it's like to have a Cesarean section? If I tell the truth, women will stop having sex and having babies and the human race will end right?

I guess I just have to trust that people will take certain bits of information and roll with it. I was pretty careful about the things I read before I gave birth. I love to google and research till my eyes bleed but I also read somewhere that you can give yourself a coronary if you're not careful. I learned that lesson when I first found out I was pregnant. I scared myself reading some things when I was looking up a certain pain I was experiencing and from then on I was really careful about which sources I used and what information I chose to read.

While in the midst of composing my letter, I was listening to some relaxing music. A steel guitar was playing and I was instantly taken back to that time of "the waiting" just before giving birth. At that time I remember I was soooooo ready to have the baby and not be pregnant anymore. My fingers and toes felt like sausages. It felt like I was wearing my baby. He was so large and taking up so much of my body that I felt like he was strapped onto me. I just wanted to hold him and meet him so badly. I was so tired and worn out from the massive nerve compression in my leg. Gestational Diabetes made me have to pee every 20 minutes and that was mighty annoying. Needless to say, I did not have an easy pregnancy.

Anyhow, for about a week straight, we sort of camped out in the living room with me laying on the couch ready to pop and watched the Firefly series while we waited for Godot. Yes, the WHOLE series. Every episode on DVD. I'm personally not really into sci-fi, but Hubby loves it. You would have to have seen it to know, but there was this theme music that would play and it had a steel guitar in it. I got sucked into watching it and almost looked forward to watching the plot develop. There was something soothing about the theme music and it got to be something that relaxed me while trying to nap. So now, every single time I hear a steel guitar, I think of Firefly which makes me think of waiting to give birth.

I wonder how it is for other women.
Do you have some memory trigger that makes you think about your pregnancy?
(leave me a comment)

There are certain moisturizing lotions that the smell reminds Hubby and I of the late nights of agony when he would have to massage my leg and back to keep the excruciating pain from making me lose my mind. I remember the pain in my leg being so bad that I wanted to saw it off with a dull nail file in the middle of the night. I still have some of moisturizing lotion left, but I now hesitate to use it because when I have, it reminds me of that uncomfortable time. It's not all bad memories, but mostly it was not a really great time. Hubby smells it and says "ah, smells like pregnancy" and he isn't saying that with a fondness in his tone of voice. So, I guess I'll save it for the next pregnancy if there is one and hope and pray it's different the next time around.

Everyone tells me that each pregnancy and each birthing experience is different. I have to believe in that or else we wouldn't keep the human race going. I have to believe that the next time won't be as bad as the first. I have to have faith that there is a reason the human mind blocks out these memories and represses all of the bad stuff for you. I still remember a lot, but I know I remember it very differently. I think Hubby remembers things more clearly but it's just something we don't discuss much. I know it is still too traumatic for him at times. I don't know that men have that "invasion of the memory snatchers" program that runs on their brains when it comes to childbirth. I feel bad for them in a way.

Sometimes I am tempted to blog about my labor and delivery experience. I just might some day so I have some permanent journal of it just for myself. Maybe when I'm done with my letter to my mother-to-be friend, I'll some how incorporate it into a post. Maybe it will be the therapy I need to resolve some issues I still harbor about the experience.

Political Pop Corn

Politics. It's all the buzz. It's all the rage. It's like pop corn. It's slick with butter and pieces are flying in different directions yet some are sticking together in a clump. Who's brand will be the fluffiest? All the cool kids are blogging about it. Well, I have something to say. WTF! is what I have to say. I'll be straight up. I have nothing to hide. It used to be that discussing who you vote for was like discussing your salary. It's just not something you did.

Times change.

I voted for Obama in the primary here in AZ. There I said it. And no, I'm also not a trader to my gender. I'd like to share with you a comment I recently put on Mrs. Flinger's blog just because it really sums up how I feel about politics right now.

"..Politics to me are like a Far Side cartoon: “blah blah Ginger. blah blah blah blah Ginger.” I try so hard to pay attention and learn what I can and then get confused some more. The answers all depend on who you ask too. In the end, I just follow all the other lemmings, go fill in the little oval for the person who convinces me they will do the best job based on who has the best speech writers. And hair dresser. Then I grab the handles of the hand basket and hang on. I wish I weren’t so cynical, but cheese-n-rice, it’s only February! A lot could happen from now till then.

I think RuPaul should run for pres and that would fix everything. Terrorists would take one look at that and say “oh HELL no” and leave us the frig alone so we can concentrate on getting better Botox injections for all Americans. God helps those who help themselves, right?..."

My point is that I'm growing very tired of all the nitpicking about skin color and gender and whether or not it matters. What matters to me are the same things that matter to most people and the bottom line is who is the best person for the job. I'm not confident that any politician will do what they say they are going to do once they do get into office and in the end, it's not the President who has the final say anyhow. It's all a game of political football and I didn't even watch the Super Bowl this year. Not even for the commercials. That should tell you how much I care for football. (Except when in reference to the below comment.)

What is really pissing me off right now is the candidates' stances on education. Specifically No Child Left Behind — or how teachers around here, like my husband, refer to it more commonly as No Child Gets Ahead. I just don't have a lot of faith in their uses of the word 'reform.' Why can't they just commit to getting rid of the damn thing?

No Child Left Behind: The Football Version
Author Unknown*

1. All teams must make the state playoffs, and all will win the championship. If a team does not win the championship, they will be on probation until they are the champions, and coaches will be held accountable.

2. All kids will be expected to have the same football skills at the same time and in the same conditions. No exceptions will be made for interest in football, a desire to perform athletically, or genetic abilities or disabilities. ALL KIDS WILL PLAY FOOTBALL AT A PROFICIENT LEVEL

3. Talented players will be asked to work out on their own without instruction. This is because the coaches will be using all their instructional time with the athletes who aren't interested in football, have limited athletic ability, or whose parents don't like football.

4. Games will be played year round, but statistics will only be kept in the 4th, 8th, and 11th games.

5. This will create a New Age of sports where every school is expected to have the same level of talent and all teams will reach the same minimal goals.
If no child gets ahead, then no child will be left behind.

No one seems to know the source of this written work, but if you know differently, please let me know so I can cite it properly. This has been emailed to me several times now and I've seen it on the web in other blogs, so couldn't hurt to post it in mine as well.*

At the very least I can say Obama has a more consistent and more attractively laid out plan (at least on his website) of how he will tackle NCLB. Sure, he doesn't say he'll get rid of it, but he does spell out how he plans to revise it which, for the time being, at least, looks good in RGB.

Billary on the other hand, when I visit here website, I feel my intelligence is a little insulted when I go to check it out. Why? Do they think I won't notice subtle design changes and implementations? Editing? I'm not stupid.

A couple of weeks ago, I checked out her website along side of Obama's and compared where they said, or — excuse me — their web designers said, they stand on education issues. After comparing the sites, Obama's was easier to comprehend whereas Clinton's looked like it wasn't as well thought out while it dismissed the topic of NCLB as just a mistake the Bush Administration made and she was going to reform it, blah blah blah - White House-speak. I could have sworn the text looks different today than it did just a week ago. Maybe I'm wrong, but I thought there was more to it than what is there now.

When you go to her site now, it simply says she will "...End the unfunded mandate known as No Child Left Behind." That's it? That's your plan? I just don't trust that for some reason. It just feels like to me she's stretching her positions to make it so it's what people want to hear. All politicians do this, but some just seem more sincere than others. I'm not a Republican so I wouldn't vote for McCain or Huckabee, but at least they seem sincere.

There is also some interesting controversy floating around out there that has to do with her actual position on education "reauthorization." I don't like that word "reauthorization," do you? It's one thing to say you'll get rid of something. It's one thing to say you think something is broken and list how you plan to fix it. It's something else — I don't know what — to say you will "reauthorize" something.

It's gobbledygook to me.

Do take a read on the links directed from this blog post so you can see what I saw.

"Improve teacher training." To me, that still translates into "let's keep blaming the teachers for everything and call it lack of training." Nice.

Just as a side note, I wonder if her website designers have read what was said in the New York Times about Obama being a Mac and Clinton a PC. I don't take it that seriously, but I do find it amusing and tend to agree with Obama's site being more Mac-esque and more appealing to me personally. I also think his communication resonates with a younger crowd.

I hate to be so critical of Hillary, but I just don't like being led by fear and finger wagging. I just don't find her all that inspiring. I wish I did, but I just don't. She reminds me of former female bosses I've had who use their authority to belittle you. That's just how I feel. I realize some women feel they need to be a little bitchy to rise to the top. It shouldn't be this way, but it is in some respects.

Gender and race are really not important to me when it comes to the right person for the job, but how someone represents themselves is and that means all of their mainstream media and communications as well. Sincerity has a lot to do with it also.

Many others have been judged for far more on much less, but these are complicated times in which we live and so to the gallows they will go.

Like popcorn, fluffy is as fluffy does.

Call Off the Adoption

Ok, so I'm no longer putting my kid up for adoption. The laptop booted up and has been – knock wood – working fine since this morning. It survived having diluted apple juice spilled across part of the keyboard and speaker and I'm happily typing from my responsive keyboard once again. Leaving it in tent position all night with the battery removed was good joo joo evidently. The return key feels slightly sticky, but I'll live. I have yet to test out the optical drive, but I have faith that it will be alright. I have a feeling that when the internal temp rises as I do higher processor grinding tasks, the keys might get a little stickier. It's just a theory and only time and lots of banging the keys will tell. Maybe it will turn into crunchy granola after a while.

Last night I used Hubby's G4 to look up the servicing manual for a MacBook Pro. I also looked at lots of pictures of the machine taken apart. There is no way in hell I'm ever going to attempt taking this thing apart. Unless I win the lottery that I never play, then maybe. Browsing through all of the photos of the assembly parts made me appreciate this little machine even more as well as the steep price tag. It also makes me a little more paranoid and on even more of a mission to toddler-proof it more. I think I'm going to buy one of those keyboard condoms for it sometime soon.

I wonder if they make them ribbed for my pleasure?