Wednesday, May 31, 2006

You know you're old...


When you go to the doctor because your mouth is inexplicably swollen, sore and chapped and she says "Looks like you burned your lips." Huh? Yes, folks, apparently as we get older our bodies' "natural defenses" (things like moisture, fatty epidermous, pigment, etc., etc.) exit the building leaving us more prone to things like SUNBURNED lips... WTF???! Not too mention the other sagging, creaking, stooping, thinning happiness that heralds our head-long dive into middle age. nice.

Saturday, May 27, 2006

Riddle me this...


How come I never like anybody who likes me and vice versa how come I'm always chasing people who are so unfamiliar with what I actually look like despite seeing me once a week, every week for months on end that when i suddenly appear with hair that is 2 feet longer than it was before just squint a little and say "Hey, did you get highlights or something...?" before turning away to continue their far more fruitful conversation with my kid. {sigh}

Anyhoo, check out this really very cool picture my 3-year old took of me (because this is a family blog I cropped it so you can't see that I'm actually sitting on the toilet -- not USING the toilet you perverts! just sitting there, watching my kid take pictures of the cat who happened to be in the bathtub. Long story. Anyway, where was I??? Oh yes, look at this!



tell me my kid's not going to be famous in all the photography/drag-racing circles!

Friday, May 26, 2006

Dar-lin'!!


I just got called "Darlin'" by a really cute butch girl who was parking next to me and who paused to let me open my truck door so I could get out before she opened her door to get her bag. "Go ahead, Darlin', after you..." Hmmmm. I think something remarkably similar to this happened the LAST time I had long hair. I'm sensing a real added value to this whole hot-mop-on-the-top-of-my-head thing! :-)

Tuesday, May 23, 2006

I don't do the sterotype thing...


I mean, I've been around long enough to know that you just can't believe the hype, BUT can I just say, I've had long hair (really long, and wavy with blonde streaks -- it's kind of cool actually) for approximately 20 hours now and in that short amount of time I have noticed a MARKED difference in the reaction I'm getting from the boy half of the world. Not from people who are seeing me for the first time/random passerbys on the street, mind you, these are people who I see every single day. like the guys at the place where I park my car. two years I've been parking there and at most we are shyly cordial to each other. My hair is suddenly droopy and all of a sudden they're giggly/josh-ey "I should charge you more because I can't see your month sticker!"/multiple people apparently need to tell me where to park (allow me to re-iterate, i have been parking there in approximately the same spot for well over a year...)-ey. And don't even get me started on the suddenly super helpful "Do you need an extra butter with that?" bagel guy.

Hmmmm. Well, since the hair is apparently going to be around for the summer, I think I may just treat this as a sociological study and start documenting. maybe I can use it for my thesis if the other, education related one, falls through. :-]

Thursday, May 18, 2006

drumroll, please...


Grades are in from Spring session (aka last set of courses I have to do EVER) 2006

One "A" in my Quadrant Analysis and one "B+" in my Proposal Design and Development class. Not bad for someone who spent the semester trying to redefine all that it means to be a SLACKER.

In other news, a certain store-display-checking-someone who happens to work for a large-ish, cool-ish make-up company has roped me into doing this "hair campaign thing" they're starting which basically means I have/get to sit in a chair for four hours on Monday and have fake hair (well, technically it is real, it just used to belong to some Pakistani lady, that's all) glued to my head. (I've been fielding frantic questions all day from the "shoot assistant" to the tune of "Would you say you're more #2 french refined or #4 deep wave????" And,no I'm not getting paid for this although i do get to keep the hair. ;-]

Found my phone...


Or should I say, had it found for me. :-] Folks may commence with the calling.

Wednesday, May 17, 2006

eek!


Lost my phone folks so if you call my cell the odds are even better that I will not return your calls!

In other news, me and the Baby arived home yesterday to find one half of the couple that are my landpeeps doing some gardening in our front (their back) yard. All well and good except that it was hot and the Landpeep in question had removed his shirt -- a phenomenon which sparked the following conversation between me and the Spark:

Spark: {extremely happy, LOUD voice as we walk by} Piples!
Me: What Sweetie?
Spark: Piples!
Me: "Peoples"?
Spark: Tipples!
Me: I'm sorry, I'm not understanding...
Spark: Nipples!
Me: OH! Nipples. Uh. Heh, yes, Sweetie, nipples. Heh heh... Well. Look he cut the grass! Look how short it is now!
Spark: Men Tipples!
Me: Uh, yeah, heh, yes, men have nipples too. {smile and nod at Mr. LandPeep while hurrying child up the stairs and inside the house} In we go! Do you want some juice?
Spark: Juice!
Me: {way enthusiastic} Yay Juice!
Spark: Juicy Nipples!

{sigh.}

Saturday, May 13, 2006

MY BABY BROTHER IS HAVING A BABY!!!


Well, his girlfriend is and he's involved somehow. :-] Whoo F'in Hoo! More Magnet brilliance by way of the next generation! Is the world ready??? It had better be!

(He thinks there's a good chance he'll have a boy. Ha! Yeah right...)

Thursday, May 11, 2006

ah, where to begin...?


Just got back from a biz-ness trip to Chicago last night/early this morning so please to forgive if I'm a little incoherent (more than usual that is) -- Quick note re: the week-end before i left (meaning this one that just passed) How very much fun was it to get to hang out with the shockingly good-looking crew that happens to be parenting the kids my 3-year old is friends with?? Very, that's what! O.K. also on that note... 3?? I have a 3-year-old. Sheesh. Sorry, just that she was 13 months old like four weeks ago!

Ah hem, moving on. THEN to the event to end all events, Miss Boo's Capoeira belt-ceremony which was COOL -- all these kids of varying heights, ages, ethnicities and experience levels showing the grown-ups what they could do. Pretty gosh darn amazing -- CP was there as well and took actual video footage so, begin with the "being really nice to me" part now and you may be invited to the pizza + let's watch Boo perform party being scheduled for later in the summer!

Hmmmm. what else... feeling very fine and capable right this second. the conference was mostly about catalogue but I did meet some great people who I intend to put to immediate use in coaching my department at work AND I came away with the realisation that pretty much regardless of how completely off the mark/expensive and bizarre my boss may think my ideas are, I'm actually right there with what the "industry experts" are saying. Not that this necessarily help me get anything approved but gosh, it does feel good to get some kind of validation for my "next steps projects." I was beginnng to think I was insane. I had a great conversation with this one lady from New Yawk who was like: "Oh, bosses always think you're nuts! It's because they don't get the underlying statistical stuff so they have no idea what to think is important. All they think about is page rank." I swear, I almost kissed her...

{tired} I was going to try to make this an actual full update of all the various aspects of my life but I'm exhausted. Chicago time was killing me (up at 4:30am PST to catch the "7:15" early bird sessions, seriously, who thought that sh** would be a good idea??!) and I actually just got back with my little big girl an hour or so ago (going to collect the big big girl in about an hour) so I'm a little pooped. Glad to be home though. Very much missed my babies. Very glad I was able to cover my chocolate baby-girl with kisses and get her all squirmy/mortified/giggley in front of her little friends/cousin; looking forward to embarrassing the older one in exactly the same way! ah... sometimes it's good to be Mom.

Wednesday, May 03, 2006

Man o man...


Today kicked my A**! Luckily I am skilled at not just rising above such unpleasantness-es as, say, every single thing that COULD go wrong with my stupid set of IT systems actually GOING wrong (that's not true actually. Instead what happened was we had the APPEARANCE of a major f***up without the actual F***ed up part so really, while I still got my a** thoroughly chewed the hell out, it ended up being over nothing really.) Nice.

K. so moving on. How is it happening that I (yes, that would be ME) am having such eventful and lovely week-end plans just fall into my lap?? First, on Sat. we're doing the party-with-friends part of the Spark's birthday which will be so cool I'm not sure I can even stand it; then, on Sundee my big girl is going to show the Capoeria world exactly how things ought to be done as well as getting her first belt!

Quoting her teacher who called to make sure she'd be at the ceremony which will feature kids and thier teachers and parents from all over the country: "She's just so good. I really want the other adults to see what she can do. I think it's going to get alot of them interested in her, I mean, she's got all this innate sort of talent. She's still pretty modest but man she's really good!"

{blush, smile} No, please. Stop. O.K. if you must...

"She reminds me of myself when I was starting out, of course she's already better than me at the handspring stuff..." Yay!

Tuesday, May 02, 2006

FYI...


Attention: All Parties who are interested in being featured more prominently on this blog.

The following are the only methods (short of applying a detailed analysis of causality allowing for statistical regression and controlling for both the "X" variable as well as for any randomly generated divergence from the "mean") that have currently proven successful:

1) Have sex with me.

2) Don't have sex with me but somehow get me to think you MIGHT (this is not nearly so difficult as it may sound as my capacity to be deluded in this area is as wide as the summer day is long.

3) Become one of those (rare) individuals who having listened to my nonsense for 10 years or more still invite me to things like lunch and parties.

4) Bypass the "me" factor altogether by ingratiating yourself with my kids. (Note: this one is actually the hardest to pull off since my Angel-babies, while invariably polite are, at the same time, well aware of the fact that you need them FAR more than they will EVER need you. And don't think offering them lots of candy will work either. Believe me, I've tried.)

So, that's it. Unless of course you want to get on here in a "This person annoys the HELL out of me" context. Then all you really need to do is belong to the human race and wait for me to notice you.

Mmmmmm....


Did I mention that I had a particularly nice visit with Pretty Boy this week-end? I declare, that is one boy who knows how to make appropriate use of an incredibly nice hotel room! :-]

Monday, May 01, 2006

{sigh}


I made a new friend today. I was buying a mousepad and we started discussing my (some might say "insane") desire to pair the exact right mousepad with each particular person in a certain department -- at least for the ones I care about. the rest are getting AdTech Freebies. Anyhoo, we eventually moved on to talking about how now that he was "through" with school, he plans on joining the police academy but has to wait until he is legally old enough to carry a gun. Which would put him somewhere between 18 and 21. I think this is pretty much indicative of all that is wrong with me right now. Actually, the fact that he came away from this exchange with my cell number, probably crystalizes that point a little further. {sigh} I am officially "one of those women." I fear me when I'm 45 and Boo starts bringing home her high school track buddies....