Fun Times

©1987 -MGM

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I took my little red truck down the street to a garage today to get some work done and my daughter picked me up. On the way back to the house she said she wanted to try "Yoostar." I told you about the dancing game we did on the x-box kinect, where you don't use any sort of hand device - the game just uses your body. Well "Yoostar" is a game that inserts you into a movie scene and shows you the lines, like karaoke does for music.

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The first scene I did was from The Princess Bride. I played Inigo Montoya where he's explaining to Wesley just before their swordfight about the 6-fingered man, and I actually got to say, "My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father: prepare to die." It was hilarious, because I was doing the voice. Okay, I was doing my version of his voice. It was really funny.

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My Sweetie got home from work while we were doing this and we said, "You try one!" and he was all, "No, no." And then my daughter and I got distracted with something and then he's over there doing a Humphrey Bogart scene from Casablanca. He made the highest points of the day! We were jealous and yet teased him for being all "No, no" and then jumping right in.

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Way later in the night, I was watching "Late Night with Jimmy Fallon" and Liv Tyler was on and she showed a scene from her new movie and Rainn Wilson delivered a line that went something like, "People spend all their time trying to find happiness. I think happy people are....arrogant." And I was all, "What? Really?" Do happy people seem arrogant? Then I must be considered one giant arrogant fool. (((Sorry about blogger being a dick with the paragraph breaks. I'm giving up after 5 tries to format this thing right!!))))

My Brain is on Fire!

Okay, not like the guy in Limitless, but I had a great run on "Jeopardy!" As I've explained before, our goal is to know an answer that none of the contestants know. We watched a TON of "Jeopardy!" over the weekend because they were backed up on the DVR because we had been watching all the basketball. I don't remember all of mine, but two of them were "What was Prizzi's Honor" and "Who is Rod Stewart?" I had a pretty good run.

I also invented a new word today: Slackadaisical. Maybe it's redundant if someone is a lackadaisical slacker, but I thought it was funny. And the way it played in my head was, "Who knows if he'll even go to college? He's pretty slackadaisical like most of us." And by "most of us" I was referring to a certain branch of the family. But at least some of us are good at game shows and making up words.

Not Much Ado About Anything

I got the rest of my doorknob/handle/lever/things on Friday and installed them on Saturday. All of those were for the inside doors. Now I'm looking at the doors that go outside. That dog was in front of me at the home improvement store. I feel like I'm going there as often as I go to the grocery store. But there are no little shaky dogs at the grocery store.

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I was sitting on the floor the other night watching my team play and I noticed this footprint in the carpet next to me: It's my footprint. I have the flattest foot in the world. Like Fred Flintstone.

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Now I'm just 3 weeks away from my trip. Last week I was all excited and now I'm thinking: Three weeks!! What? I have so much to do! What am I going to pack? I need to get more sun! I need to work out my feet on the treadmill more! I'm sure I'll be very productive this week, and next week I'll be all excited again.

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On the basketball front, my team lost and my brackets are shot. For some insane reason I am in third place in the brackets but I think it would take a crazy miracle for me to win the money. But that's okay. Life is good. Spring is here and we had a great date night Saturday night. We saw Limitless and I really liked it. The premise seemed somewhat unique and there were lots and lots and lots of great New York City shots. Hey! I'm going to New York! I can't wait!

An Odd Week So Far

I didn't wake up right on Monday. First off, I slept too long and that always screws me up. Sometimes it will go away in a few hours, but it didn't. It took me forever to come up with something for lunch. And that's bad because I take my heart pill with lunch and I try to keep a consistent time each day, but by the time I finished lunch it was 3:00. And for some reason I had only bought enough stuff on Friday to make dinner through Sunday. I knew there was no way in hell I was going to the grocery store feeling all slow and stupid. I did manage to come up with something for dinner that was actually pretty good.
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I woke up great on Tuesday, and I expected that because fortunately, I'm never deadheaded two days in a row. I even woke up early, all refreshed. I broke out my new easy peasy electric screwdriver and replaced all the doorknobs. (new):

old:

The store actually didn't have enough when we bought them so I have to get three more, but I replaced all that I could, and I chose the main ones that we see. I guess "doorknob" isn't really the right word because there really are no knobs involved, but I don't know what else to call them. Are they door levers? Door handles?

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I really like that type because you can open a door with an elbow. You can't do that with a knob. Well, I can't. Maybe you can. And I have osteoarthritis in my thumbs and you don't even need thumbs to open these. You just push down with your fingers. You pretty much need a thumb with a knob.
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So to recap: Monday = deadhead and lifeless, Tuesday = alert and productive.

Well Wednesday was really unique. I actually got up, showered, got ready, and ran out to pick up something for lunch. I never do that. Seriously, I have done that maybe once a year in the past 4 years. Then after having lunch, washing the sheets, taking a little nap, emptying the dishwasher and washing the pans, I went to the grocery store. (If you are someone reading this blog for the first time ever, I used to be about 95% agoraphobic/anxiety/never leave my house and that's why I am so proud of myself for going out to get lunch.) So I was very pleased with myself. I recovered nicely from deadhead Monday and got a lot done. But to be honest I'm looking forward to today being an IN day. I actually did a little clapping cheer that went like this: Thursday IN day clap clap clapclapclap.

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I think I will putter around, relax, and admire my new door thingamabobs.

Four Weeks!! Four Weeks!!

Although I have never fully understood this expression: I am fit to be tied! Exactly 4 weeks from right now I will probably be brushing my teeth at my best friend's house getting ready to go to sleep. No I won't be going to bed early - it's an hour later there. I am so excited about my birthday trip!
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Loretta and I took our first trip together in October 1999. It was the first anniversary of Dad's death and I wanted to get out of the house. We didn't really know each other but she knew my Dad well and I thought she'd be fun and she said yes and off we went to Vegas. I have never had a better travel companion. We totally fill in each other's gaps when it comes to travel. It's the little things. I'll have a safety pin and she remembers to get the ice. It's always perfect. And we laugh and laugh and have so much fun.
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We've been on so many trips together, we have it down to a science. First order of business: Have the cab driver stop somewhere for beer and other goodies. Second order of business: Enter the hotel room and order extra towels and ashtrays and tip that person well. Third order of business: Play!!
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And I love showing Loretta around. We nearly always go somewhere that I have been to before, so I know the ropes a little bit. She has not been to New York. She doesn't even know what to expect. I expect she will love it. And as usual, I have some plans, but not too many, leaving lots of free exploration time.
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We'll have two full days in New York - Wednesday my birthday and Thursday. Tuesday and Friday will be coming and going. The Saturday after my birthday we are going to color Easter eggs with my brother and nephew. And while I am in North Carolina I'm going to have pork barbecue and and good ol' North Carolina hot dogs.
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It's going to be a great vacation and I can't wait. Four weeks! Four. Weeks. (woot woot!!) What a fun celebration of my 50th anniversary of being alive. Dude!!

Nice Day This Year

I was looking over my posts from a year ago and apparently it snowed last year on March 21st. Hmmm. This year it's going to be 80° on March 21st. We went out to dinner Saturday night and sat outside. And I wore shorts. I spent the afternoon sitting on the deck getting some sun. (Barney loves it when we are outside with him.) We also did some yard work. I can't remember what that groundhog said, but if it was the same as last year, that groundhog is pretty stupid.

I am enjoying Spring and Basketball

The Floors! The Floors!

I never understood why someone would pick out tiles, that when placed together, would look like cheap linoleum:
But those were our entryway tiles. Or you can call it the foyer, if you like. Here it is being redone:

And here it is done:

This is a view into the kitchen from the hallway. You have a good(?) view of the fugly tiles:

Here are the new ones:

This view is looking into the kitchen dining area (the table was out at this time):

And here is the after:

Our bathroom is what is called a "Jack and Jill" layout. There are individual counters and sinks on either end with the tub, shower and toilet in the middle. For some insane reason, the carpet from the bedroom flowed into the bathroom on both sink ends, with tile in the middle:

Now, the entire bathroom is tile.:

And since the flooring guys have to unseat the toilet and take it out, I decided to buy a new toilet. When else are you going to get free toilet installation? The toilet brand is Jacuzzi! Now I can say I have a Jacuzzi!:

Next up: See this ugly '80's looking doorknob? We just bought new knobs for the whole house. So those ugly things are going away. I will be working on that all week with ice pack breaks for my thumb. (My thumb hates screwdrivers.)

In The Interim...

Jazz seems to get a kick out of how my brain works, so I thought I'd share a little thought flow that I had today:
I was reading an entertainment article about Scarlett Johansson and Sean Penn apparently dating and it stated their ages as 26 and 50. I thought "Ewwww. That would be like If I dated my daughter." Then I realized what I had just thought and laughed and thought, "Well, no, not really, because that's just bizarre." Then I thought, "Oh, okay, it would be like if Kate (my daughter) dated "M" (a high school buddy)." Then I imagined my daughter, who thinks deep thoughts, saying something like, "The main problem with helping ravaged countries is that large inflows of cash tend to corrupt their governments." I pictured "M" saying, "Huh?" Then I had a good chuckle.
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And just now: My Sweetie has a recurring joke when someone has a shortened version of a name such as "Wil" or "Jon" that goes "His parents were so poor they couldn't afford the other "L." Or in the case of "Jon," they couldn't afford the "H." So when I looked up the spelling for Scarlett Johansson, I thought, "Man! Her parents must have been really wealthy!"

Job is Done! (But I'm Not)

That's a close-up of two of the cracked tiles that were in my kitchen. The tiles were hideous enough, but add cracks and well, it's just crap. And I didn't even mention the GIANT grout line. Yuck! We've always hated that floor.
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The tile guys finished and left at 4:35. So what I thought would be a three, or maybe slightly more day job, was finished in two. I was so happy - and I felt a little stupid for being so irritated by their LONG day on Monday.
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There's still a little scuzz on the tiles but I can't mop until Thursday afternoon, so I will wait for my after pictures and then post a long picture post of everything. After I sleep as late as I would like today, I'm going to be cleaning up the rest of the dust and putting all the stuff back in the kitchen and bathroom. I do love my new floors.

A Short Summary of So Far

It was loud.

It was dusty.

It was inconvenient.

And they didn't leave until 7:35 pm!!!

That was too long.

I will have them out of here by 5:00 today.

Seriously, that was too long.



(The pic was taken in the early afternoon. Most of the tile has been laid. As Naomi is wont to say: There will be more to come...)

No Sleep For Me

I'm getting new kitchen, master bathroom and entryway flooring starting Monday morning at 9:00. am. That's right, A. M. As in ante meridiem. Which is Latin for: way before I normally wake up. So I will have to get up EARLY and put on a bra and there will be jackhammer type thimgs or maybe actually jackhammers removing the old tile. And dust. Those 3 or 4 days will suck. But then I will have nice new floors. I will take lots of pictures and have many show and tell type things to come. And I will probably eat a lot of dust. I'm glad I own earplugs.

The Life of Food

I read one of those Heloise hints from some lady not too long ago and she said that with her busy family, they prepare meals for a week every Sunday. I hope they freeze the Wednesday, Thursday and Friday meals. I don't know about you, but I have a three day fridge rule. And by three days, I mean it's inedible in three days. If it doesn't get eaten within 2 1/2 days, it is thrown out. 72 hours is too long. If I know it won't be eaten and it's something particularly good, I will freeze it. My mom has told me horror stories about my step-dad finding something in the back of the fridge and eating it. I can't believe he is still alive.

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I also see those articles every year around Thanksgiving with catchy titles like "Great Recipes For A Week Of Turkey!!" And they never mention freezing. YUCK! Is it just me? I'd like to hear your opinions. How long do you keep leftovers?

Post Oscar

The very first thing I read online after watching The Academy Awards was an article nitpicking at every little detail. Really? It's entertainment. And it's live. Live television is never going to be perfect. If you want to complain about the Oscars, you should complain that the memorial segment did not include Betty Garrett. Ms. Garrett, a beloved friend of one of my blog friends, Naomi aka The Old Lady of the Hills, died on February 12th. That seems like plenty of time to get footage of her in the classic film On The Town with Gene Kelly and Frank Sinatra. I mean, really it's a live show. Whatever. Anyway, if you want to read some great stuff about Betty Garrett on Naomi's blog, just follow that link. Other than that, I thought the show was fun. If I didn't like that sort of thing I wouldn't watch it. I do and I did and I did.

Too Coo-wool for Skoo-wool

I heard someone on TV today pronounce "school" as "skoo-wool" with two syllables and of course that set my mind off on how everyone pronounces everything differently and somehow we all understand each other. I say "school" with one syllable (rhymes with "cool"). I have my own weird things. I pronounce "hanger" and "swinger" with a very hard N and G, and My Sweetie makes (ruthless!!) fun of me for it. One of the weirdest things I do is pronounce "your" and "you're" differently. I pronounce "your" like it rhymes with "yore" and I pronounce "you're" like it rhymes with "her." (I was going to say "like it rhymes with 'pure' " but then I realized that some people pronounce "pure" with two syllables like "pew-er.") I have no idea why I pronounce them differently. At least I always spell them right. Maybe that's because they are such different words to me. Yore momma told me yer going batshit crazy over there.
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I have no idea why I can't say "hanger" and "swinger" like a normal person. I can't even figure out how I'm supposed to say them. At least I don't add syllables to words. What's that all about? Most Texans add extra syllables to words. They make "Hey y'all" a four syllable sentence. In North Carolina that phrase is maybe one and a half syllables. Texans even make the word "up" a two syllable word when they ask, "What's up?" That's weird. Not wee-yerd. Just weird.
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So another informal poll here: How do you pronounce "school" and "pure" and "you're" and "your"? And isn't it cool that we still all understand each other?

Like My Arm Is A Guitar

Those are my x-rays - which are digital now. And they show much more than old x-rays. For instance you can see veins and muscle and the fat on the back of my arm, oh my! The good news it is is not arthritis. It's some sort of tendinitis. Sort of like tennis elbow. I really should cut back on all the tennis. The doctor wanted to give me one of those steroid dose packs but I said, "Yeah, no. The last two times I took that stuff I had gall bladder attacks." He seemed surprised by that. I wanted to tell him to google it. He wasn't my regular doctor. No surprise. My regular doctor is never ever available. I think I've seen every doctor in that building. If I wanted to see my actual doctor I guess I'd have to plan ahead. because that's how sickness works, right?
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Actually I like this other doctor just fine. I believe he was my doctor the first time I broke my foot and for one other thing that I can't remember. He brought out this strap thing for me to wear on my arm just below the elbow:

It has a bean bag type filler on one side (their website calls them "ergoBeads™") and a strap on the back. The bean bag presses down on the muscles, reducing the muscle action from reaching the elbow tendons. I imagine the inventor of this device was/is also a musician, because it reminds me of a capo. In case you don't know what a capo is, it's the clamp thing you put on a guitar to change the key or pitch. So I'm guessing the placement of my Imak cuff has retuned my arm to the key of A. Or something like that. I hope it works.

Paybacks Are Hell (And Swift)

I so should not have made any sort of joke about my husband being sick. When I went to bed Friday night suddenly my right elbow was in agony. I finally (and mercifully) drifted off but slept only about 4 hours before waking up and not being able to get back to sleep. After tossing, turning, sighing and moaning I gave up and got up thinking TV would distract my brain from the acute pain that was my elbow. Around 9:00 am I could not take it any longer and dug out some old Vicodin. I hate pain meds and usually only take them the first day after surgery or breaking a bone. It has to be that bad.
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And I'm going to see my doctor and I dont even do that for a gall bladder attack. We searched my blog for when I posted that sometimes it feels like my elbows are coming apart and that was December 4th. I think my right one finally came apart. So my arm is in a sling right now and I typed all this with my left hand. (Shifting is a bitch.) My Sweetie moved the mouse to the left side before he went to bed because I haven't been able to do any computer stuff since Friday night. It's been slow and tiresome doing everything with only my left hand and taking a shower is crazy town, but at least I did get some sleep Saturday night.
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Anyway, my right arm is unusable right now and I will never ever ever again make a joke about my husband being sick. This payback is hell.

A Different Virus on the Computer

My husband is sick as a dog, so I only got on the computer once today for a few minutes. The whole time I was thinking, "Don't touch your face! Don't touch your face!" Then I just gave up and used a bunch of hand sanitizer. I waited until he went to bed and sprayed the hell out of the whole house with Lysol. Especially the keyboard, mouse and chair. I really really love my husband but when he is sick I just seem him as big bag of virus and bacteria. I must have washed or sanitized my hands about 800 times today. He'll be home sick again today (Friday) but I will be out doing Meals on Wheels and I'm pretty sure I have many errands to run. I'm sure there are some errands to run.

Going Underground

Although I haven't been in a New York City subway car since 1978, I decided that as part of the NYC experience, that Lo should take a ride. Lo has never been to NYC. So although I went twice as a teen, and for about two days in 2007, I will be the guide and showing her around when we go for my birthday in April. Yeah, I am not a seasoned NY traveler. But I am a seasoned traveler. As someone once said about art, "I know what I like when I see it." I know how I like to travel.
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I've talked about Dad many times on this blog. He really had his awesome moments. The things I loved about him, I incorporated into myself, as I guess all children do with their parents. I really loved the way Dad traveled. He was adamant about not being a typical tourist nor doing touristy things. He introduced me to the concept of asking the cab driver or the bellman at the hotel where to go as opposed to asking the concierge.
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When our cruise ship docked in the Bahamas, Dad asked the cab driver to take us to his favorite bar. We were really off the beaten path. It was crazy. Not only that but the bar was named the same as my high school boyfriend who had an unusual name. Stuff like that is really funny to two drunk people. On our first trip to Las Vegas, it was December and there were horrid frigid straight line winds, but we ventured out that first day, grabbed a cab and asked the cabbie, "Where can we get a good Rueben sandwich?" The cab driver knew where to go. And our Lake Tahoe trip was awesome. Dad hired a limo to take us around the lake. And that guy was great. When Dad and I went to New Orleans for Halloween, he had broken his foot just before our trip and went anyway. My Halloween costume was as Tonya Harding, so Dad, on crutches, kept pointing at me and saying, "She did this!"
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But back to New York. I posted about my first trip and how I met Rodney Dangerfield. (That was one of my very early posts back in 2005, so it was a little strange to read it again.) We went the next year with my high school boyfriend, my brother, and his best friend and stayed through New Year's Eve on Times Square. That was crazy. Dad accidentally smoked pot laced with PCP and missed the whole basketball game and we only found him at the end of the game. That's a funny story. (Dad and I also took a trip to Puerto Vallarta as well as some beach vacations with other family.)
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Oh. So back to the subway in 1978. There I was in New York with my high school boyfriend. My high school boyfriend and I had a whole afternoon before the next basketball game to wander around and we went into the Empire State Building and saw the line for the elevator and I said, "I'm not waiting in line. We can still say we went to The Empire State Building." We did the same thing with The World Trade Center. Went in. Went out. We did take a ferry to the Statue of Liberty where we smoked a joint and took the walk up to look out the dirty crown windows. Then we decided to take the subway back. Except we didn't. Make it back I mean. We ended up in a deserted warehouse district with empty boxes blowing down the street. It reminded me of tumbleweeds in old western movies. And there was a guy either dead or passed out on the sidewalk and he was the only person around. We were freaked out. I think we had ended up in The Bronx, but I'm not positive. We walked and walked and walked and finally found civilization. And this was in New York. It was crazy that it was so deserted. We finally found a subway station and found a train back to Times Square and we were so happy.
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We shouldn't have that problem in April because I've been studying that map. I may have always loved improv traveling, but I really do like maps. Getting lost sucks. Besides, this time I will be the guide.

Wonderful Weekend

After our Twilight Zonish bout of freakishly frigid weather, the weekend dawned sunny and warm. After lunch I sat out in the sun for a little bit and actually got hot. Granted, I was still dressed in my dark thick winter thingies. The sun on the black cotton nearly baked my thighs. I took a shower and dressed and we left to run a few errands. Okay. I was going to leave it at that, but the truth is, we didn't "run errands." Since I see my blog as a journal of sorts, it's silly to lie, 'cause then it's like I'm lying to myself.

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On Friday, the Meals on Wheels pick up was easy peasy. The site coordinator had brought her husband along and they had a cart - like the one old Brooks wheels around in The Shawshank Redemption with the library books. So even though I had my nice big green bag and the extra bad weather meals fit in it perfectly, I didn't have to carry anything out to my car. The SC's husband wheeled the cart out, I unloaded and he wheeled it back in. One quick trip. And then I was finished with my route in about 35 minutes. I went to lunch and had a nice long sit at the bar, did my USA Today puzzles and went to get new tires for my truck. After I pulled into the tire place, I did the quick check around wondering if there was anything of value in my truck and as I looked behind the passenger seat, my brain asked, "Huh? What is this?' Well it was the green bag full of emergency meals. Yep. After I put them in my truck, out of sight, they were instantly forgotten. So My Sweetie drove me around Saturday afternoon to hand them out. Although I knew there would be no bad weather all week and therefore could have waited until Friday to hand them out (they are shelf stable), I didn't want a daily reminder in my house of what a dingbat I am.

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After we got the forgotten meals delivered, we hit a bar and made a plan for dinner out. We drove over to a popular area that has lots of shops and restaurants, not realizing that everyone in the universe was planning on celebrating Valentine's Day two days early. That place was packed. We finally gave up and headed back to our part of town and hit a nice restaurant that we had not been to in a while. We had a $75 gift card, so we both went crazy and ordered from the specials of the day. I had that awesome rock lobster tail in the picture above. Yum City!

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On Sunday I actually cooked breakfast. Afterwards we sat outside for a long time. I may have actually gotten too much sun on my knees I'll see how they look after I wake up, because I plan on sitting outside every day this week. After sunning, it was almost time for the Duke basketball game. The game was great! Then we ate lasagne with italian sausage and watched the Grammy Awards. It was really a nice weekend. I like those.