Thursday, December 29, 2005

Christmas

So hopefully everyone had a wonderful Christmas!

We received a number of DVD boxed sets, so I've been spending time with the family and ignoring everything else. One of the sets I got - Peewee's Playhouse -- I watch that and wonder--What age group was that show really meant for?

My kids have been laughing like crazy. PeeWee Herman is not the most normal of people, yet despite his goofy antics, I've never seen my kids laugh more in my life.

I watch it now and I still find it just as amusing as I did when I was a teenager, but I see things now that were so sexually suggestive that I'm surprised I never caught that in the past.

What's more funny is "Larry" Fishburne - aka Lawrence Fishburne - as Cowboy Curtis. I would love to hear him talk about that role!

Thursday, December 22, 2005

Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Feliz Navidad, etc.

First, can I say that Carlos, a Mexican exchange student from my high school days, has forever ruined the song Feliz Navidad. I can't hear that song without screaming for the station to be changed. He serenaded us for months with that puppy and 17 years later I still can't listen to it.

I also have this issue with one local radio station that switched to an all-Christmas songs format right after Halloween. But that's between me and them!

My kids are officially out of school now, so I'm not going to post for a few days at least. In the meantime, I welcome anyone to go to my son's Blog. He's supposed to keep it polite, he knows mom is watching, but sometimes he cracks me up with his venting. It's kind of a "Complaints on the minds of your average pre-teen" type thing.

http://vermonterwithpie.blogspot.com/

Have a wonderful holiday--whatever you celebrate--and may it be safe, happy and full of good times, family and friends.

Haircuts

I have had long hair since I was about 14. It's varied in length over the years, but yesterday I grew sick of it. (Not the first time.) I decided that I was going to have it all cut off. I vowed that this time I would not chicken out as I have for about 5 years running. My husband needed a haircut anyway, so I managed to get 2 cuts for 7pm and we went out to dinner first. I had this game plan, I had a couple of beers and then went. I found a cut that I felt would suit me and the book said it was best for my face shape and hair texture and curl...

Watching 6 inches of hair fall to the ground is a breathtaking event. The panic sets in, but I was determined to make sure I didn't chicken out. In the end, I was totally amazed with the outcome. Not to mention having your hair dried and styled in 3 minutes is an amazing feat!

I'm kind of sad that I didn't do this when my kids were small!

Wednesday, December 21, 2005

Baseball

As Boston fans, my husband woke me up with screams of outrage when he learned Johnny Damon was leaving Boston for the Yankees. Me? I'm not really surprised. The sport is no longer about the fans, it's all about the money. I spent 12 hours, yes 12 HOURS, trying to get tickets when they went on sale a couple weeks ago. Every game I tried, there was a waiting room to actually be allowed in to purchase tickets, and eventually I gave up. My husband's father always shunned Boston saying it was too expensive, so he's never actually been to Fenway to see a game. In the end, he won't go this year either. After not being able to acquire tickets to the games we could make, I went onto Ebay and found numerous listens by scalpers that were already on Ebay at 9am that morning. Am I surprised? No. Again everything in baseball is all about the money - tickets, player salaries, you name it and money buys...

Thanks, but I'll stick to football. At least there I have been able to successfully acquire Patriot tickets and it hasn't set me back a ton.

Tuesday, December 20, 2005

"Santarchy"

Have you heard this news story? http://worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=47958

Okay, so I guess I'm confused. The "Santa" wannabes are tired of commercialism, I agree, but they then turn to violence to get their point across? As the true meaning of spirit is about peace, love and goodwill towards man - can they now explain their actions? I'd love to hear their excuse. Personally, I think they were looking for an excuse to become rowdy and pull off some petty theft so they used the real group "Santarchy" as a front for their juvenile and destructive behavior.

Monday, December 19, 2005

Do your taste buds change with age?

I'm curious. As you grow older, do your taste buds change? I have spent the first portion of my life detesting beer. I couldn't drink the stuff. Hops tasting like perfume just disgusted me. So I was shocked when in the past two or three years, I found beer more appetizing than a sweet wine. I can't drink zinfandel anymore, it tastes like sugary grape juice. I'll still drink a wine a few times a year, but it has to be very, very dry. Burgundy has become a favorite.

However, as the months pass, I find myself becoming more and more intrigued with beer. I've always enjoyed helping my husband with his home-brewing. Making beer is a science that is extremely fulfilling. Now as I make it, I find myself drinking beer and being able to pick out the hops that the brewer uses. This shocks me. I also am surprised that the light beers I used to love just don't satisfy me in the same manner. I'm branching out. I still can't stomach stout or the really dark beers, but my husband cracks up when I order Peroni or Moretti at our favorite Italian spot. Take me to an Indian restaurant and I'll order Taj Mahal every time.

I'm convinced that it has to be something to do with your taste buds altering as you grow older. Otherwise, I'm baffled.

Sunday, December 18, 2005

King Kong

Three and a half hours... that's a long time to sit through a movie! Even for an adult. Now I do have a comment that I've made before and will make again - TODDLERS AND INFANTS DO NOT BELONG AT THE MOVIES! Especially not a movie with roaring apes and dinosaurs. I cannot believe that there was a two year old there and then an infant in a baby seat. If you really can't get a babysitter, plan it more in advance. The two year old was removed from the theater screaming because she was scared half to death. I question the thought-process of some grown-ups.

Now my husband is a huge King Kong fan, but he also believes that no one can do justice to Ann like Fay Wray. He loves the classic. However, he also finds Naomi Watts to be quiet adorable, so he felt this one might be able to top it. It didn't work for him. I'm open to anything with dinosaurs. So I was more than happy to go.

The basic premise is this: It's 1933 in NYC. A down-on-her-luck actress, Naomi Watts/Ann Darrow, finds her vaudeville act has been shut down without warning, so now she's starving and turns to petty theft in order to eat. However, a less than scrupulous director (Jack Black/Carl Denham) is pushing to film a movie at this never yet explored island - Skull Island - despite the fact that his funding is being pulled - he's got a day to hand over everything. Denham moves to get everyone onto to the ship he's hired, film the movie, and return to the U.S. with a hit before the people who are funding his movie can stop him. When his actress drops out, he needs to replace her (a size 4) in a hurry. He heads to a burlesque house and spies Ann standing in the distance. He feeds her, talks her into the project (which has been written by Adrian Brody/Jack Driscoll, a playright who she admires), and they head off, barely beating police.

Eventually, they wind up crashing into Skull Island where Ann's screaming seems to have ticked off some beast. Natives become restless, and steal Ann in order to offer her to King Kong. By now Jack is in love with her, so he sets off on a mission to resuce her. A number of other ship crew join him. Only dinosaurs roam the island and King Kong isn't about to let his new "girlfriend" out of his sight.

So the movie is action-packed. I don't think I've ever spent more time reminding myself to breathe. I will give Peter Jackson credit at the suspense in this movie. The problem is that during the whole ship voyage (which is incredibly long and really didn't need to be stretched out that far) you could tell it was green screen/computer work. It looked fake at times, so that started to ruin it. Another problem is the directors use of the speed up/slow down cinematography. Some scenes were slowed down to a crawl, almost dreamlike, and that effect grew tedious. Others may like it, I don't.

King Kong is well done. It's impossible not to fall for him, and by the end I really wanted to see him destroy the ever-whining Denham, whose character is a pain in the behind. I'm not going to say how it ends, most already know, but whether Denham gets a comeuppance (and he deserves one) is up to the viewer to find out.

Again, three and a half hours is a lot of movie to sit through. Half an hour was spent watching previews, the theater could have done everyone a favor and cut it to a 2 or 3 previews, instead we sat through EIGHT of them. Eight was absurd.

If you do go, and I recommend it because some of the "action" scenes have your stomach clenched and you do forget to breathe, plan to get up a few times. I highly suggest taking breaks during the first hour which is all the voyage to Skull Island. You won't miss anything of importance.

Wednesday, December 14, 2005

Okay, so help me out!

Growing up, I was always a blonde. I lived most of my life as a blonde, but three years ago I was dared to try something new - I turned into a redhead. Now surprisingly, the number of comments I got from complete strangers over the gorgeous color of my hair became absurd. I seriously had people stop me in stores to tell me they loved my hair. It seems trivial, but having been on both sides of the haircolor prism, I think redheads have MUCH more fun. I never went back and even though I've contemplated it (keeping up with red hair when you are not naturally red is a task in itself) I don't think I'll ever go back.

Anyway, so today. My son announces he'd like chicken for dinner and he even goes downstairs to get me chicken from the freezer. So I decide to put it in the crockpot for the day, I take it out of its packaging and proceed to slice my knuckle up really nicely while trying to remove the absorbant stuff that they put under all meats. (Providing you can call tearing up your knuckle NICE). It stung like mad and I was dripping blood. After I'd washed the cut (More of a huge amount of skin peeled back) I looked at my son and he started laughing. I understand the humor in this. How many people can say they've sliced their finger open on a frozen chicken breast? I've decided I must be the only person in the world. Therefore, I'm on a mission. Has anyone else ever done such a stupid thing?????

Monday, December 12, 2005

Hey it's the holidays aka GOOD will towards men.

Okay, I know I touched on this earlier this season, but I find myself needing to return to this subject. I realize that Christmas shopping can be horribly stressful. If you are the type who gets angry, then can I PLEASE suggest shopping online???

Of all insane places, I had to go to Walmart. I tried using a local photo print shop and they did a horrible job with my prints - in fact, they cut off half of a head while they went crop happy, so I refused the pictures and had Walmart do them instead. It's cheaper and I'm afraid the quality is much better with the 1 hour photos. Unfortunately, this also meant dealing with insane holiday shoppers.

While there, we bought a replacement printer for the Brother printer that died its Error 41 death. So I was in the electronic section, the clerk said the line started "here", so I looked around and not another soul was around, so I got into line. Ten minutes later, some guy comes up and starts accusing me of having cut ahead of him in line and he was getting very aggressive, so my husband suggested we just leave and go pay up front. So I did so. It's not worth getting into fist fights which is where this guy was heading from the looks of it.

So I have no fear of the "Self-serve" registers and I got into one of those lines. Unfortunately the machine balked anytime someone had something from the electronics department. It took us 40 minutes to check-out. I wasn't thrilled, but no line was moving faster...

Here is where people need a reality check. Behind me, a woman got totally frustrated with the line and decided she was leaving. I understand that. What I don't understand was why on earth she then body checked a man to the side of me. Literally shoving him out of the way so that he fell to the ground with this creepy sounding thud as he fell to the ground and whacked his head on my ankle and the concrete floor (I had good boots on so any injury to me was buffered). Everyone around us thought he'd broken his hip bone by the way he got up limping and my husband and I are betting that he had one hell of a headache that afternoon - if not a mild concussion. He took a very hard fall. It was after this that the woman suddenly said "Oh, my God I feel horrible. I'm so sorry, I never meant to hurt anyone but I was so fed up with things."

So lesson learned for her, but I don't think that's good enough. If you have issues of this nature and your anger is going to get the best of you, then just don't go out mid-afternoon on a Saturday. Someone is bound to get hurt. IN this case, I suppose it was the guy's pride that had him fleeing the store without letting store employees call in for medical treatment.

Somewhere along the way things are getting too far out of hand. It's CHRISTMAS, a time for giving from the heart - not for trying to beat each other into submission! So please, stop, take a breath and then lighten up! This isn't what I want my children learning about the holidays and I doubt many others would want their children watching adults fight over lines, certain toys, etc. It's just not what Christmas is about!

Sunday, December 11, 2005

Karaoke Revolution Party for the Xbox

Okay, I admit it. I freely admit it, actually. I am a Karaoke Revolution junkie. I love that game and most people won't play anymore because they have issues trying to beat me. Apparently, I'm good... It's hard to judge yourself though.

Anyway, I have one complaint. After owning the first game and now buying the new game that mixes singing and dancing, I want Xbox to explain one thing to me... how come they set it up so that you can't add the songs from the first game to the second game. Asking people to pay $75 for the downloads on top of $40 for a quick Xbox live subscription is obnoxious, especially when the bulk of the "new" songs available for download were on the first game. I just checked over the list and there are only about 20 songs that interest me, so having to buy the packs and not being able to buy individual songs - I think I'll pass. I'll just work on getting platinum and diamond records in the Expert mode thank you very much.

So if Xbox really wants to do it right - they'll let you add songs from the first version of the game - after all, we paid good money for that game! And then how about letting people buy individual songs at the average 99 cents a piece. I think that would make a whole lot more sense!

Thursday, December 08, 2005

Holiday baking

It's getting to be holiday baking time again! This year I'm going to test out some of my favorite recipes using Stevia to take some of the calories out of it. One of my all time greatest are these flourless Peanut Butter cookies. I have to toy with the Stevia to figure out the correct measurements.

But these cookies are so easy -

1 c PB
1 cup sugar
1 tsp baking powder
1 egg

That's it. Mix together and bake at 325 for 10 minutes.

How about your favorite recipes? Get in the holiday mood and share!

Wednesday, December 07, 2005

Printer reliability

Can I spend today NOT recommending a printer? Sure, I can and I'm gonna!

Eight months ago, my eight month old Brother MFC3220C printer died. Literally, died. It got the error of death (though at the time I didn't know about this error from death). Basically, I turned on the printer, it beeped ferociously at me and the message on the display says "Unplug your machine and call Brother."

So as the printer was under warranty, I called Brother, they Fed-exed me a reconditioned printer at their cost stating that this error was extremely common and it is that the printhead has jammed. So after it happened, I did a little research of my own and found that thousands of owners have run into the same issue.

So eight months have passed and guess what! I just turned on my printer and again there is the kiss of death message. Only this time, it is no longer under warranty as the replacement printer is only covered for 3 months. So I have to buy a new printer. I'm not happy, nor will I ever buy a Brother product again.

My issue. If THOUSANDS have encountered this jamming printhead, then why hasn't Brother recalled the printer and created a more reliable product???

Tuesday, December 06, 2005

Medical Profession

Okay, after watching the news and then reading the newspaper, I have a few comments for today.

First, moderate drinkers are less likely to become overweight. Okay, well someone forgot to tell my butt that!!!!!! And at the same time, I read just last week that women who drink are twice as likely to get breast cancer as those who never drink... So which do you choose?

Which leads me to today's hot story. Shaving your armpits and using deodorant regularly can increase your risk of breast cancer. So I guess we are all supposed to be really hairy and stink really bad???

I realize that just about everything you do in today's world puts you at risk for something. So unless we all are locked away in germ resistent rooms (uh oh, no sun... lower levels of Vit. D which decreases serotonin and can cause depression, so that won't work) Hmm. You can't go hide out on a deserted island because you might burn and sunburn can lead to skin cancer... No hiding in the basement with artificial sun because they you are at risk from radon-induced lung cancer. I think we are all in trouble.

What I really want to know - why the focus on all these disagreements when there are really critical breakthroughs waiting to occur. Stop arguing over shaving and deodorant and let's find some cures!

Friday, December 02, 2005

Virus Emails

Okay, after receiving a couple of virus laden emails yesterday that McAfee happily caught and destroyed before it ever even reached me, I am left with a question. No, make that two questions.

First, why would a virus sender think that titling the subject "Warning this is the FBI, you've been entering illegal websites" will actually work. I saw that subject and laughed hysterically. Like the FBI is really going to make online arrests now???????

Second, obviously the fact that this virus is still spreading - well it makes me wonder who in their right mind would then open something that is so stupid?

I can guarantee you - no matter the crime - the authorities are not going to give you a warning online. They'll show up at your door unannounced, armed with a warrant. I can just see the next virus now -

Subject: This is the police. You're wanted for questioning in a murder. Please send in this quick survey and we'll be around later to arrest you...

;-)