Saturday, December 30, 2006

On My Soapbox

Call me old-fashioned. But I think the world would be a lot better off with out the "dolls" they call Bratz. I am sorry, they look like little hookers to me. Let me illustrate my point.



This is my grandniece Eraya. Isn't she sweet in her little cute dress holding a flower. She looks as sweet and innocent as a 5 year old should. Now let's look at the whole picture:



That Baby Bratz doll just ruins the whole thing. Look at it, it's a pedophile's fantasy doll. What message are these dolls giving to our young girls? I heard the Eraya got talking Bratz for Christmas. Apparently they talk to each other, what do you suppose they say to each other?

"Hey, b*tch, this is MY streetcorner!"
"I hope my pimp doesn't beat me tonight!"
"I didn't know he was a cop!"



Need I say more?

Monday, December 25, 2006

Not As Merry Of A Christmas As It Should Be

Everything was going just fine, and then I found out that James Brown died! His CD 20 All Time Greatest Hits was in my CD player for 3 months straight when I got it in the early 90's. I know it was the early 90's because Max was a toddler and he used to say "Get up, Get on Up" from the song "Sex Machine Pt. 1". Then I recorded the beginning of "Get On The Good Foot" as my answering machine greeting, except nobody knew who they were calling, but those who knew me well figured it out.

One good thing about this is that, like me, James Brown fans everywhere are playing his music on Christmas Day, which means that this will be the funkiest Christmas ever. And that is all good.

Thanks, James Brown. You had Soul and you were Super Bad. Heaven will be super funky now! Right On Right On!

Saturday, December 23, 2006

Thoughts On Snow

It snowed this morning. This is the first snow I have really gotten to watch from home, all the other ones were either during the night or while I was at work. So I woke up the kids, opened up all the blinds and put on the snowing music from the Charlie Brown Christmas CD I have. The song is called "Skating" and you can listen to a piece of it if you click the link and scroll down. It's the song that plays while they are catching snowflakes on their tongues and Lucy says she never eats December snowflakes, only January ones. Anyway, it was great watching the snow fall. The boys went outside and had a(nother) snowball fight, Leo made snow angels and Max stamped out his name in the street in front of our house. Here are some pictures:






I realized that snow makes everything pretty, even unsightly things. For instance, that pile of tires in my neighbor's yard? Now they look like a cake with icing. Snow is the answer to a messy yard! So if you have a messy yard and you don't live where it snows, I recommend getting a snow machine and covering everything up with snow, your neighbors will thank you! Now if it only snowed in my kitchen...

Thursday, December 21, 2006

I Feel Better!

Which is a good thing because it's almost Christmas. Leo can tell you the number of hours until the big day, both my kids are really excited this year. All I know is that it's going to be weird not having my family around, this is really the first time in my life that I haven't been with my siblings. We are going to try to do a webcam thing, we'll see. I have gifts to wrap and stockings to stuff and a Christmas Eve dinner to cook. It is no secret that I am not a very good cook, but I am taking a stab at it anyway. Who knows, just like the family in "A Christmas Story", this may be the year we discover Chinese Turkey.



FA RA RA RA RA, RA RA RA RA!

Sunday, December 17, 2006

I Am A Grandpa!

First I was becoming my grandma, now it appears I am becoming my grandpa too.

On Friday my foot started to hurt around the ball at the base of my left big toe. I thought my shoes were too tight or something and figured that I would feel better when I got home and took them off. NO. The pain in my toe got worse and worse to the point that there was a 1:30 am visit to the ER. I explained my symptoms and was told that I HAVE GOUT.

GOUT!!!

First of all, I didn't even know that gout existed anymore, I thought it went the way of scurvy and rickets. But I guess not. And I thought that only old men get gout. No on both counts.

Secondly, I have the Sunday Night Supper Club coming over this weekend! AND it's a week before Christmas, and guess how long gout attacks last? You guessed it, a week.

My body has the crappiest timing ever.

BUT I WILL PREVAIL!!

Wednesday, December 13, 2006

Pictures For My Family



Greetings from Angie, the family Christmas tree angel. She has graced the top of my mom's or my tree I think since before I was born. The old girl is still in pretty good shape, she made the move to Washington no problem!



Here is our tree. As soon as the real ones come pre-lit I will go back to real ones.




Rudolph and his buddies are having a Holly Jolly Christmas on top of the china cabinet.



I went to Sears, and the "A Christmas Story" village was 1/3 off, so I had to get it--Merry Christmas to me!



And the eternal conflict between dinosaurs, ninjas, and knights continues to rage at the gingerbread house!

Tuesday, December 12, 2006

Christmas Memories

Inspired by this blog, here are some Christmas-related memories of mine, not all of them warm and fuzzy, and in no particular order.

1)In the late 70's I had a job at the Cinema 70 movie theater and one year I had to work on Christmas day 10am to 6pm. I was totally bummed that I was going to miss all the fun. When I got home that night, my family was still there and they had not opened any gifts, they waited for me. I was blown away by their thoughtfulness then and still am today.

2)When the pictures came back after one Christmas when I was a teen, my grandma noticed that you could see up her dress to her underwear in one shot. There had been several copies made of these pictures and she made everyone who got a picture color in her panties with a black pen to match her dress because she was so embarrassed. I am laughing so hard as I type this.



I had to get the picture out, it's so funny! I am sure my grandma is in heaven having a conniption right now over this.

OK back to the memories.

3)One year I got this game (no doubt from my sister), I forget the name of it but you were given a word and you had to name songs with that word in the title. My brother kept making up these bizarre song titles and every time we would challenge him, he would say "It's a country song!", and because the rest of us didn't know any country songs we believed him and he won. That cheater!

4) Here is a memory from every Chrstmas that my mom was alive--German style spinach and red cabbage to go with the ham. A few years ago we tried to re-create her dinner but it was too much work. I must say though, that my brother's red cabbage and my sister's spinach are outstanding!

5) I hate to put this one in because everyone gasps and feels bad, but my mom passed away on Christmas night in 1996. This could be a bad memory every year but we turned it into a good one by all being together and drinking a toast of egg nog out of her Special Christmas Egg Nog Glasses. Before I moved I distributed the glasses evenly among the family and I hope to coordinate a long distance toast with everyone on Christmas Day.



Merry Christmas!

Sunday, December 10, 2006

Longing For Christmas Past

This is the first Christmas in 4 years that I have been working full time and it sucks! I had gotten used to the leisurely shopping, decorating and socializing because I wasn't working, now I have to cram it all into the weekends, I hate that. It would help if I was feeling better, but I have been keeping this horrible sore throat at bay with massive amounts of Advil for about 11 days now. I did manage to get the Christmas cards written along with the dreaded Christmas letter, consider yourself warned. And I am done with all the shopping except for the boys' stuff.
And with the last minute addition of the entire "A Christmas Story" Christmas village(don't ask) I am done decorating. All that's left is to wrap and send the family gifts to CA and experience the annual Gingerbread House Building Fiasco with my kids. So I would say I'm doing pretty good, but at the expense of things like sleeping and cooking at home. But those things are overrated anyway, right? Hope you all are keeping all the plates spinning too.

Monday, December 04, 2006

An Epic Story

When I think of an epic story I think of a story that spans generations. This is one of those stories. It spans one generation--mine.

The year was 1973. I was in seventh grade at Fremont Junior High School in Seaside, CA. Back then the girls took cooking and sewing, and the boys took woodshop and metalshop. Really.

I had Mrs. Lee for Sewing, and our first project was to make a gym bag. It was basically a cube with a drawstring closing the top. I picked out this peachy orangey pseudo tye dyed material and sewed it up into the most bitchin gym bag ever! I even embroidered my name on it, it was so cool. Oh how proud I was of my awesome creation, I was so jazzed that I bought some blue tye dyed denim material and made another one at home. Those were good days.

Well, days went by, then years went by. My awesome gym bag was left at my mom's when I moved out in 1980, and by the time I moved back in to take care of her 16 years later, both gym bags were gone. It really didn't matter though because I had forgotten all about them anyway.

Flash forward to the present day. About a month ago my best friend Tami and I were having one of our marathon conversations and she said, "Do you remember Mrs. Lee's sewing class? Whatever happened to our gym bags?" I had no idea and neither did she.

Then at Thanksgiving I was at my sister's house in one of her bedrooms and I looked over and there was...not my gym bag. But close! I had also forgotten that around the same time of my sewing class, my sister was into her crafty phase. She quilted, upholstered furniture, etc. Well, my sister, God bless her, had made a pillow out of the leftover gym bag material, and there it was at her house! I freaked out in front of everybody and basically stole the pillow and put it in my suitcase and took it home with me, where it now sits in my bedroom and comforts me with happy seventh grade gym bag memories.

Isn't that a great epic story? Here is the pillow, it's beautiful, I am so happy!



And we lived happily ever after--The End

Saturday, December 02, 2006

Have Yourself A Tacky Little Christmas

Let me explain.

In October of last year we went to Disneyland. They had already decorated New Orleans Square up for the holidays. It looked like this:



I was awestruck and vowed to try something like that at home. So I bought shiny beaded garland and shiny ornaments and strung them between my kitchen and family room. It turned out great! Sorry no picture. Then we moved, and I had nowhere to hang those things anymore. Then it hit me. Wouldn't those shiny plasticky ormanents look fabulous on a fake white tree? Decide for yourself.



Dolly approves!
Here is a pic with no flash for the full lit effect.



My favorite angle to look at this tree is with the window next to it, you can see the snow outside, it looks great!



Now I understand what all those Christmas songs mean, like "Winter Wonderland" and "Let It Snow" and "White Christmas". I finally get it!

Note to my family: I will be posting more pictures of the house once I get the tree up. Love to you all!