Just Some Stuff to Say Real Quick

I've been sitting here at my computer since quarter 'til 5am doing a hodge podge of Internetty things (browsing, social mediaing, paying bills, etc.) and am finally tired enough I might just fall asleep at the computer! Hopefully I make it to a comfy location before my body decides to shut down.

Anyway, today is 10/10/10 and I felt it was only appropriate to point that out (because no one else will today)! It's a busy day for a lot of people. Emily, Andy, and Tim are running in the Chicago Marathon today; Amanda is patiently "watching" the race. Today would have been my dad's 56th birthday. There are a whole horde of parties happening today for a variety of reasons. That's just to name a few things that are going on this fine October day.

I myself will be going to a party, blogging, shopping, writing out Thank You cards, addressing invitations to Eva's shower, and hopefully getting together with a friend for dinner who surprised me by coming home for my shower before she has to head back!

With that said, I'm off to hopefully catch at least an hour of sleep. I hope to blog later over at Baby-Blog about the amazing baby shower I had yesterday. As a baby-blog reminder, I need to make a post about all of the anxiety dreams I had been having (and some still to continue I'm sure); the shower of course with some highlights that include many a sheepy things and Chris' Infant Relief drops.

A few things to specific peoples

To Seth, I am sorry I didn't make it out to your birthday party, I didn't have it in me. To all that attended my shower, THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU, I honestly have been in tears worrying about how to work in getting items for the baby (with considerations to both time and money). You not only made it fun, but more helpful than you will ever know. To DMA and Marc, thank you for giving Chris work this week. You not only helped with our financial situation, but his mood/stress as well. Rachel, thank you for traveling all the way here, it was a wonderful surprise. To those ladies that helped plan and do stuff at my shower, THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU! It seems to me that everyone had a great time first of all, and secondly, I think everyone was very happy with the food and treats. I don't know what I would do if I didn't know such amazing girls like Eva, Becky, Amanda, Marie, and Brandy who would be willing to take time out of their own lives to help me. It takes a lot of stress off of me, and while you may think you know how much you've helped me, you will never know how much you've helped my sanity (which as you know is questionable at best). To Mike, congrats bud, 6 months is amazing, I tear up just thinking about it! To Aunt Pat and Aunt JoAnne hang in there ladies, your babies will be okay, we've got to tell ourselves that.

Amanda Is Finally On Facebook

Blog-
Last night was rough. Today is bearable, I'll be leaving work at noon. Today's lessons:

1. Don't sweat the small stuff.
2. Don't panic and stress about the things for which you have no control.
3. Give yourself something to look forward to, always!
4. At the end of the day ask yourself if the choices you made, actually made you happy . . . if not, then on the next day, try to reconsider what you can do differently.
5. It's probably too far from your heart to kill you.
6. Don't let guilt guide you.

Recent updates: I finished Dog On It, super cute book that I am loaning to Chris. I am now onto Bloodsucking Fiends. We have Mama Skweak's birthday party this weekend. My window in my car was fixed thanks to Chris who went to the junk yard, got a window and put it in himself. Saved me loads of money too. I may have already blogged that. Amanda is finally on Facebook. Took long enough! I am still pondering the 6th installment of the Hitchhiker's Guide. Thanks to the Sutter siblings for providing me with exciting play by play on the ESPN spelling bee yesterday (when I needed the entertainment)!

Yesterday and today's comic Brevity, (that I am sharing this week because it's backwards)! See previous blog for clarification!





Likes/Dislikes-

People I know blogging; or getting to read interesting blogs.



So many bloggers, does anyone read any of it? And why aren't more people I know blogging?


Word-
yo

1. When followed by an apostrophe (yo'), a contraction of "you" or "your".

2.An informal address or title to one whose name is not known; can be used as an interrogative address.

3.A declarative or imperative exclamation, whether alone or within a sentence.

Cynicism Shined Through

Friday, Friday, Friday . . . oh how I love thee!

Went to the game last night (with the Sutter clan), the last against the Cubs series . . . and it was a glorious sweep! We had bleacher seats, and they were awesome! On a side note, I better see my hat again . . . in ONE piece and alive!

My cynicism shined through as I tried to convince Emily to stay away from the nice boy who is way too nice for his own good. My argument is that the nice guy is just a front. Everybody is mean . . . so I'd rather know your degree of meanness when I meet you up front rather than have you break my heart later. See, the nice guy is the lure, and eventually the nice guy will have you chained to the basement wall. Stop rolling your eyes at me! If you think about it, you know it's true!

I rode my bike into work today so I could go to lunch with others to the Crown Candy Kitchen! This is going to be so fun! Yippee Skippee!

Now . . . I have something very exciting to show you. If you know me at all, you will know that my favorite architect (despite his poor ability to provide quality construction) is Frank Lloyd Wright. One of my favorite toys are Legos (click here for cool Lego dude). So what could be better than FLLW Legos?



Sweetness pours over me! Okay, seriously, keep your head out of the gutter please!

Now, to Drew and Becky, THANK YOU for being awesome peoples that also use made up wordifiles. I had started to wonder if I was the only person to have a unique vocabulary. It's not that I like to brag or anything, but this obviously means we are quite brilliant!

To Chris, THANK YOU for finding me cheap junk yard glass for my car! And thank for saying you will put my car back together. You don't have to do that. But I'm not going to turn down the help either! I'll get you a check when I get home. We need to remember to go to the bank so I can put my ASCE reimbursement check in there this weekend!

To Jeremy, THANK YOU for the recommendation for T-Shirts @ T-shirthell.com. Deadly stuff . . . wrong and deadly stuff!

To Amanda, I believe I have thought of a solution to your problem of having too much on your plate . . . either A) get a bigger plate (but the not the ideal solution) OR B) find another plate to shove some of your "food" onto (seems enough people are doing it to you) OR C) Get that dog Emily wants and shove some of the "food" onto the floor, most dogs will eat anything!

. . . this brilliant mind needs to get to work, so onward I shall go . . .

Word-
purse out: To not do something because of a girly reason, to wuss out. Generally used from one male to another.

I Wrote About YOU

I'm fairly certain that no one reads this. Sure, I might average about 8 views a blog, but that's just a view, not a read. And that's just MySpace, no one dare travel into the realm of my Blogosphere!

I can visualize how this happens: The reader (whom I will call You), opens up the blog, skims through to see the length. Short=read; long=skim through for Your name, a silly link, a picture/video, a punchline, or just the word of the day. It's okay, I'm a blog reader, I can relate! Sometimes there just isn't enough time in the day to read blogs, You have to be choosy! [Christine, Grace, Eva]

So with that said, I'm going to trick You into reading this by randomly placing images, videos, or Your name in this blog (click on links titled "You", maybe You show up?!). I find that what I have to say is meaningful to me, and I want it to be meaningful to You as well! [Papa Skweak, Becky, Skweak, Mike, Badger]

Have You ever met some one that is all wrapped up in something You don't understand or that perhaps You think is too radical? Maybe she's just too wrapped up in anything for You? Perhaps You are thinking this about me and my blogs? Or sheep? [Elvis, Kim, Emily, Amanda, Shane]

That's okay, it's understandable. We all go through life with this social understanding of things. Depending on the society in which we learned, these behaviours may vary widely.

Well now to my point.

Stop caring what other people might think. If You believe in something, stand up for it. Don't wait for some one else to stand up for it, that may never happen friend! [Jami]

I care about the waste that we as humans produce (as Americans, "land of plenty" mentality, we are huge wasters, for this I am ashamed of US). Tomorrow is Earth Day and I challenge You, I challenge EVERYONE to reduce waste. Try to not throw anything away. Try to reuse everything that can be reused. Try to buy products with less packaging. Try to recycle anything that can be recycled (and in fact try to have nothing that needs to be recycled). Try composting! Just TRY! Please! Trying makes up so much of what we should accomplish in this world. Trying is usually what we give up on. Please just try! [Drew]

I know You will do the right thing! [Holly]


Word of the day (thanks for scrolling here!):
porn storm: Surfing for porn and getting bombarded with pop-up windows.

Pop-up Books

I woke up in a really good mood today. I laid down at about quarter to eight, and don't remember a thing until about the time my alarm was going off this morning. I was having a great dream so I just continued to smack the alarm for about an hour to keep him quiet so I could keep dreaming. I finally realized that I actually had to get out of bed at some point, but I'm glad I did.

I read a good blog today about books. One of those books was about pop-up porn! Now, I won't post that link because I feel that it is adult content, and I don't want any unnecessary eyes looking in, but if you want the link, e-mail me and I'll send it!

The subject of pop-up books made me recall a book I want. It is called the Pop-up Book of Phobias! Emily's roommate had this book, and I made a note that I wanted to get it, well gift it to a couple of people at least (can't say any names, it takes the surprise out). I'm glad I recalled this because it gave me the opportunity to get the link somewhere that I'll remember! You should check it out. It rocks!

What is awesome about having looked this book up is that I see the author also has a Pop-up Book of Nightmares! I wonder if he has a page for dead bodies, like most of my nightmares involve?

Well, I have to get some stuff done before Andrew comes in and finds me slacking! Ha, me slack, never! But before I go I want to thank Drew and Holly for agreeing on the meaning of "you were so cool you could have put out Vietnam". Thanks to Eva for catching the phrase's song which was in no way part of the challenge. Thanks to Janet for her blogs, they rock!

Word of the day:
Alabama chrome: Duct tape.

In Use: Dude, you need to fix your car; some Alabama chrome will fix you up right.

Bed Bugs

Let's start this off right, Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Now, onto my complaints: I scanned some photos at Walgreens because I was too lazy to try and figure out the scanner at home. Long story short, not all of the photos I scanned are on there! Argh! I'm sure it was user error and not Walgreens, but I'm blaming them all right! No big deal I s'pose, I'll figure out the scanner and just take care of everything at home.

New subject: I was happy to see yesterday, that the hoklife.com blog was mentioned in another blog (blogs about blogs, you've got to love the redundancy)!

Newer subject: Yesterday I met Amanda at the movie theater to see Coraline (in 3-D). We both got there early and decided to walk for a bit where I heard a great story, ok well, "great" is still up for interpretation. So as you may know, I went to New York and stayed with Emily (Amanda's sister). Upon our return, Emily followed to attend the funerals of two family members, where she gave Amanda some unpleasant news. This news has an effect on me, but Emily didn't want Amanda to tell me the story until after she was back in New York; simply because she thought I might think she was dirty and gross. Basically, Emily has bed bugs in her apartment. None of us saw them, but upon her return to New York, they were discovered. Measures were taken to remove the bugs, but that is still to be seen as promising. Amanda has checked her place and found none, and I have not seen any either. I think it will be interesting to see if Chris reads this blog because I haven't told him yet of the possibility of bed bugs (that I don't think we have).

Anyway, so why am I telling you this whole story? Please recall that Emily didn't want me to think she was dirty or gross. Here's my thing; first, while I do slip up and judge people, I make a very strong effort to not judge anyone; I don't know their stories, and I don't know what made them who they are, so really, why judge?! Second, I am surprised she would think I was shallow enough to judge her (this seems to be a theme with people I know lately). Third, she was standing right there when I licked (yes LICKED) the Empire State Building, I wouldn't dare dream of calling some one else gross!

Anyway, let me jump to another topic, work. Today has been a good day, we got our submittal out on time! Abdel stopped by to tell me I have either changed or I look good in green, and since he thinks he'd notice if I changed, he says I look good in green. Thanks Abdel, that was nice, and I really needed that! Next, Andrew mentioned that he wanted me to work on his project. He's never requested me to work on his projects, but this time he did. Andrew and I get along pretty decent. He's a jerk, I'm a jerk, and we can both be pretty callous. I think we've bonded some where along the line, and I like that! I'm also excited to know that I at least have work for a couple more weeks. I hate living week by week not knowing if I have work the following weeks; but I'm adapting (rather uneasily though).

And lastly for the day, my review of Coraline. Please note that They Might Be Giants have a song in the movie, so on that note, it rocks! The animation is excellent, and worth catching in 3D. The story line is good and has a great moral (love the parents you have, they're all you got, good and bad). Here's where I get weirded out by the movie; it's scary. It has a creepy cat, characters with buttons for eyes, spooky dolls, and it's just creepy! I know that saying this means little to anyone who knows me. I can't watch Willy Wonka without getting scared; so Coraline is about that level of weird/scary if you need a reference. Also, watch out for things that fly at you (remember, it's 3D)!

Here is your word of the day:
get Irish: To get drunk.

In use: Me and my friends are gettin' Irish tonight.

Canadian Boyfriend

I can't talk long. I came in to work late today after sleeping close to 24 hours. It felt good to sleep. I will be leaving at noon for lunch with Amanda and Emily and will also leave on time tonight to go to yet another wake/visitation. This time for Amanda's grandma (dad's mom). I think I already mentioned she had passed away in yesterday's blog.

I'm pretty busy again this week. So I will leave you know with the word of the day:

Canadian boyfriend/girlfriend: An imaginary or fictional boyfriend or girlfriend.

Could Maybe Have Something to Do With . . .

Well, I finally made it to Friday. This week feels like it has been forever; long, stressful, and sad! The really bright side right now is that I am working in a spreadsheet. It's like wrapping yourself in a warm comfy good smelling blanket!

So, yesterday was a really weird day for me, weird things happened, I've begun wondering if I am insane or not. It's like God, that I do not believe exists, was talking to me (no, there were not voices)! I don't discuss religion, so I won't dwell on it in this blog. I also don't want to dwell on it for fear that someone will point out that I am actually very insane. I'm also just not a theologian, so, no point in this discussion; however for the sake of commentary on my life, I, for the first time in years, (in fact so long ago, I can't even recall) I actually prayed. I don't know who I prayed/talked to, I don't know why I did it, I don't even want to wonder why I did it. I just did. I prayed for a lot, for instance, I prayed that Badger would not think I'm insane for praying and just really in need of some sort of understanding as well as for him to figure out his work situation. I prayed the same for Amanda as well (whose opinion I think highly of), and that for her to have some amazing strength (which she already has) to get through everything that is going on with her life. I prayed for my mom to be healthy. I prayed for Eva to be healthy. I prayed for Shane to get some sleep. I prayed for Holly to get a break for once. I don't know how this prayer thing works, I did after all give up on it years ago. Maybe I asked for too much. All I know is that it didn't kill me. I'm not ready to be converted and I don't even want to see a single comment from anyone on this subject. It's literally just a commentary on my life right now!

So part of my prayer was for my mom, who is okay at the moment. Yesterday she was in urgent care with some leg pains that they thought were blood clots. She was scanned and told that was not the problem. I really hope they are right and didn't miss something with the scan. I need my mommy!

Badger picked out some plants for the house/backyard. They are lovely, I don't want to maintain them, but they will look great if properly cared for. I like to garden, I'm just not in the mood to do it!

Rachel K. is still in the hospital, no baby yet, but doing well. Hopefully she can hold out longer for the baby's health and well being.

Rachel M. is coming to town in about 3 weeks. She will be staying at my house in a spare room for part of her trip. I love when my friends come and visit and stay with me.

I am taking Emily to the airport on Saturday morning so she can head back to New York. Emily is who Amanda and I went to visit in New York. She was in town for her dad's funeral (Em is Mandy's sis). I met Em's friends Tim and April yesterday. I think they were decent people, but I really didn't chat with them or anything. Tim was very nice.

I rented a WeCar yesterday to get around to Nowhere, Illinois and back to the city.

I'm supposed to go to a jewelry party tonight, but will play it by ear to see how much work I'll have. I also think I'm getting sick. Could maybe have something to do with licking the Empire State Building. Oh well!

Anyway, I need to be finish this up and getting on with work.
So I will leave you with the word of the day!

hip replacement: The process of introducing a formerly cool person to a product or idea that attempts to make them cool again. Reinventing an individual's public persona through association or action.

In use: Quentin Tarantino gave John Travolta a hip replacement with Pulp Fiction.

2nd and Bowery

Well, I'm blogging on a Sunday night because I have so much to say. This past weekend I went to New York City, possibly one of the greatest cities on the face of this planet we call Earth. No driving, but walking or public transit everywhere, and I have never felt so able to blend, as I did in NY.

Amanda and I flew into JFK, caught the Airtrain into Queens to catch the subway into Manhattan, just a couple of blocks south of Central Park to stay with her sis in her tiny apartment. We walked a lot that Friday night we got there, went to a musical on Broadway, and were delirious by the time we finally got to go to sleep that night. It was early Saturday morning when we got a call that prepared us for unfortunate news later that day. We carried on however going to Battery Park, Wall Street, Brooklyn, and the lower east side, perhaps my favorite neighborhood. The lower east side is ran down, it has so much to say! I dragged Emily and Amanda on a wild search for the street Joey Ramone Place, which was at 2nd and Bowery, a corner close to what used to be CBGB's. Sadly, CBGB's is no more, nor is the sign for Joey Ramone. I believe some punk ass bitch stole it! I can't say I wouldn't have tried myself! Anyway, we also went to the Tenement Museum, you should check it out. I ate at a great pizza joint in Brooklyn, and walked the bridge back to Manhattan, which is something I could see myself doing everyday!

Anyway, one of the things that we did on Saturday was to go to Trinity Church near Wall Street. We were inside admiring the architecture, and waiting for the church to implode on us. We were told to turn our cell phones off, but I rarely do, I turned it to silent. When I got my cell phone out, to send a text, I saw the incoming call. It was Gloria calling for Amanda (knowing Amanda wouldn't have her cell, she was to call me). It was the news we had been warned about. Amanda's father passed away. I could only offer the words of encouragement I could have used and perhaps did use when my own father died to get them through this the best I could. It was the memories I had of watching my dad suffering in the end that brought tears to my eyes. It's been hard to get through this weekend, watching them sadden, trying to make them laugh, trying to forget my own sad memories. I had the overwhelming urge to go lay down on top of dad's grave site and just cry. Being in a really great city helped more than you could imagine! We stayed busy, I pulled out all of my comedic acts to entertain, and told them of my own wary mid-life crisis ordeals to take their minds off anything really important!

It was good to be done with this weekend, although I didn't want to leave. I don't want to deal with this week. I still want to disappear. But to end on a high note, New York was awesome, and I plan on returning, you should think about being there yourself!