I’ve moved…

I have officially moved to a new blog  – I was having some wordpress issues on some widgets that I didn’t like!

 

…out

I’d like to register a complaint…

this stuff never gets old…

 

For the love of Starbucks…

I just got back from grocery shopping at my friendly neighborhood grocery store (yeah, New Year’s Eve grocery shopping…my life is full of wild living….)…anyways, I was thrilled beyond anything you can imagine as I rounded the corner of one aisle and came across a newly painted green wall and muted flooring. Yes….yes…finally…a Starbucks is going into the store right down the street from where I live. Ah….2008 is going to be a great year!

In honor of the new Starbucks, grab your cup of espresso dreams as I give you….Taylor the Latte Boy… 

This and that…

OK….so it’s been an enourmously long time since I’ve last posted anything. I’d like to think it’s because my life is such a whirlwind of activity that I have no time, but actually it’s because my life *is* such a whirlwind of activity which is fairly mundane…

So I’ve decided that instead of posting great thoughts, observations and the like, I’m just going to have one sided conversations with myself and place them on this blog. That way I’ll never argue with myself…I think…

So an update on stuff, I suppose, is in order. My kids are older…my son is just about to turn 4-years old and my daughter is still 8 going on 13 (and quickly acquiring the subtle art of teenage sarcasm as needed for her to survive the next 10 years of her life). My own birthday is tomorrow in which I advance into the ‘Late 40s’ category, versus the ‘Early 40s’ stage that I am leaving….sigh….

Soon we will be leaving on vacation to fly to Chicago (to catch an ever thrilling Cubs game….oh, and say hi to family too) and then driving up to the Northwoods of Wisconsin. Yup, a two-week vacation to the cabin in looming large. I love Northern Wisconsin, so does my husband (who has vacationed there his entire life)….it’s my kids that I’m worried about. Right now, my daughter just gets absolutely hysterical if she sees a bug…any kind of bug…any kind of size…and she drags my little son into the hysteria when she gets that way. And Northern Wisconsin has a lot of little critters. This should be an interesting two weeks!

So my life right now is getting ready for the big vacation. Looking forward to relaxing with a beer, looking out over the lake and watching my children work themselves up into hysterics….should be fun…

…out

Chad Vader…

I only just recently came across this series of films on YouTube. Really, really clever! I swear, I’ve worked with all of these guys before…. 

Tucson revisited

I wanted to sincerely apologize to any folks living in Tucson who may have found my recent postings about your lovely town as somewhat disparaging.  Really….I think it may be a genetic thing, though.

My great, great grandfather (Mr. Daniel Webster Jones) was the author of a fairly incredible book titled Forty Years Among the Indians which describes his varying adventures here in Arizona among other places in the 1800s. To quote this widely travelled man when he was visiting the town in 1875:

“At Tucson, we found quite a number of white residents. This old town has been so well described by many writers, that I will simply say, it never was, is not now, and never will be much. Its only merit is in its being so very old; some two hundred and seventy-one years.”

So, if I seem somewhat biased, well, I’ll blame it on my ancestors. It has nothing in anyway shape or form to do with the fact that I went to Arizona State University at all…really…

 out…and go devils!

The lion sleeps tonight…

OK, so I just posted recently about Tucson and the white rats popping their little white heads out of the white toilets throughout the town. Yeah…I know…many a potential nightmarish vision comes into my head when I think about it…

Put here is in article about a supposed mountain lion roaming the wilds of my neighborhood (ok, maybe a mile from where I live – but, even more disturbing, just across the street from where my little 3-year-old attends pre-school!).

Urban myth – or true story? I don’t know….and I don’t really want to find out either!

…out 

High on the ‘ewwuukky’ factor…

People are so hung up on animal cruelty these days…this makes me wonder if the animals are finally getting back…

oh yeah…only in Tucson…go figure…

…out…

Hawaii or bust…(something up)…

Sorry I haven’t posted in a while. It’s been pretty busy around the ol’ homestead these past few weeks. One very eventful thing that occured last month was a week long vacation in the beautiful Hawaiian islands. Yup…we went to that tropical paradise.

I’ve been to Hawaii a few times before – once with my family when we took a lovely cruise around the islands (loved it…even got to have a traditional ‘on board’ romance with a crew member – or two – hey….it was a long cruise!!! – of course, this was the 1980s when things were a ton different…but I digress) . The other time was with my husband before we were married. Spent the vacation on Maui and had a blast. Both times, when I left to go back to the mainland, I literally had tears in my eyes. Didn’t want to leave…

So, for this vacation, I was looking forward to being whisked away to that tropical paradise and enjoying hours of relaxation and rest at the beach….

….yeah….right….

See, we also took our 3 and 7 year old kids….did I say something about relaxation? How in the world does one get a 3-year-old to want to ‘relax’??? And the 7-year old? ‘What are we going to be doing fun today, mommy?’ …. ‘Sleeping, dear…’

The flight was pretty long to the islands (6 hours) and the first bit of stress was trying to figure out how to keep the kids entertained long enough to not drive the other passengers crazy. I pulled out all the stops…books, portable DVD player (newly purchased), crayons, etc. Did I say relax??? OK, the flight isn’t supposed to be that relaxing, so we’ll try when we get there.

We got there late Saturday night just in time to check into the hotel and go to sleep. I was hoping the kids would sleep in late, but no…so I got up with the kiddies and we piled out onto the balcony of the hotel. We appropriately ooh’d and ah’d over the swimming pool and the view of the beach from our hotel.  There were tons of birds flying around and, trying to be ‘fun mom’, I got the kids to get some crackers we had and started to feed the birdies out on the balcony. These birds were pretty tame…

About an hour later, I thought it best to start the day. As I was walking back into the hotel room with the kids following behind, I noticed the coffee in the coffee pot was sloshing all over the place – ‘that’s weird’, I thought, ‘why’s that happening?’ – somebody really heavy must be walking by the door. The next second, I realized that we were actually having an earthquake. Yup, we got to experience the Hawaiian trembler. Now I transitioned from ‘fun mom’ to ‘hero mom’ in a heartbeat – ‘OK, kids follow me into the bathroom and get into the bath tub’. I shephered the kids into the bath tub and stood there while the earth was still moving around some. Of course, in hindsight, I realize that I have my natural disasters confused – we would have been in good shape if a tornado was about to rip through the coastal Hawaiian resort, but I should have been standing in the doorway for the earthquake. Hey…I’m an Arizona native….I don’t know anything about this stuff!!!

Well, standing there with my children, the power went out and the room went black. I heard a whimper from my 3-year-old son and I realized that I had to quickly move from ‘hero mom’ to ‘mommy the rock’ so I started to laugh at loud (maybe with a touch of hysteria…I really don’t remember….) and said ‘Hey kids, I think we’re having an earthquake! Isn’t this great???!!!’

By now, the earth had stopped most of it’s movement, so I leaned out of the bath tub long enough to yell out of the room (and towards the bedroom where my big bear of a husband was sleeping) and said ‘Hey, honey, I think we’re having and earthquake!’ Honestly, I was looking for ‘hero daddy’ to pop into the bathroom with an ‘everything’s going to be ok’ kind of response, but all I got from the bedroom was a ‘Cool!’ response. Yeah…ok…thanks….

So we made sure everything was ok and got dressed. I, of course, kept an eye out continually on the coastline to make sure I didn’t see the water start to receed quickly. Hey, we were on the 3rd floor, and I calculated in my head what a large wave might bring in! Of course, the kids were a tad confused when my husband and I were talking about a big wave, and started to look out for any salamis that might be coming from the ocean. Yeah..I think my 3-year-old will have an unhealthy fear of luncheon meat for the rest of his life.

Once we got the ‘all clear’ from the hotel PA system, we went down to the pool area and milled around with the other guests who were in a state of surprise/shock. I was able to use the one working cell phone by a nice gentleman – really, a nice, nice man – he had tattoos and body piercings and all – and he was so sweet to let me call my mother (’cause she would freak if she couldn’t get a hold of me). Never, ever judge people on how they look on the outside…ever.

My husband and I were laughing at this point. See, last time I was  in Hawaii we did have a wonderful time…but we also were there when Hurricane Iniki hit the islands. So we feel somewhat responsible for this natural disaster. We figure that, next time we go, we will inform all island residents that we are on our way.

Well, the power turned back on just an hour or so after the earthquake and we had a really nice vacation after that. Not a relaxing one, but nice enough to be sure…

…and that is what I did on my fall vacation…out 

It’s just a sad day…

I’ve just been very down lately – a few days ago I had a depression that just wouldn’t shake. Really unusual for me as I am normally a fairly happy person…I don’t know if it was remembering 9/11, or the weird illness I had over the past week (get this, hand, foot and mouth disease…yeah…I felt absolutely bovine), or considering the news of the CIA torture spas for terrorist suspects (just because they do it, we can too!), or whatever…but I’ve been coming out of this depression slowly…feeling a little better…until today.

Then this.

I love my team – but the yahoos who are running the Diamondbacks are taking away it’s (albiet shortlived) past – changing the uniform colors next year. And now Gonzo…my guy…from day one, I have truly liked this guy (I remember the first year the Diamondbacks played – that awful year when we lost over 100 games – I still cheered for him.) I felt a special bonding – silly really – when he had triplets just a few weeks before my first child was born. I knew the sleepless nights I was getting, Mr. & Mrs. Gonzo were getting as well (ok, maybe they had a live-in nanny, but that’s not the point). I’ve heard that Luis G. is a really, really nice guy too.

I feel that depression coming back…I think I’ll go watch reruns of game 7 of the world series again…

…out.