Sunday, February 27, 2011

And the  2010 Oscar  (tm) went to...

Best Picture - The Kings Speech

Best Actor in a Leading Role - Colin Firth,  The Kings Speech
Best Actress in a Leading Role - Natalie Portman,  The Black Swan
Best Supporting Actress - Melissa Leo, The Fighter
Best Supporting Actor - Christian Bale, The Fighter
Best Director - Tom Hooper, The Kings Speech

Best Art Design - Alice in Wonderland
Best Cinematography - Inception
Best Original Score - The Social Network
Best Original Song - Randy Newman "We Belong Together",  Toy Story 3
Best Sound Mixing - Inception
Best Sound Editing - Inception
Best Make Up - The Wolf Man
Best Achievment in Costuming - Alice in Wonderland
Best Visual Effects - Inception
Best Film Editing - The Social Network

Best Animated Short - The Lost Thing
Best Animated Feature - Toy Story 3
Best Documentary Short - Strangers No More
Life Action Short Film - God of Love
Best Documentory Feature - Inside Job

Best Orginal Screenplay - David Sedler, The Kings Speech
Best Adapted Screenplay - Aaron Sorkin, The Social Network

Best Foreign Language Film - Sweden, In a Better World

Friday, February 25, 2011

Friday Cat Blogging

Small Cat thinks union busting is unpatriotic,  bad for business, bad for America and suicidal for Rethuglicans.  Small Cat stands with the State Employees of  Wisconsin and beyond. What hurts one of us, hurts all of us.

Small Cat says you should go to a rally near you on Saturday, they start at noon. Wear Red.

Thursday, February 24, 2011

The People, United, Will Never Be Defeated.

Whatever you've got planned for Saturday afternoon, reschedule it.


Teachers, nurses, firefighters, students, police officers and others protesting in Wisconsin have occupied the Capitol building and streets of Madison for the past nine days.


On Saturday at noon, their protest is going national. In cities across the nation, including every state capital, we'll come together to stand in solidarity with the people of Wisconsin.


This time the Republicans have gone too far in their attempts to bust unions, slash state budgets, and give tax breaks to their wealthy friends.


So on Saturday we'll stand up to say that we're sick of the attacks on workers' rights. That we're sick of an economy that showers corporate executives with bonuses while squeezing middle-class families. That we still believe in the American Dream. And that we're willing to fight for it.

Find Your Rally!


(I can't be at the one in Raleigh but there is no reason you can't be at the one nearest to you.)
Six of one, half dozen of another

I get tired of people accusing my dog of shitting in their yards. More annoying then being hectored for something  we didn't do is to get hectored as they are driving past me at 35 miles an hour so I am unable to defend us against this charge. If my dog has shit in their yard, I have promptly and completely removed it.  My mellow has been seriously harshed.

Well. If  I am not welcomed in the yard with my dog I am also not welcome to remove the cans and bottles either. I wonder what they will find more annoying. My dog peeing on their landlords yard or the winos leaving cans and bottles there? Because if I am forced to avoid that house, I will avoid it completely. I hope they enjoy the piles of broken glass and cans that will be a result of my diligence. I do hope this summer that the lady keeps her landlords yard mowed and shrubbery trimmed because I would hate to have to call the city and complain about her. Those pesky city inspectors and their ordinances!

There is one other house on my route that I also avoid . While she has not objected per say,  the homeowner is a well known  neighborhood nut job and Tea Party Queen and I fear if I was to remove the mountain of cans and bottles that have accumulated on the fringes of her lot that she would accuse me of stealing from her. So I resist and the clutter mounts.

I am also annoyed because its winter again. It was warm and now its not, I was feeling so hopeful about the end of the real cold that I took the step of putting away my second largest winter coat and replaced it with my third  largest winter coat. I had all ready taken my largest winter coat out of rotation and If I have to bring it back in before next winter, I'll cry.

It was so bad this morning I had to wear a scarf again! I thought I was done with scarves! I just hadn't put them away yet because it after all February. I was really excited about  not wearing scarves anymore as for a period of time, a dark, cold period I call January, I was forced to wear two scarves at a time and my largest winter coat and I was still cold all the time. Its never going to get to be spring at this rate, if I had known I was moving to the frozen north I would have more seriously considered my dedication to Chik Fil Lay. And I'm mad at them now too. I wanna go home.

Wednesday, February 23, 2011

Deep breaths

I noticed when I was awake this morning at 3:20am, I remembered that I was also awake at this same time Monday.

It was not stress related, it was strong wind related. I was woken up both mornings by strong, strong winds. Gusts, strong, prolonged blows.  The kind of wind that makes me grateful my car is parked under a roof and that that roof is so far, hanging on. This morning I woke up with a cat laying across my throat, clearly,  Dogger has taught him about her enemy.

Baby Kitty and I lay there and listened to what I hope was not pieces of my roof pealing off. I was glad my bike was hiding in my car. Finally, about 4am, it stopped and I removed the cat from my neck and went back to sleep.

I went outside later in the morning to check to make sure that everything was where I left it, I had st my recycling bag in an earlier wind storm and I was curious to see what I lost this time. In all that wind, in all that naked force the only thing out of place was my watering can. I walked the dog expecting to see some sign that something happened, that I did not dream the wind - that it was not in fact an interesting new manifestation of  stress in dream form. The cat was not afraid of my dream, was he? Was I being awake enough to make the cat afraid? Or was my cat trying to kill me? He was on my throat, he was not moving and his purring could have been a ploy to lull me to sleep so he could do me in?

True, while he was I was holding him in place and I do out weigh him by a considerable amount so if I had to I could throw him across the room without much effort, if I saw fit to or felt that for some reason my life might be in danger. But I'm pretty sure I would just suffocate on his fur because he's just so cute when he's disciplining me. Stay there! Don't Move! You moved! I punish you now puny feeder! See! I'm walking away!, no more fluffy lurve for you!



I mean, he has me trained well. After two years of living with me, he has just learned how to jump in my lap to sit on my lap while I watch TV and since I want to teach him that this is a positive thing, I do nothing once he is there. As long as he is up there I do not move. Not for anything, I don't go to the bathroom, scratch,  jump and  do something about the massive cramp eating my leg, less I startle him -  I don't answer the phone, and if the remote slips, well, I'll just watch this channel forever won't I? I'm always afraid that if I do get up, he might decide that this is just too much trouble and he would rather just hang out on the arm of the couch instead, with his back turned.

He's all Take a deep breath will you? Think that your needs are more important than mine? You should have taken care of  those things earlier.If you weren't comfortable you should have figured out before you warmed the blanket up. I'm here now. I could at any moment go and keep the arm of the couch warm instead. You know, if I had any interest in learning how to feed myself, I would have bounced by now. That is what you mean to me,  you are nothing more than a fountain of kibble.

I do whatever I can to make sure the fountain remains free and clear of debris.

Tuesday, February 22, 2011

Accomplishment City

I had it on my list to make Dogger more Dog cookies this week and I got it done Monday evening before 6pm. It makes it so much easier to get things done when Dogger decides to cut a walk short because she doesn't like sub woofers or she was horrified as I was that the stupid woman whose car the sub woofer was a passenger in, was going to continue backing her jeep up until it mated with her house and produced a  very attractive RV/Jeep-knock off hybrid.

So,  we hustled back home. I fed Dogger, knocked back some left over spaghetti and tried to decide how I was going to spend the rest of the day. It was a little after 5pm, so I had a lot of time to work with. I first thought of what am I going to wear to work tomorrow?, this really weighs on me if I haven't made a decision by about 9pm, then I cleaned the cat box because I was there and you can't put a price on a clean cat box and then after that, since I was in the kitchen to dispose of the cat box bag, that it might be a good time time to wash my hands and then maybe set out Doggers pills for tomorrow and fill her bowl.

You can't take care of that kind of chore soon enough. If I have to do that in the morning it eats valuable minutes I could be reading obits of strangers or over thinking my hair squishy choice Blue? Too blue? too jeans-centric? too ragged? too cliche? Maybe white? too stark, black?  which one? shiny?, mat, jersey? high profile? low profile? Oatmeal? I can spend hours doing this. If I have to waste time  filling a dog dish I can kiss the whole blue issue good-bye and I'll have to settle for oatmeal, again.

Anyway. I did my chores. I thought about dog cookies. I thought about varieties of cookies, I thought about prepping dog cookies for later use. I thought about having to roll out refrigerated dough. I decided to make beef bouillon-cheese dog cookies.

Now.

180 dog treats later, minus five burned, I biked 5 miles. It is much easier to do the five miles if I did not also bike at lunch. It seems I only have so many miles in me per day. I may need to adjust my daily mileage - which is disappointing to say the least.  I think I can work with it. I can  power through the  mild  fatigue  by maybe pretending to pull to the side of the pretend road occasionally, maybe cross training by  running upstairs a few more times or fetching the laundry from the basement. I have Olympic caliber rationalization skilz.

Monday, February 21, 2011

Damn the Man

This is what Democracy Looks Like
I feel all hung over now.

I thought I hit the highpoint early, when I found and transported back to my house, on foot, a twelve pack of empty 40s! You never know how far away from your house you really are until you have to carry back a dozen 40 oz bottles. I was very excited, as you don't usually find that many 40s just  laying around - one or two at a time, sure, after a holiday weekend, but twelve? that's a find along the lines you don't usually find unless Wild Irish Rose is on sale, and those are small bottles and some are plastic. There are still a few of the 40s left where I found and I am going back to get those too. If I didn't do this, no one else would. I get these up and out or they stay there indefinitely.

Glass and plastic don't rot or decay. Once there, they are there forever and they pile up and eventually they break and do not act as fertilizer in any way and now you have piles of broken glass and while they do catch the light and glimmer and shine in a very atractive way, no argument there,  they are piles of broken glass. Lovely.

And so I go about my way like a reverse Easter Bunny.

I got home with sore arms and a renewed dedication to cross training because I could now claim I worked out my weight lifting.

Saturday was Book Sale Day! I got  cash from the ATM and set myself a budget. And then the gorging began. I paid $2 a hardcover and $1 and still ate until I had to be rolled home. I did pretty well, coming home with my prize for day, Entertaining Under the Influence by Amy Sedaris and handful of other titles I was glad to get. Later on, I cavorted with Alphgal and Tiny E while Broskey fixed Bike.

And then on Sunday, Alphagal and I went back to the book sale for $5 box day and waited in line for an hour to get in.  Long story short? My haul for the weekend was 65 books, 32 hardcover and I spent $33, coming in under budget.  I got everything from Edith Wharton to Kathy Griffin to a book about making your own curtains. I filled three bookshelves and had to re-home my DVD collection. Borders picked a suck weekend to tank because I'm not going to be in the market for books, new or retail or discounted,  for months.

Friday, February 18, 2011

Friday Cat Blogging

Small Cat looks for signs of spring
The Republicans hate women...

Top 10 Shocking Attacks from the GOP War on Women


1) Republicans not only want to reduce women's access to abortion care, they're actually trying to redefine rape. After a major backlash, they promised to stop. But they haven't.

2) A state legislator in Georgia wants to change the legal term for victims of rape, stalking, and domestic violence to "accuser." But victims of other less gendered crimes, like burglary, would remain "victims."

3) In South Dakota, Republicans proposed a bill that could make it legal to murder a doctor who provides abortion care. (Yep, for real.)

4) Republicans want to cut nearly a billion dollars of food and other aid to low-income pregnant women, mothers, babies, and kids.

5) In Congress, Republicans have proposed a bill that would let hospitals allow a woman to die rather than perform an abortion necessary to save her life.


6) Maryland Republicans ended all county money for a low-income kids' preschool program. Why? No need, they said. Women should really be home with the kids, not out working.

7) And at the federal level, Republicans want to cut that same program, Head Start, by $1 billion. That means over 200,000 kids could lose their spots in preschool.


8) Two-thirds of the elderly poor are women, and Republicans are taking aim at them too. A spending bill would cut funding for employment services, meals, and housing for senior citizens.

9) Congress will vote any day now on a Republican amendment to cut all federal funding from Planned Parenthood health centers, one of the most trusted providers of basic health care and family planning in our country.

10) And if that wasn't enough, Republicans are pushing to eliminate all funds for the only federal family planning program. (For humans. But Republican Dan Burton has a bill to provide contraception for wild horses. You can't make this stuff up).
Moving along

I decided I needed to find a better way to have the bike in the car. I thought about how bike traveled in Minnie. Bike traveled upright, as opposed how bike was traveling in Element, on its side. I felt that this was not in the bikes best interest  as it would lead to damage and I don't want the grease getting all over and it would, and it was a pain in the ass for me. I needed to get a plan because I really want Bike to live in the car but for that to happen I was going to need to make some changes.

So.

I thought more about how Bike had traveled and I thought about the interior of Minnie. I thought of where bike had been positioned in Minnie. Bike was upright, supported on one side  by the seat and on the other by side of the wall of the car.  I  took the bike in and out of the car by the side door.

In Element, Bike traveled on its side, unsupported and I had to slide it in and out by the back bay doors. It would start out upright but it would fall down the minute I turned a corner or used the breaks. This is not a good way to have the bike in the car and I know that in the bike friendly Element, that this was not the way it was supposed to be and there is no way that Minnie would be in any way superior to Element. This is not allowed in my world view.

A plan had to be hatched. I went out  Element and studied the situation. The bike had been upright in Minnie because there was support for it. There was support for it because there was a  seat in the van, in Minnie I have kept both seats in their upright positions so that I would have lots of room in the car for the dog and the bike , but not at the same time. Dogger likes to spread out and I don't want dog fur in my seats - I have dog fur on everything else that I own, its nice to have at least one thing that is not covered in fur. It is also stupid and not realistic.

What was not occurring to me was that there are seats in the back of Element!, there is no sufficient reason why the seats aren't down really, except that I think its neat that they don't have to be. They are nice seats, but I haven't had the luxury of being able to move seats around before and  I enjoyed playing with them.

I put one of the seats down! and low and behold, I created a support for bike! I can pick bike up and slide bike in and bike doesn't fall over. I don't think I can use the side door to maneuver bike in and out, but the back bay is not hard to work with.

Thursday, February 17, 2011

Ride like the wind

The bike, the bike the bike.  I finally rode it at lunch today, the first time in months.  I did learn some things. For instance, I am going to need to develop a more efficient way to get the bike in and out of the car because what I did today was not efficient and I don't want to make that unpleasentness a habit. Minni Van was a total turn off in many ways but it was very easy to to get the bike in and out of it. I'm going to have to study the Element Owners Forum to see if they have any tips to make it easier without buying the bike holder thing that Honda sells for the car.

And then there is the little problem with the bike seat. I am seeing a slip cover in its future, Ow!.
 I may have suggested that the seat was a little high while I was riding it... It was uncomfortable so I might have made comment about perhaps it could be lower and then  I discovered that there is "lower" and then there is "too low", I tried to suggest that it could be a little higher and it refused! It went right down but it would absolutely not go right back up.  Purple bike would do it on demand! I wanted to feel tall and it said ok! be a giant or I was having a short day and it said "ok! be an elf! .

I discovered that it is just about the same amount of uncomfortable to ride the bike when the seat is too low as it when it is too high. I tried and tried to get it to go back up but it adjusted itself  shorter like a charm but it would adjust itself taller for anything. Purple bike would have felt my pain.

I also learned or was reminded that a major difference between an exer-bike and a real bike is that when you peddle faster on an exer-bike you peddle faster the exer-bike doesn't bolt forward in a startling manner and you do not want to be startled when you are bolting forward! its off-putting. The exer-bike does not startle the rider with bolting behavior, while the real bike takes great pleasure in bolting!  I had forgotten this.

It also came to my attention that my real bike does not  mud guards or a thing that goes over the greasy parts or fenders. It also does not have a kick stand! I can't blame the environment of bike anorexia ( "my bike needs to weight less! every once counts!") that is in style today for this because back when I bought the bike such niceties were probably kept off to save money not weight.

I need the kick stand because of another issue I discovered. The back tire has a fast leak. It holds air for approximately twenty-five minutes, so it needs to get aired up constantly. It is easier to do this if the bike can stand on its own. I start to add up the things the bike needs 1) new tire, 2)mud guards, 3)grease guard, 4) kick stand  - and it all starts to add up. I have to decide if I want to fix the existing bike or just buy another. I did the fix the bike thing with the last one and it was a bad call. I could just buy a new one at Target and give my Dad his/my bike back and start over and when that bike starts to fall apart I could donate it to the guy who takes bikes and fixes them up and gives them to kids.

Its something to think about.

Wednesday, February 16, 2011

Ducks in a row

The tire is full and the bike is in the car.  I'm going to have to rehearse getting it in and out because its a lot different than the other car and its not quite as easy to maneuver the bike in and out but I;ll figure it out. The Element is Super Car, and it loves bikes so I know it wants to work with me on it. I also just ran across an Element owners forum, so if I have a hard time I can ask them how to handle it. Yay for the internet.

The bike pump is going to live in the car as well because I'm pretty sure that the ill tire is not going to hold the air I put in it earlier. I bought an inter tube for it but I'm afraid that its problems go deeper than just a leak. I got a good look at the tire and it seems to be rotting in places and I think that its going to be added to the "buy later" list. I think that list is going to need to be re-prioritize because its getting to be rather extensive.

I bought some nicer potatoes. I should have just waited and bought nice potatoes the first time around, but this allows me to have a wide selection and if one kind  craps out I'll have another that might not. I have now a hand full of russets, Yukon gold, German butterball and Holland. I again fought the push to buy purple potatoes - they are totally in and everywhere I have looked for seed potatoes has been pushing them  hard I gather they are supposed to look really cool in potato salads.

At the nursery I learned that the time to get these puppies in the ground is now or as soon to now as possible. The literature they gave me wants me to put them in the ground ASAP, so the barrel is going to have to go see my parents and have its surgery performed and then I am going to have to get on the stick and start rounding up the dirt I'm going to need since the county dirt store doesn't open for at least another month. I also learned I am riding a wave, the guy at the checkout said he has only been working at the nursery for a week and he's all ready talked with a lot of people who are planting potatoes. for the first time and like me, are so excited about it. I felt the need to tell him I was a newby, hopeing he could enlighten me. No can on that sadly, but at least I'm not alone out here.

My next step is to go to a home improvement place and let them tell me how I am going to keep my increasingly spread out garden watered on a timer and if its going to be possible to water a garden on multiple fronts and various platforms.

Tuesday, February 15, 2011

Weakness

I broke my "only food" rule, but then, afterwards, in a fit of rationlization,  I decided to change the rule!, now the rule reads "Only strictly utilitarian goods", so no clothes no toys no bobbles nothing pretty or fun or desirable. I diluted the original rule but I did not abandon it

My first slip was that I bought a slip cover for my exerbike and then the second break was when I bought a new bike pump and a new inner tube for my real bikes'  tire - Very sexy? No?  Well, you have not met my slip cover! I am in love with my new slip cover! It makes the exerbike almost painless to ride! A huge step up from definitely painful to ride.

  I would very much like to ride my real bike too and since I do not use my bike as a toy, and when I really start to  seriously rationalize my failure to stick to my guns, I don't feel all that bad about spending the money to serve my health and I could almost the inter tube and bike pump them into the same category as the hydrogen peroxide I picked up the other day on sale. I also bought a couple of bags of bad food for my donation to my groups quarterly  "party". I did use a coupon for the brownie bit things.

There was just an ad for a pawn shop. It appears as though the store is staffed by well dressed sorority girls and stocked with  only  the finest quality jewelry and musical instruments. Nothing about cases full of hand guns and more advanced weaponry and staffed by scary looking dudes on cell phones who ignore you.

I went to Wallyworld for my new bike pump. I walked in the door and was slapped in the face by a display of POTATOS for $3! I bought two varieties. It claims that they are guaranteed to grow but just in case I'm also going to get some from an actual nursery. If the nursery potatoes seem to much, much nicer, I'll return to Wallyworld what is Wallyworlds. At the very least I'm going to a real nursery to ask questions and window shop. I do want credit for not buying the sexy purple variety, which all the seed catalogues really, really want me to plant. I said no, I don't want them. They seem kind of small and pokey and I'm not sure I want to eat purple food

Monday, February 14, 2011

Subject: Tell Congress: Don't pull the plug on NPR and PBS!


Dear Friend,


In a budget proposal made public on Wednesday, House Republicans announced plans to zero out all funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), the nonprofit responsible for funding public media including NPR, PBS, Pacifica and more.


If the Republicans are successful, it would be a tremendous blow to the entire public interest media sector.


We cannot allow Republicans to destroy public media.


I just signed a petition telling Congress to fully fund NPR and defend public service media. You should too. Click below to take action. Hit back!
Sunny Days

Things are looking up. Two weekends in a row Dogger and I have gone up to Dix and enjoyed the sunshine and warmth, Dogger as especially enjoyed being re-introduced to her extendo-leash, something we don't use on her daily walks as she could easily extend herself into a bus.

Yesterday she ran! She hasn't run since last summer. We were both surprised that she still knew how.  She'll never know the joy of running around like a crazy person off leash like she did before she blew her knees - and she was a huge runner, she would run until she just couldn't go anymore and she got such joy from it but it was still  nice to see her making the most of her chance to feel the wind in her ears again. The last time she had that feeling was riding in the back of a truck.

The paper promises us that its going to get still warmer in the coming week. I saw this as my cue to out the bike back in the car. It doesn't matter how lovely it is outside, I can't do anything about it if my bike is back at home. I started the process, and yes it is a process, by removing Doggers travel bedding from the back of the car. It doesn't need to live there and it was time to re-home it.

Before the bike can go back in the car I had to put more air in the bikes' flat rear tire. I plugged the pump on and started to pump up the tire. I would check every few minutes to see what progress was being made and progress was very much being made ( thank you new bike pump!, burn in hell old bike pump). It still felt a little softer than I like so I gave it a few more hits when the pump exploded.

The pump did not "explode",  the air hose ripped in a rather dramatic way that startled me and caused all the air to leave the tire. Super. I said "Hey, I can fix this! I don't watch sixteen hours of HGTV a day for nothing! Bring it on,  little minor home repair issue! ", I went to the basement grabbed a role of duct tape and went about "fixing it" . Yeah, you can't fix that problem with duct tape even though it looks like you should be able to fix it that way, you can't, even if it seems like a really good idea. It took everything I had to not just grab my purse and head back to Wallyworld to get a replacement but I can't eat a bike pump and so it is added to the list of things I will buy next month, right next to the toaster oven. Do you know how tragic it is to have a freezer full of toaster strudels if you don't have a toaster?

My next step is to see if the bike pump and the toaster oven recycle.

Friday, February 11, 2011

Best behaved snow evah.

I woke up  and looked outside and there was no snow and then I walked Dogger and there was no snow and then I went out for the paper and no snow. Then I went out to go to work and everything was white.

It must have started to snow as I walked in the door with Dogger after our walk, I hadn't opened any of the drapes because it was cold and I wasn't interested in the house getting colder and while I did open the curtains in Doggers room, I didn't open the blinds all the way and I didn't bother looking outside. One minute it was doing nothing and the next minute I was driving to work in the snow. Shockingly, despite the wet streets, everyone at work showed up! I couldn't believe it,  wet pavement  is usually really scary and it makes people stay home just in case. The snow was even really pretty while it lasted, but by lunch it was mostly all gone, by the time I went home for the evening I had all but forgotten it snowed at all.

By the time I walked Dogger it had completely slipped my mind. We were passing by one of my neighbors houses and I saw something that looked like white chalk rocks next to the house. I thought Why did they put rocks down? Are they going to to try to park there? I hope not because that looks like crap". and then I said Oh, wait, that's snow! . I don't have a problem with my short term memory at all.

Something I just did so I still remember it is that five miles is a long way on the exerbike I have done it three days in a row and its not as bad as I thought it would be but the bike seat is really uncomfortable after the first three and a half miles. I have to stop and not sit down for a minute but then I man up and finish the route. I think if I can average twenty-five miles a week I would not suck.

Thursday, February 10, 2011

Friday Cat Blogging



Cathlete
A potential act of Gawd

Its supposed to snow. Or not. it depends on where you get your weather. If you get your weather locally, its not going to snow but at the same time a second local source has been predicting snow since last week. NOAA says snow but how much depends on where you live.

I'm surprised about the local media, whom usually feel very comfortable telling us that even the smallest accumulation of snow is going to lead to a  "Ya'll all gon' die" situation.

It starts very early in the morning with a shivering Weather Intern standing on a dark street speaking with the Studio Bunny.

Weather Intern- The street is wet. I repeat the street is wet. I advice everyone to stay off the streets and stay at home where its safe.
Studio Bunny - I understand that the streets are wet?
WI - Yes, Bunny. I can confirm that the streets are wet. There is a potential for real danger.
SB - Its really dark and I can't tell from the monitor, but just how wet is it out there? Is that black ice behind you?
WI -At present it is definitely damp and  the potential exists for black ice to form. We haven't had any reports of  ice as yet but it is early. We'll know more when the sun comes up.
SB - So until then, our viewers should stay at home?
WI - That's an affirmative . Its February and 47 degrees, things could change in a heart beat. There is snow  falling only 400 miles away from our viewing area and if you go a little further east, its actually sticking! We could have a real storm emergency here!
SB - We just got reports of school closures just in case this potential weather emergency becomes even worse.  Please read the crawl.
WI -  Its dark and cold and and it won't be light for at least another forty-five minutes. We just don't know about the storms track, except for we have for the last week that there is a  small potential for some accumulation at higher altitudes. Here at sea level,  we just don't know how much we can expect. We may be in for a dangerously overcast day.
SB -  We'll have more on local closures after this. Stay tuned for Potential Bad Weather for Other Places!

Three of the seven of us at work are definitely going to tell our boss that they that where live it snowed a lot , the same people are always out when the weather is inclement. Or it rains. I always wonder why my boss doesn't ask more questions about the amount of snow that these people are dealing with or why after years of this kind of weather they haven't picked up  driving skills other than that of calling in and claiming they can't drive in it.   Why they can't perhaps park at the end of their driveways or stock up on  traction enhancing kitty litter or laying a rug or blanket across their windshield o protect it from snow and ice? Two of us live out in the boonies and should have never tried for a job in Raleigh and the other lives in town but the parking lot at her apartments "has lots of hills" thus making it impossible for her to make it to work. For real. She's never actually tried to see if she can do it, she just knows she can't.

Weather pussies make me tired.

Wednesday, February 9, 2011

Work Related.

One minute one I was thinking maybe I would just have a protean bar for dinner and the next minute I was steaming some broccoli and a tilapia  filet and popping some rice into the microwave. I had a protean bar for dessert.

Num.

I've decided that the people I work with are suicidal. Every day at least one of them does something to make me want to kill them. I think its an insurance ploy so that they can claim their death was work related. On a good day its just one of them, on a bad day they take turns. Some of them treat me like some sort of mentally deficient  house plant while others seem to be under the impression that since I know how to transfer calls that I must be some sort of technological wunderkind. I'm younger than they are so clearly I can make their computer work by force of will. I'm supposed to be able to walk into their office and magically cure whatever is wrong with their machines. Oh, yeah, clearly its your schmitlikter, its over heated. I'm going to drigelburt your hardleaf and root around in your sub menu file tree and just clear that right up. Right.

 I can get away with that because the best way to make your computer stop doing whatever it is doing is to turn it off period. Turn. It. Off. If you really want to screw with your computers mind or simply turning it off didn't work? unplug it, its like napalm . If that doesn't work you have to call IT because whatever you did to your computer is way beyond me. They could always ask our resident computer person but she's a highly capable young black woman and she scares the shite out of them.

She could help them and fix their computer but I'm less scary. Its their own faults their computers are always messed up. There is only so many times turning off it going to be helpful. Eventually, the real IT person is going to follow smell of burning plastic back to your office you're going to have to start rooting around in weird parts of the computer you've never been in and there are all these sub menus and files and you just know that if you hit the wrong button you're going to wipe out the whole share drive and probably nuke the server.

I like my solution better. Turn the mother off and go the fuck home. Screw this noise. Done.

Tuesday, February 8, 2011

Eat Less, Exercise More

I think I would have gone four miles this evening but I had a batch of  bran muffins in the oven and the timer beeped. But I think I would have gone the extra mile. I have until Ash Wednesday to get myself to four or I'll have to do five a day for Lent. I decided that today.

Its good to have goals. Oh and for those of you keeping score: this batch of muffins came out looking like muffins and tasting like All Bran.

Did y'all watch the game? It was really good. I watched it all the way up to where my DVD decided that what I really wanted to watch was House Hunters! The last two minutes of the game! I was so pissed. I didn't have the game set to record because I was watching it, I should have recorded it just because my DVD player might decide to screw me over. I also missed Puppy Bowl, but I'm not certain I get Animal Planet anyway. I knew all ready that the Packers had won thanks to a CNN Breaking News alert, but still, I wanted to see the win. I watched an entire game that not involve the Cowboys or the Long Horns, by myself, thank you very much, I should have been able to watch the whole thing.

Whatever. Ben Rapistburger ate turf.

Friday and Saturday the entire family celebrated Baby Nephews' second birthday. I need to find a new nom de blog for him as I think at age two you are no longer a baby

Dogger and I had a lovely day Sunday. We went to Dix campus and gambled around the horse field and then I found a warm place and read my book while Dogger grazed near by. She really liked being able to sniff different smells and be in the sun. It didn't take long for everyone else to discover the field so we moved to another lovely field and did the same thing. IT was a different field and much to my shock, it did not drain the same way. Field One was dry, Field Two was damp. Damp is not great for reading. We both got some nice exercise though and it was heavenly to spend time in the sun. And? it was warm in the sun - No coat, no gloves, no scarf.

Monday was cold and by Thursday is supposed to snow.

Monday, February 7, 2011

Um, its Super Bowl Sunday! its practically a national holiday! Do you have any idea how long this game lasts? or how its wrong to miss the halftime show? And how little time that leaves for things like writing entries?

M&M is in multiple commercials? Really. Sad just sad.

Friday, February 4, 2011

Friday Cat Blogging

Kitty Yoga
Lets see, since I came home from work I've : Walked the dog, fed the dog, fed myself, cleaned the kitchen, cleaned the bathroom, vacuumed the dining room, the living room, the hallway and the dogs room,  changed the dogs linens ,did a load of laundry, put out the trash and recycling,  emptied and filled the dishwasher, decided what I am going to to wear to work tomorrow and cleaned out the cat box and for my reward I watched my Thursday night TV.

I was going to reward myself with a dessert food from the store but I had a protean bar instead.
HAPPY    BIRTHDAY  AUSTIN!!!  THE  WORLDS  BEST TWO YEAR  OLD NEPHEW EVER!!!!!


Thursday, February 3, 2011

If you don't like it, wait 24 hours

I wore a windbreaker today. Half the country is under a foot of snow and I wore a windbreaker to walk the dog this morning, mostly for the pockets.  I also wore a sweater but mostly because my house is cold and now its a habit.

I have a found a new use for the 30,000 tee shirts  in my wardrobe- undershirts! Who knew they could be so multifunctional?  In the summer they keep you cool and in the winter they keep you warm! I have a new appreciation for my tee-shirts and I will try to be more respectful of them in the future, I mean if I knew I would be wearing them year round I might have invested in higher quality product.

On that same token, I bought flannel lined jeans this summer without ever thinking I would actually wear them, they were on sale for $18 and I thought I would just get them as a souvenir, now I hardly ever take them off.

I', not wearing them today though, 70 degrees is too warm for February here, we have four distinct seasons and we are still in the "winter" part,  and 70 degrees is not typically what we experience in winter. Its not like when I was in school back in central Texas where there are two distinct seasons Summer and  Cricket Hatch, which  if we had had a Fall, would have been Fall  and then its Summer again, for the next nine months. In February we wore shorts and felt bad for people who lived in places with winter.

I  did not wear shorts, I could have, because ti was just that warm, but I decided that that sort of behavior would be disrespectful with so many people, including my friends back in Texas are covered in snow. Also, I could not find my shorts. It was colder inside my house than it was outside. My glasses fogged up when I went outside the first time. Its going to get cold though, and its going to feel really, really cold when it does. The high for Thursday is supposed to be only in the forties. That's going to really sting.

Wednesday, February 2, 2011

Happy February 2!

Have you ever wondered why they don't offer flour flavored snacks? Because it tastes like chalk . I made some chalk flavored muffins and I don't know what to do with them - I would eat them but I don't hate myself that much and if I was to suck it up and eat them I fear I might just give up on food all together - Which come to think of it, with summer approaching might not be all that bad an idea...

Yeah. No. I don't want to throw them away because that would be wasteful and wrong. I can't throw away food. My next thought was "I could feed these to the ducks! Ducks like bread! I could totally feed them to ducks and not feel bad about it"  and then I thought, there isn't any water around here and I don't think I have ever seen a duck in these parts, once on a walk I ran across a man who had just been traumatized by a huge owl, but no duck sightings.

I would put the bread out for the squirrels but if you're feeding the squirrels you are also feeding the rats and the cockroaches and I would like to live in a world where all the rats and all the cockroaches have starved to death. Sure, people would probably insist on writing sad chanteys about how tragic it is that all the rats and cockroaches are gone, but they would be promptly beaten to death with their own banjos and we would sing songs about happiness and bunny rabbits instead.
Where ever the muffins go, they aren't going to stay here. I do put a little food outside for the cats but its with the understanding that it is a bribe I give them for killing rats, Like me!  Like me! Kill rats to please me! leave rats on my door step, I won't mind! .  In the winter time they seem to do less hunting, but come summer, they are regular mass murderers. Big Gray kitty, Jojo,  takes down full grown squirrels and roof rats - which is like saying "really big rats and really big rats", the smaller kitty seems to have concentrated his early efforts on small rats and voles - which is like saying "small rats and small rats".

I know from rats. Before this area got all gentrified it was ghettofied.  I had  a dead rat problem in my yard due to a neighbors alive rat problem in their house. I called the city to complain about my dead rats and was told You got dead rats in your yard? You got a problem. The city of Raleigh ain't got no problem. Thank you for calling!.  There is no vector control in Raleigh.
Speaking of rats. Today is Groundhog Day! Its up to him to let us know if we should just all kill ourselves now of if there is hope that this winter will end. In my mind today for Mr. Really Big Rat Groundhog,  is really kind of about whether he gets to live another year or if he gets turned into a zesty meat pie.

Tuesday, February 1, 2011

It is never going to be spring

It was beautiful over the weekend. I was entertaining thoughts of putting the bike back into the car Well. It looks like the cold has broken, finally, I think I'll get the bike tire pumped up and start my lunch time riding again. Its been too long and then it was winter again. Blast.

Speaking of bike riding I don't think I'm going to make the jump to five miles a day on the exerbike quite yet. I'm going to have to do four miles first, I was planning on jumping  straight from three miles to five miles but I don't think this is going to be possible. Three miles makes me tired - which is odd, because two miles is nothing but three miles is work. I was going to give myself three weeks to move on but its going to take me longer.

Two days of nice weather and I put away my big winter coat and most of my scarf wardrobe, I was thinking about putting away the warmer of my pairs of gloves. I wandering around downtown in a hoodie! No gloves, no scarves no ski pants! It was amazingly liberating and short lived.

I should have known. If its gorgeous on weekend "A" by weekend "B" there should be six inches of snow on the ground, that's been the drill this winter but at the same time, if weekend  "A" has six inches of snow then weekend "B" will be comparatively beautiful.  At present, HGTV is showing us rich people buying million dollar plus beach houses in fabulous locations. Its suppose to make us think of summer and  sitting by the beach and being warm. Its making make think nasty thoughts about the Juntas that are currently in control of whatever tropical paradise the rich people are shopping for beach houses in. "Tropical Paradise" is just realtorese for "Banana Republic". Pooy on them and their $600,000 dollar beach front 600 square foot tenement. I hate them and hatefully wonder how long it took them to catch their first tropical infection or get stung by some tropical pest. Costa Rica is really pretty and tropical and exotic and your two million dollar tree house is really the awes, until the reality that cholera isn't just something bad that happened to your ancestors. Oopsy.

Moving on, one of the forty No Reservations reruns airing tonight is set in Egypt. I keep looking at the people he's chatting up and wondering if they were in the streets and if that restaurant is still there or that market. He's wandering around 2008 Cairo. I wonder how its changed in the last 72 hours?

Why is the Travel Channel running a series called When Vacations Attack, this seems contraindicated.