Month: November 2002

blonde moments. Or rather, blonde twenty minutes! Any of you psychos out there who decided to venture out and do some shopping today, you have my sympathy. Now get off the damn computer and take a long, hot bath and then a nap. You’ve earned it. I keep wanting to use the phrase “Sweet crappin’ Jesus!”, and just haven’t determined the right moment to do so. Maybe in the middle of sex? Did y’all realize that Survivor was on on Wednesday night this week, not Thursday? And that it wasn’t a real show, but rather some NEVER BEFORE SEEN FOOTAGE!, basically a recap of what happened each day? We watched it, but it wasn’t that fascinating. The thing with Ghandia acting like she was a model and posing for pictures was incredibly dorky, not to mention the fact that everyone called her “Diva.” Thank god it’ll be back for real next week! Did I mention that I sat down in front of the computer late last week and made a major dent in the list of Christmas presents we have to buy? Thank god for Amazon. My grandmother continues to be the hardest person to buy for, though I think we’re just going to send her a nice Christmas flower arrangement this year. We give out a LOT of gift certificates – especially to Fred’s niece and nephew, who are teenagers and know what they want better than we do – and my brother’s family. I would have not the slightest clue what to buy any of them, since I haven’t ever met my niece – she’s, I think, 10 now – and haven’t seen my nephew since he was 2, and he’s 15 now, so they get gift certificates as well. I’ve never met my brother’s wife, but rumor has it that she’s a big reader, so she and he are both getting Amazon gift certificates. I just thank god that Fred’s father and stepmother always tell us what they want, rather than making us guess. I don’t know what on earth we’d give them if we had to figure it out on our own! Since the flavored coffee Fred likes so much went over well at Thanksgiving dinner, I think we’re going to put a little basket together with some of the coffee and some cute mugs.

I said to Fred, “We should give them a basket with coffee and a couple of those mugs in it.” Then I paused and thought. “And maybe some biscotti.” Fred said “With that last sentence, you went from a cool idea to a pretentious, yuppie idea.” He clenched his teeth and said “Buffy! Would you care for some biscotti?” Heh. My sister continues to be the easiest person on earth to buy for, thank god. The theme for this year is bath stuff (and I think she’s returning the favor), and not only did I buy a bunch of Sarah Michaels stuff for her, but I think I’m also going to place an order with Lush. The problem with buying presents for her is not figuring out what to get her – it’s stopping before I spend $300 on her, and $50 on everyone else! Okay, I’m freezing my butt off, even though it’s a balmy 38 degrees outside (that cat door in the dining room lets in a lot more cold air than you’d think!), so I’m going to go turn the fire on and do a little cross-stitching. Have a great weekend!]]>

Nesco Roasting Pan to cook the turkey, and it kicked ass so much that we’ve ordered one for ourselves), and then went upstairs to take a long, relaxing bath with some awesome bath salts. I stayed in the bathtub until the water got cold, then got out, put on my nightgown (hey, it was getting dark out! It’s not like I spent all day in my nightgown or anything…) and went into the guest bedroom to start straightening up. I have a little less than a month to get the room ready for my parents, and I figure if I do a little bit each day, maybe the room will be presentable by the time they get here. A girl can dream, can’t she?]]>

here. When we were making our grocery list Friday night, we put everything on the list that we were going to need for Thanksgiving. One of those items was a turkey, and I reminded Fred that he needed to get one bigger than the one he usually buys. “Yeah, I know,” he said, looking at me as if I were an idiot. It wasn’t until sometime Sunday that I realized he’d bought a 22 pound turkey. TWENTY-TWO POUNDS. That’s the size of Tubby! And at the most, we’re going to have 13 people. I don’t know the rules for choosing a turkey, but surely a pound a person is more than enough, especially considering that Fred’s sister is going to be bringing a ham. But Fred thought it was fine, and that we’d just freeze the leftover turkey. I had visions of eating turkey for the rest of my life, but Thanksgiving had been turned over to him and was his responsibility, so I let him deal with it. It was sometime last night, when we were laying in bed talking, that Fred said “So, are you going to put the turkey in the sink of water during the day tomorrow?” I said “Well, it takes 11 – 12 hours to thaw in water, and if it needs to cook in the roaster for 7 hours, if you want it to be done at noon, you need to start it at 5, so it needs to go into the water around 4 or 5.” Pause. Then I snorted. “But *I* am not going to do ANYTHING with the turkey, ’cause it’s not MY job!” We were silent as we thought about it. “You know,” I said. “I don’t think it’s going to fit in the sink.” In the end, Fred went to the store this morning and returned the turkey, getting a 12-pound turkey which was already thawed and fits nicely in the refrigerator. I had to run to the grocery store myself, because we decided to get some regular soda (we only have diet in the house) in case someone wants one. I bought a 12-pack of regular Coke and brought it home, which was weird. I don’t think we’ve had regular Coke in the house for about 2 1/2 years. It’s like having an ex-boyfriend in the house, while you’re cavorting and slurping on your current boyfriend.

The current squeeze. Aaron-The-Bachelor was on Less Than Perfect last night, and man, he’s no actor, is he? Fred walked through the room while he (Aaron) was on the screen and said “He can’t act worth a shit, can he?” Damnit, Jim, he’s a Bachelor, not an actor! I was just relieved that we didn’t have to see Aaron pull the liver-lipped kiss or the dueling tongues thing on Claudia, because I saw plenty of that while his show was on the air, thank you. Man, have you looked at the top of your refrigerator lately? If not, go climb on a chair and check it out. If you’re not some kind of freak who cleans up there often, I bet it’s nasty as hell. The top of MY fridge was, since I haven’t cleaned up there ever, and we’ve lived here for more than a year now. It’s clean now. The parts I could reach, anyway. I managed to forget to tape The Osbournes last night. Luckily, it’s on again tonight. Whee! Y’all have a great Thanksgiving – if you’re in the US, anyway. If you’re in another country, you’ll just have to settle for having a happy Thursday. Thursdays only come around 52 times a year. Make the most of yours!]]>

here, although the entry ends before I start talking about Sunday. Because it was getting so long, I decided to end it and put Sunday in it’s own entry, if yaknowwhatImean. And there will be pictures in that entry. Pictures of the production team, pictures of cameras, but most importantly, pictures that Fred took of me with, I have to assume, the goal of making me look as hugely fat as possible. Bastard. I spent part of the morning – hell, most of the morning – cleaning out the pantry and refrigerator, because I know that with Fred’s sister making the gravy on Thanksgiving day, chances are good that she’ll poke her head in the refrigerator, and since neither Fred nor the spud are capable of moving the container of iced tea from one spot to another without randomly dumping big puddles of it all over the inside of the refrigerator (as well as the floor), I needed to clean the damn fridge. The floor can take care of itself. And proof of my cleaning:

They probably look just like any ol’ fridge or pantry to y’all, but those babies are cleaned and organized like they’ve never been before. The up side to cleaning and organizing the pantry is that you can (as long as the pantry stays cleaned and organized, that is) see where most everything is. I found two jars of Boar’s Head Mustard that I didn’t know we had, which is cool. I’d been wondering why we’d been going through them so quickly. Tomorrow, all I’ll need to do is some dusting and picking up (and maybe the hardwood floors), and then before I leave for the pet store on Thursday, I’ll vacuum, and voila! Clean house! (Clean enough, anyway) Big thanks today go to Say, who sent me some adorable smiley-face stickers in the mail and made me smile and to reader Dawn, who sent me This Pen for Hire AND some smiley-face stickers! If you think you can have too many smiley-face stickers, you are sadly mistaken. There’s no such thing! Thanks, Say and Dawn! I was going through my My Documents folder last night, looking to clear it out, when I came across a couple of old short stories I wrote years ago – probably 8 or more years ago. I’m going to look at them again, and if I think they’re worth it (even if they make me cringe ’cause they’re so bad), I may put them up in here. Unlike Fred, though, I won’t do the cliffhanger thing, because I’m nicer than he is. Stop laughing. I believe I’m going to go sit in front of the fire and wait for Dr. Phil to come on. That, or snooze.]]>

Miz Poo will take any little bit of sunshine she can get. Spanky’s favorite spot in the whole wide world. Tubby, on the kitty hammock, giving me a bitchy look. He does that very well, doesn’t he? ]]>

this site. It’s freaky, but cool (and I’m probably the last person in the world to “discover” it).

Evil Poo…. and her evil henchman, Evil Tubs. It’s fucking FREEZING in this house, because it’s something like 35 degrees out. Fred turned the gas to the fireplace off, so I can’t fire that up and get warm, so I think I’m going to go crank up the heat and warm up a little before I have to venture out into the cold to get to the mall. The mall on a Friday morning before Thanksgiving. I am SO looking forward to this. Please, god. Don’t let there be any annoying people wandering slowly around the mall, getting in my way and making me want to beat them to death. Okay, y’all, I need your help. I’m back from the mall, and though I didn’t mention it beforehand, the reason I needed to go shopping is because a producer and crew are going to be here Sunday morning. I can’t tell the details just yet, but they’re going to follow us around for part of the day, filming us doing things like making breakfast and eating, and maybe exercising, and I don’t know what-all else. I’m going to wear black pants, but I need y’all to vote on which top I’m going to wear, so go here and do that, if you would. (And no, it’s not Oprah) (And also, please don’t talk about it in the forums, ’cause we can’t answer any questions. Thank you!)]]>

Those wacky supermodels. Gisele Bundchen raised some eyebrows yesterday when on a chat show she confessed that her �favorite thing to do in the world� is to pop pimples. I had long suspected that I was supermodel material, so it’s nice to have it confirmed. (And Justin Timberl@ke needs a smack upside his head. You’re better off without him, Britney!) Fred was petting Fancypants last night, and I noticed that every time he touched Fancypants’ tail or back leg, Fancypants hissed. Could I have used Fancypants’ name any more often in that sentence? Worried, Fred called the vet’s office, and they told him to come right over. He boxed up Fancypants, and they left. It turned out that Fancypants had a pretty high temperature, and so the vet’s conjecture was that Fancypants had gotten into a fight with another cat, got bitten, and the bite got infected. He popped Fancypants with a steroid/ antibiotic shot, and gave Fred antibiotics to give once a day. This morning, Fancypants is back to his usual fancy self. We’re currently giving Miz Poo antibiotics once a day as well, because the vet doesn’t want her lip to get infected before it’s completely healed. I’m thinking it’s about time to just have Fred’s paychecks made out directly to the vet. Speaking of the cats, I came out of my bedroom this morning to see Spanky laying at the top of the stairs. I spoke to him, which got him excited and happy. He rolled over onto his back, and as I watched, he rolled down the top two steps before stopping himself. When I went to see if he was okay, he looked at me as thought I’d personally tossed him down the steps, and ran off. I have officially fucking HAD IT with Wal-Mart. They are now removed from the top of my preferred list and added to the bottom of my “If you absolutely canNOT get it anywhere else, including online” list. I went there this morning to buy a new food processor. Over the past few months, after Fred’s mother gave us her recipe for coleslaw, we’ve been having it once a week or so. Fred not only likes the taste of it, but really likes the fact that there’s always enough left over for two or three more lunches. The food processor we already have is very small, and I have to stop several times to empty the container of cabbage and red onion when I’m shredding it. I decided I needed a bigger one, and since I needed to drive in that direction for cat food (only Kroger’s carries the large bags of cat food that we buy), I decided to stop by Wal-Mart. I looked all OVER the fucking place for the food processors. Were they with the mixers and coffee makers, as one employee guessed? No. Were they with the George Foreman machines and blenders as another employee suggested (after I told her that no, they were not with the mixers, try again)? No. Where were they? Where could they possibly be? With the Christmas stuff, of course, between the wrapping paper and the bows. Silly me. How could I not have known that? There was exactly one choice when it came to food processors, and luckily it was the size and price I needed. I put it in my cart and then spent the next ten minutes dodging all the pallets of crap the Wal-Mart employees had left in each and every aisle on my way to check out. After spending another ten minutes in line, trying to figure out what the cashier was saying to me (she was a mumbler), I hauled my purchases out to the car and headed home. Once home, with probably a little more excitement than the situation warranted, I put the food processor together. It was big, did I mention? Made by the reputable Black & Decker and not some fly-by-night crappy company. The fucker didn’t work. Now, I KNOW that you are looking at me skeptically, reader. I know that you are thinking to yourself what Fred said out loud to me, “Did you put it together right? Did you read the instructions?”, and yes. Yes, I fucking put it together right, and I read the fucking instructions. One of the things you don’t know about me, because I’ve never had occasion to mention it before, is that I’m good at putting things together, and I always have been. I am also not ashamed to read the instructions if I have problems putting things together, but I rarely need the instructions. This time, I put the fucker together, pressed the fucking button, and it did not (fucking) work. It didn’t even TRY to work. So I pulled out the instructions and followed them step-by-step – it not surprising me that I’d had it put together correctly in the first place – and again it did not work. I unplugged it from whence it was plugged, and tried another plug, and another and another, and nothing would make the motherfucker work. So, Wal-Mart, fuck your employees, who couldn’t give a shit whether I can find what I need to find, fuck your sloppy, crap-strewn aisles, fuck your never-where-it’s-supposed-to-be stuff, fuck your miles-long lines and your cashier who can’t speak up so I can hear them, fuck your constant selling me stuff that doesn’t work because this is NOT the first or second or fifth time this has happened, and FUCK YOU. You are NOT the only fucking game in town, and though you have stuff that Target does not have, at least they take pride in making their store look halfway decent, their employees don’t look at you as if you’d shit directly in the middle of the aisle when you ask where a particular item might be, and they’re FRIENDLY when they answer questions, even if they don’t know the answer to that particular question. I’m going to return the fucking piece-of-shit food processor I bought from you (and when the customer service lady gives me the “Did you put it together right? Did you read the instructions?” look, I will slap her silly), and then I’m going to haul my ass to Target and buy one that fucking works. So there. Fuckers.]]>

Which is not to say that I can’t appreciate a cool shoe; I just don’t lust after them the way other women do. Maybe it’s because I have weird feet and they’ve never been comfortable in anything other than shitkickers, sneakers, and fuzzy slippers. Just another example of my weirdness. Yesterday, the temperature outside was 35 and with the wind chill felt 27. Today, it’s 55 out. I’m not complaining about the warmer weather, but a little consistency couldn’t hurt Mother Nature! I have to check the temperature every day before I know what to wear on my walks, and it’s a good thing I do, because I’m thinking that sweats and long johns on a 55-degree day wouldn’t work quite as well as it does on a feels-like-27-degree day. Which reminds me – I need to buy some decent long johns. I think the bunny ears would look smahhhhhshing on Mr. Fancypants. And the party hat on Tubby. And Miz Poo would kick ass as a cowgirl. Speaking of the cats, I was sitting in front of the computer around 10:00 last night paying bills, when a loud crashing sound came from the library, where the cat door is located. I turned around to see a fancy blur go by at the speed of light. Miz Poo, who had been laying on the floor behind me asleep, stood up, her tail bushed out, blinking sleepily. I hadn’t heard Fancypants go up the stairs, so I looked in the kitchen and living room before concluding that he had. I went up the stairs, and at the top stood Spanky and Spot, both with their tails bushed out, both staring warily toward the master bedroom. I went into the bedroom, softly calling for Fancypants, but got no reply. I checked the closet and bathroom, then got down on my stomach and looked under the bed. He was laying there, curled up into a freaked-out looking pile, his eyes big and dark. I talked to him for a few moments, checked around him to be sure there were no signs of blood or small rodents, and then left him alone. The other cats milled around with dark eyes and bushy tails for another half hour or so before settling down. I checked out in the back yard to make sure there were no neighborhood cats hanging around, and saw Tubby sitting under the bird feeders. He meowed bitchily at me to let me know that all was well. When I went back upstairs a while later to watch last week’s ER, Fancypants was flopped in the middle of the floor with his legs kicked up, licking himself. Business as usual, in other words. I have no idea what happened, but can guess that either he tried to put the smack down on the wrong kitty, a dog got after him, or he was in someone’s back yard and they chased him out. Whatever happened, I guess I’m glad he knows that home is the safe place to be!

Evil, yet fancy. I walked by these trees this morning and loved them so much that when I got home I grabbed the camera and drove back to take a picture of them. ]]>

Heather from Texas – had a whole segment where she was joking about how she was constantly cooking, trying to fatten up the other girls, but it didn’t work. They took a few questions from the audience, and one of them asked “Did any of you actually gain weight while you were in the house [with the other bachelorettes]?” One of the other women (not Heather) said, JOKINGLY, “No, even though Heather tried to fatten us up with her cooking!” So the show moves on for a few minutes, and then all of a frickin’ sudden Heather is CRYING, because it was so MEAN of that other woman to imply that she was REALLY trying to fatten them up, sob, wail, gnashing of the teeth. I think that everyone there had a little cartoon question mark over their head, ’cause I sure as shit did. At this point I don’t care who Aaron The Bachelor with his smack-me face picks, because Helene gets on my nerves, and Brooke is too sweet for his slimy self. I actually thought Gwen was going to end up being his final choice, and was pretty surprised when she ended up leaving last week. Even the annoying ones are too good for him, though. That’s just my opinion, folks, brought about mainly because if a guy’s going to kiss someone with the cameras all around, I do NOT want to actually see his tongue waggling around all over the place. Gah. I was watching Felicity and cross-stitching Friday night, and as the show went to commercial, I glanced up. The commercial began with a woman jogging slowly along a rather scenic trail. She stopped and put her hand to her forehead, staring distractedly off into the distance. I just can’t concentrate, came the voiceover, a soothing, female voice. I wonder if I’m pregnant? If failure to concentrate is a sign of pregnancy, I’ve been pregnant for 34 (almost 35!) years. And speaking of commercials, have you seen the Visa Checkcard commercial with Charlie Sheen? He’s in a movie store, wants to write a check, and so the guy says he’s going to have to call it in. Time passes, with Charlie snoozing on the couch, staring off into space, and trying to flirt with a passing girl (who’s not interested). Finally, we see the clerk, holding up a driver’s license. “This doesn’t look like you,” he says, and lowers it so that we can see Martin Sheen. “It did when I came in here,” says Martin Sheen. I don’t know who came up with that commercial, but it’s funny as hell. Oh, you silly, crazy readers. I’ve gotten enough email to lead me to believe that y’all think that I plan to do the cooking for Thanksgiving. Ha! No WAY, man. I’m going to scrub the house from top to bottom for the three days before Thanksgiving and then spend half of Thanksgiving day cooking? Not in THIS lifetime. Cooking will be Fred’s job, though I’m sure I will cook a supplementary dish (squash casserole) or two. The turkey and all that stuff? His responsibility. And do NOT feel sorry for him (that’s an order!). His sister’s bringing a bunch of food and so is his stepmother, so it’s not like there’ll be all that much for him to do, aside from the dessert and turkey. On the up side, his father brought over a turkey roaster so that the oven is freed up for anything else that needs to be cooked. I’m going to give the roaster a trial run this Wednesday, when I try cooking a chicken in it. Ah, good times in the And3rson house, yes indeedy.]]>