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Friday Dog Blogging ~ Saturday Edition
Thanks to Jimmy for the idea, which you can try here.
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Happy New Year!
Thank you to everyone who wished me a happy birthday yesterday. Really, I feel blessed to have such wonderful friends and family. I had good wishes here, on Facebook, on the phone, and in person. I feel like George Bailey, with his message from Clarence: “Remember, No man is a failure who has friends”. Indeed. I had a lovely birthday, thank you for asking. I would suggest waiting awhile before attempting the California Academy of Science, as it was an absolute ZOO, totally overcrowded and busy busy busy, and we could only stand about an hour of it before we had to bail and go get lunch elsewhere. Really, though,…
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Goodbye 2008…
Don’t let the door hit you in the ass on the way out. OK, this year has been the worst of my life. My mom’s illness was incredibly stressful, and had me feeling like I was running in circles, scared as hell. Then she died, and the stress was gone, followed by a sadness and emptiness that I wasn’t prepared for, and can’t entirely shake. Add to that Ted losing his job, which has been stressful and worrisome and scary, because you never know how long it will take to find another job. Also, Ted’s aunt passed away in January, his brother was in an accident which required surgery in…
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2009 TBR Book Challenge
Having just finished the TBR Challenge for 2008, I’m ready to set my sights toward 2009. In honor of one of my favorite book bloggers, Dewey, who passed away recently, several of the books on this list are books I came to via her blog, The Hidden Side of a Leaf. So many of the books I’ve read in the last couple of years, I found on her blog. I am going to miss her. The challenge is to read 12 books in 12 months, all at once or spread out, whichever way you want. They cannot be re-reads, and you have to make a list and stick to it,…
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The Pillars of the Earth
(picture and game found here) The Pillars of the Earth is set in 12th century England, and sweeps a period of about 40 years. It is the story of the building of a grand Cathedral in the fictional town of Kingsbridge (there is a real Kingsbridge, but not this one), and the people involved. That doesn’t sound like it would make for a very interesting novel, but it turned out to be a page-turner of a book with flawed characters and enough twists and turns to keep any soap opera buff happy. There is sex, violence, murder, sabotage, intrigue, historical fact, and lots of ups and downs. The main characters…
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Merry Christmas
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c9KpNznVLlY[/youtube]
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Wordless Wednesday ~ My Favorite Cartoon Character Edition, Christmas 2001
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And Me with my Christmas Shopping Done…
That’s right, it’s meat scented cologne. Cheap beef from South America, to be more precise. There aren’t enough words for how wrong this is.
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Maybe I get it
My ancestors are all Christian, some more so than others…and yet, I was raised as an atheist. Once, in 4th grade, when all of my friends were religious and I wanted to fit in, my mom caught me praying in the bathroom. She was incensed, and told me that if there was indeed a God, he was a bastard that she didn’t want me to have anything to do with. Her father had died when she was very young, her mother had married an abusive man who became her step-father, and she had a lot of serious issues with God. That was my first taste of the anger that can…
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TiVo Alert ~ San Francisco Ballet’s Nutcracker
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z5cYEAM6Te4[/youtube] We were fortunate enough to catch an encore performance of San Francisco Ballet’s Nutcracker yesterday. It was beautiful and really, really well done. I looked on our local PBS website, and there’s only one showing left, 2AM Tuesday morning. If you have a chance, record it. You won’t be disappointed, even though the Nutcracker Prince has a mask that looks a bit too much like the Burger King for my taste. It was filmed last year, and is distributed this year via Great Performances. Of course, there’s a DVD available for the ballet lovers out there. Enjoy. It’s gorgeous.
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Menu For Hope
I read over at Bleeding Espresso about a wonderful fundraiser called Menu For Hope. This fundraiser is a raffle, with the money going to support a school lunch program in Lesotho, a tiny country completely surrounded by South Africa. What can you win? Looks like there is a lot of stuff out there to win, and a lot of it looks pretty great. I’ll donate my $10, and regardless of whether I win or not, I hope the kids in Lesotho receive nourishment and hope from this program. The money is donated to the U.N. World Food Programme, via a third party donation organization named first giving. I came upon…
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Twitter Post
Just a quick post in case anyone for some stupid reason cares what I’m doing. I don’t twitter, so this is what I’ve got. YAY! The Washer/Dryer just fit. And when I say just, I mean JUST. It’s really, really tight. But boy, I love having a full sized washing machine for the first time in I don’t know how long. At least the 10 years we’ve lived here, perhaps at our old places as well. I don’t remember. Anyway, I LOVE it. I sometimes hug it. Yesterday we washed the dog bed, Maya’s sheets, her comforter, and two loads of laundry. Today is our sheets, and anything else I…
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Weekend Wrap Up
Our washer/dryer combo has been slowly dying for awhile now. It’s a combo washer/dryer all in one condo unit that looks like this. The washing machine basket is tiny, and won’t hold much. And over the years, it’s been slowly pushed out of whack, until now, if you try to wash two pairs of jeans at once, it sounds like it is going to try to force its way through the laundry room door, down the hall, and out our bedroom window. Our bed is right in front of the window, so we’re against this prospect. We had someone come out a few months ago to service it, but he…
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Healing
(picture found here) In yoga class last night, we were supposed to think of an intention for ourselves, and for those we love, and mindfully practice our poses with this intention in mind. The idea is that if you keep your intention present in your mind, you internalize it, and you project it into the world. The first word that came to my mind was ‘healing’. Thinking back over this year, there are so many friends and family who need to heal. Some physically, some emotionally, but all have suffered and are working back towards normal. Then I wondered, what is normal now? What is normal with my mom gone? …
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Wordless Wednesday