Run, Stephen, Run!

This is hilarious.

And I swear on my orange vinyl Halloween tablecloth, if he makes it onto the ballot, I'm voting for him. Hands-down.

He can't screw it up much worse than any of these other bozos, right?

Randomness

Another crazy, time-crunch weekend. Started out with a wonderful dinner at a friend's house (I still want that recipe, A!), blitzkrieged into a soccer game and birthday party Saturday, and into a family hoo-ha-turned-disaster on Sunday. I am so flippin' tired. And this week involves an afterschool playdate today, soccer practice tomorrow, co-opping a playdate, and a soccer party Thursday, and pre-camping nuttiness on Friday. And my mother's coming over that day for lunch. And I had the heating people here today and two tree companies coming later this week. And work. UGH. I loathe weeks like this.

Someone on a board I visit asked how we all plan to treat ourselves soon. I ordered new exercise shoes yesterday and a new laptop battery today. Practical, to be sure, but treats all the same. The shoes should be here tomorrow. Maybe they'll motivate me to get off my quickly-widening rump and move my body.

(And I might need to hit REI tomorrow for this shirt. Totally not practical, but I heart it. Hee hee!)

I'm reading to my six-year-old's class in a few weeks. Anyone have a book suggestion? I'm leaning towards Leonardo the Terrible Monster (I read them Edwina last year), but am open to ideas. I'm supposed to read it and discuss it with them.

Anybody know how to juice up a FIOS wireless modem? It's not as powerful as my old DSL Linksys system, and I can't get a signal on my back deck. Harumph.

I am *this close* to having DH talked into a house addition. This close!!!! Everybody send up powerful chants for me. Oooommmm....oooooommmmmm....

Lesson learned

Don't ever follow up a dinner of garlic roasted red potatoes with a dessert of a fresh Rice Krispy Treat.

*retch*

Mommy is a Fusspot

This is what my daughter said to me today, shortly after I picked her up. I laughed when she said it--we've been calling her a fusspot for well over three years. But unlike when we say it about her, I really am grouchy today.

• DH (doesn't stand for "dear" today, by the way) picked 10:30 last night to attack a slow drain in our upstairs bathroom. He is very, very good at many, many things...plumbing just isn't one of them. So he banged and plunged and dropped things and made all kinds of racket for a few hours before waking me (sort of) at 2 a.m. to tell me to call the plumber today. The sink went from slow to completely un-usable and I'm wiped out for lack of sleep. Thanks, hon.
• The plumber can't come until tomorrow. PITA.
• While we're talking about him, we have this godforsaken walnut tree in my side yard. It's huge--towers over my two-story house. One of many junk trees to litter my tiny lawn. And around this time ever year, it starts pelting the yard with walnuts. Which are not soft. So last night, the damn nuts start pounding the roof and the AC unit. And Head Dipshit acts like this is so shocking, that they're damaging our property. God only knows what they're doing to the neighbors' house. But he still won't lose the tree. I have two arborists coming next week to give me estimates on drastically pruning it, but it has to stay. I wonder if I can slip them a little cash to kill it. Accidentally. Whoopsee.
• I had to go to a class coffee at DS's school this morning. I loathe walking into rooms full of people for social events. I'm a small-crowd kind of girl and feel so horribly out of place at crap like that. Bleh.
• I keep stuffing my face and am getting downright fat. It's compulsive.
• We're out of dog food. And the WDCL eats prescription food that I can only get from our vet. Who's 20 minutes away. Off we go...

Heeeeeere We Go!

October 9, and the holiday drama has already begun. This one doesn't want to have that dinner at the other one's house, this one over here is going way down there and avoiding the whole thing, and the other one doesn't give a rip but is not helping this year. Period.

Sadly, I've come to hate the period between November 15 and January 2. Thank you, very large extended pain in the ass family. You've sapped every ounce of joy out of the season and replaced it with stress and anxiety. And just like the decorations in Target, you start earlier every blasted year.

Ho ho, bah humbug.

*sigh*

Rant O' The Day

I got the look today...the "You're seriously not getting a flu shot??!!" look.

*sigh*

The answer is no, I'm not getting the flu shot. I think the flu shot is a load of hooey, quite frankly. It "protects" against one or two strains out of hundreds, it's a total guessing game to decide which strains get included in what year's shot, and there hasn't been a single study that's proven the flu shot actually protects anyone against the flu. In fact, a study was released last week that showed it didn't protect the elderly, which has always been the #1 demographic encouraged to get the stupid thing.

The flu shot is a gigantic coffers-booster for pharmaceutical companies, who have tremendous lobbying power. Period. The reason you're so strongly encouraged to get one is that those companies lobby Congress, which leans on the AMA. And those companies also stock your doctor's freebies closet. If S/he doesn't dole out enough shots, s/he loses that closet full o' loot. Which s/he relies upon greatly.

Don't think I'm right? Then answer this: what other supposed vaccination can you get at the grocery store without a doctor's prescription? So far this year, I've seen flu shot clinics at the grocery store, Target, Wal-Mart, the library, the senior center, and my child's preschool. If one was so inclined, one could run around all autumn and stock up on flu shots, getting one after another, and nobody would keep track. You name another supposed lifesaving drug that's just handed out willy-nilly like that. It's all but over the counter! How effective could it possibly be?

I also just passed on the chicken pox booster for my six-year-old, but that's a whole 'nother rant...

Another Language, Maybe?

With many apologies to those who've already listened to me whine about this...I spent part of last night (inspired by my friend, A) looking skyward and asking the Power That Is to please find another way to communicate with me. I suspect s/he's trying to get a message down here, and I'm just too dense to get it.

Why do I think that, you ask? Because in the past week, we've ("we" being me and DH) survived three visits to the emergency room with various immediate family members, one rush to the pediatrician's office for a right-now sick visit, one phone call about another young family member having a heart attack and being hospitalized, and the news that my six-year-old needs to see a cardiologist soon. (Appt's next week)

So, while I get that the Power needs to get something across to me, I'm not understanding what it is. Do you? And if you do, could you please enlighten me before anybody else gets hurt?

I miss the old days, when divine messages came via burning and talking bush or very vivid and very idiot-proof dreams. Much clearer, those messages. If you ask me, this isn't much of an upgrade at all.

Maybe Bill Gates really is God...