February Square

Here’s the February square!  It’s my 1st cable pattern *gushes*

The January & February squares together (along with my gnome pajama pants:

And a close up of the pattern for February:

And now, to work on the cross-stitch for my friend until the March pattern is released!  Hmmm, what color should I use for March…?

Damn Hallmark Channel and Your 14 Hour Love Saga

Eight movies.  Hours and hours of sitting on my arse & watching them again.  Yes, I said again.  Not sure how i got hooked.

The first one stars Katherine Heigl (of Knocked Up & Grey’s Anatomy fame).  I think I watched the first one because of her.  Not because I knew her from those sources, but from a Disney movie.  She is a hottie, as is her co-star.  She was in the first 2, maybe 3, then she became famous & was probably too cool for the Michael Landon Jr. production.  A little too wholesome & God fearing.  She could make more money getting “Knocked Up.”

I digress (so unlike me…).  So here I am.  The beginning of movie 7.  As each one comes on I think “Have I seen….yep…I have…”  They are good movies.  However, the men all die!  Seriously. At least 3 of these movies start out “Gee, sorry your husband died.”  Yeah, yeah, I ruined it for you.  But honestly, these have been out for a while.  If you haven’t seen them yet, I don’t really feel all too terrible about it.

They are based on a series by Janette Oke.  I don’t know if I am inspired to read them, but they entertain in movie form.  If you get uncomfortable with books or movies steeped in the characters relying on God’s will and praying for guidance, first off, shame on you, 2nd, these are meant to be inspirational and wholesome.  Who couldn’t use a little more of that in their life?

OH!  I see a cameo from one of the guys from N’Sync in this one!  Or was it Backstreet Boys? One of the Duff sisters is in this one too.  Don’t let the last 2 sentences deter you. They are good shows, really they are.

Wordsmithing

There is a commercial on lately for Wal-Mart. It states, in a nutshell:

If you shop other places and spend $100/week, you could save $55/month by shopping at Wal-Mart

It took me a couple of times to catch the subtle change from week to month.  I am certain that others heard it like I did the 1st time, “huh, if I shop at Wal-Mart, I’d only pay $45 bucks for what I pay $100 for at other places…”  not what they are really saying, “you’ll save $13.75/week”

Just interesting.  I wonder how many people don’t pick up on the way they switched it around.  I wonder if anyone ever goes in & gets ticked off that they only saved the $13.75 instead of the anticipated $55.

Honestly, going anyplace but Wal-Mart is worth the extra $55/month…Unless I am in need of a healthy dose of reminding myself to use birth control.

Latest Project

It is always exciting to start a new project.  Something developing from nothing.  This is going to be a gift.  I thought it was sweet seeing just the word “love” on the loom.  I’ll post a final pic when it’s done in a few weeks too.  I don’t want to post too much now, in case either one of the recipients manages to wander onto the blog!

Palindrome

I am a bit social and I have a tendency to speak to most anyone. It drives my friends crazy at times. It also makes the people I interact with in those situations crazy sometimes too. For others, they join in and seem to enjoy it. I had a mix of those yesterday at Hobby Lobby.

I had purchased this poster about a year ago. I have a passion for all things international as well as history ~ especially the rich history of the Chicago/Chicagoland area. This is going to go up in my international room. All items in this room have either been given to me as a gift or brought back from one of my travels abroad. This poster doesn’t fit that, but somehow it still fits and I like it.

I decided I needed to finally get it up on my wall so I went to Hobby Lobby to look at frames. It is, of course, not a standard size. I was looking at framing options and really wasn’t sure what color matte to go with. I decided to elicit feedback from other shoppers. Most were very helpful and nice. One couple looked at me like I had 3 heads. There were 2 couples though that were incredibly nice. One couple were about my parent’s age and they came by a 2nd time to see if I had made progress. They were so nice. Then there was a woman that was a little older that provided her opinion. A few minutes later, she came back by with her husband ~ she said he has a good eye and would give his opinion too. I LOVED it! They were just incredibly sweet.

As I placed my order, I provided my number to the Hobby Lobby employee (who was incredibly patient) and pointed out how cool my phone number is: 123 45 54 123, like a palindrome, but not quite. But, we couldn’t for the life of us remember what the proper term was “Anagram? No…Onomatopoeia? No…” I saw my elderly gentleman friend and asked him. He thought his Mrs would know, so he went to ask her.

None of us came up with palindrome. Paul, the HL employee said that he was going to figure it out and write it on my sales slip.

And oh, funny thing…I didn’t end up going with a matte at all. Just the frame & spacers.

All You Need is Logo

They have been playing Buffy the Vampire Slayer on Logo lately.  A friend of mine coaxed me into watching it (while it was still in production) and I have to admit, I find it clever and entertaining.  Joss Wheden has written some iconic shows that have created cult followings (Buffy, Angel, FireFly, Glee) not to mention writing on movies such as Toy Story & X-Men.

But I am not here to defend what I have set on my DVR.  I am here to discuss the interesting commercial/infomercials that they have on this channel.  First, I never knew that there was a male version of “Girls Gone Wild.”  Yeah, like it takes a lot to get a guy to show off his physique…

I realized, there is very little in life you need beyond the products they are advertising.  They have the Jillian Michaels “kick start your diet with a good colon blow” product and the “Pos-T-Vac” that helps your man, *ehm*, be a man.  What’s great then is that you have the Perfect Fit button extender/reducers and well, those will work with either/both of those products above…

Then there is the Shape Weight to help women with those giggly arms.  Once we get those in shape, we can use the Invisi-Lifts to get the girls to at least look as though they are in shape.

The newest one I saw today was for Knifty Knitters and it made me want to get it because gosh darn it, people were so damn happy to be using it!  They were dancing exuberantly and quite frankly I want to be that happy.

So see, what else does one need in life? Firm…arms…supported breasts, a good cleansing, expandable/retractable pants, and a nice video to watch while knitting blissfully…ah, life is good ~ thank you Logo! …Where’s my credit card?

https://www.tryperfectfitbutton.com/?refcode=p22

http://www.jillianweightloss.com/cleanse-and-detox.html

http://www.invisilifts.com/index.jsp?directLoad&uid=1A78A5327FBAACD50DB8F41644F190B0&campaignID=15153

http://www.pos-t-vac.com/video.html

God Can Hear You Well in Kiev

In 1995, I went to Kiev, Ukraine on business.  I had the choice between there & Moscow.  I decided to go to the place I knew less about.  At this point in my life, I had never been to another foreign country except Australia, but I did know copious amounts of foreigners and could speak Spanish.  I could not and still cannot speak any of the languages spoken in the Ukraine.

I planned to have 2 days on my own before I needed to meet up with my business associates.  The Sport, my hotel was located on a main throughway and was right next to the best shopping area & across from the national circus.

It was an amazing trip.  I plotted out my trip ~ tried to memorize the street names I needed to, etc. and I prayed I wouldn’t get lost.  I wandered around and was awestruck at the beauty of the architecture ~ especially when you look up and many of the tops of these beautiful buildings were in ruins, remnants of wars long ago and not so long ago.  There were beautiful churches gilded to the ground; something that would never happen here.  People would be stacked as high as possible to scrape that gold off the buildings.  Yet here, in a very poverty stricken nation, what to me was an obvious source of money (via theft), it was left untouched. 

The contrasts were constantly showing themselves to me.  The beauty of the promenade dotted with families effected by Chernobyl; a boy with a tumor on his upper inner thigh so large he couldn’t close his legs, much less walk, a  young woman with a deformed arm.

As I walked along, I heard in a distinctly American accent, the word “American.”  I turned to see a family that looked American too.  They were from Troy, Michigan.  The teenage girl was 1st generation American.  They were there visiting relatives.  There were six of them, four that had come over from Troy and their cousins that lived about 45 minutes from the city.  It was their 1st time in the city, even though by our standards, it was so close. The family invited me to join them for the day.  My prayers were answered.  They were fluent in Ukrainian, Russian, and English.  YAY!

We saw so much, but what was extra special was that I was seeing it in a couple different ways.  Through my eyes, of course, but also through the eyes of the Ukrainian woman.  She was 30, but looked much older.  An indication of a hard life on the farm where she had lived and worked.  Watching her experience things that we would never think twice about, such as an escalator.  Mind you, it was one of the longest escalators I had ever seen, but still…it was an escalator. 

I got to use the lovely public toilets that were a hole in the floor with metal foot plates to show the best stance.  It was gross.  Lots of nastiness that I won’t detail here.  Still, an experience that I was happy to have had (and glad it was only once!).

The family made sure I knew where I was going to get back to the hotel and we said our goodbyes.  Once I got back to the hotel and settled in for the night, my knee swelled to the point where I couldn’t bend it.  The next day, I decided to just venture out close to the hotel.  The circus was on a 2 week hiatus. Bummer. So, the shopping center.  Wow.  It was eye opening.  The shops weren’t shops, they were booths and or tables.  The merchandise was sparse.  The merchandise was also old and or expired.  The one thing that really stood out were some woman’s stockings that were so old that they were no longer elasticized and the date on the packaging: 1960 something.  They had seams.

I bought my Dad and a friend the traditional  mink hats that you think of when you think of Russian/Soviet/Dr. Zivago in winter.  I believe I paid $16 US dollars for both hats.  I was later told that the money I paid would feed that man and his family for at least a week.

I have pictures of the churches out/up in my house, what brought this flood of memories back was a song.  While in my room waiting for the swelling in the knee to subside, there was one station that had English programming.  It was a music channel & they looped 3 hours of videos over and over and over and over again.  The 2 songs I remember are “Big Me” by the Foo Fighters and “Over My Shoulder” by the Mike & the Mechanics.  The later of the 2 didn’t really make it big here and I rarely hear it, so when I do, it catches my attention.  It always amazes me how one little thing, such as a song, can stimulate ones senses and open the floodgate to memories.

Excuse Me While I Kiss This Dash

It's a bit hard to tell here, but the seat was all sorts of jacked up on this rental car. I figured that once my friend sat in the seat, she’d be able to adjust it. Nope. She got in and hilarity ensued. I figured it would with her. She has a healthy sense of humor about most things, but this was an obvious prop for her.

Luckily, we weren’t going far. Luckily, I didn’t have to hit the breaks hard. And driving was difficult because we were laughing so hard! Once we got to the restaurant, I was able to adjust the seat a little so her ride back wasn’t as uncomfortable, but it still was a bit wonky. A bit later, after I had let her off at some random street corner, I tested the seat & it worked.

Apparently, her ass has healing powers. Why didn’t I have her come out to Indiana to sit in my car last month?

Well, Yes, and…

THANK YOU for pointing it out.  Mind you, that had nothing to do with anything else in the advert for this cafe.

It did it’s job ~ caught my attention, but then again, so did the brochure for the Eastern PA State Penitentiary tours.

Beep Beep & Beep Beep YEAH!

I had to laugh tonight.  I was walking out to my car with key fob in hand.  I had it at the ready in case I couldn’t find my car.  I was 99% certain I knew where I left it.  This was, after all, a short trip, just a day and a half.  Still, I have been known to need to set off my alarm to locate it.  I try to park in the same general area, but sometimes the parking Gods are against that.

Tonight I realized that there were numerous alarms going off.  I looked around an saw a few people wandering around looking lost and vulnerable.  One young girl looked a bit panicked until she finally hit the range to set off the alarm.

What did we do before key fobs and panic buttons?  How did we find our cars?  What would we do without the Seinfeld episode in the parking garage?!

1st Milestone(s)

Yesterday was weigh-in day.  I didn’t have any real expectations, other than I figured I lost a little.  I needed to after maintaining (ok, a +0.2!) last week.  I still blame that on biological warfare.

I am pleased to announce that I lost 3.8lbs!  Yay me.  This brings my total to 12.2 lbs down.  This helped me reach 2 milestones this week:

1) 5% loss.  Yep, there is 5% less of  me to love.  Weight Watchers is big on celebrations.  I, personally, didn’t need the little sticker, but they encouraged me to announce it (for those of you that don’t know how WW works, no one discloses their weight, but you can share, if you want, the amount you lost that week/total, etc).

2) I am at the weight I was at when I joined last time.  Yes, I am currently at the weight I was when I was thoroughly & utterly disgusted with myself 6 years ago.  A little sad about the fact that I let myself get even larger than I had been before, especially when I swore I wouldn’t let myself ever get over X pounds ever again….yeah, I blew by that and then some! 

But, here I am ~ trying to do something about it again.  It has been a bit easier to follow this time ~ so far.  Not sure why, but that, I am sure, will come in time and will become its own blogpost.  I am certain you are waiting with bated breath.  I wonder how many calories that burns?

Here I Come, Natty..and Deb & Joe…

And for the fun of it…my favorite billboard that takes 2 east coast marketing icons and uses them for a 3rd local one:

Such Commitment

This is square 1, literally.  A friend and I have decided to participate in the Block of the Month Club.  Twelve months, twelve blocks ~ we end up with a blanket at the end of the year.  I may have mentioned this project already, but here is a picture of the January square:

It is meant to be 13”, but mine ended up being 11'”.  Must be a tighter knitter than I thought.  I am also working with wool.  I am allergic to wool, but for some reason, this stuff hasn’t been causing me strife..yet.  Every 2nd Sunday of the month, The Red Purl (a wee little knit shop) releases the pattern.  The only cost is that she, the shop owner, asks that we purchase the supplies there.  Her yarn is reasonable for the quality of the products she has.

As is typical with me, there is at least one flaw. Seems that I can’t count and/or follow a pattern…go figure!  I feel that it gives it that homemade feel:

Yeah, like that, just not as annoying

Today my dear friend and I went to The Red Purl in Niles, Michigan…yes, of the infamous “Nice Knockers” post from earlier this week.  The knocker is actually on the door of this shop too.  As the name suggests, it’s a knit/yarn shop.  Very fun…even though there’s a whole lotta wool ~ of which I am allergic too, but I soldier on!

The shop owner is super nice (with the  element of quirkiness the seems to be a prerequisite of avid knitters).  I mentioned the fact that I had visited The Big Merino when I was in Australia which spawned a conversation about being an exchange student. 

Turns out, she too had been an exchange student.  She went to Turkey, just like my friend that was with me.  Well, I was quickly forgotten once they started discussing their exchange experiences in Turkey.  I loved listening to them.  The shop keeper seemed to be around our age, so my friend started asking about the program – the same program as hers; the year – the same year as her!  Turns out, they were exchange students together!  They had the same orientations, the same flights, etc!  The coincidences don’t end there.  My friend is a liaison for that exchange program now and the student she is “watching over” this year is from, you guessed it, Turkey.  Not only from Turkey, but from the same town that the shop keeper lived in!

It truly is a small world!

Sook.

I feel kind of silly when I watch sporting events ~ or anything that contains a moment of patriotism. Even now, as I sit here, I am welled up watching the Olympic torch relay.

I had to catch myself at the beginning of the Superbowl too.  I knew that they would show some of our troops while they played the Anthem which is a double whammy.  I was already feeling emotional and I had to hide my face when they did.

I have always had that swell of emotion, pride, and respect.  It doesn’t matter the nation, I get weepy.  Of course, the Star Spangled Banner, America, and ~ yes you can mock me mercilessly for this one…God Bless the USA move me the most.

It’s one thing when I am in the sanctuary of my own home, but it is a bit embarrassing when I am out in public.  After 9/11, they were playing "God Bless the USA” all the time.  We were at a bar and the dueling pianos started playing it. Damn it.

Gotta go now…they are playing the new version of “We Are World” and I once I get past the confusion of who the heck all these artists are, I will need to grab a tissue.

I was so cool…in 1995

I was over watching my friend’s family.  Can’t call it babysitting.  They all know their roles.  I am there just to have an adult presence there while the little ones are still awake. I am a little sad that the novelty of “me” has warn off though.

I always feel a little goofy when I talk to the older kids (did I mention there are 7 of them total?).  The look on their faces as I tell a story is kind of funny.  I will finish the story and they look at me like “yeah, and…?”   Don’t get me wrong, I believe they like me, but I just don’t think my humor translates to the younger generation – at least in that household.

I was there 2 weeks ago and had my hair up in a clip like the ones pictured. The 16 year old said “oh yeah, those are coming back into style.”

Uh…didn’t realize they had gone out of style, but then I started to think about it and yep, good chance that I have been wearing these for the better part of 15 years. Chances are also pretty good that these clips went out of fashion at some point in there.

Nice Knockers

 Augsburg, Bavaria, Germany

Niles, Michigan, USA

Better Than I Thought

Ok, here’s my weekly check in.  I knew it was bound to happen and it did.  No loss this week.  And technically I gained 0.2, but I call that bloating.

It is so tough to follow the plan/stick to it when there are fried cheese curds, trivia night, and a Superbowl party to attend.  A big weekend!  So, I will take that +0.2. 

It makes it easier to accept a slight gain when I am realistic with myself.  I knew that I was over my allotted points and I was willing to accept the consequences.  It’s not like I went hog wild either.  It was just a couple of conscious choices – I don’t typically eat fried cheese curds, but it was a long day and I was out with a friend, they sounded good.  And they were.

Saturday. Trivia.  Food GALORE!  I was OK, but I did eat a lot of chocolate – because it was there.  I do have to say how much i love my friends.  When I asked for someone to pass the cookies, they all denied me the pleasure.   Only a true friend would be willing to stand between me & a cookie.  I have them to thank for keeping me from making it a larger gain!

How Trivial…

*aaaaaaahhhhh!*  Trivia Night… How I love thee.  It’s like Christmas for those of us filled with useless knowledge.  I get giddy just thinking about it!  But let me back up & explain, for those that may not know of this lovely fund raising social interaction…

Ten people per team. Ten topics. Ten questions per topic…plus ten Mulligans (if you want/feel you need the insurance – a/k/a freebies).  Typically these Trivia Nights are held at schools.  These seem to have become the younger generation’s “BING!”  We are like moths to the flame…AND there is food and booze.  I love being Catholic.

I was asked to join a friend of a friend for my first Trivia night about 4 years ago.  I am using my friend’s son as the yard-stick; Dan Dan was just a wee little one when I joined the group and now he’s 4.  I have, gratefully, become a regular in the group.

We played last night and sucked.  Typically we come in near the top of the board.  Top three generally.  Not last night.  We were off somehow and a lot of the time, it is going to depend on the topics selected.  Last night, we lost our religion.  We fluctuated between 7th & 12th with a final standing of 11th.  Round 2 was religion.  We bit it.  We used 2 Mulligans (out of 10) and still only got 3 total right.  We couldn’t recover.  The topics weren’t ours last night.  I did enjoy our “Bishop Mulligan” answer.  Unfortunately, cleverness and wit don’t help get points.  At least not at this game (*giggle*).  Thankfully we had the music round & got them all right.  Pulled out a Taylor Swift one and, hmmm…I think there was a Van Halen song in there too…

The picture above is from a Trivia Night that wasn’t at one of the Catholic schools.  It was to raise money for Camp Millhouse, a camp that provides activities for special needs children in the community.  We took home the trophy for that one, literally!  One of the sponsors was a trophy place in South Bend. We were all so proud!  I will hold onto that victory and not dwell on last night’s loss.  I’ll still dwell on the time we were robbed from winning the game by a lousy point because of a paper airplane.

Huh? OK, I’ll take it…

I figured this week was the week.  The week that I either maintain or gain.  I was admittedly “bad” this week & was ready to pay the consequences.  Oddly, I still lost.  Not much, 1.6 pounds, giving me a grand total of 8.6 in a months time.  Not too bad!  I am not complaining, I am quite proud of the accomplishment.  I am not, however, taking this week for granted either.  I need to remain diligent and focused.  I have a long way to go and I can’t afford to expect that weeks where I fail to focus will have similar results.  Quite frankly, I didn’t deserve to lose weight this past week based on my “eff it” attitude.  I promise to not test the Weight Watcher Gods again this week.  Be warned Superbowl Sunday, I will kick you ass before you fatten mine!  (Go Horse!)

Love, as Indicated by a Well Intentioned Gift

Mr. B was my Dad’s boss.  That’s not a code name, it’s just what we called him.  He looked an awful lot like my Dad too.  When people see the pictures of Dad & Mr. B, they assume they are father & son.  There is no blood relation, but he is very much like a grandfather to me.  He just celebrated his 85th birthday and made me start thinking.

We always seemed to have a connection.  It’s funny to hear my Mom talk about how she was scared of him when I was little.  I guess he could be a bit of a bastard when he wanted to be.  I never saw that side of Mr. B.  He was just someone with whom I climbed all over and cuddled.

When I moved into my house a few years back (well before it was renamed IHOL) I had a housewarming party.  Mr. & Mrs. B came, which made me so happy!  He is getting up there in age & it’s a bit of a trek from my hometown to here.  They brought me a housewarming gift (BONUS!) ~ it was, eh…a lovely…wind chime.

Mrs. B was quite cute.  She pulled me aside to let me know that Mr. B was adamant about picking out a gift for me; that was her way of saying she didn’t like it, but had no choice. The wind chime was hand selected by him.  I cherish that lovely wind chime in all it’s glorious gaudiness.