DuckSoup

Acclimating

2011-08-03T18:53:00.001-06:00

Nikita and I are both still trying to acclimate to the Denver altitude. Nikita still seems to be living on East Coast time and wakes me at ridiculous hours in the morning to go outside. I am a bit more lethargic than normal (unfortunately Kita doesn't seem to have this particular problem), and I can't handle alcohol here that well yet (this was proven Friday night, but I am not going to re-embarrass myself by telling that story). Also, I am ALWAYS thirsty....does anyone know if altitude causes this? All I know is I drink about a gallon of water a day now, and that is not normal for me.

I am currently in the midst of searching for a job. I had a few interviews late last week, and have another set up for tomorrow. Keep your fingers crossed for me. I had totally forgotten how stressful being unemployed and job hunting is. Now, about this job search and in particular an interview I had Friday morning. I went in, and talked to two different HR people with the company...both of the ladies I spoke to were very nice and I got along very well with them. I did not leave feeling confident about the interview though. Why you ask? Because they both mentioned the fact that I may not be "challenged" enough at the position. I have two problems with this, the first being that it was a temporary (four month) position and honestly having a non-challenging job for a few months seemed kind of like a vacation to me (and I would have income while looking for my perfect dream job). My second problem arose when HR lady #2 called me and informed me that they had chosen another candidate because I am "overqualified". Umm really? I wanted to tell her that I felt that I was overqualified to sit on the couch watching Oprah all day too. Ok, not really Oprah I really can't stand her....but you know what I mean. So anyway, the search continues.

Markus and I have many projects that we have been discussing. I can't wait to get started on them! One is a video blog uh vlog (?), another is a tshirt site, and last but certainly not least home-brewing beer. Our major problems are coming from the video blog....we both seem to be idea people not onscreen talent. Maybe we need start the brewing project first so we can have some liquid courage to enable us to be in front of the camera. The tshirt site we already have, that was a project we started back in 2006 (or maybe 2007, I have no concept of time). That project got pushed to the back burner when I moved back to TX because it just didn't seem to work with us being 1,000 miles apart. We have a tendency to feed off of each other's humor and get our best ideas just hanging out being goofy. Anyway, once we get everything going I'll give you all the details.

Here's Ducky & Munky at Denver Pride 2011:

*ducky hugs*

Lost Motiviation Found

2011-07-28T11:06:00.001-06:00

I haven't blogged in a really long time, I mean a REALLY long time. Lots has happened in my life since the last time I posted anything. Some of you (if there is indeed anyone who still pops over here) are facebook friends of mine so you have a general idea about what's going on in my world. Lately though I've been kind of neglecting facebook too. Here's a rundown:

- Conditions at my brother's company in GA were less than ideal. The company is struggling and I rarely got paid on time, and I never got paid what I was supposed to get paid. I'm all for helping the family out, but I have bills to pay. As of right now I am owed a little over $10,000 in back pay. Also, my brother lives beyond his means and has a newly remodeled kitchen, nice vehicles, is building a new shop/playhouse in his backyard, etc....it was hard to not feel unimportant and unappreciated.

- I originally moved from TX to GA to help out my brother with said company and with my nephews. I can't tell you all enough how much I enjoyed getting to know the munchkins! Those are two of the most adorable, amazing little guys. That being said, my brother had a tendency to not EVER want to, as he said, "babysit"....so I sort of became built in babysitter. I have problems with this. Ok, parents out there, is it really considered babysitting if they are YOUR children? I love my little brother dearly but after living in GA for awhile I came to the conclusion that he is a selfish ass.

- I got a new puppy! She is the cutest, sweetest, smartest, best dog EVER. She was originally my sister in law's mom's dog, but she couldn't keep her....so I adopted her. Without further ado, here is Nikita the Wonder Dog:

Isn't she gorgeous! Look at those blue eyes! Gah, love love love her!!!!!

- Back in June I got really fed up with my life in general and decided I really needed a vacation. My dear friend Markus (aka Munky) in Denver, convinced me that a trip to CO would be ideal. I agreed. I flew out to Denver and spent a week hanging out with some old friends (I lived in Denver from 2005-2008), and had an absolute blast! Munky began devising a plan to move me back to Denver....it was difficult not to consider it.

- Upon my arrival back in GA my brother asked me if I was moving to CO....he is very perceptive about some things. I was honest with him and told him I was considering it. On July 12th I got into a very heated argument with my cousin/co-worker. I was told that I was going to Hell for being gay. I was told that I was sick. I was told that straight white men are oppressed by women, gays, and minorities. That evening I decided that I did not belong in a small town in GA. I called Munky and we began planning my move.

- On the morning of July 18th Nikita and I started a roughly 1,500 mile journey from GA to CO. We arrived in Denver on July 19th at around 2:00 pm....yeah, we were balls to the wall on our trip. We are both happier here. Nikita is loving the cooler weather, and she has a new playmate (Munky's dog, Morgan). I am thrilled to be in a more open-minded city, around old friends, and to be on a new adventure. Now I must find a job!

I am going to try (again) to actually maintain my blog on a regular basis. Munky and I also have a plan for video blog in the works. He is a graduate from the Art Institute and has a film degree....so we feel we should put that to some use. More on that later.

I hope everyone is well, I have missed this corner of my world!

*ducky hugs*

Thank You

2010-12-01T10:01:00.000-07:00

I would like to be remembered as a person who wanted to be free... so other people would be also free.

I just wanted to show my appreciation for the mother of the civil rights movement for her strength, persistence and courage on that historic day in 1955.

*ducky hugs for Rosa Parks*

Holiday Ramblings

2010-11-30T14:53:00.000-07:00

I think I've finally recovered from my turkey hangover. Actually now that I think about it, I really didn't eat that much turkey. However, I did manage to eat A LOT of just about everything else. My brother literally asked me how I eat and consume alcoholic beverages the way I do and still manage to not weight 982 lbs. I'm pretty baffled by this as well...thank goodness for fast metabolisms I suppose. The following pic was actually taken the day before Thanksgiving, but it is evidence of my alcohol consumption level.

And there you have it kids, the first official picture of me on the blog. Drinking a big ass beer in a Mexican restaurant...probably not the most flattering pic, but it's a pretty good representation of me.

I had intended on writing a post yesterday, but immediately after coming into the office I realized that being off work for 4.5 days (yeah we bailed early on Wednesday) is both a blessing and a curse. Much to my dismay a little office fairy did not swing by and do all my work in my absence. I think I have everything caught back up now...I also thought that about 2 hours ago before finding out I was grossly mistaken.

I had a really nice Thanksgiving. We hosted, and our guests consisted of mostly Sandy's (sister in law) family....but my stepdad was able to make it out for a visit, which was super awesome. Anyone who knows me, knows that I am domestically challenged. And I mean REALLY challenged. I was crazy stressed about helping with the food prep, but everything turned out beautifully.

The real trauma of the weekend happened when I was helping Sandy put up the Christmas tree. She is the biggest freakin' tree Nazi that I have ever encountered in my life. Seriously. About half way through I pretty much pretended to help and mostly just drank this vodka filled slush drink we concocted.

We Sandy somehow managed to spill hers at one point. And they say I'm the klutzy one! Ok, it's true I am klutzy, but I didn't spill my drink. Also, after looking closer at this pic I see where my missing chapstick is.

I think the finished tree turned out quite beautifully. Hat tip to my favorite Christmas Tree Nazi!

Also, in my opinion I managed to snap the most adorable photo EVER of my nephews.

I hope everyone is enjoying the holiday season!

Decisions, Decisions

2010-11-23T08:27:00.000-07:00

Honestly I've been to my blog several times over the past few weeks, and I have thought about posting something. Obviously that hasn't happened. I really don't even know if anyone checks this damn thing anymore. I have been considering shutting this blog down and starting over....or just drastically changing this one. I'm kinda tired of the anonymous blog and changing names and being secretive and all that jazz. I've been considering starting a new blog as the "real" me.
At first I really had to post anonymously due to my job...but now that is no longer an issue. I was also concerned about my family and the fact that they, or their friends, could possibly stumble onto here and read about some of the crazy shit that I do. I suppose I have grown weary of feeling like I have to hide things. I resent this blog now.

So yeah, there's my dilemma.

2010-07-02T14:25:00.000-06:00

A month, really? I didn't realize it had been that long since I posted something. Lots and lots has been going on.

Let's see, I got married. Not for real married, just pretend married. On a drunken evening she told me that she really liked one of my rings, so apparently I proposed marriage and gave her the ring. I had just met her three hours earlier, and she's straight. But let me tell ya, my wifey is smokin' hot. Also, I have acquired a new girlfriend. A for real girlfriend, not a pretend one. She is super great and my family/friends adore her. Odd thing here: my wifey and my girlfriend are really good friends. Fun times at the lake.

Also, I was at the midnight premier of Eclipse. LOVED it. If you haven't seen it yet, wtf is wrong with you? ;) And if you happen to have a bar near you called Dos Copas...ok, really your favorite neighborhood bar will do...I highly recommend meeting friends there beforehand and having lots of fun, taking goofy pics, and a few drinks beforehand. Just don't forget to use the restroom prior to the movie starting. I'm full of helpful tips.

I wanted to catch up on some blog reading/commenting/emailing this weekend...but since it's a holiday I'm not even going to pretend that this will actually happen. I'm going to work on getting caught up with all my bloggy friends lives starting Monday. I hope you are all doing well.

*ducky hugs*

This Has Gotten Out Of Hand

2010-06-09T09:36:00.001-06:00

So, I've been eating/drinking pretty consistently crappily (is that even a word?) since, well, forever...and lately I've been on a serious brain junk-food overload as well. It started out slow and all innocent, just reading a few mysteries, and watching a few reality shows. But my brain is all bloated and lazy and mushy now, I don't want to pick up a "real" novel that has heft, substance, or heaven forbid complex sentence structure. So, instead, I've spent the last couple of months playing. Horrible TV and alcohol binges for the most part, though I threw in some mindless gossip rags and several games of pool for good measure. That certainly has my brain functioning at peak form.

Now I think it might be time for me to get back to my Day Zero Project. I checked on my progress, and my list is now 15% completed....better than the 9% I last reported, but still really damn embarrassing. I need to feel like a somewhat productive member of society again. And trust me, I've tried to convince myself that partying = productivity...but even drunk me didn't believe that load of crap. I've been searching for songs/videos to keep me motivated during my latest endeavor. The following video will be my inspiration...

aww, come on...I haven't said anything about my favorite pretend girlfriend in at least a five or six days, and the song does say "work" in it ;)

*also, please note that I somehow made this video fit in the appropriate amount of space. I'm not exactly sure how I did that...but I'm still proud of myself.

Life Swap

2010-06-07T10:12:00.001-06:00

I love Sandra Bullock acceptance speeches. At the MTV Movie Awards she was presented with the Generations Award. During her speech she said she wanted Betty White's life. Well, Sandra, after seeing you kiss Meryl Streep and now this...

...I want your life. Well except the whole lying, cheating, scumbag husband part.

I Needed A Kick In The Ass

2010-06-06T17:43:00.001-06:00

Ok, forget the hiatus. I had a phone conversation earlier that put things in perspective a bit.

Here's the back story. Brooke is dating Jen again. Oh yeah, she went back to the psycho. I'm completely heart broken...blah blah blah. BUT if I shut down, then I am letting her win. And I will be fucking damned if I let her control my life. I'll still be around, spewing my craziness (with a southern accent of course). But no matter what, I am here...and I do matter. Whether or not certain people recognize that appropriately, I'm not going away.

It seemed easier to hide in a hole, or drink myself into a stupor, but I'm not really one to just roll over and let life just happen to me. I had two days of self pity, and I'm over it. So screw you Jen and your manipulative ways, screw you "depressed me" that didn't want to get out of bed, and screw you cable for not having anything on that I want to watch right now. But thank you Blogger for introducing me to some really amazing people.

And Brooke, if you ever happen across this page I hope you know what you gave up yesterday. I know that probably sounds angry and cocky. But that's what I feel. And what's the point of a blog if you're going to sugarcoat shit?

Welcome to the flip side.

Hiatus

2010-06-05T18:40:00.000-06:00

Just wanted to let everyone know that I'm going to be taking a break from the blog for awhile. I don't feel like I have anything to left to share or offer at the moment. I have to work through a few things, then I might be back around.

I'll see ya on the flip side.

*ducky out*

More Theories, Less Work

2010-06-03T15:01:00.001-06:00

After ~~wasting~~ dedicating a bit of time earlier today to my theories on my pretend girlfriend being a closet case, I scoured the internet to find something else to occupy my time. Because, you know, work just wasn't entertaining enough.

I found this article on Daniel Baldwin. I am now convinced that Alec has convinced Daniel to move to Oregon so that he can visit and accidentally bump into Tammie. I'm also pretty sure I should start applying for jobs as a soap opera writer.

*side note: I spent way too much time looking for a picture of Alec & Daniel together before giving up and going with this one...obviously I need to work on my Google skills.

Next, I decided that my blog needed a little fixing up. I wanted to change my header, so I played around with that for awhile...to no avail. I really am not very tech savvy, and couldn't produce anything that was even remotely in the realm of being something that I would put on my blog. And I put some really dumb shit on my blog....so use your imagination, multiply that by about 673 and you'll have a general idea of how craptastic it was. I settled for relabeling all of my past posts. I am not saying they are labeled well, nor am I saying that I labeled all of them...but I gave it a valiant effort.

Oh look, it's 4:57 that gives me just enough time to shut my computer down and go smoke a cigarette before heading home.

*ducky hugs*

No Need To Panic

2010-06-03T12:50:00.003-06:00

Well well well...looks like my little K-Stew is getting some advice from former co-star Jodie Foster. According to the article in People magazine Jodie told Kristen, "You know, you could learn a thing or two from me". In my version of reality, this means that she's gonna show her the way out of the closet....and then she's going to introduce her to me.

exhibit a:

This is where Jodie is obviously arguing the merits of just being yourself.

exhibit b:

Kristen sees the wisdom of Jodie's words...which makes Jodie, and me, happy.

exhibit c:

And the most compelling evidence I have...Jodie huddled in a closet (ok, panic room) with Kristen circa 2002.

This either makes me a genius, or completely delusional...either way I was entertained for a good chunk of time when I was supposed to be working.

*hat tip to Peggy for sending me the link to the article

A Little Of This, A Little Of That

2010-06-02T10:46:00.002-06:00

Hmm maybe I jinxed 'em. The Seattle Storm handed the Dream their first loss of the season last night. Sorry 'bout that Shalee...but really Sue Bird has been my pretend girlfriend for much longer.

Also, I would just like to state that Jane Lynch aka Sue Sylvester cracks me up. Here's a quote from last night's episode: "You know, for me trophies are like herpes. You can try to get rid of them but they just keep coming. Sue Sylvester has hourly flair ups of burning itchy highly contagious talent." I'm a bit saddened that next week is the season finale of Glee. Thank goodness for basketball season.

On a more personal note, I can barely move today. I only thought I was sore yesterday. Sooooo, I either need attempt wakeboarding more frequently....or just stop. Intermittently ~~wakeboarding~~ getting dragged behind a boat while a wakeboard is strapped to my feet, is not a good idea obviously. I have sore muscles in places that I didn't know I had muscles.

My nephew isn't having a good day today. I think the little munchkin is pretty sore too. Apparently he was all hopped up on his pain medication last night and thought it would be a good idea to get out of bed and run around the house like a maniac. It's really difficult to explain the benefits of resting and being still while recovering to a 3 yr old. He is also very upset that he hasn't gotten to go on the boat/swim in "foreber"...the effects that lake germs have on gaping wounds also make no sense to him.

This song is currently stuck in my head. Thank you Doria Roberts for being freakin' awesome...

If this song gets stuck in your head, you're welcome....unless you hate it, and then I have to question your musical taste and/or sanity, but I still won't be sorry ;)

*waddle waddle, quack quack*

Dream A Little Dream Of Me

2010-06-01T12:55:00.002-06:00

I love, love, love (did I mention love?) long weekends. Thank you Memorial Day for letting me drink myself into a stupor on Monday rather than having to work. Fun times. I attempted wakeboarding again, and obviously this is not the sport for me. I suck on a monumental level...and I am pretty sore and bruised all over. Awesome. I'm still trying to convince myself that this is not because I'm getting old...my younger brother is not helping matters though since he now refers to me as "the senior citizen". He's so precious.

What was not so fun about the weekend? My poor little nephew, Mason, had to have surgery. He has MRSA which is basically a really fucking badass staph infection. They sliced and diced his little leg almost to the bone to get all of the infection out. I would post a pic, but in all honesty the cut made me gag a little bit, and I really don't want it on my blog for all eternity. He is back home, resting and recovering. I feel bad for the little guy...the docs said he doesn't need to walk until at least Thursday, and it's getting hard for the 3 year old to sit still.

And now I will ramble about basketball for just a moment. The Atlanta Dream is impressing the hell out of me this year...they are off to a 6-0 start this year. The Dream are an expansion team that started in 2008...that year they only won 4, that's right 4, games. Last year they improved to 18-16 which I thought was pretty incredible. And this year they are the only undefeated team in the WNBA. That being said the San Antonio Silver Stars and the Seattle Storm are still my favorite teams. BUT I am glad that I finally live in the general vicinity of a WNBA team, maybe I'll get to catch a game or two this season. Also, thank you Dream for providing me with my pretend girlfriend of the day....

Shalee Lehning

Holy Wow

2010-05-19T10:40:00.000-06:00

Good:
I would like to take a moment to announce to world that I have the best cousin EVER. Cousin It just informed me that she bought me a gift that will be shipped to Georgia shortly. I'm quite certain that another "It Makes Me Smile" post will be popping up real soon.

Bad (possibly):
Brooke is still being weird. I'm hoping that her being distant is just an effort on her part to assess her life and her wants and needs. I kinda freaked out yesterday...but I'm trying to be more positive today. Unfortunately, patience is not a virtue that I was blessed with.

Ugly:

The employee that got in an accident last week somehow managed to rear end someone last night. The company trucks/trailers are dropping like flies. I am not a fan of dealing with insurance companies...they pretty much suck.

So, tonight I'm sure I will be drinking...heavily. But really, how's that different than any other day? ;)

It Makes Me Smile

2010-05-18T12:33:00.001-06:00

I have one piece of jewelry that I never remove. Ever. It's this necklace....a Celtic Union pendant. According to the nifty little paper that came with it, it symbolizes two individuals that overcome all obstacles to find each other. I purchased two of these necklaces two years ago. For those of you who have been paying attention that directly coincides with the time that Brooke and I first got back together. Jen has long since threw Brooke's necklace away...but for some reason I can't bear to take mine off. Seriously, it's been off for probably a total of two days since I got it...and that was due to my niece breaking the chain. As I sit here typing, I'm trying to figure out if I'm being optimistic....or pathetic. But either way the necklace makes me smile. It reminds me of a happy time in my life. And if that little paper was correct, just maybe, one day all of these crazy obstacles will be behind me us. So for now I am going to continue to wear this pendant close to my heart and hope like hell that it's love, faith, and optimism rather than stupidity that's driving me.

Yo, VIP, Let's Kick It

2010-05-18T11:14:00.001-06:00

Damn you Will Schuester! This song has been stuck in my head since last Tuesday...can't wait to see which one it's replaced with tonight.

And since it is Glee night, I think I'll have a Glee-themed pretend girlfriend today. Hellooooo Cheerio ;)

Have I mentioned that I love Glee? Yes? Ok, just checking.

On a somewhat related note, I think I'm just going to stick with my pretend girlfriends from here on out. I don't seem to have much luck with the real ones.

Speaking of Pretend Girlfriends....

2010-05-17T10:41:00.001-06:00

I just received a text message that included a picture of this magazine cover:

I wonder what it says about me when my sister in law feels the need to text me "news" like this? Also, I wonder if it's mine?

Basketball is Basketball

2010-05-17T09:33:00.005-06:00

This WNBA promo made me incredibly happy. I've been waiting to see marketing like this for the women's game for roughly eleven years now. Also, any opportunity I have to see my pretend girlfriend, Becky Hammon, makes me giddy.

In related news, I just realized that I have a lot of pretend girlfriends.

That Isn't A Pot O' Gold At The End Of My Rainbow

2010-05-14T11:54:00.002-06:00

So, remember how I told you that Brooke's ex, Jen, was probably plotting to kill me? Well, that might be partially inaccurate. In a very interesting phone conversation I had with Jen recently, she told me that she hoped I was run over by a car...she later changed that to wishing me a slow painful death via cancer. I can't imagine why Brooke would ever break things off with this lovely individual. What is more baffling is that Brooke ever broke up with me to date this person...and I use the term person very loosely here. I actually think she might be Satan, cleverly disguised as a lesbian.

In other news, when I arrived at the office this morning I had a message from an employee who informed me that the transmission went out in the company truck he was driving. He then explained that he purchased some transmission fluid because the levels were low and that it seemed to be running fine. Then he called back to tell me that while he was still on the side of the highway a semi truck hit the trailer that was attached to the truck he was in. Seriously, did I sleep through like 4 days? Is it really Monday? Am I being Punk'd?

And people wonder why I drink.

My Thoughts On Mother's Day

2010-05-11T13:05:00.000-06:00

This is a post that I've been meaning to write for quite awhile now...but I was afraid to. Seeing as how this past Sunday was Mother's Day I thought it was a good time.

Today I'm going to talk a little about my mom. I don't know a whole lot about my mom's childhood, I don't really know her parents that well, and honestly if most of her siblings walked into my office and slapped me right now I wouldn't recognize them. I have about a decade worth of memories of my mom, a handful of stories that others have shared with me, and a few pictures. In other words this post may not be the most historically accurate...but historical accuracy isn't really the point today.

When I was a kid I absolutely adored and idolized my mom. She was such an amazing woman, I know I'll never possess the words to accurately describe her. I can remember wanting to be just like her. I always wanted to be right where she was...I probably annoyed the piss out of her following her around the way I did. But to know my mom was to love her. She was such a beautiful person, inside and out. She was smart, funny, talented, outgoing, and stylish...so basically the complete opposite of me. She could walk into a room full of strangers and walk out with a whole new circle of friends. I have never been like that, I am generally pretty shy unless I feel really comfortable with people. It takes me awhile to trust people enough to open up and let them in. She was also very crafty. I think maybe this is one reason why I want to learn to sew so badly. Maybe part of me wants to feel like I was like her in at least some small way. Because let's face it, I will never have the style thing down...I do good to get out of the house with an outfit that even matches.

When I think about her I recall her always laughing and happy. This is probably where my historical accuracy is way off kilter because my mom committed suicide when I was a kid. I've spent a lot of time being angry with her, and I've spent a lot of time defending her. I have days that I get so mad that I could cry...and I have days that I am overjoyed to have had the short amount of time with her that I did get. I suppose this inner struggle will continue forever...but no matter what, I will always remember how she made me feel like I was the most important person in the world.

Obviously depression runs in my family. My mom's dad committed suicide, my mom committed suicide, and I have attempted to commit suicide....twice. You would think that after seeing how what my own mother did that I would not be so selfish, and I would not want to do the same thing to the people that care about me. I've turned this thought over in my mind so many times that I can't even being to count them. I've spent a bit of time in a mental health facility (that was no vacation), and I've been to numerous counselor/psychiatrist types. What did I learn from all of this? Pretty much nothing. I seem to always get really pissed off at these "experts" and generally don't see them more than a handful of times. I've had doctors tell me everything from, "it's your mom's fault" to "you wouldn't have these issues if you weren't gay". My response? "Ok, you fucking jackass, I have a question for you now. How many straight patients do you see daily? Because obviously straight people are the picture of mental health". But I digress.

Back to my mom. Do I think that I am the way I am because of my mom? Hell, I don't know. Do I blame my mom? Nope. I am an adult, I am reasonably intelligent, and I am completely capable of making my own decisions. The choices I have made are my own. In a previous post I talked about a worry angel that I received while I was in the hospital. That particular trip to the ER was the direct result of me taking a couple of bottles of tylenol...I seriously don't know how my liver pulled through that one. In that post I said that it reminded me to be the heroine of my story, and not the victim. My mom allowed herself to be the victim of her story...and that is the ultimate tragedy.

Random Ramblings

2010-05-06T10:11:00.001-06:00

It's now official, the crappy replacement BlackBerry is dead. For real this time. Three phones in two months is a record for me. I'm sure AT&T loves the hell out of me though. You're welcome Mr. Randall L. Stephenson...yes, I am dorky enough to Google the president of AT&T.

I had a slight brush with fame yesterday. There was a country music singer at our house partying and hanging out on the boat. I am going to refrain from mentioning his name because honestly I had never heard of him before...and I couldn't tell you the name of a single one of his songs. So I would be name dropping just for the sake of name dropping. BUT if Alec Baldwin, George Clooney, or Kristen Stewart ever show up on the lake I am taking hundreds of pics and passing phone numbers to them...ahem.

Speaking of country music singers, Chely Wright came out this week. And holy wow, I was shocked. This quote: “I had a partner for 12 years and we only told two people in the entire time we were a couple. I wasn’t just in the closet, I was behind the sheetrock in the closet. I didn’t even tell my best friend. I didn’t tell anyone, because the minute you do, they have to lie for you.” and this one: “Can you imagine being someone’s partner and having to be a secret? You know, it’s really hard, it’s incredibly painful. And this was the love of my life, and to this day I struggle. I mean, I lost her because of it. I realized I had painted myself into a corner. I had amassed relative wealth and success and fame and I was doing everything I ever said I wanted to do and I realized [after the breakup] that none of it matters. I realized I would rather work in a grocery store bagging groceries and live in a crappy little apartment with my partner. I would rather have love in my life than any of this—and I lost it all.” broke my heart. You can read the complete article from Curve magazine here. After reading that article you should hop over to People and read this one. I find this tid bit about John Rich especially enlightening...The pressure had been building, she said, ever since John Rich of country-music duo Big & Rich asked her if she was gay – the first time she'd ever been asked directly after years of avoiding the issue. She recalls: "John finally asked me point blank: 'You're not gay. If you are, people won't have it. It's sick, it's deviant, it's unacceptable to country-music fans.' And he said, 'You're not, are you?' And I lied. And I knew that I had gone from not talking about it to being a liar."
I have A LOT to say about all of this, but honestly I think at this point it would exhaust me, and I'm just not up to it. Maybe I'll dedicate an entry to this subject in the future. All I will say is that I think she is lovely and talented and I wish her the very best.

On a totally unrelated note I would like to express my new love for hulu. I missed Glee on Tuesday night AND didn't have the DVR set...but thanks to hulu I was still able to watch the episode. I freakin' love the internet.

And just as an update from my last post, I am still talking to Brooke. I am enjoying the hell out of reconnecting with her. I have smiled a lot this past month. Which reminds me, I bought her a Mother's Day card and I'm not sure if that's lame or sweet. So I need opinions...should I mail it or not?

*ducky hugs*

This Merry-Go Round Is Making Me Kinda Dizzy

2010-04-27T12:16:00.001-06:00

I think I might possibly be the worst blogger ever. No really EVER. I really really really am going to try to do better. I promise. Also, I'm way behind on reading all the blogs I follow...and I'm way behind on answering emails. Seriously, I'm not ignoring you.

Ok, so here's what's going on in my world. This is not meant to be an excuse, but I have been really preoccupied.

On the 17th of this month I received a message on my MySpace Truth Box app from someone that I literally never thought I would ever hear from again. I didn't get the message until the 21st because honestly I only randomly log onto MySpace when I'm extremely bored and have absolutely nothing else to do. Anyway, I was shocked to get this message...it basically just had a phone number and it said "I think you should call me", and was signed "former member of the dorky ducky club" (that's a story for another day).

It all begin in the winter of 2004...I met this woman online, we'll call her Brooke. We chatted online for awhile, exchanged emails, and eventually started talking on the phone. I will not lie to you, I was completely head over heels for her. Yeah, I know...you're thinking that's pretty dumb. Well, I've never claimed to be smart when it comes to women. So anyway, after we had been talking for awhile we decided that we should meet. We didn't live anywhere near each other....I was in Texas and she was in Michigan. I believe it was late January/early February when we first started planning this trip. I worked for a university in TX at the time and Spring Break was going to be the first available opportunity for me to travel. So it was set, things were great, I was giddy. We continued chatting back and forth, and we would send each other cards and packages and whatnot. My friends were sickened by the cuteness of it all. On February 15th she totally dropped a bomb on me. A friend of hers, Jen, showed up at her house the previous night...Valentine's Day...with a bouquet of flowers and expressed her undying love. Brooke calls me and tells me that maybe a long distance relationship isn't what she up for, and it's probably smarter to pursue things with the local girl.

I was crushed. Also Brooke was not allowed to talk to me anymore because the new girl felt threatened by me. Awesome.

Fast forward to October 15, 2006. I got a call from Brooke...she informed me that she and Jen had broken up the previous night. This is really odd because I had also broken things off with my girlfriend the previous evening. Weird huh? I saw this as a sign. We were just meant to be. Who woulda thought that I am a hopeless romantic? Anyway, we talked back and forth. I flew out to Michigan...she flew into Denver. All was well and good, and I was ecstatic. Then in February Brooke informed me that she had been talking to Jen, and she was breaking up with me to see if she could make things work with her.

I was crushed. This time Brooke promised that we would keep in touch because she didn't want to lose my friendship. That didn't happen. Jen hates me...I know this is hard to believe seeing as how I'm so lovable and all....but the chick literally hates me.

So now Brooke and Jen have broken up again. Brooke is calling me again. Brooke would like to come to Georgia to visit. Jen is probably currently plotting on ways to kill me.

I really don't know what to do. I'm not so blind that I can't see the pattern here. But for me Brooke was always the one who got away...twice. Part of me is so excited that I'm back in contact with her, and part of me is terrified that in a few months she's going to go back to Jen, and I'm going to be left to pick up the pieces of my shattered heart. My sister in law thinks I'm crazy...actually I think her exact words were, "Are you fucking stupid?". Stupid or not, I love this woman and if there's even a remote possibility that we can make things work then I'm going for it.

Ducky-2, BlackBerry-0

2010-04-13T13:27:00.002-06:00

So, my drunken sister in law threw me in the lake yesterday. My BlackBerry was in my pocket.
Rest in peace replacement BlackBerry that I didn't really like anyway. And, I still miss you BlackBerry Bold.

*UPDATE: the craptastic replacement BlackBerry is now functioning again. I still REALLY miss you BlackBerry Bold!

But on a happier note the season premier of Glee is on tonight. :D

I Am Cheating On K-Stew With E-Shue

2010-04-12T14:20:00.000-06:00

So, remember the other day when I said that living at the lake was going to be ridiculously fucking awesome? I was right. This weekend was insane. We had soooooo much fun. There were a few mishaps...but all in all we had a good time.

Friday night it was just me and Sandy hanging out. We headed downstairs to the play room and shot several games of pool...and took several shots...then we watched Steel Magnolias until the sad part then we changed the channel. Neither of us wanted to cry. Unfortunately for me I managed to find the last shard of glass from the broken margarita machine, and got it lodged in my foot. Sandy is an excellent nurse, she dug it out and bandaged me up...after that mishap we decided it was time for bed. That night was relatively low-key by our standards.

Saturday morning we woke up pretty early. Probably too early, because by 9:30 that morning we started drinking. Smart idea? Maybe not. Several members of Sandy's family came over Saturday afternoon...we grilled some food, hung out on the dock where Sandy got a splinter stuck in her foot, took a boat ride, drank a little, played some pool, and just had a nice time. Around 8pm Sandy, her mom, and her sister decided that they NEEDED to go get tattoos. I have managed to lose my ID, so Aunt Alicia got to spend a few quality hours with all the children. So that means it was me against 5 kids...I had two of Bradley and Sandy's, two of Sandy's sister, and one of Sandy's sister's boyfriend. I seriously had an Adventures In Babysitting moment...I was also totally reminded of my crush on Elizabeth Shue. At a few points in the evening I wanted to shout, "Don't fuck with the babysitter"....but I refrained. I let the kids run around like maniacs for awhile and then convinced them all that it would be a really good idea to go to bed. I honestly can't believe they minded me...I still haven't perfected my "mommy voice", and they have a tendency to not listen to a damn thing I say. I really was thrilled that I didn't have to fight them too much at bedtime. The adults all got back and we decided it would be a great idea to have a bonfire. We ran out of wood, so we got a bit creative about what we burned. *sorry about your flip flops Bradley...we aren't sorry about that ugly ass rug though* At this point I was exhausted so I totally crashed.

Sunday I woke up to maniac children yelling and jumping all over me. Fabulous! I stumbled upstairs and had some breakfast and then collapsed on the couch...Sandy and Bradley went to take a nap. Sandy's sister looked at me at one point and asked me, "do you hear water running?". I did not hear water running. About five minutes later she said, "no really I hear water running". As lazy as I was feeling I decided I should probably get up to investigate. I walked to the bathroom by the boys room, and found the problem. Little Max had several diapers stuffed in the toilet and had tried to flush them. Awesome! The whole room was flooded. That was a bitch to clean up. I'm still trying to figure out how he got the diapers off the changing table...he is not that tall. Kids are creative I suppose....I am learning that if you look away for two minutes they will be into something. Sunday evening Mason walked out on the upper deck where I was smoking and just looked at me and said he had to tee-tee. He always tells one of us before he goes to the bathroom....so I said, "ok go in there and tee-tee". At this point he pulls his swim trunks down and proceeds to urinate on the deck. Unfortunately the guys were pulling our dinner off the grill....which is on the lower deck. Thanks for the marinade kiddo.

HEEEEEY YOOOOOOOU GUYYYYYYYYYYS

2010-03-29T11:06:00.000-06:00

Ok, so my title has nothing to do with my actual blog post....but I did watch The Goonies this weekend. Wow, 20 whole days since my last post...lots and lots has happened. Some of it I don't recall, I thank my sister in law and our best friend alcohol for that. But here's what I do know:

I still haven't completely unpacked...and I've been here over a month. Pretty awesome huh? I really love digging through boxes to find my stuff. It makes my daily life a bit more challenging...and who doesn't like a good challenge?

Not being unpacked is a really good thing right now because I'm moving again. Not a crazy move this time...we're getting a house at the lake.

I killed my beloved BlackBerry. Not intentionally, but it is officially dead. I have to say it put up a hell of a fight. RIP dear phone, miss you...my new BlackBerry sucks. My brother is trying to convince me to get an iPhone. I'm actually considering it...which I never thought I would do.

Getting a house at the lake is going to be completely fucking ridiculously amazing.

Last Thursday my brother and I ditched work and went to the lake to see if we could find the house from the water. We did. It was the first time I had seen it...and I'm in love. Also, while we were on the lake Mother Nature remembered that she hates me, so there was a torrential downpour and it got really freakin' cold. We had to take cover under a bridge. But at least I didn't catch pneumonia. Take that Mother ~~Whore~~ Nature.

My brother's daughter spent the weekend with us. We had some arts & crafts/cooking time and produced some pretty kickass Easter stuff. I have the best nieces and nephews on the planet. If I were a better aunt I would probably have pics to post....but at least they are on Facebook.

I Probably Need Therapy

2010-03-09T18:03:00.002-07:00

Really Life & Style magazine? Really?

Apparently you can’t give a little girl a “boy’s” haircut or let her wear pants without the world having a complete meltdown and possibly exploding. Sure the kid has some tomboy tendencies. According to the article she only responds to the name "John". Which, of course, means there is something deeply wrong with her upbringing, possibly evil, and definitely worth consulting a panel of stylists and psychological experts over. *rolls eyes* It had nothing to do with the fact that she wanted to be John or Peter from Peter Pan. Holy shit the kid has short hair and watches Disney movies...quick, someone alert the media. Hmm, my 4 year old niece Kambree when in trouble tells us all that it wasn't her, it was Crazy Helen who was bad. She also refuses to wear pink, and would prefer blue or camouflage (like her PawPaw). Maybe we should have her evaluated too. My 3 year old nephew put on his Wolverine costume as soon as he got home last night and refused to take it off. This child is obviously unhinged. When I was 3 I was constantly stripping naked just because I hated being in clothes. Also, I had short hair as a child because I was a pain in the ass and didn't want anyone brushing it. And there was that one incident where I cut my own hair. It's a miracle I'm not a nudist hairdresser today.

But back to Life & Style....I wonder if they really think Brad and Angelina are attemping to turn Shiloh into a boy or if this was just all calculated to cause controversy and boost circulation. I am not linking to the article, but if you wanna read it in it's entirety I'm sure google can help you out. Some of the things that jumped out at me were that they called her haircut “shockingly short” and that it pushes the boundaries into “cross-dresser territory”. They even quote an “expert,” though I can't stomach calling him that, from of all places Focus on the Family. I may have to go take a vomit break in a moment.

Are people's views so limited, their definitions so rigid that they can't see that life is wonderful because of our differences...not in spite of them? Life to me, would be unbearable without variation and possibilities and freedom. If a little girl wants to cut her hair short, run around in cargo pants and avoid ruffles like the plague, why should you even care? What is so threatening or scary or wrong with letting children just be themselves? I personally don't have any children, but I feel that if more people let their kids express themselves freely....wear what they wanted, pursue what they wanted, be who they wanted, love who they wanted...this crazy world of ours might just be the better for it.

Life really is way too short to sweat the small stuff. And a haircut and clothes, well that’s beyond small, it’s microscopic. Am I completely and totally nuts? I'm curious as to how the parents out there feel about this.

Also...

2010-03-09T09:47:00.005-07:00

...I can't wait to see this movie

*I tried to resize this three times...but I am obviously not smart enough to figure out how to make it exactly right. Go me! But honestly it's better if you put it in full screen mode anyway ;)

I Feel Like Such A Slacker

2010-03-09T08:25:00.000-07:00

In the wake of my latest cross-country move I have totally neglected my whole Day Zero Project thing. I have really got to get on the ball with that. 1001 days goes by much quicker than I would have thought. After a few failed attempts at logging in...yes, it's been that long and I forgot my log in information...I was told that I'm down to 934 days and my list is currently 9% complete. EEK!

What is it they say about good intentions?

Poptart Monkeys and Jager Bombs

2010-03-08T08:21:00.000-07:00

All I can say about Saturday night is, "wow did that really happen?". Five of us loaded up and went to Atlanta to go out. First stop was Andretti's, because the guys wanted to race the go karts. While at Andretti's I lost my ID. I discovered this when I ordered a drink and got carded. It was in my back pocket, so there is really no telling where it fell out it. We searched the car, the restroom, the smoking area outside, checked with the office to see if it was turned in...and no luck. After leaving Andretti's we went to this steak house to eat. Sandy, my lovely sister in law, got the brilliant idea to order margaritas. I ordered water. Nick, our designated driver, chugged my water for me so that Sandy could pour the margarita in my water glass. Sneaky sneaky. Our next mission was to somehow get me in a bar or club. I am 32 years old....and we're sneaking me alcohol and into bars...I felt like a teenager again. My brother knows the lovely gentleman that owns a bar called Peachtree Tavern (imagine that), so we were able to get in there. After several Jager and Redbulls a band started playing. They were called the Poptart Monkeys...and I was either really drunk, or they were really good because I really enjoyed the show. Sandy managed to get pulled onto the stage to dance with the guitar player....and Jamie and I were not prepared with the cameras. I also met a really cute girl and we exchanged phone numbers. I have her in my phone as "hot girl", because I couldn't hear her name over the band. So now I'm not sure I'm going to call her. Oh well.
On the way home my brother cooked up a plan to have a friend of his pull us over. The guys were sitting up front plotting, and us girls were in the back clueless. When we saw the blue lights, we freaked out. I'm not sure why we freaked out...I mean we had a sober designated driver. As far as I know there is no law about being a drunken passenger in Georgia...but it's still scary to get pulled over no matter what.
By the time we got back home it was like 5am....so we decided it would be a GREAT idea to go wake up our friend Al. Surprisingly enough he wasn't mad...he was amused. He didn't even get mad when Sandy and Bradley were goofing around and knocked a picture off the wall and broke it. He offered to make us all some breakfast....but we decided it was probably time to go home and crawl into bed. I layed in bed and slept/watched movies until like 3 in the afternoon. Nick and Jamie came over last night and we all laughed and made fun of each other for all the stupid shit we had done the night before.
Today it's back to behaving, working, and attempting to act like an adult. Wish me luck...I seem to have issues in that department.

It Makes Me Smile

2010-03-04T07:37:00.001-07:00

This is going to be a slightly different version of the "It Makes Me Smile" series...before I talked about a physical possession...today I want to talk about my nephew. Those of you who really know me, know that my nephew, Max, has a rare genetic disorder. And when I say rare, I mean there have only been just over 30 confirmed cases. He has a Carnitine-acylcarnitine translocase (CACT) deficiency. He also has epileptic seizures, staph, and well the poor baby is just sick all the damn time. Two days ago my sister in law and I were out and about with little Max, we were eating at On The Border and he had a seizure. That was my first time witnessing one of his seizures...and it scared the hell out of me. What really amazes me is that he is one of the happiest, most loving babies I've ever been around in my life. I can't imagine how scary and painful everything he's going through is...and as a toddler you know he can't possibly understand what's going on with his little body. But he's an inspiration to me...I mean he can still put a smile on that cute little face and cuddle and play and act "normal", kinda makes me feel bad for all the bitching and whining and complaining that I do. Maybe I should evalute my life and my attitude a little bit and be thankful that I'm healthy and try to keep a smile on my face to match his.

I Had To Use My Spidey Sense For This One

2010-03-01T15:53:00.000-07:00

Following is my wake-up Sunday morning:

Sandy (sister in law): hey, sis wake up

Me: (groggy) hmmm, what?

Sandy: hey, come on get up. will you help me go shop for the stuff for Mason's (my newphew) birthday party?

Me: ok, when's the party.

Sandy: 3 o'clock

Me: HOLY SHIT!

Needless to say we scrambled during the shopping process, and then scrambled at the house to get everything clean and decorated. But a fun time was had by all. Mason had a fabulous SpiderMan party! Happy Birthday Moose!!!

I Guess I'm A Peach Now

2010-02-24T14:07:00.001-07:00

Oh Blogger, how I've missed you.

Well boys and girls I made it Georgia...with only a few mishaps along the way. I began journey from Texas to Georgia bright and early Monday morning. Well, actually is was pretty cloudy and grey out so I guess it wasn't so bright...but whatever it was early. I made it to somewhere in Louisiana before I had any incidents. I was driving along and heard a weird sound, like metal being run over. Hmm, I thought I had run over something, or something fell off of my beloved car. I was correct in both cases. My front license plate leaped off my front bumper and commited suicide...it was sad. So then I had a dilemma, do I go back or do I just say screw it and keep driving? I opted to go back for it. Probably not the safest thing I've ever done, but I didn't want to get a ticket for not having the damn thing. In TX it's a law that you have to have a front plate, I know in LA you aren't required to have one....but I wasn't sure about MS, AL, or GA and I didn't want to risk it.
All went well for a few hundred more miles...well except extreme boredom had kicked in somewhere around the Mississippi state line. It was at this point that I called practically everyone I know. I interrupted people while they were in classes or at work. You're welcome.
Right around the Alabama/Georgia border my ass just fell off of my body. I didn't go back for it. I'm going to miss it. Also I was beginning to worry that my knees would no longer function properly once I finally got out of the car. I'm falling apart.
I damn near had a panic attack in Atlanta. Seriously, you people drive like maniacs. BUT I didn't get lost in Atlanta, which shocks me. I swear every single time I've been to that city I have gotten lost somehow. So at this point I'm only about an hour from my new home. WooHoo!
FINALLY after what seemed like an eternity of driving I see the exit to Jefferson. I think I shed a tear or two of joy. I took the exit and then followed the directions that the navigation system lady gave me. As it turns out she's a big fat liar and she sent me the wrong way. I somehow ended up on a dirt road...I called my brother for directions...he didn't know where I was. His solution? For me to just sit there and he would drive around until he found me....it didn't take him long, I was two streets down from his subdivision. Really Bradley?!? You don't know the names of these streets?
When I get into the house my sister in law shoved a beer in my hand and told me it was time to party. Outstanding. Georgia is my new favorite place.

Really Quick Update

2010-01-27T15:08:00.002-07:00

What a week! Well, I gave my notice at work on Monday. My last scheduled day will be February 12th. Things are happening a little faster than I first expected...but life happens. This means I'm probably not going to be able to make the rounds and see all of the family and friends that I would like to before my departure from TX. While that makes me sad, I know that I'm only a plane ride away. I am excited about the new adventure ahead of me. Well, I'm not excited about having to drive roughly 855 miles...anyone wanna drive me there? But for the most part I'm stoked!!! My posting will most likely continue to be sporadic until I actually get to GA and get settled in. So if you need me call/text/email me...the BlackBerry is rarely out of reach.

*ducky hugs*

I Should've Been A Meterologist

2010-01-22T10:58:00.000-07:00

When I look at the Ducky Doppler Radar, I can see the winds of change are about to start blowing. And they are blowing east. This is almost guaranteed to cause a Category 5 Shit Storm in Texas.

Let me translate that: I have decided to move to Georgia. This will most like happen in the next several weeks. There are people here that aren't going to be pleased with this...for example Adam is sad, baby sister is going to be upset, my supervisor at work is probably gonna flip the fuck out when I put in my notice, and I am almost certain that my grandmother is not going to be thrilled at the idea of me moving out of state yet again. I think Cousin It might be a little sad too...but I'm pretty certain planes fly from Atlanta to Austin ;)

This new development is the reason for my absence from bloggyland lately. That is because I've been planning and thinking and trying to decide if this is a smart move. Trust me I've made some monumentally dumb moves before. After lots of thought I have decided that it is indeed time for me to pack it up and move along. I honestly don't think I was meant to live in any one place for an extended amount of time. I just can't do it, I get bored and restless and start freaking out. I've been getting antsy for awhile now...it's time for a new adventure.

Wish me luck!

It Makes Me Smile

2010-01-15T14:36:00.001-07:00

This morning I was annoyed and posted about a mean person. This afternoon I think I should balance things a bit and post something about a nice person. Earlier this week Tammie blogged about doing a series of posts about the little things in her life that make her happy and brighten her day. I thought this was an excellent idea...so I stole it from her. But don't worry, she said it was ok.

This is my "Worry Angel"...it's a worry stone with an angel inside. I know the pic sucks...sorry. But anyway, about six years ago I was in the hospital for several weeks. I thought I was going to die...literally. I was scared, confused, and pretty much alone. I had many amazing people taking care of me, but one nurse in particular really stood out. She was absolutely amazing...she would stay after her shift and sit and talk to me for hours...she helped ease some of my fears, she was comforting, she was funny, she brought me books & magazines, she was there for me. She made one of the most difficult times in my life bearable. I honestly don't know why she did everything she did for me. But she is one of the kindest people I've ever met in my life.
The day I was discharged from the hospital she came to see me, and gave me the worry angel. There was a card that explained that my particular stone was the Hope Angel...and there was this poem:

Give your worries to the Angels

It is time to heal your heart.

Every day's a new beginning
Where love & hope can start.
Give your worries to the Angels
Release your doubt & fear.
Trust in God to always be there
With Angels always near.

I was incredibly touched by this gesture and by her friendship. Now this worry angel goes everywhere with me...it's always in my pocket, my purse, or in my car. This little stone is one of my most prized possessions. It reminds me of a difficult time in my past, and that I can survive a lot. It reminds me of the most selfless person I've ever met, the kind of person I would like to be. And it reminds me to strive to be the heroine of my story, not the victim.

She signed my card "from a nurse who cares". I guess you can consider me a patient who is eternally grateful.

Let's Make A Deal

2010-01-15T07:31:00.000-07:00

I got an email the other day regarding my blog. It wasn't very nice. I was accused of being "fake" and "a phony"...by a random stranger. And this was based solely on the fact that I do not have a real picture of myself posted on my blog...and that my real name can't possibly be R.H. Ducky. While it is true that I am not really a cartoon duck sitting in a bowl of soup, and my name is not in fact R.H. Ducky, I'm fairly certain that doesn't make anything I've written about any less true. Besides, I think I pretty much covered this little issue with my very first post. Not that I expect every visitor to my blog to read every single post I have...I'm just sayin' it's there.

At first I was upset by this email...I don't want people to think I'm a phony. But after I thought about it for a little while I was pretty annoyed by the situation. First, I'm quite positive I'm not the only person out there blogging under a name other than one on my birth certificate. WTF difference does it make? If you don't like my blog, hit that nifty little "Next Blog" button at the top of your screen and move it right along.

I welcome emails and comments, and I'm fully aware that everyone on the planet is not always going to agree with everything I say or do. That's fine...disagree with me all you want, the world would be boring if we all had the same thoughts and opinions. I just ask that you do it respectfully.

So, let's compromise...I won't call you a douchebag asshole if you refrain from calling me a fake ass whore. Deal? Deal.

As Seen On TV

2010-01-13T10:40:00.001-07:00

I've talked briefly before about my shopping issues. The first being that I absolutely hate, with a passion, having to actually go into a store to purchase things. This brings us to my next issue, online shopping...oh internet, how I love you so. I would probably also have an "as seen on tv" disorder as well, but I hate talking on the phone about as much as I hate going into stores.

I have seen many things on cheesy ass TV commercials that I felt that I needed though. Such as:

Seriously, who doesn't want a Big City Slider Station? I freakin' love tiny burgers! And is there a White Castle or Krystal Burger near me? Hell no. If I want tiny burgers I'm gonna have to make them myself.

And since I'm such a delicate flower and have sensitive skin, Smooth Away would be absolutely perfect for me!

I don't actually think I need the Hair Coloring Brush...but I want it. Mostly because I want to find someone crazy enough to try it. The fact that this chick obviously has on a ~~really horrible~~ wig in the advertisement makes me laugh...and makes me terrified of the product.

That brings us to Bumpits. Big Happie Hair? Well, hell yeah...I mean I do live in Texas, I think big happyie hair is a requirement.

This past weekend I was hanging out with some friends in my hometown and we ended up going to a redneck bar. Why a redneck bar you ask? Honestly, there are no other options for bars in my hometown. We actually had a really good time...the beer was cold, and the people watching is always good for a few laughs. There was one woman with the biggest happiest hair I've ever seen, courtesy of a Bumpit I'm sure. This got me to thinking...what if I gathered a group of friends and we all wore Bumpits and went out bar hopping. I shared this brilliant idea with one of my female friends, her response was "wow, you're really drunk". And apparently I was, because I had totally forgotten about this plan until today. *thank you coworker for having really huge hair and reminding me of my plan* Well, I'm sober now, and I still think it's pretty damned hilarious.

So of course I googled "Bumpits" a little while ago, and BAM there are so many websites out there totally dedicated to "as seen on tv" items. This gave me a whole new brilliant idea. I think I should buy some of these products occasionally and test them out then write a post about them. Thoughts?

WhatTheEffingHell?

2010-01-11T12:14:00.001-07:00

I was just checking out the news and ran across this article about Global Cooling...and I must say I'm not too happy about it. Apparently the world is going into "cold mode", and we'll have a global dip in temperature for the next 20 or 30 years...good call on Global Warming Mr. Gore. Fabulous, I'm going to freeze my ass off every winter until I retire. I hate winter, and I hate being cold. Literally HATE it. I may go sit in a corner somewhere and cry. I must say, Mother Nature's ability to constantly wreak havoc on my life is pretty amazing. Spiteful biatch.

In related news, we had a water pipe burst last night. Our garage was flooded for the second time in under a year. So Adam got to stay home from work today to wait around for the plumber. Fun times. The little hut in the rut has taken quite a few hits lately.

Perhaps today I will buy myself a Snuggie.

It's Friday Already?

2010-01-08T15:51:00.000-07:00

So far this week I haven't watched any TV...at all. This is highly unusual. I think the TV has only been turned on only once this week, and that was last night...Adam was checking the weather. That is also strange, normally even if we aren't watching any particular program the TV is generally on one of the Sirius music channels or something. We didn't plan to not watch TV, it just kind of happened. Is a week without TV on my Day Zero List? I can't remember...I need to go check. How great would that be to accomplish a goal without even trying?

I spent Monday and Tuesday evening chatting with the gay husband, doing laundry, and reading a little...I need to hurry up and get through my current book Over The Holidays (which I won over at Goodreads), so I can start rereading The Lovely Bones for Tammie's book discussion. Wednesday night we did some measuring so new baseboards can be bought for ~~the glorified closet I live in~~ my bedroom. In the midst of measuring it became painfully obvious that the new bed that's being delivered on Friday is not going to fit. This means that Adam's bed will have to be moved to my room, and that lucky bastard will get my bed. I'm pretty sure the previous measuring mistake was actually a well thought out plan on his part. Gay men are cunning. Thursday I pretty much stared at my phone for two hours. Thank you ESPN for having an app for my BlackBerry. I would have preferred to watch the Lady Vols game on TV, but at least I got a play-by-play via my phone.

In other news, Adam is back on the quitting smoking bandwagon. All this really means is that he has stopped purchasing cigarettes. He still smokes mine. BUT I have only bought one pack this week. I think one pack of cigarettes between two people in almost a week's time is pretty damn good. We've talked about doing the whole electronic cigarette thing. Anyone know anything about them?

This morning I googled "microsoft courier" ) for about the millionth time since Gizmodo leaked info about it in September) and I got literally thousands of hits on articles telling me that Microsoft did not unveil this gadget at the CES event Wednesday. I am really disappointed. And I mean really disappointed. I wanted one of these so badly :( Maybe next year.

I also think I may be slightly addicted to online shopping. It's just so easy...and there's the added bonus of me not having to mingle with the general public. Hmm, maybe I'm becoming anti-social.

On that note, I think now I'm going to go home and shut myself in my bedroom and read. Hope everyone has a fabulous weekend!

Where Is The Love?

2010-01-05T12:42:00.000-07:00

This morning on my way to work I heard that Casey Johnson had died yesterday. My first thought was who the hell is Casey Johnson. So, since I'm a google whore, I looked her up as soon as I got to the office. Basically what I learned is that she was the 30 yr old heiress to the Johnson & Johnson fortune, she ran around with the Hilton sisters, she was gay, and she liked to party. Sounds like 100 other celebutantes that are famous just for being famous. But then I started noticing a trend in the comments to some of the articles I was reading. I saw things like, "she was gay, that makes her a sicko and she deserved to die", and "what a waste of life and space", and several "who cares". There was such an abundance of hateful and hurtful ugliness. We make these people celebrities....and then we hate them for being famous.

I can't help but think that it's attitudes like this that is turning this world into one big shithole. What happened to compassion? When did we become so cold and uncaring? This woman was someone's daughter, someone's mother, someone's best friend. Whether you agreed with her, or her choices, doesn't make her any less of a human being.

My condolences to her family and friends.

Playing Ketchup

2010-01-04T13:23:00.001-07:00

Umm, I mean catch-up. It's been a little bit since I posted anything on here, so here's a quick run-down of a few things going on in my world.

I survived another long weekend...barely. I hope everyone had a safe and happy New Year's Eve. We had a few friends over and had marathon drinking at ~~the gay frat house~~ home. We had a blast...stayed up until about 9am Friday morning, then I think I slept until around 5pm that evening. I really am not 21 anymore...my body definitely does not recover from a night of drinking like it used to. But hey, it's a whole new year, a whole new decade....that deserves an over-the-top celebration. At least that's what I'm going to keep telling myself.

Saturday the boys tried to convince me to go into town with them to get paint for my bedroom. I really didn't feel like shopping (actually I never feel like shopping), so I told them to pick out the paint, because I trust their judgement. Holy freakin' hell that was a bad idea. They picked red...and bought some gold paint because they have some plan to paint gold designs on one wall. This scared me due to the fact that my room is tiny and I was afraid it was going to feel even more claustrophobic. And I'm more of a neutral color kind of girl. Needless to say I was a bit leery of the red paint...because honestly when they opened it I thought it very much looked hot pink. When it went up on the walls it looked hot pink. After it dried it started looking red though. We put three damn coats of red paint up before we ran out...and it still needs a few more coats. I have decided that I hate painting and would much rather just have my plain old boring ass white walls back at this point. None of us felt like going all the way back into town to get more paint, so for now I have a half-assed painted room....and I'm really not happy with that at all.

Sunday Lifetime had a Kristen Stewart marathon going which does make me happy, so I DVR'ed all of those. Speak was one of the movies that was on, I was pretty excited because I have never seen that one....and that's one of the books I ordered from Half.com the other day. Also, the TN Lady Vols had a televised game (which is why I DVR'ed KStew) against Oklahoma. The game started out a bit bumpy, but my girls prevailed. A BIG congratulations is in order for Shekinna Stricklen for getting the 2nd triple double in school history...pretty impressive. What a difference a year makes....my Baby Vols are growing up so fast.

I'm still trying to figure out how exactly to organize my Day Zero Project stuff. I put up a bookshelf widget thingy on here, from Goodreads, for the book portion....but I have no clue what I'm going to do about the rest of it. I'm sure inspiration will hit any day now though. And speaking of the book portion of my list....wtf was I thinking with the historical stuff? I generally hate those kinds of books....they will most likely be the last ones that get read. I suppose that's why I made this list in the first place though, to do some things that I might not normally do. If anyone has any suggestions for good books in that genre let me know.

Let's Go To Wally World

2009-12-29T14:23:00.000-07:00

(And no, I do not mean Wal-Mart.)

Anyway, today my boss told me that I need to write down what days I want to take vacation in 2010. Obviously she is not aware that it is still 2009 (barely), and I really haven't planned this weekend much less the whole rest of next year. Stress. Basically I pretty much told her that I have absolutely no clue what days I may want off in the coming year...she looked at me strangely and said to just give her an estimate. Um, ok lady.

I sat and scribbled out a few dates. I didn't lump them all together, but decided one or two here and there would be better for me. Call me crazy, but I would freak out if I were away from work for more than a couple of days at a time. I am insanely unorganized and scattered in my personal life....but I am the polar opposite at work. It would kill me to even think about what might happen in my absence...holy crap, I am crazy.

So, I took my little list and handed it to her. As I was walking away she was like, "Where are the rest of the days?". I was confused. I wrote down five days. I've been here a year, I get 40 hrs of vacation time. That's five days. Well, apparently the vacation fairies are smiling on me because I was informed that I get 80 hrs of vacation time. Now, if I could only stop being completely neurotic I could probably take a trip somewhere.

Two Long Weekends In A Row?

2009-12-28T16:00:00.000-07:00

I'm back from ~~outer space~~ my long weekend. Honestly I didn't get a whole lot accomplished over the weekend...but then again I didn't really intend to. It was nice to have a weekend with no plans, no projects, no obligations, and to have the house completely to myself. I hung out in my pajamas a lot, watched several movies, read a little, got sucked into a marathon of L.A. Ink, made some really good beef stew, drank beer before noon, stayed up talking to a girl until 4am (PHB, you rock). All in all a pretty damn good weekend if you ask me.

Oh, and I finished my Day Zero Project list. Well, technically not finished I guess...I only have 91 things on my list. But that was intentional, I wanted to leave myself 10 blank spaces because I'm sure within the next 1001 days I will think of something I want to add to my list. I don't want to lock all of my goals in right at the beginning. And besides, I may take suggestions or something like that for a few of them. I haven't quite decided yet. Now I really need to figure out a good way to keep all of this organized so I can track my progress. Wish me luck with that one...organization is not necessarily my strong suit. Or you may have picked up on that with the whole label issue I'm having.

I have another long weekend to look forward to this week. I'm pretty sure the powers that be at my job realized it was better to give us the day off than to have us drag our hungover asses in here Friday morning. Good thinking ladies and gentlemen.

I Have A Plan

2009-12-23T10:22:00.007-07:00

Instead of milk and cookies this year I'm leaving out some beer and cookies with a note that says:

Dear Santa,
I can explain...

I wonder if that will work?

And if Santa stops by your house looking like this, then he must've hit my house first. It'll be my fault if Santa kisses anyone's mommy, or daddy, this year ;)

But at least he looks happy...maybe Santa is a generous drunk like me. You can thank me for that later.

I hope you all have a very safe and happy holiday season! I'm taking a break from the good ol' internet for a couple of days...see you all on Monday.

A Couple Of Things That Made Me Happy Today

2009-12-22T14:01:00.000-07:00

I got the sweetest text message ever today. It said, "Thx ~ u have always been the sister i didnt have ~ i so wish we were closer (geographically) xoxoxo". That made me happier than I've been in a really long time...I'm still smiling. It's nice to know that some people love and care about you...even if you are a screw up at times ;)

Someone brought the best ever breakfast tacos to work this morning. I don't know who brought them, or where they came from...but I loved them. Food makes me happy...that's probably why I'm a skinny fatass.

I just ordered a copy of The Lovely Bones so I can join in on Tammie's Book Discussion. I've already read this book once...but it was quite awhile ago. And I'm pretty sure the brain cells that were storing most of the information on this book were drowned in alcohol a long long time ago. I'm really looking forward to the book discussion. I'm always amazed hearing other people's interpretation of books. I find it so interesting to hear what other people took away from a story. It fascinates me how you could ask 10 different people about something, and you would likely get 10 unique answers. And I always find myself thinking, "hmm I never thought of that". I may not agree with every single observation and opinion, but it's still nice to hear thoughts other than the ones rattling around my brain.

I ordered a few more books while I was at it. Thank you Half.com for having some pretty kickass books for less than a dollar. I'm going to ignore the fact that I spent around five dollars on books, and around fifteen on shipping. It was cheaper than me driving an hour to go to the bookstore and purchase them there. And, I needed some new books for the upcoming Day Zero Project anyway. Yeah, yeah I could've went to the library...but this way after I'm finished reading I can pass them along to someone else...and that makes me happy. And really, what's more important than my happiness?

Weekend List

2009-12-21T12:04:00.001-07:00

The Good:

~ I got to talk to my favoritest cousin this weekend (don't tell my other cousins I said that)
~ finally raked the yard! (well the front yard...I refuse to rake the back)
~ every article of clothing I own is washed, dried, and folded/hung
~ the dips/snacks I made were very well received by everyone (I'm so glad my food didn't kill anyone)
~ Russell did not win Survivor. That arrogant ass doesn't deserve to win anything in my humble opinion.
~ I finished reading Dear John
~ I had a great time seeing a few friends that I haven't hung out with in way too long

The Bad:

~ The Lady Vols are no longer undefeated...Stanford beat them :(
~ Adam is being very argumentative with everyone lately. I want my precious Adam back.
~ There are still a lot of clothes in my hamper that I need to put away (but they are at least folded)
~ I did not get my Christmas cards sent out. *sigh* I don't know what's wrong with my brain, I can't figure out why in the hell I keep putting these things off.
~ I didn't finish my list for the Day Zero Project (I did add to it, just not quite completely finished)
~ I drank way too much Friday night and felt pretty blah most of the day Saturday (but I had fun)
~ Russell did however win the people's choice prize thingy. WTF is wrong America? I find it absolutely appalling that his horrid behavior was rewarded with $100.000

The Ugly:

~ Brittany Murphy died!?! Good gravy, she's the same age as I am...kinda makes you stop and think about things. My sincere sympathy goes out to her family and friends. This has really not been a good year for celebrities has it?

Dude, Where's My Camera?

2009-12-18T14:19:00.001-07:00

Where did this week go? Have I seriously only posted one entry this week? For shame. I have just been crazy busy. Luckily things at work are picking up...that breeze you just felt was my massive sigh of relief. I did take a personal day from work yesterday though to take care of some errands, housework, and what-not. I even cooked the gay hubs a meatloaf, some peas, mashed potatoes, and gravy. I know, you're shocked...I'll give you a moment to pick yourself up off the floor....

...better now? Ok good.

I still haven't raked the yard, but since the sun has finally come back out around here I might get that done this weekend. I did sweep the driveway and sidewalk yesterday though. Mostly because when I got home from work Tuesday night I almost broke my ankle when I stepped off the edge of the sidewalk because I couldn't tell where it was...yeah there are that many leaves. I also completely organized my dresser. I know that doesn't sound like a huge accomplishment, but it makes me feel better that now I know exactly where whatever article of clothing I happen to be searching for is. It's the little things that make me happy. The downstairs was completely dusted, swept, and mopped and looked quite beautiful....until a certain someone came home and walked across it with icky shoes. I made a few dips and other "party food" type things that could be refrigerated, because we're having people over this evening. I know, something else domestic...I must have a fever. Seriously though I'm trying to kind of ease myself into doing this crap (and I say that lovingly) so I'll have an easier time accomplishing my Day Zero Project goals.

I haven't yet completed my list of 101 goals...but I still have time. I sat down last night armed with a pen and notepad and have every intention of finishing that list...but I don't think I was in the right frame of mind to do it. I think I still need to add like 50 (I'm guessing) items to my list, and I got a little overwhelmed and thought I should just walk away. I'm gonna work on that this weekend, and hopefully I will have my full list done and entered by Monday or Tuesday. But I'm working on it during the weekend, the probability of me having a drink in my hand is very high...should make things interesting.

Also, I found my camera!!! It was in my car...and yes it is one of my Day Zero Project goals to avoid having my car get so cluttered with junk. There have been times that my car pretty much looked like I lived out of it. Right now though there aren't that many pairs of shoes and almost no clothes in there and absolutely no food or random water bottles. Now what will I do if I get stranded?!?

PROOOOOJECT!

2009-12-15T14:14:00.002-07:00

Yep, I just squealed that like a really nelly gay man...and there may have been some jazz hands.

I decided that this year instead of making resolutions I'm going to participate in the Day Zero Project. Here's a bit of info from the website....

The Challenge:

Complete 101 preset tasks in a period of 1001 days.

The Criteria:
Tasks must be specific (ie. no ambiguity in the wording) with a result that is either measurable or clearly defined. Tasks must also be realistic and stretching (ie. represent some amount of work on your part).

Why 1001 Days?
Many people have created lists in the past - frequently simple challenges such as New Year's resolutions or a 'Bucket List'. The key to beating procrastination is to set a deadline that is realistic. 1001 Days (about 2.75 years) is a better period of time than a year, because it allows you several seasons to complete the tasks, which is better for organising and timing some tasks such as overseas trips, study semesters, or outdoor activities.

My Official Start Date: January 01, 2010
My Finish Date: September 28, 2012 (which is weird because that's my 35th birthday)

I'm pretty excited about this. I think this is a much more realistic way for me to set, and hopefully acheive, some goals for the next couple of years. I created a profile and started building my list today. You can find me in the directory as "ducky" R.H. Ducky from Texas. I'm not a huge fan of the website setup and I hope they make some changes/improvements...but I'm loving the general idea of this project. I'll probably mostly use this blog to update and keep track of everything...I'll just have to see which works better for me.

You should head over and check it out though. Let me know what you think.

Also...

2009-12-11T14:52:00.001-07:00

...I removed all the labels from all of my posts. So if you're looking for something specific and can't find it, I'm sorry. But in reality the labels probably weren't much of a help anyway...they were not well thought out at all. I'm going to work on that, and will have labels back ~~soon~~ at some point. I might be making a few other tweaks and changes here and there as well.

Is Everyone Really Working For The Weekend?

2009-12-11T14:29:00.005-07:00

I know I am.

It's been a rough couple of days...mostly stupid work crap. I have avoided really writing anything lately because of my resolution to not be bitchy and whiny. But to sum things up, I feel like my office has turned into Crazytown and I've just been elected Mayor. Actually no, not the Mayor, more like the Sanitation Department...because I feel as though I've been left to clean up everyone's mistakes. But at least it's Friday, right? Bring on the weekend. Bring on the drinks. Bring on the 70° highs that are rumored for Sunday. My Adam has had a pretty craptastic week too, so I'm gonna surprise him this weekend with a few of his favorite meals/snacks. I'm a good wifey on occasion.

Here's a list of some of the things that I would like to accomplish this weekend:

~ Wash car (I'm totally going to cheat and do the drive-thru thing because it's too effin' cold for me to hand wash the damn thing)

~ Go to Hobby Lobby

~ Go to Merle Norman (I've been wearing the same brand of make-up since I was in high school...I might need to rethink this, it's a bit expensive)

~ ~~Go to the grocery store~~

~ Go to Lowe's/Home Depot and try to not get overwhelmed by the all the paint colors (I really need to paint my bedroom)

~ Ignore leaves in the yard (because I damn sure am not raking the bastards up)

~ Go to the Post Office and mail Tammie's package

~ Finish Dear John so I can send it to a friend who wants to read it (we saw the preview for the movie when we went to ~~ogle Kristen Stewart and Taylor Lautner~~ see New Moon and then I happened to run across a copy of the book for $3...we figured it was fate, or somethin')

~ Clean and organize my bedroom (good gravy I am really dreading this one, that's probably a whole weekend project by itself)

~ ~~Laundry (I will never understand how I go through so many clothes in one week. Seriously, I have got to stick to one outfit per day)~~

~ ~~Figure out a way to make Adam smile (he's too pretty to be sad)~~

I'm sure there are about a bazillion other things I need to do, but those things are getting top priority...mostly because they are the ones I can think of off the top of my head. I just wonder how much of it is going to get accomplished?

I hope you all have a fabulous weekend!

*cheers*

And Now....The Runaways

2009-12-09T14:06:00.002-07:00

Rules: Choose a band and answer the questions by using song titles from only that band.

Pick an Artist: The Runaways (because I haven't said anything creepy or stalkerish lately and Kristen Stewart probably feels neglected...and Joan Jett is a complete badass)

1.) Are you a male or female?
Little Sister

2.) Describe yourself:
Take It Or Leave It

3.) How do you feel about yourself?
Mama Weer All Crazee Now

4.) Describe your ex boyfriend / girlfriend:
I Love Playing With Fire

5.) Describe how you feel at the moment:
Wasted

6.) Describe what you are doing now:
Waitin' For The Night

7.) Describe where you want to be:
Strawberry Fields

8.) Your best friend/friends is/are:
Queens of Noise

9.) Your favorite color is:
Black Leather

10.) You know:
I'm A Star

11.) What’s the weather like?
Here Comes The Sun

12.) If your life was a television show, what would it be called?
Neon Angels On The Road To Ruin

13.) What is life to you?
Dead End Justice

14.) What is the best advice you have to give?
Let's Party Tonight

15.) If you could change your name, what would you change it to?
Cherry Bomb

Fashionably Late

2009-12-08T11:05:00.034-07:00

My drive to work is looooong. And thanks to my commute, I get to listen to an abundance of morning radio which provides me with a wealth of knowledge and wisdom.

This morning, for example, I learned a new phrase: late in life lesbian...no really, I'm not making that up. Actresses such as Kelly McGillis and Meredith Baxter have recently come out of the proverbial closet and apparently someone has coined yet another new term. (therapists everywhere rejoice) Also I just learned about author Susan Gabriel who wrote and self-published a novel, Seeking Sara Summers, which is based loosely on her own experiences with coming out late in life. I'm pretty sure that one is going on my "to-read" shelf over at Goodreads. I think it would be fascinating to sit down with some of these women and just chat about this whole late in life lesbian thing. Then again I pretty much find anyone's "coming out story" fascinating, no matter at what age it happened. Hmm, actually I think I just like hearing any stories about people's lives....whether they know it or not, people in general are pretty damned interesting.

But anyway, all of this makes me happy. Not necessarily because there a few more lesbians in the world, but because I wasn't late. You see, I'm pretty much late to everything. But not this time...nuh uh, I was an early(ish) in life lesbian.

Good, Bad, And Ugly

2009-12-07T12:30:00.001-07:00

here's an update of my weekend in the form of lists...

The Good

- Adam and Sam got all of the baseboards for downstairs installed (finally! we've been putting this off since July)
- The new tiles went down in the bathroom
- The transition pieces were installed downstairs, so the places where the tiles meets the laminate flooring looks sooo much better
- The downstairs is completely rearranged. We have sooo much more space now...I LOVE IT
- The Christmas tree is put up (and beautiful)

The Bad

- I didn't get the yard completely raked (but in my defense the yard is pretty effin' big)
- Sam didn't get the tiles grouted (but in his defense I begged him not to because that would mean I couldn't walk on the bathroom floor for 12 hrs.)
- While rearranging the furniture downstairs we somehow broke the box thingy that goes to the satellite (the boys missed their Sunday night Fox shows, and I missed the Lady Vols game)
- I don't have photographic evidence of any of our weekend accomplishments
- I still can't find my camera

The Ugly

- I managed to get my vehicle stuck in a ditch this weekend and had to shell out $65 for a tow truck to rescue me. In related news, I have decided to buy a tow truck. $65 for 5 minutes of work?!? I'm all for that.

What Else Do You Have Up Your Sleeve?

2009-12-04T10:11:00.002-07:00

Mother Nature and I have a long standing battle going. You see, I am of the opinion that spring and summer should last waaaay longer than they currently do...and fall and winter should be virtually nonexistent. Don't get me wrong, I think there should be a tiny bit of fall and winter, just in much reduced increments of time. It's difficult to be all Thanksgiving-y and Christmas-y if it's 90° outside. So I get it, really I do...we need some weather variation.
But here's the thing, a few years ago my gypsy spirit (and a hot girl) convinced me that I should move to Denver. Shortly after this move there was a blizzard. Not a little snow storm...an actual real live honest to goodness blizzard. Having grown up in Texas I had never seen a blizzard. Also I had never driven in a blizzard...let me tell ya, it was not fun. I drive an SUV, and I honestly thought my vehicle would be good in the snow. Holy freakin' hell was I wrong. My car is not some monstrosity, it's on the small side for an SUV, it's fairly light and liked to slide all over the road. Add to that the fact that it's rear wheel drive and only two wheel drive and you pretty much have a recipe for disaster in the snow.
Next on my list of major complaints...I moved back to Texas in October of last year. The very same damn day that I got back Hurricane Ike hit. Now take into consideration that I live very near the Gulf Coast, so needless to say my life was affected. For about two weeks we lived in a brand new apartment with no electricity, very little food, and no furniture. I was not amused.
Today Mother Nature decided to throw me yet another curve ball. It's freaking snowing. Are you fucking kidding me? Of course everyone is flipping out, schools are closing, grocery stores are selling out of bread and water, and they are talking about closing our office for the day. Come on people...it's not even sticking to the ground. Again, I am not amused. I don't want to be sent home early, frankly I kinda need the hours and the money. Not to mention the fact that I drive roughly 100 miles a day to be here, so after we factor in gas and the wear and tear on my vehicle I pretty much should have just stayed in bed this morning.

So, Mother Nature if you ever give yourself a break from wreaking havoc on my life and take time out to surf the web and read over a few blogs I really hope you happen across mine. I want you to get this message loud and clear...YOU CAN SUCK IT!

WOOOOOOHOOOOOOO!

2009-12-02T08:57:00.003-07:00

In case you couldn't tell by this post's title, I'm in a really good mood today. No, I didn't win the lottery...yet. But when I got home from work yesterday evening I walked into a nice and toasty warm home. THE HEATER IN THE HUT IS FUNCTIONING PROPERLY AGAIN! I am most definitely a summer girl, and having a broken heater was absolutely killing me. Adam is definitely my hero this week...as is the person he hired to fix it....I really had to fight the urge to give him a big fat hug and a kiss. Really, I was that excited.
Since we've been grumbling about the hut non-stop for a couple of weeks or so now, we've decided that she's going to get a bit of a makeover this weekend. Adam is going to go get some pretty new baseboards for downstairs. Also, the new flooring is going down in the bathroom. We're completely rearranging the furniture downstairs. And we're going to rake up all the lovely pine needles that are covering the yard. So basically the hut is getting a mani/pedi and getting her hair did.

In my mind I'm doing cartwheels right now. But only in my mind, if I did an actual cartwheel I would most likely injure myself.

*ducky dance*
(trust me it's so much cooler than the chicken dance)

Over The River And Through The Woods

2009-11-30T15:42:00.002-07:00

I had a pretty nontraditional Thanksgiving this year. I'm accustomed to being either at my family's or whoever I happen to be dating's family or with Munky's family. This year I was at home alone, and ate some crockpot chili (which was excellent by the way...I would give out a recipe but I don't think me throwing random shit in the crockpot constitutes a recipe). So, I know that probably sounds kind of sad...and in a way I did miss the whole Thanksgiving thing...but really it was ok. I got some reading done, I watched a few movies that Adam thinks are "stupid", caught up on laundry, cleaned the house a bit, watched some of the random stuff that has been sitting on the DVR waiting patiently to be viewed, and I played some Wii. So all in all I had a good day. Friday evening my grandma called me, the conversation went something like this:

Me: hello?

Grandma: sissy? (don't laugh she's called me that all my life)

Me: hey big dog (you can laugh at that)

Grandma: so why didn't you come to Thanksgiving little pup (yeah, she's awesome like that)

Me: umm, I technically wasn't invited and didn't know where ya'll were getting together

Grandma: aww fiddlesticks you know you don't need an invitation

Me: so where did ya'll do Thanksgiving?

Grandma: oh, we all just went out to eat

*so I'm wondering at this point if my grandma thinks I'm psychic and I was just going to magically show up at said restaurant with no invitation
**then the conversation was just normal catching up stuff, so we're going to skip ahead

Grandma: did you go shopping today, it's Black Friday ya know

Me: I wanted to go buy a sewing machine, but after thinking about it I decided I didn't want to fight the crowds. You know I hate shopping.

Grandma: I didn't go either. But if you want a sewing machine you can have your mama's, I have it here. Why don't you come up here and pick it up...I'll bet you'll be just like your mama, you can probably make anything you want on it. (yep, she got me with promises of a sewing machine and the skillful use of my complete worship of my mom...my grandma is a sneaky one)

I really was trying to avoid the whole family thing this year (that's a long story), but I did end up going to see my grandma yesterday. It was really nice to see her, I really should try to go visit more often. Oh, but I still don't have a sewing machine...apparently my other grandma (in Georgia) actually has it. I guess I'm going to have to go shopping after all.

Umm Thanks

2009-11-25T14:58:00.001-07:00

Barely 24 hrs in and I think I have to break my Thanksgiving Resolution. Damn you work for making me do this. But umm, all "nonessential" employees got to leave at noon today and were paid until 5:00. Wow, so really I have to sit here and wait on some jackass to send me some paperwork so I can get my job done. Do I get double pay for the 5 "extra" hours I am here...I seriously doubt it.

But on the bright side, I do have a job. And apparently I'm an "essential" employee. Don't I feel important? Ok, that wasn't technically a resolution breaker. I found two things to be thankful for.

Thanksgiving Resolution...Because Some Things Just Shouldn't Wait Until January

2009-11-24T09:55:00.000-07:00

So it's that time of year again. The time when we are all reminded to think about the things we are thankful for. I've had a FML seriously bitter attitude lately...but when I really stop to think about things I am actually pretty damned lucky. I may not necessarily see eye to eye with all (ok most) of my family members, but I do have some family that is absolutely amazing. I may not be rich and live some extravagant life, but I make enough money to survive. I may not get to see all of my close friends as frequently as I like, but I am fortunate to have pretty spectacular people in my life. The heater in our house may not work right now, but I do have a roof over my head (and for all of my complaining, I do live in Texas so it isn't really that bad).

I could sit here and come up with a really long list of things that I bitch about on a regular basis, and then I could probably come up with a list more than twice as long of things I am grateful for. I wonder what it says about me that I've just stopped to consider this right now, right before Thanksgiving? I'm pretty sure I should start focusing on the more positive aspects of my existence, and attempt to be less selfish and whiny.

Everyone has bad days, and I'm not going to try to kid myself and say that I'm always going to be a ray of sunshine...but I'm gonna try a bit harder. That's my Thanksgiving Resolution. Starting now, I'm giving my blogland buddies permission to (virtually) kick me in the ass whenever I start getting out of control with whining/complaining/bitching. So there's something for you to look forward this holiday season.

Hope you all have a happy and safe Thanksgiving.

*ducky hugs*

Undeniable Proof That I Have Way Too Much Time On My Hands

2009-11-20T10:48:00.003-07:00

Rather than whining about our broken heater and the $2,800.00 it's going to take to fix it, I've decided to answer some questions. A whole freakin' shitload of questions actually. Anyone else who wants to answer them should do so...these things amuse me.

Do you have any nicknames?
bitch (thanks adam), fat ass (thanks sam), psychohosebeast (thanks amy), and slim (thanks holly)

Who will you be sleeping with tonight?
i don't have anyone scheduled. any volunteers?

Do you like to grocery shop?
well, i am a fat ass

Do you do your own laundry?
yes, but only until i win the lottery

Do you watch "The Hills"?
no...are they really alive with the sound of music?

Wearing any bracelets?
always, but i'm short one bracelet...due to my klutziness i broke one of my favorite ones

Last thing you drank?
coffee....caffeine and nicotine is the actual breakfast of champions, just so you know

What were you doing at midnight last night?
sleeping

What was the first thing you did when you woke up?
i enjoy waking up so much that i hit snooze repeatedly just so i can do it several times a day

Are you taller than your mom?
i'm taller than your mom

Do you want to get married and have children one day?
that's not currently on my to-do list...but who knows

Dog or cat person?
normally dogs...but catwoman is pretty hot

Favorite place to shop?
the internet

Ever open a bag of chips in the grocery store and eat them before paying?
oh shit, you're supposed to pay for the food you consume while you're still in the store?!? oops

Do you like being in pictures?
depends on my level of inebriation

Ever been in an ambulance?
considering all the stupid shit i've done in my life i'm pretty shocked that i've never ridden in an ambulance. i do seem to take a ride in the waaaaambulance frequently though

Is your current hair color mostly your natural hair color?
it's actually all my natural color

Do you have trust issues?
yeah, and that's just the start of a long list of my issues

What's the first thing you'll do when you turn 18?
do i get to count backwards now? woohoo

Do you smile often?
when people aren't pissing me off i do

Do you prefer an ocean or pool?
i'd take either...and some warm sunshine right about now

Have your brothers or sisters ever told you that you were adopted?
no, but i'm pretty convinced that i was indeed adopted

Can you imagine yourself living in a cardboard box?
rent would probably be cheaper

Have you ever changed your clothes while in a vehicle?
several times...and trust me, it's not an easy task for tall people

Are you a loud person?
only when i'm yelling

Do you read?
nope, i've just been guessing which questions you're going to ask me. how am i doing so far?

Are you a fast typer?
yes...mostly because i don't usually bother with the shift key and i couldn't really care less if i have typos. underachievement at it's finest

How old will you be in five years?
approximately 13,565.25 days old

How tall are you?
180.34 cm

What do you look forward to most in the next six weeks?
my report card

What time did you wake up today?
i'm still working on it

What are you wearing right now?
boring work clothes...jeans and a company tshirt

Do you like Christmas songs?
omg no! could we please, please, please get some new christmas songs...the current ones have been seriously overplayed

Do you sleep with or without clothes on?
are you flirting with me?

What do you like about winter?
that it always eventually ends

How many states/provinces have you lived in?
seven...i think

What is your favorite restaurant?
hooters...j/k i've never actually been there. but their new "more than a mouthful" ad campain makes me giggle like a teenage boy

What is your favorite kind of ice cream?
beef tips w/ gravy

What is your favorite kind of soup?
talk...joel cracks me up

How many glasses of water, a day, do you drink on average?
how much water is actually in 12 oz of beer?

Do you know how to play poker?
not really. but that reminds me of a joke...
how do you wake lady gaga up? you poke her face

Have you ever been to Canada?
no, but i have been to a canadian's house. does that count for anything?

Have you ever gotten stitches?
i'm a klutzy accident waiting to happen...so yes

Do you sleep with stuffed animals?
i guess some people might call them that

Would you rather be attacked by a big bear or a swarm of bees?
dip me in honey and throw me to the....oh wait, that wasn't an option

What do you dip a chicken nugget in?
a precise mixture of bbq and hot mustard

Can you change the oil on a car?
yes. and by yes, i really mean no

What is your usual bedtime?
right after i run out of alcohol

Do you dance in the car?
yeah, a friend of mine showed me how to do the electric slide in the backseat last week

What was the last note you scribbled on a piece of paper?
b flat...no, i'm not writing a song, i just need to pick up some new bras

Is it possible that you could be pregnant right now?
they say anything is possible. but they are wrong.

If the year consisted of only one season, which would you choose?
mrs. dash

Is there a guy that knows everything or mostly everything about you?
adam and munky know all my dirty little secrets

Do you regret dating anyone you dated?
i've made a few (ok a lot) of bad choices in the dating department

When do you go back to school?
monday...wait, no, that's work

If your best friend was kicked out, would your parents let him/her live with you?
omg i'm answering questions written by high schoolers

Would you say you have an organized bedroom?
i wouldn't say that i have an organized anything

When you're at the grocery store do you use the self checkout?
they have mirrors at the grocery store now?

Is your shirt yellow?
no, it's pretty brave

Do you honestly believe that good things come to those who wait?
patience is a virtue...a virtue i don't possess, so i really wouldn't know

Do you date a boy/girl for looks or personality?
a think a good mix of both is fairly important...being rich doesn't hurt either. kidding. sort of

What did you do yesterday?
i rearranged my sock drawer

When was the last time you had a great day?
tomorrow

Little House On The Prairie?

2009-11-19T09:40:00.002-07:00

Nope. Too many pine trees around here to be a prairie. As a matter of fact we have like 467 of the 'em in our front and back yards alone. Ok, so for those of you who haven't noticed I might exaggerate numbers a teeny tiny bit. Our house is pretty little though, so I guess that part fits. But from here on out I'm going to refer to our home as "the little hut in the rut". And just to clarify, when I say our or we, I really mean Adam...you know, since he's the one who actually bought it and all. I just live there.

So the house is tiny and older, and oddly shaped. But in defense of our house, all of the houses in our neighborhood are oddly shaped...we live near a lake and I guess they were going for some summery, vacationy, cottagey, something or other. I have no clue what the technical architectural term for the style of house we live in is...so I'm gonna stick with odd.

Judging by the carpet and linoleum that was in the house at the time of purchase, I'm going to estimate that the hut was built circa 1973. There have been some improvements made. All of the walls have been repainted except for my bedroom (because I can't decided on a color), we redid the all of the flooring downstairs (that's a fun story), and some new appliances/fixtures have been purchased and installed. So the hut looks much better than it did pre-purchase...but it's still in a rut. Things that are necessary are starting to break. There's an issue with the shower, the windows are basically just pneumonia holes that need to be resealed (or whatever you do to windows to make them not leak cold air into the house), and most recently our heater decided to stop working.

The heater issue is what prompted me to write about the hut in the first place. It took me a long effing time to get around to the point huh? The other day when I got home from work the house was ridiculously cold...but you have to bear in mind that I'm really cold natured and anytime the temperature dips below like 60° I'm convinced that I'm going to freeze to death. Adam is really hot natured so in the summer the AC is running full blast, and in the winter the heater doesn't get much of a workout. Well Adam actually got a little chilly on that particular evening so he turned the thermostat up a bit, and it didn't take us long to realize that cold air was blowing from the vents. Not cool...well actually it was too cool, but you know what I mean. At this point Adam decided that he should climb up into the attic crawlspace and take a look at things.

Adam is not handy...at all...I was pretty terrified by the fact that he was crawling up a metal ladder to fiddle around with electrical stuff. My job was to hold the ladder steady and hand him tools, and I must say I excelled at that task. Nobody died, there weren't even any minor injuries...astounding. But the heater still wasn't working. Adam's dad came out to take a look at things yesterday after work (which was super sweet because he lives like an hour and half away), he is pretty handy. But the heater still isn't working. Hopefully we can get someone to come check it out this weekend. You know, before hypothermia sets in.

Until then I am going to wear 7 layers of clothes, wrap up in a blanket, and drink lots of vodka.

All Work And No Play?

2009-11-18T14:04:00.000-07:00

I've had another super productive day at work.

I made this:

<---That is an Excel spreadsheet that has all of the TN Lady Vols regular season games...the opponent, where they are playing, time, whether it's televised, score, and their record. I'm not nutty about all sporting events...but I do love me some Lady Vols basketball...and I get a wee bit out of control....and I wear alot of orange and blue.

I received this:

<---That is a birthday card. It's not my birthday. My birthday is in September. It is still really cute and made me smile.

I did this:

<---That is a binder clip gymnast that I made. Complete with mat, vault, and the whole landing area. Yeah, I'm not too down with the gymnastics lingo. But look at that landing! My gymnast stuck it.

I did this:

<--- That is a binder clip cheerleader. She cheers for the binder clip gymnast.

I also managed to squeeze in some blog reading, went to lunch with some coworkers, and even found time to do some actual work. And I get paid for this.

Cleaning Out My Closet

2009-11-17T13:04:00.002-07:00

Since I've decided to work on having a happier and healthier body (for some reason the video to Olivia Newton-John's "Physical" just popped into my head), I figure I should probably work on having a happier and healthier mind too. I have come to the conclusion that I watch entirely too much television and seriously need to get back to reading more. Being a reality show addict will really only get me so far in life.

The problem with this decision to read more is that books can be somewhat expensive to buy...and I have limited space to store all the books that I read. Of course what I would like to do is buy an ebook reader and purchase my books at significantly reduced prices and have them stored on one nifty little device. Is this financially practical for me at this juncture? No. Damn you Barnes & Noble for making me want the Nook when I can't justify spending $259.00 for it. And damn you Amazon for taunting me with the Kindle. Option two would be too get all of my books from the library for the lovely price of free. This is perfect for some titles, but since I live in rural East Texas this is not a viable option for all of the books on my to-read list. I have recently come across a few websites that are set up kinda like a "netflix for books", this idea intrigues me. However, I don't know of anyone who has ever used any of these sites, so I'm not sure if that's the best solution either.

I would love to one day maybe start some sort of book swap thing of my own up, and I think I could probably come up with a few fun ideas for that, but honestly I don't think I have the time/energy to invest in that project at the moment. I really wouldn't want to half-ass it, so I'm just going to keep that idea percolating in the back of my mind for now. But once I get my Courier, watch out world.

In the meantime, I'm gonna wait for my copy of Truly, Madly: A Novel that I won in a giveaway over at Goodreads. I'm not sure that this is a book I would ever see in a bookstore and think, "omg I have to read that"...but I'm hoping I'll be pleasantly surprised.

Also, if anyone is interested in any of the books that are lying around taking up space in my glorified closet of a bedroom, I will gladly box them up and send them out to you. It makes me sad to get rid of books, but the reality of my life right now is that things are just getting too cluttered. I've given away a ton of books and random things that were sitting around looking sad and unused to various friends already, so the pickings are slim...but really, how can you turn down a box of random ass free shit?

I Was Living The High Life....Or Somethin'

2009-11-16T11:59:00.004-07:00

Since the "town" I live in has a population of roughly 559 it's not surprising that I get bored...frequently. It's a good thing that I'm easily amused.

Friday evening on my home from work I called Adam and asked him if he needed me to stop and pick anything up on my way in. He wanted new sponges for the kitchen. Umm, ok...I was beginning to worry that our weekend was going to be less than entertaining for me. Using my powers of persuasion I convinced him that alcohol would be more fun...actually it really wasn't that difficult to persuade him. But anyway, when I went into the store I couldn't help but notice that Miller has some 16oz. cans of their High Life variety of beer in freakin' camouflage cans. Of course I couldn't resist buying them because I just HAD to show someone, and both my camera and phone were left in the car.

I have a question for whoever is in charge of this little project over at Miller. Ok, so on this very can it says, "The Champagne of Beer". Who thought it was a good idea to put "the champagne of beer" in a camouflage can? That just seems like flawed logic to me. Granted, I did drink one of these and "champagne of beer" is not necessarily the first thing my taste buds were screaming. You might want a new logo. Just sayin'

So now I have to wonder...is this strictly a backwoods Texas thing? Are these camo cans in other states? And most importantly, did I really move here on purpose?

Whacky Doodle Dandy

2009-11-13T11:40:00.000-07:00

Astroglide, that's what I'm going to start calling my oddball over-sharing coworker. Because really K-Y was just too obvious. For anyone who didn't catch yesterday's post, this batshit crazy lady that I work with was compelled to tell me about her dried up hoo-ha. I believe her exact words were, "I can't find a boyfriend because I'm dry...you know, down there".
This particular conversation fascinated me. Don't get me wrong, I have absolutely no interest at all in this chicks bits and pieces. BUT I do find it absolutely amazing that this woman, who I barely know, decided to bestow this information upon me. I'm also curious as to how this particular problem prevents her from finding a boyfriend. Unless of course she randomly volunteers this information to potential dates...which I could really see her doing now that I think about it.

I also have a couple of other issues with Astroglide...
~ she got all of her hair chopped off and then told me that we were "twinkies". Umm, no we're not freakshow. First off, I have naturally straight hair and she has naturally curly hair (which she doesn't straighten). Second, my hair is cut in a bob (according to my sister in law a "bitch bob"...longer in the front and stacked in the back) while Astro's hair looks kinda like my grandma's, which would be nowhere even remotely similar to my hair.
~ on two separate occasions she has actually touched my hair. That was pretty weird. Call me crazy but I have an aversion to people that I don't really know touching any part of me.
~ she offers me a Diet Coke at least two or three times a week. Each time I politely tell her that I do not like Diet Coke and decline. She then tells me that she has to drink Diet Coke because she is diabetic. Seriously, I think she has told me she drinks Diet Coke because she's diabetic 973,426 times since she's started working here.

One day I'm going to snap, and it's not going to be pretty. I can see it now, I'll go into full on Tourettes mode and start screaming about Diet Coke, granny hair, lube, and twinkies...then I will just sit in the corner chanting "please don't touch me, please don't touch me" while slowly rocking back and forth. Should be entertaining.

Boring Days and Things You Just Can't Un-hear

2009-11-12T15:24:00.000-07:00

Wow, today has been incredibly slow and boring at work today....well, things have been incredibly slow and boring all week for that matter. *crosses fingers that there are no new lay-offs coming*

During my time of boredom I have:

- googled a lot of random shit

- smoked too many cigarettes

- cruised around a few other blogs on here

- tried to determine what my new hobby should be

- found a cute website on origami

- decided that my new hobby probably should not be origami...

- and based on the above photo, I'm also going to rule out photography
- ran across a post on Tammie's blog that has me wanting to learn to sew
- was told by a coworker (that I don't particularly care for) that she can't find a boyfriend because she is dry..."down there" *shudder*. Honestly when she first said dry, I immediately thought she meant her sense of humor or something. I really want to go soak my brain in bleach right now.
- had another failed attempt at explaining the difference between rows and columns to a different coworker. I really wanted to advise this chick to just stay the hell away from Excel.
- password protected all of my Excel files so the above mentioned coworker can't possibly screw around with them.
- found an awesome coupon on Hobby Lobby's website for 40% off any one item of regular price. Since I get paid tomorrow maybe I will go do a little shopping
- considered options for fun things to do this weekend
- decided that I will probably drink too much alcohol this weekend
- convinced one of the chicks in the Engineering Dept. to sauter my broken bracelet
- shortly after receiving repaired bracelet I caught it on a door handle and rebroke it
- won a game of Minesweeper

-~~wrote~~ writing a blog entry

Now I just have to figure out what to do the remaining 39 or so minutes left in my workday. What a productive day I've had. I'm tired.

And I Didn't Even Prepare A Speech...

2009-11-11T08:46:00.002-07:00

Tammie recently gave me some awards. I'm fairly new to this whole blogging thing and have never gotten an award before, so I really just had a moment of giddiness. Yeah, I'm a dork.

The rules of the Honest Scrap award state that I have to share ten honest things about myself, so here goes:

1. I look for patterns and signs in everything...I mean literally everything. I'm not sure why, but I know that it comforts me. I've really only talked extensively about this to two people...one of them thinks I'm completely delusional.

2. When I'm nervous, scared, or worried I joke around a lot. Many people have taken this to mean that I just simply don't care and am never serious about anything. This is completely untrue...I am super sensitive and feel things deeply and intensely, I think I use humor (possibly inappropriately) as a defense mechanism. There have been times when I have wanted to comfort people who were hurting and I just felt too awkward or uncomfortable and made some dumbass joke and ended up causing more harm than good. Sometimes humor has helped to alleviate tension, but usually it just makes me seem like an uncaring ass.

3. I have freakishly small feet considering how tall I am. I am pushing 6' real hard, but I only wear a size 7.5 or 8 shoe. I am convinced this is why I'm such a klutz. My feet are just too dang small to balance me.

4. I don't really like sweets. I never have, even when I was a kid. I might get a craving for cheesecake every now and then, but that's about it. When I was little ~~my mom~~ the Easter Bunny used to always put books and puzzles and such in my Easter basket because I would never eat the candy.

5. I have been single for almost a year now (there has been dating, but no serious long term relationship)...and I'm very proud of that. I've always been pretty independent in a sense...but for some reason I always panicked if I was single. So, I have always had a really bad habit of jumping from ~~horrible~~ relationship to ~~horrible~~ relationship. [insert U-Haul jokes here]

6. I almost got married once...to a man. He treated very well, was charming, polite, and ridiculously handsome. My family adored him, and really encouraged the whole marriage thing. I knew that's what was expected of me...but I also knew that marrying him just didn't feel right. So instead I joined the Air Force.

7. While in the Air Force, at tech school, I met my first girlfriend. We became victims of the "Don't Ask Don't Tell Policy" after her roommate ratted us out to our squadron commander. My military career ended shortly after.

8. I am envious of people who are all creative and crafty. I love Hobby Lobby and stores like that. I can lose hours just wandering around in them thinking of all the possibilities. I will have hundreds of ideas just rattling around in my brain...but then when it comes time to settle on just one I get overwhelmed and generally leave with nothing to show for the time I've spent browsing. I think I need a good entry level hobby.

9. I think I am part gypsy. I can never seem to live anywhere for more than a couple of years before I start getting all antsy. I love moving to new places, seeing new things, learning new things, meeting new people. It's such an adventure. My favorite place I've ever lived is probably Colorado...if it weren't for the damned winters I would possibly be content to live there forever.

10. There are days when I really yearn to have children. There are days when the gay husband really yearns to have children. So far we've had these yearnings on different days. If our biological clocks ever line up the world is in deep shit.

Not sure how interesting that was but those are my truths for the day.

Oh, and happy Veteran's Day to those that served before, beside, and after me. (and yes I realize the whole "beside me" portion of that statement doesn't span a large chunk of time, but I don't really consider that my fault)

Act As If

2009-11-10T08:08:00.000-07:00

Ok, so I'm going to do a quick update on my whole medical status and then I'm going to be finished with that subject.
So, Doctor #1 (who I liked and trusted) told me that all my blood work was completely jacked up and I needed to see a specialist...she referred me to a hematologist.
Doctor #2 (who was a jackass) told me that all my blood work was completely normal and there was absolutely nothing wrong with me. I protested this opinion and pointed out the fact that I am still fatigued and getting mystery bruising and whatnot. I swear on my freakin' life this man told me to sleep more and to try to not bump into things. I was irate to say the very least.
I then decide to call Doctor #1 back and ask her opinion. I spoke to a nurse in her office who told me that she would speak with the doc and they would call me back later that day. The next day I still hadn't heard anything so I called again. This was almost a week ago. I have now also lost faith in the doctor that I liked and trusted. I'm over it.

This past weekend I was inspired, I watching movies with the boys (gay husband and his boyfriend), and we ended up watching Boiler Room. There was a part in the movie where Ben Affleck's character says (caution foul language ahead), "Act as if you are the fucking president of this firm. Act as if you have a nine inch cock. Act as if." I'm taking that to heart...well, not the president of the firm or 9" cock thing....but I'm going to act as if. I'm going to act as if I'm the happiest, healthiest person on the planet. So screw you doctors, screw you tiredness and bruising, and screw you blood work. I'm really fucking stubborn and you will not win, because I said so.

And as a side note, I think I'm also going to act as if I know the winning lotto numbers. Cha-Ching

I guess the grass is pretty green over here too

2009-11-05T11:54:00.000-07:00

All the cheese is gone, so I'm gonna put away the whine too. I had a conversation last night that put things in perspective for me. So rather than dwell on the things that are upsetting me, today I'm gonna think about what I'm looking forward to and what I'm grateful for. Wow, maybe all the cheese isn't gone, even as I typed that I was saying to myself, "damn that sounds cheesy".

I am super excited that the college basketball season is finally rolling around. The Lady Vols have their first game (exhibition) tonight vs. Carson-Newman. That means it's officially time to change my ringtone to "Rocky Top" and start praying that the "Baby Vols" don't give me a heart attack this year. As per usual Pat has put together the toughest schedule in women's college basketball. I love that even though the AP has ranked them at 8 (the lowest since 1985 for the Lady Vols) she's not afraid to test her team against the best of 'em.

I am hoping that next weekend I can make the trek to the Austin area to see my dear cousin, PsychoHoseBeast. I haven't seen her in way way way too long. I giggle inside when I think of all the adventures, and misadventures we've shared. Let me tell ya, we have some stories...and I do believe it's high time to have a new adventure, make some new memories, and get started on some new stories.

Also, I am still salivating over the rumored Microsoft Courier! Need. One. Now. Thank you Gizmodo for first leaking info on my dream gadget...and for continually getting me more and more excited about it. Seriously, I google the shit out of this thing and am overjoyed when I see a new article.

I mean really, can't you imagine how productive I would be with this thing? It makes me giddy just thinking about it.

I am also happy to report that the husband didn't throw a massive fit when the Phillies lost last night. I really thought we were going to have another "Mavericks Moment", like during the NBA playoffs. But not one thing got thrown or broken, there was no jumping off the couch and screaming, there weren't really even that many expletives uttered. For a gay man he sure is passionate about sports : )

Yes, I would like some cheese with my whine

2009-11-04T14:12:00.001-07:00

I really feel as though I've been taking a ride in the wambulance all week. Seriously, all I've done is whine, complain, and cry for the past several days. I'm starting to get on my own nerves. I really feel sorry for the gay husband, but he has been incredibly supportive, patient, and just all-around adorable.

I still feel all tired and run down and just icky in general. My doc sent me to a specialist and the only thing "special" about him is that he is a complete douchebag. He is the type of doctor who makes my fear of doctors seem rational. He was just very cold and made me feel extremely uncomfortable. I swear this man acted annoyed that I was in his office. But anyway, he examined me and ordered some more blood work...so the waiting continues.
This is exactly the reason why I don't normally even go to the doctor. Generally I try to practice the whole mind over matter thing and just try to will away whatever happens to be bothering me. Then I take a shit ton of vitamin c or something and hope for the best. I'm kind of regretting going to the doctor in the first place. Maybe I would just rather not know if I'm sick. Is that crazy?

Oh, and Dad, if you ever happen to run across my blog I want you to know how completely awesome it was for you to move to a whole different state and not tell me. You, sir get the Father of the Year Award. Not. And my older brother should get an award for telling me, "sorry, but I have more important things going on right now".

I am going to try to avoid dating bottle rockets in the future

2009-10-30T13:58:00.000-06:00

Who's been neglecting their blog? I have! I have!

Yeah, so I'm in a really weird mood today. Feeling kinda goofy...which is good because I've felt quite crappy most of the week. Wow, I really haven't posted anything since before last weekend.

I went to Freaker's Ball last Friday...which was amazingly great. Ok, I won't lie the end of the evening gets pretty fuzzy for me...but still, I had a blast! Yay for rock music, and yay for alcohol.
Saturday the pull of homecoming and the Duck Dash won over so I drove three and a half hours out of my way to go to those festivities. Also had a fabulous time there.
Sunday I had a lunch with an ex of mine. That was really nice, and kinda sad. After lunch I got to see my old roommate and some friends that I hadn't seen in forever. I also was told, "you should stop dating straights, crazies, and bottle rockets". Yeah, some of my friends smoke pot. Then I had to start my drive back home...and almost cried. I really hate driving...I am a much better passenger.

This week has been rather eventful as well...but not in the fun way. Lately I have felt just completely run down and just blah...I would say this has been going on for like a month. For the past two weeks I have been getting these random mystery bruises on my legs and feet. Tuesday I finally talked myself into going to the doctor (I am really terrified of doctors). My doctor was really ~~cute~~ baffled by my symptoms and ordered all sorts of blood work. That was a fun adventure because apparently I have tiny veins and it took three nurses and a butterfly needle before they could extract enough blood from me. This leads me to believe that I am not feeling well because I don't actually have any blood in my body. The ~~cute chick in the white coat~~ doctor was amused but decided that my self diagnosis was unlikely. *shrugs*
The blood work came back yesterday and apparently none, that's right NONE, of my tests are normal. So now I have to go to a hematologist. GREAT, just what I wanted, I get to see another doctor. Blah.

Also yesterday Mother Nature remembered that she hates me so she sent a horrible torrential downpour my way. It took me three hours to drive the 47 miles from my office to my home...and you have to understand I live in the country, so 47 miles should take roughly 40 minutes and 52 seconds (unless of course you have to slow down to avoid deer, cows, or tractors). I don't have to contend with traffic jams of the "normal" variety. I arrive home to a frantic gay husband, who is trying desperately to keep water from flooding the downstairs of our home. He did a pretty damn good job...I am soooo glad that the new flooring we put down over the summer didn't get ruined. Our garage was not quite so lucky though.

I did get a nice surprise in the mail on Wednesday, my wonderful cousin (PsychoHoseBeast) sent me a book. She's the bestest most goodest cousin in the world! I can't wait to start reading it this weekend.

I am really hoping for a nice, peaceful, restful weekend. I wish you all a safe and Happy Halloween!

How many frequent flyer miles do I get for flying by the seat of my pants?

2009-10-22T12:57:00.000-06:00

Tomorrow morning I will be headed towards Grand Prairie to meet up with some friends and head to the Freaker's Ball. I'm so freakin' excited I can barely contain myself! I fully intend on drinking a ridiculous amount of alcohol, smoking too many cigarettes, acting irresponsibly, and just rocking out with my....well just rocking out.

I haven't exactly figured out what I'm gonna do on Saturday. I have several friends in the Dallas area that I haven't seen in way too long. BUT a friend of mine in the Houston area has requested that I help her build/decorate a beer pong/flip cup table (I can be crafty when the end result is a drinking game). AND it's also homecoming at the university that I used to work for, so I was thinking about swinging by there and seeing some of my former coworkers...then I could go to Duck Dash (which of course I adore).

I suck at making decisions. *sigh* I suppose I'm gonna pull a ~~Julia Roberts~~ Vivian Ward and just fly by the seat of my pants.

*Quack Quack*

Lists are good...and bad...and ugly

2009-10-21T11:21:00.001-06:00

I've attempted a couple of times to write a post, and I seem to just ramble incoherently...so today you get lists...

The Good:

- A long lost friend came to visit me Monday. I'm still recovering.

- Someone brought doughnuts to work today...and there were the cake ones that aren't all crazy sweet.

- I am super excited that I get to go see Alice in Chains with a ~~long lost~~ dear friend of mine on Friday.

- I am super excited that I have the whole day off work Friday. Three day weekends are awesome.

- I just realized that there's a Facebook app upgrade for BlackBerry that fixed my issues with iPhone peeps.

The Bad:

- I just used 30 minutes of my life in an attempt to explain the difference between a row and a column to a coworker. *slaps forehead in frustration*

- Accidentally calling people when you're having sex is embarrassing. When it's a coworker it's absolutely mortifying. Thanks coworkers who have given me hell all week!

- On part of my day off on Friday I have to go to the Dept of Transportation to get a new ID...icky

- ~~I can't post comments to the Facebook statuses of iPhone users? What the fudgesicle? iPhone gets an app upgrade and my Facebook world has to fall apart? Not cool.~~

The Ugly:

- All of the news coverage of the Heene family is getting on my last nerve. A hoax used as a publicity stunt is rewarded with publicity. Sheesh.

Really?

2009-10-13T09:25:00.000-06:00

Today I have a rant. I was going to rant on Sunday, but was too pissed off. Then I was going to rant yesterday, but decided I wanted to think about the topic just a little more. But the more I think about it, the more confused and angry I get.

This past Saturday night my roommate invited this new guy over to hang out, play some games, have a few drinks. Cool. We've been wanting to meet some people in the area. Well this guy shows up and seemed nice enough at first, but it really didn't take long for him to completely get on my nerves.

The first sign that we wouldn't get along was the seemingly endless racist jokes. Seriously, if you have to preface your "joke" with a comment like, "I'm not racist but....", then it's almost guaranteed that you're about to make a racist comment that's going to piss me off. Also, just because you dated a black woman once doesn't prove to me that you aren't racist. I mean I dated men once, does that make me straight? Umm, no.

The next sign that we're not going to BFF's has to do with my name. Personally I'm not very good with names either, so it didn't bother me at first when he called me by the wrong name.  So I feel he should NOT get all huffy with me when I don't pronounce his name incorrectly.  His name is Derrick, I'm sorry that I said Derrick and not Derrick. I apologize that I didn't properly stress the last syllable of his name *rolls eyes*...that being said, he should understand my considerable frustration when he called me Ashley, Amanda, Sarah, Megan, and whatever other names were inserted other than my actual name. I think he started to notice that I was getting annoyed so rather than even make an attempt at remember my name he started referring to me as "the lesbian" or "bitch". Not cool.

This brings me to another point. The roomie and I refer to each other by bitch, hoe, hooker...the list goes on and on. BUT that is different, he's my best friend, we know each other very well...we know (usually) what's ok and what isn't ok. And we know that it's all in fun. I met this person like 2 hrs prior and he thinks he is on the same level as my best friend? Really? Really?

So the racist jokes and the name thing were annoying.  And now another friend of ours (who happens to be black) comes over.  Derrick at one point won a round of some card game we were playing and literally said, "white power!". And then later he asked, "where's your hue challenged friend, it's his turn". I thought my jaw was going to fall off of my face. Is this guy fucking serious?!?

By this point I had consumed a few alcoholic beverages and was having a very difficult time holding my tongue. I decided it was probably a really good time to go outside and have a cigarette. My roommate could tell I was upset so he came outside to check on me. I made it clear that I didn't like this guy and that I would prefer if he was asked to leave. Did that happen? No. What did I do? I was rude to him, made him look foolish a few times, threatened to throw a shot glass at him once (I'm almost positive I wouldn't actually throw a shot glass at another human being), then I finally became frustrated to the point that I decided to remove myself from the situation and go to bed.

David (black friend) actually had fun hanging out with this guy, as did my roommate and his boyfriend.  I could not understand why I was the only one who was offended. And honestly I don't know exactly what I should have done.  But I damn sure should've told the guy that I was offended instead of just being passive aggressive about the whole situation.  It makes me sad that there is so much hate and anger floating around and rather than try to fix it, I perpetuated it. Alcohol, you are not always my friend. The next time I encounter this guy I think I need to have a civilized chat with him about everything that happened, and how I feel about it.

Input and advice would be greatly appreciated.

I like to think outside the bun

2009-10-12T14:10:00.000-06:00

So when my Taco Bell Border Sauce packet asked, "Will you marry me?", I seriously considered saying yes.

Sorry, for the truly craptastic photo...the camera on my phone and I do not get along so well.

Ducky 0 - Insects 2

2009-10-10T11:31:00.003-06:00

Ok, so I told you about the cricket incident...but I totally forgot to tell the bee story. The other day (I can't remember which one, but it was definitely this week) I was outside my office smoking with a coworker, and I was stung by a bee. This was a completely unprovoked attack...again I was just minding my own business and nature turned on me. I kinda feel like that guy in that movie that kept getting attacked by harmless cutesy creatures. Failure to Launch...I think. But anyway, that's not really the point. I was just sitting there chatting with my coworker and I felt a little tickle on my neck. I thought it was the tag on my shirt...so i reached back and adjusted the tag, all is well in my world now. So I thought. A few moments later I feel another tickling sensation further down my back. I immediately jumped up and was pulling at the back of my shirt, because of course I thought a spider was attacking me. This really only succeeded in startling the bee in my shirt, and I was promptly stung. OUCHY! So now I have this huge itchy red welt on my back. I don't like it.

Instead of my normal perfume I think I'm just going to douse myself in Raid everyday.

Rubber Ducky, You're Flippin' HUGE

2009-10-09T10:52:00.003-06:00

I ran across this project by Dutch artist Florentijn Hofman...and my jaw dropped. This cute ~~little~~ humongous ducky has travelled to Japan, Europe, and Brazil...I'm hoping for a stop in the U.S. I would be willing to make quite a roadtrip to see this...

Like a duck to water my ass

2009-10-07T09:40:00.003-06:00

This post is long overdue...because I procrastinate and don't download pics from my camera in a timely fashion. So, I'm rewinding and going to revisit the beginning of September.

Labor Day Weekend for me was spent with family that I haven't seen in way too long. My younger brother, his wife, and two of their kiddos drove in from Georgia to spend the weekend. My brother brought his boat with him (only my baby brother would think it was a good idea to haul a boat from Georgia to Texas), his wakeboards, and his "Little Precious" charm. He convinced me, his "senior citizen" sister, to attempt wakeboarding. I seriously can't say no him....cute little bastard. Anyway, he seems to be good at everything he does and wakeboarding is no exception. I had trouble timing the camera with his tricks, but I did manage to get a picture or two of him showing off...

My sister-in-law, who I was meeting for the first time, was completely awesome! I had such a great time getting to know her and my nephews. She is a hairstylist, and she was kind enough to give me a new 'do. As payment she forced me to ride on the tube thingy with her, and much to my delight I did not die. Unfortunately nobody got a photo of that little adventure. But here's a pic of my newest sister wakeboarding (she was thrilled I got a pic because this was the first time she had gotten up)...

Next it was my turn to attempt wakeboarding. I didn't do so well...

I guess you can lead a duck to water, but you can't make it a pro wakeboarder.

Birthday Wish

2009-09-28T13:02:00.001-06:00

OMG, I have issues...and that's an understatement. I can't figure out why but I always seem to fall for straight women. Of course this generally does not end well for me. Here's an example:

I had been dating this woman for the past couple of months who identified as being straight. I'm not even joking. Logic would dictate that she's either a lesbian or bi-sexual or bi-curious at the least...but nope, she says she's straight. Ok, fine. Who am I to argue? I'm thinking this really should have been a red flag that our relationship wasn't going to work out. Did I see the red flag? Of course I did. Did I care? Of course I didn't. Well, I suppose I did care, but I suppose I'm also a hopeless romantic (or idiot) and I really thought that love would conquer all and we might just live happily ever after. Ok, so maybe I am an idiot. Whatever. Needless to say we didn't live happily ever after. She seems perfectly ok with this, but I am heartbroken. Again.
Ok, I told you that story so I could tell you this story. Late last week Straight Girl sent me a text message asking what my plans were for Saturday. I told her that I didn't have any plans. She then asked me if she could come over and spend the day with me because even though we are no longer dating she really wanted to give me my birthday gifts. I was ecstatic....because I'm an idiot.
So anyway, Saturday rolls around and she shows up at my door a little before noon. Things were going smoothly, she seemed as happy to see me as I was to see her. Almost immediately she made me open my gifts because she wanted to go to a nearby town to grab some lunch and wander around some of the antique stores and whatnot. Her gifts were so thoughtful and sweet that I literally cried...and I don't cry often. We had lunch at this cute little cafe that was adorably perfect. Walked around downtown, and really just had a fabulous afternoon. Then we go back to my place. I was super excited about a movie that she had bought me (one of my childhood favorites that I hadn't seen in years and couldn't find anywhere), and she said she would like to stay and watch it with me. Great! So there was cuddling and movie watching. After the movie she said she should be headed home, so she gathered up her stuff and I walked her outside.
At this point I made an attempt at a goodnight kiss...because I'm an idiot. This was not well received. It was promptly stated that we weren't getting back together. I was confused, I was embarrassed, and I was a little sad. She left and that left me wondering what the hell had just happened. We texted back and forth a bit, but I'm still just as confused as ever. Apparently, she wanted me to have a nice birthday (which was sweet), but in an effort to make that happen she really led me on (not so sweet). In summary, birthday #32 is really close to the best birthday I've ever had...but it's also really close to being one of the worst.

When I blow out my birthday candles tonight I think I am going to wish that straight women everywhere will refrain from hitting on me....because I am just idiotic enough to try to date them.

I really do know the difference between want and need

2009-09-25T14:56:00.001-06:00

Well, I guess I kinda sorta forgot I had a blog there for a little while. But no worries, life has been rather dull so you haven't missed out on too much.

OH, I read an article at Gizmodo earlier this week about a potentially freakin' awesome "booklet" computer called the Courier from Microsoft.

(photo courtesy of Gizmodo)

If this is true and the Courier makes it to production then I seriously ~~want~~ need one. NEED. This would be exactly perfect for all of the little projects that I have in mind, but never seem to come to fruition...mostly because I get frustrated and overwhelmed. Ahh, I can just imagine everything I would accomplish. I mean, holy grapenuts, this is the answer to my scattered randomness. I don't want to count my ducklings before they hatch, so please please puh-lease Microsoft don't let me down!

She flipped me off, I fell in love

2009-09-16T10:24:00.001-06:00

So, my drive to work is normally long and boring. Not so this morning. I was almost to work, almost there when I encountered one of the most beautiful (and angry) women I think I have ever seen in my entire life. She obviously found me attractive as well because she REALLY wanted to be in my lane. It's been quite awhile since my high school physics class and some of the details are a bit fuzzy, but I was under the impression that two objects of relatively equal mass just cannot occupy the same exact same space at the same exact time...stupid me. [Sorry I didn't pay better attention in class Mrs. F] Since I'm obviously a little dense, subtle hints such as turn signals really help me out. Granted, with her perfected manicured nails (well the one I saw when she flipped me off was perfected manicured, I assume the rest were as well) the lever for the turn signal is probably pretty perilous. *sigh* If only I were psychic I would have known her intention, but I have no supernatural abilities and she was obviously disappointed in me. When she rolled her window down and proceeded to shout (in quite an angelic voice) a stream of obscenities that would make a sailor blush, I knew she was the one. Her out of state license plate concerned me, could we really make a long distance relationship work? Thank goodness we were stopped at a traffic light so this endearing moment could stretch on for a few moments more. She ended her tirade with, "Where's the southern hospitality you redneck Texan bitch?". Enchanting, but this was the point in which our passionate romance started to fizzle out.

Sweetheart, I have the ability to charm the pants right off of you, I have southern hospitality flowing out of my ears. I could twist you around my little finger so fast it would make your head spin. But southern hospitality doesn't extend so far as to allow you to drive your car into mine without signaling, I'm almost certain of it. And darlin' you haven't the slightest clue as to what a redneck is. I do apologize for not letting you over but honestly I didn't see you, as I tried to tell you while you continued to scream epithets and make obscene finger gestures.

Eventhough we broke-up before the light turned green, I still care about you and your well being. I know you're someone's daughter or sister or cousin, and there has to be someone at home who loves you and wants you to get to and from your travels safely. Perhaps starting fights in traffic with random strangers isn't the best way to assure your safe passage. Just a thought.

That's A Load Off My Mind

2009-09-10T10:59:00.002-06:00

Arrest made in Cedar Rapids duck slaying

Associated Press
4:45 p.m. CDT, September 9, 2009

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa - An arrest has been made in the slaying of 50 ducks at a children's zoo in Cedar Rapids.
Nineteen-year-old Zachary Kanellis, of Cedar Rapids, was arrested Wednesday and charged with second-degree criminal mischief and livestock abuse.
The charges are related to the June 25, 2008 discovery of 50 ducks found dead at the Bever Park Children's Zoo. Workers arrived at work to find locks on the building and the cages inside had been broken.
Police say the ducks had been stoned to death. Forty-five other ducks were unharmed.
A tip to the Cedar Rapids Crimestoppers program led to the arrest.
The investigation is continuing.

OMG! Seriously, what is wrong with people? A teenager stones 50 ducks to death?!? Thank goodness the little hoodlum was arrested. I know that I, along with the rest of the duck community, can sleep a little easier now.

I Think I'll Start Watching American Idol Again

2009-09-10T10:07:00.002-06:00

So, Paula's out and Ellen's in. Honestly, I'm thrilled, I think Ellen has a lot to bring to the American Idol table. In my opinion she is completely flippin' hilarious...and not in the incoherent batshit crazy way that made Paula funny.

There are a lot of folks out there who feel this is a bad idea. I keep hearing this whining about how she has no musical background and such. Um, neither do I, but they damn sure let me text in my vote every week (or they would if I felt so inclined). I think it'll be refreshing to have someone who isn't in the music industry to have a voice on the show. To paraphrase what Ellen said, "Hopefully, I'm the people's point of view because I'm just like you...I'm not looking at it in a critical way from the producer's mind. I'm looking at it as a person who is going to buy the music and is going to relate to that person.".

In recent years I have been disappointed with various aspects of Idol, but now I am actually excited for the new season to begin. Best of luck Ellen!

Ducky Out.

You Owe Me....BIG

2009-09-04T11:13:00.001-06:00

So here's what happened: I'm sitting at my desk, minding my own business and just working away when I feel something tickling my leg. It was a strange sort of feeling, kinda like something was crawling on me. I scratched absently at my leg and didn't really think much about it. I'll be honest here, it had been a few days since the last time I had shaved my legs, and I thought there was some possible leg hair/jeans friction going on. But then I felt it again, a little higher up my leg and this time it definitely felt like something crawling on me. I had a moment of panic, felt my leg, and YES there was something crawling on my leg...INSIDE MY PANTS!!! I didn't really have time to consider my options, at that point I was convinced that some posionous psychotic spider was crawling up my leg...and I am truly terrified of spiders. Once the notion of having a spider in my pants fully formed in my brain, the panic intensified exponentially. I didn't know what to do. The only thing that seemed logical to me at that moment was to get the hell OUT of my pants and somehow remove the horrible arachnid of death and destruction. At this point the hopping around and frantic stripping begins...well, really it was only half stripping. Anyway, so I'm standing in my cubicle with my jeans around my knees and come face to face not with the dreaded spider of doom, but a harmless little cricket. He looked just as scared and confused as I felt.

Holy cricket in my pants Batman! How does this shit happen to me?

Needless to say, after the initial terror and adrenaline drained from my system I felt quite ridiculous and quickly redressed. Thank goodness my cubicle has high walls. And for the first time since the recession started, I was actually thankful that some of my former coworkers had been laid off. In the end I didn't die, wasn't injured, and most importantly nobody witnessed these antics.

Oh, the cricket was released back into the wild. Eventhough he scared the ever loving hell out of me, I couldn't bring myself to harm him. You owe me, buddy!

Smokin'

2009-09-03T11:01:00.002-06:00

My roommate/gay husband has decided to take drastic measures and start taking the little blue pill, you know Chantix. He has decided to quit smoking. He also feels that I should quit smoking....crazy boy. I have cut back on my smoking a lot though. I used to average about a pack a day during the week, and probably close to two packs a day on weekends. I now smoke about a pack of cigarettes throughout the week, and usually one more on the weekend. I feel that going from around eight packs a week to two is quite an accomplishment. I'm happy with that. This isn't about me though...our gay hero is not happy with merely cutting back; he is determined to quit smoking completely. That's fine if he wants to be a non-smoker. Who am I to judge? But anyway back to this miracle cure, Chantix. When my precious came home one day and told me about said drug I was like, hmm cool beans. I didn't really know a lot about it, had heard people mention it, but wasn't hip to all the lovely side effects, so I did some reading...

Important Safety Information (taken directly from the Chantix website)

Some people have had changes in behavior, hostility, agitation, depressed mood, suicidal thoughts or actions while using CHANTIX to help them quit smoking. Some people had these symptoms when they began taking CHANTIX, and others developed them after several weeks of treatment or after stopping CHANTIX. If you, your family, or caregiver notice agitation, hostility, depression, or changes in behavior, thinking, or mood that are not typical for you, or you develop suicidal thoughts or actions, anxiety, panic, aggression, anger, mania, abnormal sensations, hallucinations, paranoia, or confusion, stop taking CHANTIX and call your doctor right away. Also tell your doctor about any history of depression or other mental health problems before taking CHANTIX, as these symptoms may worsen while taking CHANTIX.

Some people can have serious skin reactions while taking CHANTIX, some of which can become life-threatening. These can include rash, swelling, redness, and peeling of the skin. Some people can have allergic reactions to CHANTIX, some of which can be life-threatening and include: swelling of the face, mouth, and throat that can cause trouble breathing. If you have these symptoms or have a rash with peeling skin or blisters in your mouth, stop taking CHANTIX and get medical attention right away.

The most common side effects include nausea (30%), sleep problems, constipation, gas, and/or vomiting. If you have side effects that bother you or don’t go away, tell your doctor.

You may have trouble sleeping, vivid, unusual, or strange dreams while taking CHANTIX. Use caution driving or operating machinery until you know how CHANTIX may affect you.

CHANTIX should not be taken with other quit-smoking products. You may need a lower dose of CHANTIX if you have kidney problems or get dialysis.

Before starting CHANTIX, tell your doctor if you are pregnant, plan to become pregnant, or if you take insulin, asthma medicines, or blood thinners. Medicines like these may work differently when you quit smoking.

CHANTIX is a prescription medicine to help adults 18 and over stop smoking. You may benefit from quit-smoking support programs and/or counseling during your quit attempt. It’s possible that you might slip-up and smoke while taking CHANTIX. If you do, you can stay on CHANTIX and keep trying to quit.

Ok, so if you read through all that, then you're probably saying the same thing I did "holyeffingsh*t". It always amuses me to see the side effects all these wonderful new pills they're coming out with. It's like they're saying "what you're doing can kill you, take this pill so you can stop, but please be aware that this pill could kill you". It BAFFLES me.

And on a related note, I saw a Chantix commercial on TV last night that made me laugh (which is the real reason for this blog). The commercial is centered around this soccer mom looking lady that's just sitting on her couch talking about how she used Chantix and how great it is and it helped her to quit smoking, blah blah blah. She tells her little story and at the end she says, "stopping smoking cigarettes is wonderful, the best thing that ever happened, the best thing I have ever done besides my husband, and dogs, and family....” Soooooo, since my mind occasionally (ok, frequently) slips into the gutter, I snickered like a teenage boy and was like "omg did she just say she did her husband, dogs, and family? dirty whore, quitting smoking is the least of your concerns. *giggle giggle*". I know I know I'm a sick twisted sorry excuse for a human. What can I say; I'm amused easily and by strange and possibly inappropriate things.

Now I think I'll go out for a smoke.

Whoa Mama

2009-09-02T12:26:00.002-06:00

The Duggar baby making factory is running full steam ahead. I've been reading that Michelle Duggar, mother of 18 and soon to be grandmother, is preggo once again.

To quote Stewie Griffin, "So, is there any tread left on the tires? Or at this point would it be like throwing a hot dog down a hallway?". My uterus hurts just thinking about giving birth to 19 kids. I mean really, how do you come back from that? I kinda feel the need to say a little prayer for this poor woman's hoohah (this stunning use of medical terminology is one of the many reasons I didn't go to med school).

Some would argue that this event in no way, shape, or form affects my life so my opinion is irrelevant. Ahh, but I feel that when they put their lives on display in the form of a reality television show then I have the right to voice my views. I have actually watched a few episodes of their show...I'm a reality show addict and there was a marathon on TLC, I got sucked in one Saturday. According to what I picked up from the show and everything I've read thus far this family is living completely debt-free (which I find absolutely amazing, kudos for that Duggar family). All of the children were/are home schooled. They are part of a very conservative Christian movement known as Quiverfull, which teaches that children should be received eagerly as blessings from God...and that birth control is a big no-no. Wow, they really took that "be fruitful and multiply" passage literally. Ok, so that's just a really quick, very basic rundown.

Now, how do I personally feel about this? My logical side would say to each their own. I won't be playing on the Quiverfull softball team anytime soon though, that's for sure. However, I do feel that they have the right to believe how they choose to. That being said I really don't agree with their teachings and the way they live their life. I tend to lean a little more toward the liberal side of things. I don't agree with the way they raise their kids...it seems to me the younger children are pawned off on the older ones to take care of. I don't feel that when you have 19 children you can truly give each child the individual attention they need and deserve...I can't fathom how they could possibly grow up to be well adjusted people. I have issues with homeschooling in instances where it seems to be a tool to isolate children from society. The Duggar family also supports several pro-family, pro-marriage (anti-gay) organizations such as Focus on the Family (don't even get me started on Focus on the Family). So, I guess the Duggar's and I will just have to agree to disagree. But I do sincerely hope for the health and safety of mom and baby through the pregnancy and birth.

Hugs for Gmail

2009-09-01T15:21:00.002-06:00

So there's a Gmail outage today....don't worry Gmail, I still love you. I have been reading lots of articles from folks who are none too happy with the service though. Today is the first time I've experienced an outage, and I've been a Gmail user for years. But, I am still receiving my emails on my BlackBerry, so I haven't been completely cut off from the world like some have. I don't see why some people are so upset though, I mean stuff breaks, I'm sure they're doing their best to fix it. I say calm down, chill out, go outside and get some fresh air....or like me, you could go out and smoke a cigarette. Anyway, what I'm basically saying is give the guys and gals at Google a break, on the whole I think Google and the services they offer are pretty flippin' great (and pretty flippin' free).

just sayin'

Who, What, Why

2009-09-01T09:28:00.003-06:00

First, I suppose I should introduce myself...Hi there, I'm R.H. Ducky, pleased to make your acquaintance. Is my name really R.H. Ducky? Probably not.

So, I guess that leads us to a few questions. Why create a blog, why not use your real name, why call it DuckSoup, what's this blog about...? The questions really are endless. I've asked myself these, and many other questions. Here's what I've come up with so far:

Why create a blog? Honestly, it wasn't my idea. I blame my cousin, we'll call her PsychoHoseBeast, she has pushed and prodded and begged and pleaded for me to start a blog. For some unknown reason she feels that I should share my thoughts with the world. I personally find this scary, for the world I mean. But what the heck, I'll give it a shot.

Why not use your real name? To be frank, that's not my real name either by the way, I like the anonymity. There are often things that I want to say that I feel obligated to keep to myself out of fear of embarrassing/upsetting/offending my family or friends. That being said, not every random thought that passes through my brain is embarrassing/upsetting/offensive, but it does happen.

Why call your blog DuckSoup? I struggled to think of a name for my blog. I stressed out about it a lot. I stress out about a lot of things a lot, but that's beside the point. So anyway, obviously I love duckies and I wanted to somehow incorporate that into the title. I played around with many different combinations, and finally settled on tacking soup to it. The name appeals to me, and this is my blog, so there. Actually, there is a more in depth answer, maybe I'll get around to explaining that one of these days.

What is this blog about? Excellent question, you'll probably figure that one out before I do. I do not have a set plan for this blog. I wanted to have a plan, I tried to come up with a plan, but to no avail. Then I decided it was just time to take action or I would never get this started. I'm excellent at procrastination.

Oh and just a warning, I do sometimes use foul language, though I really am attempting to clean up my potty mouth. Sometimes I would rather not bother with the shift key, I will probably frequently misuse punctuation marks, most likely will spell things incorrectly, and I'm not always the most grammatically correct human being on the planet. I am fully aware that I am not the greatest writer but who knows, maybe I do have something worthwhile to say.

So, welcome to my little corner of the blogosphere, I hope you'll come back again soon.