Meow Meow Musical Meow

I'm tired of being embarrassed when I begin a conversation with "So I was singing a song to my cat the other night..." Singing is a perfectly normal expression of feelings!

This is what I'll tell my grandkids it was like to sing to my cat

And this is what I envision in my head, my greatest cat-as-entertainer dream

But more often than not it looks like this

I'm Free to be Me

Don't lie. You sometimes wish you could come to work looking like this.

Happy Happy Joy Joy!

I'm taking a break from my homework to express how happy I am! Maybe I love accounting. Maybe I love sitting at my desk with my laptop, making insurance adjustments. Maybe I love sipping coffee while I make insurance and salary adjustments. Or maybe, just maybe, I love sitting at my desk, doing accounting and making insurance adjustment, sipping coffee...and wearing my Snuggie. I'm not sure, I'll have to experiment and isolate the happiness quotient in this equation. But I think everyone should make a cash transaction, acquire a Snuggie as an asset, and watch your owner's equity (or maybe just your happiness) grow.

Snuggie up baby!

Purge

In my household, the new year officially starts AFTER my birthday, so any failed resolutions are moot. Today is Day One and I'm kicking some booty!

Usually in January I get the urge to purge. My pantry is bursting with Trader Joe items bought en masse. I ran out of hangers for the clothes I have in 3 (admittedly VERY tiny) closets. My iPod is filling up with music I don't listen to and at last count...I have 6 sets of dishes. Six.

Wait, 7. Seven.

Not all complete sets but seven sets of dinner plates.

Part of the purging is evaluating what's important and making the hard decisions about what's useful and what brings me joy. What becomes yet another thing to move to the side when I need or want the important thing. What gets in my way from enjoying the things I already have.

Cheers to a January and a new year filled with simple abundance.

Sports are Fun

Bowling league started this week. Ten-week charity league. I take it seriously

Typical

Last night was the first night of a graduate class that's going to suck my will to live. I'm consulting a lawyer because I'm pretty sure that quizzes on Friday NIGHTS and tests on Saturday NIGHTS are illegal. Anyway...that's not the point of the story.

I'll set the scene: basement classroom, about 9 students and 1 professor. The prof has a thick accent and is quickly going through the logistics of the online class, showing us the websites we'll need, talking about his policies, and asking for questions. He's moving quickly because he knows a lot of us want to get home and watch the football game.

Here's the exchange that I THOUGHT happened:

Prof: Questions? Questions? Questions?

(Silence)

Prof: If you don't have any questions it either means that I'm damn good or that you want to go home. (Looks directly at me) Which is it?

Me: You're DAMN good.

Prof: (Silence. Looks to another person) You? Do you have any questions?

When I got home and thought about it, here's the exchange as I suspect it ACTUALLY happened:

Prof: Questions? Questions? Questions?
(Silence)
Prof: If you don't have any questions it either means that I'm that good or that you want to go home. (Looks directly at me) Which is it?
Me: You're DAMN good.

Prof: (Silence)

I'm a Fake Baker

Being at home after surgery and then trapped in the house because of a snow storm, I got really REALLY restless. So instead of doing something productive like gather the information I'll need for my income taxes....clean the house....reorganize the basement....unpack from Christmas....I decided to go on a mission to use up these ridiculous baking mixes I've been moving from house to house for years. Here's the scorecard:

• Organic soft pretzels: C (not as good as the homemade ones I've made in the past but not terrible.)
• Pumpkin scones: D (even with icing they were like eating a can of pumpkin puree. Blah!)
• Trader Joe's gingerbread: A++! Outstanding! Like a gingery brownie! I wanted to hug them, I loved them so much.

Before the week's end I'm going to use up the Trader Joe's green tea muffins. I'm dubious...they sound like hippie muffins.

My Sunconscious Needs a Shut Up Button

I had an outpatient surgical procedure yesterday. I am all right and everything's fine. It was my first surgical experience, actually my first hospital experience. I had been downplaying it in my mind for weeks so when we showed up at 5:30am and the whole process started, I was a little overwhelmed.

This was serious business.

Everyone was really nice. ESPECIALLY the nurse who sat next to my bed when I was in recovery while the anesthesia wore off. I remember through the fog, as I was waking up, that I was talking. For the sake of privacy...let's say I was talking about unicorns. So I knew I was talking about unicorns but it was like I was in a hotel room, listening to someone through the wall talk about unicorns. But it was me. As I gradually became more coherent I asked the nurse if I was talking about unicorns. She said I was. I asked her what I said about unicorns. She chuckled and recounted to me what I said.

I wanted to die. Thankfully, all she said was that our subconscious is a funny thing. Yes it is.

Your Mom Wears a Hat

Ute Mountain wears a hat

New and Improved

2011.

Time flies, huh?

Ahhhhhhhh

So the year ended with a major road trip. It was the longest I've been away from the house, ever. 10 days. I was half expecting to walk in the front door and find raccoons nesting in the couches. (For the record--no raccoons.) The neighbors fence didn't fall over while I was gone so that's a good start to the new year, right?

New Mexico and Colorado were amazing. The mental pictures I took will never compare to the actual pictures...when I get my REAL film developed in about 6 months. The stars, the mountains, the landscape--beautiful. The food--to die for. The travelling companion--awesome. The giant chunk of ice that smashed up our radiator--not so awesome. The brother and sister in law who helped us make phone calls and switch out rental cars--pretty awesome. The mom who took care of Roni for 5 days and drove to Omaha to give her back, reluctantly--really awesome. Celebrating New Year's Eve with George Clooney, exhasuted--wonderful.

It's back to reality. Which, after some reflection...isn't that bad.