Monday, December 31, 2007

 Stay Gold Ponyboy

Last week I was thinking about this movie and then this past weekend it was on.

When we were in HS, this was THE movie we waited with baited breath for its release. Every good looking actor from the time pretty much was in it, as well as it being a super book that we all LOVED.

This is one of the few movies that exist out in the world that I think actually do the book justice. It stayed true to the story, at the moment I can't think of any part where it strayed, although I am sure there are some parts.

It's been many years since I've seen the movie or read the book, but I could still quote along with it as it was on almost every line. Sad but true.

And I still misted up at the end when Ralph Macchio uttered those words to C Thomas Howell..."Stay Gold, Ponyboy...Stay Gold"

Posted by Acinom @ 2:54 PM :: (0) comments

Monday, December 24, 2007

 Chrismas Adam and a visit from an Elf

I meant to post this yesterday, but never got around to it, whoops!

Every since we were little kids, my sister and I started referring to December 23rd as Christmas Adam. We figured Adam came before Ever, so it just made sense. Over the years we have shared this with tons of people and now there are lots of people out there calling that date Christmas Adam. I think that's cool that we're trend setters :)

So I was a little stressed about how to spend Christmas this year. I wanted to go to my best friend's beach house here in NC and spend it with their family. Those are the girls I call my nieces and love to pieces. I mean really, is Christmas anything special without kids? I don't think so. I want to see the excitement Christmas Eve, when they can't get to sleep because they don't want to miss Santa, but are afraid he won't come if they don't sleep...

I really want to see their faces on Christmas morning after Santa's brought his load on his sleigh.

I want the love and hugs that only they can give.

But money is tight, and gas is expensive. I was stressed trying to decide what to do. I just couldn't see spending 2 tanks of gas when I have so little left in my bank account. I was crushed, but I was pretty sure I was going to have to tell my friend that I couldn't make it.

And then I was talking to an elf. She asked me how I was spending my holiday and I told her my dilemma. I was simply lamenting how I thought I couldn't justify spending that money on gas, so I was thinking I had to beg off. I wasn't trying to hint or even complaining really, I was just resigned to this fact.

And then the next day I got a text message from this elf- look under your door.

I did, and there was gas gift card.

I cried. The elf could have said she'd loan me the money, but she knew that I wouldn't take it. She knew that if she gave it to me in the form of a gas card that I had to honor her wishes to make my wish come true.

I am so blessed to have people in my life who care about me like this. I hope that elf knows how much I appreciate what she did for me. I hope that someday I can give her a gift as thoughtful and special and meaningful as this was for me.

I hope she knows that because of her, I will be having a Merry Christmas. and I hope that this is the Merriest of Christmases for all those that I care about, and that Santa brings everyone love and peace and happiness and joy.

Posted by Acinom @ 10:45 AM :: (1) comments

Saturday, December 22, 2007

 Are you a good witch, or a bad?



I have seen Wizard of Oz at least 84,000 times in my life.

I've had it on tonight while I'm doing some other stuff and I laughed at a scene that I never before noticed as being funny...

Glinda asks Dorothy if she's a good witch or a bad... Dorothy responds that witches are ugly. Glinda shares that only bad witches are ugly... and then asks her again if she's a good witch, or a bad!

In other words-- you're kinda ugly, but not heinous, so what kind of witch are you?

Hee. Dorothy fortunately didn't pick up on the backhanded insult, which I think is a good thing or Glinda may have left Dorothy to rot in Oz if she had sassed back.

Oh and get this- my neighbor has never seen this movie. How is that possible? She was scared of it as a child, but never moved past that. When we were decorating my tree she was looking at the Miss Gulch ornament and had to ask me what it was. Wow.




Posted by Acinom @ 10:01 PM :: (1) comments

Thursday, December 20, 2007

 Another 100

I've been putting this post off a few days because it's my 200th and so I feel somewhat compelled to do another 100.

Unfortunately, I've been having trouble getting inspired but I feel like I need to just try, because otherwise it'll be way too long before I post again. So here goes...

  1. I have had this blog for 17 months.
  2. This is my 200th post.
  3. That means I averaged out to post almost 12 times per month.
  4. I wish I were more motivated to post more regularly.
  5. I wish I were more motivated to do a lot of things.
  6. Sometimes, I am very lazy and it annoys me.
  7. Procrastinating is an art I excel at.
  8. In 8th grade I made a giant paper mache pencil that won the blue ribbon at some art contest thing.
  9. My mom is slowly purging crap stored up in her attic and recently pitched said pencil. It made me sad.
  10. I have no desire to have that pencil here though.
  11. I also recently received a big ol storage bin that had been up there full of random memories.
  12. I laughed a LOT looking through it all.
  13. Now I don't know what to do with any of it.
  14. How can a person throw out a stuffed animal they had since they were 6 without guilt?
  15. I still sleep with a teddy bear every night.
  16. I've mentioned him before here, and his picture is posted with his friend, Eager Beaver.
  17. My bear travels with me and likes to send his beaver friend postcards.
  18. Eager also sends post cards to my bear.
  19. I often wonder when I get these what the postal carrier thinks when they see something addressed to "Oatmeal" and signed by a Beaver.
  20. I hope that they appreciate it.
  21. I am most likely going to be traveling soon for work.
  22. Oatster will come with me.
  23. There is a scary possibility that I will be living in Montana for 13 weeks.
  24. I have never been to Big Sky country before.
  25. I'm not sure I want to live there through a winter.
  26. I can't imagine anything worse than Vermont in the winter though.
  27. Did I ever mention that I HATED living in Vermont? Yeah, I know I did, but it's worth repeating.
  28. I currently have on that "Clash of the Choirs" pathetic excuse for reality tv.
  29. I am hoping the writer's strike ends soon!
  30. I don't think Patty LaBelle has that nice of a voice.
  31. She butchered "Somewhere over the Rainbow" IMO.
  32. Wizard of Oz is one of my all time favorite movies.
  33. Because of this, everyone tends to give me WoO stuff.
  34. I have enough WoO ornaments on my Christmas tree to do a theme tree.
  35. I didn't do a theme tree though because I have guilt if I don't use all of my ornaments.
  36. My mom and sis and I have been giving each other ornaments every year since we were kids.
  37. I have more ornaments than my tree can hold, but they make me happy!
  38. This year I decorated my tree with my neighbor.
  39. And then the next weekend we decorated her tree.
  40. I love that neighbor.
  41. Often she and I have religious/spiritual discussions.
  42. I love that I can do that with her without it turning ugly like it could with other people.
  43. I was raised Catholic.
  44. I don't go to church really anymore.
  45. I did go for Easter.
  46. I'll probably go for Christmas.
  47. I don't agree with a lot of the doctrine.
  48. But I do have a personal relationship with God.
  49. IMO, that's what's more important than religion.
  50. I'm halfway done, which is good because I'm stuck right now.
  51. I just reread my first 100 for inspiration.
  52. It didn't really help much, but that might be because I am tired.
  53. Speaking of tired, I have narcolepsy.
  54. I was diagnosed 7 years ago, but I believe that the symptoms started when I was in High School.
  55. I did my sleep study and MSLT at Johns Hopkin's.
  56. I am glad that I was diagnosed there because it carries a lot of weight with new doctors.
  57. I cheated during my MSLT and napped in between naps.
  58. I wonder how the results would have been if they knew that!
  59. Even without them knowing that, they still ended the test early because I was so screamingly obviously narcoleptic.
  60. So maybe they knew...but I have a copy of the 4 page report and it's not mentioned.
  61. I used to be almost embarrassed to admit that I am narcoleptic.
  62. I got over that.
  63. It's a neurological disorder, not a psychiatric one.
  64. If I had epilepsy I wouldn't be embarrassed, so why should I be of this?
  65. I love my neurologist that I found here in NC.
  66. She lets me tell her what I need.
  67. I guess if I was asking for something crazy she wouldn't give it to me though.
  68. Before I started taking the meds I needed for this, I thought that they would affect me the way they would affect normal people.
  69. They don't.
  70. Rather than make me speed, they make me normal.
  71. Oh well.
  72. Narcolepsy is NOTHING like it is portrayed in Hollywood.
  73. Cataplexy often occurs along side Narcolepsy and that is more like the Hollywood version, but not really.
  74. Fortunately, I have very mild Cataplexy.
  75. Only one person ever actually noticed me have an episode.
  76. And it was on the phone... very impressive.
  77. If you want to know more about Narcolepsy or Cataplexy, please ask me. I like to educate.
  78. But I don't like to teach people who don't want to know.
  79. And I have no tolerance for stupid people.
  80. I had my IQ tested in college.
  81. It was high :)
  82. I can be a total ditz sometimes too though.
  83. I like to pretend it's because my brain is so full there's no room for mundane.
  84. I confess it's probably because I just don't pay attention enough.
  85. I'm very amused because spell check said Narcolepsy was spelled wrong, so I checked to see what it suggested and it suggested Nympholepsy.
  86. I'm not sure what Nympholepsy is, but it sounds like fun.
  87. Now I'm thinking about what I could share about sex that isn't TMI.
  88. Instead I'll say that I think I have been in love 4 times.
  89. If you had asked before it happened if I believed in love at first sight, I would have said no.
  90. But I experienced it. Alas, that love was not meant to be.
  91. Well let me take that back... That love was meant to be friendship.
  92. Yes, Andrew, I'm talking about you :)
  93. I miss being in love.
  94. The last time I was in love was too long ago.
  95. Sometimes I think I will never find love again and that makes me depressed.
  96. I've been a little depressed lately, but not about my lack of love-life.
  97. I'm stressed over work and money stuff.
  98. I haven't worked in a LONG time and I'm about to start again.
  99. I guess I won't be watching as much daytime TV.
  100. I'll miss watching Montel.

And there you go, another 100!!
YAY ME!!


And now I'm going to go read for a bit and then hit the hay... I have to be up early tomorrow. Rah.

Posted by Acinom @ 8:28 PM :: (1) comments

Thursday, December 13, 2007

 Oh the pressure!!

Today I added a new reader... and that's put a ton of pressure on me... why? Because she said "I'm always game for a good blog". Good! Eep! Too bad it wasn't "Im always game for a lame blog about nothing much more than having no life other than cats"!

So now I feel compelled to write something interesting.

And of course, I'm at a loss.

For inspiration I read AJ's blog and the post about the worst date of all time gave me some. But first I have to admit that I was wondering what was so bad about November 30th? Seems like a benign enough date to me! Oh THAT kind of date... yeah, Im a little slow sometimes.

Mine isn't about the worst date ever (which I'd guess would be sometime in February- I hate that month) but about one of the most ridiculous quotes from a man ever.

So there was this guy who's friends with my best friend's husband. I asked my friend's hubby to set me up with him (even though I had never met him, but I figured why not?) and he replied that he wouldn't, because the friend wasn't good enough for me. I didn't get how a guy could actually say that about a friend of his, but whatever...

So then the day came when I met him over at their house. From here on I'll call him... Billy. No, that wasn't his name, but if you knew what his last name was, it would amuse you.

So the next day my friend calls and tells me that BIlly really dug me and wanted to hang out again as a group thing. I have to say I was pretty attracted to him so I was all for it. So we all made plans to get together the following weekend at this place called Jillian's, which is like a Chuck E Cheese with a bar for adults. We had this amazing time. Billy and I totally clicked, and there was a serious connection happening I thought. Actually, so did my friend- she said she hadn't seen him that into someone in a long time. Cool! So we get home, he walks me to my door and tells me that he'd love to see me again, would it be ok if he called? I said definitely.

2 months went by and he never called. Um, ok. Whatever. I'm not desperate so I didn't stress over it, but I did think it was odd. Then one day the phone rang and it was him. And he said to me "I'm sorry I didn't call sooner, but I was in Delaware".

So I'm not sure what surprised me more, that he finally called, or that I lived 30something years without ever knowing that they had no phones in Delaware.

Posted by Acinom @ 8:07 PM :: (1) comments

Wednesday, December 12, 2007

 Dr. Seuss once said...

"Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind"

It's a tough thing to accept though who matters and who doesn't.

I made a point when I started this blog to let very few local friends know that I had this. The ones that I let in were the ones I trusted the most, who I knew I could say anything to and not be judged.

Unfortunately, I wasn't thinking and let some other locals in accidentally.

As you can read from the "outed" post, the people who came in were ones who did not like what I had to say.

And I was told by the one that she "demanded" that I remove any posts about her, and that if I wanted our friendship to continue, I would.

I thought long and hard about it. I knew that I should not have written anything that I wouldn't want people to read. Maybe it wasn't the nicest thing ever, but the fact was, those were my thoughts at that time. And the more I thought about it, my removal of those posts wouldn't make a difference. I still wrote what I wrote, and I knew that if she was going to make the survival of our friendship contingent upon me bowing to her demand, then clearly she did not really place much value on the friendship herself.

And the fact is, she is someone I became friends with due to mutual friends and interests. She was a friend of circumstance, not a friend of the heart.

So maybe I made the wrong choice. Maybe I should have kissed her ass and tried to salvage the relationship. I was a bitch and that was wrong. But you know, I have enough good people in my life who don't stress me out, so I'm ok with letting her go. It's going to be hard at occasions where we are both there, but hell, if I could work with that supervisor from hell last year, I can certainly play nice with her when we're together.

And so rather than delete the posts, rather than be censored, I chose to make this private. Hopefully that will appease her enough, and if not, well, those who mind don't matter.

I hope to un-privatize this at some point in the future when she's forgotten about us and moved forward. I'll truly miss all the fun google hits I get.

But till then, I'll just keep this open to those who matter and don't mind if I am who I am and say what I feel...

Posted by Acinom @ 9:41 PM :: (2) comments

Thursday, December 06, 2007

 Merry Christmas- I got these pictures for you


I think this is what I will be getting everyone for Christmas- framed views of my little boy's lungs.

Yes, I spent mucho dinero at the vet today.

With Seamus having HCM (hypertrophic cardiomyopathy) he is at an increased risk of CHF (Congestive Heart Failure). Last night and this morning he was breathing heavy and wheezing.

So off to the vet...

Good news- it's not CHF. However, it is an infection with bronchial involvement. He may be the best pill taking kitty cat in the world, but I feel badly that he gets 4 extra a day for the next two weeks :(

And since I spent Christmas money on the vet, these are what Im giving people ;)

But I do have to share what a dork I am...

I've always had the problem with hearing Seamus's lungs are that he always purrs when I go near him. Well he was in bed under the blanket and and I went in to check on him. I thought I could sneak up and listen through the blanket. So I did, and I lay my head on him and OMG! NO breathing! NO Pulse! He's COLD!!!

And then the lump that I thought was a pillow started purring.

So yeah, my pillow has no pulse and I think it's dead :(

Posted by Acinom @ 4:00 PM :: (1) comments

Monday, December 03, 2007

 I'm a loser :(

Again.

Maybe next year I'll win a NaBloPoMo prize.

Not that I expected to win anything, but until I didn't there was always a chance.

11 months till I get another chance...

Posted by Acinom @ 9:11 PM :: (1) comments

Sunday, December 02, 2007

 Two out of Three Ain't Bad

So this morning while having some tea and breakfast I flipped on the TV for some company. I came across a special about Meatloaf. They were showing clips from a recentish concert interspersed with bits of interviews.

This is what I have learned this morning about Mr. Loaf:

  • Unlike some rockstars, (i.e. Sting, Bon Jovi) he has NOT aged well (on stage moreso- in the interview it's not as obvious).
  • Unlike some rockstars, (i.e. Sting, almost everyone else I've seen who are not young) he seems to suck live now.
  • He picked up Charles Manson as a hitchhiker way back when.
  • He hated being a rockstar.
  • He is still quite engaging when speaking and interviewing.
  • He actually looks like a totally normal guy now in the interviews. I don't think I would recognize him if I was standing in line behind him in a Starbucks.

Here's what I already knew about Meat...

  • Back in college I was obsessed the song Two out of Three... I think I managed to piss off my entire dorm floor and force them all to start hating that song because I over played it. It seemed the appropriate song for the occasion though. I had been dating this guy for about a month who always made a point of saying how much he wanted and needed me. Then he introduced me to his girlfriend when she was up to visit from his hometown. After this, my friends and I always just referred to him as "Dickhead", as if that was his actual name.
  • There used to be a drag queen in the Johnstown, PA area who went by the name "Sandy Beach". I never met her but I always think of her when I hear that line in that song.
  • Bat out of Hell is some of the best roadtrip music in the history of the world IMO.
  • Remember cassettes? I had Bat out of Hell copied on one side of one, and on the other I had the Best of The Eagles. Also a fab roadtrip album.
  • I was also obsessed with "Best of My Love" by the Eagles. ("Every morning I wake up and worry what's going to happen today") Between those two songs, both on the same cassette, that tape got eaten one day by my boom box. I think that the tape player was also sick of those songs.
What an educational and reminiscent morning for me!

I'm not sure if I mentioned Bon Jovi as a well aged rocker because they had mentioned he was coming up next, or if it was just coincidence, but I started typing this as the Meatloaf thing ended, and now Jon is on my screen and I just have to say "wow"! IMO he looks better now than he did back in the "Slippery When Wet" days.

Oh something that amused me the other day... I had to call one of the collegiate women. It seems that a popular thing now is to have the caller listen to some song of the callee's choosing rather than the sound of ringing. Well this woman had "Living On a Prayer" as her ringing tone (or whatever that's called). She's 19. I think I was 16 or 17 when that song was released. She was still many years from even being conceived. It's good to know that song's got staying power!

So in other flashbacks this weekend I was watching Season 1 of Party of Five on DVD. There was one scene where Charlie took his shirt off. Let's just say, that Jack on Lost looks MUCH better shirtless. Clearly, Matthew Fox has worked out in the past 15 years.

I have always had a thing for dimples. When Bailey smiles it makes me smile. I had a mad crush on a guy who had dimples way back when. This was back in the days before internet, so that makes it even more pathetic that I did this... But I went to the library and looked up to see what causes dimples. I was upset to learn that technically- they are considered a birth defect! It's a variation on the normal cheek muscles. Go figure. I still think they are cute. But as I am older they don't do it for me as much as eye crinkles when smiling. And what I just found is totally interesting is that I just googled "eye crinkles" to see if I could find some interesting link to share here, but what I found by the results was more interesting, so you'll just have to google it for yourself. The posts were either about how women find this hot in men, or how women can get botox or some other way to cosmetically hide the crinkles. How messed up is that?

And on that completely random note, I have to now hop in the shower because I need to be out the door in about an hour and I'm still totally in PJ's and completely unprepared for this meeting I have to go to today.

But when I have such a sweet kitty cuddled on my lap and another on my feet it makes it so hard to push them off :(

The guilt...


Posted by Acinom @ 9:47 AM :: (0) comments

Saturday, December 01, 2007

 Contentment

2 kitties + 1 fire = purrfection

Posted by Acinom @ 9:41 PM :: (0) comments