Just Bloggled: When Life Gets a Little Baffling

The Braless Offense

2010-07-27T14:33:00.004-04:00

Color me paranoid, but I'm pretty sure this is what happens above my house every time I take off my bra:

Only instead of a masked Bruce Wayne showing up at my door five minutes later, I have every mailman, door-to-door salesman, Jehovah Witness, nosy neighbor, Girl Scout, and candy bar and magazine-selling child in a ten mile radius.

If you're like me and you live somewhere where the heat index has been 105 and above the last week or two, you have probably already realized what our foremothers did when they were burning their own undergarments in the streets--bras are borderline torture instruments during a heat wave. Sure, they still serve their main purpose. They lift. They separate. They keep the twins from taking out an eye when you're running down the street or going up the stairs, but they serve a secondary purpose as well--sweat catchers.

Bras collect sweat, lots and lots of sweat. If it's hot enough, it's quite possible to go up a whole other cup size from sweat alone. If your bra has any lining whatsoever, be prepared to spend the day scratching and readjusting what feels like several kitchen sponges duct taped to your tatas. If your bra is lineless, on the other hand, be prepared for the stares. You'll be a walking billboard for your local bar's wet t-shirt night.

That's why when I'm in the privacy of my own home and it's late enough in the day that I think it's okay to set the girls free, I do so, Flashdance-through-the-arm-pits style.

And that's when it happens. The bra signal is lit, and the next thing I know someone is knocking at my door, expecting me to answer.

A lot of times, especially if the blinds are closed and I'm upstairs, I'll just ignore the knock and hope another bra signal goes off the next street over, distracting the visitor long enough that he or she will forget why they were knocking on my door in the first place. Sometimes it works. Sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes it causes the person to just ring the doorbell incessantly to where I'm forced to do one of two things--answer the door braless or go hunt down the one I took off.

Do you want to know what happens almost every single time I make the effort of putting my bra back on? The person goes away.

Now guess what happens if I don't put the bra on. The person won't shut up, and I have to cross my arms so tightly across my chest that they actually go numb. Oh, and Bailey eats my blinds.

I can't possibly wear a bra all day long in this heat, and I'm certainly not going to sleep in one so what am I going to do--move, post a sign in my yard that says, "Anyone who knocks on the door will be eaten by a rabid Chihuahua," or go after the bra signal with a baseball bat? Maybe I should just open an upstairs window, wait for them to leave the porch, and use the discarded bra to slingshot sweaty spit balls at their heads. That could be fun.

Hopefully I won't have to decide before today's signal goes off. I really don't want to waste the toilet paper.

Two Book Review Blogs Get Head-to-Toe Makeovers

2010-07-23T16:09:00.004-04:00

I'm sorry that I have been neglecting this blog the last few weeks. I have been steadily working on two blog and one Twitter makeovers.

The first makeover was for Diane at Bookchickdi. Her blog is part book review, part Broadway play review, and she wanted a design that combined the two ideas. She also liked what I had done with the Books in the City makeover from a few months back.

Here is a before shot of her blog:

Here is the after. Click on the first image if you want to go to the site directly:

I drew everything but the photos and the Twitter bird, although I did recolor it. The header images are of Broadway show signs and of a bookstore that's actually on Broadway. The footer images are of Central Park, where Diane said she spent a good deal of time as well.

I also redid Diane's Twitter page. I forgot to take a before shot of it, but here is the after:

I was trying to draw upon the idea of New York and books without making it exactly like the blog design. I had seen so many Broadway photos online that were actually photos of the Broadway street sign that I decided to go in that direction by putting her blog name on a street sign on a New York City street corner. That building on the right is supposed to be a corner bookstore. You can see more or less of it depending on your screen resolution and monitor size.

The second makeover was for a second book review blog, The Unread Reader. Its author, Missie, also wanted something similar in feel to Books in the City. She also wanted to incorporate her favorite colors, hot pink, yellow, and black.

Here is her before shot:

And here is her after:

As with Diane's design, I drew everything in this makeover except the photos. The Kindle and Mac shots Missie provided. The other three were stock photos.

I also redid Missie's book rating system. You can see part of it on the sidebar, but the rest you won't be able to see on her blog until she writes her next review. In the meantime, here is a sneak peak. They're mini-Kindles with stars.

Since I've done nothing but work on the computer for hours the last few weeks, I'm going to take a me day today and maybe tomorrow. Then I'll try to come up with a post that's more interesting than before and after shots.

Thanks for being patient.

For Once, I Didn't Burn Down the Kitchen

2010-06-30T17:53:00.002-04:00

Alert the media and grab your coats, everyone, because hell froze over today. I made a cake from scratch and didn't burn the kitchen down. Yay me!

Lately, I have been craving one of my mom's pound cakes. They were pretty much the only thing she could cook without burning down her own kitchen, but when she died last summer, I assumed the cakes died with her. My grandmother, aka Chain Smoking Granny, had the recipe tucked away in a drawer, but she won't put the Virginia Slims down long enough to cook, and don't even get me started on the condition of her kitchen. You need to wear a Hazmat suit just to make a peanut butter and jelly.

My sister is a halfway decent cook, but Her Highness and I aren't exactly besties so if I were to ask her to make me one and mail it to me, I'm sure it would come with a little extra something special (spit, snot, just fill in your choice of bodily fluid). Consequently, if I wanted a pound cake I could eat and not die from, I was either going to have to buy it or make it myself.

Today I set about trying to make it. I didn't understand what half the directions meant, and I had never used a mixer before today, but eventually I managed to make this:

Please ignore the big hole in the top. The cake was only supposed to take an hour and 15 minutes to cook, but I apparently bought the wrong kind of pan because mine was nowhere near done at that time. For the next 30 minutes or so, I would take the cake out, check it, and pinch a little more off to see if it was done before putting it back in.

Okay, that's what the toothpick was for. I pinched it off because I wanted to and because the crust is the best part, but it was for the cake's own good, I swear.

By the time the pound cake was fully cooked, I had basically made a hole all the way through the bottom. Thanks to my pinching, it may not be the prettiest pound cake you'll ever see (that hole kind of looks like any angry mouth, doesn't it), but it doesn't taste half bad. I think it could have used a little more vanilla, even though I put the exact amount listed on the recipe, but otherwise it tasted like the cakes my mom used to make. (It was her recipe, but she was an eyeballer when it came to following it, which might explain the slight taste differential.)

Now it's just a waiting game to see if I gave myself food poisoning. I'm not venturing far from the bathroom tonight just in case.

Out of the Mouths of Grandmas

2010-06-28T16:54:00.006-04:00

Karma works in mysterious ways. Unfortunately, so, too, does biology.

Late Friday afternoon, I was curled up on the upstairs futon, waiting for the thunder to pass so that I could get on the treadmill. It was around 6 p.m. so there was little to watch on TV other than the news. I expected to hear about the weather, whatever accidents shut down Atlanta's interstate system that day, and whatever house fires and robberies the WSB deemed important. What I got instead was an end-of-the-week pick-me-up.

As it turns out, two people that I interviewed with last year are now under investigation by the state for running full-time law practices on the state's dime (they're also full-time state employees) and for firing the employee who blew the whistle on them. These two people, if they're who I think they are, were particularly nasty to me during the interview, so much so that I actually considered getting up and leaving mid-interview. I didn't do it. I stuck it out until the bitter end, but the thought was there.

If you want an example of their nastiness, here's one. They actually told me that they had no idea why I was there and that had they, rather than their secretary, scheduled the interviews, they would have never scheduled me. Nice, huh?

Anyway, the news that their nastiness came around and bit them in their karmic behinds made what had otherwise been a bad week for me. I was so happy about it that I called the only person I knew would answer the phone--Chain Smoking Granny.

After telling her about the news report, we somehow started talking about other people who we thought would one day find themselves in the same situation (i.e., having the whistle blown on their bad behavior). When referring to one person in particular, Chain Smoking Granny repeatedly uttered this one line that meant something far different than what she intended it to mean.

"I hope one day he gets blown."

*****sigh*****

If only I could claim adoption.

Three Hours of My Life I Can't Get Back

2010-06-28T16:02:00.004-04:00

Have you ever cleaned a room for hours, only to realize that the room looks worse when you finally leave it than when you entered it?

That's what happened to me yesterday when I was cleaning the garage. My intent was to get rid of everything that I didn't want or use anymore, but all I ended up doing was cause a bigger mess instead.

First, I ran out of room in my trash can. This county doesn't have a public dump so once the outdoor can was full, I couldn't throw anything else away. I could only pile it up in bags at the front of the garage.

Second, I ran out of bags. The bags--a dollar box from the Dollar Tree-kept breaking on me so I went through the box pretty quickly. As such, I couldn't bag up everything I wanted to.

Third, I remembered that the Camaro isn't an 18 wheeler, and I'm not the Bionic Woman. If there was ever a time I needed a bigger car and a couple of New York City movers on call--surely, New York City movers move stuff in a New York minute, not in a slow Southern one--it was yesterday. I have all this junky and laminated furniture that I want to get rid of in my garage. Ideally, I would like to take the furniture to Goodwill, but I have a feeling that it won't fit in my Camaro. The worn out papasan chair should; I was able to make it back to my dorm room with it when I first bought it. I just don't know about the bookcases and the microwave cart.

I should have tried to fit some of the furniture in the car yesterday, but after three hours I was way too hot and sweaty to deal with that toaster oven on wheels. I'm going to try to take some of the stuff today or tomorrow, whichever day my grandmother decides to give me gas money, but I have a feeling I will need more than just gas. I will need a Uhaul. Yeah, like I'm going to rent one of them until it's time to go to Billy.com, fill out the site's locator form, and find someone listed with Billy moving services who will help me move on a budget.

So what do I plan on doing with the furniture instead? If I can't get it to fit, I'm going to leave it well enough alone and quit while I'm ahead. Then the next time I get inspired to clean the garage, I'm going to scrub toilets instead.

This post is brought to you by your friends at Billy.com.

A Former Scrapbooker Discovers the Pretty People Weren't That Pretty

2010-06-27T17:23:00.012-04:00

I want to admit something that I hope none of you take offense to. I don't get scrapbooking. Specifically, I don't get get spending all that money, effort, and time making a page around a picture look pretty or metaphoric and then tucking that page away in a book for only your family or closest friends to see. I would much rather post that picture publicly on my blog and write something funny about it than decorate it privately. At least that way, others would get to see or interpret the picture the way I see or interpret it.

For instance, look at this picture of me from sophomore or junior year (1992 or 1993) that my sister sent me:

When I first saw it, all I could think was, "OMG, where did that come from?" I don't remember taking it. Maybe my sister finally learned how to Photoshop. I wanted to stick it back in the envelope and forget it ever existed.

Then I really started to think about it. A picture that embarrassing makes for great blog fodder so now instead of hiding it, I'm going to make an attempt at captioning it:

"Those who smelt it, dealt it, and from the looks of it, Staci had been smelling all day."
"This is your brain. This is your brain on Pepsi, Pop Rocks, and Sun In. Any questions?"
"David Caruso called. He wants his sunglasses back."

See, I'd rather make fun of myself than paste a bunch of cardboard daisies on my photo. Not that a gigantic daisy covering my face wouldn't be a good idea...

While I don't get scrapbooking now, in 1994 I was a picture taker of a different sort. Like the above picture isn't enough proof of that fact.

I was cleaning out my garage today and came across the box of yearbooks I brought back from my mom's last summer, a box that also included a gigantic photo album. I vaguely remembered the album from high school. I thought that it contained pictures of class trips, award assemblies, and graduation, along with some old Bulldog Bulletins from when I was editor of the school paper and clippings from the local newspapers showing what was going on at that time.

Oh, it contained those things all right, but that's not all it contained. The album also had page after page of my captioned take on the trips, assemblies, graduation, and newspaper clippings, which means it wasn't an album at all. It was a scrapbook.

Yes, in 1994 I was one of them.

I guess back then the stores weren't overflowing with scrapbooking materials so my snarky captions came courtesy of sayings that I cut out of Teen and Seventeen and others that I wrote on construction paper. Now here comes the sad part. I don't even understand half of the captions.

Okay, who am I kidding? I don't even understand three-fourths of them.

Here are a few of things that made me go hmm:

(Cue the C&C Music Factory song...)

"Hack Cross: Fog Walk with Me." I have that on a page that contains a ticket stub from a New Kids concert and from a trip to Graceland. I don't get it at all.
"Sigma Nu, the biting ducks, and 'It's in the corner. You can't miss it.'" That's on a page with a ribbon from the state science fair. I get the biting ducks part. We went to my science teacher's lakeside cabin, and I vaguely remember the ducks attacking us on the dock. Okay, I don't remember that so much as I remember seeing the pictures of that in the envelope of pictures my sister sent me a few weeks ago. Same difference, but what the heck are the other two things about?
"Mom, send money fast. I sat on someone's bed without their permission." From the Girl's State page. Again I say, "Huh?"
"After three movies, a comic book, an off-Broadway play, and 'The Man in the Lizards Skin Boots' video, real justice is served." From a page with a newspaper clipping entitled, "Buttafuoco gets maximum sentence." All I can say to that is, "When did Joey Buttafuoco do a music video?" I'll be searching for that baby on YouTube in a few minutes.
"Only a senior, and already at the courthouse." On a picture of me taken in front of the county courthouse. I get that one, but I wish someone had beat that sentiment out of me before college. Seriously.
"Julia Roberts marries country singer Lyle Lovett...and cuts hair AGAIN!!!" I wrote that next to a picture from Pretty Woman. Apparently, Julia Roberts' haircut was all kinds of traumatic for me. It still is. That's one woman who should not have a pixie cut or be blonde.
And of course this little number:

I'm disappointed in myself. I totally missed the opportunity to write, "Run, OJ! Run!"

Do you want to know what's even sadder than not understanding 75 percent of what I wrote? Not recognizing 80 percent of the people in the pictures. I should recognize them. I went to school with most of them for nine years, but I don't, and I think I know why. I think when my mind flashbacks to the miserable, unpopular moments of my youth or when I have those revenge dreams where I finally tell off the head cheerleader or the quarterback who teased me relentlessly--hey, my fellow nerds, I know you've had those dreams, too--I Hollywoodize the people in my head.

By Hollywoodize, I don't mean that I recast the rolls with well-known actors. For instance, I don't make the guy who used to knee me in the butt all through 8th grade pre-algebra look like Robert Pattinson.

If I were to do that, I probably wouldn't continue to remember the payback--me stabbing him in the knee with my pencil. Likewise, I don't make the daughter of my mom's boss, who I have known since preschool, look like Megan Fox in Jennifer's Body.

Maybe it's because that girl was a better actress than Megan, but who isn't?

What I mean is that, in my mind, I tend to make my former classmates a lot more attractive than they were, or I fill in the parts of them I can't remember with the parts I think they should have had. I have even exaggerated the "beauty" of the head cheerleader to such proportions in my mind that when I looked at her picture today, all I could say was, "Well, now I know she was popular for something other than her looks, and we all know what that something was."

(For the record, the head cheerleader is not the girl pictured above, but they were friends, and the girl was a cheerleader.)

In a way it's comforting to know that my childhood Mean Girls (and boys) were more a lot less Heathers than I remember them and a lot more Betty Joe Down the Street, at least so far as their looks were concerned. I feel slightly less ugly in comparison. However, it's not so comforting to know that I probably won't recognize a soul at my 20 year reunion.

Then again, maybe that's not such a bad thing.

Crack Kills, But My Neighbor's Crack Might Make Me Go Blind

2010-06-25T14:18:00.008-04:00

You know those address plaques that some houses have that have the house numbers or welcome on them, like this one from JustAddressPlaques.com?

Well after this morning I need one that says, "Manscaper needed. Apply inside," and a big arrow pointing to my next door neighbor's house.

I was in my front yard attempting to cut my grass. I say attempting because halfway in I ran over some of that orange string that home improvement stores use to bind their pine straw bales and had to stop. I don't know where the string came from. I haven't bought any pine straw since last year so I can only assume someone threw it out and it blew or landed in my front yard. (Just search this blog for things I have found in my front yard. I really need an address plaque that says, "My yard is not your trash can.")

Anyway, after I ran over it, I also ran over some metal thing that lodged in the side of one of the wheels. I couldn't keep cutting grass like that so I had to turn the mower off, sit down in my hot driveway, and try to dislodge the metal thing from the wheel and the orange twine from the blades. While I'm doing that, out comes my next door neighbor, the one who has to wash his car every single day, even though it seems to rain every single afternoon. (There's another address sign for you. "Put down the hose, and step away from the car.") At first I thought he was going to wash his car again, and I silently laughed because I hoped that the grass clippings would stick to the wet car. After a few minutes, however, I realized that he was going to do something else--wax it.

Instead of a silent laugh, that realization got an eye roll. The guy's car is just as old as mine. Wax isn't going to do it a lot of good. All it's going to do is highlight the car's old age, but try telling my neighbor that. I tried to ignore the guy as I tried unsuccessfully to start the mower, which wasn't that hard at first because he was on the side of the car farthest from me. However, once I realized that the mower wasn't going to cooperate, I headed for the garage to get the weed eater, while he headed for the passenger side of the car just a few feet away. As I dragged the weed eater out of the garage and began untangling the extension cord, Mr. Car Wash leaned over to wax the hood and that's when I saw it.

VBC better known as visible butt crack.

And it wasn't just your garden variety VBC either. It was hairy, saggy, pale, and topped off by an equally hairy, saggy, pale muffin top. I wanted to run screaming, "My eyes! My eyes!" but I couldn't. I had to finish the lawn so instead I swallowed the bile that made its way up my throat, averted my eyes, and tried to cut that little strip of grass that divides our driveways without looking up. I couldn't look at it at that distance, not if I valued my eyesight. I'm pretty sure if you look directly into a VBC, it will be like looking at a solar eclipse. You'll go blind.

Somehow I managed to complete the task, and then I practically ran to the backyard as, "Don't look. Don't look. Don't look," echoed through my head. Two hours later, after I had finished the yard work, cooled off, showered, and ate lunch, I looked out the window to see that Mr. Car Wash was still outside, still working on the car, and still in desperate need of a belt, and thought, "Man, that's going to burn."

Red, saggy, hairy VBC. Even better.

Yes, I need a sign, a huge one that tells Mr. Car Wash in no uncertain terms that he needs to wax more than just his car. Unfortunately, while JustAddressPlaques.com carries a variety of specialty plaques, including bone shaped, private property, and garage signs, they don't seem to carry one that addresses a hairy neighbor. I guess I'll just have to make it myself then or leave a bottle of Nair at his door.

This post is brought to you by your friends at JustAddressPlaques.com.

More David than Goliath

2010-06-24T14:26:00.007-04:00

There's nothing like spending money on a plant, planting it, watering it, and watching it grow, only to realize several months down the road that your evil twin must have snuck into the plant hospital and switched your plant with another one when no one was looking.

My tomatoes were supposed to be some form of Goliath tomatoes. Look how big and round they are:

Ah, the power of the zoom lens. Now look how big and round they really are:

Yes, they were the size of golf balls. I tried to stick my hand in a picture so you could have a reference point but the picture came out all blurry. Apparently, I'm not coordinated enough to take a picture one-handed so this golf ball shot will have to do.

Now I wasn't expecting tomatoes the size of this:

Or this:

But I thought I would at least get a couple of BLT's out of them. I didn't. All I got was a small side salad, no bacon included. Oh well. At least the tomatoes tasted good.

The Redneck Mobile and the Toothless Wonder Strike Again

2010-06-22T18:54:00.012-04:00

It is only Tuesday, and already it has been one of those weeks where I need a bunch of snarky T-shirts to express how I feel. I think these Cafepress customized t-shirts sum it up:

I woke up yesterday to find that my car battery was dead again. Those of you who've been reading my blog regularly know that I had two dead car batteries last summer. My grandmother had to give me money to get the car towed down the street to the Goodyear because I have better chances of winning the lottery than I do getting someone in this neighborhood to give me a jump. Dog feces in my mailbox, condom wrappers in my driveway, even tires in my bushes my neighbors have no problem giving me, but something useful like a jump--forget about it.

Of course, I switched to liability only insurance two weeks ago so I won't be reimbursed for the tow. While the tow wasn't on my side, at least the battery was. It was still under warranty so luckily I didn't have to pay for the replacement. That being said, the mechanic did send me home with uncovered recommendations-I needed to refill my coolant and brake fluid.

They should have been easy enough to deal with, right? Yeah, not so much. I just poured coolant in the radiator Friday. For it to be out again that quickly means I either have a leak or yet another air pocket. I figured it was the latter, since I seem to get them every few months, so I called my dad for instructions on how to fix it. After five unanswered calls, I decided to try to fix the air pocket from memory. I think I was doing pretty well at it too until I ran out of coolant and my dad finally called me back. That's when everything went downhill, and this t-shirt from Cafepress's Eclipse store began to describe my motto for the day:

Have you ever met someone who knows so much that he knows nothing at all? That's my dad. The more he told me to pour water in the radiator, the worse it got. Eventually, water and what little coolant was left started gushing out of the thing like Old Faithful. All he could say at that point was, "I don't know what's making it do that, sport. Your going to have to call your nana."

Forget "bite me." His comment pissed me off so royally that I wish I had this Tcritc T-shirt on so I could say, "What'chu talkin' about, Jimmy?"Do you want to know why it pissed me off? Because there was nothing wrong with the car yesterday afternoon other than I needed to put more fluids in it. Today, thanks to the advice of a middle age moron, my radiator is acting like Mount Saint Helen, and my father's answer to his big oops is get my grandmother to give me money. Yeah, because money solves everything. Even if she put money in the bank, I still have to drive the car down the street to have it looked at, and I can't do that with a volcano under the hood. Duh.

After I calmed down and hung up on the Toothless Wonder for the tenth time, I read the book to my car. It says that you can't put only water in a Camaro. You have to use a 50/50 mixture. I decided that was probably the problem. He had me pour so much water in the radiator that I essentially flushed out all the antifreeze that was in there, but try telling the King of All Worldly Knowledge that. He claims that I don't know what I'm talking about even thought I READ IT IN THE BOOK!

If I didn't look like the man, I would swear I was switched at birth.

Then again maybe they do plastic surgery on babies.

Maybe.

So after I changed clothes for the millionth time, I drove to Walmart sans air in the 90-plus degree weather. The car didn't overheat on the way, but I did. I also realized when I got there that, in the chaos of Mount Saint Camaro, I had forgotten to brush my teeth. Hot car. Hot breath. Lovely.

I bought the antifreeze/coolant that my father told me I didn't need and made it back without the car exploding. The ice cream I tried to eat on the way wasn't so lucky. Cue another change of clothes.

When I got home, I got online and began researching the proper way to remove an air pocket from a radiator. On some forum I read that you can crack your engine block from putting cold water in a radiator so now, despite the fact that I have no proof that I have cracked my block, I have convinced myself that I have. When the car cools off in the morning, I'm going to pour in the fluids and drive it around some to see. Let's just hope the only thing I cracked was my head.

Meanwhile, poor Bella, the birthday girl, isn't enjoying her birthday as much as I had hoped that she would. Because of her enlarged heart, I was scared she wouldn't live to see today, but she has. Instead of spending quality time with her new toys and her Mommy, all Bella has gotten to do is sit in the corner and wait on Mommy to get through playing Nancy Drew: Girl Mechanic on her piece of crap car.

I bet if Bella could buy a t-shirt, it would look a lot like this:

Tomorrow can't get here soon enough.

This post is brought to you by your friends at Cafepress.com.

Things To Do Before My Next Interview

2010-06-19T19:12:00.004-04:00

1. Break out the bronzer. Apparently it's okay to like the Cullens but not look like one at an interview. One of the interviewers kept asking me if I was okay before the interview, like she was scared I was going to pass out before she could say, "So tell me about yourself." I guess the whole "pale is the new tan" movement still hasn't reached Atlanta.

2. Buy one of those baseball caps that come with a little fan attached to the brim. Maybe it won't make the greatest impression at an interview, but it might make a better one than sweaty, pale white girl.

3. If I can't find the cap, find a short-sleeve business suit that doesn't scream, "Mother of the bride!" Long sleeve suits and 100 degree weather just don't mix.

4. Put on the sensible Aerosole loafers. Yesterday I wore what I thought were sensible kitten heels, but I forgot that they were sensible kitten heels with not-so-sensible, pointed toes. My pinky toes looked like I had stuck them in boiling water when I finally took off the shoes late yesterday afternoon, and today it still hurts to touch them. Next time I'm choosing comfort over style. If end up in Glamour magazine with a black stripe over my eyes because of it, so be it.

5. Hook up a catheter and a caffeine drip under my clothes. Yesterday morning I only drank half a can of Coke because I was scared I would get lost and have that exploding-bladder issue that I had the last time I had an interview downtown. When the interview was over, I didn't drink the other half. Instead, I ran some errands, bought a cherry icee, ate a late lunch, and took a long nap. Then I woke up around 7 p.m. feeling like I had an elephant sitting on my forehead, an elephant named Caffeine Withdrawal that took me hours to get rid of. So next time I go for an interview, I'm drinking the entire can of Coke beforehand, and then I'm either hooking up a catheter or buying a box of adult-size diapers to wear under my clothes.

6. Run all errands beforehand. Buying a Father's Day card at Walmart the Friday before Father's Day is like buying a wedding dress the morning of a Bridal Barn sale. I was lucky I made it out of there alive.

7. Figure out if there is a way to program the TV to go mute every time an I Can't Believe It's Not Butter commercial comes on. I wasn't kidding yesterday when I said I had Megan Mullaly's version of Turn the Beat Around stuck in my head both during and before the interview. It has been there for three days now. One more day, and I may eat my way through a tub of fake butter just to get it out.

8. Hunt down my evil twin and have her do the interview. People do it on soaps all the time. Why cant I?

9. If I can't find my evil twin, take a "How Not to Look Like a Country Hick" course at the local tech school. I think I was the only person yesterday who used a crosswalk to cross the street. I might as well have worn a T-shirt that said, "I live in the burbs."

10. Sleep. I can never sleep the night before an interview. I need to watch my old A-team DVDs, figure out what exactly it was they slipped in Mr. T's milk every episode to get him on the plane, and put it my own Silk, that or teach the dogs to knock me over the head the night before.

(Ignore this Technorati code: GU5ZMECHNF9B )

Traffic Sucks in Atlanta on a Friday

2010-06-18T16:40:00.004-04:00

In case you didn't know this fact already, traffic sucks in Atlanta on a Friday. Traffic sucks even worse when the Friday in question is the Friday before Father's Day, you're leaving an interview, it's after lunch, and both your birthday and interview suits are soaked in sweat. I thought I would never see home.

I swear that whoever invented the Georgia interstate system around Atlanta needs to be sentenced to some type of traffic purgatory when he dies, where his soul is forced to drive in circles around the downtown area with no bathroom breaks, no air conditioning, no caffeine, and no money to park until he works out all his sins or at least makes the drive easier for those of us still on Earth. He should also be joined by all the clueless jerks who change lanes without using their turn signals, who ride your bumper, who pass you only to slow down again, and who commit various other traffic infractions that make even the sanest of us long for a quiet, padded room in the middle of nowhere.

Whoever it is probably wouldn't last five minutes in that traffic before he would be knocking on the pearly gates, begging the big guy upstairs to just put him out of his misery and send him on to hell. I can only imagine what traffic would look like there, probably a lot like I-75 at the 675 merge the Sunday after Thanksgiving.

At least I'm home now, and so far I haven't found any bigger problems. No dogs having heart problems again. No pipes burst. No dead refrigerators. No curbside mailboxes in the middle of the road, although I'm surprised I didn't find this one today. A few weeks ago I went to get the mail from my curbside mailbox, which shares a post with the house to my right. When I opened the box, it, the mailbox next to it, and the entire cross beam that they were attached to landed at my feet. I tried to fix them the best I could. I put a long nail through the side of the beam, but it still felt like it needed one underneath where the support beam is. I had my dad look at it when he drove up to fix my gutter, and he said he couldn't add anymore nails to that part because the wood is split. Great. You know what that means. That means it's going to have to be replaced soon, which means I'm going to have to eventually talk to the people next door a.k.a. the parents of the children from hell so we can split the price. Swell.

It's not buying a new box or a new post that's going to be the problem. I have a Lowe's around the corner, a Home Depot five minutes away, and Mailboxixchange.com online. Surely, a post and two plain, black curbside mail boxes can't cost that much. It's getting people who won't even cut their strip of grass that borders your lawn to share the burden.

But enough about that. Between the interview and traffic, I have stressed enough today. I'm going to try to not stress anymore until tomorrow. I didn't sleep well last night. I was a bundle of nerves because of the interview, and I had Turn the Beat Around stuck in my head most of the night (not the Gloria Estefan version, mind you, but the I Can't Believe It's Not Butter remix, which is even worse). So I'm going to take a long nap and a long shower, not necessarily in that order, and hope I don't dream about driving with Megan Mullally and a giant tub of margarine in my back seat.

This post is brought to you by your friends at Mailboxixchange.com.

Disqus is Back to Working

2010-06-17T16:56:00.002-04:00

Per Disqus, the bug that was messing up everyone's ability to comment is now fixed. If you're still having issues, Disqus said try reloading the page. (Try Control-F5 to do a reload from a clean cache if a regular reload doesn't do it.) If you reload and still can't leave a comment, shoot me an email at justbloggled@yahoo.com, and I'll file another ticket. Thanks.

Disqus is Having Issues Again

2010-06-17T11:08:00.002-04:00

If any of you are trying to leave a comment and are experiencing problems, I apologize. It seems Disqus is having issues again. I have been told that some of you are getting messages about enabling cookies. I tested the system myself logged out last night and found that, while I didn't get the cookie message, I could not leave a guest comment in any browser. I filed a help ticket then, but after searching Twitter a few minutes ago it seems the issue is a widespread problem and not unique to me. I will let you know when Disqus has fixed it.

I Need References, Cooler Weather, & Cooler Neighbors: Random Tuesday Thoughts

2010-06-15T14:22:00.006-04:00

I have a job interview to go to on Friday. I thought I might actually have a shot at getting it, since they were accepting apps from new graduates waiting to take the bar exam (in other words, because it really seems to be entry level). Then the secretary told me I needed to bring a list of three references with me to the interview. Crap. I don't have three references, personal, professional, or otherwise. My former boss hates me. Neither of my work study bosses from college work at Rollins anymore. I highly doubt a single professor remembers me after nine (law school) or twelve (undergrad) years, and I have no idea if my mom's former boss, who was technically my boss the summer I temped for them, will give me one. So what am I supposed to do in regards to the references? Just list three people and hope no one answers the phone? Beg all of you to be my references? (This is me begging if the answer to the last question is yes.)

In case anyone is looking for a premade Blogger design, I have some posted now here and here. I liked them when I did them. Now I'm not so sure, but they're there just the same. I'm going to try to do more whimsical ones and finish the one that Colleen from Books in the City decided not to go with later in the week. Meanwhile, my queue is empty if you want a custom design.

Did anyone watch Dance Your Ass Off last night? Did you find it odd that everyone on there can say ass basically every 30 seconds, but Oxygen has to spell the show Dance Your A** Off, I'm assuming for FCC reasons? I find it extremely odd, but then again I also find it extremely odd that merely adding the letters h-0-l-e to the end of ass can get you fined. I mean both words deal with the same geographical area of your anatomy. Why one is considered any more offensive or dirty than the other I will never understand, unless we're still going off the idea that ass is just another word for a donkey. Seriously, who in 2010 talks about donkeys on national TV so often that the distinction would really matter?

If you watched Dance Your Donkey Off, did you also find the bald male judge creepy? I was hoping that, since I watched last season and should therefore be used to Old Baldy, he would seem less like that weird guy in the trench coat who stares at you from the mall food court and more like one of the other dance show judges. He doesn't. He's still creepy to me.

Apparently, the big Twitter and talk show topic of the day is some picture Perez Hilton posted of Miley Cyrus yesterday. He must be scared that the FBI's child porn unit is about to break his door down because the shot is now gone from his Twitter picture account and from his blog. I guess he's never heard that once something is on the Internet, it's there for good.

Speaking of that picture, I didn't see it, but I heard the hosts of The View talking about it this morning. From what I could gather Miley was going commando in a mini skirt. I'm sorry. I know a live a sheltered life sometimes, but why would anyone want to do that? Even when I run out of underwear and don't have time to wash a full load of clothes, I don't go commando. I either run to Walmart and buy some more, put on my bathing suit, or wash a pair by hand. Was Miley trying to avoid panty lines? Because if she was, they do make thongs for a reason, and if the thong showed, maybe it's time someone moved up a size instead of foregoing underwear altogether. Just saying...

Maybe Miley was just trying to follow in the pantiless footsteps of such great role models as Paris and Lindsey. I don't know. Either way Perez should not have posted the picture because SHE IS STILL UNDERAGE. Her bad fashion sense does not give him the right to break the law. Just saying that as well...

Speaking of breaking the law, once again my idiot neighbors have no respect for the water restrictions in Georgia. Almost every afternoon for the last month we have had hours of thunderstorms. Yesterday was no exception. The last time I checked rain, especially torrential rain, does a pretty good job of washing the dirt off your car. Nevertheless, my neighbor was outside at 8 a.m. this morning washing all four cars in the driveway. Idiot. I guarantee you if I even tried to wash just one wheel on my car on my off day (the guy's address dictates a Mon-Wed-Sat morning wash schedule), the local police department would slap me with a $1000 fine faster than I could whine, "But they did it." My neighbors, on the other hand, can wash their cars every day from now until the end of time, and no one but me would care.

The rain isn't doing anything to cool the air. Today's heat index is supposed to be up to 110. That's just way too hot. I swear if it wasn't for Sarah Palin and a lack of money, I would move to Alaska during the summer months. Dang her for ruining an entire state.

Father's Day and One Day When

2010-06-13T20:02:00.006-04:00

This is a Sponsored Post written by me on behalf of Victorinox Swiss Army. All opinions are 100% mine.

Lately I have been thinking of either starting a weekly feature or a blog called "One Day When," where I would write about what I plan on doing one day when I win the lottery, move, get married, have kids, get a job, etc. For instance, this week the feature post would be called "One Day When I Can Afford an Expensive Father's Day Gift." On my budget right now expensive is anything over $5, which is why my father is going to have to make due with a card for Father's Day this year.

The thing is, even if I could afford more than a card, I wouldn't know what to get my father. He is notoriously hard to shop for. I guess he is where my sister gets it from. I learned a long time ago that no matter what you buy him, he's just going to toss it to the side because someone either got him the same thing but nicer (his mother somehow managed to do that every Christmas without fail) or because he would rather enjoy something one of the revolving-door step kids bought him instead. Sad but true.

So when I heard about the Victorinox I Wear a Watch Sweepstakes, my first thought was that I should rush on over to the Facebook IWAW sweepstakes page and enter so maybe, just maybe, I could blow away the step-siblings this year. I saw this watch on the Victorinox web site, the Victorinox Swiss Army Air Boss.
I thought, "Beat that, step siblings whose names I can never remember. Beat that, step mother who needs her meds adjusted again. Beat that, little sister with the picture mugs. I am giving him a watch, and not just any watch either. I'm giving him one with a calendar, several chronographs, and water resistant features."

One day when I win the sweepstakes, of course.

Then reality set in, and I thought, "Why should I give it to him if I win? He's just going to lose it. Maybe I want a new watch, too. All I have is a dressy watch. Maybe I want a weekend watch." So after that reality check, I went over to the Facebook page, tried to like the contest and choose one of the women's watches, and found out that I had to be a member of Facebook to do so. Fooey. I'm really going to have to join that one day, aren't I? I guess I have already found my topic for next week's "One Day When" post.

One day when might actually be tomorrow since I promised my nephew that I would get us that code for Fate that's going to be listed on Facebook tomorrow afternoon. I don't know if it will be vieweable to non-Facebook members. If it's not, I guess I will finally be signing up.

If you are a member of Facebook and need a new watch or know someone who does, be sure to check out the I Wear a Watch Sweepstakes. Victorinox Swiss Army is giving away a watch a day for 30 days. Then check out all of their watches at SwissArmy.com. They even have scratch-resistant watches for people like me who are constantly walking into and knocking their watches against things. A scratch-resistant watch is probably a wise investment since "one day when I am no longer clumsy" is never going to happen.

My Childhood Was All About the Dog

2010-06-12T12:26:00.004-04:00

For as long as I can remember, my mom had this little issue with pictures. She would take them, but she would rarely get them developed. Sometimes she would claim that she didn't have the money to get them developed. Sometimes she would claim that she didn't have the time, and sometimes she wouldn't say anything at all. She would just take the roll out of the camera and toss it in a wicker basket that she kept in her bedroom. Eventually that basket became so full of film that anyone not privy to my mother's inability to follow the picture-taking process all the way to the end might have thought that the Easter bunny had finally run out of candy. He had not. The truth was my mom was just a film hoarder.

By the time my sister and I were adults, the Easter basket got a buddy, a Folgers can full of um-um-good but still undeveloped film. After my mom died last year, my sister took custody of the basket and can so she could get the film developed. However, like my mom, Her Highness tends to put things off so she didn't actually take the rolls to the drugstore until a couple of months ago. A lot of the film was so old it couldn't be developed. Other film, the "rolls" that came from my Le Clic camera, will have to eventually be sent off to some specialty online store since neither CVS nor Walgreen's had the means to develop the flat disc type of film. (Check out this Etsy ad if you're too young to remember Le Clics. Mine looked just like the purple one listed, while my sister had a matching pink one.)

As for the film they were able to develop, my sister finally mailed me copies yesterday. She wasn't kidding when she said our entire childhood was about our Pekingese Prissy. Around 70 percent of the pictures were of her.

As you can see, Christmas was all about Prissy, her stocking, and apparently her need for one more cup of coffee.

There were a few other Christmas pics in the envelope, but they were all of me showing Prissy what Santa brought her.

Now onto one of my birthdays. From the looks of the bangs, I would say the birthday was one of my middle school or junior high birthdays. Not that it mattered because Prissy wanted cake.

She just didn't necessarily want it at the table. Check out those acid washed jeans. Remember when we used to tuck and roll our jeans like that?

Of course the Spoiled One was too good to eat from a paper towel so I had to end up doing this.

And later, when her tummy was all full and she had barked "Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep," I tucked her in for the night.

The only pictures of me, Her Highness, or my mom sleeping or in bed had Prissy right next to us. Same goes for any picture of us on the sofa, on the wicker love seat, or in a chair.

There were a couple of pre-dance recital shots, but there were more shots of what happened to the costumes post-recital.

I think Prissy was hoping we would take her to Glamour Shots. There was also a picture of what happened to my mom's high school graduation cap and old glasses.

Just goes to show that not all dumb blond dog jokes are true. There were a few cat pictures as well. I think the cat is wearing ear muffs in this shot because she's tired of hearing ~~"Marcia, Marcia, Marcia"~~ "Prissy, Prissy, Prissy," all day long.

Now if those pictures didn't prove just how much Prissy ruled our lives, take a look at this hideous, worn out, dirty, paint-covered chair.

That chair should have only been in one place--the dumpster--but my mom kept it in the living room because it was Prissy's chair.

Prissy died in May 2002 at the ripe old age of 17. A couple of months later I adopted Bella and six months after that Bailey. When it comes to photos, I can't say that my adulthood differs very much from my childhood, as most of my pictures revolve around my dogs. I can say, however, that you'll never catch me with an Easter basket or a coffee can full of film, although I might rename the dog pictures file on my computer to Easter or Folgers, just for nostalgia's sake.

Ten Signs It Might Be Time to Give Up Blogging

2010-06-10T11:50:00.007-04:00

Because I'm having one of those weeks...

Your old comments have moved to a comment retirement home in South Florida.

Don't let the wrinkled skin fool you. That's them partying in the pool. The air in Vegas was too dry.
As for your new comments, ninety percent of them read "It looks good. I have learned a new recruit. Recently I have found a new online store, the [insert spammy store url] are completely various, good quality and cheap price, it's worth buying!"
Your waistline budges more than your Google Friend Connect follower count.
You have considered calling 1-800-Rent-a-Kid in order to increase your following.
Your blog hasn't been worth more than four Entrecard credits in months.
After looking at your analytics and seeing how many times your own IP address appears on the visitor log, you realize that you could be brought up on charges for stalking yourself.
Some days you would rather scrub toilets than write a blog post.
You believe blog conventions should be in the same category as root canals, high school reunions, and that CLE beach trip the State Bar holds every summer.
You read a meme question that says, "Do you think it's fair to get thrown out of a meme?" and your first thought is, "What the hell did I do?"
Your blog somehow manages to show up in such Google search queries as "sucking finger," "wet poo," "swinging boobs," "pantyhose camel toe," "kiss my vagina," and "Bengay on balls," and still no one, not even the kinky freaks, click through.

(Seriously though, who Googles Bengay on balls, and what exactly did that person do to his balls that would require them to need Bengay? I'm scared to Google it myself to find out.)

A Few Shots From My Backyard

2010-06-09T15:33:00.005-04:00

I don't feel like coming up with something interesting to say today, especially if the only person who's going to read it is that spammer who keeps posting that he or she "learned a new recruit" on 20 of my posts at a time. So instead of snark, you get pictures from my garden, and I use the term "garden" loosely. I think Photobucket lowered the resolution of the pictures because they looked a lot better before I uploaded them.

This picture came out a little overexposed in parts, but I had to post it because it shows just how much Bailey hates having his picture taken. Love the stuck out tongue. You don't have to speak dog to know what he's thinking.

I'm Running Out of Random Thoughts...

2010-06-08T15:43:00.007-04:00

Or maybe I'm running out of all thoughts all together. I haven't really decided.

For the last few days I have felt like tapping a mike and asking, "Is this thing on?" in regards to this blog. Too bad the blog doesn't have a microphone.

I think I need a kiddie gate for my headboard. The other morning I woke up to Bella screaming. She had somehow managed to get her back end stuck between the wall and the headboard. How something that big can get stuck in something so narrow I will never know. Maybe she's not fat. Maybe she's just full of those little bean things that are inside beanie babies. At least that's what I'm going to tell Dr. McSnippy the next time I take Bella to the vet.

A few weeks ago I was thinking to myself that this fake-Proactiv stuff that I had been using was really working this time. Then I woke up yesterday, looked in the mirror, and saw that I had two horns growing out of my chin, like I was Hellboy's daughter. Can't someone tell the skin gods that my sister already has that job?

Yesterday on my second trip to Fantastic Sam's, I sat next to a woman with hair the color of a beet and skin the color of an overcooked sweet potato. If she ever decides to give up her day job, she'll be a shoe-in for a talking carrot on a PBS kids' show or for Ruby's long-lost cousin Bobbie Sue.

Which reminds me. For some people, self-tanner and red hair dye are privileges, not rights. I think stores ought to require a mental aptitude test before allowing you to buy either.

I'm trying to decide if I want to watch Pretty Little Liars tonight. If the show came on some channel other than ABC Family, I would watch it no questions asked. There's just something about that channel and its obsession with Bring It On marathons that kind of freaks me out.

Does anyone else want to cry every time they see a picture of an animal covered in oil in the Gulf? I grew up an hour and a half or so from Florida's Gulf Coast (from a beach called Alligator Point). Every summer my family tried to vacation in some way, shape, or form at another beach called St. George Island, even if that "vacation" was only a day trip to the island's state park. I love the Gulf Coast's white, soft sand (the Atlantic coast sometimes looks and feels like clay), its milder currents, and its wildlife. Once when it was about to storm and the waves were huge at St. George, I had a dolphin swim by me about a wave length away. I never had that happen on the Atlantic Coast. I had planned on moving to the Gulf if I ever won the lottery, but I don't know if that will happen now thanks to BP. There probably won't be anything left but dirty sand and animal carcases. I can't even watch the news reports about the spill anymore. It depresses me more than the recession.

I fought the laundry, and the laundry won:

There's another load still waiting in the dryer for me. At least it's CLEAN laundry.

I now have I Fought the Law, and the Law Won stuck in my head.

I Didn't Think Thursday, But I'm Waking Up My Brain Cells Now

2010-06-07T17:21:00.010-04:00

My Thursday Thunks answers are a little late. I said I would do them Friday, but I'm just now getting to them. Sorry about that, although I doubt any of you were sitting on the edge of your seats, waiting for the answers. If you were, I'll send you an ice pack in the mail for the butt bruises.

1. When was the last time that you made an excuse for not doing something that you shouldn't have agreed to do in the first place? I'm sure it was sometime last week in regards to Fusion Fall. My nephew is constantly online playing it, or at least he was until his computer started crashing late last week. I think the laptop is overheating because the fan needs cleaning. I cleaned my own fan yesterday, and now the laptop is nowhere near as hot as it was a few days ago. I have been trying to call and tell him to do the same, but the last time I got through, my sister yelled at me, "You're not needed anymore!" and hung up. Yeah, I'm pretty sure that babies were switched at the hospital, too, and my real, sane, sweet sister is out there somewhere, waiting for me to find her.

2. Without identifying the person, is there someone in your life that you'd like to shake some sense into? Oh, where do I begin. Her Highness. Chain-Smoking Granny. The Toothless Wonder. The Toothless Wonder's Wife. I could go on and on down that family tree, but we would be here all day.

3. Did you ever really care if Tiger Woods cheated on his wife? I didn't until Elin enrolled in night classes at my alma mater, Rollins College, at which point I pulled the covers over my head, called Tiger every name in the book, and began pretending I went to community college.

4. Did you watch the last episode of LOST? What did you think happened? Yes, I watched it. I think Jack and his friends followed Christian Shepherd into the light and found this:

Then they got on the Skipper's boat and went on a three hour tour...a three hour tour...

5. If your dining room china was made in Mexico, why is it still called china? Because Taco Bell already took the name Mexican.

6. Tell us about your favorite movie of all time. Speed. I still hold my breath when Sandra Bullock makes the bus jump over the gap in the freeway, even though I know exactly how it's going to end. I think I like the movie because I always drive slow and therefore speed vicariously through Jack and Annie.

7. Do you think it's fair to get thrown out of a meme? How do you get thrown out of a meme? Do you start a meme fight with that weird looking guy at the pool table, or did the bouncer catch you with a fake ID? I think I would have to know more before I could answer the question.

8. Berleen lives in Minnesota and Kimber in Arizona. If they were to meet halfway, where would they meet? In a Kenny Loggins video.

9. What do you think of heterosexual marriage? I think there are way too many reality shows on Bravo about it. What's next, The Real Housewives of Omaha? Enough already.

10. What would you change about your life if you had just one wish? Right now I would have to say my bank account.

11. How pissed are you that we posted late? Seeing as I'm answering this meme on the following Monday, not at all.

12. Tell us about a recent great day. I'll get back to you when I can remember one. It's definitely not today. Just ask my hair. (See previous post or my Twitter feed for details on that.)

13. When was the last time that you juggled? Uh, I can barely walk and chew gum at the same time without killing myself. Do you really think that it's smart for me to throw bowling pins or knives in the air and try to catch them? So the answer is never.

That being said, should Nintendo ever make Wii Sports: The Circus Edition, I'll give virtual juggling a try.

My Comments Haven't Returned from Vegas

2010-06-07T16:49:00.005-04:00

My comments still haven't returned to my Blogger dashboard. I guess they're having a better time in Vegas than I thought. I'm getting very frustrated about the whole mess. I was going to go buy some blank CD's or DVD's today and export my blog to see if they comments at least appear in the blog's XML. If they do, I'm going to stop stressing about them because I know they'll be there whenever I make the move to Wordpress and one of many managed hosting solutions. If they're not, then it's time to make a decision about whether whenever is going to be sooner rather than later.

I didn't actually get the discs today. I went to get a haircut this morning, and things didn't turn out exactly the way I planned. Apparently getting a bad cut each summer is going to be a right of passage for me. I came home, showered, tried to do something to the cut I have deemed "Joan Jett Gets a Perm," failed miserably, called Fantastic Sam's about it, and went back. Now I'm waiting for it to dry. I'm hoping with another inch and a half removed, I will be able to tolerate the newer cut a.k.a. "A Jonas Brother Gets a Boob Job" until it grows out.

So the discs have been forgotten for the time being, but my overall problem with Blogger has not. There always seems to be something going wrong with it, and no way to get any help. Today it's the comments that have gone missing. I'm scared that one morning I will wake up to find it's the entire blog.

I have been looking at web hosts again, trying to find one that actually means you can pay monthly when they say X amount of dollars per month. Right now I have Superb Hosting opened in a separate tag. They offer dedicated server hosting, which I don't think I need since I don't have that many visitors, and colocation services, which I also don't think I need since I have no idea what it is. They also offer web hosting plans, the smallest of which they advertise for $4.99/month. However, you have to buy two years of hosting at once to get that price. To truly pay by the month it's $8.99 for 20 GB of disk space and unlimited traffic.

How much disk space do I need? Some hosts limit bandwidth, too, unless you go with the unlimited plan. How much bandwidth does a blog like mine need? I don't have the first clue. Wordpress isn't the problem. I know I can learn it. It's things like how much room I really need that are holding me up.

If anyone knows the questions to these things, I would greatly appreciate you telling me in the comments. Otherwise, I might end up paying for unlimited everything from some host or the other, even if I don't need it.

This post is brought to you by your friends at Superb.net.

I Was Going to Do Thursday Thunks But...

2010-06-03T19:42:00.005-04:00

I ran out of energy. I will do it tomorrow and call it I Forgot to Think Friday or something like that. I have been off all week regarding what day it is so why should today and tomorrow be any different?

So instead of a bunch of weird questions and even weirder answers, you get this from me today: Fast Food Six Pack Abs. Do I have them? In my dreams, yes. In reality, not so much. However, La Velle La Rue, my newest client, does. He lost 140 pounds while still eating fast food and is now starting a blog about his weight loss journey. He hired me to do the design for him. He wanted a design that showcased his before and after picture, was energetic, and used orange, yellow, and light green as the main colors.

Here is the blog's before shot:

And here is what I came up with. Click on the image to see it live:

I didn't use stock images for this one. I drew all the vectors myself using a free trial of Xara Xtreme, which so far I'm liking better than Inkscape. I also like that it costs only a fraction of what Adobe Illustrator does so saving up for it might be feasible.

La Velle La Rue will have meal plans posted soon. Most of you know how I am about cooking. I seem to be either allergic to the stove or to have some kind of weird, electromagnetic energy that causes everything kitchen-related to blow up, break, or catch on fire so you know I'll be checking out those plans the minute he gets them up.

Because I'm a Little Confused About What Day It Is

2010-06-02T18:09:00.006-04:00

I spent all day yesterday thinking it was Monday. I had intended to do a Take a Memo Monday post, but I ran out of steam last night and told myself I would just save whatever I had to save for my Random Tuesday post. Then I woke up this morning and realized yesterday was Random Tuesdays; today is Wordless Wednesdays, and I don't do wordless too well.

Fooey.

As if I wasn't confused enough, at lunch I drove to Arby's, ordered a coupon special, and realized when I got the window that it was no longer May and my coupon had expired two days ago on the Monday I thought was a Sunday.

Fooey again.

At least the lady at the window took pity on me and took my coupon anyway. Some days it pays to drive a car that looks like it's been through a Transformers' World War.

So even though I'm no longer confused, I'm going to pretend to be confused and do my random thoughts today. I'll just summon my inner Elmer Fudd and call it "Wandom Wednesdays." I might even get the phrase trademarked.

Now for my "wandom" ramblings...

I'm getting tired of getting emails from local paralegals who want me to hire them. Maybe I should start emailing them back, "Okay, I'll hire you if you hire me."

I'm also getting tired of thunderstorms. We've had so many in the last week, I keep looking out the window for mild-mannered reporters, meteor storms, a terrier named Toto, and my long-lost Aunty Em and Uncle Henry.

Almost every comment that has been left on this blog over the last year has disappeared from my Blogger dashboard. I'm starting to think they hopped on a bus and ran away to Vegas to become show-comments. If what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, my comments are never coming back. Time to look at Wordpress hosts again.

Bailey has decided that he likes under the bed better than outside or on top of the bed this past week. What gives? Does he have some doggy porn under there that I don't know about? If so, whose bank account is he using to pay for it? (I'm going to say that all those Taco Bell charges to my debit card were cover charges for Bailey's new habit, not for my love of warm, gooey cheese. The dog is part Chihuahua after all.)

He also likes to sit on top of the surge protector when it's storming. I don't think he realizes that the protector is meant to protect my electronic equipment from electricity spikes, not his rear end from becoming fried.

Yesterday I woke up with that old song that goes, "I love him. I love him. I love him, and where he goes I follow. I follow. I follow." I spent the entire day wondering what on earth I was dreaming about. I wish it was something good, but with my luck, I was probably just following my dogs around the back yard with a pooper scooper in the dream.

I almost went in Quiktrip after Arby's. Then I looked down, saw that my clothes were even more hideous than last time, and decided that a $.49 Coke just wasn't worth the risk of running into Lobster Guy, who is obviously turned on by women who dress like a What Not to Wear candidate.

For those who are wondering, I do dress better than a reality show before shot. I just don't do it on rainy days the morning after I eat a big, blue cheese dressing-covered salad for dinner.

Speaking of blue cheese dressing. It is not my friend. It apparently has just as much lactose as it does fat and calories. Don't ask me how I know. Just thank your lucky stars computer screens aren't scratch and sniff. I'm adding it to the list of Foods Staci Must Never Eat.

I have also recently discovered that Zyrtec 24 hour tablets knock me out. I'm still borderline comatose from the one I took yesterday. I've been giving those suckers to the dogs on my vet's advice, and they only weigh a small fraction of what I do. How have they even been able to stand up right?

It's 6:33 p.m. right now, and I would kill for a nap. If I don't buy some caffeine tomorrow, I might kill for a lot less. America's Most Wanted, here I come.

I Need to Have More Me-Moments This Week

2010-06-01T22:05:00.003-04:00

This is a Sponsored Post written by me on behalf of Dove Ice Cream. All opinions are 100% mine.

I have been staying up late the last few nights (okay, the last week) working on blog designs. As a result, I have barely been able to keep my eyes open during the day and have had rarely few me-moments. It's not that I don't want to have them. I'm just too tired to do so. I don't know if you know this or not, but sitting at the computer for hours on end can be really exhausting. It tires me out faster than one of my Firm DVD's. Plus, the longer I sit there, the more my neck hurts, and the more I wish I had my own personal masseuse in the next room instead of two dogs that would pee on me than give me a massage.

Oh, how I wish I could train them to do the latter.

Until my dogs get accepted to the Canine Institute of Massage Therapy, I'll have to work in some me-moments into blog designing and job searching another way. Today my me-moment was going to be exercising, but instead it turned out to be an hour-long power nap that failed to give me energy but did give me a bag case of morning breath. I would like to say that tomorrow my me-moment will be something a little more enjoyable, but I have a feeling it will only be cutting the grass.

Yeah, yard work is hardly all about me.

So how can I get a more worthy me-moment? I can enter Dove Ice Cream's My Mini Moment Contest.

Dove is giving away one of three mini-escapes as part of the contest, me-moments at their finest. The first mini-escape that you can choose from should you win is a four-day, three-night trip to Napa Valley, where you will get to stay in a spa resort and go to wine tastings at local wineries.

The second escape is a spa package, which is the one that I would prefer since I'm not a big fan of wine. Well, let me rephrase that. I'm not a big fan of the only wine that I have ever tried. (Yes, only one. Sheltered life, I know.) The wine that I had tried was some that my mom had left in my fridge. I smelled it and determined that it reeked of rotten grapes. I poured a little into the wine glass she bought, sipped it, declared it also tasted like rotten grapes, and poured it right back into the bottle. I haven't tried any other brand, flavor, vintage, or whatever you call it since.

Anyway, back to the giveaway and the spa package choice, which isn't technically a spa package at all. It's a $5000 check that is supposed to be used for a year's worth of spa services. Honestly, I would probably use the check to catch up on some bills and then on a really big, really fattening steak dinner. Considering my current financial state, that would be way more relaxing than a massage and a mani-pedi. Not that I would mind either if I had money left over.

Dove's third mini-escape is called the Ultimate Mini Oasis, which is another $5000 check that you're supposed to use to create an oasis at home. Okay, let's say for argument's sake that I didn't have to catch up on bills. I would use that $5000 for a jetted tub, some bubble bath, and one of those machines that automatically throws tennis balls for you. My last escape item may sound a little crazy, but if you read my things that make me grumpy post from yesterday, you know that I rarely get to soak in the tub sans a ball-loving cocker spaniel on the floor next to me. Shutting the bathroom door doesn't keep her away. The thing doesn't latch properly, and even if it did, the dog would just howl and scratch at the door until I opened. I wouldn't exactly call that relaxing or an escape so an escape for me would have to include a distraction for the dog. It's either hire a tennis ball machine or hire my own personal ball thrower.

To enter the "My Mini Moment" contest, go to doveicecream.com/myminimoment and upload both a photo showing your mini-escape and a 1000-character or less essay saying why that escape is your favorite. Only one entry is allowed per person, and you must upload the photo and essay by 11:59 p.m. EST on June 7, 2010. While only one person will win the main prize, ten finalists will get a Dove Bar tote filled with Dove Bar Ice Cream Miniature coupons, a spa wrap, eye mask, candles, lotion, and shower gel. Dove Ice Cream Miniatures are only 70 calories a serving so they're a mini-escape all in themselves, unless of course you eat the whole box.

(I'm not judging. Just ask my why I won't buy donuts anymore. They're like Lays potato chips. You can never eat just one.)

Unfortunately, the tote bag doesn't come with a ball thrower or Lactaid. You're on your own there, and yes, by you I mean me. Any hope it comes with a yard man instead?

A Birthday, Grumpy Things, Two Thanks Yous, & a Blog Redo

2010-05-31T16:52:00.011-04:00

I'm going to be a little cheesy here and say happy birthday to my own blog. I missed Just Bloggled's first birthday last year, but I managed to remember it this year. In lieu of presents, I got my blog this:

Cheap, and nowhere near as scary as the real things. Not that I'm scared of balloons; I'm not, but the Wonder Canine Twins are.

Now on to grumpier things. Sandbox Gems tagged me with this Things that Make Me Grumpy meme last Thursday, but I have been too busy working on the final touches of Books in the City's blog design to get to it until today. I'm supposed to tell you seven things that make me grumpy. Talk about opening a can of worms. I'll try to keep to the worms that I haven't let loose yet.

Tests of the Emergency Broadcast System. I guess I understand why the stations need to do them, but why do they only run the tests when something good is on? They never run them during infomercials or reruns of Jerry Springer. Instead, they run them during things like the last episode of Lost.
Sour clothes. Sometimes I forget that I have clothes in the wash like I did a few days ago. When I remember them, I'm stuck washing them three times over to get the smell out like I'm having to do today. I have dumped two cups of baking soda in there, and they still stink. I have no idea what I should dump in there next, and it's making me all kinds of grumpy. Pretty soon I'm going to be asking the other six dwarfs and Snow White for help.
Accidentally knocking a new roll of toilet paper into a running shower or a full bath tub.

The fact that the bread truck always seems to come the day after I buy bread, no matter which day of the week I go to the grocery store. I don't like wasting a dollar on bread that expires two days after purchase.

Along those same lines, the fact that gas prices tend to go down $.20 or $.30 the day AFTER I fill up, or at least they did last week.

Getting more food on my clothes than I do in my mouth. Unfortunately, this happens way too much. My family would probably say how can I miss something that big. I don't know. Maybe it's because I don't eat looking in a mirror.

Razor burn.

I'm not sure how many people I'm supposed to tag with this. Seven maybe? Here are the bloggers I'm going to tag:

Harini at Unveiling Harini
Bossy Betty at Bossy Betty
Vicki at Frugal Mom Knows Best
J.P. Ryan at J.P.'s Musings
New Jersey Memories
Stacie at Stacie's Madness
One of the Guys from The Guy's Perspective Blog

Consider this meme your ~~punishment~~ award for commenting on my blog several times in the last few weeks, even though I haven't really had anything worthwhile to say. (Still don't, but that's another story.)

I officially give up on ever passing out those blog rewards. Instead I'm going to say a big thank you to Sandbox Gems for the Circle of Friends Award and at least follow the rules as far as the accompanying meme goes.

Here are five things that I like to do:

Nap
Sing really loud and really bad in my car
Soak in the tub WITHOUT playing a simultaneous game of fetch (a definite rarity)
Fix things that people think I can't fix solely because I'm a girl
Play hidden object computer games (I think this goes back to my old Highlights days)

I would also like to say thank you to Vicki at Frugal Mom Knows Best for the Lemonade Award, which is actually making me crave lemonade at the moment.

Good lemonade mind you, like the freshly-squeezed kind you get at county fairs, not that overpriced, powdery-tasting Crystal Light that I buy sometimes.

I am about to post both awards on my awards page. I swear if anyone ever gives me another blog award again, I will pass it out.

As for my last housekeeping matter, here are the before and after shots of my Books in the City makeover. Colleen, the blog owner, opted for the head-to-toe makeover known as Package E, which includes a new header, footer, background, three columns, favicon, signature, social icons, unlimited sidebar items, navigation bar, and post divider. She wanted something that reflected both her love of books (her blog is a book review blog) and her location in New York City.

BEFORE

AFTER

I had to divide these images up because her home page was so long. Here is the top part showing all the sidebar images:

And here is the footer section:

As always, click on the pics to see them live.

I had a lot of fun doing this one, mixing the photos with the stock image. Every time I do another design, I want to redo my design with some more summery colors so don't be surprised if you stop by one day and see another Just Bloggled redo. It just probably won't be this week, as I'll be working on a new design for a blog called Fast Food Six Pack Abs over the next few days.

Okay, I think that covers everything but Entrecard Top Droppers. I'll try to get to them tomorrow.