Ring-A-Ding-Ding

I waited a long time to get an engagement ring put on my finger. What was I, 38 when J proposed? Yeah, 38. I've worn it every single day since, proud to have it sitting there on my left ring finger, announcing my commitment to the man I love.

Today I had to move it to the middle finger for a while (I bet I had you all scared, thinking something had happened between me and J, right? Hee. Sorry about that). I've only lost 15.25 pounds so far, which is just a drop in the bucket of the total I have to lose, and yet my diamond has been flopping around all the time, and when I shook my hand earlier, it actually came off. And I do NOT want to lose my ring. My love for J and my love for my Mother are both tied into this thing (since it was Mom's ring from my Dad originally).

I knew that at some point my ring would get too big, but I never would have guessed that it would be getting loose this soon. It's not a big deal - I'll just move it to my middle finger, and when it gets too big again, I'll move it to my index finger. As long as I can still wear it, I'm happy. And when I get close to my goal weight, we'll get it resized so it can go back on its proper finger.

And I'm very happy to have random parts of me, like my fingers, getting smaller. :) The scale is going down slowly, but it's going down. It's a good thing.

Mind Blown. Can't Think.

I just linked to an article that said that popular "Mommy Blogger" Do0ce makes a lot of money in advertising. A lot. Seriously. Are you ready for this number? Assuming this article is correct, she makes $40,000 a MONTH, in advertising from her blog. A month! That's almost twice what I make in a YEAR, and she makes it in one month. In one year? She makes $480,000. What the?!?

My mind is blown. I feel a mixture of feelings, really. Shock, that anyone could make that much money posting pictures of their kids and dogs and telling stories of their family online. An irrational hatred, because why the heck should she make so much money doing something like that? And most of all, jealousy. I want to make that much money! Just for one or two months, even!

Although really, I don't. With that kind of popularity comes an obligation to post all the time; commenters who feel they have the right to tell you every sick, twisted thing they think of; criticisms from every strange person to find their way online.

Still, that kind of money sounds nice, doesn't it? Just for a couple of months? Seriously, two months making that much money would pay off my credit cards, student loans, all of J's bills and probably both of our houses, too. We'd be debt free! It's like dreaming of winning the lottery.

Okay, I think the shock is leaving my system. I can go back to my life now.

Oh, and since I haven't written in so long, maybe I should tell you what's going on in my life, huh? Well, not much, really. I've lost 14.75 pounds so far. I'm hoping to be able to get to 25 pounds lost by my birthday, but that's four weeks from tomorrow, so I don't know if I'll make it. I'm going to try, though.

I got the Sims 3 from J as an early birthday present, and then he made it even better by upgrading my computer's video card so I could run the game properly. So I have a new game to obsess over. Hee.

I finally got a picture of my new niece from my brother, and she is such a beautiful baby! She looks like a doll. (Did I even tell you she was born? I don't remember. Just in case, she's my oldest brother's daughter, she was born on May 14th, and her name is Natalie.)

The dogs and cats are all doing well. Willow continues to growl constantly, Duff continues to be the cutest little white dog around, Bernie continues to just make me love him more and more all the time, and Rosie continues to charm J and I as only Rosie can, with farts and wet ears and some really great hugs.

Kate isn't hiding in her house as much lately. She's been out in the living room, loudly demanding pets instead. She even walked in front of J so that he could pet her last night! Of course then she ran back to her house when he got up, so she's not deciding she loves him or anything. Heh.

I've now read 10 Pulitzer Prize winning books, so as far as my 101 list is concerned, that goal is done! Of course, now I've decided to read all of the Pulitzer Prize winning novels, so in reality I have 73 left to go. Hee. They're too good to stop at only reading 10.

I'm getting really close to being done watching all of the Best Picture Oscar winning movies, too. I only have 14 left to watch, plus four that aren't on DVD right now. I'll be kind of sad when I'm done with this, actually - I've seen a lot of great movies that I might never have seen otherwise.

I guess that's all I need to catch you up on. And writing this has gotten me over the shock of finding out what Do0ce makes, so it's a good thing (also, I'm writing her name like that, and not linking to her, because I don't feel like contributing another hit to her page right now, because yes, still jealous of the 40 grand a month, :P).

Have a good weekend, my four or five faithful blog readers!

Catch-Up

Wow, I'm not really in here chatting much, am I? Sorry! I guess I haven't been in the blogging kind of mood.

So, nothing much has been going on with me. Mostly my mind has been focused on watching what I eat and exercising. I have a significant goal in mind that I want to reach by July 4th, and it's totally reasonable to think I can do it - I just need to do the work! So I've started doing workout DVDs on Netflix online. The first one, and the one I've liked best so far, was Crunch: Fat Burning Pilates. I did it on Tuesday night, and I worked up a really good sweat, worked a bunch of muscles, and did a nice bit of work on my abs, too. My legs were actually sore when I was done! Which I haven't been able to say after riding the exercise bike or doing the videos on sparkpeople, so I'm thinking I wasn't really working hard enough. The videos are helping in that regard.

The next night I did a Jillian Michaels DVD that was targeting the upper body (since my legs and abs had gotten worked the day before). It still worked the legs, so they were doubly sore when I was done, but I did get a decent workout in my arms and chest, too. My chest was actually sore! So it was good, I think.

Last night I took a night off, to let my muscles rest. One of the things I've learned is that muscles need time to rest, to heal. I'm not sore at all today, so I think the rest was good. One night of rest is all my muscles are getting, though, because tonight I'm back to the Crunch DVD.

Oh, and I found this virtual me thing online, and put in my height, my starting weight, my goal weight, and my body type. If gave me virtual before and after pictures (these are from the Levi's website, so she's wearing Levi's jeans and a Levi's top). Here it is:


I have no perspective on what I looked like when I started (11 pounds ago), so I'm not sure how accurate the before side is. From what I remember of being at my goal weight many years ago, the after seems pretty accurate, though. I had a small upper body, with the little bit of extra weight I still had on me in the legs and butt. (My goal weight here is 135, by the way, although in reality I'll be happy anywhere between 135 and 145, which should be about a size 6 or 8 pants (US sizes, obviously).) I have this saved on my desktop at work and at home, and from time to time I open it up and look at the after, for inspiration. I'm going to get there this time, I can feel it. I'm working hard for it, so it'll happen. Eventually. Probably early next year.

Anyway, so that's what been on my mind, mostly. Well, that and Sims 3! Which came out on Tuesday. I wasn't sure if I wanted it, but then I started seeing pictures and stories about it from people who got it that day, and now I absolutely want it! It's different than Sims 2, but that's okay. I'm going into it thinking of it as a totally different game than 2. So the differences don't bother me. I just want it! Unfortunately, it's $50, and I don't get paid until next week, so it'll have to wait. I'll have it in my hands eventually, though. I just hope it works on my desktop when I get it! The video card seems to have what they require, but it isn't a version that's supported by EA for the game, so who knows if it will or not. We'll see, whenever I get my hands on a copy of it.

Other than that, I've been reading lots, and knitting some (still working on my new niece's blanket), and watching DVDs and TV, and hanging out with J when he's home. Life is pretty good.

And there you have a quick recap of what's been going on with me. I hope you all are doing well too!

Lucky Shot

Yesterday at my sister's house, I asked my great-niece Ava to pose for me in the fort on top of the slide. At the same time, my great-nephew Sammy was being pushed on the swing by his Dad. I snapped the picture of Ava, Sammy swung forward, and I lucked into this great shot.



I love this kind of happy accident.

What I Learned This Afternoon

Riding a real bike out on a semi-hilly road for ten minutes is way more work than riding an exercise bike in the living room for 30. WAY MORE. Ouch. To think I used to be on a bike more than I was off it when I was a kid.

Finally!

Today marks a true milestone in my quest to be healthier - I have finally lost 10 pounds! Woo!

It feels like it took forever to get here, but I haven't just been dieting to lose weight - I've also been changing my eating habits, instituting an exercise habit, and basically doing this thing the right way. I'm eating a balanced diet, watching to make sure I get enough protein and fiber without going overboard on carbohydrates and fats - but I'm not doing low fat or low carb. I'm getting a good balance of everything.

I'm also exercising about 40 minutes per day Monday - Friday, and about 10 minutes per day on weekends, which is approximately a billion more minutes than I would previously have spent exercising in a week. (That may be a slight exaggeration.)

All of this work is resulting in a body that is slowly reshaping itself. I'm feeling slightly leaner, a bit tighter, and even a bit stronger. It took the scale a while to start reflecting these changes, but finally it is. And I'm down 10 pounds! It feels so good to be able to say that.

I'm so glad I finally got in the right mental place to do this. I feel so much better already! And hey, 10 down, only 67 to go! :D I just might be there by the end of the year. :)

Minor Excitement

J called me earlier to let me know that the contractor who was at our house (we had four new windows put in this week) had called to let him know that our power line was sagging really low over the road, and the pipe that holds it (our contractor called it a porcelain) had almost ripped off the house. Uh oh!

So I called the light company and sent them out there to check it out, and I drove out during lunch to make sure all was well. This is the point where I'd be sharing pictures if I had remembered my camera, but alas I left it sitting in my tote bag at work. D'oh! Oh well.

But everything was fine. When I got there the contractor was still there picking up the debris from the old windows, and the light company truck was already there. There were cones set up in front of the house to warn people of the low hanging power line, and when I talked to the guy who had shown up, he said it would be an easy fix once another truck got there.

So, whew! Thank goodness for fast acting light company repair guys, and for our contractor who happened to show up after the line came loose and let us know. Oh, and it was most likely ripped loose by the wind - it's whipping at 40 mph or more out there right now.

Now here's hoping that this repair cost is covered by the charges I pay the light company every month, and that it doesn't show up in my next light bill!

Gift for Eli

My newest great-nephew was born last week! His name is Elijah (Eli), and he's a cutie. And for a change I got a baby gift finished when the baby was only a week old! I finished his blanket last night.

And here it is! It's being displayed on top of the cutting board at work, so please ignore the part of the cutter that's showing at the back of the photo. :)

My nephew Ken and his wife Melanie were doing a jungle theme in the nursery. It's hard to knit something jungle like (at least for a beginner knitter - I can't do the fancy knitting designs yet), so I went with a jungle-y green. I hope they like it.

It's done in a basket weave pattern, which I just love the looks of. In fact, I think once I'm done making a blanket for my brother's new baby, I may make an adult sized version of this pattern for myself. It looks so snuggly and warm!

I did have one frustration with it yesterday when finishing it. I ran out of yarn! The end of the border was supposed to be 8 rows, but it ended up being 3. I'm sure Ken and Mel won't mind. :) As it is, I ran out of yarn when I still had about 15 stitches to bind off, so here's what the end looks like:

Oh well. It's the little imperfections that make these things mean more, right? :)

Welcome to the world, Eli! I hope you'll get lots of use out of your blanket once you get it.

Gone

When I bought my house in the winter of 1999, the previous owner left a few things in it. The table I had admired while I was looking at the house was there - we use it to this day. A tan rocker/recliner was in the living room. An old fake Christmas tree was in the basement. And an old Cub Cadet riding lawn mower was in the garage.

In the years since I've moved in, the tree has stayed in the basement, the chair has been used and abused by the dogs and exiled to the garage, the table is still in use, and the lawn mower got used for a few years before it broke down and I finally had the money to buy a new one.

The other things haven't been any trouble (although the recliner is going to be making a trip to the dump someday), but that damn mower has been like a weight around my neck. Or rather, a weight in the garage. A large, yellow, immovable weight, sitting there taking up valuable space. I had a way of getting rid of it last year - the college where I work would have taken it and recycled it. But we couldn't get it out of the garage - it was too heavy to lift into a truck bed (mowers used to be made of solid steel, apparently - this thing was like a tank).

I thought I was stuck with it forever.

This year my new(er) mower needed some work before it was ready to start being used. So I took it to my friendly neighborhood small engine repair guy, who fixed it up for me. I mentioned the old yellow mower to them a couple of times (I might have had some desperation in my voice), telling his wife that if he wanted it to use for parts, or to fix up and sell, he could have it! For free! Just get it out of my garage! I didn't think they were going to bite. But at the last minute yesterday, they did.

Last night they backed their truck and trailer into my driveway, unloaded my new(er), fully functioning mower, loaded up the heavy heap, and took it away. I was never so glad to see anything leave my house.

The empty space in the garage looks so good. The weight is gone.

Yay!!

Celebrating Agriculture

When's the last time you went to lunch and got to see cows, goats, horses, huge tractors and even a turkey? Today was Ag Day on the campus where I work. And I had my camera with me! Look, pretty pictures!

Cows!





Goats!


(Plus some random student holding this baby goat.)

Turkey!



And my personal favorite - Horses!

The foal reared up just as I was snapping this picture - if my camera had been pointed high enough to get his ears in, it would have been a perfect shot! I still love it, though.

Frisky baby. :)

Settling down.

Lunchtime!

Take My Temperature, Please

I think I must be sick. Sparkpeople sent me an e-mail today about a challenge they're running in the month of May - a "Sweatsuit to Swimsuit Bootcamp" challenge, to be precise. Basically it's an exercise challenge. I'll be doing 30 minutes of cardio exercise five days a week, of my choosing, and then SEVEN days a week, I'll be doing short videos that they'll have posted on their website. The challenge is designed to jump start my diet and tone me up in time for swimsuit season.

Well, first of all, I will NOT be wearing a swimsuit any time soon. I want that down for the record.

But I liked the idea of seeing a larger drop on the scale by the end of May, and I liked the idea of seeing my measurements go down even more. So, even though I HATE exercising, I signed up.

I'm going to be much more fit by the end of May, that's for sure. :)

This challenge just seemed to be coming at the exact right time for me. The scale is not going down as fast as I would like at all. I've been doing this for something like 7 weeks now? And I haven't even lost 10 pounds. I'm not too disappointed, because I have lost some weight, and more importantly, I can feel a difference in my body (and I can see the difference in the numbers the tape measure is showing me, especially in my waist). But I'd like to get that number down, damn it. :)

So. I'll be riding the exercise bike, riding a real bike or walking five days a week. I'll be doing short exercise videos (using a resistance band, which I need to buy) seven days a week. And I'll be weighing in and measuring on May 30th, to see how I did. I'll let you know.

Pornographic Banana

Today at lunch, I picked up a banana for an afternoon snack - only this thing is HUGE. Easily big enough to be two afternoon snacks. When I showed it to Jamie, he called it a pornographic banana. He told me to blog about it. So here you go.

I wonder how many hits I'll get with people searching for dirty banana fetish pictures? Ick. I shudder to think.

Did someone say pornographic banana?

***

So, I have recently discovered online comics! It seems like a weird thing for me to discover and actually enjoy, but I have been loving them! First I linked to Girls with Slingshots, which I fell in love with, so Jen linked me to Questionable Content, which I also loved. And then I found Girl Genius, and had a blast reading that one - it's full of adventure and has a plucky heroine, and it's just amazing, really. I caught up with that one recently, and now I'm sad that I don't have any more to read. Sigh. I guess I need to find a new comic to catch up to now.

***

I'm just about to finish the book I'm reading - "Nineteen Minutes," by Jodi Picoult, so I went online and reserved my next book with the library. Next up to be read is "The Road," by Carmac McCarthy, who it turns out also wrote "No Country for Old Men." I liked that movie a lot, so I'm interested in reading "The Road." I love finding new books to, well, love.

***

And now I'm out of things to talk about, I think. Talk to you next time! And let me know if you check out any of those comics (or if you know any others I should read).

***

Nine and a half inches of banana, baby. Oh yeah. :P

Warning: Super Long Movie Post Ahead

I watched three more Best Picture winners over the last week! I'm speeding through this list, which is good, but I'm kind of sad, because it won't be long before I'll be done with this! It's been a lot of fun watching all of these movies, it really has.

Anyway, on to the movies I've seen lately!

We'll go in the order I watched them. First up:
Gentleman's Agreement
1947
Gregory Peck
Dorothy McGuire

It was kind of odd watching this movie, because I don't think the subject matter is all that relevant today. Maybe I'm wrong, and if I am, you can tell me (I tend to live in my own little world sometimes, and my world doesn't always resemble the real world much). This movie is about a reporter (played by Gregory Peck) who goes undercover in New York City as a Jew, to blow the lid off anti-semitism.

Is that still relevant? It would never occur to me that people were still anti-semitic, but I also know how horrible people can be, so maybe they are, and I just don't know.

Anyway, he tells everyone he is Jewish, and feels the effects of it. His kid gets beaten up, he is denied jobs and apartments based on it, and is basically just made way more away of how horrible people can be. And this includes his fiance, who is in on the story, but who still manages to say and do things that come off as bigoted. Throughout the movie, I actually thought he was with the wrong woman - why marry the woman who has to tell herself to be open and not go along with everyone else on this issue, when there is a beautiful woman at the magazine he is working for, who is NOT in on the secret, and couldn't care less that he's supposedly Jewish? But no, he sticks with the other woman instead. It's his fiance who explains the title of the movie - a "Gentleman's Agreement," in which people who don't agree with the anti-semitism just stand back, go along and ignore it, instead of speaking up about it.

It was a good movie - I enjoyed it. I gave it 4 stars out of 5. It made you think, and made me hope that this problem really is in the past.

Up next:
The Greatest Show on Earth
1952
Charlton Heston
Betty Hutton
Jimmy Stewart
Dorothy Lamour
Cornel Wilde

This was a really entertaining movie. It followed the Ringling Bros., Barnum & Bailey circus as it traveled the country putting on shows for the masses. Brad (Charlton Heston) is the manager of the circus, Holly (Betty Hutton) is a trapeze artist who is in a relationship with Brad (but he's more in love with the show than he is with her), The Great Sebastian (Cornel Wilde) is a famous trapeze artist who swoops in and takes the center ring away from Betty's character, and lots of other characters fill out the cast.

The main story lines in this little drama are a love triangle between Brad, Holly and Sebastian, and oh yeah - Jimmy Stewart plays a clown named Buttons, who never takes off his face paint. Why? Because he's a doctor who is on the run from the law - he's wanted for murder.

Along the way, Brad puts an end to a cheating scheme put on by one of the midway booths, which puts him under fire by the thug behind the crooked guy. This leads to a hold-up of the train carrying the take from the shows, and also leads to a train wreck.

All in all, this was a very entertaining movie, but it could have been a lot shorter - if you took the scenes that just showed the circus acts out of the movie, it would be probably an hour shorter.

Oh, and probably no one reading this has ever watched a Road movie (Road to Singapore, for example), but those movies starred Dorothy Lamour (a secondary character in this movie), Bing Crosby and Bob Hope. They must have shot them at about the same time as this movie, because in one scene where Dorothy is singing, they scan the crowd to show Bing and Bob sitting there eating popcorn and watching her sing. Ha! I think that was my favorite part of the whole movie. I love the Road movies.

I gave this one 4 out of 5 stars.

Last but not least is my favorite of the three:
Marty
1955
Ernest Borgnine
Betsy Blair

I LOVED this movie. And why wouldn't I? It's a romance! Ernest Borgnine plays the title character, a 34 year old Italian man who still lives at home with his mother. His younger siblings have all married and are having kids of their own, and Marty is still single and taking all kinds of heat from the women in the neighborhood because of it.

But he doesn't want to be single! He wants to find love! But he has been shot down and had his feelings hurt so many times that he's given up hope.

Enter a Saturday night, which he plans on spending at home alone, until his Mother convinces him to go out to a dance club. She wants him to find a woman, too! So out he goes, with his single friend.

They get to the club, and they're just standing around watching people dance. Marty asks one woman to dance, but gets shot down. But then it starts to get interesting. A woman comes in with her sister and two men. Her name is Clara. She's a 29 year old school teacher, who is single and has been set up on a date with her sister's husband's friend. One problem - the friend is a sleaze.

Unhappy with the "dog" he had been set up with, this friends proceeds to approach Marty and offer him $5 if he'll take this dog off his hands and escort her home, leaving the sleaze free to go off with some other woman he's seen there. Oy. Marty, being a gentleman, is offended by this man's offer, and tells him no. But his interest is piqued, and he watches as this guy approaches another man, who accepts the $5. But Clara rejects the invitation to have a strange man take her home, and is left alone.

And what do you know, Marty approaches Clara and starts to talk to her, and they actually hit it off! They bond over being dogs and rejected so many times throughout their lives. They're having a great time, and spend hours together that night, and leave promising to see each other the next day.

These plans start to be derailed by Marty's friends and family, and I was really afraid that he was going to do the wrong thing, but he came through in the end. I'm a sap, I know this, but I love romantic movies, and this one was great. I want to own it on DVD someday.

I gave this movie 5 out of 5 stars.

There, I'm all done with movie posts for the day. Aren't you happy? And the length of this surely makes up for me not posting yesterday, right? :) Thanks for reading! (And go rent Marty, you'll love it.)

Time Traveling

A couple of weeks ago, I decided to give up the Sims for a while. This may not seem like much, but when you consider that I thought about the Sims each day about as often as a teenage boy thinks about sex, you can see that it's really rather huge. Huge, but not unprecedented - I've taken breaks from playing before. But this time is different.

You see, for me, the Sims has been more than just a game. I've played it, yes, but I've also read online stories written using the game. I've contributed in online communities of people who are all as obsessed with the game as I am. I've developed friendships of sorts with some of them. I've spent time online, downloading custom content for the game. Basically, I've obsessed over it, played it as often as I could, and thought about playing when I couldn't.

But for the last couple of weeks, not only have I not been playing, but I haven't even been interested in reading the stories, or with participating in the communities around the game. It's like the Sims switch in my brain shut off.

I won't say that it's permanent. I may very well be back to playing before too much time has passed. But for now it's like I've been transported back in time, to 2002, or 1995, or any time before I discovered this game. I'm kind of liking the change.

And I'm glad that I haven't really been transported back to 2002 or 1995. I was horribly depressed over the death of my mother in the former, and I was single and desperately lonely in both the former and the latter. All in all, I'm way happier now.

And I'm not missing the virtual world of my Sims at all.

For now.

Sunny Saturday

Today was the first nice, warm day we've had here - it's 80 degrees out right now, and it's almost 7:30 at night! I love it. We went from being cold to being almost hot in just a couple of days - ah, you gotta love Central New York weather.

Today I actually got out in the warmth a bit! I trimmed back a wild bush on the side of the garage, and pulled out some chain link fence, which we're going to use around the pool, so that it'll finally be fenced in.

And then I planted my three trees! My hands were filthy when I came in, and I loved it! I actually like planting trees and flowers. Now I just need to buy some decorative fencing to go around them, so I don't accidentally mow over them. Hee.

Later on I went out and picked some daffodils, as you can see above. I love these sunny yellow flowers so much! They're my favorite spring flower.

So I had a pretty nice time out in the fresh air today. I hope your Saturday was just as good as mine!

Arboring all over the place

Today when I walked to lunch, there were some agriculture students outside, handing out free beechnut trees. So of course, I took one. On the way back from lunch, Jamie took one too, and gave it to me. Now I have two new trees to plant at home! Woo! I hope I can keep them protected and alive long enough for them to take root and start to grow. I'll have to put a fence of some sort around them, or I'll run over them with the mower for sure. (I'm not the most graceful.)

Happy Arbor Day, folks!

Middlesex

The most recent Pulitzer Prize winning novel that I read was Middlesex, by Jeffrey Eugenides (which won in 2003).

I LOVED this book. I think it's my favorite of the ones I've read so far for my 1001 list (which doesn't count To Kill a Mockingbird, which I read a few years ago and is still my favorite Pulitzer Prize winner).

Middlesex tells the story of a family - but not just any family. The Stephanides family's story begins with the main character's grandparents, who immigrated to the United States in the 1920s. The big family secret is that said grandparents were both first cousins and brother and sister. Scandalous!

This incestuous relationship resulted in two children, and planted the seed for a genetic condition that would eventually show up in Callie (Cal) Stephanides, grandchild of the immigrants. This condition results in a hermaphroditic child who appears to be a girl, and is treated as such until puberty, when the truth is eventually revealed.

What made this book so captivating, though, wasn't just the unique circumstances of the family, but the relationships in the book and the characters themselves. They were wonderfully written, and I just couldn't wait to find out what happened from page to page.

This was an excellent book. I'm glad I read it.

Nine Years

When I was a kid, I was sometimes afraid of her. When I was a teen, I was ashamed of her (I was a stupid teen). When I was an adult, she became my best friend.

Nine years ago today, she died.


She left a hole in my life that I will never really fill - no one can ever replace a mom. But at least it doesn't hurt me anymore to think about her. I can remember the good stuff now, the stuff worth remembering. We used to go shopping almost every Saturday. She used to like to go into the arcade at the mall, and put quarters in the crane machine until she had a few toys to take home to Baby, my dog. She used to call me every day just to talk.

In one of the last days before she died, I was sitting next to her bed, and she traced my face with her hand, like she was memorizing it. I felt the ghost of that touch for a long time after she was gone.

I love you, Mom. I miss you every single day. I wish you could have been here long enough to meet J. You would have loved him - he wishes he could have taken you to a Yankees game. I hope you're seeing that I'm happy.

Nine years went both very fast and very slow. I will miss her forever.

Kitty Picture Time

I should never have scanned those pictures in yesterday - the ones of Bo and Baby, I mean. I'm glad I have them electronically now, but I put one of them on my desktop wallpaper at work, and it's making me miss them so much! Sigh. I guess I need to change the picture to one of J and/or the current dogs.

So, on to happier things - kitten pictures of cats who are actually still alive and living with me at this very moment!

I just love when kittens sleep all jumbled together! It's so cute. The orangish/tan one is Kate and Lucy's brother, who was adopted by someone else.

Sleeping with their stuffed animal buddies! (These pictures are all at the house of the person who had the Mama cat, by the way - I do not own any furniture made out of material this ugly.)

Lucy is such a beautiful cat, and she was an adorable kitten, don't you think?

I look at this picture, and then I think of how freaking HUGE Kate is now, and it amazes me that she was ever this small. Poor fat Kate.

But you can see the signs of impending fathood already - she's bellying up to the milk bar all by herself! :) I kid. I love my Kate, scaredy fat cat that she is.

Okay, pictures of the past are over for now. Tomorrow it's back to current day, most likely with a short recap of an amazing book I read recently for my quest to read 10 Pulitzer Prize winning novels. See you then!

Breaking My Own Heart

Yesterday I went into my bedroom and dug out the bag of junk that I took out of my old desk when I gave it to J. I was looking for some cross-stitch supplies, but I found a little treasure instead. Pictures. And I scanned some of them in for you.




I call this the "Baby on Dock" series. Because it's my first Rottie, Baby, on the dock of a house my Mom and I rented in the summer of 1994. We lived on a pond. It was great, but we got kicked out in the fall, because the owner wanted to move some relative in. I miss swimming in the pond, though.

A cute story about swimming in that pond - Baby didn't like swimming; Rotties aren't swimmers, I guess, or at least she wasn't. I loved it, though, and would get in at the shore and swim straight out for a while before turning around and swimming back. Whenever I did that, Baby would stand on this dock and whine. She was worried about me swimming that far away from her - how would she protect me if something happened to me? She was the sweetest dog, she really was.

This isn't a series, because I only scanned in one picture of Baby on this porch. But she looked cute here, and I wanted to include it. Please just ignore the grossness of said porch. It needed a paint job BIG time. Whoa.

Baby and Bo were great pals. Bo was quite a bit younger than Baby, but she never minded having him around, and when his puppy antics got to be too much, she'd snap at him and straighten him out, and then all was well again. She was an incredibly patient dog.

Another shot of Baby and Bo. So freaking cute! Again, please ignore the porch and just focus on puppy sized Bo, grabbing at Baby, as she just endures it in silence. I love dogs so much, and I loved these two just a ton.

So, as much as I loved Baby (and Bailey after her), no dog I've ever had has really compared to my Bo. I almost teared up just scanning these pictures in. He was a truly special dog, and one I don't think I'll ever forget. I wish he were still here with me.

This picture in particular kind of kills me. It was very overexposed (which I fixed to an extent with photoshop), but this is him, you know? His ears were always like that - one up, one down. He was such a handsome boy.

Sigh.

Okay, from an animal I miss every day to a person I miss every day. This is my Mom, with her dog, Chrissy, in 1992. I never would have guessed at the time that Chrissy would outlive Mom like she did.

Sigh again.

Okay, that's enough for now. I'm just depressing myself. And wishing I were home, so I could hug J and Bernie/Willow/Rosie/Duff. Hugs are good.

(Tomorrow will either be an entry about a Pulitzer Prize winning book I finished recently, or kitten pictures of Kate and Lucy. Depending on my mood and if you guys reply as to which you'd rather have.)