The Perils of Road Trips

I'm going to go ahead and start this post with a TMI warning. I'll spare you all the details of the matter, but it will still be too much for some. So there's your warning.

Road trips are a many splendored thing. Sometimes. Back when I was originally in college road trips were the bomb. Heading out on the open road with your besties blaring the best hits of the 80s, 90s, and today. Dance parties in the car. Good times. However, the older I get, the less appealing they become. It doesn't help that Hubby is the worst road trip buddy ever. If he's not driving, he's asleep which makes driving very boring. But I'm not here to talk about that.

I've been on 4 road trips with Hubby now. The first one was by far the worst. We were driving to South Carolina for our first Thanksgiving together. This would be the first time I was meeting his family. He insisted on leaving at 3 am. At the time I was still working the normal day shift and not going to school so this was a terrible idea for me and here's why...the early hour of departure led me to be very sleep deprived which led me to drink either coffee or pop or both to stay awake which gave my stomach some problems which was already in a knot thanks to the nerves over meeting his family. What does this all add up to? PirateGeek barfing in a Waffle House parking lot in the middle of Kentucky at about 5 am. Good times. Road trips since have never been quite that bad, but they've never been an altogether awesome experience either.

Almost all of our road trips involve me being sleep deprived. This most recent one involved us leaving at 8 am after working all night and I didn't get much sleep the day before either. Good times. For me, sleep deprivation + road trip + the inevitable consumption of junk food = digestive system going into overdrive.

This is the TMI section of the post.

The digestive pyrotechnics lead to what I refer to as Mud Butt Syndrome. I won't go into specifics, but I will specify that it involves way too much wiping of the rear end. Normally this would just be annoying, but think about the kind of places you stop to poo on the road: nasty gas stations, restaurants, and rest areas. Your best shot at a nice restroom is at the rest area, but no matter how nice the restrooms may be, you can ALWAYS depend on encountering the same kind of toilet paper. You know it. It's the thinnest sand paper you will ever discover. It's simultaneously the most delicate stuff as far as falling apart at the slightest touch while also being the rough consistency of sand paper. This means that you're using half of the giant cheese wheel roll in one sitting because if you don't get at least 25 layers of it, your hand will go right through it. At the same time, this delicate ghost of toilet paper is also giving your ass the sandblaster treatment. If the MBS is particularly bad, like it was on this trip, you'll walk out of the restroom feeling like you've been sitting on a chainsaw. After the extensive awfulness of this particular bout with MBS, I decided to be prepared for the trip back. I bought some of those Cottonelle wet wipes, and had meant to steal a roll of real toilet paper from the in-laws, but thanks be to God, I never went poo on the way home. I will be prepared for the next time, though.

Thus concludes the TMI portion of the post.

So there's my little bit of advice for those of you that suffer from MBS. And now you can know that you're not alone in the world.

Butterfly in the sky...

So, I'm back from my vacay. Sad face. The bad news for me is that I have to return to my reality of cold weather and work. The good news for my vast multitude of readers it that I should get back to blogging regularly. Yay for you.

So, since Jumble Mash fulfilled my request to share with her readers what she reads, I thought it would only be fair to do the same myself. I used to read a lot back in elementary school. Mostly Goosebumps and Judy Blume's Fudge books and the like, but then I kinda fell out of reading all though junior high and high school. I picked up a load of extracurriculars and just didn't have time to read. Once I got to college, though, I started reading again. Mostly Christian self-help type books which certainly served their purpose at the time, but aren't really things I'd read again.

Then I discovered C. S. Lewis.

It is safe to say that Lewis is my favorite author. The first work of his I read was The Chronicles of Narnia. They're children's books, but I didn't get around to reading them until I was 21. I still loved them. They're great stories. Kind of like the Harry Potter of the mid-19th century. Yes, they have Christian overtones, but a lot of people would never pick up on that. Simply put, they are great stories. The Horse and His Boy is one of my favorite books of all time. After that, I read some of his other works like Mere Christianity, The Great Divorce, and The Screwtape Letters. These three books kind of turned my personal beliefs upside down...in a good way. But The Great Divorce and The Screwtape Letters are also just great stories. Which brings us to...

Harry Potter. LOVE these books. I avoided reading them for a very long time. They started getting popular when I was a teenager and I was obviously way too cool to be reading children's books then. So I didn't read them until about 4 months before the 7th book came out. I've read all of them 3 times. I don't need to tell you anymore about them. You already know.

I read sparingly for a while after that until I went back to school. I had to read a lot of foreign literature for a couple classes. The only book that stuck out to me as "good" was The Kite Runner. Yep, that's about it.

Then I took a Young Adult Literature class this past quarter. I had always turned my nose at YA Lit. Another case of being too cool for something younger than me. I'm an idiot. We had to read 9 novels for this class, but I'll just share the highlights with you.



John Green

I've now read all three of his novels: Looking for Alaska, An Abundance of Katherines, and Paper Towns. All three are very good books, but An Abundance of Katherines might be the funniest book I've ever read. No joke. They're allegedly turning this into a movie, and I certainly hope that happens because it would be awesome.

The Maze Runner

This one was very popular among the class. I thought it was a decent read, but it just didn't quite live up to the hype. There is one very legitimate reason for this. There was a series of books that I read for the class that most of the others didn't:

The Hunger Games

Go out and get these books RIGHT NOW! Several of the kids in the honors class I observed told me I needed to read these books, so I decided to call them on it. I wasn't disappointed. Hubby read them along with me, and we both had finished all 3 books within a week and a half. It took me 4 days and this was at the end of the quarter with all my final projects and such due. Let's just say I lost a lot of sleep. These books are going to be the next Twilight as far as their popularity, but it's a very different story from Twilight. They're currently casting for the first movie and I can't wait to see it. As long as it's done right, a film of these books could be VERY powerful.

I'm currently reading 13 Reasons Why by Jay Asher, but I'll hold off on sharing my opinion until I finish it. So there it is. That's what I read.

In other news, a quick and adorable story. Before Hubby and I left for vacay, it had been in the 60s and 70s around here, so our AC was on. I meant to switch it over to heat before we left. It was in the 70s the whole time we were in South Carolina, but then we get back to Ohio and it's in the 40s. Then we get back into our house and it's 58. I do not deal well with cold weather. I downright hate it. It makes me grouchy. It gives me dry skin. It makes my joints ache. I hate it. Hate it. Hate it. So anyway, I immediately turn the heat back on. Hubby starts a fire in the fireplace because he knows the central air won't warm up fast enough for me. Then an hour or so later I mention that I have had to pee since before we got home but I don't want to sit on an icy toilet seat. A few minutes later he disappears, and then I find him sitting on the toilet still fully clothed trying to warm up the toilet seat for me. That right there, ladies and gentlemen, is true love. He's the kind of husband I always dreamed of having, and there is no sarcasm in that statement whatsoever.

Until next time...

Toodles!

La la. La la la la. La la la la. La la.

The Rumors of My Disappearance Have Been Greatly Exaggerated

eHello readers. I apologize for not posting much lately. I have two solid reasons. First, I was very sleep deprived for a few days hence the half-assiness of the cash for gold post. Second, I'm on vacay spending Thanksgiving with my in-laws. This will definitely be a short post as it is currently Thanksgiving morning and the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade is coming on soon. Yay!!

I just want to share a few brief thoughts with y'all that I may or may not expand upon later:

1. The Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows movie was freakin sweet . . . as long as you've read the book. If you haven't read the book, it's probably going to seem slow and boring. If you have, though, it's basically like watching the book play out before your very eyes. Loved it.

2. The new Disney movie Tangled was freakin sweet. Seriously, I don't think I'll ever grow out of Disney movies, but this one is my favorite since Beauty and the Beast and that's saying something. It certainly doesn't hurt that the awesomeness that is Zachary Levi voices the hero in the story. More on him in another post.

3. Road trips cause me all kinds of unpleasant physical problems. More on that in another post. You can bank on that one.

4. Being a parent is rough. Our kitty, Jack started showing UTI symptoms again and it certainly made Mommy freak out, but that's why we brought him with us, so we could keep an eye on him. We got some antibiotics from the vet, and he seems to be doing better today than he was yesterday.

5. The smell of Thanksgiving needs to be bottled up or but in a candle or something. Nothing compares to the euphoric combination of onions, celery, carrots, and bacon wafting throughout the house. Yum.

6. Finally, I feel kinda bad for Hubby. He has to share his birthday with Thanksgiving this year. He seems used to it though. My birthday doesn't fall anywhere near any holidays except for those weird years when Easter is ridiculously early. Even then, It's still at least a few days away.

That's all for now. I hope everyone has a spectacular Thanksgiving, and I'll hopefully get back to my regularly scheduled blogging once we get back home.

Toodles!

I want to buy things at the HIGHEST PRICE EVER!

I've recently gone in a direction in my listening habits that I never thought I would: I've pretty much given up on listening to the radio. Way back in the days of high school, before iPods and even before CD burners, I would sit in my bedroom for hours with the radio on so I could hit record when that one song FINALLY came on. Even with the dawn of the CD burner and making mix CDs being far easier than creating mix tapes, I still listened to the radio all the time. How could I find new music without it? Even several years later, when mp3 players came into being, I still listened to the radio regularly. The last six months or so have changed this, though.

I always thought that I'd be hip to the popular music even in my old age. I still am, to an extent. I dig Lady Gaga. I love Taylor Swift. I've even developed an appreciate for Bruno Mars. But, the vast majority of what's playing on the radio nowadays sucks and it all sounds the same. I will listen to rap music, but to me, when rap is bad, it's downright horrific and lately, most of it falls into the horrific category.

Surprisingly, even the lack of good music is not the reason why I've given up the radio. There's a local station that plays really good music from the 80s, 90s, and today. However, there is one problem that every single station (at least in this area) shares.

Not a single commercial break goes by without me having to listen to at least two of those god-awful cash for gold commercials. I'm really not exaggerating about this. On the way to work I decided to give radio another chance. I turn it on, it's in the midst of one of these damn ads. I hit the preset button to go to the next preset station and the EXACT SAME ad is on only 2 seconds behind the first one. What is really mind boggling though is that the vast majority of them come from one particular local establishment and they play on every freakin station around. The few that are different establishments still sound exactly the same:

"Do you have old, broken, or unwanted jewelery? Bring it in to Crooks and Crannies Jewelers. The price of gold is at an all-time high, and we want to by your unwanted jewelry. Blah blah blah. Hardy har har. We're ripping you off and you probably don't realize it."

Something like that. It's that last part that makes me so sad. In normal life who goes, "I want to buy this stuff now that its price is more expensive than ever!!! Please come sell me your stuff!!!!"? The reason why these soul-sucking ads are on ALL THE TIME is because they work. People are desperate. They need money, so they sell their "unwanted" jewelry thinking they're getting a deal because the price of gold is "at an all time high." No...they're getting shafted. The jewelry crook buys the gold at a super ripped off discounted rate and then rips off sells to others at a more realistic exorbitant price. I once tried to help someone sell a diamond ring that cost more than $2000. They got one offer for it, and it was for $500. They took it because they needed the money. (Yes, I am aware of the incorrect grammatical usage of "they" here, but I think doing the whole his or her thing is stupid and will only do it when required.)

I'm not sure what my point is with all this except to say that the damn Cash For Gold places are ruining radio. If I had my own radio station, and a Cash For Gold place came to me for an ad spot, I'd tell them to piss off.

Winter Break

So, sometimes this full time student/full time IT goddess thing gets a little...old? Stressful? Exhausting? Frustrating? All of the above. Thankfully, as of 1:00 tomorrow afternoon, I will be on break from school for 6 1/2 weeks. Praise Jeebus. There are so many things I'm looking forward to enjoying over the span of a month and a half that I think most people take for granted. I was definitely included in that "most people" up until I went back to school last Fall.

So what things am I talking about? There are two categories: things you have to do that you normally don't notice until you don't have time to do them and things you like to do that you desperately miss when you don't have time to do them.

Under things that you have to do:

Getting gas. This actually has nothing to do with the price of gas. Yeah, it's a little high right now, but I don't really care. It's still not as high as it was 2 years ago. What I do hate about it, is the 3-5 minutes it takes to pull into a gas station and fill up the tank. I know that seems absurd, but when all you want so desperately to do is get home and go to bed, those 3-5 minutes are an eternity. This is why I never get around to filling my tank until the low fuel light comes on.

Getting groceries. I know. We all have to eat, but it is SO much easier to roll through a drive-thru while not having to vacate my heated driver's seat than it is to go into a store, push a cart around, and dodge housewives and their rugrats. I actually kinda hate this. I don't like eating out all the time. I actually do like to eat relatively healthy because I don't like being fat. See the letter to myself. But this also ties in with the next one.

All manner of cleaning - dishes, vacuuming, laundry, etc. So, duh. Nobody likes to clean, but here's the thing...I think it actually sucks more when you WANT to clean because your home is such a mess, but you just don't have the time and/or energy to do it. I hate walking into a kitchen full of dishes. We have a beautiful kitchen, and it depresses me to see it a mess, but inevitably, the need to sleep always wins out over the need to clean. Speaking of clean...

Showering. Before you jump to conclusions, I'm not one of those nasty people that doesn't shower for days. I still shower regularly, but this is another one of those things that I have to force myself to do because I usually only get time to do it right before I go to bed or right after I get up which means I am sacrificing sleep to shower. If I could have a magic shower that keeps me clean and stink free with only one shower a week, I'd be fit as a fiddle.

Now, onto the things I like to do:

Chillin. This is very broad. It can include blogging, watching tv, listening to music, playing video games, reading, petting the kitties, or even just sitting still. Part of the reason I just sat and stared at my cat yesterday when I couldn't sleep was just because I could. No homework to do. No test to study for. No 17 hour day ahead of me like the previous 10 weeks.

Cooking. I like to cook...when I have the time, energy, and clean kitchen for it. I like having home cooked meals instead of crap from the drive-thru or even just things quickly put together like a sandwich or a hot dog. I like real meals.

Working out. Ok, saying I like to work out is a stretch, but I do like to not feel like a big bucket of blubber. I tried doing it during the quarter, but it was just too much.

So those are just a few of the things that I'm really looking forward to enjoying on a regular basis over my Winter Break. Hopefully, 2 years from now, I'll be enjoying them on a more permanent basis when I'm done with school.

And now, I must go watch the bestest show ever to grace American television - Chuck.

Business Practices

So, as I previously mentioned, I had to take the Praxis exam this past Saturday. I've already made my gripes known about standardized testing in general, but there's one thing I didn't mention. The fact that most upper level tests (ACT, SAT, and pretty much every Grad entrance exam) are administered by private organizations is a bit alarming to me. Now, they are primarily non-profit organizations, but just because they're not profit doesn't mean that they don't pay their administration a freakin fortune. The money has to be going somewhere. The actual cost of administering one Praxis exam to one individual is not $130. There's no way.

Anway, this got me to thinking how some businesses can get away with things others can't. Kind of like how theme parks can charge $10 for a bottle of water or a baseball park can charge $8 for a hot dog. Grocery stores could never get away with this. People would starve. So anyway, I decided to transfer my frustration with the Praxis experience into a badly drawn comic. I tried imagining what it would be like if I had similar experiences with other monetary transactions...

 

 

In case you didn't catch what that last panel entails...I won't get my test results for 4 weeks. 4 FREAKIN WEEKS! I'm quite certain that's how long it took me to get my ACT test results back, 9 years ago. So, although technology in the real world has progressed to the point that I now have a computer that I can carry in my pocket that is more powerful than the desktop computer we had back then, technology in the test-result reporting world has apparently not progressed. One. Iota. Perhaps they still depend on the Pony Express.

Sneaky Hate Spiral

Today has been kind of a Sneaky Hate Spiral day. If you do not know what that is, march yourself on over to Hyperbole and a Half right now. I will allow you a moment for research.

Done? Cool. Now, after reading this post, you can go explore all the other awesomeness on that blog.

Anyway, back to my day. Keep in mind that my Sunday and Monday is kind of blurring together into one. The day started off good enough. I woke up shortly after noon having only gotten 3 hours of sleep feeling surprisingly refreshed, rested, and hungry. I suggested to Hubby that we get Jet's Pizza.

Mmmm. Yeah. That's right. Look at that sexy melty cheese. Yeah, baby.

For those of you who do not know what Jet's Pizza is, it's basically manna from heaven. Best. Pizza. Ever. Any day with Jet's Pizza is going to be a good day. The goodness continued as we journeyed on through disk 3 of season 2 of Castle. Great freakin show. Nathan Fillion oozes with awesomeness. Eventually, Hubby decided to go back to bed, and I joined him. After laying there for about an hour and a half, I decided to give up. All this while, my hip feels like there is a knife sticking in it. It's felt like this for the better part of 2 weeks now. I'm not going to the doctor unless it hangs around for another 2 weeks. Why? Because every time I finally do go to the doctor after being ill or in pain for at least a couple weeks, they tell me there's nothing wrong. So I pass the time by going through some old black and white photos I took in college that I might post on here later. Then I rearranged my bookshelf. Then I just sat and stared at my cat for half an hour. I think it made him uncomfortable after a while, because he turned around, so then I was staring at my cat's butt.

Eventually, I decided to give sleep another try. Nothing. I even started counting sheep again. I got to 350 and just gave up. I finally fall asleep at 8. I wake up at 9 grumpy as all get out because my sleep tally for the entire day is 4 hours. I'm already starting to see that it is going to be a Sneaky Hate Spiral day, and every time I think that, I get La Bamba stuck in my head.

I'm packing up all my stuff for work, and I had planned on reading Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows this week before we go see the movie on Friday. Well, I forgot it. Then, throughout my drive to work, my car actually gets colder. Then, I see Hubby as I come through the gate to find out that he, once again, has not packed a lunch, and will therefore probably be spending about $12 to $15 on something that we probably have at home which annoys me to no end. Then I get to work and we have this new giant computer that is the loudest freakin computer ever. Sometimes I can not notice it, but others, it's just annoying. Then, I decide I want a Cherry Coke, so I go to the break room and realize that I forgot my wallet. Then I find out it doesn't matter because the machine with the Cherry Coke is out of order. This prompted a scream. Good thing nobody's here.

It hasn't been all bad, though. Me and my two co-workers have had some interesting conversation about Jack the Ripper, Jeffrey Dahmer, exorcisms, Schoolhouse Rock, Animaniacs, high school gym class and whether lesbian gym teachers make you feel uncomfortable, and athletes foot. Good times.

With that, I will leave you with this.

Counting Sheep

So, this is going be a short post. Earlier today, I was having a hard time getting to sleep. I had read a couple days ago that counting sheep is actually an effective way of occupying certain parts of the brain therefore helping your mind to actually shut down. So, I started counting sheep to try and fall asleep. Somewhere around 75, I started getting a little more creative with my sheep. They started looking something like this:

This would look much better if I had an iPad and a stylus and Photoshop.

Yep. I actually altered about the next 20 or so sheep. Maybe I'll turn it into some sort of series. Word.

Standardized Testing Fail

So, apparently my brain thinks this post is important enough that it pushed me to get out of bed, go downstairs, and grab my laptop. That doesn't seem like that big of a deal, but since I've gotten a grand total of about 6 hours of sleep over the last 36 hours, my brain should want sleep far more than it wants blogging. However, about an hour and a half ago, some POS ghetto white trash van in front of our condo started attempting to fart itself to life in a manner that was so effing loud that it woke both me and Hubby up, and I have since been unable to get to sleep. Hubby has already left to get groceries because he has tonight off and it's not as important for him to sleep, while I have to work tonight and have class tomorrow. So as I've been lying here awake, my brain starts spinning its hamster wheels and forming a blog post about standardized testing.

Why am I thinking about standardized testing? Well, it's kind of at the front of my mind right now because I have to take one this Saturday morning. As previously mentioned, I'm on my quest to become a teacher which means I have to pass the Praxis exam to a) get into my graduate program and b) get a teaching license. Thinking about this sent me into a tailspin of internal bitching about my plight, but even moreso, the plight of many others who have to do this. Why? Because I am actually very good at taking tests. Others are not so lucky, and this is why I think standardized testing is a sham. More on this later.

This is the first standardized test I've taken in 9 years. There are a lot of differences between this test and the previous. The previous one was my second shot at the ACT trying to improve upon my already high score and therefore, was completely unnecessary. As I already said, I am REQUIRED to pass this exam to get into my grad program. The other big difference is cost. The ACT was about $30 and my parents paid it. The particular flavor of Praxis that I have to take is $130. That's one hundred. Thirty. Dollars. From my own pocket that I'm paying to subject myself to the torture of taking a freakin test. This is a crock. It stinks of conspiracy, but I'm not about to try and figure that out. Now, I'm not actually complaining so much for myself. I'm fairly confident that I'll pass it the first time around, that will be it. It still sucks that I had to sink an iPod nano cost into taking it, but life goes on. What I think really sucks about this set-up is that there are people who are perfectly capable and intelligent that just stink at taking tests.

There is already one person who has been in a few classes with me that is certainly intelligent enough and a wonderful person who I know will make a great teacher that has failed the exam once. She passed it the second time around. This means she spent $260 trying to pass this test. I've actually heard of much worse. There was one person who had to take it 6 times before she passed. Do the math. $130 x 6 = $780. That's more than the cost of a 32 Gb iPad with Wi-Fi AND 3G. I'm willing to wager that this person passed all of her classes just fine, but just sucked at taking tests, and with this particular test, it's not surprising she failed 5 times. I already took a practice exam, and there are a lot of questions that are tricky tricky. They're the kind that have 4 correct answers, but you have to choose the BEST one. Seriously? "Best" is often relative. Especially when it comes to analyzing and evaluating literature.

What annoys me the most about all of this is that our entire education system is pretty much based on standardized exams. I hate this. I know for a fact that there are intelligent kids who fall by the wayside, perhaps get stuck in classes that are not nearly challenging enough for them, simply because they are not stellar test-takers. Unfortunately, I don't know of any way around this. As of right now, exams are the best way to measure a student's progress and/or flat-out knowledge on a large scale. Within the context of a single class, there are a lot of options that are far better than tests. The problem is, not all classes and/or teachers are created equally. What might get you an A with one teacher might be a C with another. Hence the need for standardized testing. It's quite the conundrum, and I hate it. If I ever think of a solution, you can bet that I'll make it known, until then, I must submit to the conspiracy and take the $130 test.

A Letter To Myself, Vol. 1

So...I've had something weighing me down lately, and I thought I'd put it on this blog in the form of a letter...to myself because I have a tendency to go back and read old blog posts on a regular basis. I even read my oldest existing blog that ran from 2004 to 2007 (age 20 to 23). It's quite comical at times, even when I was trying to be profound and sincere. Anyway, since I'm thinking this might actually be something that occurs on a regular basis, I added the Vol. 1 to it.

Dear Self,

It has come to my attention recently that you have put on some weight, and I thought it was high time I address this issue with you. You need to stop. Now. You and Hubby are already planning on starting a big push to get on the healthy wagon over Winter Break. Awesome, you better not crap out even if he does, and I'm going to tell you why.

First, the negative aspects of being a Staypuft Marshmallow Woman:

You feel sick pretty much all the time. Although some will STILL accuse you of being pregnant, it's really just because you're eating crap and not exercising at all, so all that junk just hangs out in your system and makes you feel like ickypoo.

You feel fat. The positive side to this is that you actually don't look nearly as fat as you feel, but when you feel like this:

That really isn't all that great of an accomplishment.

Hardly any of your clothes fit anymore. You have one pair of jeans that has a big hole in the crotch, a pair of khakis that makes you feel like you're being squeezed out of one of those tubes of cookie dough. MMmmmm. Cookies. You also have some really cool t-shirts that are getting way too tight, like that Cookie Monster t-shirt that you can't really wear anymore. Stop expanding, or you'll lose the cool wardrobe you've built up.

Now, on to the positives of losing the weight.

You'll feel better. Aside from the few weeks earlier this quarter when you nearly turned into a lunatic thanks to a bout with insomnia, you always feel so much better when you're eating well and working out. Even if you still look like a tub, at least you don't feel it after swimming 20 laps.

You'll look better. Once upon a time, even you thought you looked good:

Woops. A little too far in the way back machine.

There. You were a sexy little thing. You were healthy. You could go through a volleyball practice, run 10 suicides, lift weights, go play a game of impromptu softball, and still feel pretty good. Now, stairs are your nemesis. Lucky for you, God blessed you with a wonderful husband who still thinks you're sexy even if you do look like a relative of Jabba the Hut, but if you looked like this again, he will be your slave. You can even dress him up appropriately:

Yeah...Slave Hubby.

Now, inevitably, there will come a time when hitting the gym 5 times a week will legitimately be too much in addition to full time job, school, student teaching, etc. Usually you stupidly take this as an opportunity to just totally check out of the healthy rehab and relapse into eating whatever the hell you want just because you can't make it to the gym. This logic is just a little bit flawed. This logic is what makes you fat. So, here is some motivation to at least continue to eat healthy in the form of some yummy healthy foods with visuals:

Grapes.

Mmmmm. You LOVE grapes, and they're so easy and convenient and juicy and yummy. Buy a big bag, tear of a small bunch and shove them in your lunch box. Pretty easy.

Bananas.

Mmmm bananas. Not only are they yummy and healthy, but they also help settle your stomach if you do start feeling icky. Keep some of these on hand at all times.

Mini Babybel Cheese

You just recently discovered this, but you love it. Cut of little pieces and put them on yummy crackers.

Steve-o's Healthy Popcorn

Popcorn popped the old fashioned way using olive oil, then seasoned with sea salt and garlic salt. This stuff is SOOOO delicious and way cheaper than microwave popcorn.

Water

Ok, so you're not that crazy about water, but let me tell you, you feel SO much better when you drink water as opposed to pop. The heartburn quotient drops drastically. That whole line of fire in your esophagus thing REALLY sucks.

Turkey

Who doesn't love turkey? The key here is though, get the good stuff from the deli counter. The kind that tastes like you're eating Thanksgiving leftovers. Yeah, that stuff. You never eat all of the crappy turkey, so it's worth the extra money.



So there you are, self. All the reasons why you need to get off your lazy, blobbish butt and get moving. Enjoy the holidays though. No need to take it too far. ;)

Word to your mutha (Hi Mom!),

Me

P.S. I know people are reading. Feel free to leave comments even if you want to tell me the blog sucks. And if that is how you feel about it, well...I'm like rubber and you're like glue. Whatever you say bounces off me and sticks to you. :P

The Adventures of Captain Jack

Eventually, I will introduce you to all of our kitties, but today, I thought I'd give you the story of Captain Jack since he's now been away for 2 days and we miss him so much.


I actually acquired Jack from an old blog buddy in Wisconsin who shares my appreciation for pirates, and especially Captain Jack Sparrow. This is how Jack got his name. We met just outside of Chicago so that I could be united with my new son. This is one of the first pictures I ever took of him:

At the time, he was a tiny little guy, and very adventurous, but sweet as can be.

Very quickly, he started to grow, but he still didn't get past his curious/adventurous stage.

Now...he's full grown, and a very big kitty indeed.

This photo is not a trick. There are no weird angles involved. He is laying right next to one of his sisters who is 7 years his senior. At last check, he was 15 pounds. Like I said, he's a big kitty, but we love him so much.

One of the many times Daddy has forced Jack to cuddle. Jack is not a cuddly kitty. He has some rare exceptions, and they always occur in the same manner. Right after my alarm goes off, but before I get out of bed, he crawls up next to me towards the outside of the bed, because if he goes up the middle of the bed, Daddy might make him cuddle with him, and he's not having it. Anyway, although he's not cuddly, he is still stinking adorable.

Awww. He also still hasn't lost his sense of adventure.

He especially enjoys laundry hampers.

Mommy sometimes makes him do ridiculous things.

 

But he still loves her.

Technology Pros and Cons

Yep, that's right. 4 posts in one night. This shift has become a rather desperate battle to stay awake.

Onward.

I am big into technology, computers, gadgets, etc. I've always been fascinated by these things. When I was about 11 or 12 years old and my mom took me to Wal-Mart, I didn't go to the toys. I went to the electronics. That's how I roll. Anyway, technology has progressed rapidly over the last couple of decades. Some technology has made certain aspects of life much easier and/or more enjoyable. However, many technological advances have their downsides as well. Here are some examples:

Automatic Toilets

Pro: You don't have to lay hands or, in my case, the soles of your shoes on some nasty, grimy, disease-ridden handle, lever, or button to flush your turds down the toilet. The toilet does it for you.

Con: Some automatic toilets can be a little overzealous. Anytime they sense ANY movement, they flush. Sit down - flush. Slight weight shift - flush. Move forward to grab TP - flush. Wipe - flush. All the while this flushing is gently spraying your butt with poopy water. Ew. On the other hand, we also have the ill-timed flusher that will flush while you're sitting on it, but won't flush after you've done your business until you dance a jig in front of it.

Smart Phones

Pros: There are many, but in a nutshell - you get to carry a nearly fully functioning computer in your pocket.

Cons: Addiction. Some of us, including myself, can't function without having their phone on their person. I can't sit down at a table without checking it. I can't sit on my couch without checking it. I can't go to sleep without checking it. It has become a compulsion. Take my laptop away, I'll live. Take my iPhone away, I will shank your ass.



GPS Systems

Pros: They tell you where to go without you having to try and read a map or printed directions while driving. And then there's the special voices. Who in the hell wouldn't want to get directions to grandma's from Yoda. In one mile, left turn you will make, hmm.

Cons: Sometimes, they try to kill you.



Twitter/Texting

Pros: Quick and easy social interaction. You can talk to people in situations where you might not be able to make a phone call. You can get news pretty much instantly. You get to hear from your favorite celebrities. Overall, I dig twitter and texting.

Cons: Two things, really. There's the overshare. Somehow even though we usually know the people that will be reading it, texting and twitter give an illusion of anonymity. It's like the little kid that covers their eyes and then thinks you can't see them. I admit, I'm guilty of it too, but it's still a con. The other, crap like this: "i hav a pasi0n 4 chuck lyk the bratz hav a pasi0n 4 fash0in ahaha i did n0t jst say tht hahaha- xD" Things like this make my eyes bleed. 

That's about all I've got for now. I'm sure I'll think of more later. When that times, another post will too.

Children

Yep. My third post in the span of just a few hours. Why? Well, like I said, lots of stuff I've been meaning to write about. Mostly though, I'm trying to stay awake.

As I've said before, I've been married for about a year and a half. Surprisingly, there hasn't been TOO much pressure for us to have kids, but I definitely get asked if I'm pregnant all the time. If I mention I have a craving, someone asks me if I'm pregnant. If I mention I'm not feeling well, someone asks me if I'm pregnant. It really pisses me off, which just makes people do it more.

Anyway, in a manner of speaking, we already have children. Our three wonderful kitty cats Jack, Jasmine, and Lilly. 

Captain Jack

Princess Jasmine

Pretty Lilly

I know some people think it's absurd for people to refer to their pets as their children, but that's what they are to us. We very much want to have human babies, but not yet. Parenting humans is far more involved than parenting kitties, and if we were to reproduce, one of our career goals would have to fall by the wayside. It would most likely be mine as the idea of schlepping around a 30 pound beach ball attached to me at the belly while carrying another 20 pounds in my backpack on campus makes me cringe. So in the meantime, the kitties are our children. Period. Don't make fun. Don't roll your eyes. We love our cats dearly.

This became abundantly clear to me over the past couple days. Jack, our youngest, had some urinary tract issues about two weeks back. We took him to the vet, he prescribed some medication. We gave it to him. He sprung right back to normal in a couple of days. However, 2 mornings ago, I got home from work and he was acting very odd and lethargic again. We got up for class a couple hours later and it hadn't changed. I gave him some of his medicine only to return a few hours later and find that he had puked it all up. That night, when I got up, I tried to give him his medicine again in his food, but he wouldn't eat it. This worried me, but I had to go to work. Thanks to facebook friends and internet research I found out that Jack could be obstructed which could cause his kidneys to fail and toxins would increase in his bloodstream which could eventually kill him. I proceeded to freak right out.

My Jack. My little boy. I could lose him. Suffice it to say I was quite distraught all night. We took him to the vet first thing in the morning. He was obstructed. He would have to have a surgery of sorts and stay for the weekend. :( A lot of people might not give a rip about their pets, but we do. I would be devastated if anything happened to any of our cats. Now, we're not like crazy cat people with 30 cats floating around. We have 3. I brought 1 into the marriage, Hubby brought 2. We just love our cats very, very much.

I'm not sure what my point is with this. I know a friend just found out that one of her cats has cancer on her liver and won't survive more than a few months. She and her man are just as crazy about their cats as we are. So for those of you out there that see your pets as members of your family, you're not alone.

NERD!

There are a lot of things that have been rattling around in my head for the last 10 weeks that I wanted to write about, but never did because a) school and b) the wordpress issue. So for a while, you might actually get fairly frequent posts. Maybe.

For now, I think I would explain the name - PirateGeek. Where did it come from? It's quite simple actually - I dig pirates, and I'm a geek. I'm sure I'm not alone with my affection for buckling swashes and things like Smurf hats. In fact, I know I'm not since pirategeek.blogspot.com was taken. Hence the addition of 9 (high school softball number in case you were wondering). I guess that's about the whole of it. To me, it kind of represents not being afraid to be yourself. Ten years ago, I never would have referred to myself as a geek, and I certainly wouldn't have been proud of that. Ten years changes a lot, though. Also, pirates didn't become cool until 2003 with the release of the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie.

I'm actually quite sure that this is one of the many reasons why I want to teach high school: to let kids know that it's cool to be yourself. It makes me quite sad how desperate some teens are to please their peers mostly because pleasing those peers usually involves being stupid. I don't know when stupid became cool, but it certainly happened sometime in the 20th century. I'm not exaggerating about this either. There are kids in the classes I observe that are very intelligent, but they either a) intentionally do bad on assignments, b) don't do the assignments or c) act like idiots in order to hide their intelligence so as not to be labeled as a geek, nerd, dork, brain, whatev.

Who's idea was this? Really. I would love to know what person started the thought process of, "That person's smart. What a loser. I'm going to make fun of them and belittle them to make myself feel better." I guess that's the key isn't it? People make fun of other people usually to make themselves feel better. Lame. I'm not saying I never make fun of other people, but when I do it's usually thrown right back at me and I'm ok with that, and I've certainly never made fun of someone for being smarter than me. That's dumb.

Could you imagine if we were only able to ridicule people using the truth? "OOooooh. You're all smart. You're probably gonna be really successful and make a lot more money than me. I'm probably gonna be flipping your burgers someday." At least it's more creative than yelling "NERD" at someone. Speaking of, quick sidenote, check out www.thenerdmachine.com. Cool stuff for us nerds. Wear it loud. Wear it proud, folks.

Anyway, back to the task at hand, it is my hope that, as a teacher, I might be able to impart at least some wisdom on these youngsters. Maybe I'll actually find a way to show them that being yourself is far cooler than pretending to be something you're not which, incidentally, is exactly what the majority of the "cool" kids do.

As Dr. Seuss says, "Be who you are and say what you feel because those who matter don't mind, and those who mind don't matter." Rock on. If someone has a problem with my Smurf hat and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles t-shirt, they can go hang out with the other mean, old bitters.

First

So, I've decided to take another crack at blogging. This will be my 6th or 7th blog. I can't quite remember exactly how many I've done. Anyway, the last one only made it to 3 posts, but this had a lot to do with the fact that I decided to use wordpress. Wordpress is kind of a pain in the butt to use period, but more importantly, I can't get to it from work. Terrible, I know, but truth be told, I'm still technically doing my job as I'm writing. So take that, world!

Anyway, here's a little bit about me: I'm 26 years old, and happily married for nearly a year and a half. We have 3 beautiful kitties: Jack, Jasmine, and Lilly. I work doing IT (that's Information Technology or computers for the computer illiterate out there), and my job is not very labor intensive. I'll just leave it at that. I'm also currently attending University to become a high school English teacher. I have two quarters left of my undergrad requirements before starting my masters degree. This only sucks because I already have a bachelor's degree, and I've had it since August of 2006. Even with that, I had to complete 2 years of undergrad English content requirements before I FINALLY get to move on to my masters. This makes me a 6th year senior. Sound pretty effin pathetic. Also, my husband is a sophomore at the same University working on his nursing degree...hopefully.

So why am I starting yet another blog? Because although I'm required to write extensively for school, I don't always get to write about what I want, and I don't always get to write how I want to write. I once had to completely rewrite a project because the prof said I was coming off as sarcastic. Bite me.

Another important piece of information: I work third shift, and will likely be doing much of my writing in the middle of the night. I know what you're thinking, I work at night, so the middle of the night should be like the middle of the day for me. No, it isn't. Because remember, I also have to go to school during the day. So, you know that feeling when you're pulling an all-nighter to study or finish a paper? Well, every day of work for me is just a less severe version of that. This will occasionally provide some very entertaining fodder, I'm sure of it. Sleep deprivation + lots of caffeine = slap happy.

That's all I'll say for now. I can't promise when I'll update again or even if I will or if anybody will ever even read this. Only time can tell . . . or Marty McFly and Doc Brown.