Rice and Beans and Other Fine Things

Some Call Me The Rat Queen

2011-08-15T08:19:00.004-05:00

Seems like it was just yesterday that Richard and I were talking about our summer goals and all that we would achieve and junk like that. (You know, stuff like "We are SO gonna get up every morning at 6:00 before it gets hot and walk three miles.") Then I blinked twice and here it is, already August. We did not walk once.

The school year summer is over even though the technical summer lives on. (And the temperature summer lives on and on and on until mid-October when we can finally put on a long sleeve shirt as long as it's made of a light, breathable cotton fabric. No sweater needed until November.)

I think a summary of my summer activities is in order. In no particular order:

1. When I last blogged I had just gotten home from a top secret trip to New York that I couldn't reveal at that time. You can read all about it here.

2. I got pretty excited about Shark Week like I always do, but I got sidetracked during that week so I recorded a bunch of the shows so I could enjoy all the oceanic terror at a later date. But then I discovered that watching shark shows after Shark Week is kind of like celebrating your birthday after your actual birth date. It's anti-climatic. So, bummer. I'm just not there any more. (I also discovered that AMC's Mob week coincided with Shark Week. My DVR was busy that week. I still haven't watched any of it.)

3. The grass grows overnight here and just when I think I'm all caught up, the thought pops into my head that a snake really is a lot harder to see in 6-day old grass as opposed to 2-day old grass. So I have been mowing quite a bit.

4. And speaking of snakes (and I feel TOTALLY bad about this, I really do), I hacked a snake to death earlier this summer with a dull-edged garden tool. This really was one of my darkest moments, but in my defense, I felt I had little ones to protect and at our house we place the well-being of humans over the lives of serpents.

My niece, Zoe, was visiting from Missouri and we wanted to go swimming in our little laying-out pool. As I was walking toward the pool, I saw a huge, I mean HUGE snake slithering toward me at a very aggressive speed, and he did not seem the least bit spooked by our presence even though every animal show I watch promises that wild animals are much more afraid of us than we are of them. (It's like he knew me and was coming over to speak.) My mom was walking slightly behind me with Zoe when the hollering started. And she was all "Lorie, you've got to do something!" So without really thinking too much about what I was doing, I quickly retrieved the first thing I saw which was this rusty garden tool thingie (I don't know the technical name for it) from the shed, and with the combination of my adrenalin surging, my mom screaming "KILL IT! KILL IT!" and the bearing down of the hot noon sun, I started chopping the poor creature until I had four snakes, not one.

And then I threw my bloody garden tool down and the voices stopped.

In retrospect, I wish I would have just thrown rocks at it to scare it away, because later after my husband and I went outside to examine the remains, he informed me that it wasn't a poisonous snake, it was a "good" snake that ate rats, and I really should have let it live. (And I felt the eyes of a thousand rats staring at me from the foliage, not unlike the munchkins did to Dorothy after her house landed on the witch. I am sure by now they have erected a statue in my likeness and pronounced me their RAT QUEEN.) Then he gave me a little lesson on how to tell if a snake is poisonous or not by how the eyes are set in the head and the shape of the head, but seriously? If I encounter another snake at close range in my lifetime, I can't promise I'm going to take the time to examine it's head and eyes. I've seen the river scene in Lonesome Dove too many times.

Still, I wish I had let it live (mostly because I hate rats), and the whole hacking part still haunts me. This is the most violent act I have ever committed in my entire life.

I wonder if Lizzie Borden started this way?

4. To change the subject, Richard and I have really gotten into the Next Food Network Star. Maybe it's because we just visited the Food Network Studios, but we are really looking forward to the grand finale on Sunday. Richard wants Susie to win, but I like Jeff because I would totally watch a sandwich show. We both agreed Penny is a snake in the grass (heh) and we were happy to see her booted off the show, even though it was about three shows too late. She could cook, however. But she really needs to tie her hair back. And also, gosh, be nicer?

(I know. That coming from a snake killer. I have ruined my good reputation as a nice person.)

*Update. I started this post on Saturday. Today is Monday. The finale was last night. We have recorded it, but have not yet watched it, so I will try and stay off social media today because I don't want to know the outcome until later. This is gonna be hard.

6. Brayden turned two. He has a big boy bed now. He's speaking in little choppy sentences. There is talk of potty training. And my plan to be called "Lolli" isn't working out so far. It sounds more like "Mammy." I'm not sure why he can't get it right, but he really needs to get with the program.

He still likes trains. And mud puddles.

7. At the beginning of the June, I decided I would make friends with summer and embrace him with open arms. That lasted through July 4. It has been all down hill since then.

8. And speaking of July 4, we had such a great day that day. We went to Frost Bridge to swim in the creek and slide down the rapids. (Does that sound like a completely redneck thing to do? I prefer the term country-style outdoor activity, thank you.)

Let me insert a vent here. Why do people litter? Sigh. I am not a mother earth environmental nut, but really, do you have to be one of those to know that littering is just wrong? Every time I see a beer bottle in the creek is angers me. Just pick up your dad blame trash and take it with you. Is it really that hard?

Anyway, the creek was very low and even though I have issues with swimming in water that is not clear enough to see my toes, I jumped right in and had a good ol' time. Of course, we had to go early in the morning before the party crowd got there with their coolers of beer and loud music, but we had it all to ourselves for a couple of hours. It was nice. I resisted the urge to hillbilly handfish, even though it's so tempting to stick my arm in a muddy water hole and feel around in the debris and rocks for a monster catfish, but Isaac caught a nice bass the old fashioned way. With a fishing rod.

Afterwards, we went home, hung out, had a shrimp boil, homemade ice cream, homemade peach pie, then fireworks at the annual fire works show in State Line.

Fun times.

Thanks To Delta, I Now Know What It Feels Like To Be A Vagrant

2011-06-17T19:32:00.005-05:00

So last week I had to fly to New York for something. Something that I cannot reveal at this point in time, but when I can I will, so no asking, okay?

Anyway, I absolutely hate flying to begin with for as many reasons as there are types of mustard in my fridge at this very minute, which is way too many, but I make myself conquer my fears and just do it.

The flight out there was not too bad, but the flight home was like that song on that children's show with Lambchop, you know, the one that goes "This is the song that ne-ver ends, yes it goes on and on my friends..." and then it's repeated 659 times by little sock puppets who are waaaayyy too enthusiastic about singing. Do you know that song? It just happens to be the most irritating song in the history of mankind. But anyway...

We were supposed to leave LaGuardia Airport at 5:00 PM sharp, and our driver was supposed to be at our hotel to pick us up at 3:00 PM, which made me really nervous because I personally didn't feel like two hours was adequate time to drive through New York to the airport and then go through security and all that, but I decided to not be my usual controlling self and just trust that the people who had set up this driver knew more about New York traffic times than I, especially since my hometown doesn't even have a stoplight.

And let me just warn you now that this post is probably going to be lengthy because I am venting here and I want to be as detailed as possible.

So anyway, we, and by we I mean Richard was with me, were in the lobby of our hotel by 2:15 because I am pretty anal about being late, and since the doorman asked me what company my car was with and I told him in a clear, audible voice, and since there were other people waiting in the lobby for their cars and he had already come in a couple of times to inform those people that their cars had arrived, I did not feel like I needed to say the words "Would you please inform me when my car arrives."

At about twenty minutes after three, I gave my husband that "please go and check cause I am fixin' to have a meltdown" look, which he did, only to find our driver sitting directly in front of the lobby waiting. And the doorman was there, too, just standing there as doormen do.

And anyone who personally knows me knows that one of my biggest pet peeves is being late--it unnerves me to no end--and my second biggest pet peeve is when a driver who can barely speak English tries to put the blame on me by saying "I have been here since twenty 'til. Didn't you know this?"

Grrrr. So I guess he was absent from Chauffeuring 101 the day the teacher said it would be a good idea to let your clients know when you arrive either by physically walking into the lobby or by sending the doorman who is usually standing at the door?

(Of course, our doorman was staring at the car parked directly in front of the lobby--I'm wondering why he didn't just ask the driver who he was there to pick up? How hard would that have been?)

So anyway, the ride to the airport was... interesting. I could go on about this, but just imagine a typical New York driver and multiply that times ten because we were now running late. Thank you, Jesus, for getting us to the airport in one piece.

Security was a mile long of course, but we made it through and actually had a few minutes to spare, much to my surprise. And just as soon as we got to the gate, they announced that our flight was delayed until 9:00 PM.

We waited around for a little bit, then a few minutes later, Delta announced that there was a 50/50 chance that the 9:00 PM flight would probably not take off at all because there was a whopper of a mechanical problem (my words, not theirs), so it would probably be best if we all started calling the 800 number to Delta to get re-booked.

So that's what we did. And the only option for us was to be shuttled over to JFK for a 7:15 PM flight. So this all involved a lot of walking around the airport and hauling our extremely overpacked carry-ons because we didn't want to check any luggage, and yet another nice, relaxing drive through New York. Yay.

But we managed to get over to JFK, go through security AGAIN, and then make it to the gate, only to hear an announcement that that flight was delayed. AGAIN. This time due to weather. So we waited.

At about 7:50 PM, we finally boarded. Of course we were not sitting together because we had been re-booked at the last minute, and beggars can't be choosers now, can they? And of course we had a connecting flight in Atlanta that would probably be taking off without us at 11:15 PM. And of course I suddenly had to pee, and oh, how I hate airplane bathrooms, so I decided to hold it. Plus I was sitting by the window with two people next to me, neither of whom could speak English at all. The guy was sleeping soundly, and the girl was talking on her phone (go figure), so I was basically trapped.

Then, the pilot announced that we probably had a two hour wait before take-off. He told us to stay put and not get off the plane, (like they would let us off anyway) because there was a chance we could take off earlier. But we all knew the truth. We were stuck.

So sure enough, after we had been sitting at the gate for two hours, he said we would now be making our way to the runway. The kicker was that there were 47 planes in front of us that had also been delayed. (And no I didn't randomly make up that number THERE REALLY WERE 47 PLANES AHEAD OF US!) So we taxied for two more hours. He'd rev up the engine, go about three feet, then sit still for five minutes. For two hours we inched our way to take-off. And you know how I like to exaggerate on this blog? WELL I AM NOT EXAGGERATING NOW. We boarded the plane at 7:50 and we took off at 11:50. Talk about grueling.

(The actual flight was okay, but I couldn't help noticing that there was a RULE BREAKER on board who caused me undue stress. The girl next to me kept her phone on the whole time. Listen, people, there is a reason they ask everyone to turn off their cell phones before take-off and that reason is that it can MAKE THE PLANE CRASH! She was even told to turn it off, but I watched her, and she did NOT, she just slid it into her purse. I considered passing a note to the flight attendant so she could be properly disciplined and thrown off the plane at 10,000 feet which really should be the punishment for people who put other people's lives in jeopardy. In the end, I decided to just let God handle it because I had to pee too bad to find a notebook and pen in my giant purse/overnight bag.)

And I haven't even got to the part about feeling like a vagrant yet.

So we got to Atlanta at about two in the morning. All smiles and happy faces were left in New York on the subway, where it's fun. I decided that I would be the one to re-book our flight, so I left my husband sprawled out on the floor with the luggage and headed to the Delta ticket counter, thinking they would put us up in a hotel, but NOOOOOOOO. People were getting pretty ugly. I was not necessarily angry about the delays, because who wants to get on a plane that has a mechanical problem, or fly with lightening crashing all around, but I really think they could have compensated us a bit more, like maybe a hotel room. Or at least a meal voucher.

Even bag of peanuts would have been greatly appreciated.

So they booked us on an 8:30ish AM flight which was the first flight to Mobile where our truck was, and our only option was to find a quiet corner of the airport to get some sleep. Apparently there were a lot of people in the same boat because there were bodies lying all over concourse A. Almost every row at every gate had someone, and I just did not feel comfortable sleeping across the aisle from a total stranger, so we found an unoccupied corner and lay on the floor with all of our belongings around us, strangely reminiscent of the homeless people I had seen in New York earlier that morning.

I mean the morning before because we were now in a new morning.

(And in the past when I've seen people sleeping in airports I have always thought to myself "I could never sleep in public!")

(But when grandma and grandpa need sleep, they need sleep.)

But before we nodded off to dreamland , Richard asked me if I got us seated together, and I was like "Are you kidding? We're lucky to even get on the flight at all." Then he said "give me those tickets" in that voice that can be kind of scary if you didn't know he was really a gentle giant, and he left for the ticket counter. I don't know what he did but he came back with us seated together, two delta blankets, and two meal vouchers for $6.00 apiece, which we were REALLY excited about. (Free food always puts a smile on our faces, even in the worst of circumstances. Wheeeee!!!!)

So we slept surprisingly sound for a couple of hours. (My apologies to Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta Airport for all the bodily noises coming from the corner of gate A-27.) We got up feeling and looking completely grungy and gross (kind of like homeless people), but ever ready to spend our $6.00 meal vouchers at Dunkin Donuts. Then we freshened up ever so slightly in the bathroom, but we were all "WHO REALLY CARES! WE'RE GOING HOME, TOTO, WE'RE GOING HOME!"

Great big bubble burst just ahead.

We went to our gate to wait for our flight, only to hear about five minutes after we sat down that it had been canceled (not even delayed--canceled), and would we please go to the nearest Delta ticket counter where they would gladly re-book us.

I can not even tell you how tired and deflated we were. Our vehicle was only a five hour drive away, and I mentioned that we should just rent a car and drive there or we may never see Buckatunna again. Richard went to the ticket counter and re-booked us, scored two more meal vouchers, and we were placed on a stand-by flight around 9:30. At 9:15 the board showed that the flight had been delayed until 11:30. It was at that time that we decided that we had had enough of this hell called flying, and we made our escape in a rental car.

But not before spending our vouchers at Sbarro.

And I don't know if we were supposed to return the blankets or not, but we didn't.

Take that Delta.

.

Things And Stuff

2011-06-06T16:13:00.001-05:00

Just a few quick lines while I stay completely off task today.

1. A couple of weeks ago, Brayden got his first haircut. And since this was a very important "first" in his life, he had a small entourage accompany him to the salon, which was mom, dad, Grammy and Lolli because it takes a village, people, it takes a village.

And he only had two small meltdowns during the whole 15 minutes process. I don't think he really knew what was going on at first, but you could definitely see his countenance change the second he realized that "SOMEONE HAS BEEN CUTTING OFF PART OF MY BODY FOR THE LAST THREE MINUTES! MOMMMMMMMYYYYYY!!!!!"

It was so darn cute.

But he was handed a water bottle which always makes losing part of your body seem like a little game, especially when you get to squirt your daddy and no one is telling you it's a no-no.

Fun times.

2. In other news, the hot is here, so there is a lot of suffering and complaining going on at my house. And it's dry, too. So dry that I have not had to mow for like three whole weeks, which is just unheard of in the South.

3. Right now I'm doing what a lot of people do when they are supposed to be doing something they really don't want to do so they do something else. I'm avoiding packing because I'm flying, and I have resolved in my mind that I will NOT check a bag even though I am going to be gone a whole 63 hours. I have never not checked a bag, so trying to make it all fit in a carry-on and a small personal item will be an exercise in making wise choices. But I remain committed to not pay $50 for the privilege of hauling clothes and accessories halfway across the country that will not be worn, because this is what always happens. I am a habitual over packer.

So I've got to make this work. Somehow.

Wedge sandals sure do take up a lot of room, don't they?

It will be interesting to see how this plays out.

.

Mavis Beacon Please Save My Marriage

2011-05-30T19:53:00.003-05:00

Recently, I got a nightstand which has transformed my whole bedroom experience for the better, and my husband's for the worse. And not for reasons that may or may not be coming to your mind right now, so please don't think of anything until I explain. Not that anything is coming to your mind, I mean it shouldn't be, except when someone says a phrase like "transformed my whole bedroom experience," things just sometimes pop in the mind.

Your mind should be blank at this point. Thank you.

For some reason, when we bought our bedroom suit twelve years ago, we only bought one nightstand, and for some other reason completely unknown to me, my husband felt like it should go on his side of the bed. So I have been nightstandless for twelve years. And I didn't know what I didn't have until I had it, then it all became clear to me what an invaluable piece of furniture a nightstand is.

I now--get this--have somewhere to set a glass of water. I have somewhere to put my glasses. I have a lamp which illuminates the written words of a book if I choose to read in bed, and then I can put said book in my very own nightstand drawer.

I have my own drawer.

But the best thing is that I now have a place to set my computer once I have done whatever I need to do on it. And this is the part that is making my husband miserable. Because I have been bringing my computer to bed with me. And this is a problem.

And if you think I'm going in a certain direction with this, I am still not going in that direction, so will you please blank out your mind again? Thank you.

The problem with bringing my computer to bed is that I type. But it's not typing that bothers him. It's my typing that bothers him.

So I was sitting in bed the other night, just typing away without a care in the world (In the bed! Next to my nightstand!), and I suddenly had this eerie feeling that I was being watched. So I looked at him and indeed, he was staring at my fingers with somewhat of a disgusted look. So I asked him what the problem was and he said "You're a hunter and pecker, aren't you?"

"What?"

Then he went on. "You don't know how to type, do you?"

"Uh, I'm pretty sure I'm typing here. What are you getting at?" I was starting to feel a little defensive.

"How did you get through college?" he asked.

"My sister typed my papers, thank you," I shot back.

"I can type without looking," he boasted. "You know, you're supposed to type without looking at the keys. Didn't you ever take typing in high school?"

Good grief, let's just pick your wife apart and watch her bleed to death all over the keyboard. (I cannot believe this subject has never come up in our whole married life until now. There is a good possibility, though, that he may not have really noticed my poor typing skills. We didn't get a computer until 2002, and it was a desk computer stuck in the spare bedroom where I spent many lonely hours learning the Internet. I upgraded to a laptop in 2009, so it hasn't really been that long that I was able to move out of that dark and dreary dungeon and type from our loveseat which is across the room from my husband's lounging place of choice, the couch. SO, my hands have been hidden from his view, and with the TV going loud which is the usual scenario in the living room, he really may have not noticed.)

(Or this. He has noticed and it's been driving him batty, but because he loves me so much and does not want to hurt me in any way, he has held back. Obviously he is naive enough to think that his disapproval of my typing skills will in some way make me feel bad. Good one. I think me typing in the same bed not two feet away was more than he could take and he just snapped. At least in the living room, I'm on the other side of the room on a completely different couch.)

So he went on to explain that I didn't know how to type correctly . And then he said that I "hunt" and "peck" all over the keyboard. And I challenged him that he was making that phrase up, but while we were discussing it, I pecked the term out in my Google search engine and there it was, right there in the Urban Dictionary. (Truthfully, I'm pretty fast with my pecking, so I'm not sure what the problem is.)

I asked him if me typing like I have hooves instead of fingers would have any impact on our relationship as man and wife, and his response was "Do you want me to teach you how to correctly type?"

I'm taking that as a yes.

So it looks like I am going to have to turn to Mavis Beacon for help in salvaging what's left of our shattered marriage.
.

All Aboard!

2011-05-24T22:33:00.003-05:00

My mother asked me the other day if I was aware that I have not blogged since April 11. Yes, I am painfully aware. The last few months have been a blur and the only thing that is really standing out to me about my life in April and early May is that I watched so much royal wedding commentary that the voices in my head are still speaking with British accents. But I think I can focus long enough to do a recap of what is freshest in my mind, which would be our trip to take Brayden to see Thomas the Tank Engine a week or so ago.

The real Thomas. In real life.

So all of us along with Isaac's mother, sister, brother-in-law, and nephew drove south to Silverhill, Alabama, to meet our cheeky, blue friend.

(I mean, how LUCKY are we that the REAL Thomas came so close to where we are since he lives all the way on the island of Sodor in the Irish Sea!)

(And you'd have to be up on the whole Thomas scene to get my "cheeky" reference above.)

In fact, we skipped out on church in order to leave by 11 AM so we could have hours of endless fun before our actual train ride. And it only cost us $23.00 apiece, plus food, gas, ice cream, souvenirs, and a $6.00 lemonade, which is a bargain considering all the beautiful memories we will cherish, like this one:

And this one:

And this one:

Oh I totally kid! We had a fantastic day and the meltdowns were few and far between. Especially mine. The weather was absolutely perfect, and it was mentioned more than once that we simply could not do this in July or August because the heat would just be too unbearable.

(I was the one mentioning that. Unlike the pain of childbirth which fades into a foggy memory because you get something beautiful from it, I have not forgotten the pain of last summer. I remember the Alamo, darn it!)

And this trip marked a couple of "firsts" for Brayden that my daughter brought to my attention. His first real outing (never mind that we all went to the beach last year--I have been informed that that was a vacation, not an outing), and the first time he got his hand stamped.

Precious milestones, people. The next thing you know, he'll be getting his first tattoo.

(It was also a first for me. The first time someone ever looked at me like I was a child predator. It was completely innocent, though. I thought I was doing a good deed by taking pictures of Brayden's cousin jumping across the hay bales in the hay bale play area. And after I had snapped about ten or so pictures, I really looked at my subject and it turned out that he wasn't Brayden's cousin at all, but some other little boy who I didn't know from a bar of soap. Isn't that just hilarious? Not to his mom and dad who were staring at me kind of...I don't know...scathingly.)

Would you believe that the highlight for Brayden was not the actual train ride? It was the tent where all the toy trains were. He and his cousin just loved. that. tent.

They would have been quite content to stay in there all day. It was a very unfortunate decision to pull them out of there to go ride the mini-train. Now THAT evoked some blood curdling screams, let me tell you. Never pull a little boy away from a train table in public.

After the mini-train was a visit with the fat controller himself, Sir Topham Hatt. To be honest, our little guy wouldn't have anything to do with him. I tried to explain to Brayden that he needed to put on his happy face because after all, we HAD skipped out on the house of the Lord to take him there, and a good attitude was in order on the Sabbath. He didn't quite get it, though, and he totally dissed the Sir.

Amber, however, was quite thrilled to get her picture made with him.

I put my husband in charge of videoing the big day. And this is how that turned out:

I must say, the big train ride was quite relaxing. We all put on our imagination hats and enjoyed the view as we rode nearly two miles an hour around the "island of Sodor." (Wink)

After that, we made our obligatory visit to the souvenir tent room where we spent a ridiculous amount of money buying Thomas paraphernalia, so our little guy could take home the magic of the day in the form of a song CD, a Thomas and friends blankie, and a very special train cup, with a high quality plastic straw I might add, which all together cost about $450.

But our little guy is worth at least that.

It's Official. I'm The World's Worst Blogger.

2011-04-11T22:21:00.001-05:00

I'm alive and well, just very preoccupied with life and not disciplined enough to make myself sit down and type. Presently, I am sipping a homemade frozen mocha coffee drink and trying to calm myself down from the scary beast I call my frappe machine. You'd think I'd learn this thing by now, but it gets me every single time. I put in all my ingredients and it starts to softly perk, which is a lovely, soothing, quiet sound, but then, just when I've become engrossed in another task like trying to come up with a brilliant blog post title, it suddenly switches to the blend cycle, which is a sound so loud and disturbing, all I can think is that someone is shooting at me.

Happens every afternoon.

And that was not the only near heart-attack I had today. Brayden was here and I was busy putting clothes away this morning while he was running from room to room. The next thing I heard was the eerie sound of silence, which is never good when you're watching a 21 month old unless he is taking a nap or glued to the television during The Wiggles, so I went into the bathroom where I had heard him just 10 seconds before. He wasn't there. I called out his name as I went through the house, but he didn't answer me. (Actually, he didn't answer me because he only has a very small vocabulary that doesn't yet include "Here I am, Lolli!")

Since I do not live in a mansion, I couldn't understand where he might be. My heart started racing and I was getting a little frantic. The washer was running and the thought ran through my mind that somehow he might have fallen into it and was being agitated. (Do not laugh because this really happened to a child. I saw it on an episode of Rescue 911 years ago and it's stuck with me all this time. Thank God the child lived, but still.) I ran back into the bathroom and, yes, I looked in the toilet, which I know is a little bit ludicrous, but then I pulled the shower curtain back and guess who was standing there quiet as a mouse with a smirk on his face?

Personally, I feel like he knew exactly what he was doing which was causing undue stress in his grandmother, but if he wants to think of it as a little game, I'll let it pass--for now. I was just so happy to see him that I grabbed him while simultaneously screaming "Brayden!" in my best outside voice, and that combined with the very serious look on my face scared him as much as he had scared me. (Paybacks are heck, kid. You scare me, I scare you back. And you better watch out for the hall monster.) The whole episode probably lasted all of 90 seconds but it was a very scary 90 seconds.

And, yes, I am very aware that I need to chillax and stop thinking of the worst possible scenarios.

Anyway, since I'm ~~rattling on~~ talking about him, let me also share that he is absolutely enthralled with Thomas the Tank Engine. I have my DVR set to tape all the episodes and he totally knows this, so when he comes over he grabs my remote control and hands it to me and says "choo-choo" which sounds more like "joo-joo." And then I turn off Reba and turn on Thomas. That's the way it works around here these days.

And another thing. He can say cheese (alright, "jeez"), and he poses and smiles to get his picture taken. It's adorable, so I make him do it two or twenty times each visit.

Lord he's cute even though we can't stop him from eating dirt.

Which brings me to my next topic. I am absolutely in love with photography right now and I want to learn everything I can about it. In fact, one of the reasons I haven't been blogging as much is because I have been doing some major perusing of photography sites and there are only so many hours a day I allot to the internet. And to avoid becoming "the housewife who bought a really nice DSLR and thinks she is a photographer or something," I plan to spend a lot of time this summer learning how to use my camera, as well as Photoshop CS5, which I have recently purchased. I haven't been this excited about a hobby since I started entering recipe contests in 2005. We'll see how long this lasts. So I may be scarce here, but since I'm officially the world's worst blogger, I don't have a lot to live up to.

And this doesn't have anything to do with any of the above, but my daughter made me laugh so hard the other day. I happened to glance at her Blackberry Messenger status and it read "at olive garden wif my menses" which made me do a double take. She had gone out to eat with Isaac and Brayden and apparently, in her world, "menses" is a really cute way of saying "men" just like "wif" is really cute for "with." Someone needs to tell her what menses really means.

Or maybe not.:)

.

Good and Bad

2011-03-25T20:56:00.000-05:00

Y'all. I have a severe case of spring fever and I simply do not want to sit at the computer and write. Period. So I haven't. And I'm okay with that.

But since I'm here tonight, let me tell you about my thoughts, hopes, and dreams.

Or maybe I'll just do good and bad.

Have I ever told you about good and bad? My sister and her husband have this ritual with their kids every night. At the end of the day, each person takes a turn telling their "good" and "bad" of the day. And I cannot tell you how much fun it was to watch them do this when their kids were little. I got such a kick out of hearing their ideas about what was good and bad. They would say things like "Well, my bad was that I hurt my toe, and my good was that we got to eat pizza."

Oh, if all our good and bad could be that simple.

So here's some good and bad of life for me recently. Yeah, I guess you could call this a list, but I didn't want to come right out and say all I have is a list.

1. Bad-Itchy, watery eyes; dry, coughy throat; runny nose; lots of sneezing. Hello, spring in Mississippi. I have a love-hate relationship with you. I forgive you, though, because you give me this:

2. Good-I had some family from way out of town come visit a week or so ago and family is good, good, good. Good times, good people.

3. Bad-Brayden accidentally hit me in the lip today with his sippy cup. Seriously, it felt like a piece of iron hitting my mouth. The pain was so intense I got nauseated. How can a 26-pound toddler hurt so good? Yes, my lip is swollen. But he still has my heart.

4. Bad-My mind is busy. Really busy. With thoughts. Some good, some bad. But all of them combined are causing major insomnia at night.

5. Good-Melatonin. I likey.

.

A Gimmick Exposed

2011-03-14T21:08:00.002-05:00

So the low carb diet is kind of hard. I think I'll just try to cut out sugar and only eat complex carbohydrates and lots of protein.

The end.

But since I was talking about saving money just two months ago, I think I'll pick back up with that topic now. And I want you to know that I'm still on track with my budget and I'm jumping for joy because I have only my third roll of paper towels on the holder since the very first day in January.

Hold your applause, please. I have more.

Not only that, but I made a very important discovery involving my toilets.

(Can you tell I have nothing else to write about? Because I have nothing else to write about. Doing a big blog move in February causes writer's block in March, I've found out. I've started eight posts in the last couple of weeks and they are all blah, yawn, and snore. I mean MORE SO than talking about my toilet. So you can imagine the pit I'm in.)

Back to my commode story.

A couple of years ago, I bought one of those toilet wands with the disposable scrubby applicator pads pre-filled with soap because, God forbid, I didn't want to be the kind of person who stores germs and bacteria in my bathroom like the commercials warned, even though it had never been an issue in my 38 years before. I got rid of my old-fashioned cootie covered toilet brushes and started spending about $5.00 a month on scrubby refills.

Yeah, I liked them at first, I'm not gonna lie. But I soon noticed that my toilets would get a ring around the inside of the bowl between cleanings, before even a week went by. I blamed it on chemicals in our water supply, or maybe a high protein content in our--ahem--waste. (I'm just rattling off here. I have no idea if toilet rings are due to excess protein, but it sounds completely logical, doesn't it?) I didn't think for one minute that the cause might just be that the disposable scrubby pad things were an epic fail, though, because the commercials clearly stated how wonderful they were, and everything on TV is absolutely true.

I was so brainwashed.

Anyway, when I started cutting extra stuff out of our budget at the beginning of the year, I knew they had to go. I bought some regular toilet brushes and some Comet. And I have to tell you, my toilets starting staying sparkly clean all the way through to the next weekly cleaning again. No toilet ring, much to my surprise.

And this is important why?

Because I'm trying to make a point about gimmicks. Which is totally what I think the whole toilet wand and disposable scrubby pad thing is, now that I've seen the light. The whole concept behind the wand idea is that consumers will keep buying those expensive scrubby pads every month. You could have at least the same or better results with Comet (or bleach or whatever) and a scrub brush for pennies. I think a container of Comet is under a dollar and I know it lasts me for at least two months.

And about storing the germs? I'll have you know that the toilet wand gets it's share of cootie build up on it. Yes, it does. So you are going to have to clean that every time or you will store nastiness just like you would with a brush.

I think that $5 a month is too much to pay for a questionably clean toilet.

.

Homemade Chocolate Syrup

2011-03-12T10:49:00.002-06:00

Okay, don't roll your eyes at the fact that in my last post I wrote about starting a low carb diet and now I'm posting a sugary homemade chocolate syrup. This post was in the making before I had my low carb revelation, FYI. The recipe is right here. I'll be back soon with a real blog post. I think I'm finally feeling it.

.

Just Don't Take My Coffee

2011-03-08T18:58:00.001-06:00

Richard had today off for Mardi Gras because that's a lower Alabama holiday. I thought it would be a great day to break out my whip and do some much needed yard work. After several lashings, he couldn't agree more.

We spent a few vigorous hours moving firewood and powerwashing anything that would survive a good spraying of Jomax and bleach. We worked some kind of hard and now we're exhausted. He's watching a western and I am blogging, obviously, but I'm also surfing the internet for information about how start a low carb diet, because there might be a real good chance that I am a sugar addict.

Real good chance. Like I'm pretty sure I am.

And I resolved at 3:36 PM today that tomorrow morning I will give up sugar, flour and whatever else the internet tells me to give up that is carb-related.

I just seriously hope that it's not coffee, because if so, that's a problem.

Coffee doesn't have carbs, does it?

Anyway, the main reason I'd like to give a low carb diet a shot is because of how people who are low carbing it brag about how great they feel. And although I wouldn't say I feel bad, I'm sure there's room for improvement. Or maybe I totally feel like crap and I don't even know it. I remember a few years ago I did give up sugar for a couple of months and I felt great.

So we'll see if I can make it through the first three days, which apparently is when all the withdrawals happen.

I'm afraid this is gonna be bad.

.

Desperately Seeking Inspiration

2011-03-07T22:05:00.000-06:00

This is about the sixth time tonight that I have tried to write something. Anything. And the sad thing is, I can usually rattle off several paragraphs about nothing. But not lately. I even changed my position on the couch several times, drank a Diet Coke, AND perused other blogs.

And I still have nothing in the way of the written word.

But please, say hello to spring with me.

Classic Chicken Tetrazzini

2011-03-06T19:57:00.004-06:00

I sincerely loved this and will be making it again soon. Like in a few days soon. The recipe is up at my food blog, Mississippi Kitchen. Or just click right here.

.

I Am A Turnip

2011-03-05T08:50:00.004-06:00

I'm finally free of my Typepad blog. I got the courage to completely cancel my account earlier this week. I deleted a whole bunch of posts in the process because I just did not have the energy to insert one more picture, which was THE most time consuming part of the whole transfer. And as a result of this ordeal, I got very sick of the internet and computers and technology and I cried at least twice.

And I was kind of looking at this whole transfer thing like a fresh start. I had every intention of writing content that was insightful, entertaining, and completely awesome. But something glitched in my brain, and I totally lost my enthusiasm for blogging in the last few weeks. I'm trying to get it back, but its taking it's sweet time.

You can't squeeze blood out of a turnip, people.

I do have a few boring items and I'm not going to apologize for such a lame post because this is my little corner on the internet and I can use it the way I want to. There.

1. Commenting-I am aware that there is no option to sign in with your actual name if you don't have a blog or website, so you must sign in with anonymous profile. I know this is annoying and as far as I can see, I have all options for commenting on. Sorry about this. This is one area where Typepad is a little better.

2. That reply feature I added in the comment section is not working like I thought it would. The reply does not go under the original comment, it shows up at the bottom in chronological order like all the other comments. Bummer.

3. Blogger has it's quirky little issues, but all in all, I'm happy here.

4. Still haven't solved the mystery of adding space between the last line of my post and the share button. Right now I'm just double spacing and inserting a period hoping no one will notice. But a lone period has never been so glaring to me.

5. The font. I increased the size of the font, but then something happened and and some of the posts didn't increase and they just look weird. Just so you know, I am aware of this issue. It bothers me too, but I'm trying to talk myself into believing that life is too short to stress over such minor details.

Life IS too short to stress over such minor details, isn't it?

6. And why did I create a separate food blog? It's bothered me a long time that some of my foodie friends were coming to my blog only to find personal stories from my life and not food. I just felt I needed to separate the two. Hopefully, no one is here who doesn't really want to be here. My stats are about a third of what they were, but if it was all about stats and traffic, Lord have mercy I would have quit blogging a long time ago.

Have a great Saturday. It's raining here. A lot.

.

Just Not Quite Ready For Spring Yet

2011-02-25T21:50:00.004-06:00

So I guess spring is here even though it's officially not here? Is it okay that I'm not ready for it? 'Cause I'm not, you know. That groundhog needs to mind his own business.

And there is absolutely no denying that I look a little out of place wearing winter boots with my skirts, so I was FORCED to debut my extremely pale legs to the world during revival last week.

You have my sincerest apology, Denham Baptist Church.

And did you know that if you nick yourself when you shave and it leaves a red, bloody scab, the contrast of the bright red with the white pigment from your untanned legs makes them that much more blinding?

It totally does.

And did you know how self-conscious this can make someone feel who's wearing a skirt and sitting in the front pew at church?

Quite self-conscience, actually.

That is, until I look down at my left big toe and realize that, judging from the length of the hairs, there is a good possibility that I forgot to shave it since early November. Which leads me to frantically search in my purse for some tweezers until I remember that my husband has a pocket knife that is "sooooo razor sharp it'll take the hair off your arm." The man has religiously sharpened it once a week for the last year.

"Hand over you pocket knife. If I'm not back before the end of the third hymn, I've cut a major artery and I'm bleeding to death in the women's bathroom."

But for real, I am not ready for spring just yet because we went from really, really cold to 75 plus degrees in like fifteen minutes. No easing into it. No opening all the windows and letting the cool, clean, spring air in. Straight from heat to air conditioning. It takes me a while to acclimate to weather changes, and these abrupt temperature shifts are quite taxing on my body.

Just not there yet.

Venison Tacos with Creamy Cilantro-Lime Sauce

2011-02-25T19:26:00.003-06:00

Get the recipe right here.

.

An Egg-cellent Toddler Story

2011-02-21T18:28:00.010-06:00

I have a grandbaby story to tell that just delights me to no end.

One morning last week, I woke up and noticed Amber's BBM status said something about how waking up at 4:30 AM to cracked eggs all over the house was not cool. I immediately thought she meant that someone had egged their house in the middle of the night, and I thought what kind of an idiot would do that?

This was not the case.

Apparently Brayden woke up early that morning, crawled out of bed while his parents slept soundly, and went to the refrigerator to rustle up some grub as all 19 month olds like to do.

Quiet as a mouse he was.

He took all of the eggs out of the carton, broke a few here and there and, well, everywhere, then took a couple back to the bed where his mommy and daddy lay in peaceful slumber. He cracked one open on Isaac and was just about to crack the other when Isaac woke up to see the Brayster sitting on top of him, with an outstretched arm and an egg in his hand. "This one's for you, Daddy."

I love this so much.:)

The Time When My One Blog Template Ate My Other Blog Template

2011-02-17T16:09:00.014-06:00

Question:

What do you get when you accidentally upload one blog template into an entirely different blog template and they morph into one?

Answer:

A hysterical forty year old woman screaming at her husband to "PLEASE START PRAYING! I'VE DONE SOMETHING REALLY, REALLY BAD!"

And that's exactly what happened last night, and it's because I've let all this coding go straight to my head. Instead of doing what I'm supposed to be doing with my blog, which is going into the archives and inserting my saved pictures into their proper slots, I've been obsessing a little too much with the layout and design. And I've totally gotten cocky with my "I believe I can fly/I am so awesome" attitude and my "Maybe I should think about becoming a blog-techie-code person, because that is obviously where my calling is" mentality.

That was until my world came crashing down at about 10:35 last night. After I successfully made cute oval green buttons for my horizontal menu bar, I couldn't stop at that because 1) my husband was cutting up some deer meat and totally ignoring me, so what else am I gonna do but play on the computer, and B) I have a rebellious third column that won't allow me to insert but one widget, so I thought "Hey, I am so on a roll and how hard can it be to straighten out that third column problem real quick-like?" [The answer is SUPER HARD, GUYS, SUPER. HARD.]

So I did some stuff, then I did some more stuff, which led me to remove some stuff, then I clicked some buttons, and then I looked and said "No, no, no, what HAVE I done? This is not right at all!"

So I said to myself "I'll just go back to the beginning and upload that template I backed up a few minutes ago." But when I did? IT WAS THE TEMPLATE TO MY OTHER BLOG! But I did not know this at that time.

So if you can imagine what would happen if a hippopotamus hooked up with an eagle and they had a baby, then that baby would be my blog!

OH THE HIDEOUS BEAST!

And the second it happened, my stomach started churning and my heart started violently palpitating and my palms got sweaty, because y'all...my blog was SOME KIND OF DEFORMED!

And it was due to the fact that when I accidentally fed my one blog template to my other blog template, it barfed up big, chunky pieces of code all over the place! NOTHING was where it should have been!

So I just stared at the screen, not believing the horror that was before me, and I started screaming "Richard, Richard, OH MY GOSH, RICHARD!" And he asked me what was wrong and I tried to explain to him that I had done something awful, horrible and terrible to my blog, and I was freaking out because I didn't know if I could reverse it. *HOLD ME BABY AND MAKE IT GO AWAY*

And then he said "I totally understand how you feel because when I was making my flintlock muzzleloader a few years ago [yes, he made a gun from scratch], there was a certain area around the forearm that I had sanded down just a little too much and I was just sick about it, even though no one but me could probably tell."

And even though I really appreciated that empathetic gun story in the middle of my uber scary blog crisis, CLEARLY NOT THE SAME THING because EVERYONE IN THE WHOLE WIDE WORLD CAN SEE MY BLOG!!!

And I am absolutely sure that EVERYBODY IN THE WHOLE WIDE WORLD WAS LOOKING AT MY BLOG AT THAT EXACT TIME! *SHUDDER*

It took me about ten minutes to figure out that I had uploaded the wrong template, then another fifteen or so to get it straight. And I don't know how my body survived that 25 minutes of stress, but I had to run to the bathroom immediately after because my stomach was in such upheaval.

So I checked my blog six or twenty more times to make sure it looked okay, then I went to bed and had nightmares all night.

Code is so scary.

.

I'm Just Not Buying It

2011-02-14T17:19:00.001-06:00

Is it me or is this a ridiculous concept for women?

I'm sorry, but if I walked into the bedroom wearing one of these, after my husband rolled around on the floor laughing for two or ten minutes, he'd probably throw me over his shoulder and try and burp me because this is nothing more than a glorified onesie.

And there is something very wrong with grown women dressing like two year olds.

And with all that marshmallow micro fleece (their terminology, not mine), my forty year old hormones are looking at this like a big, pink, fuzzy hot flash just waiting to ignite.

I sweat whenever I see the commercial.

And then there's the issue of peeing. I can totally envision all that marshmallow micro fleece puddling up at my ankles and touching the bathroom floor because I am not coordinated enough to deal with all that material AND tend to my potty business at the same time. Or worse yet, I can see this falling into the toilet as I try to suit back up. That really happened to me once in the eighties when jumpsuits were in style.

No thank you. I think I'll just wear my t-shirt and flannel plaid pajama bottoms to bed for my romantic Valentine's night.

.

Decadent Double-Stuffed Strawberry and Chocolate “Makin’ Whoopie” Pies in Strawberry Pools

2011-02-13T15:58:00.005-06:00

I've got a scrumptious Valentine's Day recipe at my food blog, Mississippi Kitchen. Click here for "Makin' Whoopie" pies.

Ch Ch Ch Ch Changes

2011-02-11T22:55:00.212-06:00

Y'all.

I now know why techie people charge so much for a blog transfer. It's because it sucks the life out of a person and that, my friends, comes at a price.

And I have had one week of my life sucked out of me and I'm not finished yet, although my blog is up and running. I think. At least on my end.

I'm here. But are you?

My eyes are so dry that they're making a crunching sound when I blink, and my skin is turning gray from staring at the computer screen for eighty hours, which I didn't even know this shade of gray was possible unless you're a corpse, but I think my blog looks great.

And there's more! My new food blog is here.

It's very overwhelming to know that after I have spent most of a whole week squinting at a computer screen, I'm still not through and probably have 30+ hours left of work to do. My brain is so fried right now that as I'm typing the word "through," I am thinking to myself, "No, wait, Lorie. You mean threw. Or is it thru?"

I need some fresh air and a solid eight hours sleep, and then I might be able to speak in a language other than HTML.

And speaking of HTML, the actual transfer took two minutes. But what has taken hours upon hours are two things. First, I set up the template for this blog all by myself by editing the HTML of the Minima template. Before I took on this project, I didn’t even know what HTML was. And now that I think about it, I still don't really know what it is, but do I know that it is symbol/letter/number stuff that has to be inserted into or taken out of the symbol/letter/number stuff that was in the original template in order to change the look and function of the blog.

Clearly I have no future in technical writing.

And here's a nifty little lesson I learned early on. Don't think that you can leave off one little backsplash, I mean backslash, or one teeny, tiny symbol when you're editing HTML, 'CAUSE HONEY IF YOU DO? The blog rebels in ways you could not imagine.

The second thing that is taking forever is that every single picture I transferred did not technically transfer. It shows up in Blogger, but it is still being stored at Typepad. When I delete my Typepad blog, my pictures will disappear unless I reinsert them in Blogger. That means I am slowly going through three years worth of posts and saving the pictures in a folder on my computer, then deleting them in the actual post, then adding them back. It's tedious work and I’m still not done. That's why archived posts look weird. So don't look at them yet, okay?

And just to vent a little, there are some other things that are bugging me like:

-The date and title of each post should be switched and the font of the title should be bigger and the font of the date should be smaller. You don’t know how many times I have tried to do this. I’m still working on it.

-Those black bullets in my category widget need to disappear. Yes, I have found a tutorial on how to do this but it did not work on my blog. &%$#! *Update* Done. There's more than one way to skin a cat.

-Spacing. Spacing is driving me crazy. On some posts like this one, no matter how many times I hit enter at the end of the post, whenever I publish there is NO space between the last line and the add button. But some posts are okay. It's a mystery to me.

-Yes, the horizontal menu bar at the top needs a bigger font, or better yet, some cute little buttons. I'm still working on it. But I’m super proud of the fact that I made a horizontal menu bar in the first place. *I believe I can fly* *Update* Done. I. Am. Awesome.

I’m also working on a very boring article about the reasons I switched from Typepad to Blogger and not Wordpress, because I feel it's important for other bloggers to make informed decisions, and I think I can be a help in this area since I'm practically an expert now.

I'm going to bed. Nighty-night.

Bear With Me

2011-02-05T02:26:00.007-06:00

I'm going to be working on my site and a transfer for the next week (maybe it won't take that long, but then again, it could take longer because JUST A HOUSEWIFE NOT A TECHIE), so my posting and commenting will probably be non-existent.

On top of all that I have to do with this whole transfer thing, my computer decided to start freaking out this morning and doing crazy, weird things. When my screen suddenly goes completely black and I can do nothing but turn the darn thing off and reboot, I get really, really nervous.

I'm a little edgy this morning.

If all goes well, though, I will still be at www.riceandbeansandotherfinethings.com. Everyone who is linked to that main address should still be able to get there. But all links to specific posts of mine will probably be lost. I'm sorry about that, but I didn't write the rules.

And if nothing goes like I plan, which is a distinct possibility, I've enjoyed my time on the Internet with you all.

But I hope to see you again.

Lorie:o)

But Where's My Snow? Don't I Get Snow?

2011-02-01T15:20:00.011-06:00

Would it be too much to ask for a little snow here? Just a little? I was in Academy Sports during one of my Christmas shopping expeditions, and for some odd reason, I impulsively and delusionally bought a pair of snow boots. When I got home, I realized, and I had completely forgotten this, that I had already bought a pair last March when we went skiing. So that makes two. Which is two pair more than anyone who lives in Mississippi needs.

So now I want snow because I am insanely jealous of everyone else experiencing their cozy little blizzards all across the country. My shrewdly informed weather man told me that we are currently under a tornado watch, but gave no hope for any blizzard action here.

Which means the rain boots score again. Snow boots-zero.
And my sister who lives in Missouri is all "Yeah, we're getting 14-16 inches and work is canceled and school is canceled, and I have all these really cool snacky-type treats, and blah, blah, blah."

All we have is mud.

In other news, I'm still doing my research about moving my blog, and I know that Wordpress is probably the best platform, but a thought hit me yesterday morning that I could move to Blogger. And that thought has remained in my mind for the last 36 hours. And I have to say, what attracts me most to Blogger are the words completely free.

So I'm still working on it.

Moving along, my darling grandson learned a new trick today:

Is that not the cutest trick ever?

And I feel like I need to post a picture of him where no fingers are crammed into any holes:

I'd kill for lashes like that.

And because I do not hold it against anyone who is experiencing beautiful, fluffy snowdrifts, I'm gonna hook you up and hook you up real good to a special snow treat. My cooking friend, Lisa, has a new food blog, Snappy Gourmet, and she has a couple of yummy snow ice cream recipes on there. Here and here. This is not your everyday snow ice cream, people.

When life gives you snow, make snow ice cream. That's what I always say. Except life doesn't usually give me snow, so no snow ice cream for me. But you enjoy.

Monday Morning Coffee Talk

2011-01-31T04:00:00.004-06:00

I know. I've been missing in action. I went all last week without leaving the house because of my crud affliction, but Friday morning I pulled myself out of bed, hopped in the shower, put on a smattering of make-up, and proceeded to town to get three bags of leg quarters that were on sale at Sunflower. I also went to Save-A-Lot to pick up a few things.

I just thought you should know.

A quick word about Save-A-Lot: If you have turned your nose up at it in the past (ahem, Mom), you may want to give it a try. To give you an example, about a week and a half ago, I bought an 8-ounce block of the Great Value brand cream cheese at Wal-Mart for a $1.72. The price of Save-A-Lot's cream cheese was $0.99. I'd say that is a huge difference. And by the way, I made some cream cheese frosting over the weekend with it and there was no taste difference whatsoever. It was perfectly fine. Really.

I will say that I'm not a fan of everything Save-A-Lot has to offer, but all in all there are some real bargains. They put their tomatoes in the refrigerated section, though, so that's an issue for me, but still, I save a lot of money there.

And did you know that Save-A-Lot's founder was a serial killer? Just thought I'd throw that out there as some coffee talk for this Monday morning.

Oh! And this! I made it to January 24 on one roll of paper towels. And I have not had one coke or eaten out one time in the month of January, even a fast food burger. This has not happened since...NEVER!

Alright. Enough with the tightwad/serial killer talk. What's really weighing heavy on my mind is this blog and my service with Typepad. Not happy here. I would really love to move to Wordpress where the code is greener, but to get anyone that knows what they are doing to move me would START at $300. And for someone who is rationing out her paper towels, that's just not in the budget. So, I have decided to do it myself. And I have spent hours, I mean HOURS on the computer this weekend looking at tutorials and reading accounts from people who have made the transition. (And by the way, the issue is not with moving from Blogger to Wordpress, it's moving from Typepad to Wordpress--it's been described as a living hell. I'm not kidding.)

I'm not sure what makes me think I can do this. In fact, I don't really think I can do this correctly. But I'm willing to have some broken links and some lost content for a clean start at Wordpress. And that's one reason most of my posts lately have had no pictures, etc. The moving of pictures is an issue, so I'm trying avoid extra baggage.

I'm hoping to get this done in the next two weeks. So if my blog explodes or the Internet goes down, you'll know that it's probably just Lorie fiddling around with code. I'll keep you posted.

And by the way, I accept any and all forms of advice on moving from TP to WP or on Wordpress in general. Desperate here.

So my blogging may be a little bit meager for the next couple of weeks because there is only so much information my brain can process at one time, and this whole moving issue is a doozey. A. Doozey.

Okay, let me go seize the day now.

Diagnosis: Crud, With A Smattering Of Anemia

2011-01-24T12:11:00.002-06:00

I've officially got the crud.

And that's a real southern term that means I have a sore throat, a runny nose, and one ginormous headache.

And I say southern although I'm not really sure of the origin, but I do know that I never heard that term used as an actual diagnosis until I moved to the South in the eighties.

"Why hasn't Miss Elsie May been at church?" "Well, honey, she's got the crud."

In fact, one time I went to the doctor in my early twenties when I was really sick and after he examined me, he started writing a prescription, so I interrupted him to ask him what was wrong with me and he matter-of-factly said "You've got the crud." Not you've contracted streptococcus, or pneumonia, or influenza or any other appropriate terminology you would expect from a medical doctor, but the crud.

Those crazy southern doctors are a hoot.

I was raised out west where the term crud meant corrosion, as in chemical, as in "Look at all the crud on this metal pipe or on this battery cable." That was the crud of my child and early teenhood.

Sometimes crud was a word used in place of a cuss word. "We have a test today? CRUD!"

The crud of my adulthood, though, has knocked me on my behind and turned me into a snotty, whining mess.

And to top it off, along with my crud affliction, I think my iron levels may be just a wee bit low, because I have about as much energy as a rock. My brain is also a tad foggy in the area of thinking and processing thoughts, which I find is an important skill that I use everyday in some way or another.

So my diet is consisting of Sudafed, Ovaltine and steaks, because I do NOT do liver, and raisins, although nutritionally sound and full of iron, come from the devil and the devil I will have no part of.

So, until my iron levels have increased or the crud has gone, whichever comes first, I can be found totally slacking on the couch.

Let's Keep Our Eyes On The Road

2011-01-18T14:12:00.003-06:00

Even though this video is specifically about texting, I think it goes without saying that no driver should be digging through a purse (I'm guilty), trying to find a CD in the console, turning around to tend to a baby, etc. In short, we need to keep our eyes on the road when we are operating vehicles.