Back At It

It's noon, day one back from vacation. The work world has continued to churn and so I'm 7 days behind everyone else - oh well.

There's not much to do:

250 e-mails (respond or delete)
Financial planning for 2008 (Due Thursday)
Prepare for not one but THREE new minions
Catch up so I can help my team while broom hilda is on vacation
Resume the fully enforced eatting plan (decaf non-fat latte in hand!)
Catch you up on the eatting plan - the why's and such
65th birthday gift for Glenda the Good Aunt of the East
Wedding present for Rico and the next Mrs. Rico (9/1 he goes off the market ladies... better hurry if you want a shot at him.)
Get my keys back from the cat-sitter (why she took my mail key I'll never know)

That's it for now... gotta run... e-mail is calling.

Vacation PIX

Racoons in the tree behind the cabin! Collin named the mommy raccoon "Lisa". I'm not sure where he get's it.

This is the lighthouse at Port Warden.

A seal sunned itself on the swimming dock all day Thursday.

An "arty" shot at Pt. Warden

delayed post

I finished Harry Potter last night at midnight. Its been a while since a book made me cry. No spoilers, but it was good!

Today we drove up to Port Townsend today. What a cute place, I found a fun tablecloth in a store designed to take all my free money.

Cols, who is now 4 1/2, had a major melt down at the beach which resulted in not one but two attitude readjustment sessions. The second was a full-on pull the car off the road and exit the vehicle type event. Becky was amazingly cool in spite of a screaming grunting fit being thrown her way. The sad thing was that the fit resulted in the revocation in our planned movie night. Damned four year old ruined it for me.

There's terrible cell reception here so who knows when this will post.

Camping

the local
lay out the tent
poof it's up!

Ok, I admit these are pictures from last year. (Notice the sunshine as a clue.) If I don't think the rain will ruin my camera I may opt for some "rain" shots for this year.

It's supposed to clear up Monday, so I'm going with the rising rivers on this one. The only real bummer is that instead of packing lightly, I've had to bring everything in the world I own. Sun clothes and rain clothes, ok, well not everything, I am leaving the snow gear at home... I hope I don't regret it!

I may e-post a little but if I do please ignore the typo's. My iPhone is awesome, but not really intended for word processing.

Have a great week.

He's Here!

whining

Doing the right thing isn’t always easy.  I’ve started a revised food plan (under doctor’s supervision) that isn’t a “diet” or any sort of named eating regimen, heck, I’m not counting calories.  This is six small meals per day, 60-90 grams of protein (which is A LOT), no processed sugar, good carbs (whole grain), fruits, veggies and cheese, but:

NO CAFFIENE

I had already eliminated the carbonated soda – I will miss mineral water but not as much as the damned caffeine.  I didn’t think I was drinking that much – a coffee in the morning, and then a few cups of hot tea throughout the day. Apparently I was wrong, my head hurts like I slept under the wheels of a bus last night.  Sadly, I’m going to have to pick up a different habit like Cocaine or Meth to get me through.

Using meth could be a bonus – I’ll save a ton of money on dental work once my teeth fall out.  There’s no down side!

I’m going camping next week so only the wild animals will have to hear the gnashing of my teeth, by the time I return to civilization I should be fully detoxed.

First the non-diet and the next thing you’ll know I’ll be working out.  Bwahahahahaah

Speed Reader

Golly... we had our July book group meeting Tuesday and needed to change the date of our August meeting. The only day we could agree on was July 31st!

It wouldn't be so terrible to read a book in two weeks (especially since I'm going "camping") but Harry Potter arrives on my doorstep Saturday and I want to start reading it right away.

Ahhh the pressure!

(Clearly, I'm not quite as deep as your average Doctor, Human Rights Advocate or even high schooler.)

Starbuck Oracle

What does your drink say about you?

My Grande non-fat no-water chai apparently tells the world that I am:

Personality type: Pseudo-intellectual

You're liberal and consider yourself to be laid back and open minded. Everyone else just thinks you're clueless. Your friends hate you because you always email them virus warnings and chain letters "just in case it's true." All people who drink Grande Non fat no water Chai are potheads.

Also drinks: Sparkling water
Can also be found at: Designer grocery stores

My iPhone's world tour

I still haven't received my iPhone yet, but it's on it's way. I'm happily tracking it on the FexEx Track site.

It shipped from Shenzhen CN on Wednesday and arrived in Anchorage on Friday. I didn't know that Apple had manufacturing plants in Northern Canada, but maybe the NAFTA thing made it really economical. A quick search on Google Maps improved my knowledge of geography just a little. Shenzhen is in Eastern China. (The CN should have been a clue, but to be honest I haven't sent much mail to China.) Shenzhen is currently home to the worlds 8th tallest building. (Cool!)

I was thinking from Anchorage it would be a quick hop down into Seattle and I would have my phone by Monday. FedEx has a different plan.

My phone flew east from Alaska to Indianapolis where it spent ten hours where I'm sure it stopped at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and Hall of Fame Museum.

At 11am this morning, it hopped a flight to Memphis to take a whirlwind tour of Graceland before catching the next flight at 3:10. I'm hopeful that Tom Hanks isn't on the same plane. He seems to be bad luck.

The next stop on this journey is unknown. I'm thinking Cancun or maybe Havana.

I was at the mall today and was briefly tempted to buy a phone and simply reject the one in transit, but decided to wait. My need for instant gratification must be ignored.

tp gal crushed by a ton of bricks

I thought for sure I had the worst cold. I've had a sore throat and an cough for a few weeks. I've been medicating with some Day-Qyl in an attempt to make it through the days.

During my fence building adventure in Eastern Washington the symptoms started to go away and I was feeling better. I'm sure it wasn't the restful sleep.

I thought I was over it but the morning after I arrived back in the city my symptoms were back and then it hit me - Allergies! Duh!

Since then I've been taking Benadryl and feeling fine.

Do allergies get worse as you get ... dare I say "older"? I don't recall having allergies as a kid.

My sweet brother has them: dust, grass, and pollen. He spent a blissful summer in a freakishly clean house and got to avoid yard work. My parents caught him outside in the yard smoking the house went back to its normal state of 'clean' and he was told if he could tolerate smoking he could tolerate mowing the lawn.

Oh well, now that I've got the symptoms beat I'm a happy gal. Benadryl puts some folks to sleep but I can function pretty well on it - although I have been falling asleep on the bus on the way home from work. It could be the warm weather, but I caught myself snoring today. HORRORS... the public open mouthed nap. It's not a pretty sight I'm sure.

Movie Review: Harry Potter and the Order of The Phoenix

Was it worth standing in line with teenagers dressed like Harry Potter?
Was it worth being laughed at for seeing the midnight showing?
Was it worth $10.25?

ABSOLUTELY!

For fans of the movie series this stacks up to the rest its not too long and has tons of good things to see.

For those of us who love the books this is a fair representation of JKR's longest book. The screenwriter gets kudos in my book for cramming a lot of information in and still making it a fun show.

They took a couple liberties with the story line but I'm ok with it. I've been worried because Percy Weasly has an important role in the book and thus far in the films it's like he doesn't exist. He finally got screen time and for those of us who know who he is it was nice to see him.

I really enjoyed the film and won't be surprised if I watch it again.

HOwever... it's rated PG13 and I think it was quite scary so watch the little ones!

WHY!???

Why is it that when I’m super busy at work all I can do is think of all the things I’m not getting done and wish for free time, and then when I have a day were I’m not running from place to place I don’t want to focus on work?

Harry Potter: a quick history

To: MWR
From: tp gal
RE: Harry Potter Movies

There have been four movies so far:

1: HP: The Sorcerers Stone "Yer a wizard "arry!" Harry goes to Hogwarts for the first time and learns he's the Wiz. He over hears someone talking about a "thing" and uses all his spare time to find it thus giving Voldemort a second shot at life. Ooops.

2: HP: The Chamber of Secrets: Second year at school. Turns out HP can speak "snake", kids are being petrified, he finds a diary and ends up under the toilet battling a huge snake, saving little Ginnie, and killing the boy who came out of the diary (a young image ne memory of Voldemort.

3: HP: Escape from Ass-Kaban The annoying house elf is in this movie, the time changing thing, werewolves and dogs oh my. Harry gets an uncle -- Gary Oldman... COOL! (In spite of being told to leave it alone, he solves the "mystery" that everyone knows about and gets his favorite teacher fired. NICE) He's a bright kid, but doesn't seem to notice that Professor Dumbledore has been replaced by a less Wizardly man.

4: HP: Goblet of Fire. Year four - a 20 year old HP comes back to school only to learn there is no school. There's the TRI-WIZARD TOURNAMENT - so HP is the fourth competitor, someone locks the new creepy teacher in a box and Harry snoops around P. Diddy's (dumbledore) office and goes for a swim in the least disturbing memory ever. We're told that the Ministry of Magic thinks Prof. Snape is a bad wizard and memory dumbledore defends him. Harry uses his super dooper powers of sweeping to beat a dragon, gets naked with a Ghost, goes for a swim with some big mouthed fish. He's always a hero and in "sharing" victory gets the only HOT British guy at Hogwarts killed. He does the wand tango with the newly embodied Voldemort and brings the dead body of the HOT kid back to torture his father.

This movie is #5: The Order of the Phoenix - where HP's uncle comes back for actual screen time, Harry and the gang leave school for a field trip to the worst possible place ever and he gets a little action with the dead kids gal. Oh... and there's a new BI-ATCH in town. The new teacher is a tad opinionated in the "Russian Revisionist History" kind of way. "Vat are you talkin' about? Ve von the var, and if you claim you are hungry again ve vill shoot you!" The Weasly twins should get some good screen time too...

Potter Frenzy

Ooh, what an exciting week we're about to have. The Order of the Phoenix (TOOTP) opens Tuesday at 11:58 pm and the last book The Deathly Hallows (TDH) arrives on the 17th.

I actually have tickets for TOOTP and will be at the show with Becky, Durf & Craig - we're nutty. This was my favorite book, I liked that he started to teach others, he got a little action, the twins were a total hoot, and the Ron/Hermie thing is starting to take wings.

I am a tad tired of the whole "Harry doesn't know the whole story and gets into hot water because he's making assumptions" thing. Its a little too "Days of Our Lives" for my taste - but I'm hooked so what am I going to do about it?

This really should be the best movie yet. I'm thankful that the same actors are coming back to finish the series. Yes, they may not be even close to the age of the book Harry/Ron/Herm I am willing to accept it, more so than I would a new "Harry."

Then... as soon as I'm rested TDH will arrive on my door. I will refrain from calling in sick to finish it but will need to steer clear of others until I'm done.

Here are my pre-read predictions (stop reading here if you haven't finished the last book):


I believe that by the end of the book that Snape will prove himself to be the trusted soul that the dear departed Dumbledore believed him to be. In the end he will give his life to save Harry.

Harry will join (or at least be offered a position) with the Auruors regardless of finishing his final year at Hogwarts or not.

Don't Fence Me In

I arrived at Casa Momma Pappa's pretty early yesterday. The drive over was great, not too much traffic, and it didn't get HOT until I hit Ellensburg. I snapped on the A/C after desending into the Yakima Valley and enjoyed the remainder of the drive in my favorite way, windows down and the A/C on.

Don't send me hate mail about the waistfulness of a/c with the windows down because I only use my a/c on 90 degree or hotter days which means almost never. Some of you... and you know who I'm talking about Janie... are a/c on any day over 68.

Still plagued with a cold that has moved into my chest I was hoping the uber hot weather would help clear it up and it has somewhat. Mom informed me that Aunt Sandy & Uncle Ed would be here at 7:00am to start the re-building of the fence between the house and the pasture.

7:00 AM!!! For pete sake I came over here to relax. Oh well, there was no way that I could have slept until 7 anyway... mom has chickens and a rooster. Joy oh Joy. It's hot over here and her house a/c doesn't run all night so the windows are open. At 4:30 am the (&%*%#)ing Rooster started crowing. I managed to fade in and out of sleep until 6 and then I was up.

We worked until 1, ate lunch under the big Walnut tree and decided to start again in the morning. Thankfully Ed has a nice backhoe and we weren't digging any of the post holes by hand.

I love that my family pitches in to do hard labor at each others homes. It's fun and everybody feels a sense of accomplishment. Together we've installed a new floor into the barn, put a huge deck around Sandy & Ed's house, the fence, and lots of other smaller projects. Growing up mom would get bored and she'd make us move the wood pile around the yard. What fun these rural Washintonians have.

Mom has been telling me that "Gang Bangers" have moved in up the road. I interpreted this to mean that people under the age of 50 have moved in up the road. But, now that I'm here, I'm pretty sure it's not your average household. All day long cars filled with Kevin Federline looking dudes in tanktops drive up the lane, stay for 10-15 minutes and then leave.

Tonight they are having a party and there must have been 30 cars, trucks and a couple campers filled with people going by. The Dodd's (the old OLD folks up the lane) must be thrilled. I'm sure the police will be by soon as it's getting close to midnight...

WAIT... Rooster.... gotta go must get a few hours in before that damned bird wakes up. (Maybe we're having chicken for dinner tomorrow so I can sleep in Monday.)

You gotta love technology

Nope, you won't get any scathing comments from tpGal about the Scooter Libby thing... do I think Bush is unhinged and wholly without a thought in his head other than what's good for him and his friends? YES. Will you hear me complain about it? NO! (what!?)

Rather than go into a tirade about Bush and his circle of friends I wanted to say how great things like Instant Messenger are. My dearest brother is doing time in Texas before he spends a year in Iraq (wow, sounds like prison) and he's able to have IM and Video Chats with his wife. That will help ease the time away.

When he was there the first time - you know in 1991 (grrrrr) all we had was letters... like snail mail. I'll send those too because frankly I'm a fun person to get mail from, but the IM situation is awesome! Thanks Mr. Gore for the Internet!