WINTER SUCKS!

Our groundhog didn't see his shadow this year and has predicted an early spring...what is he smoking...crack?

I'll tell you this, if Britney Spears lived in Milwaukee she would'nt have shaved her head!

This is the time of the year when you start hearing and reading about Seasonal Affective Disorder referred to as SAD with all sorts of advice on how to not get depressed this time of the year;
1. Get up early to maximize your daylite time.
2. If possible, sit near a window at work.
3. Try light therapy.......OR... in my personal opinion;
4. Move the hell out of here!!!! (some place...any place warmer than here...which according to the weather channel just happens to be Florida--but wait--don't they have hurricanes? Today, that sounds like a fair trade off!)

However, if you don't mind waiting a few years...like 93 years from now...according to a recent interview i heard from a climate instructer here at MATC...by the end of the century our climate will be just like Southern Illinois-Northern Kentucky...which means much less snow and cold BUT a whole lot more tornadoes...of course, i'll be long gone by then...something to think about while i shovel the snow this afternoon.

They're Stealing OUR songs...again!

So i'm trapped in the car during rush hour when i start channel surfing (oh right, like you don't do it too)...when all of sudden i hear The Fray--one of the bands we play--on the Christian channel! And i'm p*ssed...they did it again!...stole one of our songs! It seems like everytime i turn on their channel they're playing one of our tunes...like Natasha Bedingfield or Los Lonely Boys!

News flash...Just because Los Lonely Boys are singing about heaven doesn't mean they're singing about your heaven...and how the heck did you even justify stealing The Fray's How to save a life?!

Hey Christians, STOP stealing our songs!!!

I'm willing to make a deal with you...i'll give you back your Amy Grant AND Michael W. Smith IF you promise never to touch our Mr. Misters Kyrie AGAIN...

The Dog says "no."

It was sooooo cold the other night that the strangest thing
happened...i asked my dog Max if he wanted to go outside
and he said "no."
Which i thought was strange since i didn't know dogs could
talk.

I finally broke down and bought boots for Max, i mean i
don't own a pair of gloves that match, but the dog now has
doggie boots...not that he wants to wear them. He put up
a big fuss skirming and yipping but he'll get use to them. He
did the same thing when i bought him a winter coat last year...yeah, a winter coat...oh never
mind.

Not pregnant at the "Happiest Place on Earth"

I see Christina Aguilera is denying reports that she is pregnant again. This time she pointed out that she couldn't be pregnant because she spent this past Valentine's Day at California's Disneyland "screaming with delight" as she enjoyed the Matterhorn...a ride not recommended for expectant moms.

Which really sucks! Because i'm NOT an expectant mom...and when i took three of my kids to Disneyland last Thanksgiving the ride was CLOSED! In fact, lots of rides were closed for repair or not operating at this time. We found that so many of these rides were not open that day, that i finally gave up and took pictures of my kids standing in front of the barricaded rides...this picture is my kids in front of the "closed for repair" Matterhorn--i got a whole photo album of these...wanna see it?

blahblah...hey, girl scout cookies have no transfats!...blah blah

That's right, thats what i said! The girl scouts have very kindly removed ALL the transfats from their cookies...no more worrying about bad fats while i eat something like the 40 dollars worth of thin mints i bought last weekend...although i smoke so transfats are going to be the least of my problems in 20 years...

But i'm sure i'll have it coming...it's my fault for engaging in such high risks behaviors like smoking, eating girl scout cookies or filling up my gas tank on Capitol and Sherman...

And as long as i'm on it...i admit that i'm part of the Britney problem on the tube and in print...i can't seem to stop myself from checking out the latest stupid mess this bald headed millionaire seems to indulge in...maybe it's because it's always nice to see someone who has 100 million dollars so messed up...as in "i'm broke but at least i'm not as stupid as Britney!" Let's see Britney answer the phone and come up with a new inventive excuse for not paying her cable bill this month instead of the boring "i'm broke" same old same old...bet she can't cuz she's stupid!

It just depresses me that someone as untalented, "can't sing, can dance a little" as Britney has 100 MILLION DOLLARS!!! WHAT THE HECK! What kind of cosmic lottery did she win while someone like you and me...nice attitude, sound morals, underwear wearing person struggles...you know what kind of problems i would have if i had that kind of money...who to call for delivery..."should i call Dominos or Pizza Hut...hey, wait a minute, i'm rich...i'm calling Rosatti's!

I suspect a major part of Britneys problem is....(drumroll)...herself...and i don't mean bipolar or too much to drink...her real problem...she's narcasistic...check it out...she has 100 million and two beautiful healthy young sons yet she is jetting all over the world with guys she barely knows paying 40 thousand a night at some hotel...when she's not shaving her head...i mean i have bad hair days too but that is what bleach and Cost Cutters is for...i have a girlfriend who has tried for the last decade to have children and all she has to show for it is a weird sort of rare cancer she got from the fertility treatments...yet she's shown nothing but grace and peace...plus she's a damn fine cook, but no one knows about her...and then there's the brave teenagers who stayed by the side of a dying man they didn't know at Citgo on the corner of Capitol and Sherman...how many teenagers or adults would do that?! Damn few...but then again, they're no Britney...thank God.

Sharing a recipe from my grandma

Well, it happened again. This time i was at Walgreens picking up a perscription when i happen to see some Christmas cards i liked...and as i was looking through the boxes it occurred to me that i didn't have to buy my grandma a Christmas card this year (since she passed away around Thanksgiving) when all of a sudden a tidal wave of tears flowed up my throat, through my nose and out through my eyes...and i COULDN'T STOP! Would you believe, i had to leave the store...i muttered "allergies" to one of the clerks who asked me if i was ok as i made my escape. Up to this point, i thought i had done pretty good...but, you know, with grief, you never know when it's going to happen...one minute i'm laughing along at something as normal as the next person and then something, a song, a chance comment like "sorry about your grandma" and the next minute it's waterworks...and i'm just going to have to accept that it's going to hurt and soldier on...

I was at Southridge Mall yesterday when i saw a tee shirt kiosk and a woman making personalized tee shirts for somebody...i asked "if i brought a picture of my grandma, could they make that into a tee shirt?" and she said "they do it all the time." So, now i know what i'm going to do this week...i'm going to make a tee shirt with my grandma's picture on it...and i'm going to wear it on my grandma's 99th birthday...what the heck, i'm going to celebrate my grandma's birthday after all! And you know, i'm pretty sure she would approve of that...although, what to put on my shirt along with her picture i'm still wrestling with...at first i thought of putting "Rest in Peace" on it along with her name, but my husband thought that was way too morbid...then i thought her name with birthdate and death date and my kids said that i was depressing them...so now i'm thinking of trying a little humor...something like "my grandma died and all i got was this tee shirt!"

My grandma was a terrific cook...it's very unfortunate that i didn't inherit that gene from her...although, the last 30 years of her life she ate cabbage every day (since she thought that would help her live to one hundred)...and i'll tell you...i had to bust my butt to find a recipe of hers that didn't include cabbage in it...but i think my grandma--who loved to cook for people and enjoyed sharing recipes--would love it if i kept her memory alive with one of her recipes...in fact, this one was featured in her church recipe book in April, 1987...and if you have a grandma coming this holiday season, feel free to use it, and just tell it you got it from your friends grandma...i know my grandma would love that.

Pork Chop Noodle Dinner............ Reba Davison

4 pork chops.........................2 C. cooked noodles

1 tsp. salt.........................1 can cream of chicken soup

1 tsp. prepared mustard...... 1 C. water

1 tsp. chopped onion

Brown chops on 1 side; turn and season. Brown side with salt and mustard. Place noodles in buttered casserole. Place pork chops on noodles, brown-side down. Pour soup, water and onion into skillet; stir and heat until blended. Pour over chops. Cover and bake 1/2 hour at 350 degrees, then uncover and bake 1/2 hour til brown.

Cucumber-Pineapple Salad ........Reba Davison

1 pkg. lime jello............. 1 C. Dream Whip

1 C. crushed pineapple.. 1 C. mayonnaise

1 C. cubed cucumber

Add 1 cup boiling water to jello; stir until dissolved (2 minutes). Add 3/4 cup pineapple juice and cold water. Chill until jelly stage. Add pineapple, cucumber, Dream Whip and mayonnaise. Let set.

When it's 9 pm here...it's 6 am in Fallujah...

My husbands son, my stepson Mark, (he's the one in the middle of our Christmas photo) is now in Iraq. It sounds so ominous...for the last year or so we had the knowledge that he was going hanging over our heads like a sword...and now, it's here.

Last week, my stepson told his dad that once they got to Kuwait...they would be flown in a helicopter where it would be "so high" but not too high, as the terrorist's had rockets they could use to shoot them down, and not "too low" as the terrorist had shoulder rockets that could also, shoot them down.

My husband takes comfort in that this is something his son has always wanted to do...to join the Marines and serve his country. He also takes comfort in a fathers day card his son gave him two years ago...right before he joined the Marines:

"Well dad, i've been yours for the last 19 years now and it's coming to that time in our lives that soon i won't be around at all, who knows where i'll be next year, if i'm even gonna be in this country. You are the best dad in the world, i wouldn't trade you for any other. I mean that, i love you more then anything in this world. Keep safe dad , and no matter what ever happens to me in the future KEEP THE FAITH! Everything and every choice i make, i try to make so you'll be proud of me. That's the most important thing to me is that you are proud of me even when some choices i make, i know you wouldn't be, i look down on those choices.

I don't know what's gonna happen to me while i'm serving the country. Tell you the truth, fear of the unknown scares me to death...one thing that i do know is death. If and when i die i know i'm going to heaven. I know my sins are forgiven, i will never forget what you taught me about our creater, and savior. Thank you dad, you will live forever because of what you have done for me. The people i change for the good will (be) because of you, even if they don't know it yet. I also know that light that is inside of me, the fire that burns within (is) the fire you made.

Thank you dad,

your son,

Mark

Fallujah is northeast of Bagdad and nine hours ahead of Milwaukee, so when we go to bed at night we say a prayer for Mark as he is just waking up...and when we wake up, we say another prayer for Mark because we know he is out there, somewhere, serving his country. It is all we can do for him now.

Helping my daughter with her homework...

I suck at my kid's homework! Since i went to school (which was about one hundred years ago, back when the dinosauers ruled) math and just about everything else seems to have gotten harder and i was pretty much obsolete as far as my kids homework was concerned right around the time they hit first grade!

That's why i was so excited when my daughter told me she had to do a paper on Earth Day. How cool is that?! If there was one thing i majored in, it was writing about ten pages of bullsh#t on just about anything...as long as it didn't include math! So when my daughter showed me "her" paper, i set about correcting and adding on to it as best i could...here's what she wrote:

Dear Earth, happy birthday! I can't believe your 210 million years old already. It was just yesterday that you were in the Jurassic period of your life. I remember that your super continent, pangea, was already starting to drift apart. I also remember the first land plants that you grew...the life that your plants gave was amazing! You had animals such as plated stegasaurs, brachiosaurs and many more animals. You also had the first birds like the pterosaurs and even the early mammals. I hope you have a wonderful birthday, Love, Sara.

Now here's what i wrote:

Dear Earth, happy birthday! I can't believe your 210 million years old already when you don't look a day over 29...ok, ok, just kidding, those lines on your face, barely noticable. Probably during your jurassic period. That was because your super continent, Pangea was already starting to drift apart, probably because of too much sun. I told you to use more sunscreen! I love your first land plants! The ginkgoes i buy in a bottle...they were on sale at Walgreens last week, pretty cheap. My little dog Max would have a ball barking at your ptersaurs. That is, if they didn't eat him first. Have fun on your birthday, but don't party too hard...remember your last hangover the ice age...that really sucked! Love, Cindy

My daughter no longer asks me for help with her homework.

My husbands bosses daughters wedding and other trainwrecks

This is a picture of me camping in 1975...i did not want to camp, i don't like to canoe, i hate cold, and i hate rain...but i went camping with my church youth group up near Canada because somebody told me they had pop machines on the islands and i believed them.
They were just kidding.

The big story JUST IN TIME FOR VALENTINES DAY:

ASTRONAUT LOVE GONE BAD!

Maybe i'm getting old but it sounds like it would make a great line in a Steve Miller song...personally, as someone who never completed college it's kinda cool that someone who mastered in aeronautical engineering sucks at love...AND wears a diaper...suddenly, my life doesn't seem all that bad...although i'm capable of my own screw ups the latest being my "husbands bosses daughters wedding"...

Personal jock note;
You know, you can't be a disc jockey for over 24 years without some hearing damage...it's all those headbanging 80's tunes that i cranked up in my headphones!
(darn you Cyndi Lauper!!)

So my husband and i are in Florida for the weekend and we're seated next to this wonderful couple, the wife--i swear to God said--"i hate McMansions." Let me explain, in Naples Florida, the rich are tearing down these cute Floridian bungalows and building cookie cutter mini-mansions in their place, hence the name "McMansions"...i also HASTEN TO ADD that there is NOTHING WRONG WITH THAT...except, i think it looks like crap but what do i know...i think 72 Volkswagon bugs look cute!

So here we are seated next to this very nice couple and i swear to GOD she says that she hates McMansions which is awesome because so do i and now we have something to talk about and talk i do...i go on and on about how crappy they look and what sort of people need to tear down perfectly nice cute bungalows to build crappy "hey look at me McMansions" except people who need to show the world they have money...it wasn't too long when they excused themselves that my husband turned to me and said something to the effect of "you idiot"...she didn't say "they hate McMansions", she said "she BUILT a McMansion!"