Monday, November 26, 2007

it WILL be a Merry Christmas!!


Trent Lott of Mississippi, the No. 2 Republican in the Senate, announced Monday that he is resigning by the end of the year.

One stinky cheese ball coming up!

For MG here is my recipe for one lovely stinky cheese ball:

1 (8oz) pkg cream cheese (I used low fat)
8 oz bleu cheese, crumbled (I used cheap pre-crumbled version, this is no place to waste your hard-earned money on Maytag bleu)
1/4 cup butter
2/3 cup chopped olives (Here is where you waste your money - get the good ones - don't use the canned horrors)
1-3 T. chopped chives (we used lots)
Chopped pecans

Blend the cream cheese, bleu cheese, and butter together. Stir in olives and chives. Cover and chill for several hours for easier handling. Form into a ball, roll in chopped pecans and chill thoroughly.

This makes a large, softball size appetizer.

Lists of Passion and Hate - the Holiday Version!



Happy Holidays!! Or maybe not. While I do enjoy many elements of this festive time of year, there are still some things that just make me scream. Enjoy!

1. Cheesy carols played over, and over, and over, and over, and over. See "Little Saint Nick" in my hated songs list.
2. The pressure to buy useless things for people who don't need anything.
3. People who bring crappy cookies to cookie exchanges. You're supposed to put a little effort into it.
4. Global warming making one brown Christmas after another. Damn George Bush!!! He has stolen snow from Minnesota!
5. Women's magazines and their incessant push to make me feel inadequate. My house isn't perfect, and even at Xmas, nay ESPECIALLY at Xmas, we still have clutter, mail, game pieces, dirty socks, coffee cups, and school bags littering the place.
6. Families who insist that their kids keep believing in Santa - even when said kids are over 7 years old. Makes me want to just spoil it all for them.
7. When my own kids won't get into baking holiday cookies with me - they'd rather hang out with their adolescent friends. WTF????
8. Carolers who sing "Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer". I hate that song with the passion of a thousand white-hot suns. The only thing I hate more is the shouted "additions" created sometime in the 80's - you know them. "Had a very shiny nose - LIKE A LIGHT BULB". I'm a music snob. Can't they learn "I wonder as I wander?"
9. Christmas sweaters. Invented by my gender. I apologize on behalf of all women wearing chunky knits with snowmen on them. If they light up, I apologize ten-fold.
10. Celebrities warbling their version of Christmas songs - just stick to the notes will you? I don't need to hear the scat version of O Holy Night.

Saturday, November 24, 2007

Let the Christmas Season Commence



Another festive Thanksgiving come and gone. My family spent lots of time sitting around the dining table eating, chatting, and creating the lovely snowflakes pictured above. We have filled the kitchen with them - my oh my, aren't we a creative bunch. My blogging pal MG joined us on Friday and we put him right to work snipping. We also fed him lunch as payment for adding to our cheap holiday decor. He much admired our stinky-cheese ball created by my 13 year old. We LOVE our bleu cheese around here. And he sure appreciated the fabric dept at local store DIGS.


OK, NOW it's time for deck the halls and Hickory Farms Christmas cheese packages.

Sunday, November 18, 2007

Lists of Passion and Hate (for Kirelimel)






















Ten things other people do that make we want to slap them silly . . . . .

1. Gum smacking
2. Opening their cell phones to text during a movie. Just get up and LEAVE you clueless dink. I'm trying to enjoy a movie here!!
3. Bringing cranky or talkative babies to concerts. Yes, your baby is just the sun, the moon, and the stars isn't he? But my babies are up on stage performing and YOUR baby is an annoying distraction. Get a sitter.
4. Wearing noxious amounts of perfume
5. Parking a grocery cart right smack in the middle of the aisle while scanning the pickle selection. Yes I know it's tough intellectual work to choose between the spears and the slices, but could you just move yourself to one side or the other so I can get by?
6. Speaking of parking, people who can't grasp that the parallel parking space alloted for their car exists BETWEEN the white lines. The white lines are not a suggestion. You just throw the whole scheme off if you don't get this. Moron.
7. People who say "hopefully" at the beginning of sentences.
8. People who use leaf blowers - get a broom.
9. Thinking that being cold gives you a cold
10. Folks who use boxed cookie mixes - honestly, how lazy can you get??

I've become my mother


You're it - Michael G, Kirelimel, Melinda June, Ben Bob

Someone should be shot for this music

My blogging pal MG has tagged me, and challenged me to list 10 songs I never, ever want to hear again in my life. I can't list all the artists, I'm too middle-aged to remember them anyway.

1. We Built This City on Rock and Roll - I hate it too MG
2. Cherry Cherry, Neil Diamond
3. Sweet Caroline, Neil Diamond
4. Heartlight, Neil Diamond
5. America, Neil Diamond (I'm seeing an emerging pattern . . . . . )
6. Born in the USA, Bruce Springsteen
7. Jingle Bell Rock, by anyone!
8. Merry Christmas Baby, Beach Boys (the stores are playing Xmas songs already!! Have we lost all consideration of Thanksgiving?!)
9. Little Saint Nick, Beach Boys
10. Seasons in the Sun, what a crappy 70's memory

I'm gonna have a HISSY FIT!

How come everybody is reading and posting great comments at http://www.iammichaelg.blogspot.com/ but no one seems to be reading mine?!?!? Just because MG has a much funnier writing style, and way more interesting things to say is no reason to give him ALL the attention. Well, OK, maybe it is. I prefer him to me too. I'm insanely jealous. I'm going to invent some fascinating life events and characters so I can get lots of responses. I'm a pathetic attention-whore.

Thursday, November 15, 2007

Thank a teacher








I have been doing a lot of substitute teaching lately, and let me just say "Thank You All Public School Teachers!". From the outside it looks like a cushy job - summers off, pupils gone at 3pm, etc. But let me tell you this is one tough working arena.

I've spent some time lately at our Alternative Learning Center (which the students themselves like to call Assholes Last Chance). It's for the HS kids on the edge, and I mean ON THE EDGE. You have to put up with lots of vulgarity and over-the-top bravodo about sexual, alcoholic, and substance exploits. Being told "Suck it Bitch" is not out of the ordinary for these teachers. Neither is confiscating weapons and drugs. But someone dropped the ball on these kids, and I try to see the 5-yr-old still in there who didn't get what they needed.

This week has also seen me subbing at the High School and Middle School. After even one day at the ALC, these buildings seem like heaven. Like Kirelimel, I've been in the Special Education rooms a lot. These kids are great, and I seem to get along with them splendidly. Perhaps it was the five years I spent working with adults with special needs and mental illness. Or maybe it's just my penchant for the underdog.

These teachers show up each and every day and take on all these issues. They get about 15 minutes to eat lunch. They have to attend classes outside of school hours to keep their license. They have to function as social workers. They have to function as parents. They are surrounded by kids who smell like BO and cigarettes. They have to defend each and every dollar spent in their classroom. They often buy their own office supplies.

So to all teachers - THANK YOU.

Saturday, November 10, 2007

People are amazing

We are going through a bit of a crisis here, and a dear friend just brought over the most amazing, most generous gift. This woman and I communicate almost exclusively by email. Our schedules just never seem to allow a good face-to-face visit. I'm speechless with gratitude and amazement. Speechless.

Sunday, November 4, 2007

Teenage sleepover

It's my own fault. I said yes and now 4 teenage girls are here for a sleepover. There's no school tomorrow.

My siblings and I have an old phrase for their behavior - pepped up and stupid. It's like four preschoolers jacked up on frosting and overtired except they have giant adult-size bodies and voices. And they eat like a football team.

Or maybe I'm just a joyless, humorless, old crank. I just can't stand the silliness anymore - it's like a houseful of squirrels. We tried to play a board game together and as anyone in my family-of-origin can tell you I'm competitive with my games. I can't abide giggly girls who can't pay attention and laugh themselves silly if someone says "fart". I was the college roommate who lost her patience whenever someone spilled their Trivial Pursuit disc, or mispronounced Max Schmelling and fell into hysterical fits.

What I want right now is a crackling fire, a good book, and a cup of something hot. Instead I feel like Joan Crawford. DON'T MAKE ME GET THE CAR AERIAL!

I should have reproduced between 16 and 20 years of age. It might have been better for them.

I hate the mall, I hate the mall, I hate the mall

Took my 13-year-old clothes shopping at the Burnsville Mall today. I probably don't have to say anymore for anyone who's been in a similar situation. So many items just chapped my hide today . . . .

1. That blasted Burnsville Mall itself. I swear between my infrequent visits they rearrange the whole place. No hallway is straight. Stairs aren't where they should be. There is a horrid lack of escalators. It's exactly like that M.C. Escher drawing of stairs leading nowhere. Except with bright lights, thick perfumey odors, and the pushy sample lady at Japanese Express.

2. The evil stores catering to the 11-17 set. In about 50 sq feet of space they have placed 20 speakers all at high volume and playing asinine songs from oddly named bands. It's absolutely ear-splitting and an instant migraine inducer. Why in the world would they want the credit-card bearer to get out in a hurry?? And I'm naming names by the way. The worst offenders are Aeropostle, Old Navy, and American Eagle. I've heard from many that Abercrombie and Hollister are even worse with low lighting and continuous cologne spraying. I therefore refuse to even set foot in them. If my kids want clothes with those labels, they'll have to get a job, a car, and a credit card and just go themselves. I hope one of their CEO's reads my blog and immediately changes their tune. A letter of apology would be nice too.

By the way, I horrified my kids last Christmas season when I crawled up into the store front display at Abercrombie, pulled up the male mannequin's pants, and tightened his belt. It was my duty as an adult.

3. The clothing taste and shopping tactics of a 13-yr-old girl. I think I've been had today by my own offspring. She much prefers American Eagle clothing. I personally think it's overpriced garbage. So first we shop at Old Navy because I had the gall to bring the plastic bag we received in the mail worth 20% off anything we can stuff in. Then we shop some $25 jeans in another "affordable" store. "Affordable" meaning Mom can buy a few items and still make the mortgage this month. She performed a great imitation of trying on multiple items in every store but, amazingly, nothing fit. That is UNTIL we reached the Nirvana that is American Eagle. She found a really "cute" sweater for $50. $50!!! For a thin sweater the likes of which I could get her at Kmart for $9.95. So we agreed she would pay half. OK, my parental dignity is still intact when we left with a few items. And she was instructed to abstain from any clothing requests until the end of March.

4. The store clerks!! Every guy looked like Big Boy with those stupid haircuts that pull their bangs up into a point in the middle of their foreheads. I hope their parents take lots of pictures and drag them out at every chance for the next 40 years. Can any American teenager actually tuck in a shirt anymore? Can they at least straighten their collars? How much time and money do you suppose they spend to achieve the Goodwill look?

5. The dizzying leap into the Christmas Retail Season. The Hickory Farms booth was out for God's sake! With Holiday wrapped gift packages! I haven't put away the Halloween stuff yet. Whatever happened to Thanksgiving? I think it's become a Christmas appetizer at best. The sports stores were selling Timberwolves Santa Hats. Bath and Body Works had Holiday Spice and Mistletoe liquid hand soap! . . . . . Ok, I bought some of that.

I hate the mall.

Saturday, November 3, 2007

My next career move

I'm looking for more substantial work, and I think I've found it!!

Friday, November 2, 2007

Be grateful and have happy feet!

I just love this video. I'm going to do the gratitude dance everyday!