Wednesday, October 3, 2012

What's on my TV?

I watch blissfully little television.  I try not to let my TV Rot my brain or dictate my life.  I can live without cable television.  I can live without ANY Television, but we live with my dad....who cannot live without his TV.  So I am blessed.

I watch religiously:
Sons of Anarchy
American Horror Story
The Walking Dead

That's really it.  I do also occasionally enjoy:
Grey's Anatomy
Breaking Bad

This past week i've enjoyed a few new shows:
The show before Grey's anatomy with the yummy Andre Braugher? Yes please.  I'd like some more. (I need to remember that comes on on Thursdays)
The ABC Sunday Lineup was *ok*

The fairy tale show was a VERY unique concept but i was VERY lost for the first half hour.  I understand you want to *HOOK* your viewing audience but MAYBE you could have started the series off at a point slightly before this revolution of sorts?? It was a massive turn off for me to be so confused and to be perfectly honest.....i spent my time working a puzzle while that show was on so I saw very little visual acting.

The show between that and 666 park (Which was WHY I was tuned into ABC on a Sunday to begin with) had some promise....it seemed interesting...but it reminded me of Burn Notice (which i do love...) I kept waiting to hear Good ole Michael Weston narrating things.

"When you place a listening device in the room of your supposedly dead aunt, you need to make sure that you conceal it completely if you want to get accurate information.  This goes doubly so if it has video capability.  Someone who knows what he is doing can build a fake book out of play doh, telephone wire, chewing gum and raw tuna and no one will be the wiser....until it starts to smell."

666 Park was a delightful departure from most boring TV crap these days.  People have been shouting 'BAZINGA!' for like 2 years or so and I just always thought to myself "You idiot" every time I heard them say it.  I watch so little television that I didn't even know it was a pop culture reference from The Big Bang Theory ... I have very little tolerance for TV Sitcoms anymore so it stands to reason I wouldn't watch that crap.  I've tried SO HARD to like that show and How I met Your Mother but man.....i promise....I just absolutely can't do it.  I hate them both.

I would rather get up and work out, or read a book, or spend time with my children, or write, or work a jigsaw puzzle, or play a game or...well...do just about anything other than watch TV.

Once in a while I'll sit and veg in front of netflix and when I do...i love Psych (Almost the only "sitcom" type show i'll watch), Burn Notice, NCIS, Law and Order ____ , Numbers, Criminal Minds, etc.

There is kind of a theme in things I watch...and it seems to be.....Crime.  Mystery. Drama.  All good stuff.

So uh...What's on YOUR TV?

Sunday, September 30, 2012

If silence is golden....that must be why we are broke...



I live in a household with my dad (65 year old workaholic who works from home a lot), my brother (33 year old guy who just hangs out here occasionally), Myself (36 year old chatty cathy nice-to-meet-ya), an almost 5 year old Diva Braniac and a 3 and a half year old engineer in training.

My dad talks a lot when it comes to his work.  When it comes to socialization, he would prefer you pass him by.  My brother HATES when i talk to him because he says I talk too much.

I talk A LOT. My children have learned to talk A LOT.  Especially my daughter.  She is brilliant and likes to share that with people verbally.  As often and loudly as possible.

She is super creative and super intelligent and has a fantastic sense of humor and a fantastic heart for people. she is compassionate and stylish and beautiful and wonderful.  She loves to socialize and I struggle with wanting her to be a social, confident young lady and with wanting her to exercise a lot more caution when it comes to meeting new people.

There are days I just want to tell her

Which i guess is a nice way to say:

QUIT TALKING.

She is a good girl and her brother is a good boy but they sometimes make my head hurt.

I wouldn't trade either of my children for anything though.

How do you get your kids to be quiet when all they want to do is be as loud as possible?

Monday, September 24, 2012

Beware the invisible monster....

I started blogging in 2002 on another site.  In doing so...I met people who are still some of my closest friends today.  One of them is my friend  Jo.  I met her in spring of 2003.  She is super funny and amazing and wonderful and oh.  I love her so much.  Last year she shared the existence of her bumbumgerms blog with many people but I guess I just didn't feel like I was someone she wanted reading that blog.

I have issues.  shut up.

We luff each other and are good pals.  She was around when I made the decision to have my weight loss surgery in 2004.  She is someone I want to be friends with until the end of time.

So last year I found out that Jo has OCD.  I don't mean the kind of OCD we joke about because someone wants things to be EXACTLY SO.  Jo is a germaphobe.  She doesn't WANT Things a certain way...she NEEDS them a certain way.

I didn't realize how severe her OCD is until I read her entire blog Poop on a Hot Tin Slide.   I stopped and sobbed and sobbed for her as I read some of her posts.  She posted about last Halloween about how her anxiety was in full force as she went to trick or treat with her kids at her husbands work.  How she had dressed them all cutesey and gets there and how she is freaking out and worrying how she is going to sanitize each piece of candy.  How she was upset about her kids decorating pumpkins and touching glitter glue and felt pens and such that OTHER CHILDREN HAD TOUCHED.  It made me so sad for her.  I know she doesn't want to be this way.  Lord knows I have my own quirks.  Jo knows that this stuff should not be this huge of a deal to her but it is! She can't help it.  I have known her since 2003 and I did not know until this past week that THIS was the secret life she was living.  That is 9 years ya'll. NINE.  Nigh on a decade.  We had babies together. We were pregnant together, we used to write long arduous e-letters to each other whilest we were preggers.

I consider us to be pretty close.  And I didn't know.  Granted it's not like I am at her house every day.  But think about that.  Absorb it. Allow it to marinate and then listen to me.

There are people in your life who suffer from invisible monsters that you can't see and may not be aware are there.  Be sure not to judge people based on what you perceive to be the truth because YOUR perceptions may not be accurate.

There are plenty of invisible monsters:
Narcolepsy, fibromyalgia, MS, Bipolar disorder, Borderline personality disorder, anxiety disorders, depression, CFS.... etc.

If you aren't part of the solution then you are part of the problem.  don't cause problems for people with invisible monsters.  If you know someone in your life has OCD and they become upset when you don't wash your hands then even if you are a filthy pig elsewhere then AT LEAST when you are in their home or they are in yours....act like you care about them and WASH YO DAMN HANDS!!!

My sweet friend Jo whom I love more than anything in a world....she has a sign on the back of her bathroom door that says "WASH YOUR HANDS"  She also has an industrial automated Purell dispenser attached TO HER FREAKIN WALL.  I always wash my hands after going potty. (and before eating or preparing food etc)  but I promise - if I showed up at Jo's house I would show up in my cleanest clothing, wearing brand new shoes & socks and upon entering her home I would ask to be shown to the bathroom wherein I would proceed to lather up and surgeon scrub my hands and arms while she looked on.  then i would slather on purell before we sat to talk.  Because she suffers enough.  Why the hell would i cause her extra anxiety?

Jojo I am sorry that you battle this and please know I love you so hard!! and PS I am positive many of my FB pictures creep you out LOL. Thank you for loving me anyway :) I love you !!

Friday, June 22, 2012

Languages of Love (Words of affirmation)

Share instances with your spouse when words had a profound impact on your life-- positively or negatively.

Words have frequently had a profound impact on my life in both positive and negative ways.  I have an incredible memory and remember many things that were said to me as a child. My parents said some of the most hurtful things ever to me, usually about my weight and it took it's toll.  I believed i was some out of control blob of fat my entire childhood. when i look at pictures of myself as a child, I see a very unhappy, very attractive girl. I ate to push that pain down, to keep from hurting anymore.

Once in a chinese food restaurant I used a spoon to get 1 more shrimp from my shrimp fried rice plate and my dad shouted from the other end of the table "GO AHEAD YOU LITTLE PIGGY. EAT IT ALL. IT'S WHY YOU ARE SO FAT NOW." then he proceeded to oink and snort LOUDLY like a pig.  Everyone in the restaurant turned to stare and I wanted to die.  I would have willingly died right then because I thought everyone in the restaurant was looking at me thinking "What a fat, ugly little girl"  I was 9 or 10 years old.  That's been almost thirty years ago (It was susmmer, I was wearing a blue and white outfit that my parents bought me in hawaii..it had flowers on it and it was a friday night. It was probably 85 or 86 so we can call it 27 years.  I still remember the look of hatred on his face. I remember the other restaurant goers staring at me and I remember going for ice cream afterwards and dad telling me "you can't have any. you need to wait in the car little piggy." over ONE piece of shrimp. ONE PIECE. a single shrimp. I sat in the car while my brother and sister and parents ate ice cream at Baskin & Robbins.  When we got back to the neighborhood my dad stopped the mini van at the entrance and told me to get out and walk home.

Any time I reach for seconds of any food, those words echo in my ears.

***
I am notorious for saving texts that people send me that mean the world to me. I save emails and notes and things like that.

Thursday, May 17, 2012

Feeding Picky Eaters. Brand new strategies

My 3 and 4 year old heathens have recently decided they would rather fill up on junk between/before/after meals rather than eat at meal times. So until further notice they can't have junk except on friday's after dinner.

Tonight was our first night of trying new meals.

I made Beef & Bean Burritos from The Pioneer Woman.

Survey says?

Mom:  I loved it.  They were really good but I wish i had thought to grab some avocado and some black olives for mine dangit!

Girl: "I like the meat and beans"  She ate the filling out of hers and the top portion of the tortilla. i'm happy.

Boy: "I don't yike it."  He's 3.  He only "Yike's" things that were born as sugar cane.  He did eat about 1/3 of his burrito which is significantly better than he's been doing.

I'd give this a 5/7 for sure.