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I’m addicted to TV. I admit it. There have been times in my life when I’ve gone without TV for months and even years. But in the last several years, I’ve grown to use TV as my relaxing agent. I don’t drink (okay, the occasional glass of wine – I’ve had about 3 glasses in the last 17 months), I don’t do drugs (except lots of ibuprofen). I do TV. Right now I’m particularly fond of House, starring Hugh Laurie as a sarcastic genius of a doctor – diagnostics are his thing. I am vastly entertained by this role. I love the sense of humor, the dialog, the intellect. All of it. He cracks me up. He tortures his student doctors. Especially the young rich one. Love it!
The other main addiction is Prison Break, starring the beautiful Wentworth Miller and Dominic Purcell, both very delicious. More of that steely blue eyes/green eyes thing, and of course the dark hair and receding hairlines. WM is Michael Scofield, a very smart engineer (I’m partial to engineers, especially when they look like that) who has a master plan to break his brother Lincoln Burrows (Dominic) out of prison. First he has to get himself sent to prison, the same prison, where LB is sentenced to death in a few short weeks. Who can resist pretty boys, smart boys, and bad boys. What a combo.

The good thing for me is that the cool cat likes these shows too, because they have plenty of action, and of course the female constituent is well-represented with good specimens.

One more show I get a kick out of is Boston Legal. I don’t find any of the actors attractive, but James Spader is hilarious. And William Shatner plays a buffoon, which I also find quite funny, in a pathetic and ridiculous way. The role James Spader plays has a very sarcastic and off-the-wall wit, which I enjoy.

Disclaimer. From the paranoid. None of these photos are used with permission. I googled them and don’t remember where I found them. I might have kept the same name, but might not have. I don’t remember. I acted before I thought. I hope it’s okay. It’s all positive advertising, at any rate. Will try to stick to my own photos from here on out. Or take a little time to show where they came from. I don’t recall seeing any copyright info anywhere though. But I wasn’t really looking. Fox and ABC are probably the rightful owners. Sorry. Sorry. Sorry.

Theme: Body Parts
I don’t have time to be too creative. Before special effects, the background was actually a murky purple.

Foreground hand. Background screensaver with 4D ultrasound photo of my Boo.
This is much more true to life, however. The caption here is,

Mommy, stop taking stupid pictures of your body parts and pay attention to me!!

For Crying Out Loud.

The cool cat is having a ball with this one. We’ve seen previews for a new film starring none other than Ed Harris and Viggo Mortensen. Both men in the same film. Ed, also known as ‘your man’, ever since Enemy at the Gates, and Viggo, aka ‘Acorn’, because the cool one thinks it’s much more memorable, and funny, than ‘Aragorn’. Okay, what can I say. There’s something about steel blue eyes. Or deep green. And a receding hairline. And a uniform (regarding Ed, oh Ed). It’s a good thing the cool one wasn’t around in the days of the Last of the Mohicans, because there would be no end to the teasing about the oh-so-very-fine Daniel Day-Lewis. Sigh…… What woman wouldn’t want a man of men like Nathaniel Hawkeye to swoop in and protect. And just. be. such. a. man. Ummmmhmmm. I’ve drifted off… Where was I

The new film is called A History of Violence, and just by its title, we probably won’t be seeing it. The reviews aren’t half bad though. Maybe when Boo’s 18 or so. Or asleep.

If girls don’t dress dogs in pink tutus, who will

I was browsing through the Sunday paper and came across this quote. I thought it was cute. The ad took up nearly an entire page, and was a simple pink dot that said Save Girlhood. www.savegirlhood.com

It was a bit intriguing, so I took a peek. I haven’t browsed through much of the site, but it looks generally positive. It’s a refreshing concept.

The other day B2 stated, I’m thinking of cruising over to the city to watch a football game on the 25th. Anybody else feel like goin He lives ‘in the sticks’ hundreds of miles away. We live in said city. Or, at least, a suburb thereof.

I’m not much of a sports enthusiast. Okay, not at all. But the cool cat got right on it. We didn’t really talk about it. He just casually mentioned he wouldn’t mind going. Fine, I said, not thinking much of it at the time. I like when he has opportunities to mingle with my brothers. A coordination effort ensued. I still didn’t pay much attention. Will B6 be able to make it Don’t know. The cool one said he got three tickets. That’s nice, said I. B6 not being certain, he invited his sister. She apparently loves football. Maybe L would like to go too, mused the cool cat. Yep, L thinks it would be fun. Oh, now B6 decides he can make it after all. Suddenly short a ticket. Or two. How hard is it to get another ticket or two

A fragmented conversation unfolds and I learn that a single ticket runs in the neighborhood of THREE HUNDRED DOLLARS. Did I hear that right THREE HUNDRED DOLLARS. Holy guacamole, what in the heck I’m all ears now. And he already bought three tickets And wanted two more Funny, how this little matter of price sort of slipped past the radar. Oh, that Yeah. Well. Don’t worry, the cool one says. I found tickets on eBay for only $300 for all three, plus free parking. Woo hoo! Woo hoo, my @$$. It takes some effort to check prices via the normal means (like Ticketmaster), and then ultimately research, bid, and win on eBay. All this without a peep to me.

Not being a sports enthusiast, I had NO IDEA that pro football costs this much. I suppose it shouldn’t be a surprise. Those insane salaries they get have to come from somewhere. But golly-oh-molly, what is the cool cat thinking We don’t spend that kind of money on entertainment. I wouldn’t cough up $60 to sit in the nosebleed section behind the stage to see my soul brother in concert, and here this man I married is coordinating this sporting event like we’re the Van Gotrocks. It’s highly unlikely that he can find two more tickets seated next to the three he has, says I, assuming they’re legit, since they’re coming from parts unknown via eBay.

So we begin to gently bicker. I suggest that he stick with the three original tickets and take B2 and B6, since they are coming from opposite directions and hundreds of miles. It’s a big deal to them. He thinks I’m shafting his family and friends and giving mine preference, not seeing the logic that the Bs are taking time off from work, driving hundreds of miles, and his family and friends live here, and they’re only interested as an afterthought spawned from B2’s original request. Somehow I’ve become the bad guy.

Being the peacemaker that I am, I ask him to try and plan an event with his sister and friend at a later date, when maybe they can choose which opposing team they’d also like to see. So now I’ve basically authorized not one, but two pro games for the cool cat. He is SO shrewd. He played me well.

I’m looking forward to seeing my brothers. And oh yes. I will be thinking of how the cool cat can make it up to me.

Blackbird’s show and tell theme this week is chosen by Pea Soup – Favorite Piece of Art From Your Home.

How to choose ! I have so many artsy things in my home. Most are things that family members or I have done, some are copies of famous things, some are prints, but two are the real deal. Original oils by a fabulous artist named De Leva. Well, I think he’s fabulous. He’s still alive, so the paintings aren’t worth what, say, a Van Gogh or a Dali are worth, but one day, they just might be! So. Here we go.
This painting is enttitled, Dripping Will. It is oil on wood. Now, abstract is generally not my thing, but I absolutely love the way this artist handles color and depth. There are so many things going on in his paintings. This one reminds me of Winged Victory.
Here is a closeup of the ‘wing’.
And a closeup of the middle part. Now, this particular piece doesn’t showcase color quite so much as others in his portfolio, but there is something about the exquisite details. It’s a small painting, with quite alot of texture and detail.
Another closeup. See the spooky eyes peering out There are other organic things like bones and teeth lurking beneath the surface in various parts of the piece. All in all, very interesting.
This painting lives in a nook above the fireplace in my family room, along with a trio of bronze ballerinas, a bronze girl with lute, and a cast Rodin. (Excuse the poor lighting. The nook has a spotlight but my photography skills are sorely lacking and I’m too lazy to set up a tripod to get a good photo with no blur or flash glare.)

Someday…. …I’m going to build my dream house (after I design it and when I can afford it)… ….And this will be the magical view that I will savor… …Mountains drifting into the horizon… …a ribbon of blue water…
…a big sky, full of clouds…
…and Trees! Glorious Trees!

…Someday.

Body Parts – The Ear
I remember poring through the pages of the Great Western catalog’s jewelry section, dreaming of the perfect pair of earrings that I would buy, if only I could have my ears pierced. I was probably around 12 years old. There were hundreds of styles. So many choices. But there weren’t any clip-ons that I recall at all, and if there were, they were dowdy globs of colored pearls that somebody old and rickety like Great Aunt Edith would wear, but certainly not a fashionable young girl like me. Earrings were limited to those who had the good fortune to be counted among the pierced. How I yearned to have pierced ears. It was strictly forbidden. I’d plead with my mom. Why Why Why can I not have my ears pierced Everybody has pierced ears. Aside from the fact that I’d have to face my tyrannical father, my mother would give me her story about how disrespectful it would be to put holes in the perfectly good pair of ears that God me. I don’t know how many times I pleaded and begged.

In a moment of wild pre-teen rebellion, my sister and I took to the clandestine act of piercing our own ears. We smuggled ice and sewing needles up to our rooms and did the deed. I had planned ahead and purchased some dot earrings in a multi-pack from the local drugstore. They used to sell these cards of earrings with 10-12 pairs of colored dots for $2 or so. What a bargain, twelve pairs of earrings! I selected a card that had some tan colored dots, thinking that if they were skin colored, my parents wouldn’t notice. Furthermore, I carefully pinned my hair in front of my ears so that they’d be concealed. I got away with it for about a day, but somehow my dad noticed. How, I’ll never know, since he had so very little interest in me in the first place. He must have sensed my worry. I’m sure I was radiating guilt waves. He was furious. He sputtered like a volcano and shouted at me with fire in his eyes, but that was the sum of it, and it wasn’t that bad, all in all. I survived. No physical violence took place. My mother gave me the I’m disappointed in you comment, but that was about it. Not long after that, I figured the damage was already done, so I double pierced my ears. Nobody noticed.

As luck would have it, I turned out to be allergic to the metals used in most of the cute costume jewelry, and ended up with infections if I wore earrings longer than a day or so. I also found that I couldn’t wear posts, as the part of the earring in contact with my lobe would irritate and infect. They were uncomfortable anyway, because they would poke my neck. My dreams of accessorizing and making fashion statements with my impressive wardrobe of earrings fizzled away.

Some time later, when I was a bit more mature, in a moment of self contemplation, I realized that I have perfect earlobes. Or, rather, had perfect earlobes. Women can be so self-critical and find almost nothing to be pleased about when considering their physical selves. I will join the bandwagon and blame it on the media, with all those seemingly perfect examples of female-ness plastered on the covers of magazines. Forms that we aspire to be, but can never be.

I can find fault with almost any part of my physique, but my earlobes are nice. They would be even nicer if they hadn’t been defaced. If I cared to share the sentiment with my mother, she would revel in a victorious I told you so.

These days, I wear a simple set of earrings to fill the holes. They stay in for months, even years.

I was just coming back to my office from the kitchen when I spotted something gross and ugly from the corner of my eye. Upon closer inspection, I saw this pasty brownish slimy stuff smeared on the lid of my chest freezer. I’m not going to get into why I have a chest freezer in my living room. It’s a small freezer. It’s mostly inconspicuous. And it’s black. It actually takes me more than a few seconds of pondering, in grossed out wonder, what on earth happened to the lid of my freezer. And then it came to me. Peanut butter. It’s peanut butter, and I put it there. Moreover, I planned to remove it before the cool cat got home last night, because I was sure he would give me a hard time for doing such a ridiculous thing as that. Phew, I’m glad he didn’t notice it! However, I’m somewhat disturbed that it took me so long to find the memory lodged in my brain that I had done this thing. Honestly, I had no recollection at all.

Originally, there was a warning label on the freezer lid. I peeled it off, but most of it stayed in place. Oh crap, now he’s going to ask me why I had to mess with it in the first place. So I tried some Greased Lightning from a sample I got at a home show a few years ago. I used a cotton ball to apply it. All it did was add cotton fibers to the gum. I peeled off as much of the cotton fiber as I could. Next came the windex, because it has ammonia in it, and I thought ammonia was supposed to do a good job with sticky things like that. Nope. Same result as before. What about hot hot water. Melt that sucker. Nope, wouldn’t budge. Acetone At the risk of dulling the surface of my freezer, I went ahead with reckless abandon. No luck. Dish detergent Nope. But Dawn gets the grease out. It’s supposed to work wonders on things like this.

Last resort. The old wive’s tale (from my mother’s best friend). Peanut butter. I got out the JIF (choosy mothers choose it, you know). (Okay, it’s cheap because it comes from Costco.) Then I forgot about it. Until just a few minutes ago. And wouldn’t you know, that label gooey gummy crap came right off. Right off! I’m a believer now.

I’m ready for a show and tell, as evidenced by the multitude of photos. The subject My bathroom. Specifically, the hall bath, which has no bath. I guess it is therefore a powder room, but lazy Americans like me just call them all bathrooms.

Shall we begin

It’s a teeny tiny room, with oh, so much going on.

The room is dominated by my blue lady mosaic. I did the mosaic years ago. It’s a self portrait, with much artistic license taken.

I painted the entire room, ceiling included. I love the name of the color: Splendid Cornelius. It’s a sort of cornflower blue. Yes, I know, a light bulb needs replacing.

Incense and pottery. A must.

I replaced the original towel rack with a set of drapery holdback thingies and made custom hand towels by cutting a bath towel in two and binding with a lightly contrasting bias tape. Although the colors don’t show it in the photo, I was fortunate enough to find a towel in almost the exact shade as the wall. I like the swirly fixture theme, so the tissue holder got an upgrade as well.

The trash can is so very high class. It’s thick cobalt blue glass. Yes, glass. Although it doesn’t look like cobalt matches well with Splendid Cornelius, it actually does. My photography skills are lacking. And about glass trash cans– who has glass trash cans Me! Okay, there was this sale. At Costco. $7. What use could I possibly have for an enormous (ENORMOUS) glass vase None. But it’s only $7. Seven Dollars! Think, think, think. No! Wait! It’s just the right size for a bathroom trash can (photo doesn’t properly capture the scale). I bought 3. Thinking outside the can.

I strung some low voltage art lights to showcase a whimsical collage.

Sixteen works of art in miniature jeweled frames arranged in a square, but a bit askew. Is it laziness or artistic license The latter sounds better. I’m goin’ with it.

The subject matter Nebulae. Photos from the Hubble. I love these photos! To think there can be so much beauty in gas. And how oddly but artistically appropos for a bathroom. Ha!