super clean saturday

Yea!! I did it and all by myself too! I removed one of the shelves on the left, which let me hang the coats there and still have room underneath for our shoe box. notice I left hubby’s boots on TOP of the shoe box knowing that he will never put them in and out everyday buy hey, at least they are close to where they are supposed to be and out of sight. I have easy access to my toolbox and ahhemmm my roller blades should I ever convince myself they will do more good than damage should I dust them off and head to the roller rink.




on the top half of the closet we have a game section, a shelf where I can actually lay out my pool cues flat to prevent warping, a box containing various dog grooming items that I probably won’t use, but you just never know. oh, and there is a pump to pump up my airless mattress that went to mattress heaven. it had a little hole in it and so industrious me decided to patch it with the kit that CAME WITH IT. Well I patched it and it looked good so I aired it up. Then POOF! A big ass whole on the other side of where I patched it appeared. Seems like their glue works really good at soaking down through both sides! I digress, so the Wally-world bag is filled with winter necessities such as gloves, toboggans, and scarves. I need something prettier to store that crap in, but I have no idea what to use. What do y’all Yankees do with all that junk?

you should see the pile of crap hubby has to haul off to the dump! hey are you supposed to recycle vcr tapes? My stupid chamber of commerce can’t even tell me what to do with my LCD computer monitor that died! I feel bad about just hauling this stuff to the dump, but I am totally not letting it sit around here after all that work I spent cleaning the house up!

friday freaking gross fragments...i warned ya!

Brought to you by none other than Mrs. 4444

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probably gonna be pretty short cuz i'm hungry and we are headed out to The Eagles's Club for some cheap hot wings. woohoo. yeah we're exciting :)

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first off, who the heck and why the heck would somebody design a drain for a bathtub like this:

i think i must have been a man. who else wouldn't care to stand in ankle deep dirty water while taking a shower than a man. i mean come on. you have pretty much guaranteed that every flipping hair that goes down this drain will get caught and eventually clog the flow of water. leaving some poor woman to spend way too much time on her knees with a coathanger scooping out this disgusting mess:




and no, that's not hubby's toothbrush (but it should be) i put it there so you could have a reference of just how freaking much hair that is!!

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after asking why my allergy shots have started hurting and itching again, which they haven't done for months now, i was informed that i had been moved up to "the red tops" which means......drum rolllll....that by August i will only have to be going to cookeville every other week!!! woohooo.

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don't know why, but i have all of a sudden been "found" by tons of people from high school on face book. it's pretty neat to reconnect with them, but i find it funny that some of the people who treated me like total shit, are now "oh, i'm so glad i found you". yeah, right. either they are full of shit, have "found God", or going through a 12 step program and are starting their ammends. lol

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i am really truly starting to turn into a REAL housewife. i don't know how this happened except maybe out of guilt from not working. i have made a sock-it-to-me cake last week, snickerdoodles and chocolate oatmeal cookies this week, and i think i even managed to cook a couple of meals allll while still continuing my cleaning saga.

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that's all i can think of for now. see ya next time. same bat time. same bat channel

thmore cleaning stuff tidying up, thursday

so, my brain wasn't working with coming up with a good alliteration, but what ev. so first off i wanted to prove that i am maintaining my clean living room. i even dusted again last night. so here is proof of that. now, you might have noticed that i didn't include my desk in this pic. while i am keeping the clutter off of the desk, i was just given a stack of books from my aunt to read, and they are stacked there for lack of a better place. i have also done a major cleaning on the spare bedroom and did a major dusting in our bedroom. they will be given their own blogs once i get to actually rearrange them and make them look nicer.





now, my current project is my coat closet. some idiot forgot to take the before pic because i was all hyped up about starting this project and just totally spaced. i did however take a "just after starting" pic which might even be scarrier. all of the stuff in bags, boxes, or piled on the floor and chairs came out of the bottom of the closet. jackets and such actually were hung on the bottom rack, but that is annoying as all get out, cuz you can't see the floor. in my house, if i can't see it, it ain't gonna get clean. let's be honest, even if i can see it, it will be lucky to get cleaned. so here is the simi-kinda before pic. the big black bag is stuff that i have decided to donate or trash so far. to be honest i dont know if anybody would want some of the stuff, but i'm goin the donate route first. the boxes and grocery sacks are easy. these are all books that i, my mom, and my aunt have read so they will be going to the library. hmmmm seems like i said that when i took them outta the living room and shoved them in the closet. ok, i am gonna go put them in the van right now. oh, i might as well take a smoke break while i'm out there. be right back...

....ok, i'm back. now where was i? oh, yeah so that is/was the disaster in/on the bottom of my coat closet. here is the disaster that is the rest of my closet cobwebs and all:

as you can see, i have an abundance of old vcr tapes that i picked up from an auction, yard sale, or family member. don't ask me why. i just did. i had no use for them until recently, when i hooked up my old vcr in my bedroom - no, dirty minds, it's for the g-kid to watch movies on instead of the dvd player in the living room or my computer. the problem is, at the moment, the only vcr tape i have is the lion king. i am hoping as i go through all of those old vcrs that i will find kid friendly ones that i will store some freaking where but don't have that planned out yet. there are some old 8mm films from my dad and from hubby's family that i am hoping to be able to transfer to dvd myself (yeah right!). i do plan on goin' through the rest of the stuff to either donate or trash as much as possible.

my main goal for this closet is to make it be a coat closet of course, but in a way that they don't completely cover up the floor, so we can store our spare shoes (read: hubby's nasty work boots that i don't want anywhere else). of course my tool box needs to be stored there for home repairs and YES it is MY toolbox with MY tools in it. that was all i asked for as far as presents one year. i know. i should be a dude, but i don't like girls that much although seashore and i were just discussing how hot and sexy cote de Pablo who plays Ziva on NCIS is:

mmmmmmmmm.......oops got a little sidetracked there. ok. i'm better now.

so my faithful readers (over 26! now-which is wierd cuz i think i gained a few while i was being lazy and not really posting alot. maybe i should take the hint) my question to y'all is this...do you have any suggestions on how i should re-do the shelves, etc.. so that i can hang coats up higher (not too high i'm only 5' and i gotta be able to reach them) i need to have a specific place for board games, and possibly storage for 8mm, vcr tape, and dvds. i reallly hate my ugly dvd rack in the living room anywayS. the closet is 3'x3'x8' which is really wasted space up top cuz i'll never be able to reach that shit unless somebody can come up with some kinda cool built in step or two that i could set like shoes on and then just move outta the way when i need to reach the top shelves. i'm open to any and all suggestions as long as they don't cost a lot of money, well any money. i have tons of access to scrap metal/wood out in hubby's shop (sshhhh)

thankful thursday

i knew somebody had told me they had given me an award. i was pretty sure it was tiff over at making room for serendipity , but as y'all already know or are starting to figure out my memory chip is full/broken/has a bug/ or is just plain gone! so after much brain prodding and blog surfing i finally verified that yes indeedy it was my fellow "hubby: whatch doin'?" owner. so many, many thanks to tiff for bestowing this award to me, and while i have already received this one before, i plan on posting it again cuz i'm like that :)

“These blogs are exceedingly charming. These kind bloggers aim to find and be friends. They are not interested in prizes or self-aggrandizement. Our hope is that when the ribbons of these prizes are cut, even more friendships are propagated. Please give more attention to these writers! Deliver this award to eight bloggers who must choose eight more and include this cleverly-written text into the body of their award.”

yeah, and i'm gonna be a rebel and not pass this one on to eight people cuz that just seems like too much work for me today. if ya want it, steal it! lol

weary wednesday

i've just been too busy cleaning, babysitting, reading blogs, and just too worn out from above activities, to do much of anything. please check out my new "photoblog" over at:

http://nonnasnonsense.wordpress.com/

and also my s.daughter's that she is just beginning over at:

http://canigetanaddress.blogspot.com/

oh, and like running two blogs isn't enough, i'm contributing (don't really know what exactly that entails) to this blog:

http://girlswithbooks.blogspot.com/

sorry, that's all i have the energy for today...maybe i will be playing around with some pics on my photoblog later after the house calms down.

-peace out hommies, as the g-kid says

moving...kinda..but not really, yet, monday-UPDATED

i'm trying out wordpress, but first just as a photoblog just to see if i like it and can manage to understand all the bells and whistles over there.

yeah, real original name, but hey, less confusion for me is better :)

http://nonnasnonsense.wordpress.com/

and while i am pushing other blogs... the s.daughter aka Jamie has started her own!! she was having trouble finding a name for her blog so her address ended up being

http://canigetanaddress.blogspot.com/

which i find compeletly hysterical! so go check her out and give her some followers to boost her self esteem up a little. why someone who is like almost 6' and weighs less than my thigh could ever have low self-esteem is beyond me...but to each her own ...we all have issues.

so go check out these sites and tell us what you think. um, oh yeah, please.

school time, saturday and sunday

well, i was bored and my hubby was working out at the shop so i asked him to teach me how to weld. he took some cell phone pics of me "at work" but you can't really see my work yet. and you won't. not until i can actually make it look good :) so here are some action shots:

it was reallly cold out in the shop so i have like layers upon layers upon layers. (read: i'm not quite that fluffy) so as soon as i have even come close to mastering some techniques, such as not burning holes through the metal i'm supposed to be joining, leaving a bunch of spatter, and learning what spatter is. i will be posting some more pics of my artwork....errr attempts at art work.

this is it for tonight. i'm wore out from puppy sitting and jamie, james, & their puppy spending some time with us. hopefully more prolific tomorrow.

funny, friday....ooops forgot this one :)

SOMEBODY (read:girl in the glasses) decided last week to do a "funny friday" thing so i saved this for friday, then promptly forgot all about it. i would be linking you to HER funny friday, but it seems SHE forgot it too :)

i admit it. i stole it from an email, but it's too funny to pass up :)



While on vacation a married couple walked into a shoe store. The Salesman said to them, I have some very special Jamaican sandals I think you would be interested in.. Dey make you wild at sex.

Well, the wife was really interested in buying the sandals after what the man claimed, but her husband felt he really didn't need them, being the sex god he was. The husband asked the man, 'How could sandals make you into a sex freak?'

The Jamaican replied, 'Just try dem on, Mon.' So, the husband, after some badgering from his wife, finally gave in, and tried them on. As soon as he slipped them onto his feet, he got this wild look in his eyes, something his wife hadn't seen in many years!

In the blink of an eye, the husband grabbed the Jamaican, bent him violently over a table, yanked down his pants, ripped down his own pants, and grabbed a firm hold of the Jamaican's hips. The Jamaican then began screaming, 'You got dem on the wrong feet! You got dem on the wrong feet!'

freakin' friday already??

sponsored by Mrs. 4444:

oh, Mrs.4444 is giving away a bunch of things in honor of her 444th post. she also has some great advice on parenting that she is giving away for FREE here, here, here, and here oh, and here too!!

ok, i have decided i don't like having a life. it seems like i've been running around like crazy since...i don't know. at least several days ago. hell, maybe even a week. what happened to my sitting and reading and blogging all day??



i haven't even looked at google reader today, because i don't want to know how many i haven't read yet.



i haven't even had time to prepare fragments, but maybe this will turn into a fragment post, seeing as how my brain is just all over the place.



i APPLIED for a JOB with the census bureau . don't ask me why, except that you can basically work whenever you want from what i understand, and that's about the only job i can swing now-a-days. pass the word on to anybody looking. it only lasts for 5-10 weeks or so, possibly longer, if you get a "clerk" type position, but the pay is pretty freakin' good!



i am baby sitting my lil sis's chiauhuas or however you spell that. i spent a couple hours this morning yelling "shut up" & "hush" trying to get them to quit whining for me. it didn't work. i think they speak spanish cuz they didn't listen to a word i said.



i had to race through my "any moron could pass test" for the census because i had to get to cookeville for my weekly allergy shots before they closed. i missed TWO questions. puuhlease! now, i'm gonna have to go back next friday, because i'm anal like that and i know i can get a 100% and that's just gonna tick me off if i don't.



OH! i asked my granny if i could borrow her scooter for the car shows that are gonna be starting up soon, so i don't have to cut hubby's fun short. she has now informed my mom that she doesn't want me to use it. CAN YOU BELIEVE THAT??? she has never even sat her butt in the thing, can't find the battery and charger, but she doesn't want me, her favorite granddaughter to use it. It has got to be her dementia, or she is totally going on my shit list!



ok, so friday fragments looks like it's turning into friday freakouts...so i better shut up. hopefully i will be reading and commenting all day tomorrow and sunday.

wrong turn, wednesday

sis pointed out that i left out the best part of my story sunday night. everybody was settled down for the night, and i tried to get comfy on my makeshift bed. it was working BUT it had started to SNOWWWW. of course it's the middle of the night, nobody to play with, and damned cold! well, i guess i was feeling artsy so me, my camera, and my smokes headed out into the cold.

at first, i just went around the house taking pics of the halfway frozen LAKE-don't call it a pond around my mom-at least not to her face :) and the garden ornaments but then i got bored with that. the chocolate lab was following me around and i tried to get some shots of him, but with no light source other than my flash, every time i snapped a pic he was nowhere to be found.

i did manage to get these two shots before i gave up and went for reinforcements. it's so cool how his eyes can be one color in one shot and then a completely different color in the next shot!



i decided to go back inside and get a flashlight and my ipod. i knew tom would have one of those gazillion candlewatt flashlights because we have all bought him several over the years. voila! it was sitting right by the door, i clicked it on, and it worked. so off i go again. after I decided to take the newer path that leads to a little stream, i realized that i am not in proper foot atttire. yes, i am wearing my slipper/all occation shoes.

i headed out down this new, easy, path (in my head anywayS) that tom had shown us earlier. it led to a little stream and was pretty much a straight shot there and back.

i thought.

i got some great shots of some cool looking trees:

i guess while looking up and snapping away at trees and such is where i made my mistake, and that's where the story takes a wrong turn. the gazillion watt flashlight faded out to, ummm, mabye 2 watts and my brilliant plan of clearing the leaves away in several places so i could find my way back, backfired.

it's kinda hard to see where you're makers are when you can't even see the ground in the first place. i switched bewtween using the screen on my ipod and taking pics and then looking at the pics to see if i recognized and thing. nope. no good. well i knew i had to walk uphill, so i did, but i kept running into things like this:

which required so much back tracking i was getting pretty confused. so after meandering around awhile i eventually came out in an overgrown field which, while on our property, is totally not where i thought i would be returning to :)

the next morning before i had to leave i got to take these wonderful pics. of course, I didn't get to play in it because i had to leave before the roads got worse.


(L pic) this is moon (the ex-communicato bro's cat)

(R pic) broom at the ready to sweep off cars-thanks!

this is what it looked like when i got back home. notice the lack of snow on my side of the road and all the snow the on the in-laws' side of the road. they totally hogged all the snow! sheesh! a woman just can't get a break around here!!

what i've been up to, wednesday

well, saturday i bailed out on lil sis for a trip to my mom's because i found out there was a benefit tournament going on in chattanooga that day. the first event started at noon (hour ahead of my time) so i knew i wouldn't drag my aching butt outta bed make it down there by then. i was shooting for the 3pm singles crickets match, which just happens to be my favorite game. well, around noon, it still wasn't looking to good for me to be up and moving so i bailed on that venture as well.

hubby had been flip/flopping back and forth about driving to nashville for a car show/swap meet. he is still trying to find a front "real" chrome bumper for the '54 pickup that he has almost finished but, doesn't want to order online and pay too much for oversize shipping charges. i really didn't feel like going, but i also knew my poor hubby wanted company, so we went.

not, to bore y'all to tears with my on-going aches and pains, but to make a long 20+ year history of pains short, i have fibromyalgia, complicated by scoliosis (among many other things). well, when the muscles around the scoliosis get inflamed, they pinch a nerve behing my shoulder blade. this causes extreme discomfort, lack of sleep which causes MAJOR GROUCHINESS, and just a generalized feeling of shit. i sucked the pain pills it up and decided to go to nashville with hubby. it was a waste of time. no good finds but, they will be back in 2 weeks as a pure swap meet, so hopefully better finds to be found. (huh?)

sunday, i was supposed to be going up to dial-up hell since i didn't go on saturday. the day did not start off well for me. unbeknownst to lil sis i had planned on sleeping as late as i wanted to so i could recharge. since she had no idea this was going on, she called to see if i had left yet and to remind me to bring some stuff to mom. i preceded to call her back and chew her out which caused her to hang up on me.

FYI - major pet peeves of mine:

1)don't take without asking (i will literally give you the shirt off my back, just ask)
2)don't hang up on me, for any reason, period.
3) don't lie to me OR call me a liar

i'm sure i have others but, those are the major ones that stick out.

so, i called back, got the answering machine, told the machine some very mean things until mom decided to intervene-thank you, mom :) i tried to explain to mom what i wanted her to tell sis, cuz i knew i would not be able to express it properly, and then proceeded to just totally breakdown and bawl. like. a. baby. now, i don't even want to go up there, cuz i feel like a total idiot blowing up over something so stupid. luckily, while i taking a smoke/coffee break sis called while i was outside. i called her back and she wanted to know if i was ok. i said, yes and apologized for yelling at her and told her i was glad she called and i would be up in a little while.

i got up there and everything was cool. mom, tom, me, & sis went diggin through a storage shed looking for our old kid books and mom's recipe "bible" that had all her recipes that she had saved over the years. no luck on the recipe book but, i did manage to salvage some books the g-kid will like, if i can clean them up enough. (they had some water/mold damage)

so, after scrounging through the shed, sis & i decided to help twinfaye (aunt) put her christmas stuff in her shed and pull some chairs out for her. we worked up an appetite and headed back down to mom's for some homemade (as in not stouffer's frozen variety- like i make) lasagna and garlic bread. yummmmy

then sis & i challenged the terrific twins to a game of pictionary. mom made the mistake of smack-talking before we started game. oh yeah!! me & sis demolished them! maybe next time we play i will try to rig up some video clips of the game. it is crazy how good we are at that game!

as it was now dark, i decided to just go ahead and spend the night since i really don't like driving in the dark anymore and especially down mountains. they dragged me outta bed around 11am to go to a thrift store to look for some things they wanted. i, not being a shopper, was not looking for anything in particular but ended up with FOUR tops for just 11 bucks. you can't beat that! i just wish i had found some jeans that i liked. i pretty much live in 3 pairs of jeans that are all exactly the same and have become too big for me. oh well, they ARE comfy and that's all i care about :)

i got home sometime monday evening and was bushed. again. set my alarms (3) to get up so i could go watch the g-kid at 1pm and relieve the other grandma from her duties. wellll jamie called me about 1:15 and wanted to know if i was almost there. SHIT!! no, um, i musta fallen back asleep, i'm sorry, i'm sorry. i'll be there in 15min. well, mighta made it in 15min. if it wasn't softly snowing and all the freaks in TN think that means you have to drive idle at 0 mph. i got there at 1:40pm big OOPS. oh, well, she'll get over it eventually and if not, jamie & the g-kid will just cram back into our tiny little home and she won't have to burden herself watching him. ever. :p~~~

to make tuesday and even LONGER day, hubby went to Lowes to get a power cord for a dryer we acquired and gave to jamie. she and i rearranged g-kids bedroom and did a power clean (well she did) on it. now all she needs is some kind of great CHEAP storage bins for all his toys to stay in and organized. any suggestions on what works best for the buck?? we ordered pizza and then headed home around 8pm. loooong day, but fun and we got alot accomplished :)

today, umm wednesday, right? he (g-kid) would normally be at pre-school but, heaven forbid, he have to sit inside in the heat on a cold day, so no school. i managed to get there only 10 min. late today (not my fault this time. i was on hold with the VA and wasn't about to hang up until i got what i needed). fed g-kid peaches and attempted to get him to eat some mac&cheese with cheese hot dogs sliced into it. didn't happen, but oh, well, saved it for him to eat it at some later date. played a game of
"3 monkeys jumping on the bed" (oh joy) and then read him a couple pages of his Animals Around the Watering Hole book that i got him from a chicago museum with all the dinos - whichever one that is :)

i got all of jamie's tax papers together, came home (stopped at chicken chef for carry out dinner) and attempted to read blogs, but it wasn't working for me. so i did some laundry and dishes and just chilled for all of 5 minutes. then i decided if i didn't get up and do jamie's taxes now, they would be forgotten about. got them all done and she should have it direct deposited by next friday i think. wish mine were gonna be that easy. i keep tellin hubby we should foster a kid for 6months and 1 day and then ship him back just for the tax break! lol plus they pay ya 7-800 bucks a month i think. i could totally put him on a modified survivor diet and make money off of him! j/k!!

well, it wasn't funny, exciting, or enlightening but, it was my life the last few days. hopefully i will get caught up reading tonight and tomorrow and be back to my smart alecky self :)

two days behind, tuesday

ok, i'm now officially two days behind on reading and not really feeling it much tonight either. don't worry peeps my big mouth won't be silent for long. i'm gonna try to get caught up, commenting here and there, but not necessarily everywhere or i'll never get done. if you've got something in particular you're wanting me to comment on, or just think i may have missed something important, just comment me!

posting something about something (hopefully) soon...

something's up, sunday

although i don't really care for the color scheme, i was sick of my blog being all squished and this seemed to be the "roomiest" layout i could find. well, other than the one that totally abolished the sidebar to the bottom of the page, and i figured that would annoy the crap outta me.

SO, whadya think bout it the new look? also, if there are any techno types out there who can answer me these questions, please chime in:

Can i design my own page in dreamweaver and just copy the code and paste it onto the Layout: Edit Html page and still add blogger's gadgets? Also, would doing that make me lose any of my archives, etc..?

thanks for the input and hopefully some answers so i can make my blog reflect ME and not just be another template that i have to make do with.

oh, and that's all you get for this weekend probably. i will be up in dial-up hell at mom's so i doubt i will be getting to post sunday. wellll, i guess maybe if something really good pops into my head i could compose it there and then post it when i get back to DSL heaven later on sunday evening.

maybe.



if you're really good.



and you can beg properly.



and maybe kiss up nicely, too.

:)

friday fragments

i was smart this week. i kept a little notepad by my desk and wrote down stuff all week. i couldn't wait for friday to get here so i could post it!! well, until friday got here at 8am since the g-kid spent the night cause his mommy's sick. then i didn't want friday to be here. so, i set him up with a real poptart, milk, and a movie and crawled back into bed. ok, enough chatter, on with the fragments! oh! and don't forget to check out Mrs. 4444's fragments who got me started on this.
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does anybody else want to go on survivor just for the diet? i mean i would love to do all the competitions (duh) but i realistically know that my body can't do that stuff anymore. and there is NO way i could sleep on the ground but, still, i really want to lose all that weight that the contestants do!! i know i don't have the will power to just eat rice and water at home, and i also know i sure as hell wouldn't supplement my diet with any bugs out there, so it would have to work!
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i have decided that my dog, charlotte, is one of the smartest dogs i've ever had. if not the smartest in the world! She could totally be another lassie. we came home from that car show last weekend and charlotte came up to the door wigglin' and a wagglin' her whole body. i went outside and gave her some lovin' because i thought she was just happy to be gettin' my full attention. (dale is jeallllllous and always pushes her away so i will pet him instead) so i come back inside and sat down and she was still there just a wigglin' away. i went back out and petted her some more and then i came in and told rickey "i think she's trying to tell us timmy fell down the well, or somethin" a lightbulb went off in hubby's brain. "hmmm i wonder if i locked dale up in the shop" sure enough, he went out to the shop and dale came flying out! lol so charlotte was trying to tell us something was wrong!
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hubby came in from the shop the other night and asked me if i wanted something for my blog. i say sure, thinking a funny shop story is emminent. he says, what are you doing now? UGGHH
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i showed g-kid this pic:

he says " that's mommy and lyric passed out!"

i have no idea where he heard that phrase, but there you go. funny thing is, mommy was passed out. she had come to the house to spend the night, drink some beer, and watch movies with me for her birthday. hehe
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i was cooking dinner the other night and jamie & the g-kid were in the bedroom watchin' a movie. g-kid asked several times if dinner was ready yet and the last time i told him, "don't worry i will let you know when it's ready. i won't let you starve." the next thing i here is "mommy is starving for dinner, nonna" i replied, "she is??" jamie hollars back, "i never said anything like that!! he asked me if i was starving and i said i could eat." the little booger is already learning how to manipulate people!
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one last thing. heinous had some links over to mama still wears gucci, she had a pic of her hubby in his laying around the house outfit, and thought he looked ridiculous in it. i say HA! i can totally beat that...












hubby is such a good sport! i still can't believe i talked him into wearing a woman's shirt and letting me photograph him. :)

well, once again my fragments seem quite long winded, but i guess i just don't know how to tell a short story :)

too much electricity, thursday

sorry my mind just went blank while i was trying to think of a title. so for now it's just thursday. if something hits me before i hit that publish button it might change. then again it might not. this is gonna be a shorty because my hands are cold and i've already turned up the heat and put another sweatshirt on and my hat. i gotta get off of here soon and get me a hot cup of coffee or sit on my hands or something.

remember my hubby got me these great slippers for christmas? of course not. why would you remember something like that?! duh. although, at this point i don't think i can technically call them slippers anymore. i have worn them non-stop since christmas. yes, everywhere. i even wore them to our dart banquet because, well, i forgot to put on my boots. i'm serious. they are cloggy type shoes anyways, so it's not like i was out in pink fuzzy bunny slippers*, but they are supposed to be my house shoes. i just have one problem with them.

i am creating enough electricity to power our house, i think. i'm being shocked constantly. all day long. i shock myself, my hubby, the g-kid, both dogs, my cat, my s.daughter's dog. nobody and nothing are safe from me. i need to figure out a way to harness this electricity or to stop it in it's tracks. i'm afraid i'm gonna short out my computer or my cell phone the next time i touch them. it's getting to the point where i'm afraid to turn out the light for fear of the electricity in my body arcing to the electricity in the switch and ZAP i'm gonna be dead. i don't know or care if this could actually happen or not. i'm afraid it might happen, so that's good(bad) enough for me.

anybody have any suggestions? well, other than getting rid of my slippers/clogs/shoes whatever the heck you want to call them. they are comfy and keep my feet warm so that's not an option! ok, so added more to the title, but it's still kinda boring. i think the cold has frozen my brain cells kinda like it's sapping all of the strength outta my car battery.

~~~copying my master who copies her master~~~

*i have accidently gone out in blue, fuzzy, slippers before, now that i think about it. but i did go back home and change before being seen in public with them. well, now that i think about that i think i have gone to the dump in slippers before and just decided it wasn't worth it to go back and change. i mean come on, it's just the dump guy, right?

wanted: woody woodpecker, preferably dead, wednesday

**disclaimer**

you can send me all the hate mail you want for this post, i don't care. i know how to hit the delete button, so just save yourself some time and pretend like you sent it and i deleted it. whatever you say is not gonna change me anyways, so there!

now don't get me wrong. i LOVE animals (when they aren't destroying my property) but, i have entered into a war with the woodpeckers and carpenter bees around my house. we have been cursed with carpenter bees which bore holes in exposed wood (like the wood that holds my house up!) and lay their larvae in the holes.

EXHIBIT A:


guess what likes to eat carpenter bee larvae?

yep. woodpeckers.

so not only do i get woken up in the early mornings (a really bad thing, trust me) by the woodpeckers looking for breakfast, but now i don't have small holes in my wood. i have GINORMOUS gouges in the wood.

EXHIBIT B & C:




my house is gonna crash down on my head one day! luckily, the bees are gone during the winter, so the woodpeckers are too, but they also damage my baccy barn, my trellis for our muscadines, and our trees.

so, does anybody know how to humanely get rid of woodpeckers? if not, i'm gonna have to resort to using my shotgun this spring! oh, and don't tell me to get rid of the carpenter bees, because we try to do that too. we have this lovely sport we invented called "bee whacking" (my nutritionist loved it, because she said it's good exercise! lol) i think the last two years we have gotten over 200 bees each year, and yes we do keep count, right on the marker board on the fridge. :p~~~

bee whacking requires badmitton rackets*, lots of energy, and good hand-eye coordination. it's actually really fun to particpate, but even funner to watch somebody else attempt. if you get really good at it, you can get 2-n-1 when they are connected together in the air**. also, if you hit them just right, you can whack them right in half or sometimes they just get stuck in between the strings.

EXHIBIT D & E: not a great pic, but you can tell she's missing her butt or abdomen or thorax or whatever you call that big part! and yes, i DO know that's a she because of the white dot on her head.



just like this one is a she too. the females are usually the more aggressive and territorial ones. the males (aka: wussies) usually just fly away when you swing and miss, the females keep coming after you :)

~~~copying microblogologist*** copying literalDan section~~~

*i guess tennis rackets would work too but badmitton rackets give you a longer reach :)

** i don't know if they are getting romantic or fighting (they are very territorial) but they join up in flight and that makes them much slower and easier to hit.

***if i'm your minion for copying you, what do i call you? my master? and does that mean you are literalDan's minion and he is your master?? lol

two for one tuesday: pantry raid

i give up. i have gone back through other people's blogs for the last week or so and i can't remember or find who it was that i told i would do this pantry thing. i'm sorry! i wish there was something that kept up with where i left MY comments! ugh! i know i saw over at sprite's keeper that she did it, but i just started following her today, so i know it wasn't her. whoever it is, is a librarian i can at least remember that part! somebody, anybody, please tell me who that was! lol

so here are my pantry pics (there's 3 of em cause i have a lot of pantry with wasted space! i need to turn my, so deep that you can never see what's in the back, shelves, into slide out shelves like my mom has. they are wonderful!

oh, and you aren't allowed to straighten up the shelves either before you take the pic. i so should have cheated on that, but i didn't so you get to see me in all my unorganized glory. here they are:

the top half of my "real pantry":

the bottom half: (yes, i love peanut butter and have been known to eat it straight out of the jar..... frequently)


and this is another cabinet that i use for snacks and stuff: (yeah, i need to go shopping - not near enough snacks in here for my taste)

notice the little debbie german chocolate cookies are front and center and on the bottom shelf within easy reach for my shortness! oh, and the welch's fruit snacks were originally snacks for the g-kid but i have become addicted to them! they are pretty healthy as far as a snack: 100% daily vitamin C, made from real fruit (no preservatives), excellent source of vitamins A & E, ZERO grams of fat or calories from fat, and only 80 calories, and yet they still taste good!

not that i really care about any of that stuff for myself, but i would like to keep the g-kid a little healthy. oh, and the Cake Mix Magic in Minutes is an AWESOME recipe book that my mom got me for christmas. it has tons of recipes where the base is a box of cake mix and then you add all kinds of goodies to it to make it look like you slaved for hours to create it.

so, now i've shown you my pantry, will you show me yours?

today is what day, tuesday?

ok, so my brain hasn't kicked in even though i have read all of my blogs, ate a poptart, and had 2 cups of coffee so far. it is tuesday, right? yesterday was s.daughter's birthday. she's 25. the youngest kid is now 25. that just seems wrong. seems like just a few years ago they 14, 16, & 18. now, they are (or will be sometime this year) 25, 27, & 29.

we had a nice quiet birthday dinner with jamie & james, me & rickey, and norene. i played susie housewife and made pork chops, fried okra, corn, and some cheesy bread. i even baked a birthday cake, which was plain yellow with white frosting and sprinkles. can you tell it's a 2 and a 5?? i have discovered it is very hard to make candles spell out a number or letter.


i warned her this pic was definitely going up (oh and for future reference, don't stand down wind of the candle blowing unless you like a mouth full of smoke). i mean really, how could i pass up, not only a pic of all smoke, but check out those cheeks!! LOL (oh, and don't be looking at the little table full of clutter behind her. i haven't got that far in my cleaning yet.) and YES, we do have a dart board, along with the scoreboard, in our kitchen. i've also got a throw line stuck down on the floor and speaking of floor, ours looks like it has the measles from all the dart ricochets :) who cares? not i!

i think jamie is the 1st and only person i have ever met that does not like chocolate. at all. i mean lick the cream out of an oreo and throw the cookie part away, not like chocolate. she won't even eat m&m's or reeses! i'm pretty sure it's a sickness.

anywho, i digress, she got an mp3 player that my s.son got me for christmas (remember i got the ipod nano from g-kid's dad) but since she knew that was not really bought specifically for her, i wanted to get her something else from us. she recently got a laptop so i found a great deal on a HP all-in-one printer, scanner, copier from wally world. of course, it doesn't come with a usb cord (why is that?? it's ridiculous!) so i had to buy one of those too. i wrapped the cord and the printer & hid them in the room so the only present she saw was the mp3 player. here comes my great acting ability part...

after she opened the mp3 player, i was like, "oh, i forgot, i got you something else i think you'll need for that" and brought out the usb cord. she opened it and i picked up the mp3 player box saying "i'm pretty sure you need that cord for this. oh, man. this thing says it comes with a usb cord already! well, i don't guess you'll need that cord for this afterall." then i go back in my room and say as i'm coming out, "but i think you'll need it for this." her eyes lit up and she said "i bet i know what that is." and the little stinker did know what it was before she opened it! i guess that just means she was hoping for one, right??

oh, and btw, for the record, yes, i was up at 8am. about 4 am g-kid was standing beside my bed ( i just asked him if he woke me up or what. after making sure that he wasn't getting in trouble, he told me he said "nonna, nonna, nonna, nonna, nonna" lol he said i was very hard to wake up. it's surprising how deeply i can sleep in just about an hour! so anywho, he climbs up into poppa's spot (who is out on the couch, by his own choice-i didn't kick him outta bed) at 8 james sits up and says "is it time to get up nonna?" i looked at the clock and said "no, go back to sleep" hoping that would work. i didn't, lol

now what the heck am i supposed to do for the rest of this lonnnnng day?? i've already read my blogs and have now written my blog. yall best get to writing some more stuff!

see? who needs to see to drive? saturday sunday

this was our view for about 20 miles across and down a mountain on the way home this last evening. that isn't even glare from the flash or anything. you can just barely make out the lines about 10' in front of you and then, nothing. we used to live on top of this mountain, so i should have been prepared for this sight, but i guess i had forgotten the joys of driving blind. luckily, hubby was driving because not only was it dark (i'm night blind), and raining, but then we hit the fog. it was so bad he was only going like 20-25 mph (we usually go about 60 mph through here) and a couple of times he had to stomp on the brakes suddenly because the road just disappeared. gone. you couldn't even see a glimpse of the lines. very. scary. i had to take off my ipod and help watch the road just to make sure we didn't go sailing off into the wild blue (white) yonder.

so, the reason we were on the road in the first place, was because we had decided to drive down to chattanooga to go to a car show called the World of Wheels. (thanks Norma for the directions!! yeah, we were dumb butts and left the house without a clue how to get where we were going) the admission was waaay too high for the number of cars there. it was 14 bucks apiece!! and we walked the whole show in less than an hour. the quality of cars that were there was good, but good grief. for that amount of admission, we were expecting to run out of steam before we ran out of cars to look at. wrong! i won't bore y'all with pics of all the cars, but i am gonna show y'all some funny things we saw there. hubby will probably be uploading the pics to his webshots albums (what am i saying? I will be doing that for him) and if anybody is interested in checking them out, feel free. he also has pics of his 1954 Chevy pickup that he has done a frame-off restoration and a 1953 COE that he is turning into a 4 door (with suicide back doors!!! i likey).

like, i said, i'm not gonna post a bunch of car pics here, because i don't wanna lose the handful of followers i have gained. i am however, gonna post a couple of funny things we saw at this show. first, one of the funniest business names/signs i have ever seen:

and this is some random couple that we saw walking around the show. it wasn't too hard to get the shot of them from behind, but i have discovered it is very hard to nonchalantly snap a pic of somebody facing you, without them realising what you are doing. i was trying to get a shot of her from the front because, well, God (or the plastic surgeon) was very generous to her, and her outfit was a hoot.


my hubby wanted to know if i thought she would still be taller than her man if she took her shoes off. i said, "i didn't even realise she was there with somebody else!". i was too busy trying to be slick and sly, and not get "busted" (pun intended of course or it wouldn't be in freakin' quotes!)


unfortunately, she took the opportunity to take a picture of a car (what fun is that??) right when i snapped this shot, blocking the view of her endowments (natural or otherwise-am i the only person that has no idea how to tell fake from real?) i chickened out, and didn't try for another. her purse and bustiere/corset (i really don't know the difference) were covered with skull and crossbones, and the bustiere was def doing a good job of lifting. i watched her lean forward at one point and couldn't keep from staring 'cause i thought for sure that the girls were gonna come out and play!

this is the cooolest chair i have ever seen! i sooo want hubby to make me one, so i took 2 pics of it, just to make sure he would know how to build it. hint, hint, hubby.


doesn't it look like the arms would perfectly hold a solo cup of your favorite mixed beverage?? i'm not real crazy about the saddles, tumbleweeds, and boots upholstery, but i guess it goes along with the horseshoes.

this isn't just some pipe dream i'm having about my hubby making this for me. he is amazing with metal. he built his own rotisserie to rotate his frames (if you're a car restoration type you will know what i mean, and if not you're not you won't care so just ignore that sentence). he has also made some cool yard art:



well, if you made it all the way to the end of this looong post, i might have to add you to my BFF list. (you should be honored, it's a very, very, short list)

friday fragments

first things first. i want to thank Mrs. 4444 for generously awarding me this award:



for my friday fragments post last week. i am truly honored to be selected for this award amoung all of her other choices. i thanked her on her blog, but then realised that not only was i passing up an opportunity to toot my own horn, but also to thank her once again and show her some link love :)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

while looking at pics of the g-kid on his mommy's puter:

me: ewww james, you're picking your nose, that's groooss
james: i like picking my nose
me: you do? why?
james: cuz sometimes it's full of boogers and i gotta get 'em outta dere
(duh, nonna don't you know anything??)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

hubby: whatcha' doing?
me: reading blogs

15 min. later

hubby: now, watcha' doing?
me: why? (a little exasperated-just a little)

hubby: cuz you're smiling

me: posting comments

hubby: so why are you smiling?

me: because i'm a smart aleck, and it amuses me

15 min. later

hubby: now what're you doin?

me: reading more blogs

this has turned into an almost daily routine. somebody save me from my hubby's weird sense of humor

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i'm trying to decide if it's worth shaving my legs so i can take a pic of my kick ass calves for heinous ;) that will totally ruin my attempt at breaking my record last year for seeing how long i can go without shaving. i think he may have to wait till spring. i've decided it helps keep my legs warm, i swear it does! plus, it's really cool cuz when i swing my legs back and forth i can feel the breeze rustling through the hair.

oh, and for all of you who i just totally grossed out, in my defense, i don't have hardly any hair on my legs and what i do have is so fine and sparse you don't really even notice it. not that i would go out in public in shorts like this, but as long as i'm wearing jeans - screw shaving! plus it hurts my hips to shave and it def is not worth the pain :p~~~~

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in my quest for a clean(er) house, i have washed, dried, folded, AND put away like 6 or 7 loads of clothes. i think i'm gonna take tonight off and see if i can talk hubby into helping me do the floors tomorrow

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

does it make me a bad person if i LOVE how mean and manipulative Hugh Laurie is on House? what if i secretly wish i could manipulate people like that too? it would never happen, because i don't have that sneaky gene that you need to do that. ask, seashore. i used to drive her crazy asking questions during any movie that had plots that contained ulterior motives behind the characters actions. i just can't think like that.

fantastic little gangsta g-kid, friday

ok, first the disclaimer, cuz i don't want any hate mail. the g-kid spent the week with his daddy and turned into a movie star/rapper. he made a cute video about pirates and monkey island, with an interview at the end. it's kinda long and you hear more of baby daddy talking than the g-kid, so i'm gonna skip posting that one. this video, while i might not necessarily approve of some of the lyrics for a 3 y/o, is freaking hilarious. that being said, he is a 3 y/o and sometimes a little hard to understand so i included the lyrics below the vid. enjoy!

my name is james

i've got bread on my head

i always know, that it's right to do

what my mommy said

i got shoes on my ears

i got my frank and beans

i'm a nice, nice boy

never mean

i'm momma's boy

i'm momma's boy

and daddy's little man

my name is james!!

you want some of this?

what are you thinking?

you see these fists?

i got a fat sack of candy

i drink juice all day

i got da toys

you want to play?

i'm momma's boy

i'm momma's boy

and daddy's little man

take that! you stupid bill collector, thursday

yesterday and today the phone rang early in the morning. yesterday, i didn't bother to get up and see who it was. later when i checked the caller id, it had the wonderful "unavailable name" and "unavailable number". i thought, boy i'm glad i didn't drag myself outta bed for that. (we'll come back to this train of thought in a minute)

well, for some weird reason i woke up at 7:40 AM with a yucky

...don't read this if you have a weak stomach....

mouth full of phlegm (i warned you!) so i got up to dispose of said mouthful. i very briefly considered staying up, then my natural desires squashed that thought and i crawled back into my nice, warm, comfy bed.

twenty minutes later, there was a knock at my door. now, hubby and i, are not social creatures so i couldn't even begin to imagine who would be knocking on my door at 8am, especially since anybody who knows me, knows i would not normally be up at that time of day. so, curiosity overcame me and i went to the door with my bed head in a tank top with no bra, and shorts. i'm sure i looked lovely. i looked out through my wonderful front doors:

what do i see out there? your friendly neighborhood Fed-Ex man with a glorious box:


Woohoo, i've got a package!! he apologized for waking me (i obviously looked like i just got out of bed) and i told him that this was one thing i didn't mind getting up early for.

now, if you remember from my clean desk post, recently, i mentioned that my monitor had died and i have been using sis's monitor. who, btw, has not been asking for it back, even though that meant she couldn't have a computer at home for the last few months! i LOVE my sis!

well, just for kicks the other day i went to the Dell web-site to see how much a new monitor was going to cost. i couldn't believe it! they had a monitor that was bigger than my old one on sale with free shipping (two of my favorite words!).

so, even though i HATE credit cards and never use them, i was contemplating putting a monitor on my sears card so i could give sis back hers. well, i thought what the heck, it can't hurt to ask, so i asked hubby if he would rather me use my credit card or if he wanted to just buy it for me. he gave me the go ahead to just buy it!!! yea!!! i realllly didn't want to be paying payments and interest, etc..

so, without further ado, my new monitor:



woohooo! it's so cool! it's a 19" wide screen format with a stand and backside that are black and the trim around the front is silver. it even matches my current 'puter & accessories' color scheme! i'm thinking that hubby wanted to treat me since i've done such a good job cleaning these last few days, and i owe that all to you guys! if i didn't have you people following my progress and encouraging me, i never would have done as much as i did. so to all of my new bloggy friends....THANK YOU!!

now, back to the stupid bill collector...

since i had already been woken up by my yucky surprise and my good surprise, when the phone rang at 8:21am i decided to go see who was disturbing my peace yet again. yep, it showed unavailable, and while i was happy to receive my monitor today (4 days earlier than dell said it would be delivered) this was the 3rd interuption of my beauty rest. suffice it to say i was NOT in a generous mood toward the poor soul on the other end of the phone.

a little background info so this next part will make sense...

i have been divorced from my 1st husband since 1996. he has never, ever lived at this address. i didn't even take his last name while we were married, so when i did move here, there shouldn't be any connection between me and him associated with this address or phone number. HE doesn't even know my home number or address, as far as i am aware. i occasionally get credit card offers in the mail addressed to him and i have always wondered how that has occured.

back to the phone call...

the lady asked to speak to (insert ex's name here). I. Lost. It. i, very meanly, told that lady, "that is my ex-husband who i have been divorced from for 15 years (which wasn't accurate, but i'm surprised i even got that close) and don't ever fucking call my house again!" i heard the poor woman say "mam" before i slammed down the phone. i know, the poor thing was just doing her job, but you know what? i don't care! i pay my bills and i will NOT be harrassed for bills my ex might have accrued in the last 12 years.

so that is all of my ranting and raving for today. i'm off to fold some clothes and wash some more... hope y'all have a great day!

P.S. - ok, i thought that when you clicked on a picture it would open it open in another window full size so you could actually read all of those little comments i added onto them. somebody let me know if it works that way and blogspot is just being difficult again, or if i should just go back and take the comments off. thanks!

P.P.S. - so i was told that they are NOT opening up bigger, so i uploaded them again using the large choice. of course i deleted the Photoshop version (i knew better than to do that) after i saved them as JPEG so i can't modify them to make the text larger. c'est la vie :)

wow wednesday

first, i must confess. if it wasn't for this blog and everybody knowing i was supposed to clean last night and expecting to see results, i probably would have been lazy and not done anything.

BUT you were here waiting (i hope) to see my success, so i couldn't let you down. heinous is probably waiting for my before pics, so he can laugh at me, don't try to deny it mr! i probably would be too :)

oh, and the pink paper sorter thing that is FULL of papers to file, i haven't sorted it yet. i just cheated and moved it out of the pic. hahaha. what? i'm gonna do it. i just got tired around 2am after 2 more freaking hours of cleaning! and this time i even got all sweaty. for those of you that know me IRL you know that doesn't mean i was glistening a little. my hair was soaked and it was dripping into my glasses and i was afraid i was gonna short circuit my ipod! thanks evvvvvver so much granddaddy for passing on your "sweat like a raped ape" genes!

so enough jabbering, on with the show! the befores:

yeah, i could write in the dust on my tv. the sad thing is, i have dusted it way more recently and often than the rest of the living room.



notice the vacuum in the living room. i put that there thinking i would use it more often. i only have the one rug in the whole house, so you would think that i could at least do that regularly. nope. hubby went to use it the other day and it had spider webs/cob webs all over it. what the heck is the difference between spider and cob webbs anyways?? are they the same or what?

the wal-mart bags are full of books that i've read. i am going to the library to donate them this week, but i did move them into a box and stuck 'em in a closet so it wouldn't ruin the nice clean look.

and now, the moment we have all been waiting for, drum roll please, my clean living room!! (that for some reason seems huge now that all the crap is gone, hehe.

you see that painting up all the wall? my mommy painted it! you can't really see it that well, but it is a beautiful fall river scene and just happens to match my house perfectly :) did i just call her mommy? ok, i guess i'm regressing a little, but since she has empty nest syndrome (bad) i'm sure she'll like that.


on top of the left hand speaker is my gorgeous print by Marie Natale that i won from michelle over at Pandora's Box. her blog seems to be having technical difficulties for the last couple of weeks, but hopefully she will be up and posting again soon. oh, and i did move the g-kids toys under the desk, but then i ended up putting his little rocking chair that holds all of his books where they were. i will probably have to move it back over by the little table (that mom also painted) because he has already made me move it back there once before because "it goes over here, nonna". bless his little OCD-in-training heart.



i just threw this one in because i love my coffee table. it's one of those that has a drawer under the glass so you can display stuff. i have my seashell collection displayed along with my clay "soccer dude" i made in high school and my newly acquired water bottle full of lake michigan water, sand, and pebbles. i got to journey up to yankeeville with seashore this summer and i had to get something to remember my 1st trip to lake michigan.

so that's it for my living room de-clutterfication (yes, you may use that word i just made up). the next few nights/days i will be catching up on my laundry and i won't bore you with pics of my dirty drawers :) the next project will be the spare bedroom and then i'll tackle the master bedroom, which i guess will have to be done during the day since hubby probably won't like me cleaning it whilst he's sleeping lol.

oh, and if you're wondering why i'm not doing the other half of my living room, it's because it contains 2 recliners and a love seat. even i can't clutter those up :)

and i might add, i have kept the kitchen clean for the last few days and even baked a sock-it-to-me cake (cleaning up as i went!). damn i might turn into domestic goddess after all! lol