weekends are too short.

wasn't it just Friday five minutes ago? how is it possible that Monday is hours away?

crud. crud. crud.

it's this kind of weather that makes me wish i was off work again. nothing to do but sleep in, and court the Muse of Creativity that has been blessing me this weekend.

sigh.

hope your weekend was faboo, too.

ah, rain -

ya gotta love rainy days.

OK, well...i do.

See, here in Mostly Smoggy So. Cal., we don't get much in the way of weather. so when we do, it honestly becomes a Breaking News alert. Years ago, we had an El Nino front come through...which basically means it rained here as much as Seattle. And, sure enough, it was on the news...and part of the story included a serious story, where the rain had damaged some homes.

The newschopper, hovering over this home, caught a plastic shopping bag being swept away by the floodwaters. The news anchor, who is very much a "Ron Burgundy" type, said, on live TV, "Oh, is that a small child being swept away?" The helicopter pilot wearily replied, "No, it's just a plastic bag."

Weather here is big news. Because there really is no weather. So, overcast, cool, rainy days make me happy. i would be very happy in the Great Pacific Northwest. Hubbs says he would end up like Kurt Cobain if we ever moved up there.

i say he's a bit melodramatic.

These kind of days, for whatever reason, make me long for retirement. To be able to plan & do whatever i wanted. Own a vineyard in Napa. Travel the world. Own a beachhouse, or even my own island.

The Carpenters sang that Rainy Days & Mondays Always Get Me Down. But for me, they always make me think of the potential of my life...and what i can make of it.

i'll tumble for ya..

no, really.

this past Monday, i dragged Hubbs out for a walk. we needed to get out, and exercise is always a good thing, right?

once again, i prove that exercise will kill you.

we had walked around the parameter of Knott's, and were about less than a 1/4 mile from our home when....

i fell off the curb.

now really...who falls off a curb? sober? (insert fingers pointing at me)

when i fell, i whacked the Hubbs in the back of his leg. good thing, too...he might have left me there, rolling like a turtle on her back. but nothing was broken, except my spirit.

clumsy oaf.

now, my leg has all the colors of the rainbow...as long as the rainbow only has browns, greens & purples in it, with yellow highlights.

i shouldn't be surprised. i was always accident prone as a child. always bruising or cutting something. thank Heavens there was no child protective services when i was growing up, because i have no doubt that my mom would probably be investigated. until they realized that i was born with two left feet. i was constantly falling out of trees, off bikes, tripping in gopher holes...but that's another blog.

in desperation, my poor mom sent me to years of ballet, hoping it would make me more graceful, more coordinated.

nope. but at least i look good falling. i look even better in a tutu.

for those about to dye..we salute you.

ah, the joys of being a girl. not the every 28 days one, but the rest of them.


we get to wear cute clothes. makeup. perfume. earrings. and even if we choose to not do any of these, or to not even do them every day, we have the choice.


we also have the choice to dye & cut our hair.


or not!


today, i chose to.


now, as a child, my hair got red in the summer. all that time out in the sun, would lighten it to a lovely red. as i got older, that ended of course..mostly because i wasn't in the sun as much.



soooo - i opted to recapture the red tresses of my youth. oh, and the fact that there was a LOT of gray popping up which also encouraged me to do so.



never having been one to be shy about whether i dye or not (the one incident at work notwithstanding...i had just given a presentation to my department, when, after asking if anyone had any questions, one wag questioned: "Yeah, what's your real hair color?" my smartass response was "i'll tell you if you tell me where you got your hair plugs." can you believe this guy hooked himself a wife? amazing. with that kind of personality, too...), i have no problem telling anyone who asks that yes i do dye, and who does it.


tonight, i had a hair appointment, and i was ready for a change. i'm really digging my current cut, and since it still works for me, far be it from me to change now.


well...at least until i get bored. like today.


i'm ready for a change. and fall is here, so i felt it was time to make my hair as rich as this season. well, at least as rich as fall gets here in Mostly Sunny So. Cal.

with no further ado...here's before:







































and here's after:




yes, it's dark. it's still a little red, deep down.

it's taking a little getting used to, only because i haven't had hair this dark since my wedding.
but i kinda feel like a new woman!

oh, and yes, i did warn Hubbs so when he comes home tonight, he doesn't think he's in the wrong bed. muh-hahahaha!


sing it with me now..."i enjoy beeeeeing a girlllllll!"

what's next?

In case you hadn't heard...California is trying to kill the rest of the nation.

No, not really.

But it could seem like it...with the whole spinach thing. Now we get to add lettuce to the list.

First it was spinach. eColi found and so every ounce of fresh spinach gets pulled. Children around the nation rejoiced. Popeye went into seclusion.

Then people got really sick and some died. It stopped being funny. And now it seems that lettuce is heading down the same trail. Thankfully no one has seemed to be sick or died yet.

Or sued.

Apparently there is a woman who is suing because she got sick. She's doing it "on behalf of all those who also got sick."

Oh good. Will she also be sharing the money with all those that got sick?

Oh well.

It's a little scary. Will it come to the point where we can't eat anything but frozen or canned veggies? And, as i'm watching the lettuce story on the news last night, i'm cooking corned beef & cabbage for dinner.

i can't help but wonder what's next...and i hope it ain't cabbage.

In other non-eColi news...yesterday we took a day trip out to Oak Glen, a kinda touristy, group of apple ranches about an hour east of our homestead.

It rained. Not heavy, but enough to make us not want to hang around..especially since we didn't have umbrellas.

Final conclusion: Julian in San Diego county is better. And so far, apples are still safe to eat.

another Saturday night....

and what are you having for dinner?

for me, dinner anymore is kind of a waste. don't get me wrong, i still eat. and if anyone has seen my arse lately...well...'nuff said.
but with Hubbs working swing, there's not a lot of chances to cook. (and i have no idea how to cook for one. heating for one is a different subject. i have a Masters degree in that)

like April, says, cereal is a really good choice. as is breakfast for me: ain't nothing better than eggs 'n' toast or pancakes 'n' eggs. (preferably sunny, but cooked enough so the creepy stuff around the yoke is cooked) but cereal really rocks.

and, despite one of my last blogs, no, i haven't had cocoa puffs & buttermilk in a long time.

tonight, though...i decided to keep it simple. and to attempt a restart on WW, i had a WW frozen mac & cheese.

then followed it up with the remains of my key lime pie cheesecake.

yum-o. and yes, i realize it negates the purpose of a low-cal dinner.

so - here's the questions for the day. you may answer only one or both...the choice is yours. but do answer...i'd like to see i'm not alone out here. what are you having for dinner tonight and have you ever followed up a healthy dinner with some really yummy crap?

food is good. yummy food is even better.

oh CRUD!

no - i haven't fallen off the planet. nor have i gone on vacation or been sick. lazy? possibly. truth is, there's been a little drama going on in my corner of the universe, and although it's still here, it's a little easier. really, just a little easier.

if you are a praying person, i would ask you keep my Hubbs in your prayers. prayers for peace & a sense of calm about his life. and i thank you.

now, back to our regularly scheduled blog.

while readings my morning run-down of blogs, i checked on Loni's and realized that it's Saturday morning. which means that last night was Friday night.

which means i missed Grey's Anatomy.

@#$*&%$*@#$%$??#$@&!!!!!!!

now, if i was smart, i would set Mr. DVR to tape it on Friday. see, i can't tape it on Thursday, because that's CSI. and, if i want a continuing, happy relationship with the Hubbs (and i do), i must tape it.

crud.

now - i know what happened...there's a link on the web that give a run down on what happened on the last show. but it's not the same as watching it.

crud. think i'll just set up a timer for it now.

in other news....

someone in an apartment near ours has a dog. a dog who doesn't like to be left alone. there's a lot of whining, poor puppy.

i love dogs...never cared for cats until jr. high, when we got a stray that got knocked up. it's been Catsville ever since. but last night...i dreamed about having dogs. a chocolate lab to be precise.

*sigh* always chasing what you cannot have. it's all good. and it's all about living like today was your last day on earth.

yep. that's me. running all over the place. making no sense. but trying to.

happy Saturday.

playing tag...again...

this time by Tracey. and it's a different one thankfully!

The rules are : List 5 weird things about yourself or your pets. Tag 5 friends and list them. Then, those people need to write on their blogs about 5 weird things, and state the rules, and tag 5 more people. Don’t forget to let the people you tag know by posting a comment on their blog!

(only five weird things? hmmm.)

1) i have a square freckle on the side of my nose.

2) i was Queen of the Ringling Brothers/Barnum & Bailey Circus...two years in a row.

3)both my husband & i were contestants on To Tell The Truth. we both won.

4)occasionally i love eating CocoPuffs with buttermilk. i will allow the next few seconds for you to get it all out.





feel better? OK. let's move on.

5)i can't rollerskate.

now....i tag Linda, April, Cyn, Doug & Melissa. (don't hate me!!)

poor Georgie...

(i realize this isn't the most important story of today, but i just cannot relive another story of children being murdered by schmucks.)

if you want to wake him up before you go-go, make sure he hasn't done any smack beforehand.

you know what bugs me the most about this story? not the fact that the man is wasting God-given talent. it's the fact that they call him an "aging pop star." and he's 43,

guess that makes me an aging bitter ol broad. at 44. and i'm not nearly as talented.

or as drug induced.

born way too late

being an only child, who grew up in a neighborhood where most all the kids were in college, i had to develop a pretty dang good imagination. developing "to be continued" stories with my massive collection of Barbies and other dolls.

so, with said imagination flourishing, i also did a lot of reading. and my favorite book hands down, was "Little Women."

like most girls, i identified with Jo - the tomboy that no one understood except for her sister, Beth. but, as i began my teen years, i started to want to be more like Meg and Amy. Meg because deep down, i didn't really want to be a tomboy, but had no idea hot to stop and Amy because her story turned out to be the most romantic. **sigh**

then, came 1976. America was celebrating her bicentennial, and Mattel produced a line of dolls called the Star Spangled Dolls. each doll represented a period in our history, starting with the American Indian, and ending with a couple from the jazz era.

my favorites were the pioneer & Civil War era dolls.

yes, i had also just discovered the "Little House" books. i'd also started reading "Gone with the Wind." i loved those periods of our history.

more importantly, i loved those clothes.

don't get me wrong. i have NO desire to wear corsets. it just seemed to me a gentler, elegant time.

so imagine my glee when last week, when Halloween costume shopping with sister in law, i found these patterns from Simplicity.

holy frejoles.

i would love to make either of these, but two things stop me. 1) i cannot sew to save my life. (OK, i can sew, but not well) and 2) where the $%*@! am i gonna wear this?

i have experience in hoop skirts. when i was 15, i joined a Masonic youth group, the International Order of the Rainbow for Girls. it stressed faith in a Supreme Being, service to all, and developed (for me) an ease in leadership & public speaking. so, as part of the whole thing, as president or a past president of each unit, you had the opportunity to wear a formal with a hoop.

believe me, it takes some doing to look like you're gliding along the floor, as opposed to schlepping in hiking boots.

part of me would love to be involved in some historical group that would allow me to feed my love for history, AND to get to wear some really cool togs. but on the other hand, here in Mostly Smoggy So. Cal., we don't have a whole lot of historical spots. it's not like being on the East Coast. here, we have a tendency to reduce our historical spots to parkingl ots with a marker reading "On this spot..."

oh well. maybe in my next life.