Have need help

Have been reading too much. Have read 17 books in January. Have dirty house. Have dead inside feeling. Have slight belly. Have need exercise. Have been missing Slim*Fast. Have been missing good old days. Have been missing blog. Have been missing you. Have book in my hand. Have cake in my mouth. Have need help. (!)

Fit that in your pocket

Here she is... the iPad:

Say wha...?
No, this is not a ginormous iPhone, nor is it a ginormous feminine hygiene product, as the name implies. This is Apple's answer to Amazon's Kindle.

And it looks/sounds freaking brilliant. I've already added it to my unattainable birthday wish list.

Price? Starting at $499, but up to $829, depending on level of awesomeness.

But from what I've gathered, it's much more than a wireless reading device. It seems to have all the features of a laptop but without the keyboard. Or rather, with a "touch" keyboard on the actual screen.


Mmmmm. Delicious. Only thing lame about it is the name. Cuz really? "iPad" was the best they could come up with? It's borderline gross. They should have called me!!!! I have better names for it, like the iKindle or the iWantthat.

Haircuts and Extremely Important Question

Here's Homer's "after" pic:



He was busy watching Max and Roovy, which is why he wasn't smiling. He's not mad at me for chewing him out or anything.

I went ahead and cut Cord's hair last night while I was at it. It was super long and feathery. I cut it shorter than he wanted, but his hair grows freakishly fast.

Gus, on the other hand, begged me to leave his hair alone. I agreed on the condition that he not let it hang in his eyes. I hate it when he walks around, gazing through a veil of hair.


Now I have a very important poll question for you, unrelated to my children or anyone I know:

Is it kind of hawt when a good-looking guy gets a black eye? Once it's past the swollen phase, and just bruised?

Like I said, super important question. Think hard. Answer honestly.

Dang

Homer cut his own bangs. Bad idea, right ladies? Neither of us are too
pleased with the results. The pageboy cut is so 1780s.

Viva Las Vegas!

Congrats Erin and Scott! Welcome to the family, Scott! Exclamation
point!

Ignore the giant beers

We went to this Everclear concert in Phoenix over MLKJ weekend, as if it were the 90s or something.



I should probably mention first that we were in Phoenix with Amy & Dwight (plus kids) and Erin & Scott (Scrin, if you will), because we were running the rock-n-roll half marathon. And when I say "we", I am referring only to Tony and Dwight. The rest of us slept in and got to the race just in time to miss Tony crossing the finish line.

Oh dang. I forgot to take a picture of Tony and Dwight after the race. Dang. Maybe Amy has a picture?

After the race, Tony and Dwight went immediately back to the hotel to shower, and the rest of us sat on the grass for an hour or so and watched the Everclear concert, cuz our feet hurt from walking and standing around and stuff.

It was exhausting, dragging those free-spirited kids through that crowd of people. The "spectator" parking garage was super far away so we had to prod and push the kids all the way to the finish line (at least a half mile), and they kept swing from our hands, pulling our arms out of our sockets, and just being generally annoying. Where the H is my metal?

Anyhow, here's the runner's metals:

The square one is from the Phoenix race (clearly) and the round one is from the race Tony ran in December here in Las Vegas (obviously). Tony's halfsie time is always the same (1 hour, 51 minutes, something seconds). That's pretty consistent timing, considering the distance and how many races he's ran. However, for the Phoenix race, his time was 1 hour, 50 minutes, and something seconds. Significant improvement, no?

Whattaya think?

4U2NV

You know those coveted personalized license plates Memzy inherited from her parents because they like her the best out of all their kids? Well, it made me realized that my kids are gonna be fighting like crazy in a couple years over this baby:

That's Tony's personalized license plate from when he was in high school. Yeah, he drove around in public with that attached to his Pontiac Fiero. How he managed to not get his A kicked, I do not know.

In fact, to hear him tell it, he got all kinds of chicks with those plates. Phone numbers n junk on his windshield. Notes like, "Hey there, LDS GUY. I'm LDS GAL... "

Gross, huh?

Thing is, Tony was so adorable, he didn't need any clever gimmicks to get a desperate, nerdy LDS chick's phone numbers. See:


Tony circa LDS GUY^^

Zach Morris's twin, practically!

Anyway, we have two of these priceless license plates to pass down to our boys...



...but we have three future "LDS GUYS".

Talk about potential firestorm. So here's the deal. I figured out a way to keep this fair, as well as add a little incentive for our boys to choose certain career paths. I'm putting this in writing right here on the Internet, which is the same as writing it in outer space since it will never ever disintegrate in a landfill, so I can't take this back:

Whoever becomes a doctor first, gets dad's back license plate.
Whoever finds cure for cancer, gets his front license plate.
And whoever invents the first PRS (personal robot servant) gets my Gremlins lunch box:

...thermos included:

Good luck, boys. May the odds be ever in your favor.

PS. American Idol starts tonight. Eeek.

*The other Katie came up with the title for this post.

Books

I'm reading like mad lately. Too much, actually, and it's making my life all off-balance. I stayed up until 3am last night, finishing a really good book (that I'm not going to tell you about just yet), and then I laid in bed for another hour or so, thinking about it. I had to get up at 7am, so I had no business staying up until 3 or 4 in the morning, but I just had to find out if Miss Two Slice Hilly 'as gonna git what 'as coming to her, and if Skeeter 'as gonna marry Mister Stuart, and if Minny 'as gonna leave that no good husband a hers.

I love books that make me act all reckless and irresponsible, but I hate the consequences that go along with of that behavior. This time: I slept through my alarm in the morning, which was embarrassing, as I was supposed to sub-teach Gus's primary class. I jumped out a bed, threw on a skirt, and made it there 10 minutes late, by myself. Then I felt all down in the dumps about myself. Why'd I stay up so late? I could have finished the book after church today. But when I was reading last night, I just knew if I put that book down I would toss and turn all night, and probably have one of those dreams where I'm looking for a toilet the whole time cuz I gotta pee so bad but can't seem to get any relief no matter how many times I go.

One of these days I'm gonna wet the bed, and there'll be nothing I can do to stop it. Except maybe finish whatever book I'm reading before I fall asleep.

Anyway, American Idol starts this week, so thankfully I'll get some TV time in and balance out my life a little. Kids are good. Alive and well, if you were wondering.

PS. The potato book we're reading this month on SRBC is top notch. It's a good month to join us if you were thinking about it.

Face-lift

^^to be read in a sing-song voice.

So, you know that one Smart Remarks Book Club Blog that looks like a homeless person designed it? Well, the other day Landee suggested I redo the header. Like, take a new picture of that shelf in my office, but this time dust it off first, and remove the highlighters and wrappers and other debris, and then arrange all of the book club books we've read so far on the shelf.
^^whole paragraph to be sung. (tune of your choice)

I was on board right away, because it's an adorable idea, only problem, I was missing 9 out of 17 (yes, can you believe 17 books already!!!) of our books, due to my rich-person Kindle, which allows me to download digi-books instantly at the touch of a wand. Plus my neighbor had two of them. So, Landee goes, no prob, I'll take a pic of whatever books I have and you can photoshop them in.
^^sing all that too.

Sounds simple, eh? Maybe. But we practically spent an entire day coordinating photo shoots, discussing shadows and real light verses flash, and matching angles, and emailing pics back and forth, etc. Yeah, we took the whole thing vry srs.
^^sing it.

So, here we go from totally geek...

(old header, ya know)


To totally chic...

Like you fell into a rabbit hole and came out in heaven, eh?

Lots of those books weren't even on the shelf when I took the pic. Magical, ain't it? I can only take credit for arranging the pic, photo shopping in some of the books, adding a few shadows, adding those whimsical waves, and building the entire shelf (plus wainscoting) with my own two hands. Landee added more books and then actually made it look good. It was practically ugly when I email it to her. It had this weird vomit-like hue due to my lighting issues. She fixed the color, added some doilies of some sort, and picked the most perfect fonts (she's a master with fonts).

Only problem is, we're missing one of our books.<--singsong it. Neither of us had a hard copy. See if you can discover which one is missing. Winner gets everybody's favorite prize-->bragging rights.

Anyway, go see how fancy the SRBC blog looks now. We painted the walls in there too. I had hoped it would dry a shade lighter, but what are ya gonna do?

10

It's 10. Happy New Year!

This video is in the wrong decade. It's not old enough to be retro, just awkwardly outdated.

We had a great Christmas this year. Loved spending Christmas with my SIL, and we had a fun Christmas eve--Tony had his sister, and I had mine (Erin), and we had an awesome battle-of-the-siblings trivia game. I only took one lame picture (stuck someone in that video montage) and no group picture.

Anyway, I never got around to blogging this past week, and it all feels like old news now, so I'm just gonna leave it at that. As you can see, I got the three books I'd asked for for Christmas. So I started flipping through them a little, only intending to reminisce a little, and I ended up reading all three books over the weekend. I love them. If you haven't read them yet, I highly recommend you do. By Megan Whelan Turner. The first book might take a while to get into, but if you stick with it, the reward will be all the sweeter.

Speaking of sweet rewards, I finally met mi Internete' amigo, Flem. This is months and months (perhaps years?) in the making. Here's a badly angled picture as proof:

She is way cool, a virtual fountain of riveting-type information and conversation. Her Steve is super nice, and her kids are freakishly cute and funny. I highly recommend you become her Internet amigo (if she isn't already) and fandango a visit with her.

No holes

Merry Christmas!

Like sweaters for my feet...

Happy Christmas Eve!



I have the best friends in the world universe!
See above sweated feet? I wanted those sweater boots so badly, but they were all sold out here in Vegas (I told you this is a horrible place to live!), which only made me more obsessed with getting a pair. I checked online, and they were sold out. So I called all the stores in my surrounding states and they were sold out as well (all horrible places to live, too!).

I finally conceded defeat.

But then out of nowhere, Memzy found a random pair at her store in my size, and took time out of her busy busy day to ship them to me. Good, good friend. Thoughtful n' stuff. Can't thank her enough!

We had a quick visit from Markie and family, who were on their way to D-land, which is where they're spending Christmas this year, again. If you're wondering why he hasn't blogged much in the last few months, it's because of THIS, still. But he won a $75 Sears gift card, iPod speakers, and several more calls from various Disney princess, so...

Hope everyone has a jolly Christmas Eve!

Don't Move...

...cuz I just sent out my Christmas cards. I have this file of addresses on my compy that I print out for sending out Christmas cards, and I had to update about half of them. Apparently, 2009 was the year of The Move.

I also noticed that I am missing a few key addresses of a few key people, and I should have these addresses because I'm pretty sure I sent these key people cards last year. I'm trying to decide if I should track them down, or just let it go. What do you suggest? Keep in mind that these key people might be you. They for sure might be you.

Our Christmas card is a picture that you're familiar with that I photoshopped until it was practically unfamiliar, but not entirely unfamiliar. You'll think you've seen it before, but on second glance, you'll notice it's somehow different than you remembered. Fun, huh?!

I bought slightly bigger envelopes to send them in, cuz I thought maybe I'd glue them to some scrapbook paper and add some embellishments, sprinkle glitter into the envelope, etc. But no, when it came down to putting them together, I just stuck the slightly curled, hot-off-the-press 4x6s directly into the envelopes and tossed them haphazardly into the mail box. Some might have landed on the ground and some might have blown away in the wind, so that might be what happened if you don't get my card. Or I lost your addy.

Lastly, I haven't had a chance to blog in a while, so you might not know that my BSILF (Michelle--yay!!!) came down from the Portland area to spend Christmas with us. I suspect this is going to be the best Christmas ever!!! But I don't know how bloggy it will be. I'm thinking sparse, but I'll try. I'm also supposed to get various quick visits from surprise blog people (eeeekkk), as Las Vegas is a stopping place between two better places, so I'll try to keep you posted on all that too. We'll see.

You feeling it yet?

Christmas is about two three things.

#1. Baby Jesus

#2. Hershey's Kisses, studded with tiny bits of candy cane, Mmmm



#3. And snow



I feel like I'm forgetting something. Anyway, the problem with living in the brown dirty desert, is that we don't get any snow, unless reverse global warming occurs, and that's not going to happen this year. (It's 55 degrees today, with clear blue skies.)

BUT, did you know that if you drive a mere 20 minutes from my front door, you can get your pearl-toned '02 Suzuki XL7 stuck in a bank of snow, and have to be towed out by a giant snow shoveler-type truck?

Yes, 20 minutes. Real snow!

I'm talking about the majestic Mt. Charleston:


(Matterhorn pictured, but very similar looking.)

I don't go up to Mt. Charleston often if I can help it, cuz it's freakishly cold up there, but if I'm going to go up there, it's gonna be in December, on account of snow equaling Christmas spirit.

Last weekend, my sister and BIL (Erin & Scott) reserved a 4-person cabin up at Mt Charleston for themselves and my nieces (Maddie, and France), but Scott ended up having to work at the last minute, so Erin was kind enough to let my other niece (Emma) and me (Jenny) and my 3 kids (Cord, Gus, and Homer) all squeeze in his place. You do the math.

(I came up with 8 people in a 4 person cabin. Is that what you got?)

Well, the cabin was adorable, despite the broken fireplace and the spiders in the bathroom, and the lodge had a cozy restaurant with a big working fireplace right in the center, so for those reasons I must insist that you add "Get a cabin in December at Mt. Charleston" to your Bucket List, yo. Right after, "Stand in some quicksand."

We went sledding in an insufficient amount of outerwear, ate at that cozy restaurant, watched movies, DRANK! hot chocolate, and played games. It was fun and Christmasy and I feel a tiny bit guilty for mooching off of Erin & Scott, but I swear I'll return the favor some day.

Bummer thing is, I was worried about taking my phone (aka camera) out in the snow so I only got one picture and it's random and blurry, dangit:

You feeling the Christmas spirit yet?

Sec-tion-als!!!

My Annual Unattainable Christmas List

Last time I made an unattainable Christmas list, I ended up attaining pretty much everything on my list, so we're gonna try this again. It wasn't easy coming up with this stuff, as I already have every material possession known to man, including a Kindle, but here we go. A-hem.

#1. This bookcase with a built in cave that you can sit in.

^^OMG, I want to be her!!

#2. This magical upside-down bookshelf:

^^Look at those books just hanging there. This defies gravity and logic which is why I must have one.

#3. Good, sturdy socks without holes in them (except for the two holes at the top. bah-dum chick):

^^Are these man socks? I want the girl version. And in white.

#4. A staple gun:

^^If I had a dime for every time I've said, "If only I had a staple gun..." I'd be a multimillionaire. Why can't I get paid for making repetitive statements?!

#5. These three books:

^^This series is one of my all-time faves, and can you believe I borrowed them from the library? For shame. I need to own them. And read them in my bookcase-cave.

Plus, the fourth book comes out in April of 2010, so I need to reread them to prepare.

^^Yay!

#6. Um, more Diet Coke?



K, I'm grasping at straws here. Like I said, I have pretty much everything I could ever want except for that bookcase cave.



What's on your gizes unattainable Christmas list this year?

Huge! Important! News! Stories!

You know on Glee last night, how it was all about the principle not wanting to put the glee kids's pictures in the yearbook, because they always end up getting defaced by the other students?

Well, this local news story came on right after Glee, about this high school girl (pictured below), who is very upset right now, because her school is refusing to put her school picture in the yearbook.



Why are they refusing to put her picture in the yearbook, you ask? Well, because it looks like this:

I know, right? She looks waaay happy. What's the biggie?

But the REAL good news is that nobody was murdered yesterday, so FOX 5 News's breaking story was all about this high school girl's open-mouthed smile, and her weird half-side ponytail-rat ball. What this really adds up to is that crime is down, people!

In Hunger Games cake-makers news, our humble cake contest it still making the Twitter rounds. It really started to pick up Tweet-steam when Scholastic tweeted about it:

"#HungerGames fans! You MUST see this Hunger Games cake decoration contest of scenes from the book http://bit.ly/17gRQu. Tell us your fave."

But that's not all. The scholastic people mentioned our cake contest on their official-type blog, and gave us a link! But wait. Before you start shrugging, they mentioned our cake contest in THE same post where they made a huge official-type breaking-news announcement regarding book three:


^^That's right! They announced the release date for the much-anticipated book three in the HG series. Eeek!
(Notice that date is a whole week shy of one-year from when CF came out. Earlier than we thought. So go ahead and rip an extra 7 links from your construction paper count-down chain today.)

Read the scholastic post HERE. Notice that they call our contest "crazy." I think that's a compliment.<--said like a question. Hey, do you think this means Scollins might stumble upon our gloriously humble cakes someday? 'Twould be an honor, no?

We're Famous...

...well, ten of us are famous, at least. Mostly Landee, since her cake was featured.

What I'm talking about is: remember that humble Hunger Games cake decorating contest we had way back in September? Yeah, September is a big blur for me too, think hard. Or click that link. Anyhow, a few elite Hunger Games people, just like us, have found it and linked it to their way cooler HG-themed websites/blogs (Jabberjays.com and themockingjay.vndv.com). Plus, it's been twittered, so it's only a matter of time before Ashten Kutcher sees it.

You know what this means, right? Next year's cake contest is going to be not humble at all! It's gonna be way huger! So you better start drawing up your designs now, and... how do I say this gently?... perhaps take a cake decorating class or two? Ahem. Anyway, you have approx. 10 months to prepare if you're planning on entering next year, so you better get started now, K?

Wrapping up November

I've had so much to share this past week, but my biggest piece of news is that I felt soooo lazy that I couldn't even bring myself to blog, so I was totally in a catch 22.

On Monday, November 23rd, Tony and I had our 13th anniversary.
If you remember...
We forgot our 10th anniversary.
For our 11th anniversary, we gifted ourselves that fancy faux electric fireplace.
For our 12th anniversary, we gifted ourselves that fancy plasticy phone.
And for lucky number 13...
We gave each other a high five, and then congratulated each other on our cleverness for marring each other. We srsly deserve some honorary degree from some prestigious university or something.

Cord found out a last week that he got a part in his drama club's production of A Midsummer Night's Dream. He's playing Nick Bottom, the dude who ends up with a donkey head halfway through the play, which is the exact role he wanted, on account of the donkey head.

Lastly, I may be the last to know, but have you heard about THIS? Whoa.