Category: Life

Yay! My computer is fixed, thanks to my AWESOME computer-literate husband.

It was indeed a power supply issue. My old power supply was completely fried (and I mean that literally. The husband took it apart, because he digs examining the guts of these things, and it looked like it might have gotten so hot it melted a few components). My new power supply is a bit louder than my old one, but I’ll put up with the white noise if it means I have my computer back.

I am now making a backup of all of my emails. I don’t know why I haven’t gotten into the habit of making backups before now – I always make backups of my files, why haven’t I been making email backups? I get A LOT of email from clients, with important attachments, you would THINK I would know to make backups. Duh.

I use Outlook 2003, in case you’re curious. And I’m following these instructions to make backups in case you don’t know how to backup your own Outlook files. And let me tell you, if you haven’t made backups in a while, do it now before something happens and you’re left sweating and fretting because you can’t access your files for whatever reason.

On another note …

I mentioned that MK had to ring the Salvation Army bell today at the mall for his community service project at school. He was supposed to share the hour with two other classmates, only one other classmate showed up.

Tsk tsk.

Every single parking space was taken at the mall. We ended up parking across the street at a bank and walking 1/2 mile to his rendezvous point.

It was wall-to-wall people today. Seriously, there were so many people that you barely had enough room to walk. I felt severely claustrophobic.

And cold. Wow. It’s currently 10 degrees. When MK stood outside and rang the bell, it was in the 20’s – when it was over he said he couldn’t feel his face.

It was too cold for him to play his saxophone, so no video. Me, the husband and GD all walked around the mall waiting the hour out. I did end up buying more body lotion at Bath and Body Works – they had a special going on buy FIVE lotions for only $25.00.

ZOINK!

Oh, speaking of lotions, I bought some of the Udderly Smooth hand lotion (I found it at Wal-Mart, can you believe it?). I can already tell a HUGE difference!!!!! My hands are so, so soft and the redness is going away.

Many, many, MANY thanks to MommyTime at Mommy’s Martini for the suggestion!! I’m now a big udder fan. 😀

Do you ever get the feeling that your makeup is not right for your face but everyone is too nice to tell you?

I bought some brownish eye shadows recently, thinking it’s fall, time for some browns, and I’ve been wearing it for the past several days.

Only, after I really looked at it, and I mean really evaluated it, it looked like I had been zombified. My eyes looked sunken into my skull and red rimmed, like I had been crying in between bouts of rubbing them really hard.

In short, yuk. I couldn’t stand to look at myself, so I bought more of my normal eyeshadow: “Pure Romance” by Cover Girl. And I look like myself again – which is a good thing?

I’ve never been very good with makeup. Ever. And I’m way too cheap to spend money experimenting. I figure, if it looks decent, then I will use it until it’s gone. I might try another shade when it’s time to buy more, but overall, I get my money’s worth – whether I should or not.

But the browns … oy. I just couldn’t hack the look. It just didn’t “feel” like me.

Or maybe I’m just stuck in a rut and am used to seeing myself a certain way, who knows.

I learned how to put makeup on from my friend, Melissa. We met and worked together at Wendys and soon became roommates. She was a larger girl, but you never NOTICED her weight because she always looked fantastic. Her hair was perfect. Her clothes were perfect. She always smelled amazing. And her makeup would put a makeup artist to shame.

She was pretty. She was put together. And she knew what she wanted in life. I was jealous of her.

I watched her. Not in a stalker-ish sort of way, but when she wasn’t looking. I would watch her get ready in the morning and make note of how she applied her eye makeup. It was fascinating to watch her swish one color on one part of her lid and another seemingly incompatible color on another part of her lid and it always worked. I think this might have been before they even made the shadows that came with different colors, she would mix and match single colors, which was even more impressive, in my book.

I had only been using one color on my lids up to that point. Again, I was a makeup virgin, and I still am, in a lot of ways. I don’t wear lipstick and in fact, lipstick just sort of … mystifies me. For instance, how do you KEEP it on? Anytime I’ve worn lipstick, it’s cracked and gathered in the folds of my lips and before long, it looks like a child colored my lips, in the dark. And how in the world do you choose which color looks best on you? I mean, you only have one shot, right? You buy the tube, you get home, you try it and you hate it.

Great, $5.00 down the drain.

But back to the eyeshadow. I wore one color and that was it. I wore makeup, but you would never know it. So, I started experimenting and when Melissa noticed I was interested, she coached me.

I looked better. I felt better. And I followed her advice.

That was back in the late 80’s.

I don’t feel like my makeup has changed much since that era. Every time I think I need to modernize and I try something, it just looks ridiculous, like I’m TRYING too hard. And in fact, I guess I was.

So when I finally found a color combination that looked decent on me, I’ve been loathe to try anything else. This works, why go through the headache of trying different colors or shades?

I used to (actually, I sort of still do), laugh at women who give advice on day makeup, or night makeup, or date makeup, or light makeup, or seasonal makeup …

It all just seems like a waste of money to me. It’s the same face, does the different makeup really make that much of a difference?

But what do I know about makeup?

Nothing. And that’s my point.

So, you think I’m exaggerating about our crazy weather, don’t you.

Take a gander at the drastic temperature drop from Sunday to Monday:

Since early Monday morning? Our temperatures haven’t been above freezing. Though our main roads are clear, our roads, our neighborhood roads are like marble – there’s absolutely no traction whatsoever – it’s like driving on an ice rink.

And yet, people continue to speed through our neighborhood. And yes, there have been wrecks. I don’t understand how people can be so arrogant to think that they are somehow exempt from icy roads. Or that just because they drive a big truck, they won’t slide around like every other poor mortal being who drives a smaller car. Honestly, are people THAT stupid?

Never mind, I don’t think I want to know.

The big story in our area right now is about a three-year old Amish girl who survived over 10 hours in this frigid weather. Some call it a miracle, others are calling it “lucky.”

I personally don’t believe in luck.

The story is: An Amish father and daughter were on their way home. The father placed the little girl into the horse and buggy and went to get in himself, only something spooked the horse and the animal took off, with the little girl.

The girl fell out of the buggy and no one could find her.

If you will look at the above temperature chart? This happened Sunday night. Temperatures started dropping at noon and went from 61 degrees to 18 degrees shortly after dark.

The girl didn’t have much outerwear on because at the time she was on her way home, it wasn’t that cold. And she had lost a shoe during the fall.

So, a three-year old girl, with virtually no protection – no coat, no hat, and only one shoe – somehow survived bitter cold temperatures (let’s not forget about the biting north wind and sleet [so now she’s wet with virtually nothing to help sustain her body temperature] because yes, we woke up Monday morning to ice) for some strange reason, and no logical explanation, was found to be in perfect health and didn’t die of hypothermia.

Wow. What a lucky little girl.

Bullcrap.

God was watching after that little girl. There’s no other explanation. When her family couldn’t find her they notified the authorities and after the story went public and dozens of people began praying for that little girl, she was found, quite by accident (by a passing motorist who happened to see the little girl curled into a fetal position in the ditch), cold, scared and hungry, but otherwise physically fine.

The comments on this news story just, well, they make me sad. It must be TORTURE to go through life not believing in God or in His wonderful power. How depressing it must be to live a life in darkness where nothing goes right and there is no hope. What an utterly sad way to live life.

It’s so sad, and so unnecessary, when a better, more rewarding life is just within reach if we just CHOOSE to reach out and take it.

*sigh*

I thank God that little girl is safe. One more life has been snatched back from our enemy – death.

Thank you, Heavenly Father. You’re awesome.

There’s been a lot of talk about taking kids to see Santa this week.

And a lot of bloggers have shared their Santa pictures with us – the good and the bad (though the bad ones weren’t all that bad, they’re bad in a cute and funny way).

Though I would love to jump on the band wagon and share my Santa pictures with you …

… I can’t. Because I don’t have any.

Wait. That’s not true, I have one. This one:

This is GD when he was six weeks old. He had decided to keep the nurses busy in NICU for the first six weeks of his life – he’s such a ladies man. 😉

Since my oldest son spent the first Christmas of his life in the hospital, Santa took pity on the boy and came to visit him.

Unfortunately, I wasn’t there to witness the visit. Santa happened to visit during one of the rare times I had actually gone home and taken a shower (actually, I was told to go home and take a shower – I seem to recall a nurse spraying a lot of Lysol and then pushing me out the door while holding her nose. I can’t imagine what that was about but you know, that whole time period is a blur so just go with it).

A kind nurse took this picture and handed it to me when I stepped through the NICU door. I was both delighted that they went to the trouble of making my little boy feel special on Christmas day and sad because I had missed it.

But I was used to having my emotions teetering-tottering from one extreme to another during that time period so I took it in stride.

But that was the last time GD ever went near Santa Claus.

It wasn’t through my lack of trying, I assure you. I took both boys to the mall several times and tried to coax, and yes, even bribe them to go sit on Santa’s lap but neither boy wanted anything to do with him.

Nothing. At. All.

I blame myself. I got so into the whole Santa story that I sort of glamorized Santa to the point he had been put on a pedestal and though not exactly God-like, he was certainly an impressive figure in my boys’ eyes. They had no trouble talking about Santa, or making lists for Santa, but when it came time to face Saint Nick and look him in the eye, they would totally freeze.

I’ll never forget those young years when we would be walking through the mall and pass the Santa station. I would inevitably plead with them to at least go stand beside Santa so I could get a picture, but their backs would stiffen and they would stand ram-rod straight and without so much as moving an eye muscle, they would stare straight ahead and pretend the man didn’t exist every time we got close to him.

When they couldn’t see him anymore, they broke their stone mold and returned to normal.

It was a bizarre reaction, to say the least. After so many years of trying and so many years of putting up with statue-like sons, I gave up.

Now, of course, they are way too old to be sitting on Santa’s lap and in fact if they did, I would be very worried about them.

So, no Santa pictures. My boys simply weren’t interested. I’m guessing they felt embarrassed and intimidated being near someone so … awesome.

And again, it’s partly my fault. I used to make SUCH a big deal about Santa. He really did become legendary in our household.

In fact, I remember when the boys were in grade school and we tracked Santa’s Christmas Eve progress on NORAD. If you’re not familiar with this site – they post a video, every hour (?) on Santa’s progress around the world Christmas Eve – you really must check it out. Children eat this stuff up.

It was really quite exciting and I confess, I found myself really getting into the game just by my sons’ reactions. When Santa got close to our region, the boys went ballistic and DEMANDED to go to bed because they didn’t want Santa to pass them by.

GD was especially worked up and we tease him about that to this day. But his enthusiasm was so much fun to feed and watch.

Today, the boys know the truth, of course. At least, I think they know the truth, we’ve never actually discussed it. And when they’ve asked me point blank, I’ve always said, “I don’t know about your friends, but Santa will always come to this house, no matter how old you are.”

I tell them that because, well, my mom told us that when we were kids. In fact, she STILL says that. And though it sounded cheesy and I rolled my eyes, I secretly loved it. There was something so … comforting to know that magic was still alive.

They never see their gifts until Christmas morning. And though they’ve laughed, scoffed, and made snide remarks about “Santa”, they’ve refused to allow me to strike a deal with Santa and go ahead and put their presents under the tree.

See? Even as teenagers, they still desire that little bit of magic.

My boys have always known the real reason behind Christmas, of course. But believing in Santa was just a fun, exciting diversion and there was something so … magical about believing in Santa.

My sisters-in-law didn’t allow their children to believe in Santa. They told them the truth as soon as they were old enough to understand what Santa was. I never agreed with that philosophy but I never said anything about it – after all, that was their decision.

And they were always very supportive in our desire to allow our children to believe in Santa by watching what they said around my boys. In fact, my nieces and nephews even went along with the game for my boys’ benefit.

And I appreciated the effort. But then my nieces and nephews would turn their backs and roll their eyes and it broke my heart, just a little, that they were so cynical at such a young age. To me, they had been denied a very special part of childhood.

But again, that’s my opinion. Everyone has the right to do what they think is right for their family.

But for my family? Santa will always come and visit because it’s FUN to savor that little bit of magic.

And perhaps I’M not quite ready to give up that magic, either.

You know what’s great about blogging?

You can password-protect posts.

Whenever I start feeling burned out on blogging (and who wouldn’t posting two/three times a day! And you only THOUGHT you could shut me up! HA!), I write a password-protected post.

My audience shifts. I’m no longer writing to faceless friends, but to my family, to people who know me in real life. I use real names, I express real emotions and I’m free to write whatever the hell I want to write without fear of repercussions.

And it gives me a chance to slice open my heart and let it bleed. It’s messy but oh so therapeutic.

Take yesterday for example. I felt so b*tchy, so aggressive, so IMPATIENT. I realize some of this has to do with hormones but some of it … I don’t know, I felt like a tea kettle that had been left to boil for too long. I just felt tense and on edge.

So, I did what I always do – I exercised, hard. My frustrations oozed out of my pores and it felt good, really, really good.

And I watched “The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants” on the treadmill.

It wasn’t the story, per se, that had me bawling my eyes out, but the friendship factor. I’ve never had that. And will likely never have that closeness with another female. I don’t know. I’m different – females GRATE on my nerves for some reason.

But I’m not here to analyze why I think I’m like that – I wrote that in my password-protected post. I’m just here to say that ever since I’ve been writing these private posts? I just FEEL so much better. I feel … more exposed, in a secret sort of way.

I know it doesn’t make sense. But that’s about the only way I know how to explain it at this point.

I’m not stifled, I don’t feel suffocated, I can just BE me.

So, if you’re feeling the blogging-blues, write a private post. Say what you WANT to say as opposed to what you THINK others want you to say. It’s cathartic.

And I’m betting it helps you get over the blogging-blues.