candy

since the magnificent eve of 4 November 2008, one thing has prayed heavily on my mind. no, not the name of the future presidential puppy and whether it would be a rescue dog. nor whether Obama prefers to write with a blue or a black pen (surely not a red pen...?) nor whether Obama has a bicycle and if so, where does he ride it to and what color is it....

nope, my burning question: which candy would he select as his official presidential candy of choice? i have searched high and low for months on end for this information and am still at a loss for the answer.

here you can see m&ms which are left over from Bush's days and jelly bellies (Reagan's choice) but no new officially endorsed Obama candy :|

there is something in a red packet that is impossible to make out... surely not beef jerky? do people consider beef jerky to be candy? i sometimes see it in the candy aisle and that is just wrong and tragic for those who think of it as candy :( anyway, i must do some further checking on the internet to find out this important political information or i just know i will NOT be sleeping tonight.

i did find out during my lengthy (7 minutes of) research that Obama loves salted caramels too. i wonder if he tried a salted caramel cupcake yet, they are quite delicious :)

anyway... quite undelicious - the BBC America documentary last night: 'my 100,000 lovers' :| i watched in shock and horror covering my eyes and fast forwarding when necessary, but did hear one woman say she had 100,000 intimate encounters (i am guessing this is where they got the eye-catching title) :| i even did the math on my calculator given her daily rate (15 x 7 days x 52 weeks x 18 years....) and sure enough it comes to 98,280 :| i guess she added another 1,720 for unusually flirty days :) it quite put me off my burnt maple syrup pork sausages that i had been looking forward to for dinner all day :| tisk tisk.

off to the land of nod... it's already dark here (at 7:58pm) and dumbass school starts in the morning... so i am guessing that summer might be coming to an end :(

more complete randomness....

i keep losing a VERY IMPORTANT piece of paper over and over today. everytime i lose it, it's like the end of the world all over again. and then when it finally turns up, i put it somewhere safe for security reasons, and when i go to get it, it's gone again. the piece of paper contains a top secret recipe that i am keeping here under lock and key for my own resources, no peeking:)

• mix together peanut butter and cornflakes in a bowl
• shape into balls (it says balls, hehe)
• roll in crushed graham crackers
• enjoy! repeat from step one ;)

i really wanted a fried egg with a burnt pork sausage for dinner but instead i had all bran with granola. now i am craving the freaking fried egg all over again and a piece of burnt toast :(

someday i want to go to here! or at least just fly over this big pink bunny:



someday i want to go to hong kong too.

look at all these!! look at them!!
sure some are terrifying and garish but imagine - i bet there is an entire MALL devoted to Monchhichi monkey, if this is just a sampling!!! heaven on earth.



Danny's cure for the hiccups in a picture:

everything is possible

last night on our date we went to my most favorite mall ever, the mission viejo mall. there was a big sign saying "farrell's this way" but alas it wasn't yet open. i am cautiously excited because while i am dying to go in, the place makes me sick with nerves. the big booming terrifyingly LOUD drum and horns and whistles and things going off ALL THE TIME with no warning... crowds of organic children tasting sugar and additives for the first time, overmedicated parents with dulled senses of what's annoying about their kids, balloons popping left and right.... and farrell's is in the FOOD COURT : i don't like to dine in foods courts (nor al fresco. nor at carls jr/bk/chickfila/tacobell/jack in the box/pinkberry/sprinkles/wahoos/rubios/arbys) definitely NO food courts. not even for adorably ridiculous pig's trough desserts ;)

my shrinky dink obsession continues to grow expedentially ;) having read the instructions all the way through, i have invested in some 'artist colored pencils' as used by 'artists' such as myself :) i will report back on whether the $3 colored pencils work better than the $350 set : i didn't spend that much.... i spent $10 and ummed and ahhed for a good half hour about that :

i want this book. and i want this book too but i can't decide which one i want more : i am wondering if i should just get socks and gloves instead of just gloves because we don't have that many gloves laying around with it being 91 degrees on any given day of the year. and i can already imagine myself buying gloves just to make cute creatures out of.... on the other hand, i generally find single socks feeling all lost and forlorn and it would be awesome to be able to give them some sense of purpose and selfworth again.




did i mention this little rattie caravan was a penny on clearance...? one cent - uhuh!! and Jerry REFUSED to leave it because he loves it sooooo much???! but he HAD to leave because i was afraid silver spray paint might be bad for him....







the big 300mm telescope (with poorly fitted hood) on the left next to the puny 70-200mm and 50mm.

it's official

i hate the 300mm f2.8. that thing is HEAVY and MEAN and the lens cap is really hard to get on and off which is soooo annoying. i'm saving my $4k for something nicer ;)

the secret lives of women is so hopelessly confusing and not fun to watch... it SHOULD be compulsive viewing, it has all the right ingredients, but it just isn't. they flit between three different stories and this is me.... i can't possibly keep up - one woman has been shot on her lawn, one woman is being held hostage in a salt lake city library and another one had her legs ripped off by a fish fileting machine in Alaska and needs them amputated stat. this is TOO HARD, this is supposed to be my downtime and i'm NOT having any fun :

craving salted caramel and chocolate all over again. what to do about that...

off to make more shrinky dinks (hopelessly addicted....), paint a little caravan silver and delete this series recording. secret lives of women people - you suck!!!!!!!

complete randomness

i don't really like the new pope. that's his name around here, 'the new pope'. sure i have his picture on my fridge but i never look at his eyes, they look small, judgmental and beady to me. the old pope was 'the nice pope who wore bono sunglasses', i liked him just fine, he had much kinder eyes.

i don't really like Tim McGraw either... he seems like a bit of a tool to me and i bet he has a big booming center-of-attention voice like most other southern gentlemen ;) the fictional Atticus Finch being the notable exception...

can't decide which beach to go to. but i AM taking my stripy beach chair with me and i AM taking the 300mm f2.8 hubble telescope :)

i am somewhat intrigued by paulette macarons. but not enough to drive to Beverly Hills. i wonder if they taste like most overpriced, but very attractive line-out-the-door stuff like sprinkles... a little stale and a lot overrated. i'm admittedly hard to please (though Susiecakes always does)


must get ready, pack sodas and fruit (healthy;) and go! it's a beach day xox

at the park

... tonight. my favorite park with my favorite people :)

dreamt last night
that my neighbor had a terrifying stalker. everytime i looked out the window there he was, watching her. then, gasp, i recognized him as her hubbie :| i have no clue what this means and whether i should warn her that her husband is watching her all the time :|

made
shrinky dinks with the boys... how i love shrinky dinks and now i have read the instructions to the end, the rapid shrinking/curling/burning-my-hands-trying-to-press-them-flat process isn't quite so traumatic anymore:)

bought
50 colored pencils (for more shrinky dink designs:)... 13 bottles of diet coke... 17 boxes of cereal at target... oh and one bottle of black nail polish :|

went
to the english pub with my children for lunch. they ordered pints of root beer and fish and chips :)

called
a million camera stores looking for a 135mm f/2.0 - i could not find it anywhere and i felt very very sad :(

finally rented
the 300mm f/2.8. oh em gee. it makes the 70-200mm f/2.8 feel like a 50mm :| and it's soooo embarrassing to carry. but ohhhh the bokeh.... it's almost worth $4000 (yes... please don't let me drop that beast) and having a curved spine from carrying it/hanging head in total embarrassment for that bokeh....

ate
honey bunches of oats and almonds (i wonder if i got that right... that sounds too hard to say) for dinner.... it's one of those nights, a little jeff lewis, a little housewives, a little blackberry cheesecake icecream for dessert, a little more shrinky dink shopping and my favorite hubbie and fluffy pillow to snuggle up with xox

handle with care

before we got our rats i thought they were ugly, creepy and gross... greasy sewer dwelling creatures that weren't worth anyone's attention or love.

we were in petsmart one day checking out the supercool robohamsters when a girl and her mom came over with a pathetic sad looking rat wrapped up in a towel... it looked like it was about to die and the mom told me they were there to see the petsmart vet (which seemed soooo odd to me - it was just a rat ) and that if we were looking at hamsters as pets, we would do so much better with a rat. hmm i thought, that's all very well if you're a crazy rat lady but that scaly tail gives me the heebie jeebies and surely their teeth are infectious and the sound they make when they scamper makes my flesh creep. my boys were a little afraid too, but polite as always, we went and checked out the sad looking rat and sure enough, she was very sweet, made no attempt to maim me with her rabid teeth and i even stroked her scaly tail which she curled around my hand as if to say a gentle hello :)

my boys fell in love with her. they wanted a rat and they wanted one badly. they begged. they cleaned the car and garage. they made daily rat chore charts. they walked dogs and replenished our sodas and emptied trashcans. less than 24 hours later, we had two rats, one for each boy :| within a week we lost Ben to pneumonia :( my boys were absolutely heartbroken and i thought getting rats was a really really dumb idea.

however... it's been a month and i realize how completely wrong my first impression of these animals was :( rats are the friendliest, gentlest, cleanest, most trusting, loyal little pets any child could wish for. they give back so much love and have such trust in the little hands caring for them - never a single nip no matter how overzealous the handling gets :) they are funny and adorable - they sleep on their backs with their paws in the air like little dogs. i think every child should have a pet rat - to teach kindness, acceptance, empathy and trust and that first impressions can be so very very wrong. i love you, sweet Jerry-Berry and Teddy-Bear (and i hope you are happily settling into your (third) new cage as i type:)

Sam & Teddy

Danny and Jerry-Berry

little rays of happiness

i l-o-v-e l-o-v-e l-o-v-e l-o-v-e the president

for sooo many reasons... but most simply because he's a human being with a heart and a soul and a conscience (the twinkling eyes and sensible politics are just a really nice bonus :) he actually sends me personal emails (TO ME ONLY - they are NOT group emails ;) and calls me 'carol' which i admit kind of bugs me but i do write in lowercase, so i think that confused him from the get-go. he just sent me an email (to no-one else, i am quite sure of it) lamenting the passing of Teddy Kennedy... he writes a bloody good email for a man, had me all kerklempt. i am sending a note back letting him know we decided Teddy is a much cuter and more fitting name for our lovely new rattie, i am sure he will be delighted with the beautiful rat portrait i attached too :)

i told Sam about the passing of Ted Kennedy and he immediately knew him as the man from Cape Cod, the man whose backyard we played in on our day in Boston, and last but not least, the very nice man who gave Obama's kids a puppy :) Sam suggested Teddy would be a fitting name and tribute and i think it's adorable. Dumbo was just too dumb (and disney) for such a fine strapping young rat :)

i'm listening to beatles love again. and again. and again and trying to decide whether we should take Danny to the cirque du soleil show for his 5th birthday... we took Sam when he was 5 and he still talks about it to this day :) i dream of joining the circus and being lucy (... in the sky with diamonds) someday when i grow a little lot taller and get a little lot thinner and lose my fear of heights and flying through the air with the greatest of ease, suspended by just a ribbon wound around one ankle :)

sigh it's been a busy and fun day - i even found a box full of supercute hand-me-downs from Sam to Danny and more overalls and checkered shirts, just in time for apple picking pictures :) off to bed early with 'the hubbie' to watch dragons den and talk more trash about the awful american version 'shark tank'. we watched it last night and i am sure it sparked those awful plane crash dreams. it was awful. just awful.

they're dogsitting for Grandma and Grandpa :)


our adorable playdates for today









they played with Jerry all day long - Jerry loved the attention and went to bed very very tired but oh so happy :)

huuuge sighh

totally exhausted
from a night full of so-realistic-the-whole-room-seemed-to-jolt dreams about planes crashing, buildings falling and fiery infernos at Atlanta airport...
a) so glad i am not flying today
b) hoping it simply means this week's real housewives of atlanta will be super explosive :)

loving
gazing at these sublime midcentury home pictures taken in the mid century


a little bit sunkissed but in a good glowy way
from our day at the beach

hosting
a rattie playdate today!! i cannot wait! i have to have a 'pet talk' today about NOT pooping on our friends :)

loving
that i found a very good home for my 40D camera remote!! i love when that happens <3

cringing
over words like delicious, yummy, creamy and crunchy when used to describe pictures. and don't even get me started on lickable. ick x a million and then some

noticing in passing
that on facebook the very same people do the very same things as each other, posting the same viral links and playing the same games :) it's like a little petri dish full of different strains of personality and completely fascinating to gaze into once in a while :)

they ARE the dinosaurs

beach kid

Steph is christmas newsletter worthy, along with seeing our wonderful new president in the flesh, getting rats and buying a purple beach cruiser :)

wrestling that many under 5s is not easy, notice all the ritz crackers :)

but when you just want the mommies they all coming running back :)

the kids fell in love with this little dog Puffy (or that is the name they gave her ;)

do NOT read if you hate cattiness

thank heavens for that! alicia is gone from dance your ass off, i have endured that woman's awful emotional meltdowns for 8 weeks straight. i am catty and mean and admit openly to all of the above (and by reading you relinquish your rights to be judgmental about it;) but gawd ... crying every single week after cavorting around with 'toddler and tiara-esque' over-animated facial expressions - enough!! i can endure no more of it! the final nail in her coffin was when she won the phone call home and DID NOT give it to Ruben (my top pick, costume designer for cirque du soleil in las vegas no less:) so he could call his dying freaking boyfriend. seriously, it was all over for you that night, lady. the hex was officially in place when you selfishly called your MOM and didn't give a hoot about Ruben.


so in the quiet madness of my mind i started to fantasize that Michael Jackson is posthumously reading my blog :) i don't mind one iota - in fact if you're reading MJ, hi! i always thought you were innocent, i liked your nose before and after, and p. s. my kids absolutely adore you and your music :) but it makes me wonder... do i go to ET and sell my exciting story???! what if he is alive and desperately reaching out to me to help him?? it kept me up last night. wondering if he is a blackberry or iphone kind of person... i am guessing iphone.... but definitely not a mac person in general ;)

off to the beach. with my fancy new beach chair. please please please foreign nanny in hideous jean jacket (at the beach??) with no idea about personal space: DO NOT sit next to me again... honestly, forget the questions about George Washington on the INS citizenship test... there should be REAL questions about how to act in public. for example:
Q: how many feet of personal space should i leave between me and my neighbor at the beach?
A: at least 3!!!!! NEVER LET YOUR BEACH TOWEL TOUCH YOUR NEIGHBOR'S BEACH TOWEL. that is grounds for murder in America ;)

back later with pictures xox

monday things

drove
to 5 - count em - FIVE walmarts today :| in search of the perfect stripy little beach chair to tote down to baby beach tomorrow

found
it finally after checking 700 other stores on top of the 5 walmarts, targets, riteaids and big lots.... at CVS... thank heavens for drugstores! that chair is sure comfy!! and the backrest has 5 positions so i can lie down or sit up depending on my mood :) and did i mention it was $7.50??!

shared
thrifty's cotton candy icecream with Danny... it really tastes like cotton candy and contains an entire bottle of pink and blue food coloring in each scoop :)

ate
far far far too many pretzel goldfish for lunch. like a whole sack full :| but they're so good and so crunchy!! they just need to be dipped in chocolate or caramel (or both!) and sea salt poured all over them. and maybe bigger too ;)

planned
on going to bed early but it's already late. sigh, damn you clock!

pics from our day out...

arrgghhh!!!

why???!!! my children have submersed all their army men and dinosaurs into cups of water and frozen them all solid. now they are hacking perilously at the ice with scissors and knives (my worst nightmare) and running hot water over them (there is an orderly line of toys waiting to be defrosted) in order to set them free...

i should be grateful to finally have a shelf of my fridge back - it has been full of dixie cups with icicles hanging off them and sad looking heads sticking out the top... but all this is happening slightly to the left of the kettle. so can i make a second cup of coffee? nope :|

also troubling on this monday morn... i will NEVER EVER understand why when i press print i come back an hour later to retrieve my printed items only to find that i have to press print all over again. MEN!! i know this is the work of men with lanyards, spectacles and greasy thinning hair. i already said print - so just do it!! and my itunes are all messed up again. seriously do NOT stand between me and my 352nd play of 'blame it on the boogie'...

off to right the world's wrongs again... to that romantic hillside village of "Temecula" today, oolala! followed by "Winco"... where everyone's a winner (i so should be writing ads.... ;)

laguna beach

the park (duh)

the arboretum. they said no posing... this isn't what they mean by posing... right?

always sometimes

always
searching for the perfect something.... right now my list is:

• perfectly cool set of eastern king sheets
• girl monchhichi with bib
• size 6 worn-out osh kosh overalls
• an easy going not-at-all-fancy macaroon recipe

sometimes
wondering why someone living deep inside a Los Angeles cemetery reads my blog... the stat counter reader map can be a very troubling resource :|


waiting
for the oven to ping. i made bread and butter pudding with the leftover homemade bread

wondering
exactly how long it takes for 3 chewmonkey-chewmonkeys (monchhichis in 4 year old-eze) to be driven from Valencia to South Coast Plaza :) i called puzzle zoo and they said no sign of them yet. honestly. i know the 405 is horrible but a week???!

otherwise thankful
to be home alone with just MJ for company and absolutely no fingerprints on the windows to stress over. blood pressure = 110/70. and the pudding is ready :)

my lunchdate: ruby club sandwich with the bacon on the side and one kid burger

ben and jerry <3


rats on skateboards are very hard to command eye contact from and basically a motion blur :|

and some rats refuse to even try and need lessons :|


you wanna piece a him?