guilty of sometimes forgetting to remember every little thing...

but i really am grateful for:

• datenights - and sweet friends/family make them happen :)

• fresh flour tortillas - and sweet friends who bring them to the house after you casually mention how much you love them

• peace in the house after a very, very full week of playdates and overscheduling

• dinner with my honey at our favorite Mexican restaurant where the staff are sweet and attentive and the food is sooooooooooo good :)

• my iphone and the myriad of purse items it is able to replace - camera, flip camcorder, calculator, book, pedometer, watch, word search book, air hockey table (yes i used to keep one in my purse), flash cards, crappy old phone that never stays charged, pen and notepad, kid toys, ipod with permanently 98% flat battery, pocket-sized amazon.com for reviews/price checks, badly scribbled down piles of directions and addresses, coupons, store reward cards, recipes to shop for, etc etc etc. if only it was a lip balm too... and a credit card :)
  

• the new drumset :) playing the drums is hard!!! i almost earned a little respect for Ringo Starr - almost... then i remembered this video :)

• occasional glimpses of the sparkling pacific ocean

• pale pink peonies

• fake lakes in the middle of little tuscan inspired shopping centers

• estate sales - T minus 2.5 hours until the one around the corner. it's sinister and terrible to admit, but i really hope it's the former home of a formerly alive person... estate sales of dead people yield the most fascinating 'i was using this face cream, then i died' kind of curios. and sad items like unwanted grandparents' day gifts and photo albums...

ok grateful, back to grateful not spooky.... i am grateful for:

• living in Orange County... i am so hopelessly grateful for this everytime i attempt to drive inland on the 91 freeway

• a car that is reliable and safe and perfect for kids, and unpretentious and attitude-free and sensible

• my GPS which i would so hopelessly be lost without (the iphone GPS isn't quite as helpful and kind to me though it has the red freeway thing so i know that the 91 will be dead-stopped :)

• Trader Joe's perfectly fudgy slightly salted brownies, which save me from ever going near a ridiculously overpriced, obnoxious gourmet bakery EVER AGAIN!!!
  

• Fastrak - to facilitate my love for private stretches of highway with no-one on them :)

• DKNY cashmere mist

• never having been 'the other woman' (how i hate Rielle Hunter and all she represents)
  

• having a TV/DVD/DVR with just OUR shows in the bedroom

• parking in the garage and how easy it makes life with children

and everything else in between: checkered summer shirts, gappy smiles, Danny asking to go to the arboretum, Michaels coupons' used on tubes of sharks to reward really good little boys, fingerpainting with a baby, i love mom pjs, snapshots, taking photographs for fun, diet coke, good hair days, a full tank of gas, mcdonalds caramel frappes, linen paper, Vegas, apple pie, etc etc etc :)

beatles, sluts and canoes

so we didn't get the Beatles Rock Band after all... even though it DID have the very special Hofner bass and microphone stand that we positively NEEEED in order to sing harmonies... because the stupid person on craigs list's stupid wife let her stupid coworker have it. i know - what on earth????? surely i can sue these people for getting my hopes up like this, and then dropping me like a stone...? for the emotional distress, surely?? it's just ridiculous, i don't know how some people sleep at night, i really don't....

but... we did get a big red boat instead :) and our boys are pretty happy :) and i must admit you can go places and do things in a boat that you can't do with a plastic guitar and fake drums. so it's all good... but i really hope the above-mentioned people CANNOT SLEEP TONIGHT!!!

speaking of sleeping at night and not being able to... or just generally sleeping with anyone 'hot' wearing a wedding band... Rielle Hunter. oh deary me - what a confused mess she is. but i love confused messes like Rielle Hunter!!! so i'm off to watch the second half of Oprah and savor every sleazy dirty-bitch minute of it :)

oh em gee!!

i have been obsessively F5ing the video games section of craiglook for what feels like months searching for the Beatles Rock Band entire band kit since it's completely hopelessly VHTF for wii people. now i have found it :| right here in sunny Southern California :| (and i was willing to drive as far as South Carolina to pick it up...)

but suddenly i wonder... do i really really NEED it? i mean i know i want it... but is it shallow and lame to fork out a bunch of money for a fake guitar because it looks like a hofner bass? of course i want it!!! drums sound fun, right? i want blisters on my fingers too!! i want to throw down my hofner and take over the drums during the 'carry that weight' drum solo.... but i am suddenly consumed with second thoughts about the whole major commitment of plastic crap that makes the house look like one of those houses you see on Wife Swap with uncirculated air, closed blinds and pasty inhabitants with Boo Radley eyes who eat swanson tv dinners and have laundry piled up on their dining table... i don't want to be that person!! but i want that game!!!

what to do....? hope it's sold already so i can stop turning it over in my head...? if it isn't sold, it's meant to be, right?! and i will just make a rule to always always keep the windows and blinds open :)

sigh - i am sadly addicted to cornflake cakes. i am sure they are healthy, right? they are just chocolate chips melted with cornflakes.... how many calories can that possibly be? i really do regret having them for breakfast though... that wasn't smart as now the whole day is in ruins and i will eat horribly all day :(

off to Yorba Linda this morning - they don't call it the land of gracious living without good reason.... and their Michaels had BETTER have my "EZ display kid art frames" :|

one more reason Nancy Botwin bugs me :

she can crawl through a tunnel... from the basement of Maternity World in San Ysidro... and WALK - TO MEXICO (which is a loooooong way), get drugged into a stupor by the Mayor of Tijuana, pass out for days and STILL manage to somehow find her way back home, without having her children repossessed by CPS... but i can't keep track of my car keys without losing them at least 50 times in a 24 hour period.

did you know Nancy Botwin (in real life) was originally considered for the role of Susan Meyer in Desperate Housewives? only one woman bugs me more than Nancy Botwin - and that's Susan Meyer :| whenever there's an explosion - or a plane crash - or a serial killer on the loose on Wisteria Lane, i cross my fingers and toes so hard that it will kill off Susan Meyer. but she is like a cockroach - nothing kills her off :(

did you also know Nancy Botwin's (in real life) husband left her when she was 7 months' pregnant for Claire Danes... who now has minus 100 points on my scoreboard. i feel a little less hostile towards Nancy Botwin (in real life) since reading that....

did you also know the top of Matthew Perry's right middle finger was amputated by a door? i never noticed that on 'friends'....

did you also know Marilyn Monroe had six toes?? i am not sure i really believe this - it seems like a far-fetched tall tale to me.... ok, enough showbiz trivia...

today's news:

finally found something to use my free $10 Kohls card on before it expired - i got some much-needed pillow mist and a mysterious product called 'liquid pajamas'. i tried it on my hands they felt like satin pajamas instantly :)

went to two Michaels looking for the "EZ display kid art frames" that are on the website so why are they not in any of the stores??? honestly i am not stupid - i asked one woman named 'Sadie' (who was not sexy at all) and she swore blind that some lame plastic frame she was holding (with no mat in it like the one in the picture on the website) was the one i was looking for, by clicking her big plastic french manicured nails on it repeatedly - even though it clearly wasn't... so the Michaels roadshow continues in the morning....

made 24 chocolate rice crispie/coconut/cornflake cakes and ate 2 (so far :)

received sun dresses from Lands End... now i will get to see if growing an entire inch in height means i no longer have to order 'petite' and am now considered 'regular' by American standards... will report back after tearing apart the hundreds of plastic bags to get to the goodies ;)

am a little too scratchy and snotty to sing with the Beatles tonight... so i am off to just watch Aaron play guitar on medium.....

i like

playing pizza parlor with Danny - although he gives away all his food for free, because he is just that kind of guy :)

i have

a stinky cold which requires me to go everywhere with an entire box of tissues :[

i ate

two chocolate cornflake cakes with coconut and sea salt for breakfast :)

i am telling myself

that it's technically a good breakfast because of the cereal and fruit...right?

i lost

my stupid asshole car keys in Albertsons. after enlisting the help of every staff member to check every single aisle, i found them in the stupid asshole side compartment of my bag ;)

i went to the store

for hot dog buns and couldn't find the bread aisle despite searching the store looking for those derned keys for another 15 minutes after checking out :[

which means only one thing...

fish sticks for dinner tonight instead :)

i am really really really tired of

passive aggressive people

i don't like

"nobama" people either. i only have one word to say to them: "yesbama" :)

i really wish

i could go on vacation and just sleeeeeeeeeep for the entire first day or two... i am that tired

i think i need

a walk down the trail to trader joe's for flowers, black bean taquitos and more salted brownie mix :)

back later with pics... off to the park and then trader joe's xoxox

L.O.L.

{list of loves:}

highways with no-one on them :)

text messages :)

the millions of different scoopable items at winco - my favorite being the chocolate chip section with every size and flavor of chocolate chip on earth... closely followed by the candy aisle... and the pet food aisle - they even have rattie food :)

my boys playing lego rock band together :)

the hat's chili cheese fries - they are undoubtedly the BEST junk food e-v-e-r !-!-! (they are served in a tray for 4 drinks and they fill the entire tray... they feed 5,000 people easily :)


finding a new favorite place on yelp - this weekend it was a taiwanese bakery called 85C :)

getting the very best parking space at target :)

finding out there are jigsaws here :)

Sam finally earning his long-awaited ipod touch and the beautiful glow in his face all day :)


getting to play with Grandma's brand new ipad... it's beautiful and shiny and i love it!!

warm evenings


our local pet store where you can hold the ducklings, bottlefeed the lambs and walk the puppies :)





early nights in bed watching weeds (team celia!)

i'm not obsessed or nothing....

... but i have spent the entire weekend staring at (and drooling over) pictures of bubbly, charred pizza crust in search of the perfect wood-fired heavenly pizza pie.

it all started innocently when i was looking for flea markets to visit and found this little street vendor at a brooklyn flea market selling THIS PIZZA out of a mobile brick oven :| it's official - i want that mobile brick oven - and i will take it everywhere i go!!!!


anyway.... on saturday, we checked out pizza e vino in 'little boxes made of ticky tacky' rancho santa margarita (THE most annoying name waaayyy-too-long name EVERRR!! i could never live there because writing my address on forms would take up 105% of my daily patience...)


they claim to have have one of only 36 brick ovens in the entire u.s. of a.... which i just don't believe and forced me to take everything they did and said with a huge pinch of salt. however! the pizza was pretty yummy and everyone smiled and wasn't all pretentious and annoying-like so i will be back :)

last place we tried was pizzeria ortica in south coast plaza area. oh. em. gee. pretentious and annoying and no-one smiled at all EVER and they lifted furniture over our heads for the entire meal AND we had to park in a structure (i don't like parking structures:| ) the pizza on the edges was pretty awesome but in the middle with the ingredients the pizza guy had handpicked to go together artistically and refused to leave off so as not to spoil the "art" of the dish (it's pizza....... get over yourself)... not so much. i gave it 5 out of 10 just for the crust alone but never ever want to go back, however charred those bubbles might be :|


all my research led me to create my next culinary tour departing next saturday: the los angeles pizza tour 2010 stopping at...

pitfire pizza

mulberry pizza

village pizza

mozza


and maybe blue jay way too :)

next tour - Phoenix AZ!!! there are SOOOOO MANY notable pizzerias on my list to try there, i have no clue why, but i just know i must go!! and hungry too!!! most important on my list: pizza bianco, which is allegedly the best pizzeria in the country :) with a 3 hour wait...

ok now i am starving... off to find a breakfast cereal that tastes and smells like burnt bubbly pizza crust :)

things that make me sick

• people who tug on their earrings, especially when the hole is almost torn (argh i can't type for gripping my earlobes) kate gosselin does it compulsively as if her list isn't already a mile long :|

• returning things to stores - especially to assholes like Alex at Walgreens who deserves his very own "dear Alex at Walgreens - suck my left nut" facebook fan page :|

• tall shoes

• dusky pink nail polish

• eating two packs of worcester sauce potato chips (i found this out at lunchtime....)

• walking through customs trying to look innocent, knowing very well you lied on your forms :|

• people who wear really really tight pants (exception: Freddie Mercury)
  

• driving along lonesome stretches of freeway with 0.01 gallons of gas left

• those awful awful awful bags that look all real housewives of new jersey
  

• that reminds me - animal print a-n-y-t-h-i-n-g

• jewel's voice

• MGM Grand in Las Vegas for absolutely no good reason

• the smell of workmen in home depot

• red robin

• shopping in Calumet

• the Paris metro (and the SMELL!)

• how people in big huge cities take the liberty of staring at you on subways, metros, tubes, etc but never smile back
  

• bent back fingernails

• people scraping their fork against their plate
  

• people who crunch on apples like horses do
  

• people who chew with their mouths open

• people who pop their gum (especially when they're old enough to know better.... that means you, daycare lady at childtime)

• people who chew ice (it makes me wish chewing ice really did cause very bad things to happen :)
  

• the way Nancy Botwin drinks her soda
  

• christian rock music
  

• dogs riding in the back of trucks
  

• anything with beating wings

• the smell of shoe repair shops and costco tire center

• country music singers (especially men, except Willie Nelson - he doesn't make me physically sick, just kind of bored :)

• board games of any kind
  

• 95% of lens baby pics
  

• chocolate and fruit sitting together breathing the same air
  

• ditto onion bagels next to cinnamon bagels
  

• dropping things on my bare toes - i just dropped a teaspoon on my toe and it hurt like the dickens :|
  

• french manicures especially on plastic nails
  

• men who do that snot nose withdraw sound (and some women even do just to further turn my delicate tummy upside-down)

• the smell of poopy diapers (i have to breathe through my mouth when a poopy kid is around so as not to heave and feel embarrassed on behalf of the offending child :)

• people talking about scars and stitches in graphic detail
  

• slimy turkey meat
  

• slimy ham
  

• steak with chewy fat on it

• seasoned fries

• bread that isn't super duper fresh and kind of smells like ash

• tamales

• even remotely undercooked chicken

• playing baseball on the wii
  

• going to the movies or theatre (my legs get sooooo completely restless and it's the only time i really want to run :)

• staying in bed too long

• weddings
  

• any more than two cups of coffee in a 24 hour period

• starbucks coffee
  

• pizza hut's greasy crust

• the cheesecake factory

• the medium setting on Guitar Hero :)
  

list of lists

loving

• mcdonalds caramel frappe thingies (so much better than starbucks and no snooty laptop people who don't have children and don't know how to react when they see one)
• the moms at preschool (except, regrettably, the ones in the next list:)
• the zen that is mixing melted chocolate and crushed cornflakes together to make little chunks of edible concrete
• 'Blackbird' by the Beatles
  
• this amazing genius buffet of buffets invention, with which you can cruise the buffets of Vegas nonstop all day long for one price :)
• wii Beatles rock band - if heaven is a place on earth it's singing every song on Abbey Road with the hubbie on guitar, after the kids have gone to bed and never wanting to quit and go to bed even though you're aching and exhausted :)
• the very idea of a Michael Jackson cirque du soleil show :)
  

hating

• that Sydney is back at preschool :| with her vacuous bluetooth, white-shoe-wearing Speidi-esque mother :|
  
• that i judgmentally attribute JJ's feral behavior to the fact that his mommy has tattoos on her neck
  
• Walgreens (i am determined to yelp about that little bitch Alex in the pharmacy :)
  
• Stella McCartney - for absolutely no real reason... she just has that mean girl Gwyneth/Madonna look about her ;)
• Nancy Botwin
• the word 'weaksauce' and the people who jump on lame douchey online community bullshit words like that and force me to have to hide them on facebook (which is when i just decide to X them as it seems more honest... but then i know they will ask why... and saying they use lame expressions like weaksauce makes me feel like i'm a mean girl too... but honestly, i am not mean, just hopelessly british and correct!! british people don't use bullshit made-up words because the dictionary is peppered with really wonderful REAL words like lame and douche and bullshit already :)
  

wondering

• how old all the real husbands of New York are... they are all kind of wrinkly and pedo looking from afar ;)
• how come Nancy Botwin gets away with all kinds of really bad things on Weeds, but i almost pee my pants using a coupon that i printed twice at Albertson's because it clearly said one per customer, but it was a great coupon so i just HAD to print it twice :)
• how come Nancy Botwin's kids are smart and sweet even though she never spends ANY time with them, when i feel guilty and responsible if i am not playing with/teaching/correcting my kids nonstop all day long... i don't want to be a drug dealer or nothing but i would like the occasional guilt free day off.....
  
• why the nice husband and wife ducks, that were staying in our front yard, decided to move away... even though we built them a little shelter from the rain (in case they were thinking of starting a family) and bought them official wild duck food from Petsmart :(
• why anyone in their right mind would want the Taylor Swift band hero.........? sure there's no Rolling Stones or David Bowie game but there's Taylor Swift :|
  
• if anyone in the focus groups actually likes the insidious Siena family....? they make me never ever want to own a Siena and i used to like Sienas :|

wishing

• it was warmer than 49 degrees here
• for a Michael Jackson 'just dance' game already, so i can start training for my cirque du soleil audition :|
• they had awesome flavors of potato chips here - i miss roast beef and prawn cocktail flavor chips, even though i don't actually like roast beef and prawn cocktail :)
  
• we had more fish sticks
  
• it was summer already (because it's frrrrreeezing here!)
• we had a second guitar (and the new one was a Hofner bass....)
• i could think of a yelp account name that i won't forget because it's not inkyblack

off to play a little 'all you need is love' before bed xoxo

flags, air quotes and poker faces

still desperately seeking...
a full size american flag quilt. i found an american flag that happens to be full size, that i thought i could skillfullylessly sew onto a plain white quilt, but said flag is meant to be draped over caskets :|

loving
Danny's overuse of "air quotes" when telling stories about "nightmares" and needing to go "potty" :)

hating
people who record their voices and then say they hate the way they sound (whhhatever...)

feeling blue
that the boys have plans on Sunday and therefore we can't go to the Venture flea market as planned :( i would go all by myself but i can't make unprotected left turns and LA is full of them. and getting to Ventura requires driving through LA :( darn you, debilitating fear of unprotected left turns :|

regretting
not buying the entire Beatles rock band bundle with drums, guitars, microphones, etc. not only do we need a couple more microphones for harmonies... but we really really - like really reeeeeally need Paul's hofner bass to make the band experience complete :(

wishing
Danny would PLEASE learn more lines than "we will, we will rock you!!" if i had a dollar for every time he's sung that ONE LINE today... i'd have at least $5000 :|

wondering
if now i am soooo much taller, i should have ordered petite or regular dresses.... hmmmm

wanting
a cup of milky sweet tea and 15 ginger cat cookies, no more no less (15 ginger cat cookies equals 2 fat grams - which is quite a calorific bargain as they are so darned tasty/ gingery/crunchy)

hoping
Kate dances with her Ramona face on tonight - i love her possessed expressions :)

going to bed - back tomorrow xox

my latest obsession...

...since becoming a musician and joining a little band called the Beatles - song facts! more specifically song facts about my band ONLY :)

for example....

day tripper:
the line "she's a big teaser" was written as "she's a prick teaser."
nuh-uh.... they had bad words when the world was still in black and white??

hey jude:
at 2:55, you hear a sound from John Lennon while Paul keeps singing. it sounds like "ohh!" at first, but it is really him saying "...chord!" you can barely hear it, but if you listen really closely, you can hear him say "got the wrong CHORD." he says "chord" much louder than the other words. and about two or three counts later, you can hear McCartney say "fucking hell."
(hmmm, 10 plus points for Paul McCartney :)

blue jay way:
George Harrison wrote this in a house he rented in Los Angeles on a street named Blue Jay Way. (i want to go to there!!)

eleanor rigby:
McCartney wasn't sure what this song was going to be about until he came up with the line, "picks up the rice in a church where a wedding has been." that's when he came up with the story an old, lonely woman.

"Father McKenzie" was originally "Father McCartney." Paul decided he didn't want to freak out his dad and picked a name out of the phone book instead.

this song contains both mine and Aaron's last names in it (and is the reason we decided we really should get married :)

in my life:
this song was played at Kurt Cobain's funeral. the Beatles were an early and important music influence on him. Cobain even cited Lennon as his "idol" in the various journals he kept throughout his career with Nirvana

lady madonna:
Paul McCartney said that this song is a tribute to women everywhere. it was inspired by a picture of an African woman suckling her kid, over the caption "Mountain Madonna."

michelle:
"sont des mots qui vont tres bien ensemble" is the french translation of "these are words that go together well"

i will:
67 takes were recorded - the 65th was used

(and i thought 21 takes of 'michelle' was bad... that's how many takes it took me to get 100% on expert setting :)

get back:
at the end of the album version, Paul says "thanks Mo" in response to Ringo's wife, Maureen, who was clapping (bless her, she must have a higher IQ than her hubbie :)

ok i admit... at this point i got bored reading through my favorites, and no longer really cared to look if there really were 4000 holes in blackburn, lancashire and who and why did someone see fit to count them all ;)

in other news... i have grown one full inch! how is this possible?! it is true though, i am now 5 feet 3 tall and this means, i assume, that i can eat more calories? i sure hope so! chicken and corn for dinner (sigh - that doesn't sound appetizing at all... not as appetizing as chili cheese fries, that's for sure....)

spotted at Trader Joe's - Pedro Hernandez!! aka Jorge Miguel, the latino George Michael of Orange County, CA :) i haven't seen him for (what seems like) YEARS (but it's probably been 6 months...) boy oh boy, did he have a big line of (swooning female) fans waiting to be waited on by him :) i was too weak and thready from walking to Trader Joe's to wait at his checkout, plus the checkout next to him was empty and was giving out free cookies. but i'm going back - oh yes i am going back :)

off to attempt to make dinner look edible, play some more lego rock band and conquer my nemesis, the wii fit advanced obstacle course, once and for all :|

ginger cats, amanda woodward and depressed fish

i love

the smell of neutrogena anti-residue shampoo (though i constantly stress i am stripping away essential grease and pigment from my hair...)

i shouldn't love

it when Danny says something "bwuddy hurts" but his little bwitish way of cursing is sooooo bloody cute :)

i neeeeeeeed

ginger cat cookies and hot tea with milk and sugar - my hips are still achey from too much perfect 10 today (which i suck at - i have a tendancy to overbump and hit the opposite mushroom....)

i can't figure out

why Amanda Woodward talks like a ventriloquist these days... i can't ever listen to what she's saying for watching her lips not move

i always always

buy whatever the trader joe's tasting hut is giving away - today it was black bean and cheese taquitos with avocado salsa :)

i bought

the domain name for my blog - now i just need to figure out how to move there and block an entire country of sebaceous teenagers from viewing it (who i won't mention by name, or they'll all move to another country and i will have to block even more of the world :)

i put

lucky bamboo into Clarice's fish tank as i read it can lift the spirits of depressed fish but Clarice won't get near it :( sigh....

i am

going to bed to watch the rest of 16 and pregnant with my ginger cat cookies and tea - goodnight :)

the daily news

in-n-out have raised their prices :[ in a recession!! soooo not cool! i just see this as further ammunition to lose weight AND save 6c a pop on french fries. i bet animal fries went up by a dollar or some insane amount...

i want this house. failing that i want my house to look like that and have ocean views too. but be walking distance to trader joe's and less than one mile away from target :)

yesterday i accompanied Sam and 120 fourth graders to the Mission. that is BIG news - i went on a field trip :) and survived!

i don't like defense attorneys or understand how they sleep at night. and i don't understand why on earth this bonesmoker gets one at taxpayers' expense?? this man murdered the manager (who had twins Danny's age, just to tug a little harder at my heartstrings) at my local home depot at 5pm on a friday night ie. the time regular people could be stopping by for vanilla sky colored paint or a pretty flat of impatiens, and i'm paying to defend him??? seriously... and what is with this woman's (yes woman's) hair?? does she not possess a brush???

the electrical parade, the only truly lovely thing about disneyland is leaving california :( i am soooo glad i didn't renew my pass this year!!!

my hips really really ache. i blame 'just dance' for hours on end last night :[

this restaurant, cafe rio is coming to the empty space at my local shopping center :( i had high hopes of a del taco or dunkin donuts moving in... but nooooo, it's going to be yet another united states of generican mexican resturant instead. because we really need one more of those :[

news correction: yesterday i whined that the wii doesn't play netflix on it. well in yesterday's mail there was a DVD to correct that ;) so we watched Weeds in the den on the big tv last night :) which is technically the same size as the bedroom tv when you are sitting 20 feet away from it :) hmm...

off to take aleve, make lunches, etc. back later (or not...)

what's cool about my wii thingies and what isn't so cool about them....

my review which if i posted it at amazon.com would get lots of negative comments from GSOH-less technical losers who use words like DLC and FWIW and nunchuk and IMHO (GSOH is a-OK in my book:)

i love that it is white and shiny. if it were black and shiny it would look unsightly and dusty

i don't love that it doesn't play DVDs or Netflix (maybe it does... this is where the annoying technical losers would pipe in with their DLCs and IMHOs...)

i love wii fit!! i can weigh myself and then pee and weigh myself again and see how much weight i 'lost' :) i think about the terrifying weigh-in part everytime i eat, yesterday i only ate a spoonful of yogurt and a pita bread :)

i don't love the 'ohhh' that i makes when i step on. either i'm really heavy or it's looking up my pant leg... neither scenario pleases me :(

i love being able to tight rope walk. and i rarely fall! (which makes me even more determined to try out for cirque du soleil in LA)

i love that i have a great center of balance :)

i don't love that game about which number is higher - i don't understand it and so i get them all wrong and it makes some snarky comment and says my real age is more like 56 :(

i love bowling with the boys

i don't love how my ball always goes left no matter how much i turn sideways to compensate :(

i love that MJ and Obama are on my bowling team

i don't love how mad they get and shake their fists when i accidentally throw my bowling ball at them :(

i don't love how loooooong it takes to get from game to game. it's time i should be burning fat not waiting for things to load :[

i love being able to float down a river in a big bubble. i just wish i didn't hit so many derned rocks :(

i don't love hula hoop anymore.... i used to be so good at it! now i can be swirling like a maniac and they still fall down :( maybe it's broken... ;)

i love that MJ and Obama are in my step class :)

i also love love love love love the song that the easy (not advanced) step routine is set to :)

however i don't love the song with the penguins on the iceberg :( and i just don't get that game, it's so utterly pointless

i love the punchbag - it just needs an uploadable face on it

i don't love that easy is too easy and hard is too hard

i love Beatles rock band (times one million)

i don't love Guitar Hero quite as much - the singers are all skanky looking and look like they smoke and take drugs

i love hanging out in the Abbey Road studio

i don't love how distracting that fold in the rug is...

i love when Paul McCartney wears glasses

i don't love how i mess up the song gazing at him

i looooooooooooove Just Dance!!

i don't love having things like Presidents of the United States and Blur on there (though i do like the sassy dance to boys and girls or is it girls and boys...)

i love the A Little Less Conversation dance the best

i don't love Womanizer - it's too hard!!

back later with more indepth reviewing...

monday things

loving
all the monday morning facebook updates about it being mean old monday morning. what are they talking about - there's a new reason to love monday!!! each monday night kate gosselin provides comedic dance relief for us all, to make mondays lovable and look-forward-to-able!! i think Obama commissioned this to bring joy back into our lives and i think it's pure genius :)

wondering
why people airbrush babies :( and i'm not talking about newborns with red blotchy skin and newborn acne - i just saw a perfectly cherubic 9 month old looking like Wayne Newton :[

hating
the spot on my chin that is now 7000 feet tall.

wishing
i bought the surgical tools i saw at the flea market yesterday :( yes, i would cut into my chin with a suspect looking scalpel that was $2 and looked awfully blunt - this is an emergency situation :|

loving
that flea market - we walked around for FOUR HOURS yesterday and i still could have stayed another four re-poring over every weathered wooden berry bucket and hand-embroidered 50s tea towel. everything has a story to tell - it's chicken soup for the Nate Berkus lover's soul :)

bought
antique french grain sacks to make perfect story-telling pillows (yay!)
scrabble tiles :)
little houses collected from board games over the years (to make my own tiny planned community :)
2 teeny ankylosauruses
a big bag of legos
a very old pie tin
a very old crate for toys

ate
the very very very best chili cheese fries EVER at The Hat... and 19 hours later, i haven't eaten since :) this could be my new diet ;)

kind of hoping
it rains again today... i want to stay home and do wii fit all day instead of doing real activities :) if only there was a dog walking wii game...

costco, kate and monkeys

i wonder
why i cannot for the life of me find one full/queen american flag quilt anywhere on God's green earth?! is there some unspoken american rule about not having a quilt that looks like a flag?? it wasn't on the citizenship test... or do quilt makers dislike Obama so much that they have refused to make patriotic quilts for at least the next 7 years??! (yes 7:)

i hate
Costco milk containers. i just have one question - why?????!!!! why do they have 4 levels of security on them??! it's just milk! and i want to access the milk.... hmm, i should sue Costco for potentially increasing my risk of osteoporosis....

i have
jetlag. and i haven't even been anywhere :[

i wish
that target Paul Frank clothes were in big boy sizes too. Danny misses Julius :(

i adore
Kate Gosselin! for all the meanest and most terrible of reasons! don't listen to the haters Kate, keep on dancing :)

sleepless.... but not in seattle :)

because... it's flea market day again!! we are going to the Rose Bowl in 3 hours!! at 7am!!! it's 4am :| i have been awake since 2am with arms itching to find, purchase and carry beautiful conversation pieces home :) i have cash! lots of it!!! (but don't mug me... i bite and i don't remember my last rabies shot) and a shopping trolley! come on already, daylight! it's up time!!

plus i couldn't sleep because i had to - HAD TO - see this 'jesus touched me' video again... how i love the soup (when it's good :)

plus i have pressing things on my mind... like is kick out the jammies radio still around...? (it is!) and how come David Bowie hasn't journaled in 3.5 YEARS??! what has he been doing??!

and most urgently: how do i invent a wii game.... when i can't even figure out how to turn on the guitar after 2 weeks, without a nervous breakdown and help from a small child...?

for i have the bestest idea EVER for a wonderful Beatles Love inspired acrobatic cirque du soleil balance board-using game - i have to invent it just so i can buy it myself and play in compulsively till i get 100% every time! then demonstrate it on Oprah, leaving one under each seat, naturally! but i kind of hate Chicago. ok not kind of... hmm maybe i will do Dr Phil instead... i really want to cry and get one of his handkerchiefs to put in a shadow box. and see if he hugs all his guests and what he smells like. and if Robin sits in the audience for the full hour. i am full of wonders about his show.... i won't go on Ellen - the thought of dancing with her freaks me out for some reason.

anyway!!! i neeeeeed this game! forever i have been perusing the cirque du soleil job board only to come to the conclusion that i have no skills :( so i must invent a game that lets me at least PRETEND to be Lucy in the sky with diamonds (safely. on the floor in my den. on the easy setting. so i can get 100% everytime :)

my other latest obsession: beatles rock band :) maybe i can bring this to the LA cirque du soleil casting call...?



and what we've been up to...

a list of lists

songs i l-o-v-e to play on my magical electrical guitar, that still needs stickers all over it, because i am most definitely KEEPING it:

• beat it - MJ
• oasis - some might say
• fat bottomed girls - queen (thanks A:)
• mountain song - jane's addiction
• michelle - the beatles
• birthday - the beatles
• taxman - the beatles
• lucy in the sky with diamonds - the beatles
• while my guitar gently weeps - the beatles
• the one i love - r.e.m. (there are sooo many more i'd love, which brings me to my next list.......)

songs i'd love to play on my magical electrical unstickered guitar that i don't have yet:

• stop - jane's addiction
• killing in the name - rage against the machine
• heresy - nine inch nails
• star 69 - r.e.m.
• short skirt, long jacket - cake
• baby you're a rich man - the beatles
• we can work it out - the beatles
• jane says - jane's addiction
• suspicious minds - elvis presley
• hello goodbye - the beatles
• sympathy for the devil - the rolling stones
• crosstown traffic - jimi hendrix
• i can't explain - david bowie
• rosalyn - david bowie
• rebel rebel - david bowie
• jean genie - david bowie
• queen bitch - david bowie (ok they really need to just make a david bowie game and i'd buy it :)
• mother nature's son - the beatles
• sunday bloody sunday - u2
• gone - u2
• driver 8 - r.e.m.
• turn you inside-out - r.e.m.
• ignoreland - r.e.m.

game that needs to be invented, made and in my hands ASAP:

• just dance: 'michael jackson' edition
• pretend pets that do pretend tricks
• pretend commercial flying simulator thingie

new items on my shit list:

• gamestop for being full of scary pimply sweaty 'gaming' people
• the angry cashiers in michaels who insist on re-cutting out my badly torn coupons (like i have time to actually CUT coupons????! lead vocalists/guitarists don't cut out coupons...)

new must-haves:

• wholewheat pita bread
• juicy fruit gum
• really smooth legs
• the present by philosophy (i am so glad melissa recommended it :)
• at least one season of 'weeds' at all times
• day trips to kmarts in the middle of nowhere with nowhere to be at any given time (today it was montclair:)

random questions i have asked my iphone recently (with answers, naturally):

• how tall is George Clooney? (not that i think he's cute or nuthin...) 5 feet 11
• how does George Clooney smell? masculine/groomed/no distant smell/like a good suit :[
• how tall is David Bowie? it thought I said David Belly... hehehe:) 5 feet 10 also :) oh, and the site called him 'actor in labyrinth'... his biggest claim to fame apparently ;)
• how tall is Lady Gaga? 5 feet 1!
• which beatle was the tallest? John Lennon: taller than Jesus Christ to quote wikipedia ;)
• does George Michael have any tattoos? yes/no - urgh!
• where is Agrestic? Santa Clarita
• is there a pie factory outlet in Costa Mesa? yes!
• how tall is a giant redwood? 370 feet tall!
• where is Ladera Ranch library? in Ladera Ranch ;)
• was MJ's rat really called Ben? no-one knows....
• what's Canon address? 15955 alton, irvine, ca

things i bought at the english store:

• worcester sauce potato chips
• prawn cocktail potato chips
• tomato ketchup potato chips
• salt and vinegar hula hoops
• malt loaf
• milky ways
• freddo frogs
• sausage rolls
• mushy peas
• zoflora 'roses' disinfectant (just like jo malone's red roses!)

random snippets of pointless information

• i have post traumatic-shoe-putting-on stress since finding a real life foot long LIZARD sitting in my shoe last week. i thought it was a toy.... it looked like a toy. but it was NOT a toy :(

• i am obsessed with the show 'property ladder' - it is SO utterly riveting :)

• i want to buy a hair salon just to have Tabatha take over :)

• i made the best E-V-E-R brownies on monday. they are so so so sooooo rich and fudgy - the trick is much more butter and much less baking ;)

• i am waiting patiently for my wii microphone to arrive so i can officially become a beatle (but not Ringo - ever) i bet the mailman is at home right now singing his heart out to 'carry that weight', i just know it... and it drives me crazy

• i hated the dansko celina shoes, they made my feet look even fatter :( i had to return them with a heavy heart :(

• i am never ever deeply inhaling from an aerosol can by accident ever again - i have been living on aleve (which always makes me want to sing that like Jon Bon Jovi) for 3 whole days. huffing sucks!

• however much i don't like Paul McCartney (which is a lot), i find him distractingly adorable in the rock band game and flub every song gazing at his puppy dog eyes:)

• i love this website and this one even though the second one is kind of naughty :)
  

• today i decorated Clarice's fish tank with a little bamboo plant and a tiny british telephone booth for her to hide inside (i removed the phone to avoid electric shocks and ridiculous party line phone bills) i hope she likes having new places to hide as well as the shell that she uses for her boudoir. i would get her a friend but she is a fighting fish. i wonder how fighting fish have children? and don't they get lonely killing all their friends....?

• i really like the idea of oompa loompa bananas but i really hate the way they taste all wallpaper-pastey:( i bought some bananas at the 99 cent store that are very stubby. i am now worried they are large oompa loompa bananas instead of small regular bananas....

• we are going to be chick parents in 20 days' time!!
  

wi-fi, huffing and movies

wondering
why Yosemite doesn't have ANY nice restaurants. or wi-fi. and i mean NONE - of either :|

(post script
we came home one night early ;)

wishing
we'd stayed at the Ahwahnee. which had a very nice looking restaurant but with bad yelp reviews (the Awahnee did at least have wi-fi :)

wondering
why i always find oscar winning movies the most dull :|

still recovering
from accidentally inhaling some very nausea-inducing aerosol thingie. kids are so weird - they do that for F-U-N :|

hoping
my wii rock band microphone comes soon - i NEED it so badly. i haven't technically ordered it yet so i am guessing it isn't arriving tomorrow as i would like :(

whiners, carrot cake and dancing

i am working at preschool again today :( i swear i have some kind of mission impossible brain dysfunction. how can i possibly get ready to leave for snowy Yosemite AND tend to 25 preschoolers ANNNND pick Sam up for a lunchdate? it's impossible - therefore i choose to accept the mission and torture myself when i fail :|

there is one small child i don't like - there is always one. last year it was Sydney, the obnoxious daughter of the obnoxious always late mom with the white shoes, the baseball cap and the bluetooth. anyway yes, i admit, i form an instant and lasting impression on anyone who is too needy and whiny and doesn't use good manners, especially with pointless stuff like the amount of playdoh i give them (it's tooo much!!! now it's too little... wa wa wa... cue: walk away/no longer answer to 'Danny's Mom')

my bargain of yesterday: i have had a $5 off coupon for Mimi's Cafe in my 'coupon keeper' for at least 6 months. it is full of crumbs and almost torn in half due to old age and it expired 3/31/10 :| so i went into Mimi's (where i refuse to actually dine) and asked if i could buy the only delicious thing that isn't even on the menu, the carrot and raisin loaf that they put on the table before food arrives (this makes NO SENSE, sweet before savory - very very wrong) and they said yes!! i got two entire loaves of sweet, raisiny carroty goodness for NOTHING!! it's the little things that make me happy :)

... like acing the 'u can't touch this' dance on wii 'just dance' the FIRST TIME! sure Danny did too, but it's easy and fun and i love easy and fun! i can't do 'womanizer' though :( oh and i successfully played the r.e.m. song without being booed off the stage - it's getting better all the time!!

this year's 'bookmark now turned into a postcard'. thanks to GWB and the Arnold for making class sizes sooooo big they don't fit on a bookmark anymore - thanks guys :|