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I kind of miss the Nazi's?

Keep your hair on, I don't mean it that way. Warning, warning, warning! If you haven't seen the new Indiana Jones movie, don't read any more. Spoilers ahead. You've been warned.

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You have chosen.....wisely. So today I escaped work (haha!!!) and went to see the 10am showing of Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. That's right, 10am. There were about 50 other people there! Can you believe it? It felt so naughty. Yet so right. :)

I was 15 or 16 when the last Indiana Jones movie came out. WHY has it been so long? Man, I love me some Indiana Jones. Not in the way my mom does; she's got it bad for Harrison Ford, but as he's older than my dad (which seriously boggles my mind), I think it would be kind of creepy if I had the hots for him. Though I do have to say, he's aged well and Calista Flockhart is a lucky, lucky woman.
The reason I love Indiana Jones is because I love adventure. Not the Die Hard let's blow everything up adventure, but the swashbuckling, using history to solve riddles, swinging on a vine (or a whip) kind of adventure. Indiana Jones is the perfect action ADVENTURE hero. Blowing crap up and shooting people to add gratuitous violence is not adventure. Being chased through a tomb by half naked natives with spears or blow darts is adventure.

When I first learned there was going to be a new movie (and it wasn't just a rumor like the ones we've gotten the last 19 years) I was over the moon. Of course I knew Indy would be older and that is would likely be different from the original movies, but it never occured to me that there would be different villains. Yes, I know the villians in Temple of Doom weren't Nazi's (though the Chinese gangsters were pretty cool), and IMO it was the weekest of the 3 because of it. I have to give big props to Cate Blanchette on her Boris and Natasha Russian accent, but it just wasn't the same. Who knew the Ruskie's wouldn't be as interesting as the Nazi's? I actually foud myself missing the Nazi's. They were bad guys with style and a purpose. The Russians....not so much. It was just too...blah. Yeah, that's the word. Blah. Sure there were explosions and escapes and icky creatures and threats, but they just lacked the charisma the Nazi's had. Sad, isn't it?

A person who did NOT lack charisma was Harrison Ford. He brought Indy back with style. His smirk was there, as were the whip, the khaki shirt (sweat stained of course), the man bag and of coursethe Fedora. Also some kick ass moves. Damn. I lurve me some Harrison Ford. I mean Indiana Jones. Yeah, Indiana Jones. That's it. It was so awesome to see him back in the Fedora.

Karen Allen was back too! Yea! Marion! I love her! Not in that way. Shia LaBoef was pretty good with his James Dean-esque hat, motorcycle and 'tude. Indy, Marion and Mutt! Awesome! If you don't know where that storyline is heading, you do not need to see this movie. You need to rent Goonies and get a Baby Ruth because you're not ready for Indy.

All in all, I really loved this movie, because it was Indi-freaking-ana Jones, but found myself longing for the Nazi's and all their style and badass bad guyness. Ruskies? What did they do? Stare at us and make some big threats that they couldn't follow through on. I mean really, what kind of villain is that?

Dum, da, dum, dum. Da da dum. Dum, da, dum, dum, dum, da, dum, dum, dum.......

I feel the earth move

At about 4:38 am I bolted straight up in my bed. My dogs started barking and everything was shaking. My first thought was that the bad weather we were supposed to get later on Friday had moved in earlier than expected and there was a tornado near. I jumped up and nearly toppled over because the floor was shaking. Huh? Did I suddenly wake up on a boat on rought seas? I got to the window, looked out and all was clear. No rain, no wind, no tornado. What the hell was going on? I staggered towards the bedroom door to get to my son, and the minute I set foot in the living room, the shaking stopped. I checked on my son, who was still sound asleep and then looked back outside. Still calm, still clear, still no tornado. Weird. I went back to bed wondering if maybe I had dreamed it all. Had I been having a bad dream? Did some weird dream carry over to my waking moments? I was so confused. Did I somehow get drunk and not know it? No, I didn't even have a glass of wine with dinner. The only thing I had indulged in was half a sleeve of Thin Mint cookies while I watched The Office. Mmmmm, Thin Mints. I love Thin Mints. So chocolatey-minty delicious. Mmmmmm....Wait, where was I? Oh yeah, I had eaten cookies. Were they spiked? You can't trust those Girl Scouts. They only have those cookies once a year. What do they put in them to make people start salivating at the mere mention of Thin Mints or Tag Alongs? Are they drugging us? Had I eaten too many, od'd and had some weird hallucenations? Effing Girl Scouts. I laid in my bed staring at the clock and trying to figure out what had happened and how I would take my revenge on those sneaky GS bitches. I remember seeing 5:56am and then I must have fallen asleep because my alarm woke me up at 6:30. I was soooooo tired and still a bit disoriented. I followed my usual morning routine where I open the shades, turn on the living room light and then the news. Imagine my surprise when I hear them talking about a rare mid-west earthquake that struck at 4:37 am 115 miles from where I live. WHAT? I literally stood stock still. I had been in an earthquake! Holy crap! There was mild damage all over the area, including cracked walls, foundations, broken windows, pictures and a few chunks of concrete that had fallen from an overpass. Weird.
I got my son up and took him to school, where the talk on the radio and around the school parking lot was all about the quake. My meeting for the day had been cancelled due to inclement weather to the north of us (I was supposed to count trees-funity, fun, fun, fun!) so I came home and watched a bit more of the news, then decided to lay back down for a while since I had had little sleep. I stretched out on the sofa, one dog curled up against me, the other sleeping on the floor right next to us. I closed my eyes and felt a soft shaking. I looked down at the dog on the floor to admonish him for scratching and shaking the sofa (this happens quite a lot actually) but realized he was sound asleep. The shaking continued and the water bottle on the coffee table suddenly toppled over. Aftershock! Both dogs woke up and were suddenly on top of me. The shaking went on and I could hear things rattling in the cabinets and 2 pictures come crashing down in my bedroom. My mind told me to cover my head (there is a sizable black and white photo of Paris hanging above the sofa and as much as I love Paris, I did not want to be knocked unconscious by it) or get to a door jam, but I had 2 *slightly* overweight dogs literally on my chest and by the time I got them off, the shaking was calming down and then came to a stop. I flipped on the TV and the news anchors were talking about it. Who knew earthquakes could cause such a shake up on the news? See what I did there? That's right, I'm funny. Get used to it.
The rest of the day I waited for more aftershocks and was not disappointed. There were 3 more that I could feel and each time I had to fight to keep from being smothered by about 40 pounds of chicken shit dogs. Oddly, each of these tremors happened while I tried to catch up on some sleep. It was a conspiracy! Someone was out to keep me from getting the rest I so desperately needed. Damn it earth, what did I do to you? I don't litter! I don't smoke! I recycle! Let me sleep!
Another negative side effect is that all damn day I've been singing that song: I feel the earth move under my feet, I feel the sky tumbling down, tumbling down....Stupid earthquake.

Happy birthday to me!

Happy New Year! Oh, wait, it's March isn't it? Crap, bit late on that. Sorry. It's been a busy couple of months. Okay, not really, I've just been lazy. Did you read the name of my blog? Well, then you shouldn't be surprised. Actually, quite a lot has happened. My job got all kinds of crazy; well, crazier than before, my beloved Elsa von Nordland had some serious problems and I had to trade her in for a newer model (ain't that always the way?), a distant cousin I've christened Ulrika von Nordland, ds got sick (I so don't do vomit), one of my dogs got really sick (she's better now though, thanks for asking), and I developed a penchant for stapling fabric to the tops of my windows and apotocary jars thanks to The Nesting Place. Seriously, it's become something of an addiction. I'm sick with it and find myself scouring fabric stores in my spare time or looking for the perfect jar. So, that pretty much catches you up since my holiday in the cardiac ward. What's new with you?

Tonight I sit here, on the eve of my 35th b-day (funy note: I actually typed 25th. Do you think there's such a thing as a Freudian typo?) watching a Tivo episode of The Celebrity Apprentice (don't judge me), typing on my blog and eating and organic apple. I'm a wild woman! Hold me back. I might get some caramel dipping sauce for the apple! Woooooooooooo.
I've gotten a bunch of b-day cars (including one from the car dealership where Ulrika came from) and some pre-emptive emails asking hos I feel about turning 35. My answer: meh. I mean, really, I make 35 look good. You've seen me, I'm a hottie. I'm also incredibly humble, but that's really my only fault. It's my cross, but I bear it. So, tomorrow, if you happen to have a glass of wine in your hand (and really, why wouldn't you? I know I will.) hoist it up and drink to my big 35. Happy birthday to me!

Christmas on the Cardio Ward

Ho ho ho and happy belated holidays my faithful readers. I hope you all had a Currier and Ives day. Sadly, I did not. Oh, no, I did not. Why you ask? Well, sit back and let me tell you. Christmas Eve started out quite well with a trip to the mall, just for fun. No presents needed to be bought, but hey, why not go watch other people scramble? After an hour of two wanering around the mall, we headed home and hung out for a while, before having a lovely dinner of steamed crabs, baked potatoes and salad. After dinner it was time for the wee one to go to bed (visions of a bug vacuum he desperately wanted from Santa dancing in his head), and then we watched the greatest Christmas movie of all time, Holiday Inn, while drinking hot chocolate. Doesn't that sound lovely and stress free? Well, it was. Santa came by, ate a few cookies, drank his milk, left some presents and filled the stockings (with a bit of help) and it was off to bed. Ah, nice relaxing Christmas. Wrong! Around 10 to midnight I woke up in agony. Ag-ony. My chest felt like it was in a vise grip. I assumed it was heartburn (though I never suffer from it, and had eaten nothing that would cause it), so I took some Pepcid and waited for it to go away. It did not. I argued against going to the hospital, as I knew I would miss Christmas morning, so I dealt with it in semi-silence (there was a bit of moaning and groaning I have to admit). I couldn't lay down because it got worse, so I sat up on the sofa until I finally fell asleep from sheer exhaustion. We opened presents around 8 am, which was everything I thought it would be, and Santa, that crafty old elf, did indeed bring the much coveted bug vacuum eliciting squeels of delight and striking terror in the heart of bugs everywhere. After presents, I decided I could deal with the pain no longer and carted myself off to the ER, where I was immediately wisked to the back ahead of several people who loked like they had been there quite a while. Suck on that broken-arm-while-trying-to-do-stupid-tricks-on my-new-skateboard-kid. I was given an EKG (good), hooked up to a million machines, poked proded, stabbed with many needles and made to drink horrible, horrible concoctions that no one should ever have to taste. I was exhibiting all the symptoms of a heart attack. What? I'm 34, I eat well, work out regularly and have none of the risks, but there I was, attached to monitor, in dreadful pain and apparently having a heart attack. Fa-la-la-la-la-la-la.-la-la. Around noon they decided to do an MRI and inject dye into my IV. Guess what? Turns out I'm allergic to the CT dye and almost instantly broke out into hives. Fun! This lead to a shot of Benadryl that knocked me out and was the first time in hours I felt no pain. God bless the makes of Benadryl. I awoke from my drug induced stupor to be given nitro glycerin pills and blood thinning shots in the stomach. Ouch! This was not the Christmas I'd planed, let me tell you. It was then decided that while my heart seemed to be fine, they wanted to keep me. In the hostpital. In the cardio ward. I was so not happy, but what was I going to do? They wheeled me up to the third floor where I was easily the youngest person on the ward by a good 30-40 years. In fact, my roommate had 58 years on me. That right, I spent Christmas with a 92 year old, who, just in case you were curious, was incredibly flatulent. God Bless us everyone! They took me out for a while to do some more tests and I was being wheeled down the hall, I could feel the eyes of the other patients whose rooms we passes boring into me. I imagined they were wondering if my heart was bad, and how they might get hold of it to replace their failing tickers. I hugged my blankets protectively over my chest and trid to look sicker than I already was. Once back to the relative safety of my room, I kept my eye on the door and the nurse buzzer in my hand, just in case they decided to hobble to my room zombie like to check out my heart. I got almost no sleep, as the nurses kept coming in every hour to check my stats (my bp was crazy low-68/40) and every 2 hours to take blood. Plus, I had to keep my eyes out for the other patients. They can be surprisingly crafty at getting those heart monitors wheeled down the hall and I was taking no chances. They might have stashed a butter knife from the oh so delicious (and sodium free) Christmas dinner and attempt to crack my chest open with it. Trust no one!
So, after a night of no sleep, more medications than I probablytaken in the past year and enough needle sticks to make me look like a junkie, it was concluded that I had something called chostochondritues. What, not up on your obscure chest ailments? Let me put it in lay terms for you: it's an inflamation of the sternum and cartilidge that connects to the ribs. It mimicks the syptoms of heart attacks and can only be diagnosed after ruling out everything else. Also, it hurts like a beeyotch. I was given some (more) anti-inflamatories, some happy pain meds (now we're talking) and discharged. We had Christmas dinner a day late, but still, I was with my family and friends and with the exception of not being able to drink any alchohol (something about not mixing alchohol and pills, but hey, celebs do it all the time, and look how well it works for them) it was lovely. Hope you all had a wonderful holiday! Bring on New Year!

Mamma's gotta eat!

When "that time of the month" rolls around I eat. And eat. And eat. I'm crazy with the eating. Stand still too long and I might eat you. I'm normally a very conservative and health conscious eater, but for about 4 days every month that all goes out the window. Screw you healthy eating! I'm a woman on a mission! Cookies? Yes. Candy? Please. Cake? 2 slices. Chips? Leave the bag. After the 3-4 day eating binge, I lay on the sofa, partially hydroginized oils seeping from my pores, and realize I have to stop and get back to the gym. God I hate that last day. The upset stomach, the extra weigh, not being able to look at food without wanting to vomit. Fun!

This is all bad enough, but about 2-3 times a year it gets realy bad. I mean like crazy bad. To the point where I get obsessed with 1 or 2 specific foods and must have them. Things I normally wouldn't eat in any large quantity or things I wouldn't eat at all. The last time this happened was shortly before Shrek the third came out we were ramping up by watching the DVD's of Shrek 1 and 2. In Shrek 1, in case you've been living under a rock and don't know, Donkey invites himself to stay with Shrek and utters the line "And in the morning, I'm making waffles!" That line sparked my hormones and I became obsessed with waffles and pancakes. I like both, but really only eat them about 3-4 times a year as a rule. I like pancakes, but they sit in my stomach like a lump of lead afterwards rendering me completely useless until they've digested. That's a great excuse to get out of things, BTW. "Sorry, I can't help you move. I ate a short stack this morning and have to let them digest before I do anything. I'll just be on your sofa watching TV in the mean time." Try it. People are so astonished that you can really get away with it.

Anyway, waffles and pancakes were on my mind all the time and on my plate at least twice a day for 4 days. It was truly horrible. I still can't look at Mrs. Butterworth. After my carb and sugar filled binge I don't think I ate another pancake or waffle for about 4 months. All that syrup can mess with your head. It's strong stuff, man, strong stuff.

This month, when my good old friend "Aunt Flo" rolled around (that is a totally stupid name, BTW) I got the crazies again. Well, I kind of always have the crazies, but you know what I mean. What was the object of my obsession this time you wonder? I'm embarassed to admit it, but for you I will bear the humiliation: Easy cheese. Oh, you read it right, cheese in a can. I've sunk low. Real low. Cheese in a can is something that has never, not even once been in my shopping cart, but I was in the store and walked passed it on the cracker aisle and suddenly I had to have it. I swear I was like a Southerner staring down collard greens. The pull of the aerosol cheese was too strong to resist. I covertly looked around to see if anyone was watching and grabbed a can (Cheddar) and tossed it in the cart and threw a box of Ritz on top of it. I raced to the self check out (no cashier will be looking down on me while I buy my ooey goodness in a can), paid and dashed home hugging my bag to my chest like it contained treasure. At home, I opened a pack of Ritz (truly the greatest cracker ever) and squirted out my cheese in a nice little star pattern. I was so excited it was almost comical. Cheese in a star shape! How freaking awesome is that? I placed the cracker in my mouth and sweet heaven was it awful. I mean awful. Not even the Ritz could cover the horror that was assaulting my poor taste buds. It was like eating a musty gym sock. Yum! You'd think I'd stop there, wouldn't you? Wouldn't you? Of course you would, because who in their right mind would eat squishy cheese that tastes like a gym sock? Oh, let's not forget, I was NOT in my right mind. My mind had been taken over by the crazies. I had to have more. Can you believe it? Me neither, but there you have it. I sat down and at an entire sleever of Ritz, all covered in that repulsive oddly orange squishy cheese. Yes. I. Did. Even as I was doing it, I knew it was wrong, wrong, wrong, yet I could not stop. Mercifully, I was drawn into this bubbling vat of hormones, for only 2 days when I finally broke free of its malovolent grip and came back to reality. I hung my head in shame and threw away the evidence of my 2 day spiral into the depths of darkness and self destruction. I still have trouble wrapping my head around that fact that I actually ate almost an entire can-o-cheese. I have no idea what demon posses me every few months, but when it does, there is no denying the beast. Sadly, all I can do is wait around and pray that next time it doesn't come in the form of an urge for dirt or shredded tires or pickled eggs.

Sucidal Christmas

Ah, the holidays. Somehow they crept up on me and once again I'm suddenly wondering why there are lights up and Santas at every corner. Didn't we just have 4th of July like last week? How is it almost Christmas already? I am entirely done with my Christmas shopping, so I guess it's not THAT big of a surprise, but still it seems far too early. Maybe because stores start shoving Christmas down our throats in early October and we're all really numb to it by the time the actual holiday rolls around that when it's actually the real holiday time, we just don't care anymore. In every town there is always one radio station that plays 24 hour Christmas songs starting around November first. I boycott this station with a fervor generally reserved for the STL Cardinals or the White Sox. There are only so many Christmas songs (even if every Tom, Dick and Mariah do a version) and really, how long can you listen to them over and over and over before you get a little nuts? As we are now less than a month away from Christmas I decided I could lift the boycott and hear a few holly jolly songs. I punched the stations pre-programmed button and out came the warbling notes of Judy Garland, followed by Bing Crosby and that upbeat Melekeleki Maka. I love you Bing! Anyway, I'm cruising along, feeling merry and bright, smiling at bundled up passers-by and enjoying the twinkling lights when one of those sad sack holiday songs came on. Boy, nothing will bring you down like a sad Christmas song. We're not talking Elvis' "Blue Christrmas" here, because at least that has a fairly peppy tune, but have you ever heard "Christmas Shoes?" If not, it's about a boy who wants to buy his dying mother a pair of shoes for Christmas but doesn't have the money. Yeah, yeah, it's a sweet sentiment: poor boy, dying mom, Christmas miracle, blah, blah, blah, but come on! It makes me want to slit my wrists. Why do people write sad Christmas songs? Is there any wonder that the suicide rate goes up around the holidays? I don't know that that's true, but I heard it or read it somewhere and it sounds about right, so I'm saying it. Prove me wrong children, prove me wrong.
After the sad song, my Christmas spirit plummeted and I thought about looking for another kind of spirit. I do not condone drinking and driving though, so I had to nix it and hope that something upbeat would come on to bring back that Christmas-y feeling, but no, no. Christmas Shoes was followed by Toby Keith's "I'm right here" which again, wrist slitting urges. Good grief (Charlie Brown), what's up with all that? Holiday songs should be about snow and family and Santa and Jesus and stuff, not sad little kids and their dying moms or kids in a homeless shelter hoping Santa will find them. Yes, I do realize this stuff is reality for many people, but holiday songs are supposed to bring you up and make you feel the spirit of the season, not drag you down into the depths of sorrow and dispair. The next time a sad song comes on, I'm going to turn it off and start singing something silly like "I want a hippopatamous" or "Dominic the Italian Christmas Donkey" and keep myself happy and bright. Boo on sad sack Christmas songs!

Oh, I want a hippopatamous for Christmas! Only a hippopatamous will do! I don't like crocodiles or rinososauruseses, I only like hippopatamouseses. And hippopatamouses like me too!


The only sad holiday song that gets a pass for me is Same Auld Lang Syne by Dan Fogleberg. I know it's supposed to be a sad song about regrets and what might have been and what not, but it always makes me smile and think about the boys in my past and what would happen if I ran into one of them at the grocery store.