Tuesday, July 27, 2010

It's about time.















Text Color






Etc.....

It's about time i changed my blog. I'm not sure what i am going to do about Facebook. It seems difficult to do both. And i realized i made it more difficult on myself by friending everyone who asked to be my friend. I have people on there related to my work that i don't even know and have never spoken to. Why did they want to be my friend anyway? Normally i am not even worried about protocol or politeness but i just couldn't turn them down. One of them is even my boss!

And if i had to choose between Facebook and the blog, i will choose the blog. Even if Facebook does make it easier to share photos.

anyway, here are some photos of last week with Barbara/equeyaya who posts here. We had a great time and we just settled right away into an easy time like we have been vacationing together for years. We talked about big stuff and we talked about little stuff. What we didn't run out of was stuff to say. Kylee joined us in Seattle for one day and we went to a somewhat disappointing lunch at Wild Ginger. That's a photo of us in a wine bar. (Kylee finally turned 21 years old!) I like the guy in the background.

We made the lovely risotto one night. And we drank a lot of wine. Mostly all Washington wines. In fact, i still haven't wanted any wine since so i'm blogging with Fresca! It was a very very good trip.

Oh yeah, the first photo is from Brian cooking and smoking up the whole house a couple of nights ago. It never even set off the fire alarm, so i went out and bought a new battery.

Random thoughts .

1. You know those ziplock bags? I have the HARDEST time ever getting them zipped and unzipped. It makes me worried for when i get to be an old lady. If Brian wasn't around to open up stuff i will starve. I am famous for tearing up cereal boxes like a rabid pit bull might. I think it's called patience. Or lack thereof.

2. Have y'all seen the Old Spice commercials. OMG, let me know if you haven't and i'll come back with the YouTube. They are the BEST.

3. My ex husband wore Old Spice so i would never buy it for Brian.

4. Isn't it weird how a smell can take you back to that time and place and be a reminder of someone, even if you don't want to remember them?

5. Where is louielouie? Are you still in Cannon Beach?

6. I read a whole book yesterday from beginning to end and may finish one today too. Much of my summer escape reading is thriller turn pager kind of stuff.

7. I am having a great summer. I took a nap today and yesterday. I love naps. I love watching the HG channel. I love getting my run done early in the morning. I love sitting on the patio drinking my french press coffee with the paper.

8. I bought Tom Petty's Mojo cd yesterday on iTunes. My favorite song is Candy. I love it when an artist i have loved for years and years is still doing what they do best.

OK, that's all i got. I hope some of y'all come and post about your summer vacation too. I'll keep blogging even if no one is reading because i just like the writing and randomness of it. It's my outlet. And Facebook is limiting.


23 comments:

equeyaya said...

brian smoked up the house, lol!

i am with you on the baggies. it makes me feel so inept. i'm surprised this didn't come up in conversation last week!

when i look at that wine bar photo again, it's pretty obvious the bartender framed the creeper dude in the shot. that's pretty funny and actually adds a lot to the photo.

i shared my pictures with the cowgirls tonight and jo got their official seal of approval. it really was an excellent experience, start to finish. it was exactly what i needed to begin to restore my soul.

i am back to work for one week before my next vacation. i have the whole week off next week, but we are only away Tuesday through Friday. I'm driving with the girls and a friend of Grace's to Niagara Falls. it should be quite the girl adventure.

it's a nice week to be back to work because a lot of other people are on vacation so i can get things done. sometimes i get annoyed when my day's plan gets thrown off track because someone "needs to see me immediately." that happened today. then i felt bad about being annoyed. the person was a nursing assistant who needed to move because her landlord was selling the house she was living in. she made her plans and saved for her move. then the transmission on her car went and she had to use her money for the security deposit on the new place to fix it. if she didn't have her deposit today she and her three kids would be homeless by the weekend. i was able to pull together an emergency meeting of our "sunshine fund committee" and get funds approved for part of the deposit, and hopefully she was able to convince the new landlord to buy her time for the rest of it. her story brought tears to my eyes and reminded me of the reason i am there.

my dad wore old spice. i have not seen the commercial, so i hope you'll post it.

i am reading A Tree Grows in Brooklyn for the first time ever. i love it.

i have to get up in four and a half hours to meet cowgirls for a workout, so i'd better dry my hairs and get my ass in bed.

tomorrow is another day!

jojo cucina cucina said...

"I'm on a horse." This is the first one i had ever seen and my favorite!

louielouie said...

1.Still in Cannon Beach. The last of the family is checking out today, but Ron and I have one more night. It has been good: beach walking, sitting in the hot tub, hanging out, good conversation, great music and a ton o fun cooking with Doug. We also had a smoke out the house episode on mexican food night. We cooked all dinners in -can’t believe we forgot to take pics of the food. It was all fantastic. My brothers and sister and their families were all here at one time – everyone but my son :-). My sister left early so did some of the older cousins but my brothers just left today. All seemed to enjoy themselves and no one got overly weird. Of course Ron and I were in a condo down the road. . . My sisters in-law are saints, and Jo they can more than match you glass for glass any day

May be one too many days with my mom though, or maybe two too many martinis with my mom two-too many days. OMG the stories. I told my brother I didn’t know what was making me most crazy, the retelling, and retelling, and retelling “updated/revised” old stories or the new old stories we had never heard. Don’t you think the emergency room fork between the ribs and how my mother saved the day in 1959 would have come up before yesterday? I made emma promise to slap me silly when I start this.


No naps for me not even much reading, mostly crosswords. The weather has been good, not hot enough for sitting in the sand, but good for balcony-type sunning and perfect for waking. Anyway one last day with just the two of us will be good. I’m trying to gain the focus necessary to make an appointment for a cut and color. Right now it sounds just too hard,

2. I LOVE the Old Spice ads; each one is better than the next. Got to admit, I also like the Keith Stone ones for Keystone Beer. I do enjoy ads in general, most all except the drug ones. Looking forward to the new season of Project Runway, my only non-cooking reality show pleasure.

3. Enough for now, I may walk to town, or maybe not -

jojo cucina cucina said...

Your Cannon Beach experience sounds pretty good. But i don't picture your sister in laws matching me wine for wine.

I would like to see your mom two martinis beyond her max or was it YOU who had to two beyond?

Don't you think our risotto is very pretty?

The Old Spice ads are great. He has a bunch of them that are just YouTube ads because the Spice Dude is on Facebook now. He answers Facebook comments and questions. My favorite is from George Stephanopolis. If you had Facebook you could see it on my page!

equeyaya said...

love that guy.

Modern Hippie said...

did you ever see the money "someone like you" with ashley judd and hugh jackman and greg kinnear (its a good movie, rent it if you havent) theres a scene where she goes to a plastic surgeon to remove her nose memory (its called something else) because anytime she smells vanilla and laundry and she thinks of her ex and gets depressed haha its pretty funny

you need to get the ziplock bags with the little device on it, like a real zipper. cause i too hate ziplock bags, what i hate more are the ziplock bags you get from the deli they are so tiny i can never get them back together! why can't food be velcro-ed? i dont see why it wouldnt work! haha

i should give you some of the books they are GREAT fast reads and funny, i laugh out loud at them.

jojo cucina cucina said...

Kylee, you wrote 'money' when you meant 'movie' LOL....

eque, he's great isn't he? I can't believe you hadn't seen this commercial before.

Velcro makes way more sense than ziplocks. The reason i wrote about it is because i was trying to open up some cheese that was in a ziplock maybe a half hour before i wrote the blog and i Brian wasn't home and i was cussing that cheddar up and down and sideways. Finally, i got it open. But i have been known to simply pull out the scissors and say 'f8ck it'.

However, i do not have a problem using the corkscrew. so i'm good there.

equeyaya said...

haha! i am definitely more practiced with the corkscrew, too! dontcha love when you finally rip the bag open and the shit inside flies out everywhere? "device," lol, Kylee!

I am not surprised i haven't seen that commercial because i NEVER watch TV. That's one of the things I want to get back to when my life settles down. Some guilty pleasures....

jojo cucina cucina said...

OK, you people. you people who do not watch TV make me crazy. Julie, are you reading? You miss out on so much! :)

louielouie, help me out here. Tell them about what they are missing "Project Runway", "Say Yes to the Dress". "What Not to Wear", "Sell this House" "Holmes on Homes" - i could go on and on.

Barbara, Brian and i went and walked Chambers Golf Course tonight. We did it in 50 minutes flat without the shortcut. Then we went to Jakes in Steilacoom and negating all of that exercising by drinking two 10% microbrews!

I do not know how y'all know how to decorate your house or how to dress without watching the HG / TLC and A&E channels! you DON'T know what you are missing!

The bartender, John (who i love because he remembers me) explained to me that the two 10% microbrews i had in two hours went to my head is because they are almost like drinking a bottle of wine.

jojo cucina cucina said...

LOLOLOL.... i just re-read what i wrote and realized i cut and pasted in the wrong place when i went back to add aobut the decorating the house. I think i just proved John right!

Tomorrow i am going to work! boohoo.boohoo.

equeyaya said...

How was work?

Today I came home around 5:30, cleaned my riding boots and cleaned out my riding gear bag, filled four bags with sticks and other yard waste. Argued with Grace, emptied the dishwasher, washed some other dishes and put away some kitchen stuff I got at the sale at work, made a hamburger, drank a lite beer, and worked for two hours on my freelance writing job.

I want to be lazy and read books and watch TV and decorate my house.

Tuesday I leave for vacation again! Wish me luck keeping three teenage girls entertained in Niagara Falls!

jojo cucina cucina said...

I was JUST coming here to tell anyone who cared about my first work day and how fun to have you actually ask me, eque!

I walked in to a huge pile of stuff, bills, dues, mail, etc. on my desk even though i had been in the office once in mid-July. Being a very task oriented type of personality, I LOVE piles of work so that was fun.

The people i like best were there today for part of the day. And then the new UniServ Rep we just hired came in and she and I walked across the street and had lunch and it was so easy and comfortable and nice to be with her. I'm really going to like her.

Then louielouie and her husband stopped by this afternoon when everyone else had gone home. and at 4:00 pm I had a good stop point and met Irene (one of my office buddies who had been there in the morning) to meet me at my pool for a wine break fter work.

I still have one more week until i'm back for good. I plan on being lazy that last week.

I don't even know why i just said that since i've been pretty lazy the whole time i've been off.

I love summer.

eque, I think you will be just fine in Niagra Falls. THEY will keep you entertained! (But bring wine in your suitcase just in case.)

jojo cucina cucina said...

Because i went to work today after having been off since June 25 i INSISTED that it was Monday when Brian asked me about what we did last Sunday. I was so sure that Sunday was yesterday. He has not been off on vacation but he even paused and said it scared him when i told him it was Monday because for a moment there, he believed me.

louielouie said...

No work for me yet!!!

As a last hurrah, am planning a dinner party for tonight. I’ve been experimenting with a mango margarita recipe and finally found one Ron likes made with fresh honey- mangoes. Emma and /I perfected a fresh (traditional) margarita recipe in Cannon Beach.

So we’ll start with the margaritas and my cooking-light, grilled pepper poppers recipe. I tried it last week with my brother and it’s a keeper. Those, along with the Gazpacho, will start the meal.

yum!

jojo cucina cucina said...

I dont' like Gazpacho. That's the cold tomato soup, right? I do like the idea of pepper poppers, but it might just be because i like saying it. pepper poppers, pepper poppers. Mango margaritas sound good too. I make mine with fresh oranges and shaken, but i can totally see how mangoes would be a good substitute. Do you float Grand Marnier on top or does that not go with mangoes?

louie, i have to ask, what is that new avatar of yours?

jojo cucina cucina said...

What the hell?

I'm reading the newspaper and it is telling me that calcium could give me a heart attack?

What the hell?

My cardiologist has me on 1200 mg of calcium (plus the calicum in my Flintstone vitamin) with Vitamin D because it's also supposed to be good for high blood pressure in addition to helping my bones and now the news is telling me it could GIVE me a heart attack?

What are we supposed to believe anymore?

This pisses me off. I think i am going to stop reading health shit like this and just go with my own health care plan. Lots of wine, lots of sun, lots of TV watching, and a nap every day.

Unknown said...

YEAAAA JoJo updated her blog. Of course I can't talk..

It's just too hot here to do anything. I took Lucy to Doggie School today to learn to behave. Of course, I found out it's all me not her. She did really well and I discovered what worked for my lab does not work for my beagle. So I'm talking really soft and she responds so much better to it.

I'm having another staycation this week. I start Wednesday..hopefully. My boss got a really nasty ear thing that causes severe vertigo. If she is not better (can take 4 weeks) I may have to postpone.

I just read Lost Horizon (the book about Shangri-La) and I read it in an afternoon. I think I read it in high school but didn't like it then but loved it now.

I was going to get a nook or a kindle but I think I'll wait. I downloaded the applications to my phone but that is just too small to read.

And I quit reading health things..it all depends on your dna..my gf chewed tobacco, drank and was meaner than Mel Gibson and he lived to 90. My gm (on the other side) ate greasy food and was 100 lbs overweight and she lived to 90 as well. Our operations guy in Germany was in his 30's when he dropped dead of aneurysm..otherwise healthy as a horse.

jojo cucina cucina said...

gawdammit, i had a whole comment here and lost it because of an errant finger on my netbook clicking a wrong button which popped me out.

OK, start over. i get you susieatl on the living to 90 with all the bad living.

My YaYa grandmother, Bop, who lived in Morgan City, Louisiana, was an insulin diabetic who drank Schlitz out of can every day, smoked Viceroys and cooked and ate all that southern fried food. She was about 75 pounds overweight and lived to be 85 years old. Never exercised in her life. Didn't eat her vegetables either.

I am afraid my mom is going to live past 100 and put ME in an early grave.

Tonight we have a BBQ with my family and my Uncle Alfred who flew in from La. Alfred was married to my yaya aunt Judy (who died a few years ago.) He is coming in tonight with his second wife and i don't like her (but it's mostly because she is not Aunt Judy.)

So because we are having this BBQ my mom has to call me three times today.

The first message is :
1. Are you coming? What time will you be there?
2. I have this merlot i bought for Alfred. Should it be refrigerated?
3. Ok, i'll meet you there at Scott's. (at my brother's house where the BBQ is.)

This in itself wouldn't be so annoying. what's annoying is that our answering machine message is Brian playing a few opening harmonica catchy bluesy licks and then saying, "leave a message" and EVERYTIME Mom calls she says, "hello, Jo? Hello Jo? Are you there? "

As if we would answer the phone live playing the harmonica.

jojo cucina cucina said...

i am drinking the prerequisite glass of wine right now before i go over there.

susieatl, by the way, i laughed out loud at your "meaner than Mel Gibson" comment! You are so funny.

equeyaya said...

jo, i laughed out loud FOUR times at your last post:

1. I am afraid my mom is going to live past 100 and put ME in an early grave.

2. I have this merlot i bought for Alfred. Should it be refrigerated?

3. Brian playing a few opening harmonica catchy bluesy licks and then saying, "leave a message" and EVERYTIME Mom calls she says, "hello, Jo? Hello Jo? Are you there? " As if we would answer the phone live playing the harmonica.

4. And the Schlitz out of a can reference, did you know that was brewed in Philadelphia?

I had an EXHAUSTING day. I filled four more bags and my big trash can with shit in my yard, and then tried mowing for the first time and broke my lawnmower. Which is fine because I am NEVER mowing grass again. I don't care what I have to pay to have someone else do this for me. It was one of the most traumatic experiences of my life.

I came in after almost four hours in my f-ing yard and took a shower and a nap.

Then Grace and I went shopping at Marshalls and I got a couple of cute tops for our trip to Niagara Falls this week.

Then I made meatballs and sauce. I'm feeling better now.

Then I picked up Mel at work and came home to VERA AND JOHN, my alter-parents. I can't remember the last time I saw John out of his own apartment, and he CAME TO SEE MY NEW HOUSE!! I was so excited I gave him kisses and hugs and we had a great visit.

So I'm over the whole lawn mowing debacle.

And, yes, I AM drinking wine. Some Italian stuff from Montepulciano, where Vittorio is from. <3

And I'm listening to Ryan Adams, Magick.

jojo cucina cucina said...

eque, because you mentioned Majick when i read this morning i plugged my iTunes into Ryan Adam's Cardinology when i went running today. I love that song and the Fix It song too.

Happy Birthday, louielouie! Today is her birthday. Oddly enough, louie was born on the exact same day as Brian's sister.

I watched THREE hours of "Say Yes to the Dress". It's so weird i even watch this show because i hate brides and weddings and never wanted to get all caught up in that shit when i was married all those times. (Even the first time.) But there is something about watching the personalities that has me hooked.

equeyaya said...

Happy birthday, Sarah!!

Lois' 62 year old husband is hooked in Say Yes to the Dress too. Too cute!

~ T (grits) ~ said...

LOVE the pics of you and the gals, Jo!!!!!