brain blobs and verbal vomit

It is like I am twelve years old as I erupt in giggle fits every time I look at this.  That lady in Spain meant well, but there are a lot of things you shouldn't do unless you are an expert.

Pretty much this will be a post that contains a lot of links to other sites.  Oh well, it is my third post of the day.  Yeah, third post.  This helps make up for my posting laziness right?  I think with the rain of Isaac I may even get in a few terrible films this weekend!

Back to the fresco...

I am sure that after this crime against art there was going to be a stiff punishment, but I am betting now it wont be as bad since this has become a tourist destination.  "Tourists Flock to Furry Beast Jesus Fresco"  - this just makes me giggle more.  Not just because now people want to see this in person, but because it now makes me think like Rush Limbaugh.  He has come up with some pretty crazy conspiracies, like the latest that "Obama manipulated Isaac's storm track to delay GOP convention" -yeah, he really said something along these lines.  I am sure Obama also changed the storm track to ruin my weekend.  Seriously though, am I crazy to say that maybe this was on purpose to get more tourists? Like a "Tee hee, let's get Cecelia to do it. This will get us so much news coverage!"

Fresco Jesus is on Twitter and you can even submit your own rendering!  Seriously, you can scribble and submit your own fresco via Twitter.  The collection of submitted images are on Pinterest.  Some are not that great but there are a few chuckles in the bunch.

Here is what my submission would be if I ever did anything with my Twitter account.  It was kind of hard to paint with their program.  Now that I look at it, I really didn't need their program since I didn't leave any of the original fresco at all.  Oh well.  I guess it is some sort of Memeception as it is a meme within a meme...

There are tons of other references out there to this botched image...can you imagine people dressing like this for Halloween?  Imagine it.  Someone will do it.  Here are a few images from http://www.cheezburger.com/
 I cannot stop laughing at this one.  Seriously.  Every time I look at it there is laughter.

There is a lesson to be learned from this.  Don't try and do something you don't know how to do if it is really old or really important.

Yeah, I am not the best neighbor.  I guess I could be considered a hermit as I am never seen in front of my house unless I am getting in or out of my car.  but I really only have two neighbors.  I am not counting the rental across the street nor the vacant houses that are for sale on my street or went into foreclosure.  I also have a business, a bar/restaurant/ and a laundromat right here too.

So my two neighbors are either side of me.  I love my one neighbor.  He is great...works all day, plays horse shoes or rides his Harley in the evening.  Nice and quiet.

Then there is the neighbor on the other side of me.  I have bitched about her before in another post.  Did I ever pursue anything on that.  NO.  So my lack of sleep these last few nights I guess is my own fault.

Why did I not pursue this?  I know at the time of that post I was going out of town and had other trips planned.  I know I didn't want my house sitters to have to deal with any repercussions of me contacting the authorities.  Then procrastination...

Something I learned today is that to deal with her, I would have to contact two different departments of the city.  Health and Humane Services on the dogs and Code Enforcement on her weeds/trash.

What lead up to this you ask?  BITCHINESS DUE TO LACK OF SLEEP - that and PMSing.  NOT A GOOD COMBINATION PEOPLE!

This isn't lack of sleep because of the husband snoring.  This is lack of sleep due to barking and whining dogs.

Tuesday night my neighbor wasn't home.  At that time I thought just the one dog had been left outside.  I assumed the police wouldn't be able to do anything so I didn't call...well, not until 5am.  I was going out of my mind.  My bedroom is right at her back yard and the head of my bead is at the window.  So I had the perfect vantage point for listening to this dog all freaking night.  I was going absolutely batshit nuts.  So I dialed the police.  The dispatcher told me that she could send an officer out but he couldn't do anything and my best bet is to contact Health and Humane Services during business hours which was after 8am.  The policeman came and knocked on the door.  I knew she wasn't home so this was going to result in absolutely nothing.  I was wrong, this resulted in all of the dogs barking instead of just the one.  This continued well after he had left. The dogs eventually quieted down and I finally slept...and ended up oversleeping to where I didn't have time to report the dogs before work.

After work I did not notice the dogs...well, not until 8pm when the barking started again.  This is when I noticed two of her other dogs, the Great Dane and the gray Terrier  It was that stupid black dog AGAIN with the barking.  This is where I noticed that my neighbor had her back basement door open which I am now assuming was shelter for the dogs.  That stupid black dog barked on and off all night.  It seemed to bark for between 10-20 minutes with about a 15 minute break in between...sometimes there was only a 2 minute break.  I know it was close to 1am before I finally went to sleep..that sleep ended when my husband woke up for work at 4am.  His alarm woke me and that is when I noticed that the dog was still barking.  That was pretty much the end of sleep for me.  So between 1-ish and 4am is all the sleep that I have gotten.

Today I am PMSing and I don't work today so plenty of time to call on the dogs.  Speaking with the woman at Health and Humane is when I learned that City Ordinance allows TWO dogs and more than two require approval from 75% of the neighbors.  I know I didn't give approval.  I am the only neighbor she really has.  There is a business on the other side of her, vacant lot behind her, bar across the street...looks like it is just me.
While I was on the phone with them, I asked if they also did anything about weeds and trash -I was thinking Health and Humane would cover that .  Nope.  They gave me the number for Code Enforcement.  She also told me that they wouldn't be taking the dogs and that they have to leave notice for the owner to contact them within 24 hours - DAMN I WISH I WOULD HAVE HAD TIME YESTERDAY!  Then it would already have been 24 hours and maybe they would be packing up the pooches!  She said she would have someone out first thing.

I will say again, I am crabby from no sleep and also PMSing and I find it ridiculous that my neighbor would be gone two complete nights and leave her dogs out all night.  RIDICULOUS!!!!  So I am DONE letting things go.

I called Code Enforcement and unleashed a bitchy rant about the weeds and trash.  I did apologize to the lady and tell her that I have not been getting sleep because of the dogs and that I had already called on them.  She said someone would be out first thing.

YAY, this is two departments coming out first thing.  Let me tell you that Animal Control's first thing = first thing.  They came at 9am.   I watched her knock on the door.  I know I told them that the home owner hadn't been home in two days...so the dogs inside the house were barking.  I was the nosy neighbor and peeked through the window at the happenings.  I watched the animal control officer walk around both sides of the house and look in the back yard.  Only the black dog was outside.  One of the smaller dogs was barking inside and i wished the Great Dane would have been barking too so she could note that there were three dogs.  SIGH.  They did leave notice on the front door though.

I have been watching this house and didn't see where code enforcement stopped by but maybe I am wrong.

What I did see was the person who is "taking care" of these dogs.  The lady that rents the building on the corner for her upholstry business showed up today with her dog (which is never leashed and was not in the back yard) a Chihuahua (possibly the neighbor's as I have seen this dog before) and the white terrier (which is definitely the neighbor's).  So while she was filling up all of the water buckets there were FIVE dogs in the yard plus hers roaming the area outside the fence.  The black dog is barking even more now because he is excited to see a person and the other dogs.  This lady did what she came to do and is gone.  What isn't gone are the two additional dogs.  The white terrier has a "yip yip" bark that is annoying.  All of the dogs are barking this evening because there is a bar across the street from this neighbor's house and the dogs like to bark at all of the people coming and going.  The lady did not remove the notice from animal control which to me means she did not see it and will not notify the pet owner.  That is fine.  I am sure I will be complaining in the morning about the dogs barking tonight.

In case you didn't want to look at that other blog from April where I wished a tornado would take away her house (ooooh, maybe Isaac can wash it away this weekend!!!), here are some side by side pictures of the house.

April 2012

August 2012

April 2012

August 20

You can see that in four months her "weed tree" by her window has continued to grow somehow in the summer with extreme heat and no rain.  You know she wasn't watering it.  It is a miracle beyond miracles.  My grass is brown but her weeds thrive.

Another change you can see that there is a trashcan in the backyard now for the dog feces.  Yeah, because collecting it and putting it in an open trash can doesn't make it stink anymore.  I bet that will be super fantastic this weekend.  If it doesn't blow over, then it will collect the possible 6" of rain.  I can't wait for that stench.

I am probably going to be disliked very much by my neighbor but I don't care.  I disliked her more first.

I am sure this is not the end of this saga but it is the end of this post.

Yes, I have my lazy moments...but not out in public.

http://www.80stees.com

I take my child to an Elementary school for speech therapy.  We started this last Spring once he turned three.  This teacher had a number of students so there were appointments before and after us,

The laziness of the other parents just shocked me.  One of my kid's classes was a shared class.  This father was unbelievable.  He would come in, sit in the hallway and let his kid do whatever while he played games on his phone.  Games on his phone with the volume up.  Did I mention this was in a hallway at an Elementary school where there are other classrooms?  This father played away on his phone while his kid starts kicking the magnets on the sand table.  Yes. kicking.  This is making noise...but not enough to pull his father from his game to scold him.  My kid is laughing, he thinks this is neat so he quits quietly playing and starts to imitate.   When does the father look up?  When I am scolding my child...which I have to repeatedly do because he is not stopping his child's behavior.

I dislike this father.  Every week it was the same thing and his kid was rowdy.  Gee, I wonder why.  Does the child feel he has to act out to get his father's attention?  I know you are thinking that this isn't necessarily lazy father but more that he is inattentive to his child...but there is more.  You have to sign in and out in the office and get a visitor badge.  This father could not be bothered to take that step so that the school knew who all was roaming the halls.  When he was confronted on this, he then started signing in - but he would also sign his time out so he wouldn't have to go back into the office.  I noticed when I would sign in that he was already signed in and out on the line above me.  SERIOUSLY?  YOU ARE THAT LAZY THAT YOU CANNOT OPEN A DOOR AND WRITE DOWN A TIME WHEN YOU LEAVE?

Yeah, I was glad for the school year to end and not have to deal with that every week.  It just grated on my nerves...but now it is a new school year.  I was afraid of what annoyance the year would bring.

There have been changes in the school this year.  They made a window right at the entrance so that you don't even have to go into the office to sign in.  It is all right there on a ledge with the clip on "visitor" badge.  So simple and easy.  This should help that lazy father that couldn't be bothered to open the door to the office a second time.

The toys and busy tables had been removed from the hallway.  Probably due to too much noise the previous year.  Oh well, we would read books then while we waited.

Our first class last Monday was great! We didn't have to share an appointment so I didn't have to deal with disliking any parents sitting there and no one was there before or after us.  I think I am a minority as a parent that doesn't like to chatter nonstop about my kid.  I had a Chatty Kathy last year that finally figured out that I didn't care to listen about her and her kid.  What a relief to sit in silence.

Our second class though wasn't as nice.  I signed in at the office.  The time was 10:50, what is this?  The line above me shows someone signed in at 10:20 and out at 11:00.  Is there are time traveling parent with the appointment before ours?  No.  She is still sitting there waiting in the hallway for her child.  She is just another lazy parent who couldn't be bothered to sign out.

I don't understand it.  THE CLIPBOARD IS RIGHT THERE FOR YOU TO SIGN OUT.  RIGHT FREAKING THERE ON YOUR WAY OUT THE DOOR!

She was reminded to sign in and out at the office again by the Speech teacher and they left.  I got to wait in silence again (I should say in the amount of silence a hallway in an  elementary school offers with a kindergarten and first grade class nearby).  Just right before my child's appointment was over Lazy Father from last school year shows up.  They have the appointment after us.  This must be their first appointment for this school year as the child is upset about the toys missing and is going on and on about it.  ON AND ON.  Looks like he is going to have to entertain his son while he waits.  Nope.  He keeps suggesting that he go down the hall to the water fountain.  Um, that is not a toy or something to occupy his time.  Really?  GOOD!  Here is the teacher and my kid.  I am saved from getting irritated.

I go to turn in my visitor badge and sign out 11:31 next to where I signed in.  What else do I see?  Lazy father signed in 11:25 and then started to write the out time.  He wrote the "12:" but didn't fill in the minutes.  Really?  Is this a time saver?  You wont have time to write two numbers, a colon, and two more numbers when you leave?  You have to save time by getting that action 3/5 of the way completed?  I find this irritating.  All of this makes me angry and it is only the first week of school!

If parents can't show that they aren't lazy when they are out in public at a school that is helping their kid...then how lazy are they at home? Is this the reason why their child that is not of school age needs help with speech?

This concludes the verbal vomit on this subject.

You know this is hot.

Your feet take a beating.  They are powering you along over all sorts of different terrain.  They support your body weight and shift as necessary to keep you balanced.  You don't really think about them until they are hurting.

When those dogs start barking - you had better listen.
HEED MY WARNING.  THE GREAT AND POWERFUL OZ HAS SPOKEN!

I have worn a ton of non-supportive shoes in my life and I have been paying for it for YEARS.

It caught up with me around 12ish years ago when I went from a desk job to a constant on the feet job.  It seems every few years I do a cycle of jobs that are either constant sitting or constant standing. That round the standing was kicking my ass.  This is when I realized that I needed more support in my shoes.  I broke in a few pairs of Birkenstocks and I was good to go.  Those shoes are a little on the pricey side (if you are cheap like me) and they just don't go with everything.

My Chiropractor made me custom orthotics about 7ish years ago.  They were great!  It made it so I could be on my feet forever and they slipped into any shoe (except sometimes you have to get a 1/2 size or full size larger). Life was perfect for my feet until pregnancy.

I have complained about this fact in other posts...but when you are pregnant, those hormones that loosen up your ligaments in your rib cage and pelvis - yeah, they do that in the feet too.  At this time I was in a round of "sit on my butt" type of job.  So the fact that my my foot had gotten a size larger and that my arch had fallen was unnoticeable (you ask how I wouldn't notice my feet becoming larger? I was working the sit on my butt job and I was already buying larger shoes to accommodate the orthotic insert...so the shoes weren't ever tight).  My orthotics didn't really fit me anymore and I had no clue up until recently.  I had left the "sit on my butt" job to stay home with the kid.  In November I started working part-time at an "on your feet all day" job.  It was two days a week and I just figured that I wasn't used to it when my feet were hating me.

Eventually I went to the New Balance store for a pair of shoes.  I knew they had experts and would scan my feet for the perfect fit. They set me up with a new pair of shoes and inserts.  I went back twice for adjustments on their insert.  It just still didn't feel right.  I imagined in my head that if I spent $200 that I should feel like I am gliding on a cloud (again, I am cheap and $200 on shoes should be at least six pairs of shoes instead of one).  My plan for these shoes was for the gym for exercising which I need to incorporate in my life bad.  My feet were still hurting after a day of work wearing these.  Something isn't right!

The pain got progressively worse.  It wasn't until last week that I finally went to a Podiatrist.  I think why I put it off is that in my head only old people went to Podiatrists.  I wasn't wrong.  Sitting there looking at all these old people with the same New Balance shoes...*GASP*  I AM ONE OF THEM!

I had an idea what was wrong with me but now it was confirmed by someone other than myself and Dr. Internet.


There is a band of tissue (Plantar fascia) that runs the whole bottom of your foot.  It is connected to your heel and runs all the way to your toes.  This problem can occur with overly flat feet or high-arched feet when you aren't getting the support that your arch needs.  The plantar fascia can become inflamed and without proper treatment it can get out of control.

Do you ever have heel pain or have trouble walking (like it is painful and you hobble for the first few steps) when you first get up in the morning or have been sitting for a long period of time?  If you said "YES" then you most likely have this ailment as well and it has gone untreated for too long.

What is happening is that when you are at rest, your foot is pointed down and the Plantar fascia is contracted.  It starts healing and tightening up this way.  When you put your feet down on the floor the Plantar fascia is then flexed.  Basically this motion is ripping and tearing that band of tissue apart.  You notice after a few steps the pain goes away, but more damage has been done in the process.

My appointment resulted in a shot in my heel, a splint (this keeps the foot flexed so that the Plantar fascia is stretched and can heal) to be worn when I sleep or am sitting for a long period of time, temporary wraps with support in the arch to be worn all the other times, and new custom orthotic molds to be made.  I was also instructed to ice down my heel in 10 minute intervals and was also given handouts on exercises (I found this link to similar exercises) to perform to help with the healing.  If I follow the directions, I should be 40% better at my next visit in two weeks. Surgery was mentioned as a possibility if all of these measures didn't help.

EEEK!  SURGERY!  I better follow those rules.

If any of this blog post made you think that you had this problem and you have not visited a Podiatrist, call and make an appointment.

This concludes the PSA on feet.

I love what I remember from the 80's.  It was my youth.  I grew up in the 80's with the music, TV, clothes, movies, cartoons, toys, and etc.  I guess everyone is nostalgic about their youth...but the 80's - such a fun and colorful time.  It is no wonder our generation has 80's themed parties.  I went to a second annual 80's birthday party at a friend's house last night.

Reading back over this I realize this has gotten long.  SUPER LONG.  You will also notice the title covers a LOT of subjects.  This is what happens when things float around in my head and then something happens to pull them all out...

I got sucked into watching "Ice Bear" a few weeks ago.  It is about the Polar Bears and their migration...yeah, it was not a happy time show.  This was sad.  It was showing how these bears that used to have snow are now without snow and food because of the heat, they get overheated and die.

There is no doubt about it, this planet is changing.  All of the pollution we create and all of the waste we are creating can't be good.  Everyone has to see that right?  Global Warming.  It is real.

Why am I bringing this up now?  We just had a large festival in the city where I live that lasted three days.  I happen to work at a business right in the middle of the madness.   What did I observe?  The laziness that we have become.

People were putting trash right next to the doorway of our shop.  There was no trashcan there.  Let's just throw our trash right next to the 200 year old building on the cobblestone sidewalk.  That will look great. That will add to the ambiance. What you ask? Couldn't they bring it in and ask if we had a trashcan?  No.  No they cannot.  People are lazy.  I say people because once one lazy person does it, another will see how that is a good idea and pile the trash on top of that and on the window sills of the buildings in the Historic Neighborhood.  Thanks for visiting!

I did not walk around much at this festival, but during my little trek I did not see any recycle bins.  This is the fault of the committee and the city.  Really though, would people use them?

Let me just say that I am not claiming in any way to be the best at recycling and preserving the environment.  I try to do what I can when I can. Do I recycle? Yes.  Do I have trash that goes to the dump?  Yes.  Our trash and recycling bins are the same size. Our recycling bin is completely full every week while we might only have one to two small bags of trash in that trashcan....back to the blog... 

So, I get home from a long day of working and those thoughts of all the trash generated were floating around in my head.  I sat down to relax and scrolled through FB to see if there was anything that I had missed and there was one of those "SomeEcards" things.
This pretty much summed it up.  So I shared it and then looked up info on garbage before going to bed.

Here is some of the nuggets of info I came up with.

Have you ever heard of a trash vortex? Yeah, we have one on Earth - well actually two (the Western Garbage Patch and the Eastern Garbage Patch).  The one between California and Hawaii is estimated to be twice the size of Texas.  While I am talking about trash in the ocean, did you know that the ratio of plastic to plankton ratio is 6 to 1?  SIX TIMES MORE PLASTIC IN THE OCEAN THAN PLANKTON.

Wait, we don't live in the ocean so let me bring up some garbage info on the USA. Did you know there are over 3000 active landfills and over 10,000 old Municipal landfills in the United States alone?  One of our largest located outside of Los Angeles, CA is over 700 acres.  That is about one square mile.  Picture a square mile of garbage. That isn't the biggest though.  Apex Regional located right outside of Las Vegas, NV is 2,200 acres.  Fresh Kills Landfill on Staten Island, NY was closed in 2001 and also 2,200 acres.  Did you know that at one point the mountain of trash was taller than the Statue of Liberty?  The landfill is now in the process of being developed into green space.

Can you imagine all of these mountains made from trash?  Seriously, Google "Mount Trashmore" for pictures.

Sure the gases from landfills are now being used to power homes and the green space on these trash mountains are used as wildlife habitats...but still, do we have to throw so much stuff away?  Also, that is how the modern landfills work.  What about all of those other ones before we got smart?

Remember when I said that I shared that picture above before going to bed?  The next morning I had a few friends click "like" on the picture...and one comment after I was at work.  Was it regarding how we are destroying the Earth?  No.
She is the pink, I am the green.

If you are wondering - yes, she did unfriend me.  Am I hurt?  Well, we went all through school together.  You can see that we have 64 mutual friends (maybe less once I post this).  Shoot, I went to a few slumber parties at her house as a kid...but since graduation I have seen her once.  I will say that she is and always has been a beautiful person with a kind and caring soul.  The kind of someone you want on your side, so yeah I guess it kind of stings a bit where she severed that FB friendship.  Am I crying about it?  No.  I just think about things and then when these thoughts are too much swimming in my head, then I write them out --so here we are.

It took me a little bit to think on how to respond.  Do I approach the fact that there are several religions that are older than Christianity and some have different beliefs on how the Earth was created?  Do I throw science and evolution in there?  No.  I will leave that alone for now

She got me wondering what I "continually make posts" on and what else she found "hurtful."   I scrolled back through my timeline...and back...and back....I didn't go back the whole year, just a few months  What did I find?

I POST A LOT OF CRAP ON FACEBOOK.

What are in these posts?

I post a lot of pictures of my kid.  I post a lot of pictures of events and trips.  I check into places.  I give shout outs to my friend's and family's businesses. I take and post pictures from my phone of funny things that I see on my travels about .  I share random thoughts and silliness.  I share lots of geeky links and geek humor.  I don't see how any of these are "hurtful."  What else could it be?

I do share links to my blog posts.  I don't think these are it, they are links that whisk you away to blogger.com and aren't really "in your face" on FB to be "hurtful"....so then that leaves the other things that I can combine into my "I love my gay family and friends and want them to have every right/freedom/benefit that I have" category.

If this is what is "hurtful" then I guess I am now the one that is hurt.

Then that makes me reflect on that first sentence.

"I find it really hurtful the way you continually make posts that are based on your perception of a group of people rather than the reality about them."

What reality of what group of people am I perceiving incorrectly?

I have FB friends and family that are different race, religion, sexual preference, beliefs, political views, lifestyle...you get the picture.  These differences are what makes the world interesting.  How boring would it be for everything to be the same?   While I don't agree with everything that I see on FB, I don't let it bother me.  Do I tell people that I don't care about it?  No (unless it is some obviously photoshopped image with false statements, then I put my two cents in).  If it makes them happy, brings comfort into their lives, and isn't breaking the law or harming others - then let it be.

If you see things that you don't want to see, Facebook makes it easy.  Just click on that arrow by a person's name and -POP- there is a magical little box where you can click on different options.  I know that a lot of my facebook friends have me  hidden, or only see my important posts.  It doesn't bother me, I have a handful that I have hidden too.  

I was having trouble on the ending of this post and yesterday a friend posted this image.  Perfect.

Working in a cube jungle you really notice quickly how fast illness can be spread around.  It seems to always be the same few that start with it and they spread it around.  "Hey you.  Yeah, YOU. The one that is sick.  STAY THE F HOME.  No one wants what you have and if you can't manage to wash your hands, use hand sanitizer, and keep your germs to yourself then STAY THE F HOME.  What?  You don't have any sick days left because you have been sick a lot?  Then let your co-workers know to contact HR to try and make an exception because you will make everyone else sick and then let's reflect on your lifestyle."

Let me just state that I am not in anyway claiming to be the most healthiest person in the world.  One look at me will tell you that exercise seems to be a bad word to me (that will be changing once I am cleared for exercise by the podiatrist - please cross your fingers that there will be no surgery).  But again, I haven't really had a bad cold/flu/virus/sinus infection in quite some time...so I will share some things that I have learned.

• Eat plenty of fruits and vegetables
• Cut out fast food 
• Wash your hands
• Get plenty of sleep
• Know your allergies and how to treat them
• Drink plenty of fluids

After the birth of the child I decided that we would be eating better in our house.  We decided to cut out High Fructose Corn Syrup.  I blogged about it in April.  It is in so many things primarily because it can extend the shelf life of food.  It is in EVERYTHING.  Because I had read an article about it being linked to autism and also ones linked to obesity, it just made sense that I should try to have us eat better for our kid.

I also introduced more fruits and veggies into the meal plan.  Sure you can take vitamins - but why not eat the foods that contain them to get the most benefit?  I know it is easy to stray away from them, believe me.  So many cheap and easy foods don't have any fruits or veggies...including the fast food.   Which while we are at it, CUT OUT THE FAST FOOD.  Not only is it not healthy and packed with fillers and unwanted calories, it is prepared by people you cannot see.  These are mostly high school kids who really don't care about you, they only care about their paycheck.  So do they wash their hands as often as they should?  Do they have a cold that they are passing onto you?  Who knows.  But since the food itself has little nutritional value, it isn't really helping your body ward off germs.

Back to fruits and veggies.  I was never a big veggie eater...but guess what.  It is easy to work them into a meal and even disguise them!  Don't have access to fresh veggies?  Okay, try this

bag of frozen cauliflower (thawed)
bag of frozen spinach (thawed)
can of diced tomatoes
2 cans of tomato sauce
1 pkg cream cheese (I use the low fat kind)
1 pkg ground sausage (I like a Mild Italian sausage)
mushrooms (I usually get one of those large packages of mushrooms in the veggie section)
1- 2 cups shredded cheese (However much you want and I use a mix of Italian cheeses)
seasonings (I use Italian, garlic powder, and salt )
pan for cooking sausage and mushrooms
9x13 baking dish

Start frying up that sausage, while that is happening you can wash and slice up your mushrooms.  When your sausage isn't mostly pink anymore, you can throw these mushrooms in to cook.

You will want to cut your cauliflower up into smaller pieces and you can dump these along with the spinach into the 9x13 pan (oh yeah, you might want to get that oven pre-heated to 350).   When your sausage/mushroom mix is done, drain off the fat and dump the sausage/mushrooms into the 9x13 pan.

Now onto the sauce.  I reuse the pan that I cooked the sausage in and dump the cans of tomato sauce, diced tomatoes in the pan and dump in my seasonings.  I usually put in extra seasoning because this will be flavoring that cauliflower and spinach.  Now put that cream cheese in to melt. When the cream cheese has melted, dump this in that 9x13 pan and stir it up.  then sprinkle in your shredded cheese.
Cook this at 350 for about 30ish minutes.  Bam!  You have a veggie casserole thing that will trick your family into eating vegetables.  

 They wont know that there isn't pasta in it.  Sure there is a lot of cheese but you could cut some of that out if you wanted.  I also started substituting spaghetti squash for pasta in a lot of things.  Try using a garlic fettuccine sauce with chicken and spaghetti squash as the "noodles." Delicious.  Like lasagna? Try layering slices of zucchini and tomato in those layers instead of some of the noodles.

Fruit is so simple to work into a meal.  I mean really, can you imagine a more refreshing snack than fresh strawberries or grapes?  No time to eat fruit?  Then drink a Naked or other fruit juice...but check those labels to make sure you are actually having FRUIT and not some sugar and flavoring.

Remember up above when I mentioned the cube jungle?  Yeah.  Let's talk about washing your hands.  Not just when you sneeze or blow your nose, but when you touch things that other people touch...like the office fax machine or copier...hand railings...think about someone that has sneezed their snot into their hand and think of all the things that they have possibly touched.
I am going to admit it now.   Did you ever notice that your desk seemed sanitized?  I was the psycho that had a can of Lysol and Lysol wipes in my desk drawer along with anti-bacterial hand sanitizer on my desk.  If you worked with me and went home sick, let me just tell you now that I sprayed everything on and around your desk with Lysol after you left.  I had a baby at home and I did not want your germs and did not want to bring them home to my kid.  I will tell you my psycho ways paid off.  My kid has never had a bad sickness.  In his 3 years he has thrown up twice, had a fever once, and only been on antibiotics twice.  Other than pain with teething and one ear infection, none of that happened until he started interacting with other children in a classroom setting.  Parents don't always keep their kids home when they are sick (yeah, would hate for a sick kid to mess up mommy's schedule) but guess what, when they are 2 and 3 they don't understand how germs are spread.  It is our job as parents to be smart!

Another thing that sometimes is hard to do is get plenty of sleep.  Your Immune system needs proper rest to work at fighting off those germs.

Allergies.  You might say you aren't allergic to anything but that might not always hold true.  Our bodies change all the time.  So, know what you are allergic to.  I am not saying that you have to go get tested, but if you seem to have allergies certain times of the year check and see what might be floating in the air...mold, pollen, etc.  You can take an Allergy pill to fix this.  I know that I have some sort of allergy to a pollen or other plant life.  I know that certain times of the year it bothers me more and I know that in the morning I feel the worst.  My solution - I take a generic zyrtec before bed.  Did you that know your simple allergy can develop into a sinus infection?  Sure sinus infections from allergies aren't usually contagious, but know one wants your oozing nose around them.

Make sure that you are drinking plenty of fluids.  I know that I do not drink enough water...but so many of us have replaced all beverages with soda.  That is not the way to go.  Soda (while it is sooooo gooooood) just is not good for you in many ways.  Did you know that soda robs your body of calcium?  I just recently gave up soda and know how hard it is.

Alright, I will jump down from my soapbox now...but before I do, I decided to look up info on the CDC site and pretty much all the stuff I am ranting about is right here.

So this really isn't a film but I am calling it a WTF anyway.

My husband and I will be attending an 80's party in a week (YES!  How totally awesome right?  We get to dress up!) and we were looking up stuff on the interwebs and I clicked on a break dancing mega mix video.  So the husband started doing some break dance moves, the kid started dancing around, and yeah I did have to join the silly fun.

Then I started clicking around and ran across these "Dancin' with Kim" videos.  They are over the top 80's which made them either horribly wonderful or excellent fakes.

The intro to the video leads you to believe that these were long lost VHS tapes discovered in recent years.  So this made me want to find out more.

IMDB page for "Dancin' with Kim"  says

"From 1982 until her tragic death in 1988, Dancin' Kim Wood thrilled audiences with the hottest new dances of the day on her locally produced TV show, Totally Rad Dances with Dancin' Kim."

But if you click on her name Kimberly Wood...then you are whisked away to her IMDB page which shows that the dance videos were made in 2008 and she was in something as recent as 2010.

It is starting to feel like Blair Witch now with the lies.

This makes me want to look for more info.  A Google search found a deleted Wikepedia page.  The entry was made August 15th 2008 and deleted August 21st 2008 because of possible hoax and fictional character.

August is proving to be a challenging month.  Seems like there hasn't been time to blog.  Well, that's a lie - I guess I should say I haven't had time to complete and post something.  I have written several drafts but haven't hit that "publish" button.  It is hard sometimes to figure out how much you want to share and what that line is where it is just too much information.  It is kind of a struggle though...on the one hand I want to get these bats out of my head, but then is it too batty to share?

Anyhow, today I will just bitch about getting older.

So yesterday a Facebook Friend posted this link to a video.  It was a video of a kid singing his heart out to his girlfriend.  Let me just state first that he is NOT a singer and that Simon Cowell would rip him a new one and the kid would probably go home to cry his eyes out and later become a hermit (yeah, I am aware of the run-on sentence situation but I must say that I am thinking of  Star Wars Kid now).

So it takes a lot of guts to post a video like that on youtube.  He is singing over Bryan Adams "(Everything I Do) I Do It For You" and it just isn't good...but still you can't stop watching and listening.  Let me say though that all I could think of watching this (after I felt bad for his singing skills) was that this song was released way before he was born and that he probably listens to his mom's "oldies" music and this is where he learned the song.  Then I started feeling old and sad. Oh, I guess you are feeling like you MUST see the video.  Warning, do not have your volume up too loud.
So now I am feeling sad and old while I have my feet propped up because they hate me.  I think I bitched about my feet changing size and shape from the pregnancy.  Yeah, I have a Podiatrist appointment next week.  Eek.  Makes me feel I may as well check into a nursing home while I out that day, maybe pick up those diaper panties that Lisa Rinna is pushing...anyway, this reminded me of something that I had seen last week.

So a week ago I was watching TV and a Life Alert commercial came on.  You know, the "I've fallen and I can't get up" ones.   Yeah, I glance up and I am in disbelief.  I swear the lady on the commercial is not much older than me.  Seriously.  I skipped it back and snapped the below picture. Good thing I had an evening of drinks ahead of me to make me forget this image - which incidentally worked since I didn't remember until the Bryan Adams kid.

It is 4/15/14 and since this has been a popular post via Pinterest, I think it is time to update to include a few more bottles that I have decorated.  Check them out at the bottom!
Look!  A craft!   It has been a while I know.

So have you ever given a bottle of alcohol as a gift but felt like it could be just a little more special?

FEAR NOT!  I will tell you how to snazz it up a bit
I have a friend that was turning 21 and remembered a pin that I had seen on Pinterest where someone had bedazzled a bottle of alcohol.  At the time I thought "hmm, that is kind of fun, but I don't know when I would do that" so of course I did not pin it...man, glad I tucked that away in my head because I could not find the pin again for the life of me. I searched every word combo I could think of and could not locate it.  The pin that I had seen used a bottle of tequila and the bottle was painted with sequins around the label.  It was pretty cute.

Anyhow, on with my craft.  I decided on a bottle of Absolut Vodka.  I thought I could play with the words and make it say "Absolutely 21" and add some sparkle.   So off to the store to pick up the Vodka and look at glitter, paint, and sequins to compile a vision in my head.
I settled on the silver glitter paint to paint onto the entire bottle.  I found these blue glitter letters in the scrapbooking area that would be perfect to spell out the "Absolutely" and I knew I had some blue glitter at home to make the large "21."
So I started in with the paint.  I painted the entire bottle starting at the base of the neck and left the little silver medallion thing paint free.  I put this paint on thick and I did several coats...I think I ended up with four coats.  SO SPARKLY!!!!!
Then on with the lettering.  I put a rubber band around the bottle to give me a straight line to work by.  I started with the center letters of the word and worked out from there.
Once that was complete I started with my glitter. I used Elmer's glue and blue glitter for this (you could use glitter glue but it seems to take so much longer to dry in my experiences with it).  Figure out your placement of your numbers and make a few marks with a sharpee.  Only do one number at a time and give the glue plenty of time to dry.  If you don't, then the curve of the bottle will cause the glue to run and your numbers will not be perfect.
I had enough letters left so I decided to make it say "Absolutely 21st Happy Birthday" and added the Happy Birthday around the bottom.
I then added a band of thick silver glitter around the top and bottom...because as my BFF said "you can never have too much glitter"  - very true!

I have not been posting very regularly...and I will say that if I didn't have those Comic-con posts saved as drafts the month before, I think my posting would have been more infrequent.

http://www.thinkgeek.com/product/8753/

There have been a lot of things going on...crap, I haven't even gotten to watch a horrible movie in a while.

What have I been doing with my time?

I have been watching a lot of the Olympics.  I don't think I have ever watched this much of the Olympics in my life.  I guess because I am not working full time so I am able to catch the stuff they show during the day.

I also have been working on three projects that will all be postings in the future.  One is silly, one is a fun gift idea, and the other is a big one (a furniture face lift..working out the schematics on this one still).

I am not going to lie...next week probably wont see a lot of posts either.  I will be working a little more because of Festival of the Little Hills and it will probably kill me.  It is hard going from a "sit on your butt desk job" to one where you are on your feet and running around crazy.  Rough on the feet.  I had custom molded inserts before when I worked retail and didn't have any foot issues....but that was before the kid.  It seems my feet changed drastically during that whole pregnancy deal.  So my inserts are not perfectly molded to my feet anymore since my feet are a different size and shape.

Yes.  Not only did you deal with all of the changes during pregnancy and you leave the hospital with a baby that will change your life forever...but your feet might never be the same.  Your body releases lots of different hormones.  One hormone lets the ligaments expand..this is important for the ribcage and pelvis...but it also loosens them in the foot which can cause the arch to fall which in turn causes the foot to widen and lengthen. YAY!

So my arch in my left foot has dropped and my feet are larger than they were.  This wasn't a big deal when I was sitting at a desk all day, but standing and running around in shoes that are a half size too small or wearing custom molded insert that isn't the shape of your foot - FOOT MURDER.  I went to New Balance and got new shoes and they scanned my feet, but I have to tell you my feet still kill me.  I have been back to the store and they made adjustments but still, my feet do not feel like they are dancing on clouds.

Hmm.

I didn't intend to make a post that ended with me bitching about my feet.  Alright, I guess that is enough verbal vomit for now.

Yes, I am aware that I have neglected the blog.  With the Olympics and our little trip and all of the stuff in between there just wasn't time to do everything that I wanted to do.

I mentioned trip.  We flew up to Milwaukee to visit family.  It was my first time flying into Milwaukee.  What a strange sight out of the plane window when you realize that you are flying over the lake to go in for a landing.
When the flight crew went through the safety protocol before take off, a joke was made during the life vest portion that went something like "should we encounter a water landing between here and St. Louis..blah blah blah chuckle chuckle"   Um, looks like a water landing could have been possible so quit with the jokes people.

We landed without any problems, retrieved our luggage, and located our ride.  Here we go on our rural ride.  I grew up in a rural area so seeing farmland is not a big deal...but one thing should be noted, the barns all seem to be so pretty up here.  They all look like story book barns..which writing this made me want to do a google search.  Yes books exist on this and you can find them on Amazon.

One thing I had forgotten about when we arrived at the house is that my phone wouldn't be working the way I wanted.  There seems to be some sort of Verizon block on the house.  So almost off the grid for a bit.  I have to tell you that it does make you feel a little disconnected when you are addicted to technology.

We spent a day at a nice little park with a beach in Kenosha.  Let me tell you that coming from St. Louis with temps in the 100's, being on the beach where it was low 80's and a cool breeze from over the lake is HEAVEN.

Heaven can be an evil place though since I got sunburned pretty good on my shoulders and back.  I know exactly what you are thinking right now "You are half ginger.  The sun HATES you.  Why did you not take precautions?!?"  Well, I did.  It was the reapplying where it went wrong.  I worried with the toddler and husband but no one worried with me.  SIGH.  Everyone had a great time.  The toddler loves the beach and swimming and was upset about having to leave.  He quickly forgot about how upset he was once there was a boat ride back at the house.

The next day we went to a baseball game. It was a Brewers/Astros game.  I am not a fan of either team.  I dislike the Astros more but the Brewers are in the NL Central with my Cardinals so I was torn.
One thing about being at the game though, people up north are NICE.  I don't mean that they are nice where they don't heckle the out of towners...they are nice nice.  We had a dad and his two drunk sons sitting in front of us.  The sons arrived to the 1pm game tipsy and went on from there.  Normally this would be an annoyance but drunk son #2 had a new bag of sunflower seeds and he offered to share with all around him.  I don't think I have ever been at a game EVER where a fan sitting near me has offered to share any type of food.  One of the drunk sons would curse and the other would scold him because we had the toddler.  They were so worried about cursing around us that they ended up moving to other seats that were not near children.  I know right?  That doesn't happen.

The couple in the row with us asked me if it was alright if they gave my son some M&M's because they were eating some right next to us.  They gave my kid a new bag of M&M's and actually apologized that they might be a little melted because of the heat. Seriously, they apologized.

Then the couple behind us gave our toddler the plastic hat bowl from their nachos.  They had wiped it out the best that they could before offering it and when I was wiping it out with baby wipes they even said "here, we have a container for trash right here"  This whole sequence at the game was just like being in bizarro world. I am not saying that my St. Louis fans are mean and I have never had a BAD experience...but I have never seen any of them go out of their way like this.
The friendly fans made me feel bad to laugh inside about this cup...after all, the Cards got the wildcard and ended up winning the World Series.

That was the last full day of our trip..so another boat ride for the evening and then up early in the morning to head to the airport.

It was quick checking bags and going through security.
Speaking of security...above is the sign that is in the area with the chairs for putting shoes back on.  I have been to several airports and have never seen a sign like this (crap, some don't even have chairs for you to sit and put your shoes back on!).  Anyhow, this sign made me giggle.

I tell you, nothing feels as good as being home and sleeping in your own bed.  Everything has been unpacked and put away and hopefully I will get back on my blogging schedule!