QweenB

Where the hell have I been the past 14 months????

2010-11-19T20:51:00.004-07:00

*Moved almost all of my belongings in 8 trips in my Subie, 30 miles northwest

*stip clubs

*pole dancing lessons

*Mexico for the first time

*Christmas alone

*Vegas for New Year's

*skiing, skiing, and more skiing

*hiking

*mountain biking

*many, many, many rock & metal concerts

*Warrior Dash

*Urban Assault Ride

*Broncos games

*Buffs games

*Oddly enough, very few Avs games...hmmmm...

*Car wreck (T-boned by a texting teen)

*Skin cancer revisited

*Found myself

*Found joy

Nobody Puts Baby in a Corner!

2008-09-27T19:45:00.001-06:00

I haven't been to a concert in a LONG time. A rock concert, that is. I've seen a lot of symphonies and soloists, ballets, operas, musicals...but it's been a long time since I was at a concert. I jumped back in this week for Augustana/Maroon 5/Counting Crows at Fiddler's. (If you haven't heard Augustana, check them out! I first heard them on Weekend Edition when Ari Shapiro interviewed them on NPR back in May. Great interview. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=90780265 The acoustic version of Sweet and Low is...SWEET!)

I had a couple extra tickets and ended up going last minute with my friend Baby and her friend Desi. Baby is very easy going, fun to be with, funny, funny girl, who is always ready, willing and able to drop everything for a party, a concert, or a Capt'n & Coke. Desi is a hard core Crows fan. I thought he was going to crap himself he was so excited.

I hate the seats at Fiddler's so we had lawn "seats." We copped a spot with our blanket and settled in to enjoy the show. I guess I didn't anticipate all the high schoolers who would be there. We were surrounded. They thought they were really cool and sneaky for bringing in alcohol. I should give them kudos, because we paid $9/drink and they paid far less, I'm sure.

We seemed to offend the group of 7 to our right mid-way through Maroon 5. One of the jerky boys punched me in the arm and said, "HEY! Could you be quiet?? We're here to hear the show!" I was so shocked to be punched, no less by a 17-yr old punk, that I was near speechless. I just looked at him and said, "Huh? I can't hear you. It's really loud in here." Then, just as the Crows were taking the stage the same jerky boy crawls over to our blanket and tells Baby to move back a foot because we were, "invading their space." That was enough for me. I told him it was LAWN and my ticket says the same as everyone else's: LAWN. You get some lawn and I get some lawn. No defined lawn. Then I said, "Maybe you should crack open Daddy's wallet and spend $100/seat to sit up front, cry ass." He actually came closer, took his hands and measured the space from Baby's ass to the next blanket behind us, all the while crying something about there being a whole foot behind us. Baby just sweetly said, "Dude, what's the problem. I ain't movin'. I'm just chillin'." The girls to her right got up and moved. Tee hee. Age over stupidity, I guess. (The whole while Desi was trying to not piss his shorts in anticipation.)

Always bring your nose bandage and your Baby to concerts, I say. Is that a halo around us??? I'm sure it is!

Now That's Candidate I Can Get Behind!

2008-09-26T05:02:00.000-06:00

The white sign on the lower right corner reads, "KODY FOR PRESIDENT" and my neighbors put this sign in their front yard, I'm guessing to combat all the other yard signs that proliferate neighborhoods pre-election season. Kody is our neighbor's Shiba Inu and I just might make him my write in candidate. These neighbors (funny...I know all my neighbors' dogs names but don't know the humans' names...) live in one of the last remaining Bonnie Brae bungalows. It's little. Hasn't been remodeled. Has big trees in the front and back yards. But...it's little. I'm guessing about 800 sq. ft. So they have an old VW hippie van in their drive way. They use it as an extra room. Like a guest room, I guess. Very resourceful. I like them because they walk their dog a lot and they are nice, easy going people. Would they have to move to Pennsylvania Ave if Kody wins??? They would have plenty of spare rooms then!

To quench the burning desire to know...

2008-09-25T21:40:00.008-06:00

The easy answer would be, "Yes, yes, I'm scared. I'm afraid." But it's not really true so I can't just cop to it. (True story: my middle brother got married way too young, at 19, and he and his wife had a lot of trouble the first...ah...20 years of marriage. Teenagers are apt to have trouble when they get married before they even figure out who they are, let alone what they want...but I digress. We can talk about marriage another day. At one point, she made him go to marriage counseling. He agreed with everything the counselor said to him. He agreed to make all kinds of changes. No arguing. No complaining. He just agreed to anything and everything, even though he thought it was all a colossal pile of crap. It was the one and only visit to the counselor he ever had to go to. The counselor said, "Wow, I think my work here is done. You don't need counseling." Now that's a smartie-pants brother. He and his wife just celebrated their 22nd anniversary. He extolled his wisdom to me and our older brother years ago and we all laughed and laughed. I think my other brother uses this method, too. I love those fellas!!)

And as easy as it would be to just say, "Yes, yes, whatever you say," I just can't do it. It is the path of least resistance and sometimes being stubborn out weighs being non-confrontational. Don't get me wrong. I have used my brother's methodology many, many times in my life and IT WORKS. But not here. Not now.

It's like climbing a ladder and reaching the top...now what? That's how I feel. I'm rushing up ice and my mind goes blank. "Now what?" It's just not automatic yet. I still have to think and plan and prepare, THEN I try to execute. At some point I will figure out how to let my mind go and my feet will do the rest. Just not yet, I guess. And I'm not sure that is even a conscious decision. I think it just happens magically one day. Like a light switch.

It's many things, but not fear. Try any of the following:

apprehension

lack of confidence

poor execution

limited understanding

unwillingness

retardation

Pick one, or all, but stop saying FEAR.
"Hallo! My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die." "Stop saying that."
My work here is done.

Ode from a Namesake

2008-09-22T18:24:00.006-06:00

Forgive the deviation from the norm of my blog (if there is such a thing) but it's the least I can do to honor a memory...her kids have no such honor. This post is for her, and for me. I won't be sad if you close the browser now and check back later for a new post where I ramble on about inane drivel.

Even if you have kids, you could die and no one would even know it. I know a lot of people die every day and no one even realizes they were alive to begin with. But this one was near and dear to my heart, and I knew she lived. I should at least get the pleasure and honor to say goodbye. I mention the kids part because I am often asked if I have kids and why don't I have kids. My usual response is, "No, I don't have kids. Why do I need kids? I have dogs." To which, they always say, "Well, dear, who will take care of you when you're old, and who will post an obituary and host your funeral?"

This last part has been blatantly proven false this weekend. My aunt, for whom I am named, passed away. She was 62 and suffered a horrible, horrible life. She had MS and Parkinson's, coupled with early-onset dementia. Talk about the trifecta. And if those three aren't bad enough, her husband was a mean, nasty man who cheated on her (but he got his---he died of an aneurysm while he was taking a crap and no one found him for a week!!! Fucktard.) ["Who gets Prince Humperdink? No one? Jesus Christ, Grandpa, why'd you read me this stupid story??"] He treated her like shit and her three sons are sadly, like their father. Well, actually, the oldest boy is a crazy neo-nazi homeless guy wandering the streets of Frankfurt looking for any handout he can find and is near death himself, from cirrhosis of the liver. He even had some of his white supremacist rantings published a few years ago---I cannot seriously be related to him, of that I am sure. He got Hep C a few years ago and suffers from a really bad case of schizophrenia. Couldn't happen to a nicer guy. Fucktard.

She has two other sons, twins: Felix and Kristian. They are the epitome of selfish, spoiled, wannabe millionaire jett-setters. Problem is, they used their mom's disability money and their dead father's pension to fund their lavish lifestyles and dumped her in a nasty nursing home. They also sold their mom's meds on the street for extra $$$. Delightful young men. One of them, I can't remember which--doesn't matter, they are both ass clowns--married his girlfriend and got her pregnant because the German government gives married couples $4,000 Euros for each kid they have. WTF????Fucktards.

My aunt was always a delicate soul. She could barely do anything for herself her entire life. She was definitely born in the wrong century. She would have thrived in the early 1800's in the south, wearing the lavish gowns and having people bring her tea and little sandwiches. She just was not the working type. Growing up my mom did everything for her. My mom's the oldest...two years older than this aunt. My aunt was fragile and deliberate in everything she did. She was sweet and gentle and spoke in a very quiet, hushed tone. She married a man she thought would take care of her every need. Not. Anyhoo, she was never the same after the twins were born. She suffered a double-whammy batch of post-partum. And back in the early 70's post-partum was not a disease, was not recognized...it just was...not. She went YEARS without leaving her bedroom. Sad. The saddest part for me was how her husband and kids devalued her; treated her like she was addle-minded, which was so far the contrary. She was very, very intelligent. She, like my mom, spoke many languages and she was a voracious reader. She was one of the most well read people I have ever met. She could also name any classical piece of music and its composer within hearing about three notes. And she remembered the most quaint details about me, my brothers, growing up in post-war Germany...she enjoyed a good cup of coffee in the afternoons while she listened to talk radio. Sounds familiar.

I'm not sure we would have even found out she had passed away, if my youngest aunt hadn't seen one of the twins in a store. He mentioned in casual passing that Nane died and they had her cremated. No obituary. No services. He and his brother had already signed the papers to take control of her share of their parents' estate. Wow. I'm hoping they both have aneurysms in a public restroom, or in a restroom on a train....or someone pushes them out of a moving train.

They sequestered her about 10 years ago so the family rarely got to see her, if ever. They did bring her to each of her parents' funerals, so I did get to see her twice in the past six years. The last time I saw her was at my Oma's burial three years ago. She was wheelchair bound and when I went up to greet her, she thought I was her as a young girl. She thought she was having a flashback dream of her past. I didn't correct her. It would have just confused her more. So I just sat with her in the cemetery and had the most delightful conversation.

Oh, and she hated her name, too. My dad actually insisted on naming me after her. (He was in love with her many years ago and when she spurned his advances, he asked my mom out, I think to make my aunt jealous. I could not make this shit up, honestly.) She went by Nane her whole life. A nickname given to her by my mom, who as a wee child, could not pronounce her hellishly long name. I always wanted to go by a nickname. My mom refused. When my oldest nephew was born he couldn't pronounce my name so I became NeNe. My whole family still calls me NeNe.

The similarities are glaring even though we chose such vastly different paths in life. So I end my memoriam post with this:

Schlaf endlich im Ruh, meine beliebte Tante Nane

Kristiane Bettina

Benner Michnacs,

1946-2008

The Nose Knows

2008-09-19T02:40:00.006-06:00

and it doesn't smell fear. (It actually hasn't smelled anything in three days...) "That's actually a legitimate fear! She was rifling through my shit!"

On Wednesday I had the delight and pleasure of spending four hours having cancer cut out of my nose. How does cancer decide that the side of my nose is a good place to hang out?

A little background: I had a red spot on my nose for about six months. So back in January 2008, I went to a derm clinic where I work. After the craziest, worst visit ever, the doc told me it was acne. He diagnosed me by taking a scalpel blade and cutting into my nose. "Yep. I saw pus. Definitely acne." Now, I don't know about you, but I have never had a pimple for 6 months. ["Do it Harold. It's 6 months. It's a hockey season!"] I didn't buy it. But it took four+ months for the incision he made to heal so I hoped he was right. By August, it looked BIGGER! So, I found a "real" dermatologist-plastic surgeon and within 5 seconds of him looking at it he said, "I don't want to alarm you, but that has to come off right away." WHAT? SERIOUSLY? Official diagnosis: morpheaform carcinoma. I don't like the sound of that. Acne was sounding much more friendly all of a sudden.

The morning of my surgery I played hockey for two hours, got stuck in traffic and barely made my appointment. I'm thinking Freudian lateness. I figured if you have to have cancer cut from your body, you should at least get to skate beforehand!

When I got there and checked in, I sat down to see the following:

Cosmo Girl. Reader's Digest. Seventeen. Spa. PC World (I think this one was actually the doctor's private read.) American Cheerleader. (I didn't even know there was a magazine just for cheerleaders. Really? Weird. Is there a magazine for band geeks?) I almost got up and left. All of a sudden this seemed like not the place to be. I was surrounded by older folks...in their mid-70's to 80's--the Reader's Digest was for them. I guess the young girls who read those beauty magazines come in after school? And do we NEED Cosmo Girl to reinforce to millions of girls their low self esteem and the fact that less than 1% of them look like the girls in the magazines??? I did not want a doctor who seemingly focused his practice on the beauty, or lack thereof, of young girls. Too late. They just called my name, and pronounced it correctly. That never happens. Nurses all over MT and CO have called me everything from Bonita to Beverly. Strangely enough, I answer to those names....Okay. I'll give them a second chance. If they can sound out B-E-T-T-I-N-A correctly I'll see what they have to say.

I had a Mohs Procedure, where abouts the surgeon cuts out tissue, packs the wound with a pressure dressing, sends the cancer to pathology, looks for clear margins, then goes back in right away if he missed any cells and you do it all over again. Yes, I got the pleasure of going through it twice. Yeah for me. The best part is that they "recovery" you with all the other Mohs patients in a room with a TV, magazines, games, snacks, and surprisingly good coffee. The other nine patients and I bonded by telling jokes about our cancer. After chit-chatting and joking on and off throughout the morning they taught me that it was going to be okay and you really need to live each day to its fullest. Don't settle for second best. Don't do things that don't make you happy. You get one shot at this. Make the best of it. I showed them how to text from my cell phone. Helen texted her great-granddaughter and laughed until she cried. Oh, I also found a really good butt & abs workout on the ball in one of the magazines. Geraldine thought I should just tear it out and take it but I insisted on copying it into my notebook...drawing each move with intricate detail. She laughed and said, "There is no other patient in this room that will use that workout, sweetie. You just take it! If you see any good recipes, tear them out for me." She's a wild one!

The options for closing the wound: stitches or skin graft. I'm not that vain. I don't really care if I have a scar on my nose. I have no illusion that I will ever be in a model, so wrap it up and I'm out of here. Oh, and the skin graft??? They use fat and skin from your ASS. Um, no thank you. I took the stitches. You can keep that ass meat graft. Truth be told, the doctor decided stitches were the best treatment for me. I'm not sure I could have convinced him either way.
The best part is that I have a bandage that kind of rivals that of someone who's just had a nose job. I haven't decided if hockey brawl or deviated septum is the winning response to all those who gawk.

Tips:

1. If you think it's bad, it probably is. Don't take no for an answer.

2. Have a bottle of Grey Goose on hand because there is no way to scratch an itch under that bandage.

3. It will be nearly impossible to breathe out of your nose. Plan accordingly.

4. Oh, and you'll have no sense of smell, for a while.

5. There are a lot of nerve endings in your nose.

6. Great way to spend a day off. Um. No.

Here are some of the responses I got after telling friends and family that I had cancer in my nose. (Again, it seems like a WEIRD place to get it...)

*Wow. Really? That's crazy.

*Holy shit! What? Really?

*Is that all?

*Your new nickname can be Buck Melanoma Head!!

*That's fucked up!

*Let's go to Ireland!

*She wins by a nose!

*A third nostril will enhance O2 intake and help with endurance training.

*At least you lost all that weight so you're hot now and no one will even notice the hole in your nose.

*You could just throw a stud or hoop in the hole and no one will even notice--then you'll have a really cool piercing!

*They use butt-cheek skin for the skin graft?? Can I call you Ass Face???

And finally, a few words about fear.

["The fear's too much for a duck. It--it eats away at the soul! There must be kinder dispositions in far-off gentler lands."]

It's not fear, so much as apprehension. I'm a planner. I plan. ["Russians don't take a dump son, without a plan."] I want to know what's in store for my future. I know I can't know the LONG term future, but I like to know what I'll be doing, where I'll be, etc. at least for the next week. Two, three months makes me happier, but I'll settle for this week. Having never been through anything like this, I had no idea what to expect. I don't like that. I just want some inkling of what is going to happen. I run all aspects of my life like this. It is not fear of the unknown. Just...caution. Leeriness. Lack of trusting fate or putting my trust in others who can hurt me---with a needle and a very sharp knife. I'm also methodical in my approach to things. I want to see it. Feel it. Touch it. Watch it. Then try it. Try it again. Slowly. Slowly. A little faster. And a little faster still. I am a perfectionist. Problem is...most things in life don't react too well to perfectionism. You gotta roll with the punches. Now I'm rolling right into the weekend with some great plans: a mountain bike ride, some scrapping, some hockey, and maybe some BBQ'ing with friends. All will be planned, methodical, and perfect. Just how I like it! Hey, it's my weekend. Get your own.

"Fear is like a giant fog. It sits on your brain and blocks everything -- real feelings, true happiness, real joy. They can't get through that fog. But you lift it, and buddy, you're in for the ride of your life."

Just Call Me Adrian Peterson

2008-09-16T19:32:00.005-06:00

Today I went from hockey player to football player in one spiraling analogy.
Positioned behind the middle of the line, a fullback may do some running, some blocking, and some short receiving. A classic fullback is more of a power runner than a running back. Many modern formations do not use a fullback. Most plays utilizing the fullback call for him to block, generally by running up the middle of the line, clearing a path for a running back to run while having the ball to gain yardage.
The fullback must be strong enough to break tackles and draw the attention of linebackers and defensive linemen. Good flexbone fullbacks are usually the best ball carriers on the team and receive the majority of rushing attempts.

Which is better than the old B:
the offensive tackle's role is primarily to block on both running and passing plays. The left tackle is charged with protecting the blindside, and is often faster than the other offensive linemen to stop 'speed rushers' at the Defensive End position. Like a guard, the tackle may have to "pull", on a running play, when there is a tight end on his side. Offensive linemen can not catch the ball but may run the ball if they want. In most circumstances, however, they do not. Except for the snap by the offensive center as each play from scrimmage starts, ordinarily the only way an offensive lineman can get the ball during a play is by picking up a fumble. On rare occasions offensive linemen legally catch passes; they can do so either by reporting as an eligible receiver to the referee prior to the snap or by catching a pass which has first been deflected or otherwise touched by an eligible receiver or a defensive player. Any other touching of the ball by an offensive lineman will result in a penalty.

What I'm supposed to B:
The wide receivers are speedy pass-catching specialists. Their main job is to run pass routes and get open for a pass, although they are occasionally called on to block. A wide receiver may line up on the line of scrimmage and be counted as one of the necessary 7 players on the line in a legal formation (a split end), or he may line up at least one step behind the line of scrimmage and be counted as being in the backfield (a flanker if he is on the outside, a slot if he is not). There are generally two types of wide receivers, "speed" and "possession". A speed receiver's primary function is to stretch the field, to be a deep threat, and to pull away an eighth defensive man near the line of scrimmage from moves against the quarterback. A possession receiver is generally the more sure-handed of the two types and is used to keep possession of the ball by making catches that gain first down yardage, but he usually lacks the speed to attack a defensive backfield.
Or:
The running back was formerly called "halfback". The running back carries the ball on most running plays and is also frequently used as a short-yardage receiver. Running backs, along with the wide receivers, are generally the fastest players on the offensive team. Most of them tend not to run straight ahead, preferring to make quick cutbacks to try to find holes in the defense. This, however, is a generalization, since some running backs are more power-oriented.

It went something like this:
Coach: "Here's a football analogy for your playing. You are like a fullback. They lumber and have medium strides. They head straight up the field. You used to be like an offensive tackle--slow, methodical, and very position oriented. You need to be more like a wide receiver or running back. They are fast, with long powerful strides and they run through the defense, looking for the hole. "
Me: (Speechless for three hours, which rarely happens.) Later I thought, I'd rather not be a football analogy. I think that's why girls don't play football.

Here's where my mom would say, "Oh, Honey, men are from Mars and women are from Venus. It's really true. You just can't give merit to anything the Martians say."

There you have it.

2 vs 3 or is it 3 vs 2??

2008-09-15T23:20:00.008-06:00

I'm a fidgeter. I fidget. A flibbity jibbit. I twiddle and tap. Tip tap. My foot or leg are always going. Go. Go. Go. I sway back and forth. Left to right. Front to back. I can't sit still. It's even worse now that I have all this freakin energy. I'm wondering if I've had adult ADD all along and I've just been branded a procrastinator who can't sit still. It is an actual recognized DSM-IV (or is it V?) disease/disorder. Crazy, huh? So to speak...

[Useless trivia: Not to be left out of the multi-billion dollar drug race, Ortho-McNeil Pharm has a drug just for AADD: Concerta. Wow. Really? Yes. Better living through pharmaceuticals, I guess. Oh, it's also prescribed for adults with Tourette's. Maybe Bug and I could share a script!]

"I don't think I want to know a six-year-old who isn't a dreamer, or a sillyheart. And I sure don't want to know one who takes their student career seriously. I don't have a college degree. I don't even have a job. But I know a good kid when I see one. Because they're ALL good kids, until dried-out, brain-dead skags like you drag them down and convince them they're no good. You so much as scowl at my niece, or any other kid in this school, and I hear about it, and I'm coming looking for you! Here's a quarter, go downtown, and have a rat gnaw that thing off your face! Good day to you, madam."

I wonder if this has something to do with my fascination with numbers. I make patterns with every number around me. Phone numbers. Addresses. Dates. Numbers of things on lists. The order of lists. It's kind of Rainman-esque, without the entire savant part and I can almost function in society as long as no one gets in my way.

"It's a 1949 Buick Roadmaster. Straight 8. Fireball 8. Only 8,985 production models. Dad lets me drive slow on the driveway. But not on Monday, definitely not on Monday."

"Sally Dibbs, Dibbs Sally. 461-0192. "

Don't even get me started on multiples of three...I started playing softball in the in third grade and my chosen number was 9. I wore that number for many, many years. Nine is a magic number. I know, I know, in the last post I said 300 was a magic number, but I just lose my head around numbers. They are all so wondrous.

Just make things even and in proper multiples and no one gets hurt!

So I was recently asked if I prefer two really hard workouts in a day or three medium workouts in a day. How can a number freak addicted to endorphins answer that? Two. No. Three. Definitely two. Three, right? How about, depends on the day??? Depends on what I feel like??? Some days I need three. Others, two. I choose not to choose. How's that?

She's Lady 300!!!

2008-09-12T19:00:00.002-06:00

It’s as easy as a-b-c…1-2-3…
3-0-0 is a magic number.
“I run my unit how I run my unit. You want to investigate me, roll the dice and take your chances. I eat breakfast 300 yards from 4000 Cubans who are trained to kill me, so don't think for one second that you can come down here, flash a badge, and make me nervous.”

In 18 months I’ve taken 300 lessons. That’s 16.67 per month, 4.17 per week. Holy schneikies!! It is a serious milestone. 100 seemed huge. 200 just swept past me. Here I sit at 300, well, 303 now. I was told I’m on a plateau and I need to kick it in gear. I’m stuck on a few things, “well a bunch of things, really.” Can’t get over the hump… “the hump, my hump, my luscious lady lumps. Check it out.”

Now starts new expectations. Things will be different. (Ever notice when you think things will be different, or you HOPE things will be different…they aren’t??? I was sure when I turned 16, things would be different. 18th? Different. 21st? Different damn it!! And, no. Things were not different. I was the same. My life was the same. Same. Same. Same. And it makes me mad. So, anything 300+ had damn well better be DIFFERENT!!!) “It's going to be really special, she's just about kissed 300 guys at this point”.

My lesson book only has a few, sacred blank pages left. What happens when you fill your lesson book? Do I get another one? I’d better! Or, do we just start over and re-do all the previous lessons?? I have questions.
“I hired a 90-lb girl to work in the stock room at Smart Tech for you, okay? I should've hired a 300-lb guy to lift the 60-inch flat screen, but instead I hired a hot girl who can't lift an iPod to bring you out of your funk.”

Things I’ve learned and observed…
Food:
“Oh, you have Tofutti! You heard what the doctor said, your cholesterol is over 300! You're... basically a solid.”
»I need to prepare to be able to perform.
»I need to eat to perform.
»I need to eat to live. Seems easy enough. Execution is the problem. (I think that’s the same issue those on death row have…)
»If you plan and prepare ahead of time, you won’t be left with nothing to eat.
»Finding the right foods that don't make me sick is a struggle.
»It’s a life-long process.
“You guys are like Butch and Sundance peering over the edge of a cliff to the boulder-filled rapids 300 feet below, thinking you better not jump 'cause there's a chance you might drown. The President has this disease and has been lying about it, and you guys are worried that the polling might make us look bad? It's the fall that's gonna kill ya.”

Hockey:
»I can put the puck in the net anywhere I want. I never, ever thought I’d be able to do that. It was like a light switch turned on the day it all finally clicked. Tip: practice the technique exactly how Coach teaches it. It works.
“Well, actually, nobody on this planet ever really chooses each other. I mean, it's all a question of quantum physics, molecular attraction, and timing. Why, there are laws we don't understand that bring us together and tear us apart. Uh, it's like pheromones. You get three ants together, they can't do dick. You get 300 million of them, they can build a cathedral.”
»I love to skate. And now I love to shoot. When I first talked to Coach about lessons I didn’t want to shoot. I didn’t want the puck. Now I want the puck all the time. More puck!
“Isn't it amazing how the internet makes everything you say sound 300 times sluttier.”
»You can’t get better if you don’t practice. Playing in games does not make you better. It reinforces your current habits and mistakes.
“No one lives forever, no one. But with advances in modern science and my high level income, it's not crazy to think I can live to be 245, maybe 300. Heck, I just read in the newspaper that they put a pig heart in some guy from Russia. Do you know what that means?”
»Try something. Try anything. Don't just stand there. Keep moving. SKATE!!!
»The game of hockey is not prescribed. You can't plan for what's going to happen. It is not a drill. You just have to react and let your instincts take over.
"In 300 years, when Evil returns... so shall we."
»If you have a particularly BAD lesson and you want to cry, wait until you get in your car. Then phone a friend: a hockey friend who takes lessons and has been there before. (Thanks, Coxie, Bug, Kimbell & Cuervho for always making me feel better!!!) Never, never, let the coach see you cry. It's not his fault you can't execute and no good can come from this.
"Are you crying? Are you c-r-y-i-n-g??? There's no crying in baseball!!! There's no crying in baseball!!!" (Substitute H-O-C-K-E-Y for baseball.)

What does all this mean? I have no freakin clue. I'm just trying to get through the day as best I can. Have fun along the way. Get a good workout. Treat people how I like to be treated. Do no harm. Get up and do it all over again until someone tells me to stop.
"Why do you keep beating your head against the wall?" "Because it feels so good when I stop."

Make that 29!!!

2008-09-09T20:21:00.004-06:00

I've been briefly blogged on Outdoordivas.com!!!!! All for the love of skirts! Check me out: http://blog.outdoordivas.com/public
Scroll down...not the balding grey-haired guy wearing the skirt...I don't know what that was all about.

The gals at the OD tables after the race were intrigued by my love of the skirts. They took my pic while I waited for my friends to come back with our jackets from the car and I promised to send them the pic of all my skirts. The rest is history, sort of.

Oh, and yes...as of today, it's 29. I added a super cute and CHEAP Champion skirt (all white) to my collection today, complements of Target's clearance rack: $8.98!!!! I just might be out of control. Good thing I "just say no to drugs."

"This business will get out of control. It will get out of control and we'll be lucky to live through it!"

Convert to Skirt!

2008-09-08T18:58:00.006-06:00

Addicted to the skirt? You be the judge.

I have been wearing sport skirts for about a year now. They are the MOST comfortable thing to wear...ANYTIME, ANYWHERE!! I wear them for everything. I've even worn them to work. (I'm certain they are in direct violation of our very strict dress code but some mornings after getting up at 3:30am and getting on the ice by 5:15, I just can't get myself into a suit.) [I also prefer to wear other skirts instead of pants...hips and thighs go better in skirts than pants. Even so, I think if you try the skirt, you will love it.] Does having 28 sport skirts classify as an addiction? 6 black. Three taupe. Six in shades of pink. One teal. Two blueberry. Is there a support group for this?? OH YES THERE IS! Read on, friends! (Outdoor Diva Sports is working on a story about my love of the skirt for their website. I'll keep you posted.)

Lo and behold, there is a woman who is more committed to the skirt than me. Hard to believe. But true. She started a company that makes all kinds of cool sport skirts. They cost a fortune so I'm guessing she's nearly a millionaire by now. The bulk of my collection was acquired off the clearance racks at Target and SportsAuth. She's from Boulder, CO. Not surprising. She also started a 5k race called the SkirtChaser where the women get skirts instead of race shirts. All the women start the run 3 minutes before the men and then the men go and, yes, chase the skirts.

I signed up for the run and convinced four of my friends to do the same; of which, only one of them was a runner. They are such great friends to come join me and wear a cute skirt, it didn't matter to them that they had to run 3.2 miles. "Do you run, Knight?" "Only when chased." Following my marathon training??? Read on. If not, you won't care about the rest of this crap. This is the first race in a LONG time that I didn't stop for a port-o-john. Not because I didn't have to...but because THERE WEREN'T ANY!!!! What the hell? Who has a race with 866 runners and NO port-o-johns???? Crazy. Maybe that's why I hurried to the finish in 26:13. Hmmmm...good strategy? No. Absolutely not. Not recommended. (I didn't eat bananas at all that day. Learned that painful lesson. I ate mostly plain oats. Nuts. Lots of water. An apple. Nothing too crazy. Still haven't quite figured it out. Only five weeks left. ARGH!!!!) Officially, I finished 126th out of 609 women and 192 out of 866 total runners. Rumor has it that when the men caught a skirt, they were supposed to slap it on the toockus. I didn't see, nor receive, any slapping. I take that personally! Why have the rule if you're not going to enforce it?!?!

Is this really not funny???

2008-08-29T22:43:00.006-06:00

Seriously, I need a funny-check....

About six months ago, Honey came out of the kitchen holding a little piece of foil. It was the foil from the lid of my quart box of soy milk. (Hey. Don't knock it until you're tried it. It is YUMMY!) He carried it all the way back into the master bathroom where I was getting ready for work. He said to me, "You know what really bugs me? When you leave these little pieces of foil on the counter." I giggled. I had probably left them on the counter, maybe twice, three times at most. What made me giggle is that OUR KITCHEN WAS A DISASTER AREA at the time. The sink was full of dirty dishes. There were cans and glass bottles and newspapers, all needing to go to the recycle bin out back and the table was COVERED with his mail from the past oh...6 months. Yet, it was the little tiny piece of foil that I forgot to toss in the trash that bugs him??? It's not like I drink a box of soy milk a day. It takes me about 5 days, so it's not like they were building up. AND...I wasn't finished in the kitchen getting my lunch together, so I was going back in there and would most likely have seen it and thrown it away.

Okay. Fast forward to yesterday. I have been saving up these little foil toppers for the past three months. I've been hiding them in a secret place until I had enough to completely cover the little cutting board that resides on the counter...the scene of the crime six months ago when I left that little one by accident. Yesterday I decided my stash was a-plenty so I hatched my plan. I wrote a sweet little message on a Post-it, put it on the cutting board and then covered the cutting board with the little foil toppers. The whole while giggling like a little school girl.

When I got home, nothing. The cutting board hadn't been touched. It was as if he missed it completely, which would have been impossible. Well, being the impatient person that I am, I called him. I slyly asked him if he found my secret sweet note. He said, "What note?" I said it was hidden someplace funny....he said, "No." So when he came home I said, "HEY! Did you NOT see the funny little foil thingys on the cutting board???" He replied, "Yeah, I saw them but thought it was kind of crazy and a little schizophrenic..." He didn't even crack a smile.

"I mean think about it, you never hear the word "oy" and not smile. Impossible. Funny, funny word. "Poodle" is another funny word. Very funny. I know. Funny is funny. This isn't funny. I am now desperate, lonely and a criminal."

Driving in my car...

2008-08-26T22:43:00.000-06:00

This is my lovely PudgeMobile. (I bought this car a year ago, off the lot with 7 miles on the odometer after my Honda crapped out on me going 70mph on I-70 in rush hour traffic, in the left lane, in 90 degree July heat. Oh, I was also in my business suit rushing to an early evening hockey game.) He is so named (if you know me, you know my auto always has a name...makes it more personable, I find, when you're trying to coax them out of a snow drift, up a big hill, or to keep running on a tank that clearly has been on E for awhile.) because of the last three letters on his plates: PUJ. Gawd bless the DMV.
Here's that story, sorry if you've already heard it ("Skip to the end.":

In September last year (Crap! That means my registration is due again...ARGH!), the DAY my temp tag expired (thanks to an ass at the dealership sitting on my paperwork) I made it to the DMV at 4:55, five minutes before they locked the doors. Funny, if you show up with five minutes to spare, you don't have to wait in a long line, at least on that given day. The first issue was when she told me it would be $575. Um, huh? It's not a fancy-schmancy race car or luxury SUV. It's a freakin' Subaru Forester. Then, the clerk hands me my plates. I look to see xxx-PUJ. Here's the last of our conversation, after I picked my jaw off the floor post check-writing:

Me: "Um, P-U-J? Really? I have to have 'pudge' on my plates for the life of this car?"
Clerk: "What? Oh. Yeah, well, at least it doesn't say F-A-T."
Me: "Good point. Hadn't thought of that..." How do you argue with that logic???

Not only is the Pudgemobile a rock magnet, it also came equipped with an invisibility cloak. I shit you not. About a month after buying him, a big truck kicked up a rock and dented the hood on the passenger side. About six months after that, a Jetta kicked up BOULDER and put a HUGE dent smack dab in the middle of my hood. That rock was so big I thought it was going to shatter the windshield. And, about a month ago, a Ford pickup kicked up a rock and cracked my windshield. As for being invisible...it has to be the only reason I am constantly being cut off, cut in front of, and generally ignored on every street in Denver, interstates included. Today I was driving on I-25 then I-70 to skate and I was cut in front of no less than six times, and TWICE people randomly just took over my spot on the highway as if I didn't even exist. Good thing I have cat-like, lightning-fast reflexes, and the Pudgster maneuvers so well or we would have been squished Subie and that would make me sad.

And this past Sunday ushered in the end of an era: my sweet, sweet Toby was sold to a high school student, who just so happens to be H's niece. Toby was my very first brand-spankin new car. I bought him at Bitterroot Motors in Missoula, MT, in October 1996 shortly after a psycho bitch driver totalled my Subaru Outback.

Toby is a forest green Corolla and possibly the most dependable and reliable car in the world. Why, why, why would I sell him???? I don't know. I sold out for an AWD and my first love has always been a Subie. I bucked it at first but then....the Tax Man cometh: cue ominous music and nasty letter from the IRS demanding $13,400. (Cue crying and sadness.) That's no typo folks. And certainly deserves it's own post at another time...

Honey drives away in the Tobster to deliver it to his niece, whom I will be teaching how to drive the 5-speed manual transmission this weekend.

Out with the Scoot...In with the Cruiser!

2008-08-24T11:04:00.006-06:00

So after riding 36.6 miles all around Denver in the Urban Assault Ride (stay tuned), something donned on me...I can get anywhere I need to go, ON MY BIKE! Which means, free parking, no gas, no enviro impact, and an extra workout. Four great reasons to sell my sweet, sweet Scooter-Love and get me a cruiser.

I often do things out of order and with no patience for waiting, I skip to the fun part. "I hate waiting." True to form, I haven't sold my scooter yet, but I did get me a perdy new cruiser. Check it out!

This sweet ride is the Townie by Electra. It's the original "flat-foot" aluminium cruiser, meaning, when you sit on the seat, your feet are flat on the ground. It is a 21-speed haulin' ass machine! Sadly, the pix does not do the color justice. It's a magical, wondrous, shiny pearly purple. As quoted by some guy at the Walgreens yesterday, "Dude, I love your bike. It's like, candy apple purple. Way cool." My response, "Thanks, man."

And what does every girl need when she gets a shiny new cruiser??? A hip new helmet to sport! I certainly can't be wearing my Giro helmet that's built for speed when I'm cruising on my Townie. Right? Right!

This picture is for Coach. It's a little blurry, but it says on the back of it, "I LOVE MY BRAIN." Get it? Got it? Good!

The wire basket for the front and the streamers for the handle bars are on special order. Then it will be way tricked out!!!

Know anyone looking for a Piaggio LT50...low mileage...

Where the HELL have I been???

2008-08-24T08:10:00.019-06:00

In the freakin' penalty box on a three-month blogging hiatus. It has come to my attention that I need to return to the blogoshere to release the demons that have taken over my brain.

It has been a BUSY three months. "There is too much. I will sum up."

May

Played in FOUR hockey tournaments. Took 1st, 3rd, LAST, and 2nd places. The quad-fecta!

Took an Indian cooking class. Very fun, and tasty, too! Mmmmmm...mangos....I mostly wandered around and let the other students cook the food. Never fear, I did taste it all at the dinner party afterwards. "You can really taste the chutney in dat one!"
Ran the Bolder Boulder in the cold rain. Had great times for miles 1, and 4-6. Qualified to be in the top wave next year. THANK GAWD! Waves are A-JJ, or something like that. I was in wave HC. That is just too many people in front of me. GET OUT OF MY WAY PEOPLE! I'm trying to get to that port-o-john.

June

Wrote an $11m grant, and two $2m grants for work in two weeks. There is no picture that can sum up that fiasco.
Saw Ira Glass at Colorado College in the Springs. Highly recommend! If you've never heard him, go to http://www.npr.org/ and download some of his shows called This American Life. It is worth every second.
Ran the Summer Solstice 5k in City Park in 28:40. This run is for skin cancer awareness. This is the finest example of foreshadowing I have ever known. More on that later. This run is at 6pm on a Wednesday. Who has a frickin run at 6pm in the middle of the week? People who don't work for a living. It's at City Park and there is NO PARKING at City Park. I ended up parking at the Natural History Museum and RAN about a mile to the start and got there AS THE GUN WENT OFF!!! That was a good warm up.
Coach crashes motorcycle. Wear a helmet next time, dumb ass! I should have taken a picture of his road rash on HIS HEAD. Dumb ass.
Jules' wedding. Good time had by all. Bon fire was a sight to see! "Check out these girls!"

Ann visits for DanskiTri. We've been friends for 21 years. That makes our friendship old enough to drink alcohol.

July

Camping in southern CO with H, ABC & CBG + 3 dogs. Torn left quad muscle dampens the weekend. Although, I didn't have to be on camp set-up or take-down duty, so that's the plus to that story.

P visits with sweet Norah. They are currently living in Singapore, which she delightfully calls Asia for Beginners. We've been friends for 25 years. Wow. That is a l-o-n-g time.

Drums Along the Rockies at Invesco Field. Once a band geek...ALWAYS a band geek!

URBAN ASSAULT RIDE - this will have it's own post because it deserves it!
Curtie visits. We have been friends for 27 years. HOLY HELL that's a LONG TIME. He gets me with a Soup in the Bun surprise. DAMN HIM! He is one of the funnest people I know. I always have a great time with him and he always makes me laugh, even when there's nothing funny.

August

Senior Open golf tourney in the Springs. This event had more rules and n0-n0's than any other even I've ever heard of. No cell phones, no cameras, no water bottles, no food, no signs or banners, no breathing...just kidding. Here's a tip: the best cell phone holder in the world is my bra. I always carry my phone, in my bra. So that's how I snuck my phone into this posh event at the Broadmoor in the Springs. What is the ticket taker going to do? Ask me to feel my breast? Ask me to strip down? Not going to happen. He didn't say anything, other than, "You can't take that food into the tournament." I had 2 Lara Bars, and 2 Honey Shots in my purse. I was ready for my "special needs diet" speech and 30 seconds into it he realized he didn't want my coma/death on his head so he said, "Okay, you can take them in, but just don't throw the wrappers on the ground." WHAT THE FUCK? That's why you won't let me take food in? Litter??? Um....they were selling all kinds of junk food with more litter possibilities than my little fruit & nut bars had. What really killed me is that we weren't allowed to take in water bottles. Well, it was 92 degrees out that day with clear skies. They were selling 20oz. water for $4.50, and not a drinking fountain in sight. We were there for six hours and walked more than 6 miles. Unless I wanted to invite heat stroke into my list of ailments, I needed to drink more than one bottle. I spent $36 on water that day. Shouldn't I at least get a share or two of stock in Coca-Cola for that price??? Last pro-golf tourney I go to. (We all look fairly pleased to be back at the house where water is NOT more expense than platinum.)

Separated shoulder. To add insult to injury, the girl I chased down, took my stick, dropped it, got the shot off on my goalie and I got called for HOOKING!! (Not THAT kind of hooking.) It must have been mind-fuck hooking because the last time I checked, you had to have your stick in your hands to hook someone, and mine was a good 10 feet from where I crashed into the boards.
MUDDY BUDDY - this will be posted with the UAR. This, too, is an event worthy of a separate post.
Skin cancer. Morpheaform basal cell carcinoma. ON MY NOSE. I've heard third nostrils will be all the rage in 2009. Maybe I can just stick a hoop in it and it will look like a cool nose-ring that I put there on purpose.

You gotta have faith!

2008-05-04T23:39:00.004-06:00

"I'm losing my faith in humanity."

Sometimes good guys do finish first.

The nice guy ends up with the nice girl.

Bad guys get what they deserve.

No animals die.

There's enough of everything to go around.

Life is fair.

There's plenty of creamer for the coffee.

I make the right choices.

We all get the sleep we need.

We all get the love we need.

I believe in happy endings. I do. But don't tell anyone. If there is no happy ending here, someone is in BIG FAT TROUBLE!
...or...we should make our own happy ending and call it a day.

"...to hell with humanity. I say, we take it. We just take it over for ourselves!"

A quote for Wednesday:

2008-04-30T20:46:00.003-06:00

"A couple hundred years ago Benjamin Franklin shared with the world the secret of his success. Never leave that 'til tomorrow, which you can do today. This is the man who discovered electricity; you'd think we'd pay more attention to what he had to say. I don't know why we put things off, but if I had to guess it has a lot to do with fear. Fear of failure, fear of pain, fear of rejection. Sometimes the fear of just of making a decision. Because... What if you're wrong? What if you make a mistake you can't undo? Whatever it is we're afraid of, one thing holds true: That by the time the pain of not doing the thing gets worse than the fear of doing it, it can feel like we're carrying around a giant tumor. And you thought I was speaking metaphorically... 'The early bird catches the worm.' 'A stitch in time saves nine.' 'He who hesitates is lost.' We can't pretend we haven't been told. We've all heard the proverbs, heard the philosophers, heard our grandparents warning us about wasted time; heard the damn poets urging us to seize the day. Still, sometimes we have to see for ourselves. We have to make our own mistakes. We have to learn our own lessons. We have to sweep today's possibility under tomorrow's rug until we can't anymore. Until we finally understand for ourselves what Benjamin Franklin meant. That knowing is better than wondering. That waking is better than sleeping. And that even the biggest failure, even the worst most intractable mistake, beats the hell out of not trying."

PostSecret

2008-04-28T22:36:00.012-06:00

by Frank Warren

"Can I tell you a secret? I'm gonna keep one."
Next time someone tells you Frank is in town, GO SEE HIM! You won't be sorry.

"You know, I think when the person writes Anonymous, their identity should be kept secret."

"Do you think it would be so bad if they knew? Keeping this secret seems awfully complicated."

Holy Sneak Shitballs!!!

2008-04-27T17:57:00.004-06:00

"Prepare ship for ludicrous speed! Fasten all seatbelts, seal all entrances and exits, close all shops in the mall, cancel the three ring circus, secure all animals in the zoo!"

Today was the 26th Annual Cherry Creek Sneak in Denver. I ran the 5 mile in 47:40. What is most noteworthy is that I ran mile 5 in 7:39. 7:freakin39!!!! I have never broken 8:00....I think I could have run a faster total time if I didn't have to leave my breakfast by the side of the road just before the first mile marker. That first mile was a killer.

Clearly, I was optimistic...I lined up in the 7:01-8:00 min/mi wave. I usually do this to get away from stroller-pushers and walkers. I guess I almost actually belong in this wave now. Tee hee.

Lessons Learned & Observations Made:
1. Great race that's about two miles from my house: can sleep later the morning of! Parking sucks, though. I just made it about five minutes before the horn because I had to park almost a mile away. At least I remembered where I parked the PudgeMobile after the race!
2. Very flat course with less than a mile on concrete: good for shins and arches.
3. Cereal and coffee two hours before, not a good choice. Didn't even go near a banana. Some lessons I learn the first go-round.

4. If you lose 110lbs., you can run 8:00 miles. Last time I "ran" this race was in 2006. I think I logged 14:00 min/mile. That's cutting some serious time!

5. I don't think I'm a good runner but I always believe I'm going to finish every race.

6. My secret dread is finishing dead last. I think I'd better be dead if I finish last.

7. I feel SO great when I see the FINISH banner ahead of me. It's a feeling unto its own. Makes it very easy to sprint the final 100 yds, or so.

8. I run to escape the stress around me and noise in my head.

9. When elating to ABC about my 7:39 mile, H said, "Duh, you're in great shape...better shape than you think." [!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!]

10. Finishers get a boatload of schwag in a handy reusable bag: samples, food, drinks, beer (what's with the beer at all these CO races after running before noon????), energy bars, lip stuff, sunscreen, a ton of coupons for more schwag, a free sammie at Spicy Pickle...

11. I like to be the fashion police when watching the other runners. I see some crazy ass outfits running around. Today a gal ran in shiny silver tights, skirt, and tube top. I'm guessing she doesn't own a mirror, or she's stuck in the 80's. I won't even go into all the guys who run nearly naked. That is shit I just don't need to see first thing in the morning...saggy old wrinkly nastiness.

12. This was the first run I did with my new waist pack. It sucked. It holds a water bottle and has a little tiny zipper pocket that basically holds about two TicTacs. Still searching for the perfect running pack.

13. The 5 mile run started last of all the runs, at 9:15. At first I was bitter that the 5K started at 8:30. Why have the shorter distance go first??? Then, when I realized it was 30 degrees at 8:30, I was glad to have an extra 45 minutes for the temps to rise a bit. It didn't rise all that much, though, so I ended up running in tights and a long sleeve shirt. I was sweating like a whore in church by the second mile but got such a cramp in my right quad that I figured if I stopped to take off my tights I probably wouldn't get started again. I did manage to get my long sleeve shirt off at mile 4, just in time to run almost all of mile 5 in the shade. I think that's why I had such a great time in the last mile. I was freezing my noonnies off so I had to hustle to get back in the sunshine...and the Starbucks stand with FREE Pikes Peak blend was CALLING MY NAME! I could smell it the last quarter mile....Mmmmmmm, coffee....

14. This leads me to my last lesson...don't do so many dry-land lunges and squats with weights three days before a run. I probably won't remember this next time. Good thought, though.

15. This was also the last year I run in the 35-39 division. That's a tough nut to swallow.

The race is not for the swift...

2008-04-19T17:46:00.005-06:00

...but for those who keep going. --Fred Lebow

"Are you alright, Buddy?"
"I just need some alone time, Papa."

I've been away from the blogosphere. Just trying to figure some things out. I'm back. Things aren't figured out, yet. Alas.

Now that the fall/winter hockey season is officially over for all of my teams, it's time to seriously train for the SanFran Marathon. Apparently, I can't do a long run and play a competitive hockey game in the same day. This seriously messed with my running schedule. I guess I'm not in shape enough. Well, by the fall, I will be. I'll be able to do a 10-miler AND kick ass on the ice. Got the goal. Got the schedule. Now it's time to do the work.

I fully implemented John Bingham's marathon training plan last Sunday and nothing will get in the way now. So, per the schedule, I went for a glorious long run today in beautiful Denver. It was the perfect running weather: not too hot, nice breeze, big blue sky over head, warm sun. Things were great. iPod was fully charged. Shoes felt good. Energy level high. Then at mile 4.3, things went south, so to speak.

Lesson learned:

If I eat this 30 minutes before a run,

I will need to find a

QUICKLY!

And it wasn't until mile 5.7 that I located the green box of hell smells. It was about 80 degrees out today and the park was REALLY busy. Ergo, the portOjohns were busy, too. I feel violated and I may never be the same again. It was a toss up for me: use the green box or just squat in the trees behind the green box. No, the trees wouldn't have offered much privacy, but at least the air was clean. I opted for the green box. Ugh. Just. Nasty. At least there was paper...

I can't decide if the last 5 miles were better or worse post green box experience. I'm thinking of just burning my running clothes and dipping myself in bleach.

Select poignant songs heard on iPod during run today:

Runaway by Bon Jovi

Don't Stop Believing by Journey

Oooh Oooh by Pat Benetar

Sometimes It's a Bitch by Stevie Nicks

Hump Day Wonders

2008-04-09T22:22:00.005-06:00

Four innuendos on Hump Day:

"The male erection. Pitchin' a tent, sportin' a wood, stiffie, flesh rocket, tall tommy, Mr. Morbis, the march is on, icycle has formed, Jack's magic beanstalk, rigor mortis has set in, Mr. Mushroom-head, mushroom on a stick, purple headed yogurt slinger... oh, and a pedro."

Today I told a complete stranger that, "I like 'em really stiff. The stiffer the better. You couldn't make it too stiff for me." He didn't crack. Not one giggle. Once out of my mouth, I giggled. He just paused, then continued the conversation.

The color guy, John Kelly, calling the Avs game tonight said, "He just couldn't get it up...", which made me giggle. I'm guessing all my hockey friends giggled when they heard it, too.

The male facilitator on a work project said to me today, "Bettina, you make it so hard. Do you know how hard you're making it?" I laughed out loud. The rest of the group just looked at me.

Coach told me today, "Don't get on top of me!" I just giggled.

Makes me think the people I hang out with have dirty minds and the rest of the world does not. I think the rest of the world might be missing out on something.

Crazy things I learned on Hump Day:

A baby with two faces was born in India. She drinks from both mouths and blinks all four eyes. She only has one brain, though, so when she gets older, will she be able to have two independent conversations? The people in her village think she's a reincarnated Hindi goddess. What a fabulous culture to embrace her and worship her. I believe she would be shunned if she had been born in America. I may relocate to India. Love their food and they don't eat cows, either.

Chinese scientists serenade abandoned wolf cubs to help them learn to howl. One of the only two reasons I love Chinese scientists. That and the pandas.

The kitchen is the dirtiest room in the house. Not just my house, everyone's house. In fact, your cutting board (not mine, I'm sure) has roughly 200% more fecal bacteria than your toilet seat. You're not safe at work, either. There are about 400 times more bacteria on your desktop at work than on a toilet seat.

Here's a little known fact about laundry: washing your underwear with the rest of your clothing can cause hepatitis A and stomach flu from the fecal-borne organisms that burrow into clothing, even during washing. I'm thinking of going to disposable undies or just going commando 100% of the time.

In a study of cyclists who drank chocolate milk after riding until they were energy depleted, they were able to ride 50% longer than cyclists who chugged Gatorade or other sports drinks. Is it the milk or the chocolate?

Fat is the body's back up fuel system. The role it plays in the body is that when there is no carbohydrate around, fat will become the primary energy fuel. Unless, of course, your body is depleted of carbs. Then you burn muscle as fuel. This is bad.

SLEEP: Still not enough. At least I'm not this bad: One of the longest recorded sleepless stints dates back to 1964 (I wasn't even born yet) when a San Diego high school student, supervised by Stanford scientists, stayed awake for 264 hours and 12 minutes--a bit more than 11 days. It was previously believed that going without sleep for so long would cause serious mental damage. (I would argue that those who see me on 0-4 hours of sleep would agree with this.) It proved untrue, however, when the student, who sacked out for 15 hours, returned to his normal waking/sleep schedule with no noticeable aftereffects. That we know of. Oh, and clinical tests revealed that women need more sleep than men. That's because we do more in our waking hours than men do. I'm just saying.

"If I didn't wake up, I'd still be sleeping."

RAM: "Let someone else handle all the tiny details today--you've got bigger fish to fry. Somehow, you need to get a handle on the long-range plans for your family or workplace pretty soon."

Ram: 6

B: 2 (I'll fry 'em, but I'm not eating any fish. I've decided. Just. Can't. Do. It.)

Fish and Fetus

2008-04-07T23:49:00.006-06:00

"Repeat after me: Fish are our friends...NOT FOOD!"

So I've taken to seeing a dietitian to help me sort out my inability to eat food and figure out what food I might be able to eat. Coach has me keeping a food log to try to track what works, what doesn't, etc. Today, after being force-fed an egg sandwich (with YUCKY mayonnaise on it!) I was told I basically eat too little of the right things, except for the fruits, veggies, and tofu, and not enough of anything else. (Apparently, protein bars are not meals. Neither are protein drinks. Hmmm...I'll make a note of that.) Then, I was told to EAT FISH. Um, what part of vegetarian are you not getting? Vegetarian - one who does not eat flesh, fish nor fowl.

I ate a couple bites of trout about 32 years ago. Heaved it into the river. Fish smells B-A-D. No getting around it. Fish is nasty. Oh, and it's not just any fish I need to eat. It needs to be cold water wild fish. What the hell is that? I wonder if there's a soy-fish-substitute out there somewhere...

And eggs. I'm supposed to eat the whole egg (with Omega-3), cooked, thank gawd. But yolk and all...ugh. Yolks rank right up there with fish. YUK. It's chicken fetus. I do not want to eat chicken fetus. I can get the whites down by not thinking about what they are and cooking them with a ratio of more salsa than whites, but the FETUS? I just don't know about this.

I also just don't like chickens so maybe that feeds into my dislike of yolks. They are mean-spirited birds. Nasty, mean, bitchy birds. One of my jobs on the farm (yep, born on a farm, most likely retarded...) was to get the eggs in every morning. You need to know, chickens do not fear children. Some of those damn birds wouldn't get off their roost to give up their eggs. Well, they'd get down right snippy with me and I of course, would chicken out. (HA!) Then the eggs would rot, bad things happened, dad yelling like a wild man, blah, blah, me in big fat trouble. So my grandpa says to me, "Just go in, put your hand on the side of the chicken on its roost, and say 'Shoo bird, shoo bird,' as you use your hand to up-roost it." Sure. Good plan for an 8 year old. The next morning my dad says, "Don't you leave one egg in that hen house or you'll be sorry." I sure as hell didn't want to be sorry so I knew what I had to do. I gathered all the eggs the hens had abandoned in their nests and then on to the evil hens who thought those eggs belonged to them. (Wait, um...yeah, they laid the egg, so, doesn't that make it their egg? So, I'm stealing their babies???? I had that very conversation with my crazy gram. She told me she and grandpa owned the chickens so anything they laid belonged to them, not the birds. My grandparents were slave-chicken owners!) The VERY FIRST hen I walked up to, I stuck my hand out, pursed my lips to say, "Shoo bird," and that f*cking bird flew (yes, flew) off her roost and PECKED ME IN THE LIP. "Plugged me clean through." There was a complete hole through my upper lip. I bled like a stuck hog. Needless to say, I dropped the entire basket of eggs and raced into the house, which was a good 200 yards from the coop. I looked like my face had been through the wood chipper: tears, blood (lots of blood) and snot all teamed up to make me a horrific sight that garnered all the sympathy I would need. I never had to get eggs again. I did have to clean the hog pen, though, so, good trade, right?

"So laying eggs all your life and then getting plucked, stuffed and roasted is good enough for you, is it?" "It's a livin'."

I really don't have any traumatic story about a fish trying to bite my finger off...I just think they smell like rotten ass and I'm just not fond of eating rotten ass.

All in my quest to build muscle instead of losing it week after week...fish and fetus. Yum Yum.

"Your ideals and values are on the table now, which doesn't mean that you're shifting gears -- just that you need to make some tough choices. Once you see it all clearly, you should know what to do."

Ram: 6

B: 1

DAMN THE RAM!

Sleep Study: I'm starting FOR SURE tomorrow night...I'm only looking at about 3 hours tonight so that won't work.

Confusion and Morals

2008-04-06T23:38:00.006-06:00

Saturday: "You are often the one who starts the ball rolling and today is no exception. Your spirit of adventure is fully engaged and you are eager for new experiences -- so see what kind of good trouble you can stir up!"

Sunday: "You need to stick it out through the current situation, no matter how much you want to cut and run. Your perseverance will pay off in the long run in a big, almost unimaginable, way."

I'm getting mixed signals from my dear, sweet Mr. Ram O'Confusion. I'll give you Saturday but Sunday? I don't think so. I am more of a cut-and-run gal, rather than a stick-it-out gal. By now, he should know that.

Ram: 4

B: 1

Moral dilemma. Moral imperative. What's the gold standard? Who's morals are we being judged against? If it's our own morals and we chose the path we think isn't immoral but it's immoral to others, how can it be deemed immoral? Who gets to judge? Just wondering.

"Life isn't simple, it's complicated. We're all just thrown in here together, in a world full of chaos and confusion, a world full of questions and no answers, death always lingering around the corner, and we do our best."

"To the death!"

"No, to the pain!"

"I'm afraid I'm not familiar with that one."

"I'll explain and I'll be sure to use small words so you can understand."

Innuendo

2008-04-06T17:50:00.006-06:00

"Someday, you'll have to make good on your innuendos."

A woman who just ordered a shot of tequila at a bar in Cherry Creek (Funny, it wasn't GKL...):

"Just get in me and get it over with it."

On the bench at my last men's game:

"B came but Will didn't." "I've heard that's a problem with Will!"
"Boys, be harder on your sticks."
"I couldn't get it up; too much rubber, not enough wood."

Coach: "I just can't get used to my knob."

Me: "Would some wax help?"

Coach: "Don't come on my face! Come across my face! So rude!"
Me: "Excuse me."

Coach: "No way. I punch the clock, put my sack lunch on the nightstand and get ready for a full day's work. Sometimes I wear a scuba mask and fins."
Me: "Wow. So much for research."

Three to 13 Minutes

2008-04-03T20:00:00.007-06:00

Here's some light reading for you, from today's Denver Post. It's so delicious, I had to share.

Let love endure, but keep sex short
by Megan K. Scott, AP
Maybe men had it right all along: It doesn't take long to satisfy a woman in bed.
A survey of sex therapists concluded the optimal amount of time for sexual intercourse was
three to 13 minutes. The findings, to be published in the May issue of the Journal of Sexual Medicine, strike at the notion that endurance is the key to a great sex life.
If that sounds like good news to you, don't cheer too loudly.
The time does not count foreplay, and the therapists did rate sexual intercourse that lasts from one to two minutes as "too short."
Researcher Eric Corty said he hoped to ease the minds of those who fret that "more of something good is better, and if you really want to satisfy your partner, you should last forever."
The questions were not gender-specific, Corty said. But he said prior research has shown that both men and women want foreplay and sexual intercourse to last longer.
Dr. Irwin Goldstein, editor of the Journal of Sexual Medicine, cited a four-week study of 1,500 couples in 2005 that found the median time for sexual intercourse was 7.3 minutes. Women were armed with stopwatches.
It's difficult for both older men and young men to make sexual intercourse last much longer, said Marianne Brandon, a clinical psychologist and director of Wellminds Wellbodies in Annapolis, MD.
"There are so many myths in our culture of what other people are doing sexually," Brandon said. "Most people's sex lives are not as exciting as other people think they are."
Fifty members of the Society for Sex Therapy and Research in the US and Canada were surveyed by Corty, an associate professor of psychology at Penn State Erie, and student Jenay Guardiani.
Thirty-four members, or 68 percent, responded, although some said the optimal time depended on the couple.
Corty said he hoped to give an idea of what therapists find to be normal and satisfactory among the couples they see.
"People who read this will say, 'I last five minutes or my partner lasts eight minutes,' and say, 'That's OK,'" he said. "They will relax a little bit."

I have questions.

There's a Journal of Sexual Medicine??? How do you get a subscription to that?
More isn't better??? Clearly this guy a.) doesn't have orgasms, b.) has never tried Turkish coffee and dark Swiss chocolate, c.) has no addictions, and/or d.) was born on a farm and is retarded.
See? GKL, you had it right ALL along! Two minutes is just not enough! You didn't need a research study to tell you that!
1,500 couples signed up to have SEX for research? Why do I never see that add in the paper?
Did they get paid for the research?
Does that make them hookers?
Does that make the researcher their P.I.M.P.?
The women were "armed with stopwatches?" [Okay, hon, on your marks...get set...OH! FALSE START!!! Do over.] Did they have starter pistols, too? Maybe just those into S&M got those...
"It's difficult for older and younger men to make it last much longer." So...we gals should just keep finding, what, 27-yr olds???? What's the magic age? 24? 29? 34? Is there a range to choose from?
There's a "Society for Sex Therapy and Research?" Are they accepting new members? Where do they meet? Hourly motels? How long are their meetings? Between 3-13 minutes?
"Most people's sex lives aren't as exciting as they brag about?" [Unless they are porn stars.] REALLY??? Brilliant. This guy is brilliant!
Relax. Have sex. Take as long or as short as you like. Why not?

I leave you with these quotes, also quite delicious.

"You know how they say to never drink and drive? Well, never drink and bone."

"Oops. That's not your vagina. That's your asshole."

"…and then your Mommy said, "Just do it already!" which was very confusing to Daddy, so I took the most literal translation."

"Do you want to do it doggie style? You're not going to fuck me like a dog. It's doggie style. It's just the style. We don't have to go outside or anything."

APRIL FOOL'S!!!

2008-04-02T23:45:00.001-06:00

This was the BEST birthday, um, in a very long time. I was going to say EVER, but I think my 30th was perdy damn good, too. So was my 20th...I was in Vienna for that one...ah, good times...no foolin'!

39 Fun things to do/see/get when you're a fool and want to celebrate it:

Waking up to a GIANT pot of brewed NM Pinon coffee
Drinking all 48oz of #1---powered me through #s 3-39
Skate for 4.5 hours, 1.5 hours of that on your very own private sheet of ice (I should just stop there because it couldn't possibly get any better than that!!!)
Getting half an hour and a Sk8nSht comp'ed by rink guy because it's my Day! (Oh, that's almost as good as #3.)
Laughing hysterically with teammates at 5:15AM lesson...KB going ass-first over the pads, into the net...
All my fav songs played at the rink and volume at the max!
No other coaches & students during my lesson. (Very close to being as good as #3.)
Fruit basket from my mama (I knew I should have stopped with #3!)
Fruit basket with ONE York Peppermint Patty. (Things that make me go, "hmmmm...")
BOD made up for #8/9 by making me HOMEMADE strawberry cupcakes (YUMYUMYUM!)
Calls from all my fam and good friends
Target gift card
iTunes gift card
Archiver's gift card
Enchanted...Patrick Dempsey is h-o-t.
Straight hair, and I didn't put any effort into it
SWEET card from H...awwwwww.....that's my guy!
Framed pic of J-ML taking a wicked slap-shot (YES on the right foot!!!)
Gorgeous double ring silver necklace from TFNY'S (perdy, so perdy! LOVE the little blue boxes!)
Dinner (Thai food-yummy) with good friends in Denver, and they live in WY!
German Riesling x 2
Juicy Juice (thanks, SV!)...Let it Bee, tee hee!
St. Liberata (needed her Saturday night apparently!)
Taking #23 out with me to be my wingman every time I party. She can be trusted. Some guys, not so much.
Vodka/crans at the bar
Blues/rock bands at the bar
Dinner and drinks in Denver
Card from my boss that says, "Wishes for a great day to a fool...no foolin'!" He's a funny guy!
Basket of blooming perennial bulbs (my fav) from mama---to make up for #8/9? No! It was BOGO at the floral shop! No kidding.
Gift card for a spa-pedi from my staff! And it's at my fav salon! They are awesome!
Hearing my 8-yr old nephew sing, "Happy Birthday to you, you're a hundred and two, you look like a monkey and you live in a zoo...or maybe you smell like one too!"
Didn't care for the 102 part in #31...he's 8, what does he know?
Favorite work colleague singing to my voice mail box from her hospital bed, at the top of her lungs in her narcotic-induced state, at 3:15AM, "HAPPY, um, DAY, ah, BIRTHDAY, and...ah...oh, yeah, B-girl! Happy something, um...yes, right, HAPPY! HAPPY!" Don't panic. Narcotics are prescribed and necessary for horrific bike accident.
No management meetings at work for one whole day. (Nearly as good as #3, but not quite. Need more of #1 to get through them.)
Confirmation email from Nike...Team A-B is officially registered for the SanFran Women's Marathon. WOO HOO!!!
Finding a gas station with gas for $3.06/gal! It was $3.19 most everywhere else.
#36 was ON my way, not OUT of my way!
Avs clinching a playoff berth with
Peter the Great's first goal of the season!!!

Gift from my Ram: "You should find that people are more willing than ever to help you out with your various plans and projects, so don't be shy about asking! You may find that they're in need of some serious guidance, though."

Ram:4

B:0

Sleep Study v 2.1: if you only get a couple hours of sleep several nights in a row, it'll feel like you have a hangover without the fun the night before.

12 Things I learned the past three days:

2008-03-31T00:46:00.010-06:00

1. Startling fact #17: I am too old for a babysitter. This is a harsh reality that I have to take care of myself. "I think if you wanted a babysitter, you should marry Mary Poppins."

2. Startling fact #17a: I need to take control of the outside factors to play better hockey.

3. Not-so-Startling fact #10: I don't like getting yelled at. "It makes me feel small and powerless."

4. I don't like interlopers at the coffee shop. [You know them. You're sitting there minding your own business and next thing you know they saddle up next to you with a vague, "Can I sit here?" and proceed to sit down, before you can answer, and unload their crap so you have to move your crap to make room for them. This happened to me on Friday. I was updating my calendar and was using about two square feet of space at the counter. I just wanted to be left alone in peace to drink my coffee. There were 11 empty seats in the coffee shop. WHY DO YOU NEED TO SIT NEXT TO ME???? I've had a rough morning!!! I just want to drink my Joe alone!!! The lady that did this also had some disgusting salad with fish in it. It smelled like ass-fish AND to top it off, she was a SMACK-EATER!! You know them, too. They eat with their mouths open and smack-smack-smack their food. HOLY HELL, GET THE FUCK AWAY FROM ME!!! At some point, I will say this to these rude strangers. I think the only reason I don't is because I'd most likely get banned from the coffee shop and then I'd be very, very sad.]

5. $9 for a salad is just too much freakin money to pay for rabbit food. I got a salad for lunch on Friday at Mad Greens. It was a "Small Build Your Own" and it cost me $8.69. Here were the ingredients:

spinach (raw, leafy)
grape tomatoes
chick peas (canned)
soy beans (boiled)
tofu (raw, marinated in ginger vinegar)
red onions (raw)
broccoli (par-boiled)
light on the light red pepper dressing

ALMOST NINE DOLLARS for a salad with a total calorie content of 305??? Outrageous. And it's not like it's the MOST tasty salad ever. It's alright and it feeds the beast, but, really, $9???

6. I got an average of 4.5 hours of sleep each night. Not enough to qualify for my unscientific sleep study and not enough to function well for long. That will be my Sleep Hypothesis #2.

7. The Red Rocks workout is a KICK ASS workout. I burned 2200 calories in the 2.5 hour sweat-fest. Check it out: http://www.redrocksfitness.com/. Holy smokes! It's my new favorite workout. You get to workout in one of the most beautiful outdoor theaters in the world: stairs, stairs, and more stairs, 300 pushups, more dips than I could count, sit-ups with rocks in our hands, resistance bands leashed around our waists as we ran UP the stairs, all to some rocking music to keep us going....whew! SO MUCH FUN! If you are in CO, you should check this one out. And, the guy does it for FREE!!! Just show up and sweat. Oh, bring gloves. That was a lesson learned the hard way...

8. I like drinking with my hockey friends. GKL is my good, good, vodka friend. I love her. Five vodka crans and five shots (give or take a couple...I lost count) are too much in one night, though. I am too old for that, I think. If you do drink that much, make sure you drink an Emergen-C before you go to bed. (Put one in your wallet now so you're prepared the next time because most likely there will be a next time, sometime.) Helps with the morning after.

9. Know what else helps? An EYE OPENER at the RFL. Yummy bloody mary. Possibly the best I've ever had. Highly recommend it. (When you get the "EYE OPENER?" invite on your car the next morning, you accept. It's the polite thing to do.)

10. I like drinking at bars that remind me of MT. RFL could be on any street corner in any town in MT. Cozy. Friendly. No crazy yuppies. And CHEAP drinks! Ahhhhh....the taste of home....

11. If you do drink too much, make sure your good friends take your keys, take care of you and drive you to their house to sleep. Don't try to take their picture though, because you're probably too drunk to hold the camera steady. Thanks He(a)rds for taking good care of me!!!

This is GKL showing me her "juicer."

12. Coach is a lightweight. I edited the other terms used when he left early.

Innuendo from BOD at our hockey game tonight : "I don't know if he's hard but he is coming fast."

A teaser for Friday:

2008-03-27T23:40:00.004-06:00

"You're feeling pretty good about where you are, but you're just restless enough to want to look further. See what you can find out beyond your borders--you never know where the next big thing will come from." My beloved Ram of Aries, you big tease!

Oh, I have a perdy good idea!

If I go to sleep RIGHT now, I could actually get six full hours. Okay. Zzzzzzzzzz. See? Three hours last night makes it really easy to nod off just about anywheZzzzzzz.....

"Ze Germans are ze schmartest people in ze worlt!"

2008-03-27T23:15:00.001-06:00

I love the German people, I do. But sometimes they make me say, "Was das Bumsen??" [Loosely: "What the f*ck??]

They name the dispensers in their bathrooms, in ENGLISH...crazy English at that.

Lady Killer: These are paper bags for feminine products, I'm guessing...I actually brought one back to add to my scrapbook. [The unused bag, moron!] I just didn't think anyone would believe me if I didn't have proof.

Big Willy: The toilet paper dispenser is my favorite, for OBVIOUS reasons...

Soap Susi: She's a shy, puckish thing with industrial strength soap that will eat the skin from your hands if you leave it on long enough. (The Germans are germophobes {Misophobia or Mysophobia} for the most part.)

And last but not least, Paper Jack. He's a straight forward, hard working, rough, 45lbs stock paper towel dispenser. Towels double as mid-grain sand paper.

These pictures were taken in a quaint, very pricey restaurant where we celebrated the life of my Oma after her funeral. She loved that little restaurant. The first time we went there was on her 70th birthday [but I don't recall the group of crazy dispensers in the bathroom---I'm sure I would have mocked them back then, too.] She called ahead to make sure the cook would make me a vegetarian dish. I overheard her telling him, in the typical direct German tone, that bread and cheese are not an acceptable meal for a vegetarian so he'd better come up with something substantial and tasty. And he did! [Everyone did what Oma told them to do. She had a way of convincing anyone to do just about anything.] He made me some yummy vegetable gratin that I've never been able to replicate. Oma always made sure I was well taken care of...at this meal after her funeral, I had my choice of cheese on toasted bread or cheese on sprouted grain bread. I miss her.

Here's a picture from that trip. [My relatives eating at said restaurant. I'm not even sure who all of those people are...random folks looking for a free meal?]
I swear, this will not turn into a vacation blog. I don't even take vacations unless, apparently, there is a funeral involved. Proof? In the past four years, the only time off I've taken was for 1.) Opa's funeral, 2.) Oma's funeral, 3.) Gram's funeral...in that order. Crazy. Oh, and I'm fresh out of grandparents so no more vacation funerals for them!

So I was thinking about these funny dispensers today because I heard a scientist on the radio talking about all the germs in public bathrooms, and how you can catch all kinds of shit (pun intended) just by WALKING into a public bathroom. Now, I am a germophobe from way back. (See reference above regarding German people.) It takes all my resolve and the past 38 years gaining the strength to even go into a public bathroom, let alone to USE one! [It's true. As a child, okay, up until about five years ago, I never used public bathrooms unless I was drunk; too drunk to even remember using them. But my friends were witnesses, so I guess I did.] I did not need to hear this guy yammer on about the diseases living on the sink, soap dispenser, towel dispenser, etc., let alone the toilet! Ick! My skin is itchy just thinking about it. Oh, and those paper seat covers? Don't bother. Basically, after going into a public bathroom, you should strip naked, burn your closes and shoes, go through haz-mat decontamination, and dip yourself in bleach.

I bring this up because at the Avs game last night I had to go into the Pepsi Center bathroom to vomit. (I warned you earlier that food does not like me.) I can't imagine anything worse than having to stick your face near the seat, as opposed to your bum. I made it about four feet away and couldn't go any closer. I should have tipped the cleaning lady, except I'm not sure anyone had cleaned that toilet in about a month. Bad Karma points for me: -12.

"Next time why don't you just give me a paper cut and pour lemon juice on it!"

SLEEP STUDY: Was das Bumsen! I don't have time to sleep! I can say, unequivocally, on three hours of sleep a night I can fall asleep just about anywhere throughout the day. That is B's Sleep Theory #1.

Is the freakin universe trying to tell me something??

2008-03-27T00:13:00.005-06:00

"Now is the time to make your move -- even if you're sure you're not quite ready. Your positive attitude and energetic spirit are perfect for making things happen and you sure know how to improvise!"

Ram: TWO

B: ZERO

I need to figure out how to improvise in all areas of my life...especially with a stick and puck. Actually, I've always hated improvisation. Just give me the notes/rules/guidelines/script and I'll play/abide by/follow/read them! I don't want out of my box. I'm perfectly content in my box. (TEE HEE HEE! Totally unanticipated innuendo!)

"All right, you're a reindeer. Here's your motivation: Your name is Rudolph, you're a freak with a red nose, and no one likes you. Then, one day, Santa picks you and you save Christmas. No, forget that part. We'll improvise... just keep it kind of loosey-goosey. You HATE Christmas! You're gonna steal it. Saving Christmas is a lousy ending, way too commercial. ACTION!"

And here's a quote directed at me this week, "DO SOMETHING! Keep moving, fake a move, DO SOMETHING. Just DON'T STOP! DON'T YELL OUT SOMETHING! DON'T QUIT! " Little voice in my head, "That's a lot to remember." (And in rereading this quote = MORE innuendo!)

UPDATE to Nicknames:

A sportscaster on the local TV station in Great Falls, MT, used to call me Funky Cool Bettina. No kidding. Of course, he was always drunk when he called me that, but so was I! (Thanks for reminding me, GKL!)

Zack from PB calls me Snipe, after watching me nail the crossbar about six times in a row at a Sk8nSht.

And how could I forget H's new name for me: Donkey Driver????? This refers more the sound he made imitating me, rather than how I actually drive, though.

Sleep Study Update:

Four hours a night is just not allowing me to draw any conclusions or form any hypotheses. I'm in study-delay mode. They said something about lack of sleep effecting memory, but I can't remember what it was...

"The pressure of a name...

2008-03-25T22:32:00.007-06:00

Okay, I'll give you a name......Cinda-f*ckin'-rella!"

I have many names. I'm guessing it goes hand-in-hand with my multiple personality disorder? The funny thing is, my mama PROHIBITED nicknames for me until I was in high school and my 16 years of rebellion finally wore her down. (Remind me to tell you sometime how I got my ears pierced at 17, a year before I could "legally sign for myself.")

See, I hate my name. Always have. I like my name when I'm in Germany. Hate my name when I'm in any English speaking country. My dad named me after one of my mom's sisters. (She's crazy, by the way...doesn't bode well for me, oh, and she has MS & Parkinson's. I couldn't make this shit up, I swear.)

It's just that my name is ALWAYS mispronounced or forgotten. My kindergarten teacher called me Belinda every single day. My kindergarten "diploma" is even addressed to...Belinda. How hard is it to remember 15 five-year olds' names??? (Funny side note that doubles with a movie quote: in A Muppet's Christmas Carol, the Crachits [Kermit & Miss Piggy] have twin piglet daughters, as well as older son Peter and Tiny Tim. The twin's names are....BETINA & BELINDA!!! [Since it's such a great movie, they are forgiven for misspelling it.] And there is a scene where Miss Piggy/Emily Crachit mixes them up and replies to their correction, "uh, uh, WHATEVER!"...funny ass shit, but most likely to just me and Jules, my movie quote equal. Put this on your holiday movie list. You won't be sorry.)

And if I had a dollar for every time I've been called Bonita, I'd quit my job and buy me an ice rink, people! I realize Bonita means 'beautiful' but to me, it conjures up some trashy, grease-bomb, trailer park crack whore mental image that I just can't shake. When someone tries to pronounce my name and they say, "Um, Bonita?" I, a.) ignore them, KNOWING full well they are talking to me, b.) get caustic and say, "are you dyslexic or retarded? T's before N," or, c.) chant quietly, "Hooked on Phonics worked for me!"

So in high school, my band buddies (or was it my softball teammates...I can't recall) started calling me B. Just B. It's easy. Simple. Rolls off the tongue. And few people forget it. My mom was mortified. Sorry, mama! It stuck. Until now.

My name has morphed into various other names by my friends and family. Exhibit A:

Roomie Jolene called me ButrosButros
U1 called me Spaz the entire first year of college
UB kids called me Petuna one summer...I blame my boss, JS for starting that one
Nephews call me NeNe
Opa called me Tienschen...I can still hear him calling me from downstairs...and I'd holler back, "Opa, was machst, du?" He wanted me to make him waffles. They were his fav. (Sorry, tangent down memory lane for me...my blog...my tangent...too bad.)
U2 called me B'tweena in high school
A tennis coach called me SchneidaPie, as in "Serve me up a slice o' SchneidaPie." Always made me giggle.
One of my brother's friends used to call me Schneidzie Whiplash ????? Your guess is as good as mine...
I hesitate to write this one, because I never liked it either...my dad called me Bum and Bummie until, oh, I was 30. I think he realized when I no longer answered to it, that he should drop it. Problem is, his wife still calls me Bum. (As a wee-pup, I was THE tom-boy of the neighborhood. Two older brothers will do that to you. I also had very long hair that I would not let my mom comb, ever. I was a straggly headed wild banshee child. I also didn't like to wear shirts. Story for another time.)

Why does this naming-thingy rear its ugly head now? Because it seems I need a new name on the ice. I've been using B forever. But there's another girl on my team whose last name is Bean. When we're on the ice together, we can't tell if Coach is yelling at B or Bean...see? Confusing. I say, just use her first name, which starts with an M, and let me keep B. It's not flying, so the search for a new name is on.

My last name is too long and doesn't "roll off the tongue." I don't know what that is all about. There were some other crazy suggestions, PT, M, I don't know...I sort of blacked out during the naming negotiations. And now, I sort of fell into a new name, Juicy.

Just so you know, I'm not on board with it, just yet. I hear my linemates or Coach calling, "Juicy, Juicy!" And I seriously, look around, giggle, wonder what is so juicy, then realize, OH, THAT'S ME! All of which takes over 10 seconds. Puck is gone. Play has moved on. And B, I mean Juicy, is trying to figure out what happened.

As a joke, I found a couple FUNNY t-shirts by Juicy Couture. Nothing quite like having 4-inch letters across your chest spelling out: Juicys Do it Better! I've worn them out to the bar, post-game party. Now a bartender actually calls me Juicy. A guy who serves me vodka, calls me...Juicy.

Story behind the Juice: ("There is too much, I will sum up.")

There's a jerky hockey guy/instructor that told me five years ago that I should just quit because I'd never be a hockey player. This was after I tried out for his "competitive" hockey team. After hearing this, my good friend ABC-123 started a team for me so we could show him we COULD be hockey players. I see this guy almost on a daily basis at the rink. Now he's all compliments. He makes all kinds of sugary comments to me. Mostly I ignore. But sometimes I giggle. See, had he taken me seriously when I asked him after the tryout what I needed to do to become a "hockey player" and I was willing to do anything, he could have said, "You can take lessons from me." Think of the $$$ he could have made from me. Now he gets BUBKUS from me and Coach sees me multiple times a week! ("Hi, remember me? I was in here yesterday and you wouldn't wait on me. Big mistake. Huge. I have shopping to do.") So about six weeks ago I went up to jerky hockey instructor to see if I could sub in his novice league. He said, and I quote, "B, of course you can. I know you will control the juice." I said, "I have...juice?" And he said, "GIRRRRRRL! You got JUICE!!!! I know you won't turn up the juice and skate all over the novice. You know how to play nice with them so go, have fun." I was and still am speechless...until...

I made the mistake of telling Coach and my line mates. It seemed like I had FINALLY arrived. The guy who told me to quit, admitted (almost, in his own crazy way) that I can play hockey, and since the folks who have always supported and believed in me (and played with me when I was so horrible) knew the original story of Mr. Rude, I figured they should get the follow-up story.

Just call me Juicy! I'll try to remember you're talkin' to me!

Sleep Study: Not progressing as hoped...maybe better luck tomorrow night.

I'm officially freaked out.

2008-03-25T02:27:00.003-06:00

"You and your big heart are going through some craziness right now and while it might not be the most fun you've ever had, you can tell that it's a lot better than what could have happened instead!"

I'm going to keep a tally of how many times this freaky Ram predicts my future or my moods...starting...NOW!

One.

"My little brother got his arm stuck in the microwave. So my mom had to take him to the hospital. My grandma dropped acid this morning, and she freaked out. She hijacked a busload of penguins. So it's sort of a family crisis. Bye!"

I really do need to get more sleep...

Sleep, Broken Ass and the Avs

2008-03-24T23:01:00.007-06:00

Sleep study has been postponed until tomorrow night. Sorry. There is just too much crap to get done in 24 hours. I can say that 6 hours of sleep didn't help the whole perfect practice thingy in my lesson. May have well just got 3 hours, at least then I would have gotten a bunch of stuff done and still had a poor performance.

"Yuck! This juice tastes like ass, here you try it!" "No, thanks. I'm trying to stay off of the ass juice for now." So I have a broken ass. Seriously. I cracked a bone in my ass. Not to be confused with a bone in my crack ass. I keep falling on my left ass bone. You'd think I have plenty of padding, what with all my natural fat-padding and the breezers/shorts I wear for hockey, but, no. A couple months ago, in one of my men's games, some ass-clown-roller-turned-ice-hockey-jackass came up behind me and took my feet out. (One of the problems with these ass-clown-roller-turned-ice players?? They don't know how to stop because they have no understanding of edges on their skates. See, on rollerblades there are no edges and roller players really never stop.) I came down on my left ass bone. It was bone splintering pain. I couldn't even finish the game--this has never happened in any sport I've ever played in 31 years. Sweet Bug O' Death ordered me up some ass-ice to help ease the pain but it just really made me want to cry.

This is a picture of the bruise THREE WEEKS after aforementioned ass-clown knocked me down.

This wasn't the first falling on my left ass bone. No. I have a bad habit of not picking up my left foot in transitions. (Non-hockey folk, this really isn't an important fact for you.) So, I catch my left outside edge and WHAM! Down on my left ass bone. I CANNOT TAKE IT ANYMORE.

You guessed it...today, I fell, again, on my left ass bone. The bone splintering pain really makes me want to throw up. (You just never realize how often your butt checks are engaged throughout the day until you break one of them: sitting on the toilet, sitting at work, walking, running, skating, bending, jumping, laying in bed, turning over in bed, doing other things in bed. And it's hard to explain to people in meetings or on the train why you're gingerly trying to sit down or shuffling in your seat trying to get comfortable.) I bought new breezers, twice. They both suck in the ass-padding area. I bought figure skater jump pads. They slip around in my shorts. (I sweat, you see.) I just need something to protect my broken ass. My sweet D partner on that men's team had these words of advice, "Yeah, I've done that. Took forever to heal. You know what you really need to do?" Me, "No, what?" Him, "Don't fall on it again." Clever. He's also the guy who suggested I look into anger management classes...Boys are so funny.

The boys at the hockey shop think I need to special order custom breezers from Finland. I laughed and laughed and laughed. Really? Custom? I'm guessing they'd either come with no padding at all or have only one leg hole, given my luck with custom hockey orders. (These pants are billed as 'the best hockey pants in the world.' They are handmade in Canada. And Canadians know hockey, right? I think it's time to pony up $170 to save my ass.)

I forgot to Advil-up before leaving for the Avs game, which made it a REALLY, REALLY long game. Sitting on a broken ass bone for almost three hours is not fun. Oh, that gets me to the whole point of this story. Sorry. Rambled on a bit.

There was an older, dumpy, rural-looking couple sitting in front of us tonight. (Avs beat Flames 2-0. Yeah Avs! Awww...poor Jerome...He's HOT!) They were either Jose Theodore's parents or staunch supporters of the Christian Right-Home Schoolie-Focus on the Family bunch. Maybe both. We like to comment on Theodore's play. It is rarely positive. He's just a train wreck. Every time he comes out to play the puck I'm just sure his breezers are going to fall around his ankles, he's going to bobble the puck, and we're going to get scored on. The latter two have really happened.

So, H & I were chatting how Three-or-Four is awful; he had just mishandled the puck. (Yes, yes, he did get a shootout tonight, but seriously, the D blocked more shots that I've ever seen them block. And clearly, everyone gets lucky every know and then...except maybe me...story for another time. Ah hem.) I think the straw that broke the Frumpter's back what when H said, "He's a f*cking sieve," when the scoreboard was trying to get the crowd to chant The-O-Dore. Well they turned around and gave us the nastiest fire and brimstone stink-eye...I was sure the heavens were going to open up and unleash an ungodly fire and plague of locusts upon us. I'm just not sure if it was the swearing that tipped the scale or the Theodore bashing...doesn't really matter. You know I just ran with it from there. Instead of being all nasty to me, maybe they should just pray for me. Isn't that really the Christian thing to do? (Have you seen the quote from Gandhi, "I like your Christ. I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ." Or something like that. You get the point.)

1. It's a hockey game, not church. Expect foul language.

2. It's late at night. Kiddies should be in bed by now.

3. All you have to say is earmuffs!

My Ram is a scolding ram! Baaaaaaaaa!!!

2008-03-23T20:31:00.004-06:00

"You've got needs -- but so does everybody else! It's one of those days in which you can get a lot farther by smiling and asking how people are doing than by simply reaching for whatever you want." Especially if you come home at 3:50am and the question is posed, "Where ya been? Bars close at 2:00." Not ALL bars close at 2:00...and what if I'm just a selfish bitch? Then my needs would come first, right? I should have read that damn horoscope when it reared its ugly head in my inbox at 11:40pm last night! What good is a horoscope if you read it 16 hours after the fact???

So I cooked a lovely dinner of homemade pasties. It's a two hour ordeal but worth it, I find!

"There are many perfectly nice cats in the world, but every barrel has its bad apples, and it is well to heed the old adage, "Beware the bad cat bearing a grudge.."" That'll do pig, that'll do...

"I can't finish all this and sleep at the same time."

2008-03-23T14:30:00.008-06:00

"You have to sleep. It's what keeps you pretty."

So, the other night, H tells me to come watch something on the iMAX in our living room. Thinking it's some great hockey clip, I hop to. It turns out to be a story on 60 Minutes about SLEEP. http://www.cbsnews.com/sections/i_video/main500251.shtml?id=3942130n

Leslie Stahl* is reporting on all the bad things that can happen to you if you don't sleep: heart disease, diabetes, obesity, blindness, rotten teeth, scurvy...okay, I made up those last three. We watch the whole episode, which is s longie--they actually break for commercial in the middle of the report. If you watch 60 Minutes you know this is a rare occurrence. At the end of the report, he says, "See! That's why you need to sleep more." I was speech-LESS! I HAVE TO SLEEP MORE? This coming from a guy who's sleep cycle is so f-ed up he can't fall asleep when the sun goes down? Seriously, he sleeps from 4am-10am. I don't get it. I thought he DVR'd the episode for me as if to say, "Wow, I should get more sleep," meaning HE should get more sleep. He goes on to say, "You get up at the butt-crack of dawn, play hockey or workout and then go to work then play hockey or workout until midnight." I should have looked at him and said, "Hello pot! I may be the kettle, but we're BOTH black!"

Quotes (you know I love my quotes) from the report:

"In fact, sleep is as essential as food because they will die just about as quick from food deprivation as sleep deprivation. So, it's that necessary," [First food is fuel and now sleep is, too???]

"Whatever the function of sleep, or the functions of sleep are, they seem to be so important that evolution is willing to put us in that place of potential danger by losing consciousness. It would be the biggest evolutionary mistake if sleep does not serve some critical function," [The scientists don't even KNOW why we need sleep and they are assuming it's an evolutionary mistake if it's not important? What is that?]

"Sleep, we've been finding, actually can enhance your memories, so that you'll come back the next day even better than where you were the day before," [So, on the days I get 8 hours (that's what they recommend in this study) I should remember everything from yesterday. What if you're completely wasted the prior day and you get 8 hours of sleep that night? Will you remember all the crazy shit you did the night before?]

"So, it seems to be that practice does not quite make perfect; it’s practice with a night of sleep that makes perfect," [I am going to try this tonight to prepare for my lesson tomorrow. We'll just see about that! I'll do my own damn sleep study and let you know. I'm no Leslie Stahl, but I do have a stop watch that goes tick-tick-tick-tick-tick.]

"It's this odd notion that we all think in Western civilization that we have to stay awake to get more done. And I think that's simply not true. In fact, I think if you have a good night of sleep, what you'll find is that you can get more done than if you simply stay awake." [Adding this to my study...]
"Well, the first finding, and it stunned us, was there's a cumulative impairment that develops in your ability to think fast, to react quickly, to remember things. And it starts right away," Dinges says. "A single night at four hours or five hours or even six, can in most people, begin to show affects in your attention and your memory and the speed with which you think. A second night it gets worse. A third night worse. Each day adds an additional burden or deficit to your cognitive ability." [If the detrimental effects are cumulative, doesn't one of those math properties come into effect here (what are they, again...associative, commutative, distributive, and equality??) that if you sleep for 24 hours straight, you could make up three nights of lost sleep, thus, lack of sleep is cumulative but so is a lot of sleep...]

"But remember, we're not allowing caffeine, and we're not allowing physical activity and bright light. And for most of us, probably a day or two or so, you can get by taking these, what we call the counter measures, right? But, at some point what these studies show is the impairments get so bad, that there's little to no rescue possible without getting more sleep," [AH HA! CHEATERS!!! This damn study isn't even close to real life. What sleep deprived person doesn't use some kind of stimulant until they can catch some make up zzzz's?]

I may have to concede the sleep issue...It's not just H. My mama and Coach tell me I need more sleep, too. I'm out numbered. Funny, Miss Marley thinks by 6am every morning I've had plenty of sleep. I'm still doing my own damn sleep study, though, so stay tuned.

*Side note: H and I actually have a funny joke between us about Leslie Stahl. She did a report a few years ago about autistic savants. There was a young boy, maybe 8 or 9, who was blind and severely autistic. He was also an incredible piano player. Anyhoo, when she first met him and introduced herself to him, he said to her, in his cute little voice, "Helloooo Lez-lee." We often repeat this funny greeting randomly for no reason at all. It's really just funny to the two of us, I'm guessing. Never mind.

The Bug Blooms

2008-03-22T14:24:00.006-06:00

Here are some rare, never-seen photos of Bug O' Death. She is wearing her very special helmet cover. (It's actually a swim cap on loan from a male teacher she works with, who is also the best player on our men's team. He wore it at a pie throwing contest at their school. I gotta say, my schools and teachers SUCKED compared to the fun things BOD does with her students!!!)

Sadly, the jackass refs wouldn't let the Bug skate with her new look. It apparently posed some kind of hazard...rubber cap, rubber flowers...someone could lose an EYE or maybe even DIE! "You'll shoot your eye out, kid!"

Which just reminded me a funny thing my youngest nephew once said to me. He was sitting next to me at his first ever hockey game...we were watching H's team. The ref made a bad call (are you seeing a THEME here, people??) and I let slip, "Come on, Jackass, let them play." Without missing a beat, the 7-year old says, "NeNe, I think he's a zebra, not a jackass."

Crazy things I've heard this week:

2008-03-21T09:53:00.007-06:00

A man, after visiting a strip club, is SUING the stripper who gave him a lap dance. She apparently clipped his face with her 5" stiletto heal when she was swinging her leg around his head. He claims he has permanent damage. No, he didn't lose an eye or anything and as far as I could see, looked like a typical fck-nut guy who visits strip clubs. Listen, Dumbass, you are giving her $$ to sit and spin on your lap and now you're suing her? I wonder if State Farm or Geico would insure strippers for this kind of thing...

The federal project officer of one of the grants I work on called me this week and said, "What time is it there in Denver? How many hours are you ahead of me?" She's in Maryland. I wanted to say, "I'm about 90 IQ points ahead." But instead said, "Um...we're two hours behind Eastern Time, so it's 11:00 here." How do people like that have jobs? Oh, they work for the federal government.

A stingray JUMPED (or FLEW) out of the water and landed on a women's face in Florida. The woman died. She was riding in a boat with her husband. They were going about 25mph. The stingray weighed almost 60lbs. WTF? Stingray can jump or fly or whatever??? Coming from landlocked MT, I don't know much about sea life. I'm not a water lover, especially oceans. They freak me out. Give me a nice fresh water lake, any day: no sharks, no stingrays, no crazy wild sea life. Just fish and slimy weeds, and they don't taste like you're sucking on a salt lick. Yuk! And what was the husband thinking and doing while watching this rogue stingray? What would you do? Holy crap. I'd crap my shorts, that's what I'd do.

AnnaBanana is in SanFran this week and texted me this bumpersticker she saw: "George Bush is the worst president in history. How did people vote for him twice??" I'll tell you, HE CHEATED! And no, he's not a pirate, and least not the good, Johnny Depp-pirate.

Me to the 19 year old Starbucks barista, "Hi. Can I get a grande decaf?" She looked at me for 20 seconds straight. Then finally said, "Um...like, coffee?" I said, "Um...like, yes, coffee. You know, drip coffee. The brown stuff you brew into those big pots?" She pondered this for another 20-some-odd-seconds and said, "Uh, we don't have coffee." No explanation. No reason. Okay then. I've got nothing. So many things come to mind, like, "Sweetie you are too young to have fried your brain smoking so much pot," or "Oh, is this Starbucks Guitar Repair & Maintenance? I thought it was the coffee shop," or "REALLY? You've run out of beans? Holy shit, it's Armageddon! RUN FOR THE HILLS!" I walked across the street to the REAL Starbucks and got my cup o' joe. Good thing there's one on every block!

Look Ma, TRIPLETS!!!

2008-03-21T00:30:00.006-06:00

Born: T1 (triplet on the right)-November 3, 2007 (replaced January 5, 2008 & January 28, 2008)
T2 (triplet in the middle)-March 5, 2008
T3 (triplet on the left)-March 11, 2008
It's a strange gestation period for skates.

Weight: 5lbs/pair in box
Size: 5D

Total cost, pre-surgical repair: $490
Estimated surgical cost: $270

Since I've learned (x3) from T1 that the eyelets are deformed, I'm going to do a preventative procedure on T2 & T3. And now we wait for reconstructive surgery. We're going with a specialist in St. Paul, MN.

Deformed.
But I don't discriminate: T1 is treated just like T2 & T3.

Lovey Lu-Lu and the Sock Fetish

2008-03-20T23:10:00.005-06:00

This is my sweet Lovey Lu Bird, Daisy:

She's a 4 1/2 year old German Shepherd mix, and she's the sweet, sweet, protector of my world. She oversees all the doings at our house. We adopted her on her last day at doggie-death-camp (aka Denver Municipal Shelter). She was a stray. She was malnourished and very, very sick. Didn't take long to nurse her back to health: 40 treats and 200 kisses a day will do that!

She potty-trained herself = ZERO accidents in the house (and she lived on the street her whole pup-life, pre-adoption), crate-trained with ease (although she did growl like a mad-dog in the mornings when she wanted out), she was top in her obedience class (she was very good at correcting the hyper beagle when he got out of control), and she never, ever chewed on anything that wasn't "hers."

She used to guard our garbage. Whenever we'd take the trash out, she'd come over and guard it and us, like she trained at Loomis Fargo. Seriously, the Queen, Herself, couldn't ask for better security detail. Now she hoards our socks. Four years into living together, you think you know a dog, and it's just now that her sock fetish has reared its ugly head.

This is her latest sock collection. No sock is safe. No location is sacred. She actually noses her way into H's hamper and pulls out the socks! Turn your back for two seconds...your sock is history, baby. I guess it could be worse, she could like underwear or Danskos.

And randomly, she'll chew you a nice little hole in the end of your sock, just in case you need...a hole...in the end of your...sock.

We used to fight it. We'd find her with her paws on top of the sock, head down over it in protect mode, and we'd take it away from her. We'd tell her it's not her sock and give her one of the many, many approved dog toys scattered throughout the house. She never growls or snaps. She just looks very disappointed when you take away her latest acquisition. Now, we just let her keep them. Dogs live, what, 10-15 years? I can live without a couple socks for the next 6-11 years, knowing she was a happy, happy sock-loving pooch.

As proof: this is about half of the "approved" dog toy pile. I pile them on the bed, Miss Marley scatters them throughout the house...it's a great game!

We are very lucky that Marley realizes that the socks are Daisy's so we don't have to mediate any disputes over hosiery.

Aries forecast of the day:

2008-03-19T20:15:00.003-06:00

So this was what greeted me in my inbox this morning,

"Some days are just less exciting than others and you know deep down that's a good thing. Everyone needs to recharge and refuel every now and then and you're no exception -- so stick to the schedule!"

I think I heard this at least twice today, IN PERSON, once from Coach and once from my Boss. That's just down-right freaky! It's like that damn ram is spying on me. Remember, I don't buy in to that crap, but I think I'm ready to throw a dollar in the pot. Maybe I should have bought a lottery ticket last Saturday...

Raise a glass to the band geek in your life!

2008-03-19T19:08:00.007-06:00

I was a band geek for almost all my school years. I started in 4th grade and kept right on going through college. Mainly because my mama bought me a flute in 4th grade---I asked for a clarinet: potato/potatoe---and she said I would have to play it the rest of my life. I perdy much do what she says. She is the boss of me.

This PostSecret just cracked (tee hee!) me up. I can't say I ever went commando in my marching uni, at least in high school...but I think I marched drunk a few times in college, so it's anyone's guess if I was commando or not.

I met some of my best friends in band...good times. And band geeks (Band-O's if you went to Butte High in the 80's) like to drink, a lot, wherever they go. The chaperones used to check our luggage before band trips and SMELL all our shampoo/conditioner/water bottles, looking for alcohol. Tip: stash it in your instrument case. Doesn't work well if you play the piccolo so make friends with the tuba player.

Bands always get roped into playing for all kinds of crazy events. Our high school band played at the opening of the McDonald's in my home town. Am I the only one that finds that weird? Did then. Still do.

We also played for volleyball matches (fans and players hated us) and for wrestling matches. [I have nothing against either sport. It's just that the fans, athletes and coaches didn't really want us there. We didn't really want to be there. We already played for every football and boys/girls basketball games, and every parade in town. It was some some kind of Title IX/equal access thing in the 80's, I think.] The wrestling coach at my high school (he holds some national record for number of state titles...creepy little guy with cauliflower ears) asked us to just play the same song after each match: the theme from the 1984 Sarajevo Olympics. [This is one of my favorite Olympics. It's the one where Torvill & Dean skated to Ravel's Bolero and brought down the house with perfect 10's in artistic impression. First time ever in ice dancing. Sorry hockey mates...I'm still a figure skater at heart, and sometimes when I'm skating now in full hockey gear. Just ask Coach about my pretty flamingo leg extension. I was in figure skating back in '84, so...leave me alone. I can tell you that the Soviet hockey team defeated the Fins in 1984 for the gold. So there.] My fingers still know the notes to that damn theme song. It's one of those tunes that once it's in your head, it's not going anywhere. What is that all about? And the wrestling coach dictates the music? Weird.

My college marching band played for a dedication of a veteran's memorial. We were all SO hungover and it was a super somber event. I just remember thinking, please gawd, don't let me vomit in my sax. And being the jokesters that band geeks are, it was hard to keep a straight face with all the comments and innuendos flying around. Funny and sad at the same time.

My music career has come in handy in life. A couple years ago, my friend U1 (Ugly 1), [we have a U2 & a U3 in our circle---it's a term of endearment, I promise. I'm one of the U's. Don't go feeling all bad for the Uglies.] and I played a sax duet of the Star Spangled Banner at our state hockey tourney. I thought it might be cheesy, but we got a ton of compliments. One of the player's mother came up to us in tears about what a special moment it was. Ummmm....it's a women's REC HOCKEY LEAGUE! Weird. My team lost in the championship game in a shootout. Not weird. Just disappointing.

You can identify the Uglies because we have this sticker on our cars. Although, U2 is in Singapore and I don't think she has a car there...

Strange is as strange does.

2008-03-18T18:58:00.003-06:00

You are not alone.

I'm definitely out there. Here.

Doing strange things.

Saying strange things.

Going to strange places. (See http://bugodeath.blogspot.com/for WrestleMania 03/16/08.)

So in this week's PostSecret, I count no less than 10 that could be mine. And yet, maybe one is...I'm not saying for sure.

Get upstairs and put your big pants on!!!

2008-03-17T22:47:00.000-06:00

A picture, or three, is worth a thousand words...and 90lbs!!!

Seriously. Those were my shorts. I wore them LAST SUMMER!!! I think they are sz 24, maybe. Not sure. Now they are Lucky 10's. I can get both my legs into one of the legs of the big shorts.
I found them in my closet. After 40+ huge garbage bags to Goodwill, somehow, one pair remained...I just need to figure out how to tone my flabby ass and I'll be set. I hope that's not age-related, too!

Runnin' O' the Green...

2008-03-17T18:57:00.001-06:00

Tips for Runnin' O' the Green 7k in Denver

*Don't stay out until 3:00am drinking vodka with friends, getting only three hours of sleep the night before.

*If you lose almost 90lbs, make sure you try on your cold-gear running tights, or you'll be holding them up the entire 7k!

*If you use your bra as a cell phone holder, don't forget to take it out before you leave your car.

*If you forget to remove your phone from above mentioned cell phone holder, and your big brother calls 5 minutes before the gun sounds, even if you haven't talked to him in a month, don't pick it up. Between the bagpippers and the announcer, you won't hear him and he won't hear you. Something about my entire family having breakfast at my brother's...mom...dad...in the same room...eating????

*Check out the race course BEFORE you get there or your race could be 7+k...(And I haven't learned this from past experience! I used to run the Blue Mountain Women's Run every year in Missoula. One year I missed the 5k turn and did the 10k by mistake. I couldn't figure out why it was the longest 5k of my life!)

*Check your hockey calendar before you sign up for the race. Or vice versa. 60 minutes between race finish, drive to rink, and playoff game is just not enough.

*It's a freakin' St. Patty's Day run. Remember to wear SOMETHING green for christ's sake!

*Just say no to Killian's Red as the post-race drink!

*Just say no to corned beef bagels as the post-race snack!

*After the race, don't forget where you park your car...

Best part of the race? 36:57!!!

Finisher's Cheap Plastic Cup

Me and 2,000 of my good friends

Sign of the Ram...

2008-03-14T00:35:00.000-06:00

I'm not a superstitious person and I don't believe in fortunes, Tarot, or horoscopes. Somehow, I got on a horoscope list-serve and I tell 'ya, I can't get off of it no matter how many times I email, "REMOVE." Even though I think they are crap, some of those damn "fortunes" were spot on! Eerie...

Every day at 11:40pm, a nice little thought for the next day arrives in my email inbox. Here are some samples:

Things are moving much more quickly than you had expected them to, so you might need to adjust your expectations accordingly. It should all be for the best, though and you can expect the right people to notice. (This one is for tomorrow...I'm very impatient so I like things to move quickly but I don't always get things quickly. What people should notice. Like stalker people? People I know? I have questions!)

Whatever you have to do today should be quite a bit easier than you had expected it to be. That doesn't mean you get to skate away from responsibilities, but it doesn't mean you should have time left over. (Wish I could have made the last part come true!)

You've got plenty to say and should take the opportunity to say it. You might have to make time in that meeting or ring up someone you haven't spoken with in ages, but it's definitely worth it! (I rarely lose an opportunity to say what I need to say.)

Your mind is on issues related to stability and the home today and you may want to take another look at financial arrangements. It's not the most exciting stuff in the world, but it's important. (No. I don't think so. Just didn't happen.)

Try something new today -- from a restaurant you've never seen before to a new way of talking with your mate. Things can get even more interesting, as long as you keep exploring the world! (I don't like change or new things--unless they are purses or shoes--so this one was also crap.)

You are full of fiery energy and can't help but move it when then mood strikes you. It's easy to have fun and get things done -- and people should follow right along when you need them to do so. (The fiery energy part was confirmed by Coach, but he certainly didn't follow right along and neither did anyone else I had to deal with that day. I call bullshit on this one, too.)

You've got to stick with what you know today -- say no to even the most appealing opportunities. You need to tread water, because things are trickier than they appear. You should shoot ahead tomorrow! (I like sticking to what I know. Everything was tricky this day, but I didn't shoot anywhere the next day. Crap Meter Reading: 9.2)

Listen to your ego -- it's got a lot to tell you today! Don't worry about appearances, because your ambitions can't possibly take you too far afield. Things may need to calm down next week, though. (The fateful game night last Saturday. Ooooooo...freaky!)

Today sees you pretty much right where you want to be and your recent activities have paid off in a big way. Now might be a good time to re-evaluate your long-term goals in light of recent successes. (Funny, I did reevaluate my goals and ended up adding a couple to them. BUT, my hard work did not pay off when I was riding the wood at the game!)

Your eyes are wide open and you're ready to take advantage of any opportunity that comes your way today. You may surprise a friend with your sudden moves, but you can smooth things over soon. (Seems like all I'm doing lately is trying to smooth things over after running my lips. I'm going to be quiet now.)

And why are astrological pictures always so creepy? Weird visions from the movie Bachelor Party are dancing in my head...

Food, food, everywhere, but nothing to eat...

2008-03-13T23:29:00.000-06:00

I can't eat. I can't eat normal food. Normal everyday food that normal people eat. I'm broken. I like food, don't get me wrong. A nice spicy pad Thai...a ginormous salad with all the veggie trimmings...tofu baked, fried, grilled, or flambeed...YUMMY! My tummy doesn't find it so yummy, though.

I basically pick at the same things day after day and can count them on all my fingers:

oatmeal
tofu
broccoli
black beans & rice
fake eggs or egg whites
pretzels
apples
oranges
protein drinks & energy bars
oh, and coffee, coffee, coffee

The crazy thing is, some days none of the approved foods on the list stay down. Other days, they are golden. What's the secret? What's the magic? Is there a pattern? Like string theory, it makes no sense to me.

Now this wouldn't be a huge problem except it's come to my attention that I need food as fuel. Why is this a novel concept? Food=fuel. No food=no energy. And it has reared its ugly head almost every day the past couple weeks in my workouts. My Coach has taken to nagging me to eat. He actually stops my lessons and makes me eat some kind of energy chews. I have been skating for months sans break during my skate. It's only a 50 minute lesson. I've run for 4 hours straight without stopping for energy chews. WTF? Why now? Here are some reasons that I've been given:

you have more muscle now and muscle burns more energy, faster,
if you go for a 50 minute run and then try to skate for an hour, that's two workouts, not a warm-up and a workout,
you are burning calories so you need to replenish them before you burn them (does that even make sense???)
maybe you just don't eat enough, period. (Huh.)

I do eat. Okay. I try to eat. Sometimes less successful than other times. I'm now told to eat SIX times a day. HOLY CRAPMOLY! I can't eat three times a day, let alone double that. "Six little meals." Is there even enough time in the day to do that?

I'm reading this great book called Marathoning for Mortals by John Bingham. He's a regular columnist in Runner's World and author of No Need for Speed (Coach wouldn't like that one.) He's known as, The Penguin, for his funny penguin-esque running gait. His motto is, "It's not that I had the courage to finish, but the courage to start." Anyhoo, here are some tips from his chapter on nutrition for long distance runners:

Food is fuel. (Got it.)
Eating well is part of your training program. (This one is new to me.)
No diet is right for everyone. (Duh.)
You need more than water to be well-hydrated. (Does coffee count? The Penguin would say yes. He's addicted to Starbucks, too.)
Hydration is an everyday activity. (The more you drink the more you pee.)
Too much water is as dangerous as too little. (This one is down right scary.)
Use sports drinks. (Toughy. My Dr. told me not to drink them. Too much sugar in these drinks and I struggle with keeping my sugar at an even keel.)
Get the fluids in you, not on you. (He says to just stop or walk when your running a race to drink. Funny. I have the same problem, only I don't spill it on me, I get it up my nose.)
Eating after a hard workout speeds up recovery. (Also news to me. You're supposed to eat up to 400 calories within 30 minutes of finishing the hard workout.)
Food is fuel that your body needs to perform. (Okay, this one must be important because he repeated it. I think I'm catching on.)

And The Penguin's "Absolute most important nutritional step to ensure success: practice." Practice eating before, during, and after long distance running to ensure you get it right. Oh. My. Gawd. That's a lot of eating. And likely in my case, vomiting!!!

Okay, see? How can I keep all this crap straight?

So after reading how important water and sports drinks are, and that I should be eating during any workout that's longer than an hour (WOW! REALLY???), he also says that you shouldn't eat a PowerBar/Gel and drink a sports drink. It's one or the other, but regardless of which one you choose, you need to flush them down with water.

It's really just too much. What happened to the good ole days when I went to a three hour softball practice, rode my bike to and from 6 miles, came home, ran around with the dogs, and ate a bowl of cereal????

This business will get out of control...

2008-03-11T21:55:00.000-06:00

...it will get out of control and we'll be lucky to live through it.

This is my desk at work. WTF? How does it get this out of control? I don't even remember what's in those stacks o'crap. And I don't think I'm ever going to get to the bottom of it. In fact, I'm sure I won't. It just seems projects keep piling up and as I finish them more creep onto the piles...I have creeping piles. I wonder if an antibiotic would help. Maybe it's MRSA. Or bird flu. West Nile? Ugh...it just makes me want to vomit and then crawl into the fetal position and rock myself to sleep.

Try to find the following random articles of crap in my office:

Thank You notes
Bose speakers (okay, they are not crap, but they take up space on my desk)
Shredder...it quit working a year ago but I was told I couldn't throw it in the trash...
Small milk crates that my PC sits on
Souvie glass from Pucktoberfest hockey tourney
Picture of me & H
Binder full of my Board finance reports
Post-its, Post-its, and more Post-its reminding me of things I just must get done today
Hydration to stave off dehydration from the 110 degree heat in my office
Stack of requests that need my signature (this could apply to ANY of the stacks)

Trouble, that starts with T...and rhymes with B...

2008-03-10T21:55:00.001-06:00

I got in big, fat, huge, trouble with my Coach this weekend. Thing is, I was mad at him but he turned it around and said he was really mad at me. What do you do with that? It's a good ploy. I'm going to use it in the future when I piss someone off. I'm just going to spat back, "Yeah, well, I'm pissed at you!" I tell you, if you are the first person pissed, you are going to be confused and speechless.

We had two of the worst refs in the history of hockey officiate our game on Saturday, and I use the word officiate only because that's the official word but says nothing for what these two bimbos did. One of them PLAYS in our league, in our division. Um, hello? Conflict of interest? She called 6 penalties on my team. We usually have between 0-3 penalties. The other idiot ref called NOTHING. Except the game winning goal by our opponent when our NET WAS OFF. In any other game, the goal would have been waived off. This other ref is an absolute beginner ref. She is timid, scared, and squeals when the puck comes near her. Yep, squeals like a piglet.

[My co-alt-cap't wrote an awesome letter to the Head Ref/Ref Scheduler about our concerns. His cookie-cutter reply, which we've received once before, was blah, blah, blah, not enough refs for women's games, blah, blah, blah, they are Level I USAHockey certified refs, blah, blah, blah, no ref, even himself, can call a perfect game. I swear to gawd, I could ring his scrawny neck.]

Coach thinks I let the refs get to me, which then rendered me useless. I say, yes, I was pissed on the bench and made some choice comments, BUT, when I jumped on the ice, my focus was on the puck, my linemates, and the opponent's goalie. Since he makes the rules, he won. Pulled goalie, 6 skaters, B is once again warming the bench.

Now, I don't expect favors. I take a ton of lessons and practice every day. He doesn't play favorites with my teammates (or me--even though he tells me I'm his fav, I think he says that to all the girls) who take lessons from him, clearly! But, I think my hard work and dedication have earned me a spot. (He picked a sub over me...) Not to mention, he keeps telling me I can skate and shoot. His reason for not playing me in the last 2 minutes: "You lost your mind."

Not until he told me that.

How can I convince my teammates that I'm the go-to player if my coach doesn't show them that he believes in me? He says he believes in me but he also says (on a weekly basis!) that he wants actions, not words. OKAY! ME, TOO! Actions. No excuses.

So he got pissed that I got pissed. What is that? I couldn't even watch the end of the game. I get benched and I thought I was skating hard all game. I was blinded with rage in the locker room and understandably did not want to discuss it in front of all my teammates, nor in the lobby in front of all the honeys and random people sitting there. Even at the bar, three shots and four double cocktails later, it was not finished. It took 24 hours to get us back straight...sort of.

Although, he did remind me in my lesson today, 37 hours post pissiness, that I made him really mad this weekend. He's normally a very calm, voice of reason. He's easy-going; doesn't seem like much would piss him off. Sometimes I just don't read people. "Wow, you're lucky. People surprise the shit out of me."

Thinking back on it, I may have a serious anger issue with bad refs. In my men's game on Sunday the refs actually told me to keep my mouth shut or they would toss me. Now, I didn't swear at them or yell. I got cross-checked in the chest and knocked on my ass by one of the jerky opponents. I got up, and tried to get the puck. Our goalie covered it. Whistle blew. I skated to the ref and asked how that was not a penalty. He said, "If it's a penalty, I'll call it and you keep your mouth shut the rest of the game or I'll toss you out." REALLY? SERIOUSLY?? I was very calm when I asked and I really did want to know. He was standing three feet from this non-penalty. Head down with shame: puck drops immediately following this repartee, and I slash the shit out of the back of the legs of the guy who cross-checked me. TWEET! Two minutes for me. My D partner suggested maybe I seek out anger management classes and my good friend Bug o' Death (also on my women's team) sat quietly with me on the bench, post 2 minutes penalty rest, and said, "B, please go to your happy place. This game is really important and we need to win it." Maybe I should seek out these classes before I'm ordered by a judge.

Stupid People

2008-03-09T18:03:00.000-06:00

My good friend and college roommate, AnnaBanana, has a plan. When she becomes Dictator/Ruler of the World, she is going to create the Island for Stupid People and Smokers. Kind of like the Island of Misfit Toys in the great Christmas classic, Santa Claus Is Coming to Town.

The premise is simple, really. First and foremost, all smokers get shipped there. No questions asked. You smoke. You live on the Island. You are not allowed to come back to the mainlands until you are smoke-free. She would also ship all the stupid people there. I'm thinking this is going to have to be one ginormous island! Examples of stupid people - Go to the Island. Do not pass go. Do not collect $200:

People who stay in the left lane by an on-ramp and don't let cars merge.
Rude customer service people.
People who say, "Irregardless."
Managers who say, "Sorry, that's company policy."
People who cut in front of the coffee line and act like they have no knowledge of this strange concept of "lining up".
Cheaters. Even if they are pirates.
Referees who are on a power trip or just plain ol' dumb asses!
People who voted for the President even after his first four horrible years.
People who don't vote.
Doctors who think they know it all but clearly don't; then they wait to order tests until your disease has progressed to the incurable stage.
People who expect something for nothing.
People who are convinced their problem is the worst, most urgent, and most important.

Feel free to add your own to the list. The possibilities are endless for stupidity.

Mine, too!

2008-03-09T14:18:00.000-06:00

Screw Graf and their little 705s, too!

2008-03-09T14:05:00.000-06:00

So, once again, my Fool's Day Baby mo-jo works against me. (My daddy told my mama not to have me on April 1. He said I'd be cursed the rest of my life. It's about the only thing I agree on with him. Oh, that and his love for dogs. He treats them better than he treats people. I do the same.) I spoke/wrote too soon. Five weeks after ordering my custom Graf skates, the hockey shop calls me and tells me Graf can't make my skates. HUH? My arch is too high and the depth of my foot from the top of my ankle to the back of my heel is too great. HUH? THEY ARE CUSTOM!!!! CUSTOM, by definition, I believe means MAKE THEM TO FIT ANY FOOT. So the uppity Canadian Graf know-it-alls want to make me G70s instead of the 705s. Problem: G70s are plastic, not leather, cost $60 more (FOR PLASTIC INSTEAD OF LEATHER???), and aren't even off the production line so it will take at least a couple more months. So I'm supposed to pay $480 for plastic skates SIGHT-UNSEEN????????????????????????

After much deliberation with Coach and H, I decided to NOT get the Grafs. I'm going to buy TWO pairs of my current skates (they are on sale online for $150 now because they are 2007's model) and send them to some skate guru in MN to have the eyelets reinforced. That adds $90 per pair.

Maybe it was because I posted my joy for custom skates on Leap Day and that combined with my Fool's Day Bad Mojo led Karma to bite me in the ass. Or, my feet truly are a freakshow.

I think I have lost my mind.

J-ML: My Fav Av

2008-03-05T20:27:00.000-07:00

MY FAVORITE AVALANCHE Player, although Super Joe and Little Kyle Cumiskey are a very close 2nd and 3rd....

John-Michael Liles #4

Position: Defenseman
Shoots: Left
Height: 5' 10"
Weight: 185
Born: Nov 25 '80 (Age 27)
Born in: Indianapolis, IN, United States
COL Season: 4th
NHL Season: 4th
Drafted: Colorado's 5th round choice, 159th overall, in 2000
Acquired:Colorado's eighth round selection (159th overall) in the 2000 Entry Draft

I aspire to play some day just like him. He's an offensive defenseman. He's quick. He's fast. He's powerful. He scored the game winner over the Canucks last night. WOO HOO!!! And his goal celebration is modest, yet excited. (More on those later...)

He is always ready to jump into any play. He mixes it up and doesn't take crap from anyone on the ice, even the big goons like Niedermeyer.

I seriously need to apply what I see him do to my games. Well, not the full-on checking part, but the speedy, offensive, quick-feet, quick shots business.

He was born in the good 'ole USA. He's really not Canadian. Hard to believe. Oh, and he's just plain fine to look at.

For a long time, and even now (sometimes), H mutters under his breath how J-ML is a terrible passer, has bad turnovers, and doesn't finish his checks. He knows this bugs me, yet he continues. I just sit back and enjoy the show. I have to say, though, I was having heart palpitations the few weeks leading up to the trade deadline. There were so many rumors that J-ML was on the block. (There's also a rumor Coach Q doesn't like Liles' play....rumors and mere speculation.) I just can't imagine going to a game and not seeing him flying down the ice. If the coaching staff were so unimpressed with My Boy's play, why did he see ice time in every PP last night, along with Sakic, Forsberg, Hejduk, and Stastny????? That is possibly one of my favorite lines EVER!

Secrets

2008-03-01T12:13:00.000-07:00

I am addicted to Frank Warren's website http://www.postsecret.com/. People send in their secrets on postcards (yes, via snailmail) and he posts them on his website. Every Sunday they change and every week I see at least three that I could have sent in. I'm tempted. (I've got secrets I'm just itchin' to tell but not even to my best friends. It makes me feel almost evil and devious to keep the secrets and I like it. I thrive in it. But, I want to tell strangers for some reason.)

This week I just couldn't resist this one. It is SO true. Why do I want to be friends with my lame coworkers? Not all my coworkers and lame, but the majority, well....

And the culture at my employer is such that they believe, nay, impart their belief that we MUST have a best friend at work. Hey, I have best friends and they don't need to be people I work with. I like to keep my work life separate from my home life. Mainly because I live two lives, at least. Maybe more. I should change my name to Eve.

Frank has four books published of the postcards he's received. Go to B&N (or any big chain store, not the fabulous independents) and peruse them. Buy them from the independents...use the chains like a library but don't give them your $$$.

Skates, skates, skates

2008-02-29T22:01:00.000-07:00

I love skating. Ice hockey skating, that is. I had some issues with skates when I first started (think: skates 4 sizes too big) but then I found a pair of Bauer Supreme 6000 (made in Canada) and they were like butta'. After four years, it was time to retire them. They had lost all their support in the ankles. Damn. So I went in November and got Bauer (now Nike crap made in China) Supreme 70 [picture on the right]. At first I LOVED them like my 6000. Then, one week into wearing them, I blew out the top left grommet on the right boot. Huh? $240 skates? (I wear junior sizes so I save $200 on them.) Bauer warrantied them and gave me another pair. Yep. One week later, same grommet. Same boot. Same problem. Bauer decided it was me, not their Chinese boot. They did "give" me another pair but told me under no uncertain terms that this was the last pair they'd "give" me. This one lasted two weeks. Shit. Damn. Fuck. (Can I say fuck on Blogspot?)

So the boys at PB, my fav hockey shop, convinced me to get custom Graf 705 skates [picture on the left]. All leather. Made in Canada. Craftmanship guaranteed for life. I did it. What did I have to lose, other than $420. On February 2, I spent almost an hour having my foot measured (very tickly) and now I wait. It could take up to 12 weeks. Sure hope that Chinese plastic holds up until then.

Quotes v.2

2008-02-29T21:43:00.000-07:00

Coach: "B, you need to come across my face."

Me: "........"

Coach: "Squat and explode."

Me: "wow."

Coach: "Get in and get out. You need to come faster."

Me: "Really. Hmmmm..."

more ramblings...

2008-02-29T21:23:00.001-07:00

I don't sleep much. I don't know why. I love sleep. I just don't seem to get much of it. Okay, I do know why. I get up early to play hockey or workout. Then I stay up late to play hockey in games that start at 11:45pm, or do laundry (sniffing included), or scrap, or just futz.

H and I went to see In Bruges a couple weeks ago. I was SO excited. Love Indies. Love the Irish accent, Scottish ones, too. But from the first two notes of the opening music I knew it was going to be trouble. And it was. It was dark: Tarantino-on-crack-killing-innocent-people-you-care-about dark. It did have one of my most favorite movie lines of all time, though. When asked if he likes it in Bruges, Collin Farrel's character says, "Well, if I was raised on a farm and was retarded, I might like it here. But I wasn't, and I'm not...so, I don't." Just funny ass shit to me. But the precipitating act of them going to Bruges: not funny. And it just ends crazy.

Let me just get this out in the open. I'm a shopaholic. Well, I'm more of a collector of pretty things because I don't actually like to shop. I just like the end result of the shopping. If I could skip the traffic, parking, waiting in lines, dealing with dumb clerks, I'd like shopping. Don't think Internet shopping is the answer. I'm too impatient. I want it and I want it now. I like buying other people pretty things, too.

I'm also a procrastinator. I bought a great book that's supposed to help us stop procrastinating. Problem is, I never got around to reading it. It looks like a good book and would probably help, too.

I was really bitter to have to work on Leap Day. It's a free day for my employer. What a load of crap. I only get 7 paid holidays as it is and now I'm getting the same salary for 366 days as I get for 365 days. So I played hookey most of the day. I'll have to make up for it this weekend because like a good communist employer, the work must get done regardless of how many hours you've already put in.

My Favorite Things

2008-02-29T21:08:00.000-07:00

THAI food! For some reason, I can't get enough of the spices in Thai food right now. A few months ago it was mexican spices...weird. I don't even crave burritos anymore. Now it's Pad Thai and a spring roll. Yummy! A friend of mine when to Thailand for a month a few years ago. He had a great time and said the food was 100x better there. He ate and ate and ate. He even brought me back a souvie.
My Bose QC3 headphones. Holy crap! If you don't have them, you should get them.
Hockey lessons. Best workout, bar none. Helps that I have a great coach. Don't tell him that. He might get a big ego...too late.
Dansko shoes. The only shoe I wear, other than my Adidias Response Trail runners. I have over 50 pairs. Shhh...don't tell anyone.
My iPod. Seems cliche, but I do love it. Only problem is that my 80gb is F-U-L-L and the one I want, the 160gb is $400. Ugh.
My iPod Shuffle for workouts. Little. Clips anywhere. Stays put. Stands up to sweat. No neoprene band on my arm to get sweat-logged. Yuk. Such an incredible technological advance from the early Walkman...
Coach bags. No better purse in the world. Quality. Timeless. Functional.
Scrapping swag. If you don't scrap you don't get it. I won't even try to explain.
Coffee. Dark. Rich. Robust. I could drink it all day every day. I'm addicted. It's a good thing I chose coffee instead of say, whiskey or crack.

Quotes I've heard and mumbled v.1

2007-09-18T00:04:00.000-06:00

Me: "Wow, this drill is really hard."

Hockey Coach: "If it was easy it would be called basketball and everyone could do it. You can substitute the word soccer for basketball..."

Director I work with: "We don't even know what we don't know."

(I think she stole that from Bush.)

My accounting professor: "Now we strudy cawraraw ronds. Cawraraw ronds. Cawraraw ronds."

Me: {He could say it 100 times and I still wouldn't know what the hell he's talking about. As I glanced in the book I saw, "Callable bonds." OH! Now I get it!}

Ramblings of a Crazy Woman

2007-09-16T23:06:00.000-06:00

Did you know there is Butt in liquor? Seriously, this is a sign in a liquor store in the Frankfurt, Germany airport. I only drink vodka and I don't recall seeing Butt on the ingredient list. I wonder if it's a secret ingredient in ALL liquors, or just dark ones.

Why is there nothing good on TV? The only show I can stomach is Weeds and it's only 30 minutes of joy once a week for something like 6 episodes. You should watch it, if just to hear different musicians sing the theme song. Sometimes I sing the song in my head during really dreadful meetings at work, which is turning out to be every meeting these days.

Why do dogs get cancer? Doesn't seem fair somehow....

What if I'd turned right instead of left?

I'm thinking of entering an eco-challenge race....but I really hate blisters on my feet. My good friend AMM is a marathoner and we cruised around Boston a few years ago. I had no less than 12 blisters on my feet and they took forever to heal. Come to think of it...she did the same thing to me in NYC. I think I'd really like the eco-part but the blisters, not so much. I wonder if Band-Aid would sponsor my trip.