Meaty

I did my superhero, but being as intelligent as I am, I did not scroll down and add eyes/nose. I just plugged right through and got a quick result. Mainly because my kids were still awake!!

So my superhero was all cool, but had no facial features which makes her a bit less 'super'. So, I banned the children to their rooms and began, once again, using all of the exact same features, accessories and remembering to add a FACE. The outcome looked the same, only more normal and yet the name changed by quite a bit.

I know, I know, it is a simple name generator, blah, blah, blah....but I went from being Baroness Von Burning Inferno to the following......

I'll admit - the new persona entitled "MEATY" does fit me a bit better, but "Experimental Hottie"??? If there are any dudes out there that like KINKY CHUBBALUBBIN' CHICKS, then I guess I'm your girl. I chose the torcher accessory and would have referenced my insane abilities to flame some meringue pie, but with this new title I could be roasting something completely off-base.

I digress...

My post yesterday was about my encounter with a person that was affected with 'something'. I try really hard to not to be judgmental. I actually thought I was mostly on the side of acceptance of people that are different or otherwise labeled. That was until I encountered something that I had never come across before. His hands were covered with raised, whitish lumps. I imagined it would be what a 'boil' would look like. Whatever it was, it was awful in appearance and in my head I didn't feel pity, I felt "ick". A similar feeling that I imagine most people felt about the Elephant Man. And then I felt about a half inch tall. I think it is only when something stares you in the face that you can truly measure your character. I'd say that I failed on that one. I still don't know what it was, and in the end I did shake his hand. I am embarrassed to admit, though, that I did not WANT to.

Do you or don't you?

When making a business transaction with a salesperson, assuming all goes well, you would anticipate a hand shake upon the conclusion of the sale - right? Usually, I would say that this is the case.



When dealing with salespeople one would assume that a person hired would not have communicable diseases, right? So, knowing that a company allows a person to work for them you would gather that contact with this person would be safe to be in contact with. Are you still with me?



That said, if the person is visually affected with something you are not familiar with, say protrusions or growths on their body, would you assume that they are risk free and be comfortable with a handshake?

Taking this a step further, your salesperson has small growths on their face/eyelids and then along the hands and arms there are large protruding growths, with coloration. Do you welcome the handshake?

If you do shake their hand, how would you feel? Were you forced and now feel the need to cleanse? Would you think nothing of it?

If you don't want to shake, how would you decline a person with an outstretched hand waiting? Do you wonder if you've offended them? Do you care?

**I'll be more specific once I hear reactions from some of you**

Eyeball

Last night I thought I was going to be making rainbows out of colored water, and I find myself wearing latex gloves, holding a sharp object and only breathing through my mouth to avoid the smell.

Have you ever seen an eyeball just laying on a tray? I had not. Didn't really want to either. But we went to the science display at my daughter's school and one of the activities involved eyeballs. Not just any eyeball. A cow's eyeball. Did you ever notice that cow's are kinda large, with big heads and enormous eyeballs? The task at hand was to dissect the eyeball.

Luckily, I was only an assistant, here to watch my child slice up a pupil. The eyeball filled her entire hand, as if it were a raquetball. It was squishy and wet, but she jabbed the scissors in and began to cut all the way around the cornea. She peeled the cornea off and squeezed the eyeball like a wet sponge. The lens popped out and was described by the instructor to be just like a coughdrop..."but don't taste it" he says. As if. Meanwhile, her sister is huddled in the corner refusing to touch, or help.

The next step, she turned the eyeball inside out to expel the vitreous humor which is the gel that fills the eyeball. There was a lot more to see and learn, but I was trying to keep my cookies in while consoling her sister that she should at least "try to touch it".....

In the end, she was proud of herself and amazed at what she found inside the cow's eye. She could not wait to tell all her friends about what she did. She took off her gloves and told her sister how awesome it was and said, "you are such a girl...."

**the 7 year old dissected the cow eye, while the 11 year old middle school student shrieked and gagged in the corner**

We're off to see the Wizard

Today, we are off to Blue Ridge, Georgia to visit my favorite Apple House.

My birthday wish was to get a mercedes of an Apple Cutter and to get my favorite Apple Fritter. There's no rocket science to apple cutting, but I just want a really good cutter and a bag of the biggest, best apples I can get - a tub of caramel dip and a fritter for dessert.

Honestly, this apple house we are going to makes the best fritter I have ever had. And it is huge! I have never been a fritter kind of girl, in fact, I am completely devoted to CAKE. When I'm at a bakery or dessert establishment I never sway from my beloved CAKE. I LOVE CAKE! Cupcakes are even better, because everything is better in a "mini" (well, maybe not EVERYthing...) In the fall we visited this orchard and they had no cake. I decided to try a fritter and I became completely hooked. I swear they must have a little man behind a curtain working some frickin' magic on these fritters.

I also wished to sleep in today, and I got it! All the way until 8:15 am - it doesn't sound like much, but to a mom that is like sleeping all day!

Hope you all have a fantastic day, I know I will - all my laundry is DONE!

You touch every place in my heart

Every time our eyes meet

This feeling inside me

Is almost more than I can take

Baby when you touch me

I can feel how much you love me

And it just blows me away

I've never been this close to anyone or anything

I can hear your thoughts

I can see your dreams

I don't know how you do what you do

I'm so in love with you

It just keeps getting better

I wanna spend the rest of my life

With you by my side

Forever and ever

Every little thing that you do

Baby I'm amazed by you

The smell of your skin

The taste of your kiss

The way you whisper in the dark

Your hair all around me

Baby you surround me

You touch every place in my heart

Lonestar, Amazed

Self Love Day

Today is Self Love Day! I should tell you something about myself that I just LOVE!


This is a hard one for me........but one thing I can say is that I think I am one of the most easy going people I know. I am typically the one who can keep the cool in a uncomfortable situation. If you screw up, I tend to downplay the whole thing to help you save face. When most everyone around me is freaking out, I play it cool. I do not panic.....

Something that goes along with my level head is that I am a very anticipatory (is that a word?) type of person. I notice what's going on around me and I react to what I can see is about to happen. I don't live my life with blinders on, and never feel that I should be the center of attention. I do everything in my power to notice how I can help those around me. For instance, Hunk and I were once about to get on an airplane and I noticed a couple that had been waiting - just like us - for our delayed aircraft. The difference was that they had their two small kids with them and both kids had fallen asleep. The couple had carry on bags and a car seat - and each of them were holding a sleeping child. Being a mom I know that the worst case scenario is to wake up a kid when they have FINALLY fallen asleep. The dad was attempting to hold a sleeping child and a car seat. I could see the thoughts and ideas racing through their heads of how to accomplish this, so before she began to try and wake up those kids I offered for Hunk and myself to carry all their stuff on the plane. She practically melted into happiness. Not that tons of people wouldn't help like this, but I anticipated that this couple would need help long before boarding when I first saw them both with sleeping kids.

I've got a cool head (mostly) and I am noticing those around me.

I've given you something about me that I like, do any of you like me? If so, why??

Love me and then go and Love Yourself!

Love Me!

Friday will be Self Love Day 2009 - I'll be thinking of something to love about ME between now and then. I'll be cramming for this test for the next 2 days........

Please go and visit Hilly to find out the official rules and to join in on the fun. And then, don't forget to come back here on FRIDAY and show me some love......

In other news....

I'm no longer sick - yay! I seriously had some bad germs because I felt horrible for a number of days. HOPEFULLY, no one else in this house gets to share that love!

MONDAY - Feb. 16 - there will be no mail, no banking, many businesses will be closed, school is out and there are a number of fantastic sales going on at your local retailers. You can all thank me that my birthday is such an all important day.

I am thrilled beyond belief that there is NO SCHOOL on Monday. One of the things that annoys me to no end is the constant slavery of the early school day. Monday, I will get to sleep late!! I spent 20 years of my life attending various educational institutions which required my early morning attendance. The holy grail of graduation was the very idea of not being chained to the school schedule ever again. Then I had to go and have kids. Apparently, I am not a morning person. I don't know when this happened because I spent most of my younger years being the first one up, wasting daylight was criminal. I guess this means I am actually getting old. I'm looking down the barrel of 38.

My current goal is to have every stitch of clothing in the house clean and on a hanger before midnight on Sunday. My only wish - to not have a pile of laundry ANY WHERE for one entire day. Fleeting dreams, but one can hope......

NO Snow

No, people. The snow tease was a BIG FAT LIE! LIES, I tell you. It did rain, but nothing came of it. Poo!

I just knew everyone was on pins and needles wondering if we were covered in a blizzard, so that's my update. I'm going back to bed - I feel "flu-ish".

Talk amongst yourselves...

SNOW Day!?

In Atlanta we don't get snow very often. If we are lucky, we will get ice once or twice a year. So when Stone Mountain Park decided to become SNOW Mountain Park we were definately in.

They took the gigantic sloping lawn (typically used for Laser Show viewings) and have turned it into a snow tubing slope with 8 lanes, snow blowers and the works. THey added a snow playing area and provide everything you need to build snowmen, igloos, sled, etc. We just purchased a lift ticket and show up - no equipment or toys needed.

We got to the park at 3pm today and I brought all of our snow clothing - bibs, boots, heavy coats, gloves, hats, scarves - you name it, I had it. We got out of the car and proceeded to put the stuff on before walking over to the entrance. I started to feel really silly because it was actually really warm out today - 62 degrees at the time we were doing this. People in the parking lot were in short sleeves, no coats, and thought perhaps we were over-dressing for this. I got the kids all suited up, but I carried my own snowpants. I needed to see if they were actually necessary before I was going to put them on. Turns out, lots of people were wearing snow gear, so we didn't look ridiculous once we got to the tube hill.

See what's wrong with this picture? This is the line for the tubing hill, all these people you see are going SNOW TUBING. Do you see the guy in khaki shorts and a Tommy Bahama shirt??? SNOW tubing, people.

The first area we went was the snow playing area where the snowmen/igloo building was. It was very soft "snow", but it was super slippery. It was the consistency of an ICEE drink. The snow blower then came on and the "snow" was coming out in giant chunks. It was funny to watch this pipe toss out hunks of ice/snow mix. It was not at all like snow blowing at ski resorts - likely due to the temperature. My kids still thought it was awesome. You can't tell from the picture, but they are standing in the falling snow chunks here. They put on their coats so they would not get it in their hair, but they both spent most of the day with their coats off. It was warm!!

The tubing line was long, on the first run we waited for 30 minutes. The sessions are only 2 hours, so I thought that a 30 minute wait was a bit obnoxious. It turned out in the end that we were able to go down the hill 4 times in 2 hours. We may have been able to get in one more run, but the kids slowed us down a bit. The tube ride was fun - the "snow" had melted quite a bit with the bright, warm day we were having. Everything was pretty drippy, but there was a nice thick base so the slopes were fine. By sundown, the melty was beginning to get packed and hard so the slopes got a lot FASTER. They kept blowing the icee mix the whole time, and I am still amazed that they are able to keep SNOW in this weather. It is crazy!!

I am VERY glad we wore all the snow gear because if you can imagine playing, rolling and tubing in an ICEE you can imagine that we got very wet. The snow clothing came in handy for keeping us dry, though we were all a bit hot in the thickness.

I don't have a lot of good pics, we had the camera, but Hunk ended up leaving it at the school function we stopped at along the way. We needed to go help the Drama dept. get ready for a play my oldest is in. They were playing with the makeup and we took a few pictures, the camera was put down and then forgotten. I did end up purchasing a toss away camera, but I won't see those pics for a few days. It is hard to use film after being so accustomed to digital. I ran out of shots quickly because I'm so used to taking a bazillion pics and just deleting the bad ones. Hopefully I don't have a film roll full of bad pics!! I guess in this respect that film will never die. There will always be the disposable camera, I don't think they will be able to create a disposable digital camera - or maybe there is such a thing and I live under a rock.? What I have today is from my iPhone....so yeah, they suck.

We had a lot of fun - I hope I got some good pictures on the disposable camera, because this was just something to see - in Atlanta - a snow slope. Who would've thought?? We are actually expecting some REAL SNOW according to the weather man - possibly on Monday evening. Can everyone please just put all your karma, postive thoughts, prayers or whatever you choose that we will get a frickin' BLIZZARD? I could use a day off this week - my calendar is packed!!