flightless hag

A chronicle of the adventures of birdwoman: a lonely, talentless freak who wanders the internet in search of entertainment.

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Location: Philly

I'm a 40-something married white female, survivor of weight watchers, avid reader of pulp. Dogs (not cats), extreme right (handed, not politics), ENTJ, alto, wanna-be knitter.

July 24, 2009

What is it with these depressing books?!

First, our principal gives us the "Last Lecture", then my mother in law gives me "A Thousand Splendid Suns". I had them on my shelf for the summer reading marathon. I finished them both in the last 24 hours.

I now feel like kicking somebody to make them feel good, too.

Sheesh.

I guess I should go get "Sarah's Key" that my mom gave me. So I can go into a depressive funk that will last for weeks.

Why do people so love books that make them feel like crap? I mean, I like to read, quite a bit actually, but I usually choose material that makes me laugh or love or be angry. Not sad. I really dislike feeling sad.

I can appreciate these books as being well written and well told stories. But I simply do not like the wrung-out feeling I have after I've finished. It's not even angst. It's downright depressing. And when it's fiction, I don't even feel enlightened. I just feel...

manipulated! That's it! I feel like the author has got me to read this by making me feel like there has to be SOME damn light at the end of the tunnel, even if it is the oncoming train. At least the train would end the trauma.

So, I guess I'll keep reading the classics because it's what you have to do to be able to have conversations with people. But at least I understand now why I completely hate them, and I'll go read my fanfic and pulp fic and other happy sappy crap completely guilt free.

(*)>

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July 17, 2009

Spendin Money We Don't Have

You might think this is a post on the hyper-consumerism that has driven the American economy to the brink of collapse. But it is much closer to home.

This has been the year of breakages.

First the for-home computer broke.
Then the for-school computer broke.
Then the car broke.
Then the dishwasher broke.
Then the washer broke.
Now we are broke.
Well, not really, but I'm really hoping and praying that nothing else goes wrong!

~~~~~


This week we have an extra kid. We're participating in the Fresh Air Fund - though how our town, so close to Philly, could have cleaner air than another, I'm not certain. Anyhow, we have another Sean in the house - spelled differently, but sounds the same. Ho ho! Confusion~ thy house is rogers.

We were told that a lot of these children, especially the boys, gravitate toward the dad in the household. That is certainly the case here. As soon as John's "in tha house" - seanII's like a barnacle on him. But in a good way.

He's a really nice kid, and my boys already like him a lot. There's some jockeying for best friend position, but he seems to balance them pretty well. So far, so good!

(*)>

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July 08, 2009

OK, Ick

We switched from my beloved DirecTV today to Comcast. The bundle just saves us so much money that I couldn't justify not doing it. Anyhow, the comcast guy is here, and he had the tv turned to a local affiliate while he tinkered.

Some show called The Doctors (?) was on. It has a GROSS factor of 11 out of 10. They were talking about some stomach cancer, inherited, that killed like 7 out of 10 people in one generation. So the next generation all had THEIR STOMACHS REMOVED!

I almost removed my stomach after the next story, though. They talked about weird eating habits. One guy was a proponent of the raw meat diet. Have fun with your parasites, dude.

But the weirdest HAD to be the guy who cooked a three-course meal out of... wait for it... his first child's PLACENTA.

I thought soap operas were bad. Sheesh.

(*)>

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July 06, 2009

Killer Strikes Again

Ahhh, the joys of having a new dog.

We thought our kitchen was dog-proof, but a few weeks of rainy days showed that even the best-nailed-down molding could be pried up with puppy teeth. All of my rugs got chewed to bits, but hey! That's an excuse to buy pretty new rugs from TJ Maxx! (and I got this cool rug with a rooster. I'm so proud!)

So, now that sunny summer has come, the dogs are outside most days - all day! We got a new fence as our old one was certainly not Houdini proof. The new one is aces until the boys forget to close a gate. Then, out goes Loki. He's not a runner, just a curious dog. He comes right back when called. But nowadays, it's usually bearing gifts.

Two days ago, it was a mole.

Today, ~sniff~, it was a bird.

~~~~~

We've been doing a lot of swimming; stinky, moth, and I. I felt the sun was a little strong today, so I checked my back when we got home. Last year, I got the crap burned out of my back when we were at Virginia Beach. When I checked my back today? I still have the marks from last year's burn. I know because I haven't worn that swimsuit since that fateful trip. But I can still see the lace marks.

A friend of mine just turned up with a huge amount of skin cancer on her arm. I was never a sun bather, but she was a sun-avoider. Terrified of skin cancer, she was, cos her mom had it. And now, despite her precautions, she has it. Good thing she's paranoid, because this little tiny mark, that the doctors thought was a flu-shot scar, ended up causing a 3x1 inch hole in her arm. The docs still don't know if they got it all. Suck city.

~~~~~

I'm still getting used to this Mac OS. The touch pad still makes me swear sometimes, and setting up the new scanner/printer (it was free, and now I'll have a printer at school! Yee haw!) was like pulling teeth! HP doesn't like MAC all that well. But I now have 5 wires coming out of my desk. 4 of them are power cords. 1 is internet to the modem. C'est tout! For a semi-ocd girl, it's a thing of beauty. Or a beautiful thing, as Vic might say.

Well, I'm off to type more addresses back into address book. Just wanted to see if I could get my photos cleaned up after the big switch, and then see if I could upload. Yes, still getting used to the Mac, but liking it as I learn. I guess I'm not so old as that, if I'm willing to learn new tricks.

later, gators.

(*)>

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July 04, 2009

I Like War

Summer has started. Yipee! I've already had the kids out on 4 Batan marches. They're becoming inured. Must think of new torture, soon.

The way it works this year, when the boys get real antsy, we go for a "walk". Which is at least 40 minutes long. If they get talky-backy, well, they write sentences. This way I've got both gross and fine motor skills being exercised. I've also got "trivia contests" which cover the crap they have to learn before they go back to school this fall, and we read every day.

Sheesh, I think summer is busier than the school year.

But before summer actually started, I had 2 weeks where I was still at school and Stinky and the Moth were not. I got all of it covered except the last 4 days. I took one of those days off. For the other three, we hired a nice kid from down the street to babysit.

The first morning that she showed up, John said to Sean, "why don't you tell her what you like to do, Sean."

Sean looks at her seriously and says, "I like war."

Nice.

The other parents in the neighborhood alternately send their kids to our house to play - yes really - Americans vs. Indians (the boys made that up) or some other such boy game, or they avoid us like swine flu. We have nerf guns, and missile lauchers, and bow/arrow sets, thanks to all the Harvey uncles. The families who send their kids deep down think guns are ok, but are embarrassed to admit it. Other families eschew us completely. They do NOT like guns.

So I have this set of cap guns that I was going to use for forensics in the science bashing session at the end of the year - caps give off enough crap to do a gun powder residue test - but the school police nixed it. The cap guns are too realistic looking, I guess.

So we have them at home.

Dudley's birthday party (see a few posts down) is in 2 weeks or so. When we go, we're thinking of presenting the cap guns as a gift. What do you think? A little evil goes a lonnnnnng way.

(*)>

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