Just Another Day With Me

I Believe

Love, love, love  this song, I haven't heard it in years and I wonder how I forgot about it??? 

F**K the Furnace!

Soo... my  feminine instinct comes on when I realize that the house is getting cooler...  hmmm... go check the thermostat, doesn't look too bad yet.   Go crank the temp.  it clicks to come on.   Wait, no heat coming out of the vents on my floor.   Yeah, its Monday.  ITS COLD OUTSIDE TODAY like in the 20s.  What the Hell, we aren't North Dakota. So, the frigid or arctic blast is supposed to stretch out all week.  Now, I realize that it IS January, it IS supposed to be cold outside with the whole Earth Spinning around the sun and tilting on its axis creating our nice, balmy, temperate climate.   But, being a naked ape and totally lacking a nice warm furry coating and not being able to hibernate like the luckier mammals I'm expected to live in this frigid weather.   OK, well where I live we have had 80 degree days in January, but then we get the wild fires. 

Monday went ok, the first day of the semester went ok.  It was cold, I had to go to the Post Office, the lines were super, super long.  Then to Walmart, and it was packed and the lines were also super long.  Didn't anyone tell them that the holidays are over and not everyone needs to go to Walmart at once?  

So now, the pilot is lit, and we are waiting to see if it shall come alive this evening - it seems to need to warm up.   We will see if I have to stay up all night trying to keep the house warm and toasty using innovative approaches like doing laundry all night or watching the oven burners, and running my two little space heaters.  I won't sleep with any electric heaters on.   But, hopefully its just the thermo coupler or something like that broken on the heater.  

Its still a Monday, I'm tired, and frustrated.   It would be ok, on any other day....

 

 

Reminders of Ike 2010

Galveston Gulls

Birds on the beach in Galveston Texas

Oh Hail the Garmin

Now, I like traveling with my nice laminated trucker maps.  Generally they can get you to where you are going.  As long as you are not going to Houston or to your Aunt's home way out in the sticks in rural Mississippi.  The Garmin Nuvi, I am slightly resistant to, afterall really can people not read maps. But in a major city like Houston, finding a residential area could be difficult. Back in the day before cell phones people had maps and they had convenience stores and gas stations to ask for directions.  But in a city like Houston having a little machine with our "British Bitch" telling us which way to go and where to turn.  Sure was nice and she really knew her way around town.   So, this is the technology is cool post.  I still won't travel without a REAL map (you know the kind that you can hold on your lap- that doesn't talk to you). 

It is an equalizer, now the illiterate and the folks who can't read maps can travel without worry.  

Drive Through Louisiana...

I can't say I was impressed with the south west corner of Louisiana, we were driving through and it was a cool grey, depressing day and I kept saying to my husband that "It looks like Kansas, with more trees" right down to the agriculture (sugar cane) industry.  It was suprising,  I suppose when I haven't been to a place I have no pre-concieved notion of what it will look like.   Well, southern Louisiana looks like Kansas,  it just had a few more trees.   Nothing exciting, nothing that would make me have a strong desire to live there.  The Bayous give off these kind of creepy vibes and are pretty neat to look at.   But, I do prefer the Biloxi area as far as my love of the Gulf Coast goes.  
We had about an hour where I felt the sun was going to come out and it would be a pleasant day.  I was wrong, soon the cloudy, grey misery crawled over the horizon and left that gloomy feeling as the temperature at 6:30 am in Biloxi was a nice 56 the temp as we drove through Louisiana slowly began going down and stopped at 49 degrees.  Which seemed incredibly unfair to be in the warm Gulf coastal plain and suffering with such cold weather.  

Well, it LOOKS Warm

My day in Galveston was quite chilly, for palm trees and green grass the temperatures ranged in the low 50s and it was windy.  Very cool out.  We went to the "Strand" The Strand, we then went to the other side of the island (the sea wall side) and went and had some ice cream at Ben and Jerry's.  Then back to meet my Husband and new Sister -in-Law at McDonalds.  

When we first arrived in Galveston we stopped off at a old Cemetery which was fascinating and then drove downtown.  It is an interesting place.  It may not have been warm but it looked different from the snow back home. 
 

Precious

Galveston

I'm Back

Five days and two thousand miles later I have returned home to have one day of Christmas Vacation remaining.  Our journies took us to Mississippi then home returning via the Gulf Coast passing through both Northern and Southern Louisiana and Texas.  We made roughly two thousand miles and had the opportunity to ring in the New Year with my new (old) baby Sister-In-Law.  My Husband had not seen her since she was two when his Dad split up with her Mom.  It was a wonderful way to ring in the New Year with his baby sister.  I got to visit with an old friend from North Dakota and explore Galveston and Houston with her.  We also got to visit with my 84 year old Uncle and My husband's Aunt while in Mississippi.  What a week!  On the way home we picked up my other young cousin at the Airport, our holiday began with dropping him off at the airport.  What a week!!!!  I needed the journey to sooth my restless soul.  Now, I need a nap!

The Official Tattoo Post

My opinion on Tattoos is apparently not as enlightened and as cool as many people I know.  I have a couple of friends who love getting "tats"  now, I respect them for their love of being "inked" but, I don't play into this fad.   I don't think there is anything that I want permanently on my body. Just the thought of explaining to the nursing home employees the profound meaning of the dolhin on my ankle makes me cringe.  That was an example there is no dolphin on my ankle.  I am tattoo free.

I guess I can't imagine what would strike me as so damn important that I run into town and say I must have sparkly looking stars across my ass?  Or I desperately need a tattoo of Strawberry Shortcake across my back.   Maybe I really, really have a deep desire to have a naked woman tattooed on my thigh.  Maybe the guys who get the naked women tattooed are just showing that those are the only naked women they see? 

Now, its not that I don't like looking at them or seeing their reasons behind why they get that particular peace sign, smurf or sea turtle.  I hate seeing teenagers and high school students whose parents take them in and allow them to get a tattoo at fifteen or sixteen.  Where are these parents brains?   It is SO not acceptable in my old fashioned opinion. 

As a teacher I suppose I'd never want to deal with it, or having something you'd feel like you have to cover up on your body.   Being somewhat of a exhibitionist, I don't mind wearing a bikini to the pool at the ripe old age of 32.   As a teen I dressed, well briefly in the summer and still don't have much of an issue with people who wear skimpy clothes (as long as they have the figure to carry it off).    I do not want to see your muffin top, really, especially if its one of those jumbo sized muffins.   Not to be bitchy, well maybe to be bitchy.  

My husband has a homemade tattoo on his thigh (as in he did it himself) not sure of the technique but its a heart with a dagger and the faded words that would say "Who Needs Bitches"  I'm sure it was quite profound at 22 years old, but I'm not sure you can read it today. I can't say that I disagree with the subject of the tattoo because I certainly dont' need bitches, and perhaps he should relabel it to "Who needs more than one bitch."  I have to pick on him for his one tattoo. 

I suppose some of them are pretty and If I ever got one it would most definitely be on my ass, well then I wouldn't have to worry about covering it up, would I ?  But what would the point of it be?  No one would see it.  

That being said there are varying levels of artists.  So,  if you get the homemade variety on someone's living room floor and arent' happy- well it is your fault.  Don't let "Bubba Ray" with an ink gun give you a permanent stick figure.   Some people are very creative in their stupidity.  For your entertainment here is a website called: Ugliest Tattoos these tats truly are bad, and awful.  Many are explicit with adult content, so if you want to see something you've never imagined check the website out.   I enjoy peoples stupidity.  But seriously check out this website, it will keep you amused for hours.......