Well... I'm packin' my AOL bags and moving to Blogger...
Feel free to check my new "digs"...
I'm not completely moved of course---I have lots and lots of boxes to pack, and I hope to be completey moved before AOL officially kicks my bunny butt out for good. I have until Halloween. How nice of them, huh?
If you haven't already, let me know your new Blogger addresses... This is mine:
http://coelhathoughts.blogspot.com/
I was reading a fellow blogger’s entry the other day, and the subject was music/songs that remind us of different people, places, etc.
There are a few songs that do remind of me of certain people and places.. Not good people or places...but..
For instance this morning when my husband’s alarm/radio went on, we woke up to Clearwater Revival. I don’t remember which song it was (they all sound the same to me), but whenever I do hear anything sung by Clearwater Revival it reminds me of my ex-husband, who LOVED Clearwater. It also reminds me of that hot afternoon, driving home from an anniversary party that was thrown by his best friend. I was driving because of course my ex-husband had a little too much to drink. He had his bare feet sticking out of the passenger side window singing along to Clearwater Revival. I was not amused, just thankful that it was a summer early evening, and I didn’t have to deal with nightfall on the dark narrow country roads I was driving.
I remember this day quite clearly because I had a sudden realization that day listening to Clearwater Revival Greatest Hits CD. I was thinking of the surprise 65th wedding anniversary party we had been to earlier. It was for his best friend’s parents who must have been well into their 80’s. It was a surprise anniversary party, and their kids went all out. They had a wedding ceremony at the church where they confirmed their wedding vows, and later a big reception at the nearby Portuguese hall. I remembered the looks on their faces-neither of them looking too excited and more annoyed than anything else. They did not look prepared for so much "excitement" they looked more like a pair of very tired deer caught in the headlights of a fast approaching pick up. Sure they smiled, but I think they were a little too stunned-and overwhelmed by the suprise. I then looked over to passenger side of my car and saw the husband rocking out, with his eyes half closed to Clearwater pretending to playing air guitar, with his feet stuck out of the window. Okay, I was grateful that at the he was the happy and dumb drunk at the moment, versus, the kicking the seats mean drunk. I suddenly realized that I was 30 years old. Damn-I felt old! Was I going to be celebrating my 65th wedding anniversary with this guy? Is this as good as it gets? I seriously didn’t think it was going to happen-and it hit me right there and then. It was a scary reality check that I didn’t really want to accept, but at the same time, strange as it may sound, it was almost a relief to know that it wasn’t going to last forever.
When I hear the song, Truly, Madly, Completely, by Savage Garden, I also think of my ex-husband-but not just him. I think of him and his Canadian, married girlfriend (courtesy of an AOL chat room) that he was cheating on me with. Okay, there were a few others, but this one is the one I really knew about. I know this was “their song” (excuse me while I hurl) because of the emails I found from this woman on my computer where she wrote the words of the lyrics to the song. This was confirmed by my own daughter, before the divorce, when Lizzy announced one day in the car that the song that was playing on the radio was “Dad & Espie’s song”. Lovely. I think Liz was like 10 years old. Isn’t that lovely that she should know about that, huh? Her dad didn’t bother to hide it from her. Apparently a complete cassette full of love ballads was sent to the ex, via the lovely Espie. At least I’m grateful to only know of this one song. Whenever I hear that song, I shut it off-it makes me sick and it makes me angry, but sometimes it makes me laugh. Why? I TRULY, MADLY, COMPLETELY know that Espie did me a big favor.
Don’t get me wrong. There are songs that I know that remind me of good people and good things. I will write about those later. When my alarm woke up this morning, the radio/alarm went off, and the first thing I heard was a man’s voice saying: “Millionaire”. I’m not kidding. It was a commercial for the California State Lottery, and I caught him ending his sentence with "millionaire." Sounds good, huh? Of course I bought a lottery ticket this morning! Bring it on!
Today is Tuesday—not much happening today…literally. I realize today is a Rosh Hashanah, but is that a good enough reason for the HOUSE to take TWO days off instead of working on this EMERGENCY crisis our country is facing? Don’t they want toget this settled? Isn’t it important?! How irresponsible! Damn. May be we ALL should take a few days off, and not pay our bills, and just let things “settle” for awhile. Seriously, let's all play golf!
It's Friday, and it's about time. That is all I'm going to say....
What is it about the month of September? It is 30 days; not as long as some months, but for some reason, it has to be the longest month of the year. It's been a busy, hectic, month.
Yesterday morning I read something disturbing, and sad. One of my best Avon customers is in jail. Lovely, huh? All I have to say is she was one of my favorite customers; she always paid her bill on time, and she was very sweet to me. I was just thinking about her earlier this week, wondering why I hadn't heard from her because she usually submits an order every other week with me. Now I know why. Large amounts of money is involved, and she did mention that she was having "a great summer"... hmm.. I guess large amounts of money would make any summer extra special, huh? Sad situation. You reap what you sow. How frustrating.
I can't sell to clients, and she may become one soon. Too bad because I could sell a lot of stuff to inmates in the jail. Do you realize that women actually take ink from magazines for eyeliner, shadow and lipstick?! Yep. It's always important for some to look their best. For hairspray, they use sugar and water. I am amazed how resourceful some of them can be. There are limited things one can take with them when they are doing time in the slammer. Makeup is not one of them, but some ladies actually go to the extremes and stick them up the "kazoo" (there are places up there-you know where) hoping they don't get found during the strip search. When I used to work for the jail office, I would come across some very interesting notes from some of the inmates to our staff:
"Help! The plastic bag with the cigarettes came out, but not the cigarettes!"
Ouch.
It's FRIDAY!!! Yipppee!!!
Tomorrow I'm going to San Francisco to get Lizzy's classes registered for when she starts her college courses. I'm thinking that may be we should take the train there instead. It shall be interesting... I think I'll bring my camera.
I need to decide where my son Andrew is going to take his confirmation classes for church. Yes, we are Catholic, and I want him to finish his religious sacraments-and he has finally agreed to do them-just can't decide whether to have them done near home, or near my mom's house. I'm also wondering whether or not to enroll Nicholas in kindergarten cathechism. Decisions..decisions...
I'm also trying to decide on my work schedule. I'm seriously thinking of getting my hours voluntarily cut 10 hours and work a 30 day week instead of a 40...
There is hope on the horizon that Lolly will be moving out of this office I share with him soon! YAY!!
I got 6 boxes of Avon Christmas stuff last night, and two are still sitting by my front door. I have to start thinking of basket ideas for the Christmas Boutique in November. Thanks Lisa Jo for the suggestion. I may put some on here for you guys to see, but I don't know if I can advertise it---I have to check for sure. I don't want to get cited and convicted and thrown in jail. I can't sell anything behind bars, and the people in there probably would want to buy my stuff, but they don't have money. I don't want any of them being caught with any Skin So Soft moisturizer, or Avon Slick Swirls stuck up their "kazoo" if you know what I mean.
Happy Monday, and Happy Autumn!
When I left home this morning, I could have sworn I saw blue skies, but as soon as I got to work, damn---it all vanished! It's cold, foggy and just plain "blah" looking. Oh well, it's Monday-it might as well look yucky today. I'm going to be stuck in this ugly building at work for most of the day, so let it rain even!
I'm hoping this week is better than the last-it was a very forgetful week, full of weird and silly things. Remember the dead frog? Well it seems that Lizzy did not run over it after all. It seems like it was actually "planted" there. Tania remembers seeing the bloody mess on the driveway before Lizzy actually came home from work. It's a miracle that she didn't run it over when she did come to work. Liz has seen these dead frogs before in front of people's homes. Apparently this is a group of younger people in the neighborhood that have a thing for frogs--they enjoy killing them for fun. They are Frog haters. Do they know that Lizzy is a Frog lover, or did someone just randomly leave the dead frog on our driveway? Anyway, Liz is grateful that she wasn't the one who ran the poor creature over. By the time I got home, what was left of the frog was gone. I'm guessing a cat or those big black crows that like to poop on my car took it away-you know the circle of life thing.
The animals around the neighborhood have been doing weird things lately. Yesterday we saw a squirrel run around in the backyard with a bone in his mouth. I'm hoping it was a chicken bone it found somewhere, and not something else. I've never seen a squirrel with a bone in it's mouth. Anyway, it saw me peering at him through my kitchen window, and then leaped onto one of the cypress trees like a flying squirrel. And then there are the black crows. I cannot stand those things. They are scary looking, and they enjoying nothing more than poop all over my car. They sit on the branches of the tree in the front yard, and I swear to you one day they actually followed me to my mother's house. I never used to see black crows in my mom's neighborhood before--never--even as a child, and there they were one morning on the street in front of my mother's home, just squaking at me as if they were mocking me.
"Hey mom, those birds! I've never seen them around here before!" exclaimed Andrew.
"They are after me Andrew. They enjoying pooping on my car."
Isn't there some ole' wive's tale out there that says if a bird poops on your car you are supposed to have tremendous amounts of good luck? Well, that is what prompted me to buy that lottery ticket. Well, I didn't win. (You probably guessed that already.) I didn't even get one number. Instead, the next day I left my purse at home and had to beg for money from my son for gas in my car, and had to spend the whole day without a purse-not fun.
In other news---I'm going to try and get a table at the Christmas Boutique at my church in November. It's going to be an Avon information booth, and I'll have a basket to raffle out, and sell some gift baskets that I'm going to fix up. You probably don't know this, but doing gift baskets for sale has always been an idea I've had for a very long time, so I'm actually a little excited about it. My sister-inlaw may be coming down, and she is going to help me "recruit" some new Avon ladies, or men.. Yes, there are men out there that sell Avon. Avon Men. Weird, I know.
I got this from Lyn over at: http://journals.aol.com/ukgal36/Britsblog/entries/2008/09/20/5-things/4611
who got it from Sharon over at:
http://journals.aol.com/tpiez4me/CoastalComfort/entries/2008/09/19/5-things/2042
The 5 List
5 things you collect
Bunnies--(stuffed, crystal, porceline..etc..everything but the real ones), perfume bottles, laundry, and yes children/teenagers...
5 things about your hair
Long-it needs a cut, thick, heavy--it gives me headaches sometimes, needs a new box of color, people say it's pretty.
5 things about your pets
We miss our cat, L.A.; had a pet chicken named Jenny in Portugal, but I think my aunt cooked it for dinner, had other family pets when I was younger, beloved doggies: Marco, Barney, and George the cat named after who else, Boy George.
Pictures I need to send, pencils, old mail, paper clips, coupons.
5 things you love to eat in summer
watermelon, barbecue hamburgers, hot dogs, ice cream, & macaroni/potato salads
Your turn
This morning, getting the car loaded for work, I found a ghastly sight on the drive way - a dead frog near the rear end tire. Apparently my daughter ran over it in mid leap last night. Eeeeww.. It was disgusting!!! There is a big gash in the garden hose in front of the house, so I couldn't spray it down, and move it into the dirt, so I had to scrape it off the cement with a broom. It was a terrible, bloody mess!
I went inside to get my son out from his room, and happened to mention the casualty to Lizzy. She screamed, and felt so badly.
Lizzy is a frog lover. She actually enjoys going to the neighborhood park with her friends at night just to look for frogs. Apparently the frogs come out at night, and they are very cute to look at. She has even showed me pictures of the little frogs that she and her friends have seen. Well, I don't know what this frog was doing all the way at our house.
"The frog should have stayed home in his pond!" Nicholas exclaimed, as he watched mom sweep the poor creatures remains into the dirt.
With all the distractions of sweeping frog guts off my driveway, I got so frazzled that I actually forgot my purse in the garage. I didn't realize this until I got to my son's school, and by that time, it was much too late to drive back. So, here I am, without a purse, feeling really off balanced, and almost naked. Of course, I had no money, with little gas in my car, so I had to borrow $20 from my son. Wait, he owed me $20....okay, it all worked out, but still-it's so annoying not having a purse all day, plus, I'm driving illegally without my license to boot. I feel such the criminal today!
See, this is what happens - yesterday I mentioned some selfish things I would do if I were to become a millionaire, and today I have NO MONEY. $10 for gas, $5 for lunch, $5 for my son's lunch. I have only one dollar in change in my pocket at the moment. Lovely, huh? Looks like God is trying to tell me something, hey? I still have my lottery ticket in my desk...who knows, perhaps I'm going to be a winner tonight. May be the dead "Kermit" on my driveway is a sign of some kind.
In other news, I discovered that McD's is giving away Wizard of Oz figurines in their happy meals!! HURRAH!!! And there is a Lolly Boy figurine!! HURRAH!!! Guess who is going to have one in her office?! Now I'll have to Lolly's around my desk!!
Today I bought myself a lottery ticket, so I can win millions of dollars, and quit my job, so I can afford to write a book, and dig a hole in the back yard, so I can dip my feet in the “cement pond” any time I feel like it…
Wish me luck.
Seriously, if you won millions, what would you do?
Well, I couldn’t do anything too crazy, because I have kids. I can’t go off and travel all year long or anything, because they need to be in school. Kids keep you from doing fun and adventurous, or dangerous things—they keep you grounded-sometimes too much so. Oh, and yeah, they all need to go to college. There goes all the money!
Sigh.
But, seriously, I would welcome any amount of money. Instead of buying my Rice Crispy treat that I usually buy at the gas station, I bought a lottery ticket. I’ve invested a whole ONE dollar to the possibly millions someone will win. That someone could be me.. Who knows? I’ll keep you posted. If you don’t hear from me, anytime soon, (ha ha ha) I probably won. Chances are you will hear from me though.
A Winkie
In other news, I heard on the radio some interesting trivia on the movie the Wizard of Oz. The Wicked Witches’ soldiers were called the “Winkies”. I did not know they had names. You remember how they marched around, chanting in that very low and haunting march, that sounded like: Oh E Oh…Oh ee? Well, what they are really saying is: “How we loathe the old one.” (Referring to the witch.) Apparently, if you play the Pink Floyd version of Dark Side of The Moon, right after the 3rd roar of the Lion that appears right before the film, the song coincides with the film. I’ve never tried it, but always wanted to. Have anyone of you done this? I would love to see it at a theatre. I’ve seen the Wizard of Oz a number of times, and I think it would be interesting to see it.
Which brings to mind… Lolly the department munchkin is in a meeting at the moment. Thank God. I do still have my Wizard of Oz calendar. As soon as he is gone, I’ll hang up the munchkin picture for those who will miss him.
