Wednesday, July 2, 2008

Picture this, Huntington, 2008 or so...

Now that I'm feeling perkier - it's Picture time! 
Some recent  (and not too recent) pics that MUST be shared!

Harry made me a book from him and Phoebe for our anniversary.  I made him this:
and ended up more than a little rainbow-colored by the end of the night!    But he loved it- and - heck - I found out that I can actually draw a car!   A CAR!   And it looks purty darn good if I do say so myself.  :)


    I love Blenko glass.  Say it with me "Taste the Rainbow!"


Blenko shark's teeth!  Cool! Yeah - we bought one.  :)


I got new glasses!  Yup  - so sis plucked them from my face and declared "Man!  You're blinder than me now!" with glee.  Gee, thanks sister-who-is-now-dead-to-me.   That's okay though - she stood up to see how she looked in them and promptly clotheslined herself  on the top of the table's umbrella! 

Pot Pals! Now on sale at your craft store!   No more buying it from skanky men  and women who consider hygiene an optional part of life!
Yay!


Harry Simpson!



I'm doing much better - thanks to all who wrote to me to make sure I was alive.
I am!
And just in time for cookouts galore!
Anyone got any cool plans for the Fourth?  Just blowin' crap up and expanding your waistline?  Me too!!!!!

:)


Monday, June 30, 2008

Solid Foods are the Devil

Chicken Sandwich - 1
Holly eating solid Foods again - 0

Oh well, I tried.  It just didn't work out as well as I had planned.  I'm obviously home from work today and trying very hard not to be sick and to not freak out too much about what made me sick and why I had little red dots all over my face last night that are still there today.

I work in a place where we serve real honest-to-God humans so it's very possible I contracted something there.  But why in the world would it show up on a Sunday?

Anyhoo - I'm babbling due to lack of brain power from not having any food.  And we all know my stance on junk food equaling creativity.  It's the combo of sugar and grease - it's what the geniuses of times gone by would've used if Opium and prostitutes weren't so widely available.

Whew...  floor spinning - back to bed I go... 

Sunday, June 29, 2008

What goes down... must come up...

The morning was wonderful.  Harry and I slept in, had a little fun and then he made me lunch - gorgeous and thick burgers with real bits of garlic and Crazy Jane's Mixed-up Salt (sooo good!).   We ate heartily and I finished by making a beautiful salad of orange and purple cauliflower with bright green broccoli to take to the non-cookout party that mom and dad were throwing us for our fifth anniversary.

The salad was made, the pizzas were ordered and the cake was ready to be picked up.

And then it hit me.  I couldn't breathe.  I looked around wildly and helplessly for the elephant that had to have been perched on my chest.  My stomach clenched, my ears hollowed out and my face burned.  I was freaking out and didn't know what was wrong.  

"Hold me," I said as Harry lept from his couch to mine and rubbed my back. 

"Do you want to lay down?" he asked.   And I, grateful that he didn't ask if I needed to remove my panties, said, "No - I think - yeah - maybe if I throw up?"

So I did. Multiple times.   And then spent a good hour shivering afterwards.

Not sure what happened there.   

And no - not preggers.  Positive there. (Negative? Whatever -ya'all get what I mean.)

So now I am on the couch and looking up stuff on WebMD.  Here's hopin' it was a bug - cause that salad I made is just too pretty not to eat.  Ugh.  Eventually...

Saturday, June 28, 2008

Forget me Not

My would-be delivery date came and went.  I pretended not to notice it.  Pretended not to feel that itchy and prickling notion that was teasing the back of my brain.  I was hoping to forget.  I went to work, I came home, I laughed, I smiled, felt the grins reach my eyes but still waited for the day to be over. 

No one really said anything and we pretended it didn't matter even though I knew that it kinda did. Hallmark just doesn't make cards that say "Sorry your fetus died - but have a great day!" or "You would've been a great mom - buckup and have fun trying again!" or even a "Miscarriage?  It's okay - you would've dropped it on its head anyway..." But really - they should make those cards  - especially for those of us with wildly inappropriate senses of humor.

However, my sister, the one who has always been there for me through nightmares about people putting tape on my head (not sure, either) and rubbed my legs when I struggled with the beginning of a rather complicated and long-winded lympatic disorder and she who seems to always forget things as soon as they are shoved into her already over-crowded, ADD-riddled brain dropped off a tiny pink package at my  house. 

There, in front of my television (where she knew I wouldn't miss it!) was this little gift bag with crisp white paper poking from it.   A note tucked inside was written on with her flailing scrawl: 

A butterfly lights beside us, Like a sunbeam and for a brief moment its glory and beauty belong to our world... but then it flies on again and although we wish it could have stayed, we aer so thankful to have seen it at all...

Another note read:

Sometimes miracles arrive so tiny that we cannot feel the weight of them and yet we are still cahnged and we are blessed none the less.

A small box was cradled within the pink bag.   Inside was a round mother of pearl necklace representing what would have been a new birthstone and a new title for me. 

It's one of the most wonderful and thoughtful gifts I've ever received and it made me realize, more than ever, how much I love my sister.

So even though there are no plans on the rather rainy horizon (really?  More rain?  Seriously - I am DONE with precipitation!) Harry and I have vowed to consider the possibility of trying for a Harry the IV within the next year.  And if it doesn't stick that time, well, I'm sure I can adopt one from another country.. or from Brad and Angelina - I'm sure they won't miss one of theirs...

 (Me, Tiff and Sis)

Wednesday, June 25, 2008

Things They Don't Tell You...

Harry and I bought our first house right before we got married.   It was three stories, had lots of white walls, carpets and cabinets and it was ours!  Wasn't too long, however, that we realized we had no frickin' clue how to run a house.   We had a yard with no lawn mower and a big bed with no sheets.

Eventually, though, we figured things out through guessing and sheer dumb luck.   And more than a few tubs of spackle (not on the bed or on the lawn - but ya know - for when we painted and - uh stuff. Oh, never mind!).

So you can only imagine my surprise when one day, about a year or two after we moved in, I noticed that the air conditioner was only mildly blowing from the vents.  I adjusted the temperature and the fan settings.  Nada. 

Mustering up my pluck, I picked up my phone and called Robert, my ex-boyfriend who could probably take apart an AC unit and reassemble it blindfolded like one of those Rubick's Cube geniuses.

"Robert!  My air isn't working!  Well, it's cold - but it's barely blowing!"

After his initial sniggering came to an end he said thoughtfully: "Hmm... Well, when was the last time you changed your filter?"

I stopped with one hand still held over the vent.  "Filter?" I repeated.  "If I were this 'filter' thing - where would I be located?"

"Holly!"  he yelled into the phone.

"What?!  I grew up in a house where central air meant opening two windows on either side of room.  When we got fancy we'd stick a fan in the middle!"

"Go change your filter."

"But I don't wanna go outside!"

"Holly.  Listen carefully.  Go downstairs, look for a small door.  Find your air conditioning unit.  Pull the handle and pull out the filter.  Put in a new one."  His sarcasm was not well hidden.

So I did what he said.  I went downstairs, squealed at the single dead bug that had keeled over in the middle of the closet and made him stay on the line as I huffed and hemmed and hawed and further cemented his belief that our breaking up was one of the best things that had ever happened in his new (much more bland) life.

That being said, I have been diligent-esque about changing the filter.  So when Harry and I went to the evil Home Depot the other night and came home with two new allergen-reducing overpriced filter I told him to put them at the top of the stairs.  Putting things at the top or bottom of the stairs is code for "take me with you" when anyone traverses said stairs.  He picked them up and left the kitchen.

I followed two minutes later and noticed the filters leaning against the doors to the basement.   But where was Harry?  He wasn't in the bedroom and he wasn't in the tv room - so where was he?

"Harry?  Harry?!"  I called.

"Yeah?"  he answered - from downstairs!

"WHAT THE HELL?!"  I yelled as he busted out laughing and sheepishly peeked around the corner of the stairs.   "WHY WOULD YOU GO DOWNSTAIRS AND NOT TAKE THE FILTERS WITH YOU?!" 

He was red-faced and bouncing off the furniture now as he continued to laugh at my outrage over his lack of carrying the filters to the lower floor.  

"Oh that's too funny!"  he said as he continued into the bedroom and into the bed.

"You put them at the TOP of the stairs but you didn't take them with you downstairs?" I was flabbergasted.

"Yup," he said, putting one farmer's tanned arm behind his head and leaning back on the headboard.  "I left them at the top so that I'd remember to change it tomorrow."

His logic was so flawed and infuriating all I could do was stare.  And then laugh. 

After five years of marriage he still makes me laugh.   And want to kill him.  All at the same time.

Aint love grand?!

And - because I have to keep up the front of me being the biggest geek ya'all know - I bring you the link to a new Joss Whedon project :  Dr. Horrible's Sing-along Blog!   

So excited!


Teaser from Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog on Vimeo.

Monday, June 23, 2008

Happy Anniversary to Meeeee!.... and Harry....

Five years of wedded bliss can only be celebrated in one way. That's right - by spending too much time in a movie theater.  

Last Friday we saw "Get Smart" which was pretty cute and not too cliched or stupid.  After a refreshing meal of burgers and greasy fries we then decided to catch a second flick "Love Guru" which was a bit cliched and stupid.  Mike Myers may have hit his stride with Austin Powers but the Love Guru was just a bit, well, blah. Justin Timberlake, however, was awesome in it!   He actually sings Celine Dion with a fake Canadian French accent at one point.  

And then Harry looked at me with that twinkle in his eyes.  

And I ended up at the end of a row watching a third movie.  "The Incredible Hulk" was actually pretty good and Harry was salivating at the thought of getting the flick on a blu-ray disc.

Saturday morning dawned with our anniversary seeming very much like the d-day of 2003 with me in bed alone and groggy.  Harry had left me to go buy some overpriced boat-like shoes with little jumpy men on them and I decided to go with mom to the local Farmer's market that just started up down the street.  Only it wasn't there.  Hmm.

So we ended up at a produce stand and I bought some lovely non-tainted red, yellow and green tomatoes and some peaches.  The man who quickly put our produce in recycled plastic wal-mart bags told us of a lunch dish prepared by the Greenbrier here in WV.   After pan-frying not-too-thinly-sliced tomatoes in olive oil and slicing one of the large red tomatoes, I layered it on two pieces of white toast with a piece of American Cheese and some mayo on it. 

I expected it to me okay and it was WONDERFUL!!!!

And then we had a great meal at The Chop House.

:)

                    

Tuesday, June 17, 2008

Bathing the Blind - and other fun tasks...

Silver is a blind Mr. Kitty.  He's also mostly deaf.  And, when I found him on Sunday stuck in a corner, bouncing off each wall as he tried to right himself and hollering loudly, I noticed he looked - ratty.

So what do I do?

That's right. I stuck his skanky siamese butt into the sink and dumped a handful of soap on him.   He proceeded to sit in the water and stare at me accusedly with those big blue sigthless eyes and, on occassion, try to crawl down the front of my shirt.  

Not that I didn't deserve to look like the last-place loser of a pathetic Old Girls Gone Wild Wet T-shirt contest - but I was trying to help.   And here is Silver, still wet from his bath and about two seconds away from slapping me, with cunning mad old ninja accuracy, across my reddened cheeks: