Year End Leaderboard Results

I did my last walk of the year this morning at 3.2 mph!  You can see by the Leaderboard that despite the fact that I was/am in invalid, I still beat Sara walking 167 miles since my surgery.  I will just say 167 miles this whole year since I probably walked 0 miles before the surgery.  To be completely fair, Sara started keeping track of her miles after me, but let's remember that my first tracking started at with mile intervals at 1 mph or less.  Yea me!  Next year I'm going to try to aim for 500 miles.  Sara and I are going to celebrate our number one and two positions on the Leaderboard tonight with a little something called alcohol.

Frames

When I got home I discovered my nook recategorized by the cleaning ladies.

Year in Review

I feel obligated to put some kind of superlatives on this year.  So- here they are:

Biggest Events:
Max and surgery, both of equal life changing status

Best Books:
Actually, I can't think back of a book where I was like oh my god, that was the best book I've ever read besides The Affair by Lee Child and let's face it, it's not because it was the best book I've ever read, but because there was a lot of brilliant violence.

What's In a Name Challenge 4- Final

I did not finish this challenge, since I didn't read a book with jewelry or a gem.  But I don't feel like any less of a person because of it.

Between January 1 and December 31, 2011, read one book in each of the following categories:

1. A book with a number in the title: One Day, The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet, One Shot
2. A book with jewelry or a gem in the title:
3. A book with a size in the title: The Long Run
4. A book with travel or movement in the title: Angels Flight
5. A book with evil in the title: Mortal Fear
6. A book with a life stage in the title: Die Trying

Top Acts of Mischief 

• the killing of two cats
• the trapping of a cat in the garage
• the escaping and being arrested, but not re-incarcerated

Estimate of Tubs of Sour Cream Eaten off of the Counter:  4

Friends

Monday I went to the O.C. to visit my most bestest friend in all of Strasbourg, France, Jack, and Damien who was visiting in from France.  Damien, Jack and I had many a fun night in Strasbourg, France.  The highlights were an accident involving my glass of gin and then Damien's glass of gin, as if we were two amateurs, learning that Siri, in France, is a man and that Damien is a Jack Reacher aficionado.   We had many beers while Jack's wife Megan, took care of the fort.  Due to the fact that I am old, I had to take a half a pain pill and when we passed the St. Regis, I exclaimed slightly goofy, "Oh my god, I've seen that on the Real Housewives of Orange County.  This is so cool!"  When I become a Real Housewife of _____, I will invite Jack and Megan to dine with me at the St. Regis because that is what Real Housewives do.  I did not go for a walk so Sara is of course the Leaderboard leader.  I'm ok with that because it's not every day that I get to visit my most bestest friend in all of Strasbourg, France and Damien.  As an aside, since Jack and Damien are chemists they spend a large amount of time discussing molecules and nanoparticules and other such things that probably don't actually exist, and I enjoy asking, "What does that mean?" and watching their brains work through, "How can we explain this to a complete idiot?"  (Hint:  most answers begin with "Sigh...")

Today, for vital inexplicable reasons, I had to get a Facebook account.  The Saratoga Animal Shelter is not on Facebook largely because I do not feel capable of dealing with the drama that seems to accompany a Facebook account, so I made the account in Randi's name.  You can't search for her because her privacy settings are set at the highest and she has no friends because I can't deal with it.  I didn't even give her the password because I don't trust her not to log in when I'm not home and post pictures of her spread out on the couch with Earl smoking a bong behind her.  I'm not about to lose my job because Randi can't control herself.  The few minutes I spent changing the settings on Randi's account cemented my resolve to be Facebook free.  Then I wore myself out taking down Christmas decorations and making a dent in the crap that litters my house.  

Jack et Damien à la plage.

La plage

A bird who was eyeing my sandwich.

Celebrations

My new favorite blogs are always showing beautiful pictures of their parties and preparations.  I thought I'd do the same.

First, I dressed Max's friends.

I doctored the store bouquet for a centerpiece.

The pound cake recipe said to leave the sour cream and butter at room temperature for 30 minutes.  Only a fool would leave that on the counter.

The set table.

À table!

Baby at the table!

Christmas morning- before he was overwhelmed by toys.

I made the macaroni ornament when I was two.  It's the most important decoration on the tree.

My mom made this Christmas outfit.

Overall, Christmas Eve and Christmas were a great success.   The raclette was delicious.  Sara is still my friend after spending Christmas Eve with us.  The baby got just about every age appropriate toy made by Fisher-Price.  My dad proved that he is completely useless, again, because I took him to Toys R Us expressly, so that he could tell me if I was going to buy something that they had already bought and only the fact that they were sold out of my first two choices prevented me from purchasing the same toy because my dad didn't know they already had it or that it was already under the Christmas tree.  I managed to get both my parents' new iPhones working without losing my mother's contacts and helping them both enter the modern age.  I didn't get to sync my dad's 50 songs yet; there wasn't enough time.  And I got new knives!

The Truth Is in the Leaderboard

Dopplegangers

What a day.  I spent the morning with Max who enjoys it when I tickle his sides and seems to spend an inordinate amount of time laughing at me (is there something about me that is laughable?  I'm beginning to wonder if I should take offense.)  Then I got my hair done and came home and the substitute cleaning lady was here.  Here is our exact conversation:

Me:  Hi
Her:  Mucho cleaning
Me:  Ok looks good.
Her:  Mucho cleaning bathroom voy a hotel Sweeden.
Me:  Ok??
Her:  Mucho cleaning
Me:  I'm going to lay down.
Her:  ???
Me:  (miming sleeping )
Her:  Todo cleaning es OK?
Me:  (laying on bed)
Her:  Muy sleepy.

Don't get me wrong; I could have conducted all of the conversation in Spanish because I gots me those kind of linguistic skills and by that I mean I had passed the AP Spanish exam in high school and my favorite band of all time is La Ley and also I saw Juanes in concert.  I could have said "Voy a dormir.   Tengo sueño." without even a second thought, but I wasn't feeling it.  My fog filled lethargic brain only wanted to lay down.  And I'd be lying if I didn't say I felt a little bit like a jerk because I didn't make more of a linguistic effort.  Lo siento.

Now, I'm going to need for everyone to put his or her imagination cap on, you know the cap you wear when you are trying to use your imagination.  FYI: It's imaginary.  Go ahead place your cap gingerly on your head and imagine the exact opposite of me and the Saratoga Animal Shelter.  What do you probably see?  My new favorite blog theenchatedhome.blogspot.com.  I can't even say how I came across this the other day, but it is now my favorite and I have spent hours clicking on links.  I am considering it training for when I become I Real Housewife of ____ because I don't want to be the housewife that fucks it all up her first episode in.  While reading this blog and others linked to it, you will notice there is an absence of handymen who come to fix the warped garage door and broken big garage door and who remove a dead mouse from the garage in the process.  There is also an absence of holes in the drywall from wayward animals.  Additionally there are not any ducks, unless they are on a platter.  They also don't find randomly placed hammers in the liquor cabinet.  They have, in essence, the opposite of my life.

One of the links asked the question "What if your blog was a room?"  So I asked myself, "What if Me and My Pack of Dogs was a room?"  And here's what I came up with:  Only half of the shit in the room would work properly and the other half would work intermittently.  There would be a doggie door and a broken wine glass on the floor, having been knocked over by Randi Unadopted in an exuberant entrance to the room.  One or more dogs would be licking his non-existent balls.

Excursions

It's been quite a busy couple of days.  First, Monday, Sara and I left the desert for a trip to Total Wine, Macy's and Trader Joe's for wine, make-up and raclette cheese for my raclette grill I ordered myself.  Merry Christmas self!  I also bought myself a tool box thingy to organize my tools.  In case you're wondering what kind of tools a single girl might have, I have all kinds of tools like a round saw, miter saw, jigsaw, aligator hedge trimmer, various sorts of screwdrivers and wrenches, a cordless drill and a corded drill, a drywall knife and various other assorted outils a person might need.  What I don't have is a mig welder, but that's a whole other story.  I don't like to use any of the tools which is why there are two men on my roof fixing the shingles that came off in the gale force winds a few months ago.  The pounding has caused all three of my dogs into hiding, from which I am not sure they will ever recover.

Back to my adventures.  Tuesday I went with the Big Guy to buy his and my mom's Christmas presents.  I can't say what they are in case my mom decides to pay attention to me and reads this, because it would ruin the surprise.  Then we went to Toys-R-Us.  When we were little my mom worked at Toys-R-Us  and let me tell you, there is no cooler place for a mom to work than Toys-R-Us.  I digress- that place was a freaking zoo.  I was glad my dad was there to protect me because there were wild eyed mothers pushing at my cart trying to get to presents.  We were lucky to make it out alive.  Our last trip was to Costco to purchase the charcuterie for my raclette grill that I purchased myself for Christmas.  I don't have a Costco card and haven't been to Costco in at least year because 1) it was too big to even expect to get through without my leg going numb and deux) a single girl does not need that amount of food.  Before we went in I said to my dad, "I haven't been to Costco in forever.  I'm going to want to look at everything!"  Also, since Christmas presents seem to be based on Max's preferences and enjoyment, I pointed out to my dad what I thought Max would like:  set of wine glasses, roaster and not the book with all the paintings at the Louvre.  (Really?  All?  I call bullshit with two hands and two feet on all the paintings in the Louvre.)  It took us a long time to get through Costco because every two minutes I stopped and exclaimed, "Wow! Dad!  Look at that!....Wow! Dad! Magazines!  Wow! Dad! Serving platters!  Max would love that!"  He eventually told me I needed to get out more.

This morning, I discovered that Mr. Hawk has been hunting in the overgrown bush in the Little Backyard.  I saw something in there moving around and I thought it might be dove or another bird, and then hopped out Mr. Hawk!  Who knows how many birds he poaches from there because that's where the finches fly when I walk out and they scatter from the duck food.  After, the pipe guy came out and fixed my faucets that weren't draining.  There was about ten minutes of work and then an hour of talking à la my mom and causing me to ponder various emergencies I could come up with to get him to leave and since I hadn't spent enough money this week now the handymen are out working on the roof and effectively traumatizing the Pack for life.    I did not go for a walk because my back is quite sore, so without a doubt Sara is winning on the Leader board at dailymile.com which none of you can see because you are not our friends.  I had previously been the leader on the Leader board for three weeks in a row, which forced me to point out to Sara that she was being beat by an invalid.  Tomorrow I'm going to go to dinner at Sara's who is currently cat sitting for Jessica.  I'm going to take my breathing machine so I can make it through a two cat evening.

Early Christmases

The Christmas Breakfast at school is a Pretty Big Deal.   Everyone brings their family.  The weeks leading up to the breakfast are filled with smack talking emails in which "reply all" is standard and it's a wonder no one loses his/her email privileges.  And the only way to be a sure fire hit at the Christmas Breakfast is to have a baby with you, so I had decided this year, I wasn't going to go unless one Maximus A. Jagiello could be my date.  Lucky for me, he rarely has dates and just needed a ride.  Friday morning I drove to my parents and picked up the stinking cutest baby ever.  My mother had dressed him in his Santa outfit and when we walked into the Christmas breakfast (after I had to wrestle him out of the car seat, having been unsuccessful at removing the car seat from the base) there was a collective "Oh, how cute."  Renee said, "Oh Bethany he's precious."  And then she chastised me when I responded, "I know!"  "Bethany," she said, "you're supposed to just say 'thank you'"  I said, "I'm not his momma!  I'll say I know! when people say he's cute because he sure is!"  Peggy took him around and introduced him to everyone as mine and I said, "Great Peggy, people are thinking, well no wonder Bethany got so fat and was out at the beginning of the year."

Then I spent all afternoon at my mom and dad's house.  I babysat while they went and got their tree and  then Max and I watched and laughed, when they, as is classic Mom and Dad, nearly got divorced over whether the tree was straight in the tree stand.

Saturday, Sara and Jessica and I did Christmas.  I had great plans to make snowman cake pops.  Let me tell you, they were going to be the Bomb.  I had pretzel sticks for the arms, mini Reces Pieces for the hat and candy for his eyes and nose.  Only turns out making cake pops requires some skill and I ended up with a big fat mess and was unable to make anything look remotely edible.  Jessica made me and Sara aprons, presumably so that we can be domestic goddesses and have better luck finding men.    They are pretty cool.

Yesterday, we propped this guy up in front of the tree and said, "Be cute!"  I think he did pretty good.

What my cake pops were supposed to look like from bakerella.com:

Daddy, Please!

Last night I used my best, "Daddy, please" voice to get his legal advice.  I thought all hope was lost.  But today the most bestest dad in the whole world called to let me know a whole bunch of things I can't divulge, but which made me squeal with delight when I heard them and made me call and say, "Is this the most best dad in the whole world??"  That guy's the best!  Also, he's going to get my duck food and dog food tomorrow and he's going to bring it to the house and put it in the appropriate containers and pick up the thing I can't speak about which I'm going to leave outside.

In other news, I knew yesterday that today was going to be miserable because I had 4 1/2 hours of Family presentations awaiting me.  That 4 1/2 hours of "Voici mon mère.  Il esssst belle.  Il est 36 ans"  I told Sadonna maybe I was going to need to take some pain medicine to get through the day.  I knew today was going to be a "why do I like French?" day.  I didn't know that I was going to lose my marbles half way through the day, so much so that I had to put myself in a time out in Gretchen's room.  I said, "I"m going to walk into Mrs. Peratt's room and count to ten."  I've only ever been that mad maybe two other times in my career.   Once was in France, when a girl wrote "FUCK" on the chalkboard and when I saw it, I lost all my billes and screamed "QUI... A... ECRIT... ÇA? QUI??!!"  And then I stomped myself as fast as I could to the train station only to find myself pushing the open button the train door frantically while the train started to move away.  I don't remember if that night I met the chemists, but I'm sure there was alcohol when I got back to Strasbourg.  And the other time, I'm sure it's happened, but I can't remember.

To get over losing my marbles, I ate three sugar cookies and one and one half shortbread cookies, chili cheese fries and a bacon avocado cheeseburger.  I feel better.

Thwarted Plans

I was supposed to walk five miles today.  I was supposed to pick Sara up shortly before 10:00, then meet Bill, then walk my five miles, then go to breakfast, then work on a quilt.  Instead I have spent all day in a pain pill stupor due to the fact that there was a fucking cat stuck in the rafters of my garage.

Let me back up and tell the story proper.  After putting in my sheets to be washed because someone who wasn't me, threw up on them, I walked outside about 8:30am to start the car so I could go to the store and buy some gin, apples, blueberries and tea (listed in order of importance.)  However, when I walked out the door I heard a lot of commotion in the garage and so I walked in to discover Randi, up on top of the miter saw jumping at the rafters trying to eat an obviously scared cat.  Earl was also scaling various piles of junk trying to get at the cat.  Screaming ensued.  I tried to reason with Randi and Earl, but since that didn't work I had to drag 150 lbs into the house because the door to the garage is swollen and won't shut and it was the only way to keep the cat safe.  Then I called Sara and I said, "There is a fucking cat trapped in the junk in my rafters!"  Sara offered some advice to try to shoo the cat down.

After which I spent about 30 minutes trying to reason with the cat.  I also called my dad and said, "There's a god damned cat in the rafters, DAD!"  He suggested I open the big garage door and so I pushed the big garage door open, because of course, the garage door opener is broke.  And I took these pictures.

Then, because I could see that this was one fucking big cat, I thought perhaps she was pregnant and had decided to give birth in my garage.  It was also clear that she was quite literally a scarity cat, so I had the bright idea to move some junk around to make a ladder for her to get down.  She wasn't having that; instead, she climbed on top of the open garage door and hunkered down.  I then had the bright idea to try to pull the garage door down, hoping that she would just slide right out of my life, but the garage door is bent and it wasn't cooperating despite using all of my strength.  By that time, Sara was already on her way over to help out with a can of cat food and an immune system that permits touching cats.  She got here and enticed the fat cat with the cat food.  The cat came right to her, then scratched her nose when she pulled her down from the rafters.  After which Sara released her back into the wild and we had to put down the garage door.

Sara with the fucking fat ass cat that tried to get itself eaten at my house earlier today.

So, to review, a list of activities that have landed me back on the couch today:

1. Wrestling Randi and Earl into the house, so that they didn't eat a cat.
2. Opening the garage door.
3. Moving junk around in my garage to try to make a ladder for the cat who was stuck in my rafters.
4. Trying to put the garage door down by myself.
5. Putting the garage door down with Sara's help.

For one, I don't understand why the cats in this neighborhood do not have some kind of neighborhood watch going on and why they continue to come into my yard.  One would imagine that my house would be somewhat of a legend- like kittens would tell each other at sleepovers about the house on the cul-de-sac where cats disappear.  Or maybe they do and only the daredevils show up or only the cats that the other cats don't like.  Second, my dad was pretty vague about it, but he did imply a few weeks ago that there have been other crimes committed here and that he had cleaned up after such crimes.  He gave no details, but it appears the Saratoga Animal Shelter is not only harboring assassins, but training them to be more effective.  Third, I need a god damn man to help me take care of all this shit.

There's just enough room on the chair for Clark and his girlfriend.

Book Reviews

This morning started out with quite the commotion when a black dog was running amok in the access road and all three of my dogs had to chase it.  They are currently now all passed out:  Randi and Clark in here with me and Earl posed at the edge of the doorway because his foray into the room did not end well.  The trash can and bag of batting proved too threatening and he had to make a hasty retreat, knocking Randi over in the process.

I realized that I hadn't posted any book reviews in a loooong time.  I've been reading, I swear!

Books the LA County Library took back before I could finish them:

Echo Burning Lee Child  Some lady picks Jack Reacher up and wants him to kill her husband.  I only got to the part where Jack Reacher was trying to decide if he wanted to be a man whore with her.  Eeh, I was not interested enough to finish it.  (ASIDE:  Lee Child was on Charlie Rose and described Jack Reacher's man whoreness and "romance."  Click here to watch.

Doc Mary Doria Russel  I only read about 30 pages.  Something about Doc Holliday.

Books I finished:

A Is for Alibi Sue Grafton  In the first book of the series,  Kinsey Milhone is trying to solve a murder without a cell phone and without the internet.  And she does a pretty good and interesting job.  I bought this book and B Is for Burglar as well.

The English Assassin  Daniel Silva  Israeli Assassin, Gabriel Allon is framed for a murder and in the process of finding out who actually did it he shoots some people in the head and crisscrosses the European continent.  Fast paced and interesting as always.

State of Wonder  Ann Patchett  My main response to this book was huh, hum.  Dr. Marina Singh travels to the Amazon jungle to find out why her research partner has been killed.  She encounters her med school mentor who is researching a tribe in which the women have children until they die.  This book was interesting.  I read it pretty quickly, but I never really got the whole point.


The Leftovers Tom Perrotta  In a Rapturesque, yet religious-less event, people all over the world have just disappeared.  The Leftovers is the story of the people who are left and how they deal with being left behind.  Creepy cults abound as the characters find their way without their loved ones.  Definitely interesting.


The Tiger's Wife  Téa Obrecht  The synopisis via Goodreads.com :

 In a Balkan country mending from years of conflict, Natalia, a young doctor, arrives on a mission of mercy at an orphanage by the sea. By the time she and her lifelong friend Zóra begin to inoculate the children there, she feels age-old superstitions and secrets gathering everywhere around her. Secrets her outwardly cheerful hosts have chosen not to tell her. Secrets involving the strange family digging for something in the surrounding vineyards. Secrets hidden in the landscape itself.

I'm not sure what to say about this book.  It was ok.  A friend of mine raged and raged, but I just kept getting confused as the author went back and forth between stories.

Food Rules  Michael Pollan  Some rules for eating in case you weren't sure what to do.  Interesting and a very quick read.

The Night Strangers Chris Bohijilian  I love Chris Bohijilian, so I was very excited to read his newest novel.  Chip Lipton is a pilot whose plane crashed and 39 people died and he is racked with guilt and plagued with PTSD.  In an effort to "get away" he moves his family to New Hampshire.  What follows is a ghost story, weaved with the occult.  There's a boarded up door in the basement, a group of herbalist and a gripping story.  I sat in the doctor's waiting room riveted, my hand to my mouth barely breathing for at least twenty pages.  I'm  not sure  I bought the ending the way the author intended, but I was not disappointed.

Santas

Just try and say that this guy isn't the Cutest Baby in the World.

Bonjour Tristesse

True sadness is getting ready to pour yourself the drink, only to realize all of the gin had been partooken of the night before.

Referrals

I had my appointment with the infamous Dr. Earle today.  I have a good 6th period class and left in a wave of warm "Aurevoir!  Aurevoir!"s  I was a freaking rock star walking out to the parking lot.  The whole way to my appointment, I practiced using my big girl words and not my construction worker words.  I wanted to have an app that drowned out all of the annoying people in the waiting room, but there's not one available in iTunes yet (patten pending.)  I also practiced choosing my attitude, so that I didn't go in there giving off waves of pissed the fuck off.  I answered the tech's medical questions, calmly and with only the barest tint of sarcasm.  My conversation with Dr. Earle started with her saying, "You know it wasn't me that said you can't go to the neurosurgeon, it was Choice Medical, they said you had to come see us."  I explained why that was not exactly true and she looked at her notes, where it was indeed written "Advise Bethany she cannot have a referral to the neurosurgeon."  In any case, my attempts to not put out pissed the fuck off vibes and I don't have a gun vibes must not have been successful because Dr. Earle left the room and the next thing I knew the tech was standing in the room taking notes; presumably in case I got crazy and tried to fuck some people up at the speed of a turtle.  She said it didn't make sense why I would want to go to physical therapy six months after my surgery.  I said, yes, but I requested this months ago (and, I didn't add, I've been waiting for you fucking douchebags to get your thumbs out of your asses and approve it.)  After a lot of blah blah blah and me stating my case why I should be granted the privilege to go to physical therapy for two times so they can show me exercises to do and exercises not to do since I have two titanium rods in my back, Dr. Earle acquiesced that that was a reasonable request and she would submit it, but she was doubtful that it would be approved by Choice Medical.

I didn't get to see Max because he was with his parents.  Parents schmarents.  That guy should be available for play whenever I want.

In other earth shattering news, the Big Guy reported that he and my mother spent some quality time rethinking their Christmas Present 2011 Policy, which up until today had been, "If you're name is not Max, no presents for you."  He also reported that they already purchased my present (yes, singular) and he was happy to report that "Max is going to enjoy it very much."  Based on this description, I am fairly certain I'm not getting a set of Wüstof knives.

Comfort

The early morning wrestling match involved some kind of play mishap which resulted in Clark needing some quality time on my lap this morning.