Favorite Moments

I never once watched Everybody Loves Raymond when it was on prime time television but I've seen it in its syndicated life. I doubt I've seen all the episodes but it's a funny show. Some of my favorite episodes include the one where Debra and Ray leave their luggage on the stair landing, or the episode where they remember how they met. But one episode that makes me laugh until tears are streaming down my face - every time I watch it - is the one where Robert deliberately munks up his wedding invitation because Ray and Frank convince him Amy really wants to do the invitations and he's taking that away from her if he does them himself.

Are you an Everybody Loves Raymond fan? Do you have a favorite? Share please! :o)

And now, a clip from the wedding invitation episode. Enjoy! :o)

New favorite commercial

Have you seen this yet? Too cute. :o)

Recap of 2008

I'm stealing this from Alyssa, who stole it from Sarakastic who stole it from others, so this is far from an original post idea but it looked like fun and I'm nothing if not a follower (hey, the leaders gotta have someone following them, right? ;) ). Basically what I've done is taken the first sentence of the last blog post of every month. Then assembled the sentences in such a way that it might tell a bit of a story.

Here are the sentences:

January Well, Slime Boy (the probably married man that asked me out) got let go.

February The other day I had a doctor's appointment.

March Dear Muse, It was so nice to see you this weekend.

April Lately I've felt like I've been so behind on everything.

May I've been having some interesting dreams lately.

June I told a friend of mine yesterday that I'd blog about an eHarmony discovery I made.

July In less than 24 hours I should be in San Francisco.

August Okay, so you know that it took an online dating service for me to reconnect with a long lost friend (who I went out with once before a hundred years ago).

September Well, SCG and his family got here Friday around 10:00 a.m. and worked until about 4:00 p.m. - and we didn't finish the clean up! I

October Well, I went running last night.

November As most of you know, I did the online dating thing this past summer.

December Okay, this has to be a top 9 because well, there aren't 10 books that I feel that I can say I loved this year - of course that probably has a lot to do with the fact that I'm down from over 70 books read from last year to just over 30 this year, including audio books.

So, my mishmash, for what it's worth:

The other day I had a doctor's appointment. Well, Slime Boy (the probably married man that asked me out) got let go.

I told a friend of mine yesterday that I'd blog about an eHarmony discovery I made. As most of you know, I did the online dating thing this past summer. Okay, so you know that it took an online dating service for me to reconnect with a long lost friend (who I went out with once before a hundred years ago).

Dear Muse, It was so nice to see you this weekend. I've been having some interesting dreams lately. Lately I've felt like I've been so behind on everything. Well, SCG and his family got here Friday around 10:00 a.m. and worked until about 4:00 p.m. - and we didn't finish the clean up!

Well, I went running last night. In less than 24 hours I should be in San Francisco.

Okay, this has to be a top 9 because well, there aren't 10 books that I feel that I can say I loved this year - of course that probably has a lot to do with the fact that I'm down from over 70 books read from last year to just over 30 this year, including audio books. (Yeah, I know this one doesn't work but what are ya gonna do?)

White Elephants

Today my group at work had their holiday party. The meats were paid for by the department but everything else was of the potluck variety. I kept a list in my office where people could - but weren't obligated to - sign up so they could see what was needed or be sure they got in what they wanted to get in. We had a pretty good spread.

(That's my boss in the background.)

After we ate we played the White Elephant Game. You know the one. If you want to play, you have to bring a gift. All the gifts are placed on a tableand those bringing gifts draw a number. The person with number 1 goes to the table and picks a gift to unwrap.


We had some interesting "wrapping" - that envelope WAS the "wrapping paper".

Anyway, when number 1 is done, number 2 can either "steal" the present from number 1 or take another gift from the table. If the gift is stolen, then the person whose gift was can either steal someone else's gift (if it's further down the line - if only two have gone there wouldn't be another gift to steal, and you can't steal back your gift). Each gift can be stolen twice before it's "frozen" and it stays with an owner.

What we did to make sure we knew when a gift was frozen was they had to put on a hat - or other item available (hats in the picture above). Someone mentioned that people wouldn't want to wear the hats so I stipulated that if they didn't wear the hat, their present became unfrozen again and could be stolen. Yeah, I know I'm bad but it was totally worth it! lol

The first person to have their gift "frozen" was given a boa to wear.


Doesn't he look thrilled? lol I think it's a good look for him.

Anyway, a couple of weeks ago Christy Craig was having a contest over on her Killer Fiction blog and I said if I won (it was a pooping Santa), I'd put it in a Victoria's Secret bag and put it in the white elephant game at work. And I won. Well, I didn't win-win but she gave me one anyway - I think to see if I would do it and take pictures - and I did. :)

I have to confess that I thought about using something else because I really thought the pooping Santa was cute but I couldn't find the "replacement" gift I was going to use - my step-father's CD with the title song of "I don't look good naked anymore". I mean, really, how funny would that be in a Victoria's Secret bag? But, since I couldn't find it to save my life, I went with Plan A and used the pooping Santa.

Well, it wasn't any time before it got stolen - bag and all.


And a few minutes later, it was forever frozen (and since I was the last number in line, it was before I could steal it :( ).


So, I didn't realize how many "stealers" we'd have in our group and didn't know how many "frozen" hats I'd need. Well, I'd brought three headband hats and the boa. I borrowed six sombreros. I figured that would be enough. Well I was wrong. So, when we ran out of those, I had to get creative. Below are the "alternate" "hats" (yes, I thought the words should be quoted separately ;) ).


(By the way, he was the only one that didn't return his "hat" at the end of the game. No, seriously. lol)


And one last one with all the "hat people".A good time was had by all. :)

Miscellany

I forgot to bring my lunch today and I deliberately didn't bring a book to read, since it was Weight Watchers' day. However, since I didn't want them to watch me eat the hamburger (I didn't get cheese *sigh*) and fries I bought in the cafeteria, I didn't stay for the meeting. Which gave me some time to do other things. Like read blogs. And maybe write one. :-)

So, I be-bopped over to the Killer Fiction blog (all links on the side-bar) and found out that they have you autograph your breast before they do surgery on it. I didn't know that. And I'm still waiting on a reply as to whether they have you do this pre or post-drugged up.

Then I visited the Deadline Divas. Ellen had a very eloquent post about writing and donuts. And now I just wish our cafeteria had a Krispy Kreme section, but maybe I'll have to settle for cookies. (Hey, I don't have to weigh for another week, right?)

I stopped back by (I say back by because I think she posted this yesterday?) Alyssa Goodnight's blog. She'd posted about reading the latest Harry Potter story (no spoilers please because she has been known to stop by here too). She made a comment of having one regular visitor who had never read a single HP book. I assumed she meant me until 75 more posts (okay I exaggerate, but I wasn't the only one!) came through saying they'd never read any either.

Then I went to Laura Drewry's blog. Did you know Hell has frozen over? I didn't but now I wonder if it has anything to do with our recent cold weather? It was still hitting the 90s as recently as last week here. (Can you say UGH?!) And now it's a pleasant (if not "cool") 60 or so.

And then, last night...did you see Dancing with the Stars? If not, this might be a bit of a spoiler, I'll just tell you that now. Anyway, Marie Osmond fainted while waiting for comments from the judges. It was really strange because she seemed to have all this extra energy after the dance and was laughing kind of manic-ly one minute and on the floor the next. They went to the longest break in the history of commercial breaks and came back and said she was okay. (They said her first words when she came to and saw everyone hovering over her was "oh crap". Poor thing.) Anyway, what I was going to say is that the show was barely over and I popped over to msn.com and saw that they'd already posted an article about it, complete with video coverage. She ended up in last place, with that billionaire...Mark Cuban - is that his name? I'm worried she will get voted off tonight because I had no problem calling in votes for her and Mark hasn't been in the bottom two since that first night, despite being in last place (or next to last place when Wayne was still in the competition) with the judges each week since.

Anyway, that's all this hamburgered/french fried brain can come up with for now. Have you discovered anything interesting recently?

Full Disclosure

Okay, I'm in a bit of a pissy mood so I want to do something to lighten things up, before I do (or say) something I will regret.

Having said that, I've been talking to a lot of men I work with, who happen to be married (and some that are not, actually), of their ideas about the wife's role (and theirs too, in some cases) in their marriage. And then I've been "ranking" them based on my idea of a good husband.

Husband number one said his wife was a stay-at-home wife because he "liked her to take care of things so he didn't have to deal with them." This could mean a lot of things but just on face value, I ranked him kinda low.

Husband number two said that his wife worked part-time, sort of. She does free-lance writing for the newspaper and also sells articles to magazines. I thought this was pretty cool until he told me that she spends too much time on it and it interferes with "family time" because he's "spoiled" and wants her to be available to him at all times. He was serious. He also made husband number one look a lot better.

Husband number three, whose wife works, said he shares responsibilities with his wife. He does most (if not all) of the cooking. I asked him if his wife was a stay-at-home wife if that would still be the case. He said it would be because he likes to cook. Move to the head of the class.

Husband number four is the husband from last weekend. The one who had his wife lifting heavy furniture one month after giving birth saying "it's okay, she's strong." Made husband number one look better but may or may not make husband number two look better. They may very well be even.

Husband number five transferred in from Singapore last December. He'd been here a couple of months before his wife was able to join him and shortly before she arrived he said - and I quote - "I can't wait for my wife to get down here, the laundry's really piling up." All I could think was she was one lucky woman...NOT! Pretty low on the list.

Then there were the husbands-to-be...not that they're engaged or even dating or anything, they will just be probably be married some day, unfortunately. Husband-to-be number one said he used to have a maid. He called her "mom". Then he went on to tell me that him and his roommate are somewhat "messy" individuals and tend to wait for the other to clean up. He considers it a great victory when his roommate gives in first. And there's some "lucky" woman out there that will commit her life to him someday.

The discussion with the other husband-to-be (number two) was more about kids than wives and involved husband number one. HTB#2 was in an accident last week (a ladder fell off a truck and hit his brand new - only driven twice - car dead on. he's okay but the car...not so much) and the three of us were talking about it. Husband number one said something about the car and I said something like, "this from the man who has more pictures of his car in his office than of his kids". HTB#2 said, "yeah, but it's a really cool car." They both lost points on that one.

Of course, this is all subjective and means nothing - for a lot of reasons (not to mention it was all done in fun). One, it's just my opinion. Two, what difference does my opinion make if I'm not the wife?

But it also made me wonder what other people think makes a good spouse? (Husband's opinions welcome too.) What things does your significant other do that makes you overlook the things that make you crazy? And what do they do that make you crazy?

Inquiring minds want to know. ;-)

P.S. Pissy mood gone! (For now anyway :-) )

Cold and flu season...or something else?

Yesterday I finished Jennifer O'Connell's Insider Dating. It's a story about a woman who decides to put together a network of women who will compile information, in an anonymous database, on the men they've dated so that other women can make informed decisions about who they date. While I enjoyed the book, I also learned something interesting.

One of the men had this thing where he would sneeze when he was horny. The heroine (and creator of the database) thought it was made up but told her friends about it. One of the friends explained how it was true that what happens in the nasal area is (or can be) directly related to the activity going on south of the border. It cracked me up. I thought it was made up for the story. I really did. I was going to post a blog about it without looking it up online, because it was too funny not to say something about it but I didn't want it to be proven untrue. But I couldn't stand it. In the end I finally broke down and googled it.

And you know what? Apparently it IS true! Something about the tissue and blood flow in each. They work the same and are (or can be) interrelated somehow. It's at times like this that being single sucks because I would so ask the man in my life about it but there's no discreet way to ask someone - a man - if it's true, that I know of. I mean, I have a number of good friends that are male but I just can't see myself asking one of them about this.

What I DO know, though, is that, I will never, ever hear a man sneeze again without wondering (and probably busting out laughing) if it's more than just a nose tickle. LOL

Hairy Scary

I went a little over a week ago to get my hair cut and my eyebrows waxed. I went to Mastercuts. Now I know what you're thinking but I rarely have anything difficult done to my hair so I didn't see any reason NOT to go there - or to go somewhere else and pay $90 just to get the ends of my hair trimmed.

So that's where it starts. Well, maybe I should back up and tell you that the last time I got my hair cut I had a "long" layer put in and asked them to cut it so that it would curl under easily, if not naturally. Considering the curling under thing is done the same as a layer, just underneath, I guess I shouldn't have been surprised that my hair chronically curled UP all the time - no matter what I did. And it didn't look good. I felt like an aging rock star that had a shag/mullet combo and didn't care that it looked awful. Except I did.

Anyway, when I got to Mastercuts I got a Hispanic hair dresser. I don't mind this except that during the course of my visit, I got the distinct impression that she struggled with the English language. Here's why:

She called me back and asked me what I wanted done with my hair. I told her that I just wanted the ends trimmed, a little taper around the face and cut so that it would curl under easily. I also told her I wanted my eyebrows waxed.

She said okay, then walked away to get the drape thing to cover me with. When she came back she said, "You want same haircut?"

Um, no. I just told you what I wanted, I thought. I SAID, "No. I just want the ends trimmed, a little taper around the face and I want it cut where it will curl under easily. I also want my eyebrows waxed."

"Oh, okay."

Then she starts cutting on my hair, and I swear she cut each one individually, using weird methods I've never seen used before. But I say nothing. Just when I think she's done she ask, "You want your bangs cut?"

My bangs were at chin level, which in my book means I do NOT have bangs anymore. I just looked at her and said, "No."

"Oh, okay."

Then she reaches in her drawer and pulls out something I've never seen before and aims it at my head. "Excuse me," I said. "What are you doing?"

"It's a razor."

Okay, not what I asked, and I'm even a bit more concerned. "What are you planning on doing with it?"

"It's a razor."

"Yes, I know. What are you going to do with it?"

"It give your hair texture."

"How? What does it do?"

"It's a razor."

"Yeah, I don't think we'll be needing it today."

"No? Oh, okay."

She put it away and then said, "That's all then?"

"I still want my eyebrows done." (Obviously I'm slow.)

"Oh, okay."

So we go over to the area where she's going to do my eyebrows. She doesn't ask me anything, she just starts applying wax. Not a lot you can do at that point. And really I was okay, up until she put it at the top part of my eyebrow. I said nothing because, really, what are you going to do? If it's munked up, it's munked up.

She worked on them for a while and then started tweezing the strays and she's spending a lot of time on them and finally hands me the mirror. I look at the right eyebrow...it looks good.

I look at the left eyebrow...it looks good too.

I look at them both...they don't match!!!!! I nicely point this out to her and she did fix them, as best she could. No one has said anything but I think I know why. Here's the deal, I can only raise my left eyebrow by itself (I can raise them both together but I cannot raise the right one by itself) and the left eyebrow is slightly higher than the right so I figure people think I'm giving them one of "those" looks. I'm not but that's how it looks - at least to me.

So if you see me and think I'm giving a look, I'm really not...it's just the result of a bad eyebrow wax. LOL

By the way, for fun posts (and entry into a contest), stop by here and post a comment. Tell them Lucy sent you. ;-)

Sing Along

I want to make fun of people today. Before you go thinking awful thoughts about me (well at least about wanting to make fun of people), just know I'm going to give y'all something to make fun of me about as well.

Have you ever been singing a song, loudly, where others could hear you, only to realize that the words you were singing weren't the actual words to the song? Think Phoebe Buffay (that's the right spelling...I looked it up) from Friends from an early episode when she thought Elton John was singing to Tony Danza instead of the tiny dancer. That kind of thing.

Or, the guy from my church when I was in high school. We sang a song quite frequently that had the words, "Thy loving kindness, is better than life." He thought the words were, "Thy loving kindness is better than wine." I mean, His loving kindness IS better than wine but it wasn't the right word. He said he was very embarrassed when someone pointed out his error.

Okay, so mine...I recently bought a Bon Jovi CD that has his song It's My Life on it. Now, I really do know the right words (well, I think I do anyway) but when I'm singing it? The wrong words come out - a lot. For Example:

Right way (we think): It's my life. It's now or never. I (ain't) gonna live forever.

Lucy's way (we know): It's my life. It's now or never. I don't wanna live forever.

and another passage...

Right way (we think): I just wanna live while I'm alive.

Lucy's way (we know): I don't wanna live while I'm alive.

Now I'm sure there's some subliminal or Freudian message I'm telling myself with the way those passages come out of me but I'm choosing not to look to closely at it.

But anyway, do you have any songs that the wrong words just want to come out of you when you sing them, loudly, where people can hear you? And if so, please share (I shared mine. ;-) )

A little silly

My step-father sent me this and I thought it was fun. Hopefully it will work. And if it does - you might want to set any drinks you have aside. ;o) (It's popping up in a separate window for me - just so you know.)

Can you keep a secret?

I've mentioned before that this is my secret blog. . . no one knows about it. I have one person that I don't know from RWA that knows about this blog (and only one person from my local chapter - and she doesn't know the name [I did tell her once, she just didn't remember it - which I'm okay with]), and I trust her with all my secrets so it's okay if I put this post out there.

At work we're getting ready for boss's day. Last year we dressed all our bosses up as pirates and the everyone else had to guess which pirate they were supposed to be. It was fun and all but at the time, I suggested we do a 50s theme this year. They all said okay and them I'm sure they promptly forgot about it. But I didn't.

So a few weeks ago we had our monthly Staff Support (SS) meeting and I brought it up again. I threw out the 50s theme again and they all liked it, but then started leaning towards Elvis and wanting to dress all the male bosses as Elvis from different times in his career. The lone female boss was going to be dressed up as Priscilla. Okay, we have a starting point.

Then, a co-worker and I decided to see where we could find Elvis "costumes" for cheap (because we pay for all of this out of our own pockets) and ended up at buycostumes.com. From there we went to their adult wig selection and we went off in another direction.

I sent an email to all the other SS telling them what we'd found and we scheduled a meeting for today to discuss further. I'd come up with an idea for a game, which was a starting point but after we started brainstorming I think what we decided was even better. We made a lot of decisions and I think it's going to be so much fun. We're going to dress up eight people (we're doing more than usual). We'll have Elvis, Donald Trump, Bill Gates, Dean Martin, Jeff Bagwell, Marilyn Monroe, Sonny, and Cher.

Now, you may be saying "Didn't she say the lone female boss?" but then probably disregarded it because I also said we're dressing up more than usual. But you'd have been right the first time. We're dressing one of the men up as Cher (his SS doesn't particularly like him so her wanting to do that to him is more out of spite but we all agreed it would be fun - and we like him so. . .).

Anyway, I worked up a little "program" today creating a tri-fold document. On the outside it tells them what the event is called and other miscellaneous information. When you first open it up you see the "rules" of play (which I'll go into in a minute). When you open it further you have all the bosses' names, with a blank beside it (for their guesses), the questions they're allowed to ask and the menu (the SS make them lunch too - and we've already decided on that as well). Everyone seemed to like it.

But the rules - we've decided not to dress them up from the beginning this year. Instead, they're going to come out as themselves, having only an index card with numbered answers on it. The group will be broken up into teams and each of the "celebrities" will visit with the teams. The team will say, "I want the answer to question 5 (or whatever number)". They won't read the question. The celebrity won't know the question - only the answer (they're not going to know who they are either - at this point anyway). Each team gets to ask three questions from the list, of which there are ten, of each celebrity. Then they have to make a guess at who they are supposed to be.

At the end of it all, the teams turn in their program with the answers and the team with the most right answers wins. (We're going to get them a little something but that hasn't been decided on yet.) While they're turning in their answers, the celebrities will be leaving the room and will be asked "who are you?" to see if they know. Then we'll dress them up as their character and they'll come back into the room - to music.

Elvis will come in to "Love Me Tender", Sonny & Cher to "I've Got You Babe", Bill Gates to "Money" (I don't know if that's the name of the song but I sang it for my co-workers and they knew what I meant.), Marilyn to "Happy Birthday Mr. President", Jeff Bagwell to "Take Me Out To The Ballgame". We haven't definitely decided on Dean Martin's song and Donald Trump will come in with pink slips saying "You're Fired!"

I'm already looking forward to it and it's a good two months away! I think it's going to be a lot of fun and I'll have pictures to prove it! :o)

But don't tell anyone - it'll be our secret. ;o)

For the easily amused

I've blogged before about my two favorite DJs, Roula and Ryan. They're on the air every morning from 6:00 - 10:00 and they do some amusing things - which is one of the reasons I listen to them.

Well, this morning they sent someone (I assume their intern) out to conduct an "experiment" at a local fast food restaurant. The premise was, drive-thru restaurants waste a lot of your time so they wanted to give some payback, right?

So they send out Kevin (aka Special K) to a local drive-thru restaurant for breakfast.

We first join Special K as he's one car back from placing his order. He acknowledges that there are cars behind him in line (which was the first time they considered that this would inconvenience customers probably more than the restaurant's staff but they decided to plow on anyway).

He pulls up to the thing (what do you call it?) you place your order at and orders a breakfast taco - that's it. We hear the lady tell him it will be $1.18. He pulls up.

When he gets to the window the lady says something we can't hear but Special K says, "You said it'd be $1.18."

(unintelligible talk from the lady)

Special K: "Can I borrow a quarter?"

Anyway, there was some more talk and he offered to buy her something (the DJs commented that it sounded bad that he couldn't afford his own breakfast but he's offering to buy her something...he said "she looks hungry!"). He paid for his food and they brought it out to him.

At which time he cut his engine and proceeded to eat his breakfast while still at the window. The DJs were expecting the staff to get ugly about it but they said nothing.

Meanwhile, the car behind him honks his horn at him. The DJs tell Special K that if they come to the window to investigate the honk to ask for more salsa. They did. He did. They brought him more salsa.

The car behind him honks again. The DJs tell Special K to prop his feet on the dashboard and get all comfortable while he's eating. He does.

The lady comes over to the window and politely asks him if he would go park "over there" to finish eating his meal. Special K says, "You want me to park over there to finish eating?"

"Yes."

"It's okay, I'm almost done. Can I buy you anything while I'm here?" He continues to eat, at the window.

The person in the car behind him lays on the horn.

Special K finishes up and drives off - the staff of the restaurant never getting ugly or rude. The guy in the car behind him though....

I was LMAO when this was going on. What can I say? I'm easily amused. LOL