Super Bowl Sunday!

With me being in Chicago, the Super Bowl is HUGE this year. I was just checking out TVGuide.com to see what time the official game starts, and I discovered something interesting on Animal Planet. To quote The TV Guide listings for Puppy Bowl III, "Puppies cavort in a play area that looks like a football stadium in the third annual event that offers an alternative to the Super Bowl. Included: a halftime show featuring kittens."

Part of me is terrified, and part of me wishes I had a blank tape so I could record this for future use. What exactly that future use is, I am unsure ... but it would be decidedly fantastic.

So a ton has happened since I last updated. Our computer is officially running Windows Vista now! We had been using the Beta version for awhile, but now we've upgraded to the full thing. I'm having fun exploring, but the husband really knows his stuff and could tell you about all the wonderful fantastic things Vista can do!

Speaking of which - I had texted him about the fantasticness of Puppy Bowl, and he told me where to find the CD that will reinstall the software that lets us record TV straight onto the computer! YAY! Puppy Bowl III - you will be mine! I'm going to go do that, and then later write a whole new entry all about the rest of my life. There's big news! Hint: I'm a librarian!!!!!

Advice Requested

I am in the middle of a bit of a job flux. I graduate in May with my MLS, which is super exciting (YAY!), and I am already keeping an eye out for library related jobs. I am applying for a storytelling internship at the library down the street (literally six blocks away. How wonderful would that be? And I'd be STORYTELLING!) which would be only 10 hours a week but otherwise perfect: working with youth, getting to know people at the library I would ideally want to work with when I graduate, and best of all - it ends just before my due date so I can easily take time off to have a baby!

I just got an email from one of my professors. A library way out in the suburbs is hiring a youth librarian, and they are willing to look at people who are almost done with their MLS (that's ME!). I'm definately going to apply because what is the harm in applying? There are a couple of cons for this job, the main one being that map quest says it's 45 minutes away - but I used to have a class way out their and with the construction on the Dan Ryan it's more like an hour and a half ... PLUS I'm having a baby in May. How great is it to say, "wow, this job is wonderful! Thank you! I'm gonna need a couple of weeks off in about four months. Is that ok?" Pros for the job? It's in youth services, it's part time (I was planning on taking a few months off after giving birth, but a part time job that works with my schedule would be fantastic as well), and it's in a pretty nice suburb.

Ok, so I guess I don't really need advice - I'm going to apply for it either way. I'm doubting I'll get it because it's the type of job that everyone at my school will probably apply for ... but a girl can hope, yes?

I hate writing cover letters. As soon as I am done here I am going to the library and getting a few books on writing cover letters. They always seem so awkward and formal and contrived to me, no matter what I write. Anyone out there really fantastic at cover letters who wants to give me some pointers? I'd be appreciative.

P.S. I've been reading like crazy and plan on telling y'all about them very shortly. Stay tuned for reading fun!

Barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen ...

I am feeling all domestic and kitchy and 1940s. Back during the summer, Jell-O was on sale and I thought, "who doesn't love Jell-O?" So I bought eight packages. How much Jell-O have I made since I bought them? Exactly none ... and I have had the craziest craving for Jell-O lately. I think it is brought on by the commercials they have nowadays for the people who eat the wiggly desert and start wiggling themselves. They're strangely addicting commercials. ANYWAY - I looked in my pantry and realized that three of the flavors I have - Strawberry, Apricot, and Pineapple - look very pleasing together, so I just made up three batches and am letting them cool for a bit before I pour them one on top of each other. I've never done this before, and the web is not being helpful when it comes to telling me how long to chill before mixing ... four hours total for chilling - that I know - so I've set the timer for an hour (by then they should be reasonably firm, I think), but I'm checking it in half an hour.

The ultimate goal? Red, orange, and yellow kitchy goodness!

I just realized something

I am very envious of my sister. My favorite animal in the whole wide world is the mhorr or Dama Gazelle. I love it - but it is extinct outside of captivity, so I have never actually seen one. My sister used to live in St. Louis and one of her favorite places to go there was the zoo ...

and this means that she has seen mhorrs quite a bit!

So now I have to get ahold of her and ask if they are as gorgeous in person as they are in pictures.

(edited because I am a silly Librarian Pirate)

Hmm - Blogger does not seem to be letting me update right now. I’m not sure if this has anything to do with the scheduled outage tomorrow morning or if this is just because I’m special, but either way I can’t do it! The blogger page is glitching all over the place. I’m writing this on Monday, January 8 at 3:38 pm, but perhaps it won’t be updated until Blogger feels like letting me tomorrow ...

I made eggnog cheesecake a few days ago for my husband’s birthday. I just asked him if he was ok with dinner tonight being cheesecake and milkshakes, and he said yes. WOO! Go me! I don’t know why, but it’s always more fun to have crazy dinners when I can pretend that “it’s ok. I have permission.” The permission could have come from my 12 year old cousin and that would be just fine with me, as long as I have it. This seems to me to be the opposite of what most people would want. For many, the pleasure of the deviant dinner comes specifically from the fact that dinner should not be cheesecake and milkshakes. For me, the pleasure comes from the dinner being something I shouldn’t be supposed to do - but it’s ok, because I’m special. It’s an ego boost.

Now that was a completely boring rambly paragraph that could easily be summed up as, “cheesecake and milkshakes for dinner! Woo! You do it too, I give you permission.”

Ice Cream is buy one get one free at the store right now (because really, who buys ice cream on January 8th? Me! That’s who!), so I get to spend the whole day deciding on milk shake flavors. Brandon said he doesn’t care, so it’s all up to me. I’m thinking chocolate and mint chocolate chip ... although I know Brandon has a thing for banana milk shakes (don’t ask me. Eeeew), so perhaps mint chocolate chip and banana ... or perhaps I’ll just decide when I get there.

For Christmas, Brandon got me a DVD set of movies by the Monty Python boys. Last night and this morning we watched The Adventures of Baron Munchausen which contained my new motto. Someone tells Baron Munchausen that he has no grasp of reality and he responds, "Your reality, sir, is lies and balderdash and I am delighted to say I have no grasp of it whatsoever." Overall it was a fantastic movie - one of Uma Thurman's first (one of the few times where I think she is really as gorgeous as everyone says she is is this movie), and Sarah Polley (who I loved in Road to Avonlea when I was little).

Anyway, I'm back from work and Blogger is letting me post so I better not miss this opportunity!

A hint of Philosophy at work

As most people who have worked retail for far too long, I have some standard phrases I use in certain situations. When I see a customer who looks as though they are in need of some help I walk up and ask "How can I help you today?" If I see a customer who looks as though they are finding and enjoying and probably not (but perhaps) in need if anything I ask, "Are you finding everything alright today?" Today I walked up to a customer and asked her "Are you finding yourself alright today?"

Existentialism when shopping for picture frames. Can't beat that!

In other news, I burned my hand pretty badly last night. I tried to take a picture of the gruesome blaring grossness that is my hand, but I couldn't quite get the flash to stop washing out the burn and making it look pale and wimpy (compared to the red grossness that it is), but at least you can kinda see the size of the burn. It hurts like crazy, but my loving husband bought me pirate bandages!!! Seriously - how cool is that? It would be even better if they were librarian bandages ...

Anyway! I'm off to eat carrots. I've got a crazy craving ...

Love in the library quiet and cool!

So - one of my New Year's resolutions? Update at least once a week. We'll see how it goes. We all know I'm a slacker monkey, so this might be a problem ...

Penny Arcade pointed me in the direction of the video for Everytime We Touch by Cascada (Joan?). Parts of it I like - turning the library into a dance party? Awesome. The funky dancing janitor? Groovy! The library they filmed the song in is awesomely old fashioned which makes me grin and giggle like a schoolgirl. The song itself is too Pop-y for my usual tastes, but it's somehow infectious ...

My main problem with the video? It isn't the stereotypical shushing librarians ... it's the desperate need for Miss Cascada to rearrange the library's card catalog
and then throw random cards around. How is anyone going to find their books NOW, eh? Yes, the library should have that all on computer by now (it is 2007), but they've probably invested their money elsewhere - like in keeping the library groovy and old style looking!

Ok, so I'm a huge geek ... isn't that why you love me?

In other news - first ultrasound! My baby officially has fingers and toes! YAY!

"You think that's an update?"

Ok, ok - I'll spend the rest of the evening working on a better update. There's a lot goin' on in my life right now!

My new favorite blog (besides all of yours, of course) is Mimi Smartypants. She's fantastic - and she's here in Chicago, so I'm reading her archives right now noting all the local flavor. It makes me happy. I just read the January 3, 2001 entry and feel the need to share something with my husband, but it's far to long to text to him and he's at work, so I guess I'll just have to share it with the Internet. Mimi Smartypants says:

One of my holiday gifts was this page-a-day calendar called "Forgotten English," which has a queer medieval word for each day. Today's was especially good: curtain-lecture. Meaning "A lecture or homily delivered by a wife to her husband when in bed, upon the shortcomings and errors of his daily life." From T. Ellwood Zell's (what a name!) Popular Encyclopedia, 1871. This really cracks me up. Can you imagine lying in bed while your spouse lists your faults? Sweet dreams!

One of my other new favorite things is audio books. For Christmas my fantastic parents got me a Zune, and yesterday I went to the library and got Barbara Kingsolver's Pigs in Heaven on CD to listen to while I did the dishes and laundry and went grocery shopping and crocheted and in general went about my daily life. Kiddos, I'm already 3/4 done with the book! One of my Reader's Advisory teachers was a big audio book advocate because you could double (or more) the books you read just in your daily life, and I am so much a fan now! I tried it a few times during that class, but we only have a stereo in the living room, so when I was in the bedroom I had to have it waaaaay turned up. That was a fun week - I had to read a romance for class, and I was listening to it, and didn't realize it had some ... very explicit sex scenes. I live in an apartment, and our walls are so paper thin that I can hear every wood on my neighbor's TV ... so I went tearing through the house to turn it down before the neighbors think I'm the sort of person who listens to steamy sex scenes REALLY LOUD!

In completely different news, I just read Issue 2 of Onslaught Reborn (if you don't know what I'm talking about, you probably don't read Marvel comics, so don't worry about it), and I got the I'm bringing Onslaught back song stuck in my head. I was going to be all cool and stick it in my blog only to discover that it was taken off of YouTube because Marvel didn't like the use of their pictures in it. I was all excited too - but I guess you'll just have to read the lyrics instead.

And with that, I am going to go listen to more of my book and crochet.

(Captain America) - yeah he’s in it
(Incredible Hulk) - yeah he’s in it
(Iron Man) - drinks too much Guinness

So I had this whole plan. First I was going to post a celebrity-stalking- style-post about how “I” had figured out what was going on with Librarian Pirate. I was going to post a picture from about a year ago, and then one from now and show that suddenly this mysterious Librarian Pirate HAS BOOBS! The obvious answer is that “she” has had some work done - namely a boob job. I would include an obligatory quote from someone close to Librarian Pirate renouncing this fact, and another from someone else saying that there is a large amount of more boobage - what else could be the culprit?

THEN a few days later I was going to post another celebrity-stalking-style-post denouncing the rumours swirling about a Librarian Pirate boob job and claiming that “we” know the truth. We have discovered photographic evidence that the boobs are not the only thing about “her” that are getting bigger. I would then include a picture of my waist that showed the possibility of a baby bump.

I’m sure you can figure out quite a few reasons why this never happened.

• It's dumb
• It's needlessly complicated
• It is not as funny as I think it is
• I don't have any good pictures of me with boobs
• I don't have any good pictures that acurately show off my baby bump
• I'm not so sure that people would "get it" because of the aforementioned "dumb"ness and needless complication of the scheme

So basically I'm just going to come out and say it. I'm having a baby! I am incredibly excited excited. According to current projections, I get to become a mother and a librarian in the same week! I’m due two days before graduation. Here’s hoping that Turnip Head (working name) isn’t early, because that could really mess up me finishing school the way I want to. We’re rooting for right on time ...

Other questions answered:

No, this probably isn’t going to become a mommy blog. I don’t know that I have spent enough time with my blog for a proper theme to emerge, but I can imagine that me having a baby is just going to add one more topic for me to discuss. An important topic that I will probably spend quite a bit of time talking about, but that will SO very much not be the only thing discussed.

Yes, I’m healthy. Other than throwing up (ALL THE TIME) and general aches and pains (and shortness of breath and random dizziness), I’m just dandy!

Yes, My husband is super happy. Brandon is almost more excited than I am (possibly more, because he isn’t throwing up all the time. I’m super jealous). He does all sorts of adorable things - reading books to my belly, taking good care of his irritable, pregnant wife, etc.

Yes, I am hormonal. I’ve started crying to ranch commercials. FREAKING RANCH COMMERCIALS! It’s a SALAD DRESSING! It isn’t a tear jerker! But have you seen the new Hidden Valley Ranch commercials where the boy or the girl right around my age is in a new apartment/dorm room/whatever that’s drab and full of boxes, and they sit down and eat a salad covered in Hidden Valley Ranch dressing and it transports them to a picnic with their family (presumably in their mind, but if it does have that kind of power, then rock on, Ranch Dressing!) because they miss their family so much? Yeah, makes me cry. The funny thing is, it makes me cry not so much because I miss my family, but because the character in the commercial thinks that salads are the best way to deal with missing their family. Me? I miss my family? I call them. Works SO much better than eating a salad. But then again - that might just be me and my crazy ideas on what to do when you miss your family.

So - any other questions that I missed?

I have to tell you how cute my sister is. Do you remember twelve days ago when she posted about the most adorable bibs ever that she made? And she said that "one of her friends" just announced that she's having a baby? Well ... that friend was me. At first, I thought "friend? FRIEND?" Then I thought, "how sweet! She's not announcing it to the internet before I can!" See - my sister's smarter than I am. I heart her. And those bibs! SO CUTE! I'm not sure if I'm going to let the baby spit up on them ... AND she made us scarves for the crazy cold Chicago winter we've got coming (although it is GORGEOUS today!). Which reminds me - she asked me to take pictures of the scarves so she could preserve them for posterity. Let me go do that ...


Done! Go check out my flickr page if you want to see them (and if you happen to be my sister and would rather I emailed you copies, just say the word, and they're yours!).

Well, it's time for me to go move around the laundry, then clean the kitchen, then eat some chips and salsa while reading a good book. I hope you all enjoy your day!

Brandon uses up the internet

Silly SBC! My husband and I moved last Saturday. SBC/AT&T said we would have internet/phone service by Thursday. When it wasn't on by Friday we called and they said, "we'll send someone right over to check the lines and your box and whatnot, it should be up in 24 hours at the latest, but probably by 7 pm." It soooo wasn't on by 7pm, and it definately wasn't on 24 hours later. Yesterday, Brandon called again and said, "still not working!" They said, "we'll send someone right over to check the lines and your box and whatnot, it should be up in 24 hours at the latest, but probably by 7 pm." Brandon said, "but you said that yesterday and nothing got fixed!" They said, "Thank you for calling AT&T, have a nice day!" And they hung up. TRAGEDY! So Brandon called them back, spent another 10 minutes navigating their automated phone system before getting another real person who said, "we can't get someone out to fix your problem until Wednesday." WEDNESDAY!

So this morning we pulled out the laptop. "Perhaps we can find someone nearby using an unprotected wireless connection!" we thought deviously. We found someone! They're probably far away because we're only getting it at 30% of their speed, and it's really slow. Brandon got on first to change our addresses with important places (like the bank), and then he showed me the trailer for VIVA PINATA (I'd link it, but oy with the slow internet!). He obviously had internet. He gives the computer to me and the thing can't even connect to gmail. "YOU USED UP THE INTERNET!!!" I shouted furiously at him. (Well, not so furiously, but I'm building dramatic tension here!) "Wait a minute and it'll come back. It's just really slow.

I decided to spend that minute writing an update for the blog, but since this laptop's only word-esque function is Notepad. I am writing it there and am amused by the silly font that Notepad automatically uses.

Still no internet - i'll update this when it becomes available! And now blogger isn't letting me spell check, and I typed this while emotionally distraught, so hopefully you guys cana read it. I'll go through and spell check it later. Forgive me?

didja miss me?

You know you did. It's ok to admit it. I have a story to tell you.

You all know there is a war coming between pirates and ninjas, right? Well, if you didn't, now you know. From the title of my blog, I am sure you can figure out what side I'm on.

Yesterday, the other side made the first move*. The good news - my nose is not broken (just twice it's normal size and somewhat ... purpleish black), and the concussion was only very very minor. The bad news? I feel like an absolute idiot. I mean - who lets ninjas get the drop on them?

The even better news? This brush with the enemy has caused me to want to return to my blogging days. You excited? Good! Thank you for at least pretending.

*By "they made the first move," I obviously mean that it must have been ninjas, because really - who is clutzy enough to walk into a metrocart? Those stealthy ninjas must have moved it in an attempt to do evil.

UPDATE: And can I tell you all how amazingly freakingly excited I am about this movie? Yay!

It is not so much an apology as it is an explanation

It is not so much an apology as it is an explanation

I was sending an email to my mother about all the books I have to read for the one class I am taking right now (Library Materials for Young Adults), and I figured that you all might be interested in exactly what is keeping me from you.

Keep in mind that all this is going on while work is crazy. One of my fellow managers quit, so I am working 45 hours a week to make up for the lack of another manager. I know – YAY money, but still! Free time? In the immortal words of Mike La Fontaine, “I don’t think so!”

So – for class next Monday (a week from today) I have to read Feed by M.T. Anderson, Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card, and then I get to pick two of the following:

Adams, Douglas. Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. Harmony, 1979.
Bechard, Margaret. Spacer and Rat. Roaring Brook, 2005.
Dickinson, Peter. Eva. Delacorte, 1988.
Philbrick, Rodman. The Last Book in the Universe. Blue Sky, 2000.

And that's just for the first half of the class - Science Fiction. For the second half (Fantasy) I have to read Tithe: A Modern Faerie Tale by Holly Black and Anansi Boys by Neil Gaiman (FINALLY! I have been wanting to read that for ages!), and I then get to pick two of the following:

Billingsley, Franny. The Folk Keeper. Atheneum, 1999.
Gruber, Michael. The Witch's Boy. HarperTempest, 2005.
Kibuishi, Kazu. Daisy Kutter: The Last Train. Viper, 2005.
Morris, Gerald. The Squire’s Tale. Houghton, 1998.
Patterson, James. Maximum Ride: The Angel Experiment. Little, Brown, 2005
Peet, Mal. Keeper. Candlewick, 2005.
Pratchett, Terry. Wee Free Men. Harper, 2003.
Westall, Robert. Yaxley's Cat. Scholastic, 1992.
Wooding, Chris. Poison. Scholastic/Orchard, 2005.
Westerfeld, Scott. Uglies. Simon & Schuster/Simon Pulse, 2005.

The fun doesn't end there! For Tuesday (Humour) I have to read Christopher Paul Curtis' Bucking the Sarge and Louise Rennison's. Angus, Thongs, and Full-Frontal Snogging.

AND (select three)
Benton, Jim. It’s Happy Bunny: Life. Get One. Scholastic, 2005
Hiaasen, Carl. Hoot. Random House,
Limb, Sue. Girl 15, Charming But Insane. Delacorte, 2004.
Paulsen, Gary. How Angel Peterson Got His Name and Other Outrageous Tales of Extreme Sports. Lamb, 2003.
Pinkwater, Daniel. The Education of Robert Nifkin. FSG, 1998.
Strasser, Todd. How I Spent My Last Night on Earth. S&S, 1998.
Williams,Carol Lynch. My Angelica. Delacorte, 1999.

LETS MOVE ON TO WEDNESDAY, shall we? Wednesday is Biographies, Nonfiction, and Semi-realistic Fiction. We start with Jack Gantos. Hold in my Life and move on to Anita Lobel's No Pretty Pictures: A Child of War

AND (select one):
50 Cent. From Pieces to Weight: Once Upon a Time in Southside, Queens. Pocket Books, 2005.
Freedman, Russell. The Voice that Challenged a Nation. Clarion, 2004.
Greenberg, Jan & Sandra Jordan. Vincent Van Gogh: Portrait of an Artist. Delacorte, 2001.
Myers, Walter Dean. Bad Boy: a Memoir. HarperCollins, 2001.
Partridge, Elizabeth. John Lennon: All I Want Is the Truth. Viking, 2005.

Then I also have to read
Winick, Judd. Pedro and Me: Friendship, Loss, and What I Learned. Holt, 2000.
AND (select one):
Armstrong, Jennifer. Photo By Brady: A Picture of the Civil War. Atheneum, 2005.
Bartoletti, Susan. Hitler Youth: Growing Up in Hitler's Shadow. Scholastic, 2005.
Farrell, Jeanette. Invisible Allies: Microbes that Shape Our Lives. Farrar, 2005.
Frank, Mitch. Understanding the Holy Land: Answering Questions about the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict. Viking, 2005
Hamanaka, Sheila. In Search of the Spirit. Morrow, 1999.
Nelson, Marilyn. A Wreath for Emmett Till. Houghton, 2005.
Perel, David. Bat Boy Lives! Sterling, 2005.
Philbrick, Nathaniel. Revenge of the Whale: The True Story of the Whaleship Essex. Putnam, 2002.

By then I will be flat out dead. Completely and utterly. This class is over at the end of June, so in July I might be back. We'll see. At the very least, I get to read some fantastic Young Adult books, which nobody should ever complain about!

Friday Cat Blogging

.

I don't understand this kitten. She has a moment to be all calm and serene (the picture woke her up - she was asleep two moments before I took this), so she goes and sits in the dustbin?

Crazy cat.

In other news, Miss Doxie posts more than I do ... this must be rectified! Because I don't post enough! Interesting things are happening. I must to the library now, but when I return - the saga of the cereal (and not the Johnny Depp stuff Marcia keeps telling me to get - although I do need to get that cereal too ... )

hey hey HEY!!!

WHY oh WHY did NOT ONE SINGLE PERSON tell me that there is, in fact, a whole slew of buttons and t-shirts and magnets all devoted to librarians being pirates?

And apparently one well known librarian once said, "It wasn't so long ago that librarians were seen as pirates. How dare you let people take books for free? And make copies!?!? You are all a bunch of thieves! ... We all run by different rules but we all have the same goals in mind. My only request is that you don your eye-patch, practice your arrrr's and help protect the distribution of information in all its forms."

So ... yeah. I'm going to start (from now on) pretending that librarian pirate is named such not because I am going to be a librarian and I have a silly fascination with pirates ... but because I truly am all about freedom of information. I am - I really am ... I just thought the association between librarian/pirate was subtle ... not ARR! BOOKS! (even though that's my new motto - as my sweeet new banner declares.)

So yeah ...

I so meant that. Because I'm brilliant.

I'm not really here

I'm working on my final essay. I really am! I just had to pop in and tell you what a lovable dork my husband is. I went to the kitchen to get brain food chocolate, and when I come back, after what I've written on my essay it says, "IÂ'm a bumbely bag of coconuts." This was fifteen minutes ago and he's still giggling about it.

Now lets talk about why the world suddenly hates me

I'm not entirely sure why it does, but it definitely does. Something has caused the world to hate me. I have examples! Oh yes, I have examples. Most of them center around my job - which, it occurs to me, I have never blogged about. It might sadden some of you to know that while I will soon (SOON!) be a librarian, I currently make my living being neither a librarian nor a pirate. I don't shush people nor do I buckle swashes. We weep. We weep more because I work retail. It's how I'm getting through grad school, though, and most of the time I enjoy it (because I try to be hopelessly optimistic.

Anyway - the world hates me. I HAVE PROOF!

1. Yesterday at work I was rearranging things. I was taking things off of shelves and putting things back on shelves and moving shelves. It was insanity, I tell you, INSANITY! We have these impossible sort of shelves that are near impossible to move. They have these hooks that latch in and the more weight you put on them, the more solidly they stick into the proper holes. To get them out you have to hit the bottom of them with a rubber mallet. I am usually not strong enough to get them out, so I usually get help. I had moved something heavy off of the top shelf that had been there for a good two months or so. I moved heavy things off the bottom shelves. I then looked under the middle shelf to see how many pegs up it is when the top shelf just suddenly decides to fall. It hits me on the head, drags it's sharp edge down my arm, and lands with a thump on my thumb. OW!
2. It has been 60 degrees here every day. Today was the day I had to be at work by 5:45 am (that's right, you. AM!!!!) to do truck outside - I was not excited about the early morning, but I was trying to be happy because today was supposed to be gorgeous and I had to be outside for an hour or so right away! Finally - I'd get to see the sun! What did I get while unloading the truck? HAIL! It hailed this morning.
   
3. We're done unloading - JOY OF LIFE! My shoe became untied, so I bent to tie it, lost my balance, and fell into a box of wine glasses. I only broke one, but it was one of the pretty ones! Made me sad.
   
4. Later today I was bringing a ladder out from the back so I could bring some chairs down from the top shelves for a customer. When I was halfway there, this little boy runs in front of me and scared the everloving SNOT out of me - I was afraid the ladder was going to hit him. Instead, I dropped the ladder on my hip bone - bruising it darkly, along the way bruising the crap out of my side as the ladder scraped its way down my body.
5. Then I went to lunch. MMM - I'm slightly obsessed with Chipotle. There is one across the street from where I work and I only allow myself to go there once a week - otherwise I wouldn't leave. So guess who drops her burrito today? Oh, that would be me.
6. Back from lunch, I declare that I am not going to cause any more trouble today - and promptly trip over a basket of glasses that my coworker had just moved off of a shelf and was about to put on a different shelf. I left two intact, I am pleased to announce.

But things are looking up. My husband made me

a beautiful origami butterfly yesterday that is sitting there just making me happy, and tonight I get to eat the tastiest looking fruit salad in the world.

So my sister mentioned That Catholic Guilt Thing when she doesn't post every day. Just imagine what the Catholic Guilt Thing has been doing me for over two weeks pretty much!

So we're going to skip over the apologies and get straight to important things that have happened to me recently, starting with the absolute most important.

• MY HUSBAND GOT A NEW JOB!!! I have purposefully not blogged about how craptastic his job is currently, because once I start complaining about it I have trouble stopping. He is still a waiter, but at a much better restaurant. His old job was in a bad part of town where he got an average of 7% in tips, which is just pathetic. His new job is right downtown and at a super fun restaurant. I'm very happy for him.
• Brandon got me an Easter Basket that had in it peanut butter M&Ms, French Vanilla Pudding mix, Chef Boyardee raviolli, and pear juice. I loved it.
• I think I'm going to contact PETA about my husband. When I ate my chocolate Easter bunny, I decapitated it right away before taking one bite. Quick, painless, over. The lovely man I married purposefully saves that for last, eating the head after everything else to prolong the anguish. What do you think? Should I send PETA a letter? (I wonder if they hate Easter for just this reason)

Anyway - here's hoping everyone out there is wonderful! Stay tuned for more book reviews!

Fantastic Firsts #3 - Gregor the Overlander

Collins, Suzanne. Gregor the Overlander. New York: Scholastic Press, 2003.

I don't know about you, but every time I read the title, I get Depeche Mode's "John the Revelator" stuck in my head:
Well who's that shouting?
Gregor the Overlander!
All he ever gives us is pain
Well who's that shouting?
Gregor the Overlander!
He should bow his head in shame

I probably have issues ... but on to the book! Gregor the Overlander is part Alice in Wonderland, part Neverwhere, and pretty much all fantastic.

Two years, seven months, and thirteen days after his father disapears, 11 year old Gregor is doing laundry with his baby sister Boots. Being of that exploratory age, Boots finds that one of the grates opens, and when Gregor rushes to stop her from falling, they are both sucked down into the Underland - a land miles and miles below the surface of the earth. There they meet giant cockroaches (crawlers), rats (gnawers), bats (flyers), spiders (spinners), as well as an entire city full of humans. After being taken in by the humans, Gregor discovers that he just might be the fufillment of a prophesy, and that his father is being held captive by the rats. Thus he sets out on a perlious journey to save his father, and if the prophesy happens to follow him, so be it.

Gregor the Overlander was great. The character of Boots is just full of that childish wisdom that I'm a sucker for, and the characters are brilliantly done. I was finishing up this book just before class one night and I ended up sobbing right there in the hallway, because I really just loved all the characters.

I've had a rough week, so this review is going to be a bit short, but definately check this one out! I very much enjoyed it!

Artemis Fowl

Someone who LOVES me (aka my husband) bought me the new Matisyahu CD, Youth. By "the new Matisyahu" I mean the first big Matisyahu CD. I love it. He's great!

So anyway, the reason you are all here - a continuing of my "Fantastic Firsts" book discussions. Today we talk about Artemis Fowl by Eoin Colfer. The quote on the back is really quite fantastic, "Stay back, human. You don't know what you're dealing with."

The Fowl family is one of the biggest crime families in the world. When Artemis Fowl the First tried to move in on the Russian Mafia's territory, they launched a stolen missile at the ship he was on. This leaves his son, Artemis Fowl the Second, in charge of an enormous fortune and a huge crime syndicate. Unfortunately with the loss of his father and the ship he was on, the Fowl family stopped being billionaires and slipped down to merely multi-millionaires. Artemis, being a 12 year old boy genius, vows to fix this and hits upon a brilliant plan. He is going to steal gold from the faeries. This doesn't seem like such a good idea to me, but then again - Artemis is the genius!

Artemis Fowl is funny, witty, and smart. The faeries are surprisingly sophisticated, technologically savvy and great fun. Definitely not your typical faerie story, and I love that. I can't wait to find and devour the rest of the books!

You can read the Prologue and the first two chapters at the Artemis Fowl website, and then skeeble off to your local library and read the rest!

Good News + Grocery store Fun

Jill Carroll is free!!!!!!! I'm not sure if I put enough exclamation points there. She was treated well, she's in good health and John Podhoretz is a bit of an ass (but that really didn't surprise me).

You know, I know that I had class all morning so I was a bit out of the loop, but I really should start getting my news from, oh, I don't know, news sits as opposed to the blogsphere sometime soon. Thank you, Body and Soul, for letting me know about Jill Carroll!

Switching gears, I have to tell you the story of the grocery store from today. You know how sometimes the grocery store seems made just for you? Well - today I stopped by the grocery store to get tomatoes. I went to the tomato section, and the really good kind - the tomatoes on the vine - were on SALE! I was ecstatic and decided to get some cereal to celebrate. Being an adult who can pick out her own cereal I decided to get something chocolatey and something fruity. I get there and all Kelloggs cereals (normally 4.30) are on sale for 1.99. What kind of a world is this? YAY! So then I remember that I drank the last of the milk last night. SADNESS! Until I remember that I am in a grocery store! And in grocery stores they SELL MILK! WOOO!!! So with that I walked to the end of the cereal aisle, grabbed a gallon of milk, and started for the door. Just then I had a flashback of my husband saying that we are almost out of lunch meats. I skeedadle in that direction, well aware that my basket (by this point) should probably be a cart. Ah well. I get to the lunch meat section and I find that the good kind is BUY ONE GET ONE FREE! Now Buy One Get One Free always gets me - even more than 50% off (which I don't understand at all). I mean - I buy one thing that I was already going to buy, and they just GIVE me one? Out of the kindness of their hearts? WOW! Super cool!

So I'm checking out, finally, and the lady says, "do you have the coupon for the milk and the cereal?" and I said, "there's a coupon? I thought they were just on sale." She shook her head. "You have to have a coupon." "Well then no. I don't have the coupon." "Here!" Said the sainted check out girl. "I will put the coupon on your order anyway!" YAY!

So I'm leaving the store, looking at my receipt, and the sainted check out girl lied to me! The cereal WAS on sale without the coupon! What the coupon did was take the $2.99 that the milk cost and subtracted $2. It then took two of the cereals I grabbed and subtracted $.50 each. Basically this means that the milk cost me negative one cent. How cool is that?

Yeah, I know - it's a little thing to get excited about, but it has totally made my day!

I was going to post my Artemis Fowl review here, but this entry is getting long and my cereal is demanding someone EAT! So I shall be back soon.

P.S. - I'm trying to think of a good blog name for the husband. I've been reading far too much Miss Doxie and am inspired by her use of El Dukay. Also I have a hysterical story to tell that requires he have another name. So now, loyal readers, what should I call him? (besides "'Dough-ni the magnificent" which is what my mother and my sister call him. Actually, that might be a great name for him! Dough-ni! Hmmm ... I must think on this ... )