Except I don’t drink beer because beer is gross and I don’t understand how anyone can drink that garbage because it looks like pee and tastes like an uncooked, liquified pretzel. Gross.

Blake wrote a great post about our election, which you can read HERE. He’s better at explaining things in a way that’s understandable so that’s why I left it to him to write THE post on the election. I was too emotional yesterday to do it because the results really upset me. The good news is that the NDP, for the first time ever, is the official opposition with the 2nd highest amount of seats on parliament and that’s my team. The good news is that the NDP was put in that position primarily by the youth vote and that makes me hopefuly that in the next 4 or 5 years, when it’s time to vote again, people won’t be shy about “wasting a vote” on the NDP as has traditionally been the case. It is very possible that Jack Layton is going to be our next Prime Minister and I couldn’t be more thrilled about that.  He’s going to have a lot of cleaning up to do with what Harper’s going to do to this country during his carte blanche reign of terror, but at least he’s the right man for the job. Or at least *I* think so.

Yesterday I was supposed to quit smoking and I did, for the day, but when Blake came home I asked him to take me to the store to buy smokes because right now I have a nasty cold that’s making me miserable and I didn’t want to feel more miserable than I already felt. So fuck it, I’m smoking for the time being. (Which has been my justification all along, because I can justify anything if I try hard enough.) I’m going to quit, I just don’t know when and I’m tired of talking about it so this is the last time I’m going to bring it up.

The local Mac’s is a nightmare daily because they have the cheapest gas in town and literally cars are lined up 10-15 cars deep, waiting for their chance at the pump, so I’ve been buying smokes at the Korean convenience store in town that I like better anyway because they have a lot more stuff, like used movies for $2.99 which I scoop up every now and then. Yesterday when we stopped, they had hanging baskets of begonias for $14.99, which were full and beautiful so I bought a yellow one. Then after I got home I was thinking about it and I asked Blake to go back and get me the last orange one they had because I had a feeling they’d sell fast because they were really high quality and pretty cheap for a hanging basket.

Behold my begonias:

My great grama used to have begonias. I don’t know anything about them, I haven’t even read the tag they came with yet, but I love them. One is going to hang on the front of the house and one’s going to hang in the back, once we get a proper hook for it. I’m not sure if they over-winter or not or how that all works but I’ll Google later and find out. Aren’t they gorgeous though? What a bargain for only $30!

Yesterday Blake went out to brunch with all of our Scratching Post friends and I couldn’t go because it was in Toronto and I had to work (as did Blake). I was really bummed out all day that Blake got to go and I couldn’t. I was pissed at him, I’ll admit, because I was jealous. These are people I’ve known for a long time and he’s only known for a short time and not as well as I know them, so how come he gets to go and I can’t? It just seemed unjustified and it put me in a bad mood. Then when he got home he told me that every7one missed me and he gave me a little keychain with my name on it and “Scratching Post Breakfast Club” that Mira had made us all and I felt a little better. Included.

Okay it’s time for me to work, so I’d better wrap this up.

So as I’ve mentioned, my friend Amy works for a non-profit teen drop-in centre called The Neutral Zone, which is a safe haven for kids who need one and they’re in a contest with the Bank of Ann Arbor to win some much needed funding. That’s where you come in.

On Facebook, go to the Bank of Ann Arbor’s fan page and vote for Teen Centre Inc. (The Neutral Zone) by selecting them and answering the question, which this week is “The best local meal for under $15?. Vote every day for them by adding the app until May 12th so they can get a higher ranking and therefore get more money. If you do this, you would be doing a HUGE favour to me and my friend Amy and the kids that are helped by having this safe haven to go to.

It only takes a few clicks every day and it’s 100% for charity. Please help us! Don’t think of it as helping a friend of a friend who you don’t know from Adam, you’re helping out a children’s charity. Thanks in advance. GO TEAM GO!

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Help RAPS win $25,000!

Yep another one. Now I know what you’re thinking, that I’ve already got you clicking for The Neutral Zone but this is equally as important to me and so is the person behind it.

My friend Phaedie loses one of her friends at least once a week. That’s because she works for a high-capacity cat sanctuary in Richmond, British Columbia, run by the Richmond Animal Protection Society, and unfortunately feline leukemia and feline AIDS is a part of the job, especially when dealing with such close quarters.

To keep cats out of shelters, people need to spay and neuter their pets and that’s what RAPS is aiming to do with Pepsi Canada’s Refresh Project contest. Their aim, with the $25,000 to be won, is to help low-income families spay, neuter and vaccinate their pets in order to help curb the already problematic business of sick, unwanted pets.

So how can you help? It’s easy. Click here and vote. You can sign in using Facebook connect so it really does only take 2 clicks and you’d be making a world of difference for animals and their people. Plus you’d be making Phaedie and I incredibly happy.

Currently RAPS is in 3rd place, so let’s help get them to 2nd or try to get them to #1 as only the top 2 spots receive funding. I know people don’t have money to give to every charity that comes their way, but if you’d normally be clicking on Farmville crops anyway, please use your mouse-fingers for this as well and help make a difference in the world. Thanks.

The contest voting is until June 30th, it’s a daily vote and I’ll be posting every few days to remind you to vote in case you forget.

Wes and I just finished planting our veggie seeds! We planted cucumbers, “big beef” tomatoes, sugary cherry tomatoes and golden cherry tomatoes. The cucumbers and golden cherry tomatoes are going to be grown upside down, which has Wes baffled, heh. We didn’t do beans this year because Blake didn’t think it was worth it and I agreed and we didn’t do peppers this year because in the summer peppers are pretty inexpensive and they take up a lot of room in the garden for only 3 peppers per plant. Plus the kids didn’t like the purple ones I grew last year EVEN THOUGH THEY TASTED EXACTLY THE SAME AS THE GREEN ONES so they didn’t get eaten.

So here is our grow op for this year:

Thanks to Ruggedo for the seeds! <3

My mother-in-law, Brooke, e-mailed me on the weekend because she identified the little purpley-blue flowers that are growing all over my front lawn. They are called SCILLA! Here’s a pic she took to show me how they’re growing all over a walking path in Michigan:

It’s CARPETED with them! I love it!
It reminds me of all the trilliums we have around here.

This is a pic she found on Google of scilla close up:

I think my pic’s better though. :o)

Anyway, mystery solved! Thanks Brooke! <3

Working a full, 8-hour day on a beautiful spring Saturday fucking sucks. >:o( I mean yeah, it was worth it to see the Pixies, but this is practically tooooooorture! I am bored beyond words (although I plan on writing many of them).

I have Sherry’s Dessert thawing on my counter right now so there’s that to look forward to and after work we’re going to go to the school to go rollerskating, but in the meantime I am positively bored to tears!

Last night after work I went and voted (Liberal — because for once I think they actually have a chance in my riding!) and then we went to the school to rollerskate. I’m not sure if I mentioned it but Blake and the kids got rollerblades a few weeks ago so now we’re all outfitted with wheels and plan on going skating every day of the long weekend or maybe even more if the weather’s nice enough and Blake gets home early enough. Blake and Madison skated fine but Wes & I were pretty shaky. I did okay considering I hadn’t been on skates of ANY kind since I was about 12, but I fell on my ass when I was trying to sit back down in the car sideways because normally when you do that, you use your heel to push yourself but obviously on wheels you can do that so I slid all the way down to the pavement. Madison made fun of me because she’s a bitch. Can’t wait to make fun of her for something. Shouldn’t be too hard. But all in all, a good time was had by all, even though we only stayed out about 45 minutes because my calves were killing me since I was using leg muscles I normally don’t use and I’m very very out of shape.

This afternoon I gel mediumed my leaves for fairy wings on the big canvas but with this canvas I didn’t want to put glitter down first (which I would normally do) because the leaves are so fragile, I was afraid they wouldn’t lay flat or they would break if I put the glitter down first, which would make the surface slightly uneven. Now that the leaves are down, I’ll go back and add the glitter around them, then after that dries, I’ll paste down the girls, would should be interesting. I’ll probably have to do them all separately since I have to put books on top of them while they’re face down to get them to dry flat and doing all 3 at the same time might be a little tricky. When doing such a big canvas with a lot of margin for error, I think it’s best to proceed with caution so you don’t spend a million hours on it, only to royally fuck it up in the last stages.

After rollerskating and dinner, I’m going to finally get my seeds planted because I’ve been neglecting to do that for weeks on end. Normally I start them in March! Things have just been busy. My “lawn” is covered in crocuses and these little purple flowers I don’t know the name of.  These:

And then I have baby daffodils growing, big daffodils and these white things that I forget the name of every year. Hyacinths maybe?

In another month I’ll be out there planting my cosmos and Bachelor’s Buttons seeds! It’s almost time! (Which is another reason I need to get my seeds started as soon as possible, time’s running out!)

Anyway, work’s getting busier so I should probably wrap this up, especially because I can’t think of anything else to write about. Not much is happening in Sunnyland these days, than god! In case you missed it, I posted about the Pixies show here and if you care, you can find the setlist here. I think the highlight of the show was “Into the White” with a strobe light behind Kim Deal and a smoke machine spewing out fog everywhere. Cool. As. Hell.

Snow be damned, summer is right around the corner!

This weekend has been fucking GLORIOUS so far! It’s my first weekend off in 3 MONTHS and I am milking it for all it’s worth!

I spent all of Friday night playing Sims Medieval, which is fucking AWESOME, then all day today (Saturday, since I haven’t slept yet) I sat on my fat, lazy ass and painted 3 FAIRIES who just need the whites of their eyes painted, their pupils painted and to be given dresses and they are FINISHED, which is also FUCKING AWESOME and tomorrow? I’m not sure what my plan is for tomorrow but Blake got me instant mocha latte mix at Wal*Mart today so I know that’s in the plan and I’ll probably just continue painting, watching the Oprah channel and playing more Sims.

Tonight we had a McDinner and it made me feel so wretched I had to take 2 Gravol afterward. I don’t know why I do this to myself, I only eat McDonald’s maybe twice a year now and every single time I have it I feel like barfing afterward and then I feel guilty about all the fat and salt I just consumed. :o( Oh well.

My fairies…oh man do they ever look awesome. I was going to take pics and post them here but I’ve decided to wait until I’m finished their entire painting before I show the world. One’s Asian, one’s East Indian and one’s Caucasian and they all have black hair and metallic espresso eyes and they look fucking wicked. I was SO SO SO nervous about painting the Asian one because I’ve never done it before and I was also using a new brand of paint which is apparently more highly pigmented than the paint I normally use because I thinned it down the way I normally would but the coverage was too thick and it wiped out all of my shading, unfortunately, so the Asian fairy doesn’t really have any shading to her face while the other 2 do. I was so upset that I ruined her this way that I cried but Blake gave me a pep talk about how it was my first try and no one ever does awesome on their first try so I don’t feel so bad about it now. Her eyes look amazing though, I’ve gotta say, and especially with the metallic black hair she really does look Asian so I’m kind of proud of how she turned out despite the lack of shading. The East Indian one’s eyes are also on a slant and she just looks great. The white one? Well, she looks like every other fairy I’ve done in the past 3 years. All 3 fairies are going to have those pressed leaves I bought as wings, the Asian girl is going to have green ones, the Indian girl is going to have bronze ones and the white girl is going to have gold ones. I’m not sure what the background of the painting is going to look like yet, but you KNOW it’s going to have a fuck tonne of glitter! Anyway, I’m happy with them so far and I plan on continuing with them tomorrow after their lips have dried, which I just painted.

Today was super windy and grey and gross and I felt bad for all of the vendors at the Maple Syrup Festival that our town had today. They close off the main street so craft/artisan vendors can sell their wares and it was just a shitty day for it over all. The wind was so bad that it blew out gate open twice and the dogs got out but they know where they get fed and they came back. Blake’s now secured the fence with garden twine and two plastic zippy things and the wind’s not supposed to be as bad tomorrow so hopefully that solves that problem.

I’m smoking again. I don’t know why. I don’t really want to talk about it and I don’t really want to hear any lectures, I just wanted to throw that out there in full disclosure. I had quit for 2 weeks but on Friday the freedom of the weekend and having things be perfect was too much and I broke down and bought a pack and then I was thinking that we’re going to see the Pixies on Wednesday with Ronny, Alex & Deanna and Deanna smokes so if I quit on Monday, there’s no way I’m going to make it through the Pixies with Deanna smoking so I might as well just keep smoking until we come home from the show (Thursday) and start quitting again. I think I may read Allen Carr’s book again.

Speaking of books, I’m still reading Freedom by Jonathan Franzen and I’m finding it extremely dry. I don’t even know what the fucking story is and I’m about 1/6th of the way through. It reminds me of something but I don’t know what…

Water For Elephants opened this weekend I think, but I’m too broke to go see it because I’m in credit card debt up to my eyeballs. It’s just so goddamn easy to buy things on the internet and god help me, but I discovered eBay a few weeks ago and I cannot stop buying Japanese mulberry tissue paper because it’s impossible to find locally. I’ve bought 6 batches so far and I’ve received 2 of them, neither of which is pulpy enough for angel wings, which is what I use it for, so it was kind of a waste of money but it’s hard to tell what you’re buying in the pictures the sellers put up. I’m hoping to find one seller with the right type I need and keep buying from them, but for now it’s trial & error. Chali told me about “destashing” on Etsy where people sell art supplies on there, which is what I might do with the mulberry paper I can’t use. Someone’s gotta have a use for it and I mean it’s all pretty neat, I used a bit of it in “Black & White” on the skirt of the fairy in white, I’m not sure if you can really see the flecks of silver and gold in the paper, but like I said, it’s neat stuff, I’m just not totally sure what to do with it. And now that I’ve typed that, I’ve realized that it would probably make good skirt material for the fairies I’m working on at the moment, so hey, good for me.

Yesterday I literally tried to freeze my credit card in a glass of water in the freezer, but the glass cracked (it was plastic) and the ice just kinda, was repelled by the plastic of my card so I could literally just pull it out no problem. So much for that idea. Since that didn’t work then I guess it’s just up to me to have a little fucking impulse control which I really really suck at. On Friday I bought like, 11 lbs or something of cone incense off the internet – I’m out of control!

Tonight we finished watching Buffy, the entire series and I bawled at the part with Xander at the end of the last episode. Anya was my favourite character (Andrew is my 2nd) and I knew she was going to bite it and how she would and I knew it was coming but none of that knowing prepared me for it so I cried and cried.

I have no idea what’s going on with my period and it’s making me fucking mental. I was supposed to get it on the 6th but it was a no show, then last Sunday I had what I thought was the beginning of it (that brown goo you get right before you gush) but that tapered off after a day and now nothing except a LOT of discharge, enough that I’m wearing a pad anyway. It’s like I’m having a white period or something (and no, it’s not an infection, it’s like ovulation goo x a thousand). My new anti-psychotic that I’m taking for sleep can affect your period so I’m chalking it up to that but even that doesn’t make much sense because I had a normal period last month while I was on it so why would I have an abnormal period THIS month? I’ve also had the pain of a period, just no blood. I want blood dammit! I tried to go to sleep at around 11:30pm tonight and as I was laying in bed, I started worrying that Blake’s vasectomy had reversed itself and that I’m pregnant and what would I do if I was. (Were?) Blake and I have gone over that scenario a thousand times before and the answer is always “abort abort abort” but the question in my head tonight was, if I did have to have an abortion, would I blog about it and risk the threat of it being absolute troll bait and having the world judge me for that decision? And it’s a hard thing to answer, I thin, unless you’re in that situation, but I think I would blog about it. If I were pregnant right now, the amount of drugs I’m on would seriously fuck up a fetus and it would be all drug addicted and probably be deformed or mentally retarded or something so an abortion would be necessary for that reason, but there’s also the reason that we’re done having kids and we’ve taken every precaution NOT to have any more kids, so there’s that reason too. I think anyone who has an abortion has valid reasons, don’t get me wrong, I’m just listing what mine would be. Anyway, while laying in bed, I decided that I would blog about the whole thing because hey, that’s what I do. But I’m (probably) not pregnant so I don’t even know why I’m writing this…

So we’re going to see the Pixies on Wednesday and it’s out of town and I’m getting really nervous about it. We’re getting a hotel room, which I love because I love staying in hotels, but I’m worried about the dogs who will be alone for the night. We’ll be leaving early on Thursday morning and it’ll take 2 hours to get home, so the dogs shouldn’t be in too much discomfort, but still, I worry. And I feel horrible because in planning this whole thing, I didn’t even consider them. My mom’s taking the kids for the night and that’s all that I had on my brain as we planned. It only occurred to me tonight that the dogs would be an issue.

I also think that tomorrow Wes and I are going to plant our vegetable seeds and get them started on the living room windowsill. I have the cups for it and have for a while, but I keep forgetting to do it or I’ve been too tired after work to do it (because it takes twice as long and it’s twice the mess when Wes helps, but he likes doing it) but it needs to be done and I have the time tomorrow so I might as well.

And I’m really just babbling at this point so I’ll tell you about the Sims Medieval and call it a night.

The Sims medieval is not like the regular Sims really, it’s kinda like a cross between the Sims and WoW on super easy mode. You control your Sims but they have specific jobs and you have to do quests. To be quite honest, the guidebook that came with the game is pretty worthless and I’m not even sure what the point of the game is yet. I made a kingdom and did every single quest and now I’m not sure what to do. There are “ambitions”, like the first one is called “New Beginnings” and the goal is to build up your kingdom so it has every building and every profession, which is what I completed tonight, but then there was nothing left to do so I went to the main menu screen and saw that 2 new ambitions had opened up so I clicked on one of them and it wanted me to make a new game, a new kingdom, rather than playing with the kindgom I’d just built. And that’s confusing because what is the point of building a whole kingdom if you just have to keep building like, alternate kingdoms for each new ambition. Is anyone playing this game? Am I doing it wrong? So I started a new kingdom for one of the new ambitions and that’s what I’m playing now. The first kingdom was called “Sunnyland”, naturally, and the new one is named “Sunnyland 2″ because I’m creative like that.

Anyway, here are some screencaps:

My first monarch, Sunny Moody.

Sunny Moody having a royal bath.

This one is Queen Sunnybananas of Sunnyland 2.

My wizard, Zennish Moody.

My physician treating a patient. I forget his name. :o/

Praying with Oprah, my Peteran priestess.

All in all it’s a fun game, but I wish I understood what the hell I was supposed to be doing better. I can’t imagine I’m doing it right with the whole starting another kingdom thing for each new ambition because that is a royal pain in the ass.

So that’s been my weekend so far. I think now I’m going to see what everyone’s up to on Facebook while I finish my Coke and then get to bed. Happy weekend!

Crocuses in my front yard.

It’s a cold, grey, rainy day, but my friend Ana reminded me today that even on grey days you can find beauty in the world.

Thanks, Ana. <3

The crocuses were gifted to me by Chali, so thanks to her too. <3

I had to go to the doctor’s this morning to get repeats on my codeine contin (which he raised by 100mg/day) and Tylenol 3 (30mg codeine/300mg acetaminophen) and Naproxen. He lectured me about taking so much Tylenol because it’ll kill my liver, which I’m oh so aware of but I don’t see any alternatives here, which is why he raised my codeine contin. That’ll keep me from having to take so much Tylenol 1 (8mg codeine/300mg acetaminophen, 15mg caffeine) during the month and then I have the Tylenol 3 for when I’m actually on the rag and wanting to kick puppies. So was that clear? He lectured me about taking so much Tylenol and then rx’d me…more Tylenol. I’m not complaining because he did what I wanted him to do, I just thought it was funny.

I have today off because I had to go to the doctor’s this morning at 10:30am (we just got back now and it’s almost noon) when I start work at 10am usually, and then this afternoon is metabolic clinic. But this actually worked out well because I woke up to an e-mail from Belinda asking our boss for Saturday night off because it’s her boyfriend’s birthday. I have to make up my metabolic clinic hours on Saturday anyway (Belinda works nights) and Blake’s gone to Militiagan for another funeral this weekend anyway too, so I said I’d take today off and work Belinda’s shift Saturday night for her. Then I’ll still have Sunday off, which, if I’m working the night before, I’ll probably use to sleep in and then play Sims Medieval all day. So it all works out! I had intended to work from whenever metabolic clinic was over (we usually get home around 3:30 or 4pm) until 6pm, which is when my shift usually ends, but I decided I’m not going to bother and I’ll just make up the hours on Saturday since I’m needed then anyway. That means that I may actually make it to yoga tonight, which is good considering I haven’t actually been in about 4 or 5 weeks because work + metabolic clinic all in one day is too many things for me, so yoga has had to go by the wayside until metabolic clinic is finished on April 5th.

Speaking of yoga, our teacher is pregnated! She already has a toddler, she goes to school for holistic medicine and she has a full-time job on top of teaching yoga, so she’s going to be one busy lady. We’ve signed up for the next session because I’d like to continue once metabolic clinic is over and done with. As I may have mentioned a time or two, I absolutely love yoga and I’m really looking forward to going tonight since it’s been so long. I bet she’s going to make me sweat…

Today at metabolic clinic we’re discussion our addictions. I am 6 days smoke-free and talking about smoking makes me want to have one so I hope they gloss over that and just talk about the addiction part. This is our last real class I think, as next week is our “graduation” and evaluation session. I’m not really sure what that means but I do know that I’m going to need to fill out my module evaluation sheets which I’ve been neglecting to do unless they’ve specifically asked me to do them at the end of class, as they have in some instances.

I’ve been doing the treadmill daily. The first day I did a total of 55 minutes but then the next day I was sore because my shoes are those Sketcher’s Shape Ups so I only did 20 minutes and I’ve only been doing 20 minutes since. In fact, instead of writing this post, I should probably get on the treadmill, especially since I’m at the very tail end of The Virgin Suicides and I’d really like to finish it so I can star Freedom by Jonathan Franzen since that’s Oprah’s current book club pick and I think she’s going to be doing the show about it sometime soon. I’ve never read one of Oprah’s book club picks while the book club was happening before and I’ve always skipped those episodes as a result, but this being her last season I figured I’d give it a shot, especially since I read in Adbusters that my generation doesn’t read enough Jonathan Franzen, so there’s that too. Have any of you read this book? What did you think of it? I don’t even know what it’s about, I haven’t read the back or anything and I know absolutely nothing about the author or his previous works. But whatever, I’m looking forward to cracking the spine on that thick sucker and I love that I got a treadmill with a book stand. Reading while walking is turning out to be something that I really enjoy. The treadmill even has a place for an MP# player to be plugged in and two cup holders that fot a can of Coke Zero perfectly. I’m totally set up!

Yesterday Blake brought me home dirt so when I’m NOT wearing my $200 hockey jersey or going to yoga, I have to start my veggies on the window sill. I have Super Sugar Snap peas, Napoli carrots, Thunder cucumbers, Parade green onions, Golden cherry tomatoes, Sugary cherry tomatoes and Big Beefsteak tomatoes. All I’m going to start inside this week is the cucumbers and all the tomatoes. The peas did fine last year with just being stuck in the garden and hopefully the carrots and onions will do the say. Last year the garden got overrun with weeds and I didn’t know what were weeds and what were vegetables so I couldn’t weed and the carrots and onions never grew. Neither did any of the herbs (that I know of, like I said, I couldn’t tell the difference between them and the weeds). This year I’m going to do herbs in pots on the porch, although part of me is thinking “why bother?” because fresh herbs at the grocery store really aren’t that expensive and we use frozen basil chunks for Blake’s awesome cherry tomato pasta anyway and I think they’re only $2.99 for 20 cubes. (I think he uses 4 in the tomato thing, maybe a bit more.) It just seems like, for the pain in the ass of it, it would just be easier to buy fresh herbs at the grocery store than tend my own.

Blah, I’m babbling. I’m gonna go finish The Virgin Suicides and get on the treadmill. I hope everyone has a wonderful day!

PS. Yes I know I need to get my roots done. I was going to go to the new salon here in town to have highlights put in, but I’m broke right now so I bought a box of hair dye today at the pharmacy instead. I’ll go to the salon another time and just get Blake to trim my ends with my awesome art scissors. No big deal.

Okay, to tread I go!

PPS. I can’t go to yoga tonight! We’re playing the Sabres and I have to tweet 100 times about how much I hate Ryan Miller! Curses!

Thanks, Ruggedo! <3
(My mom gave me the pussy willows.)

We have:
Candystripe cosmos – 1/4 lb
Daydream cosmos – 1/4 lb
Gloria cosmos – 1/4 lb
Purity cosmos – 1 lb
Radiance cosmos – 1/4 lb
Bachelor Buttons – 1 lb
Organic Russian Mammoth sunflower seeds – 1/4 lb
Grandpa Ott morning glories – 1/4 lb

For those new to Sunnyland, my entire front “lawn” is actually a wildflower garden. Here’s what it looked like in 2009:

You can view the whole history of “Keep Off the Lawn” by clicking here.

Last year we really focused on the vegetable garden in the BACKyard and mid-summer I actually got depressed and anxious over the front yard, which happens when you have issues leaving your house, so I had Blake mow it down. :o( But THIS year it’s going to look fabulous and I have it on good authority that the kids are going to help me keep it weeded so that’s a plus and I’m kinda stoked. The seeds for the veggie garden came last week, as did these things you use to hang plants upside down! I’m going to use one for golden cherry tomatoes, one for regular cherry tomatoes and one for cucumbers.

Anyway, Blake’s picking me up some dirt today so I can get the grow op on the windowsill in the living room started and then it will really be spring!

Why hello there blog friends. How are you today? Me, I’m not doing so well. I seem to have caught a stomach bug and I’ve been barfing and shitting my guts out since Monday. On the plus side, I’ve lost 3 lbs, so there’s that…on top of this illness, the new anti-psychotic my shrink has put me on for sleep has made me have a total lack of appetite and if I force myself to eat, I feel sick. I don’t know if this is a blessing or a curse. If I don’t eat, my metabolism will shit down and start storing everything I DO eat as fat, right? But if I eat, I feel sick, so I dunno.

The kids are off this week for March Break and so far things have been okay. They’re at the library right now getting 2011′s dog tags and won’t be back until around 5pm, they said, so I have the house to myself. Right now I’m working and also working on my angel. I’m currently waiting for her wings to dry. I don’t normally paint my angels’ wings but doing girls of colour is not like doing white girls and when I overpaint the parts I would normally cut off, it shows through the mulberry paper so I have to paint this one’s wings white and then I’ll go over them with a pearlized white so they shimmer. Right now I have so many ideas and so little time and it’s really frustrating the shit out of me.

I’ve been splitting my time between writing the novel I’m working on and this angel and so far things have been going okay with it but I just wish I had more time. Last weekend I finally finished working off the hours I had to take off for Blake’s grama’s funeral so now, theoretically, I get a much needed day off and I absolutely cannot wait. We get the Oprah channel now and all I want to do is watch bad, Oprah-endorsed shows and paint pretty girls. My nights after work have been dedicated to the novel, so I’ve only been working on the angel as I work or on the weekends.

The novel is going well. I don’t really want to write about it all that much for fear I’ll jinx myself and stop working on it but I have a good feeling about it. It’s going to be self-published of course, and I know there’s a stigma attached to that but I don’t want to deal with submitting to publishers and getting rejection letters. Why would I do that when I have my own built-in audience? Plus, I can always submit it to publishers AFTER I’ve self-published it, if I felt so inclined, so that’s the plan.

Right now I’m working on chapter 20, which is about halfway finished.

Metabolic clinic yesterday was the pharmaceuticals module and for the most part it was pretty boring because I look up every drug I take before I take it so there was nothing new for me to learn there. I’ve always been worried about the amount of Tylenol I take because of the endometriosis and the pharmacist told me that liver damage from acetaminophen isn’t cumulative, it doesn’t happen over time, it’s when someone takes 30 or 40 Tylenols at once when liver damage occurs. You’re only supposed to take Tylenol 1′s every 4-6 hours (2), but lately the pain’s been bad enough that I’ve been taking them every 2 hours and sometimes even every hour, so it’s good to know that in doing this, I’m not causing myself permanent liver damage. I mean, it’s not GOOD what I’m doing, of course, but I’m not going to wake up one day and keel over from liver damage. Another thing I was/am worried about is the fact that often after I eat I get bad stomach pains, which could be a stomach bleed from taking so much Naproxen. Blake has to take a day off every time I go to the doctor’s though, which is why I haven’t had it checked out yet. And honestly, without the Naproxen I don’t know how well I’d cope with life so I’m reluctant to tell, the doctor about it at all. I’m probably being stupid. If it gets worse I’ll go to a doctor.

It’s going to be spring soon and I have it on good authority that my seeds should be ordered soon. This year we’re planting carrots, green onions, peas, big tomatoes, regular cherry tomatoes like the ones we grew last year, golden cherry tomatoes and cucumbers (upside down!). For the front garden, which I’ve decided to do this year because Blake thinks a big garden like mine will help sell this house better than a lawn, it’s just going to be several varieties of cosmos and Bachelor’s Buttons, as usual. Nothing fancy. Well, some of the Cosmos are fancy, like these ones, but really I’m only planting the two types of flower. Sunflower Alley is going to be pretty straight forward too with just your standard big sunflowers. Past years I’ve planted all kinds of different varieties of sunflowers but only the big ones seem to come up, so fuck it, that’s all I’m planting this year, especially since, ideally, we won’t be living here to even see them bloom.

Tomorrow is ST. Patrick’s Day (my 6 month anniversary of having this job!) and I’ll be making Jade’s Swiss Potato Soup with fresh biscuits for dinner, pending Blake brings me home a big pot to make it in because I accidentally ruined my old one by trying to put those dried “pulses” (beans, peas etc.) in a stew and they all stuck to the bottom and burned so bad there was no saving it. Here’s Jade’s potato soup recipe, it’s pretty simple and tastes wonderful!

- 2 tbsp butter
- 1/4 cup chopped onion
- 2 cups diced raw potato
- 1 cup boiling water
- 1 tsp salt
- 3 chicken bouillon cubes
- 3 cups milk
- 2 tbsp flour

Melt butter. Saute onions. Add potatoes. water, salt, bouillon cubes. Cover & simmer 10 minutes. Combine milk and flour. Stir into potato mixture. Cook over medium heat. Stir constantly until thickened and boiling.

And voila! Homemade potato soup! I’m going to add chives to it and possibly I’m going to put in leeks instead of onions if Blake can find any. Also I’m using chicken broth instead of cubes and last year I think I just used a whole tetra box of chicken broth and skipped the boiling water.  Anyway, it’s good stuff and if you make it, let me know! Last year we featured it on Buttercup and I know a lot of you made and liked it, so I’m hoping this year you will as well!

Tomorrow is Day 1 of no more smoking. I just opened a fresh pack right now and when I go to bed tonight, the rest of it will be destroyed. I started smoking again on March 1st (my birthday) and it just time to give it up again, this time for always and forever. My throat is sore, I’ve developed a smoker’s cough and I’m getting headaches so it’s just not worth it anymore. So I’m just warning everyone in advance, if I’m bitch, that’s why, but after the 3 days it takes for the nicotine to leave my system, I should be okay again. Luckily this time I only developed the chemical addiction and not the mental habit, so it shouldn’t be as hard to quit as it was last time. Theoretically.

The dogs had their shots last week and the new vet said that they’re both overweight. Hoover definitely is, but I don’t see how she figures Lucky is. Either way, they’re both on diet dog food now so hopefully that’ll help. She also said that their teeth could use some rawhide, so we got them each a bone on Saturday, which they’ve both been enjoying (although Lucky threw up twice after we gave him his). Now that they’ve had their rabies vaccination for the year, they can get their municipal tags, which, as I mentioned, the kids are doing now. Hopefully Madison won’t lose my credit card this time!

Well, I’d better get back to my angel while work is slow. I hope everyone’s day is going well and I’ll probably post tomorrow.