My Weblog

No Time To Think Of A Title

Ha! Bruno is sick too! We are a fine pair, I tell ya. His thesis is due friday. My deadlines are choking me. If stress doesn't kill us, the bird flu might. I want to run away from home but I can't think of anywhere where I can hide from my work. Better just to face it head on and get it over with. So today I am writing my first article and sending it off and tomorrow I'll get started on the second one. I have a big deal article due in the beginning of January for a medical journal that I need to have done before we leave for California also. And a newsletter. And all of my christmas projects. Why am I wasting me time updating this blog? I don't know.... I guess I should go to work. What is it that Jack says in The Shining? All work and no play...

I've Caught The Christmas... Flu?

I think that I'm sick again. My throat started hurting last night and now my head feels like it's floating somewhere in the clouds. I don't understand. I don't touch other people. I hardly ever leave the house. Is Bruno a carrier? Does he suck up the germs of all the infected people at his school and bring them home gift wrapped for me? I'd prefer flowers instead.

I can't be sick because I have two (count them: TWO) articles due by Friday. This is disconcerting. I can't miss these deadlines or else the magazines will skip my columns in their issues. Bad. Very very bad. Both articles should be relatively easy to write, but I'm not done with my research. Argghhhh!

I also have a bazillion projects to finish up in the next three weeks for the Christmas gifts. My first attempt at sewing a zipper didn't turn out too well. It actually freaked me out so bad that I'm afraid to turn the sewing machine back on. Chicken, I know. I received my embroidery patterns though, and so last night I ironed on all of the letters and embroidered one of the pages in the book. It looks pretty good considering I've never done anything like this before. There are mistakes, but I hope that no one notices. I also made a batch of calendula soap. It looks disgusting, but I'll reserve my final judgment until it actually hardens. I kind of suspect that it will still look gross when it’s done though. Have you ever smelled dried calendula flowers? They smell like feet- sweaty gross feet. It was making me kind of ill to separate the petals from the stems. I guess that's why the recipe calls for a teaspoon of tea tree oil. To mask the feet smell.

It sounds like I'm bitching here, but I'm really not. I'm stressed and afraid I'm sick and that stresses me out even more. I wonder if Santa will lend me an elf until Dec. 15? I could really use the help!

Bob, The Christmas Tree

Quick post here. The tree looks great with all of the decorations on it. The pictures that we took? Not so great. I'm going to take better ones later, but I have a ton of research to do right now. So, to give you a little (blurry) preview, I would like to introduce you to Bob, the christmas tree:

Attack of the 8-Foot Tree

We got our Christmas tree last night. It's huge! I usually end up getting the smallest (thereby cheapest) tree possible each year, but that was back in California. Who knew that trees would be cheaper out here? It makes sense now that I think about it. Every Christmas tree in California has to be trucked in from far and distant lands (there being no real trees in California), but here we could have had our pick of lovely trees in at least 5 of our neighbor's yards. I'm sure they wouldn't have minded if we cut one down. Trees are everywhere here! (O.K., they would have minded. Which is why we bought a tree instead.)

In our city it seems like the only places that you can buy trees are at churches. There could be a whole slew of secular Christmas tree lots only a mile from my house, but I don't know this area so I couldn't find those places. I was having mixed emotions about buying a "church" tree. Landlord said that the best trees could be found at Shrine, a catholic church down the street from our house. I don't doubt that they do have the best trees, but I absolutely refuse to give my money to them. A few months ago they put up a bazillion crosses in the grass in front of their church with a big sign that said something like, "Each cross represents 100 abortions performed this year." I'm sure their sign worded it better. Anyhow, I had to drive by that stupid place almost everyday, and everyday I had to restrain myself from getting out of the car and defacing their property. So, you can see why it would be impossible for me to give my money to these people. They would just have used it to buy more crosses.

Which is how we ended up at Home Depot. HD could be run by nazi's or sacrifice babies in the storage room, but they don't do it in my face so I can give them my money without feeling bad about it. (Note: If they really did those things I wouldn't buy my tree there either. I would chop down my neighbor's tree instead and blame it on the idiot boy who lives next door.) When we got there it was already 8pm and dark and they hadn't put any lights out in the tree area yet. A very lovely gentleman with the Christmas spirit escorted us out there with a flashlight and proceeded to show us the various types of trees. I blame the flashlight for our 8-foot tree. Since we couldn't really see anything, we took the most accessible tree. I'm not saying it's not a beaut, but I am saying that it's an 8-foot mammoth beaut!

When Bruno and I purchased ornaments for the tree a few days ago, we did it with a 3-4 foot tree in mind. So, naturally, we purchased gobs of those "mini" bulbs. Those things aren't going to cut it on this tree. We would need 5,000 of them and that would only cover the top of the tree. No, this tree is going to need bigger bulbs... and lots of tinsel... and I'm going to have to get a special clearance from the electric company to put lights on it. I want to forewarn them before we drain the entire city of its electricity. If you lose power tonight and you live in the metro Detroit area, blame the poor lighting at Home Depot- but don't blame the guy with the flashlight. I think that he really is Santa's helper. That guy was everything that's right about Christmas!

(I'll post pics of the tree once it's decorated. And don't laugh at how sparse the decorations are either. We are newly weds. And we left all of our worldly possessions back in California.)

Redecorating For X-Mas

I've made a few changes around here for the holidays. I like this new banner so much that I want to keep it forever! Too bad christmas can't be all year long. I don't really mean that. I just like the new look. Enjoy!

Happy Happy Days

These past two days have been just lovely! Having Bruno home has been wonderful, and that, combined with the first snow of the season, has made this an awesome holiday! Bruno's school has literally been locked for the past two days and so he was forced to stay home, but I'm not splitting hairs here. I'll take it however I can get it!

Yesterday, somewhere around 2pm, we decided that it would be a good idea to buy and then make a turkey. We found one that didn't need to be defrosted and by 10pm we were stuffed to the gills will yummy thanksgiving goodness. It was completely last minute and it worked out splendidly.

Today we went shopping (like nuts!) and I bought myself a beatiful new wool coat for winter. Of course, I needed a new scarf, hat and gloves to go with it so I bought those too. I love winter so much. After fall, it's my favorite time of the year. I wish so badly that we could stay here for christmas just so that we could actually see snow. I've never had a white christmas before. But, our families will freak if we even mention the idea, so a traditional california christmas it is.

Tomorrow we will go get our tree even though we will only be here for about 20 more days. I don't want to forgo the whole tree thing though. Last year christmas was an after thought since Bruno and I had our official wedding the very next day. I was too worried about everything that could go wrong and all of the last minute details that a wedding loves to drop in your lap to even think about christmas. Not to mention, Bruno had been in Italy for the 4 months leading up to our wedding and I was anxiously counting down the days until he arrived home- 3 days before christmas (4 days before our wedding). So christmas was but a small blip on my radar screen. Not this year though! This year, I'm going to squeeze every last drop of yule tide spirit out of it. Even if it kills me!

A Thanksgiving Picture Montage

Turkeys Abound

Well, last night a bucket of snow was dumped on my little neighborhood and wow is it beautiful! Today Bruno and I are going to brave the chilly temps and try to explore a little bit. This is my second winter here, but the first winter I was living downtown and it wasn't safe to walk the area and really enjoy the snow. I wanted to have snow fights and build snowmen, but it's too hard to dodge bullets and play in the snow at the same time. Takes some of the fun out of it, you know? So today, I have big plans for my first snowman! I'll take pictures. Lucky you!

When I say that it's cold outside, I really REALLY mean it! In California, my family has probably put on their very best tank tops and shorts for the holiday dinner. Not so here. The temperature is 19 degrees right now with a wind chill below zero. ZERO! Jeeze Louis! We can only find one of Bruno's gloves so he is going to freeze his poor other hand if we do go outside. I told him that when his arm freezes we'll just break his hand off and put it on the snowman. He didn't really appreciate my suggestion.

Happy turkey day, or tofurkey day if you are so inclined...

More Snow Pics

Can you tell that I love taking pictures? I had to get outside to see if I could get some better shots. Here are the two that I like the most:

The Gift Baskets Runeth Over

In the time that it took me to take, photoshop to within an inch of their lives and then post those photos, even more snow has fallen. If I would have waited just an hour, the pictures would have been even better. Oh well. I've got another 5 months of snow ahead of me, so there's plenty of time for that.

On a completely different subject, last night Bruno and I had a date with the computer. We spent hours in photoshop playing with his latest project: the collage. It was so much fun. We cropped it and went to town with the colors, filters, clarity and everything else would could get our grimy little fingers on. So, after hours of good clean fun, we came up with this to add to our baskets of christmas goodies. I'm going to take it to the printers and then punch a hole in the top, insert some pretty ribbon and viola! A bookmark. Then I'm going to cut them up smaller and make gift tags and "product tags" for each of the items going in the baskets. Fun, huh?