Ode to the Octopus

I believe the octopus is amazing.  Don't think so?  Watch this guy's presentation and then tell me octopuses aren't the rockin'-est creature in the sea.

They use tools--even tools that we've thrown away become useful to an octopus.

No litter?  No matter.

They are masters of disguise.

They aren't all fun and games either.  They can be deadly.

They don't even need the ocean to live.

Watch out though.  They can be little thieves, too.

No wonder Ringo Starr wrote a song about them. (covered by Muppets)

You see, the octopus have so much about them that makes them intriguing in this world.  They have three hearts.  They have three versions of their name to satisfy plural form noun: octopuses, octopi, and octopodes.  They are the most intelligent invertebrate on the planet.  They have arms--not tentacles.  For such an intelligent beast, they have a short life span; usually they only live 2 years in the wild according to National Geographic.  I find them fascinating and inspiring and playful.
I'll leave you with this octopus giving birth to a rubber ducky.

Read little bookworm. Read it. Read it!

I've spent the last four and a half hours reading a new book.
I love Sunday afternoons without demand that allow time for personal endeavors like devouring a new book.  I positively squealed when my husband told me that a new novel by one of our favorite authors was released.  You see, I had ordered books 2 and 3 of this Anne Bishop's series:

Amazon swears I only ordered 3.  Consequently, when 3 arrived last week I was excited.  Until I opened the package and found only book 3.  I had no book to read and time to read a book!  How aggravating is that?
Then today my hopes soared at the news of new Terry Goodkind.  Then, I was dismayed when I could not locate Terry Goodkind's latest novel on the website for Hasting's (we have a gift card with some money still.)  Then I couldn't find it at Amazon either.  I could get it for a Kindle, but not a hardback.  Finally I went to Barnes and Noble looking for a Nook book and there is was in all its glory:

Turns out he released it himself as an ebook.  Hence the no hardback.  Read the manifesto at the start.  It explains everything. I am only 400 pages in, which is just about the 1/3 of the way mark on this tale, but I am loving it!

Anticipating the release of a new book by a favorite author can be extremely taxing for bookworms like myself.  I only recently started reading George R.R.Martin, so I didn't have to languish terribly long waiting for A Dance with Dragons, but those few months were killer!  My other favorite author, Anne Rice, used to routinely release a new novel in October of the year.  I trained myself to check the book release lists at the bookstores.  It got worse when I worked at Hasting's and could check the lists well in advance of the actual release date.  The sensation when a much anticipated release of a phenomenal author finally breaks through to the stores always produces a mighty

Finally, my bookworm can rest and enjoy the tale of the first Mother Confessor.  *sigh  I must get back to reading.  I left at a really good part.

In-House Matinee

Today I did something great.

OK.  I did a lot of “great” things like finding a way to get all of the ornaments off the tree and back into the same number of storage bins, a couple loads of laundry, some dishes, brushing Poofus without losing some flesh…see?  A lot of great things.  The greatest though?  Taking 90 minutes of the day to sit on the sofa and watch Princess Bride from start to finish.  No reason why other than the impulse hit and I kept snickering at all the great quotations that PB fans all say back and forth to one another like:

            “Have fun stormin’ the castle!”

“There’s a shortage of perfect breasts in the world.  It’d be a shame to damage yours.”

“Inconceivable!”

“As you wish.”

I could go on.

            “Anybody want a peanut?”

Sorry. 

Anyway, this film is a classic!  It gave Robin Wright her start before that soap opera “Santa Barbara” and before Sean Penn.

It brought Columbo out for a new generation to take note.

It shows Fred Savage in his pinchable-cheek youth.

It gave us memes to cover our social network walls.

 I have picture of my husband in this costume from a wedding he officiated for a lovely young couple.

It gave us the all time greatest sword fight scene.

I saw an interview about this sequence.  They practiced during breaks and finally showed Rob Reiner the 3 minutes they came up with.  He said, "That's it?" They beat the longest ever filmed sword fight as a result, but as you see here, the final cut was only...3 minutes!

 It gave us romance, revenge, monsters, and miracles. 

It gives us a smile every time we watch it.  Therefore, I simply said to my husband that I wanted to watch it. 

And we did.

And we laughed.  We said lines along with it. We sang “Storybook Love” along karaoke style at the end. 

 Thank you Mark Knopfler.  Who knew that voice matched this image?  Great name Willy DeVille.  

Sometimes a little time out for a classic movie that you adore just completes an afternoon.  It certainly kept my spirits high on this gorgeous, sunny, January Saturday.  I've watched this movie countless times, and I will watch it many more.  I smile every time.

TGIFB

Thank the gods it's Friday beer!
That's right.  Today's post is about that first hoppy slurp of a delicious beer that heralds in the weekend.  Today's beer is Jubeale: a festive winter ale.  How lovely is that?

My brother in law also makes his own beer.  I am positively giddy that he will offer up some of his tasty stash tonight.  It wasn't quite ready for New Year's, but he thought perhaps it'd be good to go this weekend.  Here's crossing fingers and toes.
In college, we were poor as so many students are.  We also spent a lot of free money on alcohol.  Also a common trait of college students who just recently turned 21 are prone to do.  In college, we bought beer by the suitcase.  Keystone became our favorite because it was so stinkin' cheap.  Tasted..well...like bitter water honestly.  We could afford it though, so it became a staple for weekends.

Thankfully, I stopped drinking that *ahem brew because a doctor told me I was probably allergic to it. NOOOOOOOOO!

I of course then joined the Big Sky Hash House Harriers and quickly returned to imbibing beer of a much higher quality.

Please note that my tongue is firmly planted in my cheek.  Miller Lite is a step up from Keystone...if you trip and fall back down again.

If you don't know what the Hash House Harriers are, Google it people.  Think--drinking club with a running problem.  Essentially it was a lot like a fraternity of people who enjoyed beer, running (I walked because nothing is worse than running when it comes to exercise), and violating just about every politically correct behavior known in society.  We drank a lot of beer.  We sang a lot of inappropriate and mostly sexual in connotation songs.  We ate a lot of pizza and BBQ and burgers.  We had a lot of fun.  Great people, great times.  Alas!  Many of them moved on as those of the military must from time to time.  However, I still adore each and every member of that club.  I simply cannot enjoy a beer without smiling about those times.  So many wonderful people and so much beer!

Anyway, I will leave you with our blessing prayer:

Our lager,
Which art in barrels,
Hallowed be thy drink.
Thy will be drunk, (I will be drunk),
At home as it is in the tavern.
Give us this day our foamy head, 
(BSHHH, you know what to do here.)
And forgive us our spillages,
As we forgive those who spill against 
us.
And lead us not to incarceration,
But deliver us from hangovers.
For thine is the beer, the bitter, and 
the lager.



Barmen

Fun Sock Day

Today’s happy actually began last night.

Perhaps it was the lack of sleep.

Maybe it was the TED talks series on artistry and illusion I watched last night.

Then again, it could just be a fetish.

I LOVE FUNKY SOCKS!    Today my husband and I declared “Fun Sock Day.”  He wore Batman and I wore a lovely pair of knee socks with a knee length denim skirt.  Both pairs were Christmas presents. 

My appreciation of strange socks began in high school.  It continued in college thanks to the support of my family and their gifts.  Once an adult, I began to expand and discovered toe socks like these:

I love how the NYE purple Monster High nailpolish shows through.

Once I started on toe socks, I couldn’t stop.  I then moved on to knee socks like these luscious argyles:

Fun fact: these were actually purchased as part of a Velma from Scooby Doo Halloween costume.

Eventually I even added these to my collection:

Fun fact #2: I love pairing one of these with one of the Velma socks for Clash Day at work.

Anyone who knows me knows I detest pink.  However, I couldn’t resist the obvious clash of melon and fuchsia.  Too awesome to discount simply because pink is the anti-Christ of the color world. 

Fun socks can also be artistic like these Laurel Burch socks I picked up in Bozeman, MT a few years back:

The best part?  I posted this declaration of Fun Sock Day on my Facebook wall and some of my friends joined in.  Woot!  Some with the “I have a ton of fun socks” and some with the worry of the argyle not being fun enough.  Argyle?  Always fun.  Just like paisley and houndstooth in my opinion.  Polkadots too.  Anyway—my favorite though was one young lady who posted her rainbow toe socks for everyone to see.  Totally made my day! 

Here’s to Fun Sock Day!  

Those are moose fronts and butts in case you're wondering.

Gnarly Grumblies

Today’s moment of happy provided quite the stretch.  It seemed insurmountable.  The summit of this task proved daunting.  How was I ever to make the happiness happen when I slept for less than four hours and I had to return to work after a vacation?  Yet—it happened.

Here I thought my title was clever.  Then this image came up in a search for "grumblies." *sigh  Great pic right?

Granted if not for a healthy dose of coffee the gnarly grumblies might have bested me.  However, I did indeed find a way to persevere.

I made a Top Ten List of reasons why I was glad to be back at work.  It included items like “another chance to be my best” and “no Mayan apocalypse.”  Then I did a little writing about an awesome event from the break followed by either a funny, unfortunate, or embarrassing event.  Each time a group did this activity at work today, I shared a different set of events from my own break.  I even made myself think of more awesome details when people asked how my vacation was.  Once my drowsy cobwebs cleared and I had two hours back in action, I admit—it definitely felt better than draggin’ my heels and wallowing in the pity party to which I could’ve succumbed. 

Top Ten Lists come in handy everywhere!  Even in Wayne's World.

As I shared my stories, my spirits lifted, but what was truly inspiring was listening to other people tell me of their stories.  One person went to Belize over the vacation.  Did you know almost all of the food in Belize is grown locally by Mennonites?  Another person just met her uncle for the first time over the holidays.  No elaboration but it deeply affected her from her demeanor.  Then another person said he and his cousins wanted to play basketball, but the court was covered in snow.  They decided to shovel all the snow and play a little freezing temperature ball at the park.  Can you imagine? 

These rare moments when I can really make a personal connection keep me going sometimes.  Seeing people as the individuals with depth and dimension rather than numbers and graphs and statistics reminds me of all that is important.  The insight I gather gets tucked away for future reference.  I wish I had more chances for this kind of activity and understanding.  For now though, it sustained me through the first day back.

There you have it: a daily dose of happy from a sleep-deprived, grumpy-butt person just tryin’ to get through the day.  

And So It Begins...

Happy 2013!

As many people have done in the past and will continue to do in the future, I started the year with a gentle and loving kiss with my husband.  I love the New Year’s kiss.  I really just love kissing in general, but on New Year’s with my Snugglebunny it holds a wee bit higher status for me.  I had no idea why this tradition came about, so I went hunting for answer and found more than I bargained for.

Among other and sometimes stranger NYE traditions of course is the Spanish tradition of eating 12 grapes—one for each toll of the clock at midnight.  This is for good luck.  My nephew upon learning of the tradition reached a different conclusion.  He saw it as a way to have healthy bowels. Really.  You see, he knows grapes make him poop; therefore 12 grapes to start the new year means his intestinal health will prosper.    Oy!  There’s also the direction of the wind idea for New Year’s.  I personally was unfamiliar with this tradition.  Apparently the direction of wind foretells the upcoming year’s events.  For those in my area where this morning’s winds were from the northwest, I am truly sorry.  Luckily it’s just superstition, right?  For some, the food’s the thing.  Black eyed peas, greens and cornbread baby!  I didn’t realize this one had so many variations, but yummy about sums it up!  Now I’m hungry and I have more write.

Back to the kiss.

Did you know that it isn’t just the person you date or married that you should kiss?  The midnight kiss is a ward against “a year of coldness and lack of affection.”  Whew!  Dodged that one.  However, it need not be a human you kiss.  According to one survey, more people will kiss a pet on NYE than a human!  A gender gap exists here; women are four times more likely to spend NYE with a pet than a man.  In that same article it is apparently a political choice as well with Dems spending NYE with a pet more than Repubs do.  Historians though do trace the practice of the kiss back to Romans.  What didn’t come from the Romans when it comes to celebration practices right?  Anyway, Saturnalia apparently did give rise to the New Year’s kiss as did the English and Germans who held masked balls.  They used the removal of the mask for a kiss as a way to rid evil spirits from the new year as well as setting the tone for your relationships that year.  No pressure.

Of course, no discussion of the New Year’s kiss would be complete without the clip from the classic rom-com When Harry Met Sally.

Anyway, as I look for all those little things that make me happy, kissing is definitely high on the list.  My husband has always been a fantastic kisser and I couldn’t ask for a better start to 2013 than a generous and sincere kiss from this gentleman.