Hold on and pretend it's a plan

I finally got around to making one of my sporadic wordpress blog posts: Smelly Books.

Being a sports fan is not for the faint of heart. Every time my team goes into big games, I wish I didn't care so much. But winning a close game that you really have no business winning is sweet.

Survive and advance and my Jayhawks will get at least one more game.


*whew*

I loved Revenge last night. Wild cards galore now. I can't wait to see what happens next. I have a bad feeling that things are not ultimately going to end well for Jack, Charlotte, or Declan.

And to say it non-spoilery: I had a feeling as things went on that the person who was killed would wind up being someone other than originally implied. And just who did do the killing, hmmm? And did "Amanda" step into further trouble by accepting that ride? Conrad's dad seemed pretty cool last week. He definitely dropped in my estimation this week.

A Dogs New Year's Resolutions:

10. I will not lick my human's face after eating animal poop.

9. I do not need to suddenly stand straight up when I'm lying under the coffee table.

8. I will no longer be beholden to the sound of the can opener.

7. Take time from busy schedule to stop and smell the behinds.

6. Get a bite in on that freak who gives me that shot every year.

5. Grow opposable thumb; break into pantry; decide for MYSELF how much food is *too* much.

4. January 1st: Kill the sock! Must kill the sock!

3. January 2nd - December 31: Re-live victory over the sock.

2. The garbage collector is NOT stealing our stuff.

1. I will NOT chase the stick until I see it LEAVE THE IDIOT'S HAND!

After going back and forth on it for a couple of days, I went ahead and bought a Soda Stream. With the gift card that I had, it was only about $60.00. Plus a few more dollars for a package of soda flavor.

I have to admit that it's a pretty neat little device. Very easy to use. No electricity required. None of the flavorings use High Fructose Corn Syrup which makes me happy. Even the non-diet flavors use Splenda to some degree along with sugar. I'm not super thrilled about that because I have a distrust of artificial sweeteners, but in the end it wasn't a deal breaker for me. So far, no buyer's remorse. (Actually, if I had more in the way of discretionary funds I'd consider getting one to have at the office too.)

In case anyone's interested, here's one review site that I read while I was thinking about making the purchase.

One of the presents under the tree this year was a nice check from mom and dad. It's winding up being a little more immediately useful than i had hoped.

I took my car in for an oil change today. Among the things discovered when they did a once over: some belts needed tightening (expected, there was some squealing that was starting up), a leaky valve cap, and a rear strut that is beginning to fail. (The latter would explain why I was starting to feel like the car wasn't riding as smoothly as it should.) So, I get to take it back to the shop next week for the struts and a alignment.

Plus a couple of new, or newer--tires are in my near future too.

*heavy sigh*

I frequently have to remind myself that I have a Dreamwidth account. However, as things continue to evolve I can see the possibility of activity increasing there. If you're friended here and want to friend me there, my DW user name is smg01.

I had some really great teachers in school. Last night I was remembering a story about my high school Shakespeare teacher. Mrs. Fambrough was short, a little stocky. Tended to wear semi-dramatic jewelry. A classmate once mentioned how you would look at her outfits and think that they shouldn't work, but somehow they did and they looked fantastic. She had kind of a flat, nasal voice. A sly sense of humor. And complete control of a class.

One day, as we were doing Henry IV, part one, she related this story. It'll be obvious fairly quickly, at least in part, where it's going to go, but I don't think it suffers for.

She described the day a number of years previous that she was teaching a freshman class. They were in either new or temporary classrooms--I can't remember the exact circumstances, but the upshot was that there were no clocks in the rooms. (I bet you can guess where this might be going.)

On that day, she gave a rousing lesson on subject-verb agreement. At the end, she asked if anyone had questions. One boy's hand immediately shot up:

"Yes?"

"What time is it?"

Mrs. Fambrough shook her head and then told us what happened next:

"So I fixed him with my Fambrough eye and I said:

What a devil hast thou to do with the time of the
day? Unless hours were cups of sack and minutes
capons and clocks the tongues of bawds and dials the
signs of leaping-houses and the blessed sun himself
a fair hot wench in flame-coloured taffeta, I see no
reason why thou shouldst be so superfluous to demand
the time of the day."

"Nobody ever asked me what time it was again."

She went on: "He probably went home that night and said that his teacher didn't let people ask questions. The truth is, we love questions. It's just stupid questions that we don't like."

It's been well over twenty years and that story still makes me smile. Mrs. Fambrough was a hell of a teacher.

Quite some time ago, when the local Border's was closing down, I picked up--among other things--a copy of The Hunger Games. There are two approaches one can take with a series: 1) Buy all of the books so you can seamlessly go from one to the next, or 2) Buy the first, see if you like it and go from there. This time I went with option 2.

I finally got around to reading The Hunger Games past week. It took me approximately three pages to be completely hooked. By the one quarter point, I was realizing I should have gone ahead and gotten all three books. On Sunday, when I found book three but had to have book two ordered for me, the failure to buy all three at once took on the look of strategic error.

I flirted with the idea of slowing down my reading to try to stretch out HG until I have a copy of Catching Fire. Since I'm not constitutionally capable voluntarily leaving off a book that I've become invested in, that was a no go from the start. So here I sit, waiting for CF to arrive later this week and reminding myself that I don't want to read Mockingjay out of order.

I'm such an instant gratification person when it comes to books.

By the way, I wasn't sure if I was going to like Hunger Games. The plot description didn't quite seem like my kind of thing. But so many people that I trust loved it that I gave it a try. I thought it was utterly engrossing and I can't wait to find out what happens next.

1. I've been working on a blog post about my phone fear (among other things), but it seemed a little early expose my neuroses like that. Instead I posted something about life with a finnish spitz

2.Revenge continues to intrigue.


( speculation )