Just Another Herd Creature

Land of the Unreal.  Everything on the Strip is Big, Everything is Blinky.  I just returned from dropping stonebender and wild_irises off at the Mirage to gamble for a bit.  I'm sure stonebender will have something to say about his first experience at a live poker game when he gets computer access.

The 9.5 hour drive here was not bad.  A little radio, a little ipod music, a little talking and stonebender reading to me while I drove, made it all go by pretty quickly.   I hope the ride home on Tuesday goes as well.  

I'm enjoying alt-polycon.  It's a little weird since I have never read alt-poly.  I feel like a bit of a hanger on at times.  I'm having my shy moments now and then.  There are lots of very interesting people here, some I know, some I don't, but would like to get to know.  Only tonight and tomorrow before most people go back home.  Tomorrow night we have tickets for Spamalot.  I'm looking forward to it - not the drive down the Strip on the night of the Super Bowl, but it will be worth it.  

Driving is crazy.  If I ever come back here just for a vacation, I think I'd prefer to stay at one of the big hotels on the Strip. 

This is all very disjointed because I want to go to a panel in 1 minute. 

 Video Description

Has Apple considered the implications of its glorification of thin models in
the MacBook Air television advertisements? Has it once considered the
feelings of my "big boned" HP, and how she's felt living in a society where
you're only as attractive as you are THIN? And what about the young
processors that are at an impressionable age. Do they need this pressure? I
think not.
YouTube

 Happy Anniversery stonebender and serenejournal!  May  you have many, many, many more years together. 

The wind was shoving the rain almost in a horizontal direction. Messy. Cold. Wet. Grey. I LOVED it. Sitting at a stop sign, the van was rocked back and forth; without the storm I would have thought "earthquake". Again, I LOVED it!

I know this can cause a lot of problems for people and I'm sorry for that . . . but still I LOVE it. All that's missing is thunder and lightening.

Lunch will be hot soup from a nearby restaurant, in the 6th floor lunch room, sitting next to the wall of windows enjoying nature's show.

We saw "Juno" last night. It was very, very good. All I'd heard was basic plot; it was about a 16 year old pregnant girl, and that it was a sleeper indy film like "Little Miss Sunshine". Both true with some kick ass acting, quirky smart dialogue and a great soundtrack. I'd have to go through the films for this year, but I'm pretty sure this is my favorite film of 2007.
2 Thumbs Up - Thunderbirds are GO!

If you celebrate this day, Merry Christmas. If you don't, enjoy the silly dog picture. After Gilly's cancer surgery, which removed all her lower teeth except for the canine, the tooth made a perfect hook for the ornament. I may have executed the photo, but the concept was courtesy of clever_doberman, so I must share the blame/accolades with her.

It was 1967 and I was 10 years old. Santa was as real to me as my mother and father. I knew what he looked like, I knew how he spoke and I knew he spent the year tracking kid’s behavior and making toys. He lived in the North Pole with his wife and helper elves. He ate the chocolate chip cookies and milk I left for him every Christmas Eve; the reindeer ate the carrots. This I knew.

By the age of 11, I’d begun to experience how large the world really was. As a family, we took a train ride to see Uncle Ervin in California. It took 3 days to go 2000 miles. In school I learned to travel all the way around the earth was about 25,000 miles. Even if you don’t account for the time it takes him to drop off the presents, even if you accept he could go faster than a train and maybe even an airplane, the math for an overnight delivery was looking mighty shaky. I’d already accepted his use of magic, after all there’s nothing aerodynamic about reindeers, but somehow I expected the rest of his story to be straightforward, i.e. magic free. This was my waffle year; logic fought with my ardent wish to believe Santa was real and adults never lied.

Christmas Eve was the extended family get-together. For most of my childhood, Mom and Aunt Emma alternated hosting this night. This year it was at Aunt Emma & Uncle Frank’s home. They lived in a 2 story house; upstairs was an apartment they rented out. When you came in the front door, there was a small alcove. Here was a bookcase with lots of old hardcover books; many of them condensed Reader’s Digests. The year before, I was content to play with my younger nieces (ages 4 and 5) and boy cousins; Aunt Emma always had the Lincoln Logs and Mr. Potato Head ready for us. This year I waved off the kids and sat on the steps leading up to the apartment and read a book by the dim bulb in the entrance area. When I finally got too cold to stay there, I went back into the main house. I briefly considered joining the kids, but the enticing smells, warmth and especially the buzz of adult talk drew me to the kitchen. I distinctly remember wanting to be part of the conversation, not just the “fly on the wall” trying to hear something I shouldn’t. Of course, if the adults were really talking about “adult” things, they changed the subject or switched to Italian when they saw me.

Unfortunately, even thought I wanted to be included in the grown-up’s life, often I found it boring. Just as I was about go back to the front room and see what the kids were doing, their father John arrived. Snowflakes melted on his dark hair and the smell of new fallen snow swirled around him. With the perfect level of excitement in his voice, he said he heard on the radio that U.S. weather radar was tracking a UFO; they weren’t sure but it might be sleight shaped. What did we think it might be? “It’s Santa, it’s Santa” the girls shrieked. “Maybe” their father replied. They kept insisting until he agreed it had to be Santa. All my doubts vanished with this announcement. Radar “saw” Santa. John sounded so convincing. For this moment, for this night, I believed again. I knew there would be presents waiting for me in the morning and only one person could have left them there.

By the next Christmas, logic prevailed. I knew Santa was a myth. I knew Mom bought and wrapped the presents. I knew Mom ate the cookie and milk and put the carrots back in the fridge. I became part of the adult Santa conspiracy, with a wink behind my nieces backs, as we assured them Santa knew what they wanted. A little magic had left my life.

Not the way dbubley is sick, but sick enough with ear aches and a sore throat that I didn't sleep much last night. I've called in sick, which I rarely do, but I just feel so tired and when my ears hurt, I have a hard time concentrating.

It's rainy and cold here today and the forecast calls for rain most of the week. We went to see "Golden Compass" yesterday, I figured about halfway through the movie I was getting sick. I've not read the book; I enjoyed the movie, although it was apparent the story is much, much more complicated than they could fit in 2 hours of screen time. Now I want to read the books. My “books to read” list is getting impossibly long. Bad news: there’s not enough years of life left to read them all, esp. since more are added each day! Good news: I’ll always have a book to read. Maybe after a couple of hours of sleep, I’ll be able to concentrate enough to read. There is a silver lining to this sick business.

May any readers today have a better day than our household is having.

EDIT: Since I wrote that last sentence, I must say our household is having a WONDERFUL day because of some WONDERFUL, STUPENDOUS,INCREDIBLE GOOD news; serenejournal's mom is cured and going home from the hospital real soon!!!!

Worried about "mom" (aka serenejournals mom) and about serene. Living in the hospital while someone you love is going through all kinds of pain is exhausting, draining you of every thing you need to be the support for the sick person. In this last year, I've been both support and patient. Let me tell you, even with the pain and fear of surgery, it was easier being the patient. Of course, this is bringing up all MY Mom stuff. This will be the 8th holiday without my mom. The sadness and tears come unbidden, it has never gone away - it shifts to a lesser prioity, but it's always waiting just off stage to overwhelm me.

Almost forgot - I got in my very first moving accident today. Thirty-four years of driving and now, today of all days, I have my first. Everyone is okay. The van is okay. The other car has some damage. I'm not sure whose fault it was.

Now I'm really going to bed.