No Good Could Come Of That

Joanne and I went to the Bahamas and all you get is this crappy blog.

We left on Monday, Memorial Day, flying into Miami bright and early. A little too bright and a little too early for my liking, but hey, it's vacation so I mustered along. However, my Big Plans of being all packed up in advance did not transpire so true to form, I was up packing Sunday night at 11 p.m. What is wrong with me?? I had two whole days to get it together, and still found myself right there at the 11th hour putting stuff in a suitcase. I did, however, manage to mop the common hallway of the house and sew a pair of pants of Kenny's Sunday afternoon. Kenny asked me what the fuck I was doing, sewing and mopping when I shoulda been packing, but I guess I'm just a procrastinator right to the core. He then said he's rather happy to see that I am an erratic vacation-getting-ready-er regardless of who I'm going with and in the future he won't allow me to blame him for my last-minute shenanigans.

So after all that, and running on little sleep, is it any surprise that I was tired and looking for a nap Monday afternoon? This is the one key area where Joanne and I differ on vacation - she is not a napper by nature. She was tired, too, since she was packing late Sunday night and didn't get to bed early either, but instead of napping she left me to sprawl around in the room while she roamed around the ship. She was probably wondering who the hell she got involved with for vacation at this point, but it wasn't a total loss on Day 1. After my short nap I was ready to rock and roll. Or at least walk and sit.

Once I awoke and Joanne came back to the room, I heard the strangest words I've ever heard uttered on vacation come outta Joanne's mouth: "I guess we should unpack." "Unpack??!!!??" I reiterated, in shocked confusion as to what she meant by that. Yep, she really meant to unpack her suitcase, utilizing the drawers and the hangers - all of it. She told me she'd save the left side of the dresser for my things. In all my years of travels, I have never - not once - unpacked my things and put them in hotel/ship/whathaveyou dresser drawers. I will hang a few things, things I don't want to wrinkle up too badly, but certainly not every little scrap of fabric I've brought with me. Joanne cleans out her suitcase, and after a little effort all her items were tidily tucked away or hung in the closet, with her suitcase looking like this:

You can even see the dresser drawers still open where she'd been storing her things.

To me, this is crazy talk - I don't like to pack as it is, much less do it just to undo it the next day - and then have to do it again in 4 days! But I succumbed to the guilt she bestowed on me and actually hung my nice dress pants and put my swimsuits in a drawer and my pajamas in another drawer. The rest of my items I unpacked like this for the duration of the trip:There you have our biggest travel differences: Nap vs. No Nap, Unpack vs. No Unpack. Oh, one more, too, but we can't go into that here. Some things that happen - or don't happen - on vacation stay on vacation.

So Day 1 was pretty much getting settled in, checking out the casino games, heading down to meet our dining companions. Before dinner we decided to try our luck in the casino, and sat down at these Powerball games and I promptly won this with my first $20:

Very lucky right off the bat! Then we moved to 3-card poker to try our luck there, and I ended up winning over $300 with three-of-a-kind. I'm happy to say I brought $700 home with me on this trip - I didn't give it all back to the Casino at all!

Joanne had some casino luck as well, we played in a slot tournament towards the end of the week and she came in 1st Place for a win of $150! Not bad, was supposed to be a free cruise 1st prize, but they didn't have enough players. It's still fun to come in first!

Here are some other things we did during the week:

Drank these:

Went to Atlantis, Paradise Island on Tuesday:

While there, we had toes in sand, coconut drinks in hand:

I was dubious when Joanne announced she was taking her coconut drink with her into the water, but I gamely followed behind.

It made for a nice photo of her. That is, until we attempted water entry. Then, the waves and undertow were a little fierce. I got my pose in, but yes, it is cropped like hell, because there is no way it was getting posted in it's virgin state - I was trying to maintain some balance while not spilling an ounce of the coconut. It made for an interesting and unflattering splay-legged, falling-over kinda pose. But I was laughing!

Then, the waves got ahold of us both, and Joanne got rolled by a wave and lost her drink.


We still swam around and had a good time, and the foreboding clouds in the background didn't affect our day at the beach. The skies opened up a bit later, after we were done eating and we were exploring the underground aquarium on the Atlantis property.

Atlantis is home of numerous death-trap water slides, which we passed while wandering the property. I saw one titled "The Abyss." Catch phrase of the trip was generated when I uttered, "No good could come of my fatass sliding down something called The Abyss." No good could come of that, indeed.

The End of Days 1 & 2.

Riddle Me This.

What's red and white and sore all over?

These Girls. :(

So sunburnt, that white spots formed out of sheer frustration of which shade of red they should be. Yes, I slathered myself in layers upon layers of waterproof 30 SPF. I think it's a scam. The lotion companies sell you the block, which doesn't actually block, and then sell you the aloe vera soothing gels. If their sunblock worked, why would we even need to consider soothing sprays? A conspiracy, I say.

Cruisin' Towards Home

Hello, Hello! Here we are, winding down on our very fun vacation - last night :(



It's been a whirlwind of a week! We've been jampacked busy, with Monday night getting settled on the ship and then stops Tues/Wed/Thursday. Tuesday we spent the day at Atlantis Resort on Paradise Island in the Bahamas. They've started opening the resort up to cruise passengers, so for a small (?) fee we had beach and other resort privileges. For some odd reason I was fixated on perhaps seeing Miley Cyrus there.... but no such adventure. It was HOT on the beach and I willingly paid $30 for a beach umbrella to hide under. We drank coconut drinks out of coconuts, swam around, drank a gallon of sea water (the waves were a little fierce) , ate lunch and called it a day. I was ready for a nap. That's the only difference we've really had - I'm a napper after a long hot sunfilled day of excursion and Joanne is not a napper. I think I've had an influence on her, though, because today she laid down and napped when we got in from Key West. I knew that I could convert her to my lazy ways!

On Wednesday we stopped at Royal Caribbean's private island, Coco Cay. It's one of my fave spots, so I was happy about that. We rented floating mats and drifted around on them for part of the day, sipping Coco-loco's in between. I think this is where I got my doozy of a sunburn, despite the heavy and frequent slathering of sunblock. My boobies are on fire, to say the least. Pictures to come when we get home, I know you're excited to see those!

Today was Key West. We bought trolly tour tickets which included a stop at the Truman House and Hemingway House. Both were fun, Truman House was really interesting. Petted some cats at Hemingway House. Then our trolly bus broke down and we were literally herded out to the side of the road where we waited a good 20 minutes for another bus to come by and pick us up. This put us way behind on our drinking agenda - we had to make up for lost time. Next stop, Margaritaville, where we indulged in cheeseburgers in paradise and margaritas, of course!

From there we walked back to the ship, stopping at Sloppy Joe's for a to-go beer. I got licked there, but that's another story.....Joanne just laughed :)

Tonight, Joanne won 1st place in the casino slot tournament! Unfortunately, the prize was supposed to be a free cruise, but they didn't have enough players so 1st place payed out cash instead - $150. Still a fun little win, just too bad not a cruise! I didn't even qualify, except perhaps for low score. However, I did win $400 on the first night on a slot machine, and then got 3 sevens playing 3-card poker, which paid over $300. So that was a good night of action. We're going back to try some last-night luck.

At $0.55/minute, that's it for now. More to come, with pictures.

Sounds of Summer!

First true sound that Summer Has Begun: The ice cream truck just rolled by!! Makes me wanna run right out there and buy a red-white-&-blue bombpop.

But I'm old, and couldn't get outta my chair, let alone down the stairs, before it had passed the house by. Ah, Summer.

$4000 Pussy.

Stanley believes there is nothing better than a warm summer day and an open window.

Caesar, on the other hand, has been sick, and long story short (as my Reader more than likely has heard by now), after three different vets he was diagnosed Tuesday with lymphoma. So we're doing what I never thought I'd be doing, which is administering cat chemotherapy to target his cancer. It's concentrated in his stomach, and the success rate is 70%, and while I was skeptical, it does seem to be having an impact even after only two days. He's happier looking, he's purring, and most importantly, as the cancer in his stomach shrinks, he's able to eat again! Small doses, but he's definitely interested and hungry. So it's been a pretty crazy week since Monday when we started getting 2nd and 3rd opinions, and now it's Friday and here we are. Going into this weekend on a positive note with the cat is a happier place to be. Here he is with his little shaved paw to get his IV:

What next? Well, there has been a lot going on, but not worth getting into here. It's not that interesting, really. I finally went to the doctor for my hacking cough I've had since December. He laughed that I "rushed right in" to get checked out. Well, finally figured I'd better since it doesn't seem to be going away, there are some potential issues at work with dust and whatnot, and frankly I'm sick of coughing my ass off every day and never even having had the pleasure of smoking to warrant it.

My doctor is Old School. He does not believe in frivolous health issues. If you showed up at his office with a limb hanging off, you'd be hard-pressed to get a bandage from him. I wouldn't have been surprised if he had suggested leeching me. Instead he gave me some sample allergy pills of Singulair. I took one, came home and promptly took a 3-hour nap with Twinkle. I hope it was just regular laziness and not medication-induced, as I will never get anything accomplished with forced napping.

I've got a busy getting-ready-for-vacation weekend ahead of me. I hope to post something more entertaining later, I would be saddened to leave my Reader with this drivel for a week. Bahama-bound on Monday - it is going to be a most fun girl-trip for Joanne and myself!

That's it for now. I'm heading to bed, that 3-hour nap has plumb worn off.

Lupe Screwed Us: Part Deux

Saturday Kenny and I made our first venture to The West Side Market. I've been there as a yute (see: My Cousin Vinny), but hadn't been there as an adult shopper. Kenny had never been. So we made plans to become trendy shoppers.


Of course, there was no way we were getting down there at opening hour, so we headed down according to our "morning". I read online that there was a cafe in the building part, so we planned for a meal there as well. We arrived around 2:00 or so, and were immediately overwhelmed by the buzzing hubbub of activity. Kenny started to get a little panicky, he's not one for chaotic crowds to begin with (unless the promise of Huey Lewis is at the end of the rainbow).

We were hungry and it was quickly becoming apparent that we needed to head to the restaurant ASAP, before we started buying twenty pounds of salami and headcheese, just because it was food. As luck would have it, we found a seat right away and ordered lunch: pulled BBQ pork for Kenny, and a fresh walleye sandwich for myself. It was really great and we were sufficiently fueled to do some sensible shopping.



The market was a lot smaller than in my mind's eye. My childhood memory is of it being a cavernous building in which you would never find your party again should you become separated. The stand I remember most vividly is that of the Bratwurst sandwiches. It was our family destination, where we would wait in a snaking long line for our sandwich with sauerkraut, and my dad would pop to the booth next door for a fresh cuppa buttermilk, to which he always added a layer of pepper before drinking. As a kid, I wanted to try it, but really couldn't see what he enjoyed about it - who drinks a cup of buttermilk?? With pepper? Really. Well, that was his meal, and he enjoyed it with his bratwurst. The stand was much smaller than I remembered, but it still had a gathering. It was a shame that we were too full after lunch to partake, but there's always next time.

The trip was a little bit of a walk down memory lane, as I found the same stand still standing (hahah!) where my mom would purchase her Hungarian jams for her Christmas cookies. Still right there, all these years later.

Kenny and I kept our purchases rather minimal, tried not to get carried away. We purchased some farm-fresh butter from the stand where my father enjoyed his buttermilk, some Hungarian bread which Kenny remembers his grandfather getting from time to time, sirloin steaks which looked too good to pass up, and some fudge that is touted as the best in the area. It's not an unwarranted distinction - it's incredibly creamy and delicious!

Once we got to the open-air portion where the vegetables are sold, it quickly reminded me of the area where cruise ships dock - filled with merchants yelling for your attention, offering up the best deals, "Here, look here - just for you!" Quickly, a woman started shouting out her best deals on bananas and whatnot. The sign said, "4 lbs. for $2" which is 50cents/pound - same price as Giant Eagle. When I commented on that, she said she'd give me bananas, a small watermelon and a large cantaloupe for $5. Sounds like a good deal, I said okay. But. I did not get 4 lbs. of bananas, in fact, the bunch is so small it didn't even register on my scale. I'd say less than a pound. The watermelon is just so-so. Haven't tried the cantaloupe yet, but I have low expectations. Kenny tried to convince me it was still a great deal for $5, but since my main focus had been the bananas, to come away with far less than I wanted was irksome. Lupe screwed me. But wait, there's more.

While we were getting $5 worth of stuff I hadn't really wanted in the first place, she offered Kenny a deal on mangos: 4 for $2. Fifty cents a piece is a really good deal on mangos. So he purchased four of them. Today, I decided to give myself a healthy dose of vitamin c and the extra ka-pow of other assorted antioxidants promised up by the mango and discovered it was thoroughly rotted out in the inside. So I cut another one. Do you know where this is going?? Yep. LUPE SCREWED US.

Seinfeld was right: Fruit is a gamble. One we lost when pitted against Lupe.

Now For His Next Act....

Not content with frittering away his time on countless movies, video games, social networking sites and endless gambling trips, Mr. Anderson discovered an even more impressive use of his time: Perfecting the flawless execution of tic-tac teeth:

He impressed me with this skill over beer and BLT's at our #1 local hangout, Moe's. Yes, he can perfectly position tic-tacs that have had the color sucked off to look exactly like hillbilly teeth. Folks, if you're not impressed with this amazing feat alone, let me assure you he did this all WITHOUT HANDS. Nothing but tongue and lips. I know you're now dully (no, that's not a typo; it's a clever pun on my part) impressed.

Hands off, Ladies. He's taken.

Fit for King James

Lebron's crib includes a game room, bowling alley, three-story aquarium, barbershop, recording studio and a movie theater, but I betcha it doesn't have THIS:


Classic Cleveland, Baby!

Mothers.

Here we are, finding ourselves celebrating another Mother's Day. And again, Sophie celebrates another birthday - 92! Melinda, my nephews and I went out to her house on Sunday for the festivus, bringing food and cake over to her house since she's not going out on account of the Swine Flu - it's not gonna get her, No Sirree. You may think I'm making that up, but that's really the excuse she gave me for not wanting to go out and celebrate with Kenny's family. And she's serious about it. Oh, well, when you're 92 you can have your own rules.

She's lookin' pretty darn good for 92. Melinda and I can only hope to hold up that well. I'm doing what I can, and have had some success battling back against The Wrinkle, by the way. It's a lot less evident and severe. Take THAT, Wrinkle! I've been implementing my 3-prong attack, without the green tea, but using not just one, but three wrinkle greases on it at night. And I've been re-educating The Wrinkle with Frownies in place, much to Kenny's nighttime delight. I'm a sexy little number at night with these little papers stuck all over my face.

Here's Sophie looking innocent. I told her to strike a "holy" pose so she did:

We stayed a few hours, enjoying ribs and chicken from Famous Dave's and chocolate birthday cake. It was nice to see my nephews, I don't see them very often. Trevor is pretty sensitive to all conversations which include any mention of below-the-belt activities and left the room a time or two. I asked if they "Twittered" and they said no, and I merely mentioned that I've twatted before. Trevor left the room. Then Melinda proceeded to tell us about having two kids the natural way, passing right out of the vagina (no C-sections) and that did Trevor in. Me, too, by the way. And now I'm guessing you, too, Reader. Again, you're welcome. Oh, yes, we do have these conversations right in the room with Sophie. I told her to say dicks and tits while I was taking her picture. I grew up in a rough household, you wonder why I am the way I am?? Now you know.

Here's a picture of Melinda & Clan's dog. He's cute and well-behaved. And he's not neutered, as I noted when I saw him walking around with gigantic dog-balls swaying away. Melinda doesn't seem to think that's a pet necessity. Ah, country living. That's all I can say. How I escaped it is still a mystery.

Sophie did make one pretty good Sophie-ism. She mentioned the neighbor's dog got hit & killed by a car, and it was "better that the driver just killed the dog, because the vet bills would be what it would cost to care for a person." She is nothing if not practical.

Saturday we spent the day with Kenny's side of the family, treating them to a Mother's Day dinner at Buca de Beppo, our two-year-running tradition. We really have a good time there. Here's Margie & Linda striking a pose:
And Margie with Stanley. How lucky, they've been together and married over 65 years. What a nice way to roll through life, with the one you love beside you.

The End.

Seriously. TMI.

Kenny paid homage to my child-free vagina in celebration of Mother's Day. You're welcome.

Make Mine a Peach!

It was an obligatory weekend, which is never ideal, but sometimes it just is. Oh, be forewarned, this post will have pictures of cats. So you know.

Saturday morning I got up really fucking early for a Saturday morning. Timmy and Lisa heard me rummaging around and looked at each other perplexed, wondering if there had been a three-hour time change they didn't know about. No. I was just up early, getting ready for the big finale for Toastmasters. Had to drive down to Canton by 9 a.m., ready to give my criticis...er...helpful evaluation. I had to go first. Drat. To make a long story short, I was DQ'd. Went over time. But. The fucking people running the lights didn't have it quite figured out for the first speaker (me!) and so it threw my whole game off. Oh, well. I was mad and annoyed and sad and disgruntled. I don't mind losing (well, maybe I do), but at least if I had sucked and didn't win, I could accept that. But to get up, get dressed, drive an hour away, and do a good job and get DQ'd really blows. So I am full of sour grapes. Kenny and I have both deduced that I am in fact a sore loser. So that's the culumination of the evaluation contests. And I really think I would have had 2nd place (out of 4 of us). Some fucker has my trophy now.


I pouted a good part of Saturday, and then we went out that evening for cocktails with The Gang at Cleats. Pete was trying to ply me with tequila for some reason, but I was a cautious drinker. I've already been the victim of tequila and black cowgirl hats. I don't need a repeat performance of that experience.

I'd like to have something more exciting to say about Sunday, but I spent the entire day scrubbing this house down from top to bottom. Well, that was the plan anyway - I didn't make it much past the bedroom. I decided to do it right and clean the closet as well, no sense spring cleaning half way. That took For. Ev. Er. And the HAIR in that bedroom - I think I scraped up a sixth cat for us.



Now, in the past I have been mocked by many for being Exact Change Girl. Yes, I'm the person at the register who scrounges in her wallet to make exact change. It annoys many, mostly men, for whatever reason. But here is why I do it. For the simple fact that I don't have this much change in my possession:

Now, that picture does not do the amount of change justice. It's A LOT. It's practically filling a Longaberger Bread Basket. And it's the bane of part of my bedroom problems. Kenny rarely makes exact change, so every time he spends money, he's handed back a handful of coin. Which goes in his pants pocket, and then gets emptied out all over the top of the bedroom dresser, the coffee table, or even better, the bedroom floor. I walk around picking up quarters, dimes, pennies, nickles each and every day. Sophie would have a field day. Me, not so much. I'm just annoyed by it. Think I'm kidding? Here's the dresser, after I've cleaned off all Mr. Anderson's other papers and whatnot, and the change - and dust - left behind:

So I cleaned all that up, reallocated the other three change baskets he had into the one large basket, put a small basket for all his other paper and bullshit he pulls out of his pockets, and have put down a mandate that once the big basket is filled with change he needs to do something with it to pare it down or I'll just take it to Coinstar and keep it. I didn't actually tell him that part, but that's what'll happen.

That room is pristine now and it smells like fresh air. Now comes some of the cat pictures I warned you about. Twinkle had The Best Day helping me clean the room. Then, once it was scrubbed from top to bottom, and clean bedding was in place, he was exhausted.

Stanley's laying with him.

In my household, we're a little weird with how much we weigh the cats - but I like to keep a tab on it because weightloss is actually first indicator that something is awry. Which is exactly what happened with Caesar. I've noticed his fur has looked a little baggy lately and really started to monitor his weight. He lost an incredible amount in a short amount of time - down from 20 lbs. to 14.6. Thursday night we took him up to the vet to see wassup with dat. He's also been doing a weird head jerking thing, too, so I shared that with the vet. Concensus seems to be that he's got a tooth ache - which would hinder his eating, cause the weight loss, and account for the jerky head thing. So here he is resting tonight, with his little tooth ache.

He goes in Monday morning for cat tooth surgery. They'll put him under and figure out which tooth is the source of the angst and do an extraction. Caesar hates me more than he normally does (he's a 1-man cat and really has no use for me) since I'm the one who's been giving him his dreaded antibiotics. He disregards the fact that I've been giving him cat food broths and whathaveyou. I'm the enemy.

Oh, it didn't help matters that when I went to load him up Thursday night to take him to the vet I didn't have the cat carrier door secured properly and his floinking around inside caused it to come loose and he toppled out of the cage and landed on his face in the stairway. At that moment I realized I'd be a horrible mother and it's a good thing my loins did not bear fruit. Or children. Fruit might actually be kinda cool.