Recently in family/friends Category

one of the comics i read online is count your sheep.  it is about a sheep that lives with a mother-daughter family to "take care" of the little girl.  he puts her to sleep at night.  ah to be able to count to one and fall asleep!

it is amusing and i find the punchlines and storylines to be quite good.  the art pleases me and the color choice just seems to fit and be right.  i think one of the reasons i love it so much has to do with the mother-daughter relationship that seems ever so familiar to me.  i always wonder if it is similar to father-son relationships or if there is something intrinsically weird about mother-daughter dynamics. 

today's episode:

i loved this one the moment i read it because it sums up how i feel about my mother. i gave up, so long ago, on doubting her ability to know me in the big picture. she doesn't make decisions for me, or tell me what to do, but she has this uncanny knack for knowing me. i have to say, that supermompower of hers certainly comes in handy as she can predict the future.

thanks mom!

there is seriously nothing going on here.  rien de rien.  no news is good news.

while i am sitting on bedside duty, i would like to say that the nurses here on the 3b wing of saint joseph's hospital are PHENOMENALLY incredible.  it is insane how lovely they are.  how kind.  how quick they are to help.  how good they are at their jobs.  clearly, these nurses are the best of the best in this hospital.

one of the things that annoys my mother more than anything, wait, let me rephrase... more than ANYTHING, is burping out loud.  i am a pro at keeping it quiet and to myself, but let me just say...

i belch better than any pre-, during-, or post- pubescent boy in the world.  and my mother knows this and is not/NOT fond of this at all.  the problem is, coke is the catalyst of champions and i am quite fond of the brown liquid of the gods.  and let me just say, there is nothing more satisfying than belching like homer simpson after a swig of coke.

so the other day, before the christmas festivities can begin, i had to run to my mothers to pick up a platter and drop off something to her house.  i grabbed a coke and out came a beuatiful and extraordinarily unlady-like belch.  my mother looked like she was forced to eat fire as someone scratched their nails down a chalkboard.  i looked at her and apologized.

she rolled her eyes, took a deep breath and then sighed, "uh huh."

my father had just walked into the kitchen with a big smile on his face, "that's my girl."

"joe, don't encourage her."

who needs encouragement?  i didn't know the goal was to make me a lady.  ; )

so i don't get thanksgiving.  i am probably more unamerican than t because he loves it more than most.  it's the food, not the thanks.

i did not really grow up in a big thanksgiving family.  most of my memories were not of this big elaborate meal that had hundreds of people.  it was not this big fun/stressful/awesome family gathering, it was just a turkey, stuffing, and a bunch of other things i hate eating.

that's right.  i said it.  i hate eating that crap.  i don't like turkey (except my mom's and even then i am on a limited turkey diet), sweet potatoes, stuffing, pumpkin pie, cranberry sauce.  the other stuff, well, it's salad and dessert and appetizers.  what the hell? 

so here is my ideal thanksgiving menu: a pig roast, with cornbread pudding, egg noodles, salad, deviled eggs, potato salad (mustard based not mayo-based), dips and chips, asparagus, an assortment of cheeses, etc.  but you see... do you see the problem?  what i just described?  that isn't thanksgiving, that's the 4th of july!

(looking at a quarter of washington state)

him:  whatcha looking at?

me: a quarter i haven't seen yet.

him: let me see.

(he takes quarter from my hand and inspects it)

him:  look at the dolphin.

me: eyebrows raised.  or a salmon?

him:  it looks like a dolphin.

me: eyebrows still raised.  or a salmon?

him:  i guess dolphins would be in florida.

me:  yes, yes they would.  and salmon would be in washington.

for the record, it does not look like a dolphin.

sometimes, you just have to listen to someone else and do what they tell you to do.  for example, this afternoon, a friend told me that we needed to get out of the office, for our own sanity.

her advice: take a walk, get macdonald's french fries and a fountain coke. 

we walked over to the macdo.  ordered.  sat there eating our bounty of fries and drank our magnificent coke.  we sat there and we talked and we giggled and everything felt a thousand times better.  everything felt like it would fall into place.  the stress went away and calm came back.

thank you "l" for knowing what's good for me.

i totally volunteered and asked to do this.  but alithinks participated in a meme and now i am doing it too.  because, well, i got nothing else for the moment... and i have to wait to talk about the library.

so... here are the questions she asked me and my answers:

1) how often are you asked to pronounce your name? was it a problem when you were in school?

i get asked on an occasion, not as often as you would think.  the biggest problem is that when someone asks for jeorg, they tend to expect a boy and are usually shocked.  the other issue is that some people try to "fix" my name by adding a diminutive like jeorgie, jeorgette, jeorgia, etc.  this is quickly corrected.

2) i've lived in lexington for almost 18 months. in that time, we've met for coffee once here, and once in paris. is there a chance we'll meet again? maybe in moscow?

hehehe.  yes.  we can always meet for coffee, it is usually a matter of pinning me down by schedule.  the thing is, others who know me and know me well grab me very quickly and set things up... this is not to say that i am popular... because i am not.  it is just that you have to get to my calendar...

3) you have to choose: lexington or paris. which one's it going to be?

you're mean to me.  it really does depend on context.  if you are talking coffee, then paris.  if you are talking public transportation, paris.  museums, paris.  but family and friends, lexington.  work, lifestyle, lexington.  thomas, lexington.  i love them both a lot...

4) when we last had coffee (which was very fun, by the way), you told me you walk to work. what shoes do you wear for your commute?

my 2 mile trek is done in either galoshes (rainy days), kicks (which are blue and brown), or a pair of shoes that are really well broken in and comfortable (they tend to be shoes that were bought in europe because they seem to take the walk well).

5) which french star (rock, movie, or tv) makes your heart go thump-thump a little faster than usual?

you didn't put up soccer players? really???  this one is really hard because there isn't really a french star that makes my heart beat faster.  i used to find vincent perez really hot, but well, he just doesn't do it for me anymore...  olivier martinez is definitely yum... this is hard...

so if you want to play...

apparently i am worth mocking by lurkers who do not have blogs (hi frank!) as is noticed in my last post.

i think mocking is a good thing.  when we start taking ourselves too seriously, then i think the world has a problem.  namely that i really should not complain about the fact that i had to spend time in paris, france and drink lots of coffee and shop a lot, etc.

my life, no, is not that rough and frank is all to kind in pointing it out.  but i would like to mention that HE was in PARIS, FRANCE for 3 WEEKS this summer too.  so frank... that pity party, i expect you to bring the cheese and i'll bring the whine.  ; )

thomas left this morning to return to the states.  so, essentially you only have 9 hours to rob us blind.

in the mean time, this makes me a "single" girl in paris.  not that i don't have anything to do.  it isn't like i am alone, ever.  i have students here and amazingly enough, they seem to be around, circulating in and out of my days here in paris.  it's like i birthed 11 kids without the pain and now i can't get rid of them.  ; )

so now, i have things to organize, grading to do, actual teaching (gah!), and the sales to finish out.  thomas is scared to death that i may come back home with more shoes.  although i promised after the pair i bought yesterday i wouldn't buy anymore... but seriously, i think that promise may only extend to yesterday... there is a time limit on certain promises... like shoes.  and when one is unofficially single in paris during the sales, shoes must be bought...