Friday, October 31, 2008

Friday Pics: Pumpkin Patch

Week number two for Friday pictures and we have some great pics. And thanks to Jen allowing me to be lazy, this is also my Spin Cycle for the week. Oh, and before we begin, I must thank Kat from 3 Bedroom Bungalow for my newest award. You are awesomesauce Kat and I will do your meme. At some point. Honest. I distract easily.

Ok, starting with me... and once again, the pictures are added to the blog in the order I receive them.


Unfortunately my children were not quite as photogenic as I had hoped this year so I decided to use a picture of my oldest from back in 2004. Connor was much cuter back then, he couldn't talk as much.




Reece and Henry from Jen at Steeny Bee. Now before anybody gets upset that they sent multiple pictures in and I only picked one of theirs but two of Jen's, I have my reasons. First, I owe her a MASSIVE gambling debt and I'm partial to my knee caps. Second, the kids are both sporting genuine JBG tees, not Chinese knock offs, real Steeny Bee haute couture. Third, can you believe the neck muscles on these children? They're wearing pumpkins on their little heads! Fourth, and most important, this is my blog and I can do whatever I want.



Eli and Corbin from Carrie at Cole Pack. My oldest would love nothing more than to juggle his brother's head like this.


From Jen at Sprite's Keeper. I will trade you one of my boys for Sprite. Think about it.


From Jonny's Mommy of Boondock Ramblings. He's like a little pumpkin with legs.


From Momma Trish at Pandora's Ethernet Connection. I have no talent for carving pumpkins. I think I'll just stab a knife into mine and leave it outside.



Church Punk Mom from Embellished Truth And Polite Fiction sent me quite a few pictures to choose from, but I had to use the vat of corn kernels. Sure there were pumpkin pictures, but look at this. It's a giant tub of corn! How far away is Iowa?




My niece Mikayla from A Day In The Life Of. Taken with my sister's new Nikon D40 (bitch) and also by far the largest picture file sent this week. I think this file was second only to my operating system in size.




Mitchell and Noah from Mary Anna of Random: the musings. That is one big ass pumpkin.




Remy, which you may have already seen over on Texas Word Tangle last week, but it's a great picture.




Khadra from Crab Goggles. Her hubby carved a pumpkin for every member of the family.




From Cameron at Get The Stink Off. "Dad! Take the picture! We're sitting on stems!"




Oscar from Jenni at Oscarelli. Lift! You can do it!




Yuck from Ellie of Me and You and Ellie. Moosehead! Woot!




Cousins from Casey at Half As Good As You. If I had a uterus, I'm sure it would be telling me to have another one of these.




Hailey from Middle Aged Woman at Unmitigated. Pretty in pink. She picked the one with all the dirt on it, right?



Thanks everyone for participating, this was fun. Any ideas for next week? I was kinda thinking tonight's costumes but I'm sure you'll all be posting your own, although it might be nice to see them all in one spot. I don't know, what do you think? Or I could pick something totally random for Monday.

Thursday, October 30, 2008

A Post About No Post

Busy today with Halloween parties and lawyers so no time for a post. We're renewing our mortgage so I have to go sign away my soul for another five years. Anyway, I had a great response to the pumpkin patch picture request and it will be going up tomorrow. You still have time to send in your pictures today. I'll even take them Friday morning and add them in.

Soul-less Dumbass

Wednesday, October 29, 2008

Wordless (lazy) Wednesday

Remember those geese from the other day? When I missed being pooed on by 20,000 birds?


Fucking geese. Nailed the ENTIRE van.

Not sure what this means. I suspect some type of secret code.



And apparently this was the best way to watch a band at the pumpkin patch yesterday.



Maybe I should have titled it "Not Many Words Wednesday?"

Monday, October 27, 2008

Marriage Is About Sharing

I have this ability, nay, this gift of being able to share my... essence with my wife. Before I go to bed every night, just before washing my face, I take off my shirt and throw it at her. No matter where I throw from, en suite, main bathroom, door way to our room, anywhere really, I have an almost instinctual ability to put in right on her head. I don't do it every night, I don't even plan it which makes it all the better because she never knows when it's coming. In fact, tonight (last night), just to test my super natural powers I threw it back hand, using my left and looking in the mirror. Right on target. And I don't throw it hard, oh no, it's all about finesse. I want that shirt to land gently and deliver every bit of aromatic love it can without losing any fragrance to a rough power shot. It's all about the love, y'all.

And yes I do pay, one hundred fold. She's small but she has the cold black vengeful heart of a Klingon. It's still worth it though. Every. Single. Time.



Sometimes, little boy, sometimes.

On a happy note, Krystal from Mommy's Escape is now (and earlier than planned) the new mother of Gabriella Crystal, 5 pounds 15 ounces and doing well. Congratulations.

**Also, thanks for all the pics sent in yesterday, I have ten already! Keep them coming!

Syn-propanethial-S-oxide is not your friend


So at some point in our collective history some poor bastard was starving bad enough that he/she had to eat an onion. "Hey, this thing makes my eyes feel like they've been stung by bees and I'm going to lose a few fingers just cutting it up, but it's either that or die. Hopefully that saber tooth tiger doesn't show up while I'm rolling around on the ground clutching my face and screaming." Guess what? I'M NOT STARVING! Why are we still torturing ourselves with these damn things?!

Yes, Supreme Leader is making me cook tonight, why?

DUCK!

Ok, so they're not ducks, they're Snow Geese but SNOW GEESE! just doesn't work. Before leaving for my bike ride yesterday morning I told Supreme Leader that I'd better take the camera because if I didn't then an eagle would land on my handle bars or something. No eagles, but I did get about ten thousand geese. The video is a little choppy and you might want to turn down the sound a little because it was windy.



I can't believe I came out of that clean.

**PICTURE ALERT**

Last weeks Fall picture post went over pretty well, I think, so I decided to do another for this Friday but give everyone a little more time to send them in. So this week, how about pumpkin patch pictures? Send me pics of your little ones in the pumpkin patch. If you don't have little ones, send nieces or nephews, friends, whatever. If your little ones are now big ones, send old pictures. If you have none of the above, take a picture of a pumpkin. This is open to everyone, including the lurkers. Come on, don't be shy! Once again, the email is:

ctordoff@yahoo.ca

I was thinking of doing Halloween pictures, but since it's not until Friday I figured it would be easier to let everybody take their pictures Friday and then send them in next week. What do you think? Guess we'll see how this one goes.

Sunday, October 26, 2008

Halloween Last Year

Inspired by Henry at Steenky Bee.






This was all due to the creativity of Supreme Leader, I had nothing to do with it. Aside from candy inspection. Safety first.

Friday, October 24, 2008

Spin Cycle: Tricked Out

Dammit! Friday again and I still haven't done the Spin. Ok, short and sweet.
By Sunday morning I'm so 'tricked out' I'm ready to toss my tube skirt and stiletto boots.

Is this the first one sentence Spin?

All The Leaves Are Brown...

Holy Guacamole, Bat Man! I asked for some pictures and you actually sent them! If you're just tuning in, back on Wednesday I asked if anybody would be willing to send in some pictures of what fall looks like where they live. And look what happened. I added the pictures to this post as I received them, except for the top three. Mine's first because... well it's my blog. I "borrowed" the second set of pictures. And the third I already had from a guest poster. So here they are.

Richmond, British Columbia, Canada.



I wanted to take a picture from this angle so you could see that my dahlias are still blooming. My dahlias in Canada. 1558 kilometres or 932 miles north of the next set of pictures.


Utah from Jen at Steenky Bee! Oh wait. No, I stole this off Jen's blog because she didn't send me a picture. I don't call Jen names, I prefer to mock.




Detroit, Rock City from Middle Aged Woman at Unmitigated. Happy belated birthday's 17 year old boy & 19 year old girl



Washington from Jeff at Good Father. I live close to Jeff so the wet fall look is very familiar.


Pennsylvania from Lisa at Boondock Ramblings. That is one seriously cute kid.


California from Jen at Blissfully Caffeinated. I don't know what to say, Jen. It's just so sad. Of course, any day now the rains will begin here and not let up until April so you can laugh at me then.





Florida from Casey at Half As Good As You. (*whisper* hate you a little)



Missouri from Kat of 3 Bedroom Bungalow. And her husband's cool Halloween decor.



Iowa (which I'm guessing is McCain country) from Church Punk Mom of Embellished Truth and Polite Fiction.


South Florida from Krystal at Mommy's Escape. (*quiet whisper* you suck)



New London, Connecticut from Ellie at Me and You and Ellie. New England. You guys like, invented fall, right?



Sucky South Florida (her words) from Carrie of Colepack.



More British Columbia pics from my sister, Melanie at A Day In The Life. The first one is in the town of Merritt. If you saw the A&E version of The Andromeda Strain last year, this is where they filmed it.


Vernon.


Thanks everybody for joining in. If you were going to send a picture in but didn't get it to me in time just email it soon and I'll add it to the group.

Thursday, October 23, 2008

Sci-Fi Friday... On Thursday


"It is a glorious day."
"It is. Let's kill this fool in front of us."
"Brilliant!"


*PS. Thanks for the all the pictures yesterday. Keep them coming!

comiquero on flickr

Wednesday, October 22, 2008

Fall, Or Whatever You've Got

I've got an idea. (And yes, it did hurt a little, thanks for asking) A lot of people have been mentioning the fall colours (or lack thereof) where they live, so why don't we share? Take a picture out your front or back door and send it to me. I'll show you mine and you show me all of yours. What do you think? If you don't have anything nice around your house, find a nice area of town and send it instead. You can even lie and say it is from your house, who's gonna' know? Snow on the ground? Good, then I can laugh at you. What do you think? If you're in, email me your pic:

ctordoff@yahoo.ca

Give me an idea of where you're sending the picture from. Privacy-wise you might not want to go into too much detail, and that's ok, maybe just hint. Or I can make up city for you. I'll post what I get on Friday. If you don't want to play along it's fine, I won't take it personally. I'll drink myself to sleep every night and abuse prescription meds, but whatever, we'll still be friends.

Finally, an important item of business I thought I had taken care of but obviously forgotten (it's the booze and the pills). JEN AT BLISSFULLY CAFFEINATED IS AWESOMESAUCE!


Tuesday, October 21, 2008

Vacationing With Family And Blood Feuds

Guten morgen, meine damen und herren! I'm back from my back to back marathon holidays. (That's right, three 'backs' AND a salutation in German) A big GIANT thank you to my guest posters, Jen from Steenky Bee and Middle Aged Woman from Unmitigated. I am so grateful to the two of them for helping me out while I was gone. Emily from Two Dogs Running was scheduled to post too but due to some unfortunate events wasn't able to. Don't worry though, I'm sure those racketeering and extortion charges are bogus and she'll be able to get back into the country once the State Department sorts everything out.

So this trip was up to see the family in Kamloops (just in case you think I made that up). The boys were very excited to spend a night at Nana and Grampa Jerry's where they got to throw rocks at spawning salmon:


Joking. They don't spawn this time of year. Unfortunately we also had to spend time with my sister and brother-in-law. Bad blood, you ask? There is now:



My sister showed the boys some evil video on You Tube and now the boys will not stop singing the f*cking peanut butter jelly song. My brother-in-law was kind (please read "an evil bastard") enough to set some pictures of the kids to this song in a little video. It's over on her blog here. I highly recommend you go over and watch. Make sure you have your children with you. Someone else deserves to suffer.

Finally, one last video thank you to Jenbo and Middle Aged Woman:



She USED to be my favourite sister.

Monday, October 20, 2008

Confessions of a Canadian Wannabe

Today's guest poster holds a special place here in the hearts of Us & Them. Before Mary from Unmitigated came along, Us and Them merely plodded along in comment-less obscurity. We were ocassionally visited from the likes of Jodi of Jodiferous and Tracy from Kaply, Inc, but otherwise it was bleak and lifeless out here on the tundra. Then Mary came along and left a comment. I followed her back to her own site and left a few comments of my own. Next thing I know she's back, and she's brought Mama Dawg with her. It all went to hell in a hand basket after that.


Confessions of a Canadian Wannabe

Ahhhh, the Great White North. I have lived all my life in Canada. Well, not exactly in Canada. Not in the literal, I-am-a-Canadian-citizen sense.

Okay, I live in Detroit. I live closer to Canada than Sarah Palin does to Russia. How's that for close? And I'm a hockey fanatic! I live in a town that calls itself Hockeytown! Of course we also call ourselves Motown, or Murder City, U.S.A., but that just serves to illustrate my point! Doesn't it? I guess not, but these are interesting and mostly true things.

Venue change: I was composing at the dining room table, and have moved to the more comfy couch so I can look at the gorgeous maple trees outside--Maple! Like on the Canadian flag! Here's some of the gorgeous color right outside my window in the morning sun:



Back to hockey. Detroit is the proud possessor of an Original Six team. We Original Six fans are arrogant bastards. As if our teams are the best because they've been around longer than any others. They are, of course. Better, I mean. Montreal, Boston, Toronto, Detroit, NY Rangers, and Chicago. Here's a picture of my insanely expensive Original Six hoodie:



I was willing to put out the bucks for this item because I blew it with the jacket. One time at the Joe, (that's what real hockey fans call Joe Louis Arena, named after famous defenseman, Joe Louis) I saw this gorgeous taupe-colored leather varsity jacket. The Original Six logos were embroidered across the back. It was $375. Even though it would have been the perfect winter jacket and lasted for years, I was too cheap to buy it. When I caved in and sent Husband back to get it for me for Christmas? It was gone. And no one makes them anymore. How much did that suck? A lot. Even with the exchange rate.

So there's my love for hockey. That's one thing. Also? I love curling. Not my hair. With stones. And a skip, and brooms. There's a Detroit Curling Club. How many of you knew that? Curling is one of the reasons I love the Winter Olympics, and a reason I love the winter Olympics on the CBC. Living in Metro Detroit means we have Canadian programming included on our basic cable packages. Woohoo! Rick Mercer, Peter Mansbridge, and Don Cherry (EVERY night is Hockey Night in Canada)! Incidentally, I feel certain that one day, Ron MacLean will be nominated for sainthood. Did you notice that I ended up back on the hockey topic?

If all that is not enough to convince you that I am Canadian at heart, there's also this: I like vinegar on my fries. But only because you can't buy poutine around here.

Sunday, October 19, 2008

I Came, I Saw, I May Have Stayed Too Long

I know I'm supposed to do some type of intro for my guest posters, but that would just be slowing you down. It's Jen from Steenky Bee. Hold on to something...



A few weeks ago Captain Dumbass sent me an email asking me to guest post over here at Us and Them. I eagerly agreed, but then began to worry that I accepted his offer too hastily. He’s well known for posting about six times a day. Would I have to post that often? How could I be expected to keep up with that rigorous schedule of posting every 3 hours? He promised he would call me to go over the details. I was all kinds of excited.



When the Captain phoned a few hours later, I tried very hard to listen closely and concentrate on his instructions. His exact words were, “I’d love to host one of your stories over here at Us and Them. Please guest post for me Sunday. Send me your write up and I’ll put it up over at my place.”



But in my adrenaline crazed state, all I heard was, “I’d love to host you over here. Please be my guest. I’ll put you up at my place.” I immediately grabbed a map of Canada, a bunch of warm clothes, a mix tape and headed north.



Day 1: The Element of Surprise

I arrived at the Captain’s house a few days late, but only because I grossly misjudged exactly where Canada was. According to my map, it was only three inches away from Utah. Maps lie. Canada is, like, far.



The Captain and his family seemed a little surprised to see me on their doorstep. I think his exact words were, “What gives you the right?” Maybe he was caught off guard because I was a few days late. His wife, who insisted that I avoid direct eye contact with her and refer to her as Supreme Leader, kept asking me why I drove all the way through four states and crossed the Canadian boarder unannounced. I assumed one of two things; a) she was very interested in my gas mileage, or b) hubby didn’t tell her I would be a guest in their house while I posted stories to his blog.



For the first hour or so, there were some awkward side glances between the three of us. Eventually, I broke the silence by asking what was for dinner. For the remainder of the evening the Captain and Supreme Leader huddled in the kitchen and talked in hushed tones. For the most part, they were super-duper nice. When I would holler for them to bring me a cold beverage, they would shout back for me to get it myself already. They must have really wanted me to feel at home.



I did catch Supreme Leader rolling her eyes at me quite a bit during my stay. I figured it must be a cultural thing with Canadians. When the Captain’s extended family showed up for his mom’s 50th birthday party, most of them gave me the eye roll too. Despite all the pointing and laughing at my expense, I was totally feeling at ease in their home.



And the hospitality didn’t end there. Multiple times, the Captain and his wife offered to put me up in a hotel so I could have some privacy. Of course, I politely declined their generosity. I drove all the way up there and I wasn’t about to leave them now. Supreme Leader threw her hands in the air and shouted, “Fine. Have it your way!” and stormed into the master bedroom.



“Have it your way, too!” I waved and called back to her. This must be the way Canadians say good night. The Captain said the same thing to me about five minutes later as he headed off to bed.



Day 2: Spontaneous Blogging

Who knew the Captain and his family were early risers? At 7:00 am sharp, he was up and summoning his family to the kitchen. He declared loudly that it was time for a family meeting. He wheeled out a large white board and began writing furiously. He then announced that no one could leave until they had given him at least five blog-worthy ideas. He warned his boys that he would no longer accept any snail or poo stories. He felt those stories were so played.


Two hours later, the meeting adjourned. Supreme Leader made mention to the Captain that she thought this was, by far, the suckiest meeting ever. The Captain responded with “I’m totally blogging that!” She responded with some sort of hand gesture that I thought only people in prison knew. The Captain shouted, “I’m totally blogging that too!”



A little while later, the Captain and his family ran off to some emergency situation that had just suddenly come up. I was told that they would be gone the entire day and the place they were headed didn’t have any phone service so I should NOT try to call them. As they peeled out of their driveway, Connor, their oldest son, yelled out of the van’s window, “Why don’t you just go home!”



I could only assume that the little guy wanted me to wait at the house for them to return, so I did just that. When they walked in around 9:30 that night they announced that they were going strait to bed. I gave them a traditional Canadian greeting of “Fine. Have it your way!” It went over huge. Both boys both gave me the eye roll. Up until now, the younger one, Liam, had made every effort to pretend I didn‘t exist. Score!



Day 3: Metro Dad is My Hero

Around noon, I heard the loudest alarm buzzer sounding throughout the house. Immediately every member of the family scurried into the den and hovered around the computer. Each of them looked frenzied with excitement. The Captain pushed his way past his wife and the boys to take his seat at the computer. From my vantage point, I could clearly see that he was reading through Metro Dad’s sight. He was so focused, so serious. He shushed Supreme Leader and the boys several times when they began talking too loudly. One time when the boys were particularly rambunctious, the Captain turned around and shouted “Daddy needs quiet while he comments on Metro Dad! You know how important Metro Dad is to daddy!”



The family stood around the Captain and waited in anticipation for him to finish posting his comment. The boys even shouted ideas for him to consider. Each time, he dismissed them with a sweeping hand motion. They held their breath as the Captain swiveled around in his chair, pumped both fists in the air and exclaimed loudly, “Number seven. MY COMMENT IS NUMBER SEVEN ON METRO DAD!”



The Captain then stood up and began shadow boxing with himself. Connor and Liam were jumping up and down and screaming. Supreme Leader clasped her hands together, threw her head back and yelled, “Yes! Finally we’ve cracked the top ten!” This was truly a moment for the family.



Despite all the celebrating, my visit was cut short with the Captain and his family early the next day. Supreme Leader announced they were having their home fumigated and everyone would have to leave “and maybe never come back” she added. I think she mentioned something about an infestation of American Parasites or something. Eww. I tried to google this insect but, but so far, my search for this rare bug has proved usless.

Although I never got around to writing a post for the Captain, I feel my time was not wasted with his family. I learned some very valuable lessons on my short trip. I learned that Canadians use the term, “You should really get out of here” pretty freely as a term of endearment. They must have said it to me at least five times. I learned that Canadian women really like their space too. Several times Supreme Leader told me to “Back off Yankee fool!” I want so badly for her to teach me that cool hand gesture.



And the boys! Oh how I loved little Connor and Liam. They introduced me to the best Canadian game ever. They never explained the rules completely, but from what I gathered, the object of the game is to run from someone (mostly me) whenever they enter a room and shout “Stranger danger!” as loud as they can. I’m really going to miss them all.