Holiday! HUZZAH!

Well, I'm off for a few days...I've got somethings to celebrate, so I thought I'd do it by going home to lovely Vancouver Island, BC.

Things to celebrate include:

My BIRTHDAY (just passed) 33 years on this planet...not bad considering I thought I'd be expired by 26.

BUT BEST OF ALL...

It's been officially 1 YEAR TODAY that I QUIT SMOKING!!!

And believe me, that's something to CELEBRATE!
It was a bit of a struggle at first (as one would expect), but now, it's smoooth sailing!

YAY ME!

So, if work isn't to chaotic when I return on Wednesday, I'll blog away, but don't get your hopes up...my desk reverts to a natural state of disorganization the minute I leave it alone for more than 3 hours.
Ugh.

Now HERE'S a thought...

"The cave you fear to enter holds the treasure you seek."
~ Joseph Campbell

I love Joseph Campbell. He was, indeed, a truly wise man.

Now, let's consider closely that idea.
Interestingly, the treasure that he's speaking about may be, simply, the overcoming of your fear in the first place!

How lovely!

Now, while my fears aren't many, the ones I have are big deep black caves, designed to swallow little girls like me up, never to be seen again!

What do I fear?
I fear to say!
Amongst friends, I'm generally considered fearless...

Well, I guess that, in and of itself is a fear, isn't it?

I fear people seeing me as less than in control and in charge.
You know, the vulnerable, wimpy side of me.
Admitting it is half the battle right?
I guess now I just have to cry in front of someone to get 'the treasure I seek.' Or tissue, as the case may be!

Okay, that's one down.

NEXT!

Uh, on second thought, that's enough for today.
Anything more is too scary.

Honest! I haven't fallen off the face of the earth!

But you want to know what I HAVE been doing?

I've been reading so many other peoples blogs it's starting to make my head swim a bit, and that's the LAST thing I really need!

There are SO many good blogs out there, so many interesting people with interesting lives and thoughtful things to say about the world.

BUT I found a site that's a little creepy...I read some of it, and boy, did I ever feel like I needed to take a shower afterwards.

Here, I'll share:

http://notproud.com/

Go.
Read.
Feel dark and confused and muzzy from what goes on in peoples heads out in this big old world.

It's already weird enough as it is!

I was going to retell the tale of Lot here.

You know, the one about the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah and bad, bad Lots' wife who turned into a pillar of salt 'cus she wouldn't listen to her husband, but the story is awful enough on it's own with out requiring much adjustment.
Let's look at it for a moment, shall we?

God doesn't care much for homosexuality, which apparently the lovely cities S&G are replete with.
So he sends some angels down to check it out, and hang with Lot while they suss the place out.
While the angels are there, some of the village men want to rape them.

Well! Lot won't have anything to do with that, no sir!
Instead, like a good host, he offers up his virginal daughters to the mob of men for use and abuse.

Oh, but wait, it just gets better from here!

So anyway, the angels prevent the rape of Lot's daughters from happening, but they tell Lot to scram out of the city, 'cus god is going to do what he does best...smote smote smote and smote some more!!

No one believes Lot except for his two daughters and his wife, so they high tail it for the hills...everything is going well except Lots' wife turns back (of course), and is immediately turned into a pillar of salt.

(Why a pillar of salt? I don't know. What could the reasoning possibly be?)
So anyway, she's suddenly (and conveniently, I might add) out of the picture.

Eventually Lot and kids make it to a cave and hide out there.
With lots of wine.
Lots and lots of wine.

Note to self:
When fleeing from god's smoting, don't forget to take the wine!

The girls get bored, so they come up with a cunning plan.
As they are the only females left on the face of the planet, they really need to get started repopulating the world, right?
Yeah, that's what they thought.
So.
This is what they do.

The first night, they get dad REALLY drunk. Then one of them has sex with him.
Lots' a lush, so he doesn't remember being a victim of incestuous rape the night before.

Day two.
Get dad drunk again, so second daughter gets a go! Wheee!
And then they both have sons who go on to become famous and influential leaders, (presumably they were able to hide the webbed feet and extra teeth.)


Moral of the story:

Wine will help you save the world as long as your not gay.
Anything is better than gay, even incest.
And rape is fine, as long as the parties are different sexes.
And moral decrepitude is generally permissible (without the gayness, of course.)

Buon compleanno a me!

And many happy returns to me, too!

Apologies to those of you who wait in eager anticipation of my blog being updated regularly, I've been laid low by lethargy and anemia.
(And for the rest of you, I apologize for my suddenly enlarged ego!)
I think age will do that to you though (enlarge the ego that is)...after a certain point in time, you give up on false modesty and insecurities and just BE.

Really though, I haven't done any deep reflecting on my birthday or aging at all.

I LIKE birthdays, and enjoy the well wishes that come my way, but I pay no nevermind to the bit about getting older.

And anyway...I'm not getting OLDER, I'm getting BETTER!!! And I firmly believe that.

Speaking of birthdays...a hardy welcome to:

http://www.bathtubspider.blogspot.com/
Many congratulations on a brand new baby blog!

OH!
I cut my hair SHORT (and upon doing so my hair suddenly, and with great gusto, went VERY curly.)
I colored it as well, and now (according to a friend) I resemble Goldilocks' evil sister.
Black ringlets instead of blond.
Somehow it seems appropriate.

Oh BOY! Infinitive verbs!

I’ve decided to take up learning Italian as a hobby.
I need a good hobby besides reading, because while reading is fabulous, it’s a passive type of self education.

Instead, I’ll be actively learning something, which will prevent my brain from atrophying and oozing out my ears in a disagreeable manner.

I am amazed that at one point, I actually got REALLY excited about verb usage. (I’m not kidding…honestly, I leapt up and grabbed my workbook to make notes. Yes. I have a workbook.)

Generally, I'm really rather hostile to that kind of thing.

Through school I was the kid that was staring off into space imaging what my pirate ship would look like, and how many long haired cabin boys I would have.
(Hey, it WAS the eighties. Jon Bon Jovi ROCKED! I would have had him on my ship. Not now though, his hair is to short and he's cleaned up his act. Won't do at all. I've heard that Tommy Lee is free though, and as I too, hail from the Comox Valley as does Ms. Anderson, do you think...ew. Never mind.)

The teacher struggled (in vain of course) to get some French past participles lodged in my skull…but I resisted, and in the end, I won the battle.
"Vive le resistance!!"
(ooops, okay, you got one past me Mr. Philips...but rest assured...it will not happen again.)
Uh, rest in peace Mr. Philps, you really did do your best.
It's definately not a reflection of your teaching abilities, merely a statement to my willful ignorance and determined non-bilingulism.
I've changed my ways, really I have!

So, very soon, I expect (through my own expert tutelage) that I shall be completly fluent, and will be blogging away in Italian for all of those in bella Roma who eagerly await the day.

Desidero!!

Exciting weekend, but not in a good way.

There's an old curse that seems applicable at this time...
"May you live in interesting times."

Well, this weekend certainly has been interesting...it started with my dear friend being laid low by an unruly appendix and large intestine, and ended with my dear little cat (the one that aforementioned "stupid idiot boy" 'lent' to me) breaking her wee leg.

Well, Jennye's on the road to recovery, though off work time will be 2 weeks or more, and Attessa is currently at the vet being repaired.

I really could live WITHOUT those kind of interesting times!

(Cheers Jen, you'll be belly dancing in no time, with a great scar to add mystery and intrigue to your dance!)

I really don't like cilantro!

My girlfriend and I were discussing men and relationships the other night, and more specifically our general taste in men.
She was wondering how come she could really like a mans' ability to make her laugh, and think and feel generally special, but still have no interest in him.
Well, of course, there’s lots of reasons that could happen, but then the real point of the matter came out.
“He’s not very attractive…am I THAT shallow that I can’t appreciate a man’s other qualities without that getting in the way!?!” She was very disappointed in herself.

The only analogy I could come up with was, “Well, not everyone likes cilantro! Taste is taste is taste, and I really don’t think that it’s anyone’s fault if you’re not physically attracted to someone!”

More specifically, am I a shallow person if a handsome man hits on me but the only thing that comes out of his mouth is “Duuh, you’re purdy.”

I require intelligence, that’s paramount. I refuse to believe that my requirement for brains would make me a shallow person.
So, in the same breath, I must refuse to believe that not liking someone’s physical appearance isn't also perfectly acceptable.

On the OTHER hand...men often get chastised severely for expressing their requirements in a woman, particularly if they are physical requirements.
I wonder why the double standard?

Huh.
Oh well, I don’t like cilantro and I refuse to feel bad about it.
And I don’t like Brad Pitts’ looks either. pffft.

What a horrid beast I am.

Now, I'm not saying I'm a prude...

…but I was flicking through channels the other day and happened to notice what looked like a live sex show, right there on the old tv...Je suis choqué!!

I mean, there were men touching themselves through their boxer shorts, and women in next to nothing lingerie rolling around on top of other women in less than next to nothing lingerie and OH!
Over there on the other bed was a women on her knees in front of a man (hmmm, I wonder what they were 'pretending' to do!)
Hmmm. I didn’t think they were allowed to show this stuff on the telly, really…

HEY!

I know that brunette up there singing away and masturbating...
It’s…Brittany Spears!

Really, I’m NOT a prude, but…uh…people are taking their 10 year old daughters to that!

I know…I know…I managed to live through Cher and her thong, Madonna with her pointy-breasted self-touching show, not to mention Tiffany(!), without turning into a mindless slut, but Ms. Spears Miami show struck even me as way over the top.

I know what’s going on here!

I’m getting old and crotchety.

Damn.

The Dodo Club

(Because I’m fairly new, I have to point this out ‘cus I find it VERY exciting…if you click on the title of this blog, it’ll TAKE YOU THERE!! So cool.)

So. Anyway. On with the show here.
As a child, I was hooked up with this particular club…”The DODO CLUB”. Man, it was great.
We (Jennye and I, of course) would pile our pennies together, and rush down to the post office to have the lady (it was always a ‘lady’ back then. Not a woman or man. “The Postal Lady.” It was a title. You could apply…) but I digress...you asked the Postal Lady to please make a money order out to the tune of 7 pounds, because it was going to England, and they use pounds there, not ‘dollars’ isn’t that weird? I wonder if their money is heavier and that’s why they call them pounds?? Yeah, right.

And then we would have to (get this) MAIL IT(!) to England.
No e-mail credit card stuff then, no sir.
These were the old days, waaaay before this 'internet' thingy-ma-jiggy…and credit cards! HA! I don’t think my parents even had a checking account!
Which might go a long way to explain my current aversion to credit cards, I mean, some anonymous company doling out credit to complete strangers. Hello!?!
And checks!? What good are they, they’re not even real money! Well in MY day…


Anyway. “The Dodo Club” is devoted to the conservation of rare and endangered animals via a ‘zoo’ (though I do hate to call them that, but I can't think of a better word at the moment) on Jersey in the Channel Islands created by Mr. Durrell.
Great club.
They would mail out a monthly newsletter (monthly or was it quarterly?) with all sorts of information and tidbits about the daily destruction of the planet and how the human race was responsible for the demise of thousands of species of animals (well, okay, they didn’t actually say any of that.
But I was 9, I could read between the lines!)

AND they had a ‘pen pal’ section.
So I had a PEN PAL.
She was from Hungary (Debrecen) which I thought was fabulous because I’m half Hungarian on my fathers’ side, although he was born in Canada…and so was I.
BUT I always thought it was so exotic and mysterious…in my mind, I was half a gypsy princess, whisked out of Hungary due to the turmoil of the country, and that when I was old enough I would be returned to my rightful throne to rebuild the country to it’s former glory and power!!!

Well, you never know!
Maybe one day soon the next newspaper headline you see will read, “QUEEN TAI RETURNED TO THRONE!!! THE COUNTRY REJOICES!”

I’m have a hard time keeping on track here…okay, my pen pal’s name was Agota Vinczeffy (it was close to that…c’mon, I was 9).
I wonder what ever happened to her. I was very diligent in writing to her. She wasn’t diligent in responding.

Since then, I’ve gone to Hungary, but I never went to Debrecen. I discovered cheap beer and that the country wasn’t in that much turmoil. How could they be, with beer that cheap!!

I still think I would have made a rockin’ Queen though.
I would have sent lots of money to “The Dodo Club” if I WAS queen, believe me!

The Story of Job, as retold by Tai. With NO apologies. *

"1 There was a man in the land of Uz, whose name was Job; and that man was blameless and upright, one who feared God, and turned away from evil. 2 There were born to him seven sons and three daughters. 3 He had seven thousand sheep, three thousand camels, five hundred yoke of oxen, and five hundred she-asses, and very many servants; so that this man was the greatest of all the people of the east."

And that’s were it all began to go seriously wrong.

So, God and Lucifer were chilling out at God’s crib when Lucifer pulled God aside and suggested a bet.
“Hey, big ‘G’,” Lucifer grinned a pointy grin, “What say you and I have a wager, a little joke on Job, say.”

“Oh, I don’t know…I like Job. He does exactly what he’s supposed to and he’s really quite obsequious. I like that.”

“That’s only because you give him everything he wants,” Lucifer pointed out, “You let me have a little fun with him, and I swear, ‘he will curse thee to thy face’."

“You really think so? Well, okay. Off you go. But I just don’t believe it!” So God sent Lucifer off to turn some nasty tricks on poor unsuspecting Job.

The next thing Job knows, ALL of his she-asses, camels, oxen, sheep AND servants were all slain.
Gone.
'Smote' even.
And that's not to mention every single one of his kids annihilated.
But Job didn’t get mad, oh no, he didn’t even flinch!
He just prayed to God and said, “Thanks God…I didn’t need all that stuff anyway.”

God laughed and laughed at Lucifer…”I told you! I told you! Job totally rocks. There’s no WAY he’d ever be pissed off with me.”

“Humph. Well obviously I went easy on him. Let’s have another go, shall we? I know, I’ll scourge his flesh or something. That’ll annoy him.

“Oh, fine. Just don’t kill him. I like Job.” God sighed and waved Lucifer away.

So Lucifer went back down to Job’s place and inflicted some loathsome little sores on him from head to toe.
Not to mention the running scabs.
Even Job’s wife was like, “Wow, God must really be choked with you. You should totally renounce him.”

Job just wept a little, cursed his wife and sat on some ashes.
His friends eventually showed up, and even they didn't know what to say.
They didn’t offer any help or anything, but there was a lot of rending of garments and weeping.

Well, then Job SNAPPED!
That was it. He was finally totally pissed off.
“God, you SUCK! What did I ever do to you? C’mon, look at me. My whole family is dead. I’m like, totally unattractive to my wife and friends. Geez! I’ve had it. I hereby renounce you.” He yelled, shaking his scabby fist in the air.

Actually, he went on and on and on about his ‘groanings pouring out like water’, and ‘longing for death that doesn’t come’. Really quite pitiful, but you could hardly blame the guy, really.
I mean, look at what happened!
And, to quote Job a little further, “My flesh is clothed with worms and dirt; my skin hardens, then breaks out afresh.”
Eew.

So after a while of this, God finally tunes in to what’s going on, (thanks to Lucifer’s strutting around saying, “Who’s your DADDY!?! WHO’S yo’ DADDY!!” **), and WOW, was God ever choked.

Meanwhile, Job was still complaining when God showed up, full fury.
“HEY! YOU!” He yelled at Job, “Who do you think you ARE!?!”
Job looked up and freaked out, “Oh, uh...God, it’s you! Uh…uh...”
“Yeah, I heard you whining away down here, and I’m not very happy about it. I mean, seriously Job. I AM God. And you’re not. What do you think you're doing, talkin' smack about me?!”

“Well, I hate to be pedantic, but look what happened to me!!” Job rolled around in the ashes a bit to re affirm his current and unpleasant lot in life.
“I loathe my life; I will give free utterance to my complaint; I will speak in the bitterness of my soul.” He continued, just in case God missed the point.

God proceeded to yell at Job for a while, about Ostriches, "The wings of the ostrich wave proudly; but are they the pinions and plumage of love? For she leaves her eggs to the earth, and lets them be warmed on the ground, forgetting that a foot may crush them, and that the wild beast may trample them. She deals cruelly with her young, as if they were not hers; though her labor be in vain, yet she has no fear; because God has made her forget wisdom, and given her no share in understanding. When she rouses herself to flee, she laughs at the horse and his rider.”

Job didn’t really get the point of that, but he didn’t fail to get it that God was royally annoyed with him, and he’d better make peace, ‘cus when God starts talking about opening a can of whoop ass on you, you’d better make your apologies, and right quick.

"I know that thou canst do all things, and that no purpose of thine can be thwarted. Who is this that hides counsel without knowledge? Therefore I have uttered what I did not understand, things too wonderful for me, which I did not know.”
Basically, Job just completely did a full recant on the “I hate my life,” and was being his old obsequious self.
Which pleased God a lot, because he gave Job more oxen and camels and servants than he ever had before.
Not to mention a new and improved family!
Oh, and then Job got to live to the ripe old age of one hundred and forty years old.

The moral of the story?

Fawning sycophant...it's the only way to go!






*In fact, I even RESEARCHED this stuff! All italicized quotes are taken directly from 'The Source'. (just in case you were curious!)
You should look up the story of Job yourself, you'll that see my version is much more entertaining!
Here, go have some fun finding my quotes!
http://eawc.evansville.edu/anthology/job.htm

** okay, that's not a legit quote, but it's damn funny (see first asterix)

I guess no one warned them about me.

They (meaning my unsuspecting company) just trained ME in the handling of dangerous goods and hazardous materials!

HAHAHAHAHA!!!!!

"Excuse me young lady, just where are you going with that semi-trailer of hazardous materials?" Says the unsuspecting officer.

"Oh, it's okay sir, I'm CERTIFIED!" I say, dazzling him with my big brown eyes.

"Ah, well, carry on. Drive safe!"

"Oh, yes sir. That's just about the only thing on my mind...driving safe."

Mwahahahahahaha!!!!

Oh, that's so sad...

Yes, I joke about being a 'crazy cat lady', but truly, this is a grievious state of affairs, and I will never EVER end up like this.

And if I ever DO start to show true 'crazy cat lady' tendencies, I would hope that my dear friends would intervene at cat number 20 or 30, and present me with this article to knock some sense into me.

But, oh, it really does make me feel sad.

The New Zealand Wine Festival.

And a good time was had by all!

http://www.stoneleigh.co.nz/

http://www.oysterbaywines.com/flash/flash_content/index.html

http://www.new-zealand-wines.com/

http://www.kimcrawfordwines.co.nz/

There were some lovely sauvignon blancs, not the least of which Gravitas represented...but for a relatively inexpensive sav blanc though, the Stoneleigh makes a very nice, very drinkable summer white (their Chardonnay is very good too!)

Each of the 45 or so agents only had 3 different wines on display, the sauvignon blanc, chardonnay and a pinot noir, so the selections were limited, but it's a really good way to sample a really specific type of wine from a very specific part of the world.

My favorite? The roasted New Zealand lamb with mint jelly, of course!
But seriously...I really enjoyed all the Oyster Bay offerings. The seem to have made the most impact.

(Mmmm, but the 10 year old Cockburn's Tawny Port I had afterwards, in the lounge of the Four Seasons Hotel really topped the evening.)

Ah, bliss!

Oh, and I wore my new hat, and my, didn't I feel just like Audrey Hepburn!

Clean keyboard leads to inspiration.

Okay, I'm not THAT inspired at this very moment, but I can tell that good things, NAY! ... GREAT things will transpire now that I've cleaned the black gunk and weirdness off of my keyboard!
It's like I've got a new lease on life or something!
Alright, at the very least, I don't feel nauseated when I look at the filthy thing. Honestly, it really was disgusting.

I would like to point out, however, that it's not my fault it got like that. The place where I work is incredibly dusty and dirty, and short of sandblasting the joint clean, there is very little I can do about the amount of dust that collects everywhere.
It seems to be magnetically attracted to my keyboard.

Anyway.
Everyone NEEDS to get one of these little jobbies, they really ARE magic.
And considering how much I dislike domestic tasks, this actually makes the whole cleaning thing kind of fun!

They're at a store near you.
In the cleaning aisle.
So run out and buy one, what are you waiting for!?!
Really. You'll thank me for it!

(I hate sounding like an ad...but I can't help it, it's really great!)