So, i started breaking down my lights and modifiers and thinking about the best way to pack them, but got totally distracted and had realized i hadn't made a photo for my Self-Portrait Project lately. Or have i? Who knows. Anyway:
really...doesn't this portrait make you think "Moulin Rouge" and "A Clockwork Orange?" it's just disturbing enough to be inspired by Clockwork, but still has a Moulin feel to it.
Click to see it biggah.
I'm not talking about what i eat, but more how i eat it. It just occurred to me that i'm pretty picky about which foods get eaten with what utensil and from what container.
Examples:
Spaghetti must be eaten from a bowl, never a plate.
Cake must be eaten from a bowl with a spoon, with milk poured over. Otherwise, why bother?
Ice cream must be eaten from an 8-oz. glass (a cup is okay, too, but not plastic).
Actually, i prefer any food in a cup vs. on a plate, if it can be reasonably eaten that way.
If it can't be eaten in a cup, i'll try a bowl before resorting to a plate.
Don't give me a large spoon or fork. I'll take the kids' sized ones.
Mayo straight from the jar with a spoon? Yes, please!
Ice ruins drinks (except for liquor, unless it's mixed with juice).
I hate eating at a table. Couch, floor, bed, standing...anything but a table.
Conclusion: i'm weird.
Happy Festivus!
It's almost 9:30 p.m. and I'm making a late (very late) dinner of Indian spiced green beans and rice flavored with cardamom and saffron. I love the taste and smell of Indian food (although don't get me started on the asafoetida).
I grabbed a green bean and bit into it. A cumin seed escaped from the bean and burst between my teeth. That distinctly cumin flavour washed over my tongue. I literally had to close my eyes and just savor it.
It took me back to some of my few carefree days. I was stationed at San Angelo, Texas--the last stop of my training as a Russian linguist in the Air Force. I was young and healthy, ran daily, ate a vegetarian diet, and was just happy. I used to make tacos in my room with refried beans. I always put cumin in the beans.
Biting into that cumin seed tonight, I could feel the heat of my months in Texas, see the green grass surrounding my building, feel my feet pounding the pavement as I ran for miles, my breath even and effortless. Those were good days. Good days, indeed.
GelaSkins Inc.
I love birthdays! They are just so fun, even if we do nothing at all. I have no idea why I love b.days so much, but there ya go!
Look what my cute kids got me:
They know me too well! I'm the ultimate Hello Kitty freak. Heeeeeeeeey, I lived in Japan for two years...that's my excuse!
GelaSkins Inc.
I have soooo many pictures that make me look like a Hoo. I couldn't figure out WHY I look like a HOO, but I finally have it. It comes from my dad's side of the family. That space between the nose and upper lip? Ours is vast. It's "Hoo-ish." We have no upper lip. I guess that's WHY we have the VAST VOID between there and the nose.
Allie LOVES having her picture taken; can't you tell?
Today Al had her quarterly endo appointment. If you remember from her last one (in May) I was completely distraught because her A1C was dangerously high (it was 9.7--ouch!--and should be in the 7's or even better, the 6's, in order to avoid damage to her kidneys, eyes and heart. A little education: the A1C test measures the "average" blood glucose level over a 3-month period. It does that by measuring the amount of sugar stuck to a dead blood cell--they live about 3 months). Her A1C as of today is down to 8.2--a good drop from 9.7! We were happy, but will feel better when she gets it back down to the happy 7's. 
I will probably regret posting this, but here goes anyway! Remember, I was raised in a "different" sort of family. Harharhar. Do I really want to go THERE? The pix speak for themselves. Yes, they are really ME. (In the first one, the words surrounding me are my Enneagram [am I spelling that right? I'm too lazy to check.] details.)
Okay, I'll go there. A little family history (just a LITTLE). My mom has a twisted sense of humour. I'll leave that as it is. She was also not very restrictive of what I watched or listened to or investigated. From my earliest memories as a wee tot, I recall watching old Bela Lugosi movies. He schooled me in vampirism--I guess you could say he was my Pre-K Vampire teacher. Snort! From those old movies grew a devoted love and affection for all things gothic or macabre.
Okay, yes, seriously, this is our actual wedding photo. Go ahead and laugh; we laugh at it everytime we see it. The story's pretty good, too. See below....
For those of you who have never heard our dating/wedding story, here's the skinny:
Todd & I met because his brother-in-law (Jeff) was my home teacher and brought his wife (Devon) over one Sunday because his h.t. companion was out of town. At the end of the visit, very sweet Devon asked me if there was anything they could do for me and I (jokingly) asked if she could find me a husband--not just any old husband--a good LDS husband because the guys I had been dating or meeting lately had really not been so fantastic.
Seriously, I was joking about her finding me a husband. But suddenly a lightbulb went on over her head, and she looked at Jeff and said, "My brother!" Then she looked at me, then back to Jeff and said, "But he's so weird!"
I was sitting there with a sinking feeling, thinking, "Great. Now I have to meet her weird brother." Because it would've been pretty rude to ask and then say "Oh just kidding." So, a BBQ was arranged at Devon and Jeff's and Todd and I were going to meet. (We actually met briefly a few days before that at D & J's son's Eagle Scout project, but didn't talk then).
So, to make a long story really short, Todd & I met at the BBQ, then Jeff forced him to ask me out later that week. We dated for 3 weeks. One Saturday, Todd borrowed his sister Erin's convertible and we drove up to the rim to go hiking. It was a really nice day. When we arrived back at my apartment in Mesa around 6 that evening, neither of us wanted the day to be over. We stood there saying, "What do you want to do?" "I don't know, what do you want to do?"
We were wind-blown and a little grungy from the drive and hiking, so I didn't really want to go out to dinner or anything public like that. So, then the great idea came to me and I "proposed" it to Todd: "Let's go to Vegas and get married!"
So to make that part of the story short, we hopped on a plane and flew off to Vegas and stood in the very long line to the county office, then were limo'ed off to "A Las Vegas Garden of Love" (which later had it's own reality show on t.v.) and were given a talk and prepped for marriage by a 16 year old boy (I'm so not kidding) and married by a pretty decent pastor who gave us a nice talk about marriage.
We didn't have rings, or anything else "wedding-ish" and were married in the grungy clothes we had hiked in that morning. Notice that Todd got married in a Wheeler A/C shirt!!!!
I have this picture on my MySpace page. It cracks me up. Todd's face is so cute and mischievous in it and my smirk says so much...to me. I didn't write this on my MySpace page, but the reason I'm smirking and Todd is laughing is because he's poking my belly fat! He teases me alllll the time about it. Couple that with the fact that this year is my 20 year high school reunion and I'm feeling a bit...shall we say, motivated. I've been working out regularly for a few weeks now, and even started going to aerobics at our ward building on M/W/F. I'm already feeling such a difference. See, Marty? I'm finally doing it!
Prepare to giggle
I look absolutely awful with short hair! Isn't that hilarious? I didn't do too good a job PhotoShopping my face into Posh's hair, but who has time for that? It's done well enough to convince me NOT to cut my hair! ROFL!!!!!
I feel like I haven't posted in so long! I've been swamped with LIFE. I had to rework our Pinal Community Watch blog after our regional meeting. Blockwatch (yes, I'm the Captain, Oh Captain!) has had many issues going on that I had to deal with, work has been more abundant than usual this week (much to Bryce's dismay), and Allie and Zane have left for Virginia until July 26 (and I'm grumpy because I miss them!). And I've been recruited as a district representative for GSTAC and have been reading about it and pondering what role I will have there. Shew! I haven't even had time to bury my nose in my Einstein book...major bummer!
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Not to mention finger painting (which is exhausting)...
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...and having our patio extended...
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...so that now we can get grass and clean up and landscape the back yard!! WHOO HOO! No more BROWN DIRT! (Yes, you all know how much I adore the brown dirt :o)
From then...
Yesterday was Todd's & my fourth anniversary (we were married on 6/5/4). The last four years have been the best of my life. There's so much I could say, but I think anyone who knows me knows that I adore Todd and are probably tired of constantly hearing about it! Hehe! So, here's to four years and hopefully at least 44 more!
'til now...
This morning, bright and early, Todd, Bryce and I went to Schnepf Farm to pick peaches. We got to go on a hayride to get to the peach orchard. This was Bryce's first hayride. He looks a little confused or disgruntled; not sure which.
Bryce got to pick some peaches, too!
And even try some in the orchard. Don't worry; they're organic.
A nice lady on the ride back took our picture...evidence that I really am at all these events with my family!
Rhianna?! LOL! I don't think so! Not even 15 years ago, unfortunately.
...and Bryce apparently resembles an Asian girl, and so did Zane. That's funny because people say my boys look like me and our nephew, Chris, calls me Lucy Lui (that's why my blog name is Lucy Liu). Haha!
and here's a more clear one of me...taken with the new camera...what a GREAT lens...it shows every freckle and rement of my pregnancy mask that won't go away! YIKES!
