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Thursday, November 19, 2009

Pay It Forward Holiday Cheer

I had insomnia again Sunday night. The last time I looked at the clock it was 4:01am. When I have insomnia, I often thing about future posts. (What else is there to do when you can't sleep?) I came up with this one. I hope you like it and I hope you'll jump on the bandwagon.

With the economy the way it is, I'm sure everyone is scaling down their celebrations and scaling down their gift giving. When you're one of the people doing this it's hard to be of good cheer. It's depressing.

I thought why not take the Pay It Forward idea and adapt it to the holidays.

What you do to Pay it Forward doesn't have to cost money. It can be time or effort. It could be baking an extra batch of cookies to share with your elderly neighbor. It could be offering a ride to the grocery store to your neighbor who doesn't have a car. It could be shoveling a neighbor's walk. You could be in line at the grocery store behind a mom with her kids and she's a couple bucks short to pay for her groceries. Whatever it is...it's some kindness to spread holiday cheer.

Whatever it is you do, you ask the recipient to Pay It Forward in whatever way they choose.

The way I'm Paying it Forward is through baked goods. In our house, baking ingredients are staples and we always have them on hand. It's easy and not terribly expensive for me to bake an extra batch of cookies or an extra bread. Of course I'll be having Anastasia deliver whatever it is to Mr. Friendly, because she's the charming, friendly, bubbly part of this duo and I'm the ogre. Lol!

I was thinking of including a note card with a poem about Pay It Forward Holiday Cheer, explaining the concept, but I'm not a poem writer. Any ideas?

So what do you think of Pay It Forward Holiday Cheer?

Lola's Diner
©2008-2009

Wednesday, November 18, 2009

So What's Your Thanksgiving Drama?

Er...I mean, what are you serving for Thankgiving?

No, wait...what is your Thanksgiving Drama? Or maybe you don't having Thanksgiving Drama.

We don't yet know what we'll be doing. The family matriarch (honest, I'm not being sarcastic, I'm just avoiding the use of 'mil' because technically Anastasia and I aren't married and even though her Mom ok'd me calling her Mom, I think she might spontaneously catch fire if I referred to her as 'mother-in-law'.) Even though I tried out 'Mom' just last week (yeah, it's been years, and I just snuck it in now...yes...I'm a big chicken!) and got a hug from her. Anastasia's eye's about popped out of her head when she heard me do it in front of one of the homophobic family members. Ok, now I'm ramblin, but you get my point. The family matriarch has declared that she's not doing Thanksgiving this year, but 'we' can come over. The thing is...she's told this to virtually all of Anastasia's siblings, which in effect means she IS doing Thanksgiving, but which also means it could be a huge debacle because she said she wasn't doing it and she will no doubt forget some of those conversations with the other siblings. No, I'm not kidding. This has happened before. And yes, no matter what it's always a debacle because we are all Irish and there is alcohol involved.

So this means that our Thanksgiving plans are up in the air. I will still be making a turkey dinner with all the usual trimmings, it's just a matter of when. Our menu rarely changes, except maybe adding a new dish. Lola's Thanksgiving Menu. Our daughter is insisting I make the Roasted Brussels Sprouts. She loves them.

Add to this drama, we have the ex drama. Our son will be with him for Thanksgiving, but the ex is trying to manipulate our daughter who, due to the current visitation order cannot travel to his Thanksgiving. This stipulation in the order is to protect her because of issues with previous visits. He knows this is the arrangement, yet he continues to try to manipulate her, which obviously causes her problems. He's even tried to solicit the help of our daughter's school counselor, who has repeatedly told him to cease the Thanksgiving talk, as have I, but as usual, he ignores all of us. Anastasia is about ready to have a conversation with him. Let's just say that...well..that wouldn't be pretty.

Sunday night as I typed this I was watching Grey's Anatomy repeats on late night. They aired one of the Thanksgiving episodes. The one where O'Malley has to shoot a turkey. I always love the Meredith Grey voiceovers. They're so well written. So poignant, sometimes profound. Here are just a few from the end of the episode:
"Being grateful for what you have...whatever that is."
"Maybe we're thankful for the familiar things we know...and maybe we're thankful for the things we'll never know."
"At the end of the day if we had courage enough to still be standing...it's reason enough to be thankful."
Frankly I can't wait until Thanksgiving is over. But then I'll only be more depressed, because I'm historically one of those crazies out there on Black Friday. Our budget doesn't allow for Black Friday shopping this year so I'm going to have to find some other way to amuse myself from 3am Black Friday until 5pm. Any ideas?

Lola's Diner
©2008-2009

Tuesday, November 17, 2009

Random Tuesday Thoughts


Can you believe it? 517 posts! I didn't even notice when I reached 500. I guess times flies when you're having fun. And we're at 242 followers! Thank you to all of you and give a shout out once in awhile in the comments. I'd love to hear from you!

All weekend was spent frantically trying to find a free twin bed frame because our son did who knows what to his old one. Anastasia just told me not to look, not to ask questions, just to know that the old one was bent beyond repair and I just needed to find one. Thankfully I got one off Craigslist and it was brand new still in the box.

When I wasn't working on that I was dealing with our daughter who wanted me to be her entertainment committee, whilst the whole time being indignant and refusing to do chores. Still trying to figure out how that works.

Today I get an email from our daughter's school, bus transportation for bowling was not arranged. I made numerous frantic phone calls and emails and it's finally arranged. Why does there always have to be this drama surrounding her after school activities? Why don't the school/coaches/special ed department/transportation get their shit together ahead of time? What if I was working, how could I possibly have made this many phone calls and emails to get this fixed?

Our son hasn't shaved since Halloween. He thinks he's rockin' the Seth Rogan scruffy look, but he's not. It just doesn't go with his Shaggy from Scooby Doo hair. He's insisting he's not shaving until he has a full beard. Umm, hello, that could be years. He's just got sideburns, hair under the chin and his neck. No mustache, no cheek hair and nothing on the chin. He looks ridiculous.

Isn't it great how the government has decided that women in their 40's don't need mammograms? (Women In 40's Advised Against Routine Annual Mammograms - Chicago Tribune.) No doubt that decision is a precursor to what we can expect from the Obama Health Plan. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for every legal United States citizen having healthcare, but if you're going to downgrade the medical necessity of certain tests and procedures to make it happen, then what is the point of it all? I'm just sayin'...

Monday night was Code of Conduct at the high school. Our daughter went last year. It's only necessary to go once in your high school career. I insisted our son go even though he continues to drag his feet about an activity. I had to go to the high school for a parent's bowling meeting afterward, so why not get all the pain over with at once? Yes, there was arguing and grunting, but I held my ground and I have his signed Code of Conduct Contract to prove it. Yay me!

Did anyone catch the Wanda Sykes show on Saturday. They seemed to have changed the format from last week. Not sure what I'm thinking of it yet, other than it is fresher than SNL. Of course that's not saying alot.

Dave Letterman needs his eyes checked. What the heck happened to Sharon Stone's face? I didn't even recognize her. Well, until she spoke...very distinctive voice.

How come my Mafia in fb keeps loosing fights and I keep losing so much money? Curses to Anastasia's niece who got me hooked. Like I don't spend enough time in this black box.

Still waiting hear about Anastasia's job interview and we are biting our nails here wondering why we haven't heard anything. Please keep your fingers crossed, say a prayer, send some positive energy out into the universe our way...whatever you can do we would greatly appreciate it.

Lola's Diner
©2008-2009

Monday, November 16, 2009

HAVE YOU or WOULD YOU...Meme

Welcome to Monday Mayhem
Every week is something different.
Have fun!
Today's meme- Have You Would You?
For each of the prompts, you may answer with an image, a sentence or however you want to.
Simply copy and paste this into a post on your site and answer the prompts.
I got this from Harriet @ I Am Harriet.
HAVE YOU or WOULD YOU...

Go Skinny Dipping?
Never been 'skinny'...not even close! Not a chance!
HAVE YOU or WOULD YOU...
Woken up somewhere that you have no idea how you got there?
Not that I ever recall.
HAVE YOU or WOULD YOU...
Eaten a rabbit?
I don't think I have, but doesn't it taste like chicken?
HAVE YOU or WOULD YOU...
Have a meet-up with another blogger?
Blogger
Yes I have! Lin, Patricia, Lynne, Rita!
I can't wait for Lin and I to meet up with JD.
HAVE YOU or WOULD YOU...
Stolen a candy bar?
I'm pleading the 5th.
HAVE YOU or WOULD YOU...
Roasted a pig?
No I haven't. But my Dad used to take me to an annual festival where spanferkel was served. Also, an ex-boss invited all the staff to her neighborhood's pig roast. Our son took plenty of close-up photos of the head to gross out our daughter. Lol! Spanferkel is delicious!
HAVE YOU or WOULD YOU...
Bounced a check
Bounce Fresh Linen package
HAVE YOU or WOULD YOU...
Gone for a balloon ride?
Hell to the no!
HAVE YOU or WOULD YOU...
Write a really cool Monday Mayhem ?
You tell me :)



Lola's Diner
©2008-2009
 
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