Valentines Day Countdown - 4 Days To Go

Valentines Day is in 4 days. I thought I would do a little countdown and share some of my past Valentines Days. I'm hoping you will share your stories as well.

My first Valentines Day story comes from the 4th Grade. It was the 60's. It was common for many of our craft projects to start off with a cigar box. I think today, shoe boxes are more the norm because cigar boxes are so difficult to come by. We were decorating our boxes to hold the valentines that our classmates would be giving us. We had construction paper, paper doilies, glitter, colored markers and felt to work with. I worked diligently on my box. I thought my final product was quite artfully done.

Even as I worked on the box, in the back of my mind I wavered between being excited at the prospect of having a box filled with valentines from my classmates and having my box empty. You see I was not one of the popular kids in my class. I was the big kid, the overweight kid. For years I was teased constantly. The reason I wavered between a filled box and an empty box was because I thought it was common decency to give valentines to all of your classmates. That's what my Mother taught me and that's what I have always taught my children. Even though I didn't want to give valentines to the boys that teased me and called me names, I did.

Valentines Day came and we all displayed our boxes. The teacher took all the cards and placed them in the boxes. Excitement was in the air. When it came time to open our boxes, I opened mine slowly, not even completely. I saw inside a single card and a heart sucker. I closed the box and put it away until I got home. Everyone else was full of excitement and laughter. Many were showing off how many cards and candies they got. I kind of just sat there with a terrible feeling in the pit of my stomach from the anger building inside me. I didn't let it show. I kind of sat there disinterested and prayed for the bell to ring to mark the end of the school day.

I got home and read the handmade card. It was from my teacher, Ms. Svacina. The card said that "beauty is on the inside and you don't need 30 valentines to know that you are special. You are very special."

In the years after that Valentines Day I had spent many alone. Somehow the memory of that 4th grade Valentines day made being alone seem not so bad. Looking back I realize that Ms. Svacina was trying to buffer the blow of that empty box. Part of me felt very special, because none of the other children got a handmade card from the teacher. The bigger part of me though, felt like a pathetic loser.

So now it's your turn. Use the comment section to post your Pathetic Valentines Day from the past.
Please, don't make me feel like I'm the only one with a pathetic Valentines Day in their past!

Lola's Diner
©2008-2009

I Have Finally Arrived!

I have no idea what put me over the top. I've been checking out this site for ages now trying to find out how much my blog is worth. It has always said that my blog was worth Zero! Until today! Woo Hoo! (Ahem, too bad I'm not actually seeing any money from it, I could use some green.)

My blog is worth $37,259.64.
How much is your blog worth?

Lola's Diner
©2008-2009

Blog Love Award

Louise @ English Opinion - Welcome to My Crazy World has awarded me the Blog Love Award. Thank you so much Louise! I’m now passing on the Blog Love to other fantastic bloggers!

Here are the rules:

* When you receive the Blog Love award, you should place the logo on your blog proudly!
* Link to the blogger that awarded you the love
* Nominate your friends and bloggers you read regularly, as many as you like
* Finally, let them know you’ve nominated them to receive the award

I am officially passing on a little Blog Love to the following exceptional bloggers:
1. BlueViolet @ A Nut In A Nutsell
2. Tammy @ Crazy Mom With 4 Boys
3. Sue @ Stay At Home Mom
4. Melissa @ Why Be Normal

Lola's Diner
©2008-2009

Lemonade Award

(IF YOU WERE WAITING FOR THE SHAVED EYEBROW PHOTO OF MY SON, SEE THE POST BEFORE THIS.)

Amy at Being Bipolar has awarded me the Lemonade Award. The Lemonade Award is given to bloggers who show great attitude and/or gratitude. Thank you so much!

The rules say I am supposed to nominate 10 blogs. I'm going to nominate 4 outstanding blogs.
1. Blessie @ Happy Life
2. Willa @ FickleMinded - A Life That Is Less Ordinary
3. Kara @ The Frugal Angel - Guided Psychic
4. Staci @ Just Bloggled: When Life Gets A Little Baffling

Lola's Diner
©2008-2009

Speaking of Laughter

I nearly wet my pants 20 minutes ago telling Anastasia what our son did. We were both laughing so hard we couldn't understand each other on the phone. She kept asking my Why? Why? Why did he do it? I don't freakin know!

He's definitely his father's son, that's all I can say. Nearest thing I could guess is that he was trying to take attention away from the fact that he lost the cell phone that his father provides him. He lost it while he was in Chicago this weekend. My other guess, is that he didn't like them long.

What the freak am I talking about?

He shaved half of each eyebrow with his electric shaver! Yup, he looks like a freaking Groucho Marx caricature, except he shaved the stache this weekend so he's just got Groucho eyebrows.
This is the best photo I could get. He is missing close to an inch on each eyebrow (the section closest to his ears). I think you can tell pretty much from this photo. He kept deliberately raising his eyebrows while I was trying to get the shot. I'm so glad these eyebrows will be in his Graduation Photo which will be taken tomorrow. And they will be in his school yearbook. He mentioned something about that his best friend's eyebrows were shorter, so maybe this eyebrow shaving thing is going around the school?

Anastasia asks me what the hell was I doing that I didn't know what he was doing. He was in the freakin bathroom, I thought he was using the toilet. He shaved his face yesterday (finally) so I know he wasn't in there shaving. He won't have to shave his beard for at least a week, if not 2 weeks.

Then Anastasia keeps asking me what I'm going to do about it. What the freak do you want me to do about it? Do you want me to get an eyebrow pencil and draw in the missing eyebrows?

If I can get him to sit still long enough in the morning before school I'll snap a shot with the digital camera and post it, but I can't make any promises. (What can I say, I'm all about my bloggers!)

Jeez I'm hoping the school nurse doesn't call me. I think she has me on speed dial by now.

Lola's Diner
©2008-2009

Random Thoughts/Rants

The Healing Power of Laughter – Last night Anastasia and I watched Happy Gilmore on ABC Family Channel. After the movie Joel Osteen Ministries was on. Normally we don’t watch ministry/evangelical type programming, but the topic caught our attention. If you’re interested in watching the episode online it is "#413 – The Healing Power of Laughter".

The first thing that struck me about this "message" was how topical it is. How when times are tough we need to do things to lift our spirits, how our bodies can create their own "medicine". How laughter creates endorphins and can improve our mood and sometimes even improve certain medical conditions like depression or fibromyalgia. How something as simple as finding ways to laugh everyday can make a difference in our lives. How important it is do watch a funny television show or movie or read a funny book. Even having a laugh at ourselves. I have to say, Anastasia and I laugh every day. We both have similar senses of humor and can find the funny in anything.

Another thing that struck me was how much difficulty ministers, evangelists and religious leaders must be having in today’s times finding sermon topics that speak to their congregations. Sermon topics that acknowledge the times we are in and inspire hope must be very difficult to write.

Am I the only one that finds it odd that ABC Family airs 700 Club programming and Joel Osteen Ministries programming? I’m guessing this is not something new, perhaps I just never noticed.

Inattentive Mothers – Today I spent an hour and a half in a waiting room. There were numerous young mothers with young children. One young mother had an almost newborn in a baby carrier and a very active 2-3 year old son. He was all over the very large waiting area, running, climbing on chairs, etc. His mother did nothing to reprimand him or get him to return to her. She let him run wild.

At one point he grabbed his privates and said he needed to use the bathroom. The mother grabbed his hand and took him to the Ladies Room and LEFT THE BABY where she was sitting! The mother and son were gone for at least 5 minutes leaving the baby unattended. (Unless you count us strangers and some of them looked pretty sketchy.) Then the mother returned alone, leaving her 2-3 year old son in the Ladies Room alone! He came out nearly 5 minutes after that and proceeded to parade around the waiting area again, running, climbing, etc. Another mother with a son the same age who was seated clear across the room let her son run and slide on the floor on my end of the room. After this continued for more than 40 minutes the security guard finally called out "hey, you need to get your son" and the woman retrieved him, but he was back at it in a few minutes.

WTF is wrong with these mothers? How do you leave a baby unattended in a very large waiting room? How do you let your toddler be in the Ladies Room alone? How do you let your child run around like a wild animal disturbing the staff of the facility and the other patrons? These mothers were in their 20’s, not in their teens and you would think they would know better. When my kids were little ones I made sure they behaved themselves in public. Don’t these women read the news about child abductions? Call me crazy, but I won’t leave either of my children alone in a crowded public places and my kids are teens!

Jeez, I sound like an old lady. Next thing you know I'll be saying "Get off my lawn!" Who/what am I becoming?

Octuplet Woman – Haven’t we all heard enough about her? Now the news is saying she has had lip injections and possibly other things done to make her look face like Angelina Jolie. What I want to know is how exactly does she plan on attracting a Brad Pitt look alike? Or is she planning to attract the real Brad by having a larger brood than the real Angie?

Octuplet Woman’s Mother – Doesn’t she have anything nice to say about her daughter? I mean, caring for 6 grandchildren while her daughter visits her new babies has to be a lot of work. She does sound a bit bitter, don’t you think? If her mother isn't going to help her and her father is going to Iraq, who is going to help her?

Lola's Diner
©2008-2009

My OTHER Daughter

Yesterday we had AT&T at the house because our land line phone wasn't working. No dial tone and if we try to call our land line we got a busy signal. This happened before, but they were able to fix it without bothering us.

Anastasia had to leave to do her caregiver gig and ran into the tech on the way out. The tech came to the front door and asked me to disconnect every phone and the desktop computer. I did so. Then he came to the back door and said that "my 'other daughter', the redhead, said to talk to you." He said he found a short in a line to the garage. He disconnected it and had me plug everything back in and try the desktop computer.

"Other daughter"? WTF? I've had people refer to Anastasia as my 'sister', but "other daughter"? Normally I correct everyone, 'no, she's my partner', but I was completely stunned. I was speachless! Anastasia is 5 years my junior. (Yes, I got me a young redhead!) How could anyone make the mistake of calling Anastasia my "other daughter"? Wow, I know I have a few gray hairs. Ok, more than a few, but not that much! And I know I may walk a bit hunched over because of my back issues, but I'm not the only 47 year old with back problems. Come on people help me out here! WTF?

Wow, if I wasn't depressed before, I sure am now. "Other daughter"?

Lola's Diner
©2008-2009