Mmmm...Unexplained Bacon

My future step-father?

3 bags of candy; 0 trick-or-treaters. Nice.

*SNIP*

Only 17 work days till Thanksgiving vacation! The Thanksgiving meal is my favorite meal in the world! None of the individual foods are my favorite foods, but you can't beat the combination of turkey, mashed potatoes, and stuffing (you have to mix them all together for the best effect). And then when you add cranberry relish, sweet potatoes, and pumpkin pie, and my step-aunt's awesome rolls with honey on them, mmmm...

I'm meeting a woman I work with tomorrow morning so she can show me a way to get to work that doesn't involve driving on I-83, but I have to meet her (and she lives more than halfway to work) at the time I usually leave. This should be good.

I REALLY want a house with a garage. I had to break out the ice scraper this morning. It came off pretty easily, but still...

I saw Elizabethtown yesterday. It was decent enough, but my mom is now in love with Orlando Bloom and said she wishes she were 20 years younger. Alrighty then. Did I just say alrighty then? What is this? 1992? I guess we now know where I get my tendency to have a million TV and movie boyfriends.

I read in the paper that elementary schools are doing away with Halloween parties and the like because standards are so strenuous. That is such bullshit! We are exposing children to our society of all work, no play way too early. No wonder so many kids have mental disorders. Back in my day we had Halloween parties and still managed to do well in school. I had no worries when I was in elementary school. We treat children like adults and then get mad when they want to assert their independence at earlier ages. Let kids be kids while they still can. They have plenty of years to be corporate drones like the rest of us.

More Stuff.

The Christmas CD that I ordered came in the mail today. I ordered it because Jon Peter Lewis has a song on it, and it's actually really good, although not too Christmas-y. A version of "O Holy Night" by Josh Groban is on the CD, and it was so good it gave me chills. It's weird that I'm not religious, but I like religious Christmas songs better than secular ones. Although I'd have to say that one of my favorite Christmas songs is Peter Griffin's version of "Carol of the Bells" on Family Guy:

"Holy crap, here comes Jesus
And he doesn't look too happy."

My internet connection is being wonky. It'll work for 10 minutes then stop, so I'll reset my computer, and then it'll work again for 10 more minutes.

I had to carve my Jack O' Lantern today because it was starting to rot and I wanted to get it out of the house. You know, it's really hard to carve a pumpkin that's so soft that a Sharpie pierces the skin.

I watched Dracula today. Worst. Movie. Ever. Ok, it's not the worst, but I gave it 1 star on Netflix. Maybe it would have been better if I had been paying more attention.

Don't forget to turn your clocks back! Most people get an extra hour of sleep, I just end up waking up at 6 AM instead of 7 AM.

Stuff.

I just got back from picking up my car after getting my tires. So much for keeping my credit card balance below a grand! I have to go back again on Tuesday to have something done to my brakes.

I saw The 40-Year-Old Virgin last night. It was really good! I love Steve Carell and Paul Rudd, but I absolutely adore Seth Rogen. He played Ken in Freaks and Geeks and he was my favorite character. He has the greatest delivery.

The Office is back on Tuesday!

Not Again!

Those who know me know that I have extremely bad luck with tires and always run over sharp metal objects in the road. Flat tire #4 (within 2 years) just occurred today. This time it was some random metal object. I can't win.

Way to Go, Sheetz

I was feeling all smug that I got $13 worth of gas for free (gift certificate) and a free hamburger (coupon from when we first moved) from Sheetz (a local gas station) until I got home, opened my hamburger which, by the way, was just handed to me in a mayo-covered wrapper, and found that they omitted one important thing: the hamburger! Luckily I had enough other crap on it that I could still eat it and it wasn't that bad, but believe you me, if I had paid for that, I would be back at Sheetz getting not only a new hamburger, but also my free hamburger coupon back.

As much as I loathe The View, I have it on right now because Kim Catrall was on. What the hell is with Star Jones? Did she have gastric bypass? I know she didn't burn the calories by having sex with Big Gay Al.

MR and Liz, we need to all get together to go out to eat again. That was fun!

I'm off to eat some chicken fingers that I heated up for lunch (damn you, Sheetz!).

Busy

On The Apprentice, Martha had some pet guy on and they were talking about how they shot the pet segment on that set and then Martha said they shoot their food segments on the same set. Umm...eww...

That last sentence doesn't make sense, but I can't think of how to reword it.

I've been busy as hell at work the past couple of days. This morning when I showed up no one had bothered to take the phones off night service or turn the computer on or anything, so I had to cover the front desk, which was unexpected. Gotta love doing 2 jobs. I also put together a chair for the receptionist.

I lost my Starbucks Pumpkin Spice Latte virginity this morning. Good, but when my coworker told me I owed him $4, I almost fell out of my chair. I can buy a whole can of Maxwell House for less than $4. Not as good, but seriously...

I Hate Network Executives

I can understand preempting The Simpsons, Family Guy, and Arrested Development for weeks because of baseball, as I know baseball makes FOX much more money than actual quality programming does, but I CANNOT accept preempting Arrested Development for a RERUN of Prison Break AND NBC preempting The Office tomorrow for a 90 minute Biggest Loser. People would seriously rather watch a bunch of fat people work out than watch The Office? Geez... Tonight I'm going to actually have to spend quality time with Chris or read a book or something. How will I survive?! :)

Hee!

This is mostly for me because I don't know that anyone else watches, but it's a screenshot taken right after Phyllis asks if a one-night stand counts as an office romance. To me, a big part of the humor of this show is the little faces the actors make to the camera after certain lines. Also, John Krasinski is my new TV boyfriend.



I came across this site from the Saved by the Bell forum (shut up) at TWoP. For some reason, this synopsis in particular made me laugh out loud:

Read my Lips: Jessie's a Man
Zack and Jessie go head-to-head in the race for student-body president for the chance to preside over the gang and 12 or so random extras. May the best man win!

Jen vs. Box Elder Bugs

It's that time of year again. I'm scared of 99% of bugs, but luckily I'm not scared of box elder bugs. This is good considering we get a massive infestation of them in the fall and winter. They congregate on the front of the house, particularly the front door. Whenever you open the front door, the bugs that are hanging out in the door frame decide they want to come in the house. Every day I kill at least 5 of these damn things. We literally go through twice as many napkins during box elder time than we do during non-box elder time. Usually they pretty much hang out at the front door, but sometimes they get bold, as one did last night, and decide to scurry across the table as I'm eating dinner. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to break out my industrial size container of bug spray (it even comes with a hose!) and let these bugs know who's the boss.

Purty

Chris took this a few weeks ago.

My Idols

Martha Stewart - She's a bitch and she's good at cooking, sewing, decorating, etc. She has this way about her where she's able to say the meanest things while making them sound polite. I totally want to be her.

Elton John - I like Elton John's old music, but that's not the reason he is my idol. He's my idol because he made a rule at his parties that no one is allowed to talk to him unless he talks to them first.

My mom - My mom is like Martha Stewart to a lesser extent. We were driving to one of the ritzy neighborhoods last weekend and we passed some crappy apartment where people had their junky cars parked on their lawns. My mom's observation, "I'd hate to have to drive through this shit to get to my nice house." Hee! My mom's also awesome though, and has done tons of stuff for me over the years. My only hope is that I can be half as generous with my children (if I have any) than she has been with me.

*An update on my Dr. Phil hate. I read an article where he said that his wife told him before they got married, "You make the living, and I'll make it worth living." I now hate Dr. Phil's wife almost as much as I hate him.

Wishful Thinking...

With Random Musings as my inspiration, I decided to think about what I would do if I won Powerball. I never win the lottery. I've won $1 a few times, but that's it. Our paper has had coupons for the lottery every month this year, and I've played every time (I even had 2 sets of coupons for the first 6 months); I haven't won a damn thing. I didn't play Powerball this time, but if I did, here's what I would do:

Design my dream home and have it built.
Decorate my dream home.
Go back to school to get my master's in something, I just don't know what.
Buy a bunch of books, CDs, movies, etc. that I want but can't justify spending money on.
Go to England and some other European countries.
Buy stuff for friends and family (a house for MR, pay off Liz's mortgage, and buy some of the dumb stuff Chris likes). And yes, I'd spend more than that, before I get a deluge of comments saying, "Is that all you'd get me?!"
Take up some hobbies that I've always wanted to do like gardening, knitting, quilting, etc.
Donate to charity.
I'm sure I'd come up with a lot of other things to spend my money on if I had it!

Go me!

Today marks the 4 week anniversary of my last cigarette! My lungs feel no different and I'm not rolling in the dough like I thought I would be. My car and my hair smell good though!

People Suck

I just read a blurb in the paper about a woman in Pittsburgh who accidentally killed her 2- and 3- year-old children because she burned their house down. How did she burn their house down, you ask? Well, you see, she burned their house down because her son was allergic to the family dog, so she set their dog on fire. Incidentally, the woman's name was Tequilla. First of all, I hate "creative spellings" of names. Second of all, why do people name their children after liquor? I think I'm going to name my children vodka, triple sec, and whiskey.

I hate people...

Random

I had a dream last night that I was at the grocery store with my 2 teenaged sons and Jeffrey Tambor made me abandon them.

Unwrapped had a little blurb about astronaut food that was really interesting. Usually Unwrapped annoys and bores me.

It turns out I'm pretty lucky that I didn't work yesterday. Apparently some guy jumped off an overpass and held up traffic for hours.

The Office is on tonight!!

My Weekend

I had a good, productive weekend! On Saturday since it was in the high 70s I did a bunch of things outside--repotted some plants, washed some rugs and let them air dry, washed my car and cleaned the inside of it. The bugs were able to feast on my flip-flop clad feet. Yesterday I went with my family to a local orchard because they were having a festival. I got my Jack O' Lantern pumpkin and got some Christmas shopping done. Then we went to some open houses.

The houses we looked at were about half a million dollars, and the real estate agent told us that in Maryland the same homes would go for 800K-900K. They were incredible, although none of them would be my dream home. They all had a little something that I wouldn't want. Granted, if you gave me one of those houses tomorrow, I certainly wouldn't complain, but if I had that much money I think I'd want to build my own home to my own specifications. I could also do a better job at decorating than their decorators did if I had an unlimited budget :-). Here's a link if you like to ogle rich people's stuff as much as I do. None of the single-family homes we looked at are on that site, but we did look at the attached villas.

Free Love on the Free Love Freeway

I ain't going home 'cos my baby's gone.
-She's dead!
She isn't dead.

I finished The Office (UK) last night and almost cried when Tim gave Dawn the paints and then when they got together! Eeeeeeee!!! PMS also had something to do about it. I get sentimental when I have PMS.

Now if only Jim and Pam could do the same...

A Question and a quandary

Hillary Duff is releasing a greatest hits album. Don't you have to have a hit before you can have greatest hits?

I need to know what to get this one lady at work for Christmas. Usually with coworkers and people I don't know well, I get them a lottery ticket or a gift certificate for gas. This woman is really religious and she doesn't drive. Isn't it like, against Christianity to gamble? Is that even considered gambling? If I don't get her a lottery ticket I have no clue what to get her. A gift certificate to a store or restaurant is out of the question too, because I don't even know where she lives. Then I thought about getting her a mug with a packet of nice coffee in it, but I think she drinks tea. Do they have packages of tea bags like that? I buy the tea bags where you get 200 for like, 99 cents, so I'm obviously not a tea connoisseur. I guess I'll figure it out by Christmas!

Target Anonymous

My name is Jen, and I'm a Targetholic. I just spent over $300, but I can justify it! For the low, low price of $300 I got a pair of boots, Crest Whitestrips (a reward for quitting smoking), tweezers, masking tape, make-up, 6 light-weight sweaters, a pair of Levis, sweatpants, a pair of khakis, a hoodie, and 7 of the same long sleeved t-shirt in green, blue, pink, red, brown, and 2 black (I know, but I wear black a lot!). So you see, my spending it totally justified! And besides, I know have a complete fall and spring wardrobe. Totally justified...

10 Things I Loathe

I have a raging case of PMS right now, and people are pissing me off, so I thought I'd make a shit list.

1. Tom Cruise: I have never liked him as a person or an actor, and I'm so tired of hearing about $cientology. The whole Katie Holmes thing creeps me the hell out, and I hope for her sake that the Kool-Aid wears off and she gets out of there. The fact that she can't make noise or have drugs during childbirth is screwed up. I heard they actually had to stop John Travolta's wife's childbirth to wait till she calmed down. I'm no OB/GYN, but that doesn't sound like it would be good for the baby.
2. Oprah: I'm almost scared to bust on Oprah, because her fans are scary. I hate how she gets her fans to boycott certain products (beef, Hermes). I hate that she's able to do this because her hardcore fans are sheep and have no minds of their own. My grandma loves Oprah and Dr. Phil (I'll get to him in a second) and even rearranged pictures on her wall because of a show Oprah did. I have no problem with getting ideas from a show or boycotting a product because of a conviction you have (because I've done that with Wal-Mart), but it's almost creepy the way Oprah's fans are. I also hate her damn fight with weight loss. Wow, it's so incredible that you were able to lose weight while having a personal trainer and a chef. I'm sure your legions of fans can afford to do the same. Well, actually they probably can because they're all housewives whose husbands can afford to have their wives sitting at home wearing dresses and pearls while watching Oprah (and no, I'm not busting on housewives because my mom was one, but she most certainly didn't sit at home and watch TV all day).
3. Dr. Phil: Hypocrite. He has diet books. He's not obese, he sure as hell ain't skinny. I've heard that he beats his wife. He says to a man who looks at pornography, "That's someone's daughter you're looking at!" Wait, Dr. Phil. Who is your son (who is a massive tool) marrying? A Playboy centerfold? Ok, then. To a woman whose husband has cheated on her, "Give him another chance." To a man whose wife has cheated on him, "Kick her ass to the curb."
4. Wal-Mart: I haven't been in a Wal-Mart for around a year, but my blood pressure would go up 100 points everytime I set foot in one because of how overcrowded it is, how tiny the aisles are, and how stupid the people there are. These people were probably the inspiration for Cletus and Brandine on The Simpsons. I hate what Wal-Mart does to smaller companies. There is a local pickle company here who has huge jars of pickles for sale at Wal-Mart. Wal-Mart lowered the price on the jar so much that the company actually loses money when they sell a jar, but Wal-Mart won't raise the price. We also know about the way Wal-Mart treats its employees.
5. Dick's Sporting Goods: No particular reason; I just hate that store with the fire of 1,000 suns.
6. Sausage: To me, sausage is the most foul food on the planet. It's a bunch of random meat parts with some flecks of fat stuffed into a casing made of god knows what.
7. Science Fiction: I hate anything having to do with space or aliens.
8. Football: I think I'm one of the only people in the world who hates football. I also have a confession to make: I hate Penn State and am happy when they lose. This is mostly because my ex loved Penn State and had to watch the game every Saturday. Also, if you lived around here, you would understand. There is Penn State everything! A company even made Penn State blue mulch. People have huge blow-up Penn State football players in their front yards.
9. Emeril Legasse: Shut up, Emeril! His food looks awesome, but I hate him. I hate, "Bam!" I hate the Crest commercials. I hate his audience. A typical show: I'm going to add garlic *insane cheering* and onion *more insane cheering* and pepper *even more insane cheering* and a big pile of dog shit *more of the same*. Now, I love me some garlic, but it doesn't make me clap and cheer insanely when I add it to a dish.
10. 99.9% of the people on my morning commute: STOP GOING 55 IN THE PASSING LANE IN A 65 ZONE!!!!!!! Stop pulling right in front of me when there's no one behind me. Stop trying to cut in front of everyone and then slowing traffic up when you have to get back into the correct lane. Stop stopping in the middle of the street in the city during rush hour to let your passengers out! Stop rubbernecking and holding up traffic for miles! Arghhh!!!!!!!!!!

Ok, I feel better. :-) Now it's off to get a much-needed haircut and then to Target to buy a bunch of not-much-needed stuff!

Eeeek! Part II

Need a reason not to do drugs? I give you Boy George.

Time and drugs have not been kind to you, Mr. George.

Save the Office

I must say that The Office (US) is now my favorite TV show. Not just my current favorite TV show, but my all-time favorite. You read right: I like The Office better than Arrested Development (blasphemy, I know), Good Eats, Friends, and Family Guy. I don't like it better than The Simpsons, but they're in a totally different category, so The Office can still be my all-time favorite without ousting The Simpsons. I can't even watch sitcoms with laugh tracks anymore. I tried to watch a rerun of Friends the other day and couldn't stand it, which is weird considering it was one of my favorites back in the day. Anyway, everyone needs to watch The Office and tell everyone they know to do the same, because if not it's going to get cancelled. My Name is Earl has better ratings, for God's sake! The UK version is good as well, but I'm partial to the US version. Watch, people! 9:30 Tuesday nights on NBC!!

Musings

It's now the time of year for my hair to come out in clumps. For some reason when the weather gets cold I lose massive amounts of hair. Shouldn't that happen in the summer evolutionarily? It's annoying because it gets all over the place and sticks to everything. I lose as much hair from brushing it once as I usually do in 2 weeks. It never looks any thinner though. It's weird.

I hate my bank. It merged about 2 years or so ago, and now it takes forever for things to clear. I deposited cash on Saturday morning and it still hasn't cleared. I understand that yesterday was a holiday, but it's cash! I used to be able to deposit cash and then go home and check my account online and it would be there. Now it takes a day or two, even if it isn't a holiday. They also lost one of my deposits one time and it took them weeks to credit me. I even had the deposit receipt.

I am so tired, but I took off Friday and Monday, so I'm happy!

For MR

Ewww! Skank!


This goes out to all my baby daddy.

Infomercials

I totally want the Magic Bullet. I realize there's no way in hell it works the way it does on TV, but it looks awesome. The infomercial is cheesy though (as if they all aren't). Chris's and my favorite infomercial is for the Shark Vac. This guy kicks over a bowl of dog food and fakely goes, "Whoops!" And the two hosts say each other's names every sentence.

"Mary, have I told you how much I love the Shark Vac?"
"No, Steve, you haven't!"
"Well, Mary, I love it more than I love my children."
"Gee, Steve, that's great!"
"Yes it is, Mary! Whoops! I accidentally knocked over this bowl of dog food, Mary!"

I had the TV on after the Magic Bullet infomercial and was at the dining room table doing some stuff when I heard the guy on the next infomercial saying, "I saw how big it was and I couldn't believe that something that big could come out of a baby so small! It was bigger than mine, relative to our sizes!" I thought to myself, "Please don't let them be talking about poo." They were. They kept discussing how much fecal matter we all have stuck in our bowels. I changed the channel (to another Magic Bullet infomercial, incidently).

There are so many awesome infomercial things. If I bought everything I wanted, I would be broke. I don't want the Magic Enema or whatever the hell those people were advertising.

Random Thoughts Whilst Watching TV Last Night

Dakota Fanning creeps me out.

Best Buy says I can control the Black Eyed Peas with the touch of a button. Can I make them go away forever?

The task on The Apprentice was to have a technology expo for old people. What is wrong with the jackass who asked George if people of his generation were set in their ways? First of all, you don't imply that your job interviewee is old and second of all, I think it's pretty obvious to anyone with a brain that old people are set in their ways.

What was up with the scene with the weird editing where The Donald was telling some guy that he was going to succeed and then he brought in Miss Universe to whore her out to the guy? Is part of being Miss Universe being pimped out to random executives?

The Donald needs to make up his mind as to whether or not he likes loyalty.

I hate when people say, "The reason is because..."

I hate how The Donald allows the women to use their sexuality to sell. Yes, sexuality is used in advertisements, but the executives themselves aren't in their ads wearing bikinis.

Hee! at George hanging out with the old guys.

Dumb Person Alert

From The Smoking Gun:

OCTOBER 5--An Oregon woman claims that her former doctor prescribed sex with him as a treatment for lower back pain, according to a new lawsuit. In a Circuit Court complaint, an excerpt of which you'll find below, Susan Beach alleges that Randall Smith, an osteopathic physician, told her that there was "a medical need to manipulate a nerve in her vagina to help alleviate her lower back pain." These treatments began in June 2003 and ended seven months later after Beach mentioned the unorthodox care to her dentist, who was alarmed by Smith's behavior. Beach is seeking $4 million in damages from Smith and the medical clinic where he worked. Smith, who has claimed the patient sex was consensual, was stripped of his medical license in April for submitting phony reimbursement claims to the Oregon Health Plan. That criminal scheme cost Smith, pictured in the above mug shot, 60 days in jail.

Yes, it was totally wrong for the doctor to take advantage of that woman, but come on!

The End is Near

From Reuters:

NEW YORK (Oct. 5) - Movie star Tom Cruise and his fiancee, actress Katie Holmes, are expecting a baby six months into a whirlwind romance that has turned the once intensely private Cruise into a giddy and very public lover.

News of the pregnancy was first reported by People magazine Wednesday. A statement from Cruise's publicist, his sister Lee Anne DeVette, added: "Tom and Katie are very excited, and the entire family is very excited." Holmes, she said, "has never felt better."

No wedding date for the couple has been set and no details about the sex of the baby or the due date were available. The baby would be Cruise's first biological child. He adopted two children with actress Nicole Kidman before their marriage ended in divorce in 2001.

What a Tool

Yesterday morning I had just pulled into my spot in the parking garage and was sitting in my car getting my stuff together when some tool slammed his car door into mine. Wouldn't you think you would open your car door gently, especially if the person in the car next to yours was STILL SITTING IN HER CAR?! Then he was like, "Oh, sorry about that."

The Office was great last night, and I'm looking forward to Martha tonight, if only for the recap on TWoP. If you watch that show, I strongly recommend reading the recaps. The one for last week's show had me laughing out loud in my office. I mean, my living room...I was reading it at home, not at work...

I Just Realized

I just realized that I don't have a picture of myself on here. That's mostly because I'm not photogenic and because I don't have many recent pictures of myself. Here's one that was taken at the zoo. It's not a particularly good picture, but what are you gonna do? On an unrelated note, hockey starts tomorrow! Go Penguins!

The Office

I got The Office (UK) from Netflix and watched it yesterday. It was funny! I actually like the US version better, but that's probably just because it's the version I saw first, and because I love the dynamic between Jim and Pam. I wasn't feeling it between Tim and Dawn. I do like Ricky Gervais's David better than Steve Carell's Michael though. I didn't realize the two shows were similar and that the US version borrowed jokes from the UK version.

I can't believe it's October already! This is craziness! Halloween is only 4 weeks away.