Tuesday, January 11, 2011
Cat Lady Confessions
I often try to fight this moniker, I mean, I only have two cats. Okay, so I trap, neuter, and return barn cats....and I feed the barn cats, but still - I am far too cool to be a cat lady - plus, I like dogs too! Then I have a moment where all I can do is shake my head and confess, yes, I am a cat lady. It is like those awful "you know your a redneck when" jokes. Yep, you know you are a cat lady when you have one cat at the head of one side of the bed and another at the foot of the other side of the bed, so you squirm in at a diagonal so you don't disturb the kitties. I hang my head in shame.
Tuesday, January 4, 2011
Preparations for Tortur, ah, I mean Relaxation.
The Oatmeal Face Mask and the Banana Hair Mask (looks all smooth and innocent doesn't it.)
Misadventures in Natural Beauty
Tuesday looked to be a relaxing evening - the house is clean, basic to do list is done. So I thought, you know, it IS winter - perhaps I should do a hair mask and a face mask to control the frizz and dry skin. Inspired idea, don't you think. I had honey, I had oatmeal, I had a banana, and I had a free evening. Turns out these are not only the ingredients to recipes for natural beauty treatments, they are a recipe for disaster. (Ha ha, do you like how I set that up.) I was feeling pretty mellow just at the thought of a long, hot pampering bath - so rather than blend or food process the hair mask, I thought it's just a banana, a fork will do. Oh, how wrong I was.
I run the bath water, add a little salt to it to add to the natural beauty treatments, I settle in with my little concoctions and a book nearby. I slather my hair with the mixture of one banana and approx. a tablespoon of honey, cover with the shower cap to lock in the juices. I then apply my face mask of oatmeal and honey (1/4 a cup to a dollop - I know but it would have required more washing to measure) I set the timer for twenty minutes and lean back with my book and relax. Ahhhh.
Beep Beep Beep. Okay, stand up switch to shower mode, first wash off crusty oatmeal, check - no problem here - just mentally preparing to clean the goo off the shower floor before in cements. Next, remove shower cap - thoroughly rinse so no stray banana bits cause a future moldy surprise, check, again no problems. Lastly, prepare to rinse out hair mask in order to have the lovely conditioned hair the recipe promised - Danger! Danger! Here is when the lack of food processing makes itself known. First, the water started a little to hot - great, bake a few pieces of banana, wonderful. Wait - where did all these tangles come from? Crap! Fast forward to nearly forty minutes in the shower picking mini chunks of banana from my head, enough hair pulled out from tangles to form a sculpture of a pet hamster (I shall name it Hairold - ha ha, nerd). What is a girl to do. Well I will tell you. At the forty minute mark, this girl decides to get out, let hair dry the brush out dry flakes of leftover banana (which HAS to be easier than the wet version) and shower again in the morning. So Lesson here - it is worth it to dig out the food processor.
CONFESSIONAL TIME: This is a review lesson - I had the exact same experience minus the hamster sculpture with an avocado mask earlier this year. Great treatment when run through the food processor, new torture method when not.
I run the bath water, add a little salt to it to add to the natural beauty treatments, I settle in with my little concoctions and a book nearby. I slather my hair with the mixture of one banana and approx. a tablespoon of honey, cover with the shower cap to lock in the juices. I then apply my face mask of oatmeal and honey (1/4 a cup to a dollop - I know but it would have required more washing to measure) I set the timer for twenty minutes and lean back with my book and relax. Ahhhh.
Beep Beep Beep. Okay, stand up switch to shower mode, first wash off crusty oatmeal, check - no problem here - just mentally preparing to clean the goo off the shower floor before in cements. Next, remove shower cap - thoroughly rinse so no stray banana bits cause a future moldy surprise, check, again no problems. Lastly, prepare to rinse out hair mask in order to have the lovely conditioned hair the recipe promised - Danger! Danger! Here is when the lack of food processing makes itself known. First, the water started a little to hot - great, bake a few pieces of banana, wonderful. Wait - where did all these tangles come from? Crap! Fast forward to nearly forty minutes in the shower picking mini chunks of banana from my head, enough hair pulled out from tangles to form a sculpture of a pet hamster (I shall name it Hairold - ha ha, nerd). What is a girl to do. Well I will tell you. At the forty minute mark, this girl decides to get out, let hair dry the brush out dry flakes of leftover banana (which HAS to be easier than the wet version) and shower again in the morning. So Lesson here - it is worth it to dig out the food processor.
CONFESSIONAL TIME: This is a review lesson - I had the exact same experience minus the hamster sculpture with an avocado mask earlier this year. Great treatment when run through the food processor, new torture method when not.
Sunday, January 2, 2011
More suggestions
I added to the list
7. _Are You There, Vodka, it's Me Chelsea_ by Chelsea Handler get the audio - it is a bit raunchy here and there but laugh out loud funny
8. _Kite Runner_ & _A Thousand Splended Suns_ by Khaled Hosseini
9. _Cutting for Stone_ by Abraham Verghese ** <3 This one I loved - checked it out from the library - but may have to buy it for my collection.
10. _The Art of Racing in the Rain_
All good reads.
7. _Are You There, Vodka, it's Me Chelsea_ by Chelsea Handler get the audio - it is a bit raunchy here and there but laugh out loud funny
8. _Kite Runner_ & _A Thousand Splended Suns_ by Khaled Hosseini
9. _Cutting for Stone_ by Abraham Verghese ** <3 This one I loved - checked it out from the library - but may have to buy it for my collection.
10. _The Art of Racing in the Rain_
All good reads.
Saturday, January 1, 2011
Books Read in 2010!
At the beginning of 2010 I set the resolution of reading a book a week for the entire year to renew my passion of reading. While I did not completely attain this goal - I did read more books than weeks in the year so I feel overall it was a success. I have had many people ask if I had kept a list of what I read and if it was going to be posted. I had not but decided it was a worthwhile endeavor so instead of a book this last week, I complied the list. The order is loosely based from last to first but not completely. I am posting originally in facebook than copy/paste in a couple different formats, so if it looks weird in other formats than I apologize. (FYI a _ at the beginning and end of a title counts as underline in FB.) I don't recommend every book I read and some I LOVED! The following symbols will denote a very loose recommendation system: * good read **very good read <3 I loved it -READ IT! #audioversion. At the end a few books I love that I read prior to the beginning of the year. So here goes......
Non-Fiction
1. _Food Politics: What Everyone Needs to Know_ by Robert Paarlberg
2. _A Big Little Life: A Memior of a Joyful Dog_ by Dean Koontz *
3. _Beyond the Rat Race_ by Arthur Gish *
4. _The Element: How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything_ By Ken Robinson, Ph.D w/ Lau Aronica **
5. _The Geography of Bliss_ by Eric Weiner
6. _Beyond the Board_ by Doug Brown #
7. _Harvest for Hope: A Guide to Mindful Eating_ by Jane Goodall w/ Gary McAvoy & Gail Hudson **
8. _Blink: The Power of Thinking without Thinking_ by Malcolm Gladwell **
9. _The 50 Best Ways to Simplify Your Life_ by Pattric Fannanig(can't read my writing here - not certain about this spelling) & Heather arras Mitchner
10. _The Story of Stuff_ by Annie Leonard **
11. _Life on the Mississippi_ by Mark Twain * #
12. _Leavings: Poems_ by Wendell Berry <3 (Not sure where poetry fits category wise but WB's poems seem non-fiction like.)
13. _Shift Your Habits: Save Money, Save the Planet_ by Elizabeth Rogers
14. _Possom Living: How to Live Well w/o a job & with (almost) no Money_ by Dolley Freed
15. _Everthing I Need to Know I Learned from Children's Books: Life Lessons from Notable People in All Walks of Life_ by Anita Silvey <3
16. _Loot: The Battle over Stolen Treasures of the Ancient World_ by Sharon Waxman **
17. _The Happiness Project: Or, Why I Spent a Year Trying to Sing in the Morning, Clean my Closet, Fight Right, Read Aristotle, & Generally Have More Fun_ by Gretchen Rubin <3
18. _I Am America (and So Can You!)_ by Stephan Colbert **
19. _Animals Make Us Human_ by Temple Grandin & Catherine Johnson ** #
20. _How Starbucks Saved my Life: A Son of Privelage Learns to Live Like Everyone Else_ by Michael Gates Gill **
21. _Mennonite in a Little Black Dress_ by Rhoda Janzen
22. _Give a Little: How Your Small Donations can Transform our World_ by Wendy Smith <3
23. _Have a Little Faith_ by Mitch Albom **
24. _Eating Animals_ by Jonathan Safron Foer **
25. _Making Mummies Dance: Inside the Metropolitan Museum of Art_ by Thomas Hoving
26. _A Supremely Bad Idea: Three Mad Birders & Their Quest to See it All_ by Luke Dempsey <3
27. _See Me After Class: Advice for Teachers by Teachers_ by Roxanna Elden *
Now to my perfered reading style, FICTION
1. _Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close_ by Jonathan Safron Foer * #
2. _Gourmet Rhapsody_ by Muriel Barberry
3. _ The Knitting Circle_ by Ann Hood *
4. _Faithful Place_ by Tana French ** #
5. _Bad Blood_ by John Sandford
6. _Her Fearful Symmetry_ by Audrey Niffenegger #
7. _Ape House_ by Sara Gruen
8. _ Wicked Appetite_ by Janet Evanovich <3
9. _Jane Slayre_ by Charlotte Bronte & Sherri Browning Erwin
10. _Prayers for Sale_ by Sandra Dallas **
11. _The Bonesetter's Daughter_ by Amy Tan * #
12. _The Help_ by Kathryn Stockett *
13. _The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner_ Stephanie Meyer <3
14. _The Elegance of the Hedgehog_ by Muriel Barberry <3
15. _An Unaccustomed Earth_ by Jhumpa Lahiri ** #
16. _The Lost Recipe of Happiness_ by Barbara O'Neal *
17. _Marker_ by Robin Cook *
18-38. The entire Stephanie Plum series by Janet Evanovich <3 (Great guilty pleasure reads!)
39. _Dead Watch_ by John Sandford **
40. _Every Last One_ by Anne Quindlen <3
41. _Oh My Stars_ by Lorna Landrik <3
42. _The Puzzle Lady vs. Sudoku Lady_ by Parnell Hall
43. _The Shadow of you Smile_ by Mary Higgins Clark *
44. _ish_ by Peter Reynolds <3, _Oh, the Places You Go_ by Dr. Suess <3, _Where ther Once There Was a Woods_ by Denise Flemming <3
45. _Beatrice & Virgil_ by Yann Martel *
46. _Run_ by Ann Patchett <3
47. _Oolong Dead_ by Laura Childs
48. _The Woods_ by Harlan Coben <3
49. _ Jane Eyre_ by Charlotte Bronte <3
50 _Rough Country_ by John Sandford *
51. _The House of Sand & Fog_ by Andre Dubas III
52. _Heat Lightning_ by John Sandford <3
53. _Loving Frank_ by Nancy Horan
54. _Take My Heart_ by Mary Higgins Clark *
I also read a lot of Amanda Quick/Jayne Krentz - guilty pleasures that I didn't count in the list because so simple of reads.
Whew - obviously I love a lot more fiction!
Other Selections to Consider
1. Some of my guilty pleasures are of course Mary Higgins Clark - can't go wrong there
2. I have enjoyed the Virgil Flowers series by John Sandford - all are listed above except for the first _Dark of the Mood_ which I listened to the audio version - very good
3. _Water for Elephants_ by Sara Gruen - I love this book
4. _Angry Housewives Eating BonBons_ by Lorna Lardvik enjoyable lighter read
5. Classics to revisit (on the female side) _My Antonia_ by Willa Cather, _Pride & Prejudice_ by Jane Austen, _Gone with the Wind_ by Margaret Mitchell (and of course _Jane Eyre_)
6. _The Life of Pi_ by Yann Martel
Over 81 books in one year! Yeah! I hope you enjoyed this list and go get reading
Non-Fiction
1. _Food Politics: What Everyone Needs to Know_ by Robert Paarlberg
2. _A Big Little Life: A Memior of a Joyful Dog_ by Dean Koontz *
3. _Beyond the Rat Race_ by Arthur Gish *
4. _The Element: How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything_ By Ken Robinson, Ph.D w/ Lau Aronica **
5. _The Geography of Bliss_ by Eric Weiner
6. _Beyond the Board_ by Doug Brown #
7. _Harvest for Hope: A Guide to Mindful Eating_ by Jane Goodall w/ Gary McAvoy & Gail Hudson **
8. _Blink: The Power of Thinking without Thinking_ by Malcolm Gladwell **
9. _The 50 Best Ways to Simplify Your Life_ by Pattric Fannanig(can't read my writing here - not certain about this spelling) & Heather arras Mitchner
10. _The Story of Stuff_ by Annie Leonard **
11. _Life on the Mississippi_ by Mark Twain * #
12. _Leavings: Poems_ by Wendell Berry <3 (Not sure where poetry fits category wise but WB's poems seem non-fiction like.)
13. _Shift Your Habits: Save Money, Save the Planet_ by Elizabeth Rogers
14. _Possom Living: How to Live Well w/o a job & with (almost) no Money_ by Dolley Freed
15. _Everthing I Need to Know I Learned from Children's Books: Life Lessons from Notable People in All Walks of Life_ by Anita Silvey <3
16. _Loot: The Battle over Stolen Treasures of the Ancient World_ by Sharon Waxman **
17. _The Happiness Project: Or, Why I Spent a Year Trying to Sing in the Morning, Clean my Closet, Fight Right, Read Aristotle, & Generally Have More Fun_ by Gretchen Rubin <3
18. _I Am America (and So Can You!)_ by Stephan Colbert **
19. _Animals Make Us Human_ by Temple Grandin & Catherine Johnson ** #
20. _How Starbucks Saved my Life: A Son of Privelage Learns to Live Like Everyone Else_ by Michael Gates Gill **
21. _Mennonite in a Little Black Dress_ by Rhoda Janzen
22. _Give a Little: How Your Small Donations can Transform our World_ by Wendy Smith <3
23. _Have a Little Faith_ by Mitch Albom **
24. _Eating Animals_ by Jonathan Safron Foer **
25. _Making Mummies Dance: Inside the Metropolitan Museum of Art_ by Thomas Hoving
26. _A Supremely Bad Idea: Three Mad Birders & Their Quest to See it All_ by Luke Dempsey <3
27. _See Me After Class: Advice for Teachers by Teachers_ by Roxanna Elden *
Now to my perfered reading style, FICTION
1. _Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close_ by Jonathan Safron Foer * #
2. _Gourmet Rhapsody_ by Muriel Barberry
3. _ The Knitting Circle_ by Ann Hood *
4. _Faithful Place_ by Tana French ** #
5. _Bad Blood_ by John Sandford
6. _Her Fearful Symmetry_ by Audrey Niffenegger #
7. _Ape House_ by Sara Gruen
8. _ Wicked Appetite_ by Janet Evanovich <3
9. _Jane Slayre_ by Charlotte Bronte & Sherri Browning Erwin
10. _Prayers for Sale_ by Sandra Dallas **
11. _The Bonesetter's Daughter_ by Amy Tan * #
12. _The Help_ by Kathryn Stockett *
13. _The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner_ Stephanie Meyer <3
14. _The Elegance of the Hedgehog_ by Muriel Barberry <3
15. _An Unaccustomed Earth_ by Jhumpa Lahiri ** #
16. _The Lost Recipe of Happiness_ by Barbara O'Neal *
17. _Marker_ by Robin Cook *
18-38. The entire Stephanie Plum series by Janet Evanovich <3 (Great guilty pleasure reads!)
39. _Dead Watch_ by John Sandford **
40. _Every Last One_ by Anne Quindlen <3
41. _Oh My Stars_ by Lorna Landrik <3
42. _The Puzzle Lady vs. Sudoku Lady_ by Parnell Hall
43. _The Shadow of you Smile_ by Mary Higgins Clark *
44. _ish_ by Peter Reynolds <3, _Oh, the Places You Go_ by Dr. Suess <3, _Where ther Once There Was a Woods_ by Denise Flemming <3
45. _Beatrice & Virgil_ by Yann Martel *
46. _Run_ by Ann Patchett <3
47. _Oolong Dead_ by Laura Childs
48. _The Woods_ by Harlan Coben <3
49. _ Jane Eyre_ by Charlotte Bronte <3
50 _Rough Country_ by John Sandford *
51. _The House of Sand & Fog_ by Andre Dubas III
52. _Heat Lightning_ by John Sandford <3
53. _Loving Frank_ by Nancy Horan
54. _Take My Heart_ by Mary Higgins Clark *
I also read a lot of Amanda Quick/Jayne Krentz - guilty pleasures that I didn't count in the list because so simple of reads.
Whew - obviously I love a lot more fiction!
Other Selections to Consider
1. Some of my guilty pleasures are of course Mary Higgins Clark - can't go wrong there
2. I have enjoyed the Virgil Flowers series by John Sandford - all are listed above except for the first _Dark of the Mood_ which I listened to the audio version - very good
3. _Water for Elephants_ by Sara Gruen - I love this book
4. _Angry Housewives Eating BonBons_ by Lorna Lardvik enjoyable lighter read
5. Classics to revisit (on the female side) _My Antonia_ by Willa Cather, _Pride & Prejudice_ by Jane Austen, _Gone with the Wind_ by Margaret Mitchell (and of course _Jane Eyre_)
6. _The Life of Pi_ by Yann Martel
Over 81 books in one year! Yeah! I hope you enjoyed this list and go get reading
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)