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Bristol-Meyers-Squib will donate one dollar to AIDS research for every candle lit.
Go to the site, click anywhere on the map to light a candle, and choose your reason for lighting it (health, strength, love, hope, remembrance).
I chose health, in the hope that my two friends who have HIV will continue to live happy, healthy lives.
What's coming up this Saturday? Oh yes... it's the holiday edition of Bootie LA; wear a Santa hat and get a free Bootie CD!
Someone emailed to let me know that yesterday's posted reminded them of The 213 Things Skippy Is No Longer Allowed To Do In The U.S. Army. I'd never seen the Skippy List before, but now I am sitting at my desk biting the insides of my cheeks to keep from laughing outloud.
I think my favorite item is number 44: I am not the atheist chaplain.
Dear demon hellcats Oscar & Taylor,
I don't know WHAT has gotten into you since we've moved to the new house, but the rules have not changed.
You are still not allowed up on the counters, tables or (this is new) stove top.
You are still not allowed to scale the fireplace to get to the mantle.
You are still not allowed to claw the couch.
You are still not allowed to claw the curtains, especially when you then get *stuck* with your paws above your head and have to yowl like a banshee until I come rescue you.
You are still not allowed to go outside and launching yourself full-force at the window screen will NOT help your cause.
So far today I've lost the glass in two framed pictures, two candle holders, one glass of orange juice, one vase, and one plate of toast because of your antics so just KNOCK IT OFF.
And while we're at it, I'd like to amend the Rules List to encompass some things that you've never tried before but are definitely Not Allowed To Do:
You are not allowed to sneak into the kitchen cupboard and scare the bejeezus out of me when I open it to retrieve a tea bag. Mostly because doing so involves getting on the counters, but also because I don't need the heart attack.
You are not allowed to dig in the litterbox as though you are trying to escape from rabid coyotes, thus flinging cat litter EVERYWHERE within a six foot radius. I don't know why you started doing this, Oscar, but now would be a fantastic time to stop.
You are not allowed in the refrigerator. Ever. Under any circumstances. No amount of indignant meowing will change this rule.
You are not allowed to sneak into the linen closet and wallow all over the clean sheets and towels, thus covering everything in a fine layer of cat hair. Also, there is the aforementioned heart attack problem with me opening the closet to find you there. How on *earth* did you get up to that third shelf, Taylor?
I am totally allowed to laugh at you when you skid out on the hardwood floors after trying to take the corner too fast and end up sliding into the wall. You are, in turn, totally allowed to look offended and lick your paws imperiously.
It's a good thing you guys are cute. And that you keep me warm at night.
Aggravated,
The Management
Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday - a day devoted entirely to being with people you care about and to being thankful for what you have without religious or heavily commercial overtones. Crisp weather, bountiful and delicious food, friends, family and football... Thanksgiving encompasses almost all of my very favorite things. Every year I look forward to it as the joyful kickoff of the Holiday season.
This year... well... this year hasn't worked out exactly as I'd hoped. Having turned down generous offers from friends in favor of another plan, I find myself with the fixings for a modest turkey dinner and no one else with whom to cook it.*
Life, it seems, doesn't stop for holidays.
It would be easy to lapse into self-pity, to waste the day in tears and amorphous anger. It would be easy to mistake this as something that happened to me, rather than something that just happened.
But, why?
This Thanksgiving may not be unfolding exactly the way I'd imagined, but I still have so much for which to be thankful:
I am thankful for my beautiful new home in a lovely green place where I feel both safe and settled.
I am thankful for the cats, who are a combined 30 pounds of comfort and comedy every day.
I am thankful for my job that, for all its frustrations, is now challenging me to learn new things.
I am thankful for my health, for a body strong enough to build, to dance, to climb.
I am thankful for my chosen family of beautiful, crazy, awe-inspring friends whom I adore.
I am thankful for my my parents, and for C&J, who love me unconditionally and who never stop believing that I am capable of anything... of everything.
And I am thankful for Apollo, whose love I know to be both profound and steadfast. I am a better person for loving him, and for being loved by him.
There will be other Thanksgivings that will live up to my best-laid plans, so this year I'll spend the day quietly... cooking up my turkey and being thankful for all the gifts of my life.
___
*Ed Note: No, I am not utterly alone. I could call any one of those friends and say "I'm stranded" and they would happily squeeze an extra place setting on to their table, but I've decided to take the cue from the Universe and spend a peaceful day at home instead.
Yesterday, six of us hiked the Switzer Falls trail for the first time. It wasn't quite the leisurely hike we were expecting, but it was well worth the extra adventure. The trail was gorgeous, the picnic lunch that Adri made was delicious, and the weather was absolutely perfect.
Adri and YellowMan took more photos than I did, but you can see mine here.
Later, after several solid hours of hiking, we convened at my house for beer, food, and football.
Does it get any better than that?
I don't think so.
Off to Switzer Falls with Adri and assorted.
Pictures to follow!
I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, to discover that I had not lived. I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear; nor did I wish to practice resignation, unless it was quite necessary. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms, and, if it proved to be mean, why then to get the whole and genuine meanness of it, and publish its meanness to the world; or if it were sublime, to know it by experience, and to be able to give a true account of it in my next excursion. - Henry David Thoreau
Too far have I strayed from the lessons of the woods.
No longer.
---
*wold, n. Forest. 1513 Douglas, Ænis IX. xi. 13: “Rane..dois smyte apon the wald [orig. humum].”
(via Apollo)
Excel has frozen up three times in the last ten minutes while trying to execute a ridiculously simple formula.
I can take a hint.
Once again, I am without internet access at home.
It's not Charter's fault... oh no... it's because my *#&*$^%!* power cord frayed / shorted out / started making weird clicking noises and I won't have time to grudgingly shell out $79 replace it until sometime this weekend.
*grumbles*
