Sunday, January 27, 2008

One More Excuse To Live In My Kitchen

This weekend, The Best Friend and I convinced The Original Redhead to come down from Nashville and help me redecorate my kitchen in exchange for copious amounts of food and wine. Don't worry your pretty little heads, we saved most of the wine for after the painting was done. And I have to say, it turned out awesome. The Professor isn't too keen on losing one of the three rooms (out of 4 total) that had the Major Green Theme going on. After a little over 3 years of marriage, I trumped him by bringing in reinforcements, and saying "But the Best Friend made ART! For our Walls!" He didn't have a chance.

One More Excuse To Live In My Kitchen

This weekend, The Best Friend and I convinced The Original Redhead to come down from Nashville and help me redecorate my kitchen in exchange for copious amounts of food and wine. Don't worry your pretty little heads, we saved most of the wine for after the painting was done. And I have to say, it turned out awesome. The Professor isn't too keen on losing one of the three rooms (out of 4 total) that had the Major Green Theme going on. After a little over 3 years of marriage, I trumped him by bringing in reinforcements, and saying "But the Best Friend made ART! For our Walls!" He didn't have a chance.

Wednesday, January 23, 2008

Saturday, January 19, 2008

Live-Blogging the Snow

I'm gonna go ahead and say this won't be so much live blogging, as it will be "one blog post updated a few times". But I wanted a shorter title. So, on to the Alabama Winter Storm Of The Century (So Far, Because I'm Going To Need A Better One). Otherwise known as AWSOFTC(SFBIGTNABO). I was supposed to wake up to temps in the low 30's. A couple of inches of snow on the ground, with more gently falling from above, daring me to go out and act- behind the safety of my privacy fence - like a 5th grader let out of school on a snow day. Snowball fight challenges with The Professor had been thrown down and the hot chocolate was brought to the front of the pantry. And then. I woke up at 7 AM and looked out my bedroom window to see the dead grass. Which I shouldn't have been able to see, because it was supposed to be buried beneath inches of heavy, white, wet fun-ness. There was a little stuff stuck in the creases of my neighbor's roof. It was not enough to mollify me. I went back to bed. At 9 AM, I woke up and lo and behold! It was snowing. White stuff was whirling around! And it was melting as soon as it hit the ground. I snapped a picture and went back to... um... snuggling ... The Professor. I did, however, get a picture of the AWSOFTC(SFBIGTNABO): AWSOFTC(SFBIGTNABO) Update: 10:00 AM It's still snowing! Go AWSOFTC(SFBIGTNABO), Go!! But you tell me how much difference you see in this picture. The love of my life - my meteorologist, that is (yes, he's all mine!) - is currently on the TV assuring me that it's not over. That I can still get up to 3 inches. We'll see. I have a ruler ready. You can depend on me to bring you updates, live from South Shelby County. This is Deborah, reporting... I think I may need to turn off the news updates for a while. AWSOFTC(SFBIGTNABO)Update: 11:00 AM It's still snowing around here. Nothing in the 3-6 inch range that I was all geared up for. But it's enough to justify hot chocolate. Once it's past noon, it'll be enough to justify spiked hot chocolate. Also, the cats tried their "Dash out the back door" maneuver. They got three steps out and then high tailed it back to the door. Which I had closed. Maybe getting their feet in snow will teach them that my house is not the torturous prison that they suspect it to be. Also, because I thought you might be tired of the shots of my empty backyard, this hour's picture comes from the front bushes. It's kinda pretty right now. AWSOFTC(SFBIGTNABO) Update: Noon It's been a productive hour. I skipped the hot chocolate in favor of making what is, at the moment, the only snowman in the neighborhood. What a bunch of dullards. Although I guess maybe snowman-making isn't high on the list of things to do when you're 80. Which is the average age of one entire side of our neighborhood. Maybe I should share my spiked hot chocolate with them? Because that should ALWAYS be high on the list of things to do. Also, because even though my husband is a New Englander - And therefore, as I have been told repeatedly today, far superior in his knowledge of snow - he decided our snow man needed a fourth body segment. Honestly, as much as I've been eating lately, a fourth body segment kinda makes sense. So this little guy's fitting right in: As you can probably tell in the last picture, the snow has stopped. So I don't know if there'll be any more updates. You never can tell around here, though...

Tuesday, January 08, 2008

Sexy Book, Excitement and a little Sibbling Pride. It's like a 3-for-1 sale here.

I don't even know how to convey my utter excitement. If I didn't have a full glass of wine, I might jump for joy. If I didn't have a lap full of cat, I might pee in my pants just a little. If the Professor wouldn't immediately call the men in white coats, I might just start giving banshee yells. Thank God for wine, cats and husbands. Feel free to thank God in whatever order occurs to you. Are you on the edge of your seat yet, waiting to see what has me so over the moon that I can't even form coherent sentences? This: Since I know you're itching for the information on how to buy this incredibly hot, steamy, sexy, erotic, exotic, intoxicating, titillating, captivating work of art, I'll give you a link: GO HERE AND BUY THIS BOOK. But wait! There's MORE! Ember (whom honesty dictates I must reveal as my sister), being the soul of good-spiritedness didn't stop with writing the above mentioned hot, steamy, sexy, etc. work of art. Oh no. She's running a little contest over on her website. A contest that I am hereby recusing myself from, due to the fact that I am, at the moment, acting in a small, tiny, wee, minuscule PR-ish way. And then there's the editing thing I did for her last year. Hmm. Ember? I need a raise. Wine is fine. But hey! Don't let that stop you! Go read all about the contest. You'd better do that before you read the book, because by the time you're done, you will have forgotten all about contests.

Wednesday, January 02, 2008

Wine, Shoes, and Streakers

Because I am lazy and I drink too much wine, I completely forgot to update you on that little party that I had to go to awhile ago. I actually wrote about it and then decided that hitting “publish” was too much work. Since I know the world has been waiting with baited breath, here’s the update. You’re welcome. Last night’s gathering of esteemed (mostly retired) faculty was a ton of fun. True to form:
  • No one labeled me as a trashy interloper;
  • Certain male eyes not belonging to my husband strayed a wee bit;
  • Certain female eyes not belonging to me enjoyed looking at my husband;
  • There were several … innuendos … between couples that have been married for longer than I’ve been breathing that probably should have made me a little uncomfortable, but instead made me hope The Professor’s still licking hot sauce off my fingers in 30 years;
  • I learned more about the scandalous university in two hours than the sum total of everything I ever learned in college, and maybe the first year of grad school;
  • there were many stories; small colleges are FILLED with intrigue, scandal, deception and dramatics and this makes me believe that any good politician should start their career as a college professor;
  • My boots, as always, made my legs look sexy as hell.
It really was a fun night. The first 30 minutes are always the hardest, and the most uncomfortable for me. It’s not exaggerating to say that some of these people have known each other since at least 5 years before I was born. But that means I get to hear over and over again: “But that was before this pretty young thing {me} was around.” And really, if you’re going to be called something over and over again, there are worse monikers than “pretty young thing”. We were at the home of someone I actually don’t mind naming – he’s a multi-published author, who just happened to win the Harper Lee award this spring. Bill Cobb can tell me stories for hours, and I will NEVER complain. I took him for a class in college, and even though he exempted us all from the final because he was retiring the next week, I actually learned quite a bit from him. I learned that his wife had just been on a shoe-shopping trip, which was the moment I learned that he has a pretty darn good wife. I learned that at some point in the drug-hazy 70’s the university had a plague of streakers, and it got so much publicity that a school up in the Heathen North started up a little competition to get more documented cases. I also learned a little something about The Modern Novel. Being around 21 at the time, I focused on the shoes and the streakers.