The morons mixed with the ox

I’m not calling my guessers morons, just so you know. I’m just having a little play with words in regards to my oxymoron challenge. I took a look at the guesses I received, some by email and some via comments on my post, and I just have to tell you that nobody hit it right on the nose. So, without further adieu, here are the oxymorons that were screaming for silent praise (I decided not to use fortune cookie):

• working holiday
• pretty ugly
• unbiased opinion
• minor crisis
• healthy downturn
• good grief
• only choice
• tragic comedy
• act naturally
• clearly confused
• even odds
• Great Depression
• same difference
• all alone
• deafening silence

There you have it – 15 oxymorons in one paragraph. Madre, you came the closest with a guess of 14 (and no, co-worker Ryan could not be counted as an oxymoron; he’s a pretty swell worker). Congratulations! You win this:

                                        AND        

 

 

 

 

Two great little items that will hopefully help you find peaceful slumber.

Hmmm. This was kind of fun. I may have to do this again next week.

Friday Deals & Steals

I have this thing about shopping. I never buy anything unless it is on sale. Food, cars, clothing, toys – you name it and I have to get it at a good price or it will just drive me nuts. Recently, my best deal was getting four pairs of jeans for Caden for $9.83 each at GapKids. Four pairs! Two for now, two for later. That kid can wear out pants, mainly the knees, faster than I can snap my fingers. I was so excited because the jeans were normally $26-34 a pair – and I like Gap jeans; they are pretty durable.

In these tough economic times, I am looking to save where ever I can and I am more than willing to share how I do it. My sister-in-law, Hilary, has a great blog with tips on using coupons and rebates to get your daily essentials. She also earned $500 in free gas cards! You can read how she did it here.

Here are a few deals that you might just want to check out:

• Restaurant.com has discounted gift cards to many restaurants around the U.S. AND you can get an additional 70% off their discounted prices by entering the code SUPER when you checkout. A $10 gift card to Braza Grill regularly sells for $3 on their site. Add the discount code and you get it for $.90! Save money to have a night out, that’s what I say.
• AltrecOutlet.com has a big clearance sale. Look for items that say BRO Deal and get an extra 25% off the clearance price when you enter the code BRO at checkout.
• Get an additional 50% off clearance items at Old Navy when you use the code HALFOFF. 
• Tilly’s is having a clearance (isn’t everybody these days?) and you can get shorts for $5, jeans for $20, shirts for $3-9, and more.
• Get these cute Simple Carousel shoes, which are environmentally friendly, for only $16.38 at 6pm.

Just a few small deals for a Friday. Oh, I will be letting you know the answers to my oxymoron challenge a little later today…

Blowing it up at work

I am sitting in my little cubicle laughing my head off right now. I just distributed 117 kazoos to all employees on our floor. Why? Because today is National Fun at Work Day and coincidentally, National Kazoo Day (or not so coincidentally).  And because I am the leader for our Positive, Engaged, Prepared (PEP) team at our site, I try to make things as fun as possible. Especially considering we are all losing our jobs – or having to relocate out of state – by the end of this year. 

I am all about the laughter. Imagine all the surprised faces and goofy smiles I was able to pull out of people when I gave them a kazoo and said, “Happy National Kazoo Day! And National Fun at Work Day!” Not a single person was a grump about it. You can’t help but smile when somebody hands you a kazoo.

So here I sit, listening to a few people try out their kazoos. Most won’t work, really, because they are cheap plastic and cost $.12 cents. Somebody did ask me why they couldn’t have received a really good kazoo and I replied, “Because those really high end kazoos are $3; we’re in a recession. Take the $.12 cent kazoo.” 

I can actually hear at this moment a chorus of three kazoos wafting strains of “Be kind to your webfooted friends…for a duck may be somebody’s muuuuuuhhhh – ther. Be kind to your friends in the swamp…where the weather is very, very damp.” Complete with marching feet. I’m not sure if those are the real lyrics but since I was raised on a tape of Glen Miller and his rousing rendition of “Sweet Violets”, this is all I know. It still cracks me up.

Blow some hot air today and get a kazoo!

Oh, and by the way, nobody is taking me seriously on the prize I offered below. I TOTALLY am going to send out the prize – so Amy, if I don’t hear from anybody else with any other guesses by Friday, you win!

The Year of the Ox(ymoron)

It’s the start of the Chinese New Year today. Go have a fortune cookie. I went to a Chinese restaurant for lunch today with my pal and co-worker Ryan. A restaurant that just so happened to be called Fortune Cookie. And this was the fortune he got in his cookie:

Wow. Well if that ain’t the old kick in the teeth for you. Ryan was kind of irked. “You get a freaking fortune cookie, you expect something,” he said exasperatingly. “Well,” I sighed, “that probably is the most fitting thing you could get. I mean, you really don’t get a ‘fortune’ anymore and it’s not exactly a ‘cookie’. I’ve always thought they should be called Crumbly Advice or Slightly Sweet Sageisms.”

So far, this Year of the Ox is not looking to be living up to its potential. The Ox represents wealth and prosperity and as I listen to the news, see what’s happening around me, I’m thinking the ox has fallen down on his job. Maybe he’s contracted Mad Cow disease. 

I’m hoping that I won’t have too many working holidays in this pretty ugly economy because in my unbiased opinion, this minor crisis of  a healthy downturn is adding to the deafening silence of commerce around the globe. Good grief. It seems that the only choice we have in this tragic comedy of financial errors is to act naturally, keep spending, even though we are clearly confused. Some give even odds that we’re headed for a Great Depression. Or Mars. Same difference. We’re all alone in the same crowd.

(Count how many oxymorons I used and win a  prize. All to celebrate the Year of the Ox.)

Cadenisms

Monday night I happened to be at my parents for a little bit and Caden and I decided to stay for a little Family Home Evening lesson my dad wanted to discuss. He had selected Elder L. Tom Perry’s talk from the last conference on simplifying our lives (something I’m really keen to work on) in the Ensign. 

“Angie, do you mind reading the article out loud for us?” Dad asks.

“No problem – happy to.” I grabbed the magazine and began reading it aloud. Allison was laying on the floor near the fireplace, nearly comatose to the world (college wears you out so much you know). Caden was rolling his eyes and clearly not paying attention (typical 8 year old behavior). Family togetherness in action.

A large majority of the talk centered on Henry David Thoreau’s experience at Walden Pond, how he built a tiny cabin and lived with the bare essentials for two years. After his whole experience, he discovered that man really only needed four things to survive: food, clothing, shelter, and fuel.

At this point, my dad interrupted me and said, “Caden, what did your mom just say?” 

“Ummmm…something about clothes and food.” Caden squirmed around on the floor.

“What are the four things we need in this life to survive?” My mom started gesturing and mouthing words to get him started.

“We need, um, food, and clothes…[mom pointed to the ceiling]…and a roof – I mean, house…aaaaaaand…um…”

“There’s one more thing we need to survive as a family,” my dad says.

Caden brings his hands to his face, thinks hard, and blurts out “Hostility?”

I don’t think me, my dad, or my mom have laughed so hard in such a long time. Out of the mouths of babes…and who knows, maybe some families survive on hostility alone? :p Needless to say, I kept giggling throughout the rest of the talk. Oh, he kills me. 

{I’m thinking that he meant ‘hospitality’ – otherwise, I think I may have some ’splaining to do}

Where’s my transvestite hairdresser when I need him?

See this? This is a head FULL of layers. And was not exactly what I was expecting in the haircut I got last week. 

Sigh…this latest haircut came out of a necessity to just trim off the dead ends. When I need just a “trim”, I usually head to my local Fantastic Sams by my office. When I need a style, color, and more, I head to my local spa club to get the works. I just don’t want to pay $40 plus tip for a trim when I can get the same thing for $16 at Sams. And it became totally worth the money when I met “Nick”.

A few months ago, I headed into FS just to get my typical upkeep trim. The girl behind the counter was very nice with quite the couture haircut. She said, “I can take you back right now, sweetie” and she showed me to her open chair. As I followed behind her, I started to think, ‘hmmm, something’s not quite right’. Ask anyone who’s ever had a “she/he” experience and they will say that little alarms start to go off with your senses – there are all these conflicting signals, visual cues being thrown back at you: feminine demeanor, no hips, pretty hair, high falsetto voice, eyes made up like Tammy Faye, no chest (or a questionable chest, you know, depending on girth), and the tell-tale Adams Apple. Your mind takes all of these in and you try to make sure you determined “Yes, it’s a woman. No, wait, it’s a man. Well, I think it’s a man…maybe it’s a woman…a really ugly woman…or pretty man.” 

That’s what pummeled my brain as “Nick” {that’s the other problem – they always have a boy/girl name too!} took me back to the sink to wash my hair. It was his hands that eventually gave him away. Definitely man hands. Although according to Seinfeld women can have man hands too…

However, back in the cutting chair I still was trying to sort it out. I didn’t want to make any reference using “girl” pronouns in case he/she just might be a cross dresser and still thought of himself/herself as a man but just liked to wear footless tights, deep plunging v-neck sweaters, and gold bracelets up to his/her elbows. But I couldn’t use “boy” pronouns either! I was so confused and yet had the most delightful chat with him/her. She/he was hilarious and I remember a large portion of our conversation centering around rotten tomatoes and food poisoning {during that tomato recall scare} and long hair down to your waist being acceptable only if you were a polygamist’s wife {just my two cents}.

When “Nick” finished with designing my hair, I was in awe. It was fabulous and totally unexpected. And I’ve been going to him/her for trims ever since. However, last week when I dropped in just spur of the moment, he/she was busy and I got the OTHER girl. I only had my lunch hour so she would have to do.

Why is it when you tell a stylist what you want, they most often just do what THEY want to do? And you sit there wondering, “Why did you ask me what I wanted if you were just going to get all creative and go Rene Fris {I LOVE Shear Genius!} on me? Ugh! Just take off the damn inch and a half I asked for!” Sorry, but a bad haircut irritates me to no end. Especially because I have naturally curly hair and the right or wrong cut can make my hair life a complete H-E-Double Hockey Sticks for weeks and weeks. 

“Just need a trim, don’t mess too much with some of the layers,” I say to the girl. 

“Okay, you want to keep your length, right?”

“Yes, please. I just need to get those pesky flyaways taken away for a smoother look.”

“Sure!” And then with one fell swoop she takes her scissors and SNIP! There goes 3″ of hair to the ground. Um, hello??? Did I not just say a TRIM and not a WHACK to my head? Suddenly, I’ve become a living hedge and Sweeney Todd is taking her weedwacker and slicing away like my head needs to resemble the layers of an onion. To understand what 50 million layers will do to natural hair, especially hair like mine that has a schizophrenic curl that is somedays wonderful and other days kinkier than thigh high boots, adding multiple layers all over my head will result in me looking like an electrified French poodle. On a bad day. On a good day, maybe just a bit wilder than an 80’s Farrah Fawcett look. In either case, IT’S NOT GOOD. 

What does this mean? It means that now until my hair proceeds to grow out again to my normal length, I absolutely have to use my straightener just so I feel presentable. Which means I need to make sure I use “product” in my hair so the heat won’t damage it too much. Which I hate. Because it feels icky. And I hate feeling icky. Guess I just have to wait a few more weeks to get back to “normal” – hair that is.

A BIG event (we were awed)

I asked Caden last week what he would like to do for our date night that was coming up and he said, “Go see the dinosaurs.” 

“The dinosaurs? You mean, like, in Vernal?”

“Huh? What’s Vernal? No, I mean that show ‘Walking with Dinosaurs‘!”

Apparently, this new show that came into town gave you an opportunity to see dinosaurs up close and personal – in a completely harmless and utterly non-threatening but totally educational way. I hadn’t heard much about this show and truthfully didn’t have high expectations for it. I just imagined big puppets that walked around the stage and didn’t do much. Well, I was right on the puppeteering but so dead wrong on how boring or uncool it would be.

Walking with Dinosaurs was awesome. We had great seats and I have to say I was completely taken aback at how engrossing it was to watch these giant monsters move about the stage. Parents learned quickly that there probably should’ve been an age limit for kids who would enjoy it and which ones would be scarred for life and possibly have nightmares for days on end. The opening scene with “real” dinosaurs involved an Allosaur coming in and biting the head of a baby dinosaur and carting it off stage. Yeah. There’s the food chain in action kids. One little boy behind me screamed out, “Daddy! The baby’s head is dead!”

That being said, the puppets were incredible and the actors inside made them appear lifelike. It really was as if you were watching a live dinosaur at times. The Brachiosaurus was fantastic, the Triceratops fascinating, and the Tyrannosaurus Rex was the coup de grace – he took your breath away at the end of the show (and subsequently your hearing). You can check out a great clip of how they move here.

We happened to be at the 3:00 p.m. show on Saturday which was probably 65% sold out. The family in front of me mentioned how in many cities the entire run sells out in just a few hours but in Salt Lake that didn’t happen because of the predominant religion. Mmm hmm. Because of the whole “evolution thing” he said. Um, no, I don’t think it was because of that. I think it more had to do with the fact that it was kind of a pricey show and families in Utah have several kids, so short of taking out a small loan, how could they afford to take them all? Sheesh. Predominant religion, my foot.

Anyway, it was still very cool and totally worth the ticket price. 

Seriously?

Okay, I know we’re all “hurrah, hurrah” these days when it comes to a new President and how historical and groundbreaking this all is and tra la la bang the patriotic drum but this latest thing I heard about borders on the ridiculous. 

Unless you were living in the backwoods in your shed the past 14 months or so, you heard at one time or another the mantra and monotone chant of “Yes, we can!” pummeled into your media frenzied brain. And now a very popular ice cream maker has decided to take that mantra and channel it into a new flavor:

Oh my gosh, seriously??? Sigh…the drum beat will never end. Ai yi yi.

Little pretties

Ever since I saw the movie Marley & Me (which, by the way, I bawled my eyes out over), I’ve wanted to get a small gold necklace to hang around my neck. Jennifer Aniston’s character receives one as a gift from her husband for having their first child and I just remember thinking, ‘Aw, how pretty and dainty that little necklace is!’

I’ve found a few little pretties that I would love to have, all from Dogeared:

I have this thing for angel wings – and I want this dainty pair around my neck

Of course, this little feather would do the trick, too

What’s sweeter than a teeny, tiny heart? A little love goes a long way

Nothing beats a simple circle – hands down

Maybe I will need to start dropping hints for something like one of these for a certain holiday that occurs next month. Or maybe not. I may just pick up something delicate just because and not for any other particular reason. 

Wednesday Whatevers

Random reflections:

• I’ve started training for my first marathon for this year and have become decidedly irritated with my dang runners knee condition. Gosh dang aging – why does it have to happen to good people, you know? If you run and have ever had runners knee, you know my frustration. I have a great desire to just go kick out 6-8 miles but about mile 2.5, my knee starts to swell and feel not so hot. I’ve plowed through it to make it to 5.5 but then had to ice-ice-ice it away for the next 24 hours. The Guy was not very sympathetic to my pain. “Aw, you’re just falling apart! That’s what happens when you get old.” Shortly after recovering from his two black eyes, his knee started to hurt. Guess what’s wrong with him? See, told ya you shouldn’t poke fun at the lame; it will come back to bite you in the derriere.
• Work has been EXCEEDINGLY stressful since the New Year began. Why? Our company had a miserable 4th Quarter like most of the world and the fear is that it may change plans already set in motion. So instead of that year long cushion of needing to find a job, release dates could be brought in. Yikes.
• On the other hand, I’ve received multitudinous praise recently for some of my writing/communication work. In fact, my manager (who is extremely philosophical) compared my abilities with Kipling’s “If” poem: One gift that Angela has is the ability to speak in the everyman voice. She is the personification of Kipling’s version of someone that can talk with crowds and keep her virtue; or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch. Don’t mean to get braggy about it but I needed that praise that day. And my Grandpa Taylor would be proud – he quoted that poem often to me. 
• I have this strange addiction to Vanilla Coke. I typically don’t drink soda at all, usually I’ll just order a lemonade and water or sometimes a “designer drink” (as The Guy calls it) meaning a pina colada or the like. But for some strange reason, Vanilla Coke is a weakness. It has to be REAL Vanilla Coke, however. Not the canned stuff or even fountain variety. The good stuff can be found at Hires (or Wingers). Give me a Big H, fries, and a REAL Vanilla Coke and I’m a happy girl. What’s funny is that I can’t stand the taste of regular or Diet Coke whatsoever. Yet mix in that delectable vanilla flavoring and suddenly I’m salivating.

Anyhoo, that’s just some Wednesday Whatevers.