Impromptu Movie Reviews

Movies We Watched Over Thanksgiving:

Live Free Or Die Hard - Amusing action movie. Some really improbable stunts, but some good lines. Overall, not a bad way to spend two hours.

Spiderman 3 - Almost kid acceptable. A few curse words, but for the most part, we could let Supergirl watch it. Cute, kinda mindless, again - not a bad way to spend two hours.

Mr. Brooks - Really good. It stars four actors I hate (Kevin Costner, William Hurt, Demi Moore, and Dane Cook) and I still really liked it. The interaction between Costner and Hurt makes the film. And there's a couple of really great lines.

Protecting the King - You've never heard of it. For a reason. It's just simply awful. Tells the story of Elvis' stepbrother, who became the youngest bodyguard in rock and roll when he guarded Elvis. He's basically a punk who goes on tour and lives it up, drinking, drugging and screwing groupies. His life parallels Elvis' spiral out of control and he winds up unemployed at 22 when Elvis dies.


In other news, Supergirl did a face plant off the back steps yesterday. She's fine, but her nose is scratched all to hell. She looks awful. Poor little mite. So much for Christmas pictures.

More Things That Make Me Smile

I work in a super young, very small office. Most folks, this is their first job after college. At 31, I'm the third oldest person in the office. The oldest is 34, the second oldest only beats me because his birthday is in July and mine is in October. I'm older than the Boss. I'm older than my direct supervisor, who is not based in our office. While my age is certainly no secret, I don't really look my age, I look a bit younger. And I blend in pretty well with my co-workers, so my age isn't really commented on all that often. Still, it's a known fact that I'm older than them. Which usually works to my advantage, because it gives me some authority and gravitas when I need them to listen to me.

Anyway, three of my co-workers just popped into my office because they had a bet on how old I am. Their guesses were 27, 28, and 29, because, "She can't be in her thirties yet".

Oh yeah, baby! Drinks are on me!

A Series of Unfortunate Events - Thanksgiving Edition!

On this happy Thanksgiving Eve, I thought I would tell you all the heartwarming little tale of how I broke my ankle. Mainly because it happened over the Thanksgiving holiday three years ago. On the Saturday after Thanksgiving, Rock was next door at his parents' house (yes, my in-laws live next door) and Supergirl and I were hanging out at our house. Well, around 4:00 or so, she got bored and decided to go visit Daddy. So I threw on some jeans and put on my new favorite sandals - a pair of platforms with no straps on the ankle. We jumped in the car and cruised over to the grandparents'. We got out of the car, I took about four steps in their gravel driveway, my left foot slipped off my sandal, I planted my right foot to try to keep my balance, but no dice - I was down. Rock came running over and started checking me for injuries. I thought I was fine, but then we both noticed that my right foot was sticking out at a 90 degree angle. Not quite right. We left Supergirl at the grandparents' and went to the emergency room. Fortunately, I didn't have to wait long. They immediately e-rayed it and told me that I had broken all three bones and dislocated my ankle. They asked if I had been in a car accident! Or fallen down stairs! It took two tries two get it set back in place. The first time, the doctor injected novocaine, which helped *ALOT*. The second time, the novocaine had worn off and he couldn't give me any more. And he had to pop my ankle back into joint, then hold it and try to explain to a nurse how to wrap the plaster around my ankle. While he was explaining, it slipped out of joint (yes, that hurts just as bad as popping into joint). Then he popped it into joint again, held and tried to explain and it slipped out of joint again. Finally, he popped it into joint, and held with all his strength and helped her wrap the plaster around the ankle. Then they put me on crutches and sent me home. Three days later, I had surgery. I still have a metal plate on one side and about ten metal screws throughout my right ankle (which you can feel through the skin), but after two months in casts/ boots/ crutches and three months of physical therapy, it's fine. I've got some pretty awesome scars, though. And I never, ever wear heels.

Things That Make Me Smile

This morning after I turned off my alarm clock, I rolled over and kissed Wildman on the cheek. He felt a little cool, so I pulled the covers up over his legs and started to pull his blanket down over his arm. As I was doing that, he started giggling.

What a great way to start the day.

The Wildman Cometh

Today is Wildman's First Birthday! My little sweetie is one. Seems like a good time to tell his birth story. I know it's out of order, since Supergirl is older, but hers is dramatic enough that it will be exciting whenever I tell it.

So most of the pregnancy had been uneventful. I was about 30 weeks along and my office had just hired an admin to fill in for me during my maternity leave. She was nowhere even close to up to speed. Well, the week of Halloween rolls around and it's a doozy. We have a bigwig in town, an evening work event, doctor appointment in the middle of week, and of course, Halloween. Fortunately, last year, Supergirl's idea of Halloween was to go to her grandparents' house and give out candy to the other kids. Much easier than tromping all over the neighborhood trick-or-treating! The doctor appointment was a total bust. Rock and I arrived right on time only to sit in the waiting room for 45 minutes. We finally got pissed off and left! By the end of the week, I was completely exhausted. And my ankles were starting to swell. My right ankle, which I broke three years ago, would swell up every day, so with the pregnancy adding to it, it was about the size of a grapefruit by the end of the day. The left ankle, the normal one, was swelling to about the size of a tennis ball. On that Friday, I had an eye exam at lunchtime. Normal, routine, no big deal, right? Well, for some reason, they decided to check my blood pressure. 145/95. Even I know that's high. So I called the doctor's office and left a message. It took them three hours to return my call and then they wanted me to drop everything and run to the hospital. Not likely that I'm going to drop everything and run out at 4:00, when I've got stuff I need to finish and it took them 3 hours to call me back. If it wasn't an emergency 3 hours ago, it isn't an emergency now. I went to the hospital after work, after assuring my office that I was fine and I would see them all on Monday. The doctor had other plans. She had trouble getting my blood pressure back down, even after several hours of just laying around in a hospital bed, and there was protein in my urine. She told me I needed to be on bed rest. I said, "But I can still work a couple days a week, right?" She threatened to keep me in the hospital over the weekend. I said, "Oh, you meant bed rest, I must have misheard you, yes, of course, I can go home and rest. Screw the office." Naturally, I had not shaved my legs. Naturally, every nurse and doctor had to feel my swollen/ furry ankles. I vowed to shave them the moment I got home and keep them shaved until the baby was born. The next week and a half was fairly uneventful as all I did was shuttle back and forth to the doctor's office, fill out paperwork to be out of work, and buy a new recliner. (what? you didn't know that was a required part of bed rest? we did that the first day!) I got bored. I got lazy. I stopped shaving my legs. I started bitching about how was I supposed to relax if I was running to the doctor's office every damn day. Finally on Monday, November 13th, after a relaxing weekend of doing nothing (and no doctor visits), we went (where else?) to the damn doctor's office. They had apparently had a much more exciting weekend than we had. In a bad way. They had had a lady whose blood pressure was not as high as mine have a "bad outcome". Rock said, a bit fearfully, "But she's okay now, right?" to which the doctor answered, "No, she's not." At which point I kicked Rock, because frankly, I didn't want to know any more. The doctor wanted to put me in the hospital overnight for observation, then make a decision the next morning about whether to proceed with our planned c-section that day or send me home for more bedrest. So me and my unshaven legs once again checked into the hospital. This was about 5:00. I got set up with monitors on my blood pressure and on Wildman, still rocking around in my belly. Rock went home to feed the pets and make arrangements for Supergirl to stay overnight with his parents so that he could come back and stay with me. He got back about 8:00 and we were talking calmly. I rolled over in bed to get more comfortable and the monitor beeped. The nurse came in and asked, "What did you just do?" I told her that I rolled over and I showed her how I had been on one side and had moved to the other. She showed us that Wildman's heart rate had dropped when I moved. And that it wasn't the monitor not picking up. His heart rate had dropped from 140 (normal) down to 100 down to 80 (low) down to 60 (scary low) and then had climbed back up. It was very quick, but definitely real. Having been through that with Supergirl, we didn't want to take any chances with Wildman. So the doctor came back in, smiled at us and said, "Well, we've been waiting on a sign - I think we just got it! We're having a baby tonight!" My first thought? "They're both born on the 13th" (Supergirl's birthday is September 13th). I was awake during the c-section which was very cool. I couldn't hold little Wildman right away because he was early and had to go to the Special Care Nursery, but I heard his first cries and I got to see him immediately. And after a little while, they rolled my bed into the Nursery so that I could hold him. And he was perfect. He weighed 4.5 pounds and was 18 inches long. We had gotten the Betamethazone shots to get his lungs ready, so he was as healthy as he could be. And so tiny and beautiful. He held his body temperature and didn't need antibiotics or anything. After a day or so, he needed a small feeding tube because he wasn't strong enough to drink from a bottle. So he stayed in the Special Care Nursery for two weeks with a feeding tube until he had gained enough weight and could eat enough from a bottle to keep gaining weight. Then he came home and never looked back.

Down at the Wa!-Mart

Okay, so no one likes to hear me gripe about my husband. I guess it does sound pretty ungrateful to bitch about how someone else irons your clothes. So! On to happier topics! Stories From a Rural Wa!-Mart on a Sunday Night! (yes, we went to Wa!-Mart on Sunday night - this is what passes for excitement in my household.)

Rock and I were rummaging through the $5 movie bin and teasing each other about which awful movie we would buy to torture the other one with. He threatened me with The Core, which stars Aaron Eckart, my least favorite actor in Hollywood, and I threatened him with Lara Croft, Tomb Raider, because he hates Angelina Jolie (I KNOW! How can anyone hate ANGIE?). Anyway, we were holding up movies, trading barbs, throwing movies at one another and back into the bin. We debated on one movie, threw it back in, then decided to get it and couldn't find it. After a little while of this, a lady on the other side of the bin started cracking up laughing at us. We laughed and were a little embarrassed, but she was like, "It's so nice to see a couple laughing and having fun instead of arguing and fighting."

When we got to the register, we were behind a family of rednecks who were purchasing a camouflage cap. Somehow they got the idea to try to spell "camouflage". They made it through c-a-m-o alright, missed the "u" entirely and then stalled out on the spelling of "flage". They came up with "flag" and "flaug" as possibilities before giving up entirely.

Grumble, grumble, grumble

This morning has not gone very well. First of all, I was running a bit late getting ready for work. Then I took a small break to walk over to the bed and sit down to talk to Rock, Supergirl and Wildman. Wildman was being restless and couldn't decide if he wanted to play, eat, or lay back down and go back to sleep. So Rock gave him a bottle and commented that he needed his baby seat to lay back and eat properly or else he would just play with the bottle. Supergirl went and got the baby seat and brought it into the bedroom. I laid Wildman back on the bed and he ate for a minute and then threw the bottle down. We all talked for a few minutes and then I got up to continue getting ready for work. I didn't realize that Supergirl had put the baby seat right behind me, though, and so after two steps, I fell right into it. Not hurt at all except that I'll probably have a bruise on the underside of my right breast tomorrow and a scrape on the back of my ankle, but damn. That wasn't much fun.

Also, I'm wearing a shirt that Rock ironed for me last night. Amid much griping and not so good natured teasing. (He usually irons my clothes because I am beyond incompetent at it. Usually he doesn't mind. I have no idea where the attitude came from last night. Oh! And we're only talking about two or three shirts here, not my entire wardrobe. Last night, I asked him to iron four shirts, only because he usually wants to do them all at once, not do one now and then do three more another time. And those four shirts will last me two or three weeks, because I don't wear them all every week. Hmmmm....do I have some guilt/ misgivings about asking him to do this? Must investigate.) I made the mistake of commenting that this shirt is easy to iron because only part of it needs ironing. I ironed it last week and didn't do too bad! (It's one of those shirt and sweater combos, made to look like you're wearing a button down shirt under your sweater vest.) Rock sniped back that it was only easy if you didn't know what you were doing. Well this morning I noticed that Mr. Expert missed ironing the button part just below the collar. Which I managed to iron last week. So much for not knowing what you're doing! (I do have to confess that I did iron a wrinkle into the left sleeve, though.)

Just one of those days, I guess. argh!

Ariel and the Disgruntled Kangaroo

Supergirl as Ariel.

Ariel with her brother, the Disgruntled Kangaroo:

I'll let you all guess which child enjoyed Halloween more this year.

Halloween

Cutest. Kangaroo. Ever.

The Ariel pictures will take a little longer, I still have to get them developed. But here is Supergirl: