dear verb

it has been 17 days since i took your recommendation for the badger sleep balm and it was delivered. it has been 17 days and i have slept the night through till morning.
i thank you. (again)

What do you think?

I usually make gifts for people for christmas because a)it keeps me busy and b) I think it means more. However, my relations have decided that they do not like scarves, blankets, stuffed animals, table cloths, dish towels and everything else I make and have been dropping hints about what store-bought items would be better for whom (mainly parents commenting about children).

Usually, my home-made Christmas drive usually starts in July and ends around Thanksgiving. I think about what colors people like and things they want, need, or could use that I can make and set about making all of them. I also pair these home-made gifts with a small store-bought item, but nothing over $15. I HAVE A LARGE FAMILY and buying something more than $15 for everyone just isn't possible. I wish we'd do a gift exchange where everyone spends $25-$30 on one person and that's that, but this is always shot-down when I say something.

So, after a few ingrateful comments about last Christmas, I didn't do anything this summer to get ready for Christmas. People forget that yarn is not alwyas cheap and the time placed into making a gift should also be factored into the "cost" of the item. Sure, I didn't get anyone an Ipod for Christmas, but the items I made weren't $5 when one thinks about all the work involved too.

I was hurt by the comments and really pondered what to do this year. After some thought, I came up with the idea to make baby blankets and donate them to a local charity in the names of the people who didn't like getting homemade stuff from me. I was going to give them a card with a picture of the blanket and some info on the charity instead of a gift. I thought this was a good idea but someone close to me told me that my idea was petty and mean and I should just give the ingrates a gift card or something.

O, Gretchen

Does anyone but me watch Project Runway? If so, is there anyone else in the world worse than Gretchen? And did you love it when Tim Gunn blasted her at the end of the show? Am I all alone in wonder?

This Broard Sounds Like a Female Joe McCarthy

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/plum-line/2010/08/sharron_angle_refuses_to_disav.html

X

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/27/whats-wrong-with-this-chi_n_697632.html

Mesmerizing and eerie

Some of the earliest color motion pictures that you will ever see.

I think batting the eyelashes, along with flirting a fan, may be hopelessly lost arts.

Spammer!

To anyone who got an Email from me containing objectionable links: sometime between the time I went out to dinner last night and the time I came home from dinner, a spammer got hold of my Email and sent Emails to everyone on my AOL Adress Book with objectionable links. I changed my AOL Password and effectively deleted my AOL Adress Book, but I apologize to anyone who was upset by said Emails, even though it was not me.

Things you might be saying wrong.

Like, I never exactly knew what to do with "further" and "farther."

Check THIS out and you might learn something, too!

so much fun!

So you can load a photo of yourself to this site (it says it's best if it's a face shot with hair pulled back, but I just loaded what I could find and it worked just fine.) Then you can play around and give yourself whatever crazy hairdo or makeup you want. I just spent an hour playing with it!

Check it out: taaz

P.S. Only you can see it, unless you choose to share!

This made me laugh

"Anna Paquin and Stephen Moyer got married on Saturday, US Weekly reports.

The 'True Blood' couple reportedly wed at a private residence in Malibu, exchanging vows under a tent near the beach.

They announced their engagement last August, and have frequently spoken to the press about their onscreen vampire sex. Paquin announced she is bisexual in June."

----------------

The other eleven months she's heterosexual?

orbie....

i love reading your stories about your woven rugs. it is so interesting to know where they came from. old flannel shirts, sheets, jeans.
a little story about each rug. so neat.

netflix

I signed up for Netflix. So far I have watched Tristan and Isolde. It was good. I am now going to cancel the premium channels off of my stupid dish network because i am tired of paying for movies that are from the 1980's and the few new releases. I will keep HBO. the rest can go.

do you have netflix?

i am fascinated by things like this.

i wanted to be an archaeologist. i should have been.


Civil war Discovery in East Georgia By Rickey Bevington
media link Updated: 11 hours ago

Millen, Ga. — Archeologists have made a major Civil War discovery in east Georgia.The find launches what’s expected to be a decades-long unveiling of a lost Union prison camp.Confederate forces hastily evacuated Camp Lawton in rural Millen, Georgia in late 1864 as Federal forces pushed deeper into Georgia.

After that, the 42-acre stockade southeast of Atlanta was practically forgotten. That’s until this past winter when Dr. Sue Moore and her team of archeologist's with Georgia Southern University started doing basic shovel tests of earth:

"We starting turning up buttons and pipes and buckles and just an enormous amount of stuff and were just totally, totally flabbergasted and astounded by this."

With less than 1% of the site excavated, there could be untold numbers of untouched artifacts. The U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, which owns part of the land, has installed security fencing, motion detectors and cameras to protect the site.

All artifact photo credits: Amanda L. Morrow, Georgia Southern University

Good God, what's new?

Okay, this made even a hard boiled egg like me tear up.

A wonderful tribute to those who are sacrificing and giving so much.

Watch it with some tissues.

Happy

belated birthday cats! and, just as importantly, congrats on the new grand daughter.

AACK!!!

http://www.cnn.com/2010/SHOWBIZ/08/12/cathy.comic.strip/index.html?hpt=T2

Jackie Evancho Wows on 'America's Got Talent' (VIDEO)

Jackie Evancho Wows on 'America's Got Talent' (VIDEO)

oh no he didn't

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/11/ben-quayle-calls-obama-wo_n_678503.html

And here it is!

In all its old-people-candy glory!

Remember?

The Brach's "Pick-a Mix" stands at the grocery stores? Jilly's crocheted candy dish post reminded me. My grandparents always had those Brach's butterscotch hard candies--the ones that came wrapped in yellow cellophane. I tried to like them, because they were candy, dammit, and candy was a GOOD thing. But I didn't, really.

Those Brach's stands would also have lots of small bins containing starlite mints, those fruit flavored hard candy sour balls, wrapped in a little twist of clear cellophane, individually wrapped caramels and those strange, chewy coconut candies, and numerous other slightly odd candies. Honestly, I never really liked any of it very much, though I could tolerate the sour balls if I could get a red one.

And I recall that you could "sample" a piece there in store if you dropped a nickel in the little metal box attached to stand. I'd give my kids a nickel for a sample if they went to the grocery store with me, and they'd really try to be happy about it and find something that wasn't gross. But let's face it--they'd really have preferred to just have some Nerds or a Jolly Rancher.

I don't suppose that "Pick a Mix" stuff still exists, though I know I still see Brach's candies in bags, especially jelly beans at Easter time.

Poor Brach's. I guess all the old people who liked their strange candy are now eating it from that dusty candy bowl in the sky...

Mixed Feelings

I have mixed feelings about this. On one hand, it's hilarious. On the other it's . . . I dunno.

Flight attendant splits plane

I would think it'd be more fun to stay and subdue the problem passenger. I love that he took the time to grab a beer before splitting.

creative

I'm always amazed at how creative people can be.

Kirsten Wicklund completes a crochet or knit project, dips it in porcelain, fires it (which burns away the yarn) and is left with beautiful statues of doiles etc.

The pictures are just beautiful and sorta remins me of the candy dishes full of stale and dusty ribbon candy at my great-grandmom's house. No one was ever allowed to eat the nasty stuff, it was as much a decoration as all the doiles and hummel figurines.

I think this is why I hate knick-knacks.

Anyway, here's the link if you'd like to look.

dinner for schmucks

while not the funniest movie i have ever seen, i did enjoy the afternoon with steve. we watched the movie in the Paladium, which i now consider the movie theater from heaven. comfy chairs, servers bringing me refills of soda served in a glass, with lots of ice. a menu to choose tasty snacks, with someone also bringing them to me.
a lovely afternoon. a fun movie.

It's off again!

Is anyone surprised that the Palin-Johnson engagement is off? Maybe the Palins et al are better judges of character than the Old Broards.

happy 49th birthday

President Obama! (just in case you stop by the Old Broards)

lindsay out

after 13 days for good behaviour. 3 months of rehab.

movie review

I just watched Girl with the Pearl Earring. What a slow awful movie. What good is having Colin Firth in a movie when he's not lip-locking with anyone. And that little girl--creeping around all the time. Blech