Decorating advice plus Music Monday

When adding a new family member to your home, it is always important that she coordinate well with the woodwork and furnishings.

Lola

Another 14 question meme

From Sunday Stealing:

1. Lots of pillows or just one? Describe your pre-sleeping rituals.
One for sleeping; many for decorative purposes.  Get undercover, shut off light, sleep.

2. What kind of books do you read?
hard cover, soft cover, and electronic

3. What are your neighbors like?
Perfect - they wave hello and mind their own business. OK, the little girl screams and squeals alot, but she's cute and charming so I'll forgive that part.

4. What's really creepy to you?
Some guy adjusting his crotch while he's talking to me.

5. What's your current fandom/obsession/addiction?

Purging.  You have been warned.

6. Do you prefer your junk food sweet, salty or savory?
a Salty Woman prefers salty food



7. What was the last expensive thing you bought?
It's been so long ago, I forgot.

8. What is your greatest fear?
That I'll lose my memory. Oops.

9. Do you get cravings? If so, what do you crave?

Brownie -

but not this:

or this:

or this:

but this:



10. What do you do to change your mood?

There's only one way I get Moody:

11. What was the last meal you ate that you loved?

Portabella mushroom stuffed with sauteed spinach and tomatoes served atop couscous, accompanied with skewered grilled figs and brie cheese  mmmmmmmmm

12. Do you want to learn another language? If so, why?

Klingon - just for fun

13. What's something that you'd like to say to someone right now?
Would you like fries with that?


14. What are you looking forward to?
The most wonderful time of year.  Care to waltz?

Wacky Wednesday

Finally a nutritionist developed a diet we can all relate to: days filled with eating Hostess Twinkies and Cupcakes, Little Debbie Snack Cakes, Doritos and Oreos.  The idea was to see whether dieting strictly by calorie counting and not by nutrition would yield weight loss and poor health.

 Here's a sample day:

Espresso, Double: 6 calories; 0 grams of fat

Hostess Twinkies Golden Sponge Cake: 150 calories; 5 grams of fat

Centrum Advanced Formula From A To Zinc: 0 calories; 0 grams of fat

Little Debbie Star Crunch: 150 calories; 6 grams of fat

Hostess Twinkies Golden Sponge Cake: 150 calories; 5 grams of fat

Diet Mountain Dew: 0 calories; 0 grams of fat

Doritos Cool Ranch: 75 calories; 4 grams of fat

Kellogg's Corn Pops: 220 calories; 0 grams of fat

whole milk: 150 calories; 8 grams of fat

baby carrots: 18 calories; 0 grams of fat

Duncan Hines Family Style Brownie Chewy Fudge: 270 calories; 14 grams of fat

Little Debbie Zebra Cake: 160 calories; 8 grams of fat

Muscle Milk Protein Shake: 240 calories; 9 grams of fat

Totals: 1,589 calories and 59 grams of fat

In two months of eating this stuff, he lost 27 pounds and his body mass and other health indicators changed for the good, not for the worse as the nutritionist had hoped.

"I wish I could say the outcomes are unhealthy. I wish I could say it's healthy. I'm not confident enough in doing that. That frustrates a lot of people. One side says it's irresponsible. It is unhealthy, but the data doesn't say that."

I'm a person who believes in numbers and numbers don't lie. So now you have scientific data to back up your junk food diet. Bon appetit!

Tuesday Titillation

Monarchs are a lot like politicians.  They have their proper public sides with lengthy marriages to adoring spouses, while behind the scenes they're keeping company with mobsters, strippers and prostitutes at sex parties. This time it's 64 year old King Gustaf of Sweden. Married to his lovely wife for 34 years and proud father of three beautiful eye-candy children.

In a new unauthorized bio  ("Carl XVI Gustaf - The Reluctant King")  which has already sold out its first printing, the investigative authors allege the King had numerous affairs, sometimes bedding down with multiple women at the same time.  Apparently the King would have elaborate dinners followed by lap dances in hot tubs and bedroom trysts.  They also allege he had an affair with a Swedish singer, Camilla Hennemark (from the group Army of Lovers), with whom he had fallen love love and wanted to run off with her to a far away island. Here she is playing nurse:



But the Swedes are sticking by their King, even though he hasn't denied the allegations.

"Over 80 per cent say the lurid allegations have not changed their perception of the king - and almost 50 per cent say that it is wrong for journalists to look into the private lives of their royal family."

As for the King, he said ""We're turning the page, much like you do in your newspapers, and look ahead instead...because we have certain duties to fulfill and we have work almost every day."

So if nothing else, the new biography answers our questions of exactly what kind of work royals engage in every day.

You Go, Girl!

I dislike most politicians, but every once in a while someone comes along that I feel could shake things up a bit and change the system.

This year that person was Kristin M. Davis, a woman who ran for governor of New York, but sadly came in 6th of 7 candidates.  The masses simply are ready for real freedom yet.

Ms. Davis is a former madam of one of the prostitution rings that another politician, Elliott Spitzer, brought to public scrutiny.  As a result, Davis was convicted of promoting prostitution and served a four month sentence.  She contended that Spitzer was a former client, but he had been blacklisted because of his behavior to her girls.

She is no dummy: graduated from high school at the top of her class at age 15, got a degree from St. Mary's College, spent ten years working in a hedge fund starting as a trading assistant and working her way up to VP. She started her escort service at age 28 and built it into a multi-national $5 million dollar a year business.

"When I got out of jail I was broke, the government confiscated all of my money, I was unemployable because of the stigma prostitution has for women in the business but not men, and I was appalled after seeing both the criminal justice and corrections system up close. I began reading Goldwater, Hayek, Von Mises, Freidman and Ayn Rand."

She made good use of her time reading all the right books, in my opinion.


Originally she was going to run on the Libertarian ticket, but she refused to appear at their party's convention, and as a result was not put on their slate. So she started her own political party, The Anti-Prohibition Party.
Her platform included legalizing marijuana, prostitution, gay marriage, and casino gambling. Sort of the anti-Christine O'Donnell.

She made the candidate's debate lively with her one-liner wit and  blond jokes and ripped her competition with remarks such as:

“The key difference between the M.T.A. (Metropolitan Transportation Authority) and my former escort agency is I operated one set of books and I offered on-time and reliable service,”

“Businesses will leave the state faster than Carl Paladino at a gay bar.”

I hope we will see more of Kristin in the future. Although some may think she's a bit wacky because of her view, she appears to be one of the biggest advocates of real freedom in the political arena. And she has more brains, wit, and initiative than Christine O'Donnell.

The 14 Question Meme

From Sunday Stealing:

1. What do you consider your hometown to be?

a small pimple on the prairie

2. What’s the hardest part of your average day?

walking in the dark down to my parents' house to fix their breakfast

3. The easiest? Why?

Going to bed 'cause I'm sleepy. (I bet you thought it was for some other reason)

4. What beverage do you reach for to quench your thirst?

water or The Real Thing that things go better with.

5. What is one not-so-secret goal you have for your life? I’ll let you keep your secret ones to yourself.

To stay alive another 40 years

6. What physical pain do you fear most? For example, I’m trying to decide how bad my jaw pain needs to get before I risk a potential needle from my dentist. So, for me, throbbing is preferable to jabbing.

Sore throat. I have a very high pain tolerance for everything else.

7. Where do you find solace?

in my vehicle

8. What makes you the saddest when you read/see the news?

that the reporting is so biased

9. What do you eat for a favorite snack?

10. What movie could you/would you watch more than two or three times and still enjoy just as much as the first time?
Wizard of Oz and I've watched it over two dozen times



11. What boy/girl first made you cry?
My brother

12. What brand of coffee/tea do you drink most often?
I don't drink coffee/tea. I get caffeine elsewhere (see #4).

13. Dig in the dirt with or without garden gloves?
Without - I like to get down and dirty once in a while.

14. James Taylor or Carly Simon?
Carly - a lot of talent in one package

Busting Stereotypes

Former cheerleaders in science: