"Everything that is really great and inspiring is created by the individual who can labor in freedom" Albert Einstein

"A dame who knows the ropes isn't likely to get tied up." Mae West

Monday, February 21, 2011

Music Monday

February 21, 1958 - The Peace Symbol was designed.


Sunday, February 20, 2011

The Very Late Meme

Courtesy of  Sunday Stealing:

1. Make a list of 5 things that you can see without getting up:
monitor, dog, cat, book, Kleenex, Coke
2. How do you style your hair?
Blow and go

3. What are you wearing now?
dang reading glasses

4. What's your occupation?
This time of year it's tax-preparer 24/7

5. What do you hear right now?
The dog licking and I won't tell you what she's licking

6. Who was the last person you hugged?
A client; her husband has major health issues and she's struggling to cope
7. What is/was for dinner?
Chinese take-out, all alone.
8. What did you do today?
fixed breakfast for my parents, washed 5 loads of laundry, went grocery shopping, took out the trash, walked the dog several times, ran some errands, browsed the Internet, went to my office where I worked on clients' tax returns, did some light cleaning, and hung some curtains. Sunday is only a day of rest for the religious.
9. Dog person or cat person?
In the last few years, both.

10. If you had to change your name, what would you change it to?
Beau Peep
11. What was the last thing that you bought?
a lamp shade which looks better on the lamp than it did on my head
12. If you could afford to go anywhere in the world, where would you go?
San Francisco to see my daughter. It's not the money to get there that's the problem; it's the time away I can't afford.

13. Where do you see yourself in five years?
In the mirror with even more grey hair

14. Where's your birthmark?
in my pants where you can't see it

15. What are you doing this weekend?
Was there a weekend?  See #8. Saturday I worked at the office until 2:00, got dinner for my parents and watched a movie (see #17).
16. Which book are you reading at the moment?
The Art of Table Dancing - A birthday gift from last month




17. The last movie you've seen?


Mary and Max - a great animated film based on a true story of a pen-pal relationship between a young Australian girl and a middle-aged man with Asperger's syndrome from New York. The art work and claymation are wonderful and so are the voices of Toni Collette and Philip Seymour-Hoffman.

18. What are you doing tomorrow?
About 12 tax returns

Thursday, February 17, 2011

Thursday Thoughts

1.  I've been so busy preparing income taxes, I forgot a holiday since I last posted.



2.  Death has been unexpectedly hitting middle-age men in our locale:  two suicides, heart attacks, strokes. And f***ing cancer (as Sandwhich Life would say) took a lovely local young wife & mother in her 30's, and another who was a hometown celebrity of sorts (1975 Playboy Centerfold).  March winds, please blow the black clouds away; our community has had enough sadness this month.
"Death is a very dull, dreary affair, and my advice to you is to have nothing whatsoever to do with it." 
                      W. Somerset Maugham
3.  In case you weren't aware of it, Atlas Shrugged is finally being made into a movie - a trilogy actually. Part I opens April 15, 2011.  Here's the trailer:

Monday, February 7, 2011

Music Monday



When the wicked witch (or the tyrant or the despot) dies, not everyone sings and dances as lightheartedly as the Munchkins did with the demise of their trouble-maker. Within the resounding ding-dong happiness, there are always those of the inner circle who mourn.

Those who weep for the tyrant are often three types: 1. Persons who knew, and eagerly and voluntarily supported the evil actions; 2. Persons who knew the evil but chose not to openly oppose it; and 3. Persons who were ignorant to the reality.

Witches are sneaky with their devilishness. They make light of their own behavior to divert their evilness to prankster or joker status. They hide aggression under the guise of pluckiness and tenacity. They masquerade as philanthropists who use largess and the bribe of giving to wield control of their "Favor Bank" accounts.

There will always be mourners for the evil.  The Munchkins should sing and dance while they can because other witches have mastered the disguise techniques and are ready, willing and able to fill the void.  The question is whether the Munchkins are smart enough to see through the foolery the next time around.

Thursday, February 3, 2011

Thursday Thoughts - Part 2 - Because you asked for pictures

Their side of the snow pile:


My side of the pile after I drove over it several times with a 4 wheel drive:


Thursday Thoughts - 's no problem? Ha!

I do all snow shoveling by hand at my office because the sidewalk area is small and does not warrant the use of a snow-blower.  The bank next to my office has a large drive-through, and they pile their snow on my property instead of the available space on their own property on the other side of the drive. 

I have asked them politely over the past few years if they would please not do that, but my requests are continuously ignored. Because they do this, I must shovel  through 3-5 feet of piled snow in order to clear a public sidewalk. Some days it takes as long to shovel through their pile as it does to do my entire sidewalk.


The pile also extends into the street which causes an obstacle for city plows, and therefore the area for my customer parking on the street never gets cleared properly.  (The bank has its own parking lot and is situated on a corner with two sides of additional street parking.)

The residents across the street from my office plow the snow from their driveway, and instead of pushing it off to the sides of their driveway, they push it out into the street and continue pushing it across the entire width so that all their snow ends in front of my office and their side is clear. Because of the other neighbor's pile of snow, it exacerbates the problem with the city plows.

I think heavy snowfall brings out the best and the worst in people.  Unfortunately it seems the worst are in my neighborhood and simple common courtesy has disappeared.

**********************************************************

Angry snow men mobs have now taken to the streets.



 
(Or else the marshmallow snowman production at the Peeps factory has gone into over-drive.)

Wednesday, February 2, 2011

Wacky Wednesday Wisdom

Celebrating 125th anniversary of ground hog predictions!



"This is pitiful. A thousand people freezing their butts off waiting to worship a rat."
            Bill Murray in Ground Hog Day.
(Official ground hog idol)
"This is one time where televison REALLY fails to capture the true excitement of a large squirrel predicting the weather. I for one am very grateful to have been here."  Bill Murray in Ground Hog Day.




Around here, we call them Woodchucks.

Tuesday, February 1, 2011

Tuesday Titillation

Some men like having sex with show girls and some apparently like having sex with show hogs.


"...the hogs were examined by a local veterinarian, during a routine examination, and the owner was told that four of the hogs had a vaginal infection."
A fellow in Mississippi got caught after a farmer suspected a fox in the hog house and police set up surveillance cameras.

Who knew that getting down and dirty with hogs could land a 120 year prison sentence?