kellementology

life according to me

Category: Hopes & Dreams

  • Blog Horoscope 2008

    Now that I have another year to look forward to blog-wise, I’ve decided to look to the stars to determine what may be in store. It’s not that I don’t believe I have control over this, because obviously, I do.

    I’ve not seen anyone else’s fingers a pecking at these keys.

    Having said that far less eloquently than I intended, please let me define exactly which stars I’m referring to.

    Horoscope stars. And if my limited knowledge in this particular area is correct, a horoscope is dependent on an individual’s ability to discern the extent to which certain celestial bodies are aligned, thereby deciding one’s fate so to speak.

    I wonder if it works for a blog?

    Since I created this blog’s first entry on March 15 (which in and of itself is not a great date when one considers that the Ides of March did not bode well for Julius Caesar), I shall use that as the official “birthday” for this exercise. And please trust that I will not forget to refer back to it to measure the course of accuracy as the year proceeds.

    What? You thought this might end up as the now defunct phoodplan did? My fingers have no difficulty exercising, so the likelihood that this experiment will work is fairly high. No. Calories. Involved.

    So moving right along, after surveying a variety of on-line sources and comparing their main points of interest, I chose this one.

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  • Wednesday Wordlessness. Finally.

    My year in Foh-Toz. Five words. Not bad. Okay so now 12.

    And just to confirm that I am so not wired to be wordless, I began this post some time on Wednesday, of course, and here it is Friday morning. And I’m typing. Words.

    Actually, I’ve been going through my foh-toz from the last year and I’m always amazed about what I learn. Fascinating things such as, 1) I still don’t really know how to use my camera which doesn’t bode well since it’s a point and shoot and can’t be much easier; 2) I take a lot of photos of food — an unbelievable quantity — they need to be deleted — do you have any idea how long that will take? Just another thing to put on my list; 3) I’m enjoying life so much and smile lots every day at very simple things; 4) There’s quite a story attached to almost every single one and although another viewer may not know what that story is, I do.

    I can remember thoughts, concerns, larger events, weather, and so many other not so visible aspects of life connected to each shot. And most of the time, that in and of itself is what brings the smile to my face.

  • Almost a bloggoversary

    The anniversary of my first year as a bonafide blogger is approaching. You might think, “So what,” at first notice, but there is so much more that I’m mulling over.

    My blogroll is one of them. Although it’s changed depending on the mood I’ve been in, or what mattered on a given day, it’s remained remarkably the same since I began a year ago on March 15th.

    The Ides of March?

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  • Bottled Fat Free Opinions and some Sand

    I’ve been in food land. You, gentle reader, should know that by now when the end of each month comes around, I will not be here. Surely you must have come across at least one of the eight trillion loaves of Julia Child’s French bread that are flooding Bloggsville with carbs, haven’t you? Just for grins and giggles, I did a Google search to see where I fell in the mix and actually looked at each page…scanning…searching, and feel not too badly surfacing on page 25 connected to Foodbuzz. I guess I’m not quite famous. Yet. I stopped looking for any mention of my foodblog on page 45 or something. Clearly I either have time to burn, or don’t feel like cleaning my house.

    I’ll keep working on it. Being famous — not cleaning my house.

    But, being the pithy one that I pretend to be, I’ve decided to get that point across with my rendition of Message in a Bottle. The point being that I’m a hopeless foodie and that it does take time when one enjoys much more about food than simply eating. Call it my version of the Slow Food Movement. The incomparable Cooper of Wonderland or Not, Should Be Famous and Darfur, an Unforgiveable Hell on Earth graced me with the opportunity to put my virtual Message in a Bottle and I do have to say that I’m feeling fairly famous about that since she NEVER, EVER even bats an eye at memes or awards.

    It’ll be rough trying to pulling on my jammie top tonight before bed, so fat is my head over this.

    In all seriousness, Message in a Bottle began at Mimi Writes, and from my visit there, I discovered that Mimi also instigated the Band Meme of which I was also a daft lemming willing participant. I do have to say that it was one of the more inspired memes I’ve been smacked with intrigued by and any excuse to open Photoshop is a complete afternoon sucker upper absolutely fine.

    Unfortunately, I just might be one of those mentioned who resides in her dungeon. Mayhaps I didn’t follow those directions either? *sigh*

    The directions for Message in a Bottle are not quite as lengthy (see below) as Julia Child’s recipe for pain francais (17 pages…), but I can feel myself not wanting to attend to them since there isn’t food involved. A hamburger for engaging might be a good idea since I’m on election watch this evening which is on a semi- collision course with American Noodle (and OMG how could the Texting Tweeners not vote off the cool, but not so melodious biker female?). And if I’m not mistaken, New Amsterdam, that show Fox has been dangling in front of us since before the holidays is going to premiere this evening (the one with the hunky guy who lives forever and how awful would that be?)

    Heavens to Betsy. How have I come to this?

    Here is my message in a bottle…kellypea’s message in a bottle

    My message can be taken literally; goodness knows that I live by this advice. But more importantly, it is a message reminding us that if we deny ourselves that which is special, we risk so much of what can make life truly amazing, relatively speaking, of course. If I must also explain — from an analytical angle, dark chocolate and red wine are a source of anitoxidants. The butter? Well, if you’ve been using “spread,” how are those triglyceride levels, hmmmm? It’s all about moderation. *bends over to drag soapbox from under the desk* You have noticed what happens when you really enjoy something and saturate yourself with it, it loses its sparkle, right?

    Okay, so not sex or rock ‘n’ roll okay? Behave. But if you thought about it before you read it, consider yourself seriously tagged.

  • Friday, Rain in Paradise, and Awards…What could be more perfect?

    I’m sitting here just like I so often used to each day, wondering where I should begin. No, not with my writing. That’s rarely an issue because I can just sit down and write most anything I feel like writing. Whether anyone wants to read it is a completely different issue, isn’t it? Sometimes, it’s more of a battle with respect to what tone I want to indulge in, or how many distractions there are on my screen that also vie for my attention. I look at the clock in the upper right corner of my toolbar and am always alarmed at where the time has gone.

    Some of my diversions are quite relevant, as they relate to current events that occupy my mind like the debate between Hillary and Obama last night (and I’ll bet you just can’t wait for me to spew about the whole health care issue, right?) Or the outcome of the first round of eliminations on American Noodle (and wasn’t that cut throat the way the first kid went out?). But many of the distractions that delay my writing when I actually get to wallow in Bloggsville now, are anything but. They’re more like pleasant detours involving the people I’ve met along the way for nearly a year now that I’ve been writing at kellementology and in the land of foodies. Very pleasant detours, diversions, and distractions, all.

    I’ve been trying to get organized, finding that I don’t use my blogroll in either of my blogs. I know. You’re thinking that a blogroll isn’t for me — it’s more to let everyone else know whom I enjoy reading, and to share a link which helps them in the land of Google and Technorati, and all things virtually searchable or something like that.

    So in an attempt to keep in better touch with others, I’ve begun to collect feeds in the reader I chose — Netvibes. I know everyone else seems to use Google Reader, but my affiliation with Google is only through my membership in the Daring Bakers, the ever expanding group (I think there are well over 500 members now…) of loveable foodies with whom I bake once a month. My food blog is hosted by TypePad (which is a network I almost never wander around in for some reason), and this one is my very own, of course. Without my connections to MyBlogLog, Blog Catalog, and more recently, EntreCard (which I haven’t developed a strong opinion about one way or the other), I wouldn’t be very good at keeping up with people. Feh, like I have actually been doing that successfully anyway.

    So I’ve changed the settings on my Mac to open to my Netvibes home page and am racking up the feeds. I know you’re snickering right now thinking that I’ve been under some rock and that having recently freed myself, have discovered something that has been around since Al Gore discovered the Internet.

    Go ahead an laugh. I can take it.

    But the big question is — are YOU in my reader?

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  • Right on Day One.

    The day has finally arrived. It feels as if I’ve waited forever and think of all that has gone on in this country and the world in the past eight years. Almost a decade with someone in the White House that I believe never should have been there. Ever.

    That’s quite a bit of water under the bridge, wouldn’t you say?

    I’ve had much on my mind as I’ve watched the candidates line up over the last year and begin their campaigns. It’s been an incredibly long year. Too long. And when I realize that as much as I’ve waited for today to arrive, we still have nearly nine months left to see how big an ass Rush Limbaugh can make of himself over the outcome of the presidential election. Did you hear what he said about John McCain yesterday? O.M.G.

    Unbelievable.

    He’ll flap all the way to the bank. I’m sure.

    In the meantime, I’ve placed my vote in the same garage I’ve been placing it for the past five years since moving to this area of Paradise. The same pleasant people greet me and chat each time.

    “How’s business been today?” I asked one of the women. “Busy?”

    “No,” she responded, surprising me.

    “What’s wrong with this neighborhood?” I teased, knowing what her comeback would be.

    “We’ve got over 65% who vote on absentee ballots here!” she smiled. The young man assisting asked me how I’d be voting today because I’m registered as non partisan.

    Um. I sort of forgot that I get a bit feisty about this whole choosing sides from time to time and hadn’t remembered changing or when I’d changed. He patiently explained that I could vote Democratic, or N/P, or…

    I confessed that I would be voting as a Democrat, just to cut to the chase, grinning as the woman handed me a ballot. I made sure I knew what I was doing because we’ve had umpteen gazillion changes over the past few years about HOW we cast our ballots. Having gone seriously high tech now, we are using a black ink pen and a ballot printed on card stock. No poking, no punching, no scanning, or beeping or page flipping. All I had to do was fill in the bubble.

    They continued casual conversation over my shoulder as I scanned my ballot, laughing because more than one of the volunteers had submitted an absentee ballot, and now, as we all know, many names originally on that ballot are no longer present for the primary today.

    Interesting…

    And more than 65% in our area alone vote absentee ballot? That could prove to be interesting with respect to the Republican votes, so much has changed. We have so many absentee ballots in Paradise, I heard they began to count them very early this morning to get a head start on results.

    On the short drive home, I noticed only two campaign posters — one attached to a stop sign and the other a light pole. The Vote for Ron Paul poster seemed out of place here, but anyone’s would. But his posters are the only ones I’ve seen anywhere in the last couple of weeks. Even bumper stickers have been rare. Although I did notice one plastered on the bumper of a Lexus when I was walking the dog yesterday. And then there was that forty-something woman who was standing on the center divide early this morning with a huge homemade sign that encouraged passers by to cast their vote for Obama… And the youger woman outside the mall with a small, but official looking Vote for Hilary sign in one hand hanging next to her side, and a much larger, homemade Obama sign in her other, held high above her head.

    Still undecided?

    What did Obama say during the debate with Hilary in Hollywood the other night?

    “I’m right on Day One.”

    And I believe it more than I’ve believed anything in a very long time.

  • Already planning for summer vacation…

    The MoH and I have saved ninety gazillion points on our respective plastic money over the past couple of years in anticipation of another trip to Europe. When my sister first told me a while back that she charged everything to collect points, I thought…Yer kiddin’! And then promptly jumped on the bandwagon.

    Now before you get your drawers in any kind of a serious knot about thinking this is not a good idea, please know you actually have to pay the plastic money off as you go or you’re screwed. Count that as your “don’t do this at home” warning type message because I don’t even want to listen to you whine if you figure out you have no will power. Okay, well maybe I’ll listen a bit. But that’s all.

    Moving right along…

    We totally enjoyed a trip to the UK two summers ago and loved every minute of the seven days and 750 miles we drove from Manchester down to Bakewell for a few hours visit to Chatsworth House, and then to Conwy in Northern Wales, down to Powys-Knighton, Bath, Glouchester, Stow-in-the-Wold and on to London . I’m sure I have the order a bit screwed up toward the end there, but you get the general idea.

    We lovingly referred to it as The Toads’ Wild Ride because we didn’t especially love driving on the wrong side of the road in that tiny vehicle that tried really hard to be a van but failed. It was cute, though, stuffed as it was with the three of us not so small people and our tons of luggage. We loved the people we met, the amazingly beautiful green countryside (nary a freaking palm tree in sight…), the castles, and the tiny villages we’d miss if we blinked as we passed through. It makes my heart ache just remembering. It is soooooooo hard not to venture right back and see the parts we didn’t see. Sigh. Like that could actually happen when there is so much else to see in the world.

    And since we used plastic for that trip, it actually helped pay for this next one. Points, points, and more points. So where are we off to this next summer courtesy of our points? Italy. Now how completely cool is that? “We” includes one of my older sons who is paying for his own air fare, thank you very much! And…I think my sister’s family is going to meet us there, too, so this could be downright party time for us all. Or pandemonium.

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