Janet and Alex Rules!

DH and I took a long weekend and visited my parents and (wink, wink) Janet Evanovich just happened to have a book signing in Nashville Monday night. Not only was I able to be among the first fifteen fans in line, but I got to meet Alex too.

Can you tell I'm trying to restrain myself here? Because what I really want to say is, "OHMYGOD I GOT TO MEET JANET AND THAT WAS SOOOO COOL AND ALEX WAS FREAKIN' AMAZING TO MEET TOO AND JANET SIGNED MY LIKE FAVORITE BOOK AND OHMYGOD IT WAS LIKE FAN-TASTIC!"

But, no, I'm restraining myself.

Seriously, this was a major deal for me. I am an absolute Plum Crazy fan and harass Alex on the Q&A all the time. I was afraid if I told Alex who I was she'd call security. That and there were tons of people in line and I didn't want to be a pig. Well, any more of a pig than I already was.

As for the DH and DSS portion of the weekend, we were lucky enough to be in town for the Orange County Choppers 2006 tour. For those of you who don't know, OCC is the motorcycle garage on American Choppers on the Discovery Channel with Paul Sr, Paulie, Mickey, Vinnie, Rick, Cody, Christian, Jason, and the rest of the gang. I'm not a true motorcycle person, but I can truly appreciate the beauty of these bikes. They brought twelve of their choppers with them for the fans to see and the level of detail was just insane. The television just doesn't do them justice. It was a great show, and family-oriented which was nice, especially considering I had no idea what to expect. I was accidentally in Sturgis at the beginning of the big rally up there one year. At first I wasn't intimidated, but then I saw part of the pay-per-view special from after I left ... and you can probably kinda guess the reasons for my hesitation from there. There are hard-core bikers and then there are great families who have bikes.

And Mikey ... that guy just cracks me up. I'd consider myself a serious groupie, but well, I'm married and that seriously cuts down on my lusting after the funny guy. Gotta love Mikey though.

So now we are back in Indiana and it just started to snow. Flurries, really, but still. Ugh. I wanna go back already.

Village Idiot

Hi there. Obviously, I'm the village idiot today, maybe even longer.

Apparently you have to set things up a certain way on Blogger to not only allow people to comment, but to be able to read the comments people make. I wasn't ignoring anyone, really. So thank you ZaZa and Robin S for commenting.

So now the pressure is on. Kinda like singing in your car. On the one hand, you have this thought that hey, this is awesome. Everyone should see this. But in reality, someone is probably watching me make an ass of myself. Which, really isn't a bad way to go. The making people laugh part, that is.

And now in my infinite wisdom, I decided to merge Blogger to Beta and I think I've given myself another identity. Yup, I've lost myself.
I knew I called it Blogger/Flogger/Frappr/Crappr for a reason.

Sheesh

Hi there. I'm an idiot. Or at least a blogger idiot. I don't even know how to run my own site. Sheesh.

I've been typing away, trying from time to time to say something that at least sounds witty. And yet, I was stumped why no one ever commented on the posts.

Not that I was saying anything earth-shattering. Or even necessarily comment-worthy. I was just expecting a "howdy" somewhere.

When I first put this blog up, I was instantly spammed. That or that guy REALLY wanted me to look at his furniture site. So I made a few adjustments.

Sigh. You know it's hard to invite people in if you forget to leave the doors or even windows open.

Sorry folks. Hopefully a few of you will drop a note to let me know I fixed it.

Six Feet Under

(Or probably less.)

Sad news. My stepson’s hamster Max (aka Vlad) passed away yesterday. He was three, so he pretty much lived life to the fullest. I never had a hamster before so it was fun until the end. The poor little guy’s hair started falling out and he wasn’t moving around so well.

Hamsters are usually nocturnal so I really didn’t notice anything wrong until about two weeks ago. Once I did, I started doing research on the web about hamster health. Word to the wise, researching medical conditions on the web never turns out well. You either think you’ve got the plague or feel like Mommy Dearest. I feel like the latter, although if I remember correctly the plague was carried by rodents, so I may still have a shot at that.

We switched bedding, and shortly after I noticed Max having problems. According to the net, some pine bedding carries toxins hazardous to hamsters. My thinking is why would you label it for small animals if it could potentially harm them? Next, I think the poor little guy had a stroke. That was a possibility that never occurred to me. I mean, he’s a mammal. Of course he could have a stroke. I just never dreamed he would. I have close relatives that have had strokes. They were in the ICU for days and weeks of recuperation are involved. Next was the hair loss thing. I don’t know if he had mites or it was due to the stroke or maybe he stopped eating. It was hard to tell. He was a dwarf hamster and he really didn’t eat much anyway. What he took out of his food bowl, he usually hid.

The worst thing was that every condition I looked up indicated I should rush the little guy to the vet right away. Yes, that was my gut reaction at first, but then kept thinking of these stand-up bits on TV about hamsters being disposable pets. I mean, this is an animal kids foist off on one another at camp because the population keeps increasing. I kept having visions of Max hooked up to tiny IV units in a tiny little ICU unit, followed by an astronomical bill from the vet that would cover my next three car payments.

Now don’t everybody get all up in arms about Max suffering. We did our best to keep him warm and I helped him drink from the water bottle a few times a day. It is my sincerest hope that he didn’t suffer. And it’s not like I was going to flush him down the toilet like the guppies. He will have a proper burial in the back yard and we will have comforting thoughts of Max in hamster heaven, running on his wheel, playing in the bedding, and hiding his treasures to his hearts content.

Even his roommate Tiger, aka Jabba the Guinea Pig, seems sad. While they were in separate cages, they shared the room with my stepson when he was at our house. Tiger isn’t normally the cuddly type, but this week he wants to be petted every day. The dog is acting the same way. Of course there are times when I’m not certain who is comforting who.

I don’t know what I’d do without pets in the house, even at sad times like this.

Happy Dance

I just realized that I will be heading for Tennessee for a visit with the folks and the Janet Evanovich book signing in little more than a week. I am doing the Snoopy Happy Dance.

I’ve been rereading my Plum novels the past few weeks. Ranger is fun, but I’m definitely a Cupcake. Funny thing is, when I tried my hand at Plum fiction about a year ago, I ended up with Ranger. Actually, his brother, but still. Go figure.

With any luck, I will be able to keep from making a complete cake of myself at the signing. Janet’s daughter Alex runs the web site and I’m just as much a fan of hers as I am Janet’s. The site is a lot of fun, (http://www.evanovich.com), with photos of reader pets, Ask Alex, games, trivia, etc.

Yay!

Happy! Happy! Joy! Joy!

(Ren and Stimpy)

Ok, time to get the funk out.

5 Tips for feeling better

1. Go for a walk outside. Unless it's raining cats and dogs like it is here.
2. Take some one-on-one time with your pet. Pets are known stress reducers. Unless it's a guinea pig. If you get peed on, it's your own fault. You've been warned. I usually toss mine a toilet paper roll (the cardboard center) and he chirps happily for hours. Best of all, I don't get peed on in the process.
3. Talk to someone you care about.
4. Watch a funny movie, read a funny book, or pick up today's comics in the paper. Laughter is a great stress buster. One of my favs is Close to Home (the comic strip).
5. Decide you want to feel better. I know, I know. It isn’t always that easy. But every once in a while I tell myself to knock it off. If I want to feel better, then go do something that makes me feel better. And it works.

Seriously though folks, if you’ve been down and blue for some time now, look up a therapist. I did several years ago and simply talking to someone who won’t judge you does a lot of good. I didn’t have the worst problems in the entire world. I don’t even have the worst problems in my own family. We even got to the point where my therapist and I would just sit there and I would say, “I think I’m OK now.” And she told me, “I think I’m wasting your money at this point. How about if you need me again, call me. I’ll be here.” Very cool.

I’ve been it that dark room before, checking to see if my life insurance would cover my current debts. The thing that woke me up to the fact that there was a problem was the day a question popped in my head: Are you afraid someone will stop you? Or that they won’t?

If I want to matter to someone, I also need to do something to deserve it. Make a difference in someone’s life, whether it be a child, a shut in, or someone’s grandparents whose kids live far away. The last time I checked, the Lone Ranger hasn’t ridden into town lately, so this is something you’ve got to do yourself. Make something happen. No matter how small.

And if you’ve thought about hurting yourself, wanted to sleep forever, or thought no one would miss you if you’re gone, CALL SOMEONE TODAY. Call a hot-line, a crisis center, someone in your church – it doesn’t matter who, but call someone who can hold your hand and show you the door you need to go through.

Some goes for if you know someone who is in trouble.


Here are a few numbers.

National Hopeline Network Suicide Prevention Hotline: 1-800-SUICIDE (1-800-784-2433).

Boys Town Suicide and Crisis Line: 800-448-3000

Covenant House: 800-999-9999


And if you have other needs, check out this website for more hotline numbers:

http://www.allaboutcounseling.com/crisis_hotlines.htm

Soylent Green Is People

I seem to be bringing out the big guns today, people. I'm stressed. Majorly stressed. Just name the main biggies that cause stress and I'm there.

I pulled a muscle in my shoulder and for a moment I thought, "Is that a shooting pain down my arm?" I'm the first to admit I'm in lousy physical shape: seriously overweight, diabetic, high blood pressure, prone to an occasional anxiety fit, and my foot hurts. Little wonder I think I could be on track for a heart attack in my 30s.

DH is stressed too. The bad thing is, usually I don't find out how much he's churned up inside until he's sick from it. He doesn't want to worry me. The bad thing is I do the exact same thing. No wonder we are both going gray.

I hate stress.

One of the things I due to combat it is use humor. Sometimes I crave it like a drug. I'll watch "Whose Line is it Anyway?" for hours. I've been spending a whole lot of time on the He Wrote/She Wrote Blog, looking for that *snort* that I love. I'll pull out old comic books, a light romantic comedy, my Stephanie Plum novels any thing to help get me through.

I've been typing "Ohm" a lot. Sometimes I write it tongue in cheek, but usually it is more of a tip of the hat because I really think meditation works. I was raised catholic. Prayer and meditation, no matter how you do it, can help reduce stress and put you in a more relaxed state of mind. That and I like the sound of it.

Oooohmmmm. See? I feel a little better already.