I am Offended

Lake Superior State University is on my list.  I'm not even sure where this institute for higher learning is located or anything about them, but they are on my list, man. They have recently published their annual List of Words to Be Banished from the Queen's English for Mis-use, Over-use and General Uselessness and guess what appears on the list?  Monkey!!

They say Monkey should be banned - particularly on the Internet because, and I quote, "many people seem to think they can make a boring name sound more attractive just by adding the word 'monkey' to it."  Oh no, you didn't just dis my blog name?!  Bring it on, you maverick!

I honestly didn't pick the name monkey because I thought it would make my blog more attractive.  I picked the name because I have a thing for all things monkey-related.  The Barenaked ladies song "Another Postcard" is a personal favorite.  And yes, I have gotten postcards from a chimpanzee, all of them sent anonymously.  My personal favorite, Starsky and Hutch chimps driving in a car!  I have a rather extensive monkey collection that graces my office at work.  It is a challenge to find a monkey related souvenir when you travel.  And, last but not least, I have this thing for Naughty Monkey shoes.  Not only are they cute, they are different.  Plus it is fun to watch a bunch of stuffy guys in my line of work, crack up when you tell them you are wearing Naughty Monkeys!

So maybe I should change the name of my blog - to something like "Maverick Monkey Going Green to Change the Carbon Footprint".  How do you think they would like that one?

100 and counting....

Even though I recently celebrated a birthday (and despite what the nice people at AARP think), I am no where close to 100 years old.  Some days I may feel like I'm ancient, but that is a completely different story!

This is my 100th post!  I never fancied myself much of a writer, but we gather inspiration from those close to us (thanks MEF!) and sometimes you just have to take a leap to see what happens.  I hope that the 3 people that read this find this blog mildly entertaining at times and that you aren't using this blog as a cure for insomnia!

One hundred posts seems like such a milestone, I didn't want this to be just any old post.  I waited and waited for divine inspiration.  It didn't come easily.  I guess since I decided to take some time off work, my brain decided it could check out too (or all my brain sharing friends are really alert this week)!  Yesterday, I got the inspiration that I needed from Sugar.  Not the kind of sugar that you get from too many holiday treats (although I've had my share of those), but from "the" Sugar.

MonkeyMamma (aka SewWhat?) just recently scolded me for never being in front of the camera.  There is a really good reason for that - I hate having my picture taken.  I can find all kinds of flaws in myself - crooked smile, too many freckles, wrinkles, and I could go on and on.  I keep telling myself that I will get in the picture when.... You know, the infamous "when" that is never today but some vague spot in the future. 

Coupled with the mild scolding from my mother, a blogging friend who is willing to put herself "out there" and my nifty Christmas gifts from Mr. M, I decided that I am going to attempt to do a self portrait a month for the next year.  I may not love the way I look but I'm not a hideous monster either. Maybe this will be the push that I need to keep up with the workouts.  Maybe this will be the thing that teaches me to love myself for who I am.  Maybe, just maybe, this will be the inspiration for me to get back on the diet and lose the weight that I gained back recently. 

Whatever happens, I know this, I will definitely learn something in the next year. Good, bad or indifferent, I will at least have something to scrapbook about next year at Crop Camp!

Hmmm....

It is 10:30 here in the great Midwest and I just heard that Santa has already consumed 63,000 cookies tonight.  The first thought that popped into my head - "I wonder how many calories are in 63,000 cookies?"  

I hope everyone has a very Merry Christmas and may Santa bring you what your heart truly desires!

Ta-Done!

By know you all know me well enough to know that I am the world's biggest procrastinator.  I never start anything until the last minute and I usually finish up exactly when I am supposed to arrive somewhere.  So you will all be extremely surprised to hear this news.....drum roll please.........I am FINISHED with my Christmas shopping.

Yep, you heard me right, Ms. "I still have time" or "I don't start shopping until Winter" is officially finished with her shopping.  Ok, I have 2 small things to buy to fill in some missing pieces, but other than that I am DONE.  I even have the gifts bought for people I know I'm not going to see until after the holidays!  And you know what else, I even have everything wrapped!  I never start wrapping until about 10 pm on Christmas Eve and I end up staying up half of the night trying to finish up.  But this time, I am done.  I even have a "color coded/design system" so I can tell at a glance who the package is for.  Well at least I can tell between the children and the adults!!  Oh, do you want to hear something else disgusting?  I was inspired by a gift tag set I saw at the store last night and decided that I could make my own, so I custom made all of the gift tags (me loves me Cricut!).

Now that you have picked yourselves off the floor, do you want to hear more? Yesterday I decided to hand make by Christmas cards.  You heard me right, on the 19th of December, I decided to tackle a monstrous project with an impending deadline.  I not only hand stamped the design, but also water colored, paper pieced (without the Cricut :-o) and glittered up part of the design.  Sounds simple right?  Yeah, ask my friends and they will let you that this is typical behavior for me!  Considering that I started after 10 am on Saturday and the design requires 10 unique stamps where do you think I am at with this one?  Sounds like a project that I would still be working on by next Christmas, huh?  I am happy to report that I not only finished up the design but they are all signed, addressed, stamped AND mailed!  Even with dinner out and a shopping excursion yesterday afternoon (spent 50 minutes in the store - 5 minutes to get what I wanted and 45 minutes to check out), dinner out last night followed by another shopping excursion and a quick run to the store again today, I still had them finished before dinner.

So for a girl who started thinking about shopping about 96 hours ago, I think I did pretty good to be at this point.  In fact, the guys in my house keep asking me what's wrong because I have everything done and it isn't Christmas Eve yet!  I guess my recent encounters with Santa really put me in the mood.

Of course, the tree is still naked and the dust bunnies are threatening to take over still, but one step at a time!

Guess who I saw?!?!?

Picture this.  I'm sitting in traffic this afternoon.  Patiently waiting for the light to turn green, when all of the sudden, the woman in front of me rolls down her window and starts frantically waving at someone on the opposite corner.  It was avery friendly "hey look over here" kind of wave.  I was compelled to see who on earth she was waving at.  

And what to my wondering eyes should appear?  SANTA CLAUS!  He was in his sleigh and waving to the anyone who was looking.  Of course his eight tiny reindeer were replaced with a V-8 but it doesn't really matter.  After standing in line for 45 minutes to purchase the items that it took me 2 minutes to select, it put me in a much better mood.

Now, I'm officially in the holiday mood.  Still haven't finished shopping, haven't finished up the holiday cards or baking and the dust bunnies are getting demanding, but bring it on, I'm ready for the holidays!

Ready....but not for the holidays

The tree is undecorated.  Presents still need to be bought.  Nothing has been baked. Christmas cards?  A vague idea is formulating in my brain but no action has been taken yet.  Dust bunnies seriously outnumber the people in the house.  But all the same, I am ready!

I have paid for my January Escape.  After a convoluted process, I finally got reservations so I can shower and take a nap that weekend.  Now all I have to do is prepare my stuff and make sure I have clean laundry.  No problem, I can do that all on the morning of the event.  That is my normal M.O.!

While this is one of my favorite events of the year, there is something else coming up that is even better.  We have our plane tickets purchased, hotel room reserved and our portion of the house rental paid in full for our tropical vacation coming up in a couple of months!  I can't wait to kiss this lousy winter weather goodbye for a week!  After a week of constant ice, snow, sleet, and freezing rain, I am ready for a break.  Not to mention taking an entire week off work will do wonders for my soul!

Maybe the holiday stuff will get done, maybe not.  But it doesn't matter because I have a lot to look forward to in the new year!

On the First day of Christmas....

I was ready to post this last week, but MEF Nicole beat me to the punch! I guess that is brain sharing at it's best! 

I had this crazy idea for our office holiday decorating contest and some crazy girl (love ya!) offered to help me out.  I wanted to use the 12 Days of Christmas as our theme and we printed out the words.  We also discovered that there is more than one variation on the wording which really confused us!  So without further ado, here is our rendition of the 12 Days of Christmas!  Sorry if they aren't clear, this is the best I could do with my camera phone!

Finally, some vodka

Ever since our no more vodka incident, I have been obsessing over our lack of vodka.  I know the simple solution is to go to the store and buy more but that isn't so easy.  You see, I'm kind of picky.  Mr. Monkeygirl and I went to the local grocer and stood in front of the vodka display and couldn't decide on what we wanted.  We ended up leaving without a bottle.

After having a bad a bad day earlier this week and complaining about it via text, my BFF replied, "I hope your not out of vodka."  D*mn, now she hit a nerve because we are still out of vodka.  "Cr@p!  Yet another reason to sit in the corner and cry!" was the only response I could come up with!

Tonight, we attended Mr. M's Holiday party and I sent him up to the bar for a drink.  I asked for Vodka and Cranberry and I told him "If they are out of vodka, we are leaving immediately!"  Fortunately for me they had a good supply of vodka tonight but I ran into a new problem, they ran out of cranberry juice.  I love Bloody Mary's but I had a difficult time switching from sweet to spicy.  Good thing it was time to go home!

Monkey Monday -12.08.08

I need a vacation.  I am officially brain dead. It has taken me 15 minutes to get this far on this post.  Coal is snoring on the couch and I want to seriously join him but I got stuff to do.  So what does this have to do with Monkeys?  Absolutely nothing except for the fact my mind racing 20,000 different directions and the name of this dude is on path 20,001.

In the interest of time, I'm going to make something up.  I think a good name for this guy would be Penny.  Because that is about all I ever leave Vegas with is a few pennies.  Yeah, I know Penny is a girl's name but like I mentioned earlier, I'm tired and they are my monkeys so I can call them whatever I want.

Yeah! It's Shipped!!

I wish I could say that my package of my delight was some perfect Christmas present that I found online.  Nope, not that organized!  I am psyched because my DVD of Season 4 of LOST has been shipped.  I should get the package next Monday so I better get moving on the buying, decorating, baking, oh yeah, and work before then so I can camp out on the couch for 5 days to get my LOST fix!

Coal Updates

Coal had his first Vet visit on Friday and we found out a few new things.

1. He is 18 weeks old.  That is good news because the Vet says we only have about one more month of the "bad" teething!  And he is about 2/3's of his adult weight now.  This means he will "only" end up about 60-65 pounds.
2. Coal is definitely a mix - part Lab, part Pointer (ha! I was right!!) and part Hound Dog.  The Vet kept saying he thought he had hound in him and Coal finally decided to be vocal and the Hound Dog was confirmed!
3. The poor puppy also has some sort of vicious looking worms.  The pictures looked disgusting and it sounded even worse but the Vet didn't seem to concerned.  A worm pill now and another treatment in 2 weeks and he should be good to go.
4. Apparently we are bad dog parents and got a lesson in controlling our dog. The tips from the Vet are helping but I have to think that every puppy acts like a crazy dog when they get to smell a new human.  Whatever, Coal is getting better but he is a back talker.  If you tell him to stop doing something, he gets smart and lets us know that he is not happy with being corrected.

New Challenge

I never realized that blogging was going to become a challenge.  I can come up with things to blog about.  I can find pictures to post.  I can respond to comments left behind.  I can find time in ever increasingly busy days to post.  No, those thing no longer are my biggest blogging concern.

What is my problem?  I will give you a hint.  It has a cold nose, 4 paws and is currently chewing on my hand.  Coal is proving to be a pain tonight.  Every time I move the cursor, he is attacking the screen.  When I'm typing, he is hitting some key on the keyboard that makes all of my open windows disappear.  It is kind of cool so I need to watch him closer to see what he is doing.

When he isn't making things disappear, he is chewing on my foot or the back of my knee.  I think I will be really glad when this puppy stage is over.  My my best guesstimate, I only have about 12-18 more months of this type of behavior.

Monkey Monday - 12.01.08

Hi!  Hi!  Hi! Hi!  It's Coal again - I watched my Mommy playing with her computer earlier and it looks like fun.  My Mommy gets to show off her monkeys so I asked her to take a picture of my favorite monkey.  

I love this monkey.  I haven't had him for very long but you can see that he is really well loved. I don't know why he is missing his legs (I think Daddy threw them away).  I love giving the monkey head kisses and a few love nips.  Mommy and Daddy just love it when my monk-monk and I talk to each other!  Monk-monk kind of has a high squeaky voice but I love listening to him talk to me.  We can talk for hours!!

I want to thank SoccerMonkey and Mommy's WorkTwin for my presents.  I think there is more stuff in the bag but Mommy and Daddy hid it from me and I can't reach the top of the fridge to find out what is in there.  

Oh yeah, the boney's are soooo delicious!  I love them so much that Daddy went and bought me some more tonight.