Brrrr....cold, damp....brrrrrr

I'm sitting here looking at the photos on my wall - all of which I have taken and then "done" something to. (Damn, that makes me sound like some type of photography psycho/rapist/serial killer) I must admit, I'm getting pretty good at the photo thing -YES, that is me contorting myself into the shape of a pretzel in order to pat myself on the back.

Anyway......I'm sitting here when it dawns on my that I hate the cold! Now- those of you that live close realize that it IS 46 degrees - and 46 degrees is NOT that cold. But it's damp. Not just damp - it's seep into your bones and make everything feel brittle and just yucky damp.

There are a few things about he cold that are good - but then again, I can usually find at least one good thing in any situation. But anyway - good things about the cold.

1.) Cold prolongs the shelf life of milk. Sounds simple, right? Everyone knows that cold - not freezing, just cold - keeps milk fresh. But DOES IT REALLY? Yeah, it keeps it liquid, no nasty chunks or funky oily stuff on top. So that's fresh, right? If so, why aren't cows kept cold? (Just asking, don't expect an answer) And it confuses me that milk is warm when it comes out and we call it fresh. It's cold when we buy it - and we call it fresh. And when it's chunky we call it spoiled. So, what about "clabbered milk"? Is it fresh? I could go on, but you get the idea.

2.) Really cold keeps ice cream solid! (Brilliant, aren't I?) Solid ice cream is good - especially Butter Pecan! Although butter, pecans and liquid cream isn't so good. Don't ask, you really don't want to know and you probably wouldn't believe me anyway!

3.) Cold gives us an excuse to have "hat hair". Not that hat hair is good - it's not. But it does serve as an awesome excuse for those days that your hair just won't behave or when you're just too lazy to "do" something to it.

4.) Cold makes it easy to tell if we are still breathing.

Well- that's about it. I guess I could say something about sweaters - but I just did, so we'll leave it alone.

Now for the downfalls of the cold. In my opinion there is really only one - Cold winters are, have been and always will be the downfall of civilized life. People are just not nice in the cold.

Ii know there are those of you who "LOVE" winter. All I can say to you is, I'd pay for your therapy if I could afford to do so. I know you're not bad people, most of you are nice. I just don't understand what a person could enjoy about wet socks, red noses, chattering teeth and numb fingers. It's hard to be attractive when you're bundled up like the Michelin man.

Wet socks make your shoes stink!

Red noses are NOT a fashion statement!

Chattering teeth are fine if you are a squirrel!

And numb fingers make it difficult to type.

That being said, I'm going to go curl up in front of the heater - as soon as I move the cats out of the way- and wish for Spring to hurry up!

Tata

Dodadaghovi

Snow.....what more needs to be said?

I'm sitting here watching it snow and listening to the wind prowl around the corners of my house, moaning and whining like a hungry wolf looking for a way to get in.

We are at the beginnings of a Winter Storm, or so they tell me. I don't know how much of a storm it is, or will be, but I know it's colder than I care for, and the wind tries to cut you to pieces when you step outside.

So once again, boys and girls, I am trapped in the house. So I thought I would post Version 2 of Teri's Questions that are Just Dying for an Answer!

1.) Why is it that the driver of the snowplow doesn't seem to have a problem getting to work? Has anyone else ever wondered about that? I mean, if the roads are too bad for school, or travel of any type, how does the snowplow driver get to the snowplow? Does he take it home so that it's handy when he needs to clear the roads? Do we have people held prisoner at the State Road Garage and we poke them into snowplows as needed? I mean, they do a pretty good job, the best they can anyway, I'm just wondering how they get to work. If any of you are married to/living with/are related to/know a snowplow driver, please answer this question for me, it's driving me nuts. (or is that nuttier?)

2.) Who is that poor dumb sap that is always sent into the heart of the worse weather ever by his bosses at the Weather Channel? Better yet, what did he do and who did he piss off in order to deserve being sent into the middle of a hurricane/tornado/flood/ice storm. And don't you just love the fact that he aways says the same thing, "It's getting pretty bad down here." Did he piss in someones Wheaties or what?

3.) Why is it that you can try and be nice, send everything your "friends" on Facebook request and still can't get them to send you a single thing? There doesn't seem to be any shame is begging like a bum in the subway for parts, hearts, boxes, nails.....everything, but there must be some type of rule that I'm unaware of, because I send out the things people request almost every time. But, damn it, I still need one heart, 7 nails, 3 paint buckets.....and no one seems to care. I feel so alone and neglected......I think I need an intervention.

4.) What happened to early morning news shows? Is anyone really interested in the latest New York winter fashions? (Which, by the way, look like something you'd wear to a Hustler or Penthouse party, not something you would wear in New York in the winter.) I must be getting old, but I remember when a show had the word NEWS in it you were going to hear what was going on in the world, not what FiFi was wearing when she was carried outside to pee on the curb! Maybe they should change the name to Irrelevant Stuff That No One Cares About Today, instead of just the Today Show.

5.) Will Martha Stewart live forever? Now, I admit I don't like the woman, although she does do some cool stuff with leftover socks, but a person can't help but admire her. She goes to prison for insider trading (like she needed to make any more money), she becomes the butt of way too many emails/stand up comedians/late night talk show host, she gets out of prison and she's still making more money than the Treasury Department! You have to admire that. But damn, how long has this woman been around? I'm 50 and it seems as though there has always been Martha Stewart this, Martha Stewart that. Come on, there is only so many things you can do with a tampon and a glue gun!

Well, that's it for this installment of Teri's Questions that are Just Dying to be Answered. Maybe I'll be back in little while. Right now I'm going to take the pup out to play in the snow!

Dodadaghovi

It is still cold out there......and I'm still trapped in the house.....this can't be good!

So, it's all of 18 degrees out there.....and it's just now 9 p.m. Bet tonight is going to be cold enough to freeze......well, fill in your own analogy here. Anyway....it's bitterly cold out, and I'm still trapped in the house because it's too cold for a skinny little old woman to go roaming around in the big bad world. Once again my day was filled with the wonder that is living alone, having too many pets and needing to vacuum at least once a day just too keep up with the various and sunder "stuff" that seems to collect on the floor when you have pets.

Oh yeah, and thinking about stuff. And therein lays the problem. Teri home alone, wild eyed and stir crazy, left to her own devices. This is the stuff that physiological thrillers are made of! Or perhaps that should be the stuff slasher films are made of. Although I admit there has not been anymore fantasies of becoming an Uzi toting revenge killer....there have been some strange thoughts going through the cold, dark maze that is my mind.

I'm trying to figure out why I continue this stupid blog for one thing. I know there are a few of you that read this.....mostly my friends, which of course makes me ponder the type of people that I befriend, I mean, I love y'all, but if you can read this stuff and still not be afraid of being left alone with me....well, maybe you should be doing some soul searching as well. (I'm just kidding guys, I love y'all and I think that you're wonderful people without whom I would be a raving lunatic.)

Tonight though I'm going to toss out a few questions for y'all. Hopefully someone out there will do me the courtesy of tossing back a few answers. Who knows, maybe we can get a game of virtual baseball going!

So here it is, Teri's list of questions that are just dying to be answered! (version 1)

1.) Does anyone know what possesses a person to go to the Mall (yes, I used that word....please forgive me. Either that or add it to my ever growing list of sins) on the Friday after Thanksgiving? I mean, are there actually that many masochist out there these days? Although I admit, it does warm my heart a little bit to think that I may be receiving a gift which was wrenched from the trembling hands of some wild eyed little teenager who then, in a fit of rage, pushed a rather large woman into a display of chocolates, sending a cascade of nugget filled goodies skidding across the aisle. I mean, the very thought of something like that happening just makes that gift just a little bit more special, now doesn't it?

2.) Do all homeowners become tasteless, color-blind Nyctophobia suffers when the calender starts nearing Dec. 25? (Don't bother looking it up, it means suffering from an abnormal fear of the dark. Or, if you don't believe me, do look up it. I was just trying to save you some time.) I mean, some of these houses would make a bad Vegas show seem to be in good taste. Please folks, don't mix Santa, the elves, a big inflatable snowman and the Christ child all together in your little 8x8 front yard....it ends up looking like an electrical LSD flashback from the 70's.

3.) Who came up with the brilliant idea of tinsel? Was there once a surplus of tin-foil that fell into a shredder somewhere? Or is it all just an evil plot to wipe out all house cats everywhere? (In case you don't realize what I'm talking about, house cats seems to have an uncontrollable urge to ingest tinsel....it's dangerous, not to mention messy. You think hairballs are gross....wait until you clean up a shiny, tinsel laced ball of.....well I don't know what. It takes gross to a whole new level!)

4.) What the hell is going on with the skinny Santas??? Did I miss a memo or something? Did Santa Claus join the cast of The Biggest Loser and no one told me? If I'm not mistaken, the story goes something like this......"He had a broad little face, and a round little belly, that shook when he laughed, like a bowl full of jelly....." Somehow that description doesn't fit with the hollow eyed, peaked, emaciated Santas that are showing up more and more often. (If you want the truth of the matter, I figure that after hundreds of years of delivering toys to screaming brats Santa just needed something to take the edge off.....unfortunately he decided that he needed to do something that would allow him to have the energy to continue with this charade......you know, just a bit of crystal meth from time to time.......now it's too late, Santa has become a shaking, scratching, stick thin shadow of his former self. But that's just my thoughts on the subject.)

5.) Who made the first fruitcake and how long as that sucker been bouncing around the world?? I'm not saying ALL fruitcake is bad....I actually like a good Stollen from time to time. (Once again, don't bother looking it up, it's a German bread that has dried fruit in it....and sometimes a shot or two of 100 proof something.) And the darker varieties of fruit cake, if they are moist, are good once or twice a year. There's nothing like sugar glazed dried fruit to start your day out right!! My question is about that one fruitcake that seems to keep circulating around the world. You know the one I mean, it serves as a door stop the other 11 months of the year, only to be picked up off the floor, brushed off and stuck back into a foil pan and wrapped with disgustingly cute wrapping paper and mailed to you from someone who calls herself your Aunt Milly, although you've never met this person or even laid eyes on a photograph of her. Have you ever tried to cut that fruitcake?? A Ginsu knife would not be up to that job. Actually, most chain saws are not up to that particular task. (If any of you are thinking of sending me the above mentioned fruitcake, please don't. I'd hate to have to write a threatening note, attach it to said fruitcake and toss it through your living room window.)

6.) Who's bright idea was it to have only one showing of "It's a wonderful life" on television this year?? I wait 11 1/2 months to watch that movie! I expect to be able to see it all the way through at least twice. I expect it to be on at least one channel every night for weeks before Christmas. WHO'S EVIL PLOT WAS IT TO PREVENT ME FROM WATCHING THIS MOVIE??? If the guilty party would please just step forward, admit their guilt and do everything in their power to fulfill my wishes, I promise there will be no retribution. Well, not much anyway.

7.) How many times do I have to watch the Hollywood Christmas Parade?? WHO wants to watch it in the first place? I mean, it's not exactly Macy's Parade, not to mention that there is just something wrong with Santa in red boxers with bright blue packages on them. (I'm sure there is some type of sexual innuendo mixed up in there somewhere, but come one SANTA in boxers?? Somethings are best left to the dark realms of the imagination.) Besides, I'm sitting here freezing my substantial ass off in the now 11 degree winter and these idiots are on television in shorts and tank tops with Santa hats. It's just wrong!

8.) Is it just me or are more and more people saying "Merry Christmas" like it's some Gypsy evil eye curse or something? There doesn't seem to be much of that "warm fuzzy" feeling in that particular statement these days. Some woman in the drug store the other day actually made some strange design in the air and muttered under her breath just directly after wishing me "Merry Christmas". It was obvious that what she was wishing for me was definitely a lot less than a warm, glowing holiday season. Maybe it's the Masochist thing again, I'm not sure. But then again, I was just a little frightened and ran away with my tail between my legs. (Believe me, with the tail I have that is NOT an easy feat!)

Okay, that's the first installment of Teri's Questions that are Just Dying to be Answered. Please send me your answers, thoughts, complaints or just your particular take on any subject that crosses your little minds!!

Love y'all!

Dodadagohvi

It's early....but Winter is here and I'm stuck in the house.....you know this can't be good!

All I can say is BRRRRR it's cold! The thermometer on the front porch says it's all of 13 degrees out there. That is WAYYY too cold! Time for all of us thin blooded Southern girls to stay inside where it is warm and find something to keep us occupied.

So, what have I been doing to keep myself occupied? Well, housework for one.....you know, that mindless activity that either lulls us into a blank staring Stepford Wife or turns us into an Uzi toting wild eyed homicidal manic. I tend to lean towards the Uzi toter myself, but that is another story entirely.

I have also been trying to figure my tendency toward screwing up everything good in my life. And I'm here to tell you what I have figured out so far. So pull on those hip boots and take one last deep breath of fresh air because the shit is about to get deep!

I have been pondering love, relationships and all things confusing and complicated that are terrifying and heart wrenching as well. In other words I've been trying to decide if I believe in, are you ready?? TRUE LASTING LOVE!! Yes I said it, I said those words that can make a grown man tremble and a young girl faint.

Now, for those of you that have no idea what exactly I mean by TRUE LASTING LOVE, let me elaborate. I mean love between two people that last through thick and thin, good times and bad, rich days and poor night, as well as sickness and health. The type of love that stands strong even when you don't like the person at that moment, the type of love that can withstand those hot, horny nights as well as those days when the closest thing to sex you get is saying screw you as you pass one another in the hallway.

I do know that once upon a time such a love was not an unusual experience. I know that my grandparents went through things that would destroy most relationships these days. I have several friends that have that type of love as well, they have walked through hell together and came out holding hands. So I know it exists. I know that once upon at time a person could find that type of love.

Now a days however, I believe it's an almost extinct experience. I believe that most people don't want to put the work into a relationship that it needs in order to survive all the shit that life can and does throw at us. It's too easy to replace people these days. Once a relationship gets too difficult it's just easier to move on to the next one. I mean, who would want to put out actual hard work, who would want to compromise, who would want to give every ounce of themselves to another person when it's so much easier to move on to someone new. There's even that added bonus of the "new toy" feeling that we all have at the start of a new relationship. When there's a problem, just leave.

Right??

Well, it's not right, but it is reality. At least it's reality for way too many people.

At times I think it's reality for me as well. I have discovered that I have fallen into a pattern of not allowing another person to get close enough to me to cause me any pain. Once they get that close, which is rarely, I do something to make them miserable just so I can be proven correct in my assumption that they were going to leave anyway.

You would think that because I realize this about myself that I could do something to change it. YEAH, RIGHT! Just because I realize it doesn't mean a damn thing other than I realize that I have a particular behavior that needs to be changed. Notice I said needs to be changed. Doesn't mean that I'm going to change it, doesn't even mean that I would if I knew how. Just means that I realize something about myself.

Right?

NO, it means that I'm a chicken shit that has been hurt one time too many by one of those people that find it easier to move on than to work on a relationship. That's what it means. It means that big, bad, "I can handle anything" Teri is too afraid to open herself up in order to give a relationship a chance.

Why is that, you ask.

Well boys and girls, get comfortable and I'll tell you a little story. Maybe it's one you've heard before, as a matter of a fact I'm sure a few of you have heard a similar story, if not lived one yourselves, but this is my blog and I can damn well say what I want.

Once upon a time there was this woman that fall for a wonderful man. (Notice wonderful is in italics? There's a reason for that.) The man supposedly fell for the woman as well. (Once again, notice the italics.) The man was having some problems with depression and such, and wasn't the easiest person in the world to get along with, but the woman was determined to stick it out because she just knew he was the one. ( Notice bold letters)

Well, things went okay for a while. The man got better, the depression slipping away almost as silently as it arrived. And, believe it or not, that is when it all started to go to shit.

Once he wasn't so depressed that he wouldn't leave the house, once he talked and acted more like his old self, the man started running to the bars with his friends. (yes, those pesky italics are still around) He spent less and less time with the woman and she began to feel less and less important and more and more like a convenience instead of someone that is actually loved.

I'm not going to mention the other women, oops, I guess I did, didn't I?

To make a long story short, the woman stayed years longer than she actually should have, ended up having her self esteem and self worth shredded and, in the end, having her believe in love destroyed. Now she is alone and wondering if she will remain that way.

Yes, you guessed it, she is me and I am her. I used to love, may still love, may once again love, may always love this person, and it didn't, doesn't, never will matter. I've accepted that, and actually I'm okay with it. I mean he is the one and all. Of course I thought that meant he was the one that I would be with the rest of my life, the one that I would share that love with. I didn't realize he was the one that would mess me up so bad that I can't seem to break down that wall that suddenly sprang up around my heart.

So kiddies, that is my sad twisted little story. Anyone have any suggestions for this poor screwed up middle aged woman that is getting more and more afraid that she will be alone for the rest of her life?

Or do you think I should just pull up my big girl panties and move on?

Dodadagohvi