The Olympics, I mean. I’m a self-admitted sports fan. I love watching a variety of different sports, from US football to Nascar. I’ll even watch bowling on occasion (oddly, I don’t like baseball and it’s the one thing I won’t watch). So even aside from country pride, the Olympics are right up my alley, watching the world’s talented athletes show their stuff and compete for public glory. I love it. Love it! I even turn the TV on mute during the day to watch sports like hockey and curling. And it’s not just the US athletes, I’m happy to cheer for athletes from other countries who compete well. I just love something about the excitement of the moment at the Olympics. Maybe someday I’ll get to see them in person, as some of my Canadian friends have been doing this week.

But if you’re not watching, you’ve missed some amazing moments for the US team. The men’s 1500m short track speed skating. Ohno was not going to medal, it was going to be a Korean sweep and then…two of the Korean skaters took each other out in the last turn and allowed Ohno and a US teammate to skate to silver and bronze.

Yesterday’s events were also exciting. Lindsey Vonn skied to gold on an injured leg. Shani Davis became the first man to get back to back gold medals in the 1000m. And Shaun White wowed the world with his snowboarding prowess. Seriously, if you watch nothing else from the Olympics, watch the clip here, of Shaun White’s first and second run (second run is at 3:40 on the video so you can fast forward). Even if you don’t know anything about snowboarding, you can see his talent and feel his joy as he wins. It’s a perfect representation of an Olympic moment.

For photos and videos of other “Golden Olympic Moments” you should visit the NBC Olympic site. Take a moment to celebrate for the athletes whose hard work paid off!

I hate to be boring and talk about the weather, but really, this is ridiculous. I posted some snow pictures early last week. We had snow, plenty of it. Turns out, we got another 14-16 inches this past weekend. Something our city is ill-equipped to deal with. No side roads are getting plowed. You should see the hideous piles of snow on our street. Parking is atrocious. People can’t walk on the sidewalks anywhere in town, so they’re walking in the street. Yes, even on the busy roads. It’s beyond dangerous. People were/are without power, living in shelters and generally unable to cope with this much snow. We haven’t had a full day of school in surrounding areas in almost two weeks. And now, on top of it? It’s supposed to snow again. Argh.

Look, there’s a reason I moved from North Dakota. There’s a reason I’ve lived here for almost a decade. Because we’re not supposed to get much snow. That’s how it works, that’s the deal. I hate snow. I lived with 5 plus feet of it every winter for several decades. I had enough. Please no more. Pleeeaasssee.

Today after we worked out, I casually mentioned to Josh that his brother had called just as I’d reached the locker room (I had Josh’s phone since he doesn’t get a locker, just gives me his few things). When he asked what he’d had to say, I said I didn’t know as there are rules against using cell phones in the locker room. I supposed (aloud) that it was so no one had the opportunity to take pictures with them. I then tossed out a comment about how often I get an eyeful of naked women in the locker room.

He was shocked. Apparently, being naked somehow doesn’t occur in the men’s locker room? Or if it does, it occurs infrequently, in haste or out of sight of other men. Whereas in the women’s locker room, it’s not unusual to see women in various states of dress, including buck naked, walking around, drying their hair and watching TV (yes there’s a TV in the locker room).

But he reports that men don’t do that. And that if you have to be naked in the men’s locker room, you do it quickly. Or you’re only naked under a towel, even to take under off/put them on. Okay, that image made me laugh because…really?

It seems that men don’t want to look at other men’s dangly bits, or have theirs seen. It must make having to use those public urinals particularly painful.

Cripes, I enjoyed this way too much. I think this should go on my business cards, don’t you?

Make your own superhero.

Is going to be the MONTH I take off from blogging. I think I’m using all my interesting thoughts up on Twitter. But, hey, at least I’m not boring somewhere! If you’re wondering just what there is to talk about on Twitter, in the past few days I’ve had conversations about the shifter anthology submissions I’m reading, how I handle revise and resubmit letters, whether or not I’d wear those leggings (liquid silver in color) or that T-shirt (that talks about flushing), what the movie Watchmen is like and if I should go see it in the theater, a sample of some of the most…interesting (and rather hysterical) writing, and whether or not Commissioner Gordon ever finds out Batman’s real identity. See, I told you. Not boring.

I have, I’m sorry to say, absolutely nothing interesting to report here though. I’ll try to do better. You know who is still job hunting, Demon child is going to be home in the afternoons from now on and I am…working on that whole concentration thing. I’ll get there!

You know who thought there might be some concern about that, since I apparently haven’t blogged in something like five days. Who knew? I’ve been spending a lot of time flooding Twitter with my random thoughts, and I really haven’t had anything I wanted to blog about. I’ve opened the “add new post” page every day but…had nothing to add.

I did add a page (look at the top of the blog) for Couch to 5k, though. So I’ll at least try to update that.

Also, prize winners, I just now realized I didn’t get your prizes sent out. Ack! I’ll do that this week. I think my concentration is shot because I’m having to adapt to a new routine now that you know who is home. It’s not a terrible thing, it’s just taking some getting used to. I’m so used to having this (mostly) set routine Monday-Friday, with about 6 hours of total silence. Not only do I not have the routine so much anymore, I don’t have the silence. Plus, to further throw things off, I’ve started working out. I’ve noticed I’m a lot more forgetful, easily distracted, and less focused than normal. Hopefully once I get used to this, those things will get better.

It has been weird weather here and we had a gorgeous weekend, so we went to the beach. I should do a post on our weather cycle. Friday the 1st, we were at the beach. Sunday/Monday it snowed and I have pictures of Josh and Brianna out in the snow.Then Saturday pictures of Brianna wearing shorts, standing by the snowpile, with the convertible (top down) in the background. And Sunday? Beach pictures again. We went, in 5 days, from the coldest day of the winter (1 degree) to 70+ degrees. Kind of bizarre.

At some point, the computer will let me upload all the pictures I took, and maybe I’ll be able to share them!

So anyway, I’m not dead. Though I did do my running in the cemetery today. Is that weird?

That’s what I started today. I was supposed to start yesterday but, well, we were kind of “snowed in” and I certainly wasn’t going to go break an ankle on the snowy/icy sidewalks. So I started this morning (at my local Y, on the treadmill). If you’re not familiar with this, it’s a 9-week interval running program designed to take you from the couch (that’s me!) to 5k (3 miles) of running. The reason it’s successful for many people is because of the fact of being an interval program–you start slow and build. The program encourages you not to skip ahead but instead to follow it as it’s designed. But if you need to repeat a week and stretch the program to more weeks, that’s okay too. You set your own pace.

So I did day one today, which is a combination of 60 seconds of running then 90 seconds of walking, which didn’t really seem to bad. I did notice, since I was on the treadmill, that I only went 2 miles, but I was told on Twitter that as long as I did 20 minutes (I think I actually did slightly more) that I was fine. Okay then.

One thing that makes it a lot easier to do this is to use the music podcasts that have been designed for this program. That way you don’t have to wear a watch/use a timer, but instead listen to the music which has a cue in it when it’s time to switch from running to walking and vice versa.

Right now my goal is to just finish the program and run the three miles. Once I’ve done that, I’ll decide on what my next goal will be. I’ve been challenged to do the half-marathon in Virginia Beach in September but that’s…a lot of running. I’ll be impressed if I get to three miles in three months. Girl Scout cookies all around if I manage that!

Sorry I’ve been silent for a few days. There’s some stuff going on here, but I’ll get to that later in the post. First, let’s close the contest. Thanks to everyone who suggested songs for my workout playlist. There were a lot of songs I never would have thought of and am going to add to my list!

I chose the winners using random.org. Of course, the first two #s it chose were me. Duh!

The winner of the Australia Bronzed Boys calendar is…Mad! Congratulations, Mad, please email me or use the contact form here on the website and let me know your mailing address.

The winner of the Australia Bronzed Girls calendar is…Albert. Same goes, Albert. Please contact me using the form here on the site and give me your mailing address so I can get your calendar in the mail.

On the good news front, Sony sent me a 700 to try out (because they rock like that) and I got it Friday. I’m going to use it for a few days over this weekend and will try to post my thoughts on it next week.

Other good news: My dad was in the area for a business meeting and decided to extend his trip and come visit us. He got here yesterday afternoon and will be here just for the weekend. Since they live in North Dakota, we usually only get to see them once a year because it’s expensive, and time intensive, to fly in and out of there. So we’re all glad to see him, but Brianna is especially thrilled. She loves it when she gets to see family and she’s seen a lot of them lately!

On the bad news front: Ugh, I don’t even like to type this but we’ve joined the ranks of Americans affected by the economy and the “reduction in workforce” as of yesterday morning. Josh was laid off yesterday morning when he went into work. It was a complete shock to us and not expected at all. Obviously we’re still processing this, since we only just found out. But I just keep telling myself it could be worse and that we’re certainly not a unique situation.

And to end on a positive note, we visited the beach yesterday, even though it was windy and cold. But we walked the beach, collected seashells and I took some pictures. It was a good day. Mostly

Thanks to a tip from you know who, who was laughing hysterically over this article at MSNBC

Pranks with electronic road signs stir worry

COLLINSVILLE, Illinois – Pranksters in at least three states are messing with electronic road signs meant to warn motorists of possible traffic problems by putting drivers on notice about Nazi zombies and raptors. And highway safety officials aren’t amused.

The latest breach came Tuesday during the morning rush hour near Collinsville, Ill., where hackers changed a sign along southbound Interstate 255 to read, “DAILY LANE CLOSURES DUE TO ZOMBIES.”

A day earlier in Indiana’s Hamilton County, the electronic message on a board in Carmel’s construction zone warned drivers of “RAPTORS AHEAD — CAUTION.”
Story continues below ?advertisement | your ad here

And signs in Austin, Texas, recently flashed: “NAZI ZOMBIES! RUN!!!” and “ZOMBIES IN AREA! RUN.”

read rest of article

Okay, I can’t help it….bwahahahaha. It would totally make my day if I saw something like that.

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Snuggle up with my Sony Reader and my copy of Bone Crossed by Patricia Briggs. Please hold all my calls as I will be unavailable until I finish.

Also, as a random aside, cocktail parties? Freak me out. I’m always afraid I’ll end up standing in the corner with no one to talk to for two hours. Very scary stuff.

Talk amongst yourselves. I’ll be back when I’m done.

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