Happy Belated Memorial Day!

Over the past 2 years, both my Uncle and best friend joined the Army. My Uncle has been in Afghanistan since Jan. My friend went to basic training and was then sent to a base in Missouri. As if a Memorial Day present from the military, they will both be home in June.  My Uncle is back for 2 weeks to be home for my cousin's high school graduation. My friend came home today, he'll be back for 3 1/2 weeks before being shipped out to Korea for a year :(  After going 6 months without seeing them, getting a little visit is such a great gift. I have had the pleasure to fly next to or around active military men and women on occasion during my travels. They are all in such great spirits either on their way home or returning from a visit. Never underestimate the power of support for our brave military.

Heat, Hockey and Money Hungry Hussies.

Finally, nice weather has made its appearance. About damn time! We barely had a spring around these parts. It went from snowing, to raining to 85 de-freaking-grees. I'm still shocked that this weekend is Memorial Day weekend. When the hell did that happen? Apparently while it was raining.

Over the last few weeks I have become more thankful than ever about where I live. In New England, we have snow. Sometimes, lots of it, 60, 70, 80+ inches in 2-3 months. But that's it. We suck it up from Dec to Feb and then we move on. These poor people around the country dealing with tornados and hurricanes and flooding just breaks my heart. I hate shoveling out my driveway and car every other day, but at least my safety and the safety of those I love isn't threatened. I hope the worst is over.

                                                                   
In other, less-life-altering news, The Bruins are in the Stanley Cup Finals!!!! YAH! Being completely honest, I don't watch hockey during the regular season, but come playoffs, it just sucks me in! It's so exciting, fast and nerve-wracking it's hard not to watch. But with the Bs success so far this year, it make me think about all the people who must hate Boston and their fans. I mean, come on, we are always winning something. "Boston" and "sports" just go hand in hand. If they aren't winning the Super Bowl, they're winning the World Series, or the NBA Finals in '08. It must get annoying. Not to me. To outsiders. Growing up in this area, I've always longed to live somewhere else, because you know, grass is always greener. But as a sports fan, there is no where else I'd rather be. Now after almost 40 years, the Bruins have a chance to add another trophy to the collection of 6 we've taken home in the past 10 years.




In really unimportant but needs to be addressed news, Kim Media Whore Kardashian is engaged. Why does she have to "sell" everything she does? If it would make her money, I think she would sell her own mother. And because she's just as bad, her mother would collect her 10% manager fee off the sale. As much fun as reality tv can be, the whole "famous with no real talent" thing is starting to become tiresome. Besides what kind of life can you lead when you're lugging around a 20.5 carat boulder on your hand?

This is why it's a tv show and not real life

We are coming to the end of May sweeps, which means my life as a TV fanatic is coming to a close for the summer. As much as I love getting lost in TV, I have a love/hate relationship with the crap these shows try to make me believe. Sometimes I don't know why I continue to watch some of the ridiculous stuff out there.

TV Land: House, the medical drama on Fox. Dr. House is a complete lunatic. Like, should be hospitalized, crazy. He runs around breaking every rule around him, jeopardizing his job as well as the doctors he works with. Nevermind the lives he risks. In every episode, he lies, threatens, cheats and withholds medication to get what he wants. Being a diagnostician, all he cares about is finding out what is wrong with the patient. Not for the patients sake, he'll cut off someone's leg or cut out a piece of someone's brain without much thought. He doesn't care if the patient never walks or talks again, just as long as he gets the right diagnosis.

Real Life: his ass would be fired. 100x over. Hell, he would never have made it out of medical school. Especially if his school realized that he swapped papers with a classmate before the final.

TV Land: Private Practice, drama on ABC. Violet Turner, the ridiculous shrink in the practice. She spends her life making people do what she thinks is right. Not what is best for the patient, what she thinks is best. If people don't agree with her, she shows up at their house, and pretty much annoys the shit out of them (and me) until they do what she wants. Now, when it comes to her and what she does with her life, there is no discussion. She does what she wants. Like leave her child after his traumatic entrance until the world. Or like taking off on a book tour when her medical license gets pulled.

Real Life: Her license would have been in jeopardy long before her recent transgression. There is no way she would have that many friends/colleagues and a loving husband if they realized how much she mind#$&%* everyone around her.

TV Land : General Hospital, daytime soap opera on ABC. 1) don't judge, I was raised by a mother who watched ABC's daytime lineup. Every few years I check back in on GH to see what's happened. DVRing makes catching up easier for sure. 2) I know it's a soap opera and has absolutely no basis in reality. GH is filled with mobsters, car bombings, kidnappings, and murders. Thankfully no aliens and devil possessions on this one.....yet.
The thing that is currently driving me bonkers is the Michael Corinthos storyline. Short story, Michael is the oldest son (19) of Sonny Corthinos, the resident mobster in Port Charles. He does bad things all the time, but always seems to pull in the most beautiful and successful women in town. He also seem to impregnate all of them. Well Michael is struggling with being surrrounded by "the Life" but yet not being able to participate. After serving time in prison for killing someone who kidnapped his mom and baby sister, he now thinks he is the second coming of John Gotti.
So now that his father and godfather won't let him join the family business, this stupid shit is bordering on joining the rivalry mob family in town. Are you kidding me? So everyone is trying to talk him out of it, but is walking on eggshells as not to upset Michael and push him into the arms of the competition. What? He's 19, tell him to STFU and get in line.

Real Life: Seriously? Everyone would be in jail. And Michael wouldn't be such a stupid douche bag.

Oh TV, I still love and support you. Even though you bring nothing but crazies into my home on a daily basis.

Nothing A Little Girls Night Can't Fix

One Weds night, the girls and I went to see Something Borrowed. I had 4 Groupons that were about to expire, so it was a great, cheap option for a weekday night. We went to this great theatre that has tables and all the chairs are bucket seats from old Cadillacs. Plus you can eat and drink there, so it's pretty much the greatest invention of the 20th century. We got a movie, 128oz of Coors Light, popcorn, and dinner for $18 each! Tbag, Little Linds, and Rach had all read the book, so they knew the whole storyline, I was going in blind. But it's a Rom-Com, so I pretty much knew the ending before the previews stopped rolling. You can't really expect too much surprise from a Rom-Com, it's not like it's a M. Night Shyamalan movie, where you will undoubtedly see a major twist. In 99% of RCs, the good girl always gets the good guy, and that's exactly why I love them!

Plus, I am such a fan of Ginnifer Goodwin, mostly because she is the anti-Katherine Heigl.  The best guy friend was played by John Krasinki, who is just so adorable, and perfect in this role. Plus he's married to the British beauty Emily Blunt, who was fabulous in The Devil Wears Prada. Extra points because he's a Boston boy. Of course the big name on the movie was Kate Hudson, but let's be honest, Colin Egglesfield was the main attraction. WOW! 2 thumbs up for the casting department on that one! Seriously, where has he been all this time? I'll tell you where, wasting his and my time in minor, non-leading roles. Which is a miscarriage of justice if you ask me. Yowza.

Anyway, I really enjoyed the movie. A great pick for a girls night out!

Luckily for me, girls nights are fastly becoming a weekly occurrence in my life again. There was a time a few months back where I was barely picking up my phone, nevermind making plans with a gaggle of girls. Just in the last 6 weeks or so, I've finally crawled out of my depressed unemployment hole.

The first month of umemployment was sweet.  It was very much: "who needs work?, I'll stay up late and sleep til noon", ya know, The Good Life. The worst part was when everyone would ask what my plans were, and what did I want to do, blah, blah, leave me alone. Most of the time I knew they meant well, but it became difficult dealing with everyone's constant questioning. Then the 2nd and 3rd months, I hit a wall. Couldn't find jobs that seemed decent, couldn't even get a damn response from potential employers! ugh. I pretty much stopped leaving the house. Not my best look.

So I started this blog. I needed to do something to keep my brain active. As much as being free of work and responsibility can have it's advantages, after awhile, it becomes a painful bore more than anything else. 

Well, now, I got my swagger back! I'm unemployed and I ain't ashamed. I have all the free time in the world and lucky for me, my unemployment checks cover my bills with a little left over to have a life (bc God knows my savings is nonexistent). Now I have plans 3-4 nights a week. Whether it be lunch on a deck when the weather decides to cooperate, or a girls night in with Skinnygirl and playoff games (Bye Celts, hello Bruins).

I'm just trying to make the most of a difficult situation. It certainly doesn't hurt to have girls around who love a cocktail and some gossip as much as me!

Young Adult Until Proven Otherwise

 

Apparently when a book is published under the genre of Young Adult, I, at 29, am not the target audience. Who knew? Because if it belongs on an 11th grader's summer reading list, I'm all over it.

Both the Twilight and Hunger Games series had me from the first hint of a love triangle and a slight sense of Sci-Fi. *Prior to '08 if someone had suggested Sci-fi, the daggers coming from my eyes would have caused serious damage* Evidently, these books are geared toward the 12-18 set. Pish Posh, I tear through these pups like it's my job. Sadly it's not.

Sharing my love of YA books is my amazing friend, K-loko. She is me in blonde, Polish, pint-sized, crazy type A form. She takes the world by the balls on a daily basis, whereas I like to let the world come to me (that success rate discussion is for another day). Having passed on Twi to her and she returning the favor with HG, we decided to start our own little book club. We are always a book or 2 ahead of each other so we figured it would be more fun to read together. So far, not so good.

Our first selection,

Mothers Make The World Go 'Round

PS and I (and Chin, our Sher Pai, RIP) 1983

Everyone has a mother. Not everyone has a great mother, which is a damn shame. I am blessed to have an absolute, without a doubt, accepting, loving, caring, funny, supportive and non-judgemental mother.
I really hit the mother jackpot with PS. Although she believes, and routinely suggests, that I don't appreciate her, I 100% do. My mother is a big "actions speak louder than words" kinda lady, so accordingly, taking out the trash and doing the dishes expresses love more than "I Love You". I, however, am not a subscriber to that school of thought, but that's neither here nor there. Even when she drives me crazy, I do not know what I would do without my mother. She has been a single mother getting shit done my whole life, and she deserves a GD medal for putting up with my shit for 29 years.

Even with the fact that she has not spoken to me in 20 days

A wedding and a funeral

This has been the craziest weekend! I have spent many, MANY hours watching, rewatching and recording every damn thing about the wedding of Wills and Kate! So fun, so exciting, so tiring.  LOVED it.

Can we talk about the ensemble, please? I really like the dress. Loved the lace. Loved the sleeves (not that she had a choice), loved the tiara and earrings. I was hoping for a little more drama with the train,