My ranking of the Wiggles characters in order from least tolerable to still not tolerable but more tolerable than the previous

Jeff
Murray
Dorothy the Dinosaur
Henry the Octopus
That pirate in Captain Feathersword's crew who has the wine corks hanging from his hat who has facial tics
Wags the Dog
Greg
Captain Feathersword
The rest of the pirates
Anthony

It's been a while
Since I posted about Bad Lady. She and I are getting along much better these days, but she still grates on my every last nerve. So she hasn't had much to do, and has been asking me for work. I've been giving her minor stuff that I know she can't eff up too bad.

She just called over to me and said, "So you know Sandy* whose business card you just had me do? She said she wants 'more options.' I don't DO 'more options.'"

"Dude, what ELSE do you have to do?" I asked. Maybe I didn't say dude. But I do say dude sometimes. I shouldn't.

"Stuff." Her witty retort.

"*exasperated sigh*"

Strange conditions
Date: August 20, 2007
Time: 12:08 p.m.
Current temperature: 60 degrees Farenheit
Current weather: Monsoon-like conditions

Likelihood I will not get wet at Pete/Dave concert tonight: zero

Who'da thunk?

Mystery Pic

Going through some old photos. I came across this one... made me laugh.


What's going on in this pic? Take a closer look...

Stormy weather
We've had rain on and off all week and last evening, we had a pretty nasty storm. Around 6:30, the power went out.

Try explaining to a 2-year-old why you cannot oblige his command for "lights on," or why the compelling episode of "Blue's Clues" has suddenly vanished off the TV.

We were without power for 45 minutes. But I swear it was more like 45 years.

Paranoid. Must. Shop.
Instead of the usual physical issues that go along with "that time of the month" for most women, I come down with mental issues. For instance, I always get an extreme paranoia about the other girls I work with -- that they are talking about me behind my back, that I'm being scrutinized at my job, etc.

Today is that day.

Add the fact that Doodle threw the most pathetic and heartwrenching tantrum this morning when I left him (read: abandoned) (read: I'm a horrible mom) at day care, and I've become a total train wreck.

My remedy? Go shoe shopping at lunch.

Unfortunately nothing struck my fancy, but somehow $60 worth of Bath and Body Works ended up coming back to work with me. I have no idea how that happened. I remember nothing.

Lolcats
I made my first lolcat pic... I ish ashamed for myself. Someone needs to give me some work to do.

Lucinda (a.k.a. "Unks")
We have really nice neighborhood cats.

You may remember my post about Walter, the kitty who stole my heart a few weeks ago. I am sorry to say that Walter has not made a return visit.

However, over the past week, another kitty has been sighted in our yard -- a smaller, female tortie who I have dubbed Lucinda. She likes to hang out by our non-grape grape arbor in the backyard. I saw her a few nights ago and went out to see if she was friendly. She mewed and approached me for some lovin'. Then she went back about her business of chillin' at the grapeless arbor.

Last evening after dinner I took Doodle outside, despite the nearly unbearable humidity, and Lucinda materialized and took a distant post to observe us.

"Unks!" shouted Doodle, for this is what he calls Uncle Dom, and also Aunt Peepers. "No, that's not Unks, it's another kitty," I told him. "Hi Unks," Doodle said.

Lucinda timidly approached us, and then rubbed on both me and Doodle for some attention. After she had her fill, she playfully flopped down in the grass. "Unks sleeping," Doodle told me, and he proceeded to also lay in the grass.

She hung around for the remainder of the time we were outside, until I finally decided it was time to go in and take a bath and get ready for bed. "Bye Unks!" Doodle said.

I find it very interesting, and odd, that two cats who are total strangers to Doodle and to my family have paid that child more attention than the two who live with him every day. You know, Unks and Unks.

Parking: $9
Admission ticket to park: $20
Confidence boost: Priceless

If you have any body or confidence issues whatsoever, I have a cure for you. When you look in the mirror and don't like what you see, or if you're feeling miserable about your life in general, it's time to take a field trip. Get a friend, preferably one with a great sense of humor. Drive to your local amusement park. Make a day of it, or just purchase a starlight admission -- most parks discount the fare after 5 p.m.

This worked for me this weekend. My husband and I decided to visit Geauga Lake, an amusement park close to where we live. It's a pretty decent park, but it's no Cedar Point.

Before we even purchased our admission tickets, I thanked my husband for taking me. I felt like Miss America walking into the park. It was an eye-opening experience, to say the least. I saw people in clothes several sizes to small, things bulging out of places from which I did not know things could bulge, people with fewer teeth than my son, bathing suits that creeped and crawled into folds of skin.

Once inside the park, we enjoyed ourselves, despite coming off each roller coaster with a feeling of "we're definitely too old for this." The night before, we had gone on a bike ride, after recently having our bixes fixed. I haven't been on a bike in at least 5 years, maybe more, and it showed. When I got off the bike, I could barely walk. My tailbone in particular was bothering me. So riding roller coasters the next day? Not a big help. The old wooden coasters tossed us around and my poor petuttie was aching. The Big Dipper, which is Ohio's oldest coaster at the ripe old age of 82, was a killer. Both my husband and I have battle scars from that ride. Mine is a huge, grape jelly-colored bruise on my hipbone. Seriously, I have never had a bruise this color. I'm not sure that I'll be able to reproduce after the jostling my insides got. Sorry, Doodle.

We also escaped peril by mere minutes. We were in line for the Double Loop, another one of the older coasters, and they had loaded the car ahead of us. We were next in line to go. Without warning or apparent reason, the ride operators, most of which were not U.S. natives, by the way, shut the ride down, citing mechanical failure, and apologized for the inconvenience. I bolted away from that ride faster than you can say class action lawsuit.

After about 2 1/2 hours, we had had enough. We rode everything we wanted to ride (Double Loop and a second closed-down coaster notwithstanding), we saw a little slice of Americana, and we felt good about ourselves and our lot in life.

It was time and money well spent.