Aw Paddington

I finally got around to watching the first Paddington movie last night. I don't know what made me stop at the Redbox and grab that movie...ok..I do..Peter Capaldi was in it.

Either way the movie was super cute.

Hugh Bonneville is just great as a normal dad...and the hippie biker scene...OMG so funny. Its hard to see him in rolls other than Lord Grantham though.

Nicole Kidman pulls off evil pretty well too.

Then there's Peter Capaldi's Mr. Curry.  Aw.....especially when he falls for Millicent. I saw a lot of the 12th Doctor in Mr. Curry. A bit of a curmudgeon, a little silly, a little geeky, but oddly lovable.

The animated Paddington was superb. He looked almost real. Well, if real bears wore hats and coats.

I liked that for the most part the movie was light hearted. I'm not a fan of too much drama in family films like this.

There's always a sad bit, but it wasn't too traumatizing. (You know, like UP!)

This was just a good movie for anyone to watch..and now I want to see the sequel.

An Eventful 2 Weeks

Well, there's been a lot going on in the last few week and it all involves Mokey.

The little stinker ended up back at the vet. He still won't eat what he's supposed to,which makes it hard for those crystals to dissolve and dear god, I can't afford for him to get blocked again.

Last Friday he seemed a bit better...and he got to chewing on the Christmas tree.

Yeah.

Remember National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation?

Thankfully he didn't hurt himself, but while we tried to disengage him from the Christmas tree lights, he BIT ME!

My mild mannered, slightly deranged cat, BIT ME!

I had to go to the vet the next day for his meds and then off to Medexpress

At least today my hand more resembles a hand, which is a good thing.

Here's hoping Mokey stays out of trouble for awhile.

And It All Went To Hell

So things were nice up until Christmas Eve.

I have cookies made. All the shopping was done. The house was decorated and quite pretty.

Then Mokey got sick.

5 hours in the Animal ER on Christmas Eve, with an estimate that made me nauseous. Mokey was cathed and unblocked, but had to stay 2 more days for observation.

Yeah...so much for getting rid of debt in the new year. Boo to the hiss.

He's now on a special diet, and I'm trying to wean my other kitties away from eating in a grazing manner.

This is not making them happy at all.

The bill is not making me happy.

No matter how hard I work to make a holiday nice, things always get fucked up.

My Trees

This is our pretty little 6 ft tree in our living room

Most of the ornaments on this tree came from Dollar General and Dollar Tree.

Hey, I have cats, I don't want things that break.

As I'm sure you can see, I love owls...well...little birdies in general.

I love this tree.

The next tree is my little 4 ft silver tree, in my dining room.

I bought this little tree in 2013 when my dad was put on hospice. It was a crazy year, and we didn't have a regular tree that year.

This little one sat in the corner.

Its a more playful tree.

Its precious and I love it.

I only hope the kitties don't try to kill it.

That's why I have created a cookie container barrier around it.

Yes, those are all my Christmas cookies stored there.

Mike..get a box..come get some! You too Bill :)

Cookies Cookies Cookies

I'm not doing to well on the cookie haul this year. I'm not sure why. Maybe because I'm just so darn tired.

All I want for Christmas is to sleep on a bed for a few hours.

That said...

I've got

2 different kinds of biscotti made, Andes Candies Cookies (which are a fabulous cake mix cookie), coconut macaroons and I've got holiday shortbread in the fridge ready to be baked.

I just wish I didn't have to cook supper and deal with that sort of thing right now. Maybe I'd be a little further along with my baking.

At least they look pretty, right?

Well I Accomplished Something

Its a week before Christmas and all through the house.

Nothing is getting done.

The only thing that I managed to do today was bake 2 different kinds of biscoti.

How exciting is that?

Tomorrow's cookies will be Russian Tea Cookies and Spritz

Yes, the cookie craziness has begun.

I wish I knew why I did this.

Norman Lear Comedies Weren't All That Funny

Thanks to Antenna TV, I've been revisiting old shows that I watched growing up. One of them is One Day At A Time.

The episode on tonight is with Mrs Romano having a fling with a married man.

I'm baffled that an affair is considered funny.

Yes its a real life issue, but it makes you wonder. Ann was supposed to have been a divorcee whose husband cheated on her.

Makes you wonder.

I've always considered cheating to be pretty despicable. Nothing funny about it.

That's how I feel about most of Norman Lear's shows, especially All In The Family, which actually disturbs me these days. Sure there are laughs, but most of the "issues" are sadly still relevant now, which makes me sick to my stomach.

How can we, as a society not have changed much in the last 40 years?

So yeah, I need something more lighthearted than anything Lear did. I need something funny like Bewitched

An Early Christmas Present

Well today I bought a new laptop. I'll be picking it up at Staples tomorrow.

This comes after my external fell off my desk and hit the floor.

Can you say deader than spam.

The computer is half dead. (the clock doesn't work. Don't ask. I have no clue)

So I figured, even though I'm not financially at my best, now was the best time to replace the laptop. You know, before it totally dies.

Hopefully after this, I won't have any further HUGE issues.

HA!

A Little Kitty Humor

Admit it, you sang it as you read it!

OK, well, I did.

The Tree Is Done

I'm always happy when the tree is up.

I think it looks pretty nice this year.

I'll be doing a small silver tree in the dining room next week.

But the house is really looking festive.

I can't wait to get to baking. That will start next weekend too.

Scratty Went To The Vet Today

Scratty got her shots and all her happy bloodwork and poopy check today.

Such fun.

Scratty is much for the unknown, be it situations or people. In fact, Scratty hates strangers. So yeah, the poor baby had to wear a muzzle, because we don't want her biting Dr. Greg, who is a pretty awesome vet.

She seemed to know where she was going the second she got inside the building. She didn't want to go into the lobby at all.

Then there was Grizzly.

Grizzly was another dog about the size of the animal whose name he shared.

Yeah.

He was a happy dog too.

She was mostly ok with the vet tech, but Dr Greg, being a man, and those are the strangers she likes the least, well, she was all tooth baring crazy dog from hell.

The good thing was that by the time everything was done, she was too pooped to pop or rather bark at anyone else.

All in all, things went well.

No one got bit.

YAY

Mom's Birthday Cake

Mom would have been ok with a Pepperidge Farm cake, but I found one of her old cookbooks and there was a fabulous recipe for a Mandarin Orange Cake..

Isn't it stunning.

It was also very simple

One of My favorite songs

Hallelujah is one of my all time favorite songs. A friend posted Bon Jovi's version today on Facebook.

Believe it or not, I've never heard his version before.



I think he did a damn good job with it.

Now if only Elvis Costello or his wife, Ms Diana Krall would cover it.

The Daddy Birds

A few years ago I started to collect little bird figurines with ear flap hats.

Why?

My dad had this horrible ugly hat with ear flaps that he wore every winter. It was navy blue with plaid lining.

Dear god was it ugly.

But every time I see a hat like that, I think of my Daddy.

Hence, Daddy Birds.

I love them, because they make me think of him.

They also seem to hide every year and I have to go through ever bin of decorations that I have to find them.

Sneaky little birds.

Things I Don't Understand.

I don't understand all the hate in the world. I watch the news and I try to understand. There are always going to be different belief systems when it comes to politics.

At one point in time I could understand both parties.

These days, not so much.

I understand not wanting the country in debt.

I don't understand not wanting healthcare for all Americans.

I don't understand people that think it would be awful for their children and their children's children to have cheaper college educations. Just because you are saddled with debt doesn't mean the upcoming generations need to be. The more educated we are, the more jobs and new ideas there will be.

I don't understand people that don't read. Books are such a fabulous thing and so much better than most TV and movies these days.

I don't understand hatred of one particular group of people.

I do however understand how instilling fear can cause that to happen.

I don't understand how we can let the fear take over our lives and in all actuality let the terrorists win. There's a fine line between making things safe and making things a prison.

Its a sad world we live in.

I Accomplished Much Today

I have Christmas decorations up, well most of them.

Woo hoo!

The tree will go up next weekend when I'm not running like a fool to get stupid things done.

I'm proud of myself.

I'll get some pictures in the next day or so, when I've found all the decorations that I want up.

I even have the outside done, which is amazing considering that we have no outdoor outlets.

At least the house is looking festive now, which is better than nothing, right?

I need to give up Facebook

Facebook is the devil.

I got started there because of a friend that played one of those stupid farm games.  I've made some wonderful friends there, but Facebook is detrimental to my health.

Why you ask?

I have a tendency to read comments.

On political posts and recipe posts.

That is enough to make anyone's head explode.

Not to mention those time sucking games. The are freaking addicting. I really want to increase my reading next year. I am at 100 books so far this year. I'd really like to go for 200 next year, and I think the only way to do that is to abandon Facebook.

Plus it would be nice to get back to more regular blogging.

Where Has The Month Gone

Gah, I only posted 1 time in the month of Nov? Tomorrow is Dec 1.

Is my life that boring?

Yes, I do think so.

I watch classic telly, read lots of books and am generally a miserable human.

Yup, so that's why there's no blog posts lately.

I really need to find a reason to get back into blogging.

Can anyone lend a hand?

Welcome To The Holidays

So Halloween is over and it is officially Christmas. The hell with the turkey, just buy a lot of presents.

Well, I'm broke.

They only care about how much people can consume.

More suicides happen over the holidays ....

I can't imagine why?

Its supposed to be the happiest season of all, right?

Well if you are lonely and your family is dwindling or far away...what happiness is there?

Hallmark plays Christmas movies from Nov 1  through Christmas about finding love. To that I say BAH! but without the humbug.

I just want a pretty house, some nice cookies to eat..and minimal drama. (By that, I mean as little time with my sister and her family as possible)

I want scaled down meals, because we end up wasting so much because there are only about 8 people max at my home for any holiday.

I'm 43, I don't need presents to keep me happy, though if anyone wants to buy a book or CD off my amazon wishlist..have at it. I never turn down good books or music. But I have a hard time imagining people spending thousands of dollars on one holiday.  It just doesn't seem right.

24 hours.

It doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me.

When those 24 hours are over....the let down is really hard.

And don't get me started on the car commercials, cos I'm never getting a Lexus with a big ole bow on it in my driveway for any holiday.

I'm Depressed

I was feeling  more than a little blue today.

I miss my Dewey.

I know there are other kitties in my house that need love, and I love them all so much, but the loss of my Dewey hurts more than I thought.

I mean, this hurts like losing a family member. She was my baby. I fell in love with this little ball of fluff from the moment she wandered into my yard.

Then as I was leaving work, Tom Petty's The Waiting was on the radio.

I thought David Bowie's death hurt, but dammit, Tom Petty's death is much more painful. I think he was one of the artists I listened to when I was barely old enough to care about music. Tom Petty, The Beatles and The Monkees.

I still feel like part of my life has been torn away.

Today everything felt a little more heavy on my heart.