Superglue and Puzzles...

I've done some puzzles in my day. I've even done a couple of those 3-D suckers, and they were fun.

However, the most convoluted puzzles are the ones that you have to figure out when you break something.

Mamaw sent a blender with me, because she doesn't use it and I was whining about not having one to make margaritas with for New Years.

I was putting it away when I dropped the base. At least it wasn't the pitcher.

It broke the back of the casing, down into the recess where the pitcher sits, but I tested it and it still runs.

So, I'm trying to glue it all back together, but the way it broke, the pieces all have to go inside and under, and it's a bit frustrating. I had to break out two pieces that I had glued in because I didn't have enough room to get another piece in.

My fingers are covered in superglue.

But, I have a tequila and Dr Pepper that I'm sipping my way through as I work on it. And, back episodes of ER on the DVR.

When I'm finished, or when I get everything done that I can without having to let the glue dry overnight, I'm going to go take a nice hot shower and use the lavender Egyptian Cotton towels that Mamaw bought me, put on my silk pajamas, and curl up with the remote and the rest of my shows.

Tomorrow, I'll clean and prepare for having anywhere from two to four guests for New Year's Eve. In a one bedroom apartment.

Whoever gets here first gets to claim the couch. Everyone else can paper rock scissors for which stretch of floor they want... I might wind up with someone on the floor of my bedroom.... A couple of the guys are big boys, and there really isn't that much floor space.

Guess I'll have to put away the whips, chains, and body oils......

If A Tree Falls In The Living Room, And No One Is Awake To Hear It.....

Is the cat still to blame?

I've been camping out at the Older Homestead (Mamaw's house) for the last few days, since she bribed me with ill-gotten gains she brought back from the Choctaw Casino in Oklahoma.

Yesterday afternoon, we finally got the Christmas tree put up. Yesterday evening, the Nephews came over and helped me decorate it. Elder Nephew actually did most of the decorating, and directed me in the rest, but Younger Nephew did his bit.

Do you have any idea how cute it is when a one year old boy toddles across a room with a Christmas ball to stand by his aunt's feet and very solemnly lay the ball on the lowest bough, cock his head and look at it, and then look up for approval? He got a big hug and kisses and told how fabulous he was, that is, until Elder Nephew decided enough was enough and tugged on my pant leg to ask me to lift him up so he could reach the taller parts of the tree.

We had a blast, the tree looked like a one year old and a four year old had been in charge of decorating it (those ones look the best anyway) and everyone was happy.

Except, apparently, the cat. Mamaw was glad she had to pee before she came into the dining room this morning, which caused her to take a different route than she might have otherwise. The tree had "mysteriously" fallen in front of the door from her bedroom to the living room.

If she hadn't needed the girls' room, I might have been having to pick her up as well as the danged tree.

Thank goodness we invested in the unbreakable plastic decorations when Eldest Nephew was just toddling around.... we never would have gotten all the glass out of the carpet.

I'm also pretty thankful that it's a fake tree, otherwise it might have been ruined.... I'm never entirely happy with the fake tree, I love the smell of a real tree, but I can't be around them. I'm miserably allergic, which we discovered when I was small. As long as the tree is alive, I'm fine. I'm even ok when it's fairly fresh, but when it starts drying out, even being in the same house with it causes my nose to plug, my eyes to swell, my stomach to become upset, and strange itchy rashes to pop up.

I know that I shouldn't get rashes unless I touch it, but I do, even if I don't know why.

My high school insisted on getting a real tree for years and putting it in the lobby where I had to walk by it, even though I stormed the office every year for three years to complain. The fourth year I just let it go. The fifth year (our high school and junior high were in the same building) I sat in the hallway just off the lobby for an hour before I stormed the office. The office workers and the principal walked by me a few times, so they knew exactly where I sat. When I walked in with my eyes red and swollen enough to be easily noticeable, used half a box of tissues to blow my nose, showed the rash on my arms and threatened to puke on the principal's shoes, they decided it might be a good idea to have a fake tree. For one year.

There's more than one reason I avoid claiming that high school whenever I can.


On another note... I'm back at the apartment now, to do some straightening up and stuff before the holiday, because I won't have time afterwards before company comes.

Five days at Mamaw's... my TV looks dinky after the fifty inch HD flat panel. My tree always looked dinky- it's only three feet tall, after all.

Congratulations E!!!

Got a call from E today, he had some news.

Seems he checked his voicemail down here, and he had a message from Del. This, of course, sent Ed into a panic. He thought he'd failed his Speech final.

Turns out there was someone looking for E, and Del was passing on the message.

As soon as E gets back, he'll be employed on a local ranch. And training cutting horses. I'm so happy for him, it's a sweet set up. He'll have a house on the ranch, and he'll be able to show, which is what he's been working towards.

I guess the ranch owner (who's family has trained some pretty spiffy cutting horses in the past, I'm not up on their recent work, but they go way back with my family, cutting for fun and buying horses from us) has heard so much good about E that when he needed a hand, he went looking for good ol' E himself.

He was vibrating on the phone, he's so happy about this. And I'm just as happy for him.

Congratulations, E. No one deserves a break more.

He Stole My Line!

Tuned into the NFR tonight (after straightening myself out on the actual air time, one in the morning is a replay of round nine on ESPN2, round ten was at seven on ESPN) only to hear one of the announcers totally gank my Superbowl line.

Now, I admit, it could be a coincidence. It was, after all, a rather apt comparison.

But, I don't really buy the whole coincidence thing. Especially when not believing in coincidences means that I was quoted at the beginning of the most gut-wrenching, suspense filled night in professional rodeo.

Admit it, Announcer Guy! You stole my line! Own up to your theft and get me tickets for next year's NFR, and all shall be forgiven.

And, if you pay for my hotel too, I'll throw in a blog post on the psycho gate habits of barrel horses, and why Molly Powell flipped her right rein up over her horse's head for barrels two and three.

No, really, I've probably got about a thousand words just on the gate thing. Course, once I revise so that I'm not calling them some variation of psychotic in every other sentence it might be less, but it's total quality!

NFR!!!!

I forgot....

YEEEEEEEHAWWWWW!!!!

National Finals Rodeo Round Nine is tonight. Round Ten is tomorrow night/Sunday morning. Technically here in Colorado it starts at one in the morning on Sunday.

Depending on how exciting tonight is, I might just have to stay up and watch it live, anyway.

For those of you who don't understand what National Finals Rodeo is, all of the rodeo cowboys and cowgirls in the country fight tooth and nail to qualify for NFR. It's the top competitors in Bareback Bronc Riding, Saddle Bronc Riding, Steer Wrestling, Team Roping, Barrel Racing, Tie Down Roping, and Bull Riding, all competing for ten days straight, night after night, and against the best stock in the country for the right to be called the best in the country.

The top earning cowboy will break $400,000 for the year in prize money, even if he doesn't win the buckle in any of his events.

There are cowboys who have three events a night, at least one of them usually rough stock (bronc or bull riding) and there are a lot of injuries. They're all competing anyway. (And they wonder where the phrase "Cowboy up" came from....)

It's the pinnacle of the rodeo year. It's the Superbowl, except instead of playing one game, you play ten, one every night, and the other team (being the critters) gets to physically beat the crap out of you over and over again.... And you don't even have the satisfaction of thinking that they're just as tired as you are because they get rotated out.

It's so great!

Now, That's Just Weird...

Ya'll may remember my post here about how I tripped on the stairs in the lecture hall. Well, the touch tenderness is finally pretty much gone... it hasn't been bad for a couple of weeks but the bruise was still present and it was still tender when I pressed on it.

I had honestly kind of forgotten about it, until I thought tonight to check the bruise and see if it was gone yet.

Got to poking around... and I have a dent.

An honest-to-goodness crease in my kneecap.

WTH??

I never thought you could dent your body! Even with my rather spectacular acts of clumsiness I've never managed to leave a dent before!

What am I supposed to do about this?? Sand off the paint and smear some Bondo in there?!?

It doesn't hurt... the patella is still in one piece, it won't flex no matter what pressure I put on it at whatever angle, and everything seems to work just as well as it did before it happened.

So, to my medical readers... Should I be worried? I mean, is this something I should get checked out? Since it doesn't seem to be causing any problems I would really rather not have the doctor's bill, if I don't have to. However I'm not medical enough to know if this is likely to cause a real problem, or if there's anything that can be done about it at this point anyway.

Besides, I'm curious to see if anyone has heard of this before. If I'm much of a medical oddity maybe it can make me some money....

A girl's gotta eat, ya know.

New Perspective

Thanks to OK Katrina for slapping me upside the head with a realization.

Katrina mentioned Monkey, which got me thinking.

It's a training issue. I have to train myself not to smoke.

And, in training, you build upon the previous lessons.

You don't take a horse that's never seen cattle and expect them to do a perfect cut right away.

You break it down into steps, work on each small step until it's easy for the horse, and then move on to the next.

I started to do that, by cutting back on my smoking, but I wasn't cut back enough to go to cold turkey when I ran out of cigarettes. I had my horse loping on the proper lead, and then asked it to run 13 second barrels. It just doesn't work that way.

And, in case of training failure, you back up, go back to the basics, and build from there.

So, I'm backing up.

I bought a pack of cigarettes, and I'm going back to the cutting back stage. I bought menthols, because, frankly, they're disgusting to me, and that makes it easier to resist.

The cigarettes are on the top shelf of the pantry, far enough back that they're difficult to reach. The lighter is in the junk drawer. The ashtrays are over the stove.

I have to expend effort to get a cigarette, but I'm not going to expect myself to be perfect right away anymore.

I had been thinking of this as just a matter of making myself do it, and do it now.

Thanks again, OK Katrina, for reminding me of what I should have remembered myself.

So. Re-training, Day One. It's going to be a long road, but patience will get me there faster than force, I think.