Relax...I'm still here

Man, I have been horrible about blogging in the last few weeks. I'm sorry to anyone who actually reads this garbage. :) I have been extremely busy with work, but mostly I haven't blogged because I haven't had much to say as of late. I feel like I am in a rut...or just a never ending cycle of work, sleep, eat, work, sleep, eat, etc. I will be in San Antonio on Monday to help my mother start sorting through Granny's clothing. It's going to be an emotional nightmare. I wish I had a more exciting life to share. I might just have stir something up soon! :) As a side note, I am ready for college football season to begin! Austin, which is always fun, is just rockin' when the Horns play. I am hell-bent on actually attending a game this season.

Ann Coulter quotes (*GAG*)

• "If you don't hate Bill Clinton and the people who labored to keep him in office, you don't love your country."
• "Liberals love America like O.J. loved Nicole."
• "In this recurring nightmare of a presidency [the Clinton administration], we have a national debate about whether he 'did it,' even though all sentient people know he did. Otherwise there would be debates only about whether to impeach or assassinate."
• "I think we ought to nuke North Korea right now just to give the rest of the world a warning. ... They’re a major threat. I just think it would be fun to nuke them and have it be a warning to the rest of the world."
• "I think [calling Clinton a scumbag] is factually correct. ... I don't think you could win a slander suit on that. Truth is a defense."
• "When contemplating college liberals, you really regret once again that John Walker is not getting the death penalty. We need to execute people like John Walker in order to physically intimidate liberals, by making them realize that they can be killed, too. Otherwise, they will turn out to be outright traitors."
• "There are no good Democrats."
• "I take the Biblical idea. God gave us the earth. We have dominion over the plants, the animals, the trees God says, 'Earth is yours. Take it. Rape it. It's yours.'"
• "I think, on the basis of the recent Supreme Court ruling that we can't execute the retarded, American journalists commit mass murder without facing the ultimate penalty. I think they are retarded."
• "My only regret with Timothy McVeigh is he did not go to the New York Times Building."
• "Whether they are defending the Soviet Union or bleating for Saddam Hussein, liberals are always against America. They are either traitors or idiots, and on the matter of America's self-preservation, the difference is irrelevant."
• "Even if corners were cut, [Iran-Contra] was a brilliant scheme. There is no possibility that anyone in any Democratic administration would have gone to such lengths to fund anti-Communist forces. When Democrats scheme from the White House, it's to cover up the President's affair with an intern. When Republicans scheme, it's to support embattled anti-Communist freedom fighters sold out by the Democrats."
• "[Canadians] better hope the United States doesn't roll over one night and crush them. They are lucky we allow them to exist on the same continent."
• "A central component of liberal hate speech is to make paranoid accusations based on their own neurotic impulses, such as calling Republicans angry, hate-filled, and mean."
• "[Liberals] are always accusing us of repressing their speech. I say let's do it. Let's repress them. ... Frankly, I'm not a big fan of the First Amendment."
• "I think the government should be spying on all Arabs, engaging in torture as a televised spectator sport, dropping daisy cutters wantonly throughout the Middle East, and sending liberals to Guantanamo."

If I Only Had More Time...

I have been SLAMMED busy lately -- both personally and professionally -- but there have been several items floating around in the news world that I wish I had time to blog about. Here's the short list:

• The Pavlov-like reactions of Bush's base on gay marriage.
• All the reasons Ann Coulter (a.k.a. nasty cunt bitch) offends me as a woman.
• If I vote for Kinky, am I throwing my vote away?
• Is being called 'photogenic' really a back-handed compliment?
• Why Sen. Joe Biden is my man in '08.

I am in the process of switching offices which entails a lot of paperwork and marketing material updates. It's such a pain in the ass, I wonder if it's really worth it!

I hosted a big family BBQ/baby shower for a cousin who is pregnant with twin boys (!!), and we attended my firm's company picnic on Saturday. Both went beautifully, but it's nice to be back in a silent house! Now it's back to work, work, work.

I promise to do better blogging, and do less excuse making on why I'm not blogging! I hope all is well in your world.

Heart-shaped face...blah

Okay...here is a smiling photo of me taken today.

**CHEESE!!**

Am I just critical and paranoid or do you think I could pass as the love child of Jay Leno? Damnit, look at that pointy chin. I could do some damage with that thing!

Alright, enough silly photos of me. Back to the serious business at hand...

Serious Boredom

I have been playing around with my Corel Photo Paint thingie. Anyway, this is a result of massive boredom while hubby has been away on business.

I look like such an expressionless, zombie with a fat face! Ugghh. Oh well, there is something void and haunting about it. Someone recently pointed out to me that I haven't been smiling in any photos in the past few months. I will try to dig up some happy, smiley photos of me.

I'm the Flanders Mare!

I don't know about the rest of you, dear readers, but I get slammed with several pointless, silly quizzes everyday online. Today, I was finally sent something that was a bit more high-brow.

Which wife of Henry VIII are you?

I admit to being a bit of an English/Royalty/Tudor history nerd, so I enjoyed it. I was disappointed that I wasn't Anne Boleyn (Elizabeth I's mom). Oh well, at least I am a wife that kept her head! Here are my results:

I AM ANNA OF CLEVES:

Sensible, comfort loving and practical. Not afraid to wear ugly shoes on a date.

Anna of Cleves got the royal shaft. She came all the way to England to become the fourth wife of Henry VIII. Once married to Anna, he refused to consummate the marriage, and called her the "Flanders Mare." Talk about a burn, considering that by this time, Henry was the fattest man in England and had a rotting syphilis sore on his leg.

Anna was miffed, but she was too sensible to let it ruin her fun. She was given an annulment and a fat yearly allowance, and she threw extravagant parties and dined on delicacies for the rest of her life.

Vacation Snapshots I

The view of the Jefferson Memorial from the FDR Memorial @ sunset.

The National Cathedral

The Potomac River @ sunset

Lincoln Memorial

Now in His Field of Dreams...

I have been missing my dad terribly again. He died suddenly in October – the day after my two-year wedding anniversary. I vividly remember everything about that day leading up to the 8 PM call that he was gone. When I heard the news, I felt nothing. I blanked out. It’s still a mystery to me as to why I just went into a zombie-like mode. I didn’t truly cry until his “baseball funeral” a week later.

My dad was a baseball man. Since returning from his two tours of duty in Vietnam (1971), he worked in the front office of minor league baseball. He spent the vast majority of his career working as a General Manager, and it took him all over the country – Midland, TX; Danville, IL; Montgomery, AL; Newburg, NY; Tupelo, MS; Beaumont, TX; somewhere up in Massachusetts and finally to Edinburg, TX. I am sure I am leaving out a few places. It was difficult for me to keep up with his location most of the time. Sometimes every new season brought a new team and a new city.

I was born in Montgomery, Alabama (but moved to Texas when I was 6-weeks old) when he was the General Manager for the Montgomery Rebels; a Triple A team in the Tigers organization. At the time, my parents were younger than I am right now. I am an only child, and I always felt a burden being the daughter and only child of a sports man. He never told me such, but I always believed he was disappointed that I wasn’t a boy. So even as a little girl I tried to compensate and appease him in that department.

Since my parents divorced when I was still a baby, my dad got me every summer. I remember asking my mom to take me to the public library so I could check out baseball history and stats books. I would memorize as much trivia as my 7-year old brain could hold, just so I could impress the baseball fat cats that hung around my dad during the season. Dad would beam with pride as I recited off Cobb and DiMaggio stats. He would have me list off every baseball team in each league and have me also cite what city, state, name of the stadium, etc. Looking back on it now, I must have seemed like nothing more than a dancing monkey with a bow in my hair to these men. I just lived to see my dad brag about me though.

Naturally, given his profession, I grew-up in ballparks. Baseball is in my blood and in my family tree. My only paternal cousin also plays minor league ball in Florida. I have attended more games than anyone else I know. I love the smell of the leather gloves, the crack of the bat, sitting off to myself before the crowd is let in and watching batting practice and warm-ups. I look back fondly on the summers in high school and college when I worked as my dad’s assistant. The experiences I had and the characters I met I will never forget.

I’m sorry. I know I am just rambling, but I can’t seem to get him out of my mind lately.

I am grateful that he died a quick and painless death (pulmonary embolism). I am grateful that he died at the ballpark – the place he loved more than anywhere else. I am grateful that we had repaired some rocky spots in our relationship. I am grateful that he lived to see me get married. I am grateful that he lived to see me grow into a smart, strong woman. And I am most especially grateful that he taught me the love of baseball. I am sure that may sound silly since it just a game, but it’s all we had between us.

There are so many things I am grateful for, but a few things I am also haunted by. I hate that he died on the night the Astros got swept in the World Series. The Astros were our team. Ever since I was a kid we would joke that the Astros would never go to the Series. And then it actually happened and we were so excited. He called me almost every day in the two weeks leading up to his death – which was highly unusual. The last phone call we had was during Game 4. We watched last few innings of the game together on the phone.

I haven’t been able to watch or attend a baseball game since his death.

I hate that he won’t get to see his future grandchildren. He was one of those men that lacked in the fatherhood department, but would have been an awesome grandfather. I am sure I will cry the first time I take my own child to their first ball game. That would have been something I would have wanted my dad to do with them.

Two days after he died, hubby and I went down to the Valley to meet up with my uncle and start the horrible process of settling my dad’s affairs. On Halloween night, his team threw a memorial service at the stadium, and I finally allowed myself to get emotional. Even though he had been with that team for several years, it was the first time I was getting to meet all the people he had told me so much about. To my surprise, they knew everything about me as well.

Anyway, I have no idea if there is an afterlife or not, but I’ve always thought that “heaven” would be customized to every individual. I hope I am right. I hope my dad is sitting in a big leather club chair and talking shop with all the greats he loved so much…Ruth, Mantle, DiMaggio, Cobb, Gehrig.

Ugghh, I need sleep. This was rambling and dreadfully written, but I just needed to get all of this off of me and send it out into the void of cyberspace.

Quote of the Day: "Church of Baseball"

I believe in the Church of Baseball. I've tried all the major religions, and most of the minor ones. I've worshipped Buddha, Allah, Brahma, Vishnu, Siva, trees, mushrooms, and Isadora Duncan. I know things. For instance, there are 108 beads in a Catholic rosary and there are 108 stitches in a baseball. When I heard that, I gave Jesus a chance. But it just didn't work out between us. The Lord laid too much guilt on me. I prefer metaphysics to theology. You see, there's no guilt in baseball, and it's never boring... which makes it like sex. There's never been a ballplayer slept with me who didn't have the best year of his career. Making love is like hitting a baseball: you just gotta relax and concentrate. Besides, I'd never sleep with a player hitting under .250... not unless he had a lot of RBIs and was a great glove man up the middle. You see, there's a certain amount of life wisdom I give these boys. I can expand their minds. Sometimes when I've got a ballplayer alone, I'll just read Emily Dickinson or Walt Whitman to him, and the guys are so sweet, they always stay and listen. 'Course, a guy'll listen to anything if he thinks it's foreplay. I make them feel confident, and they make me feel safe, and pretty. 'Course, what I give them lasts a lifetime; what they give me lasts 142 games. Sometimes it seems like a bad trade. But bad trades are part of baseball - now who can forget Frank Robinson for Milt Pappas, for God's sake? It's a long season and you gotta trust. I've tried 'em all, I really have, and the only church that truly feeds the soul, day in, day out, is the Church of Baseball. -- Annie Savoy, Bull Durham (1988)

Quotes of the Day

"A positive attitude may not solve all your problems, but it will annoy enough people to make it worth the effort." -- Herm Albright

"A synonym is a word you use when you can't spell the other one." -- Baltasar Gracian

"Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind." -- Albert Einstein