Aloha!

Some useful phrases I'm trying to remember for our 12 hour , that's right 12 HOURS!!!, flight tomorrow morning!

I am filled with admiration for my in-flight meal.

Kahaha ko'u na'au i ke 'ano o ka mea 'ai ma keia mokulele.

Yumm....except we probably wont even be getting a meal.

Only six dollars for a headset? Why thats only three dollars per ear!

'Eono kala no ka ho'olohe lekio? 'O ia ho'i, 'ekolu wale no kala o kahi pepeiao!

Dude, portable DVD player, maybe the best invention EVER!!!

I'm sure you all are feeling sorry for us.

Sigh....

I saw this show advertised in a magazine and laughed and laughed.

But you know what? Sarge and I watched it the other day, and Scott Baio is totally dreamy!! Loved him recently in the movie "The Bread, My Sweet".

And he does not like people, we are totally MFEO!!!

Dinos! Again.

So I bit the bullet and bought my Dinosaur tickets.

Holy freaking $100.00!!!

Ticketmaster really sticks it to you with those "convenience" fees. Kind of luckily Sarge has to work that weekend, so we only have to shell out for 2 tickets.

When I was a kid, I remember my mom taking me and my brother to see shows all the time. Ice Capades, Kapaza(Japanese children's theatre), Circus, musicals, the ballet, all kinds of things. I really have to remember to thank her for spending so much time and money on my cultural enrichment.

Piko seems pretty excited about the show. We watched the videos that are posted on the site. There's one about the "Making Of" the dinosaurs, so it was good for her to see that they are just extremely large and lifelike puppets. Or parade floats as she likes to call them. What age do kids begin to separate fantasy from reality? real vs. not real. We watch the Nigel Marvin "Walking With..." shows on Animal Planet and Discovery all the time, and that stuff looks real, and Nigel(an adult), and the other actors interact with them like they are real. I know that she knows that cartoons are not real, but what about CG stuff that really does looks like it actually exists?

Anyway, we'll see what it's all about soon enough. Well, not soon, the show is not until September 22!!

Jumping on the meme bandwagon after reading Mrs. S's post today.

5 Maybe, somewhat, kind of interesting things about me.

1. I have a birthmark on the white of my right eye. People think I have something in my eye all the time. And I have only met one other person who also has a birthmark on her eye.

2. I can pick up just about anything with my toes. It has to be between the size of a golf ball and a dime. And it looks like Piko is inheriting the "monkey toes" skilz.

3. I grew up in Hawaii, lived there till I was 26 and have never been surfing. Not once, ever.

4. I have in my lifetime used an oxy/acetylene torch, cetrifugal casting rig, TIG welder, and MIG welding setup. I have blown glass, poured bronze, and silver, and made my own wood carving tools from scratch. But I still need the Librarian to hook up my entertainment center.

5. I have never ever been stumbling, falling down, passed out drunk. And that's probably a good thing.

And the cat?

The mocking continues. Hey, I was reading that!

deGallo Photolog

Nothing exciting around the home this week, the weather has been nice so Piko and I have been at the pool alot.

But here are some of the semi-interesting pictures I took this week. I was going to type "photos" but that sounds like I think that they're art, and they sooooo are not.


The Damn Cat. She's not fat, but look at that pooch! It's hanging over the edge of my desk!!


The Damn Cat again. This is proof that she loves Sarge. She would never let anyone else sit with her like this. I have always told Sarge that he picked out the dog, and she was supposed to be his pet, but she loves me more. And now, I got a cat, and she's supposed to be mine, but she loves him. Darn animals! Making me crazy!

Ok, when I took this picture I thought it looked funny, as if Piko had a big butt. Then I loaded it onto my computer and looked at it in a larger format, and realized it just looks like Piko is sitting on a giant blue Va-jay-jay. Naughty pillows indeed!

And Sarge sent me this picture in an e-mail.

Hee-hee, LOLERSKATES!!!

de Gallo Dilemma

Holy Poo! The Dinosaurs are coming!!!

I am seriously torn about getting tickets to see this.

On one hand Piko loves dinosaurs, she got the Nigel Marvin "Prehistoric Park" and "Chased By Dinosaurs" DVD's for her birthday, and loves them.

On the other hand, how will she react to "real" dinosaurs?! I will be bummed and well, a bit cheesed off if she freaks out and we have to leave. The tickets are not that cheap.

I have no doubt she'll go totally bananas and shiny at the idea. But once we're there with the dark, and the loud, and the lights...
What to do....what to do...

So I was thinking the other day that the last movie that I actually saw in the theatre was "March of the Penguins", and this was with Piko (her first movie theatre movie). We don't even go to see the latest animated movies. I think that I have mentioned before that Piko is a freak and does not enjoy cartoons very much. Apparently any sort of "bad guy" in an animated movie is scary to her, and you know that there is always a "bad guy". We'll watch Shark Week on Discovery Channel no problem, but no cartoons! EVAH!!!

Anyhoo, though we don't go to the movies I'm always reading the movie/entertainment section in the newspaper. Just to torture myself I guess. I began noticing a weird trend in recent movie poster art. The actors look nothing like themselves. Maybe it's just the way the images transfer to the newsprint, I don't know.
Here is the first example of when I noticed it. "Meet the Fockers" poster.

Ben Stiller's face looks like it's made out of clay, and I know that Blythe Danner is much more beautiful than that. It looks like they all have way too much make up on, which could actually be the case. Strangely though, Babs and Dustin look pretty normal.
Then in the last week or so I noticed the phenomenon again with the "License to Wed" poster.

What's up with Mandy Moore's neck!?! And again Robin Williams...somewhat normal.
Are these just awful translations (Vectors?) by the graphic artists? And if you were the actor/actress wouldn't you be pretty upset by the most unflattering image of you plastered all over the place?

Something else that caught my eye once was this poster with Hilary Swank in "The Reaping"

Brought to mind this poster


Ok, maybe now that they are right next to each other they don't look all *that* similar. But still, kind of right?

LOVE this movie by the way. I have horrible taste, I know. Gotta love campy, awful, techno-apocolyptical, virus-runs-rampant, sci-fi horror movies. Especially if they feature Oded Fehr, and redheaded hotties like Stefan Hayes (yum!). And Mila Jovovich totally kicks butt!

"Vanity is the quicksand of reason"
-George Sand

Oh Google vanity search has really done me in this time. Revealing exactly what I have found will reveal a bit more personal information than I would like. But let me share a couple of the gems I discovered tonight.

My college ex-boyfriend has resurfaced. Yes Jacy, this is the one with the Casper Van Dien smile, the motorcycle, and the penis that would not stay in his shorts. Apparently he is running his own personal training business in Las Vegas. That's pretty great I must say, he is doing a job that he always wanted to do (apparently the professional wrestling gig did not pan out...seriously), and enjoys. On the other hand at 5'10" and 210lbs, he does not look at all like the boy I dated in college. AND, looks nothing like Casper Van Dien anymore, thank goodness. Just plain weird.

Second, and worse!!! I have just discovered that my last name is a somewhat popular slang term for:

"...any person who is of the white trash/thug/inbred genus. Standard accoutrements include but are not limited to gaudy chains, wife beaters, garishly baggy pants/shorts, Lugz, visors, and various other urban brands such as Ecko or FUBU. Often seen in camaros or over-accessorized japanese cars. Almost always seen smoking "cigs" or at least smells as though one has been bathing in cigarette smoke. As far as other bathing is concerned, the ****** is lacking. Disgusting facial hair such as the molestache, crustache, or White Trash Stache are commonplace and seemingly required. "Dood, Toight, Sooo Wasted," and "Cigs" are standard vocabulary. Can be spotted at malls, 2 Fast 2 Furious movie premiers, and in Sonic parking lots. Music choices involve one of two genres. They enjoy bad popular rap such as 50 Cent and Eminem or nu-metal in the vein of linkin park and slipknot."

Hi-yi-yi!!! Basically the Chavs of the Americas!

Note to self: NO MORE GOOGLE VANITY SEARCHES!!!!!

Why Is This Cat So Mad?

Look at her, she's all "Mrrrrrwow! RRRRROWWWW!!!" Ears back, eyes narrow.
(Click on photos to enlarge them.)

She even turned away from me when I was taking pictures. Look at that tail flick.

Coulld it be...
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THESE?!?!

"FINE!" she says, "I shall sit down and let you see my poor paws!! Have you seen what they have done to my poor paws?!?!?"

"OOOOOOOOOOOHHHHHHHH!!!!! I'm just going to claw this blanket with frustration!!! AWW MAN!! What have you done to me?!"

BAH! Shopping rant!

Piko de G and I trekked out to the commissary this morning to restock our 'fridge with something more than frozen hamburgers, sliced tomatoes, and soda.

We got rock star parking right up front, and all was looking well. I should have known it would only go downhill from there.

Today was shopping cart derby day in the aisles. Just about everywhere we went carts were parked strategically sideways, or in the smack dab middle of the aisle.

In the spice section there were about 6 people in a group blocking half the lane, and their carts were along the other half. Basically causing what M. Sarge would refer to as a "Cluster F**K", making me say WTF? And they were all apparently together, and arguing the merits of garlic salt vs. garlic flakes! Move out of the damn aisle!!

As we were moving towards the dairy area there was a lady parked horizontally across the lane. As if she were turning around and getting ready to head back in the other direction, and then decided that that would be a totally AWESOME place to stop and have a 5 minute "chat" with her friend who was all the way down by the orange juice. NOT. SO. MUCH!!!!

Finally, getting in line to pay. UGH, please move your damn cart 2 inches closer to the checkout so I can get past, thankyouverymuch! This lady was with her two older teen looking children and was leaning on the back of her cart while the kids were unloading it onto the belt. There were three other registers open down past her, and we were trying to get past. She leaned, her kids unpacked, looked at me, unpacked more, she leaned more. I said excuse me about 4 times, Piko de G even said excuse me. She leaned some more. FINALLY, she gets out of the way, by backing up into my cart. "Oops I was trying to get out of the way, and ended up getting in the way. Tee-hee!" I just gave her my 1,000 mile stare and said "Uh-huh". Then Piko de G being 5 said really loudly "SHE DID GET IN THE WAY!!!" as we finally passed them. Nice.

Another question, when the heck did it become a good idea to allow a 6 year old to "drive" a full shopping cart? If they're going to *DRIVE* it into the back of my ankles, I'm going to have to *DRIVE* my foot up their.....

This is what I get for going at 10:30 instead of 8:30.

Happy Birthday Piko de Gallo!!

Here are some pictures from Piko's Golf Birthday party.
It was not held on her actual birthday, but since the grandma's were here, we decided to have the party early.

The cake. Don't tell anyone, but the dog came right up to the cake and put her nose on the left corner. Oops. Extra frosting right there!
The bottom is a 10x10 square, and the ball is the Wilton soccer ball cake pan. I used a grass tip for the grass, and white chocolate melts for the dimples on the ball. If I had had the time or the inclination to do a test cake, I think that I would have gone with two ball cakes just to give that ball a little bit more lift out of the "grass"

Golf trophies for the participants.

Tee off.

Windmill house.


We have a winner! She wouldn't kiss the cup like Tiger Woods does.


This was a great party, and everyone had a good time. The grandmas were happy because I gave them jobs to do, M. Sarge was happy because he got to play golf with his daughter, Piko de G was happy because she got cake and presents. And I was happy because she was happy. That said, M. Sarge and I agreed that this is the last big party we will be having for her. It's just too much work, and Piko de G gets too many presents. There was a moment when M. Sarge almost flipped out at a crowd of 4 and 5 year olds because they would not back away from the cake. He had to use his "Big Voice" to get them to move back and form an orderly line. I asked him if he wanted me to schedule his vasectomy the next day.

Just wondering...

What the heck should I do with these tomatoes? I cut them up for M. Sarges BBQ, but they were barely touched. I had some today and they seemed fine, but what the heck should I make with them. Let me note that neither M. Sarge or Piko are particularly fond of straight tomatoes.


And, YAY SCIENCE! Piko de G and I celebrated the 4th with a new stomp air rocket.



What a crappy photographer I am.

There's more! In-Law Rant Part 2

Oh yes, there's more. This one got pretty TL;DR, so unless you like petty bitching, I would just skip it.
I am such a raging bee-yach, and it took all my powers not to fly off the handle this weekend.
Continuing the In-Law tirade...

**POST REMOVED**

Ok, I've decided to remove this post. Thinking about the weekend is still kind of upsetting, but overall, they are very nice people, and they ARE my family now.
August 2007

What the?!!!

HUGE SIGH!
My house is my own again, the invasion is over.

M. Sarge's mom and grandmother came to visit us for 4 days, to be here for M. Sarge's promotion to Master Sergeant. His dad could not get off from work so he stayed home.



**POST REMOVED**
Due to the fact that I'm an asshole and should not be bashing my family on-line. No matter if they know about it or not, because even though they irritate me, I really do love them.
August 2007.