Hug your family

It seems like this week, everywhere I turn I'm hearing these awful stories of people losing loved ones or getting terrible diagnoses. Cancer that grows and spreads silently in seemingly healthy people, until one day they get devastating news.... It strikes fear in my heart on a daily basis. It's so unfair, so random, and so cruel for all involved.

That's why I try very hard to never take my life or family for granted, but some days it's hard to stop and think about all that we have to be grateful for. We all have off days (or weeks, like this one has been for me!), and we all get busy and frustrated and short with those we love.

Today I am going to hug my family extra tightly. I am going to eat well and go to the gym (for the first time in months) and try to lose some of this weight that has crept back on while I wasn't looking. I am going to count my blessings.

These pictures were taken by my friend Lauralee last weekend, and they are a reminder of all that I have to be grateful for.







Hug your families tightly. Life is short, but sweeter when we add more sugar! :)

10 things I've learned at the mall

1. Just because you can fit into a certain size of clothing, doesn't mean you should.

2. The people who decide to put kid-traps like rows of gumball machines and quarter-operated rides near the mall exits should be drawn and quartered.

3. There are two kinds of people who eat Cinnabons: skinny people who don't gain weight no matter what they eat, and fat people who just don't give a shit anymore.

4. Teenagers are herd animals.

5. Old Navy clothes are cheap for a reason. Namely, they don't fit right and their fabric tends to be so thin you can actually see daylight through it.

6. They put eau du crack in the Yankee Candle scents. I know they're overpriced, but I cannot stop myself from buying them!

7. The "family room" restrooms are disgusting. I can't think of a more vile place to breastfeed or change my infant. I'd sooner use the mens' room.

8. I've never been cool enough to work at The Gap.

9. No matter where you park your car, you will be at the furthest point away from the store at which you actually went to the mall to shop.

10. Nobody wants a gift from Things Remembered.

That is all.

Worst dog owners, ever.

DH doesn't want me to tell you this, but he never reads my blog (boo!), so shhhh.

We just spent an hour looking for our dog. DH put his dinner out and was cooking up some hotdogs and mac n' cheese for us; I was trying (and failing) to take a nap on the couch while the boys played GeoTrax. Typical exciting Saturday night at casa de Bev, don'tcha know. When Fritz didn't come running for his dinner and he wasn't in his usual sleeping spot at the foot of the stairs, it occured to us that we hadn't seen him in a while.

The search began, and I got more and more worried as the minutes passed. It is dark and cold tonight, and he never strays from our yard, and always comes when we call for him. Tonight, nothing. Dh drove up and down the main road and returned empty handed, then I drove off down the street as well, windows down, calling his name.... I was really worried that I would find that he had been hit by a car since he's mostly black and it's very dark tonight. I was already imagining making flyers and calling the police, trying to remember his full tattoo number....

When I got home, DH had cracked the case, and now we are dying of embarrassment. You see, this afternoon we went to a local farmstand to meet a friend who was going to take some family pictures. Since Fritzi is a family member, we decided to take him with us. We had a great time, ran a few errands, and came home around 4:30. When we got home, DH carried in the sleeping baby and BS and I grabbed our packages and came inside.

Fritz was in the back of the minivan for over two hours, quiet as a mouse.

I am SO embarrassed! He is fine, of course, but to think we were out there calling and calling his name, and he was 10 feet away in the car and didn't make a peep! At least he was warm enough in there, and the back windows were down so he had fresh air... but MAN. This is bad dog parenting, for sure. We were thinking of getting another dog next spring but now we're pretty sure we have our hands full with the family members we have presently!

So there you have it - one of my most embarrassing moments.... Please don't call the cops to report our neglectful ways!

Nestlenookie, indeed.

I'm having some post-vacation depression, folks.

Jim and I try to get away each Columbus Day weekend to celebrate our anniversary, which is 10/6. Last year we didn't get to go because, well, I'd just had a baby. This year, it would have taken a team of draft horses to keep us from going! My in-laws arrived on Friday and we left a trail of dust and Cheese Nips on Saturday morning as we sped away from the house. Hey, we just like Cheese Nips.

Anyway, we, and by we, I mean *I*, had researched resorts and inns in VT, NH, and the southern coast of Maine for months, and I found one that honestly had everything we wanted: scenic, private, outdoor & indoor hot tubs, spa pool, flatscreen TV & DVD player, balcony, horseback riding... you name it. The only bad part about it was their extra cheesy name: Nestlenook Resort. BWAH! I mean, really.

BUT... the place is awesome. Amazing. As in, we have found the place that we will be booking every year from now on, forever and ever AMEN. Unless, of course, we get the opportunity to go to Vegas again. :) That's a deal-breaker.

The room was outstanding. King sized four-poster bed, gas fireplace, mountain views from the French doors:

Privacy galore, and this tub in the bathroom:


Uh, yeah. It was that awesome.

We slept well (no 5:30 wake-up calls from the baby!), ate well (Filet Mignon medallions, anyone?), and submerged ourselves in hot bubbling water three times per day both Saturday and Sunday. Oh, and when I say it was private - well, imagine a gorgeous pool and outdoor stone jacuzzi with NO ONE else there... all weekend, no matter what time we went down. I don't know where the other guests were, and I don't care. It was all ours!

Here are some pics from their extensive "Victorian" grounds:

Yes, that is a swan peddle boat, and hell yeah, we did take a ride! I laughed my butt off while doing it... a couple on the shore even laughed and took our picture, and I didn't care. Screw 'em! Their loss. Swan peddle boats are da bomb!



The theme of the weekend was us waltzing in past crowds and getting seated at restaurants, etc. Here is Jim beckoning me to join him on the abandoned, uncrowded peddle boat. He was singing a song from Charlie & the Chocolate Factory, if I remember. "Come with me, and you'll be... in a world of sweet imagination..." *sigh* He's a funny dude.

This had to have been the busiest tourist season in northern New Hampshire. There were mobs of people in North Conway (it took over an hour to drive the few miles through town!), but at Nestlenookie... it was peaceful. Quiet. Serene.






Sunday morning we went to a very popular (and thus, crowded) restaurant for their jazz breakfast buffet. In keeping with our theme, we were told the wait was 45 minutes unless we could find two barstools. We walked into the bar and found... two empty barstools! It was like there was a ray of sunshine following us all weekend! Divine! We had an outstanding brunch with the best Bloody Mary I've ever enjoyed, and best of all... the dining room was crowded with families and screaming kiddies, but the bar was adults-only and lovely. Huzzah!

Later that night, we saw a gorgeous sunset from our private balcony:


It was hard to leave the Nestlenookie Resort, I'll tell you. Just two short days and we felt pretty refreshed, as if we'd been on vacation for a week. Of course, maybe that's because we haven't been on a real week-long vacation in over 3 years. Ugh.

The ride home was excellent, too. We took the picturesque Kancamagus Highway over the White Mountains:






So, there you have it. This is why I'm dragging ass at work this week. I cannot believe it will be another year until I get to go back. I wonder how long I can get the in-laws to watch the kids next year.... :)

We opened the door...

Now, how do we close it as nicely as possible?

A month or so ago we had our nextdoor neighbors over for a meal. They're nice folks, and we've lived peacefully next door to them for the past 7 years, waving at each other's cars, chatting at the transfer station, etc. Last summer our street got some new residents, and we found ourselves bonding with our old neighbors out of mutual dislike for the new people.

Hey, we tried to like the new people; I gave them a little potted plant and a card upon their arrival, DH and I chatted with the mom out on the street and heard a brief version of their life story, we have let our son play with their kid in the yard a couple of times. Sure, we weren't nuts when they hosted an elaborate party on July 4th, complete with sporadic and extremely noisy fireworks from 8:30 PM till... oh, midnight or so. Not steady, boom boom boom, fireworks, but the kind that go "BOOOM BOOOOM BOOOOM POW PZZZZZOOOOOOOW!" and you think, "Oh, good, that must have been their finale. Now it's nice and quie---" "BOOOOM BOOOM PZZZZZZOOOOOOOOOOOW!" Ok, that was annoying, but we certainly didn't say anything. I mean, hey, we keep to ourselves, and like living on this street because everybody leaves one another alone. :)

Then came the motorbikes. One day, the father and the son rode a pair of LOUD motorbikes up and down our street, in front of our house. They were really loud - that high-pitched "vrrrroooooooooom" sound, times two. They started buzzing our quarter mile street about 8-10 times per night, right around the time we'd get home from work and start to unwind a bit. You know, like the time of night (6-8 PM) when you're sitting on your back deck, listening to the sounds of the forest.

For the first time in my entire life, I contemplated calling the cops on them. Neither DH nor myself has ever called the cops on anyone before; as I said, we're extremely live & let live kind of folks. But this... well, this was bad.

Then one day after about a week, the motorbikes stopped buzzing the street. We thanked our lucky stars and moved on with our lives, until Saturday when DH was out on a walk and the new neighbor (not the dad, who refuses to speak with us, even when spoken to) approached him and said, "Hey neighbor. Did you call the cops on us?"

Huh. DH said no, and she told him that a neighbor had complained, the cops had come out, and now they are forced to just ride in their driveway. Bear in mind that one of these "drivers" is seven years old and does not wear a helmet. Nice. Anywho, it was clear that she didn't believe that Jim wasn't the one who called the po-po, but he was polite and we had a good chuckle when he got home. Then, he called our neighbor and that is how it came to pass that we had them over for dinner one night.

As I said, they're nice folks - older, with no kids. It's pretty clear that the dude spends quite a bit of time drunk out of his gourd (not that there's anything wrong with that!), but we really enjoyed our night with them. Unfortunately, at some point that night, the wife mentioned going to an amusement park for a Halloween thing this month, and I guess we said, "sure!"

Now they have called and want to go, and now we don't want to and don't know how to tell them that there's no excuse at all, we just don't wanna go. They're nice people - but if we're doing an amusement park, we'd like to go with our friends and their kids, ya know? I don't know how to break it to them, and I certainly don't want to tick off another set of neighbors! As DH put it, it'd feel a little bit like we were going with our parents... and I don't know if they expect us to get a babysitter or what (they're NOT kid people), but that's not happening. So.

I wish we hadn't opened that door... it's much easier just waving hello to neighbors.

In light of our economic woes...

Look at me go!

My third blog entry today. This has to be some kind of record for me! Aren't I prolific? :-p

I just wanted to share a movie rec. As some of my friends know, I tend to choose my Netflix movies based on what strikes me as funny/interesting/different, what Entertainment Weekly says, etc. I tend to like offbeat indie films, and it can be hard to find them since they're often not reviewed in "mainstream" movie reviews. Don't get me wrong - I love some of those "mainstream" films, too, but I definitely enjoy finding little-known gems amongst the piles of mass-produced stuff.

So, that being said, this week's Random Bev-pick is Outsourced, starring nobody you've ever heard of.




IMDB: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0425326/

Essentially, it's a movie about a dude named Todd Anderson who finds out that his job in customer service for some crappy Lillian Vernon-esque retail company has been moved to India, where labor is cheaper. His boss tells him to go to India to train his replacement and the team of workers, so he does. I don't want to give too much away, but let me just tell you that this movie was touching, smart, funny, and a really eye-opening account of what goes on with corporate outsourcing.

As someone who dials a Minnesota phone number and reaches India (and lately, China) several times a day for work, I thought this film was interesting. It shed a little light on what those places are really like, and to whom I may be speaking. On a side note, when calling our home office, you can always tell when you've reached a foreign call department because of the "American" names they choose. This one chick I always seem to reach in Brokerage Equity Service calls herself, "Apple," for instance. For reals. I always feel like telling her that unless she's a celebrity, Apple is a fruit, but, she's sweet, and I really don't want to ruin it for her. I'm no bubble-burster.

Anyway, it's a cute movie. There's one particularly sweet moment between the two main characters that really left a lasting image in my mind. I kind of want to see it again already! It's sweet, and charming, and different. And that's why it's a Bev-pick.

In case you missed it

If you're the one person in America who didn't see this week's hilarious Tina Fey-ism on SNL, here you go:


Freaking hilarious! Their take on Biden was spot-on, too!

Another day, another market tumble

I am really, really, really starting to wonder if I made the right decision going further in the financial advice industry. Eek.

Doggone it & you betcha - you're such a good debater!

I enjoyed last night's VP debate, and only got worked up once or twice. ;) They both did a pretty good job of avoiding their own stereotypes, sort of. While Sarah Palin didn't come off as the poorly-prepared novice we've seen in the interviews these past few weeks, she put a little too much "golly gee!" into her demeanor for me to take her very seriously. Also, for his part, Biden managed to reign in his "blow-hard-ness" enough to get the job done, which was a relief!

Anywho... someone just sent me this on Facebook, and I immediately knew I had to share it with you:


Click to enlarge, my far-sighted friends!

For me, the best part of last night's debate is the anticipation for this week's Tina Fey impersonation on SNL. Lots of fodder for the satire mill.... It's almost too easy. Almost.

Laughter is the best medicine

So open up and take your meds, people!


From the semi-funny Jim Carey vehicle, Bruce Almighty.

The first time I saw this, I was literally doubled over with laughter. We had to rewind it several times. Then we saw the blooper reel, which was even more perverse! If only the rest of the film were this funny....

**Note: So, the first YouTube clip I put up today was fantastic quality... and NBC yanked it a couple of hours later. I guess I should be flattered that little ol' me possibly caused it to be yanked just by linking to it from my blog.... SO, here's a slightly crappier quality version of the scene. Enjoy.