Well at least this didn't happen to us. I've no idea where in Bonney Lake this occurred, but there are 6 trees on this house. The ground was so soaked from all the rain that trees not only snapped off, they uprooted and toppled over. Fir trees, like California Redwoods, have very shallow root systems.

But hey, I'm OK

POST-STORM REPORT CARD:

State of Washington: F

Puget Sound Energy: F

City of Bonney Lake: F

Qwest Telephone: A

Comcast Cable: A

It was one hell of a storm we had on Thursday night. It poured rain in buckets all day long, and my boss sent me home at 2 to prepare for the storm. I was so relieved when Brian made it home. The wind didn't start kicking up till about 6:30 and it was pretty bad. Our power flickered for a few hours. We finally went to bed at about 9:30, and when Pepper woke me up at 10, shivering and crying, the power was out. Poor little doggie was so frightened. I got up and gave her half a doggie tranquilizer and let her get up on my bed, but she wouldn't stop shaking. Brian finally got up and gave her the other half and let her up on his bed.

We woke up to massive devastation on Friday morning. Fortunately, no trees fell on our house, but we had a lot of huge and heavy branches in the yard. We also discovered that Sagan was so frightened that he'd vomited in his crate all night long, so Brian had to clean that up. Friday we went for a walk w/ the dogs and checked out the damage. Lots of trees on power lines, snapped poles, one guy had a tree fall on and cut in half his brand new 5th wheel. We also saw a few damaged homes. All things considered, we were in good spirits on Friday and Friday night, we figured our power would be on by Saturday night. Meanwhile, we withheld food from Sagan on Friday but he did drink water, which he proceeded to projectile vomit all over the family room rug that night.

Saturday arrives and our kitchen freezer is clearly melting, fast. There's a huge puddle of water on the kitchen floor. We threw out all the food in the freezer, and put some of the fridge stuff outside since it's cold enough to keep. We were able to get the cars out of the garage by propping the door open. We were starved so we went out for breakfast, came home, and did storm clean up just like the rest of our neighbors. The thing that REALLY annoyed us was that as soon as you turn off our street, everyone else has power. But you should see the piles of debris alongside the roads!!! I swear, just let the City of Bonney Lake tell us to remove the debris and they will suffer my wrath. Meantime, we let the doggies out in the backyard to play and get some air while we cleaned up out front. Saturday night arrives, and we are still in the dark. I notice that Sagan is acting really weird. He can't seem to stand up or walk right, he keeps staggering into the walls, tipping over and he has this goofy grin on his face. Brian gave him a quick exam and there were no yelps of pain. Then we smelled it.....sour apples. Sagan got into the rotting apples in the back yard and was drunk. I half expected to wake up the next day and see that he had a tattoo on his leg that said "mom" or "rosie" or something. lol We spent Sat. night in the dark, again.

Sunday we get up and there's STILL no power. By this time I am pretty much apoplectic. I was able to get the car out and go to the bank, but the gas station was out of gas, and they had jacked the price dramatically. I called PSE and was assured that they were "working on it". I called them again at 3:00 and I shit you not, the message they had on their first menu, after listing all the towns (in King County of course) that may not see power for another week, was "for emergency shelter information, go to our website." HELLO!!!!!! How can you check a website WHEN YOU DON'T HAVE ANY POWER? Morons. I finally talked to someone and basically bitched at him.

Before I explain further, those people who do not live here or have ever lived here need to understand the dynamics in Washington State. King County thinks that they are god & Seattle is the center of the universe. They think they are the only county in the state. They look down on Pierce County as if we are a bunch of redneck country bumpkins. A few years ago I was on my way home from work and there were 2 accidents on Highway 410, and a brush fire at the top of the highway, and not one single Seattle-based traffic report mentioned it. Not one. All facilities are restored to King County FIRST and foremost. (Unlike the east coast, where people are more town-centric, west coast people identify themselves by county. It's the same in California). Meanwhile, as you travel around town, you can see plenty of Qwest and Comcast trucks working on their lines, but not a PSE truck or City of Bonney Lake truck to be seen anywhere.

At 6:30, I called PSE again. I wade through their stupid menus and finally get a person. I am stark raving mad now. And you know what she tells me???? She has the unmitigated AUDACITY to tell me, "I know, we have people in Medina who are still out of power too." That was the proverbial straw that broke the camel's back. "MEDINA?!" I scream into the phone. "WHO CARES ABOUT THE GODDAMN BILLIONAIRES IN MEDINA!" (Bill Gates lives in Medina!!) The only reason the fucking lights are off in Medina is that the richest of the rich flew their private jets to Vail or Aspen for the holidays!!!! If she had said any other town - Spanaway, Graham, Yelm....places that are remote and poor, I would have been more understanding, but don't expect me to feel sorry for the mucky mucks in Medina for chrissakes. So then she explains the 4 stages of repair: "First we assess the situation. Then we assign a job number to the repair and wait till that number comes up, for the repair stage, but if the crew has to wait for another piece of equipment to arrive like the tree cutting crew, they will leave and go to another location to keep working. Then we next make sure that the mainlines are working & power is restored." She goes on to tell me that they are flying in crews from other states to help.

I said, "OK, the trees are on the lines, there's a pole snapped in half and dangling over the road, SITUATION ASSESSED! NOW GET THE DAMN TRUCKS OUT THERE!" She was actually really nice and took my abuse pretty well......and I did try to tone it down a little b/c a part of me felt sorry for her b/c I'm sure I wasn't the only one who was that upset. In fact, she said they were getting a lot of irate calls from my neighborhood. But she did say that it was in their system so that meant that the crew had been out to "assess" the situation & repair number was assigned, which meant that we were now in the "repair stage". Well la-de-frickin-da. And another thing, it's not like they didn't know this storm was coming! Why weren't crews from the other states on their way up here on Friday? They wait till Sat. and Sun. to fly people up?

At that point, I left a message on my work's machine and my boss' home machine, with my cell phone number, requesting that he call me at 6:00 a.m. to wake me up so that I could get to work on time. He called this morning, as requested, and felt awful about our situation. I had to bring Pepper to work with me because the house is too cold, and we took Sagan to day care. Both dogs desperately need a bath.

Next time my PSE bill comes in, I'm thinking about sending my payment at the last possible second with a letter that says, "your bill came in and first I assessed the situation. Then I assigned it a bill-paying number and put it in line after all the other bills that came in before yours. But then when I went to pay it, I didn't have a pen that worked so I moved on to other things. Then once I found a pen that worked, I was able to write the check. Then I had to bring it into work to get a stamp. Then I mailed it."

So all things considered, we are fine and in a lot better shape than those who had multiple trees fall on their houses. However, we are greatly inconvenienced without power and clearly, I was not cut out to be Amish. The first 3 things on my "want" list are: A landline telephone, a generator and a gas stove.

Happy Chanukah!!

I loved Ann's "Another Night Before Chanukah" post and that reminded me of a song my cousins taught me years ago. They used to live on Long Island in the 1970's, and their neighborhood was predominently Jewish. They used to come up to Cape Cod to stay at their grandparents' house for all of their school breaks (their grandparents lived just down the road from my parents). One Krissmiss, they came up for school break and sang this song that their neighborhood friends were singing:

Herman the Chanukah Candle

Had a very shiny light

And if you ever saw it

You would even saw it's bright

All of the other candles

Used to laugh and call him names

They never let poor Herman

Join in any candle games

Then one foggy Chanukah night

Rabbi came to say

Herman with your light so bright

Won't you light my menorah tonight

Then all the candles loved him

As they shouted out with glee

Herman the Chanukah Candle

You'll go down in history!!!

Christmas at SeaTac Airport

You all, no doubt, heard about the flap at SeaTac Airport this week when a rabbi merely suggested that a menorah also be placed in the airport along w/ the Krissmiss trees. In a knee-jerk reaction to the perceived threat of a possible lawsuit, the Port of Seattle removed ALL the trees. And then the snowball effect started of hate mail to Jewish centers and synagogues and letters to the newspapers, and apparently it made national and international news. The Port has since returned the trees to the airport.

Next year you can find me at Gate S9, and Brian will be at Gate C24.

Happy Wednesday

Where can I get one of these?

Just because

I haven't posted any Vincent piccies in awhile!

I still say that the picture should have been moved so that the light switch opening was more strategically placed. But then I'd be leaving the lights on all the time.....

Then and Now

Ah, but how can you tell the difference between then and now???

The below is our wedding picture, taken June 27, 1989 in Attleboro, MA. It was about 95 degrees with 100% humidity. My friend Holly (the best woman) and I were 20 minutes late because of traffic. The flower child, Alicia (who was 7 at the time) was shrieking because she kept stepping in duck shit.Here's the wedding party: Holly (the Best Woman), Brian, me, Jef (the Man of Honor) and his daughter, Alicia (the Flower Child). I really feel old now because Alicia is now married! Jef's been living in the Bay Area since 1995 and Holly and her husband Stephen and their 2 young sons also live in the Bay Area.The next photo was taken in the summer of 2005, here in Washington. The photography studio is a client of my office. We were going in to have formal photos taken for Brian's mother's birthday gift. But when the photographers found out that we were Deadheads, they begged us to bring our tie dye hippie clothes so that they could finally use the giant tie dye backdrop they bought.

Another Funny Picture

This picture was on Elizabeth D'Onofrio's blog today and I had to put it on mine because the "WTF" looks like something my husband would have done if we'd lived in this building. Thanks EDO!

Winter Funnies

I hope everyone has a fabulous weekend! I got these cartoons in an email today and they cracked me up.

The Coolest Furniture Store on Earth!

This is the Old Cannery Furniture Warehouse, in Sumner, Washington. It's not far from where I live in Bonney Lake. The store has 10 acres of furniture and is the coolest furniture store I've ever been in. It's such a huge place that when you get to the very last room in back, there's a sign over the doorway that says, "Entering Puyallup". They go all out for Christmas and it's beautiful at night. Inside the store is very pretty and rustic, with old brick and beautiful wood beams and poles. There's a little train that travel throughout the showrooms and warehouse, and as they describe it, "a hobbit style" fudge/candy store hewn out of an ancient tree. They even have an oak furniture manufacturer on site. If you have children, upon checkout, they give the kids an old fashioned train whistle and a balloon. I wish I needed more furniture because I could spent a ton of money there!

This bridge is right near the Old Cannery and is just lovely at Christmas, as you can see. There are speakers hidden on the bridge and which play Christmas carols. We like to go down there on Christmas Eve.

The ultimate female joke!!!

ULTIMATE FEMALE JOKE

I offer this joke to you in the hopes that women will love it and men will pass it along to a woman who will love it.

A woman was sitting at a bar enjoying an afterwork cocktail with her girlfriends when an exceptionally tall, handsome, extremely sexy, middle-aged man entered. He was so striking that the woman could not take her eyes off him. The young-at-heart man noticed her overly attentive stare and walked directly toward her. (As all men will.)

Before she could offer her apologies for staring so rudely, he leaned over and whispered to her, "I'll do anything, absolutely anything, that you want me to do, no matter how kinky, for $20.00......on one condition." Flabbergasted, the woman asked what the condition was.

The man replied, "You have to tell me what you want me to do in just three words." The woman considered his proposition for a moment, and then slowly removed a $20 bill from her purse, which she pressed into the man's hand along with her address. She looked deeply into his eyes, and slowly and meaningfully said.... "Clean my house."

6 idiosyncracies

Tagged by Ann.......I have so many idosyncracies it's hard to pick just 6 (as my husband nods feverishly in agreement). Let's see:

1. All the light switches have to be in the correct position. For example, we have a hallway light that is controlled by 3 different switches: upstairs, on the landing and downstairs. It drives me nuts if the light is on, but the upstairs switch is in the down position, or if the light is off and the upstairs switch is in the on position. Same goes with the light switches for the outside lights.

2. I can't wear bracelets or watches that fit loosely on my wrist. They have to fit snug and/or be made with elastic so that they don't slide around.

3. I have to have all the dishes done before I go to bed. My poor husband is so sick of my saying "bus your crap" when he's going upstairs at the end of the night.

4. I have to have my cereal dish/cereal stuff laid out the night before, my clothes for the next day laid out the night before and my lunch packed and ready to take, and I must make my bed in the morning before leaving for work or weekend errands. When I was a kid, I couldn't shut the light off in my bedroom without making sure that EVERYTHING was tidy and in it's place. If I saw so much as a pen out of the pen holder, or a school book not lined up with on the stack of other books, I'd get up and fix the situation.

5. I hate having my feet & back of my hands touched (except for holding hands). The thought of having an IV in the back of my hand makes me shudder. I hate wearing shoes (and unlike most women, I don't even own any shoes other than sneakers and one beat up pair of shoes), and usually go around in my stocking feet. I don't even like to wear slippers.

6. I have to have something to look at while I eat. In the morning when I eat breakfast, I usually look at a road atlas of the USA, Washington State or Canada. At lunch, I usually read one of the magazines we have in the office, and at dinner, catalogs. Which, incidentally, I have a tendency to read back to front.

Happy Google Day Vincent D'Onofrio

Here's my contribution to our Google Alerts experiment!!!

"All Things Just Keep Getting Better"

You, came into my life, and my world never looked so bright.... It's true! You bring out the best in me, and now I can clearly see....
Days keep getting better, Nights keep getting better....
Days keep getting better, Nights keep getting better....
It's true! It's true! It's true! True! True!

When you are around, when you are around, all things just keep getting better.... When you are around, when you are around, all things just keep getting better....
I love that song; it's the theme from "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy".

I was going to post some of Val's more racier photos from "Guy", for the "nights keep getting better" lines, but then I remembered that my friend's 17 year old daughter reads my blog and I didn't want to get too graphic!!!

Ann came up with a great idea to do a VDO posting on Sunday so that Google Alerts will pick all of us up on Monday!

Happy Frisky Friday everyone! Have an ab fab weekend!

Merry Christmas vs. Happy Holidays

The Season of Brotherly Shove is, once again, upon us.

Yesterday I was reading an article in one of my hubby's secular humanist magazines about how the Christians are trying to shove "Merry Christmas" down everyone's throats now and how important it is not to let them. As you all know, that expression has fallen out of favor and it's more "politically correct" (if ever there was an oxymoron) to say "Happy Holidays", in order to include all religious beliefs (or non-beliefs), and people.

I realize that the word "Christmas" contains the word "Christ" and not all people believe in Christ, which is totally cool with me. Personally I think Christ was a pretty cool dude who did good things; the son of god however? Not so much. But to me, "Christmas" is just a word. I like saying "Merry Christmas". It feels more, I don't know, festive I guess. It hearkens back to a simpler time when there seemed to be more love, caring and sharing than there is now.

I was raised Catholic, Brian was raised Lutheran. He stopped believing in god long ago and is atheist. He's way too scientific to believe in god!! I was, at best, a "Christmas Catholic" after I got older and no longer had to participate in religious instruction so as to be confirmed. I don't really remember Sunday school, I spent most of the time staring at the stained glass windows and daydreaming. I rarely, if ever, did the "homework" and I memorized the prayers just to get by. But I always enjoyed going to Christmas Eve Mass at 5:00 p.m. My hometown was much smaller in those days, and many of my classmates were at Mass too. My father was well known and respected in town, and therefore, knew just about everyone at Mass. It was fun to see my friends, wish them Merry Christmas, then go socializing afterwards to my parents' best friends' homes (they all had kids my age).

I always associated Christmas with Santa, not so much the nativity story, although I enjoyed setting up our family's creche. I used to put the wisemen far away from the stable and move them closer each day till they arrived on Christmas Eve. My parents thought that was adorable.

Nowadays, elementary schools won't even decorate. I remember how much fun it was to decorate our classrooms with construction paper, have a party on the last day of school, give presents to my friends, see the tree in the school lobby as we arrived each day. Remember how much fun it was, that last day of school and you were ready to get on the school bus, and everyone was saying, "Merry Christmas!!"? Wasn't it exciting? Didn't it put you more in the spirit?

When I was a senior in college, I befriended a Jewish girl and we became good friends. She lamented that, growing up, she'd always missed out on Christmas. I had a key to her room, so one night I decorated it and got her a 12", but live, decorated tree. She was so excited!! And when school got out for Christmas break, she came down to my house on the Cape and helped decorate our family Christmas tree. Meantime, she taught me how to play Dreidl, using Chanukkah gelt for our winnings. She didn't have a Menorah at school, so she bought a set of 8 plastic flower shaped birthday candle holders and each night we lit one of the candles. I had a great time doing that! (She now celebrates both holidays with her children).

I have dabbled in Native American spirituality, but am currently studying Wicca. I respect other people's right to believe what they want. My only problem is with the rampant hypocrisy of so-called Christians. I'm not sure if there's a god or not. I don't believe much of the religious doctrine that I was brought up to believe. I find the Bible stories to be interesting and fascinating, but I don't necessarily take them to be "truth".

The winter solstice holiday, Yule, takes it's roots from paganism. The evergreen tree was the only live, colourful thing in the forest during those dark, winter days and was brought inside and lit with candles on winter solstice to celebrate the end of the dark and the return of the sun. There are many other pagan, solstice traditions from "olde Europe". Unfortunately, Christians decided to take over the Yule/solstice celebration by announcing that the holiday was to celebrate the birth of Jesus, thereby squashing the pagans under the heel of their collective boot.

Brian doesn't even like to say "Christmas Presents", "Christmas Tree", "Christmas Cards", etc. I pretty much type it as "Xmas" when I'm emailing people. We are a secular home, but I don't see what the fuss is about saying "Merry Christmas" to people you know celebrate it, whether or not they are religious. However, when I made a bunch of cards last weekend, I stopped short of using any actual, direct "Christmas" reference, opting instead for "Have a Cool Yule" or "Have a Happy Holiday Season" because I didn't want to offend anyone!

However, where do you draw the line? If you eradicate "Merry Christmas", then does that mean all references to Christmas have to be removed from carols and movies/shows to avoid offending non-Christians? Will we now sing, "It's beginning to look a lot like the last week of December"? "I'm dreaming of a white winter"? "A red ryder bb gun story"? "...then one foggy December 24th evening, Santa came to say...."? "The Grinch who stole December 25th"?

But I digress.

I have friends and family of all faiths and beliefs and I'd like to know what do YOU think? How do you acknowledge the season to your family and friends? Is it more acceptable to say "Happy Holidays" to people you know celebrate Christmas? Is saying "Merry Christmas" really that bad, if one realizes that "Christmas" is just a word? It's not even pronounced "Christ-mas", so I don't see what the big deal is!! Do you have to be a Christian to celebrate Christmas? Do my Jewish friends wish their non-Jewish friends "Happy Holidays" or "Merry Christmas"? Let me know!!

Snow Day!!

We woke up today to snow and ice, and the WSDOT advised everyone to stay home and avoid driving. I told my boss I'd try to come in once it got sunny, but he told me not to try it because of the treacherous conditions. And even though it is sunny now, it's still in the 20's and the roads are very icy. I will probably work at some point over the weekend to make up for the time I've missed so far this week.

Last night the Seahawks came back to beat the Packers in what is becoming known as "The Seattle Snow Bowl". First time in history that it's snowed at a Hawks game.

Western WA has also broken the "wettest month" record by exceeding 15" of precipitation.

My doggies are enjoying chasing each other around in the snow; as you can see above, Pepper was having a great time this morning!

I'm trying to make good use of the day by preparing my holiday cards and packages to send out, and I really need to clean out "the cupboard under the stairs" which holds a lot of my craft supplies. It's getting like "Fibber Magee's Closet".

Growing old is mandatory, growing up is optional

I turn "twenty-twenty two" officially at 11:20 p.m. I have the distinction of sharing my birthday with Jimi Hendrix and Carolyn Kennedy, and every once in awhile, it falls on Thanksgiving which is always fun. One time in college, when I got back from Thanksgiving break and was showing my roommate/spiritual twin/sisterfriend the stuff I got, she says, "You spoiled little brat! You get presents for Thanksgiving???" I was stunned and stammered, "but....but....but it was my birthday!" Needless to say, she was eating crow for a few days. Now, 23 years later, we still joke about it. Michelle - if you read this, I love ya babe!!

And I suppose I should do a pre-emptive strike before "Anonymous" leaves some torrid scenario about me and Michelle as roommates, which he is prone to do frequently, so "keep it in yer pants, dear, it wasn't like that!"

Speaking of "Anonymous", I've no idea what hubby got me as I won't open any pressies till I get home, but hopefully there'll be something Vincent-related!!

So happy birthday to me, and here are some tasty pics from Eliza, thereel, eBay and others who I cannot recall but you know who you are!

From torrential rains to snow

The wettest November on record continues, this time with some snow. It's not a lot, but any snow in the Puget Sound area is newsworthy. We usually get at least a couple of inches each year. But once 4" - 6" falls, the entire region shuts down because we are not equipped to handle it like they are in the mountains and in Eastern Washington.

It's still snowing up north in the Bellingham area (about 30 miles south of the Canadian border) but it's just warm enough here to start raining. When we bought the house in June, 1999, we were in love with the big horseshoe driveway. Now it's more like, "what were we thinking?" We've had snow and ice so bad that we've had to put kitty litter down to get enough traction to drive to the top, after getting a running start down the street. And storm cleanup is no picnic either when you have to use a snow shovel to get the thick, slippery coat of pine needles removed. You get quite a bit of exercise trying to clean up this driveway, let me tell ya!!
I expect the snow to be gone by early afternoon. But it's fun to see when it happens!!

Well I've finally emerged from my triptophan (trytophan?) stupor long enough to post some pictures from Thanksgiving Day. It was awesome. The weather was cold and rainy all day, which is what we pray for each year.

Here's our table; a lovely mixture of paper plates and fine crystal stemware. I scored the cornucopia flower arrangement at the Fred Meyer store where I went to do my last minute shopping on Wednesday morning. I couldn't believe my luck!
I wish that the next two photos could convey how hard it was raining, and how dark the sky really was. Rain was pouring out of our overflowing gutters.

A cozy scene in our livingroom.

I love Thanksgiving weekend and I think it's really my favourite holiday, even over Christmas. I get to live in pj pants or sweats for 5 days. But oh how I dread Monday when I have to wear pants again. And nice clothes too because my boss is taking me out to lunch for my birthday to an upscale restaurant in Tacoma called Stanley & Seaforts. I'm thinkin' I better get back to the gym before the Christmas food season is upon us!