This weekend was filled with good and bad, first up, the good. Friday night was dinner with good friends. So good seeing Bill and Linda, meeting Ashley’s boyfriend and seeing Nicholas. We closed down Abuelos! Total greatness, can’t wait to do it again.
Then Saturday, the Susan G. Komen survivors luncheon, then time with Jeffrey and Tessa. I took the Irishman’s girls over to play with Tess, took them to McDonalds so they could run wild, then back to Jeffrey’s for more play time. They dug in the dirt, found a worm family and had a ton of fun.
Yesterday was not so fun, I was leaving to run some errands, the wind caught the front door and it slammed on my right thumb. I am right handed, it is incredibly hard doing anything at all. I slept with a baggie full of ice, that of course melted in the night, at 6am this morning, the bag must have unzipped, ice water everywhere in the bed. I have never ever seen the Irishman jump up that fast.
So happy Monday everyone, I hope you all had a gentler wakeup than I had!
My Humbling Experience
Yesterday I had the most humbling experience I have had in a long time. I volunteered to work at the Susan G Komen survivors luncheon. I have a friend that organized the raffle and needed volunteers to help with it. I said yes without even knowing what I would be doing.
So yesterday morning I found myself surrounded by the most amazing women, women who have fought a battle and have won. They are warriors to the highest degree, amazing, strong women. What struck me as I watched them, was that cancer, not age, is the great equalizer. It knows no age, no ethnicity, has no socio economic boundaries. I saw women of every age, size, shape and color there, and they were all beautiful. You could see their souls shinning through, their warrior spirits were in attendance, one could see it in their eyes, their demeanor, they had faced the worst and they had won.
I am truly humbled to have been in such presence, so much so I have volunteered for the next even, the Plano race. I am going to drive a golf cart, so excited. I do this in part to honor Sandi’s memory, and in part to celebrate my friend Wanda’s triumph over the disease.
I have always found myself in the presence of truly great women, I don’t know why God chooses to give me these influences in my life, I am just grateful He does.
God is good, He is ever-present in my life, I am unapologetically a Christian, I am not going to water that down for anyone. I don’t feel I have to, I don’t ask anyone else to water down their religious beliefs, so they in turn should not want me to. I will pray before meals, I will ask Him for forgiveness for my trespasses and I will praise Him for the good things in my life. I will continue to ask Him to tell all that I love that have preceded me home that I said Hey.
So, today I ask Him to tell Sandi I said Hey
The Bachelor, How I really Feel
I saw a tweet the other day where Barbara Walters called the show, The Bachelor a degradation to women, I retweeted and added my own two cents. I called it a degradation to humanity, it was mentioned on MSN.com trends. I had no idea until someone commented here and let me know.
I would like to tell you why I believe the Bachelor and the Bachelorette shows are degradations to humanity. We, as humans, have come so far in the short amount of time we have been on this planet and this is what we reduce ourselves to? Vying to be on a television show where, I admit I don’t know, how many women are trying to get the attention of one man? Vice versa on the other one, but let’s tackle the Bachelor first shall we. All of these women, allowing this man to grope them and stick his tongue down their throat all in the hopes of a proposal at the end of the program. These women are not ugly, however from what I hear some are crazy, but they are not ugly. So why this show? Why humiliate yourself in front of the world for a man?
Fame, comes to mind, in our current culture people will do anything for fame, including taping themselves having sex and “leaking” it to the public. How must the parents of these girls feel watching them do these things. If my daughter, Elizabeth Anne, told me she was going on this show, I would lock her in a room until she was too old to go anywhere near it. But here is the thing with my daughter, I raised her differently, I raised her to be independent, self-reliant and to have self respect. These women have no self respect, and from what I know of the show the man involved has no respect for these women. He goes from one to the other saying I love you to them? When they see the show air do they feel humiliation? Or, because in this society, they are happy to just be on television? That is the real question, when are we going to go back to having morals and not thinking that being famous is all there is to life?
Don’t get me wrong, part of me would love to be famous, just for the free shoes that I know someone would want to send me. Are you out there Jimmy Choo? This show is not romantic, it is skanky and encourages women to whore themselves out for a few moments of air time.
If we boycott this show, like we all should, then these people would have to have real lives, real relationships and perhaps have a modicum of decency. As it is they don’t have any of those things.
Those are my feelings on these types of shows, I hate them, I like scripted programming, let’s get Joss Whedon back on prime time, then I will be a completely happy woman.
Fish out of Water
I was watching Suburgatory last night, I love this show, not just because the dad, George, is amazingly cute, but because of the fish out of water premis. I think I like it because most of my life I have been a fish out of water. For the first 12 years of my life I was raised in Oklahoma City, I am a true city girl, I walked everywhere. My friends and I would walk to the movies on Saturday, we walked to the Tastee Freeze and the store. Then I moved to Owasso, talk about a fish out of water, a city girl in the country. It was crazy, there were no movie theaters to walk to, no stores, nothing to walk to except a pond, creek and woods. Oh and my BFF Tammi’s house, thank you Jesus that was within walking distance!
She was a fish out of water as well, just moved from Tulsa, I will never forget the first day of school, it was Eighth grade, we went all day, class after class, something was amiss. Finally at the end of the day, we are waiting for the bus, and I turned to Tammi and whispered what did they do with all of the black people? In Owasso, there was only on black kid in our whole school, and Anthony was so popular there was no way he was noticing me. She said I don’t know, this is crazy, see we had both come from inner city schools where it was very much more blended. Even though there was very little diversity in Owasso, I have to say I witnessed no racism in our school, very proud to be from Owasso to this day, I claim it as my home town.
Next it was a move to Atlanta with my then husband, the only place I have ever lived where I felt instantly bonded. I felt accepted, and welcomed, it was the most amazing experience. I met people that their great grandparents had known my great great grandmother. My then husband did not fare so well and hated it, so move again we did. This time to Texas, first it was Las Colinas, then Plano. Plano, a place I really felt out of the loop in, at that time I think all of the women in Plano were stay at home moms and I still worked. We had decided I would work until we had a second child, we used my paycheck to pay off everything. Anyway, the garages were in the back, so you came home and left and never met anyone. One day, I parked in front after getting Jeffrey and my neighbor across the street happened to be out and came over. Vicki was so sweet and invited my little boy over to play with her little girl, Ashley, they became fast friends. In the meantime I was having a hard time finding a church, see I was FreeWill Baptist and those did not exist in North Texas at the time. So I called my dad, because he always had the answers, and asked what to do. He said to find a good Southern Baptist Church and I would be fine. Lo and behold, my new neighbor Vicki invited me to her church and it was Southern Baptist. So I took Jeffrey and went, I have to be honest, I never fit in, I was married but my husband didn’t go to church, and apparently you are looked down on for that in the Southern Baptist community. Or at least at that time you were, I felt the stares, I was very pregnant with a small child in tow and no wedding ring (fingers were swollen) I had to convince them I was indeed not an incarnation of the whore of Babylon. They let me in, Jeffrey loved it, I stayed. I then became a stay at home mom and Vicki convinced me to put Jeffrey in Mothers Day Out at the church. That is where I really found my group, Jeffrey’s teacher Jan was the best, she was pregnant as well and could tell I wasn’t comfortable with the whole leave my child to do nothing situation. I will never forget how Jan made me feel. like I was not the worst mom in the world and that it was ok to leave Jeffrey one day a week. She continued to make me feel welcome and to this day is one of my best friends. Jan is simply the best, I met other women that made me feel welcome as well.
I will say the childrens minister at that time did not, she was never warm or welcoming to me, however she was to the children, so I can overlook the heavy handed, unkind things she said to me during my divorce.
I will tell you what finally helped me to feel Plano was my home and that was meeting Linda, she was as loud and opinionated and out going as I was. It was like meeting me, and it was a revelation, I could be me in any situation and not care if anyone liked me. I tend to keep people who are amazing and yes, I have kept Linda. We were parted for a while, but once she found me again (thank you Facebook) it was as if no time had passed. We picked up where we left off, total greatness, she still is.
I have decided that a fish out of water is a good thing, those of us who find that we are one, we don’t flop around, we grow lungs and adapt to our new surroundings. We then grow legs and explore our new environments, we grow and learn and assimilate others to our way of thinking. A fish on land is a good thing, welcome to my world.
Zumba Time
Yesterday I tried Zumba for the first time, I convinced my workout partner, Kay, that we needed to do this. Wow, that is all I can say, well actually not, I am going to say a lot. I finally got it by those endorphins everyone is always going on about. I loved it! It was not like exercise at all, it was an hour of dancing. I haven’t sweat that much in, well, a long time. This morning I could barely get out of bed, my legs and arms hurt so much. We will be doing the class every Tuesday and Thursday, it was just a blast! High energy, low impact fun. There was a woman in there that wore this scarf thing around her waist that had all of these jingle thingies on it, I want one. I need one. I want to jingle when I shimmy. Let me tell you, I didn’t know what I was doing, at times I was lost, but I just kept moving, and figured the more I went the more I would get the steps. I probably looked like a big ol’ donkey, and I didn’t care, still don’t.
Elizabeth Anne has gotten me hooked on a new game, it is a drawing game, for those of you who know me really well, you know that I do not draw well. So it is funny as all get out, I laugh so hard at my own drawings. Elizabeth sent me a text last night that said “What the hell is that” out of sheer frustration at her mother’s drawing ability. For the record it was a cat pouncing. the word was pounce.
Happy Wednesday, the week is going slow, I blame the time change, I am hoping the weekend goes slow as well. Saturday I am volunteering at a Susan G. Komen event, I don’t know what I am going to be doing, but I am sure it is going to be a fun time. I have to be there at 7am, that I didn’t know I had volunteered for until Wanda sent me an email telling me the specifics. I will have to remember to set my alarm Friday night, I am very excited, I do this in memory of Sandi and in honor of all of my friends battling breast cancer.
This morning, the Irishman made my coffee, I love it when he does that, his coffee tastes so yummy! Wednesday is off to a good start!
Ashley’s Journey
Last night I watched another episode of My 600 lb Life, this time it was Ashley’s story, she was well over 600 pounds and young. In her 20’s, her whole family was heavy, she was the first to decide to do something about it. Now her family was not as heavy as she, but they were and are hefty. Ashley did not do as well as Henry, I don’t know if it is age or mindset or the environmental factors. At the end of the show she was down by 345 pounds, she should have been at her goal weight, her loss was slow due to her not eating right. She had two skin removal surgeries along the way. However her legs, her legs are what I cannot get out of my mind. The doctor even said her legs looked the same as when she weighed over 600 pounds. He said that he could probably remove another 30 pounds of skin off of her calves alone. This show is enough to scare anyone into eating right and not allowing themselves to get to this situation.
Her mother was absolutely horrible, I have never seen a mother behave like this, she was constantly making fun of her daughter and saying how she was going to have pie and cake at Thanksgiving and how Ashley couldn’t have any. Then she would just cackle, yes, cackle is the only word to describe the sound coming out of her mouth. This is a woman who is around 300 pounds if she is an ounce. I was yelling at the television, What the Heck woman! She should have been on a restrictive diet. In the end Ashley was actually coaching a girls softball team and being active and productive in her life. I would love to see where she is today.
Watching these shows gives me resolve in my own weight loss journey to continue on and yes do the dreaded exercising that will tone my legs and arms and give me abs that look good. I am terrified of being 600 pounds, it is one of my greatest fears. Perhaps an unreasonable fear, but it is mine.
I will make good choices today, wether is is with food, my outlook, my job and my physical activity. I hope everyone has a great day and chooses to be healthy, happy and active!
No Internet Weekend
I did it, I went 24 hours with no internet, it was hard, I am not going to lie. Especially first thing in the morning, I read the comics and Dear Abby online, that is how I start my day, however, yesterday I did not get to. I did make the Irishman bring me a newspaper, I accessed the old fashioned way. He said the hardest part was when his soccer team won and he couldn’t brag about it, and when the man at the bar hit on him. He couldn’t even text me about it, since he is the one that said no text messages. Serves him right, since he came home and then slept all day. Yes, I believe he cheated because he was “sick” so he slept all day. Avoided temptation, is what he did. Ok, so he was actually not feeling well, but still, I went to Costco and Target and couldn’t even tell anyone where I was.
I would also like to say thank you to Jess and Elizabeth Anne for bombarding me with messages I could not read. I resisted the urge to even look; I did call them and ask them what was so all fired important. Nothing, nothing was important!
I have to admit it was kind of freeing in a way, after a while, I didn’t have the urge to look, to see what everyone was doing, to see if I was missing something. I think I will unplug every once in a while just to regroup. I caught up on my TV watching, I read a book, which is something I love to do, it was nice. I did miss the Stylization on Ruelala, which was sad for me, but Elizabeth Anne sent me a text this morning saying I didn’t miss anything. What a relief!
Watched another episode of GCB, I am really loving that show, it is so spot on, everyone who lives in the Dallas/FT Worth area needs to see this show. Oh who am I kidding, all Baptists need to see this show, it doesn’t matter where you live, this show is spot on. Watch it!
Never Bet an Oklahoman
Today was absolutely fantastic, to start things off, coffee of course, then a great appointment with my hair stylist, Beatrice, who is a miracle worker. Then off to see Phillip at Starbucks! I got to meet his partner Taylor, and also see other old friends and meet new ones. A great time was had and Phillip just looks fantastic, and happy, he was glowing, so good to see.
I took lunch to the Irishman as a surprise, I hope he enjoyed his sandwich and coffee treat, then back home. I was going to run errands and do some grocery shopping but it was pouring rain so I decided a nap was in order. I did nap, and it was good.
So, the Irishman and I have made a bet, we bet that the other could not go a day without the internet. We will be doing this tomorrow, so you will not hear from me again until Monday. No games on the IPad, IPhone, nor the Mac, no checking in, no Facebook or Twitter. I wonder who will cave first, a lot is riding on this, te greatest being bragging rights.
I believe I will be the winner, he believes he will, we shall see, tat is all I have to say. I can be very stubborn and iron willed when the situation warrants, I think we have all seen that with the change in eating habits.
The hard part will be tomorrow night, Ruelala.com has their Sunday night Stylathon, the deals, I am already hurting with the thought of not being able to log in. But I can do it! Wish me luck!
Weekend Plans
Well here it is folks, Friday once again, and a glorious Friday it is, dark, dreary, cold and wet. Amazing weather, I do believe God is telling me He loves me. I am firm believer that everything happens for a reason, we may never know the reason, but a reason there is.
This weekend I am going to get to see an old friend, Phillip is coming to town and has set up a meeting at Starbucks so he can see his friends here in town. I would never have thought to do that, I am so excited to see him! He is such a great person, and has done things in his life that I admire. First off he took a chance and moved to a new city to start a new life, I thought he was so brave at the time, and still do. He has been blessed in so many ways since, I wont go into detail, because it is his story, just know that since he stepped out on faith, his life has flourished in so many ways. I am in awe of him, his positive attitude and his amazing smile, can’t wait to see him tomorrow!
I also want to go see the new John Carter movie tomorrow; I am hoping to talk Jeffrey into going to see it with me. I love these kinds of movies! I am so excited about it, I know that sounds crazy, but I love the escapism, the bigger than life, the stepping out of your comfort zone and fighting aliens on an alien planet idea. I loved the books; I loved reading Edgar Rice Burroughs as a kid. Pure greatness, I cannot wait to be taken to a different time and different world, love the movies!
My First Influence
Today is International Womens Day, so I would like to tell you about the first woman who influenced me. My Grandmother, Lela Mae Hammond Testerman, who was nothing short of amazing. They say I am a lot like her, I tend to think I am, she really didn’t enjoy cooking all that much. She had a few signature dishes that everyone loved, if there are any Testermans out there that have her chicken and dressing recipe, I totally need that. She had a sweet tooth, and an insatiable appetite for hollywood gossip. Oh and the romance novels, I totally get that guilty pleasure from her.
She was fierce in her love for her family, she would defend any of us to the death, if she didn’t like what was happening, well denial was the word of the day. She taught me how to walk in a hoop skirt because she was convinced the fashion would make a comeback. She once told me that I didn’t have to be so smart because I was pretty, she was not joking. To this day I see that point of view, I see it in the world, I now understand what she was talking about. However, let me tell you something, my grandmother was smart, and funny, and she married well. Not in money terms, in character terms, she totally knew how to pick ’em as the saying goes. She was a good Christian woman, who placed her faith in God and would tell me she was sure everything would work out in the end or come out in the wash. She was my best friend, when I moved away from her I would write her long letters, I am talking 10 pages long, filled with all of my girlish hopes and dreams. She never once put me down for those, she would write me back telling me about her days, the church and Burt and Lonnie’s latest antics in the National Enquirer.
I miss my Grandma terribly, I know I will see her again, I am keeping a mental log of what has happened to her favorite celebrities so I can catch her up when I see her again.
Angie World 