Green and Various Updates

Our local grocery store Whole Foods (organic, fresh and yummy) has gone more Green than they already were. I go over there as frequently as I can for lunch as they have the most amazing salad, food bar. Lots of delicious items, albeit expensive.....I dump a bunch of stuff in a plastic container, put some Miso Shallot dressing on it (my favorite) and voila, a healthy lunch. Well now they have these brown cardboardy like containers. Turns out they are made of bullrushes and they degrade in a dump or your backyard composter in 90 days. That's pretty awesome. They have always used paper napkins made out of recycled paper. Non-bleached paper or course, The bleaching of paper is the worst part of the entire polluting paper goods making process. Where do you think all that used bleach goes? A lot of it in my gramma's lake!
You can read about how Green Whole Foods is here.

Speaking of Green another neat product that has gone green is Annie Chun's noodle meals. They make all their bowls out of some sort of biodegradable material. So the meal is self contained, you microwave it at work or whatever in its biodegradable bowl, then throw the whole thing away. Annie Chun's is sold at Whole Foods and Trader Joes. Look for it. It's good too!

Further updates on life -- the Dodge Magnum appears to be leak free! Keep tuning in for the driveway cleanup sage.

The family/Gramma's 90th DVD got burned but the voices are out of sync with the lips. What is that all about??? More searching and troubleshooting and burning awaits me.....

I Love and Hate New Software

I bought some new DVD burning software today from Roxio. I downloaded it from the internet because I couldn't find anything at Best Buy. That, in and of itself is another blog. The fact that brick and mortar stores are failing to meet consumer's needs and the internet is. But I digress.... I installed it and it wouldn't run. It complained that my video driver was out of date. I have a Nvidia GForce very expensive graphics card. I had to upgrade the driver. I had to update my Windows Media player to 10.0 and patch it. Not sure what that has to do with it, but I had to do it. Another 30 minutes of my life gone. Then of course, I had to register the product. After all of this I could finally use the product.

After fumbling my way thru I was thrilled to get to the point of burning a DVD. I put a nice, expensive blank DVD-R into my DVD burner (which I've never used) and the burn button is greyed out and it keeps saying "drive empty". Well, it's not empty, I put the DVD-R in it! I checked the Roxio support website, it says I should update the DVD burner driver. Imagine that......so I did that. Another 30 minutes gone.....Reboot, relaunch, try again. Still greyed out. Can you hear the screaming? I then tried searching on Roxio discussion boards. Oh, I need to be a member? I had to confirm my registration which was in my email inbox. Sign up for an account, etc, etc. It turns out I had the DVD-R in the wrong drive. Sometimes, by the time you reach this point, you just have to smile. Otherwise, there would be more crazy people in the world.

However, after I figured all that out, waited 20 minutes for the DVD to burn, I'm getting an error message right at the end of the burn. I'm not looking it up, I'm just going to bed. This DVD is a combination of several DVD movies taken at my Grandma's 90th birthday party. I'm trying to combine them into one DVD and burn movies for the families. Like they say, no good deed goes unpunished.....

Family Picture

This last weekend Dena and I flew up to Morson, Ontario for my gramma's 90th birthday. Here is a family picture. Gramma has 11 children (10 still living), ~ 35 grandchildren and ~ 48 great-grand children. There's a lot to count so I may be missing some..... This picture only represents a small portion of those.

Various Notes

The Dodge Magnum has been in the shop 2 days now. They are making darn sure they've fixed the problem because, being the insane bitch that I am, I spoke with the service director and put the fear of God into him. They didn't call me today, so, I guess they are keeping the car over the weekend......

Here's me getting my hair highlighted....

Dodge Magnum drives woman insane

Wednesday I'm off for the 5th time to the Jack Ellis Dodge dealer in Glendale to have my 2006 Dodge Magnum serviced. The last 2 times they basically told me it wasn't leaking and sent me on my way. See previous posts, I won't rant about it again.

So, since some of you know me pretty well, you know that I don't like to be told I don't know what I'm talking about, which is basically what the Dodge dealer is telling me. Don't ever tell me that. So, in order to prove to my service woman, Astrid, that the friggin' vehicle is leaking I've been placing cardboard under the car. Now, the rest of this I'm going to tell you is bordering on insane, according to Dena. But hey, that's me. On the driveway, I've placed chock marks where the tires to the car go and the outside lines of the cardboard, so if it drips, I'll know exactly where. The reason that's important is because I've placed tupperware all underneath the car on the cardboard using duct tape of course. That way if I get some fluid in the tupperware, I know where to place the cardboard again. See, it's very logical.

I've had marginal success with this. You see the vehicle doesn't leak that much in a 24 hour period. My driveway is full of stupid little stains about the size of a dollar pancake. Some of them quite fresh from the recent leaking. Tomorrow morning I'm also taking a digital picture of the driveway and taking it to Astrid. And I'm taking the evidence, in tupperware, to her as well. Dena says that it's crazy. Frankly, that never occurred to me. It really seems a logical thing to do. Is that what crazy is like? Doing things that to you are extremely normal, but to other people are totally whacked? So, by the way, I have about 1 milliliter of liquid in my huge tupperware container. You can darn well bet that the top is going on and off to Astrid it's going!

3 Sisters at Venice Beach

Princess Ariel and Gramma at DisneyLand

The Coffee Experiment

Well, my mom and Aunts are here visiting and for preparation I thought I'd be clever and buy one of those single serving coffee machines. That way each one could have whatever flavor coffee they wanted in the morning. Being that they are all quite independant women, I thought this would be an excellent idea. I went out and bought the Braun Tassimo single serve machine. I was a little disappointed in that at Target they only had 1 kind of coffee and one tea, but thought I could pick up more somewhere else. We tried the machine and it has wonderful coffee with excellent brew control, i.e. each person can really tailor the strength of their brew to their tastes.

However, it only had one kind of coffee and I couldn't really find any others. So I decided to go back and return it and get the Phillips Senseo single serve which seemed to have coffee everywhere and all different flavors. Well last night we tried that machine. Everyone agreed that the coffee tasted funny, burnt even. We tried to make cup after cup trying to change things up, and each time they said the coffee just tasted bad. Not too strong, not too weak, just bad tasting coffee. So, guess where I'm going today......back to Target to return the damn thing.

It was fun while it lasted, I'm borrowing a regular old filter coffee pot from my friend and buying regular old coffee at the store.........perhaps I'll pick up a flavored creamer......
The moral of the story? If you're going to buy a single serve coffee machine, buy the Braun Tassimo, it's a great idea. And the real moral, if it works, just don't try to make it better, just use it!

Gramma's Adventures #1 -- California Speedway

Here's Gramma and Auntie Dawn at the California Speedway watching the Indy cars race. This is where normal people can rent a few laps in their dream car (Indy or Nascar) and race around the track. It was very exciting at this HUGE venue.

4th Time's a Charm?

Wednesday found me back at the Dodge Dealership in Glendale - Jack Ellis Dodge. My red magnum had been in for service on March 21st, again, for the leaking transmission. (see January 11th, 2007 post for history). I really like this Dodge dealer, I had first taken it to Carmax by LAX, but the place is very large, very impersonal and I had to wait a week for an appointment. Glendale Dodge is very small and after my 3rd time there I recognize a lot of people. It's sort of sad when you are recognizing people at the car dealership.....

Back to the 21st -- normally I take the car to Astrid the service advisor, a short little Hispanic dyke, but this time she was busy and Nick came out to the car. Nick is the antithesis of Astrid. Large, European, male chauvinistic, loud -- by the end of the day he had blamed my leak on Jiffy Lube putting in my oil filter cockeyed. A bullshit story I'm sure. Just because I'm a woman doesn't mean I'm stupid. He also claimed they cleaned the bottom of the vehicle so that if it leaked again (well of course it'll leak again stupid, you didn't fix it!) then they would be able to identify the location.

Off I go to the dealer again on April 4th as it leaked from the moment I drove it back into the driveway in March. Now when I say leak, it's not as bad as the December leak, it's more like over a 12 hour period I get a silver dollar size spot on the driveway. This time I made sure I got Astrid. She is very attentive and assured me she'd take care of it. I got a call later that day and they could not find a leak. She wanted to keep the car overnight, put a large pan underneath it as well as clean all the residue off the engine and the splash pan. (isn't that what that idiot Nick said he did?)

The next day I went to pick up my baby, which I truly missed as I was driving a Ford Focus as a rental. There's the biggest waste of sheet metal you've ever seen. My sister says that it's the only car that people laugh at you when you tell them what you drive. How true. On the freeway I felt that my feet could feel every single pebble on the road and the wind noise, wow. Back to the Magnum, Astrid said they didn't find any leaks but there was a lot of old oil and other residue in the splash pan. They cleaned everything and sent me on my way. And when the porter drove the vehicle around to me, guess what, Astrid had it washed. I was very pleased. I stopped and thanked her and she said, "I'm always thinking". Yes, that's what separates the Nicks and the Astrids of the world. Forward thinking thoughts.....

That car better not be leak anymore! My driveway looks like the Clampett's live here.

Spring has Sprung

More on the Shoulder Problem

I had to go back to the Ortho guy today because my Physical Therapy prescription expired. Fortunately, I was in the middle of a self imposed "body" experiment (I do these occasionally) and my shoulder was much worse. If there is something going on with me, I'll often do an experiment, like with the shoulder I abstained from all exercise involving the shoulder for 10 days. The shoulder actually got worse. That led to valuable info for the doctor, he feels its more muscular than joint related. Well, to tell you the truth, I could have told him that. But I was glad to hear it none the less.

So after much discussion we elected to treat the issue from 2 different avenues, as a chronic inflammation in the shoulder joint and as a muscular problem in the pectoral/shoulder region. So, I have 4 more weeks of Physical Therapy and today I had my first cortisone shot. I was fairly freaked out about that whole cortisone shot thing. I thought they were going to come after me with a 14" needle, but it was just a little needle, was actually less painful than when the vultures try to get blood out of my arm, and the shoulder hurts less already. Also, when we discussed that physical inactivity worsens the problem, he said to get out there and play more golf and go to the gym more! WooHoo!!!

Another update will follow in a few weeks, as I'm sure you're dying to know about my health....

Things that happened a long time ago....

It's interesting and disturbing how things that happen a long time ago affect us for the rest of our lives. I was just in Boulder, CO and something that happened to me ~ 10 years ago came up again. I've not told anyone except maybe Dena this story, but I'll share it with you now.

About 10 years ago I was in Calgary, Alberta working on a VoiceMail project for some oil company. I was staying in the Sheraton by the airport. One night I was sleeping and was awakened by noises. I laid there confused as I was just in a dead sleep. I heard loud banging like something was being thrown against a wall. I was still kind of confused. Then I heard a door slam and I heard what I thought was sobbing in the hall. It began to dawn on me that someone was beating this woman. At first I was momentarily stunned and a little at a loss as to what to do. I quickly regained my senses and got up and peeked out the peep hole. I could see nothing but as I had made my way to the door I heard someone open a door and probably pull her back in as the door slammed again.

Shaking, I reached for the phone and called 911. Well, as you can imagine there was a swift response. The hotel front desk was miffed that I didn't tell them first. Yeah right. The cops came and since I could not pin point which room they could do nothing. Sounds come from all over in a hotel and they are hard to tie a direction to. The floor was deathly quiet for the rest of the sleepness night I had. It makes me tear up now just writing this blog. I feel so sorry that my response wasn't quicker for this woman and often wonder what ever became of her and the asshole that was beating her.

Now, sometimes I lie in a hotel room, sounds freak me out. The other night in the Courtyard Marriot in Boulder I heard what I thought was either crying or laughing in the hall. I can assure you I was out of bed in a flash! They were right in front of my door and she was kind of laughing and the man was cooing to her. So, no 911 calls that night.......

Movie Review -- Departed

Don't read this if you haven't watched it.

*************** SPOILER WARNING ***************

This movie was not oscar material. It was entertaining for sure. It was typical Martin Scorsese, definitely. It was disappointing in that it was apparently a complete remake of a Chinese film called Infernal Affairs, actually, so much a remake that it was scene for scene. Infernal Affairs (called Mou gaan dou in China) it is said was actually better than Marty's take on it. And it wasn't like Marty was making a remake of a 50 year old movie either, the movie was made in China in 2002. Jeesh, what is it saying about us that not only are we getting product from China and lessons in globalization but now we have to get our film ideas from them too? Sad.......

So why did Martin Scorsese win? Let's face it, he was given the Oscar as recognition for all his work. Do you really think people will remember Departed as a ground breaking, memorable film for years and years to come? No. But people will remember the type of film that Martin Scorsese makes and for that, he deserves an Oscar. Should it have been this year? Should he have been "encouraged" to stretch and make something even more innovative? Who knows.....

Physical Therapy Update

OK, so awhile ago I posted how I put off going to the physical therapist because I was concerned about the $1,000 a year coverage limit. I finally couldn't take the pain anymore in my shoulder and went to the PT place. I asked them to check coverage for me, just to be sure. I didn't want to run over the limit. She called and checked, it's unlimited. WHAT! Woohoo!! So, now I'm like, well why did my insurance company screw me last year when I went for my neck and only cover me for $1,000 leaving me with a nice $400 bill before I was notified I was cut off? I called them to find out the scoop. After many menus, much button pressing and speech activated menu navigating, I finally got a real person. Although, I'm not too sure you can call them real since they read almost every single word in our 10 minute conversation from a script. I could tell because she wasn't a good reader. A little slow. That's the new thing you know, almost every call center of any size has "scripted" employees. They read all questions, answers, etc from a set of scripts. It can be very aggravating, but don't try to bypass it because they cannot function if you veer from their script. Automatons.....

So I discovered that my "health" plan has 2 special exclusions for physical therapy. If you go for your back or your feet (your feet, really??), you have a $1,000 limit per calendar year. Your neck is part of your back because it's part of your spine. How stupid. I'm sure these exclusions are because most people who need physical therapy need it on their back, or apparently, their feet. The US system allows insurance companies to basically deny or limit coverage based on any whim they may have. Let me just tell you how ridiculous the American health care system is. How rigged. How against the normal everyday person and frankly, to some degree against the doctors, too.

Life Update

Well, I thought I would just throw out some info about all that's going on in my life right now cause I'm sure you've been wondering why I haven't been blogging. I've been too busy! It feels overwhelming, invigorating and exciting to have so much going on. As I mentioned to you all before I've been going to physical therapy for my shoulder & neck. Wow is it hard and very painful. I had to go 3 times a week but now I have to go back to the Ortho guy for a re-evaluation. My therapist, Darlene (who I'm pretty sure is gay but she is very, very professional and cleverly doesn't let on about anything in her personal life) is recommending me for more visits.

I am currently planning for a 4 day scrapbooking getaway at the end of March. That'll be a blast but there is a lot of planning that goes into these sorts of things. How much alcohol to bring, which pictures to scrap, who the masseuse is going to be, etc.

My mom and 2 of her sisters are coming in April 6th. I'm very excited about this. We're going to have a lot of fun. They all come in 3 hours apart at LAX. So, all day Friday I'll be driving back and forth to the airport. We'll be going to Disneyland, the Griffith Observatory, the Huntington Gardens for high tea (that reminds me, I have to make reservations for that....) and all sorts of fun, touristy stuff. I hope to be blogging that whole trip so stay tuned for that.

Just Stuff

My personal trainer (yes, I have one. I live in Los Angeles don't I) suggested that I let my hair grow longer and have it cut to look like Ellen Degeneres. He says she has baby fine hair, too. What do you think? Think I'd look good with an "ellen" haircut?

On the way home from the gym I pass thru Beverly Hills. Today I saw 5 cop cars and 9 cops arresting a guy. There's a joke in there somewhere right? How many Beverly Hills cops does it take to make an arrest?

By the way, if you live in Los Angeles you MUST know what IMDB is. People use it as a verb or noun in conversations. It's THE movie website with all the scoop.

I love singing in the shower with my parrot. He cracks me up. He sings and dances with me. He's bobbing and weaving and squawking....I wonder if he thinks I'm bobbing and weaving and squawking?

Hey all those Canadians reading my blog. Big shout out to all of you! How many of you are out there??? You can post comments even if you don't have a blogger account by doing anonymous. Jeesh that's a hard word to spell.

Lesbians take the Academy by Storm

What an amazing night in Hollywood Sunday night. Unfortunately it's only now that I've had a chance to blog about it. When I saw Ellen Degeneres up on that stage I thought to myself, Wow, she's come a long way. Do you remember when she was practically run out of Hollywood for coming out on the Ellen show back in 1998.

The "Ellen Show" was successful enough in its early seasons to warrant annual renewal, due largely to DeGeneres' perceived appeal and comic ability, but it was never a huge critical or ratings success. Only with Ellen's coming out did the show make its way into the wide public conciousness and hit a critical plateau. However after the initial coming out frenzy the show's ratings declined somewhat and ABC began feeling the pain of an organized backlash from religious conservative groups regarding the "gay content" being exhibited. While the final episodes of "Ellen" continued breaking new ground and winning awards, they were also widely criticized for focusing primarily on gay issues -- a criticism begun in anti-gay circles but which spread very quickly to the mainstream media. The brass at ABC found the justification they needed to finally pull the show from the air in May of 1998 after five seasons.

Where are we now? Not only has Ellen just hosted a very successful and more importantly, funny Oscar show but she has a successful talk show. Not to mention she's probably wealthy beyond belief. You go girl! Way to keep plugging and overcome adversity. The power of positive thinking? Or a sign of the times? Right place......etc

And what about Melissa Etheridge taking home the Oscar for Best Song? Kissing her girlfriend on National TV in front of 100's of millions worldwide and then telling Oprah's buddy backstage that "Oscar will be the only man to see my bedroom". Hehe. We certainly have come a long way!

Acupuncture Treatment #1

I'm having a lot of pain in my right shoulder and while I am starting physical therapy, I thought I would also supplement it with Acupuncture. Since my health insurance only covers $1000 of physical therapy, which is only about 8 visits, PT isn't going to solve the problem. So, I'm trying to find an alternative. Here's some pix with all my needles.

Lions for Lambs - another post....

Me and one of my techs (Drew) sitting behind Senator Tom Cruise's desk. Those pictures behind us are of the U.S. Senator (Cruise) and famous people, like Bush, the Dali Lama, etc. All professionally photoshopped of course. 3 of our Mitel IP Phones are sitting on and behind his desk.