-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Gray Ghosts: July 2006

Monday, July 31, 2006

My kids at play...

Please disregard the toys strewn about...they are spoiled.

Sassy Bin Laden and Fisher P. Lovebone

Fish does not like Sass to hide and when we ask where she is at, she goes and looks for her. Like most cats, Sassy has a fetish for cardboard and plastic and finds this empty Vita Water case a cozy spot. Fisher though is not having it!

Here it is a YouTube incase you got a WHACK MAC!
I KID! LOVE YA JOEL & SARA!

Sass & Fish @ YouTube



Uh, WOOPS...sorry, I was drunk when I took that picture!

Sunday, July 30, 2006

An Artist is Born!

Today we did ART!



Rewind came over while Hoo-Ha & Pope gutted their place for a garage sale we are having. She brought a plain wodden jewelry box over and some different paints and stickers and stuff. We went out back and proceeded to paint the box and cover it with pretty little girly things. It was super cute, but we wanted to do MORE!

So we asked Uncle Mike and he gave us a cool wodden jar we painted red with silver glitter on top. Then she wanted to write his name on it and Love Rewind. That is the nickname he gave her one night because she was repeating herself over & over like kids do!

That wasn't enough though so we took a white coffee mug and painted the names of everyone in our family on it! Even Sassy Bin Laden and the dogs. (We also put Baby on there for the little brother or sister she is going to have!)

The coolest thing we painted though was a 12inch vinyl record sleeve the DJ Dirty Mike had in his collection. He has become quite the mix master and has extra blank sleeves for his records. We were so impressed with her work, we put it on E-Bay...NO SHIT.

Clicky here to see her auction! -> REWIND in the HOUSE!

We will give FREE SHIPPING (1/2 price international) to any bidder that mentions this blog. They money goes to Rhiannon's School Clothes Fund for this coming school year! We are going to go to the craft store and get more paint and goodies, and she is gonna be a power seller on E-Bay! Who knows...maybe we can put her through college this way!

She is also a great photographer. She can take the best photos with any cell phone camera. I am so serious. I am getting her a camera for Christmas. (Probably sooner since I am not not known for my patience!) Anywho, I think she has talent and an artistic eye. Rhiannon Rocks!

Friday, July 28, 2006

Happy Birthday DogGrandMa!

Yesterday was my momma'a B-day. She turned 57 years young!
As you can see, she is a photo-whore and loves her picture taken!




She has been dying to go to Caprial's Bistro ever since she found out Caprial & John (from the OPB cooking show) were from Orygun and had a restauraunt here in town. Let me tell you the theme for the night was Spendy & Trendy. So Mike & I took her and IT WAS TO DIE FOR. First we had a Melange of 6-7 different types of cheese, nuts, berries & compote on house made crackers. Washed down by designer drinks like passion fruit puree martini w/ coconut flake and candied mandarins, marion berry margurita & dirty blu cheese olive martini's. Then came the salad. Lightly grilled onion, aged blu cheese, yellow pear tomatos, frise & colrabi. I liked the sesame orage vinagrette. The soup was a chilled cucumber something er other but I passed. Mike & I had well seasoned, thick & rare flat iron steaks atop herb & garlic smashed Yukon Gold taters with a balsamic vinagrette and white wine reduction. Madre had grilled swordfish and an exotic grilled veggie mix. It had some kinda sauce I don't remember. Miguel had an unsweetened (for the most part) mottled lemonade drink. The wine selection was mind boggling. We had a great time. My mom is awesome. She was the mom everyone wished they had cause she let us get away with murder and cooked weiner wraps. We passed on desert, though they looked divine and I regret it now. We opted for Ben & Jerry's. I threw rocks at my friends window from the parking lot but I don't think he heard me, or he saw the oxygen, realized who it was, AND DECIDED TO HIDE!

BOO-YA!



We got home about 8pm and I put on my PJ's and crawled into our "guest bed" (aka. Cousin Matt's room) for some reason with mom to watch TV. Then we were gonna hot tub. I took a booze snooze and didn't get outta that bed once until 10am!!! HELLO! It was a great night though. She is at the casino tonight giving my inheritence to the Indians. GO MOM!



She didn't think it was funny that I transposed the numbers in her age. How rude.

I still haven't blogged about last weekends Pig Roast. GodDamn it was hotter than hell. About 2/3 of the folks that usualy come canceled. Atleast I didn't have to talk about the tube in my nose all day. It was ok though, we got drunk and played horseshoes till dark, then we went swimming with a small child...who did infact survive. The food was excellent...for white trash fare. I'll get around to it later. Rewind, I mean Rhiannon is coming over to make 'Smores before bed. Can you say sugar high. Thats why I borrow my two legged kids...

I keep the 4 legged kind cause fur hides bruises.

Thursday, July 27, 2006

Gardenin'

Took some pics when I was watering tonight.

My Artichoke is blooming.



Click picture for a close up. They are neat flowers, er, um I mean vegetables?





I got some petunias.



Lotsa cosmos.



This pic doesn't do this purple verbena justice.



...or this pink one for that matter.



This is my breast cancer pink geranium.



Pete. My dragon.



I don't know what this is, but it's pretty.




One of my favorite containers. I love succulents.
The pot on the right is full of herbs. No. Not the good kind.



Oh and check out Fish, she wouldn't look at the camera. Moody bitch.



Speaking of Fisher P. Lovebone, she met another Weim at the dog park today. Honey Girl. She loved me. Fish wasn't having it. She pushed between us and barked in Honey's face. I swatted her butt and told her no, but it didn't phase her. Ain't nobody gonna touch her mama. This is exactly why we can't get another dog. She is a selfish spoiled brat. WOOPS.

Wednesday, July 26, 2006

Shit makes sense...

I came across this piece, read it, and it all made sense. READ IT if you give a shit...you got time.

BLOOD IN BEIRUT: $75.05 A BARREL


The failure to stop the bloodletting in the Middle East, Exxon's record second-quarter profits and Iran's nuclear cat-and-mouse game have something in common -- it's the oil.

By Greg Palast
July 26, 2006


I can't tell you how it started -- this is a war that's been fought since the Levites clashed with the Philistines -- but I can tell you why the current mayhem has not been stopped. It's the oil.

I'm not an expert on Palestine nor Lebanon and I'd rather not pretend to be one. If you want to know what's going on, read Robert Fisk. He lives there. He speaks Arabic. Stay away from pundits whose only connection to the Middle East is the local falafel stand.

So why am I writing now? The answer is that, while I don't speak Arabic or Hebrew, I am completely fluent in the language of petroleum.

What? You don't need a degree in geology to know there's no oil in Israel, Palestine or Lebanon. (A few weeks ago, I was joking around with Afif Safieh, the Palestinian Authority's Ambassador to the US, asking him why he was fighting to have a piece of the only place in the Middle East without oil. Well, there's no joking now.)

Let's begin with the facts we can agree on: the berserkers are winning. Crazies discredited only a month ago are now in charge, guys with guns bigger than brains and souls smaller still. Here's a list:

-- Israel's Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's approval rating in June was down to a Bush-level of 35%. But today, Olmert's poll numbers among Israeli voters have more than doubled to 78% as he does his bloody John Wayne "cleanin' out the varmints" routine. But let's not forget: Olmert can't pee-pee without George Bush's approval. Bush can stop Olmert tomorrow. He hasn't.

-- Hezbollah, a political party rejected overwhelmingly by Lebanese voters sickened by their support of Syrian occupation, holds a mere 14 seats out of 128 in the nation's parliament. Hezbollah was facing demands by both Lebanon's non-Shia majority and the United Nations to lay down arms. Now, few Lebanese would suggest taking away their rockets. But let's not forget: Without Iran, Hezbollah is just a fundamentalist street gang. Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad can stop Hezbollah's rockets tomorrow. He hasn't.

-- Hamas, just days before it kidnapped and killed Israeli soldiers, was facing certain political defeat at the hands of the Palestinian majority ready to accept the existence of Israel as proposed in a manifesto for peace talks penned by influential Palestinian prisoners. Now the Hamas rocket brigade is back in charge. But let's not forget: Hamas is broke and a joke without the loot and authority of Saudi Arabia. King Abdullah can stop these guys tomorrow. He hasn't.

Why not? Why haven't what we laughably call "leaders" of the USA, Iran and Saudi Arabia called back their delinquent spawn, cut off their allowances and grounded them for six months?

Maybe because mayhem and murder in the Middle East are very, very profitable to the sponsors of these characters with bombs and rockets. America, Iran and Saudi Arabia share one thing in common: they are run by oil regimes. The higher the price of crude, the higher the profits and the happier the presidents and princelings of these petroleum republics.

This Thursday, Exxon is expected to report the highest second-quarter earnings of any corporation since the days of the Pharaoh, $9.9 billion in pure profit collected in just three months -- courtesy of an oil shortage caused by pipelines on fire in Iraq, warlord attacks in Nigeria, the lingering effects of the sabotage of Venezuela's oil system by a 2002 strike... the list could go on.

Exxon's brobdingnagian profits simply reflect the cold axiom that oil companies and oil states don't make their loot by finding oil but by finding trouble. Finding oil increases supply. Increased supply means decreased price. Whereas finding trouble -- wars, coup d'etats, hurricanes, whatever can disrupt supply -- raises the price of oil.

A couple of examples from today's Bloomberg newswire are:

"Crude oil traded above $75 a barrel in New York as fighting between Israeli and Iranian-backed Hezbollah forces in Lebanon entered its 14th day... Oil prices rose last month on concern for supplies from Iran, the world's fourth largest producer, may be disrupted in its dispute with the United Nations over its uranium enrichment ... [And, said a trader,] 'I still think $85 is likely this summer. I'm really surprised we haven't seen any hurricanes.'''

In Tehran, President Ahmadinejad may or may not have a plan to make a nuclear bomb, but he sure as heck knows that hinting at it raises the price of the one thing he certainly does have -- oil. Every time he barks, 'Mad Mahmoud' knows that he's pumping up the price of crude. Just a $10 a barrel "blow-up-in-the-Mideast" premium brings his regime nearly a quarter of a billion dollars each week (including the little kick to the value of Iran's natural gas). Not a bad pay-off for making a bit of trouble.

Saudi Arabia's rake-in from The Troubles? Assuming just a $10 a barrel boost for Middle Eastern mayhem and you can calculate that the blood in the sand puts an extra $658 million a week in Abdullah's hand.

And in Houston, you can hear the cash registers jing-a-ling as explosions in Kirkuk, Beirut and the Niger River Delta sound like the sleigh-bells on Santa's sled. At $75.05 a barrel, they don't call it "sweet" crude for nothing. That's up 27% from a year ago. The big difference between then and now: the rockets' red glare.

Exxon's second-quarter profits may bust records, but next quarter's should put it to shame, as the "Lebanon premium" and Iraq's insurgency have puffed up prices, up by an average of 11% in the last three months.

So there's not much incentive for the guys who supply the weaponry to tell their wards to put away their murderous toys. This war's just too darn profitable.

We are trained to think of Middle Eastern conflicts as just modern flare-ups of ancient tribal animosities. But to uncover why the flames won't die, the usual rule applies: follow the money.

Am I saying that Tehran, Riyadh and Houston oil chieftains conspired to ignite a war to boost their petroleum profits? I can't imagine it. But I do wonder if Bush would let Olmert have an extra week of bombings, or if the potentates of the Persian Gulf would allow Hamas and Hezbollah to continue their deadly fireworks if it caused the price of crude to crash. You know and I know that if this war took a bite out of Exxon or the House of Saud, a ceasefire would be imposed quicker than you can say, "Let's drill in the Arctic."

Eventually, there will be another ceasefire. But Exxon shareholders need not worry. Global warming has heated the seas sufficiently to make certain that they can look forward to a hellacious -- and profitable -- season of hurricanes.

10 months...

Since we said "I do".



Been together bout 8 years now, he's my best friend.
I am so tired of fighting. It's never been like this really. A little tiff here and there yeah, but not like this. I walk on egg shells these last few days. I know I am not perfect and I am ok with that. Now if I could only get him to be ok with that too...



I got some things to work on, it's not all his fault. No, that is not battered woman syndrome talking. I am making an effort. I just hope he does too. I don't know if I could make it without him. I'm not talking about money...I just mean dealing with my disease, life in general. He does alot for me. Physicaly and emotionaly.



I think it will be ok. I think we will work it out. I know how much he loves me.

Thursday, July 20, 2006

The Rodeo came to town.

Spike & Mike hard at work.



Spike came to town yesterday. He is my husbands best bud. They work on the road together and keep eachother sane...well sorta. He is a funny funny dude and I like him alot. Infact he was in our weddding. He's in town for the Pig Roast at my dads Saturday. It is a white trash ho down if I ever saw one. Spike will fit in nicely. He and his wife are mainly here for a Horseshoe Grudge Match with my dad & shit. It might get ugly...seriously.

Speaking of ugly...



We are in the midst of a heat wave here in Orygun. I think it was like 96 today 101 tomorrow and 105 Saturday. WTF. I hate the heat. Today the Mayor, DaTilla and Neal met me at Mayors bar and we had libations and lunch. I had a deep conversation with Tilla, it was very stimulating, he is quite an interesting man. Poor Neal was on duty and had to go to the Dr.'s so he could not drink. He is a big bad fireman EMT, but he knows how to party! Mayor drank her lunch. I limited myself to only two bloody mary's (with extra olives of course). She brought a friend who I liked very much. Her new neighbor. Maybe that is why she hasn't been blogging! She got a life! HA! Well she said she would try to make a post some day.

I will be the blue girl...holding my breath.

Monday, July 17, 2006

My new Fave

I found it on YouTube.
Now maybe Joel can see it.
Atleast you can stop and start it now!



Not much to say...
I keep fucking up.
Feel out of control.
Does that make me crazy?

The short answer is YES.

Monday (tomorrow) I start over.
I am going to do right by me...I swear.

Saturday, July 15, 2006

Lazy Dayz

I think today will go down in the books as one of the laziest days ever.

Miguel my Spanish pro-golfer hit the links with some buddies so I slept most of the day. I am not even gonna tell you what time I actually drug my ass out of bed. It is far too embaressing. I obviously needed the rest I guess. I was not very restful sleep. I kept having crazy half dreams from the noises around the house and thoughts in my head. I do that alot



I puttered around on the computer for a bit, then I went outside to blow some of the stink off. I wattered my plants for a bit and had a nice long conversation with the dogs. They like to visit when I do my watering, my veggie garden is along the fence and they follow me up and down asking about my day and how I feel. They are good guys. Odin and Elway. Fisher tags along on my side of the fence, but she is so busy chasing sticks and bugs and rocks. She doesn't have time to talk.



That is a picture of Rhiannon my little niece. I titled it "Cornface". I like to give my pictures titles. She loves corn on the cob. This is one of my favorite things about summer. Dinner on the deck, a nice little fire. Kid in the hot tub splashing around. My family means the world to me. I am so happy it has grown two more faces and one more on the way.



She took that one of us together by the fire. I called it "Firelight". She is a whiz with a cell phone camera I tell ya! HooHa and Pope have her every Wednesday and every weekend. Tomorrow we ALL are going up to my dads place and helping him and Patsy get the place ready for Pig Roast 2006 next weekend. It is one of the highlights of my summer I tell ya. I am taking my 50ft. hose with me and actually going swimming for the first time since getting sick. I used to be quite the swimmer. I am very excited. Here is a picture of my old man on a horse at our friends big BBQ last year. I call it "Dad on horse". (Couldn't think of anything better.)

Wednesday, July 12, 2006

Can ya hear me now?

I be AudioBloggin.
What do you think? Thinking about making it public for anyone to use to leave a message on my blog. AudioComments if you will?

this is an audio post - click to play


(I just listened to it...pretty rough. I apologize in advance.)

Tuesday, July 11, 2006

Equality. What a concept.

Stole this from the Mongolian Grill lovin' Maven.
Thanks Girl.



Show Your Support
Fuck off if you don't like it.
I didn't ask for your opinion, I'm giving you mine.
Start your own blog Hitler.

Saturday, July 08, 2006

Date Night...

Studmuffin surprised me with a hot date tonight!


What is my Italian Cassinova's idea of a hot date you ask?

Changs Mongolian Grill followed by a expidition soccer match at PGE Park! Not your idea of romance? Well, it works on me. Tomorrow our favorite favorite team (Italy) plays the stinky French for the World Cup, so we got warmed up tonight for the big game.

It was a gorgeous night for a soccer match. The Portland Timbers played an English soccer club, Coventry City. Surprisigly, the Timbers WON! It was tied and came down to penalty kicks and we out kicked their asses!

So we got this mascot, Timber Jim. He is a lumber jack on speed. He runs around with a chainsaw (SERIOUSLY) and saws a round off this huge log everytime a goal is scored. Here he is on his log, getting the crowd to chant one of their many fight songs.



My favorite chant of the night was "Your going-home in a Port-land am-bu-lance". The fans are outragous and quite rabid to be honest. I sat right above the rowdy section and half of the fun was just watching them! Many are drunk, they like to dress the part of soccer hooligans and they have horns and drums and flags and shit. It's quite a spectacle! I thoroughly enjoyed myself. I OD'd on peanuts and spent $15 on Diet Coke. We also had a peanut shell fight, it was so romantic. Here is the goalie carrying Timber Jims log.



Dinner was delish. I love me some Mongolian Grill. I especially dig the plum sauce. It's like sweet Mongolian Katsup. Mmm Mmm Good.

Friday, July 07, 2006

Grand Finale

So here in Orygun, we have laws about fireworks.
Nothing that flies. Nothing that shoots over 6ft. high...basicly nothing good. It is the Republican firework brigade, buncha killjoys they are.
So what do fine upstanding patriots like ourselves do to celebrate the birth of our fine albeit mis-managed nation?

We go to Washington State Bitches!

That's right. We traveled 101 miles north to be exact to the Chehalis Indian Reservation and contributed $500 (Potpourii & HooHa and Mike & I) to their college fund! Between the casinos, the fireworks and the white lightning, them Indians know how to party! They got it right, they are the true Patriots! God Bless the Native Americans! It was money well spent.

So I took the advice of my readers Matt & Will and went to YouTube to upload the finale they worked so hard on. Seriously Jim (Sherriff of Fist City) Mike & Pope worked their butts off running around in the dark. I am surprised only Pope got a small burn. So here is the video I shot with my camera, there is a HUGE disclaimer/watermark running through the middle of it but please look past it. Watch the whole thing cause the end is the best part. YouTube would not accept it and this is the only way it would take it. I don't know why because I don't know what I am doing. It tells me it won't accept files over 100MB and the file I made that has the BS watermark running through it is less than 100MB so it accepts the F'd up version of course...

We all sat in the backyard and they were in the front yard. It is easier for 3 men to run from the cops than it is for the women & children. We had the fire & were comfy in our ultra cozy chairs and could see the whole show from right over our heads. It was wonderful. This was the best year so far. We had all of the neighborhood watching and even had applause and neighbors come up to us later thanking us for such a sweet kickass show.

Next year will be even better. Jim will have his own pallet of tubes and we wrote down the best of the best things we liked the most and that is what we will buy next year. It is a choreographed dance orchestrated by masters of the art that is the firework.

Grand Finale (This is only a fraction of the entire event!)


Enjoy!

Thursday, July 06, 2006

4th of Joo-ly ShinDig

The 4th is all about the kiddies...
(Til the sun goes down!)



My gorgeous new neice Rhiannon (YES like the song).
Mike calls her Rewind for short, cause everyone needs a nickname.



Deuce on the loose...



The Mayor of Fist City does NOT care what you think about her white sox and black gaucho's with sandals. DEAL!



I had to join in the fun too. Damn my feet are sexyhot.
Those thick sox are HooHa's feet. We didn't wanna get cold!



Deuce stomping un-popped pop-its...they just don't make 'em like they used to.




Pope and Deuce watching Mike light something illegal I am sure.



My new niece and Potpourii shooting a Roman Candle.



This is Crazy Chris, my bi-polar shizophrenic neighbor across the street. He watched the show all night between beers and bong hits and lithium tablets...I will blog about him sometime, dude is WHACK!



This is a short little "legal" kiddie fountain. Our Grand Finale is so long I can't find a site that will host it. I'm still looking. 161MB or 4 minutes 40 seconds long...if you have any advice please dispense it. I can e-mail it, but can't get it posted. Let me just say IT FUCKIN' ROCKED THE NEIGHBORHOOD!

Purple Fountain

My new Razr

Stay Tuned...

I am going to post about our 4th of July kickass shindig complete with a video of our Grand Finale. I just need to tweak some shit. I got some pictures too. It was a success and a good time was had by all!

In the mean time....drool over my sweet new phone!
(Ladies or any dudes that like pink)

I had to get a new phone, I dropped mine in my cereal and it was not working properly. I couldn't hear and it only wanted to charge sometimes and I can't have a tempermental phone in my line of work.



Now, I gotta go. Today is 1st Thursday and my P.A.L.S. (Portland area lung support group) meet and Jim got a transplant! I wanna hear ALL about it.

YEAH FOR JIM!

Sunday, July 02, 2006

Have You Seen This Dog?

This is the look I got last I saw her...



She is one smart cookie. She watched me put Q-tips in my pocket in the bathroom and grab the bottle of ear cleaning solution. Immeadiatly she knew what was up. Now I can't get close to her. I tried tricking her with love, offering treats, snuzzels on the couch...nothing works. She is off in the bedroom, lying on her bed pouting. So I came here to waste a little time. I will get up for some berries in a minute and then we will see. She can't resist the sounds of mamma in the kitchen! THEN I will pin her down on the couch and let the ear cleansing commence! Oh, did you notice the spoiled brats red Coach collar? Trendy bitch she is.

Last night we had a sweet little Q.



(by the way,NEVER tell a woman she can't BBQ)

So anyways the Mayor and Sheriff of Fist City Proper came over and we had libations and tons of good grub. An assortment of deserts, the Sheriff hit the hot tub while we sat around the fire laughing. I was wasted. Good times...till the horrific sound of a car CRASH up the street. Cop T-boned a minivan. Someone was ejected and died. Sad times.

Speaking of Sad times...



That is for my friend. He knows who he is. It is a hug cause he needs one.

Saturday, July 01, 2006

Holy Shit.

So I took this quiz thingamabobber and the results it came up with totally fucking freaked me out...

This thing was so random and off the wall and I answered it honestly and this is what it pooped out. SO. RIGHT. ON.
Spooky...

The HTML is screwy and it posted it way...down...there ~>


























What You Really Think Of Your Friends


Mom is your soulmate.
You truly love Mike.
You consider Christy your true friend.
You know that HooHa is always thinking of you.
You'll remember Mayor for the rest of your life.
You secretly think Willie is creative, charming, and a bit too dramatic at times.
You secretly think that Stacey is colorful, impulsive, and a total risk taker.
You secretly think that DaTilla is loyal and trustworthy to you. And that DaTilla changes lovers faster than underwear.
You secretly think CousinMatt is shy and nonconfrontational. And that CousinMatt has a hidden internet romance.

www.flickr.com
This is a Flickr badge showing public photos from lynseymom. Make your own badge here.


open mind : ignorance

Dogster Terror Alert Level


ORblogs - Oregon Weblogs Community