Sunday, December 24, 2006

Merry Christmas and Book #59 - Admissions

I got up this morning to go to mass. It was so pretty. All the poinsettias and the huge Nativity scene. Looked so nice. I love all that. I had wanted to go to Midnight Mass this evening, but I don't have anyone to go with me, so I am opting to go tomorrow morning when the hubs is back home. I hope next year I get to go.

Admissions is set in New York City. The book centers around the New York scene of trying to get one's child into the "right" school. There are 2 main characters who are also best friends - Helen, the mother of a girl, currently going into the admissions process and Sara, the director of admissions at the school where Helen's daughter currently attends. There is a lot of outside drama and a colorful cast of characters so I was pretty much sucked in right at the beginning. I read it fairly quickly - less than a week. I recommend it even if you just read it for comic value.

Well, the rest of my day will be baking pies, watching movies and watching the Steelers hopefully put an ass whoppin' to Baltimore. The last game they played was pretty damn ugly so let's hope my boys bring their A game. I doubt I have time to post later, so all of you please have a wonderful Christmas or whatever it is you celebrate. I hope all of your days are filled with laughter, thoughtful gifts, easy exchanges for the thoughtLESS gifts, no in law drama, and a magic fairy to come clean up the mess later.

Labels: 50 Book Challenge, Christmas

Elizabeth at 11:30 AM

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Saturday, December 16, 2006

Book #58 - Your Big Break by Johanna Edwards

I read another book by this girl called The Next Big Thing and ended up loving it. To my knowledge, these are her only 2 books in print. This book was about a young girl who lived in Boston who was employed at a company called Your Big Break, Inc. The company specialized in being the middleman in doing the ugly business of dumping someone. They also would do letters of resignation and the like but mainly it was about dumping the extra baggage in the bed beside you. Doing the whole "It's not you, it's me..." thing. Life was going along grandly until the main character, whose name escapes me like always, has a meeting with a potential client who wants her to dump her most recent boyfriend, who happens to be our heroine's father. Her married father. Uh yeah. It spirals out of control from there but it is, despite the somewhat depressing parts, a really nice, fast, light read. Perfect for me, in other words. I highly recommend.

PS - I am so gonna be able to do 60 books by the new year. How cool is that?

PPS - And yes, that is the highlight of my day and yes, I am that much of a nerd. Shut it.

Labels: 50 Book Challenge

Elizabeth at 8:39 AM

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Monday, December 11, 2006

Book #57 - The Memory Keeper's Daughter and other shit

I finally finished this book today. It was such a good book and really well written. Not sure why, other than my love of all things fluff, that it took me so long to get into, but it was always good. Basically the premise of the book is a doctor delivers his own twins in 1964, the boy is fine, the girl has Down's syndrome. He sends the daughter away to be put in an asylum with his nurse. The nurse can't bring herself to leave the girl in this cold place so she takes her and keeps her as her own child. The doctor tells his own wife that while there was twins, that the daughter died. It follows all of their lives over 25 years. Very good read. Run out and grab it.

Weekend was quiet. No lunch with Karen since she had to work early. I did some OT this weekend to help at work and make a few extra dollars. Christmas is nuts, no? As much as I try to keep my budget, I invariably go over. Oh well, God bless overtime, am I right?

Saturday I worked and then hung out here. I watched 3 really great movies this weekend. One was Heaven with Cate Blanchett, then The Man Who Cried with Cate again, Christina Ricci and Johnny Depp and then this afternoon I caught An Inconvenient Truth. Man, that movie was amazing. Horrific and scary and startling. Regardless of political affiliation or your like or dislike of Al Gore, I highly recommend each and every person see it. The facts can not be disputed. I will be making changes to how I live my life. Bet your ass on that.

I also took another trip to Kohls Friday night since they had a nightowl deal going on. Got a few things. Sunday, I went to mass, to Target, Sam's, Walgreens and then home. I did a couple hours of work. Relaxed in the afternoon and took a snooze. Today, the poop and I went to the vet for his semi-annual visit which included a blood test, a fecal test (ouch) and then a physical. He did spectacularly well. Won the vet over as per usual. He was terrified that I'd leave him. I would NEVER but I guess in his tiny canine brain, I could take off at any second. Poor thing. As if. Then I had a dentist appt. No cavities. Yeah! However, I gotta floss more. I have been a major slacker in that area. No one likes tooth chubs, ya heard?

Well, tomorrow I have to be up at 5:45 to take my mother to the hospital for a hysterectomy. It's nothing serious but she'll be an inpatient for a few days. The hubs is working so do you bitches know what that means? Yep, this bitch has the house to herself. And we all know what that means.

Naked laps around the perimeter of the house.

I think I just figured out why the neighbors are horrified by me.

Labels: 50 Book Challenge, Update, Weekend

Elizabeth at 9:58 PM

1comments

Wednesday, December 06, 2006

Book #56 - The Ex Files

This book was sorta unreal, but I still liked it. Done by Jane Moore who I have said before that I enjoy. The main characters were about to get married and each made the ridiculous decision to invite a few of each of their exes to the nuptials. Of course, all hell breaks loose when a huge secret is let out and mayhem ensues. Good book for those who like light drama of which none touches you.

I am still reading The Memory Keeper's Daughter, but seriously, I just can't do stuff that is not lighthearted anymore. It takes me a bit to get through something rather serious in nature. Even though this book is not a downer in any way, I just have this tendency toward frivolity lately. Who knows what my deal is? Anyway, shooting for 60 books by the end of the year. Should be able to do it. :)

Labels: 50 Book Challenge

Elizabeth at 2:06 PM

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Monday, November 27, 2006

Book #55 - Love @ First Site and One down, Three to go

OK, book review first. This is another Jane Moore book. I got an onslaught of them at one time from the book service dealio I use. I have another one sitting back there somewhere too. Anyway, this one is about a girl who hates her job, is single and not thrilled about it, close with her fam but has that one friend who is truly the non-friend. Doesn't everyone have one of those? I used to. A girl I dealt with and honestly, I am not sure why. No energy for the confrontation, maybe? No balls for the confrontation is more like it. However, I made it a point of extricating a lot of the negative from my life this year and she was part of that.

Back to the book. The evil "friend" in the book signs up the main character to an online dating service - not a fun thing or a way to get a laugh but to just make her squirm. I won't even go into the rest of the book because a lot of things unfold and I will for sure give crucial details away. I am in the middle of reading a not quite as fluffy book called The Memory Keeper's Daughter. I gotta mix fluff into that though. I am just superficial that way, sorry.

Today was day 1 of the 4 ten hour days I have this week. Today was relatively painless. Started out slow but once those doctors got back to work, I was rockin all day. I would like to make up for the work I missed the last 3 days of last week, but I doubt that will happen. I could maybe make up 50% or so. I'll take it. I needed the break.

Tonight has been a quiet night. Just some tv and the Poop-a-loop at my side begging for some dirty rice. I could feed him until he exploded and still, he sit with his chin on my knee with the face of starvation on.

I've decided I want a big red barn star for above the tv. Lori over at Lost In Surburbia inspired me. I found several on ebay for next to nothing. I hope the hubs gets me one for Xmas. If not, I shall take care of it myself after the holidays.

OK, Catholics out there - question for ya. What is a feast day? It is not a holy day of obligation, right? What is the diff between those two things and why is mass attendance obligatory on the days of obligation and not feast days? Splain to me please. Of course, my cradle Catholic hubs did not know dick. Please - contain your shock.

OK, I'm off to read more trash and sit in my comfy bed kept warm by my fluffy cat and long legged, runs in his sleep, grinds his toofers, pitches an all fired fit when I am not touching him if he is on the bed (I will SO get that on tape one day) Poopus. Night night, all.

Labels: 50 Book Challenge, Decor, Religion, Work

Elizabeth at 10:21 PM

9comments

Tuesday, November 21, 2006

Book #54 - The Other Woman and my day

This is a book by Jane Moore who has written quite a few great books. She writes lighthearted "chick lit" normally. I somewhat synopsized this book earlier this week, so I won't bother. The ending was nice though. Everything sorta came full circle.

I was a tad concerned about this week's work due to the doctors turning in very little work, but I was okay today, thankfully. I am not sure about the rest of the week though. We shall see. I figure if I make my personal production goals for 3 or even 4 days, then I can have one day where I have slowness. No biggie. The hubs works today and tomorrow but thankfully he is off for Thanksgiving because his ass is doing all the cooking. My job is pies and those bad boys just came out the oven. Hehehehehe. Done, bitches.

Just finished watching my Gilmore Girls. I am beyond annoyed that Lorelai married Christopher. I did not watch 6 friggin seasons on DVD for her to end up with that dude. WTF???

Now I am waiting for that new show, 3 Lbs to come on. I love me some Stanley Tucci. Balding or not, he is sexy as hayell. Yum.

I watched Letterman last night to check out Kramer doing is big apology. I am not sure what the hell happened to that dude. From the tapes I saw, I mean it looks like he just plum lost his damn mind. His career is over for sure. He was a funny dude. Too bad he went down that road.

OK, I know most of you bitches work outside the home, but I love me some Regis and Kelly. I don't start work til 10 so I can normally catch the bulk of it while I make myself less of a slob. I saw last Friday with Clay Aiken co-hosting in Regis' place. First, let me just proclaim right now that the dude needs to come flying out of the closet in a rainbow colored caftan and call it a day. Oh, and fire his stylist FORTHWITH. However, he was a bitchy little queen through the entire show. Kelly was all psyched to interview Emmitt and that dance chick because she friggin loved that damn show. Talked about all the time. He got all pissy because she was monopolizing the questioning. Oh, I'm sorry, but the name of the show is Live with Regis and Kelly, not Live with Regis and Dude who is staying in the closet.

Then, Rosie "I can't shut up to save my soul" O'Donnell is lambasting Kelly for her so called homophobic comment. Clay attempted to cover her mouth in order to get more questioning in and she got visibly annoyed. She backed up and went "Oh, no, no, I don't know where that hand has been." Um, how exactly is that homophobic? She did not say his hand smelled like sweaty balls. She did not say "Hey, I detected day old Astroglide on that palm." Get over it, Rosie. Oh, and PS - you just called him gay. So much for him keeping his sexual orientation a secret. Ya know, for those of us who still weren't clear he was gay - the sightless and deaf.

Dad underwent his second blast of chemo yesterday. As per usual, he felt great yesterday, but he knows that by Wednesday, he'll feel like ass. I hope that by a week from Friday, when I arrive, he is not so under the weather. I am fine hanging out and chilling, but I just hate for him to feel nasty and not want to eat. After this, he is going to get another PET scan and CT scan to see if the cancer cells shrank at all. The major concern is of course the lymph nodes. Frankly, it is not promising being that the surgeon is not even anticipating doing surgery. You know those dude would cut open anything if they could, so the fact that he is sorta steering him towards additional chemo and radiation means he does not think he is a good candidate. What that means for survival time is not clear to me just yet. I am just trying to get through this day to day.

I do not have much Xmas shopping to do at all, but I may take a ride out to Kohls Saturday after work and finish up. I hope they are still having their cool ass sales that day and not just Friday. Not sure. Might be too tired.

The chill has finally hit us, thankfully. I am loving it. I actually had to bust on the heat briefly today. Loved it. It is killing me to not put out my Xmas decor yet. KILLING. ME.

Labels: 50 Book Challenge, Random

Elizabeth at 9:10 PM

9comments

Sunday, November 12, 2006

Book #53 - The Yoga Mamas

Yep, I finished this book in less than 24 hours. I know, it's a sickness. This book is written by Katherine Stewart who also wrote Class Moms, a book I read a few months back. I liked this one so much better. It centers around 5 women who meet in a yoga studio in New York City, all of whom are pregnant. None of them have a thing in common other than the fact that each of them are undergoing their first pregnancy. They begin to become friends and are each so pleased to find someone who understands how this all feels.

The story is so much more than that - a bit of a mystery unfolds which ripens the story big time, but the base of the book centers around these women.

Good read - pick it up if you get a chance.

Labels: 50 Book Challenge

Elizabeth at 10:48 PM

6comments

Thanks for the bone, Ben, Book #52 and other crap

Well, my boys pulled it out, so Ben's jaw is safe for another week.

I also have to catch up on book reviews. So book #52 was "The Same Sweet Girls" by Casandra King. I had read another book of hers, "The Sunday Wife" and while the story is out of my brain right now, I remember liking it. Well, this book was fabulous all the way to the incredibly bitter sweet ending. In fact the very end was just perfect. I loved it.

The book was about 6 girls who had been friends since college. One of the originals had died at the age of 25 and another girl had sorta filled her spot since then and had inadvertantly given the group their name. I won't go into it because it would take forever, but it was a wonderful book that showed how even in our dysfunctional friendships with some of our friends, we get so much more than we put out from them. I just loved it.

I have been a slacker with putting pictures on here, so this is a shot I took one night outside my house. Is that sky not amazing?

This is why I will go to Pet Owner Hell.

Well, that and this.

Sorry, but this shit just cracks me UP.

Labels: 50 Book Challenge, Football, Pictures, The Pooper

Elizabeth at 7:49 PM

4comments

Saturday, November 04, 2006

Book #51 - Mine are Spectacular

That is a phrase that on eof the characters says to herself daily in the mirror while cupping her boobages. I shit you not.
The book centered around this woman who is engaged to a dude who has a few bucks so they move out of the city and into the burbs in this big ass house outside of NYC. Her best friends, a dermatologist (who does the little ditty up above) and a former Hollywood agent who leaped off the fast track onto the Mommy track, keep her sane while trying to deal with an intrusive ex-wife who has made it clear she wants her man back, a soon to be step-daughter who acts like the spoiled bitch from hell and a consistently absentee soon to be hubs. That's no bueno.
The story was good moved quickly. I like how it ended up in the end. Not all tied in a bow, but nice enough.
I actually finished this book well over a week ago and have moved on to #52, but I just kept forgetting to post this. I am still knee deep in Gilmore Girls DVDs from the Flix. Six more episodes and I am officially done. Then I will finally see some movies and then on to season 2 of the Sopranos. I so DIG that show.

Labels: 50 Book Challenge

Elizabeth at 1:41 PM

2comments

Thursday, October 26, 2006

Book #50 - PS I love you by Cecelia Ahern

I actually started this book a while back and did not come back to it until I finished my two prior reviews. The main character's husband just died. She of course thought that she would spend the rest of her days with him, but he ended up with a brain tumor and she left her job to take care of him. Upon his death, she finds out that he left 10 different envelopes for the next 10 months with her parents. Inside each envelope, which she is not to open until the first day of the designated month, her hubs assigns her some task that he thinks will enable her to go on with her life and help her cope with her grief. It could be very sad in places, but honestly I think it portrayed grief in a very real way. She did not suddenly snap her fingers, find a new man and a new job and all was ducky. She had her good days where she thought that she would just about get through this and then other days, good job or not, that she just flat did not want to get out of bed.

I reviewed another book by this author called Rosie Dunne. I recommend them both. You can pick either of them up at the Big Red Bullseye that we all know and love.

I am pumped that I actually made this goal of 50 books in a year. I am still reading so I imagine I'll just see how many I end up with by the end of December. Granted I am hardly reading great works of fiction, but I figure that every moment I spend with a book in hand is one less that I am staring blindly at the tv and that's always a good thing.

Labels: 50 Book Challenge

Elizabeth at 2:11 PM

2comments

Friday, October 20, 2006

Book #49 - The Starter Wife

I made brief mention of this book back on a prior SPF when talking about the husband's ex. He needed a practice marriage before he could take on the likes of me, bitches.

Anyway, this book was pretty quick to read. It is written by the wife of Brian Grazer, the famous producer. So if anyone knows the ins and outs of Hollywood marriages, it would be her.

The main character, Gracie, is unceremoniously dumped by her studio head hubs, Kenny. She ends up moving into the famous Colony of Malibu into a house that is owned by a friend who will be out of town for the summer. So she and her daughter pick up shop and move to the beach from Rockingham (street name sound familiar???? think OJ.) Her life begins to sink at first, but then of course, she finds the person she used to be before she was sucked into the vortex of Hollywood and caring about stupid shit.

In short, a good read - especially when you have an afternoon or two to yourself. Would go fab with a margarita.

Oh, and has anyone else heard that OJ is being paid several million bucks for his account of the murders???? Should he have an account being that he claims to not be there? Oh, the best part - the tentative title.

"If I Did It."

I shit you not.

Why has someone not taken his ass OUT?

Labels: 50 Book Challenge

Elizabeth at 10:17 PM

4comments

Monday, October 09, 2006

Book #48 - Fourplay by Jane Moore

Very cute book. Main character was Jo. She is a wife to Jeff and mother to Thomas and Sophie. She finds out that her hubs has been cheating on her with his secretary, whom she refers to as The Cliche. He leaves her and the kids to take up with Candy. Yeah, I am not kidding about that name. Initially her life just falls apart, but Jo realizes she has to get her shit together and move on with life. She ends up having a total of 4 men biding for her attention by the end of the book...hence the title. Her hubs was one (I guess Candy was not all she was cracked up to be), Conor, a friend of her brothers, Martin, a rich media mogul, and Sean, a man she takes up with quite seriously only to find out he is married, but still professing love for her. Yeah, hi. Talk about drama. Lordy.

I loved the book. I read it in about 4 or 5 days when I had the time. I am finding that on work days (Tues thru Sat) I honestly do not have the heart to read. I have stared at a computer screen for 8 hours listening and comprehending medical jargon, so at the end of the day, I am sorta toast. That is why I don't blog as much (other than all the other life stuff going on). Just the thought of like using my brain is a no go some days.

Anyways, the book is a goodie. Light, but not so fluffy that you don't give two shits about the characters. I say give it a whirl.

Labels: 50 Book Challenge

Elizabeth at 6:20 PM

0comments

Wednesday, September 27, 2006

Books #46 and #47 - Diary of a Working Girl and Devil in the Junior League

The first book, Diary of a Working Girl, was a story of a freelance writer who pitches an idea to Cosmo of finding Mr. Right in a mere 2 months in what she considers the land of milk and honey, the area of finance - which literally drips with men. Of course things don't go her way but the heroine in the book is so likeable and resembles each of us in some way that you gotta love her.

The second book, Devil in the Junior League, was fabulous. I had eyed the book up at the Barnes a few times and sat it back on the shelf each time. I got a gift card for my birthday, so I snatched it up. I loved it. The main character is left by her husband who not only takes up with a sad assed looking chick and obsconds with all of her money. She ends up having to take up with her neighbor who is (GASP) a Yankee and a rude one at that because he is a lawyer and just sneaky enough to find her weasel of a husband. The deal however is that her payment for his services is that she needs to get his equally tacky wife into the Junior League. I loved this book. I zipped through it in about 2 1/2 days or so. I highly recommend if you see it in the Barnes.

Labels: 50 Book Challenge

Elizabeth at 9:52 PM

1comments