Time to do this again.

Unbelievably, it's time to put all my stuff in boxes and color code it again.

I've absolutely gotta stop doing this every year or two.

What'd I miss?

I was a bit under the weather for awhile. Skipping over the surgical, narcotic-y parts, it was a huge gigantor success. The large grapefruit sized mass was removed with n'er a hitch. They sewed me up. Most importantly, there was not a speck of cancer in sight! :) :) :) Smiles don't begin to describe it.

And after a couple of potholes, my road to recovery was paved with wonderful friends, amazing family, skilled and compassionate medical-type people, happy cards, gorgeous flowers, yummy candy, and love love love love love.



Then I got home and stared at this for what felt like a really really long time. (No, I'm not at all dramatic...I'm not.)





And even though so many of my favorites came to visit. And even after I was able to go out, I still felt like the walls were closing in on me.

Today, I go to go to work! Yay! Ok, not that I miss the actual working part, but I had somewhere to be! I got to be part of the ebb and flow of the city again.


I saw cute babies in strollers with sleepy parents pushing them down the street.


I saw teenagers who were clearly skipping school to go check out South Street with expensive cameras.

I saw this weird balloon thing.





I smelled trees and flowers and goodness and fabric softener.

I heard a beautiful voice singing way too loud in the subway station where the acoustics are oddly awesome.

Then, I saw this on a manhole cover and laughed out loud.



It's good to feel a part of the world again.

For sale!**

1 Large Ovarian Cyst

1 Ovary

And, what the heck, I'll even throw in a Fallopian tube.

Items are all slightly used, but hold significant sentimental value. Seller hates to part with them, but one must do what one must do. Items will be available on March 22nd, directly after surgical procedure.

**Clearly, this is a joke. And maybe in somewhat poor taste, but sometimes your options are laugh or cry. Today, I choose to laugh...or, at least, to tell bad jokes.

On hiatus...sort of.

So, I am fully well aware of my shortcomings as a blogger. I kind of suck at it. And, I already know it and feel bad about it. I've had some things going on that kind of win the attention category. Such is life.

Not that they've been coming fast and furiously lately, but they are going to be remarkably slow for a little while.

I know, it makes me sad too, but it's what I've got to give right now.

I'll be in touch...I promise.

Best Picture Nominee #4

Avatar

Directed by James Cameron

Starring: Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana, Sigourney Weaver

Pretty amazing. I don't even really know that I liked it, but i couldn't pull myself away from it. Seriously, it took me forever to come around to seeing because it looked kind of generic and boring. But really, it was kind of awesome. Blue people, really cool planet, and the story was unoriginal, but interesting. My money's on this one for best picture and I don't even think I'd be mad about it. Check it out in the theater in 3D, it's worth it.

Best Picture Nominee #3

An Education

Directed by Lone Scherfig

Starring: Carey Mulligan, Peter Sarsgaard, Alfred Molina Rosamund Pike, Dominic Cooper

Interesting story that is artfully told by all of the actors. Carey Mulligan plays a delightful, beautiful intelligent young woman who is seduced into a life more glamorous than her own. She's a school girl motivated largely by her father's dreams of her becoming an Oxford woman. Well made and well played. I was a bit surprised this made the cut for Best Picture, but I was glad to watch it.

Frosty the snowman...

You've met Frosty the Snowman.

With his corncob pipe and button nose,

and two eyes made out of coal.

Cute, huh?

Have you met Anthony (ant-uny) the Snowman?

He's Frosty's cousin.

He lives in South Philly.

No corncob pipe here, he's got a cigarette.

Rather than a silken top hat, he's wearing a ball cap.

And, there are no eyes made out of coal, rather a broken pair of sunglasses.

For buttons, empty bottles of Yeungling.

Best Picture Nominee #2

Inglorious Basterds

Directed by Quentin Tarantino

Starring: Brad Pitt, Christopher Waltz and many many more

A Nazi revenge fantasy fill that's positvely fantastic all the way around. True, it was a little bit on the bloody side, but it's Tarantino and that's kinda how he rolls. Christopher Waltz, the guy who plays Col. Han Landa, is really quite good. Great story. Great imagery. Poor spelling.

Seriously worth checking out. And, I'm pretty excited that it got nominated. Like him or not, Tarantino is a force as an American filmmaker and it's cool to see him sitting at the grown-up table.

Done lost her mind.

Ever have one of those days where you're just feeling completely out of sorts? Nothing works, nothing fits, nothing feels right , people seem dimmer than usual and EVERYTHING makes you feel all wonky?

Me too. Right now, I'm on day three of one of those days.

It started on Friday. I was supposed to get on a plane to go to Florida. I was supposed to take my man to meet may dad. Instead, we got a bunch of snow dumped on us and we got stranded in Philly for the weekend. To be precise, marooned my little island of a house with nothing but cookies and movies to keep us company. (Thank goodness I'm not the least bit dramatic!)

Normally, a snowed in weekend would sound fun, but I was SO disappointed that I couldn't even muster the will to enjoy it. I tried...oh, I tried.

I watched movies, baked cookies, made soup, went for a walk, walked to brunch with friends, watched movies, danced around the kitchen, listened to music, talked to people I loved, and cried intermitently for 3 days.

My darling 4 year old neice got wind of my predicament and she came up with a solution, "Aunt Carolyn, do you think you might feel better if we came and picked you up and drove you to Grandpa's house?" It was the best idea I have ever heard and yes, it would have made me feel better. Alas, they live in Michigan, I live in Philadelphia, and Grandpa's house is in Florida. No such luck sweet girl. She tried...oh, she tried.

Poor Cody was there to witness the whole nightmare. He was such a trooper. He made me laugh alot. As he put it, he 'danced around like a drunk monkey' trying to cheer me up. He tried...oh, he tried.

But to no avail. There were moments of sunshine, but mostly I felt like a dark stormy cloud was chasing me around my little house raining on my little head

It's cool though, I hear we're only suppsed to get 10-12 inches tomorrow...ugh. Maybe I should try something else?

Best Picture Nominee #1

The Hurt Locker

Directed by Kathryn Bigelow
Starring: Jeremy Renner, Anthony Mackie, Brian Geraghty

Long story short, I liked it. I had no idea what it was about before I saw it, except that it was an Iraq war story. As it so happens, it's about a special team of people who disable bombs in a war zone.

This isn't a best picture. It's a well made film with excellent character development, which is actually the entire story. The very subtle plot is merely tool a to help justify why we're still focusing on these people. Although I will say that it was very interesting to watch...even without a plot to pee in.

Kudos to Kathryn Bigelow for rockin' out in a genre that doesn't normally see many women.

An open letter to Jack Frost.

Dear Mr. Frost,

It is with great respect that I recognize the integral part you play in our universe. I neither begrudge nor belittle your work. But this business with dumping 2 feet of snow on my city everytime I want to fly somewhere is really going above and beyond. It seems almost as if you are going out of your way to "snow on my parade". Frankly, I think you kind of suck.

Sincerely,
Snowed in Philly

"Flying" out of Philly

Anyone who has ever attempted to take a flight out of the Philadelphia airport knows precisely why the title says "flying". It's a cute premise, but in Philly having an airline ticket and being at the airport in no way implies that you are going anywhere.

Now, I must say that i love my new city. It's unique. It's a little rough around the edges. It's big, but not too big. It's got the best cannoli imaginable. It's an awesome new place to call home.

Sadly, it's also home to the worst airport on the planet. Seriously, I imagine it would be easier to fly out of Philly if I glued feathers onto my sleaves and flapped my wings real fast.

If it's even remotely cloudy, they cancel flights. And if the sky even kinda looks like it might consider raining, they close the airport. If it's cloudy and the temperature happens to be anywhere near the 30's, they operate under martial law and draw straws to see who gets eaten first.

Last time I flew it was the week before Christmas and it snowed an inordinate amount for Philly. It almost never snows here, so any snow is inordinate, but the snow really was quite ridiculous. By a remarkable stroke of grace, I did not draw the short straw and I got on my plane. It was a few hours late, but it got off the ground. Most people weren't so lucky.

This Friday, I'm supposed to fly out of Philly on my way to sunny Florida. And guess what? They are predicting snowstorms to rival the storm we had in December. What are the odds that lightening will strike twice and that I might actually get on a plane that is actually leaving the airport to go to an actual destination? Yeah, my money's on the snow, too.

Happy Birthday, Cody!

Happy Birthday to you.

Happy Birthday to you.

Happy Birthday, dear Wyatt.

Happy Birthday to you!

It's a wonderful time for the Oscars and Oscars and Oscars and Oscars and Oscars and Oscars and Oscars and Oscars and Oscars and Oscars

Last year, I took the plunge with the Oscars and watched all the movies that were nominated for best picture. As well as most of those featuring the nominees for best actor/actresss or best supporting actor/actress. It was... a lot of freaking movies. I seriously watched more movies in the month of February than I had for the entire rest of the year.

On the plus side, it made the whole award season much more fun to watch. This year I was going to try to do it again. The nominations are coming out bright and early this Tuesday morning. I was really looking forward to the nominations announcement, but then I remembered that this year the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences will be nominating TEN films for the best picture category.

Seriously, try and make a list the last ten movies you saw in the theater. In the last six months, I think I've seen two. In the last year, I've maybe seen 10 and that's including last year's Oscar nonesense. How the heck am I supposed to watch at least 10 Oscar nominated films in a month?

I can already see the headline, "Philadelphia woman affirms a little known fact that it is, in fact, possible to subsist entirely on a diet of movie theater popocorn, peanut M&M's, and Diet Coke. More at 11. "

Wish me luck!

Dude, where's my good mood?

Have you seen my good mood lately? I seem to have misplaced it. I know it's around here somewhere.

I feel like I've looked nearly everywhere. It's for sure not hiding in between the DVD's on the shelf. It's not hiding behind the milk in the fridge, but I cleaned out the fridge just in case. I looked for it in my dreams, but it's not even showing up there. In a moment of total desperation, I looked at the bottom of the ice cream carton, but still no good mood to be found.

What do you want to bet that my good mood is hiding in my running shoes? Lazy little shoes have been lounging around my gym locker lately, eating bon-bons, and watching soaps. That's it! Tomorrow I'll gently suggest to them that they help me find my good mood! Brilliant.

Short and ridiculous.

Earlier this week, I had a follow-up appointment to get my new contacts checked out. All told it was a successful little appointment. I got a new prescription and what amounts to a Do-It-Yourself chemistry set. Can't really complain. The only issue I had was (big surprise) in the waiting room.

I arrived a five minutes before my 9:15 AM appointment to find a pretty long line at check-in. This doctor is located in a major eye institute and all the morning appointments were coming in at the same time. The five women working the counter were moving at the speed of light and there was still a line, but it was moving.

At one point the woman in front of me flopped on the floor in a huff. Crossed her legs. Crossed her arms. Exclaimed, "This is just ridiculous!"

Ridiculous is certainly the word that came to mind, but perhaps for a slightly different reason...I looked at a clock and noted that we had been waiting for precisely 7 minutes.

The miracle of modern technology...

Have you ever seen these things?

They're staws filled with cookie pieces.

You plunk the end of the straw in a cup of milk and slurp! slurp! slurp!

Sarah looks understandably skeptical.

Then she realized that this is just another incarnation of cookies and milk.

Simultaneously bizarre and delightful.

Kinda like me!

It's official, I'll just have to sleep when I'm dead.

Seriously, who has time to sleep? There is so much goodness to be had and so many fun things to do. I can't help but think I'm missing something, all the time. It's getting to be a problem becuase no matter what I'm doing, I almost certianly want to be doing something else. And, not something else INSTEAD of what I'm doing at the time, but I'd rather be doing something else, too. Take for instance this very moment: I would like to be writing this post, reading this fantastic book that's sitting next to me, watching the movie I can hear playing in the living room, curled up on the couch with my boy, planning a party, and sleeping so that I have enough energy to get through my day tomorrow. I suppose I'll just have to try to fit it all in tomorrow!

Veggies are cool.

I heart the food network. It's really too much to get into here, but I am completely obsessed with it. I don't even have cable and I watch it all the time. When I'm at my boyfriend's house and we're watching television, I switch the channel everytime he walks out of the room. I'm the sadist who even watches the Barefoot Contessa while jogging on a treadmill. It's sick, I know.

Sometimes it's exceedingly cool. The past Sunday was a prime example. On a show called "Iron Chef America" they did a special show highlighting the talent of celebrity chefs Bobby Flay, Emeril Lagasse, and Mario Batali. They worked with a lesser known, but infinitely cooler chef Cristeta Comerford. She runs the kitchen at a place in DC called the White House.

The challenge was the typcial 60 minutes to create a mulit-course feast highlighting the secret ingredient. This time the secret ingredient was anything from the White House garden. If you're like me, maybe you've heard that Michelle Obama planted a garden at the White House. I thought little plot, some basic veggies, nothing to write home about... So. Not. The. Case.





This garden is a-mazing. It's huge with crazy varieties of veggies. More than that, it's yielding a serious amount of edible, organic crops. Per White House Assistant Chef, Sam Kass, the garden has produced over 1,000 lbs. of produce since it's planting earlier this year. It cost about $200 to get started. Not only are White House visitors mowing on the uber local veggies and honey, but the surplus food is being used at a DC area soup kitchen. Seriously, it's really cool. I highly recommed reading up on it a bit.

Well done, Mrs. Obama.

Oh Christmas tree!

Oh Christmas tree! Oh, Christmas tree! How you mock me.

You were once so pretty, fresh and green.

Now you're a big browning, fire hazard.

Your rotting needles keep sticking to my feet.

Stupid tree.