3 for Chinese

Today I had lunch with two of my best-ees / BFFs. Sarah and Benita picked me up for lunch and we went to one of our local Chinese haunts, China Chile. Awesome chow and those wok'ers and servers are quick! They definitely don't want you there for 4 hour!


So why is it that after you eat Chinese food, you are hungry an hour later? I'm sitting here thinking about the left-over box of shrimp with veggies setting in work fridge right now. Anyone touches it and they will lose digits! Actually, I'm obsessing about the magic veggie box. I watching the clock, counting the minutes when I will be hungry enough to grab up the box of prawns and veggie joy. But I'm still not hungry. Dang it! I could do what I've been to known to do in the past and eat it anyway. Then complain to every co-worker within ear-shot that "I can't believe I ate the whole thing." Isn't funny that after leaving an Asian restaurant, the patrons start trying imitate the Asian server? Awe! Chop Chop, etc. I can't remember a time when I walked out of a Mexican restaurant trying to talk like a Mexican server? "It's cold out here, I need my Yacket" Just not the same funny zing. But then I leave a Mexican restaurant so darn full, I normally can't speak for fear I might reflux my beans & rice. Gosh, what would you say if you left a German restaurant? Talk about the waiter's wiernerschnitzel?
Ok, so my food is still in the fridge and I'm mentally fighting with all my might to keep it there until breakfast time tomorrow morning. Hey, breakfast is what you eat, right? And right now I want breakfast to be shrimp, rice & veggies. In my next blog, I will let you know if I held out or if I tore up the cute little box of Asian sunshine before the day is out. I think I can, I think I can.....
To be continued......

This is My Mental Bucket

This is my Mental bucket. As you can see, my mental bucket a.k.a. "MB" has a yellow shovel. I use my shovel to put many things into my MB. Sometimes I shovel crap-o-la, which you can ask Will, I'm really good at. Sometimes I shovel a pile of mental notes into my MB, which I will end up forgetting and have to eventually write them down on paper or send myself an email reminder. Though mental notes made about a spousal unit are put into the long term mental bucket, because we women won't let them forget any slight or mishap. That's our job. Let me pull a little example out of my MB that would be a long term note. Um, hey honey remember the time you made a bathroom reference stating I was taking a bus load of kids to the pool? Which my mental bucket spit out the translation of, "What? you think my butt is as big as a bus?" Ok, so I twisted his words around a wee bit just for the sick satisfaction of watching him squirm, back-track and try to rephrase the sentence. Oh the shear joy of tormenting! My MB can also struggle with the fact that my teen-age daughter, is growing up so darn fast and I really miss just chill'n with her. But I've also learned to cherish the moments when she acts like she still likes me. Which last for about 10 seconds, and then I'm back to being an annoying pain in the teenage butt. I have to be honest, at times I do enjoy razzing her. Sometimes my MB goes haywire. My shovel starts acting like a back-hoe and my MB over-flows with chocolate. MMmmmm Chocolate. That's when my MB is filled with Pre-mental Sand. There is one thing my bucket is never lacking. That is love! Even when my bucket it teetering and threatening to spill, there is always an abundance of wonderful people in my life. So shout out to the wonderful people and don't forget to add more chocolate. Monday Rocks!

http://health.yahoo.com/featured/46/8-mind-boggling-optical-illusions/

Grumpy Butt, the Diet and Orange Cream Sherbet

Yesterday I officially started my pre-wedding / honeymoon in Hawaii diet. Big sigh. I'm not sure why this happens, but the first week of my diet usually means I am going to be one grumpy crabby "B." Now I'm not the type of person to starve myself, in fact, I enjoy eating healthy. I think it's more like mental deprivation, then actual food deprivation. Heck, it takes me a week to gear up just to make the announcement at home, that the junk food festival is OVER. The other night, I was having my allotment of Orange Cream sherbet. When I decided it was time to ditch the carton. So I sat the carton in the sink, thinking I would wait for it to melt, then dump it down the sink. Well, the saboteur, I won't name any names, Will, put the carton back in the freezer. Not to be detoured, the next night he served me up my small allotment of sherbet. When he wasn't looking, I quietly put the closed container in the garbage. Well, Mr. Ruin my diet figured out what I did with the container and retrieved it from the garbage. Darn dumpster dive'n, trash pick'n saboteur. They say, third time is a charm. So this morning while "Save the Sherbet" man was snoozing, I hid the half empty container in the bottom of the garbage. By the time he finds it, it will be liquid orange cream sauce! I'm safe. Well, until I'm hit with a mountain of PMS hormones and I decide that I will die if I don't have a piece of Dove chocolate. Which I can't mentioned in front of the Benedict Arnold of diets, because then there will be fridge full of chocolate stored to sooth the savage PMS beast. Now that is love. So one minute I love him dearly for taking care of my savage PMS chocolate craving and the next minute I' m ready to thrash him for making me break my diet. Gosh, poor guy! Good thing he isn't afraid to stare down into the face of danger, me. Without sound overly mushy, I love that man! TGIF

My Dad's Train Hobby

It's here! The Adobe Mtn. fall meet (Oct. 16-18). Ever since I can remember my awesomely cool dad has been into trains. Back in the day, in our basement in Indiana, my dad had set up a really cool H.O. train "play room." My brother and I got to hang out there while my dad played. Yes, the train play room was more for my dad, but he didn't mind sharing with us too. There were tiny mountains, bridges, over-passes, under-passes, towns and little mini-everything. It was such a cool place and a great hobby to keep my dad out of my mom's hair, for the most part. Well now, ump-teen years later, my dad is still into trains. Except now the mountains are real and there is no basement. Because trains of this size wouldn't fit into a basement anyway. My dad, mom and family are members of the Maricopa Live Steamers. This is mostly made up of a group of mature adults, a sprinkling not as mature adults and a few kids too. These train enthusiast spend most of their weekends tinkering with their trains, which can cost a small fortune I might add. They also spend most of their weekends expanding the track, fixing the track and adding fun little touches along the routes. There is a great sense of family and fun when attending their events. Maricopa Live Steamers is a not-for-profit organization. They offer train rides to the public on weekends between Labor Day and Memorial Day, for an optional donation. You get a cool button if you toss a couple of bucks into their donation can. All proceeds are put right back into the train park. Plus they have a really cool train traffic coordinating system for their miles of track. Red light, green light.... Oh the boys and their toys. If you get the chance, please check out their website. Happy Riding. Choooo Choooo

http://www.maricopalivesteamers.com/

We are back from Vegas! The girls had a great time and so did the parents. The girls got to experience a bunch of firsts. First time in Vegas, first time in a limo, first time in a taxi and a bunch more stuff. It was Sara's goal for the weekend to see a transvestite or as she likes to call 'em a trannie. Her goal was accomplished on the last day when we stopped at a Boulder City McDonald's. The girls enjoyed having their own room, connected to our room of course. They also took advantage of room service. I should have taken the picture of McKenzie with a giant piece of chocolate cake in her hand, tearing it up like a wild beast. Both girls made me proud when they had two plates on their table while at the buffet. Talk about a buffet load of food. On the last day we went to the wax museum. The girls loved that. Had to keep McKenzie from dry humping the Johnny Depp statute. Guess she has a slight crush? I was worried they had a policy if you break it, you buy it. I don't think I could afford to fix a headless Johnny Depp wax figure. Luckily we were able to pry her off. We also went to the Shark Reef at Mandalay Bay. Which was totally cool. What was even more interesting was they were having a tattoo convention in the same location. I've never seen so many mo-hawks in my life and that was just on women. For some reason, my daughter has this fixation with tattoos. She doesn't want to get one, but loves to look at them. So we took them to an air-brush tattoo artist and let them get a fake one. By day two it was smeared from the alcohol in the perfume they sprayed on their wrists. On the last night we went to the Circus de Soliel, Mystere. The girls loved it! That was the quietest they were the entire trip. It was definitely a fun time for all. Though the next Vegas trip is going to be adults only! Cuz we are going club'n. :)

Vegas Baby

Well peoples, this is the big Vegas weekend. I had promised my 16 year old that I would take her on a fun trip for her 16th birthday. Her birthday was in July, but I pointed out to her that she was 16 for the entire year. You might be asking why the heck would I take a 16 year old to Sin City? Well for one, it was her choice and two there are plenty of things for a family to check out in Vegas. Just think of all the experiences she will have. One example, walking down the strip and having all the "card clickers" that's what I call all the people passing out half naked cards of women to men. These people hit the cards on their thighs, tap them with their fingers, anything to get your attention. Half the time the strip is littered with the pictures of women whose parts have a star on their parts. Only in Vegas! The other fun thing to check out is all the shows. We have already lined up two shows. No topless reviews.... The MGM now has the new CSI Experience. It's were you get to solve a crime with a simulated version of one of the CSI characters. Sounds interesting. One of the most entertaining aspects is watching the hordes of people chow down at the buffets. There are some serious eaters out there. Probably not a bad idea for these buffet places to offer wheel chair service after you eat. One of my daughter's request was to go to Caesar's Palace, so she could see where they filmed the movie "Hangover." You can all bank on it that we will be shopping. Shop shop shop. Shop until we drop. :) Can you tell I'm looking forward to this trip? Of course the adults will get some time on the Blackjack tables. Wish us luck! Go Big, or Go Home. Penny slots here I come.

Have an awesome weekend people!