Happy New Year's from me and George!

I do not care that George is wax. He is lovely.

                                                   A smooch for my wax boyfriend George!

My friend Karen and a camel

Happy New Year

Hello faithful readers,

Happy New Year to you all. I wish you blessings, peace and love for 2005. I had a wonderful holiday in Orlando with Mom, Jenny and Kevin. I got to scratch the kitties with the pink back-scratcher from South of the Border. Since I can't pet the kitties and still be able to breathe, I use the back scratcher. The kitties don't mind. They think it is my paw.

Yesterday, Karen and I went to NYC. I bought a cheap handbag on Canal Street, then we visited my friend Lisa at her office for the New York Daily News in City Hall. Next we took the subway to Radio City Music Hall, where another friend - Jill - is a producer of the Christmas Show. We got to see the camels that perform in the Christmas show! They live in the Radio City basement for the run of the show and every day, their person walks them on 53rd Street. Apparently, camels like to dance and stretch their necks to the tall trees.

My goals for this year are to lose some weight and to really work towards my goal of adopting a child. I want to be a mom more than anything. I wish I were married and pregnant with my own biological baby. But that hasn't happened. This is not to say it won't, but I do feel strongly about being a mom and about the need to give homes to orphaned children. It costs about $25,000 to adopt a child from abroad, such as China or Romania. I do not have that money, but maybe it will come to me in some way. Who knows. If I am meant to adopt, it will happen.

It has been hard for me to watch the coverage of the tsunami. The whole thing is so big, devastating and awful. On one blog, a man in Southeast Asia wrote that it is a good thing he is an atheist, because he can't imagine how a God or god could allow the tsunamis to happen. Perhaps because I am writing this in the comfort of my New Jersey apartment, but I don't belive God caused the tsunami. I believe that these are things that happen on the earth and now, we are just in the way since there are so many of us humans. I believe this after living through the Florida wildfires of 1998 and Hurricane Charley in 2004.

But it is still awful and my thoughts are no comfort to those who are suffering. My sister, Jenny, has been thinking about the tsunami, too and this is what she wrote to me in an e-mail today:

" Hi Kathy,

I wish you a very happy New year, and I hope it is a
more peaceful and hopeful year for us all.

All is finehere.  Quiet.  I am working on revisions,
Mom had breakfast with Judith and Kevin
is getting ready for work.  The kitties are fine.

Kev and I will go out to dinner, then come home and
just hang.  Maybe light a candle in honor of the
people in Asia.  What happened there, it just makes me
heartsick.  All those people...

Jeez, there's your place to look to adopt.  Talk about
immediate need and kids being orphaned!  I'd say
Indonesia/Sri Lanka/India, etc are the places to focus
on!  I just can't imagine having all one's friends and
family just washed away....it's a devastating thought.

So, I think it is right to have sort of a quiet New
Year's, being glad for what we have, and just paying
honor to all those who lost everything.

Seriously, I SO plan to watch any whining in the new
year.  If a tsunami is not whacking into my home and
carrying away all those I love, then I really ain't
got any problems, and I've nothing to complain about!

Thus, on that quiet and sad, but-also-glad-to be-alive
note, I wish you the healthiest and most hopeful of
new years, and hopes for us all for peace and safety.

Love, Jenny"

(KQ again: I did some research and the U.S. government says it will NOT allow Americans to adopt tsunami orphans for the near future. Things are just too chaotic and it would be best for many of the kids to just stay with extended families instead of being completely uprooted. Makes sense.

http://travel.state.gov/family/adoption/notices/notices_2017.html)

A man with a brain injury and "penis wounded" wants to date me

Oh and he lives in Hungary. I got this e-mail on one of the singles websites I am on.

---

In 1983 I was installing ocean navigation equipment onto a yacht; kneeling 20 feet above its oily teak deck in the aluminum tuna tower, when the single side band antenna I held contacted the marina's power supply cable- its one century old insulation, weather-abused, broken. Just as 7,200 volts entered my right hand 7,200 volts exited both kneecaps. This conduction pushed me backwards off the tower; my chest smoldering pink flesh; my brain charred and comatose; my penis wounded; my life, stopped. Eleven minutes later a Greenbank, New Jersey, paramedic stabbed an insulin needle into my heart, restarted it. Two months after that chemical jump-start, I opened my eyes from coma's darkness, onto a shiny new world; everything different, everything the same. I had head-trauma. 'Head-Trauma'. What happens every time a person loses consciousness. The quantity of the frontal brain damage received moves in concert with the length of the coma. My coma lasted 59 days, on the cusp of permanent injury, which meant that although my reality reception, immediately afterwards, was completely skewed and whacked, it would be temporary.

I relearned to walk; I relearned to eat with a fork and use a knife; I relearned to speak without a stream of drool falling; I relearned to pee in a toilet bowl while standing, then, I moved on. I studied life. I learned when not to speak; I learned to eat life with a spoon; I learned to be humble. I married, I divorced.

*********
Twenty-one years hence I live in Hungary, next door to my wonderful seven year-old son. Presently, I seek a conversation with the Naropa University community in order to attune this Self more with contemplative education; in order to define my unconscious becoming conscious; in order to understand and expiate that; in order to reply, further, to the death knell once heard for me.

Who I am seeking

I seek a kind woman. I live in Hungary, mostly. Although I also have a residence in Southern New Jersey.

Frigid

It is FRIGID here today. Thirteen degrees! That is it.

Am heading to Orlando tomorrow for a week. Mom tells me it is "chilly" there, too. For instance, may only hit 75 one or two of the days that I am there.

Sigh. I remember when I thought Florida was "too hot."

The Apprentice finale

Kelly won, as we know. This is good. I picked him right out at the beginning of the show. Trump LOOKED like he wanted to pick Jen. But maybe he got confused between picking an employee and picking a wife. Look at Ivana Trump and Marla Maples. Look at Jen. Hello.

But let us not forget Ivana (the contestant) and the exact point at which she lost her mind during the candy-bar-selling task and dropped her skirt for $20. Here is a hilarious re-cap from my favorite website, Television Without Pity:

http://www.televisionwithoutpity.com/story.cgi?show=125&story=7225&page=7&sort=&limit=

"...A bit later, Ivana watches Mosaic walk away down the street. "They look like strippers with chocolate bars, I'm not going to lie. And when I say 'strippers,' I mean, like, at a cheap beer dive in Texas. With peanut shells on the floor." If she weren't such a jerk the rest of the time, I would chalk that up to just one of those things where you're so frustrated that you spit out a barrage of insults you know is irrational -- I've done it a million times, mostly about basketball officials. But it's Ivana, so she gets no slack. As she walks with Kevin and Kelly, she says that it's now "a street fight," and she's "not afraid" of Jen and Sandy. They're "cheap hookers," et cetera, et cetera. "Give me twenty bucks a bar, I'll take off my skirt," she says. Now, how you can reconcile calling other women "cheap hookers" and taking money to take your own clothes off is something that isn't quite clear to me, but we'll get back to that. Carolyn, who apparently is around, looks concerned. Ivana interviews that when she saw that Jen and Sandy were using sex appeal, she decided to "do something completely drastic." So. Ivana walks up to this guy and asks him if he'd like to buy a chocolate bar. He hesitates. "Twenty dollars a bar," she says, putting her thumb into her waistband, "and I'll drop my skirt." When he blanches, she says it again. "Twenty dollars a bar, and I'll drop my skirt." He laughs. "Come on," she says. "You're making big money in there, come on." Another guy walks up, and she makes the same comment to him. One or the other of them gives her twenty bucks. She puts down all her stuff. She grabs her skirt, and she pushes it to the ground, revealing white boy-cut underwear with some kind of print on it. One of the guys points."Niiice," he says to his buddy. "Yeeeah," he adds. She executes a spin for him, as another few people walk past. Carolyn stares coldly, thinking, "The Equal Pay Act was passed, and all I got was this lousy idiot in her underpants on the street..."

Are these parents on crack?

WHO? WHO I ask you, are these parents who allow their children to spend the day with Michael Jackson at Neverland Ranch? Regardless of whether or not Jackson is convicted, he is just one creepy dude.

http://www.cnn.com/2004/SHOWBIZ/Music/12/18/jackson.party.ap/index.html

 

My friend Joe Gallo is famous

(Well, in Bucks County anyway)

http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=13568649&BRD=1683&PAG=461&dept_id=40877&rfi=6

George Clooney in wax!

Madame Tussaud's Wax Museum in NYC is unveiling a figure of George Clooney tomorrow at 11 a.m. Shriek!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

http://www.nycwax.com/index.asp

More blood tests

Had more blood tests today. To check my cholesterol and more to check for celiac disease cause I see that doctor on Friday. Apparently, checking for celiac disease involves draining a quart of blood from my body.

I couldn't eat before the test so that was lots of fun. NOT! I got to the blood place and I THINK I had the lady who made me pass out before, but I wasn't sure so I said: "I am a hard stick. I passed out last time. I will be doing this lying down here on this cot."

She is thwapping my arm for a vein. So I say, "If you can't get one, forget it and we will try another day." But no, she felt obliged to soldier on. She found a vein.

Meanwhile, she lined up a series of empty tubes on my tummy. "I am just going to lay these here," she said. Um, sure, I guess. My tummy is now a table.

It was taking FOREVER. I think she is almost done. Then she says, "Two more" and picks up a vial off my tummy/table.

"It is coming out really slow," she said. THANKS FOR THE UPDATE. Now SHUT UP.

Finally was all over and I got orange juice and a hot ham and cheese at the Wawa.

Merry Christmas from the elves and I

Who let the elves out?

http://www.debsfunpages.com/funpages/view.cfm/6678

U2 will be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame!

http://www.cnn.com/2004/SHOWBIZ/Music/12/13/people.rockhall.inductees.ap/index.html

My review of "Ocean's Twelve"

Well, I loved it, of course. George looked sooooooooo nice. But I must say, and I think George would agree with me, that this is really Brad Pitt and Catherine Zeta-Jones' movie. The main plot really revolves around them. But that is okay, because Brad looks nice and buff, with cool short hair and silky shirts. Oh my!

Of course, I still love George most. A funny running gag in the movie is that everyone thinks he is older than he is.

The plot is all twisty-turny and I lost the thread several times. But who cares. This will make it more fun the next time I see the movie.

Europe looks wonderful in the movie. Must win the lottery so I can go to Rome and Amsterdam and London and Paris.

I am crabby

Cold, greay, dreary day. Rainy. Yuck. Makes me want to curl up in a ball. Am so crabby that I am ALMOST not excited about the opening of "Ocean's 12" today. Almost. Have papers to grade. Have to be perky at a Happy Hour tonight and I don't feel like it. I gained three pounds while I have been watching my weight. On top of that, I spent the morning at the gynecologist. Yipee.

Karaoke

I sang karaoke last night. The disco classic, "I Will Survive." Hee.

Christmas shows tonight

8 p.m. "A Charlie Brown Christmas." See the Peanuts do those funky little dances. Look at the weird little Christmas tree. Listen as Linus, who is supposed to be five, recites from the Bible

10 p.m. "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy Christmas Special." I hope Carson has some Christmas balls!

Menudo member is on the SWAT Team

...and he got injured in a car crash.

http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/content/gen/ap/FL_Menudo_Car_Crash.html

 Police officers, including ex-Menudo singer, hurt in car crash

YEEHAW JUNCTION, Fla. — Four members of the Coral Gables police department, including a former member of the 1980s band Menudo, were injured when the van they were riding in overturned on Florida's Turnpike in Osceola County.

The officers were members of the department's SWAT team and returning Saturday from the SWAT Round-up International, a 66-team competition in Orlando.

Miguel Cancel, one of the officers injured in the accident, was a singer with Menudo as a teenager in the 1980s, said Coral Gables police Lt. Paul Miyares.

The four officers — Eduardo Orbe, 29, Edwin Pagan, 32, Eugenio Arencibia, 32, and Cancel, 37 — were southbound on the turnpike Saturday about 10 a.m. when the rear right tire blew on their van.

The vehicle flipped onto the northbound lanes, coming to rest on the northbound shoulder about four miles north of Yeehaw Junction, the Florida Highway Patrol said.

Orbe, the driver, and Pagan, the front-seat passenger, were wearing seat belts. Arencibia and Cancel, who were riding in the back and not wearing seat belts, were ejected, the FHP said. All four were taken by ambulance to Orlando Regional St. Cloud Hospital.

Orbe and Pagan were treated and released.

Arencibia and Cancel were taken by helicopter to Jackson Memorial Hospital in Miami for treatment. Miyares said Arencibia suffered a back injury and Cancel suffered a "severe injury to his left hand." A hospital spokeswoman referred calls to the department.

Sgt. Augustin Diaz said Cancel recently has performed benefit reunion shows with the group. Some of the members, including Cancel, reunited as El Reencuentro for a reunion tour.

This weekend...

...I spent hours grading students' papers. Ah, the end of the semester. It is 10:35 p.m. and I still have seven more papers to get through tonight.

  I have read so many mixed metaphors, fuzzy details and bad punctuation that my eyes are about to fall out. One student even started her article with the dreaded phrase: "Webster's dictionary defines." AHHHHHHHH!

  But I did take a break this afternoon to go to the Sketch Club Players performance of "A Taffetas Christmas."

http://www.geocities.com/sketchclub/

  My friend Mary Kate played "Peggy," a dippy performer who can sing in pig latin, among other talents. If anyone lives near Woodbury, NJ, go check out the show.

   I probably won't do any community theater until this summer when I will try out for the Neil Simon play, "Rumors."

I am...

...bloated. Does anyone care? Nah, I didn't think so.

But at least I did not get fired from "The Apprentice!"

The Apprentice

Anyone watch "The Apprentice" last night? WHAT was Ivana thinking by offering to drop her skirt for $20. HelllOOOO. Clearly, she lost her mind.

Trump probably didn't care so much, but it  is not like that is behavior he would want in a CEO.

I wasn't so horrified that Jen and Sandy put on short skirts and heels to sell candy bars. Because they KEPT THEIR SKIRTS ON!

U2's new album is No. 1 on the charts!!!!

http://www.cnn.com/2004/SHOWBIZ/Music/12/02/music.sales.reut/index.html

U2's album tops U.S. charts

LOS ANGELES, California (Billboard) -- U2 earned its sixth No. 1 album on the U.S. pop charts Wednesday as its new release, "How To Dismantle an Atomic Bomb," sold almost twice as many copies in its first week as 2000's "All That You Can't Leave Behind."

The new Interscope album moved 840,000 copies in the Thanksgiving holiday week that ended November 28, according to sales data from Nielsen SoundScan.

The Irish quartet's previous package, "All That You Can't Leave Behind," entered -- and peaked -- at No. 3 in November 2000 on sales of 428,000 copies; it has a to-date total of 4.2 million.

U2 ended the two-week chart reign of labelmate Eminem's "Encore" (Shady/Aftermath/Interscope), which dropped to No. 2 with 471,000 copies. The band also terminated the rapper's three-week stint atop the U.K. charts on Sunday.

The album's arrival was heralded by first single "Vertigo," which is featured in Apple Computer's iPod/iTunes TV commercial. The track spent four weeks atop Billboard's Modern Rock Tracks list, which is based on radio airplay, and is currently at No. 3. Additionally, the band made a series of high profile appearances in the week leading up to the album's release, including a performance on NBC's "Saturday Night Live" and an unannounced free outdoor show in New York.

U2, which first went to No. 1 on The Billboard 200 with 1987's "The Joshua Tree," has a worldwide sales total of more than 120 million copies, according to Interscope.