Trick or treat

Probably the most interesting Halloween costume I ever wore was back in 5th grade when I dressed up as a California Raisin. I had the white gloves and everything.

Coon poop and other treasonist behavior

I politely asked Zeke to go outside last night before bed and he went scampering off in the general direction of the doggie door. (He's so smart. He picks up words so quickly.) I heard the click of the door and then three yelps and he was running back inside. "What now?" I thought. Was there a giant squirrel looming out on the deck? After investigating this morning, my father determined that Zeke had run into a raccoon looting our birdfeeder. Poor Zeke. The raccoon was likely 3 or 4 times Zeke's weight. And not only did that stinkin' raccoon devour all the birdseed, he also left a massive pile of poop littered with birdseed under the feeder. Raccoon poop!

My poor father. Not only are we in possession of the most fearful dog in America who will not pull his weight by intimidating small rodents, but now my father has to clean up raccoon poop. I think he expected Zeke to be his ally in the War on Squirrels. To be honest, I'm kinda waiting for Zeke to put the squirrels through a training camp on how to use the doggie door properly and bust into the house. The squirrels would capture Dad's WMD water cannon and then we'll be seeing some real excitement.

*Note - I apologize for posting about poop again.

Eeeek!

Ann Coulter is crazy, however very entertaining!

Kerry's got more gay marriage positions than the Kama-sutra, including the "yawning dog," the "courtesan's dilemma" and the "flip-flopping weasel."

Name that spider

Every Fall, these gigantic spiders weave huge webs outside my bedroom windows and then sit in the centers, looking ominous and evil with their orange and black legs and big bodies. I've never been able to figure out what kind of spiders they are.

So, of course, I was excited to see this photo online today because the spider in this web looks exactly like the ones outside my windows. The caption of this photo identifies it as a Banana Spider, however it looks nothing like the pictures of the Banana Spiders here or here.

So now I'm back where I started. Any ideas?

Tasty

Caramel-filled Hershey Kisses are great! I'm no fan of milk chocolate. Dark chocolate seems like the only way to go. But the caramel filling canceled out the yucky milk chocolate. Caramel anything is so delicious.

Grace

"We have all of us been told that grace is to be found in the universe. But in our human foolishness and shortsightedness we imagine divine grace to be finite... But the moment comes when our eyes are opened, and we see and realize that grace is infinite. Grace, my friends, demands nothing from us but that we shall await it with confidence and acknowledge it in gratitude."

Isak Dinesen, Babette's Feast

No fear

I held Zeke the Weenie on my lap yesterday and pointed out to him the Evil Squirrel outside the window robbing our birdfeeder. He started SHAKING. I attempted to convince him that real dogs don't tremble in fear of rodents, but alas! No sense can be talked into this dog.

The new Breck girl

Ordinarily, I'm not one for ridiculing a political figure for something non-political. I think it's unfair to point out flaws in appearance, speaking styles, spouse's weight, and so on. I really don't think about which candidate has better hair, but after watching this video clip, I'm certain it's John Edwards. I would find little humor in this clip if it spanned a minute or so, but IT'S A LONG CLIP! I can totally understand wanting to make sure your hair is looking good. You should see my hair in the morning and the amount of work that goes into taming this bush. But Edwards just goes overboard! I've never seen that much work go into a man's head of short, shiney hair. It's amazing.

To Tivo or not to Tivo

Chris has been on me to get Tivo for months! Who here has Tivo? Do you like it? Come on, Internet! I need feedback!! What good is this weblog if not to receive solicited or unsolicited advice?!

Heat me up

It's official! Warm offices encourage employee productivity! I'm secretly forwarding this link to upper management.

Evil Allison and loving friends

One of the reasons I love my friends is because I know they think about me. I often take this for granted. One of the most difficult things about being in a wheelchair is just getting around. If I'm by myself, I have to worry about handicapped parking availability, curb cuts, heavy doors, rain, table height, restroom accessibility, and a myriad of other factors.

Last night, I had a "business" meeting at a local restaurant. I arrived on time, but most of my party had arrived early. As I pulled up in my van, it dawned on me that I might have a difficult time getting inside. It was raining fairly hard and there were two sets of double doors. I didn't have any of my group's cell phone numbers so I did what I always do in these types of situations: I beat my pride down to a bloody pulp and waited outside the restaurant until I could flag down someone to open the doors for me. Good times. Nothing like a little pre-dinner humiliation to work up my appetite. I HATE relying on other people. "Oooh, Allison! We were wondering if you were going to make it!" the group cried when I came in. "Yeah," thought the Evil Allison that lives in my head. "You all appear really concerned."

I have to stop and remind myself that I can't expect others to always think about me. I can't assume that the people I meet with once a month always take me into consideration when planning meetings. I've worked really hard toward being more independent in the years since my accident, although I do confess that I feel so much more comfortable in public when I know someone I trust is there beside me to back me up.

I cannot even begin to tell you what a comfort it is to make plans to meet my friends for dinner and automatically know that everything will be taken care of. They meet me in the parking lot. They open the doors for me. They make sure the table is the right height. They move the chair out of the way. They verbally assault and obscenely gesture to people who violate the cross-hatched area next to my van. I feel very taken care of.

I don't expect everyone to know the little things they do to make me comfortable. But I want them to know that I appreciate it. :)

Maybe I'm in a bad mood...

I absolutely love the TV show "Scrubs" but I rarely get the chance to watch it. I came home last night from a meeting and actually caught most of last night's show. By far, my favorite character is John C. McGinley's Dr. Cox.

Perhaps it was because I was in a bitter, foul mood last night, but I almost died from laughter when McGinley's character was attempting desperately to crush another doctor's spirit.

"People may be hard on the outside," said the female doctor, cheerfully. "But they are typically soft and squishy on the inside."

"People are not chocolate. People are bastards, with hard bastard shells, and bastard filling."

AHAHAHA! Ahaha...Eh. Well, I thought it was funny. My sentiments exactly.

Bastards.

Killing time

I once wrote that I would abolish the 2 p.m. hour from the day if I could. I've changed my mind. The 1 o'clock hour has to go. There is nothing redeemable about the 1 o'clock hour.

Sinking low

Nice. I'm always thrilled when I hear campaign speeches like the one John Edwards gave the other day:

"Christopher Reeve just passed away. And America just lost a great champion for this cause, somebody who was a powerful voice for the need to do stem cell research and change the lives of people like him, who have gone through a tragedy," said Mr. Edwards. "Well, if we can do the work that we can do in this country, the work that we will do when John Kerry is president, people like Christopher Reeve are going to walk, get up out of that wheelchair and walk again."

Amazing. Since Kerry is going to literally raise me up out of this wheelchair with his magic stem cell wand, maybe I will vote for him. Ugh. Whatever. First of all, I love how Edwards takes the death of Christopher Reeve and uses it to his advantage. I've been wondering when he was going to pin Reeve's death on Bush...because, you know, it's all Bush's fault, along with the shortage of flu vaccine, the economy, the hurricanes in Florida, and the AIDS epidemic.

Second, it's just tacky to talk like stem cell research is the miracle solution to cure all ailments. Yes, it's promising however quite unrealistic to think that, in the next 4 years with Kerry as President, injured people will rise up and walk as a result of rabid research.

A common misconception is that Bush is banning stem cell research. False. There is no ban on privately funded embryonic research and no ban on publicly funded adult stem cell research.

It's foolish to imply that Kerry will somehow make the lame walk and it's pretty low to raise false hopes to gain a vote. Unfortunately, it works for him.

A waxing fool

At the prodding of my friend Beverly, I went to Merle Norman to get my eyebrows waxed for the first time ever. I've always been a plucker partly because I think it's stupid to pay for something I can do myself and partly because the thought of ripping all my hair out at once sounds painful. I'm a big, cheap wuss.

Waxing was awesome. Quick and easy. And relatively painless! My eyebrows really don't look any better than usual, but the overall experience was very pleasant. I'm afraid I'll get addicted and start waxing everything.

Let me just tell you how much of a clueless, non-girlie-girl I am. I paid the lady that did the waxing and instead of giving me a $5 bill back, she gave me five $1 bills. Ah! Tip the girl! Duh. It's a good thing she gave me the ones, because I would've taken my five and rolled out. And if I ever decided to go back to her, she would've waxed both my eyebrows off...or at least butchered them a bit. Note to self: Always tip anyone who makes you look good.

Conversations

Bev: What if you had friends that really wanted to go to a strip club. Would you go with them?
Allison: I'd send them to Southeast where all the gay clubs are. Next time they wouldn't ask me.

Now I'll definitely vote for you

By far, my favorite part of the debate last night was when Kerry said, "Oh, by the way, I've been blessed by the Native Americans..."

Shaddup!

One of my biggest pet peeves: people in the theater talking though a movie.

"At what point do you turn around and tell someone to shut the hell up?"

Fortunately, I normally have people who do that sort of thing for me. When I go to the theater with a few of my friends, nobody gets away with much more than a peep. One day I'm sure we'll get into a rumble out in the parking lot. Personally, I'm only good at passive-aggressive techniques like The Evil Eye and Mental Death Threats but, for some reason, those are never that effective.

Megan lives!

Oh-eeee-oooo-ooh! Happy Birthday to my gorgeous, knock-out baby sister Megan who turns 21 today. This is it, my darling. There is nothing else to look forward to except wrinkles and tendonitis. Enjoy what's left of your birthday!

Christopher Reeve 1952-2004

I was in high school when Christopher Reeves was first injured and, while I thought it was sad, I didn't really give him much thought until after my own spinal cord injury in 1999. His injury level was the highest possible, a C2, while mine is much lower at C7. His head was literally disconnected from his spinal column. The severity of his injury leaves me wondering how he managed to survive at all.

I look at my limitations and pity myself. I think of all the things I can't do on my own and I think about my lost independence, but I can brush my teeth and feed myself and move around and even flip you the bird. Christopher Reeve could just move his finger. Yet every day he continued to get up, he traveled the world, he spoke to Congress, he made public appearances...all the while not hiding the toll loss of mobility took on his body. THAT is admirable.

It makes me tremendously sad to compare the strong, handsome man in the red cape to the helpless man in the wheelchair. However, being Superman has more to do with strength of mind. Christopher Reeve put a face to spinal cord injury. Single-handedly, he has done more for the cause than any one person could do. Using his celebrity and connections, he has raised not only millions of dollars for research, but awareness levels as well. A Superman knows how to put his powers to good use.

I have not always agreed with Reeve on fetal stem-cell research, but I am proud of the work he did and admire the strength he found to do it. The SCI community and the world has suffered a big loss.

We celebrate life, we love life, we tell ourselves life is good. And yet very often when someone dies, we force a smile and whisper, "You're free." Whatever the person's pain or rage or thwartedness, it's powerless and gone, never to return. It's a comforting perspective when you look at Christopher Reeve. And it's even nicer to think that maybe somewhere he's awakened this morning, frisky as a colt, and gone off for an aimless run. (Washington Post)

Dance on the stars

I was desperately looking for an autumn picture for my new banner but couldn't find anything that caught my eye. And then this crazy chick from the vintage Gancia poster spoke to me. "Look at me! I drink Gancia! I raise the bottles up in celebration! I wear pink AND dance on the stars!" And I thought to myself, "She's drunk. But I want to dance on pink stars and I want my readers to dance on pink stars, even the male readers!" And so there you have it. Enjoy. It's not exactly autumn-themed, but it's kind of election-themed with the stars and all. After all, I'd pay to see George W. and John Kerry dance on pink stars.

Celebrating Fire and Freddy

So I never made is to the 40th Annual Apple Harvest Festival. The apple was not celebrated and I truly feel bad about that. I was just so exhausted after everything yesterday that I could hardly work up the energy to go to bed. I still feel icky. And don't you think the apple deserves your 100%? Anything less isn't acceptable. So instead, I celebrated fire safety with the local fireman today by watching them burn a house down. God bless 'em.

By far, the most interesting moment of the day was spotting Freddy Krueger walking down the street waving to cars outside the post office. I guess everyone's gotta use the postal service...even scary people and mass murderers. The mail must go through.

A medical marvel

So not only is my uterus "way back there" (according to my psycho ex-doctor who gave me pap smears all the freakin' time), but I also have an "amazingly low-pressure" bladder! Apparently, it just keeps stretching and stretching! What other embarrassingly private information can I tell you about my body? What can I say? I am fearfully and wonderfully made!

I was sitting in the hospital's waiting room waiting for my "procedure," when I noticed the receptionist answer a phone call. She then turned to the woman she was currently helping and said, "Hang on. Let me get this little girl to her prep room." I looked around the room for a little girl but didn't find one. And then she walked over to me! I'm the little girl! See, I'm not complaining at all about being called a little girl but I am 26, for goodness sake. I've got lines around my eyes and in my forehead and, oh crap, I'm getting scowl lines as well. People usually mistake me for a soccer mom. When I was a junior in high school, Megan (5 years younger than I) had a soccer coach who thought I was her mother! People always think my older sister is younger than me. So I guess I should feel good about it. Oh well. It just struck me as odd. I feel like I'm 60.

PS - When I was having the testing done, the doctor shoved a TV screen in my face and pointed out a big, pink, blobby thing. It was the inside of my bladder! How disgusting is that! I got to see the blood vessels, the openings to the kidneys, some scarring, and other lumpy things. He just kept saying, "Your bladder is very healthy" and I kept saying "This is nasty... This is nasty... This is soooo nasty."

Plans for this weekend

I'm taking tomorrow off which ordinarily would be a wonderful thing. However, tomorrow will not be wonderful by any means because I'm going to the hospital for testing. And to make matters worse, I'm going to a D.C. hospital that I've never even heard of before. I may come back home with an amputated leg or somebody else's baby or hopefully a perscription for Valium. It's a gamble.

The parents and I are headed up to Gettysburg this weekend and will be attending the 40th Annual Apple Harvest Festival. As a family, we are big fans of apples and big fans of harvest and, any time an apple or its bi-products are celebrated, by golly, we will be there. I'm hoping there will be hard apple cider available for immediate consumption. I'm taking my camera so expect photos at a later date.

I'm so happy Monday is a holiday. So happy, in fact, that I could cry. I desperately need a day to completely relax. I've been a big ball of stress lately and don't know if one day off is going to make a huge difference but at least it'll give me an opportunity to catch up on some sleep.

I need to order photos from Steph and Vince's wedding. What kind of loving family waits over a year to order pictures from a family member's wedding? I think Mom feels guilty that we don't even have a single picture to frame and put on display somewhere. In an attempt to make her feel better, I tried to tell her that our family just doesn't put much emphasis on photos but decided, after looking around at all the photos on our walls, that was a load of crap. It does make me feel better that Steph and Vince haven't ordered any for themselves yet either. What a bunch of slackers we all are. Somebody please set us a deadline.

I'm hoping to make a dent in The Moonstone, the Wilkie Collins book I'm currently reading, but think that may be unrealistic between all the hospital testing and apple festivities and sleeping. I may post later but if I don't, have a fantastic holiday weekend, Internet. You're good people. Do something exciting in honor of Columbus.

Wha? No shots?

Stinkin' Chiron! Human resources just sent out a note canceling our annual flu shot clinic. If I get the flu this year, somebody's gonna pay!

Overheard

"I mean, does anyone really need to know how to dance these days? The clubs play 'instructional' hip-hop like 'Lean Back' and 'Get Low'. You know, 'Lean forward and touch your toes.' Even the whitest mf-er can look good in the clubs... They tell you what to do!"

More on "Lean Back":

"Hey Juan or Bob or Reggie (no idea what race he was) why aren't you leaning back like the rest of us? It's a really easy dance, all you have to do is lean back. Don't be shy, it's not nearly as complicated as the Macarana, the Humpty dance or the Hora."

No Child Left Behind

Hmmm. Democrats in Congress are saying that Bush's No Child Left Behind act has failed schools. I certainly am no expert on the events taking place in schools and I don't doubt that there are weaknesses with NCLB. But my mother is a special education teacher in Maryland's public school system and, since this law was passed, she's seen remarkable improvements. First, her special ed kids are not being ignored any longer. Teachers are being held accountable for what their kids are learning. This ultimately may be unfair to the teachers, but at least now they are working harder than ever before. Second, the special ed programs finally have the supplies they need.

Like I said, I don't know all the ins and outs of public education, but I'd like to think NCLB is making somewhat of a difference. I should get my mom to post something about this. Maybe she'll leave a comment. She's a smart woman. Mom, leave a comment!

Spreading the word

I sat next to Kim at church yesterday. For some reason, nametags were being given out at the door. So when Kim saw mine, she ripped it off my shirt, wrote "is cool" under my name, and secretly attached it to the back of the guy in front of her. Kim is awesome. Thanks to her, I had a walking billboard proclaiming my coolness throughout the church all morning. Just another step furthering my goals for world denomination. Kim is part of my marketing and promotions team.

-----------------------
Aside: I really could use all the coolness publicity I can get because apparently I am NOT cool at all. This fact was confirmed when I got in my van yesterday and realized I left my glasses inside. So I pulled out my backup pair, my old glasses that I wore throughout high school and college, and was shocked at how big and ugly they are. At least I have relatively fashionable glasses these days but unfortunately the fashion pretty much stops there. I think I need those gay guys with the queer eyes to straighten me out.

Like a natural woman

Well, it's about time the sleek and straight hairstyles are out of style. Wavy is in, people! I'm almost in style! I'm desperately waiting for the My-Hair-Is-Natually-A-Mess look to be in. One day... Yes, one day...

Begging for a bath

What's up with Zeke the Weenie chillin' in the bathroom sink?