Here's to an Idol-free Today

That will hopefully come next week.

Every morning, I watch Today. I am obviously not looking for hard news to go along with my morning coffee, but it gets me a little informed and entertained.

Except for every Wednesday and Thursday morning, when they would do a 10 minute "commercial" for a show on a totally different network. Meredith would get all excited talking about American Idol. I always wondered how the brass at NBC would allow it. They didn't talk about who got kicked off any of the other shows on other networks. They didn't even talk about the first woman to ever win The Biggest Loser, an actual NBC show.

I don't watch American Idol. Because I like music. Watching a dozen tweens butcher classic songs week after week in a "karaoke from hell" kind of way makes me die a little inside.

But it's Meredith's reason for living. Or so you would think, judging from the daily giddiness when talking about it. "Did you watch?" she would ask Matt. "Um, no," was his standard reply. And oh the drama when the father of one of the "singers" was "banned" from back stage.

Isn't there a war on? An election coming up? A dog that can do tricks? Because the only way I would consider American Idol "news" is if when one of the "singers" got voted off, they whipped out a gun and went postal, with Ryan Gaycrest getting caught in the crossfire. I might actually watch that episode!

It all came to a head today on Today when the "winner" and the runner up appeared on the show. Meredith was so giddy, Matt had to sit in on the interview. I swear all she did was sit there and giggle. As a journalist, I died a little inside watching it.

So I switched over to Angel on TNT. If I am not going to be informed, at least I can be entertained.

Oh Skinny Cows, how I have missed you

Woo hoo! I went to my Weight Watchers meeting tonight, and I lost 3 1/2 pounds! Now I am sure that was just water, but what the hell, I'll take it!

I am "rewarding" myself with a glass of wine. OK, two.

I made some good changes this week. I switched to raw veggies with my hummus, instead of crackers. I got a food scale to measure out proper portions. I've been writing everything that goes in my mouth down on my journal pages. And I danced around the kitchen while preparing a Memorial Day batch of Manhattan Clam Chowder.

And, as an allowed treat, I have reintroduced myself to the most wonderful of 2-point ice cream treats, the Skinny Cow ice cream sandwich. They are heaven! And, since chocolate is my "trigger food," I got little 1-point chocolate Zingers and these 2-point chocolate mint bars for that after lunch fix (not all at once. Just one a day!). Take THAT bowl of peanut M&Ms up at the front desk. You can not defeat me!

I can do this. I am determined! This week comes some walking and more work with my hand weights. I'll be strutting that pink skirt by Labor Day!!!

The bejesus

Once upon a time, quite some time ago, before Turner Classic movies or even TBS and TNT, The Wizard of Oz was shown on TV only once a year, on a Sunday. I think it was around Easter time. One week was Oz, the next Sunday was The Ten Commandments. One thing was guaranteed on Oz night. Either Jan or Dick had to come calm down their screaming child, who awoke in the middle of the night after being chased by winged monkeys and green-faced witches.

That screaming child was me.

They probably drew straws before putting us to bed, knowing that in a few hours, I would be howling. It was as annual an event as the showing of the movie itself. And yet, I watched it every single time.

I thought about that last night while I was watching Dexter on my newly acquired Showtime (in all of its TV-M glory). As I watched Dexter slice the cheek of his restrained captive, I thought, "I really should not be watching this so close to my bedtime."

But I couldn't change the channel. For some sick reason, I can't stop scaring the bejesus out of myself. If there is a suspenseful movie on, I am compelled to watch, knowing full well it will haunt my dreams.

It's just a movie, blah, blah, blah. Well, I have been "blessed" with a very vivid and active imagination that will sometimes not be quiet. I have laid in bed, terrified a guillotine blade was going to drop from the ceiling after watching a special on Nostradamus. I did not get one second of sleep the night we watched Copycat, as every creek of the house, every rustle of branches outside was a crazed killer trying to break in. And, my sister was a heartbeat away from a face full of Lysol when she came home late the night I had watched the original Helter Skelter.

I still remember the look of dread on my mother's face when I told her I had watched Psycho at my friend Jennifer's house. I knew she was imagining me waking up screaming in the middle of the night. Nope, I just made sure to bolt the bathroom doors when I was in the shower. Which I did until I went to college.

Don't even get me started on Jaws. The first time I saw it, I was terrified to stick my toe in the lake, let alone the ocean. Now, it's one of my favorite movies, and I watch it every time it's TV. It was on last Thursday, and I kept flipping back to it during the season finale of Grey's Anatomy.

Which is a whole other thing. I can't watch the gore stuff. Can't stand the sight of blood. So there are times where I can't watch ER or Grey's. But give me a 10 p.m. airing of Psycho, and I'm all over it. Maybe I'm not as scared of it because I know what's going to happen. But I still jump when that shower curtain whips open. And the ending is still unnerving (on a side note, I am referring to the original Hitchcock movie, NOT the remake).

And while I watch Jaws all the time, and appreciate it for the genius piece of film making that it is, the idea of it still freaks me out. When I am in the ocean, I make sure there are people out farther than I am, so they will get eaten first, and I'll have time to get out of the water. I don't use a raft or a float, because that makes you look like a seal underwater, and I don't want to end up like that little Kintner boy. And if something touches me underwater, I will climb on the head of the person next to me to get out of the water.

I may like to scare myself when I'm on the sofa, but out in the big ocean, why take chances that my imagination is actually real.

Wonder Twin Powers Activate

Form of:
Someone thinner with better hair.

Well, there's not much I can do about the hair. It's big and curly/frizzy. Any shorter and it would look like a mushroom cap. Longer and the curl gets pulled out. It's got a mind of it's own. I do control the color, since it's leaning toward silver and gray when left to its own devices. So now, thanks to Performing Preference, it's Medium Amber Copper Brown.

Now the thinner part, I can control. And need to control. I went to my first Weight Watchers meeting tonight. Well, not really my first. I joined eight years ago and lost almost 30 pounds.

That is hard to fathom for me. I've always been the thin one. I've been 5'7" since probably about the first grade. For as long as I can remember, when we had to line up by height in grade school, it was always me in the back with the boys. And I was thin. In high school, I probably topped out at 119. My friend Charlie recently told me, "Yeah, we thought you were sick, you were so fucking thin."

My first response was, "Who the hell was 'we??' Was that the royal 'we?'"

My second thought was that even then, I always felt fat. I knew I was thin, but I always felt like I could be thinner. That didn't stop me from eating what I wanted. Oh, the metabolism of a 17 year old.

There was even a point when my dad thought I was bulimic because of how the end of meal time and my trips to the bathroom always seemed to be pretty close. I don't know why that was, but I don't like to throw up when I am sick and really have to, so I certainly wouldn't make myself on purpose. And, as I told him, if I were bulimic, I'm obviously not very good at it, since I'm still fat.

I was never fat. And I'm not fat now. I'm just bigger than I would like to be.

149.

That is what the scale said tonight. That is 6 pounds lighter than what I was when I first walked through the doors of Weight Watchers. It took from January to June, but I got down to 127. 128 is the lowest healthy weight for my height. So I grew up being about 10 pounds lighter than I should have been, still thinking I was fat. And, it's hilarious that even with ridiculously low blood pressure (to the point where a nurse actually asked me if I was still alive), I still passed every sports physical, and my doctor was never concerned that I was 10 pounds thinner than I should have been.

I want to lose 15 pounds. I'm not insane or unrealistic. I'm 37, and I doubt my body will get back down to 128. And to be honest, even when I was 30 and lost all that weight, it was so hard to keep it there. Like salad all the time, chicken with no skin and veggies all the time hard. I like my steak, and I like my wine. And I sometimes like to lean toward reality. So if I can get it down to 135, and fit into my pink Anthropologie skirt, and my paisley Banana Republic skirt again, well then that is all the reward I need.

(oh, and my 20 year reunion is next summer, and I want to show up looking AWESOME, and not sick)

The New Door

Actually, it's not new. It was here when I moved in. Right there by the bathroom. The door stays closed, because behind it is the water heater and air conditioning. Not attractive things to have on display.

I call it the new door, because ever since Sunday night, Daphne the cat is suddenly obsessed with it. Like she's never seen it before. Closed doors often give her stress. I can't be in the bathroom without her paws coming under the door, trying to open it. But the attention she is paying to this door is kind of freaking me out.

She lays in front of it. She tries to open it from the bottom. She gets on her back paws and reaches up for the knob, desperate to discover what this door is hiding.

I am not so sure I want to know.

I've whipped that door open to show her that nothing is in there (God, I hope there is nothing in there.). I've taken my flashlight and shined it around, hoping something of the small mammal/reptile persuasion didn't come shooting out. I don't really want to see the food chain in action.

The search came up empty. Or, at least, the flashlight didn't flush out any game. The door was shut, and she walked away. For a little while anyway, until the pull of the newly discovered door draws her back.

I really hope there is nothing in there.

Hooray for Mom

This is one of the first pictures of me and my mom. My dad is there too, but I cropped him off. Today is not about him (his day is in June). It's about my mom. Doesn't she look fabulous?! And me, well, how cute am I?!?

We're in the driveway of my grandparent's house in Syracuse. You can make out Grandpa's back in the picture. In the whole shot, you can see that he's grilling up a batch of what we call Jack Chicken. My grandfather loved to cook. Maybe it was the French in him, I don't know.

I do know that that love of cooking was not passed on to my mom. Nope, Jan doesn't like to cook. At all.

But that's OK. She worked as a teacher, and then came home and took care of us. That taught my sister and me that women can be successful and have careers, and still keep it together at home. We didn't always see eye to eye when I was growing up. She told me once that she was not my friend, she was my mother. I think that kept me on the right path. And now that we are both adults, I can honestly say that we are friends, too. She is the first person I want to share news with, whether it's good or bad, important or silly.

Speaking of silly, I must say that we certainly were not raised eating fast food every day. She did cook for us, and had quite a few "go to" recipes that were always crowd pleasers. (And, because we're French, there was always salad.)

I made my favorite mom recipe today, in honor of Mother's Day. It was called No Peek Beef Casserole in the cookbook that came with her Crockpot, but we've just always called it Crockpot Stuff. I put it in a family cookbook I put together, and my cousin's husband said he would eat it every day. It's super easy, as most Crockpot meals are, and yummy.

Crockpot Stuff (or No Peek Beef Casserole)
1 1/2 lbs stew beef (1 inch pieces) (You can go up to 2 lbs. of beef)
1 pkg. onion soup mix (I use Beefy Onion flavor)
1 can cream of mushroom soup
1 4-oz. can mushroom stems and pieces (I don't drain them, but you could)
1/2 cup red wine (and a little for the chef)

Combine all ingredients in Crockpot. Stir together well. Cover and cook on low for 8-12 hours (high, 5-6 hours). Serve over noodles or rice. (We always had it over rice, but some people like it with noodles. It's a personal call.)

Enjoy, and have a very Happy Mother's Day.
I LOVE YOU MOM!

Divided We Fall

This morning's CNN.com poll question scared me. Well, the question itself didn't scare me, but the results chilled me to the bone. The question read, "Democrats, if your choice is not the nominee, what will you do?" The choices were: Won't vote, will vote for the nominee, and will vote for John McCain. When I checked the little dot to say I will vote for the nominee, 45% agreed with me, and 41% said they would vote for John McCain.

WHAT?!?!

At the risk of sounding offensive, that is the stupidest fucking thing I have ever heard. I don't understand how someone could abandon their belief system and ideals like that. Why? Because you don't like his former pastor or the situation with her husband? No wonder we, as a party, can't get our shit together. We don't stand together. And we are easily distracted by non-issues.

I don't want to tell people how to vote, but I would think, at the very least, you should vote for the person who believes in what you believe in.

If you marched on Washington for pro-choice, why would you vote for a man who is pro-life, and who just today vowed to nominate the most conservative judges he can to federal positions, which almost guarantees Roe v. Wade would be in jeopardy?

If you're against the war, why would you vote for a man who said we could be in Iraq for 100 more years?

If you think the last 8 years have been hell and can't wait for the nightmare to be over, why would you vote for the man drinking W's Kool-Aid?

If the economy is hitting you hard (and who isn't being hit hard, oh, that's right, the rich), why would you vote for the man who 1. is married to a woman worth more money than I can count and 2. has admitted that he knows nothing about economics?

I am supporting Obama. But if Hillary ends up being the nominee, I will gladly vote for her. (If my vote counts. I do live in Florida after all.) They are really not that much different. They do have different ideas on things, but they have the same ultimate goal, and that is reclaim this country and help the people that live in it, and to make it great again. Make it a country to be admired around the world. Because, news flash, the rest of the world doesn't think we're all that great anymore.

USAToday put together a little match game that asks basic questions about where you stand on the issues, and matches you with the candidates that stand with you or not. Here is the link. Check it out, and really look into your heart and mind and see where your ideals and beliefs are. And vote them.

This is a historic election. We have a chance to do something great. We have the chance to stand up and say, "No more!" to the war-mongering, money-grubbing, Bible-thumping (hello, separation of church and state) Republican party. But we can't do it separately. We can only do it together. We have to stand together as a party and as a people. It's the only way we can actually make a stand and make a change.

You say it's your birthday

Well it's George's birthday, too. And, more importantly, my sister Jenny's.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, JENNY.

Summer is coming!

Well, I live in South Florida, so it's coming sooner for us. Either way, here is a tasty salsa recipe to enjoy!

Watermelon Salsa

3 cups finely diced watermelon
1/2 cup diced green pepper
2 Tbsp. lime juice
2 Tbsp. chopped cilantro
1 Tbsp. chopped onion
1 Tbsp. chopped jalapeno pepper (seeds in if you like it hot, seeds out if you like it medium)
1/2 tsp. garlic salt OR 1 1/2 tsp. fresh pressed garlic

Mix all ingredients in a bowl. Cover. Chill.

Eat with tortilla chips.

Oh, and it's Cinco de Mayo too