The Yard Sale

I'm not gonna lie to you people: I am not crazy about yard sales. Oh, I like going to them pretty well -- lotsa fun stuff to see and bargains to be had -- but I don't like throwing them myself. Still, we've done it probably 5 or 6 times now, with varying degrees of success. Our latest attempt occurred this morning, from about 8 until noon. E.M. likes to set up a snack stand, which is often one of the more popular attractions (people get hungry and thirsty when yard saling). The few highlights of the day included someone carting off our skanky old BBQ grill (but not until we'd reduced the price from $3 to $0!), and my beautiful girlfriend Donna arriving in the late morning with Starbucks for us.

Please enjoy these documentary photos.

Kid Olympics

Every year, my son's school holds the Kid Olympics. It's cute -- each class is assigned a country, they make T-shirts and flags, then compete in track & field events. This year, E.M.'s country was Palau, which of course you would know just by looking at his t-shirt, quite obviously inspired by the Palauian flag. ;-) The other team in this particular relay was Germany. I'm delighted to say that Palau won this event, due in no small part to the cheetah-like speed of my son.

The Party

Kelsey did seem to enjoy her dog party! Especially the delicious repast prepared especially for her by her big brother.

Kelsey's birthday!

I can't believe my baby girl is ONE today!!! Such a big girl. Kelsey Ginger Boof, scion of Ralphs Gold Cash and Bea Dixie Belle, whelped 5/28/07.

I'll post party pix later, so stay tuned. :-)

Leave me comments!

I have been trying to figure out how the comments work on this blog – i.e., can people comment without having a google account?

The answer is “yes”, but it’s not the most intuitive thing in the world. What you hafta do is, after you go to the comments section, there’s an option you can click on that says “name/URL”. That’s the one you want if you don’t have a google account. You can put any old name in there that you want!

We’re all learning about blogging together. Isn’t that beautiful?!

Even if you don't comment... Thank you for reading! xoxoxoxoxox

INDY!

Awesome dang movie. Kudos to whosever idea it was to bring Karen Allen back! And high-five to Harrison for still rockin' that fedora at age 65. I totally believed he was swashbucklin' around Peru!

L.A. Arboretum

Yesterday, after the rain had passed, we thought it'd be a nice idea to visit the L.A. Arboretum. We haven't been there since The Boy was in a stroller! So, off we went.

Here are some documentary photos! (There are so many peacocks there, we decided they should re-name the place the "Peacock-oretum.")

The beautiful photo above was taken by The Boy!

Tweet Cohabitation

Well, it's been one week since Cooper joined us, and I'm happy to say we now have successful Tweet Cohabitation. We eased them into it, since Cosmo hasn't lived with another bird in 4 years.

Cosmo definitely seems to enjoy the arrangement more than Coop, who mostly seems irritated with Cosmo. Still, they're doing well together now and are sharing the Chirp Condo quite peacefully.

Presidential Endorsement

At this juncture, I wish to proudly endorse Barack Obama for President of the United States.

I was initially a Hillary girl. But I became disenchanted with her when she started in with the business-as-usual campaigning, making subtle and not-so-subtle digs at her opponent, and pandering to her "working-class white" support base.

So, now I've decided it's time to throw my support behind Barack. I signed up today to receive ongoing communications from his campaign. Even though he's a Muslim. (BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! KIDDING! JUST KIDDING, PEOPLE!!!)

The Curse of the Billy Goat

I'm startin' to think maybe the Curse of the Billy Goat has been transferred to the San Diego Padres. (Payback for the 1984 NLCS, mayhaps? Too many ex-Cubs playing for the Padres? I dunno.) But look at their fall from grace! Last year, they were contenders! This year, not only are they at the rock-bottom of the NL West, they are the undisputed Worst Team In Baseball! This is bad news for my MadDog, who I'm sure would like to be racking up some wins, but has no run support from his team.

Then yesterday, Padres starter Chris Young gets hit in the face by a line drive. Minutes later, the starting catcher is knocked out when Albert Pujols slid into him. Sweet Odin - what next?!

Anyway, it makes me sad.

Sen. Robert Byrd (D; W.Va.)

Look at this sweet old fella! I want to snorgle him! He's the most precious former KKK guy ever. (I really mean that, even though I sound all facetious.)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xzQ13hA7ieI

For cryin' out loud.

So today, I go to Ralphs to get some veggies to go with dinner tonite. I see that they have artichokes on sale, so I grab 3, and a bottle of Bernsteins dressing, and head for the checkout. The guy rings me up, and tells me my total, which is like over $11. I say, "That sounds like an awful lot! How much were the artichokes?!" and he sez "$2.50 each." I reply, "But I thought they were 2 for $5!" The guy just looks at me.

Oy, vey. The lady behind me sez, "Havin' one of those days, are ya?!"

Cooper & Cosmo: The Meeting

Today marked the first interaction between Cosmo and our new parakeet, Cooper. The meeting was held in the loft area of Cooper's palatial dwelling. The first thing Cosmo noticed was that his swing had somehow ended up in this guy's loft. He was none too happy about that, but put aside his reservations and got to work cozying right up to Cooper. Cooper was rather cool about the whole thing.

We let them kibbitz for about 45 minutes under strict observation. Cooper has a real pointy beak, and he knows how to use it, so we were concerned for Cosmo's safety. But all went fairly well and we're looking forward to trying again tomorrow!

Welcome, Cooper!

The Siegels welcomed a new addition today -- Cooper the 'Keet! Cooper was acquired as a friend for our bird Cosmo (a.k.a., Mr. Chirps). We got a beautiful new bird condo, which will ultimately house both tweets, but for now they just live nextdoor to each other and are still getting acquainted...

Updates as they occur!

The Kitty

It occurs to me that I should report on the condition of Miss Tabitha Q. Puss, since, as many of you know, she's been under the weather of late. I'm happy to report that she seems to be doing much better. We switched her to a diet of wet food only (this helps cats with dehydration) and she really responded! I have not seen her this perky in years. We feed her about 4 times per day, which is alot, but it keeps her happy, taily up in the air and the whole kit-n-kaboodle! I suspect this also helped her blood pressure, enabling some of her vision to return. She doesn't walk into as much stuff. I still call her "Mr. Magoo" tho. LOL!

Padres v. Cubs

Welp, the Padres and the Cubs are playin' right now, and my beloved MadDog was pitching... up until the early part of the 5th inning, at which point he was removed after a flurry of hits (and runs) by the Cubs.

I *love* when the Cubbies win... but I hate when it's due to MadDog havin' a bad outing! Four earned runs for The Professor today... sigh

E.M.

(I'll be referring to The Boy as E.M., so as not to provide identifying info about him here on the interwebs. You'll notice we also don't identify his school and stuff.)

The young'un asked me to blog about him tonight, so I told him I would. :-)

E.M. is a very nice boy, very handsome and VERY smart. His dream is to attend CalArts one day and learn to be an animator. He has already made several short live-action films, and a couple stop-motion animated films! I hope one day to post some of them here... But for now, I offer you the only thing I could find pix of -- this poster he did for a report on the Lego company. He also did this beautiful mission model, with help from Dad. His mission was San Luis Rey de Francia in Oceanside.

E.M. is a great reader; currently he's mostly into non-fiction. He also enjoys creative writing, and spends as much time with Microsoft Word as with his gaming systems! He does enjoy his video games, especially games for the Wii and Nintendo DS. He loves Mario and Sonic games the best right now; he also has a Zelda game for his DS that he is crazy about. He might offer some game reviews here on my blog in the future, so stay tuned!

Blake DeWitt

Although, at this juncture, my baseball heart still belongs to Mark DeRosa, I do wish to sing the *praises* of a certain rookie by the name of Blake DeWitt. This young man is rockin' 3rd base for the Dodgers while Nomar is out with some lame ailment. ("Owww! My leg! Owww! My wrist! Owww! My knee!" Jaysus H. Criminy.) I'm quite enamored of young Blake, and wish him all the very best in the big leagues - hopefully with the Dodgers.

Do check out his impressive stats here:

http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?playerId=29083

Bill O!

Here's an amusing old video of Bill O'Reilly havin' a total freakout. If you have headphones on, be careful, cuz he'll hurt your ears!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sWNYCbdic1M

Bill Shatner

I dunno, man. Bill Shatner just *kills* me! There are seriously tears running down my face.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBWOmHUvKBw&NR=1

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DvQwXOCKNLY

MadDog!

Greg Maddux achieved his 350th career win yesterday! He is the most fantastic pitcher ever, in addition to being a guy of great integrity. I wish there were more players like him.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greg_Maddux

Speed Racer

Holy Cats! We just got back from seeing the Speed Racer movie, and I am blown away! It was awesome.

Now, to be fair, I expected to hate it. All I've heard is how *bad* it is, so the bar was set pretty low. But now, having seen it, I can tell you that it has got to be one of the most visually striking movies I've ever seen. I mean, it is STUNNING. I will be thinking for days just about how it looked. It was really a treat.

And let's face it... I'm gonna like anything with a chimp in it. Sad, but true.

Inspiration

Well, I must give credit where credit is due... I would not have even considered starting a blog, were it not for this man:

http://www.mattlogelin.com/

For whatever reason, the idea of a personal or family blog never occurred to me... until I saw his, and saw the blogs of the people who post on HIS blog. Then, I imagined the possibilities...

Now then... What can you expect to see here? Well, first of all, this is where I will post all those annoying (but super-cute & awesome!) vacation photos I normally e-mail!




Also, I will provide updates as to what's new with us, what The Boy is up to, what cool music we're listening to, etc. You will hafta remember to check in here if you wanna be kept up-to-date! And I hope you will.

And so, ladies and gentlemen... the story begins.