Chit Chat free zone

First and foremost, I love, love, love my IPod. In my opinion it's just as important as the running shoes I'm wearing...it makes my daily exercise regime a few points above tolerable. But, here's the problem.
I live in a "Leave it to Beaver" neighborhood. Nothing wrong with that, in fact many people from many other states have chosen to settle in our little piece of suburbia...it's a great place to live. There are lots of neighbors, dogs, a few kids, and great areas to take walks. Therein lies the problem. When I'm movin and groovin and shakin and bakin to Donna Summer, Madonna, Christina Aguilera, or whoever...I don't want to be bothered. I really just want to walk, but on the other hand I don't want to be rude to the neighbors around the area.
Lately, every morning when I walk I have been learning the fine art of reading lips while wearing the IPod. I can totally translate "hello" or "good morning" but it's the "how are you today?" or "great day for a walk" that totally throws me off and I feel like I have to unplug and say my few words of social kindness to those more slower walkers on the block that want to chit chat.

I can get over it but then I began to think...are we raising socially inept adults in our society as a result of the IPod and other personal music devices? Will the kids of today be taking "Social Skills 101" as adults because of overuse of "me" time? It's great to have your space, your time and music to yourself, but I think we need to keep ourselves open for using our social graces with other living, breathing people. I mean, what would you do if you happen to bump into Madonna on an early morning run?

Bad Girls

Compared to some of the people I work with I might be considered cool, hip or a little funky. Compared to singer Amy Winehouse, I am vanilla. I am Polly Purebred. I am a wallflower at the grade school dance.
She has got such a thrown together, uber-cool, rebel without a cause vibe about her and you know she would just tell you to take her or leave her..."but if you leave me, you'll never know what you'll be missing."
From an article on tiscali.co.uk--
"She has the vocal prodigy bit covered. If words have already worn themselves out trying to describe the horny, sleazy, salty spiritual, worldly wise, late night, tired of bullshit, downtown, flirty, velvet resonance that makes for a great soul-jazz singer they're going to fall apart entirely over Amy."
Her popular song, Rehab,reminds me of poor Britney and her very public meltdown. The only difference is that Winehouse would be openly and honestly wearing the bald. Sometimes, bald is beautiful.

Flag Frenzy

What ever happened to the good ole 4th of July? Picnics, family, friends, fireworks...a down home, kicked back, relaxed sort of holiday. It was a holiday meant for summer...throw a couple of hot dogs on the grill, whip up some potato salad, pop open a brewsky, and you got yourself a fourth to be proud of. All of a sudden it's become this hoo haw of buying red and white and blue ribbons, flag t-shirts, hats with flags and fireworks, and festooning the house with streamers, wooden craft cows with red bandannas, and not one flag but fifty to line the driveway! Let's relax a little, people!We used to be able to count on the 4th to be a mellow, lazy, hazy kind of holiday but now the merchandise has taken over. What's next? Labor Day?

Paris Paris

If you haven't seen this--it's hilarious...enjoy!

Brad who?

I gotta tell you....Ocean's 13 will probably not be nominated for any theatrical awards but it could be nominated for lots of attractive men. George Clooney has got to be my favorite bringing a sort of Cary Grantness to the film...he's fun to watch and it's true....this guy is definitely getting better looking as he's getting older.

Which brings me to another thought I've had lately...what's up with these women wanting to be "cougars" in our society?? I think it's great if you look fabulous for your age but why would you want to go after the twenty year old man when you've got men like George that are your age and that you'll have much more in common with. I think the same applies to men as well dating women that are half or more of their age. I get it. They're young, beautiful, but don't you want more than just looks? Don't you want a conversation, some history, some point of view? Don't you want someone that knows what an "album" was or a "typewriter" or who John Lennon was? (okay...I was going to say Donna Summer or The Monkees but you would have winced)

Eye candy...easy on the eyes and no calories. Seems sort of tasteless to me.

Late bloomer

I admit it...I'm a little late to jump on the bandwagon but atleast I'm catching up now. I'm addicted to Season 1 of 24...thank you Netflix. I love the idea of the "real time" when I KNOW that I have just saved myself 4 minutes of commercials (and minus the fumbling with the remote when you only have the television show recorded with the commercials).

And you know what else I love...when you tell people that you are really into this show and they've already been fans of the show for season after season, they just look at you with a certain gleam in their eye. It's almost like they realize that you just started with a mind blowing drug...or are on chapter one of the best book ever...or they remember the good old days when they too were obsessed with Jack and how in God's name would he save the world?!

Where's my flipflops?

"Tom, it's just too difficult for me to walk in these....can I please take them off?"