Christmas miracles and how to do them properly!

The ex Mr amused and his wife decided to tell their son, Elmer, that Santa is not real... He is only 10 and if they had any imagination, they could have kept this up for a while. What is more fun on Christmas morning than the excitement children feel when they see all sorts of gifts under the tree that magically appeared in the night.... Smirk and Grin decided that this was an error in judgement, so I hatched a plan! Now I am really good at the Christmas magic... Ask Grin she will tell you all about the year "Santa" made a letter appear on the printer telling her about the good deed she did by giving the doll that she really wanted, but was way too expensive for my budget, to a homeless girl who lived in a car in Alabama... But this years Christmas miracle had to be good.... My plan was to do a midnight raid on his house and leave presents from Santa for Elmer under the tree. Grin would hold the dog outside, Smirk would crawl in the doggy door and deposit the presents. I would be in the car with the engine running.... There would be black clothes, dropping and rolling and jingle bells. All this would be done at midnight Christmas eve!!! So we planned for the fun!

We bought 3 gifts. Nice small and fun. No books as that would be a dead giveaway it was from me. We purchased special wrapping paper, just the right hint of old fashioned but nothing like we had at home, another dead giveaway. We wrapped and waited. We planned and then made contingencies... Just in case the parents were still awake at midnight wrapping presents, Smirk would go in through the back while they were in the garage wrapping... This was their norm.

Finally Christmas eve came and we received a call from the Mr. Ex. He and the family were going to a party! DUH, we had forgotten about the annual boring Christmas eve shindig they attended. We flew into action... Gifts in the car, no need for black face, clothes or jingle bells, just sneaking in the back and tucking presents under the tree where we hoped no one would see until morning. Darkness had fallen by the time we arrived, nothing stirred in the house, minus the dog. We snuck into the gate, hiding as we went, still doing the mission impossible moves we had seen in every movie. We obtained entry through the doggy door, put the presents down, then realized we never wrote his name on them... So we rumbled around for a pen, careful to leave no traces that we were ever there, I wrote his name disguising my handwriting, we placed carefully and snuck out the door. There was mass giggling and hiding. We then drove home, happy that the first part of the plan went well!

The next day, Christmas morning, was fantastic! We opened presents, drank coffee and cocoa all snuggled up in our jammies, when upon the table there arose such a clatter... The jingle of text messages arriving in tandem, we jumped from the couch to see what was the spasm. The message was from Daddy proclaiming our greatness... Giggles and smiles were passed but unawareness we replied. We protested our innocence. How could we know what happened at his house 30 miles away!! He did not believe us until we drove up in the drive. He sprang from his house to question and query. Did they drive here last, was the question he pondered. I responded no... how could they, when would they, we were together all evening. The confusion on his face was priceless. The girls they did question. The Christmas miracle was a success. No one still knows the truth... And unless an elf cracks.. No one will... Now to plan for next Christmas... How do we top this one????

I hate shopping!

I love presents. The surprise and happiness on peoples faces when the get presents. I love to give and receive them. I however hate to shop for them. Malls are horrible. People are rude and smelly. I realize that the store I was in had far too many people it for the air conditioner to work effectively but come on it was broiling. And the many of the unwashed masses were huddling exactly where I wanted to be. And no one knows the meaning of the words personal space. Why was the woman in line so close to my behind that she kept hitting my purse with her elbow. I finally had to accidentally swing my body to the side to violently cough and hit her with my purse. She was that close... Why?? Do you need to be close enough to me to smell me?? There is nothing in my purse of interest so back off! Not only that but I couldnt find the shoes I was looking for even though the girl on the phone told me they had them. Did you know that no one sells regular televisions any more?? No flat screens only... What if I dont want a flat screen especially not one that is about 15 inches and cost more than my car. Next year, no shopping! everyone gets home made presents. I am going to spend the year learning how to knit and make my own sweaters... Or maybe just alot of internet shopping!!

And I still have to go to Toys R Us....

Red red wine... Goes to my head...

Yeah!!! Today scientists have announced that red wine, with diet, exercise and mental activity may help prevent Alzheimer's!! And since half of my family is quite prone to loosing their mind this is a very good thing!!! I will be buying 2 buck chuck by the caseload.

http://www.livescience.com/health/060928_red_wine.html

The 7th gate of hell??

So since I turned 40 (I think I just threw up a little in my mouth, it is still very hard to say that I am 40. Damn there it is again) the lovely people at the DMV decided that it would be fun to coincide the expiration of my driver's licence with my birthday. Not only did it expire, but I was not being allowed to renew by mail. I had to go into their locations. These are horrible places where people can become stuck in the quagmire of bureaucracy.

But the worse part of this.... I forgot about it.... Completely! Did not even realize that for the past week, I have been driving on an expired driver's licence. So when a friend who just moved into my area called me for directions, it sparked a little hint of panic. I said a few choice expletives and asked her if she wanted company! She came to my house, dropped her kids off with mine and we left to go to the 7th gate of hell... The local DMV.

The closest office to my house is a block away from the beach in San Clemente. We drove there expecting a lengthy wait. We each had a book to read and she had her computer in case we needed to log in and do something for work.


As we walked in through glass double doors in the large space at the local strip mall, there was no line.. Waiting at the end of the fake leather encased ropes where their should have been hundreds of people queuing was a friendly face. She laughed and even cracked a joke! She handed me the paper I needed to fill out and we were each given a number. We sat down to fill out our respective papers and after 5 minutes our numbers were called. YES you read that correctly FIVE minutes. I barely had time to finish filling out the entire form! We walked to counters that were right next to one another and both of the women at this location were also nice... Not overly perky, but pleasant.... They looked over the forms, asked us to read the abc's that were way far away, asked for money, gave us receipts and sent us to the next window to get our pictures taken. We practically ran over to the next counter to see what wonders waited there. There was a mirror and a red carpet and a very nice, laughing employee. She was happy, she took our pictures, told us the photos looked good, said have a nice day!!

What was this place?? Did we enter an alternate reality? Every time I have been to the DMV I had to wait so long it was like that the scene in Beetlejuice...

But instead it was like a scene out of Pushing Daisies...There was singing, dancing, bright colors and pie...

Well, without the pie... And singing... And dancing for that matter, but there were bright colors.

Life in the fast lane???

So I am just going to come out and say it... Get it over with, just like ripping a band aid off the hairy part of your arm... Yesterday was my 40th birthday. The more I say it, the easier it gets to admit that I am 40... My birthday was spent working... Avoiding the birthday thought... Although everyone wanted to give me their best wishes, I suspect they really wanted to see if someone brought cake. Smirk and Grin were very sweet. They tried to make dinner, I helped, just so it wouldnt burn. They did clean the living room. I got a lovely card from my parents! But the kicker is when the Ex Mr. Amused called to ask me a question and then had to remind me that he might be a year older than me but as a man, he gets distinguished but women just get old... Not fair!

It is really difficult to think that I can possibly be old enough to have lived through the 70's, the 80's and the 90's. I dont feel 40, but it is sad... I am supposedly now middle aged. I am also now classified as a cougar... This is not right! Why are women cougars??? For instance...Would anyone call this man a cougar? He is 2 days older than I am and still beautiful.

This link below does make me feel better although, I do not have a personal trainer and lots and lots of money to help me with this transition but does anyone ever call these ladies cougars??? I dont think so!!

http://www.filmschoolrejects.com/opinions/a-dozen-actresses-in-their-40s-that-still-rev-our-engines.php

I do believe I am going to go and finish off the cupcakes that the girls bought me last night. And have at least 5 more cups of coffee then maybe I can face the rest of my new 40 year old life. The coffee may taste funny with the salt from my tears, but I am sure I will be fine... But I never want to hear about big cats again....

Amazing adventures in Hollywood!

For months, the girls and I have been trying to get to go see a taping of the Ellen Degeneres show. For those living under a rock.... We love her and think she is hysterical. Every time we would check her website, there were no tickets available. Well this month, I checked and they had some availability. So I signed us up to attend a taping on October 14th. After I signed up for the tickets, I sent an email to Ellen from Smirk.. The email had said that the girls wanted to take me for my birthday... As it is a big birthday... And guess what happened!!!

Last week we got a call from Ellen's production company. They didn't have tickets for the 14th, but had standby tickets for October 7th. They were only standby and we might not get in but they assured us that if we didn't get in we would have guaranteed tickets for a later date. We all felt lucky and said OK!

So today we drove up to Burbank, went to the studio and checked in. We were handed standby numbers 302 - 305!!! This was for the 2nd taping of the day!!!! There were 200 people inside the studio at a time.

As we stood at the street signal to cross the street I happened to notice a very tall, sun glassed guy standing on the opposite corner of the street. I grabbed Grin by the arm and said "Look, MEN IN TREES!!! Abraham Benrubi... The bartender!!! We were so excited! We loved that show and he was fantastic in it!! Grin nearly stopped breathing!!

So after we crossed the street, we were escorted to the riff raff room right inside the entrance a very large sound stage. Really nice, huge screen tv's couches and the Ellen store. We got to watch and listen to the taping. It was so fun!!! Today's show taping was actually for October 16th. Now every day, on Ellen, she gives away fabulous gifts and door prizes. Carlos, the production assistant told us that the Riff Raff doesn't usually get the swag that they give away, but he would try! And low and behold he did!!! We all received copies of Natasha Bedingfield's CD.... Again for those rock people http://www.natashabedingfield.com/home.html. Natasha sings the popular song, Pocket full of sunshine. She is also helping promote a Wii Video game called Boogie Superstar. We got both of those! But the most amazing and wonderful prize. Since this is breast cancer awareness month, and Ellen is a big supporter of breast cancer research, she is raising money for the Susan G. Komen foundation. (if you would like to donate... visit www.ellentv.com) Wacoal ,the bra company has decided to help her cause. The folks at Wacoal donated $50,000 to Ellen's race for the cure and they donated bras and a fitting to everyone in the audience!!!! We were soooo excited to find out that we in the Riff Raff room got all of these things too!!!!! WAHOO!! We all get new bras!!! How excited are we!!!

We got to see a star and get a new bra too!!!! We also got our guaranteed tickets and will be going back to see the actual taping of the show in November! Hollywood is so fantastic!

The beginning of my depression...

So if this guy can get a girl, why the heck cant I find a guy... So do I need to be either morbidly obese or need to be super thin...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7648634.stm