Life is short, even in its longest day

I found out New Years day that my dad has cancer. Needless to say, it came as a blow to me. He is the only parent I have. He is my superhero. He has yet to decide if he is going to have surgery. He knows that he will not have chemo or radiation. One thing he has decided is to sell his house and travel around North and South America for the next 3 years. He wants to see places that he has yet to see in his 74 years. One thing this has reminded me of is that life is short, too short for pettiness, for anger, for missed opportunities. I can take this as something devastating or I can take it as an epiphany. I wish I had the courage and the faith my dad has.

So long suckers!

Well, it's the last day of 2008-Thank God! So, to jump on the bandwagon, here's some of my hits and misses for 2008.

Hits:
Election night-I still get chills and teary eyed when I watch the news reels. Words can not describe the pride I felt in my country.

Life altering happiness for my friends. Babies, new jobs, new houses. It makes me happy when my friends are happy.

New Music: New music from The Black Kids, Santogold, The Ting Tings, Vampire Weekend. Indie rock was actually good this year.

Movies: Iron man (Robert Downey Jr. ME-OW!), In Bruges, Cloverfield, Be Kind, Rewind. I'll admit that I haven't seen a ton of new movies but these are ones that stuck out with me.

Tina Fey playing Sarah Palin. Priceless

The Misses:

While on the subject of Sarah Palin-she's an idiot. Enough said.

Prop 8-with as much pride as I had in my country, I felt like I was sucker punched when this passed.

The loss of loved ones and people who inspired me. You will be sadly missed and will forever hold a place in my heart.

Movies: Where to I start?

Dark Knight-now before everyone jumps all over me saying how great this movie was, you're wrong. I'll give you Heath Ledger but the rest of the movie- crap

Indiana Jones-Dear Lord! I had to kick my own ass for watching this movie. Two hours of my life, I will never get back.


That's just the beginning and I'm sure I could go on and on but I just want to tell 2008 to get the hell off my lawn! I am looking forward to 2009 and I am determined that it will be a good year.

I hope everyone has a wonderful and safe New Years eve. I hope the new years brings you mountains of happiness, success, calm and peace. I can't wait to see all the whacky adventures ahead of us. May peace, love and happiness follow you.

I'm outta here-see ya next year! Peace out! (oh yeah, I'm bringing that back for 2009)

Books, books, books...

One of my goals for 2009 is to read a book each month. I love reading but hardly put time aside to do it. Also, I can never find good books. I love mysteries, most non-fiction. I hate romance novels and not big into sci-fi. I do like a good horror novel. Mainly I like period pieces from the industrial age. So, tell me-what's your favorite book? What do you recommend?

And it snowed, and snowed, and snowed....

So, for those of you who don't know about about the Pacific Northwest, we get rain. LOTS of rain, like almost 9 months out of the year rain. Snow, maybe 2 inches a year. It never gets that cold. Well, Mother Nature decided to show us exactly what she is made of. Conversation with my husband:
(weather channel):We are expecting 4-10 inches of snow, ice, and then snow again
Me: BS! I'll believe it when I see it. They couldn't predict a snow storm if they were in the middle of it.
Mark: Honey, it's gonna be a blizzard.
Me: Psh....

Two days later: (this is our pond)


Mark: I blame you for all this snow
Me: Well, I'll be damn.
Mark: Yeah, blaming you.

We did have a pond.....



Any chance to dress up Jujube is a good day for me. The snow is up to my knee. We got about 12 inches and there is another storm coming on Wednesday.


We also use to have a dog, now we just have a snowball with ears and crazy eyes. If you see this beast, run the other way. The cuteness will kill you on the spot.


This storm has really crippled the city. They have closed a highway down in the Columbia Gorge because of snow and ice and wind. We had gust ranging from 40-70 mph. It was just crazy!Some of the buses aren't running and a cab wait is about 8 hours. We aren't even getting mail, cause it can't come in from the east cause the highway being closed. So, lesson learn-I'll keep my mouth shut (yeah right)

It snowed!

Yesterday we got snow. I love snow! Normally in the Portland area we usually get one snow a year if even that. Mainly just rain. Well, it's suppose to snow this whole week and into next. I'm so excited! Here are a few pictures of the white stuff and the pups freezing their butts off. Along with the snow, the temperatures are so cold! The high today was 26. It's getting down in the teens at night. BRRRRRR!



Since it's been cold and snowy a lot of birds have been in our back yard. We have several hummingbirds. Here is one of the regulars. I can't believe how fearless they are. It's so weird to see them stationary. I love hummingbirds!



Mr. Kato decided to stay in. Smart choice.

Oh Christmas tree, Oh Christmas tree!

Our tree is up and decorated. It's so cute and smells WONDERFUL! The skirt belonged to Mark's mother. The little mouse ornament was her's too. It's so nice to have something from his family. The 2008 Pedersen Christmas CD is done too. Although, I think nothing can compare to my 2007 CD this one comes very close. How can you go wrong with when songs include "Santa wants some lovin'" and "Oi to the world"?

I've also been watching a ton of Christmas movies/shows. Can I tell you how much I love Rankin and Bass Christmas specials? A Year Without a Santa Claus-classic! I've also been watching White Christmas way too much. I save A Christmas Story for Christmas day when I can watch it over and over on TBS.

Oh yeah, and my own personal rant. This morning on the CBS morning show they were doing "Hand made" gifts-because people are so strapped for cash this season (please! Handmade does not equal cheap, ya bastards). The thing that bothered me most was that the hand made stuff wasn't even hand made. They just bought stuff from the store and put it together in a basket or took all the dry ingredients for cookies and put them in jars. Give me a break. CBS morning news, you get the finger.

All the children's smiling faces....

Who doesn't love Santa and Christmas? Apparently, these children.




On other related news-my dad's wife is doing better. She is able to walk now and has a little bit of use of her hand. I want to give a BIG THANKS to all my friends who are so supportive. Even when I thought I was alone, I could jump online and see everyone's smiling faces and wonderful comments and have my spirits lifted.


Mark and I went to a super fun party this weekend. Here's our traditional picture.


More to come! I've uploaded a ton of pictures.