this is before one too many

Happy New Year, Happy New Decade to all....

Every year I make the obligatory New Years Resolution
This year I will maintain my goal weight, keep up my exercise routine, continue to make jewelry and continue being the general all around nice person that I usually am.

I saw an ad in the NY Post, I never buy the NY Post, but the person next to me left it on his seat and I saw this, TOMORROW TIME WARNER CABLE MAY NOT CARRY THE FOX NETWORK. Who do they think they are kidding? If I were Time Warner, I would tell Fox to take a hike, because when 13 or so million people are not there to watch your advertiser's commercials, you will see how fast Fox trots back to Time Warner Cable.

B-B-BURRRRR, Chatter, Chatter

It's really cold outside!!!! 18 degrees right now. This afternoon the 50 MPH wind gusts brought the wind chill factor down to minus 8. Is this NYC or Fairbanks?
My plans for the day were thwarted till the thaw! No Northern Shrike in Hackensack Meadowlands. No Mew Gull off of the Belt Parkway. No spin class at the YMCA.

The highlight of the day was the shopping cart escalator at Costco. I had to stock up on paper goods to be prepared for the next big storm. One can never have too many cans of red kidney beans or too many rolls of toilet paper in the house.

Are we ready to TUMBLE!!!

My wonderful husband, who saw the page from the catalog with the item circled and who I told this is what I want for Christmas as I taped the page to the wall, got the hint and bought me a jewelry tumbler kit, complete with stainless steel shot and tumbling powder for Christmas. Now as I type my projects are tumbling. Tumbling burnishes jewelry to polish it. The stainless steel shot keeps hitting the jewelry and polishes it in the tumbler. Woo-hoo!!! I was having problems finishing my work at home because I had to wait till I went to class to tumble. Over the summer I couldn't tumble at all, I would go back to class in September and the first thing I would do is grab the tumbler and get a high shine on my metal.

In the just not quite getting it category--the NY Times had an article today about how people, who have converted to Judaism, feel about Christmas. One person had a hard time parting with the Christmas tree, so now she has a Holiday Tree decorated in blue, white and silver. Another visits his family, but doesn't recite the traditional midnight Novena. But there was this one woman, in the process of converting, who wanted to make a traditional Christmas dinner for all her Jewish friends-bourbon glazed ham. I think she hasn't gotten past the intro chapter of her "How to be a Jew" textbook yet. Probably somewhere in first chapter she would have found mentioned the Kashruth if she did.

Seen at the sorely missed Waterview Diner, a Hanukkah menu posting.
Roast Lion of Pork

The Lion of Judah

Christmas Eve 2009

This is a very subdued Christmas. I noticed that not many homes are decorated in the neighborhood. I walk around and there are very few holiday lights. The NY Times ran an article in the paper today about people who are just not celebrating Christmas at all. Seems to me, we have commercialized Christmas to death. Don't worry, between Americans 5 second sound bite attention spans and 10 second Alzheimer's memories-we'll start spending and running up the charge cards again. The third world will work once more and all will be well in the world.

The strangest thing I have seen this Christmas...
On Sanibel Island, Florida, a Drive-Thru Living Nativity.
C'mon! Get out of your gas guzzlers for Christ!
Only in America

Here is my other thought for the day (or really yesterday)
We should have a new punctuation mark in the English language.
It should be an upside "!".

This is why...
I reviewing a "gourmet" market that opened up in the the neighborhood in an email to my husband (see below). I was telling him that it was just like all the other "gourmet" markets in the neighborhood. (None of which I would call gourmet, but then again I have been told that I am a food snob cause any "gourmet" market that sells commercial health food products that I can buy at Pathmark, is not a "gourmet" market in my opinion) Sorry, I digress, I needed an punctuation mark that was the opposite of a "!" to put after the Eh in my description of the market to him to truly express my sentiment.

See, I have created a revenue producing idea! You would have to reprogram all the computers in the English language to have a new character in all the typefaces, all the key boards would have to change. So would all the PDA's, and all the cell phones. Think of it as the Y2K problem and the television broadcast standard change rolled into one. The government would have to issue coupons so people can go to RadioShack and buy, for a couple of dollars, a replacement keyboard! Bet'cha looking for an upside down "!" right about now...


Larry (the above mentioned husband)and Shari, on the beach, Sanibel Florida, week of 12/7


Larry and Shari, at Jamaica Bay, Wildlife Refuge, Christmas Eve 2009

Two weeks ago, I was on the beach and it was 87 degrees, today we were out birding and it was 37. What a difference 50 degrees makes!

Funny thing overheard today

I am sitting in a cafe, having my Vita-muffin with a cup of coffee, trying to read a book. This is the conversation I overheard.
Woman 1: What do you do for a living?
Woman 2: I am a psychiatrist
Woman 1: That must be interesting
Woman 2: It gets to be like any other job, but I love it.
Woman 1: Oh
Woman 2: Have you ever been to a psychiatrist?

Now, I am sitting, thinking (to myself), Lady, you need help, have you ever been to a psychiatrist?

Crocodile at Ding Darling NWR Florida

We spent a week on Sanibel Island, the highlight of the trip was seeing a Painted Bunting. We had 4 target birds, Wood Stork, Limpkin, Sandwich Tern and Snail Kite.
We also got our first really good look at a Pileated Woodpecker. We've heard them, we've seen the bottom half of them, but this time we saw the whole bird. They are largest woodpecker in North American.

We saw an American Crocodile which of course reminded me of this relief that is in the Musee d'Orsay in Paris

Crocodile don't eat my babies!
actually it's Les Nubiens by Ernest Barrias

When we saw this in the d'Orsay, it was like, what the hell is this about????
There must be bigger problems with the Parisian sewers than we realized...

Urban myth
There are alligators in the NYC Sewer system...
Do You Think???

Don't drink the water!!

Photos by ME!

picture of my window sill garden
The cactus is one of the only plants I can have because the cats won't eat it.
The Vinca is rescued from the street. I found it in a cell pack lying on the sidewalk. It bloomed all summer.

My table top studio arrived today and now I will have professional looking pictures of my jewelry. I have to put the light bar together and test it out.

Very happy if it works. Tomorrow the results will be posted.
In the past went outside on a cloudy day and got good results.



But I can't rely on the weather to be cloudy all the time. And it is winter, sort of cold to go out and take pictures.

On a sad note, I have to return my new snow boots, they are hurting me so much that I can't walk in them. LL Bean is great, even though I wore them twice, they can be returned for a full credit. Kudos to LL Bean!

Just a couple more days...

Just 2 more days and then we are off until 1/4/10!
No work, just hanging out, going birding, making jewelry.
Hope this year, isn't like last year, where I was in bed with the (swine) flu on New Years Eve, watching the live feed from Times Square. That was pretty depressing.

The week between Christmas and New Years always seems to fly by. Hopefully there will be a rare bird or two to chase. But I have to dig the car out first. UGH!

In honor of my dear husband's colonoscopy...
This is the funniest thing I saw today
(_!_) a regular ass

(__!__) a fat ass

(_E=mc2_) a smart ass

The others were too crude for me to list.

It's beginning to look like winter

We got one foot of snow!!!!
How smart I was to purchase a new pair of snow boots this year.
It's not even winter and I will be using them.

People's reaction to winter storms in Brooklyn always surprise me. Most of us live in walking distance to a supermarket, grocery store or bodega, and now a Duane Reade, Rite-aid, Walgreens or a CVS. Do you think one of them will run out of milk or toilet paper. What's the cause for panic? In the age of Costco, don't you have a case of TP in your closet? I know I do. OMG!!! I only have 4 rolls left! Let me go to Costco the Saturday before Christmas, 1 hour before a major snow storm and stock up! I will never be able to get toilet paper again, ever! THIS IS MY VERY LAST CHANCE!!!.

Yesterday I forgot to mention the handpainted street sign I saw while walking home from dropping my car off for it's annual inspection. It said "CRUB YOUR DOG". Did they leave off "S" and was I really suppose to bathe my dog? Should the sign have read "SCRUB YOUR DOG".

Check list for emergency supplies
flashlight
batteries
hand crank radio
pop tarts
toilet paper
chicken wings
diet soda
coffee
coffee mate non dairy creamer
hand made jewelry

In case you are wondering where you can find, totally handmade, fashionable jewelry on such short notice...go to my newly created ETSY store! Even in the worst storms, you never know who you will "bunk" into while shoveling, so you should always look your best. Think of it as your ear's equivalent to a wearing clean pair of underwear.

Etsy-Bitsy-Spider Climbed up the Snow Mount

I went to Fairway this morning...it was the RUSH!!!!!!!!!!! before the big storm.


I waited 10 mins just to get a parking spot. True to form people were buying milk, toilet paper, and chicken. I was buying a gift basket. Like d-uh! I let Fresh Direct deliver my emergency supplies-diet soda, beans and chicken. At 12 noon, Fairway still had rocksalt. What does that tell you about Brooklynites?

We all live in apartments.


I spent the afternoon and evening setting up my Etsy account. Now drilbu designs has a virtual store front. Go, spend money on (my) jewelry. If you buy a daisy, I will donate money to a foundation that supports health care access to women.

See it's not about me, all the time. I do make some exceptions.

The snow is finally falling, tomorrow we will wake up to a foot of the white stuff.

I have coffee, diet soda and my emergency container of coffee mate non dairy creamer and a new bag of kitty litter for the cat box.

Hey Yo!
Bring on the snow...
I can't believe I was sitting on a beach in 87 degree weather last week.

Can't spell, can't type

A winter storm is approaching.
Should I stock up on Poptarts, toilet paper and chicken?