Itty Bitty Hooves

Money To Burn

Okay, I’m sorry, but the fact that a lock of Ernesto “Che” Guevara’s hair just sold at auction for $100,000 is a pretty sad example of the kinds of things that drive us. Do we really have that much money? Do we really crave a connection with famous people so badly that we’ll go to such great lengths to have something like that in our possession at any cost? Apparently. It goes back, I think to the ‘golden’ age of screen stars like Clark Gable, Garbo, and Monroe where autographs were the prize of the day, and could be sold for stupid amounts of money. In fact I saw a show on tv the other day about modern day autograph hounds who stood in line for hours to get to their ‘targets’. See the word target. That’s what they are. These aren’t fans waiting for one particular person. These are people out to get ANY famous autograph. Of course there are those more sought after, but these autograph hounds not only wait for hours, they have a fistfull of pages for the star to sign. It’s so blantantly obvious what they are going to do with them, it’s no wonder so many stars have an adversion to signing autographs anymore. They know these aren’t the fans. They know these are people getting a product that they can use to get the real fans to pay big bucks for something they could get on their own if they had the time and ability to search out their idols.

Just the mere fact that such things have value shows an eerie facet to our psyches. Of course, the fact that there are people with a hundred grand to blow and that’s how they choose to throw it away is another one. They say we are in a recession, and heading for a depression and there’s no money around… obviously ‘they’ are wrong.

Men Are From Mars

Lots of men in the rural areas have shop buildings on their property. A place to care for their big equipment, but I think a lot of times it’s just a typical male thing. Even in the crowded cities, and hauty suburbs you can usually find guy’s garages full of tools and grease. I think it’s every man’s dream to have a garage full of body shop supplies whether they know how to use them or not. It seems most guys do, at least to some degree know what they’re doing with tools. It must come pre-packaged in their systems, unlike me (a woman) who barely knows how to hold a hammer, and forget about changing the oil on my car, or certainly anything more complex. It’s part of the sexual make up, and if that makes me a sexist, or anti-woman’s lib I guess I am. There are just some things that really do define the sexes no matter how ‘the same’ we want to demand we are. Tim Allen’s humor loves to showcase the differences between the sexes, and certainly the inherent love for tools most guys seem to have. I think he really ‘hits the nail on the head’ pardon the pun, when it comes to that. Men may be from Mars, but I bet there’s an auto shop up there.

Stick It On And Go

Of all the diet products I think Hoodia is the best. I’ve had friends tell me what a wonderful product it is, and how well it works, plus it’s natural which makes it less frightening a prospect than some of the pharmacudical concoctions available. They even have a diet patch now made from Hoodia ingredients. That type of thing would be better for me than pills which I never remember to take. I can’t even remember my daily vitamin most mornings much less diet pills. With the patch you just stick it on and go. For those who feel they need diet support it might be the way to go.

Is That Really A Cure?

I’ve had RLS (restless leg syndrome) all my life. Of course, when I was younger no one knew what RLS was. It didn’t have a name. All I knew was it meant I was one heck of a restless sleeper–downright dangerous in bed. The symptoms of RLS vary from person to person. For some it may be a tingling in the legs when they sit down and rest, or try to sleep, for others it can be like a cramping sensation. For me it’s like electrical impulses that run up and down my legs and I have to move them… HARD. There are medications for RLS now. Just like all of the other ‘cures’ out there for various illness and diseases, it has some crazy side-effect possibilities. Now really, I can see taking the chance on some of the side-effects if the illness is devestating, or possibly fatal, but come on, taking the chance on symptoms worse than the ‘illness’ itself? Does that make sense? It’s sort of like some guy taking viagra to cure a limp you-know-what and going blind (didn’t their mothers warn them about things like that?) somehow I don’t see the cure being better than the problem. I’d settle for a limp ‘thing’ and being able to see. As for the RLS I’ll settle for the restlessness, hubby’s used to it, and it doesn’t bother me THAT bad.

Deep In Your Soul

Hey, the ‘purple midget’ Prince has a new record that is at the top of the soundtrack listings. I’ve never cared too much for his style, but he does have good music. Purple Rain is one of my favorite albums, and movies… right next to Led Zepelin’s The Song Remains The Same. They are both movies and albums that can take me back to my teen years with fond memories at the sounds of the first bars of music. Lots of music does that for most people. You can’t help but remember the times that were happening when you first, or most often heard each song. It’s almost stronger than smell when it comes to association. Music is such an important part of my life, everybodies life really, that it’s hard to seperate it from our actual existances. Who’d want to? I love the way music makes me feel, helps me cope with troubling times, or makes me happy during the good times. Music is international too, it doesn’t matter anymore what the barriers are when you are listening to good music. It doesn’t matter what color your skin is, or what you look like, it only matters that it gets deep into your soul.

Hard Working Man

I’ve spent a lot of time perusing the varous Boer goat websites of breeders in my general area (I consider anything in the tri-state area my locale). It amazes me how they get such wonderful, clean, well positioned shots of their goats, male and female. Now my girls aren’t so hard, but getting my big guy to pose beautifully is kind of a task. Not that he’s not just as pretty to look at and well put together, he is, but he’s a definate ‘hillbilly’… not the sophisticated type. He’s also much fonder of his ‘farm clothes’ than he is of playing dress up show goat. Not at all cooperative, sorry to say when it comes to clippers and shampoo. He takes great pride in his ‘blue collar’ apparanes and his obvious working ‘dirt’. He’s so yellow right now you almost can’t tell where he should be white. At least I know he’s a hard worker, lol.

The Not So Simple Life

When we first moved out to the country 11 years ago I had visions of the ’simple life’ running through my head. Scenes from Green Acres and Oliver and Lisa living in a run down house on a couple hundred acres trying to grow corn. Of course the reality is much different. Even real farmers don’t live completely ’simple’ untech-touched lives for the most part. Now you have your dyed-in-the-wool homesteaders who really do cut down to the very basics. I thought I wanted that and tried it for a long time but I’ve come to realize I like technology, and heaven forbid you try to take away my computer (although there are extremely few homesteaders that actually do away with that little convienience either)… I like things like projection televisions, sterios, ipods, cell phones (another thing that seems to leak its way into the ‘traditional’ homestead no matter how un-tech they’re trying to be, but I’ll stop with the pointing out the inconsistancies of those items)… I just like technology.

Sure if something like Y2K actually did ever happen, I COULD live without the nice things in life that make living more simple, and a lot more fun, but I don’t want to if I don’t have to!

Actually I just realized the ‘inconsistancy’ in my own descriptions… calling living without technology the ’simple’ life when many of those items actually make life MORE simple. Wouldn’t want to live without my washer/dryer either… beating clothes on rocks isn’t my idea of fun, OR simple.

What’s Really Best

I talked to my son on Sunday and he actually asked me to look up some numbers for things like AA. Now that’s a great program, but I really tried to stear him toward an actual drug rehab center. He kind of balked at the idea of a ’stay in’ place, but at this point I think he REALLY needs that type of help. A support group afterwards would be wonderful along with the after care help he’d get from the rehab place itself. I should be happy that he brought up the subject on his own, and I am, definately. It’s a real first. I think that baby-steps at this point could be more disasterous though. Not getting the amount of help he needs may lead to failure and then giving up on the idea that anything can help him. I’ve given him the options that are available and hope beyond hope that he chooses what’s really best for him, not what’s most convienient, and easiest.

Absolutely Amazing Locket

I just received the locket in the mail that I ordered. It is BEAUTIFUL. I was so caught by the sight of it. I wasn’t prepared for it to be as wonderful as it is. Ordering was simple, but I had to include the picture I wanted for the inside of the locket and that proved to be a complicated matter for me. It was a composite of two seperate pictures, one of my son and one of my daughter–just head shots, but blending them was difficult, and I was so worried both how it would end up looking on the locket in general, and how they would fit it into such a small space and have it still be recognizable. Boy oh boy they did though. Not only is the picture clear and beautiful, but they blended the two shots so that it truly looks like one picture of them side-by-side.

I couldn’t be more impressed. Pictures on Gold has all sorts of fantastic picture keepsakes including gold lockets , pendants, name jewelry, medical id jewelry, and much more. They are a fantastic company to work with, and fast in getting your order processed and out to you. Most importantly the outcome will definately exceed your expecations. I took a couple of pictures to show the beauty of the locket but it really doesn’t do it justice at all.

The problem was keeping the glare off of the picture and when I finally figured out a way to do that it turned out a little blurry, but trust me on this one, it is AMAZING.

Kid Rockin’

The Kid Rock arrest for brawling in a waffle house in Atlanta is all over the news this morning. Someone on one of the websites I visit said: Why can’t he just get drunk, and high, and eat pancakes like ever other rock star? LOL So true. What’s all this brawling about anyway? Looking at his trashy picture he looks like a stoned hillbilly, the problem is he acts like one too. The rock star life is supposed to be glamourous, not stupid, although most of us know now it’s both, and it’s neither. Kid seems to be caught between trying to be ‘white’ rap gangsta, which he’s not, in a white guy it just looks stupid, and trying to be a ‘good ole’ boy’ which he’s not, in him it just looks like someone tossed him in the sink and forgot to turn on the disposal. The man needs to get a life cause he sure isn’t making the best of the one he has. All that money, and he has to get into a brawl at the local IHOP.