Big Brother Got on the Bus Today....

Big Brother, His lovely Wife, and The Princess

Big brother leaves bright and early on Tuesday. Please have him and all of our soldiers in your thoughts.

Peace,

Toonses

JOOMY!!!

Joomy, it worked!

Joomy recommended that I join NaBloPoMo this month to see if I can get a post up every day for the month of November. As a participant, I get this really cool and slightly violent badge for my blog's sidebar.

Now, most of the people reading on a blog are fairly proficient in the use of computers, or, at the very least, blog templates.

Let me be the first to tell you that I am not in any way proficient in the use of computers or blog templates. It took me months to learn how to make words into cool links that you could click on (And of course, a matter of days later, blogger came out with this handy button in the create post section, so all my knowledge went to waste).

This weekend Joomy tried to help me online by giving me a handy code to put in my sidebar that would allow the badge to show up so I could identify myself as a NaBloPoMo participant. It didn't work.

So, I tried it in a new place. It didn't work.

I tried altering it. It didn't work.

And then I did about fifteen other things and it still didn't work.

Then, I copied and pasted my template into a Word document and sent it to Joomy in hopes that she could fix it. I tried her suggestion, and it didn't work.

So, I gave up.

I know that generally, with computer things and me there is some teeny, tiny little thing that is so simple and so straightforward and for some reason I just miss it. It's like basic addition. It's so simple that it's just over my head. So I figured I could just make a post that says "Hey, I'm a NaBloPoMo participant. FYI". And be done with it. (Although that wouldn't be nearly as cool as the gun badge that currently decorates my sidebar.)

Well, by some form of magic, or some supernatural power, or intervention of the Blogging Gods, the NoBloPoMo badge is now in my sidebar! After all those error messages and my pathetic giving up, it appeared! Out of nowhere!

Hurrah!!

Or, as more 'with it' folks would put it, Huzzah!!

Thanks Joomy! I'm not sure what you did, but it was great!!

Toonses

Nothing Makes a Girl Feel Better....

Nothing makes a girl feel better than a night on a couch surrounded by junk food and gum balls. And, better yet, than to have a television in front of her flaunting horror flicks.

Mal and I got together this evening to watch some good old fashioned horror movies. I am a huge fan of this genre, but typically I find it hard to get someone to watch them with me. I've yet to find a lover of horror like myself: people either find horror movies too lame or too scary. As a result, I'm usually left watching them alone.

I had to introduce my dear friend to the Friday the 13th series tonight. You can't live without seeing this series. In my greatest ever time of need, Davey lent me the entire Jason and Freddy series, so I've seen them all; however, I must say I delight in introducing newcomers to the joys of Jason and I can watch him time and again.

The first one is pretty good. I love Friday the Thirteenth Part One. The best part about it?

The boobs.

And no, I'm not joking.

The girls in this movie have real boobs! Who would have thought? Even better? A few of them had thighs! That's right! Legs that resemble something other than a modern day match stick. These girls had hips, calves, and boobs come in other shapes than... well, in other shapes than the ones you currently see in modern day media.

So, while we should have been scared out of our wits and calling on the cute boys down the hall to come to our rescue, we were cheering on the girls with their realistic boobs and thighs.

Of course, no amount of cheering from overtired university students can help the real-boobed girls of the seventies overcome the evils of Jason. But at least we tried.

Toonses

The Weekend, The Weekend....

It's finally the weekend.

Finally.

At last.

It's been a long week. And when your long week culminates beside an oversized box of feminine care devices and ends with a co-worker ripping a bandaid off your arm at work (Long after you've finished your shift) ... Well, you know it's been a long week.

I had to have blood taken today. The doctor on campus wants to make sure that there's nothing physically wrong with me.

You might say that she's double checking to make sure that I am, in fact, insane. Which is nice of her, when you think that perhaps I'm not actually insane and for all these years I may have just had a vitamin defficiency.

I can see Tom Cruise jumping on a couch right now.

So, yes. Blood. Taken from my. Pumped out of my body against my will.

I only cried a little bit.

The thing is, I just don't think it's a good idea to go around with a big old hole poked into one of your veins all day. And while it may be a bit over overkill to hospitalize someone for an afternoon to make sure their veins don't explode after having blood taken, I don't think it's a terrible idea either.

I guess the problem lies in the fact that I don't know enough about physiology. Because obviously it's safe to take blood. But I just picture the blood pumping so easily out of my veins during the office visit, and then I wonder, what keeps it from shooting out of my veins the rest of the day?

And I've watched a lot of Fear Factor in my lifetime. I know all about coagulating, and the possibility for blood balls and all that kind of thing. I know that in reality, my body doesn't actually want to spurt out blood through the hole in the vein that was left there that morning.

But for some reason, I'm always scared that will happen. Like, I'll be standing there serving a customer, and I'll reach across the Cajun Steak dish to the cheese dish, and a big spurt of blood will shoot out and hit the sneeze guard.

Disgusting, no?

At any rate, I'm sure you'll be pleased to know that my veins did not turn against me and spurt blood out at inopportune moments, and my body actually did it's job and made sure that my vein did it's little coagulating thing the way it was supposed to.

That doesn't mean it wasn't on my mind, though.

Toonses

Everything is Gonna Be Alright....

So, I've been having some feelings over the last few days. Some feelings that aren't so nice. Some feelings that indicate to me that perhaps the medication that I've relied on for the last few years isn't doing it's job any more.

I've accepted long ago that I'm a crazy person. I'm cool with that. I can be a crazy -- but medicated -- person. The operative word here is medicated and of course, when I say medicated, I assume you think I mean a medicated person who's medication is properly functioning.

So, I did the grown-up thing to do. It was tricky, because sometimes I feel so far from grown-up that it's not funny. Not to mention the fact that I have trouble doing anything medical without my trusty sidekick, SuperNan.

I went to the Campus Medical clinic today. It was full of cranky people who don't speak the same language as I do and in fact, they even decided that it would be best to greet me in this language that I don't speak, and better yet, they decided to try and converse with me in this language that I don't speak.

Talk about the height of rudeness.

On top of that, all the magazines in the waiting room were also in this language that I don't speak and subsequently, this language that I don't read.

How frustrating is that?

So I waited, and surprisingly enough, I didn't have to wait very long. Which is a good thing, considering that I was reading the magazines by their pictures. And pictures of celebrities with captions in foreign languages is not a fun way to pass time.

I got into the office and waited. Beside one of those wierd hospital beds that bends and twists in wierd ways and a giant box of disposable speculums.

Yes.

Me, my insanity, and a giant case of disposable, pre lubricated speculums. Waiting.

They were the small size, in case you were wondering.

It's moments like these that make me think that maybe God has a sense of humor. Like when you really study the platypus, you start to think. There has to be rhyme and reason to it all, because if God is not behind all this madness -- the madness the of platypus and the madness of me -- then really, there is nothing else.

So myself, my nerves, and my box of speculums were sitting there and I thought, how handy is that? If I feel the need to vomit when this doctor waltzes into the room, I have a handy receptacle in which to yak. And how nice it would be to show my disdain for those devices than to throw up on a whole case full of them? It would be lovely.

Unfortunately, (Or perhaps fortunately, depending on who you are) I'm one of those people who can never throw up. So I didn't get to exact my revenge.

At any rate, I'm on the way to be back to feeling like my chipper self again.

Because what would this world be without me being my chipper self?

Toonses

Life, Life, and More Life....

Life goes on.

I had a wonderful weekend. I got to see the Berry Family, of course, and got to spend time at the Ranch drinking copious amounts of beer with the fam.

I had to say good-bye to Big Brother this weekend. He, his wife, and their lovely Princess came for the weekend. The Princess is now walking and contemplating talking. She knows who is who in terms of Mommy and Daddy and it is ever so cute. She also toddles everywhere, often screeching in glee over whatever she finds handy to be gleeful over.

She is an incredibly cuddly baby, and lets me pick her up and cuddle her pretty much whenever the urge strikes. Luckily, she puts up with this, as I'm trying to cuddle her almost every chance I get.

I get to go visit my sister in law over Christmas, so I'll get to see them at that time. Big Brother I won't be seeing until February.

As far as Canada's involvement in Afghanistan goes, I'm starting to feel more and more conflicted; However, I have my red Support Our Troops Tshirt and my magnet on my fridge. Because I do support our troops.

The BossMan has utterly mucked up my schedule at work this week: I'm not going to ask him to change it at this point because he has been ever so understanding lately with regards to my random sicknesses, school schedule, and frequent desire to go home. Next week though, there is no way I can handle this many hours. My course load alone is more than enough to do me in.

Fortunately, I'm not entirely done in yet.

And so, life goes on. Hopefully in the near future I'll have something more informative, interesting, entertaining? Anything to write about. For now, all I've really got is an entire dissertation from my family psych course, and even I'm fed up with that.

Toonses

One less heathen in the world....

I went to Berry Baby the Fifth's baptism this weekend. It was a grand time and the service was lovely. Berry Queen dubbed me the official photographer and I got some beautiful pictures of all the Berry Babies.

At one time, Berry Baby the Eldest and I were chatting about something or other and I gave her some form of inane advice. Something like "Don't date anyone with wierd piercings or purple hair". And she rolled her eyes at me and said "Yes, Aunt Amanda". And I was a little stunned and I said "Aunt?!" And she said "I dunno... cousin? Something".

Another time Berry Baby the third was talking to someone about me in my hearing distance and he said "That's Amanda. She's our.... Amanda?"

That's the thing about the Berry Family. They're like an extension of my own family, but the difference is, we got to choose each other.

I know that the Berry Queen is not completely comfortable with pictures of her kids on the internet. I'd love nothing more than to share some of the pics I got of the beautiful, well mannered and often hilarious Berry Family, but I'll just instead have you picture the most wonderful children in the world. I'm their Something. And I love it.

Toonses

Photos!

Ok, I know it may not be much but if you want to see some photos of my nephew and I carving a pumpkin together, check it out on my other site. Hopefully when midterms and such calm down I'll be able to get some more of my other more recent photos up for your viewing pleasure!

Toonses

Taking steps to secure my future....

So, Operation Secure The Toonse Brigade's Future is shaping up. So far it's just a plan, but I'm slowly working on putting it into action. As those who know me and love me best know, so many of my plans get blown up in my face and end tumultuously with my return to the ranch to spend time in a drunken stupor on the living room floor. Since SuperNan hates her children being in drunken stupors -- and hates drunken children on the living room floor even more -- here's hoping now that this plan as well doesn't blow up in my face.

I did well today with my new eating plan. I also spent some time this evening working with a skipping rope to try and burn off some excess calories. If we can wrangle down a car on Friday, SuperNan is going to take me shopping so I can buy a few small free weights to help me build up some arm and upper body strength. So at this point, I'm feeling kind of optimistic.


In the meantime, Coperni-Kitty is terrorizing the appartment with toilet paper. It seems to be one of her favorite habits of late to go to the bathroom, retrieve the toilet paper, and then see that it gets strewn about the house.

This phenomenon is not new, as last time Coperni-Kitty and I were home, Big Brother exhibited his displeasure when she covered the second storey of the ranch house with toilet paper as well. Of course, this could be avoided altogether by my assuring that all toilet paper is secured properly on its little roll-y thing. However, if I were to do that, what would my precious kitty do in her spare time?


Other than nap on a chair that is covered in my clothing, what is an apartment kitty supposed to do all day?

Isn't she cute?

Toonses

A new day, A New Goal

Some recent thoughts have led to my realization that I need a new goal. I've been thinking lately of my student loans and how much they are weighing on my mind: I'll never get to my goal of being the Queen of My Own Throne if I can't get these loans paid off forthwith.

Step One is to make some major changes in my lifestyle. Not so much my entire lifestyle, perhaps, but definitely in my eating habits. I've gained a ton of weight through this whole "Pursuing my Dreams in the Big City" thing.

So, this is it for me. Starting tomorrow, I lose weight. Not the next day, not the day after. No more waiting until I move home, no more waiting until the next Berry Season. Now. It starts now.

SlimFast, here I come. I know it works, I know it's the best diet for me. I just need to stop eating during my shifts at the SubShack and take control of these habits that have evolved: sitting at night munching on whatever I can find, impulse-buying pounds of junk food at a time, and chowing down on SubShack cookies. Oh, and my drunken Shawarma habit. That has to go too.

The only concern that's left is: Exactly how many calories are in three Tall Boys of Canadian? Because that is definitely going to be one of the hardest habits to give up. I love beer. This love affair Beer and I are having is a relatively new one, and I'm not sure it's one I can or even want to give up.

Which means that for every day I drink beer, on that day I'll have to ingest that much less food.

Bring on the empty-stomach buzzes!!

My goal for now is anywhere from ten to fifteen pounds by Christmas.

Pray for me, Dear Blog. I need your support and strength right now. Because these pounds have got to go.

Toonses

SuperNan saves the day!!

You'll all recall the incident when I went to buy some supper and was turned down. Because the money I thought was in my account was not actually in my account. The checks were in SuperNan's purse. And while it's well and good that my money was safely stowed away, it's always more handy to have my money stowed away where I can actually access it.

Today, I went to put a check in the bank because I didn't think I'd have time once I got home. And lo and behold, what did I find?

SuperNan had put my GST check in the bank for me! Hurrah!

In celebration, I felt the need to make some frivolous purchases because SuperNan is such a big fan of frivolous purchases. These included Pringles chips, a bag of chocolate Halloween candy, some Highlighters I didn't really need, and some milk.

And of course, I made a quick run to the beer store so I could have some beers while I study for my midterm tomorrow.

Three cheers for SuperNan and frivolous purchases!!

Thanks Mom!!

Toonses

Sometimes everything seems yucky....

The Precious Boy

At times when everything seems yucky, I like to look at pictures. They say a picture is worth a thousand words.
In this picture I see the Oh-So-Very Precious Boy, swinging around. Look at his eyes. His big, beautiful blue eyes that scream a million emotions every time you look at him. I see the messy kitchen, strewn with my tornado of crap in the bottom left corner. The messy kitchen screams "A bunch of happy people just sat here and ate" and that always makes me happy.

You can see my beer bottles on top of the stove and of course, that means that I had beer in my belly at the time of the photo-shooting and of course, nothing is better than that.

Kami and Uncle Dixie

I don't believe I have introduced Uncle Dixie to my blog at this point. Uncle Dix was so named by the Precious Boy when he was about three and the name has sort of stuck. Dixie is the little fat one who is ever so cute. Of course, Uncle Dixie is not an uncle to anyone, and if she was, she'd be an aunt... but that's partly why the whole Uncle Dixie thing is so funny.

Of course, we all like my dad's bird dog Kami as well, although I have to say that I'm not a big fan of her name. To this day, I contend that she would have made a much better dog wih a name like Stratford or Shakespeare... But my Dad has this wierd thing where all animals need to have a two syllable name that ends in an EE sound. Perhaps that's where some of my insanity comes from. Who knows.

These pictures make up what I lovingly refer to as the welcoming committee every time I get home. There's nothing quite like coming in the door laden with hundreds of pounds worth of your laptop, guitars, textbooks, a cat, and a month's worth of laundry to be jumped on by about a hundred and fifty pounds worth of dog and child. I get to go home for another long weekend this week and I can't wait to get there.

If my dad drank my beer while I was gone, there is surely going to be Hell to pay.

At any rate, I'm sure that you can tell that I'm still enamoured with my new camera and I'm loving the whole pics-taking thing.

Toonses

Being a Crazy Person, Part One Million

So, today thus far has been a completely useless day. I have done nothing of value and in thirty minutes I have to leave for a class, so I'm doubtful that anything of value will get done.

Berry Queen (Or SuperNan) has once again conspired to make my life tumultuous and difficult. Perhaps it was both of them. Regardless of who conspired to do what, I now have a hideous decision to make: Go visit Big Brother before he leaves for Afghanistan, or go and watch Berry Baby the Fifth get baptized? I thought I had demanded two weeks notice on the baptism of this baby?!? And now I'm torn. Not to mention dateless. AND LOCATED IN THE WRONG CITY. I haven't seen Berry Baby the Fifth since mid-September and I don't think I will be able to see her again until SuperBowl Sunday. At the same time, when Big Brother leaves I won't be able to see my niece, my brother, or my sister in law for six months.

At this point I think I have to say that I value a weekend with my brother more than a day with the Berry Queen although it makes me want to cry when I think about it. Next year I'll be living at home again and SuperNan and I can go to visit whenever our little hearts desire. When your brother is in Afghanistan, making a road trip to visit isn't exactly an option.

I've been feeling lately in a way that I haven't felt in years and that's scary for me. The thing about OCD is that, in a lot of cases, it's a children's disorder that can be outgrown. Like acne. It turns out that I haven't outgrown either. I'm not sure if this is a matter of my medications no longer being effective or what, but I've been experiencing some old behaviors that I haven't experienced since I was a teenager. I'm not that interested in going into detail on my blog, but to make a long story short, this is one case where my mental health affects my ability to live normally outside of my own home and can result in some pretty nasty physical ailments.

My only choice here is to either live with these nasty physical ailments (which isn't really a good option) or change my behaviors so that I don't have to face them any more. Changing my behaviors isn't really an option either because in a lot of cases I feel that I simply can't.

So, I'm deciding what to do with myself, as per usual. And as per usual, I suppose it's nothing that a stiff drink won't fix although, considering I still have over four hours of classes today, that's probably not the best option. Not to mention I'm broke and out of booze. Sigh.

Toonses

So very, very sleepy....

Midterms are beginning to start up this week. As a result, I'm going to be incredibly busy. Busier that I have been this last week. Which means I'm going to be intensely busy...

My weekend went like this....

Friday I had to work and on the way I saw this tree.

I'm pretty sure that this tree is a strong indication that fall is well underway. Which makes me want to cry and scream. But instead of crying and screaming, I went to a party at Mal's house.

Myself and the lovely hostess: Happy birthday Mal!! (I'm

On the left)

Unfortunately, I left the party before the police got there. Boo and hiss to that! I miss all the good stuff! At any rate it, was nice to catch up with some work people and that sort of thing.

The following day, Saturday, I had a football game to go to. And it turns out that for me to say that I kinda suck at football would be a huge understatement. At any rate, it was nice to be out and about with the same folks I generally play ultimate with. It, too, was a birthday celebration and following football, the Birthday Boy's wife was gracious enough to feed us all some pretty yummy stuff.

Happy Birthday to City Dave!!

Saturday night was an equally good time by Pete's fireplace. It was heavenly to sit beside the fire, put back a few beers, and play this crazy stockbroker board game. It was pretty good to catch up with Kanobe and his lovely Fiancee. Kabobe was also good enought to help Pete out with a minor home improvement project involving the refrigerator door and a new tool kit. You know how men and their tools can be.

Good Ol' Jeffie. Always willing to lend a helping hand.

In all, it was a pretty good weekend. Unfortunately I should have spent much more time studying and much less time socializing. As a result, this week will be pretty rough. Long. Torturous. Mid-term-a-licious. Call it what you will, but don't expect too many updates.

Or, maybe you should expect lots of updates as I'm likely to pass the time blogging when I should be studying. Sigh.

Toonses

Aaaahhh, Thanksgiving....

Thanksgiving means a lot of things....

It means going home to the farm

It means carving a pumpkin

with the Precious Boy

It means Duck Hunting!!

It means that even though I'm 22 and

In University, SuperNan is still

doing my homework. Sigh.

And of course, it means waking up

early to play Light Sabres in the morning

Happy, Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

Toonses

In which my building falls down around my head...

I'm sure you'll all recall the trials and tribulations I experienced while living in Hell. The orange hair, the police involvement, the shower that was determined to scald me to death...

When my roommate and I found this apartment, we thought it was great. Not only is the building infested with incredibly beautiful men: the Super shows up to fix things when they need to be fixed. He laughs when my empty beer cans fall off my balcony and on to his. And he's nice. And he doesn't smell. Not smelling wins you big bucks in my books.

Now, when you look at this picture of my hallway, you don't see much. But actually, the floor is curved up in a little speed bump type thing.

You can definitely see that something is amiss in this picture

Yep, that's the crack there, on the ceiling beside the light fixture.

And here is the opposite wall from the first one you see.

Clearly, my entire building is falling down around me. I'm not really sure what I should be doing about it. So, like any normal person would do...

I sat my big ol' butt down on the couch to watch Grey's Anatomy.

Ahhh, my life.

Toonses

How do you work this thing?!?

Ok, so, I'm playing with my new toy. And I couldn't, for the life of me, figure out how to set the megapixels.

It seems that SuperNan is having a hard time loading the other images of my blog because the ol' homestead only has dial-up. We are not sure if this is a computer problem, a dial-up problem, or a pixel problem.

So, I consulted Joomy, But she couldn't really help me because... well... There is only so much you can do for a technologically incompetent fool online.

She suggested I read the manual.

Bah! Who does such a thing? So I fiddled. Add deleted the contents of my memory card.

So I had a cigarette and a beer and fiddled some more. I googled. And apparently googling "Make less megapixels" won't do a girl like me much good.

So, feeling desperate, I started actually reading the owner's manual to find out how to make less megapixels. As opposed to looking dejectedly at the pages and then heading out to the balcony for another ciggie.

And then in happened.

I found what I was looking for. I can shrink the number of megapixels! I'm a genius!!

So, I took some random pictures.

Is it just me or is this kitty lookin' kinda beefy?

This is our houseplant. Or appartment plant. Whatever. His name is Snuffalupagus.

I also took a picture of our TV, Big Al. You'll recall that my dear friend Davey was kind enough to outfit my roomie and I with a full screen TV. I'm not sure how many inches he is, but our brand new Cable comes in mighty clear on him. Thanks, Davey!

Wow! I can't get over how much faster it is to upload the pics now! This is great!

Now all I have to do is wait and hear from SuperNan if they are actually easier for her to upload. Time will tell.

Toonses

Can you feel it?

My Field of Dreams

When you look at this picture, do you get the same butterflies that I do?

Does your heart do a little pitter-patter, and your breath quicken? Can you envision your very own Berry Cave, your very own parking lot, your very own flag system, your very own BerryMobile?

Well, my heart does do a little pitter-patter. I do get butterflies. I suppose that to someone without dreams of turning this twelve acres of river ront property into a booming business, it just looks like a bunch of cow corn. I'm sure that if you boiled it in enough brown sugar water, it would turn into edible corn that you could consume if you were desperate.

I see neatly trimmed ditches and rows upon rows of strawberries in my favorite varieties: Annapolis, Myra, Governor Simcoe, and maybe -- just maybe -- a V Star here and there for SuperDad. I see the fields neatly trimmed with properly grown sod. I see a little Berry Cave that Big Brother and and my Dad can build together ... I see it trimmed with flowers planted by SuperNan. She's good at the whole gardening deal.

I see picnic tables and a little gift shop. I have no idea what I'm going to sell in my gift shop. Hand towels and Candle-y type things, I suppose. But I see it and I think it will be cute and homey. Quaint.

Yes. My field of dreams. I think about it a lot.

Toonses

Let there be pictures!!

This, my friends, is was technology can do for a person. It can introduce my cat to my blog. And it is wonderful. Here is Coperni-Kitty only weeks after her first birthday.

I can't believe I own a digicam! And I'm using it to put pics on my blog!! This is so thrilling!

It's a bird!

It's a plane!!

No!

It's SuperNan to the rescue!!

What's that Berry Queen? You're jealous? Of a sprayer?

Don't you know what those terrible sprays can do to your health?!?!

Almost like beans in a pod. They come in pods, doncha know.

I had to introduce a city boy to his first soybeans last weekend.

I also had to make a first introductions to a shotgun. For safety's sake, we gave him my nephew's wooden one.

Safety first!

My CAR! My precious little Chevy!!

In seven short months, I will be back behind the wheel. If everyone could stop now and say a little prayer that my poor little chevy still actually runs at that point, we would all be most grateful.

Hopefully I can get some more pics up on my other website by the end of the week.

Take care!

Toonses

Blogging as the sun comes up...

After an eventful night in the emergency room I am home, soon to be back to my chipper (or not so chipper) self. I left here at ten and managed to go all by my lonesome to have myself looked at by a doctor. SuperNan was there in spirit, though. She insisted I call and keep her updated on the situation. Which I tried to do but every time I wanted to leave the room the doctor came back and asked me some more rather intrusive questions.

I said a lot of "I think" and "I'm not sure" which is probably why the work-up took so long. If I had just told her about the stabbing pain in my left side rather than waiting for her to jab it and make me scream, the evening would have been a lot smoother, I'm sure.

At any rate, I should be cured soon enough so that I can get back to my life of classes, readings, the SubShack, and of course, sleeping.

A very sleepy,

Toonses