Well, it IS called Woodhaven Ramblings...

Just some random thoughts while I avoid making dinner:

• I got my much anticipated “People” magazine in the mail and wondered what Anna Nicole Smith was doing on the cover. Then I realized it was a reportedly very happy Jessica Simpson. I have to admit, I like her current look better than her Daisy Duke one. Nice to know that even with a bazillion dollars and access to trainers and chefs and such, sometimes it’s just impossible to resist the Lil’ Smokies® wrapped in Pillsbury Crescent Rolls®. I’m feeling much better about last Sunday already.


• Ladybug season is apparently upon us again at Woodhaven. They keep buzzing around lights and crawling on the windows. How they get inside, I don’t know; it’s been too cold to open the door. Fortunately our real estate agent forewarned us about this annual winged invasion. “Just suck them up with your vacuum hose,” she mentored. Better than ants I suppose.


• We’ve gone a couple of weeks now without any significant rain. I miss it. This either means I have officially become a Pacific Northwesterner or I have lost my mind. Or perhaps both.


• It wasn’t until I was chatting with a very urban friend in Chicago about our respective gyms that I realized it might be a bit odd that I regularly see a man at my rural gym wearing his suspenders while working out.


• Over Christmas, my mom served a very tasty tzatziki sauce that she found at her local Costco. It is nowhere to be found in ours. Who knew Reno was so chic and très international?


• I’ve decided one really great thing about not having a job right now is that I am not fearful about losing it. I know way too many people who are unemployed.


• Thanks to a llama auction (an auction FOR llamas, not OF llamas), I am now the very proud owner of “The Llama Game: The Game of Buying, Selling, Breeding, Birthing, Packing, and Showing Llamas.” I’m a little afraid to open the box, especially for the birthing part. From the outside, the game seems to take itself very seriously. I am under no illusion that the game will aid my quest to convince Rob to buy me a llama. But served with a bottle of wine, I am certain it will make for an exceedingly entertaining evening.


• My Wii Fit has deemed, at various intervals, my actual age to be 51, 41, 32, and 42. One morning, in the course of 30 minutes dodging soccer balls, skiing, hula hooping, and doing one mean Warrior Pose, I lost a pound and gained a year. I’m trying not to care.


• Thanks to the 15 inches of snow that fell and then lingered on Woodhaven back in December, we are now the proud owners of “Snow Mold.” This according to the fine people who fertilize our lawn and keep the crane flies from organizing a complete coup. I have no idea if we bought the conveniently offered extra treatment to make it all go away. Some things I’m just better off not knowing.


• We tried the new burger place in town (see the January 14 post). Turns out they have a most spectacular Chicago Hot Dog, complete with tangy neon relish and a pickle spear. We’re returning tomorrow night so I can sample the namesake burger.


• It seems a whole bunch of local Manly Men with Big Manly Trucks got the same Manly Trinket for Christmas. Now all over my town I am treated to the sight of lemon-sized metal testicles dangling and jingling under license plates. Most seem to come in chrome but one lucky and especially manly fellow is sporting brass ones.


• I am this close to finally starting on my scrapbook from the trip I took with my mom back in September. You know, the scrapbook I planned to have finished by Christmas?


• A few weeks ago, we were in a local restaurant with some friends. The owner came over to one of them and said, “Weren’t you in here last week with a little girl?” Remembering that he had been there with his daughter and granddaughter he replied, “Yes, yes I was.” In a flash the woman returned with a well-loved sippy cup explaining, “You left this. I washed it for you.” I love my small town.