10 Reasons Why Rose Needs an iPhone

1) I’ve never been on the cutting edge of technology, but I like to think that I’m no more than a step or two away from the edge. However, in today’s world, technology advances along at speeds so great that I’m getting farther and farther away from the edge, telephonically speaking, and I feel that if I were to get an iPhone, I’d make a nice leap back to just being a step or two away from it.

2) I would like to be able to surf the net anywhere and at any time be able to update my Facebook status to say something perspicacious such as: “I am currently contemplating the life of the kumquat.”

3) There are cool apps that I just KNOW would make my life more simpler. Like my friend Kathy was showing me her phone and she has a flashlight app. I just know that sometime between now and when AT&T will begrudgingly allow me to upgrade my phone, I’m going to be caught in the dark somewhere, and I’m gonna wish I had a flashlight with me. And if I had an iPhone, I’d be prepared!

4) Another cool app that I’ve been told about has the word “Dragon” in the title… I don’t recall exactly what it’s called, but I could speak into it and it would automatically type what I say. I think this would be great because the world at large has no idea of what it misses out on because I’m nowhere near a computer when I have a blog-related epiphany and of course, since my 40^th birthday, my memory has more holes than a sieve so most of my brilliance never makes it to paper, so to speak.

5) If I had an iPhone, I'd be able to better organize my life. In one place I'd have my phone address book, my calendar where I could put entries about my non-existant social life, my music, my video of the piano stripper (tee hee), and my current audio book! It would be like my iPhone was my assistant, and you know, it would almost be as good an assistant as I am to Steve! (Even better -if that's possible- as it wouldn't have the mind like the aforementioned sieve.)

6) I'd never be without a camera. So the next time some twit runs into my car while I'm in Noble Roman's having a nice lunch with a friend and trying to decompress from the morning at the office before I have to go back to the office for the afternoon!!! Where was I? Oh, yeah, I'd have a semi-decent camera handy to take pics of the damage.

7) Or, video! When I'm ambling down the street, hanging out in my own world (because they understand me there), and I witness a evil deed perpetrated by the foul Prince Romero and/or his enormously bosumed wife on some wealthy victim, I'd be able to whip out the phone and take video, provide it to the police, have the detective fall for me (remember, I have a thing for men with guns and badges), get the reward from the wealthy victim for helping catch the aforementioned Prince Romero and his wife, and become famous! All because I had an iPhone handy.

8) My level of coolness would skyrocket. Now don't get me wrong. I'm already way cooler than most people I know. But geesh!, imagine the heights my coolnessocity would reach if I had an iPhone! I'd be ice, ice, baby!!

9) My 42nd birthday is coming down the pike. Since 42 is my favorite number, you just know that my 42nd year will be faboo! And the gift I receive for this birthday (even if it is a gift from myself) has to be equally faboo!

10) There's an app that translates your cat's meows into English! I truly NEED this! Living with three cats, as I do, there is constant communication going on between them, and I just KNOW that they're plotting against me. Either that or they're complaining about my treatment of them. But then they all live the life of Reilly (I don't know who Reilly was, but he must've been a cat), so they really don't have much to complain about, so it must be that they're plotting to overthrow my regime.

New Years Resolutions - 2010

Never being one for either making or keeping resolutions, I'm taking this opportunity to list area in my life which need serious consideration and at the end, I'll think about picking one to work on. Ok?

1) McDonalds - According to my mother, there was a time, in my youth, when we didn't have enough money to go to McDonalds all that often - it was more of a 'special' thing. Now, when I look at my bank statement each month, I see a third to half of all my debit card charges going to McDonalds. I've already sort of tamed the Sweet Tea demon in my life and at least 9 out of every 10 visits to McD's I get regular tea instead of the diabetic-coma inducing liquid which I would prefer. Since moving to Wadesville, the only McD's on my way in always has 15 cars in the drive-thru in the mornings, so I need to work on taming the McD's Sausage Burrito demon so I don't waste 10 minutes each morning in the drive thru.

2) Weight Watchers - No, I'm not suggesting the ubiquitous resolution to 'diet and lose weight.' What I need to do is either resume going to the damn meetings or stop paying the $40 a month to them. The actual weight loss is not my main concern. It's the $40!

3) Walking - As you may or may not know, depending on whether I'm imaging that I blogged about it, I bought myself good walking shoes and a pretty purple iPod earlier this year for the sole (hahaha! shoes? sole?) purpose of getting out and walking for exercise. When I lived in town, I lived near the University of Evansville and had good sidewalks and nice neighborhoods and a campus that I could walk around. Did I do it? Um.. about 5 times in the 4 years I lived there, yes. I know why, well, other than the obvious fact that I'm lazy. I grew up in the country and am used to wide open spaces. I could take a walk down the road with my Walkman and sing along to the music at the top of my voice and no one could hear me but the residents of the cemetary (and they were not complaining.) I couldn't really do that in town. Might've gotten arrested. So, now that I live back in the country, and I have the shoes, and I have the pretty purple iPod, Rose needs to get her footies in gear and start walking up and down the road.

4) Facebook - Again, as you know, I have a serious addiction to Facebook. Not to the friendship aspect. I don't really like people. But to the games. I have a farm in both Farm Town and FarmVille. I grow and sell crops on an island in Island Paradise. I desperately dig for relics in Treasure Madness f/k/a Mania. And I am currently maintaining both a clan and mafia in Vampire Wars and Mafia Wars, respectively. I'm exhausted. So, I need to decide on one, that's all I'm asking for, just one, FB application and drop it. I was going cold turkey on Treasure Madness this past week, as I'd finished all the maps. But then they drag me back in with more maps! Vampire Wars, well, I'd gotten bored with that, but then they started this special New York thing and I've almost mastered all the New York jobs. Mafia? Well pretty soon after New Year's they'll open the Hong Kong part... and I am on level 200 or so, it seems a waste to give up now.

Yikes! This looks difficult, doesn't it? Well, as promised, I'm going to think about this, and I'll let you know next New Year's which one I picked. Sound good? For now, though, I need to run by McDonalds and get me some tea so I can have something to drink when I get home because I have a lot to do... I have crops to harvest on FarmVille and I'm almost done on that last Christmas island on Treasure Madness. And I'm listening to this great book on my iPod...

Oh, well, Happy New Year's to all!

Variety is the Spice of Life, eh?

Ok, so it’s been a while since I was blogging. What follows is the variety-pack version of what’s been up with Rose:

Farmtown Addiction: I’m still severely addicted to Farmtown. And I got the Sibs addicted and they took their spouses’ Facebook accounts and created extra farms… which I think is cheating, by the way, but… And mom suggested that Farmtown might be something fun to entertain Dad, so we got him a Facebook account and a farm set up. And we all enjoyed chatting while harvesting each others’ crops. Now that Dad’s gone, we are continuing to farm his property and once we get him to level 28, where you can buy river bits, we are going to turn it into Fuzzbutt’s Memorial Garden. It’ll have rambling hills and a river, and trees and flowers and park benches and bunnies and cats wandering around. Dad would be proud.

Vampire Wars: Haley now has me and Holly addicted to another FB application – Vampire Wars. Not as involved as Farmtown, but still fun. But I logged on this morning and find out that someone put me on the hitlist! Why? I can only assume it was because I have a nasty habit of attacking more than twice. Haley says it’s ok to attack twice… and she has a habit of naming people to the hitlist, so I’d think she’d know. But yeah! Humpf.. I thought about tracking the person who put me on the hitlist down and killing her (figuratively speaking) but I decided to let it go. The best part of Vampire Wars is the minions:

Minions and Tiaras: Ok, my regular readers who commit my ramblings to memory will recall, no doubt, that for Christmas I humbly asked Santa for minions and a tiara among other things. Well my birthday was last week (#41 – only one year away from #42!!), and my boss’s wife (Shannon) and kids trotted into the office with a balloon flying and kazoos trumpeting and what to my wondering eyes should appear in the gift bag? A tiara!! and matching earrings. (Ok, they were the cheap-o kind you buy for kids, but I was thrilled!) I put the tiara on and wore it the rest of the day!

I broke one of the clip-on earrings trying to get it out of the package, but I quickly covered up my faux pas with the faux jewels so the kids wouldn’t notice. Shannon told me that she was sorry but she didn’t know where to get me minions, so I told her that that was ok because thanks to Vampire Wars I have plenty of minions! In fact, I’d gotten my first college fraternity just that morning! That earned me an odd look. :) My goal now is to get me a lawfirm – mwahahaha!! Steve (Boss#1) asked what their specialty was and if they were hiring. I don’t think he gets it.

My peeps at work took good care of me for my birthday. I honestly didn’t expect much, as they’d put on all but a 4-course meal for my 40th birthday last year. But I got to my desk and there were cookies, and donuts, and banana bread, and chips and salsa. It was, needless to say, not a Weight Watchers sponsored event. But it was my party so I ate what I wanted! Then mom came into to town that evening and we went to Logan’s for my birthday meal - the first of many upcoming events without Dad. And we cried a few tears, but for the most part we just had a good time talking.

The Friday after my b-day, my fiend, Jennifer, (whose birthday is the day before mine) and I took off work and spent the day together for a mutual celebration. We went to Absolute Beauty and I got a pedicure (see picture) and she got a massage (no picture available). Then we hit Yen Ching and dined on Crab Rangoon and Garlic Chicken. Now for years, our absolute favorite Chinese restaurant was the Panda, but it closed and we don’t know where the chef went…(I think we’d have followed him/her anywhere. But we’ve found a strong contender in Yen Ching. Although they don’t put enough spice/heat to it, so we have to order extra spicy. Which means we have to order LARGE glasses of ice water to drink!

After our delicious dinner, we went to go see the new Gerard Butler movie, The Ugly Truth. Now, I think I’ve mentioned in these pages before that I would pay to watch Gerard Butler read the dictionary for two hours… especially if he’s using his Scottish accent…(let’s say it together: “if it’s not Scottish, it’s CRAP!”). So with that in mind it was an enjoyable movie. The language was a bit blue at times, so it earned it’s R rating. Personally, I was hoping to see a little skin (his, not Katherine Heigl’s) for the R, but… It was predictable and your basic romantic comedy, so without GB, I’d have probably suggested we go see Harry Potter again, but with GB, the DVD will find its way to the Gerard Butler wing of my DVD collection. Heck if I still have the Tales of the Mummy movie where his character literally is killed in the first 3 minutes, I’ll get this one!

Is There a 12-Step Program for Farm Town?

I have come to the conclusion that I have a highly addictive personality. It isn’t drugs or alcohol that I’m addicted to, though, or even chocolate! It’s Farm Town. And I bet at least some of you know what I’m talking about.

It’s an application on Facebook and it started out innocently enough… someone sent me the gift of a chicken. I like chickens so I accepted it, rather than ignore it, and was automatically set up with my own farm. Still, all was well. But then I figured out that I could plant crops and harvest them for money and then plant more. Before I knew it I had a whole bunch of grapes planted. But then there was the heartbreak of going back to my farm the next day and discovering that all of my grapes had rotted.

So I learned and became better, stronger, richer.

Oh, I made the mistake of wasting my initial profits on material things, like fences, and pathways, only to realize that the ground underneath them was far more valuable to my farm’s future. I sold those things and tilled up the land to plant more crops.

One of my “neighbors” told me about how to hire myself out to earn money harvesting other farmers’ crops. While my crops grew, I prostituted myself at the Marketplace begging other farmers to hire me.

Then I noticed that I was planning my day around my crops and when they would need to be harvested. I actually woke up at 4:50 AM one morning because I had grapes that needed to be harvested. Going to my sister’s in Indy for the weekend? I had to harvest my crops and plant longer growing crops for the weekend, in case I wasn’t able to get back to my farm.

I come home from work at night and before even checking to see if I have any mail, I’m turning on the computer to warm up so I can get to the farm that much quicker. Last night, I didn’t have dinner until after 8:30 pm because I was more concerned with the status of my farm!

Finally, I got to a high enough level that I can buy more property to make my farm larger. So now all of extra profits get saved for buying more land!

Like all other things, this too shall pass, but until then, if you need me, odds are you can find me either on my farm or in the market place. I’m saving for a farmhouse. (I suppose that up until now, my little avatar has been sleeping with the chickens.)

I Am a New Woman

Last night was my first night using my new CPAP (Continued Positive Airway Pressure) machine and I awoke this morning feeling like a new woman! Well for one thing, when I woke up this morning, a couple of minutes before the first alarm, I was AWAKE. I know, you’re saying “DUH,” but it was such a strange sensation that I literally sat there in bed trying to name it for several minutes.

I picked the machine up Monday afternoon and upon getting home with my new toy, I got ready for bed, plugged it in, put distilled water in the humidifier thingee and popped the mask on my face. I was ready for sleep. Of course I first had to suffer through the investigation of my two roommates. Both Sophie and Gizmo had to sniff and analyze the strange alien-like thing that appeared to be digesting my nose. After I passed inspection, I tried to go to sleep, but I think I was so excited that it took me a while to calm down. After getting myself into a position that was both conducive to sleep and did not smudge my mask out of place, I went to sleep.

My normal mornings were like this: 6:30 - alarm goes off; 6:40 - the sound finally penetrates the depths of my sleep and I turn off the alarm and start the long-winding journey toward consciousness; 7:00 - the second alarm goes off and I turn off the alarm, but turn on the TV and I again journey toward consciousness, but since I’d only had 15-20 minutes of sleep this time, the journey isn’t so long, but is equally arduous; 7:00 to7:15 - I snuggle and cuddle with my babies and watch either V-H1 (because mornings are the ONLY time they actually air music videos anymore) or the first few minutes of the Today Show (until I get sick of either the news or the interplay between the hosts); 7:15 to7:20 - I start telling the cats that I HAVE to get up; 7:20 to7:45 - I get up and hobble into the bathroom to shower, brush the teeth, put on the contacts, etc.; 7:45 - get dressed, sit down to put on socks and shoes; 7:55 - wake up when one of the cats pounces on the bed; 8:00 - wobble outside to the car and drive to work (I start work at 8:15).

But today, again, I was awake BEFORE the alarm. I sat there and cuddled with the cats and watched the local news morning show until I was sick of the news and/or the interplay between the hosts and I turned over the V-H1. When the second alarm went off at 7, I told the kids that I had to get up. I got up, did the whole bathroom thing, got dressed, skirmished a couple of times on World Domination in Facebook, then got to work early. I was SO perky at work, I think people thought that I’d been kidnapped and replaced by a pod person. I was all “Good Morning!” and “Howdy!” and I was smiling! (Those who know me know that although I’m ambulatory, I don’t really wake up until 10 and even then I’m not perky.) AND, if that weren’t crazy enough, I actually took the stairs between our office floors … not once, but SEVEN times!!! Oh, and normally I’m yawning all day because I’m just tired. But the first yawn didn’t come until about 5:30! It was incredible.

All this perky awakeness is tiring though, so I’m ready to go to bed.