Kottage Kibitzing

Photo and video editing at onetruemedia.com

Wow! That was fun! Had a great weekend with the gf's. We literally did a little bit of everything! Ate, drank, skied, walked, sang (lots of songs, played name that tune ~ lotsa fun), did a 3D puzzle (first time doing one of these - we were very vertically challenged LOL), read, slept, took pictures and mostly talked! I was zonked when I got back late yesterday afternoon.

Managed to get some quality time with hubster when I got home. Our neighbours are away and offered the use their hottub. Whoopee! Needless to say I was in bed by 8:30 and asleep by 9:30!

Mama said there'd be days like this, there'd be days like this, my Mama said....

Irish Church Lady
(ICL)

Roughing it!

I'm off for my 3rd annual weekend cottage visit with the girls. We'll be doing some cross-country skiing, walking, talking, eating, drinking, puzzling, singing ~ you name it!

Yes, we have to ski in, pulling our provisions on the toboggans!

If you're looking for Saturday Photo Hunt it's here at ICL is at Home.

Have a great weekend, internets!!!

~ICL~

P.S. Is it just me or is blogrolling completely wacky these days, always showing every site as updated??? I sent them a support request and I just got back a standard email (so far). There is nothing on their 'breaking news' posts about issues. Please respond if you are experiencing or have noticed the same thing. I see on TNChick's SPH blogroll it looks that way too.

Crap I love technology (when it works!)

Thursdays 8:30 EST

The OFFICE is one of those shows you can watch a few times and still laugh and pick up on new funny things each time.

You can't blog while watching THE OFFICE or you may miss something.

You have to intently stare at the TV to soak it all in!

Also you have to intently stare at the TV during the commercials and not change the channel because if you don't catch the first few seconds after the commercial you may miss something funny.

If you have to go to the bathroom you run very quickly at the beginning of the commercials like you have the $hit$ or something.

And if you have to get something to eat or drink during the commercial you use the buddy system and call out from the kitchen every few seconds "Is it on yet?".

Just wanted to give you the THE OFFICE watching etiquette rules. You need to be endoctrinated properly.

O and BTW I blog about THE OFFICE on Fridays / Thursday nights after the episode and everyone shares their favourite parts of the show so it may be helpful to keep a pencil and paper handy while you watch unless you have a good memory not like me.

O and after the show ends and the Deddle Dee Productions sign comes on and you're all smiley because you laughed but suddenly you get a sad feeling because it's over you just keep watching because SCRUBS comes on after THE OFFICE and it is pretty funny too.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Tonight's office episode: The Return

Oscar returns from his long vacation with mixed emotions on whether or not he still wants to be a part of the office.

Favourite parts:

Andy singing, Angela telling Kevin "Never", Andy trying to reel in Jim and annoying the hell out of him.

What was your favourite part?

Irish Church Lady
ICL
Irish

Where is Meez?

So I've been slowing down on the amount of posts I do.

Also the amount of time spent blogging, although I still do blog a lot. I've commented before about how I was using some of my Christmas vacay time to get my house in order. That's gone well. Okay well not finished, but well.

That has crept into my blog time but for good reason. The other reason why I've "tried" (see me doing the double handed quote?) to cut back some is because hubby is "expressing his dissatisfaction" (read complaining) about the amount of time I spend doing "it".

He'd rather be spending time doing the other "it" with me. Not gonna happen! LOL At least not for the length of time I spend blogging!!!

So I'm trying to be more "balanced" in my blogging, chores, quality family time which is an incredible ideal. Can't say I love it but I do love my family so I'm trying to make the most of it.

I still feel like I have an untenable list of things in my head that I want to write about.

I also think that I do my blogging as a refuge, an escape. That includes playing with gadgets (check out my new Meez pic on my sidebar), photos, making videos, teaching myself html, problem solving my html goofs, and reading and responding to peoples blogs. I love doing all those things which should be reason enough alone to want to blog, isn't it?

More on why and what I want to escape from on another day.

My goal for tonight is to get caught up on my reads in bloglines and hit the sack early. It's cold here, I had a busy day (but I got my run in!) and I'm tired.

Laters, internets.... and big smooches

ICL

SNAP to it with SPA!

Let's get one thing straight. I'm not getting paid to write this post. *

I'm doing it for love.

I love this new Snap Preview Anywhere™ tool that you now see for the links on my blog.

I found it first at Sanni's Coffee2 Go site and I said, hey I gotta get me a piece of that.

So I implemented it right away and it was a SNAP to do. I honestly don't remember how but it was easy. It involved putting some code into my template. Click on the link "Get free previews from SNAP.com" that you see a the bottom of a preview when you hover on any site and it will bring you something that looks like this and you can sign up from there.

SNAP.com is a growing company ~ see more in a news interview with Tom McGovern, CEO on CNBC here.

Oh and I just read on their SNAP blog that they got a contract with WordPress so that all those users will get it as part of their WordPress blogs. Alright!! (say me, even though I'm a Blogger user, I still get the benefit if WordPress users have it. Woot!)

So tell me, do you like the SNAP Preview functionality?


* I'm not a big PPP fan or fan of blogs with advertising, even though I still read the blogs but with less devotedness. Sorry folks, it's my blog and how I feel. Dog knows Pool Boy would be thrilled if I got paid for blogging because I spend so much time doing it.

Incidentally this is pure coincidence but I find this funny.

I just created a blogspot last night to store my photos that I submit to the more serious photo memes (I'm finding my current one ICL is at Home is too busy, I needed an all white one) called Irish Church Lady Snaps (as in Snapshots ... kind of an oxymoron [yes, my favourite word] which I find funny because it's all digital these days and plus I've been dealing with depression quite a bit these days - yes my own, my sisters, my FIL which is why I chose the blogspot name) and then I read about this SNAP.com phenomenom which I had coincidentally just implemented myself only a few weeks ago.

There's more. A project I was working on last year was called SNAP and I work on SAP application software as part of my job and I love going to the SPA (acronym for Snap Preview Anywhere™ ) and my daughter Nurse-a-Baby works at a SPA called THE SPA.

Is it just me or do you find these types of coincidences, commonalities humourous?

I guess the dear dog was telling me to blog about this or maybe his alter ego. Hmmmmm...

Me thinks my dear god is telling me to get on and finish my cleaning (which I haven't started today)but first I'm going out for a run with DQ Girl.

Laters, internets!

Irish Church Lady (ICL)

THE OFFICE

THE Office Recap:

~ wow! Dwight resigned! Lots of big plot action happening on The Office these days!

Michael was so tame and well behaved tonight. It's the best I've ever seen him.

What's with the Duffus (I don't remember his name) trying to move out the Shrute-meister?

Oh.my.dog the picture of Dwight and Jim when they went out on their first sales call was so cute!!

In honour of Dwight, shucks we're gonna miss him:



Irish Church Lady (ICL)

Thursday Thirteen ~ The Lame A$$ Version

Banner courtesy of Yellow Roses Garden

Thursday Thirteen

Week 75 ~ My 27th

1. Wednesday night came up pretty fast and I hadn't even thought about what to do my 13 on.
2. Back to werk and it's starting to suck the life out of me again.
3. Consequently, I started out doing some chores, as planned Monday night but wimped out last night and tonight.
4. However I have been back at running ~ 3 days in a row which is a good thing but I am sore. I last ran Dec 15.
5. It's been great running weather here (of which I've missed most of it~ nuts!) but today it was quite cold and windy and I had a chill the rest of the afternoon at werk.
6. THE Office tomorrow night ~ I plan to start my Office posts again on Friday. Wasn't last week's such a surprise? Jan and Michael - is it for real??? NOT! Check out the Schrute Space blog for Dwight.
7. My once a month Chiro appointment for my back is tomorrow a.m. I'm ready for a tune up. Feeling it, especially in my upper right shoulder, which is not my usual problem spot (prolly brought on by all my cleaning last weekend LOL)
8. This is such as lame a$$ 13 that I am falling asleep.
9. I found a lot of bloggers who love making lists like me on Happy and Blue 2's blog today. I've been using Google lists for tracking me lists on line. It's superfabulous!
10. I've nominated some people on the Seventh Annual Webblog Awards (THE Bloggies) today. I'm not saying who but there was quite a few.
11. Your welcome
12. Nominations close 10:00 PM Eastern Standard Time (GMT-5) on Thursday, January 11, 2007, anyone can nominate their favorite weblogs.
13. I made it to 13 mother.of.dog now I'm going to bed.

~Toodles~

Irish Church Lady (ICL)

Manic Monday ~ This and That

This and That

Do you wear a watch every day? If so, describe it.
I alternate mainly between two watches, depending on what I am wearing. One is gold and silver, more delicate looking. The other is all silver with a square face and a silver band.

Sometimes I forget to put my watch on, which isn't really an issues because there are clocks everywhere ~ cell phone, PC.

Do you wear cologne or perfume?

Sometimes. If I'm going to a doctor's or chiropractor appointment I do not because they don't want you to. Also, if I'm going to church I usually do not because I know some people are sensitive to it. If I'm just going to work with no appointments, then I usually do.

What's under your bed?
Dustballs. Haven't cleaned there yet.

Also some other stuff in shoeboxes etc. I forget what it is but I'll soon find out. The bedroom / master bath is next on my list to clean but it will have to wait until this ~ this weekend, although I did start a bit on it Monday night.

What do you keep on your nightstand?

A lamp. A coaster for me coffee cup. A bottle of hand sanitizer. A bottle of water. And other crap that piles up there, right now it's a computer headset. A few books and the phone cradle on the lower shelf.

Well this was a rather lame Manic Monday on my part. I'm not feeling very humourous today.

Update on the home / work front ~ I finished the mudroom on Sunday and now you could eat off the floor which is saying a lot because there was a lot of mud to clean out of there. I had some laundry and mending to do tonight and I started on my bedroom but only made a little dent in it.

Why is it that I seem to need long stretches of time before I tackle a job? Why, why, why? This is part of my problem, if I worked on this stuff a bit at a time, and blogged less, then maybe things would not get so backed up.

So I've decided that, until I get my To Do list done, I will blog less and clean more. Sucks, I know.

If I'm not feeling too wiped when I get home from werk, I will continue with my list as much as possible so as to not leave it all to the weekend.

It was a kinda tiring day back at work. I had almost 500 emails to deal with (half of them were spam ha ha), I still have to go back and respond /fully about 100 of them.

Also trying to remember things from before Christmas and follow-up with people as to where they had progressed too was brain taxing. At least I did not forget my passwords. That usually happens.

So it was a Manic Monday after all!

Toodle~loo~, whenever

Irish Church Lady (ICL)

Updated Ah fiddlesticks! That's it! They're done!

UPDATED

Ah fiddlesticks! That's it! They're done! They're over! But my cleaning list is not yet done!

I'm feeling depressed. There's only one thing that can help me. I go crazy today trying to finish the rest and in doing so I am sure to put my back out and then I can stay home sick for a few daze and blog away, read, watch movies, take strong anti spasmatic muscle relaxant drugs and then drift in and out of a dreamy fogland sleep.

But what if I miss something really important at werk? Some new organizational changes, a key meeting, some project issues that only I can solve? he he

My obsessive-compulsive tendencies are killing me here. What to do, what to do?

I think I'll get another cup of coffee and blog some more to ponder it.

Oh in the meantime, can you please help a new blogger friend out? Bipolar Mo needs some votes to win some wacky medical book. He's a funny man with issues. Need I say more? Now go vote, mmm'kay?

Laters, internets

Now give me some love...

xoxo

Irish Church Lady , ICL

SOS ~ Sunday Only Speak ~ Introducing Psalms Sunday!

For my Sunday Only Speak , irregularly seen here on Slainte ~ It's only Me, (cause it is, who else could write this blab?), I would like to introduce, from Erica at Butterfly Kisses :

Erica writes:

Each Sunday I will pick one or two Psalms (depending on length, she's doing them in order). If you would like to take part, after reading the Psalms, share in a post whatever you would like in regards to what you read. For example, what did you think of it? What does it mean to you? Do you have a story behind it? Can you teach us something about it? Do you relate to a portion of it? What verse from it spoke to you the most?

I will write my post as well on Sunday morning and include a mister linky so that all contributors can link to their posts.

So I have decided to contribute this week for the following reasons:

1. My bible reading sucks and is generally limited to the readings at church each week. Very rarely, I will open and read a bit, but to be honest, this is usually in times of crisis, and I don't make it regular habit. It ain't my bag, even though my faith is strong and to be honest I'm not a big reader of anything. It seems I don't even have time to read all the blogs I want to these days!
2. I don't know the Psalms well at all. I thought this would be a good way to drip feed them to me. I ain't into memorizing them though but I will explicate.
3. I find Erica can be quite inspiring to me because of her strong faith and ability to discern. I would like to support her in any way I can.
4. I'm not going to church today, so I need to spend some time with / thinking about God and Jesus. (Lame excuse, I know).

Here is this weeks Psalm 1:

Psalm 1 (NKJV)
1. Blessed is the man
Who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly,
Nor stands in the path of sinners,
Nor sits in the seat of the scornful;

2 But his delight is in the law of the LORD,
And in His law he meditates day and night.

3 He shall be like a tree
Planted by the rivers of water,
That brings forth its fruit in its season,
Whose leaf also shall not wither;
And whatever he does shall prosper.

4 The ungodly are not so,
But are like the chaff which the wind drives away.

5 Therefore the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment,
Nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous.

6 For the LORD knows the way of the righteous,
But the way of the ungodly shall perish.

So for me, I take from this Psalm...

1. Don't heed advice from people that are not mindful of God's will.
2. Try to stop people from sinning ~ it's their own free will.
3. Don't judge people for their actions ~ again, it's their free will.
4. Worry about my own spiritualness, and sanctify that.
5. In short, it's all about me, not them.
   

How does it speak to you?

Sunday Only Speak
Irish Church Lady (ICL)

Time to Take the Christmas Decorations Down

Please go to me photoblog "ICL is at Home" for Saturday Photo Scavenger Hunt.



Irish Church Lady (ICL)

Thursday Thirteen - The Clean House Version!

Week 74 ~ My #26

1. I took these 4 extra days off werk as holidaze because (a) I needed a long break and (b) I had a ton of stuff to do around the house that just never gets done in the 'normal' working week.

2. Seems like kind of a waste of holidays, but on the other hand, it is worth it for me as I feel better that things are getting under control on the homefront and that is peace of mind that you can't get by going off on a vacation somewhere.

3. Here's what I accomplished so far: kitchen deep down cleaning including inside all cupboards, behind fridge, throwing out / donating things I no longer use; basement (putting everything in place and cleaning / purging after the flood of 2006.

4. Oh.my.dog ... I can't believe I wrote this post on September 14 about everything that I needed to do and I'm still not done yet.

5. Here's still what is on the list to get done: Bedroom deep clean, including ensuite bathroom cupboards and drawers and clothes closet, mud/laundry room/front hall closet, finish putting my Mum's things away (I'm halfway there), clean window blinds (this may have to take place over a few weekends ~ anyone have any good tips on the way that they clean these?).

6. I did a major reorganization of my kitchen countertops and cupboards. I thought 'outside the box' and moved things from one cupboard to another. Just because they've been in that cupboard for 15 years, doesn't mean they have to stay there! hee hee

I uncluttered my countertops, removed jars, canisters etc. that were contributing to that cluttered feeling and made room for them in the pantry cupboard. I don't feel that I have enough counter space as it is, and this stuff was adding to this feeling. I'm thinking that the new uncluttered look will help everyone to keep it looking clean and not let things pile up in the kitchen that shouldn't be there.

7. Those magic pads, you know the white ones, are awesome!!! I must have gone through about 6 so far this week. They are great for cleaning walls and trim. (How come I'm the only one that notices the finger marks on the walls and doorways??)

8. Batgirl helped me by cleaning out all the kitchen drawers and organizing everything nicely. She also helped in the basement.

9. Of course, while doing this the list of things that need to be fixed has grown, discovered as I work the rooms. Pool Boy is going to be busy!

10. I will take my Christmas decorations down this weekend. I'm still enjoying them in the evening. I still have to take a picture of my new little pink Christmas tree. I've delayed because I still have some ornaments to hang and I don't have any hooks. It seems like all the stores I went to, even before Christmas were already sold out.

11. Here's a picture of me Mistletoad I already posted about instead. Isn't he precious?

1. 12. Here's a picture of our outdoor lights, taken from my bedroom window. Pool Boy already took down the blow up snowmen when I took this picture. Still a bit of snow left but it's been disappearing from the small dump we had after Christmas.

13. Back to werk on Monday Jan 8th. I'm grateful that I had the holidays available and was able to take them at this time.

Irish Church Lady (ICL)

TT header by Goofy Girl

2 Years Old

~THE BABY GIRL~

~THE EVENT~

Yup, The Doodle was a New Years Baby. Last year on her first birthday she was 'sick as a dog' (ha ha) with some virus. This year she was in much better form.

Her Mama, DQ Girl (BTW we may have to change her name, more on that later), spoiled her with prezzies ~ a new Princess shirt, a new (bigger) pink bed and a new noodle toy that squeaks (at least for a few days!!).

~THE COLLAGE~

~THE MONTAGE~
aka music video

click to play

(funny in my head)

Make photo slide shows at onetruemedia.com

~THE SLIDESHOW LINK~
The photos ~ click to enlarge
























~the Warhol shot~

~The Producer~
Irish Church Lady (ICL)

~THE END~

*wheww!*