The Clam Rampant

Kasia December 31st, 2008

Well, that’s not true, actually. I have plenty that I could do.

But my beloved is in the shower, and I am in my fleecy robe and jammies, sipping a Coke and wondering how I should spend the rest of the morning. I have to admit, “very little” sounds very good; it’s rare that I have a not-too-busy day to sit around and daydream.

Canuck, TBS and I all went to IKEA together last night. It felt like we’d bought out the store! We got a new TV stand that will better accommodate all the electronic gadgets he brought; we got him one of those funky Poang chairs that he’s wanted for years, which is a Christmas gift from me; we got him a desk chair, which is his Christmas gift from his mother; and he splurged a little and got me a drying rack that I’d wanted for ages but had never found anywhere until IKEA came to town.

You are officially old when a drying rack seems like a fantastic gift.

We’ve also gone ahead and purchased a new stove, which should be delivered Friday. I will, unfortunately, be back at work by then; but assuming they deliver it before about 4 p.m., he can have a nice dinner waiting for me when I get home.    I have already begun the “Honey-Do list” of things he can be working on during the days while I’m working; and with his help, I am thinking I will go back to riding the bus in the mornings. I’m terrible about getting out of bed, which means I drive nine days out of ten. (I will still have to drive one, maybe two days out of five, but if I can reduce the wear and tear on that poor old car, doggonnit, I will.)

Tonight we have plans to go to a New Year’s party in Rochester, unless of course the weather turns nasty – it’s a long drive on what my mother calls “Amateur Night,” and if bad roads get thrown into the mix, I might chicken out. I hope not, though; I’m quite looking forward to it!

Funny story before I sign off for the moment: yesterday we went to go meet with the priest who’s celebrating our nuptial Mass, and he was telling us (in his Slovak accent) how he, his associate pastor, and his former associate pastor were all riding together out to Toronto for a fellow priest’s birthday party. They get to Canadian Customs and are being asked the usual questions: where do you live, where are you going, whose car is this, what do you do for a living.

Three Slovak citizens in a car together. Illinois plates on the car (the former associate pastor is now at a parish in Chicago). Two say they live in the Detroit area, one in Chicago. Going to Toronto for a birthday party.

“What’s your job?”

“Saving souls.”

Customs agent looks at them – I’m surmising they weren’t wearing their Roman collars, but he didn’t say one way or the other whether they were. Customs agent writes “Saving souls” down on the yellow referral form and sends them straight to Secondary for further questioning.

These are the times that try Customs agents’ souls…kind of like when I told the U.S. border agent I’d bought a “missal”. I recommend saying “book”, if you are ever faced with that situation…  :-p

• Autobiographical ramblings , Busy-ness , Cars - they eat at the table with you , Catholicism , Funny things priests say , My Beloved , Silliness , Stuff I do
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Kasia October 28th, 2008

…this is ridiculous!

I’m sure my resident atheist reader will be the first to point out that it was my purchases that afforded this particular abundance; but it still makes for a good headline.

Gentlemen: this post is going to deal with some explicitly feminine things. May I suggest you read no further? Continue Reading »

• Blessings , Silliness
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Kasia October 21st, 2008

Your result for Are You a Jackie or a Marilyn? Or Someone Else? Mad Men-era Female Icon Quiz…

You Are an Ingrid!

Ingrids have sensitive feelings and are warm and perceptive.

How to Get Along with Me

• * Give me plenty of compliments. They mean a lot to me.
• * Be a supportive friend or partner. Help me to learn to love and value myself.
• * Respect me for my special gifts of intuition and vision.
• * Though I don’t always want to be cheered up when I’m feeling melancholy, I sometimes like to have someone lighten me up a little.
• * Don’t tell me I’m too sensitive or that I’m overreacting!

What I Like About Being an Ingrid

• * my ability to find meaning in life and to experience feeling at a deep level
• * my ability to establish warm connections with people
• * admiring what is noble, truthful, and beautiful in life
• * my creativity, intuition, and sense of humor
• * being unique and being seen as unique by others
• * having aesthetic sensibilities
• * being able to easily pick up the feelings of people around me

What’s Hard About Being an Ingrid

• * experiencing dark moods of emptiness and despair
• * feelings of self-hatred and shame; believing I don’t deserve to be loved
• * feeling guilty when I disappoint people
• * feeling hurt or attacked when someone misundertands me
• * expecting too much from myself and life
• * fearing being abandoned
• * obsessing over resentments
• * longing for what I don’t have

Ingrids as Children Often

• * have active imaginations: play creatively alone or organize playmates in original games
• * are very sensitive
• * feel that they don’t fit in
• * believe they are missing something that other people have
• * attach themselves to idealized teachers, heroes, artists, etc.
• * become antiauthoritarian or rebellious when criticized or not understood
• * feel lonely or abandoned (perhaps as a result of a death or their parents’ divorce)

Ingrids as Parents

• * help their children become who they really are
• * support their children’s creativity and originality
• * are good at helping their children get in touch with their feelings
• * are sometimes overly critical or overly protective
• * are usually very good with children if not too self-absorbed

Take Are You a Jackie or a Marilyn? Or Someone Else? Mad Men-era Female Icon Quiz at HelloQuizzy

• Silliness , Stuff I do
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Kasia August 5th, 2008

Kit tagged me for the Ten Things I’d Like to See in Action meme. How could I argue? – the poor woman has a family wedding and then a visit to her mother in the same week. Anything to distract her…

So. Ten things I’d like to see in action. This has been a challenging one…not just to come up with ten things, but only ten things, ten things that no one else has mentioned, and also to hopefully not have to confess anything on the list when I’m next celebrating the Sacrament of Reconciliation. I’m not sure I did so well on the last part…

1) Paris Hilton as a deckhand on The Deadliest Catch. Preferably with her inheritance being contingent on a favorable review from the captain and the rest of the crew. And automatic failure if anyone gets washed overboard as a result of her incompetence. Even if she’s the one who gets washed overboard.

2) A reality show wherein our elected leaders (bare minimum: House, Senate, and President, though state and local leaders and the SCOTUS members would be a welcome addition) have to survive for three months on the average U.S. salary and in an average-sized U.S. home. No credit cards, no HELOC. TBS got mad at me because that was originally her idea. Nothing in the meme says it has to be my original idea. But in the spirit of fair play, and since I didn’t think to give her credit, I change this to: “How fast Congress would jump to fix Social Security if they and their loved ones had to live on it.”

3) Stephen Harper and Barack Obama cage-fighting. Yes, I’m being facetious. But it would be interesting to watch their techniques and see who ultimately won…Tell you what: I’d settle for watching them debate each other on the merits of Canada’s social welfare system. Hint: in this case, the Canadian is going to be less enamored of it than the American.

4) Sara and her beloved actually going through with that Inquisition-themed wedding reception.

5) Kit’s middle child doing one of her Fatima impressions. (Too cute!)

6) Fr. Erik’s skate-punk trap. (Schadenfreude…)

7) Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s face when Christ returns in glory. Ideally with a slo-mo freeze-frame option.

It isn’t so much that I want him to go to Hell or anything – I pretty much have to hope that everyone will be saved. I just want to see him realize that the Jews are still “the apple of God’s eye” (as Casper ten Boom so aptly put it). Oh, and it would be nice if God granted him a vision that confirmed that yes, the Holocaust actually happened. And that it was wrong. [wry smile]

8 ) Mac’s infamous worst-hair day. I just am having trouble wrapping my brain around how awful it must truly have been.

9) Jesus saying to me “Well done, thou good and faithful servant…” (As opposed to “Begone from me, you wicked servant,” of course.) Hey, there had to be something serious in this list!

10) A Catholic bloggers’ convention. Bring your dog(s). Lots of liquor, ice cream, Land Shark lagers, chocolate, salt licks, and brown sugar bacon snacks. Mmm. Kit can come up with the menu, provided Wiley doesn’t eat it first. We can make commemorative rosaries with the Exterminatrix of Heresies as the centerpiece…

Let’s see…who hasn’t done this? I tag TBS, Canuck, Foxfier, and Heather Siekierski. And anyone else who wants to play.

• Friends and fellow bloggers , Jokes , Memes , Politics , Silliness
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Kasia June 25th, 2008

You Are a Powdered Devil’s Food Donut

A total sweetheart on the outside, you love to fool people with your innocent image.On the inside you’re a little darker, richer, and more complex. You’re a hedonist who demands more than one pleasure at a time. Decadent and daring, you test the limits of human indulgence.

What Donut Are You?

Curtsies to Mac at Mulier Fortis and Karen at Gem of the Ocean.

• Silliness
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Kasia February 25th, 2008

One of the highlights of the weekend…

Our parish’s new music minister, while a very kind soul of great talent, has a regrettable habit of peppering each Mass liberally with Haugen, Haas, Schutte, and Joncas. And the St. Louis Jesuits. Whenever I see a composer’s name at the bottom with note that s/he was born in the ’50s and is still with us, I have an involuntary anticipatory cringe. It’s usually borne out by the lyrics, the melody, or both. Once in a while I finish and think, “Hey, that wasn’t so bad,” and once in a blue moon I might think, “You know, that was actually OK!”…but as a rule I just don’t care for them.

ANYway, the Communion hymn yesterday was “Eye Has Not Seen.” Melodically, we both actually thought it was OK, but lyrically I thought it was too reminiscent of the Unitarian “hymns” I grew up singing. Though it did actually mention God…well, anyway.

After we left the church, checked the Lost & Found, and had a doughnut or so in the social hall to keep my sugar up until after I’d taken The Canuck to his train, we headed out to the car. We got in, and my beloved said:

“You’ll understand why I wouldn’t say this in the church, and I’m probably tacking extra years onto my time in Purgatory for this, but when they read the name of the Communion hymn, all I could think was: ‘Eye has not seen…but I can has cheeseburger!’”

ROFL. I love that man!…

• Catholicism , My Beloved , Silliness
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Kasia February 16th, 2008

So I’m in Chatham at Chez Mere de Canuque this weekend. Last night when we went to bed I was in a really lousy mood. It was probably a combination of watching the final episode of M*A*S*H (The Canuck is a huge fan) for the first time and crying at several points, then getting an e-mail that I overreacted to. Anyway, so we’re getting ready to go to sleep and I’m trying not to be snarly and unpleasant, but am still being contrary, which is pretty much as far as I can get towards the pleasant end of the spectrum when I’m in that kind of mood. At that point, I usually have to sleep it off.

The Canuck, of course, is being very sweet and trying to be helpful. He’s offering to rub my neck, which is a little out of sorts – I’m refusing. He’s offering to go over and put the computer to sleep so the light will stop irritating me – I’m refusing to let him.

Finally he looks at me and says, and I’m not kidding, “OK, but the next contrary statement you make, I’m going to go put the computer to sleep AND rub your neck. Sound good?”

What could I say? If I said no, that would be a contrary statement, and he’d go ahead and do it.

I hate how easily he can outsmart me! I especially hate when I end up laughing off my lousy mood as a result of his having outsmarted me! GRRRR!

I always lose at chess, too. Like Inigo Montoya, I have no gift for strategy. I can play well for a while, but I’m never able to checkmate my opponent. I remember one time I was playing chess with my then-best friend; I had her down to two pieces, but for the life of me I couldn’t checkmate her. The game went on for HOURS. Finally she had to come up with my strategy to checkmate her, because we both wanted the game to end but didn’t want to just quit.

• Cranky Clam , My Beloved , Silliness
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Kasia February 10th, 2008

I’ve been tagged, both by the Archangel’s Advocate and Puff/Bear at The Spirit’s Sword, for the Middle Name Meme.
First the rules:
1. You have to post the rules before you give your answers.
2. You must list one fact about yourself beginning with each letter of your middle name. (If you don’t have a middle name, use your maiden name or your mother’s maiden name).
3. At the end of your blog post, you need to tag one person for each letter of your middle name. (Be sure to leave them a comment telling them they’ve been tagged.)
E - Emeril is my second-least-favorite TV chef. (Least favorite is Jamie Oliver.)
M – Meat and potatoes. It’s been clear from my early childhood that those are my strongly-preferred foods. (OK, meat and starch…)
I – Idiosyncrasy. It’s one of my favorite words.
L – Late. I constantly run late, usually due to overcommitting myself. Drives my poor compulsively-early fiancé absolutely bonkers.
Y – Yahoo. Yahoo is my free e-mail of choice.

I tag: Jaibee, Jill (in the combox is fine), The Canuck, Heather Price, and Heather Siekierski (a.k.a. Mrs. Kheldar).

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Kasia February 1st, 2008

Book Meme Rules:

1. Pick up the nearest book (of at least 123 pages).
2. Open the book to page 123.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the next three sentences.
5. Tag five people.

Now, first I have to admit that I’m cheating on this, because I saw it this morning at home, and probably really should’ve done it there. But the thing is, my office at home has books stacked on the desk, on the floor, etc. as part of this massive book-purge I’m doing, and there were easily half a dozen books that were roughly equidistant from me. So I’m doing it at work, and I’m intentionally skipping over the shelf of reference books (particularly since a lot of them are in Italian or Latin, or do not involve true sentences, i.e. the Kenedy Directory), and skipping right to an actual BOOK that I actually bought to read on my lunches, Visits to the Most Holy Sacrament and to Most Holy Mary by St. Alphonsus de Liguori. No, I’m not trying to show off; if you’d rather, I could reach twice as far and pull out Emily Post. No? I thought not.

It does include portions of two paragraphs…

It asks for the grace not to be numbered among these ungrateful people, for the gift of a deep love for the Blessed Sacrament, and for help to love him more deeply. The prayer to Mary uses a verse from the Song of Songs, a spurious saying of St. Ignatius of Antioch (ca. 37 – ca. 107) and a saying from St. Ephrem to describe Mary as a powerful defense against the powers of evil for all who have recourse to her.

In the Office of the Most Holy Sacrament the Church sings: “There is no other nation so great that has gods as near to it as our God is near to us.”

And there you have it.

Jaibee already tagged The Canuck and Jill, so…I tag The Big Seester, Julia, DJ, Mrs. Kheldar, and…um, a lot of people have already been tagged for this, so how ’bout we leave it at four?

• Memes , Silliness
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Kasia April 25th, 2007

Who wrote this quiz?!?

You Are Bert

Extremely serious and a little eccentric, people find you loveable – even if you don’t love them!You are usually feeling: Logical – you rarely let your emotions rule youYou are famous for: Being smart, a total neat freak, and maybe just a little evil How you life your life: With passion, even if your odd passions (like bottle caps and pigeons) are baffling to others

The Sesame Street Personality Quiz

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