Technology, Helping Us Enjoy and Document Life

This is a picture I took from my phone as I stalked a theft-flee-chase-capture-and return event a couple weeks ago. I happened to be an eye witness during the flee-chase-return portions of the adventure. I witnessed it all from the comforts of my own car. Had it not been for technology I would've missed the whole event. I give credit to my phone for the slow driving (because I was talking on it) that put me right where I needed to be so that the fugitive could place his hand on my car to stop me in the middle of a busy road. My phone also gets credit for taking this crappy picture during the return portion, but still provided a medium to pass it on to you. My car of course helped me find the post-capture section after a brilliant U-turn upon realizing the green bag the kid was carrying was probably full of stolen goods. My car also helped me follow the participants [bad guy-pictured center (his hands are in handcuffs), undercover Smith's security pictured left (with green bag containing stolen goods) and other security dude's lower half of body pictured right]. And of course credit goes to the invention of blogs, helping the world to stay connected with everyday life.

Obsessions

How do I confess this? And truly make you understand? I am not joking when I say I have an obsessive personality. I have tried to verbally convince people before and it doesn't work. So you can think it's a joke if you choose. I'm pretty sure my immediate family knows of my problem, and a few friends. Here is a list of things that have captured my passion in the past:

Sobe

Grapefruit (Everyday from December to February)

Golf (held captive for three years)

Boating (prisoner for several years....missed weddings and showers)

The OC (So in love with Seth Cohen that I will name my child after him. COuld there be a better couple than Seth and Summer?)

Julia Roberts (Back in the Pretty Woman days. I lied to my mom to get out of the house to see an R rated show. Of course I felt guilty and confessed to her, while also demanding she lighten up because I was going to see R movies and there was no sense in lying about it)

Not working full time (definitely an obsession...going strong for....since I was...I can't remember but a very long time now)

Working (Even though I don't want to work full-time, I probably do, some weeks I end up working 80 hrs a week. I can't say no to work. I have to go. And sometimes I get sick thinking about the work I miss. I must get a life. And a husband. And make my friends and family like me again.)

Twilight--This is the latest obsession.

Pictured below is the night the 4th and last book was released in the series. Traci, Candice and I joined hundreds of other crazies at midnight to get our copies. FYI--the book was LAME (other than it made me want to be a vampire)

Not a surprise I'm sure. Most people have been obsessed with the series. And since the movie has been released, people have revived the simmering obsession into the boiling hot mess it was in the past. Damnit! So have I. I DID NOT like the movie. Maybe it's because I had to stay up until midnight to watch it. Or I went swimming at 10pm to find a second wind, only to find a headache. Maybe because I was sitting next to someone who at every scene would say, "That IS NOT what they said." Or would improvise some of the lines, Like "Edward, Remember who you are." And she would add..."a child of God." Maybe it's because the people I was with wouldn't share their carmel apples with me. But mostly I think it's because:

-Rosalie WAS NOT beautiful.

-The editor just flipped coins about which parts to cut, or was only 10 yrs of age.

-Pet names like Spider Monkey?

-Climbing trees? Professing their love in trees?

-Edward scary?

-Some very bad acting in a hospital bed.

-And most important, absolutely NO character or relationship development at all!

See, I'm obsessed. So badly obsessed that I had to go see it again. And I like it WAY better.

PS..I did lie in one part of this post for the purpose of entertainment. The truth is the carmel apple was offered to me and I did take a piece.

Kentucky, Crazy Capitol of the World

Lucky me spent Halloween in Kentucky this year. Awesome weather and some of the cutest kids you will ever see! Pictured below are Riley and Max (my nephew). Riley and Max are like boyfriend and girlfriend. She bosses him around and he just grunts. Once in awhile he will get fed up and yell at her. She can't quite say her "M's" so she calls him "Ax." Which is what we called him too.

Sam was a bat and slept the entire evening while we walked from house to house. Nothing better than a sleeping baby.

This is a rare time that Sam was awake (see the little owls on his outfit ?). Normally when I pack for a trip I pack light (I hate checking baggage) knowing full well I will need to wear the outfits more than once. Didn't work out so well with a baby that spits up as frequently as I take breathes. Sam was considerate though, he always saved some for his dad :)

Max enjoys many unhealthy foods like:


Dog treats (eaten in the kennel for full effect)

Whipped cream



Chips (jalapeno), coke, slurpees (which I got in trouble for...I gave him one for lunch), ice cream, pie and suckers. However, he does have a penchant for green peppers, raw onions and pickles. Interestingly, he is just learning to speak and chooses words like: pickle, candle, bubble and purple to be among his first.

I couldn't get enough of his pirate costume. I laughed everytime I looked at him.

Sam was so sweet. We had some great bonding time. Poor little guy has a hard time breathing so his mom and I referred to him as "piggy." I miss our early mornings together where he was half asleep and squirmed EVERY second that passed, hoping to find a comfortable position.

Just an FYI: THis kid is pure-raw trouble. I've never seen anything like it. I believe it to be unparalleled. You can't tell from the look on his face, but Ax IS NOT to be messed with.



Just an FYI for the family, Matt actually is in dental school. I met an instructor of his. Went to his clinic. He even worked on my teeth.

Also, Sarah is a superstar! How she manages both of those children without having gone crazy is a mystery. She is a great mother...don't be afraid of medication if you need it though. Stay alive!

The Bear Has Spoken

Last weekend was SOOOOO GREAT! Olive Kate came to visit. Olive is a very good eater and takes it seriously. She is on a perfect little schedule, even for pooping--it's like clockwork.

We went to Wheeler Farm and chilled with Donkeys and Diesel fumes from tractors. (Personally, I felt inspired to become a farmer and vowed to the pigs and other livestock that I would be back to make their lives better. I informed the staff at the farm of my intentions to volunteer and #1 They wanted to know if it was court ordered...I guess most people don't want to work on farms. And #2 They were excited that I could help them in the offices, to which I said, "I'm more interested in being with the animals. YOu know, feeding them, cleaning their stalls, milking, piggy back rides. No offense." Peoples responses to me are starting to make me feel like I'm not normal)---okay....back to Olive

The girl will sleep for 12 hours a night and then wake you up with smiles and giggles. There is nothing better than a happy baby waking you up. I wish she could wake me up every morning.
Grandpa carried her in the Bjorn around Silver Lake. Something I wish I had had for our walk earlier that morning. I was dumb and took a stroll and when she was sick of it...I carried her in my arms. I had to switch arms about every 30 seconds!

Bjorn usage requires a 6 hour course inorder to use it correctly

I tried to eat her cheeks everyday.

I had the best time with them and wish so bad they lived right next door to me, or in my loft. I had to sleep off the depression for three hours after they left.

Some Little Jaunts

I have well over 100 cousins. Here are five of them. Christina, on the far left, is 17 and has been doing her public service by working on the Bill Dew campaign (I voted for him solely based off my theory that Christina would never work for someone she didn't respect. Her mother once told her in a moving car to take her crying baby sister, pictured second from the right , out of the carseat. To which Christina replied, "I will NEVER help you break the law." You can definately trust this half Japanese beauty)

Pictured below is the cry-baby sister spoken of above. Sadye and I spent a lovely saturday afternoon hanging out with Alpaca's on Rebecca Bergman's farm. They ARE NOT lamas. Rebecca has been begging me for months to come to the farm to meet Eduardo/Pedro because "he is so hot and young." So I finally make it to the farm and she informs me that she won't introduce us because I need to marry someone rich. I don't know how to take that comment. Is she looking out for me? Protecting me? Does she think my personality can only be with a rich man? Does she think money is that important to me?

I don't think Sadye had that much fun. How could you not have fun riding an Alpaca?

Breakfast at SIlver Fork Lodge with Daniell and Joanna. I wish I knew the reason for the look on her face (Bad food? My head is touching hers? Somewhere in her childhood she confused the command of "smile" with constipation?)

If I ever run away from home, this is where I will be.

Eyeliner Anyone?

This is my friend Danielle. She came to my house Saturday night to hang out with several of my other friends (it was a mix of three different groups of friends) and announced that she only has a quarter of her eyebrows. I never realized it but she was right! How could I not notice?! I spend hours hiking and talking with this woman and never noticed the missing eyebrows.

You can see for yourself.

Of course my friends are the type to jump right in and "fix" the issue (not that it needs to be fixed). Within minutes Danielle had a new set of eyebrows. (FYI-it was MY eyeliner that was used, yes, I have eyeliner---but no sharpner--I've had this particular eyeliner for over a year) . THe look on Danielle's face as she saw herself in the mirror for the first time with eyebrows was priceless. I've never seen so much suprise on her face (now that I think of it--maybe I have but she never had the eyebrows to show it). She actually screamed and ran out of the room, where all of us gathered and laughed as she said, "Why don't you just connect the two?"

Yes, Another Baby

This is where Sam Matteo's placenta was disposed of. I'm glad the room is labeled. You wouldn't want to walk into that room accidentally. Could cause nightmares. (I knew a lady who made soup from the placenta's of her children. And yes, she would eat it)

Sam was born September 9th via C-section. He weighed 8.15 lbs. When he left the hospital he was down to 8 lbs. Yes, his name is Sam Matteo. Middle name after his father's american name but translated into spanish.

As you can clearly see, Sam's father IS NOT latin american. Nor does his brother Max have any latin american blood.

Just a little FYI, Sam looks EXACTLY like his older brother Maxwell did when he was born. Although Sam has a more clement demeanor than Max did/does.

Welcome to the family St. Matthew. I can't wait to see you in October!!

Palin-Clinton Non Partisan Message

This is a link to see the much talked about Saturday Night Live skit with Tina Fey as Palin and Amy Poehler as Hillary. HILLARIOUS.

http://www.nbc.com/Saturday_Night_Live/video/clips/palin-hillary-open/656281/

September 15th Activity Log

-Drove to Logan at midnight while watching "Jumper" on portable DVD player. (watched it going up Sardine Canyon.....ooooohhhh Dangerous).

-Actually started watching show when realized actor is the bad actor who played Aniken Skywaker, who is dating my favorite actress from The OC, trying to figure out why in the world she would date Darth Vader when she could have Seth Cohen. Idiot.

-Realized that my favorite actress from THe OC is in Jumper.

-Realized the tramp must have cheated on Seth when she was making the movie with Darth.

-Talked about ghost stories in the OR while recovering tissues from donor

-Talked about my obsession with The OC.

-Defended my position that just because I say a girl is beautiful or I'm obsessed with her doesn't mean I am gay.

-Took a 45 minute nap on my office floor

-So tired that when my boss saw me and wanted to know what I was doing I couldn't say one word. Just stared at him.

-Went to Medical Examiner's Office after I was rudely awakened from my nap to work some more.

-Made cookies with my little buddies Chance and Eli while their mom was at work. The dough was good but the cookies were gross.

-Watched Chance and Eli spread as many germs possible from their bodies to the cookies while packing down the brown sugar, licking it off their hands, then packing it some more. (They also tasted the salt and flour...Eli liked the salt.) Tried to show them how to smell vanilla but they would only blow on it.

-Taught Chance how to lick raw-egged-batter off of beaters. Eli wouldn't do it. I think he knows about Salmonella.

The boys TOTALLY know how to dip cookies in milk. One of the cutest things I've ever seen. Also one of the messiest.

-Realized my fourty-five minute nap at 7 am wasn't going to be enough so took an hour nap and woke up realizing I had Sushi dinner plans. (Wasn't babysitting at the time)

-Could not formulate thoughts into coherent words or sentences for 10 minutes.

-Attempted to excuse myself from dinner plans if people were coming I didn't know (Didn't want people I don't know to know what I am like on no sleep...it's personal).

-Was told to get my a#$ out of bed

-Ate half priced sushi at Mikado to my heart's content. Normally I would say half priced seafood is a bad idea. I guess it still is a bad idea. BUT, I'm not sick and I sure the food handler's protector chapter frown upon feeding customers bad fish.

-Dinner conversation revolved around dreams. Dreams to not be shared on-line.

-I made my dinner friends (Dr. McKellar--ER doc extroardinaire and Kathryn Creer--holder of 23 yr swimming relay record at local pool) come to my house for frozen yogurt and peaches. BEST BATCH EVER!

Great sunlight Eh?


-Bedtime: 10:30

James Conley It Is

For those of you who don't know much about my family, I will share a smidgen of information. We are retarded. I guess slow is a better word. Maybe I should say we are slow when it comes to getting married (well, I am slow when it comes to that) and having babies. There are four of us siblings and the youngest is 28 and the oldest is 35. In that time my brothers have collectively added four babies to the fam, and it's pretty much all been done in the last year.

So I give you this disclaimer: At my age you would think I would be over having nephews and nieces, but I feel as excited as the day I was first introduced to silly puddy. IF you tell me to "get over it" I will kill you.

Meet my cute little James. He is really little. Doesn't fit into his skin yet. Has a high pallate. Loves to sleep. And it takes 10 minutes of him stretching like a cat before he will wake up. And he can create some serious pooh. I couldn't get enough of him while visiting in Palo Alto. I held him as much as possible, even when sleeping. So much so that it made the parents worried that I would condition him to sleeping on humans.
He is really smart and already knows how to flip people off. IF you look at the smirk on his face you can tell it was intentional.

This is what I did most of the four days I was there. (while also getting addicted to Million Dollar Listing and Flipping Out. Some of the best shows I've seen since the OC and Jack and Jill...but not quite as good).

We did get to visit Santa Cruz and watch the crazy surfers. Apprently people get killed here because of the danger of the wave smashing you into the cliff. Which wouldn't happen to me because I probably couldn't catch the wave (unless I had a 12 foot board).

My brother is an awesome cook. He made two great meals and it really stressed me out that he knew how to cook and I can only bake. How did he get so good? (all my brothers are great cooks). He even has a smoker and made amazing Lexington pulled pork sandwiches. I gave him accolades and he gave me a piece of information that blew my mind. He said, "When I cook a meal I keep it simple, I have a piece of meat, a veggie and a starch." How profound. I might be able to implement guidelines like that.

No matter what he says, it still takes skill. I attempted making poached eggs one morning and as I dumped the egg on Dan's plate, realizing it was 90% raw, he said, "I'm not eating that." If you can't even get the "meat" dish right, you're gonna have problems. Eggs people. How can you mess up eggs?!

Little Red Riding Hood

The following conversation took place on June 7, 2008. If I had not been a participant in the conversation I would've thought it at least extremely embellished, if not completely fabricated.

"Crap, I forgot water. How am I going to boil the noodles?!"

Me:"Just use water from the river."

"No way. I need pure water."

Me: "If you boil the water it will be pure. It kills anything alive and makes it safe."

"No. I won't do it."

Me:"They say it's safe."

"Who is 'they'?"

Me:"Every person in the world. It's an undisputed fact."

"I won't do it."

I had this conversation camping the night before the Little Red Riding Hood 100 mile race. I only did 64 miles, but that was all I needed.

Because river water is unsafe to boil noodles in, Eli survived off hard boiled eggs and dirt.

We had a great night full of medical malpractice as I poked needles into some sort of cyst on Pam's thumb. I think in this pic she was trying to hold up the hurt thumb but just ended up giving us a thumbs up. And a thumbs up it was.

The next day Pam, Alli and I headed into town for an all women's ride. We met up with Trish who brought her own car support team (Dave Monson). We are all pretty new to cycling, novices if you will. It was overheard during the ride that "these riders don't know the language of the road!" It's true. When someone said, "Left," Alli thought they were saying her name. When somebody said, "Car back" we would just laugh and think the people were strange. I didn't know until an hour into the ride that it meant that there was a car in back of us. Cool.

I met a really cute guy on the ride too! Doesn't get much better than that.

Aaah...good times

I feel like I'm going insanse with posting, I should at least limit myself to one post a day. But I guess since I didn't post for months I'm just catching up. I just really like this video. It makes me laugh. If you listen closely the whole thing is explained in the video.

Summer is about Survival

I feel angry and I want to fight someone. My back is KILLING me cause I got punched and pushed at least a hundred times in soccer tonight. Some blond girl seriously punched my back as if I were a boxing bag.

I also want to kill someone. I do have someone in mind. It was this other girl in soccer who was a dirty player, I only went up against her once and that was enough to invoke "killing chrissy" personality. All I could think the whole game was how much I hated her. This isn't a regular reaction for me but I kind of like how it feels.

This is a pic of my team 4 years ago, I have no pictures of the current team because they never show up. I don't even know who really is on the team. Usually we have a few Mexicans join. Also we have boys on our team.

Hike club is in full swing. It is deffinatley a different year. I am a co-founder and you would think it a position of power and authority. I've held this position for 4 years, I have experience, yet feel no respect. My job has become one of transporting cargo. Which means I'm not allowed to do anything dangerous or fun just because I have a child on my back. And if I do something in the gray area (always gray, I would never go black bc once you do you'll never go back) which to me looks totally white, I am treated like a 5 year old that bit a baby (which I have done before only I was older). I can't coax kids into crawling through pipes, I can't rock climb and I can't look at rattlesnakes. My hands are tied. The only part of me allowed to function naturally is my autonomic nervous system (ANS). Everything else is under strict orders.

The following is a picture of hike club 4 years ago. I have no pictures of the current club, but I will.

Hike Club has risks:

Luckily Danielle has a brain and stopped before the ice bridge gave way and she fell into the river below that dissapeared under the snow for 50 yards.

Timp caves are dangerous as well, I lost my leg.

If you ever hike Timp #1 take something warm for the top #2 don't take short-cuts (ask Danielle and Val) and #3 please look for the rock that went up Danielle's wazoo. She carried it for an hour then carelessy left it after a bathroom break.