Happy New Year!

This year in news...

Talking and hand gestures



Smiles


Wine


Fire

The day I learned contentment

The day I learned what contentment is I thought about it and it was gone.
The day I learned what contentment is I felt it glisten,
I thought
and it was gone.
A warmth in my heart slowly imbuing throughout my body...
This feels amazing!
How did it happen?
How do I make it stay?
Will I feel it again?
Hold.
On.
To.
It.

Thoughts.

And then it was gone.

Another Blaine?

Instantly, I am overwhelmed with hatred for this boor who bears my name. "It's my name!" I shout at the top of my lungs, in public. I stomp my feet, gnash my teeth; I am ready to battle this 7 year old phony!

And then, my heart opens to this young him or her. A little artist who paints stain glass window designs on cardboard. How proud I am of you, Blaine age 7. You may wear my name.

Perhaps he or she has a little piece of me at age 7. Maybe one day we will become great friends.

So nice

How stellar it is to sit and relax and read in a warm house with snow outside on the ground.

Snow and Christmas

It couldn't have been a better past few days. We ate, drank and Christmased with the best of them. Whoever "them" is in that saying.

We started out with the Roberts family on Christmas eve. There was an obscene amount of food consumed and mimosas all around. It was the biggest Christmas of all- 13 people!! And if the amount of food, folks and merriment are any indication of the amount of presents, you can be sure that Santa treated everyone quite well.



Christmas day began with our annual christmas morning yoga class with Ti. It is the absolute best part of Christmas in my opinion; yoga, warm people, good energy and a christmas meditation.




The rest of Christmas day was spent in my childhood home with mama Barbee and uncle David. The food was delicious and I now know why I was chubby child- like Julia Child, Dena Barbee is not afraid of butter and it makes for some damn good food. We ate, presented, talked and ate. And little Blaine was even channeled in some sugar cookie decorating, which were neighborly taken to the Burmese neighbors who are Buddhist but have an affinity for Christmas tree shaped cookies and sprinkles.

Later we Black Swaned- and WOAH...I'll have to talk about that later.

Then came the snow...





Snow Blaine





Snow dance





Snow hike






Snow baby





Snow man ( I can't take credit for this one. It was sent from Jess)





Snow snuggle



It's been a great holiday weekend. It's only too bad that there isn't any school to be canceled on account of all this snow.

Muppets!

I've always really loved muppets. They are wonderful creatures with shining personalities. It is my 2011 goal to watch all muppet movies.

2011 is going to be a great year.

Reassure me!

Hey, it's completely ok to cultivate a look entirely comprised of sweats during my vacation, right?

A Compelling Story

For me to deem a film a "good one", it has to do one simple thing:
make me feel something. Usually this is done through great actors telling a compelling story. 127 Hours is the perfect example of this being done, and being done oh-so-well.
127 Hours is the true story of outdoorsy guy, Aron Ralston, getting trapped in a canyon by a giant boulder. As he was climbing, he slipped, fell, and a boulder came after him, bracing it's fall with his arm. For the next 127 hours, or 105 minutes in movie world, he is stuck. Eventually, he must break his own arm and saw through it using his dull multi-tool to escape. Only to be faced with an 8 hour hike/climb before he is spotted by a family who gives him food and water.
One can only imagine what it must be like to go through this, and being put in this position, where you must imagine what this like, is one of the most poignant aspects of the film.



James Franco is amazing, and should be recognized, a lot. Like, in all ways that actors can be recognized. He was so real and subtle. And after reading the article by Ralston himself, in this months Outdoor magazine, I am convinced!



James Franco and Aron Ralston



So, pretty much... Go see it. I know it might be hard. There's a lot of "great" films coming out this month (Black Swan, Blue Valentine, The Fighter, The Tourist). But, as far as getting back something from a film, this one delivers. It will make you feel something.

Comfort in knowing

It's good to know you can still get unisex hairstyles and cuts somewhere out there.


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Salsa Pants: A funny story

After my last post, I got to thinking about my old friend, Kristin. I've been reminiscing and rehashing old funny stories and good times together. An especially funny tale comes from the days of middle school, 6th grade, I believe.

Kristin's mom would often come and pick me up and drive us both to school on Fridays. These were special days as Kristin and I relished the idea of getting to arrive to school together. To make these days even more special, her mom would sometimes buy us breakfast burritos, one of Kristin's favorite breakfast items at the time.

Now, on one particular friday, Kristin has just been shopping at Limited Too. A moment on Limited Too- If you are a girl my age, you know that Limited Too was the place to buy your clothes. Purple pants, body suits, the logo sweatshirts, blossom hats, etc... So on this day Kristin was wearing her brand new Limited Too white jeans and shoulder-less purple plaid bodysuit. Just picture it.

So, Kristin's mom is driving us to school on this Friday and she bought us some breakfast burritos. And naturally, what goes great with breakfast burritos? Salsa, of course.

You can probably imagine what happened. I am putting salsa on my burrito, and next thing I know salsa has squirted from the salsa packet onto Kristin's sparkling white denim.

Hi-lar-i-ous!

Kristin freaked out, I felt terrible, and a funny story was born. I can't remember exactly, but I do think she spent the day at school like that. And, I squirted a little salsa on my pants to make her feel better.

Funny. Or...Maybe you had to be there?

Decorations

One of my happiest Christmas memories is driving around at Christmas time with my childhood bestie, Kristin. We would listen to the Mariah Carey Christmas CD, sing at the top of our lungs and laugh so hard as our stomachs felt that they would burst from all the candy we had eaten. Her mom would drive us around to see Christmas decorations. I can still envision what her mom's car looked like and what it felt like to sit in the back seat. It was just plain old fun. The lights were magical, although we were probably way more excited by the subsequent sleepover.

Now, as an adult, I think about how much work it must be to decorate the house. I just don't see myself as a decorate-the-house-with-lots-of-lights kind of person. But one can still enjoy the lights and the nostalgia. And that's what we did. Last night, Jason and I enjoyed some Christmas lights. Sans Mariah Carey, unfortunately.

Charlie Brown

awesomeness

The Last Day of School Before Christmas Vacation.
Awesome Hats.
Holiday Sing Along.
Classroom Party Hopping.
Way Too Much Food.



Did I mention the awesome hats that we made?

Holiday Themed Yoga

For all of your holiday theme needs, try this:

Dancer Pose. Because everybody likes to dance during the holidays.
Child Pose. Be Baby Jesus.
Happy Baby Pose. Be a happy Baby Jesus.
Camel Pose. I believe Jesus rode a camel at some point.

Tree Pose. Be the Christmas tree.

Vomit Hand: A true poem about what happened to me today

Vomit on my hand, vomit on my hand
We were supposed to be testing, but I got vomit on my hand

Many math problems is what she was to do, but a grumble in her tummy caused her to
SPEW
pink chunks of pancake on a stick, government sausage sadly on the library floor.
My poor, poor student, unable to test anymore

Grossed out as I was, I tried to be kind
But evil infecting germs were dancing through my mind

As the test fell to the floor, I heard her stomach roar as more barf began to pour
onto my hand
and my poor, poor student ran towards the door.

Drip.
Gross.

I ran to the bathroom to scrub as fast as I could
leaving my other students standing where they stood
their shrieks and cries echoed through the halls
their moans and groans bouncing off the walls
were no match for the vomit on my hand

Vomit on my hand, vomit on my hand
I hope I don't get sick from the vomit on my hand

Love and Robots

A Robot Creation Myth




A mad scientist creates a robot and then dies just before he is able to put the robot's heart in. The scientist's monkey sidekick saves the day and drops the magical robot heart into his hollow metal chest.

The robot comes to life, full of love and ambition for his robot life. His eyes light up and he dances around to some funk jams.

The robot then proceeds to go around trying to make friends. He is cast out and turned away by humans wherever he goes. Fueled by his scorn and rejection, our robot protagonist then becomes a robot-rights activist, only to be sucked up by big brother robot government folk into a space ship and taken to trial for insurrection and rebel rousing.

He is found guilty and sentenced to memory erasure and life on a farming planet, where he must farm the "garbage" that the humans eat. But, on this farming planet the robot meets some outcast rogue robots who have started their own organic, self-sustainable farm.
Again, there is awesome robot dancing.

My favorite robot is pictured here. He had a gas pump for a hand and would fill up his friends and dance around. So Awesome! He was also the best dancer of the farmer robots.
The protagonist robot then falls in love with the girl robot, who awakens his memories and inspires him to return to Earth to save the other robots there who are now involved in a crazy world war (humans vs. robots). With his love and faith he is able to save the world for robots to live in peace.

Again, more robot dancing.

I LOVE LOVE LOVE Paperhand's new puppet show. In spite of the rain and gloom, my Saturday night was truly inspired. We were filled with love and, yes, robots too.

Silver

Edie got a new silver boot for Christmas! She loves it!

The work party

Tonight is the staff Christmas party. I don't want to go but I am going anyway. There's something weird about standing around drinking and talking to people that you really barely know. I mean, I know how loudly you can yell at kids, or how fast you scuttlebutt down the hallway, or how savy you are with the copy machine. But, how much fun will we have talking about not school things? We shall see...

Hopefully, there will be some antics to keep things interesting. Just in case, I have been googling Christmas pranks and preparing a list.

1. Put the cookies on the toilet seat?

2. Gift wrap the entire party?

3. Dress up as Santa and flash the whole party?

4. Or maybe just steal the entire party and take it back to my lair?




Hmmm...Surprisingly enough, there are not very many interesting Christmas pranks out there. I'll have to think of something by tonight.

Pastry child

Cheese Danish, anyone?


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