"That's a Dealbreaker!"

A friend of mine told me about a recent date she had been on. I thought these kind of situations only happened in books, movies, and tv shows. I have never heard of anyone I actually knew encountering this particular circumstance.

My friend has been chatting with a guy that comes into her work at least once a week. He's a nice guy and they always talk about movies, news, and other light topics. The other day he asked if she would like to meet up at a coffee shop and then hang out while they ran errands around town. As she was talking to him on their date she found out that he is married and has two children.

But not to worry, he told her they have an unconventional marriage. Apparently, once he reached the age of 30 he was determined to have children. Somehow, he found a woman who was willing to give him a child without all those messy emotions and whatnot. She had the baby and he decided he might as well just marry her. About a year later he decided he wanted another child. So, the two have two children, are married, and live together but don't love each other or even share a room. He mentioned that he explained to his now wife when they got married that he did not love her and never would. He also informed her that he would also not be faithful to her.

By this time my friend was wondering what she had gotten herself into. When the date was finally over, she said goodbye, hopped out of the car, and headed to her own vehicle. As she was walking away, the guy rolls down his window, and (from his car - he didn't even get out) asked, "Hey, don't I get a kiss?" To which she replied, "No."

Needless to say, she will not be hanging out with this man again.

Snowpocalyse!

The weather reports are in and the snow has been falling for the last couple hours.

FINALLY! Central Illinois will get a snowpocalyse the likes of those in New York, DC, and other parts of the east coast! More Info

DANGEROUS ICE ------- HEAVY SNOW

I'm super excited. Here's the forecast...

Issued by The National Weather ServiceLincoln, IL 1:24 pm
CST, Mon., Jan. 31, 2011
... BLIZZARD WARNING IN EFFECT FROM 6 AM TUESDAY TO
NOON CST WEDNESDAY...
THE NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE IN LINCOLN HAS ISSUED A
BLIZZARD WARNING... WHICH IS IN EFFECT FROM 6 AM TUESDAY TO NOON CST WEDNESDAY.
THE WINTER STORM WATCH IS NO LONGER IN EFFECT.
* TIMING... SNOW WILL
INCREASE ACROSS CENTRAL ILLINOIS LATER TUESDAY MORNING AND THEN BECOME HEAVY
TUESDAY AFTERNOON THROUGH TUESDAY NIGHT... THEN DIMINISH WEDNESDAY. SIGNIFICANT
BLOWING SNOW WILL OCCUR TUESDAY AFTERNOON THROUGH WEDNESDAY.
*
ACCUMULATIONS... SNOW ACCUMULATIONS OF 12 TO 18 INCHES ARE EXPECTED...
ESPECIALLY ALONG AND NW OF I-55.
* WINDS... NORTHEAST WINDS OF 25 TO 35 MPH
WITH GUSTS TO 40 MPH WILL OCCUR TUESDAY AFTERNOON AND TUESDAY NIGHT. WINDS WILL
REMAIN STRONG ON WEDNESDAY AS THEY BECOME NORTHWEST.
* IMPACTS... BLIZZARD
CONDITIONS WILL CAUSE EXTREMELY HAZARDOUS TRAVEL TUESDAY AFTERNOON THROUGH
WEDNESDAY... OR LONGER.

Central Illinois - check
NW of I-55 - check

I'm hoping for the 18 inches. BRING IT ON!

PS How pretty (ane exciting!) are these maps!?!

Bucket List

Recently I was thinking about how I've been doing a lot of things in the last couple years, and planning to to things in the future, that I have always said to myself, "I would like to do that in the future." So.... I decided to be a couple years late to the game and make my so called "Bucket List". Hold on to your butts.

The Bucket List

• Visit New York City
• Visit Hollywood/LA
• Travel in Europe (i.e. Paris, London, Rome, Venice...)
• Marry a man who adores me and whom I adore
• Have 3 kids (preferably 2 girls and a boy)
• Always have a cat (so far so good)
• Visit Disney World
• Visit The Wizarding World of Harry Potter (I'm headed there in March!)
• Go skydiving
• See the Pacific Ocean
• See the Atlantic Ocean (Also in March)
• Swim with Dolphins
• Drive a motorcycle
• Visit Japan and/or China
• Visit Washington DC
• Visit every state in the USA (24/50 down)

I know there are things I'm forgetting (especially as I write this at almost 1 AM) but basically, I want to experience life. I want to travel, have a family that always included a cat, and see and do as much as I can. I don't have aspirations to be someone rich and famous but if I can experience as much of life as possible I would be happy. And to be happy would be a pretty good life.

The Mystery of the Time Lapse

A weird thing happened to me a couple of weeks ago and I have no explanation for it. I'm going to tell you the whole story and let you decide because I really have no clue and am slightly disturbed by the whole situation. Obviously, if it's still on my mind a couple weeks later.

On Wednesdays I work at the church office in the morning and at the El Paso Library at 3:00 pm. Usually I work, get lunch, maybe run a few errands, head home for a bit, then go to work in El Paso. The drive between Bloomington and home is 20-25 minutes and the drive from home to El Paso is only about 7 minutes. Easy peasy. No problem.

A couple week ago, I left Bloomington at about 2:15. I took the county roads which still had a bit of slush on them so I had to go a tad slower. The trip home should have taken 30 minutes at the most and I would have been able to go inside, pick up a couple things, and sit for a few minutes before heading into work.

However, when I got home and walked in the door my mom looked up and asked, "Shouldn't you be at work?" I replied, "In a little bit." To which she said, "It's 3:15."

I was a little shocked at this news and obviously rather confused because there is no way that drive should have taken me an hour! NO way! I didn't run into any obstacles other than a bit of slush for a couple of miles and I didn't stop anywhere once I was on my way. I was going the speed limit (or slightly under on the slushy parts) the entire way. So what happened? I lost a half an hour of my life with no explanation of what happened.

And before you say, maybe you looked at the time wrong when you left, I also called the pastor and asked him what time I left and he told me about 1:15 or 1:20 as well.

The situation is really confusing me. Did I get abducted by aliens? Did I hit some kind of time portal? WHAT HAPPENED? Thoughts? Hypotheses?

An Observation

I like working at the reference desk. It's peaceful, unless school is out or we are busy, and the questions are generally easy. And while you have to answer the phone every time, it is usually something easy like, "What time do you close?", "Can you renew my books?", "Do you have such and such movie/book on the shelf?". So, you can usually get a lot of other work done while working the desk.

However, when a patron does come in, you can usually tell which ones to dread. It's that person who is not walking directly to the desk but meandering and taking their sweet time getting to where their going. Sometimes they make eye contact but more often then not they just slowly trudge along observing everything going on around them. The quick, eye contact people generally know what they want and the question can usually be met with a quick answer. But those meanderers.... they have the questions you despise. The ones you try to avoid like, "Can you help me with my resume?", "I need books on an obscure topic, can you help me?", or "What is the value of this stamp?" More often then not the question really means, "I have this project to work on but don't want to put forth any effort. Can you do it for me?"

Ugh... meanderers.

Celebrity Death Watch 2011

Always something to speculate about, some friends and I spent the day thinking up names of people who could/would/might/we'll-see-if-they die from now until Dec 31, 2011.

Come on now, you knew this could be coming. A list about celebrity death predictions? Right up my alley.

So without further ado...

CELEBRITY DEATH WATCH 2011

Dan Ackroyd - 58 (he popped into my head and I thought I'd better just go with my gut)

Chuck Berry - 84

Ray Bradbury - 90 (He's old and a lot of big name authors have been going lately)

Lillian Jackson Braun - 97 (she's really old and I've been thinking she was going to die for the last couple of years)

Jimmy Carter- 86 (he's gotta stop writing books sometime)

Dick Clark - 81 (wouldn't it be ironic if it was on New Years Eve?)

Tim Conway - 77 (from the Carol Burnett Show)

Billy Crystal - 62 (another Dan Ackroyd situation)

Doris Day - 88 (she's old and hasn't been seen for a while)

Kirk Douglas - 94

Michael Douglas - 66 (they say he's better but...)

Roger Ebert - 68 (we all know about his health issues. How much longer will he be with us?)

Queen Elizabeth - 84 (Charles has gotta take over sometime)

Peter Falk - 83

Aretha Franklin - 68

Zsa Zsa Gabor - 93

James Garner - 82 (sad but it could be coming)

Billy Graham - 92

Andy Griffith - 84 (haven't heard much from him lately)

Larry Hagamen - 79 (TV star of Dallas and I Dream of Jeannie)

Russell Johnson - 86 (the Professor from Gilligan's Island)

Kim Jong-il - 69 (He's been ill... haha, I know, bad joke)

Lindsay Lohan - 24 (Getting out of rehab... possible OD in the future. Sad but it sometimes happens)

Rose Marie - 87 (I'm thinking it's going to be soon.)

Penny Marshall - 68 (she has been ill and has cancer)

Taylor Momsen - 17 (that girl's headed for trouble)

Peter O'Toole - 78

Nancy Reagan - 89

Carl Reiner - 88

Keith Richards - 67

Andy Rooney - 91

Taylor Swift - 21 (I'm pretty sure this was just someone's wish but at least it would turn the manic mourners off of Michael Jackson)

Elizabeth Taylor - 78

Amy Winehouse - 27 (I was suprised she was 27. The same age as me! She looks a lot older than that. I guess drugs, alcohol, and life on the road will do that to you. Keith Richards?)

Christmas Break Re-Read

I have been commissioned (for enjoyment, not pay unfortunately) to reread one of my favorite books from yesteryear and bring it to share for the high school book club in January.

The rules are as follows:
1) The book must be at least a chapter book (no picture book cheaters in this crowd).
2) The book must be something you read when you were younger.

Here in lies the problem. For the high schoolers the "read when you were younger" means jr high. For me, what does that constitute? Books read in jr high? High school? College? I'm not sure how to define this.

The high school librarian is doing Little Women which opens up a whole other field of classics that maybe I didn't read when I was younger but were meant to a younger audience.

Here are the titles I've been contemplating...

1) All American Girl - Meg Cabot
By far my favorite Meg Cabot book for it's awesome wit and fun action.
Plot: a girl living in DC instinctively jumps on a would be presidential assassin and gains fame as "The Girl Who Saved The President". Insanity and hilarity ensues as she meets the first family and starts a friendship/maybe more with the first son.

2) Dealing with Dragons - Patricia C. Wrede
The first in a four part series. The third book in the series is the one that got me back into reading in the 6th grade.
Plot: A tomboy princess runs from home when she is told she will be forced to marry a prince she doesn't know. She runs into a dragon (usually feared) and takes a job as a Dragon's Princess (a job one is normally kidnapped for). While learning the ropes she has to ward off knights
trying to "rescue" her and help hysterical princess who actually were taken, she also has to top the plot of an evil wizard.

3) Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
A classic. If I have to tell you the plot I am very ashamed of you.

4)Princess Diaries - Meg Cabot
Meg again but this time the title she is most known for. Another fav from yesteryear (and by yesteryear I mean high school and jr college. Sad but true, I didn't discover her until much later than I should have. This is the first in a twelve part (with extras here and there) series of the
hilarious happens and hijinks of Princess Amelia Mignonette Thermopolis Renaldo, Princess of Genovia.
Plot: Mia is your everyday New York girl who like to blend into the background. Unfortunately, she finds out she is actually the princess of Genova (a tiny country located between France and Spain) of which her father is the current monarch. The book is quite different from the
movie but the main elements are there. Her life is pretty much pathetic since she does not want to be a princess, is clumsy, not that pretty, is terrible at math, has blond triangle hair, a cat that eats her socks, a crush on her best friend's brother, a horrible grandmother who is given
her Princess Lessons and a mother who is now dating her Algebra teacher.

5. Life of Pi by Yann Martel
Not sure this one will count but it has been a favorite of mine since 2005...
Plot: Pi Patel and his family are traveling with animals from their zoo in India to North America to start a new life (The animals are set to go to other zoos). The future is not what was expected however when Pi's boat sinks and he is trapped on a life raft for many days with an injured
zebra, a hyena, an orangutan, and a full grown Bengal Tiger. Soon only Pi and the tiger remain. A story of survival in the face of tragedy.

6. Me: Stories of My Life - Katharine Hepburn
A nonfic, always good to have at least one in the mix, about the life of the incomparable Katharine Hepburn.
Plot: Katharine Hepburn's entire life up until 1991 when the book was written (she died in 2003).


Any other ideas or suggestions appreciated but let me know what you think...