I always seem to have the perfect words in my head before I sit down to blog them, but they disappear when I actually, you know, sit down. Isn't that always the way? I need to write them down as soon as I think of them. Or, blog standing up.

The beginning of 2010 has been spent mostly doing what I was doing in late 2009: procrastinating on stuff I know I should be working on (my stories, this blog, just to name two of many), and indulging in way too many books, movies, TV shows, and way too much Internet. And drinking way too much caffeine, which I'm giving up on Monday for at least one month. I'm pretty sure that means I'm allowed to drink every iced chai latte within a ten-mile radius before that time begins, right?

Nothing of serious consequence to write at the moment, but I wanted to get at least one entry in for the month of January. This blog needs a serious jumpstart and/or makeover. Much like myself, ha.

Somewhat related: I got a new pair of glasses recently, and they're super cute. I can't find a picture of them online, but they're black with small white flecks on the front, and flowers on the sides. Besides all that, it's good to be able to see clearly again. According to the doc, my right eye is pretty much the same as a year and a half ago, but my left eye has gone on its own little adventure. How nice for it.

All right, I'm out. Having mostly squandered the first two days of a four-day weekend, I need to go tackle some of my to-do list.

Winter begins two weeks from tomorrow, and Christmas is just a few days after that. How'd all that happen?

I finished my Christmas shopping yesterday, which is a relief, and mailed out my Christmas cards. I actually have the holiday spirit this year... much better than 2008. Today's going to be all about baking cookies: my famous Quigleys, white chocolate-nut, chocolate capuccino... and Oreo snowballs. Chomp. We'll see how many treats aactually make it to somewhere else other than my own mouth.

The little bookstore I love that's never open was open last week, and I picked up some awesomeness:

- Grace Metalious' "Return to Peyton Place." I finished reading this on Friday... it was dirtier than the first one, yet highly unsatisfying. I've already rewritten it in my head, and my version is way better. Sorry, Mrs. M.

- Jacqueline Susann's "Yargo." Okay, JS is one of my all-time faves, but I don't know how I'm going to be able to read this book. Check out the description on the inside cover: The story of a beautiful woman who was kidnapped by the most attractive man she had ever met--a man from outer space. I now can't even look at the book cover without laughing hysterically.

- Jacqueline Susann's "Dolores." Whew, no man from outer space in this one (as far as I can tell.)

- Jackie Collins "Hollywood Wives." I love this book, I believe it's the 2nd JC novel I ever read. My old copy literally got read to pieces, and now it's finally been replaced.

- Jackie Collins "LA Connections." Haven't read it, but it's an older JC... and when it comes to Ms. Collins, older is better. Jeez, I miss my copy of "Sinners." Who the hell let me give that away just because I'd read it 20 times and could recite it from memory?

- Vicki Lewis Thompson "Nerd Gone Wild." I read another one of VLT's nerd books ("Nerd in Shining Armor," or some such) and it was wonderfully smutty. Let's hope this one is too.

It's been quite some time since I've done any writing of my own. That'll be one of my New Year's resolutions for sure. Then again, since I never keep any of those, I should probably rethink that strategy.

Okay, just saw a commercial for 'Excedrin Menstrual Complete.' The box is pink (because, you know, women wouldn't buy it otherwise) and it supposedly contains ingredients that help with cramping, bloating, etc etc. Checking out the Excedrin website, you know what it contains? Aspirin, tylenol and caffeine. Gee, the exact same ingredients (and amounts of said ingredients) as Extra Strength Excedrin, Excedrin Migraine, Excedrin Back and Body, and every other type of Excedrin. Seriously? I'd continue to mock them here, but their product(s) always work for me, so there you go.

I miss the dream journal I used to keep. I'd write in it almost every morning after waking up, and I had it in a separate (non-blog) part of the site, too. I don't remember exactly how, when or why I stopped keeping it... but I do know that I can't remember my dreams as well now that I'm out of habit. Anyway, since I no longer have the separate journal, you're advised to skip the next couple paragraphs if you're not interested in the bizarre workings of my subconscious mind:

I was in an art contest that involved decorating the inset of an old grandfather clock, beneath the clock face at the top. I was responsible for decorating half, and the other half was being worked on by a team of two people (actually one guy, and his assistant who was doing nothing useful). I had a box full of supplies to decorate the clock, but at first only had two colors of papers/fabric to use: pink and blue. I was trying to paste the pre-cut squares into the clock, but was getting frustrated because the glue was too slippery and the squares wouldn't stay where I wanted them to. The other team was going to be putting in an image of the Virgin Mary on their half, but they left and didn't return.

As I kept working and searching in my supplies, I was finding more colors, patterns and textures to use. There were even some thin plastic and glass panes that I could easily snap apart. I also discovered that the project went much easier when I applied the glue directly onto the clock and put the materials on top of it, instead of doing the back of each square. I had so much stuff that soon, I'd covered the entire inset instead of just my half. I'd also put in (without noticing) an upside-down cardboard box that I was going to decorate to look like a building with lots of windows. For each of the "windows," I'd use pictures of people's faces.

Okay, more than enough about that... I have plenty of stuff to write about, but possibly not enough interest in writing it all now. In the meantime: I was at Starbucks last night, and saw/heard the most annoying high school girl totally get her ass handed to her by the cashier. The girl ordered some weird-sounding drink I'd never heard of (a strawberry mocha water?) and the cashier said, "Oh, that's a popular one lately." (Seriously? Because it sounds disgusting.)

The girl went on to brag about how her brother had invented this drink because he'd been trying to find "the absolute cheapest thing" that he could order. (I guess he's never heard of tap water, or making your own coffee at home. Also, way to just admit that your brother is a cheap-ass.) Long story short, the cashier gently pointed out the unlikeliness that the brother had "invented" this drink and the girl got all pouty and said "WELL, WHATEVER." I was sitting near the cash register, and trying so hard not to laugh. Is it weird that I'm happy to be much closer to 30 than I am to 13?

Since my Zune has to charge a bit more before I can get on to my punishment exercise on the treadmill, I guess I don't have a good reason to not keep writing. Speaking of how old I am, I celebrated my 27th birthday a week and a half ago, and what a celebration it was. EC came on a surprise* visit after telling me she couldn't be here this year, and it totally blew my mind. Like, I seriously didn't recognize her for half a second because it was so unexpected.

*It was a surprise to me; apparently, everybody else in the Bay area knew about it. Thanks, guys!

As it always is when we're together, there was much fun in shopping, eating, and just hanging out. No joke, I gained 2 pounds in the five days she was here, and no wonder: we had Chili's, Panera, and Uno's, and the hugemongous meal I put together for a dinner party the night before she left. Fun times, except for when it all had to end. Boo to Arizona for repeatedly taking my best friend away from me.

With my job turning full time in a couple weeks, if not earlier, I've just been trying to get in some good fun and relaxation before then. I got an amazing massage on Friday, and have even more beauty products to obsess over thanks to LS (Lush stuff) and JH (Bath and Body Works giftcard). The only thing about B&BW is that it's hard for me to find stuff there that I don't already have; but I went there on Friday, and managed it. For instance, this amazing new buttered rum-flavored lip gloss that I may end up drinking instead of wearing. Yum.

In continuing my movie streak, my mom and I saw "The Stepfather" on Friday. It wasn't awful, but it wasn't as scary (or as bloody) as I remember the original being. Dylan Walsh was pretty good, and inappropriately attractive, as the evil stepdad, but almost everyone else was so annoying. I'm no fan of Sela Ward, and her character was a complete idiot; Penn Badgley (never heard of him, and I think I'd remember a ridiculous name like that) was just okay; and the needy blond girlfriend never wore pants, which was distracting in a bad way. My verdict: they totally failed to match the awesomeness of the original. But don't most movies? I can't wait to rip apart the remake of "Nightmare on Elm Street" in April.

All right, that's enough. This is generally where I'd promise that I won't let almost a month go by before I blog again, but I very well might let that happen, so, yeah.

So, what's with that new vibrating mascara? Maybe it's me being my usual dunce self about eye makeup (okay, makeup in all forms), but that just sounds like a bad idea. What if it goes haywire and pokes out your eye? I could also go on a big rant here about the inherent sexism of the constant bombardment of ads for useless beauty products for women, but I'd like to be done with this blog entry sometime before the end of this decade, so let's just consider it said.

I'm in the mood to review things, so let's just get right to it:

"The Final Destination" Disgusting, but awesome.

"Sorority Row" Most of the reviews I read for this are pretty negative, which surprised me. It wasn't scary, exactly, but it was a good scary movie - especially when stacked up next to most horror movies released these days. It reminded me a lot of the original "Black Christmas," if that movie had been a TV show done by, say, The CW, because SR so much music in it. Is it just me, or is there always music in the background of movies & TV shows now? It makes my head feel crowded.

"Jennifer's Body" I went to see this with my expectations way too high, and was therefore disappointed. I was basically rewriting it in my head the whole time to make it as awesome as it could (should?) have been. But, I would definitely still have cast Amanda Seyfried and Brandon Flowers Adam Brody. Never would have guessed that Seth Cohen could make me feel uncomfortable. (Also: just read that Brandon Flower's second son was named Gunner. Seriously? Well, it's better than Apple, or Bronx Mowgli. I think.)

"Sons of Anarchy" I hate Henry Rollins. If they could go ahead and kill his character off as quickly as possible, because you know they just have to do it, that would be great. Get rid of Tig while you're at it, because he's still gross.

"The Vampire Diaries" Okay, so picture the remake of "90210," except set in the middle of nowhere, and with two vampire brothers. One of them is a handsome goody two-shoes a la Edward Cullen; the other one has apparently just graduated as Eric Northman's apprentice. I'm loving this show, and not in an ironic way.

"True Blood" Finally, Maryann is gone! (I usually try to not do spoilers, but if you don't know who I mean already, just trust me when you meet her that you'll tire of her quickly.) As for everyone else: Sam is amazing, Tara's annoying (get your shit together, girl), Eric is a jerk that I don't trust one bit, Pam needs to be featured more because she's great, Jason's still dumb, Lafayette's still fabulous, and Sookie and Bill... well, I really don't want to do spoilers, so I won't. But I will say that I pray nightly that HBO decides to begin next season, like, ASAP.

"TruBlood" That is, the drink that you can buy from the HBO store, if you're a fan of the show and therefore inclined to nerd out on it. It's yummy and comes in a heavy red glass bottle that makes it look creepy. Fun!

"Prison Break" I still have the last two episodes of the final season on my DVR, and am unwilling to either watch or delete them. Not because it's so amazing that I'm sad to be done with it, but because the last two seasons were so awful that they cancel out almost all of the awesomeness of the first two seasons. It's painful to watch a show you loved suck so bad. I do approve of Wentworth Miller's recent guest role on this season's opening episode of "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit," though. Good lord, what a hottie. He and Christopher Meloni are only 11 years apart in age, but WM's character made Elliot Stabler look like a geriatric coward who's refusing to give up his badge. I smell yet another superfluous spin-off.

"Epitafios" I just about died of joy when I found out (by pure chance, I might add) that this was coming back for a second season. I haven't sat down to watch it yet, but I know it will be amazing. And if by some chance it isn't, you'll hear my dying screams of anguish from wherever it is you are at the moment it happens.

"The Mist" My mom and I watched this movie a couple nights ago. To sum it up: Storm, weird mist, grocery store, octopi, religious weirdo, pterodactyls (or whatever the plural of that is), religious weirdo recruits other nutties into a grocery store cult, escape of the non-nutties, four bullets for five people, an awful "I really should have waited five more minutes" moment, the end. If you find Thomas Jane attractive, as I do, this movie will be just about tolerable... but still depressing.

"Hung" Speaking of Thomas Jane... I still can't decide whether I like this show, but I've watched the entire first season. Okay, imagine if "Six Feet Under" was only one half hour, and featured a dude with a huge schlong instead of a family with a funeral home - that's kind of what "Hung" is. Everyone is kind of annoying, but in an endearing way, and there's occasional hilarity. If it comes back for another season, I'll probably watch it - OnDemand, though, because it's not so great that I can stay up past my 10:00 Sunday bedtime.

"Nurse Jackie" Exactly how much trouble can one woman get into, and still keep the audience rooting for her to find a way out of it all? My only complaint about this show is that it feels like it should be an hour long. Oh, and Peter Facinelli hasn't been naked (yet?). Otherwise, it's perfect!

Jeez, reading this entry over, it sounds as if all I do is watch TV and go to the movies. Actually not true - I've been watching a lot less TV (I have been going to the movies, but I've made it into a social thing, so there). Still wasting too much time on the computer, though. All machines aside, I really feel like I've seen more of my friends lately, which is obviously a good thing. I've had a really weird year, and I'm glad to be at the end of it with things looking up.

In my brief review of "Halloween 2" last post, I forgot to mention something important: the previews for other movies! Seriously, one of the major reasons I go see horror movies at the theater is so that I can see what else is coming out.

So, previews I saw this time:

"Alice in Wonderland" Not necessarily a horror movie, though it looks creepy. Oh, Johnnny Depp, why did you let them uglify you so? I probably won't catch this one, as I was already semi-traumatized by a live-action TV movie version of AIW I saw as a kid. I was actually talking about that with EC not long ago, and how the part where somebody turned into a goat freaked me out. "I'm pretty sure it's a pig," she said. "Oh, yeah," I said, thinking back to the book and how someone (a baby?) turns into a pig. Goat, pig, whatever, the point is: scary.

"Saw VI" I saw the first "Saw" (there's no non-awkward way to say that, at least not that I've found) and have avoided this line of movies ever since. The older I get, the less I can deal with gore. Plus: If Cary Elwes isn't going to show up again, is there really a point in seeing it? I probably will, though. Ugh.

"Youth in Revolt" Okay, Michael Cera was pretty hilarious on "Arrested Development" (though less so than every other character, IMO), but does he have to star as every geeky teenage boy in every movie that has a geeky teenage boy?

"The Stepfather" Yet another remake, the trailer for this also included a remake of The Cars' "Drive." Whoa, this is all making my brain hurt. The major thing you should know about the original film is that Terry O'Quinn's playing the title character is the reason that, to this day, I can't watch anything with Terry O'Quinn in it. For whatever reason, I often watched this movie when I'd go visit my grandparents, especially on overnight trips... probably not the best idea.





Instead of the traditional teenage heroine that was featured in the original, the remake has a teenage dude as the main character, along with a girlfriend and at least one younger sibling. To me, the whole point of "The Stepfather" was that she was alone in being suspicious of, researching, and trying to reveal her stepdad as the monster he was. From the trailer, it looks like they've made the new one into more of a phallocentric movie a la "Disturbia." And you can't have a successful horror movie without a female lead. Has it ever been done? Correct me if I'm wrong...

Long story short: I'll still give the new "Stepfather" a chance, because it has "Nip/Tuck's" second hottest doctor Dylan Walsh as the stepdad in question. Eep.

Those were all the previews I remember, though I may be missing one. I know there was a preview I wanted to see: the one for "Jennifer's Body." I saw the trailer before seeing "A Perfect Getaway" a few weeks ago, and it looks like fun times. First, it's named after a Hole song; and second, it's got the female lead in Amanda Seyfried ("Big Love"). It also has Megan Fox, who I dislike for no good reason at all. Plus, it had some dialogue that my inner 14-year-old fell in love with: "But you're killing people." "No, I'm killing boys." Ouch.

All right, I'm out. My Sundays are usually lazy, but I think I may go run errands today instead of putting them off until the week, when I actually have other stuff to do. It already feels hot outside, though. Fall and winter, where are you?

I've had a busy week. Among other things, I:

- Had dinner with JH, wherein we caused a scene by fighting over the check. The waiter stepped in and played Rock, Paper, Scissors with her, which ended up with me winning (paying). Ha! Oh, and we ate at Olive Garden, where I haven't been in at least a year, probably longer. I was good and had the apricot chicken with veggies - tasty, but now I wish I'd gotten something loaded with cheese and sauce and carbs. Mmm, calories.

- Sweated it out in the second week of my exerjazz class. I'm really glad I started doing step aerobics again a few months back, or I wouldn't be able to keep up at all (you know, instead of just barely). Thinking about it now, I'm not sure how I ever got through the class the first time I took it seven years ago.

- Made a quiche and took it by my old office for SC's (late) birthday celebration. I love how I can always go there and things will be as if I've never left. Kind of like "Cheers," with (slightly) less booze.

- Went through my closet and tried on a bunch of things I haven't worn since at least May. I'm holding on to some of them, but lots are going to be going on to new homes. Yay for them... in any case, I figure this gave me reason to go look for some new clothes. I went to the Ross in Pittsburg and got three cute tops, AND - prepare yourself - an argyle sweater! It's a bright pink with some orange and tan in it as well. But if this weather keeps up, I'll have to move to another state for it to be cool enough for me to wear it comfortably.

- Which reminds me that I have to go get ready for a walk around the neighborhood, in that elusive time of day when it's not gross-hot but not yet dark.

- Saw "Halloween 2." I like it better than (the remake of) the first one, but I can't pin down exactly why... mostly because I can't remember the first one, probably. Though there's plenty of gore to be seen in H2, the sound effects seemed much more vivid and disgusting. I'm much more sensitive to what I hear than what I see, so I was kind of nauseous at parts. Blech. Other thoughts on the movie: I really like Brad Dourif as the sheriff; and I really, really like Malcolm McDowell as Dr. Loomis... even if he was a total media whore.

- Got 31 books, for free. No kidding; apparently the library does an annual giveaway of books "no longer needed" in their collection. Where have I been every other year? Most of the books I got were novels I've never read before, but look interesting. (As if I don't already have at least a dozen books on my shelf that I've yet to crack open.) I got quite a few YA books, because sometimes I like to be able to finish a book in an hour or less. Some of the standouts (in my mind) from my impressive haul:

Judy Blume's "Starring Sally J. Freedman as Herself" - I scored an old hardcover copy of this, with an unintentionally funny jacket. There's a drawing of Sally with pigtails and a flower tucked in her hair, Rita Hayworth off to the side, and Hitler off to Sally's other side, with an expression on his face like he's about to sneeze. Heh.

Cynthia Voigt's "When She Hollers" - I read this years ago (as in high school) and put it on my Christmas list. My mom thought it was too disturbing, and instead got me Voigt's "Izzy, Willy-Nilly," which is about a high school girl who loses a leg in a car accident. Yeah, that's... also disturbing, thanks Mom.

Phyllis A. Whitney's "The Golden Unicorn" - My grandmother gave me a copy of this maybe two or three years before she died. It's a corny romance, but actually has an interesting heroine and plot. Anyway, when my grandma died and her ashes were buried, I also put the copy of TGU she'd given me her the grave. I don't regret that, but have often wished, "Man, I'd like to read that book again." So when I found it yesterday, I'm sure I had the biggest, dumbest grin on my face.

That elusive time I mentioned in between hotness and darkness is running out, so I've literally got to run out the door now.

I've been putting off blogging for, obviously, about a month or so. At the moment, having to choose between this and a stack of receipts that need to be organized, I'm choosing this. I don't know the reason(s) for my lack of bloggy love (writing, not reading) lately, but, yeah.

Random stuff from my brain:

- While waiting in line at the grocery store every week, I inevitably end up staring at the magazine rack until it's my turn. Well, either that or the candy, and, having no dental insurance at the moment, I prefer to rot my brain rather than my teeth. Anyway; Cosmo occupies the top spot on the left side of the rack, primo place for a (incomprehensibly) popular magazine. The grocery store clearly wants women to buy it, but they block the bottom 75% of the cover with an opaque square of plastic. So, it's okay to sell it, but not to display it? What? My brain hurts.

I will say that I admire Cosmo for always managing to get at least one variation of the word "sex" that shows above the plastic shield thingy. Way to go! Plus, women's magazines are good for one thing: Jezebel's hilarious dissection of story teasers.

- Just last night, I finished reading Rae Lawrence's "Shadow of the Dolls," her take on the sequel to "Valley of the Dolls" that Jacqueline Susann never got to write (or at least complete) before her death. My verdict: Yawn, boring, disappointing, etc. Plus, Lawrence apparently has some kind of vendetta against question marks. Such as, "What does that mean." instead of "What does that mean?" I'm something of a punctuation fascist, and this drove me insane.

- I went bowling on Thursday night, and my game has neither improved nor declined in the time since I took bowling for my PE credits a few years ago. Not much of a story here, but I did: 1) Have fun 2) Eat some garlic fries and 3) Get a pair of socks with the bowling alley's name on them. Apparently, they're included in the price of the game. Cute! Also, because their shoes are sized ridiculously big, I wear a size smaller there. Sweet.

- Disclaimer: Boring dream paragraph. I had a dream last night that I was living in my grandparent's old house, and there was a dead clown in my bed. And I mean a clown, with full makeup and outfit, and there was blood everywhere. Ugh! I was mostly concerned with how long I should wait to call the police, because I'd been watching both a John Wayne Gacy bio and a First 48/Crime 360 type of show before finding the body, and worried that these things would make me seem suspicious. Interpretation: I have issues.

- My computer almost died, but then my dad did a bunch of stuff to it, and it's working great now. Yay Daddy!

- I was at an antique store with my mom last week, and she got me a new owl for my collection. You can screw his head off (that doesn't sound right), and he has a hollow space where he used to hold cream or lotion; something perfume-y, at least.

- I've added "Hung" to the list of shows I watch while on the elliptical, but still can't decide if I like it. Pro: Thomas Jane is hot. Con: No male frontal nudity. Pro: Thomas Jane is hot. Con: All the funniest stuff on the show is always featured in the "next week's episode" preview. Pro: Thomas Jane, and so on.

- They shouldn't make beautiful candles. Candles just end up getting burned, and turn into ugly blobs of wax. Make candles ugly (yet still pleasantly scented), and maybe I'll actually light some. Also, people who lick the frosting off of birthday candles freak me out. I'm always afraid that the fire is going to spontaneously reappear, and burn off their face. As noted above: I have issues.

Okay, I was going to do one blog of all the books I've read lately, but my attention span won't allow. Plus, doing several entries over however-many-days (my guess: several) will make me look much more productive than one long entry. Right?

William Peter Blatty "Legion" - This sorta-sequel to "The Exorcist" takes place several years after the events of the first novel, following Detective Kinderman as he investigates some... unusual crimes. First, a young boy is crucified while delivering newspapers on his daily route, and then a priest is killed while receiving his parishioners' confessions. As if these murders (and the ones that follow) weren't unsettling enough, there are two more points to consider: One, Detective Kinderman knew all of the victims before their deaths; and two, all of the victims are marked with the unpublicized signature of the Gemini Killer, a serial murderer who was shot to death by police years before (though, his body was never recovered).

Though slower to get into than its predecessor - mostly because of Kinderman's complicated thought process and conversations - this book all at once became terrifying and impossible to put down. Like the best murder mysteries, it has more than one viable suspect, the creepiest one being Dr. Vincent Amortas, who's become apathetic to everything (except for an unusual occult hobby) since his young wife's death. In fact, many of the suspects are employees or patients of the psychiatric wing of this same hospital. And one of these patients bears a disturbing resemblance to Damien Karras, the priest who died at the end of "The Exorcist."

This was made into a movie as "The Exorcist III," which I haven't seen yet. According to IMDB, Brad Dourif plays the Gemini Killer (of course!), and either Dr. Amfortas is renamed or not in the film. Boo. While reading it, I was picturing Forest Whitaker in the role, but I guess that's neither here nor there.

In the "real world" (quotation marks due to my thinking fiction books are just as real as... um, reality?):

- My health coverage was extended through the end of January. Sweet! Not as if I particularly like or want to see doctors all the time, but it's just comforting knowing that I could.

- Last night, I went to Qin's for the first but definitely not last time. Though it was tempting to get a ginormous sushi roll (one of my friends ordered one, and I think it was almost bigger than the table), I ended up ordering two pieces of unagi, garlic broccoli, and garlic-lime fries. Hey, there's no such thing as too much garlic. The restaurant is gorgeous, and the food was amazing. I barely made a dent in my mountaion o'fries and brought the rest home for snackage. Chomp.

- I have to talk on the phone at work. A lot. And, having done so over the last few weeks, I've rediscovered something I almost forgot: I don't like talking on the phone, at least not to people I don't know. For one thing, I'm constantly getting people's voicemails and have to leave the same basic message over and over. "This is Yvonne at such and such, calling about blah blah blah. Please call our office at numbers-numbers-numbers." Then my brain falls out, I reinsert it, and go on to the next call.

- My mom and I went to Ross this morning, me being in search of new tops. Usually I find quite a few I like there, but I only got two today. Strangely enough, they're both "nice" tops, and all I wanted were some plain old shirts. And though I wasn't looking for jeans, there was a super-cute pair with blue and pink stitching that I had to get when I realized that they both a) were super-cute and b) fit me. The Clothes Gods are weird and good that way.

- I went to Michael's the other day for the first time in months, and discovered the holy magic that is the Bead Corner. Somehow, I walked out of there before my wallet spontaneously combusted.

- Speaking of spontaneous combustion, I still think there's a lot of weirdness going on with my computer. The blue screens have stopped (for now), but I've had a few problems with startup and shutdown, and I'm pretty sure McAfee has gone evil-insane, as it tries to "update" itself several times a day. If anything seriously wrong goes with my computer, I'm thinking I might just give up and become Amish. I'm pretty sure they'll be okay with me breaking, you know, every single one of their rules and traditions. Or: I'll become Amish and go on permanent rumspringa. Awesome.

So, on the USA's 233nd (or whichever) birthday, I decided that the blog could use a makeover. It's needed one for quite awhile - I was sick of the gray and pink one after about a week - but I had the time today, due to the lack of a "Law and Order" marathon. Somehow, it just doesn't feel like a holiday without one (Sign #622 that I am a couch potato).

Anyway, I've spent today alternating between working on the new design, and reading. I've finished two new (to me) books recently, and I'm already halfway through a third. I'll report on these... eventually. Right now, I'm off to begin the important task of starting dinner: pigs in a blanket, and oven-roasted potatoes and broccoli with cheese. I wish you a yummy Independence Day as well!

I had the weirdest, longest dream last night. Short version: there were government-approved podpeople, and everything on my computer got erased. Boo.

Oh, and that second bit reminds me: I got a blue screen of death the other week! I haven't seen one in quite awhile, and almost pissed my pants.

It was the strangest thing. The day before this happened, I was on a website when I heard some background music start up even though I couldn't see a player on the page. It wasn't exactly a song, or at least one I've ever heard before. There was music, but mostly overlapping conversation fragments that were repeated over and over. One of them was a guy saying, "It's not my decision, but..." and another was a teenage girl saying "Of course there will be no implications (or maybe complications? something with -cations), Mom!" It was kind of freaking me out, but it stopped when I went to a different page on the website, so I forgot about it, until...

The next day, on that website again, I heard the music start! Determined to figure out what, how and why the hell it was, I turned my speakers up... just in time for everything onscreen to go away, the music stopped, and the blue screen appeared. I may have actually screamed out loud, I don't really remember. I turned my computer off, then back on, at which point it turned on normally and has been functioning fine ever since. Whew.

Other scary news:

- As I write this, there's a spider watching me from the ceiling. I've been looking back at him approximately every two seconds to see whether he's moving (hopefully, to a place where I could smash him), but he seems content where he is. Just don't fall on my head or in my water, and we're good.

- "Pet Sematary" and "Pet Sematary 2" are on FearNet's On Demand section right now, and I watched them both last week. It was pretty awesome. I forgot how hilarious PS2 was, especially Zombified Gus. Just my opinion, but there can be nothing wrong about a movie that has L7 on the soundtrack.

- I'm currently reading William Peter Blatty's "Legion," which took me some time to warm up to, but is now a serious contender for Scariest Book Ever award. Possibly even scarier than "The Exorcist," but I'll reserve judgment until the last page is read. I stayed up way later than I should have reading it last night (it's probably what caused my weird dreams), and got hooked again for at least an hour this morning. I'd start reading it again right now, but I'm kind of scared to...

Non-scary book news: I finished one of the June Flaum Singer novels I bought a few weeks ago, "The Markoff Women." It started off great, following the story of a young woman's arranged marriage, then her son's voyage to and assimilation and success in America, and then... the book abruptly stops with what could've been the awesome story of his daughter. Instead, we get to watch her grow up to be a spoiled, social-climbing, anti-Semite (unknowingly hating herself, as her father hid his Jewish heritage since years before she was born) through a couple dozen brief diary entries penned by her father. Boring. All I can say is... JFS, WTF? I prefer to think not that she ran out of steam, but that her publishers told her the book was way too long. To quote JFS' brilliant "The Debutantes": Fuckers!

I'm off to exercise (indoors, it's kind of a thousand degrees outside), but I wanted to end with good news: I got that job I interviewed for and have been working for a couple of weeks. Yay me!