Probably more than anyone needs to know...

"Happy Easter"
or for the non-religious: "Hoppy Easter"

I haven't said that much this year... Easter has become a non-holiday for me over the past couple years. I feel a little strange about it this year.

Easter used to be one of the major holidays of the year -- I mean, religiously it's one of the highest holy days of the year... and growing up it meant getting all dolled-up for church and an hour-and-half service... and family dinners... and, of course, the non-religious aspects of it: Easter Bunny, hidden eggs, hidden Easter basket, candy, candy, toys, candy, etc.

It was a major day for me every year growing up -- probably second only to Christmas.

And now... now it's just another Sunday. In fact... I just signed off of work. I put in a few hours of work today, and I'm off to NYC this evening, and there's really nothing special about the day.

I saw this coming -- back when I became "too old" to search for hidden Easter eggs. (You know, 20 years-old or so *wink*) And, then when I started not considering organized religion as part of my beliefs, it took yet another dive in the "Holiday Hierarchy".

Today, I could care less about Easter. It means nothing to me... there's not a single Easter egg in the house... not a single bunny... not even a chocolate rabbit to bite the ears off of.

It saddens me a little actually.

I remember how it used to be: how exciting it was looking for the eggs and easter basket; how fun it was to dress-up for church and get "Spring clothes"; how nice it was to see family and eat a huge, scrumptious meal; the joy of seeing the first flowers of Spring.

*sigh*

I got a little Easter surprise from my mom & dad this morning -- a deposit into my bank account of some "candy money" so that I could go out and get Barry and I some Easter candy. I love my mom! :) It made me happy... and, I know if I lived in the same town as them, we'd surely have a basket of candy hand-delivered... and I'd probably even go to church with them...

Final thought: it just makes me wonder what's so special about Easter and why I'm sad... to me I think it means "family" more than anything... and so I'm left with this sadness that my family is not around me, and without them Easter really doesn't mean anything... and I'm left with one less reason to celebrate... one less holiday on my calendar... and I think that's what really saddens me the most: in today's day-and-age, when it's "GO GO GO", any lost day of "fun, family, relaxing, thankfulness, and joy" is a lost day indeed. :(

Have you ever seen a squirrel run out into the road in-front of you... he gets more than halfway across and then sees you coming, panics, and runs back in-front of you.  And you think "Stupid little creature!"

Don't be so quick to judge...  I think we do this sometimes in our own lives.

"Huh?" you ask? ... This happened on my way into work this morning... but after my initial "Stupid little creature, keep going!" scream while braking quickly to avoid him, I asked myself "Why would he do that?!" and think I realized something... 

Perhaps he was turning back to what he "knew" rather than take the chance on the "unknown"... 

I mean, halfway across and suddenly this car comes flying at him.  Panic!  OMG, what do I do?!  Do I turn back and go the way I just came because I know I can make it and I know how far it is and I know it's safe back over there?  OR, do I keep moving forward without truly knowing how much further there is to go and not knowing if the other side of the road is as safe or as good a destination as I hope it is?

Life is like that sometimes.

How often have I been working toward a goal, only to have some conflict come along or hit a stumbling point at which I panic and turn back.  Abandoning my quest to return to what "I know" rather than what "I want".

I'm not saying the other side of the road is always a better destination... but wouldn't it be great to have a "driver's view" of our lives and see if we're more than halfway to our goals or not?  To have the omnipotent knowledge that we're almost there if we just keep going?  

Sometimes what we think is the easier path, truly isn't.  

Alas, the squirrel doesn't understand us when we yell, "Keep going, stupid creature!"  Perhaps there is a voice out there yelling at us too, but we just can't understand... or, aren't we listening?

I've never really been a big fan of Halloween.

As a kid growing up in a rural community, "Trick or Treating" consisted of putting on a costume, piling in the car, and being driven to relatives' houses. Once there, you had to do a song or joke before you'd get a piece of candy... followed by "visiting" and kissing grandma... then piling in the car and driving around more. At the end of the night, all that "work" got you about 10 pieces of candy and a buck or two.

I dreaded it.

Middle-School / High-School years brought some actual trick-or-treating once I was old enough to be allowed to walk around the nearby "town" with our cousin. It was amazing to me to knock on a door and get candy without having to have to do anything for it. There were still a few houses in the neighborhood that wanted the kids to tell a joke or sing a song or something... but not many.

Nowadays, I wonder if the kids even think about having a joke or something? It also irritates me that communities set days and times when the kids can walk around. What ever happened to Halloween Night being "the" night? And kids drive from community to community depending on what nights they each have "scheduled" for "Beggar's Night". *sheez!*

Oh... and the fact that scary movies and gore totally skeeve-me too doesn't help the fact that this is probably my least favorite "major holiday".

A friend at camp this weekend called Halloween a "Gay High-Holy-Day"... why? when did it become that? I don't think I'll ever conform to that theory. Perhaps when I was in high-school I could dress up like a girl and get away with it, and that was probably the best part... but does that really constitute it as a great "gay" day? If anything, it just makes it harder to spot the possibilities. [possible boyfriends, in-case that wasn't clear]

Oh well... I have to give Halloween some credit, as it does fall during my favorite time of the year [Autumn]... but honestly, Thanksgiving wins the title of "Fall Holiday" for me.

---

In other news, I coordinated my work team's "Pumpkin Carving / Decorating" contest and our team tied for first-place in the department. Let me tell you, there were some really great ideas. I think ours won because of how it tied-in a little bit of all our team members... that and the blood (aka shock-value). I'm waiting on a picture of it... but it was a pumpkin with a mean face, and an arm sticking out of it's mouth. The arm was on a bloody keyboard with a mouse eating it's thumb. Then we put things around it to represent the different members of our team.

I didn't dress-up in costume. I almost came in as "Heidi Ho"... It wasn't even that I was afraid of comments or anything... seriously, I think people would have loved it... but in all seriousness, I just didn't want people at work calling me "Heidi" for the rest of my days here. It would be one of those things that people would think was "cute" for years and I would think was "annoying" after ten minutes...

My response to a posting by bearpawly about video games brought up a lot of thoughts / memories / emotions in me...

I never really "got into" video games... I mean, yeah, I played them, but never really had a desire to own them and spend a lot of time on them. This carries through to today -- I have very little desire for a Wii or PS3 or anything like that. At-most, I would want it in the same way I'd want a board game -- something to play in a social situation. So I can't justify the cost of it for a rare party where people might want to play.

Back-in-the-day, I enjoyed tinkering with the text-based "adventure" games... but what intrigued me most about them was not the quest itself, but "how" it was done... the way the computer could "understand English" really captured my interest. So much so that I hacked one down and figured out how it worked and wrote a small one myself to prove (to myself) that I could do it.

The interactive-world games intrigued me too... but I couldn't really get-into them, mainly because I wasn't good at them, and that frustrated me. I'm kinda thankful that I wasn't too good at them and didn't want to spend the time in them... because if I had, I may NEVER have left the computer lab in college. There was this text-based multi-player game back before the World Wide Web became what it is... (back when "email" was "amazing"...) there were three or four people in the computer lab ALL THE TIME and occasionally you would hear one yell out to the other about some fantastic sword or kill he had just done or something like that. I just used to roll my eyes. Who knew that those multi-player games would morph into the graphically intense and exciting "worlds" of today.

They still intrigue me immensely... mainly still about "how they do it"... but, honestly, they also scare me a little. I guess I saw one too many "SciFi" or "Outer-Limits" or "Matrix" type shows where the world sinks into a truly "virtual world" and no one leaves the house or even remembers what human contact is like.

I often wonder what some of the kids today would do without their little handheld GameBoys and fancy games at home... "go outside? see the sun? talk to people?" OMG, what a concept? I wonder if the future president of the United States is out there right now playing "Mortal Kombat" or "Grand Theft Auto" and is she/he thinking that's what life is really like?

OMG... so I wore my "I *heart* Irish Boys" t-shirt to the celtic festival yesterday... what an experience!  It was great... so many people do this double-take when they see it.

I had (at-least) four people take my picture -- two of which I saw them taking with their cell phones (without asking, but I was OK with it)... another one of them, this really cute college-aged(?) guy came up to me and asked if he could take my picture with his friend.  I was a bit uncomfortable, but of-course I said yes.  I was uncomfortable because about five minutes earlier I had this guy come up to me and make a point to read the shirt and then mean-spirited & loudly yell back to his friends, "OMG, it does say 'Boys'... ugh!" whatever asshole.  So anyway, this other guy that wanted to take my picture seemed nice -- assumedly completely straight, but obviously not narrow, or at least good-natured about it.  He introduces me to his friend Shane(?) who was this ADORABLE Irish-looking guy... and said put your arm around him... I have to remember this tomorrow... They were drunk, and good natured about it, and they were cute... I'm such a sucker for a cutie... But what I think I want to remember most about them was as I was walking away from them, they said (without intentions of me hearing I don't think), "That's one brave man" and then they laughed -- but in a really fun way, not a "laugh-at-me" way.  That made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside... and totally counteracted the asshole from a few minutes earlier.  It's interesting how life can do that... 

Anyway... wearing the shirt all day was a blast... I just kept a smile on my face and I think that's what made it OK to so many people... If I was prissy and mean, I bet I could have gotten into a fight or something about it.  But because I just smiled and laughed at it (at myself) it was a really fun time.  I loved just stopping and standing in the crowd while I would wait for my friends (in line for food or beer or something) and watching the people do little double takes or smile or sometimes even point... LOL!  I guess I do have to admit that I like the attention... *sigh* am I an attention whore?  Oh well, so be it... That shirt is definitely being worn again next year!

I do have to admit though that I only really enjoyed it when my friends were around.  When I walked away once to use the porta-pottie, I felt "alone" and a little afraid of "what if"... being in a crowd, or even with just one friend, made me feel comfortable and accepted... but being alone was really a little frightening for me.  And at the end of the night when I was tired and considering walking home alone because I just wanted to go home, I thought about the shirt and the dark alleys I would be walking through to get home, and I reconsidered and decided that I wouldn't.  Sad that I have to feel that way... practical I guess, but sad none-the-less.  Times like that when I wish gay bashing wasn't a reality.  ...  Well, I hope, that my little shirt may have helped "spread the love" a bit around Bethlehem yesterday.

PS: I'm waiting on a picture from my friend of me in the shirt... I'll post when I get it... :) 
 

OK... so wow... I haven't posted (or read) LJ since mid December... and that was just to grumble about the fact that Winterfest was no-more. So really, I've been out of the loop for almost three months now...
Work has been so busy for me since November... and being that the only time I really read/update LJ is during work hours: hence why I've been out of touch... Here's a quick recap of the last three months:

Work: very busy times... creating huge updates / redesigns to my web time/project tracking system... no time to breath really...
We moved to a new building in mid-December. The new place is really nice. Commute increased from 1-mile/5-minutes to 7-miles/20-minutes. *sigh* Oh well... It was "rough" at first... but totally used to it now and seriously, it's nothing to grumble about.

Thanksgiving was nice... my sister hosted and Barry and I helped with cooking and all.

Holiday Party with labelsdc at the start of December was fun.

Got our new living room furniture... HUGE set, but really nice.

Got a real Xmas tree on Dec 9th... Was so nice to go "tree hunting" at the farm and actually saw the tree down myself. Marea and Chris joined me and housemates Ken & Don for the hunt. Marea and Chris also got their tree. It was nice... only thing that would have made it better would have been some snow on the ground and Barry to be there with us.
(Pictures of tree and living room to follow shortly.)

That night, had a good time at Bill & Jerry's annual wine-tasting party. Got snookered. :)

Annual tree-trimming party at Brian's was fun... drink a beer and hang it on the tree. What a great concept... my only concern is: after a few weeks, does the tree start to smell of rotten beer?

Got to visit campground on the 16th... weren't going to do any parties that night, but then decided at last minute to stay at hotel with Ken & Don and go to Pat's Holiday Party. Was fun... drank a lot... The next morning, our drive home wasn't so "fun"... but we made it and recovered over the next two days. :)

Christmas gift shopping went rather well... Barry and I got out several nights and managed to get everything we wanted to get. Spent one evening at Tara's getting some pearls for several of the girls on our lists (family/friends). (I helped her with her website... check it out: Perennial Designs Jewelry.)

Fantasy Football: I lost... darn... so close though... I was doing well, then really bad... then I started to do better... but it was too late... *sigh* Oh well... at least the dinner and cooking part was all done on one night and was rather fun... Todd's new house was really nice and got to play "Wii" as well, which was interesting/fun.

Christmas was very nice... I went to my traditional dinner at Grandmother N's house. That was nice to do... Barry didn't go, as we still aren't technically "out" with that side of the family yet... but I have a feeling that won't be the case for much longer... Barry's been included on my parent's xmas-card-letter for the last two years. And was in the picture they sent to all the family too this year. :) Christmas morning was at my sister's house... she being pregnant (due in March), she didn't want to travel, so all of the family (including my brother) came to her. It was such a nice day: three hours of present opening -- we take turns and really cherish each gift. Took a breakfast intermission to eat "Cheese Strata" that Barry and I made (YUM, new tradition?)... I spent the most of the day putting together my nephew's "Kenex Roller Coaster" -- It was like a big puzzle or like playing with an erector set or legos... FUN!
(Speaking of Christmas Card Letters: Once again I did not send any cards this year... I'm such a slacker... this is the second year in a row without sending any letters... *grrr* I'm so mad at myself... and yet, have I done anything to correct the situation? no... *sigh*)

New Years: Barry and I went to spend the weekend with Frank & David (our neighbors at The Woods). It was such a fun weekend. They hosted us in their beautiful house in NJ. They drove us into New York on Saturday evening... we drove around in their convertible (through China Town and Little Italy, top-down, freezing weather, bundled-up in blankets and earmuffs, playing loud music, people looking at us like we were a bunch of fags out on the town... which we totally were... it was so much fun!)... then we walked around the village and had some drinks... the two of them are very familiar with the gay bars and places to go/see in the city, so I felt very comfortable and it was SO NICE to be in the city again. (Oh how I've missed the city...) We went to see "Drowsy Chaperone" on Broadway and had front-row mezz seats... it was AWESOME! Then went back to the village to hang out and drink until wee-hours of the morning... and flirt with a bunch of cuties...
Sunday (New Years Eve), we slept in and then helped them prepare for their dinner party that night... they hosted a "murder mystery" party. I was "Mary Kay Eternity" -- in drag, I was the wife of Barry (who played "Jim Bob Eternity") -- we were a TV-evangelist-couple from the south (think Tammy Fae Baker)... very fun... wonderful dinner and lots of champagne...
The following day we recovered from our hangovers and just lounged around.
(Pictures of this also to follow soon...)

January was pretty uneventful... just lots of work, rolling out my system changes to the department, including training all 140 associates in the enhancements.

Barry and I got an SUV (replacing his car) on Jan 24... We got a Toyota FJ Cruiser. It's SO awesome... We totally love it. 4WD and high-clearance... it's going to be so cool to have for the summer going up to camp... and for the winter snow... and just in general it's so cool... :)

Last week (Jan 27 - Feb 3), Barry and I went to Breckenridge, Colorado with a big skiing group. Being that I've always wanted to go skiing out-West... when Matt and Tara suggested that we go with this group that they have gone with a couple times in the past, I jumped at the chance. Barry was looking forward to just getting-away for the week even though he doesn't ski, he figured he could sit in the condo by the fire and relax. It was a great week away from things and I got some good skiing in. At first I was disappointed at the conditions, but then we got about a foot of snow on Wednesday and we went to Vail that day... it was the most amazing riding I've ever done (I'm a snowboarder)... That's what I went out-west expecting. It was great. Barry hurt his knee on the first day, which made it difficult for him to enjoy his time, but we managed to go out around the town one day and go out to eat a couple times. He also cooked a big spaghetti dinner for a group of 10 of us the one night. All-in-all it was a fun time. I'm not sure if I would go out-West for skiing again and may just stick to Vermont for my "big snow"... but who knows... perhaps another ski trip is in my future.

Back to work today... and it's actually been a rather slow day... I caught up on my emails, and thankfully nothing pressing or urgent came-up while I was away. Nothing was planned for today so that I could use the day to catch-up... so I actually had some time to post this. YEAH!

One final note: Barry left his job this afternoon... they really dicked him over -- for the last time! I'm so glad he walked... They gave him a bad annual review... and he works SO DAMN hard for them... they had no right to do that. He stood his ground and told them it was unacceptable to get that kind of rating. They really dicked him over about a raise and promotion several months ago... and things have been going so bad for him there since then... and I've told him several times that the stress of that place isn't worth it... But he kept giving them his best and giving them more chances... today was the final straw, and I'm glad he stood his ground... it's the principle of the whole thing... he handed them an immediate resignation and walked out. On one hand, yes, I'm nervous... with only one salary we're going to have to tighten our belts a little and live a bit less extravagantly... but on the other hand, I'm really happy because perhaps it's a blessing in disguise... A chance for him to start new and fresh somewhere and not have this horrible stress that place was giving him. And also... haven't you always wanted to say "take this job and shove it"? Imagine: he actually got to do that today. *cool*

So that's a wrap-up of the last three months... ending on a pretty big note...
Over the next couple days I'll catch-up on some of my LJ friend's journals... so don't be surprised if you get a response to a post from months ago. :)
*hugs everyone*

OK... so I know I'm way behind on news... but I just found out yesterday that Steve Irwin (Crocodile Hunter) died!! And was stabbed in the chest by a stingray.
Link to WikiNews Article

So to all those out there who have made fun of my intense fear of stingrays... all I have to say is: I told you so! And, I will never, ever even consider "swimming with the rays"... ever...

I don't know why... but this news made me very sad.

*phew* ... What a weekend...

Barry & I took off Friday and Monday which made for a really long weekend -- basically 6 days at camp... I feel so strange being back at work... it was quite a weekend...

( Cut because it's a bit long and rambling... )

So that's about it... theater, drama, fun, drinking, eating, sweating, swimming, insecurity, depression... that about sums it up.

God that sounded worse than I really think it is... feels good to let it out I guess...

That little red-headed chick -- Wendy -- serves up a mean hamburger, fries, soda, and frosty...

So, I'm not sure if it's just because I haven't had Wendy's in ages or what... but I just had an almost orgasmic experience with a frosty and some fries. *Yummmmmmy*

There's something about Wendy's that brings up all kinds of memories of High School... we had one next-door to our high school and used to hang-out there after school. That's where I first dipped a fry into my frosty and found out how good salt, potatoes, and chocolate icy go together. (Hey, don't squint your nose up at me if you haven't tried it.) It's also where I learned to play the "strute" (a straw-flute). I laughed so hard soda came out my nose. I imitated a teacher I hated and fell backwards in my chair, legs-in-the-air... friends laughing so hard that soda came out their noses. Got my favorite music teacher more than one "Biggie Ice Tea"... she was almost never seen without one.

Ahhh... good times... good times...

---

As I was on my way to lunch, saw a "Safety Checkpoint"... nearly broke my neck checking out the cops... Holy crap Bethlehem has some HOT officers.

On my way to work, I just had to go out of my way to go through the checkpoint. When the cop told me to stop, and handed me the card, and smiled and said, "We're just checking to make sure everyone is wearing their seat-belts today sir. Thanks." I nearly melted... Good lord... I wanted to go around the block just to go through again.