Like Vietnam...

"Before Truth sends her triumphant light into the depths of the heart, imagination catches its rays, and the peaks of humanity will be glowing when humid night still lingers in the valleys."
-- Friedrich Von Schiller
"Heat, ma'am! It was so dreadful here that I found there was nothing left for it but to take off my flesh and sit in my bones."
-- Sydney Smith
"Too hot to go to Church? What about Hell?
-- Anonymous Billboard Author
"It's red hot, mate."
-- Tony Hancock

It's hot... it's damn hot! Can you tell, that I am hot. Where I work during the day, the Einsteins who built the building didn't include air conditioning. We have 3 counter fans and 3 ceiling fans and it doesn't walk the dog!

Today was especially hot here... the humidity is still at 88%! Ack! I thought, at least my evening job has air conditioning. Much to my chagrin, I walked in here and it is HOT... HOT... sticky, icky hot... ooh, I sounded like Pinky there! NARF! The air conditioning is broken. GGRR!!! I have a fan at my back and it is barely wafting the mist that is rising off my glistening skin. As you should know, men sweat, women perspire, but Queens glisten!

Oh, did I tell you that I'm hot?

Well, one good thing that happened this week was that the first volume of Animaniacs and Pinky and the Brain came out.

If you haven't seen these, they are very entertaining. The Prince and I are HUGE Pinky and the Brain fans. We purchased the Animaniacs, since they started on that show as short segments. To keep our collection complete, the purchase needed to be made... at least that is our logic for our fiscal irresponsibility!

Pinky and the Brain is filled with brilliant spoofs of old movies, politics, and pop culture. We are convinced that it was written for adults. It is such a hoot! Watching the episodes are worth it just for the "ponderings". Check the DVDs out! You won't be sorry!

"Well Queen, what are we going to do tomorrow?" ... "Try to stay ice cold baby!"

Stay cool and safe!

Salt Addiction... It's Real... It's Rough... It's ... Damn I Love Salt!

"A man must eat a peck of salt with his friend, before he knows him."
-- Miguel De Cervantes
"Of all the flavors one eats, salt is indispensable..."
-- Chinese proverb
"That's the saltiest thing I ever tasted, and I once ate a big heaping bowl of salt."
-- Fry in Futurama
"I had drawn away into the salt,
myself, a shell
emptied of life."
-- Hilda Doolittle, “The God.”

My name is The Queen of the Land, and I am a saltaholic. They say the first step is admitting your problem. Well... I freely admit it! I embrace! I am a slave to it.

I adore salt. If it were a man, I would marry it. It is something I cannot get enough of.

My doctor has strongly recommended that I watch my salt-intake. Oh, I am watching it alright! Seriously though, I have done a much better job of not using the salt shaker. I have actually been excellent.

I can't, however, have pasta or mashed potatoes with out it. It is just un-American. It truly raises pasta and potatoes to another level of the Nirvana spectrum.

I remember growing up, we used to have pasta with butter and salt all the time. It is one of those special dishes that acts as a palate seducer and a therapist all at once. There is something in that combination. Being raised this way, I prefer to have pasta in this fashion. Don't get me wrong, I love a nice tomato sauce on pasta, but I prefer the naked delicacy that is pasta, salt, and butter.

In the days of yore, pasta to our family was first elbow macaroni and then spaghetti. If we were getting real fancy schmancy, it would be ziti. Woohoo! Now, the Prince Consort are big fans of fussili, tortellini, and linguini. Dammit, we will cook anything!

As an adult, I experienced an awful incident with ziti and from that day, I REFUSE to eat it. To put it in a nutshell... I went to dinner at someone's house and was told we were going to have macaroni and when we showed up, it was ziti. I commented on how we weren't having macaroni, but ziti and everyone looked at me like I had just called the mother of the family a fu**ing whore. I was like, what? Ziti is not macaroni and not one person agreed with me. Of course it was macaroni. I thought my head was going to explode. It was them against me! Close to a coup! Where was Paulie Walnuts when I needed a room taken out???

Utto... I just realized... I am a pasta addict too! Cripes!

Ack, all these vices and I still feel like I am not being naughty!

Back to the salt. I love it, I love it, I love it... but I do know that it is very unhealthy for the blue baby to have. The Dowager Queen is also on a limited salt-intake regime, which is helping.

So, my children, send positive, strong support thoughts my way! Stay cool and safe and don't be seduced by the ever sexy Sodium Spectre...

Leave me alone...

"Romance reading and writing might be seen ... as a collectively elaborated female ritual through which women explore the consequences of their common social condition as the appendages of men and attempt to imagine a more perfect state where all the needs they so intensely feel and accept as given would be adequately addressed."
-- Janice A. Radway

There is a new Nora out. Need I say more?

Food for Thought...

"In my life
Why do I give valuable time
To people who don't care if I live or die?"
-- The Smiths, Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now
"If I hadn't seen such riches
I could live with being poor."
-- James, Sit Down
"You’ve got to search for the hero inside yourself,
Search for the secrets you hide.
Search for the hero inside yourself
Until you find the key to your life."
-- M People, Search for the Hero
"... forgiveness is giving up all hope of having a different past..."
"... then I remembered this basic religious principle that God isn't there to take away our suffering or pain but to fill it with his or her presence..."
-- Anne Lamott, Traveling Mercies

So, I have been in a thoughtful phase. Maybe I am going through some sort of midlife crisis... although, my "Glinda" Nana did live until 101, so I am still quite far from midlife if I go by her standard. BTW, is it just me or does everyone have a "nice" and a "mean" grandmother?

I have been relentlessly listening to a mix CD I made from the songs used in the Manchester Passion and have been reading a non-fiction, which I NEVER DO! Both of these instances have brought some interesting lyrics and author musings my way.

The above lyrics/quotes I found especially interesting and thought provoking. I was going to discuss my interpretations, epiphanies they brought, but then I thought... no. Someone may have a different spin then I did and I wanted people to have a fresh, objective, reading.

I know that these are not complex or Kantian quotes/lyrics, but sometimes the simplest things have the biggest impact.

So enjoy!

BTW... What was Zinedine Zidane thinking? What did Marco Materazzi call him a Frog? Get a grip! What a disgrace and disappointment!

Stay cool and safe!

Okay, so I am easily distracted ...

"Sorry I haven't been around much lately but I'm easily distracted by shiny objects."-- Tick's Brain in The Tick
"Can't you pay attention for more than three seconds?"
-- Kagome in Inuyasha

Hopefully, I have been missed. As you can see, I have not posted for a while. There was a span in April around my birthday that I was on vacation and then I had an plaguelike, malingering illness that literally JUST went away. I still have an occassional cough from it. I kept complaining that it was SARS or consumption, but no one believed me! They will be sorry! Okay, I haven't been to China, but I am as beautiful as this consumption victim!

All of a sudden, I look at the calendar and... ACK! It's already July 6th??? Cripes! I figured I should post something!

Unfortunately, over the past couple of months I have been finding that when I sit down to do a post, my brain goes into overload. There seems to be so much I could discuss or aprise one of...

Do I tell of the joy that I felt at Sheffield United's Promotion to the Premiership?

Do I talk about how the 99 Restaurant is my favorite fast food crack house and I can't get enought of their buffalo tenders?

There's also Manchester Passion to talk about. At Easter, the Passion was done in modern form, live in Manchester, England, using music from Joy Division, The Smiths, New Order, and James to name a few... It was phenomenal and will become an annual thing for the Prince and I to watch.

Or do I ramble on how I am 8 beers into a 50 beer card at the Olde Forge Tavern, which has the most tasty, mesmerizing wings on the planet? BTW... not to worry, I have a year to do the card and you can only do 4 beers at a time... Have I ever mentioned I love beer?

Do I discuss how the Dowager Queen has been rabidly watching the World Cup? We are so proud! Do I dramatize how sad the Prince Consort and I are that England is out of the World Cup or that Alfred E. Rooney was framed by that Nancy Christiano Ronaldo? *SIGH* At least Portugal lost! There is a God!

So much has gone on! Ah... well now I am all tired out! So kiddies ... I am back and will try to be more consistent in my efforts!

Stay cool and safe!