Hacker's Paradise

I've just received a double hacker whammy! Yesterday I tried signing into my Yahoo! Email account but my password didn't work! I tried every variation and I even tried their password retrieval service to no avail. I went on to my Yahoo! profile and lo and behold all my info had been wiped a way and someone left a rather naughty cartoon image with the words "HACK" "A" "Z" on the profile page. AHHH!! So I frantically wrote to Yahoo! pleading for my sanity er... my account back.

Still retaining my naivete, I sauntered over to iTunes ready to buy a coveted song for $1, when lo and behold when I went to make the purchase my debit card was declined. Mon dieu! So, this morning I made a few frantic phone calls (do we see a crazed pattern here?) to my local bank and they said that I was on the list Mastercard had of stolen debit card information! ::faint:: Luckily, my local bank jumped right on it and cancelled my card before any of my hard earned cash was swiped. My poor lovely precious debit card, what shall I do without you... (see Financial Dunce Has Epiphany for details of my love affair with my debit card).

This just validates the fact that I really really really need my vacation. Good thing it starts on Friday!

Dum dum da dum... Dum dum da dum...

I watched "Father of the Bride" (1950) yesterday as I lounged in a heavily air conditioned room as the world outside roasted in the heat and humidity. I was sincerely impressed by this film. Spencer Tracy was absolutely incredible as the flustered father having to deal with the "chaos," a word he repeats throughout the film, of his very young daugther's impending wedding. I loved how realistic it was. The audience gets to see all the ups and downs. It wasn't a complete fiasco but it wasn't a fairy tale either.

Lately, I have been taking notes while watching old movies. It keeps my mind active and I like commenting on things that tickle my fancy. Here are some of the things that caught my attention:

"old-fashioned rigamarole" - Elizabeth Taylor says this. I loved the phrase. Wish I could incorporate it into daily life!

Spencer Tracy says to his wife on their daughter's wedding day "You know, you have no right to look like it this. It isn't fair to the bride" - this made me melt into a puddle of absolute goo!

End shot- Camera zooms out as the father and mother of the bride dance amidst the empty glasses, confetti and other party flotsam and jetsam leftover from the chaotic wedding. Romantic yet very realistic!

Way Cool Flowers

So I’ve moved on a bit from my innocent crush on Bobby Darin, and now I’m swooning over contemporary rock/pop-ers Gerard~Way of My~Chemical~Romance and Brandon~Flowers from The~Killers. But I can’t decide which one I like the best? What’s a girl to do? Brandon’s more classically chic yet there is something really naughty (aka alluring) about Gerard. What a delicious dilemma! If your not familiar with them, Mr.~Flowers is on the left and Mr.~Way is on the right.

VS.

It's Starting...

On All Things Considered, NPR did a segment called Top 100 Lists Shape Modern Culture. And it's the beggining of a germ that is about to spread like wildfire. Backlash of all those really annoying list shows on tv. I like myself a good list and I like reading lists. Especially if they serve a purpose (i.e. inform, organize, relieve stress-> that's a biggie for me). But what does a show like The 40 Most Awesomely Bad Breakup Songs do? Kill brain cells in large quantities. List shows are going down like Disco in the early '80s. Crash and burn!

Burn baby burn, disco inferno!

Scrumptiliumptious!

It is such a pleasure making a favorite recipe from scratch. Taking all those wonderful simple ingredients and putting them together to create something marvelous. And when a particular recipe brings back joyous memories and a sense of connection to your heritage, well then it’s even better. Today I made a classic Portuguese recipe called Carne de Porco a la Antejana, which is a pork and clam dish served with fried potatoes. Being half Portuguese myself, my family would take many trips over the Atlantic to visit relatives in Portugal. And I remember when I was 8 or 9 years old, we ate at this marvelous restaurant in Aveiro right by the beach, and had this dish. I can still remember the décor of the restaurant, the sound of children playing along the beach and the smell of the salty ocean water. So today, I revisited this moment in time by creating this dish. And the best part of it is, making it for those who shared that same experience with you long ago who appreciate it as much as you do.

The dish may sound a bit strange, but it’s really quite delicious. It’s make with seared cubed pork loin in a white wine and tomato sauce and you steam the clams over the dish and cover it with chopped parsley. You serve it with cubed fried potatoes, which absorb the delicious sauce. The best recipe I’ve found is Emeril Lagasse’s. Just note to cut the cooking time in half (2 hours is not necessary trust me!) and cover the pan!, otherwise you’ll have no sauce (just dry paste, which is no good).

Bon Apetite!

20 Really Interesting or Just Plain Strange Things You Didn't Know About Me

1. I conjugate French verbs while I drive to work
2. and listen to NPR on the way back
3. I don't get along very well with people my age, but I get along fabulously with older folks
4. I abhor television but can't stop watching it
5. I speak to my dog in 5 languages: English, Spanish, Portuguese, French and Incomprehensible Gibberish
6. I studied Environmental Science at an Agricultural high school, but graduated college with a Bachelor's in English
7. A notable literary figure once hit on me (shh! my lips are sealed)
8. I am a bonafide mama's girl, if there is such a thing
9. I am militantly against smoking and at the tender age of 5 convinced my dad to quit
10. I gave up refined sugar cold turkey for my hypoglycemia
11. I have a very large collection of Louisa May Alcott books, but haven't read most of them
12. The film Strangers on a Train (1951) creeped me out so much, that I started hyperventilating half way through and had to stop. (I watched the rest of the film a few days later)
13. I have a collection of soil from around the world that I keep in little jars. So far I've only got England and Canada.
14. If I could chose a alternate dream job not necessarily based in reality I would be a costume designer for movies.
15. I dream of getting a PhD and being called Dr. Raquelle
16. I impulsively visit the trivia section of IMDB after watching any and every movie
17. I've never watched Star Wars or Indiana Jones (ducking)
18. I have a physical aversion to Coca-Cola
19. I have watched 22 out of the 29 films that Marilyn Monroe was in, and my goal is to watch them all.
20. I'm happily single but secretly wish I was married

He's a Real-Life Hot Dog with a Cold

It was so excruciatingly HOT!! and humid and muggy yesterday that walking outside felt like waltzing right into a hot oven. My whole family's been feeling the effects of the hot & humid weather we've been having, but none more so than ma pauvre chiot (my poor puppy as I call him). He has his own room (yes it's true, in fact's he's got two mostly all to himself), but only one big fan, which doesn't do this horrid heat any justice. So yesterday I decided to give him a nice cool bath as a treat. You could tell he really enjoyed it. He got very quiet, cracked his famous doggy smile and wagged his tail happily. I dried him off thoroughly and gave him a treat for being so good. But this morning when I wake up all I hear are doggy sneezes, one after the other after the other. Mon dieu! Ma pauvre chiot has got the sniffles! Cute as doggy sneezes are, it worried me. Guess he's more sensitive than I thought.

Financial Dunce has Epiphany

A few months ago, I received some advice from an old friend. He’s a realtor and I told him that after graduate school my next big life goal was to own a home. He told me that if I wanted to take out a mortgage on a house, I need at least 24 months of really good credit history in order to get the best deal on a loan. Well, this made a lot of sense. Two years was a substantial amount of time to show the bank that you are financially responsible. Yet here is the rub for me. I have absolutely, positively no credit history. I abhor credit cards! The thought of owing people money makes me cringe and I just know that being in credit card debt would put me in a perpetual state of anxiety and worry. So what is it that I do when I don’t have the cash on me? I whip out my glorious debit card. Purchasing products or services with my debit card causes me to only buy those things that I can afford as I know that the money I spend will be coming directly from my checking account. Plus!!! (here’s the best part), no bills! So I know all my payments are made on time, because I don’t make them. They are made for me.

But of course, no matter how wonderful debit cards are, they do not give you a credit history. First thing I did, as I was still nervous about getting a credit card, was take out a Federal Perkins Loan (subsidized) for graduate school. Yet, it will not do me a lot of good now, since I won't graduate for 2 or 3 years. So what do I do in the meantime? I apply hesitantly applied for a credit And unbeknownst to me, the financial dunce I am, you need CREDIT to get a CREDIT CARD? I’m sorry but that made no sense to me? So if you need some credit history to get a basic, no frills, credit card, how do people get their very first credit card?

Then it dawned on me. The light switch over my head turned on and shone brightly, angels with huge wings began to sing “Hallelujah,” and I raised my hands to the skies and said “by George I think I’ve got it!” Alright, maybe it wasn’t so dramatic, but for a financial ignoramus, like myself, I was proud to have thought of this. So to answer my question, how do people get their first credit card? The parental units, mayhaps? A loving father or mother may put his or her adorable son or daughter on their account and get them a separate credit card for their own use. And my father, who has the best credit history on the face of the planet, can co-sign a credit card for myself, which I will use, (wisely of course), so I can build a nice credit report of my very own.

I hope this idea works, and that this epiphany doesn’t turn out to be a complete washout. At this point, I can only be optimistic and hope that my dream of a home sweet home all my own isn’t just a castle in the air.

Ma Vie Dans Les Images

This wonderful idea comes to us from Bev of Bev’s Bookshelf. Look up the answer to the following statements on Google’s Image Search and see what wacky and/or cool pictures the internet throws back at you in response! Here are mine. Enjoy!

The place you live:


Your favorite color:



The place you want to get married:



Your first love:



Your favorite vegetable:



Your favorite animal:



The last name of your favorite actor/actress:



One of your favorite songs:



A bad habit of yours:

Incapacitada

That’s my word of the day. “Incapacitada.” Also known as incapacitated, rendue inapte, onbekwaam gemaakt, inabilitante, ανίκανος, 無力にされる, etc. According to Merriam-Webster’s it means “to deprive of capacity or natural power; to disable.” That is exactly what happened to me today. The unpredictable weather in New England proved even more unpredictable when the temperature on this Spring day reached a whopping 93 degrees Fahrenheit!! Yikes! And to think only a week and a half ago it was 45 degrees and raining! And this was the type of dry sweltering heat that renders you useless and lazy. I simply can’t bear such a drastic change in temperature. It’s not even that time of year to put in your air conditioner, but I found myself needing to just to be able to keep from melting away.
So what did I do during this uncomfortably hot weather? I was deliciously idle. I lounged in my blue chair in my light handkercheif (as in material not size) skirt for what seemed like countless hours. In my heat-induced lethargy, I watched 2 or 3 episodes of the new-ish show The 4400.”

Mon dieu! That show gave me the heebie geebies. It’s about these 4,400 people who vanished into thin air, their disappearances ranging from 1948 to 2001 to be returned in 2004 exactly as they were before and with no recollection of what happened to them while they were gone. They return all at once in some weird light bubble thing that lands them on a lake in the mountains. That didn’t really freak me out as much as how they had to adjust to their new lives after so much time was lost. And they each came back with some new power that only made them be ostracized by everyone around them (sounds a bit like X-Men right?). So strange. I had to pull myself out of my listlessness and walk away from the TV cause I was getting weirded out.
Right now the sun is beginning it’s slow descent and the temperature is dropping steadily. And all is well, because I have a wonderful air-conditioned office and quiet office to look forward to tomorrow.

I Heart Bobby Darin

I just recently made the startling revelation that I have a crush on the late-great crooner Bobby Darin. (It’s very innocent I assure you as I highly respect those who have passed on.) My realization of this subconscious infatuation began a few days ago, when I watched my very first Bobby Darin film. It was his second joint venture with cutesy wife Sandra Dee, and that film was called “That Funny Feeling.” It had been at the time “inconceivable” how that title would foreshadow what was to come. Although it may sound “unbelievable,” I had only known Bobby Darin by name. I had absolutely no notion of what he looked like or what songs he was famous for or anything. When I took one look at him, I was instantly captivated! This man had the most amazing smile. Not even a smile, more like a gentle half smirk. In my humble opinion, his lips rival those of legendary lips of Elvis, Gregory Peck, Robert Mitchum or to use a modern example, LL Cool J. And when he cracked that smile, two of the most adorable dimples would appear, making me swoon with delight. I was still a bit disconnected by the fact that I still was unfamiliar with his music. One trip to amazon.com solved that in a jip. I discovered that out of this boyish frame came a manly voice that could blow you away. My jaw dropped as I discovered that he was famous for tunes that I have heard over and over again all through out my life and have enjoyed. Splish Splash (I know it by heart, even the instrumentals), Dream Lover, Mack the Knife and Beyond the Sea are all personal favorites of mine. Yeah sure other people have done renditions of these songs. Even Kevin Kline sang “La Mer”, which is a French version of “Beyond the Sea” for the film “French Kiss.” But there is no mistaking the soulful voice of ::sigh:: Bobby Darin. Now, if you’d be so kind please excuse me while I gush and swoon!

Chet Baker always understands...

Some days I feel like that Chet Baker song, "Everything Happens to Me." Today is one of those days.

I make a date for golf
and you can bet your life it rains
I try to give a party
and the guy upstairs complains
I guess I'll go through life
Just catching colds
and missing trains
Everything Happens to me

I never miss a thing
I've had the measles and the mumps
and everytime I play an ace
my partner always trumps
I guess I'm just a fool
who never looks before he jumps
Everything Happens to me