My Ovaries Are Aching...

Nothing like some adorable baby pics to make me feel really old...

Here's my baby cousin's baby girl (Argh! Just typing that makes my brain hurt! I feel an urgent need to wear knee-hi stockings rolled down to my ankles & yell at the neighbor kids to get out of my yard). This was taken at the county fair, where she won a blue ribbon in the Baby Contest (Prettiest Girl 14-18 months). To which I say, was there ever a doubt?


Isn't she just too cute?!

Mingling amongst the crowd at the contest was this little peanut, only a few days old. And - as if I didn't already feel geriatric enough - this is where I'm obliged to point out that he is my cousin's baby's baby. (Slightly older cousin this time, but still...):


Like I said - adorable.

It's a good thing these kids are so damn cute. Otherwise, I might have to resent them a little for emphasizing my decrepitude...

Nah. Can't do it. They've weakened my defenses with their cuteness. *sigh!* I guess I'll just have to be madly in love with them. :)

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Now playing: Kim Ferron - Nothing But You
via FoxyTunes

Is It Just Me, Or...

Is anybody else missing Rachel Maddow?

Don't get me wrong - I'm very happy to have my Keith back from his summer vacation. Countdown is and always will be his show, and nobody does it better.

But somebody needs to give Rachel her own TV show, for crying out loud! I've been a fan of her radio program for years, so I'm not surprised that she did such a good job guest-hosting for the past 2 weeks on Countdown. I know she'll still pop up as a regular commentator on MSNBC, but I'm sorry - that's just not good enough.

Until this egregious error is remedied, I'll have to make do with some of my favorite video clips from the guest-hosting stint. This one is doubly good because it also features comic genius Michael Ian Black (who will unfortunately always be known to my husband only as Johnny Blue Jeans):





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Now playing: Jet - Move On
via FoxyTunes

Better. Faster. Keith-ier.

Okay, so we all know I stole that line from the Countdown commercials, but it was just too perfect for my needs. But first, I feel the need to backtrack a bit...

If you've dropped by this blog at any point over the past 3 or 4 months, you will probably have noticed the lack of posts and updates. I could give any number of excuses, not the least of which being my grandfather's grave illness (he passed away on April 17th) and all the family drama which ensued, but the heart of the matter is that I just wasn't feeling very bloggy. I'm sure the problem wasn't helped by my fibromyalgia, which is always exacerbated by any kind of stress - and the stress that a death in the family brings is an especially potent type indeed. But the truth is that I have felt relatively well for quite some time now... I just didn't have it in me until now to get back on the blogging horse, so to speak.

So, please accept my genuine apologies for my sudden and prolonged absence. I will endeavor over the next few days to catch you all up on what has been going on around here... I'm sure something has been happening, but for the moment I'm at a bit of a loss. Well, I guess there is one exception...

My trusty laptop Keith has been struggling for quite some time with the many burdens of living with me - such as my constant, unreasonable requests to run applications that required Windows XP even though he was very clear at the start of our relationship that he could only provide me with Windows 2000. Ultimately, we made a mutual decision to part ways, although we will always remain close. After much deliberation, he has been put out to pasture as a 24/7 conduit to my bulky external hard drive. It's a low-stress position, but still a vital role in my computing life. He seems to be fitting in well.

All this is to explain the presence of my fancy new laptop, which has been duly dubbed Keith 2.0 (I hope this doesn't lead to any resentment issues within the network...). As the title indicated, he is indeed better, faster and Keith-ier than my first love. On top of running Windows XP Pro, he also includes some fancier hardware, such as the built-in DVD-RW (yay!). We're still getting to know each other, of course, but I predict a long, beautiful partnership in our future. He has already helped me to tweak my blog layouts and to backup a lot of my data. And I'm sure that it is in no small part due to his inspiration that, at long last, I finally find myself feeling bloggy again.