why don't you know???

So, where have you been? what in the heck do I have to do to let you know I have started another blog....didn't I mention it? didn't i put it on my sidebar and say "look it" I thought I tweeted about it? i thought you were listening????

For all those who don't know.... I have started another blog..... it's not a mommy/family blog, more of a me, me, me and more me blog. Just the wee secret stuff that you think of when you're growing older, fatter and none the wiser!!!

Just so you know.. it's perfectly legal to follow Ramblings and Pink Clock at the same time, I won't be posting as often on LPC but I'll try to do something very worthwhile at least two or three times a week so check back now and again.

It's not hiding, it's not a secret, you don't need a code or a handshake or anything and comments are highly encouraged...sought after....demanded in fact!!!! So come on, don't be shy, lets see you over at Little Pink Clock, read, participate and leave, nothin' to it my sweet!

this has nothing to do with anything, it just makes me smile!! hee hee.

When you just know.... .

When people find out that I am not a true Southern Belle but a little impostor from across the pond there's always the same question.... what brings you to South Georgia???? Well there is one good answer to that one.... a good lookin' American with enough charm to make me follow him to the ends of the earth.

I know I have quickly mentioned our meeting and the joining of man and woman in Holy matrimony in previous blogs but I haven't given you the complete unabridged version.... and this still isn't the complete unabridged version, for a couple of reasons, one being I have too many friends and family reading the blog as well as hubby told a member of our Church staff about it and I think he's stopping by now and again!!!

So....it was a beautiful day in sunny Salisbury, Wiltshire and Ali is just talking on the company phone as usual when her lovely friend Lisa calls to nonchalantly ask if she can attend Lisa's honeymoon in Majorca, yes that's right, "Ali, my friend, can you come on honeymoon with me, my fiance has ditched me and the holiday's already paid for, just bring some drinkin' money and we'll have a right knees up!"....."fantastic" said Ali, "I don't have anything going on in May and would love to spend two weeks getting drunk and behaving badly on a Spanish Island with you Lisa, my BFF, beats being a bridesmaid!".

Off they go, back in the days when it was ok to smoke on the plane in coach... urchh... and more urcchhh back in the days when Ali was a smoker but it still made her bleeuucchhhh to smoke on the plane. Fourteen days of sun, sand and sangria.... but what's that... a few days into the holiday word on the island is there's a ship bigger than Palma Nova and it's full of randy young AMERICAN's... visions of Top Gun danced in the girls' heads! Not really, they thought "OMG six thousand of those arrogant, big mouthed yanks spoiling our Brit holiday, not freakin' likely!!! "

Then one night while they were having a great time in a bar called the Underground (as in the Tube) it happened, his gorgeousness walks up and asks Ali, "would you care to dance with me fair maiden", "oh alright then, if you insist" replies Ali all cool and British like. So off they go, and before they get to the dance floor he turns around and properly introduces himself, "I'm Steve" and he shook her hand very politely. "Blimey, this blokes really polite, and gorgeous" she thinks.

So they dance the night away, let Lisa go home alone (wtf was that about, what kind of a friend is Ali anyway) and then they walked to the water front and sat on the beach all night talking until the sun came up. He lied about his age, she didn't.... he lied about visiting England... she didn't. Ali later found out that the little white fibs he told were all in an effort to impress her...forgiven!

The next day Lisa and Ali met Steve for lunch and took a tour of the USS George Washington.. very impressive...Lisa made the comment as they sailed to the boat that it looked like something out of a James Bond Movie... yes you had to sail to the ship to get aboard!!! Woo. The couple spent another day or two getting to know each other in Spain and all too quickly the US Navy had Mr Gorgeous back on the open seas heading to other parts of the Mediterranean, Ali reluctantly returned to Sunny Salisbury.

Love knows no boundaries, they stayed in touch by phone and letter, growing more and more fond of each other as the days passed. Then, what's this, he was to have some time off around July 4th when the ship would be docked in Cannes, France. OK said young Ali, never one to let miles stand in the way of true love, she promptly booked a room in Paris, booked herself a flight from London to Paris (why the heck didn't she take the train? Charles De Gaulle is worse than a hernia!!!). Leaving no detail undone, the young lovestruck maiden called her beau and gave him step by step instructions on how to take a train from Cannes to Paris and how to get to the hotel. (she's pretty cool like that). All the time she was sure he wasn't an axe murderer but you never know so she contacted Patricia her very good friend in Paris and made sure that Patricia knew the details of her little romantic getaway, that way if things went pear shaped Ali had someone to turn to. (again,she's pretty cool like that).

So after five days of wonderfulness in Paris, sightseeing, drinking wine, dining in lovely french cafe's and restaurants, wandering around the Louvre, ascending the Eiffel Tower, blah blah blah, the couple knew Cupid had done his thing. Steve returned to his ship, she returned to England and so it went on.... a fairy tale romance... both knew they would be married when Uncle Sam though fit to issue a Visa and they would live happily ever after. With a little help from their friends (IE: parents with sky miles) they courted long distance (trans-Atlantic to be exact) and eventually the blessed day arrived when they said "I will" in the Hunt County Courthouse in the great State of Texas.

Ali moved to the States to be with her wonderful Sailor boy and dedicated her life to being the perfect wife and homemaker, Steve said goodbye to the US Navy and hello toTexas and a career with Raytheon using his skills in avionics to provide a home for his new bride. Those were the Dallas days, two young lovers with nothing but a wonderful future together to look forward to ... crazy fools!!!! After a couple of years his career took him to Georgia where the young newly weds made a home and soon started a family, another brief move to Tallahassee, FL and then to Thomasville GA where they laid down their bags and called it home. "Mmmm, I like it here, do you darling?" asked Ali one day, "I sure do, my sweet" replied the still dashing Steve and that was it, home it was and home it remains to this day.

And so my friends, when you meet someone from the next town and worry that it wouldn't work because of the distance just take a look at these kids.... love will conquer everything...miles and all!!!!! Don't be afraid, just listen to your heart and if the guy doesn't go along with it... he's just not that into you, move on.

This outpouring of nostalgia was inspired by the beautiful photographs at Spudballoo, she captured all the romance and chic, and even cheek of Paris ... many thanks my little Spud, I totally heart you! I think everyone knows that by now!

I have arrived... safe and sound.....

Look what I found in my "real house" mailbox last night......

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

How fantastic to get a little pick me up from across the pond!

Thank you NBF Spud, my heart sang at the absolute cuteness of your creations!

What a beautiful, magnificent world we live in when you can become

friends across a virtual blogoshere and make people happy with

pictures and some lovely words!!!!!!

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Merci bien, thanks, mucho gracias.

Confusion Reigns.....

OK obviously when you're a bear of little brain like me, it's hard to do two blogs at once!!!! I just posted something here.... that was meant for Inner Ramblings... so comment wherever you want but please, please comment!!!!! Otin, I know you're a man but feel free to give your 2 cents worth, might be interesting to get a male POV... thanks luv!!!!!
I want to note that I have not had any wine today.... you'll get it when you read the post!!!!!!

Miss Funny Fanny (the American meaning)

Fanny is a funny word it's has very different meanings on each side of the Atlantic... this time I'm using it in the American way, only cause I like the sound of Miss Funny Fanny and it fits the story! glad we got that outta the way and I have probably ruined the whole story with that preface!!!!!

Ashley the cute five year old is now officially Miss Funny Fanny..... she's been coming out with some really doozies over the past couple of days. She was planning her ensemble for the first day of school, she wanted the pink shorts outfit that has a little short sleeved jacket with a zipper in the front. She announced very loudly she was going to wear the "noodle" shirt under the jacket.... pause.... the noodle shirt??? she meant the sleeveless shirt, she's heard the term spaghetti straps banded about lately and it became the noodle shirt... and that's how it will stay!!!

I went to wake them up this morning and there she was already dressed, she had gotten up in the middle of the night and changed in order to save time in the morning! Daddy thanked her for laying on the wrinkle bomb and saving the rest of the family!!!!

And the piece de resistance has to be following her bath tonight, she told me how sometimes she gets afraid in bed, she was naked and hopped up to stand on the bed, she turned around and clenched her buttocks and told me that's what she does when she's scared of vampires and stuff at nighttime!!! Hilarious... I could not stop laughing at her... which makes her mad by the way!!!

I'm thinking of renting her out to the seriously depressed, she can bring a smile to the biggest misery boots and will always leave you thinking what the heck was that?????????????

Oh for the love of the kids.....

uh... yeah... where's the crayon's people?

Zoink babies....

Ashley never was one to hold back!!! Waaahhhhhhhh!!

Today they are back in school, safely tucked away where they should be, out of my freakin' hair and into someone elses... someone who's paid to listen to their shrill jibberings all day.

So yesterday, being the wonderful dedicated and selfless Mama that I am, I went to Tallahassee to a place called Zoinks... a mecca for kids who wanna bounce and boing and get their sillies out. Fortunately for moi, they also provide comfy leather couches and wi-fi so Mom's can blog about the experience while there.

BUT MY GOD could it be any freakin' noisier in there????? I am somewhat of a noiseaphobic... yes.. I have turned into my Grandad, I turn the tv down constantly, cringe when I get into the car after hubster has been driving and he leaves the radio at 300 decibels and I am always telling people to pipe down, zip it, hush and just plain shut the fook up!!!!!

It's all for a good cause though, tire those kids out completely before getting them home and into bed early ready for the first day back to school. So even if I did walk out of there with the mother of all migraines it was worth it... it was worth it... it was worth it!

We went to Atlanta Bread Company before going there..... those people are definitely run by a corporate office where no one has kids. They give you a little activity paper with the kids meal but no crayons.... duh... why the hell would you give kids an activity thingy with no crayons???are you a complete moron??? or just set out to aggravate the crap out of the parents. And no, on this occasion super Mom didn't have any pens or pencils in her purse... bad super Mama.

When asked about it we were told they're not allowed to give out crayons... corporate says so. The next strike was that instead of giving them a cookie with the meal, there's a little coupon thing on the activity paper that says go to the bakery counter and get a free cookie... that's really when the fun began. MrMcG is not known for his patience or his tolerance of incompetent people... we get to the counter and wait ... and wait... and wait some more. Finally hubby donned "the look" and took care of business, he cracks me up when he does this, he is purposely an asshole just to point out the shortcomings of the service givers who aren't giving a service!!!! He charged up to a little guy who was hanging around the other end of the counter and said, "hey buddy, what do we have to do get our free cookies?" to which little guy replied "you need to wait at the bakery counter"..hubby "we've been waiting there for ten minutes and you have all looked at us but no one is serving us".... oh he said, and proceeded to go and get the cookies and put them in a bag for us. Then hubby asks "tell me why the hell you don't give the kids the cookies with their meals, now that would make some sense!" and little guy just shrugs and says..."uh dunno". All the time this is going on the manager was standing there, we knew he was the manager 'cos he had a different colored shirt on and looked cowardly, he didn't say one word or offer a solution to the problem or anything. They have great peach tea but sucky service toward kids... off my list of places to visit (for now anyway).

The Sunshine Skyway Bridge....

Bridges scare me... always have done.... they are high... there's generally something dangerous underneath like deep treacherous water, fast moving traffic or trolls. Mostly I just get tense up a little, close my eyes and pray until i get to the other side and off what I consider the worst of the engineering achievements of mankind. We were quite happy going around weren't we?

However, this last time that we passed through Tampa we thought we'd take a little detour over the Sunshine Skyway Bridge, it's a doozy for us bridgephobics. We stopped on the fishing pier for a closer look (I think the fishing pier used to be part of the original bridge before a disaster involving a boat colliding with the bridge~see there are always disasters!).
I stuck the camera (pre Nikon so don't judge) in front of me and just snapped.... this was a little distraction from the fact I was one a bridge (first strike) it was pretty high (second strike) and there were HUGE flapping birds (third strike)!!!!!!

Enormous feathered friends and regular blokes just fished along side each other like they had been doing it all their lives. Kids were holding out little fish that they were using as bait and the birds would just come along and eat out of their hands... or catch the fish if you launched it up into the air..... too cool!!! for a land lubber like me anyway.

Steve and Ashley enjoyed the view while I snapped away at some of the wildlife sharing our experience... herons, terradactils (hee hee), pelicans, seagulls and others I just don't know the names of.... all out there enjoying the Florida sunshine!

Now get me the hell of this pier and back onto dry land....