cocobunga

boob tube...

Years ago, when Bill Hemmer and Daryn Kagan hosted CNN Live Today, I was totally addicted to CNN.  I would begin and end my day with CNN.  Well, after watching years of natural disasters, Amber Alerts, and pregnant women getting murdered by their husbands, I decided to change it up.  Enter HGTV.  And why not?  It's light and breezy in comparison to world news.  You saw what I learned about decorating in my previous post about the animal kingdom in my kitchen, right?  Okay, so maybe I should pay more attention.

Moving on, in Lynn's World, other than HGTV, watching the boob tube isn't high priority this time of year.  I'm a gihugic fan of Californication, Dexter, and Curb Your Enthusiasm and the new seasons won't premiere until this fall.  Ugh!  Love Weeds, as well, but Season 6 won't begin until August 16th.

Since I'm all caught up on Nurse Jackie episodes (love it), rather than watching the complete season of Sex and the City...again...the other night I was surfing On Demand to scope out other options.  I started watching The United States of Tara.  

The United States of Tara first season aired in 2009 and the second season just began last week.  I thought I'd start from the beginning of Season 1 and continue along until I caught up.  The series follows the life of a suburban housewife with dissociative identity disorder (DID).  It stars Toni Collette and John Corbett.  JOHN CORBETT!  Flashback to SATC...Oh, how I wanted Carrie Bradshaw to end up with Aidan.  Big?  Big who?  Aidan can park his shoes in my closet anytime.  Umm Gary...I know you feel the same way about Beatrix Kiddo from Kill Bill.  ;)

Anyway, the lead character, Tara, and her dissociative identity disorder creates complete chaos within her family.  (Note to my kids if you watch this show:  DID is not the same as PMS so, really, I'm fine.)  The bizarre events which take place when her alter-egos show up keep me coming back for more.  Although, I just started watching, I'm almost halfway through the first season already.  I'm hooked. 

So, call me shallow.  Yes, I traded CNN for HGTV, HBO and Showtime.  And...until David Duchovny, Michael C. Hall, and Larry David make their way back into my bedroom this fall, I guess I'll just have to suffer watching John Corbett play a TV husband with infinite patience for his wife who has multiple personalities.  Well now...who wouldn't love that? 

 

i'm here wogl...

Every weekday 98.1 WOGL, an 'oldies' radio station here in Philly, gives away an all-inclusive vacation to paradise.  This free trip to a fabulous resort in the Caribbean is for two adults and two children and the Vacation-A-Day is sponsored by Apple Vacations.  All you have to do is go to their website, register to win, and listen.  Each morning at 7:20am, the Breakfast Club DJ's disclose on-air what time they will announce the name of the winner.  When they announce your name, you have sixty minutes to call in to claim this prize.  You can even register to get e-mail updates and text messages to remind you to listen.  Piece of cake, right?

So, each day I listen for my name to be announced on the radio.  It's pathetic but true that I listen...and listen...and listen every day at the appropriate time.  Umm...I haven't won yet.

Well, this has become a source of lots of jokes in my home.  When the kids get home from school, I say to them, "Can you believe they didn't call my name today?"  They're like, "No really Mom?"  They look at me like duh.

One morning Blaise actually asked me to sit me down because he had something really important to talk with me about.  Shit.  Did he get a detention?  Did he want to get a tattoo?  No, thank God.  He just wanted to ever so delicately break the news to me that WOGL was not ever going to call my name.  Oh, he who has little faith.  Did I really give birth to him?  

When I do listen to the winners call in to claim their prize, I find myself critiquing their level of excitement.  Some winners are actually like real polite and soft spoken and say, "oh thank you."  Oh thank you?????  Like they can't muster up a "WOO-HOO" or two or three?  gah.

A few months ago I actually e-mailed the DJ when one of the winners said oh-thank-you in this little tiny insignificant voice I could hardly hear over my dog's snoring.  I wrote that if he called my name I would be like "OH MY GOD!  WOGL IS THE BEST RADIO STATION IN THE WORLD!  OH MY GOD!  THANK YOU, THANK YOU!"  He sent me back an e-mail and told me to keep listening.  So I do.

Although I'm pretty sure I probably disqualified myself when I contacted the DJ, I still hold out hope that some magical day WOGL will announce my name - or Gary's since I registered him on-line as well.  Oopsie...is that allowed?  If you're reading this WOGL execs, I was just kidding.  Of course, Gary registered himself.  Honest.

Anyway, I'm keeping the faith and I really hope when they do finally announce my name that it's not a day when I'm in a meeting or getting a much needed pedicure.

what the heck am i thinking...

This morning I was reading an HGTV Design Happens blog by Dooce about decorating and how people tend to fill their kitchens and their homes with animal tchotchkes.  Definition:  A small piece of worthless crap, a decorative knick knack with little or no purpose.

Immediately, I thought to myself...yeah, I hate houses that are cluttered with those useless tacky things.  I once sold a house where the owner had been a school teacher for over forty years and she collected owls.  Owl gewgaw was everywhere.  I mean everywhere.  One even hooted at me in the bathroom and I jumped off the toilet and hit my head on...you guessed it.  Owlch!  Forty years worth of owl gifts from her fifth graders created bad, very bad home decor.

At the same time, I reflected about how much I love animal prints.

 

I have a leopard throw on my bed...love it.

 

 

My leopard window treatments (with ball fringe...remember, I'm Italian) in my kitchen add just the right amount of pop!  Not too much...just a splash of the unexpected.  So cool.

 

I've wanted a single zebra club chair in a remote corner of my living room for quite some time.  Understated, yet elegant, touches (keyword: touches) can make a great statement. 

So, as I was sitting sipping my cup of tea pondering these thoughts, I started to look around my kitchen and I WAS HORRIFIED!  Here's what I found in what I perceived to be my understated, yet elegant kitchen:

Who am I?

Not one but two roosters?  Are you freakin kidding me?  I don't even like roosters.

Mr. Pig.  Okay, he's okay if he was the only farm animal in the room.  He holds a cute little blackboard my kids draw on every now and then.

The deer antlers...gift from Alex.  Some people think it's driftwood.  Yeah, that's it.  From now on it's driftwood and on that one, I'll give myself a bye.

St. Francis and eight birds.  Umm...I have nothing to say for myself right now other than my blessed mother Mary gave me that statue.

Then there's the donkeys and camels above the window.  Not one.  Not two.  But a whole damn army of them.  Notice there are monkeys riding on the donkeys leading the camels.  Where are they going and where did they come from?  Oh...that's right.  I remember.  They were a Christmas gift from Gary a long time ago.  Apparently, I still have Christmas decorations up in March.  Yikes.

Think I'm finished.  Nope.

Look at the last photo.  Yes, it's a monkey sitting on my windowsill next to a bowl of fake beaded fruit.  A harlequin monkey with a top hat...and...gulp...he's a bean bag.

But, but...I thought I was good at interior design.  Why on earth do my friends call me to help them decorate and design their homes?  Have they looked closely at the the zoo in my kitchen?

What the heck am I thinking?

I'm thinking thank God it's spring...it's time to have a yard sale.
 

fitted sheets...

In my never-ending quest to simplify my life, I ran across this video.  Being a visual learner (which comes from many, many years of people watching), I thank God for videos. 

So, here ya go.  You never know when invited guests might take a peek into your closets.  Geesh.  Don't judge me just on my cluttered kitchen counters.

via www.youtube.com

meatballs...

Three hundred and eighty five meatballs. Do you think that will be enough?

I am hosting a bridal shower for my sister's daughter tonight.  Okay, Mimi is not my biologically sister but since neither of us have real sisters, we became a sisterhood unto ourselves many, many moons ago.  So, I guess that makes Mia my niece.  Love that!

So, back to the meatballs.  I'm an overcooker.  Not to say I overcook and burn things.  Okay, okay, I can see my five kids reading this thinking really mom?  True confessions - I do burn biscuits every time I cook them because I totally forget about them until I sit down to eat and think what is that burning?  There, happy kids?

Anyway, it's just that the Italian in me always cooks way, way too much food.  Hence, overcooker.  I think it stems from growing up in a house with my Italian grandmother.  Gram always had something cooking on the stove no matter what time of day.  Mmmm.  I can recall the smell her spaghetti sauce right now.  There were times I came home from school to find...uh...the mailman (oops...I mean, letter carrier) sitting at the kitchen table eating a plate of pasta.  It's true.

If anyone sitting at Gram's dinner table didn't have seconds, she would indignantly ask, "What's the matter?  You don't like my cooking?"  Needless to say, when I brought boyfriends home for the first time to eat dinner, Gram would base her opinion of them on whether or not they had seconds...and thirds...and so on.  The more they ate, the better she liked them.  No seconds...that guy was out the door never to be heard of again.  Obviously, Gary made the cut.

So, for tonight, three hundred and eighty five meatballs will hopefully be enough?  I don't know why I always doubt the amount.  I'm pretty sure we'll be eating leftover meatballs for the next week or so.

Yep.  Gram would be so proud. 

clearly tuned in...

Just when you think you are clearly tuned into your teenagers and their needs, you have one of those days...

7:00 a.m. in the kitchen:

Blaise: I have a scrimmage after school today and I my old baseball cleats don't fit.

Me:  Really?  I didn't see the baseball schedule.

Blaise:  It's right here on the bulletin board.

Me:  Oh, okay.  Where are you old cleats?  Did you try them on?  Go get them.  Let me see them on your feet.

Blaise:  Mom, they don't fit.  My feet have grown since last year.

Me:  Oh.

Blaise:  So can you go buy them for me and drop them off to school?

Me:  Umm...no.  I don't know what size or which ones you would want.  I'll pick you up at your lunchtime and we'll run over to Dimmers.

Blaise:  Then, I won't have any lunch.

Me:  Okay, okay, I'll buy you lunch while we're out.

 

11:23 a.m. in the shoe store:

Blaise:  I also need glasses.

Me:  Wait, you need glasses?

Blaise:  Yeah, I can't see.

Me:  Since when can't you see?

Blaise:  The sun hurts my eyes.

Me:  Really?  The sun hurts your eyes?  I'm pretty sure the sun has been around way longer than you have. It's just now starting to hurt your eyes?

Blaise:  Yes, and I also need one of those things that goes around my neck to hold my glasses so I don't lose them.

Me:  Wait.  Can you see the blackboard?

Blaise:  Mom!  I mean sunglasses for baseball.

 

D'oh!

Ahh, motherhood.  I can see clearly now...at least until tomorrow.

gmail...

Amazing.  Every morning my Netscape Inbox if filled with announcements of all of the lotteries I have won and inheritances I am to receive.  United Kingdom National lotteries, long lost relatives in Nigeria...who knew?  Geesh, I must be the luckiest person on the face of this planet.

Seriously now.  Who and where are these people who have my Netscape email address?  I visualize these trolls sitting around in a little crowded smoke-filled room - of course, choking down can after can of Spam - emailing to (God knows how many) vulnerable people soliciting their personal identification information?  Do decent, honest, yet naive, people really contact these villains, send them their social security numbers, and hard earned money?  So desperate.  So sad.  Shouldn't we all know by now:  if it sounds too good to be true, then it is.

That, my friends, is why I finally opened a Gmail account.  Okay...actually Alex registered my name for me for fear that some other 'Lynn Coggin' would sign up and get my most coveted lynncoggin@gmail.com before I got around to it.  Thank you Alex, my-favorite-red-headed-son.

I applaud the brilliant Paul Buchheit (the 23rd employee of Google) who was the creator and lead developer of Gmail.  I'm grateful there's a computer program out there monitoring my Gmail account and keeping these lunatics who prey upon the weak out of my virtual world.

For those of you who got on the Gmail train a long time ago, kudos to you for being so prudent.  For me, I guess it's better late than never.

 

come on, smile renee...

Just a little update folks about recent Bradley Cooper and Renee Zellweger sightings...

Gary just went to get his afternoon Grande Bold from Starbucks.  My friggin cell phone is now exploding with texts from him.  Needless to say, I had to delete texts to read his texts but I won't rant about that again.

 

Ha...guess who's here at starbux?

Really?

Yep...Renee.

Can you get a pic of her? 

I actually asked her for a pic and she said no!  I should have just paparazzied her.

Hahaha, yes, you should have.

I said can I get a pic for my daughter and she said not now cause I am really in a hurry but tell your daughter I said hello.  I said I will but...she may be disappointed that it wasn't from Bradley.  She said, I would be too! 

 

Sweet.  Sounds like a real live Hollywood romance to me.  Right here in little old Jenkintown, Pennsylvania.  Crazy, huh?

hokey pokey...

How many times throughout your life do you "test the waters"?  You try something and then may try it again.  If all goes well, you may just throw your whole self into it, right?

Well, I think Roland Lawrence LaPrise was onto something when he concocted the song, Hokey Pokey, along with two fellow musicians in the late 1940's for the ski crowd in Sun Valley, Idaho. The group, the Ram Trio (with Charles Macak and Tafit Baker), recorded the song in 1949, and they were awarded a U.S. copyright in 1950.  We can all recall this song from:

a) our childhood; or

b) a wedding reception we attended where we had way, way too many cocktails and the band (getting the evil eye from the parents of the bride) was desperate to get the guests involved.

Either way, the lesson we learned from doing primitive aerobics to this song was to go ahead and give it a try because maybe "testing the waters" throughout our lives really IS what it's all about.

You put your right foot in,
You put your right foot out;
You put your right foot in,
And you shake it all about.
You do the Hokey-Pokey,
And you turn yourself around.
That's what it's all about!

You put your left foot in,
You put your left foot out;
You put your left foot in,
And you shake it all about.
You do the Hokey-Pokey,
And you turn yourself around.
That's what it's all about!

You put your right hand in,
You put your right hand out;
You put your right hand in,
And you shake it all about.
You do the Hokey-Pokey,
And you turn yourself around.
That's what it's all about!

You put your left hand in,
You put your left hand out;
You put your left hand in,
And you shake it all about.
You do the Hokey-Pokey,
And you turn yourself around.
That's what it's all about!

You put your right side in,
You put your right side out;
You put your right side in,
And you shake it all about.
You do the Hokey-Pokey,
And you turn yourself around.
That's what it's all about!

You put your left side in,
You put your left side out;
You put your left side in,
And you shake it all about.
You do the Hokey-Pokey,
And you turn yourself around.
That's what it's all about!

You put your nose in,
You put your nose out;
You put your nose in,
And you shake it all about.
You do the Hokey-Pokey,
And you turn yourself around.
That's what it's all about!

You put your backside in,
You put your backside out;
You put your backside in,
And you shake it all about.
You do the Hokey-Pokey,
And you turn yourself around.
That's what it's all about!

You put your head in,
You put your head out;
You put your head in,
And you shake it all about.
You do the Hokey-Pokey,
And you turn yourself around.
That's what it's all about!

You put your whole self in,
You put your whole self out;
You put your whole self in,
And you shake it all about.
You do the Hokey-Pokey,
And you turn yourself around.
That's what it's all about!

star struck...

Gabrielle, my 17 year old, went to the gym after lacrosse practice because rumor had it dreamy Bradley Cooper was there yesterday around the same time.  He grew up in Jenkintown and returns home for visits, and I believe he's shooting a film in Philly over the next few weeks as well.  Not that I'm stalking him.  I just get my B.C. updates every day from my daughter and her friends who apparently are stalking him.

So, Gabrielle came home after her workout a bit disappointed.  She obviously hadn't spotted her latest crush.  After dinner, Gary headed to the gym.  As luck would have it, there he was.  Of course, Gabrielle made her dad promise to call her if Mr. Hollywood was there and so he did.

Instant chaos in our house as Gabrielle almost breaks her neck running down the stairs to tell me.

Gab:  Oh my God, oh my God, he's there.  Andrea is coming back to pick me up.  Dad called.  Can you believe it?  You know I get star struck, then I can't breathe.

Me:  No, I didn't know that.  What star have you ever seen?

Gab:  Bill Cosby at a Temple game.  Blaise, do you want to go with us?

Blaise:  No thanks.  If it was Taylor Swift I'd go.

So off she went.  She got her glimpse of Bradley Cooper AND Renee Zellweger in their shorts and did her second work out of the day.  Life was good.

Ahh...life with teenagers...keep breathing.