Diane Keaton has really been getting under my skin lately. Well, maybe it's been longer than just lately. I think this has been going on for some time now, but I just can't put my finger on exactly when it started. Let's say...it has been off and on for about two years? Maybe.


Anyway, you might be wondering, "How does Diane Keaton make the Butterfly crazy?"

I could say it has something to do with her need to make every character she portrays on film gesticulate like a psychotic mime addicted to amphetamines. It seriously makes me want to grab her god damned flailing arms and strap them to her sides with duct tape...But no, that's only part of it.


I could also mention the positively shrill and hysterical quality that her voice takes on whenever one of her characters is having some sort of neurotic breakdown. Because I mean, really, can you think of any part she has played over the years that did not incorporate this performance?? I honestly think that she is not playing parts anymore, but rather making extended-cameo appearances in films as herself. Except, it's more than that...


I could talk about her perpetually bad posture and how she sort of slouches while jutting her hips forward in a most irritating way...Is this her body's idea of an endearing pout for the spine? It's not sexy, stop it, stop it right now! My former ballet teacher, Ms. D'Aubray Goncharoff would be appalled and promptly throw Diane out of her class if she saw this crap.


I may point out -- what I strongly suspect might actually be written into her contract -- a stipulation that all of her costumes are to involve numerous clothing layers above the waist, ridiculously voluminous skirts and a copious helping of scarves. She looks so bundled and uptight that it makes me constipated to look at her on screen. And, this wardrobe issue brings me agonizingly close to the one thing that makes me most insane about Diane Keaton...

Have you ever noticed that this woman has a serious, serious, SERIOUS addiction to belts? Not just belts, but belts so wide that they'd almost be suitable for use during weightlifting? Diane, dear, you need help. Step away from the belts!


For example, I was watching Because I Said So tonight on cable. On a whim, I decided to count how many times she wore an insane belt. [You can try this same game yourself with any of her movies, like a fashion drinking game!] And, I am positively alarmed to report that she was wearing a belt wider than 2 inches (more like 3-4 inches!) count 'em -- on NINETEEN separate occasions, with the exception of ONE time where she had a belt that was approximately 1 1/2 inches wide, and another scene in which she was wearing her belted bathrobe (which may or may not count, technically) -- all in the same film! That's TWENTY-ONE extremely-belted moments. Jesus Christ. I think she was wearing no belt in perhaps five (?) scenes...not much more than that, I assure you.


Boy, let me tell you, Diane can work a belt into ANY situation. She can NOT do Formal Wear without a menacing belt (as seen in the first two pictures above.) She will do it over a thick series of shirt layers (third picture)...she will do it over blazers and coats (fifth picture which is actually a real life occurrence - but you can just as easily see the same thing in Because I Said So too!)...And last, but not least, her crowning achievement? At left, incorporating a huge belt into a wedding gown -- which by the way, also makes use of the bundled-buttoned-shirt-with-scarf motif!


Listen lady, I'm all for a signature style. But, fuck. Change it up once in a while, will ya? The Annie-Hall-thing had to be phased out of all women's wardrobes at some point, now you need to phase out this "crazy Diane" business, too. Really. It's time.


[ Photo credits: Picture #1, Picture #2, Picture #3, Picture #4, Picture #5, Picture #6 ]

Labels: annoying, clothes, crazy, dianekeaton, movies, pet peeves, photos, scary

Meet my man...my man is a slug. No, of course, I am not living with an actual terrestrial gastropod mollusk! But sometimes, it feels like I am. Before you misunderstand me, I am not trying to say that the man is slow...or lazy...he's not! No, he is a wonderful guy who is kind, funny, extremely handy fixing things and he has a very cute butt. However, he is very much like the slug pictured at left in one particular aspect of his daily life...

He leaves a slime trail wherever he goes! Here is some evidence that he was in the kitchen recently.

Don't see what I mean? Scroll down to the closeup picture below.

Now, do you see it? This made me laugh -- so much so that I have decided to preserve his handprint for a few-days-more-worth of chuckles -- before I whip out my Orange Clean to wipe it away with a rag for good.

There was a time that this kind of thing would have infuriated me. As I have matured, I see these things as an opportunity for increased household humor. I know he appreciates my decision to laugh instead -- which is why he is willing to be such a good helper whenever I occasionally ask. The best advice I can offer to others who find themselves frustrated by such things is: You'll both live longer healthier lives the more you laugh at and enjoy these differences. Besides, no one loves a nag.


[The slug photo was borrowed from here.]

Labels: adult, funny, health, household, kindness, love, men, pet peeves, photos, theMan, women

Nutmeg sleeps in weird positions.

Jackson makes weird faces when he yawns.

I get mad when I get postcards in the mail from someone whom I have explicitly told to leave me alone...doesn't matter who, dear readers...suffice it to say that I am irritated when my wishes are not respected, over and over again. Maybe this will get read and incorporated...maybe it won't. My blog, my feelings, my outlet. So, if you are reading -- Fuck Off, Person.

That's all I have to say today, good and bad.

Labels: adult, anger, annoying, blogging, cats, cute, jackie, Nutmeg, pet peeves, pets, wishes

I have been trying to get into doing my yoga on a regular basis. This does not happen, of course, but I am trying... Which kind of makes me crazy -- because it really does make me feel good when I am doing it -- and when I am done. You would think that it would be pretty easy to get into something like that. I have all of my fun accessories...my colorful mat...my bricks...my strap...and my really great instructional DVDs, courtesy of Seane Corn. But, alas, I do not do it enough. I think this has something to do with feeling like I have such a long way to go...in terms of feeling like I did when I was my most fit. It is discouraging and annoying not to see results quickly. Yes, this is probably the crux of the matter! But no excuses, I just have to do it. Eventually, I will start to see something happening and not just feel achy all over.

Things I do feel differences in pretty quickly are: my lower back usually feels better, a truly deep breath actually feels relaxing while I am doing yoga, and I sweat like a maniac, which is great for my skin.

The thing that I have a hard time buying? The whole idea of the yoga poses and the twisting "squeezing toxins and waste materials" out of my organs. I have read that this is true -- because the contraction of muscles helps to move blood and fluids through the body, the faster they move through the body, the faster your body can process them and move them out. From a circulation system standpoint, this all sounds perfectly reasonable. But, it always irks me when the yoga DVDs mention this during an exercise...because it sounds so similar to the language that the "high colonic" nutjobs use...and, from what I understand, colonics are total bullshit. I think colonics appeal to people's psychological hangups about poop and disgust with their bodily functions -- that if they could just get the "dirty, dirty poop!" out of them faster, they would "feel cleaner" or "feel empty" -- all under the guise of "removing toxins" and losing 3lbs faster...

So, what am I saying, here? I am not sure. I guess, if someone would like to show me some real medical evidence that colonics are good for you, then great. I might even consider having one -- it's not bloody likely that I would pay for one, but if I could do it myself, I might. In the meantime, I will continue to push myself to do my yoga. And, I will grit my teeth and take a deeper Vinyasa breath when Seane mentions the squeezing of my toxins, trusting that she is not a total nutjob who is putting me on. Conscious intention of breath, whatever.


All I know is that, even with crunchy-granola Seane Corn having a chunk of one of her eyebrows missing, I still like her WAY BETTER than that condescending bitch, Suzanne Deason and her f'ing crooked, sideways-talking mouth! I can not abide that woman talking about squeezing my toxins. I would like to squeeze her toxins, with my hands on her neck...while I am in Downward-Facing Dog position, of course!

Labels: annoying, exercise, health, learning, pet peeves, photos, recreation, videos, yoga

As filthy as that sounds, it was all pretty innocent. I was taking a little nap and these two (Peanut and Noodle) decided that the crook of my leg under my butt was a good place to sleep. Since I sleep half on my side and half on my stomach, I always have one leg bent up and one leg straight -- so they were actually sleeping on top of my straight leg. Rest assured, this was not good for my circulation in that limb! I was woken up by the man snapping pictures... Eventually, we dismantled this cozy little arrangement because my leg was getting numb and I needed to use the bathroom. But, it was very toasty and sweet while it lasted. ;-)

In other news, Trudy has finished her course of liquid antibiotics. Now, she just needs to continue one daily pill, which is not so bad. We have been monitoring and recording her weight, hairball puking incidents, etc. She has been slowly putting on weight, but it is really difficult to keep her interested in any one particular food. She likes certain foods one day, then she gets bored and will not eat them the next day.

Today we bought a couple of new foods to try. She devoured an entire plate of Whiskas Mixed Grill in Gravy -- a really creepy, juicy concoction that comes in a pouch, of all things. SHE LOVED IT! I guess she liked the idea of eating like an astronaut? ChooChoo in Space, woo hoo! Just you wait though. We will buy a few more pouches of this stuff and she will probably never eat it again...which means the garbage disposal cats, Peanut and Jackson, will come along and eat it for her. It is good to know that her finickiness will result in her brothers' gaining weight, and not her. Just what I wanted.

However, Noodle is a good boy. He is universally finicky and barely eats his wet food. He is a dry-brown-pellet man, mostly -- I do not expect him to gain any extra weight as a result of the Kitty-Buffet table.

And now, I think I will have some Corn Flakes...all this food talk made me hungry for a snack...Damn Cats!

Labels: cats, ChooChoo, food, jackie, noodle, Nutty, pet peeves, pets

The symbol of my day's torture...my entire St. Patrick's Day was spent:

a) installing this year's subscription upgrades for my computer protection softwares
b) getting error messages on certain liveUpdate installation processes
c) not getting the apparent fix installations to work
d) waiting for a chat rep to join me online to try to fix my problems
e) getting links for other fixes to run that didn't work
f) being told to download the Norton Uninstall Tool and uninstall all Norton softwares from my computer and start fresh
g) waiting over an hour(?) for all of the Norton applications and GoBack histories to be removed
h) reinstalling all of the softwares and encountering new, different error messages
i) resolving most of the error messages, some, not resolving...
j) waiting for a chat rep to join me, again, for a long time, to discuss why my firewall subscription still says that I have only 16 days left?
k) re-entering my new product key in a different way so that it could be recognized this time
l) thinking I was done with all installations and issues and was finally ready to re-run my virus and spyware full system scan so that I could have everything up to date...only to discover 90,000 files into the scan that I had more issues to resolve!
m) waiting for a chat rep to join me, again, for a shorter time, to let her know that she needed to merge my leftover subscription days with my renewed year subscriptions so that I would get the full 396 days that I have paid for...
n) following all of the directions to get the server to update my new balance to my computer
o) finally resuming my virus and spyware full system scan so that I can rest easy...

That was my ENTIRE fucking day in a nutshell. I need a drink, I need a lot of drinks, but alas, I will not drink them --- because I would be drinking alone into the night, like an alcoholic, whilst the boyfriend sleeps. I'd rather have tea and Raspberry Newtons, thank you very much.

While I am bitching, let me mention another, unrelated annoyance (a spelling pet-peeve)...I recently read a comment on another blog where the commenter said that one of his/her career ambitions was [is] to become a writer. This same person, within the single comment posting, misspelled the word "definitely" as "definately" not once, but twice! It took a great deal of self-restraint not to leave my own comment suggesting that the person learn to spell first if s/he wanted to have a prayer of becoming a professional writer. Good God! I behaved myself though --- and saved it for my own blog --- where it is more appropriate for me to voice my "issues" with the mangling of the English language.

/end rant

Labels: annoying, computers, holidays, pet peeves, software