So… I was asked to manage and promote a friends band… I have decided to do it! I have no experience doing this type of thing, but I think it will be a lot of fun. They are a classc rock style band called “The Generation”… I am looking forward to booking them shows, making them some money (and myself as well… hehe), and having some fun with advertising. Plus I’ll get to go to a bunch of free shows. So for now it sounds like fun. Wish me luck, and check the band out on their myspace website at *** http://www.myspace.com/thegeneration951 *** and let me know what you think.

I was not the best teenager in the world… far from it. If you know me, you know some of the behavior I was up to in my high school years, and it only got worse into college. I am not even proclaiming my innocence now in my behavior. But, for God sakes CHILDREN of today -GET A CLUE-!!!
As a substitute teacher I run into all different types of children in different walks of life, and at various ages. I can say across the board that kids today do things that are just as bad (sometimes worse) as the things I did…. but they are screaming to be caught! Why is this? I go to work, and in essence babysit high school students, and try for the life of me to teach them something… and what do I get??? A plethera of things…
Some students do want to learn, have their fun, and not get into trouble. But it seems the majority of kids today are “looking” for trouble. I can not remember any of my male classmates “hitting” on teachers…. Let me tell you this is common place today! How do you deal with this as a teacher!? I also do not remember all of the spanish speaking students trying to get away with vulgarity and talking about drugs and gangs in spanish, IN CLASS!! They assume I don’t speak spanish, being the white girl that I am, and honestly they assume right. But, I can however put one and one together and get two. I know all of the cuss words and drug words and their way of throwing around gang talk and I just can’t believe they dont leave that stuff outside the class! I have managed to skate by on that knowledge alone and trick them into thinking I speak some spanish… I wonder how long that cn last!
Now I must say the boys are slightly easier for me than the girls. When I have a problem with a class clown, I do revert to sacrcasm and a bit of joking to show them that I have much better “skills” in that area than they do, so they should quit while they are ahead. I know this is prob. the worst way to go about it…. but I have not figured out another way, comming into a new class everyday and demanding respect is hard. The ones I seem to have the most problems with are the girls who are 17 and 18 and doing their makeup, eyebrows, etc. and hitting on the boy in front of them shamelessly while ignoring my direction. I have even had instances of girls comming to my class stoned! I mean hey… I did it once upon a time, but I didnt get caught! For goodness sakes, bring some visine and perfume and control yourself. I am not an idiot! I know when you come in all glazed over and giggling like a little girl, smelling of pot… you are high! No real brain surgery required there. But these kids are either so used to getting away with it they don’t care… or they have been caught so many times they dont care! Either way I am just disgusted by it at this moment…. I know they all have to learn and grow, but just keep your recreational activitys outside and try not to get caught… save me the trouble and yourself the heartache! Wasn’t half the fun of doing something bad…. NOT getting caught??? These kids confuse me! I wonder what it will be like when I am even further removed from them in age!? I guess I will just be understanding them less and less as the years go on!

My old roomate and one of my best friends came to visit with his girl-friend. We had such a BLAST! I love seeing old friends. It is like we just hung out yesterday! We got some of the old “gang” together and partied like it was 1995… Which prob. means nothing to anyone but us! We went to some bars, had a little get together at a friends house, went out for sushi, and had an all around good time. I have learned with age that you can never make a “new” “old” friend, and the best friends that I have today are still from my childhood. Do you remember when your parents used to tell you that you wouldn’t know any of these people when you grow up? I swear I am in touch with all most all of them! I love “my boys” (as I call them) that I hung with every day in high school and after. And I still keep in touch with allmost all my good girlfriends from way back when. I dont know what my life would be like without the people who know me the best. I am just one of those people who really hangs on to others and to relationships. I guess that is evident in the fact that i married my “high-school” sweetheart. This September it will be together for 12 years and married for 3! WOW!
Me and Tony Tone

So my husband has been working like a mad man recently and has had like one or two days off a month. Thus the title! So, this month, we went camping! We packed up our things and off we went, back to the desert, back to Joshua Tree. I LOVE that place! And that is really saying something since I HATE the heat, and the desert… haha.
So, we had to go a little late, due to Jeremy’s work schedual, and our friends were nice enough to set up our tent for us! What a GREAT group of friends we have. Who likes setting up a tent? Le alone one there not even going to use. This trip was just as good as the last one, although very different. We camped next to a very angry German man who yelled at us to shut up at like 10pm! It was quite amuzing. We also got to do things like hike and not wear 50 layers of clothing, because this time it was not 15 degrees outside!
I don’t know when our next camping trip will be, especially with the weather heating up. I am sure it will be hotels from here on out. But my main concern is when I will get to spend time with my favorite person again… my husband. He works so hard for us and gets so little time to himself! I find myself hanging out with my friends a lot these days. It is not a bad thing, but sometimes I feel like it is strange to be married and going out alone or with my friends 3+ nights a week and partying like I did when I was 21 and single.
So I dont want this blog to turn into a bitch fest… so lets get to the good part! PICTURES!

Today I will be leaving for a comping trip to joshua tree!!! I am so excited, I cant wait! Out i the desert with my friends and a fire and drinks and food. It doesnt get much better than that. So this is my pre-blog to the one to come. I cant wait to post pic’s of all the fun moments we’re gonna have. If it is half as much fun as last time we will have a blast! I have to get back to packing but I was so excited I had to share. I hope everyone elses weekend is as fun as mine! HAve a happy day!
I know I will! YEAH!!! CAMPING RULES!

As I get older… I realize how important that “old friends” are. You can never make a “new” old friend. And no matter how well you know a new friend you can never reminisce with a new friend about “old times.” Being nostalgic with an old friend on a saturday afternoon is priceless to me. Having my livingroom full of old friends remembering “the good old days” is even more priceless.
I had the joy this weekend of a visit from an old best friend and roomate Tony comming to visit. This, of course, brought out most of the other “old friends.” Back in the day it was always Me, Tony, Todd, Brian Sweeny, Greg and Brian Smalley, causing all the trouble we could. Now it is great to just get as many of us together as possible and talk about old times, how are lives are going now and just party for a night and remember why we like eachother so much!
So this weekend, that is what we did. Not everyone could be there… Todd is in Utah and Smalley is living in Norwalk and didnt make it up, but Greg, Sween, Tony and I had a blast. These are just more memories to add to the countless ones we already have. More times to reminisce about in the future.
This weekend just solidified for me the importance of always keeping in contact with old friends. They will always love you for who you are, they will not judge you, they will stand by you through anything and love you no matter what. I love these boys, they are like my brothers and I am sooooo lucky to have them! I cant wait untill we can all hang together again!
Just wanted to share my joy in one of the most simple pleasures in life… true friendship, long lasting friendship! Embrace those around you, those you have known for a large majority of your life. They are so important! To my friends that are reading this… I love that we keep in touch, even through technology. It means a lot to me Have a great week!
Chow!

Saturday brough great weather and a wonderful girls adventure. A couple girlfriends and I took the bike trail to fairmount park and had a picnic and then road around down town. We went to the falconer for a drink and then back to my place for a nap. I hate the summer heat, but I love the spring time, being out in the spring weather and riding my bike. We road about 8 miles through out the day and had a blast! It was the best saturday I have had in a while, and a girls day out is always fun! For anyone that doesn’t have a bike, I reccomend getting a beach cruser. It makes for hours and days of endless fun! I am sitting in my living-room wishing I was back on the trail, back on my bike. It is awsome to feel the wind in your hair, the sun on your face and have the whole day ahead of you with nothin to do but ride. Good frinds, good food and some memosas are always a great addition to the bike ride…. RIDE ON!

So you may be thinking…”Am I going to hear some dirt”… the answer is “No”… My blog today is on my general thoughts about gossip. I think that I stopped technically “gossiping” about people many years ago. Now this is not to say that I NEVER talk about anyone. To say this would be a lie. However, I try to stick to a strict rule of never saying something behind someones back that I wouldn’t say to their face. And generally speaking, when I talk about my friends, it is more matter of fact or what have they been doing lately. I have even found that as I have gotten older, it bothers me when others are too ruthless in talking about others, and I do not enjoy holding grudges against anyone. I am not above cutting toxic people out of my life, but I hold no ill will towards them, life is to short.
Now this being said, I realized today I have another type of addiction to gossip. This is a long standing addiction. As I was buying my watter and cig’s… and other things I needed before heading off to work, I instinctively grabbed the new issue of STAR magazine off the shelf and plopped that 4$ magazing down on the counter and bought it. As I drove home to get ready, I realized that I do this more than once a week. I also read perezhilton.com about once a week. Now this is what I would consider a “toxic” ammount of gossip. As well as a rediculous ammount of money that I am wasting each week. I buy Lyfe&Style $1.99, OK $1.99, and InTouch $1.99, every week at the grocery store. Then once a week I buy another magazine, either fashion or something like STAR or People which is at least $4.00 a week. So this is like $10.00 a week or $520- a year! Holy CRAP! The things I could do with $520 dollars.
So my point this afternoon, to myself and to others is this… why am I wasting my money on gossip? Why is it ok for me to actually spend money to hear about other peoples lives and tragic moments, when I don’t think it is ok to talk about the people I know… for free!
Like my many other blogs, I wonder if my moment of clarity will have any effect on my future actions. Will I be able to give up my weekly fix of mindless gossip? Will I refrain from wasting that $40- a month on pointless reading material when I could be reading a book!? Only time will tell. It is so easy to identify ones faults and much harder to actually do something about them. Untill then, I am off to work to finish my STAR magazine… What a rip!

After 11 1/2 years (9 years dating and 2 1/2 years married) I have run out of ideas. I don’t know what to get my wonderful husband for his birthday. He spoils me on EVERY holiday, yet he hates recieving gifts. He especially seems to hate his birthday. In years past I have bought him birthday cakes that he has refused to even eat! He really just doesn’t like to celebrate his birthday. I just can’t figure out why. But, being the person I am, I just can’t let the year go by without trying to make the day at least a little special. He is, afterall, the most important person in my life. So, after weeks of searching, I will end up wih a small cheesy gift and a card. What ever will I do when we have been together for 20 years!? He is very hard to shop for! I always thought that men were supposed to be easy in this area, but I was dead wrong (at least about my hubby). So here is hoping that I come up with some way to make his special day… special.

My hubby and I have been thinking of buying a home and I have been outraged by the prices of homes recently. However, today… and a lot recently, I have found myself reflecting on the Riverside homeless. If you live here you have see the infamous “vet on a bike” selling his packets, that has disappeared from our streets. You have also seen the one man who daily breaks my heart. He is tall and so skinny, wearing black shreaded clothing and long dark hair. I have seen people give him clothes and have friends who have given him clothes, he doesn’t wear them. As a matter of fact, I have seen him at the good will and I believe he donates the clothing he is given to other homeless people! This man just tears me apart. He is never drinking, I see him buy food a 7-11 or the grocery store and I think he is crazy. This has really put the “housing market” into perspective for me. Just the fact that Jeremy and I can THINK about buying a home makes us SO lucky! The fact that we have a wonderful rental home, and even a roof over our heads is a blessing in itself. Our sanity and having one another is another blessing that we take for granted daily.
Back to the “vet on a bike”… He was sick for a while, and also quite “out of his mind,” and I believe that his dissapearence signals that he is no longer with us. I believe that he has died, as he was very ill the last time I saw him. This is so sad to me for some reason. I didn’t know him, but I feel as if he has been a “part” of Riverside for so long that it is strange to not see him riding his bike with his stuffed dummy and flag, proudly displaying his “WAR” sign on the front of his bike. I have had strange encounters with this man and believe me when I say he was “not all there,” but he was living his life to the best of his ability and I truely believe this.
I ask myself on this quiet Sunday morning, as I sit in my livingroom, laptop in hand, what makes ME so lucky? What can we as a community do for these people? I give money to charities that I feel are not keeping the money for themselves, I donate clothing and furnature that I no longer use and I give money and/or food to homeless people that I see whenever I can. But I just know that there is more we can do. With the extreme wheather changes that we have here I feel that these people need even more help from us as a community. When I see the man in his shreaded clothing out in the rain or baking in the 110 degree heat, I just wish I could give him shelter. Why is there not a place for him to go here in the area?
I truely believe that many of us (including myself on many days) drive around in our cars and pay no attention to this horrific thing that is going on right under our noses. On friday, as I watched a woman feeding the man in the shreaded clothing on a bus bench, I felt that if there were more people out there like her, willing to sit down and take the time, he may not be in such need. I know that if the roles were reversed and I was on the street with no where to go, I would hope that someone would have the love that this woman had and care enough to make me a sandwhich. I pray that this never happens to me or anyone I know. But I almost feel as if I DO know these people that have been roaming our streets for years and years and that I have done almost nothing to help.
I know that writing this blog is not going to feed these men and women of Riverside. I know I am probably writing mostly out of guilt this afternoon for not doing more. But, I am also writing out of appreciation. Appreciation for what I have, for those who are trying to do something and for those who will hopefully try a little harder to do more. I am also writing it in hopes that it will make me more accountable and force me to do more when I see these people. They need just as much love, and possibly more, as each one of us reading this right now. How sad to be all alone in the world with nothing. I hope that we can all do just a little bit more. I hope that I can appreciate what I have just a little bit more. I hope that others can notice this problem and feel just a little bit more. Because if everyone does just a little bit more… imagine the difference that can be made!