Le Monde de Fromage de Kate

I decided to tease you with one little morsel:

What is it? How can you ask??? Cannot you see that it is the worst picture ever taken of the mighty Mississippi River (from a toll bridge with a camera phone inside a moving car with the window up)? Yes, indeed, it is. But I think I read somewhere that every famous photographer started out their career by taking really ghastly pictures of the Mississippi River through the rungs of a toll bridge on a camera phone inside a moving car with the window up. If that is the case, I am destined for greatness.

Yes, it’s true: Internet Explorer HATES educational television. TWICE, now, when I’ve prominently featured links to The Learning Channel or the History Channel (see “STAY IN BED or Learn THIS!!!” and “Musha ring dum a doo dum a da…“) Internet Explorer gets its panties all in a wad and messes up the way my blog columns wrap (I HATE the word “panties,” so that’s quite severe effrontery coming from ME). I cannot figure it out. I finally gave up TRYING to delve into the problem the first time and shall probably end up utilizing the same cop-out method for yesterday’s entry, too.

So why bother even mentioning it? Because I want to EMBARASS the browser. As a matter of fact, I am WRITING this using Internet Explorer instead of Firefox (which, in case you haven’t noticed the slightly OBVIOUS clues, I rather PREFER). SHAME and DEGRADATION, IE, for your obvious aversion to educational television. SHRINK BACK those excessive column widths out of MORTIFICATION!!!

That should do it.

And I am such a COLOSSAL wiener that I cannot even think of a more clever title.

I usually try to see as many Oscar® nominated films as possible. Firstly, I am most fond of movies, in general, and secondly, it’s such a festive challenge (even if you are by your lonesome and not officially in a “contest”) to see if you can predict who and what will win. Last year I managed to get most of the “big” films in – even though it was just under the wire. I did a film marathon the day BEFORE the Oscar® broadcast and I believe I even managed to fit one in the day OF the broadcast.

Not this year. In fact, I’m mortified and embarrassed. I am looking at the Printable Oscar®.com Ballot, and let’s just say good intentions pave the road to HELL and ARTISTIC IGNORANCE. I MEANT to see so many of these films and, for whatever reason, I DID NOT. I considered jamming in the single most complicated film marathon EVER over the last couple of days, and I did not see a SINGLE FILM. I take that back; so help me, I watched Yentl AND Armageddon on television. SHUT UP! I love Yentl! Mandy Patinkin looks through my SOUL with those exquisite brown eyes.

But what of THE 78TH ANNUAL ACADEMY AWARDS®? Let me inventory the films I’ve seen. I’ll divide them into two groups; Group I includes well-respected films that may even be nominated in more than one category (and COULD win) and Group II includes movies that are in the somewhat more “humble” categories (wherein one goes for snacks or takes a restroom break during the presentation thereof):

1. GROUP I:
2. Pride & Prejudice: This film received four nominations. And I give it ALL LAUDS AND HONOURS AND BOW DOWN TO IT WITH ALL FITTING APROBATION AND VENERATION. Amen.
3. March of the Penguins: It’s a DOCUMENTARY, so it won’t get much Hollywood-type recognition, but I liked it very much. The penguins were so, SO CUTE (please ignore the fact that I gush like a fifteen-year-old girl) and it was so poignant when their egg died or whatnot.

Yup, that’s it. We’re on to the second unit:

1. GROUP II:
2. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire: Don’t get me wrong, I quite liked this movie. But let’s face it; it’s part four of a SERIES and it’s only nominated for Art Direction.
3. Batman Begins: I admit, I liked this one, too (Christian Bale, being such a pretty, PRETTY man gave the film SOME bonus points just because he showed up in it). However, it wasn’t THAT great, and it’s only nominated for Cinematography. Fodder for bathroom breaks.
4. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory: What can I say? It WAS rather a mess (what with all the chocolate…), but Johnny Depp is fascinating no matter what. Oh yes – and a pretty, PRETTY man. Besides, my family watched the DVD special features and I had the unparalleled pleasure of watching my Father, Shirleen, Sarah and William do Oompa Loompa dances – hysterical, if not vaguely surreal. Anyway, I suppose if you make a giant blueberry outfit you deserve a nomination for Costume Design.
5. Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith: “Hello, my name is Kathryn and I saw Revenge of the Sith.” “Hello, Kathryn. GET OUT – YOU SUCK!” Something like that, anyway. Don’t EVEN get me started on this film. Just the inequities in health-care between the Dark Side and The Force make me SEETHE. Annakin gets turned into, shall we say – a smoldering, carbonized LUMP, and they can still REBUILD HIM FROM SCRATCH. Okay, so he has to talk more slowly because of the special respirator, but it just makes him sound more authoritative. And the special “suit” just looks evil and threatening – he’d no doubt custom order such an ensemble from his tailor (and then strangle him WITH THE MERE POWER OF HIS MIND if it was too tight in the crotch). Padmé, on the other hand, dies in childbirth. They can reconstruct Annakin/Darth Vader from a charred blob of NOTHING, yet she DIES IN CHILDBIRTH. DROIDS (no doubt straight off the moisture farm) are her caretakers, and all they do is discreetly cover her with a large, metal, gynecological horn o’ plenty and just let the babies pop out willy-nilly. WHAT IN THE HELL? And yeah, yeah, there are those who would claim she died of a “broken heart.” PLEASE. Apparently The Force isn’t any help for a “broken heart.” Like she found no reason to live FOR HER CHILDREN as opposed to pining away for her HUSBAND, who was EVIL INCARNATE (and unforgivably whiny even when he was “good”). Darth Vader, who was, you might say “heartbroken” when Padmé died, was effortlessly patched up by The Dark Side.

That’s it. I have failed you terribly, Jon Stewart, my BELOVED (if you weren’t married with two children, that is). Maybe next year…

WARNING: Do not think that my complete ignorance of the bulk of this years Academy Awards film canon will stop me from commenting on it like I know what I’m saying. It’s not as though being uninformed has ever stopped me from discussing pretty much ANY subject, ad nauseam.
Happy Oscar® Day!

Take a look:

Don’t Worry; I’m Double-Jointed

Muppet Detail

I donned the bling first; Ernie and Bert were serendipitous (lurking in a box that should have contained only plain bandages).

I drove Sarah to school this morning. At the same time I was trying to look (SAFELY – as I AM Kate the Safety Dog) at pictures she’d finally convinced someone to develop from her seventeenth birthday party with her friends (involving a young couple tied up in police tape and “crepe paper” – a term which she had to feed me three times because I could NOT remember it – and a good blackmail shot of that couple kissing (Alas – the teenage blackmail and HORROR) and fancy masks and VERY fancy socks on Sarah’s part), the “safe” viewing of which caused slight motion sickness what with all the looking back and forth and back and forth and back and forth. And evidently it is “Spirit Week” and today is “Hawaiian Day” at her school and we were already on our way when she told me and I was bemoaning the fact that I had not known so I could loan her my authentic Hawaiian coconut shell bra (authentic, at least, in the sense that it was carried back from Hawaii as a gift to me). She was NOT especially disappointed. Perhaps, as the week began with “Hat Day,” and she has been the only person allowed to wear a hat every day, it wasn’t that exciting. It was a surprisingly quiet ride considering that Sarah often has a cell phone attached to her ear as though it had grown there and her phone was IN ITS CASE. I should explain that Sarah, since birth, has had a natural quality to her voice (a combination of frequency and natural projection) that causes it to carry about three miles at any and most every given moment. So her phone conversations, which she may consider private (“YOU hang up first! No, YOU hang up FIRST!!!!), are not. She did regale me with a surprisingly quiet verse of, “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star,” (?) when we hit a long stop light, but the conversation was otherwise very subdued for Sarah. AND she had disc six of Season Four of the Gilmore Girls WITH her!!! Huzzah!

On my drive back, I ended up behind this filthy wee hatchback. In his car I could have sworn he had a small stack of sad, yellowish squares of sod. This was a little baffling – it’s just not sod season, and even it were, he could only have made a very tiny yellow lawn. I had too much time to ponder this, I admit, because he was driving VERY SLOWLY. When I did pass him, what I thought was sod turned out to be a bale of hay. Yes, he had a couple of boxes and one bale of hay in his tiny, grimy hatchback. This was mysterious, too, as people who don’t farm (yes, some do – there are still ranches and farms in this valley) sometimes seek out hay bales and cornstalks and other such earthy things as decorations for autumn. But it’s winter, and if this man were a farmer or rancher, it’s quite surprising enough that he wasn’t driving a pick-up truck to accommodate sufficient feed for a little herd of animals. Perhaps he’s a one-cow farmer. And perchance it’s a very tiny little cow. I could have mulled over this further (sad, yes), but THEN I got behind a slightly banged up pick-up truck (this is NOT the weird part – banged-up pick-up trucks are fairly ubiquitous in this area). The unique thing about this vehicle was the personalized license plate which read, I kid you not, “Gunman.” I cautiously tried to observe if he had a gun rack in the truck cab (also, unfortunately, not especially abnormal in this area), but I didn’t see one. He DID have one of those big metal boxes that fit in the truck bed, so perhaps that’s where he keeps his assault rifles and his shotguns and grenades and hand-held missiles and in a stand-off he has practiced grabbing them through the tiny window in the back of the truck cab. Yes, it sounds like I am embellishing the number and fire-power of the weapons that this man may carry, but if you PAY to have a personalized license plate made that says, “Gunman,” I presume you have at least a slight fondness for weapons that shoot bullets and buckshot and such. Either that, or you have a guilty conscience and you are admitting your part in an unsolved crime and hoping that the local-yokel law enforcement will eventually figure it out.

I tried NOT to think about the firearm potential in this scenario, as I found it a tad frightening, so I started to listen more assiduously to the CD I was playing. “Behind these Hazel Eyes” came on. YES – I was listening to Kelly Clarkson’s Breakaway – and all y’all can just stop the mocking right now. Are we not all entitled to our guilty pleasures? I’d never listened all THAT closely to the lyrics – I’d liked the fact that the song concerns “hazel eyes” because I have hazel eyes. I abruptly was struck by the ridiculous nature of the phrase “the tears I cry behind these hazel eyes.” There are certainly poetic references to emotions that one “hides behind their eyes,” but that’s different. Those allude to the metaphor wherein “eyes are the windows to the soul.” So you could hide grief or despair “behind your eyes,” but tears? Look at this:

Gross Anatomy of the Eye

Tears flowing secretly BEHIND the eye around the optic nerve, down into the orbital cavity? Blech. It’s just WRONG – all wrong.

And people wonder why I go out so little.

*Pretentious, yes, but it sounds better than, “What I observed on State Street.”

Until I discover the possibly serious ramifications of this, let us keep my forthcoming revelation on the QT (why in the hell DOES that mean “in secrecy”? Apparently it is derived from “qui vive,” but as far as I can tell , that translates literally to “who lives.” So it’s a secret why “on the QT” means “in secrecy”). Oh yes – the revelation:
I believe my Mother has an unnatural and subconscious

fear of the number “five.”

This was evidenced yesterday in a collage she made (of shoes) that I was to scan and send to my sister-in-law, Julianne, so she could replace her cancelled catalog Christmas present (as I’ve mentioned several times, since my Mother is the catalog shopper extraordinaire of the UNIVERSE, sometimes you only get a little cut-out picture of your back-ordered holiday gift, or you have to choose an alternate gift because they ran out of…whatever it is they run out of). At first glance, you think there are eight shoe choices. Upon closer examination, however, there is NO NUMBER FIVE. One, two, three, four, SIX, seven, eight. I asked my mother about this and she honestly had no idea why she’d omitted number five. This could be serious. I am one of five children. My Mother has five grand-children. Everyone in this family has five digits on each arm and leg.

All I can say to my siblings and my nieces and nephews is GUARD YOUR LIVES AND YOUR DIGITS. MOM/GRANDMA MAY BE OUT TO GET NUMBER FIVE!

As far as the children go, the logical choice would be ME. My Mother is undeniably the most generous and patient person on this Earth, but still waters run DEEP. Perhaps she’s reached a breaking point…

I received a large pimple on my right (face!) cheek for Christmas; it was rather festive. It was not the only gift I received. But I’ll get to that another time. I was going to call this entry, “What Would Cause Kate to BAKE?” But zits are funnier.

Nonetheless, let’s address the question. Indeed, what WOULD make Kate act even slightly domestic? Well, as I had mentioned, I was on to Plan G with my big Christmas Craft Project. I think Plan G might actually work. However, I was sooooo tired of broken drill bits and red-hot stone shards flying through the air, wearing eye protection, getting covered in moist stone grit (to the point that it would make my hair stiff – interesting thought for a styling product, perhaps, but also YUCKY), and losing my favourite pieces of rock. I needed a break. So in the middle of the night (is that not when I do ALL my most interesting work?) on December 23 – which, I suppose, would technically make it December 24 – Christmas Eve, I baked a TRIPLE batch of Boiled Raisin Cookies. This is, believe it or not, something in my skill set; I make a decent Boiled Raisin Cookie. And if you’ve not tasted Boiled Raisin Cookies, I should tell you that even folks who do not like raisins have liked these cookies. I use my Great-Grandmother Monson’s recipe (and she was a really WONDERFUL cook and baker). Here, FREE FOR THE TAKING, is the THE RECIPE.

So, yes, I have yet to finish my big Christmas Craft Project, but I have not given it up completely. Besides, Boiled Raisin Cookies are my Dad’s favourite, so it was a nice festive holiday-like thing to do for him.

So Happy Holidays and All That Jazz to All Y’all!

So I’m on to Plan G (I believe) with my major holiday craft project. It seemed simple and elegant; it is now gargantuan, pollution-emitting and, to be frank, slightly dangerous.

The “Rock Men” have been very helpful. They, for instance, inspired my very special hand-crafted water bath made from a piece of laminate flooring. Nonetheless, I’ve broken TWO MORE diamond drill bits (at least this time the didn’t go flying into the air or put me in danger of putting out an eye). I went to replace them, and the “Rock Men” very sweetly told me that one needs to be patient and I was PERHAPS bearing down too hard with my Dremel® tool. Well, in truth, they are more frank than that; they said, “You’re pushin’ too hard.” They then suggested an alternative to suddenly magically assuming the patience of Job. One of the “Rock Men” even showed me how to do it. It looked straightforward, I have the tools, I thought Plan F was well on its way. Nope. I now have ruined approximately two yards of REAL “half-round” silver wire (priced by the GRAM, for crying out loud).

So please, pretty PLEASE, wish me luck with Plan G. It’s a little sticky, but at least no one will sustain second or third degree burns from it.

Heartfelt apologies to e. e. cummings (even though he’s dead).

I started this “All Lauds and Honours” blog entry for Blobbies in May. Okay, I wrote the title on May 1, 2005 and then became distracted by the e. e. cummings poem upon which I based it (“i sing of Olaf glad and big”) and became intrigued with my great-grandfather’s World War I history in Engineer Company 5 (his name was Olaf – Olaf Wilford Monson – so it’s not QUITE as tangential as one might think) and was caught up mulling over whether or not he was really “glad” and “big” – he was to some extent but that is, indeed, a subject for another time.

So – BLOBBIES!!! It turns out that now is an opportune to discuss said creatures, as the OFFICIAL Blobby Farm is now open!

Not only is it a website of amusement and delight (peruse it – you will agree), it is the official source for Blobby purchases. AND THERE IS STILL TIME if you’d like to purchase a Blobby as a Christmas gift for your niece or you mail carrier or your boss or your cat OR the Queen of England (I’m thinking that she has NOT been privileged to meet any Blobbies). If you order your Blobbies by December 20th, you should receive them by Christmas (if you are not in Iceland, that is. You’d have to check with Blobby Farmers Maria and Chris about their Reykjavik shipping policies).

Oh – have I said that I LOVE Blobbies? I am Blobsessed; it is true. Read about my EXTREME Blobbsession of last Christmas in my Holiday Gift Ideas.

Let me introduce you to my collection:

Dread Pirate Ned 1

Shawny Donut 1

Hoosier, Jr. 2

Peek-A-Boo Radley, Jr. 1

Tot, Jr. 2

Uni, Jr. 1

Also, take a look at my entry to last year’s Blobby Coloring contest, for which I received a “FREAKISHLY Honorable Mention” in my age category.

For which I won this:

Kitty Crud 1

My nephew, Leif, won first place in his age category (talented little spud).

I have done it. I am OFFICIALLY old. It has little to do with chronological age; I have done the three defining things that make your SOUL old. They are as follows:

1. I LAUGHED at The Family Circus: My Mother was reading the “Funny Papers” (that’s what we old people call them – we watch our “stories” and we read “The Funny Papers”) the other day. Somehow she and I got into a discussion in which we marveled that The Family Circus still ran in “The Funny Papers.” She surmised that old folks liked it (and remembered that my Father thinks it’s a funny comic strip – HE’S always talking about “the good ol’ days”). I said something about every single comic consisting of that flat-headed kid with severe A.D.H.D. being told to go somewhere and we are treated to a picture in in which we can follow the arrow to all the OTHER seven hundred places he goes before he gets to the destination in his original instructions. Ha ha. My Mom said that only covered fifty percent of the comic strips (and I’m going to guess only the Sunday ones have the room for all those arrows and HILARITY). Then she described that day’s Family Circus scenario. It had something to do with that flat-headed kid being lost in a department store and the harried-looking “lost child” attendant making an P.A. announcement that “we have a little lost boy who says he is eleventy-seven and his name is ‘Spongebob.'” I hesitated for a moment, and then I said, “That’s actually kinda funny.” My Mom AGREED (she can be forgiven, as she is over fifty). I SAVED “The Funny Papers” so that I could include a scan of the comic strip and perhaps, just PERHAPS, someone might agree with me that in this case, The Family Circle was uncharacteristically amusing (okay, I even PULLED IT OUT OF THE RECYCLING BIN). Someone threw it way, though (and I have too much dignity to search – even if it IS the recycling and not the garbage – once again).
3. I watched Matlock ON PURPOSE: I was working on a project yesterday and flipping through the channels and I CHOSE with all my facilities of will and volition intact, to watch Matlock. And, so help me, last week I CHOSE to watch Murder, She Wrote. TWICE.
5. I was a bit chilly and I elected to wear a SHAWL: Nope, I did not grab one of my “hoodies” or “snugglies,” I chose a freakin’ SHAWL. Please let it count for a little bit that it is made of Pashmina (I say “is” because, so help me, I’m still wearing it). And does that fact that it is periwinkle count for or against me?