.::still blinking::.

Meet my newest love interest. Mr. Bento.

I packed my first lunch today for jj in it. I was so excited. I don’t know if he cared. But I love the idea of organizing food and making it pretty like the Japanese do.

In clockwise order: asparagus, homemade pitas and Anzac Biscuits (let me know if anyone wants the recipe, they are so good and almost no sugar), orange slices and lettuce, Diana’s Chicken and Sweet Corn Fritters. I got that recipe from First Meals, it is a cook book with recipes for kids. Of course, my kid will not eat them. In the center is a little bit of sesame ginger dressing.

There is a whole underground Mr. Bento Society.

The baby that lives at my house, the one that screams at me all day long, refuses to eat anything that resembles actual food.

Cheetos, not a problem. Juice, bring it on woman. Fruit snack, load my plate up lady. Alfredo and noodles, not a chance fat a**. Get it out of my sight and just because you ate some I am going to cry and blubber the rest of the evening. I, the man child, have a point to prove. Because obviously you are a little dense woman, and do not understand that in my life syllabus I outlined the three foods that I will eat. So dear lady, you had best not try to feed me anything else ever again or I will be forced to hit you with my spoon repeatedly.

Love,
Gentry
(You know who is in charge here).

I do graphic design for Herriman City. Not a lot, just for a few summer events. I did the program for the Miss Herriman Scholarship Pageant, remember there is a scholarship in there.

Doing this program every year I am on the phone for a few hours discussing every word and semi-colon with the pageant directors. They take their job very seriously. I take my job very seriously also, I do not take their job seriously though. I can portray class and style, but for some reason I don’t think that pageants are the epitome for grace and elegance. The pageant directors will ask my opinions about things and I will make some joke about something, and they will not laugh. Then I remember that they take this stuff very seriously. They take their work to heart and they feel that they are helping raise the next mega starlets of the days to come. I guess I just don’t see it like that. I do see it as a fun night to watch young girls make fools of themselves, and I am always up for that.

There was the one girl who came out and you knew that she thought she was going to win. She was slinky and bouncy and I immediately wanted to hit her. For her amazing talent she portrayed her love for the last whatever years of cheerleading by doing a routine that she had choreographed. If I was a pre-pubescent boy, I am sure that I would have loved it. But I could hardly watch. And her evening dress looked like something a cheap Mexican prostitute would wear. Am I going to be sued for slander?

There was another girl who may have been good if she would have stopped jerking around stage like a robot with one of its spark plugs missing. Belly dancing is supposed to be graceful. Do not do it like Eurkel from Family Matters.

I was impressed by two girls. They had a quiet elegance about them. The were unobtrusive. They were girls that actually portrayed class and beauty. I am glad they won.

I was also impressed with the past Miss Herriman. She lost the pageant two times before she won it. I have seen her progress and grow into a very smart and intelligent woman. She started as a shy girl with no courage or faith in herself. She has turned into a woman with grace and elegance and I would not be surprised if she ends up doing great things.

I am not a believer in pageants. But this girl came out of her cocoon and decided to become someone beautiful. I think we all have that ability. It just took being paraded about for this girl to find herself.

He started crying today while I was doing the dishes. I looked over to find him alone on a deserted island with no way to get off.

So I turned the stool over and it immediately became a force to be reckoned with.

I am boycotting Wal-mart. For the past like 5 years I have been going there every week faithfully. But I have had enough.

Last week I went to the Neighborhood Wal-Mart, as if it being a small version makes it any more palatable. I was standing in the check out line, waiting my turn. When a checker from the next lane over came and butted in front of me so that she could discuss when my checker got off of work and what her husband was doing that day. I sat and listened and finally lost my patience. Who does she think that she is? Did she not see me standing there with my kid and groceries? Stop wasting my time lady. So I said, “Excuse me.” And she looked at me like, Who are you? and Why do YOU think that you can interrupt our conversation? The lady pulled her hair up into a fake pony tail and let it drop and then walked away. Rude.

Today, I was again at my local neighborhood walmart and went to the self-checkout lane so that I would not have to deal with stupid lady and her side kick stupid ponytail. I rang all my stuff up and and then decided that I did not want one of the things that I had gotten. So I did the remove it from my list thing. But the machine would not let me continue with anything and kept saying “Please wait for assistance”. A red light started blinking, so I figured that help was on the way. I stood there for a few minutes until I was finally fuming and went and yelled at the customer service people. They walked over fixed my problem and walked away. They did not say they were sorry, they did not even take the thing that I had decided that I did not want. I was made. So I left my Bertolli Frozen dinner on top of the cash register. It will probably stay there until it molds and turns itself into compost and just disappers.

So I am tired of the lack of customer service and I am not going their any longer. I like Target way better anyway. I can get groceries at Macy’s for cheaper than at Wal-mart, I just need to pay attention to the ad they send out weekly. But they really do have good deals and they are not open on Sunday, I will support businesses that do that. And they always give G a balloon and smarties. I love that they care about the customer. When it comes time to renew my Sam’s Club membership, I am not going to do it. I am going to go to Costco. They may cost more in membership fees, but they take American Express. I love my American Express. I have one for business and one for personal. I get points for everything that I buy. So eventually I will be able to go places with all the points that I build up for buying stuff. That is a dream come true.

Also, have you seen “Supersize Me”. EEEEWWWWWWW! It is so gross and you know that Wal-mart plays a huge part in that. They do not sell actual beef, they sell soy with brown food coloring and ground up plastic in it. They sell chicken that has been given growth hormones so that they have abnormally large breasts like the Dolly Parton of chicken. That is what you are buying at Wal-mart. Quality, medically enhanced, impervious to radiation, chicken.

Four jobs I’ve had

1. Cowgirl. In Bryce Canyon. Does that count as a job, I’d say more like child labor. Perhaps I will write about that in another blog sometime. I did it for three summers. Three of the worst summers of my life. Anyway, dressed as a cowgirl and entertained people from other countries who wanted a real western feeling time. Because that is how we in the west spend our time.
2. Human Resource Manager for the computer labs at Utah State. That is where I met jj.
3. Thanks you for calling Priceline.com. My name is Makayla, can I get your ticket identification number?
4. Foot Doctor Financial Filer. Fungus and ulcers. Things I never wanted to know people actually had.

Four movies I can watch over and over

I really find it impossible to watch any movie lately. I usually takes about four days to watch one. But in the days when I watched movies, these were them:

1. Dirty Dancing
2. That thing you do!
3. Little Women
4. Beaches

Four places I have lived

1. West Jordan, Utah for about 10 years as a child
2. Logan, Utah going to college for 6 years while going to college. I love it there and would move back in a heart beat.
3. Herriman, Utah went to high school for 3 years there. I was there for such a short time that my mom’s neighbors didn’t even know that I was her child and wondered who was visiting on the weekends.
4. jj’s parents basement and my old bedroom. While I was pregnant and we were building a house.

Four TV shows I love

1. “The Apprentice”
2. “The Office”
3. “Lost”
4. “Arrested Development”

Four places I’ve vacationed

1. San Diego, California
2. Moab, Utah
3. Tiajuana, Mexico (gross)
4. Las Vegas, Nevada

Four of my favorite dishes

1. Sushi
2. Polasami (corned beef, onion, coconut milk, spinach) SO GOOD!
3. Salmon Tacos
4. Jamaican Jerk Pork Salad

Four sites I visit daily

1. dooce.com
2. toothpastefordinner.com
3. allrecipes.com
4. oprah.com

Four places I would rather be right now

1. Warm and cuddly with jj
2. Running
3. San Diego
4. Snowboarding. I am not good. So I would like to be snowboarding well.

Three people I am tagging

1. Annie
2. Lindsey
3. Trisha ( I don’t know your blog)
4. I don’t know anyone else that has a blog.

The end and amen.

Knowing that new people are reading this kind of makes me nervous. In real life I hold back and don’t tell everyone my story. Here I let it all fly. Here I write about the real me. In everyday life I paint on my happy face and pretend that I am perfect. Really, there is quite a bit going on underneath that I don’t talk about, except to jj. This is theraputic in a non-expensive, exabitionist kind of way.

This is my truth, it may not be your truth. But to me this is real and how I see and feel about things. So there is the disclaimer.

So do not be offended, this is not meant to offend. Besides, you are a fool if you are offended by those who did not mean to offend you and and an even bigger fool if you are offended by those who did mean to.

Also, I am not looking for pity. What I am needing and wanting is self-sufficient love and acceptance of myself. That is something that others cannot help me with. It is a slow process, and I think I am making progress.

What is so wrong about having pink hair? I want to do it. jj wants blue. But we feel like we have to be good examples. Well, jj doesn’t really care about being an example. But he does worry about what work will think of him. But does it really matter? For me it is an artistic statement. Being an artist, isn’t that what I should do? My cousin, Cassie, who was my best friend all my growing up years, got blue streaks yesterday. If I had had the cash, I would have done it also. Maybe.

I feel like I have to be a good example to the young women that I teach. But do I really? Does it really matter? It is not like blue hair means that I am doing anything bad. I am not doing crystal meth. I have never gotten drunk. I have no strange piercings, and if I did would it really matter if no one could see them. I dress modestly. Blue hair would not change any of that. So what is the big deal. I wonder what an extreme hair cut really is anyway.

Besides wouldn’t it teach them that just because someone looks different doesn’t make them bad or different. Isn’t that the kind of thing that we should be teaching? And yet I am scared.

For Christmas, I received this knife. l I have been cooking lately and Martha Stewart showed me the kind of knife that I need to be the perfect cook. So that is what I wanted. jj is especially proud of it because the end is copper and as the blade wears down you can sand off the back so that the blade and handle are always even. Brilliant.

I quickly realized that I would also need to keep it sharp. I was not aware that knifes just do not stay sharp. But I wanted to keep my perfect knife in perfect condition. So I went onto ebay and bought the FURI Tech Edge Sharpening System.

I don’t know if I have been this excited for something to arrive since I was little and I knew that Christmas was coming. It took about a week to get here and I checked the mail everyday in anticipation. When it arrived I quickly and accurately sharpened all my knives and soon needed more. I have since sharpened my mothers knifes (she only had 2 that were not serrated) and am always on the lookout for more that need sharpened.

I follow the instructions precisely and sharpen it every time I get it out with the very fine sharpener. Just to keep it in working order. I love my knife sharpening system.