I hope everyone has heard about the “pet” chimpanzee going crazy and attacking his owner’s friend. A shame. A real shame for everyone concerned, especially the mauled human and the dead animal.

Chimpanzees are evil. Seriously, they creep me out. They share many of the same behavioral tendencies of homo sapiens, really, and people tend to creep me out too. I’ve watched far too many nature documentaries of chimps forming what could basically be called a gang and then warring against other chimps for territories and mates. Those critters are quite savage and not cute or cuddly. ( I do like gorillas, though. They’re dangerous too, but less …less spasmodic bbout it. Hey, I never claimed I was consistent,) I don’t want chimps dead, mind, they have their place in this world. Which is far away from me.

I would never ever have one as a pet. They aren’t “pets”, they are animals, like we are. (Got a few words for you, if you don’t believe we’re animals, you haven’t seen people at a buffet place. Or a clearance sale. Eeesh.)

It is snowing so hard up here in ….where I live. We’ve actually been snowed in and told to stay home. It’s so bad even churches have been closed. We have at least seven inches of snow. At LEAST.

Thank goodness that I am vacation this week. I plan on staying home. But my parents (I know. They drive me crazy but I miss ‘em.) probably won’t make it down for Christmas.

No Christmas for me. But it will be white around here for awhile.

One of the toughest issues I need to overcome is the desire to overeat–especially the dreaded “j” food—the destroyer of every well intentioned diet. I nibble on stuff that isn’t what I’d call good for me, my junk food of choice is mostly chocolate, and justify it by saying, “Oh, it’s only a couple of Hershey’s Kisses. It won’t hurt if I have only three or four or five…right?”

The answer to that is, “Wrong! Suck it up, admit a temporary defeat and move on.” I refuse to beat myself over a set back. Believe me, I’ve done enough beating myself up for a life time.

For the majority of my personal daily cuisine, I do make healthier choices now, incorporating more lean meats and veggies to my meals. But there is just something so …incredibly comforting about junk food. I don’t know why, but I feel “safe” when I eat alot–I especially relish the tastiness of Swiss Cake Rolls. Yummy.

And let’s face it: a carrot doesn’t impart too much comfort unless one is a rabbit. (Or a gold digger. Oops, wrong kind of carrot!)

Granted, food shouldn’t be about seeking comfort and security, but it should be savored. I’ll admit I’m having a hard time balancing healthy food with taste bud tingling deliciousness. Some of the meals I produce are healthy, but rather bland. Others are good but way too calorie ridden. And, of course, the economy is making it even harder to afford healthy and delicious food.

Ugh. Losing focus…need to get back on track.

Oh yeah, I was talking about my penchant for over eating and not the state of our union’s economy.(That’ll be another story for another time, gentle readers.) I eat out of stress. I eat out of loneliness (that’s partly my wallflowery fault.) and I eat out of desperation sometimes. Desperation for what, I don’t know. When I find out, this blog might be the third or fourth to know. Or not. I’m a believer in keeping some issues private.

I need to come up with a way to determine how and when I’m over-eating. I DID start a food journal, but gradually forgot to add entries…and well, you know. I guess I’ll call it as I see it; I got too lazy to count calories and put what I ate in the book. Maybe I should start again.

Well, as my fingers are currently laying exhausted on the keyboard, that’s all I have for right now. If you’ve made it this far, thanks for reading and letting me ramble on.

I don’t believe in role models–well, let me qualify that. I don’t believe in making role models out of people that I have never met personally. However, I do believe it is ok to adopt a certain action—like compassion for the unfortunate—from someone like Gandhi. But I wouldn’t base my whole life just from some of his words I happened to read on paper. Note on Gandhi: I will say that there are worse people to look up to. If you want to make him your role model, go right on ahead. I won’t complain.

I prefer real life role models because I have a better chance to fully draw upon their experience, rather than try to absorb it secondhand. And I’m better able to sort out what is applicable to my life.

That said, it baffles me why people put pretty celebrities that are all sparkle and no substance on pedestals–then moan and groan when the fallen “idol” doesn’t live up to the idolees’ moral standard. (As if anyone can live up to the scrutiny of millions of prying and adoring eyes. The thought of being observed like that makes me squirm. But that naggling little feeling may be my social anxiety disorder acting up.) Humans will be human and there’s always a little flaw that shouldn’t be emulated. Especially those people in the “entertainment” industry.

Why bother to imitate them? Because they’re pretty? Because they can sing and/or entertain? Parents whine about celebs like Britney Spears or Paris Hilton being poor role models. Well, it’s not really their job to BE role models. They are (marginally defined at best) entertainers. Anyone that aspires to be a beach bottle blonde with big boobs and only a few brain cells–possibly due to the bleach–should really ask themselves if they deserve more.

Our society needs more people to act like Gandhi and less like a Bimbo Bubble, or Macho McCool.

Family, true family, is who you choose to let into your life. True family shouldn’t be about a matter of blood or words on a page. You should feel people are members of your family in your heart. I can barely stand the people who share the same genetic code with me, but I consider my roomie as my sister.

I can’t have children. Which is fine as I don’t really want children, not the way the country is going. (And according to some Mayan prophesies, 2/3^rd of the population will be dead after 2012 anyway—not that I believe in the prophesies…) But if I did want rug rats, and I guess I might if I met the right person, I think I would adopt. 

It wouldn’t make me love or defend the child any less.  If I were a mother, I would be a very, very devoted mother. I’d take motherhood seriously. It would still be MY child, my heart, something for me to share my life with and someone that I can teach and see develop into an amazing person. 

I hurt inside when someone says, “I won’t be able to love any child not of my own flesh.”(This isn’t dedicated to anyone that reads this blog.) Really, that is an arrogant statement. What of those children that don’t have dedicated and loving parents? What of the abandoned ones that are shuffled off from foster home to foster home?

I say love them. Find one and show them the true meaning of love and family. Teach them to trust and to live and to love openly without fear of being hurt or mistreated.  Most of the world’s minor problems (which, all together add up to be a major one!) stem from the lack of love in children’s’ lives.

I don’t mean to hurt anyone’s feelings by this post. I don’t want to be seen as cruel or unfeeling. I merely wish to say there is always a way to have a family, even if it is slightly nontraditional.  Don’t give up.  There really are children that need you.

I’ve been so fricking busy lately, (I even cut down on my WoW time) that I haven’t been able to bother with a proper post.

I will leave you with a thought that I believe to be true.  It’s a comment I left on another blog…one that I happen to disagree with, but this comment is still post-worthy.

I’ve found that in the long run, hate is often more destructive to the person experiencing it, than to the object of the emotion.–Me

I have to go to work for a few hours today (double OT) then I’m off to go see Iron Man.

I have …gout. It is currently plaguing my big toe—and I cannot describe how godawful the pain is. Try imagining a fiery spike of pain going up your leg every time you move or even gently touch it. Walking is damn near impossible; it is a debilitating pain. I give it 9 and a half points out of ten on the pain scale.

I fight every day. I scratch, gnaw, bite, gouge and kick my way just to make it through with my sanity intact on a daily basis.

I am a fighter. I hate giving up, though I may occasionally just take a break from a project/activity. Still, that’s not the same as actually giving up. It may be a fine line between the two, but it’s there. I just realized how much of a struggle I’m in to lose a hundred (or so) pounds. It’s actually pretty scary–more so than any horror movie. (Except those with *shudder* slugs in them.)

It’s hard to get and stay motivated. I have to find some sort of carrot to dangle in front of my nose… I know. When I lose 25 pounds, I’ll get some new clothes. 50? More new clothes–and maybe a bigger MP3 player. At 75, I’ll undergo a complete makeover. When I reach that golden “100″, I’ll treat myself to a trip to Disneyland. Or something like that. It might be nice just to go someplace warm and become one with the sand and the piercing aqua blue water. It’d be sweet to have a good looking cabana boy offer me a margarita with one of those tiny little parasols.

This exercise/incentive program is going to have to be on hold until November, though, because of training. It’s just too chaotic right now (and I’d be setting myself up for failure) to start it. My workplace has a gym…and I’m going to sign up again. I quit last time because I was too self conscious.

This time, I resolve not to care if people stare at me as I lava lamp my way to fitness on the treadmill.

Gyms are for fat people too, after all.

Enough of my medically or electronically induced woes! Time to bring on my opinions!

Let’s start with Britney…Ms. Spears if you’re nasty. She has to be a truly horrible mom if she had her kids taken away…even as rich as she is. She’s making K-Fed (what kind of grown man names himself K-Fed? Oh yeah, a hillbilly.) look like a reasonable, caring parent!

I blame it on the fact that her parents pushed her into show biz at such an early age. Normal kids are eager to please, eager for approval and it’s dangerous for their general well being to BE in the entertainment industry. Now, I think kids can be great entertainers and still live a fairly normal life—as long as the parents protect them and do not pressure them to succeed.

Obviously, Britney’s parents let her down and now she’s letting her own kidlets down. I hope she realizes that she’s hurting her boys by hurting herself.

She’s in a sorry state. Maybe having her kids taken away will help her. (Or it could send her further along on that psychiatric downward spiral.) If she doesn’t wake up from this, she’ll probably self medicate until she’s dead.

Don’t get me wrong: I am no fan of her disposable music, I just think she’s a sad woman who needs a little compassion and tough love.

On completely different topic, because thinking about Ms. Spears (Yes, I’m nasty) is making me depressed, I think the eschelon of anti-heroes has a new member: Severus Snape.

I’ve always liked Snape for some reason….I’ve always been pretty good at reading between the lines. I’m good at ferreting out obscure details, good at fleshing out things left unsaid and coming to an accurate conclusion regarding a plot or character. And I’m definitely good at analyzing…though some of my thoughts leave something to be desired.

A word to those who have never read the Harry Potter books, but may want to: Nothing is as it appears.

Yup. Hard drive crashed. Now we’re on an inferior loaner computer. It can’t be helped, I guess. I’m going to miss my WoW buddies, since I’m not about to load the game on a borrowed computer. It takes FOREVER to load all that information for one thing. Second, I do not want to leave too big of a personal touch on this bucket of wires and chips.