I'd like to give a big "FUCK YOU" to November.

Ok, really it's going out to the last week of October, too. Way to dick me over universe.

First things first. The beginning of the last week of October. As I was getting those four new tires installed, I went and had Chinese food around the corner. And guess what my fortune cookie didn't have? That's right, a fucking fortune. Should have been my first clue that it was only going to get worse.

So I went to the dentist on Thursday, the day before Halloween. No big deal, right? I was having some tooth/mouth pain and figured I'd get it looked at, make an appointment for a later date and move on. WRONG! I left many hundreds of dollars poorer, with strict instructions to not have anything sticky or chewy or hard. And a pretty temporary crown. I'll be going back in a few weeks for the permanent one to be put on. It sucks. I didn't even know I had a cracked tooth. Ok, so maybe I did since I played with it with my tongue, but it wasn't bad or anything. Oh, and nearly a week later, my damn tooth still hurts.

Halloween was actually pretty good. Chunk went to a couple of houses and got some candy. He had three adult type people go with him and we had a good time too! There was a quasi party featuring "Zombie Eye Ghoulash" and a fizzy "Witch's Brew." Good times. And Chunk got more candy than he could possible need and has tried to eat it all so far.

Things were going pretty well until Monday night. Went to the Campus Advisory Committee meeting. I'm now in the Special Education small group. We're to deal with things in the Campus Improvement Plan that deal with special ed kids and stuff. I know NOTHING about special ed. They say this is a good thing, it'll "help." I can't for the life of me figure out how, but sure.

Fast forward a couple hours and you'll find me loving my potty and trashcan. Fast forward to Tuesday morning and you'll find that I haven't kept anything down in 12 hours or so and am headed to the emergency room for help. Which they gladly supplied. 8 mgs of Zofran, I don't know how much phenergan, and two bags of saline later and I'm better. Sort of. Turns out I also have shingles. You know, that crappy chicken pox like shit for adults. It itches and it hurts and I'm miserable. I'll live, yeah, but I have to take FIVE pills a day for 10 days. So, every two hours I'm swallowing giant pills.

I started this post on Thursday and I'm just now getting around to finishing it and posting. While I've felt better, I'm still not at 100%. And I don't think flipping my mattress Wednesday night by myself (it's a queen) helped. Oh well. More things have happened since then, but that'll have to wait. Dun Dun DUH!

It is finally cold. YAY!?

O, I love Halloween. This is no surprise to anyone. What I don't love? Having my filling break and a possible infection the week of. Dentist is on Thursday and hopefully I'll be cleared for all the candy I'll be stealing eating Friday.

Things I love today:
* Having Roadside Assistance. You see, I had a flat tire last night and forgot that I bought RA when I bought the car. Came in great to change the tire.
* Stewart. He took me to the grocery store when I thought I didn't have RA and then hung out for a bit, despite his being allergic to every animal in my house.
* Being able to buy four(!) new tires.

Things I do not love today:
* Having to buy the aforementioned tires. Totally shitty, but really needed. The tread was coming off and I didn't know it. OOPS!
* Not being able to eat really because of aforementioned filling. Ugh.
* Being in a CFIDS flare. It's not something I talk about a lot, because most of the time I'm fine, but damn, I'm tired.

It has finally turned cold in the Land of Hot. This is good except that when the heat is turned on in the house, my room is 5 degrees hotter than any other room. I'd love to be able to open my window, but I'd really like to have a burglar bar put on. Mine's the only one on the outside of the fence. I don't want horny boys crawling through my open window! (OK, maybe, but only Edward Cullen, who of course wouldn't be stopped by bars.)

Found out FOAF is bi-polar. He's been distant the last couple of weeks and now I get it. He's worried it'll make me not want to hang or something, but it doesn't. He's not the first one I've known to have it and he probably won't be the last. I'm not worried, I'm relieved. At least this way I know how to handle it when he's distant and stuff.

My VCR crapped out on me. I'm very devestated. It still works, it'll play and record manually, but the timer doesn't seem to want to work. Which means now I must be home to start it taping. That could be ok, but what if I forget? Do you know how long it takes the C-Dub to put episodes up??? Waaaay too long. Almost a week. And then it starts skipping and is obnoxious. And yes, I'm old school. I love my VCR. If I had a DVR, I'd just find more crap to tape and that wouldn't be good for anyone! But now I have to make sure I'm home to tape Super Why on Friday. Special Halloween episode, don't you know.

Uh, I'm a little anxious to get back to my Gossip Girl book, so, yeah. Love me some S and B and N and C. And I'd like a nap for $200 please Alex.

How to Carve a Fake Pumpkin

So, I know I keep talking about how I carve fake pumpkins every year. And I keep getting the "What the Hell is a fake pumpkin and how do you carve it??" response. I'm here to tell you! Now that I've gotten my photo stuff to work, I'm a happy camper and can regale you with the awesomeness that is fake pumpkin carving. Let's Go!

You start with a plain old craft pumpkin that you get from Hobby Lobby, Michael's or somewhere similar. They come in different sizes, colours and shapes. The second one I did this year is this one.

From Delusions and Desires

Then you pick a pattern and follow the directions, just like you would carving a real pumpkin. Here's this year's design.

From Delusions and Desires

This is after the pattern had been punched and I'm about halfway finished.

From Delusions and Desires

The finished pumpkin! If you look closesly, you can see the dust in the back of the pumpkin. A little vaccuming take care of it. (ok, click on the picture and you can see it in the bigger version.)

From Delusions and Desires

All you need now is a hole for the light. I normally do a hole in the top where the stem is, but the bottom was better for this shape.

From Delusions and Desires

All it up and ready to go! I use a battery operated tea light candle in my pumpkins. Or, glow sticks and bracelets for some other colour.

From Delusions and Desires

I love my pumpkins and my decorations! I may post other decoration pictures later this week, cause, you know, this was a lot. And I'm still trying to figure out all this picture stuff with Picasa. I'm used to uploading to a different (private) site and then adding in with HTML.

It's times like these...

that I wish I drank more.

I'm sick, again. I'm tired. I'm hurt, physically. Fucking Sudafed should not be taken at night and I should know this by now, but I took it anyway and then never could get to sleep and now I'm just all "ARGH FUCK OFF!" at the world.

I took all these pictures for my great "How to Make a Fake Pumpkin" post, but then when I went to edit them, I found out Jeremiah lacks any kind of decent photo editing software. WTF, Jerry. Now, I leave you guys fake pumpkin knowhow-less.

My day is slightly better. Star Trek Voyager is back on. I hate when Spike switches things up and I don't get my nerdiness in. Yes, I'm a big fat nerd. Ok, not as big as SOMEONE I know, because I have never been to a convention for ST or dressed up. Not that I didn't want to, cause I always wanted to be Counselor Troy from TNG for Halloween when I was younger. I wish I had a fucking Holodeck. That shit would be awesome.

I got nothing. Sorry.

And it's raining?

I am a bit sick still and a whole lot bored. And because of that, you get this.

I started decorating for Halloween. I am currently two weeks behind in decorating. Seriously. I know when Halloween is, y'all, but I love Halloween more than anything else. I've even dressed up once already! (OK, so that was for the children's Halloween symphony concert I took the kid to, but still. And I rock the Pink Princess from 4th grade costume.)

Ok, so my friend was trying to set me up with his friend. The friend of a friend (FOAF) and I have come to the agreement that it will never work. We decided this based on twenty questions. I'll save you the horror of reading our twenty questions, but suffice it to say it took 11 questions for him to admit he doesn't like kids. Dealbreaker, dude, dealbreaker. We can be friends.

And on the Prospective Boyfriend front, I went to a movie and dinner with him and two of his work buddies. The movie turned out to be funny, it's the new Brad Pitt/George Clooney film. Dinner was spent at the Olive Garden. He loves the Olive Garden. I got soup. I'm never hungry when I'm sick. I'll know I'm not sick when I start craving pizza. Anyway, the evening ended and I didn't hug him. I just don't know what he's told people, so I didn't. I should have. But, I know he had a good time too, as always, he says.

I am becoming something I'm not sure I should with him. I miss him. I feel the draw to talk to/email him every day. I'm willing to watch Floriday football with him. Yeah, weird.

Alright, I have a meeting I'm supposed to go to tonight that I'm going to skip, but I still need to carve my fake pumpkin, so I'm out.