Wireless and free

We FINALLY got our wireless router hooked up. Now I can blog from the living room. Woo hoo.

The food turned out great. We had it for lunch and dinner. Yummy.

I meant to put up a link here to the funniest video I've seen in a long time. It was an AP report about this guy in....ummm...maybe Indiana who, as a protest, paid his property tax bill in coins and dollar bills. Good for you pal. The Treasurer's office was hacked off. The guy wheeled the money in on a wagon. I should have done that the other day. We had to get new tags for our van. This cost is based on the weight of your vehicle. The price goes up every 2,000 lbs. Apparently, our van weighs 4003 lbs. So for 3 extra pounds, we paid $30 more for our tags. I asked the lady if she would lower it if I promised to take out my spare tire. What a rip off. Maybe next year I'll pay it in pennies.

We watched a really good movie last night called "Fracture." It stars Anthony Hopkins and Ryan Gosling. We all liked it a lot. It's a detective/thriller/lawyer thing. I give it....3 stars. It's one I would definitely watch again and might even buy.

Chantix Day 26, Smoke Free Day 11

Well it finally really happened. I was standing in front of the mall waiting for Jeff and this guy was standing there smoking a cigarette. It smelled sooooooooooooooooooooo good. I kept looking over at the guy and he finally asked if his cigarette was bothering me. I said, "I recently quit - it smells fantastic." He just laughed. Again it just made me kind of sad and longing. But I did not go out and buy any. *big dramatic sigh*

Maggie linked to a YouTube video in her comments to someone else. She said it was not for the faint of heart and boy was she right. It's a video this guy made chronicling his mother's death from lung cancer. I bawled my eyes out watching it. An aunt of mine died of lung cancer earlier this spring. I hate to think what she (and her immediate family) went through. It also didn't help that the woman in this video is kind of a smaller woman with black hair. People who *really* know me, know why that's bad. Anyway, here's the link. It is very sad and hard to watch. Please make sure you can handle it before you click. I really don't want my kids making a video like this about me some day. I guarantee that the thought of my kids going through this made me much sadder than not being able to light up with a stranger this afternoon.

No lunch yet

Still haven't eaten yet. The house smells so good I want to cry.

I thought I'd post this story. It doesn't seem like it's all that great for the deer either.

Off to the park for an Animal Shelter fund raising event. Lots of dogs, games, face painting - should be fun for Noah.

Lunch is on me

Right before I go to bed, I'm going to put the following recipe together in the crock pot. We're eating at noon, so stop by.

2 1/2 lb beef chuck roast
16 oz. jar of pepperoncini
1 packet beefy onion soup mix
4 cloves garlic, crushed
salt, pepper, and italian seasoning to taste
1 splash (or so) of dry red wine or dry marsala

Put all ingredients in slow cooker and cook 10 to 12 hours. Shred meat and place on hoagie/rolls. Cover liberally with provolone or mozzarella. Place under broiler until cheese melts. Reserve juice for dipping.

We may not make it until noon. Brunch sounds better!

Chantix Day 25, Smoke Free Day 10

Finally Friday. My afternoon seemed to drag on forever. Someone told me they had this brilliant idea for a new way to define time. But their theory isn't completely flushed out yet, so I didn't get to hear it. (Yeah sure.)

So today was pretty good. No horrible cravings. I still think I need to have a real test though. I caught a whiff of someone smoking as I was leaving work and it smelled really good and made me feel kind of sad and wistful. But it didn't turn me into a crazed, screaming lunatic - so that's pretty good, right?

I was scrolling through my last Chantix Day, Smoke Free Day post and was surprised to see that it's only 10 days. It feels longer. I don't know if it's the "wow I feel like I've known you forever and it's only been 2 days (or drinks)" kind of feels longer or "oh my god this is the most boring thing I've ever done for 5 minutes and it seems like 5 years" kind of feels longer. Maybe somewhere in between. I'll have to hunt that person down for the new theory of time.

Oh hey! It's Fun Photo Friday. We took this picture of the boys' feet a couple of days after we brought Noah home from the hospital.

Art

New paintings by Hubby.

Blogging awake

I checked my email and saw I had comments to my earlier post. I couldn't even remember what I had written about. I was sleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeepy this morning.

I've gotten many nice comments from all of you telling me to keep with it - despite my negative feelings about the whole thing. If I didn't say this before - thank you so much. Things seem to be a little bit better today. I REALLY REALLY REALLY wanted a cigarette after lunch (and I forgot to call for my refill - again), but am doing ok now.

The weekend after next we are going up to visit my parents. This is kind of the BIG TEST for me. I know my mom won't smoke around me if I ask her not to, but that's not really the problem. Just knowing they are there is the problem. If there were actual cigarettes in this house, I would smoke them. (We won't even get into whether or not there are any in my older son's room.)

As to sticking with it. I about 30% think that the reason I don't start up again is just so I don't have to tell everyone I failed. Most of my close family knows I'm doing this, as do my close friends and people I work with. Plus all of my loyal readers. Not that anyone will hate me/disown me/fire me....but still. How embarrassing. (Also MOST of these people are non-smokers....they don't GET IT anyway.)

Speaking (more nicely) of Dylan - I'm so proud of him today. Since he now is a fully licensed driver (it's funny - every time I say that I get 10 more gray hairs), he was able to take himself to a doctor check-up all by himself. Maybe not the biggest milestone in a kid's life, but it did kind of strike me. I was all prepared to use some of my personal time from work and then happily realized that he could do this on his own.

Here's a Photoshop-ed picture I took of Dylan when he was little. I don't find this all that funny anymore.

Chantix 23/24, Smoke Free 8/9

Sorry no post last night. Fell asleep really early. So here I am doing this at 5:30 am - and I've been up for over an hour.

Yesterday was a little better. Haha. Not really through any effort of mine - I was really busy at work and then fell asleep early. Maybe that's the real smoking cure - be busy and sleep. Although this doesn't leave much time for other activities.

I keep forgetting to call my Dr. for my refill. I think about it at times like this when I can't call. But maybe when I come home for lunch and see this, I'll do it! For those of you that are well into your quit, how long are you planning on taking Chantix? I know some are working on tapering off. The thought of being tied to a pill for a long time isn't very appealing.

I hate being up this early. I just can't think of anything else interesting to write because my brain hasn't really become functional yet. It's a really good thing I don't have a job that requires me to do anything delicate or focused early in the morning.

MUST MAKE COFFEE.

I'll post more later when I'm human.

Makes me smile....

Got to feeling guilty about posting such an unflattering picture of my son.

This is how he makes me feel:

Chantix Day 22, Smoke Free Day 7

As of about 1/2 hour ago, it has been one week since I have smoked.

*confetti, fanfare, ticker tape, people doing flips, noisemakers*

Honestly, I'm not all that thrilled. My head is in such a bad place about this. I cannot see this in a positive way. What I see is: "Oh goody. I've now deprived myself of something I like and enjoy for a whole week. Yippee skippee. Next week - no coffee. Then no chocolate. Then no pasta." Eventually I hope to be down to water, a grape, and a smear of tofu on a horken fiber chunk.

I know I sound like a complete brat, but there's no sense in lying. I'm sure that if I stick with this there will come a day when cigarettes don't even occur to me, I'll hate the smell of smoke, I'll pity all those hackers freezing by the ashtrays in the cold, etc. But I'm not anywhere near that yet - not even close.

This is how I feel:

Chantix Day 21, Smoke Free Day 6

It's been a bad 24 hours. I really want a cigarette. Almost went and bought a pack earlier this evening. I miss it. I know, I know - I don't miss the cost, health probelms, blah blah blah. Whatever. I just miss it. I just want to sit and relax and unwind and smoke. I sometimes wish I never started this quit.

Chantix Day 20, Smoke Free Day 5

I'm so happy that I made it through the weekend. I was very nervous about notsmoking with all this free time on my hands. Staying busy really helped (although I've not done much of anything today). I still have to wonder how I would do around other smokers. I think that will be really hard. I don't feel at all ready for a test of that quite yet, but I'm not going to actively avoid it either. I've been very lucky over the last week that I just really haven't been in situations around smokers. I haven't even had anything happen like I walk out of a store and someone is standing right outside smoking. I still think that if someone offered me a cigarette it would be almost impossible to say no. But maybe I'm being too hard on myself. I do know that if I were to smoke right now it will taste horrible.

Speaking of things tasting horrible (because that's always a fun topic), I seem to be have some sort of weird issue with this. I know a smoker is supposed to get all their taste buds back and sense of smell and all that, but this does not seem to be working out too great for me. Over the last few days, any kind of meat has tasted really weird. This is only for meat that's kind of stand alone - not mixed in with other ingredients or heavily spiced/sauced. It's been so strange that when we went out for lunch today, I just ordered sides and no meat because I didn't think I would eat it. I have no idea why this is happening, if it's related to quitting or not. I just hope it goes away soon or I start getting used to it because I love meats and I'm hungry!!!

Silly

Ok. I like art - all kinds - painting, drawing, music, acting. I married an artist. I also really like coffee. I'm drinking coffee right now. But coffee art? Come on.

Chantix Day 19, Smoke Free Day 4

Today has been a little easier. I've tried to keep myself busy. We shampooed the carpet in our room and REALLY cleaned the living room. I even Windexed all the glass on my picture frames. I'm sure all you smokers are smiling because you KNOW that paper towel came away that yucky yellowy brown color. Bleh. Aren't we all glad we're not putting this on our teeth, hair, clothes, walls, windows, etc. anymore? I never did get the bathroom done. We still have to put all the furniture back in our room and I'd like to give that a thorough cleaning like we did the living room. The rest of the house can wait until tomorrow. I think staying busy really helped. I've had a few rough moments, but it's been ok.

I got some really good news today too. I was given my starter month of Chantix as a free sample. I was worried about the cost of further pills, which I will need the week after next. I called Walgreens to see if my insurance will cover it. Turns out they will! My cost will be $56. Extraordinarily cheap if you consider how much cigs cost. $56 is about one carton - which would only last me about a week. I think all insurance should cover this. What they're going to save on my various heavy-smoker related illnesses over time should more than offset a few months of Chantix. I would have paid full price for it, but it's nice to know that I won't have to. I really want to put a Quit Meter on here as others have done. But I don't want to jinx myself. I'll put one up after two weeks.

P.S. Maggie - it was delicious. We tried to wait for you, but couldn't make it!

100

I smoked 100 cigarettes. JUST KIDDING!!! Still notsmoking.

This is my 100th post. Yippee. I'm in the process of adding labels to all my posts. (This is how desperate I am to be notsmoking.) I got bored with it, but I'll try to have it done soon.

I'm starting to feel like I'm getting too focused on notsmoking. It's hard to notsmoke when all I do lately is post about notsmoking. I think I'll start posting other stuff on here like I used to.

So in that spirit, let's bring back Fun Photo Friday. I live in Pierre, SD (no Mom, crazy stalkers are not going to come all the way here to kill me now). Fireworks are not allowed in the city. But the crazy folks over in Ft. Pierre (across the river for all you non-Dakotans) have no such ordinances. In 2006 we watched the utter 4th of July chaos in Ft. Pierre from the safety of the Pierre side of the river. It looked like a combination of Operation Desert Storm, Carnival, the Millenium celebration, and Armageddon. Apparently people just go ape-wild over there. Fireworks in the streets, in backyards, in parks, on sidewalks - anything goes. This picture was taken (by someone - don't know who) from the Pierre side of the river this year. It's a beautiful picture and it gives you and idea of how crazy it gets over there. Yes I know the 4th of July was over quite a while ago, but I thought the fireworks were a nice tie-in to my 100th post celebration.

Chantix Day 19, Smoke Free Day 3

I want a cigarette. I'm craving really bad right now. I don't know why the last 2 days have been so much harder than the first day. I thought each day would generally get a little easier, barring a major trauma or something. Oh wait. My 16 year old got his full, unrestricted driver's license yesterday. NO WONDER!!!

I feel really...ummm...like jittery and distracted and like I should be snapping my fingers and tapping my feet and pacing. I have this big plan for the weekend - cleaning. I want to get all the last vestiges of smoke stink out of my house. I had planned to start this tomorrow, but maybe I'll go scrub down the bathroom. Just for something to do. I also have a kind of complicated thing planned for dinner tomorrow. I could do some of the prep work tonight. (Hahaha. I just noticed that my link takes you to a previous post that begins with - "Lose a tooth or a finger?" Just keep reading - there IS a recipe [with no body parts] at the end.)

ARGH!!!!

I'm in such a weird state. I feel very confident that I will make it through the evening, but I just don't like feeling like this. It's almost like that nagging feeling that you forgot something. You just keep turning that thought over and over and over in your mind. I better go. I need to find something to do.

Chantix Day 18, Smoke Free Day 2

48 hours! Wheeeeeeeeeeeee.

Today was hard for some reason. I REALLY wanted a smoke after lunch. I couldn't quit thinking about it. Just really wanted to FIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIILLLLLLLL my lungs with smoke. Isn't that absurd. It just looks stupid written down. Anyway, I made it through ok. Somehow I missed a pill along the line. The one I'm taking tonight is a morning one. Maybe that's why today was harder.

Maggie wrote a big long letter to those that will be prescribing Chantix to people and I couldn't agree more with what she had to say. But to the Chantix makers, can I add this thought - your packaging is stupid and annoying. Why why why make nervous, jittery, upset, spaced-out, fragile, and otherwise neurotic smokers claw through all this cardboard and plastic???? Have mercy. ESPECIALLY for those of us that are so orally fixated that smoking wasn't enough - we chew our nails to the nub too.

I was originally going to do a post about how I'm going to miss all the friendly people I've met around various ashtrays. You smokers all know what I mean. Where else do you see VP's chatting with janitors? I was going to point out how all those friendly people seem to have migrated "here" - meaning the Chantix blogs. Seriously, what a bunch of supportive, funny, interesting people. Let's all vow to stay this way and not become snooty, judgmental nonsmokers.

But anyway - I'm cutting these thoughts short so that I can send all my best wishes to Stan. It seems that he was reading my blog at work and someone caught the TITLE of the blog, but not the substance. I fervently hope that Stan has not been labeled a porn-monger by his work. Yikes.

(I'll change it back to "Stripped" after Stan is in the clear.)

24!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

No, this post is not about the TV show. Jack Bauer can kiss my butt because....

I have now officially been 24 hours without a cigarette!!!

Woo hoo. I do have to admit that if someone offered me one right now, I would have an incredibly hard time saying no (and would probably say yes). But I don't have any in the house (that includes ashtrays - car ashtrays even) and I will not be going to the store or sending anyone else.

This is so much easier than it was on Day 8. I do miss the cigs, but I'm so happy this is working out. I think it's just going to get easier as I go along and I will miss them less and less. I am so optimistic and happy right. *dances around the room*

Chantix - Days 16 & 17

So far so good for quit day. I really have no urge for a cigarette - yet. I'm on my lunch break right now and I haven't been smoking at this time for the last week or so. I think tonight might be a little more difficult. But there are actually no cigarettes anywhere in the house. I'm pretty confident I can make it without a run to the store.

I really have to say that I think the directions for Chantix need to be re-evaluated. A week on the lower dose just did not cut it for me. Go back and read my Day 7 and 8 posts - I was a MESS. But here I am now a week and a half later and I feel pretty good. I'm a little nervous about tonight, but I'm not dreading it like I did before. Also on Day 8 when I tried to quit I was a complete wreck all day long. Maybe I was such a heavy smoker that a week wasn't long enough. I wish they had a way for a person to better gauge when their quit day should be. Also, I think it was beneficial for me to have a week of tapering off. For me here's what seemed (so far) to work:

Week 1 - start the pills, regular smoking
Week 2 - cut way back - I got down to about 4 on weekdays, 6 on weekends
Week 3 - quit

Maybe this wouldn't work for everyone, but it could be an option. Of course this does mean that I'll likely have to take the pills for longer, but I'm ok with that. Better the pills than the butts.

More weird dreams last night. I slept from about 7:30 pm to midnight and then was up until 4:00 am. Yuck. I'm not tired right now, but I'm sure I will be tonight. I'm going to try very hard to stay up until at least 9:00 tonight so that this doesn't happen again.

Sleep

As my regular readers (all three of them) know, I have sleep problems. The Chantix isn't helping. I keep having these weird dreams and when I wake up, I'm TOTALLY awake. I also kind of don't want to go back to sleep because the dreams are so weird. So now here I am at 3 am doing this. Bleh. To make matters worse, since I'm so tired all day I wind up taking a nap at a stupid time when I get home. I'm all messed up now. It's probably a good thing I'm not a surgeon or a trucker or someone who makes nuclear things. I really want a cigarette right now, but I don't know where they are. And I'm not quite mean enough to wake up my husband to make him give me one. My mom used to give me a bad time for "wasting" my cigarettes - I'd leave this really long butts in all the ashtrays. Well now I smoke them to the NUB, so I can't even pick out a butt to puff on. Yuck. That's so nasty isn't it? To paw through a dirty old ashtray for a cigarette - gross. I'll be so glad when this is over. Something to think about - smokers are really the only people over the age of 3 who will drop something out of their mouth onto the ground and then pick it up and put it right back in their mouth. What a fun habit.

Chantix - Day 15

Dreams. Wow. I have been having some loopy dreams. Last night it was that I slid on my back behind the entertainment center. I knew it was way too small for me to fit back there, but I also knew I was dreaming and could do it if I wanted. I have no idea why I wanted to get back there - I'm sure it's a horror of dust and cat fur. Anyway, I'm back there and then I stand up - there's plenty of room. I then decide to come out from behind the stupid thing and I tell myself, "well because I'm dreaming the whole living room is going to be gone and something really scary is going to be there." Sure enough, the whole living room was gone and I was like in the middle of the jungle. I wake up on the couch and my fat cat is sitting on my chest and I can barely breathe. So then I *really* wake up and of course there's not cat on me and I'm not in the jungle. Freaky. I'm sure there's a really slick interpretation of all this - coming out from behind smoking is scary and the big cat on me is the cigs that stop my breathing - too slick maybe? But I've had lots of weird dreams in the past week that weren't so easy to interpret. The dreams aren't really scary or unpleasant - just super strange and extraordinarily vivid. I could really feel that cat sitting on me - he's huge and weighs a ton.

Rama

Any science fictions fans reading this? I hope so. I'm not a HUGE sci-fi fan, but I do really like Arthur C. Clarke. I am currently re-reading Rendezvous with Rama and plan to follow-up with the next 3 in the series. So here's my problem. I do not function well with visual things. I can't judge distances or height or anything like that. My ceilings are all about 20 ft. tall for all I know. North is always whatever direction I'm facing. I measure distance in time - she lives 10 minutes from me. Do you get it? This book describes the inside of Rama in pretty good detail, but I can't seem to visualize any of it. It doesn't help that everything is in the metric system. So - if anyone has read this book, do you know of anywhere on line I can find like a map of the inside of it? (Does this question make me a total geek? Probably, but I accepted my geekiness long ago.)

Chantix - Day 14

I had the opportunity for a little self-test and I failed miserably. Something happened tonight that made me REALLY upset and I wound up chain-smoking 3 cigarettes in a row. So now I know I need to work on that aspect of things. I do tend to smoke a lot when I'm upset or stressed. I was actually doing really well today before that happened. Maybe I'll get a punching bag - take up boxing for stress and to work out. Too bad there's no tall buildings here - I could do that Rocky-up-the-steps thing.

Despite what happened tonight, I've really been looking forward to being done with this whole thing. I hate the idea of being "controlled" by something. I also really love looking at the Quit Meter on Maggie's site. I can't wait to put one of those on here.

Chantix - Days 12 & 13

Watched a dumb movie and fell asleep last night so no post. Nothing really new to report. I'm holding steady at about 4 cigarettes a day. I am going to take Maggie and Stan's advice and set this coming Wednesday as my quit date.

I was reading Stan's blog and he said something about the cigarettes not tasting very good. I'm kind of noticing that too. They sort of taste like....I don't know....dirt or icky coffee grounds or something. Not very pleasant. I get these cravings and then light up and....yuck. Then I have to eat or drink something to get the taste out of my mouth. Weird. I'm also noticing that it's VERY hard to see people smoking - even on TV. I guess it's a good thing I don't hang out in bars. I don't know if I'll ever be able to see my mom again! ;)

My birthday is coming up in about a month. I'm trying to look at this whole process as birthday present to myself. Maybe giving myself a few more birthdays.

Chantix - Day 11

Sorry I'm not being better about responding to all the great comments. I wound up sleeping most of the day. Of course, I did manage to get in a few cigs. I think I need to reevaluate where I am with this. Maybe setting a new quit day is the way to go. In any event, I'm way too fuzzy-headed to think about this right now. Hopefully I feel better tomorrow.

Chantix - Day 10

I have bronchitis. How ironic is that? I finally get around to quitting and then get sick with something I always get sick with because I smoke. Funny. I've had 3 today but I'm going to bed very soon so that will likely be it. I've been reading a lot of the other Chantix blogs. I'm glad I haven't had too many bad side effects. Other than the headache the first day there's been nothing - no stomach problems at all - and I have had some really bizarro dreams, but I have dreams like that on a regular basis (remind me some time to blog about "Hislop"). Reading the other blogs has been sooooooooo helpful. One common theme is that it seems to take people way more than one week to quit - as the directions suggest. I even asked the doctor about that today and she says that she's starting to tell people to set their quit date further out - although this means they'll likely be taking it for longer. I find that interesting. I wonder if the drug company might revise their instructions. Anyway - I'm off to lie down as this bronchitis is really wiping me out.

Chantix - Day 9

Cheated again today. In the past about 48 hours I've had 5 cigarettes. That's definitely not quitting, but it sure is an improvement. It seems like the evenings are the hardest. I didn't have any problems at all this morning - and I used to smoke way more than 5 between the time I got up and the time I went to work. During the day isn't so bad either (BUT - I can't smoke at work anyway...I'm a little worried about the weekend). I think I need to find something to do in the evening that will keep me distracted.

I've also noticed that I'm eating too much. Someone at work made popcorn today and it smelled so good I thought I'd die. I may get some light popcorn to munch on. That's got to be better than M&M's.

Please check my links off to the side. A really nice person named Maggie left me a very encouraging comment. She and others are also blogging their Chantix experiences. I'm adding a link to her site and she links to many others.

Update

I didn't make it. I had one. I'm going to try to go to bed soon so I don't cheat again.

Chantix - Day 8

This is what Dante meant by the Ninth Circle of Hell. Actually, the Ninth Circle of Hell would be better because then at least I'd get to inhale some smoke. I am in utter agony. (You should see me trying to type this - my fingers haven't been working all day.) I haven't had a cigarette since about 11:30 pm last night. That's 17 hours and about 51 minutes for those of you (like me) keeping count. I've had a gallon of coffee, about 14 pieces of gum (sugarless), I was asked by 3 different people to stop clicking the end of my pen, I'm extrodinarily cranky, I cried this morning, and I have a splitting headache. Why am I doing this???? I don't want to live forever, I'll give up movies to pay for smokes, my kids won't live with me forever....hmmmm.

The blue pills don't do a damn thing. Or IF they do - I cannot believe that anyone does this "cold turkey." Those people must have....uhhh...parts...of cast iron. Anyone who has quit cold turkey is my absolute hero. You have all sprinted light years ahead of people who can actually parallel park in my ranking of amazing people.

I might post more later after the 2nd blue nothing pill of the day. (I have this HORRIBLE suspicion that these pills are just placebos and that some evil genius at the drug company is laughing maniacally at my pain.)

Chantix - Day 7

I don't think I can do it. Just the thought of it is making me upset. There's better be some pretty big mojo in those blue pills.

Chantix - Day 6

My throat hurts. I don't know if it's from my last-weekend-smoking-palooza or if I'm getting sick or if it's from the medicine. I don't feel otherwise sick. Kind of tired, but not sick. I'm dreading Monday like you wouldn't believe. Wouldn't it be easier to just be in a medically induced coma for a week or so? Just until the cravings are gone? *sigh* I wish they had something like Anabuse for smokers. Take one drag and just get sicker than a dog. One of the ladies I work with (the unicorn lady) lives really close to me and we're going to start walking in the evenings next week. I'm trying to remember why I thought this would be a good idea. Since non-smokers have forced all of the puffers outside, being outside makes me think of smoking. But maybe I won't think about cigarettes when I'm sweating like a pig, gasping for breath, and trying to make my legs stop trembling. Maybe I should try to quit chewing my nails next week too - just get rid of all the bad habits in one fell swoop. If my week is going to be hell anyway, might as well make it really HELL. Bleh. I've got to get my attitude right. This drug came with a little card with a website and support line. Tomorrow I'll look into that and try to get my head in a better place.

Boys - A Must Read

If you have boys in your life, you must read this article from Time Magazine that I found on Yahoo News. I've heard of the "Dangerous" book mentioned in the article and have had plans to get it.

The Boys Are All Right

By DAVID VON DREHLEFri Jul 27, 5:10 PM ET

My son was born nearly 10 years ago, and I remember telling him that morning that he was one lucky baby. Forget Dr. Spock or Dr. Brazelton--I took my cue from Dr. Pangloss. If this was not the best of all possible worlds, it was certainly the best time and best place to be starting out healthy and free in a land of vast possibilities. In the months and years that followed, however, there came a steady stream of books and essays warning that I had missed something ominous: our little guy had entered a soul-crushing world of anti-boy influences.

There was, for example, Harvard psychologist William Pollack's Real Boys (1998), which asserted that contemporary boys are "scared and disconnected," "severely lagging" behind girls in both achievement and self-confidence. The following year, journalist Susan Faludi argued in Stiffed that the cold calculus of global economics was emasculating American men. In 2000 philosopher Christina Hoff Sommers blamed off-the-rails feminism for sparking The War Against Boys, and two years later writer Elizabeth Gilbert found The Last American Man living in a teepee in the Appalachian Mountains. By the time our boy was headed to third grade, magazine editors were grinding out cover headlines like BOY TROUBLE and THE BOY CRISIS, and I was getting worried. The voyage to manhood had come to seem as perilous and flummoxing as the future of Iraq.

It's enough to make people long for the good old days. Sure enough, one of the hot books of the summer is a zestfully nostalgic celebration of boyhood past. The Dangerous Book for Boys, by brothers Hal and Conn Iggulden, flits from fossils to tree houses, from secret codes to go-carts, from the Battle of Gettysburg to the last voyage of Robert Falcon Scott. A sensation last year in Britain, the book has been at or near the top of the New York Times best-seller list since late spring.

The Dangerous Book, bound in an Edwardian red cover with marbled endpapers, has many of the timeless qualities of an ideal young man: curiosity, bravery and respectfulness; just enough rogue to leaven the stoic; an appetite for any challenge, from hunting small game to mastering the rules of grammar. It celebrates trial and error, vindicates the noble failure. Rudyard Kipling would have loved it.

These charms alone can't explain the popularity of an amalgam of coin tricks, constellations and homemade magnets, however. Clearly, The Dangerous Book has tapped into a larger anxiety about how we're raising young men. This is a subject worth digging into, because it reflects not just on our sons but also on their sisters, on the kind of world these kids might make together--and on the adults who love them, however imperfect we prove to be. With fresh eyes on fresh facts, we might find that an upbeat message to a newborn boy is not so misguided after all.

THE MYTH OF THE BOY CRISIS

"I don't think anyone will deny that girls are academically superior as a group. Girls are more academically powerful. They make the grades, they run the student activities, they are the valedictorians."

Christina Hoff Sommers, a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, was explaining how she came to worry deeply about boys. In the book-lined parlor of her suburban Washington home, she ticked through a familiar but disturbing indictment: More boys than girls are in special-education classes. More boys than girls are prescribed mood-managing drugs. This suggests to her (and others) that today's schools are built for girls, and boys are becoming misfits. As a result, more boys than girls drop out of high school. Boys don't read as well as girls. And America's prisons are packed with boys and former boys.

Meanwhile, fewer boys than girls take the SAT. Fewer boys than girls apply to college. Fewer boys than girls, in annual surveys of college freshmen, express a passion for learning. And fewer boys than girls are earning college degrees. Even sperm counts are falling. "It's true at every level of society" that boys are stumbling behind, Sommers continued.

Observers of the boy crisis contend that families, schools and popular culture are failing our boys, leaving them restless bundles of anxiety--misfits in the classroom and video-game junkies at home. They suffer from an epidemic of "anomie," as Harvard psychologist William Pollack told me, adrift in a world of change without the help they need to find their way. Even in the youngest grades, test-oriented teachers focus energy on conventional exercises in reading, writing and other seatwork, areas in which girls tend to excel. At the same time, schools are cutting science labs, physical education and recess, where the experiential learning styles of boys come into play. No wonder, the theory goes, our boys get jittery, grow disruptive and eventually tune out. "A boy will get a reputation as hell on wheels that follows him from one teacher to the next, and soon they're coming down on him even before he screws up. So he learns to hate school," says Mike Miller, an elementary school teacher in North Carolina. Miller's principal has ordered every faculty member to read a book this summer titled Hear Our Cry: Boys in Crisis.

In short, society treats "boyhood as toxic, as a pathology," says Sommers--who may have been guilty of this herself when she wrote several years ago that the Columbine killers were emblematic of turn-of-the-century boyhood. But she's right that it's not girls who are shooting up their classrooms--and boys are at least five times as likely as girls to die by suicide.

There are statistics to back up every point in that sad litany, but I also found people eager to flay nearly every statistic. For instance: Is it bad that more boys are in special education, or should we be pleased that they are getting extra help from specially trained teachers? And haven't boys always tended to be more restless than girls under the discipline of high school and more likely to wind up in jail? A growing congregation of writers have begun to argue that the trouble with boys is mostly a myth. Sara Mead is one; she was until recently a senior policy analyst at Education Sector, a Washington think tank largely funded by the Gates Foundation. Intrigued by the wave of books and articles about failing boys, Mead crunched some numbers, focusing narrowly on the question of school performance. The former Clinton Administration official concluded that "with a few exceptions, American boys are scoring higher and achieving more than they ever have before."

In particular, Mead decided that boys from middle- and upper-income families--especially white families--are doing just fine. "The biggest issue is not a gender gap. It is these gaps for minority and disadvantaged boys," she told me recently in the think tank's conference room. Boys overall are holding their own or even improving on standardized tests, she said; they're just not improving as quickly as girls. And their total numbers in college are rising, albeit not as sharply as the numbers of girls. To Mead, a good-news story about the achievements of girls and young women has been turned into a bad-news story about laggard boys and young men.

The more I probed, the more I realized that the subject of boys is a bog of sociology in which a clever researcher, given a little time, can unearth evidence to support almost any point of view. I also came to the sad realization that this field, like so many others, has been infiltrated by our left-right political noise machine. Our boys have become cannon fodder in the unresolved culture wars waged by their parents and grandparents. On one side, concern for boys is waved off as a mere "backlash against the women's movement," as two writers declared dismissively in the Washington Post last year. The opposing side views any divergence from the crisis theme as male-bashing feminism.

Then I came across a new report from the Federal Government: Uncle Sam's annual attempt to paint a broad statistical portrait of the nation's young people. In long rows of little numbers printed on page after page of tables, this report told a different story from that of either the woe bearers or the myth busters.

WHAT THE NUMBERS SAY

"America's Children: Key National Indicators of Well-Being, 2007" is the work of many agencies, from the Department of Justice to the Department of Education to the Bureau of the Census and beyond. It gathers a trove of data, and as I made my way through it, I concluded that there's real substance to the boy crisis, and there have been good-faith reasons for sounding an alarm.

Statistics collected over two decades show an alarming decline in the performance of America's boys--in some respects, a virtual free fall. Boys were doing poorly in school, abusing drugs, committing violent crimes and engaging in promiscuous sex. Young males lost ground by many behavioral indicators at some point in the 1980s and '90s: sharp plunges on some scales, long erosions on others. I was forced to confront a fact that I had secretly known all along: that teens of 30 years ago--my generation--were the leading edge of an epidemic of thugs, dolts and cads.

No wonder so many writers began calling for change in the late 1990s. Reliable social-science data often lag a couple of years behind the calendar; it takes time to gather and compile a nation's worth of numbers. Stories about social trends that you read today may be describing the reality of 2004 or 2005. The groundbreaking boy books were a response to statistics portraying the worst of a physical, mental and moral health crisis.

There's more to the story, however. That downward slide has leveled off--and in many cases, turned around. Boys today look pretty good compared with their dads and older cousins. By some measures, our boys are doing better than ever.

The juvenile crime rate in 2005 (the most recent year cited in the report) was down by two-thirds from its peak in 1993. Other Justice Department statistics show that the population of juvenile males in prison is only half of its historic high. The number of high school senior boys using illegal drugs has fallen by almost half compared with the number in 1980. And the percentage of high school boys drinking heavily is now the lowest on record. When I was in high school, more than half of all senior boys told researchers they had downed five or more drinks in a row within the previous two weeks--a number that I have no trouble believing. By last year, that figure was fewer than 3 in 10.

Today's girls are also doing well by these measures, but their successes in no way diminish the progress of the boys. In fact, together our kids are reversing one of the direst problems of the previous generation: the teen-pregnancy epidemic. According to the new report, fewer than half of all high school boys and girls in 2005 were sexually active. For the boys, that's a decrease of 10 percentage points from the early 1990s. Boys who are having sex report that they are more responsible about it: 7 in 10 are using condoms, compared with about half in 1993. As a result, teen pregnancy and abortion rates are now at their lowest recorded levels.

What about school? Boys in the fourth, eighth and 12th grades all score better--though not dramatically better--on math tests than did the comparable boys of 1990. Reading, however, is a problem. The standardized NAEP test, known as the nation's report card, indicates that by the senior year of high school, boys have fallen nearly 20 points behind their female peers. That's bad, not because girls are ahead but because too many boys are leaving school functionally illiterate. Pollack told me of one study that found even the sons of college-educated parents had a 1 in 4 chance of leaving school without becoming proficient readers. In an economy increasingly geared toward processing information, an inability to read becomes an inability to earn. "You have to be literate in today's world," says Sommers. "We're not going to get away with not teaching boys to read."

Even here, though, there may be grounds for a hopeful outlook. Boys at the fourth- and eighth-grade levels are showing modest improvement in reading and now trail their female classmates by slightly smaller margins than before. If that's a sign of improved teaching and parental focus on reading, then we ought to expect gains in the higher grades soon.

"I think it would be an error not to be optimistic," says Michael Gurian, author of several books about raising boys. "But at the same time there is reason to worry." He sketches the sinking trajectory of undereducated males as blue-collar jobs move to low-wage countries. Though definitive data on the dropout rate are as elusive as Bigfoot, there's little question that a worrisome gap is opening between boys who finish high school and those who don't. Boys with diplomas are now far more likely to go immediately to college than the boys of my era were. Solution: we need more boys with diplomas.

And that can be done. A generation of enlightened teaching and robust encouragement has awakened American girls to the need for higher education. Women now outnumber men in college by a ratio of 4 to 3, and admissions officers at liberal-arts colleges are struggling to find enough males to keep their classes close to gender parity. "We've done wonderfully with girls. Now let's do the same for boys," says Gurian. One way to start might be to gear advanced training to male-dominated occupations--already the case in many female-oriented fields. Schoolteachers and librarians (roughly 70% female) must go to college, but firefighters and police officers (pushing 90% male)? Not necessarily. Top executive secretaries are college educated; top carpenters may not be.

About the only scale on which today's boys are faring dramatically worse than the boys of my era is the bathroom scale. When I was in high school in the late 1970s, roughly 1 boy in 20 was obese; today 1 boy in 5 is.

My favorite statistic seemed to sum up all the others: fewer boys today are deadbeats. The percentage of young men between 16 and 19 who neither work nor attend school has fallen by about a quarter since 1984. The greatest gains in this category have been made by black youths. In 1984, 1 out of 3 young black men ages 18 and 19 were neither in school nor working. That proportion has been cut almost in half, to fewer than 1 in 5.

Today's boys may wear their pants too damned baggy and go around with iPod buds in their ears. They know everything about Xbox 360 and nothing about paper routes. I doubt that they slog to school through deep snow as I recall doing back before the globe warmed up. But judging from the numbers, they are pulling themselves up from the handbasket to hell.

SO WHERE DID WE GO RIGHT?

Unfortunately, it's one thing to observe human behavior--count the crime reports and the teen births and the diplomas awarded and so on--but quite another to explain it. Popular science and the best-seller lists skip eagerly from one theory to the next, lingering with delight on the most provocative if not always the most plausible. A recent paper suggested that falling crime rates can be explained almost entirely by reduced lead exposure in childhood. Which was odd, because last year economist Steven Levitt's best seller Freakonomics chalked up the improvement to legalized abortion, which, he theorized, cut the number of unwanted children prone to wind up as criminals.

Or take the teen-pregnancy numbers. It's not enough to credit the virtues of responsibility and better sex education. Something racier is desired. According to some writers, fewer teens are getting pregnant because they've all switched to oral sex. Or maybe the phenomenon is due to a still unexplained decline in sperm counts.

But before we go dizzy on cleverness, let's pull out Occam's razor and consider a simple possibility: maybe our boys are doing better because we're paying them more attention. We're providing for them better; the proportion of children living in poverty is down roughly 2% from a spike in 1993. And we're giving them more time. Parents--both fathers and mothers--are reordering their priorities to focus on caring for their kids. Several studies confirm this. Sociologists at the University of Michigan have tracked a sharp increase in the amount of time men spend with their children since the 1970s. Another long-range survey, reported by University of Maryland researchers, has asked parents since the 1960s to keep detailed diaries of their daily activities. In 1965 child-focused care occupied about 13 hours per week, the vast majority of it done by moms. By 1985 that had dropped to 11 hours per week as moms entered the workforce. The 2005 study found parents spending 20 hours a week focused on their kids--by far the highest number in the history of the survey. Both moms and dads had dramatically shifted their energies toward their kids.

Are there risks of overparenting boys? Sure. And here's where the success of The Dangerous Book gets interesting, because it suggests that as parents spend more time with their sons, we may be reconnecting with the fact that the differences between boys and girls need not be threatening and that not all the lore of the past about how to raise boys was wrong.

Gregory Hodge is a good example of this return to tradition. He is principal at the Frederick Douglass Academy, a public school in Harlem. His school was one of three recently honored by the Schott Foundation for excellence in educating black male students--the most troubled cohort but also the group making the greatest progress in many areas. Hodge told me that when he arrived at the combination middle school and high school 11 years ago, the academy was already a great success--but the student body was 80% female. The new principal made it his business to recruit more boys. Today, of the academy's 1,450 mostly poor and minority students, half are male. Yet the dropout rate remains virtually zero, and this year (like most years) every member of the senior class graduated and was college-bound. Every one.

Hodge says the secret is to reach boys before they get into trouble--he uses the academy's basketball facilities to lure youngsters still in grade school. Once you have their attention, you must show them a world of possibilities that you genuinely believe they can achieve. "Young people are looking for validation," he says. "You are important. You will be successful. We don't talk about 'if' you go to college. Around here it's 'when' you go to college."

Frederick Douglass Academy students adhere to a strict dress code and accept rigid discipline. Many of them virtually live at the school, even on Saturdays, doing hours of homework, attending required tutorials if they lag behind, participating in dozens of sports and activities, from basketball to lacrosse and ballet to botany. "Everything a private school would offer a rich kid," Hodge explains. But within this highly structured setting, the school recognizes that many boys need room to learn in their own way. "Some of the kids are hardheaded," Hodge says in a gravelly Bronx roar. "That's what makes a boy. They've gotta experiment, learn the hard way that his head won't break concrete. Male students tend to want to find things out for themselves--so why don't you use that as a teacher?

"I once had about 15 boys very close to dropping out," the principal continues. "They weren't into sports. I had to find something for them to get into. Finally I made a recording studio for the little meatheads, and they ran with that. All of them made it through to graduation. I'll try anything--dance, chess, hydroponics, robotics--anything to let these kids know that this is a world they can fit into, where they can be successful."

THE BASICS OF BOYHOOD

Nothing Hodge says is remotely ground-breaking or experimental--and that's precisely the point. Only in recent decades have societies seriously begun to unlock the full potential of girls, but the cultivation of boys has been an obsession for thousands of years. "How shall we find a gentle nature which also has a great spirit?" Socrates asked some 2,500 years ago--essentially the same question parents ask today.

Ours is far from the first society to fear for its sons. Leo Braudy of the University of Southern California, in his 2003 book From Chivalry to Terrorism, noted recurring waves of anxiety. Europeans of the 18th century imagined that free trade and the death of feudalism would spell the end of honor and chivalry. Then, with the dawn of the Industrial Age, writers like John Stuart Mill worried that progress itself--with its speed and stress and short attention spans--would cause a sort of "moral effeminacy" and "inaptitude for every kind of struggle." By the end of the 19th century, a manhood malaise permeated the entire Western world: in France it inspired Pierre de Coubertin to create the Olympic movement; in Britain it moved Robert Baden-Powell to found the Boy Scouts; in the U.S. it fueled a passion for the new sport of football and helped make a hero of rough-riding Theodore Roosevelt.

All these reforms shared a common impulse to return to the basics of boyhood--quests, competitions, tribal brotherhoods and self-discovery. There was a recognition that the keys to building a successful boy have remained remarkably consistent, whether a tribal chieftain is preparing a young warrior or a knight is training a squire or a craftsman is guiding an apprentice--or Gregory Hodge is teaching his students. Boys need mentors and structure but also some freedom to experiment. They need a group to belong to and an opponent to confront. As Gurian put it in The Wonder of Boys, they must "compete and perform well to feel worthy."

The success of The Dangerous Book for Boys is one sign of a society getting in touch with these venerable truths. Nothing in the book suggests that boys are better than girls, nor does the book license destructive aggression. But it does exude the confidence of ages past that boys are to be treasured, not cured. "Is it old-fashioned?" the authors ask themselves about their book. "Well, that depends. Men and boys today are the same as they always were ... You want to be self-sufficient and find your way by the stars."

A TRIP TO BOY HEAVEN

If The Dangerous Book were a place, it would look like the Falling Creek Camp for Boys in North Carolina--a rustic paradise complete with a rifle range, nearby mountains to climb and a lake complete with swimming dock and rope swing. The choice of activities at the camp is dizzying, from soccer to blacksmithing, from kayaking to watercolors, but no pastime is more popular than building forts of fallen tree limbs and poking at turtles in the creek. Leave your cell phones, laptops and iPods at home.

There I met Margaret Anderson, a pediatric nurse from Nashville and a member of the faculty at Vanderbilt University. She works in the infirmary while her 11-year-old son Gage discovers the woods on multi-day pack trips. "I call this place Boy Heaven," she says.

Falling Creek subscribes to a philosophy of "structured freedom," which is essentially the same philosophy paying dividends among boys at the opposite end of the economic ladder at the Frederick Douglass Academy. It works across the board, says Anderson, and she wishes more of the boys she sees in her busy Nashville practice lived lives of structured freedom too.

"Whether it's urban kids who can't go outside because it's too dangerous or the overscheduled, overparented kids at the other end of the spectrum--I'm worried that boys have lost the chance to play and to explore," Anderson told me. Our society takes a dim view of idle time and casts a skeptical eye on free play--play driven by a boy's curiosity rather than the league schedule or the folks at Nintendo. But listen to Anderson as she lists the virtues of letting boys run themselves occasionally.

"When no one's looming over them, they begin making choices of their own," she says. "They discover consequences and learn to take responsibility for themselves and their emotions. They start learning self-discipline, self-confidence, team building. If we don't let kids work through their own problems, we get a generation of whiners."

That made sense to me. As I watched the boys at Falling Creek do things that would scare me to death if my own son were doing them--hammering white-hot pieces of metal, clinging to a zip line two stories above a lake, examining native rattlesnakes--I didn't notice many whining boys. Yates Pharr, director of Falling Creek, seemed to read my mind. "It's the parents who have the anxieties nowadays, far more than the boys," he said. "We've started posting photographs of each day's activity on our website, and still I'll get complaints if we don't have a picture of every camper every day."

Worrying about our boys--reading and writing books about them, wringing our hands over dire trends and especially taking more time to parent them--is paying off. The next step is to let them really blossom, and for that we have to trust them, give them room. The time for fearing our sons, or fearing for their futures, is behind us. The challenge now is to believe in them. [This article contains charts. Please see hardcopy or pdf.]

View this article on Time.com

Chantix - Day 5

Another relatively boring post. Took 2 white pills today and no noticeable effects. I also skipped my afternoon cigarette break again. Despite that, I'm starting to feel very negative about this whole process. I don't think I'm going to be able to do it. I know that such an attitude is bad, but that's how I feel. Also, I think it's going to be horrible. I think I'm going to crave them like crazy and then feel horribly guilty and like a failure if I cheat. I guess it's a good thing I never got hooked on drugs or alcohol. I can't imagine how people quit that kind of thing. I've never even been able to quit chewing my nails. Ugh. This is just depressing me. Maybe I'll be in a better mood tomorrow.

Chantix - Day 4

Nothing much to report again. I took 2 pills today with no noticeable bad effects. I also went from the end of lunch to the end of the work day without a cigarette. Normally I take a break around 2:30 or 3:00 to take a few quick puffs. This afternoon I was REALLY busy working on a project and never got away. I thought about it, but never went. It didn't really bother me either. I think I'm still smoking the same amount at home, but I'm not 100% sure about that. I also think that a lot of those are from habit. This process hasn't been too exciting of a read so far, I know. But let's see what I have to say on Monday - the day I'm supposed to really quit. More tomorrow....

Chantix - Day 3

No headache again today. Maybe the one on Monday wasn't from the Chanitx. Maybe I am turning into a unicorn (although it appears that this phenomenon can be diverted by Aleve). I had a hard time getting to sleep last night. I was VERY fidgety and couldn't settle down. The side effects of Chantix do mention problems sleeping, but I have problems sleeping anyway. Again - I don't know if it was from the drug or not. Tomorrow I have to start taking two pills. Hopefully nothing new happens with that.

Chantix - Day 2

Well nothing to report today. I didn't turn into a unicorn, nor did I have a faceache. Here's an interesting dilemma though. So I'm supposed to have less desire for a cigarette. But every time I think about whether or not I have the desire for a cigarette, I then want a cigarette. How is this going to work? It's like having someone tell you NOT to think of a White Rabbit (hehehe - nice tie in from yesterday? Those who know what I mean get 10 bonus points). If someone tells you that, you can't help but think of one. Maybe things will change when I start taking 2 pills a day. That happens Thursday. Or maybe all the magic is really in the blue pills. Hey wait - the blue pills??? I might fall out of the Matrix. Anyway, no headache today, but no other changes either.

Chantix - Day 1

I hope you all are excited. We're starting a new feature here at Mobius. It's called "Quitting Smoking" or "How to Become a Raging B***h in One Week." Since most of the stuff I blog about is pure drivel, I have decided to chronicle my attempt to quit smoking. (Although it might be more interesting to have the poor souls that have to live with me chronicle what that's like - but they don't have blogs so you're stuck with me.) AND JUST FOR THE RECORD - IF I GET PARKINSON'S SOMEDAY I'M GOING TO BE REALLY REALLY REALLY REALLY REALLY ANGRY!!!!

Anyway, Chantix is a new prescription medication for those that are trying to quit smoking. It's supposed to suppress the desire for cigarettes. Here's how it works. For three days I take one white pill. Days 4 - 7 I take two white pills. On the 8th day (let there be Hell)....I mean....I quit smoking and start taking two blue pills. I then keep taking two blue pills a day until I'm all cured, or I kill someone. Let's all hope for the cure.

So I took one white pill today. Of course I have that hippie song in my head - "One pill makes you larger, one pill makes you small. And the ones your mother gives you don't do anything at all." (Mom - how funny is that??? It is a real song.) Whatever. Anyway, the pill gave me a faceache. Not really a headache because it was all in my cheekbones and forehead. (This lady I work with said that maybe I was turning into a unicorn. If my face hadn't been so painful I'm sure I would have found that really funny.) I took an Aleve and that seemed to work. I tried doing this a few years ago with Wellbutrin and it also gave me a bad headache. Hopefully I'll get used to this one and the headaches will stop.

This drug is also supposed to help with the ritual aspect of smoking. This is something that I don't think non-smokers understand. It's more than just the addiction to the nicotine - it's the ritual of the whole process. After I eat, I light up. First thing when I get in the car - I light up. Also, I'm a fidgety person anyway. I play with my hair, I doodle, I tap my fingers. Smoking gives me something to do with my hands. I better get some Silly Putty. But the makers of this medicine claim that it helps not only with the cravings but with weaning you from the ritual aspect of it. Maybe that's why it's called Chantix. Maybe I'm supposed to chant my way out of this. *Note to self - run out and buy a CD of chanting Tibetan monks*

I suppose I should address the why of this. Well - duh - it's bad for me. It's bad for my kids. It's stinky. It's EXPENSIVE. I have this loosely formed plan for the next few years - get out of debt, advance at work, lose some weight (before my 20 year high school reunion in 2010), quit smoking, etc. Might as well get going on a couple of these, right?

So we'll see how it goes. I hope the headache doesn't happen again tomorrow. It was really weird. I never get headaches in my face. I never even get sinus headaches or anything like that. The post next Monday (quit day) should be really interesting. I'll try very hard to do a post every day. If you never hear from me again after next Monday - maybe check the papers! :)

Tonsil update and AFI

Dylan came through his tonsil surgery just fine. He's recuperating at his grandma's house (I don't blame him - I'd rather have her as a nurse than me!!). I'm sure he's going to be very sick of Jello and Popsicles very soon.

The American Film Institute has come up with an updated best 100 movies of all time. My comments are first, my husbands are in italics.

1. "Citizen Kane" (1941) - "Rosebud." It's ok. I'd never pick this as number 1. Agreed.
2. "The Godfather" (1972) This is a boy movie - I've never really cared for it. I don't like most gangster films.
3. "Casablanca" (1942) Great film - loved it. I wouldn't have this in my top 10.
4. "Raging Bull" (1980) Another boy movie. Like this one.
5. "Singin' in the Rain" (1952) A musical!! *shudder* Not a big musical fan.
6. "Gone With the Wind" (1939) Fantastic - love it, love the book. Well - yeah!
7. "Lawrence of Arabia" (1962) Fell asleep during this one - and I love O'Toole. Only saw it once, don't remember much about it - except the camel.
8. "Schindler's List" (1993) Amazing film - I cry every time. Very powerful film.
9. "Vertigo" (1958) Fantastic - what a thriller should be. All these so-called thriller directors should watch more Hitchcock films.
10. "The Wizard of Oz" (1939) I always found this kind creepy - flying monkeys! Everyone should watch this - I like it.
11. "City Lights" (1931) Haven't seen it. Never heard of it.
12. "The Searchers" (1956) Haven't seen it. Ditto.
13. "Star Wars" (1977) Love this movie - was obsessed with it as a girl. The first film I ever saw in the theater - love it to this day.
14. "Psycho" (1960) Creepy - not a favorite. Take it or leave it.
15. "2001: A Space Odyssey" (1968) Phenomenal - wish I could see it on a big screen. This would be in my top 10.
16. "Sunset Boulevard" (1950) Haven't seen it. Ditto.
17. "The Graduate" (1967) One of my favorites - but kind of campy. Good film, but not one of my favorites.
18. "The General" (1927) Haven't seen it. Ditto.
19. "On the Waterfront" (1954) Not a Brando fan. One of the few Brando films I like.
20. "It's a Wonderful Life" (1946) Have never seen this from start to finish - but I've probably seen the whole thing in bits and pieces. I like it. Love Jimmy Stewart. This is a Christmas standard - and that's what made me sick of it.
21. "Chinatown" (1974) Bleh. Not a Nicholson fan.
22. "Some Like It Hot" (1959) Funny. One of my hubby's favorites. She's right.
23. "The Grapes of Wrath" (1940) Didn't like it or the book (and I love Steinbeck). Haven't seen it.
24. "E.T. -- The Extra-Terrestrial" (1982) Not a favorite of mine. Too sappy for me.
25. "To Kill a Mockingbird" (1962) Out of these 100, this would probably be my #1. Fantastic book and movie. Wouldn't be my number one, but is a really good film.
26. "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" (1939) Okay. Ditto.
27. "High Noon" (1952) Haven't seen it. Good film.
28. "All About Eve" (1950) Haven't seen it. Ditto.
29. "Double Indemnity" (1944) Okay. Haven't seen it.
30. "Apocalypse Now" (1979) Yuck. Two hours of yawn and then he chops a guy's head off. Wow. (Duvall as a crazy guy is okay)
31. "The Maltese Falcon" (1941) Haven't seen it. Really good film.
32. "The Godfather, Part II" (1974) Boy movie. Bleh.
33. "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" (1975) Can't even come close to how good the book is. Doesn't do anything for me.
34. "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" (1937) A classic. I played a dwarf in a play - this was too traumatic to make me like the movie. I was Sneezy.
35. "Annie Hall" (1977) Yuck. Big deal.
36. "The Bridge on the River Kwai" (1957) This would be in my top 10. Ditto.
37. "The Best Years of Our Lives" (1946) Haven't seen it. Ditto.
38. "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre" (1948) Haven't seen it. Ditto.
39. "Dr. Strangelove" (1964) I like this one. This would be in my top 10.
40. "The Sound of Music" (1965) One of the maybe 6 musicals I like. Ditto.
41. "King Kong" (1933) Not a favorite. I like this one.
42. "Bonnie and Clyde" (1967) Didn't like it. Bores the hell out of me.
43. "Midnight Cowboy" (1969) Okay. Ditto.
44. "The Philadelphia Story" (1940) Haven't seen it. Ditto.
45. "Shane" (1953) This would be a good movie if it weren't for that annoying kid whining "Shane, Shane." Ditto.
46. "It Happened One Night" (1934) Haven't seen it. Ditto.
47. "A Streetcar Named Desire" (1951) Brando - no. Nah.
48. "Rear Window" (1954) Great movie. Ditto.
49. "Intolerance" (1916)Haven't seen it. Ditto.
50. "Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring" (2001) I just can't get into these movies. I don't get the point. This is one of the best trilogies I've seen.
51. "West Side Story" (1961) Musical! Bleh. Gangsters dancing? No.
52. "Taxi Driver" (1976) Yuck. I think this is pretty good.
53. "The Deer Hunter" (1978) Okay. Ditto.
54. "MASH" (1970) Yuck. You have to be into that era - I don't get it.
55. "North by Northwest" (1959) Amazing. Ditto.
56. "Jaws" (1975) Scary - great movie. "We're gonna need a bigger boat." Great line. Not great, but really good.
57. "Rocky" (1976) Bleh. I like the 1st one.
58. "The Gold Rush" (1925) Haven't seen it. Ditto.
59. "Nashville" (1975)Haven't seen it. Ditto.
60. "Duck Soup" (1933)Haven't seen it. Ditto.
61. "Sullivan's Travels" (1941)Haven't seen it. Ditto.
62. "American Graffiti" (1973)Didn't like it. Again - you have to be part of the era I think.
63. "Cabaret" (1972) Okay. Nah.
64. "Network" (1976) Love this one. Another great line - you know the one! Awesome.
65. "The African Queen" (1951) Fantastic - loved it. I like this one.
66. "Raiders of the Lost Ark" (1981) Great movie. Ditto.
67. "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" (1966) Haven't seen it. Ditto.
68. "Unforgiven" (1992) Booooooooooooooooooooooooooring. What is so great about this movie????!!!??!???!??!??!!!
69. "Tootsie" (1982) Fantastic. Really good.
70. "A Clockwork Orange" (1971) Wonderful. So creepy that it's in my top 10.
71. "Saving Private Ryan" (1998) Didn't like this one that much - hubby loves it. She said it already.
72. "The Shawshank Redemption" (1994) Fabulous. Ditto.
73. "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" (1969) Okay. Ditto.
74. "The Silence of the Lambs" (1991) Great. Here's a guy who DID pay attention to Hitchcock.
75. "In the Heat of the Night" (1967) Fantastic - amazing acting. Doesn't thrill me.
76. "Forrest Gump" (1994) Okay. Ditto.
77. "All the President's Men" (1976) Okay. Ditto.
78. "Modern Times" (1936)Haven't seen it. Ditto.
79. "The Wild Bunch" (1969)Haven't seen it. I think it's funny how Monty Python's take on this movie is about as bloody as the real movie.
80. "The Apartment" (1960)Haven't seen it. Ditto.
81. "Spartacus" (1960) Cheesy. Brilliant when made, but cheesy now.
82. "Sunrise" (1927)Haven't seen it. Ditto.
83. "Titanic" (1997)Cheesy - but good. Ditto.
84. "Easy Rider" (1969) Overrated. I don't get it.
85. "A Night at the Opera" (1935)Haven't seen it. Ditto.
86. "Platoon" (1986) Yuck. Okay for me on this one.
87. "12 Angry Men" (1957) Fantastic. Ditto.
88. "Bringing Up Baby" (1938) Haven't seen it. Funny. "Where's my intercostal clavical?" Funny.
89. "The Sixth Sense" (1999) Amazing. Ditto.
90. "Swing Time" (1936)Haven't seen it. Ditto.
91. "Sophie's Choice" (1982) Haven't seen it and didn't really like the book. Haven't seen it.
92. "Goodfellas" (1990) Boy movie - but I like this one. Not a fan.
93. "The French Connection" (1971) Good. One of the best car chases ever filmed.
94. "Pulp Fiction" (1994) Great. Ditto.
95. "The Last Picture Show" (1971)Haven't seen it. Ditto.
96. "Do the Right Thing" (1989)Bleh. One of the few Spike Lee films I like.
97. "Blade Runner" (1982) Bleeeeeeeeeeeeh. My husband loves this and I just don't get it. I think it's dark and boring and weird. And I think Harrison Ford ***IS*** a replicant. Yeah - I like this. She's so wrong. We're getting a divorce now.
98. "Yankee Doodle Dandy" (1942) Okay for a musical. I get that song stuck in my head all the time. James Cagney singing - come on....he's a gangster.
99. "Toy Story" (1995) Okay for a cartoon. It's a good film.
100. "Ben-Hur" (1959) Okay. Charleton Heston is one of the greatest actor's ever. (said very sarcastically in a hilarious Charleton Heston voice.)

We want to know....where is:

Giant?
Dr. Zhivago?
The Last Emporer?
Empire of the Sun?
Planet of the Apes? (This is Jeff's question - NOT MINE.)

Also, I wish there were more movies from when I was alive.

By the way, the links take you Roger Ebert's "Great Movies" reviews.

Tonsils, Geckel, and Nudists! (oh my)

In about 12 hours my older son is getting his tonsils out. I'm so worried about this. I know it's a fairly routine procedure. But still.....it's my BABY. I had mine out when I was 17 and it was horrible. Although I did lose about 30 lbs. in a month. So if you're looking for a drastic, one-time-only weight-loss plan: have some serious throat surgery. I'm sure Dylan will be fine, but I can guarantee I will not get much sleep tonight and will be a wreck until I can see him after the procedure. Even more fun is that Noah has to have this done in a few months.

The news is so ghastly today - plane crash, things exploding in New York, and some horrible child neglect thing. Since all of that has been covered and covered and covered, I will offer you some quirkier stuff.

Since we no longer have Kat for the science news, I give you "geckel." This is the newest kind of adhesive. Not too exciting until you start wondering if YOU can walk on walls.

We're almost all going to be fat. But that's ok, because now they're going to make movies about us. Too bad "Hairspray" is a musical - can't stand 'em. I just can't suspend disbelief enough to buy into people just bursting into song. (Aside: My mom used to make up songs on the spot from the last word someone said. This bothered me to no end when I was a kid. When I was about 8, 9, 10? I said to her, "I bet you can't make up a song from ANY word you hear." She said she could. So I said, "Zebra." This is what she came up with: "I used to wear and A-bra and now I wear a Z-bra." This may have something to do with my dislike of musicals.)

But at least he won't get Parkinson's disease.

Reason 123,679,654,365,564,656 why I can't stand tree-people. Furthermore, there are some places on the body where frostbite is NOT GOOD YOU IDIOTS!!!!! Although...maybe it will limit their ability to breed....hmmm....strip away morons.

News

I haven't done a news update in quite a while so here we go:

Don't mess with the Queen. She's the Queen for Pete's sake.
Snooty photographer: 0, Queen: 1

From the who-really-give-a-rip-at-this-late-date files - I like the Doors. Kinda. But really, who cares?

From the DUH!!! files - it shouldn't be any other way.

People get hit by lightning while wearing I-Pods. My question is what were you doing out in the dang rain to begin with???

While I wouldn't mind finding a few thousand dollars, this just seems......icky.

I like to be early for things. Somehow I always have friends who are consistently late. This MAKES ME EXTRAORDINARILY ANGRY. And they act like it's my fault for being punctual. I think being late to things all the time is unbelievably rude and ill-mannered. But a YEAR early - I'm not quite that bad.

Now I FINALLY understand why my husband is a beer snob. If this is what most Budweiser drinkers look like - uh - hand me a snooty beer please.

HA!!!

SO THERE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

PUFF PUFF!!!