Blog – Page 84

The Best Things I Heard This Weekend

June 3, 2007 By Jenny Ryan 3 Comments

As I came out of my office into the living room on Sunday evening I was informed of the following by one of The Gamers:

“Jenny, I had to fight 30 levels of men in diapers wearing bowls of curry on their head to get here.”

Me (looking up at the television): Yeah, I heard you say that when I was out in the other room, and I was r-e-a-l-l-y hoping that I heard you wrong. But apparently, I did not.

-This “What?!” moment is brought to you by the game Shadow Hearts 2, the game that will make you constantly question your sanity and turn to the people around you to ask, “No, seriously. Am I on drugs?”

********

One of our friends has just been hired as a police recruit. The following story comes courtesy of her first day on the job.

Police Corporal: Hey, do you have a pair of really nasty jeans in your car?

Our Friend: Um, no.

Police Corporal: Well, you need to get a pair of really nasty jeans, a long-sleeved shirt, and a pair of shoes that you don’t mind getting really gross and keep them in your trunk.

Our Friend: OK, why?

Police Corporal: Because we might need to send you out into the woods to look for corpses.

Thursday Thirteen #26: 13 Fictional Characters I’d Like To Meet

May 31, 2007 By Jenny Ryan 9 Comments

1. Sherlock Holmes

2. Bishop Blackie Ryan

3. Nuala Ann McGrail

4. Chuck and Rosemarie O’Malley

5. Sean Dillon

6. Fr. Tim and Cynthia Kavanaugh

7. Miss Jane Marple

8. Hercule Poirot

9. Betsy (Ray), Tacy (Kelly), and Tib (Mueller)

10. Meg and Charles Wallace Murray

11. Vicky Austin

12. Canon Tallis

13. Polly O’Keefe

Get the Thursday Thirteen code here!The purpose of the meme is to get to know everyone who participates a little bit better every Thursday. Visiting fellow Thirteeners is encouraged! If you participate, leave the link to your Thirteen in others comments. It’s easy, and fun! Be sure to update your Thirteen with links that are left for you, as well! I will link to everyone who participates and leaves a link to their 13 things. Trackbacks, pings, comment links accepted!

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Memorial Day With Engineers

May 28, 2007 By Jenny Ryan 5 Comments

My Father-In-Law: “You know how optimists say the glass is half empty, and pessimists say the glass is half full?”

My Husband: “Yeah.”

My Father-In-Law: “Do you know what engineers say?”

My Husband: “They say that the glass is too big.”

My Father-In-Law: “Exactly. The glass is twice as big as it needs to be.”

Thursday Thirteen #25: 13 TV Events That Felt As Real As If They’d Happened To People I Actually Knew

May 24, 2007 By Jenny Ryan 5 Comments

1. Pretty much everything that ever happened on Little House on the Prairie, including when Albert was dying of leukemia,

2. And when the entire town of Walnut Grove blew itself up rather than fall into the hands of an unscrupulous businessman.

3. When the Chief died on Gimme A Break. (OK, so this one did actually happen to a real person.)

4. When Alex P. Keaton drove cross country on Family Ties in order to meet Ellen at the train station to prevent her from marrying her boyfriend, and to tell her that he loved her.

5. When Nancy Drew was kidnapped by the Howard Hughes-type recluse on The Nancy Drew/Hardy Boys Mystery Hour and it almost prompted Frank Hardy to admit how much he loved her.

6. When Carter was stabbed on ER, and as he fell to the floor, wounded, he looked over and saw Lucy also lying on the floor, mortally wounded.

7. When Ari shot and killed Kate on NCIS.

8. When Deputy Chief Brenda Johnson’s entire staff on The Closer, after fighting her for an entire year, all threatened to quit if she was fired from the department.

9. When Colby Granger turned out to be a spy for the Chinese on Numb3rs.

10. When Booth dropped everything and rushed to New Orleans to save Bones when she was unjustly accused of murder on Bones.

11. When Angela finally realized how much she cared for Hodgins after he survived being buried alive in a car on Bones.

12. When Keith Mars reveals to Veronica that he’s just gotten back the results of a paternity test that prove that she is, in fact, his daughter on Veronica Mars.

13. Also on Veronica Mars when Cassidy “Beaver” Casablancas blows up the airplane carrying his archenemy, and you thought that the explosion had also killed Keith Mars.

Oops, I forgot! 14. When Col. Henry Blake was killed in a plane crash on his way back home from Korea on M*A*S*H.

With My Finger On The Pulse Of “Hip”

May 23, 2007 By Jenny Ryan 7 Comments

Lately I’ve seen this blogging meme making the rounds where you Google “your name+needs” and then list the first five or so things that come up. Being nothing if not a Shamless Troller For Stuff I Can Write About On My Blog I googled, and I came up with these results:

-Jenny needs a job. (No thanks, I’m good.)
-Jenny needs to find herself a baller. (First, Jenny needs to know what the heck that even means.)
-Jenny needs a cold shower. (Yes, but only because of the fever that’s accompanying this damn strep throat!)
-Jenny needs a smack daddy. (This scares me.)
-Jenny needs attention (Hm, truer words were never spoken.)
-Jenny needs to see herself as a good reader. (Not a problem.)

I had no idea what a baller was (and I’m kind of afraid to know what a smack daddy is), but I wasn’t worried because today I was tutoring the high school student who is my source of knowledge for all things “hip” and current.

“So, what’s a ‘baller’ “, I asked her when she got here.

“Is that a serious question?” she asked in disbelief.(Sarcasm: the price I pay for knowledge.)

When I assured her that it was, she informed me that it had multiple meanings. On the one hand it can apparently mean that “you have pimps and ho’s around you”, or it can mean that you’re really good at something.

“So, you could say that you’re a baller at Spanish. And I? Well I could say that I’m a baller at life.”

(Gee, thanks.)

We went on with the lesson until we got to a tricky problem involving a certain verb conjugation.

“Why is that the answer?” she demanded, when I corrected her mistake.

“Because [involved grammar explanation that you probably don’t really care about].”

“That really pisses me off!”

“I know. It’s because Spanish is out to get you.”

“Jenny, the whole world is out to get me. I’m a baller at life. That’s just the price I pay.”

My Kind Of Math

May 23, 2007 By Jenny Ryan 3 Comments

While watching the Science Channel TV show entitled, “Most of Our Universe is Missing“, I learned the following helpful model which explains how the composition of the Universe breaks down.

5% is composed of atoms

21% is composed of “dark matter”, which no one can prove exists

and the remaining 75% is composed of “dark energy”, which no one actually understands

Now this is the kind of math that I can totally get behind, math which basically says “Um, yeah, we don’t actually know so…let’s just go with ‘magic’.”

So, thanks so much, World’s Top Cosmologists, but could I just make one, tiny suggestion? The next time you need to come up with a model which basically rests upon The Presumption Of Magical Particles, hows about you just come to me first? I’m way less expensive than launching satellites into space and can come up with just as magical a solution, and then with all that money we’ve just saved we can apply ourselves to some important issues here on earth. Such as convincing the CW not to cancel Veronica Mars before we learn whether or not Logan and Veronica can ever work out all their problems and become the happy, stable, staying-together-forever kind of couple that we are looking for in our television viewing. (And yes, I AM bitter!!)

Just a thought.

Things That Make You Say, “What?!”: Scientists

May 22, 2007 By Jenny Ryan Leave a Comment

AKA, “Why I Majored In Spanish”.

“We get to answer the question of whether or not the Universe is one day just going to collapse. That’s the fun of this project.”

-a scientist on the TV show entitled, “Most of Our Universe Is Missing“

Teaching Spanish To Engineers

May 18, 2007 By Jenny Ryan 3 Comments

Yesterday in class I taught the Spanish words for the days of the week and the months of the year. Then, in order to give the students a chance to use the new vocabulary, I did some oral drills.

Me (in Spanish): “What are the months of the summer?”

The answer I was looking for: “June, July, and August.”

The Answer I Got From An Engineer: “Well, summer doesn’t officially start until June 21st, when the month is almost over. So in order to get 3 full months included in the season you will need to apply the ANSI Standard Of Rounding Up. So the answer would be July, August, and September.”

Thursday Thirteen #24: 13 Misheard Lyrics

May 17, 2007 By Jenny Ryan 12 Comments

Thirteen Misheard Lyrics

1. “Sleep in heavenly peas.”-the Christmas carol, Silent Night: “Sleep in heavenly peace.

“2. “Gladly, the cross-eyed bear.”-the hymn, Gladly The Cross I’d Bear.

3. “There’s a bathroom on the right.”-Creedence Clearwater Revival, Bad Moon Rising: “There’s a bad moon on the rise.”

4. “Excuse me while I kiss this guy.”-Jimi Hendrix, Purple Haze: “Excuse me while I kiss the sky.”

5. “Dead ants are my friends; they’re blowin’ in the wind.”-Bob Dylan, Blowin’ In The Wind: “The answer my friend, is blowin’ in the wind.”

6. “Midnight after you’re wasted.”-Marcia Muldaur, “Midnight at the Oasis“.

7. “The girl with colitis goes by.”-The Beatles, Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds: “The girl with kaleidoscope eyes.”

8. “She’s got a chicken to ride.”-The Beatles, Ticket to Ride: “She’s got a ticket to ride.”

9. “I’ll be your xylophone waiting for you.”-The Foundations, Build Me Up Buttercup: “I’ll be beside the phone waiting for you.”

10. “Are you going to starve an old friend?”-Simon and Garfunkel, Scarborough Fair: “Are you going to Scarborough Fair?”

11. “Baking carrot biscuits.”-Bachman-Turner Overdrive, Taking Care of Business.

12. “Donuts make my brown eyes blue.”-Crystal Gale, Don’t It Make My Brown Eyes Blue.

13. “Got a lot of lucky peanuts.”-Frankie Valley and the Four Seasons, Let’s Hang On: “Got a lot of love between us.”

From 1001 Dumbest Things Ever Said, ed. Steven D. Price

Links to other Thursday Thirteens!

Living Life Backwards

May 16, 2007 By Jenny Ryan 1 Comment

I want to live my next life backwards:

You start out dead and get that out of the way.

Then you wake up in an old age home feeling better every day.

Then you get kicked out for being too healthy.

Enjoy your retirement and collect your pension.

Then when you start work, you buy a mansion on your first day.

You work 40 years until you’re too young to work.

You get ready for High School: drink alcohol, party, and you’re generally promiscuous.

Then you go to primary school, you become a kid, you play, and you have no responsibilities.

Then you become a baby, and then…

You spend your last 9 months floating peacefully in luxury, in spa-like conditions – central heating, room service on tap, and then…

You finish off as an orgasm.

I rest my case.

-Author Unknown