Like a turkey with his gobbler cut off

So when we make a cake, I get a piece, a big one granted, and I eat it.  And then I am good for the day.  Sometimes I will grab another for a midnight snack, but cakes last a while around here.  I can eat it in fork sized bites and feel satisfied after a nice big piece with chocolate icing.  Cupcakes are another matter altogether.  You (or I at least!) can eat one in two bites and then you dive in for another in 5 minutes.  We made 24 cupcakes yesterday, and we have  5 left.  19 cupcakes gone in 24 hours.  My estimate:  Seporah 2, Felicity 2, Mommy 5.  You do the math.  Cupcakes are the Devil.

When Jason put up the video about college being an adventure, I got totally reminiscent of Final Fantasy. I started Final Fantasy 12 over a year ago, but never finished it. So I decided to pick it up again. Of course it had been so long I had to start over. Each Final Fantasy is set in a different world with individualized cultures. The last one I completed, FF 10 I could completely follow the storyline and nuances of the people. It’s entire world was based on religion. I can follow that, imaginary or not, I understand how religion can affect a society. *I skipped FF 11 since it was online and I don’t play so well with others.* FF 12’s storyline is incredibly difficult for me as it is heavily influenced by politics.

I don’t understand politics. I don’t mean that as most people mean it; I mean it as I don’t understand the elementary basics of it. It’s truly embarrassing. I mean I can’t remember if Obama is Republican or Democratic. I know he’s in the liberal party, but can’t seem to get them straight (if someone could tell me an easy way to keep them straight I would love that, I mean I still use the “righty tighty, lefty loosey”). When I was in college I had a basics government class. I was convinced I would work and figure it out and become a politically informed adult. And I did, at least for the tests, unfortunately I couldn’t remember anything 6 months later. I will probably never vote, I feel it’s a huge disservice to our society to have people like me voting. And every year when we’re encouraged to study and pray and then go vote, I ask my husband and he gives me his 2 cents. But come on, Steven’s one of those extremely conservative persons who only listens to extremely conservative persons and I get an extremely bias opinion. And it makes me even more confused. What did I get out of him this year? McCain bad, Obama worse.

So back to FF12. Although the world is intricate, the player should still be able to follow the story. Me, not so much. I was kinda wondering why I was continuing to play it again (especially since there is no romance in this one, come on!) and Steven was watching me play. You can equip your characters with various weapons and usually most people would have a sword and a shield. Not me, I’m all about the poles. His reason why I continue to play it, “You just like to beat people with big sticks.”

Edited since Steven said I didn’t actually tell who Larsa is: Oh, and Larsa’s the little brother to the emperor of a city, Vayne. Vayne killed his 2 older brothers and it appears he’s on his way to be executed. I have no idea if Larsa’s a good guy or a bad guy at this point.

(Seporah loves this song)

Life has been oh so busy so I haven’t had a proper post in a while. And I really did intend on having a post about Seporah on her birthday. But anyways, I’m only 4 days late. Can you believe she’s already 3 years old? It’s insane, but it’s sounds so much nicer to say I have a 1 year old and a 3 year old rather than 1 and 2. Anyways, she is now 39 inches, 35 pounds, 86 percentile for height and weight and quite comfortable in 4T clothing.

The most pressing issue with her is her speech. She babbles all day long like there’s no tomorrow. She has a decent size vocabulary, but she will not put words together, she does not make sentences. Example; “lasdgh aglka dhglhs drink. alkfjl kadg;aldgj cup. lkahdgsh vlhadgk No! Juice! askjgya oisaeyt ag Please! alifh dih ga Thank you! ahg ahgiah gfa hdfglkhgk.” She’s always been a tad behind vocally, but she babbled so much we always assumed she’d catch up. However I was like no more of that. So she’s getting to see a speech therapist for evaluation (also an audiology evaluation just to make sure she can hear, but I’m pretty sure she hears me as clear as a bell).

Other than vocally (and the potty) she’s right on target. She expects the world to revolve around her, she’s never met a stranger, and expects everyone to love her and give her their undivided attention. ”Here I am, Love me!“ would be her personal motto. She’s very physical, loves to run and jump and dance all day long and she’s incredibly strong. She’s very opinionated and knows what she wants, taking no substitutes.

(As if you didn’t know) Trains are her absolute favorite thing at the present moment. Followed by dogs, fish and ducks. Favorite TV show-Little Einstein, then Winnie the Pooh and Backyardigans.

She really can’t get away from music at this house and has developed a serious love for it. She’s an awesome little rocker. She’ll play any instrument she can get her hands on and if there’s none available, the floor works really well as a drum. If she likes a song, she starts dancing, moving and shaking and tells everyone to ”Dance!“ right along with her.

Lately she’s become slightly more girly. I’ve been able to put dresses on her the past month. I think this is due to Miss Karen’s influence, painting nails and having proper dress up clothes and jewelry at her house. I’m now hopeful I’ll have someone to go get pedicures with in a few years.

In the past 6 months or so she’s also become a picky eater. Which is somewhat crazy since Seporah use to eat whatever we put in front of her, literally, bell peppers, vegetables, lamb, casseroles, anything (well except green beans, she really has always hated those). Now, somehow or another she lives on top ramen, sandwiches (called wunches, a cross between lunch and sandwiches), apples, oranges, and milk. It’s mildly annoying.

She has about a bazillion toys, but her favorite? Dad’s iPod Touch. She so wants her very own, but I’m like, hey if I don’t get one of my own, you sure don’t get one of your own. We’ll just have to share with Daddy.

Seporah also couldn’t get away from books at this house. We literally have 300 board books alone. She will sit for an hour while you read to her one after another. (tangent: it’s always been this way since she was a little baby and when we were at the Doctors and he asked if we read to her, I actually got a little angry even though it was a valid question since we read to her soooooo much) (oh and tangent 2: Felicity not so much about the books, I’m hoping she’ll grow to appreciate a good story, but the difference between the 2 of them and their reactions to books is quite wide).

Things she doesn’t like? Scary movies and socks without shoes.

Seriously? How can you not love this big girl?

(Seporah got a camera for Christmas too and as soon as I figure out how to get the pictures from her camera onto the computer those will be up here too)

New Year’s Eve was just about the worst day ever at work. New Year’s Day being only slightly better. Somehow I made through two 14 hour shifts without eating or drinking and without keeling over. Now time for quiet meditation. Press the play button, seriously.

Since she did it, I figured I would write what I am reading, or have read recently.

  Ask me any time what I have read recently and I will probably say I have read Ender’s Game.  I probably have read it 300-500 times, and I know between reading it and listening to it on audio book, I ingested it at least 20-30 times in 2008 alone.  The story surrounding the book is interesting… I saw it on a book shelf at a book fair in Beeville Texas the last week of school at FMC elementary school when I was in the 4th grade.  I looked at the book all week long, from Monday to Friday, and wanted it all week long.  I think it was $4, but I didn’t have that kind of money in the 4th grade, and I knew my dad wouldn’t have it, or at least I was afraid to ask for it.  Anyway, I am not proud of this, but on Friday, as they were packing up the Scholastic Book Fair, I snuck it under my shirt and ran off.  While I am ashamed of this particular action, I cannot say I regret it.  The book has shaped my life and philosophy on it.  Many many things in my life would have been very different without this act.  

The book is the exploration of a series of games set up to make leaders out of children.  Ender is my number one hero (followed by Jack Bower!) and we would all do well to emulate his empathy and wisdom.  

Which leads to the most recent book I have read.

  While there have been many sequels to Ender’s game, and a parallel series, Ender in Exile is the first direct sequel to Ender’s game, in that it picks up directly after the surprise ending in the first book.  After having read Ender’s Game hundreds of times, I didn’t know what to expect of a direct sequel.  It almost screams “sell out” at this point, like the author needed a good holiday book to make some money.  That was my initial fear at least.  I couldn’t have been more wrong.  I should wait to say this until I have read it more than once, and may alter my opinion, but it may very well be better than Ender’s Game, and I can’t say that lightly.  It more than fleshes out Ender’s character - it tortures his character to show what he is made of, and he comes out a man, having been a boy in my mind for 15 years.  

I have run out of time for now, but will continue later with 2 other books I read in December 2008, and concluding with what I will be reading in January - February 2009.  Happy New Year!

It’s really rather annoying, obsessions I mean. It’s a good thing I’m not into something like heroin, because I’d never have a chance of crawling out of the hole I dug myself.

We live on an island isolated in the middle of the ocean. We are sitting ducks in the pond of natural disasters. In the month of December our electricity has gone out no less than 15 times due to the storms that have occurred. For the most part it’s annoying. The girls don’t sleep well with it being pitch black. I have to tape the fridge shut so the food doesn’t go bad from it being opened every 10 minutes. And well I have to think up something more entertaining than Little Einsteins.

For some however, it’s more than annoying. Something I just found out, only 2 hospitals on this island have generators. Tripler, the one I work at, and Kapiolani. Queens, Castle, Wahaiwa and all the rest don’t. Not such a bad thing until you think there are people who literally need electricity to power the machines that let them live (why those hospitals don’t have generators is a whole other subject entirely that I will not dive into in this particular post).

Our house didn’t have power for approximately 18 hours starting Thursday. Tripler lived on generators for about 11 hours. Kailua, where our great future President Obama is vacationing, 30 minutes. Seriously. Obama, how about you make a change and light a candle. And to make it worse, out of all the storms, flooding, relocating, electricity going out and such- Thursday’s was national news. Hello?!?!?! Come on, I’ve lived without electricity quite a bit this month, Obama can live without it for a little more than 30 minutes.

Last night, we tried to hold a Christmas pagent with 2 toddlers, I’ll skip over the bad parts and head straight to the cute parts. 2 toddlers dancing all over the living room while Mom and Dad sing Silent Night and Jingle Bells, are girls are movers and shakers. And then Seporah finding the Christmas oranges that were suppose to go in stockings and begging for them. Sticky orange juice gets everywhere. Then while trying to tell the story of the nativity because 1 of the wise men is in blue, he accidently stands in for Mary 3 times.

Then the girls got ready for bed. I think Seporah knew something special was going to happen since she decided 45 minutes early that it was time to brush teeth and go to bed. And literally jumped into bed. Of course Mom and Dad stayed up rewrapping presents and stuffing stockings.

Now it’s 5:51 am (I usually get up at around 5:30 to do chores) and I really, really just want people to wake up.