Chatchphrase

I love playing catchphrase! If you haven't played it before, it's like charades. You play in teams and try and get your team to guess words and phrases by giving them verbal clues. It's fast, loud, and hysterical.

What I like most about it, though, is that you really see peoples true colors. Especially where wine is involved. People either end up laughing until they cry or just plain mad --you've been warned.

We played tonight --sober-- for about two hours straight. And I just have to share some of the insane rounds. Well, the rated G ones anyway.

Clue: Spiderman.
Guess: Peter Pan!

Clue: Hi...
Guess: Bye!

Clue: (Girl points to her pierced earlobe.)
Guess: Ear hole!

Clue: I poke holes in my ex-husband.
Guess: Voodoo doll!

Clue: Only an idiot would order this at Burger King.
Guess: Veggie burger!

Clue: Two people coming together
Guess: (Wait, this one is not rated G)

I swear, it's just scary where minds will go when a clock is ticking!

Pictures Online - Say Cheese!

As you can see, I like using pictures on my blog. They usually come from one of three places: my camera, flickr, or stock.chng.

Today in my Google Reader I was checking out Freelance Folder and yesterday's post listed several places to get pics, so I thought I would share the list.

Free stock/image websites (be careful of copyrights)

• Flickr
• Compfight
• Stock.xchng
• Stock Vault
• TurboPhoto

Premium/paid stock image websites

• iStockPhoto
• Fotolia
• Dreamstime

Of course, once I saw this post, I couldn't help digging around for more places to find pictures. And so here it is. Some are paid, some are free, and some are a bit of both.

• Corbis
  
• Getty Images
• Foto Search
• Creating Online
• Dreams Time
• Free Foto
• Large Pictures

Of course, I had to eventually stop and get back to work, so I couldn't keep surfing and adding to the list. But I'm always on the look out for more sites to pull pictures, so if you know of any, please drop a link for me in the comments.

Pic by Ian Britton

Moving Transitions

The relief of handing over the keys to the old apartment, knowing it was empty and perfectly clean, was like slipping into a hot bubble bath. Too bad it was only a similar experience. Reality: There's another apartment waiting with boxes and suitcases galore.

I'm really happy though. We're actually weeding through stuff one last time as we unpack. Could it be? Is it possible that we will finally be free of the unnecessary crap we've been lugging around? It's like super labor-intensive therapy, I tell you.

We aim to be unpacked by Sunday. It would be nice if we could just finish during the week. But, you know, even if we didn't work, we need to pace ourselves. It was starting to get grumpy at the end there. Nothing worse than irritated and tired people around a ton of very throw-able things.

Best part of the new place: The Library.

That's right, my office is completely surrounded by books. It's like entering a temple. I love it!

My brother designed and built 8-foot tall adjustable shelves for his house. When I saw how many bound bundles of joy fit on them, it took my breath away. First chance I got, we bought them, and--good brother that he is--he even installed them for me. Woo-hoo!

Anyway, they disassemble completely and fit in the back of my VW Golf. Well, sort of. The long pieces poke out. The point is, I'm free of bulky bookshelves, and I can completely cover my walls with books.

Did I mention how much I love books?

My husband is happy about the shelves as well, but for different reasons. There's a segment of them that replaced the old bulky entertainment system, so all of our movies are in one place and the TV is mounted in the perfect spot.

Oh, and he loves that all my books are contained. Can you believe the nerve? That's OK, I forgive him for not understanding my obsession. As long as he never attempts to actually get rid of my books, he's safe.

Best Feature of the new place: The Wet Bar

I know it makes me sound like a total lush. But it's more of a space issue really. You see when we got married, several people gave us wine glasses, champagne flutes, highball glasses, shot glasses, margarita glasses, martini glasses... you get the point.

We are very social creatures. I guess in the minds of many, that means we need enough glassware to open our own bar. Or is it a hint? I don't know, but now that there is one place for all of it, it'll surely get used more. I guess that means we have to have a party eventually. How else am I going to manage to use the 40 wine glass rings?

Most convenient feature: Faux Wood Floors

They're just easier to clean. Carpet is a pain. Now we don't have to worry about tipped over glasses or dirty patches by the balcony door. And we can picnic in the living room without a problem.

Besides the spills, though, there isn't a vacuum on earth with enough suction power to really get rid of all the yuck. And frankly, my salabhasana is better when it doesn't involve breathing dust. Yay, clean faux wood floors.

Oh, and no, that's not me in the picture, nor can I manage to go up that high... just yet.

Well, that's the summary. This is going to be great. I'm taking the two writing gigs I landed today as a good omen. Why? Because I can.

Pics by Diva Bex, Xipe Totec39, and shankargallery

Moving Makes Widows

Moving has officially taken over my life. I'm tired, cranky, and contemplating setting a match to everything. For the panic prone, put the phone down. I'm exaggerating. Emergency services will not be needed.

The purging is still extremely satisfying. I love watching the bags of trash pile up, and I love staring at the empty spot they leave once they're gone. It's very liberating. But coordinating this effort is causing friction of the growling kind.

It doesn't help that my schedule is completely messed up either.

Imagine if you will, a woman that sleeps 8.5 hours a night suddenly sleep deprived, near yoga-less, and eating down the fridge and pantry. After this, I'm off chicken, bread, and pasta for a long time!

Remarkably, I've lost two pounds this week. I've also lost hair pigment--and no, this is not how I envisioned aging. If we don't finish soon, I'll be a twiggy cranky hag of a widow with stiff joints.

One more week to go.

Pic by J&E's photos

Moving and Marriage

In the kitchen, hubby-man and I look like a perfectly coordinated ballet. We cook well together other places as well. And we can spend hours talking over coffee, clean our house together in harmony, choose a show to watch side by side, pick a restaurant with little debate, and dance in perfect coordination.

Packing and coordinating a move, however, is like a three-legged race with a peacock and a monkey.

• He wants to keep it; I want to toss it.
• I want to keep it; he wants to donate it.
• He wants to move boxes first; I want the furniture gone ASAP.
• I want the tornado of papers in our home office dealt with first; he thinks we need to do laundry and pack clothes first.

And so the list continues. As long as we're working separately, there's relative peace in the house. Jointly, however, we have snags just trying to decide how the boxes should be taped!

Though I am proud to say that last night we went through the insane amount of pens we have together--tossing dried ones and setting aside good ones to donate--and we didn't get into a single argument.

Why is this such a Herculean task? Not moving itself. The answer to that one is easy: we have a ton of crap and moving is a pain in the butt. I mean getting along.

I think we've both moved so many times that the process has become a ritual, and our rituals are incompatible.

I will say, this time was better than the last two. At least we aim to stay out of each other's way. We nearly killed each other on the first one. Our saving grace this time: We hired movers.