It's Thursday - It Really Is...

This week I'm on Winter break so I have lots of time to get into trouble! I intentionally did NOT go visit my sis or parents or anyone/place else as I wanted to get loads of cr*p either purged out of our home or just taken care of. Must say I've been fairly successful in this endeavor - but MAN, it depresses astounds me how much there is yet to be done! How the hell did we collect all this stuff???

On other fronts, I saw the most bizarre thing today. As anyone who is obsessed with the weather like me knows, New England has been blanketed with snow for most of our winter. It's been mild enough lately, relatively speaking, that under our home eaves there's no snow. As I was coming down the driveway, there had to be at least 30 robins on the snowless ground. I quickly drove in the garage and went upstairs to get my camera which wasn't in my purse, dammit, as I'd forgotten it, dammit! I snuck out the front door, barely put just my camera around the corner, snapped off a pic...and got...nuthin'. Little buggers had flown, one and all, to the area around our mail box. I was not happy. I won't be sharing that particular photo.

On another note, I'm quite pleased with our Olympic ladies! Lindsey Vonn and Julia Mancuso - you two ROCK! Thanks for making us Americans so very proud! Oh, and that snow boarder, too - he was good!

On the next note, wasn't the dog show wonderful?? That Scotty dog was just the best - but I LOVED that doberman - oh what do I know???

Last note on a very sorta nice day - played bridge tonight. Let's just leave it that I was not, repeat, was not in the winner's circle. POOH!

~~~

xoabb

expect anything!

Photo: 8:30am, 2/16/10

Now That's What I'm Talkin' About!!!

Told you I was gonna win at bridge tonight! Of course it was all because of my superior playing skills...it had nothing to do with good cards...or good luck...or good advice... ;-)

~~~

xoabb

expected fun!

Hey You! Is it Safe Yet??

Fun on the golf course...well...not for everyone:

Last week Jules, Mental Mama, a good friend of ours and I played a round of golf. Quite poorly, all of us, but that's entirely another story. (And nothin' that a nice Margarita at the end of the round didn't take care of, thank you!) In the middle of the round, we watched the above fellow (a young groundhog) slowly waddle across the fairway in front of us, seemingly without a care in the world, until, all of a sudden, a young hawk (I think, but could have been a young osprey) swooped down heading straight at groundhog! Groundhog was quite close to the tree and had the good sense to run as quickly as he could to it. Then hawk, because he was only looking at groundhog and not where he was flying, promptly managed to somehow run into the tree trunk.  Thank God for that, or there would have been carnage, and I don't like my golf game disturbed by carnage, thank you very much! After he got himself together, hawk flew to a low branch on another tree close by, but all the while staring at groundhog, who was not moving a muscle. 

We were close enough to see hawk getting ready to once again try to make groundhog his lunch when, out of nowhere, mocking bird flew in and started attacking hawk! That mocking bird pestered hawk so thoroughly, he finally gave up and flew away.  Groundhog stayed frozen right where he was, looking all around for a good five minutes before he finally skedaddled fast across the next fairway and into the brush.  That little old mockingbird saved the day as far as I'm concerned! (Yeah, yeah I know, that old circle of life thing...PLEASE, just not in front of me!) NICE!

P. S. - I was sure I'd also taken a most ~fabulous~ picture of mocking bird attacking hawk on the tree branch, but when I got home, I discovered I had taken a picture of an empty tree branch. That's what happens when you're old and forget your reading glasses at home, the outcome of which is you don't have a snowball's chance in you-know-where of seeing your camera monitor clearly. Hey! I guess was lucky I got ground hog's picture!  

~~~

xoabb

P.P.S. - Regarding that first picture of the hand of cards for yesterday's Y post:  A yarborough in bridge (or whist) is a hand that has no card higher than a 9, i.e., no honors cards.  Nope, that is not a good thing.

YARBOROUGH!

Y is for...

YARBOROUGH*

~~~

OK, my dear Bridge buddies, do you remember what that term means? 

 ~~~

"Uh-0h" is the word spoken by the holder of the above hand when her partner's Yarborough dummy hand is laid down.

  

It is NOT good! 

~~~

xoabb

*Answer is sure to come in the comments from some quite knowledgeable bridgie kind of person....or I'll supply it tomorrow if there are no correct answers!  (Which I doubt!) 

That Would Be Me!

Sometimes even a novice Bridge player,

(THAT WOULD BE ME!)

has a stroke of genius,

(ahem...perhaps just phenomenal luck??).

Last night I had a GRAND SLAM!!!!

(The ultimate triumph in Bridge World, I've learned)

And my partner, Jane, aka

Miss Walking Encyclopedia of Bridge

didn't even help me.

What's that old saying?

"Even a blind pig finds an acorn every now and again."

Guess I found that ole' acorn!

It's a good thing I did because the first hand Miss Jane and I were dealt, I totally misbid - suffice it to say it was a complete disaster. I'm quite happy she likes me better as a friend than a bridge partner. ;-) We certainly had fun, tho!

I LOST! I LOST!! I LOST!!!*

I am completely inconsolable. Bereft. Depressed. I don't think I can bring myself to talk about last night....Ok, I can, but it's going to be so so hard to do. And a little embarrassing, unfortunately....(sigh)

The fairy-card goddesses were good to me and I messed it up all by myself.

I lost at bridge last night and I should have won just like last time, but I didn't keep an accurate count of the cards in my hand vs. the dummy hand and ended up with 6 cards in my hand and 4 in the dummy's. DUMB DUMB DUMB, DUMMY!!! Especially sad since I had the Ace through the Jack, all in hearts! (I think that's called a ~Grand Slam~. {{UPDATE at 4:26pm on 2/6!! Mental just told me I had HONORS - duh!}}) I tell ya, if anyone else in our group had had that hand(probably anyone else who plays bridge), they would have counted correctly while taking every trick (THAT would be a Grand Slam!)! (Hey! I'm just a beginner here! Oh, and by the way? I plan on staying a beginner for at least the next 5 years.)

That Mental friend of mine won the whole dang thing!

(I just know she cheated.....I'm just sayin'.)

Oh, and the junk-snacking was much better as you can see from Miss LaLa's picture. This time around, we dipped our carrots and celery....and potato chips (nobody's perfect)....in garlic or pesto hummus. We topped off our much better food evening with a delicious low-calorie Costco chicken pot pie. Just look at the pie's nutrition facts below! See? It's nice and low-cal. A true diet food. Low in sat. fat and salt. Have two servings! Won't hurt 'cha a bit. Not one bit!

Nutrition Facts
Serving Size 1 serving (about 6 oz.)

Amount Per Serving

Calories 484
Calories from Fat 262

% Daily Value based on a

2000 calorie per day diet

Total Fat 29.1g, 45%
Saturated Fat 9.7g, 48%
Polyunsaturated Fat 4.5g
Monounsaturated Fat 12.5g
Cholesterol 41mg, 14%
Sodium 857mg, 36%
Total Carbohydrates 42.7g, 14%
Dietary Fiber 1.7g, 7%
Sugars 7.8g
Protein 13.0g
Vitamin A 46%
Vitamin C 3%
Calcium 3%
Iron 11%

I AM just sayin'...

~~~

*title of my next WW post, and don't tell me that's wishful thinkin'!

~~~

xoabb

It's Bridge Night!

Tonight we're at that Mental Mama's home. I sincerely hope to be reporting back later that my winning streak is continuing. Those fairy-card goddesses were sure good to me last time. Do sit on my sholder again....please...F-C G's?!

And do let me repeat the hopes and dreams for last bridge night's junk food consumption we all so miserably failed to heed:

I'm also hoping to be able to report that our consumption of junk food was reasonable this time. Of course, that would be a first. (Refer to this Mental Pause Mama post. See what I mean??) HA! Do ya think we'll do any better this time? I'm taking bets!

~~~

xoabb

I WON! I WON!! I WON!!!

BRIDGE NIGHT ROCKED!!
AND THOSE CARD GODDESSES ROCK!!
AND THAT BEE-YOU-TEE-FULL SCORE CARD ROCKS!!
Notice that the score for Ann (that would be me)
is much much higher than anyone else's!
All that money? My winnings - we play for big stakes.
What a wonderful, fun, delightful, perfect, lovely,
wonderful (oh - I already said that) night!

Of course, not everything went as I hoped......
the snacking....it was fierce!

~~~

xoabb

It's Bridge Night!

At my house...........I hope to be reporting back, later on this evening, that I was the BIG MONEY WINNER and not those other people I play bridge with! DANG IT - I lost so badly last time I deserve to win purely on sympathy! And my loss had nothing to do with my playing abilities........I think....well, maybe a little...... I'm sending up a prayer to the fairy-card goddesses to send me grand slam-worthy cards all night long! Is that too much to ask????

I'm also hoping to be able to report that our consumption of junk food was reasonable this time. Of course, that would be a first. (Refer to this Mental Pause Mama post. See what I mean??)

~~~

xoabb