Life/perception changing things. . .

PainterGirl is hosting Create a Connection for getting to know you. Thought it might be fun to participate a bit. . .

So here goes - she wants to know: "...what book, movie and song not only changed your life, but also changed the way you thought about the medium. It could have been when you were a child or a teenager or just last week. Anytime in your life."

So - Let's see. We'll start early in age. :)

MUSIC: I grew in a musical household. My mother was a flute teacher and my brother and I both played instruments from Fairly young ages. I think the song that really started my love for music of all kinds and struck a chord (sorry for the pun - been with my husband too long) with me was 30,000 pounds of Bananas by Harry Chapin. I started hearing this when I was very young as my mother was a *HUGE* Chapin fan - and we used to say "how much do you love me?" and instead of big wide arms and saying THIS MUCH, we would open our arms wide and says "30,000 POUNDS!" :) Growing up I would listen to more Chapin songs and a lot of them would spark conversations about politics and history that songs were based on, along with pyschology and thoughts about the education system etc, as well as hearing about relationships in many of his songs. It was a way to learn about life through music.

BOOKS: I was 13. I was a complete and utter couch potato. Would come home from school and watch TV all evening. I would do homework at school so it wouldn't interfere. I started reading at a very young age and was good at it - but it was too much like school work. When I was 13, I went to a bat mitzvah and met a new friend. She introduced me to this book. This is the book that got me started back into a love of reading. It introduced to me an entirely new genre and type of writing and I voraciously read all of her books that summer. Mercedes Lackey is very good at sucking in people. I have outgrown a lot of her writing now and having read a lot more things that are more sophisticated etc, I can see the simplicity in it, and yet, I can reread Arrows of the Queen and that whole series over and over and over and never get tired of them. They are old friends. And now I've spent the last 6.5 years working part time in a bookstore and learning about all the other wonderful authors out there and continuously renewing my joy in reading. And of course, having met my husband at the store while I was working, and us having very similar bookshelves, kind of adds to the life altering joy i have discovered stemming from that one book.

MOVIE: Movies are more difficult. I'm not sure if there is a particular movie that made any drastic changes in thoughts but. . . I have to say that the one movie/series that I can watch OVER AND OVER AND OVER no matter how often is The Mummy and The Mummy Returns. I know they are light, fluffy, action movies. There isn't anything deep about these movies or anything else. But the area ALWAYS entertaining to me - and whenever i'm home sick and there is nothing else on TV - those are the movies I put in the DVD player. I wore out my first set of DVD's and had to buy new copies. :)

here's today's little bit of insight into the mind of Miss Ilanna. :)

***warning - semi gross commentary below!***

In other news - Can I call em or can I call em?! - Just heard that a certain Suka was pregnant. (she lost it.) But i TOLD you all she'd be pregnant before her sister in law gave birth. And I'll bet she's retrying as we speak. (so to speak anyway) Rumor has it that she may have an eating disorder (which could certainly explain so many miscarriages so young...) We are also speculating about a possible munchausen's type thing going on. Though truth is, the girl is just playing house as far as I'm concerned. She was visiting Auntie Em and asked Auntie Em to distract sukaspawn for a moment. At which point (and I and my mother have NEVER heard of this mind you) she used some kind of TOOL to extract the usual diaper filler from her daughter stating that she doesn't "pooh" enough. Umm huh??? I mean if the kid is constipated give her a little prune juice and you are all good. My guess is she is playing with a doll. She feeds her, and then the natural progression is to change a diaper, but she does it on a schedule not on an as needed basis and so decides something is wrong if there isn't anything there. And my guess is this only happens on the weekends, b/c Hello is there during the week. I am also willing to bet it's more often done when in 'public' to show off just how good of a mommy she is being. Ahh well - just had to get that off my chest and well.. it's new Suka story which i'm sure you all await with baited breath. :)

Let's see how long it takes for Auntie Em to have to start paying SukaStar's mortgage considering they bought a house for roughly $700K using an 80/20 mortgage. This should get interesting. (oh and before they move in in 2 weeks they want to repaint and wall paper the whole house, put in carpet and granite countertops - b/c suka says she can't kosher the ones that are there. And of course they want to use all of Auntie Em's contractors... we figure in hopes she'll end up paying for it all. but - for some odd reason... they can't seem to hire them. hmmmmm :) )

That's all for today folks :) I had a great time visiting my friends in TX. We just kind of hung out and relaxed all weekend. Got to see the bats fly out from under the bridge in austin which was neat. Haven't gone through the pics yet to see if any are workable. If I do I'll post them.

have a great weekend folks!