Banshees Really DO Exist!!

They do! They really do! We've all seen them too, because every human has at one point in their lives been one. We know them as 2 year-olds. My nephew for instance is currently in his banshee stage, with a shriek that can, and quite possibly has, peeled the paint off walls. Sorry to say I have no actual proof of this, but believe me. Its the only thing that can possibly explain his ability to push the decibel reading off the scale. Thankfully he comes with a pacifier. If you plunk him in front of the TV and run Kiki's Delivery Service, he's extremely quiet. Until its over, and then... You'd better be quick on the play button. My dog's brick splitting bark sounds so tame now. That's probably a blessing of sorts. I no longer jump out of my skin when she barks right behind my back. She sneaks up behind me and does that, and I'm fairly sure she laughs about it too. Thank god she can't take pictures.

The shrieking aside, my sister's kids are all good. I keep telling myself that the littlest one is just a baby, and I'm being dumb when I climb walls to escape the noise. So far I've not been terribly effective at convincing myself of that. Ah well.

On Monday I had my second physical therapy appointment. It seemed to go well. The PT wants to keep things very simple because that's what seems to be working for me. I have a suspicion that this thing in my neck may never completely leave and I will be doing these little exercises for a long time to come. At the moment though, they are allowing me to function at about 90% of normal. Unless I forget to do them, and then I'm back to a dying fish for a hand. Always fun for parties and attempting to eat spaghetti. OR I've got an odd wimpy feeling to the arm, and slight numbness down the inside of the arm to the wrist. Either or both can happen, and I'm not always in a position to fix it with the exercises. Its a learning process for now, but at least it's working.

After the appointment, I drove home in the little rental. Nice enough little car. In fact it was nice enough to drive right back down the hill later to see a movie. I decided on Prince of Persia, which wasn't a bad film exactly, but it rang hollow. I really didn't give a crap about any of the characters. The action scenes were fine, the dialogue wasn't bad, and FX were top notch. However this whole thing basically falls into the same category as National Treasure. A movie that has everything I love in a film, but totally fails to pull me into it. Everything fell rather flat, like walking into a very clean glass door. You'd like to be inside the party with everyone else, but something is preventing you from getting to it. I'm not saying this was bad film, because for many people I'm sure it was great, but for me... eh. I should've gone to see Killers.

And! I've got my car back! It looks brand new. The place that did the repairs gave me a detail job on the car too. The only thing that was a little screwy is that there was sap all over the car, so they couldn't give it a wax job. Therefore I get to get it further detailed in the near future, and I get to figure out how its getting sap all over it, given it lives in a carport. Odd. Anyway, I've got my car back!! Soooo happy!!!

ACK!! An AWARD!!

I am in an extremely foul mood today. There is no real particular reason for it, just that I wanted peace and quiet and instead my sister and her kids are invading for two weeks. Starting at 6pm or so today. I'm not going to say anything else about it because I start moving from merely agitated to outright angry. As bad as this sounds, I greatly dislike having visitors to the house. That includes relatives. I would be exceedingly happy as a hermit. A CLEAN hermit. With chickens, goats, dogs, and at least two mules. I'd be good.

On a brighter note, somehow I got an award from "Little Messy Missy". Thank you Little Messy Missy. This was the last thing I was ever expecting. I didn't think I wrote enough on this thing to ever gain award attention. Definitely a brighter spot in the day though. So, basically I think the rules go that I thank the person who gave it to me. Done. :)

Then tell everyone 7 things that you probably don't know about me, and given that I don't like talking too much about myself, that should be relatively simple. The last one was that I was supposed to pass this award on... Which could be a problem given that I generally don't read a lot of blogs. So, I will hold onto this until I run across people who meet the criteria.

1. I'm afraid I already gave this away. I harbor a deep need for solitude.

2. I still sleep with a little pink plush elephant.

3. I absolutely abhor dresses and skirts. Give me jeans any day.

4. I have a polished stone collection that I keep in a fish bowl. Every once in a while I take the fish bowl and dump the stones on a table, and then look at them for hours.

5. I don't like chocolate, unless you offer me raisinets. Then I can eat an entire bag. Most people get chocolate cravings... I get cravings for Nori (that's the dried seaweed they use for sushi), and eat them like potato chips. Yes, I know. Weird.

6. I want tons of plants in my room, but I've got a black thumb.

7. My favorite movies are from the 40s and 50s. Hollywood lost something when they hit the mid 60s, and they haven't gotten it back.

Lately I've been watching a lot of Anime online. There are a couple of sites that have some really good quality shows, but you have to take a good look around before you find them. About 3 years ago, I came across one at work called Mushi-Shi, and loved it. There are some Animes that have this wonderful soothing feel to them. You can watch them hundreds of times, and the feeling never really fades. Mushi-Shi was one, and Natsume Yuujinchou (translates to Natsume's Book of Friends) is another which I just found. When I'm really stressed out I find myself going back to it to watch. It has a soft melancholy feel to it at first, but as the show progresses and the main character finds that he's not as alone as he thought, you find yourself smiling by the end of the half hour. If you have ever seen "Spirited Away" then you may like this, but its not quite so action packed. This is much quieter, and built around a kind teen who can see spirits and has never quite fit in with whatever relative he was sent to stay with. When he finds himself with the last people willing to take him in, in the country, he makes a real effort to fit in. You can find this Anime on CrunchyRoll, and other places, but I'd suggest the first because of the quality of the media. You'll have to put up with some obnoxious commercials, but its worth it.

On to the shoulder update. I'm not sure what's going on with my shoulder, and neither is the physical therapist. His conclusion was that this was not run of the mill whiplash, and that he'd need some time to pinpoint the issue. Since he's not sure what's going on, except that whatever is causing it is in my neck, not so much in the shoulder, he could only give me one exercise to do. It helps a LOT. This doesn't cure it, because it always comes back, but it just involves a little traction to the neck, and my hand acts normally, my shoulder doesn't hurt much, and I'm pretty much normal. For a while at least. Which is VERY cool! Now... If I can just get my car back. I'll be happy.

I zoomed through another book instead of finishing off the two I'm in the middle of, but I couldn't help it. It was an Ilona Andrews book, and I absolutely LOVE her writing. First book was "Magic Bites" and then she went roaring right through another 3 books. They're so much fun, and I'm constantly cracking up at the images my mind creates from the descriptions. If you want a light read with modern day magic, then this would be for you. They're fun!

After I caught the little Imprezza Speedball, Dad took me out for pizza, and then we went and wandered around Best Buy. I found "The Watcher in the Woods" for $5 roughly, and got it. I hadn't seen it in so long I'd partially forgotten the story, but I remembered liking it. This was one of Disney Studio's oddball creepy movies. Another was "Something Wicked This Way Comes" which is one of my favorite Ray Bradbury books, but the movie adaptation was very well done. Anyway, I finally got to sit down and watch "Watcher in the Woods" today, and it's still good, with probably what is one of the last appearances of Bette Davis before her withdraw from films. Good movie, and I'm glad I got it.

Ah yes... Eat a Cookie!