Udder Chaos

What I Learned This Week...

SwissCheese — Sat, 03 May 2008 15:54:52 GMT

- it should not take 10 hours to travel 300 miles. By plane!

- my friends are awesome and generous in ways I never expected. They're also a bunch of alcoholics, but that's besides the point.

- what the "privacy" switch on the hotel room door does, which disables the lock entirely.

- waiting outside your locked, non-working hotel room door for 5 minutes, when you're supposed to be in a room giving a presentation feels like eternity.

- public speaking gets soooooooooooo much easier with time and practice. Not sure what happened this year but I finally found my style and presenting feels effortless now.

- having conference attendees nod and seeing light-bulbs going off in the audience is the most gratifying thing about public speaking or teaching.

- male geeks fill out the weirdest and often creepy session and speaker evaluations!

- never.... and I mean NEVER put a "demo" slide in your presentation while writing it, thinking it will keep you from having to write more, without actually preparing a demo.

- DO NOT wait until the night before giving your presentations to read them as you might find a "demo" slide you had forgotten about.

- Paul Mooney is a wonderful person to bail you out of a really bad spot. He's also fun to make fun of, and speak with and he has the most "bling" belt buckle I've ever seen! (ask him to show it to you next time you see him)

- NEVER use the words "Ireland" and "endorsing violence" in the same sentence. Not even on stage, when trying to say something witty about your co-presenter. I am serious, don't do it, even if it might get the largest laugh out of the audience.

- after watching attendees/presenters/myself for a few days while socializing/presenting, I've decided that there is a universal law that has to do with getting attention and IQ. The more attention people get, the dumber they act and sound.
I am a perfect example of that as I loose at least 40 points when stepping on stage.

- I should not have told anyone about my TCF (Travel Curse Fairy) as people (ok, only my friends) avoid me now.
You may also not be shocked that my plane just got canceled after being delayed and I am hence writing this from yet another airport while waiting for hours and hours and hours..... (sigh)

TCF in the House!

SwissCheese — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 02:33:07 GMT

Guess what I did today?

If your answer was "have a relaxing Sunday afternoon" or even "have an uneventful travel experience" then you clearly are not familiar with my "friend" the travel curse fairy, or TCF for short.

(Steve McDonagh or any other creative types, an illustration of what such fairy would look like is most appreciated)

Yes, my friends, the TCF paid me a visit today and turned a simple 3.5, straight flight into a 6 hour nightmare. Nobody else I know can get their flight delayed for hours AND manage to get their pre-paid rental car reservation canceled out of the system only to spend another hour on the phone and finally getting a different rental car.

But wait, it gets better - the highlight was arriving at the hotel 20 minutes after the front desk attendant left, which was precisely 20 minutes after the night attendant was supposed to show up.
Half an hour later, the hotel's manager showed up with her two small kids that had obviously just been woken up.
I ended up getting my room key and when I asked why nobody was staffing the desk the security guard looked at me, shook his head and simply said "I have no idea, this has NEVER happened before".

Of course it hasn't - the TCF and I haven't even been to this hotel before!

Soooo, since I am scheduled to be traveling for the next 7 weeks, let's have some fun with the TCF as I announce:

(drum roll)

Here's how it works, I tell you actual, scheduled events that are SUPPOSED to happen and you guess what is ACTUALLY going to happen, while allowing for the Travel Curse Fairy to strike at any point in time.

The person that guesses closest to what the travel curse fairy dishes out, will receive a bottle of Anguillian Pyrate rum, an Anguilla t-shirt and a genuine, hand-written note from me!

I might even come up with other games along the way, as I know most of you don't have a 7 week attention span, but for now, just play along...

So to kick the first round off, here are 6 scheduled items that are supposed to happen.
In the comments add your guess on what WILL happen:

1. Number of days I am supposed to be traveling:     53
2. Number of intended lost or delayed pieced of luggage (note, I do carry on whenever I can): 0
3. Number of airports I am scheduled to visit:     31
4. Number of scheduled unexpected overnight lay-overs:     0
5. Number of car/hotel reservations that are supposed to get lost: 0 (but we're up to 1 here already)
6. Number of countries I am supposed to visit:     4

Your guesses please!

Dear Universe.....

SwissCheese — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 01:41:59 GMT

... what the f*&K????

DISCLAIMER: If you were born after 1990, please stop reading now as this post will include LOTS of bad words.
As a matter of fact, if you offense easily, or wish to retain a somewhat polite image of me, just look away now.

Dear Universe,

what exactly did I do to offend you so much today?

All I was trying to do was make someone's 30th birthday special. Someone that doesn't have any family here and that didn't think anybody remembered.

Is getting up at 630am to bake 30 croissants and making fried pies for the kids entire school such a bad thing that I should be punished with an extremely painful burn on my arm, right in the spot where the keyboard hits behind my wrist?
(yeah, geeks, think about that and weep for me)

You knew I wasn't gonna give up on trying to have a good day so easy, but did the kids have to be sick today or all days when I have a laundry list of things to do in a hurry?

I did start to question your intentions when the entire school was gathered in the yard, waiting for our arrival, with the birthday present and the breakfast goodies.
Wanna guess what happened?

Exactly, the universe doesn't have to guess, cause it's omniscient and sh*%!

Yeah, my c*#p dragon mobile wouldn't start and no amount of sweet talking made it change it's mind.

I do appreciate you making help available to me so easily, but not until the school gathering was just about to dissolve and we were just about to miss the the birthday surprise "HEY, WE REMEMBERED" entirely.

After getting the car jumped and hauling to school, was it really necessary to place those cops on the side of the road? Did they HAVE to clock me going way too fu*&ing fast?

And making that police officer ask me to turn off the car while writing me a ticket, was NOT a funny joke, Universe!
NOT funny at all!

Of course we missed the school gathering entirely and I looked like a schmuck showing up late with a ton of cold , freshly baked breakfast goodies and the coolest birthday card/book ever.

I do appreciate you making the birthday boy laugh and cry all at the same time upon seeing the coolest birthday card/book ever, but then making my car actually stop running on the side of the road, on the way home was NOT appreciated.

Oh and making my "hey, can you come get my pi**ed off ass that is broken down on the side of the road?" ride get a flat tire, on the way to get me, was really a bit over the top, don't you think?

At least you made fixing the flat not take too long, which left enough time to go by the Government cashier to pay that stupid a$$ ticket.
Now I know you have a sick sense of humour, but making the Government cashier ladies say "weren't you here yesterday paying another ticket?" while laughing was just rubbing it in!

But next time I say "just one quick stop by the bank" to anyone, please do slap me, as I know better and should know that any trip to the bank here always takes an hour.

ONE HOUR???!!!!

Having the bank teller finally come back after making me wait at the counter for 20 minutes (what the he!!? was she printing money back there?) and telling me "I've got good news and bad news", all we have are $20 bills in bundles" may be entertaining for you, it really isn't so much for me though as it makes me look like a drug dealer.

While I do appreciate you getting me out of there eventually (even though by now my ride is pissed) and getting me setup to drive my broke-a&& car home at 10 miles an hour, having the door handle fall off in my hand while parking the car, was just insulting.

Oh and thanks for making the cat puke right next to me just now, while writing.

It's barely noon, what gives?

Signed,

-F

P.S. Dear universe, wanna make up? I'm traveling this weekend and some fu*%ing twittering doves put a travel curse on me so I really don't need more sh*& stacked up against me.

Update 1:
Dear Universe,
I take it you are not ready to make up yet?
The bank just called saying they're not going to pay the check I wrote to the cable company yesterday 'cause my signature on it "looks funny".

Update 2:
Dear Universe,
I hope you forgive my ignorance, as I now understand that you were actually protecting me by making the Travel Curse Fairy fire his BS at me a day early. This was helpful because my travels with two 4 year olds went off without a hitch and the stuff above is mostly handled.

To all the well-wishers, thanks for the concern and I was actually finding all of the above more funny than upsetting and wasn't in a bad mood about it at all.

"Rubber Duckie, You're the One..."

SwissCheese — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 12:27:50 GMT

While researching the history of the Rubber Duck (don't ask), I came across the below story that reads like a plot to the next Pixar script:

Who'd have thunk that a 29'000 rubber ducks accident could change the world by providing data to researchers!

Not for Sale: Ice Skates (or much else) in Anguilla

SwissCheese — Fri, 04 Apr 2008 19:26:45 GMT

Conversation that took place between the two 4 year olds and me:

Lola:                  "Mommy, where is the North Pole"
Me:                    "At the very top of the globe"
Lola:                  "I wanna go there"
Me:                    "but there is nothing but ice and snow there and it's freezing cold"
Lola:                  "I know that, but we can buy ice skates and jackets and make snow-men"
(Always knowing better) Pickles:     "Lola, you can't buy ANYTHING here in Anguilla"
Lola:                  "Hm, true. Mommy, next time you go to America, can you buy me ice skates?"

Funny how fast kids catch on to that "you can't buy anything in Anguilla, but EVERYTHING in America" concept.

When Shit Goes Flying...

SwissCheese — Thu, 03 Apr 2008 17:04:58 GMT

A chicken just came in my kitchen, tried to fly away from me and in the process hit the wall and shit on my floor.
Somehow that seems appropriate right now and it's making me giggle.

So have you ever had a total shit day, where you question why you even bother TRYING to deal with life?

And then, out of nowhere, you get sucked into a conversation you weren't looking to have, that makes you hurt and yet, somehow doesn't feel to get right to get out of?

And you're so worn out and dissapointed in the powers at be that you don't have enough energy to even attempt to come across as someone able to deal with life and the blatant truth just sort of spills out of you in really harsh words, kicking everyone else involved in the groin?

I did today and had already started preparing for the "would using a little tact kill you?" response.
Instead I got what has just turned my day around a bit....

"island girl, you officially rock"

Pictorial Week in Review

SwissCheese — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 12:08:51 GMT

- A fun Easter Egg hunt was had by all, even though some of the kids got bit by fire ants, which managed to invade the candy goodness in the 5 minutes the eggs were outside. (Note to Europeans, it is customary in the US to purchase empty plastic eggs that can be filled with candy or coins). Our traditional "Easter Egg Animal Charades" game was fun too, even though some of the grown up's can't tell a Moose from a Mouse

- Great food was had the entire week by all and it's always fun to warn visitors about the extremely high cost of..... well, everything here on Anguilla, and then watch their faces when the bill comes for a dinner for 7 people. And since I've finally been to Blanchard's now, I can say that the cracked coconut desert is AMAZING!
Pictured below is a quarter of their wine cellar, which was oddly enough the only thing still standing after the last hurricane that came through Anguilla. Now who ever said that God doesn't exist!

- It's amazing how kids need not a single toy at the beach to keep themselves occupied for hours (coconuts don't officially count as toys)

- Since the ferry to/from St Maartin didn't run for almost a week due to insane weather, my visitors had to take a charter plane to and from, which was described as "traveling in a flying mini-van"

- Naked Spanky came along for some of our beach trips and sustained no injury while getting bitten by a native Anguillian monkey.

- Moonsplash 2008 Reggae festival was a blast, Bankie Banx & The Roots and Herb , Masud Sadiki and Steel Pulse sounded great and the whole place was jumping. The Dune Preserve is one of the best intimate live music venues EVER, including several bars in a tree-house and one out on the beach.

Sorry for the shaky video, it was VERY hard not to dance, even while filming.
http://blog.visitusinanguilla.com/2008/04/01/pictorial-week-in-review.aspx

- As always, something terribly exciting happens when visitors are here. Usually, it has something to do with the dragon mobile (my car) or the water or gas running out. Sure enough, the night the visitors were leaving the water pump went nuts. I'm blaming Jamie doing dishes under running water for over an hour. (thanks Jamie for doing the dishes though).

- Anguilla is still stunningly gorgeous and I'm glad I got my own camera again with panorama feature!

Shoal Bay above and Island Harbour below.

- The end of Moonsplash 2008 was on Sunday at the beach. I had no idea that Bill Buchan's younger brother lives here in Anguilla!

And in case you were wondering, he WAS wearing something under that "kilt".

Things I Could Do Without Right Now

SwissCheese — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 14:42:57 GMT

being over a month behind on writing sessions for Admin2008
intermittent internet outages which is making the above extra difficult
the kids being out of school for 2 weeks and hence being at the house (my office) all day

(cute picture of little kids and little kittens added to put me in a better mood)

getting a $500 speeding ticket 'cause of Mooney making me late to meet Jamie and his crew which are visiting this week
staying up until 2am to write, since that's the only time I am not on kid "call", which is causing me to be mighty cranky
coming home to find the medium size chicks in my house, pecking at anything and everything. and yes, where there are chicks there is chick poop

(chicken trying to crawl under my fridge)

a broken cell phone which is making it very difficult to play tour guide for my visitors
missing Lolu
late night phone calls from a Dallas ER about IslandBoy falling off his bike and breaking his arm

Breathtaking

SwissCheese — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 15:38:35 GMT

Amazing photography/art by director Pierre Michel on his site.

Fire Flower, made for a jewelery company is breathtakingly beautiful and the HD version is worth the wait to download.

Although, you probably should not do that if you're at work since it contains artistic nudity..

OurDogLolu.com

SwissCheese — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 01:09:14 GMT

Why did the chicken cross the road?

- To get away from our dog Lolu.

Then a car came and ran them both over.

We're all a bit worn out on losing family members at the moment and I had no idea how ominous my statement of "it's hard to want to talk about death" was the other day, nor how much Lolu's love for fresh chicken would impact our family.

We miss you Lolu and the kids are sad.
I am not sure how I am going to do work without someone trying to chew my toes under the table.

SPC

SwissCheese — Sun, 23 Mar 2008 08:25:00 GMT

Odd entry that showed up on my Google alerts the other day...

Did you know that Anguilla, our 36 square mile little piece of paradise is number 4 on the World's SPAM emission list? Supposedly lack of security has turned everyone's computers into SPAM bots and hence Anguilla creates more SPC (SPAM per Capita) than almost any other Nation in the world.

Now judging on the recent state of affairs of my Inbox (over 200 unread and counting), I'd imagine a decent amount of SPAM is coming from a small circle of Lotus business partners writing "Web of Deception".
(giggle)

Bad Chick News

SwissCheese — Sat, 22 Mar 2008 17:22:19 GMT

This post is somewhat overdue but I suppose it's hard to want to talk about death.
Even though Lolu, our 4 month old dog was not having any issues chewing on death on the mat in the living room.

Nor did the innocent looking cat pictured below, which was the true cause of Durga H. Chicken's demise.

Yes, my friends, another chick has passed, never to lay eggs herself.
Only a few days old and already cat and then dog food.

I have a pic of the dead baby chick but it's not pretty, so instead we'll celebrate Durga's days on earth with the Official Random Chicken, a site that brings you the best of random fowl pics every time you re-load your browser.

What? That don't think that sounds exciting to you?
You must have never spent 5 hours at the San Juan airport waiting for your connecting flight!

March (Weather) Madness

SwissCheese — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 13:34:21 GMT

April, April der macht was er will.
Except it's not April yet bt the weather's gone nuts despite.

This week I've had an umbrella ripped out of my hand by the wind and got soaking wet with rain only to turn around and get sweaty on an afternoon sunny hike.

I went from 75 degree beach lounging to 38 degree wet, soggy, fog.
Guess which one I was camping in?

I am told I don't do cold very elegantly anymore but we had a blast, despite exploding rocks and not making it to Dinosaur Valley park as originally intended!

Lighter fluid, flint, sticks, a guitar and a gorgeous fire kept everyone entertained for hours.
I didn't' even realize how much I missed a real campfire until it memorized mesmerized me, pictured posted here.

Meanwhile back at the ranch (Anguilla), some rough seas are wreaking havoc on ferry traffic between Anguilla and St Martin and no boats have been able to run for days now.
Perhaps something angered Mother Nature, perhaps that is Mojee keeping my travel curse stuck in the waves of Anguilla.

I am writing this at the DFW airport with a 16 hour travel day ahead of me.
Think I'll make it home by tonight?

Cat Fur Trade

SwissCheese — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 16:54:00 GMT

One of our cats dissapeared the other day.
If we lived in France, by the Swiss border, I'd be very concerned right now.

"According to local animal rights groups, dozens of cats were reported missing in one day in several border villages, and their collars left behind. In response, the Swiss police set up a special cat unit called Félin 74, but found no organised cat ring."

In Switzerland, it's illegal to import cat fur but domestic production and sale is allowed. It's also legal to kill stray cats and sell their fur for $5 a piece but after hundreds of cats have dissapeared from border towns which are presumed to be poachers.

Michael Schumacher, Brigitte Bardot and 106,000 others have now signed a petition to outlaw cat fur production in Switzerland and align with EU (European Union) rules.

And just for the record, our cat came back drunk, after being gone for 3 days...... fur and all!

Introducing Mojo and Mojee

SwissCheese — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 10:42:51 GMT

Apparently it is possible to travel thousands of miles without a problem or delay.
I know so because my Canadian visitors that were in Anguilla last week, had a flawless travel experience DESPITE their final destination being my house.
Introducing Mojo, and his travel size buddy Mojee, which supposedly posseses flawless travel mojo and is supposed to counter-act my curse...

They said they stood in a circle and held hands, said some blessing and did a hula dance and put all their flawless travel mojo in the palm frond dolls, but I am still convinced that rum punch was involved there somehow.
Either way, we agreed that the doll needed to provide 10,000 miles of smooth travels before we considered it as having worked.

Which brings me to yesterday...... when I missed my connecting flight in San Juan.... but got on a direct flight instead, which got me to my final destination an hour earlier.

So question to you, is missing my flight but arriving an hour sooner considered Mojo/Mojee or my travel curse at work?

Breaking News: Cistern Runs Dry in Anguilla

SwissCheese — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 14:58:23 GMT

The Valley, Anguilla (March 12, 2008) - Cursing was heard early this morning in Welches, a part of the Caribbean island of Anguilla, as a turn of the kitchen faucet yielded only loud gulping - but no water.

Despite extensive water conservation, "dry season" often takes it's toll on Anguillian's since only a small percentage of houses on Anguilla are connected to a water system and virtually all islanders depend on steady rainfall to meet their daily water needs.

According to Franziska Tanner-Whitlock, the home's resident, the timing of this event is unfortunate since there are three Canadian visitors currently in the home and there is a high demand for after-beach showers, meal cooking and laundering of sandy towels.

"I've called the water supplier and ordered 3000 gallons but so far I don't have any scheduled delivery time or date", said a frustrated Franziska. Local sources confirm that specifically during dry season, water delivery may take days, which causes many islanders to get ocean water in buckets for toilet flushing needs and stringent adherence to the "if it's yellow let it mellow, if it's brown, flush it down" philosophy.

Neither the local water supplier nor the Canadian visitors could be reached for a comment but sources state that the visitors were spotted on Scilly Cay, a small island serving fresh grilled lobster off the coast of Anguilla's Island Harbour.

Fresh Seafood Anyone?

SwissCheese — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 00:59:12 GMT

Hm, does anyone need something to do the weekend of March 22nd?

If so, I'd strongly recommend you visit me 'cause the first ever "Festival Del Mar" will take place on Easter weekend in Island Harbour pictured below, which is about 3 minutes from my house.

"Lauded as one of the Caribbean’s hot culinary destinations, the chic island of Anguilla is not only acclaimed for its 5 star cuisine found island wide, but for its finger licking local fare cooked up at roadside stalls, beachside eateries and backyard fetes."

The two day festival will be all about food and Anguilla's fishing industry and includes a deep sea fishing competition as well as a culinary competition in the categories of seafood soup or salad, best traditional seadoos dish, best roasted or grilled seafood etc. Both competitions are open to residents, St Maartiners, restaurants and non-restaurateurs alike.

For those of you that don't enjoy cooking, skip the competition but go check out the 20 food booths with tasty treats from all the fameous local restaurants, serving the freshest fish, lobster, crayfish, conch, tuna and snapper. 
Now I'm going to go out on a limb and say that there'll be your fare share of rice and peas, johnny cakes, Carib beer live reggae music and rum punches to go along all that.

Anyone (coughCharlesRobinson) wanna join me for the culinary competition?

The Bite of Coffee

SwissCheese — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 07:07:00 GMT

Now I'm all about getting my caffeine in the morning but I'm not sure I want them crawling them crawling up my nose - ew!

Kids Rock!!!

SwissCheese — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 09:06:37 GMT

What a fun way to start Monday morning - laughing out loud!

Girls Rock!

SwissCheese — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 13:14:00 GMT

"I've been waiting for so long to admit to myself that I am amazing!"

Wow!

For those of you who live in countries with movie theaters, you've gotta grab your kids and go see this movie, which opens today!

If you can't find the movie, or the camp, just pick some other way to empower your little one's and especially your chickadees!

(via jezebel )