I Didn't Choose the Nerd Life...wait....YES I DID!

Last night I was genuinely flattered when a young...(like 17 year old young) ...guy half jokingly proposed marriage because I was wearing my most favorite marvel baseball tee in Kroger. How lovely! On top of revving my (usually droopy) ego, he was reinforcing my love for all things Geeky! I am a nerd. I have never backed away from it. I love comic books and Lord of the Rings. I love both Star Wars and Star Trek. I am a twilight reading, superwholock nerdfighter.....and proud! With well over 1000 movies, to say I love the silver screen is an understatement....The most purchased at once was at a yard sale, and I bought 65....
In addition to fandom flag waving, I sing, act, do improv comedy, and dabble in all things craft-worthy....
 Enter Pinterest....I am an artsy fartsy person. Anything I can make with my hands and/or any excuse to run my mouth, I'm there. As if I needed more things to do in my life, I have spent the last year transforming my house into a haven of nerd-dom....  So today will be short, but I wanted to share with you some of the Nerdvana I have made. These are all Angie originals....Just so you know...

 I hope you enjoy it....Maybe it will even inspire you to let out your inner geek.

It all started innocently enough....Props for children's parties.....

Then people asked me to DO things....

paint faces...

 Make things...

like these coasters with a box to keep them in....

So, naturally I decided to start gifting homemade goods!

 Suddenly, I was pretty obsessed with trying my hand at..well...everything....
I made a waterproof bag out of shopping bags...

I painted....a LOT!

I painted history stuff because Mike (my husband) Is a history grad student...

My daughter is obsessed with dolphins....so I did this...

I painted a pic of my husband's guitar....(I was running out of things to paint!)

I tried doing one of those "inspirational" pieces....I don't get it...

I got trapped into painting roses...and space....and roses IN space....

 

I even tried delving into unusual mediums....like this one which is painted using concentrated teas...

and I taught myself to do spray paint art...

(p.s....I needed to sweep...I was cooking dinner...ewww)

 Finally...after much soul searching, it came to me. Life is short. Nerdy things make me happy....I should surround myself with them.... so I did this...

I made some shirts...

I made myself shoes...

In my latest endeavors, I am making bigger bolder choices toward the transformation of my home into a place to love....

My dining room table!

my son's closet...

In order to embarrass my bestie, Kelly....

 (She's the one in the middle!)

I tried my hand at songwriting...now the original song isn't mine....It is "The Nerdy Birthday Song" by The Doubleclicks....and Kel was too far away to harass in person....so I did it via the internet. The song was not nerdy enough.... Therefore I made this horribly done video to wish her a most happy birthday...and I added a second verse....(Now to say I play the guitar is offensive to people who actually use a guitar to make music...but, in my defense, I learned the song an hour before this recording and wrote a second verse about 15 minutes after that.... )

It's too big to post to the blog (apparently), so here is the facebook link...

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10205805039233741

I'm a nerd....Here I am dressed as professor Trelawney....because I'm cool like that....

Sometime I'll show you my knitting...lol!

Peace.

The Sounding Off of an Unsound Mind: Let's clear the smoke...

The Sounding Off of an Unsound Mind: Let's clear the smoke...: Last night, my father did an interview on KATV. He has cancer....and not a little bit. My father was diagnosed with prostate cancer that w...

The Sounding Off of an Unsound Mind: Let's clear the smoke...

The Sounding Off of an Unsound Mind: Let's clear the smoke...: Last night, my father did an interview on KATV. He has cancer....and not a little bit. My father was diagnosed with prostate cancer that w...

Let's clear the smoke...

Last night, my father did an interview on KATV. He has cancer....and not a little bit. My father was diagnosed with prostate cancer that was extremely aggressive. "we can get it all by removing your prostate." they said. They lied. Now, with cancer spreading like wildfire, there are no other courses of action that can cure him. At least, none that are legal.Still. We are fighters. We believe in "Raging against the dying of the light".. Life without passion is little more than existing.

Fast forward to now...... There is a cure out there. We have identified it. Our own government has done studies that prove that it works. Where is this magical item, you say?! Mostly sucking away your tax dollars by gathering dust in police lock up (or in the hands of drug dealers). I'm talking about Cannabis. You probably call it marijuana. Before you get too upset and stop reading, listen to the facts....
Here is a list of just some of the studies proving its medicinal worth:
http://www.collective-evolution.com/2013/08/23/20-medical-studies-that-prove-cannabis-can-cure-cancer/
The history of marijuana.
The oldest uses of cannabis date back to the very beginning. Etymologists have traced the word ALL the way back to the BIBLE! (What?!) There are 5 references to the plant in the Hebrew bible. One shows it is used by God for healing. It is a key ingredient in anointing oil. Believe it or not, the origin of the word "cannabis" comes from the Hebrew root "Qaneh Bosm" which literally translates to "sweet smelling cane." It is a main ingredient in the holy oil used to heal the sick and swear in the priests. (Exodus 30)
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jane-marcus-phd/holy-cannabis-the-bible-t_b_4784309.html

Cannabis was used throughout history as a medicine. Up until the early 1900's, cannabis oil was widely prescribed by doctors to cure everything from migraines to colicky babies. The 1850 census recorded 8,327 hemp plantations. (A plantation must be more than 2000 acres.) No one ever saw negative side effects of this! It was a widely grown crop and used to make everything... I MEAN EVERYTHING! It makes a paper, cleaners, wax, body care products, cloth, rope, concrete, caulk...(I could go on)... Henry Ford's first car was made almost entirely of hemp...and it ran on biofuel made from it!

Then why is it illegal and not just regulated?! Now THAT IS the question.
Cannabis was labeled a schedule 1 drug under the "Controlled Substances Act of 1970. What does that mean?! That would make it one of the most dangerous drugs available...on par with heroin. Do the numbers coincide with this idea?Nope!

No one in history has ever overdosed on pot. Not ever. You would have to consume so much in such a short amount of time, you would die of lack of oxygen trying to choke that much down at once.

Cannabis was used for thousands of years, until the early 1900s.  For a short but wonderful documentary, watch the face of Discovery Health, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, and his life changing risk to his career....his documentary "Weed":

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B4GUkzTnFG0

This is a shorter doc put together by someone who sites all their sources. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UNhvj6g8MWc

Marijuana cures cancer, among many other illnesses...

Worried about how recreational cannabis will affect society?! Don't be... In the states that have already legalized it, teen pot use is down to an all time low. DWIs are at an all time low. The economy is up. Traffic accidents are down. The media tried to say that one person died from marijuana. He was drunk and high and fell off a balcony. I don't think that counts....

I am very proud of my father, a preacher, for taking the controversial stand to legalize cannabis. This is his interview.
http://www.katv.com/story/27359562/group-pushing-for-new-marijuana-legalization-amendment-in-arkansas#.VGLeC65y2ss.facebook
If you would like to donate to Fred Porter directly, here is the link:
http://www.gofundme.com/cxmox4
Help us fight for the right to live.... Support the legalization of cannabis. Peace.

Cut the Crap: My Son's Room...The squeaking must end....

I am not what you would call a "clean freak"...I am, perhaps, a bit of a slob... NOT a dirty person, but I am a clutter collector and woman of many interests....One husband +one MIL+ two kids + myself + 1200 square ft =The SCARIEST place on Earth...

  I do well (between homeschooling 2 grades, cooking meals, buying groceries, etc.) to keep clean dishes in the cabinet and the kitchen floor from becoming a petri dish. I believe that housework is insanity because Einstein defined insanity as,"..doing the same thing over and over again expecting a different result."

I don't like it...I might even hate it... If I ever killed anyone, it would probably be t-minus 10 minutes from someone's expected arrival time, and, despite the frantic bumble-buzzing of the living room, I hear a knock at the door....That JW will never know what hit him....lol! If housework creates crazy, Honey, I have arrived...

Needless to say, my house is usually in less than ideal conditions...particularly the kids' rooms, which cleaning consists of closing the door and averting my eyes....

Fast forward to my current conundrum: with the onset of cooler weather, we have a new stowaway: A small furry demon that ate my new bag of organic blue corn chips! A mouse!

Now...some people are trap people...They have a little catch and release program happening... Not me! You stepped into the wrong casa mi amigo. I use poison....A slow painful death?! Good... The one downside to poison is that.... somewhere....you end up with a dead mouse.

So I have to thoroughly clean my house now. That brings us to yesterday, when I began the daunting trip into Hell...aka...my son's room.

I'm not going to lie.... Once I began pulling the horde out of his room, I realized that...all things considered...he kept it pretty clean...At the 3 hour mark, while STILL removing items from the room, I took a step back and realized he was a magician....A veritable Mary Poppins with her bottomless carpet bag of tricks... How did it all fit?!  I wish I was exaggerating....

Two things began to simultaneously occur:
1. I have done him a great injustice by teaching him how to cram things, rather than only keeping what fits in the space, and...
2. This must change...now!

13 hours of sorting and tossing and purging and organizing... 13!

Admittedly, I read this in a different blog, but it is a great idea (that actually works!), so I'm going to share... Make a toy pile, and rather than focusing on what goes, let your kid "shop" his toys and decide what stays! Also, the language YOU use when discussing toys sways their decisions... You REALLY want to get RID of THAT?! ....and, instantly, the child feels guilty for wanting it gone.... This. Was. All. My Fault. He cut it by more than half... and it is much better.... He worked so hard that I turned his closet into the TARDIS....He even has a tiny desk now....

There is good news.... We didn't find any dead mice in his room....even THEY were smart enough not to go in there....
Peace.