Its been quite awhile since I have done one of these meme posts and since I was “tagged” by Janet I thought I’d go ahead and post my answers and encourage you to do the same.

Here are the rules:

“The first player of this game starts with the topic “five weird habits of yourself,” and people who get tagged need to write an entry about their five weird habits as well as state this rule clearly. In the end, you need to choose the next five people to be tagged and link to their web journals. Don’t forget to leave a comment in their blog or journal that says “You are tagged” (assuming they take comments) and tell them to read yours.”

And so, without further ado, here are

Five Weird Habits of Mine:

1. After the initial go around I prefer to eat meat cold: chicken, hamburgers, hot dogs…this actually doesn’t just apply to meat now that I think of it. I like stuffing cold, and rice-a-roni, etc. Those cheap tacos from Taco Bell…love em cold!

2. I have certain books that I feel compelled to re-read every year around the same time of year. I don’t always go through with it but the feeling is still there: Peanuts and Dracula in early fall, Stainless Steel Rat and Stardust in the spring, sci-fi favorites in the winter, Neverwhere pretty much anytime.

3. I am a habitual movie re-watcher. There are certain movies that I can watch over and over again and thoroughly enjoy each time. I think a common thread with these movies that I like to rewatch is dialogue. Movies like Emma, Sense and Sensibility, An Ideal Husband, Return to Me, You Can’t Take it With You, Twelfth Night…it is the witty banter between characters that I like. That is one of the main reasons Firefly/Serenity became an instant favorite when I was introduced to it.

4. I love to put candy birthday cake letters on vanilla ice cream and eat it. I tend to not eat breakfast but on the days I do its usually because there is ice cream or left over pizza around. I like orange juice with tons of ice in the glass and love to drink it when eating chocolate.

5. I change my voice mail message on my work phone every day to reflect that days’ date and to indicate which building I’ll be in and when. I’m one of the few if only people at my place of employment to do this and often get complimented on it by my fellow co-workers. The truth is I got in the habit of doing it when an old boss used to think I was never around so I did it initially out of paranoia. Now its just an unusual habit.

There you go, bitches (Janet’s words, not mine 🙂 )

Okay, those tagged with blogs would be:
1. Jules
2. Rob
3. Angela
4. Fence
5. Mosker and Suzanne

I’m breaking the rules and calling out you other bloggers too, Mysfit, Jenn See, Ciera, Anne, Shannin and anyone else.

Participate if you want but I won’t be offended if you don’t.

Non-blog owners feel free to post your 5 weird habits in the comments…actually you bloggers can do this to if you don’t want to put them on your own site.

Happy weirdness!!!

Yesterday marked what would have been the 90th birthday of Old Blue Eyes. I came to like the old crooners (Frankie, Bing Crosby, Dean Martin) when I was a teenager and started watching old movies. Despite being prolific throughout his life I can never picture Frank Sinatra in any way other than the picture above as that is the way he looked in the movies that I’ve seen him in. He has such an amazing voice. One of the reasons I like the Real Rhapsody program so much is that I have been able to go and add classic songs from these guys to my library of music. Some of my favorites are: I’ve Got You Under My Skin, You Make Me Feel So Young, I Won’t Dance, Witchcraft and the Christmas classics like Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas, It Came Upon a Midnight Clear, and The First Noel.

Happy late birthday Frank. Your voice continues to be a gift to us long after your passing.

Julie, what was that Sinatra song you always played for Tori that she like so much?

(Since I don’t have a digital camera Dominique was wonderful enough to take a few pics for me this morning and email them to me. Thanks Nick!!!)

Finally, it has snowed. I love snow, especially during the holiday season. In my perfect world there would be a light snow every day starting the day after Thanksgiving and lasting until New Year’s Day. It started snowing yesterday morning and stayed at it through the entire day and all through the night. In total we were blessed with about 10 inches of snow.

One of the best things about snow is that feeling that you can play hookey. It began for us last night. We dropped our daughter off at youth group and she went home to spend the night with friends. We went to an amazingly empty mall (best time to shop…snowstorms!!!) so that I could have Mary try on clothes for me to help me with my Christmas shopping. There were more employees than customers making it alot of fun for shopping. We returned home to watch one of our Netflix movies:

The Wedding Date was a really fun movie. I had some doubts considering it was a somewhat different take on the Pretty Woman story (a movie I’ve grown to despise over the years), but it ended up being an enjoyable romantic comedy. If you’ve watched Will & Grace then you know that Debra Messing is wonderful, and Dermot Mulroney was good as well. I really hope Messing does more films as she seems very down to earth and has great comedic timing. The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the music. Not only are there a few very nostalgic (for 80’s children) Air Supply songs, but there is a wonderful score and a few terrific musical numbers by Michael Buble. I particularly like Home and Sway. I recommend it for lighthearted fun.

I love the way the world looks at night when the ground is covered with snow and the sky is white with falling snow. The outdoors have a glow that is not replicated in any other situation and I found myself getting up a few times throughout the night to look outside and enjoy the beauty. Mary’s work was closed and I took the day off and we slept in. We awoke to the most perfect, pristine, snow-covered world. Mary made us a big breakfast and we sat down to watch:

The Family Man is a retelling of the classic It’s a Wonderful Life. It borrows the themes of that Frank Capra classic but maintains its own identity. I love Christmas movies and this is one that I both look forward to and dread at the same time. (Spoilers ahead if you haven’t seen it) I love the little girl Annie so much in this movie and when Jack (Nicolas Cage) goes back to his actual life the thought that she does not exist makes me tear up everytime. Mary likes to point out that the idea is there that they will have this child in the future but its not the same for me. It just gets to me. Its an exquisite sadness though as I really love the heart of this film. Nicolas Cage and Tea Leoni are great and have such a wonderful chemistry. Tea Leoni brings such life and passion to the role that she makes it rise above what could be a cookie-cutter female romantic lead character. Don Cheadle and Jeremy Piven are also great in this. And of course Makenzie Vega is a darling (I was surprised to find out that she was the girl who played Nancy at age 11 in Sin City…thought that girl looked familiar!) I am man enough to admit that this is one of those sappy Christmas romances that I enjoy watching every year!

I’ve enjoyed playing hookey today and spending time with my wife. Tonight we will watch another Christmas film with our daughter and enjoy the warmth and comfort of home. I’m thrilled that it snowed and hope for more as the season continues. I hope everyone is enjoying the holiday season thus far and wish you joy, peace, comfort and relaxation as December rolls along.

(My desktop wallpaper. Click for larger image. If applied to background in the ‘stretch’ position it will fill entire screen at 1024×768)

As much as I enjoy Halloween it pales in comparison to my love for Christmas. The weather, the music, the lights and decorations, the food, the friendship, the air of good cheer…they are all facets of a holiday that is by far my favorite. Traditionally we put up our Christmas tree and turn on the outside lights on Thanksgiving. This year however we had family staying with us so last night was the night designated for trimming the tree. I was able to get some, but not all, the outside lights up this weekend when it was an unseasonable 66 degrees. The rest of my pursuit of Griswald fame will have to be done this week in temps between the 30’s and 40’s.

I really enjoy my subscription to Real Rhapsody. I signed up for it last year prior to the holidays and became sold when I was able to create playlists of all my favorite Christmas tunes. The first thing I did yesterday upon arriving home from work was to set up the ’05 Christmas playlist. Present are great tunes from the likes of Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra, Kay Starr, Ella Fitzgerald, Nat King Cole, Judy Garland, Amy Grant, Josh Groban, The Andrews Sisters, and of course the wonderful A Charlie Brown Christmas by Vince Guaraldi. We had light snowflakes falling occasionally throughout the day and this plus the Christmas music really helped set the mood. Personal favorites are O Holy Night (the Josh Groban version is by far the best), Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong’s rendition of Baby, Its Cold Outside, and of course any Christmas song that Bing sings.

I set up the tree, strung the lights, and laid out the Christmas decorations. When Mary got home the three of us set out to trim the tree. I don’t know if any of you are like this but we all have special ornaments that we like to hang each year. I sometimes want to do a more fancy themed tree but we have so many ornaments that have such personal significance that ours is more of a hodge podge of various items. There are ornaments from our first Christmas as a married couple. Tori likes to hang her beautiful sandollar ornament that Scott gave her to commemorate her first Christmas. I have a gold metal snowman with my name engraved on it that my third grade teacher gave me. A few years ago my brother Jason gave me a Yukon Cornelius ornament and there is one that is a sheet of music that says ‘Messiah’ on it that I always want to save to hang myself.

Afterwards we ate a great meal and watched a Christmas movie (another family tradition). This year we picked While You Were Sleeping.

This movie has been a favorite of Mary and mine ever since we saw it in the theatre in 1995. For years this framed movie poster decorated our walls. It is one of the better romantic comedies in my opinion as it hearkens back to those great romantic comedies of the 40’s and 50’s. We consider it a Christmas movie since the majority of the film takes place between Christmas and New Year’s Day. The characters are all so wonderful, especially Peter Boyle, Micole Mercurio, Sandra Bullock and Bill Pullman. What I especially love is all the little affectations that Sandra Bullock brings to her character…the way she talks, her mannerisms, the silly way she walks through the snow to her building door…they are all small things that she brings to the character that you may not notice the first time through but the combination of these things makes the character much more real. Great movie. It was especially fun to watch after my recent visit to Chicago.

I’m so excited about the Christmas season and that I have the opportunity to share it with all of you. Throughout movie and book reviews, etc. I will no doubt give a healthy dose of Christmas themed posts. I wish you all warmth, comfort and joy throughout this holiday season.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! A day of Turkey, stuffing, green bean casserole and football. I can’t wait! Hopefully my 37 year old body will still be able to handle the rigors of stuffing myself followed by hours of running around outside playing ball. Should be a fun day.

I hope you all have a wonderful, delicious, relaxing and fun filled holiday weekend!