Stolen from spirit0fstlouis

What we have here is the top 106 books most often marked as "unread" by LibraryThing’s users. As in, they sit on the shelf to make you look smart or well-rounded. Bold the ones you've read, underline the ones you read for school, italicize the ones you started but didn't finish.

Here's the twist: add (*) beside the ones you liked and would (or did) read again or recommend. Even if you read 'em for school in the first place.

I'm adding another twist - add a (+) beside the ones you want/intend to read.

( Cut due to length )

Some of my italics are for instances where I read the abridged version of the book when I was a lot younger, and never found the time to go back and read the full version as an adult.

This was a very up-and-down weekend for me...the first half of it turned out to be excellent and the second half was really bad.

Friday night, I left work a smidge early - since our entire accounting system is down thanks to a virus some asshat in NY contracted by downloading third party software, I have very little to do and felt justified in bugging out 15 minutes early - and swung by Wegman's to pick up a bouquet of pink roses for my grandmother's birthday. Went home to change clothes and pick up the husband, and then the two of us headed off to a very nice Italian restaurant in West Trenton called Paulie's Anna Rose to join my co-workers for a year-end celebration dinner. I really liked our controller's husband - he seemed really down to earth and went out of his way to single out my husband and I and make us feel very welcome. My controller got more talkative too as the evening went on - she had a toothache and was drinking apple martinis as "medicine". Everyone had a really good time - the food was fantastic (and the desserts - yummy homemade banana cream pie!!!) and the drinks were flowing - and things didn't wind down until quarter to 11. It was a good opportunity to spend time with people outside of work and I was happy they included me, especially since I wasn't here to help out with the last year end.

Saturday morning, I got up at the crack of dawn and swung by D&D to get a Box of Joe before going to my grandmother's house to celebrate her birthday. My mom brought a french toast casserole, my aunt came with bagels, and my cousin brought her boyfriend. Grandma liked the roses I got her very much - they put the crummy tie-dyed flowers her son bought her to shame!!

Mom and I also figured out the perfect gift to get my aunt for her 50th birthday next week. We went to Michael's and bought a giant champagne glass that we are going to decorate with rhinestones in the shape of a "50" and other assorted bling, and then in the glass we're going to put a nice martini set, some decent vodka and a bottle of apple pucker (my aunt is a big appletini fan).

Sunday, things started to go downhill.

Homer is still suffering from separation anxiety - he gets really upset if he can see us but not access us and really upset when he thinks we're "leaving him". In the morning, we put him on his lead in the backyard so I could get some cleaning done, and then I went outside to plant my strawberries. He saw me and got really upset that I wasn't down in the yard where he was, so he started barking and whining and squeaking. I was afraid he'd wake the neighbors so I let him off his lead, figuring he could do his thing and I could keep an eye on him while I was planting. Unfortunately, his thing turned out to be sidling up behind me and grabbing a mouthful of my plants and then taking off across the backyard with them. He refused to come when called and when I finally caught him, he refused to drop the plants - clamped his little mouth shut and swallowed most of what he took. I yelled at him - kinda loudly for early morning - and my husband ended up coming outside to see what the commotion was. We put him back on his lead while I finished with the planting, and then took him off and played with him together in the backyard for a good hour or so.

Later in the evening, he was acting restless in the house so I took him outside to play with him a bit before it got dark. He was OK at first - had a great time chasing his new rubber frisbee that I bought him Saturday afternoon - but when I went to bring him inside, he proceeded to go over to the pot where the strawberry plants were, look at me, and then, right after I told him to "leave it", pull another mouthful of plants from the pot and sprint off across the backyard. I tried to stay calm while I was telling him to "come here", but he refused to listen to me again and I lost my temper when I finally caught him after he ignored the "drop it" command again and ate the plants a second time.

He got a whack on the snoot and was told what a bad dog he was, and then I dragged him into the house by the collar, yelled at him to get in his crate, and slammed the door shut after him. I also slammed my jacket down on top of the crate instead of putting it down nicely like I usually do. I know I scared him - he was panting pretty hard as if he was in panic mode and he laid down with his back facing the living room and refused to meet my eyes. Then he started squeaking and crying to be let out of the crate, so my husband took him outside because we though he needed to go to the bathroom, and damn him if he didn't make a beeline for those plants again. This time, my husband dragged him into the house with the leash and tried to shut him in the bathroom (didn't work because the leash was too thick to close in the door). He got put back in the crate until we were finished with dinner, and even after we calmed down and let him out, he kept a careful distance from us and was panting really hard.

This morning, he was very well behaved when I let him out and took him for a walk, but I almost dread going home because I have no idea what he might take it into his head to do when I get there. I have bruises all over my leash hand from him dragging me after the neighbor or assorted wildlife, and I have scratches all over my legs and stomach from him jumping on me the second I get within range of his lead. And all this bad behavior started last week when my husband went back to work and he was left alone for most of the day.

Anyone have any advice for an ashamed and frustrated doggie mom?? I can't let him keep disobeying me like he's doing because the bigger he gets, the more of a problem it's going to be...but I can't scare him into doing what I want either and I feel really bad today that I let him frustrate me to the point where I completely lost my temper and scared him.

Being that I'm still in training all day at work and that Homer is now getting subjected to being on his own in his crate all day since my husband started back at work, I am finding very little time to update in lj lately. Or, for that matter, to read lj lately. I still love you all and I'm thinking things should settle down and I should be back to my usual chatty self by the end of next week.

A lot of news has been happening on the Homer front lately. As I mentioned before, last week he "graduated" from puppy class. I have to give him a lot of credit because he was remarkably well behaved for the last session too. He only barked twice in the classroom and walked with us mostly nicely around the store. He also demonstrated that he completely owned his new "high five" trick...for a dog that is determined to lay claim to everything around him by slapping his paw down over it, it was a very easy trick to learn. The instructor gave him some puppy-friendly ice milk with dog biscuits stuck in it as a graduation treat, and we got a bag with puppy vitamins, a new tennis ball, a bandanna, and a small loofa toy, which we promptly removed and hid somewhere since it's small size would make it Homer-food if discovered.

Then, over the weekend, we took Homer to my parent's house for a second Easter dinner. It's the longest car ride we've subjected him to so far and he passed with flying colors. He was pretty funny going down the highway - his depth perception isn't fully developed yet so he kept ducking his head in the window whenever we went under a billboard or overhead road sign. But he spent most of the ride up either sitting or laying down in the backseat, which is a big switch for him. He was good at the house too...figured out exactly where he needed to ask to go potty and spent a lot of time in the backyard digging a hole in my parents' garden. I'm not sure my brother liked him all that much, but his fiancee loved him and I like her better anyway. :)

Now he's trying to cope with being left alone in his crate all day while we're at work, and that is not going over so well with him. My husband said he practically assaulted him when he came home early and let him out of the crate - spent ten minutes jumping on him and didn't even think about going outside to do his business until he was sure my husband was staying home for the time being. Then, when I came home, he was coming in from the backyard with my husband and when he saw me he started jumping around and squealing. He spent a lot of time trying to lay on me....laid his head across my feet while I was sitting on the couch and used his giant monster paw to try and pin my hand to the ground when I was sitting next to him on the floor and needed to get up and check on dinner. And then this morning, when I let him out of his crate to give him breakfast, he stuck to me like glue and I had a hard time getting around him to go wake up my husband and finish getting ready for work.

I'm hoping that he'll settle into his new routine in a week or two and life will get back to normal.

And now, as my co-worker has just arrived, it's off to do more training. Hopefully, tomorrow I can post a little more about the new job and other stuff going on in my life...although who am I kidding...Homer pretty much is my whole life. :)

Haven't been able to post here since I left the old job because I've been sitting with someone and training all day, but I had to jump on today and let everyone know that I am the proud parent of a puppy class graduate! I still think the teacher felt sorry for him, but she gave us Homer's "diploma" (it's hanging on our fridge) and invited us to come back for the intermediate class.

Will try and get to work early tomorrow so I can post a proper update, since much has happened. :)

First and foremost, I want to wish a very happy birthday to spirit0fstlouis, who I hope will forgive me for the birthday cake I "lobbed" at her at 5:30 AM. :)

I had company this weekend, so Saturday was spent getting the house in order. Our (yes, my husband did help) main project was to tackle the kitchen - it's the one room in the house that I put off cleaning the most because it's a major chore that's very time consuming. Luckily, it was nice and warm all day, so we shipped Homer off to the backyard, rolled up our sleeves, and got down to work. The counters got completely stripped of all the assorted accumulated crapola and I tackled them with bleach and Mr. Clean. I also managed to get the melted plastic off the counter ledge with a Brillo pad and some very hot water. I also scrubbed down all the cabinet faces and the face of the dishwasher while my husband chipped the baked on scut off the stovetop and scrubbed the face of the fridge. Then, before any of the accumulated crap was put back on the counters, it got a thorough scrubbing to remove dust and accumulated dirt. After lunch, I broke out the Swiffer and mopped the floor while the kitchen rugs were hanging in the yard to dry.

The rest of the house got its usual weekend going-over, which didn't take me all that long. I'm still not satisfied with the state of my office, especially since my husband has a sparkling clean and organized office as a result of being off for two months. I think I'm going to set myself a goal of tackling a piece of it at a time every weekend until the whole thing is done, starting with my overstuffed chair and working around to the door. It would really be nice to let Homer in and not worry about him getting into stuff that will make him sick if consumed.

On Sunday, a friend of mine who I haven't seen in months came over and spent most of the day. She went nuts over Homer...who also went nuts over her in a quiet way (we suspect his quietness was due to the fact that he had consumed a large quantity of vine branches the day before and was preparing to horf them up - which he did after she left). I wish I had thought to break out my camera to document the two of them together. At one point, she was on her back and he was stretched out on her like she was his personal body pillow. At another, he curled up between her legs on the floor and passed out...every time she shifted position to get herself more comfortable, he would shift right along with her and go back to sleep.

Aside from Homer, I treated her to a nice lunch and yummy drinks at Cheeseburger in Paradise and got her addicted to Guitar Hero. :)

This being my last week at my current job, I am still struggling to keep motivated and get my work done, although the work itself is starting to dwindle now. As is usually the case, I'm finding out just how appreciated I am by everyone except my direct boss as my last day gets closer. I got several really nice emails last week from people who said they were terribly sorry to see me go, and this morning a co-worker stopped by to give me an adorable mini scrapbook to put Homer pictures in...it's double sided so I can swap it around for maximum cuteness display. And the invites to lunches and stuff are pouring in...I'm going out for lunch today with some people who sit in my row, dinner tonight with some friends in the department, and lunch on Wednesday with the Marketing Services team. Even if my boss was inclined, which I'd be willing to bet my last paycheck that he isn't, to take me out, I may be booked solid for the week by the end of the day.

I am finding it very difficult to concentrate on work and getting stuff accomplished since turning in my resignation last Friday. This is to be expected, I suppose, but I feel vaguely guilty that I am spending more time looking at the news on Yahoo and wishing I could finish another chapter in the book I am currently reading than I am spending on actual work. There's a lot of it to do for a change, since my soon-to-be-ex company is gearing up for quarter close, and I can't just drop the ball and leave a mess for someone else to sort through after I'm gone - it wouldn't be fair.

I spent most of Friday going around with knots in my stomach, since I had a hard time catching up with my boss. The FedEx with my offer letter from the new company arrived at my house around 10, so as soon as my husband called to tell me it was there, I started typing up my formal resignation letter. It's hard to know what to say in those things - you don't want to write a book but what I settled for seemed way too choppy and impersonal. I had a brief moment of panic when a co-worker told me there was a chance that I'd be asked to leave immediately after handing in my letter so I started to clean out all my personal emails - sending stuff I wanted to save to my hotmail address and deleting just about everything else.

Finally, I flagged down my boss in the middle of the afternoon and gave him the letter. He took it pretty well - I think he was surprised but he didn't act like he was upset. He did grill me pretty hard as to why I did it - didn't accept my "professional" response that I got a better opportunity at a smaller company. I ended up telling him that I was concerned about my lack of career path, and that I was extremely frustrated by repeatedly asking him for more work and/or more challenging work to do and not having anything come of it.

The hardest part was telling my accounting "boss" the news. She was in Chicago all last week, and since I was concerned about her finding out from anyone other than me and since I didn't want her to be the last to know, I ended up telling her in an email. I actually think she's upset with me - she gave me the standard line about how she's always felt that you have to look out for yourself and do what you have to do when it comes to your career, she also said that she didn't have me pegged as the first person to leave this year and got very quiet after that. I still haven't actually seen her this week and I'm wondering if she's going to talk to me today or not.

I also got a lot of lovely compliments from the marketing people - all of them said they're very sorry to be losing me and that I was a pleasure to work with.

I've also been slowly cleaning out my cube since I brought in so much stuff of a personal nature in the time I've been here. Two boxes of "desk toys" have already gone home, all the posters and framed pictures are gone, and today all the Christmas stuff will make the trip back to PA. I'll wait until next week before I take out my emergency lunch items and my plant.

Weekend turned out to be a complete bust because of the rain on Saturday - the only thing of note that I did was get my dog mad at me. He had another horfing incident on Saturday so I cut him off his kibble and fed him six small meals of boiled chicken and rice on Sunday. That helped with the horfing (two horf-free days and counting) but rice binds a dog, and every time I took him out he would try to go and give me a reproachful look when he couldn't. He was also displeased with the smaller quantity of food he was given and took a greater than usual interest in our dinner plates Sunday night. I tried giving him a small amount of kibble yesterday with the rice and chicken, and will try a little more today if he remains horf-free. Tonight he has puppy class so I'll have to make sure he's good and fed before then or he'll be a worse terror than usual.

Back to convincing myself that I need to get some work done...

I just uploaded a bunch more pictures so I thought I'd post the link again for any and all who are interested!!

http://www.flickr.com/gp/33232604@N00/rLS05Z

Apparently, smiley faces do have some import when they come on official job-related emails after all!!

Anyone else wanna join me in the unmitigated glee about the timing on this one being that we are so close to quarter end close? I am basking in imagined expressions of shock and horror!

:)

Ganked from athaena

15 Movie Quotes

The rules:

1. Pick 15 of your favorite movies.
2. Go to IMDb and find a quote from each movie.
3. Post them here for everyone to guess.
4. Fill in the film title once it's guessed.
5. NO GOOGLING/using IMDb search functions. Totally cheating, you dirty cheaters.

( My quotes )

I will also post a disclaimer that these are the first 15 of my favorite movies that came to mind and they are not necessarily in order.