Confession: I was mean yesterday

I should confess something.  I was in such a bad mood yesterday and so full of evil feelings towards my neighbors that I did something, or well refused to do something and I need to get it off my chest before I continue with my day.  Because the minute I realized I truly DO NOT love my neighbor as myself and I'm acting like it, I felt a little bad.  But just a little-hey I said I was a Christian but I never said I was perfect.  As I mentioned last post my neighbors keep me awake just about every weekend with their loud parties and it's not seldom that I wake up to find beer cans and cigarettes on my porch.  No need to mention the beautiful throw up I found on our common stairway the morning after our "discussion" on Friday night wherein one of her "guests" got smartassed with me.  I really should just tell you guys everything but I'm just so disgusted over the whole thing that I don't want to poison my blog with it.  I really do want to tell  but time needs to pass so that I can laugh at it instead of wrath over it, which is what I've been doing.  I had some other things on my mind yesterday that contributed to my bad mood as well but anyway, back to what I wanted to confess:  Yesterday at around lunch time, there was knock on my door and when I opened it there stood a flower deliveryman.  I knew it was for my neighbor and he asked if he could leave it with me.  I told him I didn't feel comfortable accepting their deliveries and I was probably pretty terse with him.  (oops it's not his fault)  The minute I closed the door I knew how petty I was being.  But that's just how disgusted over the whole thing I am. I don't want anything to do with them right now.  I don't want to accept their deliveries and I don't want to knock on their door with a fake smile and a vase of flowers. For just a couple days I just want to pretend that they don't exist.   It probably would have been a good opportunity to make peace, even though there really is no negative energy between us that I can feel.  It's really just my negative energy towards them. She at least had the decency to act apologetic, I'll give her that.   But like that Dixie Chick song, I'm still "not ready to make nice."  Eventually I will.  I still do wave to them when we see each other in our small parking lot so it's not like I'm zapping eye-lasers (as I've been known to do) or flipping them off everyday.  I just want to not have anything more to do with them for right now.  It's Memorial day weekend and I'm already anticipating another Frat party, thus my anxiety over the whole situation. Anyway yeah, so I was mean yesterday.  I used to post confessions on Tuesdays and then somehow forgot about it, I guess I should do this more often.

 I wanted this post to be a list of things that cheer me up, since I am in a happier mood today but I think I'll do it later.

Pet Peeves

I didn't sleep last night so I'm not in the best of moods today.  So today's posts are list of a few things I loathe.

-Animal print and Pointy toed shoes.  yeah yeah I've posted this before but the repetition should be a sign of my loathing.  No offense to all you folks who love them.  I just think animal print either ages a woman or makes her look desperate if it's not done right.  And I don't have enough time on the Earth left to list all the reasons why I hate pointy toed shoes.

-Finding plastic on the beach but I've already told you guys about that.

-When people pronounce Florida as if it's spelled "Flahr-duh."  I'm not sure why but it just drives me insane.

-When people make comments about how wild my dog is.  Stuff like, " You should train him."  No you should just not come over to my house, he lives here-you don't.

-When sales people try to help me.  I know this sounds odd, we all need help when we shop don't we?  I'm not talking about opening the fitting room door for me and getting the correct size.  I'm talking about the ones who know I'm going to buy stuff, so they try to maximize by making suggestions. For example, MrPea recently bought me a new pair of sunglasses for our anniversary and I was in the store trying a bunch on and the saleslady kept trying to make me try on a bunch of stuff that I hated because we have different taste.  She's just being helpful but I don't trust other people's tastes because I hate trendy things.  I always have to tell them to stop because I will automatically hate anything they show me.


-My neighbor(s).  They seem like nice people, but they are the loudest mf's I have ever had the misfortune to live next to.  I had to go over there(as non-confrontational as I am) last Friday night because she was having a loud party and there were people hanging out on my porch smoking and drinking.  I decided to forgive her because she was really apologetic until the next morning when I woke up to find PUKE on the common stairway. Yeah.  She's in the I hate you club. I'll have to post this story one day when I'm feeling more humorous over it.

-People who scoff when I complain about the cold in the winter.  Usually it's because said person comes from a colder climate and thinks no one else has the right to be cold because it's colder somewhere else.  It's not the Olympics of who has a worse winter it's just me saying I'm cold.




-Sorry New Yorkers but I might piss some of you off because I have to say this:  when people from New York move here(cuz you all know they end up in Florida one day) and every conversation starts or ends with,"Well, in New York it's done this way" or "That doesn't happen in New York,"  Or  "If this was New York...", or "I've never seen anything like this in New York"   Etc. It's always said in that nose turned up tone that they think we Floridians don't understand.  Not everyone does this but the ones who do have no idea how rude this is in any region.  We get it ok?!  You guys love New York!  New York is your standard.  But guess what, there are some of who don't give a flying f*ck how the perfect people in the perfect city of New York or Cairo or Timbuktu or anywhere else do everything better than everyone else.  If it's all so wonderful there, why are so many people moving here where everything is so awful and we Southerners are so slow and stupid?  exactly.  I promise you, I love Florida and I love Hawaii. I could live and die in either of these places, never see New York or any major city and have no regrets over it.   But I don't go around telling everyone how everyone else in Florida and Hawaii "do" everything.   Because I was raised to be polite.  This doesn't mean I don't heart NY, I heart NY very much, I just think it's obnoxious behavior. No one else does this in my experience.  I've met people who move here from all parts of the country and not one has started out a conversation with me by saying, "I'm from Vermont so naturally I'm not used to seeing all the blah blah blah that you guys here must be used to"  or "Oh well, in Arkansas we don't let our kids blah blah blah because we have higher standards than you all"


yeah I'm in a bad mood.  I was confronted with this last night for the billionth time.


 For the record my loud, rude, trashy neighbor is from Tennessee.  So my wrath today is evenly spread around.  Feel free to disagree and  add your own pet peeves.  It might make me feel better.

Stuff I do while I convalesce

I've been reading some.  After reading "East of Eden," by John Steinbeck for a book club, I decided to skip the next book that was chosen because it was too "non-fictiony" for me right now. Not that I don't like non-fiction, mind you. I just wasn't in the mood for this one and the kind of divisive conversations the last book we read like this brought out. Someone suggested I might like this one("The Passion of Mary Magdalene" by Elizabeth Cunningham) so I'm about half way into it.  I can't really call it great literature but it's a decent story.  If you got all hot and offended by Dan Brown's "The Da Vinci Code" then I would tell you to steer clear of it.  Actually the exCatholic in me is a little squeamish myself.  But I read the Da Vinci Code, it gave me a lot to think about as I have an  open mind but things are put in the "fiction" section for a reason so there's no reason in my opinion to get all 'fire and brimstone' over a book.  If one has a strong faith what is there to freak out about?  Fear?  My faith urges me to question but I won;t get into that here as this book is not the sort of book that would conjure up a discussion about faith.  It's just a story.  It's not very well written I don't think.  But it's an easy read and after the past couple weeks I've had, I needed an easy read.  If you think I'm a heathen for reading it then you need to look under your own beds for the boogieman......


Oh I watched the "Lost" series finale.  Yeah I was "one of those."  Give or take a few episodes because I didn't have a DVR back then, I've been watching since the pilot.  I love "Lost."  It was a bit of a kiddie rollercoaster the past couple seasons.  I say kiddie rollercoaster because I don't want you to think it was all that emotional for me, even when I was irritated with the characters/writing, I still loved the show.  I was just always left thinking,"What???!! Oh what the hell now??!" And it started to get on my nerves.  I could even be caught telling my sister how ridiculous things were getting.  I was actually thinking it was a good idea to end it because of how ridiculous it was getting.  Because I was expecting all the i's to be dotted and all the t's crossed so I looked forward to some answers finally dammit!  And I didn't get any answers.  But I may be the only one who really liked the final show.  Because I don't care about the "answers" I cared about the characters.  And this show gave me closure.  Does that make sense?  The only other series finale that did that for me was "Six Feet Under."  Remember that show?  Best finale ever in my opinion.  So I can honestly say that I loved the "Lost"  finale. I truly did.    It took me a few hours to realize that I loved it though.  I still hate the "Soprano's" ending I don't care what anyone says.   Anyway, yeah.  "Lost" is over we can all go back to our lives....


I've also been working on this drawing.  Two happy kool aid colored hibiscus flowers I happened upon while laying by the pool last year.  I took a photo thus resulting in a color pencil drawing.

I took this with my cell so excuse the bad lighting but as of this post I have one petal left to do before filling in the leaves and background.  If you look closely, you'll see that I wasn't able to erase my pencil outline.  My eraser sucks.  I'm trying to get a "collection" together so that I can start showing and maybe selling(although that would be hard, I have a hard time parting with my work) some of my stuff.  It's just a thought, I'll keep you guys posted on how that turns out.

Also even though I've been living like an indoor cat again I have been making a point to walk to the beach as much as I can when the day heat starts to subside and the sea breeze  actually feels like a sea breeze.  I took a couple pictures with my cell because the clouds rising were so pretty and I've been depressed about that effing oil spill.  I pray for Louisiana and the Gulf Coast to get through this as quickly as possible.  And I beg that this doesn't happen to my beloved beach.  I won't know what to do with myself if this beautiful picture turns into an ocean of greasy brownblack sludge and dead animals.  NO I do know what I would do.  I would put some boots on and help clean, broken heart and all.  But I'm praying for the protection of this place, I really am.  Look at it, how could I not?

Looks like someone had a good time on their vacation!

I live near a really expensive, fancy hotel and country club so naturally I encounter a lot of "weirdness" as tourists and country club people tend to be.  I was walking Peanut on the beach this week and came upon this wonderful evidence.....A towel and an empty condom wrapper. Not quite sure if this couple realized they were doing it right in front of a row of townhouses.   Fun.

At least they had safe sex.

Sick Pea again, not to worry though. Pea will be ok

I don't like complaining about being sick and I'm just about to so I posted a picture of this washed up dead tree I took with my cell phone this past winter. That way anyone who doesn't want to hear about my being sick can still enjoy a pretty picture and then skip the rest.   I wish I had taken more to use for a drawing but I didn't know it was to be removed. Anyway, enjoy.  Isn't the winter sky just beautiful?  And the cold ocean so blue?  Ok now skip the rest if you're as bored as I am from all my health issues.  Go on, I won't be hurt.....don't be shy with a comment though.

So here we are again.  I have tonsillitis.  My doctor has me on penicillin and a mild steroid 4 times a day and told me to give myself and my  throat a rest. Talk only when necessary and no yelling for a few days.  I thought, "ummm Yeah. ok.  Easy as pie doc."  No talking and no yelling.  He must not know any Filipino women.  First thing I did when I got out of that office was call my best friend and then my sister.  After I got off the phone Mr.Pea said to me in his smartass voice, "I thought you weren't supposed to talk a lot?"  I said, "I know but I had to get it out of my system." Truth is I really don't like talking on the phone but I love my sister and my bff and they live so effing far away from me.  So today begins the silence............so far so good.  I think.


I'm also supposed to stay out of the sun because of the antibiotic and he said not to do too much physical activity until at least 48 hours after my last dose. I need more rest and I have to stay away from spicy & salty  foods and citrus.  Ok I can deal with the no talking.  I can even deal with the no yelling(I hope). I can ween myself off salt and I don't drink juice anyway.  But no beach and no jogging?  WTF!? There's a conspiracy against me I know it.   He's right though. Normally I take really good care of myself.  I mean I was sick for over a month this winter but everyone in Northern Florida was sick.  It was the worst winter I've ever seen in Florida and then pollen season snuck up on us all and tried to do us in.  But other than that I really do live a healthy lifestyle.  I jog 2-3 miles at least 3-4 times a week.  I have a healthy diet, I don't have to do manual labor and I don't have a lot of stress. For a girl my size, I'm pretty strong.  I don't get worn out that easily.  What's funny is that it wasn't physical activity that exhausted me, a person did.  I let a negative energy in my life and it exhausted me and distracted me from the most important thing to me which is my health.  And being exhausted effed up my immunity.

 I wish I could go into more detail about those "incidents" I was bitching about a week and a half ago.  But there's so many little tedious details that happened over a long period of time and I didn't start this blog for that kind of gossip or to complain endlessly about my health. But I was really forced into reevaluating and then redefining all the relationships in my life.  And I have only myself to blame, I'm the one who who wasn't taking care of myself  so I hold no negative feelings against this person.  BUT When I found out I had cancer, I had surgery to cut it out.  We should all be able to do the same with all that other stuff.  When there's something negative in your life, CUT IT OUT.  Or you'll end up with infected tonsils like me.  Stuck inside on a beautiful day.  No jogging so you'll feel crappy about your body.  No salt, so all your food will taste like crap. Not talking and no yelling so you can't yell at your husband(oh actually I guess that's a good thing oooh but that's so hard) or talk to your sister.  Take my advice peeps.  If there's anything or anyone in your life causing you stress, wearing you out, sucking your energy--- you can't get rid of it fast enough my friends......

At least with the no talking means I'll have to blog more.

Dead things and Shark teeth *warning* this post is not for the faint of heart

This weekend was wonderful.....I spent most of it at the beach.  I encountered a few little dead friends.  Of course for the sake of this blog and for myself I took photos.








DEAD JELLYFISH.  I'm not exactly sure what species this is, I'll look it up later but since I seem to collect pictures of dead jellyfish I couldn't break with tradition.

I tried in vain to help this funny looking bug out but he must have had a lot of salt water in his little brain because he kept crawling towards the water and unfortunately died.  Rest in Peace little buddy.

I found this crab shell and thought the color and design was rather pretty.

It even matched my nail polish but that's not why I included my finger.  I wanted to remember how small it was so I could look it up in my field guide later.  I was too lazy to do it before writing this post so you'll have to just go on with your life not knowing.

This dead sea turtle just broke my heart.  The spray paint on it indicates that the Florida Fish and Wildlife had been alerted and that they "investigated".  They were probably alerted by the local sea turtle patrol, an organization I love with all my heart.  I adore sea turtles.  There's just something magical about them so seeing this dead one really bothered me.  I stood there for along time just hoping that this poor beautiful animal died of old age and not from eating plastic.

And last but not least I came upon this baby Hammerhead shark.  Well actually I made friends with some random dogs who found it.  What a beauty!  Mr.Pea was nice enough to pick it up and examine it for me so that I could take pictures.  

We made sure it was actually dead, mind you, before I started taking pictures.  Otherwise he would have put it back into the water.  I would never harass an animal for my own photographic library.  I don't believe in that.

But look how beautiful it was.  I wish it had grown into an adult shark and had a thousand babies.  I really do.

We couldn't figure out how it died.  It didn't have any marks of attack on it.  I think it ate something toxic.  LIKE PLASTIC OR TOXINS THAT PEOPLE POLLUTE THE OCEAN WITH BUT DON'T GET ME STARTED....
Hopefully this little shark became food for some other animal.  Oh shark, I'm sorry your life ended so soon.  Too soon for me to find all your missing teeth.  But.....

... of course no day at the beach is complete for me without at least a few shark teeth.

Now do ya'll understand that I am absolutely afraid of sharks?  I love them, but, I try not to venture into their home for longer than I have to.


*BTW I'm still tweaking things over here so bear with all my changes for a few more days until I can get everything the way I like it.

Goodbye Dear BlogFriend

I just found out about the loss of one of my very first BlogFriends.  Chani, our Thailand Gal from Finding My Way Home passed away a while back ago and I had no idea until HeartinSanFrancisco was nice enough to let me know after I had left a comment for Chani without reading through everyone else's.  As I mentioned, Chani was one of my very first BlogFriends back when I started LittlePea and sent me encouraging emails and comments about writing and posting that I now regret not saving.  I looked up to Chani's blog a lot because she had the ability to write with such vulnerability.  Her writing about her flaws, ups and downs, her utter "humanness"   took a lot of courage that I wish I had. She also sent me a lot of messages when I was sick and book suggestions for me to keep me occupied during my convalescence which, considering we had never met in person, were a perfect fit for my reading tastes. I am sure her talents were myriad, most of them unknown to us, but her blog posts were absolutely phenomenal and always had a way of hitting one on the head with a new way of thinking or perhaps some thought provoking insight that were always so damn spot on.  I know that she grew up in Los Angeles, loved Simon and Garfunkel, loved to walk in the fog every morning, had a little dog companion named Shanti and was just on the verge of a fresh start in a new apartment.  Her spirit had other plans and she died of a heart attack before she could physically start over but I truly believe with all my heart that she found her way back to her heart's home which is Thailand.  She was loved there as well as here on the internets.  Chani,  Bon Voyage and we'll miss you.  But I'm glad you went home......

About Me! Me! Me! Me!

I am:

-33 years old, born July 21, 1976. Made a promise to myself never to  lie about my age. At this point it's too early for it anyway but I will hold true to that promise.

-half Filipina and half West Virginian, residing in Florida!  So that makes me both an island and country girl. It's all Yin and Yang, I long for the country but can't tear myself away from the ocean. If this is the worst of my problems, don't feel sorry for me. BUT if I hear that song by John Denver about West Virginia, it never fails, I will start crying.  I really will.

-madly in love with a tall, dark and handsome French Canadian surfer. We've been married 13 years.  I'm pretty sure most people think we're obnoxiously attached at the hip but hey, like I care.

-also madly in love with a 21 pound British Jack Russel Terrier from New Orleans. He's 12 but he's still got it.  He's also the bossiest, sneakiest,  little dog I've ever known.

-a collector of shoes.  Oh you wanna tell some Imelda Marcos jokes?  Yeah I've heard them all and it's not funny.

-an expert finding shark teeth.  Proof to come.

-scared to death of sharks since I am constantly finding their teeth.  'nuff said.

-a flaming Liberal.  Unapologetic about it to boot.  BUT Conservative is not a bad word in my house either.  I'm Blue in a Red state, what can I say?

-a Bible reading Christian.  Not a "Bible thumping"one.  Not a "Bible shoving in your face" one.  A Bible reading one.  Spirituality is very important to me but's also very personal to me.  I don't feel the need to go around proselytizing in everyone's face, in fact I believe that does more harm than good. People need to feel free to pursue(or not) their own beliefs without others screaming in their faces and so do I.  If that sounds judgmental then I guess I'm also judgmental. oops. Again no apologies.

-an artiste.  I paint. I draw. I sculpt. When I can figure out how to copyright my stuff, I'll post a few things.

-the youngest of 4 siblings.  This probably means I have "baby of the family issues".  Probably. Ok I do.

-a military brat.  I am the daughter and granddaughter of Navy veterans.  Grew up on base. So this means I have never said, "Hiya Sailor! Buy me a drink?" Because that would feel creepy.

-Bilingual.  Sort of.  I took two years of French in high school, married a man who's first language is French and who's family speaks no English so I've had plenty of practice.  Let's just put it this way, I could live in a French speaking country and be just fine but people would think I had really bad grammar.  But I have that in English too, anyway.

- 4'11" and happy about it.  Did I mention that?  You guys already knew but I had to say it.


-an avid reader and member of a really good Book Club.  We just finished a book by Steinbeck as of this blogpost date and it utterly broke my heart. In a good way.  But Steinbeck does that, doesn't he?

-fiercely loyal when it comes to those I love.  I might be small but dammit fear me if I find out someone I care about has been hurt in some way.

-a total dork in social situations.  But ask me if I care.  Well ok, I do sometimes.

-a total geek when it comes to certain things.  Like shark teeth, for example.  More topics to geek out to on the way.

-not someone who buys into Hollywood or Madison Ave's idea of beauty. A healthy, rosy cheeked person who is genuinely happy is way more beautiful than those FemmeBots they keep shoving down all our throats. I can find just as many beautiful people walking around my neighborhood as I see on tv.

-lazy about checking my spelling and as mentioned in my  intro  use bad grammar. oh well.

-Finally comfortable putting myself first once in a while.  Took me 30 years and getting sick to figure that out.

-cancer free as of last year.  Thyroid cancer for anyone new. blah blah blah People here are probably sick of hearing about it and so am I so I'll leave it that.  It's over, Thank God and I've moved on.

First Post! First Post!

I wish I had something really profound to say but I don't.  Well actually no I do have something to say!  I just want to thank all my readers and lurkers for not abandoning me and sending all those "are you ok?s" to me last couple months when I was in cold and flu misery.  So there you go Thank You dear friends!  But yeah, hey it's my first post yay.  On my new blog yay! So ok, here I am. I guess I should do one of those"About Me" posts everyone does that, for some reason, I never did when I started my old blog.  Yeah.  That would be a good idea even though everyone already knows all that anyway.  Still though, for the sake of a fresh start, it would be more for me than for you guys so just skip that post if you're not in the mood for it-it won't hurt my feelings, honestly. I didn't realize how much 'stuff' was involved in getting a new thing going here.  Like all the stuff that needed to be filled out, saved, entered, clicked on.  And I'm still not finished but ok.  Well, here we go again :o)  Oh Blogospheres, how I've missed you.