Tickle me Tuesday...

Back on track with the Tickle me Tuesday. Be sure to check out other great Tickle me Tuesday blog on Moving at the Speed of Life.



On a photographer blog lately I found this one. I am just wondering how in the world that happened... I am sure they are both in for a surprise ;-)



The new Narnia is coming out soon. I must admit I haven't really been following along with the story and what is going on. But hey looks like they are trying to get a hold of a new audience crowd by mixing Narnia with Star wars ;-) Looks like someone turned into a cyclops...



Have a great Tuesday and have fun with the other Tickle me Tuesdays...

how are you selling your teenager???

I know it's all about the show and creating a little talk on the town is good for revenue. Lots of Hollywood people are using that and plenty of hopeful actors, singers etc. have faced quite a lot of different things.

I don't know why but I am thinking Lindsay Lohan, Britney Spears, Olsen twins and well it's a loooong line of well the I should have been doing sooo good but something happened.

No matter what what kids see on tv is what they want to do and well look like their idol. However these days it's a little bit disturbing to see how the idols act and many times supported by their parents.

Take Disney as an example and the most talked about show at the moment Hannah Montana. This is a show for kids and the main "star" is all of what 15 years old.
Now thinking about a 15 year old I kind of have certain expectations as to how a 15 year old is or well should be.

Man... either that family is totally out of whack with the parents support or my thinking of how a 15 year old should be is extremely old.

In an upcoming Vanity fair Bruce Handy has an article about Miley. This goes into how her favorite show is sex and the city and that she has the highest-grossing release on a super bowl weekend ($31.1 million) and the highest per screen average ($45,561) despite the artificial inflated price of $15 per ticket to the movie theater.

Anyway no article without pictures right... and with the talented Annie Leibovitz (really she is) what can go wrong??? With parents on the set doesn't the photo below just seem natural for a 15 year old???



Not only was the parents on the set good ole dad was in the shoot as well and going through the slide show we are even getting a glimpse of the next Cyrus. 8 year old Noah... You can see the slide show here or well as long as it is available.

So Billy Ray Cyrus had a hit in the 80's and well after that it was all down hill. Now what do you do to ensure you get back in the spot light? well I guess he figured there was a few daughters around and they should be able to be sold of... or what...

Granted having millions would be nice. But when seeing how other kids have been growing up and well not turned out too good....

Maybe it's just me but you sure won't find me in line to buy tickets anytime soon.
Is this normal? how does the average parent feel about supporting (big time) parents selling off their kids like that?

Update update on spring time post

Sooo I had barely posted the one on spring time and the ohhh so nice weather with great temperatures (just over 80f or so) and well... guess what...



yep... it started raining. It was kind of weird and well something to suspect in the spring time after a couple of days of warm weather. But for one thing it was coming from the "wrong" direction. Usually due to the mountains and all we don't get rain or snow from the west...



This one came in fast and with plenty of wind and rain. We had all the windows open and in no time the rain was pouring in windows and on to floors everywhere since the wind forced it almost sideways.
But we got a little free water in the tub (might be a bit cold though) and some wet carpets around the house...
In front of the neighbors house there was a small lake so hope he doesn't have to go anywhere or well had to.


ohh did I forget to mention the hail... yep the photos above is from the front steps and the little white spots are not dust on the lens but hail coming down.
This is to me a little weird. High temperatures as in well the last thing you would think of is a hail storm and yet... there it is...

Funny how things can change fast...

spring time... or is it summer already?

Finally weekend and despite the weather forcast it's not raining :-) yeah...

Of course this meant that I had to do the lawn. Getting ready to go outside I spotted a few birds acting weird and was wondering what in the world is going on out there. Here are a few shots of them. They had a little snack...



After getting the lawn done and everything else so it was time to sit for a few minutes I went outside and now I had a visitor. It has been coming around for a while and well if you know about them they can be quite nosy and get up close to check you out.



So what does my dear mother in-law think about our nice deck out back and the visitor we are getting... well judge for yourself ;-)



As the grown ups are just boring and sitting around doing nothing at all. Emma proclaims "that's it, I am going down there" and runs off to find her sandals.
But hey she likes playing around in the backyard.



However much fun it is playing baseball in the backyard interruptions come all the time. As with this one... Ooops there's a flower...



Meanwhile the nosy little bee sticks around. I guess after a while one can get use to them. They don't really do much anyway and are kind of fun.



That's it... just a little update from a sunny saturday :-)

Anniversary, shopping and dining

Soo with a slight delay we went out for our anniversary dinner and a little shopping while being out anyway :-)
For once I actually not only remembered our anniversary but also made dinner plans :-) and reserved a table... (yeah me :-) )...

The shopping would be at Tysons galleria which is a very nice place with a good experience. Not too many people and less of a Turkish bazar feeling when strolling around.
Even though we did try very hard we only managed to find one pair of shoes (for Jacki) at Macy's. However hectic it was I must say that sales guy was polite and very helpful. But hey buying Guess shoes you kind of pay for it. But only one pair...
After a couple of hours of browsing around we went to the corner bakery for a cup of coffee and sit outside to enjoy the good weather. It was a little windy but it is so nice being able to sit outside and actually enjoy it. And this time without the "hey mom", "hey day" every two seconds.

One thing though is the Neiman Marcus shopping experience... Sure we don't really shop there every day or well every month for that matter. So I guess it's a little special. However this was surprisingly closer to a Turkish bazaar when entering the front of the store where all the makeup is located. Several small sales island with the different brands and at each there is 4-5 sales associates (using the term very lightly) standing at the corner chatting about this and that.
Walking through there was two of the areas where someone actually took time out of their busy conversation to actually notice potential customers.
I know we don't walk around looking like we fling money left and right... and well we don't but can still afford luxury here and there if we want to. It is however our anniversary soo you know a little special thing is ok.
But we end up at a Dior island with items Jacki has been reading about for 3-4 years. I don't know much about makeup so you know I take Jacki's word for it being good and if that is special to her. Well she gets it (within the hitting the poverty line of course).
Compared to the sales person at Macy's this woman was... well let's say not my type... You have to buy this and you gotta buy that... hmm... yeah...
But Jacki picks out a nice lipstick and the woman calls over another woman to "process" the purchase (no cash registers around). As soon as the "processing" person gets the item in hand she starts questioning "how do you plan to pay for this...".
Ok... now it's not like a Turkish bazaar anymore. More like buying something out of a trunk in a dark alley. And I am thinking is this normal Neiman Marcus operations... hmm.
But well I got my good trusty Navy federal visa card. But guess what. All I get is a frown and "we don't take Visa..." quickly followed by "How about cash... do you have cash???".
At this point I am thinking Neiman marcus or not... I am not buying anything in a store that overcharge for everything, treat people bad and then not taking a visa card... Soo much for the Neiman marcus shopping experience...
If you plan to purchase something special for your loved one I highly recommend avoiding Neiman marcus like the plague and go see Macy's. You will be so happy you did :-)

ok that was my little rant about Neiman marcus which could be summed up in don't go there... ever!!!

As for dining we went to the steak house at Ritz-carlton. As bad as Neiman marcus is for shopping the Ritz is good for dining.
Your personal service couldn't be better. I lost count of how many people were there to ensure we had a good experience but we sure did. Never missed anything and were treated extremely good.
The steaks we got couldn't be any better. Cooked perfectly as ordered and well it may be out of the normal but we had the fries (hand cut) with our meal. They sure know how to cut and prepare fries too :-)
Mentioning Ritz-Carlton I know it sounds expensive but consider that we had some nice gifts from the in-laws paying a good chunk of the bill and this is a once a year event soo it's not really too bad. All in all it didn't cost us much more than we would have spend somewhere else. Only thing is that the atmosphere, live piano music and the perfect service makes it all worth it. So as much as I would recommend staying clear of Neiman marcus I will recommend going to the Ritz-Carlton. For afternoon tea, dinner or over night stay to get a little spoiled. It is worth every penny. These days you have to search a lot to find people treating you as good as the staff of Ritz-Carlton.

ohh and btw. if you missed it... Do NOT shop at Neiman Marcus

Tickle me Tuesday

Ok let's try with some fun but yet ohhh so cute photos.
What can be cuter than animals and in particular baby animals. Even though sometimes they can be a little bit confused.

Take these porcupines as an example... Looking for mom...


And well as many wise words I think I can come up with these are just.... cute?








Have a great Tuesday and don't forget to drop by and check out more Tickle Me Tuesday fun at Moving at the Speed of Life.

warning... may make you think

Not really a tickle me Tuesday (it's further down the page) but kind of makes you think.

This photo won the photographer a Gold Addy award (congrats) and you can find the original posting here.

The photographer is GIULIO SCIORIO and you can find his blog here: http://www.ipimpart.com and his web page here: http://www.GiulioSciorio.com.

Anyway check this out:

Talk with your kids about making healthy choices


ps. be sure to visit his website/blog if you like it

Check out the new sections

Hey while you are here...

Check out the new sections. If you haven't noticed the photoshop tutorials have moved to the photoshop section :-) Should be easier to navigate.

Tickle me Tuesday

Just a few to get you going on a Tuesday.

As Jacki had a little thing about the difference in the male and female language (here) let's start with one where well only guys would do this... but hey... Man of many talents ;-)



If the above was a "wow" experience this will be your "ewww" experience. However if the above was a "how can someone be soo stupid" experience this could be your "soo cute" experience. But somehow I don't think I will want to go there...



And no matter who you are this should leave you with a nice feeling. How can that not be cute :-)



Have a great Tuesday and don't forget to drop by and check out more Tickle Me Tuesday fun at Moving at the Speed of Life.