Hope4Peyton

I like to have fun!

And every now and then, my inner 20 year old comes popping out and rears her ugly head and then the 34 year old has to beat her into submission only to find out there’s a hot mess of a video posted on the interwebs, people! GAH!!  Oh, but if you like to see people behaving stupidly? Score. (Anyone who is offended easily, don’t watch it!  Mom, that mean YOU.) Everyone else? Have a good laugh at my expense.

I got the chance to go Ybor City in downtown Tampa for an overnight romp with two of my favorite bloggy friends and a new favorite bloggy friend. Shash, Izzy, Karl and I hit the town.  We hit it hard.

Unfortunately, it hits back sometimes.

Let me just start by saying: My camera AND my phone both made it home from this blogger adventure whole and intact and water-free. YEAH! The outing is considered a success.  *Which, Canon, Nikon, and IPhone, if you’d like to sponsor our next outing, we can make sure to NOT break any more of your fine fine products!*

I really thought that seeing Twilight for the second time with flat-out snarky friends who would rub their snarky all over the movie would make it more bearable.  EPIC fail. But you all know how I feel about that, so I won’t go into it again.  Still. So bad. We went to a theatre with a full bar…there was rum involved in our viewing pleasure and it still did not improve the film quality.  I will say that sitting with folks who will giggle and gag their way through the movie with you does make it bearable.

After the movie, we went to drown our dissatisfaction. Mission accomplished.  We had a BLAST!  I’m going to be in Chicago with these fine folks come July, Illinois may never be the same.

Karl can karoake like no one’s business…the man nailed “Come on, Eileen” American Idols style…and I mean good American Idol’s style, not the hideous gag reel stuff.  He was kind enough to duet with me on a little “Paradise By The Dashboard Lights”…that one was for you, Heather!

I love to spend time with people who make me laugh, and these friends definitely DO!

I also love to hang with folks who get the blogging thing which lots of people don’t and that’s pretty dang cool too.

I can haz very cool friends? Yes I can!

If you haven’t seen Twilight yet and plan to, you need to not read this post.

If you really loved the movie you need to not read this post.

If you have no idea what I’m talking about, you need to just move on and not even bother reading this post.

If this is Robert Pattinson and you dig older chicks, call me!

RAWR

Ok, seriously, if you are against spoilers TURN.BACK.NOW.

I flew through these books with a speed and dedication that is nearly embarrassing.  I haven’t been so enamored of a supernatural character since Angel and I guess that totally tells of my ridiculous infatuation with the romance of vampire characters…especially tortured ones who fall in love with the wrong person and use it to become totally self-flagellating.

The Twilight series was never going to be great literature…it wasn’t terribly well written and it wasn’t the greatest character development or dialogue ever put to paper (listen to me pretending to be a book critic, but SERIOUSLY?) so I wasn’t expecting Shawshank Redemption or anything.

Ok.

The movie.

If Melissa Rosenberg (screenwriter for Twilight) got together and wrote a movie with George Lucas they could probably write the highest-grossing, crapball of a love story ever to induce retching in the masses.

Lines that read cheesy in the book but were doable because you could imagine it in a particular inflection or tone came out whiny and thoroughly desperate when spoken aloud. GAG!

Book = Bella falls in love with the entire Cullen family, they adopt her as one of their own and they become this place of complete acceptance for her.

Movie = The Cullen family is practically mute, they just stand around glaring a LOT and looking expensive…Jasper’s constant expression looks scarily like Edward Scissorhands was just told he’s getting a prostrate exam and Esme, instead of being this soothing mother-figure, has apparently overdosed on Martha Stewart.

Book = The Cullen family is supposed to be gorgeous beyond all belief, freakishly good looking to the point of almost painful to look at.  Their skin in sunlight is supposed to shimmer like diamonds.  Rosalie is the epitome of beauty, a blond to drive all other blonds to drink bottles of peroxide.

Movie = They’re ok.  Here’s the thing.  They obviously didn’t cast the movie based on acting ability, so they could have AT LEAST gone with finding actors that looked the parts…OR…and this is a big OR apparently…I don’t know, actually used BLOND ACTORS where characters are blond.  Instead, I spent a good portion of the movie playing “Bad Hair Dye Bingo”.  And the glittering skin? OMG, I’m not sure I had a definite thought on what it would look like on screen, but I’m pretty sure it wouldn’t look like Edward had been bedazzled or had some harrowing run-in with the Tinkerbell.

Someone who didn’t read the book wouldn’t understand Edward’s initial reaction to Bella…a vicious avoidance to the scent of her tasty-oh-so-tasty blood…the movie made it seem as if she had unbearable B.O. and that with a shower and a shave perhaps she wouldn’t be quite so miserable a lab partner.

Of course, someone who didn’t read the book would probably fall in love with the movie…which I sort of envy.

I get that there were big chunks of the book that had to be pitched so they could make the movie in a reasonable amount of time…and frankly, I didn’t want to watch an hour of Bella moaning about how she was homely next to Edward and he was just so darn FAST…and the creepy bit about him sneaking into her house every night to watch her sleep?  *shudder*

There really is so much more that I could go on about that I disliked but you know what?

There were some really good parts too.

The special effects of the woods and the tree-climbing were great…the baseball scene was exactly how I pictured it in my mind…Robert Pattinson was (and I really had huge doubts about this one) pretty darn good as Edward…so much so that I pitied him for having to spit out those detestable lines of dialogue.

And again, Robert, feel free to drop me an email.

It was so not what my heart desired for this movie.  I wanted Casablanca with really sharp canines…I wanted The Notebook with a dark and twisty side.

I got a movie that looked and sounded like it was based on a book written for a thirteen year old.

Oh RIGHT! It was.

I’m sure that to a tween “I’d rather die than to stay away from you” translates to “I wish I could quit you” somewhere down the line.

By the time this posts I will have seen it a second time.

Because, YES, I am just that big a sucker.

I asked my husband: Pete, would you pull out that white hair sticking up in the front?

My husband replied: Which one?

Saying the right thing? Ur doing it WRONG.

However, further proof that FAIL is a genetic family trait…Rachael stood behind me as I started to write this teeny post and she was reading aloud, “….would you pull out that white hair…”  She leaned way over and looked closely at my forehead and asked, “Which one, mama?”

*sigh*

Premature greying? No, I’d say I’m right on track, folks.

ps. That title will only make sense to Twihards

pss. A Twihard is a Twilight fanatic

psss. YES, I am just that big a geek and I do plan to post my review of the movie asap.

“Bad things have happened, but we’ve managed to endure it.”

Not exactly the wonderful frame of mind one wants to take into Thanksigiving.

But really?  We have not had the best track record.

2005 brought a stroke for me and a fall full of physical therapy and worries of what kind of mother I would be if I couldn’t heal.

2006 found us reeling from Peyton’s diagnosis and we actually celebrated our Thanksgiving from a room at the children’s hospital.

In retrospect, I wish I’d known that we getting ready to enter a season of loss, because I would have spent the entire day of Thanksgiving 2007 on my knees in thanks for the lives we are blessed to have.

However, this year, we are beginning a new phase of our lives and I have never been more thankful for anything in all my years.

Wednesday brought the gift of a CBC that showed amazing counts, the likes I have never seen from Peyton’s blood…E.V.E.R. Awesome, fantastic, wonderful, tremendous, remarkable counts that bring with them the budding confidence that her body is rebounding from the years of chemotherapy.  She gained weight, she added height, she looks good and feels better. She is cancer-free.

I am overwhelmingly thankful.

In this economy, my husband has a good job.  Although we are a family separated, we are together on this day.  We are not wondering where we’re going to find money to put groceries in our fridge or shoes for our children. We have our home, insurance and a sense of security.

I am humbly thankful.

We have three children who fill our days with laughter and challenge and reminders of how new the world is every moment.  They are physically whole and spiritually growing in faith, they have the strength to fight and hearts full of love.

I am joyfully thankful.

Our lives are intertwined with family and friends, those who support us and love us and who make our lives richer in every way.

I am fantastically thankful.

We are looking into a future…one we haven’t let ourselves contemplate for so long.  We are making plans, we are seeing beyond these immediate days and anticipating what tomorrow brings..in good ways.

I am sincerely thankful.

For me, Thanksgiving isn’t about Pilgrims and turkeys, it isn’t just a day to eat until we fear combustion, it isn’t a day to mentally prepare for Black Friday.

Thanksgiving is so much simpler, more basic.

I give thanks for my children who are alive today, for my husband who share his life with me, each blessing we’ve seen, each tribulation we’ve survived, for a powerful God who has gifted us with so much to be thankful for.

I hope Thanksgiving finds you full of turkey and love and family and happiness…full of the knowing that it is not the things that you have that enrich you, but having those things that you could not live without.

Minus the turkey, every day is Thanksgiving for me.

Happy Thanksgiving.

Love,

The Mayhews

Peter, Anissa, Nathaniel, Rachael and Peyton

Peter amuses me in a special way when he asks me if I’m planning to blog.  He’s been sitting here by my side for the better part of two weeks, experiencing every flu-induced moment of agony, living in the fumes of my sickness.

What could I possibly blog about that he hasn’t experienced?

Perhaps that oh-so-special moment when Peyton learned how to casually drop the word “vagina” into a sentence…in proper context.

Nope, he was there for that one.

A fabulous second of time when Peyton kicked Nathaniel in the gibblety-bits and he howled, “She kicked me in the TENDERS!”  Tenders? As in thinly cut strips of chicken?  Where do they get this stuff?

Nah, we laughed ourselves into a frenzy as our son rolled around on the floor clutching his tenders. Parenting compassion? FAIL.

My burning need to find a house to move to in the Alpharetta area…which if you know of one, please feel free to suggest! We are still tossing back and forth about when the time will be right to move to GA, the kids want to go now, I am sort of ready to just go now as well, but there is so much to deal with before we can just transplant our lives and it seems overwhelming. I hate moving.

My complete and utter lack of holiday spirit.  MEH on turkey.  Blech on Black Friday.

The awesomely cool and wickedly disappointing “Twilight” movie. The emptiness I’m dealing with knowing that there are NO.MORE.TWILIGHT.BOOKS!  *sigh*

The fact I’m sorely disgusted that Warren Sapp managed to beat Lance Bass in DWTS.

I’m planning a trip to Chicago this summer to attend BlogHer ’09 and I am JAZZED!

I have a bunch of bloggy friends coming to my house this weekend to do whatever it is that we do…hopefully without the destruction of electrical equipment and the posting of incriminating photos.

Oh, and did I forget to mention that I managed to get myself worked up good and crazy over Peyton’s Wednesday clinic for bloodwork?  It’s her first since the end of treatment. It’s been a MONTH.

I am made of anxiety.

Other than that? It’s been pretty boring.

So, I guess I’ll do one of those horrible blog gags where I open up the floor for questions and discussion and just leave me a comment with anything you might want to know and as long as it’s not something that will get my kids kicked out of their private school, I’ll answer it.

It’s up to you folks, make it good.

And don’t forget to go check out the Seal giveaway on my review blog…it’s SEAL! NOM NOM NOM