pop rocks in my brain

Here are 5 random thoughts from this week, none of which seem big enough to be their own post. But I need a post in the next 41 minutes, before the day ends. I am trying to cultivate blogging discipline.

1. Tonight I got to go see "A Powerful Noise," a documentary about women making a difference in Mali, Vietnam and Bosnia. Obviously their stories were very empowering, and then the movie was followed by a panel of people that included Madeleine Albright. But the panelist I was most surprised by was Christy Turlington Burns. Apparently she is very involved in the issue of maternal health, to the point that she travels around the world and is taking classes toward a master's in public health. That is not even on her Wikipedia page, guys. I did not expect to be so inspired by a fashion model.

2. Since giving up chocolate and soda for Lent, I'm realizing how much of what I consume daily is chocolate and soda. Sometimes I literally don't know what to do with myself. The sound of an opening soda can in the office is such a heartbreaking sound to me now. This week I got this big tub of animal crackers to snack on, because it was the only sweet thing I liked that didn't have chocolate and that wasn't egregiously bad, like sheet cake from the grocery store. So I might turn into an animal cracker if we really are what we eat. But is eating that many animal crackers worse than eating chocolate? Time will tell.

3. Maybe you saw this on the news, but since I was all busy blogging about the cruise, I didn't get to mention that it snowed in Atlanta this past Sunday! Big fat snowflakes! A sight very rarely seen down here, made the more enjoyable by the fact that it was Sunday and there was no need to worry about driving home from work or something. It must have snowed for six hours, including this time when it thundered and snowed at the same time and apparently that is called THUNDERSNOW if a website that I read is to be believed. But don't worry about us, it will be back in the seventies on Saturday. Mwa ha ha ha.

4. Guys, don't be so hard on The Bachelor. I happened to watch this season for the first time ever because a friend turned me on to it, and I can just tell you that I don't think he did such a bad thing breaking off his engagement to the girl he broke off the engagement with. I didn't like her, and I like the girl he did pick better. Why is everyone so offended? That is all I read about in the past few days, how horrified everyone is. You're watching a show that is designed to end in an engagement after people have spent like eight weeks together. Of course there's going to be a few mistakes. The set-up is ridiculous. We don't need people getting all offended because a ridiculous set-up yields ridiculous results. We have more important things, like maternal health and other things Christy Turlington Burns supports, to worry about.

5. According to a tech guy, my work laptop is "riddled with viruses." The tech guys are going to think I am so dumb, clicking on pop-ups and believing in internet scams. Listen, tech guys, if you ever read this, I don't go anywhere illicit or do anything suspect on the internet at work! I don't know how I get so riddled with viruses! I have a blog, so you know I am not completely dumb about the internet, right? RIGHT?