Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in Tammy's LiveJournal:

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Wednesday, March 20th, 2002
12:07 am	hmm not much going on lately. This semester's almost over (yay) hopefully I'll keep the 4.0 gpa ;) Been cooking more lately. I got into a cooking mood after the last trip to NYC (~Feb 1st) and ate at all these great restaurants (peter luger, payard, union pacific, balthazar, etc). Geoff also bought me the big huge 96 piece chocolates and cookbook at payard. He signed it and stood behind us seating people. It was cool. I've made almost everythign in his cookbook now :) Everyone loved the Chocolate Mousse cake... mmm... I wold make geoff take everything to work after I had a piece so that I wouldn't gain 85 umptillion pounds from it (I'd stay up all night long making various recipes). Our gas bill prolly won't be happy... I think i've gone through like 100 lbs of sugar/eggs/butter/flour since then :) I've been debating whether or not I'd ever wanna go to a culinary school or not... not sure I'd want to spend 20 hour days in 200 degree kitchens especially since I'm not creative enough to ever be a chef de cusine nor business sense-y enough to be an executive chef. Sous chef sounds like a good thing for me... executive/chef de cusine's right hand man.... maybe :) Or maybe i'll get my own show on food tv (hah!). I mean, if that sara whatever her name is has her own show (and she seems like an idiot...) well then what is stopping me. I know, i'll work out and get my laetitia casta body and then i'll be like the anna kornakova (sp?) of cooking. No one will care if it tastes good or not...... :) hehe okay I gotta go put the finishing touches on my essay for my military history class. If any one has any specific information about Horatio Nelson or even where the best library in pittsburgh is... please drop me a line. laters tam (Comment on this)
Sunday, March 3rd, 2002
11:07 pm	ill been sick for about a week now. I never get sick :( my head is pounding, my throat burning and oh the coughing, my ears plugged, my body aching, my nose a endless mucous faucet (eew!) which along with the dryness of the heater being on has chapped my nose. totally and completely miserable. i'm debating taking some vicks 44m nyquil-esque stuff. Pros: knock my ass out cold so i'll be in a virtual coma for the next 12-15 hours and therefore not totally aware of my misery. Cons: I'll feel like i've been drugged with some nasty shit until about wednesday afternoon. i'm thinking the pros far outweigh the cons right now (though i'm sure that if i have the motor skills wednesday afternoon, i'll be kicking my ass for deciding that). PS the pain of a severely chapped nose is 10 fold less then the pain of a severely chapped nose coated in carmex (i was getting desperate!! -- don't try this at home, kids) okay going to pass out now (thank you, thank you, thank you!!) Current Mood: sick Current Music: sound of my head throbbing and the nyquil screaming my name (3 Comments |Comment on this)
Monday, July 9th, 2001
3:44 am	so bored pittsburgh sucks. nothing really to do here. bored. i'm finding myself wanting to visit florida for christsakes! that's sick and wrong -- just like armpittsburgh. i should watch what i say... it could be worse. I could be stuck in bumblefuck [insert almost any state here]. I'm so bored i started typing in "pittsburgh sucks" and "i hate pittsburgh" into google. The only thing that comes up is people from cleveland saying pittsburgh sports teams suck. I'm sorry to break it to you, ohio people. but ohio isn't much better than here. But... at least you have cedar point. Maybe it will get better. I can only hope. Maybe Geoff will take me on a *real* vacation soon. I'm thinking foreign country... south pacific... tahiti... overwater bungalow [hint hint] *sigh* a girl can dream, can't she? Current Mood: bored Current Music: BT - Flaming June (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Saturday, June 9th, 2001
4:46 pm	The telemarketers shall die! They KEEP calling. Three yes THREE!!! times today!!!! I lodged a complaint with the attorney general of PA's office. Tried calling the 1-800 number but no one was there because it's the weekend so I wrote them email which means it might never be answered. I'll only call if they call anymore. Every time they call we tell them that it's illegal in the state of PA. I'm still pissed that they got our number in the first place. GRR Current Mood: aggravated (6 Comments |Comment on this)
Thursday, June 7th, 2001
2:47 am	on a more pleasant note... Go see Moulin Rouge. I'm sure a lotta people will disagree with me but I thought it was awesome. I can't even describe it or why. Just go see it... it's only $8 and you might be suprised at how you react :) (Comment on this)
2:02 am	Peoples' ignorance scares me I love this: Philip Morris to Pay $3 Billion The Associated Press Jun 6 2001 11:11PM LOS ANGELES (AP) - A jury Wednesday awarded a cancer-stricken smoker more than $3 billion from tobacco giant Philip Morris, the largest judgment against a cigarette maker in a lawsuit brought by an individual. The Superior Court jury found against Philip Morris on all six claims of fraud, negligence and making a defective product. Some legal experts cautioned, however, that the award might not stand. Richard Boeken, 56, was awarded $3 billion in punitive damages and $5.5 million in general damages. ``We thought that figure would hurt them, make them stand up and take notice,'' juror Denise Key said of the punitive damages. ``We want them to be responsible, to put on their product that the product will kill so when you smoke you smoke at your own risk.'' It was the largest jury award won by an individual against a cigarette maker. The largest judgment against the tobacco industry in a class-action lawsuit was $145 billion awarded last year to thousands of sick Florida smokers. Philip Morris was one of five tobacco companies in that case. Boeken, who suffers from incurable lung cancer, smiled and gave a thumbs-up sign as the 18-page verdict was read. He declined to speak to reporters after the hearing. Philip Morris attorney Maurice Leiter said he will appeal. ``We recognize Philip Morris is an unpopular company. It makes a dangerous product, but clearly, the evidence does not support this verdict,'' Leiter said. He said the company believes Boeken ignored ``a mountain of information'' about the health risks of smoking and chose to continue his habit. Boeken's attorney, Michael Piuze, said he did not know how the jury set the award amount. ``I don't know where it came from, but we're pleased,'' Piuze said. The award may not pass a new test adopted by the U.S. Supreme Court, some attorneys warned. ``The punitive damage award has to bear some relationship to compensatory damage,'' said attorney Michael Hausfeld, who sued tobacco companies in May, claiming they violated federal racketeering laws to hook children on cigarettes. ``Clearly here the punitive award is an expression of total outrage and I'm not sure under the Supreme Court test for a single individual that kind of a differential would be upheld,'' Hausfeld said. Boeken had sought more than $12 million in compensatory damages such as medical bills and lost earnings, and between $100 million and $10 billion in punitive damages. He was diagnosed in 1999 with lung cancer, which has spread to his lymph nodes, back and brain. He took up cigarettes in 1957 at age 13 and was smoking at least two packs of Marlboros every day for more than 40 years. Piuze said his client had kicked heroin and alcohol, but renewed his smoking habit after trying to quit several times. Piuze argued that his client was a victim of a decades-long tobacco industry campaign to promote smoking as ``cool'' while the company concealed the serious dangers of smoking. During closing arguments, Piuze said Philip Morris is ``the world's biggest drug dealer, something that puts the Colombian drug cartels to shame.'' Attorneys for Philip Morris didn't deny that smoking caused Boeken's illness but argued that he ignored health warnings about the dangers of cigarettes and chose to smoke despite the risk. The jury began deliberations on May 22. Jurors during the 7-week trial were presented with evidence that included company memos and videotaped depositions from Boeken and clips of tobacco company executives' 1994 congressional testimony. Juror Ann Anderson said her intent was not punish the company. ``I think in the jury room a lot of people thought we wanted to punish Philip Morris,'' she said. ``It wasn't to punish them. It was to make them stand up and take notice.'' The verdict was the latest in a series of tobacco industry courtroom losses. Earlier this week, a New York City jury found tobacco companies liable for deceptive business practices, ordering them to pay up to $17.8 million to treat ailing New York smokers. There have been six earlier cases in which plaintiffs won individual awards since the mid-1990s, said Richard Daynard, a law professor and chairman of the Tobacco Products Liability Project at Northeastern University School of Law in Boston. But only one of those plaintiffs has actually received any money, a 70-year-old ex-smoker who got $1.1 million from Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp. after a 1995 jury award. The company is appealing the verdict to the Supreme Court, but was ordered to make the payment. Three others are being appealed, while the other two have been overturned. Shares of Philip Morris finished regular trading Wednesday at $50, down 83 cents. In after-hours trading, shares fell $1.75 to $48.25. APO/Tobacco-Trial/ Copyright © 2001 The Associated Press. The information contained in the AP news report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press. (Dear AP, I gave you credit, please don't sue me for cw infringement...yadda yadda...thanks) Okay... we all have known for *years* that smoking can hurt you. I mean, hello, people die every year in house fires for breathing in the smoke..... Granted, cigarettes haven't always said "warning: bad for you" on them but anyone with only a smidgen of common sense in them would realize that they couldn't possibly be good for you! So this stupid fucker gets 3 billion dollars! "He kicked Heroin...." i guess that shows us just how intelligent he is. Along with the Jury that ruled in his favor. Gives new meaning to the whole "Just remember: when you go to court, you are trusting your fate to twelve people that weren't smart enough to get out of jury duty" joke. Like the dumbass that spilled coffee on herself and sued mcdonalds. So I don't deny that tobacco companies put nicotine enhancing stuff in their cigarrettes. That doesn't mean that I have the right to sue them for $3 billion because I'm a nitwit. it's like: "I ate too much ice cream and now i'm obese, have high blood pressure and cholesterol and I just had a heart attack so I think I'm going to sue the company that makes the ice cream for $3 billion" Humans constantly amaze me. And not in a good way. It's sorta sad when you find yourself having less and less faith in the human race every day. *sigh* This is right up their with ignorant SOBs that try to ban books (you should take a look at the 50 most banned books in america list sometime). I'm not even gonna go into that one (it's right up there in frustration with people that want to take away a woman's right to choose and people that blame video games and music for their children's misbehaving instead of looking at their own shitty parenting etc etc) Read my husband's rant for a similar view... okay... i have to get off the soapbox now or i'll give myself a brain anyuerism (sp?) and have people start flaming me (which i am not in the mood for) blegh Current Mood: infuriated (Comment on this)
Sunday, June 3rd, 2001
2:22 pm	Verizon sucks ass I hate telephone companies. Today I get a phone call from a telemarketer asking if i was Mrs. Harrison and asking if I wanted to switch phone companies. Okay -- I don't even know my own phone number by heart yet therefore I could not have filled it in on some form that someone would have used to sell my number to telemarketers. Therefore I have come to the conclusion that the only possible way telemarketers could have gotten my number (with a name attached to it) is that Verizon sold it to them. This pisses me off royally considering that I pay EXTRA for my number to be unlisted and unpublished. I'm calling up verizon and bitching them out. They better do something about this -- keeping my number unlisted/unpublished for free now or changing our number for free or something. Mother fucking pieces of shit. This isn't the first problem we've had with Verizon either. GRRR. UPDATE: They called again for the same thing a day later. Found out that PA has laws against telemarketers bothering you: From http://www.attorneygeneral.gov/pei/brochures/bcp/html/telemarketers.cfm come this tidbit of info: "...The 'Telemarketer Registration Act' prohibits...calling a person who has previously indicated a desire not to be called...[and] failing to end a telemarketing call when the consumer indicates a desire to end the call...Failure to comply with the requirements of the Telemarketer Registration Act are also punishable by fines up to $3,000...second and subsequent offenses may result in revocation of registration and the right to conduct telemarketing in the Commonwealth..." well they violated both things. Grr. Next time people do that I will ask for their name, supervisor, and quote the law. fun fun. Kinda reminds me about the time that the San Jose Mercury news called Geoff's cell phone multiple times (which is illegal, iirc) and Geoff asked them nicely the first few times to remove him from the list and never to call his cellphone again. By the end he was threatening them with lawyers. We try to be nice to telemarketers but it never works. (Comment on this)
Wednesday, April 18th, 2001
3:30 am	Married Woman Woo. Got married a few days ago :) Very exiciting! Very happy :) Had a great time with Rob and Kathleen in Vegas. Saw lots of shows. Almost literally ran into Matt Damon at the Bellagio while a big bunch of stars were off-duty from the filming of Ocean's 11. Geoff got to see Brad Pitt and I didn't because I was too short to see over the crowd *sniffle*. We did however see Andy Garcia off-set talking on his cellphone and Julia Roberts, George Clooney, and a few more big stars were around but ever elusive. We'll have to see that movie when it comes out now. Being there during filming has piqued my interest. It's directed by Steven Soderbergh who's a good director.... so we'll see :) And back to our regularly scheduled programming: MOVING ARRGH heh We have to get the hell outta dodge ASAP. The fucking movers are FINALLY coming to give us an estimate tomorrow afternoon. Hopefully that means that the next morning they will be able to move all our crap. Then Tammy can finally go to bed (once you pass the 48 hour threshold you have to take seditives to get yourself to get to bed again) so she can drive 2600 miles to PA. Blegh. and no, i didn't take speed. I think Geoff's boss is getting pissy at him since it's taking so long *sigh* anyways......... Current Mood: busy Current Music: Delerium - Silence (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Saturday, March 24th, 2001
5:10 am	Listening To Music I'm bored and instead of packing I'm trying to find stuff to do... and right now I'm listening to music with the headphones on (which I do when I wanna isolate myself)... and I'm listening to Apocalyptica does Metallica and I think Metallica sucks... but apocalyptica is super cool. I guess it's all in the execution ;) I've always wanted to play an instrument but I wanna start off being good at it and when I'm not after like a day (well, duh) I give up b/c I'm stupid. Geoff gets mad at me all the time for that :) Current Music: Apocalyptica - Nothing Else Matters (Comment on this)
Wednesday, March 21st, 2001
6:12 am	Packing God, I'm so sick of packing!!! I just want it to be over with, but I'm too lazy so I get nothing done. It's like when you were little and you had to clean your room and you'd come across old toys or books or something and you'd stop what you were doing to read or play. That's what I keep doing. Geoff will help for like 2 seconds and then leave. Just like I thought ;) I'm just sitting on the couch thinking how much I have left to pack (it's like pasta -- the more you eat, the more there seems left on your plate). Precious (we still haven't figured out a new name yet) is cuddling next to me. She's sooo cute except when she's not. hehe she's quite the evil rambunctious thing.... (Comment on this)
Tuesday, March 20th, 2001
8:05 pm	oh yeah... Got my Titanium laptop. It's awesome except for the fact that the y-key was broke. They are mailing me a new keyboard. Hopefully it will get here soon. (Comment on this)
8:02 pm	*sigh* A rolling blackout killed my fish. Current Mood: sad (Comment on this)
Monday, February 26th, 2001
10:22 pm	Moving Well... I have no real computer anymore. Not for 30 more days (when it gets shipped to me). After leaving VA, Geoff had to return all the cool stuff they let us borrow. *sigh* I did get to order one of those really cool Titanium Apple PowerBook G4's though. Very nifty. I got a really nice lappy bag for it too... though Geoff talked some sense into me and I ix-nayed on the ada-pray ag-bay that was $760 -- it was really cool though :) We will be moving to Pittsburgh, PA after we find a place to live there and pack up our shit. Packing up a whole house sucks ass. Lucky Tammy will get to do it all herself too, I'm sure. We got a kitten the other weekend too. She's very cute. She's calico and her temporary (given name from the humane society) was Precious. She terrorizes Cameron. They seem to get along a little better now though. Hopefully by the time that we come back from Pittsburgh to look for a place to live next week, they'll like each other more. (Comment on this)
Thursday, January 18th, 2001
7:08 am	ACK! I can't find my fucking tin-thingy of carmex and my lips are soooo chapped. ouchy ouchy. Dammit. I put it in a pocket in either one of my many jackets or jeans and I've been searching and ack. Grr.... It's usually my freaking eyedrops that can't be found. *SIGH* burning ack I tried that Aussie Nads hair removal stuff tonight can you say FUCKING OWWY. It worked, it's just that I'm not a masochist and I have to grow out all my hair for like 2 weeks YUCK! I have like underarm hair and I can feel it go RUB RUB and sdlkfjdlsfjdlkf. It's horrible. But I figure if I can make it through this I can do anything ;) Actually, I'll prolly wimp out and shave tomorrow. UGH. I haven't been this hairy since I was 12. Current Mood: cranky (1 Comment |Comment on this)
12:55 am	Long Time, No Talk heh Wellllllll.... nothing has been up so that's why no updates :) I just drew a blank so I'll write more later... d'oh Current Mood: blank Current Music: Lola Rennt Soundtrack (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Friday, December 22nd, 2000
2:02 am	Christmas and stuff Going back to atlanta for christmas. Just got done booking a hotel because Geoff is seriously allergic to dogs and both his mother and sister have them... He'll keep himself doped up on Benedryl... but that only works for so long. Wish him luck. heh. My fishies are doing okay... but there's been a bacteria bloom and I don't know why because I haven't over fed them (if anything i'm underfeeding them until i figure out exactly how much to feed them). They don't seem to be showing any "signs of stress" so that's a good sign. I'm trying to be a good mommy! I did a water change tonight and I'll do one tomorrow too. Hopefully they'll be okay while we're gone. I got them vacation food so we'll see. I also took pictures... let me put them up here. (Comment on this)
1:57 am	Face Well, I don't have acne but I don't have perfectly flawless skin either so I decided to try that Proactiv stuff but freaking benzoyl peroxide and me don't get along. My face gets all poofy and red. I wake up looking like someone beat the shit outta me. My mom's the same way. I guess I'll stick with the clinique 3-step thing and their salicylic acid stuff. Cheaper too. Current Mood: busy (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Thursday, December 21st, 2000
3:34 am	Fishies Last night Geoff bought me a fish tank and some fish to cheer me up. The cat seems to like them a lot. He'll just sit there and stare. I got 2 Gold Mickey Mouse Platies (they've got nifty little mickey mouse heads on their tails... hence the name) and a Black Moor Goldfish. He was the ugliest fish, so I had to buy him. They seem to be having fun in their tank. I'll take a pic later maybe.... Current Mood: awake (Comment on this)
Wednesday, December 20th, 2000
7:02 pm	Hair Nightmare Well, yet more evidence of why I should just live with what I have. I bring in like 5 pictures of different angles of the style I want. Do I get it? No. Same with the color. I wanted auburn aka dark brownish red and I am given copper. Then she decides that highlights would be good. I go with it. She's the "expert" and the highlights I've seen on the person that recommended her looked great. Do they on me? No. And they also made my hair even more orange at the top. So now i look like a striped fucking pumpkin. Am I pissed off? You bet. I'm making an "emergency" appointment with someone else somewhere else because I don't like it when they don't listen to you. Darker I said. No, I like it like this, she says. Chunky layers I say. No, I like them more blended like this, she says. That'll be $200. GRRR Please dear god let the next salon know what the fuck they are doing =( I can't even go out of the HOUSE. BLAH. Current Mood: infuriated (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Monday, December 18th, 2000
2:09 pm	Music It's kinda good and kinda bad that we know our downstairs neighbors. Good because since I know that they aren't home and won't be till about 6pm I can crank up the sub (which is normally turned off) until then... but knowing them is bad when you make noise on accident. Like moving furniture, vacuuming, or dropping stuff. Heh. They tell us we're pretty quiet though. Phew =) She can also tell that I'm home so I can't screen her calls ;) (Comment on this)