First, my new toy: The Bissell Pet Hair Eraser Vacuum!!! LOVE IT! I have been researching vacuums for a while now, trying to find one that could stand the constant battle of dog hair. I think I have found it. We just got it today. I couldn't wait to try it out. Can you believe that? I was actually looking forward to vacuuming...hahahaha. Anyway, so far, I am well pleased. I think we made the right choice.
About the turtles: My hubby is a self-proclaimed saver of turtles. The ones that get stranded on the road in danger of being squashed by oncoming traffic. He will jump out of his car in a heartbeat to rescue the turtle and return him to safety. We see them alot around here. He generally gives me a saved turtle-count on daily basis. He averages about 2-3 a day. Today, on our way home from vacuum shopping (at Best Buy, so he was a happy camper to get to browse there for a while) we spotted a huge turtle slowly making his way across the road. There was a line of traffic behind us, so we couldn't come to a screeching halt. Instead, we drove just a little further down the road until we could turn around and go back. By the time that we got back to the turtle spot, another man had stopped his car and was in the process of playing turtle hero. It made me happy to know that other people out there in the world care about things like that. Its a small thing, I know. But it restores my faith in humanity to some degree. Turtle savers are awesome.
And now the laptop....Its finally fixed and in the process of being shipped to me. For real (I hope...they wouldn't lie to me would they??). Hopefully by Thursday it will be delivered back into my eager waiting hands again. Because I missed it dearly. I feel like planning a welcome back party for it. Any cause to celebrate is definitely a good thing...
Monday, May 12, 2008
We're Back, Son is home and all is well!
We had a nice graduation week-end. It was hectic because we were also moving Stephen out of his apartment, but its all done and we are back home again. The graduation ceremony was well organized and went smoothly despite the fact that there were about 8 billion kids in that graduating class. Well, more like 800 (I think...?), but they kept it popping along so it didn't drag on all day. There was ample seating and we managed to get parking directly across from the front entrance. That was wonderful. Greg and Lori had a hotel room so close to the convention center that they were all able to walk. It worked out well. I consider this weekend a success!!!
Saturday night we all decided (after having a huge lunch with Greg and Lori and the girls) that none of us were particularly hungry. We set out to celebrate instead and Stephen took us to this cute little pub on the main street shopping area in downtown Blowing Rock. I think it was called The Six Pence Pub...?
Oh my God, we had some of the best Mojitos there that night. And desserts...yummy. My dinner basically was a couple of very strong mojitos and the best Irish Creme pie that I have ever tasted. Thats fine for a celebration, isn't it??? Dad and Barb had an excellent bread pudding, and somehow, someway, Barb managed to charm the actual recipe out of the bartender. Who was young. And cute. And very charismatic...haha. I think Barb even walked away with his email address.
Anyway, yesterday we drove the rental U-haul straight from Boone directly to Stephen's new apartment here in town. His stuff is all there, but its not live-in condition yet.
Its a great place. A 2-story end unit with 3 bedrooms, 2 and 1/2 baths. It has a fireplace, and a decent sized patio in back. It just needs a good cleaning, a little paint, and a few cosmetic repairs. The former tenants treated the place fairly rough. But with a little work and some tender loving care, this has a lot of potential for the kids. The best part? (for me anyway), is that its like maybe 5 minutes away from here....10 if traffic is heavy. Hehehe. No, really, I am going to TRY not to be imposing on those kids. It just makes me happy to have a child of mine living in the same town for a while. And I might impose...just a little...over the summer, because they have a great swimming pool at this complex, and its literally just across the driveway from their door. Hahaha!
Saturday night we all decided (after having a huge lunch with Greg and Lori and the girls) that none of us were particularly hungry. We set out to celebrate instead and Stephen took us to this cute little pub on the main street shopping area in downtown Blowing Rock. I think it was called The Six Pence Pub...?
Oh my God, we had some of the best Mojitos there that night. And desserts...yummy. My dinner basically was a couple of very strong mojitos and the best Irish Creme pie that I have ever tasted. Thats fine for a celebration, isn't it??? Dad and Barb had an excellent bread pudding, and somehow, someway, Barb managed to charm the actual recipe out of the bartender. Who was young. And cute. And very charismatic...haha. I think Barb even walked away with his email address.
Anyway, yesterday we drove the rental U-haul straight from Boone directly to Stephen's new apartment here in town. His stuff is all there, but its not live-in condition yet.
Its a great place. A 2-story end unit with 3 bedrooms, 2 and 1/2 baths. It has a fireplace, and a decent sized patio in back. It just needs a good cleaning, a little paint, and a few cosmetic repairs. The former tenants treated the place fairly rough. But with a little work and some tender loving care, this has a lot of potential for the kids. The best part? (for me anyway), is that its like maybe 5 minutes away from here....10 if traffic is heavy. Hehehe. No, really, I am going to TRY not to be imposing on those kids. It just makes me happy to have a child of mine living in the same town for a while. And I might impose...just a little...over the summer, because they have a great swimming pool at this complex, and its literally just across the driveway from their door. Hahaha!
Wednesday, May 7, 2008
Hell Explained...
I received this in an email today....
HELL EXPLAINED BY CHEMISTRY STUDENT
The following is an actual question given on a University of Washington chemistry mid term.The answer by one student was so "profound" that the professor shared it with colleagues, via the Internet, which is, of course, why we now have the pleasure of enjoying it as well :
Bonus Question: Is Hell exothermic (gives off heat) or endothermic (absorbs heat)?
Most of the students wrote proofs of their beliefs using Boyle's Law (gas cools when it expands and heats when it is compressed) or some variant.
One student, however, wrote the following:
First, we need to know how the mass of Hell is changing in time. So we need to know the rate at which souls are moving into Hell and the rate at which they are leaving. I think that we can safely assume that once a soul gets to Hell, it will not leave. Therefore, no souls are leaving. As for how many souls are entering Hell, let's look at the different religions that exist in the world today.
Most of these religions state that if you are not a member of their religion, you will go to Hell. Since there is more than one of these religions and since people do not belong to more than one religion, we can project that all souls go to Hell. With birth and death rates as they are, we can expect the number of souls in Hell to increase exponentially. Now, we look at the rate of change of the volume in Hell because Boyle's Law states that in order for the temperature and pressure in Hell to stay the same, the volume of Hell has to expand proportionately as souls are added.
This gives two possibilities:
1. If Hell is expanding at a slower rate than the rate at which souls enter Hell, then the temperature and pressure in Hell will increase until all Hell breaks loose.
2.If Hell is expanding at a rate faster than the increase of souls in Hell,then the temperature and pressure will drop until Hell freezes over. So which is it?
If we accept the postulate given to me by Teresa during my Freshman year that, "It will be a cold day in Hell before I sleep with you," and take into account the fact that I slept with her last night, then number two must be true, and thus I am sure that Hell is exothermic and has already frozen over.
The corollary of this theory is that since Hell has frozen over, it follows that it is not accepting any more souls and is therefore, extinct......leaving only Heaven, thereby proving the existence of a divine being which explains why, last night, Teresa kept shouting "Oh my God."
THIS STUDENT RECEIVED AN A+.
HELL EXPLAINED BY CHEMISTRY STUDENT
The following is an actual question given on a University of Washington chemistry mid term.The answer by one student was so "profound" that the professor shared it with colleagues, via the Internet, which is, of course, why we now have the pleasure of enjoying it as well :
Bonus Question: Is Hell exothermic (gives off heat) or endothermic (absorbs heat)?
Most of the students wrote proofs of their beliefs using Boyle's Law (gas cools when it expands and heats when it is compressed) or some variant.
One student, however, wrote the following:
First, we need to know how the mass of Hell is changing in time. So we need to know the rate at which souls are moving into Hell and the rate at which they are leaving. I think that we can safely assume that once a soul gets to Hell, it will not leave. Therefore, no souls are leaving. As for how many souls are entering Hell, let's look at the different religions that exist in the world today.
Most of these religions state that if you are not a member of their religion, you will go to Hell. Since there is more than one of these religions and since people do not belong to more than one religion, we can project that all souls go to Hell. With birth and death rates as they are, we can expect the number of souls in Hell to increase exponentially. Now, we look at the rate of change of the volume in Hell because Boyle's Law states that in order for the temperature and pressure in Hell to stay the same, the volume of Hell has to expand proportionately as souls are added.
This gives two possibilities:
1. If Hell is expanding at a slower rate than the rate at which souls enter Hell, then the temperature and pressure in Hell will increase until all Hell breaks loose.
2.If Hell is expanding at a rate faster than the increase of souls in Hell,then the temperature and pressure will drop until Hell freezes over. So which is it?
If we accept the postulate given to me by Teresa during my Freshman year that, "It will be a cold day in Hell before I sleep with you," and take into account the fact that I slept with her last night, then number two must be true, and thus I am sure that Hell is exothermic and has already frozen over.
The corollary of this theory is that since Hell has frozen over, it follows that it is not accepting any more souls and is therefore, extinct......leaving only Heaven, thereby proving the existence of a divine being which explains why, last night, Teresa kept shouting "Oh my God."
THIS STUDENT RECEIVED AN A+.
Tuesday, May 6, 2008
Things I wanted to say:
1. No, my laptop is NOT back yet. Its driving me crazy. The latest update is that they hope to have it back to me by the 15th...? Apparently they are having problems getting some part. Even though this is the HP repair center, and even though its less than a year old. You would think an HP repair center would actually have the necessary parts on hand. Maybe I am expecting too much?
2. My back....AARRRGGG! It got way better. To the point that I was only feeling a slight twinge now and then. But today I managed to screw that all up again. I have no idea what I did to it either. It hurts worse than ever.
I can't get comfortable sitting, standing or lying down. And this happens to suck. I am contemplating taking a couple of days off because my son graduates this weekend, and I WILL be there come hell or high water or extreme back pain. Maybe a couple of days of babying it will keep it in check? My body defies me right now.
3. My son....did I mention that he graduates this weekend? From college? I can't tell you how happy and proud I am. He struggled a little with spanish. And he had a string of unsavory roommates (remind me later to tell you about his sophomore year in the dorm with the kid we refer to as "the chronic masturbater"...oh my!). There were probably at least 3 separate occasions when I really thought he was going to just throw in the towel and give up. My son and I are genetically programmed to just give things up if it gets too hard. He came by that part honestly. My daughter and hubby....they are too competitve to throw in the towel.
Son and I.....well, we have always laughed at those cheesy horror movies that we watch and talk about how things get to a point where we would just go ahead and lay down and let the maniac ax-murderer just kill us. You know...like if I broke a nail while trying to escape. Haha. But he made it. And....he got the acceptance letter from grad school. Applied linguistics. Yeah, I am not really sure what that means, but it sounds important and all. He made it through and I am thrilled to go see him graduate this Saturday.
4. A horrifying story that I wanted to tell you. A friend of mine, Debbie, had an incident with her 9 year old daughter this past week-end. The girl was playing outside on Saturday when she felt something crawl up her back into her shirt. She went running into the house screaming that a lizard was on her. She was having a fit, crying and hysterical. When they shook out her shirt and started to pull it over her head, just guess what fell out? A 6-7 inch long baby water moccasin. Some people call them cottonmouths. But no matter what you happen to call it, those are extremely poisonous snakes and not something you want to mess around with. Luckily, it didn't bite that child. I would have died. Like had a massive heart attack and given up the ghost (refer to my survival tactics from #3). Even hearing that story has traumatized me.
5. Soon after graduation, we will be gearing up for my son's wedding. He certainly planned a whole lot of life-changing events for the month of May. But I am looking forward to all of this.
People keep asking me if I am feeling a little bit sad that I am losing my "baby" (well, he is the youngest child). And the answer to that is no. I don't feel like I'm losing anything at all. What I am really doing is gaining another daughter, and that is going to be an awesome thing. It changes the balance within the family structure to female dominance....hahaha. Girls RULE!!!!
6. My daughter's birthday is a little over a week away. I think she feels a little overshadowed by her brother's string of high profile events. But rest assured that we have not forgotten our beloved baby girl. She has made a big decision to take on a roommate and move into a house closer to campus. This is after living alone in an apartment for the past several years. Roommate is a guy, but for those of you who may be shocked by this, she swears they are just friends. She really is excited though. The wheels of interior decorating are turning. My child has a real ability to turn a plain ordinary space into something really unique and pretty. If science doesn't work out for her (I know it will, but ...) she could always get into the interior design field. I'm hoping to have some time over the summer to go up and visit her. I want to see the house and possibly give her some of those feng shui tips that make her eyes roll....haha.
She can make it pretty, but I want to make it have a positive energy flow. Yeah...I can pretty much sense the eye roll from here. hahaha.
2. My back....AARRRGGG! It got way better. To the point that I was only feeling a slight twinge now and then. But today I managed to screw that all up again. I have no idea what I did to it either. It hurts worse than ever.
I can't get comfortable sitting, standing or lying down. And this happens to suck. I am contemplating taking a couple of days off because my son graduates this weekend, and I WILL be there come hell or high water or extreme back pain. Maybe a couple of days of babying it will keep it in check? My body defies me right now.
3. My son....did I mention that he graduates this weekend? From college? I can't tell you how happy and proud I am. He struggled a little with spanish. And he had a string of unsavory roommates (remind me later to tell you about his sophomore year in the dorm with the kid we refer to as "the chronic masturbater"...oh my!). There were probably at least 3 separate occasions when I really thought he was going to just throw in the towel and give up. My son and I are genetically programmed to just give things up if it gets too hard. He came by that part honestly. My daughter and hubby....they are too competitve to throw in the towel.
Son and I.....well, we have always laughed at those cheesy horror movies that we watch and talk about how things get to a point where we would just go ahead and lay down and let the maniac ax-murderer just kill us. You know...like if I broke a nail while trying to escape. Haha. But he made it. And....he got the acceptance letter from grad school. Applied linguistics. Yeah, I am not really sure what that means, but it sounds important and all. He made it through and I am thrilled to go see him graduate this Saturday.
4. A horrifying story that I wanted to tell you. A friend of mine, Debbie, had an incident with her 9 year old daughter this past week-end. The girl was playing outside on Saturday when she felt something crawl up her back into her shirt. She went running into the house screaming that a lizard was on her. She was having a fit, crying and hysterical. When they shook out her shirt and started to pull it over her head, just guess what fell out? A 6-7 inch long baby water moccasin. Some people call them cottonmouths. But no matter what you happen to call it, those are extremely poisonous snakes and not something you want to mess around with. Luckily, it didn't bite that child. I would have died. Like had a massive heart attack and given up the ghost (refer to my survival tactics from #3). Even hearing that story has traumatized me.
5. Soon after graduation, we will be gearing up for my son's wedding. He certainly planned a whole lot of life-changing events for the month of May. But I am looking forward to all of this.
People keep asking me if I am feeling a little bit sad that I am losing my "baby" (well, he is the youngest child). And the answer to that is no. I don't feel like I'm losing anything at all. What I am really doing is gaining another daughter, and that is going to be an awesome thing. It changes the balance within the family structure to female dominance....hahaha. Girls RULE!!!!
6. My daughter's birthday is a little over a week away. I think she feels a little overshadowed by her brother's string of high profile events. But rest assured that we have not forgotten our beloved baby girl. She has made a big decision to take on a roommate and move into a house closer to campus. This is after living alone in an apartment for the past several years. Roommate is a guy, but for those of you who may be shocked by this, she swears they are just friends. She really is excited though. The wheels of interior decorating are turning. My child has a real ability to turn a plain ordinary space into something really unique and pretty. If science doesn't work out for her (I know it will, but ...) she could always get into the interior design field. I'm hoping to have some time over the summer to go up and visit her. I want to see the house and possibly give her some of those feng shui tips that make her eyes roll....haha.
She can make it pretty, but I want to make it have a positive energy flow. Yeah...I can pretty much sense the eye roll from here. hahaha.
Saturday, May 3, 2008
The Link...
My daughter asked me last night where I found that heinous chicken bag. So, I am going to provide you all with the link. From the tone of her voice, I doubt that she was asking so she could rush off and order the chicken bag. Honestly, I think she might have wanted the web site so she could ban it from her computer forever. Hahahaha. Anyway, the chicken bag was found at Catalog Favorites and you can peruse all of their fun stuff HERE.
Bad news/Good news
Bad news first, just to get it out of the way. I hurt my back earlier this week. Its a pulled muscle, nothing really serious. But man oh man did that thing hurt. I've been really lucky as far as back problems go. I've got some tense, achy shoulder muscles, but beyond that, I have never had any kind of back issues. A lot of people do, I know. And I also know it can be debilitating. Anyway, at first I thought I had done some serious damage. Pain-wise, that is. I waited about 24 hours, hoping it would go away on its on. But I ended up going to the doc because it felt so miserable.
Here is where the good news comes in....She determined that it was nothing more than a muscle injury, and she prescribed a strong anti-inflammatory, and a muscle relaxant. It has worked surprisingly well. I can still feel it when I move wrong, but other than that its basically gone by now. The REALLY good news: the anti-inflammatory has cleared up the tendon/pain issue with my foot. Yay! That has been bothering me off and on for over a year now. Ibuprofen makes it manageable, but I have been procrastinating going to the foot specialist and having him do the cortisone shots. I am squeamish about those needles. Anyway, something good came out of this and I am thrilled. I can wear heels to my son's graduation next week-end without walking like a 90 year old crippled lady. Oh, I was gonna wear those heels regardless. But now I can wear them without hobbling...Haha. And that.....makes me very happy. Whats that old saying about every cloud having a silver lining??? Maybe there is a little something to that after all!
Here is where the good news comes in....She determined that it was nothing more than a muscle injury, and she prescribed a strong anti-inflammatory, and a muscle relaxant. It has worked surprisingly well. I can still feel it when I move wrong, but other than that its basically gone by now. The REALLY good news: the anti-inflammatory has cleared up the tendon/pain issue with my foot. Yay! That has been bothering me off and on for over a year now. Ibuprofen makes it manageable, but I have been procrastinating going to the foot specialist and having him do the cortisone shots. I am squeamish about those needles. Anyway, something good came out of this and I am thrilled. I can wear heels to my son's graduation next week-end without walking like a 90 year old crippled lady. Oh, I was gonna wear those heels regardless. But now I can wear them without hobbling...Haha. And that.....makes me very happy. Whats that old saying about every cloud having a silver lining??? Maybe there is a little something to that after all!
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
The world's ugliest...
Its no secret that I LOVE handbags. I look at them, shop for them all the time. I love checking out the vintage unusual bags on Ebay. I don't buy those usually. I'm not interested in collecting them. I only buy ones that I would actually use. I don't want the clutter of a bunch of unusable stuff, no matter how cool or collectible it happens to be.
Sometimes I run across some really interesting/ugly handbags. But tonight, while I was bored and doing a bit of online shopping, I found what might actually be the world's most ugliest handbag EVER. I can't stop looking at it. Like looking at a trainwreck I guess.
Behold:
The Chicken bag. I hope I don't offend anyone who likes chicken stuff. But this thing is beyond heinous. And yet....I can't seem to look away......
Anyway, I am still without my laptop. The repair status is that they are still waiting on a part.
And that status is starting to wear thin on my nerves. The update says that they expect this elusive part to be delivered to them tomorrow, and then they will expedite my beloved laptop to me in haste. We shall see. If I don't see a change in the status report by the time I get home from work tomorrow, I may have to get on the phone and give those slackers a piece of my mind. Not that I have much of that to spare, but seriously.....I want my baby back!
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