DragonBlog

Well, shit...

Apparently the search for the phone continues. I got an e-mail today saying that it's been discontinued, which means I'll have to find someone who's got it in stock if I want to actually get one. What I want to know is why was it discontinued? Hopefully just not enough interest in phones that look so non-modern or something. Or maybe they mean that the place I was buying from discontinued carrying it. I'm not sure. All I know is that they've cancelled my order for me and now I have to track it down somewhere else. There's plenty of places that sell it, but the one I was buying from had the best deal. Damn, damn, damn.

So no more blogging for now - I gotta go online shopping instead.

G'night!

Tired...

I think I'm more worn out this weekend than I usually am. With Brian's back still healing, I've been doing extra "lift and carry" duties, mostly involving Jareth. My own back is aching as a result, as I usually let Brian handle more of the lifting-related tasks when he's home in the evenings or on the weekends. So I'm a little pooped on a physical level. Between yesterdays excursions and today's trip to the in-laws' for dinner, I feel like I've been going and going all weekend long. I'm ready for a nap, not the beginning of another week.

Too much tired and frustration tonight. No more blogging, I don't feel like ranting or getting overly cynical.

G'night.

The Mall...

Most people who've ever heard me mention the Mall can attest to the fact that I hate, loathe, and abhor the Mall. It warrants capitalization, like the Government, the War, or the Pentagon. The Mall is a temple to the gods of capitalism and consumerism. People offer up their plastic-card sacrifices that they will later make good on with sweat and toil, or they use the paper ones they have already worked their asses off to gain in the first place. The Mall is shiny and greedy and its gods are never appeased. Its doors swing open and swallow people into the midst of its noise and confusion. The worshipping done at its many altars are done in chaos. Clocks are hard to find in the Mall. Only the poor monks who serve there are meant to be aware of the time passing, lest they forget when it is time to run about and return dropped totems to their rightful places - the Mall must look its best for its worshippers. The priests, however, stand by and rub their hands - they hope that the worshippers will stay late into the day, giving more and more onto the great collection plate of the Mall - for the priests will be rewarded by the gods if the collection plate should be full...

Oh, yeah. I was going to talk about today. Wasn't I? Right. Sorry, sidetracked a bit.

So, anyway, the circumstances that led me to the Mall today involved a specific retro cordless phone. My phone by my desk has this little problem - the kitten is chewing through the spirally cord that connects the handset to the rest of the phone. This is a big problem, as I keep this cord really long so that I can cross the room with it. This is the main phone that I use at any given time. It is by my desk, where I generally sit when I need to make any calls. The phone itself was purchased with some consideration - I like the way it sits on my shoulder when I lean it in there to have my hands free, I like the size of the buttons, and I liked the options it had when I bought it. In order to still have mobility but no cord for the kitten to destroy, I need to go cordless.

Fine. Bring me into the current century. Yadda, yadda, kicking, screaming, whatever. At least I get the computer thing, okay? But I hate phones. Especially those dinky, weenie, lightweight little jobbers that sit on your shoulder and you end up smooshing buttons with your cheek if you try and use it without hands. And putting on a headset isn't exactly convenient to do while you are trying to juggle a child with a bottle in his mouth, so that option was out too. I needed something that more closely resembled the shape of an ordinary phone handset. The normal cordless ones don't do that. Thus, we are going to try this retro jobber.

Which they supposedly carry at Best Buy. But when I went there, they said that I could only get it through them if I ordered online.

Pffft. I wanted to feel it and check it out before buying it. Damnit.

But they also supposedly carry it at JC Penney too! And there was one of those located just across the street from the Best Buy - at the Mall.

They didn't have the phone either. Since I'd already hauled the little stroller out of my trunk and strapped my poor little kid down into it, I ran a quick gauntlet through the Mall to check some other stores that might have had it. Nope. No phone.

But JC Penney was having a sale. A big, shiny, mega-percent-off type of sale. And I went into the Mall through that store, which meant that I had to leave out of it too. And the phone area had been up by the men's department, where I saw possible clothing for Brian, who has mentioned wanting a couple of new clothing items.

So, when I got back home (phoneless, mind you), I mentioned it to him. Some signs had said 70% off, see. I checked a couple of tags while I was there, and they actually seemed to mean it. We ate lunch, packed into the car, and headed back - to the Mall.

Thus, we shopped. For a couple of hours. We'd set a vague budget of about $100, and were only looking for clothes for him. In the end, I found two items in the men's section too (a denim shirt and a fleece jacket), and he got a new pair of jeans and quite a few new shirts. We spent $120, got more than we expected, and "saved" $168. In other words, if this stuff had been full price we would have paid around $280 for it. Not that we would have bought all that if we'd been paying full price, mind you. But I wanted to give an idea of what the sale was like. When we looked over the receipt in the end, we did find that we paid full price on the jeans, but enough stuff was at that 70% off range that it was fine. We stayed in-budget on his stuff, it was my two items that took us the $20 over, technically. Overall - nice.

It doesn't make up for the whole Mall, mind you. Just that store. JC Penney is cool. Especially when everything is on sale. Maybe I should have taken that one guy up on getting a store card there after all... *shrug*

Of course, then we were tired, hungry, and thirsty. There was also this irritated little boy who wanted to run all over the Mall instead of being cooped up in some stupid stroller. We did let him run around the changing area some, but mostly I bribed him into silence with small tokens of edible yumminess. I'm not a stupid mommy, see - I brought crackers and stuff. But, after we were done shopping, we headed to the food court. Where they take large wads of cash from you and feed you fattening, overpriced, teensy servings of things that taste good, but are generally terrible for you. I spent about $20 in that food court (since I was the only one who had cash on them today), where we ate some oriental food, a soda, a fruit smoothie thing, and a couple of big baked pretzels (no salt). Yum, but nasty on my system. We've been trying to eat healthier lately, and my colon was quick to respond when my body told it what I was trying to feed it. Oy.

After that, we discovered on of the coolest things I've ever seen at a Mall - a kid's play area. They've got this soft, padded area - padded floor, a wall all the way around except for a doorway, and lots of padded benches around the whole thing inside for parents to sit their butts down on - filled with padded things for kids to crawl on. The things look like a giant stethescope, a giant milk carton, a giant stack of books with a ruler ramp, and others - all of which are covered over in this nice padded stuff so that the kids can't really hurt themselves climbing on it, sliding down it, or crawling through it. There were plenty of kids there, as their parents took a break and let them run around and burn off some energy. Which is what we did too. Jareth had a blast! By the time we went to leave, he was not wanting to go. The only problem was that he also wanted to run out the doorway and into the rest of the Mall to check it out too. I played referee, running over to block his path every time he made for the entrance, or catching him and brining it back if he managed to time his escape quicker than I could get there. There was another guy there with his kids who helped me referee a couple of times too - he seemed to get a kick out of it, actually. Brian would have helped too, but his back is still bothering him and he needed to let it rest a bit after hopping in and out of clothes for so long earlier, while trying things on.

I also showed Jareth the slide part on the "books", and he had this look of "whoa, what a trip!" when we got to the point where I'd let him go and let him slide the rest of the way down on his own. It was a riot to watch him! He did some climbing over and onto stuff, and I showed him the milk carton which could be crawled through and later he did that on his own once too. He hasn't had as much stuff here at home to learn to climb with, so I'm thinking I might have to take him there again from time to time so he can work on those skills. Most of the time he was content to race around and around. There was a lot of tripping - I think his eyes are going faster than those little legs are quite ready for yet. He just wants to take in the whole world!

So, I guess the Mall isn't all bad. Especially since that play area - is FREE! Shocking, isn't it? Things at the Mall are never free unless they are to sucker you into buying something else somehow. Hmmm. But I haven't seen evidence of that in the play area yet, so we'll probably go back. To the Mall. The. Mall.

Egads. I am amazed at how some things can change. And me actually wanting to go to the Mall is a rare thing indeed.

Oh, and the phone? I just ordered it online, though not from Best Buy - they didn't have the best price on it. It's shipping ground, so I won't have it for a bit yet. Hopefully it will be all that I want it to be.

G'night!

Kid Rock (take two) and the hour-long, one-mile drive home...

Ahh, this morning was Jareth's second class of "Kid Rock" at the local recreation center. I was pleased to see progress in how quickly he acclimated to being around all those kids. He seems to see it as a time where he can occasionally just run off and check things out around the room, which is fine except for when we are all supposed to be doing activities with our kids. Then I have to go scoop him back up and bring him back to sit on my lap in the circle with the others. The group is all supposed to be ages 20 to 30 months, but I have a feeling the majority are closer to the 30-month end of that range, since so many of them are talking and jumping and doing other things while he is still wobbly on his feet when wearing his sneakers. Hell, sometimes he's still a bit wobbly on his feet when he's barefoot on the carpet like he's most accustomed to. Those darned toes just don't always cooperate yet. Gravity gets him sometimes too. Fortunately, he's actually pretty good at rolling when he falls down, so he rarely actually lands with any bump.

He's such a people-watcher. He would have been content for most of it to just stand back and watch the people interact as one might watch a television. He's like us in that way - he likes watching the terrain go by outside the car windows when we're driving too. And his imagination is wonderful, I can already tell. This kid doesn't need a television to "babysit" him or teach him things - he's learning by watching the world around him. It's wonderful to see, but I also tend to put a lot of pressure on myself too - I'm one of the main examples he has for "how people should behave" and I don't want to mess it up. I hope to not find myself saying "do as I say, not as I do" to him. Lead by example.

But now he has other examples - his own age - to watch as well. It will be interesting to see how that effects his behaviors, especially as we try to increase the number of social activities we plan for him. Brian would like to see us sign up for a couple classes in the next session, and when I get into classes at the community college there will be the possibility of some day care time too. Those other experiences will influence his personal growth.

I noticed today that he was paying slightly more attention to the teacher, which was good. Last week he was all but oblivious to her. He kept going off to one spot by the door, however, and it took me a while to figure out what he saw - the teacher had a clear blue bucket of Duplo blocks. Now, most of his toys get stored in clear blue tubs - larger than the one the teacher had, but not too dissimilar. On top of that, he has a clear (not blue) tub of Duplos and Mega Blocks at his grandparents' house, so he knows that those are toys that he is allowed to play with. None of the other kids noticed or seemed to really care until the teacher brought the box forward and dumped them out on the floor for them to play with, but Jareth saw them early on and honed in on them, waiting for someone to bring them out. The kid has a keen eye when it comes to fun.

Mind you, when she did bring them out, the rest of the children dove in like some midget feeding frenzy while mine stood back and watched. He edged in towards the action, but didn't even go after any of the blocks until one of the other moms noticed and handed him one. I'd been watching, but wanted him to judge his space and interact with others. I thanked the other mom, and it was nice to see other parents alert to the other children around their own. Ironically enough, while most of the other kids bailed when it was time to put the blocks back in the blue bin, Jareth moved in quickly to help clean up, without any need for encouragement from me. I was just bursting with pride as I watched him and a couple of others picking up all the loose blocks. He's so cute about it too - picking them up one at a time and almost carefully placing each one into the bucket. What a sweetie.

Have I mentioned that my kid is almost 21 months old and may not be talking much yet, but uses coasters under his sippy cups? He's mimicking us on so many little things! I'm so smitten with the little guy.

After class we headed out and dropped off last night's movie back at the rental place, and then it normally would have taken about five or so minutes to drive the one or two miles to get back home.

But mommy had a quest! Back when I was going to and from Northern Illinois University (about a 45 minute drive one-way), I had found a gas station that carried the sunglasses I wear. Since I'm picky about them (I wear BluBlocker's for one, which change the tint on how the world looks and I'm accustomed to it now - anything else gives me headaches) I can't seem to find them at places near me. So we jaunted off to hit that particular gas station, as my current sunglasses are in a sad state of disrepair and need to be tossed into the "spare parts" bin or the trash at this point. The lenses are scratched, they are bent askew, and one of the pads that rests on the nose fell out at some point and the sticky thing I bought to put over the empty spot fell out. I've been trying to find a pair close to me, without luck. I decided to make the trek and find a pair today...

So, the gas station either wasn't the one I was thinking of, or doesn't carry them anymore. Because they didn't have any.

*sigh*

The whole trip lasted a little over an hour and involved one long-seeming stretch where a police officer trailed after me (and I actually had been speeding some when he saw me - it had dropped down in speed for some local stuff from 55 to 30 mph, and I hadn't seen the 30 mph sign yet, so I was probably doing about 40 after coming from being stopped at the gas station) but eventually turned off, apparently letting me go (considering I had cruise control on 55 for that whole time, and knocked it down properly for a curve where it dropped to 50 mph too, he probably got bored with me after checking to make sure I wasn't driving anything stolen).

*phew*

Thank you, Officer Friendly, for not wrecking my continuing record of not getting a speeding ticket since 1994. I'm rather proud of that 10-year + record, and I'd like to keep it, especially since it's mostly due to me not speeding...

It's a strange concept, fellow Americans, I know... learn it would ya?

*grumble, grumble, mumble (damned speeding maniacs) mumble, grumble*

In the end I ordered two new pairs (good to have a spare) online after some google searching and settled for having them delivered priority mail. So much for my quest for instant gratification. I'll have to settle for the "ooooh a pretty package! For me? Ooooh!" effect instead.

So, that was my day. Well, that and SciFi Friday. It's the only television we really watch, actually. *shrug* What can I say, I'm a sucker for geeks and aliens I guess. Spaceships are cool too.

On that note...

Live long, and prosper!

Okay, so I was never much of a trekkie, actually. I generally preferred Doctor Who in my younger years. So sue me.

G'night!

Cleaning up and back injury...

Well, I got some of that crap I was procrastinating about done. I managed to reduce about three piles on my desk to two much, much shorter ones. One of which is mostly just stuff I want to read if I ever have time. The other is shorter than the first and is stuff I need to sort through or attend to in some way. There was a third short pile that needs to be filed away, but that can go in the much bigger pile of other stuff awaiting the same fate. I also managed to clean out my main desk drawer, which had become a collection of printed sheets relating to things I've either purchased or sold online. The recycle bin that I keep by my desk is just a box with a plastic bag in it, but at the moment it is stuffed full of flyers, catalogs, junk mail, and other things I found that are either outdated or useless to me. Buh-bye junk!

I just wish I could say that my desk actually looks any cleaner as a result. The best I can say is that there is one area where it's much easier to look out from behind the now smaller pile than it was with the bigger one. And the center drawer in my desk looks much tidier, but you'd have to open it to even notice.

*sigh*

Perhaps I'll get further tomorrow. If not, maybe next week.

The amazing thing is that I got stuff done even though Brian stayed home today. His back is bothering him something fierce, and last night something slipped in it for a bit when he went to pick something up for Jareth. I'm not sure exactly, but apparently he looked it up online and knows exactly what happened. Something about stuff being swollen and putting pressure on areas that should be just sort of floating next to each other instead. Don't worry, I have no aspirations towards any medical degrees. Heh. Brian can get fascinated with that sort of stuff sometimes. He knew more about my gallbladder being removed than I did! I think he gets that interest from his mom, who also likes to watch doctor shows and documentaries.

Anyway, his back is kaput. He spent most of today lying down in the bedroom, which is how I managed to actually get stuff done with him here. He's not totally helpless or anything, but it seems to be hurting him and he can't do any heavy lifting. Which means he can't lift Jareth, so that's caused some slight moderations in routines temporarily. He's been keeping ice on it for now, and then I guess he's supposed to put heat on it after 72 hours. I hope he's right about all that, and healing. Remember - we haven't any insurance. If his back is really screwed up - then we could be really screwed. Although we do have a friend who recently graduated and is now a licensed chiropractor, so we'd check with him first. I suspect he'd help us out if he can. We'll see how Brian feels by the end of the weekend. Our plans for this weekend are also being pushed back as a result though. Brian is going to try to go to work tomorrow, although he already mentioned it might only be for a half day. He wanted to be up with us this evening and said the couch would be better, so I ran out and rented a movie - after just a two-hour movie he was really feeling it. He went to bed very shortly after our son did tonight.

The good news is - since I'd rather end on a positive note - that tomorrow is Kid Rock again. I think Jareth will be really excited when he sees where we're going. Yay!

G'night!

So much for that...

Okay, so I spent just over a half an hour this evening sitting in a Border's bookstore cafe with a cup of decaf, waiting for some other people who I was supposed to meet to show up. They didn't. Damn.

I signed up for one of those "mommy" groups on meetup.com. Three people, including myself, RSVPed that they would be there tonight. But I sat there, scoping out everyone else who came by, along with the other people already sitting about, and nobody made eye contact, much less introduced themselves. Either I'm in a group with the shyest mommies in my area, or the others bailed at the last minute.

Poop. Here I was hoping to make a friend or two. Get away from the computer for a while. Pffft. There goes the wind in my sails.

I left a message on the section of forum for that group. In the meantime, I guess I'll have to check out some of the other ones instead. I refuse to be daunted by this one experience.

And, next time, I'm bringing a notebook to write in or something. Geez. I felt like a damned idiot sitting there with nothing but my purse and my coffee cup while everyone around me was using laptops or reading or writing in notebooks.

Oh well.

G'night.

And now,

Would you rather:
1. wear your hair like liberace OR telly savalas?
Well, I don't want my hair to look like Liberace's, and Brian says Telly Savalas is bald, so I'll take Telly. I think I could do bald, especially since it would grow back at some point. Nyah.
2. be world famous for your black velvet paintings OR for your grilled cheese sandwiches?
Sorry, but black velvet paintings...? The first word that comes to mind is, well, tacky. Mama's grilled cheese is just going to have to do. Mmmm. With tomato soup please.
3. smell like a water buffalo OR old cheese?
Um. Ew. I guess I'll take water buffalo, since old cheese is going to smell just rancid and I can probably cover water buffalo up with enough perfume. Uck.
4. eat monkey brain OR kitten?
Ewwww! Neither! Oh, yeah - gotta choose. Damn. I have a kitten, and though she can be a bit of a royal pain, I still wouldn't eat her! Since monkey brain is a delicacy to some, I'll go for that one. But under protest and while shuddering.

What can be put off today, may just as easily be put off tomorrow too...

Some days I just feel further behind on things than I do on others. There's a few things on my list that I want to tackle this week, but some of them feel altogether overwhelming. At least it feels good to be writing on Quick Shtick Writing again. And Wednesday I have this mom's thing I'm going to go to through meetup.com. We'll see how that turns out.

I haven't heard anything from the college I was going to take a class at, so I have a feeling I got my application in too late and will have to wait until next session before I can start taking classes. I did find out that they have day care there, so I will be able to schedule one during the day if I choose to, depending on what classes are available when. I'm thinking I might take some computer classes, writing classes, art classes, graphic art classes, theatre classes, and maybe some languages too. We'll see. I'm such a "Jane-of-all-trades" type of girl. I like to know about lots of stuff. Especially stuff that uses my artistic side.

If I only take one or two per session, it ought to keep me busy for a while. I'm not looking for a degree right now, just more learning. And I really think that doing it for "credit", however, gives me more motivation and shows some level of accomplishment at the end. I like knowing whether or not I've learned what I went in to learn. Grades can usually reflect that.

Today was relatively quiet. I think that's a good way to start the week. I did get a couple of spam comments suddenly on this blog, which I promptly deleted. I also changed a couple of files in case they were "bots". I guess I'll have to start making a regular routine of doing that, as I am pretty positive that something in the process of trying to install MT-Blacklist was the problem with my previous MT install. I suppose at least I got things moved because of it, but it was still frustrating. I like Movable Type well enough, but I'm still wistfully waiting for WordPress to become something I can use.

Other than that, I did the usual mommy/housewife things and some random tidying here and there. I'm intimidated by the piles that have been accumulating on and around my desk though, so I'm afraid I may have procrastinated on that some today, instead of diving right in. Perhaps tomorrow. Then again, tomorrow is probably "groceries" too, and laundry needs to be done soon. I may be able to procrastinate for another day or two yet. Maybe I can find a meetup group for "procrastinators" next eh? Pfft.

G'night.

All Done!

The web re-design on Quick Shtick Writing is done!

*runs around waving and cheering and making "whoop-whoop" noises*

I've reconfigured the archives, the rules, and the previous stories so that they all match with the main page. I even fixed up a smaller logo for the comments and trackback pop-up windows. And, much to my surprise, it all resizes properly so that it fits into the window. That is something I agonized over and couldn't get working properly with my personal blog here, so I'm rather proud that I manged to get it to work right on QSW. In fact, the whole thing, overall, looks exactly as I had wanted it. It was meant to be simple, not flashy, but hopefully somewhat striking. I like the way it looks, personally. The only thing I hadn't originally planned out was how the banner at the top would look, and that was something I played around with for a while and then tweaked once Brian had given me his input on it. That, especially, was something I wanted to be very simple-looking. For a page where we write out rough drafts, basically, I didn't exactly want some complicated banner at the top. The main focus for the site is what we're writing there - I didn't want to detract from that.

Feel free to comment on it. I'd be interested to know what other people think of it. I did a lot more in CSS this time around, and I learned a whole lot more about it in the process. I feel as if every time I make a new web design I learn tons more about it all. I'm almost ready to redesign this site again maybe. But not for a while yet. My poor brain needs a little vacation from CSS and HTML codes now.

I also did the first post of the new story for QSW today! Wheee! A whole new adventure to write! I'm definitely excited.

But, for the rest of this evening I think I want to veg out in the living room - far, far away from the computer. Movie night! Brian's off picking up the flicks, and I just ordered the pizza. We cancelled out on the in-laws tonight so we could get some stuff done. We did too - although with Brian having done a number on his back yesterday while shoveling, he didn't get everything he'd hoped to done. But some other stuff did get taken care of. Our kitchen table needs some repair, however, and that one got put on hold for now. But I still think we did enough to allow ourselves to kick back some this evening. Ahhhh.

G'night!

Snow...

It snowed. Bunches. Apparently there's more coming too. Brian hurt his back shoveling out the stuff that was just too dense to use the snowplow on.

I didn't take any pictures of it today, so I'll leave you with a really awesome picture that I wish I could take credit for. My father-in-law took this picture with his digital camera after a snow last year - November 25th according to the picture info. I'm also checking out how the "thumbnails" thing in MT works (for some reason it never showed up until I moved the blogs over), so this one should open to a bigger version if you click on it:

Enjoy!

G'night!

Success!

Yay! I finally got the stuff on Quick Shtick Writing looking right! I still need to set up the "rules" page again and link it on the other ones, and I also need to set up the comments so they match the rest of the site, but it's all lining up and looking the way I wanted it to! And now, with shnazzy new logo too! Whee!

Also today was our first "Kid Rock" class. They have a web site, I'll have to link it when I have more time. I think Jareth had a great time! He was a little overwhelmed by all the kids and commotion, but was smiling and wandering around amongst them by the time the class was over. I expect I'll see marked improvement in his socializing as he starts recognizing the other kids.

It seemed as if most of the moms already knew each other, so I didn't talk to many much myself yet, but then I was busy watching Jareth to make sure he was adjusting. I had to hold myself back from hovering over him, as I wanted him to get the chance to just "be one of the kids" for a while. There were a couple of points where he looked worried, but he didn't cry or get upset at all. I think he'll be really excited to see us go back again next week. He was definitely interested in the various toys and instruments that were passed around during the class, and I think he was having a hard time deciding whether he wanted to play with stuff or watch all the other people!

It did mess up his routine a bunch though, and he's really cranky tonight. We'll have to figure out how to work it out. He's not good at going down for a nap, so I think he didn't get enough of one today with all that excitement still bubbling inside him from this morning. He didn't talk at all while we were at the class, but he was jabbering away once we got home!

Now for the weekend, and trying to get some stuff done. Assuming we don't spend all our time plowing and shoveling snow off the drive, that is!

That's all for tonight though.

G'night!

QSW site redesign stuff

Most of today's time that wasn't spent on the usual tasks of mommyhood or other such activities was spent on the site for Quick Shtick Writing instead. It's not up on the main site yet, as I have some quirks to iron out still, but I've got a new banner for the top made up (although that needs a slight tweak too) and I'm working on the color scheme and layout. I'm currently puzzling over why the table cell I have the blog itself in won't seem to stretch to include all of the blog. I think I'm going to have to pour over both the html and the css codes to find out where the one little bit is that's making it so that the text keeps going but the background image doesn't.

*grumble, grumble, grumble*

Otherwise, I think it's going to look nice. I've been getting input out of Brian on how it all looks and he's making some suggestions too. We're sticking with the original color scheme that we'd set up before. You can still see some of it reflected in the current "rules" page, although that's mostly just for color reference at the moment. At least it's shaping up. I just get really frustrated when I get stuck on one thing and can't figure it out. It makes it hard to move on to other aspects of the web page. Once I have it all looking nice where I have it now, I'll be able to implement it on the whole site pretty quickly though. That will be the easy part I think.

Also relating to Quick Shtick, we received an e-mail from Ruth over at Daily Cud, which prompted me to finally drop her into my blogroll so I can stop going over to QSW and clicking there instead. She liked our story, and has made some suggestions for the next one that we are hashing over. I'm not sure yet when we intend to start the next one yet. Sometime Monday at the latest. Hopefully I'll have the new site design up before then. I'm hoping to get it finished tomorrow, after we get back from "Kid Rock", which ought to be a blast.

That's all for now though.

G'night!

Power Poofs...

So here I was, merrily working on the Quick Shtick Writing web site stuff, mainly diddling about with a banner for the top, when suddenly...

PFFFTwwwwwrmm.

And then...

mmwwwrrrrPT PTTT Ptttttwwwrmmm.

followed very shortly by...

"aaa - aaaa- waaaaah!"

followed by me sighing and getting up to hug my child who was all freaked out by the power going down then up then down again. Poof. No more power. For 45 minutes.

And, of course, I hadn't saved the stuff for Quick Shtick yet. I've sorta-kinda recreated it since then, but I didn't get into the html stuff yet. By the time the power came back I had my mind on other things, like the sinus headache that crept up on me when I tried to trick my body by skipping my sinus stuff this morning. I used to be able to get by on just one per day, but for some reason now I seem to need two. I think it's just this lousy weather, but I still don't want to be taking two - this is the one they wanted me to try and be off of for the pregnancy the last time. I still don't know what side effects it could have on a pregnancy, so I want to minimize how much of it I take.

Ugh. If I should happen to be pregnant already I don't want to muck up child #2's health after doing so well being extra healthy for child #1. However, I'm not going to stress over it too seriously, as that would probably be just as bad.

It's all good. breathe in. breathe out. aaaah.

Overall, today was frustrating. Tomorrow will be better. Friday might be best though. We've got this "Kid Rock" thing we get to start going to on Friday mornings. I signed up and ended up on the waiting list, but they called yesterday and we're in! Social time for Jareth and I, and music-related to boot! Couldn't be cooler. Next week there's a mom group thing on Wednesday night where I'll get to meet up with some local mommies. Maybe I'll make some actual "mommy friends" who have kids that mine can play with sometimes and that I can socialize with some too. That would be nice. I need some "mommy friends".

Time for Jareth to go to bed now though, so that's all from me tonight.

G'night!

And now,

Would you rather:
1. be the world's best dodgeball player OR the world's best chess player?
Chess player. Although I'd sure like to be quick on my feet like that, and have decent aim when I throw, I think that people attribute more intelligence to chess players overall. It would also be cool to be able to think that far ahead, strategically. I can do it on some games, but I've never been any good a chess specifically.
2. be allergic to egg products OR wheat products?
Wheat. I like white bread anyway. I think it would be easier for me to get along without wheat products than it would for egg. No egg nog? ack!
3. be able to go back in time to when JFK was assassinated OR abraham lincoln?
JFK. I've done civil war reenacting, and hoop skirts are a pain! Neat for a day or two, but not something I'd want to wear on a regular basis.
4. be able to do complex math equations instantly OR sing professionally?
Although I'd love to do both, I'll take singing. Honestly, there's more money in it. heh. I also absolutely love to sing (although I'm generally smart enough to not do it publicly) a whole lot more than I find satisfaction in balancing the checkbook.

The Hardest $50 I Ever Spent...

I may have previously ranted about CompUSA. I'm not entirely sure, but I think I did. I had a previous experience when I went to spend the $50 gift card that my uncle gave me as a Christmas gift. Anything I wanted was unavailable or overpriced. Anything else was either overpriced or not something I'd be willing to spend my money on just now. In the end, after getting only the barest minimum of help from the overworked employees, and being nearly run over by no less than three employees (one of which did it twice and looked more like a manager), I bailed without buying anything. I left the store hot, tired, frustrated, and with a cranky little boy to boot.

Tonight, with Brian in tow to help me choose stuff and for moral support, we went back.

Now, apparently the guy that does the area where the cameras and pdas area was out sick with mono tonight. I only know this because it took about 15 minutes before they could finally get someone to even attempt to help me see if they had a battery for my digital camera. That was "choice A" on the list of possible things to get myself. The guy that finally tried to help didn't know squat about the cameras, so he went looking online and then some other guy helped me to find that they didn't have any of that battery in stock.

This was not the most promising start of the evening. While I was waiting to find out about the battery, Brian took Jareth and wandered the aisles to look for "choice B", which was a new USB hub. I could have gotten a very nice one for more than I wanted to spend, or another one not too different from the one I already have that isn't working properly. They did have one guy there who likely knew what the heck he was talking about in the matter of computers, who mentioned that I should check the output on my power supply first. Apparently there might not be enough power for everything I'm trying to run. The hub has its own power supply, so it must be internal. I'll look and see. Scratch "choice B" then, no point in spending money on something I might not even need.

The next option was whimsical - one of those little webcam jobbers. Mostly I figured I'd quietly point it at Jareth while he was playing and get some cute home movies that way. But the one they had that I might have wanted, and was in the right price range, was out of stock. Scratch "choice C".

"Choice D" was to get Brian some new speakers that matched mine for his computer. He's been slightly jealous of my snazzy speakers with their subwoofer that I've got under the desk. I've been rather enjoying them, so I thought maybe we could just upgrade him. But he said no, that he didn't need new speakers, so I shouldn't just spend my gift card on him. I finally agreed, since we were headed to a bookstore next where he was going to spend the gift card that my uncle got for him. Usually I opt for the bookstore one as well, but I have a hard time sticking to budgets in book stores. I had wanted a Best Buy gift certificate. But I got the impression that my uncle didn't want to try and go to Best Buy around Christmastime, so when he perked up at the idea of CompUSA, I thought - why not?

Silly, stupid me.

Thus, "Choice E" came into play - some computer games. We got a newer version of Risk and some Midieval Total War thing. They were only $10 each, so we got two copies of each so we can play together. Since I still had money left to burn, I upgraded my mousepad to this funky "microfiber" one. It's really soft. I'll have to get used to it though, as it slows the physical moving of the mouse down. It does have a feel as if I can get more accuracy now though, which will be cool when I'm messing with graphics and images.

Brian, on the other hand, had a harder time not spending more than his $50 at the bookstore. I don't blame him. Our budget doesn't allow me to look at books in the book store. I had a hard enough time not buying stuffed animals and books from the children's section. Jareth and I explored it while Brian was off looking for cool grown-up books. I think he re-arranged most of the stuffed animals on the lowest two shelves, and there were a few instances of him toddling of across the store and my having to zoom over to scoop him up and bring him back. Once you take the holds off this kid, he is off to explore everything if he can! It's like he takes a few moments to get accustomed to the "newness" of the place and then it ought to be just like home, yes? He gave me a mini workout!

Other than that, today was a run to get a new crock pot and a couple other items, and I finally did my online application to the community college, in the hopes that I'll be able to take a class I want to take. The trouble is, the class starts next week, so I don't know if everything will get processed in time for me to still get into the class. It's a credit class this time, not like the drawing class I took, so I have to be signed up like a regular student. We'll see. I was able to find that they do have day care there, so I could even take some classes during the day from time to time too. It may not be towards a degree, but I miss taking classes and learning new stuff. There are certainly plenty that I'd like to take, anyway.

Enough for now.

G'night!

The Cat and the 4 lb. Rump Roast...

So, at about 10 pm last night I started the crock pot (slow cooker to some folks) up to cook up this bbq beef recipe I'd found on the web. It suggested 16 - 18 hours of cooking time, so I figured I'd get it in last night and it would be plenty ready by the time we were going to eat tonight.

All was mixed and put into the pot, I put it on the "LOW" setting and let it alone to do its job.

This morning, at about 9:00 am, which is about the time I was going to wake up anyway, although I was waiting for Brian to come and ease me out of slumber as he does on the weekends, I heard a loud crashing/thumping noise. It was shortly followed by Brian yelling "Damnit, cat!" or something to that effect.

Since I am not the type to lie quietly in bed when I know that something bad has just occurred within the confines of my home, I threw off the covers and padded my bare feet out to see what had happened.

The crock pot was upside-down on the kitchen floor, bbq sauce splattered everywhere with bits of the broken glass lid mixed in with bits of onion.

Ack!

There was bbq sauce on the fridge, the wall, the floor, the stove, a small plastic rolling drawers thing I have, the dishwasher, and cabinets.

And the 4 lb rump roast that was supposed to be merrily cooking for dinner was now on the floor underneath a crock pot that had sealed to the floor and slowly oozed the remainder of the bbq sauce out from under it.

There went dinner. Apparently the kitten got up on the counter (something the other cat, Nora, never does after an incident in an apartment we lived in where she slipped back behind a refridgerator and I had a hell of a time getting her back out). We think she felt the heat of the pot and moved suddenly. The crock pot was pretty heavy - I didn't think she'd be able to push it off, and hadn't been worried - but somehow she managed to shove it just far enough for it to go toppling off the counter. I didn't have it sitting at the edge either - it was at least a good six or more inches back.

Brian was a sweetie and took care of the mess. Then there was the small matter of what the hell we were going to about dinner, now that the previous meal had needed to be tossed into the garbage. Not only was it not finished cooking, but the issue of broken glass made it impossible for us to even consider trying to salvage. In the end, we ordered a tray of bbq pork from a Famous Dave's near us. It made use of the hamburger buns we already had, and was good, but I don't honestly think it was worth the amount we ended up paying for it, to be honest. It didn't look like as much in the tin as I thought it would when we ordered it either. But, it fed everyone and we have some leftovers, so I guess it's all good in the end.

Although now I will be shopping for a new crock pot. I use mine rather frequently, and considering how old the one we had was (I think it might have been a wedding gift when my mom married her second husband!) it was probably high time we replaced it anyway. There were areas of the outer pot that were rusting as it was.

Oh, well. *sigh*

That's the adventure for today though. More stuff tomorrow.

G'night!

Cat in the Lap...

Today was a relaxed Saturday. As evidenced by the kitten:

G'night.

A "review" of sorts...

Damn. I was going to just let it slide on by, and not bring it up on the blog. But Brian made mention that it pissed me off, so now I feel some measure of obligation to talk about it here.

The "it" being an e-mail I received regarding Quick Shtick Writing, before the most recent story had even come to completion. Instead of ranting about it, I'll just drop it down here and you can judge for yourself...

To say that your work is less than literary genius would be generous... Your work is highly unbelieveble and it seems as though you have no base for reality for your characters. Not to mention that the names that are used for characters are very unusual and add to the lack of credibility in the story. The paragraphs are poorly constructed and contain too many run-on sentences. The Context of the story is clearly not based on anything from this planet. Reading the story and glancing at your personal website causes me to believe that you are a lazy, overdramatic stay at home mother that spends too much time in front of the computer. Perhaps in order to broaden your storyline you should spend more time in the real world instead of a fantasyland you seem to have created. My husband works for a publishing company and he reviewed your work. His response is that you might as well do a good 25-30 rewrites, otherwise you might as well use it for toilet paper.

I guess that reader wasn't into the "fantasy" genre of stories, for one. For another, names like Mary and Lynna are not actually unusual at all, and can be found in most baby name books. A lot of the names I put into stories are either from baby name books, a large "who's who" book that was my granfather's (because he happened to be in it), or a derivative of one of the above. At this point I couldn't tell you which ones I named and which ones Brian did. But I suppose that doesn't matter, since the person who wrote the e-mail obviously assumes I'm the sole writer. Which means they missed the entire point of the exercise in the first place. Oh well.

As for being overdramatic - well, maybe sometimes. But lazy? I'm far too overwhelmed with stuff to do to consider myself lazy. And the majority of my computer time is actually at night, after everyone else is in bed. That's "me time" and I can do what I damn well please with it, thanks. As for the time spent on Quick Shtick - that's us trying to be better writers, so that maybe one day we can do that for a living. I see it as time well spent. I'm not about to throw in the towel because someone with nothing better to do than name-calling writes me an e-mail saying they don't like what we're writing. Oh, and just because a person has a husband who "works for a publishing company" doesn't make them (or their husband necessarily either) an expert. For all I know the husband answers phones for an editor! That doesn't give them qualifications. Not to mention the lack of any specific references to parts of the story that were examples of poor writing or bad characterization, leads me to think that this "reviewer" may not have really even read the story at all...

Okay, yeah. So there was still a little "irk" remaining in me from that e-mail. Good to get it out.

Although it would be nice to get some feedback from someone who didn't hate it, if nothing else just to mend my frayed ego a little bit. I can't understand why someone would write such a childish e-mail and send it out, so I'm not really taking it to heart. But, at the same time, I do take other people's opinions far more seriously than I should, and only have faith in myself on few and far between matters. So even a "hey, I kinda liked it" response would help. We know there are holes in it, and that there is a lot that we want to fix. But we weren't writing final copy. It was a rough draft, at best, written on the fly a little bit each day. Most of Brian's posts were made early in the morning before he'd even really had much coffee yet. Most of my own posts were made over the lovely sounds of loud musical toys that my son loves to bang on in the mornings. Considering all of that, I think we did a pretty bang-up job on this last one.

So there. I've said my piece. Just because someone felt the need to lash out and apparently picked my e-mail out of the hat doesn't make me feel any less proud of the piece Brian and I have written. And I still think it has the potential to get even better.

What the next story on Quick Shtick will be, however, still remains a mystery. We'll see if our readers give us any ideas to jump off from, or else I'll figure it out when it's time to start it - it's my turn to do the first paragraph.

That's all for tonight though.

G'night!

Tidying up and another QSW story ends

Today saw the last post on the current story we've been working on at Quick Shtick Writing. We've asked for comments from the readers, to give us an idea on where our writing could use improvement and where we've done things that have worked. We're going to take a week off, basically, and I'll be putzing around with a site redesign so it has some sort of "look" to it. Right now it's still in the basic MT template, which is boring as hell, in my humble opinion.

Not much else to say today, really. I've noticed I'm in a "tidying" phase at the moment. Brian says it's maternal. I think he thinks I'm "nesting" because we're trying for the next child. I'm not sure exactly what it is, but I'm seeing a lot of clutter and keep dropping everything to stop and tidy up. Yesterday I cleaned out the trunk of my car while getting gas, as well as a couple other spots around the house. I actually hope this phase lasts a few weeks, as I could use to tidy around my desk a bunch!

That's all for now though.

G'night!

In the Mist and Rayn...

This morning the fog rolled over the neighborhood in waves, some times thicker than others. There's a street that runs almost directly away from us, out from our driveway. It's a short street, but sometimes I couldn't see even halfway down it, much less to the end. On a clear day, I can watch the people at the end of the road, where the street comes to a "T", as they move to and fro about their houses and yards. Today the fog seemed to hold the mystery of the unknown. Even though our schedule was running a bit later for errands than I had hoped, I still needed to spread my wings and get out into it.

By the time we left, little of the fog remained. Most that was hung low to the ground in wisps. The fog had given way to occasional misting instead, and the air was warm for a winter month. I barely needed a coat.

I felt light on my feet today as I moved from errand to errand. The tires on my car seemed to glide across the road and I flew. When we arrived home to empty the car of groceries, I didn't want to stop. I was not done flying for today.

When Brian arrived home I had gotten most of the groceries put away.

"There's something about today," I told him. "I want to drive. Wanna go out for dinner?"

So, for $18 in food and some of my fresh tank of gas, I got to fly some more. Through the rain I moved, in harmony with the rain and traffic around me. This time I had both of them with me - my son and my husband. The last piece needed to make it complete was in place. Together, we soared through the night and the rain, and the worries of the world shifted into the background for a while.

Sometimes, in the rain, I find my Rayn.

Goodnight.

Internet Woes...

Today's blog comes to you courtesy of "James" in India.

Or at least that was the tech guy who got me back online today after I'd spent hours and hours rebooting and trying different stuff and peering at cables and filters and all other assortment of things until I was at my wits end.

Usually, I can figure it out. This one had me bamboozled.

I think I spent about an hour on the phone, between being on hold and then talking to James and rebooting and such. Fortunately, he spoke decent enough English that I was able to understand him without getting frustrated. I've had that problem in the past with some tech support companies that outsource.

In the end, he was able to get me connected and then left me with some vague instruction on how to get the LAN here at the house back online, so Brian could have internet again too. His instructions for the LAN technically worked, although I had to muddle about with wizards and settings before I convinced my computer to send him internet and his computer to see that it was there.

All done. All back. All good again.

Pounding headache though. *pout*

I have to fold yesterday's laundry before I can head off to bed though. I spent yesterday washing loads of laundry in-between web relocations stuff and other chores. I got all the hanging clothes hung, but the non-wrinkly stuff like socks, jeans, and towels, along with the crap we don't care if it wrinkles like t-shirts and underwear, are all sitting in laundry baskets around my computer desk, waiting expectantly.

So, if you'll excuse me - I must now fold.

G'night.

And now,

Would you rather:
1. have all your body hair fall out and take a year to grow back OR have a really bad rash between your thighs for a month?
I guess I could do the bald thing if I had to, but a rash between my legs seems just too icky... eech.
2. have people shout to you because they think you're hard of hearing OR have people make funny faces at you because they think you're blind?
Funny faces. Except they'd learn I'm not blind pretty quick if they made me laugh.
3. be tortured with bamboo shoots under your finger nails OR with thumb screws?
I think I'd have to go with thumb screws overall. But ACK! either way.
4. have your car stolen OR your wallet?
I guess the car, since the insurance would hopefully cover it. Either way would be a pain though.

Yipee!!

After spending some of today and another three hours after Brian went to bed, I finally have my blogs where they are supposed to be!

• DragonBlog is now properly at www.rayndragon.com
• To Our Children's Children has moved to www.tocc.rayndragon.com
• DragonBytes has moved to www.dragonbytes.rayndragon.com
• and Quick Shtick Writing is exactly where it's always been at www.quickshtick.com, although now the first story we wrote on there is now at a separate page where it can be read in more of a book format. (meaning with the posts in order instead of having the newest up top)

All my little bloggies are neatly in their rows, and I think I've cleaned out the cobweb files out of the old directories too. Most, if not all, of my pictures should be working on DragonBlog too. I had the foresight to do a search and replace on the export file before importing it back in on the new site.

Let me know if you see something broken. It may be that I know about it and haven't gotten to it yet, or it may be that I haven't seen it yet. I'll be doing more work on the sites soon. My priority was to get them posting properly, but now I want to do some formatting on them as well.

As for the old interest in Wordpress? Pffft. Until they set it up where I can use it in Opera web browser I really am too frustrated with it to bother. I also couldn't find a way to export my entries, which would have made the move over to another web domain a royal pain indeed. Making the move with MT wasn't entirely painless, but it was a little easier than I had anticipated - I managed to do it all in one day.

Okay. Time for sleep now! For real this time!

G'night!

Moving Day at DragonBlog...

Well, this blog is finally where it's supposed to be. If you still have your bookmark or link over at the old address, then... well you won't be seeing this post yet. I still have to set up a re-direct thingy to send people over here, although I'd like to figure out how to delay it briefly with a message page to tell people that this is where it is now. I'll see if I can figure that out.

I haven't moved the other blogs yet, but the fresh install of MT seems to be working here. The site looks a little off, however, as I don't think it's recognizing the stylesheet yet. Something got screwed up anyway. Once I've got all the blogs in place properly I'll tweak the little things back into submission. Until then, pardon the dust.

That's all for now though.

G'night!

Abort, Retry, Fail...

Well, it looks like the To Our Children's Children site is down for the moment. No matter how many times I rebuild it, Movable Type can't seem to understand how to put it back up. It looks like tomorrow I'll be working on the web site. It is taking me as many as 9 or 10 times to get Quick Shtick Writing posts up too, not to mention this blog. I tried copying over some of the files with fresh copies, but I think that maybe something got screwed up while I was trying to install the MT-Blacklist. I really don't know. I've got a headache tonight, so I'll sort it all out tomorrow instead.

In the meantime, bask in the glowing innocence of my child instead:

Heehee! He can be such a ham sometimes.

G'night!

Ups and downs...

I was going to put new pictures up today, but thanks to the 516 mb memory card in my camera, I haven't had to run down and dump them onto my computer yet. Which means I spent the time that I would have been doing that doing other things, like playing with my husband and kid. *grin* I was able to take four 30-second movies as well. A couple of which turned out really cute. I doubt I'll be putting any of the movies up here at all, however. I'll probably put one of the pictures of Jareth up tomorrow or the next day though. Mostly the movies will get put on cd and shared, as well as kept for later.

Not much else to say tonight. Since we got the Christmas decorations down last night, we were able to allow today for some relaxation and family time. It was really nice after some of the hectic schedule over the holidays.

Also, condolences go out to ntexas99, who's father just passed away on the 6th. I think my newsreader is a little delayed, as I only got the post message last night.

*sends hugs*

Goodnight.

Ahhhhhh...

For the first time in probaby three weeks, I can breathe without my nose bleeding or being totally stuffy! And, for the first time in several days, I don't have a terrible, splitting headache that makes me want to curl up into a tiny little ball in the darkness and cry.

Yep. I'm back on the old stuff I was taking, before my attempts to go more herbal for the pregnancy. I'll have to discuss how critical it is with the nurse over at my OB-GYN and see what the risks really are. Jareth turned out perfect, despite the fact that I took it for almost the entire time I was pregnant with him, so if I get pregnant again it shouldn't be too terrible to stay on it. If there's a particularly critical point that I ought to be off it, however, I'd like to know. I wasn't able to go a full month without it though. I wish I knew what the allergy was. Perhaps when we have insurance again, I'll be able to find out.

We also took our Christmas decorations down tonight. It was getting to the point where if we didn't, the kitten might have caught pnemonia with all the squirting she was getting for getting into trouble. I've had squirt-bottles positioned at various strategic locations around the place ever since we got Nora, and I've been frequently catching the kitten playing in the tree, despite the fact that we were spraying the bottom with some stuff to keep the cats away. Nora is pretty good about it at this point. I think she may have gloated a bit, watching poor Cinder getting soaked for being naughty.

Otherwise, all quiet tonight. I'm gonna kick back and check on some blogs, something I've been trying to find a little more time for again, now that the holidays are done with. I've even added a couple of new ones to the blogroll, although I haven't weeded through the old ones in a long, long while. Some are ones I don't really follow anymore, and I expect to find at least one or two that are no longer there. I'm also gettting ready to get the web site for Quick Shtick Writing properly sorted out so that each of the stories can be read properly. I expect it will take a bit of work, actually. It will help that MT exports the posts in order, however, instead of backwards like it shows on the web site. I'll probably separate into chapters and give each story it's own folder on the server. I like things all neat and tidy, even though I seem to be terrible at managing to keep most things that way. I still keep plugging away at it though.

That's all for now.

G'night!

Winding down another story...

It's clear to me that the current story on Quick Shtick Writing is coming to an end. I think I'm having a harder time writing the posts recently than I have over the entire length of the story so far. I've always had trouble writing the endings to my own stuff, so it's interesting to see how it works out when you have made a commitment to write something each day and things have to be wrapped up. The only difference is that Brian and I both know that this is just one piece of a larger story, really. I'm already dropping clues about the next story with these characters. What we're having the most trouble deciding, I think, is whether or not we will do the next story about these characters, or move on to a different story altogether. There's also a decision to be made on what the rules for the next story will be - regardless of which we do.

I think that we took a week or so off the last time we finished one, although that first story was neither as good or as long as this one has become. I like this one much better, and I think we'll be taking a serious look at polishing it up for possible publication. Or, at least, sending to publishers anyway. We'll have to see what happens.

I'm considering having my own extension of QSW at some point. I had started one previously and then deleted it thinking I might not want something I was working on alone to be so... public yet. Not that there's a slew of people reading what we write here, but nonetheless... Sometimes my fiction can feel almost more personal than my real life that I document here. I know that sounds odd, but some days my imagination can seem much more vivid than the life that happens around me. There are moments in life that are vivid to me - like many points in year we spent traveling, and a few specific moments in our wedding, and holding my son in my arms each day - but so much can seem muted sometimes compared to the worlds in my mind. Perhaps I just spent so many days in my youth allowing the strange characters in there to comfort me whenever the shit hit the proverbial fan that I'm afraid to share them with others. Perhaps some of them are so dark, as in the "vamp" posts on DragonBytes, that I worry people will judge me by their fictional actions. After all, these things come from somewhere in the depths of my mind. For someone who frequently proclaimed herself to be a pacifist, I daresay my mind can come up with some pretty nasty stuff from time to time...

Anyway, it would mean making a commitment to writing on a daily basis on something fictional of my own, not just the one that Brian and I do together. I've toyed with the idea before. I've just never decided to do it yet. Perhaps, as I start working on getting the web pages all ship-shape again, I'll throw in one for myself to work on writing with.

If I do, I'll let ya know. We'll see.

That's all for now. The sinus headaches I've been having persist, and I even broke down and went back to the old stuff I was on before. Either it hasn't fully kicked into gear yet, or I really am fighting off sickness. Either way, I think I'm hitting the sack early tonight.

G'night!

Chapped Knees and more problems with MT...

Chapped knees. Or, rather, chapped knee. Singular. Since the hole in my blue jeans was only on one side. Technically it's actually the area of the leg just above the knee, not the knee itself. And it's already not pink anymore, so it's probably not really chapped. Mostly just rubbed a little cold and raw by the wind. It was still weird in the shower when the hot water running down my leg still felt cold in that spot. Very strange indeed.

But, despite the fact that I've felt crappy for more than three days running now, I saw that we were already up to 3 or 4 inches of snow on the drive and wasn't going to wait and let it get worse for when Brian got home. So I plunked the little guy down for his nap, put on my "junk jeans" and my old jean-jacket winter coat and a really crappy pair of boots (I think proper "snow boots" are now on my list of things I need to look into purchasing soon) and hauled myself out to the garage.

I spent two hours outside - probably a half-hour of which was detangling cord and setting up the snowblower, since we own one of the cheaper, electric ones. I kind of wish we'd sprung for the gas one at this point, as maneuvering around the cord is yet another hassle to deal with. I think we must have bought the cheapest model on the market, to be honest. The thrower part refuses to stay in position half the time, and will suddenly swivel around to throw the snow you are plowing over onto the side you've already plowed... *grumble*

Nonetheless, after two hours of plowing, shoveling, sweeping (note to self - we need a new push broom handle - the metal one on ours is about to snap in half), and brushing off the car, I had the snow dealt with on the drive, the stoops, the sidewalk, and the little walk up to our house. I even did the bit of the patio that leads to the side garage door. (Note to self - the main door on the garage has frozen shut entirely...not sure what to do to fix that, actually)

And yet, it still snows.

I may have to repeat the process tomorrow. Or I may just delay groceries until Friday, and make Brian do it tomorrow when he gets home. I suppose it depends on just how much snow we end up getting. But I figured that neither of us really wanted to end up dealing with shoveling/plowing/brushing/sweeping all of it at once, so I did make a dent. Yay me.

In other news, I can't seem to find any record of a solution to the problem rebuilding my web site. It is now causing problems on all three sites - this one, Quick Shtick Writing, and To Our Children's Children, although the latter is only having trouble occasionally. Brian's site, on the other hand, seems to be doing fine even though it is also in Movable Type. I did some searching on the MT forums and through google, but have yet to see anything that has a similar enough problem for me to try the solution. I don't know whether people just purge their problems or assume that people who don't know php shouldn't be messing around with their weblogs, but I'm getting real sick and tired of finding complicated answers to complicated problems I don't have, and rarely finding easy-to-understand instructions for how to fix the problems I do have. That goes for WordPress too.

And I'm already sick of "Wiki's". So far the wikis I've come across for stuff I wanted to know more about - didn't have squat for information. It's all a really neat and novel idea to make it so that other people can add to the knowledge base, but I honestly never know if I can really trust what I'm reading in a wiki anyway. There's far too many people out there who are willing to mess with the "newbies", and I frequently qualify as one when I'm looking something up. Even on the forums people are talking about how they did stuff and I have no freaking clue what language they are speaking in sometimes.

I think there needs to be a rule - every new "for the masses" style of web program (like weblog publishing programs... *cough*) ought to have a "for dummies" area with answers to basic questions. Perhaps even setting up zones for different levels of users would be nice - beginner, intermediate, advanced... you know!

Now there's a neat and novel idea that might actually work if someone bothered to implement it...

No. Damnit. I just don't have that kind of time anymore. I used to do stuff like that for people though. Somewhere I even have a copy of a "for dummies" style bit that I did while I was working at one company that had just gotten a new program. The other secretaries were thrilled. I am generally pretty good at picking up a new office program or other such program and figuring it out reasonably quick. I am also pretty good at putting it down on paper in such a way that others could figure it out easy too...

And if anyone wants to offer me actual money to do that sort of thing - great!

But, until that day comes along, I'll just stick to scribbling my own notes at home for now, and wishing that someone else would write it for me. I've got other things to do right now. Like organizing the list of things I have to do onto the PDA that my sister-in-law's boyfriend just gave me. It was his old one (I will assume that his new one is far, far cooler and upscale) and he was kind enough to give me his hand-me-down, loaded with stuff already installed and with all the original disks, cables, and documentation...

And bejeweled.

It's a stupid, silly, tetris-like game. It hurts my eyes to look at the darn screen while I'm playing it.

And yet, I can't seem to stop.

Grrrr...

I think I'm blowing an hour each night just diddling about with the stylus on this damnable little handheld computer thingy, scooting "jewels" around the screen to make neat little rows that beep and go away...

It didn't help any at all when I installed my version of Mahjong and Player Racer that I had from a Hoyle Board Games cd that I had gotten a while back. Nope. That didn't seem to help my battery time any either.

But, if I get any sicker than I already feel, and end up laid up in bed... I'll at least have something I can play with now!

Or is that not how I'm supposed to look at it?

Hrm.

Anyway...

G'night.

And now,

Would you rather:
1. work at a company that regularly tests hair care products on animals OR regularly buries toxic waste illegally?
Toxic waste. That way I could just turn them in. I wouldn't have to know that there might be little fuzzy critters dying right there in the building with me...*shudder* Either way, I suspect I wouldn't be working there long - no matter what they paid me.
2. for an entire month, eat everything through a straw OR deep fried?
Through a straw. I don't want to burst an artery from all that fatty food, for one. Fun with puree sounds much better.
3. invent the next popular kids toy OR sex toy?
Kids toy. At least then I could tell all my relatives about it. Not to mention I have a kid here so it would be cool to say "mommy made that!" to him. I couldn't do that with a sex toy... nope.
4. find out your neighbor is a spy for an enemy nation OR a black ops assassin for your government?
oooh... black ops. Very cool. I could dig that. I wouldn't tell, and they'd have the coolest "work stories" on the block!

Sister Infusion...

Two people popped in at my place today. First was the vet, and it looks like the kitten is good to go until March now, when she goes through the whole neutering process with a couple of add-ons. We will get her front paws de-clawed, as we did with Nora, for the same reasons. Although she's wonderful with Jareth, he has suffered a few scratches and I have no guarantee that Cinder will be as equally gentle with the next child. I'd rather remove the front claws from Cinder now, than have to get rid of her later if she chose to jealously maul a new baby. We will also be putting a little teensy microchip into her, as was done when we got Nora, that can identify her if she should get outside and someone found her. I think it's a really cool idea, and even if the worst would happen - someone would be able to let us know. I have our phone number on their collars (although Cinder is still too little for her collar just yet), but they are the breakaway kind, so there's no guarantee that it wouldn't get snagged off by branches. They aren't outdoor cats - mainly because we do declaw the front paws which leaves them with less defense against other animals. It's my job to protect them, I figure. I do try anyway.

The second visit? The sister. My sister, as opposed to my husband's sister, who we get to see on a weekly basis for the most part. My sister, on the other hand, is the super-duper busy one who moved out of my house into an apartment that might as well be in another state, she's so far away. *grumble*

I've gotten to see her a little more recently at least, however, as she was with us for Christmas Day at Brian's folks' house. But then I had to share her with my uncle who I generally see less often than I get to see her. Such is my side of the family.

But tonight, she stopped by for a bit and ate dinner with us. Afterwards we hung out and watched one of the dvds from our teensy little collection.

There wasn't necessarily a huge amount of conversation, although I did get info on her upcoming spring class schedule and the new diet/lifestyle she's working on incorporating. Over Christmas she mentioned wanting to return to Western Illinois University again next fall. She seems more serious about it now than she has in the past, and I'm hoping I'm seeing a maturity that I've been waiting for - one where she's in it for the long haul and will invest herself in getting her degree. I've been disappointed in the past, but I still hope that this is the point when she'll prove me right and come out on top like I know she can. I still think that, out of the two of us, she has the better chance of really making something of herself despite the crap in our family's past. I'm not one to talk though, every time I get my confidence built up to step up and shine, I pull out at the last minute again - still terrified my mother's constant determination to tell me that I'm not good enough was actually based on some justification that I'm actually not good enough. Some days the fear of failure is still just too much to bear to stick my neck out and risk it.

In the meantime, I'll settle for being proud of seeing some growth happening in my sister, and the fact that she's still heading onward. Perhaps she'll get to grab her own brass ring while I still sit her flailing weakly towards my own.

*sigh*

Okay, somehow this post seemed like it was going to be somewhat cheerier when I started, but now I'm bummed about my own little foibles. I hope the insurance crap gets fixed soon - methinks I ought to get my ass back into therapy... heh.

Ah, well. Enough for now.

G'night!

Natural Connections...

Yesterday there wasn't so much time to blog, so I kept it simpler and didn't mention the phenomenal thing that occurred. Today, I don't have much time either, but I don't want to leave it. I wouldn't want to forget to include it in this little "diary" of mine.

As we drove home from picking up Jareth at my in-laws' house after his New Year's overnight, there was a point where ahead of us where a car had its blinkers on and was stopped in the oncoming lane. It was a reasonably heavily trafficked road with one lane going each way. On one side is homes - high-priced jobbers in what used to be a nicely forested area, so there are still lots of trees. On other parts of the road there is still some forest preserve left as well. Across the street from those houses, however, is a small horse "farm" where people can take riding lessons I guess, and a bunch of houses and small subdivisions.

It was what was crossing the road at the time that caught our attention. We slowed, but he had already crossed by the time we arrived at that part of the road. The car that had stopped was pulling off the road (hopefully so they could just watch or see that he didn't get hit by passing cars), as other cars slowed as they passed him by.

My heart raced and my breath caught in my throat as I, for just a moment, felt him - the proud, unafraid stag that stood calmly at one side of the road.

We thought about stopping, pulling over to gape at this beautiful creature still wild and natural. I couldn't though, I didn't want to take the risk of something bad happening. All manner of terrible possibilities ran through my head. If I'd had my camera with me at the time, I might have stopped and snapped a few quick pictures from a distance, but I didn't. So I moved on, happy to remember the stag as I had seen it. Hopeful that it would find a safe haven in which to hide from the "progress" of our civilization as it rapes its way across the countryside, leaving strip malls and subdivisions in its wake. Pleased to have had the chance to see a creature still wild - not broken and behind the bars of a zoo.

For just that one moment though, I connected. I knew, or perhaps remembered, what it was like to be such an animal. It was breathtaking.

And then, sadly, I returned to the moment and moved on.

But I won't forget.

Goodnight.

Phone Talk...

Well, he definitely understands what the phone is... oh yep! My uncle called to wish us a happy new year's and since Jareth has been playing quite happily recently with the play phone I found him for Christmas, I thought it was worth a try to see if he really understood it yet.

In the end, there was many tears shed upon the ending of the call and removal of the phone from his little fingers. I tried several times to get it back, but once he realized that that phone (which is cordless and not too dissimilar from the one I found for him) was way cooler, there was no way he wanted to let it out of his hands for more than a second or two. I'd get it to my ear and he'd have to have it back so he could press it to his ear again and say "hewo" in that wonderful little voice of his. He'd listen to my uncle chatting with him on the other end and chatter back at him in that sweet little kid language that I wish I could understand.

It was absolutely adorable. I think we are far less likely to have a problem with him not liking the phone, but instead we may end up with a little phone "addict" instead. LOL. We shall wait and see.

That's all for tonight though...

G'night!