I finally got my blood work done...the blood work that I should have had done in July. *ahem* I"m getting the cholesterol, the hba1c, and this time, a test for rheumatoid factor for the arthritis. The PA looked at my knuckles and said she could see a nodule on my middle finger, but in looking at both my middle fingers, they match, so I think that it's just how I look. My rings are tighter though and the aching some days is exhausting, and my hands are swollen, much like my mother's used to be. Apparently, there are new drugs that can stop the progression of the disease, so if that's the case, I'll take that, but only if I have rheumatoid versus osteo arthritis.

It sucks to be in a position to be wishing I have rheumatoid versus osteo arthritis, frankly.

I sent packages out and while all my relatives got cards, none of my friends did. My rolodex is on my computer and with all the brown outs, I couldn't run the computer to get my rolodex. I sent a box to my mom and one to Betty, but I forgot to put in relish, but didn't know if she was a relish person or not, so wasn't sure if I should torture her or not. I did include some organic yummies in there, so she'll still love me. Additionally, I got an awesome box from Harsh Betty -- chile pepper stuff like crazy and really neat goodies. I think my favorite thing was the homemade Christmas tree ornament. I didn't send her an xmas tree ornament, so I suck, but on the up side, I also swallow, which just goes to blow ya that a Merry Christmas can be had by all.

Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays and have a great new year!

It was a rough weekend with the weather we had. There was terrible terrible wind here. We were without power for 10 hours in the middle of a blizzard on Saturday evening. I drove in sleet to Kmart to lay in supplies and when I drove back it was snowing heavily. Mike had the fire going full blast and cooked sausages on shish kabob sticks for the kids. I stopped at McD's on the way back and bought a cheeseburger for me, as well as $100 worth of foods-we-could-stick-in-the-garage-to-keep-cold, hot dog buns, batteries, water, and a lantern/flashlight. When I came home, I hauled in an armful of wood for the fireplace. I've decided that if we buy a house around here, we are getting one with a backup heating source for winter.

Genny hadn't been feeling better and we took her to the urgent care on Saturday and she had a temp of 104.9 when I took her in. They gave her ibuprofen and checked her ears and low and behold, she had double ear infections again. I went to an ENT on Tuesday and he said that if she gets another ear infection in the next few weeks that yes, tubes would probably be warranted. Ladawn and I have been concerned about her speech and now, the recurring ear infections of late have been making me worry. We have an audiology appointment after xmas and a followup with the ENT.

And it's official, I'm going to experiment with grad school and a substitute credential. I'm talking to profs at the local university about obtaining a special education credential and then following that up with an ESL credential.

It's starting to snow AGAIN. Winterwonderland, my ass. You try shoveling this crap and it gets old fast.

I keep thinking though as I drive by the mountains and see the ever growing heaps of snow all around us, that there's a poem in it, but then again, I could just be suffering from cabin fever or insanity.

We saw the sun yesterday and I felt like a crack whore in need of a fix. It was 40 degrees or colder all day, and I was tempted to tear off all my clothes and dance naked through the snow just to get some sunshine on my body. I suppose when the horrified neighbors came over to ask me to please clothe myself because while the sun was blinding enough reflecting off the snow and they didn't need to see my bright white naked ass prancing about, I'd have had to forego my worship of the sun god and go back to my boring mediocre monotheistic existence, but it was kind of tempting. (Darn that jealous God thing!) Speaking of God, I saw my old priest at Costco today and then realized how much I miss my church and how I'm going to kick my husband's big fat butt out of bed on Sunday and we're going. It's not all his fault. I like sleeping, too, but I really want to go to church. I've missed counting off the advent sundays and the lighting of the advent candles -- a lot. We have an advent calendar, but we haven't been cruising the bible as much as I would like.

Why oh why did I look outside? What am I, some kind of sick masochist? It's snowing a-freakin-gain. There's also wind. I looked down south to these two big peaks and they were just aswirl with wind and snow. This doesn't bode well for this incoming storm. I guess the snow blown all over the roads again should have tipped me off some, too. Aw, sheee-it, now the snow is blowing off the roof, too! What sucks is that it's only December. We still have 5 more months to go of winter and already, I'm sick to death of it. Mostly, I'm just hating the cold because I have a hard time keeping warm. With my feet so dry though, I am enjoying the warmth of wool socks, though feeling like a creaky grandma regarding drafts. If there's even a mild draft from anywhere, I can find it. It creeps down my neck like dry snow and slithers down my back and settles against my spine like a leech to suck me dry of warmth.

I have to go brave the office depot in the next town to send my folks their box ups 2nd day. Maybe I'll wait for the hubbins to come home and we'll eat out, being that I forgot to put in the roast. :)

Russell had the scaries last night. He came in at 5AM and crawled into bed with me, claiming that he'd heard footsteps outside. Mike went out and verified that there was nothing and that it was just the rain dropping heavily from the eaves. We're having a big storm with a lot of wind, so it makes the house sound creepy. As everyone's favorite neighborhood insomniac, I had been awake since 430AM, so it was okay to see him. Of course, him getting up, got Genny up, so I had to send her to the grumpy mo0se on the other side of the bed to get help putting her sleeper back on.

When Russell just asked if everyone could sleep together, mo0se groused on the other side of the bed and growled that everyone was to return to their own beds. He made Genny bawl her head off, so he had to get up and comfort her and tuck her in. Russell asked to keep his door open, we said that was fine, but to close our door (so our alarm didn't wake up everyone at 615. Mike will sleep through the alarm, however, that's what gets me up.

Genny, I'd expected to see because she had her flu shot yesterday and was running a bit of a fever last night and she was content to curl up on Daddy's lap, while Russell played video games.

This morning, I got a relief -- I got "terminated." When the shit hit the fan at Thanksgiving with recent events, I was sorely wishing I didn't have to work and with as little as I've been sleeping, my customer service skills were certainly less than stellar, I'm sure. They apologized profusely for having to let me go, but I talked to my boss afterwards and told her all the stuff that had been going on and she said she was glad that I could stay home and take care of kids. I am, too. They both said that if they heard of stuff, they'd let me know, but with all state budgets as tight as they are, I am not expecting much. I keep thinking I should be upset, but I'm not. The biggest problem is when we discovered that Mike had a huge raise it was after I'd already made the commitment to work.

I have been tossing around substitute teaching, and I think I'm going to stop tossing it and start doing it. I have my CBEST from years ago, which still should be valid. I have to pay for my fingerprinting, but once it's done, it's done. I can choose my hours, go to school part-time, work part-time or stay home with the kids for the time being until Russell calms down. I don't know what I want to do, but for now, I'm planning on a quiet holiday. I'll start putting things together for the sub credential and then try it for a bit and then see if I want to add anything more to the mix. I'm also going to talk to this place that does skills evaluation and helps you find your niche in the world. I feel so lost lately, so this would be a good thing for me to do.

I woke up at 330AM sneezing in my sleep with my nose running like a sieve. I got up and took sudafed and crawled back into bed.
I am taking my sudafed, and have started to bulk up on my asthma meds. I just hope I don't end up on prednisone, and thus, insulin because I don't want to have to take insulin and syringes with me to work. It freaks people out a lot. Hell, it freaks me out.

I also hope I don't drip snot inadvertently on someone while I'm helping them with their computer, as that would be just icky. I already had a snot slip up once this morning, when I bent over to get a spoon in the kitchen. As I bent over I could feel an un-snivelable steam of snot go slipping willy-nilly out my nostril. You know you're in trouble when you've got snot leaving your body involuntarily.

And last night, we had the family conference about my new work schedule in January. We talked about how my hours would change and that I'd be working 9-6 or 10-7, daily and that that would mean that we'd have to work as a team together to make things work. We also talked about the fact that the more overtime I get to work, the more money we can put against a house and the more likely it is that we can stay where we are and not move Bear out of his school.

We're talking serious incentive here. We all agreed that we'd just keep telling ourselves that it was for the house and we could all hang in there for six months, if we knew at the end we could buy a house in the town where we are and not have to move elsewhere. I offered to print out a picture of a house, so we could keep the goal in mind, but everyone was positively drooling over the idea, so I think we'll just use it as our family mantra until my session time is up.

I think I've done everything I can towards our safety. I've done all the physical stuff and I'm praying. I pray that God chooses to keep us safe because we've done all the sensible footwork in the interim.

Bruno and I met last night, and I felt more empowered as a result. And that's a good thing. Work's been busy, so I don't have time to dwell on how scared I feel, thankfully.

I love my husband, my kids, my family, and I'm just counting each daily blessing as I go. I got to have lunch with Genny and Daddy today. I got to make Russell laugh this morning, after he'd had a complete meltdown. I got to eat a BLT for lunch, which is a guilty pleasure. We're broke again, but most of the bills are paid, so I don't care. If I got the check I'm supposed to for the contract work, we'd be in much better shape!

I found out yesterday that I can put our address on a hazard watch, so if we call 911, they'll automatically send out a sheriff. And Russell and I had a conversation about him being scared in which I said, it wasn't likely that we'd see him, but it was possible, so therefore, we had to warn him. He wasn't totally thrilled with that, but it seemed more comforting to him, so it was a start.

Genny cut up two of the squares I'd done the night before, so I spent hours last night trying to redo them and I ended up with three squares, one of which was correct, the other two had fabric faced in the wrong direction, so I'll have to pull them apart and redo them again. *the sound of hair being ripped from a scalp*

I should have just quilted the other quilt, but I was really mad about her wrecking these squares, so I just started redoing them. Of course, the fact that I couldn't find yet another spool of cream colored expensive quilting thread probably contributed to me not quilting and continuing to struggle valiantly with the square directions. I am thinking I might just blow off the original idea and put the non-directional fabric in the crucial directional location, so that I can ignore its direction. I could use the blocks I have, I am sure and just slip them in there and then go the easier route for the rest of the quilt.

I am totally blowing off making the dress until after Christmas. For $15, I bought a pretty velour dress at JC Penney outlet that should do fine for the Christmas party this weekend. I could just wear last year's dress, but a pretty princess dress doesn't work at a Speakeasy party theme thing as well as velour could. Mind you, I'm not titless enough to wear a flapper dress, so I'm not going to try. I do have a super long string of faux pearls I can wear that will work toward that thematic thing and then I've got a dress I can use a million times through the winter and it's purple, which next to most shades of teal, is up there amongst my favorite colors.

Speaking of purple...

I told Mike I wanted a purple hat and he got me one, but it was not what I wanted because it wouldn't stay on my head and then had this long tassle coming off it with heavy beads. Never mind that it just was something I'd never wear, though if it'd stay on my head, I'd keep it, but mostly, it wasn't functional. It had no means of remaning on my head because of how it was knitted and then the heavy bead tassle would have either been pulling it off my head or thwacking me upside the head as I walked, neither of which would be cool. He got it because it had won a prize and with all the beads, he thought I'd like it. If it hadn't cost $70, I'd have kept it and been quiet, but he had to tell me how much it cost because I'm the bills person and I just said, it wasn't worth it to keep it for that much money because it wouldn't do what I needed which was to keep my head warm. Then I felt like a big awful bitch because he'd tried, but he didn't seem upset about it and said for the money, I should get what I want.

I have a very cool husband.

Nightmares abound in our house.

I have been having this one where a strange balding man with longish blonde hair and bulging blue eyes shows up at our door and he's grinning through the window and I smile back thinking to myself,"What does this redneck want?" As I get to the door, I realize that Mike's dad is with this man and I simply couldn't see him through the curtain and shadows at the door. I tell Mike,"Call 911!" and my whole body goes into fight or flight mode. Invariably, I wake up shaking and terrified.

I always get up, pee, and check the kids and shuffle back to bed, where I toss and turn until I have to wake up for work. We've told daycares, the school, and our employers. We are doing everything to protect the kids. We had the stranger danger conversation with Russell. He's scared, but he knows what to say if he's alone for some reason. There have been two times this fall where he didn't listen to the instructions and he didn't go to daycare like he should and he was home alone. He had the good sense to call Mike at his number on the fridge and Mike came home and stayed with him, so all told he was only alone for 20 minutes, but it sure scared the crap out of us. So we told him what to do, if someone called. We told him to tell them that we were out in the garage working on something and to take a message and we'd call them back.

Last night, I went and saw The Santa Clause 2 with my friend, Mel. It was a cute movie, but it meant missing the kids goodnight rituals. Neither of them slept well. Mike said Genny got up until 10 looking for me. At 11, Russell came out claiming he needed a drink of water, which is something he never does. He saw me there and said hi and went back to bed.

Mike and I were in bed, having our nightly good night giggle and snuggles, including something where he said he wanted to rub my butt and I told him he could rub my feet because they were ice cubes. He claimed that wasn't possible and then I put my icicles on his thighs whereupon he cussed and covered them up to warm them up and we were both giggling. Enter Russell sobbing and telling us between tears he wasn't sleeping because he was having nightmares. I lifted up the blankets and had him get into bed with me and cuddled him. He told me that a man shot him. Wow.

So, I had Mike get up and lock all the doors, I told Russell to ask God to keep him safe and let him sleep, and most of all, I told him I love him.

I'm seeing Bruno on Wednesday and I told him I needed help formulating a plan of safety.

I think I might be brewing a strong cup of depression -- not sleeping and not interested in sex are good indicators of that. And the sex is totally unrelated to Mike. I just don't care. Even if I get to caring, the strength of my response is pretty luke warm. And to get me to care, Mike has to do cartwheels, which hardly seems fair to him. It's also not fair to me because I have to sort of force a reaction, kind of like you would if you walked into a surprise party that you already knew about.

Part of it, I realize, is that I haven't been working out much in the past week or so and LaDawn has asked to put our exercising activities on hold until January. I asked Mike if he would mind dealing with kids alone three days a week, so I could get to the pool and work out. He said yeah, but I know it's going to suck for all concerned. He's such a grumpy bear in the mornings and the kids are a handful, even with both of us there, but if I don't do this, I'm going to feel like shit and my sugars will go to shit. I can already tell I've put on some extra belly in the past couple weeks, so this is not good.

But the sex is something else. I don't know if I should be rabidly reading a Cosmo for cool ways to spice up my love life or just running to my nearest mental health professional.

I called Bruno, as he helped us with Russell. I know I've been feeling really overwhelmed and ambivalent about being a stay-at-home mom and even about working, so I need some help sorting this stuff out. I'm sure that insecurity I'm feeling about what I want to be when I grow up is playing a role in this, too, but I'm not feeling okay and I don't know why.

I have been really contending with my age lately and that's been difficult for some reason, too. I've also not been to church since Easter, which I miss terribly. I just feel full of regrets and grief lately and I am not sure where it's all coming from.

Today, I've been singing "Java." I got a good night's sleep, and I didn't have to do kids today, so I was just so destressed.

I love coffee, I love tea. I love the Java Bug and it loves me.

I figured out the books today and the more amazing news for the year is that we should have all of our credit cards paid by the end of February. Yesterday, I got all cocky and filled out one of those mortgage things online. I was just curious...can we actually qualify if we have a buttload of credit cards paid off and we have nothing but a car payment and student loans. Of course, between us, we have three-fourths of a house in student loans.

We'll see if curiosity kills the dream.

And the sick baby is home. She was home for Thanksgiving, I believe. I have been quilting madly to get the hand stuff done and hopefully will have it all pat by the weekend. I'm also piecing a quilt for a co-worker. I do some piecing, take a break and then quilt the other one.

I know, I know. I swore I'd never piece again, but I got this good idea and I made my own design and picked out the coolest fabrics and I just don't know what the hell I was thinking, but I sure do enjoy it a lot more when I'm doing it for myself and not some ungodly deadly for nazi quilt teachers. I'm also finding that the cutting is so much better now -- I do it as I need it and I am a lot more accurate. Practice makes Perfect.

I do enjoy hand quilting, but I feel rather inept at it and I really desperately need a smaller loom to work on for my short arms.

I just wish I had a lot more time. I'm so short on it lately.

I just figured out our percentage of debt versus credit offered and while right now it's 70%, we're getting this big fat check next week that will change that to more like 50%. This amazes me. A year ago, it was 91%.

Total wow.

Dear Sue,

This morning, I saw your boyfriend. He was wearing one of those fake leather jackets, worn open, with his work uniform unkempt and unbuttoned underneath, showing his wrinkly t-shirt. He was chinless and balding. He could be Santa with the right beard. Of course, I have always seen your boyfriends outside of java joints and there he was outside of Joe's this morning looking like you'd already ravaged him.

I got a double mocha this morning and while I was standing waiting for my coffee from the latest example of bohemian 18-22 year olds in the area -- the flaming gay man with the black curly hair just got me off on this brain tangent, remembering the boytoy we hooked Eric up with, who you wanted so badly to be straight because damn, he was cute! You were shattered when I talked to him and discovered what I believed all along, that he was very very homosexual.

I wonder how things turned out for him...if he avoided contracting AIDS because he was kind of slutty and not always careful. I sure as hell hope so. I remember talking to Eric a year or two back and hearing that a couple he'd known and introduced me to, were both dying from AIDS -- Baby was one of the names and then I remembered Dan Foster, the guy next door who did die from AIDS and how he let us be part of his life and his death. I'll never forget as long as I live how he cried when I hugged him because everyone had been afraid to touch him and I wasn't afraid and it had been so long since he'd been touched that he burst into tears. I remember when he came to my poetry reading and that you'd given me the "fuck me now" black dress, so I could be a bit Bohemian because afterall it was a poetry reading in a coffee shop. He'd been able to sit through my reading and we sat through a few more and he just couldn't hack it any more because it hurt for him to be up for too long. I remember offering to share a soda with him and him freaking out that he might give me his disease through saliva because the research was so sketchy still and he didn't want to take any chances and how sobering that felt.

Remember Mr. Kennedy whose poetry was all about fucking his girlfriend and was so hideous that we had to stifle laughter as he screamed it? I still have the limericks we wrote that made fun of him in one of my books.

I will never forget how we found out about Dan. He simply wasn't at the halfway house any more. We weren't family, so they wouldn't tell us anything other than Dan wasn't there to visit. We checked the hospital and he wasn't there either. We both knew he'd gone.

Sometimes, being an adult is hard. I feel odd walking into my java shop in my suit and hose. I want to scream at all those kids dressed in black with purple hair reading poetry,"This isn't really me! I am just as Bohemian as you!" Then, I add sarcastically,"Yeah, and look how I turned out. Married to an engineer, two kids, and a suit job." I have a hard time reconciling my old life with my new life, as the married computer nerd domestic goddess meets the Bohemian poetry writing political activist ex-prostitute.

Anyway, I saw your boyfriend today and thought of you over mocha.

Love,
RN Ruby

Overall, Thanksgiving went well, though the kitchen didn't actually regain pristine levels of cleanliness til about 10PM last night. We still have a few small loads of laundry to finish, but hey, we're getting there.

I did get the house Christmas decorated. I got lights strung outside. I just put the usual icicle lights across the front and I have this cool angel which I really dig, which also got hung. It looked pretty cool, actually. I've got two light up candles in the window -- just plain clear lights, and the tree of course.

On Friday, Mike went with LaDawn's husband to get firewood. I had jokingly mentioned he should get a Christmas tree while he was out there and then told him, no, nevermind, I'd get one at a grocery store for $20, after remembering last year'sfiasco. He brought home a 12 foot tree. I reminded him that we only have a 7.5 foot ceiling. He said he'd chainsaw it down to size. On Saturday, when he finally brought in what was left of our Christmas tree, I suggested that he take it back outside and I'd go buy one as I had originally planned. He said,"But it's a Charlie Brown tree and we shouldn't fall victim to blatant commericialism." I said,"That's not a Charlie Brown tree, that's firewood. It has no bottom, honey and at this point, only one-third of a front." He tried to tell me that the branches would relax and it would fill out. I gave him that "you've got to be freakin' kidding me look" and got in the car and drove to Raleys, where I bought a nice bushy tree for $24.99.

I have decorated many Charlie Brown trees. I'm good at it. I've spent years broker than hell, so I'm the Queen of the Bargain Christmas Tree, but this was beyond repair and there was no amount of decorating that would have brought it back from the abyss. We're talking about one good branch, here folks. We spent Saturday evening with Genny breaking lots of glass ornaments, decorating the store-bought tree. It was Sunday, before Mike admitted that indeed he'd butchered the tree and that the store-bought one was really nice.

Yesterday, our last day before returning to work and school and the same old routine, we went to the cheapy breakfast place -- 99 cents for eggs, toast, hash browns, and bacon. We walked across the street to the ice rink and rented skates. Mike decided after making it about 20 feet hugging the wall that he was too fat, tall, and old to learn to skate. I was in agony with the figure skates that squished my feet, so I asked a woman wearing hockey skate if she liked them and traded my figure skates in for hockey skates and did a lot better. It's not quite like riding a bicycle, but after a few rounds, I got more steady on my skates and had fun. Genny really couldn't hack the whole skate thing and Mike and I were unsteady enough to not really be able to help her much. I tried to skate a little bit with her, but that was when I had the figure skates and the pain was unbearable, so next time we're going to buy her those adjustable strap on skates for kiddies and let her hang with momma that way. I just don't skate well with a 35 lb weight around my knees, regardless of skates, and honestly, I was terrified that I'd fall on her and kill us both. The mercy was that a woman who was really good on her skates, grabbed Genny and let her piddle around on the ice and took her on little "rides" and Genny loved that. We'd tried hanging over the side and taking her up and down, but she really loved the rides. Russell did pretty well on his own, once he got past the initial bitching, and he made several circuits of the rink.

Then we braved the mall, which was a bit crowded, but not bad. I had to go to the body shop and get some shampoo and while I was there, I picked up presents for folks. That's kitty corner from the Disney Store, so of course, I went there, too. We ate lunch and headed home.

Truthfully, I could have stayed out longer, but that's only because of my escapism. While Grammy and Pop were here for Thanksgiving, the parole date for Mike's dad was mentioned. He'll be out in 10 days from today. No hearing, he'll just be released. We've already discussed that we'll start locking the house, something we've never done where we live because we're out in the middle of nowhere and everyone knows everyone. We're also going to have to inform daycare and Mike's employer, so that no information inadvertently gets released. We've been very careful whenever we've been up by his grandparents not to use my last name for anything. We've either paid with Mike's credit card or with cash.

They are going to limit what county he can reside in, and we're hoping that he'll actually stay there, but that's only for 2.5 years. He could learn a lot about us in the interim. He may even learn that he's got grandchildren and that's what we fear most.

So, we're going to my mother-in-law's wedding. Inherently, this isn't a bad thing, but I am always dreadfully nervous around Mike's family and I invariably feel like I never fit in, so it's hard (read "a complete and total bitch and a half).

However, on the good news front, Mike and I talked about it and we bought his older brother's ticket to go. That means that Chris will be inherently nice to us, which is a cool thing. Also, we'd told his mom initially that she could help us pay it, but when he didn't need a bus ticket, too, we gave that to her as a wedding present. Her wedding present is that she gets all four sons at her wedding.

Mike says we've killed two birds with one stone because we don't have to buy Chris or Mom a Christmas gift now. I'm all over that. Of course, I'm spending a fortune on Mike this year. I took his original star wars poster to a framing place and am getting it cleaned up, matted, and framed for him for Christmas. I told him I was spending a lot on his Christmas gift, but that he wasn't to spend an equivalent amount of money on me. Mostly, I just want a homemade wool hat from this local artisans' group. My head gets cold when I walk in the mornings because it's 20 freakin' degrees at 545AM and I realize it's a simple thing, but it's important to me, too.

I figure I look all scary with my hood pulled up and I don't like how most of my hoods fall over my eyes and don't seal onto my head very well. Call me old and cranky, but I don't like being cold and when my head and hands get cold, I feel like I'm living in a frigidaire all day long.

My office doesn't help that because I'm pretty sure it is a frigidaire. I've taken to wearing two layers when I go in in the morning because otherwise I freeze my bippy off. No, I don't know what a bippy is, but I'm guessing it's cold, okay?

I've got to do some light shopping today at lunch for Thanksgiving and I think we're out of money, which is only because I've been spending it hand over foot and not tracking it at all because I haven't figured out how to work and do that, too, but I'm going to talk to Mike and make a plan. I think honestly it would help if I could just get my PDA stand to work and then I could track that stuff in spare moments, of which there are a couple, at work. There's some down time with this job -- because people's computers don't break all the time and the legislature isn't always in session either.

Lately, however, the thing of note in our house is vermin. That's right, folks, vermin. We've got mice. Lotsa mice. I had one nonchalantly skipping across my livingroom on Sunday. I trapped it in the china cupboard and then realized that there wasn't much I was willing to do to kill it that involved bludgeoning it with my squeamish 9 year old completely flipping out about our visiting rodent at my shoulder. I unobviously let it out and tried to encourage the cat to kill it, but the cat, who hasn't been inside much since she was a kitten was completely freaked about being brought inside in the first place and just ran back out the door to the great outdoors, which to her was much more of a known variable.

I went out to the garage and found my big bag of mousetraps, and I got out the big jumbo jar of peanutbutter and I baited a bunch of traps and put them down. The one on the side of the fridge was sprung on Monday. However, the mouse in it was large and gray. The mouse we'd seen was small and brown, which made me come to realize if you can see 1 mouse, there are 20 of its partying friends you're not seeing, so I checked the towel drawers for mouse poo and to my chagrin, noted that yes, they'd been sleeping and shitting in my towels again. So I emptied out the back of both towel drawers and dropped in baited traps.

So yesterday, the back of drawer number 2 had a mouse that appeared similar in stature and color to the little varmit that had been in the livingroom on Sunday. Nonetheless, the traps remain baited and ready for some mousehuntin' and killin'. Last night, Mike thought to mention that we should probably wash the china. I told him, that yes, we probably should, but we weren't going to do that until Turkey Day because I wanted to be POSITIVE that no sneaky shitting little gray or brown little rodent had been anywhere near the china I was serving Thanksgiving dinner on. He agreed and we both shuddered and made grimaces and went to bed.

Anyhow, I am thankful for my friends -- online and in the flesh, my family (even my in-laws), and mousetraps. Have a Happy Thanksgiving!

I know it's not cool and I know it's probably unamerican, but I really really can't stand George Bush.

I am highly suspicious that he and his dad sat down one night and the conversation went something like this.

Dad: "So how's the White House, son? Did you find any cum stains in the oval office from that slut Clinton?"
Son: "No, nothing like that. I found a few condoms in odd places all over the place, but that was about it."
Dad:"Are you going to kick that Saddamn Hussein's ass for me, now? I don't think I was ever more embarrassed about how that whole Gulf War thing worked out, you know?"
Son:"You betcha, Dad! What do you think we ought to tell people? That ole Sad-ass is a goshdurned terrorist?"
Dad:"Heck yeah!"
Son: "I'll get right on that for you, Daddy."

I am all for stamping out terrorism, but allowing Saudi Arabia and Pakistan to bullshit their way out of their connections to some of these militants is just wrong and the hypocrisy pisses me off.

And lets not start into the series of legislative stuff I have been hearing on news that has been postponed until next year when the republican congress will approve it -- much of it designed to benefit the wealthy and privileged and to make the rest of us bend over and bark, baby. Lately, I've been a bit peeved about the terrorism insurance law because they are saying that it'll stimulate the economy that all those building projects that have stalled due to this will kick back in. They said how much money it'll save consumers, but of course, the assumption is that the cost savings will actually get passed on to the consumer. With the insurance industry in the mess it's in, pessimistic me, I am figuring that's a load of crap.

I am also very nervous about what Bush said recently in a press conference regarding some of the guys he wants confirmed for judge positions...basically that he can call some of these highly anti-abortion, anti-civil rights judges to the floor and get them confirmed, which means a lot of political losses for both those causes.

I didn't vote for the bastard, and I wasn't fond of voting for Al Gore, but G. W. Bush makes me frightened for this country and our future.

When I came home from class on Saturday night, I walked into a disheveled house that had no dinner cooking. I was exhausted and asked Mike to just take me somewhere to get some food. So he did. We went out to something I totally expected would be rather lousy low-end food, but it was good and when I got home, I quilted for half a hour, fell asleep in the chair, and then got up around 9 and went to bed. I have no memory of Michael coming or going in the room, except when I started awake when he came in the room once. I woke up at 8AM, and felt like I could still sleep another million years.

Mike asked,"Why are you so tired?" I looked at him and said,"Well, it probably has something to do with a 40 hour work week, 11 hours of class, and endless amounts of homework, plus house chores." He had this blank look, realizing he was dangerously close to a death wish, and said,"Yeah, I forgot you had so much class, this week." I thought he'd been pretty diplomatic considering his brush with death.

He got to go be a lumberjack all day because he went to BLM land with LaDawn's husband and got firewood for us. Hunt, gather, repeat.

I went to Costco and bought Thanksgiving fixin's and dragged two children through the horror that is Costco. The most exciting part of the day was the drive to Costco.

Genny, who'd been happily munching on an apple, starts to yell from the back seat with a rather nasal sound,"My nose, mama, my nose." She's just getting over a cold and as I reached for the spare napkins in the glove compartment, I said,"Oh, you need to blow your nose, sweetie?" "No, mama, my nose!" "You need to blow your nose?" "No, mama, apple ma nose!" "You hit your nose with your apple? Okay, honey, be careful not to do that." "No, mama, apple in ma nose." I said blithely,"An apple can't fit in your nose." Genny says insistently,"Yeah, mama, apple in ma nose."

I look over my shoulder in time to see her finger up her nose trying to fish the apple out. We stopped to get gas, and I had her blow her nose a bunch until the apple chunk came out far enough to yank out of her nose. "Genny, please don't put things up your nose. Bad baby...you can get hurt." "Kay, mama."

Weird little baby. Half an hour later, I look down in time to see her putting the straw from her sippy cup up her nose.

Mama sighed.

When I drove home yesterday, after having spent a fortune at Joann's Fabrics yesterday, purchasing fabric to make our dresses for the wedding, I realized how totally ballistically excited I was at the prospect of making Genny's and my dresses. Bizarre, I realize, but nonetheless, there ya go. This is my dress and Genny's is rather similar. I like the design of the one in pink without the braiding. I will also not be using the bottom ruffle. For fabrics, I picked out this for our bodices. Genny will have a dark purple satin skirt and I'll have lavendar. I bought some white and silver snowflake lace to go on the sleeves for both of us, so it should be pretty lovely.

Of course, at the same time I realized how much I was looking forward to sewing for Genny and me, I also realized how much I have loathed these quilting classes because of the one snippy condescending instructor. I think I wouldn't mind quilting if I knew I wasn't under some kind of ridiculous deadline and that I could take the time to do things more accurately. I further realized what I was looking forward to, was handquilting, but I still don't really know how to do that, so I am going to be trying it out on Katen's quilt. (CS -- hope you like it!) In the middle of this, I think the biggest bitch is that my machine essentially just up and died. It's reparable, but I think it's been going for a while, so it's sure made doing patchwork a pain. The face of the quilt is done, so I just have to get the padding cut out right and the backing and then quilt the face to them. I got out the quilting ring and stand out last night and I was getting all giddy with excitement. Then I realized I was just different from those in my quilting class. I just think there's something wrong with doing a straight machine quilt. I think that it's fine to piece with a machine, because it'll hold the seams better, but using the machine to do all the quilting bugs me. I even think it's cool to use the machine to do some of the quilting. I will probably use the machine on the outside to hold the thing together, so I can get to the middle and do the quilting I have in my head by hand.

To me quilting something for someone is about taking the time and energy to not only piece the thing, but to quilt it. In fact, I think that the act of quilting something is more important. My old neighbor's mother used to take solids and quilt them all by hand. Her designs were intricate and beautiful and I could see myself doing that and really enjoying it. Whenever I mentioned handquilting in class, people groaned, rolled their eyes, and said,"oh, that's too much work."

I guess that's the point to me. If you're going to go through all that hassle to cut this thing out and piece all these pieces just so, why wouldn't you handquilt it, even a little?

This change from mother to crone that I am starting to move into is interesting to me because I am finding out things about me -- like how much I like using my hands. I need to remember this as I fight with my diabetes. I need my sugars good, so I don't lose my eyes or my hands, so I can do the handquilting and sewing and cooking and canning.

I have been in an odd spot regarding my mother-in-law's wedding in January. My husband didn't seem to really want to go and I thought he should, but it needed to be his decision, so I said okay to whatever he said. I have purposely shut my big fat mouth about it because I would rather pull my innards through my nose than be involved in that decision. My mother thought it was odd that he didn't want to go to his mom's wedding, but I wasn't going to make him go, if he didn't want to go and while personally I'd just ruther not, it's his choice because it's his mom and his money.

I have told him that if he wanted to go that I would juggle the money so he could. Mike called his older brother to invite him for Thanksgiving -- more of a courtesy call than anything. His brother asked him about the wedding. Mike and I talked about it and he kept asking me what I thought, and I kept saying, "I think I will make the money work for whatever you want to do." He finally said very quietly,"I'd like to go."

So that big fat credit card we just paid off is now run back up again. *sigh* Easy come, easy go. The thing is as soon as we get the check for the contract work, we'll be able to pay it back off again. We have tickets, hotel reservations and car reservations, now however, so whee.

It means taking off two precious days of work just as the folks I'm supposed to support are showing up, but in exchange I am not taking any days off in December. I will have to work Christmas Eve and the day after Christmas, but it should be slow, so I'll live through it. I will just have to do Christmas on the weekends in preparation, and thankfully, I will have frozen cookie dough to let Mike and the kids do cookies.

The kind of cool thing is that I will get to sew a nice dress. Now, I just have go pick one out to sew. I think whatever I do, will be something I make for both Genny and I and we'll match and it'll be something wintry, without being totally Christmas.

Java Joe's slid down this morning like love in my tummy. Double mocha...even the words slide across the tongue and infer a sensuality that normally exists between sheets not between lid and mug. Did I mention, I'm a coffee slut?

I walked early this morning and I made LaDawn turn the other way, so we headed south where the dark sky still held some hope in the back of my mind that indeed, the Leonids might show themselves. As we turned west and north, we saw the full moon hover over the snow-capped mountains. When we turned south, the sun was just starting to press her light into the canvas of sky and as I glanced over my shoulder, the moon was brighter and the mountains were tinged pink. LaDawn and I turned and stopped and we both said,"Wow" at the same time. Usually, we talk the entire walk, but we both fell silent this morning after that.

I gave her a bag of clothes from my car -- a combination of stuff for her oldest, things for the younger girl in the daycare, and a few things she'd loaned Genevieve, when Gen's clothes had gotten thrashed playing, and we wished each other a good day.

I think sometimes in the course of realizing God's gradeur, I am surprised at how quiet I become.

CS's baby may be home soon...her sugars are normalizing, finally. Her mom will have a whole bucket of blessings to count over Thanksgiving, if that baby comes home. The baby seems to have suffered a somewhat nebulous "birth trauma" which makes me feel angry, because she was born c-section. What did that hospital DO to that child?

Katen's quilt is coming along though. I prayed as I finished the row last night. I enjoy setting the pictures just so. I just would like to say "NYAH!" to naysayers of the one-way fabric and fussy-cutting. There's something elegant in the calculation of each piece and its facing.

Katen, moonset, sunrise -- grand blessings.

I got to do something today...fixed someone's access problem. It was just nice to be useful and helpful.

This job is going to be a total blast.

Today, I bought a mug at Java Joe's. I ordered a double mocha to be placed in said mug. Getting a coffee mug at a coffee joint near where I work makes it seem more real. I'm a caffeinated working stiff and all. I'm getting to be coffee's bitch again. Bounce a styrofoam cup lid off my head and call me Joe's Ho, and I'm all hot and bothered, don't ya know.

I got up last night at 130AM and watched the Leonids Meteor shower in the eastern sky and was pretty disappointed. The full moon was so bright and even though we live in the boonies it was very very bright outside. The other thing was that while there were a lot of meteors -- I saw about 20 in 50 minutes, they weren't really amazing particularly - just short bursts of light here and there. I am sure that to some that the fact that it was 20 degrees and I was freezing my ass off, contributed to my lukewarm perception of this meteor shower.

This summer with the Perseids, I saw a couple of shooters that started at the horizon and fizzled at the zenith above my head and they were so astounding...definitely of the ooh and aah variety. The most interesting of the ones I saw last night was a very short and bright one that turned bright orange and green. The rest were pretty much garden variety meteors. The last one I saw was this morning just above the western horizon at 6AM and it was kind of amazing in its loneness...just that one single last hurrah over the western horizon, where the full moon had finally set opposite from where the sun was starting to send slight fingers of light into the dark morning.

Today is the first day at my new job and so far it's been pretty dry and boring and generally that new employee orientation thing.

The remarkable and incredible news is that we got a sudden influx of cash, which I cannot discuss other than to say that it not only bought Christmas, but it also paid off two credit card bills, which totally and completely rocked.

I get paid bi-weekly, which also rocks because I was thinking I was going to be on the once a month state paycheck plan. I get paid the day after Mike does, so that should be rather rockin' and keep us flush.

I talked to Mike's grandparents and barring a snowstorm, they're coming for Thanksgiving. I'm really psyched about that and am hoping for a clear day, so they can come down and relax. I love them both so much and they are so good to the kids. I also know that Mike's mom worries about them being alone, so having them here should alleviate her concerns.

I love Grammy...she tells me she'll call me before T-Day and ask me what to bring. I say,"What do you want to bring?" She says,"Well, all my dishes are packed, so not much." I said,"Good, so you stop at Marie Callenders and bring the pies." To which she laughed and said,"How about you buy the pies and I'll pay you back." Right on!

Besides I know this bakery in Carson City where I can buy the most amazing pies. I'll have to hit Marie's for decent sugar-free for me and Pop though.

The quilt has 5.5 rows complete now. I laid out row 6 last night and only got 3 of 9 squares done, so slowly but surely and ever so painfully, it's coming along. I suspect I'll be up half the night on Friday machine quilting it sufficiently for the grant class and then I will spend the weekend hand quilting messages to the baby it's for.

I found a place across the way from me that offers expresso shots at whim to one's coffee. I had something this morning called a "Sweet Pete" that had chocolate, caramel, and almond flavor added and was way too sweet. Tomorrow, I will attempt the plain latte with a double shot.

Betty, baby, I have found expresso in this state. I have found the joy again in the phrase,"make it a double shot."

800 millgrams of ibuprofen and I'll be your best friend. I'm an advil slut. I know I have arms, because I can see them, but dude, I can't feel them and I tell you, that's a good thing because my wrist and joints ache in my left hand so much, I wish someone would remove my hand and replace it with a pretty bionic one, like they did for Luke Skywalker when Darth cut off his arm.

I've got two rows of 10 done on my quilt. I am going to have to go to quilting class somewhat shamefaced because we are moving to borders tonight, but I am afraid to do more rows because my 9 patches in some instances aren't EVEN close! I did talk to the grant writing teacher though and I can use my quilt as my project, so two birds with one stone. Not only do I get through quilting class, but I get through grant writing, too. Nevermind that there's a baby whose getting lots of prayers and then will have this warm pretty quilt when it's all said and done besides all that. Of course the nine patches might not line up perfectly, but after finishing 43 of 49, I'm feeling a little 9 patched out.

Well, I have to go pick up the monkey and pizza and get everyone ready to get the hell out of here tonight, because while I will be quilting, Genny will be with Daddy at Boy Scouts and I don't expect that will be pretty. I fully expect to find Mike passed out in the recliner when I come home tonight.

My arthritis is killing me today. My hands won't hardly uncurl they hurt so much. I don't know why, but I am trying to be brave about it and avoid drugs. Mostly, I think I am saving them up for the quilt-a-thon later. I've got so much done on it. The star points are finally done -- trimmed and everything. I am only 18 away on the nine patches. I have some the strips cut out already. I have to then measure everything and get the rows sewn together because we start the finishing process this week.

I don't know that I'll have that much time for actual quilting on it. I may just do a little quilting by hand and finish the rest by machine. I am thinking of doing something kind of hokey in the quiliting, but I figure it's a baby quilt, so hokey's okay.

Yesterday, Mike was a butt to me and I went out with LaDawn for a bit. I just didn't want to deal with him or his crap. He knew he was busted when I told him I wasn't staying for dinner. I went and ate pizza with LaDawn and we shopped a little at K-mart. I just bought some dust wipes.

I came in later and both kids were bathed and fed. Amazingly enough, he'd done dishes and wiped the table clean. Essentially, he was working himself up to a big butt kissing. He apologized for screaming at me, but I guess I've been feeling frustrated with his behavior for a few days, so the apology fell short. He has been a complete asshole to me and there's no particular reason why, according to him, so he's just being an asshole for fun, I guess. It's worrisome with a new job starting next week that he's being a bitch to me and we start something new, thus, stressful next week.
Men! You can't live with them, you can't back over them with your pick-up legally any more.

Okay, so I need to get to quilting and doing my house chores. I'm only a domestic goddess for 6 more days, so I better make it count before I turn into a working mother again.

Oh, happy day! They are finally replacing the carpet in Russell's room. The previous tenants apparently had a dog that wasn't trained and peed itself blind in that room before they got rid of it. The owner kept insisting that it wasn't so, and I told him to have the room checked by pros. They found 11 stains in the carpet and that didn't include the whole room. I am vindicated! They are pulling the carpet and backing, sealing the floor, and replacing said carpet and backing. The room has reeked for months and I've been asking nicely. This month, I held onto the rent check and the owner acknowledged that he'd spoken to people who verified that yes, the previous tenant had a damned dog in here. This thing even peed down the heating vent. *ugh*

The house is upside down again. We've got Russell's bunkbed in the kitchen and all of his other furniture and crap holding boxes in Genny's room. Genny is at LaDawn's today, nonetheless. I am working on the web page contract that won't die. *sigh*

Back to the grindstone.

The past few days have been very stormy. It rained heavily here, but snowed like crazy in the mountains. Several local ski resorts opened for the season, and I took Russell and Genny up to snow today and they went sledding for an hour and then we turned around came home and I promptly slid Genevieve into bed and she went out for the count. Russell thought it was fun and games until he filled his boots with snow because he refused to tie them up. Then he kind of wallowed and whined at the bottom of the hill and asked about going home. Genny was tired, as was Mommy, so it wasn't a hard choice.

Kittygirl did come home the next day, smelling of pine trees, where I think she nestled under the pretty little blue spruce at the neighbors. She was perfectly happy on Friday and Saturday to remain in her crate while the elements stormed and raged, I noticed, though, so I have a feeling she had a rough night of it.

I am a decoratin' fool, lately. I made curtains for our bedroom this weekend, and while I need to desperately do the drapes for the livingroom, I just can't bring myself to make a decision about how to construct them just yet. I did get the futon cover done, additionally, which makes me a sewing fool.

I'm still quilting and praying. My friend's baby isn't home yet. The poor babe is still struggling with her sugars. If you're a prayer or even if you're not, please put your requests of your higher power in for this baby. I got all the star points finished this weekend and I just have to finish trimming and pressing them and then I just have the nine patches to finish up with and then it's row sewing for me. It's been a lot of praying lately with each square or patch.

I noticed lately, particularly when I am quilting how sore my hands feel. I've had a hell of a time picking up pins to set my points just so, and then I started fiddling around with my hands and realized that the pain is in the actual joints of my hands. True to genetics, I have arthritis, just like my mom and grandmother do/did. I have been taking aspirin, which I honestly haven't taken since I was a child, but ibuprofen and tylenol don't address the pain adequately. If I remember to cover my hands with blankets and take aspirin at bedtime, I often wake up with hands that don't hurt. By day's end though, I find that the pain has returned as my workload has progressed for the day. I feel old and decrepid and useless lately. To some degree, I guess I am upset I can't be there to support my friend better, and then there's the dealing with pain thing which erodes my self confidence, too.

Lately, I know I'm old because:

• I have arthritis, which worsens with weather ( I can feel it in my bones)
  
• I find myself muttering the words: "damned kids" under my breath a lot
  
• Supermarket workers refer to me as "ma'm"
  
• I need a mammogram
  
• I am at the end of my childbearing years
  
• I crave life insurance
  
• I worry about my will
  
• I am turning 40 within the year
  
• the whole idea of trying to get into and out of a snow saucer made me cringe today
  

So I've moved from maid, to mother, and am rapidly working toward crone. I am dying to be 50, so I can get a bumper sticker that says, "they aren't hot flashes, they're power surges!" In the interim, I'm just in that awkward 'tween stage.

Last night, I was falling asleep in the chair and at first I thought it was because I had too many potatoes, so my sugars were high, but I tested and they were a respectable 110, so I simply got ready and went to bed.

I remember vaguely that my husband came in at some point, shivering and I merely lifted the blankets on my back for him and let him get nice and warm, snuggling against me. The only thing I remember past that was the wind beating on the house at 3 in the morning, continuing on until about 430. When I say beating, I mean gust of 50-60 miles per hour pounding the house. I got up and checked the kids and kept a vigil for Kitty Girl who didn't want to come in to get crated last night.

I still haven't seen Kitty Girl and honestly, I hope I do soon because I could barely face the panicky tears of Mr. Bear as he called and called for that cat. Coyotes will eat even in bad weather is my belief. I'm just hoping that they didn't eat my fluffy sweet baby kitty. I miss her brother badly enough.

The bunny got new digs and thinks the protection I lined up for him from the wind is a good deal. Smart Bunny.

I have been trying for 4 days to quilt extensively and I've done dribs and drabs, but nothing like what I am supposed to. I guess I should towel off by the fire and get dressed and get what I can done. I don't believe I can face the Quilting Inquisition tonight, if I don't have it reasonably tackled.

I have to go to Mike's job and see if there's anything I can do to encourage the life insurance people to extend me benefits. They saw my weight and my diabetes and promptly said no. I am hoping that if I can get my weight down more, that they'll say yes. Wish me luck.

I have a job. It'll be at the legislature until the end of June. At that time, Mike and I will buy a house. We already have the money stuff figured out, so it'll be a blast. We've paid off one card. Only a half dozen more to go. *gah* We are going to buy something with land and then I will see how far I want to go with my organic produce dreams.

Most importantly, I am quilting for my friend CS. She is diabetic and just had her third child. Apparently, this child is a great helper because the baby was overproducing insulin to compensate for her Mom's high sugars. The baby is in the neonatal intensive care unit, while the hospital works to get her pancreas back to normal and I feel like with each piece of the quilt that I am finishing another prayer. It feels like prayer squares. I have 25 nine patches done and have 24 more to go. I have lots of things to cut out and each cut, seam, press of seam, and fabric choice, feels spiritual to me.

I am still walking regularly. I walk every day but Monday for a half hour and then I walk an hour on one weekend day with my friend LaDawn. My sugars are nearly perfect right now. I do have my moments. Halloween is what I would call a "moment," but my highs are low ones (140). I got a new glucometer to test in my arm because my fingers are getting so scarred and calloused that it makes it hard to get blood, but I haven't actually figured out how to make the arm blood thing work yet. I can get blood, but the meter doesn't work as the manual says it should. I am going to make my engineer husband see if he can program it properly and then I'll try again. I am also lotioning the everliving crap out of my hands. Keri is so very....moisturizing. I am going to keep walking. My sugars have been normal for the most part in the morning. Today they were 89. But two days ago, they were 110, which was higher than it should be, but pretty amazing for most diabetics.

I think the thing I keep noticing is how many excuses I have for not going to get my HbA1c done. My doctor isn't going to bother worrying about my cholesterol because of last year's 137 and my good ratios, but I worry about how bad it will be. I haven't been eating in a way that makes me proud of me. I am not hideous, but I always fuck around with it. I test it with a snack size candy bar and then test an hour later to see if I paid (usually not). This morning, Genny was into everything, so I had a hard time getting a shower, much less a meal. I went to LaDawn's to drop her off and LaDawn gave me a candybar so I wouldn't pass out and made me a hot dog. Not exactly health food.

Mostly, I am really really tired. I slept heavily today. I could chalk that up to the weather change -- we're expecting snow tomorrow, but I think it's more accurate to assume that Wonder Woman is back and working me to death with her unreasonable expectations of myself.

I just wanted to say hello. I also wanted you to say a prayer for a darling baby girl's pancreas and pray that it settles down and learns to regulate her little body's sugar levels normally.

I feel like if I haven't posted in 10 days that I ought to have this impressive list of all this crap I've gotten done. I don't have that much of a list. I have been busier than hell though, and it's mostly being a stay-at-home mom and errand girl. The other really incredible news is that this is going to be a semi-permanent condition. Mike got a raise of $10K and with the contract money and saved money on daycare, I no longer have to work, which means I can pretty much throw myself into taking care of my disease, quilting, school, and whatever else I come up with.

Things I've done lately include:

• threw party on weekend for friends and made a lot of food and cleaned the house like a banshee; collapsed in chair on Sunday
  
• made Genny Winnie-the-Pooh curtains
  
• designed futon cover for futon in livingroom, now have to sew it.
  
• cut out pattern for Russell's Harry Potter cape
  
• started new quilting class - have 10 of 49 nine-patches done; finally got instructions on how to make the goshfunnit paper piecing trees and can't figure out how to cut the damned background right
  
• went to my friend LaDawn's church and wasn't impressed with it much -- too preachy - going to check out the episcopal church instead
  
• walking, always walking
  
• saw volleyball game at local university and had a great time - will probably go again on Friday
  
• neverending stream of laundry
  
• working on contract stuff, but really hating it because there are too many bosses and no one to prioritize the work, but a lot of bitching due to too many bosses (round and round we go, where it stops nobody knows...)
  
• drove to UC Davis for contract; work sucked, but the trip to the local produce market made it very worthwhile
  
• cooking a lot more at home, which I really enjoy. This weekend I made apple crisp (low sugar), teriyaki sauce, and chili. We're still eating the leftovers.
  
• ending volleyball class this week which I'll miss a lot
  
• trying to figure out what I want to be when I grow up
  
• will be taking the grant writing certification classes at the local community college next semester, probably close to full-time
  
• trying to figure out how to play with my kids and schedule my days with Genny, so I get work done and she gets play time; so far, she spends some of the day with LaDawn, and some of the day with me, depending on work
  
• fighting off a cold, but think I'm losing the battle and will probably have to take copious drugs to mitigate the damage to my ability to breathe
  
• awesome sugars lately
  
• took Genny to pediatrician because she's been a whiny butt and yes, she's got an ear infection (poor little thing!)
  
• noticed lately that Russell is such a wonderful kid and that we really need to get back onto the positive reinforcement strategy with him because he loves rewards; thinking we should call the therapist and start finding ways for him to self monitor
  

Okay, so it's not much of an update, but it's a start, darnit!

I'm so tired, I ought to be testing mattresses in a furniture store. I have this extensive list of things I should be doing, but oddly enough, I am not doing any of them.

I need to mow the lawn, finish my quilt, clean the house, do laundry, shop, bank, etc. pff.

Not happening.

Okay, so I canned like Queen of the Harvest this weekend. I made something like 12 - 4oz jars, 2 cases of half pints and 2 cases of pints of relish. I spent two hours cutting on Friday night and 5 hours hovered over various pots I tell you, I felt like a witch coaxing her potions to perfection and bottling them up for lovelorn men and women everywhere. Mike said we could market it as an aphrodesiac. I told him I didn't know if you could convince people that licking relish off of various parts was an appropriate use of my product. He offered to try it out, I suggested he barbecue sausages. He agreed, made sausages, and later I showed him the pleasures of NOT using relish.

I also went to Joann's yesterday and spent my budget because they had quilting supplies for 50% off. I think it's truly abysmal that they'd do such a thing to me, but what's a girl to do? Then I went to Kmart and they were having a sale on tomatillos, so I bought some cilantro and I'll be using what's left of my canning jars to can salsa verde. I'm a sick and wrong kind of cannin' fool.

If you're wondering what you're getting for christmas, you now have a really good idea. If I go and make little hats for the jars, you just better run away and shiver uncontrollably in a corner.

Of course, while I was at Joann's yesterday, I also bought about 5 yards of cordory to make Russell a Harry Potter cape. I'm making it several sizes too big because I plan on making him get some use out of it. I'm pretty sure he won't wear the clown costume again. Dammit. He was pretty pissed off I made him wear it last year, but I warned him he'd have to wear it if I was sewing it for that shindig in August. I'm a mean ole biddy, I tell ya.

I was too freaking tired to get to quilting class last week, so I figured I'd make it up this week. Well, I went and remembered upon seeing the near empty parking lot that one of the classes had been moved...and it was that one.

I don't know how to do the stuff I need to in order to finish my quilt. I'm thinking I'll just fake it. I can call the instructor, but I already got the commentary about how everyone else had finished quilts with the idea that I must suck because I don't have hours upon hours to devote to said quilt. Somehow for one lousy credit, you'd think they'd be a little laxer. I tell ya.

I'm working on it best I can and I'm going to see if I can find someone who can show me how to paper piece (flip and fold) and I'll be hunting things up on the web, too.

*sigh* In two weeks, I start the perfect point star quilt. I suspect strongly that it'll be a little less than perfect, but rather than doing my fancy schmancy star quilt, I'm thinking I'll go cheap and easy and make a Christmas Star quilt and call it good. That way I have one to screw it up with.

I finally found the business cards of the people who interviewed me for this state job as a help desk tech and a web tech. The interviews were absolutely fun. I have never had an interview where everyone was busting up and laughing and having fun and yet, still remaining completely professional. I called the manager person and left a voicemail to let him know I was unemployed and he called me back soon after to tell me that I should talk to this other person. I called her and she said on the 21 and 22 they are calling folks that they interviewed way back when to offer them jobs doing the web tech stuff and I was at the top of the list. She also said she didn't think they had to reinterview, but that they'd let me know. This position would extend from November possibly into July. After which, I could file for unemployment until it wound around back in November again. I'd have the option of staying home with the kids during that time, pursuing more education through this professional networking group because they'll fund it. All the way around, it's a no lose deal for me. I not only get back to the webmastering stuff, so I can learn new stuff and keep up-to-date, but I get a job with bennies (it's with the State).

Whee!

Oh, and my gosh, the COYOTES around here. Last night, Mike tried two or three times to get Kittygirl in and she didn't come. I went out and called for her and usually, that produces little Miss Fuzzybutt, but she didn't show. So we're laying in bed and we hear that eerie coyote "Ar-ar-oooooooo" and I said,"I'll go get Kittygirl." I called her and she came prancing up and was very happy to see me and get crated up. She knows coyotes EAT kitties. Mike and I are pretty sure she probably saw Cowboy get killed. Whereever he was, she was not far behind. I'm just glad the coyotes didn't know that because she's a sweet old cat.

CC the bunnyboy is just as cute as a button. I think that Kittygirl might have taken a paw swipe to him because he's got a scab on his butt. She was doing that paw in the cage thing, so we gave him a place to hide, but last I saw, Russell was holding CC on his lap and Kittygirl jumped up and tried to get in on that loving thing and CC kicked her off Russ's lap. Russell was laughing his butt off. I love holding that bunny and he tolerates being pet to death pretty darned well, so it's a win-win thing for sure.

I've got to finish some quilting work today, so I'm off to do that. I still have to finish my canning which will be tomorrow's job. I actually will probably get the relish fermenting tonight and can tomorrow. Last time it was pretty watery, which wasn't bad, but it seemed a lot less relishy and a lot more saucy. I also have salsa to can. I've got to pick up cilantro and some supplementary roma tomatoes. My garden tomatoes were all big round juicy ones and not the pear-shaped meaty ones. And I still haven't figured out jars yet, so that and quilting are today's projects.

I know, long time no post.

I've been kind of busy. This whole unemployed thing takes so much time out of your schedule. You know, harrassing former employers to provide appropriate severance agreements, tracking down leads, interviewing for jobs I don't get, that kind of thing. And this week, I'm doing the mommy thing.

Genny has learned a new word this week.

For example, "Genny, please come here. You're not supposed to be in brother's room, taking all his toys and destroying his magic cards, you Satan worshipping crack addict, you!" "NO!" Of course, as I read that over I am thinking, okay, is she saying no to the Satan worship, the crack addiction (just say 'no!'), or to coming out of Russell's room?

Being that I have not found a pentagram, nor her stash of drugs, I'm thinking that leaves only one option.

I have managed to run the account about $700 into the hole. What's worse is that despite my joblessness, we can actually recover from that. Wow. I'm feeling pretty grown up all the sudden. I think I am going to start taking out my cash that I am allowed to spend in a given period and leaving the rest in the bank. I need to leave in about $50 for Mike for gas and snacks, but I can keep the rest as grocery money. When it's gone, it's gone, is all.

Fortunately, I do qualify for unemployment and with any luck at all, I'll be able to find something that will make me happy in the interim. I'm not betting big bucks on that, but we'll see. Mostly, I am looking to see if I can take the things I like and make money at doing them. I'll start researching the small business grant soon. Mostly, I need to find smaller canning jars. *sigh*

Off to research things on the net.

I got home from class at 10PM Wednesday and I'd been letting the relish ferment most of the day in my sauerkraut crock. I started to get the sugars and spices and everything nices together and realized I was out of tumeric because the darned jar is brown and I hadn't actually OPENED it to verify that it was chalk full of tumeric. My kind, darling husband ran out to get me some with the promise that green tomato relish is the ambrosia of the Gods pushing him onward, so I held off on adding stuff til he got back about 11. At 11, I started adding stuff in. Mid-way through adding things, he says he's going to bed. I get kisses from him, I get jars sterilizing in pots, I get relish stuff going and I've got exhaustion crawling over me like a swarm of ants on honey.

I keep running back and forth to the computer in the next room to verify my ingredients and finally, I think I've got everything, so I start cooking it up. I cook and I cook and I boil and boil. I spoon, dollop, and I get all 15-20 quarts of the double batch canned. The whole time I am doing this, I think,"It just doesn't smell right." I tasted a little and it was awfully close, but it was missing something. So I'm lying there in bed, in a slightly befuddled state because it *is* 130 AM and I groan when I realize that I forgot the vinegar.

So Friday, I dumped it all back into my crock, added the vinegar and re-canned it all AGAIN.

And last night, we had some on chicken sausages and oh, my yum!

---

The only other thing that is going on is that last week, in an interview I had at Mike's company, I told the woman,"I don't know what I want to be when I grow up." And that phrase, while probably totally inappropriate in a job interview, has stuck with me all week. I really don't know what I want to do, but whatever it is that I have been doing is not working for me. I have the option, financially, to actually stop working for a bit and regroup. I am sending out resumes rather half-heartedly and I am following up with them and all that, but I just have the definite sense of uncertainty. I talked with Mike today and he told me as long as we have the money to pull it off, that I should do whatever I want. I want to be a housewife and stay-at-home mom for a little while. I want to try selling stuff on ebay. I am going to make some more relish this week. I want to buy some chickens and sell "farm fresh" eggs. I want to sew, go to class, exercise, work on my yard, etc. Mike asked if I'd get bored. I said,"Maybe, and if I do, I'll go get a job." I am also looking into the grant writing thing more and more. I think I can do this and make it fly. I just have to figure out how and actually do it. I have some time to experiment and explore, so I'm going to use it to my best advantage. I had a numerologist at the Whole Earth Festival do my numbers. She blanched when she saw where I'd been. She promised me a future where she could see me giving talks or communicating to large audiences for big bucks. I just hope she didn't mean deer.

And no, I don't have new pictures up yet. I will though and you'll be the FIRST to know.

I finally understood something in my VB class. I thought that that was amazingly lucky. I actually TAUGHT something to Mikey, programmer extraordinaire. Wow. I know.

Today will be a house cleaning and quilting day. I spent hours last night slaving to get all the cuts just so and then realized that they were supposed to be 8 7/8" squares, not 8 inches. Fortunately, I hadn't cut all of them out, I had just cut a couple to see what it would look like when done, but I was cursing myself for not actually reading the instructions. *sigh* So I finally got 4 of 6 squares cut for one row and then I have to go back and cut the rest for the top row. The problem now is that for the top row, I may be short some fabric, so I'll have to wing it a bit. I found this fabric that would make a really cool sunset and it does, but then I only left myself a bit, so I may just tier the color some and I washed fabric last night, so I could.

I know now why I prefer sewing and why I have never braved quilting. At least in sewing, if you miss cutting a seam perfectly straight, it doesn't matter. In quilting, you'll be ripping out stitches til you're dead if you don't do it right. I was off on one seam the slightest amount and I had to rip it out and sew it twice. I hardly ever rip in sewing, but I seem to do it a LOT in quilting.

And a little nervous, I told my mom that I'd lost my job. I'd figured she'd say something condescending, but she didn't and she offered to make Genny some cute dresses for the holidays. I've been all drooly for this one dress for her for Christmas that I saw at Walmart. I really would like to make her something cute for fall, too. You only get to dress them when they're young, so I'd like to do something cute like that. I've also been thinking about taking her in for the preschool pix at Russell's school next week or just to Walmart to get a professional sitting done. I guess I could just dress her up in one of the costumes she's going to wear for Halloween (we have every Disney princess gown known to man through size 6) because she'd look like a pretty princess and it'd make a good picture. I'd just like something "harvesty" til Christmas. If the damned fabric weren't so expensive, I'd do that in a heartbeat, though I do have a coupon to the local fabric store.

The big news of the day is that advent of creatures. Weather changes bring creatures. In the summer, when it got super hot, I suddenly had scorpions around. Now, that it's gotten cooler, there are other things creeping and crawling about. I finally decided I'd had it with the cereal - snack shelf of the pantry, so started reorganizing boxes and cleaning things up when a mouse jumped out of where I was rearranging and sprang down behind the fridge. I know I'm a big pussy, but I'm sorry, but when something small and fast comes flying at you, you are just going to jump back and screech a second. My husband came in, all worried shitless, and I giggled and said,"We have a mouse." I cleaned out that shelf, including accompanying mouse poop and pee and pretzel crumbs and shuddered periodically.

This morning, I told Russell that we have a mouse and he said,"Why didn't you catch it?" I explained to him that mice carry diseases and can bite you and as a result, I merely squealed like a stuck pig.

It made me miss Cowboy, the killer kitty, but I figure it's nothing that peanutbutter and mousetraps can't fix. Ruby's going down to the feed store and purchasin' herself some mousetraps. I figure if I stick one behind the fridge where it ran and one way behind some cans on the bottom shelf, I'll have a dead mouse in no time. And then I'm going to make my husband take the dead mouse and toss it in the trash, because admittedly, while I love my tiny rodent bunny wabbit, I'm grossed out and freaked out about a dead mouse in a trap.

Speaking of Cowboy, we've had a lot of coyotes lately down in the valley here, and I notice there are not many bunnies around any more. The coyotes howl and yip all around us at night sometimes. It's rather unnerving because sometimes a distant coyote sounds like the baby waking up in her sleep and crying. I run halfway down the hall sometimes to listen outside her door and then hear the familiar yipping out in the sagebrush. There've been a few times where I'm pretty sure they've been on our lot and Kittygirl has scratched furiously at the door to be let in her crate because Mike hadn't gotten her in yet. I notice she's on the patio every night, like a good kitty, now. I miss her brother. He had such a big soft head and he liked to be pet by my whole hand over the top of his head because his cheeks were right by my fingers where he could get a good scritching on both sides at once. He had a lusciously soft white thick-furred belly that he'd let me rub gently. When that cat wanted to be pet, it was a wonderful treat. I miss him terribly sometimes.

Coffee Cup is a decidedly sweet animal and I think he'll fit in fine around here. He's been learning to use a litter box, so I'm hoping we'll be able to let him in some, come winter. Kittygirl has stuck her paw in his cage a bit, I think in a jealous rage, but has decided to let the bunny live, after being shooed off a few times.

Live and let live seems appropriate now.

I had an interview today at Mike's company in his department. I don't know how it went mostly because I was worrying about how I answered the various questions. I finally went the honest route, which probably makes me the dumbest person on earth, but one of the biggest reasons I want the job I ended up applying for was because I'd get to work near Mike and see him more. And that's what he wants, too. So that's what I told them. Yes, I realize that it's beneath my current skill level, but it'd be in the same building as my best buddy, so amazingly enough, I'd be OK with that. And what they didn't pay me, I would get back in carpool savings, I'd guess.

I probably blew the interview, but it's all learning curve, I tell ya.

I'm in my VB class and just learned while a "select case" statement is a hundred times better than "if then" and I felt like a big stupid buffoon for not getting it sooner.

Pfft.

I'm grieving and relieved and happy, all at once. It's kind of odd to be so ambivalent. My emotions feel like a chameleon that can't make up its mind -- vivid, changing, and self-protective. I had the first half of the grant writing class yesterday and it was more like this unexpectant spiritual journey. I've been missing church and this was a lot like that. It's based on some of the work by Jean Houston and I found it enlightening. When I say enlightening, I mean it in the sense of lighting within. I had my soul come up and pirouette like the prettiest ballerina. I came to two truths for myself.

The first is that I've had this long-standing dream of having a small organic farm. I live in the desert and the soil isn't conducive to farming particularly. I've seen a few farmers with alfalfa fields, but little else other than cattle. I've been thinking that if I could somehow make the organic farm and my desire to bring a food coop here, that I'd be bringing the best of both worlds together. I am thinking I might write a grant to that end, but I had another idea.

The whole reason I ever started publishing on the internet is that I got pregnant right after I got diagnosed with diabetes and I was scared shitless. What was worse is that everything I read about diabetes and pregnancy was along the gloom and doom variety and I was terrified, which is a bad thing to be when you're pregnant. Even when it's a normal pregnancy, stress is not a good thing. I figured if I wrote about my experience, that I'd be not only letting off some steam, but I'd give this beautiful resource to other pregnant diabetic women.

The thing is that it's buried on a web page that if you do a search on diabetes and pregnancy does not even bring up my page. I do notice that there is one woman on the entire web whose been quasi journaling her pregnancy as a diabetic, but she doesn't do a day by day look at it. In fact, most of the stuff a search on google brings back with diabetes, pregnancy, and journal are medical journal articles or March of Dimes articles citing how totally high-risk, scary and generally terrifying being a pregnant diabetic can be.

I guess I wrote because I wanted to show myself I could do it and because I wanted to give away that I could do it. And now, I'm thinking I need to take that journal and convert it to something more substantial.

So I'm in this 'tween precipice. I've got time, now, I'm unemployed. So I'm praying on it and rereading my journal from that time.

Just remember you heard it here first.

I walked in this morning, had an email from my boss asking me to come to his office before our 830 meeting. I went to review my other email and had him intercom me and ask me to come down there.

As I came down the hall, I saw him walk into a personnel person's office and then say something like he'd be there in a minute.

He said something like "we're letting you go because we can't keep you busy enough" and then told me I'd be walked down to my desk to retrieve a few things and turn in my key. I actually got him to admit that he didn't/wouldn't train me and then he said,"I really need someone who can pick this up in an ad hoc manner." I know people who have worked there for several years in a technical capacity who do not know the system at all, so it's not me. If I'd even been pointed at some documentation, I'd have been thrilled to pieces.

The severance they're offering is abysmal -- one week of pay. I not only gave up several interviews, potentially lost two jobs because I had this one, but I also gave up my web class that I really wanted and am taking the torturous VB class instead because my boss requested it.

This job has cost phenomenal amounts of money and time and one week of severance isn't going to cover it. In addition, they want me to sign a separation agreement, which to me means that they are really aware that they fucked me over.

I'm consulting an attorney to see if I can get a better severance package. I think this one sucks.

---

On the good news front, we've got a new bunny. I was going to name him Serenity, but he's the color of coffee and is small enough to fit in a mug, so his name has been officially changed to Coffee Cup.

CC is about as sweet and mellow a bunny as you'd find about anywhere and is perfectly content to sit wedged between my boobs as most of my babies (Angie and Cowboy, Russell and Genny) have. He's getting comfortable enough at times to put his nose in the air and twitch it, and is generally content to be pet a lot. He doesn't make me sneeze or wheeze, so that's a plus.

Now, if I could just get my stomach to settle down and quiet my head enough to sleep, I'd be all set. This 3AM shit, sucks, although I did find my brother-in-law online -- a fellow insomniac this morning.

And I've got an all day class tomorrow.

My boss told me when we reviewed the documentation for what I'm doing that he saw "no value added". Nevermind, that everything I do is so that they can bill their clients and get paid, but I think that's the end. It's his way of saying that I am not doing a valuable job and thus, I am expendable, which is exactly how he's been treating me for two weeks. He's also been looking for ways to cut costs and being that no one has trained me particularly in the system and that I have little knowledge of it as a result, I'm very vulnerable. Of course, I've been saying I"ve been needing training from the get-go, but to no avail.

And this boss has been a total prick to me, intentionally excluding me from email on what's going on in our department, making disparaging remarks to the effect of "what exactly do YOU do?", and then yesterday, I got asked the death knell question,"What are your hours?" I haven't been perfectly keeping to my hours, but I also have worked several hours from home on my sick days, but charged the day off to my time, not theirs. I know on Tuesday, I had a sick day, but I worked 4-5 hours from home. I expected to charge that to my time, but now, I'm having second thoughts.

I checked with unemployment and essentially, unless I get laid off, I won't be eligible for unemployment unless I go through an "adjudication process," which means that they could hold my unemployment for 4-6 weeks while I work it out with them. I know my doctor would probably be willing to step up to bat for me, but waiting 4-6 weeks to get paid would suck a lot, although, once I did get paid, I'd get it all at once. I think if it goes to adjudication, that I can easily say that I didn't receive training and that over the course of five bosses in 4.5 months, my job has endured a great deal of change and upheaval, so that what I was hired for is no longer even in the picture. I'm praying that God gives me what I need to get through, regardless of what happens.

I know we can get through financially. We won't be golden, but we'll be okay. I may sign up for all of those programs with credit cards, so that if you lose your job, you don't have to pay anything for a bit, in order to cover our butts for a while. That won't work for the car payment and Mike's student loan, but it'll cover most everything else. I figure if I can cut our cost by not needing daycare for a few weeks, and do things like dry laundry outside, we'll get by. The only one who needs clothing right now is Genny and I can make her pants. I have a lot of corderoy and prints and I can make her poofy pants to play in. I've got a couple dresses and simple pattern and a buttload of fabric, so we'll get by. I have a lot of little shirts for her and while there's not much of the long-sleeved variety, I can probably scrounge money to get her a few things at one of the "marts." Thankfully, we don't have to buy her diapers any more, and she has a couple of jackets and sweat shirts. I can also make her a few knit type shirts with minimal patterning.

The cool thing is that most of the money in two paychecks was going to pay credit cards down, so we simply won't have that and it'll be ok. We'll just still be in debt, which while status quo is better than most of the alternatives.

I guess I should go back to bed for an hour, though I'm hungry and my stomach is topsy turvy with stress. On the plus side, stress is more likely to put me into a high sugar burn.



I'm going to go check in with the "professional network" thing here locally and see if I can get some help. I'm calling the State of California Unemployment folks, too, to verify process. Overall, this sucks, but I can save a lot of money in daycare if necessary and I may be employed next week through Mike's company, too, and all this worrying in the wee hours will be rather moot.

I hate my job.

A lot.

I'm going to see if my doctor will put in writing that I need a different job and then if he will, I am going to quit and file for unemployment. We can live on that and Mike's income, plus our contract money if we have to.

The contract starts this coming week, so it'll be all good.

I stayed home yesterday. My asthma's been bothering me, but I also had a lot of programming to do and while I didn't get it completely finished, I nearly had it done. Then I got everything working as it should and I realized that the instructions were asking me to program it in a particularly awkward way. It meant a lot of variable setting and boolean setting and icky icky geeky things that would make mere mortals cry in their diet pepsi twist. I didn't do it. I sent an email to my instructor asking if the instruction was a mistake. In the process of reviewing the instructions, I realized I didn't set up my pop up window. Then I said a small curse under my breath for web programmers and their pop up windows.

Nonetheless, I am behind in my homework. It's been hard getting back into the swing of things.

Though yesterday exemplified things not working. I'd told Mike a month ago to verify that appointments I'd set up for him would work so he could get to each and have enough time. He was supposed to pick up Russell at school at 315. I was supposed to leave the house at 330. At 320, he calls me from his dr.'s appointment to ask about scheduling getting his wisdom teeth removed, and I (stupidly) assumed that because he had the cell phone he was calling me on the cell phone until he asked someone in the background a question, at which point, I look at the clock, panic and ask him about Russell at school waiting for him. Furious, I hang up the phone to call the school and get a phone call as I am looking up their number asking me who's to pick up my son?

I end up picking him up at a tween place because our usual sitter grabbed him and called me and we worked out a place between the house and school. I realize, I am not making it to class on time and feel angry and unsupported.

This was exactly why I was afraid to go to school. I was afraid that if I did it, Mike would do shit just like this and I'd miss classes and assignments and the like. I took Russell a half hour in the opposite direction to go to his orthodontist appointment that Mike was supposed to take him to and missed my class, which I desperately needed to go to. I was so angry last night, that after I took Bear to the orthodontist (it's going to cost $2500!!!- whine!) I went to a store and walked around, just so I didn't have to go home right away. I had planned to get something specific there anyhow, so it seemed normal to Russell, but I was livid. When I got home, I went and sat in the bathroom for a long time. I didn't want to just come in the house and start screeching.

At dinner, I just laid into Mike about how angry I was. He kept trying to do the "I didn't know" thing, but I reminded him of the email I sent specifically asking him to make sure...to check with the doctors and change the appointments if he needed to. He kind of slouched and tried every conceivable way to worm out of,"I screwed up and I'm sorry" that there is. He finally said he was sorry, but continued to try to tell me how it was my fault at which point Genny started tossing food and we hurled her in the tub and scurried little Miss Exhausted to bed. What was worse, is that later, when we talked about it again, he said that I should have started my homework earlier. I explained that I didn't care about my homework being late...I'm there to learn and if it gets turned in late and I still learn it, then I'm good. I care that I missed the class that I worked 55 hour weeks for 5 weeks to pay for. I care that I missed what is probably significant learning that you can't just get from the book. Because I am struggling with the damned assignment, it's obvious the week I missed to barfing.

I think ONCE in his whole academic career he had to miss a class because of a family emergency, but I carefully scheduled everything. Once in three years is pretty damned good. I made him get up and go to morning classes, that he normally would have slept through and missed. I taught him how to study so that he could pass said classes. I supported him financially so he could get through. All I'm asking for is something in return, i.e., I want to attend the classes I paid for.

---

And in my pain of readmission to school, I've discovered I can't cut a straight line to save my ass. Quilting is a big pain in my ass and I am seriously thinking about the second class because I am truly awful at quilting. I was going to do all this square sewing and cutting, but I am so dismally bad at it, that I am thinking I will wait until I get to class and get help because I suck. I was going to make this big ambitious quilt for our bed. However, in light of my obvious lack of skills and patience, I will make a small sample quilt to show just how bad I am and I will stick with the small size quilts until I don't think I suck any more. I'm sure there are people wanting baby quilts, even cockeyed quilts, so I can just put those together, slap some padding on the back, and then I can sew up the sides with blanket ribbon and not feel too horrible, inept, or perpetually guilty.

And tomorrow, I will be in the thigh pain zone because I will be playing volleyball tonight, which makes me huff and puff and use my legs a lot. I don't mind the huffing, puffing, sweating part, but the leg usage pain thing is always the next day or two. I figure I can go swim on Friday.

I am so braindead sometimes. I left my damned VB book at home, so I can't quiz myself on the questions at the end of the chapters over lunch like I planned. I actually did work on programming last night. I got the GUI (graphical user interface) pretty done so all the textboxes, graphics and formatting is done, but of course, there's no programming behind it. I'm going to have to work on that tonight. Mike's work is slow, so he's blowing off work at 12 and going home to get my book and then joining me for lunch.

I love that man.

Oh, and oddly enough, I say I should documenting my job and low and behold, my boss sent me an email saying I should document my job and meet with him to review it. He's actually going to get on our system and use it. I find it amazing. Wonders will never cease.

I am hoping I will be out of here before I have to implement squat though. We'll see what God brings.

And I know it's bad, but my friend, Sue said she might be coming state side from Hawaii and I feel bad she's bummed, but mostly, I got all selfish and excited at the prospect of her being a bit closer. I've got her box and two others at home waiting to be mailed to their expectant recipients. I need to make a special run to a special store to get her something and I have yet to get there with my crazy schedule. You have to understand that I am working on Ruby Time in that her birthday was September 1.

*sigh*

At least we didn't have to go to the in-laws.