Sigh...stuffed...content

I ate so much on turkey day that I am still feeling stuffed. It was a good Thanksgiving, lots of food, friends and some card games. I was pretty busy at the end of the day right before the feasting but in the early part of the day there was strangely not much to do. Other people, mainly Denise, were making the bulk of the food that was required to be made early and so I was only doing the things that had to be done at the last 1/2 hour or so. Hubby made the turkey, fantastic, as usual. Denise made lots of goodies and cookies, good stuff...one type of cookie I will have to make sure we have all the makings for here tonight because I want more, it was a pumpkin chocolate chip cookie...my mouth still waters when I think about them!

I am having a strange urge to decorate for Christmas right now. I really am looking forward to it this year, perhaps because this will be the first one after getting a good job and there will be less worry about making ends meet....dunno, maybe thats it. Maybe tomorrow morning I will haul out the boxes and set up everything but the tree. I always get a real tree, I love the smell of a real tree at christmas time, however, it means that I have to wait for a while before getting the tree. I know some may say that you can keep a tree alive for a long time after bringing it home if you water it and give it sugar water and other such stuff...the key there is that you have to water it...I always forget and the poor thing is losing lots of needles before the end of the holiday. I also think I am going to get a real tree skirt this year, we always use a sheet and I am thinking that it might be time to move up in the world there.

All is going well at work, really well as a matter of fact, I have been nominated to learn our PCR machine and plate key out. (WHAAA?) To explain, PCR is a method of using an enzyme to amplify certain sections of DNA to detectable levels and then run a test to determine if a tank is infected or not. We rarely get positives but still, it is very cutting edge and fun stuff. Plate key out is looking at petri dishes and determining what is growing on them...the stuff I was made for!!! I am also working more and more on our GC machine, alcolyzer and spectrophotometer...all cool stuff. My supervisor feels that I need to start taking on some of her responsibilities since she is so swamped and she feels confident that I can do them. YAY!!!

Boys are good. They are on Thanksgiving break right now, a whole week off! They have been melting their brains with video games and doing chores mostly...S has a huge project due on Tuesday so he has been sorta half-heartedly working on it so far, but today he is going to work on it for real. R has been increasingly antsy, I think school helps take some of it out of him, Thank God they go back on Monday!

Hubby is getting ready to get his EMT 1 license (State of California version of what he already has...silly) and then will be doing that sorta stuff. We are doing really well, especially now that my crazy bits are coming under control...he has been so patient and good with me through it all, I really appreciate all he has done, has put up with and is doing for me and our family...

Ugh, I have to start evenings again on Monday, 11-7:30pm...not too bad, but apparently come January we will be working graves as well...suck!!! I switched with a friend for a morning shift on Thursday (for him he is going to a concert) and Friday (so I can be home for R's birthday). Can you believe R is turning 7!! He still seems like a little, little kid to me, probably cause he is so small...but still, SEVEN!!!

Well, I gots cleaning to do...hope everyone had a happy Thanksgiving!

C

Thanksgiving!

Happy Turkey Day Everyone!

Hope you get stuffed and eat lots of turkey...I mean ham!

The face of terror...

First I would like to start by saying congratulations to my friends:
1. Evan and Denise: I was fortunate enough to witness the birth of their #4, Tasmia, and let me tell ya folks, the baby is beautiful!!! Congrats you two!

2. Shel and Trav: Congrats on your upcoming anniversary! So how many years is this? I never can keep track!

3. um...I forgot.

Well that said, I have to explain my title I guess. Today I went and saw a CIVILIAN podiatrist, now I know that the military/VA lies, but what I did not know is that they would lie so very badly. Had I known then what I know now I would probably still be in the military...well, maybe not but still I was lied to folks. My shiny new civvie doc says that the majority of my problems can be fixed, the most intense of which is the remaining nerve damage from that fateful surgery that the military doc fucked up. Yes ladies and gentlemen, if all goes very well I could be running again, and not just running but running pain free, I could walk barefoot over gravel and not end up crawling, I could....well, you get the point. I have started a series of three injections of steroids in the bottom of my foot to shrink the severely damaged nerves from the surgery, if all goes well I will be cured by the end of them...now, I have lived with this for 10 years so forgive me if I am doubtful...I just cannot believe that this could have been fixed so "easily." Now for the real explanation, the freaking shot!!! OMG I was so very terrified that it would be incredibly painful (and it was!) that I was shaking, turning cold and in tears. The shot was incredibly painful, but honestly if it does fix my foot it would be worth it!!! The rest of my feet problems can be gradually fixed by some of the standard methods, so...yay!

All that aside, life is good, things are getting fixed for my "little" bits of crazy with some medication (again I am doubtful here but I will take the ride and see where it goes). Work is great, I am getting recognition for the things I do now, who woulda thunk it...communicatin and all that! Hubby and I are getting along famously. The only thing that is not quite as wonderful as all the rest is I really want more quality time with the boys, but something inside me says I have to spend money to do that and seeing as how we are a little short on the extras of that sort of thing I am at a loss as to what to do with them...I am sure it will just take a little more thought. S and I have been doing some cooking together and we played a couple games of Connect Four, but somehow it never seems to be enough unless it is spectacular to me...I know it is silly...so I will take them to the park or go on a bike ride or something....anything...lol.

Okay, gotta go, gots me some pizza!!


C

Report Cards

I just came home from R's parent-teacher conference, where the teacher discusses your child and how they are doing and gives you their report card, etc. Last year R's was negative as were all his report cards, only one E (excellent) for the whole year...just one and that was in classroom participation for the last trimester.



I am so very freaking pleased to say that this year, (thanks in parts to Daytrana, his teacher and R himself) he had a damn near perfect report card! only two S's (satisfactory) and the rest were E's. I saw the card and almost pushed it back at the teacher thinking she had given me the wrong one! She stated, however, that he was the top in the class! I am going to write Shire, the makers of Daytrana, and thank show the change in his cards, he should be their freaking poster boy! He LOVES school, he gets upset when he can't go when he is sick...just...wow!!!



S's was a little disappointing, not so hot, but it kinda comes down to the same thing, he is on the patch too now and already has finished his homework...(it is 3:08 now and he got out of school at 2:10)...he was finished about 15 minutes ago and normally he takes until about 5pm to finish! Most of his problems also stem from losing the work and therefore missing the grades. We have worked out an oragnization system to keep the paper loss to a minimum...we will see how well that is going!

Anyhoo...work is good, home is good, hubby is good...

C

It's a pumpkin funeral Charlie Brown

Ah, how I love the holidays, the cheer, the joy, the giving and receiving of gifts, the ghosties and ghoulies...and apparently, the pumpkin funerals. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, yesterday I attended my very first ever (and probably the first in written history) pumpkin funeral.

The story goes like this...

R loves his jack-o-lanterns, very much. We grew our pumpkins this year in the back yard and he apparently loved his even more because of it. We carved said pumpkins at the home of our friends E&D on Saturday and come yesterday, one whole week later, R's slumped in on itself all moldy and covered with flies. He cried for a very long time...a...very...long...time. When the tears began to subside I suggested throwing him (yes it took on the proper pronoun even with me) into the garbage...big mistake...he started crying again and in my rush and desire to abate his tears I suggested the unthinkable, a funeral. So there we were, S and I trying to contain smiles as S dug the grave and I put the pumpkin in and R covered it up. Then we had to make a marker...we found a wooden plank and R inscribed the following:

Black

Widow

Died by

flies

11-3

-07

And that my friends is how you have a pumpkin funeral. (BTW: Black widow is the name of the deceased)

Your pumpkin burying friend,

C