Pop Goes the Wall

Here's the design I'm going to paint on the wall opposite my Elfa unit.

Happy 2007!

It's warmer but there's still a ton of snow on the ground (most of it in my driveway, actually). Yesterday the boy and I went sledding and I have the sore, aching muscles to prove it!

Later in the day, my old home town boys beat the new hometown boys out of the post season. Go 9ers!

Then, we rung in the new year with those fancy fireworks we'd been unable to set off back when the ground was dry in July.

Today all roads were open again and things are slowly getting back to normal here. We went furniture shopping and got some great deals on some nice stuff to be delivered Friday! I can hardly wait!

Husband and I are both sobbing because tomorrow it's back to work for the two of us...son, meanwhile, is still off for another full week.

'Hope Yours Was, Too

I had a great Christmas. Actually, since I've been celebrating since Saturday, I feel like the whole weekend and today have been just one, long day. Our tradition is to open gifts Christmas morning and my son actually let us all sleep until 8 a.m. this morning, which is a Christmas miracle in itself! One of my gifts was the coveted robins' nest egg blue, small box tied with a white ribbon, which made my holiday! We assembled a gingerbread house later and decorated it, and also ate the requisite Christmas ham for dinner. All is well.

I don't need to go to work until Wednesday. It will likely be awful trying to catch up between the snow days and the holidays, but I'm not complaining.

To Finish the Story...

...the biopsy was negative but I have a pre-cancerous condition that the surgeon and I will explore treating with medication. I am thankful, despite the horrific nature of the investigation, for techniques of early detection and for not listening to them when they said (after 2 years) "Let's watch it for another year."

I'm Back

Whew!

Finally able to get onto Blogger again -- I have been very frustrated with my inability to log in!

Of course, now that I'm on, I have nothing whatsoever to say.

Figures.

This is My Brain on NaNoWriMo

Any questions?

(Boy, that Debbie Ridpath Ohi -- she gets me!)

Out of Nowhere

So, I'm driving home from Denver yesterday and I'm listening to some nice music that was sort of sad and thinking about things and all of a sudden, out of nowhere, I notice that it's the 2 year anniversary of when my mother went into the hospital. She was in intensive care for about six days and then she died. When I got the phone call, 2 years ago yesterday, I made the stupid decision I'll always regret not to fly out until the weekend because I was just a few weeks into a new job and I was worried about taking the time off. As a result, I never got to see my mother conscious before she died.

I was thinking about all of that and also re-living the moments before her death when she was given the last rites, and remembering made my chest hurt and then I started to cry. Not the little I feel sad so tears leak kind of crying, but the kind where you make noise and you can't help it.

It was pretty amazing to me that I could be driving along one moment and then succumb to complete mental and emotional anguish. I thought, wow, I'm walking around everyday with feelings like this just below the surface?

Basically, I couldn't stop crying for the next 4 hours or so. That was not a fun Friday night. I woke up this morning with big, swollen eyes and a feeling not unlike sore muscles in the area of my heart, which still has not gone away. Yep, feeling pretty crappy.

No desire to write. At all. Or do homework, either. So what else is new?

So, yeah. Grief, as I've said many times before, sucks.

Homework Blues

Homework and NaNoWriMo just don't mix.

If you think I'm behind in my wordcount, you should see my homework. Especially that darn math that just keeps piling up.

Sometimes I'm so stressed about it that I'm paralyzed and don't do either. Smart, huh?

At Last At First

I finally started my novel and got in a whopping 843 words!

I'm so happy.

Not sure what was going on. I think I needed the Kickoff to officially happen (it was so much fun) first. I wrote an outline at the Write In portion of the Kickoff and then deviated from it completely this morning.

I just woke up and suddenly I knew what I was going to write and how.

All Hail

To all those parents (mostly fathers...) who stood out on the cold streets of Colorado, with coat collars zipped up around their chins, hunching so their noses would be covered, gloved hands in pockets, watching their children run with wild abandon on darks streets in 17 degree temperatures: I salute you!

And I was standing next to you!

Another Halloween under the belt!

Blizzard 2006

I thought this curly little "wave" of snow was a good indication of that wind we heard howling all day yesterday!

Post Blizzard

I tried to go to work today, I really did. It took me 15 minutes to drive around the block, slipping all the way despite the good tires and traction control. The street was a sheet of ice. A cookie sheet, with high walls. About 3 inches thick. All ice.

So I came home, called in, and started on homework. It took about 4 hours, interrupted, and came out 18 pages long. That was one assignment for one class. It is a very tough class.

Then in the late afternoon I got cabin fever, so hubby and I went to run a few errands. (Son was playing at a friend's house, learning to snowboard on the kid's front lawn, it turns out.) It was nice to get out of the house, but we passed by many cars still in ditches and some new accidents involving cars without the good tires hitting an ice slick. We also drove over many high spots where, thankfully, the warm sun today had melted the snow enough for us to get over them. Who knows what would happen if we drove over those same spots now that the sun's gone down and the temperature's dropped.

I'm very glad I didn't go to work this morning.

We Had to Call It

Well, we were almost as stubborn as those Cardinals fans in the rain. We finally postponed the Kickoff party at 2:30 this afternoon.

Highways and major roads are closed, and the coffee shop's not answering their phone so I think they're closed as well. At any rate, there's ice under the snow and it's not a fit day to be doing any driving even in daylight!

I'm very bummed out.

Blizzard, Smizzard

Bleh, a blizzard is threatening our Kickoff Party scheduled for tomorrow. I'm still planning to go but of course if there's 6-12 inches of snow that may put a damper on anyone else showing up!

PJ Day

I don't know about this wearing your pajamas to school thing.

Today, as part of Dare to Say No To Drugs week, my son went happily off to school in his pajamas.

When I was dropping him off I saw the principal walking in the door dressed in his pajamas and a bathrobe. The sight will likely haunt me for many days.

Why would wearing your PJs out in public be considered a treat?

Heck, I have nightmares about doing that very thing!

Blood, Sweat and Tears

Yesterday I did algebra until my eyes bled.

Now that the software's working, I figure I'm going to have to do 1-2 assignments/night for the next full week to keep from flunking out.

Today I'm going to a writing seminar in Denver with a friend from NaNoWriMo. Fun. Speaking of NaNoWriMo, today's the first day to sign up for the 2006 event!

And Now for Something Political

President Bush threatened immediately after 9/11 to blow Pakistan up if they didn't help us? And this is supposed to surprise or even upset me?

Get real.

Monday, Monday

My son got home from his cub scout camping trip and his cough was much worse. Could it have been that 20 degree night air in the mountains?

This morning he looked awful so I took his temperature. It was normal. So I was literally walking out the door to take him to before-school care and he coughed and started wheezing so I said, "Grab your DS and get a book. You're going to work with me." I've never done that before. Luckily, there's an empty cube next to me since Mr. Recruiter took a hike so he just hung out there while I got through giving the new Sr. Director of Marketing his orientation. Then I got son into a 10 a.m. appt. and the dr. said, "Has he ever had asthma before?"

Two pharmacies, three Rx's, and a quick lesson in administering Albueterol later, I was home with him and quite exhausted. We ate lunch, watched a science channel documentary on volcanoes, and then the beagle lay on my stomach and lulled me into a power nap.

Now I'm trying to pick up the pieces of my day.

Oh, and in between pharmacies , the dry cleaner and the gas station (well, I was out...) I went by the gym and weighed in. I lost 5+ lbs. this week!

Happy Blogday

Hey, I just realized this blog is a year old this month. I know I'm terrible at blogging, but I just can't seem to give it up. This was supposed to be my public, NaNoWriMo, writing blog when I started it last year. I'm not quite sure what, if anything, it has morphed into.

I also have a blog that's not public here on Blogger so I can gripe openly about everything and name names. Actually, it's just one I started to fulfill the journaling requirement for my Advanced Creative Writing class this semester.

I still have my old LiveJournal, I think -- haven't been over there for a while. (Note to self: post on LJ so they don't delete it.)

And then I have a blog on ebay because they were having a contest for people to start blogs and I wanted to win some money. But I didn't. But I kept it anyway.

So, yeah. I'm all over the place.

I Hate Math

No, that's not true anymore.

My lifelong case of math anxiety seems to be going into remission these last couple of weeks, as I work my way through my Intermediate Algebra class (on the road to that elusive, transferable College Algebra.)

But, I do hate my math class. Not the teacher, she's nice, if a ditzy. No, it's really the format of the class I hate, and the fact that they cannot get their computer shit together. It is making me crazy.

I wasted half an hour waiting for pages to load today -- and I have a really quick Internet connection, even on my laptop when it's on the home network! It's not me. It's the server.

And, I don't have half an hour to waste.

I mean, no one does, do they?