Kyle got a deer!

Kyle got a deer 2 days ago! Yee ha   deer meat!

Job

Well, I reckon most of y'all know or soon will that I lost my job the Friday before Christmas. I was 'adminstratively removed' for having to be off longer than 14 days for the back injury, which they said is their policy since I'd been there under six months.Whatever.

I'm trying to look on this as a blessing in disguise in the long run.

Dec.26,2005

Hope everyone had a great Christmas!

We had a nice one, I guess the funniest gift I've seen so far is Kyle got a shirt from his stepsister that had a picture of a tricycle, and it said "Chicks dig my ride". We just fell down laughing when he showed it to us last night.

I got a VCR/DVD combo player, and the first three Harry Potter movies. Since Tony had never read the books(read?what's that?lol)I convinced him to watch the first movie, and we ended up through the rest of Christmas watching the other two after that,so he's hooked now(on the movies, not the books:)

Am currently having car trouble, Tony is in the process of trying to fix that. Lynn let me borrow her car the day before Christmas Eve and the morning of Christmas Eve. The most fun I had this Christmas (besides Christmas day) was picking up April Friday night from her 'progressive dinner' and she and Kyle and I went shopping at WalMart at midnight together to finish up buying Christmas.No crowds:) and it was nice hanging out with two of my kids.

Of course, since it was after midnight when we finished.....as soon as we got in the car to come home they both started arguing their case that because it was technically Christmas eve, they wanted to open one gift as soon as we got home!(we have a tradition of opening one gift on Christmas Eve.)So yes, Mom gave in and said it was OK:)

One of the best gifts I got was a phone call from my brother in Hong Kong, we talked quite awhile. also talked to Mom and Tracy. Dustin stopped by for several hours on Christmas day, which was a nice surprise.

Now as we head into the New Year, we are all hanging in there with Tracy and Adam as they await the word to receive their daughter from China....can't wait to see the newest family member! You can keep up by visiting A Red Thread to China.

Pictures

Sorry   got rid of the pics....didn't realize they weren't private on here,but were creating a 'journal album'....some of those soldier pics were not mine to post, on the yahoo 360 blog the pics only post to the blog and they can only be viewed by the family and friends I give access to the blog.

Dec.21,2005

This is one of my epals, getting a meritorious promotion.

My back is slowly getting better. I hate being less than 100%!

Am waiting on one last gift to be delivered from my online shopping...of course, it's the one I'm most excited about giving! As for the calendars....WalMart told me last Saturday (17)that Fuji was just starting to process calendar orders from Dec.FIRST....yee ha, this might end up being a 2007 calendar!!

April has an assignment to film a movie over the holidays...she adapted that short story I wrote 100 years ago when I was 15, it's for her movie class....I think she did not realize when she took the class she'd have to end up directing and filming a movie! Because of the snowdays, I'm just irked that it got delayed till something to do over the holidays.

Christmas is coming! Besides the 'goose getting fat', I'm not getting any thinner,lol.

Tonight is the Christmas play for Sunday school....Ken and Bryan are in it, and April is singing with the other middle schoolers. Guess we're taking Britney with us, Teresa is at her second job this evening and had asked me to keep Brit till she got back. Monday night was the handbell/choral concert...Britney ended up going to that with us also, and Kyle and Morgan went. It was VERY pretty, I just love listening to the handbells!

Am impressed with how dedicated April is to handbells...she's also joined the handbell choir at church. Kyle gave her his old guitar for Christmas, am thinking after watching her Monday that lessons will be a possible birthday gift...am sure she would practice.

Well, I need to go start supper, as people will be coming and going and eating in shifts.

MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ALL!

Nugget Washer

Ok my new name will have to be 'nugget washer'....yesterday I was making homemade chicken nuggets to fry up in the deep fryer, and as I went to put the basket with the uncooked nuggets into the hot oil.....the handle came off and dumped them all in my soapy dishwater!

It was one of those things that I said 'this will probably be more funny TOMORROW than it is right now!"

After which I rinsed all the darn pieces of chicken off & started back over with rolling them in flour,etc. for cooking.I think I might need to join that Dorks R Us group after all:)

Dec.15,2005

Playing with pictures again. I have been up since 2:30.....this back thing stinks. between the muscle relaxant and pain meds, I am finally feeling a little better and it is almost 7:30. April is happy,school was cancelled due to an ice storm supposed to be coming. I don't see it doing anything yet.

Tony came in here last night, closer to work for if it had started...he is gone to work since nothing had started, but said his boss had told them if the sleet/rain starts they will pack it in and head back home.

Kyle cracked me up yesterday, he was watching the tree rotate and asked 'is there any way we can speed that thing up?' I guess we both got a mental image of it whirling furiously and flinging ornaments off, coz we both fell down laughing.

Dec.12,2005

Went to the doctor today and he put me off thru the 19th. Which is ok, will give me time to heal. Also gave me muscle relaxants, so I am VERY relaxed right now.

Dec.10,2005

Ended up staying home today, tried to sleep last night & back was hurting very badly. Darn! I think that original back injury will dog me for a long time.

Just chillin' :)

Didn't do a whole awful lot today, kind of hurt my back a little, I guess, the other night while helping Kyle move boxes. Cause it's been aching all day. DID go online shopping & went 'wild' for me:)Yep, we had snow & ice, so got to do my Christmas shopping from the comfort of the computer chair,lol.

Getting ready to work the next two days, but the drive should be ok in the morning, roads were cleared today & I don't take any back roads.Tony & April are going to bake Christmas cookies....yum.

Kyle starts night shift tomorrow night, at Wal Mart.He will be inside the building now, which is a good place to be in the winter!He is glad to bid cart pushing goodbye.

April was glad they had school off today:) She went sledding twice.

Well, I am going to play a few games of online Mahjongg & I think hit the sack...4:30 comes early!

Christmas project completed

OK,here's a completed Christmas ball....how close did I come in my descriptive writing?!LOL.

The last few days have been interesting...Dustin's car also broke down, & as you know,Tony's truck was already kaput.We had snow on Monday....driving home in that Monday night after work was OK, but Tues morning was more difficult ,because it's a bad time to find out you're out of windshield washer fluid while you are driving on the interstate after a snow with trucks blasting by you!

I'd like to say the road crews did a great job laying salt...I could tell by what was on my windshield.

Tony got Dustin's car running again yesterday, and then he FINISHED his Christmas shopping tonight. I have not STARTED, unless you count asking my friend in Baghdad to send me something!

This is funny...Ben & Emma both left their digital cameras here, but in order to get pics of my tree and decorations on the computer(to email them to a soldier in Iraq, she asked for some)...I had to ask Kyle to take pics with his camera phone & email them to me, because I don't know how to operate the digital cameras!!!('Half a geek')

Well, it's late...just wanted to let y'all finally know what the thing I was making looks like.It had been so long since I'd made one, that I had to call Mom & ask her to count the panels!(I never remember to save one for myself)There's 5 on top and 5 on the bottom, and 10 in the middle. My grandfather came up with the idea. I am bummed to find out after saving cards for a few years, I am down to only have enough circles to make 3 of these!!!Tony thinks it would be cool to try it with pictures.

Oh, and the 7th being the anniversary of Pearl Harbor, my thoughts again returned to Hawaii. When we went there in 2003 for Kirby's wedding,we went to the memorial. It was awe inspiring, and humbling and saddening all at the same time.

Which brings me to so many prayer concerns right now...I worry for all 'my' soldiers I write to, but I am particularly concerned about one in particular, who I have not heard from since the Marine's were killed..I know he's not dead, but that doesn't mean he's not injured.

And there are friends of my brother who need prayer, and friends of my sister with a child facing surgery.So,please,spare a moment to remember them.

Christmas musings

Too great....my nephew obviously does NOT like sitting on Santa's lap!lol.

Well, it's definitely beginning to look a lot like Christmas now. Tony put the tree up yesterday. Since his mobile home he rents is so small, he offered me his tree to use this year...it is a huge, gorgeous, ROTATING tree:) This is the first year in a long time that we have been able to put ALL our decorations up!

Speaking of decorations...I somehow have 'Kirby 72' painted wooden decoration, and also a 'Susie 72' decoration. Have to ask my siblings if they want these back,lol. When we were growing up, Mom every year used to get kits to make decorations for us to make them...then when we moved out, she gave us 'ours' to have. I realized this was a good idea (belatedly) last night when Ben came by & I handed him FOUR measley decorations and said 'here's yours for your tree."

Decorating the tree last night led to a whole philosophical discussion about decorations....I suppose it's all what you grew up with. Tony is from the 'theme' school apparently, where you don't use handmade or homemade decorations, you use Christmas balls & like decorate all in white & gold, or red & green or you get the picture.

Ours is always a chaotic(I like to think 'joyous') mixture of ones the kids made, ones I made when I was young, gifts ones we've gotten, or ones we've purchased over the years.Let's hear it out there...which type do you use?

Remember the Christmas balls that Granddad McNulty used to make...where you take 12(or more?will remember when I try it myself) cut out circles of pictures from Christmas cards andfold over the edges on the sides & bottom of 6 of the circles & the side & top of 6 of the circles & glue the sides ,etc. together with a ribbon for hanging in the middle & then sprinkle glitter onto glue on all of the edges(does anyone have amental picture yet?lol. I don't think I'm good at descriptive writing)ANYWAY, I used to make them....so have been saving my Christmas cards for the past several years in order to make them again,& I beleive this year I have enough.

I am undecided as to whether there were 12 circles or more in the middle...will have to figure it out when I start on some more! I will take a pic & post it when I'm done, as I have the feeling my description is leaving a lot of people saying 'What? is she talking about?'

Thursday & Friday at work were both overwhelmingdays. I don't beleive it is just me, a nurse from downstairs got pulled up & agreed that this is the most overwhelming job she has ever worked...you never feel like you are accomplishing anything & she said she felt 'chained' to the med cart cause of the heavy med pass loads. I didn't get out either night until 8:30 pm...there is just no time during the day to do your paperwork, so I always end up finishing up at the end of the day. I could write more in depth, but I have decided to try & start thinking of at least ONE positive thing each day if I can or else this job is going to kill me!

I AM upset about what is potentially going to happen Christmas weekend...that is my regularly scheduled weekend to work. Originally they told us that we could sign up for 4 hour shifts on ONE of the holidays, like they did at Thanksgiving. Now that my boss has resigned, they issued a memo late last week that said they have decided the 'holiday' is from 10:45 pm Christmas Eve to 10:45 pm Christmas Day night. So that you are supposed to work your regularly scheduled hours before their arbitrary 'holiday' hours begin.

What this means, if I'm understanding it correctly, is that they want me to work my regular 12 hour shift on Christmas Eve day...and then they are potentially still going to run me in there for four hours on Christmas day, which with me leaving at 1:30 pm to get there and returning by 8 or 8:30 pm means I can just kiss the whole holdiay weekend goodbye,except for a little 'window' on Christmas morning to open gifts & celebrate.

I know, I have the wrong attitude...I think of all 'my' soldiers and those serving who are far from home & should be ashamed of myself for griping.

I was offended by the memo for two reasons...A. they said in it"our residents need care over the holidays,too" which hacked me off...I am not stupid, of course I realized that!But they first said they were going to do Thanksgiving,Christmas, & New Years one way, & then changed their minds. and B. when you send me a memo reminding me that our residents need care over the holidays, I am reminded that I have never seen any member of upper management in on a major holiday in all my 12 years of nursing,so it's basically saying that our residents need care and we are going to make YOU do it, while we enjoy sitting home & celebrating the holidays with our families.

Well, I think I have whined enough...thanks for letting me rant!

Nov.30,2005

This is an absolutely beautiful pic that Sister Sue sent,wanted to share it!

Well, it's apparently official now....Kyle is moving back in with me. Wondered if it would work out, sorry that it hasn't & that's OK. Just have to hope there's no hard feelings...he's young yet. And darn, this means I have to move all the stuff out of the spare room!LOL.

Tony's truck turned out to be NOT fixed yesterday, so guess he will be shoppping for a new vehicle....no sense putting any more money into this one.

I work the next two days, but then have the weekend off,yay. I am currently cooking an accidentally purchased sweet potato pie....someone(not me) thought they were picking up a pumpkin pie.Don't even know if anyone LIKES sweet potato pie,lol. Guess we'll find out, huh?

Terry has a cute story posted on her blog, go check it out, & for those of you in our family.....does it remind anyone of the 'mole' incident??With a mole loose in the basement of the house in Parchment, & lots of shrieking,etc. as it ran around & Dad chased it. Ah, the memories:)

Catching Up

One of the soldiers I've met through anysoldier.com sends awesome pics of Iraq, thought I'd share:)

Sorry that I don't post when I work several 12 hour days back to back....gee, wonder why I don't?lol. It's because when I finally make it home, I just want to veg playing Mahjongg(addicted, where are the Mahjongg 12 step groups?)before I go to bed to get back up & do it all again.

Interesting end to the day at work yesterday, the call bell system went out again. It had gone out of service on Thanksgiving, which led to someones' family member getting in my face & screaming at me after I had only been there 15 minutes on Thanksgiving. (and I only worked 4 hours:)Some family members respond to the guilt of placing their loved one in a nursing home by screaming at the staff....lucky us.

Anyway, the humorous thing was my CNA's told me"hey, the bells are not working" so I went over to the other unit where the computer is to see if I could figure it out...there was a screen that said "Press Contol,Alt,Delete"....I'm capable of doing that! however, there was NO KEYBOARD!I'm looking around for the keyboard & trying to figure out how to press control,alt delete WITHOUT a keyboard??

The other nurse comes up & I say'hey,how do we do this without a keyboard?" Well, we tried to hook up the keyboard from the other computer, but that didn't work either. I start saying"we're going to have to call the help desk." The third nurse walks up & I say'hey, check this out" her face just registers total shock...'where's the keyboard?"

I place the call to the help desk, & THAT guy is shocked 'why don't you have a keyboard?'Me'I don't know'. He is saying 'I don't know how to tell you how to fix this without a keyboard, how do I fix this?' I am falling down laughing,I say"I am talking to the HELP desk, and YOU are asking ME for help???!!"He starts cracking up,too.

Then he tries to spell my name after he asks me for it,I keep saying S-E-E' he is trying to add a C and all kinds of stuff. This is my computer expert, who can't spell a 3 letter name??I finally say,'look, it's just too easy....S-E-E....as in see the dog run' He's like'OH!',he finally gets it.We are getting sidetracked by the name I have been saddled with due to my former marriage from the main issue..which is, without the call bell system, we have no way of knowing which patient is calling for assistance!

The next shift nurse arrives for report & I give up...I am handing this call-bell dilemma off to someone else and going home. My day started out with sending a patient to the ER with chest pains promptly at 7 a.m cause it was a new graduate nurse working night shift & she didn't catch on to the seriousness of the situation. I'm not bitching, I was new once,too and that's how you learn what's serious and what's not.

But this meant that I did not get report in the morning until almost 7:45, which means I was an hour late getting started on my day! I never caught up with myself, until just in time to discover the missing keyboard. In another addition of 'dorks r us', I also managed while trying to give a tube feeding to knock over the container of tube feeding onto the floor instead of pouring it into the tube...my little lady I was trying to feed was laughing hysterically, glad I could make someone's day a little brighter:)

Our belated Thanksgiving was wonderful, thanks to Tony who handled all the cooking!Ben & Kyle floated by at different times to catch the leftovers.

One of my other soldiers has become my 'Iraqi connection', she read that we were trying to get 'Lost' on DVD for April(which we did, thanks to the Sam Goody kids in the family)and said she can get DVD's over there....I told her to look for CSI for my little fanatic.I am bummed that she got extended to being over there thru Christmas, but their mail stop was Nov.1, so no way to send a card or package...am sure SHE is much more bummed!!!

We already heard back from one of the groups we sent a package to,so that was nice(that the package made it) I have volunteered to pick up 2 extra names a week to write to for awhile for Soldier's Angels, they are getting inundated with extra names.(plus this will help use up my 37 cent stamps before the increase...see, it's really 'all about me':)

I am getting ready to be a helpful mom & do Kyle's laundry for him,he is backed up on laundry & working lots of hours....Tony said"I knew it was coming sooner or later!that you'd do his laundry!"Tony's truck part is FINALLY sposed to be done today,yay!

Well, if you have gone to sleep, you can wake up, because I'm done now!!! Love to all. Kath

2 years ago

Two years ago today we were in HAWAII to see Kirby & Takaho joined in marriage. Wish I was in Hawaii today, don't you?

I am currently boiling up fresh pork ribs from where my ex-husband butchered a hog(the boys gave me the ribs, don't tell,lol)so that I can cook them in the crock pot ALL DAY.....ummmmmmm.My house will smell good.

yes,it stinks that I have to spend almost two hours driving to go to work tomorrow for only 4 hours...but at least I am not serving in a war zone in a foreign country! Remember our deployed soldiers in your prayers.

We will have our Thanksgining on Friday, I reckon. And then I work the weekend,yee ha.

My Interesting Job

I have the most interesting job sometimes. Day before yesterday, I'm standing at the med cart & the housekeeper comes up & says "I'm concerned about something in Mr.So and So's room."

She proceeds to tell me that for several days, there had been a plastic bag on a stand in the corner & that day when she was cleaning she decided to look in the bag because she thought it might be food. To her horror, she discovered an extremely LARGE butcher knife!!

Well, I tell the social worker, & then go back to the room with the housekeeper for her to divert the gentleman while I remove the knife. Keep in mind that this patient has recently been very paranoid and very angry!Well, he sees me taking the bag out, & yells at me,"If you remove that, you are going to jail!" I reply "I'm sorry sir, I have to take this out for safety, we are giving it to the social worker & she will get it to your daughter."

When I carry it out in the hall & unwrap it, I,too, am horrified at the size of this knife. and the thought that it's been in the room of a paranoid,angry gentleman!!I take it up the hall to the social worker's office, & she is at that moment on the phone with the daughter who is saying"I don't remember bringing a knife in, but if I did, it's just a little table knife" & I am unwrapping the knife again to show it to the social worker, whose eyes are as big as saucers as she's realizing how extremely large this knife is.!She gulps & tells the daughter"It's a little bigger than a table knife!We'll keep it in my office until the next time you come in and get it back to you."

You just never know what will happen when you go to work!!!

Another aspect of my job that I never realized would be part of it is talking to drunken family members of my residents. We have a woman whose daughters periodically call when they get drunk...yesterday one of them called & said"I keep calling my mother's room & she's not in there!" I said,'well, she's in the activities room, but we can push her back to her room if you want to call her back in just a few minutes...I can't use this business phone as I am waiting on a call back from a doctor." she gets belligerent & says"oh, so you are blocking me from talking to my mother?!" (big sigh inside from me) I reply "no, I'm just asking you to call her back in her room in a few..."& before I can finish the sentence she says "I wish you would shut up so I can finish my sentence!" ????I reply nicely (yes, I can be tactful, I realize many will find this a shock!:) "Ma'am just give us a minute to push her back to her room and call her on her phone,please."

Unfortunately, she proceeded on her phone call to her mother to rage that she is going to 'get a lawyer' and 'take her mother out' of the facility & 'press charges' on the grandson who is the power-of-attorney. Which got my resident highly upset. It's very sad, there is a lot of money in the family & the drunken daughters are irate that the grandson(who has his grandmother's best interests at heart) is the power of attorney.

So be thankful this Thanksgiving if it's not part of your job to confiscate knives!or talk to greedy drunken family members. Be thankful if you don't HAVE drunken greedy family members!

And I am thankful for all of you!  Happy Thanksgiving!

Hows YOUR day?lol

Ok this is how I looked this morning when Tony called to say his truck had broken down! "Bad hair day zombie". I had stayed up late last night after getting home from work and watching 'Lost' and 'Invasion'.....I'm a Wednesday night ABC TV baby.....I played on the computer coz I knew I could sleep in...ha ha! So of course he called at 6:30 a.m. & said'could you come pick me up?'

I rolled out of bed & threw on some sweats & grabbed some coffee...I don't even think I started waking up till I was halfway there!!!When he got in the car (after screaming LIKE A WOMAN when I drove up.....not really,lol:)I said "I didn't have time to get pretty' & I could see him trying not to laugh, finally he said'should I drive? you really don't look awake!'

By the way, is this national car trouble week and someone forgot to send me the notice?

Christmas fun

In other news....Tony and I had a great deal of fun getting together some Christmas packages to send to 4 groups from anysoldier.com.  I couldn't have done it if he wouldn't have helped me, it was something I wanted to do but couldn't justify the expense.

Anyway, he got involved by picking out the groups...he wanted groups that weren't on bases, but were 'out in the field'. Naturally we picked Virginia units to send to!:) Several of the groups we picked are actually living on Iraqi bases as they are training the Iraqi's...so they have way less amenities. He also picked the groups that mentioned giving stuff to local children, so we put stuff like coloring books & crayons in (dollar store shopping!!lol)

and he called his employer & got them to donate 60 pairs of work gloves! Yay, Riddleberger Bros.!When you go on anysoldier.com it lists how many contacts the addressee thinks he will have (like he thinks he can get stuff to 10 guys or 9 or whatever). So we were not sending to like an entire unit, which would probably be higher than I could count!(see previous entry'dorks r us':)

We also sent baby wipes..lol...my brother asked for an explanation of that! what it is, they don't always have access to showers...so they can do a quick clean up with baby wipes. (are you thinking 'EWWW', coz I did!) and we picked snacks & Christmas candy (no chocolate) & probably what the guys will like best...Tony put one of his old Maxim magazines in each box (go, soft porn:)  Of course, Tony gets them for the articles......psyche!Plus then we threw a hometown newspaper in each one....just coz they say a lot that they miss seeing local papers. (well, they're getting OUR local news, not their own...but, whatever works)

Ben donated some mags from Sam Goody, & Kyle & their roommate Justin donated some old play station 2 games for me to send a smaller box to one of 'my' Marines, a young man who is really delightful but must be dreadfully bored since he keeps corresponding with the elderly!

I mention this not to toot our horns but just to let y'all know that it was great fun to pick this stuff out & imagine these guys getting it....& if you're considering doing it yourself....there's still time to send priority mail!! which was only a dollar more than parcel post(that end date was the 12th) The DOD llink is here

Click here: DoD News: DoD Announces Recommended Holiday Mail Dates   but I can at least mention that priority mail can still be sent till Dec. 10.

Dorks R Us

Today I managed to blow a tire. I blame it on APRIL, if she wouldn't have said"what's that over there?" while I was coming around the curve I would've never looked to see what she meant....& then drifted to the RIGHT,even though I was looking to the LEFT...& then managed to hit the edge of the storm drain just exactly correctly to punch a hole in the tire. Fortunately Tony was with me, so he put on the spare...which I could have done if I had had to, I've changed tires....but this freed me up so that I was standing there while every one else drove by & looked at us as they were leaving.(We were picking up April from school.)So I could feel stupid with an audience:) And then one car slowed down & this lady leans over & said "I heard a weird noise as I was getting in my car & thought to myself...did someone blow a tire?" April says "hello, Mrs. Teacher", so I raised my hand & said 'yes, it was me! I blew a tire!"   I'm hoping tomorrow will be uneventful.

The results

Well, the 'Canned Hamlet' crowd got a 'silver' which April found disappointing, as the previous six years THMS won a 'gold'. She was also upset as the name of her character was on the critique from the judges for her lines being muffled by her mask. We tried to explain to her that that wasn't really her fault, as she had tried to tell the drama teacher that she thought the mask was muffling her lines. And that just because her name was on it, that was just problems with her CHARACTER, not anything that SHE did wrong.

I still think it was a great play, & I,too, was upset that they focused on the difficulty hearing some of her lines...because I still think she did a great job with her gestures & body language.

and they DID win a silver!!

Canned Hamlet Review

Absolutely adorable play....and they did a wonderful job. April did a fantastic job ....since she has to wear a mask (white 'scream' mask)she has to use body language along with her lines, and I was very impressed with her ability to do that. Several parents mentioned her afterwards as one of the kids who did a super job. I told April to quit worrying, that I think they will get some recognition at the competition.  Their drama teacher said they have come home with a "gold" award the last 6 years.

So, she's off to Richmond tomorrow, and the competition is Sat and then she's home Sat night.

Returned letter

Remember that name I got from Soldier's Angels wounded team that I sweated bullets over writing the letter to the guy cause it said that he had lost both legs? well, turns out the letter got returned today. it had "no record",""unclaimed" & "insufficient address" all marked on it. I checked the casualty lists & did not see the name....so have emailed them at Soldier's Angels,maybe they can figure out what happened.

It was actually horrendously depressing to read the casualty lists going all the way back to the beginning of October, by the way.

 

Tony hurt his knee at work yesterday....they think either strained or tore some cartilage. It's always something.

Well, I am off to view "Canned Hamlet"....review later!:)

cooking adventures with kathi

LOL. This is just sad....I actually started a fire while boiling tea yesterday!!!It was one of those tea bags with the tag attached, & I did not realize that the tag was hanging over the side of the pan. So I am washing up dishes & thinking to myself...."what the heck is that burning smell?"  Looked over to the stove & realized that the tag has already BURNT UP and now the fire is spreading up the string to the tea bag!!!

Well, naturally I put the burning string out...by flipping it into the tea! and then thought"that wasn't a very good idea...now the tea will taste burnt". so I just dumped the tea out & started all over again.

Yes, another edition of 'dorks-r-us'.:)

Soldier support for the Holidays

Came home sick from work yesterday,still feel like dirt today.Just a virus that's been making the rounds.

Y'all know I often speak of the things I do to support the troops. My tenative plans for the holiday season were to send Christmas cards....one to each of the Virginia units listed on anysoldier.com, & also one to each of my correspondents I've picked up through Soldier's Angels,anysoldier, or Adopt a Platoon.

Came across a blogger today who wishes Holiday Greetings sent to her to print out & put with her packages of cards.

Click here: Yikes!: CHRISTMAS IN IRAQ! I NEED YOUR HELP!   The DOD has listed mailing requirements for the holiday:   Click here: DoD News: DoD Announces Recommended Holiday Mail Dates   If you're thinking of doing something to support the troops for the holidays, here's some sites....time is running out!:)   Click here: Books For Soldiers - Care Packages For The MInd   Click here: Welcome to AdoptaPlatoon   Click here: Soldiers' Angels   My personal favorite is anysoldier.com   Click here: Any Soldier ... Any Soldier Inc. ... Care Package ... Soldier Support   Mostly because you can click on "where to send" and then if you scroll down on the right, they have a thing that says"click here to search anysoldier.com contacts", & if you use their search engine, you can check for units deployed from your state. I'm posting this cause I'd like to encourage you to do at least ONE thing for our fine young men and women serving for the holidays.....even if it's just something as simple as picking ONE unit to send ONE Christmas card to:)

Nov.2,2005

Well, I promised a pic from Senior Night, but it didn't turn out too well......disposable camera & bright football lights, I reckon.

I have added other pics to the photo albums, & THEN decided to just put the latest pics in one album....lol, so no, you are not seeing double.

I'm going to run the same blog on AOL, so it saves copying & pasting the blog entries into emails...between Yahoo and AOL, I'll catch most of the people on my email list....& then you can feel free to read or not read.

Back to work for two days tomorrow. Cannot beleive there are only two football games left, & then Dustin's high school football career will be over!

Kyle stops by almost every day...because they don't have Internet access yet,lol. I am currently doing laundry, & will have to pick April up at 4 from play practice....she has had something after school every day this week. Tomorrow night she has a handbell concert & I will miss it, forgot to ask for the day off in time. Ben said he would take her & pick her up.

She leaves Friday the 11th for Richmond, for the Young People's Theatre competition...that's where they are presenting "Canned Hamlet'. They stay over Friday night, & get home late Sat. night.Lynn saw her handbell concert last Sunday at the hospital, she took her for me & then stayed to watch.

Well, that's it for today!