Still playing

 I used Photo! Editor (free download)  to modify this picture. The original is below with the gray background. The modified one has the gold tones to it. The original was modified a bit with an automatic color adjuster so it is not straight out of the camera, either. Both were given a rounded edge frame from the (also free) program Photoscape.

Headache update. What can I say? Not a single migraine since I began the Neurontin (Gabapentin). I don't like the monopoly of pharmaceutical manufacturers but I do like not having any migraines. I'll just say it as simple as that. It is what it is.

You can read more here and here.

My home has been very active the past month. I have my daughter back living with me and her beau (from Florida). I have my niece and her husband staying (she is 9 weeks pregnant). It is fun to look up what the baby looks like and what is forming. We go here.  The way my daughter talks, this may be the closest I get to participating in the "grandmother" role. That is fine by me. I have lots of nieces and  nephews, I get a share of baby time. Don't get me wrong. That is not near the same as having your own grand-bambino/bambina, but I respect my daughters' wishes to not have children if that is what she chooses. If I wanted to guarantee that I have grand babies, I should have increased my odds by having more children.

Let's throw in a movie update while I am here. The Hunger Games. Lots of confusion in this story. I will skip reading the book unless I get laid up in bed for months at a time and need reading material. I know that the movie is geared towards the young adult. **Possible spoiler alerts - stop here***.  

To me, if you are trying to survive, you do not hang around or walk out in the open area. You keep your ass hidden in the trees and you keep moving. When a "friend" dies, you do not just hold that person (while the other killers are possibly close by) and sing to them and then bury them. Your enemies are all around you tracking you.

Many instances of this practice in the story. I am not clear why it got the publicity and acclaim it did. It was a good watch. A lot better than some of the shows I have seen. We like how they chose lesser known actors (that could have been a monetary decision) but this made it look a bit more real. For the girl to have short and dirty fingernails (not bitten) made it so much more believable than some of the better known actresses who may have insisted on having perfect manicures.

I did not care for them gussying the girls up in prom dresses during the ceremonies. Really? Have we not progressed beyond this sexist image? Apparently not. Will I watch the sequels? Perhaps. Maybe to see if they have more of a story line for the W Harrelson character.  And we always love Stanley in anything.

Pre-windows

Many, many moons ago - I used a program called Wordperfect. This was before the days of Windows and MS Office. That enormous package may have been around but my establishment used Wordperfect and Lotus. Remember Lotus 1-2-3? Anyway, I think it was Wordperfect that used the Blue Morpho butterfly I have pictured above. I fell in love with it way back then.

The conservatory at Key West was polluted with them. I like blue and I am sure this may be one of the most favorite of the butterfly species. In the conservatory at Niagara Falls and Columbus it was difficult for me to get a photo with their wingspan open. When this butterfly lands it folds up its' wings and they are brown on the underside.

Until I found this one. Sitting on a blue bench. It sat there for a long time and I think I took about 20 pictures of it. I had to be called away from this presentation of blue on blue. My grand niece had a butterfly on her head and my sister wanted a picture. I obliged.

Now, looking and posting the picture I am thinking to myself, 'Maybe it was dead.'

Cruise

I have one brother who prefers to vacation via cruise ship. I have not been on one, yet. I have had a couple of opportunities to go, but have not, yet. We wanted to get as many family members as possible, but nobody ever has the money to go at the same time as a deposit is required many months in advance.

This cruise ship was in the harbor when my nephew and I slipped down to Mallory Square to capture photos of the infamous sunset. As we waited for the sun to set a young lady ran up to the huge ship and the crowd cheered. Seems as though the entire cruise ship was waiting for her. From a distance I could see that she had long flowing blond hair. Had on a black short outfit and was drinking a fountain drink. I wondered what had held her up for an hour. That was how long between the ship sending out it's long wail to call passengers and the actual time she arrived. They had to completely re-open the doors and put the walkway down especially for her.

It was the folks on land that cheered. Not the passengers on the ship.

But, oh what a sunset. My nephew was upset at all the sailboats and other vessels that blocked the view, but I rather thought their silhouette against the backdrop of the setting sun added more character to my pictures. By the time the sun set my camera battery was depleted (as we had been out walking for seven hours straight by then) and I had to use my cell phone. I was so worried I was going to drop it in the water. I had used up all the camera battery power at the Butterfly conservatory. My group of family kept laughing at me because I kept mistakenly saying the Butter conservatory. I came back with the obligatory coffee cup (my souvenir of choice). And a tote. Of course a tote to carry all the other souvenirs I purchased for other folks.

I washed all my totes when I came home. I really need to spread them out and get a picture of all of them. The cats love them so I have to hide them so they do not sleep on them and get their cat hair all over them. Most of my totes are black. The one I purchased in Key West is a clam shell white.

Do you have a certain item that you pick up each time you vacation? My brother-in-law collects shot glasses, so I picked up one for him. He does not even drink. LOL! I picked up tee-shirts for all the grand nephews. A couple of magnets for sisters. A hat for my brother. I also grabbed a new key ring for myself. We ate at the Hard Rock cafe but their souvenir selection was quite lacking.

Much ado about nothing

Some weed I was practicing photographing at the lake.

I do want to give a shout out to a movie I watched again. Sunday in New York with J Fonda, R Taylor, C Robertson and R Culp. I think the funniest person is C Robertson playing the quizzical brother. The way he looks and questions this stranger he finds with  his sister who is pretending to be him is hilarious. It is one I have caught before (never the beginning, though) and cannot resist watching it yet again whenever I channel surf and find it playing.

Lit tree

Only the lights. Still. Nothing else. I have been giving it water like crazy. The kids are responsible for decorations this year. Sigh. I like how this cell phone feature "Polaroid" makes the photo look 30 years old. I think my camera is in the trunk of my car. I took pictures at our big family dinner on the 11th, and have pictures but have forgotten to get the camera out each time. Wait. I unloaded groceries on Sunday. I would have picked up the camera if it were in the trunk. Then, where is it? Aw, jeez. Now I have to go look for it.

I have the week off from work for vacation. There are about 3 problems that I am still trying to take care of remotely from home. They concern the filter. I may try one more thing and then let everything go until I return to the office on the 20th.

The filter may die by then.

Do you have children in school? If you did,  how would you feel about their Internet usage and the filter? Would you be upset if they could play games or access facebook in the classroom? How about reading/writing blogs while in the classroom?  Porn is easy. It is blocked with NO exceptions. Proxies are blocked with NO exceptions. 

Youtube, facebook, games, shopping, gambling - a lot of other categories are left up to the district. The thorn in my side (this month) is a middle school has three games housed on their web page. We are required to categorize all our school web pages as "education" and all my districts allow this category to pass. If they did not, it would be kind of difficult for them. But, this lets those 3 games show up under the category "education" and all the schools in my organization's network can access the 3 games. I have only one district complaining (but they are relentless). I am working with my filter company (they are located on the west coast and I am on the east) but their resolution has not worked. I may have misunderstood and set it up incorrectly.

I have never heard of a parent wanting a list of blocked categories for their district. I have wanted to go to districts and hold a meeting with the parents to explain how the filter works in the districts but I wonder if any parent is even interested. 

Do they think that this technology is without errors?

Is it real or is it memorex?

Found and scanned this old photo in. Do you believe that? Not true. It was actually just taken on Saturday the 20th and I used the "antiquing" feature from the free photo program I downloaded. Photoscape.

It actually looks like this:

It was taken in the Amish country when we stopped here to get some apples. 

Speaking of apples, do you eat the entire apple? I mean core and all? Some folks do. I don't. Golden Delicious are my favorite. With salt.

Here is what my sister purchased. She was SO nice and left them at my house for me to enjoy. Ah, gee.... thanks a LOT!

Chocolate! Speaking now of chocolate, my daughter's beau made the remark "For two women living in this house, there sure isn't very much chocolate."  I looked at him incredulously. "D'oh! That's just the point! We EAT it all before it has a chance to sit around waiting for somebody else to find it!"  I then laughed and showed him a secret stash that my sister had brought. Ah, sisters. I neglected to tell him that I actually hide all the chocolate for myself. My daughter quipped "I don't like chocolate."  Hmmm. What is wrong with that girl?

I hope to have a busy and productive day. I'd better get started as it is almost eleven and I have been up since six. I want to make cranberry bread again! I'll post more pictures if I do.

Witchy Woman

Here is one from the festival at the beginning of the month.

I posted this one in a very large format. How can you tell how much storage space you have left on your blog site? Go to google.com and log in. Choose Settings. Choose Google Account Settings. Choose Picasa web album - Settings . Choose storage. This should tell you how much storage space you have left to post pictures on your blog. There is a limit, you know. I have read bloggers who had to create new blogs because they ran out.

I just tested it. I took 3 of my largest pictures and set them to upload to this blog. I then watched my storage settings (as shown above) and refreshed after each picture loaded and I watched it increase. Now, this is where it gets tricky. You can delete the post, but the pictures still stay on the Picasa and still use up your storage space. How do I get rid of those three pictures since it was only a test posting?

Anywhere in settings, look at the top tabs. You should see one that says "My Photos". Choose that tab. You may have to hunt and peck, mine were at the very end of course. You can delete them here. Just make sure you don't delete any that you actually used in a blog post.

There. I'm done.

Photos and Movies

Found a new free photo program. I took the above picture.


I created this with it, by playing around/messing around with the program.

PhotoScape.

Watched City Island. I liked it. Also watched Death At a Funeral. It was okay - I was a little bit disappointed. My video store rents movies on Mondays for .79 cents. City Island I rented off the digital box from my cable company. Both made me laugh so that was good.

Picking up the pieces

Here is a photo from the past. I think I have some new pics on my camera, but have not had the chance to connect the memory card to the reader to download them to my PC.

I am still so very, very tired from the long week-end. I had a low count of 21 people at my party. That made for a nice, enjoyable get together. The next day it was up to my sister's house where her son was setting off fireworks (and the canon). Gosh, that thing is loud!

I did the baby care during the firework display so I do not have any pictures or movies to post. The wee one slept through the entire show without so much as a whimper. Nobody lost a thumb. It was a close call. There were about a dozen men drinking and there were fireworks. We should probably have an ambulance standing by next time.

I Am

As usual, the picture has nothing to do with the post

The bridge spans a koi pond built by my brother-in-law after his retirement. The little boy is the youngest son of a nephew's girlfriend. As we tend to do, we have absorbed them into our family with no questions asked and plenty of love. That is our way.

No prejudice. Well, I try anyway. I have fallen victim to laughing at a politically incorrect joke from time to time. Mostly in my younger years when I wasn't strong enough to stand up to other people. Then I went through a phase where I challenged those that told the jokes. Now I am at the stage where I don't laugh, I ignore them - they get no reaction from me and I don't waste my time with them.

I watched "Invictus". Before posting about the movie, I wanted to research it. To get my facts straight. Okay, that was three hours ago. Yes, folks. I have been reading about Nelson Mandela, Winnie, apartheid, South Africa and the poet William Ernest Henley for the past three hours. C'mon! You should know me by now. I'll do anything to get out of housework and yard work.

Poet Henley brings me to the title of my post. "I Am". This can get complicated. I started with Nelson. I continued with apartheid, read a little on Winnie (she just scares me) and South Africa. Then I started on the poem by Henley. During the movie when the poem was read in the back ground I wondered to myself, "Hmmm. I wonder what the name of that poem is?" Silly me.

I googled almost every line of the poem. Come to find out that none other than the coward T McVeigh used the poem to express himself. Forget him. Well, don't forget him and what he did but forget the fact that he thought himself a hero.

The religious undertones of the poem were an interesting read. Many folks deciphered the poem that Henley was an atheist or at least in my opinion an agnostic. Some folks say that he had to know that "I Am" is Hebrew for "God". Interesting.

I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.

Well, I wonder if Neil Diamond knew that when he wrote his song? The article does mention this reference when speaking of Jan Rot's version.

Regardless, the poem is powerful and inspiring in my book.

During my research, I came to remember other African movies full of strife that I have watched over the past couple of years. Three came to mind, "The Country of My Skull (In My Country)", "Blood Diamond" and "The Last King of Scotland". In My Country is set during the apartheid, the other two are different countries altogether.

Sigh. It is time. Time to clean. My daughter is bringing a new boyfriend to the house today. Gee, I hope he likes dogs.

Oops. Almost forgot. Had a wonderful reunion with sister 1954 last evening. My daughter, myself, sister and my nephew sat and talked for two hours after dinner (much to the dismay of the waitress and waiter-in-training). Everything was perfect except for my daughter's undercooked salmon. Twice! We sent the first one back and when the second one came, she was satisfied with just eating the edges which were done to a perfect flakiness and just left the thick soupy middle.

We did a lot of catching up, and took some "horrible" pictures which are not worth posting - the restaurant was very dark (probably so people wouldn't notice the undercooked food). I am now facing another very, very rainy day in the Ohio wetlands. My grass is definitely going to need a brush hog before I can get to it. Hey, wait! The daughter's new beau works in landscaping - you think? Nah! Do not go there! LOL!

I may as well throw this in, too. Since I am stalling. The electricity was off in my neighborhood for 7 hours yesterday. From 5:30 to 12:30. As the day wore on (with the monsoon making the day as dark as late evening) I noticed a stupid headache developing and not responding to my migraine medication. I was getting upset because I was really looking forward to this dinner we had planned. I even drank an alka-seltzer. At about 3:00 it dawned on me. Coffee! Caffeine withdraw. Idiot! After three cups of java and a nice hot shower I was back in form and ready to meet.

Peonies are coming along

With a little help from their ant friends.

I am so "sleepy" tired. Maybe it's the rain. I don't know. I think I slept all night. I remember a horrible dream, but that was early this morning. I was recovering from somebody cutting my right side with a saw. Hey, I just dream 'em, I don't try to figure them out. Well, yes I do, really. What does it mean? I have no idea with this one.

So, what did I accomplish this week-end? Before the rain? Not one page of a book! Not one sentence. Housework. Just clothes, kitchen and bathroom. So, what got done? Outside work! How could I forget I had a ton of outside work to do? And the weather was nice. My grass was so long, I had to use the grass catcher. That was a real hoot. The mulcher flap had not been lifted in years and I thought it needed a lever or something. Finally my daughter just gave it a good yank and it lifted up. Whew. I don't recall how many times I had to empty the bagger, but let's just say I waited too long on a couple of trips.

Then it hit me. While mowing I knew I was doing it. But, I kept going. Mowing is one of those things that if you stop you are afraid you won't get going again. It was hot out. It was sunny. Yep. I am sensitive to the sun. I am getting thin on top. (Not getting thin anywhere else, oh no!) But my hair is getting thin. This leaves my head exposed. I had my headphones on, but the wicked sun got me anyway.

The headache started Sunday night. I went to bed hoping I could sleep it off. Silly me! What a night that was. I made it to work on Monday (barely). The migraine meds helped a lot. After work I returned to the scene of the crime. Blankets were twisted up everywhere. There were wash cloths and towels strewn about.

During the night (Sunday) during a migraine, I get a wash cloth as cold as I can and put it against my forehead. To keep my pillow from getting soaked I lay a couple of towels on it. The wash cloth heats up faster than you can imagine. I had the fan blowing on me directly. I was at the foot of the bed, in the middle of the bed. Yep. It was a long night.

Anyway, I hope to have some pretty pictures of poppies and peonies here soon. The rain is coming down in buckets this morning. I have to take the dogs out in this, I don't feel like bringing a camera out, too.

Guess this celebrity!

It is a trick question. It is the father of the baby for the shower we are having Sunday. One of the games I cooked up was "Guess the Celebrity Baby" and we threw this one is as a trick question. It will be fun to see what celebrity they attribute to my nephew.

We had a blast with the games. My daughter did most of the work. Let's see if she will help me in getting up in front of 30 to 40 people. She might, I don't know. Me? I got over my fears a long time ago. Well, there still is a little bit of anxiety when it is work-related. But women at a baby shower - no problem-o!

We are still getting snow. I broke down and purchased a new shovel last evening. Just in time. I tried it out last evening and everything is covered again this morning. It feels a little loose, so I'll have to look into tightening the screws that hold it together. It was the last one of this type. Light when I picked it up, and it felt right when I pretended to shovel snow in the store. They had a couple of metal designs - much too heavy. Then there is the almost U-shaped scoop on the end. I don't get those at all. I scrape almost as much as I shovel, so they don't look like they would work for me.

I have a party to go to tonight. I am going to try my salami wraps on my friends to see if they like them. Then I will make them for the shower. I also have the ingredients to make pepperoni-flavored wraps. Some recipes call them tortilla pinwheels. I am going to experiment with a few different ideas.

And, I am making a fruit pizza. The last one I made, I ended up putting way too much fruit on the top. It was overloaded. This time, I will try to scale back but sometimes I only know one regimen when it comes to food. The more the better! That probably stems from growing up the youngest in a large family. I had to be quick and grab the food and eat it fast. Because if you blinked, it was gone!

Sigh. My boxer seems to have regressed a little bit in the chewing department. He was doing so well. The pups are caged now when I am gone from the house, so it had to be him. He chewed up a plastic basket. It was a cheap thing, but that wasn't the issue. His safety is the issue. He may have ended up swallowing some of the bits of plastic. It was a mess. He gave me his best Eeyore look when I scolded him.

This morning I found a tiny cord to a 12-in one multi-card reader. I am upset, but I had purchased the incorrect reader as it was. I got it for my daughter for Christmas but she found out the other day that it won't read her camera card. It was useless to us and I was going to give it to a family member who had the memory sticks it would read. I don't know who chewed it up. Whether it be the boxer or the pups. They all gave me guilty looks this morning. I have no idea how they found the cord. I check stuff before I retire. They have a way.

The Horror!

Pups in August, one month after we got them.

The pups are the only pics I have without accessing the external backup hard drive that I have. Horror of horrors my PC may have died. I am using a backup machine that work gave me, I don't think it has a working cooling fan. It is so quiet, I do not hear any fan running. Whatever.

Saturday morning I decided it would be a good time to call Norton AV and work with a tech on why my live updates were not working. It took an hour and they were swift, they were great and they got things fixed, gave me a free update to 2010 and an extra 30 days on the subscription. I shut my machine down Saturday night before retiring.

I got up this morning and Windows won't boot up. (Silent scream). What? I do not have an XP recovery disk. Heaven only knows what the heck happened to it. I probably didn't have one shipped with the system but that is unlike me.

I worked with it for a while and then pulled out the spare machine I am working on now. I only had one folder of pictures on it. It was the pups in August of 2009. Sigh. Maybe there were many signs. The one hard drive failing, Norton AV live update not completing. I don't know. Coincidence all? Maybe.

Time to bite the bullet and purchase Windows 7 and install it? Harrumph!

The kids ordered "Couples Retreat" on pay per view. It has some funny parts in it. I got a better laugh from watching "The Graduate". I had not seen it in years. My favorites were when Benjamin was attempting to get a room and the hotel check-in attendant rang the bell, then Benjamin put his hand over the bell, and the attendant hit his hand. That brought a chuckle and the next part was when Benjamin told his parents he was going to Berkeley to ask Elaine to marry him and he storms out the door, and as they stand there with bewildered looks on their faces the toast pops up in the toaster and they look at it like "What the heck?"

Classic.

In case this ever comes up in Trivial Pursuit, the woman who plays Ben's mother is the same lady who plays Roz in "Nine to Five".

I have tomorrow off from work. Will I work on my seven year old machine some more? Probably. I may be playing taps by the end of the day. I think my last backup was about a month or so ago. So any pictures or files I have saved since then are "poof" - gone. Wah.

Found it!

It couldn't stay hidden forever.

I flushed it from it's hiding place just this evening.

Pictures should resume after I charge both the batteries.

Finding shelter

The shelter house where we held our summer family reunion

Photo was taken this past week. Since I STILL can't find my camera's battery charger (oh, this gets really old, I know!), I will rely on others' photos. An elderly first cousin passed away and sister 1944 went to the funeral. While visiting, she drove past the shelter house where we held our summer reunion. Whew. I wouldn't like to spend the day there during this time of the year.

I hope that we can shelter the poor lost souls of Haiti during this tragic time.

I mentioned the Colin Powell video. You can watch the video, just google "Colin Powell BBC Haiti" and it will most likely be the first URL listed. He speaks of how organization must be restored before they can just start supplying much needed food and water to the victims. Oh, I don't know. It sounds good on paper, I suppose - but in reality I have to think "bullshit!" Save them, restore the government later! Maybe the greedy, bigger stronger victims will get the supplies, and maybe some will trickle down to the weaker people in need. It is better than waiting until there is a working government in the country.

Is he for real, or is he so full of bureaucratic logic that he cannot relate on a tragedy level? I'm sure he would just say (or think) "The average citizen has no idea what steps need to be taken to obtain order and to properly distribute supplies to the needy. Most of it would be wasted if we just threw it out there at random." I suppose he knows better than I, and I'll try to wrap my head around it. Meanwhile, how many more died today because we didn't drop supplies but waited for a government to be established in the country? I guess that is why he held the position he did and I deal with machines and their catastrophes. :)

I watched "The Hurt Locker". I really like movies like this. I don't know why. It reminded me of "The Kingdom." Yes, there is some gore and blood but I have so much empathy for soldiers and what they go through that this really touches me. Not that I can ever imagine what hell they go through (and personally, I hope I never get to know really).

J Renner looked so familiar. As I looked up his list of movies (and television appearances) I am guessing it must have been the episode of "House" where I remember seeing him.

A Mackie was superb. I have seen a few of the movies he has been in, that is why he was familiar. B Geraghty has also been in a few that I have seen. He plays a very good mentally fragile soldier. I thought I recognized D Morse and R Fiennes.

On a lighter note:
For a funny medieval help desk video, go here. Then tell me if you don't think it would have been funnier if he would have knocked the burning candle over and burned up the book at the end of the video? They missed a great ending with this one, I think.

Just freaky

This scares the bejesus out of me

Most of you know by now that I am using my daughter's camera to take pictures. The pups are growing so fast, I don't want to miss the photo opportunities. I didn't want to delete anything on the memory card of my daughter's until I saved it all off to my hard drive. I stumbled across the above photo taken underwater in a swimming pool sometime over the summer.

It is one of my daughter's friends. It freaks me out.

I am off to a Genealogy class today. I hope I learn something useful. I want to do more with the web site and adding information about our family history. I have been reading about the ACLU and it's involvement in saving the authenticity of the 4th amendment. There is plenty to think about.

Looks like we are set for a beautiful day here in T-Valley, Ohio. I'll probably spend most of mine on the road and inside a library. Ah well. If I time it right, I can get my favorite childhood pizza and bring it home. Yum!

Pink clover

From September 2007. Going back into my photo archives again because, well... you know. I lost my camera's battery charger. Is anyone keeping count? A half dozen times? Very unorganized. I used to be very organized. What happened? Oh, yeah. Life happened. I added people, animals and stuff to my life and it is all getting away from me. I am just holding on tight these days and enjoying the ride.

Speaking of animals. My zoo is messy. It bothers me at times but anymore I just roll with it. If you can't beat 'em, join 'em. I am stressing a bit about the veterinarian bills and the dog food. I am a firm believer in purchasing the dog food where the first ingredient is NOT corn. A filler. Waste. And my cats get the food that keeps hairballs to a minimum. It does work. I have not seen a hairball in weeks. But that could also mean the pups are cleaning them up. I know, gross.

A meme from Tabor. Pick up the book closest to you. Turn to page 161 and copy the fifth sentence. Here it is:


"But Julie is too sincere and thoughtful to mean it in anything other than an appreciative way."

The book is "Adventures with Ari" by Kathryn Miles. A book about a dog. Imagine that!

It is Saturday. Shhhh. I don't want anybody to hear this. I have nothing planned this week-end. Nothing! I have two days to myself! I am giddy. I can read all day. Watch movies. Well, after I do some cleaning. I have to do a little work or I will feel guilty as hell. But, not too much. I'm not going to go all Mr. Clean on you. I am more the Erma Bombeck type. Humor and a messy house. Which reminds me of a joke I read years ago. The first is a letter from Martha Stewart to Erma Bombeck. The second is from Erma back to Martha. I love it.

Hi Erma,

This perfectly delightful note is being sent on paper I made myself to tell you what I have been up to. Since it snowed last night, I got up early and made a sled with old barn wood and a glue gun. I hand painted it in gold leaf, got out my loom and made a blanket in peaches and mauves.

Then, to make the sled complete, I made a white horse to pull it from DNA that I had just sitting around in my craft room. By then, it was time to start making the place mats and napkins for my 20 breakfast guests. I'm serving the old standard Stewart twelve-course breakfast, but I'll let you in on a little secret: I didn't have time to make the tables and chairs this morning, so I used the ones I had on hand.

Before I moved the table into the dining room I decided to add just a touch of the holidays. So I repainted the room in pinks and stenciled gold stars on the ceiling.

While the homemade bread was rising, I took antique candle molds and made the dishes (exactly the same shade of pink) to use for breakfast. These were made from Hungarian clay, which you can get at almost any Hungarian craft store.

Well, I must run. I need to finish the hand-sewn buttonholes on the dress I'm wearing for breakfast. I'll get out the sled and drive this note to the post office as soon as the glue dries on the envelope I'll be making.

Hope my breakfast guests don't stay too long. I have 40,000 cranberries to string with bay leaves before my speaking engagement at noon. It's a good thing.

Love, Martha

P.S. When I made the ribbon for this typewriter, I used 1/8-inch gold gauze. I soaked the gauze in a mixture of white grapes and blackberries which I grew, picked, and crushed last week just for fun.

---

Dear Martha:

I'm writing this on the back of an old shopping list. Pay no attention to the coffee and jelly stains.

I'm 20 minutes late getting my daughter off for school, packing a lunch with one hand-on the phone with the dog pound, seems old Ruff needs bailing out again.

Burnt my arm on the curling iron when I was trying to make those cute curly fries, how DO they do that?

Still can't find the scissors to cut out some snowflakes, tried using an old disposable razor . . . trashed the tablecloth.

Tried that cranberry thing; frozen cranberries mushed up after I defrosted them in the microwave. Oh, and don't use Fruity Pebbles as a substitute in that Rice Krispies snowball recipe unless you like food that resembles puke!

Smoke alarm is going off, talk to ya later.

Love, Erma

A bitten dorsal fin

This is another shot from my nephew's collection. I am not posting my own because I am on a new computer. Well, new to the household. I am setting up a spare PC to use in case mine fails. It was purchased in 2003 and Dell will not issue a warranty for it anymore. Yes, I purchase the extended warranty on my computers. Yes, I work on computers. I know what can happen and I know that I don't want that much down time when the hardware fails.

So, on this new computer I have Internet access, but no personal pictures. But, check out the dorsal fins on that shark. I asked my nephew about it and he said he hadn't noticed. Since he posted 92 photos from Sea World, he was probably just clicking and uploading. He said he would look at the photo and get back to me.

At the reunion motel we will have plenty of devices with Internet access. Most of the younger crew's cell phones are equipped with all the bells and whistles. Service may be tricky in the hills, though. My daughter is taking her new laptop. She gets bored easily at these gatherings. Still, it is great because I am the type of person who has to know "right now!" and she looks stuff up for me in a flash.

When somebody is talking about a movie and they say "Who was that guy who played so-and-so?" I run and look it up. The other day my sister sent me an e-mail asking me "What was the name of that movie where the skinny girl dies in the end?" What?! I laughed and replied exactly that: "What?!" I mean, can she give me a little more information? I guess we were talking about a certain movie one day, but I'll be darned if I can think of what she means. This morning I woke up and thought "Passengers" with Jane Hathaway. Maybe that is the one she is thinking of. If you have not seen it yet, I don't want to spoil it - but she does NOT die at the "end" of the movie.

I'll be seeing her today and riding in the car with her to WV so I can find out if that is the one she is thinking of. Speaking of movies, I watched "The Life of David Gale" from my Netflix choices. Not my favorite movie, but it was a mystery.

I have to go and roll my cheese balls into the chopped walnuts, now. About everything else is done and ready to roll. Ah, I need to put my name on my lawn chairs. We were laughing because we told folks not to put just "insert our last name here" on their stuff because ALL of us just about have the same last name! LOL!

Update on the pooches: they are growing like a weed. Their legs are double the length as when we first brought them home. No more pot bellies, especially Chong. He is getting lean and lank. I have to remember to take my camera outside to take a small video of him running. Cheech still does the little hop and run (he is a bit bow legged) but Chong runs full tilt. His ears are flat back against his head and he is off and running like a rocket. We are pretty sure they are rat terriers, now. Check out the picture at this site of the 5-week old pup. Ours look(ed) exactly like that shortly after we obtained them. Adorable.

Family Fun

Photo courtesy of my nephew (1977) from San D!ego's TorrÉy P!nes State Reserve.

This is a family week-end for me. First I want to say that I am extremely blessed with family. Gobs of family. My Mom was an only child and she had 8 children. I was the eighth. I thanked her one time for "not stopping". She thought that was hilarious. It's true. After me she began sleeping on the couch. I always tell folks she stopped at perfection. My siblings laugh and say "Yeah, right!"

When I was little, folks would ask me "Are you Catholic?" I always just said "No" and wondered what to say next. Awkward silence. Ooookay. Now days if somebody asks me that I will say "No" and have a twinkle in my eye, a big smile and maybe wink at them. LOL!

We are filling up 10 rooms this week-end at a motel in WV Saturday night and a couple of rooms on Sunday night.

My niece and nephew are in San D!ego for vacation (coming back today) and then will join us this week-end. They had wonderful weather. I was so disappointed when they closed the Sea World in Ohio. It was such a shame. I didn't like it when I was younger because next door was an amusement park and that is where I spent my time. The fishes were boring to me. But, once I had my daughter and my niece (who loves sea critters) Sea World was a great treat for us. We went every year until they closed down. Maybe it was just too cold up here to keep it comfortable for the critters, I don't know.

But, back to happier things. My family. The only one who will not be present is my sister that is still in prison in Marysville. (The Mom of the two out in San D!ego). Ah, well. She usually only ruins family gatherings anyway. We keep hoping for change. I typed up a letter for her yesterday where she is asking the judge to re-consider her release for the fall. Fingers crossed. We used to like it when she was put away because of the gatherings being ruined. It may sound cruel to some folks, but you have to realize that we have been putting up with this for about 30 years, now.

Here's hoping that your week-end is blessed and fun-filled, too!

Wild, wonderful

West Virginia

Some family and I are headed south this week-end. Back to our roots in wild, wonderful West Virginia. We are planning a family reunion on my father's side in August. We are heading down to check out the shelter area and make plans.

The above photo is the cemetery where my father is buried. We don't think he was ever really happy in Ohio. When my parents and others moved to Ohio in the 40's some only stayed a few years, then returned. My Mom refused. She had no family left in the hills of West Virginia.

All 8 of my Mom's children were born in Ohio. I have maybe one aunt (by marriage) that remains in the mountain state. The rest are cousins. Lots of cousins. I may get to see just how many this year.

When we were kids (it took us two cars) we would visit every summer. It was great. We explored all over town. They had RR tracks and a train that went through the little town, directly across from my Aunt's house. I can still remember the train whistle blowing at night and the clickety clack of the cars running along the tracks. It was very mysterious and exciting for me.

They had an old, working hand pump in the back yard. We found it fascinating down there. They had bees and we would bring back honey. And my Aunt made jelly and always gave me a little jar of apple jelly - it was my favorite. We would have to be careful. If we said we liked anything, she was wrapping it up and giving it to us. I am so glad I didn't say anything about the glass cake holder. That would have been a little too much for a ten year old.

Her house was well lived in. It was just full of furniture and stuff that would be there from year to year. We would return and everything would be in exactly the same place and my Aunt would be sitting in her rocking chair in the enclosed sun porch where we would all gather around and talk. Next to that dreadful gas heater. Between the long car ride (none of my sisters and brothers ever wanted to ride in the same car as me, because I was the one who got car sick) and the smell of that gas heater, I was always ready for the outside excursions.

The house was full of old stuff. Calendars from the 50's and so much glass. Two things I didn't care for was the smell of natural gas and the spittoons. Mostly it was a big empty Maxwell House coffee can. My Mom always told us kids, "Do not get between folks and the coffee can." Yuck.

I think the coffee cans are long gone. The houses we visit now are more modern. The hospitality is the same. The pictures are nostalgic. I wonder if they have pictures of me and my siblings from the 60's and wonder who we are. I know I do when I go through the old family album. I will copy the old black & white photos and paste them onto a big poster board for the reunion and maybe I'll finally get to meet some of those kids I have looked at all of these years.