Behind the Scenes...

Hello all of you wonderful people who joined me for my day in pictures.  Based  on the photos I included, if I were a visitor to my blog I would have thought:

• Man!  Look at  the traffic she has to deal with!
• What a gloomy day.
• What is IN that mug?  And why does she need two drinks?
• What the heck is that red bush thing?
• OMG!  Doesn't she know you're not supposed to eat in front of your computer?!  I can only imagine the crumbs in her keyboard!
• Yuck!   Vitamins! 
• Hmmm... weird combination of non-matching paper, adhesive and non-matching  fibers.  Is she color-impaired?

Yes, I would have wondered all that and more.  Consider yourself lucky that I trimmed out all the excess mess in my office.  Actually, I wish I could have had a better brain and taken the other pictures that defined my day, but alas, I was spacey and scattered with what I remembered to snap a photo.  

So, to answer the questions I posed in my own head... and some of the questions in my comments, let's address the story that was missing from my photos. 

First... that traffic was due to  an accident.  I don't usually have such gridlock.  And  yes, I took the photo while I was in my car in the middle of it,  but I was stopped at the time I took the photo.  I actually exited the highway three exits in advance of where I usually do, and took the back roads around to my office.  That was still pretty backed up, because I wasn't the only person out there who captured this brilliant idea.  Which, of course, makes it a little less brilliant.

And the day was just  one more rainy day in the midst of a month of rain. We are so saturated!  Later on, though, the sun did peek out briefly.   But then the next storm system arrived.

My drinks.   They actually signify that it is warm enough that I can no longer drink hot tea.   I can't stand to drink hot beverages in warm weather.  However, I decided this year that I would not switch back to Coke Zero (my typical summer caffeine fix - one can a day) and stay with tea.  But iced.  So, this day was the first day of the "season" where I brewed my own iced tea.  The hot tea is in the clear glass mug and I poured it over ice in my green mug.  And it was simply delicious.  YUM.

The bush.  Well... had it been a sunnier day, it would have been a prettier picture.  This bush is just outside my office building and I love it in the spring because it's red with white blossoms.  It was my one itty bit of nature that I observed at all during the day other than, of course, the rain.

The computer's lunch.  Yes, it was Subway.  Yes, I was working while I was eating.  I typically do that when my boss isn't in town, because... well, when she is in town we eat together.  When she's not.  I eat alone.  Why break from work?  Especially on a rainy day.   And for the Subway lovers  out there, I must apologize, because I really don't like Subway.  But, as it was a crappy day, Subway is the closest "healthier choice" restaurant around.  Unless I wanted a salad.  Which I very obviously did not.  Subway was the next best choice.  The best part about the meal?  The whole thing was FREE because even while I don't like Subway as a first (or second or third) choice, I do tend to eat there frequently enough that I had a large number of frequent buyer points and got the whole shebang free, except for the drink.  The drink is a giant Coke Zero.  I was caff'd up to the gills this day.  Not usual for me.  Not at all.

But necessary.

Why necessary you ask?  (Thanks for asking.)  Because I have not been taking very good care of myself lately.  All those vitamins you see?  Yep, I've forgotten to take them for the past two days... including the day I took the photo!  I got them all out, and they got left on my desk  until today.  I took them today.  Vitamin D, in particular, is very important to me because I struggle with getting this up into a "normal"  range.  When it declines, I get groggy and sleepy (hence the caffeine).  In addition, those little crafty pieces at the end of my picture show?  We had a "take your kid to work day" event at our office today and I was asked to repeat my "contribution" from last year and design a scrapbook page to commemorate the event for each child.  So, most of my evenings this week I spent cutting pieces and parts out and designing a demo page and packaging up all the things I needed.  Sadly, this is one more photo I didn't take - the finished layout.  It was cute and focused on how each child was special and that they needed to Shine (with a sun on each page).  The papers displayed in the photo?  These were the name tags I also cut out for everyone.  The fibers (sorry, Bernice, I can't knit - anymore.  I've forgotten how)... they were brought in by a different employee and used as the strings to hang the name tags around each person's neck.  I actually "acquired" the pictured tufts of fiber to add to my scrappin' stash.  I thought they were pretty!

As I was up late so many nights cutting pieces and parts, that was also the need for so much caffeine. 

And this part of my day?

Well, that chubby cat in the lower right has spent more time on my bed than I have this week.  Time to change that picture. 

Good-night!  :)

My Day in Pictures...

See more days here!

Bucket List

No, this post isn't about the movie.  Actually, I've never even seen the movie.  But I do understand the concept.  "Things To Do Before I Die".  I've never really compiled an ongoing list on paper, although I started one once in the back of an old journal. I have accomplished a few things listed in that journal, like going on this specific ride at an amusement park, seeing the Pacific Ocean and going to the Caribbean (on a cruise). 

But today, here are some other things I've been thinking about... here are ten things to do before I kick the bucket.



I'd like to swim with dolphins, preferably in the wild...
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Live (yes, be part of the pack, even if briefly) with wolves...
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Visit Ireland...
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Spend a great deal of time in Australia (not in summertime, though)...
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Learn to water ski...
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Get a book published that I've written...
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Visit Stonehenge...
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Learn to dance...
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Go spelunking (caving)...
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Learn to ride a horse...
...by myself.
Meaning, no one leading me around while I sit atop.
Which means I'd have to get over my fear of horses.
They be big.  I be little.
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Do you have a bucket list?  Please do share!

Happy Easter!

Just dropping by today to share a few quick Easter cards I made for The Hubs, The Boy and The Girl.  I had fallen in love with the little bunny stickers so I had to share the cuteness.

Their names  and Easter sentiments were added after I took these photos.  I used a variety of letter stickers coordinating the colors t o each card.  They really are fantabulous!  I love how they turned out.

I hope you have a very Happy Easter!

Earth Mother



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People often say about me, "she's THE mom type"... which I assume means that I take care of people, I take care of animals... I take care.  Other people say, "she's the earth mother type" which I assume means the same thing.  I may wave it off, but deep down, I really like it.  I like taking care of people, animals, nature.  I may suck at outdoor gardens, but my office is a green house of indoor plants. 

Because one thing I am passionate about is nature.  Could you tell by any of my posts?  Today is Earth Day.  It is a holiday for me.  Sadly, I practice this holiday as I honor most others... with a few thoughts, a few memories and a few wishes.  I have never really taken an active part in "Earth Day" other than the first time I had ever heard of it, when I was a freshman in college, 1989. 

That was when I was 19 and started to take an interest in recycling and the three "R"s - Reduce - Reuse - Recycle.  I began cutting up the plastic holders that 6-packs of pop or beer came in (because I didn't want the fish or birds to get caught in them when they ended up in the ocean).  I bought dolphin safe tuna (or so I hoped).  I looked for ways to recycle bottles (usually into candle holders).  I participated in my dorm's recycling program.  I was thrilled when my home town began to recycle (begrudgingly but they did!).  It was important to me to know that the things I was using were not ending up in a landfill somewhere.  I began to take an interest in "biodegradable" and the different types of plastic and glass. 

Once I moved to Ohio, I was thrilled to find that they recycled as second nature... they had garbage pick-up and recycling pick-up.  I was on board!  I taught those who came around my living space that it was important to me to not throw things away that could be recycled.  I picked their pop cans and bottles out of my garbage, while they watched, and said, "No, these are recyclable."  One of my friends even commented, "you're one of those people who wash your garbage before you throw it away" when I had a peanut butter jar soaking in my sink.  Patiently, I explained that it wasn't garbage, it was recyclable.  He looked at me as if I was speaking a foreign language.  To this day, even my own family doesn't "support" my efforts 100%.  Oh, they'll toss their pop cans and iced coffee cups into the recycle bin, and the newspapers.  But they just as easily toss an empty bottle of shampoo, an empty container of hand soap or an empty bottle of allergy medicine in the garbage.  I pick out every single one and place it in the recycle bin.  It's really that important to me.

It upsets me to see people still not recycling.  It truly hurts my heart!  It's such a small, easy step to reduce the waste in our world, our Earth.  It hurts that the environmental awareness still has not yet passed on to our children.  The Girl very recently said to me, "you're the only one who does this!" referencing me pulling something she had thrown away that could be recycled.  I was floored!  It just shows me that her biological mother and the people in the community where she lives most of her life do not take the few seconds to throw their recyclables into a different bin other than the garbage can.  This young woman, who will be sixteen in a few short months, is not aware of the affect this will have on the Earth.

And this makes me very sad, and very scared. 

My wish for her is a quick awareness of how Earth is affected by this lack of awarness and caring.

If you don't already, please, please start recycling.  If your community doesn't make it an automatic weekly pick-up, please find out about your options and take the few extra steps to help conserve our resources and our nature's beauty and function.  It's only a single teeny, tiny step in all you could do to reduce your "footprint", but if every single person on Earth took that teeny, tiny step, it would certainly pack a huge wallop!

Yes, Today is Earth Day.  Start your awareness today and carry it through the year to next Earth Day.  It really is important, not just to me, but to future generations.

Happy Earth Day!

That Green Glow...

Last night we were inundated with some vicious storms, including a possible tornado south of the city (I live east of the city).  I'm not a good person when it comes to storms... I don't like them, I don't find them relaxing or pretty or exciting or whatever people find them.  They make me tense.  Very, very tense.

Needless to say, I didn't sleep well last night.  Walking outside in the morining... we were just drenched.  We have had so much rain that we're still under a flood warning tonight and it hasn't rained all day!  Despite all of this, I made plans to go for my first walk in the woods of 2011. 

Despite it being a gloomy, grey day... despite the severe temperature drop (it was in the low 60's F when I left for work in the morning and in the low 40's when I left work to go for the walk!) I still did it anyway.  Normally one for any excuse to not "exercise", this was a big deal for me. 

A friend met me at the park and we picked our path.  This was a park neither one of us was very familiar with (not the one where I took you on a walk last year).  We got into  a grassy area where it was marshy and soggy and not a fun place to be.  Soon enough, we found the real path and we were on our way.

I walked with someone who works out with me when I am with the Sadist.  (And yes, I have told my personal trainer that I call her that, and she does not seem offended, in fact, she seems a bit too happy about it... hmmmmm.)  It was a good walk, she slowed herself down for me, we chatted and learned more about each other...


Meet Colleen. Everyone say "hi, Colleen!"  :)

 ... we stopped on the bridges (my favorite places to take photos) to watch the swollen creek rush on by.  The water was quite high...

... we continued walking... we laughed and shared.  We stopped at the overlook and looked down over a canyon. 

You can't tell from the photo, but the blob of water to the left of the prominent tree
was a rushing "waterfall" of water.  Two actually.  It was pretty cool.

Toward the end we were a little lost and had to ask a park representatives how to get back to our cars.  By this time, we were both chilled to the bone as we both had underdressed and the wind was pretty relentless.  Wind-chill is not fun.  The park representatives actually gave us a lift back to the parking lot (in our defense, we had figured out the right direction, but we were cold!) where we parted ways.

It wasn't until I got home and looked at the few photos I snapped with my phone that I realized...

... that green glow is back!  I love the first pop of spring when the green on the trees is just a fuzzy green glow.  This is a little more developed than that, but with the air so cold, it felt more like February out there.  To see the green glow made my soul happy.

And y'all know how I love me some budding nature.  :)

Changes & Struggles



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Thanks you all for your comments yesterday.  So many of you pointed out my honesty and I wanted to also thank those of you who mentioned it, as this means you have forgiven me for my April Fools prank.  Your forgiveness - and sense of humor -  is greatly valued. 

And to continue on in my "honesty"... bear with me as I circle back to this topic.

As I have previously briefly mentioned, and as you can view on my foibles page, I am on a weight loss & better health journey.  I have no desire to be "skinny" or to fit into a certain societally 'approved' size of clothing.   But I do have the desire to be strong, and to be able to walk long distances without feeling like I am breathless or dying... and to not carry a body mass index (BMI) higher than "overweight", which would be a vast reduction from "morbidly obese" where I am at now.

Allow me to digress... "morbidly obese" is such a nasty term.  I know I carry way too much weight for my 5'1" frame, but I'm also very healthy for being at such a high weight.  Tell me... how can telling me that I'm "morbidly" overweight be seen in any positive light?  I mean, really... doesn't that make you just want to give up and lie down in a grave right now?

Okay, sorry, I just had to get that off my chest.  Anyway... my official current journey (as I have been on many) began last year in June.  I was so excited with my first few months results from the choices I made and then life "hit" and things slowed down.  I'm now  progressing  at  a slower-than-a-snail-in-winter's pace.  I have recently begun to focus again, and have a goal for my birthday in May.  Let me share with you some of my new(er) changes:

• Refocus on clean eating whenever possible
• No grains or starches after 2pm, preferably after lunch
• No cakes, cookies or brownies (although I did have a piece of my dad's cake when I was home in NY... but only one!) - this was a Lent thing, and a challenge with a friend (who gave up coffee and chocolate), but I'm hoping to take it on as far as I can go with it.
• If I must have a sweet, eat fruit or dark chocolate (70% cocoa or higher) and not after supper
• Eat more beans, which in  fact have become a side dish instead of grains or potatoes in the evening - I just had some very tasty seasoned sauteed chick peas
• I have also been attempting to add a day of walking (30-60 minutes) into my week, but since my treadmill is not functioning right now, and the weather has been mostly rain (as in flash-flood downpours with some hail) this hasn't been going very well

Okay, so here are my struggles lately..

• First, in getting ready to post this (in the hopes of rounding up some encouragement from all of you kind cyber friends), I updated my fitness foibles page with my stats from the beginning of this journey.  I was re-excited by the beginning and very dejected and angry at the recent updates.  I feel like I have been wasting more time, and money, and this often causes me to spiral out of control.  So I'm struggling to NOT let this happen this time.
• The bratty, selfish inner-child is constantly battling my logical inner-adult.  "I want, I want, I want!" battles with the "You shouldn't", "not now" and "wait for your weekly cheat meal".  I am sad and slightly embarrassed to say that this inner-child wins way more than she should, and that is not healthy for ME.  I don't seem to know how to win the wars against her. 
• The rule of "no grains/starches after lunch" is challenging because it seems to be all I focus on.  Even though I'm not hungry I want that pretzel or whatever in the afternoon.  Or the starches at night, which I know are a silly way to keep from going to sleep when I should go to sleep.  I think  this ties in to the inner-child above.  I'm telling  myself I can't have something and that inner-child is freaking and battling that decision.
• Sleep.  I know how important sleep is to both health and weight loss and yet, I find myself staying up at night way too late for appropriate sleep to occur.  It's another stubborn streak in me... I tell myself, "go to bed" and still stay awake surfing the internet, watching TV (repeats!) or some other non-productive happening.

Does anyone out there have difficulties with that inner-child controlling you?  What has been successful for you in dealing with this beast brat?  Please, I'd love some tricks and tips... on any of my struggles!  Because it's time for me to refocus on this.  Way beyond  time!  Your assistance in prodding me forward is greatly appreciated.  Really... push me!

Control-Alt-Delete...Reboot!

About two years ago, I started blogging.  I wandered aimlessly through really bad stories of my youth and temper tantrums about my life at the time.  And then I found Blogging for  Scrapbookers by Shimelle Laine.  I trashed that other blog and started this one.  I named it Enjoy the Ride Today because the quote at the top of my blog spoke to my soul.  It was how I wanted to live my life, even if I wasn't quite there. Perhaps I'm still not quite there.  Over time, I have written about life, scrapbooking, my health journey, and other varied topics.  Through it all, I've really made an effort to consciously "enjoy the ride".

I have had a rough couple of months, and most recently a couple of weeks of no inspiration.  This makes me sad because I know I have a bunch of  wonderful people out there who read my blog and I'm so thankful for all of you.  ALL of you.  I feel a bit like I've let you down over the past couple of weeks with my lack of presence.  I know I've let myself down.

So... I decided that it's time for a little reboot.   Luckily for me (and you!), Shimelle is doing  a new class called  Beyond Blogging for  Scrapbookers.  I thought, "what timing!"  Perfect for me to have a little boost in my blog.  I hope you'll enjoy my travels through this class, and know that I will be around much more often.  And for new people coming to visit me, HELLO and welcome.  I'm so glad you're here.

But to revamp this Kai space, I need your help.  Yes, ALL of you...my loyal readers and those of you just stopping by for the first time.   I would love to redefine my blog a little...maybe make it a tad more focused or maybe make it a little more varied.  But I really feel I can't do that until I hear your input.  So would you please help me out a little and just answer one little itty bitty question?

To  my current readers:  what have you liked best about my blog, and what would you like to see more of?

To my new readers:  I'd love to know what made you stop by today and, if you've looked around, what type of posts would keep you coming back for more?

So... yeah, if you're really on top of things, you'll see I asked each of you two questions, not one. But hey, life is all about choices, so feel free to answer one or both of those questions... or all four! Let's live life large! Your input is truly valuable to me and I'm excited to see what kinds of answers I'll get. Because then it won't just be me rebooting my blog... it will be all of us! That's so exciting!

It Doesn't Matter

It doesn't matter if it's been raining cat and dogs (and mice and men), causing great deal of flooding and wetness... it doesn't matter that the nights are still so cold the heater in the house is on (and some days)... it doesn't matter that our high temperatures have barely made it to the 60's on the ever so rare day... and the also rare sunny day is deceiving because once you step outside, the chill still enforces the wearing of a coat... it doesn't matter because...

... spring is still trying to spring, with a brave and mighty heart!

Yesterday, Today & Tomorrow

Yesterday I said goodbye to my dad and stepmom after a wonderful 4-day visit.
Yesterday I rode 6 1/2 hours from my NY home to my OH home.
Yesterday I was greeted enthusiastically by my dog Rocky and four furry felines.
Yesterday I relaxed in front of longtime recorded episodes of Burn Notice.
Yesterday I discovered my glasses were broken (shows you how much I wear them).
Yesterday I texted boyfriend advice to my daughter and her friend at 1am.

Today I enjoyed the rainy weather; it calmed me.
Today I helped a friend out by taking a shift at the store.
Today I created six single page layouts (for the store) in three hours. It's a record!
Today I wondered if I made a friend angry by telling them the truth that was in my heart.
Today I decided for sure that I will be moving my animals to a new vetrinarian.
Today I improved my health with a strength training and better choices in eating.
Today I celebrated the fact that my son passed his driving test!
Today I blogged for the first time in 7 days. (I've missed you all - thanks Nancy for the inspiration)
Today I cooked mango salsa chicken breasts, saute zucchini & portabella mini mushrooms, and roasted sweet potatoes - enough for several meals.

Tomorrow I return to the real word (work).
Tomorrow I must focus on getting my taxes done. (Yep!)
Tomorrow I balance my checking account.
Tomorrow I will write a list of the things that need to get done.
Tomorrow I choose to enjoy the day to the utmost.

How about you?

Someone Special

I just wanted to take a minute to give someone special in my world some "time" on my blog.  She doesn't force her way into my photos like Sparky, and tends to be quite the wallflower, but she deserves a lot of attention.

This is Rikki.  Rikki came to me my first summer living away from home in my new world of Ohio.  She was an itty-bitty thing that fit in the palm  of my hand. An alley cat that was fiesty as all get-out and the most beautiful thing I had ever seen.  With her black, white and orange "tortoise-shell" markings, she reminded me of my favorite seasonal holiday - Halloween.  I took her home to my then-boyfriend,  promising him  that if he still didn't love her after the weekend,  I would take her back to my office and find her a new home. 

When the weekend was over, I asked him, "Well?   Do you want to keep her or do you want me to take her back?" He looked at me like I was crazy and said, "That's like putting a baby in my arms saying I can have it and then two days later saying  I have to give it back!"  Rikki adopted us then and there. 

She was a fiesty one, though, and got in to her fair share of situations in her lifetime.  She was trapped in a couch with recliner, skinned her forepaw getting out (tore all the fur off to the skin) and to this day the "scar" is a strip of white fur that was never there before.    Once, I was eating some chips and she ran across the room, up the chair I was standing behind, up my body and snagged the chip (and sliced my lip) with her lethal little claws.  I nearly killed her that day, I was so freaked and it hurt so much.  Good thing she was a fast little bugger.  I was a lot more cautious eating around her until she realized that food was readily available and no longer needed to be a scavenger alley cat.  She would still climb on me, though, to lap up her fair share of ice cream off the other side of my ice cream cone.

When I moved into my own apartment, I remember thinking that she was such a commitment.  I wondered if I could care for something who needed me so thoroughly... and I remember telling her that we'd be together when I was in my 40's!  It seemed so far away when I was 26 years old... and here I just turned 40 last year.  At this new apartment there was more trauma for her to experience.  She was trapped in my closet one weekend while I was away... some pest control people had come in to my apartment to look for bats in my air conditioning unit, closed the closet door to keep any bats from flying anywhere and then failed to re-open it.  My cat sitter, knowing that Rikki was not sociable, kept calling for her and looking  for her but never opened the closet either (thinking I had closed it).  When I found her, she was terrified, shaking and skittish.  She had tried to dig her way out of the closet, tearing skin off of her face, tearing up the carpet and her paws.  It was just awful.  She was a sweetheart, though, and used my laundry basket as her litter box, only ruining a backpack and a shirt that was sitting in there.  I have pangs of guilt to this day because of this one thing. 

She used to race around at top speed, always ending with a huge leap into the living room  window of my third story apartment.  One day she was whipping around and jumped into the window  and  the screen popped out and she fell through!!  The Hubs (who was The Boyfriend at the time) FLEW  off of the futon and looked out to find her dangling by her little paws from the window ledge.  He pulled her in and we looked down at the screen that was bent and mangled  on the gravel below.  I don't think she would have survived.

This is truly a cat with nine lives!

She was also none too happy when I started adding animals to my zoo.   When my The Hubs came into my life, I was on the fence about getting a second cat, feeling like I was gone from home so much due to work and amateur theatre that maybe Rikki needed a friend.  Boy, oh boy was that a mistake!  He brought me home another stray cat and Rikki just wasn't the same after that.  Before, she would sleep with me, always laying between my legs and purring ever-so loudly.  But once Little Bit came to stay, Rikki wouldn't even come up on the bed.   To this day, she does not come up on the bed.  I have missed her at night ever since, even with the various other purr-balls that occasionally sleep with me.  It's not the same.

Rikki is tempermental, fiesty, loud and rambunctious.  As she has aged, the crankiness has stayed but not so much the running around.  She eats, she sleeps.  If you pet her too long, she bites.  Hard.  I don't care, I still pet her.  Often.  She will be 16-years old this summer.  She is spoiled rotten by me, whenever she will let me touch her.  She takes medicine daily to control hypothyroidism.  She was discovered to be the culprit of the "incontinence" by the doors which caused us to spontaneously rip up our carpeting a while back.  She still has many accidents.  She still has the loudest purr. She still loves ice cream.

She is my firstborn... my favorite Halloween kitty.

I just wanted to share with you my someone special.

Proper Perspective

Thank you everyone for handling my April Fools with goodnaturedness... and understanding.  I just had a little bug in me to tell little fibs all day... and some people really did believe me and I had to do some quick fixin'.  But really, it was all in good fun.

I read (or was told) this next bit when I was in college and at first was horrified that someone would write this to her parents, and then at the end thought, "what a great way to show someone some proper perspective!" 

Here... read...

Dear Mom and Dad,


It has now been three months since I left for college. I am sorry for my thoughtlessness in not having written before. I will bring you up to date but before you read on you had better sit down.  Okay?


I am getting along pretty well now. The skull fracture and concussion I got when I jumped out of my apartment window when it caught fire after my arrival here is pretty well healed. I only spent two weeks in the hospital and now I can see almost normally and only get these sick headaches once a day. Fortunately the fire and my jump were witnessed by Roger an attendant at the gas station, and he was the one who called the fire department. He also visited me in the hospital, and since I had nowhere to live he was kind enough to invite me to share his apartment with him. He is a very fine man, and we are planning to get married. We haven't set the date yet, but it will be before my pregnancy begins to show. His divorce is final now, and he shares custody of his 3 children.


The reason for the delay in our marriage is that Roger has a minor infection which prevents us from passing our premarital blood tests, and I carelessly caught it from him. This will soon clear up with the penicillin injections I am taking daily.


Now that I have brought you up to date I want to tell you that there was no fire, I did not have a concussion or skull fracture, I was not in the hospital, I am not pregnant, I am not engaged, I do not have syphillis, and there is no divorced man in my life. However, I am getting a "D" in Art and an "F" in Biology and I wanted you to see these marks in the proper perspective.


Your loving daughter,
Jane

For some reason this stuck with me through all of these years and it was actually running around in my mind when I was writing the post from yesterday.  I've been so upset about my non-working toilet that, to me, that post of April Foolery was just what I needed to give my own self proper perspective.  Anyway, thanks for indulging me, I apolgize profusely if I really freaked anyone out...
 
... now back to regular programming.

A Day of BAD News!

First off, I want to share with all of my online friends that life is just not been very good lately. A few weeks ago, our toilet in our main bathroom went on the fritz and we’ve had to traipse downstairs to the basement half bath every time we have the need to go. If that’s not bad enough, last night, our downstairs toilet began overflowing so we’re in a quandary now… as we only have those two toilets to use in our house. I guess we’ll be calling a plumbing service at some point – and VERY soon.

In addition, it royally sucked to wake up and find that our house was defaced last night! We had eggs smashed and orange and blue graffiti spray painted all over the white façade of our house. We’ve had eggs smashed on our house once before, but the graffiti is something new and most unwelcome.  Weirder than weird, whomever did it also filled our yard with ancient old Christmas decorations.  In addition, (and we’re not sure if this is related), our neighbor’s house caught fire and while they firemen were putting it out, one of our side windows (facing the house on fire) was smashed. It is the window over our couch where we watch TV, but we were very lucky no person or animal was sitting on it at the time; however, the couch is now ruined and we will need to find a replacement window (it’s currently covered in a lovely black plastic garbage bag). How we never heard any of this, I'll never know.  Like I can afford new furniture, a house painter (or whatever we do to fix the graffiti) or a new window! *sigh*

If that wasn’t enough, along with the vandalism of our house, our son’s brand new car’s tires were slashed – all four! Well, the car isn’t brand new, but it was new to him… and the tires were newer than the car, but I digress… this kid can’t catch a break. So, now we have to help him afford four new tires, because he certainly can’t do it on his minimum-wage salary. 

Not able to do anything right now, I did decide to come to work (at least it had a working bathroom), leaving The Hubs to call a plumber, the police and our insurance company. On my way here, I was stuck in traffic behind a car accident. When I finally got past it, it looked awful with one SUV like vehicle actually on its top! I was selfishly glad to be on my way to work and not still stuck in a gridlock. When I got to work, I found out that our Accounting tech was involved in the accident and is in a local hospital. That was HER SUV upside down!! I feel horrible that I was ever so selfish to wish myself past the accident just to get to work, and here she is… involved and hurt. The worst part about this entire thing is that she is the cousin to one of my very best scrappy friends. So, that makes my heart hurt even worse at my own selfishness.

Holy cow… could this day get any worse? Apparently, it can. I JUST received an email from The Hubs telling me he wants us to consider an open marriage.  And that he already had a gal in mind for him and would I be interested in one of his friends {insert name here}?  OMG!  Where in the world did this come from? We've never talked about anything other than monogomy and here he is wanting to "spread his wings" and apparently help me spread mine!  I'm at a loss...

And yet, here I am still writing this blog. All of you out there have been such a great support to me, I just felt I couldn’t go anywhere but here to share with you the tragedy of this day… April 1st, 2011. What? It’s April 1st? OMG! Really? I guess I should tell you then…

APRIL FOOLS! :)

Only three things in the above story have elements of truth to them: 1) our house has been defaced by smashed eggs before, long ago; 2) the accounting tech at my office is one of my friend’s cousins (but did not get into an accident); and 3) our upstairs toilet really has been broken for nearly three weeks.

Out of all of that? Well, let's just say that broken toilet doesn't seem like that big of a tragedy. Regardless, let’s just hope my toilet is replaced and working by the end of the weekend, because I'm tired of a freezing cold basement seat!  :)

I hope everyone has a great day… don’t get too tricked, today… be on your guard!