Crystal Queen

These 'textbook' crystals showed up today at the end of my first shift.

Just when you think you've seen all the crystals you ever want to see, just take a look at these. These are uric acid crystals from a finger joint.

Exhibiting all of their full wave plate color compensated polarizing charaacteristics.

Now here are some pics from a knee fluid. These are calcium pyrophosphate crystals.

Okay are you ready for this? Intracellular AND extracellular (in the same field!!) (This picture could be better, but really I was very busy)

And just when you think you've seen everything (or at least more than you wanted to see)...

I have one more. Earlier in the day I commented that I had never seen an intracellular crystal on a Wright stained smear. (I know, you'd forgotten what a great conversationalist I am.)

TADA! The differential slide on the same knee fluid: The cell in the upper right is a segmented neutrophil. The cell in the bottom center looks like a lymphocyte with an intracellular crystal. How totally awesome is that?

Intracellular and extracellular crystals with full wave plate color characteristics of calcium pyrophosphate identified.

Some days it pays to work 12 hours.

My Next Big Event

A year ago we were planning the first of two weddings. Amanda won't let me arrange her marriage and Alex still thinks girls have cooties. So I think there will be no weddings to plan this year. And if we're going to have any babies this year someone will have to announce something soon. So I am going to plan my baptism.
Actually this would be my second baptism. I was baptized as an infant and up until recently I have been pretty happy with that experience. But while reading through the book "Living The Resurrection" it occurrred to me that I wanted to be baptized again. If I like it, I will then search for Scripture that will support allowing multiple baptisms. You know, like every Spring, or once a month. (Go ahead and pray for me now, but hold your theological insights/corrections/outrage until later.)

Here are some things I would include:
1. Invitations to friends and family to share this celebration with me.
2. I would share my story. I would take all the time I want. (After all, it's all about me.) Let's call this a testimony, cause I don't want to be preaching!)
3. Someone with a deep voice announcing (loudly) : "This is my beloved daughter." (There would be a brief opportunity for God to do this Himself.)
4. The song "You are Being Loved"

I would sing this myself as oppossed to having someone who can really sing do it. (God will be pleased with this even if no one else is.)

Remember--just in the planning stages. Got any ideas you want to share, I will certainly consider them.

Squirrels Spring Cleaning

The squirrels who live in the shed have eaten holes near the roof for easier access this winter. There was just no fighting them this year. But today they started chucking stuff out the holes onto the ground below. Big piles of used squirrel bedding and empty nut shells.
I am going to clean out the upstairs this way. Just open the windows and start heaving things out from the eaves. Anything you have here you might want to make arrangements to get soon. Time to start my Spring cleaning.

Not So Much

Around 2:30 today I decided that maybe the trade wasn't such a great idea. If I had worked today I would still have Tuesday off. Now I have to work on Tuesday and my day off is gone.
Although I was totally blessed by being in church this morning. So I am still glad I traded. Remind me of that on Tuesday.

Trade You

Today at work I switched days. Traded tomorrow for Tuesday. Didn't fill out a schedule change request form. Didn't run it by anyone important. Didn't get it okayed. Just traded, even up. Sunday for Tuesday. A weekend day for a weekday. This was a good trade. Like when your lunch has a jumbo baloney sandwich, which you hate, and someone at your table offers you lebanon baloney which you like. And you just trade and the afternoon is better for both of you. And you never have to tell your mom. Yeah, like that.

Anything Goes

Went to see the high school musical tonight. Not Disney's High School Musical, but the musical at the high school. They did Anything Goes, which is also the musical that my high school did way back when. I only remembered one line, spoken in a Chinese accent. If lady with all paint up face will hold unruly tongue, I will talk. I will tell all. I was never in the musical. So why after 32 years do I still have this line in my head? I would like to clear it out so I have room to remember where my car keys are, or to move the load of clothes from the washer to the dryer. While I am at it I would like to remove the phone number from Brinser 2 North (717-367-9815) and make room for my children's anniversary dates and my grandchildren's birthdates. There are a lot of other things I could probably live without in my head, but I can't think of them right now...

Does This Headband Make Me Look Taller?

15 People Have Died Here (OR) Take That Off Your Head

Yes, I went away to the mountains for a week with my husband, my mother-in-law, and my preadolescent son. And, yes, we all arrived back home in one piece. (Except for the car, which arrived home, but with not with all of its pieces intact. But I digress...)

This is a picture of us at Whitewater Falls. It was taken by a stranger. Little does my family know, but the presence of that stranger may well have saved all of their lives.

See us all smiling? No, wait. Maybe I am the only one smiling.

See Alex carrying a strip of fabric and a big stick? (Like Isaac, he carried this wood up the mountain by himself.)

Notice my feet poised to run. Because I am really thinking that I could strangle one of them, beat one of them with a stick, and push the last one over the cliff.

But then along comes another happy vacationing family.

Makes me wonder if Abraham had been in a Hebrew National Forest if he would have gotten to the point of strapping Isaac to the altar. Just about the time Isaac asked (again) why he always had to carry the wood, and why were they going up this mountain, and were they there yet for the fortieth time, and Abraham was ready to just tie the kid down and light the match, along comes another father and son up the trail.

Wait, it was another Father and Son who did intervene. Wow. That wasn't where I saw this post going, but my family should be glad that there is a Power greater than me. I know I am.

Aside: There is an old Lane family legend concerning a first born son and a visit to a National Park Site with a strip of cloth tied around his head that is relevant to this story. (I personally have no memory of this, but it has been collaborated and retold so many times over the years that I am convinced of its authenticity.) Instead of lamenting that we never saw the inside of the Lemon House (?) we should be glad our mother did not strangle one of us and we all lived to tell the story.

On Top of Great Smokies

I have been playing with my pics in Shutterfly this am. I printed them to Target because I can not wait for the mail. I always thought you would need a really expensive camera and several lifetimes to capture those kind of shots you see on calendars. It turns out that God's creation is so amazing on any given day you can just show up with a little point and shoot digital thingy that you don't really know how to work except on one setting and you can get great pictures. Totally unedited. The thing that has me awed this morning (er, is it after noon already??) is that the pictures only capture a small part of the size and the colors and the grand scope of the whole place.
Maybe I'll pick up groceries on my way to Target...