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...

Unidentified Laboratory Objects

Last night at work I was attempting to identify urinary crystals. They were not typical of any crystals I knew and I couldn't find any textbook pictures that were helpful. So I left them for the experts this am to identify. The 'experts' reported them out as "unidentified crystals". I should have trusted my first instincts.

What if all our lab results went out that way...

Indeterminate amount of blood glucose.

Probable Type O blood.

Pregnancy test presumed negative.

Approximately 235,00 platelets.

>100,000 org/ml maybe E.coli possibly susceptible to some antibiotics

This is not the world I usually work in.

http://content.nejm.org/cgi/reprint/353/24/e21.pdf

Flay of Fish

Dave and Alex went ice fishing on Saturday. Caught enough for supper on Saturday. Fortunately the fish arrived here cleaned and ready for breading and frying. That's because, as Alex reported, Mr. Clary flayed them right at the lake.

flay –verb (used with object)
1.to strip off the skin or outer covering of.

2.to criticize or scold with scathing severity.

Just imagine those poor fish being scolded so severely that they lost not only their skin, but all their bones as well.
(This is why I gave up my night job. Sleep deprivation make me want to flay things. Too often my family serves as the direct object. It's a wonder my children have any skin left.)

fillet –noun
1.a boneless cut or slice of meat or fish

–verb (used with object)
10.to cut or prepare (meat or fish) as a fillet.

Moon over Mars

I thought the lunar eclipse the other night was spectacular. Here I was on earth (in Mars) watching my shadow creep across the moon. I took this picture out the living room window. (I think the little white dot in the lower left is Saturn.) What an awesome view of the universe. If Saturn looks like a dot, how insignificant must I be? Like a milli-pixel. And yet...

I am being loved
I am being loved
Right now at this very moment

There is a song being sung over me
By the One Who breathes life into me.

(See Zephaniah 3:17--an awesome 'with' verse)

I have been reading about wonder. And how there is no place for it at work. And how much I need it in my life. And how it is hard to convey it to someone else. (So if you can't really grasp the wonder of this, don't worry about it.)

The God who created the universe also created me. And the Same One Who keeps the planets in place cares where I am. And He loves me. Wow.

The Molinator

Guess the reports of the snowman's death were somewhat premature. Turns out he was just hiding underground until the warm spell passed. Caught him yesterday in the act of resurrrecting. I am always beneath you, but nothing is beneath me. Mwa ha ha... Looks like he is pretty proud of himself.

Just look at that smirk on his face...

Sunshine?

As I was going out the door to take Alex to school the sun was shining in through the kitchen window onto the fruit in the jar on the table. (Can you use all your prepositions in one sentence?) So I stopped to take a picture of it. It made me wonder what made it picture-worthy. And why did I have to get the picture right then? The table and the jar are always there. The fruit is almost always there. Usually I take pictures of unusual things. (My kids when they were sleeping or clean, for instance. The only pictures of my living room have a Christmas tree in the background.) The unusual thing today was not the fruit. It was the sun.

And I wasn't sure it would still be there when I got back twenty minutes later.

And this is what it looked like out my kitchen window when I got back twenty minutes later.

(My friend the communist, holds meetings in his RV...)

So today I will soak up every little bit of sun that comes my way. (...before it goes out on me)

Where Did My Snowman Go?

No, I'm pretty sure he's dead...

If you want to make a snowman...

Don't count on me!

Happy Valentines Day

FAFSA,the OC, and Other Figures.

I have been working on taxes, etc. for two days and I am living inside the proverbial shoebox of papers, receipts, and forms. So far I have filed our federal and state returns. I have completed Amanda's federal and state forms, but she needs to check them over before we file them. I have completed the FAFSA for 2008-2009, except I am waiting for Amanda to call me back and tell me how much money she has in her checking account. This is the last FAFSA I will have to file unless Alex grows up and goes to college. (This is certainly an uncertainty at this point.)
On another note of financial importance, Amanda still owes $300 for this semester. We sent them the full amount we owed, but this month a bill came showing a remaining balance of $300. So here is the explanation from student accounts. Remember the class you signed up for that has a $300 fee? The one we never billed you for? It is billed on a separate account called "Other Charges". And we always apply any payments to the 'OC' account first. So the money you sent to pay off your tuition and room and board was applied to the account your mother never knew you had. The 'OC' account is for parking fines, disciplinary fines, and other nasty things you don't want your parents to know about. (Why an engineering class falls in this 'OC' category, I don't know.) So, today I called the school to make them explain it to me. You know, why you took my money and used it to pay a bill you didn't want me to know existed. And so we agreed that they would send me a statement showing the charges, and then I would pay it. What a novel idea. You send me a bill. I pay the bill. You send me a receipt. Go figure.

Everybody Needs a Little Howdie

My Dad drove his van into a tree on Saturday. Quite by snowy road related accident. So while the ambulance crew is strapping him to the backboard, he has his great nephew (whose brother was also being hauled away for a CAT scan) call my Mom to get Howdie's phone number. Not to tell her about the accident--just to get Howdie's number. (Howdie owns a salvage yard and does all the body work on my Dad's vehicles.) My Mom is not dumb. (She raised 7 kids-most of whom learned to drive.)

"Why do you need Howdie's number?"
" We had a little accident."
"Is everyone alright?"
"Yes, we're all okay."
"How is the van?"
"Not so good."
"Okay, do you have something to write with?"
Notice the complete absence in this conversation of anything resembling a tree, 911, paramedics, blood, ambulances, hospitals, and/or suspected head injuries.

So this is the order of things: Accident, 911, Howdie.

My Dad trusts Howdie. He knows he will come and haul the van away. He will take care of his equipment, his glasses, and hopefully his tossel hat. He will call him when the van is 'ready'. He will treat him fairly. Howdie is probably in the will ahead of me.

The oddly reassuring thing about this is that it is so typical of my Dad that I know he really is okay. I don't need to see the CAT scan results.

(Love you Dad.)

100% Off The Cover Price

We got two issues of Sports Illustrated this week in the mail. Last week's issue, which typically would arrive midweek, arrived in our mailbox this Monday(the day after the Super Bowl). It looked like it had already been read. The Big Question on the cover was "Can the Giants Get to Brady?" Oh, oh!! I know this one. Something a little anticlimatic about getting the pre-Super Bowl issue the day after the game. So I'm wondering where the magazine spent the weekend. Maybe someone was leafing through it at the Post Office. Maybe a postal worker 'borrowed' it for their Super Bowl party. That's a pretty good deal. Only I think if I pay for the subscription, I should get to read it first. So here's a little secret: when the much anticipated swimsuit edition comes out this month, they will have to find someone else's copy to ogle, because I opted not to have that issue delivered at all. Like the pre-Super Bowl issue, I already know what will be in it. And I don't need that in my mailbox.
This week's SI came on Friday. Evidently, it didn't take as long to read.
Oh, and I miss Life of Reilly.

Cleaning and Scrubbing and Grown up Babies

I share these thoughts about houscleaning with Katie from the novel "True to Form" by Elizabeth Berg:

...now I'll have to scrub the toilet. And vacuum. And
dust. And the Venetian blinds will take forever....They are so boring to
do even when you have music on, and you think you'll crack up before they're done. Do the main part, okay, but then comes the dumb little ends and they all have to be dusted on both sides. Venetian blinds are
what hang in hell, and every day Satan says, "My, my, I see we have some dust again."

The High Cost of Vacation

My five days off were followed by 6 days 'on'. In the 48 hrs before I left for California I worked 24. And I have worked 52 hours in the week since I have been back. So today, on my day 'off' I am changing beds, doing laundry, cleaning the house, taking Alex to the eye doctor and Tae Kwon Do. I have several other things on my list, but I don't know if I will get much of it done. Tomorrow I work 12 hrs. I'm really not whining, just feeling like I didn't have time to revel in my trip. So here is what I wish my day was like:

Brother-in-Law Day

What happens when it rains in Southern California...

Thankfully we had scheduled Brother-in-Law day. Joe wanted to cancel because of the weather, but he rallied and found a way to entertain us with the help of his able lab assistant Tyler. (I have some good video of this egg sucking science demonstration, but once again I will need assistance to post it.)

Venice Beach

Tattoos---check!

(Sorry, I couldn't figure out how to flip this image. Just tilt your head till I can get home and fix it.) *fixed, <3stasi

Not on the list because it was beyond my wildest expectations:

11. Painting graffiti at Venice Beach