It’s that time again… time for me to change up stuff around here. How’dya like that new header? Pretty fancy-smancy! WK helped me put that together. (Hubs helped with the sizing). I think he did an outstanding job. If I ask him really nice, he might hire out. Changed out the colors for a more fall look too. I think it’s kinda peaceful. The Ferris Wheel is a photo I took at the Navy Pier while in Chicago in July. The full sized version was featured earlier this month at Photo Bliss and can be seen in my Flickr Photostream. (I’m way behind in updating the photos there, so I apologize if you’ve already seen most of those. I’ve beenRead More

With this one I am to divulge 10 ‘honest’ things about myself that, hitherto fore, were unknown. It took me a while to come up with this list. Apparently I have already shared way too much about myself at this blog. I had to drag the bottom of the well for this trivia… (it will also be the last one of these I do forever awhile, since anything else I could possibly share would cause me to go into recluse mode and never show my face again in public.) I weigh 20 pounds more now than at my top preggers weight, it pisses me off, but I really like having big bewbs. I honestly don’t know if I would rather beRead More

Remember me telling you about this kid? The teenaged son of…. a good friend of mine, yes, a friend of mine. And how this kid maybe, just maybe mind you, maybe went back to school this week. Being that classes started on Monday and all, And, how this may have been a really big deal, because this kid, my friend’s son, may not have been able to attend school for a long time before this. Well, this kid and all the significant adults making significant decisions with him, thought going back to school was a good idea and that Monday was as good a time as any to try. And, try he did. This kid got up at the ButtcrackRead More

Something happened yesterday that I didn’t think would for a very long time. I hadn’t even let myself hope that it could. Now, that jinx mojo is raising it’s ugly head, so to avoid it as best as I can, we will speak hypothetically. This ‘thing’ actually hasn’t really happened yet. If it were to, hypothetically, it would happen Monday, Monday morning to be exact, about the same time that public school around here opens. Let’s say there was a boy, a teenaged boy who suffered so severely from panic attacks, anxiety and depression, and obsessive behavior that his parents were forced to withdraw him from his hypothetical high school back in February. Then they hypothetically enrolled him in a homeschool program , takingRead More

When I was in high school, at the height of the iconic era of platform heels, peasant blouses and bell bottoms, I was a rebel ~ stylin’ at the cutting edge of clog mania, thermal long-sleeve tees and peg leg jeans ~ 501 Button Fly Levis’. I wore men’s jeans. At 120lbs, 5′8″ I had no hips and no ass to speak of, but did have an androgynous waistline and long, skinny legs. As today’s fashions continue their cyclic return to the hippy era, 30 years and 50 pounds later, I now have hips and an ass, but still have that androgynous waistline and long, not-so-skinny legs. It’s difficult, nay, near impossible to find pants that not only fit, butRead More

For a long time I have been beating myself up about events and situations that are either out of my control, not my doing, or beyond my ability to change. Still I obsess, still I blame, still I gnash my teeth and beat my breast. As a mom, as a woman, I also believe that is what most of us are conditioned to do. To take the brunt of blame and fault. Second guess ourselves as wives, mothers, sisters, daughters, lovers. Whether it’s a reasonable assumption or not, we take on the responsibility for all that goes wrong, while neglecting to accept the praise for what goes right. Slowly I am realizing that these negative convictions are wrong and inRead More

I’ve done this before, you know… speak of something of great importance happening only for it to fizzle and never occur. Jinxing. It happened last summer when Tropical Storm Fay was on a direct path toward us. She was supposed to bring destruction and mayhem, but blew out before causing too much trouble. I did an updating post on her, finally going to bed early when the storm was downgraded to a Depression. I have the gift. The Gift of Jinx. Claudette came, rained and left. Of course with Florida being so painfully flat, we had spotty flooding and winds gusts are still 20-30 mph which makes driving a hazard. She was kinda disappointing really. We’re fine ~ the drivewayRead More

When I first moved to Florida, the week prior to settling into our temporary condo home, Hurricane Erin (Category 2) had made her mark. Two months later, only three weeks in our new permanent home, Hurricane Opal arrived… just in time for my birthday. I celebrated my 33rd on the road, fleeing with my family from a Category 4 storm, having grown to a Cat 5 just prior to landfall. Over the past 14 years we have evacuated from Ivan and Dennis, but stayed for Georges and Gustav. We were flooded by Katrina, but New Orleans was far enough away that the wind damage was not as catastrophic. This weekend we’re closely watching Tropical Storm Ana which appears to beRead More

I spend a great deal of time engaged in daydreaming. One of a few peculiarities left over from my childhood. (A love of rhubarb and bubble baths are a couple other holdovers.) On my daily morning commute I am a rock star belting out the next greatest, and best song that everyone wants to sing along to. At work, I’m the next Eudora Welty, penning a celebrated American Classic. If Ansel Adams was a girl, I would be her standing in the sand with my camera snapping away at the sinking sun. At night, as the shadows lengthen, the light fades in the corners and I drift off to sleep, I am transported back into time and space to aRead More

Amazingly I’ve made it through year two. I’m too lazy to do a year(s) in review post ~ more to the point, I’d rather forget some of my earlier offerings ~ they were a little too random and not very interesting. Last year I did a Q&A post where I had people send in questions for me to answer about myself. I envisioned getting 100’s of questions, enough to last me through a week’s worth of posts. I did get great questions ~ thanks again to eveyone who sent them in ~ but didn’t get the staggering response I had hoped for. That’s okay… it was a shameless ploy to entice new readers. During these past two years, I’ve welcomedRead More