Currently Away from My Desk

Setting up a new computer, and figuring out it's quirks along with preparing for New Beginnings has left me needing a break.

I am currently away from my desk right now. If you would like to leave a message, I would be happy to get back to you.

Thank you.

I-don't-Mac

What have I gotten in to? A new Mac computer was delivered to my house today...I feel like I'm re-learning everything about computers. And I'm pretty sure I've messed this puppy up already!

I'm so stinkin' nervous and excited I think I may pass out. I feel a little giddy.

My owners manual says...'congratulations, you and your iMac were made for each other.'

That's it...no other direction. I'm wingin' it.

I-don't-Mac yet.

Happy Monday

It't Monday...the day to re-start and renew. I love Mondays.

Then wake up and so something more...
then dream of your mansions on high..
doing good is a pleasure,
a joy beyond measure,
a blessing,
of duty and love.

From the hymn, Have I Done Any Good in the World Today

Doing good can mean just keeping up with my home this week. It will mean fulfilling my calling at church and trying to be the best I can.

Happy Monday.

Travel Log

After some shifting and digging around I've managed to come up with a temporary solution to my computer problems. A cranky, cheapie old laptop is better then nothing.

I wanted to post some pictures of my trip to Georgia. Me...a mom who needed a little break and another mom who needed a little break, together with her daughter decided to visit another mom who needed a little break in Georgia. It was a nice break.

Georgia is beautiful this time of year. It could be that anywhere other then Missouri is beautiful in the winter, but needless to say, Georgia didn't disappoint. Neither did the sunrise in Chicago as we began our journey the first day.Our first stop after landing in Atlanta was to visit the Atlanta Speedway. Teenage daughter we brought is a huge fan of NASCAR. Some naughty bugger left the security gate unlocked so we helped ourselves to an inside view of the track.
I couldn't get over the scenery on the way to our friend's house. The pine trees are beautiful and smell so wonderful. I kept thinking...I could live here.
Evans, Georgia is close to the Savannah River, which is the border that runs between South Carolina an Georgia. We took a little field trip over to a lock...or dam that creates a canal. It was amazing. The river was impressive, wide, clear and stunning. The moss that hangs from the trees is spectacular...so different from the moss I am used to seeing in Oregon. I've always wanted to see that and it was even better then I imagined it. And it's always fun to explore with friends. We didn't run across any alligators but appreciated the warning sign.




Everyone in Georgia is just as sweet as can be. I've never been called ma'am more times in my whole life as much as I was within the first day. The only cranky Georgian we came across was the security guard at the Augusta National, home of the Augusta Masters Golf. The gate just happened to be open as we drove by one day so we thought we'd take a gander and see what all the fuss was about this exclusive club. Well, surely we didn't even make it 10 feet past the gate when we heard hollerin'. The guard was screaming so loud at us, we could hear him through the car. He wasnt messin' around when he told us we'd better leave. So we did. And instead of pictures of a beautiful course, I got one of me wearing a green Master's jacket found in an junk shop in downtown Augusta. Just as well. Not my most flattering moment.

Another great thing about Georgia is the food. It's good. Here's me some Jambalaya...

It was a great trip...I'm so glad was able to catch up on some reading and friendships. I'm looking forward to my next Travel Log.

Ghost town

It's like a ghost town around here on my blog. I really am around. You can't see me or hear me right now but I'm here.

My computer however, has given up the ghost. It crashed during a facebook chat with Chloe on Wednesday. It came to life thursday long enough to back everything up on an external drive and then went down again. I've rebooted it at least 20 times since then. It's really no fun blogging from a cell phone. And I have pictures to post from my trip to Georgia!

If I was made of money with nerves of steel (rather then a wisp of a ghost), I would be down at the apple store buying myself a Mac right now.

Maybe someone elses cool blog will be giving one away today. But since it's hard to browse blog by phone, this is one ghost that will never know. :(

I don't even know if I make any sense since I can only see about 5 words at a time.

Time to go back to haunting. Ghost out.

Full of Glee

One of the things I spent the last 6 days doing was being indoctrinated with Glee...the TV series. I suggest getting the DVD of the whole season.

Get comfy in a recliner lounge in your pjs.

Watch each episode back to back to develop a relationship with the characters.

Allow yourself to become addicted. The episodes get cleaner and better as they go.

Go ahead. Shed a few tears. Get the tingles when you hear the singing...

I suggest you do it now....so you can be Full of Glee too.

Must IMAX

IMAX is the only way to go if you are seeing Avatar. So says Boyd and Bridger. I saw it in the "normal" theater and I'm good but I hear that it's even better 3D. The best part about seeing it in IMAX is the fantastic goggles they let you wear...the drawback...you don't get to keep them. Too bad...I think they'd work well for skiing. Several members of my family...who will not be named...(2 of which can be seen pictured here ;) have seen this movie 3 times already. All recommend IMAX.

The Telephone Life Line

I read an article recently that really got me thinking. Mostly, it made me think of my own history and experiences with phones. Apparently, there is a growing trend to cut land line phone service to homes as people are relying more and more on cell phones and the need for a land line phone in our house isn't necessary and frankly redundant. I have noticed this phenomena happening among those I know. I still don't know how I feel about it.

I can see how people choose to eliminate the land line phones to their homes as we had an opportunity to experience what that feels like over the Christmas break, although not by choice. Our home phones have only worked a few days over the last 3 weeks. On one hand I have enjoyed the quiet and the disconnection of my teenagers from their friends. It has been handy to have all the calls directed to one location. But that is also the disadvantage. I like having my personal calls separate from the family business. I know that may not make sense to people...except me.

I also don't like my kids using my cell phone, which they do after going stir crazy from not talking to their friends after a few days. I try to remind myself how it felt as a teen to feel out of the loop with what what going on.

I know the new generation probably feels like home lines are a waste of time and expense, especially in the world of instant gratification that we live in now. But I can't help remembering how the phone has evolved during my lifetime. I wanted to jot down some of those memories to share with my kids. It may be that regular phones as we know them, could be come obsolete. I can't imagine what the generation older then I am thinks.

Remember the rotary phone? For my 16th birthday I got a phone for my bedroom. It was a rotary dial phone....cream. I used to hate to dial numbers with a lot of 0's or 9's in them. Put your finer in the 9 hole, turn the dial with your finger until you hit the metal stopper, pull your finger out and watch the circle dial click click...all the way back around. It took like 10 minutes to place a call...lucky you if your phone number was...222-1111. The rotary phone is actually in wikipedia...

And that reminds me....remember how you could dial 555-1212 as many times a day as you wanted...to hear the Greenwich Time? THAT was fun. Calling in all day to hear the official time of day. Oh, the fun we had back then.

And then what about those curly phone cords? The stretchy cords that started out as 5 feet long but when you wanted your privacy on a call, you would pull the darn thing so hard so you could wrap it around the corner to hide in the coat closet. After a couple of months the cord would be stretched out to 15 feet. And after that you'd start pulling it from the wall and then your Dad would be so mad and he would buy a new cord and ground you from the phone because you ruined the expensive cord....and...

You were really lucky if your phone wasn't mounted to the wall because you had the extra 2 foot cord from the phone to the wall...that's 2 more feet of privacy!

And you didn't have call waiting so while the teenager was on the phone (of which you usually only had one in the house...in the kitchen) no one else could call or reach you. And they got a busy signal...which is a novel idea now-days with call waiting and voicemail. So you would find out a week later that so and so tried to call and couldn't get through for days. So then the teenager would be grounded from the phone again and given a rule of only 5 minutes per phone call. The cool kids' parents would end up buying them their own phone line. Can you imagine? A separate phone line for the teens? I couldn't imagine...only the really rich kids got that.

And then there were long distance calls. It used to be super expensive to call long distance. And some days were more expensive then others and same with times of the day. So Sunday evening was the cheapest time and day of the week. So everyone would save up their long distance calls to Grandpas and Grandmas for Sunday night. Sometimes there would be so many people in the country using the phones at the same time on Sunday nights that you wouldn't be able to get through. A recorded voice operator would tell you the phone lines were busy. You'd try and try again throughout the night and finally give up and write a letter. Or you'd have to write a letter to tell your long distance friends and family....make sure and be home on Sunday night at 7:00 pm and we'll call you. It was a luxury and expense to call long distance, so you'd write the letter warning them of your approaching call. Then you'd all sit around the phone and take turns talking to each other. Your Mom would call you in and make sure you said "hi" to your Grandma...and so on...long distance was a BIG deal.

Then there was an operator. You know...like the song..."Operator". And no matter what, you could dial '0' and get a real person to answer. There was no 911. If you had an emergency you called the operator. If you wanted to make a collect call, you called the operator. Collect calls? What are those? For those who didn't have 10 cents for the pay phone or have the money to pay for long distance, you could call someone and charge the phone call to them...it was a collect call. Dial the operator...I'd like to make a collect call to....she'd call that number and while you waited on the line listening, she'd ask the person answering if they would accept the charges and then they would answer yes or no...and that was a collect call.

Now that I think about it...I lived in the stoneage of phone service. I'm sure it was more primitive in the beginning then that but not by much. My kids have never nor will ever know of or understand what a privilege the phones are. They really were that....a privilege and a marvel. No matter what, whether you'll keep your old land line or have the latest and greatest 4G cell phone technology, phones are life lines....and still a privilege in my opinion. Here's to my history with the life line...I''ll keep my land line as long as technology will allow....

but I'll download the rotary app for my iphone. ;)

I'm not going out there...

Notice my ears are back...I'm taking a stance...I'm not going....I'll hold it....awww...come on.....doh...

She threw me out.

Think like School

Evenings at our house are always crazy. For some reason, last night was no exception. I rarely check my emails or watch the news at night as we are always on the run until bedtime.

It would have been good for me to know that school was cancelled today before I drove my already-ready-for-the-day-at-5:30am-daughter to seminary. Last I checked yesterday the temps are supposed to be in the 20's today and no snow until tonight. I guess they figure since they will probably have to cancel school the rest of the week after tonight's storm, they might as well not bother with one day of school. Children all over the country must be so jealous and angry at the injustice done to them. They all have to go to school in snow and low temps. Consider the Alaskans or even the Wyoming..ans....(are they Wyomites, Wyomians...??) Silly me...how did I ever think they would make kids walk uphill both ways to school, in 6 feet of snow?

Now, I'm still okay with school being out, don't get me wrong. But my kids are now starting to feel anxiety about getting back in the saddle, so to speak. All they can think of is how far behind they'll be in their musical practices and how all our snow days will all be used up. That means....more school this summer.

Hey, what do I know. It's my own fault. All I know is that I was so afraid I wouldn't be able to get up this morning, so I laid awake in bed all night. And now I'm wide awake and can't go back to bed. Darn that I'm not addicted to tv or facebook or emails and check them forty times a day so I'd know what was going on in the world.

I guess that's what I get for not thinkin' the way they think.

A Day Off

School was supposed to start today. But because of freezing, and I mean freezing temperatures, we're out for today.

Bridger wanted to take pictures of a red cardinal in our backyard, but couldn't get it to hold still long enough for a photo. Instead she got these....

...through the dirty windows. But worth staying home from school for!

With the forecast for even colder weather this week, I wonder if I'll have my girls home even longer.

I think I got my wish.

First Day Pepto

Today is the first day of school for Chloe. We're still learning this college thing so we're really wishing we had flown her home on friday rather then yesterday! Hopefully she was ready to go this morning! I spent about 2 hours with her on the phone last night helping her get organized and put together for today. Why is it that she needed to be in Utah for us to have fun talking? She also starts back to her job today as well. Knowing her...knowing me, she will be needing pepto today. As I was growing up, my Mom always packed Pepto Bismol tablets in my school bag. The first days of school always stressed me out so much that I would end up with a sick stomach, vomiting and calling my Mom to come home. It would feel like a million sharp-winged butterflies flitting around my abdomen. We found that chewing on pepto calmed my tummy nerves quite a bit and quelled the nausea to help me get through the day. Off and on throughout the year, I would depend on those little pink pieces of chalk to get me through the day. When I woke up this morning I was so excited for Chloe. Not nervous. None of those tummy butterflies like I used to get. I wanted to send her vibes to just enjoy the day. These days she will never forget and will always cherish. Enjoy the day and relish in the excitement and opportunities available.
Knowing me...knowing her, I am a bad Mom for not sending some tummy butterfly medicine with her.

School starts tomorrow for Hunter and Bridger. Why am I having such anxiety about this? Not tummy butterfly anxiety, just yucky anxiety. I want to be excited since it means I get to be back on a schedule and finally have my house clean. But I don't want them to be gone. I really don't. I hate sending them back out into the world. Do I spend today having them help me put away the Christmas decorations or do I just enjoy them and use my time after their gone to clean up? I have really let things go this vacation because I didn't want to waste my time that I could be spending with them. And you know what? I really have enjoyed this break. I don't enjoy a messy house but I have thoroughly loved having my kids home with me. To be honest, I've been a little cranky when they chose to be with their friends rather then me! I've actually played some board games, put together a puzzle and tried my skills at rock band and the Wii. Unbelievable for me.

I will have pink Pepto on hand for tomorrow...

So what project or disaster do I start on first tomorrow....my official first day back to reality? There are piles all around me, calendars to keep, and pounds to lose. It's all a little overwhelming. In the end church will be the priority, but on my list of things to do and work on...is me. This year I hope to work on me a little.

Knowing me....I better keep that Pepto around.

Be Alive

This is the year...to live...

Nothing else matters but love and life. That is all we'll take with us.

Happy 2010!