ok, so we got the bill for the rental vehicle used in colorado/wyoming..........mm has no luck with rentals, it seems........she did not wreck or mame this vehicle, but she did sign off on everything.....even the things she told them she did not want....and her inattention has cost the c-w family a large bundle of cash.........mm will never again rent a car........not here, not in europe....nowhere............from now on it's either trains, or overseas delivery (when mm strikes it rich she will buy a volvo and pick it up at the factory.....it is a fantasy......)

ok, so mm is bursting at the seams and it is not her weight......we have new 'neighbors' on gwinn island circle.......and we do not expect these folks to be moving in soon.........we suspect that they bought the house as a weekend place, and as a mail box in the boyle district.........now, i say this as someone who has grandfathered her children into the danville system from the boyle system..........regardless of the insanity we went through with ap english reading tests.....i still could never see my children attending the legal district for our address..........my children are not, and never could be...boyle children..........i have said more, but i have wisely erased it all............back to the white-flight mail drop.........i am so out of the loop i did not know that they no longer attended danville schools...the younger ones go to the christian school......and the older one goes to boyle, in his cowboy boots.......i should have them to dinner.........

on a completley different topic, i am scheming about financing a trip to paris,and an apartment.........maybe i should get up a website.....send this poor lowly working mean mamma to paris.........

ok, so mm had an aromatic day.....balsamic vinegar is the exact smell.........i was reaching for the marinated roasted vegtables to make a pita during lunch.......and the lid was loose...the the marinade poured down my shirt into my sports bra......there are few words adequate to describe the feeling of cold vinegar and oil as they surround and coat each breast before soaking into the fabric of one's shirt and undergarments......nor the lingering scent.........nor the dead-center stain that screams out to be noticed........my children were kind enough to bring me a change of clthes so that i could see clients.....but i opted out of the swim banquet.......i cannot stand to smell myself at this point....i am off to take a swim then take a shower.............

ok, so i felt a void last night after dinner........the tour is over.....no more footage to watch.........but nothing on tv either.........might as well just take a bath and go to bed.......which is infinitely better than working late, i suppose.......back to dinner.....now that is a challenge........i brought home leftover crab cakes for supper....and by the time supper was to be put on the table, 'vultures' had basically eaten all but the requisite number needed for '1 each'.........now that we have 3 adolescent males around the house, i will have to start labeling food.....do not eat this on peril of death.........or some similar message.........

ok, so this morning i forgot all about my vacation rant and rave........i suppose i ranted and raved so much whilst actually driving that it was almost.......out of my system.....at the mammoth caves exit....in cave city, ky........amongst the deserted 'attractions' was a christian theme park.......golgotha fun park, to be exact......up on the hill.......all i saw driving toward the national park was the sign........golgotha fun park.........so i had a 12 mile window of opportuity to rant about how there was nothing fun about golgotha (the sign of the scull where jesus was crucified....) and what would possess people to think that anybody driving another 12 miles to or from mammoth caves would stop and spend money at this 'attraction' .........on the way back, we noticed right away that the gates were padlocked........which meant that we were right, no one wanted to bring their children to a theme park centered around the death of christ........and so it folded.........from the brief glance we got, a few painted statues of madonna and of christ were visible...the concrete kind that are sold at such places that sell concrete planters..........my gut instinct is that the church family of whoever developed this crazy thing did not even bother to come...................

ok, so we are back from our first excursion, and i am blurry-eyed exhausted.........the drive back from memphis took about 7.5 hours, when one factors in the road construction slowdowns, the rain, the pit stops.........we saw a part of mammoth caves that i had never seen before.....one that was accessible only from 500 nearly vertical steps designed by an engineer specializing in building submarines....i don't like heights. so this required a bit of lamaze breathing..........the tour guide/ranger was perky and knowledgable......the formations(drapery, stalactites, stalagmites) were really neat.......the best tour memory?.....the woman who clutched her cell phone during the tour.......like she had to be ready to take a call...in a cave 250 below the surface of the earth......can you hear me now?............then on to memphis........graceland (this morning) was already crowded ay 9:30 am.....the price of admission includes an audio tour, so they are able to crowd many more people through the house quickly.......i could not get over the notion that my entrance fee pays for lisa marie's lifestyle, including her bizarre marriages and singing career.........anyway, graceland was a funky diversion, especially the jungle room.......the best memory?.......the large group of people from ohio wearing matching t-shirts......

ok, so i managed to enjoy a date with my husband at our wine tasting last night, while my partner and his partner escorted scw and student belgian exchange student at the belgian architect's house.....we tasted 12 different wines...6 whites and 6 reds.......i do not care for reds all that much, and dumped most of each small garnet glass rather than swallow it down.........the appetizers turned out quite well....we may add some to our bar menu.......so here i am on sunday morning trying to rally, pack a small bag, load the kids into the car, and go to mammath caves.....i am so tired, however, and the urge to just stay home is overwhelming........ecw continued to coach me on the nuances of his cabriolet right up until he left to go riding this morning.....his convertable gets better mileage, and has the advantage of being a convertable........every belgian should see part of america from a convertable.......i hope to get to our memphis hotel in time to see olntv's coverage of the tour's last day......i have no idea if our hotel gets olntv.......one can only hope that the baymont hotel airport has monster cable..........

ok, so the tour de france all comes down to today's time trial...lance is only 65 seconds ahead of ullrich, who beat him in the last time trial by over a minute..........i will miss the finale sunday, unless our memphis hotel has olntv and we are settled in sunday night for some after-dinner tv watching.........we will get up early and drive to mammoth caves...we have tour reservations at 12:15 their time......we may go to the corvette museum, though it is not high on my list....then on to memphis, where we have hotel reservations near graceland......monday we also hope to see mud island, and the missisippi before heading home.......i call it our american icon tour........

ok, so mm is up and sipping hazelnut coffee, despite the 2:45 am bedtime..........the past 24 hours have been more than a blur........my mother and i arrived at the cincy/northky airport in time to meet jon, the belgian boy at the delta luggage claim. we had his picture, and thought it would be no problem to pick him out of the crowd...........he has lost weight since that picture was taken....or rather...he appears to have lost muscle since he is not in gymnastics season.......anyway, the realtime jon looked much smaller than i expected.......he whipped out his english phrase book within 5 minutes of meeting me....i must remember to speak more slowly and to use fewer slang terms.......anyway...with 5 hours to kill, we got back in the car and headed toward mecca......the joseph-beth store in norwood (less than 1 mile from where ecw grew up, and our first apartment).....we had dinner in the cafe before browsing.....and emerged from our meal to find that it was a booksigning evening.......david eggers who wrote the book' you(they?) will know us by our velocity' he sounded quite interesting.....he was reading aloud from one of his books........but they must have stockpiled all of his books near the signing table as i could not find any away from the crowd.......we made out way through tjmaxx, steinmart, homegoods, and other stores until they closed at 9:00, then went back to the airport, where we sat and watched cnn until scw emerged, looking taller, more european, and much older than when he left.........we could not leave just then, as a girl from lexington who had been on most of scw's flights appeared to have been forgotten......her parents had not shown up.......we waited with her, then started asking for them to be paged, then finally sent her and scw off to search other terminals (they arrived on united...) in case the parents thought she was on delta........bingo, her mother had been in another terminal, waiting and worrying.......we finally left for home at midnight.......there is something surreal about driving late at night, with all of the truckers.........trying to stay awake......we listened first to allison kraus, then to wilco's newest album........several tracks reminded me of dark side of the moon, especially against a night sky and a van full of sleepy passengers.......we will surely here snips and snatches of the belgian experience over the coming days and months.......though there is less to tell given the day-by-day commentary we were blessed to read thanks to blogging......less to explain.........i feel much more prepared to be a host given all that i have read about the gillard family and how they dealt with a 4-week houseguest.......still, it will be a challenge.........and then there is my baby boy...back home again......praises be....

ok, so i want it noted on my permanent record that many of the numerous emails sent to a certain student staying in belgium were forwarded news articles of interest rather than actual word-for-word written notes sent electronically........well, yea, i did write a lot of notes, because it is so easy to dash off a few lines to a loved one and press 'send'........these days writing an actual note and affixing a stamp seems to require an entire time slot in my day (this does not even include the time it takes to select the perfect note card........), whereas sending an email seems to take only a few minutes. of course, the lack of permanence is a shortfall.........i hold dear a letter that my grandmother crown sent to me while i was in college.......it wasn't very long, but she took the time to write it and send it, and now i have a record of her handwriting, her word choices, and the bits of news she chose to share with me in 1975......emails come and go, with little reason to use valuable storage space in their keeping.......unlike blogs, by the way, which can be archived and downloaded......if one could find the time.........when this student goes to college, i must make an effort to write actual notes on occassion, just in case he is feeling sentimental and wants to keep a little written record of my voluminous (sp) correspondence........

ok, so in a fit of boredom i set off in search of new reading material in my own home.........i have reread all of the harry potter series this summer since reading the new one, so that i could reread it fully reminded of all that had transpired prior.......i reread all of jane austen last summer........all of agatha christie on previous summers.....all of colette more than once...........i have read most of our list for book club...and those that i have not read i do not yet own........soooooooo, i ventured into the room of our only absent child to see what splendors lurked on his shelves........i selected running with scissors, a memoir likened to the style of david sedaris....supposedly this is a true story of this person's childhood....even looking at the picture on the back, i am unclear whether it was written by a man or a woman, as there is great gender conflict..... and serious wit......and, i am certain......some gaps in memory versus made-up memories........for example.....he/she is recalling an instance when the crazy poetess mother is getting ready for a poetry reading...she is wearing pucci and high heals....and feels like there is 'something missing'......she reaches for her box of feminine supplies and takes 2 pads, peels off the backs...and makes her own shoulder pads........now......this instance was supposedly late 60's/early 70's.........30 years ago at least........if my memory serves me, peel-off sticky technology did not come along until much later........wonder if there is a peel-off sticky sort of web site to prove or disprove this memory........ of course, i may be just being mean about this tale, which strikes me as both contrived and over-the-top to be as true as purported........i will just put the book back, and wait for comments from the book's owner..........

ok, so my boy just called from belgium, and he seems ready to come home.......we are ready for him to come home......the cat is more than ready for him to come home......we have equipped the guest room with the portable tv/vcr and all of the non-juvenile vhs movies....this child reportedly likes movies.........so when he gets bored he can hole up in his room with a good flick.......if he gets really bored, we can always bring up the disney movies........

ok, so my world traveler comes back in 3 days............

ok, so i am personally relieved that my boy abroad has made contact...after his last blog we became quite concerned about his safety.......and somewhat amused about what our guest will think about our family......there are times when most of us has(have?) a book in hand.....not often 100%, but at least 2 or 3 out of 5 at any given stretch of free time......people unfamiliar with the concept of a leisure-reading family culture could see it as strange, i suppose.....or quite boring...certainly nothing to be suspicious about.......well, yeh, we do spend far too much money on books, but that is a discussion that i will not begin to get into at this time.........

ok, so it turns out the little boy sexually assaulted at the bcfair last sunday not only goes to my church...his mother is in my sunday school class........she was still emotionally distraught this morning, but felt compelled to tell of the experience to warn parents that pedophiles are in danville and we must warn our children about them.....as well as how they can avoid these dreadful encounters.....last sunday after church, this mother and her 2 boys (both under 7) were setting up her booth at the fairgrounds.....only 3 trailers were yet there at that time...they were playing on the swings and the teeter-totter...within clear sight of the mother.....with no one else in the play area......the older boy fell off the teeter-totter......and immediately a man got out of his car and rushed over........he not only checked out that nothing was broken, he pulled down the boys pants 'to check for damage'.......and it went on from there until the boy said 'stop...i want you to stop'.......by the time the mother noticed the boy on the ground, the man was walking back to his car.....my friend noticed that he was a pleasant, good-looking man.....but at the time she had no idea what had just happened.......of course, by the time the police had arrived, the man was gone.....the mother was able to give a description, and the police artist was called in........that same day, another boy was assaulted in the mercer public library, so poliuce believe that the man just moved on to another place where he might find unwitting children.........these sort of things scare me terribly, as a mother of a 10 year old girl with little sense of personal safety.....the very first time i met her was at brookcove gas station, when she asked me....a complete stranger...to buy her a candy bar........the list in the paper, for parents to read to their children with hints for avoiding dangerous encounters covers the buying of treats by strangers, as well as other ploys used by sexual predators to entangle little ones for evil deeds..........i was reminded of 2 instances in my past.......one when i was maybe kindergarten age......my two older male neighbors (both surely under age 10)paid me 10 cents to let them look under my shirt.......i do not remember telling my mother, because i had the dime and i was afraid i would have to give it back.......the other incident happened much later, when we lived in mt gilead, and i was maybe a freshman in high school.....our cousins, aunt and uncle from texas had stopped by for lunch, and my brother and i were in the basement with the cousins playing pool, and somehow, the older cousin grabbed me by my chest from behind, and then tried to kiss me..........i was horrified, and cried and ran upstairs, but did not tell my parents what happened until the cousins had left........i was so ashamed........i have no idea if my parents ever said anything about it to them or to other family members....these were my mother's least favorite in-laws.....but it is safe to say that they never came back.........i want to tell this mother that her child will be ok, especially if she does not dwell on this as pivitol......keeps bringing it up.......if she drops it, he will soon drop it from his memory bank...file it away...until a much later date........it will be an unpleasant memory.....but it will not ruin his life..........

ok, so the elements of an idyllic sunday morning are as follows..........an indefinite period of lounging under the covers semi-sleeping to the npr's sound and spirit.........a nice not-too-strong cup of coffee on the back deck with both newspapers.....with mist rising from the creek and the sound of scw's fish pond bubbling softly in the backround........sitting at the french-style cafe table and chair.....which has a perfectly matched tablecloth and seat pad.....(yeh,yeh,yeh....this so martha..but this its MY idyl and i'll match if i want to........)....no one has turned on the television.......birds break into song from the limb of the tree with the owl-hole.........yep, this just about sums it up..........

ok, so i have read my boy's latest blog, and i am distressed because he seems distressed with dealing with emotional and eratic strangers...........my french is so poor, that i would only have it on this woman's body language that she was so upset, and i don't know what i could have done to calm her down.......i do so hope that i do not lose it completely in front of this poor belgian lad.........i may take to hiding his shoes....you just never know when it comes to the meanness i am capable of........

ok, so maybe i, too, have adult attention deficit disorder......i am frequently distracted, fidgetey and impatient when i must wait, and have a difficult time finishing tasks..........like finishing putting up the last 6 feet of wallpaper border in the upstairs bathroom.......or getting around to putting the mulch around the bush by scw's fish pond..........or putting 4 years of photos in albums..........yea.......none of these failures are my fault...it is organically impossible for me without proper medication........i new there had to be a reason.........

ok, so i was clearing tables today at trc, when i noticed that someone left a LEAFLET under their plate.........now, come on.......this is america, the land of free speech, but this leaflet is crazy....with sections about 'are you sure that there is heaven?' what point could they possibly want to make by dealing 'is there heaven?' as their first card? if there is no heaven, then why bother with the rest of the leaflet.........i do they really think that they will 'convert' people based on disrupting faith in the hereafter? and if there is a heaven, how can they be so sure how to get there? ........


on a different note, i was coming home from work, and found a suburban from texas in my driveway.....a traveling book/educaitonal software salesman......well, i was not even kindly in telling him that i was not interested and to get his vehicle out of my driveway..........'educational books/software are useful only to those who will use them....and in this family those who will use them already have hundreds of books in their personal collections, and those who don't use them also have hundreds of books in their personal collections.....so no need to buy more at this time.........the weight of our collective books will cause us to slide into the lake at some point'...........this man looked both stricken and afraid...........and he left..........

ok, so we are in the stephan-coming-home countdown.......less than a week........the logistics of meeting scw and jon at the airport will be interesting......we have accessed the airport website to try to pick out a meeting place for us and jon, as he will arrive hours before scw........we are also tidying up the upstairs spare bedroom so that scw can have personal space again........this means that i will have to make a curtain for the window.....it has had fabric just draped over the rod for at least a year (when acw went to college and the bedroom swaps began in earnest.....) the old curtain didn't go with the new william morris-style wallpaper, so i took it down.......the closet of this room is filled with bolts of fabric (this room was intended to be my sewing room....) but they will just have to stay there.........

ok, so this morning was my last 5:30 am wakeup call for a few days....breakfast catering jobs are overrated...when i arrived at trc at 5:45 am......a marauding band of young punks on bikes (approx age...10 to 15) came roaring around our corner from walnut street....and then through the papa john's lot onto main street...my first thought was 'why are they up so early'....followed by my second thought..'have they even gone to bed yet...?'

ok, so my book club picked its selections for next year tonight......the balloting took three votes..... oh my.......my 1st choice...the secret life of bees made it in.....as did to kill a mockingbird, the sun also rises, the quiet american, absalom,absalom......and a thriller whose name escapes me.....i am fixing dinner for the secret life of bees.......so many choices on what to prepare......and i would have preferred the sun also rises, even though i did not choose the book...i really like this book........

ok, so i have gotten up at 5:30 the last 2 days to go into work to get a catered breakfast together.....i am back home by 7:00.......today i took advantage of the early hour by taking a walk around the circle as an act of piety prior to the newspaper and a cup of cafe creme........curious, the things one notices when sleep deprived........

-the blue rental house appears to be empty
-the neighbors who are expecting their second baby appear to have traded in their monster truck for an suv
-there was a pile of green rubber bands at the circle's stop sign.......maybe tossed from the window of the
paper person?
-the next door neighbor has at least 24 tomato plants in wire cages in his front yard (circle people have no
back yards...the lake IS the back yard...) none of the tomatoes are yet red.....
-the new neighbors get up early to sit on their front porch and smoke, along with a cold canned beverage......
the pop of a top is unmistakable.....
-there are numerous weeds between the bushes in front of MY fence.........maybe i should go right on out
there and take care of them......
-i really like the smell of my boxwoods and rose bushes on misty mornings.....the eglantine rose bush smells
like green apples......marvelous

ok, so i really enjoyed this cnn.com piece.......

SAN FRANCISCO, California (AP) -- A high school teacher, fed up with the Bush administration's playing cards featuring Saddam Hussein, "Chemical Ali" and other most-wanted Iraqis, is now selling her own deck, "Operation: Hidden Agenda."

Kathy Eder's 55 cards show pictures of the president, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and others along with quotes, mostly from journalists, questioning the rationale for the U.S.-led war. The backs of the cards feature a 1983 photograph of Rumsfeld shaking Hussein's hand.

Eder, 42, said she decided to create her own plastic-coated propaganda in March as a comeback to the "messages of hate" contained in the cards the Department of Defense issued to help U.S. troops identify suspected war criminals.

The $9.95 deck of cards are being made by Texas-based Liberty Playing Cards, one of the companies that prints the government's "Most Wanted" cards.

Once the product became available online and at a few bookstores, Eder said she sold 3,000 decks in three weeks. She's already placed a second order for 5,000 decks.

Eder has pledged to donate half her profits to five nonprofit organizations that promote nonviolence and provide aide to Gulf War veterans and Iraqis.


the best part....both decks are printed in texas........

ok, so my mother taped yesterday's tour, on the back end of the cbs tour broadcast from sunday...........and the tape ran out just after the crash.............ecw was distressed, obviously......to be unable to see the rest of the race, and unable to hear lance's interviews about his luck in avoiding injury.........maybe tonight's broadcast will include a replay of yesterday's big moments........

ok, so it IS all abut the bikes.........i check scw's blog daily, then i check on the tdefrance results........even though i will sit and watch the tape on oln courtesy of my mother..........knowing and watching are two different things....and today i know about a crash that lance eluded.......and must keep quiet about until we watch it this evening......i did see on-lne where a person can pay $2500 for a week of riding the our course either before or after the tour has been there....and see the stages for that week from a vantage point.........this is precisely the event that would get my spouse to travel to france again.........

ok, so ky's historian laureate turned 100 years old today.....dr. clark is currently working on a book about the governor's mansion......quite fitting that a historian lives to be 100, or older.........i am starting to know all about old.....by the way.........or rather, ancient......last night we went walking, and we starting talking about the new playset in a neighbor's yard, which is right about where the original owners had their playset 21 years ago.........21 years isn't that long......i suppose, compared to 100.......the good news is that i am not quite ready for the rocking chair.........

ok, so a little lady came for lunch today with a bunch of other blue-haired little ladies......and she exclaimed......why kathy crown..i remember when you got married..........i just smiled and said......yes, that was a long time ago........what i didn't say was that this lady was not there.....and that the wedding had not been in our church here in danville as this lady proceeded to tell others at her table.......my wedding was not even in ky........but it was not worth interupting the curious story that this adled lady was telling her table.........i wonder if there was a tornado at my presumed danville wedding?

ok, so it is saturday.......a day that i no longer have off on a regular basis.........so hard to get out of bed on saturdays.........that desire to sleep in is ingrained.......but so is my desire for a cup of coffee and the newspaper, so i drag myself out of the bed and into my morning routine.......which now includes reading a certain foreign-published blog, email, and the tour de france news.......sometimes i even have enough time to read for awhile in an actual book....not today..the two books that i selected yesterday at the library seem pretty insipid.......and i hate to waste my tme finishing pointless fiction.........

ok, so the book that i really liked from the library was by trisha ashley.....who has written 3 books, 2 of which are not available at the library, at bn.com or amazon.com or half.com........the name trisha, i find interesting, as a neighbor in millersburg was named trisha dando....i could do flips off of her swingset, and her brother was retarded, and she had purple glass ballerinas in her room.......i really wanted to have a room decorated with ballerinas..........i lacked the nerve to do front flips off anybody else's swingset after we moved............a critical moment lost........

ok, so cayle and i sped down to the dock after work to swim.....and there were people there.....not ON our dock....but about 10 foot from it.....on a pontoon......with at least 6 children of ill-temper.....we could clearly hear the whining as we approached......there were 2 maternal- appearing women...and a husband-like unit boated up in a skiff not long after..........they all seemed taken aback that anyone lived here, despite the dock, and our quite visible grey deck amongst the foliage........i know that we live in paradise.......but i am unprepared for strange women to 'gun it' when they see us coming.....these 2 women gunned their motor like cayle and i were convicted felons on the loose.........they were drinking coke products, by the way.......pepsi peopl would have acted more civilised..........

ok, so i have to admit that i find a certain joy in bush's current situation with regard to iraq.......yes, i do not wish ill on my countrymen who are being sniped daily......but i do find joy in the fact that bush may be caught red-handed in lying to the american people about the womd/uranium/terrorist threat in iraq that he used to start the war in the first place..........yes, and sars is now in texas.....now isn';t that interesting.....

ok, so i have enjoyed a few library books of late......one is very strange...the new one by tom robbins.......a curious writer whose book even cowgirls get the blues was quite erotic and profound and memorable...........this one is based on the premise that some mias from viet nam went missing out of choice, and that they are still in southeast asia doing whatever they please.......the other book is about a woman who defines herself after her controlling husband asks for a divorce......i did like this novel....though i could not empathize with someone who dressed like a goth just because her husband wanted her to do so.......but i liked the writer's style enough to want to know if she has written any other books in a similar tone......good books sometimes are the best parts of my day.........

ok, so a racoon has been getting into our garage, and into our garbage..........and our birdseed, and our recycling..........last night we closed up the garage....we usually leave the side door open as the big yellow dog sometimes sleeps in their where the concrete floor is cool........but no more....now that the racoon is making a mess of things..........

ok, so etienne will be home 2 weeks from today........not that we are counting down the days........a huge storm passed through last night.....with the boneshaking lightening that makes one wonder if the house will implode....us postal won the team time trial yesterday.....they were awesome to watch as they rode in formation and with precision for ultimate drafting, aerodynamic advantage, etc......lance is #2 overall, with a teammate pena wearing yellow jersey.......the top 8 riders are postal.....which makes one wonder just which team member got left behind somewhere that he is out of the top group..........

ok, so mm watched tv in a certain exchange student's basement bedroom last night, because the tour de france tape was far from completion upstairs, and we only have 2 tv's on premise, and keen eddie was on realtime broadcast........i really like that show, enough to bear (?bare) the wrath of the hatted one, who does not like people in his room........keen eddie is a hoot for bond fans, as many of three actors in the last 3 or so bond movies are regulars on this show.......

yesterday, cyle and i went swimming for the 1st time since the boat has been extracted from the deep.....the water was wonderful......not quite bathwater temp...but fine just the same......not much chance of a tan/skin cancer at 5:00 and after.........event was marred by the failure of time magazine to show up (it was a tuesday........) these are idylic conditions, you must understand....a nice swim, time magazine and a beer in the beach chair on the dock.........maybe time will arrive today.........

ok, so here is my personal top ten list for favorite towns/cities.......i am still working on my top ten list of favorite places....in no particular order, except for #1

1. paris
2. barcelona
3. harlaam
4. amsterdam
5. chipping camden
6. williamsburg, va
7. colmar
8. amboise
9. strasbourg
10. jackson, wy

favorite places.....in no particlar order except for #1

1. paris....especially the museums, restaurants, parks, and stores.......
2. monticello
3. williamsburg, va
4. grand teton natl park
5. chartres
6. neuchwanstein
7. moet and chandon in eparnay
8. the gaudi parc in barcelona
9. giverny
10.V&A in london...the costume exhibit

well...i could go top 20 but........

ok, so it is tuesday, and we were busy today at trc for no reason.......quite cosmic if you ask me.....

ok, so i am saddened at the news that the cojoined twins in singapore died after their separation operation........the operation was risky...no doubt.......but the need for us all to have personal space would be quite a draw for taking the risk.....i do not think i could survive sanely with someone strapped to my head 24/7...especially if she is my blood kin........

yesterday i had a few moments between finishing up lunch and catering 2 suppers, so i drove on out to the goodwill to see what treasures awaited.......they had french-style bistro chairs for $7.50..still in the boxes.....you know...the green ones that fold and sit ever so quaintly below an outdoor table.......the rungs are resin rather than wood......but that is actually a draw, since i intend to put them outside.....2 by scw's new fishpond and two up by the mulberry tree.......i like it when cute is reasonably priced..........i also bought cayle a dress at peebles.......marked down from $45 to $18........bargains really make my day.......i bought a size 14 because she has grown so tall of late.....and because she is filling out of late.........she may be getting to the point where she can ride up front despite the airbag........

ok, so we are already starting to get copies of the article (amnews.com under sports..father/son.....) i was grateful that the lady who said at church while i was catering a meal.....'i brought a copy...it is on my front seat..the doors are not locked.....well she is still sporting her gore/leiberman sticker...i am so thrilled to not be th eonly one to be a democrat.....

ok, so a veil of secrecy has settled on our household...........it is tour de france time.......my mother tapes each night's broadcast on oln, then ecw picks it up next day and we watch it before bed, with a beer...the secrecy comes in on the side of pre-knowledge......i read about every day's results online before leaving work.....and i cannot tell ecw because he does not want to know...he wants to watch........so...right now i know that tyler hamilton wrecked and fractured his collarbone........and is disappointed that he has worked so hard for this year's tour........but wait......he rode a fabulous time today despite the injury................i will know this when we watch yesterday's race tonight...but i will not be able to tell it........this secrecy thing is not in my genetic makeup..........

speaking of secrecy/restraint......today i checked out a few books (we are so slow at trc in july...) and someone who works there was telling me about her daughter who is struggling to finish the last of her ap books before leaving on vacation...blah...blah......and how she will have to take a test on the day they leave before they can actually leave .....i smiled and said nothing..........this is BIG......i did not feel that i needed to tell of the entire ap reading and testing thing before scw's trips.....i just smiled......surely God has this on her permanent record.....................

ok, so i negelcted to mention that my brother-in-law who hosted this gettogether not only had karioke set up in hte basement, the system wasn't even rented........ironically, his ex-wife and her new husband (attending for the sake of their daughter/guest of honor who recently got married) were obviously well-practiced in karioke...........my table of in-laws pronounced that none of us were drunk enough to get up and sing..........(true, as i am no fan of white zinfandel nor of bud light...........)one in-law laughingly said that maybe when she retires she will sing karioke out in her garden to try to scare away the deer who eat her rose bushes........we told her that she could amend her adt (security?) sign to read......this home guarded by adt and karioke.........i guess you had to be there......

speaking of all of my in-laws......ecw and i, as well as his little sister and her husband.....were the only attendees not discussing retirement dates.......his siblings are either in their 60's, or teachers who can reitre before 60, or professionally unemployed (don't ask.....) one sibling plans to be a walmart greeter when his wife retires in 2 years.....at this rate, when ecw and i retire, that whole crew may well be in longterm care homes..........

ok, so we have just returned from a quick trip to a weber family gathering at my brother-in-law's summer/retirement home in tenn......a few observations from the trip down, the experience there, and the trip back.....when we were stuck in a traffic jam for 45 minutes between london and mt vernon due to an accident......

1. ohio is celebrating both it's bicentennial (1803-2003) and the anniversary of the wright brother's flight ......
2. indiana's web page is located at www.IN.gov..........both of these facts were gleaned from liscense plates....
3. the voyager has very little back storage space.........those wild children ahead of us for 10 miles at close range seemed to be right on the back window......
4. the new ky liscense plate with the smiley face sun is quite lame......
5.the black jetta is one of my favorite cars for looks on the highway.........
6. too many people own and travel with three-wheeler vehicles pulled on trailers.........
7. almost all motorcyclists have visible tatoos......
8. the pine mountain area of ky is lovely....when you overlook the flea markets, the mobile homes, and the litter.......
9. my nephew mitch is a genious...he remembered me from last november and he is not yet 3.........
10. i really like my sister-in-law roseanne.........
11. i am really glad that my brother-in-law nick retired from the fda 2 days ago........he needs to enjoy like due to his brain tumor...........
12. i have never watched more james bond movies in a single 36 hour time frame than this weekend........my in-laws have the entire catalog on dvd...........
13. i do not like greasy-granny wedding cake........

ok, so mdaddy was kind enough to weedwack the brick walk yesterday, and water the hard to reach places while i was at work...the walk was looking like a weedwalk, a bushier and far less attractive alternative to a thymewalk.........i have been watering faithfully every morning, as i am determined that the garden will still look good when our guest arrives..........many plants are beyond hope or beyond their bloom cycle, but phlox remain and a few other perennials.....and maybe the trellis roses will rebloom if they get enough water........we travel after work today to morristown, tenn, where ecw's next oldest brother has a hiltop home....all of ecw's siblings will be there........it should be interesting.....or amusing, which ever comes first is good enough for me.......

last night our neighbors set off numerous large fireworks.....they must have cost a bundle as they were sizable and impreessive and could not have been legal in this state........i have heard tales of trips to tenn for illegal fireworks.....i don't undertsand the desire for explosive pyromania.........i saw the first one, then decided i needed a hot bath more thna i needed pyrotechnics.........another 4th come and gone.......speaking of patriotic things.....i heard on npr yesterday that igor stravinsky was once arrested after a performance in boston because his orchestration of the star spangled banner changed the phrasing.....and the ploice considered him in violation of a statute that forbids tampering with patriotic/historic artifacts.........only in america

ok, so this could only happen in america.....

AUSTIN, Minnesota (AP) -- Hormel Foods has filed two legal challenges with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office seeking to prevent Spam Arrest, a Seattle software company, from using the Spam name Hormel has used for decades on its canned meat.

The trouble began about six months ago when Spam Arrest, which specializes in blocking junk e-mail or spam, filed papers to trademark its corporate name.

Hormel sent the company a warning, telling it to drop its use of Spam, which is trademark-protected. Spam Arrest refused.

"If you ask most people on the street, they're going to say junk e-mail as opposed to the luncheon meat as their first description of what spam is. I think they're overstepping their bounds," said Brian Cartmell, chief executive of Spam Arrest.

What are Hormel's chances?
Cartmell says his company's use of the word has nothing to do with Hormel's product. Hormel officials disagree, arguing that the company has carefully protected and invested in the brand name.

Hormel also argues that use of the name by other companies could potentially harm its business, and that the public could confuse the meat product with the technology company.

Douglas Wood, who practices intellectual property law in New York, estimates Hormel has only a 50-50 chance of prevailing. He points to a recent case involving Victoria's Secret and a male adult novelty shop called Victor's Secret. Victoria's Secret sued, using the trademark infringement argument. But Wood says ultimately the company lost in court.

"The court in that case was saying, even though they may have a famous mark, Victoria's Secret, and may have a particular association as soon as you hear it, Victor's Secret was not enough -- the confusion or potential damage to their mark -- to constitute infringement," Wood said.

Don't use pictures of Spam
Hormel acknowledges one of its most famous brand names has taken on new meaning, and in the past has made efforts to accomodate the Net community's use of the term, which was derived from a skit on Monty Python's Flying Circus. On its official Spam Web site, the company outlines what it considers acceptable use of the word. Its guidelines include referring to the potted-meat product in capital letters.

It says it doesn't object to the use of spam to describe unsolicited commercial e-mail. But the company does object to the use of pictures of its product used in association with the e-mail term.

Hormel's trademark lawsuit against Spam Arrest will be heard by the Trademark Trial and Appeals Court in Washington, D.C. No date has been set.

ok, so the rotary people in danville were delighted that scw has spoken to the 'sister' club in charleroi......dr. valhkamp is in charge of arranging scw's talk with the danvile club.......i have been getting up early and watering the garden(as well as the weeds therein.....) the weeds have gotten out of hand....i have been getting home after dark the past few days, so they will have to get a tad larger before i am able to start weeding the brick walk and pulling out the most offensive vegetation......grandma is organizing the july 4th grill-out...there will be corn on the cob....there will be no mm at this gathering, as she is working against her better judgeyes, fridays are good days for us, but this is a national holiday not associated with going out to eat.....i am bringing along a book........

happy fourth of july to our special traveler.........

ok, so my boy called this morning from belgium......his voice was so clear he could have been next door...........ain't technology grand????? didn't win the 165 million...maybe i will win now that it is up to near 200 million.......

ok, so we are getting closer to the july 4th weekend, which will not be much of a weekend off for the mean mamma.......i am working friday........as friday night is our biggest night and we hated to shut down operations on a high volume evening.........we could be wrong, and the place could be empty...........we will see......saturday after work we are driving to tennesee to a pseudo-weber family reunion...it will be nice to see ecw's brothers and sisters......i get the impression that the second generation will not be attending....only 1 out of our 3 will be there, if that is any indication.......given that 1 sister has breast/uterine cancer and 1 brother has a brain tumor, such get-togethers are a good idea........we will get back sunday night...luckily grandma is back from her trip north, so she will be available to deal with any 'parties' that may break out in our home when some of us are gone...............

i broke down and cut back the rose bush that fell during all of the rain in june.......it had completely blocked off the path beneath the deck.....and looked somewhat like the bramble in sleeping beauty.......i am sure that it will recover by next year...so much cut away.........thankfully it was done with blooming before it fell in the first place......i also watered the garden usng the new spray nozzle that i got at big lots of 99 cents......it IS the small things in life that add sweetness.............

ok, read this and weep....my baby pictures do really look like ecw\s.......

LONDON, England -- The theory that opposites attract is a myth, say a group of U.S. scientists who have found men and women are more likely to choose partners who are similar -- or they believe are similar -- to themselves.

Both sexes are most likely to attract individuals who look like them and have the same wealth, social status and share the same outlook towards family and fidelity, the new research suggests.

Previously, it had widely been thought that women who saw themselves as very attractive preferred socially dominant men, and men who were confident socially and economically looked for the most attractive women.

But the new research indicates that an ideal match is more important and marriage between equivalent people has the best chance of success, say the scientists from Cornell University in New York.

They believe too many differences between a couple causes instability. If one partner is better looking or has a higher social status, they may be tempted to "trade up" and find a better quality match, say the scientists.

Between similar matches there was less chance of breaking apart and therefore more stability to bring up children.

The results were based on questionnaires by 978 students aged between 18 and 24. Respondents were asked to rank the importance they placed on 10 attributes in a long-term partner.

The students were then asked to rate themselves based on the same attributes.

The attributes were grouped into four "evolutionary relevant" categories which were:

• Wealth and status

• Family commitment

• Physical appearance

• Sexual fidelity

The scientist found men and women who rated themselves highly were more selective than those who did not. Attributes that individuals rated highly in others, they also rated as important in themselves.

"Human mate choice in Western society seems to be based on a preference for long-term partners who are similar to one's perception of self across a number of evolutionary relevant categories of traits," said Peter Buston and Stephen Emlen who carried out the research.


Tennis stars Andre Agassi and wife Steffi Graf.
The findings explain why marriages between similar matches were more widespread and successful that non-matching couples.

"From the public's perspective, our results suggest that individuals seeking stable long-term relationships should not seek the highest quality partner available, but should simply look for partners who are similar to themselves," they said.

The findings were published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Scientists Monday.

ecw and i have baby pictures that are almost identical....we have been asked if we are brother and sister......yet, there is an atrraction that goes beyond social class, expectations, etc..........22 years is quite testament to a familial relationship.......

ok, so my mom is back in ky, and upset that the bush 'bells' section of the crown family declined to attend my dad's only sister's 65th wedding aniiversary party in toledo........my dad's youngest living brother lives in amarillo, texas.......and his family is long been know as bush followers............we hve never visited on any trip out west.....because my mother so dislikes ronald's wife naomi.......this sounds so biblical.....but grudges are often so biblical.........ronald's oldest cherub tim tried to feel me up in our basement years ago....and his mother said her boy would never do anything like that...............yeh, right..........he actually grew up to name his first child graham marshall crown.......gmc.........get it??????????thankfully, i was visited today by some local liberals, at trc, who asked first about scw, and then asked if they could arrange for bush and his entire family to be exchanged for less noxious people........such a tender thought..........

ok, so..........there is a deli that has opened up at tjhe top of 4th street hill......that has decided to landscape with fake sunflowers and fake red petunias.........all around the electric pole.......do they think we cannot ell that these plants are not real???????????the first storm will wash it all away anyway...........