ok, so my wayward menfolk have finally called.....they landed last night in eugene, oregon, took a shuttle to florence, on the coast, slept the night at the ocean breeze hotel, walked nearly 2 miles carrying their sadlebags to the bikeshop where they had shipped the tandem.....spent half the day putting it together...rode back 8 miles to the dunes so they could say they started at the ocean...then rode 60 miles back to eugene before they stopped for the night..........they just called....and they are whipped.......and jet-lagged.......and disappointed with the peeps in eugene....many 18-24 year-olds yelled at them from suv's pulling 4-wheelers.......they plan to get up early and ride out of eugene before the young punks get over their hangovers......(their words, not mine.....)...so they started with a 60 mile day.........they promised to call tomorrow with an update..........

finished the extended lotr after i got home from work tonight.....many neat scenes at lothlorian with galadriel.......now i am so tired, and thinking about skipping church....these are dark thoughts......but i really could use a day without having to be anywhere..........

ok, so mm has invested in the extended cut of lotr.......well worth the extra bucks.......i watched about 45 minutes worth last night......many extra scenes that add to the understanding of the story for those who did not read the book....alas, the extnded cut takes up 2 dvd's not including the dvd's that have cast info, special sesctions. etc.......

in more frightening news. our crazy greeter/cashier, that we hired through a mature worker 'back to work' program quit on friday to take a job......as a prison guard at northpoint........we must be afraid, very afraid about security, as this woman is a nitwhit of the first order........she would forget most aspects of her job from the time she left on friday til she came back on monday.....a flat learning curve.........oh my...on to be a prison guard..........

ok, so mm slept til 7:30, then breakfasted on a french roll and goat cheese on the deck, with newspaper and coffee............for awhile, until the breeze and the chill got the better of me.......i do not sleep well when ecw is away.....the phone rang sometime after midnight.......i answered, thinking it was ecw checking in from somewhere en route.....but, no, it was someone for acw..............who calls after 10:00, i ask you.........i woke up about 3:00 am freezing, and forced myself to get up and close the window, and find an extra blanket..........i am mustering the incentive (sp?) to get dressed and go to work......i will be working for chef rob tonight, as his son graduates this evening.......scw expressed relief that project secession will wait for his presence.......it may be quite a wait, with his return from the west on june 21, and his departure for belgium june 24.........maybe the exchange-student jon is a secret belgian secession expert of some sort......you just never know.......

mm is just livid over gwbush's stop at auschwitz (sp?) to make a speech reinforcing his decision to go to war......what a piece of work......

ok, so they are off, with only a few glitches before leaving the house for the airport.....scw wanted to take a hat, for obvious reasons, and ecw was not in the mood to indulge what he calls scw's idiosyncracies...........he forbade scw to take the orange wool cap, so scw snuck the black nike cap into his pocket on the way out the door...........i wish i could have been there when scw put on the hat at take-off..............after letting them off, i free-formed in lex......down the aisles at l.barn, to my fav. goodwills, then back home.........ras we speak, i am making thai hot and sour soup from a mix, with added tofu....i am in the mood.......

ok, so my baby boy is leaving for the coast today, and will ride back east for the next 21 or so days............i may not sleep while he and ecw are gone......i don't know who i worry about more, the rider on the front or the rider in back.........happily, i will join them on june 16 somewhere near yellowstone.......lots to do before then, though............

ok, so after 3 calls to angela johnson, messages, rather........because she always called back to the bike shop rather than the restaurant...........i emailed my next issue to the danville school bureacracy.........our exchange student jonathan will be with us during danville's first 2 weeks of school, which means we will need a papal bull to allow him to attend classes with scw...........cynically, i believe that the pope probably grants absolution easier than danville grants exceptions for summer reading testing.........anyway, i have spoken by phone to bob rowland, and have heard back from a. johnson by email, and each had a different story to tell........in fact, a. johnson adressed her email to mr. c-w.......even though the email was sent from kathycw52@hotmail.com.........quite clearly my email........after all of the calls i made to her she has yet to actually call me back......like i am beneath her contempt, i suppose............our poor student may either be a 2 week visitor or an enrolled student, depending on whom you ask........


enough of this danville h.s. stuff.....i have other dirt to dish.........restaurant rumors.........word is that the abc agent, who lives locally, was eating at freddies the other evening.....the owner, denise, approached him without understanding where he works, and commented....' you really must come back on the weekends when we are really hopping...just bring a bottle of wine with you.......' now, the abc takes this sort of thing seriously, and they have reportedly served her with a warning for breaking the law re: alcohol in a dry county........the law, as stated does not allow for people to drink any alcohol in this county, even in their own homes, let alone in restaurants.........whooops.........

ok, so the c-w's fought the good fight, and they have conceded defeat........a combined 7 phonecalls/phonemessages and 1 actual school visit was not enough to convince the danville high school bureacracy that it made more sense for scw to take his last 2 summer reading tests this wee, before his bike trip, than to wait until the next and only scheduled test date when he would be in town, june 24, on his way to the airport to belgium........i guess after disqualifiying myra away from sophomore honors english because she was in mexico, they couldn;t do much else.......the whole affair has left a bad taste in my mouth......espcially after the rotary liason, rachel white, told me that boyle schools bend over backwards to make sure that their exchange students have every chance to do the exchange without impacting their school requirements..........and.. rachel added that bob rowland belongs to rotary and should have been more supportive.........

ok, so this week's time has a great quote from woody allen, circa1967......' i am not as normal as i look'.............

ok, so memorial day is a made-up holiday, an add-on to all-soul's day specific to war dead.....i do not care about the details...i just needed a day to sit and read on the deck and drink wine and do nothing.......................i have finished the red tent......i did not like the ending, as i knew how it would end..........so bibilical...........but moving as a whole............a curious read for a feminist...so many conflicting issues...............

ok, so i had planned to sleep in this morning......my sole day off this week, but alas, i was up bright-eyed and reading the paper by 7:15 am........ah well. the lex-herald leader ran the poem bivowac of the dead, along with pics of the iraqi war dead..........i have read the sign by the courthouse, but hadn't truly read the whole thing until this morning....well...i didn't really read all of it........i am not much into war-dead poetry, but it was moving, the parts that i did read.........we had a lively discussion about tatoos in sunday school yesterday......the topic ws on qualifications for deacons, as set forth by paul.........i mentioned that these qualifications were contextual, relating to the culture in paul's time, and that we must consider our culture in determining who is 'qualified' to be a church leader......case-in-point tatoos.........paul never mentioned them directly, only indirectly spoke of dress and demeanor and reputation..........but the discusion led into the question.......would having a tatoo disqualify someone from being a deacon in our church? right now, at least 5 of my staff have one or more tatoos (most have 5 or more) , which makes me glad that i do not see them in states of undress........but having tatoos says nothing about character......even kathy clark's daughter caitlin has a tatoo, on her foot, of a flower.......anyway, i have no plans to get a tatoo, because they tend to look foolish when a person's skin loses its firmness, a sagging tatoo would be just horrid.........

ok, so mm is reading the red tent, a novel by anita diamant, whose other books include the new jewish wedding, and choosing a jewish life.......this book is about dinah, sole daughter of jacob, whose 12 sons became the tribes of israel..........i was familiar with the story of jacob, who was forced to mary the elder daughter of laban, leah, before he could marry rachel, his beloved........he ends up also having children with the handmaidens of both leah and rachel.......at the point i laid down the book, jacob had just wrestled with god, and was recovering beside the river.........the wrestling with god thing is a passage we have covered several times in the 15 years that i have taught sunday school.........it was just never covered like this book covers it....pure fiction makes it leap from the page.............the book has been suggested by many of my favorite danville 'readers', and i am just now getting around to it...............quite earthy and evocative.........especially the parts about the wives suckling each others babies..........i know that this was custom, but this is a custom we have gotten so far away from as to shock and cause minor dismay............

ok, so it is spring, and some yards are already awash in flowers. others, like one on my way to work, are awash in all-weather plastic flowers......there is something fundmentally wrong with sticking walmart-grade blooms in the ground in front of your house, and pretending that you have landscaped.....

ok, so mm was on a mission yesterday......with phone calls to the school librarian, principal, and finally the superintendent....the super. told me that he would do what he could...we'll find out early next week.......

ok, so i came across the biography of liz taylor this week on a shelf at home, and read it thoroughly with great relish....alas, no mention of michael jackson's fascination with her...but many interesting tidbits nevertheless..........she has at least 2 quirks that she shares with my own mother............i will not reveal them here, because i would not want the world to know that these quirks may swim in my personal gene pool........however, it was truly comforting to know that mother is not the only person on this planet to do these things...........

ok, so we may be taking on more business for band festival than we can physically do......

ok, so i need a little break from spirited away........cayle ahs adopted it as her video/dvd of the moment, and it is on nonstop.........i am starting to feel like the radish spirit...........

ok, so mm is in heaven over her newly recovered furniture.........as scw described it......it was a whooooo moment.......my bedroom loveseat actually matches the comforter cover.......just like in the magazines!!!!!!!!!!!!!my living room chair and hassock match the walls!!!!!!!!!!!!!the yellow chair in the back room no longer looks like a maniac amateur tried to cover it !!!!!!!( she did try to cover it, but that is not the point.........)i am so excited about how wonderful each piece looks...............

ok,so my last blog was just too full of what's wrong with the minor details of my life......let's focus on what right in the big picture.........i have no credit card debt, no mortgage, good health, exceptional spouse and children, a lovely home, a talented business partner, a compelling sunday school class, and a business situation whereupon wine sales people bring me product to taste-test. who could complain about a life such as this.........so then, why cannot i sleep through the night?

ok, so mm is lapsing into obsession.........i wake up at night and begin to worry about books not finished, about childcare arrangements incomplete, about the will i have not yet signed, about financial aid for college, you name it........i have even worried about how i will get the yard mowed while ecw is gone for 3 weeks.........even though there is a riding mower in the family...........i cannot do much about any of these things.....yet i cannot get them off of the mindwarp that replays in my head.........a mind is a terrible thing to waste........

ok, so these lyrics have been in my head all day.....


May God bless and keep you always,
May your wishes all come true,
May you always do for others
And let others do for you.
May you build a ladder to the stars
And climb on every rung,
May you stay forever young,
Forever young, forever young,
May you stay forever young.

May you grow up to be righteous,
May you grow up to be true,
May you always know the truth
And see the lights surrounding you.
May you always be courageous,
Stand upright and be strong,
May you stay forever young,
Forever young, forever young,
May you stay forever young.

May your hands always be busy,
May your feet always be swift,
May you have a strong foundation
When the winds of changes shift.
May your heart always be joyful,
May your song always be sung,
May you stay forever young,
Forever young, forever young,
May you stay forever young.


bob dylan

ok, so i am so proud of the dems in texas, for taking a stand against gerrymandering, and setting up camp in oklahoma.......so funny that willy nelson sent them a care package.......

ok, so an additional update on those pesky egg casseroles.......turns out she hadn't wanted egg casseroles after all...she came in this morning...int he flesh...not her mother this time.....to complain that i hadn;t made an asparagus quiche and a country ham quiche in her 8x12 pyrex casserole dishes..........she said she was embarassed that what she got was crusty on top.....as egg casseroles tend to be.......we won't be charging her for the casseroles l.......and i hope this is the end of the whole egg casserole affair........

ok, so we are taking off memorial day, and i plan to do nothing on that day....i may not even get out of bed til noon...........

ok, so an update on the brunch casseroles is appropriate, because the plot thickened...........not only could the hostess in question not bring herself to make 2 casseroles, she sent her mother to pick them up.......her mother with the broken ankle who had to call us from her cell phone whilst our parking lot to bring them out to her, as she could not manouver in and out of the restaurant with her crutches AND carry the casseroles back to her car.......what kind of woman sends her lamed mother on such an errand?

ok, so it si saturday morning, and i have to go in early to bake 2 brunch casseroles for smeone who is certainly capable of baking her own brunch casseroles.........on sunday i am catering lunch at my church.......which means leaving early, putting the lasagnas in the oven, going to sunday school, then leaving church service early to go and bring everything to the fellowship hall by the time the last hymn is over.........so much for my weekend...........bruce lunsford has droppedout og the gubernatorial race........and has thrown his support to jody richards......i suppose he wants ben chandler to lose more than he wanted to win for himself.......my mother the republican wants to vote for chandler because he devised the state no-call list.......i think he looks sneaky..............

ok, so a bootleg copy of bowling for columbine is playing on one of our many computers......i appreciate the ironic portrayal of charleton heston..........nra president.....and their connection to timothy mcveigh and terry nichols..........all from michigan.........as an osu grad, i have a natural contempt for michigan pepes.............now moreso.........

ok, so mm does not read carefully........this reality is not news to my family, as i cannot manage to sing the actual words to hymns at church...i come close but not always the words as written.....reading my email/spam this am, i thought i read a catch phrase......hospitalize almost anybody.............i thought, what a curious notion...then i reread it......hypnotize almost anybody......i guess i like the first illusion better............

ok, so mm and company will be catering a party for nancy that has escalated from 100 to 300 just in the past 48 hours....it is now pouring down rain, and i may just need thorazine......do they still precribe that? sounds very one flew over the cuckoo's nest.........my only consolation is the potential for a week of leisure in paris this january.......i can visualize myself sitting in a cafe with a warm goat cheese salad and a glass of sancere and a crusty baguette avec beurre.......ohhh lala.......

ok, so i have been waking up in the middle of the night obsessing about lost books, children finding summer, arranging daycare for cayle while ecw and scw are out waet, getting her to and from swim practice, etc. obsessing is the key word, because each of these things will work out somehow........

ok, so mm is really ticked off......trc is a non-smoking facility.......but that does not stop our bridge ladies in the back from lighting up inthe bathrooms, or as they walk through the piano room to smoke outside.......right now we smell like a cig factory.........i cannot abide cig smoke.............quite ironic that many of these proper ladies expressed concern about the high fat content of quiche.......watching cholesterol no doubt.........the cigs will kill them first............

ok, so we are having a classic book crisis at our house.......we cannot find our hardback and only copy of the grapes of wrath...which scw has exactly 7 days to finish..........

ok, so mm's garden is just lovely........most roses are beginning to bloom, and the affect is so special i got up early just so i could walk about clutching my coffee while i took it all in.....dew and all.........the trellis rose may be having it's best year yet........each creamey bloom has a faint scent of lemon......

ok, so we have heard today from someone we hope to meet up with near yellowstone......and being mother's day she addressed me with kudos......so tragic, in that she is someone unable to conceive..........our minister today focused on that subgroup.......those who are unable to become mothers........i talked today briefly with my child's birth mother, who was unable to parent affectively...........she also has a hard time on mother's day........i have a hard time on moher's day, because i miss my grandmothers...clara stephan broughton and helen kreager crown........both believed in me implicitly..........everyone should have such cheerleaders.......

as it is, i am getting up tomorrow at 4:30, and starting work at 5 to cook breakfast for 13 people who want scrambled eggs an hashbrowns...but they are good customers..........nighty-night.............

ok, so i called my brother, on mother's day, to check up on him....i assume he has been working nonstop due to the war......but i do not know this directly.......he is moving to somewhere else......also unnamed,...by personal request of someone else unnamed.......and he is delighted...........he asked about my middle child, who he believes would be an excellent prospect to work with all these unnamed entities......i think he is overlooking another great mind in the family, and i tell him so.......so many great minds, so many unnamed entities.........as a liberal democrat i have hard time with all of this secrecy..........in fact, i had a hard time with my sunday school lesson today.......1 and 2 timothy...and the parts about teaching of untruths.....it sounded to me like someone early on questioned paul's teachings..........and this was judged heresy......we had quite a discussion about the current baptist contraversy re; women in the clergy.......... i personally would leave my church if a consensus came about against women in the clergy......as it is. 43 baptist missionaries have quit after refusing to sign a doctrine against women in the clergy.........so sad that willing workers are excluded because they are women.......uncomprehensible.....of course, i also do not understand baptists thinking that they can convert muslims, jews, hindus, etc..........

i am approaching 22 years of hyphenated bliss......hard to imagine that that much time has elasped.......i can still recall the standoff in the social security office....when the clerk contended that she could not put a hyphen in our name, even though ss # have hyphens........we stood her down and she backed off...........i have no hope that my children will hyphate.....i picked up a history of alexander the great today...his big mistake was in failing to name an heir...no one designated to carry on the dynasty...... i believe that the hyphren thing will end with 2 midwestern liberals........and that our failure to name heirs will be our downfall...............

ok, so mm is going to disclose the bacon grease story,but just this once.........saturday, we at trc had multiple reservations......in house...for 23 and for 14 and for several groups of 5...for lunch.....and a big group of 52 at constitution square....the carryout group of tandem bicycle riders ordered ky burgoo.....a stew made from chickien, lamb, beef and whatever vegetables........i simmered mine for 3 days..........i had their salads, their cookies and bread, the works in my van when tragedy struck.....my helper, scottie, was carrying a pan on which he had cooked bacon, when he stumbled, and poured the hot grease over my head.....and my arm....i screamed....which didn't phase him as he is deaf......and iced down my arm......but thought nothing of my head..........by the time i had set up the burgoo buffet at constitution square, with sweet tea, pink lemonade, and a vegetarian version of the concoction........it occured to me that scottie had caught more than my arm with the grease......my entire head was coated with bacon grease.......my hair stuck to my head like a helmet....luckily these people were from out-of-town...........

ok, so i enjoyed reading about the guy in georgia who painted his house lime green with purple polka dots..........the 6-person historical preservation board turned down his request to add a rounded stoop at his front door............so in protest he has repainted his home to really standout in this historically correct neighborhood, which does not happen to have a specfic code re: house paint...........he has announced plans to redo his landscaping around a porcelin(sp) toilet theme......

ok, so today is mother's day.......my idea of a great mother's day involves ommission .......i would apreciate 24 hours of bitch-free bliss............if you want to complain about something today.....like how i write gramatically errored blogs..just keep these thoughts to yourself, thanks...............

ok, so mm is so very tired.........you have no idea how it feels to be this old.........lots in the news today....the gunman at case western reserve, who shot up the frank gehry building (the one built for $62 million.........) eminem won't let weird al parody his 8-mile song into couch potato, at least on a video.......i guess em has to maintain his serious persona....weird al has been allowed to parady avril...my, i bet that one will be quite special.........the judge has ruled that the disabled girl who sued to be lone validictorian could be so.....even though her disability allowed her to skip gym, study with tutors at home, and otherwise enjoy advantages that able-bodied students were not privy to.......the politicla cartoon in today lexheraldleader is amusing.......an aide is holding the mccarthy hearing transcripts, and says...maybe we should learn a lesson from these.....while john ashcroft standing close scoffs.......mccarthy was an amateur........the southern baptists have kicked out and/or accepted resignations from scores of missionaries.....because they refused to sign an oath stating that women are not fit to be ministers and women must obey their husbands...........this is scary stuff.....the text of my sunday school lesson actually includes references to this issue in 1 and 2 timothy...but the commentary literally does not go there, focuses instead on more positive lessons that can be gleaned from the bible.....as long as there are voices of reason in my own church, i can remain a baptist........a girl who waitressed for us last summer is leaving for the near east next month to be a missionary in a muslim country....she stopped by yesterday....and she was so excited about going that i didn't have the heart to ask her why she thought that trying to convert muslims from their doctrine to her doctrine made any sense.......at least they have a doctrine.....why not try to inspire those who have no spiritual life.......if one must do mission work at all.......

enough of this rant.......my roses are blooming, and the day is lovely, and i am going to pick herbs to put in my omelet before i go to work.........

ok, so last night after i left, the cook that quit last week came by, trashed/drunk/high......take your pick.......saying something about how they let him out of rehab for the weekend with the requirement that he go around to everyone he has offended to make restitution........the kitchen crew didn't believe him, and they forcefully told him to just leave.........he started arguing that he wasn't drunk...that he was sober......how bizarre..................they should have called the police

ok, so mm is listening to joni mitchell...california.......i just love that song........makes me want to go to paris, greece and spain....not california.............

ok, so mm is listening to supergrass...'grace'...i really like this song , having heard it on world cafe coming home from work one night........quite peppy............twas good to see nayef in trc today.......sheldon was wasting away to nothing without his regular lunch partner........my trellis rose is just beginning to bloom...by sunday it should be spectacular........other roses will also be in bloom...the old pink rose from the stellar homestead in independence, ohio....the house that was on the underground railroad.....also constance spry, aloha, eglantine rose, ballerina, ginny(bred by henry mitchell, late of the washington post gardening column), and many others........i have seen a snake in the same spot 2 days running......a good sign of a healthy ecosystem....a bad sign because i am afraid of snakes.......the rose that fell over is still fallen (i have fallen and i can't get up........) it so big and prickly and wet that it will just have to wait.........

ok, so the l.o. has some pretty major-league precedence.......the following is from the wm.edu website:
'Thomas Jefferson enrolled in the College of William and Mary on March 25, 1760, at the age of sixteen. ........'

ok, so in martha stewart's maazine-based calender for may, today may 6, she was scheduled to switch all of her bedding from flannel sheets to cotton...............presumably she doesn';t actually do this herself any longer.........just hollers out for someone on her staff to do it..........it must be good to be queen.........

ok, so mean mamma has just had 45 minutes of unprotected......sun......yessserie......i had such a bad day at work that unprotected sun was the only answer, that and 2 glasses of wine on the back deck........for starts, the first burst of rain flooded our side dining room...........which was cleaned up by mr. mudge and the bill sent to our landlord by the time we opened......around 1:15 i decided that business had calmed enough to allow me to get my hair cut....and a heinous cut it is, by the way......on the way back from the bypass the tornado warning was announced........and i made it into trc before the hail started and the siren began wailing.......we have little liability experience with tornado sirens and customers, so i asked each table if they would prefer to move away from the plate glass windows into the cement block portion of the restaurant.........no one would move...they all wanted a window view of the hail and wind and rain..........some even ordered drinks.........back at home, one of my bgiger roses is completely knocked over, and will take quite an effort to lift it up and stabilize it with ropes.....but not today, after 2 glasses of wine........

ok ,so a new descriptive has emerged in the cw household........whoo-worthy...........which has a slightly mocking tone to it.......gentle readers...be aware that the whoo-thing dates back to the 1st harrypotter movie.....at some point in the action, i reacted in awe with an audible 'whooooo', and my precious middle child has run with that line.........he has added hand and body motions to dramatize the verbal portions.....he claims to be re-inacting the original context but that is not how i remember it.......

ok, so i spent far too much money on bedding plants today (durhams in stanford) but now every pot is filled and many empty spots are filled with blue salvia, yellow marigolds, pink snapdragons, white stock and cleome, and pink petunias.....the trellis rose should bloom in a week or two...it must have 1000 blooms.......i also bought a small obelisk to hold up a droopy rose (constance spry) that is about to bloom...it is a nicely shaped wrought iron piece that would have been far more if i had ordered it online.......(or so i tell myself.....)

ok, so congrats are in order to the l.o. for her acceptance to centre college, an institution of renown.....but there are lingering questions......as this is a major life milestone....will there be a secession party where secession-appropriate gifts will be bestowed? as there are no lines of secessionist greeting cards, l.o. could design them herself...and market them to peeps like walmart, and start an empire.......the dissatisfied will no longer quit, they will simply seceed...it has an 'old-is-new-again' feel to it........anyway, given centre's schedule, the lo.o would not have to miss classes to travel this winter, should i, in my meanness, decide to go ahead and book that paris apartment.........

ok, so there has been a strange shift in the balance of things.......i have spent the week collecting stray rolls of film from drawers, etc....they all turned out to to be scw's......from the 7th grade trip to france, from spain, and from the bike trip through colorado last summer.....on the france trip rolls there was a picture of charlotte asleep on the train back from chartre......nothing odd there.......but on the bike trip roll, there was a series of pictures of charlotte, charlotte with friends i had never seen (friends from camp?) as well as caroline and jean.......truly bizarre, like a twilight zone moment....like charlotte had somehow taken possession of scw's camera and then snuck it back into his backpack........

ok, so the news today is filled with bizarre episodes.....such as the church in maine where 1 man has died and 15 other church members are hospitalized after ingesting arsenic in their church committe meeting coffee.......turns out there was no arsenic in the coffee grounds, nor in the cream nor sugar...which means that someone had to have put the arsenic directly into cups, or tainted the cups prior to filling them........further, a man comitted suicide in the same town yesterday, so everybody is wondering whether he 1) belonged to the church 2) somehow did the deed even though he wasn't at the church at the time of the meeting...........this will surely be a fall sitcom.............

the other sad story is about the hiker who was pinned by a boulder somewhere in the desert/wilds of the west.......for 5 days before he amputated his own arm with his pocketknife to free himself.....he is in hospital in serious condition.........i cannot even think about that scnario.........and have no plans to hike in the desert wilds of the west with or without my pocketknife.........

and strangest still is the ongoing saga of the cook who quit abruptly on tuesday.........he had told us all that his wife had left him for a rich guy, who promptly took her off to see the world after the divorce was final, and that she was now in china and had sars.........he also told us that he had converted to judiaism at her request and even told us about his seder menu......well, the dishwasher saw him with this girl monday, in a car, stopped at a light...........who makes up stuff about a wife leaving you and having sars whilst living in china? this guy struck me as psychotic.....i am glad he doesn't really know where i live.........let's see, if i was goign to make up stories to entertain my coworkers, i believe i would be more creative...............

ok, so mm is going flying to denver and driving 10 hours into the wilds of wyoming to hook up with the bikers for the last leg of their across america tour.......just have to be there for the finale

in more personal news, ecw and i spent a painful hour with a lawyer yesterday working out wills.......i have had a signed will for many years....but this will did not include a third child.....ecw had no signed will, because the lawyer-friend who prepared mine and his pro bono could not locate his when he came to sign it....and he never got around to coming back, and our friendship with said lawyer has since waned.......you might say that you get what you pay for.........anyway.....it is quite painful to contemplate the actions you wish taken at your death........especially when it comes to belongings.......we have furniture that came over to america from mainz......but do i designate a specific child to caretake this heirloom....oldest child???????, most interested in geneology child?????????/i have this piece because my grandmother put my name on a piece of tape and affixed it to the bottom......i may have to just rely on tape and markers for the distribution of family pieces........there are crown pieces of furniture, stephan furniture, and ernst furniture....oh my........i think the most painful part was deciding who would raise our children.......acw is beyond this...so that leaves a 16 year old and a 10 year old.........this has all been worked out with people we are close to.....but we of course hope that this is never to become public because we will live long enough to see them all reach adulthood.......i will admit to eating crow during this session.......when asked if one of our children should have a spouse and children at the time of our demise, did i want my estate to pass to the spouse should my child predecease me........gentle readers, understand that i have been in a snit for 1 full year because my sainted mother-in-law specifically excluded in-laws as heirs in her will.........inlaws that had put up with her for 20+ years ....and i ended up doing the same thing.........i have an ex-sister-in-law who i despise....and i didn't want to chance that one of my children made a similar error in judgement........we did not put in the will about burial plans....be it known that i want to be cremated, the ultimate in recycling.........and my ashes spread about in the roses.........now, having unloaded great burdens from mymind, i will go back to work...........