pretend chicken patties

ok, so.....when i was expecting a vegetarian home for the holidays, i purchased many meatless items......some were used right away by everybody...like the tvp crumbles we used to make a savory chili.......others were eaten as intended....such as a package of tomato basil 'beef' patties.....but these many weeks after the break i was surprised to find a box of frozen pretend ranch flavor 'chicken' patties.....overlooked...or ignored......it is hard to say...but this evening i was hungry and tired enough to lower my standards ....and who knew?.....these were just fine and dandy.....tasty enough that i have snuck back into the kitchen to microwave the second of a package of two.....nutritionally....7 grams of fat per patty is pretty good for a product that looks and tastes fried....i couldn't let myself look at the sodium....that tends to be the killjoy nutrient with these foods.....but lacking in hypertenive tendencies i will not ponder that issue at this time.......i might have to have a go at the tomato basil 'beef patties that were already consumed by my target audience.......

my class.....

ok, so i am enjoying the second semester of my health class.......i feel much more comfortable with the material and have no qualms on any words/subject matter.....in fact, this evening we had a lively discussion of the 'janet jackson' superbowl.......and viagra/cialis ads that were much more offensive......or at least the side-effects disclaimer....and a student who is an e.r. nurse related humerous details of men who actually have come for e.r. treatment for erections that last more than 4 hours........the evenings topics were the health care system in general, which includes both otc and prescription meds.....there was lots of discussion about drug ads...and side-effects disclaimers that make the medication seem worse than the disease itself......but i digress....i really enjoy this talkative group.....

three hours down the drain....

ok,so.......at the last minute i was summoned to our conference room to sit in on a videoconference using our new equipment....the videoconference was on...videoconferencing......and included useless equipment details.....as if i had any plans to actually change any settings.....and main thing to remember is to keep the speaker muted, as any talking when it is on causes the video-feed on the entire conference call to switch to you and your co-workers-and puts your picture right up there on the screen.....one of the health departments pointed their camera toward a poster of world cheeses, rather than at themselves sitting around a conference table.....i rather enjoyed that part...that and the slide about teleconference eddicate.....much as i am offended to be corrected by my family with regards to my failure to spellcheck this blog...i will freely admit that to see such a blatant mis-spelling was embarrassing......but mostly this videoconference on videoconferencing took up 3-hour block of time, and dealt out only 30 minutes of worthwhile information.....which could have been sent in an extensive email.....it is hard to believe that the savings in time and mileage will offset the investment in televisions, cameras, and other equipment..... and i relish my periodic drives to frankfort to attend trainings, as i can hit at least 2 goodwills either going or coming home.....i have only been in this job 2.5 years, and already i miss the good-old days......

haven't put it down yet.....

ok, so i am still enjoying the delillo book maoII.....which is a good sign...i have had a bad streak of getting bored and losing interest and eventually putt down books without finishing them......

blackout......

ok, so.......my spouse has mentioned that it is time to attend to our wiring.......that we may have exceeded our original set-up......and so we will be hosting our non-resident electrician either this weekend or the next...to upgrade...we had taste of blackout just prior to supper....a complete and utter blackout while my spouse was figuring out if our circuits were on the verge of overload......complete darkness for a few seconds.....and so we will host soon my spouse's next oldest sibling (the family expert) and his newest wife.......they are delightful folks and i trust that we shall be ahead of the circuitry game rather than behind for the foreseeable future........

omg

ok...so i did pick up a book to read....from my pile of andrew-suggested novels.....mao II by don delillo (2 el's.....)...and i was horrified after the inside-title-page photograph...and the 1st page of prose.....yankee stadium....weddings......moonies.......i had one date when i was 16-17 with a fellow who went to our church.....he was already in college but my parents insisted i go because to decline would make us seem....racist...no- that word was never said...only implied.....he was an adopted child...korean.....very bright...and by this time very unruly......we went canoeing, and i recall the afternoon as awkward at best.......i was far too busy when he called again to set another date......years passed before my mother called to say that he had become a moonie.....and she seemed torn....on one hand her church friends who had raised him were now lost to him....but on the other hand there was this charismatic korean/asian prophet calling his children to him......and so it is said that he married that famous day in yankee stadium....no idea whether his folks attended....at this point i cannot even remember his name and really dont' want to call and ask my mom for fear of her reminding me that we went out...but i digress from the random book i picked up to read......

no good book......

ok, so i will admit that at this moment i have no good book to read......i started sometimes a great notion.....the march bookclub selection, but put it down out of boredom....and i almost finished anita shreeve's a december wedding but found it too.....formulaic....i was supposed to feel melancholy, and i will not be forced into feelings of any flavor......joyful or sorrowful.....and the book forced upon me at the last bookclub?.....a bit of sacred feminine awakening by a best-selling author......she tries too hard and uses the descriptives(rebirth/awakening/quickening/etc) far too many times for me to take her seriously....not that i discredit the existence of the sacred feminine....yes, this does dawn on one.....but it should not require a half-inch of a paperback to get beyond this realization and into the what-i-did once-it-occured-to-me part......i know that this statement smacks of bitterness.........and for that i am sorry......i have spent 25+ years quietly defending a single hyphen...correcting each and every mis-pronunciation...and i freely admit to finding less heroic tales somewhat tiresome.....maybe this author will come into her own in the second half...i hope so...because i cannot toss aside another book without having to address bigger issues....am i too critical?...too hard to please?..... expect every author to be another jane austen?......maybe i should just amble on upstairs and reach for mansfield park...and settle into the comfort of familiar brilliancy......just this once......

belated blog.....

ok, so.....my gentle readers should recall that gov ernie decreed that no blogs shall be written nor read nor contemplated on work time....not even on breaks nor lunch....and so if a blog occurs to me on my way to work, or at work...i must do my best to keep it in my mind until reach my hallway p.c. (under my jane austen action-figure's watchful eye...)...unless i enter some notes into my pda to remind me....and so this evening i chanced to read some notes about a trip to work awhile back.....i had taken a short detour...in hopes of missing the toliver traffic....and passed by a neighborhood of ranch/bungalow type homes.....a street where i have no memories of visiting/dropping off a child....and in this short traverse a large moving bit of plasma caught my eye......a wall-size flatscreen...with matt lauer visible from the road.....omg.....the notion that matt lauer can be recognized by passing traffic if the screen is large enough- just too funny...for the record...the television screen appeared to take up an entire wall of this 'living room'.......and was entirely visible given that the room appeared to have either no draperies, or they were drawn so severely that they were not visible.....the across-the-street-neighbors could comprehend entire movies if they were deaf and could read lips......but i digress from the early morning visage of a television personality.....my immediate impression was that the tv was on for background sound.....nobody could be seen actually watching.....a bit of over-kill, dontcha think......multiple square feet of matt just for the hearing pleasure?......i suppose this memory is even more ironic given that the c-dubs turned off their tv at 7:15 pm, when it became clear that there was nothing on worth our time......and everybody under htis roof is either reading or typing......and the peaceful lack of background noise is so pleasant to my ears........

babies, babies everywhere.....

ok, so there were two newsflashes today that caught my attention......for starts, China has vowed to cut down the the fetal testing for and aborting of female babies.....they must have figured out that if every single-child family opts for a boy there will soon be no more girls for these young lads to marry.....and across the globe...this from israel.....JERUSALEM (AP) -- In a precedent-setting decision, an Israeli court has ruled that a dead soldier's family can have his sperm impregnated into the body of a woman he never met. Keivan Cohen, 20, was shot dead in 2002 by a Palestinian sniper in the Gaza Strip. He was single and left no will. But at the urging of his parents, a sample of his sperm was taken two hours after his death and has been stored in a hospital since. When the family tried to gain access to the sperm, however, the hospital refused, on the ground that only a spouse could make such a request. Arguing that their son yearned to raise a family, his parents challenged that decision in court. On January 15, after a four-year legal battle, a Tel Aviv court granted the family's wish and ruled the sperm could be injected into a woman selected by Cohen's family. The ruling also ordered the Ministry of Interior to register any children born as a result of the insemination as children of the deceased.

mm notes: i find the creation of one's own grandchildren an interesting option.......i am certain that mm cohen has thought this through and is doing the right thing.......and i will file this away in my brain under.....last resorts......

to sleep, perchance to dream....

ok, so i went to bed in the 9's last evening...which i consider highly desirable, as it gives me a chance to read a bit before nodding off......but i was up in the 2's and 3's...for no good reason......i found myself worring where children who have applied for grants/internships will find summer housing.....which is not my worry, per se......and certainly not one that i can do anything about in the 2's and 3's.....i do remember snatches of dreams pre and post my mid-slumber wakefulness......i dreamed that i was living in a very small apartment, and when i went to take a bath, my tv remotes and portable phones were soaking in the bathwater......curious?....later on i dreamed that i was at a party at my grandmother's home in cleveland...the one my cousin inherited.....and the caterer was serving gefilte-fish colored and squeezed in paisley-shaped designs on blue paper....one had to knid of suck the fish off of the paper......i stayed in the kitchen to let guests in the back door...and noted that my cousin has never bothered to refinish or replace the plywood cabinet doots......i am amazed at the detail that one can see in dreams.......needless to say...i am less than refreshed as i ponder getting ready for work.......luckily it is neither a long day nor one that is overbooked.....plenty of room for daydreams.....

one plucky bird....

ok, so this from cnn.com...

TALLAHASSEE, Florida (AP) -- Perky is one tough bird.

The ring-neck duck survived being shot and spending two days in a hunter's refrigerator -- and now she's had a close brush with death on a veterinarian's operating table.

The one-pound female duck stopped breathing Saturday during surgery to repair gunshot damage to one wing, said Noni Beck of the Goose Creek Wildlife Sanctuary.

Veterinarian David Hale revived the bird after several tense moments by performing CPR.

"I started crying, 'She's alive!"' Beck said.

Perky entered the headlines last week after a hunter's wife opened her refrigerator door and the should've-been-dead duck lifted its head and looked at her. The bird had been in the fridge for two days since being shot and presumed killed January 15.

Perky is recovering with a pin installed in the fractured wing, and probably will not have more surgery because of her sensitivity to anesthesia, Hale said.

kneejerk reaction?

ok, so this from the boston herald.....

WARWICK, R.I. - Class, from now on there will be no talking at lunch.
A Roman Catholic elementary school adopted new lunchroom rules this week requiring students to remain silent while eating. The move comes after three recent choking incidents in the cafeteria.
No one was hurt, but the principal of St. Rose of Lima School explained in a letter to parents that if the lunchroom is loud, staff members cannot hear a child choking.
Christine Lamoureux, whose 12-year-old is a sixth-grader at the school, said she respects the safety issue but thinks the rule is a bad idea.
”They are silent all day,” she said. ”They have to get some type of release.” She suggested quiet conversation be allowed during lunch.


Another mother, Thina Paone, does not mind the silent lunches, noting that the cafeteria ”can be very crazy” at the suburban school south of Providence.
Principal Jeannine Fuller did not immediately return a call seeking comment, but a spokesman for the Diocese of Providence described the silence rule as a temporary safety measure.
Spokesman Michael Guilfoyle said the school does not expect complete silence but enough quiet to keep students safe.
Lori Healey, a teacher at the school who also has a son in third grade, said ”silent lunch” means students can whisper.
”They know it’s not for punishment,” she said. ”It’s for safety, and they’ll be the first ones to tell you.”
Stacey Wildenhain, a teacher’s assistant at St. Rose, said her 7-year-old son does not mind the policy. He told her: ”The sooner we eat, the sooner we can get out to play,” she said.

brrrrrrrrr........

ok, so we have just returned from the farm..just before the snow started to fall in earnest....and while both of us are chilled to the bone, i at least had the sense to wear a coat and gloves.....the farm in question is about 2 miles from here.....a spread owned by some longterm neighbors.....they have horses (mostly unridable...)cattle, chickens, and both a dog and a cat......our daughter feeds and waters whiles our neighbors are away......which means that a parent must somehow get here over there, and back......this morning was my turn....when the dates came up she was also asked about some future needs, including several midweek rather than weekend days......gentle readers.......the notion that my child will somehow leap from her bed 45 minutes early on a school day to 'run by the farm' on her way into town is laughable, and i graciously declined this opportunity on her behalf...or rather on my behalf...the notion that i will leap from my bed early just to run by the farm is equally laughable.....especially since the wife of the couple in question will not actually be out of town....she just didn't relish the notion of leaping out of bed 45 minutes early on a work day......it is days like these when i am relieved that 1) we don't own a farm 2)we don't own horses 3) the evening feed is not my turn..........

how was your day, dear?

ok, so i was determined to get a lot done yesterday......and mostly succeeded....i did get my laundry done, watered the plants, dried out the contents of my purse after a tragic waterbottle mishap......for the record, my top check in my damp checkbook now has a faint 3-year calendar background.....packaged up returns and gifts, walked on the treadmill while watching the most recent pride and prejudice and studied my sunday school lesson and watched old alias episodes with my daughter...i multitasked at that point, by cooking supper/making breakfast treats/doing my eldest child's laundry......and thus i did manage to get most of my to-do list accomplished.....i even settled on theme music.....having been reminded of the brilliance of the p&p soundtrack...original music by dario marienneli......pieces for every mood......it always comes back to jane austen, doesn't it?......now i can freely continue to audition themes for 2008...and feel no urgency in the matter.....it was a very good day.....

to do list.....

ok, so i have a list of things that i really must get done today....
1) make breakfast treats for my spouse to take to mack's- it is his turn
2) package up these three baby gifts so they can be mailed off
3) mail back my brother's xmas gift to amazon- which means i must find the packing slip
4) grade the returned assignment #1 so i can return them to students
5) study my sunday school lesson so i can teach tomorrow
6) buy my lottery ticket
7) walk at least 30 minutes
8) put the potroast in the crockpot
9) do my laundry
10)clean out the refrigerator

other than that should be a lazy day.......

auditions continue....

ok, so my search for theme music continues....and while i seem to remain in the collection of mozart compositions, i feel that i am making progress....yesterday i walked at lunchtime for 45 minutes and 9 seconds...while listening to the section of the mozart lectures about his time in paris.....i especially like a piece he wrote in that time period...it is called the little g-minor symphony (maybe symphony #25) cannot recall the k number.....it starts out with memorable quickness and urgency...settles into 2 middle movements that are a bit more peaceful, yet still deliberate, then resolves in a final movement that sums up the best of the movements 1-3.......in the course of the lecture discussion one only heard snatches, so i must obtain the whole work to be certain before i pass theme-judgement. i do like the fact that it was written in paris, though not the detail that mozart hated paris.....how could someone hate the marvelous city?.....he actually turned down a job at versailles as their head keyboardist.....speaking of paris, i continue to audition itinerary possibilities.....this seems to take up far more of my time than it should.....possibly because i have not taken the time to write down the variations, and must start over each time...why? because i have yet to rip the wrappings off of my little moleskine journal and make permanent notes....there is something sacred about writing in a leather-bound journal, and i must not feel worthy at this point in the planning.......maybe a little mozart backround music would help.......

incredulous.....

ok, so.....on my way home i stopped at the big lots...to find mailable giftboxes.....i have baby gifts for the trifecta clan....and nothing suitable for sending these tributes to far-flung locales.....and when i was checking out, the sales girl gasped, and looked at me seriously, and whispered...these boxes (10 for $3.00) are ringing up at 30 cents.....don't you want to go back and get a few more at that price?.......no, i really only needed three boxes.....i have no place to store 20 0r 30 boxes.....and this woman looked at me like i had two heads.....that i would decline to save $2.70 on any number of box-bundles.....i had an even more astounding encounter with a service-type employee earlier int he afternoon...i stopped at the kroger on my way out of h-burg...and on a whim ordered a half-pound of chicken salad, knowing that my eldest loves this stuff.....and the counter-fellow selected the right container, but scooped up far too much for a half-pound order.....but refused to acknowledge that he had done so...and kept trying to force the lid down...he ended up slipping the entire oozing container into a ziplock.......just too funny......

message on a bottle......

ok, so i found this amusing...from the washingtonpost...

LONDON, Jan. 25 -- The mud. The long, wet, dark winter days and those cows, cows, cows demanding attention every morning and night. How's a lonely Welsh dairy farmer to find love?

Five single farmers -- three men and two women -- have become an overnight sensation in Wales by putting their photos on thousands of plastic milk containers on grocery shelves. Their "Fancy a Farmer?" stickers also list a Web site ( http://www.pishynwales.com/) where potential suitors can get in touch with them.

mm notes: dairy farming is quite limiting in terms of one's social life.....but one could find lots of companionship opportunities between the morning and evening milking sessions......

catching up.....

ok, so last night after supper it occured to us that we hadn't spoken to our eldest since last week....and we were saddened to find him recovering from illness when we called......i, for one, was horrified to know that i could have driven up some chicken soup, or picked up some sort of otc counter remedy for him had we but known.....no child ever grows old enough to stop needing his/her mamma

glass half-full.......

ok, so i am determined to find the silver-lining in my thursday.....here goes...

1)aldi roses 6/$2.99
2)new yorker arrives; good cartoons
3)16 showed up for my diabetes self-management class/outstanding!
4)eku emailed to ask my dayoftheweek preference for fall semester-thursdays!!!!
5)peter vella box chardonnay

giving hyphens a bad name.....

ok, so yesterday, amongst the other frontpage stories in the local paper, was mention of indictments for 4 immigrants....including one woman arrested locally who turned out to have been deported before under one of her 5 alias names.......her current name/alias(?) is hyphenated, as was the last names of the 3 men arrested with her.....not the same hyphenated combination, but a series that included a repeated name....like medina-medina.......who does that?...but i digress from my point......4 indicted mexicans with hyphenated names reflects badly on the rest of the hyphenated, law-abiding world.......

sibling politics

ok, so as i was driving from h-burg to d-ville to teach, npr ran a story about a moderate sort of fellow who engaged his evangelical conservative sibling in recorded conversations...trying to find middle ground......and turned it into a book, and htis radio piece......i found it somewhat painful, given that i spend 6 out of the past 12 months not speaking to me conservative sibling after an argument over the phone......i am willing to go the rest of my useful life avoiding all discussion of critical matters if it means we can sit in the same room and eat at the same table from time to time......for my part, taking about the weather is common enough ground.......

face recognition software.....

ok, so i have been troubled since my first eku class....there are a handful of folks enrolled that look so very familiar....and who i cannot place......and i really could use some sort of high tech recognition program to idientify time and place without having to ask......because in asking one acknowledges that one is a daft old woman who cannot recall simple things....like where she should know you from......the most pressing identification came easily......i said innocently...'i can't put a place with your face and she laughed and explained that she used to color her hair, and that most people don't recognize her with the grey......the other person knew who i am through mutual friends, but declined to tell me if we had ever actually met...drat...i will fret until i figure this out.......

oscar nod....

ok, so congrats are in order for al gore, nominated for his documentary an inconvenient truth........i wonder what designer gown tipper will favor on the red carpet?.......

what a difference an 'm' makes.......

ok, so it seems there is a mean mama on blogspot......and she is brazen enough to post her picture......i say brazen because she certainly looks quite young and not the least bit mean......she has outstanding taste in music.....listing sufjan stevens, decemberists, the postal service, death cab for cutie they might be giants, the beatles, belle & sebastian beck ...and she doesn'tr capitolize......go meanmama!...for the record, i grow less mean with every year that my children get older and wiser.......

bookclub.....

ok, so bookclub was last evening, but i was much too tired to blog about it last night.....being so old and all......several of the usual suspects were curiously missing.....but the ones who came rallied for a passionate discussion of this memoir of life growing up in a dysfunctional family- and she got up off the couch by raven himmel.....was the actual selection, though we spent almost as much time talking about its prequel- a girl called zippy......the flow was disrupted by a persistent beeping sound.....that became such an issue that folks got up out of their chairs to either follow the sound, or wait in various rooms to see if the sound came from that general direction......and lo, the culprit was a cellphone in someone's coat pocket-the coat itslef being on the host's bed.....the beep was to alert the owner about a missed phone call.....mystery solved.....yeah, yeah...there were plenty of folks who remembered to bring up osu's loss to florida...these are diehard s.e.c. fans.....and when the talk turned to s.e.c. basketball it was time for us to go home.......i always have a good time with these fine folks......next book isn't until march.....

shoplifting

ok, so the big news in yesterday's local paper was the shoplifting arrest of a local extension agent...local to where i work not where i live......and i was horrified, as this was the exact job my dad did for most of his professional career, and it is a position based on trust....and once the public loses your trust you might as well go home and stay there.....and then it occured to me that he could be in the beginnings of senility.....my dad would have been senile on the job had he waited til age 65 to retire...thankfully he and the rest of us were spared having to take him home from work due to things such as this......we were not spared having to go to neighbor's houses to bring him home...he would wanger away and then forget which house was his....poor guy....if this extension agent has any clue he will 1) retire immediately 2) plead alzheimer's 3) get medication to preserve memory 4) go home and stay home......everybody at work was talking about it this morning.....stuff like this doesn't blow over quickly.......

mm's alias mix #2

ok, so....weird al has been replaced as our morning soundtrack by my old alias mix, which includes the cranberries and beth orton......a much more peaceful way to bring on the workweek than amish paradise, doncha think?

the cat

ok, so...so when the mm has little else to report than feline antics.....then her life must be pretty boring, but i digress from this delightful cat...who has finally put on weight...mostly from begging food from each and every passer-by....and then managing to charm them with her singular feline ways....to stay and watch her eat her food...she seems to prefer an audience for her edibles......go figure......so far she doesn't seem to look to check that you are actually watching, but if you leave the kitchen, she loses interest in eating and moves on......

potato salad

ok, so while i was avoiding football playoffs......i started down my bookmarks looking for something interesting to read.....i came across zucchini and chocolate (might be the reverse)......and a little while back this delightful food blog published this potato salad recipe....

Salade de Pomme de Terre au Paprika Fumé

500 grams (a little over a pound) new potatoes, peeled
Olive oil
Salt, pepper
1 hard-boiled egg, chopped
3 or 4 cornichons (pickled gherkins, about 35 grams/1 ounce), chopped
1 scant tablespoon capers
1 shallot, peeled and minced
1 teaspoon strong mustard
2 teaspoons red wine vinegar
1/2 teaspoon pimentón -- I used the agridulce kind
A handful of flat-leaf parsley, chopped

Serves 2 to 3 (the recipe can be doubled or tripled).

Blanch and roast the potatoes: Preheat the oven to 220°C (425°F). Put the potatoes in a medium saucepan, cover with cold water, cover with a lid, and bring to a boil. Drain immediately, let cool for a minute, cut in two-bite wedges (wear kitchen gloves if your fingers are sensitive to heat), and transfer to a baking dish large enough to accomodate them in a single layer. Drizzle with olive oil, sprinkle with salt and pepper, toss to coat, and roast until golden and crusty, about an hour.

In the meantime, prepare the dressing: combine in a salad bowl the egg, cornichons, capers, shallot, mustard, vinegar, pimentón, a bit of salt and pepper, and 2 1/2 tablespoons olive oil.

When the potatoes are ready, add them to the salad bowl, toss gently to coat, and fold in the parsley. Let cool to slightly warm or at room temperature. Taste, adjust the seasoning, and serve.

[Adapted from Rose Carrarini's Breakfast, Lunch, Tea, Potato Gribiche,

mm notes- the pimenton listed seems to be some sort blend of roasted sweet and hot chili peppers...sounds marvelous.......

the jesus heron....

ok, so...in the midst of our semi-ice storm there is a log floating every so slowly upstream...that is how they usually float...and on it is a hunkered-down blue heron.......looking everysomuch like he is walking on water....and when my spouse pointed him out that is what he called him...the jesus heron......we take all the laughs we can get on this miserable day......

conundrum connections.....

ok, so i have spent the bulk of this day trying to figure out why i cannot seem to synch my pda, nor add more of my mozart lectures to my expansion card...at one point the device wouldn't even connect with the usb port......and after uninstalling and reinstalling and consorting with online help....i have successfully brought this conundrum device back into full usefullness......i did manage to walk 2 miles.....but that is all i have done since 10 am......tech may be the thing of the future, but techy things bring with them great anguish......

mostly mozart....

ok, so....i am still searching through the mozart catalog for my theme music......i figure it this way....if mozart composed the background music for my happyplace then he likely came up with something suitable for my non-happy place existence......i listened several times to the first section of the mozart lecture series, if only because it was on my pda and it seemed a nice alternative to my usual walking mix......maybe when this blog is finished i can get around to deleting section 1 and replacing it with section 2, just for variety's sake......the lecture series, by the way, is quite facinating......and may satisfy a deeper need- being read to must have made me very happy as a child if i so enjoy it now-but i digress.....the music i have interviewed so far in my search for a 2007 theme has been quite impressive.....the man was a genious to be able to compose music to match all conceivable moods...ah well...it is still january....i could drag this selection process out til late december and call the winning entry my 2008 theme music......

the colbert report/nospinzone......

ok, so i went out of my way to watch the awaited corss-over event...stephen on o'rielly and o'rielly on stephen.....not an easy feat when one hasn't cable nor a fast internet connection......i must say that stephen had the upper hand, or at least o'rielly refrained from ultimate meannness......i have no use for o'rielly...but then y'all knew that..i did like the part where stephen colbert swiped o'rielly's microwave from the greenroom......

posthumous

ok, so quite enjoyed reading art buchwald's posthumous column in the washington post today...a piece he wrote a year ago....seems he enjoyed a bonus year after agreeing to hospice care......happily, the 'last piece' was more of a celebration rather than a morose bit about dying......i have read much more about this fellow since his passing...about how he lived in paris for much of his professional career...ya gotta love a guy who figured out how to make a living in paris.....this evening my daughter asked me to supply our flight number, so that her birth mother could start pondering the meaning of the sequence- as if the flight number can be parsed as to good or bad/safe or sorry.....i wasn't biting on such a request.....should that be my time to go...better it be on my way to paris than to the grocery store....i'd rather any such disaster happen on my way home...so i could have enjoyed that final round of museums, favorite lunch spots, and spent a few quiet moments with my thoughts in ste. chapelle.......it has been my custom to write goodbye letters to my closest kin before i travel across large bodies of water...there is quite a stack in amongst my books....i will add to that collection before taking off in late march...just to be on the safe side......and while this won't be the same as a last blog....it will suffice to those who mean the most to me.....

decisions, decisions....

ok, so several desirable films are in lexington this weekend.....volver...at the kentucky....and pan's labyrinth at hamburg place.......i would like to see both...but neither are suitable for my youngest child....and i am not interested in seeing either alone.......i will attempt to make contact with my eldest in the hopes that he will want to see one or the other.......we shall see.......

aldi thursday.....

ok, so my life is finding a new equilibirum......i am back to aldithursday from ekuthursday and it feels just fine......today i treated myself to 2-count-em-two bouquets of $2.99 flowers....peach roses and a mixed bunch......such an indulgence i wouldn't embrace without my ekuwednesday ....the class went so very well....lots of talkative folks...lots of mature learners...and the rest...well....i can't tell yet how they will fare.....i have scheduled a lecture on physical activity on april 4, the day my plane from paris arrives stateside.....but i may just do that lecture myself 2 weeks early, along with cardiovascular disease and take my pinch-hitter lecturer off the hook......i quite enjoy havign a captive audience for 2 hours a week......i must thank them all for my flowers......

golden globes.....

ok, so i fully admit to watching every moment of the award show last evening....and the funniest acceptance speech was from hugh laurie for house (mm connection: hugh laurie was in sense and sensibilty- a jane austen-derived film....) this wrapup is from entertainment weekly:

Maybe the Globes honored so many British stars because they can be counted on to give funny speeches. Cleverest was Hugh Laurie's speech accepting his Best Actor in a Drama Series trophy. The House star first quipped that he wished designers would donate speeches to the stars the way they do formalwear. Then he upended the cliché about thanking the crew, saying, ''I know everyone says they have a wonderful crew and logically that can't be the case and they can't all be wonderful. Somebody, somewhere, is working with a crew of drunken thieves.'' No one could have donated that bit; it was pure Laurie.

my mommy hates my daddy....

ok, so this tragic comment was from the mouth of a 3 year old i saw today.......and it echoed the nytimes article about how as of 2007 more women in america live without a spouse than live with one....... how did it come to this?.......granted, i recognize the right of everybody to live with who(m) they desire...and when i read this statistic i am reading it as spouse of either gender......won't be sure if this theory plays out until i have a 3 year old tell me that my mommy hates my mommy...living with other people is the hardest thing any of us can do...whether it is randomly assigned roommates, carefully selected housemates, or a spouse......one always wants things placed where one wants them.....or doesn't want anyone criticizing when one doesn't actually care that everything is without a planned place.......that this issue is but one that can make or break a co-habitation.......ah well.....let us go back to the beginning.....i am so very sorry that that 3 year-old's mommy hates his daddy.......they should have tried a bit harder to resolve those living together issues........

less than restful sleep...

ok, so while i spent the bulk of the evening prone and under the covers, i can recall looking at the clock no fewer than 4 times......each episode bringing greater concern for my wakefulness and the unavoidability of this day....I teach a diabetes class today, and must continue to prepare for my first eku class tomorrow......and neither of these obligations should have kept me awake.....i have done both before....the last caffeine i consumed was at 2:00-ice tea.......surely i am not so old that caffeine has such a long half-life.......hopefully my morning coffee can sustain my brain to get through the morning and afternoon.....

trifecta.....

ok, so my spouse's family did manage a trifecta yesterday, january 14, with three babies born to nephews.......one lucky child even has the family name ernst as a middle name....... and since this was our planned ladies lunch and shopping trip to lexington, i did buy a few baby gifts, which i must make myself send out before these children grow bigger than a 9-month size.....speaking of lunch out, we were delighted to be joined by our eldest and his good friend that we don't get to see often enough.....i suppose the only way that this branch of the family could top the trifecta would be for all three of my offspring to have babies on the day......it could happen but it is so unlikely as to be a laughable notion.......frankly, i am not near old enough to be a grandmother.......one last thought......we drove to lexington, stopped numerous times, and came back home in the rain......and yet one of us was steadfast in her insistence that she didn't need a coat............y'all get three guesses.......

early grave?

ok, so speaking of lots of children....this from the washington post......

Children, Parents Drive Each Other to Early Graves

By David Brown
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, January 15, 2007; A06

What exasperated or overworked parent hasn't declared to a child at least once: "You'll be the death of me!"

Now we know -- with unprecedented precision -- just how true that can be.

A pair of researchers, drawing on the experience of nearly 22,000 couples in the 19th century -- has measured the "fitness cost" of human reproduction. This is the price that parents pay in their own health and longevity for the privilege of having their genes live on in future generations. The findings, published last month in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, manage to be both predictable and surprising.

Not surprisingly, women paid a bigger price than men. Older mothers were four times as likely to die in the year after having a child than their mates. Having lots of children was especially risky. A mother of 12 had five times the risk of dying prematurely as a mother of three. Even after their child-bearing years came to an end, women who had had many children died earlier than women who had had few.

The price of parenthood wasn't trivial for men, either. Despite the obvious fact that men avoided the hazards of childbirth, fathering more children meant more risk of dying before their time, too.

And it wasn't only parents who paid the "fitness cost" of reproduction.

The later-born children in very large families had less chance than their older brothers and sisters of surviving into adulthood and having children themselves. Losing a mother raised every child's risk of dying young.

The findings begin to provide for human beings what's been learned about fruit flies, guppies and mice -- namely, a measure of the trade-offs between unchecked procreation and individual survival in evolution's calculus.

As raw material, the researchers, Dustin J. Penn of the Austrian Academy of Sciences in Vienna and Ken R. Smith of the University of Utah, used a database of genealogical information kept by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Salt Lake City. They examined the reproductive history and survival of 21,684 couples married between 1860 and 1895. Each person was married only once, and polygamists were excluded. (Polygamy was outlawed when Utah became a state in 1896).

Altogether, the couples bore nearly 175,000 children -- slightly more than eight each. The women's average age at the birth of the last child was 39 years. About 1,400 of them died within a year of delivering their last baby, and 2,400 within five years. For men, the corresponding numbers were about 600 and 1,700. About 18 percent of the children died by age 18.

The data sample is the largest used to estimate the cost of human procreation. It covers a wide spectrum of society -- most men in previous studies were aristocrats -- and a period largely before modern hygiene and medicine greatly reduced maternal and childhood mortality.

"These are basically pioneers, and the mortality is probably more like what it was before the Industrial Revolution," said Penn, who heads the Konrad Lorenz Institute for Ethology but had previously been at Utah.

When Penn and Smith examined their data, a clear and unmistakable trend stood out. The bigger the family, the smaller the chance that the parents would live into old age. Both mothers and fathers paid a price for having lots of children, with mothers always paying more, regardless of family size.

For example, 1.5 percent of mothers who bore one to three children were dead within a year of the last child, but only 0.4 percent of fathers were. Among women who had 12 or more babies, 6 percent were dead within a year of the last birth, compared with 2.5 percent of men.

Big families were hard on children, too. Twenty percent of children in the largest families died before age 18, compared with 10 percent in the smallest. About 15 percent of first-born children died by 18, compared with nearly 25 percent of 12th-borns.

Why would being in a large family, or being at the end of the birth order, be hazardous to a child's health? One reason is that those children are more likely to have their mother die -- and small children without mothers are more likely to die themselves.

Children who lost a mother before their fifth birthdays had a 78 percent higher chance of dying before they turned age 18 than children whose mothers survived. The same effect was seen -- again, less dramatically -- after the death of a father. Children who lost a father by age 5 had a 14 percent higher risk of dying in childhood.

The findings also provide an explanation for menopause, which ends a woman's reproductive capacity, but not her mate's.

Natural selection, the engine of evolution, favors traits that allow organisms to produce more offspring that survive to produce offspring of their own. For many species there is evolutionary "pressure" to reproduce early, have large and frequent batches of offspring, and to stay fecund for a long time.

That's the case with guppies, for instance.

David N. Reznick, a biologist at the University of California at Riverside, has shown that wild populations of guppies in Trinidad have different "reproductive life spans" depending on whether they live in water with lots of predators or few. The ones in high-predation environments have the genetic capacity to reproduce longer, apparently because the traits of wariness and agility that allow them to escape being eaten also happen make them more fertile. However, once fertility disappears, all guppies die quickly. They don't rear their young, and consequently there is no reason for natural selection to favor those that survive after they stop having offspring.

Not so for Homo sapiens.

Every human child has a stake in his or her mother's survival. Every mother has a stake in her children's survival. Menopause appears to be a way of protecting a mother's life and helping assure she will live long enough to raise her last child to reproductive age.

So what might be the mechanism by which child-rearing erodes parents' longevity? The answer must involve basic physiology, because it occurs in both sexes and in women who survive childbirth.

One theory is that physical and psychological stress causes people to grow old before their time.

As cells age, chromosomes, where genetic information is stored, lose material from their ends, the DNA-protein structures called "telomeres." When telomeres get too short, a cell can't divide any more. It becomes senescent, or terminally old.

A study published in 2004 by Elissa S. Epel of the University of California at San Francisco measured telomere length in 39 mothers who were caring for children with chronic illnesses and 19 mothers raising healthy ones. She found that among the mothers of the sick children, the longer a woman had cared for her child, the shorter her telomeres. This was true even after adjusting for the telomere shortening that comes purely with age.

Between the women with the highest and lowest scores on a test of psychological stress, telomere lengths differed as much as between people 10 years apart in age.

hat trick?

ok, so we have three neices/nephews due any day....and it seems that couple expecting #5 (you read that number correctly...) delivered at home this morning in upstate new york before the emergency squad could arrive...the photos they sent on-line were of the proud mamma and the baby on the gurney with the e-squad arranged around them.......her name is dorothy, by the way.....when news of this birth circulated amongst my spouse's family, word came that the couple expecting #1 were pushing hard in north carolina and the couple expecting #2 were at least as far as the hospital in indiana ...no news on whether the weber's infantile hat trick has come to pass.......

roadtrip......

ok, so my sunday school class is planning a pilgrimage to plains, ga...to attend jimmy carter's sunday school class at the marananth baptist church....we have the tentative dates that he will be present...these are always posted online.....and now all we need do is to decide on a date....and figure out just where in plains we care to stay.......we spoke at length this morning about his current contraversy re: his book on palestine, and resolved to make this trip, as a few of our current and past members have already done.....life is too short to miss out on a meeting with past president carter.....he could have chosen the cushy golf retirement......i admire that he chose a post-presidential route of service to mankind

nostalgia.....

ok, so this afternoon i spent my time looking at photo albums....first of trips to europe......and then of general family photos, when i couldn't locate either the baby blue memory book or the album of our honeymoon photos...go figure.......sometimes one just has to skip down memory lane.......

good night and good luck.....

ok, so i borrowed a few things from the library yesterday....an itzak perlman recording of 5 mozart violin concertos......eine kleine nachtmusik (all movements)......the pirates of the carribean(which we inexplicably do not yet own) and good night and good luck.......this piece is meaningful to us in that last fall, after attending the funeral of my sisterinlaw in upstate new york we drove down to princeton to see our boy on our way home.....we were kinda in the neighborhood.....and george clooney was on fresh air (npr from philadelphia with terry gross) for the last hour of the trip.....the interview finished up as we were navigating toward his dorm.......we found that we have a lot in common with mr. clooney, beyond his ky roots......he is a staunch liberal....and at that time was in a war of words with bill o'reilly over his views......and clooney would not back down over his views...all this a year before the midterm elections deflated the conservative bubble a bit.......the film itself was chilling in that issues such as the right to face one's accusers and habeus corpus were front and center, just like today with gitmo......if y'all haven't taken the time to rent this film, stop by the library and borrow it...it is must-see......

songs i am searching for.....

ok, so this is a playlist from an npr story.......

Song #1: Subterranean Homesick Alien by Radiohead from OK Computer.
Song #2: Girl by Beck from Guero.
Song #3: Sweetest Decline by Beth Orton from Central Reservation.
Song #4: My Doorbell from the White Stripes' Get Behind Me Satan.
Song #5: Let the Cool Goddess Rust Away by Clap Your Hands Say Yeah from their eponymous 2005 album.
Song #6: Mad World a cover of the Tears for Fears song by Gary Jules from Trading Snakeoil for Wolftickets.
Song #7: The Shining by Badly Drawn Boy from The Hour of Bewilderbeast.

voi che sapete

ok, so these are the lyrics to mozart's aria voi che sapete from the marriage of figaro, which elizabeth bennet sings in the a&e version of pride and prejudice

Voi che sapete
che cosa è amor,
donne vedete
s'io l'ho nel cor.
Quello ch'io provo
vi ridirò;
è per me nuovo,
capir nol so.
Sento un affetto
pien di desir,
ch'ora è diletto,
ch'ora è martir.
Gelo, e poi sento
l'alma avvampar,
e in un momento
torno a gelar.
Ricero un bene
fuori di me.
Non so ch'il tiene,
non so cos'è.
Sospiro e gemo
senza voler,
palpito e tremo
senza saper.
Non trovo pace
notte, nè dì,
ma pur mi piace
languir così.
Vio che sapete
che cosa è amor,
donne, vedete

and the translation-

Tell me what love is, what can it be
What is this yearning burning me?
Can I survive it, will I endure?
This is my sickness, is there a cure?
First his obsession seizing my brain,
Starting in passion, ending in pain.
I start to shiver, then I'm on fire,
Then I'm aquiver with seething desire.
Who knows the secret, who holds the key?
I long for something - what can it be?
My brain is reeling, I wonder why;
And then the feeling I'm going to die.
By day it haunts me, haunts me by night.
This tender torment, tinged with delight!
Tell me wht love is, what can it be?
What is this yearning, burning in me?
What is this yearning, burning in me?
What is this yearning, burning in me?

local color......

ok, so after i listened to the entirety of mozart's the marriage of figaro i drove into town to have lunch with my spouse at freddies, a local eating establishment of some noteriety......our meal may have been pedestrian, but the sparrow caught inside made the meal anything but everyday.......hopefully the conundrum bird made it out alive...the last we saw if it it made a move for the kitchen.......and then we walked down to the cobbler's lair.....way down past the centre fine arts studio building...to pick our daughter's cowboy boots, newly reshod and cleaned....the fellow is a danville icon, he and his numerous cats......there were 3 black cats, a white and a rather large maine coon cat in our line of vision while we picked up the boots.....the eldest black cat is 22 years old and completely toothless if we are to believe the cobbler....the entire place was ripe with cat odor...thanks to my crafty sinus passages i was spared the brunt......and so we walked back just in time for me to take my daughter home from school...she who missed the honor role for a subject she rated an A last 9-weeks.....oy....this parenting thing is almost too difficult for words...........

the marriage of figaro

ok,so...i listened to this work in its entirety after getting home early this morning....today was the day i took back time from working monday night...but i digress......from the mozart masterpiece.......i had an aha moment sometime in the beginning of the second act, when an aria was perfromed that i had heard before.....yeo...miss elizabeth bennett sings this piece during her visit to pemberly...the visit where she is with her aunt and uncle....the song is sung in the bbc version....mapbe in tape #5 out of 6.....lizzie sings in english, but the tune is unmistakable.....next listen-through of the opera i will have to use the included translation to figure out just what is happening in english.....having little understanding of the original italian.....such lovely music, though....in any language.......

mozartmania

ok, so i came home from work determined to walk on the new treadmill to as much of amadeus as possible......and i couldn't locate the tape......i searched in all of the depository locations for vhs tapes....to no avail....and when i finally gave up and started in on determining the perfect dvd for a walk...i found amadeus with the dvd's...... who knew?......such a film to behold, considering that my favorite classical lecturer dislikes the portrayal of mozart as an idiot savant.....as for me.....this year may be a study in mozart....narrowing down his many works for many instruments to the very one that sets my soul free.......i already know the soundtrack for my happy place......all i need now is the background music for the rest of my reality........

ok,so.....as i drove up the hill on the stanford road past the cement factory and the lagoons of the water treatment plant, i was greeted with a brilliant sky...acid tangerine, aqua, streaked with glowing vanilla.....an lsd tripping color scheme.....not that i would know firsthand.....but surely one out of lucyintheskywithdiamonds....

dubya's speech....

ok, so this blogger's take on dubya's speech was precious.........

amazon.....

ok, so...i am a big fan of amazon, but this day i could slap the lot of their suppliers, at least from the books-on-cd department....i gave my sibling 2 books on cd for christmas....one was the sequel to the other.....and the first book turned out to be unusable.....the box contained duplicates of the last part, and no cd's 1-5......and so i returned it and promptly received a replacement.....which i had yet to mail off when my brother called to tell me that he so enjoyed the 2nd book that he cannot wait to hear the prequel.....and when i was packing it up this evening to mail asap......it occured to me that i should check to make sure that the correct cd's were enclosed......and they were just as the first set had been...no cd's 1-5 and duplicates of the end.....and so i am returning the conundrum cd's with an urgent plea to get the correct version here asap so my brother can hear this book.......

4000.......

ok, so it seems that my last post was number 4000 and it should surprise nobody to learn that i often skim the text rather than scrutenize the details of everything i read...even of the blog count......and so.....does the 4001st blog seem any different that the first or the 1567th?.....after the volume-related smugness wore off i became overwhelmed at the missed opportunity of it all.....i have put more words to ...well.....not paper....but put them where they could be downloaded to paper if i had the time.....i have written more words than are in war and peace......and this is all is all i have to show for it...yes, i have kept to my mission...to record my life as i choose to remember it...so that when i my memory fades i can be reminded of what i wonderful life i enjoyed while i still could......yep...i think i have done that...but when one considers that i could just have easily made up a cast of characters and made their lives something worth reading.....with all the words in these past 4000 blogs......that is the humbling part......and as i search for my 2007 theme music.....i could just as easily search for the answer to this question...just what would it take for me to quit the blog and begin the novel?

mourning.......

ok, so i received a condolence email from a friend re: the slaughter in glendale...the one whereupon my alma mater deiced to lay down and play dead rather than to play football.....we went to bed at the half rather than subject ourselves to more.....of the travesty......i will get over it in time.....

insurance.....

ok, so...sometime during this day i was in actual tears...knowing that on my current and chosen insurance plan i could not possibly afford the strength of hormones necessary to control my urge to cry uncontrollably.........how fair is that?

notthemamma

ok, so.....i am not the mamma and the md is not the pappa...but we care deeply about the fate of those who......are dear to our hearts...and we want to give a shout out to those who might have been given an extra chance to make good on their intellectual gifts....... maybe there should be a memorial to the unknown student...that person who strives under the radar......i say this as osu is losing to fla......i have turned my back on my fave football team.....they won their last national tit;le while i was in spain...so maybe they do not need my support.......my memories of college are curious in that regard...my professors never stood by my side urging me on....... my grades dropped when i came to know that the professors favored those who sucked up......and heaven knows i could not be obliged to do such a thing....to this day there are those who are still surprised that i managed a graduate school slot without their stellar support.......and so i made it my life's work to succeed in spite of those professors.........there are those who might dispute my personal definition of success... and yet i feel that one can do well as an academic rebel..............hang in there....study like these are your last days to learn...call us if we can do anything helpful...short of burying a body..........we believe in you......

amish paradise

ok, so......guess what aging album has been discovered by my youngest......yep....it plays over and over every morning....with incorrect singalong.......oy!

the small things matter most.....

ok, so i had it in my mind to look at a little memory book..this afternoon, when i was feeling especially empty-nest........a baby blue one put together a while back......and when i went to where it used to be...it had been moved...to an unknown location that i could not begin to locate......given that i wasn't looking amongst my own belongings......funny how the things we put heart and soul into prior to gifting draw us back again and again...because those pictures and sentiments may mean as much or more to the giver than to the receiver..... if this precious baby blue book can be located easily, please let me know .......

on order.......

ok, so my spouse researched and then ordered a new television online this evening.....with the help of consumer reports......the only negative comment about the toshiba lcd/hd model we ordered was that it was on the small side, suitable for a bedroom or office.....ha!.....this television will fit in our cabinet space with only half-inches to spare.......the notion that it is too small is laughable......the room is small enough that a bigger television overwhelm us with shock and awe.....

my happy place.....

ok, so....i have listened to 7 out of 8 lectures today on mozart's life and works.....a marvelous series by a fellow whose undergrad degree came from p.u.....and who went on to get a ph.d somewhere in s.f. and who now is on staff at a music conservatory in s.f........but i digress....i downloaded part of the lectures to my pda so i could walk and later work to this fascinating information....no closer to a 2007 theme song.....but i can disclose that my happy place has the second movement of mozrt's piano concerto 21 as it muzac......... when i finish with mozart i move on to lectures about beethoven.......speaking of p.u.......i helped my spouse deliver a piece of exercise equipment ot a couple i once covered in a food column...they haev moved to town....turns out their eldest has a degree from p.u.....the mamma says he is a medievalist teaching english to make ends meet......but i digress....inn my happy place there are no medievalists........

theme song.....

ok, so...at the urging of my eldest child i am searching for a 2007 theme song......he has shared his own....a classical piece, as well the the piece chosen by the middle child.......but these are not mine and i cannot comment on them.....only on what i might choose....my first thought on the topic was the dixie chicks not ready to make nice but i rejected this notion almost as soon as it popped into my head, because i am not mad about anything....this seems a song for women with issues......and that is not the 2007 i invision for myself.......so just what is the year i see for the mm?.......it may be that the search for the theme may be more interesting than the theme itself....as for my morning, i am listening to a series of lectures on mozart that my eldest has downloaded to my desktop.....mozart seems a good place to start in terms of theme.....genious, misunderstood, quixotic.....germanic....i have to start somewhere so i might as well start here.......

another reason why we are losing the war....

ok, so an army this disorganized cannot be expected to win....

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Army said Friday it would apologize to the families of about 275 officers killed or wounded in action who were mistakenly sent letters urging them to return to active duty.

The letters were sent a few days after Christmas to more than 5,100 Army officers who had recently left the service. Included were letters to about 75 officers killed in action and about 200 wounded in action.

"Army personnel officials are contacting those officers' families now to personally apologize for erroneously sending the letters," the Army said in a brief news release issued Friday night.

The Army did not say how or when the mistake was discovered. It said the database normally used for such correspondence with former officers had been "thoroughly reviewed" to remove the names of wounded or dead soldiers.

"But an earlier list was used inadvertently for the December mailings," the Army statement said, adding that the Army is apologizing to those officers and families affected and "regrets any confusion."

soon, very soon.....

ok, so....the impending start date of my spring semester class seemed so far off...until i got an email from a student requesting an override to the class-size cap of 25.......ouch...not only is the semester to start soon, but the class is full......i have yet to sign a contract....and certainly have not put any thought to the syllabus......the main campus folks send over a generic template.....but that example doesn't take into account a one-class-a-week structure.....and doesn't even come close to solving my problem of the 4/4/07 class, which will take place as my plane from paris to lexington via cincinnati is landing......i have put thought into this conundrum, but as yet have not had a flash of brilliance.....wednesday is just not a good day for me to teach.....not like thursdays turned out to be......so many other things i do on wednesday evenings....like bookclub, or picking my child up at church.....i will make this work, but at a personal price.......

monday, monday......

ok, so...i could blog extensively about my actual day off.....taken to escort my eldest for his wisdom teeth extraction...and i could go into great detail about my joy in discovering an entire year of wine spectator magazines in the waiting area.....i entered all with ratings above 90 with prices below $20 into my pda.....but i digress from the plot of this blog.....much as i look forward to my weekends....i find myself now looking forward to monday evening......about how i can wrpa up my diabetes support group in anderson....and maybe stop by the chinese carryout place for a little snack....and then make it home in time for the osu/fla game.......the online news outlets have had a few articles this week...but the buzz will surely be at a fever pitch by monday when the last bowl game of the college season commences......my good friend mark insisted at the nyeve party that fla would surely prove that the sec was a worthy opponent to the big ten (which actually has 11 teams....)...we shall see.....on monday evening...but for now i will go back to rereading my r=paris guidebook...and plotting my saturday march 31 1st-meal-in-paris.......

borrowed blog.....

ok, so i borrowed this blog post from the washington post......note the time...if i were about to be sworn in as a freshman rep in congress i'd be up past 4:00 am as well.....as for his words, i could not have said it better myself......

Choose Generosity, Not Exclusion

Somewhere in Minneapolis or Jackson or Baltimore, somewhere in America today, there is a young couple that is feeling vulnerable. Maybe one has been laid off due to outsourcing, and maybe, the other is working for something close to a minimum wage. They probably have no medical benefits. Today real income is lower for the typical family than in 2000, while the incomes of the wealthiest families have grown significantly. Things are tough for working people, but in America, we often turn to our faith in tough times.

When our couple shows up for worship service, probably on a Sunday, there is no doubt that the preacher will tell them of God’s unyielding love. “God loves you.” But the next thing the preacher tells them is crucial - not only to the young couple, but to us all. The next message from the preacher may help to shape, not only the next election results, but the political landscape of the nation.

Will the preacher tell our young couple, “God loves you – but only you and people like you?” Or will the preacher say “God loves you and you must love your neighbors of all colors, cultures, or faiths as yourselves”? One message will lead to be a stinginess of spirit, an exclusion of the “undeserving”, and the other will lead to a generosity of spirit and inclusion of all.

In America today, we are encouraged to believe in the myth of scarcity - that there just isn't enough - of anything. But in the story of the miracle of the loaves and fishes, Jesus, who the Muslims call Isa, found himself preaching to 5000 (not including the women by the way) at dinner time, and there didn’t appear to be enough food. The disciples said that there were only five barley loaves and two fish. We just have to send them away hungry. We simply don't have enough. But Jesus took the loaves and the fish and started sharing food. There was enough for everyone. There was more than enough. What was perceived as scarcity was illusory as long as there was sharing, and not hoarding.

The idea here is not that there is a boundless supply of everything. Such an idea leads to waste and dispensability of everything. But the idea is that there is enough.

If scarcity is a myth, then poverty is not necessary. America need not have 37 million Americans living below the poverty line. It is a choice. Hunger is a choice. Exclusion of the stranger, the immigrant, or the darker other is a choice.

We can choose generosity. In America today, we spend more on health care than any other industrialized nation, yet 46 Million people have none. Canada spends half of what we spend and covers everyone. Perfectly? Of course not. But adequately. That’s more than what a lot of people have right now.

We live in a society which says that there is enough for a tax break for the wealthy but not enough for an increase in the minimum wage or for national health care. There is enough for subsidies to oil and coal companies but not for families who are struggling to afford child care or a college education. But it doesn’t have to be this way.

We need a politics of generosity based on the reality of abundance as opposed to a politics of not-enough. The richest 1 percent of the nation, on average, owns 190 times as much as a typical household. The child poverty rate in the United States is the highest of 16 other industrialized nations. Employers are shifting health insurance costs onto workers. Not only are fewer employees receiving health insurance through their employers, but those who still do are paying more for it.

Recently, I have become the focus of some criticism for my use of the Qu'ran for my ceremonial swearing in. Let me be clear, I am going to be sworn into office like all members of Congress. I am going to swear to uphold the United States Constitution. We seem to have lost the political vision of our founding document -- a vision of inclusion, tolerance and generosity.

I do not blame my critics for subscribing to a politics of scarcity and intolerance. However, I believe we all must project a new politics of generosity and inclusion This is the vision of the diverse coalition in my Congressional district. My constituents in Minnesota elected me to fight for a new politics in which a loving nation guarantees health care for all of its people; a new politics in which executive pay may not skyrocket while workers do not have enough to care for their families. I was elected to articulate a new politics in which no one is cut out of the American dream, not immigrants, not gays, not poor people, not even a Muslim committed to serve his nation.

The author was elected to the House of Representatives from Minnesota's 5th District in November. He is the first Muslim elected to serve in the U.S. Congress.

Posted by Keith Ellison on January 4, 2007 4:29 AM

home sick.....

ok, so i came home sick from work today.......with a sinus headache that involved my jaw teeth to the point that i'd have gladly jerked them out by the roots.......i found a nasal decongestant in the medicine cabinet and then allowed myself a 3-hour nap.......my head feels much better but the rest of me is looking for the person/persons who beat me up while i was dozing.....speaking of jaw teeth, tomorrow i take my eldest to get his wisdom teeth extracted......a reasonable use of my 'sick' time....and so i have a three-day weekend......soon to have another 3-day weekend when we get to mlk day......but i digress......i have slim hopes of getting to sleep tonight after such an afternoon nap.........

hero.......

ok, so i read about this guy this morning...but couldn't blog about him until this evening......what a true hero....

NEW YORK (AP) -- Wesley Autrey faced a harrowing choice, as he tried to rescue a teenager who had fallen off a platform onto a subway track in front of an approaching train: Struggle to hoist him back up to the platform in time, or take a chance on finding safety under the train.

At first, he tried to pull the young man up, but he was afraid he wouldn't make it in time and they would both be killed.

"So I just chose to dive on top of him and pin him down," he said. Autrey and the teen landed in the drainage trough between the rails Tuesday as a southbound No. 1 train entered the 137th Street/City College station.

The train's operator saw them on the tracks and applied the emergency brakes. Two cars passed over the men -- with about 2 inches to spare, Autrey said. The troughs are typically about 12 inches deep but can be as shallow as 8 or as deep as 24, New York City Transit officials said.

Relatives identified the teen as Cameron Hollopeter, 19, of Littleton, Massachusetts, a student at the New York Film Academy. Hollopeter's stepmother, Rachel Hollopeter, said Autrey was "an angel." "He was so heroic," she said early Wednesday in a telephone interview. "If he wasn't there, this would be a whole different call."

Authorities said Hollopeter had suffered a medical problem, but was in stable condition at a hospital. Autrey, 50, of Manhattan, declined medical attention. Autrey had been waiting for a train with his two young daughters. After the train stopped, he heard bystanders scream and yelled out: "We're OK down here but I've got two daughters up there. Let them know their father's OK," The New York Times reported.

can you hear me now.....?

ok, so i wasted significant hours of my life this afternoon attending the live-action part of a video-conference......that was the good part, i suppose......had i had to watch this televised i would have had to get up and sneak out to save my sanity.......for starts, the subject matter could have been handled better in a memo...and the videoconferencing part took some time to get just right.........though the significant particulars of the meeting are 'secret' until march, when the centers for disease control and a produce promotional group will unveil the newest version of a fruit and vegetable promotional 'brand'.......and that cannot be transmitted as yet.....and so i sat through a powerpoint presentation that repeated topics twice in some cases to stratch the content........omg.......and no offense to the poor dear to did the presentation...she did her best given the fact that there are as yet no officially approved nutrition education materials.......and so the bottom line of my drive to the state capital was....this is what is coming but we cannot tell you much other than it is coming......at least i got a chance to stop at 2 goodwills...and listen to my christmas mix cd's from son#1....nice choices...good driving music on the cd titled pop not from concentrate......clever...that's my boy!

politically savvy.......

ok, so this from npr on my way home from Frankfort....... Newly elected Rep. Keith Ellison announced last month that he planned to take the oath of office with his hand on the Quran. The decision by the Minnesota Democrat, the first Muslim elected to Congress, drew criticism.

But now Ellison says he plans to use a copy of the Quran once owned by Thomas Jefferson. Michele Norris talks with Mark Dimunation, chief of the Rare Book and Special Collections Division of the Library of Congress, who helped Ellison locate Jefferson's Quran........

During the broadcast of this story, the interviewer and the fellow from the Library of Congress discussed how Jefferson probably came to own this book...it was printed while Jefferson was studying law, and he wrote in many of his personal correspondences that the Quran was an alternative structure for many useful laws.....I consider Ellison's decision to use this particular version of the book he holds most dear to be nothing less than genious......and a strong message to those who claim to believe in freedom of religion.....this basic tenet means that we all have the freedom to be other than Christian if we so choose and feel strongly.......just like the Christians have the right not to be Muslims or Jews or Atheists.....regardless of the political party in power.....

screaming in russian

ok, so....i was late to work this morning, as i opted to spend a few moments with my middle child before he drove away....and when i finally made it to work, it was to the screams of a child.....in a language that i immediately sensed to be russian.....and don't ya know...it was russian.....a local couple had recently returned from the ukraine with their newly adopted 5-6? year-old......who was intermittently affectionate/defiant....yet needed shots.........i will pray for them...they have their hands full.......

barbara pym

ok, so one of my middle child's roommates suggested that if liked jane austen i might like barbara pym.....i can see after finishing my third volume of prose why she has a cult following......for starts, her plots do not involve death......folks who find pleasure in rereading an author do not want to relive the upcoming demise of someone in the known plotline......a major explanation of why i have yet to reread iris murdoch.....her way with words is certainly edgier, but iris seemed to delight in killing off a major character if for no other reason than she could.......but knowing ahead of time who is to die takes away from the savoring of the rest of the book again, and again......pym is also atuned to the need of her readers to be unclear as to the exact way that the ends of her plot lines are tied up at the end.....there is enough vagueness about her last chapters as to appease any possible ending that her readers would have chosen if they themselves were the heroine (always unmarried but with superior intellect)......who couldn't put herself in the place of these lovely women that pym has described with just the right amount of nuance and mystery as to avoid downright alienation of readers who don't quite fit that description.......i must interject at this moment that these are not romance novels.......not by any interpretation of that genre.....the women pym spotlights can do very well for themselves without romance.....and mostly they see the heartbreaks of those who held out for the fairytale rather than the functional relationship.......yes, i can see women rereading and rereading pym to catch every last innuendo........now all i have to do is to order the remaining titles online.......before i start my rereads.......

the evil empire

ok, so.....i was forced to actual enter the supercenter opening in my work county...on business.......for the record i haven't been in a store in that chain in several years.......and i would not have gone today but for the urgency of the paperwork.....i had mailed off an application from the arkansas head office before leaving for vacation, only to find it back on my desk this morning.....ooops......and so i had to go to the store to view the food items in question on the shelves......with prices clearly marked.....the place is huge.....the kind of space that drains me of all life force......and though their prices are dropping on some item as we speak......my current idea of low prices are those found at the goodwill......i am still reeling over my holiday find.....a leather tote bag/purse for $1.75.. with tag to prove it was never used...... and then there is the aqua cashmere sweater for $2.50.....i really like that sweater....those are what i call good buys.....and the empire cannot even come close.........

silent house

ok, so.....i came home from my first day back at work since 12/22/06 to a silent house......i hesitate to say empty, because the cat came running from one of her upstairs hideaways....and the dog came in with me from the mailbox in hopes of an edible handout.......stephan and his entourage left this morning to continue their multi-state multicultural road trip.....such a fine bunch of folks he has found at school......the youngest is off with her mimi (read this as ex-foster mother) likely to see a movie and to have applebee''s ribs......i did chat a bit with my eldest today from a grocery store...he was contemplating a switch from a mop with disposable 'covers' to one that has a traditional mophead......and wanted my opinion....gentle readers, mammas with grown children are thrilled to be asked their opinions on any and all subjects, including mop systems.....i will meet up with him later in the week, as i am his required escort home after his wisdom teeth are removed.....thanks to his scheduled oral surgery i have only to work 3 days this week......a semi-painless way to ease back into the work mode......but i digress from this quiet abode......at some points over the break we had 8 people here for meals......and i so enjoyed preparing food for a crowd.....that may be the only scenario in which i miss the restaurant......the cooking for an appreciative crowd......but all that is passed, and i am left with a fridge-full of partially empty containers of this and that.....tempting to call the dog back in to finish them off...and start afresh.....nobody's here to tattle........and the lareg yellow one isn't going to let on........very, very tempting.........

what?

ok, so this holiday season could be summed up by that one query...what?....seems more than one family member has turned either hard-of-hearing...or is unengaged in the conversation or too far away to catch the beginning of a statement and misinterprets what was actually heard.....or the speaker mumbles the words so softly that nobody could be expected to hear clearly anyway........note to self- next christmas offer megaphones and turn off all backround noise.......

nyeve

ok, so we had a great time last evening with a variation on the usual group that gathers on nyeve,,,,,our former pastor and his wife......drinking wine......it was really great to catch up with this man who left the baptist church.....it could be said that the baptist church left him.....and its founding tenets years ago....... but i digress.....i admit to drinking too much wine.....though i stopped well before we started playing a game call apples to apples...it was really fun.....we have tentative plans to play family scrabble with one of my spouse's running freinds, but they would only agree to a matchup after the middle child goes back to school......their family now keeps a posted high-point word record.....that is a great idea....we should start that as a nytradition......ah well.....on my last day off before going back to work i would prefer to not even get dressed...but we have a houseful of comany and that option is not in the cards......