I Know I've Made It Now

I am now the proud female companion of a cabana boy- because we don't have a pool. He is much younger, has piercing blue eyes,a furry chest, and a wee behind from years of soccer. He makes a killer White Russian - or a Margarita if the occasion warrants.

He has dropped off kids at school, picked up another kid, done dishes, washed the bed linens and fed all the animals, allowing me a 15 minute shower this morning.

I have been pampered for two whole days.

Unfortunatly all this luxurious living was at the expees of Justin's job - where he was working his butt off and got let go anyway.

Okay honey, that's enough pampering. You can find another job now - you are WAY over qulified to be a cabana boy...

Thought for Today ( or why I have goats)

Football Post

My girl YoJ, is a hockey fan, but it is football season ( hockey season just started) so I thought I'd post a picture of a couple of real quarterbacks for her.

Peyton Manning - Indpls Colts in the picture he is talking to Tom Brady of the Patriots - I think they have won a couple of Superbowls ( ha ha ha)
Michael Vick - Atlanta Falcons
and ever my favorite Brett Favre - Green Bay Packers

I loved watching Kyle Orton play for Purdue - even at the Capitol One Bowl in Orlando when he got smooshed the first half by UGA. He is a guy wit a lot of heart - and much to my excitement, he is a Bear! Burb, I hope you get to see him play - I'd drive up to see him - I like him that much.

Incorrigable

It's true, there is no end to the number of little guys I'd like to have.....

hedgehogs


















Baby hogs




a minature horse...



and lucky for us - we already have a Lil'bit - this is a picture of a look alike - baby goat!

Sassenach No More

I officially became a resident today - registering to vote, registering to donate my organs ( what the heck am I going to do with them when I am DEAD), and officially changing my ID to Justin's last name. Social security was step one - work ID step two and now I have a driver's license, so I am official.

Next stop - the bank - so that my debit card matches my license - and the nice Oriental man at the liquor store can check my ID before I use the card.

The lady taking pictures at the DMV was just charming. Bear and I went together, I went first because I had to be her proof of residence. As I was standing in line to get my picture she saw Bear. "Are you waiting for a picture, honey? she said, making the hand motions like she was taking a picture. Of course I thought it was charming, Bear thought the hand motions were a bit - well - she whispered to me that she is blonde, not stupid. Bear smiled at her said yes, but they hadn't called her number. "Oh, no problem sweetie, just get in line by your mom" She smiled at people and made conversation.

In ironic payback, Bear scrunched her shoulders right as her picture was being taken - giving her the first ever BAD driver's license picture of her young life. We decided she will lose the license in a couple of weeks and get a new picture - you know you'd do it too!

The guy in front of us needed a new license picture because he had gastric bypass and was now unrecognizable on his license. Made me laugh - my license still said I weighted 145 - the weight I was at 16. Last year when I got my Indiana license back in my maiden name, I changed the weight. I was afraid the police would be at an accident scene trying to figure out who I was and where the 145 pound girl was.

Sassenach is a Celtic term - Scottish as I understand it - meaning outsider - indicating a person who does not belong to the locals. I learned it from Diana Gabaldon, my favorite author. She is a biologist who decided to write some books - and she's really good at it. She is coming out with her last in the Outlander series of books about a family during the time of Culloden and the American Revolution - check it out if you want an adventure...I have preordered it and cannot wait.

Living in Mississippi today

Here is a link to a story about helping - truth is - we aren't doing enough and we are givign money to the WRONG people. Do you think that all the advertising the Red Cross does is free - did people forget the acusations after 9/11? Cannot understand why they get money adn stories like this happen....

Alone in the Morning

I am not used to sleeping alone. When I was a single mom there was always at least one child in my bed, sometimes two or all three. Now that I'm married, I find that I dislike sleeping alone even more than I did when I was single. The bed is too big and there is no warm furry man to scrunch into if I am cold or if I wake up and can't get back to sleep.

Weird things happen when he is traveling - and I don't know whether it is sleep deprivation or if the weird things are actually happening.

Last night about 11 I heard a cell phone ring - only it wasn't any of the ringtones I knew from the ones we have at the house. Might have been an alarm from one of the old ones. I looked around but never did find it and it only rang once. But then again I was way past tired and I was trying to watch the Chargers and Giants game while drifting off - so who knows.

Then about 6 this morning, (after the Katrina refugee hound dogs next door barked until 2am) there was a loud crash and what sounded like a feed pan. I got up, checked the house - then checked the yard. Never did find out what it was - though now that I have had some coffee, I think it might have been something at one of the neighboring houses or a branch hitting the roof when the rain started.

I went out on my normal rounds, this morning I should have audioposted - the goats were in rare form. Seems the barking dogs kept them awake last night too - and they had eaten every last bit of the grass in their little pen. I was not moving fast enough for them and they let me know it. They got a new sister over the weekend - hopefully Justin will post about it - but suffice it to say that she was likely to be on the menu at a Cuban family dinner - so now she is in our yard.

The dogs were barking again, and I could smell the musky scent of the fox outside the fence. I'm pretty sure he lives in a den down by the creek, and I hope to get a better handle on exactly where that is when we start clearing the fallen trees and make a path through the woods. ( I learned this year that you have to wait until it is under 50 degrees before you start moving trees or you will have the unwelcome surprise of venomous snakes - so we have about 20 trees in various states of falling in our acreage).

As I walked about this morning, the sun was coming up making hte sky pink- our spotlights were still on in the yard, illuminating the branches in the woods, I thought about winter projects - making a walking path, building a mini-barn for the animals, extending the pens, maybe even adding a deck to our French doors which open to a two story drop. I am excited about all the timber we will have to build with - anxious to make some of those stump stools that we used to have at the lake house - anxious to clear where the garden will go in the spring, I miss my garden. There is so much potential here, and I cannot wait to make it into even more of a retreat.

AAARRRRGGGGHHHH!

Yesterday sucked - not just bad day - but exceptionally frustrating want to rip my hair out kind of bad day.

The hospital is full - so over capacity with evacuees that we are setting up beds in places we don't normally have beds. And my beeper is ringing constantly. Why people don't understand that chatting with someone about their diabetes is not a reason to hold up sending them home is entirely beyond my realm of comprehension. I didn't even leave for lunch until 1:30. This topping a two week period where I am frequently here until after 5.

Then the real fun began - to spare my kids I will say that if you are lost you are supposed to go back to the last place you saw your family - or come to where your mom works and sit - or go to the football field where you practice. I spent more than 3 hours yesterday driving around, panicking, looking for kids - two kids, two incidents. I came home at 8pm and made a ginormous fuzzy navel with diet orange drink- I needed a drink that badly. Dinner was good - though I am not sure how much of that was the fuzzy navel.

So a couple other things to share:

While watching the North Carolina game, one of my kids was marveling at the blue and black designs in the grass and asked: How do they get the grass to grow that color?

Me: Why didn't they hire you, it seemed like it went well?
J: I don't know why the hell they didn't hire me!
Me: Well, perhaps it was the profanity.
J2: Oh no, it was the racial slurs
J:Yea, I said " Oh no cracker please, I don't need this job, my momma's making me get a job, shooooot"
White suburban kids and their ghetto talk - who knows what they are saying.

When asked about his girlfriend, Jake told me: Well, I think we broke up - I can't tell exactly, but now she doesn't send me notes, so I think that must be the end.

Morning on the Ridge

Just Stuff

Now that I live in the South, it seems that I am doing a lot of my teaching using my hands - and people actually LOOK at them. So I am compelled to keep my nails polished - since I work outside whenever I can and even scrubbing won't hide the stains on my nails.This morning, I polished my nails at my desk and committed the ultimate sin- I didn't put the lid back on tightly - so now my office smells like acetone - or a crack factory - I don't know - and there is a lovely sunset pink stripe down the center of my desk. But I missed coating my white lab jacket - so it could have been much worse. And my nails look much better.

We are going to the county fair tonight - I am so cheating on you Mr Atkins - an Elephant ear is in my future.

Justin found good herbal fly repellent for my baby goats, so I will be able to avoid the fate of the last two days - washing away fly babies from in between the goats toes and off their fur. Pretty much the most disgusting task ever. I won't accost you with the details - though I am sending Summer an e-mail to get some muchneeded help.

I forgot to record the goats this morning (thanks to YoJ for directing me to audiopost)- so I will try to remember it at lunch time

Bear met someone - outside her normal group of friends - only to find he went to high school with her group of friends. We'll see - he is meeting us at the fair.

The boys are doing well this morning - both alarms went off and they made it to school.

And last but not least - Tammy loaned us her husband last night and he worked some magic on our poor old home PC - thanks, man, I know you probably wanted to get home, but you helped us out anyway. Maybe I'll be able to post some pictures in the near future!